Regular City Council Meeting September 20, 2016

0:02:23all right that brings us to item two uh which is council and staff communications no staff we do have staff they're not they're not in the room yet okay uh yes so now would be council oh excellent good evening good evening mr mayor city council i'm paul keith your interim chief of

0:02:50police i just want to report out that last monday night we had a public meeting on the subject of marijuana regulations we had a really great turnout from the community about 75 residents and other community members showed up and they really gave us great feedback

0:03:07and ideas as we look at the topic of marijuana regulation and gave us some really good direction for our work when we present some additional um proposals to you about ways in which air ways in which el cerrito might change uh its laws regarding marijuana regulations so one to report out that we

0:03:27had a really great community meeting last week great thank you thank you and now we'll go to uh council announcements council communications okay miss bridges um i'd like to announce that um on october 1st saturday there'll be the october arts month kickoff celebration this is going to take place

0:03:50at the community center it's from 2 to 5 p.m it's a free event and there'll be multiple examples of art one will be the cast of my fair lady which is currently playing at the contra costa theater we'll be performing some songs from the um production there'll be a chinese classical dance

0:04:15and folk dance from the aulan dance studio there will also be an afro latin pop there'll be poetry readings hands on excuse me hands-on art for all ages and then again that's for saturday october 1st a pre-event two to five at the community center i wanted to give a shout out to the

0:04:39director of fun sorry i have a frog in my throat is he here i met the director of our recreation department i don't see mr jones here however parents press which is a very popular newspaper that parents in the east bay in particular paid a lot of attention to awarded the city of el cerrito 27 awards

0:05:03for many of the camps that we sponsor things like our aquatic and water sports are science summer camp overnight summer camp vacation camp technology summer camp gymnastics circus art i'd like to go to that one gymnastics best counselor training program which is

0:05:25not the first time we've had these awards so thank you to our recreation staff and then lastly i wanted to remind everyone that restaurant week is coming up and that will um be taking place the week of october 6th through 9th 9th which is just coming up i believe we have about 60 restaurants

0:05:44in el cerrito many of them are participating and you can get information about this on our woods website at www.el cerrito l cerrito.org forward slash restaurant week acha thai elevation brewery lilies new orleans and many other restaurants when i looked at the website there's actually

0:06:07a lot of these restaurants are also offering a 10 discount for um meals that day and i believe there'll be prizes awarded for if you go to multiple restaurants so i think they're getting some sort of a stamp pass at each of the places that are participating and they'll be prizes awarded things

0:06:26like um cerritos uh cinema passes movie passes swim passes uh lunch at golden gate fields turf club golf at mira vista and other prizes so again that's for the week of october six through nine announcements okay um i had the pleasure uh on um what's the date september the 13th

0:06:54to participate in the ceremony uh that represented the investiture of uh for of a presidential investiture it was called uh for majda uh not i'm gonna slaughter her name and i apologize and so uh adizada as the um i believe 12th president of contra costa college

0:07:24and having already met her she's an absolutely amazing person who has done a whole variety of jobs at the college and in doing so i think brings in a tremendous amount of experience and uh rep depth everything that you could want in a person who will lead the campus

0:07:55in the future so i think it's it's really a wonderful day for contra costa college i think it's an it represents part of a new beginning another part of that new beginning was the opening of the new buildings on the campus if you go over there you'll be and you've been there before

0:08:19you'll be amazed at the transformation and i think it represents an opportunity for the students of west county when they leave high school to make a choice or maybe it's not just when they leave high school maybe it's when they're wanting to go back to get some additional education to better

0:08:44themselves or maybe it's in a whole variety for a whole variety of reasons and as a member of the contra costa college foundation board i have the opportunity to help judge the scholarship applications and it's it's a very difficult choice because the students who are applying

0:09:07for scholarships are all so worthy and needy of them these are people who are trying to go to school and while they're trying to go to school they're trying to raise a family and that includes maybe children and maybe parents so they're in a very difficult position

0:09:30to be going to school but they're doing it anyway and so i think that um it's very exciting and i do hope that the students of el cerrito will take advantage of this ever increasing opportunity in their own personal educational growth so i also so i can give you this to

0:10:01[Music] copy if you like i also um let's see here and i don't know if you wanted to talk about the [Music] mayor's initiative yes do you want to talk about that or do you want me to under the item eight report out but if you want to talk about it oh okay i uh joined our mayor in going to the

0:10:26mayor's innovation um project project and um the part of it that i attended or one of the parts just really got me excited about what we could actually do here and um having uh spent a number of years in berkeley myself before i came here i know at least i thought i knew pretty well

0:10:51what berkeley looked like then and i saw the entertainment area of berkeley as it is now and it's utterly transformative and the uc theater which i thought i knew what that was like at least because i've gone to movies many times there was no longer a movie theater it had become

0:11:15a live entertainment venue i think it tells us from el cerrito that we too can do things like this you know we too can take an area that is not exactly thriving in any way shape or form and turn it into something really powerful and so i hope that you'll go and look at

0:11:41it and then think of el cerrito and think of all the things we can do here if we set our mind to it so i think it was really a invigorating experience going to see this and i'll leave the rest to you sure okay and i'll just go ahead and give close that one by saying that i attended a

0:12:04half day of the innovative process project and one of the takeaways that i learned was about how much people like to see their city working and there are some there's a project in boston right now to track the work progress that people ask for work to be completed

0:12:24and then they get pictures and photographs of the work uh when it's done and it's a it's a beta form beta testing but it certainly would allow for better interaction between the things that we see on a daily basis and how to get them repaired so it was it was nice to see mayors from

0:12:45all over the the country present and bringing their ideas forward on a multitude of topics including solid waste and recycling which el cerrito and berkeley certainly have some of the best in the nation certainly based on the presentations that i saw um so that that wraps my comments on

0:13:02that i've got a couple others but i'm gonna i know mr friedman you've got one yeah i want to thank all the members of the community who work to support the sem family and their ability to have all-star donuts remain at el cerrito plaza it was such a great outpouring of

0:13:19support for this dedicated family and i want to thank our colleague here rick raden from the east bay times for shedding light on this and getting even helping to get more awareness in the community and is a great victory for a really hard-working family that's a treasure in

0:13:37our community i echo that and i congratulate uh the whole city of el cerrito signed pages and pages of and signed their names on there in support of the all-star doughnuts and their owners and i just want to thank the many people especially mrs briones mrs biones and i

0:14:05were in uh had many phone calls together who kept up and and let us know what was going on so uh elsarito thanks you mrs briones for uh letting us know that a treasure like all-star donuts needed to stay so i thank you for your activism there thank you also i wanted to mention that

0:14:28last friday i attended contra costa college and i was able to speak before a room full of students a government class in the new general education building and janet and i were at that same spot about three years ago at the groundbreaking of that new building it's

0:14:50a beautiful building and i was there with other elected officials here in west county and just to know to see that building a beautiful building and 21st century av equipment there i was very happy to see that and to speak before the most diverse group of young people and not so young people

0:15:16that i was very impressed by that and congratulations to contra costa college for getting it done great and i've got a couple announcements first is on saturday august 20th about a month ago we used one of our community filming events to present fix-it which is a

0:15:37film about universal health care and and it was well attended and well appreciated with the a lively discussion afterward that we had to cut short to vacate the premises i also want to report that on september 8th i represented the city before the bart board and we do have two bart board

0:15:57members here tonight uh zachary malay and rebecca saltzman and i was representing uh on behalf of the action item that i was given at our last meeting to encourage the bart board to enter into an mou with us with to study the possibility of transit oriented development at the plaza bart station

0:16:18that includes a library and i have to say that the bart board was overwhelmingly positive and excited about the opportunity of studying development at the plaza bart station that included a library and then on this last saturday the 17th i want to give a big thank you to

0:16:39the police and fire departments for their work at tri-safety day it was very well received by the public and it was greatly appreciated there were several demonstrations of what our canine officers can do as well as what our rescue facilities are rescue capabilities are

0:17:02as they um extracted both doors from both front doors and the roof of this car in less than 10 minutes um and rescued the fictitious hurt people inside um and i want to thank the crime prevention committee for their uh efforts there on to be there on saturday it was greatly

0:17:20appreciated to reach out to all the members of the public and with that seeing that there's no other communications at this time we'll move on to item three item three is oral communications from the public um all persons with persons wishing to speak should sign up with the clerk uh

0:17:41ahead of time and we um how many speakers do we have at the moment we have 17 17.

0:17:48um we typically allow three minutes but today we're going to reduce it to two minutes uh so that we can hear from everyone and kindly state your name and city of residence for the record comments regarding non-agenda items presentations and consent calendar items will be heard

0:18:05first comments relating to items appearing on the public hearing or policy matter portions are taken up at the time of those uh agenda items so if you've put in for something like item 6a or 6b we will take those comments up at that time we use a light system at the center of

0:18:24the dyes here to indicate what times you have left to speak green will be two minutes yellow will be one minute and at red i will be asking you to please wrap up your comments and with down the laptop because it's kind of locked it's not completely blocking it they moved it to the side it only

0:18:48looks like it um with that what i'd like to do is have the uh have the names uh be read at periodic times for us to uh make sure that we get a good flow of speakers coming to the diocesan or coming to the podium on a good good pace if you could read three names please

0:19:08the first three speakers are melanie proctor followed by cordell hindler and ramon briones good evening mr mayor city council my name is melanie proctor i've been a resident of el cerrito since 2008 i think like most elsa readings i am a big fan of public libraries

0:19:35they were my safe haven from bullies when i was a child growing up in salinas and i would love to see a new library here in el cerrito that's why it pains me that i must vote no on measure b the ordinance calling for the for measure b states that it shall include the acquisition

0:19:56of land for a safe modern el cerrito library and associated public facilities the focus of the measure as placed on the ballot is a safe modern library it's not being made clear to the residents of el cerrito that their taxes on assessed property value would go

0:20:19to acquire land and for this vague term of associated public facilities i don't know what that means except for in march when i attended a city council meeting the pr proposed buildings were small part library large park community centers i am concerned that the city is more

0:20:42focused on a trophy building than an actual library our library is not open very many hours a day it's only available to my family for a few hours a week because of our working hours and our children's schedule because of that so i cannot support a library bond measure in these terms

0:21:06it's now come to light something i was not aware of in march that the city actually has property it could use so i am also questioning the fact that these bon this bond could be used to acquire property when there are in fact as we've just seen a number of properties on which

0:21:24this could be built thank you thank you cordell handler followed by ramon briones and sam chung okay so okay so mayor lyman uh council members i am curtis hendler richmond i recently attended a training on how to get your how to get boards on the on the same page you know and i will send a shell

0:21:48the link to so you all can see uh how how you typically function you know as a as a body so that's one number two is um i had a concern um one last week or so um i was coming toward towards my house and all of a sudden i seen an el cerrito police coming out of south 49th and wall

0:22:07and i'm like i'm not going i'm not going to go through this again so i'm like i'm just i decided i said i'm not gonna let anything distress me so i figured this is the second this is the second running out in the scene el cerrito please come in through other areas and i'm like

0:22:22i'm not having it that's number two then number three is um i will send you the flyers for the from my fair lady um at your next meeting uh which is i forgot to bring them up so it's a good show and it's gonna run through the 9th of october so check it out when you have a

0:22:37chance uh let's see what else um all in all i think everything's coming into play so as the previous speakers were saying uh i do like a library and elsewhere because because people want to like pick up a book on one on a morning that uh that they have to before they catch a train so i said a

0:22:54new library in the bar station that sounds like a winning combination so so hopefully you'll so this item hopefully uh that this the library will be a good help for others so that's it next speaker ramon briones followed by sam chung and carmen sam honorable greg lyman

0:23:25uh honorable mark friedman we do thank you for writing that provocative letter to the landlord and i i was writing a letter but i was too late because everything happened so quick so i'm gonna read to you what you know a couple of paragraphs that i rod the success of the cities noble

0:23:52objective written on its website and i quote the city of el cerrito serves leads supports our diverse community by providing exemplary you know innovative services public places and infrastructure ensuring public safety and creating an economic economically and

0:24:12environmentally sustainable future we are leaving that future now as manifested in the welcoming business that all-star donuts provides and i i and hundreds of others have adopted the owner banara sen and his hard-working family into our daily work unleash your sustenance his

0:24:34remarkable business acumen and camaraderie place him no longer as just a store owner he is a friend a buddy who would saw random acts of kindness grace our church and see big functions community events and private gatherings thanks for listening thank you [Applause]

0:25:08i'm sam chung a resident of the city i also want to take this chance to thank the council and some of its members for the efforts to keep all-star donuts here in the plaza in particular to melanie mintz for meeting with us to mr mark freeman for writing to regency the corporation that owns the

0:25:30plaza and to mayor lyman for taking time to personally investigate the development of situation and also to rick who wrote the story that appeared in several local newspapers my wife and i moved to the city in the 70s and we've been here for almost 40 years we love the city

0:25:51we have witnessed how the city has grown from a small town by the hill to what it is today a city by the bay a city of prosperity and cultural diversity we like the plaza there are two things in particular the farmer's market yes we could go to trader joe's or lucky's to get our groceries

0:26:13but it is different when we come to the market where we feel we are in touch with the community we inter we interact with real people we help to support the local small businesses yes we love all-star donuts again we could go to pete's across the street or starbucks right

0:26:35next door for an even bigger choice of coffees but we come to all-star donuts every morning rain or shine why all-star donuts is like an extended family of our own we come to meet our fellow coffee mates we come to celebrate birthdays to mourn the passings of friends to congratulate

0:26:57newlyweds and to meet newborn babies of the next generation we come to discuss social social issues and we share our happiness and concerns as all store donuts has become what el cerrito has meant to us a spirit of welcoming and community support on the way over to the council i was

0:27:20driving on san pablo i saw a huge banners hanging on lampposts with the words we are locals yes we are locals we are a local city we have our own local character and spirit please wrap up el cerrito has lots of stories to tell and one of the stories is that of the sams the family that runs

0:27:43all-star donuts their success in building a coffee family for the city when we finished when we first heard of the eviction notice more than 3 000 people have signed petitions to plea with the corporation mr chang please wrap up okay yes we are happy to learn that they have backed

0:28:03down from the eviction decision but until the day when the new lease is really signed we don't feel at ease at heart we will keep on watching and waiting in any case we want to thank the city again for defending the good of our community and we're sure the council will continue

0:28:20to help el cerrito to grow big and strong but never for a moment forget this is the city of the local residents we hope the city and we love the city and we are grateful for your dedication and hard work thank you thank you cameron sim followed by al miller and

0:28:46cordell hindler yeah cornell already spoke that might be for a different item hi i'm cameron i'm my dad's here too part of all-star donuts sorry i don't want to repeat everything because i wrote everything down but everybody has said everything i wanted to say so once

0:29:05again thank you i want to thank the city for supporting us and it's not just a place it's not just a small business where we you know are pumping out donors or anything it is a community i grew up there i wiped tables when i was in a child there my kid grows up there and

0:29:21like mrs sam said you know there's funerals birthdays i've been to so many funerals and i've met a lot of people there who are elders who have made me the man who i am today from the filming shop that's why it's been so important to the family to keep it going because

0:29:37if you guys if people actually come into the denman shop i'm not trying to promote my parents business at all but they've done so much for me and i've seen them do so much for the community but it's just training kids who come in just being respectful it's still a simple thing if

0:29:54you come there you'll see it it's family it's and i thank you the city of el crado for supporting that because that's what we're fighting for basically thank you thank you [Applause] good evening mayor lyon lyman council members full disclosure i don't spend much time online i don't

0:30:20participate in facebook or other social media but because of my interest in a new library i have been following not that closely the neighborhood next door neighborhood thread on the library i find it frustrating because from my point of view having sat through

0:30:43most of your meetings when the council discussed the library and attended most of the community meetings leading up to the strategic plan the needs assessment development etc i know that the vast majority of the information they're asking for or they're suggesting or

0:31:05supposing exists they're even talking about a freedom of information act request to get it and it's all available as a matter of public record from these meetings that's on our website and so much time and energy is being spent going around and around on things that

0:31:26they want to know it just seems to me that they could if there is these questions that they don't have the answers to i wish one of them would just maybe get together and spend time and identify these questions and bring them to the city or as the city website says if you

0:31:47don't find what you're looking for here contact karen pinkos the assistant city manager and she'll respond to you maybe not overnight but you know she'll get the information to you then we could take this discussion and focus on the real objections that they might have or

0:32:06their concern about what it's going to cost them or but at least then they'd have an understanding of what library is being discussed and it would be positive thank you thank you [Applause] next speakers um i did have a slip for mr handler but perhaps he already spoke it was

0:32:30consent calendar ron rothbard followed by ben deliman and joy gray good evening mayor lyman council members staff and fellow citizens i'm ron rothbard a member resident of el cerrito and a member of citizens climate lobby as you know in 2013 the city of el cerrito

0:32:57adopted a climate action plan to implement ambitious greenhouse gas emission reduction targets of course climate change requires action on the national level as well i'm speaking in support of item 5d on the tonight's agenda carbon fee resolution wherein the el cerrito city council

0:33:23urges the united states congress to enact a steadily increasing revenue neutral fee on carbon-based fossil fuels at the point where they first enter the economy the goal is to reduce u.s carbon dioxide emissions to 10 percent of 1990 levels by 2050.

0:33:49such a fee would not only make industry pay the true cost of burning fossil fuels but more importantly it would make fossil fuels increasingly more expensive thereby giving clean energy a growing competitive advantage motivating companies and individual consumers

0:34:11to switch to renewables and stimulating further investment in clean energy fee would be virtually free to consumers the revenue from the carbon fee would be distributed equally to all households as a dividend to compensate for higher prices that would result from companies passing

0:34:36on the cost of the fee to consumers studies show that about two-thirds of households the lower-income households would break even or come out ahead please begin to wrap up the other third would experience only slight increases in expenses 23 municipalities across the country

0:34:55including albany berkeley and san francisco please conclude in one state california have passed similar resolutions let's have el cerrito add its voice to the growing number of municipalities and organizations calling for our national carbon fee thank you thank you

0:35:14[Applause] honorable greg lyman and honorable council members my name is ben de lumen and i live two blocks from here i've lived there for 38 years i believe in other parts of the country and other parts of california but i would never live anywhere else except in el cerrito

0:35:38and i'm speaking about the donut shop issue because i think it's a quality of life issue and i would like to commend the city council for supporting us especially thankful to mark friedman for writing a persuasive letter to the landlord agency incorporated and i want to thank you all

0:36:00thank you very much thank you can we get the names of the next three speakers please sure joy gray followed by bill kuhlman paul fideli and forrest macdonald great thank you we have joy gray and my assistant ben gray here tonight um dear city council members we've we're el

0:36:21cerrito residents we've lived here for the last 16 years i was the one that accidentally started off the next door lively discussion about measure b and i'm here tonight just to kind of share our personal feelings about it we're we're a middle class family raising our kid here in the city my

0:36:40husband and i both work to be able to live here and we raise our son here we take our finances very seriously because we we have to and also because it's the right thing to do so these are the three things i'm disappointed with about the library the measure b the first thing is the overall proposed

0:37:00cost of the new library 30 million dollars is a lot for a city this size to spend on a new library as a resident i'd like to know and hear about some of the considered options that might give us a great new facility that we use and would be willing to support without adding a substantial new parcel

0:37:22tax to my family's budget the second thing is the fact that you want a blank check with no plan for this 30 million dollars that's not how my household works and however you want to spin this it doesn't sit well with me and the third and most important thing is that

0:37:43you have purposely or otherwise left the property tax increase off your printed materials that right away tarnishes this project's credibility for us and if you've got nothing to hide then be transparent and upfront and if the residents don't want a substantial

0:37:58property tax increase then maybe that's something that you should hear and know we're very reasonable we'd love a new library and we would love to support it but we can't support this measure b and we do thank you and appreciate your time thank you mr coleman good evening mayor lyman

0:38:21honorable members of the city council my name is bill coleman i live on lagunitas avenue in el cerrito i'm just here tonight to also speak on behalf of elsewhere restaurant week council member bridges did a great job of summarizing the event and publicizing it so i won't

0:38:37take up any more of your valuable time just let me say that this has been a great effort in collaboration between the el cerrito chamber of commerce and your economic development advisory committee the staff of the city so thank you all very much and uh we have flyers

0:38:57in the back for anyone who would like to see the list of 20 restaurants that will be participating and and the flyers are also available in the lobby is that correct can you they're in the the display case to the left of the of the front counter yes excellent thank you

0:39:13[Applause] mr mayor city council members i'm paul fideli i live on harbor drive in el cerrito and i wanted to thank this council because it has set in motion a flexible option for the city to proceed toward plans for a safe and modern library it will be up to the voters to decide

0:39:38whether to take that path on november 8th not nothing it's right that nothing is final or concrete in measure b not the location not the final cost but the goal is clear there will be plenty of scrutiny on any option or proposal that is brought back to this council should

0:39:57measure be succeed if it does succeed it will be another positive step toward filling the full service library void that the city has had for several several years many of you know how hard it is to finance public infrastructure there is never an easy path for adequate

0:40:14funding look at the high-speed rail tonight you'll hear about bart's needs and funding concerns and look at the courage the lack of courage or and lack of vision in our state legislature to come up with long-term funding for our streets roads and public transit it's a difficult

0:40:31thing to do it takes courage to take a stand and move a goal forward i support measure b so our city can leverage its ability to find and finance a new library we should let the voters decide if they agree with this approach and i look forward to working to get

0:40:49this done with a lot of public involvement thank you very much thank you next three names please forrest macdonald gayan kamenian i'm sorry if i mispronounced your name jessica porter followed by georgina edwards thank you my name is kendra zion and i'm honored to be one of the co-leaders for

0:41:13the 2016 relay for life of el cerrito our whole team is coming up to be one presentation all three together rather than 10 individuals for your own time thank you so much city council members and el cerrito community thank you for joining us in the fight against cancer thank you for

0:41:34proclaiming that the weekend in july was relay for life days thank you for lighting city hall purple and making el cerrito a beacon of hope for cancer survivors caregivers and those who have lost loved ones to cancer thank you for sponsoring the 2016 relay for life of el cerrito with your

0:41:54sponsorship the el cerrito relay provided more than the i'm sorry el cerrito provided more than five thousand dollars of in-kind resources including park rentals meeting spaces trash recycling use of the police trailer and much more with your sponsorship and generosity we wouldn't have been able to

0:42:14have this amazing event thank you the el cerrito relay had 15 leadership committee members 11 teams 32 cancer survivors 239 registered participants and raised over 25 thousand dollars thank you in helping raise this money to help fight cancer provide provide programs for cancer survivors

0:42:36but the relay was so much more thanks to you we had the most participants in el cerrito relay's history thanks to you council member joya joined us for the event and walked the track for over an hour thanks to you the police department had the largest number of participants on

0:42:54their team ever and raised over two thousand dollars thanks to you we saw cancer survivors thank their caregivers for their support and strength my name is guyane and i'm a relay for life volunteer um thanks to you in the height of the black lives matter movement we saw a group of predominantly

0:43:13african american oakland residents choose to relay in el cerrito and walk the track with our el cerrito police officers my name is steve and i'm a relay for life volunteer uh thanks in each to each and every one of you when i was able to see a young girl bring a piece of hope back to her mother

0:43:40who is currently undergoing treatment for cancer right now my name is frank i'm a real life for life volunteer 23 year cancer survivor and caregiver thanks to you a newly diagnosed cancer survivor made her first friend who is also a cancer survivor also thanks to you a caregiver found a

0:44:04network of support my name is jessica and i am a relay for life staff member thanks to you el cerrito is fighting cancer and providing hope to our community my name is forrest and i had the honor of being your event lead for the 2016 relay for life of el cerrito you've

0:44:25heard about our successes of 2016 and we sincerely cannot thank you enough for your generosity and support but cancer doesn't rest and neither can we planning for the 2017 event is already underway and this season does hold some big changes for us our event is merging with the albany

0:44:42relay of for life forming a larger community event supporting the area of berkeley albany kensington el cerrito in richmond the specifics of the event have yet to be determined however we have a challenge for you the el cerrito city council we challenge you to keep your

0:44:58support as strong in 2017 as it was in 2016.

0:45:01please continue this partnership to serve our local communities fight against cancer as a co-sponsor of the 2017 event and lastly we're pleased to present you with this award to commemorate your generosity and celebrate your commitment in fighting cancer with the relay for

0:45:15life on behalf of everyone who's relayed for life thank you so much thank you [Applause] all right [Applause] georgina edwards followed by rochelle pardue okimoto and nicholas arzio good evening council and fellow residents my name is georgina edwards i have been

0:46:15a resident in el cerrito since 2005.

0:46:18both were also working family and what i love most about living here is our sense of community our civic and nature engagement and everyone's willingness to continually better our town including the resources available to to ourselves which i enjoy my family enjoys

0:46:36and friends do very much community center swim center our award-winning recycling center i want to express my support of the vision more than a decade in the making of of citizens first of all brought to council by citizens of council's support of the research that has been done over these many years

0:46:58by city management and staff to bring a safe and modern library to cerrito having volunteered with many of you in different projects i know that the project will be well managed with a view on value just as in the recycling center where many prefab buildings were made

0:47:16as well as fiscal responsibility our family looks forward to budgeting 13 a month tops for the years to come should this measure pass and i hope neighbors consider it fully thank you great thank you good evening everyone my name is rochelle pardue okimoto i live at [address removed] here in el

0:47:43cerrito safety is the number one priority for the city i look to you as council members and a city management to keep me and my family safe on various levels the fact that the city library currently does not meet seismic standards is disturbing there are many children that

0:48:12are there on a daily basis and we need to hurry up the process of rebuilding this building and making sure that our kids are safe furthermore a library really in my mind does not have a cost because how can you put a cost on literacy and how can you put a cost on

0:48:39computer literacy in the 21st century many of these kids that use the library use it because they don't have access to computers at their homes and there are other folks in the city that don't have access to computers and if you do not have access to a computer

0:48:58you are not plugged into modern day society i look forward to building a space a community space for our senior citizens and for our children to use in the future this will be a focal point of the community it is something that we need to continue to form the identity of el cerrito

0:49:22we need to pull together to make this happen we need to set aside our differences and work together and figure out a place to do it so that we can have a safe place for our children to learn it will enlighten generations to come please thank you final speaker nick arzio

0:49:51good evening i'm nick nicolas arzio and i'd like to speak about measure b the library bond i have three concerns but the biggest is probably to do with yes on b's ballot rebuttal now the ballot question also has arguments in favor and against uh the measure and then they each have

0:50:09rebuttals now no on b's final argument of their rebuttal had to do with the cost and the fact that there weren't any plans there was no location and we don't have enough money to write a blank check the rebuttal to that from yes on b actually didn't even address uh the opponent's

0:50:27arguments but rather starts out with some good old name calling and i don't appreciate that i don't appreciate that our vice mayor signed that it begins like this don't let the same old special interest rhetoric get in the way of a safe modern library what special interest

0:50:46what rhetoric these are real concerns and in the ballot argument just like the emails that residents send to the city manager just like every time we try to reach out and have dialogue we're just not getting any answers that's why people are voting no on this measure

0:51:02the second problem or the second concern that i have has to do with yes on b's rebuttal again they say that all of the money will go to fund a library it says that right in the ballot argument and yet if you look at the ordinance that accompanies this ballot measure it

0:51:22says that money will be spent on associated public facilities and if you look at council's recommendation to staff in march 1st 2016 you looked at option 1b which included incorporating a community center there's nothing wrong with us funding a community center and a library but just

0:51:37tell us that's what you're doing don't send misleading ballot arguments that say that this every dime will be spent on a library when that's just not the case finally the fact that the city the frequently asked questions document that the city mailed to the city residents

0:51:53again doesn't include the fact that measure b is a tax the financial advisory board already warned the city council that that information should have been included in the ballot language they didn't do that and now they've spent even more money sending out a frequently asked question

0:52:06to the city residents that still doesn't state that this is a tax and that information is important thank you other speakers no okay um i want to thank you all for coming out tonight and expressing your opinions they were uh received certainly all-star donut uh thank you

0:52:28for all of your work in the community uh the brown act does prevent us from discussing non-agendized items and so i just would like to summarize what i heard about the library and provide a source for additional information because that certainly sounded like the call

0:52:43what i heard the general themes are el cerrito needs a safe modern library you will all support a safe modern library and the city should spend as little as possible on the safe modern library that was the intent of this council when we put the ballot measure measure b on

0:53:02the november election and it remains our intent the sooner the library is built the least it will cost and the sooner we will have a safe modern library more information is available on cost information on the city website as mr miller said i urge you all to review the march 1 2016

0:53:22agenda and presentation and the july 19th agenda and tax rate statement that talks about the tax rate and that will be in the ballot the voter guide this matter a safe modern library has been before the city council many times over the last ten years it's not a new

0:53:43issue now is the time to move it forward if you think el cerrito deserves a safe modern library if you support a safe modern library then you should be voting yes on measure b with that i'd like to move on to the next item which is presentations item four we'll have two presentations this

0:54:04evening uh the el cerrito stars program and from bart we'll start with met item 4a good evening mayor and council members my name is suzanne ehrler and i'm the assistant to the city manager and you're going to hear a presentation tonight about the ec stars program illustrator

0:54:42students training and ready for success um with me is mr corey mason who's a teacher at el strudel high school and tonight you are going to hear from the five interns who worked at the city offices this summer as part of the ec stars program which is a collaboration between

0:55:04the school district and the city and the city provides internships for students who are in the summer between their junior and senior year that are in the it and media arts academies and the program is structured to provide both on-the-job training as well as an academic class

0:55:23portion where there's homework assignments and and discussion points so before i turn the microphone over to mr mason i did want to thank everyone who's participated in the program my colleagues in different departments that served as mentors guest speakers cert trainers mr mason and the other

0:55:41staff from the district and of course our fabulous stars who you're going to hear from in a moment good evening everybody mayor council members citizens and all the ships at sea all the ships at sea come on put up no all right i'll continue this summer we had five stars

0:56:07uh in academy students i.t and media working in various city departments the city and the academies are versed in the content of the internship program while a brief summary i promise it'll be brief is likely helpful for our assembled public weekly academic assignments have students observing

0:56:24workplace protocols and professional expectations you can imagine if you have a teenager at home this is a this is a tall order we ask much of them they decipher jargon they actively interview their co-workers they develop resumes market resources and interview readiness which will carry

0:56:43them forward vis-a-vis the cal sage scholars get the job you love text ec stars have an opportunity to directly engage with professionals on and off campus developing task skills communication skills gathering a rigorous academic portfolio of evidence of their workplace

0:57:02experience which earns five hours of elective credit our stars even underwent emergency preparedness training with the city ec star students steadily acquire the attributes of our west contra costa unified school district profile for career and college ready graduates

0:57:19linking classroom project-based learning to real-world workplace requirements as self-directed learners effective communicators and collaborators innovative thinkers and problem solvers thus high quality producers and engaged ethical worlds citizens we want to thank suzanne for

0:57:39outstanding work on point as our primary liaison for the city internship program i personally like to thank my echs it academy team melody shaw chris merida and jim lindsey in the audience tonight we have district career and college readiness lead mary cadre and of course

0:57:59we applaud and extend the work of ec stars program founders janet abelson and macaroni and also in the house go easy stars go gauchos and here they are may i only because i came in first madeleine cronenberg is here madeleine we love you thank you hi good evening everyone my name is daniel

0:58:31fang and i'm one of the ec star this year i interned at the public works engineering division over the summer it was amazing my mentor was melissa and i also worked with priscilla and saeed the answer any question i had for them assisted with when i needed help and taught me

0:58:50lots about office environment and engineering in all the tasks i assisted with i saw how important safety was for example the highway safety improvement federal grant work grand project i helped drafted focus on safety of both motorized and non-motorized users by upgrading stop

0:59:11signs at intersections i bring 21st century's skills such as creative and critical thinking to the workplace i was able to apply those skills in my daily tasks for example many times when my mentor hands me a project she expects me to think creatively and crit and solve the

0:59:29problems my learning came not only from the office but when i was out in the field with my mentors doing inspections three key points of three highlights of my work experience was doing field measurements engineering evaluation and drafting the highway safety improvement

0:59:46project federal grant for this program i was able to learn the importance of responsibility individual and teamwork skills and city values moving forward this experience will help me greatly and prepare me for the future i would like to thank the city melissa and my department the west contra costa

1:00:06unified school district and the teacher team for providing such a fantastic program it was a pleasure working with my team and many others in the city [Applause] good evening everyone my name is minhal motiwala in the summer i interned at the elsewhere recycling

1:00:32department as an easy start intern i worked with maria sanders and she's really cool but the elsewhere recycling center strives to create a better environment for the residents of west county this summer i learned many things like i got to work with my customer skills

1:00:52customer service skills and i learned a lot about new um computer programs like outlook and excel and um i met i also some of the highlights of my experience where i'm meeting a lot of new people a lot of very nice residents of el cerrito and um it's been it was an amazing experience

1:01:16overall um gained a lot of um professional okay i'm gonna skip that i'd like to thank um basically everyone who was um involved in making this an opportunity and since i haven't mentioned it up there i would also like to thank the ec stars like the rest of the stars

1:01:36because they've been really cool to be with the summer and really nice friends i've made thank you [Applause] good evening everyone my name is mohammed ursuline and i interned at the el saleto police department with detective corporal brian elder the mission of our department is to be

1:02:03committed to service safety and enhancing the public trust through professionalism and leadership the task i was given was national night out in which i had to organize the number of parties and some of the tasks i have done was to transport supplies to those that

1:02:18requested some such as banners and tote bags a skill that brought in with me was organization i love to be organized and because of that i organized a list of the past national night out participants so that we can see who has been participating annually another skill i brought in with me was

1:02:38hard work whenever i was given a task i made sure that it was done so that we can stay on task to make national knot out the best as possible i was able to apply some of my academic skills for instance i was able to calculate the given amount of items needed to go into each bag

1:02:55for each block party within seconds what i learned i learned how to use microsoft excel since i've never used it before it was fun experimenting with it to figure out what i wanted to change also i learned about the cadet work when i was done with my tasks for the day

1:03:13associated with the cadets and learn some of the attacks they do such as taking the patrol car on a car wash or getting mail from richmond it's beneficial for me as that is something i look forward to doing in the future lastly i learned almost everyone's name in the

1:03:29police department which i feel is pretty cool [Laughter] i would like to thank my mentor our supervisors the city staff and our school staff as well and anyone that i've missed for making this internship the best as possible thank you thank you [Applause] good evening everyone my name is john

1:04:05lee and i was an ec stars intern for both the finance and city management department and my supervisors were suzanne ayla and shannon collins and i thoroughly enjoyed working in both departments and meeting so many people i learned so much over the summer um the mission of the city management

1:04:25department was to provide good service to the residents of el cerrito and having a public city and the and having this public trust city hall to keep records and leave legislative process the duties i had in city management usually consisted of me learning how to

1:04:42use civic plus a web client that is used i also did some research on other city websites in order to make suggestions to suzanne and this helped with providing good cuss and this helped with providing good customer service because i could give suggestions that would be able to help

1:05:01the the navigation of the website in order to make information more accessible to the public the mission the finance department is to provide good customer service in finance such as budgeting financial reporting and enhancing the delivery of financial information and other organizations

1:05:17of and to the community and the duties in the finance that usually consisted of me inputting business licenses of the city and filing them into the cabinet i did get to work briefly with the payroll process my biggest project in the finance department was making a

1:05:32spreadsheet that consisted of the information of the boxes and the retention policy which help organize financial information and [Music] the skills i brought to this were organization adaptability and basic knowledge in some office programs what i learned was the other

1:05:57office programs that i didn't really have a handle with like excel and outlook i also learned new programs that help city the city with civic plus and track it overall i learned how to be a professional in the workplace and i learned how to communicate with my co-workers and teammates really

1:06:15effectively i want to thank my mentor shannon collins and suzanne erla my co-workers nina yoko andrea and cheryl mosby um the staff for wcc usd mr mason chris merida and mr aronian mr lindsay um and i want to thank wcc usd in general and the city of el cerrito for

1:06:39giving me such a great opportunity to learn from real-world experience great thank you [Applause] hello my name is abia sayeth and this summer i had an internship with the city of el cerrito in the recreation department my mentor was vivian brant who helped me with my work and assignments and also

1:07:06with making me feel welcome to the office and its environment when i first began my internship some of the first things i did was sending out weekly surveys and association with the camps pulling out information rosters updating the wreck newsletters and inventory for

1:07:21the fourth of july carnival along with working during the carnival during my time i learned how to use microsoft publisher to create and design flyers and to use microsoft outlook for any daily emails i would get or important foundational classes we would have to send out surveys i learned how to use

1:07:40surveymonkey to create the surveys rack track to pull the information rosters and eye contact to update and add new things to the recreation newsletter such as the parents press awards for the city during my internship many of the same things i did at school apply to work

1:07:54such as doing your work and finishing it on time keeping a positive attitude reaching your goal learning new programs and lessons that we learn at school and incorporating it at work and showing that you can do the work efficiently plus getting paid getting paid made it

1:08:08even better three highlights of having this internship is having the experience future references and having a better idea of things that are expected at work some skills i took away is being able to work in an environment where everyone is focused on their job and work how to act

1:08:25with others how to build my communication skills how to brainstorm and be organized and getting work and projects done on time i would like to thank my mentors vivian brandt for being an amazing mentor and teaching me new skills i can use later on susan ayrella and cheryl mosby my

1:08:42teachers corey mason corey mason michael aronian chris merida melody shaw and james lindsey and lastly the information technology academy and the city of el cerrito for overseeing this project and making this internship possible thank you [Applause] so that concludes the presentation by

1:09:04the ec stars this year did the council have any questions or comments i just want to acknowledge that this is our fourth year of doing this and and it's every year it's wonderful to get the presentations from the students that have really benefited from the program so

1:09:23thank you very much for coming out tonight and giving us your presentations so thank you thank you all right cordell did you want to speak on that adam okay we we have one uh commenter on this item go ahead so uh mayor lyman uh council members i am cordell handler richmond i i was just so

1:09:58impressed by that presentation i was like wow these i'm saying this is a wonderful program that this that the that the council has done on and uh and i would like to and i would take some of this example you know like so so mayor uh so the mayor tom bus office can like you

1:10:15know have some input on this so hopefully he doesn't hear me saying that so i think this is a wonderful opportunity and i think that this that this year this the ec stars have really outdone themselves so i think this is a wonderful opportunity and what else and if i remember what i said last month

1:10:33uh that uh that some that you the youth should be working in city offices because it'll like give themselves so much more of a responsibility when they go out into the real world whether it's either in the police or finance or anything like that they have the skills

1:10:48that they learned from this past summer's uh uh program so when they go out into the real world and someone like um can work like in the city clerk's office would you mention i didn't mean to say that so it was a joke so hopefully uh that the students will take some of these uh

1:11:04assistant um um positions that they learn they can and they can work here for the city so oh i think i have about a minute left so that's pretty much it so hopefully the the this internship program is a wonderful opportunity so thank you so much thank you um with that we will move on to item uh

1:11:28five four b uh better bay area rapid transit time to rebuild board members welcome i guess you guys are directors sorry directors welcome thanks for having us here uh rebecca saltzman and i your two el cerrito uh representatives on the bart board and we'll briefly mention who we are and

1:11:57where we represent uh nina i'm rebecca saltzman from bart district three and in el cerrito that includes everything that's east of the bart tracks and happy to be here tonight thanks and i'm zachary malay district seven in the yellow here in el cerrito of course the bay side of the spark

1:12:16tracks so um you know this presentation's divided up i'll start and discuss the history of bar heretofore and the critical needs we face and then i'll hand it over to rebecca who will discuss the bond itself so bart has been around for over 40 years before bart

1:12:37there was once upon a time the key system that connected the east bay to the san francisco that was demolished there was this thing called traffic that buses couldn't get around and that's kind of what sparked bart was bringing that connection back and this is what the original bart system

1:12:55was when it first opened in 74 after the transbay connection was provided and what i've been told i wasn't around them but this green line between fremont and daly city was actually a part-time service and this direct service between richmond and san francisco did not

1:13:13originally exist so there was a heavy concentration of transfers in downtown oakland to get between the east bay and san francisco since then we've expanded greatly there was extensive our system expansion program in the mid 90s by 2003 we got out to sfo in millbrae in late 2014 the oakland

1:13:35airport connector opened and there's still more to come next year both the e-bart extension to antioch is due to open as well as the first phase of bart to san jose later this year we may have the extension to south fremont opening as well so in parallel with all of these

1:13:56system expansions is system ridership growth we begin operating at about 40 000 trips per weekday when we first open today during the busiest months of the year we end up with about 450 000 riders per weekday some general characteristics about bard and its critical nature to contra costa

1:14:19county is highlighted here about a quarter of all trips begin or end in contra costa county uh 32 of the trip miles are taken by contra costa county riders uh and dropping down a bit this richmond leg of service that serves here el cerrito it's it has the highest

1:14:38ridership density the greatest volume of passengers per mile and per station compared to other legs of service in the east bay uh bart carries about time and a half on almost double the volume of uh people under the bay that the brave bridge carries over the bay during the commute

1:14:58periods another slide that's not available here but um that we have in other presentations also is the traffic impacts of bart i-80 corridor is already the worst quarter of the region but when bart goes away the time wasted in traffic as much as triples in many of the

1:15:17corridors that bart serves a lot of housing and development has paralleled bart expansion and the system as well as you can see here so again in parallel with that ridership growth what comes with it is a lot of development oriented around transit and bart so that's bart thus far i'm now going to

1:15:42hand it over to rebecca director saltzman who will discuss the uh bart bond itself that is on the ballot this year so as i'm sure you all know we have a bond measure on the ballot this november and i'm going to talk a little bit about what the bond measure would do so it's a

1:16:023.5 billion bond dollar bond and it really focuses on safety and reliability crowding and traffic relief and station access so we have to go out with this bond because we have big capital needs something i think a lot of people don't know is most of our operating costs at

1:16:26bart are paid by bart riders so the fair revenue and then some of the other fees like parking fees this really cost this really covers most of our operational costs but what's not covered is the large capital costs that are needed to reinvest in this aging system

1:16:46so the the bond plan it's really almost all for just reinvesting in this infrastructure 90 of it is for things like the tracks um and the train control system really all the basics that we need to reinvest in and a small portion a little bit less than 10 percent

1:17:05is looking towards the future things that we can do to deal with the capacity constraints over the long term so there are two major categories as i just mentioned and this just tells a little bit more about them and so here are some examples about what we intend to do if the bond passes

1:17:28so this shows water intrusion and underground tunnels this is a really big problem because it degrades things it can degrade the track we can have problems where we have to stop service so we really need to replace all of this i'm not going to go through each and

1:17:48every one of these but these are just some more examples of what we're going to fund like i mentioned the track most of our track in our system is the original trackway when i went out to see some of the track work that was happening the track was stamped 1968 so that's the

1:18:04type of thing we need to replace similar situation with our power infrastructure and with the mechanical infrastructure and the train control system is a really big item because not only will it help us to prevent the delays that we have in our system now it will greatly expand

1:18:22capacity in the transbay tube right now we're running as many trains through the tube as we can the train control system will allow us to increase that capacity so station access we really want to focus on getting more people to our stations and since our parking lots are full we want to do

1:18:43things like add excuse me add bike parking add better pedestrian access do a lot to improve the elevators and escalators in our station separate from this bond measure we're doing a big project that's coming to el cerrito del norte station we're very excited about that and that

1:19:02will increase the access there and we want to be able to do that at all of our stations and this is just a little bit more about uh the the access options for the bond and then something people have really been talking about is the need far into the future for a second transbay tube

1:19:22obviously this bond doesn't cover that but it starts to study the second transbay tube so we could seek additional funding in the future so beyond the oversight that the bart board will have over this measure if it passes there will be a citizen committee similar to the committee that was set up

1:19:43for the earthquake safety bond that bart passed in 2004 these will really be experts who can look at these expenses and make sure that bart is doing the right thing with its funds so the bond measure it's going to cost taxpayers different amounts depending on the assessed value of their home so it's

1:20:06a progressive tax those who have homes that are having a higher assessed value will pay more those who have homes that are of the lower assessed value will pay less but we think it's really a small amount compared to the huge benefit that we'll have from improving bart

1:20:25so separate from the bond measure because bond measures can only be used to fund fixed assets and even though we've had bart cars for over 40 years they're not considered fixed assets so bart has a plan to get new bart cars we've already ordered 775 cars the first ones are already in and

1:20:46will be in service next year but we're also looking to the rest of the region to help us fund additional rail cars because 775 is not going to address the capacity needs we'll have in the future so we've been working with the mtc as well as the three counties in the region

1:21:05to fund that and the measure on the ballot in contra costa measure x has funding for new bart cars um so this just shows a little bit about what we could do with the improvements between the bond with the new train control system and the additional bark cars we could really increase the capacity

1:21:25and the frequency on the richmond line and of course on all the other lines so there'll be of course a lot of benefits to the region if we pass the bond bart is so critical as director malay talked about we carry more people than the bay bridge more and more people are

1:21:46depending on bart to get particularly from the east bay to san francisco and as more job growth happens there bart will become more important so we will have if we pass the bond 30 percent more trains 40 percent less delays and 8 500 fewer cars so that will be a

1:22:07big reduction in greenhouse gas emissions as well and of course if we do nothing if we don't pass the bond and if bart doesn't continue to reinvest in its system we're going to have more and more traffic the bay bridge is actually already at capacity so i think that

1:22:22would just mean rush hour would expand to maybe 4am and go later in the morning too there's really no more space there so that's our presentation and we'd be happy to answer any questions you have any questions questions thank you thank you thank you uh you can come speak at the mic but

1:22:48this is a presentation not a debate i'm pamela wagner president of el cerrito my question on the 2004 bond that you just mentioned in your presentation when does that expire or is it is or does it not have an expiration date i'm just curious and the same thing with this bond

1:23:16measure is it reoccurring or is there no suns head on it so thank you for those questions i'm sure that they can answer your question in the lobby so that would be the best for us so we can keep moving on with that thank you thank you very much we'd like to go on to item five uh we

1:23:37have up to five l on our um consent calendar is the representative for the fall item here she is still here i see her so i'd like to pull five b so that we can have uh the representative of the fall prevention proclamation give us a couple a couple of minutes on that so

1:23:59we'll we'll get the consent calendar first and then we'll get to you i move consent calendar items 5a and 5c through 5 l a second right before i call the matter i want to make sure that everybody knows that 5e is a very confusingly worded ballot measure about single bag use

1:24:20and you really need to vote yes on that to to maintain the single use plastic bag ban that we currently have so just wanted to point that out so i have a motion on 5a 5c through 5l made by friedman and seconded by bridges all those in favor please say i i opposed

1:24:42abstentions let the record show it passes unanimously 5b we have a speaker on this matter so if you would like to speak at this time that'd be great i thank you very much for having me my name is elaine balk and i am the fall prevention program manager at meals on

1:25:00wheels and senior outreach services we're in walnut creek but we serve the whole county and so we're here asking for a proclamation recognizing fall prevention week in september falls among senior citizens are very serious matter thousands of our residents go to the hospital every year

1:25:19for falls and we know that quite often that it means the end of independence for a lot of our people and so what we do is we provide a home evaluation by occupational therapist and then we provide home safety modifications for low-income seniors and we're able to do this in

1:25:37about 150 homes every year and we also know that exercise is very important to preventing falls and so we have several exercise programs for seniors including we do a tai chi class at the san pablo senior center and so we also do some exercise programs in the home

1:25:56so uh just wanted to come in and thank you very much for recognizing fall prevention awareness week and i'm just asking people to be aware of that and if anyone ever wants any information about how to be safer in their home they can contact meals on wheels and senior outreach services

1:26:13great thank you i'll entertain a motion on five five b fall prevention proclamation i would move a proclamation of 5b the fall prevention's proclamation i'll second uh moved by abelson second by quinto all those in favor please say aye aye opposed abstentions let the record show

1:26:35it passes unanimously all right that brings us to item six which is our uh public hearing item we have two public hearings this evening they will be organized slightly differently so i will make sure that we understand the structure of each of them as we get to

1:26:58them at this time i'd like to move on to item 6a i will announce the public hearing we will have a staff uh presentation from mr from officer renshaw questions from the council we'll open the public hearing we'll have public testimony we'll need a motion to close

1:27:14the public hearing we'll take additional questions and deliberation and then i'll call for a motion officer rancho good evening good evening honorable mayor council members i'm captain chris wrenshaw your fire prevention officer and tonight i'm here to introduce a

1:27:32resolution confirming the cost of forced abatements on two properties previously recognized as public nuisance by the city council and allowing for the lien of the associated costs against the properties so this year initially we had 369 properties were found to be in violation

1:27:48and at the july board meeting 24 properties were declared a public nuisance and after lots of work we got that down to two properties that were abated so the total cost the contractor work was 1250 dollars and total admin fees was 2026 and 50 cents for a total cost of 3 200

1:28:133200 oops i wrote that wrong [Applause] two hundred and seventy five dollars and fifty cents uh available to answer any questions if you have any no no um yeah i have a quick question for you um how many do we normally have in a year i mean this strikes me as being very

1:28:45successful and my recollection is that we typically have between two and five in a year and last year was a large number i think we had five last year but uh of which one so initially last year we had 173 properties were in violation 22 were declared to public nuisance and

1:29:01eight were actually abated eight were abandoned so this year's much better uh much larger initial but much lower abatement great good work thank you i do have a question um what i'm wondering about is occasionally i'm out and about and i see a property that looks like it

1:29:22should be on the list but wasn't um is there a process for such things yep so people can either call me and leave a message they can notify me by email there's lots of ways in come to my office and advise me of that property and you know it all depends too on when i

1:29:42drove and initially did the violations if it wasn't in violation at the time and then for some reason you know with the extra rain we got this year it could be afterwards but unless i'm notified of it i wouldn't know so what what's sort of the major criteria to be in violation

1:30:03so we follow the city's vegetation management standards which follows the defensible space which they're a certain category from zero to 30 feet and then there's uh 60 to 100 feet i'm sorry 30 to 100 feet so that means that the the distance from the property i mean from the structure

1:30:21structure yes in our our biggest violation with you know this being residential structures it's mostly weeds grass and weeds or trees that aren't limbed up that's the majority of the stuff that we see in the city thanks great at this time we'll open the public hearing

1:30:38is there anyone here just wants to speak on this matter can i have a motion to close also move second motion by bridges second by abelson all those in favor to close the public hearing please say aye aye abstentions uh oppositional abstentions let's let the record show passed unanimously to close

1:30:56the public hearing uh any additional questions or council deliberation no yeah officer renshaw thank you very much for your services this evening i will entertain a motion at this time and there is text in your purple uh script for you to read miss bridges i moved let me put my

1:31:17glasses on i moved to adopt a resolution confirming the report of the cost of abatement of public nuisance conditions resulting from the presence of weeds rubbish litter and other flammable material on the private property designated in the resolution under the authority contained

1:31:32in the east el cerrito municipal cohort 16.26 i have a motion by bridges seconded by freeman all those in favor please say aye aye opposed extensions let the record show it pass unanimously thank you thank you very much and a job well done all right we will now move on to item 6b

1:31:576b is a public hearing with regards to [Music] pl14-0171 el dorado town homes tentative subdivision map i will be i have just announced the item um we will then have a staff presentation uh i see mr moss moving to the podium questions from council we'll open the

1:32:21public hearing we'll have the applicant present modified proposal questions from council public testimony an opportunity for the applicant to respond clarify any comments in the testimony if if necessary a motion to close the public hearing council deliberations and

1:32:39actions slash motion uh to vote on a resolution so that is the sequence of events this evening um with that i'll move on to staff presentation mr moss good evening thank you mary lyon lyman council members so the council uh has seen this project before um at your uh july 19th meeting

1:33:01although i think it was uh july 20th perhaps before we actually got to the item um the there was a lot of information that was included in the agenda bill for that um meeting for the purposes of tonight's presentation i'm going to try to keep the presentation short and focus on the

1:33:22the changes to the project since the last time you've seen it but i am happy to go into any information in more detail um if uh if you would like for example in the initial agenda bill there was information regarding the resident impact report for the project the various technical

1:33:40studies the zoning compliance of the project so if you have any questions about that i'm happy to go into that in more detail um so at the july 19th meeting the council did voice some concerns regarding this project el dorado townhomes the item was continued to this meeting

1:34:05september 20th to give the applicant an opportunity to address those concerns the council's concerns at that time included the accessibility of the units although the units although the units in the previous uh proposal did meet uh the requirements of uh federal statute as

1:34:23implemented by the building code um there was desire on the council to see increased accessibility and adaptability of the units the council was also concerned about the elimination of some existing living options on the site which do which should have lower rents

1:34:44and the discussion focused mainly on the inclusion of smaller units as a way to provide units that would sell or rent at a lower price point due to these concerns uh the applicant has made a number of revisions to the project um which i will highlight um the applicant has has worked with staff in

1:35:07in good faith to address the council's concerns um the applicant did come to staff with an additional an initial series of revisions and staff recommended some some further revisions so we have had a little bit of back and forth in between these two meetings so to go into the revisions um

1:35:30that is the vicinity map that's the location of the the project uh adjacent you'll see adjacent to central park between el dorado and avila this is the previous site plan um so i'm probably going to do a little bit of back and forth between the the previous site plan and the proposed news

1:35:49site plan um so the first revision is the addition of two accessible one-bedroom uh what they're calling floor plan c units so if you see here in the revised site plan those two c units are right here in this location fronting avila street or avila street however you like to

1:36:14pronounce it um and then the um the second uh notable revision is the addition of three accessible accessory living units as part of each b floor plan so if you remember from the previous site plan there were three b units on the ends of the buildings all the remaining floor plans in this

1:36:41configuration were a units the b units have remained in those three locations at the ends of the building but they now each of these units features an accessible studio accessory living unit as part of the unit so that is an accessory unit that is will be under

1:37:03the same ownership as the overall b unit but which could be rented separately if you know as as individual owners choose to do so i did want to clarify one thing on the plan set that is included in your packet there was some notation in error that that i think noted those accessory

1:37:25living units as optional that that is incorrect they are standard and they will be included with with each of those of those units so they they are guaranteed to be produced as part of the project and then thirdly the applicant has denoted a delineated pedestrian pathway

1:37:50through the project site continuing here from this point to avila street and lastly the i don't have the floor plans in my presentation i believe the applicant intends to to go through the floor plans with you but each of the each of the units has been redesigned so

1:38:11that any unit can have a chair lift added to the the staircase of it so that would also be up uh offered as an option for individual purchasers um to add that on uh if they wish to do so at the time of purchase also alternatively uh anyone who wished to do so to add a chairlift uh on to in the

1:38:34future would be able to do that um one other thing i did want to clarify is that in the staff report i believe there were some square footages that were in error that were taken from a previous version of the plans so i did want to clarify that the accessory living units that are part of

1:38:57those b units are 262 square feet and the c floor plan the one bedroom units are 435 square feet the project uh previously complied fully with the zoning ordinance um some changes have been made to the project which do affect the parking ratio of the site um it's worth noting

1:39:23that uh when the planning commission considered the project and discussed it there were some members of the planning commission who did feel that the there was too much parking on the site so the um the applicant as i mentioned has created the two c units fronting avila street

1:39:45in order to do that they reduced the parking of the former these were formerly a units here they reduced some of that parking and created a new floor plan which is the d unit which is similar to the a unit but it has a one car garage rather than a two car tandem garage

1:40:05so what that does um is these d units um since they're two but since they have uh three bedrooms um would normally be required to have two covered parking spaces they they each now have one these sea units um would not have off-street parking since they're one-bedroom units they

1:40:28normally would be required to have one and then the accessory living units in the b plans would normally require one parking space which can be uncovered and in in this situation they would not have that either so the total parking deficit is is nine spaces it's one one each for

1:40:52the d units so that's four one each for the c units um so that makes a total of six and then one each so that's six covered spaces and then one uh each covered or uncovered space for the uh the accessory living units in the b unit so that's a total of nine spaces um

1:41:13so the applicant will be required to seek a waiver of that parking from the planning commission um but as i stated due to the commission's uh initial feelings uh regarding the project uh staff is is not um terribly concerned with that um that application as just a few more things i want to

1:41:42touch on the um there's nothing about the project that affects the um sequa uh exemption that the project is applicable for i did go into that um in more in more depth at the last council meeting um basically the the project is exempt from sequa under the infill uh exemption

1:42:04um the agenda bill did uh i believe this agenda bill or at least the last one um did go through the um the qualifications for that exemption and none of those have have changed in this version of the project also as the staff report highlighted the project will increase the overall

1:42:24diversity of units in el cerrito with regard to unit size and unit type there was a chart in the staff report that looked at pipeline projects that are currently planned that we currently have applications for or or are very close to having applications for um the um

1:42:46the chart in as the chart in the staff report detailed um over 85 percent of the units in those pipeline projects were two bedroom and smaller and generally when the housing market favors rental the development of rental housing we do see that three and four bedroom

1:43:06units are are less feasible to build so staff feels strongly that three and four bedroom units that are suitable for families should be encouraged when there is market feasibility to develop them for that reason and because the the project is fully compliant with um

1:43:25all of the zoning standards except for the parking which i mentioned and because the applicant has made several changes um which to address the council's concerns and the project does implement the the vision in the zoning ordinance for the uh multi-family residential zoning district

1:43:44um and um the generally the vision of the general plan and the general plan policies um that are outlined in the agenda bill staff is supporting approval of the application um i just have one more slide here which is uh the tentative subdivision map which is actually that the actually the

1:44:02the action that is before you tonight is the approval of the tentative subdivision map um this map uh this image has been updated to reflect the current unit layout but the uh the map doesn't actually change the the configuration of the lots is the same since the last time you saw

1:44:19it um so that concludes my staff report as i said i can go into any into more detail on anything that you might like me to and the applicant is also here and um is going to go through i think a little bit more detail on some of the architectural changes and the floor plan changes

1:44:39um this is our opportunity to ask questions of mr moss jan yeah um i have a question about energy efficiency and the green point checklist um can you kind of elaborate what the applicant has already absolutely committed to and what level of energy efficiency that might be at yes so the applicant

1:45:04did submit a letter as part of their application that highlighted the energy improvements that are included as part of the project and also that letter stated that the the project had been uh that they had used uh energy software to model the energy efficiency of the project um and that

1:45:24pursuant to that modeling the um the project performed 27 percent better than the 2016 code which is the which is actually not in effect yet um but likely will be um by the time the the project would be constructed but that that 2016 code represents a significant energy

1:45:46um significantly stricter energy standards from the current code actually 2013. right okay um i'm not sure who would answer this question but when a developer goes to get financing for a project is the financing not different is the financing different when you are mixing

1:46:08both market rate and affordables in the same project does anybody not answer that i'm not sure who can answer that that's my understanding but um you know in order to kind of give you more detailed information i i would ask the developer that question they could probably

1:46:24provide more information anybody else have questions for mr moss does the inclusion of these units these uh five extra units or two extra units i guess it's two extra units do do the inclusion of these extra units change any of the sequa analysis no uh none of the changes

1:46:50um so as i stated the um the project is exempt from sequa under the infill exemption and i believe it was at least the the july 19th staff report uh went into detail on all of the qualifications for that infill exemption and none of the revisions change any of those qualifications okay

1:47:09and and then i know the accessory units are don't go towards the unit count but it's now at with even with the accessory units being counted towards their primary property it's at the full density value of 35 per acre that is correct they're adding one more unit would put it over the maximum

1:47:30density and then we'd have to do a variance on on that as well correct um the so just i guess that is one thing i didn't um probably highlight as well as i should have but the the revisions do put the the unit count at 29 uh units um with the addition of the two c units and then

1:47:50there are in addition to that the three uh accessory living units which um as mayor lyman stated don't count towards towards density um but you know effectively it's um you know it provides 32 um housing units 32 front doors 32 front doors yeah that's a good way of stating it

1:48:14okay and i have some other questions i guess mostly for the for the applicant um so i will wait to ask them those questions assuming they will be coming forward for their part of this presentation thank you at this point i will open the public hearing my understanding is we have seven

1:48:40speaker cards correct we will go with the full three minutes per speaker card um so if you could adjust the timeline is first and questions and then public testimony oh that's true the applicant gets you're right i'm opening the public here but the applicant gets the presents the

1:48:59modified proposal first and then questions from us so if the applicant's ready we would love to hear your presentation and then ask you questions great thank you very much we'll be up front again uh good evening again my name is keith mccoy i'm glad it's uh it's only night

1:49:19not even nine o'clock yet so we got plenty of time um opened you up with the last time right your expectations are very low so uh i just want to say thanks again to sean and margaret and melanie your staff we've been working really hard with them over the last month and a half or so to make the

1:49:39changes to the project we were under a tight time frame with vacation schedules and consultant times and all that but it was it all came together so we're really happy about that and and sean especially i think he's done a phenomenal job this whole process um so we heard some some very good

1:49:57comments at the last meeting and i think i had to watch the meeting a couple of times to make sure i got them all uh and then we challenged our design team uh to work with staff to try and make as many of those changes as possible and i think we actually did so

1:50:12i'm just going to highlight a couple of the topics that sean mentioned adding in some accessible units adding in some type of affordability creating a more diverse unit sizes adding the stair lift options and identifying the walkway along the avila entrance and

1:50:31we haven't modified the overall project it's still pretty much the same looking we have uh the elevations are slightly different but you know we really tried to work within the framework of the original design we thought it worked well for that particular site um and we are still consistent with the

1:50:48zoning with the general plan the setbacks and frankly i was a little concerned about meeting all those requirements adding in two new units and i think that was the marriage suggestion i think it turned out very well once we got through a variety of different design scenarios

1:51:04but we have added the two accessible units the one bedrooms and the three in-law units and those are also accessible and um and we've reduced the parking ratio so we as sean said we're going to go back to the planning commission apparently and have them analyze that

1:51:21we'll also look at it we'll we'll have to do a parking analysis of the neighborhood to make sure there's adequate parking in the in the evenings but we'll we'll go forward and do that if we go forward tonight so i'm going to turn it over to uh peter and let him go through the details of

1:51:36the changes and then if you have any questions i'm here to answer good evening everyone peter stackpole with lca architects and sean did such a thorough job he will he's allowed me to skip through some of these slides as we work our way through here we've added the two one bedroom

1:51:56accessible ground level units uh the accessible studio in-law units created the four new plan d's redesigned the staircases for the chairlifts updated the exterior elevations to accommodate those plan changes and added the painted walkway at avila shawn's covered the site plan issues

1:52:19the critical item of course is just knowing that these three corner units in the b units are the accessory units in these two units here are the adaptable or the accessible ground level units floor plan a previous plans new plans nothing to see here this is there's

1:52:41virtually no change to these units plan b the previous unit where we had a switchback stair which left didn't leave a lot of room for the an accessory unit here so we straightened out that stair it's a stacked straight stair makes it easier to apply the future chair lifts and gives us the

1:53:02width we need to introduce these accessory units at the ground floor more news here really is about the d and c units these d units are modified a units and you can see over here the dashed line represents two of those units put side by side and book matched in plan

1:53:23so that we can carve away the room we need in the middle between these to create the one bedroom accessible unit that unit has a small bedroom an accessible bathroom and a fairly generous kitchen dining and living area with an in-line kitchen it's a pretty efficient plan

1:53:45obviously it has its own entrance from the outside the plan d unit creates two new stairs so that you can continue to access from both sides of the unit it's a condition that's required because of the insertion of the plan c unit again in line stairs stacking up through the units

1:54:08first floor here shows how those two c units are grouped together by book matching two pairs of the plan a units to create the plan d units and again an example of the the corner adaptable or the accessory unit changes to the elevations not not a big deal here the the way we have to book

1:54:30match these a little bit different pattern to the elevations you can see that the pairing of some of the bay windows one of the advantages of going to this new plan for the b unit is it allowed us to to open up the corner of that b unit before the plan was fairly closed you'll

1:54:46see the impact of that previous plan on the elevations or the perspectives in a moment but we we have a much nicer element here on the corner i think in the new plan a lot more glass better for the unit itself and better view out to the street here's the location of that

1:55:04painted pathway so that you can walk continuously from street to street through the site the eldorado view the original view again no windows on the corner out here a darker element out here on the corner the new one allows us to get windows here much more air and light to the units and

1:55:26better visibility to an observability of the street from that unit similar condition on avila a dark unit here with no windows on the corner lighter condition here corner windows and that's really all i have to cover tonight and happy to answer any questions you have

1:55:51yeah mr freeman thank you very much and thank you for the modifications that you've made i know that certainly you cannot know what the market conditions will be exactly when the units are ready for sale but given your current projections how much do you think approximately these units

1:56:14will sell for you obviously didn't go to developer school where they teach you not to tell you tell anybody what the prices are going to be you know it is it is anybody's guess at this point if they were to sell today they'd be probably between 700 and 800 000 even the one-bedroom units not the

1:56:38one-bedrooms no that would those obviously would be significantly lower 250 to 300 something like that and that would be probably high thanks very much that's helpful sure well i i don't know it's a question or a comment i'm hearing you use words that make it sound like these changes

1:57:00weren't actually an improvement do you really feel that way i do actually i think we've created some more accessibility obviously we've created some rental opportunities for folks that want to buy a house and then rent out an in-law unit i'm familiar with that i have a cottage

1:57:21that i actually live in and i run out my main house so it provides more flexibility we're seeing a lot more buyers today in multi-generational markets where kids are either boomeranging back or the grandparents are wanting to move in but there's no place for them so our b units

1:57:39are particularly um ideal for that so i think it does provide a more diverse you know unit size and i think there were good suggestions and i it's a better project for it i actually live personally in that kind of a situation and it personally for me it works out

1:57:56really well there's three generations in my house now and i enjoy it and i don't know how long it will last but i have to say i don't want it i don't want it to end and so you're setting up that as a housing possibility it sounds like and um something that's difficult to find

1:58:23so and near a bart station which is um i think a lot of people think a real asset so um so thank you thanks mr bridges um yeah i have a question about the c units are the c units um as the mayor said the front doors are they at grade grade level and from the street access

1:58:47yes that's right right okay correct just to make sure there weren't stoops or something there and then um would either of you be able to answer my question about financing when you're mixing market rate and affordables in the same within the same project is there issues with financing nope um

1:59:05it depends on if it's a uh affordable housing it's an affordable housing it's usually a tax credit right uh financing which you go through state local and federal financing mechanisms and it's a competition for private development where there's affordable housing provided

1:59:22by the market rate developer typically this is standard financing thank you there's a couple of comments that are coming up i'm sure are stealing some of these thunders but we had conversations the last one about garbage garbage bins and and the chaos on garbage day

1:59:42um you know what if anything was considered to resolve that uh that challenge we did talk to city staff again about that issue and wondered if we should look to doing a more centralized facility and staff's recommendation was to know they they met with your sanitation department

2:00:01and thought that this was the best approach um especially they didn't want the trucks actually coming into the the entries they wanted them out on the street so you wouldn't have the whistle or the up you know the beep beep so and and that's the condition that's

2:00:15out here now uh the residents who have been living there have been taking their trash out to the street okay and then on i don't know if i don't know if you had the the floor plan of this particular lore it's the one and it might be the revised ds that have uh stairwells

2:00:36going out both sides both ends of the building um i think it's the revised d yes this one um is there a safety issue associated with having because if i understand this correctly the stairs come up to us to a common landing and i'm just curious if there's a safety issue here

2:00:59or what was the what was the thought of having all this stare and is it economical or is it what's the purpose of it well it's less economical than stacking them and we needed this is a very unusual condition to insert a unit like this at the ground level and and affect the ground level access of

2:01:25the unit going in one direction but it's important for the unit and the way it needs to work it needs a front door to the street but it also needs a front door it needs a door facing the driveway so it's a challenging situation and you wouldn't want to bring these up too

2:01:42close to each other at the top if you were three or four feet apart you would be too close and we would we would be uncomfortable there's no code regarding it particularly but uh we've given significantly more room than that top so you're not going to get to the

2:01:57top of the stair and feel like you're about to pitch forward into the the downhill leg great um there was a suggestion and i did make a couple phone calls there was a suggestion about the hoa retaining some of the units for rental to to make sure that they were rented

2:02:17out at market uh below market value um i called uh rcd resource uh community development dan swazilak thank you swazilak and i spoke and and he he definitely made it sound as though a project this size was below a normal project size where where affordable housing

2:02:42um can fit in and so building on councilmember bridge's question you know is this something that you guys considered is it something that uh you know that that some of these units could potentially be retained by the hoa in some fashion for renting below market

2:02:58because i can tell you that you know the community with rcd it says it's too small so i know this isn't something that there's lots of partners out there that you can go and get uh to make it work so it really would end up being the burden of the hoa to implement the this idea that came

2:03:16forward from the community yeah i i think um it would be an extreme burden on this a small hoa for this many units to actually own these these two units and then be responsible for renting them out and doing all that another option could be finding a buyer like an rcd to

2:03:34buy those particular units and having them own and manage those that was my question to them and they said it was not economically feasible for them to to do that 80 units right 30 30 plus yes right so yeah it it it's small it's hard on the small on these smaller infill projects to make

2:03:52something like that what we call pencil but um yeah it would be difficult we frankly we think that the size will keep the affordability low um and it's it's a a super creative you know option for people that you just don't see in the bay area um so um i would i would support leaving it like

2:04:12we're proposing it um and let's see what use this as an experiment almost to see how this uh how this works out for the community and hopefully it works out great and we can other developers can do the same thing in different products and the way you're leaving it is as a

2:04:27rental it would be the two one bedroom accessible units would be for sale so you'd be essentially buying a condominium and my mother-in-law has already said she wants one i said no it doesn't work that way friends and family discount yeah no as long as she puts a deed restriction

2:04:46when she sells it she sells it for the price she got it for i'm fine with that um in in the if i remember correctly from the 19th or 20th the closure report talked about some benefits that were afforded to the prior tenants um are you familiar with were all of those benefits delivered to

2:05:05that or is that something that the current property owner was responsible for yeah the property owner did all of the negotiations we weren't involved with that we just hired a consultant to manage you know the review of that process and to my knowledge yes everybody's been accommodated what they

2:05:20were agreed to okay that concludes my questions at this time and now we go to the seven speakers right mr friedman is that correct yes yes we do okay great um thank you great thank you very much so at this time we'll move on to public testimony this is an opportunity for the public to

2:05:45speak on this matter uh we will uh reinstate the full three minutes uh per speaker for is it now eight i saw somebody rush up with a card seven it's still seven okay approximately so if you could uh seven if you could read out uh the first three names that'd be great sure um former council member

2:06:09benicini followed by cordell hendler and robin mitchell good evening mayor council members and members of the public thank you for hearing this item again i've been following it from afar from my television screen and was able to come down tonight to see the presentation in

2:06:28person um i want to say just a couple things so this this project i think all it the the wheel that started this project was a wheel that many of us were saddened to see um it was a very sad thing that happened to the folks who lived there and that action was begun by that

2:06:44property owner and as far as we can tell from all of the reports in the staff report that was a legal action which took place and it and and i hope that those folks who were living there are now they've been really relocated and i hope that they're doing well the developer before

2:06:57you today has come forward with a project that meets all of the city's requirements and ordinances their proposal that they put forward in july as far as i could tell didn't meet all the city guidelines but the council at that time determined that there are some other things that they were

2:07:11interested in seeing in the project in order to be supportive of it and i when i watched that part of the presentation i wasn't sure how they could come up with the things you asked for because the site is so small it's such a small development it's very difficult to vary these types of units

2:07:25within the small of a footprint but i was very impressed with what they were able to do so i'm very supportive of the project in its current form and just in a broader statement i know with this city so many cities around the bay area are having a really um soul-searching conversation about

2:07:41affordable housing the cities that go the farthest that we all talk about berkeley or san francisco san francisco actually puts they don't come we're a city of 10 000 households they don't take only the households that come forward this would be 27 new households and say

2:07:56you pay for affordable housing 27 new households they have went forward and actually put it on all the residents they passed a housing bonds they've taxed themselves and made it a community value that they're all going to pay for they aren't just putting it on the new housing units that

2:08:10are coming to the community which i think is a very it's difficult it's a hard thing to ask um it's just as hard as saying you know when i sell my house maybe i should take a a vow that all of us will sell our house for no more than uh you know a five percent annual growth

2:08:26rate per year of ownership nobody's asking any of us to do that we all are going to at some point in funding to sell our houses we're going to sell our houses to the highest bidder um and if we really care about affordable housing i think we have to have a really broad

2:08:37conversation about who's going to bear the burden of that is it just the new residents who are coming into our community who are trying to uh find a location nearby where they can get to their jobs or is it going to be all of us and i look forward to having that

2:08:50conversation because i think it's one that we are we are going to have now that we have this relatively robust pipeline thank you for your time tonight i look forward to hearing your comments three minutes okay okay so uh mayor lyman uh council members carter handler richmond

2:09:13i really enjoyed the presentation and everything looks so um real so i figured okay this sounds like a good project so i wasn't here back in july when this uh this project was first came on to this um on the agenda so all i can say is that this as as she just stated a affordable

2:09:33housing is always is the key uh for cities i mean like berkeley and san francisco and others so i figured this is a good opportunity for for this type of development to come into elsewhere because i mean if you look at it from afar it's like it's some it's like it's very um

2:09:49very very interesting to see how how this type of development can come into el cerrito so i hopefully that the council will approve this and then we'll see how things um progress um next speaker great can you read out the next three names please yes robin mitchell followed

2:10:07by howdy gowdy and dan hardy hi my name is robin mitchell i live at [address removed] this project continues to be a disappointment and its lack of options for different size units as well as accessibility in terms of his flexibility there are now two ground floor units that we will be fully

2:10:29accessible however as designed they are completely inadequate they were shoehorned into the design in order to offer a token response to the request for accessibility they are the smallest units they were 478 now they're 435 square feet less than 500 square feet

2:10:45with only one bedroom in addition they are the only units that do not have off street parking in the project why should the units that probably need off street parking the most because the tenants may be in wheelchairs or have other issues mobile with mobility not

2:10:59get a covered off street parking space while all the other units have at least one and most have two these are the people that will have to brave the weather to get to their units while fully able people will be completely protected from the elements this seems

2:11:11extremely inequitable the additional three potential accessory living units the type b units are designed to be accessible but there is no guarantee that they will actually be rented and so as far as i'm concerned they can't be counted towards the total number of actual units

2:11:26they're only 262 square feet they were in the plans 271 now they're even smaller their studio units again completely inadequate for a decent living space and the parking deficit burden is born again by them the smallest units all of these changes are poorly designed

2:11:44after thoughts that purport to answer the request for accessibility and unit size options and completely fail as i looked at the overall design of the project i continue to wonder why the developer chose to pursue a townhouse design some of the recent changes compromise the livability of the units

2:11:59for example the unit d designs that were modified to accommodate the ridiculously small accessible units now have two duplicated staircases that take up a large amount of floor area and the resulting floor plans seem much poorer for these changes it seems that a normal apartment style

2:12:14project where each unit is one story would allow much more flexibility in the design and floor plans and result in a much better result for the future applicants as there would be much less area sacrifice for stairways and potentially negate the reason for the narrow footprint of most of the units i

2:12:30don't see the supposed benefit from staying with the townhouse model according to the el cerrito housing element nearly fifty percent of el cerrito housing stock is already three or four bedrooms and two thirds of the households are two or fewer people this results in eighty four percent of el

2:12:44cerrito homes having half a person per bedroom building more three bedroom units will result in yet more under occupied units this again decreases density is not moving in the direction needed for appropriate transit oriented development in addition the ramifications from this project for the

2:13:00previous residents of the rv park continue to play themselves out one of the residents of the non-rv rental unit suffered a heart attack during her forced move she has recovered but it shows the stress that these occupants have been under they are most vulnerable citizens

2:13:15and they have not we have not fulfilled our societal obligations to take care of them this project uses an outdated development pattern from the last century the car centric townhouse design with two parking spaces for most units large areas of paved surfaces for all

2:13:32those cars too much floor area and stairs all result in a compromised quality of life in both indoor and outdoor spaces for the future occupants the city should insist on a better design than what is currently before them thank you thank you all right good evening mayor

2:13:54lyman council members my name is howdy gaudi i live at [address removed] thank you for requesting improved affordability and accessibility measures for this project i hope you agree that the modifications offered tonight remain insufficient to approve the application

2:14:08do not be distracted by the fact that the previous residents have already been displaced or that the city is adding numerous affordable units elsewhere the issue before you tonight is what has happened at this site and the associated impacts for decades to come the context

2:14:22matters there are many underutilized sites in el cerrito where this project would have been acceptable because it would have not have to displace low-income renters and disabled seniors but the applicant took a risk on this inappropriate proposal it has been said that the

2:14:36project conservatively stays within the zoning ordinance criteria however it is never a conservative act to stake a development on the displacement of existing residents especially those with less power and money than new residents even if the law can be said to excuse

2:14:51such an action a good developer partner should have the conscience to know it is not socially responsible without meaningful attention to mitigation that need for mitigation and the failure to apply the condo conversion ordinance are the basis under which you should reject

2:15:06this application i have written at length about the conversion ordinance and provided legal references i will reiterate one a california appellate court in harold griffith versus the county of santa cruz found that the owner of an rv park was subject to the county's rent control ordinance this

2:15:21president suggests that a condo conversion ordinance could also apply to an rv park there were at least four to five rental units and site-built structures on the parcels being redeveloped as well these narrowly missed the multi-family designation because there aren't three

2:15:35units on a single lot however a single project impacts all of them at once under the subdivision map application so they also deserve protection under the condo conversion ordinance along with the rv park residents it's important to return to the finding which has been

2:15:48adopted to protect residents under just these circumstances it reads the proposed conversion will not displace a significant perform percentage of low and moderate income or senior citizen tennis and tenants and delete a significant number of low and moderate income rental units from the city's

2:16:05housing stock at a time when no equivalent housing is readily available in the city of el cerrito area that's what's happening here these are they're exceedingly long waits for affordable housing there's the need is far greater than the supply staff has provided their interpretation

2:16:21of this ordinance and i have presented and supported a different position tonight you must make your own evaluation and interpretation rather than focusing on the similarity of the dwelling to a few listed types i recommend you weigh the similarities of the impacts experienced by the people

2:16:36we should not operate under the animal farm flavor of equality where some are more equal than others one type of multi-family living arrangement is not more than important than another and it is never appropriate to narrowly exclude a deserving group just because a technicality can be

2:16:52foisted to absolve the responsibility that we all share to do the right thing there is too much unquestioned deference to the claim of real estate property rights we need to build an understanding and expectation that with property rights come property responsibilities

2:17:08and that includes social responsibility to our community as a whole this project does not increase housing density or opportunity it just changes who can live there it's time to stop the trend of supporting those who opportunistically displace people with less socioeconomic

2:17:23power please demonstrate that el cerrito knows better and reject this project dan hardy followed by sharon maldonado and sydney manchester jones good evening my name is dan hardy i've worked for various non-profit affordable housing organizations in california for

2:17:47the past 27 years i moved to the east bay to work for one here about a year ago by the way the city of el cerrito has done a great job for affordable housing the last few years i appreciate you doing that my my wife and i bought a house in el cerrito a little over a year ago

2:18:07we paid an incredibly high price for it and couldn't have afforded anything uh had we not got lucky with our last house which we sold in southern california i don't think think our kids have much of a chance unfortunately i'm here to support the el dorado project before you without a doubt to

2:18:28make a housing more affordable we need to make more market rate housing as well as subsidize affordable we need much much more housing of all kinds i firmly believe that i like to ask that you do what you can to promote infill transit oriented developments like el dorado

2:18:48without adding additional requirements especially on small projects of this size which generally can't afford speaking from a lot of experience projects of this size and type are really hard to make pencil this site probably wouldn't work as an affordable project due to its size

2:19:09i ask that you please approve this project tonight and add 32 new homes to the city's housing stock thank you thank you next three speakers please sharon maldonado followed by sydney manchester jones good evening mayor and council good evening and folks in the audience

2:19:34i want to say first of all i certainly am glad to see that the possibility of affordable units has been added to this project however you will note in the plan it says there's the opportunity for affordable units the reason for that is that if the homeowners are renting out those units

2:19:56they can certainly choose not to do it so those aren't real units those are possible units there's also no guarantee of affordability we know that rents and housing costs are going up when this project is done it's unclear exactly how much the town homes will cost

2:20:19at that point the landlords who are the you know homeowners can choose to charge fairly high rents for these small units so i do want you to remember as others have mentioned that there were 39 people who lived at aldis and those people com lost totally their affordable housing

2:20:41those who had lived there the longest had trailers that were more than 10 years old as i think you know from this whole year-long process trailer parks do not accept trailers that are more than 10 years old so those residents lost not only the land under their trailers they lost their trailers

2:21:00themselves uh i mean they lost those those trailers also so they were really in bad straights when it came to finding a place as was mentioned one woman who happened to live in one of the apartments did have a heart attack she was a disabled senior as were a number of people at aldis and luckily

2:21:19very luckily she she did survive she's not going to live independently not because of the heart attack but because she didn't have a place to live so she's going to live with a relative which of course is not unusual in in this situation where people are made homeless

2:21:35because they are displaced by development so that luxury buildings can be built for others who have a greater fortune than they had one question is how do you how can you guarantee that these actually are affordable because that that is the plan so there are different kinds of level of

2:21:58income some people think affordability um is reflected in 30 of one's income another is that your own income is a certain percentage of median income i see nothing of that in this so again to me i don't know if these will be affordable or not i don't know if they will

2:22:18actually be rented so i wonder if there's any thought on the part of the developers that these three units might be available to the people who used to live there you may know that there are people who used to live there who are living in their cars they did not end up with a place to live

2:22:40i know this it'll take a little bit of time if a project like this is built but was there a thought that those people who are living in cars might someday be able to move back to el dorado and to to live there um i don't get that sense it sounds like they have been written

2:22:59off please begin to wrap up excuse me please begin to wrap up okay um so i do think that as you can see from my cane tonight and i came with sid who will speak later accessibility can be extraordinarily important and i think an elevator seems like a much better option then

2:23:20than the staircase but i too think this needs to be rejected as it is and we need to look seriously at something that that does take care of affordability thank you good evening sir yes good evening uh mayor city council members my name is sydney manchester jones

2:23:57i'm still a voter in el cerrito and i i am one of the expendables from uh autis trailer rv park uh you know one of the displaced people and uh you know one question i have is what is affordability you know on the on these three units i think that they're talking about

2:24:27small small square footage was it 220 square feet what is affordable you know is that i'm unlimited income is it 30 of my income like many units uh rentals uh elsewhere in contra costa county and elsewhere i mean what is that you know what this all boils down to this whole situation

2:24:56with this project it comes down to conscience man you know and this is what you council members uh will have to decide you know it comes down to conscious you know i'm the face of this of what's been happening here you know so thank you thank you any other speakers

2:25:22no okay this is an opportunity for the applicant to respond or clarify any comments in the testimony so you would like to this is your opportunity to add add some additional thoughts mr mccoy or mr stackwell um i don't have any specific comments other than to say um you know we really

2:25:57tried to work hard with your city staff and with the comments that you made in july to to accommodate the accessibility some kind of affordability we call it affordable by design it's not by ordinance it's not by law but it's a way to it's a different kind of affordability and we're seeing more of

2:26:14it but but not enough of it frankly in these types of small infill sites so i think um i think we we put together a good i'd say compromise really um that while it's not being required by the city as a statute uh we have come back with you back to you with something i think that

2:26:31is uh achievable frankly so i'm going to ask a couple questions that one was would be for example instead of in d where there's the double staircase would is it economical is it feasible to put an elevator that serves you know the the second floor from the ground floor is that

2:26:51something that's completely infeasible i i know i have a young man that i know up in davis where they you know people who were buying these uh spec homes essentially had the option to swap out staircases for elevators so i don't know if it's a upgrade option or

2:27:08something is that something that you guys are you doing us all you know speculative and then you're going to go to the market are you offering sales ahead of construction we haven't decided yet on that particular matter but when we we did look at elevators after the last meeting and the width of

2:27:26the the elevators is pretty large compare even the compact ones that you probably saw at a building trade show i saw the same ones yep yeah the closet ones yeah they're very cool and in fact we have another project in nevada where we are offering those as options for a senior project uh but

2:27:42these um units are very narrow and it would take up a lot of room more than a staircase with probably two times that at least so um it's something we could we could look at uh but again i wouldn't we didn't go too far with it just our architects were saying it's just not

2:27:57gonna it's not really feasible and certainly there's a lot of discussion tonight about projects penciling or not penciling um there was a question about using the townhome model versus a condo complex that's more of a apartment style because you can do condos you know you don't have to have

2:28:14in freestanding condos you can do condos in in a traditional what most people think of as traditional apartment complex so i was just curious why the town home complex model why the town home format versus an another format right like a podium type project where you would have a common

2:28:32area garage more you know that kind of thing um that is significantly more expensive than what we're talking about for a town home project you would have need to have more units or you would have to be in a higher price point or you know a sales price to to make that one pencil

2:28:48okay so that that's why we chose that and frankly i think a podium or apartment can't higher condo type project would be would exceed the height limit um most likely so we'd need a variance for that and it would be out of context with more of a single family and and some attached

2:29:04units in that particular neighborhood so we felt the townhome fit in better and frankly it was just more economical to do it um have you guys worked out your hoa terms yet uh that's the next step so actually when we go through the improvement plan and final map we'll go through the hoa

2:29:21establishment and work with the state department of bre on that okay but no we haven't completed that yet one of the comments that we've heard more than once is that outis was a community and in order to develop a community you need long time residents i know in the condo complex that my parents

2:29:39live in they've actually changed the hoas to limit the amount of rental units that are available so that they're promoting long-term occupancy by the owners to build that community to build that sense of community would you consider putting a limit on the number of units that can be rented

2:30:01yeah we could look into that absolutely yep do you mind sure so i i happen to actually know a little bit about this because i i sold a condo earlier this year and there was actually some state legislation a few years ago that prohibits that so if if homeowners associations were allowed to

2:30:21implement those types of rules before a certain date um and then after a certain date um it became i don't know if it prohibits it but it becomes much harder to do it requires a vote of all of the the owners of the hoa or something like that so it's not something that the developer

2:30:37can put in before there's i mean they're the only owner at the moment they're they're owning all the units so is it something they could put into their their hoa before there's a before there's a transaction uh i'm not sure the answer to that i mean you've you've heard from them that

2:30:51they're they're willing to explore it so um you know i think we can leave it at that but i just i just wanted the council to be aware that there might be some challenges to actually implementing that so if we were going to be adding a condition to that tonight it would be to

2:31:05make it predicated on the legality of the condition sure okay um yeah i think in my parents it's 20 percent but you know obviously we would have to figure out how to count the three units that are intended to be rented um because certainly we would want to either grandfather them or or you know

2:31:24not have them go count towards any uh rental scenario and the the thing i'm worried about is is this the you know somebody buys it who never even tends to live in california and all of a sudden we have four people living in those nice units that you have intended for family

2:31:44and and so we all of a sudden have four people who want to have cars instead of two instead of a a set of parents so so that so it's it's it's the unintended consequences of uh these types of projects that you know are are here and we want families we want community and

2:32:04to uh to to see those three i think they're the b units the three b units are are ripe for college renting out to college students so you know it's it's uh something that we certainly don't want to um you know it's not it's it's not the purpose of this development

2:32:24the purpose of this adult moment is to i think i think mr gowdy said it well you know we we have um with with property comes responsibility and this is one of those things where we want a community here not a flop house not a a rental house and that's that's one of my concerns

2:32:43about this so it's i'm glad you're interested in entertaining it and i'll i know i know council is researching it as we speak uh miss bridges i see you have a talking about rentals in in in general are you talking about the accessory unit rentals so so the the hoa that my parents live in they

2:33:01um you know 80 needs to be owner occupied and what i'm saying is that of the 29 right 29 is the new count you know 80 percent would need to be occupied and that's how we would potentially get to supporting the type of community uh that that we need in our in our

2:33:23community so that from what i understand the accessory units have to be owner occupied right those they do yeah so they would be outside this count okay um any other questions for the applicant at this time no no did and did you want to did you want to say something

2:33:50good evening mr mayor members of the city council margaret cavanaugh lynch development services manager are currently in our municipal code just to touch just to finish the thought that was being said just then and when you have an accessory dwelling unit and a primary unit the owner has to

2:34:04live in one of the two units correct so it could be the accessory unit but they have to be present in one of the two units it's on the property that's correct because because those both of those units are one property right correct mr friedman i move we close the public hearing second second

2:34:20um moved by friedman seconded by bridges all those in favor of closing the public hearing let's say aye aye opposed abstentions let the record show that we have closed the public hearing um we're going to bring it back for deliberations and i'm going to start with uh with miss bridges um i just want

2:34:38to clarify a couple points with um our city attorney about multiple family rental housing people versus diaz the condo conversion question statutory construction and the griffith case that was cited if you could just briefly talk about those things or not briefly

2:35:07and do you want her to enumerate them in a sequence that you can consider it no i just it's a very open-ended question so i'm not leaping in to answer it immediately oh okay um i mean the bottom line is that this question has come up multiple times the short version of the answer was one

2:35:25that i assisted the staff and prepare and that is included in the agenda bill which is that it is my interpretation that the condo conversion ordinance does not apply to this project there are a number of different ways that i could articulate that um but the bottom line is that this the

2:35:39nature of this project is one that the condo conversion ordinance does not apply to you can come at it from an overall um basic principles of what the ordinance does um and the type of project that it applies to and the example that i would give there is that um

2:35:57the the nature of a condo conversion is that there is a unit to be converted and that it and that the nature of the um property is such that um the existing owner owns both the land and the structures and therefore what happens as a result of the condo conversion is that the land and the

2:36:15units are separated and um and and sold in this in the case of an rv park um typically the rvs are owned by the occupants but the land is owned by the park owner there's no there's no it is it is not possible for the owner of the land to convert the rv into a unit that

2:36:35can then be sold because it is already owned by the person who occupies it you can also there are also a number of very technical if you if you weave through the definitions of um that are provided in different parts of the code you'd also find that the definition of

2:36:48multi-family residential basically provides a list of examples that includes apartment buildings garden apartments and townhomes um i'm sorry townhomes might or might not be on the list i don't remember off the top of my head the point being and since you mentioned

2:37:09the point of statutory construction that there's a long body of case law that basically holds that um where a general term is followed by a list of examples or vice versa that the um that the that anything else that's not expressly listed has to be similar and kind to the things that are

2:37:28listed to fit within the general term as long as it doesn't as long as the result of that interpretation that construction does not is not contrary to the overall legislative intent i would say the legislative intent is exhibited by the first point that i made which is that there's

2:37:46this is not a situation in which the units that exist could be converted and sold so um the the examples that are provided in the lit so in the code there's a definition of multiple family residential housing it include it includes a general general use of the term and a list

2:38:04rvs are not on the list and they are just simply not of the kind of things that are listed they don't have a foundation they aren't attached to land they aren't intended to um to remain in place they are essentially trailers or vehicles that um exist on a chassis that are intent that

2:38:19is designed to be moved around they're just completely different types of housing could a condo conversion ordinance be written to apply to rvs yes the city of el cerritos is not um so and as to the cases that are cited um in the letter that you received and that mr

2:38:36gowdy referred to the point i would make about them is that um they um that it is important to separate the the idea of defining types of of um uh rental relationships between landlords and tenants and defining land uses the cases that he cites um all basically

2:38:57turn on the idea of defining what the nature of the tendency is to determine whether or not other bodies of law apply to the type of tenancy and so in the case that you mentioned the court found that the type of tendency was one that the um that the counties rent control organs could apply to

2:39:15that's totally separate from determining whether or not a use is one or a type of structures are such that a condo conversion ordinance does apply to them and in this case it's not a theoretical condo conversion ordinance it's the specific condo conversion ordinance that exists in your municipal

2:39:29code right now so my basic point about those cases is that again they they create they they highlight that theoretically um a condo conversion ordinance could be written to apply to an rv park the city of el cerritos does not and and those cases just don't answer the question about

2:39:49whether or not the city's ordinance does apply so i come back to my basic conclusion which is that the city's condo conversion ordinance does not apply to this project that was pretty brief best i could do okay got a four-page memo where it says the same thing even

2:40:09less succinct but that was good thank you i had to sit up here and highlight all this stuff anyway but that was brief in comparison so um what i'm thinking here is that this project initially did meet the standards of the state building code and the fair housing act okay we know that

2:40:27um so there wasn't any violation as far as that particular code was considered but there was a violation of sensibility and fairness i've got my kleenex so you know as far as the eviction and the displacement of the honest residents has nothing to do with the developer

2:40:56this was about the property owner it was despicable it was community fracturing and um you know i have to give our beloved staff um some credit that they actually i think were pretty instrumental in um having the um some a few very few of the residents of otis um

2:41:23our staff showed a lot of compassion and worked with the property owner to get a little bit of compensation it was a little bit of compensation um and very little compassion that was actually uh ended up in this this project and the displacement so you know the thing about this is we

2:41:46all operate under a world compass and you know the property owner you know isn't going to answer to the five of us he's gonna answer to a higher authority so you know one of the things about this project is it did act i have to give the developers a little bit of credit here that we

2:42:12asked for something accessible we asked for something affordable and i think that they actually provided both of those things i mean it's true it's pretty small um mr mccoy admitted that he's living in a cottage i don't know that it was this small but he's he's renting out another

2:42:32property that's much bigger and janet here has three different generations living in her house so accessory units are a way to meet some affordability they they could be rentals or it could be that it's just going to be an au pair it's going to be an older parent there's going to be a

2:42:53friend who just got out of college and doesn't have a big paycheck yet so in that measure it actually does meet some affordability and you know the units are accessible i i think they did a good job with that um in addition to that there's wall enforcements um to accommodate

2:43:13stairlifts i have two grandparents that didn't want to leave their three-story house so they put the stairlifts in and you know they do work it's not an elevator but they do work and um given given that um you know i think they did make a uh an attempt to achieve what we had asked

2:43:38we don't have an ordinance for any inclusionary housing maybe someday we will but today we don't so as far as what the applicant's produced here i see it as it's operating within our current development grant meets general plans and our zoning policies and you know in regard to affordable

2:43:56housing and i do give credit to one of our speakers who um mentioned that we actually have done pretty well with affordable housing in the city of el cerrito we've done most we've done better than most of our neighbors we are well above our regional housing need

2:44:11allocation and we have 207 affordable housings one of which is going to be next door and it's going to be senior that's in the pipeline so it's not like we're shirking any responsibility here as far as having something affordable built again the garbage uh came up the bins

2:44:30came up as a a comment and i know the staff has talked to all of our our waste management pickup people and you know i think i look around my own house and my green lace is filled with you know branches and tree trimmings and things like that at least people aren't going

2:44:49to have a lot of green waste but they're going to have their composting and you know maybe they'll figure out in their own that they're going to two or three of them will compost and push one green can out there and and a lot of them will have a lot in their gray can because we all fill our gray

2:45:03cans and you know i have this much in my blue can and they'll probably figure out that that's what they're going to have too and i do think it'll help ma meet our recycling needs a little better because we've always had traditionally a lot of problems with um you know compliance and

2:45:22multi-family drillings when we have the large the bins so for me um you know given all this information you know i can't i can't deny the project um and you know you can you can vote on this based on whether you like what they did to artists or you didn't like it or you

2:45:44just don't like mr biggs or um you know it's it's just it's compassion but i don't think we can apply how we vote on things like this in a complete capricious willy-nilly kind of way and so i would move forward with the project and i do thank the applicant for making

2:46:04some of the changes i i will just build on the comments that were just made i i think that uh the only thing i can think of um the thing that comes to my mind is the number of people i know who need accessible units they can't find them and there is not a an availability of accessible units

2:46:39to people who need them and so the idea that these are available are pretty exciting to me and i wish that there were some way that you needed to need these units in order to use these units because a lot of times what happens is an accessible unit is built and there

2:47:01are some like this i know in el cerrito i've been shown them that are 100 accessible only the person living in them doesn't need an accessible unit at all so there's a mismatch that goes on and even though which means that you can have such a thing think you're doing a good job and

2:47:23it completely misses the mark so i don't know if there's a way to um market these first to people who need an accessible unit [Music] because i can tell you if a lot of times that doesn't happen we just put in a project and they showed i was shown this 100 accessible unit and it looked

2:47:54to me like it was a hundred percent um but i don't know who's living there now and i don't know that anyone on this council does and um so unless there's a match between you know that need and the unit it really isn't doing anything so but um if somebody here can think of a way to

2:48:26match that up i'd appreciate it but having said that i agree with jan i think that it's time to move forward i think that um small units i've seen tv programs about small units in and they're touting them actually um it's kind of an interesting thing phenomena you know phenomena that

2:48:50people what people are saying is that it's a good thing to have a small unit and i don't know if anyone else ever catches those things on tv but they have these really tiny houses other people have seen them too i guess so i'm not the only one so um it's i don't think these go that extreme but

2:49:15certainly i think as a society we need to be tolerant of different approaches and the approach here is to make them the unit smaller and [Music] as a way of making them affordable and accessible and i i actually think that's fine i don't you know i think the fact that

2:49:45there are these units in this society where it's impossible for people who who need those units to find a place to live how how would i mean think about it how would anyone in this room feel if they can't find a place to live um likewise the um people who have a large family often

2:50:12have difficult difficulty finding a place to live so there are a variety of needs in our society and um the um i i'm um you know it it's nice that people are including people who have accessibility needs and this is in the society that's about all i have to say

2:50:42councilman freeman this is a very difficult issue because i support infill development but i do not support infill development that displaces a community that displaces people who've had affordable units for or an affordable place to live for in some cases 30 years

2:51:10i don't find the developers blameless because they came in and treated this project more or less like this is raw land to be developed the way they typically develop a project when it wasn't raw land and probably mr biggs said don't worry i converted the designation from a mobile home park to

2:51:30an rv park years ago probably anticipating eventually selling it i know i can buy off the few people that don't get scared off and find another place to live you'll have the ability legally to go forward but what about morally as pointed out by several of the speakers look we're not going to solve

2:51:52the affordability crisis in el cerrito by dealing with one development but we still have a moral obligation to do whatever we can to say we want to be part of a solution to make sure that the economic diversity of our community and the social diversity is not eroded as

2:52:14rapid a pace has been happening without rent control or just cause eviction or inclusionary housing ordinances or various other protections that other cities have we have no mechanism to prevent the erosion of that economic diversity which i value and i know many

2:52:33of us here value i appreciate that there's some small movement in this plan versus the previous plan but the affordability plan is really no affordability anybody who buys a unit for 250 to 300 350 000 is if they're not living there themselves they're going to want to rent

2:52:55it at market rate and market rate is more than anybody i think for even that small unit who was in the outer development would be able to afford so we don't have affordability for the people who are being displaced as was pointed out you went back to the drawing

2:53:16board and basically what i'm hearing is we don't think we have to provide any kind of subsidized affordable housing because we don't have to you have not made the argument that the project doesn't pencil out with it i didn't hear any economic hardship on the developers

2:53:34presented you are basically saying this was our plan from the beginning we'll adopt a little adapt a little bit according to um you know the requirements or the preferences of the city council but you know i see the face of one of the residents and many others you know they're scattered

2:53:56far and wide and part of the agreement for the compensation they got is that they weren't supposed to object to the project so that's why they're not all here even if they're in the area so it saddens me that we if we approve this project as is were part of that

2:54:17erosion that i talked about earlier and i don't want to be a party to that i appreciate this small infill project that project i've drove by many times i've talked to a few of the neighbors uh i brought a friend of mine that uh lives in lived in a trailer park for many many years

2:54:45and showed her the artist trailer park and it uh it bothers me to see that you know we don't have anything right now but but we do have affordable units on the way and and we're working on it and i know that we will have affordable units for seniors and people with disabilities right next door to the

2:55:15city hall we have other projects there's a hundred and fifty five units that will be built across the street from the baseball diamond at the old at the former dolan lumber 155 affordable units so i am hoping that the former tenants i hope we can do something to

2:55:38see if they will be on the top of the list somehow that they can live in some of these units that will be built in the future i know we have affordable units at the del norte bart station that's on the pipeline for 30 affordable units we have affordable units that

2:55:58will be available at uh right by the el cerrito plaza so i appreciate the what the applicant has done to change some of the units for people with disabilities and and there is so many people that i know that would be interested in moving it moving there if this was built at the time when my

2:56:25parents were looking for something like this i would have had them move there instead of 15 miles to vallejo unfortunately there were too many stairs where my parents lived and they had to move even though i drive my mother here to go shopping all the time and and to go to a familiar bank it it's

2:56:47very frustrating to see people that have to move that don't want to move so i'm hoping in the future we can all work on this together and i'm hoping that we can somehow see if we can have some of the tenants be on the top of the list on some of the units that are going to be available soon

2:57:11i um will be supporting this because families need to move there as well we have a lack of housing in el dorito we plan on making transit-oriented development possible on san pablo avenue and richmond will be working with us and they want dense housing on san pablo avenue it's

2:57:32important that we provide housing for families and there's so many families that would like to live in our community so i will be supporting this but i will also be supporting affordable housing here in el cerrito ms maldonado i'd like to ask one question before you go

2:57:51the public hearing is closed can you please tell me the nature of your question absolutely it's very short um i'd like to ask council member quito if he is saying that the city will make it possible for addis residents to get at the top of the list for this affordable housing that's

2:58:10being built it's my understanding that that list is held by other entities so i would like to hear a commitment i think that would make a difference thank you for the question it's certainly one that i can say that was at the top of my mind i don't know if there's anybody here that can answer

2:58:26this is our we don't we don't have a housing staff person anymore is that correct i don't know margaret if you had if you or melanie know the answer to this so we can certainly contact our development partners it's my understanding that resources for community development for example is

2:58:46completely full and they handled their own tenancy um we uh i think there are regulations that may even preclude us from being able to say local first but we will talk to our attorney we'll talk to our um um we'll talk to our attorneys to see if there is some way to do that it's it's

2:59:06um it would probably be challenging but we will we're always happy to look into um suggestions from the council mr woodruff it's just a complicated question that that nobody here can answer tonight without any preparation and requires further research and so i mean

2:59:22i think that what you're hearing from staff is that they will make inquiries and and i will speak with them about what's legally possible but but it's just not something that we can address tonight mrs martin i will say um that and sydney i can see you back there

2:59:37you're not expendable okay i find myself brokenhearted over the displacement of the artist community and i'm calling on staff melanie i know you can see me i'm calling on staff to get us an inclusionary ordinance immediately this is this is the we're this is the

2:59:55outcome of not having an ordinance that represents our values in place and we need to move that forward and i would like to see that come to us as soon as possible because that's that's the the displacement of artists is the result of of not planning far enough in advance

3:00:16and the inability to to require developments even as small as this to be able to provide us with replacement housing for income classes of all levels yes we're doing great on affordable housing yes we're we we need to do better in affordable housing and this this is a wake-up call that we

3:00:44need to get to that future place where we have the type of affordable housing that's out there where the lists are short enough where people who need to get on and into those types of housings can this is a troubling dilemma we're called on to be the conscious of

3:01:02our our community and and we we're weighing the displacement of artists the community benefit of more housing and the property rights of a property private property owner this is this is not by any means got tears on both sides and it's not a simple question it's not

3:01:27a simple answer when i was talking to mr swazilak swazlek at orcd he he used the terms also that was used tonight of affordability by design pushed and i know that a 250 000 condo is is not something that replaces the type of housing that was there by any stretch of the imagination

3:02:04um but it they we've done what i think is what we can with the laws that we have today that's why i'm calling for us to change our laws i'm going to insist and i need to ask a question of staff on the b type units that have the accessory units both units cannot be rented at the same

3:02:33time is that correct that's the idea of an of a accessory unit that that's correct so the the uh actually it's there's a requirement that they'd be owner occupied that the property be owner-occupied so the property owner could live in either of the units and rent out the other one

3:02:51understood if i can just add to that if the the existing municipal code requires for accessory units that they'd be deed restricted so that the owner occupies one of the units so so it it's deed restricted it would not need to go into the hos that's correct okay

3:03:09so that means that there would be of the 29 units 26 would be at the moment 20 20 the all 26 of the other ones could be rented owned by somebody and who doesn't live in our state and rented to people who come and go on a nightly basis a monthly basis or an annual basis

3:03:30that's correct i would like to put i would like to make sure that there is a restriction on the number of those units that can be rented i don't care if it we don't have an ordinance for the short-term rentals yet but for me it would be a restriction on renting

3:03:50uh the units so that no more of the no more than five of the 26 unit types in a c and d could be rented don't know if there's anybody from the developer group that is willing to [Music] talk about that talk to our attorney first yes please this is new to us isn't this a gender item

3:04:25you have to do it is it you know you have to be an agenda item yes oh do we have to continue do we have to continue yeah i thought let me just check real quick while you're conferring we're conferring also nothing online my question was how how you can do that without it being noticed

3:04:51it's part of the conditions of the approval is that correct this would be this would if i understand the direction that council member lymon is headed he would be proposing it as a condition of approval to be included so so it it doesn't need separate noticing okay

3:05:07in my experience representing other projects a 20 limitation has been enforceable and part of a condition in the past in the uh in this case that would be 20 would be 5.2 20 it's 20 of the 26 i'm taking the three off the top so it's 5.2 that's why i'm proposing

3:05:33five available at any one time for rental if it's the will of the council we think it's enforceable it's conditionable i would i would like to make so i don't know if we have to work the language out tonight or can i can we direct staff to work that out so i'm just going to

3:05:51please i'm going to take it please try and correct me we will we will we will have to make i mean this will not be the final wording but if i understand the proposal it's to add a condition of approval that the ccnr is for the for the um the project um allow for no more than five of the units

3:06:12to be um rented at any one time um excluding um the the units that will that are required by the municipal code to be deed restricted to have the owner occupy either the the main unit or the accessory unit correct and we will work on the final wording of that but that's that that i think that's

3:06:32sufficient for direction um and emotion to add that as a condition of approval this means it's a clarifying question for the attorney and counsel council is that fully rented meaning the entire units is that rooms rented within units i think that there's some nuance to such a condition that i

3:06:51understood it to be the entire unit but yeah i mean if if the owner is there and they're renting out a room that's the owner is occupied so no more than five units would be entirely rented at any given time and the details to be worked out in the ccnr's yes can we just do it based on

3:07:13that tonight yeah that's that so at this point um i'm looking at my we can council deliberately specify which units to make it a little easier um or does that mean that i don't think we can do that we can't do that and and my familiarity with this model whether it's done at the front end or

3:07:37where it's allowed through a vote of the members of the hoa later it's not it's not specified units it's basically a floating number um so that if one person if one owner if if there's if five are rented in this case a five were rented and a unit sold and the own and the new owner decided to

3:07:55occupy there'd only be four rented and one of the other members of the hoa could then rent one rent the unit out my my daughter used to be to live in a place that had an hoa and it was a nightmare and um hopefully it will bring them together and create a community

3:08:15the i think so what if they're lying to each other is that we don't worry about that or we do how do we deal with that it that's that's we're doing our best to to create a community within this i mean i know that my parents um hoa does a good job of policing it so and then and

3:08:38it you know as a result of owners being there they actually have people who look out for them as they're aging in place they have long-term neighbors that are doing a fantastic job of helping me care for them in an extended way so please i'd like to make a motion

3:09:02resolution of the city council of the city of el cerita approving a tentative subdivision map consisting of six lots three residential lots two private streets and one lot for bioretention open space for a project that includes 29 town home condominium units so there was at least one

3:09:24correction to the resolution that was cited by public is the date correct in uh [Music] what was it did it get corrected maybe was was the date correct in the first therefore clause there's a reference to the february drawings as opposed to the september or the august drawings

3:09:50and include the changes that we're making with the five units and i'm sorry could you say that so we can say it into the microphone so we can hear it this also applies to the five uh units that we agreed on limiting the rental as as the motion includes the additional

3:10:08condition of approval that council member lyman described and that i helped articulate and and to the point the mayor was making we can say that referencing the plans shown to the city council on this date just yeah we're not worried about when they were submitted

3:10:21they're the plans you were seeing this evening excellent thank you so that would that that's two changes to the text that we have before us the addition of a new uh condition and the correction to say the plans shown to us today um so we have a motion on the floor by mr quinto

3:10:41can i ask you a question yes does this include the um the application for the parking waiver we aren't considering that that goes back to planning the one of the conditions of approval requires them to obtain the parking waiver which goes to the planning commission

3:10:57that's that's number 10 i see okay thank you you want a second we have a motion on the floor oh yeah i got it you seconded it oh second motion by quinto seconded by bridges all those in favor please say aye aye opposed no abstentions but the records show that it passes

3:11:24forward one thank you everyone so those units the small units don't have parking right okay thinking about the people who ought to be using those units all right um thank you for allowing me that brief moment of collection uh policy matters we have none tonight

3:12:05uh item eight is council uh council's assignments and liaison reports all right i have three uh actually two because i already gave one the mayor's initial innovative project uh i have attended two different meetings with marine clean energy with regards to contracts for power purchases

3:12:33the agency is moving forward with purchasing additional solar and power solar power and wind power to increase the the light green content so the light green content is actually moving up from 50 percent so everybody in our uh community is benefiting from these

3:12:55contracts and on september 1st and i know staff is still here um at least i'll i'll embarrass cheryl i want to thank staff for that great event that we hosted up for the mayor's conference um and myers navi um and and everyone for what you did uh we did host the

3:13:17um who were tired chris mckenzie retired from league of cities and he was there to make sure that we knew that we need to continue supporting the league of cities the league of cities is a vital entity and he's going to he's working on trying to find additional

3:13:41staff to replace him and that's my reports i've heard already i thought it was early he's actually done it already end of this month end of end of october it's next month right yeah end end of october next month um any other reports no okay we are adjourned until and i close

3:14:10my book it's going to be october 6th is that correct october 4th october 4th i will we are adjourned to october 4th you