Attachment 03LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/24/2017
Item #3, Amendments to Town Code on Cellars
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A P P E A R A N C E S:
Los Gatos Planning
Commissioners:
Tom O'Donnell, Chair
D. Michael Kane, Vice Chair
Mary Badame
Kendra Burch
Matthew Hudes
Kathryn Janoff
Town Manager: Laurel Prevetti
Community Development
Director:
Joel Paulson
Town Attorney: Robert Schultz
Transcribed by: Vicki L. Blandin
(510) 337-1558
ATTACHMENT 3
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P R O C E E D I N G S:
CHAIR O'DONNELL: The only matter, which is not
insignificant but a significant matter, but the only matter
left on the calendar is Item 3, which is the Town Code
Amendment Application A-17-001 regarding cellars. I would
ask for the comments of Staff, and in this particular case,
Erin Walters.
ERIN WALTERS: Yes, good evening, Planning
Commissioners.
The Town’s General Plan contains Policy CD-6.3,
which states, “Encourage basements and cellars to provide
hidden square footage in-lieu of visible mass.” Last year
the Town Council Policy Committee met to review and discuss
the Town’s Cellar Policy and basement definition to
determine what changes would be needed and where changes
were needed to clarify the policy and Town Code language.
Last December the Policy Committee reviewed and revised the
Town Code language to address below grade square footage.
The Committee directed Staff to proceed to the Town Council
to rescind the Cellar Policy and to the Planning Commission
to consider the necessary revisions to the Town Code and
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other policy documents. In January the Policy Committee
reviewed and discussed light well and exit well standards
related to below grade square footage. The Committee
members requested that the light and exit wells standards
be added to the Town Code.
Based on the Policy Committee direction Staff is
recommending that the Planning Commission forward a
recommendation to Town Council to take the following
actions: Make amendments to Chapter 29 of the Town Code to
include deleting definitions of basement and cellar,
amending the definition of gross floor area, and adding a
section with additional criteria for reviewing below grade
square footage that was previously in the Cellar Policy.
If the amendments are adopted, Staff has attached
a list of documents that would need to be revised to ensure
consistency as they reference cellar or basement. These
documents are attached in Exhibit 11 and would come forward
for modification as necessary when these documents came
forward for other issues.
The proposed amendment will modify how below
grade square footage is counted for sloped lots. Currently
the sloped lots allow floor area to be exempt when the
portion is less than 4’ above grade. Any square footage
that is more than 4’ above grade is counted as floor area;
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therefore on the same floor you can have both countable and
non-countable square footage. The proposed amounts would
require that if at any point on the elevation there is more
than 4’ above proposed grade—sometimes this is called
daylighting—then the entire floor would count towards the
gross floor area.
There would be no proposed changes on how below
grade square footage is counted for flat lots. As long as
they met the criteria, they would still be not countable.
Staff has received four written comments from the
public expressing concerns for the proposed cellar
amendments, and Staff would like to note that there was a
reproduction error in the first letter, so there is an
email slipped in between the two, but there were four
comments from the public that we received, and those are in
Exhibit 13.
This completes Staff Report, and we’re happy to
answer any questions.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: We have some speakers this
evening, but before we go to the public, if you have any
questions of Staff that you’d like to ask now as opposed to
later, please let me know. Commissioner Hudes.
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COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. I have a number
of questions, but one I think would be helpful to
understand now before we take public input.
I’m trying to understand the process, because the
Policy Committee met on this and the notes are helpful, but
there’s not a lot of background. Was there public input
during the Policy Committee meetings?
JOEL PAULSON: The public input was extremely
limited and really came towards the end. Process-wise, the
Policy Committee has been reviewing a number of policies
throughout Town. Obviously the Community Development
Department has a number of policies, and we still have
dozens upon dozens to review with them. However, this had
been in process and in January of this year Town Council
held a priority session and continuing with the cellar
modifications was on the list of ordinance amendments.
That’s why we finished the work with the Policy Committee
and we’re before you this evening to get your
recommendation to Town Council on potential amendments.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: If I may have a follow up?
In terms of that input would you characterize that as
mostly from architects, or was it from residents, of were
there any real estate professionals who offered advice?
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JOEL PAULSON: I believe one of the speakers was
a real estate professional, and there were some citizens
that spoke. I don’t recall, maybe one architect or designer
did show up and speak, but I don’t recall specifically.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Did the Policy Committee
have the benefit of the neighboring jurisdiction analysis
in terms of the five or six that were cited in our Staff
Report?
JOEL PAULSON: They did not.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Okay, thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Ms. Walters, I’m not clear on
what you said. Are you saying there’s an email that perhaps
we don’t have or was just sent to us? I printed out the
Desk Item that was sent to us, so I’m guessing that’s the
same one that was on the dais today.
ERIN WALTERS: There is the addendum that
discusses there’s an extra sheet that was attached to the
minutes, and then in addition if you see Exhibit 13,
there’s an email from Gary Kohlsaat and he references
attachments, however, an email from Jay Platt is in the
middle of that, so really, the attachments from Mr.
Kohlsaat’s letter should be following that, but all the
information is included.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: All right, thank you. Go ahead,
Commissioner.
VICE CHAIR KANE: As a curiosity, on page 4 of
your report, Item 2, the last sentence about ornamental
balconies and terraces ends with, “The area of elevator
shafts and stairwells is also included, except on the
ground floor.” What’s the logic behind that? Maybe I don’t
understand it.
JOEL PAULSON: We only count those areas on one
floor, and that has been historically how it’s been done.
Elevator shafts was the only thing that was previously
referenced, however, since we are modifying this definition
we also included stairwell, which is another practice that
the Town has used for over a decade.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I didn’t know it was in here.
Do we ever use calculations on elevator shafts?
JOEL PAULSON: Elevator shafts, as it’s not
underlined, that’s in the current code. So we added “and
stairwells” is also only included on one floor, the ground
floor.
VICE CHAIR KANE: All right, thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: If there are no other questions
at this time, I will open the meeting for public comment,
and the first card I have is Tony Jeans.
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TONY JEANS: Tony Jeans. I am one of the
architects/designers that knew nothing about the policy
discussion, and I would have loved to be involved. I think
a number of the people who have provided letters here,
Gary, Jay, myself, et cetera, could have provided valuable
input and stopped this going in a stupid direction, because
in all honesty, this policy change is terrible.
Let’s start with what a cellar is. On a flat lot,
there is a cellar. On a sloping lot, here is a cellar,
except in the new policy it has to be down here, because
it’s not a cellar. This will be counted as full floor area
ratio in the new policy, so this is now going to be called
daylight basement, because the garage is here. All of that
gets counted, so the below ground mass, which is not
visible mass, you can’t use; that means that homeowners
will not build below ground.
In the existing rules, which are at the bottom, I
can carefully tuck a house back into the hill, so I can put
a piece of non-counted square footage here, I can put a
piece of non-counted square footage here, and that square
footage might enable the homeowner to do something that he
otherwise could not do.
In the new rule that’s coming to force there is
no incentive, there’s no reason for me to tell the
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homeowner they’ve got to tuck it into the hill; none at
all. It’s going to cost them a ton of money and there’s no
benefit to them. So what they’re going to do is they’re
going to move it out of the hill and put it up there.
Now, have a look at your height limit. Here is
the height limit. You build up to the height limit here,
because that’s where it’s going to be. When you tuck it
into the hill, look how much I drop below the height limit
just by putting it into the hill.
So the big problem that you’re going to have is
the new policy is going to create much more massive homes
on the hillsides than you’ve ever seen before. The policy
that was enacted in 2002 by Randy Attaway, Steve Glickman,
Sandy Decker, Joe Pirzynski, and one other person whose
name I forget, has worked effectively. I handed out
something that says basically you can’t make the findings,
I don’t think CEQA works, and the Town Code general policy…
This is just atrocious. The six jurisdictions…
CHAIR O'DONNELL: No, no, we’re not going to wave
to each other. Your time is up.
TONY JEANS: All right.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: But let’s wait and see if there
are questions. I realize your frustration on that and I
appreciate your remarks. Yes, Commissioner Hudes.
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COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. It’s helpful to
look at the diagrams. So in this example, aren’t we
currently getting the example in the upper right with the
additional cellar? Isn’t that what’s actually happening?
TONY JEANS: This is current policy.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: No, I understand, and it
adds up to certain square footage, but aren’t we currently
getting the house that’s on the right, the upper right,
with the additional cellar?
TONY JEANS: No. I mean, you may, you may not.
That is where you may not have implemented or executed the
policy as you intended, which is the goal should be to
allow extra square footage if you can reduce visible mass.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: But under the existing
policy the square footage of the house in the upper right
is the same, or smaller or larger than the one on the left?
TONY JEANS: I took the same house, how I would
design it, new rules, how I designed it there, as opposed
to how I would design it now. If I would design this house
now I would say this goes underground, but you can put a
bit here, so you’ve actually gained…you can actually put
some more square footage in than you have here. The house
is lowered, because what I’ve done is I’ve gained an area
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here. That might be a media room, it might be the laundry,
it might be a workshop…
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I understand.
TONY JEANS: …but I’m encouraging them when they
come to me to push something into the hill, because I know
you want to see that, and I know they want the mass. Here,
I’ve got no tools available to do it. It’s atrocious.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I’d like to say that I think
Commissioner Hudes’ question relates to our expert, which
is to say everybody comes in with a maximum square footage
above the ground and then says oh goody, now we get to put
some below the ground, so notwithstanding the idea of the
basement or cellar which will reduce the visible mass, but
that has not been happening, so I think anybody who appears
before us regularly knows that.
You’re suggesting maybe we should be tougher, and
that would be fine with me. We would begin to turn people
down because they didn’t reduce the visible mass because
they had a cellar or basement. They, then, would not come
in with a cellar or basement, which is exactly what you
were complaining about.
TONY JEANS: Right. I did suggest in one of the
handouts that I gave that you could add some wording to the
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current policy, which says if a homeowner wishes or needs a
daylight basement with a cellar in a hillside design and
the cellar would take them over the FAR, it should be
justified by showing how the design approach otherwise
reduces mass, bulk, or visibility from locations that could
be adversely impacted. So it means if I have to come to the
Planning Commission or Development Review Committee and I
want to go over the FAR by putting some below ground mass,
then I’ve got to show you what I’ve done. That’s a way you
can change this policy, and everyone wins, not everyone
loses.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Thank you very much. The next
card I have is Tom Sloan.
TOM SLOAN: I’m Tom Sloan. I’ve been in business
as an architect for over 30 years, licensed as an
architect, practicing in the town here for all those years.
With the association of the AIA I worked with Suzanne
Davis, now Avila, with the committee sitting at this table,
drafting up and proofreading the Hillside Standards and
Guidelines.
I knew this was going on, but this afternoon
there was a barrage of emails from all kinds of architects
that couldn’t make it today and asked me to come out and
speak a little bit. So I want to say, kind of putting a
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little twist to what Tony was saying, if you can’t see it,
why are we regulating it?
I had a project in Los Altos Hills; it was a one-
story residence up near a ridge top, it was on a slope,
they had a daylighting garage. It was a beautiful building,
it fit everything, but they had a problem because we had a
basement underneath the rest of the house, a pretty full
size basement that connected to the garage. They said
they’ve made a Condition of Approval that you’re to
bifurcate the basement, disconnect the garage from the rest
of the house, and give it 5’ of separation, and then they
approved it. You couldn’t see this bifurcation.
Then that led to about a five-year stint where
that became the new regulation, something similar to what
we’re doing here, and then they changed it back. They
realized that it was ridiculous, so they said you don’t
have to disconnect the portion of the basement that you
can’t see from the portion that you can see. If you can see
it you count it. You still have to measure all the heights
and all that from that part.
I would like to suggest that we take some more
time. You’re going to see a lot of pushback on this and
it’s going to cause a lot of problems. I know that there is
a lot of architects that we would sit down in this room,
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work with Staff, and troubleshot this thing to get it
right. I’m five generations, born here in the Bay Area,
grandparents all go to Los Gatos High School, this kind of
thing. I love this place and I don’t want to see the hills
populated with stucco. That resource has got to be
retained. That’s about all I have to say.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Thank you. Are there any
questions of the speaker? Yes, Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: I really just have a
question of Staff, just because I heard it a couple of
times. I assumed that these meetings are on our website and
were published as available, correct?
JOEL PAULSON: All the meetings are published on
the Town’s website.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Okay, I’m just curious,
since I’d heard that twice. Thanks.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: All right, thank you. The next
card I have is Brad McCurdy.
BRAD McCURDY: Thanks for the opportunity to
speak. I’d like to say that Terry and I support and would
echo the comments made by other opponents of this proposed
policy change. I was very happy that I took the time to
look through the resources on the website, because I
immediately realized that I wouldn’t be able to do as good
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a job as Tony had done showing section views to illustrate
the points that we would make. That saved me a little bit
of time, Tony, so thanks for that.
We strongly disagree with the conclusion reached
in the Staff Report analysis provided. Under Part A, the
General Plan Policy, it states that the General Plan Policy
includes the wording, “Encourage basements and cellars to
provide hidden square footage in-lieu of visible mass,” and
then it reaches the conclusion, “The proposed amendment
supports this policy by providing an incentive to bury
square footage below grade.” I would contend with my 22
years of experience as an architect working with homeowners
that it will do precisely the opposite. It will remove the
incentives to bury square footage and result in some of the
stuff that Tony illustrated so nicely.
Rather than being a solution in search of a
problem, I would contend that this is very likely a
solution in actual conflict or at odds with the problem.
The proposal is a significant change to the policy. It has,
really, the potential to significantly impact homeowners
property rights and property values for all residents of
the Town, so I’d ask that you consider prior to providing a
recommendation to Town Council taking the additional time
to do further analysis and further collaboration with the
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architecture and client community to try to reach a better
way of obtaining the objectives that you would like to
achieve.
We’ve heard from clients a bit of confusion
regarding the proposed change, too, and this is another
thing I’d like to mention, because some residents appear to
be under the impression that this was an intention to
remove the Cellar Policy and provide a little bit more
lenience and openness, when I actuality I think we probably
would have had a better attendance at some of those
meetings if it had been entitled “Potential Tightening of
Cellar Policy” rather than removal of it. Thank you for
your time and consideration.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Thank you. We have a question.
Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: You mentioned that this is
not a solution to the problem. How would you define the
problem?
BRAD McCURDY: I would actually go back to
Commissioner Kane’s assertion—I believe I’m correct in
this—that sometimes we see the upper right-hand section
Tony presented with a cellar added below it, and I’m sorry
if I’m misattributing that, but the idea that we want to
reduce visual bulk has very significant impact when it’s
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just objective rather than subjective, and so if we create
a policy where we’re attempting to remove the credit for
underground square footage, then yeah, you’re doing exactly
the opposite of what you intend, versus, say, for instance,
the point being made that perhaps in order to earn the
right to have a cellar you give up some right for above
ground square footage. I mean, that could be another
proposal, but there are literally dozens of potential
solutions to this potential problem of too much visual
bulk.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Maybe just even following up
on that point, I don't know if you had an opportunity to
read the Staff Report and Exhibit 12, which is a summary of
five other jurisdictions and their approach to it.
BRAD McCURDY: I did.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Do you have any reaction to
those five and whether any of those go partly or fully to
solve the problem that’s been described?
BRAD McCURDY: To be honest, first my immediate
reaction was that the five that were chosen were a little
odd, because in my humble opinion Atherton is mostly flat
alluvial plane and has a lot fewer impacts on hillside
residential, and I think the same could be said for
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Woodside. The majority of large homes that I’m familiar
with in Woodside are on more flat rather than more steeply
sloped sites. I think Portola Valley and unincorporated
County and potentially other communities towards the Santa
Cruz Mountains might also be appropriate to consider when
it comes to the problems of visual bulk on hillsides.
But my reaction is that recently I’m aware that
Monte Sereno has been considering actually the reverse
process of what we’re considering tonight, which is going
from the policy that we are proposing to the policy that we
currently have in town, and I find it odd that while
they’re trying to potentially fix a problem by providing
architects and designers with more tools we’re potentially
removing a tool that could be used rather than exploring
other objective ways of getting to the same subjective
result of less visual bulk.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you for mentioning that
reversal. It might have been a letter from you or someone
who said that they had already reversed themselves, so I
went back and looked at the policy, and the policy had not
been reversed and I thought well maybe there’s a time
lapse. What you’re saying is they are considering it?
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BRAD McCURDY: That was my understanding, yes.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Okay. I was thinking that they
had in fact done it. They haven’t done it.
BRAD McCURDY: Yeah, to my knowledge it has not
yet been changed, but it has been, sort of, as this
probably would be among that architecture and AEC
community; it would be hot button issue over there as well.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Any other questions? Thank you
very much.
BRAD McCURDY: Thank you for your time.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: The next card I have is Bess
Wiersema.
BESS WIERSEMA: I don’t have a PowerPoint or
anything tonight. Good evening, Commissioners.
As you can see, there was a bit of a flurry
today, and I think that one thing that I would like you to
take away from this and understand is that those of us who
are professionals that present projects to you that have to
fit within the guidelines as well as uphold what our client
is trying to accommodate after perhaps purchasing a piece
of property, coming down to the Planning Department and
understanding what the rules and regulations are, and then
coming to us as a new homeowner or a new property owner and
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understanding what their rights and their opportunities are
with their particular property seems to be extremely in
jeopardy at the moment.
We had a collective of architects today and in
the past couple of days that is actually fantastic. I was
pleasantly surprised that a lot of us got on email together
and finally said what is happening? Now, the one thing that
is of consensus is that while some of us may have been
notified that there was a policy meeting that was going to
take place, the notification happened within a day or so or
on the day of the Policy Committee, even though maybe it
had been requested. This is no disrespect to Staff, we’re
all busy, it’s an incredibly hot climate, but I believe
that as a consensus the group feels that it has not been
consulted in terms of being an opportunity to provide you
and the Town of Los Gatos citizens with the right way to
maybe go about interpreting current design guidelines that
are set forth.
In an email today I have a list of several
architects that were unable to attend tonight that are in
adamant disagreement with the currently proposed policy. I
have Jay Plett, David Brett—and I’ll hand you these emails—
Mike Rowe, Frank Garcia, Cindy Rozivink (phonetic), Mike
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Ferris—I probably just butchered that name just like you
all butcher mine—Tom obviously, Tony, Brad, et cetera.
I think what I’d like you to take away tonight is
that there is clearly an issue with what is at hand here,
and part of it might be that the wrong thing is being
addressed. I think that this is a stab at addressing bulk
and mass, and unfortunately it’s an irresponsible stab at
addressing bulk and mass, and it’s a way to try to mediate
and mitigate and create a prescriptive policy around
something and create a rule for an exception rather than
addressing the issue at hand.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: All right, let’s see if there
are any questions. Yes, Commissioner Badame.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Are you aware that there
just wasn’t one committee meeting on the Cellar Policy?
BESS WIERSEMA: Well, we’ve been made aware of
that. Here’s my response to that, Commissioner Badame. I
would just say this: The group of us that’s out here
tonight, the group of us that couldn’t make it tonight for
things like graduation, et cetera, are people that you see
often, and the fact that every single one of us is willing
to say we’re going to come to the table, we’ll help you
solve this, we agree it’s an issue. I don’t like having to
tell a client that something they’ve heard at the counter
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is not something that I can get through Planning Commission
and create a set of drawings for, but every single one of
us has said none of us have been asked to participate in
the process for defining a role that we are responsible for
presenting projects to you.
So, yes, I understand there have been many
meetings, it’s posted on a website, however, I agree with
Brad that maybe if it had been titled something a little
different it might not have been misconstrued as what it
was and it would have been a hotter ticket for all of us.
But I have a group of architects in town that you see that
has said no, this is a problem, and please, please continue
this and ask us to participate in solving it. We’re willing
to, on our own time.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: I see your side to this
clearly. Personally, my side of this—and I have a question
here, so I promise to get to the point—is what happens is
not the perfect scenario where somebody comes in with the
single-story house and the tiny…I hate the word cellar, by
the way, that is a storage closet. If you look it up in the
definition that is a storage closet. It’s a basement, okay,
so we’re not going to say cellar anymore. Instead, I have
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two stories, plus usually a basement the size of my house,
and I’m not exaggerating when I tell you I can’t remember
an application that came in front of us that didn’t max it
fully out. So I totally get this idea of it helps us make
the house smaller, do more, and no one is saying you can’t
build a basement. You can; it just counts against the
square footage.
But my question is as somebody that we do see
often, so you have a lot of dialogue with us, what if
something was put in—somebody had mentioned it—like okay,
you can have a full basement, but you can no longer max out
the height requirement? Staff is probably going to kill me,
but I’m just trying to throw out thoughts here. Your FAR is
now reduced by a percentage, because the idea is you’re
building this basement to reduce mass up top. So knowing
your fellow architects and knowing yourself, is that maybe
a dialogue that should be happening, in your opinion?
BESS WIERSEMA: I think it could be a dialogue
that’s happening, but I think there also has to be a
respect for property values that exist in our particular
township, and an understanding that the current FAR
regulations, especially in hillsides which already have a
deduction granted and a penalty for them, that penalties do
exist and the fact that if we can’t make something work for
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what is currently viable, then it comes to you and you have
the opportunity to say yes or not, or to tell me, just like
everyone else, you need to reduce your bulk and mass.
Again, I think the issue is not necessarily the
Cellar Policy, I think the issue is the definition and
understanding of bulk and mass. Absolutely will I bring a
house to you that is probably touching the height limit and
what is allowed according to the rules, that if anyone
decides they’re going to go buy a piece of property and
they’re going to do their due diligence and they’re going
to come down and they’re going to meet with the planner who
is going to give them the proper information that says
according to this calculation this is the size of home that
you’re allowed to put there, they base their decision on
buying that piece of property or choosing to remodel or add
to or tear down and redo, that piece of property. That’s
how they make that decision; it’s math and it’s dollar
based. It’s also lifestyle based, I agree.
Unfortunately, I can tell you that 9.9 out of my
clients that go down there say, “But I bought this and they
said I could put a 4,200 square foot house on it,” and not
once have I ever been able to get a 4,200 square foot house
past you guys without changing or giving up something
architecturally for them, whether that’s an amenity or an
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aesthetic, and that’s okay, because those are the houses
that I bring to you, those are not the other eight houses
that go through without any of that.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Correct.
BESS WIERSEMA: And so I feel like this is trying
to create a rule for the exception, rather than actually
saying we have a guideline, and if we have a problem then
we need to address the problem, and the problem is not the
Cellar Policy necessarily, the problem is the definition of
bulk and mass and the lack of understanding and
interpretation on all levels of that, whether it’s us as
professionals, Staff, or you as Commissioners that we
present to and rely on to interpret a ton of information
that you get.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Okay, thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I have a question, too. My
experience is the same. Let’s assume you could build a
4,200 square foot house, so you come in with 4,200 square
feet, and then you say and I want this basement, and of
course one answer to that is no, because you’ve got a 4,200
square foot house. That would make life simple, but we
don’t have it simple. People come in and say the basement
you can’t see, therefore it shouldn’t count, and therefore
we can get both, and maybe the problem lies with us. Maybe
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we’re the ones that ought to be saying no and get the
message across, but people being normal I think are going
to say we want as much as we can get, and the way this has
been interpreted, in my experience in the past, is nobody
comes in with a smaller house because they want a basement.
They come in with a maximum house and they want a basement.
So how would you suggest we address that problem?
BESS WIERSEMA: Again, I think it’s a
question of redefining bulk and mass. If someone creates a
basement that isn’t seen by anyone in the neighborhood, has
no impact on any neighbors, has no impact on any passerby
on that piece of property, why does it matter?
CHAIR O'DONNELL: So if we assume that our policy
says the reason we have it is to reduce bulk and mass,
you’re saying we should just ignore that?
BESS WIERSEMA: I’m saying if the policy is
stating that the reason we have a cellar policy that says
we don’t have to count that square footage is indeed to
reduce bulk and mass, then it should be addressed, and
perhaps Brad is right that there are some denominators,
just like there are for hillside reductions based on slope,
that there are some sliding scale that has to do with
percent of house versus basement. I don't know what it is,
but I agree there is a problem.
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Clearly there is an issue with FAR and how we’re
counting it. There are people who are concerned about that,
and then there are also those of us who make our livelihood
doing this, and I’m not saying we’re just out to make a
buck on it, but we do have people that say to us, “I bought
this piece of property. I went down to the Planning
Department. They told me I could build a… It’s right here
in the thing,” and I’m like, “Hold, please.” We have to
decide how to make the rules, and the point is that what is
before you tonight is not acceptable and does not account
for conversation around those kinds of rules.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: We have a couple more questions
I can see coming up, but I wanted to say, just personally,
the architects that have appeared before us in our various
roles—I think I can say—all have been excellent, so I want
you to know that we respect your opinion, and maybe we’ll
get some more opinions, but we have some questions.
Commissioner Badame.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: I’m not sure what your
applicants tell you with their experience with Staff, but I
can tell you that I’ve been down there in the lobby of the
Planning Department and I personally have witnessed Staff
tell an applicant that the FAR is never a goal, so I would
like to think that Staff does a good job of telling
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property owners don’t count on maxing the FAR, so when they
go to see you, the architect, I question that, if they
think that it’s just a given, and this is what I get
because this is the maximum FAR that I can have.
BESS WIERSEMA: I mean no disrespect to Staff,
and I have a very good relationship with them, and I agree
with you, I think Staff does an amazing job. I don’t think
Staff is the issue.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: My question is in the form of
seeking advice. I think I’ve been around since 2002 on and
off the Commission. The Chair has been here longer than me;
we’re getting long in the tooth.
When this was issued everybody thought the words,
“Cellar is to provide hidden square footage in-lieu of
above ground visible mass,” and it goes on and on, I’m
trying to think of an exception, but in my time I’ve never
felt that that was being applied. So I’m asking you, after
15 years of wanting to have something more definitive and
realizing that people build to targets and we’ve been
arguing about Cellar Policy forever, how do I get past the
intent to provide hidden square footage in-lieu of above
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ground visible mass, and my feeling is I’ve never really
seen that? What do I do with that? Can you help me?
BESS WIERSEMA: I think it’s interpretation, and
I think that this group of people that is here tonight,
these people that also vehemently oppose what is before you
and wish for it to be continued and would like to
participate in the process, would like to help define that.
I don’t have an answer for you tonight. I understand the
issue.
I also understand that we have clients that come
to us, and I know in my own practice that the scope of an
average home for a fill-in-the-blank family with picket
fence plus dog plus whatever has changed drastically and
perhaps there is a disconnect between what is currently
accepted as a home of a certain value and scope and program
from when the policy was written, and I think there is a
lot to be said for that.
I also agree with Brad that the townships that
were chosen to compare were clearly cherry picked to
address a certain, I don't know, typology and understanding
what homes is. I could tell you that in Atherton I have a
house that has a basement that swales out that you would
never approve, and rightfully so, but when we look at
policy and compare it we also have to make sure that when
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we’re comparing policy and rules and regulations and how
they’re set up, they’re also interpreting that policy in
the same manner, and the interpretation that Atherton uses
for their basement and cellar policy is not the way that it
is written and the way that it is interpreted and assigned
to this understanding for how it is being held applicable.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: All right, thank you.
Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you for your comments,
and just so that I understand your concerns, it sounds to
me that there may be two areas of concern.
One is that if the goal is to provide hidden
square footage in-lieu of above ground visible mass that
the method that’s being proposed in the amendment may not
be the best way to do that.
Then number two is that there may be a problem
with clarity such that instructions that come from Staff
may be not the same as the instructions that come from the
Planning Commission ultimately.
BESS WIERSEMA: I believe that Staff does the
best job they can to say that—like you pointed out,
Commissioner Badame—your FAR is not necessarily a guarantee
100%. So you take an Average Joe that rolls down to the
counter and says, “I’m looking at buying this piece of
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property in this development. What can you build?” And you
hand him the packet and you tell him to go look online, and
you get the calculation and they say XYZ. Agreed, they
might be told that’s not necessarily an end all to be all,
but they walk away with a calculation and they walk away
with an understanding that they can put a certain square
footage on a piece of property. We all have the dirty job
of telling them that we might have to bring it to you and
they’re not going to get it, and that is a difficult thing.
That doesn’t mean that Staff isn’t doing their
job. That means that the interpretation of each project
that comes before you is open to your interpretation, which
I think is valid, but that’s why you don’t make the rule
for the exception, because you don’t see the rule, you see
the exception.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Right, I understand. So if
I’m getting it right, there is an issue with the clarity of
the rule such that the people are not clear on what they
can do, and the second, the way that it’s been proposed is
not necessarily the best way to achieve the goal of hidden
square footage.
BESS WIERSEMA: I believe that every architect’s
name that I read off absolutely agrees with your last
statement that this is not the answer to the problem. I
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personally believe that we are addressing the wrong
problem. I can’t say that for all these people. I can say
that the problem is bulk and mass, and it’s been pinpointed
right now on Cellar Policy that is just incredibly opposite
of what you are trying to accomplish.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Okay, thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: I wouldn’t want to ask you
to speak for all of the architects, but in your opinion and
perhaps in your cohort collective, is this an issue of
hillside properties more than it is flatland properties?
BESS WIERSEMA: It’s interesting.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Because the examples that
I’m seeing in the materials presented have only addressed
hillside.
BESS WIERSEMA: I think some of the examples like
Tony’s diagram tonight addressed hillside, however, I have
several downtown properties that you would consider to be
relatively flat and not hillside like what you would see
from a viewing platform, et cetera, and those all have some
existing cellars that daylight greater than 4’, based on
how old architectural typologies were built, perhaps it’s
one corner of them, because as we know we can look at a
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diagram and it’s just 2-D, and that’s the perfect scenario,
a slope that goes like this.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Let me interrupt; I
probably wasn’t clear. Is the issue that the architects
have with the revision to the Town Code primarily to do
with hillside properties rather than flat properties?
BESS WIERSEMA: I think there is concern that
what is written does not apply just to hillside properties,
but is blanket, number one, and then number two, I even
bumped into Marico Sayoc this afternoon and she was like,
“No, no, it’s not written for if anything daylights, it’s
written for if greater than 75% daylights,” and I thought
to myself huh, Policy Committee doesn’t even know what it
has put up here today.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: She’s watching this program.
BESS WIERSEMA: She’s going to be okay with it; I
talked to her. But I agree with maybe putting certain
definitions on it like that. My point is there’s clearly a
problem, it’s clearly not okay with what it is.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane, did you have
your hand up? Okay. I think we’ve all asked some questions.
Thank you very much; we appreciate that. I now have another
card, which is Nick Williamson.
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NICK WILLIAMSON: Good evening, everyone. Nice to
see you all again, if you remember me.
First of all, I’d just like to say I support what
you’re trying to do here. I think it’s…
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Just for the record, if you
could give us your address.
NICK WILLIAMSON: My name is Nick Williamson; I
live at 148 Maggi Court in Los Gatos.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Thank you.
NICK WILLIAMSON: I think it’s great what you’re
doing here. The intent is absolutely brilliant. You’re
trying to uphold what I think are great standards in the
Town to try to look after the hillsides and look after the
general character of the town; it’s all great.
One thing that stands out to me is we’re all
discussing the Cellar Policy as it exists in that document,
but the Residential Guidelines always defined basements as
distinct from cellars, and a basement had anything above 4’
and then the area of that enclosed space would count
towards the FAR. So we always had a basement policy that
would apply, and in hillsides you generally have a bit of
more than 4’ showing somewhere, so really, it should have
counted anyway. Whatever we’re arguing there, it was always
in there.
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The difficult thing is that people then can…they
go out and design a basement but then call it a cellar, and
as it comes back we’ve referenced the Cellar Policy, and
the Cellar Policy on the Cellar Policy document doesn’t so
much look at what you do with basements, it looks at what
you do with cellars; it’s a cellar policy as it applies to
cellars, and the Residential Guidelines are very clear, it
says basements are included in the allowable FAR, cellars
are not, and there is a Cellar Policy that defines with a
cellar some parts of it don’t count towards the FAR, it’s
only the parts that have the 4’ distinction that counts
towards it. Residential Guidelines lays it out already, so
what we’re confusing always is the term. Is it a cellar or
is a basement? Often in the hillsides it’s always a
basement, because more than 4’ is showing.
I think the architects are complaining, but it’s
actually because they’ve been able to get away with the
Cellar Policy applying to something that it shouldn’t have
applied to, and I think you’re absolutely right, more often
than not people are using the Cellar Policy, particularly
in the hillsides, incorrectly to maximize the square foot
above what’s essentially a lower floor to maximize that
FAR.
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And we’re even going further. There is a problem
with bulk and mass and there is a problem with FAR, because
FAR is a target, and it’s quite a large target, and even
though something like the Hillside Guidelines says all over
it you’re not going to get anywhere near this on a steep
slope, people still design right up to that FAR limit, so I
think the FAR numbers are too big, and also there needs to
be some direction to be inside of that.
But really, there isn’t a basement policy,
there’s the Residential Guidelines around basement, which
already kind of answers what we do in the hillside. If you
merge the two definitions, then you need that hillside
clarification, because otherwise you lose it.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: All right, your time is up, but
I think we have some questions. I should remark, I guess, I
don’t see the lights coming on, is that correct? Or am I
just missing that? We’re hearing the noise here, which
gives you the warning, but I have not seen the… We’re doing
fine, but it just finally dawned on me that I wasn’t seeing
the lights, so that’s not unusual for me. Commissioner
Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Since you are a resident,
I’m going to ask a similar question. If being more specific
right now to the hillsides, and I know that the hillsides
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are what affect you and why you’re here… And thank you, I
agree, it’s a basement.
If we were looking at the basement policy in the
hillsides, and let’s say based on topography, I’m going to
kind of be more specific, because I think I’m getting to a
point. We’re looking at how it’s going to be built. There’s
going to be a basement, because we can’t… But if there was
something that was written there that said however, you can
no longer meet the 25’ maximum, it’s going to be this tall,
and there’s a reduced square footage. Do you think that
would assist in addressing this policy for both sides that
would be somewhat of a compromise in understanding that
sometimes people build a property and there’s really no
other way to get a bedroom, because of the topography,
which is a whole other conversation, or do you feel like no
matter what, even if the mass above is reduced, if it’s got
a basement it’s still infringing on the bulk and mass from
a visibility standpoint?
NICK WILLIAMSON: That’s a good question. By the
way, although you agreed with me about the basement, I also
agree with you that a cellar is also for storage, so I
agree.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: From the Midwest. It was
where we stored canned things.
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NICK WILLIAMSON: I think as soon as you start to
say people are going to live in it with windows and doors
and have it part of their living area, then it’s a
basement. If they’re going to store something in it or use
it as a room that is just practice, then I think a media
room or something, I don't know, but anyway, to answer your
question.
I think the square footage is an easier parameter
to work with. I think it gives you more flexibility if
you’re working with square footage, whereas if you’ve got a
height thing, then it’s the topography of the hill and the
steepness of the hill, and then the visibility thing comes
into question, how many trees are surrounding it or how
tall are the trees and other things, so I think height is
important in terms of visibility and particularly in the
Hillside Guidelines where it does into that, but I think in
terms of trying to control the bulk and mass and the impact
the houses have, I think square footage is important and
it’s an easier metric to work with.
The problem is always we go back to the maximum,
and I think you’re exactly right. Everything I’ve seen in
my limited experience is being built to the maximum or
shaved just under.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
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COMMISSIONER HUDES: Just following up on the
discussion about square footage, and you indicated that you
thought FAR was often too large, is the issue with the
nominal FAR or is it that the percentage reduction on a
hillside is not enough to account for the issues of the
hillside?
NICK WILLIAMSON: Yeah, looking just purely at
the FAR when you come to the hillside and you have the
slope reductions, there are two things about it.
One is the actual number that applies, so you can
calculate the maximum FAR and then you can make the
deduction, and it gives you the new maximum you can go up
to, and that becomes the target. So I think the first
question is are the targets what we want, because that’s
what we’re likely to get. That’s what the design is likely
to come up with.
The next bit of when it comes back to there’s
always a subjective assessment to be made, which is just
this design really can’t go to the target, because the way
that it is, it’s too close to other buildings, or the slope
is too steep, or there’s something where it destroys too
many trees. Then you’ve got another thing where you’ve got
to provide another reduction, but then that becomes who
applies that and how do you calculate that, and with
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property prices and square footage being so valuable, you
will invariably get into a difficult position, and I think
quite rightly deny things when they get too big and too
close to other buildings. Then it goes up to Town Council
and then they find themselves trying to do a detailed
planning job when they haven’t always been on the Planning
Commission themselves and had that experience.
So I think it’s always a target in the numbers,
and I think something that the Mayor said at a Town Council
meeting recently at the end of last year was, “Possibly we
need to review the numbers, because we do need to build a
bit smaller than the numbers, but it’s too much
interpretation, so the numbers probably need to be reduced
down.”
The slope question is an interesting one there,
which is seen in a couple of situations that you stop
making deductions after a 30% slope in some situations, but
not in others, because if you go into the hillside
residential area you just have to increase massive amounts
of land to cope with the very steep slope, but we’re
getting into maybe individual cases there, so I won’t.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Other questions? Thank you very
much.
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NICK WILLIAMSON: Can I just say, because every
time I’m up I’m always rushing and a bit flustered, so I
just want to say thanks very much.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Thank you. The last card I have
is Lee Quintana.
LEE QUINTANA: Lee Quintana, 5 Palm Avenue.
Before I put my illustration up I want to read
what’s on top of it, because it’s too small to really see.
It says, “The illustrations provided in the Hillside
Development Standards and Guidelines are schematic and
meant to show the intent of standard or guideline.” I’ll
leave that there, because these are the illustrations that
came out of the document and they’re scattered throughout
the document in various places.
I’d like to start by saying… Am I going to have
the same flexibility on time that everybody else did?
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Why don’t we wait and find out?
LEE QUINTANA: Okay. Yes, I think that there is a
problem that is more specific to the hillsides than to the
flatlands. I think the policy for the flatlands only needs
some general tweaking and what’s being done is a step in
the right direction, but the hillsides are much more
challenging. I have three suggestions that I wanted to
make.
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I do believe that it would be easier for people
to understand if there were figures that went along to
illustrate the concepts that are trying to be provided, and
also I think there can be a tweaking of the language to
make the intent more clear.
I think there is a difference between the
hillsides and the flatlands. For one thing, most of the
houses on the flatlands tend to be more square, a small
rectangle. On the hillsides, in order to meet the height
requirements that we have set, or the maximums, the houses
tend to be much more linear. That’s also because we ask
that they be designed to be along the contour. So what we
have in the hillsides sometimes are houses that are 50-60’
deep, maybe more, but they’re 100-140’ wide. Those are big
houses, and they still have the challenge of the slope.
Most of the examples that have been shown both
there and they have been shown by presenters are of the
elevation of the slope side.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Why don’t you take a little
more time? Go ahead.
LEE QUINTANA: Okay. Such as this, just
convenient because it was there. If you use the way we do
things now and you come with your basement floor, cellar
floor, whatever you want to call it, at the 4’ level and
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only count that portion that goes there in the pink, that’s
a very different look than if you’re looking at it from the
contour side. And this is an example of something in the
hillside where the actual square footage in the
cellar/basement below grade space has been pushed back and
in front of it is a large area, which is called the
(inaudible), and above that is the veranda with the covered
roof, and the square footage just starts from the pink line
to the left. The bulk of that house is much bigger than the
square footage that’s being counted, because these are not
being counted. This also goes against the policy of
stepping the house into the hillside, or stepping the roof
with the hillside; it’s much more rectangular. Now, if you
take that same…
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Lee, you have about another 30
seconds, okay?
LEE QUINTANA: Another 30 second? Okay. You take
that same house, or my concept of what the house would be,
and this is similar to something you saw recently, and flip
it along the contour, and now you’re looking down at the
floor along the contour of the land. What you have is the
covered patio, and then you have the rooms back here. You
also have windows, set-in doors, windows, set-in doors,
windows, set-in doors, and windows on the sides. The doors
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are all glass. Essentially you have a regular house. The
light penetrates all the way to the back. These function
like regular rooms.
I have lots of things that I wanted to comment on
that were commented on by other people, but I’ll see what
you ask me.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Now we’ll get into some
questions. Thank you. Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Lee, were you involved in
early 2000 when this Hillside Policy, when the Cellar
Policy was put into place?
LEE QUINTANA: I’m glad you asked me that,
because that was one of the things I didn’t have time to
say. Okay, when…
COMMISSIONER BURCH: No, wait. Hold on. Yes or
no, were you involved?
LEE QUINTANA: Hillside Policy, yes, I was on the
committee; I was the chairman.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Well, I have a specific
question. When you wrote in for cellars as an exclusionary
space, because there are barns and stables listed, was your
intent at that time that it was livable space that took
mass away from the upper, or was it storage space? Do you
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recall the conversations? I’m mean I’m not saying… So this
is an opinion. I’m just asking.
LEE QUINTANA: It’s not going to be an opinion,
because the last special meeting that was called that was
an ad hoc committee to iron out some last problems, I was
supposed to be on it, but the requirements was you had to
be there for all the three or four meetings that were
prescheduled, and I was going away for one. So I honestly
said that, and so I couldn’t be on it. They appointed
somebody else who was absent at least one of the meetings,
and the cellar went in. That was put in at the very last
meeting, and when I came back and saw it I said, “That
doesn’t make any sense at all.”
COMMISSIONER BURCH: But in that discussion in
the last meeting, do you…
LEE QUINTANA: I wasn’t there. I don't know what
went on.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Okay, thank you.
LEE QUINTANA: But I can say that, if I may refer
back to something, two things.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Quickly, because there are a
lot of questions.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: Just answer the question,
please, because otherwise we’re just going to take too
long. Okay, Commissioner Badame.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: So I have a question for
you. I’m looking at Exhibit 14 and it contains the minutes
of the Town Council Policy Committee meeting dated December
15, 2016, and you provided comments on the original
development of the Cellar Policy, which I think is separate
from what is contained in the Hillside Development
Standards and Guidelines. We don’t have those comments, so
can you elaborate on that for us?
LEE QUINTANA: Say again what I said at the
meeting, or what was summarized?
COMMISSIONER BADAME: All right, we were provided
minutes of the Policy Committee meeting on cellars.
LEE QUINTANA: Okay. Policy CD-6.3 was put into
the General Plan under another policy number during the
update of the 2000 General Plan, of which I was on that
committee as well. We had an ad hoc committee that worked
out problems, and one of the things that that committee
came up with was the idea that we really didn’t have a
community development element, and so we developed one, we
proposed one, which then went back through the whole
procedure.
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One of the things that we were dealing with, or
that we wanted to address, was the issue of new needs for
residents and maintaining the small town character and the
look and feel and the mass and scale and everything, and
what we came up with with that policy—there were three of
us who wrote it, and it was approved by the General Plan
Committee as whole and then by the Commission and the
Council—and that was to do cellars.
Maybe we phrased it wrong, maybe we should have
said below grade space in-lieu of visible space, maybe we
should have explained it better, but basically what we were
trying to say was that if you did a cellar, you could take
off some space from the top, and you wouldn’t count the
space that was considered the cellar, and you would wind up
with more space than you could if you just went by the
floor area ratio or the gross floor area that you were
allowed.
One of the previous speakers talked about the
architectural committee that was here that came from the
community of architects that critiqued the Hillside
Development Standards and Guidelines. I happened to be at
that meeting, and my recollection of that meeting was that
the architect said the Hillside Development Standards and
Guidelines were tough, they were doable, that it would take
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a lot of creativity, and that the first time you started
giving exemptions you could just sort of toss it all away.
The question of the daylight basements came up
and we discussed it, and Bud Lortz, who was director at the
time, assured us that if the daylight basements really came
out and functioned as a full floor, they could not be
counted, because anything that was higher than 4’ would be
considered a story, and it has not been interpreted that
way.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Okay, I think that’s the
answer. Thank you. Do you want a follow up question?
COMMISSIONER BADAME: I just want to make sure I
understood the first part of the conversation, and that was
the policy that was implemented that you were a part of
comes down to a reallocation of square footage to reduce
visible mass, is that how I understand it?
LEE QUINTANA: That’s sort of what we were trying
at. We were trying to figure out a way to allow people to
have more functional square footage but at the same time
not max out the square footage above the space. We
discussed it but it didn’t go very far, and I do think it
was a great idea and still is, that not all square footage
be the same, because we run into problems. We ran into
problems with houses that had 20’ high rooms and they were
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assessed the same square footage as if there had been a
floor put in and there were two floors. Palo Alto was one
example where they count one-and-a-half if the room goes up
to something, and if it’s more than that it counts twice,
and they don’t any exceptions for stairwells or that type
of thing, they just look at all of those things that create
the mass.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Thank you, Ms. Quintana.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Was there another question? I
thought I saw a hand. No. All right, thank you very much. I
have no other cards.
That being the case, I’m going to close the input
from the public and now go back to the Commission and
Staff, so if there are questions of the Staff, I’d
encourage that right now first. Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Question for Staff. The
intent behind the desire to change the current policy and
modify Town Code doesn’t come through in the current set of
documents, and as a new Planning Commissioner I don’t have
as much history with the issues that the other
Commissioners do, so question for Staff: What specifically
was the intent, the stated problem, that this elimination
of policy and change of Town Code, was hoping to achieve?
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JOEL PAULSON: I can’t remember years worth of
information, frankly, and as I stated before, the Policy
Committee is looking at all of the Town policies, whether
that’s Community Development Department, Town Attorney,
Clerk, Parks and Public Works, all of them. Staff has
brought forward some of them.
There have been some recent projects where cellar
policy has been an issue, some in the flatlands, some on
sloped lots. That’s one distinction I’d made is it’s not
just hillside, but it’s sloped lots; we have sloped lots
all over town, not in the hillsides. So I think that’s what
helps raise the Policy Committee’s interest to ask that
that be placed on their agenda. They requested that it be
placed on their agenda, we brought that forward, they
discussed the item; ultimately we came up with a solution.
As I think you’ve heard this evening, there are a number of
different ways to address mass and scale, bulk, visibility.
This one happens to deal with Cellar Policy.
The majority of what the Policy Committee has
been doing is they’ve been rescinding policies that are
from Planning Commission, Council, or previous directors,
and where appropriate putting them into code. We’re
converting this into code. We’re bringing forward their
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ultimate recommendation for recommendation to Council, but
the exact reason I couldn’t state.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Before you follow up, let me
just ask the Town Counsel a question. What I’ve always
learned is that the testimony concerning adoption of
ordinances or laws is largely ignored, because you wind up
with the document, and even the one who moved the document
forward may tell you all kinds of intentions, but in fact
you have to deal with the word. So if we could ask our
attorney to what extent, we both went to law school and
they taught us that very early on, so I’d like you to
comment on that.
ROBERT SCHULTZ: Sure, you’re exactly right. The
statutory interpretation is just going to look at the
words. You can look at past practice of how that’s been
implemented but the actual what we call legislative history
sometimes can be looked at but really is not going to
dictate as to what the words mean.
I think we’ve had some very difficult cases in
the past few years that have come forward to you, projects,
and in my mind at least, which could be correct or
incorrect, it had to do with homes that were on very steep
slopes as opposed to gradual slopes or no slopes, and the
use of the Cellar Policy from certain vantage points look
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like three-story homes, and I think that was the issue
which brought up the bulk and mass issue and how it was
being interpreted. I think Commissioner Hudes hit it
perfectly when the two pictures were shown, and what you’re
getting is you’re not getting that bottom diagram, you’re
getting the top diagram plus the cellar, and that’s what
we’re trying to alleviate from happening, I think.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Janoff, you were
in mid-question.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Just to clarify, so what
I’m hearing that the problem which is wording, which will
live in perpetuity, was intended to address the bulk and
mass issue, right?
ROBERT SCHULTZ: Correct.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Just to be clear, it sounds
like the work of the Policy Committee, and the issue that
the Town Attorney just described is still consistent with
trying to achieve the goal of providing hidden square
footage in-lieu of above ground visible mass, is that
correct?
JOEL PAULSON: I think that’s a fair statement,
yes.
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COMMISSIONER HUDES: And would you say that there
are multiple approaches to do that, that one of the
approaches is the one that was proposed by the Policy
Committee, but that potentially the neighboring
jurisdictions, of which there are five, or other towns that
have hillsides or slopes might also provide some other ways
of addressing that goal?
JOEL PAULSON: That is definitely correct.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Thank you. On page 5 of 9 I
want to focus on number 5. It reads, “Planning Commission
may allow an exception to the criteria listed above based
on extenuating or exceptional circumstances,” and so forth.
Listening to some of the things that we heard today, I want
to be clear on my understanding of this as I decide how I’m
going to recommend that this move forward.
Ms. Walters, in you opinion if an application
came in front of us that was proposing a basement that
would be visible, however, we have certainly seen homes
that we’ve allowed some exceptions in height, because they
truly couldn’t be seen by anyone, would we have the ability
to say in this instance we feel that because this is
completely hidden, not visible even to a neighbor, and
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because of the topography of the land this is actually
giving necessary square footage? I’m not saying it’s a
bowling alley; it’s necessary square footage. We could then
recommend that that be allowable and not be included in the
FAR? Are we allowed to do that? Did I stump you?
JOEL PAULSON: I would say that what you would be
looking for there, which is allowed currently by code and
by the Hillside Development Standards and Guidelines, would
be requesting an exception. There could be an instance with
one of the topics that you say yes, there are extenuating
circumstances that made that appropriate, but if it is
truly square footage and let’s say, for instance, it’s the
basement or the daylight, you’d be still calling that
square footage, but you’d be saying in that particular
instance it’s appropriate, and so you could grant that
exception. Again, you have that authority currently through
Town Code as well as Hillside Development Standards and
Guidelines.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Thank you.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Would the applicant have to ask
for an exception?
JOEL PAULSON: They would, yes.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Because we don’t normally get
that request.
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JOEL PAULSON: You see requests for exceptions
every once in a while; exceptions to the FAR are what you
typically see.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Right, okay. Vice Chair Kane,
deliberate to your heart’s content.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I think we’ve been arguing this
policy since the day after it was written. It was well
intended. I don't know if there were any attorneys on the
Council at that time. Was Mr. Blanton an attorney? I came
in after that. The Hillside Standards and Guidelines has my
name on it, has Chairman O'Donnell’s name on it, has Lee
Quintana’s name on it, but I wasn’t involved in the Cellar
Policy until the arguments started.
We look at this Cellar Policy in a tight little
package of 5x1, 2x2, 4’, whatever. The purpose of that
policy goes to the purpose of the FAR. It goes to the
purpose of the Hillside Standards and Guidelines. It goes
to the purpose of every rule we have, which is essentially
sustainability of those hills and protection of those
hills. We have language on cut and fill. We have language
on hauling. There’s a reason for all of that. It’s rabbits.
It’s nature. Those are the hillsides that we are supposed
to be protecting and preserving. It goes to the character
of the Town; it’s environmental issues. That’s where the
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property values are. That’s why people wish to stay here
and wish to come here, because of the way it looks. And if
they can’t get a basement bigger than your house, which
we’ve both seen, that house is still going to go for $55
billion dollars, and it’s going up every day. I don’t have
any money in this game. I don’t have any skin in this game.
I have a promise to preserve, to protect, without a badge,
but that’s what I’m supposed to be doing, that’s what I’ve
been trying to do for many years, and this policy we have
has not served us at all for the purposes that I’ve stated.
I understand the conflict of interest and what’s
at stake, but I’m not looking for any gray areas now. I’m
not looking for any compromises now. I’m looking for the
work of what the policy is… My proposal is that the work of
the Policy Committee goes forward as is to give us those
tools to do what we’re supposed to be doing on
sustainability and protection, and then if we need to step
back a little bit, that would be reasonable. But to step
forward from something unreasonable is cloudy and murky to
me.
I’ve read the document; I’ve talked to people
about the document. It is what we need, and then having
that position we can look at alternatives and exceptions
and try not to give the language away again.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: Let me just make one comment
and then I’ll get to you. If the original purpose of this
was to reduce bulk and mass, that’s a good purpose, even
for the rabbits up in the hills, so we don’t want to throw
the purpose out with the bath water. It’s very nice to talk
about our love of the hills, but if we want to accomplish a
reduction of bulk and mass we don’t do it by simply
adopting this policy. I just want to say that I would hope
that we could bring some intelligence to bear on whether or
not this policy should be changed, tweaked, or adopted, but
our desire to benefit mankind will not replace analysis.
Commissioner Badame.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: I would just like to state
that our current policies and definitions should work to
enforce the policy statement contained in Resolution 2002-
167. The problem is that we have creative interpretation,
and I can give an example that had to do with us amending
that resolution and that was the stacking of two cellars,
so I thought that was very creative. I don't know what that
did to bulk and mass, but certainly two cellars is going to
create more bulk and mass on the downside of the heavily
sloped hillside, so now we have an amendment that states
that there can only be one cellar per property.
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To me, we have to have specificity to avoid these
creative interpretations that come about, so I’m in favor
of these amendments. I find that they’re extremely detailed
and well written. I’m in support of them. The specificity
is important in maintaining our hillsides.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: It strikes me that the
intent to reduce bulk and mass hasn’t specifically been
addressed by the current policy or the amendments to the
Town Code, however, I agree with Commissioner Badame that
the change to the Town Code and abolishing current policy
does go a step further toward really making it quite clear
what an expectation is. It takes it to an extreme, but we
still have the latitude to negotiate some latitude there.
What I’m not hearing, which I think if we adopted
the change to the Town Code, is still missing is what I’m
hearing and what I feel personally is what we are missing
is addressing visible elevations. To Lee Quintana’s point,
when you look at the elevation from the side you don’t see
what you’re seeing when you look at that square on. If the
face of the house is stepped uphill, you may be looking at
100’ of house, not just 25’, based on how steep that hill
is and how much an architect has taken advantage of
stepping back portions of the house. So I think when you
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talk about an interruption to the hillside view, you really
need to be addressing that elevation that can be seen, or
there may be more than one elevation that can be seen.
I’m intrigued by a couple of suggestions that
have come up today, whether it’s separating the hillside
slope from flatlands to be more specific in attaching
criteria to the more challenging slopes, increasing the
slope deduction, reducing the FAR or giving a range of FAR
targets for the higher sloped properties, or perhaps even
penalizing property owners who come back with absolutely
maxing out, so if you’re going to max out there, you’ve got
to take something away in order to preserve the spirit of
the reduction of mass and bulk. Also I like the idea of
reallocating the square footage, so if you’re giving more
below ground but you’re not seeing that reduction above
ground, do something so that that happens.
There seems to be a step in the right direction,
but there’s something missing, and whether it’s solved by
another policy or a further amendment to Town Code, I think
it might be worth taking advantage of the architects
volunteering to work together in order to come up with
something that satisfies the Town.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Burch.
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COMMISSIONER BURCH: Commissioner Janoff and I
are thinking very similarly here. I think this is a great
document, and I’ve sat in on enough applications that are
the reason this is here, but I agree. I still feel like
maybe there’s a little bit of work, and so my question to
Staff is if we were to approve this moving forward, could
we approve it however with recommendations.
JOEL PAULSON: Of course, you can provide
direction. I think some of the stuff that Ms. Janoff
brought up, those are very tied together, but they’re
completely separate from what the Policy Committee was
looking at. This is specifically addressing the Cellar
Policy. We have brought up many of those things in many
forms, including the priority setting session, and those
did not rise from a workload perspective.
But yes, whether it’s reducing the height,
reducing the FAR, reducing the coverage, increasing the
setbacks, there are a number of things that can also impact
that, but we haven’t received direction yet to move forward
in that, but you clearly can provide any direction, any
recommendation going forward to Council.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Could that even include a
recommendation that I feel like there potentially should be
an additional committee meeting that included an architect,
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one resident, perhaps a member of the Planning Commission?
Can I recommend that? Because the people that sit on that
Policy Committee are very intelligent, but I know that
things have come to light to me tonight I didn’t even
consider when I read this document that made me think if in
ten years people are going to ask me if I had anything to
do with this and what was the intent, that maybe there are
a few things we need to still vet out.
ROBERT SCHULTZ: I think the recommendation,
which would be excellent, which I think we have much
improvement to do is to make the recommendation that when
there are Policy Committee meetings that entail these type
of subjects or other subjects related to planning to make
certain there’s more than just the outreach of our current
legal requirements to publicize, but to do that type of
outreach.
I think we could have done better in this, and
we’ve seen it in some other incidences. I took an approach
for our smoking regulation and actually hand delivered to
27 different businesses that were going to be affected by
it, because I just felt like they weren’t getting enough
notice, and those are the type of things we just have to be
more aware of and not try to put the (inaudible) on the
developer or on the applicants or on the citizens, so I
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think that’s where the recommendation needs to come to the
Policy Committee, not that they include one person from
this or that, it’s that we just have to do better outreach.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Okay.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Before I call on Commissioner
Hudes, I just want to say this. I tend to think we’ve heard
from both the architects present and the architects who
were represented by other architects here that they for
whatever reason, and whether they should have known better
or whether they shouldn’t have known better, would like to
have some input. I don’t know that we’re on a train track
that has got to get to the next station in the next hour. I
don’t see any particular reason why we could not do that,
get not only the architects’ input, but anybody else, and I
think what our Town Attorney just said makes sense. A lot
of things are noticed that most people never notice.
The problem I only have with this solution is
it’s sort of an ultimate solution, and with things that
make everything black and white, it’s great if that’s the
only thing you can do. I don't know that that is the only
thing we can do. I do know that we started with a purpose,
which was to reduce bulk and mass by putting in basements
and/or cellars. Now we’re basically throwing that out,
because in part being on the Commission I can think of
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times when perhaps I should have been more firm in saying
wait a minute, you’ve got the maximum above ground, why in
the heck are you asking for this basement? Now, I was not
the only one who perhaps didn’t do that, but there’s some
responsibility that lies with me and perhaps with some of
us.
I personally would like to get as much input in a
short time as we could. I don’t like it when our
professionals in town, who are good people and they appear
before us all the time, feel that they have not had an
opportunity to have some input. We don’t have to adopt that
input, we can go anywhere we want to, but I would
personally encourage that we not reach a decision tonight
other than to say we should get that input and then come
back and make a decision and refer that to the Town
Council. What we’ve read in our record does not show much
basis for these decisions. I don’t question the people who
made that, but I don’t share their knowledge; I don't know
what the basis of it was. I just wanted to say that before
I call on Commissioner Hudes. Go ahead.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. The matter in
front of us I think is an important and urgent issue to
achieve a goal that I think is an excellent goal, and
that’s to provide hidden square footage in-lieu of above
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ground visible mass. I think that one way to achieve it is
in the recommendation from the Policy Committee, but I’ve
also heard testimony tonight that says there are
potentially some unintended consequences of that that may
actually cause us to not achieve that and to have a
situation that’s potentially even worse than what we have.
Yet, I think the idea is a good starting point to
work from. I wouldn’t be comfortable about approving that
without having further understanding and discussion of
this. I particularly am interested in how other
jurisdictions that have a hillside have addressed this
issue, and the five that were proposed of which I think
three may have relevance, they’re great, they’re right next
door, but there are lots of other jurisdictions as well,
and I think that it might be valuable for the professionals
in the architecture field to bring us some of that
information. I know it’s difficult for Staff to achieve
that, but I know that a lot of the professionals who
testified or are working in town have access to that kind
of information, and I think that would be very valuable.
So my opinion, rather than start with passing
this recommendation it would be a better thing to do to
achieve that goal to potentially hold a study session and
to specifically invite to that session professionals with
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experience not only in the architecture field but also I
think in the real estate field as well, so that we can
understand if we’re putting ourselves at a disadvantage to
other communities by adopting a particular policy, and to
work this issue a bit more before making a recommendation.
I think it is a priority to solve it, but I don’t think I
personally have the information in front of me to be able
to support what’s been recommended.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: I just want to add to that,
because I feel pretty strongly about this, that if we were
going to do that and recommend that architects or others be
invited, I feel very strongly that there are probably some
residents that would request to be invited to that, and I
would hope they would be. They are directly affected by
this and have strong opinions, too, and have done a lot of
research that I (inaudible).
CHAIR O'DONNELL: We’ve had some testimony
tonight from people who qualify under that, and we would
want to expand that so we’d not only get people in who
perhaps one can argue make a living at this versus people
who live with this, and so yeah, a broad group. Vice Chair
Kane.
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VICE CHAIR KANE: I hear the Commissioners and
appreciate and respect the sense of fair play. It certainly
can be construed as an issue of fair play, but I also want
to isolate that what we’re talking about is a contest over
projects that are contested. The projects that do what they
need to do, we never hear about them. They can go to
Development Review Committee, other subcommittees. I see
houses getting built, I say to Joel, “What’s up with that?”
“Well, it went through DRC. Everything is copacetic.” What
we see are the ones that push the envelope. What we see is
something where Staff has a concern. So I appreciate the
fair play, but we’re not talking about all the houses in
all humanity, we’re talking about the houses that push the
envelope and threaten the things we’re supposed to stand
for.
One of the things I thought when I read about the
4’ limit was it would prevent the clear appearance of third
floor dwelling units, because we’ve lost a number of
projects that look like third floor but it wasn’t, it was a
cellar. That’s only the issues that are being contested.
The ones that play by the rules, we don’t even know what’s
going on. We see a house being built, it’s because they did
it the way the language requires them to do it. Thank you,
Chair.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: Yeah, I agree, and my
question I guess to Staff is if we were to approve the
matter that’s before us, which eliminates one source of
confusion in the Cellar Policy and provides clarity via
Town Code and other modifications to Town documents that
create consistent language, the Planning Commission still
has the opportunity, as you said, to address exceptions
that we feel are in the spirit of what we are trying to
achieve in terms of producing bulk and mass.
I guess personally I don’t see any issue with
approving what’s before us and proceeding with further
clarification, because this doesn’t do anything regarding
the bulk and mass either. That’s why I was saying it’s kind
of six of one, half a dozen of the other, except that if
the policy continues to provide for creativity that we
really don’t want, then tighten it up, throw it away, let
this change stand, and then proceed with additional
modifications, perhaps additional policy or amendments,
that do address the spirit of what we’re trying to
accomplish.
There’s no harm in putting something strict in
place if we have the latitude to negotiate back from it,
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and if it clarifies something that’s causing problems, I
think that’s a reasonable thing to do.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: But I guess to that point,
and this really is a question for Staff, if this new policy
were adopted, wouldn’t there be projects that never come to
the Planning Commission that would be denied?
JOEL PAULSON: There are always projects that if
they’re denied they can be appealed to the Planning
Commission. I will tell you that if something is at a DRC
level typically and we can’t approve it, it gets forwarded
to the Planning Commission. I can’t recall a project that
Staff has denied at DRC and that was not forwarded to the
Planning Commission; that’s not the typical course, so you
would still see that.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: But there are projects that
are on a slope, that are not even on a hillside, that are
just approved at the Staff level, and they would be
rejected if this policy were adopted.
JOEL PAULSON: If they exceed the FAR, then they
would automatically come to the Planning Commission, so
they wouldn’t be rejected; it’s just a different process.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane.
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VICE CHAIR KANE: How would the Chair suggest we
proceed? We don’t have a motion before us per se, or do we?
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I have not commented. I’ll
comment, then your pleasure; you can make any motion the
Commission wishes to make.
Just as a lawyer, I guess, I don’t believe in
adopting rules because I know that I can adopt exceptions
to them. Nor do I believe in adopting a rule because I know
we can study it and change it. I’d kind of like to believe
that before we adopt a rule we know what we’re doing, and
I’ve heard a lot of testimony tonight that said, you know,
you haven’t heard from us at all, we make our living doing
this. I’ve heard very intelligent comments from people who
think this is a good thing. My own analysis of it is we
might as well get rid of that portion that said the reason
we do this is to reduce the bulk and mass, because what
we’re saying is we don’t want any more of this, we want all
the bulk and mass above ground. Now, sure, people can come
in and ask for exceptions.
I guess all I’m saying is what in the world is
the harm in setting this on a 30-day calendar or something?
I think this flies in the face of the intention of reducing
the bulk and the mass, because if I were an architect and
you told me the things you’re talking about tonight, it
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would be a cold day in hell before I’d fool around with a
basement, unless people wanted to store their stuff. The
purpose was good. It’s not being carried out, so I guess
I’m just saying if we’ve totally given up on the ability to
make it work, then yeah, sure, just say basically we’re not
having basements or cellars in Los Gatos anymore. So first
I’ll ask Commissioner Burch.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: That leads to a question of
Staff, because I see both sides here. Can we do that? Can
we say all right, we want to fast track this and hold a
meeting within a month that includes public and speed this
along?
JOEL PAULSON: You can request that. Staff will
not be able to produce that. We have an extremely tight
workload in the first place.
COMMISSIONER BURCH: Okay, well that’s what I’m
asking. What’s a realistic timeline?
JOEL PAULSON: Fall. We’ve been at this with the
Policy Committee for almost a year, so to get through that
there are a number of options. The five jurisdictions that
are provided, those are strictly examples. We’re not going
to analyze everybody’s existing policies and then talk to
them, because as was stated this evening, that might be
what the policy says but how they actually interpret and
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implement it is completely different. We are not going to
take on that exercise. We don’t have the resources to do
it. So perfectly fine whichever direction the Commission
would like to go.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Let me say this. I understand
Staff’s problem, this is you work very, very hard and
you’ve only got so many hours in the day, et cetera. If you
assume for the moment that therefore we’re not going to try
to burden Staff further, I guess one question I have is if
you simply set a time within the 30 days for people’s
input. Not to burden Staff; obviously you might have
somebody show up or something, but we have not heard from
the architects, we have not heard from a lot of people on
this, because one, people didn’t know about it, and I think
what the Staff drew up—and they did a good job—but I think
they were in essence told to draw up, you didn’t dream it
up yourself.
Perhaps if there had been more to consider,
something different, Staff has already told us there are
more ways to solve this problem than this one, but if we’re
saying that it’s not practical to listen to some input for
the next 30 days, because we could say we’re not going to
have any more meetings, but we’re going to allow whoever
wants to submit just to submit, so the next time we meet,
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and I don't know when is the next time we can meet, they’ll
tell us in a minute, we’ll at least have some writing from
these people. We’ve heard there are architects who have
strong feelings but couldn’t make it tonight, which I can
kind of understand if they didn’t know about it. Again, I
would feel better if we gave everybody the opportunity to
make these comments. Everybody. But if the Staff says we
couldn’t do that until the fall, then I should know that.
JOEL PAULSON: No, I think I was speaking to the
study session and a committee and everything else. So
perfectly willing to take more comments. It’s not going to
change our recommendation. We’re bringing forward a
recommendation from the Policy Committee that will provide
you additional information and food for thought, which may
inform your ultimate recommendation before it goes to
Council.
I would suggest then that it would go out to June
28th, if I can breath that far, gives a little bit more than
a month for folks to comment. We will also endeavor to
reach out to the two or three local AIA groups, and so that
even the folks that may not be in the loop from this
evening, in that chain, that they also have additional
opportunity to provide input on it.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: I’ve got a bunch of hands up
here, so I’ll call Commissioner Badame.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: I would not be in favor of
stalling this out. It’s been in the works for about a year,
there have been multiple Policy Committee meetings that
people could have gone to, there was time to get more
written correspondence than what we’ve received, people can
take time to come down at night for a Council or Planning
Commission hearing. We all have busy lives. We can talk
this thing to death. I believe that we can forward it to
Council. The architects have plenty of time between now and
then to actually meet individually with Council members,
supply more written material, you know, they don’t get to
talk to us, so I think there is plenty of opportunity and I
think that I would not be in favor of a study session; I
would like to forward this on to Council.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Just to make the record
correct, we’re no longer suggesting a study session, we’re
suggesting that people be given until the 28th of June to
submit written comments. I understand your comment will
apply to that, too, but the record should not say it was
for a study session.
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Okay.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
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COMMISSIONER HUDES: Did you want to…
COMMISSIONER BADAME: Regardless of study session
or delaying, it was my comment that I’m not in favor of
delaying for more public comment, because Council will get
plenty of it.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: That’s what I understood your
remark to be, I just want to clarify. Yes, Commissioner
Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I have to respectfully
disagree. I don’t think that the format of a Council
meeting is the best way to take input and resolve a
question like this. I think it requires some dialogue, and
I believe that this is a matter that is not going to have a
huge impact if we took another period of time to deal with
it. I think it can have enormous impact on a residence, on
real estate values, on other things that are potentially
consequences of this, and I believe that there are some
times when an ability to sit across the table and have a
dialogue about something is more appropriate for solving an
issue than passing what I can see is a proposal that some
people are not terribly enthusiastic about.
I think it would be better to spend more time, to
do some more work on this, and so from my perspective I
think a study session is the best way to deal with this
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kind of an issue where more information is needed, more
data is needed, and more back and forth dialogue would be
appropriate to solving the issue. For instance, the
testimony from Ms. Quintana, which I thought was very
interesting and compelling didn’t fit into three minutes,
and I sure would like to have a dialogue with her as well
as with others who might choose to speak about this and
provide some input, including some developers, including
some real estate professionals, and including residents who
are impacted by this overall.
So I, for one, am not in a rush to pass this on
when I think the Planning Commission has a responsibility
to deal with this and to do so in a manner much more
considered than the way we’ve approached it so far.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I agree strongly with
Commissioner Badame and Commissioner Hudes, and I look at
the Staff Report and it does allow us under Alternative C
to continue the matter to a date certain with specific
direction.
If we want to have a firm recommendation to
Council, and I do want to have a firm recommendation to
Council, then taking another four weeks perhaps, not the
next meeting but the one after, allowing for input to be
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articulated and submitted to us in enough time to read it,
not the date of the hearing, because the matters are
complicated, and if we got that in advance, then I think
the concerns of Commissioner Hudes would be addressed, but
to move forward on that day, not to slow down Staff,
they’ve been working on it for a year, not even a
disrespect Staff that they’ve been working on it for a
year, but give time for more input and then, Commissioner
Badame, we’ll make a decision.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Let me make something clear,
and that is we could not have a study session, listening to
Staff, until the fall. It is my hope that that being the
case and reading, I think, my fellow commissioners, that’s
not going to get approved. On the other hand, I have
suggested that perhaps to the 28th I think was the date
suggested, we at least allow for written input. Clearly not
the dialogue that you’re talking about. On the other hand,
we’ve had a dialogue this evening after a fashion. If
people have an opportunity to submit their writing to us
and we have an opportunity to consider that, and then they
have an opportunity to speak to us at the next meeting,
that may not be as good as a study session, I’ll give you
that, but I do think it is better than simply adopting it
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tonight when all we’re really saying is could give us what
is essentially four more weeks.
I don’t disagree with Commissioner Badame. Sure,
people should pay more attention and show up and all that,
but I just don’t see anything wrong with giving people a
longer opportunity. My judgment is a very, very important
thing, and I know you all feel the same way, it’s just we
come down somewhat differently. Yes, Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: I am in favor of a very
brief period during which additional public comment would
be accepted or directed to the Planning Commission,
however, to the extent possible I would recommend that we
not ask for broad comment, but for some specific language
that would help to achieve what we are trying to achieve in
terms of reducing bulk and mass.
One of the things I did appreciate about Tony
Jeans’ comments on his PowerPoint version, toward the back
there were a couple of recommendations for here’s an
alternative wording that’s not quite as extreme as the Town
Code but not where we are, because we can take comment
forever and then we have to reinterpret it and reduce it
down to some specific language that would work.
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So I would be willing to accept a short timeframe
during which we request input for specific language on how
to achieve the goal of reducing bulk and mass.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I’m going to call on Vice Chair
Kane in one second.
I just want to say this: Anyone listening to
this, whether they’re in the audience or elsewhere, should
know that we’re pretty close to making a decision now. If
we give the community an extra 30 days, no more than that,
whatever it was, the 28th, they had better make good and
focused arguments, because your comment is correct. We
don’t want to invent the wheel, but we’d sure like to
understand a little bit about it, and I think we’ve had a
pretty thorough discussion tonight ourselves as to what we
may be concerned with. Now, if somebody wants to submit a
letter that doesn’t respond to that, I don’t advise that.
Okay, so I’ve got Vice Chair Kane, and I don't
know if there was another hand up or not.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m going to make a motion that
under Alternative C-3 of the Staff Report we continue the
matter to a date certain, and I’d recommend that date
certain be June 28th, and it says give specific direction.
Commissioner Janoff has tried to specify that specific
direction, and my motion would be that anybody can say
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whatever they want to say in advance of the meeting,
please, and also attend the meeting if they wish, and
that’s my specific direction specifically to get that input
that some of us feel is lacking right now. I need a second.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I’m prepared to second that
motion, but I would add a comment to that, if I may, and
that is that particularly for the real estate professionals
and the architects who understand the issue and understand
the potential ways of solving this, it would be extremely
helpful to get some specific recommendations in terms of
not only here are the ways you could address it, but here
is the way we think you should address that issue to
achieve the objective that you’re after based on our
consideration and our knowledge of various other
municipalities and other ways that this has been proposed,
and to draw on our community as compared to put that load
onto Staff. I think we have very talented folks who appear
in front of us, and I would say that that time period would
be very valuable to us if we had very specific
recommendations about changes we might make to achieve that
goal.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: And I want to accentuate what
Vice Chair Kane said. People sometimes submit wonderful
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documents to us on the night of the hearing. It’s humanly
impossible to give that document the kind of attention that
it perhaps deserves. You will obviously have the right to
do whatever you wish, but since I would really love to be
able to consider what you’re saying, I’d just encourage you
to get it to us early enough that we can give it the
attention it deserves. Commissioner Janoff.
COMMISSIONER JANOFF: In this motion does that
imply that the Cellar Policy as written, our inclination is
to do away with that, because it’s not working, and modify
Town Code, or does this just go back to ground zero? I just
want to know where we are in terms of what we’re likely to
do in a month.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: In a month, everything is as it
is today, until we take action, and when we take action
we’re making a recommendation, so things don’t change until
the Council does something. So nothing is going to change
today to the 28th, but now at least no one can come before
us and say oh, we didn’t know about it.
And more importantly to me than we didn’t know
about it is I would love to be helped, because I agree with
Commissioner Hudes, it’s a very, very serious matter. Now,
it may be that this is the right answer, and it may be that
this is not the right answer. Vice Chair Kane.
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VICE CHAIR KANE: Well, the seconder proposed an
amendment, and his specificity doesn’t conflict with my
general recommendation that anybody can say anything, so…
CHAIR O'DONNELL: He didn’t propose…
VICE CHAIR KANE: Whatever, he’s a seconder with
an amendment and…
CHAIR O'DONNELL: No, he didn’t have an
amendment, is what I’m saying.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I wouldn’t characterize it
as an amendment; I characterize it as comments that I made
to folks who might provide information.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I think that’s what you said.
VICE CHAIR KANE: That’s a second?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: It’s a straight second.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Yeah. Are there comments or
questions? If not, I’ll call the question. All those in
favor of the motion, signify by saying aye. So I think we
got everybody but… Okay, so it’s unanimous, so it will be
continued then till the 28th, is that the date?
JOEL PAULSON: That’s correct, it’s continued to
a date certain of June 28th. No additional noticing will go
out, but we will work to do some outreach, and hopefully
the folks in the audience tonight will do some help for us
as well for those we may not contact.
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CHAIR O'DONNELL: And I would request this of
Staff, and I don’t think it’s a heavy burden, to the extent
that anything comes in really early before we would
normally get our package, I know that you will just forward
it to us by email or otherwise, because the sooner we all
get to grapple with this, the better it’s going to be. So
thank you.
I think that concludes the Commission’s work. How
about Mr. Paulson or our Town Attorney?
ROBERT SCHULTZ: Since we’re trying to involve
the public even more, tomorrow there is a Policy Committee
meeting at 9:30am, and although it’s not taking up this
issue it is taking up an issue that we’ve been dealing
with, and that’s late submittals by applicants and by
appellants that have come in after the Thursday deadline,
after the Friday deadline, come in Monday.
We’ve seen an uptick in that from, like I said,
both the appellants and the applicants, so the Policy
Committee is finalizing a rule tomorrow that would be
implemented in your rules and in Council rules that would
require all submittals from the applicant and the appellant
to be in 14 days before the hearing. So if you’d like to
comment on that, you can come tomorrow, but that’s another
one we’re working on.
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The Policy Committee meets once a month on I
believe it’s the third or fourth Thursday, and as Joel
mentioned, they are looking at quite a few land use
policies. The other one on tomorrow morning’s agenda has to
do with downtown employee parking, not really related to
land use as much as it is to the downtown area, and so
we’ll try our best to get the word out even more and make
certain the public is aware of what items we’re looking at.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: I’m expressing my complete
ignorance on that first point. The proposal is that the
public must submit 14 days…
ROBERT SCHULTZ: Public comment will still remain
the same, and that can be any time. This will just apply to
the applicant and the appellant.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Oh, okay.
ROBERT SCHULTZ: And with the appellant only if
there is an appeal, and the applicant for the first time it
comes to the Planning Commission almost always has
everything in way beforehand. It’s been with a few appeals
that have occurred lately that it’s gone to Council, both
the appellant and the applicant have waited, and in my mind
at least they were even done with their analysis and what
they wanted to submit, but still waited till the Tuesday to
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submit it to Council, and that’s what we’re trying to
alleviate.
CHAIR O'DONNELL: That makes a lot more sense to
me. Any other questions? Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Yeah, to the Director of
Community Development, do we have the money or could we get
the space in the Los Gatos Weekly to put in items like
this? I know we put agendas up on the website.
JOEL PAULSON: We actually put a half page ad in
on this in last week’s weekly.
VICE CHAIR KANE: In the weekly?
JOEL PAULSON: Yeah.
VICE CHAIR KANE: On this?
JOEL PAULSON: Correct.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Can I change my motion?
CHAIR O'DONNELL: Could you read it, please? Any
other questions or comments? If not, the meeting is
adjourned. Thank you, all.