08-24-22 Minutes - PC
110 E. Main Street Los Gatos, CA 95030 ● 408-354-6832
www.losgatosca.gov
TOWN OF LOS GATOS
PLANNING COMMISSION
REPORT
MINUTES OF THE PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING
AUGUST 24, 2022
The Planning Commission of the Town of Los Gatos conducted a Regular Meeting on
Wednesday, August 24, 2022, at 7:00 p.m.
This meeting was conducted utilizing teleconferencing and electronic means consistent with
Government Code Section 54953, as Amended by Assembly Bill 361, in response to the state
of emergency relating to COVID-19 and enabling teleconferencing accommodations by
suspending or waiving specified provisions in the Ralph M. Brown Act (Government Code §
54950 et seq.). Consistent with AB 361 and Town of Los Gatos Resolution 2021-044, all
planning commissioners and staff participated from remote locations and all voting was
conducted via roll call vote.
MEETING CALLED TO ORDER AT 7:00 PM
ROLL CALL
Present: Chair Melanie Hanssen, Vice Chair Jeffrey Barnett, Commissioner Kylie Clark,
Commissioner Kathryn Janoff, Commissioner Reza Tavana, and Commissioner Emily Thomas
Absent: Commissioner Steve Raspe
VERBAL COMMUNICATIONS
None.
CONSENT ITEMS (TO BE ACTED UPON BY A SINGLE MOTION)
1. Approval of Minutes – August 10, 2022
MOTION: Motion by Commissioner Clark to approve adoption of the Consent
Calendar. Seconded by Commissioner Thomas.
VOTE: Motion passed unanimously.
PUBLIC HEARINGS
PAGE 2 OF 6 MINUTES OF PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF AUGUST 24, 2022
2. 17291 Wedgewood Avenue
Architecture and Site Application S-21-027
APN 409-14-013
Applicant: Edick Lazari
Appellant: Douglas Scott Maynard
Property Owner: Young Kim
Project Planner: Sean Mullin
Consider an Appeal of the Development Review Committee to approve a request for
construction of a new single-family residence and site improvements requiring a grading
permit on property zoned R-1:8.
Vice Chair Barnett indicated that he would recuse himself from participating in the public
hearing for 17291 Wedgewood Avenue due to personal reasons.
Sean Mullin, Associate Planner, presented the staff report.
Opened Public Comment.
Douglas Scott Maynard, Appellant
- We are asking to reduce the size and mass of the proposed two-story home at 17291
Wedgewood. The mass and height of the home would not be consistent with the homes in
the immediate neighborhood, as stated in the Residential Design Guidelines, because 100
percent of the houses in the immediate neighborhood have one-story rooflines.
Additionally, our property adjoins on the left side toward the rear where our pool and
garden are, and the proposed project would totally eliminate our back yard privacy, which
we have had for 27 years. Our issue is not that the proposed house is two stories, but the
height and the mass of the house. The story poles for the project are twice as high as the
houses in the immediate neighborhood.
Claire Han, Applicant
- My parents are the homeowners of the subject property at 17291 Wedgewood Avenue. In
addition to meeting the basic findings required for approval, the proposed plan has also
been designed and further revised in careful consideration of its potential impact on
surrounding neighbors. Building a single-story home would not be feasible due to a
number of site constraints, including: a required 20-foot right-of-way dedication; another
10-foot utility easement; offsets for trees to remain on the property; the converted ADU; a
two-car garage with storage; and a back yard further restricts the potential buildable area.
Two story homes in the vicinity are neither unprecedented nor out of character, and are
compatible with the existing immediate neighborhood. The majority of the neighbors
support the proposed plan. The Appellant and their son have expressed concerns
regarding the potential loss of privacy for a portion of their shared yard, but changes to the
PAGE 3 OF 6 MINUTES OF PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF AUGUST 24, 2022
ground floor have been made to address these concerns by moving the home closer to
Wedgewood and modifying the building envelop to provide additional setbacks. The
building footprint has been moved away from the Appellant’s pool area, and the windows
are now set back an additional 5-12 feet. The second floor now sits 75 feet away from the
fence line between the subject property and the Appellant’s pool area, and my parents
have paid for half the costs to construct a new six-foot fence along the shared property
line. They have also agreed to a condition of approval to add planting along that shared
property line to provide privacy screening. There are no plans to convert the property into
four units.
Douglas Scott Maynard, Appellant
- The rear of the proposed house contains a bank of windows looking toward our yard, and
the story poles indicate that those windows would look into our yard. This project can be
done as a one-story house. The house has been moved forward, so there are no setback
problems; the garage is extra large and could be reduced; the patio could be eliminated
and made into house area; and the back yard area could give them a few hundred more
feet. Altogether they could get at least 2,400 feet out of the house plus their 955 square
foot basement, equaling 3,359 square feet, which should be plenty for them. Other
neighbors I’ve talked to are unhappy about two-stories going into this neighborhood. If
built, this home will change the entire neighborhood, which is made up of small lots on a
small street.
Will Maynard
- I am the Appellant’s son and live at 14344 La Rinconada Drive. I appreciate the effort the
Applicants have gone through to address our privacy concerns, but they are not sufficient.
If this house is approved as a two-story, there is nothing preventing the rest of the
neighborhood from building up and looking directly into our yard. When the home next
door did unpermitted construction of a garage the Town intervened and forced them to
block all the windows, which preserved their privacy, which we are now at risk of losing
again.
Closed Public Comment.
Commissioners discussed the matter.
MOTION: Motion by Commissioner Janoff to deny an appeal of the Development
Review Committee, subject to an additional condition of approval that
the construction management plan shall restrict vehicles, material, or
traffic of the construction crew from using Browns Lane. Seconded by
Commissioner Clark.
Commissioner Clark requested the motion be amended to add “with the recommendation
that the Applicant consider planting more trees.”
PAGE 4 OF 6 MINUTES OF PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF AUGUST 24, 2022
The maker of the motion accepted the amendment to the motion.
VOTE: Motion passed unanimously.
3. Review and Recommendation of the Draft Objective Standards to the Town Council
Sean Mullin, Associate Planner, presented the staff report.
Opened Public Comment.
Rob Moore
- I support the objective standards and thank the Commission and staff for their hard work in
putting this together. These objective standards will do a lot to streamline the planning
process while ensuring high-quality projects. The prospect of objective standards is
incredibly exciting to the people I have spoken with.
Bess Wiersema, Studio 3 Design
- I represent your local architects including Gary Kolhsaat, Louie Leu, Tom Sloan, Jay Plett,
Noel Cross, Terry Martin, Bob Flury, Jennifer Kretschmer, and Tony Jeans. We have
reviewed the document and met to figure out how to best support the Town in
streamlining the process for permitting, but also allow for design guidelines and objective
standards that would provide a positive built environment for the Town. We have
significant concerns about what we see in the draft documents and request this be
continued and that the Commission lean on its local architects and designers to help define
details that are applicable to the Town and community. This document creates a rule of
thumb that can be used by everyone for essentially design by numbers, which means you
end up with a project that looks exactly like what the diagram defines. We’re also very
concerned that several of the items within each of the categories are not relative to a
positive built environment and do not reflect local standards for other communities that
are similar in size and scale to ours. We’re concerned that the diagrams shown in the
document are limiting in terms of form and proportion. We respect that the Commission is
trying to streamline the process by objectifying subjective design standards; however, that
is not the definition of good design. Trying to objectify guidelines and subjective rules is
something everyone wants to do because we’re trying to make it easier for people to
understand what to design to get approved and make it easier for the Commission to
support or not support a proposal, and request that you respect the fact that there are
items already part of the permit process: peer review through the Town’s consulting
architect; public comment on projects; and a robust conversation around them. Many of
the architecture features suggested only reflect traditional detailing and architecture. How
will more modern elements be classified, and who judges if a proposed element meets this
definition? The danger is that only traditional architecture will meet these qualifications,
and that is not necessarily relevant for multi-family. We are available to answer questions
PAGE 5 OF 6 MINUTES OF PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF AUGUST 24, 2022
and have categorized each section and have concerns and options we would be willing to
share.
Lee Quintana
- I encourage you to consider meeting with the architects of the Town. Objective standards
are a good way to speed up the processing of projects, but the standards have to be easily
understood by everyone who sees them. I agree with Bess Wiersema that the illustrations
in these objective standards tend to make one think that all these buildings are going to be
absolutely symmetrical, square, street facing, and boring. I think we need objective
standards, but I’d like staff to explain what these particular standards apply to and why
they are being developed, because it is my understanding they will only apply to very
specific projects, not every project, and that it is not clear what projects the objective
standards apply to.
Closed Public Comment.
Commissioners discussed the matter.
Opened Public Comment for a specific question.
Planning Commission questions of Bess Wiersema followed.
Closed Public Comment.
Commissioners discussed the matter.
MOTION: Motion by Vice Chair Barnett to continue the public hearing to a date
certain of September 14, 2022. Seconded by Commissioner Clark.
Commissioners discussed the matter.
VOTE: Motion passed unanimously.
OTHER BUSINESS
REPORT FROM THE DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT
Jennifer Armer, Planning Manager
• None.
PAGE 6 OF 6 MINUTES OF PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF AUGUST 24, 2022
SUBCOMMITTEE REPORTS/COMMISSION MATTERS
Housing Element Advisory Board
Chair Hanssen
- HEAB met August 18, 2022 to review the entire Draft Housing Element. The draft
document will be released for public comment before being forwarded for review to
Housing and Community Development, who will ultimately certify the document.
Historic Preservation Committee
Commissioner Clark
- HPC met on August 24, 2022 and approved two requests for removal from the historic
resources inventory, approved construction of an addition to a building in the Downtown
Historic Commercial District, and forwarded a recommendation to the Community
Development Director on allowing variances to an accessory structure.
ADJOURNMENT
The meeting adjourned at 9:26 p.m.
This is to certify that the foregoing is a true
and correct copy of the minutes of the
August 24, 2022 meeting as approved by the
Planning Commission.
_____________________________
/s/ Vicki Blandin