Attachment 03
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
1
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
A P P E A R A N C E S:
Los Gatos Planning
Commissioners:
Mary Badame, Chair
D. Michael Kane, Vice Chair
Charles Erekson
Melanie Hanssen
Matthew Hudes
Town Manager: Laurel Prevetti
Community Development
Director:
Joel Paulson
Town Attorney: Robert Schultz
Transcribed by: Vicki L. Blandin
(510) 337-1558
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
2
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
P R O C E E D I N G S:
CHAIR BADAME: Moving to public hearing Item 3,
22 South Santa Cruz Avenue, Conditional Use Permit
Application U-16-003, requesting approval for a Conditional
Use Permit to operate group cooking classes, Cucina
Bambini, with beer and wine service and alternative use of
parking on property zoned C-2. APN 510-45-014.
May I have a show of hands from Commissioners who
have visited the site? Are there any disclosures from
Commissioners? Seeing none, Ms. Puga, I understand you’re
providing the Staff Report this evening?
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct. Good evening,
Commissioners.
The Applicant, Cucina Bambini, is requesting to
operate group-cooking classes with beer and wine service
and alternating use of parking on property zoned C-2. The
Applicant is proposing to merge two vacant ground floor
spaces into one 1,475 square foot space. The Applicant is
requesting to operate from 10:00am until 9:00pm seven days
a week. The proposed floor plan includes a full kitchen
with modular worktables and a flexible space separate from
the kitchen area for customers to partake in what are known
as “drop-in activities.”
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
3
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
The Applicant is requesting a flexible class size
that does not propose a maximum cap on the number of
students and instructors. This is due to the fact that not
all scheduled cooking classes may be at capacity, and which
drop-in space would be available.
The existing commercial building provides four
parking spaces onsite and has credit for 16 parking spaces
in the Parking Assessment District. The Applicant has
entered into a parking agreement with the landlord for six
additional parking space credits Monday through Friday
after 5:30pm and all day Saturday and Sunday. Given the
proposed parking agreement the Applicant is requesting
approval to increase the number of students and instructors
after 5:30pm Monday through Friday and from 10:00am until
9:00pm Saturday and Sunday.
The Applicant is also proposing beer and wine
service during cooking classes and private events. The Town
of Los Gatos Alcoholic Beverage Policy requires any new
service of alcoholic beverages to be reviewed by the
Planning Commission with a recommendation to the Town
Council. The Applicant is also proposing beer and wine
service for the drop-in activities. As described in the
project designation included as Exhibit 4, activities would
include cupcake making and decorating. As defined by
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
4
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
General Policy 7 of the Alcoholic Beverage Policy, these
activities would not be considered a meal.
Staff has recommend Conditions of Approval
regarding the shared parking agreement, operating hours and
alcohol service. The proposed use is in conformance with
the Town Code and consistent with the General Plan. Staff
recommends that the Planning Commission condition the
maximum number of students and instructors allowed at one
time, as well as condition that no alcohol service shall be
permitted in the drop-in space, and forward a
recommendation of approval to the Town Council for the
proposed project.
There is also a Desk Item before you this evening
that contains two public comments that were received after
the distribution of the Staff Report.
This completes Staff’s presentation and we are
available for any questions.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Ms. Puga. Do we have
questions of Ms. Puga? Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. You say that
Staff is recommending setting a maximum number of students.
What is that number?
JOCELYN PUGA: Working with the Applicants,
originally Staff came up with a maximum of 16 students and
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
5
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
two instructors Monday through Friday from 10:00am until
5:30pm, and with the additional parking based on the shared
parking agreement, that would increase to 31 students and
three instructors.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Follow up to that. Are there
any other businesses that have a complex parking
arrangement by time such as this one?
JOCELYN PUGA: There are some group uses in the
downtown. One in particular does use this alternate
parking, and they also do have a shared parking agreement
with the office use in the same building, so it’s a similar
scenario.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Do they have different
maximums at different hours?
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct. It’s after the
office use, so it’s 5:30pm.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I had some other questions,
but they’re on different aspects.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen, you had your
hand up.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I had a couple questions.
One was I know that the CUP goes with the site, so
supposing that the proposed use, a cooking class with beer
and wine service, didn’t succeed, the only permitted use
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
6
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
allowed subsequent to that without a new CUP would be a
company that offers cooking classes, not any other kind of
class?
JOCELYN PUGA: If the use were to leave the
space, the CUP does run with the land. If another cooking
space wanted to come in, they would have to operate under
the same Conditions of Approval in order to use that space.
Otherwise, they would need to come back to the Planning
Commission to modify the Conditional Use Permit.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: And it would have a
cooking class, not some other kind of class?
JOCELYN PUGA: Yes, the same use.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Then kind of a follow-on to
that. There’s a mention of four parking spaces onsite. Are
those the ones that are directly behind the building?
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: And one of those I’ve
noted was a handicap space.
Then, I know Sur La Table also offers cooking
classes. I just wanted to confirm they do not to my
knowledge offer alcohol, but that’s not a primary part of
their business to do the classes. Do we have any experience
with that in terms of how it’s affected parking? Because a
regular retail establishment would fall under a certain
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
7
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
ratio of parking to people that might be in the store;
whereas we’ve been learning with some of these classes that
they tend to have higher needs for parking, because of the
need for all the people to be there at one time, so I
didn’t know if we had any knowledge of how it has worked
out with others that have offered cooking classes, and Sur
La Table is just a couple blocks way, so I wondered about
them.
JOCELYN PUGA: Sur La Table does have a
Conditional Use Permit for their cooking classes, and
you’re correct, it does not include beer or wine. As of
date we have no violations with regard to complaints of
parking for the use, so I don’t have any background
knowledge with regard to that question.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: But we haven’t heard any
vocal complaints about it?
JOCELYN PUGA: There have been none that have
been filed with the code compliance officer.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Any further questions?
Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you for your report. I’m
looking at the Town’s Alcohol Policy and a number of
questions come up.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
8
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
I’m wondering, we strongly discourage—a nice way
of putting it—new applications for standalone bars or
restaurants with separate bars. Where do we have alcohol
where it is not a restaurant? Or put another way, are we
considering this establishment a restaurant?
JOCELYN PUGA: We are not considering this
establishment a restaurant, no.
CHAIR BADAME: Along with that, a wine bar is not
considered a restaurant.
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct, it’s not.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Does our Alcohol Policy provide
for establishments that are not restaurants serving beer
and wine?
JOCELYN PUGA: It does not, so it does not speak
to this particular use, which is somewhat of a hybrid use,
but I does speak to serving meals with alcohol, and that’s
where Staff has pulled that interpretation from.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So we’d be arbitrarily opening
up the Alcohol Policy to another corridor of use, since we
currently don’t have one of that nature, is that correct?
JOEL PAULSON: That is correct. I’ll speak to
that.
Obviously, as was mentioned before, many wine
bars have been approved that don’t fit into this policy,
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
9
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
but this is the closest policy to address alcohol service,
and so that’s why Staff has chosen to use that. If you have
concerns, then you can make that part of your
recommendation as we move forward.
VICE CHAIR KANE: As I read the resolution, yes,
I do, because alcohol beverages are not regulated, we want
to balance the regulation, and we’re opening a corridor for
a non-restaurant to be serving beer and wine, so I’ll bring
that up later. I have another question, if I may?
CHAIR BADAME: Of course, Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: The parking, there are only
four spots there, right?
JOCELYN PUGA: There are four parking spaces that
are onsite, but they have 16 parking spaces in the Parking
Assessment District.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I know, I was there today.
Where are the other 16 spots?
JOCELYN PUGA: They’re in the Parking Assessment
District.
VICE CHAIR KANE: That’s the old policy of
they’re out there somewhere, and we could have up to 31
students and three instructors?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
10
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct. Many of these
downtown uses provide onsite parking, and so they bought
into the Parking Assessment District to do so.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I appreciate the Parking
Assessment District, but I’m very concrete, and I see 31
people inside the store leaving, I see 31 people outside
the store waiting for a parking spot, and I see three
parking spots available, which may have been taken by the
instructors, because they’re dutiful and arrive early. You
see what I’m seeing? I’m seeing what a lot of people are
objecting to, which is intensity and more traffic and no
place to park.
I have a question on the 5:30 provision to open
up more parking. The people who made that agreement, does
this mean that they have to leave, the staff; the whole
function of that building has to leave the building at
5:30?
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct. The Applicant can
speak more to that, as they worked with the landlord to
make this determination, but it was that, yes, the office
use that is on the second floor would vacate the space by
5:30pm.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I don't know any better so I’m
asking you, is that a practical promise? A business has to
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
11
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
shut down at 5:30 to give up the parking spaces that aren’t
there. Does that work?
JOCELYN PUGA: It can work, and it’s what the
landlord, who occupies that second floor, has agreed to.
VICE CHAIR KANE: All right, thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: I believe we’ll be hearing from
the landlord tonight, too, if I can interpret these speaker
cards correctly. Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Two things. One, I assume
that the existing businesses, when they were operating
well, consumed some parking as well. Is it your belief that
this new use incurs more parking?
JOCELYN PUGA: The previous spaces were both
retail. They were a laundry mat and a flower shop, so they
do have a different parking calculation for the downtown.
Based on that it’s one per 300 square feet. Without doing
the math, I can’t tell you exactly what the difference
would be, but they would more than likely be similar in
use.
JOEL PAULSON: I’ll just jump in as well. That’s
where we start to determine how many parking spaces they
have, which is 7.33, and as we regulate group classes of
any kind we require one parking space for every instructor
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
12
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
and one parking space for every three students. So for us,
the parking is equal.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I had another question.
CHAIR BADAME: Okay, go ahead, and then I’ll get
to Commissioner Hanssen next.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: In the Applicant’s statement
they asserted that there have been no problems with the
alcohol or any other issue in Willow Glen. Did Staff
independently verify that with the City of San Jose?
JOCELYN PUGA: No, they did not.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Actually my question was
exactly the same as Commissioner Hudes’. I think that’s an
important thing, and we’ll want to hear more from the
Applicant that there is already an existing location in
Willow Glen and there is experience with that, and maybe we
don’t have all the data from that, but I think that will be
helpful in this.
CHAIR BADAME: All right, one more question from
Vice Chair Kane, and then I’m going to suggest that we move
on to hear from the Applicant.
VICE CHAIR KANE: In Staff’s report of the
Applicant’s request, the Applicant requested that there be
no cap on the attendance, which seems a little difficult to
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
13
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
grant, no cap on attendance, when we’re going to discuss
very tight parking. But it seems to me that there’s an
internal cap, and that’s limited by the parking, is that
correct?
JOEL PAULSON: That’s correct. I’ll try to
clarify, and Ms. Puga can correct me, or the Applicants can
correct me when they come up.
What the Applicant is requesting is that they be
permitted to have any combination of number of students
and/or instructors that is supported by the parking that
they will provide, whether that’s Monday through Friday
from 10:00 to 5:30 or after 5:30 Monday through Friday and
Saturday and Sunday. If you look at Exhibit 5 there is a
chart, and just for discussion purposes, the first line, if
they only had one instructor the parking would support 19
students. If they had five instructors, the parking would
only allow seven students, and then everywhere in between,
and likewise down below. So they’re asking for that
flexibility.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you. One more?
CHAIR BADAME: One more question.
VICE CHAIR KANE: That Applicant has offered, and
it seems a very good idea, that there be cooking classes
for children. Now the Applicant has also stated there would
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
14
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
be a mom and dad night out, date night, where their
children could be left and mom and dad could have an
evening on the town. That’s an evening timeframe for
children to be in this location, and I didn’t see anything
in the Staff Report about certification of personnel taking
care of 10-15 children in an evening setting when mom and
dad are not around. Do we require that?
JOCELYN PUGA: We don’t require that and we don’t
have any specifications for that, but the Applicant can
speak further to that question. I know that they do similar
scenarios in their Willow Glen location and they can speak
to that.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. I’m going to recommend
that we hear from the Applicant; they’ve been waiting
patiently. Thank you Ms. Puga.
We will now open the public testimony portion of
the public hearing and allow the Applicant and their team
ten minutes to address the Commission. If you could please
state your name when you reach the microphone, so I know
which speaker card to attach it to.
RICK BALLARD: My name is Rick Ballard.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
15
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RICK BALLARD: Thanks very much for this
opportunity, and thank you, Ms. Puga, for the report.
As was mentioned, Cucina Bambini opened in 2008,
so we’ve been open for eight years, and in all that time,
in fact before that time, we’ve been excited about the
prospect of opening in Los Gatos; we’re both from the area.
When we found our site in Willow Glen we decided
to open there, and since then we’ve developed a method.
I’ll get into showing the floor plan and how we operate,
but I wanted to point out that the business is much more
than cooking classes, what we operate. We’ve been compared
to Sur La Table because it’s an obvious comparison; they do
cooking classes as well. But really, there’s no place else
that I know of like us that offers cooking for all ages.
It’s basically a fun place to come and cook.
We have classes and events from age three all the
way through adults, but in fact more than just classes.
Over half our business are private parties and events. One
of the reasons we have more people coming on the weekends
is there are primarily children’s birthdays throughout the
day.
Our Willow Glen location has two separate
kitchens, it’s 2,100 square feet, and so we can have
parties in each different kitchen. The parking situation
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
16
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
there… We can address parking; I know those questions will
come up.
I’ll just say one of the reasons we’re actually
excited about this particular location is because of the
parking. We looked in Los Gatos at several locations over
the last two years straight. We met with every member of
Town Council and discussed everything. We’re extremely
familiar with the regulations, which is why we proposed
that sort of sliding scale so long as we’re compliant with
the regulations, which in all cases we would be, and I can
address that.
But just to give an idea of the types of parties
and events we do. Adult cooking classes, group dinner
parties, corporate events, we do lots of family decade
birthday parties where families will come cook together.
We received our beer and wine class 41 license; I
think we’ve had it a little over three years now in our
current location. Never a single incident or issue
whatsoever. It’s not in any way a bar. Someone doesn’t just
come in and order a glass or wine or a bottle of wine. As
someone pointed out in those letters, there are plenty of
spaces in Los Gatos where someone can go get a drink. It’s
not our place.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
17
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
We have found that offering beer and wine service
during our adult events allows us to do many more types of
events, more culinary experience events; food and wine
pairing, for example, or corporate events where people may
want to have different sorts of wine.
We can work with local wineries like Savannah-
Chanelle, which is one of our partners; we serve their
wine, we can have events.
In Willow Glen we’ve worked with local
restaurants where a chef will come and have all of his
loyal customers come. He’ll come to our place and he will
teach a class at our place, and bring his customers in, and
of course they want to have wine with dinner, or they want
to learn about pairing food with wine. It’s an intricate
part of the business.
We have a retail component, but we are not
primarily a retail site. For example, again, I heard the
comparison to Sur La Table. We’re very different. Sur La
Table does not offer beer and wine, but they have a full
retail establishment.
One thing I will say is beer and wine is
essential to our business, so when that question comes up,
the answer is yes. The reason is we found when we first got
our license, while it only makes up about maybe 2.5% of our
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
18
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
total revenue, beer and wine service, the moment we got it
we were able to start doing corporate events, adult dinner
parties, family gatherings, Kiwanis Club events, all those
sorts of things where we wouldn’t have before, because
people wouldn’t want to come, if they didn’t have that kind
of rich culinary experience; it’s pretty hard to separate
the two. Our business increased by at least 30% because we
can offer beer and wine, so it’s essential to our business.
It might help to give a little bit of an overview
of the space, the floor plan. This is the same floor plan
that was submitted already to the Commission, and it’s on
the wall over there, this is just easier to see.
South Santa Cruz Avenue is right here; Broadway
Avenue is over on this end down here, and the adjacent
business here.
This is our main kitchen right here, and it’s
outfitted essentially much like a high-end residential
kitchen, so unlike some other cooking schools that you’ve
been to or may have seen it’s not a real commercial type
kitchen. It feels more like a well appointed home kitchen
with the Viking ranges and the nice ovens and things like
that.
These worktables are shown here as an example for
classes. These are actually modular worktables, stainless
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
19
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
steel worktables. We can move them anywhere, and the beauty
of our space is our ability to do lots of different kinds
of events. This is set up for a typical class right here
where you can see I think there are 18 seats here. This
would be a regular kid’s class or an adult class.
Up in front above the screen there’s a monitor
where whoever is cooking up front, you can see what they’re
doing.
This space here, which was described as flex
space; sometimes we use it. In our current locations it’s a
whole other kitchen, but in this location sometimes we will
actually use it to set up tables. Let’s say we do a
corporate event or an adult dinner party, you’re making
pasta or you’re doing a Thai menu or something in the main
kitchen, and then over here we’ll have a dining table all
set up, so when you’re finished you can go sit and enjoy
the meal, perhaps with wine, with the rest of your party.
So to that point—and we can address it later—I
wouldn’t call this a drop-in area, and I wouldn’t want to
have a limitation that says we can’t have alcohol in this
area, because it is part of the overall kitchen. Kids’
activities, whether they’re drop-in activities or a kid’s
class, we’ve never once had somebody request beer and wine,
and we would never offer it, and we’re fine having a policy
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
20
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
or limitation that there is no alcohol for the kid’s
classes. It’s only for people who are participating in the
adult classes.
There may have been discussion, and I didn’t
realize this, in the Staff Report where it said that we’re
requesting alcohol service for the drop-in, and I think
that came up because sometimes we may have… Most of our
events are either private parties or scheduled classes, but
sometimes we want to have a drop-in pizza night where
families can come in and they can make pizza and cupcakes
from scratch. They make the dough, they make the sauce, and
they can enjoy them there. That kind of a drop-in event, it
seems to me if a family wants to have wine with their
dinner, they should be able to. It seems to me they’re
eating a full meal, but we’re willing to discuss that, I
suppose.
I think this gives you a general layout of the
facility and the types of things we do.
One of the reasons we really like this space,
especially this space, is it’s also directly across from
the park where there is the farmers market. It’s exciting
to us, because we can do the sourcing of local ingredients
and have something we’ve done a little bit in Willow Glen—
but it’s not quite as convenient because their farmers
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
21
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
market is very far from our place—is we can have farmers
market classes where people can come in, we go to the
farmers market together, pick out ingredients, then come
back and cook. Whether it’s a cooking challenge, one team
against the other, a Chopped type of thing, this space
makes that available.
We’ll talk more about the parking, but I would
say we’ve been to this site, my wife and I, a dozen times
just recently. I mean I’ve lived here for 40 years, so I
know downtown very well, and I know you do too, and I can
tell you this area of town is by far the easiest to park
anywhere. The dozen times we’ve been to this site over the
past six months or so we’ve never once had to look for
parking more than about 30 seconds. It’s never been an
issue in this part of town, for our car.
I would say our use is very different. The kid’s
classes, the kids don’t drive; parents drop them off. The
parties, people come together. I think the three to one is
a very conservative ratio. I realize that for health clubs
and nail salons and things like that that people come
individually; this is very different.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Mr. Ballard. Are there
questions for Mr. Ballard? Commissioner Erekson.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
22
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Thank you for your
presentation. I’ll have some comments about the business,
because I’m actually familiar with your operation in San
Jose.
In the Conditions of Approval—assuming this gets
approved at some point—there is language used, “ student
and instructors,” when discussing limitations on the use,
so in your mind the people who are drop-ins, if you have a
drop-in activity, are they students? Assuming they’re not
instructors.
RICK BALLARD: Yes, they’re students.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: So if you were maxed out
by the use conditions with classes that were going on, you
wouldn’t be operating, even if that space were sitting
vacant? In other words, if you had the maximum number of
students that were permitted in the main kitchen, and there
wasn’t anything going in in what was shown as flex retail
space, you would not have drop-ins going in there?
RICK BALLARD: That’s correct.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Okay.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Thank you for your
presentation. I went on your website for your Willow Glen
location and I was looking at the calendar, so I was hoping
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
23
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
maybe you could clarify if I was seeing what I thought I
was seeing.
It looked to me like—I think you alluded to this—
a big part of your business was the kid’s parties, and then
another big part was the private events. Then to me it
looked like a lesser part of the business was the adult
classes that are more private events. Would that be a fair
statement?
RICK BALLARD: I think that’s a fair statement,
because a lot of the adult activities are more the private
events as opposed to just the adult classes.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: That’s what I thought. On
this parking issue, you said you hadn’t had any trouble
finding parking spots. Have you tried to find a parking
spot during the farmers market on Sunday morning or any
time during the day on Saturday, especially during the
summer here in downtown Los Gatos?
RICK BALLARD: During the daytime, yes. During
the farmers market, no.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: That might be the cause of
some concerns that my fellow commissioners have. I did
notice on the schedule, just looking at what you had
scheduled in your Willow Glen location, it looked like
there were back-to-back parties all day long on Saturday.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
24
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
So if a party is from 11:00 to 1:00, and then the
next party is from 1:00 to 3:00, and that party is at
whatever capacity of, say, 20 or so people, what happens at
the transition point? Because people are going to be
leaving at 1:00 o’clock, and then they’ll be coming in at
1:00 o’clock, so that actually could be twice as much on a
busy day like Saturday. It looked like that’s the day that
you had the most events scheduled.
RICK BALLARD: I understand the question.
Remember that our location in Willow Glen has two kitchens,
and so that allows us to actually have more parties. In the
kitchen there’s always an hour break between the parties.
It’s impossible for us to clean up for one event and have
the next event feel like they’re having a fresh party, so
there’s always at least an hour break as far as I can tell
between every party, so it’s not an issue. People clear out
before the next event.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: That would make a big
difference in terms of avoiding what I just said, which is
the double parking issue with the overlap.
Maybe you could say in what ways you think the
scheduling might be difficult. I did notice, for example,
all summer long it looked like you had kid’s classes, but
they were primarily on the weekdays. You mentioned that the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
25
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
parents drop them off, but if there are 20 kids in the
class the parents need to come drop them off, and then they
need to come back and pick them up, and they’re probably
going to, I guess, leave the area until they come back and
pick them up for the camp. Is that a fair…
RICK BALLARD: I don't know. If dropped my kids
off, I’d want to spend the afternoon or a couple of hours
in Los Gatos and have lunch or go get coffee. I think that,
again, is one of the beauties of this particular location.
People can kind of do that in Willow Glen where we are, but
they have to walk a little farther; we’re not right in the
prime area. Here, why would you want to park twice?
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Right. I did note that if
the Willow Glen experience is similar to what it might turn
out to be in Los Gatos that the vast majority of all their
kid’s classes were at times when it wasn’t a high traffic
time for us. It looked like they were primarily in the
middle of the day, or in the case of the summer camps,
they’re in the mornings and maybe even early afternoon on
weekdays, but not going into the weekend unless there are
kid’s birthday parties and stuff.
RICK BALLARD: That’s right. Usually we have
Little Chef classes, the little ones in the morning, those
are only an hour long—usually parents stay for those,
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
26
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
because the kids are much smaller—then maybe after school.
Well, there are some other kid’s classes that are home
schoolers, or older kids, but many of them actually live in
this area or in Los Gatos Mountains. That would be during
the daytime. Then there are some afterschool classes for
kids, but primarily it’s during the daytime, kid’s classes.
Then adult, if you’ll notice on the schedule when
we have adult events they’re typically from 6:00pm to
8:00pm. We purposely don’t schedule those every night. On
nights that we don’t have those, we have those slots
available for private dinner parties. If you want to get
together with a group of friend and have a dinner party,
that’s where you do it.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: So, for example, this
weekend I noticed back-to-back parties all day long on
Saturday, so are those corporate events, or adult events,
or are they kid events?
RICK BALLARD: If it’s back-to-back during the
weekends, those are typically kid’s birthday parties.
Again, it’s one of the reasons we want to open up here,
because we’re full, and this is a site that’s very
accessible for our staff and close, and we have a clientele
that…
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
27
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, sir. I’m going to look
to the other Commissioners who were waiting with their
questions, and then we can circle back when he comes back
for five minutes. So Commissioner Hudes followed by Vice
Chair Kane.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. I had two
questions on the business model, and I appreciate, and I
want to make sure I understand, the alcohol part of the
business model. You said that in Willow Glen alcohol sales
contributed about 2.5% to your revenue.
RICK BALLARD: That’s right.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: And that it generated about
a 30% increase in your business due to opening up on adult
activities.
RICK BALLARD: That’s right.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Do you anticipate that to be
the same in Los Gatos?
RICK BALLARD: I do anticipate that if we did not
have beer and wine that we would not be able to have the
adult events, and the business model would not work here.
It’s more expensive here as well.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: How essential is that adult
event to your overall business model?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
28
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RICK BALLARD: Well over 50% of our revenue,
probably 60%-plus of our revenue is adult events. The ones
that are dependent on beer and wine, like I said, we had a
30% increase, so it’s significant. Probably a third of our
business could be attributed to events where the people may
not have otherwise come if we weren’t able to have that as
an offering.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Would you say that you are
unlikely to be successful if you’re not able to do adult
events?
RICK BALLARD: We would not proceed if we can’t…
Oh, if we do not do adult events?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Correct, because if there
were an alcohol restriction, and then therefore you were
not doing adult events.
RICK BALLARD: We’ve done research on this, and
there are a smattering of children’s cooking schools around
the country, and in almost every instance eventually they
fail, because they don’t have a model like ours. It sounds
great to do it, but if you spend that much money on a
kitchen and a location, you want to keep it busy.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I had one other business
model question and that’s about the local chefs. When
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
29
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
you’re doing something with local chefs, who’s running the
establishment?
RICK BALLARD: We have staff there that knows the
facility. It’s just having a guest instructor come in.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Then with regard to
monitoring this, do you have a similar sliding scale
student/instructor ratio to what you proposed on page 4 of
7 in your other facilities, and if so, who keeps track of
that, and who asks employees to leave or kids to leave?
RICK BALLARD: We keep track of that. My wife
Shelley runs the business, and she has a manager and a
couple staff supervisors that if we have too many staff…
There’s never an instance where we say there are too many
people here, because things are scheduled ahead of time.
All of our classes are booked online. If we have an event,
people say how many people are coming, so we plan staff
accordingly. If people don’t show up, then we may let some
staff go home.
The whole point of the sliding scale isn’t
because we want an open-ended cap. It is more because we
want the ability to add more staff, and we want to say the
rules allow us, if we have one more staff member, then that
just means we can have… I want to be able to have extra
staff, knowing that for each additional staff member we
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
30
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
have, we can have three fewer customers. The whole point of
that is we may have a time where we want to do training. We
might want to have four staff members there because two
people are shadowing. If so, then the available number
would go down. We can only have ten students, and… Very
often we have a small class. We may want to have extra
staff there. So that’s why I just don’t want a limit on the
number of staff, so long as I recognize that if we have
extra staff, then the number of patrons goes down.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: And the numbers that are on
page 4 of 7 realistic? Would you actually have 19 kids and
I think maybe it’s two employees?
RICK BALLARD: The 19 and 1 is an infrequent,
probably not with kids, but there is an instance, and
again, the reason we propose this is because that shows the
maximum capacity of the place. Twenty people during the
day, 19 and 1, is the maximum number of bodies we could
have in there, but that’s an atypical situation. It has
happened before. For example, in Willow Glen we had a
business association come. They’d come periodically and
they’d have a meeting there, maybe do some sort of
activity. We only need one staff member for that.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: What would be more typical
than 19 and 1?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
31
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RICK BALLARD: During the daytime, 16 and 2, as
Ms. Puga mentioned, and on the weekends, 31 and 3,
depending on the type of event. If it’s more of an adult
event, it’s doable. If there are kids involved or at
birthday parties, it’s usually the 28 and 4.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: So it’s 16 and 2, 31 and 3,
and 28 and 4, is that correct?
RICK BALLARD: Those are the most typical.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Okay, thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: I’m going to jump in with a
question for you, Mr. Ballard. Beer and wine licenses, they
usually lead to full alcohol licenses. My question to you,
do you envision down the road having craft cocktail
pairings with food?
RICK BALLARD: No.
CHAIR BADAME: No.
RICK BALLARD: I don’t.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I have four questions, if I can
get them all in.
I’d like to begin with further discussion of the
agreement you have with the landlord, and I made the
question of Staff that in order for you to get the
additional spots they actually have to leave the building
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
32
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
at 5:30 for your parking spots to go up. And I asked Staff
is that really practical? I have an office in town; I
rarely leave at 5:30. The phone can ring at 5:25. But this
says I’ve got to be out at 5:30. I run the business, I own
the building, and it says I’ve got to be out at 5:30. I
wonder about the practicality of that, but what I also just
noticed is this says I can’t work on weekends, nor my
staff. Is that practical?
RICK BALLARD: Well, we only have three spaces.
May I put up the chart, so we all can look at the same
parking?
VICE CHAIR KANE: That’s the chart I’m working
with. They have to be out at 5:30 during the week.
RICK BALLARD: The parking agreement gives us six
of their nine allocated spaces. You can see here they have
nine allocated spaces, right?
VICE CHAIR KANE: Right.
RICK BALLARD: Six of them on the weekends. The
owner will come up, and like you, he owns the building and
also that’s his office. They have 9.46 spaces allocated
there. They have four employees there, and none of them use
the onsite parking. In fact, they have a parking agreement,
which they gave me a copy. It has been submitted to the
Commission. All of their people are parking in the Toll
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
33
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
House. They have a monthly agreement where everybody parks
there, because it’s easier for them. They don’t use a
single onsite parking spot; they don’t use a single offsite
parking spot.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Be that as it may, I’ve asked
Staff this question. They have to be out of the building at
5:30, or are you allowing people to take their spots over
at the Toll House?
RICK BALLARD: I’m sorry. I’ll let the owner
speak to this, but they don’t have to all be out by 5:30.
We’re only taking six of their 9.46 spots.
VICE CHAIR KANE: This may be a tempest in a
teapot, but let me seek clarification. When I first
discussed the parking situation on the four parking spots,
the contract, the Letter of Understanding that they have
with the landlord, says they get extra spots at 5:30, and I
made the inquiry: Does that mean that the landlord and his
or her staff need to leave at 5:30 to create those spots?
The answer that I got from Staff was this is correct. Is
that correct?
JOEL PAULSON: I’ll look to Ms. Puga.
JOCELYN PUGA: That was an incorrect statement.
If you look at the parking table they still have 3.4
parking spaces left, so there still would be the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
34
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
availability for them to use the space after 5:30pm and on
the weekends.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So they don’t have to leave the
building?
JOCELYN PUGA: That’s correct.
VICE CHAIR KANE: But they somehow create
additional parking by staying there?
JOCELYN PUGA: They still have a remaining
balance of parking left.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’ll admit I’m confused.
My second question: I asked earlier of Staff,
when you have 16-19 children, either at a birthday party or
for—I’m not sure what you call it—date night, or Mom and
Dad’s night out, when you have 16… You had junior chef
classes, what, from three to five, and junior and senior
classes from five to eight years old?
RICK BALLARD: Oh, yeah.
VICE CHAIR KANE: These are young kids?
RICK BALLARD: Young kids, yes.
VICE CHAIR KANE: And if I had a young child and
I wanted a date night or something, I could drop my child
off at, I don't know, 6:00 or 7:00 o’clock, have a two-hour
dinner. The people taking care of the children, whether
it’s daytime or nighttime, are they certified?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
35
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RICK BALLARD: Are they…
VICE CHAIR KANE: Certified for small childcare,
supervision?
RICK BALLARD: Our manager and my wife are both
early childhood development certified. We owned a pre-
school for almost ten years ourselves, and some of our same
staff is there. Not all of the staff is certified. We’re
not required by the State of California to have childcare
certification. There are some drop-in kidcare places, if
you look at them. As long as they’re there during a certain
number of hours, under a certain number of hours, or a
certain number of hours cumulative throughout the week or
something like that, throughout a month, then it’s not
considered a childcare facility.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m just being a dad.
RICK BALLARD: Oh, yeah.
VICE CHAIR KANE: And I don’t understand the law,
but if I drop all at 7:00 o’clock at night with 15 other
three year olds, five year olds, eight year olds, those
people don’t have to be certified?
RICK BALLARD: No. I mean we have staff policies,
and we have, but certified by the State of California or
anybody else, I’m not sure what you mean by certified, but
it’s not a childcare center.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
36
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: Certified, vetted, background.
RICK BALLARD: It’s not a childcare center.
VICE CHAIR KANE: All right. I want to get a
vision of how this works. So we have Uncle Harry’s birthday
and 30 of us are coming, or 20. But it’s a class; it’s not
a party. We’re going to learn how to cook something. So
there are going to be one or two people there teaching us—I
love your layout, by the way, very nice—one or two people,
maybe three. Maybe you’ll assign an instructor to each one
of those tables; I don't know how it works. But how does
the beer and wine work? Is it self-serve, or do you have a
waiter?
RICK BALLARD: You would order it from one of our
staff members.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So the person teaching?
RICK BALLARD: Well, no, we always have a lead
instructor, and in a scenario like you said, probably two
helpers.
VICE CHAIR KANE: The helpers would go and get
the beer and wine?
RICK BALLARD: Yeah, one of the staff members is
in charge of going around, just like a waiter in a way, but
they’re seeing how are you guys doing with your cooking?
Can I get you anything, any utensils? There’s always a head
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
37
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
instructor, and then there are other staff members who are
there to help take care of the customers and make sure
everything is going smoothly.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m guessing it works in Willow
Glen, but we may have different requirements than San Jose,
and I’m trying to see four people teaching cooking and also
serving beer and wine, which limits my birthday party to 28
people. That’s how it would work?
RICK BALLARD: Yes, it would limit the number. I
have to look at the table. Yes.
VICE CHAIR KANE: All right. My final question is
very important. You understand that during the summer you
won’t be able to work on Wednesday night? Jazz on the
Plazz. We can’t have any competition. It’s only ten weeks.
RICK BALLARD: We’ll come up with a…
VICE CHAIR KANE: That’s a hell of an event. I
mean we pack a whole bunch of people in there, and if they
want to learn how to cook a pie, they could come on over.
RICK BALLARD: Occasionally Willow Glen, not
quite as extravagant, but they have Dancing on the Avenue
and events like that, and we’re mindful to not schedule
events that are going to be a headache for everybody at
those times. But it does give us an opportunity to open our
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
38
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
doors and let people come in and see and hand out
information, so it’s almost as valuable.
VICE CHAIR KANE: You said you’ve been in town a
long time, so you know how magic it can get on those summer
Wednesday nights, that’s all.
CHAIR BADAME: Was that a question or a
statement?
VICE CHAIR KANE: Did you know? Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: We are going to move on, but thank
you, Mr. Ballard. You’ll have an opportunity to come back
up and we’ll ask you more questions, I’m sure, but we’re
waiting to hear from members of the public. I have two
speaker cards here. John Machado.
JOHN MACHADO: Good evening, I’m John Machado; I
reside at 16411 Matilija Drive in Los Gatos, California.
Mr. Tate, the property owner who will be speaking, has
hired me to lease this property. We were very specific in
the type of tenants we were looking for.
We are very happy with Cucina Bambini, because in
my experience in working in the Town here for over 30
years, the foot traffic for traditional retail seems to die
right at Main Street and we don’t get a lot of foot traffic
as far as retailers. People may walk to Willow Street Pizza
and have pizza and beer, or they may get an ice cream or a
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
39
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
burger, but as far as retail shoppers, we’ve been not
successful in getting them to go that far south or west in
town.
So we were seeking destination retailers that had
experience in operation. I did visit the store in Willow
Glen, and there are other retailers in that area and
everything was very positive feedback. We also like the
idea that it caters to the children and it’s an educational
class in addition to what Sur La Table and Williams-Sonoma
does, which are big chains. We know in Los Gatos we’d like
to help the individual and we’re not as formula store
oriented, so we feel this is a proper fit.
We don’t want to have continual revolving doors
in this location, and we feel this particular use will be
here long-term and serve the community. Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Mr. Machado. Any
questions from Commissioners? Seeing none, thank you. Our
next speaker is Ron Tate.
RON TATE: Good evening, Commissioners, my name
is Ron Tate. I’ve owned the property for 18 years. I’ve
resided in the property for 18 years. I have my real estate
development company upstairs. I’ve been doing real estate
development for 57 years and owned a lot of commercial real
estate over the years.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
40
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
My location, I struggled with it from the
beginning of time. My average tenant has stayed two years,
because having to have retail where there’s no foot traffic
just doesn’t work, and there never will be any, because I
have the park, I have the post office, and the only
retailer now left coming south on North Santa Cruz Avenue
is the hardware store. I know you don’t care about my
success, but my success can only be successful if I have
somebody that’s destination. The beauty shop I have is
destination, and the rest of the retail has just been a
total failure. I’ve had to evict three tenants, and in 18
years I’ve had eight different retail tenants.
Let me clear up one other thing. No, I don’t
leave my office at 4:00 or 5:00 o’clock some days, but I
park, and all my employees park, in the Toll House parking
lot. We do not park onsite. I have a contract with them.
You should have a letter in your file I got from the Toll
House. I’ve been paying them to park there in their parking
lot for 15 years, so that being said, I don’t impact the
parking at all.
The other issue that I think is really important
is I think this is kind of a use that’s different. It’s
been successful in our area. And this is not a drinking
establishment; this is not a cocktail lounge. People don’t
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
41
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
come in to have a cocktail. I don’t drink at all, I never
have drank, but I go to meet people sometimes at the wine
bars, and 90% of those people are legally drunk, because
they sit there and they drink. This is not how this works.
People come in and they have a beer or a glass of wine, or
they pair the wines with the food, and that is a wholly
different kind of establishment.
With that being said, my wife and I decided
actually if in fact we don’t get this use, we’re probably
just going to put dead storage downstairs, because every
time I have a tenant turnover, it’s about $25,000 to
$30,000 between paying the broker, paying leasing
commissions and everything else; it just doesn’t work out
for us. We’re just not going to try it anymore. We’re not a
retail location.
Just one quick thing. There are 51 retailers from
Main Street going down Highway 9. I have one, the hardware
store, so I really wish that you would approve this use. I
think it would be good for the Town and a service that’s
not offered here. Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Mr. Tate. We have a
question for you from Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you. I appreciate
looking for a creative use of the space to enhance the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
42
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
vitality of our downtown, and I understand that retail may
be a challenge in that space, and so thinking about this,
it’s coming down to a question really about the parking.
There were some statements that were made about
the parking not being used by the existing tenants, that
they were parking offsite. Is that correct, and could you
describe the parking situation behind the building?
RON TATE: The parking behind the building is
strictly for the tenants, or the shoppers, the people that
come and go. None of our employees are allowed. Our
employees cannot even pull in the parking lot; that’s the
rule. They have to park at the Toll House and walk back and
forth. The parking is used by the tenants, and a lot of
times it’s used by people who don’t belong in the parking
lot but they’re there, and so we have other high intensity
long-term uses such as the spa, and ladies come and have
their hair done; they’re four or five hours.
But we police my parking. Four of us—I actually
have five people now, but we all have parking passes—do not
park in the parking lot; it’s not allowed.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Follow up. Do you believe
that there will be parking for 7+5 customers plus
instructors, up to 18, 16+2, during the day, and also 22+6
in the evening, and 34+2 in the evening?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
43
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RON TATE: Yes. There’s a map that shows where
all the parking is. This is not a big deal. They’ll give it
to their students. We’ve talked about this. There’s a map
that shows where all of the all-day parking is, where the
short-term parking is. It’s a challenge. This is why Los
Gatos is so vibrant, because there isn’t enough parking,
and I don’t think there ever will be enough parking per se,
as parking goes.
So yes, I do believe if people look for parking
the way I… I tell people when people come to see me, I say,
“Look, if there’s no in my parking lot,”—and I have very
few people come to see me, I have ten visitors a month on
the outside—but if people park… Everybody seems to find a
parking space. It’s a little bit of a challenge, but it is
a challenge. Every business has that challenge. I don't
know of anybody that has enough parking.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Vice Chair Kane has a question,
and not a statement, for you.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Number one, Mr. Tate, I know
your contribution to the Town and your many, many years of
living here and contributing, et cetera. I wish you success
on the project, and I’m trying to get my hands around the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
44
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
parking, and I’m trying to get my hands around the alcohol
and the children.
You have a Letter of Understanding signed by Mr.
and Mrs. Ballard and yourself. It says, “In accordance with
our lease, each Monday to Friday after 5:00pm and all day
on Saturday and Sunday during the term of the lease,
landlord assigns six additional parking spaces from the
total number of parking spaces allocated to landlord in
connection with its business operations on the second
floor,” and you mentioned that you are a commercial realtor
with a full staff, et cetera. So that’s where I got the
impression…
RON TATE: No, I’m a commercial real estate
developer. I don’t have real estate sales people or
anything.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Commercial real estate
developer; I’m sorry. Because you have time specific is why
I thought staff would have to leave to vacate those spots,
otherwise, why be specific about the time at all? Simply
allocate the spots to them?
RON TATE: Sure, perfect.
VICE CHAIR KANE: You can do that?
RON TATE: Absolutely, not a problem.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
45
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: See where it gave the
impression that you had to go home at 5:30? Because it
specifies 5:30, and I didn’t know why it would do that if
it didn’t matter.
RON TATE: Maybe that slipped between the cracks.
I do not leave the building sometimes at 5:30, but
sometimes I leave at 4:30, and sometimes I leave at 9:30,
but I’m never parked in any of the public parking spaces.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I didn’t say you were, I’m just
saying your Letter of Understanding says 5:30 Monday to Fri
and all day on Saturday and Sunday, and I thought that
meant less use of the spots so that you could get the six
additional spots to which you were assigning to them. No?
RON TATE: Well, I didn’t understand your
question. Please repeat it.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Your Letter of Understanding
specifies that after 5:30 Monday to Friday you allow the
tenant to use six additional parking spaces, and all day on
Saturday and Sunday. So I got the impression that meant to
create those six spaces you and your staff had to leave at
5:30, and I asked that question of Staff and they said I
think that’s their understanding. If you’re saying it
doesn’t matter, why did you put in the 5:30? Why didn’t you
just give them the six spaces?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
46
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RON TATE: That’s in error.
VICE CHAIR KANE: The letter is in error?
RON TATE: Let me have an error. Yes, yeah. I
don't know why it was filled out that way, but we don’t
park in the parking spaces, we just never use them. We
never use any public parking.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So Exhibit 5 is superfluous
where it differentiates between 5:30 before and after and
weekends? In other words, it really should be just one
chart, because you’re dedicating those six spaces 24/7?
RON TATE: That is correct.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you, sir.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Mr. Tate. Calling Lee
Quintana.
LEE QUINTANA: Lee Quintana, 5 Palm Avenue.
The Zoning Code under CUP states that, “There are
uses that might be compatible with ordinary allowed uses if
properly located and regulated. These are called
“conditional uses,” and it refers you to the table of the
conditional uses. It goes on to say, “however, the list of
a conditional use does not indicate that the use must be
allowed,” which brings you to the parking issue.
Also in the General Plan, under Land-Use Policy
9.3, and this is under the Central Business District, it
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
47
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
says, “encourage a mix of retail and office, except in the
CBD designation, where retail should be the emphasis.”
I don’t have any particular thing to say about
this project itself, but it seems to me that there are
trends that seem to be happening: merging spaces, changing
spaces from retail uses to less intensive retail with just
a partial bit of retail, and alcohol with practically
everything. I think these are issues that need to be
seriously considered, and that’s all within your
discretion, given the fact that that’s exactly what the
zoning ordinance actually implies under the CUP
designation.
The question I have goes back to parking, and
that is without knowing what the actual use of the beauty
parlor next door is, the number of employees and the number
of stations, and people overlapping, et cetera, how do you
know that the parking spaces that are allotted in the
general parking district are actually not being used by
that business?
I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of the kind of
arrangement that would allow for the use all the time. The
alternate parking uses are usually based on the uses being
different in time, and so I’m just asking that all that be
considered in your deliberation.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
48
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Any questions for Ms.
Quintana? Seeing none, thank you. Appreciate your comments.
All right, we will give the Applicant another
five minutes to step back up to the podium and add any
further comments about the application.
RICK BALLARD: Thank you. First I’ll start with
the questions that were posed to Mr. Tate, and try to
clarify a little bit around that parking agreement.
I think the distinction between daytime and
afternoon, this was an agreement that we had posed to Ron,
and that’s why he didn’t have a definitive answer, and that
basically was a mistake. And perhaps it was a mistake. It
came from our discussions over the past, I don't know how
long, like I said, over a year or so with Planning Staff
and others and our reading of the code. I’d requested at
one time that if we could try to get more spaces during the
daytime, and at least my interpretation of the
understanding was that we could do a parking agreement, but
it would have to be an after hours thing, so that’s why the
parking agreement was structured that way.
If we’re hearing from Planning that that’s
irrelevant, that it looks more about the actual use of the
parking and the Parking Code, which I think it should be,
then you’re right, the distinction between daytime and
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
49
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
evening is kind of moot and it doesn’t belong. So that’s
what I would say about that.
Also, along the lines of the parking and the
plan, I want to clarify that the Town Code describes the
calculations. They can be confusing, but there are defined
calculations and defined allocations within the Parking
District for businesses. It took a while for me to
understand them, but they’re very clear, and our use
complies with those calculations.
Now, one could argue with the rationale behind
the calculations to say three to one, does that really fit?
I would argue if we were an exercise studio, or a hair or
nail salon, three to one may not be appropriate. Four to
one is what restaurants use; that’s more appropriate for
us. That’s why I feel very comfortable with our parking
calculations, because the fact is most people come to our
venue in groups; they don’t come like they’re going to go
to an exercise studio by themselves. They come in groups,
just like going to a restaurant.
I imagine the Town put a lot of time into coming
up with the calculations and the policies behind parking,
and I also know that there are some questions about how
those are being applied to other businesses, but I would
request that those same doubts don’t be applied to us,
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
50
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
because I think our business model is very different, and I
think it’s very conservative actually if you apply those
calculations to our business, a three to one.
The last thing I’ll mention is there was a public
comment about the General Plan and citing specific code,
whether or not we meet that. I think if you read the Letter
of Justification that we submitted, it cited I think at
least ten—I didn’t list them out, and I certainly don’t
have time to list them out—different policies, and five
within the Land Use Element, and eight or nine within the
Human Services Element, that we directly meet, and this
isn’t with some broad interpretation of any of them. Again,
there’s no time to go through them.
It wasn’t necessary, but I think if anybody took
the time to see how we really benefit the Town of Los
Gatos, I challenge you to find any other business that
meets even half of these that we meet, and it’s due to the
flexibility of our business. But the only way our business
model works is in the way that we’ve proposed, so major
changes to that model, meaning drastic changes to the
parking or refusal of alcohol, would change our business
model and it would probably make it untenable for us.
CHAIR BADAME: You still have more time, if you’d
like to continue.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
51
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
RICK BALLARD: I’m fine, thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Okay. Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Mr. Ballard, have you had an
opportunity to read the letters, the Desk Items that we
received from the neighbors on Broadway?
RICK BALLARD: Yes, I did.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Okay, thank you. Now, can we
put that parking chart back up that you had up earlier?
RICK BALLARD: Sure.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m mildly flabbergasted, which
may mean I misunderstood what was just said, but the
essence of what was just said is the top chart doesn’t
matter, doesn’t exist. What it says is that the promise, if
you view it as a promise in complying with Town Code, under
students and instructors on the top chart where you
promised to have four students for the four instructors,
since that chart doesn’t matter anymore since the extra
spaces can be allocated to you 24/7, then my word earlier,
“superfluous” comes into play, and instead of (inaudible)
us 10 and 4, you can do 28 and 4, 24/7. Did I get that
right?
RICK BALLARD: Now I’m having a little trouble
following yours.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
52
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: Well you said the Letter of
Understanding was a mistake with respect to the time
parameters.
RICK BALLARD: Yeah.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Of the two charts, the one on
top is a function of those two time parameters, daytime.
RICK BALLARD: That’s right.
VICE CHAIR KANE: And it says daytime you can
have 10 student and 4 instructors, but we kind of just said
that it’s irrelevant, there is no daytime, there is no
nighttime, there is no weekend, the six spaces can be
allocated to you 24/7/365, which means instead of 10 and 4,
you get 28 and 4, 24/7. The bottom chart is the only chart
that exists or has any meaning if the Letter of
Understanding was a mistake.
RICK BALLARD: If the date qualifications on the
letter are a mistake. If we are allowed, and if our
understanding with Planning that we had to put time bands
on the parking agreement, if the parking agreement could
only be in the evening, then if that’s not correct and the
parking agreement could be any time, then yes, you’re
right, the bottom chart is the correct chart.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
53
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: So your Letter of Understanding
was a function of what you thought you heard from Staff?
Otherwise, why make any time differentiation?
RICK BALLARD: The time restrictions in the
Letter of Understanding are what I thought from Staff. It’s
very possible that it’s my mistake, but that was my
understanding or misunderstanding (inaudible) Staff.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I think it’s a good faith
misunderstanding, however, you can see where I’m coming
from that we’re not going to have 10 and 4, we’re going to
have 28 and 4 any time the 28 show up. There’s not daytime
restriction.
RICK BALLARD: Like I said, if you look at the
parking calculations and the practical reality of the
parking, of how we could be allowed spaces if in fact
they’re not using their spaces, and if those could be
allocated to us during the daytime, as you’re suggesting,
then yes, we should be allowed to have those numbers under
the Town Code.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So the question is can you see
I’m misled by the top chart, which has no meaning
whatsoever, apparently?
RICK BALLARD: Yeah, I could see that. It was
certainly not intentional.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
54
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: I didn’t say it was. I just had
to put that in the form of a question. Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I just had a question. The
site has 1,475 square feet allocated to your business,
correct?
RICK BALLARD: That’s right.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: So my question, just a
practical question, is if you had the maximum amount of
students and instructors, which on this chart would be
34+2, 36 people, that turns out to be like 40 square feet
per person. Is that normal? That doesn’t seem like very
much space. Does that work for your business to have that
many people in that small of a space?
RICK BALLARD: It depends on the time of an
event, but yeah, sometimes we’ll have events where it’s
just more of an appetizer making class, where everybody
doesn’t sit down, but there are stations and people can go
around, for example, corporate events. People go around and
they can go to different stations and they can cook, and
it’s more on their feet, moving around.
Our current location, like I said, is 2,100
square feet, and we can accommodate much larger parties
than 34 people. Like I said, the reality is if we have a
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
55
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
party that large, there are very few circumstances where
we’d probably have two people. More often we’d want more
staff, and that’s why I wanted the sliding scale. I want to
be able to add more staff.
But yeah, there are instances where we would only
need two staff, depending on the type of event, if it’s
more of a meeting type of an event.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: That answers my question,
thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Any further questions? Seeing
none, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Ballard.
We will now close the public testimony portion of
the hearing and ask if any Commissioners have any
questions, comments or motions? Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: This is probably a
question for the Chair and for Mr. Paulson. Ms. Renn
happens to be in attendance, so would it be appropriate to
let her be a Staff person that we could ask questions of?
CHAIR BADAME: I think that would be an excellent
idea. Mr. Paulson?
JOEL PAULSON: That is perfectly fine. I’d just
like to clarify the parking concerns so that we can get
that squared away. Alternating use of parking, there is
specific Town Code language that speaks to, “Some uses
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
56
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
generating parking demands primarily during hours when the
remaining uses are closed.” So Staff’s understanding is
that those would be vacated. You can’t allocate parking
space, whether you're using them or not, onsite for the
24/7 scenario that you’ve allocated. So the two charts do
apply, but the requirements would be that those businesses
would have to be closed, so you’d need to make that
distinction.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So the clarification is
unnecessary, but there’s been some confusion and I just
want to do it again.
The reason we had the distinction to create the
six spaces is we closed the business. That means I have to
leave at 5:30 and I can’t work on weekends, neither my
staff nor myself, is that correct?
JOEL PAULSON: Correct.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: I have a follow up
question to that. Is it possible to condition this use on
the presence of the apparent type of agreement that there
is between the landlord or the owner and the Toll House to
help address? In other words, can we write a condition into
this Conditional Use Permit that would require the
landowner to have in place, and on file with the Town, an
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
57
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
agreement to add parking spaces, and it could either be
specific to the Toll House or some other location in town?
JOEL PAULSON: You could, however, we also would
have to bring in the Toll House, because they would need a
CUP to allow for alternating use of parking, and they’d
have to show that they have excess parking from what they
currently need on their space.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Right, I understand that,
but it would be permissible to do that?
JOEL PAULSON: It could, but it couldn’t be
approved until that agreement had been reached.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: I understand.
CHAIR BADAME: Ms. Renn, thank you for stepping
in on short notice. Do we have questions for Ms. Renn?
Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Thank you for being here.
There are people at your house who would prefer your being
there, I assume. I have a couple of questions for you that
I’m going to ask at the same time, and I’ve got another
question I’ll keep apart.
The first part of it is do you have general
comments about this particular type of business, and in
your judgment, since you have the greatest sensitivity to
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
58
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
the economic vitality of the downtown, even general
comments about that? Then I’ll do two subsets to that.
They talked about a destination business, and so
in your comments about it can you talk about that concept?
I don’t need to elaborate more, I’m sure you know what I’m
talking about. And then if in fact one were to not have the
top half of the parking chart, and it were possible for it
to be extended for 24/7, are there other reasons, based on
your knowledge of business activity in that part of the
Central Business District, that it would be wise to limit
the parking, or have a different parking standard either
for those specified times, or for other specified times?
MONICA RENN: I see this as a perfect type of
business for the time that we’re in in the retail world,
and I think that Mr. Machado touched on it a little bit. A
conversation we’ve had I think in other meetings between us
and at Council is we do see these hybrid businesses over
and over.
I think we often hear the term “People need
something to show up for.” Just standalone retail is not
the strongest market right now, and certainly not on South
Santa Cruz; there is no foot traffic. Once you get to that
Lyndon Plaza, people do go there to stop and eat, but they
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
59
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
don’t typically travel past. There’s not much there; the U-
turn of the foot traffic kind of happens there.
We notice the Main Street Bridge. While there are
51 retailers on Main Street, people will turn the corner on
Main Street and they get to the bridge and it trickles off.
It’s just the behavior of how people shop.
I worked a long time with Mr. and Mrs. Ballard on
different locations. We looked all over Los Gatos, and
really this does seem like a great fit. It’s something that
you could walk to if you live around there, and there are
schools and pre-schools nearby that could do field trips to
it. In my opinion, it’s a great fit. I had the benefit to
visit their other location for my own personal use, and I
see that being something that will fit in our community.
As far as the second question, I think that
people find parking. We have events that bring in 850
people. We had the Great Race and our sustainability event
in one day a couple of weeks ago, and we were greatly
impacted, probably had 1,500 extra people here in town, and
still had people shopping, still had people dining, and
still had enough for people to park and pick up their
friends from the race. We had an entire parking lot closed.
I think people can find parking.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
60
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
So while we don’t have places to file millions
and millions of cars, I don’t think that the difference
between 22, 28 or 31 students is going to make or break
anything. Does that answer the questions?
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: So there wouldn’t be any
particular rationale, aside from the alternative parking
regulation. Those kinds of considerations, just from pure
economic vitality, there’s no particular reason to
differentiate from whatever the maximum might be allowed?
MONICA RENN: I don’t think there is, no.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Okay, thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: As a follow up to the
parking question, I asked the question earlier and I’d be
interested in your perspective on it. There are businesses
there now, and at one time those businesses were vibrant.
They generated some parking demand. What’s your assessment
of this new business versus these other businesses when
they were vibrant?
MONICA RENN: From the parking perspective of
what I think the delta would be, it’s interesting, because
I think that the majority of the people just, again, out of
behavior, will go to that location or go even to Willow
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
61
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Street or something, but I don't know that they would
necessarily go down and turn up Broadway to park. I think
the majority of people would be looking at that parking lot
maybe where the Chamber of Commerce is, or some of those
other well-known public spots. I can’t imagine that there
will be a large amount of people that will go to that spot
first and then look for parking, except for maybe the
person who is not familiar with our town. But for the
majority of people, if you know something is on South Santa
Cruz, you’re likely to start looking for a parking spot at
Elm or one of the other parking lots, so I don’t
particularly think that this would cause that much
difference.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: As a follow up, are there
other businesses where the business themselves tells their
customers about alternatives for parking?
MONICA RENN: Give an example of what you’re
asking; I’m not sure I’m clear on that.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: This is a business that
isn’t a drop-in business; this is a business that’s
scheduled ahead. Are there other businesses in town that
are scheduled ahead where the business owner suggests where
people might park if there isn’t parking right next door?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
62
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
MONICA RENN: Absolutely. I think the personal
services would be a great example of that. If you have an
appointment and you know it six weeks out, and maybe you go
to that same person every six weeks, you may have a
conversation with them about where do you park, or they may
say we suggest you park here. Another suggestion could be
coming to a restaurant. If you have reservations and you
know you have a party of 12, you may ask them or they may
suggest where you park.
We don’t have any obvious guidelines or rules
that people do that, but I think just in general we also
have the Chamber of Commerce that serves as our visitation
center, and they will often give people suggestions on
where to look for public parking.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I just was curious as to
your opinion. I don't know if this analogy is going to make
sense. If you were trying to compare this, and since it’s
different than anything else we have… I don’t even know if
it’s still there, but remember Petroglyph, where they had
kid’s parties; it was on Santa Cruz? It’s still there?
MONICA RENN: Yes.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Okay. Do you think this is
more like Petroglyph or is it more like Orangetheory
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
63
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Fitness? I’m just trying to frame the parking in my mind;
that would kind of be the range of things. I would just
like to see what you thought.
MONICA RENN: I don’t think it’s really either. I
think it’s probably a combination. The idea of having a
drop-in I think is where… Staff would often do that same
thing. We get an Applicant that comes in and we say what
are they like? What avenue are we going to push them down?
We saw that with We Olive, I think, that they came in and
they had all these different facets that didn’t necessarily
fit into one box that we were used to seeing. I think
Cucina Bambini is a good example of that.
As far as marketing or a draw of clientele, I
would see them being closer to a Petroglyph where you do… I
mean I’m deep in the birthday party circuit with my own
family, and I know you often take three kids and someone
else picks those kids up, so it is an accurate statement to
say that it’s not one car per person that’s coming to those
classes.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: So in that sense it’s very
different than the fitness model?
MONICA RENN: Yeah.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: Thank you.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
64
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you, Ms. Renn. Vice Chair
Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: You said you’d work with the
Applicant, so I’m trying to find a suitable location. I
imagine that involves a length of time of working with them
to get things worked out. Did it ever come up on the
confusion regarding the six extra spaces requiring that the
operations upstairs be closed and shut down after 5:30 and
on weekends?
MONICA RENN: For me personally, I think because
I work with the code so often, it didn’t seem confusing to
me. We often look at parameters around office hours, shared
parking is something that comes up quite a bit, especially
with bank lots and things, so to be honest, it wasn’t
something that I even thought twice about.
VICE CHAIR KANE: But it seems confusing to them,
the two versions that we’ve heard tonight.
MONICA RENN: I don't know, I didn’t…
VICE CHAIR KANE: I know you’ve got the economic
vitality. What I’m looking at is less vitality. It’s more
like which is it, chart number one or chart number two? And
if the Applicant doesn’t understand the businesses need to
be closed down, then that may not be acceptable to the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
65
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Applicant. It seems germane to the whole question. What do
you think?
MONICA RENN: There’s the question. You know
what? We do this a lot; we look at shared parking a lot, so
I think that it’s actually a reasonable thing to do. It’s a
question that we hear over and over when we bring things to
Council: Why do we have empty office lots at nights when
other jurisdictions ask their restaurants and their
nighttime businesses to use those? This is one opportunity
that we have when we can do that.
VICE CHAIR KANE: The other question is are you
aware of any requirement on certification for childcare of
children at night or in any such setting?
MONICA RENN: I agree with what the Applicant
said about the amount of few hours that you could do a
drop-off. It’s done in a lot of places, these Parent’s
Night Out, it’s a very common thing and the employees can
run it. The parents make the choice to leave their kids
there for that short a period of time.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Thank you. Thank you for being
here.
MONICA RENN: Of course.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Commissioner Hudes.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
66
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I just wanted to understand
from Staff, where in the language does it permit childcare?
JOEL PAULSON: It doesn’t permit childcare.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: So childcare is excluded?
JOEL PAULSON: Parent’s Night Out is another
class setting.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Okay.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. All right, any further
discussion amongst Commissioners? Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Mr. Paulson has been very
patient with me over the years I’ve been on the Planning
Commission, so I want to ask his patience again. Can you
back up to what you said to us about the alternate parking
spaces and kind of go over that again? I think I have most
this sorted out for myself, and then how what you said
applies to whether Exhibit 5 should look like Exhibit 5 if
in fact one were to potentially incorporate that as a part
of the Conditions of Approval?
JOEL PAULSON: Sure. Ms. Puga can put that up on
the screen. If you can zoom up the alternating use piece.
So it’s in the Town Code, 29.10.150(e),
Alternating Use of Parking. As you can see up there I was
just paraphrasing some of that, and where some of the uses
generate parking demands primarily during hours when the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
67
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
remaining uses are closed, alternating use of space is
allowed, but only if specifically authorized by the
Conditional Use Permit.
So from Staff’s perspective, and I’ll let Ms.
Puga, who obviously has done most of the interaction with
the Applicants, speak to this further. But from Staff’s
perspective, the two charts are applicable if they are
going to meet the requirements of Town Code.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: I have a follow up
question to that, and I’m not sure of all the Staff if you
were including potentially the Assistant Town Attorney.
When we have public testimony that there is an
apparent agreement between the Toll House and the owner of
this property to use on a regular basis, apparently—if none
of us have seen it, I assume that you haven’t—to occupy six
spaces in the Toll House. Do we have a duty or
responsibility to understand whether that exists, and
whether that causes the Toll House to have a deficiency in
its parking, and should that be taken into consideration
before we make our recommendation to the Town Council? I
mean we could obviously make a recommendation that says
check this out, Council, but ultimately before this
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
68
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Conditional Use Permit would be approved by the Town. Do
you understand the question that I’m asking?
JOEL PAULSON: Yes, generally I understand the
question. The options are one, to fold it into part of your
recommendation that that be addressed. Staff would have to
do some analysis of the Toll House. They technically would
have to have a current CUP with the Toll House for
alternating use of parking in that scenario, which I don’t
believe exists, and so that becomes problematic from that
perspective.
Given the code language, I wouldn’t suggest… I’ll
defer to the Town Attorney, but you stray from the
alternating use language in the code, but again, you can
make that part of the recommendation and ultimately the
Council has the ability to interpret the Town Code. I
haven’t seen it done that way in the past. All of the ones
that I can recall have been when businesses are closed.
That’s when those parking spaces, whether it’s credits or
actual parking spaces, are freed up for the other use.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Thank you.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I just want to make a
comment. I thought that based on the testimony from the
Applicant, and I know from me looking at their website, it
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
69
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
seems like the majority of their business is in the
evenings and on the weekends, maybe with the exception of
the summer because there are summer camps for kids on
weekdays. So I’m not really sure what the big deal is about
having additional spaces between 10:30am and 5:30pm Monday
through Friday, when the issue is really that most of the
traffic that they’re going to generate is the evenings and
the weekends. So that was my comment.
CHAIR BADAME: Appreciate that. Commissioner
Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Maybe I could get the ball
rolling a little bit. I’m trying to balance the desire to
have a really thriving downtown, particularly in the face
of the challenges that will be presented with the North 40
and the amount of retail that has been approved in the
specific plan there.
Given the changing definition of retail and the
challenges that are coming, I am very favorable to this
type of use, however, I think that as I’m reading the
application it’s heavy on the use and not very heavy on the
conditions, and so I have seven conditions that I’ve been
thinking about that would make it more in balance and more
acceptable in my mind.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
70
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
The first one would be to specifically exclude
its use as a childcare facility.
The second one would be that staff would be
present during the time when non-employee chefs host their
own events.
The third is that alcohol will not be served
during children’s events.
The fourth would be to require the landlord to
have an agreement for offsite parking, which I think would
delay actually the final approval of this until that was
proven.
The fifth one would be to have a review after
three months, six months, and then annually.
The sixth one would be to inform customers,
particularly in the case of booking events in advance, of
alternative parking locations, the responsibility of the
business owner to do that.
Then finally the seventh one, the chart and the
maximums. I per the testimony of the Applicant, I think the
top numbers are just not realistic, the 19/1, so I would
drop down to 16/2, 13/3, 10/4, and 7/5, and exclude the
19/1 during the day and the evening. Again, per the
testimony of the Applicant, I would exclude the 34/2 and
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
71
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
drop down to the 31/3, 28/4, 25/5 and 22/6, and specify
those as maximums in the Conditional Use Permit.
So those are some thoughts.
CHAIR BADAME: I have some questions for you,
Commissioner Hudes. With the condition of no alcohol during
children’s events, there are parent/child classes, so would
that include the parent/child classes where the parent
might want to drink alcohol?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: In my mind that would. It
would be excluded during that time as well. So it would be
adult only events where alcohol would be permitted I think
would be acceptable.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you for that clarification.
Any further discussion? Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: A couple of questions for
my esteemed Commissioner colleague. If I understand
correctly, because a childcare facility is a particular use
and has a definition, and the use is specified in this and
the use does not include a childcare facility, it also
doesn’t include many other uses. I’m not sure of your
rationale for specifically wanting to incorporate land for
excluding a use that isn’t named. That’s a question for
you. I’ve got some other questions about some of your
others.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
72
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER HUDES: That may be a question for
Staff as well as to whether that’s necessary, but there
seemed to be in the application—that’s why I was asking the
question before—the possibility of children being dropped
off for childcare while parents go somewhere else. Not
there for a class, but for childcare. Is that something
that’s explicitly outlined in the application?
JOEL PAULSON: I would look to Ms. Puga on
whether or not there’s any specification of the Parent’s
Night Out, but we would not consider that a childcare
facility, if that’s what you’re looking at. But Ms. Puga
might be able to offer some additional information.
JOCELYN PUGA: I don’t have much to offer besides
what the Applicant provided as their description of what
the parent night class is, and then again refer to what the
director said, that we define childcare in our Town Code,
what size and what specifications that are required, and
the conditions on this permit would be for group-cooking
classes and do not include daycare.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: In that sense, in response,
I would exclude Parent’s Night Out from a permitted use.
But dropping children for a class where the children are
enrolled in a class I would say would be a permitted use.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
73
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Chair Badame, can I ask
some additional questions?
CHAIR BADAME: Yes, Commissioner Erekson, go
ahead.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: The fifth condition was a
three month, six month, and annual review, so I assumed
that meant annually a review. I wasn’t clear whether it was
at the end of a year, or if it was each year, but more
important to me than that is what is being reviewed at the
end of three months, what is being reviewed at the end of
six months, and what is being reviewed either at the end of
12 months or each year, and what’s the purpose of that
review?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: To get to the first point,
in my mind it would be three months after the approval, six
months after the approval, and then annually thereafter,
depending on how Staff does these things, whether they do
them on a calendar basis or whether they track them on an
individual permission basis; I don't know which way they
operate.
With regard to what’s being reviewed, to me it’s
the conditions in the permits and are they being met, in
particular there are some that I think are ones that are a
little tricky, the sliding scale and the parking. Are there
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
74
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
conflicts on the parking, and are all the conditions in the
permit being met?
CHAIR BADAME: I have a question for you,
Commissioner Hudes. Staff recommended no alcohol in the
drop-in area, because technically cupcakes aren’t really
considered a meal. With what you are proposing with the
added conditions, how do you feel about that, especially if
it’s just adults that might be in the drop-in area that are
decorating cupcakes, and not necessarily children?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: To me the issue wasn’t about
the area that was being used, it was about the presence of
children. For me, I wouldn’t adopt that recommendation; I
would just go with alcohol would not be served during
children’s events.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Commissioner Hudes, there is the
concern whether or not children are present, but the drop-
off zone, decorating a cupcake is not a meal, and that’s
the thing we’re trying to get at with their recommended
restriction on alcohol, so as you’ve got it proposed I
wouldn’t support that. It’s about whether or not there’s a
meal, and the fact that it’s being served in whatever
location where alcohol is being served.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
75
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
I wanted to continue, Madam Chair, with what’s
becoming for me the $64 question. On that chart that we had
up on the wall, Commissioner Hanssen, I wasn’t concerned
with 9/5, I’m concerned with understanding the six spots
that are created in the evening and on weekends, and the
fact that there may be some confusion on the Applicant’s
part when he stated, “I work nights and weekends.”
I work nights and weekends; I appreciate that.
But if you or your staff does work nights and weekends,
vis-à-vis what you’ve got up on the wall that says
“Closed,” that means the office is closed, and I wouldn’t
want that condition to be imposed on anybody, and
especially me, because it’s not practical. I couldn’t run a
business that way where I have to leave at 5:30 and on
weekends, and I’m not sure the Applicant understood that,
because he said the letter was a mistake and the time
limits were not that material, which vacates the top chart
and gets us back to 24/7 I can do all that parking stuff.
I don’t think it was understood that if we go
with allocation of those six spots after hours,
unfortunately the office has got to be closed nights and
weekends. I don't know what I would do if it comes to
making a recommendation without understanding how the
Applicant feels about that restriction and whether or not
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
76
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
that’s a viable restriction going forward. The whole thing
is going to come undone if that’s not understood. I don't
know how to do that without reopening the public hearing,
which I’d recommend.
JOEL PAULSON: Again, your recommendation moving
forward. This still has to go to the Town Council, and so
if you have a strong opinion one way or the other, then
that could be part of the recommendation from this body.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I don’t have that strong an
opinion, the Applicant does. “I’m going to work nights and
weekends,” which I totally appreciate, but it’s going to
come at cost, given what you’ve shown up on the board.
JOEL PAULSON: Most definitely.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So then the conditions will be
unintentionally violated.
JOEL PAULSON: Well, the conditions will be
modified as appropriate by the Town Council, and a
determination will be made, and they’ll have to function
under whatever conditions are approved.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I understand.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I just wanted to make a
general comment, and then I would be prepared to make a
motion. In hearing all the testimony I initially was pretty
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
77
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
concerned. I actually think this is a good use for the
location. I do think it is a bit risky, only because it’s a
business model that we aren’t familiar with and we’re not
sure how it’s going to work.
I feel that if we have a review I could deal with
a year from now if we have some kind of review in place
relative to what’s been happening with the parking, what’s
been happening with the compliance with our Alcoholic
Beverage Policy, and then I could be comfortable moving
forward.
That being the case, I do want to make a motion
to recommend to Council to request approval for the
Conditional Use Permit Application U-16-003 to operate
group-cooking classes with beer and wine service and
alternative use of parking on property zoned C-2, APN 510-
45-014.
I can make the finding that the project is
categorically exempt pursuant to the adopted guidelines,
the implementation of CEQA. I can make the findings for the
Conditional Use Permit as required by Section 29-20-190 of
the Town Code: “The deciding body may grant a Conditional
Use Permit if it finds that the proposed use of the
property is essential or desirable to the public’s
convenience of welfare,” because it provides a cooking
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
78
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
school service to Los Gatos residents. The proposed use
will not impair the integrity and character of the zone,
because it’s a commercial use and would be located in a
commercial zone. The proposed use would not be detrimental
to public health, safety or general welfare, and the
conditions regarding the parking agreement, operating
hours, and service of alcoholic beverages placed on the
permit would maintain the welfare of the community. The
proposed use of the property is in harmony with the
variance elements and objectives with the General Plan and
the purposes of the Town Code.
I can also make the required finding for the
redevelopment plan for the Central Los Gatos Redevelopment
Project Area, that the proposed project is consistent with
the redevelopment plan for the Central Los Gatos
Redevelopment Project Area, and that the project is
designated commercial and it falls within general
commercial uses.
I would like to add some of the conditions that
Commissioner Hudes suggested, for example, the ones that I
thought were important would be to add a condition that the
Applicant should take the responsibility of informing
customers of alternate parking arrangements, that staff
must be present when there’s a non-employee leading a
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
79
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
cooking class, and that there be no alcohol at events that
include children. I thought that Commissioner Hudes’
suggestion of eliminating the 19/1 and the 34/2 on the
chart in Exhibit 5 was worth incorporating as well. So
that’s my motion.
CHAIR BADAME: Do we have a second? We do not
have a second. Motion fails. Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Let me try to take it a step
further. I agree with the motion that was made previously,
but I would add to that motion that we would require the
landlord to have an agreement for offsite parking, that
there would be a three month, six month and annual review,
that childcare would be an excluded use, and that the
numbers mentioned in the table would be maximum numbers in
the Conditional Use Permit.
CHAIR BADAME: All right, the Town Attorney would
like to step in.
LYNN LAMPROS: Thank you. With regard to the
offsite agreement with the Toll House, I would inform or
comment that the Conditional Use Permit that is before us
does not contemplate or require that Mr. Tate commit to
parking at the Toll House Hotel. Mr. Tate’s business or
property comes with nine-plus parking spots. It is only
after the technical close of this business that six of
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
80
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
those are allocated to Cucina Bambini. If those six spots
were allocated, say, during the day the Commission might be
interested in understanding the provision for offsite
parking, but that is not a feature of what’s before us,
therefore I don’t think it’s a legally tenable requirement
to have him prove that he has a parking agreement with Toll
House.
I think it was being offered as sort of a plum,
as if to say look, I don’t even park there at all. But the
fact of the matter is all that’s before us is there are
nine-plus spots, and after the close of business six are
allocated to Cucina Bambini, which allows for three for the
possibility of nighttime and overtime work. So I’m not sure
that I would suggest that that’s not really a legally
tenable requirement.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Would it be, and we can go
back to the record, if the Applicant has stated that he has
such an agreement in place?
LYNN LAMPROS: You can direct that he prove it,
but this CUP isn’t contingent on that agreement. It wasn’t
contemplated in this project, so I would say there’s not a
nexus between making him prove it and this particular
application.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
81
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
With regard to the childcare facility, I would
suggest that there are very strict and specific state laws
regarding childcare facilities. If the Commission were
interested in directing Staff to show that, if you wished
to pass this on to Council with any kind of recommendation,
you could ask for a definition of that to see whether this
business falls into a childcare facility.
My relatively informed but not very researched
opinion is that it just does not fall into the state
requirements as a childcare facility, so they’re not going
to need to meet certain of those criterion, but you could
ask for a definition, I suppose, to satisfy yourself that
it doesn’t constitute a childcare facility.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: My concern is about the
Parent’s Night Out, which is where children are dropped off
for childcare, not for cooking classes.
LYNN LAMPROS: I’m not sure that’s accurate. I
think that they’re dropped off for classes that in effect
serve as childcare while the parents go to dinner, but they
are a class; they’re not just running lose.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Then I don’t see why that
has to be differentiated at all in the use permit. I don’t
think we should even address that, because whether it’s day
or night, there are going to be situations where children
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
82
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
are dropped off to do the class, so I would prefer to
remove the Parent’s Night Out if it’s anywhere in the
application.
JOEL PAULSON: If we can get clarification, part
of your motion is that they not be permitted to do Parent’s
Night Out?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Correct.
JOEL PAULSON: Which would be also meaning that
you don’t want them to do any child classes where that
child could be dropped off?
COMMISSIONER HUDES: No, what I’m saying is when
there’s not a class, where it’s just purely childcare.
JOEL PAULSON: I think in the Applicant’s letter
they say that Parent’s Night Out are classes, so classes
will be performed. I think I understand, you’re saying that
it has to be in conjunction with a class; it cannot just be
having the children dropped off.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Correct, and I’d be open to
you suggesting language to address that issue.
CHAIR BADAME: Vice Chair Kane followed by
Commissioner Erekson.
VICE CHAIR KANE: To the Town Attorney, in your
discussion with Commissioner Hudes you went from six to
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
83
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
nine on the three spots. Did you say that the business
would not have to be closed?
LYNN LAMPROS: I did not say that. I said that
the way our code is written it allows for alternating
parking with businesses that have distinct closures, like a
bank.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So we’re back to 5:30 closed,
and closed on weekends?
LYNN LAMPROS: Correct, but it’s not a complete
allocation of all nine spots.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m going to try to support the
motion with one addition, but however we get it to Town
Council, that needs to be resolved that the Applicants and
landlords all understand what allocating spots means, and
that they can live with that an abide by that. It seems to
me to be an onerous condition and there might be another
way around it, but if you’re going to commit to it then
you’ve got to commit to it, but it just seems to be very,
very difficult to commit to that.
To the maker of the motion, I wonder if you’d be
willing to add to your motion Staff’s comment that no
alcohol service be…
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
84
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
CHAIR BADAME: Wait, we don’t have a second yet.
I believe we have to have a second before we add to the
motion, or am I mistaken?
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m in discussion period here.
CHAIR BADAME: Okay.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I’m discussing.
CHAIR BADAME: Go ahead.
VICE CHAIR KANE: To the maker of the motion, I’m
discussing would you also include the Staff recommendation
that no alcohol service be permitted in the drop-in space.
That essentially violates the Alcohol Policy, which says
alcohol shall not be served unless there’s a meal served as
well, and it’s been discussed that cupcakes or whatever is
going on in the drop-in space in no way constitutes a meal.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I need to be educated a
little bit on that point, because I’m not in favor of not
allowing alcohol in that particular room in the business.
To me that is a natural room to be used for wine to be
served with dinner when adults are preparing dinner and
then go in and sit down, so I don’t think that makes as
much sense.
Where I need to be educated is how the Alcohol
Policy deals with food, and does it say “meal” or does it
say “food”?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
85
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
VICE CHAIR KANE: Well, at the risk of pretending
to be an educator…
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I’m just trying to get a
response from Staff on that.
VICE CHAIR KANE: A meal is not popcorn, not
shrimp, not chips, not dips, but a meal is a meal, and in
the drop-in place there’s not going to be any meals served.
There are going to be cupcakes decorated, or whatever the
Applicant said in his letter, and I’m strongly opposed to
alcohol service unless there’s a meal.
Moreover, as you get to it, there’s no other
place in town that serves beer and wine unless it’s a
restaurant, so we’re already going down a new corridor if
not a slippery slope, assigning that permit to this
service.
You want to review it every three and six months.
I think that’s prudent, and we have space to make that
recommendation at Council, but I don’t think we have any
space to recommend a violation of the Alcohol Policy.
CHAIR BADAME: I’m going to allow our Community
Development Director to step in here. Mr. Paulson, would
you like to comment?
JOEL PAULSON: Just to get back to Commissioner
Hudes’ original question, actually I think the way that the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
86
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
condition is currently worded, which is Condition 9 of
Exhibit 3, actually meets your intent.
To Vice Chair Kane, I don’t think Commissioner
Hudes is saying that you should be having beer and wine
with cupcakes, but I think during their public testimony
the Applicant stated, as Commissioner Hudes, did that that
would be an ideal place to put tables up for after you’re
done cooking; you go and you eat your meal and you could
have wine. This limits the service of beer and wine as
permitted only with meals, and so regardless of location,
that I think covers at least what Commissioner Hudes is
looking for, and then it further defines what a meal is.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Well that would still support
Staff’s recommendation that beer and wine not be served in
the drop-in zone for the drop-ins to decorate a cupcake. It
will be for people having a meal that they brought from the
main room.
JOEL PAULSON: Correct.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Okay.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: And to be clear, my motion
does not include language about the drop-in zone, but it
does include Item 9, which says, “The service of beer and
wine is permitted only with meals,” and then goes on from
there.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
87
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
CHAIR BADAME: Are we clear on that, Vice Chair
Kane? All right, do we have a second? Motion fails.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Whoa, let me go… I’m sorry. I
didn’t want to be talking all night long, but I’ll second
the motion. We’re making a recommendation to Town Council.
We’re not setting policy, we’re not agreeing, we’re not
denying, we’re sending a recommendation to Town Council,
and I’m just one voice, but I think what Commissioner Hudes
has come up with is reasonably prudent, so I’ll second the
motion.
CHAIR BADAME: All right. We have discussion.
Commissioner Erekson has got his hand up.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: I think I know what the
motion is, but I’m not sure. But I would make some
observations with respect to Commissioner Hudes’ concern
about Parent’s Night Out.
In the letter from the Applicant, Parent’s Night
Out is actually in the section of kid’s classes, so I think
it’s pretty clear that’s the intent of the Applicant. It’s
a type of kid’s class; it’s not a separate category in
their letter that’s part of their support of their
application, so that seems to me to be not an issue. That’s
just informational from my perspective.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
88
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
I think the motion still would include something
that would explicitly exclude a childcare facility. If
that’s the case, I couldn’t support the motion, because we
would have to have a limitless number of exclusions. It
seems like to me we specify use and we don’t specify what
are not uses, so I couldn’t support a motion that would
exclude a particular use; there doesn’t seem to be a logic
to that.
Then it’s not clear to me the reason for
excluding, and what we gain from excluding, the 19/1 and
34/2 in the chart. As a matter of fact, in his testimony
the Applicant used 19/1, a business association, as an
example of where they might do that. Well, it wasn’t usual,
but they might do that. I could see that happening. I could
see them, for example, hosting a limited Chamber event
where they wouldn’t need but one staff person there, so I’m
not sure what that gains us by eliminating that, and I’m
not sure what it gains us by the 34/2 given that they
might… I mean I can’t imagine I’m going to have a viable
business and I’d have too many people there that I couldn’t
provide good, quality service to. So I guess I would have
to respect the way they run their business.
But I would support the intent of Commissioner
Hudes as including the chart, and that’s Exhibit 5, as
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
89
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
greater clarification of what is Conditions 6 and 7 where
there are not maximums, so I would think there would be
ways that one could incorporate an appropriate Exhibit 5 as
the way to express what the limitations and boundaries are,
because I’m a bit uncomfortable with the language that’s in
the use permits myself now. While I understand you could
get to it from the language that’s in there, I just think
it’s better to be very explicit about that.
My other observation is that while there was
testimony in response to a question that I asked that
people that drop in would be seen by the Applicant as
students. Assuming that they’re very successful with their
business and they’re here 15 years from now or something,
and they’re thriving and we think it’s the best addition to
that end of downtown ever, history then gets lost
sometimes, so I would suggest that we might use the term
“instructors and staff” and “instructors/staff,” so it’s
clear, because there could be staff there that weren’t
technically instructors at a time that might need to be
there, and that would be clearer. Also, “students and
customers,” or some language like that, because the drop-in
situation, if I understand what they contemplate for that
and I’ve actually visited their place in the past, I don't
know that I would consider drop-in people as students
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
90
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
necessarily in the way that there’s an explicit class going
on, so I would be interested in those kinds of things.
Then I do have a question for Mr. Paulson, since
one of his three departments now is the Compliance
Department. While I’m not opposed to reviews, I guess to be
sure that people are complying with a Conditional Use
Permit, and I’m not saying we shouldn’t ever ensure that
people are responsible for it, but it’s not clear, if I
understood the maker of the motion, some of it was about to
be sure that parking is working out okay.
Well, I’m not sure how I measure that it’s not
working out okay. The Town has a set of standards that they
use to allocate parking spaces, and as long as they’re
doing that, unless they not egregiously saying we don’t
want people to come here and go to our classes unless they
come one in a car and they create kinds of problems,
something like that, I’m not sure how we would effectively
enforce, or be sure they’re complying, with in fact the
code.
JOEL PAULSON: Obviously that’s close to a
residential neighborhood, the Broadway area. The citizens
there are very engaged, and so if things become challenging
from a parking perspective, then we would look at that
three-, six-, nine-year, whatever those time periods are,
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
91
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
we would look to code compliance to see how many complaints
they and/or other Staff had received relating to any of
those issues, whether it’s noise or parking.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Thank you, and I appreciate
the comments. Let me see if I can address them, and maybe
in reverse order.
With regard to the review, my intention was to
ask that the review be done such that the Applicant is in
compliance with the Conditional Use Permit, and not go
beyond that review.
With respect to the definition of customers and
students and instructors and staff, I agree with that
completely. I sort of ran out of time to say that when I
was describing it myself, so I would suggest we use that
wording that you suggested.
With respect to the maximums in the table, I went
back to the testimony of the Applicant and I am concerned
about the intensity that the project will generate, and so
if the Applicant says that it’s viable to run this at 31/3,
then that’s what I think the maximum should be, rather than
something above that that was in their initial requirement.
So I would prefer to stay with the 31/3 as the top number,
and the 16/2 as the top number, just because I think it
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
92
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
makes sense in terms of having at least some impact on the
intensity.
Then with respect to the first point about
excluding childcare use, I think I made that in my initial
comments, but that was not part of my motion. My motion was
to have Staff address the issue about the question of
whether Parent’s Night Out would be simply childcare, and
it was clarified to me that it included classes, and so I’m
satisfied with that and I don’t think we need any language
with respect to that first point.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you. Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Commissioner Hudes, referring
to Exhibit 5, those top two lines that you made reference
to are simply an extension of the ratio of how many spaces
are required and committed. He’s not committing to 19/1 or
34/2, but that’s what he could have under the parking
ratios, whether or not they ever get used; it’s simply an
example of what he could have, I think.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I also clarified that those
numbers would be a maximum, whereas the application does
not specify a maximum.
VICE CHAIR KANE: So you want to eliminate those
two line items?
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
93
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I would take the first line
item off the table as a maximum on both tables.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Right, that’s what I meant. I’m
not sure how you’d do that other than the ratios; it’s
simple mathematics.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Well, you end up with 31/3
is 34, and 28/4, which is the next one down, is only 32.
VICE CHAIR KANE: Okay. We’re making a
recommendation. I’m okay with that.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: It’s a smaller number, and
that’s what I’m suggesting.
CHAIR BADAME: Okay, so we have a motion and a
second on the table. Is there any further discussion before
I call the question? Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: It would be helpful to me
if the Staff could actually review the motion and clarify
exactly what the motion is that we’re voting on, because I
want to be sure that I’m being an informed voter.
JOEL PAULSON: I’ll start, and then anyone can
fill in. Typically what we will do is just review the
videotape so we make sure we don’t miss anything, and even
following this conversation we’ll do that as well.
We have a motion from Commissioner Hudes to
incorporate the elements from Commissioner Hanssen’s
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
94
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
original motion, which was staff present when there are
non-employee instructors present; no alcohol during kid’s
events; that the landlord enter into an agreement with Toll
House; that there be a review at three, six, nine months
and one year from when the business starts operation; that
the Applicants will inform customers of parking options in
town; that the maximums become the 16 students and 2
instructors as a maximum for the daytime use, and that the
31 students and 3 instructors be the maximum at the evening
and weekend timeframe; and also we are going to add the
language from Commissioner Erekson on the
“instructor/staff” and “student/customer.” I think that’s
the last one I have on my list.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: With respect to the
maximums, it would be to include that full table that gets
into the ratios as well.
JOEL PAULSON: Adding a reference to that chart.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Correct.
JOEL PAULSON: Okay.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hanssen.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: I’m not sure I’m clear
about the additional idea of the agreement. We already have
a copy of the letter from the landlord and the tenant
saying that there is an agreement to allocate six of the
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
95
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
parking spots, so I’m not sure what the additional
expectation would be. Then I was thinking of our attorney’s
comments that this could significantly delay the process,
because it essentially would have to be another CUP for the
Toll House, so I’m kind of uncomfortable with that. I just
wanted to make sure I understood the intent and what it
really meant.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: I think this is a technical
issue that I would prefer Staff to recommend how to deal
with that. I think I’ve heard some different opinions on
it. I think that it’s important, but I don’t think that
creating a legal nightmare is what we’re trying to do here.
COMMISSIONER HANSSEN: So would you be taking
that off of your addition to the motion? It’s a
recommendation that it should be looked at by Council.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: Yeah, I think it’s simpler
to take that off for now, and if Staff thinks about it
before it goes to Council and wants to make a suggested
change, then that would be their purview to make a
suggestion.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: I think I’ve got it. I
just have one clarification. The restriction on “No alcohol
at kid’s events,” quote and unquote, that was Joel’s
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
96
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
wording, does that mean events which are exclusively
children’s events? Events at which, I assume, the intent of
that would be events at which there are minors, or to
exclude any event where this is a minor, or events at which
there were only minors? Those are two different things.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: It was my intention that
alcohol not be served during children’s events, and that
means when children are present. So it would be permissible
on the converse to serve alcohol when it’s an adult only
event.
JOEL PAULSON: Thank you for that clarification.
Just so everyone understands that I think you end up with
the family getting together, the family dinner, which may
have all ages down to kids, so I understand your motion,
but just so folks understand that.
CHAIR BADAME: I’m going to add to the discussion
here. I have concern with the parking. I also have concern
with the intensification of alcohol licenses in our
downtown.
However, I’m amenable to the overall concept of a
cooking school. I think this is something new that will add
to family fun and commercial vitality in the downtown, and
I believe it would support other businesses as well as
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
97
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
expand resident-oriented services, so I would be supporting
the motion. Commissioner Erekson.
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: Just so that I clarify
when we take that vote that I’m not going to support the
motion. I don’t think it’s necessary to preclude alcohol
service at events where there are adults and children
present. My sense is, although I understand this, the use
isn’t being specified as a restaurant. We’re using the
logic of a restaurant for the way we’re interpreting the
alcoholic beverage thing, and we don’t preclude restaurants
from serving alcohol where they have minors present, so I
can’t support it on that basis.
Then I don’t feel the necessity to eliminate the
two lines that Commissioner Hudes wants to eliminate off of
Exhibit 5 in that chart.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Hudes.
COMMISSIONER HUDES: With respect to the children
and alcohol, I guess the situation I was trying to prevent
was not the family dinner where there were adults and
children, it was where there was a class and there were
adults drinking off on the side. So if there’s a way to
maybe clarify that, and that’s why I use the term
“children’s events,” that alcohol not be served during
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
98
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
children’s events. Maybe we can modify that language to
address that second issue.
CHAIR BADAME: Vice Chair Kane.
VICE CHAIR KANE: I want to stress this is a
recommendation. It’s not a denial, an approval, or a
pyramid or something that’s going to live for seven… It’s
going to live for a week until it gets to Town Council. The
gist of the motion being made is kids in bars. We don’t
want kids in bars. People go to a restaurant, they sit down
and they have a glass of… This isn’t a restaurant.
So it’s uncharted waters, and it’s a
recommendation. The intent is well intended that children
not be present when alcohol is being served. It’s not a
restaurant.
So with that recommendation, Commissioner
Erekson, I think we’re doing our job of giving a
responsible guidance, recommendation, to Town Council.
They’ve got to decide this thing. I think we’re giving them
a multi-pronged recommendation with a lot of good things to
think about. This is not a deciding body.
CHAIR BADAME: I’m going to step in here.
Commissioner Erekson does have a right to disagree and
voice his opinion, and after we hear from him, I’d really
like to call the question. Commissioner Erekson.
LOS GATOS PLANNING COMMISSION 5/11/2016
Item #3, 22 South Santa Cruz Avenue
99
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
COMMISSIONER EREKSON: After eight years on the
Planning Commission I don’t need to be reminded by another
Commissioner that I understand that we’re making a
recommendation to the Town Council, and that the whole
eight years I’ve been on the Planning Commission it’s been
clear to me that we can only make recommendations where the
Alcoholic Beverage Service Policy of the Town is a part of
the application.
That being said, I don’t think that it’s an even
close interpretation when you use the word “bar” to
describe this. It’s not even close to a bar. It may not be
a restaurant, but it’s certainly closer to a restaurant
than it is to a bar.
CHAIR BADAME: Commissioner Erekson, I think we
all can agree that we can disagree at times, and I think
it’s really time to call the question here, so all in
favor? Opposed? Commissioner Erekson opposed. Passes 4-1.
Mr. Paulson, since this is just a recommendation
to the Town Council, are there appeal rights of the actions
of the Commission on this item?
JOEL PAULSON: There are not any appeal rights
for this item.
CHAIR BADAME: Thank you.