 I'm going to call in on 925-389-769 as soon as we start the meeting she'll be on the side. Okay. Thank you. February 17th meeting of the city of Santa Cruz planning commission to order. Thank you all for joining Apologies for getting going a little bit late. Clerk could we please have a roll call here. Okay. Yeah. Like we have a full house for the evening so there's no absentee. Is there any statements of disqualification for any items on the agenda tonight. Okay. Hearing none we will move along. We will move along to oral communications. This is time for any members of the public to address the commission for any matters that may come before the commission in the future. This is not for agenda items on the agenda tonight but anything that is of relevance to the commission that may come in the future. So if you would like to address the commission you will have three minutes. You can raise your hand by hitting star nine if you would like to address the commission at this time. Are we seeing anybody who would like to address the commission at this time. Okay. Last call for that and we will move right along. Okay. Moving to the next agenda item approval of the minute for the February 2022. Is there any questions or clarifications from any of the commission. Or I entertain a motion. Do you actually have one question for staff. We did actually flip flop the order of which the items were heard and that was not reflected on the minutes. Is that something that we need to correct and continue this item or maybe a little direction from staff on that. I think I'm fine with it. Does any commissioners have any issues with that. And if not I will entertain a motion for the approval of the minutes for the February 3rd meeting. I think the motion but I think you need to ask if anybody from the public wants to comment on the minutes. Okay. Does any members of the public want to comment on the minutes. Seeing none. Clark are you seeing anybody with raised hands. Okay. So hearing none now we will entertain a motion for approval of the minute. I move to approve the minute. For a second. I'll second it. Okay. Commissioner Kennedy moves for approval. Commissioner Maxwell seconds. Could we please have a roll call vote. Thank you. Hi. Sorry minutes approved unanimously. Okay. Moving on. So on tonight's agenda we have a consent calendar. And just as a little background for commissioners in the public. A consent agenda includes items that staff feel are noncontroversial that align with the applicant. And that can be moved through a single motion for approval. And at first we'll go ahead and ask any commissioners if they would like to remove any items from the consent agenda. There are two items. It's the mission street project, a special use permit to establish a 24-hour fitness gym in an existing building located in a CC zone district. And the second item on the consent agenda is to continue the oversized vehicle ordinance implementation appeal to the March 3rd meeting. Is there any commissioners who would like to pull any one of those agenda items off the consent agenda? Yes. Commissioner Schifrin. I don't want to pull the mission street item off the agenda, but I would like to ask a question if I could. Yes. Go ahead. I'm just wondering about the landscaping along mission street. The site planning shows very little landscaping. And I was just wondering why, you know, for some explanation about why, given the importance of mission speed as an entrance to the city, there wasn't more landscaping required or provided? But maybe I'm not reading the drawing correctly. Hi, Chair Schifrin. This is Samantha from the city planning department. The project planner, Lane Zorich, is here. If you could promote her to a panelist, then I'm sure she'd be happy to answer any questions. Hi. Can you guys hear me? Yes. Go ahead. Yes. So I believe one of the conditions of approval that I included include adding a landscaping plan that will improve and increase the plantings that are located on the front facade there, if you are correct. It is pretty minimal at the moment. And we would like to enhance the look and attractiveness of mission street. Great. So that plan will be approved by staff? Right. When they come in for their tenant improvement building permit, that will be reviewed at that time to make sure that they are putting in some enhanced plantings in that area. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I also have one clarifying question. I don't want to pull it from the consent agenda. This is a question for staff. I do believe I remember a past project coming before us and a discussion back and forth with staff about including, and this is not necessarily for this project, but just in the future, including with the staff recommendation, an overview map showing adjacent properties. And then also, I thought there was a requirement, and I may have missed it, to include in the staff report kind of the notification to neighbors. And it may have been in there, so I may have missed it. I just wonder if staff could comment on those two components. An overview map for adjacent properties when we have to use kind of special use to come through and also just summary of the notification for neighbors. I don't know how much I can speak to that. That might be something that Samantha might also be able to discuss further. Yeah, this is absolutely for staff, for sure. Okay. So maybe Sam or someone else from city staff is chiming in on that one. Thank you. Ms. Orts. Thanks, Chair Dawson. So we do include an overview map of adjacent properties. I think you're referring to the site section. Yeah, those are required for new development so we can see the impact of lights and new construction and the size and mass of the building on the street and on adjacent buildings. In this case, they're just reusing an existing building. So Lane, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe there's no new actual construction proposed, at least on the exterior. And I don't recall that we were directed to include an exhibit that showed notice to the neighbors, but we certainly could do so if that's what you wanted to see. Yeah, I think it would just be helpful for both commissioners and the public just to get a better sense of, I understand that there's no additional building in this, but just to understand kind of the adjacent property usage, if you guys are doing that anyway, it would just be nice to have that included in staff recommendations moving forward. I don't really want to belabor it, but I see Mr. Marlett may have something to add. So go ahead. Yeah, just a point of clarification. So are you talking about the list of the folks that got notices or the radius map that shows the properties that got noticed? The latter? A sentence that says, you know, we notified properties within however many seats of this, you know, like I said, it may have been in the staff report, but I think I would just find that really helpful. So if I have neighbors that, you know, come and are asking questions, I could, you know, point to that there was notification made. And also, again, just an overview map, including in the staff report, since that's something that's part of the process anyway. I just think it would be more informative to both commissioners and the public if we could do that in the future. Okay, so if it's not included on the plans, as was the case this time, we can certainly include that as an exhibit. Yeah, that's not a problem. Yeah, that would be very helpful. Any other questions or comments before we go to the public to see if they have any wants to remove anything from the consent agenda? Okay, so I'm going to go ahead and open the public hearing. If any members of the public would like to remove either one of these items from the consent agenda, I can hear that testimony now and then we could go ahead and do that and move it off for a full discussion. Are there any members of the public who would like to remove either of these items from the consent agenda? If so, please raise your hand now by pressing star or nine. And are you seeing any raised hands? I am not. Okay, we'll give it another second or two to make sure everybody had a chance. Still seeing no hands raised. So we will go ahead and close the public hearing and bring it back to commission. I would share motion for approval of the consent agenda with the staff recommendations as run. Second that. Okay. Moved by commissioner Schifrin, seconded by commissioner Greenberg. Could we please have a roll call vote? Okay. So consent agenda is approved unanimously, the staff recommendations. And so we will move on to item number four, local regulation amendment ordinance. So can we please have a staff report start us off here for item number four. Good evening commission. I'm Catherine Donovan senior planner in the advanced planning division. And let me bring up my PowerPoint. Here we go. So we're looking tonight at this local regulation update. And these first came to the commission in a package of amendments in September of 2020. At that time. You can't see the PowerPoint yet. Oh, sorry to interrupt. Oh, thank you. And try sharing that again. Yeah, let me try it again. You see it now. Yeah. As I was saying, the regulations first came to the commission in a packet with other amendments in September of 2020. And at that time, the commission pulled the slope regulations from the rest of the packet and continued that item. And move the rest of the amendments along to the city council. We've returned with a slope regulation amendment. On January of this year. And the commission recommended approval of a small section. But continued the remainder of the amendments. So we're coming back now with that remainder. And because we have. Two new commissioners. We'll be spreading through. A large portion of the original presentation. So. Just. I'm sorry if it bore you, but just bear with me here. So as background here. The general plan is the guiding land use documents. And the zoning ordinance implements the general plan. The 2030 general plan updated policies related to development on slope. But the zoning ordinance still reflects the 20. Oh, five. General plan. And you can see at the bottom of the slide, there's some examples. What did what different presence of slope look like? And I tried to find one that showed 30 and 50 and I could not find one. So this shows. 17. 33. 66. And 100%. So the 33 would be close to the 30%. The 66 is. Considerably more than 50%. And the 20. Oh, five general plan, the slope policies. That 30% and 50%. Limit. The 2030 general plan. Remove those. Limit and based their recommendations. To use. New construction techniques and best management practices. And also directed that geotechnical reports be required. And that's where there was a potential for slope instability. And I have here the actual policies from the general, from the. 20. Oh five general plan. Which are lengthy, but you can see that. They limit development. On. Over 30%. To have it on greater than 50. And. Required. To have the specific criteria to be met. For development. Between 30 and. 20. 30 general plan. Remove those policies entirely. And. As I said earlier. Recommended. Updating the zoning ordinance. To address new construction techniques and best management policies. Review. View the slope development provisions in the zoning ordinance. And update them as deemed necessary. To discourage development on unstable slope. And to require engineering geology reports. When in the opinion of the city's planning director. Activation and grading. Have the potential. For exposure. To slope instability. Or the potential to create unstable slope or soil conditions. So the goals of this update were to comply with the 2030 general plan. But also to reduce and streamline the applications we get for minor projects. As I mentioned in the staff report. The current planning division gets a lot of. Applications for. Project that. Really are quite minor and. That have to come before the planning commission often just go on the consent calendar which. Is a is a waste of time and money. For both the applicants. And for staff and the commission. Who could be spending their time. Better on. More complex projects. We're also. Looking. At the potential of. Allowing development where it is feasible. And requiring. Site specific geological report. So that. They would have science based engineering solution. When it would be feasible to develop on those. The proposed changes. Prior that geological. Review that I spoke of. On or near slopes of 30% or greater. They require the engineering solution or relocation if the report shows there are issues. That can't be solved by engineering. We added some exemptions to the requirement for a slope permit. And we changed the existing rating. Exemption from. 100 cubic yards to 50 cubic yards. Visualized how much 100 cubic yards wasn't decided that's an awful lot. We also updated the findings to address. The visual and environmental impact. And we removed. From the list of regulations. Where. Planning development project may vary we removed the slope. Modification. Regulations. We also updated the application. Process. And. Combined the slope modification and slope variance. Into a slope development permit. We. Modified the public hearing requirements. Currently there's no public hearing. If the project is less than 10 feet or sorry greater than 10 feet. From a 30% slope. And it goes through the planning commission. If it's within 10 feet of a 30% slope. And what we're proposing. Is that the no public hearing requirements. Are for. Projects that are on or within 20 feet of a 30% slope. And the public hearing baby for the. Zoning game administrator. If the project is on or within 20 feet of a 50% slope. This. Section of the zoning ordinance is also part of the local coastal. Program. And so. It. Will the amendment will also be a local coastal. Program. And so we assessed it for consistency with the local coastal. Program. And found that is consistent with the policies. Related to coastal access and view protection. It will require geotechnical review. With engineering solutions. Or relocation of the project to prevent or mitigate development. On unstable slope. And it retains. And strengthens the findings for the slope permit. Is. The map. Of. The areas in the city that have. And you can see they are the areas that are. We believe black lines. And then. For the most part in the green areas. Which are the open space and park lands. The large blue area is UCSC which. The city does not have development control over. There's also some. Small amount of slope. Along. And. High street. And then. Various. It follows the various creek. Locations. And then also. Hard to see on this map. But along the coast. There are quite steep slopes also. One of the issues that. Seem to be. Difficult. For people to. Visualize is that. Is that of the density. The general plan. Requires that development. Of at least. The minimum density. Be applied when develop. Developing a property. Unless. There are constraints associated with the natural environment. That require a lower density. And the percentage of. Alone is not a constraint. There are. Many instances of property that are developed that have. Deeper than 30 or even 50% slope. The constraint. Comes. When you discover that. That. Locas. Associated. With. Unstable soil. And the geotechnical report. Establishes that constraint. Because the general plan density is based on. The gross. Area of the property. The amendment would not change that density. We're not changing the size of the property. So it would not change the number of units that would be. Allow. On each property. It would. Allow. Units. Located. Potentially located on 50%. Or greater slopes. But they would be units that would have been allowed. Elsewhere on the property. There are also two state laws that have come up. With regard to. Development on the slope. The first is SB nine. Which was recently passed and went into effect in January. It allows. Two units on most single family parcels. And also allows most single family parcels. To be split into two lot. With two units on each of them. And that can only be done once. The housing accountability act. Or HAA. Also requires that development be allowed. At the maximum general plan density. And the proposed amendment. Would not increase the number of units that would be allowed. By. Either the housing accountability act. Or by SB nine. So what the amendment would do. Is that it would. Give an additional level of review. The geotechnical report. That would now be codified into our zoning ordinance. And those geotechnical reports. May show constraints. That would lower the general plan density. For the housing accountability act. So if that geotechnical report. Showed that a. Portion of the property. Had an instability and could not be developed. Then. The density for that property. Would be based on. The net. Lot area. Not the gross lot area. So the lot area. Would be smaller. And therefore the number of units may be smaller. The geotechnical report. Could also expose unsafe. Conditions. Which would allow the building official to. Deny. The building. Of. Bowling unit. Under both. SB nine. And the housing accountability act. Another issue of concern. That was raised with. With. Resistionship to. Look. Lot. Is wildfire danger. Wildfires are an increasing danger in the west. And. Generally. Would stick with their address through the. State. Map. Very high. Fire hazards. Severities on that. And none of those are mapped within the city. In. 2019. The city also added. A wildland. Urban interface ordinance. Which. Math areas. That are. Particular concern because it's where. Housing. And development are close to. Wildland. Which. Is. Endangered from fire. And that. Ordinance. The. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Ordinance. Bill. Though the building division. To apply additional. Construction means and methods. Or fire protection. And again. The number of units that could. Be built in the wildland. Urban interface. With the amendment. Would not change. It's the same amount that. Could be developed. Now. properties in the well-known urban interface that have slopes. A portion of the property is slopes, and a portion of it is not. But the entire property is within the WUI district and is in danger from wildfire. The fires don't stop where the property gets flatter. And this is a map that shows the WUI area, and superimposed over that are the slopes. And you can see those in that sort of yellow-orange color. And as shown before, the vast majority of this area is UCSD land or parkland. But there's definitely areas of development. If you look carefully, you'll see that generally those areas of steep slope border the development so that there's usually a single row of housing along the edge of an open space or a slope area. You can also see that there are other orangish areas that are outside of the WUI area. Some of those are outlined in the creek, but there's also that section that goes along Escalona and High Street. Before the CEQA review of this document, the California Environmental Quality Act, the city retained DUDEC to review compliance with the general plan 2030 EIR. And DUDEC prepared an addendum as there are no substantial changes to the general plan that would invalidate the analyses of the EIR that were done for the general plan. There were some questions about certain parts of the addendum at the previous Planning Commission meeting and DUDEC revised the addendum based on the commissioner and staff concerns. And you have the revised version in the red line version in your packet. We also had the law firm Rami Morris Manley prepare a legal opinion about the appropriateness of using an addendum and whether there was any requirements to review impact from SB 9 as part of this project. The legal opinion from Rami Morris Manley, RMM, was that an addendum to an approved EIR is used when there are no new or more significant impact caused by a change in the project or circumstances. And the issue was brought up that the post SB 9 allowed additional housing on single-family lots that that was a change in circumstances, but the legal opinion firmly stated that the enactment of a new law does not constitute new information or change circumstances that would trigger sequence subsequent point review provisions or in terms of whether an addendum is the appropriate environmental review document. And they also stated that any increases in development due to SB 9 would not be considered reasonably foreseeable. That's sort of a technical term in this instance that is described in the legal opinion. And there are a number of cases that discuss that reasonable foreseeability. One that is quite similar to what we're seeing here in that it had to do with a 27-unit development that would have allowed second unit with the approval of a youth permit. They were sued because the environmental document was sued because they said it did not include an analysis of those second units. And the legal determination was that the development of those second units was not reasonably foreseeable because it depended on the individual property owners and there was no way to predict who was going to build a unit and where it was going to be. And the environmental review of any potential future unit would occur at the time when those units came forward as a project. So there were questions on the addendum and this is mainly before the prior meeting that we wanted to cover those because they continued to come up. One of the questions related to added development, because we would remove the prohibition from development on 50% slope, that would mean that an area that currently is not allowed to be could potentially be developed. However, the same number of units would need to be the maximum number on each individual property. They could be relocated, so some of them might be able to be built on the slope, but they could not add new units that would be built on the slope. However, with the review of the geological report, if that report came back and said that there are areas where the slope is unstable and can't be built, that might actually lower the density of the property because it would be looking at the net lot area rather than the gross plot area. The general plan requires actual constraints to lower the density and the slope percentage alone is not a constraint. The SB9 and the Housing Accountability Act each require specific development capacity that goes beyond what's allowed under our local development standards. However, that would be allowed to be built on the slope whether or not this ordinance went into effect. There were also a number of questions about the wildfire danger, and we went through these earlier. The very high fire hazard severity zones are set by the state, and there are none within the city limits. We adopted the wildfire urban interface ordinance in 2019, which allows the building department added code enforcement or building codes to be used in those areas that would use higher building standards for fire prevention. The development plans are reviewed by both the building vision and the fire department. There are also specific fire standards that apply in the wildfire wildland urban interface areas. Additional information was provided online this week. It includes the EPA's smart growth fixes for climate adaptation and resilience, which is a booklet put out by the EPA addressing a number of climate adaptation measures where smart growth principles can be used. And then also the city's 2017-2022 local hazard mitigation plan five-year updates. So addressing the information in the EPA's document and the local hazard mitigation plan, we also posted the documents that are used to review developments for anything in the city related to storm water and the best management practices for storm water. And also, there's a specific provision in this post amendment that storm water to and from comply with city, regional water boards, and state requirements. The local hazard mitigation plan had a map that showed potential landslide areas. And this legend is very hard to read. That dark brown is definite. The lighter brown is, I can even read it, definite rigid. That doesn't make sense. The tan is probable, and the yellow is questionable. And if you look, there is nothing within the city except those areas of the lighter yellow, which are questionable. And those areas are in the UCSC area and in Pogonet Park. In order to approve, to recommend approval to the city council of these ordinances, the proposed, the following findings has to be made. And they are that the proposed amendment serves and furthers public necessity and general community welfare, that the proposed amendment serves and furthers good zoning practice, and that the proposed amendment is in general conformance with the principle of policies and land use designations set forth in the general plan and local coastal plan. And I would be happy to take any questions or comments. And I'd also like to say that Tim Shields, our acting division chief in prevention and the fire marshal, and Robert Oki, the interim fire chief, are here for questions, as well as definitely Stephanie Freelo, our doodex consultant. And that completes my presentation. Hey, thank you so much, Catherine. Can we go back to go ahead and unshare screen so we can go back to the screen? So we'll go ahead and move into commissioners with any clarifying questions for the staff report. We'll have plenty of time for comments. But this is a section, if you need any clarifying questions based on the staff report or anything you've read in the staff report, the written staff report, this is time. So any commissioners have any clarifying questions for staff this time before the public hearing? Okay, seeing none, before I open the public hearing, I just want to remind the public that we need to ensure that we can sprain our comments to the policy that is being considered. I will not tolerate any ad hominem attacks on commissioners. And I just encourage the public to be professional and respectful and focus their comments on the policy and sharing with their commissioners their thoughts on the policy. And so with that, I will go ahead and open the public hearing. Each member of the public will have three minutes to address the commission. The clerk has a timer so you will hear a beep at the end of your three minutes. And if you haven't already, we would please ask you to wrap up immediately after you've heard the beep. If you would like to address the commission on item number four, slope regulations amendment, please go ahead and raise your hand. I'll go ahead and open the public hearing and raise your hand by pressing star nine. And the clerk will call on you in order. Go ahead and pick it over to you. We have the clerk call in the first speaker, please. The first speaker. If speaker, you'll have three minutes. Please identify yourself and address the commission. Thank you. Well, I suppose that's me. My name is Mark Framac. I'm not here for ad hominem attacks. But I would like to tell you that I have a home in Santa Cruz, thanks to the slope modification ordinance that you're about to hopefully revive. The property of my house design was subject to at least in a course of 11 years, 12 hearings before the planning commission, and five or six hearings before the city council and two lawsuits. And we're talking about a house that was built within 20 feet of a 30% slope. The slope modification is based on a very broad generality that building on a slope is unstable and unsightly. It's a lot like saying that immigrants are gang members. My house, when the foundation was poured, the engineer and the soil engineer came out to the site and looked great embarrassment. They turned to me and they said, this house is going nowhere. I was bedded one foot into solid rock. It was obvious that the house was in the foundation been over engineered by a faculty of five. I have walked in the Royal Sacred Canyon, do all of my house, looking for my house. On many occasions, it's very difficult to find. It's almost impossible to see from the open space. So all that time was spent satisfying the discretionary wins of neighbors who didn't want to lose their views, who had inroads to politicians who were willing to use discretionary hearings to advance their own agenda. And I'm hoping that tonight, this commission will move the zoning ordinance towards a rational and impartial and objective path towards reviewing and updating application. I've sat on the zoning board and planning commission. I've watched commissioners approve slope modifications for hot tubs on slopes greater than 50% for fence of theirs. And I've watched them deny minor changes to people who were on the wrong side of a political divide. So I asked you to correct this once and for all. The science is great. The ruling which has been added is very important. Thank you very much. Thank you for your comment. Are there any other members of the public who would like to address the commission on item number four, the slope regulations amendment? If so, please raise your hand pressing star nine. Okay. Just want to check with the clerk that you're seeing no hands. Okay. Thank you very much. Give it just a second or two here. All right. With that, I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearing for item number four and bring this back before the commissioners. I would also like before we go into comments just to call out that we have had additional correspondence added on the website for this item. If the public would like to review that. I believe those comments are from Chair Schifrin. So I think I would go ahead and start with Chair Schifrin to just. I'm sorry. I haven't quite switched yet in my hair in my head. Commissioner Schifrin, I'll start with him and then we'll go to Commissioner Kennedy and then move on down the line. So Commissioner Schifrin, we'll go ahead and start with you and then we have Commissioner Kennedy and Commissioner Conway. I thought I saw your hand. Anyway, go ahead. Commissioner Schifrin. Well, let me show you. I just have two issues. One is a procedural issue and I was wanting to get this response to this. It has to do with the zoning ordinance process for initiating amendments to the zoning code. Section 24-06-02-0 says that amendments may be initiated, and this is through the zoning ordinance by the City Council and the Planning Commission. I'm just wondering where the authority exists for staff to initiate zoning ordinance amendments because the amendments to the scope regulations were not initiated by the Commission. I'm not aware that they were initiated by the Council, but they were brought to us initially with a recommendation for approval with the Environmental Document NUM. And maybe missing something, it wouldn't be the first time that I just haven't come across this code section. I wondered how it applied. I can answer that. Thank you, Commissioner Schifrin. Madsenwa Principal Planner in Advanced Planning. This was specifically called out in the 2030 General Plan. Direction was given in the General Plan, as Catherine showed in our presentation. The fact that it's in the General Plan and there's direction to move forward with this in the General Plan is direction from Council as well. So you're, okay, I guess I have an understanding that the amendment really flows from the General Plan, which was approved by the Council, to go for a review of the zoning ordinance for scope regulations, and that's why you voted for it. Correct. Okay, thank you. I think that makes sense to me. I just wanted to be clear about how things get in front of us. The other point I would make now is that I sent in comments on my concern, my people concerns about the addendum. I appreciate the staff has responded to them. I appreciate the memo from the attorneys on it. I still disagree with the analysis. I feel that there's confusion over what is an amendment issue and what is a secret issue, but I'm not going to argue about it tonight. My concerns are on the record. If somebody wants to take them up, it's one of the reasons I'm not able to support. So that's recommendation, but I wouldn't be able to support it even within an environmental document that I agreed with, and I'll talk later about other reasons for that. So let me just say that I've read over the responses and appreciate them. I don't want to get into a debate about it. I stand by the concerns that I raised, and I think that, from my perspective, my knowledge of secret evaluative issues, but I'm not wanting to spend a lot of time tonight trying to talk to you out of it because I know that's impossible, and I think it's impossible to talk to me out of it. So your position is on the staff position, the attorneys position on the record. My concerns are on the record, and I'm just happy to leave it at that. Okay, thank you, Mr. Schifrin. Moving on to Mr. Kennedy. I want to move approval of staff recommendation. This seems to me to be streamlining. I can't tell you how many hours I spent on this commission just wasting staff and people's time on these slope ordinances, so I'd like to move approval. And I'll second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. I feel like we haven't really had enough discussion on this from commissioners. I actually had comments as well, so I'd like to go ahead and commissioners make additional comments before the vote. Is there any other comments besides me who would like to address this before we go to a vote? Yes, sir. I think it's appropriate. This is a time to make comments on the motion on the floor. Do you want me to go first or do you want to go first? I'll let you go first, and then I'll back clean up, and then we'll go to the vote. I'm not willing to. I'm not going to support the motion because, as I mentioned, I think the quick analysis is inadequate, and an attendant is not the appropriate environmental document. The ordinance removes the prohibition of major developments on slopes over 50%, despite the negative impacts of doing so and the loss of one of the very few remaining environmental objective standards. I would be very close to supporting this ordinance and the changes if it did include the continued prohibition of slopes on slopes over 50%. I think the proposals for slopes less than 50% are desirable. We've already recommended it to the council, which is also included in this, the exemption for minor projects. I also support the proposal to require geological reports. I think that would be a benefit. I am a little concerned. I wanted to ask the question before I go on staff regarding who will review these geological reports. My experience, and if we go to the daily city of San Francisco, engineers can find ways to build on any kind of slope. And I just wonder what the city would be hiring these geotechnical professionals, or if it's going to be the developers who get to hire and direct the geotechnical professionals, what is going to be the city role in oversight and review of these reports? The general process, and Sam or Eric can correct me if I'm wrong here because I don't work in current planning, but the general process is that this would be a requirement to be submitted with the application. So it would be the developer who would hire someone to hire a geologist to do the report. City staff would review. We would definitely send these to our building department and our public works department and these vary quite a bit. Sometimes they're immensely understandable to even a layperson. I would say planners are one step above a layperson. Public works and building officials are building, review people are two or three steps above us. So if we felt that the language was not clear, we would require clarification, but generally it would be included in the application packet. Eric, did I get that right? Is there anything I missed? Yeah, applications are the reports are generated by a geotech engineer that's hired directly by the applicant and our building plan check engineers can and do review those. You got to remember these are all licensed individuals. From time to time on some controversial projects, we have had a third party review by an outside consultant. So we have our consultant on retainer and we've used their geotech engineers to peer review the reports that were submitted by the applicant. So from time to time, we can and do do that. Well, I guess Mike, thank you for that. Helpful. As I understand it and I could be wrong, I think the county has the geologist that they sort of it's on staff that reviews them. And I think that seems to me to be important. And I think it's a weakness in the ordinance not to be clear about how those geotechnical reports and they are the only basis for mitigating any development impact or even deciding where the development can occur on each slope to simply leave it up to the developer and the developer's hired engineer to make that determination. I think it is. I can't support that approach. Another reason I'm not going to be supporting the amendment. I am unable to and finally I'm unable to make the fight the following required findings that the proposed amendment serves and for this public necessity in general, general community welfare, I think that these by reducing the particularly the prohibition of development on 50% and more slopes, it reduces the general the general the community welfare and increases and makes minimizes more or reduces the environmental concerns and environmental constraints that exist on these slopes. I also don't I can't make the finding that the proposed amendment serves in person for zoning practice. I think for zoning practice is it's important to have clear requirements. And I agree that sort of not making it clear is a problem. And what we're doing is in a way in finding the concerns we're reducing the level of certainty in terms of where development can occur, where development can occur. So based on those reasons I'm not going to be supporting the motion. Thank you, Commissioner Schifrin. I see Commissioner Conway. Go ahead, Commissioner Conway. Thank you. And Commissioner Schifrin, I think you've made your point really clear through both your writing and your statements. I do understand your objections and I definitely strongly disagree with them. I very much support the finding that this furthers public welfare. I think that it's, pardon, I got that bit. I asked my problem tonight. So I'll limit my comment. But I think that this ordinance is practical. I think it does, in fact, enable the city to function more efficiently. And I also believe that it is, keeps the city safe and the citizens of the city safe. And I think it is a far better approach than the one that we've been using up until now. And I very strongly support the staff recommendations and certainly include in the final. Thank you, Commissioner Conway. Okay, I'll make a few brief comments here. And I'd like to just share my screen and go back to this map that was in Schifrin's presentation. I want to again thank staff for their thorough presentation as well. And I would just like to concur with Mr. Schifrin, but perhaps slightly different reasons. I also cannot make the finding that this ordinance, specifically the part about removing the prohibition in 50% slope, if a public necessity or furthers general community welfare, I am in support of all of the other components of this staff recommendation except the 50% prohibition. And just quickly, the reasons why I'm not in support of this come down to the fact that there is certainly a geological component to slope stability. There's soil eurotivity. But there is also just the physical fact that water and fire moves differently across slopes. And as slopes increase, the effect of the behavior of both fire and water is more affected as slopes increase. So if you look at the map that was in staff recommendation, you can see that the vast majority of the 50% slope areas are in the wild, urban interface. And a lot of the risk assessment that we're assuming associated with developing these areas is based on a climate regime that no longer exists. So we know that we are in a constant state of drought, flood or fire in the state of California. And so removing an existing prohibition in the wooey particularly, just for clarification, I would be supportive of removing the prohibition outside of the wooey. But keeping the prohibition inside the wooey is a very practical approach that ensures that until we have a better understanding of the risk of these areas for mudslides due to extreme precipitation, I think in December, I think in a 32-hour period or something like that, we had seven inches of rain. That's the kind of climate that is predicted to continue. And these kind of extreme precipitation events as well as just extreme, dry, extended drought changed the fire and the water regime in a way that it doesn't make a lot of sense to me to remove the 50% prohibition in these areas. So I just feel like because we can do something as a planning commission, I don't think there's a necessity for us to do this. I don't understand how this is furthering community safety and actually allowing for the community to have a better risk assessment for their development. I really feel like I could support this if we kept the prohibition in the wooey. But removing this prohibition just makes no sense to me with our very limited understanding of what the true risk is of developing. And these pretty extreme slopes. It's not that the engineering doesn't exist that we can do that. But how does the engineering match with the climate regime that we are all living in now and as we move forward? So again, I won't be supporting the staff recommendation. I certainly would support the whole package if we could keep the prohibition in the wooey. And I hope that we are really thoughtful about these kind of decisions in relation to the climate that we live in and understand that when we're looking at these risk assessments, they're based on previous data. They're not based on our understanding of what's happening now because we don't know what's happening now. So I think being precautionary about these kind of things makes a lot of sense. And I hope that we really consider that when we vote. So I will go ahead and stop there. One more call for comments. And then we'll go ahead and have the clerk read the motion on the floor and take about, looks like Commissioner Greenberg would like to speak. Thanks so much. And I'll try to keep it really brief. And thank you all for your comments. And this is a this is a tough one. I think that I really appreciate the work that the staff has done to respond to our previous comments and also the circulation of the additional documents. And I hear what Sarah Dawson is saying. And you know, I think we're all extremely concerned about this new climate change world that we're living in and the issues of the wooey and are needing to proceed in the midst of that at the same time recognizing that building housing in urban areas can also have environmental benefits. And so far as we're not extending that building outside, you know, further into a lot of more wildland areas, I think that my understanding from the map is that a lot of the wooey areas are park lands and that much of the areas represented on the map. And so they're undevelopable. And so in the report, it talked about, you know, 17 to 28 lots that are developable. And that many of those are in areas that are more the urban part of the wooey. And I was struck by the documents shared, Marcos fixes for climate adaptation and resilience. It talked about the fact that slope alone is not the only issue to consider that we have to consider slope in relation to the location and density of the housing. And so it strikes me that a lot of these properties lot are themselves in areas left down the Upper West Side that are, you know, relatively dense and, you know, located in relatively dense already developed urban size areas. And I feel we want to encourage development in some of those areas as insofar as we can. And I am, you know, encouraged by the fact that the technical geotechnical engineers and the building department and the fire department are going to weigh in as well on these proposals. So in that sense, I feel, you know, much more confident in supporting this initiative by the staff. So thank you. Commissioner Miss City Miller. Thank you, Chair Dawson. I'll keep my comments brief. I have the following comments. I think that this ordinance needs updating. Like Commissioner Kennedy, I have heard many of these matters before and they are typically relatively minor. Streamlining this is a benefit to our community. I believe that the way this ordinance has been rewritten that public health and safety will be protected. In fact, it may be more protected and, you know, that we'll have engineers involved earlier. I have to take exception to some earlier comments that were made that pointed out, you know, a failure here and there of an engineered structure. I'm not going to dispute that failures occur, but to make an example out of them I think is disservice to the industry. I'll liken it to someone who might complain loudly about how often and how many people buy when planes crash while ignoring the fact that hardly any planes ever crash and that getting in your car and driving to the 7-11 or Safeway or wherever you want to drive is far more dangerous. And so I want to take exception to that. And I think that kind of fear mongering has no place in this discussion here tonight. With respect to the fire and flood concerns that have been mentioned by some, those are relevant and important issues. And those are issues that you need to evaluate on a case-by-case basis. I agree with Commissioner Greenberg's comments that, you know, these potentially developed parcels for spoilers, you know, hardly any of them, seven or whatever the number is, that they're already in urbanized areas. And the greater risk is that we would develop in non-urbanized areas because we're unwilling to develop urbanized areas. And that has a far greater impact on the environment than anything we're imagining here. I also want to commend the staff for doing such a thorough analysis on this amendment. I respect the advice and the opinions of the professionals that have been hired to comment on the, on the process here. And so I find myself in full support of the staff's recommendation. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner, Katie Miller. Commissioner Maxwell. Yes, thank you. I will make my own brief as well. I feel like there's been a lot of comments. I agree with, definitely with Commissioner Greenberg that, you know, once you take a look at the map that he's really, I mean, we're talking 17, not really that many. I definitely also agree with Commissioner or Chair Ross that we don't know what the impact is going to be. There's no way to know, really. But I also, and then I also want to concur with the City Miller, Commissioner City Miller, like, you know, I'm a builder. I built on plow. It's not. 50% slope is a lot, but it's not that much. And it's not, we're not talking 100% slope. It's minimal. But again, I hear everyone's comments also. Thanks to staff for all that work to get through. And for that, I will be surprised. Thank you all, Commissioner, for your comments. Last call for comments before we have the clerk. Go ahead and remind us of the motion on the floor. And then we'll go ahead and take the vote. Hey, thank you so much. Could we have a roll call vote, please? Hi. Hi. Well, what's my math? The motion passed five to seven. Is that right? Five to two. Five to two. Sorry. Motion carries. So thank you, everyone, for your comments. Thank you to the public for their comments as well and for everybody watching. And again, big thanks to staff for a very thorough job on a very complicated, protracted agenda item. So thank you so much. So let's go ahead and move on to informational items. Do we have anything from staff on informational items? Go ahead. We just pull it up. Just looking at your schedule for next month. The only item for the next meeting on March 3rd is the one you just continued involving the oversized vehicle appeal. And then on the 17th, we'll have a discussion on the downtown plan expansion effort. And then there's also a project, an affordable housing project at 415 Natural Bridges that involves a plan development. So you'll be making a recommendation to counsel on that. So those are the two items we have for that meeting. Okay. Thank you. Any other informational items from any of the commissioners? Okay. Moving along to a subcommittee advisory body or a report. I don't believe we have any of those. Is that correct? I'm not seeing any motion by any of the commissioners. Okay. Any items to refer to a future agenda from any of the commissioners? Okay. Seeing none, I want to thank everyone in all the public for attending and again to the staff and commissioners. And with that, I will bring the February 17, 2022 City of Santa Cruz planning meeting submission to adjournment. Thank you, everybody.