 35 minutes. Good evening. I will call this meeting of the February 15th 2024 Planning Commission for the City of Santa Cruz to order. Could we have a roll call vote? Commissioner Dan, here. Gordon, Kennedy, here. McKelvie, here. Paul Hamas, here. Thompson, here. Hanway, here. Thank you. Good evening and welcome. This is my first meeting serving as chair this round and I'd like to take the opportunity to thank Commissioner Kennedy for his service as chair and especially for sharing his glee as housing projects got approved. I've appreciated how you celebrate every unit and especially every single affordable unit. Also, it looks to be a busy year ahead and I hope community members continue to participate and provide lively comment to the policies and projects that will come before the Commission this year. In order to facilitate the public process I intend a formal format for the Commission meetings and to that end I'd ask that all questions and comments from commissioners they're all welcome but I ask that you wait to be recognized by the chair before speaking and remind you that Commission meetings are not the time for dialogue with the public although you are always welcome to put any public questions on the floor during Commission deliberation. Also hearing public comment is an important role of this Commission and everyone who wants to come to will get a chance to speak generally for up to three minutes. Your comments are welcome and will be heard whether you are confident and experienced at public speaking or if this is your first time and you're nervous. Audible expressions of support and disagreement do not further public participation and for this reason I don't intend to tolerate them during the meeting. Thank you for respecting everyone's participation in the process. And with that do we have any statements of disqualification? No I'll mention I received one ex-party email like 445 and just forwarded it on to staff. It wasn't very exciting. Great thank you. And we'll now open oral communications. This is the portion of the agenda in which anyone any member of the public would like to speak to the Commission about items that are in our purview but that are not on tonight's agenda. You're invited to come and speak. If you're speaking to tonight's agenda we'll have a space for that as well. Is anybody here to speak to something not on tonight's agenda? Great. Welcome. We appreciate it if you tell us who you are. Good evening Commissioners. My name is Alberto Luzre with the Northern California Carpenters Local 505 and I'm here to speak about the new development coming to the city as a overall. It seems that a lot of the projects coming into the city I don't have any they don't have any labor standards as far as health care, apprenticeship, local hire and illegal wage. Earning illegal wage ensures that our citizens can afford rent, can live in the city. It seems that about 80% of the people building the projects or more than our Santa Cruz. They're not locals. They're bringing people out of state, out of different counties. I seen by walking jobs. I see people getting jobs coming all the way from San Diego for painting jobs. How can you afford paying jobs? How much are we paying those people? How come our locals can do it? And that's a question. Also they don't provide any health care. And what happens to the to the construction workers or anybody sent to any construction workers, they don't have health care. Who pays for the health care? Our citizens do. Apprenticeships. We're not promoting any type of apprenticeship. What what what we're going to do if you don't promote apprenticeship? What can happen to our risk youth? People being at risk, being on the streets. If they don't got no no way to survive, they don't get a chance. Also minorities, women, they don't get a chance. The trades are the last resource for people that maybe couldn't make it to school or how hard time in school. Uh, so I encourage you to ensure that when somebody comes into project, ask them, please get some various standards in there. We need those various standards for our citizens commuting. I committed myself for four years all the way 2000 Francisco. Waking up at three in the morning every day. We're just planning a project here and about, like I said, 80% of them. They don't have any standards. What should I be traveling all the way down to San Francisco? I don't think that's fair. I think we need to do something else as a community as part of the planning. I've been to so many city planning commissions commissioners and they tell me, Hey, you know what? Planning is not part of planning. Labor's part of planning. Who's gonna build it? Where are we gonna give the people? So I asked, please ask for area standards, a legal wage, health care, apprenticeship and local hire. We need our locals not to move away. A lot of people are getting pushed away from here all the way to those manuals Fresno. They can afford living in the area. Thank you for your time. Thank you. With that, we have approval of the minutes of February 1st, 2024. I'll move to approve the minutes. Oh, second. All those in favor indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Those are approved. Tonight's public hearing involves a proposed hotel at 302 to 328 Front Street with a number of requested permits listed on the agenda and will also be covered by the staff presentation. With that, could we hear from the staff? The commissioners, Ryan Bain, senior planner. So before us tonight, we have a proposal for the cruise hotel. In terms of location. The project involves six parcels total located at the northeast corner of front and Laurel. With the front street to the west of the river to the east, some development is occurring to the north and then Laurel Street and the bridge to the south. Through the parcels and the San Lorenz River. Through the parcel by the applicants are owned by the applicants and contain the building and parking lot occupied by the Santa Cruz Community Credit Union. The other three parcels are owned by the city of Santa Cruz with the project contingent upon the acquisition of two of those parcels and one of those would remain under the ownership of the city of Santa Cruz and contain what we'll get to is the Maple Alley passageway. So the proposal involves demolition of the commercial building that I had mentioned and construction of a new six-story hotel with 232 rooms, three floors of underground parking, ground floor retail, banquet and conference space, a restaurant bar, cafe and then amenities such as a gym, spa and a rooftop pool and bar area. The general plan for the majority of the project site where the building is proposed has a general plan use designation of RVC which is regional visitor commercial and it's also in the downtown Santa Cruz area of the RVC section. That section designation emphasizes a mix of uses such as office and retail uses, residential and mixed use developments, restaurants and visitor attractions. The proposed use of the parcel as I would tell is consistent with the intent of this designation and the area of the project on the city-owned land east of the building up to the River Rock that is supposed to be filled and landscaped with outdoor amenities has a land use of natural area or NA. This designation provides for land that should remain in an undeveloped state to provide for habitat, protection, public safety or public recreation. So with public recreation allowed it should be noted that the downtown plan and the San Lorenzo urban river plan call for publicly accessible outdoor extension areas connecting the development to the River Rock in this area consistent with this land use designation and that's part of the project. The project is also consistent with many general plan policies relating to visitor serving uses, alternative transportation, open space access and downtown area development. In the staff report there's I listed quite a few of those policies and I just pulled out just a handful of them that are applicable. So new development adjacent to the San Lorenzo river includes patios overlooking the river and hence connections to the levy trails and other design features that's being incorporated as part of this project. Again encouraging buildings to be oriented towards sidewalks, public plazas, walkways or rivers and to include features such as public benches and natural seating areas. Creating pedestrian friendly frontage and streetscapes and attractive pedestrian oriented areas and supporting development and expansion of businesses that make a balanced contribution to cultural, environmental and economic health of the city. So these are all applicable to this hotel project. A few more revitalizing the riverfront area. This is a big part of the project. Encouraging the development of facilities that would accommodate conferences and conference goers in conjunction with existing or new hotels. So this hotel also has a banquet area and conference rooms. Attracting a top-end full service hotel to expand and improve the year-round conference segment of the tourism market. Providing for the development of supporting land use is adjacent to retail shopping areas while assuring protection of existing residential. So the hotel will be certainly supporting all the downtown businesses nearby and maintain and enhance the recreational value of the San Lorenzo River. So those are all part of this project. The project is also located in what is the San Lorenzo Urban River Plan which provides a framework to implement the community's vision to enhance the river area. The project's proposed building design and open space improvements adjacent to the river rock are consistent with a lot of these slurp policies. So improving the scenic and recreational value of the riverfront, public access, the urban and neighborhood interface with the river, incorporating the river into the surrounding urban fabric. And then in terms of front street-required new development projects to incorporate design features that encourage active engagement with the river rock. It's filling adjacent to the river rock and landscaping and physical access to the river rock. So those are all components of this proposed application. As I mentioned it's also located obviously in the downtown and the downtown plan. So the downtown plan applies and the policies apply to this project. And the project is consistent with the goals and policies of the development and the downtown plan. The plan has what are called first principles which is kind of an overarching goals for the development in this area. So talk about form and character, building height, accessibility, open spaces, pedestrian, bike and transit access are all part of that. So the project implements these principles and strategies in several ways. I mean the building has its own unique character while still maintaining consistency with the design standards and guidelines in the downtown plan. The building height is consistent with the additional height zone B and the other surrounding projects in the vicinity that provides a visitor-serving hotel which will in turn support other local businesses such as restaurants and retail in the downtown. And it creates a strong linkage to the river by having the restaurant bar and banquet uses on the east side of the building oriented toward the San Lorenzo River. Also the site lays out an enhanced pedestrian and bicycle usage with outdoor stairway and new accessible pathways connecting Front Street to the Riverwalk as part of the Maple Alley passageway. An additional height request is being requested as part of this application and the downtown plan has two additional height zones. This is additional height zone B. This is mainly the properties between Front Street and the San Lorenzo River from Soquel to Laurel Street. This general starting starting from here going all the way up to Soquel is additional height zone B allows an increase in building height from 50 to 70 feet with a recommendation from the Planning Commission and approval by the City Council and when it meets certain specific criteria. And so the application includes a request to increase the building height to 70. So in addition to meeting the specific development criteria detailed in the downtown plan standards with the additional there are some overarching city objectives that are required as part of the additional height request. So let's see here. So the proposal meets these objectives as follows. The additional height to 70 feet allows the building to retain a form that provides architectural articulation as well as provide publicly accessible open space and access from Front Street to the Riverwalk. The additional height allows for 116 more hotel rooms and would be created under a project that only met the 50 foot base height. So this provides more visitor serving accommodations and more positive economic benefits to the downtown. And also with additional hotel rooms it provides and generates additional TOT tax. It provides important conference and meeting room space as well as restaurant retail space and a location adjacent to the Riverwalk and walkable to many businesses in the downtown generating economic and social activity in in the downtown area specifically in this area. Let's see. Building follows development standards which are intended to promote the appearance of multiple building rhythms at ground middle and upper levels. So it doesn't look like a large monolithic building and so they've done a good job of that and their design. The parcel for this north as I mentioned will remain owned by the city but will improve with a 50 foot wide public baseo which is considered the Maple Alley Passageway which is connecting Front Street to Riverwalk and that will be designed constructed and maintained by the hotel. Ball of remaining under city ownership. The proposed extension areas include amenities such as outdoor dining adjacent to the proposed restaurant and bar space as well as an event lawn adjacent to the banquet and ballroom which connects this space to the Riverwalk and with the hotel qualifying as non-residential project and requesting additional height the project will be required to pay an in lieu public benefit fee of at least $5 per square foot for any floor area occurring above that 50 foot height which is estimated to be approximately $227,000 that will be going toward affordable housing fund. The downtown calls for rooftops to be fully designed and creatively integrated into the function of the building and the project does has designed a rooftop amenity area that includes three separate pools lounge area as well as bar food prep kitchens and a bathroom as proposed the rooftop bar and all these structures meet the requirements set forth in the downtown plan including height set back coverage and integrated design in addition to the roof amenities the the roof does house also some screened mechanical penthouses and for the elevators stairhousing solar panels etc that exceed height which is allowed by our zoning code and it's actually I should note that it's that those type of mechanical equipment rooms are not considered as part of the rooftop amenity and are not limited but as proposed the project meets all of the height set back and percentage of rooftop area in terms of the rooftop amenities so in terms of the entitlements that are being considered as part of this application tonight there's a demolition non-residential demolition for the demolition of the existing building a heritage tree removal permit for several trees boundary adjustment for the for combining the lots coastal permit special use permit administrative use permit design permit and a revocable license for outdoor extension areas so as I mentioned with the demo permit the existing structure was built in 1978 it is not listed as historic and is is not eligible for listing for the state national or city historic building survey in terms of the boundary adjustment the project site is comprised of five lots not including the city own lot that will remain on its own and which this will be consolidating into one lot through a sequential lot line adjustment the merger includes combining three privately owned properties which would be totaling approximately 23,000 square feet along with the two city owned parcels which are about 9,000 square feet so the resulting lot meets the minimum 5,000 square foot lot size and new development with an far of 4.77 meets the the 5.0 far allowed in in the general plan designation the proposed project does require a coastal permit because it's located within the coastal zone overlay and there's also a sliver of it that's also covered by the shoreline protection overlay district so as proposed the project is consistent with applicable policies of the local coastal program which seeks to minimize the impact development on coastal resources and provide visitor serving uses such as a hotel for this area the city the city coastal commission staff and applicant have been working together on this project over the last year plus and the coast commission has indicated that there will be certain requirements regarding low cost of his recommendations so these discussions are continuing and we're working toward meeting the coastal requirements but in addition to the numerous public access enhancements that'll be provided as part of this project including the Maple Alley Passageway the River Rock improvements and the outdoor extension areas the applicants are proposing to address this coast block and lcb policy with the following measures which have been memorialized in the conditions of approval so they're looking at contributions to Santa Cruz Hostel Society to the Boys and Girls Club providing tower viewers for visitors to view the river habitat free bike rentals free public wi-fi family suites community days for local nonprofits to have access to the rooftop facilities and then just some of the general amenities like restrooms bar restaurant services that will remain publicly accessible during operating hours also a design permit is involved as part of this application here's a looking at a basic site plan the site is generally flat along front street and Laurel there is the San Lorenzo Leve which slopes up to the east up to the which slopes up to the river walk the project proposes to fill the city own property between the east side of the new building and the levy and create a publicly accessible outdoor extension area that's connected connects to the river walk so we have outdoor seating and flexible lawn area all here that will be in the fill area there's three levels of below grade parking which will extend approximately 30 feet below the existing grade which will park 214 cars by way of a valet system that incorporates vehicle lifts and shuttles to park and retrieve those vehicles vehicular access to the hotel will be off of front street this is where the port of Coucher is so that's where everyone anyone coming to the hotel will approach through the port of Coucher the main hotel lobby entry which is right here next to the port of Coucher consists of a grant entry that leads to the second floor lobby area the front street level also contains bike parking hotel administrative offices as well as commercial retail spaces that fronts both front street and the maple alley and then there's also on the corner here facing the lower all street and front intersection is a cafe a coffee bar commercial space the second floor plan which has a lot of the hotel amenities includes the main hotel lobby bar restaurant meeting rooms and banquet and ballroom area there's approximately 6700 square feet of banquet meeting room space with two ballrooms totaling approximately or I should say the 3,500 square feet of meeting rooms get that straight sorry approximately 6700 square feet of banquet meeting room space is proposed with two ballrooms and five meeting rooms totaling about 3,200 square feet so they'll be able to have conferences weddings etc all be available and be able to provide that that kind of space for those types of events the spaces can accommodate meetings and banquets up to about 350 people if fully occupied let's see here's the Laurel Street elevation so basically levels three through six contained hotel rooms the portion of the third and fourth floor containing a spa and fitness room in regards to parking we have our we have a Resort City Council resolution that was adopted not too long ago that defines the vehicle and bike parking requirements for all the land uses in the downtown area so hotels by resolution are required to provide a 0.25 spaces per room so with 232 rooms that's 58 spaces that are required for the hotel use the project is providing 214 parking spaces and as I mentioned it's going to be an automated parking solution that uses lifts to park energy vehicles in terms of bike parking they're required to supply a total of five class one and 42 class two and they're providing 68 class one and 56 class two so they're well exceeding the municipal code requirements for bike parking in terms of off-site improvements they'll be providing new sidewalks which will be expanding in width so 12 foot along front street eight foot along laurel street new street lights as I mentioned the maple alley pedestrian bike connection the river walk levy new street trees directional curb ramp install at front street and laurel an extension of the river walk along laurel to intersection to the intersection and then all utilities and that will be undergrounded so maple alley as I had mentioned earlier provides a direct pedestrian and bike connection between the downtown front street essentially and the river walk so the plaza is a public space with movable and amphitheater seating provides space for planned and provides gatherings adjacent to the hotel retail space it's the plaza is connected to the river walk via an accessible pathway and stair through slope terraces and planted with trees and landscaping that you can kind of see here so this is front street and this is how we'll access the river walk here at its connection with the river walk the path widens to provide bike parking and sculptural seating element with the views of the river so this as I mentioned this will be constructed designed constructed and maintained as by the hotel but will remain owned by the city and there'll be an agreement that will be developed as part of how it's how all of this is used the proposed project includes as I had mentioned the proposed project includes a property that's currently owned by the city so at a council meeting in May the city council basically declared that those parcels are exempt surplus property there's two parcels and a government code requires that there be general plan consistency a general plan consistency determination by the planning agency prior to the sale of the public land and the planning commission serves as the city's planning agency so that's why it's before you tonight so both parcels are being sold within the downtown plan area where hotels are principally permitted use and so as we've discussed the project is consistent with the general plan policies and the sale of the land is consistent with the general plan and downtown plan CEQA provides several categorical exemptions which are applicable to categories of projects activities that the lead agency has determined generally do not pose a risk of significant impacts on the environment a CEQA categorical exemption review was prepared by the city's environmental consultant which determined that the project exempt from CEQA under categorical exemption section 15332 for infill development so that being said the project meets all the acquired site area standards and the findings for approval as detailed in the staff report the various attachments on the project implements goals and policies of the general plan and downtown plan to support a new visitor serving hotel and enhances the vitality of the downtown provided lizes and connects people to the San Lorenzo river and promotes alternative transportation and walkability so staff is recommending approval based on the findings and conditions of approval and the draft resolution and I am available for any questions as are the applicants thank you for that large report some well presented at this time I'd like to ask if there are any questions from commissioners of staff commissioner dam oh do we get presentations by the applicant yes okay I'll wait for that okay okay good what we usually do is we'll take questions from the commission of staff and then we'll get a presentation from the applicant just like since I'm new and I want to follow proper tradition can staff questions be after the applicant as well absolutely yes yep absolutely any other commissioners want to question staff right now let me ask one now okay commissioner Kennedy so I'm looking at those voluntary community benefits that are proposed and I understand that those are conditional upon an appeal to the coastal commission and so my I love these things that are offered particularly the Santa Cruz Hostel Society donation but all of them really like because the hostel is so directly providing access to the beach for anyone who can't pay 400 bucks for a hotel room so my question for you is how are these amounts come to I mean it looks like a great list I'm a little tempted up the ante but uh was that just in negotiation with the project team or the applicants might be able to answer that better than I can but as I had mentioned this is something that been low cost visitor accommodations and those type of requirements that coastal commission staff have indicated should be part of projects as part of the local local coastal program they're a little gray it's hard for them to come up with you know exactly what those should be and so we've been working with them the applicants city staff to kind of come up with some ideas to satisfy those requirements and these were some of them that were included and as I mentioned they're still kind of ongoing discussions about this so this is it's not limited to this there there will be more and we're hoping to have some of those more flushed out before it gets to council okay so some felt more important than other staffs we could give feedback on that thanks for addressing that directly it's it's it's just interesting and I like how they do that you know because the appeal would take so long it's instead the money could go to good causes in my opinion so yeah the idea is they really would like the money to stay local yeah sure okay any other questions from the commission with that we'll invite a presentation from the applicant good evening I'll be brief because staff has done such a comprehensive job on the presentation my name is Owen Lawler I'm a manager of the applicant at at CSF Ventures LLC one of the managers so I just have a few brief comments and I'm here of course to answer questions and we can delve into the details as you wish as I thought about this project and review the staff report again today I was just struck by how many how much how many general plan policies this project addresses and I'm since we've talked so much about the project I want to give a little context and as I've been doing work along the river so it's interesting in 1977 the city adopted the first general plan that talked about reconnecting the downtown with the river those who don't know in 1955 there was a flood we had a significant the army corps of engineers very quickly constructed levees by the early 60s the levees were constructed but what happened was we disconnected the downtown from the river which had been grown up since the 1800s or along the river so to this day we still are not connect to the river these projects that we're working on are the beginning of reconnecting the downtown to the river and that's something that that for at least half a century the community's spoken about in its general plan so it's an exciting time to actually bring that to fruition here so in addition to that the project does something else that I think the community is really excited about which is get people out of their cars and create a dense walkable downtown where people can live a lot of their lives without getting in a car as much as they do being on the bike path being connected to the bike the extensive bike network that we're building out is really a huge advantage and we want to encourage that's part of this project is bring people to town who love to bike connect to the biking community being literally on the bike path is an exciting opportunities so and as I know Lee I mean I'm sorry Ryan didn't mention but we've got several letters from the downtown community and we've got other folks from the downtown community you can talk about how important it's going to be to have a new hotel downtown to really stimulate and help bolster our downtown merchants and how important that is so we're excited to be part of that and to the point about our contributions we're excited about this contributions to the community we see the hotel as being not separate but again more connected to the community an opportunity for people to come to town to learn more about the community to contribute to bring activities in the community like the Boys and Girls Club and how do fundraising and the more we connect the hotel to the community it's a win-win I think people who come it it's makes a more rich experience and it's obviously good for the community and we see this not only creating that role but also creating like a hub and a meeting place for people in the community and we see this in Abbott Square we've created this great space in the downtown and people really flock to it and we can do that on the river and this hotel can foster that and create another great meeting space for downtown I think that community will be excited about and I've been many people have told me that told me that so so we're excited about that so and then finally of course the hotel is going to contribute significantly to the finances of the city and cities and I we haven't mentioned that tonight but I thought I'd at least mention a significant contribution in TOT close to two million dollars a year going up from there so I just I just wanted to add that and myself and Frank Petrelia our our attorney it's here to answer any questions you have as you as you continue your deliberations and thank you for your service thank you and with that well all the questions from the commission for either staff or the applicant Commissioner McKelvie uh thanks for the presentation both the staff and the applicant couple of things very much along the lines of what Commissioner Kennedy mentioned um I read the correspondence the letter from the applicant regarding the public benefits that can and can't be asked for the the proposal as it's shaped right now there's just a few things I'm wondering how much latitude there is to ask and this is a question for staff as well as the applicant but you know things like three days a year for community groups to utilize the facilities is I mean could that be once a month could it be you know what are the what are the what's the shape of that you know negotiation in just I'd like to know because it's not specifically stated beyond those kinds of access arrangements are all the public are all the restaurants amenities etc are they all publicly accessible I mean I wouldn't think that a you know an on-site gym or anything might be but but I'd really like to know the contours of that and then because so many of the amenities involve the changes to the levy that are subject to an application that I guess is not complete based on the correspondence and the and the proposal that I read is do we have absolute approval to make these changes with the army corps at the levy and if there's any hiccup in that what happens to the amenities that are the public benefit that's being offered if I'm wrong on the status of that but I'd love to be corrected but that's really the I'm very interested in kind of the public benefit and and I am actually I love the concept of this project I would love to see more rooftop amenities but that's you know that's a calculation that other people have been involved in so good thank you for those questions staff and applicant you want to jump in on there's a few in there go for it good evening Chair Conway and commissioners I'm Lee Butler director of planning and community development so the number of times per year that those community or the amenity spaces are available I would direct that question to the applicant and I would just also highlight that as Ryan mentioned you know we are in coordination with the coastal commission with respect to additional visitor serving low-cost visitor serving accommodation conditions as we noted in our staff report but go ahead and I understand that the low cost the low cost actual accommodation in the within the hotel are not part of the discussion that's that's still the case correct that is still the case at this point to our knowledge I know the the applicant has been exploring various ways in which to address the low-cost visitor serving accommodations and so they can provide an update on the latest with respect to that but as I mentioned we do expect to have some type of additional condition that is placed on the project at the city council level that's just still being worked out at this point in terms of what the specifics are related to that the second is are the restaurants and bars publicly accessible that is my understanding that they are I would ask the applicant to speak to whether or not that is factual it's you know they would confirm that's the case but I believe that's the case I don't know about the pool area and whether that would be accessible or not they can speak to that the army core question is is in our lane rather than the applicants and yes there is an outstanding army core application that is something that has been obtained for the front riverfront project where we're constructing 175 units just north of this site and that that process does take a little while to get through the army core they the applicants typically run that that army core application process concurrently with the building permit so that they can get both of those the the building permit and the army core permit completed at approximately the same time and so that's what I would anticipate as part of this as well is that they overlap the army core permitting with the building permitting and hopefully those will will dovetail at right about the same time thank you welcome and I don't know if you wanted to chair invite the applicant for I wondered if the applicant would like to address the further questions from Commissioner McKelvie happy to we're certainly open to making the facilities available more often obviously the offseason is going to be easier than you know 4th of July but we're certainly open to to we again we see this as a win-win we we think connecting the hotel the community and vice versa is a good thing so we're we're certainly open to and was there some other you know I have a follow-up question to that how do you anticipate that operating on the ground so if I'm a local non-profit and I want to have my annual meeting say how would that how would that go about have you thought that far ahead I know it's kind of in the weeds but I would just say we'd probably have some you know some kind of a process that you'd contact the general manager or you have certainly not time lead time on this and conflict with other events at the hotel would you know we could work it out I'm not doesn't look complicated it's going to be overly cumbersome okay thank you is that good for your questions Commissioner Paul Hamas thank you chair Conway this is for the applicant can we go back to the I guess I would call the community benefits slide there was a list of okay my question is are you open to shifting around one of these priorities there it is the tower viewers my understanding is that tower viewers can run two to three thousand dollars each and is that roughly correct I don't I've never bought one so I don't know okay and yeah I mean that's all well and good don't know you know I kind of feel like if you want to go and see the offerings of the levy you can just go down there and it might be of better community benefit to shift I mean I'm not sure how many you were thinking of providing but maybe shifting those into like maybe a contribution to a local one of the local groups that you have listed here maybe that might be possibly a better use of funds this was an idea that I think came from another project we're certainly open to that we're I should add we're also we see the connection of the rivers again a win-win people the benefit of the river and the habitat and connecting people that we've had discussion the coastal watershed council about leading tours and connecting people with the river environment as well so you know this is a work in progress we're certainly open to other ideas about how to approach this and we and I assume those would be they were thought of at least for the pool area was that sort of the idea or well potentially or along the levee itself for folks to look at wildlife and the levee without having to disturb them gotcha okay thank you thank you commissioner dan thank you yeah I have a couple of questions but but on that point another option is providing binoculars and every hotel room there's been places I've stayed that have done that that's a good idea by the ocean that's cool but that's that wasn't what I was going to ask oh I actually had some questions about the landscape plan I think that was in the project plans number three yeah I just had some I couldn't find where it was listed what the replacement trees would be the replacement street trees or the replacement trees on the levee any one I mean the levee actually I did see but the I did not see what species the replacement street trees would be whether that's dictated by the city's plan I believe if I'm it's either sycamores or london plane so but are they are they you know I didn't I didn't see where they were in the packet so and since this was my first development project with this city planning commission you know at the county there was always a comprehensive landscape plan and they had a list of species with numbers I think where the plans were and I just couldn't find where that was I think that's in the set I think we I'm pretty sure there's a landscape palette in the set with the tree the tree the species I could CMG with Lansing Ortega I mean they we spent a lot of time on it so I'm I'm sure you give me a a few minutes I can probably find that for you sorry yeah that would be great sorry I don't know that off the top of my head but I could find it for you yeah and I great and I think just to clarify for commissioner Dan on the significant project sometimes what's part of this packet is sort of a representative piece of the plans and there is a website that has the full set isn't that right Lee to be helpful well maybe after this meeting I could you could show me where that is because landscape plans are important to me so then also I had a question though about the renderings because the renderings do show street trees and other trees and so it's confusing to me if the renderings are trying to tell me what the replacement trees are or if they're just fantasy trees there are no fantasy trees every tree in here is selected and specified so the renderings are an accurate picture of the species of replacement trees I mean honestly there may not be at the same size that is showing on the plan part two of my question yeah but yeah but the landscape palette from CMG is careful there's no so the renderings are accurate as to what the replacement species are going to be okay well that yes so then on the renderings I guess by question would be they show mature trees and I guess I just you know don't find that very helpful and when I'm trying to get an accurate picture of what the project is going to look like from year zero to 10 it would be more helpful to me I don't know the rest of my commissioners think they have a rendering that has a more accurate picture of what it will look like as built because I do their renderings are beautiful and by the way the design is lovely it's a I think the design is beautiful but landscape is important and I think it's really helpful for me and the public to be able to see you know an accurate picture of what the landscaping will be so and so if there's going to be palms and I can't really decipher some of the other trees it would just be good to know what that is well yeah agreed I think we're going to use some fairly larger larger specimens than might ordinarily we want a hotel when it opens to be an attractive place and landscapes a key part of that the roof along the levee all that but I don't have off the top of my hand exactly what size we're planning to install in each location and all that the staff report actually was undecided about that they said we're either going to go with this or we're either going to go with this and so I guess in general this might not be you know in your bucket it might just be what the city is requiring of you and it require you to specify so I guess that's part of what my questions are I would have to look at the plants to refresh my memory but there's pretty extensive landscaping detail in the full set if you pull it off there are so and then yes so not to beat a dead horse on this but I guess for the understory very specific of what type of sage and grasses are going to be used but that's I just couldn't find that for the trees that's that's why I asked so there's a narrative on sheets L1-1 that states where we're to find my place L1-1 in the plans project plans three yeah thanks yeah sorry yeah thanks it we split them into three just based on the size of the documents it's 11 of 26 and it looks like Ryan's going to pull that up here yeah I looked up it says pages it's it's 11 of 26 L1-1 the narrative states streetscape improvements are implemented on front street to reinforce cohesiveness of the district in accordance with the downtown plan existing london plain street trees along front street or to be retained where possible and further reinforced by planting eight new trees along the length of the hotel site and it goes on from there I'll note that just this past fall in September the planning commission actually updated the street tree pallet or made a recommendation I should say to the council to update the street tree pallet for our downtown area and that was subsequently approved by the council submitted to the coastal commission and that is now in effect so so we have a very new plant pallet that that includes the street trees for our downtown area so this would have to comply with that new those new requirements so the applicant gets a buffet of choices for street trees and they choose out of what the city's palette is typically our parks department rate puts that requirement on them at the building permit stage and in regards to tree replacement there are 16 trees that are recommended for approval 11 of which are heritage so in terms of our requirements in the coastal zone that requires in terms of replacement ratio it's as you mentioned they can kind of have a choice but it's two 24 inch box trees or six 15 gallon trees for each tree to be removed that's a set as a condition of approval so they will be required to do that and I believe the landscape plan does meet that requirement so in order to see the palette of tree species I should reference this other this other document then I can do that later I got it let's see the other question I had is more of just the parking requirements what's the logic behind only requiring 0.25 spaces per room I believe I wasn't involved in that discussion but I think the idea is that and if you're in the downtown area you're not just going to the hotel you're also there's overlap in terms of going to restaurants going to an office going shopping going to a Warriors game what have you so you're going to be going to the hotel or and basically you don't need to have I think that's the idea is is the over basically parking to go to various locations in the downtown and I understand it's a policy that the council set but yeah I just it just didn't quite make sense to me if you why you would have fewer that many fewer rooms than parking spaces than rooms when folks are going to drive probably to Santa Cruz to stay here and just just maybe wonder where people are going to park hang on one thing Commissioner McKelvie did you want to add something to this isn't doesn't this fall under 2097 this is a hotel it's not a housing project like but it's like the one use that's not yeah that's right it's the only place we can't have parking yeah there there are two exclusions hotels being one and AB 2097 so we are allowed and and so we are allowed to require parking for hotels and I think just to add on to Ryan's comments you know this this hotel originally had substantially fewer parking spaces and in our downtown we actually allow for and it's less of an issue now but previously pre AB 2097 when we could require parking for most uses we did require parking for most uses and they often relied on the public parking supply and part of that was a result of that being a more efficient use of parking spaces so you know an individual who comes to stay in the hotel overnight can use one of those public parking spaces when they go off to do whatever they're doing during the day visiting our beautiful city they that same parking space can then be used for someone going to breakfast and then they leave and so on and so forth and so that same parking space is used quite a few times I will note that our city transportation engineer is here with us and if if the commission has questions then I'm sure we can lean on his expertise as well but I think that's that was really the the thought behind it is that that shared parking resources and more efficient use and also it reflects the fact that we want to encourage hotels in our downtown it's an important use we heard from some of the commenters who provided public comment about how the visitors to downtown hotels will really help support our local businesses and so a parking ratio that's too high would be discouraging that use and how it way I don't know I don't follow you because I feel like yes we want a hotel we want people down there to use our downtown but I I I I get where you go and I'm very familiar with modern transportation demand practices and and I get all that I just and I don't need to belabor the point I'm just saying I would not have supported a lower parking I mean we're at the limit we can ask them for and I think that's good it's still fewer than the number of rooms that concerns me if the hotel's full and there's a warrior game going on I mean it's going to be park again down there so anyway I mean I live down here so I walk everywhere but I also am familiar with when it's crowded and busy and people are circling and circling and circling for parking down here so I support the parking as is I just wanted to familiarize myself with the logic behind low requirements so that's all for now okay great thank you Mr. Thompson I have a question I'm going to hand it at the moment Mr. Kennedy I'm going to couple okay well I've got seven so they're kind of detailed first as I see the project is going to be all electric it's your intent to stick with that and not switch to gas which you technically could do not for long but for a little bit longer interesting question so pool heating is an issue we can come what a big issue from what I understand especially you know and we have a spa in the interior I would defer to my mechanical engineers we'll comply I can't answer the standing here if we have the option for gas if we would install a gas meter and use gas for water heat I'm thinking primarily the pools would be the main issue we certainly would use heat pumps and all that for the space heating and split units probably in the unit rooms that's an interesting answer the plans in front of us indicate that they will comply with the natural gas ban so and I'm going to take that as we if we have to we will and the building next door is a hundred percent yeah understand again some of these are kind of detailed but I've been thinking about these buildings for a long time so bear with me I saw one of the conditions was like loaning out bikes and I just wondered if you'd thought about B-Cycle or integrating with that maybe that's just to come and I'm sure Matt could help with that but seemed like there might be an opportunity there absolutely providing bikes and a B-Cycle station even better I think that would work for everybody okay I'm kind of zipping around here I see those beautiful concrete panels that are being used on the exterior yeah I really like this design generally I have a concern we used to call it articulation which is a dumb word but like insets and having a little shadow so for example that one of the rendering shows these concrete panels you know with the very deep wells and very deep shadow lines and then the renderings I see is more flush which is okay but it's kind of an architectural question let me think for a second in your opinion is the current design providing enough relief to give us a you know facade with some depth well I think it's I'm gonna speak like an architect unfortunately I understand that you're not couldn't make it but we spent a lot of time thinking about the materiality I think in my view it's not simply articulating spaces but better quality material yeah what we're proposing is a this this ceramic panel essentially is I think will create a really it doesn't come through as well I've seen pictures of this in other buildings around the world and it's very beautiful material I think it's that will create the kind of interest in the in the in the elevations with different light reflecting on it during the day as Ryan pointed out we've designed to the ordinance in terms articulation yeah we as a non-residential building we have to comply with the zoning ordinance and we've worked very hard make sure that we do so that's a great answer we're not getting all sand flutes stuck over here so that's a big deal thank you so kind of falling on that and this kind of goes to staff condition number 23 talks about and maybe you could pull it up if you get a minute talks about staff finalizing the colors and I get how that process works I wonder if we could add the words like materials and connections to that condition because to me it's more than colors I think you're doing this already and we've talked a lot Timory's not here but about how the materials come together is as important as anything else hard to ask but if we could clarify that would be nailed down like moving forward it would make me happy did you want to be suggesting that we yeah so 23 right there reads final colors shall be approved by the zoning administrator prior to approval of building permits and my suggestion would be to add two words so that it reads final colors materials in connections but if anyone's got a better word please give me one said materials on what in connections you know like where the where the stucco ends transitions there we go I like transitions thank you John I know you do this already but I think this might give you a little extra clarity of that yeah there's not a problem adding that at all also note that condition seven requires that the working drawings have the same level of articulation of the conceptual plans that are before you have so we also have that other condition as well that's right okay thanks that was easy um all right we're talking about trees so those big old palm trees on the pool deck which I think will make a beautiful space those would probably really violate the height limits when fully ground they look really tall to me so I like a heat to go there but our trees excluded from the ordinance be rude I don't think that's ever came up in that discussion did it it all talks about structures yeah I'd never thought of it when we were writing the ordinance okay um don't care I might want to figure that out because they're going to be big trees hopefully if they thrive up there that's what I hear from you know everyone I run into oh it's so tall it's so tall so here we are you know I think it's a good idea to exceed the height a bit but then we're going to go even taller makes me a bit nervous okay fairly controversial is there public access restroom associated with this project and I know I know but well I'd say this like most hotels there'll be there'll be a restaurant in the lobby is it this is an issue I understand the issue I don't think we've worked out exactly we're going to have there's also a space on the there's two probably cafes of some type one on the corner of that proposed for the corner of Laurel and front and one facing the maple alley probably we'll have bathrooms working out but not really like that porta potty that was out there for many years okay that's a good answer I'm not intending the hotel to like manage a public facility for us but man when you have to pee you have to pee and you're going to pee in that bathroom or on the wall and I'm not saying them me you know so just a thought I wonder if it could be incorporated in the public park but it's a big ask yep okay commission McKelvie there is a bullet point in the letter from Mr. Chen says provide publicly accessible restrooms that are accessible from the river walk oh you hear me yeah then in the restaurant the yeah we have to work out operationally how that works understood I think it's in everyone's benefit as much as possible everyone's needs are accommodated here thank you that's kind of a sensitive one for me at least okay number 27 oh is about this buzzer when cars enter and exit this is the thing we do to like slap this buzzing thing on just like make us feel better they're typically kind of annoying I would like to ask if we can eliminate that condition and here's my reasoning and maybe Matt would be better to talk to this this is a big white pork co-share and you can see like one of the plans I wrote down which one it is you can see other cars are coming in and out of there but this is not like other projects where it's a real narrow thing so I know it's not a huge amount of money but I wanted to ask if public works is like set on that or if we could ditch it our transportation engineer Matt Starkey is here we'll ask if he would like to speak to that potential thank you if I'm wrong if it's going to be super effective and safe then I would change my mind good evening everyone Matt Starkey transportation manager here city Santa Cruz yeah we do typically add these buzzers where we have more of a a blind driveway coming out of a parking facility I think this may have been more one of our standard sort of conditions we put on I do know in the traffic study we referenced there's good visibility coming out of the driveway here yeah that's it Ryan like where this is turning yeah I say this is something maybe we consider looking at in the building permit review phase maybe we add some flexibility on that condition for us yeah just looking at the wall way out here there's that stairwell area on the right there that it just didn't seem necessary but you've heard me and I'll leave you to fine tune that okay thank you just add one thing on that Pete because I flagged that too and I thought of the people who are going to be living next across the street so it's like address it now or address it later it feels to that's the kind of thing we like slap on to make ourselves feel better about it okay is that all my questions that is thanks I have some big things to talk about later but thank you Matt good questions Matt you could stay I have just a couple of questions and I'll start out with the one that may involve you so the Paseo the Maple Street Paseo was a really big deal a big selling point for as the whole standards were being developed and I have a couple of questions about that and one of them is so first of all the idea was that it's going to be a pedestrian and a bicycle access from the levy downtown without having to be on one of the streets and without taking your life in your hands I thought it was a little steep the way it is now use it all the time but so first of all one question is about the safety of the there's a crosswalk is that flashing is there anything to press I did not see in there what kind of analysis has been in terms of that yeah the so I think the crosswalk you're referring to here's the one shown on the bottom of the screen here what we don't see in this nice rendering is the project on the south side of the street where we're working with the Metro Center redevelopment to actually build the traffic signal intersection here so yes I do care a lot about that signal it's going to be a typical traffic signal and the details of how we do the detection and crossing and connections across there being worked out now actually mostly it'll just be a reasonable bicycle access so then that raises a question and it came in through some of the public comment and I wondered when I looked at it as well the as it's shown it's very steep and which to me makes sense because you know if I was commuting home and I'm in a hurry I think I should be slowed down as I'm going down that hill you know and probably dragging a foot on the way down there was a recommendation from a member of the public that it be basically we cut out a turn and it made be made more gradual and I wondered if you could speak to that I was concerned when I saw that proposal that it would just be way too fast going down there and also maybe it wouldn't meet the grade requirements yeah I think when we combine bicycle and pedestrian facilities we have this constraint with ADA on how we do the slopes through the area we looked at this issue earlier today I think it's one that's worth investigating further if we do want it to be a high quality bike connection we do need to consider curving these connections so that cyclists can come down the path similar to how you access the San Lorenzo River Bridge right now there's a curve there that helps you get up slowly but you can still do it on your bike so I do think that's a good improvement here other ideas we could consider would also be on the stairwell including like a little lip or sort of like gutter that you can actually bring your bike tires up with you as you go up the stair that could be a nice feature as well if we can't get the grading to work through here that's both accessible and tolerable for bikes good thank you I think my next question about bicycles is probably for the applicant I love that this is this project is intended to really attract bicyclists and we have a lot of bicycle activities here I know I certainly had friends coming in for the triathlon and so forth who can't find a place and you know so that's that's a real benefit I looked at the bike parking how safe is that bike parking are you is it is it like you know I lock my bike to a structure there is it gated is it I do you anticipate people you know hotel guests coming and keeping their nice bikes there are they going to be in their room probably I mean probably I mean if they're very nice I'm sure they'll want but we're I think our goal is to make it secure enough so people feel comfortable with it I I recall the design and to be honest it's been looking this has been two years probably since it started for this so I haven't here we go sorry thank you okay but we have a bike area yeah no that's going to be I remember now that's secure for sure I mean and you'll you'll need a key you'll need a hotel key you know to get in there or some some other yeah yeah but thank you that's that's good and then my last question is for staff what local hiring policies I know the city has fairly robust local hiring policies when it's involved in a project which it certainly would be on a number of levels because there's the land what would what would apply for this project I think it's an important point I do not know that there are specific requirements that are being built into that sales agreement but that is something that you could ask of the applicant they are negotiating with that with that sales purchase I understand that it is it's tricky to bring up and it also you know is should be done very thoughtfully but I have seen it happen in a lot of contexts I'm not sure that I feel knowledgeable enough of how to bring it up in this context beyond raising the question sure so we we have looked at the issue in the recent past approximately three years ago um we did an evaluation and presentation to the council related to that and found that there are both cost increases and labor constraints in our local area that pose challenges to the larger projects in particular I understand that and so um that at that time there were no additional recommendations that were carried forward there may be some additional study of that in the near future to see if those same constraints are still in place and what we certainly recognize the benefits of both environmental and in terms of keeping that that money local and we also recognize that the the workforce isn't always large enough to support some of the big projects right because of our housing costs right I know it's a tail chaser yeah which I wouldn't look to add a condition or anything like that but I do raise it as a question and I wish that we could find a way that we could have some policies that strike that balance you know goals or whatever it's a larger discussion but one that you know certainly can be explored in a manner that allows for the the projects to proceed but also recognizes that importance and so it's something that we have given some additional thought to even since the the last study in in 2000 or so maybe some priority hiring or I'm not sure what that whatever there are models similar to what you're speaking to that could be explored okay thank you just wanted to bring it up that's all of my questions yes Commissioner Kennedy I've got one more just for the applicant before we move on to public comment I know we talked a lot about this in the downtown plan days which seems like just yesterday and a long time ago one of my big concerns for this project and I see all these great conditions we'll talk about those later is like kind of lighting and I know that's very sensitive throughout this plan so what's your feeling on the lighting design here is it going to give us the results we want is it going to be dark on the levy like kind of what's your intent for lighting you know it's all coming together but I see tree up lights in some spots and sometimes the anti-burden you know the bird stuff says one thing and I just want to hear from you like it's going to be light on the roof deck but it's not going to spill into the levy and you know how's all that work in your mind well I think it's going to require careful study as we get into into the construction drawings I think it's it can be a really beautiful aspect of the night of this you know for people to enjoy it we've got the impacts to wildlife we've got neighbors and night sky issues it's something that requires some special thought you know to make sure we get it right and so I struggled on the last project which is a whole different deal about this and requested like a photometric study which in my green building experience kind of helps to find out what you're going to get would you be amenable to that I mean another applicant thought it was like a $10,000 thing and I was like oh my gosh that sounds like a lot but what are your thoughts on a well I guess best way to achieve the lighting we hold on our goal is to really do everything right okay I mean we want to and lighting is a real you know I'm no expert but it seems reasonable given the scope of this project to get the best minds around the table to design the lighting that deals with all these you know different aspects of it so I think that makes sense okay thanks I'd just point out that to comply with this condition that Ryan has highlighted here I would anticipate that they're going to need to provide a photometric study at the the building permit stage to ensure that level of detail is being in your team you're calling out the foot candles and everything yeah exactly yeah totally if I could digress for just a moment I just wanted to also point out that for public projects when those are coming through we do have in our scoring system benefits that are provided to local local companies and that may be what you're that may be what you're thinking about yeah so we do have that on the the public side but we do not currently have that on the private side so which would be that's when you were mentioning that I was thinking that's probably what you're thinking about now that right I was connecting the dots a bit okay great thank you for that okay thank you and with that I will open the public hearing anybody who would like to address the commission can do so at this time for up to three minutes would you please line up if you intend to speak to the commission please sign in while the person before you is speaking um and uh introduce yourself and welcome yes we are could you please sign in over here you did already great wonderful good evening and thank you for for your time my name is todo I'm with you not here logo 19 the hospitality workers union that representing workers central course of california every aspect of the hotel project seems to be meeting the bare minimum nothing more the developer is not commit to any real community benefits in term of lower cost accommodations the hotel is providing next to none with raised serious question about the project consistency with the local coastal program and the coastal act to address this issue the developer had offered only a few crumbs three family suite which only comprise less than one and a half percent of the total room small donation to non-profit organization free buy rental wi-fi and public accessible restroom to add insult to injury the developer insists that even this pottery offer will be withdrawn if the project is appealed to the coastal commission and receive substantial issue finding nor would this project continue enough to solving the housing crisis that many of our member face the coastal commission shares our opinion that five dollars is too low for an in lieu fee by changing this amount to a minimum they have opening up the opportunity for the city to require more affordable housing needs to remain a priority and the city should do everything in its power to raise that five dollar fee not only for this project but for the future developments the community and Santa Cruz deserve better than what this hotel is offering please recommend that the city council reject this project I also want to note that we have submit a lengthy more detailed letter to you and we apologize for the last minute submission because we was only having three days from the staff report came out so thank you for your time and commissioner chair I just want to note that at least one of our speaker who speaks Spanish so we will need to do the translation we'll allow that for time thank you okay thank you for your comments commissioners and chairperson Conway I'm a little emotional but I'm going to speak from the heart and from here my name is Vicky Silva and I work at the higher agency of Montere I was born and raised here in Santa Cruz and my daughters and granddaughter live here as well the hotel proposal proposal concerns concerns me due to the lack of lower cost rooms and low and low fee payment and the development we will it will make to affordable housing the city needs to make sure the shore is able to be enjoyed by all by improving lower hotel emotional I'm sorry it's okay by improving by approving a luxury hotel with almost no lower cost rooms the message is clear that the access to the coastal is only for the wealthy hospitality workers like me cannot afford to stay in a place like this I can barely afford where I work at with an employee discount actually I've never stayed there or any of my family members or friends sorry I went off the track and this high end hotel would be no exception I would like for all all hardworking people like me who live out of town in here to be able to access Santa Cruz and enjoy the city like I do but that would not be possible without lower cost accommodations housing is extremely expensive in Santa Cruz which reminds me I have to think of which bill I'm going to pay what groceries I'm going to buy we have three water bills we have clean water chemicals that could put in the water and dirty water I'm always balancing I'm living month to month and still commuting to Santa Cruz gas everything I don't even think I'll be able to stay in Santa Cruz like the gentleman that spoke first we're all having to move to areas that have lower housing costs in Santa Cruz and the hotel is not giving as much as it should towards affordable housing at the minimum free required this project would not fund any real housing development in Santa Cruz I urge you to raise the in lieu fee for this project I encourage the same for future projects to me there is no word like the Monterey Bay area I love living here and couldn't imagine living somewhere else please don't lose sight of the concerns of the community and to our voices because we're here so you can hear us of the community and I recommend that the city council reject the project as proposed thank you for your time thank you for your comment good evening my name is Marta Hernandez thank you for your time and I live in Santa Cruz and I have worked at Dreaming as a housekeeper for 28 years as a resident of Santa Cruz for several decades this hotel project really really concerns me the low affordable housing contribution and the lack of any meaningful lower cost accommodation will have a detrimental effect on my community housing is not affordable for families like me there is not enough affordable housing in Santa Cruz and the determination for affordable housing is not a great base on the cost of living in my neighborhood my neighborhood I directly see the effects of not having affordable housing there is crime and drug addiction people do not have a place they can go to the bathroom they can go to the bathroom let alone take a shower and drug use and vandalism are done openly this creates a hell hazard for my community that's my first concern I can see several homeless they need places to live because they don't have places where they have go pee and that's really really big problem for the health for everyone and having houses that is actually affordable will help alleviate these issues without lower cost room this new high end hotel will invite only rich people to come and enjoy our natural resources and leave us behind it will not be fair to be to the people who call Santa Cruz home the city and developer need to think of the consequence or on our city such as homelessness and trash rather than thinking solely on profits Santa Cruz residents deserve a decent place to live please recommend that this city council that's not approved the project as proposed thank you thank you for your comments I'm going to ask the members of the audience to please refrain from expressing either disagreement or support it makes it really difficult for new speakers and we're going to really welcome all comment thank you for 13 years como propone este hotel no contribuye a la comunidad eternios de vivienda accessible todos días manejo 45 minutos al trabajo porque no me alcanza para pagar vivienda cerca de mi trabajo y erdo dos horas en el en la carretera muy cansado agrado el día ocupado en mi trabajo quiero tiempo para pasar con mi familia gasto entre 80 90 dólares de gasolina en semana vivo en pescadero con mis padres de mayoridad de 80 años mi esposo mi dos hijos y si si no movemos a vivir a santa cruz pagaría yo más de 5000 dólares al mes en vivienda no gana lo suficiente para pagar esa cantidad ni yo ni mi esposo tener vivienda accessible nos ayudaría mucho para no viajar tanto a mi trabajo reducir los castos de vivienda tiempo para viajar con mi familia y pasar con ellos y con mis padres los niños del proyecto deben prompon con prometerse a pagar más de cinco por y he cuadrado a la a esta comunidad comunidad respectosamente pido consideración a las familias trabajadoras a esta área para tener viviendas accesibles para nosotros gracias thank you very much I will translate what she just said good evening commissioners my name is Maria Elena Gonzalez and I work I have worked at the treatment for 13 years as proposed this hotel does not contribute enough to the community in terms of affordable housing every day I drive at least 45 minutes one way to work because I cannot afford housing closer to my job spending nearly two hours in the car is exhausting on top of a busy day at work every day and it takes away time from time from the time I could otherwise spend at home with my family I spend around 80 or 90 dollars on a week on gas I live on pescadero with my parents my husband and my two kids one of whom is an adult we have no choice but to live together if if I were to live in Santa Cruz I will cause it will cost me five thousand at minimum I don't make enough to pay that not even with my husband's income affordable housing in Santa Cruz will benefit working people like me because we could live a short distance from our jobs which will reduce the environmental monetary cost of commuting the developer of this hotel needs to commit more than five dollars per square foot to this community I respectfully ask you to consider working families in this area thank you thank you very much good evening planning commissioners I'm Ron Pomerance the city's planning development mantra and policy is housing housing housing and more housing at any and all costs now a few well connected developers dangle visionist history and inflated promises to build a hotel using three city parcels no less the mantra is magically suspended at least until some other sites down the road open up for 150 foot developments sure looks feels and smells like hypocrisy in motion approval of this oversized monolith to environmental stupidity in the floodplain within adequate parking that goes below the river level and will require continual pumping little improvement for pedestrian bike access and safety increased congestion inaccessibly priced for the majority of residents and visitors and most importantly a lost opportunity to comply with California state regional housing needs allocation Rena all point to denying this project big hearted generosity oh wow 15 thousand dollars to the hostel society 25 thousand dollars to the boys and girls club wow that is incredible sarcasm accepted there's no labor protection as you've heard another ground for the project denial is a sleight of hand trick the hotel developers asked and got increased height from the general plans 50 feet to 70 but in the hotel's plans they've added 15 more feet to that when does the shuck in and jive and end sure would be honorable and fair for staff to also represent the residents and public's interest rather than being shills for developers I hear excellent questions from some of the commissioners and when SOP answers are given unfortunately they backpedal and concede to the staff and the developers why don't you hold your ground and assure public major benefits are required and upheld it sure feels like the fix is in to give the developers what they want this hotel should be rejected and our public land should be used to meet Santa Cruz's number one problem pop number one problem and the mantra we've just talked about earlier more affordable housing especially for our workforce thank you for your time and your thoughtful consideration thank you for your comments hello commissioners I'm Jorian welkins I'm the executive director for the downtown association of Santa Cruz so I work with the 550 businesses in the district downtown I want to thank all of you for volunteering your time to help make our city better I care a ton about landscaping so I loved all of your questions I also wanted to just recognize and thank all of the workers who came to speak today and to let you know that the downtown businesses care a lot about affordable housing and we do everything we can to advocate for better places for workers to live in Santa Cruz so that they don't have to do those commutes that can live here in our community so we really appreciate your words today as well but I am here today to support the hotel project I have heard from personally from three dozen different business owners who are massive fans of this project and in the public meetings that the project developer has offered to have with the business owners they've all been unanimously supportive of the folks who've showed up we know this is going to bring hundreds of people into our community on a nightly basis who plan to go out to eat who are going to go shopping and who are going to really add to a thriving downtown and we need investment in our downtown to continue have a thriving downtown retail is constantly under attack by Amazon and we aren't going to be able to fill every retail vacancy with another retailer and we don't have things like this drawing people downtown we won't have the beautiful downtown that we have today so I'm here to urge the approval of this and also thank you for continuing to work on affordable housing I'm excited about all the affordable housing that's being built downtown as well thank you thank you hello commissioners my name is Bill Kempf I'm an architect in town and I've had an office downtown for 25 years and I'm also the treasurer of the downtown association so I just think what I agree completely with what Jorian just put out about bringing more people downtown and I think that having a hotel it's crazy to me that this town doesn't have a hotel in the downtown core and I think that bringing in people from the outside when they're on vacation that they they're kind of forced to use our downtown which will be great for the businesses that we deal with on a regular basis at the DTA the thing that's surprising to me the most as an architect is how little architecture or conversation there's been tonight but I really am excited about what Owen has put forth I think it's contextually appropriate I think it fits in with everything that's that is happening downtown and I love the fact that he has energized the levy I think it's a great project and I'm totally in favor of it and I hope that you are as well thank you thank you for your comments hi everyone Joy Shandeldecker thank you for the presentation and the questions and being here so I agree that affordable housing is our real need not a another hotel but I expect this project to move forward and in that light I'm just gonna make some comments and proposals so many of the community benefits I'm seeing seem to be one-time cash payments rather than ongoing the community benefits of increased transfer transient transient occupancy taxes and sales taxes will be uneven and they'll go into our general fund not our affordable housing fund so how about we keep all of our public land and charge ground rent because once we privatize our community assets we never benefit from them again in in the same way in this way we can keep our our community asset and benefit from them in different ways also just a comment publicly accessible doesn't mean it's not the same thing as public like a library or a public restroom so we saw a little bit of that in the discretion between what's in the letter about a public restroom and then some sort of equivocating on it so I've always with this project I've always been a little concerned about this publicly accessible thing like things that are publicly accessible are usually accessible to me because I have a certain amount of privilege and disposable income they're not accessible to everyone generally in reality I'd also like to see this be a union hotel since our only union option right now is the dream in which is not affordable for many local people or organizations even the Democratic Central Committee couldn't afford to use it this year for their annual event so we need more competition and more options for our community we also need those good wages and labor protections for our workers and while I'm on that track it's another opportunity to bring up a citywide community workforce agreement for building this project to bring together all the different community needs we have including for projects to be built by skilled and local workforce thanks thank you for your comments my name is Natalie Goff and I'm concerned about the parking in this hotel hotels have 3 p.m. check-in times usually and these elevators are going to be carrying cars up and down that takes time and I was looking at the design and it looks like there are 3 valley parking spaces so if there are only 3 places where cars can come in where's everybody else going to line up it's on a Friday afternoon and the real estate developer mentioned 4th of July what where are those cars going to line up if the hotel is full so also front street is only 2 lanes wide I don't understand where where are these cars going to go are they going to take numbers you're going to hand out buzzers I don't get it I've parked in elevator parking lots in San Francisco and it takes 20 minutes to get your car back takes 20 minutes sometimes to park so I'm just wondering how this is really going to work I don't think it's working workable to carry cars three stories down into a basement and carry them back up and I don't think people are going to be taking the bus to Santa Cruz to go to this hotel I think they're all going to be taking bringing their cars here so thank you thank you for your comments hi my name is Gretchen Riley I've lived about 20 years here in downtown Santa Cruz in an apartment it's uh affordable to a senior if you live properly I haven't got but one car that I use maybe six times a year I walk everywhere all over town I really love seeing the different environments and so forth and I've kind of cherished all the old things for a long time in fact there are many beautiful historic properties around but modern things are kind of nifty there's a lot of things going on people love to gather in these places I like to drink coffee so I go to almost every place in town and this would be fun the other thing for me is I have family and friends and they have a hard time finding a place to stay and when they do they're not in town they're out of town and they would have to come park downtown this way they could just be here and not have to roam and I don't know maybe they'd like to roam but anyway I like having a place like hey there's this place in town and you could be right there and you could enjoy the town so for me it just as a resident and enjoying my town and not knowing all the details of making it all perfect for everybody it looks pretty good to me and I'd like to see it happen just from me and family and friends who could come enjoy the town more and be more vigorous and bring much more excitement and activity thank you thank you for your comments would anybody else like to address the commission this evening seeing none I'm going to close the public hearing and return to the commission for starters would the developer or the applicant care to provide any rebuttal to any comments made through public comment you're welcome to do so now well I won't call it a rebuttal but I had a few comments I to share the need and the understand the huge need for more affordable housing downtown those of you know me know that I've involved in a lot of affordable housing projects my entire career Santa Cruz has done more than most communities and will continue to do more than most communities but there's more to be done and we as a hotel operator would love to have more affordable housing we would love for people to live close enough to here to work to so they don't have to drive these horrendous commutes from Watsonville or Los Baneos or Salinas and we this is a need of all employers in Santa Cruz if anybody talks to people employ people in Santa Cruz this is the universal thing that even people with very who are given who are fortunate enough to have high paying jobs can't afford to move here and this has been something a little bit on my soapbox but I'm going to say it anyway it's this has been a problem for 50 years in this community we're only just now coming to grips with it in the last maybe five or 10 years we need all types of housing and downtown is the place to do it and we certainly started that process and we'll continue thank you thank you would staff care to provide any comment on public comment we're available for any questions that you may have thank you so uh okay Commissioner Dan thank you I guess Michael's making me go first Commissioner Paul Hamas I had a question about how many employees approximately I mean I just a ballpark of how many employees how many employees will the hotel employ my partner is the expert on hotel operate but I think it's about 130 ish 130 and where will they park I mean I was just thinking about this when obviously they're not not everyone's going to live in Santa Cruz well we that's something that's going to have to get resolved for sure there we as part of a larger discussion of downtown you know this hotel can't solve all of the issues of downtown it is a parking district there's public parking city issues parking you as employees if there's enough parking they can buy parking monthly parking we need to build more parking my personal opinion opinion is we need to build employee parking for all of downtown not in the core someplace outside of the core leave the public parking primarily for visitors but this is a long-term process and we're going to have to solve it we're benefit that we across the street from the bus depot I'm hopeful that people will improve bus service will encourage people to ride the bus and those who are fortunate enough to live close enough to ride their bikes do that I'm hopeful but it's an issue we're gonna I don't have a perfect answer I'm not obviously I wouldn't ask you to solve this this is more of a you know general question but what about bus passes for employees is that something that hotel would consider I don't think we have any problem with that at all I mean I understand there's a program right now that's paying for that but that I don't think is gonna that will end I think at some point so I may think it'd be advisable to offer that at least so I'm sure there'll be folks that have to drive anyway and then so that was my question for you but I have a couple questions for staff the first one was this about the sale of the city owned parcels um where is there a is it proposed that the revenue from that sale go into any particular bucket or is that proposed to just go into the general plan a general fund that's a decision that the council will be making I mean I would support asking that it go into the affordable housing fund if we want to make that recommendation it seems like a logical place for that and then as far as the $5 per square foot fee for the extra building height can you just go into a little bit of I mean it seemed like and I'm not suggesting this is the case but my read from the staff report was like we're still negotiating this so just let us keep negotiating it you know otherwise I would want to try to help figure that out but I guess I wanted a sense from you staff what where that where that conversation is with coastal staff sure I think the biggest issue here is what the ultimate contribution is going to be with respect to the low cost visitor serving accommodations there is potential that that is a very substantial cost and as we work through that you know we will be looking at at balancing all of the various factors both the low cost visitor serving accommodations as well as the contributions to the affordable housing trust fund and looking to maximize what we as a community receive while also making sure that you know we are not compromising the ability of the project to move forward because you know essentially they're trying to make money right and that's okay they're a business we want them to make money we want them to succeed and they won't build their hotel if they're not going to make money no clearly I understand that yeah obviously yeah I know you do I know you do I just want to want to be clear that that there is that balance because what I mean the and maybe I'm the the tone of the staff report me it was suggested to me that something to the effect of this is the minimum I mean over and over it was saying this is the minimum this is the minimum and so to me that makes me think oh we're gonna we're gonna move it higher and so what I'm just trying to understand is you want us to help negotiate what that might be or is this something that as commission don't bother because we're working it out with coastal I think whatever you decide we're gonna upend anyway I would say I think that it's challenging to make a determination on the affordable housing trust fund contribution without knowing where the low-cost visitor serving accommodations costs are going to land and I would also say that those are also appropriate questions for the applicant okay got it okay okay and then I just had one other one other question about one of the conditions of approval that I just wanted to know where it came from and it was it was with the list of other contributions of boys a girl in clothes whatever and then it was it was talking about the requirement to have family suites and it says something like that in there it says something like three family suites with bunk beds that's very specific to have bunk to say with bunk beds and just wondering why that is I anticipate that's because these rooms are are fairly small and would be challenging to get other types of additional beds in there again that I would leave that up to the applicants because they can they can speak to that intent there I mean I guess my inclination is not to be so specific I understand we want to have rooms for families I fully and 100% support that though when you put bunk beds in a room you're really limiting it also and so a suite that could also be used for like you know a girls weekend you know I wouldn't want to pull that short straw and have to sleep in the bunk bed you know if I was so I mean I I I will think it's great to require some areas you know some rooms that a family could could could be in but also not limit it sure I think that's a fair point I mean because the design could change as they go into building permits and then the there there may be an opportunity to provide some other alternative way in which multiple beds could be accommodated and so I think it would be a fair revision to just you know put in a for example with with for example bunk beds something along those lines yeah but not require I mean right the way the condition reads now it requires the fire that's right yeah okay that's a good comment and I see we have in response to your questions a couple of Matt did you want to respond to Commissioner Dan's point I want to just make sure I've called your attention to the traffic study that was done where we do actually go into some good detail on the parking that's provided 214 stalls provided by the applicant which is actually more than when we reviewed it they're only 202 provided then the average or the during a weekday the peak parking demand for a hotel is assumed to be 230 parking stalls so this proposal is very close to what is sort of expected for hotel parking generation and again these rates that are in this study come from national averages not places like Santa Cruz where we have great transit and biking options and so the issues around parking I don't see them as substantial I think people are concerned about the other piece here is talking about in the downtown parking district we have our go Santa Cruz program which I do miss not to promote comes with the bus pass included paid for by the parking in the area and other sorts of transportation demand management programs that help people give up their automobile when they work downtown those are excellent but if you have a family and you're I mean I think we just have to be realistic about that some people just aren't able to not have a car and we have to be able to accommodate that and so areas where we can require parking I think we have to require parking but I appreciate that thank you thank you and did you want to respond to the question about the family designed rooms did you want I feel like we solved it by taking out the bunk bed requirement requirement allowing for bunk beds but not requiring so I'm okay all right okay commissioner pohamis thank you chair conway can we go in project plans number three to a 5.09 that deals with the street delivery and trash pickup I'm sorry the a 5.09 in project plans three so that is the seventh page it looks like five was again sorry a five oh nine two more oh nine sorry okay got it okay so what I see from the schedule projected trash collection is that there's three days of waste and I think I read there was five days of recycle and then two days of compost so a lot of you know big trash collection going on pretty much all days of the week and then there's also deliveries for say the coffee shop and whatever restaurant takes up the tenant space on the ground floor and then also stocking the bars and restaurants and all these so there's going to be a lot of pickup and delivery right is there any sorts and from what I can see in the plans is and you know not an expert at refuse collection but this seems to me to be a pretty big obstruction depending on the time of day right so I guess I'm just interested in hearing from maybe staff maybe the developer on is there some sort of idea in terms of delivery schedules or anything like that because it just seems like there's this is just going to be a very busy part of the project in a very narrow street with a big residential development next door and yeah if there's a Warriors game or something like that going on like it can you just talk about that a little bit just it just seems like a very busy situation so yeah we spent a lot of time on this is downtown densifies we're going to become more urban place so these kind of issues will come up more and more we spent a lot of time with the city's utility department and our consultant thinking about this but the short answer your question is most of the liver will occur at night clearly when we're you know because we're going to from from our delivery point of view minimize semis and use smaller trucks to the extent possible the city of course except the refuge recycling food waste all those things so they'll they'll schedule it but normally those schedules are you know the pickups are very early in the morning with our with the the staff moving bins onto the street moving them back into the locations in the that are pointed out in the building so it's we're as we densify these are the kind of issues that will come up this is a very difficult site that way it's a great site but it's only got one access right you don't only have there's no back alley there's no side street everything that comes in and that building is coming in and off of front street and so you know it's it's you know this these are issues that come up in other urban places more often and we're just kind of it's a challenge bringing the and yeah I'm just saying those it's a challenge and it's doable it's done many places it just is a little different than what we've done here before great thank you anybody else have any comments commissioner Thompson um hi I'm I don't know that I've got questions so much as I'm ready to comment good because I think this is really a remarkable piece of architecture and I really appreciate the fact that it's all one color that it hasn't been jazzed up with patches of different primary colors I think it's very handsome but I also think it's really well thought out functionally I think the the notion of putting a lot of energy into the rooftop area is right on target it's about time quite frankly that we had a building that took advantage of its location and our weather and made the roof an outdoor space as well I think the the aspect of the project that I don't think has gotten enough attention in the discussion yet is the the the improvements and connection to the river because this is the first one after you know 100 years of downtown development we've finally gotten around to actually saying gosh this is a potentially really beautiful place why don't we turn it into a park along the river and that's what they've done they've turned it into a private park served with food and beverage and a wonderful place to be a wonderful east facing place for breakfast on the river I think the arrangements of how the the pedestrian areas and bicycle areas are are separate but integrated is right on target the the Paseo actually was of idea was first came up when we were recovering from the earthquake because all of a sudden there were spots where there wasn't a building along the river and the the the notion of then aligning the Paseo's with the streets so that if you were walking down a street you could walk right to the river and this is the first one but I hope it is becomes a new part of the identity of downtown which is that we have a downtown that literally connects to the river and again it just astounds me that it's happening for the first time and I think that the design of the Paseo is first rate I was concerned that when the Paseo's got developed because they are in our plan that they would be 30 feet wide this is wide enough to be a real break in the the rhythm of the buildings it's big enough to actually be an active space that people don't just pass through that buildings open out onto and so I think that that's tremendously important I just to maybe real quickly go through some of the things that have been raised here the the London Plain trees that were built in Pacific Avenue after the earthquake were 24 inch box trees they looked good day one they look better now but I don't see any problem with us having a similar kind of urban forests that we've already accomplished we've we've proved to ourselves we can do this I wanted to actually go back to the parking ratio one more time because while I was listening to folks talk about this I was thinking about the the travel I've done in the last five years and I haven't ever brought my car with me to the hotel and it just didn't ever seem like a good idea and so oftentimes I was in cities where I hadn't arrived in a car so it wasn't like I had to get rid of one but I think that that if I look into the crystal ball of what's the future like I think the there is more and more reason to think that folks will not bring their private car to the hotel with them that they will get to the San Jose airport and realize that Santa Cruz is a place where you don't have to have a car to have a good time they'll take a limo or an uber to get to Santa Cruz and they won't ever need a parking space and and I'm not being um um ridiculously optimistic about that I just like I said I look back at the travel that I've done in the last five years and almost every time I didn't bring my car with me um uh and in part because I was going to places where I didn't want a car you know um and that strikes me as Santa Cruz in our future is going to be a wonderful place where I think you know I had a good time and I didn't even have to worry about where to park the car um so um I'm I trust the transportation engineers getting this probably right um uh let's see what else was it here um yeah I think we can't underscore the fact that what we're getting is privately developed parks one in the Paseo and one along the river um two items that we've never had before and I can't imagine how we would ever have created them if we had to do it out of city revenues certainly not at the level of finesse that is being proposed with this project um uh so um uh oh the the last one was um uh on the subject of um the need for public restrooms um for folks who are not hotel or restaurant guests um across the streets going to be the transit center and the transit center is exactly the right place to have public restrooms because it's part of what a public facility delivers um so I'm not at all nervous about the fact that there aren't public restrooms designed into this project um we've I think we got that one covered so um boy if we can get this quality of architecture in the rest of our riverfront um that would be fantastic um to have a um a new park along the river that's almost a quarter of a mile long sounds like this is a good way to start thank you that's it appreciate that other comments yes commissioner mckelvey I'd like to second or third everything that commissioner Thompson just said uh and many of the comments here already I think that you know in terms of our sustainability goals as a community um we want people out of their cars we want them to come to this place from the transit center that is being created we want uh people living downtown in the new newly approved affordable housing that's you know really coming to the floor now it's not I don't think it's something that uh I don't think it's just hopelessly optimistic I think I think we're trying to provide that and we're I think we're you know with arena success in the last cycle I think we're you know we're moving that way um talking to the parking for just a minute I know that do we still have all the same parking reduction measures available um the employee parking program the expanded bicycle or substitute bicycle parking and also complimentary time of use so we do it's got less applicability under AB 209 yes but I'm and forgive me I was thinking that because mixed use we still have limited ability to affect it but if we can affect the hotel I would encourage the applicant to look at an employee parking program that is literally like combination of bus passes of uh you know I know that for a while ecology action did this program where they would you pay a fee per year per employee and you would they would be able to avail themselves of a loan for a new bicycle uh support if they had problems riding home they get a flat tire or something people would come and help them you know get home um they're just I think there are a lot of approaches that we could suggest and I don't know about demand to uh you know make this model work and demonstrate that it's a it's a real uh it's an achievable solution because I think the amenities are fantastic I think that the the public benefits if you know assuming they're all going to pan out the way that they're presented I I think it's a great proposal that way but it does depend on some things you know meshing and getting put together for you know in terms of logistics so thank you for your comments uh anybody else have comments yes commissure Kennedy I've got a just a few so I wanted to appreciate staff's efforts to put those lighting conditions in here they're like all over the place and I wonder if actually collapsing back into like one more synced one I was thinking of the lighting designer being like oh man I gotta go through they're all listed here 27 b and did it but I really appreciate like putting that in there this is the one of the top things we heard in the downtown plan was like what about light spillage and these huge buildings and like and those are just reasonable concerns so keep at it tighten them up and I think uh with the commitment to a good lighting design that problem will not be a problem I'm glad you brought up the earthquake Matthew I was 13 at the time but uh getting the Maple Street alleyway which my memory is it's a historical alley that was there if don't ask me what year and then was closed down that is huge like that's a huge public benefit it's enormous and I started in with a bunch of like picky comments about this rendering of the to say and be like well what happens if there's homeless people living there and we have put gates up and you know all these things we talked about during that plan and it'll work itself out so I do want to say it like I put up the rendering on sheet a 0 15 which I think is just a few away from where you are and like Commissioner Dan mentioned with the fully grown trees I was like oh man when you take away the fake people on the fake trees what's left here so I just trust staff and the applicant to make this plaza as beautiful as possible I'm not going to condition it it's in everyone's interest for that space to work but I do want to highlight again just all the different users and all the different people and all those delicate interactions and a lot of that's operational like I'm concerned about that tiny weird retail space never being rented but hey you know we do what we can it's next to the dumpster and the electrical room so I'm sure it's going to fly off the shelf anyway enough comments this is a great project and and to respond to one more thing this is part of the overall economic development plan for downtown in my eyes and so though it's not like we're requiring an affordable unit in this hotel this hotel is doing plenty to contribute money and economic prosperity to the whole project which I think helps everything okay anybody else have comments now I have a couple of comments I'd like to make yeah okay um so first of all I'm delighted to hear that you like the architecture I thought it was pretty but I don't know anything so um I'm really glad to hear that um another thing is it's um ever ever since this plan first came forward you know it's a truism if you're trying to build anything that you can't make more land and what I really love about this project is it's making more land and um I love what it's doing to activate the river I think it is just you know all of these years later all of these decades of conversation um and we're finally happening it's a really and it's a really big change for our community and a really good one um and I know we've talked about all of the ways we use that river and its problems and we've talked about it a lot but I'm really excited about that and I think it looks like it's been treated really really well the other thing I'd like to say is you know again I've been scrambling for housing sites since 1983 um and um every site can't be housing this site shouldn't be housing and what it is doing in terms of as many people have said economic vitality and supporting our dear struggling downtown um bringing people downtown to eat at the restaurants shop in the stores this is a great location to not have a car I mean it's just you know you can walk to the beach you can walk downtown you can um you know really really enjoy it I loved it everything that was was said about that as well um I do have um uh questions and I don't think now it's necessary that certainly the time I understand that things are still a little bit fluid but supporting low cost accommodation is one of is a it's a fundamental tenant and um exactly how this project um is is going to play a role in that um I know it's moving around a little bit um and I have to say I was you know curious about um you know I've spent some some time working on a commercial impact fee um going towards affordable housing because you know a project like this does um engender and higher need for affordable housing because it has all these jobs glad to have the jobs they don't pay well we don't have the right housing fit for them um and that is a really complicated answer um you know we're not going to be taking on um a study to establish nexus and proportionality that this isn't the time for it um and again we we don't want to do to this project um what we've done to prevent housing for so many decades which is just to keep burdening it with more and more requirements that said I do think that having it make its contributions um is really fair um and I think they need to be done at a fair level I don't feel like I can work that out right now um the staff the coastal commission and you know what's going to be coming to the council I think is a fine place for it to um you know to keep moving along I really like some of the ideas like the um bus passes for employees I mean that's just an opportunity you know better than building the parking lot that we I know we do need um to do that um I guess that was my most of my comments what did I what did I miss um I think that's that's enough for me yes I had one other thing I wanted to add just because it came up in an email today about the concern of the ramp in the Paseo's mean I actually have some experience in this having gone through this design process the whole point of the ramp is to make them handicapped accessible right well that is such a slow ramp that it's not a challenge to ride a bicycle um at that percent grade and the drawings that we actually saw today have the the turn in it wide enough so that it really works so I think that's worth keeping in mind that I think we can expect people to actually ride their bicycles um through the Paseo to get up to the top and I'm planning on it and my sense is that it's going to be safe and that there won't be a conflict between pedestrians and bicycles that um make the Paseo less than it could be and that's partly because it's 60 feet wide I I think it's going to be a lot harder to pull this trick off in a 30 foot wide or a 40 foot wide Paseo just wanted to kind of say some reassuring things about that aspect thank you okay any further comments or is anybody ready to make a motion I can make a motion I have a couple comments um so this project um I'm the appointee of the fourth district so this project is in my district um I am a 22 resident 22 year resident of downtown so when I think about things going into downtown I look at it as is this going to enhance my neighborhood or not enhance my neighborhood and this project without a doubt is going to enhance my neighborhood it's I love that you spoke highly of the design because I'm just an amateur but I thought the design was absolutely beautiful um it's I think it's one of the best design projects we've had in Santa Cruz in many years and I hope that as your architect picked out some some of our architectural gems as inspiration I think the the neary building the octagon the clock tower and the um the lighthouse at steamers that this building will be seen as an inspiration for the next buildings that come along I don't think that we've been wholly successful in the past with design and I won't name names but when I'm coming from the east side across the bridge into Santa Cruz I will be grateful to have this as my view coming back into the west side so I'll just say that so kudos to your architect um really nice job um so I also just wanted to add that there was some talk about um our housing production in Santa Cruz and you know I just want to say I've worked in the Monterey Bay region for a long time and I'm familiar with what other communities are doing to house with housing and no one is building no other city or jurisdiction is building housing like this city is um both affordable housing we have a 100 affordable project two blocks from here another one that's proposed to go in with the library we have hundreds of units um that have already been approved to go in downtown so um no community is doing as well as we are with with both with 100 affordable projects and market rate so I just want to put that on the record I also love the rooftop amenities and I I don't mind the extra height if it's greenery on the roof so I'll just say that I'm not worried about that I think that that enhances the roof um and so with that I'm happy to move the staff recommendation with um I think we had a couple of possible changes with the conditions of approval to remove the reference to bunk beds and we had that little one Commissioner Kennedy did you have one too yes adding the words paint materials and right and that was uh condition number 23 to add the the highlighted words here materials and transitions after colors and before the word shall or any other suggested changes by commissioners um sorry so I have a motion on the table and with a with a couple of changes changes while that's still proposed are there any other changes so that we don't have to make amendments can I ask a question about a change um the buzzer so was that was for the entire condition or was it just the buzzer it was just a question it's really a question for Commissioner Kennedy I remember staff was going to take a look at that at the building permit process but um good question though I will second uh the maker of the motion okay we have a motion in a second and Lee what have you got to say thank you um I would add uh if you are interested in removing that uh condition about the buzzer or beacon whatever it may be um you may want to include a recommendation in your motion that says um with some flexibility there so that uh then we can wordsmith that um going into the city council hearing and provide that flexibility so our transportation manager can look at it and see if there's something that isn't going to disturb the folks across the streets um and um remove it if it seems superfluous so are you suggesting a friendly amendment that would include some language that uh has examination of that um prior to going to council something like that I can't personally make friendly amendments but yes one of the other type of thing we're talking about do you have a suggestion maybe switching chow to may could give us a little bit of easy flexibility can we do it the other way and just strike it and then you guys add it back in if you really want it back you know it's a little bit bigger to take it out as the as the commission I like the idea myself of softening it or or asking for some more consideration taking into account the fact that it is going to be it's a thing and uh we have some concerns about it maybe the buzzer it doesn't need to be a buzzer could be a less you know impactful noise may include an automated warning buzzer could also maybe other also lights or something maybe there's another way to do it it does this work for you this works for me what does it work for you it's really fun I'm just going back to support because you're there's tons of room you don't need anything that's just my opinion I kind of agree um and I would just say make it more broad scope you know the word buzzer I say you know I'm thinking the basketball game you know don't want to hear that but um I could see it a slightly different sound and a visual cue or something that's very localized for the people on that sidewalk but I'm I'm in agreement that the the goal is to have the annunciation and uh and the warning but I don't think we have to prescribe what it's going to be an automated warning cue or other mechanism sign I mean it's already says buzzer sign mechanism so or other mechanism that kind of leaves a pretty wide open yeah I kind of like that um yes don't you go finish the thought I was um just going to mention that commissioner dan had a question about um the bus passes for employees and the applicant had agreed to do that but that is not a condition right now so um with the applicant being amenable to that that could be something that the commission is interested in adding as well adding as a condition of approval you know how I hate that this is a good one though just putting it out there because it was part of the conversation and it didn't show up in in this and so it's the commission's discretion I just wanted to could we hear from the applicant on the um practicality of that and my my objection is usually about hanging new conditions of approval off like a and I appreciate that I I honestly can't tell you because I don't know exactly what it would cost how many employees would avail themselves of it all these details but I would think we probably can work our intent is certainly to find a way to encourage folks to use the bus and one way to do that is to make parking hard but we we want to we I would imagine that maybe we can work something out I don't know if I can sit here tonight and commit but I would I think that it's not a significant issue can you think of some language well I mean I guess at this point there is a program right now that offers it so I mean I would just suggest that this council we could just leave this for the council to figure out at this point okay can I make a small suggestion this is a small issue and potentially a friendly amendment but this should be a way to maybe eliminate the or they even call the tower lookers or whatever they were the little things and maybe reallocate those to bus passes yeah I mean the tower viewer I would even be amenable to eliminating that entire condition and just providing binoculars which I think is probably easier yeah my one concern about that is that when people are stealing the pillows they'll just throw the binoculars in there unless they're really crummy binoculars and then you might as well have a tower I don't know I've never been to a hotel with binoculars but that would that's my first inclination is like if they're nice yeah I'm gonna I'm gonna steal them Michael Kennedy went into the weeds but the public cannot access those binoculars or they could access something oh that's true now you're right now you're right you're right so the intent is to write like a public thing I get you I get you why don't we do this yeah could you it maybe staff in the staff report to the council include a paragraph discussing these items that the commission brought up but did not resolve so let's see is that Eric are you comfortable with resolving it yeah we can certainly summarize your discussion okay yes if mr. Butler I was just gonna note yeah our transportation manager Matt Starchy just alerted me to the fact that based on their location the employees will all get free bus passes because they're right across the street like forever or just for right now that is part of the Santa Cruz Go program I will okay just to hear your question Matt okay next question yeah as long as people keep parking downtown and paying a fair price we can keep paying for that program see we need parking after all there we go okay non-issue and or issue resolved so on condition 75 I wonder if we should just give 50 grand of the hostel I grand of the Boys and Girls Club I council can fix that I'm tempted to say a hundred but come on this is expensive hotel I should disclose like one of my best friends manages the hostel and it is the greatest thing you've ever seen go there hang out it's doing more to get people who don't have money to the coast then like literally anything can imagine I think people shower there it's just great so I don't know how you feel about that I would advocate for eliminating the tower viewers and reallocating that towards something else if that's the hostel situation if that's I don't know how the maker of the motion feels but I'm happy to I'm happy to include that okay then I'll I'll move to eliminate the tower viewers and reallocate that funding into condition 75 however that's done we can also just kind of leave that open ended for council but I want to make it like 50 grand instead of 15 not $3,000 no no no I think the process maybe is one of you can make a friendly amendment and be specific about what you want included right so that test can figure it out so would you accept a friendly amendment to change 75 a to an amount of $50,000 and 75 b to an amount of $50,000 I think if that gets you out of it and if the second degree yes cool reminder these are recommendations yeah and they could all go away if it's appeal though I would beg the developers not to please any further so just so I clarify you were recommending what you're recommending changing the amount oh yeah 75 a they're both becoming $50,000 go bigger go home Pete well I'm increasing the incentive to not appeal the bigger that number is like if we're going to play this deceitful game all right any okay so the maker of the motion and the second have both accepted that yes commissioner just one question when we call them tower viewers are talking about something that's out in the public realm it's not in a room right it's outside so people can look down and what I assumed it was usually what is it it's one of those things that you have around the wharf you put a quarter in and you look let's put people down on the levee stop looking we spent a lot of time hearing about how building taller buildings along the river was actually going to be good for wildlife in the river because it's creating more shadow and it's going to help return the river to some better balance and so I assume that we're going to be looking for you know salmon swimming at the river that's what they're gonna hope springs eternal steelhead you know okay so we have some proposed language is it done we're ready to go I'm not clear about the tower viewer did you say that you wanted to amend it to take it out they want it gone yeah take it out eliminate the tower viewer increase the amounts given to the Santa Cruz Hostel Society and then also the Boys and Girls Club from 15 to 50 and 25 to 50 and it's too bad the likely appealers are not here anymore um so um with with that um any more discussion on the motion as amended with that I'll call for a roll call Mr. Dan yes Kennedy yes McKelvie yes all Hamas yes Thompson yes sir Conway yes with that the motion passes and um thank you and we have a little bit more business thank you everybody um so moving on do we have any information items this evening and thank you everybody for coming if you're not gonna stay for the line down yeah just one item to report on the um the 40 unit project on high street 900 high behind peace united church uh the council heard two appeals on Tuesday and denied both appeals and so the project was approved um your approval that your recommendation for approval last November was upheld essentially um they did add some conditions around geology and uh tree protection to um address some of the appellants concerns but that that is an approved project now and Eric I heard that like the revised conditions basically satisfied the neighbors was that the case yeah we did get some work to that effect yeah that they they uh did appreciate the the change in the language yeah this my impression was like we're almost there almost there that's that's great thank you so looking at the schedule your next meeting is March 7th and we have a use permit um involving a retail cannabis use on mission street and that's it's the only thing scheduled right now okay um very good and um I believe we we don't have any subcommittee or advisory bodies right now and no items referred to future agendas and with that this meeting is adjourned thank you very much thank you