 We're now live on YouTube. Meeting is in session. Hello and welcome to the Capitola Planning Commission meeting of November 3rd, 2022. In accordance with the California Senate Bill 361, this is a hybrid meeting with commissioners and the public attending both in-person and remotely via Zoom. Information on how to join the meeting using the Zoom application or a landline or mobile phone, along with how to submit public comment during the meeting tonight, is available on our website, cityofcapitola.org, and on our published meeting agenda. As always, this meeting is cablecast live on Charter Communications Cable TV, Channel 8 in the City of Capitola, and on Channel 25 throughout Santa Cruz County. The meeting is being recorded to be rebroadcast on the following Monday and Friday at 1 p.m. Meetings can also be streamed live on YouTube or on the city's website. Our technician tonight is Eric Johansson. And now let's move on to the roll call. Commissioner Christensen. Here. Commissioner Newman. Here. Commissioner Ruth. Here. Commissioner Westman. Here. Chair Wilk. Here. Please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance. To the flag of the United States of America, which is stands on nation. Item two is oral communications. Are there any additions or deletions to the agenda? There are no additions or deletions to the agenda this evening. Okay, we'll move on to public comments. This is an opportunity for the public to speak for up to three minutes on items that are not on the agenda. If there's anybody who wish to make a general comment, now is your time. Please come forward to the podium. Or if there's anybody on Zoom, please raise your hand. Five attendees on Zoom, no hands are raised. Very good. Let's move on then to commission comments. Any commissioners on items? Very good. How about staff? I did want to inform you that come January, we'll have updated technology for the sound system integration after, I think it was two meetings ago that we had some issues followed by other issues at city council. So we plan to continue to go hybrid, but we're investing a little more money into our system to make sure it's less flaws come up and that there's more interaction with the members on Zoom. And as a reminder, when the public does come up to speak tonight to have them please speak into their microphone, so into the microphone so that the folks at home can hear them as well. Very good. I'll try to remind them. Okay, let's move on then to approval of minutes. So we have three minutes that we need to approve or review or comment on. Any comments on the minutes or motions? I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of August 18th, September 1 and October 6. Do we hear a second? We have a motion by Commissioner Westman and a second by Commissioner Christensen. Are there any other comments? Let's have a roll call vote then, please. Commissioner Christensen? Aye. Commissioner Newman? Aye. Commissioner Ruth? Aye. Commissioner Westman? Aye. Chair Wilk? Aye. Meetings are approved unanimously. Let's move on to item four, the consent calendar. These are items to be taken all at once. And there are two items, El Salto and Capitola Avenue, a permit, a building permit and a continuance. Does anybody of the public or the commission wish to take any of these off the consent calendar? Mr. Chairman, I'd ask that you take them one at a time because I cannot vote on B. Okay, let's just talk firstly then about 602 El Salto Drive. Does anybody wish to make a motion on that or take it off the consent calendar? I'll move approval. We have a motion to approve El Salto. Do we have a second? I'll second it. A motion to approve by Commissioner Ruth, a second by Commissioner Westman. Any comments? How about a roll call vote then? Commissioner Christensen? Aye. Commissioner Newman? Aye. Commissioner Ruth? Aye. Commissioner Westman? Aye. Chair Wilk? Aye. Item B, 401 Capitola Avenue, you need to recuse yourself? Yes. Okay. So now we have four commissioners willing to vote on that or able to vote on that. Are there any comments or is there a motion? I move for continuance. A motion to continue a second. I'll second it. Second motion and a second to continue 401 Capitola Avenue. No more comments. Let's have a roll call vote. Commissioner Christensen? Aye. Commissioner Newman? I recuse. Commissioner Ruth? Aye. Commissioner Westman? Aye. Chair Wilk? Aye. Okay. Consent calendar is approved. Moving on to item five, public hearings. This is where we get a chance to talk about the items one at a time. We'll go through five items. Staff in order, I mean staff presentation questions from the commission, then public comment, then deliberation to finally a decision. Our first item is 935 Balboa Avenue. Do we have a staff presentation? Yes. Thank you, Chair Wilk and good evening commissioners. Let me set up for one moment here. All right. This is 935 Balboa Avenue. The item before you is an appeal of an administrative denial of a tree removal permit to remove one Eucalyptus tree within the multifamily low density zoning district. This evening, we will describe the tree removal application process and present the appeal. Next, the appellant will be given the opportunity to speak and answer any planning commission questions. The chair will then open up the public portion of the hearing and that will be followed by planning commission discussion and decision. The proposed tree for removal is a mature blue gum Eucalyptus located on both properties at 935 Balboa Avenue and 1001 Balboa Avenue. This tree is part of a larger grove of Eucalyptus trees separating Cliffwood Heights and the Park Avenue rug going down to New Brighton State Beach. The subject tree is approximately 135 feet in height with a large canopy, some of which extends over both of the residential structures at the aforementioned properties. The tree is not located in an environmentally sensitive habitat area. It did come up on question if there were monarchs in this area and we haven't identified them at this site. This is something we can come back to reference if we need to, but it's a sort of the layout of staff process when we can make findings on a staff level to approve removals, that process would go straight down from pre-application, staff evaluation, findings for removal, the formal filing of an application, and then finally staff posting the site to publicly notice. Most tree removal permits are reviewed at that level, at the staff level. They begin with a preliminary review from the public work staff who can approve the removal of non-heritage trees only if the findings removal contained within our community tree and forest ordinance can be made. If the findings cannot be made, the application is transferred to the planning department for the review. The city may require the applicant to pay for an arborist under contract to the city and provide a report for the tree. The community development director will then make a determination based on the findings of the arborist. A pre-application was submitted in 2020 with an arborist report dated from 2019 that was prepared without any city involvement. That initial report recommended the retention of the eucalyptus tree. Staff subsequently visited the site and did not see any changes to condition of the tree since that arborist had come out and inspected it and subsequently was not able to make findings. In 2022, approximately 18 months after the first review by the unaffiliated arborist, the city contracted a second arborist to assess the tree. The city arborist also recommended that the tree be preserved. Following that second review, staff formally denied the application which was then appealed by the neighbor in September of this year. For the planning commission to approve the removal of a non-heritage tree, at least one of the findings for removal must be made and there must be no feasible alternatives. The findings, which include the health of the tree, safety considerations and property damage are shown here. They will be addressed individually by the following slides and you can refer back to these if it need be. On the first finding for the health or condition, staff and the arborist found the tree to be in good health and good growth. The co-dominant stems of the eucalyptus tree here can be a structural concern but in this case we're found to be in fair condition and the arborist reported a low likelihood of a complete failure. There was further no evidence of any decay or disease or decline of the tree. With respect to safety considerations, the arborist found that the tree poses a low safety concern without mitigating action. Hanging dead branches over one inch in diameter were recommended for removal but other than that the arborist found that in addition to the main stems being not a safety consideration, he found that the live branches posed a low likelihood of breaking. With respect to property damage or the likelihood of substantial property damage, city staff and the arborist found that the tree has not caused and is not likely to cause unreasonable property damage. As mentioned before, there is hanging deadwood which has the possibility of causing some property damage. In addition to that, there was some sections of fencing at the base of the tree which have been lifted and damaged as a result of the basal growth. The concrete patio is mentioned in the appeal in the backyards of both properties show cracking but staff and the arborist did not believe this appeared to be caused by root growth. It would ultimately take an excavation to explore and find out what the ultimate cause was though. Couple photos shown here were submitted by the appellant at 1001 Balboa Avenue. That's the sections of fence that were referenced. The patio here is on the appellant side and it shows the cracking and sliding there. This finding pertains to the feasible alternatives to removal which is something that cannot be met in order to approve the removal of the tree. The arborist found that there were feasible alternatives short of removal available to this including the removal of that deadwood to reduce risk of any droppings. The selective thinning on the larger limbs to reduce the weight of those branches and further reduce the dropping of live branches and the consideration of cabling of the main stems to reduce any potential for the main stems to fail. With that, staff recommends that the planning commission uphold the city determination and deny the appeal. And I'm available for any questions. Thank you. Questions of staff? If we allow the removal, what would the replacement requirement be? So that was something that came up earlier. The, there's a fence line behind this house which doesn't seem to accurately represent the boundary of the property. The property appears to extend considerable ways about 40 feet into that eucalyptus grove. So in spite of the fact that this is already a large lot, there is a substantial area on that lot that is completely covered by canopy. So even with this removal, it appears to be about 30%. It's no replacement requirement. That was our initial assessment. Other questions? All right, let's move on to public comments. I was gonna say, I think if the appellant wants to speak, that would be the first. All right, let's start with the appellant. If you could come on up and speak into the mic. Good evening. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak before the commission today. My name is Moha Hassan. I'm one of the owners of 1001 Balboa Avenue. I have been a resident of Santa Cruz County for the last 24 years. I own several properties in Santa Cruz County. I'm not against trees. I have a garden. I love gardens, except in this case, when we bought this property, this tree was there, was a huge. We tried to address it, except it's really not on our property. It's on our neighbor's property, which is 935 Balboa Avenue. I'm the owner of 1001 Balboa. It's not a tree that we share, except because of its size, because of its huge humongous colossal size, it has overgrown and it has overgrown to our property, to where now it has damaged the fence, and it continues to damage not only the fence, but it's also encroaching as Mr. Shah mentioned, on what we believe is the patio, which is cracked, and also the size of it is 140 feet long, tall. That's 10 stories building in a backyard, okay? As it was mentioned, the lot has tremendous amount of canopy cover, because we are right behind Park Avenue, and you have all that eucalyptus grove. We have maintained some of those smaller trees on our side, but again, in all honesty, the two pictures that you saw do not provide 10% of the justice to give you an indication of the size of this tree. I am afraid for my tenants, for my property, I currently have renters there. I don't wish to have them there the whole time. We eventually gonna use that house for ourselves, me and my partner. The tree drops branches, small branches, leaves. We have dealt with that. The question is, what happens with if there's a big branch that comes down? What happens if, yes, the arbor says that it is healthy right now, but is it gonna be healthy a year from now? We don't know. It has a split. I have submitted to you and I don't know if you have read over my appeal papers and 12 points indicating why I believe this tree should be removed, that we have gone through this legal process following the city's tree permit process. With the approval of the owner of 935, Balboa, two year period. And the discussion with the actual new owner of the property at the time, Joe Stokely, started in late 2019. Then we were hit with COVID and then we had a stop and then we started the process with the city of Capitol. So over almost it's gonna be three years trying to just gain a permit to remove it. If there is a need for a replacement, we're more than happy to do a replacement, but something smaller, maybe some fruit trees, something that everybody will benefit from. There's a letter that was sent from one of our tenants, also to the city indicating the thread that they see from the tree. I'm asking the commission to reverse the decision of the city on denial of the permit. Please, I wish I also had asked today is that if you were willing to come and see the tree with your eyes, I had asked the tenant to provide permission and they did. And I was expecting hopefully that you would be able to before this meeting that you would come to the backyard and see it and tell me if this is something that you would be able to live with. Now I have very good neighbor with Joe, has been cooperative in this process. We have worked together on this, but maybe I would have made different decisions if it was in my backyard. But this is obviously history and right now, removing it, we need a professional company, they need a permit, you know the process. We don't wanna do anything that is gonna jeopardize or increase the risk of anything and we see that there is a risk with the maintenance of this tree in its position. So I'm appealing to you again as a resident, as a homeowner, as a concerned citizen that this tree, yes, it has been there for a long time, but it has, time has come for it to be removed because of the potential danger. We see that there's a clear and present danger to the property, to the residents there. It may not happen now, it may not happen this winter, but with the climate change, with the storms, with the weather changing, I don't know. I see it, it's huge. Again, I just wish that you come and see it. The pictures, I've provided several pictures in the packets that I hope that provided you some kind of idea, but it's nothing close to, compares to actually seeing it in real, with your own eyes. And I don't know if I would need to go over the information that has been already submitted to you. I don't wanna take all your time here, but there's an issue of the tree encroaching on the property. I don't own the tree. I don't want the tree to be encroaching on my property. I don't want it to be breaking the fence. We can't have a neighborly fence because the fence has been broken by the tree. It's actually the tree is pushing it over. Trimming it is a short-term solution, and it's not the solution. And we're looking for one solution to this that will end it. And it's not gonna be, by any means, a low-cost, reasonable solution. It's a huge tree. We have had a chance to review the packet and your information. We really appreciate your information and all the hard work you've done. And are there any questions, the applicant, while he's here? I have a question. Yes. Is there anybody that values the tree in your neighborhood that you know of that has anybody, besides you and your neighbor, has anybody come for again? For maintaining it? For, I mean, is anybody else bothered by it, or is it? Is there anybody else that is bothered by it? My two tenants that live on the properties and obviously the owner, Joe Stokely, and his tenant as well. Okay. It's a duplex. Is there any neighbors that have objected to the idea that you would take a town? No. No. I have a question to the applicant. I thank you very much. Let's move on to other... I don't know if there's anybody on Zoom that wants to talk. Well, I think we can continue the public here. Yeah, move on to public comments. Yes, from other members of... Thank you, you may sit down. Thank you. Other members of the public wish to speak on this issue. Now is your time. Please step forward and step forward to the microphone. And is there a sign-up sheet? There is. If you could... If you could just... So for the minutes, it's good to have your full name. But do you have Florencia Williams? And you have three minutes to state your case. Yeah. I've been living at 935 Belbo since 2015. That tree's been dug by our family. We care for it. It's been constantly... They come out and do some treatment every year to make sure it stayed healthy. It's a beautiful tree. I mean, it's part of the ecosystem there. I mean, it's been there. It's probably the oldest thing on that hill. And it's gorgeous. I mean, we could be afraid that the airplanes are gonna fall in our yard tomorrow too. I mean, things can happen, but that tree has been inspected several times over the years. And all the arborists that have seen it and commented, they said it's very healthy. It's in good shape and there's no need to remove it. So I don't know what the problem is with the tree. I mean, it's just a tree. All right, thank you, Mr. Williams. Anyone else? Chair Wilk, we have five attendees via Zoom. One would like to speak. It's number two, Tony S. If he would unmute, he's now can speak. Hello, can you guys hear me? Yes. Okay, so it was hard to hear everybody, but I'm also the co-owner of this property with Mo. And we've really looked at all our options and avenues in terms of making this work. But the reality is, this does present a danger. Now with the climate changes and all that, one big storm can really do a great damage because if it's a big tree, it carries a lot of weight. Just I would say a major windstorm would easily break a few of those branches and cause damage. Now I understand one of the neighbors saying, you know, it's not a danger. Well, if it's on this property, he wouldn't say that because obviously it's not on this property. He doesn't care about the danger that happens directly on the two direct properties that it sits on. So for us, we're trying to be proactive rather than going the legal way and wasting your time, wasting our time. We're trying to be proactive in terms of really addressing the issue before it happens. And I think that's the smart approach, the savvy approach in terms of really rectifying something that you could probably see may cause a great danger or damage. Because again, with its weight, with its size, it can actually cause more than damage, but essentially who knows, depending on who's sitting in the living room and the branch falls in the living room, it could potentially cause a death. So again, we'll be proactive. There's a thousand other trees right behind it. We're not taken away from the looks of the area. We're not taken away from the environment. I think we're just again, be proactive in doing the right thing for the better rather than keeping it and just procrastinating and hoping nothing will happen, which we don't want to go without route. So again, understand that we're again, we're taking the proactive approach, the smart approach that keeps everybody safe, healthy and hopefully no major incidents. That will reduce the cost from all aspects, from a homeowner perspective and the city's perspective. I think we've all seen the damages that big trees can cause when they do fall. So the further away from the actual structure, I think the better off we are. So I hope you would take that into consideration. Of course, nobody has hand sign information, nobody knows what's gonna happen, but we know we do get major storms to winter and a lot of times we carry heavy, heavy wind and really that would be the big factor that we would be more concerned with. Thank you, Tony. Thank you. Other comments? Anything from Zoom? No, no other hands up in Zoom. Okay, so we'll close then public comments and... I'm sorry, there is another Zoom hand up. Okay. Joe, you can unmute and speak. You have three minutes. Hello, good evening, commissioners. Can you hear me? Yes, Joe, we can hear you. Yeah, anyway, well, thanks for taking the time of everybody here to talk about the tree. Yeah, it's a beautiful tree. I think it's the nicest tree in the whole grove there, but as my neighbors, Mo and Tony, when we first purchased the property a few years ago, they were real concerned about it. And yeah, but there's been several arborists that have come and done studies on the tree and they all say it's healthy and everything like that, but it is a ginormous tree, it's as big as a redwood. And I think they and I are just concerned that, if it ever did fall and land in the way of the properties of the homes there, it would cause a lot of damage. So like Tony was saying, we're just trying to do the right thing and be proactive and go through the proper channels. So that's what our motivation is here. And I just want to say thanks for taking the time to listen. Thank you. Thank you, Joe. Okay, let's then bring it to the commission for deliberation. Anybody want to comment on this one? I'll go. Go ahead. Okay, so first I want to say that the staff, our staff handles these tree applications very consistently and thoroughly and fairly. They are bound by the, what I consider to be a very rigid statute that doesn't really take enough variations into consideration, but that's not their fault and they apply it as they see it. I think we as a planning commission have a little bit more discretion. My concern here is, well, first of all, Mr. Fouts report, I, by the way, I did look and I think probably most of us went and looked at the tree from the street. Mr. Fouts report rates the danger, the risk of the tree as moderate. So to me, that needs to be balanced against the nature of the tree, which is one of a huge number of eucalyptus trees in that area. So that if it were some other, not a heritage tree, but some other species of tree that maybe was more unique or needed or necessary or less plentiful, maybe the standard for risk would be a little bit different. But for me, the fact that it's, that there's tons of eucalyptus trees out there and they'll get big too over time, I think what causes me to balance this in favor of removal, even though the risk isn't huge, it's enough given the fact that it's one of hundreds of eucalyptus trees in that grove. Thank you. Mr. Newman, anyone else? Go ahead, make. Yeah, I went out Tuesday afternoon and looked at it peeking over the gate there. And my concern was that it might be a major part of the whole eucalyptus forest and leave a big hole in it. But it looks to me like it's kind of an outlier towards the Balboa side. So that eliminated that concern I have. And recently, the commission just approved two very visible public trees to be removed at the end of Warf Road because they drop pine needles and cause some minor damage to the sidewalk. And some people that supported it got a better view. But this tree, I think probably with the potential for the property damage and the damage caused right now and the fact that it's not gonna really impact that whole urban forest there, I could support removal. I think we need to be consistent and that would be consistent with our prior decision. I agree with Commissioner Ruth. I did go out and look at the tree as well. And this one does seem to be forward of the main grove of eucalyptus trees. And I think that removing this tree is not going to have a huge impact on the canopy that runs along there with all of the other eucalyptus trees. And I also agree with Commissioner Newman. I think the staff did an excellent job on going through the process and evaluating the tree. And if I had been in their position, I would have come to the same conclusion based on the findings that they have to make. But for us, we have a little more flexibility so we can make a finding for removing the tree. Courtney? I agree with everyone. There's, I've lived under eucalyptus trees in the past and every year is a new branch or deadwood or something falling and it just seems that even if you were to remove it one year, it would be happening the year after. And so I would support the movement. Okay, I also would support removal. The reason, well, I visited it. Not only did I visit it from the front, but I went around the back from Park Avenue and climbed that little hill and waded through the forest. And it's a big, beautiful tree. It's very healthy. I was the one who asked the question about the monarchs. If it was to be a monarch grove, it just would be certainly a part of that ecosystem. But as it was pointed out, there's no history of that. So I would tend to want to agree with staff. However, as Commissioner Ruth pointed out, there's precedent that's been set recently on trees. He and I both have been trying hard to save trees several times and have been shot down. And the reason is because, well, first of all, safety first, right? We've had a redwood tree on 47th Street that we voted to save, but it was overturned by the city council because of safety damage. And basically big trees are dangerous. And this is a big dangerous tree from that standpoint, even though mitigations can be done, but you're talking about serious expense, putting cables in, removing, constantly moving deadwood, this and that. Hate to put the owners through that expense unnecessarily, especially as Courtney pointed out, that's still gonna be a problem. So the safety issue seems to be one that we're gonna continually come across whenever there's a big tree. And I think the city council, even if we try to save a tree, is gonna say no, safety first. Finally, there's the other thing we're supposed to consider is structural damage. And that was the reason that we approved the removal of the canary pines on Warf Road because of the sidewalk was damaged and the curbs were lifted and this kind of thing. And that was gonna continue to be a problem. Well, I mean, those are safety problems that could easily have been handled with just shaving down the sidewalk. Nevertheless, that's, that and the pine needles is what got those trees removed. And so I can look at the fence being a structural problem. It's a, you constantly have to worry about the fence and the property line. And I looked at that patio from behind and to me, it looked reasonable to assume that that crack did come from the roots of the tree. So, you know, how do you just distinguish between the lifting patio and a lifting sidewalk? So to me, I think in order to be consistent, we need to follow the precedents that have been set, especially recently. It's also a non-native tree. So that kind of weighs against it. So I also, I think I'm with the rest of you in terms of thinking that as beautiful as a tree as it is, and it is. I mean, it stands right out. It's not worth keeping. So, I'll move that we accept the appeal and allow the tree to be removed. A second. We have a motion by commissioner Newman and a second by commissioner Christensen. Any further discussion? Let's have a roll call vote. Commissioner Christensen. Aye. Commissioner Newman. Aye. Commissioner Ruth. Aye. Commissioner Westman. Aye. Aye. Appealed is approved unanimously and go ahead. I would like to read some findings into the record for this. So what I'm hearing is that the removal of the tree is in the public interest with respect to the condition of the tree. The tree does possess a safety concern without mitigation. That the removal of the tree is in the public interest with respect to unreasonable existing and potential property damage. And that there are no feasible alternatives to the tree removal to secure the purposes of the community tree and forest management ordinance. And we'll put those findings into the minutes that you'll review at the next meeting. So the findings were for denial, so I wanted to. Everybody okay with that? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, that clarifies things. So with that, we can move then on to item B, which is 216 Central Avenue. Do we have a staff presentation? Coming right now. All right. Thank you. This application before you is for a design permit, historic alteration permit, coastal development permit, variance and minor modification for a single family residence. Project is located at 216 Central Avenue within the single family residential zoning district. This is a couple images of the residence as it appears today. Different shots of the front elevation there. It's located in the Depot Hill neighborhood on the corner of Escalina Drive and Central Avenue. The site is adjacent other single family homes, the historic Casablanca apartments, as well as the in at Depot Hill. The applicant is proposing first and second story additions and modifications to the historic primary residence. This proposal does not include modifications to an existing detached garage in the rear. This is the proposed site plan. The additions for both first and second story are shaded in blue and they are distanced from the front elevation along Central Avenue. With the additions totaled, the proposed project is 2,267 square feet for a floor area, excuse me, a floor area ratio of 50% or 50.5%, which conforms to the maximum floor area ratio of 52% and a lot. I'm gonna go through the existing and proposed elevations side by side, starting with the above, which show the front or west elevations. This is the most publicly visible elevation. The applicant is proposing additions which are stepped behind the ridge of the cross gable to create added depth. Most modifications will not be visible from the street level of Central Avenue, and we've got some renderings to show you at the end of the elevations. Exterior cladding on the additions are horizontal wood lap board. The boards will be differentiated in width from the original and existing boards and on the front section. These are the north elevations which face Escalona Drive. They are also publicly visible. The section on the left on the proposed is what would be new and modified. The proposed design replaces a previous addition on the rear of this structure, and it also replaces a loft portion above. This is the interior side or the south elevation, and this is the rear or east side elevation. As I mentioned, the applicant had included a number of street renderings. These are both taken from Central Avenue. The one on the left is from the intersection of Central and Escalona just to give you an idea of what the massing may look like from the street. So as mentioned, this does include a historic alteration permit. Some of the context behind this home is that it actually used to be 112 Central Avenue. It was located about a block down towards the ocean. That red line indicates where it came from. In 1999, 2000, the city approved an application to relocate and construct additions to this home. It also included a variance to place the detached garage, which is still there. Because the relocation and the structural modifications, the historic status was in question and subsequently reviewed in 2020 by architectural historian Leslie Dill. Ms. Dill found that the siting was still to be within the context of the original hind development era of Depot Hill. This determination was later supported in an attached letter by local historian and former architectural and site committee member, Carolyn Swift. Following that and submittals of designs for this addition, architectural historian Seth Bergstein provided a preliminary review, which included several recommendations, including reducing the second story mass and height from 27 feet to 25 feet, beginning the second story addition behind the ridge of the cross-gable, insetting the second story additions behind the Eve line of the original cross-gables as viewed from Central Avenue, as well as differentiation of the cladding from the original house to the additions. Subsequent revisions incorporated these recommendations. And following those design changes, Mr. Bergstein found the project in compliance with the Secretary of Interior's Standards for Rehabilitation, and as well as the California Environmental Quality Act. For the variance in minor modification, I'm sharing the findings from the staff report, but I can also read you what they represent if you would like, and we can also reference up here. The existing residence is within the minimum front setback and is considered non-conforming. The proposed structural alterations with this project would exceed 80% as described by our calculation and as was reviewed by our building official. And that's 80% of the present fair market value of the existing structure. Therefore, the applicant is requesting a variance for the construction cost, calculation formula, and limitations for non-conforming structures. In relation to the variance request, staff was able to make findings supportive of granting a variance for the non-conforming calculation. Findings A through F are captured on this slide and the next slide, and I can go through them if you'd like, but I'm gonna move on to the next slide here. These are the findings D through F. The application also includes a request for a minor modification for the covered parking dimensions. The proposed additions exceed 10% of the existing floor area, which requires that the applicant bring the parking into compliance with all development standards for parking. The existing garage is less than the required 10 foot deep or 10 foot wide by 20 foot deep space as is required to meet the covered parking requirement. Because the existing space deviates from the required dimensions by less than 10%, the applicant is seeking a minor modification for the minimum covered parking dimensions. The site plan here shows what the proposed arrangement is of a total of three parking spaces. The two on the left and lighter orange are the uncovered spaces and the one on the right and the darker orange is the covered space located within the garage. John, can I ask you a question about that? Is that any different than the existing parking out there right now? Is the parking being modified at all because of this improvement to the property? The parking area of the uncovered spaces would need to be modified, but the existing garage and driveway is otherwise just gonna be built into. The site plan above shows that arrangement as I just described. And for reference as well, because it relates to some of the findings for the minor modification, I have the front and rear property line dimensions there showing that the lot does even visually taper down towards the parking area and driveway and that moving the garage forward as it cannot be moved backwards would actually make it difficult, maybe infeasible to put a second uncovered parking space in the front as they've currently proposed. That is included in the findings, which I have for you now. In relation to the minor modification request, staff was able to make supportive findings for the minimum covered parking dimensions. As with the variants, findings A through F are captured on two slides and we can certainly go back and cover them if you'd like. And with that, staff recommends the Planning Commission approve the project based on the findings and conditions of approval. Are there questions of staff? Seeing none, let's move on to public comment. Do we have the applicant here, wish to speak? Are there any other members of the public wish to speak on this item? We have three attendees on Zoom and I do not see any hands up. I will say though that the architect is online if you do have any questions for them. Actually, a hand just came up on Zoom. Okay. Bridget, Etsy, Esty, you can now speak. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, great. My name is Bridget Esty. My husband and I have properties on both Escalona Drive and Central Avenue. And the property on Escalona Drive looks directly at 216 Central Avenue. And we just wanted to, just for the record, let you know that we do support the improvements, the recommended proposed improvements. And we think they've done a great job of meeting all of the rehabilitation criteria and look forward to the improvements that they're proposing to make. Thank you, Ms. Esty. Anyone else? No, there are no other hands up. There was a hand up, but oh, here we go. Yep, R. Scott Mitchell. Oh. Okay, well, if there's no more comments, let's bring it to the council for deliberation. Anybody wish to speak on this item? I have a quick question for staff. I can't ever recall a variance for the construction cost calculations that exceeded 80%. Is this something, is this a first? I believe we've done this before. So yeah. If I may, yes. I believe it's been done on multiple occasions, but in the staff report, and I can pull it up if you like, I believe we referenced 124 Central Avenue, which was thematically similar to this project. It was also a historic house. I believe it's the purple house, as you may know it, on Central. And they did receive a variance for the construction cost calculation. Yeah, it wasn't on there, maybe my memory's failing maybe. Haven't we done away with that in the new ordinance? Well, we tried, but we didn't succeed with the election of the ordinance in the ghost of commission. So this is a new method. Yeah. Okay. Any other comments or do we hear a motion? I mean, we've granted variances of all kinds due to historic preservation. That's one of the main reasons that we do grant variances. This is an unusually shaped lot. Yeah, it meets all the requirements. The minor modification is very minor, it's like one foot. Yeah, I think it's nice that the applicant redesigned the project to address the concerns of the historians and set it back behind the roofline because now it really does look like it fits on the property itself. So I'll make a motion to approve the project with the staff's findings and conditions. Second. I have a motion by commissioner Westman and a second by commissioner Ruth. Are there any other discussions? I have no comments. Can we have a roll call vote? Commissioner Christensen. Aye. Commissioner Newman. Aye. Commissioner Ruth. Aye. Commissioner Westman. Aye. Chair Wilk. Aye. Motion passes unanimously. Congratulations, good luck on your project. Thank you. Let's move on then to item C, 2022 zoning code amendments. Pick up where we left off, I guess. Yeah, thank you. This evening we have Ben Noble of Ben Noble Planning to finish up where we left off. We are not going to go back and over the whole presentation. We did want to suggest that we open the public hearing early and then we'll talk through the last, the remaining four items. So would that sound like a good idea to open the public hearing? Do we want to go back and do the presentation on the items we didn't talk about, which was? You know, at the last meeting, Ben presented all of the items. So there's only a few remaining. And Ben, if you wouldn't mind just maybe listing what those remaining items are and then we could open the public hearing on those items and then go into the discussions. Yeah, that's a good idea. Sure. Can you hear me okay? Yes, Ben, we can. Great. All right, so just a little refresher. On October 20th, we had the first hearing of these amendments where the Planning Commission provided direction on the first five topics of interest on our list. And what staff is requesting tonight is direction on the remaining five topics of interest as well as any other items that the Planning Commission has comments on with the amendments, with the request to make a recommendation tonight to the Planning Commission or to the city council for them to adopt these amendments. And what we had in mind for the meeting tonight is starting with number six, EV charging stations, that I would go over the slides again that I presented two weeks ago and then have Planning Commission discussion and direction on that item and then move on to the next one, generators. I would review the proposed amendments and the Planning Commission would then discuss and provide direction and so on and so forth until we've completed the list. We thought that that was a sensible way to proceed tonight. And I guess we wanted to check with the Planning Commission and Mr. Chair if that sounds like a good approach. I think that's a good approach. We also have to have the public hearing on each item. So yeah, so that's the question. And you suggest that we do it all at once. I suggest we do topic by topic. Sure. Okay. We have one attendee on Zoom. Okay. I have a question. Didn't we talk about electric vehicle charging stations because Commissioner Newman talked about how we ought to have something in there that makes it work with state law? I thought we left it. I thought we left it. That was the ADUs, okay. Yeah, yeah. Okay, Ben, go ahead then and... All right, great. I'm sorry, go ahead. I'm sorry, go ahead. We talked about charging stations because we talked about the size of the screen on them, didn't we? We did, and he showed us the thing where they were using the screens for advertising. Was that just part of questions? We just asked that. We interrupted and asked questions when he was talking about that, but we didn't have our discussion. Oh, okay. So go ahead, Ben. Electric vehicle charging stations. Okay, thank you. So existing code has language about EV charging stations and it requires charging stations for new uses with at least 25 parking spaces and additional remodels that increase in existing parking lots by 50 or more. That has 50 or more spaces by 10% or more. So existing standards are for large parking lots with a lot of spaces. And if the EV charging station requirement is triggered in terms of the number of charging stations, if a lot has 25 to 49 parking spaces, one charging station is required. And then an additional charging station is required for additional increments of 50 additional parking spaces. So again, we're talking about very large parking spaces in, or parking lots in shopping centers. And what the proposed amendments say is that the number of EV charging stations is required as required by the building code as that's something that evolves over time. And there's also language that limits the size of digital screens to two square feet. And there's language that requires screening of parking lots on lots with six or more spaces if there's an EV charging station as would be required for any parking lots. So nothing unique or different or additional for EV charging stations. And so there are alternatives that we've considered. It is possible to specify in the zoning code the number of required charging stations to make sure that's consistent with state law. And then expecting that state law will evolve over time with the building code and the green code, the city would then need to periodically amend the zoning code to make sure that the two are consistent. Another option for the city is to codify the required ministerial process to approve a building permit for the EV charging stations. That's something that's required by recently adopted state law. That city need to approve these charging stations through a streamlined ministerial approval process. The language for that, if a city does codify it, it's typically in the building code. It can be very detailed. And I think our preference and recommendation on this is to not codify that process and instead rely on state law to establish that. So part of the reason why these proposed amendments are coming before the Planning Commission tonight, particularly about the digital signs, is that there does seem to be kind of emerging in this interest within the advertising industry to use the EV charging stations as an opportunity for electronic billboard signs. The city has previously received inquiries about whether or not this is permitted and what the approval process would be. And as I previously mentioned, a staff's recommendation is to limit the size of digital screens to two square feet as a way to prohibit the sort of large digital display advertisements that we're seeing in some communities and that are of interest to the advertising industry. So with that, I would sort of stop my presentation on the EV charging stations and turn it back to the Planning Commission. Okay, yeah, without deliberation, are there any questions on his presentation? So now we can move to then the public if there's any members of the public. No longer any attendees on. Okay, so let's bring it then back to the commission and any comments on this item? I did want to mention, we did approve an EV charger, two EV chargers, I think it's two, there might be a couple more at the mall at Macy's and they are the large screens and at the time of approval, it wasn't clear that they'd be utilizing those also for advertising. So I just want to highlight that. There are two that would be non-conforming as soon as we pass this ordinance. But, and that's what we're trying to prevent is they can put Pete's coffee on there and other advertising. We can at some point notify them all and enforce our sign ordinance on those. So there is a way, but we're just really trying to avoid this situation from happening again by for the two square feet of screens. I don't understand the objection to the advertising. I think if you don't like advertising, then just ban it, no two by two foot screens at all. Just, we don't like advertising. Or if you like it, why not go, what the heck? Well, you do need a screen because when you go into charge, you've got to utilize the screen in order to operate. Seems like you need to charge that, so, yeah. Our sign ordinance would actually govern it if we were capable of enforcing our sign ordinance, which I know is difficult. I'm more concerned about the technology. If people find it lucrative to have the big screens, nobody's gonna make a charger with a small screen so you won't be able to get one. And we'll just have a variance every time someone wants to install one. I don't even think we should put that provision in there. You don't, you want the big screens? No, but I don't think we're gonna have any control of it. We're at the mercy of what the manufacturers produce. Right, but I think that the manufacturers are going to produce ones other than the big screens because there are going to be a number of places that are not gonna want to have the big screens, not only us, but you're not gonna see. I don't think it hurts anything to put it in there. I just think we're gonna get a lot of variance requests when people can't get that type of charger. I think we ought to go along with staff's recommendation on the size of the charger so we don't have the big screens for advertising. I think we ought to incorporate the Cal Green standards. So for the number of stations that need to be, we can, you know, someone can always put in more, but that way we don't have to keep going back and changing the ordinance. And I think parking lots ought to be screened the way we have established screening parking lots now. We shouldn't change it just because some of the parking slots are going to have charging stations in them. So that's my opinion on the three points. I agree with all of those except for the screen size. I don't have a problem with the big screen personally. So, Ed, Susan, all the way. Okay, Courtney. I think I'm favoring the smaller screens too. Okay, well, I think it's direction enough. Okay. So that's staff recommendation. Okay, Ben. Should I have generators? You have a generator? All right. So, generators, we're talking about generators for emergency power during power outages and the existing code is silent on this matter and the city has in the past received questions about this and also there have been installations of generators and clarity on the rules that apply to generators or something that would be beneficial. So the proposed amendments would prohibit generators in the front and the side setbacks of a property that would allow generators to project five feet into the rear setback if necessary to locate the generator behind the rear building wall. There's also language that limits testing hours to 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. And would also prohibit freestanding generators to supply service to recreational vehicles. Excuse me, Ben, what does testing hours mean? Is that mean running hours? So that's the time during the day when a generator can be tested and periodically a generator does need to be tested. It's actually a requirement of the generator to do that periodically. And what we're saying here is that if when it is tested it can only occur during the time of 8 a.m. But it could run 24 hours a day. Yeah, I'll get that in off. Well, I think it typically needs to run for about an hour. This is my understanding. We're just saying that you can't test a generator during. I mean, I can tell you every month when they test the generator here at City Wall from my house I can tell you every month they test the generator at Chatterbrook. And why shouldn't they do that testing during the daytime rather than at night? I mean, if the generator needs to run it can run all night, but. So the testing is noisy. I know nothing about these generators. Yeah, I think I brought up the generators once before. We actually have in our neighborhood a home that's put in a commercial sized generator. And it is so noisy when it runs that it's difficult for people in the neighborhood to sleep. I mean, it's loud. And so my concern about the generators was I thought we ought to have some noise standard for them or require them to soundproof them because we do now require commercial developments for people to soundproof their generators. And it seems like in a residential neighborhood there ought to be some consideration about noise and soundproofing. It's not, I'm not real concerned about where the generators go. I'm concerned about the noise that they make. And so again, let me just pull a thread on this testing thing. So testing is an extra noisy thing? It's a maintenance requirement. Testing is a maintenance requirement that happens. I'm just wondering why would you flag this as anything special? The point is that in an emergency use of the generator you don't have any choice about when you do it. But testing you can do at a time that doesn't annoy people. You can choose when to test. I see, okay, that makes sense. But I mean, I think it's nice that we're starting to address this issue, but I don't think this is really a very good solution to the generator noise disturbing the neighbor issue. Just like Commissioner Westman says, I mean. So we can put levels, acceptable levels requirements on there, so within our general plan in the residential district for an occasional disturbance that may happen in a residential district, the allowance is between 60 and 70 DBLs. So we were thinking that if you would like to put a limit on this, suggesting 65, and then it'll come at a greater cost when somebody goes to the store to buy their generator. And we tell them it has to be a 65 DBL. I think I found one online today that was about $1,400, but you can get a much cheaper generator that's probably very loud. And you can get generators that are very quiet. I mean, my neighbor on one side of me has a generator and you hardly hear it when it's running. So I do think it would be nice to have some sort of noise standard in there. Could you limit it to say when there's power outages? I would think a lot of people are doing it just because they're worried about when they lose PG&E or whatever they want the generator to kick in. It's when the generator runs for three or four days straight and no one can sleep and it typically happens in the summertime when it's hot and people have windows open. So those people aren't just responding to a power outage. They're just using it instead of. No, it would be typically its power outages. And it runs for days. We've had one. I don't think it was last summer, the summer before in our neighborhood that went for four days. Oh, I guess I've been forging it. I think given the nature of Capitola and the density of Capitola, we should have a noise maximum for sure. Could we incentivize soundproofing? Like providing some type of bunker or putting it within some, you know. Right, if they buy a noisier one, they can soundproof, though. People, I've known people to bury them in kind of an underground bunker and it provides a lot of soundproofing on their own purposes. I have a question on that. Just the language of the rear setback. So if it's a non-conforming house that has a 10 foot setback, are you allowed to put the generator within that area? It says five feet into the rear setback. So if the lot is 100 feet deep and there's a 20 foot setback requirement, it could only go five feet into it. So there'd still need to be 15 feet between the property line and the. So it's the legal required setback, not a non-conforming setback. Correct, yeah. I could clarify that on there. Yes, yeah. So I would be happy with it if we put in the 65 and said if they can't meet that standard, then they need to put in some soundproofing. I agree. Yeah, okay. Ben, did you hear that? Another suggestion that I think I heard was to add language that limits the use of the generator to power outages, excluding the testing, the mandatory maintenance, to prohibit somebody from using the generator for an extended period of time during periods when there is not a power outage with the planning commission. I got to add language along those lines. I think that would be a nice addition. I agree. Can we think of anything else that somebody would need the generator for I just would hate to limit somebody that needs. I think it would be wise to add language about an emergency or a power outage, you know. Yeah, you could add some language that in an emergency or a power outage because something could happen at their particular home that required all the electricity to be turned off and they wanna run a generator to keep their refrigerators. Yeah, I think a couple of the applications that we've seen for generators that come in through building were for medical reasons too, that if the power were to go out, the people who have medical needs so we wanna make sure they're protected. Yeah, absolutely. Do people who just wanna add a home generator for emergency need to come and get a permit? They do. They come in and get a building permit. So that's when we would. Not quite. You really need it if you're putting in a system where the generator kicks on automatically if the power goes off. A lot of people in my neighborhood have generators that if the power is out for a while you just run the generator and plug your refrigerator or whatever you wanna keep running into it and those don't need no big permits. But those aren't applicable to this. No. Those are portable generators. So for portable generators, we don't have a permit requirement but we could still have a sound requirement. Sure. They can't put them in their front yard. All right, is that enough? If we were to do that, we would want, we would need to make that clear in the year that it's, I think the way it's written right now is really for home generators that provide backup electricity in case of a power outage. So if we want it to apply to these portable generators that could be used for other purposes, we'll need. Well, portable generators are used in construction and all kinds of things. So are we gonna control that too? I mean, I think we should just limit it to built-in generators permanently installed. Well, why don't we start with the built-in generators permanently installed? I think this will work in progress. That's a good place to start and if we find the others a real problem, we'll add those in too. Okay. Sounds good. Okay. Do you, would you like me to review the direction on this or would it be good to move on to the next topic? That would be helpful to hear it back. Okay. So the direction is to add a noise standard. So 65 decibels at the property line and if the generator exceeds that, it needs to be soundproof to meet the standard. We will limit the use of the generator to power outages or emergencies and we will clarify that the rear setback is five feet into the minimum legal setback, not the existing building wall. That's all right. That sounds right to me. Okay. Okay, great. So we'll move on to minor modifications, which is timely since you had that on your agenda previously. So the existing code allows with a minor modification, deviation to a physical dimensional standard such as setbacks of up to 10%, but there are other types of standards which are not eligible for minor modifications. So it's a limited use and availability and it requires planning commission review and approval. The proposed amendment is to allow for community development director action on a minor modification if the project does not otherwise require planning commission review. The idea behind this being if the project involves this minor adjustment to setback or other similar dimensional standards and it would not otherwise need to go before the planning commission that this is something that could be acted upon at this time. Could you give us an example? Yeah, sure, because this is why we are proposing this. We had an applicant actually in the upper river view, terrorist neighborhood come in, wanted to do an addition that would not require planning commission review, small addition off the back of the home. Their garage interior space is substandard. So I wanna say it was at like 19 feet two inches in order for them to move forward with the project, I could not allow a minor modification so therefore it would have to go to the planning commission. So minor modifications are allowed for up to 10% of a measured, it can be a setback, a driveway dimension, it does not include height limit so I can never do a minor modification for a height limit. It also does not include like density limitations. It's really about measurements within a site plan. And if you wanted to even just make it really specific to just parking space dimensions that I could sign off on, that's another way to approach this. If you always wanted to see if there was, if someone could come in for a 10% minor modification to the front yard setback, and if you wouldn't want me to be able to make a decision on that, then you could specify exactly what that permission could be. But it can only go up to 10% so. Is there ever a circumstance where you would determine that that wasn't an appropriate use of 10% at a stack level? Yeah, I think so. If there's a streetscape in which all the houses are setback at the 15 feet, I feel like that's really asking for a variant. You know, it's almost in that variance area. And I also, the way it's drafted, I could bring it to Planning Commission. So if there were one that I didn't feel comfortable with that I didn't really think it qualified as minor, I could bring it to the Planning Commission. If someone wanted on a 40 by 80 lot instead of a 16 foot rear setback, a 14 foot setback would be a minor modification. They, it's only up to 10% so it would be, like they could get a one foot variation a little over a foot. It would be a foot and a half. A 10% of 20 feet would be two feet. Yeah. So instead of a 20 foot setback, it would be an 18. 18. So they could ask for that, Bob. But they can come, I mean, like the one that was on Riverview, it just came on the consent calendar to the Planning Commission. Yeah, so. It doesn't seem like. My concern about this is, especially with setbacks, is occasionally these are issues to neighbors. And it may just be that they're using the setback because there's something about the change that they're not too happy about and they wanna, so if it's just an administrative decision, a staff decision, the neighbors really don't get any input in it or opportunity to be heard. So I'm kind of would prefer just to limit it to the parking issue. I think that's wise. Yeah. I could go along with just limiting it to the parking issue. My concern is we keep embedding in our zoning ordinance all these avenues and runs around our requirements. The best one was Dennis Norton's building down there at the corner of Stockton where it was taller than there was no variance, but it was something to do with the mechanical equipment or something. Yes. Deviation. It was something. The lighthouse. Okay, so driveways. So just the dimensions of a parking space is what I'm saying. The dimensions of parking space is limited to that. Otherwise it stays the same. That was the planning commission. Sounds good. But to make sure I have this right, so this list here which you may hopefully you can see okay, this is when a minor modification is allowed. And what we're saying is that if it's for number one here and there's no other need for planning commission review, the director could act on this. But all others would need to continue to go to the planning commission. Correct? So when you add community benefits and minor modifications, the project just keeps growing and growing. All right, so are we good on minor modifications we can move on? Yes. Okay, so second story decks and balconies. Currently, second story deck and balcony requires a design permit. And the existing code prohibits upper story, multi-family decks and balconies when a budding R1. And this is part of the newly adopted objective standards for multi-family and mixed use residential development. And also the existing code excludes second story decks and balconies from the floor area ratio calculate. And the amendments that are in the packet tonight include new standards for second story decks and balconies in R1 and RM parcels of budding R1. The standards address orientation, minimum property line setbacks, maximum projections from the building wall. And there's also language with some changes to the FAR rule and the packet amendments would include in the FAR calculation a second story deck or balcony that is covered or enclosed on two or more sides, but would continue to exclude the second story deck or balcony from the FAR calculation if it's uncovered and open on three sides. So for example, this balcony deck in this photograph would be excluded under the FAR calculation. And so following the proposed language being shared in the packet, staff has thought about this a little bit more, received some feedback, and we would like to present to you a slightly revised recommendation on this issue. One of the revisions is probably the biggest change to what is in the packet is, hopefully you can see this okay, A on the screen, which will revert back to the rule in the old code prior to the adoption of the updated code. And what the old code required was that if an uncovered upper floor deck and a covered exterior open space, if it's more than 150 square feet, it would be included in the FAR calculation. But if the deck or balcony is less than 150 square feet and it's uncovered, then it would not be included in the FAR calculation. So that's part of our revised recommendation tonight. And why did you revise it? And then the other. Let me just. Excuse me? I can answer that. I don't think we had as many issues with upper story decks under the old code. And I think that's because they counted towards your floor area ratio. The new code, the upper story decks don't currently count towards your floor area ratio. So I think bringing back the old standard of just capping the allowance at 150 square feet. Otherwise it counts towards your. What was a rationale for removing it, decks from the floor area ratio to begin with? The original was to allow more articulation in the buildings and more variation in the form and design. But what we're finding is the impacts are on the neighbors are large and they tend to be doing larger decks in the rear yard. So that was why I suggested that maybe we just go back to the way we used to do it because we didn't seem to have as many proposals for really large decks. So the problem really is this, this is one of the most conflict-ridden issues we see as planning commissioners because one neighbor wants a deck and the other neighbor wants privacy, right? So this doesn't really address the head-on that you're saying that the former ordinance seemed to work better. Having a limitation related to FAR helped. So we're not only recommending A, we're recommending A with B and C. So also, Ben, if you, and it will have been, walk through B and C. But so it's a new package of, let's put a new FAR limit on it that allowing up to 150 square feet, but then also a rear yard setback of 25% of the lot, a front setback of 20 feet, and then on the interior and exterior, a 10-foot setback. So it actually has to step in further away from the neighbor's properties. Are there any illustrations of what's allowed that we can look at? There we go. So. So the applicant comes in and meets all these standards and the neighbor comes in and says, this is an invasion of my privacy. So are we, under this new proposal, if the applicant meets the dimensional requirements, does the applicant have the right then to have that second-story deck? It still requires a design permit in which there are privacy standards in the review of a design permit. So it gets us right back in the same problem. But it does, I like the idea. I mean, the thing that bothers me about the whole deck issue is it's so subjective. And it's like, well, I think it really is gonna bother that neighbor. It's not gonna bother this neighbor. We approved one up on Depot Hill because on the Fonsa's house remodel, because it was sort of there. So I would like to see a, I like the idea of coming up with some standards which says, you know, if you meet these standards, then you're entitled to have your deck. If you don't meet these standards, then. And we have to take the design aspect out then? For the design permit or? Well, I mean, I sort of agree with what Commissioner Westman's saying is that if you meet the requirements that we're gonna enact here, you'd have a right to your deck. Yeah, but you were saying, well, there's still design permit and the design permit gives the Planning Commission discretion to deny it if they feel like it because the neighbor complains. Oh, just wouldn't it be just like anything else? Like a 25-foot hut requirement? Well, you meet that, it's good, but we still go review it and say, oh, I don't like that, look at the house. It's contextual. Yeah, design review still looks at the overall design of the house. But I don't think it's, I think they would have a pretty good argument. Like I get to be 25 feet tall because that's what I'm allowed in the zoning district. I get to have my deck because this is what I'm allowed in the zoning district. I think it would make it clearer for us. It helped me a lot, you know, in terms of reviewing these. Is there specific criteria for the privacy? There is criteria for privacy in our design permit, but it's not like objective standards of you can't have a deck within 10 feet of a window or any, you know, it's not that, it's very, it's just to protect privacy. I just, so it seems with the increased setbacks, it seems it's trying to limit the line of sight to, you know, curtail neighbor conflicts, but it just seems kind of unfortunate if you have two houses that are backing up to each other and nobody cares if they have the second story deck and then they're limited by that. But I think it's, we have to look at the longterm. It doesn't matter who lives there right now. What matters is, you know, longterm because houses change hands all the time. It's, you know, what kind of standards are we gonna have in our community as far as privacy and decks go? Not, I mean, you shouldn't get what, if your neighbor objects, you shouldn't, you should be able to have your deck. If you meet the standards, your neighbor doesn't object, doesn't mean you get a much bigger deck. Solution is to ban second-story decks. Oh my gosh, yeah. So, I'm gonna ask you more. I've got a question on this slide. Yeah, for this slide, the top of the slide is the street, the main street, this is the corner lot and then there's the side street. The box that you're seeing is what would be allowed for this, like the allowed setbacks for a second story on a building. So what you're seeing is what the footprint of the second story of the building could be. In the hatched area, that's where the deck could be. So the deck on the second story can go as far as the structure on the second story for the front yard facing the street and then also the side street yard. But then there's an increased setback between homes of 10 feet, so the deck couldn't be right out where the, at the wall where the second story has allowed to extend to. And then in the rear yard, your rear yard requirement is 20% for a setback and the deck would be at 25%. So there'd be more inset under this ordinance if we were to modify it this way, so. I'm confused here. Are we allowing then, if they meet the requirements, second-story decks on the interior side of a lot that faces the neighbor? But they would have to be inset 10 feet. So they couldn't be within 10 feet of the property line. But you could still have a deck on the side of your house on the second story. That applies to roof decks. I'm sorry, Ben, could you, is the first, do we have language in there also that it can't be faced towards the interior lot line? It can't face the interior lot line? I thought we had that in there. That was in there. Yeah, that was a, that is in the packet language. I think what we're coming to tonight with is an alternative recommendation to eliminate that statement, which we're concerned is problematic. So that probably should remain in our recommendation that first item. I'm sorry, that I didn't clarify that earlier. So I think the idea was not to allow decks on interior sides. So in that diagram, the only place that a deck would be allowed is either on the front or the rear, correct? Or the exterior side along the street. Or the exterior if they were on a corner lot. On a corner lot. Oh, no, wait a minute. So then that, that diagram is wrong. So you can't have a deck on, that's a lot line, right? The dashed line on the left. Right, you can't, we're saying you can't have a deck on that side. Well, it says you can. Oh, I see, because it's a dashed line. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, that makes sense. If we bring back that A, which says you can't face the interior side, you couldn't have a deck along that between two homes, but you could have it off the back of the home. Right. Or any face looking towards the street. And was that requirement still into the, requires like a rear yard deck, second story deck to be set back within that, second story, to have walls on the side of it to protect the view. This would essentially get you there. It would be more inset, because it has greater setbacks and it has a greater rear yard setback so it would have to be inset. It doesn't say specifically that. So they're not required, but the potential is there. The potential is there, yeah. So wait a minute. So let me pull the string on that. So you have a second story balcony in the rear and let's see, we're limited with a square footage, I guess. So it can only go six feet out, is that it? Yeah. So in other words, so you couldn't inadvertently have one facing the neighbor because you'd only have six feet on the side that would potentially face it. Yes, off the back. Off the back. Okay. I get it. When you think about requiring on that interior side of a rear yard deck, a six foot wall, protect that privacy looking towards the other property. If you're requiring walls, doesn't that count against you towards FAR requirements? Right? It would just be on the one side. Well, I guess it would be on both sides because if it was a house in the middle of the lot, middle of the block, you'd have to do it on both sides. And so then would that count against your FAR because you got walls on both sides? It won't make a difference with the new 150 square foot exception. Yeah. To me, I'm not the one who complains about second story decks. So you guys need to decide whether you need walls. I agree with you to encourage visual obstacles so you can't see your neighbors. This is a good idea. I just really disagree with the whole FAR counting it into the massing of the home just because if you provide all these limitations for increased setbacks and obstacles, visual obstacles, I feel like that's a lot of requirements and then actually trying to pull square footage out of the home to compensate for outdoor space. It just seems, I don't know, you're losing a lot of what the home could be. So you're gonna reduce the size of your bedrooms or the bathrooms to then allow yourself a little bit outdoor space that you're already providing so many obstacles and provisions for your neighbors. But if you were designing a house for yourself, that would be a decision you'd have to make. Where do you want to utilize the space? I totally agree with you. My only prerogative is that when you have 2,500 square feet to work with, say, and you get a 150 square foot credit to put on a second story deck. And I think that was actually not just 100 square, 150 square feet, but that counted any outdoor space like an enclosed porch or anything in the previous code. And so you had to distribute that 150 square feet in all these different places and it really ran out quickly. So now you don't have a lot of area to work with for the second story deck or any outdoor space in general. So I just kind of felt that trying to pull it out of the house is really taking away from the charm of each design. I think for me, I'm comfortable with the 150, you get 150 square feet. If you go beyond that, it counts in your FAR. So the 150 square feet. On the second story or all. Is free, right? Yes. The way you're proposing it. The second story or does that include patios? So Ben, can you pull up the 100? Okay, so uncovered upper floor decks and covered exterior open space in excess of 150 square feet is included. Like upper floor decks. Yeah. I mean, we could add something about front porches not being included in the. If the 150 square feet could only be used for the upstairs of the second story decks. I still don't like it, but I think it's still, I mean, that'd be better than trying to split it with your front porch and your upstairs deck. That's not really what it says the way, is it? Yes, but they're referring to a previous code and the previous code specified that you had to, you had all these different places to put it. I mean, for me, you know, I'm, I'm somebody who could go along with commissioner Ruth and just ban second story decks because I think there, I think they're a problem. I mean, you know, I'm particularly in Capitola with the size of lots that, that we have. I really could go that way. So I'm trying to step back from that a little bit and come up with a scenario that for me will provide some assurances of privacy and setback for the neighbors. We'll sort of put the planning commission in a place where we won't be deciding, you know, individually whether they should or shouldn't or do we like this house or not like that house. It takes all of that out of it. We're gonna have, you know, a set of rules. This is how it works. So I, for me to go along with it, I think we would need to keep A in there because we don't want people building enormous decks which, you know, someone might decide that that's what they wanna do. And I don't think there should be decks on the interior between houses. I don't think 10 feet is quite enough. And, you know, the other standards work for me and I'm not in all honesty so concerned about having a wall put up because I think that Katie's right. It will evolve that way because it's gotta be setback in the building itself. We've required that in the past. Up on, was it McCormick? Oh, about one of those houses up there. It was recently on Monterey. Monterey, yep. We've required that. I just think that should be a provision in there. If you're going to have a rear deck it needs to have privacy walls. Hey, I can go, I mean, I can go along with that. Okay, I can look at that. I wouldn't go along with that but I think I'm a minority about the decks in general. What? Well, I tend to agree with Courtney in terms of the second story deck is a great feature, not only architecturally but living space and, you know, the notion of you having to limit that and take that out of your floor, your ratio, that kind of limits your design. And, you know, people don't like decks because you can see in somewhere in their backyard I don't grow a tree or something, you know? I just don't, you know, you gotta live with people. We're split all over the place here because this is a irreconcilable conflict between. It's okay, there's a compromise. There's a compromise. I think that if I would be okay with the way that it's written if we can just make sure that the 150 square feet is dedicated to upstairs to our level. Second story? Thank you. Just because, just to make sure that. Upper floor decks, yeah. Yes, just so it doesn't get. To be clear, in the past, the covered exterior open space we would utilize this towards first story, covered porches. So to Courtney's point, a lot of times when you're doing, when you're trying to utilize this exception and max out your FAR, it's hard to, you know. Right, so it's very limited. So what she's asking for, the way I understand it, is that the 150 square feet can be for an upper second story deck and we would have an additional 100 and square feet for features like front porches, so. That's, in my interpretation, I'm sorry to beat a bit, of course. In my interpretation, I just feel that it's important for the charm of Capitola and that's where, in designing houses in this town, it's, you want to have that, the porch. You wanna have the rear yard, you know, overhangs. All those things and you don't wanna be limited on that by taking space away from the actual living usable space inside the house. Right, so if you added, so really what you're doing is we're adding an additional 150 square feet that's not going to be counted. So you could do the front porch or on that and you still have 150 square feet for your second floor deck. I don't know if there's, limitations on the first story just doesn't seem to make sense, but the second story, if what we're talking about, if we can allow 150 square feet, that's what I'm saying. Ben, are you suggest, did you just make a revision too? I did just make a revision and I think there may be, let's see, I wanted to see if this is what majority is leaning towards. Uncovered upper floor decks in excess of 150 square feet is included in the FAR calculation. Right, so we're not dealing with front porches, they're no whole, we're just dealing with balconies and decks right now. Why would we allow a deck of more than 150 square feet since there's such a problem? What if you had two upper floor decks on two different sides of the home? You can't have them on the sides of the home. And not sides, I'm sorry, but like different, maybe a little bit in the front, a little bit in the back, if that's where they're allowed, epithetically. You can do that, it's just that if they exceed 150 square feet, then it gets count in the floor area ratio. Well, do we have to worry about massing at this point? I mean, 150 square feet, is that a lot, a lot? Is it six feet, the max the deck can measure? Yeah, it's six feet, so, so like, 25. 25. Is that right? So that's 120. You know, you could get like a, like a, so the back area of the second store is four feet. Yeah, it's 25, it could be 25 feet wide. So it's 25 foot wide deck by, but if you think about, if you have a front deck, also on the front of the home, but yeah, it's, it could be a six by 25. So a backyard deck. If you want to put it all in the backyard. If you want to put it all in the backyard. It could be 25 by six feet, or it could be 12 by 12. But it can't be. But it has to be set back, so. And then. It could be halfway into your house. It's going to take up your whole house. It has a larger setback than the rear wall, so. So it can't extend beyond that hatched area, then is that correct? That's correct. Okay. Correct. Okay, and we need to change on B number three, because they're not going to be allowed at all on the interior side yard between houses. I would say leave it just so that we make sure on the backyard, there's that inset of 10 feet. So if they're extending, but we'll add a point about that they can't be facing the interior side yard. I like the 10 foot setback in the rear yard. That's a very good point, but we need to say that we don't allow them between houses. Correct. I added the language that's in the packet. I think what I'm hearing is to make sure that this stays in the amendment. Let's see. The second story, Decker balcony may not face an interior side, parcel line abutting a lot. I would still like to include language about privacy walls, but I think that might be in the minority. No, that's it. We could go with privacy walls. I think you got three people who go with privacy walls. Could we go so far as to say it removed the word uncovered? Could it be covered? Because it could be argued if you have privacy walls, maybe you would want to incorporate it into the massing of the house. If it's setback so far into the setback. You mean if you cover it? Yeah, like if it's setback into the setback or increased into the massing of the house. So you just extend the roof line over it? Just a little bit so you have a nice sheltered area that's partially shaded or if you put a trellis that's connected to the house that could be considered covered. If we remove the uncovered word, and it just says upper floor decks in excess of 150 square feet, that would make it so it would be more incorporated into the massing of the house. And we could incorporate privacy panels. Okay. Is that okay? Ben, did you hear that so for point A to remove the word uncovered? So let's say we have the upper floor decks in excess of 150 square feet is included in the FAR. The following setbacks are required, 25% on the rear, 20 on the front, interior and street side, 10 feet. Second-story deck or balcony may not project further than six feet from the exterior building wall to which it is attached. Can you blow that up so we can read it? Do you wanna add something about privacy? No, I just, yeah, I wanted to see if there was anything in there on privacy. A second-story deck or balcony may not face an interior side parcel line abutting a lot with a single-family home. And then privacy screening shall be required along the interior side. Screening? That could be somebody putting up a couple of plants, no. Okay, so a privacy wall. Privacy wall. Yeah, is required. So frosted glass wouldn't count, that's not a wall? That's a wall. Yeah, okay. So privacy wall required in which circumstances? Required on the side of the deck along the parallel to the interior side parcel line. I would think privacy screening would be okay because what about a trellis if you had a, you know, and I'm one of those cross-hatch trellises on each side. I could put up a couple potted plants and say that's a screen. Well, so the screen would be something you'd debate and the staff would say that doesn't count because it's not part of the structure. But a wall is not debatable. I'm not in support of that, but I may be a minority here. Oh, not in support of a wall? How about a privacy screen? I could, privacy screen would work because then we would have to, they would have a permanent privacy screen. A plant's not a permanent privacy screen. There you go, permanent privacy screen. That way it gives them a little leeway rather than- Just tell me what that would look like. What's a permanent privacy screen? It's similar to the application on Monterey that we were, they were proposing privacy screens, right? They had one, they had several examples. One was a trellis. One was a glass, but you couldn't- Oh, they opaque glass. It was a paint glass. But I do think it needs the word permanent because I hear your point with plants. Like, Luverd Wood or something is usually a popular, and it would be installed, so. Okay. Okay. We go on second story decks? No, we're not. So, in what need- It's for- Open the public hearing on this. So, this is, right now we're just talking about R1 and multi-residential, right? We- Is this- We haven't gotten to talking about decks and roof decks for commercial projects. Correct, correct. Okay. And when you say the interior side, when we have a lot that's in the center of the block, don't you need a different terminology than the interior side? Well, there's street side and interior side. So, in the middle of the block, you're gonna have two interior sides. Okay, they're both called interior. Yeah, so they would both have the screening. I think it's important for the screening requirement to tie that to a rear deck only, because on a front deck, we're not saying. Yeah. Oh, good point. So, for a rear deck, I'm afraid to do this in the PDF, but so for a rear deck that is facing a rear parcel line abutting a single family dwelling, is that when a privacy screen is required? Yes. A permanent privacy screen, example of a paid class, is required for a rear deck facing a parcel line abutting a lot with a single family dwelling. I don't think that quite captures it, because I think it's, the screening is supposed to be between the neighbors, so it's for that adjacent property line, not like on the back of the deck, right? It's not to face, so it's on the side of the deck so that you can't look into your neighbor to the side. Do you guys wanna wordsmith this later? Yeah, we can. Okay. I've got it. Wait, okay, do you've got it? Yes, but it has to be on the side of the deck. It's not on the rear portion of the deck, so I'll send it to you. If you can send me this, I'll send you an edit. Okay, so I guess we, does that look reasonable? Yes. Okay. Yeah, I think we're real close on that. All right, are we ready to move on to roof decks? How are we doing? Are we okay? Can we keep going? Is everybody okay with that? I'm fine with that. All right, let's keep going. Okay. All right, so roof decks currently require a design permit. Can you blow it up a little bit? In the newly adopted objective standards, roof decks are prohibited on multi-family development, buts are one. And so the proposed amendments add a new roof deck definition and would also prohibit roof decks in R1 and any parcel budding R1 would require five foot setbacks from the building wall closest to them. It would allow for railings to project above at the maximum building height and limit structures within a roof deck only to structures that are needed to access. So that's the proposed amendments and I can pull them up on the screen as well if we want to look at them. And one question we had here is in the village this comes up. There's a few roof decks and I've heard concerns over the years about the roof decks, safety. We've had code enforcement calls and also from the planning commission of whether or not to be able to design with a roof deck. And right now it's not protected in terms of if there are areas of town that you would like to prohibit roof decks, it would be appropriate to know that now. One item that I do want to raise is that in the hotel design that we did see for the hotel in the village there was a second story roof deck that would be, in my opinion, very appropriate. So I think if there is a desire to prohibit roof decks, it might be good to tie it to residential uses or make an exception for hotels because that, I don't know, that was a tiered deck that came down that was a nice element that I'd hate to prohibit that in a future design. That was what they claimed is a community benefit that was built over public property. Right, yeah. So I have a couple of things. First of all, we are prohibiting these next to an R1 district and we just approved a hotel up by the post office that's next to an R1 district with a roof deck. So, you know, and if you look at our zoning ordinance for the commercial areas, an amazing amount about R1 districts. I mean, you look at Capitola Avenue, Capitola Road, everything about an R1 district. So we're really saying that... So you might as well approve them for R1s as well? You can't. No, I don't want to go there. Okay. And, you know, we talk about the hotel and the village and the second floor deck that they were proposing to me was not a roof deck because it was not a deck up on the roof and the last thing we want to do is have a deck on the roof of that hotel because then it will really impact the people who live on Depot Hill above it who are very concerned about the height of the hotel to begin with. So I'm sort of talking in circles, but I don't think there should be roof decks in the village. I don't think they work in that area. Which is an R1, so we're not really dealing with that. Has it written? But she asked if there are other areas. We're saying that you can't have any roof decks that are next to an R1 district. So, yeah, I guess that's fine with me, though. We did just a proof one. And she asked about the village area. I have a hard time with them in the village area because it's so congested. I'll stop. Well, I'm trying to think of it. So I kind of overlooked the village. I'm trying to think. I can't imagine any roof decks. I don't see any. I think the remodel down at the end of Terrace Way just had one. Yeah, there are roof decks down there. But that's Terrace Way. Is that R1 or is that the CV zone? I'm not sure. Terrace Way was the central village, but residential overlay district. So how about Riverview as you get closer to Stockton? Isn't that CV? It's CV until you get to the trestle. Yeah, so there's a lot. I mean, do we want... So they're okay there? The way this would read, that decks would be okay. And there are several. Yeah, I'm not in favor of roof decks. Like what is the... I mean, not that I actually don't know. I think that roof decks have a potential to carry noise a long distance because they're up high and we all know noise goes like that. I don't see a reason to have them on very small parcels that are so close together. I think they have the potential of being a real noise issue. And it is our nightly rental zone. So that factors in with noise. And it's basically a hotel use down in the village for all the residential. So to allow rooftop decks. Vacation rental. Yeah, I mean, I think we're addressing it in the air and not the most important area actually of the city. I don't know if I'm former against them, but if we're going to prohibit them, it seems like the area we would prohibit them in would be in the vacation rental areas. What I was kind of deluding to is just... If they were prohibited in the CV zone, allowed in the other multifamily residential zones but not those parcels that are but R1 zones. Is that a problem? I'm not sure. The other suggestion for the abutting R1 zones is that you could say that they need to be oriented towards the street, kind of similar to what we just did, so that the rooftop deck and in the example of the hotel also, it wasn't oriented towards the R1. It has to be... I mean, personally, I think the rooftop deck that we approved on the hotel is going to ultimately be a problem. It's going to be, you know, coming back. Because you can't have it there and not have noise for the residential neighborhood. I'll bet it's never utilized. So let's take Cliffwood Heights. I mean, that's what we're addressing in terms of you can't have a rooftop deck in Cliffwood Heights, but that's the one place where nobody has a rooftop deck. I mean, it's not an issue. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So no one objects to this. Yeah. We don't even need it. So this is fine with me, except I don't think it deals with the village and I think we need to deal with the village. Just add a prohibition in the CV zone. I mean, that works for me. How about everywhere? That's fine with me. I'm with me. I don't think we need rooftop decks. And I think, yeah, I just... That's fine. We just should address it in some form. Well, we really want to just... I think we're being a little hasty here. We're talking about our residential. I think we can all kind of agree that in residential zones, it's, yeah, you don't want a rooftop deck. I can't agree with that. Cliffwood Heights is my example. And you think rooftop decks are okay there? What's wrong with it? Yeah. 6,000 square foot lot. A rooftop... Okay. Nobody does it because they don't, you know, they have backyards. So, I mean, my point is that we're discussing R1 zone. And now you're saying, well, should we be concerned about all these other zones? Well, I haven't really thought about all those other zones. Well, the roof decks, we're not talking about R1 zones, are we? No, they're not allowed. They're not allowed in the R1 zone. It's more for your multifamily. We're talking about the multifamily and commercial zones. You know, I kind of like the idea of looking at it case by case. You know, like you pointed out, we approved the hotel. Well, why did we? I mean, we looked at it and said, well, that's reasonable to have a rooftop deck there. And it, but it abuts a residential zone. And it's... So, to have just a blanket statement that says they're prohibited, just inconsistent with how we've ruled in the past. I think if you take my suggestion, just to add a prohibition in the CV zone, that probably accomplishes what we need to accomplish. I agree with that. I could live with that. So just prohibit in the CV zone. And leave this in place here the way this is written. So it's not next to an R1 zone. It's not next to... It's not in a R1 zone as well. Not in an R1 zone or next to an R1 zone. Or the CV. Okay. So Ben, is that consensus from everyone? To remove it from the central village? Or not? It's a big change, but I'm in favor of it. I won't object. Or mixed-use village. It sounds like the direction is the amendment as proposed with the addition to prohibit roof decks in the mixed-use village zone. Yes. So that concludes the items that we highlighted. I think we also wanted to provide an opportunity for there to be any additional discussion or comments about any other proposed amendments that we did not highlight. I only had one. And that was that... Now I've lost it. I had it out here. The map that shows the Riverview Terrace neighborhood. I just had it right here. What did I do with it? I think Katie can find it for me. We talked about this earlier. Just a few seconds ago. It doesn't match the... Oh, here it is. Page number. Page five of 143. Or page 203. I don't know which one. It's figure 17.16-1, Riverview Terrace. I just think this map should conform to the single-family zoning. You'll notice there's a lot on oak where it comes in. And I walked up and looked at that property. I don't particularly know why that jog goes in there. So I would just like you to look at this map and see if it can be cleaned up so it's more consistent to the boundary lines. The little jogs didn't make any sense to me. There's quite a few of them. Yeah, some of them. There's a couple parcels on Capitol Avenue. I know that one, that little indentation. That's all one parcel from Capitol Avenue. It's not. It's not anymore? It's not anymore. And there's a little apartment complex here, but it accesses off of oak. You know, I think there's three sort of little units right there. Yeah, it's not anymore. And I think the same thing is true with this sort of jog down here. You know, this is off the river. Why does that jog in there? Down here? Where does blue go? So we can just give, can we give staff an action just to review that? Yeah, just to review the map and make certain it's accurate. Okay, figure 17.16-1. Our map specialist has taken notes. Okay. I'll be taking a look at that. Okay. Any other items? Other zoning comments. That's a broad question. I'll ask for now. Okay, let's move on then. Let's call that a wrap then. Wait, wait, wait, I got one. Page 53. There's a comment about planting of invasive species is prohibited. It's talking about, you know, landscape planting. And my question was, who's going to determine what is an invasive species and how's that going to be monitored? So I think we should either take that out. You know, we talked about another places we suggest native landscaping and that, but since there's no official list of what is an invasive species, I think a lot of people consider Ivy an invasive species and it's planted all around town and others. So that was on page 53. I think that should come out. I agree with Susan very much. And I actually had a couple more, but... In Carmel, they won't let you plant agave cactus. And I thought that was interesting. Agave cactus? Yeah, they said it was an invasive species. Yeah. Everywhere. Yeah. You know, I think if you don't have a list and official list, then it gets a little vague. Get the higher biotical. Sorry about that. I'll shut up. Thank you. Well, I do have a particular grudge against English green Ivy, but... We all have our plants we don't like. All right. Let's move on then to the director's report, item six. Okay. I want to make sure I have the invasive species. What page and section is that? Okay. Well, I... 53. 53, but that was on the original packet we got. It's in the landscape section because we moved all the information on landscaping to the one section. I think it came out of our coastal overlay zone. So it's a red line in the landscaping. And it's page 53. Is it specific for the visitor serving property? It was, but we put it in our new... When we consolidated everything into the landscape chapter, it shows up there. Okay. So there's a statement that the planting of the invasive plant species is prohibited. So the direction is to remove that sentence? Correct. So I don't have page 53 here. Could you just... So the idea here is... No one can... The idea before was that anywhere in the city of Capitola you're not allowed to plant an invasive species. No. And now we're removing that. No. What it was was that the Coastal Commission had required in the Coastal Visitor Serving District there be this statement that no invasive species are allowed. And when they consolidated the landscaping, they took that from the Coastal Commission's requirement and now made it a city requirement. And I'm saying I don't think we want to have that requirement. Okay. I understand now and I agree. Thank you. Okay. Yep. The sentence is, the planting of invasive plant species is prohibited. And we're going to strike that. Any other points of clarification that you need, Ben? No, but do we need the Planning Commission to take action and make a formal recommendation? We do. We need a formal recommendation to take your recommended changes to the City Council for a first reading. So we need a motion to recommend that these comments be forwarded to the City Council? Yes. I'll make that motion. Okay. Okay. We got a motion by Commissioner Westman and a second by Commissioner Ruth to have a roll call vote on the recommendations to move these to the City Council. Commissioner Christensen. Hi. Commissioner Newman. Hi. Commissioner Ruth. Hi. Commissioner Westman. Hi. Chair Wilk. Hi. So now can we move to the Director's Report? Yes, we can. Let's do that. All right. Item six. I'm a little bit out of order, but I did want to introduce Lilliana to you. Lilliana is our new office coordinator at the front desk and just a great asset to our team. Our previous Deputy City Clerk decided to move on from the city, so she's helping us out while we're doing a recruitment. And so Lilliana, thank you for being here tonight. And then for my Director's Report, I have quite a few updates for you. So this week we kicked off the housing element and hosted stakeholder meetings. So we had a series of eight meetings over the past two days via Zoom, and we had some really great participation from our business community, real estate community, local housing advocates, a lot of different groups. So got some great feedback on what our biggest issues are regarding housing in Capitola and suggestions of where housing should go. So I will be bringing the housing element like kickoff to the Planning Commission and the City Council come January of next year, so when the new council is seated. So second update is there's a new revenue stream for affordable housing. It's called the PLHA funding. It's the permanent local housing allocation funds through the state. This was part of SB2, which passed, I think I want to say back in 2019, might have been 2018, but there was a $75 real estate transaction fee that is attached to all real estate transactions and the state has been collecting that money and it looks like our first three years of collections have been great and it's almost adds up to a half a million dollars for the city of Capitola. It's for real estate transactions that happen within your city limits. So where you next week at City Council will be moving forward with applying, but that money can be used for ten different types of affordable housing projects. We're suggesting that our City Council put that towards being able to produce more affordable housing and so that with this new funding stream will be actually be able to work with our local nonprofits and developers and provide some funding to help them with affordable housing projects in the future. Third is our pre-approved ADU designs. We now, it went through the building process and it took a while of back and forth going through the building review and getting them all up to code. We now have five approved building approved ADUs. I updated our website yesterday. There's now a new ADU page. So on the left hand side you can click on the ADU and there's the new guide is available as well as the five pre-approved ADU plans. So thank you for all your work on that. Let's see. On our next meeting, December 1st, I'm going to be bringing to you at the director's report. I'll have an arborist report regarding the tree out front of city hall. It's doing quite a bit of damage to the sidewalks and threatening the building. I will say it's one of my favorite trees because it gives me great shade in my office and it will be missed. But that, sadly, we have to bring that forward to you. But I'll be providing an arborist report at the next meeting. And we'll also be looking at the calendar for 2023 at our next meeting at city council. We'll be asking whether or not they would like an earlier start time, earlier than 7. So that's something I'll also be asking the planning commission. So if you just think about that over the next month and I'll be asking if you'd rather meet earlier. And last, at our last meeting we talked about paper and with these really large items wanting paper, I did want to get some feedback on plans. In the past, we used to ask every applicant to bring in seven copies of full sized plans and we would distribute them to your houses with the agendas. Since COVID and going digital, we've only required two sets of plans. So there's not as much paper in our office anymore, but it's really for your benefit. If you'd like to be looking at the large plans, we're happy to make that a requirement again for planning now that we're back in person. I would say the only concern I have on the digital ones, when you go to expand them, at least on my iPad and my iPhone, they won't let you do that. They revert back or they flip over. So you can't expand them to look at detail. Yeah, I have difficulty reading them sometimes because they're so small and I can't, I keep trying to make them bigger and I can't figure out how to make them bigger. Are you both on iPads? Yeah. I use an iPad and a Mac Pro. And neither one of them can I get it to make them bigger. So I don't know if that's just the format they're being sent to us at. If I could blow it up so I could look at some of the details, then I wouldn't need the big paper plans. I don't need all the plans. If I have a problem seeing something, I can come in and look at it. There is, when you're on our website, there's a couple different ways to access the plans. And I can show you really quickly on Zoom. So when you're on our website, if you go down to agendas and minutes and here, I'm going to put planning commission. So there's different packet types. There's the agenda packet, which is, this will be a PDF. If you go to this HTML agenda packet, this is where we all like to go just to get directly to the staff report or the exhibits without having to scroll through the whole packet. So anything in blue you can highlight and then look at. Have you been to this? You've been using this? Yes. So I was hoping that maybe if you go directly to the plans, it would alleviate the issue because it's not tied to the whole agenda packet. So I would suggest trying that, but it sounds like you've already been utilizing HTML. I usually go to the packet through the e-mail that gets sent to me. Okay. So then here on the HTML, you'll have the option to really zoom in or zoom out. Okay. No, that's good to know. That'll help. Okay. Please don't meet. And then we are trying to resolve that if you do a query for the zoning code or the muni code that that would come up more easily. I'm also going to show you this. When you're at the city website, the muni code is here as a button. Right. And I don't know if the phone... The difficulty on my iPad is when it comes up, the buttons are below the screen, the visual. So until Mick pointed it out to me, I know I'm slow. I didn't even know the buttons were there. It used to be at the top too. So we updated our website more recently. So that's something I can bring up to our designer. If the size just went down so the button showed when it comes up like on an iPad, it would be helpful, I think. Thank you. That's it for the director's report. So the answer is we don't need full-size drawings. No. Perfect. Okay. And that's the director's report. Now, last minute, commission communications. No? I think we finally made some headway or roof decks. I really believe this might solve all the controversy. Sure. We'll never have a problem with decks again. And with that, we'll adjourn. Thank you.