Author: <span>Board of Directors</span>

The expectation of eventually building the “Wine Country Hotel at the Bankhead” seems to have come unraveled. The Independent published a story about it, and we investigated. The phone numbers for Presidio are disconnected, no responses to email, behind in their state filings, and the agent for service process resigned (no one to contact for legal matters). Their representative Rikesh Patel, who oversaw the development negotiations and was the face of the project, hasn’t worked there since 2019 and no replacement has been identified. All of this considered, the company does not appear to functionally exist in California anymore.

The unfortunate breakdown was ultimately hard to avoid. We believe the location was the main problem, since it was never going to be able accommodate adequate parking for the guests as well as several other challenges. Ultimately, it was as infeasible as we suspected it would be since it was conceived in 2016.

There is a group of concerned residents that is proposing a new location they believe can allow a downtown hotel to be a success. Their website at livermorecommunitycoalitionspeaks.com explains their example in more detail. You can reach out to Safia Hasan Livermore.community.coalition@gmail.com with questions.

We hope City officials can be inspired to fulfill one of the major priorities expressed by the residents during the original outreach.

History of the Downtown Livermore Hotel Planning

In 2016, Lennar Multifamily Communities (now Quarterra) originally was poised to develop a massive 260 unit apartment complex. The residents pushed back, and elected a new Council that year with candidates who pledged to do something different. The new Council focused on a smaller housing plan and other aspects including the Presidio hotel planning.

The Valley Link Rail commuter train project through Livermore is not making impressive progress, and may never be built.

We periodically check the pulse of the proposed Valley Link commuter train. In short, things are looking dire.

• The JPA committee still meets every couple of months, as they have been doing since 2015.
• The lawsuit is still ongoing, and it could devstate the administration budget.
• They have not made any progress on the substantial funding gap for many years.
• The informational websites are looking abandoned – still claiming that construction could begin in 2025.
• It is now being designed to end at Mountain House. No more Tracy, River Islands, or Stockton plan.

The final dagger may be the absence of federal funding, upon which the feasibility has always relied. California should not confidently expect new federal funds for transit projects until at least 2030. Unfair, but could be expected nonetheless. By the time it might be politically possible to request funds, who can say in what condition the federal debt will be, and the added scrutiny under which it is dispersed? By that time, will it be considered standard operating procedure to withhold California funding?

Isabel Developments

The failure of Valley Link is not the worst part of the problem though. That honor goes to the thousands of new residents that will soon be living in the new developments going in near Costco. The entire justification for the original zoning intent was based on the existence of a real BART station within walking distance. When that didn’t happen in 2015, the “almost BART” Valley Link was proposed. After that was taking too long, the Council made the truly awful decision to rezone the area for building without any requirement for transit.

Today, thousands of homeowners are being courted to buy these homes with the promise of the future Valley Link transit station. Read it for yourself in Harridge Development Group’s information sheet for the Isabel Crossing development. When the traffic problems created by the development become a problem, residents will be angry and the developers will be long gone.

Southfront Station

The trouble isn’t confined to Isabel/580 either. The other concerning area is Southfront road – the other proposed Livermore station, where a general plan update is suggesting future high density development. Here’s a recent reference to the “Midtown Focus Area” (often called “Midtown” even though it’s not near downtown) in the context of the City of Livermore General Plan update:

“The Midtown focus area includes the site for a future Valley Link station, and the vision for this focus area is a transit-oriented, complete neighborhood with a mix of housing, jobs, and services.”

and …

“… the Planning Commission recommends … identifying the Midtown Area designation on the General Plan land use map and preparing a specific plan to address Valley Link access, housing unit targets, and neighborhood circulation and services.”

No clear path forward

Valley Link is dream project in a continuing search of financial viability. Some public works projects, even those planned with the best intentions, just fail. Valley Link may be headed toward collapse if progress on funding continues to stall. We made a similar conclusion about BART to Livermore, years before officials would admit the truth. We are equally as skeptical now, as we were then.

October 9, 2024

Citizens for Balanced Growth has filed a lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court due to improper conduct relating to open space funding. The Dougherty Valley Settlement Agreement fund is administered by Livermore and is supposed to be spent on open space protection in accordance with a set of procedures. These procedures were not followed and money was spent, even after city staff were made aware that they were breaching the terms of the Agreement. Here is a link to the complaint.

This is not the first time City staff have failed to properly manage this money. In 2019, Save the Hill group sued Livermore for a different reason. That time, it was for ignoring the fund when it was readily available for protecting Garaventa Hill from undesirable urbanization. Our current lawsuit may even complicate the City’s ability to comply with the 2023 ruling against them and affect how long it will take them to fully resolve their violation of the California Environmental Quality Act and the court order in that case.

The current lawsuit was filed because City staff recommended to use the DVSA fund to purchase property without a required consultation with CBG. Staff were fully aware that they would be breaching the Agreement, but went ahead and did it anyway, brushing aside our required oversight role.

Essentially, Livermore trapped CBG in a “catch 22” situation, wanting us to support multiple property purchases, but denying us the details we needed in order to analyze the nature of the expenditures and the terms of the sales. The suit seeks to force staff to follow the proper procedures and ensure there is a mechanism in place to keep this problem from happening again. We are confident the Court will judge the facts of the case in our favor.

Once the Fund is again operating normally, it will be able to once again be used for its intended purpose of acquiring open space land that benefits all of us, as well as future generations.

Founded by a group of concerned residents including local legends Don Miller and Margaret Tracy, CBG has achieved many beneficial environmental outcomes along the way since 1982. We continue our vital work in any capacity where we can be helpful, and effective.

Livermore city staff acted unconstitutionally when they refused to process referendum petitions for a vote of the people. This is another major court decision against the City of Livermore. Winning and losing in court is an occasional occurrence for most cities. Comparatively, this may be the most serious illegal activity the City of Livermore has ever accomplished.

We have posted the video of the hearing on our Youtube channel.

This is a developing story which has been reported in The Independent, Livermore Vine, and the SF Chronicle.

The decision states, “Livermore city staff’s Adoption of the challenged resolution was a legislative act subject to the referendum power, because the development agreement at issue approved the construction of and improvements to a new public park. We also conclude that, in approving the development agreement, the City did not act as an administrative agent for the State of California under the statutes dissolving California’s redevelopment agencies, enacted starting in 2011. We direct the superior court to order respondents to process the referendum petition as required by the Elections Code. We also reverse the court’s order requiring plaintiffs to file an undertaking under Code of Civil Procedure section 529.2 as a security for costs and damages due to the action.”.

Here is the full case decision. Published on Findlaw and Justia, and on the Appellate Court page. Notable quote from Judge Chou: “This was a lawsuit that that plaintiffs or petitioners never should have had to file because the city clerk improperly rejected the referendum… this was a lawsuit that frankly, they never should have had to file”

In July of 2022, Livermore residents presented petitions for a referendum to the City Clerk. The goal of the referendum was to allow for a future decision by the Livermore City Council to alter the recently approved plan for a housing project in the downtown. Instead of sending the petitions to the County for a Ballot measure to be created, she held on to them. That was an illegal and unconstitutional action.

(From the Chronicle)
A state appeals court says voters in Livermore can decide the fate of a hotly contested and long-delayed plan to build downtown housing and a public park.

The city designated the land for affordable housing after acquiring it in 2008 and chose Eden Housing as the developer a decade later, with $14.4 million in bond funding from Alameda County and a loan from the state. The planned 130 housing units would be reserved for those earning no more than 60% of the county’s median income. The project also includes retail space and a new park, to be built by the city and named Veterans Park.

Opponents, who then called themselves Save Livermore Downtown, filed suit in 2021, contending the project conflicted with local planning and zoning laws and had failed to conduct a proper environmental review. The courts disagreed, saying the city and the developer had complied with the laws and taken adequate steps to prevent air and water pollution during construction.

Foes of the project then circulated petitions for a referendum to block it, and say they have submitted over 9,700 signatures to the city, 4,000 more than needed to qualify for the ballot. The city refused to process the petitions and said Livermore’s approval had been an administrative action, exempt from referendum, because it had acted as an agent for the state in approving the loan to the developer. 

Superior Court Judge Michael Markman agreed, but he was overruled Wednesday by the 1st District Court of Appeal in San Francisco, which ordered the city to verify the signatures and place the referendum on the ballot if it qualified. The court said Livermore’s approval of a park was not contained in the original plan and was a “legislative action” that allowed opponents to seek a referendum on the project.

The plan initially approved by the city “specifies use of the property as high density housing with an affordable component,” Justice Mark Simons wrote in the 3-0 ruling. He said the plan “says nothing about the construction of a public park, and (Livermore officials) are misplaced in arguing the City merely acted as an administrative agent of the State in making the policy decision to do so.”

“In deciding to construct and improve Veterans Park, the City made discretionary policy determinations that were not dictated” by the initial plan, Simons concluded. 

If the referendum qualifies, it will likely appear on the November ballot in Livermore, which has about 86,000 residents. If voters were to reject the project, the city and the developer could try to come up with a new affordable housing plan for the property.

The ruling was welcomed by Winston Stromberg, a lawyer for the project’s opponents, now called Move Eden Housing. It means “the Livermore City Council will either have to repeal the resolution (of approval) or put it on the ballot for the voters to decide,” he said.

In a statement from Eden Housing, attorney Andrew Sabey said the ruling was “a testament to how difficult it continues to be to build affordable housing — especially in wealthier parts of the state, where well-funded opposition can afford to hire lawyers to bring relentless legal challenges in an attempt to delay the housing projects so long that they simply fail.”

The developer and the city could appeal the ruling to the state Supreme Court.

Reach Bob Egelko: begelko@sfchronicle.com; Twitter: @BobEgelko

Machine generated transcript of the 2023-12-13 Livermore General Plan Advisory Committee (GPAC) meeting  with video timestamps, synchronized with the video posted on our Youtube page.

0:00
so I’m going to get the meeting started and uh it looks like possibly we may
0:06
have a we may have a very exciting but a little long evening as part of the
0:12
workshop and discussions and again I want to offer everyone uh the opportunity to uh express your opinions
0:20
that’s very important to us so first of all let me start the agenda by asking
0:26
deie to uh uh I call the meeting to order and and please uh if he can help
0:31
us with a V call yes thank you chairperson uh Committee Member Alexi
0:37
here Committee Member Bacha here Committee Member
0:42
vernham Committee Member Chang here Committee Member haverson here Committee
0:48
Member Kent here Committee Member Kingsbury here Committee Member Leon
0:53
here Committee Member Pete here Committee Member RTA here Committee
0:59
Member Stout here Vice chair tro masi is absent this evening and chairperson
1:07
Shang here okay thanks so much Debbie um
1:13
so uh again uh as I said louder yeah my apologies I’m afraid
1:20
to touch this so I’m going to really try hard to get close does that help can I
1:26
turn up the volume you got to eat it the volume somewhere
1:35
turn is there volume control no no I’m touching it
1:41
literally like this is this better little bit a little bit okay so I’m just
1:46
going to be kissing this thing the whole night oh dear that’s going to be my best friend I hope tonight okay
1:55
so okay so uh again uh we really welcome uh PPP first participation for tonight’s
2:01
meeting however to uh conform with the BR act uh no action can occur on items
2:07
presented during citizen for to provide public comments please submit a speaker’s
2:13
card uh right over there you see the yellow card please uh take a uh take a
2:19
copy and uh bring it to Debbie um and when your name is called please
2:26
stand to address the uh committee and uh commment are limited to a maximum
2:33
of 3 minutes per person per item and uh open Forum will conclude after 30
2:40
minutes and we really hope to get through the agenda so I appreciate your
2:45
patience um if we have additional speakers we can have uh we can reconvene
2:52
uh after the after our matters for consideration so uh Debbie do we have
2:58
any common card we do uh Greg
3:26
Scott I’m Greg Scott um I can’t do anything about the past we
3:32
can’t do anything about the past we can only learn from the past that’s obvious I should have been involved in this
3:37
Committee in this planning from the beginning that’s the past I can’t do anything about it I think the plan is
3:43
inadequately considered I know a lot of you put a lot of energy into this but I think it’s inadequately considered you
3:49
have five areas with channeling in three options each one so you have a total of uh 15 options where are the quantif
3:57
quantifi on each of these options one case is water what are we going to do for water what are the projections for
4:02
water for each one of these options for each area um if we think a little more that
4:08
in 2045 we’re going to take 275 gallons of water to produce 750 milliliters of
4:15
wine in a bottle think again maybe you need more cannabis dispensaries if you think that it’s not going to happen
4:20
we’re in trouble on water our s our s um Walken aquifer is in big trouble okay uh
4:27
we have a reservoir the largest Reservoir in the United States the me Reservoir supplies water for 40 million
4:33
people the California’s taken 4.3 million acre feet out of the Colorado
4:38
River for those four for California and to supply the South Northern California
4:45
shipping 5 million acre feet South an acre foot is the amount of water to
4:50
cover one acre to the depth of 1 foot it’s about 326,000 gallons of water but
4:55
about the same as a regulation Olympic swimming pool where are we going to get the water we need need quantifi you
5:00
don’t do a business plan projections without quantifi you don’t change a business plan or come up with a new
5:06
business plan without quantifi if you have any if you do it without quantifi and you have any
5:13
competition they will eat you for breakfast okay that’s on the water situation I don’t understand your
5:19
planning on water situation the other thing in every element of of of your options on this plan you’re talking
5:26
about jobs jobs okay um um artificial
5:31
intelligence um VOD kosa an investor that has his thumb on a lot of things in
5:36
the Bay Area he says in 10 years 80% of the tasks and 80% of the jobs are going
5:42
to be done by artificial intelligence okay what kind of jobs are you talking about
5:48
manufacturing humans doing Manufacturing in 10 years really um if you can’t assess the
5:57
present better than this I I don’t understand your projections for the
6:02
Future Okay um I think we Elders need more
6:08
wisdom than this we we need to do better than this and we need to do better than this for
6:14
the children and the young people it needs to be a lot more quantifi in the
6:19
projections to what we’re doing thank
6:28
you Michael
6:35
fuchi oh my goodness I need the microphone I can’t hold the microphone my guitar at the same time can you guys
6:41
hear me out there yeah what am I doing again um let me just tell you a little bit
6:47
about me I’ve been a resident of Livermore for over 40 years um I’ve been a local businessman for over 35 years
6:54
owning a music store and downtown lovar hence the guitar um I see some fellow
7:00
rotarians out there I saw Brandon today at Rotary which was wonderful to learn a little bit about what you guys are doing
7:06
I want to say thank you for your commitment to this project um I don’t know much about a lot of it but I do
7:13
know one thing and that is that I worked on the urban growth boundary and so I just took a little song and I just wrote
7:18
a few words so I could comment on that I know I’m not going to change any Minds this evening but perhaps I might get
7:24
attention where other people in the community might pay attention to what you’re doing and and comment in the
7:30
future and contribute to this effort of making Livermore a wonderful place to live um let’s see what else can I say
7:38
okay well I’ll just turn the pitch and say um uh thank you for tolerating me
7:45
okay leave my boundary alone in the place I call home let the dear in the
7:52
hand of the play where s is h a develop word and the
8:00
skies are not cloudy all day oh home on the
8:07
gra is the earth grow boundry we CL it benefits us all let them all hear
8:16
our call to maintain a strong boundary this
8:21
way oh Home on the Range with a boundary not subject to
8:28
change for it’s right to protect and not to
8:35
neglect the open space that still remain okay that’s my
8:47
contri thank you uh David
8:58
rounds great I get follow the guitar as your work comes to I’m David
9:05
rounds I lived in Livermore for a whole lot of years 50 of them and um thank
9:13
you um and I just had a couple things to say tonight as your work comes to conclusion I remain convinced that this
9:20
committee can create a viable update to the general plan that does not require that 1200 Acres of currently protected
9:27
open space become mostly industrial land and requiring that the urban grow boundary be broken east of Greenville
9:34
Road unfortunately it does appear that that’s the direction you’re going and
9:41
um it appears that this committee is planning to present the city council development plans for Five Focus areas
9:48
which includes the east of green I believe this is a mistake I’ve got a couple reasons here um first the city
9:56
has done an admirable job for the last 20 plus years of keeping the mandated
10:01
proposition D to grow within the city limits this laser focus on infield
10:06
growth has made Livermore the exciting City it has become breaking the urban growth
10:12
boundary to expand the size of the City by 1,200 Acres will completely change this Dynamic of focusing on infield
10:21
grow with an additional 1200 Acres of Greenfield it is mostly zoned for
10:27
industrial the city will no longer have to focus on keeping the city compact exciting and livable because developers
10:34
can just sprawl to the east the second reason is the population
10:40
grow and the requisite job growth numbers that justify breaking the urban growth
10:45
boundary are suspect and seem to be based on theoretical
10:51
projections that far exceed the current scientific projections from organizations like
10:58
aank the plan as it exists will require a vote of the citizens of Lor this is the third
11:03
reason in order to expand the city beyond the limits Beyond Greenville Road the likelihood of such a vote actually
11:10
passing is at best 50/50 it’s probably more like
11:15
6535 if it does not pass what happens will the city have to reconvene
11:21
a new gpac Committee in a year or so to alter the plan to stay within the city
11:27
limits or maybe just keep you guys moving uh shouldn’t this committee do
11:33
that work now by preparing scenarios that keep urb growth and development within the original four Focus
11:40
areas it will certainly be an incomplete and insufficient presentation to the city council if you do not include how
11:48
the general plan revisions will look if the voters say no thank
11:56
you thank you
12:09
Vladimir hi so uh it seems like The public’s opinion on at least one of
12:16
these Focus areas is pretty clear uh the Greenville expansion I was at the last Workshop I
12:22
wasn’t at the first one but every group that uh was formed there the 10 tables
12:27
or so everybody was completely opposed to this one uh Focus area the other ones
12:34
there’s some you know uh something you could maybe discuss there but the Greenville one was pretty clear so I
12:43
think that’s just the one I’ll talk about because you know we all care about democracy right all art and supporters
12:49
of democracy in here right so uh if public opinion drives the
12:55
city’s actions then I think this one issue surely we could just put to rest
13:01
because the public has made up their minds and unfortunately like the others
13:08
mentioned you do seem uh determined to proceed with this regardless but I hope
13:15
that uh you proved them wrong and me and uh at least on one thing on this one
13:22
thing we can agree is uh nobody wants this uh green bell expansion thanks
13:32
uh that’s the last one I have for open
13:38
form thank you so much D okay so thank you for expressing your thank
13:46
you for expressing your opinions we really value uh those and I think the
13:52
next item is consent item but we don’t have any uh agenda items so I’m going to
13:57
move on to matters consideration and today uh we have uh a
14:04
a very nice presentation prepared by the project team to talk about the first
14:10
Citywide Lane use scenario and I’m going to turn this over to Cy yes chairperson
14:18
U wow that’s loud um maybe
14:26
yeah so really quickly uh for this item we’ll give a
14:33
highlevel project overview and discuss briefly the Landy Alternatives
14:39
process um and then at the last meeting um the committee had a sort of Workshop
14:46
where he broke into groups and deliberated the different Focus areas and the different Alternatives um but we
14:52
wanted to share with you uh what we heard from uh community outreach that
14:57
we’ve done over the last couple months so that you can um consider that as we move forward in this um iterative
15:04
process and then we will go Focus area by Focus area to
15:10
um kind of work towards this preferred land scenario and create a draft map and
15:15
so the way we are proposing to do that tonight is a little bit different um than what we’ve done in the
15:21
past um in the in the past we’ve had very broad discussions um which was
15:27
appropriate at the time as we’re brainstorming and now we’re kind of pivoting to where the project
15:34
team needs some direction from the committee on how best to move forward with the input you’re providing and so
15:40
again we’re going to do that Focus area by Focus area I’m going to hand it over to Joanna in a minute and we’ll walk
15:46
through the focus areas we will uh summarize the individual groups that
15:51
gpac broke into what they their recommendations were and then summarize
15:56
our interpretation of what that direction is and then allow the committee to deliberate on that and make
16:02
potential changes to it and then actually vote on that direction um we are recommending chairperson Chang that
16:09
as part of that we take public comment for each Focus area so as um uh members
16:15
of the public who are with us this evening who want to speak on this item that they can speak on any of the focus
16:21
areas and we’ll go through each one of them um and then at that point we will summarize what our next steps are um and
16:27
come back to you uh at a meeting in January again this yes just we go back on page okay so uh
16:37
please know that the second bullet uh under the focus area discussion uh as
16:42
far as the public comment uh please still take a a common card yellow common
16:48
card and bring those to Debbie just so we know you’re prepared to speak to any
16:54
one Focus area at the time okay please uh think about that at this point Thank
16:59
you and I would just add we we’d welcome comments on all the focus areas if one wanted to speak on all the focus areas
17:06
as well do you want to go in sequence yes we go in sequence um so just as a
17:12
reminder of where we’re at in the project this is our our project timeline um you can see we’re we’re coming to the
17:19
end of 2023 and this timeline will shift a little bit we still have uh work to do
17:25
on the land use Alternatives process as we work to velop a draft uh land use map
17:31
and the committee will have as much time as it needs to get a map get comfortable with a map that they that you as a
17:37
committee are endorsing to send to uh Council for their deliberation and review uh so so again this might change
17:44
a little bit um and then eventually uh we’re still targeting spring of 2025 to
17:50
package up all the materials including policy development into a draft general
17:57
plan so again just a little bit about the meeting format we are seeking the committee’s direction we’ll go Focus
18:03
area by Focus area if there’s changes to that direction we will make it in real time and um then call for a vote to
18:11
confirm that is the direction of the committee and then with that information with that direction we will prepare a
18:18
draft land map a Citywide map and then bring back further analysis with that map including things like our jobs
18:25
housing match what that what that scenario would produce in terms of the job’s housing match and is it adequate
18:31
that would be a question for the committee to deliberate bring back some market feasibility information to really put a
18:38
filter on um some of the landage changes we’re proposing are they feasible and
18:43
and on what time Horizon uh and then also because the committee had asked for this at the last time we’re anticipating
18:49
bringing back what’s the impact of uh a land use map with the EAS of Greenville
18:54
Focus area and also without the east of Greenville Focus area so the committee
18:59
uh can can compare those two um and so again we’ll return um in the new year
19:06
with that map for the committee to review and make further refinements based on that
19:11
information so at this point I’ll hand it over to Joan and she can walk us through the Alternatives process and
19:18
then each Focus
19:25
area thank you drops welome no they were here when I got here
19:30
I would eat them okay okay good time okay um thank
19:37
you Andy is this working you’re going have to project more push the button there we go okay the green light always
19:43
looks like it’s on but it’s not on thank you okay I’m Joanna Jansen with place works thank you for having me it’s
19:48
exciting to be here this is a um it’s great to be rolling up our sleeves and uh moving forward with the gpack on the
19:55
preferred land use scenario so um as we get get started just a reminder about
20:00
both things that we know are important to the community and to the city as an organization and also things we’ve heard from you as the gpac that you want to
20:07
achieve big picture as part of the general Plan update and as part of this preferred scenario um really responding
20:14
to the Community Vision for maintaining livermore’s high quality of life I think we know that’s important to all of us
20:20
part of that is fostering high quality job creation and maintaining the diversity and the strength of the local
20:26
economy another important part that we’ve heard over and over again is about planning for adequate housing options um
20:32
including a range of housing types to accommodate a range of income levels and um really setting the foundation for the
20:38
city to continue to be fiscally and financially sustainable and able to maintain and improved Public Services as
20:45
Livermore grows and changes in the future just as you know what we’re doing
20:51
here with the preferred scenario is really mixing and matching ideas that have come up throughout the process to
20:57
then create create the basis for a land use map as Andy just said that will be further studied as part of the general
21:03
plan e and ultimately be adopted as part of the general plan land use
21:09
map as just a reminder for folks who are relatively new to the process this has
21:14
been ongoing for um almost a year now we worked on identifying Focus areas de
21:21
developing and confirming the land use alternatives for those Focus areas evaluating and comparing those
21:27
alternatives um and now we’re at the point of selecting a preferred scenario for further study after we do that we’ll
21:33
then be moving on to the Future um steps of the general plan and the general plan
21:38
e Andy mentioned that an important thing for you tonight is for us to convey some of the community outreach that we have
21:44
heard through um our recent Outreach events this slide just shows you snapshots of the popup events the
21:51
community workshops um and the various ways that we’ve been working to um hear
21:56
from people throughout Livermore this slide is a snapshot of um online events
22:03
uh webinars popups presentations to different Community groups um a range of
22:09
uh uh Outreach events throughout October and most of November that uh culminated in US reaching almost uh a thousand
22:15
people in Livermore to ask for their input at this phase of community outreach and I’ll be um summarizing that
22:23
as I go through each one of the focus areas so starting off with
22:28
Road just a quick reminder the vision here that all three different Alternatives would Express differently
22:34
is to create a visitor destination that supports production and maker spaces and really serves as a gateway to deliver
22:40
more wine country so we have uh the maker Village alternative that includes
22:45
some new residential uses and kind of a Central Park the production alternative
22:50
which is um entirely uh production related uses it does not include any
22:56
housing and then the wine country Center alternative which includes Housing close to East Avenue and then a more
23:02
production Industrial oriented designation um uh further south the the
23:09
other differences here are also the central located Park in the wine country Center Alternative versus a park east of
23:15
Vasco Road and the production alternative so what we heard from the
23:21
community was overall perhaps a slight preference for the maker Village alternative some interest in lower
23:27
residential densities in that alternative uh we did also hear support for the production alternative um but
23:34
perhaps with a shift to move the park to the west side of Vasco Road as you saw in the other two Alternatives the wine
23:40
country Center Alternative I would say kind of attracted the least uh level of Interest or support from the broader
23:46
Community um folks uh did some some people did respond to the lack of an industrial designation in that
23:53
alternative um others wanted to increase the density of the residential and someone wanted to lower the density
23:59
of the residential so a range of view points there about um those Alternatives
24:04
we did hear from many folks that it’s going to be very important to think about circulation and especially safety
24:09
on Basco Road in this uh Focus area perhaps we could look at more park space
24:16
some wanted more housing some wanted no housing some felt like um this is not the best location for industrial and
24:22
that industrial uses should instead be encouraged to be closer to 580
24:28
so in addition to the community input we want to Recons re review the gpac input
24:33
from uh when we were here last month group one started with the wine country Center Alternative um and made some
24:40
changes from there and wanted to just make sure that parking is considered and future development in this area
24:47
especially given the number of different um businesses and um that this would be uh in part at least a visitor attracting
24:54
area Group Two started with a blank map and really um added residential medium high northern part of the focus area um
25:03
a park in the central part of the area uh some areas as mixed industrial
25:08
commercial in the South and then the remaining as the commercial Wine Country designation that kind of more reddish
25:15
color and then group three started with the maker Village alternative increased
25:20
to the density of housing in the northern portion of the area from medium high to high and replaced the mixed
25:27
industrial commercial with again with residential medium high density so more
25:32
intensity of Housing and housing across a larger area um and had an idea of including poos to Foster internal
25:39
connectivity so those were the three different ideas we got back from the three different groups um of the gpack
25:46
and here’s our interpretation and part of what we’re interested in your kind of reaction and refinements tonight um
25:53
start with the maker Village alternative um we would then and from
25:58
that increase the wine country commercial by replacing some of the
26:03
mixed industrial that kind of pink designation with that um and increase
26:08
housing density by replacing half of the residential medium high density with um
26:14
high density so this slide just shows you um a map and the changes that I just described would be uh happening to this
26:21
based on this maker Village alternative as a starting point
26:28
so we’re going to pause there and go through the process that um Mandy outlined for each one of the focus
26:35
areas so this is now the direction that we thought we heard from each of the
26:40
groups and we’re asking at this point that the committee uh confirm that this
26:46
is the direction and if not make some minor adjustments and uh discuss amongst
26:51
yourselves I also wanted to point out that although Committee Member Burnham can be here this evening he did provide written comments and you have a copy
26:57
give those uh to consider and thank you Paul uh this is
27:04
the moment we recommend opening public comment um and so you want discussion
27:09
first or comment I think we I think we’d recommend taking public comment on this Focus area if anybody has anything to
27:15
say and then with that in mind uh the committee can deliberate or move forward
27:20
okay okay so I’m going to refer to Debbie to make sure that we have your
27:26
yellow common card and Cur call names for this particular Focus area one time
27:34
does anybody have a comment card for this particular area because I do not have any at this
27:39
point what number was it would be good to refer to the numbers on your agenda
27:45
here the the one number is 4.1 and it’s going to be broken down into the focus
27:50
areas so it all be 4.1 so this will be 4.1.1 I think this is
27:58
okay just in case you don’t hear uh on the agenda this item is 4.1 it’s going
28:05
to be a large portion of this evening’s work and we are going through one Focus
28:11
area at a time and still remain on 4.1 and we are asking the public to provide
28:17
your comments and we’re going to have a gpack internal discussion before we
28:23
recommend the final Direction uh um can we know which order
28:29
we’re going in because then we we can tell them like 4.1 area one 4.1 area 2
28:35
so they can Smit their cards now instead of having to wait until the thing goes we just have them I feel like a lot of
28:41
people know which one they want to comment on IDE I think the the focus area for
28:47
the Pas Road wasn’t the first one in the booklet so that’s a good idea um yeah so
28:54
we are going to go through them in the following order first row that’s the one we just finished the next one is going
29:00
to be Los pus and then it’s going to be Laughlin
29:05
mid and then Midtown and then east of fille and the process for each Focus
29:13
area will be the same where we will introduce the summary of the community input the summary of the gpac group
29:20
input allow public comment for additional Community input for those who are here and then go to the gpac for
29:25
their deliberation and Direction on that Focus
29:34
area so I’m going to try to repeat that one more time just in case it wasn’t clear so Joanna helped us by identifying
29:41
the vas area is number one and later next we going to talk about lastas port
29:48
and I know these names may may not mean much but uh uh maybe we have an overall
29:55
map to show uh so the second is losas the third one is L and then Midtown and
30:02
east of Greenville okay do you need need to repeat those the sequence again you
30:08
want me to repeat one more time I have the worst memory so that help me okay so Joanna let come back uh back to number
30:15
one do we have any common cards for basketall okay and chair given the the
30:23
back and forth nature of this if people would just like to signify that they’d like to speak I don’t know that we need
30:28
have to have a comment card for each of the focus areas so if you don’t have a comment card for it that’s okay indicate that you’d like to speak on that
30:34
particular Focus area and you can come speak okay I like that I like that so can we still limit five minutes three
30:40
minutes two minutes three three minutes and how many half an
30:46
hour I think that’s at your pleasure how many minutes we allow for each
30:51
one it’s actually your pleasure okay and you don’t need to if if we had
30:57
uh 40 comments on each item we should probably set a limit got you okay we do
31:03
want to really be efficient but not rushed so I do want to have a good balance here so three minutes each and
31:10
please I miss you please raise your hand I’ll try to look very hard thank
31:16
you three minutes okay great Scott again I just want to comment on the housing
31:23
situation uh and the planning and part of that my interest is um because I was
31:29
homeless in this community for 6 years and N9 months up to about a year and a half ago and I spoke to the city council
31:37
for two and a half years on homelessness and it’s like speaking to the wall really um we’re on and I attended the
31:44
Human Services Commission for two years and did that nonsense and listen to it
31:50
and honestly we’re on no road to solve homelessness and on the save Livermore
31:56
or any the county or state of California the state of California um put $17.5
32:04
billion into the homelessness over four years and where are we we have 170,000
32:10
homeless by count okay we have 70,000 homeless on the street of Los Angeles um
32:17
now the governor is just bankrupt on the ideas and his man for housing and his
32:23
Deputy um chief of staff on housing and homelessness is Jason Elliott he’s
32:29
clueless too their idea the 17.5 billion dollar didn’t work for homelessness so
32:34
uh let’s throw 20 billion at it right we’re looking at a projected deficit for California is $68 billion it’s the same
32:42
mode so homelessness is a little like little a lot it on the housing
32:49
problem um you’ve got if you do the statistics more and more people are cost burdened on the housing especially as
32:57
part of this inflation Trend we’ve had since 2022 um the the rents have gone up a lot
33:04
and mortgages with the percentage of the interest rate are outrageous housing costs are still very high in a major
33:10
part of the inflation and more and more people are cost burdened cost burden
33:16
means that the amount of your gross income you’re paying for rent and housing is over 30% more and more people
33:24
are cost burdened it’s it’s crazy we’re not solving the problem so my argument
33:31
on homelessness I don’t think you’re going to solve homelessness by housing the reason is you’re never going to have
33:36
the resources but what are you going to do about housing for workers regular housing for workers and one of the ideas
33:44
is you’ve got to decommodify housing we’ve commodified housing it’s you know Venture Capital private Equity you
33:52
you’ve made this game um I’ll just give a brief example of Jeff Bezos ahead of of Amazon he’s going to give $120
34:00
million to solve homelessness but he’s going to start a company for $500 million where people can get a slice of
34:07
owning homes so that’s going to make it expensive more expensive for everybody so we have this investment procedure
34:14
this economic procedure that’s just making housing more expensive for everyone and andoss for people that
34:20
don’t have housing to get into housing we’re on the wrong track thank
34:25
you thank you so much may I interject uh uh
34:31
I want to really clarify uh some procedural um Point uh we always
34:38
encourage open forign discussions and comments and we would love to hear from you however just to be again um be
34:46
efficient and go through all the focus areas I wonder if we can really look at 4.1 as its own agenda item and really
34:54
focus on 4.1 being the topic of discussion and we would love to have you
35:00
come back and talk to us during the open Forum but please raise your hand and we
35:05
would love to hear from you that is specific to the focus area thank you so
35:11
much will that be okay okay any objections from the group okay so again
35:16
back to focus area one I’m sorry the one may not be
35:25
right well good evening my name is Lori Souza and I’m chair of the board of the Tri
35:31
Valley Conservancy um my comments are more general not to not to this specific um
35:37
focus area um but the land use planning work that you’re doing is very important and will impact our quality of life as
35:43
well as the character of our community for Generations uh this next phase of your process is especially important because
35:49
it will be the basis for your report and recommendations to the city council so first the TVC is most concerned about
35:56
about preserving open space that has high conservation value as an example the land currently owned by Bart appears
36:03
to have species and habitat that would be valuable for conservation efforts these lands if preserved as open space
36:10
in perpetuity can be the starting point for a permanent green belt and Wildlife
36:15
Corridor along the entire eastern border of limore second TBC remains committed
36:22
to infill housing to protect Prime Farmland from development and and to provide sufficient opportunity for more
36:28
people to live and work in Livermore thereby improving our quality of life through improved work life balance
36:35
reducing traffic and meeting climate goals third the TVC is committed to the
36:40
sustainability of agriculture in the liore valley several of the focus areas will have a direct impact on our ability
36:47
to support the economic viability of our precious Wine Country fortunately the city council did a great job of choosing
36:54
the members of this committee as you represent present the diversity of Livermore residents and have dedicated
36:59
yourselves to this complicated and lengthy process you have our deepest appreciation for your commitment As you
37:06
move into these final stages of the process I trust you will rely upon the key learnings that you have compiled and
37:13
base your recommendations on the combination of these facts along with your understanding of what our community
37:18
needs to know if these Alternatives truly provide for balanced amount of both housing and jobs I believe there
37:25
needs to be a a little bit more detailed analysis we need to better understand the current state of the quality and
37:32
quantity of jobs in Livermore compared to Future job creation needs will there
37:37
be sufficient industrial land available to provide for this and still achieve our infill housing goals and what is the
37:45
ideal alignment of a permanent green belt along the city’s Eastern Edge thank you for the work that you’re doing and I
37:52
look forward to following your progress
37:57
thank you so much I anyone else for Vasco
38:03
Road okay so um if possible that’s stay
38:08
on the vas Vasco Road topic and if it’s
38:14
okay maybe we can go back to the map of uh the colorcoded areas just in case
38:19
anyone wants to speak to any changes they want to
38:25
see hi my name is Jane Gibson I’ve lived here for about 50 years I was on the
38:31
last workshop at the last Workshop um in for this area when I look
38:38
at that um area that is already developed with warehouses that are
38:46
occupied that are um that are occupied in um providing
38:54
services and jobs and what have you and what you’re what you’re if I’m
39:00
understanding correctly what your you mapped out was to replace those
39:07
warehouses and jobs with homes I know that there’s a church I understand
39:13
there’s a brand new church there that would be affected from it why would you tear down and why would you
39:20
remove working parts for our city when we have other areas where we can quit
39:28
homes thank
39:33
you thank you so much any
39:40
others okay so I’m sure um some of our committee members would like to have an opportunity to uh really clarify we did
39:48
have a uh Workshop like uh meeting last week and for those who think uh joined
39:53
us last week this is the result of our internal Workshop so I would like to
39:59
have the Committee Member comment um really the summary that the project team
40:04
presented does just reflect of what the committee would like to see please speak
40:09
up uh again I think raise of your hand is good okay
40:16
he yeah I’ll um I’ll just start by saying my family currently rents were a
40:22
tenant in one of the buildings in this space so um I I both have uh some
40:28
knowledge but I also have a bias so I’m just saying that up front um you know Basco row um that area is is essentially
40:37
a burned out Industrial Park there’s some very nice buildings most of them
40:42
are very low class um meaning you know they don’t they have leaky roofs they
40:47
have don’t have hot water they don’t have sidewalks uh there’s no parking um
40:54
but it’s a very vital part of the of the Livermore Wine seink because there’s a dozen small producers there that are
41:01
small wineries uh I think there’s 12 wineries three breweries and one Distillery that
41:09
are in uh the space because it’s affordable it takes tens of millions of dollars to buy a large parcel of land
41:17
and build a winery but if you can afford the rent and make enough wine and sell
41:22
enough wine you can start there and that’s always been the hope is um
41:27
there’s some very successful wineries like Cuda Ridge that started in the garage of my neighbor then it was in a
41:33
barn on East Avenue and then they were able to actually build a purpose-built
41:39
winery in one of the city’s specific plan Catalyst sites and it’s one of the
41:44
most successful operations in the in the town so I think um the the housing
41:51
transition has already happening there’s a big white cutout which is sometimes the hard thing at looking at these Maps
41:58
that’s because a big piece of this has already been replaced with housing and the entire perimeter around it is now
42:05
single family housing as well um up in the northeast corner uh I was one of
42:11
those who advocated for higher density housing um and a lot of that is based on
42:16
um this particular part of Livermore uh has from all the data that’s been shared
42:23
with gpac over the past two years it has some income equity and diversity issues
42:30
uh but there is apartments on the other side of East Avenue directly across from this that is an old casket Factory it’s
42:38
been closed for years um and most of it’s open and been knocked down there’s also um uh some storage
42:46
sheds um there’s lot of things going on there’s uh but but not a lot of Vitality
42:53
so that’s one of the few locations where I think we could actually build Workforce housing that’s both affordable
43:00
and practical it’s walkable to a lot of jobs and it’s bable to the a station and
43:08
the future Valley Lan so um I think some of the things that came out of the group
43:13
I was in was look that’s that’s one of the few places where an apartment
43:19
building would actually be an upgrade to the total neighborhood it would replace the beeping Fork Clips at 4:00 a.m. that
43:26
a plumbing shop or some other kind of industrial business would have and then
43:32
we could build lower density housing more like town homes that is a product
43:37
that’s done very well in Livermore uh it would abut the single family housing so instead of a nice single family house
43:44
which is what’s all behind to to this area to both the East and to the South
43:52
um you would have transitional to from low density to higher density and um but
43:59
we would still capture the inner part the maker space which is so critical to the small startup wineries Distillery
44:06
breweries uh the park is key because those businesses are at a disadvantage that they don’t have a lot of land like
44:14
the people um who have Vineyards out in the country and have lots of event space
44:20
um it would be a part that could be both both available for the residential people and it could be activated by the
44:27
businesses and there’s a lot of entertainment moving in here so it actually it it works on a lot of levels
44:34
it it can bring in better Equity better diversity and it can improve the art
44:39
scene in Livermore because there’s music at night uh at least six of the wineries
44:46
are regularly featuring Fe featuring music and a lot of the Neighbors come
44:51
out of Raa and out of Charlotte’s Court and they actually take scooters or bike
44:56
or walk to this venue so uh it would be a great addition for the labs and on the
45:02
other side of Vasco that is the long awaited Wine Country retail Center 25
45:08
years ago when the area plan was made and the wine country was preserved there
45:14
was supposed to be a wine country retail Center think of an Oakville Grocery like
45:19
you have in Napa a grocery store with a large parking lot which would fix the parking issues uh especially the parking
45:26
issues at night because it operates during the day and at night the businesses that are doing entertainment
45:31
could have parking I will confess we’re one of those businesses that needs more parking at night but it would be a place
45:38
for the electric bike shops the picnic shops all the all the things that create a wine country uh that was promised 25
45:46
years ago it had an initial $1 million of funding that was diverted to another
45:51
project by the city not to benefit the wine country but it did benefit at the Arts and this was a a big win for the
46:00
wine Growers and the wine Growers who have been wanting this activation part
46:05
for their wine country that we lack the services that other wine countries have and so it could all work very
46:12
synergistically with a uh continuing the transition to housing but housing that
46:18
has better density and more diversity more inclusion and still protect the
46:24
small businesses that are in the inner core and that’s what’s called The Block which is now renamed the roow they the
46:30
block doesn’t include the peripheral those businesses are are virtually empty but um there’s some very nice ones but
46:37
most of them are empty plots so that’s that was the vision that
46:43
kind of went into the whole thing and and uh I support the um the maker
46:48
Village but with higher density housing than what’s being shown up in the the
46:54
north uh s
47:01
of so the one change then that you would suggest Committee Member is to increase the density of housing in the northern
47:08
portion just captur the B but not the not the location right no I think that’s
47:14
because that’s where you have apartments on the other side of East Avenue and that’s where you’ll have the best access
47:20
to mass transit buses it’s all right there currently
47:26
so so could I ask then what you’re suggesting is um amending bullet 3 to
47:32
say increase housing density by replacing half the residential medium high density with residential high
47:37
density in the Northwest portion of yes the project area for the site
47:44
okay explain as we go yes so what what we’re looking for at this point is to identify some consensus or majority
47:51
amongst the gpac members to include that as a change to this slide because what we really want want to get to at the end
47:56
of this process is what’s written on that slide when your staff and project team go and develop the new draft
48:03
alternative for the map that this is what you want to see when we bring this back to you the next time you’ll say yep
48:09
that’s what I said so we want to do that through some head nodding until we get to sort of the end of the amendment
48:15
period and then we’ll actually take a formal roll call vote and say do you want to move forward with the this
48:21
direction for your staff to uh to move forward with the mapping exercise and you’ll get to say yay or nay at that
48:28
point and so when when somebody makes a suggestion uh we want to note it and
48:34
we’re going to look around among our committee members and look for a show of hands if we have at least half of the
48:40
people raising the hand we’ll put it down on the slide if if not then then
48:46
some additional discussion may be needed yeah just uh like Paul was saying so we want to be very clear in terms of
48:52
tonight’s procedure and um so after this direction uh after the discussion we as
49:00
a group uh will indicate a very clear direction for the project team so that’s
49:06
very important uh for the gpac members to understand how you will uh either
49:13
like to endorse uh the current uh summary or you like to modify that or
49:19
any other comments so uh take your time this is uh really one night that we really want to think you through
49:27
so while people are thinking I want to ask a question I think this mostly GE Le toward you Brandon is um as we go
49:35
forward with these Alternatives there’s going to be a further analysis on what is actually economically feasible in
49:41
terms of the density in terms in the housing commercial and Industrial mix
49:46
and uh I saw the head no I answer the question but the next part Following part would be like what kind of timeline
49:51
would that look for the community actually see that kind of information to to for the community to see the analysis
49:57
yeah like I mean it could be a year could be two years just like what what like kind of so make sure I understand
50:02
your question you’re asking when the community would see our analysis of the map or you asking when yeah like the
50:08
economic feasibility of something like as we go forward through this like based off your experience like hey we can zone
50:14
for this but then as we get further to actually reality and like interest what how long do you think that
50:21
usually takes for them to someone say okay you zone for medium but economically I can’t really do Medi I could do lower like and it doesn’t have
50:27
to be a part of this process I’m just talking conceptually in general sure I think part of the filter that we would
50:33
want to run the final or the draft preferred alternative through is what’s the probability of conversion of the
50:40
land use types that you’ve all directed us to include and we bring that back to you sometime early next year okay and
50:46
say you want high density housing here um in the current market that’s not
50:51
supported or it’s only supported at these rents or something like that um which is potentially okay because you
50:59
might have a scenario in which you have a portion of the housing that’s feasible in today’s market and a portion that may
51:05
take some time to become feasible this is a long range planning exercise but what we want to do um to the fullest
51:11
extent we can is take the direction you’re giving us and then run it through the analysis to say not only is it is it
51:18
feasible by looking at something like residual land value which you’ve all learned about through the process but also what’s the probability of this
51:25
converting in a reasonable period of time those are you know somewhat speculative in terms of analysis because
51:31
every case is has different factors to it we want to give you a reasonable confidence interval that something that
51:36
you put on the map is uh is perhaps aspirational but not delusional great that’s actually yeah kind of translated
51:43
my my word salad there but it also doesn’t mean it happens right away just
51:49
because we the gentle pin finished here and now it’s highy housing there’s still
51:55
there’s a tenant there it doesn’t mean that they get kicked out it means that over time if they want to change what
52:00
they’re doing they would just the designated to change the house
52:05
right that that’s exactly right so each one of the properties we’re looking at is owned by a landowner and and may or
52:11
may not have a different tenant and the landowner may decide I want to continue doing my industrial use or I have a
52:17
5-year lease with my tenant and so some of those things will will play into the time frame for any of these properties
52:24
um housing values for for developable land are generally pretty good and and
52:29
we’ll give you some of that information as well the the value for the type of housing available will drive in part How
52:36
likely it is that the land owner may be interested in in converting in a near term so the other piece I would add just
52:44
to build on on Paul’s comments um is while the the community outreach
52:49
campaign that we’ve engaged in and are summarizing for you has come to a close we are still getting feedback including
52:56
from Property Owners that’s coming in a bit onesie TWY and some of them are in the audience tonight we’ve seen them and
53:02
I’m sure we’ll continue to hear from them and that will be incorporated into the feedback you get as well that while this product may be feasible in market
53:10
conditions we’ve heard that the property owner doesn’t want this or thinks that there it’s a long timeline for conversion we’ll be able to add that
53:16
into the comments as well this is not the last shot that you’ll have at making
53:21
changes to this map so this is initial direction for us to make some of the changes you’ve identified we’ll bring it
53:27
back confirm that that’s what you said and that the map reflects your wishes and then we’ll have additional analysis
53:33
that we’ll present as we move along through this process early next year yeah just to add to that I think
53:39
there’s a consensus of all of us that we really do want to know the feasibility
53:45
of a lot of these plans a lot of these numbers and that we respect that the
53:51
project team would really do a very conservative effort to try to explain
53:57
these visibility filters in a way that someone like a lay person myself can
54:03
relate to this I have no background whatsoever in urban planing so I want to Echo that sentiment that the community
54:10
uh clearly will have that interest in understanding these numbers and the feasibility of these plans so we will
54:17
continue to push for that kind of data Clarity question uh in line with that input uh
54:25
regarding land owners um may or may not agree to um um to the land
54:33
use as a followup to what David said about the retail part uh east of
54:41
Basco so was that true of that particular property owner that’s why uh
54:48
we haven’t had any retail put on that uh property on that
54:54
parcel
55:02
so where was the retail uh that uh David was you’re talking about the retail east of Vasco Road there yeah so sorry what
55:10
was the question um so David referred to uh the retail Pro being promised uh 20
55:18
years ago or so 25 years ago or so but we have not had it so was that part of
55:24
so I don’t think Camp was referencing were you talking about this particular site or just in general the concept of a
55:29
wine country retail Center well the the existence of that which was in the South
55:34
lummer Valley area plan and and acknowledged by the city it has never
55:39
had a site identified by the city until this process and that was the first time
55:45
when it came up and said this could be a poal site if we make a maker village
55:51
where we could actually locate a wine country center it’s it’s open land it’s
55:56
not currently being farmed I think it had been farmed at one time so at this point we have not heard
56:03
from every property owner who resides within the focus areas that is a process that will be ongoing and we’ll continue
56:09
to provide that feedback to the committee as been move forward all right thank you so at this point does it feel
56:15
appropriate to okay so to check in with group um I well I guess I feel like I
56:21
can start by saying that um I I agree with um Mr tent’s uh sentiment on the
56:28
east side of Vasco although I don’t necessarily like it being the parking um
56:35
because that means there’s lots of people walking across and it’s I think already an issue like people excuse me
56:41
walking down that area I mean I just think that it’s kind of dangerous and I
56:47
also don’t like the park being on that side because people taking their bottles of wine and beers and having their
56:54
drinks and I don’t know just walking across a busy street with all that fun sounds dangerous to
57:01
me um so I just and but I also do support the high density I think that it
57:07
is a great infill City location to have more affordable housing as opposed
57:13
to and by the way I agree with you is the the park will only work as it’s
57:19
shown in a and C it will be a waste of taxpayer money to build it in B so was
57:25
your concern about if the park were to be relocated to so like like the auction where the park or the green space is on
57:31
the east side of Basco in that property I don’t I don’t really support that because especially if somebody with kids
57:38
who would take advantage of that um I it would make me nervous to like have a
57:45
bunch of people so the the maker Village alternative we’re starting with under this set of direction is uh maker
57:52
Village is on the left so in that case the park would be on the west side of Basco
57:57
okay yeah I’d actually piggyback a little bit of that not necessarily the park space because it’s uh based off the
58:04
makeer it’s already there uh I’d actually want to kind of gauge in terms
58:10
of getting some of that commercial retail space on on the east side getting
58:15
that more incorporated into the core um because you know as uh member Kent had
58:21
mentioned there’s a lot of families that are going there and like kind of checking out the area the entertainment area that’s already kind of in that core
58:27
and if we put some of the um uh more commercially type zoning like a grocery
58:33
store or possibly some sort of food or dining alternatives on the east side of
58:39
Vasco you’re you’re asking more or less families in that area to either drive there or if they walk they are going to
58:45
be crossing a very in my opinion a very dangerous Street um so I’d actually think putting it in the core would
58:50
actually be safer and more beneficial to the um uh uh surrounding areas so then
58:56
the the housing that we see in the Alternatives and the surrounding neighborhoods would be able to walk and
59:01
utilize that space a lot easier so the second bullet there calls for increasing the wine country commercial um I believe
59:08
the intent of that was to move it into the core as you’re describing so we can we can further elucidate that in the
59:15
point itself that you want some of that moved so some of the food and and other aspects can be on that side yeah
59:22
swapping or is it swapping pink with red or just making more red and less pink
59:28
the bullet says making more red and less pink but but again that’s for the committee to provide us with that
59:33
feedback if what what Committee Member shout is suggesting is expanding the wine country commercial into the core
59:41
then that would necessarily involve the removal of some of the mixed industrial I I was thinking more of a swap but okay
59:48
I mean I think uh there are some members on the committee who will have a better sense of the wine country needs than I I
59:54
would I I’m just speaking primarily from somebody with a family who would never
1:00:01
cross that street with my family like you not like even in the sometimes the middle of the day the people drive way
1:00:06
too fast I would avoid that area you did like a foot Bridge or something which I know was outrageously expensive and not
1:00:12
economical and I I do have a suggestion before we get too far because I I think if if the dialogue just goes we’re going
1:00:18
to get multiple suggestions around multiple changes we have one suggestion on the table that we have haven’t gotten
1:00:25
complete feedback about so I would suggest that we finish if you go back to the map and we finish the conversation
1:00:32
about I’m going to go back about that uh Northern corner and and transitioning
1:00:38
some of that to higher density if we could focus on that with your comments and then we can jump into additional
1:00:44
comments about where how we move things and and other aspects of what we got on this screen Paul can you repeat that
1:00:50
just you want to focus on the question in terms of res IAL right so Committee
1:00:56
Member Kent had a suggestion that we uh modify can you go back
1:01:03
to okay you go
1:01:10
ahead so uh the suggestion was that uh at the northwest side there that an area
1:01:19
there be modified to be high density housing so this would be higher density Apartments in that location so that was
1:01:25
the suggestion that that was a good location for that use okay and I was
1:01:31
just going to say that we modified bullet 3 to capture that feedback so that’s the that’s what’s on the table so
1:01:36
what we’re looking for is is is first some discussion about that and then a show of hands on do you think that’s a
1:01:44
good idea just fullly three just forly three yes um I think Christa has some
1:01:51
yeah I’m I’m in favor of that because I support more affordable housing I don’t think there’s enough of
1:01:57
it I I would say I agree we need more higher density especially if we think
1:02:02
about it without Green East of green bille it’s we’re going have to increase the density
1:02:09
everywhere well I mean there’s no housing component with e go so no I know
1:02:14
but if that’s industrial otherwise that industrial would have to be somewhere else yeah I don’t I don’t see how the
1:02:24
well we also don’t know that it’s affordable and we also I don’t see how the high density supports the vision for
1:02:32
that use so I would say in that regard I’m
1:02:37
not in support of
1:02:42
it other feedback
1:02:48
comments did you have a comment on something else okay so let’s see a show of hands how many people are are
1:02:54
supportive of this modification of the
1:03:00
okay uh you can here later on we’re going to ask you to vote and and you cannot abstain then but you can abstain
1:03:06
now we’re just looking to see who supports it and I think I saw enough people to keep it there for now and so
1:03:11
now we would open it up to other comments perhaps if any member Stout’s comment about the commercial space
1:03:17
commercial space no um yes so the the comment would be to I think it’s a little bit in there but it would be uh
1:03:24
swapping some of the space for commercial on the east side and bringing that into the core how much I mean I
1:03:30
think there’s probably a conversation around that if it’s a full swap or half swap or whatever um I just would like to
1:03:36
see some of that red zoning but the deeper red so just for the those in the audience the deeper red is a commercial
1:03:42
versus the purple is like an industrial uh zoning get some of that deeper red into the core and some of the the purple
1:03:50
on the outside it could be a full swap could be a half that part I’m not I don’t have any sh
1:03:56
feelings about so if anyone else the committee does they can so the suggestion then is to take starts
1:04:03
similarly with maker village maker Village alternative Y and then swap the wine some of the wine country
1:04:09
alternative or all of the or sorry alter the wine country commercial or all of it with a requisite amount of the mixed
1:04:17
commercial industrial there yeah um again I think some members may be able to speak on the need for the amount of
1:04:24
uh Wine Country industrial and Wine Country commercial zoning in terms of full like we don’t want to replace maybe
1:04:30
swap and so I think uh might have a better stance on yeah I would just say I
1:04:36
mean because there’s there’s a lot of things that have to be done is Vasco is a complete street it’s got good setbacks
1:04:42
except right there there are no bik Lings there are no sidewalks most of the parking is illegal parking against um
1:04:51
the uh the rules of the city um so there has to be a light and there has to be a
1:04:59
crosswalk if you’re going to um actually pull um the Eastern portion in if they
1:05:07
if you don’t do that you shouldn’t even develop it you should just leave it as fallow land which is what it is now
1:05:13
because if you don’t have access and and this area currently is not bikable it’s
1:05:19
not walkable and it’s not uh and you you cross the street at your own
1:05:24
Peril um but but the assumption is if you’re actually doing it you would do it
1:05:30
right and make complete streets and add add crosswalks and lights and if not you
1:05:36
should just drop off the east part all together because it’ll be no value yeah I think that is a good point that the
1:05:42
city would not allow this type of a development without side improvements
1:05:47
that are consistent with the rest of the road in development standards with those
1:05:54
those types of development like signalized Crossing or whether it be race table Crossing would those things be implemented at the same time or would
1:06:03
they be implemented in much later in the much later future because I know like for instance I live off East Avenue it’s
1:06:10
pretty unsafe to cross East Avenue unless you’re you know all the way by Mines Road or like there there’s very few signalized Crossings on East Avenue
1:06:16
I think I see uh uh you know someone had passed away and they put a mural on the sou sign that’s been there for quite some time and now we’re doing the you’re
1:06:22
doing the bulb out uh quick build bu outs whatever you want to call them so I’m just curious if those types of
1:06:28
improvements would happen like right away or would it be something that would take some time so I think uh it would happen in
1:06:36
the near term uh the land uses themselves will take time to change but
1:06:42
I would expect that once the general plan was adopted with a change in land
1:06:47
use that we would then you know our next step is for us to look at all of our
1:06:52
other doc docents codes requirements we would look at our our active Transportation plan and see what sort of
1:07:00
changes what might be needed in certain locations it might be a year or two after the general plan is adopted but I
1:07:07
think within the near term somewhere in that time frame we would probably try to address Paul is there a scenario in which the development itself would show
1:07:14
up without the street improvements no yeah the city has funding ready for those types of improvements we would um
1:07:20
again depending on all the changes in the general plan we would prioritize areas based on Need for Public Safety
1:07:27
but U they would all be done eventually the the highest need areas would go
1:07:32
first okay and is it possible to I don’t know if this it happens a little more but te the developers have like impact
1:07:39
fees to pay for those types of things based on what type of developments are coming in any new development any new
1:07:44
buildings constructed would pay impact fees Andor the develop it itself might
1:07:51
put in that Improvement there may be a need to service that development with those types of improvements and so the
1:07:57
developer would put those in if the development came early enough I think we see that there’s enough activity out
1:08:04
there that with these changes in land use we would likely proactively
1:08:10
consider go back to Bullet
1:08:15
to um we want to specify the kind of in increases and the
1:08:22
kind of removal it would certainly be helpful for us if we identified uh how
1:08:30
much and what I think as written it says increase Wine Country commercial and remove but what uh Committee Member
1:08:37
shroud had suggested is kind of a replacement and a switch so I think that’s the discussion on the table can
1:08:43
we open the floor for other thoughts um I work nearby and I I agree that Public
1:08:51
Safety is very important um I don’t know if it’s necessary to really do a one by
1:08:57
one swap or maybe some sort of mix just to really priortize Public Safety uh at
1:09:04
the same time really increase the utility uh so maybe some other committee
1:09:10
members can Chim in as far as whether it’s a swap or is it
1:09:16
infill just I don’t I appreciate the discussion on Public Safety I don’t know
1:09:21
that that’s going to help us get to the bullet because no matter like if it’s industrial use people who work there
1:09:27
will have to walk the street if it’s a retail use people who shop there will have to walk the street so to me those
1:09:33
are I think we’ve had a discussion that safety is important and we’re going to have make sure that the city prioritize
1:09:40
it but that doesn’t factor in like if we’re going to swap or if we’re going to
1:09:45
that’s like economic discussion so I would hope that Mr Kent or other people
1:09:52
who know about the economics would wa it on that put you on the spot yeah well
1:09:58
my my view is I I’m looking because you know they they spent all the time to try to train us on basic planning principles
1:10:06
is if you’re putting high density Apartments which I think the majority of the the committee supports in the
1:10:13
northeast corner um the row of old um buildings but there’s some of the better
1:10:19
buildings on the other side of the street those three Parcels of of purple
1:10:24
and there is a there is a church up there it’s brand new it’s very nice but it’s all residential single family
1:10:30
residential in all that white area is I would probably put Town Homes because
1:10:36
that’s the typical transition you’ve got high density apartments and you’ve got Town Homes going to single family homes
1:10:42
which are already there um they’re you know they’re they’re they’re they’re
1:10:47
nice homes they’re pretty small and then you would have the block would just be a block it would be square with a part
1:10:53
Park in the middle of it um you don’t you don’t have to put more wine country
1:10:59
commercial in there because that’s happening anywhere because the the the old businesses there are pulling out and
1:11:06
going to other places that are more suitable um for tile cutting and
1:11:12
plumbing fixtures and um this is this is kind of the kind of businesses that were
1:11:18
there and the wineries and the breweries are moving in so it’s just happening now anyway
1:11:24
but there there’s more residential that can be yielded out of the maker Village alternative because the space
1:11:31
requirements of of the makers is very small because that’s all they can afford
1:11:36
so you’ve got people renting four 3,000 square feet and splitting it between two wineries so they can cut the rent in
1:11:43
half so is your perspective then that the reason to have the wine country commercial on the east side of ASCO is
1:11:49
because of the availability of undeveloped space to facilitate something like a gr grocery store as opposed to having that on the west side
1:11:56
of Basco where there are existing facilities and it can happen soon it can happen fast whereas the buildings that
1:12:02
should be residential those three Parcels on the west side of Research Drive it makes no sense to have
1:12:09
commercial in between two residential you know neighborhoods but that may take
1:12:15
20 years before the owners of those buildings convert them to town homes may happen in 5 maybe 20 but it will
1:12:22
eventually happen um it’s not a this is this whole area is transitioning to residential the part of
1:12:28
the Maker’s Village was instead of letting it all go to residential can we do something for Libor for the wine
1:12:36
country by preserving the maker space because without it how do little
1:12:41
wineries start up so can’t start up in the county the county is Big to try to summarize the
1:12:48
comment I think one of the challenges maybe you’re identifying is that the creation of new maker space type
1:12:54
facilities on the east side of Vasco Road which would require brand new construction of relatively small
1:13:00
flexible industrial condos may be more challenged in terms of new construction on the east side of the road than the
1:13:07
utilization of existing facilities and the Block in that main block area and so
1:13:13
you’re recommending that the wine country commercials stay on the east side of the road and the mixed
1:13:18
commercial industrial maker space yeah not here but he feels very
1:13:25
strongly that makers need to be a component you just don’t want tasting rooms you want people that are still
1:13:31
making beer Wine and Spirits in the back with a Tasting Room in the front so can
1:13:39
can see the poter so would you I I think one of the
1:13:44
things I heard was potentially turn these units into residential is that correct right it would be the same level
1:13:51
of density of what you would have on the other other side of Research Drive Right
1:13:56
which also AB but single family housing right and to preserve more of this maker
1:14:02
space would you swap that with something down here for example and keep some of this maker space or did I misconstrue
1:14:11
that well there’s yeah there’s there’s a winery and a distillery in there now the
1:14:17
um that’s probably going to continue for quite some time right so that’s a separate topic what Comm memb St brought
1:14:24
up should probably close but it wouldn’t be I wouldn’t move I wouldn’t move the
1:14:30
the Oakville type grocery into the core because there’s already buildings there
1:14:36
that people have moved in like hermit crafts into these into these old buildings I would just just keep them
1:14:44
safe and leave them as they are um when you build a retail Center you’ll end up with tasting rooms and things in there
1:14:50
because that’s what always happens um but that that’s your your chance to build new and an attractive rer or a
1:14:58
food Hub that’s been talked with the supervisor that he’d like to see Castro Valley has a food Hub it’s a year round
1:15:05
Farmers Market we have a great farmers market that only operates in the warm
1:15:11
months what other other comments on that topic well I I I think there’s room for
1:15:17
it to be a little bit on both Sid that’s why I thinking like maybe some of it not all of it cuz I you know when you talk about like creating like a commercial
1:15:23
space for a residential I’m not talking like putting a grocery store there I’m talking like some area that’s like more
1:15:28
or less dedicated to like restaurants cafes and and the like that can complement the the breweries the
1:15:36
distilleries and the wineries that are in the area that are doing wine tasting so it’s not just wine tasting in that core right next to residential there’s
1:15:42
places for the the families that can go to cross the street go to the park go to the like you know grab a coffee hang out
1:15:49
at the park with their kids grab some food or whatever that that’s the kind of stuff I was thinking to really just activate that Central
1:15:56
Area um so I mean does that side of town need a grocery store yeah probably when
1:16:02
we’re kind of grocery store you know poor in a lot of these neighborhoods in our in our city um and do we need stuff
1:16:09
like you know bike repair bike rental yeah I I think that’d be great to be able to rent your bike and ride up and
1:16:15
down Tesla and take it back um but I I just don’t think what you talking about like creating a space that’s for
1:16:22
visitors and for the community you kind of need to have like um a multiple like angled
1:16:28
approach like on the right hand side if I see it there I see that as space that people who are coming and tourists that
1:16:34
are visiting are going to drive to and people who don’t live in that neighborhood are going to drive to versus if you put a little bit on the
1:16:41
inside that’s where the people who are going to be living in the neighborhood can walk to so I think like I said I
1:16:46
think there’s room for both um and I’d like to possibly see if there’s room for that but like I said I don’t want to
1:16:52
like take it away from these side wholesale because I think like I said I don’t want to just completely shift the
1:16:58
whole thing and I also don’t want to take away too much space from the maker uh maker spaces that we do have planned
1:17:04
for like you know commercial or industrial use cases too so I’m just asking for like a sliver for like
1:17:10
something there to really activate and bring that core make it really Lively and so I think I think what we do
1:17:18
have now is under bullet two that we would move some wine country commercial into that core area that that that’s
1:17:25
already there so there would be some opportunity for the area in purple there to be converted not from maker but to to
1:17:32
Wine Country commercial and uh how much is yet to be defined and um again if the
1:17:39
committee has specific feedback on that we can take it or staff can take a shot at it bring it back to you and we can further refine it yeah I know Brandon
1:17:47
you ask for the wear uh somewhere next to the park is kind of I think is is the ideal where
1:17:55
like if I’m looking at the map and throwing a dart I would be aiming for um
1:18:01
the I guess the uh southwest corner there yeah like in that area cuz that’s
1:18:07
really like the it’s Central to the housing surrounding it and it’s Central to it being right next to the park so it
1:18:13
kind of again looking for a small little space that I think would probably be the more ideal location for it if if you’re
1:18:20
asking for a where from me okay so can we do a show of hands at this point on
1:18:26
let’s go back to Bullet so we can see what the bullet is say so I think and and perhaps a slight embellishment of
1:18:32
the bullet too would be to move and add some wine country commercial somewhere
1:18:38
near the park for the next iteration of the map we going to show of hands on
1:18:43
that can we see theing yeah thank you that we good okay sorry hands one
1:18:52
more time look like we had strong majority okay excellent I do want to return to the
1:18:57
point that Paul brought up that I think Committee Member Ken added just to make sure everybody’s clear who had already voted for the concept of um or endorsed
1:19:04
the concept of the residential the Northwest portion that Committee Member Kamp was suggesting it on both sides of
1:19:09
Research Drive that modify the thiret just to say North
1:19:16
West and North corner or both sides of yeah nor
1:19:21
Northwest on both sides of research guy perhaps that’s great and this slide really is just to make sure we have
1:19:27
clear Direction it’s not a policy document or anything like that so more clarity is is better for us I think
1:19:33
visual you know validation for a lot of people is
1:19:39
important so I guess that’s part 1 a of that modification and then part one B could be the leaving where wood Family
1:19:46
Vineyard and The Distillery currently are especially given to member Kent’s comments that they’re not likely to go anywhere given that they’re successful
1:19:52
op operations so we could do a swapping essentially of the east side of Research Drive to the north with the southern
1:20:00
portion where Wood family and uh and The Distillery are show of hands in support
1:20:06
of that questions um uh I was just wondering if this might be a good area
1:20:12
to have like lower level industrial commercial and upper
1:20:18
Apartments um kind of mixed in there um so that that way you’re not taking land
1:20:24
away from potential business and you’re also providing housing and I know that
1:20:29
that is typically not a popular um route to go but I feel like in this area there’s lots of people
1:20:35
living there and lots of businesses and tourists going in that it might not be a bad idea maybe I don’t
1:20:43
know yeah so in that case what Paul was just saying is you could allow mixed use umal industrial a mixed commercial
1:20:51
industrial residential as an option
1:20:57
saying so that way we can have some Arena numbers and taken care of and then
1:21:03
also kind of satisfy like the natural development of the area to be fun and hip and cool place so that would largely
1:21:09
and this is just food for thought for the group as you think about that that would largely involve the removal and
1:21:15
replacement of the current structures as opposed to a change in the use
1:21:20
modification wouldn’t that be true if you’re building an apartment building anyway building a what an apartment
1:21:25
building would you have to remove yes so I guess I should clarify which which section are you talking about any of the
1:21:31
housing that we were talking about the Northend I see yeah and if
1:21:37
you if you allowed it you wouldn’t necessarily require it but you could
1:21:42
accommodate if someone wanted to consider a mixed juice so that’s a again
1:21:48
a question to the so we got two two questions on the floor I think one is the swap
1:21:53
and then the other is this idea of allowing mixed juice other
1:22:00
comments can you give us an idea of how in terms of land space that uh east side
1:22:08
of Basco uh what do you compare it with what’s existing right now in it’s about
1:22:14
5 Acres um that piece of land there’s two Parcels there it’s about 5 Acres
1:22:20
total um you want to comparable kind of and AUST give me a quick minute I’ll go
1:22:27
back to you yeah so I guess that’s true so um
1:22:35
the parking lot downtown is a pretty good analog for that that’s about 4 Acres so the the big parking gravel area
1:22:42
that’s going to be behind the First Street businesses there that’s about 4 Acres so a little smaller than that you
1:22:48
s of scale so there’s not a whole lot of uh industrial it’s not a whole lot of
1:22:54
industrial space you can put on there uh industrial space you could put
1:23:00
on the on the east side um yeah east side is is vacant land
1:23:05
today um and probably would be a challenging site to develop with
1:23:11
industrial U if that’s the question that you’re
1:23:17
asking and when I say industrial it’s still uh one
1:23:23
related industry related yeah we could we would certainly be looking at that through feasibility
1:23:29
analysis but developing smaller scale industrial facilities like these um is more challenging today than it has
1:23:38
been yep so we got two questions on the table one’s the housing swap um and then
1:23:44
the other is uh is adding a residential mixed use
1:23:49
component to the commercial industrial so why don’t we take the housing swap
1:23:56
first show of hands who’s comfortable with so take away houses and put more
1:24:01
commercial so it’s add the housing on that side and revert that side to a
1:24:07
maker space type of facility is what I understood the yeah
1:24:14
say that one more time add residential on the other side of research on the North End and convert
1:24:22
that to the commercial industrial like the maker space product that’s in the core there can you split
1:24:29
it certainly okay so see who supports one but not the other yeah I’m not in
1:24:34
favor of taking housing out all the housing we can
1:24:49
get okay are we adding so is the current
1:24:55
status as the committee understands it that we are have already added the residential to the other side of Research Drive in the north section
1:25:01
that’s the current status yeah I did too okay I thought was just so then then can I can we get a
1:25:08
show hands on that we’re adding I think this was Committee Member of Kent’s comment let’s do them one at a time
1:25:14
we’re adding uh residential on both sides to the north is that how many are okay that
1:25:22
on the North side the north yeah okay so most okay good and then on
1:25:30
the on the South Side I I saw a more mixed idea should we let me just ask it
1:25:36
should we keep that as housing how many would keep that as housing two how many would uh change some of it to the maker
1:25:46
Village four okay so we got a few more for maker Village any more discussion
1:25:52
about that since we’re not since we’re a little
1:25:57
uncertain I mean my my Outlook I think is that kind of jumps on to what had
1:26:02
some Brandon what some members had said where yeah we have some businesses there that are doing well and you know I think
1:26:09
there’s opportuni for zoning that could enhance their capabilities in terms of
1:26:15
what they can and cannot do um in that space and give them more more Lanes to
1:26:20
do more that could benefit the business in the the the city and the surrounding areas in terms of providing services so
1:26:27
I wouldn’t want to uh change that zoning to residential for a successful business today that
1:26:34
could then ultimately restrict them from being able to grow and ultimately if they do want to grow having to look
1:26:41
outside that current space so okay that’s kind of my outlook for some of those spaces and and I don’t know how
1:26:47
many of those Parcels fit that description but I do know some of them do with wood family being there the
1:26:53
Speak Easy that they operate right next door but I don’t know how far down that road it goes so there could be a line
1:26:59
that could get drawn at that conversation um I just know the with Wood family there being the Wier it is I
1:27:05
wouldn’t want to inhibit their growth any other comments yeah I have one so
1:27:11
let’s go back to the m I think they are uh enough unknowns to me personally that
1:27:17
I really can say yes or no based on a number of factors how feasible it is uh
1:27:24
to change the the the corner yellow to
1:27:29
Industrial or how feasible how how um how does that change the overall ratio
1:27:36
so can we ask for more analysis just to to know that decision is based on
1:27:43
feasibility and overall agregate absolutely so again your decision today
1:27:48
is not final we’ll take we’re going to call this a draft we’ll take your draft back we’re going analyze it for
1:27:54
feasibility and we’ll analyze the housing for feasibility in general if you told us to keep the first couple of
1:28:01
parcels there as maker Village we could analyze the feasibility of that too or if you want us to analyze at all as
1:28:06
housing we can do that as well so that’s that’s what we’re looking for from the group is what we’d like to analyze so
1:28:12
personally I agree with the driver that they had brought up that the fact that the right hand side of resarch ride is
1:28:18
already housing the left hand side of you know the red area is already housing seems to be more you know um it’s kind
1:28:27
of a whole Community right there without breaking up however the South Side it
1:28:33
doesn’t seem to have a strong driver so it’s really based on feasibility and overall Advocates to
1:28:40
me so no
1:28:45
vote question so you mentioned that the like how much of
1:28:52
purple is being used you said some tile businesses are going to move out and other different type of commes but how
1:28:59
much of the purple do you think is necessary to keep that make your village
1:29:04
thriving like the bottom row that we’re discussing converting to purple you’re
1:29:10
saying you’re voting against that are you saying it’s not necessary it’s it’s already purple now I mean the winery is
1:29:15
in there is outgrown the space so they’re looking for actively looking for other space but another Wier will move
1:29:22
it’s a good site just for a smaller Winery but it’s it’s purple now the question is because it a butts housing
1:29:29
is it better off everything on that side of Research Drive that a buts housing be housing or do you want a little island
1:29:35
of commercial just to irritate the neighbors um that’s what it
1:29:41
does um so but it’s but given how well at rents and the rents they get it’s
1:29:48
it’s likely to stay commercial until the building fall down is that something you
1:29:54
can allocate for mix you could allocate any of it for mix it’s it’s unlikely to change to mixed
1:30:02
use without uh a new building being constructed or without at least a second floor being construct but it allows for
1:30:09
it to be residential one day right stay commercial yes you’re just you’re just overlaying a
1:30:16
residential zoning on top of the current commercial zoning you’re adding a permitted use yes
1:30:29
anything on question but you know we’ve seen that
1:30:35
stuff happen downtown before remember the beautiful row of of town homes that
1:30:41
got built um and there was a pizza place that wouldn’t allow it to be completed
1:30:48
so they hung out and so they kind of built half a town home roll then that business went out of business and I
1:30:55
think it’s a nail salon or something there now but it’s so you know the owner
1:31:00
may never want to sell it he may want to keep it as commercial and get rents forever and the person building the town
1:31:06
homes next to it will be irritated because they rather build out the entire block but but that happens it happens
1:31:14
every day in the city now I would say the only thing to to think about with the mixed use is that if you allow it if
1:31:21
you can go back to the M if you allow it in that maker Village core you will be
1:31:26
bringing residents in that may not want to have the music or some of the other
1:31:31
activities uh in the evenings or on the weekends so that is it’s a compatibility
1:31:38
issue potentially uh I’m talking about in that
1:31:43
core yeah all all four of those will be impacted by the commercial cuz they are now cuz it’s
1:31:50
Altimont Brewery there it’s visit right mhm so uh
1:31:57
let’s go ahead I I think what’s what was on the table that we didn’t quite get a
1:32:02
decision on May we can do one more show f is on that bottom corner there shall
1:32:08
we keep let me ask the question should we keep that as housing who would like to keep it as
1:32:13
housing uh I think the options are going to be keep it as housing uh convert it
1:32:19
to make a village or allow mixed use so those are the three options I’ll throw
1:32:24
out so I saw just a couple of hands for keeping as housing who would like to have it convert to maker
1:32:31
Village only a couple who would like to go to mixed use
1:32:37
see we got three four four SP okay so
1:32:43
it’s not a majority but it is the most hands that we got on this so we’ll bring back to you an analysis of mixed use uh
1:32:50
in that area quick question can you go back to the maap mhm
1:32:56
sorry so like I’m trying to understand kind of where everybody’s coming from cuz like if the vision for this actually
1:33:04
is Crea a visitor destination that supports production and maker spaces
1:33:09
that serve as a gateway to South lore Wine Country like um housing on
1:33:18
Basco um and the type of housing you know it’s like obviously you drive
1:33:24
further down Vasco and it’s you know Vineyard gate and all those you know
1:33:30
really nice homes but you know there’s some that have Blended in with all the trail and everything um that would not
1:33:37
be the case here um and would look more like what you have at the corner of East
1:33:46
and Fasco and then obviously like further down as you drive um you know back towards Patterson
1:33:53
and all that so I’m just trying to understand why anyone if this is
1:33:59
actually the vision would try then and like support the housing as far as this
1:34:06
vision goes I understand people have a lot of philosophies on housing in general um so it would just kind of be
1:34:13
like maybe we should change the vision then because like there’s not much like
1:34:19
South limore Wine Country Gateway messaging with more housing on your
1:34:24
gateway right or am I missing something I think at the back of our heads or the
1:34:30
back of my head is we’re always going to have this Vina element uh especially if we go to the
1:34:38
Las Positas and uh two of the groups said no change so we’re not adding any
1:34:44
housing element on one of the purpose areas so it’s always going to be yeah
1:34:50
that element but arena is not like our vision it’s not liver board’s Vision but
1:34:56
it’s it’s a mandate though yeah I mean like in that case Reena should be can I
1:35:02
ask a clarifying question yeah are you talking about just on Bas or are you talking about along the entire length of research well I think they’re two
1:35:10
separate I mean I understand like why David is saying what he is as far as
1:35:16
like the housing up at research in East Avenue yeah like on that side I like I understand why
1:35:22
but like to also try and add housing on Vasco so like it’s really those two
1:35:28
calots like Wood family that’s you’re talking about yeah because like what housing are you going to put in there high density yeah but not like the rest
1:35:35
of resch Drive we’re just talking about just medium maybe it’d be helpful to put the
1:35:40
types up I mean helpful for for the whole crowd cuz we have the
1:35:47
books but they don’t it’s that medium high density medium high Road of
1:35:54
town yeah it would be like a I I mean the people who would move into them are
1:35:59
the ones who like to go out at night yeah or people who work at the lab I suggest that uh we really don’t have
1:36:06
enough data at this point that just a non confined to one uh Direction so so
1:36:13
we will if it’s okay with the committee we’ll evaluate some mixed use and at least that gives you another land use
1:36:19
type to consider and so we’ll do a little bit of evaluation for that in that uh bottom corner
1:36:26
there any other comments on this Focus area otherwise uh we will ask you to to
1:36:31
vote to approve the changes that we’ve made so far so this approval is not to say that
1:36:40
is the final direction is to say this is the consensus based on our exercise and
1:36:47
then we are asking for a lot more data even after this so I feel comfortable saying moving
1:36:55
forward to the next Fus area I we vote on the side second wow look at that
1:37:04
y second you vote on the direction that’s
1:37:10
contain this okay so we have a second okay so that’s thank you so much for
1:37:15
having a very uh helpful first case maybe the next case we have to call R yes we do oh
1:37:23
thank you okay this is the vote part the oh this is the vot part this is the vote part okay de please yes thank you so uh
1:37:31
Committee Member Alexi I Committee Member vaa I committee me member j i
1:37:39
Committee Member Halverson no Committee Member Kent I Committee Member Kingsbury
1:37:46
hi Committee Member Leone hi Committee Member Pete
1:37:52
can I say we need a yes or a no is
1:37:58
that it’ll be counted as a it be counted as a yes not a no remember this is not the last time
1:38:05
that you’re going to get to see it but either yes or no is
1:38:10
fine yes okay Committee Member rala I
1:38:16
and Committee Member Stout I the eyes have it
1:38:24
oh so
1:38:30
sorry so I have 10 eyes in one name thank you so much D this time CH we
1:38:37
would like to move to the next Focus area but we’d recommend we move to the east of Greenville Focus area um there’s
1:38:43
uh some folks in the audience that would like to speak to that item okay so we’re changing the sequence okay Jo you welome
1:38:56
okay thank you very much uh let’s skip ahead to east of Greenville this is
1:39:02
obviously a focus area that has attracted a lot of attention throughout the process uh so we have three
1:39:08
alternatives for the east of Greenville Road Focus area has been mentioned tonight this is um just over 11,000
1:39:15
Acres located east of Greenville Road um it’s west of the aqueduct that’s the
1:39:22
curvy line and um south of 580 the southern edge of this um goes down to
1:39:28
Patterson Road uh the city added the east of Greenville Road as a potential new
1:39:33
growth excuse me job growth area given the amount of um residential uh
1:39:39
potential residential infill that’s being considered in the other four Focus areas based on the feedback that we were
1:39:46
receiving from the gpac um from the business and Commercial community in in Livermore in the direction from the city
1:39:52
council and the vision for this area is to establish land uses that support Innovation and technology companies in a
1:40:00
complete District to be able to host a mix of jobs services and amenities um to
1:40:05
really help the city meet its long-term FIS fiscal sustainability goals and again um find a way that this can serve
1:40:12
as an inviting gateway to Livermore um South Livermore Wine Country so you can
1:40:18
see from these Alternatives um uh that that there is no residential in any of
1:40:24
these Alternatives all three Alternatives contemplate a different mix of um industrial that’s the purple color
1:40:31
uh commercial that’s the bright red color um maintaining existing public or
1:40:36
utilities uses that’s kind of the light blue color um and then a new research
1:40:41
campus idea that might be some sort of partnership with uh educational Institutions and the labs taking
1:40:48
advantage of the proximity of the labs which are just um across uh across uh
1:40:53
Greenville here and I misspoke earlier I apologize um I said it was Patterson it’s not um
1:41:00
Patterson is in the midpoint of the um of the focus area here and then the
1:41:06
other two land uses are uh this dark green would be a regional Sports Park
1:41:11
type of um amenity and that that happens in alternative B and alternative C in
1:41:17
the darker green color that you see the lighter green color would be some sort of agricultural um or open space green
1:41:23
belt or um uh protected area to preserve open space that might be a thicker band
1:41:30
um kind of going lengthwise down the area as an alternative a it might be a very thin band as an alternative B it
1:41:37
might be a larger kind of solid more Consolidated chunk um in the northern
1:41:42
part of the area as in alternative C and then all three Alternatives also include this kind of light green wine Catalyst
1:41:48
site um at the southern so when we uh heard from the community
1:41:55
at the all of the different events that I listed earlier in the presentation we did hear a pretty wide range of
1:42:01
perspectives from the community about whether or not it’s appropriate to consider Urban uses in the east of
1:42:07
Greenville area for the folks who are open to considering that um people uh
1:42:15
responded to Alternative a by um saying that they would like to see an increase
1:42:21
in the commercial and agricultural land in that alternative um people who were more drawn to Alternative B would remove
1:42:28
the sports park reduce the amount of land dedicated to that research campus use that I talked about um and replace
1:42:35
some of the commercial uh with industrial and for those who preferred alternative C they would also remove the
1:42:42
sports park move the research campus to a different area that’s a little bit flatter more topographically easier to
1:42:48
develop and increase the amount of open space so um we did hear as you can see
1:42:54
here that um if there is a sports park in this area the locations as initially drafted in the alternative seem maybe a
1:43:01
little bit too remote and too hard to reach um folks were interested in planning for a wild life Corridor at the
1:43:08
old 580 underpass thinking about connectivity and site access this is pretty undeveloped at this point um and
1:43:15
so that would really be starting from scratch in terms of connecting and integrating this area into
1:43:21
existing uh Livermore roadway Network um one thing that motivates
1:43:27
people to consider supporting development here is an increased tax revenue through develop of this area
1:43:32
development of this area but they would really only want to see that happen if the types of industrial uses were something um more than just um
1:43:40
warehousing folks did point out a number of folks have pointed out that the topography in this area is pretty hilly
1:43:46
and could make Industrial Development challenging so when we did our workshop
1:43:52
with the gpac in November uh group one started with alternative a relocated the
1:43:58
Sports Park from the south uh to the north and added a green belt to the east
1:44:04
uh maintained the agricultural site in the South added a little bit more of commercial General north of Patterson
1:44:10
Pass Road in the in the middle there where you can see in the marker um maintain the existing public uses and
1:44:16
designate all of the remaining area with that purple General Industrial designation there was interest in kind
1:44:23
of letting the market determine where the research campus would be located rather than identifying a specific
1:44:29
location for that on the land use map Group Two started with a blank map
1:44:35
and colored it in uh their alternative would add a sports park in the southeast
1:44:40
of the focus area again that’s the darker green that you see kind of on the Outer Edge change the wine Catalyst site
1:44:46
to open space maintain the public designations add had open space buffers
1:44:51
along both West and East you can see the kind of vertical green stripes there designate the majority of the focus area
1:44:58
in again the purple General industrial they did include space for a research campus that’s the blue and black stripes
1:45:05
and then designate the small triangle that goes um west of Greenville Road as
1:45:10
mixed commercial and Industrial and then finally from the third group of the gpac uh Workshop they
1:45:17
started with alternative C and revised that to replace some of the what had
1:45:23
been the bright red commercial General south of Patterson Pass with the um restriped research campus so that would
1:45:30
go all the way to Greenville Road so in attempting to kind of
1:45:36
synthesize that and give you a starting point for your discussion tonight um we’re starting with um an idea of
1:45:43
starting with alternative a but relocating the sports park to the north
1:45:48
and using the research campus idea from um alternative C so just to rehash
1:45:54
this is um where we would start with alternative a there would be a research campus I’m sorry a sports park kind of
1:46:01
in in the northern part of the focus area somewhere and then you would pull
1:46:07
over that striped blue and red research campus from alternative C and use that
1:46:12
kind of larger shape in alternative a so again that is the kind of starting
1:46:18
point for the gpac um discussion
1:46:26
tonight comments first yes okay okay so
1:46:31
um I appreciate your patience I know it we took a while to finish the first Focus area so um I would still like to
1:46:40
be as efficient as possible and uh ask that you you uh really address this
1:46:46
particular Focus area yes in a larger context but it’s speaker again will have
1:46:52
3 minutes and um please be patient with each other and um should I just call
1:47:00
could you please call I do have a couple of cop card already for this specific area so I’m going to go with that order
1:47:06
first and then we’ll see if there’s any additional ones I have Jean King
1:47:11
first do you want me to come up there you’re going to come to me
1:47:17
okay but do I have to can I sit down yeah you can okay I’m not as mobile as I
1:47:23
might have been one time okay um I have a couple comments it turned on get it
1:47:30
really close to your mouth yeah now can you hear me there you go okay I’m sorry okay thank you for letting me sit down
1:47:36
I’m not as mobile as I was I I want to emphasize that what should be considered
1:47:43
in this area is no plan at all and I think it has been a mistake that it was
1:47:49
not mentioned at a lot of the meetings but there is there should be the option
1:47:54
that there is no plan here that you do not use this area and there are several
1:47:59
reasons why you should not do that for one thing is that
1:48:05
um if if you if you if you even if you move it
1:48:10
out and you say there’s going to be no housing that’s not going to make it permanently that there’s no housing that
1:48:16
can be changed in the future research can always be done in the open campuses
1:48:23
of both Labs both the lab and the Sandia lab they have open campuses and research
1:48:29
facilities can be in those things and open to the public and the if you want
1:48:34
open space just leave it the way it is in the county open space don’t you don’t need to stay and change it I attended
1:48:42
the workshop at cochi school and the vast majority of attendees did not want to develop the area west of Greenville
1:48:49
and overwhelming number of dots that showed the priorities of the attendees
1:48:54
were on the place for leave it as open space I don’t know how the other workshops and popups works I don’t know
1:49:02
if they were given a choice of priorities and I do not know if they were ever given a no build for that area
1:49:09
if all options were not always given then the Outreach statistics are incomplete and flawed it is premature
1:49:18
and in a significant waste of taxpayers money to commission an environmental impact report eir for developing the
1:49:26
land east of Greenville section uh option number B this land is protected
1:49:32
by an urban growth boundary ugb that the residents of Livermore strongly support
1:49:38
besides there is no current need to consider lands outside the ugb for
1:49:43
additional development there is sufficient land within the ugb to
1:49:49
accommodate res residential commercial and Industrial Development for at least the next decade and almost certainly for
1:49:56
much longer than that the statistics of the population that have been given in
1:50:02
the reports by the city are incorrect our population is not that great now and
1:50:07
there is not estimates for increased growth why develop precious open space
1:50:12
land when there are alternative locations inside the ugb to accommodate
1:50:17
any actual growth for the foreseeable future future intensive development in North Livermore and east of Greenville
1:50:24
Road would be extremely costly it would destroy our harm agriculture Wildlife
1:50:30
wetlands and watersheds open space and Scenic Beauty air pollution and traffic
1:50:36
congestion would be exacerbated it would eliminate diversity in land use and impair the character of Livermore and
1:50:43
the sense of place of its residence none of these rural areas now has public infr
1:50:50
structure and facilities for Urban Development development east of Greenville is a mistake at this time
1:50:56
thank
1:51:02
you
1:51:09
Paula um I’m Paula Peterson and I agree with um Jean 100% uh I do believe that
1:51:18
there should be a no project plan uh as a choice I don’t think that was
1:51:24
discussed um also I I kind of feel that so I I
1:51:30
attended the um environmental meeting last week um and I was feeling a little
1:51:39
bit I I guess cheated because I got a notice saying that I had a voice but
1:51:47
when I got there we have already put this in place um I was told
1:51:53
$300,000 has already been marked to do this Environmental Research on this
1:51:59
property that the city hasn’t hasn’t even approved yet so I guess I’m a
1:52:06
little concerned on what decisions are already being made or that have been
1:52:12
made that we haven’t heard about that have taken place because I was
1:52:18
completely under the impression that when I was going there I was going to get a choice to make do we do it or not
1:52:24
but we’re doing it now um along with Los uh Lin Road they are doing that as well
1:52:30
but for the Greenville side um the the
1:52:36
city hasn’t the population of Livermore hasn’t even uh heard or had a choice I
1:52:43
saw we’ve reached a thousand people for this comment but there’s over 880,000
1:52:50
people in the city so I’m a little concerned about how we’re reaching out
1:52:55
to our uh residents when we have 880,000 choices now I don’t even get to choose
1:53:02
because I live on that property where they’re talking about turning into
1:53:07
industri so I don’t get to even choose or have a choice if this is going to happen or not my my destiny of life is
1:53:16
in all of the city’s hands and so I I just want to make sure that messages are
1:53:22
being completely honest and out there so that when people do have to make a
1:53:28
choice they know what choice they’re having but furthermore I’d like to just
1:53:33
make this no choice and have this no not even on um the plane um that’s thank
1:53:48
you
1:54:01
duck I can
1:54:06
address green is on I want to address the members
1:54:13
here so um I participated uh 20 plus
1:54:20
years ago uh in the last go around of this and I just want to point out
1:54:26
um that was a different time um the people there were many people who
1:54:34
eagerly wanted to be where you are it’s been hard to find you and thank you for
1:54:40
all agreeing to do this it takes a lot of time and personal energy uh but we
1:54:45
had former mayors former elected officials people very deep knowledge of land use and people who had frankly made
1:54:53
mistakes in their careers with land use and didn’t want to make them again so
1:54:58
they served and they were able to come at this from a really just deep life
1:55:04
experience way and I know not all of you have that um and so it it sort of uh put
1:55:11
you at at a bit of a disadvantage um the second disadvantage um is that um that
1:55:18
we we didn’t have last time is that we weren’t led by a company like placeworks um place works leads these
1:55:27
processes like they led the downtown in directions that the people don’t want it to
1:55:32
go and um you didn’t hire place works you were stuck with them just like we’re
1:55:38
stuck with them um and there’s nothing we can do about that now but we can fix
1:55:43
one thing the breaking of the urban growth boundary is highly unpopular you
1:55:49
know that there is no reason to do it now and it
1:55:54
screws up the rest of your plan because if you’re depending on this area to provide you uh land uses um that are
1:56:02
just not going to be there you need to completely redo the rest of your your focus areas um if you need to add a
1:56:10
focus area somewhere else in the city that you haven’t added now maybe you need to do that um but the urban growth
1:56:18
foundary is going to this is going to run into a brick wall um the residents are not going to pass a breach of the IR
1:56:25
Road boundary and I hope that you will grab the bull by the horns change
1:56:30
direction on this and uh not go east of Greenville thank
1:56:37
you thank you uh Mike Frederick do you want to speak on Greenville yes I do
1:56:48
okay
1:56:56
I’m Mike Frederick um I’m on the eler
1:57:01
county uh conservation Resource District board I’m on the County Agricultural
1:57:09
advisory committee and I was on the TVC I’ve uh been involved with them for a
1:57:16
long time I’ve been involved with the land use issues a lot around the area of
1:57:22
Livermore expanding Beyond Greenville seems to be driven by the desires of a single industrial
1:57:29
user uh who will provide few jobs considering the amount of land that
1:57:34
would be used placing industrial
1:57:41
uses but up against the canal that supplies many of
1:57:47
The Vineyards south of the area seems like a profoundly bad
1:57:53
idea uh I should mention that the um the I always want to say the ACR CD because
1:58:00
the name’s too long just got a $7 million Grant to study placing animal
1:58:06
crossings in areas around the Bay Area particularly one of the focus areas is
1:58:13
580 and so there’s very good possibility that will be an animal crossing in in
1:58:19
the area that you’re talking about and my first question is do you really want mountain lions being fed into an area
1:58:27
that you’ve developed industrial that area should be kept if not wild and it
1:58:33
isn’t wild now at least as least developed as possible eliminating the Greenville
1:58:41
component which doesn’t seem to be presented as an option even though it’s been mentioned here tonight that maybe
1:58:48
we shouldn’t have that component uh eliminating that component seems like
1:58:55
a great idea keeping it will throw the city into another devisive struggle like
1:59:00
the Downtown Development I think the vast majority of Livermore residents can find consensus
1:59:06
around all the other areas keeping the east of Greenville component will create
1:59:13
divisive op devises or I’m sorry vigorous opposition uh to the moving of the urban
1:59:19
growth boundary and could cast negative sentiment on the rest of the process
1:59:25
thank you very much for your
1:59:38
time uh Mr Scott do you want to speak directly about Eastville east of
1:59:46
preville on this Focus area yes
1:59:52
Greg Scott breaking the urban growth boundary and sphere of influence it’s
1:59:57
absurd and it’s absurd because Livermore you can’t even maintain the infrastructure you have now and I can
2:00:04
give you an example for that I used to live in the Royal mocho I mean lived
2:00:10
there and if you remember February of 2017 it rained it rained quite a bit I
2:00:16
was living in that Creek I watched it rip up the concrete the bike pass it goes crazy one night I had these guys
2:00:24
come around me they had a little boy trailer and bulldozers and equipment and all these people showed up and the
2:00:29
highway patrol showed up and they’re all staring at me and the highway patrolman had The Bravery to come talk to me say
2:00:36
what are you doing here I go I live here and he kind of walked away like I was some sort of Martian but they left me alone why was I not afraid because I
2:00:43
watched what the water did and I also at the time attended the City Council meetings and the city council spent over
2:00:50
time they finally figured it out $650,000 to do the fixes that rain was nothing compared to this historical
2:00:57
record one historical record is The Rains of December 1861 through January
2:01:02
of 1862 it rained 10t in most of Northern California it rained 5 feet in
2:01:08
Los Angeles so Robert Livermore Jr knew exactly where to build his house we can’t maintain the infrastructure we
2:01:14
have now against something like that and what do we have coming we have extreme weather coming it’s a matter of
2:01:20
understanding the primary atmospheric component out there over the Pacific it’s called the Pacific Walker
2:01:26
circulation we have we’re not considering this this extreme weather that’s coming our way and it’s going to
2:01:32
hit this and we’re going to build we’re going to expand our infrastructure when we can’t even maintain our current infrastructure against this how does
2:01:39
this make sense it doesn’t you know you’ve got a lab over here that spent
2:01:44
$80 million over four years on software for is called the Earth
2:01:51
exoscale Earth Earth I mean excuse me energy exoscale Earth Systems model does
2:01:57
anybody look at that what what’s going to happen you know what what we’re facing and we’re going to expand the
2:02:04
perimeter and make ourselves less resilient and more vulnerable somebody tell me how that
2:02:11
makes sense it it doesn’t we’re we’re up against you know it just rained in the
2:02:16
Olympic Peninsula it’s 65° de it’s unheard of it rained in one town
2:02:23
3 and 1/2 in in in 24 hours in there it’s unheard of for the Olympic Peninsula where it tends to rain do you
2:02:30
think we’re ready for it we’re not we’re making ourselves more vulnerable less
2:02:35
resilient by expanding the infrastructure when we should be concentrating on our current
2:02:46
infrastructure does anybody else have a card in the audience that’s all I
2:03:07
have good evening hi um my name is John Stein Bush uh as many of you know I’m a
2:03:14
property owner in the east of Greenville um additionally I’m an active commercial realist a broker here in the tri valley
2:03:20
and have been for many years and with cers um first of all I want to thank the members of the GAC and the staff for two
2:03:28
years of tireless work on this project um this is a you know I guess the the
2:03:34
the most well attended night we’ve had in two years or you’ve had in two years I’ve been at all of them also um but uh
2:03:42
I just wanted to digress short a little bit you know the the the general Plan update is something done by every city
2:03:49
in California it’s required by law it’s done typically 20 25 years and it’s the
2:03:56
place where the community looks at where they are with respect to their rules and
2:04:01
regulations which is their General plan which is the map for the future and they
2:04:06
make adjustments as to where they think they need to go for the next 20 to 25 years your
2:04:12
committee as you applied for your positions you were interviewed you were selected and you spent two years working
2:04:18
with the city to advise them the staff and the Planning Commission and the City Council on a plan that will work for the
2:04:25
next 20 to 25 years that includes changes where changes need to be made um
2:04:32
and for all of that work you should take a lot of Pride um so I wanted to point
2:04:38
out some of the facts that led to the city looking at thece of Greenville and
2:04:46
I again I’ve been at this uh on on the commercial and Industrial side for a long time and um these are the facts
2:04:54
during the last General plan cycle in Livermore which you know is about 21 22
2:05:00
years 893 Acres of commercial and Industrial land have been
2:05:05
absorbed that amount includes 204 Acres of retail and Commercial 39 Acres of
2:05:12
office 408 Acres of industrial land 70 Acres almost 7 Acres of
2:05:19
expansion land inventory by companies that have their uh facilities here think
2:05:26
of companies like gillig topcon form factor and others and more than 171 Acres of public
2:05:35
infrastructure in the last 21 22 years the public infrastructure is it about
2:05:40
580 interchange the extension of jackon Boulevard West out to the outlet mall
2:05:46
all of the streets sewers w water utilities and storm drainage around the outlet mall The Oaks Business Park
2:05:53
Streets uh um um West Los paas Boulevard
2:05:58
in East Livermore so storm drainage basin Zone 7 canals interner changes all of these
2:06:06
improvements make life in Livermore easier better and more efficient for its
2:06:13
citizens and a lot of that development is done through these projects
2:06:19
like Oaks business park or the outlet mall that get approved and get built
2:06:25
within the city today there remains only about 131 Acres of commercial and
2:06:30
Industrial land left some of those Parcels have dual Zoning for residential
2:06:35
and they’ll likely be developed that way and the other Parcels are typically remnants or poorly shaped or they not
2:06:44
very well located for development so the work your your committee is doing is
2:06:50
what’s expected to be done in a general f update look at what’s happened over the last 20 25 years and project what
2:06:58
you’re going to need over the next 20 to 25 years
2:07:04
um and then you come up with a plan that you can recommend to the Planning Commission and the city council and the
2:07:12
city council will adopt something that they’ll promote to the C C now if a
2:07:19
vote of the urban growth a vote to move the urban growth boundary is warranted
2:07:24
uh by the plan that the city council puts forth then that they would put it forth as that would is the plan that
2:07:32
would be best for the community for the next 20 or 25 years and let the citizens decide through a vote so I uh I
2:07:41
compliment you for your work please keep up the good work and uh thank you for the job you’ve
2:07:47
done splend
2:07:56
splend good evening everybody I’m Spen sporio and I’m here on um on behalf of
2:08:02
innovation Tri valy leadership group which is a a the business leadership group for the tri valley represent all
2:08:07
the major Employers in town such as the the labs and Stanford Tri Valley healthc Care and lamb research um our CEO Kitty
2:08:16
Marcel send a letter in either last night or earlier
2:08:22
today a couple years ago we released uh our vision 240 plan for the entire
2:08:28
triality we hired uh the economic Institute of the Bayer Council to help
2:08:34
us to do that it took us a couple years to do that one of the things we found is
2:08:40
that the DI diminishing amount of of commercial land in the tri valley and so
2:08:48
what you I think what I what I’m hearing is that there is uh a lount of Commercial Business serving land has
2:08:54
been reduced to a smaller level and what we found is that it’s not unique to
2:09:00
Livermore it’s the same thing going in San Ramone Dublin and
2:09:05
Pleasanton and um so we urge you to take a look at our vision 2040 plan and
2:09:12
realize that we know took the time to study this problem and it is a real problem and it and here’s something I
2:09:18
learned about yesterday morning it’s not unique to the tribal I went to a breakfast um where the mayor of San Jose
2:09:26
Matt mahy spoke you know what he talked about the loss of business serving indust uh
2:09:33
business serving land in the city of San Jose and you think how that be possible it’s the biggest Geographic City in
2:09:39
Northern California they’re concerned about it because they understand that what it brings is jobs and businesses
2:09:45
that support the quality of life we all enjoy in the bay so thank you very
2:09:53
much uh Stacy
2:10:04
Logan hi thank you I’m Stacy Logan want to thank you all first of all for being on this committee little bit of history
2:10:10
about myself I was raised in Pleasanton we moved to Livermore 24 years ago when we bought our house I love this town I
2:10:17
love that Livermore Pleasanton have kept it from looking like another city in this Tri Valley that doesn’t look great
2:10:24
I love that the citizens here are so involved and are paying attention to what is happening to try to make sure we
2:10:30
don’t turn into something like that city as far as the east of Greenville goes
2:10:36
that’s our gateway to Wine Country we don’t when you’re driving from the freeway down towards Wine Country you
2:10:43
see beautiful Hills on the left you can kind of ignore all the industrial on the right if that’s all built up you’re going to going to lose that I have a lot
2:10:50
of friends who are land owners in that area multi-generational ranchers they’re
2:10:56
grandchildren are now learning how we all eat you know all all of our food how
2:11:01
to raise crops they want to stay there they’re very afraid that if the land use
2:11:07
changes even if they don’t sell their property taxes are going to price them out of being able to live where their family has lived for Generations that’s
2:11:14
not fair the other thing at last month’s Workshop that I went to six out of the eight tables all said
2:11:21
they do not want any development east of Greenville they gave an alternative as a
2:11:27
worst case scenario in case it’s voted in but they all said no development finally since a lot of you
2:11:34
probably live in the city and you see the full moon when it comes up once in a while I see this every time I drive out
2:11:39
to take care of my horse at night next full moon which is going to be on December 26th drive out towards
2:11:45
Patterson past ridm park your car and watch the moon come up over the hill it’s going to be
2:11:50
around 10:30 it’s absolutely stunning to see it come over those Hills if we build out there we’re going to lose that and
2:11:57
we’re already losing too much of that already thank
2:12:02
you uh Julie
2:12:09
wild hi good evening I’m a new resident of Livermore
2:12:14
and I agree with so many of the speakers that just spoke it’s one of the reasons that we love
2:12:20
this area it’s we don’t want the urban growth boundary extended either it needs
2:12:26
to stay open open space for these I mean now you’ve even inspired me to know that
2:12:32
there are families that have been there for Generations why why mess with it and if this is what the community is saying
2:12:37
hopefully you’ll take that to heart and and remove it um and we just moved I’m
2:12:43
surprised to hear from the gentleman that we need more space we just moved here from Milpas and there are so many
2:12:49
empty Office Buildings in mil pis and in San Jose so that that surprises me I
2:12:55
didn’t know that um because with my own eyes I see that there are so many empty spaces and they’ve been there for years
2:13:02
we were in mil Pedas for 2 years those buildings are still release they still on the market so I don’t know where that
2:13:09
part came from but uh yeah we don’t I don’t agree on this um and the other
2:13:15
thing too um even moving here to liore and talking to my neighbors about this
2:13:20
because I was you know I found out about this I would say 10 out of 10 of the
2:13:25
Livermore residents don’t want the urb growth boundary to be to be changed they
2:13:30
love the open space here at Li mors please keep it that way thank you thank
2:13:37
you is there anybody else who would like to speak on the east of
2:13:46
Greenville
2:13:55
I did not come prepared to speak so forgive me uh my name is Carolyn Lord
2:14:00
and I like what people said about why are we discussing County Land we’re not
2:14:06
even discussing Livermore land the urban growth boundary um I totally understand
2:14:12
what splend was saying about warehousing spaces I had to go down to Carmel today
2:14:17
on business and drove by all big til tubs that are in Morgan Hill but also to
2:14:23
know that’s what Tracy’s doing so I think Livermore needs to see well maybe
2:14:28
we don’t have big Warehouse spaces because it’s being um accommodated by other cities other towns things change
2:14:36
you know you can say oh well there’s not big Warehouse spaces going on in San Francisco but look at all the creativity
2:14:43
there we were just talking about Basco Road oh maker spaces there’s different kinds of business at different seasons
2:14:50
of the city it’s never going to stay the same um you know what used to be the
2:14:56
edge of a metropolitan area we have to realize we are in the middle of What’s
2:15:02
called the urban Umbra of San Francisco that goes from San Francisco to Reno we are not at the edge we’re not at the end
2:15:08
of the road anymore and then also uh my husband is a a retired facilities
2:15:14
architect from the Lord’s Livermore labs and when he started working there in oh 1974 75 he had old Labs go oh my gosh
2:15:23
those Hills are hot cuz you have to remember the EPA the lab’s been there for a long long time for like 20 years
2:15:30
before the EPA been started and going oh we need to put filters on our Stacks so
2:15:36
who knows what has floated over there and then having that in mind um oh about
2:15:41
8 years or so ago I was doing a painting project and I was painting off at Greenville Road and I was talking to a
2:15:47
man who owns business and he goes oh yeah people have come here and they’ve decided no they don’t want to be there
2:15:54
knowing the longterm you know kind of questionable stuff that drifted from the
2:16:00
lab you know the kind of things that you know the site 300 kind of stuff as well so I think it’ be best just to leave it
2:16:06
as it is it’s inappropriate to even uh you might say covet that land and to say
2:16:13
oh well just because I want it doesn’t mean it’s appropriate sort of work within your back that the city has done
2:16:19
that then work it okay thank
2:16:25
you uh
2:16:37
Tina thank you um my name is Tina D I first came here in the 50s my parents
2:16:44
brought me here I grew up here I raised ra my children here and then I moved
2:16:49
over the peninsula for 20 years and I came back um I actually own a property
2:16:55
in this area that you’re talking about um and first of all I want to thank you for your service I just found out about
2:17:01
this effort about 6 weeks ago um I mentioned that my husband and I left for
2:17:07
20 years and came back and we came back because we like liore and one of the
2:17:12
things that we’ve talked about with each other is what a great job we feel like Livermore is done in the last 20 years
2:17:19
how much change there’s been and we’ve enjoyed all of it the downtown the um
2:17:25
the wine industry and we’ve been very impressed with how Livermore has planned and
2:17:32
executed to bring these changes to life um so when I first heard about this
2:17:39
I was actually very open to the idea that Livermore would plan something in the neighborhood where I live because
2:17:46
the neighborhood that I live in doesn’t seem to have a plan at all right now um
2:17:52
and we have three sides to our property this is an example one side’s the lab and then there’s three other sides to
2:17:59
our property and in the last year two of those sides have been come become popup
2:18:06
um maintenance yards that are not permitted and they’re not monitored and
2:18:13
they’re not enforced by the county so when I hear
2:18:18
have no plan that doesn’t mean that there’s not a plan there’s other thing that’s happening anyway and so I don’t
2:18:25
know exactly what plan you all will come up with but I’m super intrigued about it because I feel like
2:18:33
Livermore has done a great job and I feel like you all are doing a good job and I’m really interested in the thought
2:18:40
that Livermore citizens and livermore’s infrastructure and livermore’s planning might bring what
2:18:49
they brought to other parts of lore to that area so those are my thoughts thank
2:19:02
you anybody else like to speak to easn Greenville I of
2:19:14
course one thing that I just heard about the plans um and I thought I’d mention is that the South part of Livermore does
2:19:21
have a plan right I think it’s called like the South Livermore General plan or something like that right it exists
2:19:27
doesn’t it okay and it just has a bunch of conserved uh
2:19:32
land around it just a bunch of free and open space and when it comes to
2:19:38
expanding Livermore it seems like all the pressure is placed on the northern part then and that happens to be where I
2:19:43
live so I take a problem with that if I lived in South Li maybe I’d say that’s great but I don’t maybe one day I will
2:19:50
but um yeah that was one thing I wanted to say the other thing was can I see other
2:19:55
slides here this uh Community input slide I
2:20:00
found interesting because when I came to the second Workshop that took place I
2:20:05
don’t know the name of the school that’s on Scenic um yeah I spoke with you Joan directly a
2:20:14
lot and you handed out these packets to us and you insisted that I write everything that I think down and I did
2:20:20
even though I hated doing it um but I asked you many times what are you going to do with these packets are you going
2:20:26
to convey this information to the city somehow and when I look at this for Greenville I I don’t see anything you’re
2:20:33
representative of what I saw at that workshop at all the only Community input I see here is that actually we’re going
2:20:39
to start at the same place that you were always going to start at anyway so that
2:20:45
seems like that was a point point with second exercise doesn’t it and it’s it’s
2:20:51
actually hard not to take it personally to know that if if I have to deal with you in the future and your company that
2:20:57
this is how you handle your workshops I don’t think that’s I don’t think that’s a very nice of you so uh the other thing
2:21:05
I wanted to say and I think the gentleman left I don’t want it to be
2:21:10
like a personal attack but something that I think should be considered is
2:21:16
when I when I look at the city of Livermore I I or when I look at anything I trust my
2:21:22
own two eyes I don’t look for somebody to aigh in some kind of institution some
2:21:28
kind of establishment of multiple corporations or something like that or the mayor of San Jose because the mayor
2:21:35
of San Jose probably has something similar to say to what our mayor has to say Marsh and I know that he’s very Pro
2:21:41
build and and he wants this development to go through and I’m not interested in hearing their opinions because
2:21:48
um the studies and such that they may or may not site uh have a
2:21:55
financial uh backing that preserving open space is
2:22:01
not and uh so I think what you should focus on instead of these opinions of
2:22:08
some kind of think tanks and such is uh the opinion of the people and I think
2:22:16
the opinion is clear I just hope that you uh take it to heart thanks thank
2:22:28
you okay
2:22:34
Charles hi um I’m Charles I us to go with Tina so I want to talk a little bit
2:22:40
more about the lack of management in Easter green bille because you’re right when you say there when you say no plan
2:22:47
is not on the list and no plan is never going to be on the list because because the the plan you
2:22:54
talk if you look at the county the plan is solar panels um and and battery backup storage
2:23:02
we’ve been contacted by people for both of those on our property we get called by people who want to put their trucks
2:23:08
on our property and you know and we we bought that because I’m I’m from West
2:23:14
Virginia it’s rural I like the country we intended to build our we have a
2:23:19
caretaker weend to build our house when the independent took a picture to show how pretty Easter greenv
2:23:26
was they took a picture of our barn that we store but I don’t want you know the if
2:23:32
you leave it to the county you can wait 20 years and you’ll drive down east you’ll drive down uh Greenville Road and
2:23:40
what you’re going to see is the solar panels and you’re going to see battery back up because that’s that’s what the
2:23:47
county is permitting and if you want to do something for the winery and you live in and you live in the county they won’t
2:23:54
let you say that you wanted to do you want to do a Tasting Room well you can’t
2:24:00
do a tasting room because to do a tasting room you have to have wine processing so you say okay we’ll do wine
2:24:05
processing but in order to do wine processing you have to have sewer you have to have water you bu County won’t
2:24:11
permit it because you don’t have anything to do to deal with the waste water it if uh say you want to have an
2:24:18
event center the you know the people that are on Basco they you know we’ talked to some
2:24:24
of them and and they say it would be great to have a place where we could have our monthly wine wine meeting you
2:24:30
know our wine club meetings and things like that we don’t really have space for that that would be great you talk to the county again you can’t do that because
2:24:37
you don’t have because you don’t have the other things you don’t have those other things because you don’t have the services and I’m not really here to bash
2:24:44
the county they have no way of putting in a sewer system right they have no way of doing those
2:24:49
things and and really we talk about liking the wine industry but the wine industry is in trouble people are taking
2:24:56
out their Vines because and we’ve looked at that right so if you look at what it cost to put in Vines it’s like $35,000
2:25:02
an acre the last 20 years um you can make a couple thousand
2:25:07
dollars a year on those so you do the math it makes no no sense so the people
2:25:12
who put in the vines under the conservation eement are are taking them out I me I mean I know that people here
2:25:19
like they probably know a lot more about the numbers than I do but they’re taking them out and what we really need Tina
2:25:26
and I were not looking we we want to build our house there we want to live there or we did but we don’t want to live next to solar bers so we do but
2:25:34
since we’ve learned about this we really need to think about this whole holistically how do we how do we help
2:25:41
the South Livermore the a wine industry and and what are the things that we can
2:25:46
do the other things to help with that so just want you to you know think more globally then that little patch of
2:25:52
ground that’s that we’re on that you go down my thank you thank
2:25:59
you anybody else um I’m going to make out the last
2:26:04
one so we can move on thank
2:26:15
you I’m Jane Gibson um I I appreciate all of
2:26:22
the effort that is being put into this but I am I am not
2:26:29
understanding and I would like an answer from the committee why you feel we have we have
2:26:38
to expand our boundary for what reason we have as it
2:26:46
was pointed out there’s a lot of um spaces already here that in instead of
2:26:53
the city giving our permit to build a new one tell them no until our existing
2:27:00
structures are filled up and improved and working we’re not building more new
2:27:08
structures I don’t understand why that can’t be done but mainly I’m not
2:27:13
understanding why you all seem to think that we have to move we it’s so
2:27:21
important to Annex or in move the boundary over to the canal it doesn’t
2:27:27
make sense to me I think that that it just doesn’t make sense to me
2:27:35
and a lot of that I don’t know if that property on that’s all of the Greenville area I don’t know if it’s privately
2:27:42
owned or if it’s just open County space or what um so I I I don’t exactly
2:27:51
understand all of that um I was at the um cochi school at that
2:27:59
workshop and um as it’s been said by a couple of people there were eight
2:28:06
tables six of those eight tables did not want to extend the boundary why is that
2:28:13
being ignored thank you for all the stuff you’ve done thank you so much and we really
2:28:21
appreciate your opinions um what you have said really helps uh inform our
2:28:26
understanding of uh the the public sentiment and your considerations your
2:28:32
uh personal uh situation and cases so again we appreciate the kind of input
2:28:38
that you take the time to provide so I’m going to move on and just say that in
2:28:43
interest of time uh I would like to invite our committee members to
2:28:53
chime I know there’s a lot to be said don’t
2:29:02
fight let’s see the map again as we look at the bullet point that’s on the slide so there’s only one bullet point which
2:29:09
is a actually kind of questions here so maybe I maybe I’ll
2:29:17
try to start store some discussion points um
2:29:23
so um my personal journey to this point is I have been Amazed by what the
2:29:30
community has provided to me personally and I think the city is thriving and I
2:29:38
had two children who grew up here uh as an immigrant I benefited um by a lot of
2:29:44
resources here and I appreciate the kind of planning that a city like L
2:29:49
more is providing for us in order for the community to continue to thrive uh
2:29:56
we often have to really think ahead and balance really many many competing
2:30:03
priorities and I would like to have our decisions and thinking to be well supported by uh thorough research and
2:30:12
thorough methodology of obtaining the research in order to inform our citizens
2:30:18
in order to inform our community to make the best decisions that will leave a
2:30:23
legacy once we you know once personally when I’m not here but my children and
2:30:29
our children will benefit so personally I would encourage us
2:30:37
to think about possibly some data with
2:30:42
and without the Greenville Focus area and without that we really don’t have
2:30:50
true a true picture of whether that is going to help with a couple uh
2:30:56
considerations we have in order for the city to continue to thrive um
2:31:01
unfortunately just like personally I have to make money in order to enjoy our
2:31:07
quality of life so tax generating Revenue um quality of jobs I think very
2:31:15
very for that I’m able to enjoy the kind of quality of job not just the job the
2:31:22
quality of job that the city is able to provide me personally so that my family can Thrive so that is also a very
2:31:29
important consideration but we don’t know how to make that decision and um so
2:31:35
we need really to consider whether we can do that without the Greenville is a green or maybe we are confined to really
2:31:44
look inwardly or possibly hourly in order to ensure that the Next Generation
2:31:52
continue to thrive and is that enough to start the conversation I don’t want to
2:31:57
so chair if it is helpful for us to recap again I said at the beginning of the meeting that there will be the
2:32:04
analysis that will come out of this preferred draft preferred land use scenario will include not an option with no east of
2:32:11
green bill so that the committee is better prepared to understand the impacts of
2:32:17
both from a land use standpoint fiscal standpoint all the tools we’ve used to provide the analysis to this point what happens if you don’t include Greenville
2:32:23
what happens if you do and you’ll have the opportunity to revisit all of that information and decide how you want to
2:32:28
move forward with land use uh the land use preferred alternative yeah I personally am satisfied with that
2:32:33
because I would like to have more data and I would like to really believe that
2:32:38
um a lot of consideration is is really for the benefit of the future uh
2:32:44
Vitality of the city and please chining um yes oh yes thank you
2:32:51
save me uh last speaker I was wondering if you can touch on uh you know who who
2:32:57
currently owns it um and what would happen if we don’t extend the boundary is it true that we will see um solar
2:33:04
panels or or will it say exactly how it is for the next 25 years so it’s most of the land out there is privately owned by
2:33:11
a variety of different Property Owners it’s under the jurisdiction of alam County so they have current land use
2:33:17
control and um because there’s existing County zoning and rules uh Property
2:33:24
Owners can make decisions about what to do subject to those rules so they the land may not stay as it is there will be
2:33:31
uh changes in use or exercising certain land use rights such as solar or other
2:33:38
uses that would be permitted under County zoning the other thing I would add so this is out at the Far Eastern
2:33:44
edge of the county and and we do see a number of uses out there that don’t seem to be permitted so I don’t know that the
2:33:51
county is is actively enforcing their land use regulations as we might like
2:33:56
but um Andy is correct there is a set of regulations out there that are supposed to guide the land
2:34:04
uses um just as a clarifying question several of the public comment focused on
2:34:10
there being open space in this EAS can you just point out what which is actually like protect in open space
2:34:17
right now versus just owned by different private owners but and not developed
2:34:22
because they haven’t decided to develop so I’m not sure if there’s any
2:34:28
conservation easements within this area that would make them protected it’s designated for large parel lag and so um
2:34:35
it just hasn’t been developed okay undeveloped but not open
2:34:41
space protected open space in the way that we have talked about those words you cont there’s not yes there’s no deed
2:34:48
restrictions limited to just open space and in fact as Paul alluded to there are
2:34:53
um some industrial zoning zones out there and you can see that there’s also
2:34:58
some industrial activity that as Paul said and is we’ve communicated with County staff are not permitted they’ve
2:35:04
just organically emerged over time the um other thing I would add is
2:35:10
that because there’s an urban growth boundary the city does not extend or is not permitted to extend sewer or water
2:35:17
service to that area and so that also acts as a limiting factor for what can
2:35:22
happen there any development uh permitted under the large parcel egg would need to be developed on a SE
2:35:28
septic system for
2:35:34
example so just one more clarifying question about the process we know that
2:35:39
the next time we evaluate these or it won’t be these it’ll be one alternative
2:35:44
with the research behind it right is that and so there will be an option if
2:35:51
we don’t touch this site if we don’t make any designation um so what we’re
2:35:56
doing tonight is if we were to do anything on that site after a public
2:36:03
vote to extend the urban growth B so there’s multiple steps here what we would want to do more or less yeah so we’re we’re
2:36:10
taking all the input for all the focus areas including Greenville and looking at in a Citywide map we’re going to
2:36:16
evaluate that for a lot of the variables Mr Carell just talked about in addition we’ll evaluate all all those scenarios
2:36:22
without any Greenville to see what the tradeoffs would be but tonight what we need to do is know that not like having
2:36:31
no change to the plan is still on the table yes but we if we assume that we’re
2:36:37
creating the option to have a change and that’s what we’re debating and what do you want us to
2:36:44
study if we have only uh 100
2:36:54
some um Acres available for commercial land from this point uh knowing that 20
2:37:02
25 years um ago until now we used up
2:37:08
over 800 speakers uh what would happen um
2:37:17
I think I know the answer in my head but uh as an economic uh planner um what
2:37:23
would be the impact of not having additional land available for commercial
2:37:30
industrial needs um that’s that’s typ difficult to
2:37:36
say with Precision um but I would say that certainly uh new development
2:37:43
is um less complex than Redevelopment and so if you were looking at something
2:37:51
like not having an east of Greenville alternative you would be saying that we’re basically going to allow for the continued development of the remaining
2:37:57
land um and as has been pointed out uh and I think it is accurate that many of
2:38:02
those Parcels are relatively small they’re not particularly well sized um shaped or located and so you would see
2:38:11
some new development on the remaining empty Parcels um which are relatively few compared to the last 20 years and
2:38:18
then you would have to see Redevelopment uh so something that exists today either in that same land use category or that
2:38:25
could be rezoned through a future General plan Amendment would then result in the construction of the type of um
2:38:31
use that was uh lucrative enough to Warrant a Redevelopment project I think
2:38:37
one of the things that’s important to consider for the group is what are you trying to achieve um with this whole
2:38:43
exercise and when we’re thinking about the entire map if you look at the east of Greenville component the vision for
2:38:49
that is mostly centered around um high quality jobs which is can be Loosely translated into jobs that pay a wage
2:38:56
that’s commensurate with the cost of living in this area or somewhere closer to it we’ve seen a roughly 10% decline
2:39:02
in the number of people who are living and working in this community over the last 15 20 years so now it’s about 20%
2:39:09
of liore residents are also working here um there are a whole host of reasons why people work where they do and live where
2:39:14
they do but if you want to have jobs that someone could afford to live in the community and work in the community you
2:39:22
need to have spaces for that and I think so that vision for East of Greenville of
2:39:27
supporting technology companies high quality jobs um leaning into the Innovation and Science and Technology
2:39:34
identity of the community when we bring back the different Alternatives that have an EA Greenville non green but one
2:39:40
of the things you’ll have to consider is if that’s an important vision for the gpac and for the community where does
2:39:45
that happen if it doesn’t happen there and that’s why I think the the no build option for E of green bill is important
2:39:51
to look at because you’ll have to then rebalance your priorities and understand how that Vision then can be translated
2:39:58
into other parts of the community and achieve some of those same outcomes and what’s the trade-off for
2:40:05
that I’m sorry I’m back on my so boox so on that note um I think we like to go
2:40:12
back to re uh revisit our vision and the community characteristics Community
2:40:18
Values and really think inwardly and see how we want to see our community uh do
2:40:24
we want um the community that has a job housing ratio to be like uh certain city
2:40:33
maybe we should Benchmark them and maybe for the sake of explaining that goal uh
2:40:40
really again the goal of how we want to see ourselves uh one of the metrics
2:40:46
seems to be the job quality job and housing ratio for a good match so maybe
2:40:54
as part of the data Gathering maybe the project team can provide the community a
2:40:59
better definition of a certain uh housing job ratio so that will uh help
2:41:07
us achieve our vision and our goals and
2:41:13
values yeah I think it was done the slide earlier but I’m not sure so I’ll say it again that part of the analysis
2:41:19
that we want to look at is not just a jobs housing ratio which is the number of jobs to the number of housing units
2:41:26
but what are the characteristics of those jobs um we have several thousand
2:41:31
jobs in the community that are retail service jobs Transportation um warehousing jobs that
2:41:36
don’t pay what we consider to be a living wage to move into this community or even to live in this community if you’ve been here for a little while and
2:41:43
so some of what the committee may want to consider is what happens if you look at the analysis of jobs that are
2:41:49
available here not just in number but in terms of those other characteristics um and that can be part
2:41:54
of the analysis I think is one of the filters that we’re planning to to apply to this so that you can make a decision
2:41:59
about comparing Apples to Apples when you’re talking about jobs generated for example through neighborhood serving
2:42:05
commercial retail uses at the Midtown Station area compared with engineering or scientific jobs in an R&D setting
2:42:13
somewhere else in the community
2:42:18
have a question um and we’ve had a lot of meetings and I I’ve forgotten more than
2:42:25
I probably remember from the meeting so might be factor of my age but um can you
2:42:33
remind us to refresh why in this east of Greenville area we picked the entire area why why are we analyzing the entire
2:42:41
area and we subsets of that area considered
2:42:50
so the the committee in general was interested in in the vision that was laid out for East of Greenville and um I
2:42:59
think the idea was to study the entire area uh what we’re looking at now is ref
2:43:04
finding a map that we want to study and so if you wanted to revise uh any of the uses within this
2:43:14
area we certainly could but I I I think the initial uh
2:43:19
evaluation or interest was in the types of jobs that Mr cwell has talked about and um looking to see what maximizing
2:43:27
that land use type might look like the other thing we heard from the committee early on was that um there was not an
2:43:34
interest in residential or or other types of land uses in this area that residential did not seem appropriate
2:43:40
here and so that left us with job generating uses which is is what the
2:43:45
committee ended up uh suggesting for these Maps so that’s a bit of how we got
2:43:51
here but we are interested today again to refine based on of the comment that
2:43:56
you heard tonight that Joanna talked about receiving from the um from the
2:44:02
thousand people that we talk to at uh 30 or 40 different public uh popups and
2:44:07
events and activities so um and then obviously your own experience what you’ve learned on the committee we’re
2:44:13
looking for you to synthesize that and and provid us some Direction a part of the conversation also was the aqueduct
2:44:20
being just a natural barrier for this just to go from Greenville all the way
2:44:25
to the aqueduct and then in terms of the the space right I think that was more your question was why this why so big
2:44:32
yeah I think that was yeah so it more geographical than the what the the what the more the geographical question I
2:44:38
think because that line along the border is the aquifer and it’s kind of right that is the South Bay Aqueduct
2:44:44
so that AAL boundary very correct on the Eastern Edge and then we heard from the
2:44:50
tri valley consy early on that some of the property on the southern boundary
2:44:55
was uh more suitable for uh Wine Country related uses and so you see the wine
2:45:00
catalist site in each of the Alternatives based on that feedback yeah because the whole area is
2:45:07
quite large I mean and some of the speakers were referring to lands that are really in the purview of the range
2:45:14
Land Trust they’re up in the hills the canal um is there because that was the
2:45:21
low point so you know they ran the canal where it was the path of least resistance so The Logical buildout of
2:45:29
the city has always been that Canal before the urban growth boundaries were put in it was designated the urban
2:45:37
Reserve um I had no issue in 2020 when they put the urban they just drew the
2:45:42
straight line down because because you know they put over a th000 Acres of
2:45:48
Farmland inside the urban growth boundary and the desire was to infill
2:45:53
that land first and then you wouldn’t have you know the voters though maintain
2:45:59
the right that at some point when you’ve used up all the land uh you know
2:46:04
building houses and the outlet malls and attracting businesses um that we would
2:46:10
um we could go back to the urban Reserve if the citizens wanted to do it but the
2:46:16
the canal really marks the end of the city once you get past the canal the slopes become extremely steep extremely
2:46:23
fast I mean the many of the slopes are so steep you couldn’t even plant Vineyards on them because there are
2:46:29
Hillside ordinance as it relates to how steep you can you can’t Terrace anymore
2:46:34
that’s a bad practice for erosion so this is the the piece that the city has
2:46:41
long identified as where they would put Industrial around the airport which is
2:46:46
mostly done and east of the city now east of the city used to be what’s
2:46:51
Midtown it’s a little hard having this conversation before Midtown because Midtown was the light Industrial Area it
2:46:59
was east of the city but then the city annexed the labs and all of a sudden
2:47:05
what was the east of the city is now Midtown and the new east of the city is what’s left on the east side the west
2:47:12
side of the canal because that was is always the topographical limit and and
2:47:18
Livermore sits in a valley it sits in the Livermore Valley Watershed and that is where the
2:47:24
Watershed drains to and that’s why the canal is there so that it’s not a big
2:47:30
area in the context of everything we have all the way up through the Altamont but it is the area that that the city
2:47:38
has long looked at doesn’t mean you have to develop it I I agree with chairman Shang that you know i’ I want to see the
2:47:46
the no development option as well because I think it has implications um if we if we stop
2:47:53
converting if we stop infill housing on light industrial land then we’re still
2:47:59
going to have to hit the Reena numbers we were all excited when we heard that look we’re good for Reena with infill
2:48:06
housing not only this cycle but probably for several Cycles Beyond it’s not the
2:48:11
10 years Miss King talked about it it could well be 40 or 60 years before the
2:48:16
city would need to go outside of infill if you don’t build Midtown if you don’t
2:48:23
put residential and that’s satisfying the vast majority of our Arena requirements for this cycle that were
2:48:29
that were now you filed for and the ones after that then um there’s only one
2:48:36
place to go and and that is North Livermore and that’s where the urban
2:48:42
growth boundary was a battle over it was over we’re going into North Livermore um but measure D sunsets if if the city
2:48:50
can’t achieve its Arena numbers as infill it can go back into North
2:48:56
Livermore uh measure D just simply forced the city to look at infill and higher density prior to taking taking
2:49:03
that step so you know I think we came here because I think the vast majority
2:49:10
of people and the citizens would rather continue to build a neighborhood like
2:49:15
Midtown then um and replace the light industrial land east of the city which
2:49:21
has always been our policy for multiple General plans then try to go in there
2:49:27
and refight the battle of the north the south is under conservation so
2:49:32
you’re saying you’re saying if we can get the residential in Midtown right
2:49:37
there’s no pressure to go EAS res no and it was never the city’s
2:49:42
policy to go with housing East it was always to put the light industrial East
2:49:48
and at the airport and put the the housing in transit oriented places where
2:49:54
people can you know access connectivity and buses and Bs and things off is to
2:50:00
get Midtown available that Light commercial goes
2:50:07
east basically or it’s future replacement like commercial goes east so
2:50:13
that midtown’s available to avoid going nor to
2:50:19
meet yeah you or we I mean obviously we have lots of options the staff knows them better than us including we we have
2:50:26
state mandated housing requirements so we have to build housing I think many of us are here because we believe the city
2:50:33
needs more affordable housing but affordable housing is a two-way street you have to have jobs that allow the
2:50:40
local people to afford the houses in their own Community um we we don’t know what the job housing match is I’d like to see
2:50:47
benchmarks of other communities what is it in Santa Rosa what is there are other towns like here San Louis abiso you know
2:50:55
that are kind of Fringe Coastal Wine Country areas um but you know from my
2:51:02
vantage point the Census Data came out I did a cursory study of it our ratio should probably be 2 to one because the
2:51:10
average um house in Livermore is so expensive both both people have to
2:51:16
work and so the the idea that you know you can afford your house on one income
2:51:21
is not um yeah there are some fortunate people who can do that um not many of
2:51:27
them actually live in Livermore though I mean so you know that’s that’s what Woodside is built for in Atherton um
2:51:35
this is uh you know it’s it’s a challenge to afford a home here and over the years in the last 20 years we’ve
2:51:41
lost half the people who both live and work in liver we’ve driven them out the lab hires lots
2:51:48
of people and you know I live on Greenville I see where they go They’re not driving West they’re driving east
2:51:55
because they work they live in Trac and mountainous because those homes are relatively affordable for the jobs you
2:52:01
have in Livermore so how do we attract better quality jobs we have to build more affordable housing but we also have to
2:52:08
have jobs that pay better and that’s not been the history of this town
2:52:15
and Brandon knows all that because I think at the last meeting we had with the wine Growers and others you’re
2:52:21
you’re spouting off the details about um what what the jobs pay here versus what
2:52:27
they pay elsewhere it was
2:52:34
sobering and I tell you Wine Country jobs don’t pay well either I mean there’s um there’s not an employee in my
2:52:42
family’s company who wouldn’t be well there’s two that would not be eligible to live in Eden Housing
2:52:50
downtown but we’re the best employer in town in the line country but those jobs
2:52:56
you know Tasting Room managers make $40,000 a year how do you afford a
2:53:03
house on 40,000 a year you got to have a spouse who also works I know I’m out of
2:53:09
order but I’ll be quick I’m sorry I’m sorry okay that’s key within the committee uh discussion sorry um any
2:53:17
other committee comments a question right uh just to give us an idea of
2:53:22
what’s happening in the county land uh you mentioned uh
2:53:27
unpermitted activities there can you be more specific what are the activities
2:53:33
there that are not permitted and why is County not well I know that you know probably can’t answer for the county but
2:53:40
is it too East for them to really care about this portion of Al the county so
2:53:47
we met with County staff as part of our engagement just normal course of operations I let them know what the city
2:53:54
and the committee is contemplating and they acknowledged that this area has
2:53:59
had several code enforcement issues over the years um and those things are
2:54:06
activities like dumping illegal storage those types of uses um going on right
2:54:12
now yeah and some of them been cleaned up some of them are still ongoing um
2:54:17
they didn’t we’d have to do more you know ask more questions about what exactly is going on um and I wouldn’t
2:54:24
want to speculate on why or why not um code enforcement is going on out there um it’s a large County they have limited
2:54:31
staff resources but and just to add in this is is more
2:54:38
editorializing but most of the time people will seek the most productive use of their assets
2:54:45
and when they don’t have a pathway to legitimate productive uses of their assets and other things happen uh until
2:54:52
there’s code enforcement and they certainly we would all like to see more enforcement from the county of what is and is not allowed out there um but they
2:54:59
have a number of competing priorities in Alam County as you may have guessed um and so we do see things like in you know
2:55:05
dumping dirt fill and other types of roadway storage and things I’ve seen it having been out there it’s it’s not
2:55:12
great and we’d like to see that stop irrespective of the east of Greenville conversation um but I think that is the
2:55:18
motivating factor behind it is that people can make money doing it so is there like the any information
2:55:27
on how the land owners um preference would be to be part of the city so that
2:55:34
like um that that land is better managed and can have things like
2:55:42
sewer or do they want to stay in the county so it’s it’s mixed we’ve been meeting with some Property Owners some
2:55:48
property owners are interested um we want to hear from them about what their long-term plans are for their property
2:55:54
just like in in all of the focus areas um others are intrigued but not
2:56:00
yet sure that’s what they want to do and others may not want to do it at all so we’re just still as Brandon said taking
2:56:08
property owner feedback and it’s it is trickling in so if we present an option to expand
2:56:16
the urban go boundary but keep the same designation that that County currently has on that land is that maybe a better
2:56:23
option for the time being well that that’s really up to the
2:56:30
feedback of the committee to to take a look at that um if
2:56:38
you if you brought it into the city with a large parcel ad designation uh this
2:56:44
the city would perhaps be more proximate and and better able to monitor the land uses from a code enforcement perspective
2:56:51
um you wouldn’t you wouldn’t see much change beyond that so I guess the question is is that is that a worthwhile
2:56:58
thing to do to add a clarifying point just because the urban growth found moves
2:57:03
does not put it in the jurisdiction of the city the land would also have to be annexed and that’s a process unto
2:57:13
itself
2:57:19
I want to make sure I uh we all have the opportunity to speak on this topic I
2:57:26
think there will be some action needed so we can uh really address other Focus
2:57:32
areas I know it’s been a very long day and I had an 8:00 meeting this morning so I’ve been
2:57:39
working anyway just like you have don’t open a copy
2:57:47
luy you we should havee now okay uh please
2:57:55
um any other comments from the committee I’m really sorry uh that we really want to follow the procedure and I don’t need
2:58:02
to really dismiss any comments and I apologize for I just had one quick question in terms of the sports park uh
2:58:09
are there any other Alternatives if you know or is this really the only alternative for sports
2:58:16
park in terms of like if we decide you know if we do have to have one in this area if it is better to have it like on
2:58:22
the North side so perhaps go back to the map
2:58:29
um if I recall I think there were a couple of reasons for the interest in the sports park one is it’s something
2:58:35
we’ve heard uh from from residents within the community that there’s a need for the second piece was there was some
2:58:41
thought that it might be an amenity for people working in this area and especially those uh who can think about
2:58:49
where to locate high-tech jobs like the idea of locating those jobs near um near
2:58:55
near amenities uh in terms of the land itself the Northern Area is much Hillier
2:59:03
and uh and is will be more challenging to develop
2:59:08
uh just as it would be more challenging to develop industrial uses there it may be more challenging to develop a sports
2:59:15
park you’d have we’d have to take a look at it and and take a look at what the size might be it’s it’s a rather large
2:59:20
area so it doesn’t mean that you couldn’t um and in terms of where else in the community um it’s an interesting
2:59:28
question and the city itself is not really in the Parks business right it’s LPD which is a separate entity that is
2:59:35
in the is in the Parks business I I think they’ve heard as well that the community is interested in additional
2:59:41
parks and additional Sports Parks uh um there are not too many large Parcels
2:59:48
within the city itself that are um easily convertible to a sports park um
2:59:54
and I’m I’m not much more of an expert view on that I don’t know if there’s additional comment on Parks or
3:00:00
LPD not on the parks LPD fece except to say that you absolutely don’t have to keep it in here if you don’t want to it
3:00:07
was added as we wanted to create three different Alternatives that gave the community something to react to gave you
3:00:12
all something to react to but if you feel that site is better utilized for something else that’s more consistent
3:00:19
with the vision it’s completely within your prerogative and we we’ll take your direction on that we can move it North
3:00:24
we can get rid of it we can do whatever the committee develops consensus around is the parks department prepared to fund
3:00:32
it without seeking Community benefit from the
3:00:38
city so um we have not had extensive conversations with LPD
3:00:44
I suspect that what you would do if you wanted an amenity within this District
3:00:50
would be to require all of the land owners to pay a a proportional fee
3:00:56
towards the development of that Community amenity that that could go towards open space that could go towards
3:01:03
a variety of different things that are amenities if if you wanted to have them
3:01:08
the development could help pay for those and and it potentially could help pay siphon to siphon funds
3:01:14
from conservation is going to put us at odds with the conservation Community green Bel Alliance Sierra Club is is
3:01:22
whenever the cities have annexed open space like Pleasanton and Livermore did in the South the funds from that were
3:01:29
used to acquire the 5,000 Acres of conservation easement there’s not an acre under conservation easement in this
3:01:36
area now and there’s a reason there was never any funds for it because it was never meant to be conserved if it was
3:01:43
meant to to be conserved the 5,000 Acres that are entirely in the South some of
3:01:48
them would have been in the East but they weren’t because that’s not what the plan was and so now we’re trying to
3:01:56
build a new green belt and we want a wildlife Corridor and all these other situations we want to preserve the view
3:02:03
corridors um the the money from that from this development is going to be
3:02:09
required to fund those activities it’s you know you won’t end
3:02:14
up with an Eastern green belt around Livermore which would you know you have to buy the development rights off the
3:02:21
lands right if you want to stop development and if you want to clean up the the toxic dumps and the debris
3:02:27
burning sites and the pallet dumps and you know there’s lots of stuff going on
3:02:33
there there’s trailer parks and a lot of vehicle storage because they leak Diesel and they’re not allowed to be parked
3:02:38
anywhere in the city um or even at the wineries we got got our inspection Monday they come out
3:02:46
every year so that’s why everybody’s moving their vehicles out there we don’t
3:02:51
but I know plenty who do because those are extremely toxic things that are that
3:02:56
are going on there so to your comment so how do you clean that up if you take the
3:03:02
money away from the conservation Community I was just pointing out and I’m not suggesting that you do that so
3:03:08
there there will be Revenue if you develop this there would be revenue on available for the types of uses you’re
3:03:15
talking about and if you want to concentrate them on open space reservation and clean up and those kinds
3:03:21
of things uh certainly you could remove the sports park as a potential cost
3:03:27
um uh that could compete right yeah or if the parks District sees the need and
3:03:33
wants to fund it then it’s that’s a horse of a different color it’d be a lot easier to put it in I don’t think you
3:03:39
can put it next to the highway because you know I I’m old now but I I had kids
3:03:45
um we hated playing in Tracy we hated playing in Dublin we did like playing in
3:03:50
Danville that wasn’t bad they just had to level that you know that soccer field that’s out there where they basically
3:03:56
cut the mountain down but the kids got very fit running up and down the stairs took me a half hour but uh you
3:04:05
know that’s you know I don’t I don’t know if you can build another sports park next to a highway um but the data
3:04:12
you’ve shared with this committee keeps talking about particulate matter and all of this and I I interpreted that as
3:04:19
that’s a non-starter yes if it were feasible we would have stuck it up and lost the seat this
3:04:25
court so we did have some conversations with LPD as part of this process showed
3:04:32
them the different Alternatives they were open to the idea of a sports park um just because they’ve signaled that
3:04:38
there is a community need for those types of fields but they also did say um
3:04:44
that development Park fees collected from development could be reinvested into the existing system to to provide
3:04:51
those opportunities for additional Sports and play so to Brandon’s Point um
3:04:56
it’s kind of up to the committee if this is a appropriate location for one it doesn’t have to be you can choose not to
3:05:02
have a sports facility in in this
3:05:07
location I recommend I recommend we go back to the bullets and then we move for what I I
3:05:15
know that again um we don’t seem to have enough data as far as feasibility so
3:05:20
that’s look at you know Source part I do recognize it’s the need Poss we we just
3:05:26
don’t know where that that’s so that again a lack of data so that’s think about that so please help us uh move
3:05:33
forward the agenda what would you like us to do I think we’d like to see if you want
3:05:40
to make any changes to to the to to what we have on the screen and what we would
3:05:46
study if you want to make any modifications at all whatever you’d like to change you can make it as a
3:05:53
suggestion and the committee can talk about it you want to go B back or we can start there okay but the first all is
3:06:00
not V to write certainly it could be I mean this is what we interpreted from
3:06:06
the three tables that got together at a previous meeting the workshop where the committee members met as Joanna talked
3:06:12
about the the closest thing to consensus was to start with alternative a but tonight
3:06:20
if you all decide you want to start with b or c or some other thing you could certainly do that as well let’s take a vote if we don’t have
3:06:27
enough vote clearly we need another alternative to start with does that make sense the lack of consensus means it’s
3:06:33
not a good starting point okay does that make sense okay
3:06:40
um I I’m going to ask to raise your hand and for bullet one if you feel that
3:06:45
alternative a is a really good starting point with modifications again more data
3:06:50
to support any you know changes and please raise your
3:06:55
hand just start with alternative
3:07:01
a thank you okay um second um again I’m not sure North is
3:07:10
really I don’t know maybe I’m Mish hearing we just we just don’t know so we
3:07:15
could modify this and first ask the question of do you want to include a sports part and then we could talk about
3:07:21
location okay e Okay add a sports park
3:07:26
period add Sports Park question mark add a sports park question mark but we we
3:07:32
going to vote whether we should add a sports park how about that just regardless of the location cuz you’re
3:07:38
going to help us so I’m going to vote CU my two of my children both my children love sports and they had to dve we had
3:07:45
to drive so far four only four okay so is that
3:07:55
enough no that’s not enough so those most part okay that’s good I respect
3:08:01
that okay um research campus um again we don’t
3:08:08
know really we’re not talking about the size um but we are talking
3:08:14
about okay so should we decide between a and C exactly what size we’re talking
3:08:21
about because I don’t know if you know alternative C is a direct move with that size can we
3:08:28
commment on that what is the good size why don’t we let the committee why don’t
3:08:34
you guys work that out what’s that the see with the
3:08:41
resarch back discuss about what we heard was let’s choose the
3:08:47
largest research part out of the three options okay and so I guess the question
3:08:53
for the committee is are you okay with that okay that’s both first on the size
3:09:00
I would just say on the discussion what’s wrong with starting with a smaller one and if if the labs whoever
3:09:06
is going to sponsor the park they could buy the other Parcels around them and I
3:09:13
mean because it’s it’s all a technology park at one level or another if it if
3:09:18
it’s owned by a university and deel or whoever runs the
3:09:23
labs these days um you know can’t they decide that just take it take it out of
3:09:30
the light industrial space yep that’s absolutely one of the options on the table I’d also point out but I like
3:09:35
keeping a little piece in just because I think the community has to be focused that this is a need that we’ve heard
3:09:43
repeatedly about having an open campus and just in the interest of because we
3:09:49
have the introduction of of mixed use alternative as something sort of in between or a new one in the Vasco area
3:09:55
I’d also just offer to respectfully remind the committee that we have other Industrial Place types as well so if you
3:10:01
had a goal of higher job generating uses but still in the commercial industrial
3:10:06
range you have the mixed industrial office product type which is more R&D
3:10:12
and life sciences and Tech focused than the general industrial is but not quite as much as as potentially restrictive as
3:10:19
the research campus so you have some gradations you can play with here as well if that’s something that you’re interested in but we don’t have that
3:10:25
color we don’t have you you don’t on this in these Alternatives but it exists
3:10:32
as one of the place types we’ve used in other places obviously does that mean we should it just means it’s one of the
3:10:37
options for you just like we introduced a mixed use residential commercial industrial into the Vasco row concept
3:10:43
your full range of place types is available so if you didn’t want to have basic General industrial and research
3:10:49
campus as your only two binary options there are other things you could consider well we spent a couple hours on
3:10:56
this I don’t know four or five meetings I think the one thing we all I think there was consensus is we don’t want
3:11:03
distribution centers like the ones being built in Tracy because they don’t bring high paying jobs or the or the density
3:11:09
of jobs there’s too few jobs right because they’re automated um I’d like
3:11:15
to please tell me about the procedure I’d like to um suggest that we keep it
3:11:20
the you know designation of research
3:11:27
campus um that not lose that Flav sure that’s one that’s the bullet point the
3:11:32
third bullet point is I think two parts one is to have the research campus which is clearly stated here and then the
3:11:39
option C of the research campus relates to the size and comme member K ask but now we’re
3:11:45
talking about a fourth bullet point that would say all the things you know because you know the technical language
3:11:51
is we want the high-paying job kind of research and development not the stuff being built
3:11:57
and Tracy I would suggest you answer the first question first is do you want a research Park and then I would suggest
3:12:03
we go yes to Brandon’s question which is do you want to add another type of land
3:12:09
use to evaluate which is perhaps focused on hired and I’m not suggesting that only the
3:12:15
research campus could become a mixed industrial office any of the land could become one of those those Place types
3:12:21
that we discussed so you can answer the first question first and then move on to the other ones that’s that’s first just say we want to keep the flavor of the
3:12:29
research part and have a vote on that have one more comment oh question on the
3:12:35
research uh I’d like to start to say that um I’m in favor of a research part
3:12:42
but my question question is and I know this question has come up from uh the community uh about visibility of
3:12:49
research uh being done inside uh the open open Camp I would recommend
3:12:56
separating those two um yeah but just yeah just to answer the community whether it’s Peaceable not or I think
3:13:04
they both can be pursued but they both could be rejected so good there are just so many moving parts so why don’t we
3:13:10
focus on whether this Focus area should have a research campus you know um just
3:13:18
adding another variable which ISC pass
3:13:23
theate so I think that first question Cherry to your point is show of hands should there be a research Park
3:13:30
designation yeah but I appreciate the the idea that we need to look at all the
3:13:35
variables that’s yes thank you so second question yeah is which alternative do
3:13:43
you want or some other sizing option that’s there I I have a question just for
3:13:50
reference I mean what kind of size are we talking on alternative a versus C in real terms like in acres I don’t know
3:13:57
that top my head
3:14:05
80 as big as the madeup winery is going to move
3:14:11
in
3:14:18
so that say that on the micop
3:14:24
I so for scale the small red commercial piece in alternative a is about 7 to 10
3:14:31
acres so per scale what shopping centers in Livermore
3:14:37
of that size the Nill Portola
3:14:43
it’s about the size of a commercial center but trying to extrapolate it looks small but so so to answer your
3:14:50
question that’s 7 Acres and the small smallest research campus is four or five
3:14:56
times size that can you remind us uh the rationale behind wanting to take
3:15:02
alternative C for the size that is the feedback we heard from
3:15:11
the the each of the groups conveyed a different uh feedback on the
3:15:18
research campus and that’s what we’ve interpreted is move alternative C do
3:15:24
remember whoever recommended moving C to do I think it’s just people the the
3:15:30
coloring of the the charts is kind of what they’re deriving that from and we can go back and probably look at some of
3:15:36
them but some of them had it some of them didn’t but it was really just like looking at what the group started with
3:15:42
with like you know and then how they colored it in they kind of just realized our Stephanie from our group was the
3:15:49
smallest yeah I remember that so I was curious how this even then too big sum
3:15:55
it’s true this is why we’re going to so if you don’t like that this is our I
3:16:02
think we were looking at the coloring of your maps and some of your comments and trying toct maybe was confusing even to
3:16:08
ourselves so we did Miss I just want to make sure we miss some important
3:16:13
and this is why we’re doing this exercise to confirm that we’re getting your direction correct okay so one more
3:16:20
time do we have any memory of why someone might have prefer alternative
3:16:28
SE I mean I’m going to be honest I don’t think that matters if if we all come to a consensus that we like a smaller one
3:16:34
that someone can grow into and purchase around it doesn’t matter what we discussed last time we can all vote and say let’s start with a smaller one I
3:16:40
agree I was just trying make will be somehow and that quick quick glance so don’t hold me to this the small research
3:16:48
campus is about 50 acres plus or minus kind St okay so I’m going to vote to
3:16:55
strike alternative C part of it but just say ensure the you know Spirit
3:17:00
designation of research campus without from alternativ SAR alternative a would you
3:17:07
focus us towards alternative a then okay um that’s a very question do we say
3:17:15
alternative a is a good starting point can we vote on that we already did well
3:17:21
just just be sure and how big is the parcel 40 45 acres is I think it should be small looks like you want a
3:17:28
smaller I know the size of the par below it’s the smallest one yeah somewhere between 50 and 60 quick Google Map
3:17:35
sketch so plus okay let’s I just mod say starting point alternative a I’m
3:17:40
completely personally so I think we have a yes alternative so strike the from alternative
3:17:47
SE do you want to ask your other question um well as as Andy is
3:17:53
Whispering to me with no Sports Park and the start with alternative a and then a
3:17:58
smaller version of the research campus you essentially are saying go with alternative
3:18:04
aily right with with respect to the bullets that are on the slide so if you wanted
3:18:10
something that deviated from alter as you see it here we need to add those things to the slide to give us direction
3:18:16
to make changes right so I think there are two questions one was one
3:18:25
Brandon two questions I think remaining one is do you want to add a land use
3:18:31
type that is a business Commercial type that perhaps brings some higher paying jobs I think the second question before
3:18:38
we reach the end is uh are you okay with the open space shown in alternative a or do you want to
3:18:44
change the open space designation can we write those two bullets up just so I I
3:18:50
think those are very important questions just so we understand one at a time one
3:18:55
is the um mixed industrial office that and that
3:19:02
that is currently not on the maap we would whether we like that flexibility is what we trying to decide would you
3:19:08
like us to evaluate some of that that’s right okay the second uh the open space uh distribution uh yes
3:19:17
thank you so one time we may also need to add something
3:19:23
to the ad mixed industrial office because for us to prepare a map we need to know approximately how much and approximately where what are you looking
3:19:29
to change but we can start with the do it or don’t do it and then figure that part of it out okay so the spirit of
3:19:36
that is so that if there’s a need to increase the research campus there a
3:19:42
interest in um other drivers that will offer
3:19:47
flexibility I think the reason to contemplate a mixed industrial office use is because it would be somewhat less
3:19:54
restrictive from a zoning standpoint than the research Park use might be um
3:20:00
but perhaps more restrictive than a general office would be in terms of ensuring that your your uses were higher
3:20:06
density so it’s going to be somewhere between a general industrial and a research park that’s where your mixed industrial office is from a job density
3:20:12
and likely job quality standpoint yes the key is quality okay
3:20:20
um so vote yes and no is a binary
3:20:25
vote then we can talk about if it’s yes then we can move on to talk about how
3:20:30
much and where so binary go for adding the the help to have quality job
3:20:38
so I’m for it so C the distinction we have now does
3:20:45
support it this is just making it a little bit more defined in terms
3:20:50
of what would go there correct so the the general industrial allows variety of
3:20:56
different types of industrial use a wider net it’s it’s a right it’s a a
3:21:02
more inclusive I’ve got it here the general industrial says includes manufacturing warehousing R&D recycling
3:21:09
facilities and heavy industry that uses stores or processes Raw materials so that’s your most broad industrial
3:21:14
category it also includes things like R&D and and uh manufacturing but it
3:21:19
doesn’t necessarily preclude the other things of course that can be changed as we go through if we go through specific
3:21:26
planning all kinds of things can happen there the industrial office designation includes research and development
3:21:32
high-tech processing uses such as Life Sciences but not heavy industrial uses such as traditional manufacturing
3:21:40
MH more questions I’m sorry I forget to turn my head this
3:21:45
way so I mean in terms of the wear right I mean we don’t want to get rid of all
3:21:52
of the general that’s a do the binary first cuz if we say no that’ll be done
3:21:58
okay is that okay so the wear is next would that be okay just okay binary yes
3:22:05
or no you want to have for mix for mix industrial office at the broadest
3:22:12
definition of okay so that’s answer is yes okay please would Prelude uh
3:22:19
warehousing mixed industrial office would in its current definition preclude warehousing and other heavy industrial
3:22:26
uses yes I I would offer to this group that you’re not actually creating policy
3:22:32
tonight you’re giving us some things to look at so if it turned out that we said do mixed industrial office everywhere
3:22:39
and the feasibility analysis said you can do some but you really aren’t going to have that everywhere and in which
3:22:45
case you’d be rendering the land you know unusable we would bring that information back to you so you’re going
3:22:51
to get a chance to tweak it again so this is more you telling us what you want us to look at and what you might
3:22:57
prioritize all things being equal and then you can react to that when we bring the analysis back yeah I think we have a
3:23:03
common voice that really the quality of job how we generate them is really of
3:23:09
essence so ASA I’m sorry I interrupted you so rude uh no um what I was thinking
3:23:15
what my thought was when we talk about like the spacing and we don’t want to necessarily want to replace all the
3:23:20
industrial General in that area because some of it’s already Zone industrial General we can maintain it enhance it so
3:23:26
on and so forth um the the space that would that makes the most sense in terms
3:23:34
of creating like a a Synergy between the two is obviously this lower part below
3:23:39
is that Patterson path that wrote or is that but yeah below Patterson past next
3:23:45
to the labs next to the Future uh campus re research zoning space if we were to
3:23:51
go that route that would to me makes the most sense at least starting from South going north where that line would go
3:23:58
just stop I don’t have really a preference but I I think starting with the bottom and working your way up for
3:24:04
that uh industrial office makes the most sense if we were going to go forward with
3:24:10
it is it possible for you to do the analysis of how much and then we can take that and put it where and where in
3:24:18
a future point I feel like it’s hard to really determ right now looking at this how much and where we’re just looking at
3:24:24
like a plan view I I think if you told us we’d like you to look at 50 to 100 acres and we’d
3:24:31
like you to do it in the in the southern area then that at least gives us something to analyze and we can help you
3:24:37
evaluate its feasibility and whether more would be uh viable or not yeah I
3:24:42
think that’s right I think if you don’t have a strong preference on where to put it or not to put it then we
3:24:49
can put it where we think it makes sense or perhaps consistent with committee members strout’s comments about surrounding the research Park and then
3:24:55
when we do the feasibility analysis if it turns out that you could accommodate more of that than we’ve planned for then
3:25:01
you can alter your map and if it turns out that it’s less then you can also alter your map okay yeah I think it
3:25:06
makes sense to strad the research part with the question of how much is I think
3:25:12
okay we can take a stab at it that would be helpful we don’t really have that that analysis sitting here
3:25:18
sure I’m going to jump in a couple hopefully quick things um one I don’t
3:25:27
think um like you were saying about the I mean I think broadly there’s a
3:25:32
consensus but I don’t think the vision like for me um has anything to do with
3:25:39
job creation as far as anything about east of Greenville um I
3:25:46
would take most everything off of any of these Alternatives um I
3:25:55
think is there a scenario when we were talking about taking stabs at things and
3:26:00
feasibility um where most if not all of
3:26:07
this we went like the other way with it that like it became um all
3:26:16
restored um open space and you know we got Tri Valley Conservancy involved and
3:26:22
I’m talking as far I mean I would go all the way up to 580 personally especially if you know
3:26:29
there’s talking like Wildlife thorough fars and everything but if the city’s like we would never look at that than
3:26:37
you know something as far north as like opposite National Drive that
3:26:44
everything south of that um would truly be an Endeavor in
3:26:52
um preserving all of the um generational ranches and Ranch lands um equestrian
3:27:01
centers um and what would then continue to point itself towards um being an
3:27:09
actual um Gateway at least um as far as Facing East obviously
3:27:17
there’s no wine country Gateway driving by National Labs it just will never
3:27:24
happen having said that um you know you certainly do away with it with any sort
3:27:30
of development any of these Alternatives renders any sort of wine country Gateway talk NL and void in my
3:27:39
opinion um just with how much you would you have to physically drive through um
3:27:45
and I think I’ve made kind of my stance clear the last couple years but I I’m just trying to understand if there was
3:27:52
some sort of alternative um which to be clear my alternative would be um some
3:28:00
sort of restorative Endeavor um to where all of all of that shaded is green or
3:28:07
dark green or some sort of green variation or I I think there’s probably a couple spots along the way where some
3:28:16
roadside um you know really thoughtful kind of wine country uses um were put in
3:28:24
um so I guess like part of me is just almost getting a Vibe check as far as am
3:28:31
I the only person who sits on the committee with that type of view like is everybody else like yeah the answer is
3:28:38
somewhere in here so well so we have that teed up as the
3:28:45
next we have that teed up as the next conversation and I think it absolutely so appreciate everything you’ve said
3:28:51
yeah I I would suggest that we finalize the totally how much of this other land
3:28:57
use the the commercial mixed office do do you want to have or do you want us to study would you like us to study 100
3:29:02
acres or something I would suggest we finish that okay and then your comments just now can tee us off into the the
3:29:09
final question which is how how much open space do you want to have yeah B okay
3:29:15
U yeah that makes sense so yeah totally makes s make sense to me
3:29:22
so um I like the idea that really we haven’t had a chance to look at the map
3:29:29
very closely so thank you for bringing that up and now looking at how much and
3:29:35
where if you go back to the purple yes we have quite a bit of purple and some
3:29:41
that will possibly be changed to mixed industrial and office and so now it’s a
3:29:46
balance of uh the purple versus um the
3:29:51
mix and maybe I can ask a question that there’s quite a bit of uh General
3:29:58
industrial uh in that huge space and what kind of jobs um and what kind of uh
3:30:04
quality job that will help us really create that ratio that you know that
3:30:11
would be most realistic so it’s it’s a difficult question to answer and the reason why is
3:30:18
because while General industrial permits the widest range of uses including some
3:30:23
that may be lower in terms of overall jobs numbers and what we would consider job quality um it doesn’t always mean
3:30:30
that’s what you’ll get um we actually had for example a very wide range of uses including distribution centers and
3:30:36
all kinds of other things on the Oaks business park and we ended up with gillick so it depends on what the market
3:30:43
does um if you want to preclude those things to ensure that you only get some
3:30:49
of the higher job density uses then that’s where you might want to say we’re only going to allow the mixed industrial
3:30:55
office here and then we’ll allow some general industrial which may include
3:31:01
some less desirable quote less desirable uses uh in other parts of the area um
3:31:07
for flexibility sake um but it’s really up to the committee there’s no perfect formula for that it’s you could say do
3:31:14
everything that’s not Research Park in mixed industrial office and test that and see what the feasibility is I think
3:31:20
I know what the answer to that question is going to be which is it’ll take longer to build out because the kinds of
3:31:25
companies that fit into uh that mix of uses is just smaller than by definition
3:31:31
than the broader set because they’re a subset um so I think it’s we we can sort
3:31:37
of just pick an area or you can pick an area and say do everything everything below Patterson Pass to Lupin other than
3:31:44
the research Park and study that and at least we’ll have a feasibility concept at that point where you say we can only
3:31:52
support actually half of that or you could support more and then you can change your map yeah I I see your point
3:31:58
so really feasibility and really um sometimes drives these kind of decisions
3:32:03
or we just be you know dreamy right I mean what happens is if you don’t have
3:32:09
demand for that type of space then your as you all remember your residual land
3:32:14
value will go to negative because you can’t afford the cost of construction for that type of a facility so that’s
3:32:21
how all feasibility works and so we’d have to go out and determine what’s what’s likely to be the Demand right now
3:32:27
we’re at you know a particular point in the market we’ll be at a different point in the market later and so it can be you
3:32:34
know a little bit of um of Art and and not so much science but I think we can put some reasonable estimates behind
3:32:39
that so personally I would say that that’s a balancing act you know you you want to create quality jobs and at the
3:32:47
same time you want to be realistic about How likely all these quality jobs can be
3:32:53
created with companies not that are not here yet right so could we just ask you
3:32:59
to kind of find a good balance between feasibility and our sort of vision and
3:33:05
ideal that we have because looking at lots of purple I’m a little bit worried now so there’s a lot of purple the
3:33:13
densities will be very different though based on the topography the densities if the use
3:33:19
types are different or in the different areas yeah that’s right some will be high density but some are going to be
3:33:25
very low absolutely and so the the underlying conditions like that will also have an influence on what types of
3:33:31
facilities can be built um and you have very large colored polygons on there but
3:33:37
with underneath those is topography and all kinds of other things that are happening so what’s that access issues
3:33:44
yeah access issues so you know who knows so I think that’s this is meant to be to
3:33:50
give you something to respond to but you almost certainly will not have this widespread of development in those areas
3:33:56
that’s right okay so let’s go back to the bullets how do we verbalize
3:34:05
um we’ve actually lost the internet so we cannot make changes to the slide at the moment um but we did hear you say
3:34:13
that we wanted to add mix in industrial office and it sounds like we’re looking
3:34:19
at um around the Patterson Pass Road area and we’ll bring back some
3:34:27
options any preference in terms of pison pass area I I’m not familiar with
3:34:35
the lower near the research campus yeah South p
3:34:44
yeah that’s Patterson Pass lopin is the top of the wine cataly site the bottom of the research that would be the mix it
3:34:51
could be yeah the boundary okay so and we may want to look at that
3:34:57
through a finer lens ourselves and see from a development potential standpoint where does it make sense to do the
3:35:03
different types of uses so we can apply some of our subject matter expertise to that as well bearing in mind that you
3:35:08
have the ability to change it when bring it back to you if it doesn’t match what your expectations were so how can we
3:35:14
best express our FR you want to ask us to look at that area and at least then we’ve looked at an area and we can give
3:35:21
you some feedback because I think we’ve got a lot of other things to do tonight so maybe south of patteron pass north of L between Greenville Road and the
3:35:28
aqueduct Research Park we’ve got the direction yeah let’s vote are you okay okay with us looking at that
3:35:34
area taking a look at it yeah right okay so we got enough people and then the
3:35:39
last question was the open space which commissioner at T for
3:35:45
yeah yeah I so I kind of reiterate I mean I think um I thought it was like
3:35:51
really compelling what you had said earlier just as far as like I
3:35:57
absolutely it would be you know let’s say we go through this process and you
3:36:03
know down with east of Greenville comes out on top and we’re
3:36:09
like okay we’re not we’re not extending and then you know 5 10 years from now
3:36:15
it’s just littered with solar Lots you know I think like that would be a major
3:36:21
loss to I mean in my opinion um and would absolutely wreck everything that
3:36:28
we’re saying you know all of these different colored uses you know are
3:36:34
going to do so I think um I think is there
3:36:42
is there one of the many scenarios is there a scenario where um all of this is um you
3:36:53
know brought in or you know Incorporated and you know protected in perpetuity
3:37:01
essentially I mean it’s essentially what I’m talking about is massive conservation easements um to where all
3:37:08
these Ranch lands are protected and um if there’s you know restorative work and if everything’s as bad as you know it’s
3:37:15
I mean I I can only assume that everyone El like
3:37:21
I drive this now like all the time I like drive to the end of Loop in and back and or you know it’s it’s really um
3:37:30
I mean I think it’s a really it’s honestly I mean it’s um actually a really for all of The Dumping and
3:37:36
everything that is very obvious when you drive certain parts of it um you know still still is a really remarkable piece
3:37:44
of our Valley um and so to me I think um
3:37:49
are there steps that can be taken in the same process or is there a separate process um that
3:37:57
could um make this stretch of our Valley um as beautiful as um South Livermore
3:38:06
and North Livermore um because um I you know up north Livermore out at a
3:38:13
barn out there and I mean it’s one of the best drives you can take um and I
3:38:19
think like obviously how close to the city this whole stretch is obviously
3:38:24
will always be what it is um but is there a scenario that the city is still
3:38:31
interested um without all of this development happening so the question
3:38:38
is is it possible to an help to make it all open space then protect it that’s what your question is yeah so so you
3:38:46
could Annex this area into the City without modifying the urban growth boundary and you could leave the same
3:38:53
land use designation or have a similar type of land use designation the city then would be the code enforcement arm
3:39:01
and might be I don’t mean to uh bash the county but maybe the city would be a little more proactive on the code
3:39:07
enforcement side of things be worse yeah well uh
3:39:12
and and and the other question is could you put easements over the top of everything and and for that you would
3:39:18
need a funding source uh to identify you’ve got a cost there 22 m780 th000
3:39:25
and TVC could get it done okay we just need 22,7 180,000 do you have it no I
3:39:32
don’t have it but but to answer your question yes
3:39:37
you could do that the last piece that would be missing is is the funding for the easement well the and the other piece to be missing is the agreement
3:39:44
from the property owners because it’s all privately owned right right right the property that’s a great point so the
3:39:50
property owner buy it but they have to be willing to sell it yeah property owners have to be willing to sell you an easement I see and they and they we
3:39:56
cannot require them to sell you an easement yeah and I guess I I bring it
3:40:02
up like you know in part to I mean it’s like when we were hearing earlier about you know say like a general generational
3:40:09
ranch or something and is that then dangerous to them to sell the
3:40:14
easement is that I mean it’s you know like what would be the
3:40:21
incentive to or to not sure generally we’ve seen that that generational
3:40:27
ranching families do have more interest in in easements than than other land use
3:40:32
owners if if they’re thinking that they’re going to pass this to their kids and their grandkids Etc the the easement
3:40:38
allows you to continue ranching activities right or perhaps to conv to to shift to Vineyards or other types of
3:40:45
agricultural land uses uh depends on the easement type and uh but um other land
3:40:52
owners you know may not want to have that level of restriction
3:40:58
depends it’s it sounds like um you are should considering something
3:41:04
that goes further than uh don’t build Greenville but instead and more
3:41:09
something you might call it a restore a rest a restorative component to that or a conservation component yeah I mean I
3:41:16
think like if the end result you know
3:41:22
is you know essentially the end result being don’t build here kind of thing um
3:41:28
what are the different routes you can take for that to be true um to me I mean
3:41:35
I think like is there even more work to be done there on the
3:41:42
heavy lifting side of almost restorative work you know as far as restoring the
3:41:48
natural grass lands and all this kind of environmental work that I think makes
3:41:54
the valley as you know inhabitable as you know it can be um
3:42:01
obviously now it’s getting if we’re talking about the city being involved it’s you know sounding way more
3:42:07
philanthropic I think you know than say something like a east of Greenville land
3:42:13
use Alternatives um but I guess I’m just trying to think creatively about
3:42:18
um how important the green you know buffer that we’re all talking about is
3:42:24
and like how much more important that green buffer would be if it’s not just
3:42:29
everything on the other side of the aqueduct now it’s actually like large you know swats of land that
3:42:37
actually like boun boundary limore in the same way South Livermore does yeah
3:42:44
the reason for my question just to try to clarify it was so that the committee knew what was being proposed because we
3:42:51
we will have a um no east of Greenville analysis that gets done on the final Citywide
3:42:57
alternative but it sounded to me like you were proposing to go further than that um and I wanted to make sure that
3:43:03
it was clear what was being proposed for that piece of it so that we could document that if that’s Direction
3:43:10
committee wanted to go um that is such a big topic I don’t know if we have the
3:43:16
capacity tonight I mean I guess could we do it
3:43:21
this way like um how much of the committee is interested in not building
3:43:28
e of Greenville partly seeing an option on it we already know that that’s still
3:43:33
an option on the table so I don’t really like the not do anything here you’re
3:43:39
saying because in the end there will be some sort of component we’ll bring that back to you as one of two sets of
3:43:50
analys and I think the conservation isort of the option uh clearly is really in
3:43:58
aligned with a lot of our you know just personal preference of how how we really
3:44:05
want to maintain the open space however that’s such AIG topic that I don’t
3:44:11
really know if we have any have enough consideration or even research done such
3:44:16
as the cost 22 million I think that’s you know that to me it would just be a
3:44:22
kind of diminishing return to to know it’s going to cost 22 million and it’s still going to a study I don’t know we
3:44:30
have enough yeah um really data to support the option however we do I do
3:44:36
feel that if you if you don’t mind um we do want to talk about the balance of
3:44:43
whether the open space within alternative a which we all agree to be a good starting point by the majority of
3:44:49
the committee perhaps we can take a small nugget of a discussion and say is
3:44:54
an open space balance based on alternative a needs to be
3:45:00
changed so certainly you can and I just want to add one additional element to address Committee Member Hon’s comment
3:45:06
that you will in short order after this meeting get the analysis back that
3:45:13
includes the absence of a Greenville alternative you also have in the near
3:45:18
future a policy discussion that you’ll go through as a committee around the general plan which could include policy
3:45:24
discussions around conservation so I don’t know if we will be able to do everything that you want to do in the
3:45:31
mapping component of that but there will be opportunities to explore the importance of conservation as you go
3:45:37
forward alongside where you’ll have the analysis of what happens if you don’t do Greenville and you’ll be able to combine
3:45:44
those things together I think to at least get to maybe what you want to address sure and in terms of the
3:45:50
Greenville alternative which is what we’ll be studying the question really was if you can go back to the map are
3:45:57
you able to do that
3:46:02
D perfect um alternative a has a green belt buffer along the Eastern Edge and
3:46:11
so the question that was raised is that is that what you’d like us to study for this alternative that’s right so that’s
3:46:17
talk about again we have voted uh bullet number one number two number three
3:46:22
number four so the next bullet really is whether a change is necessary and that
3:46:28
again is binary and once we decide we feel that the change is necessary then we talk about how much it wear does that
3:46:36
work for everyone no I I just one quick because I think change almost implies
3:46:42
like should it be less um I think there’s a strong case to be made that
3:46:48
the BART lands which we you know have complete consens not
3:46:53
consensus unanimity that the BART lands are not going to be developed those should be added to the open space on the
3:47:02
Greenville analysis because you can’t run a wildlife Corridor and you can’t have a green belt and unless you’re
3:47:09
running the entire Eastern edge of the city so the BART lands form the eastern
3:47:15
edge around Springtown and those belated neighborhoods and and then it connects
3:47:22
under the highway there right where your cursor is and then would continue into some form of green
3:47:29
belt on one side of the canal or another this is showing it on the western side
3:47:35
of the canal but I think you can’t really do your open space analysis and unless you’re picking up the green belt
3:47:41
lands because then you’re not achieving a green belt around the city people say well you just blocked out that corner
3:47:47
then you’re going to go out and develop the BART lands and push it right up to the top of the
3:47:53
Altimont um so it’s if you’re going to talk open space you got to talk the whole Eastern Edge the
3:48:00
city and we’re not there yet but the all of the Committees I believe uh showed
3:48:06
keeping the BART LS as open space right and then that’s the quick way to to cut
3:48:13
an hour and a half off this meeting too is you take the BART lands out of L there’s no discussion and you’ve got a
3:48:19
little strip of land that is already zoned and the Planning Commission can handle it there’s no reason for us to
3:48:26
spend 90 minutes belaboring something that is not in the purview of this Advisory Board and and I think we’re
3:48:33
going to get there in just a few minutes if we can finish up this question about do I do we have to spend 90 minutes no
3:48:41
we don’t we don’t hopefully we can do it more quickly so uh yes so perhaps we can
3:48:47
ask the question are are we okay studying the open space in alternative
3:48:52
a is that or Committee Member um is the committee okay with
3:48:59
this with the open space that’s shown in alternative a and if you’re not then we
3:49:04
can talk about how to change it okay so I like that binary is should we keep the
3:49:10
open space as this and you know how is the question is phrased means whether
3:49:16
the hand is up so should we keep you like to do the positive should we keep if you want if you want to do the open
3:49:23
space that’s shown in alternative a please raise your hands I me you agree with what’s there okay if you agree with
3:49:29
the open space as this as this right alter alternative a
3:49:34
alter that’s which means if you don’t raise your hand and we would like to see some
3:49:40
changes made yep so so I only saw one hand raised and so then we would need
3:49:47
following that we would need a proposal for a change so we need a proposal for change I propose we add the BART lands
3:49:53
which we all agree should not be developed to it and then that would allow us to get a a biological survey
3:50:01
and assessment which is the data we’re lacking on where should the green belt be and where are the lands that have
3:50:08
conservation value remaining okay that should be preserved can you point can you point so it is
3:50:14
this shows it different Focus area is your point that is that part of
3:50:20
the focus area can you go to the focus part of another Focus area should not be
3:50:25
a focus area but is your point that the like if so put the other Focus area
3:50:31
aside I say say that that was open space and we have this open space in the actual Focus area that we’re discussing
3:50:37
alternative a is there anything missing up top that would really complete it like that purple part that we can see in
3:50:43
this picture does that have to change to open space in order to do what you are saying part of it will you see that
3:50:48
where the the dotted line that’s the city boundary I believe um so so and it’s fine to get
3:50:55
direction this you can’t have an island of biological diversity you have to connect okay so that purple part has to
3:51:01
change yes the green has to come down under the highway and then connect along
3:51:07
the canal and then run to the South the south is already conserved where we have Critters Galore
3:51:16
um but the East is not conserved at all so is it fair to say then that the
3:51:21
proposal on the table is essentially to add the BART land as open space to the east of Greenville alternative and
3:51:29
modify the Northwest end of the east of Greenville alternative to allow for the connection of those two pieces right cuz
3:51:36
ultimately you got to do an eir and that means you got to have a biological assessment and he knows all this stuff
3:51:42
he was TBC it’s you can’t do one without doing the other so we’d be panning back
3:51:48
a little bit on that Focus area to allow for the inclusion of that Northern component of what is the BART land today
3:51:54
and again all this is going to be in one map so it’s I think it’s okay to cross these Focus area boundaries in terms of
3:52:00
the direction it adds with more clarity for us so was what I stated what you’re proposing to do yes did everybody
3:52:06
understand what I said okay let’s go back to you say I’m sorry yeah to the
3:52:11
map or yeah so uh now I saw the uh the laugh let’s go back so Point again so
3:52:18
you want to extend extend that yeah right yeah so we all know take now yeah
3:52:25
when you say B land how much of the last land are we talking about the open space area I think basically the undeveloped
3:52:32
land yeah do you want to call for a show of
3:52:38
hand at least on that bullet I don’t yes okay
3:52:45
so this is really entire city as a single map and and so the question can I ask
3:52:55
another question sorry go back to the E green wheel we’re not changing the purple we only just
3:53:04
adding I think what we would look at is what changes would be necessary to the very tip of that purple in order to
3:53:10
allow for the Wildlife Corridor and natural connection of that so we do add
3:53:16
that do how much do we need to lower the purple even
3:53:21
more yeah I I think we we could look at that as a staff name point we don’t need to we don’t need to arbitrate that here
3:53:27
we just say make a continuous screen space yeah if we understand the intent to make the continuous screen space to L the wildli quarter remember you’re going
3:53:33
to get to see this map again so if we’ve done something you really don’t like I like that map 27 yeah yeah let’s see why
3:53:41
not okay please so so show of hands for that suggestion to be included in the
3:53:47
direction okay that carries might be our first unanimous what am I adding here
3:53:54
sorry I think the 0es change open space continuous now let’s vote on getting
3:54:00
it’s not worth looking at the rest of two continuous two continuous open space connecting Greenville to La okay that’s
3:54:08
good enough for you yeah any any other changes to open
3:54:16
space that b open space and B be considered rather than a so what it does
3:54:24
is it the commercial or what industrial goes off the lab but stops short of the
3:54:32
canal well I think that yeah that’s already what that is right no a
3:54:37
isge bottom sou has open space to the
3:54:43
east north of oh yeah with the sport well you don’t do the
3:54:49
Park Sports just there you do b instead of a
3:54:57
so dark green is open space too so you have more open space Oh you
3:55:04
the wine catalyst typ
3:55:09
he’s he’s saying from from the wine Catalyst you have enough commercial
3:55:14
coming off the lab there to stri and you’re going up some distance north why
3:55:21
do you have to go that far east why can’t that be all open
3:55:29
space well at least studied point is I think that’s thing
3:55:35
there’s enough economics is there enough Revenue out of what you leave was commercial industrial to fund everything
3:55:41
else because you got to fund the open space yeah part of the 22
3:55:47
million got to I mean may I just maybe
3:55:52
really try to find a nugget to V down since we’re not going to have the sports park in alternative
3:55:59
C should we change that green space in alternative C that was going to be a
3:56:05
sports park and put it in a so that to the right edge of alternative a we see
3:56:13
more green you want put the sport part back in that we just want get rid of no no not Sports open space okay cuz we’re
3:56:20
not going to have sports partk sports part you said put the sports part I’m sorry yeah equivalent
3:56:28
space off I think Tim’s using alternative B’s open space as it’s
3:56:33
alternative oh yeah as the reference and then the the dark green could go back to the commercial I mean no no no like no
3:56:43
Tim there you go but you you’re going to have to have enough commercial to fund
3:56:49
that yeah I mean is this about the 22 million yeah you’re going to preserve it
3:56:55
yes you want to preserve it you want to reserve it you know is it just to be
3:57:01
determined in the future don’t have to conserve it could be
3:57:07
reson someday yeah your vision I think is to never Reon that’s right you have to fun that
3:57:15
though yeah you me there’s going to have to be
3:57:21
some connection some south of Patterson north of Lupin
3:57:28
once you’re in Lupin then you’re all conserved pass there most of the land south of there is already under
3:57:34
conservation E’s now but you do have to get there
3:57:42
somehow yeah okay in the view sh can we verbalize what the
3:57:51
V I don’t believe I can combination of the wine Catalyst
3:57:58
site and the Sports Park from alternative b as open space and alternative a the same footprint of
3:58:04
those green Shams microphone so are we basically making this purple space
3:58:11
here not not not not par green but open space
3:58:18
green so look at alternative it would include the the what I think I’m hearing is this green
3:58:25
space that’s part of the wine Catalyst site as well as this green space that’s part of the sports park these two green
3:58:31
shapes here north of Lupin would move to this area of alternative a but they
3:58:36
would be open space color yeah yeah that’s too much not the the
3:58:41
dark just like more like the peninsula area we just need don’t include the dark green in that conversion just the light
3:58:48
green I know Tim is that what yours I was saying all of it but I mean I don’t I don’t get I’m not a dictator
3:58:55
so no I know but just for the talking point it did include the it did you know
3:59:03
there other ways to look at it okay can we just say that we want somewhere
3:59:09
somewhere along the line of Alterna the light green maybe the dark green
3:59:15
equivalent space and we just going to depend on the project team to tell us
3:59:21
the pros and cons I we want a good really feasible space to develop jobs
3:59:28
but we also want a continuous green space between pison pass and yeah so I
3:59:34
think this again does go back to what are you trying to achieve here um and and part of what I can suggest to you is
3:59:41
that the area that you’re proposing tover back into undeveloped land or conserved open space however you’re
3:59:46
doing it is some of the best potential developable land in the
3:59:51
space um because it’s flat and it’s near it’s going be con Tye of things so from
3:59:57
a from a development and infrastructure standpoint it’s good for that which doesn’t mean you have to want that but
4:00:03
it’s just something to think about in terms of trade for raising that is that why the source part are set there
4:00:09
because see flatter okay thank you for raising that that is a
4:00:14
consideration yeah I don’t I don’t know exactly where the Topo starts up in the nor
4:00:20
section right but I think there questions were’re proposing or was being
4:00:26
proposed was how much to how wide does that Corridor need to be I think is what
4:00:32
the question was if you need a continuous path so I’m certainly not an expert on
4:00:37
that
4:00:44
so I heard a suggestion to have a similar amount of open space to what you see in alternative B for the sports park
4:00:50
and the the extended Catalyst site would you like us to consider having that
4:00:56
amount of open space somewhere in the northern area where there’s more
4:01:01
topography so take okay say alternative c um it would be similar alternative
4:01:09
see example okay so again what what are we trying to achieve so you know one pin
4:01:16
we want flat you know developable uh area so that the
4:01:23
feasibility of mix use can be you know realized at the same time we appreciate
4:01:29
open space is that why we trying to achieve we could look at a combination
4:01:34
of alternative A and C so you could take the the large open space area that’s
4:01:39
shown in C and extend if you want to extend a green belt down you can extend a green belt down along the aqueduct as
4:01:46
show me in a okay huh I’m what I’m envisioning is a
4:01:54
green belt around the whole area that there’s that there’s there’s
4:02:01
undeveloped space on the eastern most parts of this wi within the aqueduct do
4:02:10
you want it to be inside of the aqueduct that’s what I’m envisioning that you’re still creating a barrier you
4:02:17
just moved it so and inside you’ve got some industrial
4:02:26
inside yeah the trade-off we have to consider is that what moves inside for
4:02:32
industrial might be less likely to become industrial so the revenue source
4:02:37
is is lessened but you can decide that that’s just the tradeoff that we have to
4:02:44
make yeah and again I think it goes back to Brandon’s point about like well what
4:02:50
do you want and if everybody like on the you know by
4:02:55
and large is kind of like yeah one of these Alternatives works for me I guess more than anything I’m just trying to
4:03:02
share I think that that land use like the best use of it for our
4:03:10
future is not Innovation and Technology based companies in a complete District
4:03:19
so to your point yeah it might be more the kind of thing where you know like
4:03:24
you’re saying we want to maximize the industrial that can go in there which is totally fine I’m just
4:03:33
saying yeah yeah so then it would be kind of a okay well
4:03:39
let’s just move on with these Alternatives and I can enjoy just like I don’t like
4:03:45
that or whatever you know it’s like just go on record well as as we discussed
4:03:51
there will be a no east of Greenville alternative that we will look at U the
4:03:56
question is for the east of Greenville alternative how much open space do you want to have and where do you want to have it right and uh so do we have
4:04:05
another proposal so that we can let’s go back why does the staff I mean I’m
4:04:10
looking at the topography map there’s some logical places where it can be M that isn’t nearly as large as what you
4:04:18
have as the sports park which was just taking an entire parcel right but there
4:04:23
it rises here MH so you’ve got to have a setback off the canal anyway is that is
4:04:31
that 100 ft or is it more so if you want to give us the direction to show as open
4:04:37
space all of the the hilly terrain that would be challenging to develop we could do that yeah well just make it contiguous
4:04:45
from top of the city where the BART lands are all the way down till you hit the South liore Valley area plan go back
4:04:52
again Debbie the only part that you wouldn’t be able to do that with is the part in blue which is the water and power site you could go around a massive
4:04:59
water tank there it floods yes why would go around that you can go around that so
4:05:04
I think that just make one vote which is I think we all appreciate this contiguous uh uh open space as you know
4:05:11
whether as really uh just set back as you set it is uh
4:05:18
but that if you go back to the alternative a that that again remains to
4:05:23
be really a good starting point but add your recommendation of how wide the
4:05:29
setback should be between Patterson and
4:05:35
Lupin so Jeb if you go back to the map what I heard is that we would have a
4:05:42
continuous open space buffer going from the freeway down to lopen Road and that
4:05:49
the staff will come back with some information on topography and show you that open space area based on the uh a
4:05:57
combination of topography and ensuring that open space buffer all the way down the site while maintaining the you know
4:06:03
the Vitality goal for developing economic so we can we can take that
4:06:09
since it’s getting late we we could certainly take that we’ like to take a vote folks in favor of that yeah I think
4:06:17
we have enough so we’ll come we’ll work do that work and bring it back thank you so much I’m going to really recommend
4:06:23
that we would oh we have to take take what we
4:06:28
have to take a vote on foral V foral vote on this direction on the Easter GRE okay the whole thing yes I am happy with
4:06:35
way we are no I V we we need a motion and
4:06:43
a who Moved sorry second okay sorry we’ll do a roll
4:06:51
call vote from Debbie please uh Committee Member Alexi hi
4:06:58
Committee Member baa hi Committee Member CH I Committee Member
4:07:05
Halverson I Committee Member Kent I Committee Member Kingsbury hi I
4:07:12
Committee Member Leon I Committee Member Pete hi Committee Member rivalta hi
4:07:19
Committee Member stra hi and chairperson Shang
4:07:26
hi thank you so much for your patience and I really really do appreciate the
4:07:32
process you know late we are now let’s not look at the clock um so can you recommend the next
4:07:39
step since we really didn’t finish the focus are we will have to come back to the
4:07:46
full committee and continue our discussion for each of the focus areas and uh our next regular meetings I think
4:07:53
the 8th January 10th January 10th thank you um so we may PLL the committee to
4:07:58
see if we can meet before then to keep things moving but the next regular meeting is January 10th which is either
4:08:05
like next week or the week after new yearor we’re thinking 25th maybe we can meet and the next meeting just to be
4:08:12
clear would be to cover only the remaining Focus areas that we have not yet evaluated yeah we won’t ask you to
4:08:19
give us all the data if I did we will not have it okay start with
4:08:28
midt so procedurally am I closing the item only for today but not the whole uh
4:08:36
discussion I think we’re adjourning and you’re continuing this item to the next meeting of the GP okay so
4:08:42
we app date to be determined they should be really appreciate whoever stays
4:08:48
display and really you know I know um so we arej thank you so
4:08:54
much we’ll see you next time

Machine generated transcript of the 2023-12-5 Planning Commission meeting with video timestamps, synchronized with the video posted on our Youtube page.

0:02
so we will go to item five public hearings item 5.1 is a hearing to
0:10
receive public comment on the notice of preparation for an environmental impact report for the east of Greenville
0:16
project and the project is located east of the Livermore city limits in an unincorporated Alameda County and we’ll
0:24
turn it over to uh Mr Stewart thank you chair person
0:30
uh this evening senior planner Ashley ver will provide the staff analysis with
0:36
support from our consultant Eileen Mahoney from Rincon environmental
0:41
Consulting and with that I’ll turn over to miss Vera all right thank you good evening
0:47
everyone so um as noted tonight I will be presenting the east of Greenville um
0:53
project to receive public comments on the scope of the environmental impact report as Mr Stewart noted we have alen
0:59
Mahoney here with FRC con Consultants that is part of the environmental consultant team in addition we have Andy
1:04
Ross our economic development manager providing support as he is the project manager for the general Plan
1:11
update can you hear the microphone a little closer I’m hard of hearing sorry all right the purpose of tonight’s
1:19
meeting is to provide the public the opportunity to comment on the scope of the environmental impact report or E
1:26
comments should be limited to the scope of the EIR rather than the merits of the pro project itself tonight’s meeting is
1:32
not held to conduct a question and answer session however everything uh commented in uh tonight will be made
1:40
part of the project record and a formal response will be drafted as part of the draft environmental impact report
1:46
process please note that staff will be returning to Planning Commission at a future meeting for the commission’s
1:52
comments on the E as well as the project at a as a
1:58
whole this slide shows the general overview of the CEQA process as it relates to this particular project a
2:05
notice of preparation for an environmental impact report was released on November 21st 2023 for a 30-day
2:12
public review period tonight we are requesting comments on the contents of the draft
2:18
IR following the close of the public review period staff and the consultant team will prepare a draft e and
2:25
ultimately a final EIR before returning uh to Planning Commission and Milly city council for a decision on the project
2:33
there will be additional opportunities for public comment during this process including an opportunity to comment on
2:39
the draft IR once it is published the project area is generally
2:44
located east of Greenville Road in Alama County with the exception of parcels located west of Greenville Road between
2:51
marathon drive and National Drive the area includes approximately 1140 acres
2:57
of land and is located outside of the city’s limit El the majority of the project area is also located out of the
3:04
city’s North Livermore Urban growth boundary the project area is currently primarily undeveloped with land
3:11
designated as Agricultural and uh scattered with industrial public utilities and Rural
3:16
residential uses during preparation of the land use
3:22
Alternatives analysis for the general Plan update the project area was selected for further exploration the
3:29
vision for this Focus area is to provide a campus-like environment that supports Innovation and Technology based
3:35
companies including a house a mix of housing uh jobs Services I’m I’m sorry excuse me a mix of jobs no housing uh
3:44
services and amenities to help the community achieve long-term fiscal sustainability and also serve as a
3:50
gateway to the South Livermore Wine Country there are three potential land
3:55
use alternatives for the east of Greenville project that were developed to consider consider uh a variety of
4:01
these land uses to achieve this Vision all three Alternatives consist of generally the same land use uh types but
4:08
in various various proportions and locations as shown on this slide here
4:14
the areas shown in red represent General commercial land uses the areas shown in purple represent industrial uses the
4:21
areas shown in varying shades of green represent Recreation and park uses open
4:26
space uses as well as agricultural uses the areas shown in blue represent public
4:32
uses and finally the areas shown in the hatched pattern represent a research and campus uh type of
4:42
development the project that will be analyzed in the environmental impact report is defined as alternative B
4:48
because it is the most intense land use uh pattern of the three Alternatives and therefore has the most potential for
4:55
possible impact analyzing the most intense alternative is useful for value valuating and understanding uh the
5:01
effects of development in the project area the project also includes modifying
5:08
the existing land use designations to allow for the land uses listed on this slide in addition the project includes a
5:14
potential measure on a ballot to expand the north Livermore Urban growth boundary to include the entirety or a
5:21
portion of the project it is important to note that expanding the north Livermore Urban growth boundary requires voter approval
5:30
although it is uncertain whether the city council will ultimately decide to place the measure on the ballot in order
5:36
to have the option to do so environmental review must be completed the E analysis will provide an
5:42
understanding of potential environmental impacts and help inform city council deliberations and create a potential
5:48
opportunity for Li more voters to decide on the land use
5:54
proposal this slide shows the environmental topics anticipated to be analyzed in the Environmental impact
6:00
report this list includes all topics included in the appendix G of the SQL
6:08
guidelines so there are a few ways to submit public comments on this project the first option is to provide comments
6:14
verbally uh tonight alternatively comments may be provided in either
6:19
writing um and sent to the address shown here uh or um comments can also be sent
6:26
in via email shown to the email address on this slide all comments must be submitted by
6:32
Wednesday December 20th at 5:00 which is the close of the public comment period
6:37
staff requests that the comments are limited to the scope of the IR in closing staff recommends the
6:44
Planning Commission receive public comments on the east of Greenville project notice of preparation and the
6:50
contents of the e no additional action is required by the Planning Commission tonight that concludes my presentation
6:58
and stop is available for for any questions thank you Miss Farah for the
7:03
presentation before we open the public hearing I just want to see if anybody on the Planning Commission has any
7:09
clarifying questions
7:14
ask uh thank you chair person I have two uh if you don’t mind one was um just to
7:22
be clear that when we’re talking about this area east of Greenville none of the new expanded area
7:30
that we’re talking about tonight overlaps with the South Livermore special uh planning district does it I
7:38
think there was a little bit of like area where that might have been true or might have not have been
7:50
true so there there maybe a little overlap with the counties South ler
7:56
Valley area plan and the southern end yeah that’s what I was wondering about right so there there’s probably a bit of
8:03
a boundary overlap if I’m understanding correctly from Mr Ross uh but the the rest is um sort of stands on its own
8:11
outside of any the city’s South B Valley specific plan area or counties South L
8:18
area plan great thank you and clarifying question number two is is less I think
8:23
this is a technical thing that I think would be useful for the public in attendance and that is when you say you
8:29
know limit comments to the scope of the eir could you just give an example for all of us just to
8:35
know sure so when we say limit the comments to scope of the IR that means we are looking for comments related to
8:41
the technical nature of the E and the topics that are analyzed by uh an under
8:47
squa and rather than say a a comment that um maybe opines on the project and
8:53
and not a technical nature great thank you Miss thank you Mr Stewart sure chair
8:59
Larry if I can just add on that and um Ashley can you go back to this slide with a graphic on there please so these
9:06
are all the topics and environmental aspects that uh would be included in the
9:13
environmental impact report if you think or the public thinks there’s an area
9:18
that’s not included on here that should be uh that tonight’s an appropriate time
9:23
to bring that up uh because Miss Vera said this is everything in the uh
9:29
California Environmental Quality act dependencies so it’s a pretty exhaustive list and um but if if if uh you think or
9:39
the public thinks there are things missing that should be also analyzed now be appropriate time to to request those
9:45
be included in the scope of the environmental
9:50
document I’m wondering if it would be possible U Mr Stewart and Miss ver to leave this graphic up for the discussion
9:58
so we can just keep referencing it visually thank
10:03
you I I just wanted to make a note for the um for the record and for uh the
10:08
public that uh there is uh audiovisual equipment here tonight that is not part
10:14
of the city um so I just be aware that that is not the city’s audio visual
10:20
equipment and that is an outside group okay thank
10:27
you okay we’ll now open the public hearing and how many speaker cards do we have tonight miss
10:38
stle I have 10 okay so we’ll have a three minutes for each speaker I don’t
10:45
see our eping device up there are you the official okay right so please
10:58
proceed followed by John Stein whenever you have a SQL or anir
11:06
not inir there’s usually one option and one option they give you different options and in evaluating different
11:13
things one option is no project and so that’s the part that I’m speaking here
11:18
tonight is because I believe there should be no project there okay it is
11:23
premature and would be a s significant waste of taxpayers money to commiss and
11:30
environmental impact report eir for developing the land east of Greenville
11:35
Road the land is protected by an urban growth boundary ugb that the residents
11:41
of Livermore strongly support besides there is no current need to consider land outside the ugb for additional
11:48
development there is sufficient land within the ugb to accommodate residential commercial and Industrial
11:56
Development for at least the next next decade and almost certainly for much
12:01
longer than that the population numbers of the city and its consultant place works have used are significantly in
12:09
error in September a city staff report claimed that livermore’s population is
12:14
91,000 in fact the City’s population has never been that high according to
12:20
official state and Census Bureau reports livermore’s population peaked in in 2019
12:26
at 87,8 99 in April of 2020 livermore’s
12:32
official population was reduced by 136 and it has gone down every year
12:38
since then as of January 1st 2023 our population was less than 9
12:45
85,000 that is more than 6,000 lower than the city staff September
12:51
estimates why develop precious open space land when there are alternative
12:57
locations inside the ug GB to accommodate any actual growth for the foreseeable future intensive development
13:04
east of Greenville Road would be extremely costly this rural area now has no public infrastructure and facilities
13:13
for Urban Development it would destroy or harm agriculture Wildlife wetlands
13:19
and watersheds open space and Scenic Beauty air pollution and traffic
13:24
congestion would be increased it would degrade the character of Livermore this proposal is a mistake please vote
13:32
against commissioning an eir at this time for development east of Greenville
13:37
Road to break livermore’s ugb no development here thank
13:46
you John Stein followed by Doug
13:56
Mann uh John Stein uh 1334 Cathy cord city of
14:02
Livermore uh I would urge that uh uh when you do the notice of
14:09
preparation uh you involve not only The Usual Suspects alab County um The Zone 7 the land owners
14:21
LPD a fishing game and the various Transportation uh
14:27
organizations but also expand it to friends of Livermore friends of The
14:33
Vineyards local venters wine grape Growers and other
14:38
irrigated agriculture users uh and uh a tribal
14:44
Conservancy I I think unless there’s a a shared vision for this area perhaps
14:50
somewhat different than the city suggested three options uh the probability of getting gaining vo
14:57
approval is somewhat limited um perhaps uh there can be a set
15:04
of mitigations a smaller area or agriculture that is acceptable to all of
15:10
the various organizations and would urge that uh uh the planning process look into that as
15:18
far as Alternatives uh the area along Jack London Boulevard between Jack
15:24
London Boulevard and the quaries is substantial and the City is currently looking at warehousing and would urge
15:32
the city to look at uh more intensive uses either offices or
15:37
campuses uh perhaps even more commercial also uh in the mid city part
15:43
of the plan uh perhaps uh placing a light industrial along the freeway to
15:49
act as a buffer for the residential uh would be useful that area is bounded on
15:56
one side by railroad tracks and and on the other by 580 and some buffering uh
16:02
would be useful but more important is a shared Vision that stands a chance of being
16:09
approved uh there were three assumptions made uh by the uh uh plan uh General
16:17
plan committee one was that uh there would be voter approval the second is
16:23
that population would increase and currently in California population and the average
16:31
age uh of that population is getting older and the population is
16:37
decreasing uh finally uh at the workshop there seemed to be the idea that the
16:43
high intensity residential could be concentrated in one area separate from
16:48
the city and I would urge that as you look at this uh that area be integrated
16:55
with the city as much as possible with facilities that are used by the rest of the
17:01
city uh finally the Assumption was made that Capital Improvement funding would
17:06
be available and I’m not sure that the uh eir will discuss uh methods either
17:13
bonding uh user fees or M R thank
17:20
you Doug Mann followed by Jeremy tro masi good evening Commissioners I have
17:27
not spoken with the planning Comm for several years and let me just say once I won’t say this every time I come
17:33
to speak with you because I try to preserve time we only get 3 minutes but thank you for serving on the commission
17:38
uh it’s selfless work no money all the above uh but uh we all know you’re doing
17:45
an important job um so when we have an environmental
17:52
consultant that comes and says only talk about these things um that’s just really
17:58
hard to do um we come here outraged that we have not one not two but three
18:06
alternatives to break our Urban growth boundary no alternative uh to preserve the urban
18:13
growth boundary that we fought so hard to create and that we want to keep and that is the environmentally Superior
18:20
alternative if it existed uh they’re not being given it so they’re not they’re not going to study it um you know this
18:26
has place works fingerprints all over it I’m no fan of place works I don’t think they ever should have been hired by the
18:33
city um I I really don’t know any jurisdiction that would uh even benefit
18:38
from uh hiring place works I I uh they have shown that whenever they whenever
18:44
placeworks come here mostly what they do is they make this place worse and I don’t like it um I don’t know how to
18:52
talk to these topics as instructed by your $300,000 Environmental consultant
18:59
um it’s uh premature it’s unwelcome to have this
19:06
alternative and uh I’m not sure that anything more needs to be said we know that the city council is going to break
19:13
the urban growth boundary we know that’s coming we’re not stupid um and your uh
19:19
place works is going to recommend breaking the urban growth boundary obviously that’s all they’re doing uh
19:25
and you will recommend and alternative of breaking the urban growth boundary
19:30
move forward to the city council I would say send this back to staff with your strongest possible statement that you
19:37
need an alternative that doesn’t break the urban grow boundary thank
19:43
you Jeremy troop mossi followed by Jeff
19:51
Kaskey sheesh how we doing tonight guys thanks
19:57
for being here um so I am uh Jeremy tro MSI I’m the um
20:03
Vice chair on the general planning committee um one of those people who sits through those meetings and spends
20:09
my time much like you so um I’m happy to be here even with the torn ailles um just to put my uh record my my my
20:16
comments on record so um I’m a part of that committee that spends a lot of time with this document and these suggestions
20:21
to you um and I’ll just get to the point um I think it would be irresponsible of
20:26
the city of Livermore on the behalf of everyone who lives here to not consider everything in the scope of our influence
20:33
and that includes what is this east of Greenville no decisions will be made tonight and no decisions will be made
20:39
for the foreseeable future I am asking you to think broader than the comments that you’re going to hear tonight I’m
20:44
trying not to get it only took three comments to get me spicy um because you hear a lot of things in here um I’ve
20:50
been in that meeting for the past nearly two years every other Wednesday you know
20:56
whatever it doesn’t matter um and there is more work happening than what is being suggested this evening decisions
21:02
haven’t been made and at the end of the day it comes to a a complete vote that is the beauty of this democracy so I
21:09
understand we all can come up here and say whatever we’d like to um relative to what we’re suggesting we are simply
21:15
suggesting that we are responsible and how we manage the city its boundaries and how we would like to grow within the
21:20
next 20 to 30 years and if we refuse as a city to go this way it’s such a
21:27
contrast of opinion to cons like to to suggest that we can’t consider going this way um when it comes to Urban
21:33
growth boundaries so um man when you start going off your notes here um I got
21:40
a little time so bear with me um I didn’t crutch up all the way up here not to say a few more things um so I mean
21:48
yeah there’s still a vote the city should do their due diligence and we should learn more about what is ahead of
21:53
us before we are so certain as to what is next for us
22:00
um you know and that’s that’s all I got guys um happy to be here um and I hope
22:05
we can continue to educate ourselves on what’s best for the future of Livermore as an entirety uh we are not the Cow
22:11
Town we used to be Jeff Kaskey followed by David
22:26
rs’s all right anyway ah um good evening Commissioners
22:32
and staff my name is Jeff Kaskey I’m a resident of Livermore for some 40 years
22:39
a decision to break the urban growth boundary should be based on significant compelling needs that can only be met by
22:44
breaking the urban growth boundary and nothing we’ve seen so far shows that need even with requests from both
22:51
General plan advisory committee members and members of the public we have not seen the no build plan for the east of
22:57
Greenville fot Focus area this plan requires that the people of Livermore vote against protecting this
23:03
Agricultural and open space as was just noted we know that Livermore residents value their protected egg and open space
23:09
uh land so the no build options should be included so that we can get a a a
23:15
complete picture for residents to consider there is a lot of underdeveloped and undeveloped land
23:21
available for economic and uh for industrial and research uses uh within the city limits within the city
23:29
we have 78% of the industrial square footage of the whole Tri Valley according to the city’s own Economic
23:34
Development strategic plan it appears that the driving reason for this push is topcon’s ownership of the land in the
23:40
focus area which they want to use for industrial uses it’s not surprising that’s what you would expect them to
23:45
push for um but they don’t need to be bailed out by the city of Livermore um to suddenly get their land revalued as
23:52
industrial land they can buy industrial property the same as everybody else there’s EX existing industrial land um
23:59
and the gpac focus areas suggest even more so besides topcon’s windfall
24:05
there’s really no reason for this change let’s take a look at the areas suggested the wine Catalyst area can be done
24:10
outside the ugb that’s one of the reasons we have a ugb that’s kind of strange to go and
24:16
create an area and then pull it in the research facility Zone sounds interesting but if it’s important why
24:22
wasn’t it suggested in any of the other industrial uses the ones inside the ugb
24:27
none of them are more than 2 miles from the lab two of them are right across the street so if the research facility is
24:32
important and I think it would be cool it can be easily done inside the ugb at the same time along with wildlife
24:39
habitat the land currently contains equestrian facilities grazing land and Rural
24:44
residences this proposed uh change will push them off the land when the property value Rises as it gets revalued as
24:50
industrial land so will their property tax so the increased value will encourage them to sell as the increased
24:57
cost pushes them to sell there was some belief that bringing
25:02
this land into the city would protect it even better but this group actually is probably one of the groups that knows
25:07
best that that’s really not true it takes a vote of three of you folks and three from the city council to completely change the purpose of land
25:14
once it’s inside the city boundary breaking the livermore’s urban
25:19
growth boundary is a far-reaching precedent setting proposal it should be based on unique compelling needs that
25:25
can only be met by breaking the ugb and none of that is here instead this would set a precedent of breaking the ugv to
25:32
benefit influential corporations thank
25:37
you David rounds followed by Alan
25:43
Burnham good evening Commissioners and staff um so my comment on the scoping of
25:50
this project is it should not there should not be an eir at this time um and
25:56
I’ll tell you why in the staff report to the city council on September of
26:02
2022 regarding the comprehensive General Plan update livermore’s current population was pegged at
26:09
91,000 and jobs were at 53,000 this report went on to say that
26:14
using abag and MTC methodology the population could increase to
26:20
120,000 and 57,000 jobs by 2040 fast forward one year to last month
26:30
land use Alternatives report for the general Plan update where they presented these three
26:37
Alternatives uh the growth projections in those plans were wildly optimistic compared to what was projected a year
26:45
ago using the middle alternative for example the general plan document is saying that City should plan for a
26:51
population of 134,00 significantly higher than the 120,000 that was predicted
26:58
last year and for 81,000 jobs which is significantly more jobs than were
27:03
projected last year the general plan document assumes that you can only get these numbers by breaking the urban
27:09
growth boundary and expanding the City by over 1100 Acres today we are reviewing you
27:16
are reviewing a notice of preparation for the eir of the 1100 Acres of current open
27:22
space that Livermore would need to bring into the city limits to achieve these overly optimistic projection my question
27:29
is why spend today the several $100,000 it will cost for an eir for land that
27:34
the city does not need today and might not need in 2045 planning is important but it is a
27:41
difficult process made much more difficult because of the significant changes the bar is seeing around home
27:46
prices and employment many people work at home at least part of the time some people work at home all the time will
27:54
this trend continue sure and it probably probably it will and it
28:00
makes these overly optimistic projections for the general plan document that much more unrealistic once
28:07
the 2024 General Plan update is in effect the city can review that plan every
28:12
year why not produce a document a document that is more realistic for the next 10 years and if circumstances
28:19
change and they will revise the general plan when you have a better idea of what the real changing Trends are today’s
28:26
General plan View and update has not offered compelling reasons for these overly optimistic
28:32
projections if there are compelling reasons they should be clearly stated and Su and clearly and succinctly stated
28:41
to the public particularly if the city expects citizens to vote to break the
28:46
urban growth boundary in order to expand the city thank
28:52
you Alan Burnham followed by Michael fuchi uh good evening honorable uh
28:59
Commissioners I support an e eir to explore environmental aspects um a
29:05
potential development east of Greenville but I’m concerned that the e as proposed will be misconstrued by the public and I
29:12
think you probably heard some of that tonight and it will not but it will not address all the important environmental
29:18
issues needed to inform voters of any proposed modification of the urban growth boundary I don’t really have
29:23
enough time to debate all the the other content that has been said but I but I will make the comment that alternative B
29:30
makes the least sense of any of those three options is the most intensive and that’s why it’s being but but there’s
29:35
really no way in the world that that’s ever going to be done um the the commercial area there is is bigger than
29:42
than all the commercial area u in the west side of uh downtown so the question
29:47
the question is do you actually get the information you need to make an assessment of of a of an environmental
29:54
impact I suggest that perhaps maybe by changing you can if you do that but then you say okay if we reduce the commercial
30:01
down to 30% of that value what difference does it make another words it’s always tradeoffs uh that you have
30:07
to cons be considering um I also recommend that the e address the issue of public benefits
30:14
of this development um it really hasn’t uh been discussed here tonight but it it
30:19
it really impacts all these things as as as other speakers have said one of the
30:25
main justifications of this is is the question of whether or not there’s enough land inside the current um city
30:31
limits to provide all the housing that may be required by Reena um and if you
30:36
don’t analyze this in the context of the overall picture you’re not getting the right answer uh and you also need to
30:44
look at the uh the issue of maintaining good jobs housing uh ratio considering Rea pressures and and and even more
30:51
important generate uh what’s the potential of generating funds to permanently preserve agricultural lands
30:57
and wineries in the east and south of Livermore in other words again one of the reasons for doing this is to
31:03
generate resources to do other things and if you’re not including those other things in the analysis you’re just really not going to get a good answer so
31:10
I that’s why I think you need to take a more holistic view of this e thank
31:16
you Michael fuchi followed by Richard Ryan good
31:23
evening I brought a guitar with me because um what can I say I I I’ve own a
31:28
music store in Livermore for over 30 years I’ve lived in Livermore as a resident for over 40 years and uh I
31:35
can’t remember the last time I brought a guitar to a city council meeting or meeting like this but um I just wanted
31:41
to say that I agree with several speakers that have spoken about baying breaking the e or breaking the urban
31:48
birth boundary so instead of like preparing uh a speech tonight I thought I’d just write a few words and and sing
31:55
a short song um that might be uh helpful for the other voices out there that
32:01
couldn’t make the meeting tonight so I’ll do this why not leave my boundary alone in my place
32:10
I call home let the dear and anal play where selom is heard a developer
32:20
word and the skies are not cloudy all day oh Home on the
32:29
Range is the urban growth boundary we claim it benefits us all that the all
32:37
here our call to maintain a strong boundary this
32:43
way home Home on the Range with a boundary not subject to
32:51
change it’s a right to protect and not to neglect the open space that Still
33:02
Remains that’s all I got to say all right thank you appreciate the
33:08
time Juan Pablo Gales Martinez gvan
33:17
sorry followed by Paula
33:23
Peterson I’m afraid I can’t top what you just heard
33:28
uh I I would just like to I I think
33:33
we’re out of work what was the speaker who was the next speaker Juan Pablo
33:39
sorry Mr Ryan was next I think followed by okay I just want to make sure we got the right order yeah I’m Richard
33:46
Ryan I’d like this just second the comments of previous speakers
33:52
particularly Jean King and and and the comments of other people this whole thing seems to be
33:59
premature the the the general uh plan commission is still here holding
34:07
public hearings on this topic it’s hasn’t been decided by the city council it hasn’t been decided by anybody yet it
34:14
just seems to be incredibly premature to even be considering an eir
34:21
so I I would hope that you would just send it back to the staff and say hold this for a while and uh
34:28
see what what what comes out of the public hearings that that are taking place so
34:34
thank
34:44
you the previous gentleman look more like a Juan Pablo than I do
34:50
so good evening ladies and gentlemen my name is Juan senior landage manager for
34:56
thank you for to comment here uh tonight among the many projects we’ve been
35:01
involved in in this area with my tenure at SMD is the creation of a permanent East Side Urban limit line for the city
35:07
of Dublin the uh permanent West Side Urban limit line that was used to be uh
35:13
uh temporary on the west side of Dublin and we also waited on the Aramis solo project proposed for County land in the
35:19
north limore area as well as a proposed Cemetery more recently uh that we’ve had
35:24
concerns with BB Chang land use biological impacts things like that with regard to this project uh tonight glad
35:32
to see uh uh basically throwing the kitchen sink of squa uh at this and
35:37
that’s pretty good because this project would most likely require an examination of all those uh issues what is usually
35:45
missing from an examination of biological resources that in our experience is very uh cogent to this
35:51
specific project is that uh this project is being proposed in the narrowest point
35:57
in the 200m long diabal range which runs from basically the tip of Contra Costa
36:03
County from the water down to the Kern County the little tippy top right there
36:09
so it is the neck I like to call it of Mount diu the the thin thin connection
36:18
that that very popular Mountain very biologically Rich area has to the rest of the diabo range and based on all
36:24
sorts of research that we’ve seen uh uh regarding climate change the need for a north south uh migration Corridor for
36:31
various plant and Wildlife species uh but even perhaps more importantly the
36:36
need to maintain it for populations that currently exist and require their genetic inte Integrity to be maintained
36:42
the population South of the 580 to connect them with the north uh a lot of times that examination of the importance
36:50
of wildli quarters missing from squa documents uh that examine things like
36:55
this also we note that there are very very few Crossings Wildlife Crossings
37:01
along the 580 that connect the north and south side of the Diablo range and one of them would be directly impacted uh by
37:08
this proposal so uh definitely examination of that would be uh very important obviously has been noted um a
37:16
no project alternative would be well served being included in this squid document and
37:24
if another set another alternative besides a no project is to be considered
37:30
one thing we’ve noticed is that uh cities that like to expand their uh
37:37
urban urban limit lines we call them in qu Costa County Urban growth boundaries here but for example Pittsburgh they
37:43
will attempt to set aside small areas of open space or mitigation land in a sea of
37:49
development maybe better served to have a wide swath along one side one axis of
37:55
this project uh that could amarate some of your mitigation concerns that’s it for me thank
38:01
you Paula
38:10
Peterson hi there um my name is Paula Peterson and I really wasn’t sure what
38:16
an eir was so I kind of Now understand a little bit about it but um I’ve heard
38:24
people here say I’ve been here for 40 years um my family’s been here uh since
38:31
the 1800s I heard somebody say that this is no longer a Cow Town well I still run
38:38
cattle today because my grandfather ran cattle today the property that you are
38:44
doing this eir is where I live I heard somebody say that if um we we expand the
38:52
urban growth boundaries that the population of the people that live there will probably have to pay higher
38:59
property taxes or eventually have to move that’s me that’s I I will be
39:05
affected um we talk about this being 20 years from now so I’m speaking for my
39:11
grandsons because today they’re learning how to run cattle they’re learning the responsibilities of being in a country
39:19
World um you take that away and which we’re taking away today where kids don’t
39:25
even have that cap capability of doing you know the outdoor things that they
39:30
should be doing we becoming a um computer technology where kids are you
39:37
know on their phones or they’re on their video games uh you know I’m fortunate to
39:43
have grandsons that will grow up to learn how to have the responsibilities of being able to um
39:52
have good ethics good work ethics uh learn the you know the life of um uh the
40:01
circle of life kind of things kids today don’t get to learn that um this
40:08
environmental whatever I’m not sure exactly what it all means and how it all
40:14
handles but I think it has already been said that we have a lot of um places
40:21
inside the city limits that we can look at growing uh it’s already been known
40:27
that the population is you know going down not going up I had heard also how we were going to make this this whole
40:34
growth thing was going to make it so that people could live in Livermore and work in
40:40
Livermore today if you don’t make 100,000 each in a dual resident you will
40:46
not be able to buy a house in liver rent in Livermore is extremely high
40:53
so expanding the city of Livermore is is not going to fix the problems that we
40:58
have today and I don’t see that we’re addressing the problems we have today so
41:04
I’m obviously a no no growth um I think she said it the best that how she
41:12
explained the whole thing the gentleman that said that this is no longer a cowboy Town look at your emblem there’s
41:18
a cowboy so that’s just my my take and
41:24
thank you for listening
41:29
those are all the cards I
41:37
have okay so we will thank you very much for the comments we will close the public comment period And there’s no
41:45
action required tonight from the Planning Commission but want to give each commissioner a chance if they’d like to ask uh make a comment regarding
41:55
and these are comments regarding the scope of the contents of the E and so we’ll go to uh commissioner dumbar
42:04
first uh thanks I’ll keep this uh brief thank you for being here and expressing your concerns I know that um as was
42:11
expressed it’s a rather specific topic and I hopefully you saw that we accepted your comments
42:17
um as broad as they were and they will all be taken back um I there were some
42:23
things I just wanted to quickly go through a no project alternative is required for this analysis correct as
42:28
with an so it will be analyzed correct that’s correct
42:34
okay and um there were a lot of smaller things that I think will be they’re all
42:41
getting written down and recorded and they’ll will’ll be addressed the other one I heard was
42:48
um that I wanted to jump after let me see if I can find it um an e does address public benefit in a
42:57
roundabout way but it’s primarily focused on environmentalism you know the the impact
43:03
of a project and the the public benefits are not really necessarily required or
43:08
are only required in certain cases is that generally correct okay so it’s we we should talk
43:16
about it and I think I heard the word uh clear and concise explanation of the trade-offs and I I’m I’m looking for
43:22
that as well and I think we should all expect that um
43:28
I think those were the the ones that stuck out to me oh I my uh roommate in college is finishing up his PhD at Davis
43:35
with a PhD in geography and his specialty is in Wildlife quarters so I really appreciated that comment thank
43:46
you commissioner PCO thank you chairperson Larry um I
43:53
think most of my questions were covered by commissioner Dumar um there was uh
44:00
one thing I did want to clarify that it is the um City staff so the city of
44:06
Livermore is initiating the eir is my understanding and it’s required by law
44:12
in order for it to be considered by the city council um am I wrong about that so
44:23
um earlier this year the city council did direct staff to to initiate an environmental impact report for this
44:29
project uh the city is acting as uh what’s called the lead agency under squa
44:34
um meaning that they are the decision makers uh as it relates to um the environmental document being certified
44:41
ultimately as we know the the final decision regarding the ballot does um depend on voter approval um but you you
44:48
have that correct that uh the the city is um drafting the IR essentially thank
44:55
you
45:07
Mr CAC thank you chairperson um several of
45:13
the other Commissioners have asked questions that I was rapidly typing a bullet point list note uh up here to
45:19
cover so thank you other Commissioners um there are two areas in specific that I would
45:28
just want to offer comment on um the E itself please correct me if I’m wrong is
45:34
by necessity site specific because it can only consider the boundaries of the area that whatever land use change is
45:41
being proposed in correct that’s correct it’s putting together a baseline area to evaluate and
45:49
evaluate those impacts um the follow-up question I have is is with regard to the
45:55
topics that are here and this is mostly because we get a you know boot camp in this sort of information but with regard
46:01
to the topics here these are the ones that the state of California but requires in a squa sort of environmental
46:10
review right that is correct okay um looking at sort of the California
46:16
required topics on this list there are a couple that I would like to uh request
46:22
special emphasis on as part of this environmental and PCT report one is
46:28
Transit uh and Transit accessibility I do have some concerns
46:34
regarding Transit integration with the rest of the city of this area and then
46:40
the second area would be um related to
46:46
the I’m sorry I’m looking for the exact technical term here public services and
46:52
public service and public servicing utilities to this area uh as part of that as areas of specific
46:59
study that said one of the questions that remained in my mind that I think
47:07
has been also articulated by a number of folks here tonight is while not in the
47:12
direct scope of what is considered a technical eir there is a bigger why I
47:17
think in my mind and in some of the minds of the commenters here tonight and
47:22
I do want to ask that as part of this process can we focus on elements of that
47:29
bigger why uh I believe one commenter spoke about it as can we make this e a
47:34
little bit more holistic in its approach even if that is not necessarily what is ordinarily done for the case of
47:42
an um in that regard the areas that were kind of on my mind as well were impact
47:50
on Agra business and small business uh in that area impact on wildlife and
47:56
Wildlife Resources specifically biological resources um and also impact on uh
48:05
plantable acreage for our Vineyards which was why I was asking uh which sort
48:11
of specific plans this area might overlap with earlier um and
48:17
lastly one of the other things and I will say this having personally come from the general plan advisory committee
48:24
is that this is about eval ating tradeoffs um and I think there
48:29
is to a lot of the points that are being made tonight you know there’s this
48:37
analysis of do we have enough land in
48:42
aggregate for specific commercial and Industrial uses versus do we have enough
48:49
of that land concentrated in the right areas for these uses and it’s sort of
48:56
you know the same argument that Xfinity or Comcast uses and says oh we’re not a
49:02
monopoly because we cover all of Northern California but Verizon covers all of Nevada right well that’s not very
49:08
local that’s very that’s very sort of hyper Regional and I think in this case
49:15
you know educating our voters and educating our city with regard to why
49:21
some of the sizing of the proposed land uses are being proposed this way would
49:27
would be a very edifying component to this as it moves forward um because I
49:33
I’ve heard you know that yes in aggregate if you were to take all the commercial and industrial space and pack
49:40
it all together we have plenty of it but some of those sites are too small to be useful for the kind of uses we want for
49:46
our city moving forward so I think digging into that a little bit would be something you
49:52
know that I believe would be edifying for both our voters and for for for folks moving forward and again none of
49:59
these are things that are typically considered in an e but due to the sensitivity of this area and due to the
50:06
history were just comments I wanted to add as areas if you can include please
50:13
do I Anderson thank you uh and thank you everybody for the comments um I know
50:20
that they will all be deeply noted by staff um I just did want to do some
50:27
clarification uh we are not voting on anything tonight
50:33
correct that is correct thank you um the city council has already commissioned
50:39
the eir to be done that’s correct that is correct and if I may add
50:46
in uh commissioner Vin jenko’s earlier question related to the state requirement I wanted to reiterate yes it
50:52
is a state requirement based on the actions that we do need to do an eir um
50:57
uh in order to consider any movement forward at all regardless of the outcome
51:04
thank you um and uh we have as a Planning Commission no authority to stop
51:12
this eir correct that’s that’s correct yeah um so
51:19
especially since it’s on the agenda as receiving public comment there’s nothing
51:25
we could could do in this agenda item to say no even if we wanted
51:32
to that’s correct and and um we would bring this this item at a future public
51:37
hearing for your recommendation at that time that that would be appropriate all thank you appreciate that I’ll just add
51:43
to there’ll be another uh public comment for the actual draft environmental impact report
51:49
itself awesome yeah because tonight is about the scoping what are we going to look at right um
51:56
moving on down the line um and uh commissioner Dunbar brought this up
52:01
about the uh no project option that is not just something we will look at
52:06
that’s legally required Now isn’t it yeah so okay um thank you
52:14
um uh next uh taxes uh Prop 13 still
52:19
covers all properties in the state correct that’s my understanding yes okay
52:27
so property tax would would only rise at 2% um for property owners until they
52:36
sell that land that’s right okay I just wanted to double check on that as well
52:41
um um
52:46
so and then
52:53
um oh that was since the voters okay this question is going to have a lot of ifs so I
53:01
apologize first if the council votes if it moves forward if it goes to the
53:06
voters um and then if the voters approve so after all those steps if that’s what
53:14
ends up happening then the land use designation would be decided at that
53:19
point is that correct yeah so there would be additional steps that would occur after
53:26
that um including um things like annexation of the properties uh future
53:32
more detailed planning of the area as well um that would all be something developed in the future okay so we’ll
53:41
have even more the public will have even more opportunity at that point for land use
53:47
designation correct that is correct so a lot this
53:53
year is still a very high level picture of the land use pattern out here and as Miss feris said there’s a range of
54:00
different land use types we’re considering as part of this alternative and that’ll have to get further refined as we move through the
54:06
process thank you um it is good to see you here Mr Ross because this question
54:12
kind of pertains to the other e we have is there any overlap between the two
54:18
IRS or are they just completely separate they are separate but related so they’re
54:24
working on Parallel paths now and the general Plan update eir is looking at
54:30
the Citywide scale at East potentially east of Greenville because the decisions on what the preferred Landing scenario
54:36
has not been decided yet plus all the other Focus areas and this particularly
54:42
is looking solely at the east of Greenville area at some point in the future they may merge and we’ll just
54:48
have to keep coordinating these efforts as we move forward thank you so much um U thank you
54:55
Steph I really appreciate all that um I think uh it was uh Jeremy tro masi
55:00
brought up the point that this is this is a very thoughtful process that we’re that there’s a lot behind the scenes
55:06
that we are you know that staff is working on to make sure that we have every option available and understand
55:14
everything about this so uh I appreciate all your hard work um Jeremy sh M also
55:21
said that we’re no longer a cow toown um we may not be the same type of Cow Town
55:26
but we’re still a cow toown at heart so um that that’s all I
55:33
have okay thank you to everybody who came tonight provide their comments on this uh e
55:39
scoping yes oh yeah yeah I’m sorry thank you so much chairperson Larry I had one
55:45
more question regarding the scope and it’s just an understanding because this is for a plan for 20 years from now as
55:53
as one of the commenters pointed out when the ER is done is only the impact
55:59
looked at immediately when the land use designation could be changed or are
56:04
there projections for what could happen in the the 20 years down the
56:10
road yeah so the E will look at both essentially the the present day but also
56:17
um kind of fast forward into the future and and look at um other kind of changes
56:22
in the environment expected projects in the pipeline line and kind of what we call the in the IR the cumulative
56:28
conditions of the project and how that may impact um the topics listed
56:33
here I would just add really quickly to to put another point on what Miss ver said is we would look at a scenario
56:41
where whereby all these land uses on the map that are colors are built out right
56:47
to see what would that impact look like and we would project what time frame we think we would get built out at and
56:53
that’s how we’re Sim similar doing this with the E and some of the analysis we’ve done as part of the land use
56:58
Alternatives those evaluations look at what would the conditions look like at
57:04
buildout at year 2045 it doesn’t tell us how fast or when but if we fast forward
57:10
into time and and assumed everything got built out this is what we would expect
57:15
to happen Okay thank you Mr so I’m assuming that would include so that would include the impacts in all these
57:22
areas including agriculture and Agra business um assumptions based on
57:28
population and housing and a range of those assumptions yes that’s correct thank
57:38
you okay I just had uh one question on the E process and then two comments on
57:45
the scoping Miss Vera the question is could you describe to me the process I
57:50
heard some question from the public about how we’re going to invol involve stakeholders and other agencies that’s
57:58
not a chapter in the e but that’s a process that you go through how how are they
58:04
involved sure so I I believe the comment you’re referencing to is talking about maybe distribution of County the
58:11
documents yeah fishing game yeah so the um all these environment documents including the nose preparation and
58:17
eventually the the draft di those are sent to those uh those agencies um
58:23
consistent with state law and requirements as well as kind of our neighboring agencies such as Alam County
58:30
um and so those those will be sent um when it comes to a groups that are not
58:35
necessarily listed on um say the state’s list of kind of distribution for example
58:40
like it’s you know calr gets a copy um uh fishing game as with noted gets a
58:46
copy um when there’s other groups outside of that uh the city does have a um interest list that can be um added to
58:53
a list serve uh that’s kind of similar to like a public hearing notice list where they are notified of document
58:59
availability um and provided again the opportunity to to comment okay the
59:06
comment I see in your list here uh geology and soils and when I’m looking
59:11
at the alternative B uh and the land uses I’m just you’re going to have to
59:17
make some assumptions for density right you’re uh to look at traffic and I’m
59:24
wondering about the Contours at the North End of the of the the area that
59:29
we’re talking about and how is that part of the process you’re going to be looking at how you would fit those
59:36
industrial Parcels in there and how the grading would look that would affect D that would affect geology right right so
59:44
the the E will include a set of assumptions on um kind of the maximum intensity of development based on each
59:51
individual use that could go in and then analyze it assuming that maximum intensity is Mr
59:58
Stewart no I wasn’t going to add anything into what SP was okay saying so there wouldn’t be a grading
1:00:05
plan in in the E you would just assume that all the density that’s shown
1:00:11
in the I call it the purple area is possible and analyze the site in that way that’s right the cir is um
1:00:18
considered to be programmatic in nature where it is kind of a higher um level look at it uh in the future if uh you
1:00:26
know detailed planning were to continue on this project and and ultimately development were to occur then that’s
1:00:32
when um things like raing plans would be would be provided okay last uh item for
1:00:39
scoping I believe it’s Patterson P Road there’s the uh transmission lines that
1:00:44
uh run parallel with Road just on the south side and they’re not your typical uh secondary or primary power lines
1:00:52
these are the I don’t think it’s p though there’s a substation too right there at patteron Pass Road and I know
1:00:58
that can sometimes impact what can happen underneath so that would then there’s a
1:01:05
chapter on utilities right so that’s a different group that’s not your typical
1:01:11
P coordination it’s it’s a go ahead I believe those are the power lines that
1:01:17
that substation feeds the labs which is on a different network and different grid and so we would look at the impact
1:01:23
of the project development to the existing conditions and that would be part of the existing conditions we’d
1:01:28
also look at how would this development or area be Serve by utilities like PG
1:01:35
Etc okay all right we no action from the commission but yes
1:01:42
yes I apologize CH person Larry um I did have one more question and one more
1:01:47
comment um Miss in addition to the two areas of specific emphasis that I called
1:01:53
out related to the environmental imp report the public services and transportation areas I actually had the
1:01:58
word Wildfire circled on my little notepad which is in my mind it was a
1:02:04
proxy for something that is actually not listed by the state which is the impacts
1:02:09
of climate change um and I know that’s very very hard to sort of assess but at
1:02:16
the same time I think 20 years from now if we continue on the trend of warming
1:02:21
that we’re on we’re going to be pushing about 2° cels and honestly that may actually affect
1:02:27
the kind of land uses we want to put out in that area should it move forward so I
1:02:33
had Wildfire circled as a proxy for can we also start thinking more about the
1:02:38
impact of climate change here in our region um and what that might mean for how we want to do with our land uh so
1:02:45
that was the other actual area I neglected to mention and then I also just neglected to say thank you um
1:02:51
there’s a lot of folks here tonight and I’m deeply appreciative of everyone in this town and thank you for coming out
1:02:57
tonight and thank you to staff for this incredibly hard work putting this together thank
1:03:05
you just one more for me and I’ll reiterate uh thank you for coming out all of you um those of you familiar with
1:03:12
this process and those of you unfamiliar with this process you’re welcome here um and some of you may unfamiliar might
1:03:18
think this was all very dry it’s all just a part of the process we’re all eagerly awaiting that draft IR I’m sure
1:03:24
I will see many of your faces again on that um I wanted to tee
1:03:29
up uh a question to staff that I will probably ask when the draft comes back
1:03:36
which is to say when the draft comes back this commission I want everyone to understand
1:03:41
our role here this commission is going to make a determination whether that e is adequate correct we are not
1:03:49
necessarily going to make a determination that that is the option that we want the city council to take or
1:03:54
the staff that that’s the one we like but only to say that the all the environmental impacts have been properly
1:04:00
addressed that’s what we’re being asked to do here whether they should do something is a council question is that
1:04:07
correct that is correct to ultimately make a recommendation on either certifying the e or not and that
1:04:13
recommendation will go to council um that will occur once the final eir is is
1:04:19
drafted we are certainly open to our own personal opinions but that’s the thing that we task to do with and then I’ll
1:04:26
probably ask it the same way when we come back so
1:04:31
thanks Mr Stewart do you have what you need on this item we do thank you very much all right
1:04:38
we will ask I ask one conclude I oh so there’s opportunity to I’m sorry public
1:04:44
comment is closed but you have an opportunity until December 20th to send in your
1:04:50
comments yeah appreciate that so we’ll move on to item
1:05:11
6.1

Machine generated transcript of the 2019-04-22 Garaventa Hill environmental certification meeting with video timestamps, synchronized with the video posted on our Youtube page.

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okay thank you mayor Marchand members of the council good evening my name is Steve Stewart I’m your planning manager
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and I’m joined up here at the desk by Tran SES our one of our associate planners the project planner who
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inherited this project or volunteered to inherit it back when we passed that on
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also uh engineering specialist on my right Mike poto and then our um environmental consultant from Lamere
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Gregory Associates is Rebecca Al so before we get started a little bit
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I’ll um I’m going to provide a brief history of the uh
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site and before we do that I did I did want to note that the proposal before
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you this evening is the result uh of and the response to a lot
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of comments and suggestions and recommendations from a lot of folks in this room including the Savar gaven and
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Hill group uh nearby neighbor our federal and state resource agencies
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the Livermore area Recreation Park District city council and and
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staff so the 32 Acres site is located up in our Northeast uh part of our city
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right in between Laughlin Road and Vasco Road the um Altamont Creek Elementary
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and Altamont Creek Park are directly south across Altamont Creek from the project site can you move that
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just and this sites the last undeveloped parcel that’s part of the Marissa uh development out there so the
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the site does have an extensive land use history and was part of the in the early
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90s as part of the marilisa development plan for just under 400 units in the area you can see the the project
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outlined here the time had um sort of a loop ra Road around the nor with some
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larger estate Lots on top in the mid90s the city council
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approved the subdivision that created the uh residential development around
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the project site also the School site and the uh Park site in addition to the
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gabena wetlands preserve parel and at this time the the uh
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property was designated as a remainder during that development uh just be developed in the future but at that time
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it was noted that some of the density uh allocated to this parcel was transferred
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off to the site and uh used in the other development but that 76 units would
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remain available as part of the overall density transfer for that overall
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project in 2000 Western Pacific housing applied under the city’s housing imp
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implementation program uh with this 45 unit development uh proposal had again
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45 units had a loop road coming along entire site was pretty much developed
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except for the northwest corner couple of culde saacs up on top of the nles with the view or estate Lots up on
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top uh due to below average Landscaping contributions to City
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facilities and its location the project was ranked below average and did not receive housing allocations that
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year in 2011 the current applicant lafy communities uh applied for the
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development plan with this uh layout included 76 single family residential lots with a
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loop road couple of culde saacs uh up there the road looped over the saddle
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between the two NES on the property and included a two-lane vehicular access
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Bridge extension from Hawk Street over Altamont Creek and into the
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project staff worked with the applicant to revise uh this proposal to reduce the
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grading and try and preserve more of those NES and the landforms there and this plan you can see um
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eliminated the Lots just off of Bear Creek and the Lots at the base of the
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eastern most null to try and Preserve of that land form and then add some other changes including getting rid of the
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little culde saacs uh that opened up more of the the Northwestern null
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project still had the two-lane vehicular Bridge extending from Hawk Street and over Altamont
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Creek So based on public feedback uh including uh those at a
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public hearing for at the Planning Commission for the draft environmental impact report the applicant made
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revisions to that project and you can see that on the
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screen
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um and this this is in response to um comments heard at that public meeting
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for uh encouraging cut through traffic with the bridge here so the bridge is
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removed and again uh um still had the uh
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lotting pattern to preserve most of the NES the outcrop in the northwest corner
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was to be saved uh also in response to concerns from Li Mario Recreation and Park District uh trees and uh ve
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vegetation were removed from the outer um planter uh natural buffer area to
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eliminate perching opportunities for Raptors that would prey on burrowing owls that are known to habitate uh in
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the gaven Wetlands Preserve
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so the Planning Commission did consider this project shown on the left and uh
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they recommended denial at that time uh primarily due to the extensive grading
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and some of the uh comments from LPD at the time and also
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um uh from comments taken during that environmental impact hearing so uh in
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2015 the applicant went back to the drawing board and revised the project again uh primarily to reduce grading and
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the main change Was the removal of the uh loop roadway that required a lot of
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grading up on those NES so that was changed into an emergency vehicle
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access uh that that essentially follow the Contours of that uh saddle there
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between so rather than proceed um to the city council with a
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recommendation for denial the applicant did make make these changes uh to the site plan again you’ll
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note now that the bridge is no longer uh part of The Proposal again in response
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to some of the comments from the neighborhood and the surrounding um uh developed residential about cut through
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traffic uh just another note in response to some
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of the comments they heard they did add it’s really hard to see on this slide a pedestrian connection to the existing uh
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Trail Network that’s off the site there and then they also provided visual simulations to show what that project
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would look like in its context so at this point the project
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still required a legislative act by the council because they were still seeking to uh change the zoning on the project
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to vary from floor area ratio limitations and also
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setbacks so in 2015 the Planning Commission did vote uh to recommend the
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council approve this plan that you see on the screen and they felt that the 20 their 2014 concerns had been addressed
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uh this is the same plan that the council looked at later in September of 2015 and and uh directed the applicant
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to return to the planning commission with a project that was more subordinate to the Natural landforms reduced some of
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the grading and provide an emergency vehicle access uh to the
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site specifically the these are some of the methods that the council recommended
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the applicant explore to reduce the grading including reducing the number and size of the units the overall height
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narrow some of the street widths reduce some of the retaining wall Heights on the site and again provide that uh
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emergency vehicle access and here in the green are the responses that the development plan has incorporated
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including reducing the number of units from 47 to 44 total the actual number of
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buildings is is 41 and that’s due to their approach to meet the affordable
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housing um inclusion area ordinance Turan will go over that a little more detail they reduce the average size of
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the units to be more comparable with the neighborhood reduce the basically the whole height of development by by moving
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it down the hill narrowed Street widths enabled uh further reduction in some of
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the grading reduced the the largest retaining wall Heights which were on the
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northeastern boundary up around six to 7 feet reduced those to two feet by
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pulling those lots in off of the perimeter and um having a bit of a buffer between the
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development and the open space and uh also provided a split um retaining wall
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at the project entry instead of a single six to seven foot retaining wall it’s
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now split into a four foot retaining wall with a three-foot bench for planting and then a three-foot wall on
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top of that so we I’ll show you some pictures of that in a minute and also the
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Eva uh this is a comparison of the 2015 grading plan where the council provided
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that direction and this is the proposal in front of you this evening you will see that
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the uh retaining wall I was just talking about has been changed to a split level
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retaining wall that steps back and allows planting uh between the steps and
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what that did along with moving the entire road down further south in the site and also narrowing it up was enable
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uh to preserve uh more of this null and its natural condition and move that
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grading that chase that slope back up the hill previously further down the
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hill uh you can see that the there was a a handful of units removed from this
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entry in order to preserve that view as you go onto the site over the bridge as a pedestrian or bicyclist that is of the
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null a couple unit uh units up here in the corner were eliminated and then a
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20ft wide emergency vehicle access only Bridge with pedestrian bicycle access is
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provided uh at the Hawk Street Extension
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and with that I’ll turn it over to Turon I’ll walk you through some more of the project
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details so shown here is the 2018 site plan incorporating council’s 2015
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directives as Steve me mentioned the current proposals for 44 units 38 of
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those would be detached single family homes which are identified here in green please note that the ones uh signify
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where the single level homes are going to be located they’ve been strategically located at the project entry and then up
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in the northwest corner to help preserve views of the nolles and surrounding
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hillsides Steve mentioned the project also proposes Duets uh they’re shown here in yellow these units would
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partially satisfy the city’s inclusionary housing requirement and the remainder of the requirement would be
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satisfied by a cash payment equivalent to the additional 3.15 affordable units
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required uh this method is consistent with what the city’s done before for other projects that include the Orchid
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Ranch and the Grove subdivisions shown here in blue is the
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bike pedestrian and Eva bridge at Hawk
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Street and uh Steve mentioned due in large part to community staff and agency input over the years the NES and rock
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outcroppings will remain undeveloped with Public Access Trails those are shown here in red and the orange
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squiggly sections identify where portions of the trail would be uh Ada
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improved the project architect will discuss the architecture and floor plans in Greater detail as part of the
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applicants presid presentation but shown here are the proposed elevation Styles which are Spanish villa and Farmhouse
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the current proposal has significantly increased architectural diversity since 2015 when the only architectural style
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being proposed was the vill style and the home sizes are comparable
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to Altimont Creek development to the East and comparable to the bluff development to the
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north all told the project proposes five floor plans including the duet floor
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plan the duet units are all TW story and are
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evenly dispersed throughout the development The projects’s Corner Lot locations have been utilized to allow
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the duet units front doors and garage doors to be located on their own separate Frontage the buildings duet buildings
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have achieved design parody with the attached units including having comparable massing and scale to the
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twostory single family detached units again uh other projects with
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similar duet units include the Orchid Ranch project which is east of Isabel
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Avenue and the Grove subdivision off of Mines Road as part of their proposal the
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applicant has prepared several before and after simulations conveying the project this particular simulation is
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viewed from a location East of the site near n Court we have a key down in the
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bottom right hand corner uh The View is due West towards
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the project and as you see the project is only slightly
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visible this photo is viewed from a location a few hundred feet east of the previous slide location and is has a
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different orientation it’s more Northwest facing the Planning Commission uh back in December did
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request additional photo simulations and this Vantage provides a view around the
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Southeastern null this view is from the Western
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Terminus of be Creek Drive where access to the project is proposed Steve mentioned the retaining
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wall on the right hand side that steps back and provides plantings to be less visually
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impactful this slide shows a cross-section of that retaining wall uh
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it would each of the walls would be three and four feet tall and the bench in the middle is three feet
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wide this view is from the sports fields at Altimont Creek School looking north towards the
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project from this perspective you can see the bridge and uh one or two units to the
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left to the west
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side over here after with previous versions of this
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project units were significantly more visible in this
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view shown here is the same view enlarged and showing sevene established
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Landscaping this view is from the northern Terminus of Hawk Street where the bridge is
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proposed a view of one of the NES that lines up with the bridge has been preserved at this
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location this photo simulation is viewed from Vasco Road looking East to the project site the proposed project is
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visible in the foreground with the ridge lines of the preserved NES visible
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behind the proposed units here’s the same view again
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enlarged and with 7-year established Landscaping note here the absence of trees in
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response to the park District’s concerns with providing trees and the natural
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buffers this is a photo Sim that the Planning Commission requested here the project is viewed from a trail location
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Southwest of the site from this Vantage Point Brushy Peak would be
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visible
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this photo Sim is from the same location as the previous slide but the orientation is more east facing to
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provide a slightly different view uh the trail uh where the photo is taken from
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is adjacent to existing homes so in this vantage point you see some
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existing development this is a rear yard fence that you see in the right hand
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side
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in summary significant changes from the 2015 version of the project include the Project’s compliance with the existing
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zoning due to this the site does not require rezoning for project approval the only required entitlements are the
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subdivision map and site plan design review the current proposal also has
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fewer units and smaller units than any previous version of the project and a public amenity in the form
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of the Eva bicycle and pestian Bridge is being proposed by this project and would serve an as an
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expansion to the trail Network at this time I’d like to hand it
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over to Rebecca old of lford Gregory who will go over the environmental
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document thank you and good evening as noted my name is Rebecca Al with lanord Gregory primary report prep for the
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environmental documentation I’m just going to summarize briefly today what we did for
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the analysis and what the conclusions were and then I’ll be available if there’s any technical
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questions so knowing that there were environmental concerns related to this site and project uh we did complete an
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environmental impact report or eir covering all environmental topic areas under the California Environmental
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Quality act or squa through that analysis we found that there were no impacts that would remain significant
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following mitigation so nothing would be unavoidable uh instead the 21 potentially significant impacts that we
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identified were able to be reduced to a level below significance thresholds
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through the imple implementation of mitigation measures uh all other topic areas had
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either no impacts or impacts that were already below significance threshold so let’s go over briefly what those
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are um first some topic areas had impacts below significance thresholds
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this was in uh Aesthetics or Visual Land Use Services utilities and noise uh I’m
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not going to talk about those since there weren’t any significant impacts unless there’s questions later uh a
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couple other topic areas had some impacts that could be mitigated through the implementation of standard
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mitigation that apply to most projects uh this included for emissions uh
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mitigation requiring compliance with the city’s greenhouse gas reduction plan increased Energy Efficiency best
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management practices to reduce construction emissions and then while there are no known cultural resources on
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the site mitigation would require a plan for unexpected Discovery and the appropriate handling in that
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event so other detailed analysis required uh some Project Specific
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mitigation to be implemented I’m going to go over these in more detail so first up Wetlands there are a
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lot of wetlands in the area but almost none on the development area of the project itself uh that tiny little
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orange circle there is in fact the wetlands within the subdivision area it actually looks like a little hole
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somebody dug with a shovel um it’s 0.004 Acres uh however it does qualify based
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on its characteristics as Wetlands so mitigation requires appropriate coordination and replacement through
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Regulatory Agencies so this is the biological slide
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there’s a good amount of natural areas in the vicinity and those areas host some sensitive species and
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habitats we did numerous biological surveys and studies and this is one of
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the many figures from those this is just an example of those figures it shows known occurrences of certain um
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sensitive species in this case it’s California red-legged frog and California tiger salamander and it shows
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those known occurrences throughout the area but not actually on the project site and indeed when we had our
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biologists go out to the site they also did not find any individuals of those sensitive species however they noted
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that the site could be used as supportive habitat for a number of those
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species and therefore mitigation was applied as if those species were found because it could be used that way even
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though they were not the mitigation includes uh preconstruction surveys and
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protection measures to prevent the potential for harm during the construction activities and then also coordination
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with regulatory agencies for offsite habit habitat um protection to
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compensate for the potential habitat loss represented by development of the
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site and that um off-site habitat protection would meet or exceed the
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recommended mitigation ratios of the Regulatory
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Agencies so this slide shows uh the geological exploration that was per
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formed at the site all the blue dots or areas that they dug and the numbers trenches that they performed to
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characterize the soil and subsoil conditions so quite a bit of uh Discovery happened at the site to make
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sure that there would not be issues with development of the area mitigation includes basically
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adherence to the geotechnical standards that are appropriate to the specific characters of the site um it includes
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soil and Foundation preparation slop stability based on those specific
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characteristics sure what
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happened this doesn’t seem to want to go
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back okay so this is the transportation slide
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this is again one of the figures from the Transportation analysis this particular one shows the amount of
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project trips that would be added to vicinity intersections during peak hours it’s not intended for you to be able to
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read all the numbers um just as something to look at while we talk about it so um the conclusions were that the
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trips would be within the residential street capacities that this project connects to and they would not cause
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Project Specific impacts at any of the intersections however when combined with area development so we looked at a
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cumulative scenario uh there would be one impact under a cumulative level that this project would contribute to and it
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was the need for improvements at Laughlin and North Front intersection with mitigation requiring contribution
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to those
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improvements so again to summarize uh dis comprehensive analysis to address
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the the known concerns with development of this project site we didn’t find any impacts that would remain significant
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after mitigation uh all the impacts would be reduced to a level uh below
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significance thresholds through the implementation of mitigation uh and as was kind of
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discussed the project has changed over time the current project is actually similar to the environmentally Superior
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alternative that was originally identified in analy in the
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draft so then just to summarize how the changing project has changed the environmental analysis and
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conclusions over time the number of homes has gone down every time so impacts related to issues like the
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amount of traffic or emissions would all have gone down over time um the bridge
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or no Bridge has changed over time originally it was a vehicular bridge that would have required Creek
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realignment um so some amount of biological impacts and then no bridge
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but now The Pedestrian Eva would not require Creek realignment so only
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temporary impacts to the creek so it’s covered within the original analysis and would have a reduced environmental
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impact uh we were uh required to take a look at the changing projects as they
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occurred and we actually looked at um the first change in the first final eir
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and the second change in what was called a reissued final eir um as I mentioned
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it it’s actually very similar to one of the Alternatives that we already took a look at so mostly we just needed to
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update some responses to comments to make sure that they were appropriate to the current project and to compare the
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impacts um from the original project that was analyzed in the draft irir all of the impacts would be the same or
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reduced fewer homes and vehicles less rating less stream impact uh reduced
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potential for vehicular pedestrian conflict uh and only minor revisions
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were required to reflect the revised project did you want to talk
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about so just to before we finish up Rebecca um mentioned that the offsite
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mitigation for this part uh development would be um required in that is also owned by
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the gaven family it’s an 85 acre piece here in the Springtown Alkali sink up in
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um just north of Springtown uh this is the 300 acres that the city owns uh this
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property um is has a much higher value in terms of biological diversity on it
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it has a stretch of Altamont Creek that you can’t really see but winds through the property has Al alkal soils scalds
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seasonal Wetlands has birds beak on the property Al so a habitat for the tar
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plant I don’t know that we’ve anybody surveyed out there for that just yet and
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then also occurrences of uh California tiger salamander Vernal pool fairy shrimp and I believe red-legged frog so
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um you know recently the council did authorize uh the city to work on a
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couple of projects here to to receive mitigation money from other projects one in Dublin and one out in um Discovery
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Bay to conduct some Wetland restoration by the removal of noxious and evasive weeds
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putting up some fencing to try and eliminate the trespass that’s ongoing out there and causing significant damage
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and then also signage uh to inform the community of the the um valuable
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resources out here and also offer an education opportunity um so those are uh in play
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uh currently that the city’s working on where also uh in discussions about the
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entire sink with these Property Owners uh they’ve built a mitigation project
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down here uh for a pg& transmission line it actually has birds beak all over it now uh city owns some more property down
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here so if we could get all that under one easement and one management plan might be best for the sync in the long
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run that’s still some early discussions we have ongoing with an
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individual so with that back to uh teron for a
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recommendation so in conclusion staff and the Planning Commission recommend the city council adopt a resolution
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certifying the environmental document and after approval of the application instruct staff to file a notice of
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determination with the Alam County Clerk staff and Planning Commission also recommend the city council adopt a
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resolution approving vesting tentative tra map 894 it’s part of subdivision 13001 and
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site plan design review 13 five authorizing the allocation of 44
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housing implementation program units for the project and authorizing the applicant to provide six duet units as
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proposed and to make a cash payment equivalent to 3.15 Affordable units to satisfy the inclusion Area Housing
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obligation that concludes staff’s presentation Building Material samples have been provided by the applicant on
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the table also supplemental materials have been provided by staff these include an April 18 letter from the
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planning division to the savear gaventa hill Group which responds to various inquiries and concerns expressed by the
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group also included in the supplement materials is an a another April 18 letter from the Save Our G Hill group
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themselves which provides comments on the proposed landscaping for council’s consideration this
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evening in addition to staff’s presentation the applicant has also prepared a presentation staff can
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respond to questions from the city council now or hold all questions until after the applicant presents thank you
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and we did uh have a few words from our City attorney as well and now a few words from our attorney good evening
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mayor members of the city council um I just wanted to reiterate it’s in the staff report but I think it’s important
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to reiterate that with respect to this project that you are acting um as a qu as a Judicial body not as a legislative
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body with respect to this particular project so what you would be doing is looking at the rules and regulations
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with respect to Planning and Zoning that that apply to this property as it exists um in determining whether or not the
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project as it’s presented uh meets those requirements not establishing any new rules or regulations that you would be
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doing as a legislative body otherwise okay very good thank you for the clarification uh okay let let me see are
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there any questions uh from the council at this point for staff vice mayor carlen yes thanks uh thanks to all of
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you for the U very thorough presentations I have a question for Miss alt about environmental conclusions the
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current Project’s similar to the environmentally Superior alternative what does that mean help me understand
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what that means so for an environmental analysis
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uh in a draft e the preparers are required along with the city to consider whether there could
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be changes to the project that would actually reduce or avoid the impacts that were identified for the project so
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if you got rid of the bridge or if you reduce the number of units could you
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substantially reduce uh the impacts that you had identified so for this project
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we considered I have to refresh my memory
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here yeah so this was very similar to the reduced density uh project which is
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also the current General plan allowance alternative we called it um and that looked at a 47 unit
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project um on the site with reduced impacts related to the bridge itself
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okay so when you did the original analysis it wasn’t on the originally proposed 76 unit with the road on Hawk
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Street it was not it was not that so it was so um so how was this one not
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environmentally right so one what I’m struggling with right one of the chapters the last chapter of this book
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which is the draft is the chapter that looks at potential Alternatives so this amount of the book looked at their
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proposed 76 unit project with the bridge and then this part at the end said how
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might we reduce impacts of this project through Alternatives SQL requires essentially is part of its standards
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that you develop and analyze certain uh very specific Alternatives sure one
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including a no project alternative and one uh basically called a environmentally sensitive or Superior
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altern ative and that tries to meet most of the objectives of the project but
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with reduced impacts and so it is trying to develop a a project that has fewer
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impacts than the originally designed project okay so what what made the other
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one Superior no bridge at all the reduction in units so
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in other words remember the original project at 76 units dropping it to 47 um the reduction in grading um having to do
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with fewer units um the elimination of the uh vehicle Bridge which in that case
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required realignment of the creek right The Pedestrian uh and Eva does not so it
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it maintains that environmental superiority and so that’s why the summary said many of those things were
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accomplished and in fact even enhanced from that environmentally uh Superior alternative with this particular so you
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don’t mean that there was another one that’s Superior to this one you just mean this actually looks a lot like that
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Alterna I was misreading the sentence sorry thank you it’s all semantics right
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uh councilor Monroe um that was actually similar to
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what I was going to ask ask or say whatever um but I do have a question that was brought up to me which is uh
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could you talk a little bit about the danger from floods or fire or any of the other Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse
35:53
that might invade but in in in all seriousness floods or Fire have been raised and I
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think that those are legitimate concerns yeah the the the project itself is out of the flood zone so there’s uh not a
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worry there a lot of the concerns brought up in the past were what happens if the Culver at Laughlin Road gets
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blocked and the road becomes impassable um how how would you get out
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and so that was part of the impetus for uh the council directing the applicant
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to look at an emergency vehicle access there uh the we’re in a seismically active
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region and so um you know there are fault traces out in the area you can see
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as the other development that’s been approved out there avoids those in almost a linear uh fashion it’s very
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apparent when you look at the aerial photos and then uh regarding Wildfire so the project was reviewed by
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the Livermore Pleasanton uh fire department and they have um you know
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reviewed the preliminary hydrant locations the loading on the Street the widths the bridge and all of those
36:59
satisfy their requirements for uh battling a a fire that might occur out
37:05
there their first priority is to protect the structures and uh and then then look at
37:12
the hillsides if those are still left so the concern was raised about the
37:18
uh emergency Bridge itself in the case of a flood could that be uh uh washed out
37:27
yeah the the the bridge designs has to be above a particular um high water mark
37:32
in a particular flood if it’s 1003 above the so it’s 3 feet above the 100-year
37:38
flood level uh so that it would not be washed out in a flood event unlike the bridge
37:46
at Laughlin it is a single span Bridge so there is nothing in the floodway that would actually catch or uh create an
37:53
obstacle for flood waters so if flood waters made it essentially through the Laughlin uh bridge and that actually is
37:59
a segment set of culverts there uh Concrete Culverts um they would actually have no problem getting under the
38:06
Eva okay any other questions okay uh you said the applicant
38:13
had a presentation as well sir down
38:20
please just the first page for me that’s
38:25
all
38:34
how we get up and down okay we should had an educational
38:45
course there we go there we go yeah good evening mayor
38:51
masan and the me other members of the city council my name is Patrick Tui I represent lafy community commities the
38:57
applicant in this uh on this sub metal this this application um we’re here tonight with
39:03
our Consultant Group they’ll come up in each speak briefly after my thoughts are done my my comments um after September
39:12
2015 when we were before this body and received a lot of direction we took a
39:17
pause wanted to clear our mind take be able to take a fresh look at the project
39:22
um after kind of focusing on the direction to to reduce
39:27
units and we went back and and took a look at the existing um the existing
39:34
underline zoning our PD 115 it goes back to the mid 90s I believe it’s been there for a while um
39:41
what that zoning does it it simplifies our application we get rid of a general
39:46
plan Amendment and a rezone it’s a straight tentative map application uh what we have to live with
39:52
there is increased setbacks and a more stren F
39:58
calculation so the setbacks helped us reduce our lot count from 47 to
40:04
41 and um the F drove even with the increased lot sizes drove the fa drove
40:10
the house size down so just implementing the underlying zoning and eliminating the general plan Amendment and the
40:17
rezone kind of helped us with those two issues I can appreciate that 47 to 41
40:23
isn’t perhaps the biggest number you might have been looking for but there’s another way to look at it um I know it’s
40:30
47 to 44 but if you think about it we went from 47 to 41 and then we lost three additional
40:37
units for the uh application of the affordable housing requirements so in
40:43
reality we ended up losing nine units of market rate housing over 20% of our last
40:49
project that was before you we think that is is is is doing very well
40:55
compared to what we’ve uh what we’ve had to do on other other sites um so in
41:02
addition to that we’ve reduced the grading by 46,000 cubic yards staff had a graphic up there that showed you what
41:07
it would do um by reducing the grading we’ve been able to uh lower the Lots
41:14
which then Prov provides a better look at the nles once the homes are built I’m not going to say it’s a significant
41:21
Improvement but it’s a anywhere from a 2 to 5 feet depending on your perspective it also allowed us to reduce the
41:27
retaining lalls primarily in the northeast corner and along Bear Creek Drive the one of the comments we
41:34
received in the prior public hearings is that the big scarp or grading along the
41:40
Bear Creek Drive was wasn’t adequate it was it was it was inadequate so with the privatization of
41:49
the roads meeting and HOA will now care for those and they won’t be public roads I.E city city maintained we were able to
41:55
shrink that roadway up by eliminating parking then by splitting the retaining wall that the staff’s already talked
42:01
about we were able to eliminate a big face a big face of a wall put a three- foot planning area between it and
42:08
thereby reduce the big grading on the south face of the East null so um between the grading and then
42:15
the street privatization we’ve really been able to reduce a lot of the impacts on the grading and and therefore gain
42:21
that 46,000 cubic yard reduction or better yet 25% % reduction in the grading from
42:28
the last plan we we provided to you um we also have the Eva in there as a
42:35
capital cost the project that’s fairly obvious that’s that’s on the Builder developer but the maintenance is also on
42:41
this sole project of Now 44 homes with including six uh
42:47
bmrs affordable units um we’ve taken that on through a cfd um there’ll be HOA in addition to
42:54
that on on the h H maintain properties but we we also taken on the cfd
43:00
requirements you know the city will is planning on hiring the HOA to maintain that bridge where it’s where it’s
43:06
practical um but the entire cost of this bridge this Eva bridge that serves that entire Community North of Altimont Creek
43:13
is on this entire project forever more we’ll build it and we’ll maintain it so
43:19
100 plus units or so north of Altimont Creek are are protected when if and when
43:25
the the Laughlin cross in ever fails so it’s just a a developer perspective
43:30
that’s all I mean to share with you lastly 50% 56% of the open space remains
43:36
privately held but publicly accessible again HOA will maintain that cfds in
43:42
place to cover some of the maintenance of that when necessary so between an HOA
43:47
and the cfd there are no there’s no no exposure for for public funds to be used
43:53
on this project I want to say almost entirely but staff can answer that maybe more specifically we’ve gone to Great
44:00
Lengths to rejigger this project refigure it out and and we think we’ve
44:05
done we’ve addressed your your direction given to us in uh in the September 2015
44:11
meeting so unless there’s any other questions for me I’d like to turn it over to the consultant team let them run
44:17
through their presentation and then we can take questions individually or as a group later okay thank
44:25
you see if I can figure it
44:30
out good evening mayor and Council my name is Steve ler and with rer Jensen AAR we’re the civil engineers for the
44:37
project um my uh goal here is to describe what
44:43
uh changes we’ve made since the council last saw the project in 2015 and where
44:49
we are now so in these uh following slides I’ll run through uh what what was
44:56
the plan in 20155 and how we’ve how we’ve modified it in in red to to show
45:02
the changes um so uh we eliminated six
45:10
Lots we added the Eva Bridge we added we uh created two uh Ada
45:19
connections for um uh connections to existing Trail
45:24
systems um as has been mentioned we’ve we’ve um
45:31
reduced the amount of grading and and tried to improve the views of the Noles from
45:39
afar we’ve increased the setbacks the floor area ratio has been
45:49
reduced home sizes have been reduced and there’s been an 85 acre
45:55
conservation ation parcel that was previously mentioned uh what I’d like to do is just
46:01
run around uh the project and try and identify specific areas of changes so uh
46:08
we’ll start down here and work uh clockwise so in this what we called area
46:15
one um you can see this black line represents where we originally had the
46:23
grading design by um making a a series of U adjustments including um moving the
46:32
street and narrowing it um we’ve been able to bring that grading line down
46:40
down the hill substantially to this red line um we all okay so let me walk
46:48
through uh we removed lot one as I mentioned previously
46:53
um we’ve moved the entry Road South and we’ve narrowed narrowed the road and made it
47:01
private and as was previously mentioned um the retaining wall that that is along
47:08
this entrance has been uh redesigned to be a a stepped wall U with Landscaping
47:15
in between so we can screen it and there’s the Ada path down to the existing Altamont Creek Trail
47:23
system uh and at the edge of the um Eva
47:28
Bridge or in the view corridor we’ve opened it up we’ve taken out these four Lots highlighted in
47:35
Gray um so that the views from from the end
47:40
of Hawk Street and and the school are um better at this point in time
47:49
um the maintenance as Pat mentioned maintenance of the bridge will be by the
47:55
um Association and a
48:00
cfd again the road is narrowed uh through this section of the of the
48:09
project um retaining walls have have been put behind the houses so that we
48:15
could bring the the slope line down the hill so the grading would not be as far
48:22
up the hillside as as it was previously um the the retaining walls are behind
48:28
the houses they really won’t be seen moving on to the next
48:34
area if I can get this to work maybe I need to point in a different direction towards a computer there we
48:42
go um lot 14 was also
48:50
removed road again is narrowed we had a retain paining walls
48:56
um again behind the Lots so that uh or behind the houses again to reduce the
49:04
the uh views or the reduce the grading and minimize uh
49:10
impacts um up towards the northern let’s see this would be the U yeah the
49:16
Northern end of the project um we’ve reduced the uh the height of
49:24
the wall where we could um steepen the slope um to to try and reduce the amount
49:30
of grading that that would be
49:36
involved there we
49:43
go again reduce the width of the road we’ve lowered the pads so we we dro
49:52
the the elevation of these Lots
49:57
and um this thing isn’t click for okay now we’re on the uh
50:06
east side of the project and again this is where uh the height of the walls was of concern
50:13
before we had about a six foot high wall we’ve we’ve adjusted that we we’ve shortened our lot depths and um move the
50:22
wall up to the top and and reduce it substantially um
50:29
so those um all of these pads were were reduced uh or the elevations were
50:36
reduced to lower the view of the um the roof
50:51
lines and we’ve uh We’ve pul again pulled a lot the back lot line in it
50:56
used to match out to the boundary of the property there’s now some open space in between um the boundary and and the back
51:03
of the Lots this shows the uh the changes in
51:10
the in the uh setbacks and how they’ve where where they’ve increased uh um from
51:17
15 to 25 and from 12 to 15 in the in the front with an average uh sidey yard
51:24
going from 7 to 10 this shows uh the relationship of the
51:30
uh conservation land relative to the project
51:38
site this is the Ala for that so I’ll turn it over now to our landscape
51:44
architect David Gates I think you want to hit that one
51:50
and point it that way a point or two yeah you’re welcome to it yeah
51:56
uh thank you Steve good evening Mr mayor council uh I appreciate seeing you at
52:01
the art events you seem to be at all of those that’s great uh I’m just going to talk briefly about the landscape
52:08
character um I think the goal for the landscape is to keep it uh as much a
52:14
grass null as we can and then make it accessible to the existing Trails
52:19
Pathways and sidewalks which this diagram shows this is an enlargement of the
52:25
plant planting plan and you can see um several components there’s the entry
52:32
component here with the walls this is C3 it’s a water quality Zone and that’ll be
52:38
indigenous reparan plants like Willows and buck eyes the null areas themselves
52:44
will be mostly left as grassland we’ve sprinkled a few native Oaks up there
52:49
just to increase the the visual character and then we’ve created some
52:55
screening in these areas here because there are some existing residents and that’ll help a little bit and it’ll
53:01
create a sense of an entry for the people using The Pedestrian pathway and you can see the rest of it basically is
53:08
uh grasses it’s a mixture of three or four species of grasses this is just gets you into the
53:15
genus species you can see the The Oaks you can see the patterns I won’t get into the detail it’s all drought
53:21
tolerant it’s all um typical today for the U management practice for vegetation
53:27
a lot of Natives and adjustable variants this is the character the goal
53:33
is to keep it um you know the pattern of Livermore is nice Natural Stone and
53:39
natural materials so the the entry walls and the bridge of butts and elements are
53:45
are those similar materials and this is just a closeup um you know we’re creating a Gateway and an
53:51
entrance to the existing neighbors you know there’s a separation there there’s the open space and you can see we’ve
53:58
we’ve scattered The Oaks in a way so you have views in and views from across we’ll look through and around the Oaks
54:05
here’s the Wetland area with the repairing character as it abuts the creek this just shows you the nature of
54:13
U what the look will be as you’re coming in from the existing neighborhood so there will be the the retaining walls
54:20
will be on this side the double wall you can see the Oaks and you can see here the reparan character and this is a
54:27
7-year growth projection to give you a sense of what that looks like as you’re coming into the
54:33
community this point I’m going to give you the architect to learn about the
54:54
architecture good evening mayor and council
55:01
members um I’m with Mark ruford with William hmal Architects the architect
55:06
for the project I think staff has covered a lot of the revisions to the architecture
55:13
very well but I’d like to just go back and cover some of the high points as far as the changes from what was proposed
55:19
before and where we are right now so the architecture
55:26
itself um as far as the buildings we have what we had in 47 buildings before
55:32
now we’re down to 41 buildings because three of the buildings for the to get to 44 units are actually the duet units so
55:40
we’ve reduced the number of buildings on site and also um in complying with uh
55:46
increased setbacks both on sides and uh rear and front we have smaller
55:52
Footprints less coverage of the site and also so less square footage of the homes
55:58
themselves and so with that reduction in uh square footage size of the homes it’s
56:03
helped reduce the the massing of the homes
56:10
themselves
56:15
oh and so we have one single story and then we have uh of course four twostory
56:22
plans uh three of the uh um twostory plans are the single family
56:28
detach and then plan five is the duplex uh two-story
56:34
plan and uh two of the plans of the the single
56:40
family detached have two car garages and two have have three car garages again
56:46
and we’ve changed the configurations of the garages so there’s just less uh for a 60ft wide house they have less garage
56:53
forward they have some front porches and just quite a bit of articulation uh again with reducing some of the
57:01
massing on the homes themselves of course a single story reduced massing to
57:06
the sides of these homes and then also as you go through the package you’ll see that the rears have also uh quite a bit
57:14
of reduced massing uh the uh the larger plan um which is the plan for I’ll get
57:22
to that but again if you look through the package the package you have you’ll see the rears have uh you know very U
57:31
aesthetic rear elevations with less masting than you would
57:36
expect and front porches Less Garage these are two car garages on the plans one and two
57:43
um and uh Plan Three has a three-car garage and then plan four also has a
57:51
three-car garage um with one of them turn sideways so you only see two from the street and
57:58
this particular plan also what we’ve done with it it is the larger plan AT 3150 but it does have the master bedroom
58:06
on the first floor to reduce the massing at the second floor and if you look at the rear elevation in your package
58:11
you’ll see it’s for the most part single story across the rear and again that’s just to kind of reduce the massing
58:17
because it is uh the concern of the rears was a great concern as far as the way this sets up it’s a little elevated
58:24
for the rears and and where it’s seen from from long distances and in addition to the
58:30
modifications we’ve made to the architecture I’ll just go over with um we’ve increased the uh as far as the
58:38
Styles it’s has a more eclectic mix of architecture now we’ve introduced the uh
58:45
Spanish and The Farmhouse with uh a different um siding board and bath
58:50
siding onto it and some different roof materials and then also some some some
58:55
uh you know richer colors deeper colors into the mix so there’s a stronger
59:01
contrast in the architecture and there’s also uh uh differences between the roof
59:06
pitches there’s just a variety it’s just a stronger variety than what was proposed before with more of a just kind
59:12
of a Mediterranean style architecture is what we proposed for the total project before so we’ve kind of mixed it up um
59:19
taking um you know instructions and uh guidance from staff to to move in this direction
59:31
we’ll go this
59:39
way and then with these two homes um it’s actually the duplex they are one of
59:44
them is around 1,400 Square F feet the other one’s a little over 16 it’s 100 square feet they’re two stories they’re
59:50
three bedrooms and four bedrooms very uh um family oriented uh homes and uh the
59:57
way they’re oriented as far as they are the uh affordable but they each have their front door and their Garage on
1:00:02
separate streets because they sit on Corner Lots so it’s and they kind of fit the masting of the um the larger single
1:00:10
family homes so I think staff as as I mentioned earlier I think is is kind of
1:00:15
prepped very well as far as the architecture and all the changes we’ve made and um that’s it for me if you have
1:00:22
any questions I’d be happy to okay any questions this point from the
1:00:28
council okay thank you all right thank you very
1:00:37
much okay one two okay I got about 15 cards you guys
1:00:43
want to take about a uh anybody care for about a five 10 minute break anybody okay let’s take a brief
1:00:51
break here and then we’ll go uh go into the public hearing thank you very much for your uh uh for the staff report and
1:00:57
uh so be back here in about 10 minutes thank you good evening and welcome back to
1:01:02
round two of the April 22nd meeting of the Livermore city council uh we just completed the uh staff report for 5.02
1:01:10
the Genta project and now we’re coming up on uh uh the Ci or the public hearing
1:01:17
on that so I’ve got uh currently 16 cards for the public hearing uh we want
1:01:22
to be able to hear from everybody so I’d ask that you keep your comments to three minutes or less and if uh you agree with
1:01:29
somebody uh you can raise your hand and let us know uh so with that I have uh
1:01:35
John Satur Marne steel and uh Michaela
1:01:40
Maro Mr sator good morning or afternoon John sator Tiffany comman um others here will
1:01:48
talk to the native species and natural habitat concerns uh questioning the E
1:01:53
I’ll do that uh I do ask the council provide some transparency tonight and disclose which members if any have
1:01:59
walked the project or the trail to the South to get a better visual than the renderings presented tonight uh the
1:02:05
visuals from the Tiffany area um clearly show that these houses are going to be a blight of the whole Hills um for people
1:02:12
using that trail from even the west side of Vasco um then when they walk that
1:02:17
trail to the parks or to the school um it’s going to be an iore um this is a
1:02:22
bad uh fit for the area to get to this point you’ve seen the different iterations that they’ve brought forth uh
1:02:28
the bridge no Bridge um and the way it’s now designed the tra traffic every day
1:02:34
is going to have an extra mile to connect at Bear Creek Road just to get to Altamont Creek School or any other
1:02:41
service in Livermore um this is not promoting the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions as
1:02:47
required in state Bill 743 SB 743 requires cities and counties
1:02:53
to incorporate vehic vle mileage miles traveled in traffic modeling rather than
1:02:58
level of service with the goal of reducing the miles traveled you cannot find a more remote place to locate a
1:03:04
subdivision within livermore’s boundaries vehicle miles in this area cannot be mitigated with a bicycle or
1:03:10
foot travel as the city has no bike Lanes or pedestrian paths Crossing 580 East of First Street accessing the city
1:03:17
or the largest employer of the lab from this area on bike is a death defining Endeavor uh city manager mark Roberts
1:03:24
previously remarked at his previous city council meeting that the double-edged sword that is State Bill 743 is building a subdivision far away
1:03:33
from everything can result in a perfect level of service however the travel time is lengthened going directly against the
1:03:39
miles travel um provision of the bill um building in an urban area there
1:03:46
would be problems with level of service I ask the council to look into level of service of Livermore at this
1:03:52
point I think we are far from perfect at the Northeast section of Livermore and I’d like to know how
1:03:58
that’s comparable to the rest of livermore’s level of service from Fire and Police Department anecdotals are
1:04:04
always fun but I’ll give you two uh just today we had a fire department call out uh after about 30 minutes of a fire
1:04:09
alarm sounding in my neighborhood um I actually went out and checked on the the house I saw them moving around but then
1:04:16
about 30 minutes later I heard the fire department show up uh earlier this week I was walking my neighborhood and a
1:04:21
resident had complained to me about another Resident who had assaulted him
1:04:26
and he was still waiting for about 3 hours for the police to show up to take his report on that assault this was an elder elderly man who had another
1:04:33
person’s dog um chased put to chase on him um so in the end the zoning may be
1:04:39
right the plan may be feasible the environmental impact may be minimal if you have faith in the eir but it’s the
1:04:45
wrong thing to do uh city council marshan what you said is the commission decides whether it’s could be done but
1:04:51
the council decides whether or not it makes sense with the um larger picture in mind thank you thank you Mr sator M
1:04:59
steel uh Michaela Maro uh Ken Brook good evening mayor and council
1:05:05
members my name is Marne steel I reside at 1996 Meadow Glen Drive and I am here
1:05:11
with the save the hill group and tonight I’m speaking on behalf of Cindy Anders she’s a founding member of our group but
1:05:17
she’s unable to attend tonight and I have her written speech here so I’m going to give you Cindy’s comments as
1:05:24
some of you have seen the save the hill group is a very dedicated well-organized and passionate group thank you to you
1:05:31
council members and City staff that have recently met with our group to discuss the impacts of the proposed development
1:05:38
and thank you for reviewing the documents we have submitted some of you provided a bit of feedback on those and
1:05:43
and we really do appreciate it as you can see the access to this proposed development is
1:05:49
problematic access on Hawk Street adds to the already impacted Elementary School traffic and having a solitary
1:05:56
access on Bear Creek creates its own major issues there should be two access
1:06:01
points for this development ideally one at Dalton Vasco intersection but we’re
1:06:07
told that’s not feasible so if we are indeed forced to consider the second
1:06:12
access road at Hawk then it should be a real access point it should be a true
1:06:17
two-lane road and Bridge the scary 2017 and 18 wildfires here in California are
1:06:23
a new and very real threat we have to address this awful issue smarter decisions can hopefully avoid disasters
1:06:30
such as the total Destruction in Paradise California so if and when there is a wildfire on the hill we need to
1:06:37
allow folks to escape from this development or allow them to enter it to
1:06:43
rescue their children their elderly and their pets this unfortunately means a two-lane unbaled unrestricted bridge on
1:06:51
Hawk we hate to even suggest this this idea this will increase traffic at the school create possible vehicular
1:06:59
collisions with the many Creek Trail users and has a huge impact on the sensitive Altamont Creek but if we have
1:07:06
to choose one evil over another this is the lesser of two evils please consider
1:07:11
this in your review this evening of this proposed flawed development thank you very much for your time thank you Miss
1:07:19
steel uh Michaela Maro Ken Brook uh Julia
1:07:24
Ben Gigi sorry hi my name is Michaela and I oppose the development of the garenta
1:07:31
Hills uh project I will be speaking about the city’s already in place guidelines which go against the proposed
1:07:37
project this open space which contains Altimont Hills creeks and nulls or an official historic Scenic resource of
1:07:42
Livermore which the city declared in chapter 26 revised project assessment it plays an important role in the residents
1:07:49
daily lives the residents recognize this area as a cultural importance which makes where we live have this particular
1:07:55
character and identity this proposed plan will destroy that character and identity the city of limore has set
1:08:00
certain guidelines and procedures to protect historical resources please follow your own guidelines and policies
1:08:06
and protect this historical site in Livermore the city has goals to maintain livermore’s character identity according
1:08:12
to your standards one of these goals is to maintain current resident views of the visual benefits according to the
1:08:17
General open space guidelines views and visual access intent it states that the city will ensure that the views which
1:08:24
are unique and specific to Livermore are preserved from residential development this plan will go against your intent to
1:08:29
keep our views we the current residents will not have the views of the hills and NES because of this development you
1:08:35
report that the project will substantially alter the views of identified Scenic resources from nearby
1:08:41
public areas therefore the impact related to Scenic Vistas is less than significant according to the reports
1:08:47
your reports less than significant I call BS you are permanently destroying 32 acres of land which we cannot get
1:08:54
back yes that is significant at any angle from Altamont Creek Drive Bear Creek Drive The Bluffs Tiffany common
1:09:01
garva Ranch Road Altimont Creek Elementary School and many many many other streets the views will be blocked ask the residents who live there not
1:09:07
some report or pictures that you see up here the plan has too many twostory homes which will block our views of the
1:09:14
hills and nulles and on Earth Day let’s talk about the environment your impact bio report states that 32 approximately
1:09:20
32 Acres of grass grassland habitat will be permanently removed an additional 1.1
1:09:25
ACR will be temporarily Disturbed for construction of the bridge and access road over the creek how can you say that
1:09:32
this removal of grasslands is not significant when we have the special status species which are known to use
1:09:37
the habitat the proposed site which will be permanently and temporarily destroyed has potential potential to support these
1:09:45
endangered species and is significant for the breeding of Vernell pool fairy shrimp California tiger salamander
1:09:52
Western Spade foot to Cod and nesting Birds tell me why this project is okay to destroy endangered species and
1:09:58
potential future species your lost disturbance report of habitats clearly states a significant impact why aren’t
1:10:04
we paying more attention to this since the US fish and wildlife surfaces determine most of these species are at
1:10:09
the endangered and threatened level why are we even considering this project they are federally protected the
1:10:15
migratory bird treaty act and Fish game code of California protects the nesting Birds which we have at the hills and
1:10:20
nles why are you even thinking of allowing a development to destroy a protected species and its habitat if
1:10:26
necessary I’m sure the residents of Livermore will take the necessary measurements to make aware the national level why is this not only a bad idea
1:10:34
but a bad bad bad bad bad idea thank you thank you uh Ken
1:10:39
Brooks uh Julia uh and Karen Crossley good evening uh mayor and
1:10:46
council members and I want to thank you for the opportunity to address this uh this issue um the proposed development
1:10:54
plan shows that there’s only one way in and one way out now I’m speaking from
1:11:01
being evacuated from my home down in Southern California and have experienced how fast a grasp wind driven fire can
1:11:10
travel I mean it is scary and right now the proposal this plan proposal wants to
1:11:17
add to have approximately I think it’ll be over 200 homes that would be trapped
1:11:24
if the road uh llin Road were to be blocked at um at Altimont Creek Road you
1:11:33
know that is it’s that’s crazy to me I don’t understand we should have learned
1:11:38
from from the paradise fire and even today they are relooking at their
1:11:44
communities to make sure they have more than one way out the proposed Bridge
1:11:49
quote unquote emergency exit that was being planned or is being planned is not going to be used by First Responders
1:11:55
I’ve asked them about that they say no no seconds minutes are very important to
1:12:01
us we cannot risk trying to blast through uh a school zone area on an
1:12:07
emergency we’ll go around the other thing is is that with this proposal
1:12:12
since there only one way in and one way out all of the commercial uh traffic for
1:12:18
construction the heavy equipment will either have to come past our school
1:12:24
and around to Bear Creek to get into the um into the development and by the way
1:12:30
right now the parks are just full of um kids playing soccer and baseball cars
1:12:37
are parked either side it’s and it’s a mess and you ask any mother here any parent right who picks up their children
1:12:44
from that school they refer to that triangle at the school as the triangle of hell because you got parents of 600
1:12:52
kids trying trying to get in and out to pick up their their children and let’s make this worse let’s make that an
1:12:59
emergency exit are you kidding me an emergency exit that’s going to dump right into the backyard of the
1:13:06
school it just does not make any sense it’s very unsafe and I’ve got 30 seconds
1:13:11
because I need to bring this up again when I moved here which is just about a year now one of the first things I
1:13:17
looked at was Vasco right and at Vasco and um I forget the the name of the road
1:13:25
the traffic light that would take if that road were to continue up into the development thank you yes you would have
1:13:32
a four-way Lane Highway that would be able to deliver all of the equipment all
1:13:37
of the move uh Earth moving equipment and all the construction workers into that development without having to drive
1:13:44
it past through our school past our uh our parks and through residential areas
1:13:51
it makes so much sense to go that way I asked this question at the last meeting and after it was at that the um at the
1:14:00
uh planning meeting and there was a silence because I asked why wasn’t Vasco looked at and then someone went well I
1:14:09
think it was drainage drainage issues that was the reason given I thinking oh my goodness me you know with all the
1:14:16
other issues that we have and especially the safety issues we talk a lot about the planning and the houses and
1:14:22
development and architecture nothing about the roads it’s it’s not a good plan it’s very well very ill conceived
1:14:30
and thank you I’m sorry that I took a little extra time but it’s quite emotional thank you Mr Brooke uh Julia
1:14:36
and if you could pronounce your last name for me please yeah Julia bigi okay thank you Ben um so I’m a mother of a
1:14:44
child who goes to Altimont Creek Elementary um my daughter will also be going in a couple of years I moved to
1:14:50
this area this specific area for the the open space for nature for views of the
1:14:56
hills not no overcrowding I think a new development would tarnish all of this so
1:15:01
I’m against any further development for the above reasons and just as important for the safety of my children as Ken
1:15:09
reference it is so crowded in the morning there’s so much traffic at at
1:15:14
drop off even at pickup we don’t need more people um we don’t need more cars there and I just don’t want more
1:15:20
pollution I don’t want more cars like I said that endanger my kids and I don’t want more congestion around the drop off
1:15:27
and pickup the pollution for the construction for long periods of time dust um that the kids will be breathing
1:15:34
it’s just the way that I picture my kids at school and playing and this project is
1:15:41
just chaos and I just oppose it thank you uh Karen Crossley Ted Crossley uh
1:15:47
Mary perner uh Karen Crossley uh at 1424 Fox
1:15:55
Creek Court uh you know I’ve always wondered why gvan Hills was ever
1:16:02
considered an appropriate place to build houses it’s hard to build on it has a
1:16:07
diverse uh ecology why had it been zoned for
1:16:12
housing in the first place and as I I looked into it it appeared that it happened around the time maril Lisa was
1:16:19
built and while I understand that we all like to make money on our Investments most of us can’t do so because it goes
1:16:26
against the general plan fur looking further into the general plan I found
1:16:32
out that it that as far back as the 70s the general plan has stated that
1:16:37
Livermore should not buil on Hills I’m sorry they’re not noes yes you’re you
1:16:43
know you want to present it as nolles but they call them Hills gent Hills so they must think they’re Hills too uh
1:16:51
anyway uh it appears that the general plan has never been followed so the question becomes is the
1:16:58
general plan just a piece of paper that is followed when it’s convenient or ignored when is in isn’t convenient so
1:17:06
what so what needs to be done for the city to follow its own rules even if a
1:17:11
lawsuit is the outcome we need to follow the rules and if the city doesn’t follow
1:17:16
its own rules why do you expect the citizens to follow the rules and I also would just like to add that it’s that
1:17:23
the thought that these duplexes are affordable is laughable I have children
1:17:28
that have college degrees that cannot afford these houses in
1:17:33
Livermore and I find that they’re all planning on moving so we will be the
1:17:39
only ones left in this town and they have spent their lives here thank you thank you m Crosley uh Ted Crosley
1:17:47
uh Mary perner and MaryAnn Rosa
1:17:58
for the record my legal name is Verlin Crosley and Ted Crosley is is a
1:18:06
nickname uh good evening council members and guests and may mayor maon we have
1:18:15
debated the Gava Hills development for seven years I again want to point out
1:18:21
the development has never complied with the Livermore City’s General plan and
1:18:28
still doesn’t this development should have been rejected when proposed 7 years
1:18:33
ago it should have been rejected when it was repr proposed and reposed and
1:18:40
ropos it has been revised yearly but still proposes building houses on Gava
1:18:46
Hills the hills are an ecologically sensitive area that is home to several
1:18:52
species that that cannot be reloc relocated and whose habitats will be
1:18:57
destroyed by the builders tractors and graders although that may not be endangered yet they are part of our our
1:19:05
EOS system that adds to the uniqueness and Desir desirability of this
1:19:11
area the hills are not suitable for housing in their present form because they’re not level have rock formations
1:19:19
that need to be removed or moved either way the skylining character of The Hills
1:19:25
will be destroyed access roads to the homes will be visible and will increase traffic on
1:19:31
Bear Creek and Hawk Hawk Street is narrow and goes past
1:19:36
allmont Creek School a new two-lane bridge at the end of Hawk is intended to
1:19:42
provide access for the fire department and act as an emergency exit for the hills residents even then access for
1:19:51
firefighting equipment will be very limited and Hawk Street will certainly not accommodate Fire Equipment entering
1:19:58
and residence leaving at the same time the only upside to this development is
1:20:05
that it would generate or increase livermore’s real estate taxes by approximately probably $40 million I
1:20:12
don’t know of course the loss of the hills as an undeveloped area will make the property of existing homeowners less
1:20:20
desirable the skyline of developed Hills is C to be preserved the skyline of a
1:20:26
housing de development is not an AC is not acceptable as an
1:20:32
alternative the shity if wanted to develop these Hills should have changed
1:20:38
the plan years ago to accommodate the development of healing areas but that
1:20:44
would have been challenged by the voters have no doubts the voters like the
1:20:50
general plan as it is and we are upset because you are not following it thank
1:20:58
you thank you Mr Crosley uh Mary perner Maryann Rosia
1:21:05
Graham
1:21:12
tber good evening your honor and council members um my presence here is uh
1:21:19
somewhat impromptu I had a conversation uh prior to Christmas with a good friend
1:21:26
Mary put off who cannot be here this evening now I understand that she has spoken in front of this group in the
1:21:33
past on this topic of the Genta Hills uh proposed development and that she spoke
1:21:39
eloquently I’m sure that uh I have not prepared and that I um don’t have the
1:21:47
facts and figures uh but I am convinced by Mar ‘s passion that this proposed
1:21:57
development may be a violation that the hill that is behind
1:22:02
gaventa school is one of the Stepping Stones going up to Brushy Peak which has
1:22:09
been a site a sacred site for the alone and other tribes historically and is
1:22:16
still honored in that way um I believe that it serves as a beautiful
1:22:23
lovely peaceful background and that it will be destroyed I I honor what these
1:22:29
people are saying um and I I respect their arguments and so basically again
1:22:38
in in honor of Mary and uh her beliefs I
1:22:44
hope that you will not uh will not Grant this development the go-ahead thank you
1:22:51
thank you m per uh Maryann Rosa Graham tber Andrew
1:22:59
Barker good evening uh mayor Maran city council members and staff my name is
1:23:04
marann Roosa and I live at 1787 Sterling Court in Livermore I’m representing the
1:23:11
sellers in the sale of this property to laferty communities their names are
1:23:17
Sharon Albright and Karen Red Elk um they would very much have like to have
1:23:23
been here but they are very elderly and they live in Berkeley and they cannot drive at night this project has been in
1:23:32
the planning since 2010 it’s been through numerous reviews in the city and the plans were revised
1:23:39
based on what the planning department as well as the city council desired going
1:23:44
from the 76 to the 44 with the duet units I’m going to reiterate some of the
1:23:51
things that were were said today the square footage on the homes have been reduced the lot sizes have been
1:23:58
increased the building Heights reduced to to have less impact on the neighbors
1:24:05
the project conforms to the current zoning which is low residential land use
1:24:11
the eir report has said there’s no significant impact to the environment
1:24:17
the lot sizes and styles of homes is consistent with the nearby homes in the Bluffs
1:24:22
in Altamont Creek and the Mary Lisa development Livermore has a very diverse
1:24:29
population and needs diversity in housing in fact we need all kinds of
1:24:34
housing as I’m a realator and I can attest to that many of the newer developments are two and three story
1:24:42
condos Town Homes plus single family homes on very minimal siiz Lots mostly
1:24:49
with no backyards and small Pao are even balconies this development provides that
1:24:57
diversity Gran the Grant Hill does have open space walking paths and concern for
1:25:04
the environment the emergency access which is also a pedestrian bridge will
1:25:10
allow for the families to walk their kids to school and back from school in the
1:25:16
afternoon um oh I’m sorry I’m almost done I want to commend laferty home for
1:25:22
the excellent design of the project and their dedication to making significant changes to satisfy the Planning
1:25:28
Commission and city council recommendations thank you very much for allowing me this
1:25:34
time thank you Miss Roosa uh Graham tber Andrew Barker and Michelle
1:25:40
Mitchell tber hi everyone my name is Graham talber I don’t live at the hill but I
1:25:46
love it first off I just want to say looking for California tiger salamanders
1:25:52
is one one of my favorite hobbies they’re actually really special salamanders known as mole salamanders
1:25:57
because they spend almost the entire year underground in Burrows and Upland Hills like the gaventa hill once a year
1:26:04
in the middle of the night and only on the rainiest nights of the year the California tiger salamanders make a migration to vernal pools at lower
1:26:10
elevations where they breed this is virtually the only time you can see a tiger salamander they don’t leave tracks
1:26:17
and they use ground squirrel Burrows as H so evidence of their existence outside of these rain nights is basically
1:26:24
non-existent the data in the eir that suggests there’s only 0.0004 Acres of CA
1:26:29
tiger salamander habitat on the gaventa hill is extremely dated and would be debated by any qualified biologist this
1:26:37
was mentioned in the Planning Commission meeting and has not been resolved liore started off with a thousand acres of
1:26:44
this awesome habitat called an alkal SN the health and existence of this habitat is entirely dependent upon the hydro
1:26:50
hydrologic cycle and the hydrologic significance of the hills surrounding the habitat this Alkali sink habitat is
1:26:58
the habitat that surrounds the hill it is also the only habitat our City’s flower the livmore tar plant can be
1:27:04
found in unfortunately the original Thousand Acres of alkal sink has been reduced by 50% to 500 Acres the Liv more
1:27:12
tar plant along with a handful of other critically endangered plants and animals that call The Alkali sink home are
1:27:18
clinging to existence any further loss or damage to this habitat is ecological
1:27:24
disaster as it is now the mitigation property proposed cannot ever be developed due to The Endangered Species
1:27:30
Act as large portions of the property are tiger salamander Western spadefoot and red-legged frog habitat this is why
1:27:38
the property currently exists as a public preserve the livmore wetlands preserve go check it out it’s an awesome
1:27:44
Park this property has already been preserved so mitigation using this property has absolutely no added
1:27:50
ecological benefit is and is an entire scam finally I’d like to address that
1:27:55
the eir provided at the Planning Commission meeting was performed before the statuses of several species that are
1:28:01
found in the alkal sink had changed I’d also like to say this is the sneakiest and mo most ecologically inconsiderate
1:28:08
eir I have ever seen given the number of special status species that exist in our
1:28:14
alkal syn and its Upland counterpart the Genta Hill thanks thank
1:28:20
you Andrew Berker Michelle Mitchell uh Brent Syler good evening my name is Andrew
1:28:27
Barker I’m a resident of Livermore I’m here to encourage you to approve this development uh we desperately need more
1:28:33
housing in Livermore U let me briefly address the environmental concerns um our main problem we Face
1:28:41
environmentally is global warming and the main cause of that is vehicle travel
1:28:47
so the 44 families that could be living here don’t disappear if the houses aren’t
1:28:54
built uh if the houses aren’t built those families are commuting from Modesto and causing much more
1:29:01
environmental harm than the building of this um of this development so I
1:29:06
encourage you to approve encourage you to approve the development thank you
1:29:11
thank Mr Berker uh Michelle Mitchell Brent Siler Luan
1:29:20
tongue good evening mayor and Council I’m here tonight to oppose the proposed Genta
1:29:28
Hills project and I support the technical flaws that the save the hill group has presented to the city and to
1:29:34
council and and you the mayor as well I had a whole thing written out of what I wanted to talk about and then
1:29:41
after hearing the comments um I’ve changed my mind a little bit so I poize it’s not going to be as polished as I
1:29:47
had started out but um I’m going to give it a shot anyway um i’ like to start out
1:29:53
with part of my original um plan and that’s to talk a little bit about the possibility of preserving it as open
1:30:00
space in a few years the city will be re-evaluating the general plan the
1:30:05
property in question was rezoned in 2003 to a lower density zone is it possible
1:30:11
that during the uh General plan of re-evaluation the city can take the time to look once again at rezoning this
1:30:17
property so that may um it may remain open space um given the city’s history
1:30:23
of preserving open space and hillsides the city’s current General plan and the city’s work with the elamont landfill
1:30:30
open space committee on recommended list of priority areas for future acquisition
1:30:36
in eastern Alama County I’d like to request that the city consider working with other local agencies the save the
1:30:43
hill group to secure funding from the elamont landfill open space committee and partnering with a local Park
1:30:51
District or District dists to preserve this area as open space um I also forgot
1:30:56
in the beginning I wanted to thank um the council members who took the time to come out and take a look at the
1:31:02
beautiful hill we appreciate that and the city staff um for the time that they’ve spent with us we really
1:31:08
appreciate that as well so the other things that came up while listening to other people I’ll quickly go through um
1:31:15
they’re talking about putting a trail system in this new development uh a specific trail system a maintained trail
1:31:21
system they’re hooking that up to a landscape maintenance District which is behind my
1:31:27
home it is not a maintained Trail um I as my understanding landcap Landscape
1:31:34
Maintenance districts are set amounts of budget so you’re going to hook up trails to something that isn’t even a trail or
1:31:41
part of the current Landscape Maintenance District budget so as a resident I oppose that I oppose the fact
1:31:48
that you’re trying to connect things that shouldn’t be there anyway um the fire danger I I’m befuddled by that um
1:31:57
that the fire department doesn’t think that adding more trees and having Hills of grass in between a um residential
1:32:05
area is a good idea and fire danger and light of what other people have said about the recent fire dangers um having
1:32:13
dry grass in that in in that enclosed area I can tell you as a resident fire um Fireworks get set off out there and
1:32:20
you’re just adding more people and more dangers to a more concentrated area thank you for your time I appreciate it
1:32:26
thank you uh Brent Syler uh Luan Tong
1:32:32
and Bianca cavelli evening council members SE um
1:32:39
I’ll have to give it to the save the hill group they’ve done a fantastic job in trying to identify Alternatives as
1:32:46
well as you know problems that they have um you know for me yeah go back to our
1:32:52
history more recent history the but fire um where the Flames traveled at uh 800
1:32:58
yards a minute um and when you look at that space how defensible is it going to
1:33:04
be um you know we build the stack and pack houses uh where fires can go from
1:33:10
one to the other and it’s not the low running fires that we got to worry about but it’s the Embers that it generates
1:33:16
and it puts up into the air with all the wind that we get from that area coming down uh in through
1:33:22
Livermore um one thing that was brought up even by staff is kind of the layout of the area
1:33:29
I mean the group’s been fighting this for almost 10 years now so it’s pretty obvious residents don’t want
1:33:36
this um the developer wants to make money the people who have the land want to make money it’s a money-making deal
1:33:44
so Lisk them their money uh let them set a price listed what we did um for the uh
1:33:51
the other preservation area let’s get money from other other towns where they need to be able to uh pay into a fund
1:34:00
have them pay any of this let’s make it contingence just like the city planner said we should and that way it’s all
1:34:06
under one umbrella people get paid for for their land for their effort we get
1:34:12
to preserve the area I personally would like to see it preserved uh versus having housing going in there uh based
1:34:18
on what the residents want um that live there I I’ve Got Friends that live there um right now they
1:34:24
have a view of the the hills and the nulles when these houses come in they’re
1:34:31
going to be having people look on uh from their houses down onto them and
1:34:37
that’s not what they bought and that’s what they’re going to get so I oppose having this go forward i’ I’d like to
1:34:43
see a different alternative plan thank Mr Syler uh Luan Tong uh
1:34:49
Bianca cavelli and uh Dennis
1:34:56
Kai mayor marshan and members of the council my name is Luan Tong I live at
1:35:01
2157 te Garden common in Marisa Courtyard um I represent not only myself
1:35:07
as a neighbor to Genta Hills but also Friends of the ayos and Center for biological
1:35:12
diversity um the first time I saw tonight was the um the view from Tiffany
1:35:19
which is my neighborhood um and it’s clearly that that image of the houses
1:35:24
completely covering the top of the hill because we’re close unlike vascal road which gave a very misleading view before
1:35:32
um that is not subordinate to the land forms so the top of the hills obscured
1:35:38
from that area so I suggest that if this project gets approved that it should be
1:35:43
one-story homes on the side facing marilissa Courtyards the almite creek elementary and the Bluffs so that it it
1:35:51
um has less of an impact on The View put all the two-story homes on the backside
1:35:56
um I want to mention a big concern that I just had I learned recently in Mira
1:36:01
Courtyards so we’re like you know packed houses and we’re across Tiffany and across the creek from all that open
1:36:08
space their fire insurance has been cancelled just because we are close to
1:36:14
an open space so now you have these new houses basically it’s a wind tunnel it’s
1:36:20
usually very wind up there a lot and you have this grasslin area which has been
1:36:25
known there’s been fires that have blown through there and now you’re adding trees and houses and as Brett mentioned
1:36:34
earlier when the trees go the ashes blow and now generally people in the Bluffs
1:36:39
are downwind from the direction that the that the wind is blowing so now you have
1:36:45
fuel you have trees before you just had grass it blew through and they could
1:36:51
stand on top of it but now you have houses and trees and all the extra trees that they’re suggesting in the in the
1:36:56
landscape I think it’s a really bad idea to have it in a wind tunnel in a fire prone area so I think those people are
1:37:02
going to have a difficult time buying fire Insurance in that area given the past recent history of our more fire
1:37:10
prone environment in California um I also want to add that uh
1:37:16
the survey mentioned the environmental survey mentioned that they did not find any spe Species of special concern or
1:37:22
native plants and I provided pictures to uh planning staff and as well as uh
1:37:28
Council councilwoman Monroe of pictures that I took of burrowing owls on the
1:37:34
property pictures that I took of quite a few native plants on the property so and I’m not a professional surveyor but I
1:37:41
know what to look for because I’m out there all the time um just wanted to point that out let’s see I’m also
1:37:49
concerned with I think this was mentioned earlier but any change in water flow diverting away from or
1:37:55
allowing it toward um from the development into the direction of the rare plant alkal sink is unprecedented
1:38:02
there’s no example of a a residential area uphill of a rare plant alkal sink
1:38:07
and how that hydrology is affected so that you don’t know and you might be killing off The Alkali sink plants by
1:38:13
allowing that development so I think um the views from there are spectacular it should be preserved for the public it
1:38:20
should be kept as open space and I think it was a mistake in the very beginning to have
1:38:25
allowed that to be developed for houses in the very beginning so I urge you to
1:38:31
vote on Earth Day vote for mother earth and say no to the development thank you
1:38:36
thank you uh Bianca cabelli uh Dennis key uh Greg
1:38:42
Scott hi good evening I’m Bianca Kelli good evening mayor city council and
1:38:48
staff um thank you for this opportunity I want to second everything in opposition that is said previously in
1:38:54
opposition to this development um I’ve been a Livermore resident for 24 years and I care about my community deeply a
1:39:01
few points happy Earth Day first of all um I’m with save the hill group um there
1:39:07
are funds available and we’re working on collaborating with finding a buyer for this unique beautiful space to maintain
1:39:14
open space um a few points the general plan specifically States no building on
1:39:19
slopes Hills or NES Why is the development even being considered the general plan needs to be honored here
1:39:26
per LPD limited tree planting okay but we’re looking at twostory homes perching
1:39:31
for Raptors to pose threats to existing burrowing owes we have current photos and videos
1:39:39
showing their existence right now my question is why were there no
1:39:44
visual views of impacts from the Bluffs which will show specific impacts visually we
1:39:53
haven’t seen that we saw different perspectives with very minimal impacts
1:39:59
and that’s not the case so I’d like to ask for visuals from the Bluffs because
1:40:05
that’s where all of the impact is going to be shown and that are those are Hills and slopes so my other question is have
1:40:14
there been recent testing and core drillings of seismic activity in the area the last report was done over 10
1:40:19
years ago has that been done or even requested because we’ve had recent seismic activity within the last 10
1:40:26
years I would imagine what’s the bridge slope um the last thing that I read was
1:40:31
it was indicated at 5.9% to 6.81% that it’s 13 ft High keep in mind
1:40:37
that elamont grade is 2 to 4% that’s a big significant difference between 5.9
1:40:42
and 6.8% isn’t it that leads a dangerous situation for the bridge that’s not
1:40:51
that’s not even conceivable actually as an emergency exit point and if we’re going to talk about the bridge in
1:40:56
addition a on lane bridge is inadequate in case of emergencies for 44 homes if Laughlin which is the only existing one
1:41:04
way in and one way out one way in one way out if Laughlin for any reason is
1:41:09
blocked you’re not only blocking the 44 homes you’re blocking all the other existing homes in the entire
1:41:16
area um I just think this needs to be re-evaluated this is a wind tunnel I live there I know I experience it on a
1:41:23
daily basis we’re talking wind tunnel I have seen personally fires and they go
1:41:28
through that field like seconds we’re not talking minutes we’re talking seconds now you’re adding again what
1:41:34
Luan just said about the houses trees you’re adding major fuel it’s
1:41:40
going from one point of instant easy dealing with grass where they can break
1:41:45
it off to homes Embers um a recent a recent had a
1:41:51
conversation with a friend who yes her fire insurance was cancelled due to the fact that we’re in a one tunnel which is a risk and a danger especially in light
1:41:58
of all the fires that we’ve had in California it’s a serious concern and an issue um Without fire insurance and
1:42:04
insurance for these homes you don’t get loans sorry this is an environmentally and ecologically sensitive very unique
1:42:10
Hill that should be honored and left untouched and pristine and maintained open space this is not a consciously
1:42:16
buildable site our goal from save the hill group is to maintain this unique open space to maintain safety for our
1:42:21
community thank you for your understanding and thank you for understanding this is such a sensitive
1:42:27
site you know it’s like comparing apples to oranges anywhere else the nature of the Wind Tunnel the fire hazards the
1:42:34
Rolling Hills slopes and NES which are indicated in the general plan to be protected not build on build it on and
1:42:41
I’m asking you to vote consciously tonight and honor Earth Day and oppose this plan thank you so much for your
1:42:46
time I appreciate it thank you Miss Celli uh Dennis key and GRE
1:43:00
Scott thank you for the time the name is Dennis Kai I’m at 1658 no way I live at
1:43:06
the uh almost at the corner of Bear Creek uh in no way and that’s going to
1:43:12
lead into the access point of this uh proposed development which I totally
1:43:19
oppose I’m forward development believe me I’m truly for development but that’s for smart development and again this is
1:43:25
not smart development you’ve heard a lot of comments uh from my neighbors you’ve
1:43:31
heard a lot of comments and in the past we have folks that want to be here that can’t be here and they’re probably five
1:43:38
times the numbers 10 times the numbers that you see here uh from that perspective I just want to kind of go
1:43:44
back a little bit in history in 2015 uh from the mercury news is that
1:43:49
the city council on Monday declined to give the green light to a plan to build
1:43:54
47 homes that’s down from the 76 that you guys really wanted to put up there
1:44:00
uh you talked about it would jeopardize sensitive Wildlife increase traffic and violate the general plan it still does
1:44:07
that what has changed the council unanimously agreed
1:44:13
not to certify the final environmental plan of the gaventa ranch
1:44:18
Hills and so from that perspective you said the council members Express reservations about how the project would
1:44:25
affect visibility of nearby Hills you know the only reason I remembered to come here wasn’t because I wasn’t
1:44:31
concerned about the hills I was going for a walk in between that path between the
1:44:37
school and the hills and when I looked over there I looked at my wife and I said that’s destroyed if they build this
1:44:44
and I said oh my God that meeting is tonight so we had to cut our walk short and get down here un fortunately she
1:44:51
couldn’t make it but what has changed truly what has changed you’re talking
1:44:56
about visibility we’re talking to you about the safety of the residents we’re talking to you about the environmental
1:45:03
impact there was a time you said there was a fire I told you back then I saw
1:45:08
one if not two spotted owls or at least I saw a ground burrowing a on either side and then there was a fire and the
1:45:14
comment came out what happened to those animals well we had another person said they took pictures and found seven
1:45:20
ground bearing owes out there now seven these are endangered species and mitigation is not going to save them
1:45:28
you’re going to destroy their habitat as you will toward the other endangered species in that report on the on the
1:45:35
Mercury News back then they talked to you about it and the letter that came to you from the environmental attorney that
1:45:42
also talked about all the different endangered species what have we done about it so you’ve got
1:45:48
safety you’ve got the views what’s really changed I really don’t think you know the comment that came to
1:45:54
us from laferty as we were the last person that got up to speak if anything
1:46:01
that was to that was said here tonight were to be believed I would say the same thing
1:46:07
about their project my concern is not just the visibility it’s about the safety and it’s also about the
1:46:14
environmental impact thank you for your time thank you Mr Kai Greg Scott
1:46:28
uh Greg Scott so I hear two categories of concern here the environmental concerns and the flood danger concerns
1:46:36
and um I’ve lived in Northern California for a number of decades now and I would
1:46:42
be very concerned with the flood danger um I’ve been to many of these meetings
1:46:49
in the city council and the February 2017 storms where you went on and on
1:46:55
about the $650,000 for the uh a royal mocho repair
1:47:02
um when you look at the hydrologic data I just wonder how you’re planning for it for example what’s called ark storms Arc
1:47:09
is atmospheric River Thousand-Year storms um this comes under the multi-hazards demonstration project the
1:47:16
USGS and there’s a little problem here because they don’t have to be Thousand-Year storms they’re every 200 U
1:47:23
years or less but we haven’t had one in a while the last time we had one was in 1861 to 1862 when the capital of
1:47:32
California was flooded and had to be moved um but from sediment levels and studies it’s found that these storms
1:47:38
occur every 100 to 200 years and they occur 50% of the time with more um there
1:47:46
are stronger storms and what happened to the 1861 1862 storm uh that that was the
1:47:52
time when it rained 66 in in Los Angeles so I’m wondering about the flooding and
1:47:57
how the you plan for the flooding in um in this project when our hydrologic data
1:48:04
it seems to be rather limited uh on the environment it was expressed that um uh
1:48:10
concern for um carbon dioxide pollution uh from commuters and that’s a valid
1:48:17
concern uh we’re looking at 44 houses um and the carbon dioxide emissions from um
1:48:24
the 44 houses now I don’t want to downplay that but in a 44 houses the
1:48:30
carbon dioxide emissions in a state that’s putting out 500 million tons of
1:48:35
carbon dioxide per year that’s a concern um you know our number one environmental
1:48:41
concern is nitrogen that comes from our Agriculture and phosphorus concerns and then our number three problem is
1:48:48
biodiversity and genetic diversity we are losing a lot of our biodiversity and genetic diversity and how we know that
1:48:54
is a little system called leadar um it’s light um um distance and R ranging and
1:49:01
we have the satellites up there in aircraft and we are losing our biodiversity and genetic diversity like mt and we’re just taking it out piece by
1:49:08
piece this is just another piece of it um so we have to weigh certain things
1:49:14
here and um you know $650,000 compared to what could happen
1:49:21
in an atmospheric River storm that’s not in your plan out of the 100-year
1:49:27
parameter could be a lot of money thank you Mr Scott and last com
1:49:34
card Cindy Anders just got in under the
1:49:39
wire sorry I say just got in under the wire minut it I won’t tell you how fast
1:49:46
I sped here um hi my name is Cindy Anders um
1:49:52
I’m at 1499 winding stream drive here in Livermore um I’m here with the save the
1:49:57
hill group forgot my shirt sorry um first off I do want to thank council
1:50:03
members and City staff for working with the save of the Hill group for what seven years now it’s amazing um I think
1:50:11
this this this working together has so far been really beneficial I’m kind of
1:50:18
shocked thank you but anyway there’s still some flaws as you have heard with
1:50:23
the project um one thing that um I don’t think I was told hasn’t been mentioned
1:50:29
yet is uh you know as you as you have heard we would really like to arrange to
1:50:35
buy the hill keep it a open space in perpetuity open space and perpetuity
1:50:40
Forever by the hill that’s our that’s our goal here um we’re not looking at
1:50:46
just a eight or 10 year option and I’m I’m really curious why the developer
1:50:53
hasn’t bought the hill why are they just doing an option are they concerned that
1:50:59
this will never go through because of all the technical flaws I don’t know maybe you can ask them so anyway um I
1:51:06
just wanted to share that thought with you guys and I really truly am kind of impressed to um have Livermore work so
1:51:13
well with his residents I think it’s kind of remarkable so thank you all
1:51:18
thank you okay uh with that that the last of the cards that I have so I’m going to close
1:51:25
the public hearing and bring it back to the council uh questions from the council at this point I had one quick
1:51:32
one yeah I just want know what what we’ve heard a little bit from speakers
1:51:38
about we’re violating the general plan could anybody elaborate on that
1:51:44
please of Staff of course sure the general plans designated this property as residential uh back in the 1976 plan
1:51:54
it was designated for 1 to 5 acre sites it was a uh in 1988 the area a general
1:52:00
plan Amendment occurred and that changed it from the 1 to five acres sites to uh it was 2 to three to the acre and then
1:52:08
in the 2003 General plan it was down zoned a bit because of the unknown environmental constraints in the
1:52:13
property so the property has been residential for a number of years when
1:52:18
you look at the goals objectives and principles that uh we analyze to
1:52:26
determine whether or not it’s consistent or not look at the entire um series of goal objectives and
1:52:33
policies for example uh there’s a goal that says preserve and enhance livermore’s natural
1:52:40
setting uh there’s a policy that says the city shall permit no intensive development of the hills if you stopped
1:52:46
there it’d be pretty clear but then it adds a few sentences under which
1:52:52
conditions that it would be okay to um develop on those tough sites and that
1:53:00
um is where you get the to making it sub uh subordinate to the Natural land forms
1:53:05
trying to Cluster the units you move them down off the Hills Preserve the ridge lines that sort of uh idea so it’s
1:53:12
sort of a clustering principle so it’s that’s one example of
1:53:17
how we as staff look at a general plan goal you take it in its entirety so the
1:53:22
property has a residential General plan designation and it follows the um goals
1:53:30
and strategies to try and minimize the impacts to the Natural land
1:53:39
forms okay uh council member Monroe questions com question point I have a
1:53:45
bunch of questions um should I just run through them sure okay um I wanted to go
1:53:52
so we’ve we’ve heard these These are basically reiterating some of the questions we we we’ve just heard I
1:53:57
wanted to go back to the uh fires the trees the wind tunnel um and how that
1:54:03
would play out and maybe hear a little bit more in detail how that could work out and um you know in the event of an
1:54:11
emergency um should I just keep read all the questions and then get them answered or go one at a time here what’s
1:54:18
easier one of the time a time okay fine um so can I get that one answered
1:54:34
first I’m sorry council member Monro can you please repeat that sure um I wanted
1:54:40
so I I had asked prior to public comment about fires and floods um and those came
1:54:47
up again several times with with with concern that that maybe the answer I
1:54:52
want an answer that was a little bit more in depth than the one prior to public comment sure so our building code
1:54:57
and our fire and safety codes require certain um construction practices to
1:55:03
minimize uh impacts from fire including sprinkling providing fire sprinklers in
1:55:09
all of these buildings which they will do uh it’s been reviewed to um ensure
1:55:16
there are enough fire hydrants that are adequately spaced to fight uh any sort of structure fire
1:55:23
that might occur and also with um distances to pull hoses to places uh
1:55:30
where there aren’t a hydrant so um from that perspective the the infrastructures
1:55:37
in place to to um take on a blaze if it were to occur either in the natural
1:55:44
areas or the developed Lots um and again our departments look
1:55:49
looked at it for uh adequate access loading on the street our U the Environ
1:55:57
the emergency vehicle access Bridge has been reviewed and found to be adequate and
1:56:04
um uh regarding the flood uh issues like I mentioned these homes are actually quite a lot higher
1:56:11
than many of the homes out there uh so they’re well out of the flood plane uh
1:56:16
for Altamont Creek and um so that that’s a concern that um we’ve we’ve touched on
1:56:24
it in the environmental documents and it’s it’s adequately uh cited to avoid
1:56:29
damage from floods um okay
1:56:36
um okay um so I know that there this is the last the marilisa development as I
1:56:44
understand it was um uh had three hills correct is this
1:56:50
hill how does this hill differ from the other two these are a little bit
1:56:57
higher and uh the other there’s a hill that’s just to the east that’s a similar
1:57:05
similar in height that’s been set aside sort of similar to uh this project that
1:57:12
um it’s sort of behind null court and Bear Creek so the the development is basically clustered off of that Hill
1:57:19
side and tucked along be Creek Road then there’s a a a hill that perhaps our city
1:57:26
manager could talk about its exact location uh but that is now covered with homes yeah that that was actually the
1:57:32
fourth hill of the cluster there and that was located south of the Creek area um and that area was graded so you can
1:57:39
actually still see the remnants of that in the the actual height of the street out there but that area was developed as
1:57:44
part of the original development
1:57:50
violation of Native American territory any question question on
1:58:12
that yeah so we’re we’re obligated to consult with our recognized tribes and
1:58:19
spokesman or spokespersons and so um they had an opportunity to look at this and um you
1:58:27
know we recognize that Brushy Peak is a significant resource and um and this generally
1:58:35
basically this project is far enough South so that it’s not part of that that
1:58:41
holding uh it is the uh tribes that have lived here over the years regard the
1:58:46
whole valley as uh uh significant resource and and sacred in many places
1:58:52
especially along creeks and so uh when projects come along we look at that very
1:58:58
carefully and uh try and address their their um concerns and comments as best
1:59:03
we can and as well as avoiding work in The Creeks when we can do that
1:59:11
so this was part of the E and the um
1:59:16
recognizing that there’s not one Community you know there’s not one
1:59:22
person that speaks for everybody is what I’m hearing um those people who are recognize agreed that this was okay to
1:59:29
build on is that a correct interpretation of what you said I’m not sure I don’t think I I would put those
1:59:35
words well I was I was so okay try so they did not have unique objections to
1:59:40
development in this area um based on place um so you did hear that many of
1:59:46
our the tribes believe that development anywhere uh in the valley Valley um disturbs the overall uh ecological and
1:59:53
sacredness of the area there were not unique features of this particular land form that were identified um and if they
2:00:00
had been those would have been incorporated into our analysis thank you sorry I I was
2:00:06
trying um and the sightings the of tiger salamander and burrowing owls that were
2:00:13
not Incorporated in the eir so as I mentioned in the
2:00:19
presentation although we didn’t find species when we were out there we assumed that they could be on the entire
2:00:25
site um so having found them on the site only confirms our assumptions that they could be on the entire site and if if
2:00:32
they do come across one during construction the resource agency approved biologist who has to be on site
2:00:39
will halt work and uh they’ll take corrective measures to avoid harming or taking a species under both state and
2:00:47
federal law the appropriate action to deal with that particular potential habitat is the identification
2:00:54
and acceptance of mitigation property um the staff has done pre-consultation on
2:00:59
the mitigation of property to see whether that’s acceptable um to address those particular species um and the
2:01:04
findings is that that it does in fact it is a higher value habitat as your staff described earlier based on what actually
2:01:11
exists on those habitat uh mitigation areas and and to that point and then I’m going to just I’m going to leave some
2:01:17
for other people um the uh question of this being the the mitigation site never
2:01:23
being developed anyway so it doesn’t really um I’m going to pre rephrase here it doesn’t count as a as a real trade
2:01:30
could you speak to that uh as as well sure and I’ll just uh take that one
2:01:36
that uh it is true that it is privately held and there are no um conservation
2:01:43
easements on it that would protect that in perpetuity but the project is um
2:01:49
also heavily impacted by trespass uh BMX bike jumps motorcycles
2:01:56
RC cars and trucks and things and the the damage that’s that’s um ongoing
2:02:03
there is significant and so part of the mitigation on this would be to put a
2:02:09
permanent conservation easement over that property and also require the
2:02:14
applicant the developer to provide an endowment which is essentially a a bank
2:02:20
account that will earn enough interest to take care of that property in perpetuity uh just based on the interest
2:02:28
and so they’ll have to develop a management plan that will talk about that property and what’s best for it and
2:02:34
then the endowment will be set at an amount um appropriate to carry out that management and perpetuity so it would be
2:02:42
protected so so in other words right now no it won’t get built on but right now
2:02:47
it is being destroyed as an ecological site um in some ways uh um and I’m
2:02:54
seeing some people in the back saying that’s not correct but so
2:03:00
I and typical Pro protective measures include things like fencing to try to
2:03:05
prevent trespass and uh bicycle use and jumps and all the things that that happen uh near existing housing trespass
2:03:13
is actually one of the major contributors to the deterioration of sites in the area um people taking both
2:03:19
animals and themselves onto the site um uh is a is a major problem for those
2:03:24
especially those flat areas um but even areas that have some topography to them um when people bring their animals on um
2:03:32
that can be a significant impact to the site and so one of the things is to fence the site appropriately and then to
2:03:37
manage it in a in a ongoing manner so I I don’t know if this is okay or not just
2:03:42
I’m not sure about protocol but um as I was making my statement I’m seeing some some
2:03:49
people saying in in in the back indicating that that they strongly disagree um is I don’t know what do we
2:03:58
let it go we got you have the floor I well I I I’m curious to know
2:04:08
what the objection is but I I don’t know whether they get well so they they’ve spoken and now we are you’re getting
2:04:15
input from uh from the staff you knowing no so now now is it’s comes back
2:04:23
to the council so the council has the opportunity so your I could ask no you’re asking questions of the staff and
2:04:30
the staff is responding we don’t want to go get to a point where somebody’s going to say well I don’t believe that okay it
2:04:37
so it depends on on who you
2:04:42
believe I’m done I I I I’m finished it’s uh someone
2:04:48
else is okay
2:04:54
U okay vice mayor Carling I’ve been out there too and I’ve
2:04:59
seen uh the hill being destroyed by bicycles and other people trespassing on the land as it is now so I’m not exactly
2:05:07
sure why you think that that’s the wrong statement we’re talking about the mitigation property no I’m talking about what’s going on there today we’re
2:05:13
talking about the no I’m talking about no no no sir I’m talking about what’s going on today which is the point that
2:05:20
my council member was talking about what’s going on today not the mitigation what’s going on today I’m talking about
2:05:25
what’s going on I know what you’re talking about I know what you’re talking about we’re talking about two different
2:05:31
things obious two different properties very far I know that I’m well aware sir it’s my turn to
2:05:39
talk Sir Mr talber Mr talber
2:05:44
please the council no that is not true well I have signs I have pictures of sir the par sir
2:05:51
we are now talking not you you’re asking question you’re asking Mr T I told you
2:05:57
that we’re talking about different you’re right the public has the opportunity to speak during the
2:06:04
public so they get to lie you and we don’t get to rebut we’re talking about two Happening Here you guys have not
2:06:11
been out there you don’t see the signs around I thought I just said i’ been out there there are signs around the prop
2:06:18
not talking about Mr Talib we are not talking about the mitigation property we
2:06:24
are not talking about the mitigation property we’re talking about the site the site is what we are talking
2:06:32
about Mr vice mayor I’d like to talk about the road
2:06:38
um and I spent some time out there and um and Mr
2:06:43
Brooks said that he had never heard an answer to the question about vascu that’s a question I asked city manager
2:06:49
and I can we ask the can we get a reply on that again please putting a road
2:06:56
through the wetlands uh to the immediate west of the site um would be a significant environmental impact The
2:07:02
Preserve that essentially is immediately to the west of the um area where the
2:07:07
project is located is sensitive um and in fact uh as people have identified
2:07:13
that area does have sensitive species in it and um essentially has a significant amount of wet in that area so placing a
2:07:20
road in that area which was one of the things that was uh initially analyzed and rejected because of its significant
2:07:26
environmental impact um while it would improve access um it would be a significant environmental impact um
2:07:32
you’re required we’re feasible to try and minimize or eliminate those environmental impacts so that particular
2:07:38
proposal was not carried forward in any of the development Alternatives thank you and I think
2:07:44
um I think uh council member rro address the issue of safety and
2:07:51
concern about fires and emergency access and can we just review that again Mr
2:07:57
Stewart I mean we’ve gone from we’ve had three several different
2:08:02
plans one with no emergency access out Hawk a
2:08:08
two-lane road that would require some re re-engineering of the of the aoo and
2:08:16
we’ve settled on at this point and any way a is it a one lane or is it just a
2:08:22
narrow two-lane emergency vehicle access it’s a 20 foot wide Bridge with a 5 foot
2:08:31
um pedestrian raised sidewalk on it and it’s you know be open for bicyclists
2:08:37
could use the roadway part or the sidewalk if they wanted to so the the um
2:08:44
initial proposal had a full two lane one lane in each Direction and a sidewalk
2:08:51
bridge that required realignment of the creek during the public hearing for the
2:08:57
environmental impact report there was significant uh testimony that the um
2:09:04
neighbors were concerned with cut through traffic and that it was an environmental impact and based on that
2:09:10
testimony the applicant revised uh the project to remove that bridge so
2:09:17
therefore that alleviated the significant environmental impact uh and
2:09:22
left the sole access into and out of on bar Creek Drive so when it came before
2:09:30
the council in September the um uh neighbor neighborhood and Community
2:09:37
basically said they were concerned about emergency access in the event the Laughlin Road becomes unusable due to a
2:09:44
wash out or some failure of the road or blockage and so they asked
2:09:50
for another way in and out of the development and as uh your city manager
2:09:55
explained the access from Vasco Road is significant from an environmental impact
2:10:01
perspective potentially could cut off flow into lpds gavan and wetlands
2:10:07
preserve and um so the we looked at
2:10:12
pretty much every other location to try and get a vehicular access into that site and the only one that works is
2:10:19
extending a bridge over the creek from Hawk Street and so that’s that’s where we are
2:10:25
today before you with the Eva Mr and the the Eva provides for
2:10:32
emergency access into that site so uh fire will use that in the event of emergency police can use it as well uh
2:10:39
provide it responds to some of the issues uh and uh if fire police want to
2:10:45
open that up for uh vehicular egress in the event of an emergency that’s
2:10:51
available as well uh people can obviously walk or bicycle in and out through think there’s some concern
2:10:57
though still expressed by some that if well I guess two things one is
2:11:03
that there’s a there’s presumption that the fire department is only going to go in through Bear Creek if need be um but
2:11:12
you’re suggesting that they might be able to go in through Hawk and then wouldn’t they be
2:11:20
you know wouldn’t some of the residents be trying to leave in that area down
2:11:26
Hawk and there’d be some traffic um problems with one emergency
2:11:34
vehicles going in One Direction and people trying to exit in the other so the the way it’s set up today it would
2:11:39
be balled and controlled by emergency Personnel they would be able to uh enter
2:11:45
the area and make a decision about whether how they want to utilize that access point uh it could just be an
2:11:51
access point for emergency vehicles to get to uh an emergency more directly
2:11:57
they could also open it up and allow vehicles to leave the area um and that would be controlled by your emergency
2:12:03
Personnel they’d be directing traffic uh and having people uh leave if necessary
2:12:10
so your issue today is you have significant number of folks north of uh the creek um that are served by one
2:12:16
access in and out um this emergency access would provide a second way to deal with that while the proposal is to
2:12:24
in include ballards across the emergency access the city has also prepared emergency accesses that are simply
2:12:30
signed um the modest risk in that case is that somebody will place a vehicle on the bridge in an inappropriate time
2:12:36
however it is built for full vehicle access um so that would be an alternative if that were ultimately a
2:12:42
significant Council concern is rather than to Ballard the emergency access simply sign it um and you have a
2:12:48
examples of that throughout the community where uh in some cases they are not ballers they just simply signed
2:12:54
for emergency vehicle access use in any case there would essentially be one more way in and out with this project than
2:13:00
without the project and while the project adds 44 um homes uh it does
2:13:06
actually provide a second way out for everyone north of the creek including houses that are currently on be Creek
2:13:12
existing and the other piece that it actually is a clear span exit rather than essentially a culverted exit um
2:13:18
with the large concrete covers and it’s actually much higher than the Laughlin road so in the uh in the case of flood
2:13:25
it would actually uh be a much more robust way in and out to the neighborhood north of the
2:13:31
creek yeah I don’t think I’m in a position as to knowing what would be better signs or ballards um I think it’s
2:13:39
up to the professionals that know more about that than I do but uh I do think that this has been looked at um for a
2:13:47
long time and it seems to me that it’s a reasonable um solution I also would like
2:13:52
to thank everybody for um spending the time and the energy particularly the
2:13:57
save the hills group um I think back at least from my understanding seven or
2:14:03
eight years ago this project has gotten a lot better and I think everybody should be uh proud of the work that
2:14:10
they’ve done to make this project um certainly much better than it was with
2:14:17
76 homes and no emergency access and so on and so forth so I think that was
2:14:23
that’s been a great benefit to everybody concerned I also want to I don’t think I
2:14:29
don’t see any planning Commissioners here tonight but I’d like to publicly
2:14:34
thank them for the U questions and answers or the questions that they uh
2:14:41
asked of staff and others in terms of uh in the at the Planning Commission meeting when this came up it was very
2:14:47
very thorough and I uh it certainly helps me um and U as I learn and try and
2:14:55
understand what some of the questions and concerns are um so they and again I
2:15:00
would like to thank Planning Commission for taking the time and the energy to question many many things that
2:15:07
haven’t even been brought up here tonight and lastly the staff have done a fabulous job in terms of working on this
2:15:15
for a number of years and I appreciate all the the energy and effort that you guys have put into
2:15:22
this counc m Warner Yeah couple of questions here and
2:15:29
mostly around our um flexibility and you know the kind of decisions we’re making
2:15:34
but but we we were just talking about ballards or signs and I thought we were the last time we talked about this was
2:15:41
or somewhere was you put up the temporary plastic things that you can just drive over if you have to but it’s
2:15:48
not something that somebody would be on a Saturday night just doing for fun so I thought there were other options here
2:15:54
with respect to that there are at council’s discretion uh the standard approach is essentially
2:16:00
the lockable metal uh Ballers but there are other options um either signing or essentially breakway and those can be
2:16:08
made out of several materials that essentially if they’re nudged with a vehicle um they basically lay down right
2:16:13
so then the as long as we’re on that topic I just want to make sure I understand the fire department has
2:16:19
looked at this yes they have so the professional fire department has says it’s said it’s
2:16:25
okay and the the name of that bridge is Eva right yes that’s correct so I’m so
2:16:33
I’m not but I did hear some comments that said fire wouldn’t use it but that doesn’t make sense to me so um the the
2:16:41
first line of approach would always be the open public Street um so that would be uh an emergency responders um first
2:16:49
approach um if that were compromised um they would use the secondary access um
2:16:55
and that’s the same with every emergency vehicle access we have in the community is um to the extent feasible they always
2:17:01
like to keep um all of the equipment on open public streets um but they can use the emergency vehicle access if they
2:17:07
need a second way in or out um and or if there’s something wrong with the primary access so with respect to the U
2:17:15
emergency access and I mean I’ve heard two things been talking about tonight was floods and fires and I don’t think
2:17:22
they’re likely to happen at the same time so the uh but I did sort of hear
2:17:27
that that kind of get a little bit confused but so we’ve thought about this separately in the two events but we’ve
2:17:33
never thought about a a major flood Thousand-Year rain and a fire
2:17:39
right correct okay and we do plan for the hundred-year flood that’s what we’ve that’s what we take a look at okay so
2:17:46
the um you why I’m looking at this and i’ you know I’ve been around this project for a
2:17:52
lot of years and this strikes me as one of the projects I mean this is Decades
2:17:57
of going through this so I I do want to Second the uh comment that even miss
2:18:02
Andrews made made about working together I’ve been out there and tried to think
2:18:08
about this um pretty carefully and I certainly understand the U community’s
2:18:14
desire not to see this project happen uh but I’m not sure that we got a lot of
2:18:20
options here but I want to just talk about a couple of things so I want to make sure I understood the earlier
2:18:26
conversation about the um spe the endangered species so what I’m hearing I
2:18:32
think I heard was the evidence that they are there is not sufficient to say that
2:18:39
the eir or the the impacts aren’t mitigated is that we can’t find because
2:18:46
they’re have we’ve seen that we you know we have photographs of them being there that’s not sufficient for us to find
2:18:53
that this is not the eir is not satisfied uh no to the contrary we actually found that even though we
2:18:59
didn’t find them we assumed they were there anyways that’s what I’m saying okay so the fact that that they there
2:19:07
evidence that they are there is not sufficient for us to find that this project doesn’t meet the requirements is
2:19:13
that what I mean we’ve already assumed they’re there correct so it’s only confirming the assumptions we’ve already included in the eir and we’ve already
2:19:20
mitigated assuming that those species I’m just trying to make sure I understand how much latitude we’ we’ve
2:19:26
got here so the the other thing that we haven’t spoken about yet was the uh
2:19:33
suggestion well why can’t we just make this all go away by buying it
2:19:39
and that would be you know I could I can see the uh the advantages of doing that
2:19:45
and um but but I’m not sure that we at this stage can require that to happen and I
2:19:53
just wanted to from the city attorney get some kind of opinion on what kind of latitude we have
2:20:02
here that’s correct what you have to evaluate the project that is set before you um not look at the possibility of
2:20:10
what the city could do with the property as we’re currently not under contract to purchase that property laery communities
2:20:17
is under contract to purchase that property so that would be a separate course of action apart from your
2:20:22
determination as to what to do with this proposal before you this evening so and this gets back and I’ll get back to that
2:20:29
in a second but the the other my understanding that I want to make sure I
2:20:34
correct is you know it was suggested well why don’t we just change the general plan in the future but it’s my
2:20:41
understanding that once once you have a general plan and a project is submitted
2:20:47
consistent with that set of rules that we’re now into a different world we can’t do the legislative act of changing
2:20:55
the rules correct we’re not you’re not acting as a legislative body in this particular instance in fact you could H
2:21:03
you know stray into the realm of a takings argument if you have a property that meets the requirements of the
2:21:09
general plan and the underlying zoning and then you attempt to Midway through change what that is so we we can’t we
2:21:16
can’t change the rules in the Midstream correct correct and that gives us significant legal liability correct you
2:21:23
there would there would be compensation that would need to be provided should the city so the even though the council
2:21:30
can’t uh require that the um land be made
2:21:35
available that doesn’t preclude the community if because the suggestion has
2:21:41
been made that they can raise the funds that doesn’t preclude them from
2:21:46
trying to by it right correct if you play out that scenario if the uh save
2:21:51
the hill group were able to raise the funds um and offer more than what the developer is offering with you know
2:21:58
taking into account the value of any potential entitlements on the property um there’s nothing other than contracts
2:22:05
that they have in place that would prevent that from happening but presumably that would involve large sums of
2:22:10
money okay those are my questions at the moment okay thank you uh and again I
2:22:17
want to thank everybody for their comments tonight uh and again staff this has been a significant uh Evolution over
2:22:23
the uh uh the last what 30 years on this
2:22:29
that uh uh this is you originally zoned for housing in 1976 uh and then uh rezoned in in in 88
2:22:38
um some of the I one of the speakers said that this this was was already open space uh but it’s been zoned for housing
2:22:46
since 19 76 so it’s it hasn’t been open space since since uh I’ve been in
2:22:52
Livermore and uh someone else said that uh uh you the access to this site is is
2:22:59
very important to people’s daily lives um and that uh uh this site is currently
2:23:05
a preserve uh but it’s my understanding that this is private property and that
2:23:11
over the course of the last you know 20 years people have been allowed access to
2:23:17
the site um trespassing as it were and having the free enjoyment of the site uh
2:23:25
and we also heard that and I’ve seen uh where you’ve had uh dirt bikes out there
2:23:33
and bikes and some significant damage to that to that site um now
2:23:42
uh they aren’t currently on private property but if this development were to
2:23:48
go through uh there would be legal access ongoing legal access uh to the
2:23:55
site and then funds to maintain the site that correct that’s
2:24:02
correct um and uh to uh council member
2:24:08
Warner’s Point uh has to any Toge has anybody ever made
2:24:13
an offer on this site to purchase it for space I know that this was stated back in
2:24:20
2015 that they were going to to buy the site the neighborhood was going to buy the site do you know if any offer was
2:24:27
ever made I am personally not aware of an offer okay and somebody said that there’s the funds are available but I
2:24:34
presume that would be like the Altimont open space funds but there’s there’s a lot of very specific requirements behind
2:24:41
that funding that’s correct they’re tied to um sites with significant native
2:24:48
significant biological diversity and also uh for non-motorized recreation so
2:24:53
Trail access right and this uh most of the grasses up there are no longer native is that correct that’s that’s
2:24:59
true yeah okay so they’re they’re non-native grasslands all right and
2:25:07
uh so has already been been established
2:25:13
this does meet the general plan requirements and has for some time
2:25:18
correct correct okay and
2:25:24
um yeah uh let me just see if I got any additional notes
2:25:31
um one of the things I thought was interesting was somebody had made the comment that because of this vast open
2:25:38
space uh that the fire insurance for some of the residents was were cancelled
2:25:45
um one of the other hand if a certain portion of this open space
2:25:51
in grass land which does present a fire hazard is reduced wouldn’t that then
2:25:56
reduce the fire hazard
2:26:03
anybody so the combination of better access to the area um the the um
2:26:08
irrigation that happens in the uh yards that immediately surround the uh homes
2:26:14
in that location um and the fact that Wildland interface is a grassland interface which is actually the least
2:26:20
dangerous type of interface versus a tree canopy or other items the area is a relatively low um uh risk uh Wildland
2:26:28
interface obviously any place the city touches open space lands there is a risk the existing neighborhood has some level
2:26:35
of risk because wildlands essentially touch the edge of that neighborhood this area will not significantly increase and
2:26:42
as you say in certain circumstances could actually decrease that risk in certain limited locations um and that’s
2:26:48
why we did have the our fire Personnel take a look at that both for access to it um access to the open space um the
2:26:55
ability to provide High fire hydrants with uh inappropriate links so that essentially hoses can be drug to protect
2:27:02
both this new neighborhood and the existing neighborhood effectively in the case of a fire so we’re not talking about putting up a tree canop be like
2:27:09
paradise no uh you looking at the landscape architecture out there it
2:27:14
looks like they’re fairly widely spaced and uh there’d be a looks like just some
2:27:20
significant breaks in there so you wouldn’t have a uh a wild grassland fire and presumably if the HOA is maintaining
2:27:27
the site uh you wouldn’t have it go wild uh in a wild state that is true the the
2:27:33
trees have been limited the landscape plan uh contemplates uh a limited number
2:27:38
of native Oaks incorporated into the project around the exterior boundaries where the the project uh uh abuts the
2:27:46
weest there wouldn’t be any trees on those uh adjoining property flanks uh
2:27:51
because of the concern about Raptors so the project site has a pretty limited number of trees
2:27:57
Incorporated okay so this is it does follow the general plan uh this area is not open space it
2:28:06
is private property uh which has been accessed over the years uh by the
2:28:12
community um oh last uh has LPD ever expressed an interest in acquiring or
2:28:19
maintaining the property no they have not okay I do
2:28:25
remember though as a former board member at lpda that we had uh looked at a plan
2:28:30
that if this if this development be built and this is where they’re talking about 76 units that there was an that
2:28:37
adjoining open space parcel would be managed by LPD so how if they’ve brought
2:28:42
that up again I do not know but I know that we discussed it at one so that if the development went through the there would be an Associated open space yes
2:28:49
well but there is an Associated open space yes and right now there’s a open space where people are would be but be
2:28:56
managed by an HOA instead of by L RPD yeah it sounds that way to me anyway
2:29:01
okay the adjoining property uh to the West is owned by LPD and right I’m
2:29:06
talking about the the area to the uh to the east oh okay okay so it sounds like a similar
2:29:14
thing happened uh okay uh any further questions
2:29:19
comments if I could com oh go ahead go ahead go ahead I just want to be quick you know it’s really funny um and I
2:29:25
don’t mean funny funny it’s just interesting to hear I’ve been here a few
2:29:30
years not as long as many but long enough to remember when the mirisa development and everything
2:29:36
between Laughlin and Vasco was open space ranchland
2:29:42
Farmland from North Front North none of that
2:29:48
existed and uh I remember having exactly the same opinions as you have of this opin of that opin when I was when I had
2:29:56
to bring that up when that came before the council that and Mira Lisa being the last piece
2:30:02
in that puzzle out there but I just really really died over the amount of
2:30:09
habitat that had been gobbled up by all these places and so it’s it’s interesting just
2:30:17
to hear that all of a
2:30:25
sudden unfortunately families still have kids kids need a place to
2:30:31
live they aren’t going to live with mom and dad forever this is one that’s been a a real
2:30:37
tough decision for me because I it I didn’t like the original version 76
2:30:43
houses and anybody who knows me knows that I know the wildlife in that
2:30:48
neighborhood specifically better than probably anyone in town CU I’m out there almost every day almost every day and I
2:30:56
know where the tiger salamanders live I know their grandparents I know you know
2:31:01
pretty much I I’ve studied them for years in the Brushy Peak area uh in The Alkali sinks all these areas out there
2:31:10
and I just I remember when you know I remember
2:31:15
hiking with my wheelchair up where the new Safeway is right now because there is buring ow habitat I say the new
2:31:21
Safeway how is that Safeway down there in First Street first in Los pitas but before that was
2:31:27
built there were buring owls that I used to check on all the time down there daily before Mines Road went from First
2:31:33
Street to East Avenue it didn’t go through anybody it didn’t go through and
2:31:41
there was a big open space down there where the Safeway is where buring ows
2:31:47
were and I know from being out there and studying and and and I know you know many of you on
2:31:54
the save the hills group are Backpackers and hikers as as and and know me from
2:31:59
meeting me on a trail um
2:32:04
it’s I don’t like when we when this has to happen
2:32:09
when something has to be moved mitigated but
2:32:15
unfortunately we we have to find a place to put all the people we have here we can’t keep
2:32:23
having people drive through town from as Mr Barker said Modesto and probably as
2:32:28
far south as U as Merced and I know some that do that every day and come into
2:32:35
town and and I’d rather have a place for them here to shorten the commute have them live and work in town uh and we
2:32:42
we’re we trying pretty conscientiously during my relatively short time on Council to do
2:32:51
that to make that happen and
2:32:59
uh this this has gotten to the point this development where it’s gotten to a
2:33:04
place where I can just about handle it you know it it’s they’ve the inclusion
2:33:11
85 Acres this huge piece of property that’s almost as big as Sil Sycamore Grove
2:33:17
and um that’s kind of a a good thing to hang on out there that it’s it’s I I’d
2:33:24
just like to see see I I i’ wish the plan had never come up but it’s come this far now it’s been reduced in size
2:33:32
the homes have been reduced the uh there’s plenty of mitigation on the fire
2:33:37
side and Public Safety side so uh I just I’m just fascinated still that you know
2:33:44
because we we all saw Mir Lisa coming in and and were sweating about it back then
2:33:50
so uh just to put in a little bit of perspective more than anything so when you make a
2:33:56
motion oh comment so um I had a bunch of questions
2:34:01
but I hadn’t actually said anything about what I thought so first of all I wanted to uh reiterate to add to agree
2:34:08
with those who have already thanked staff those who have thanked saved the hills um I really appreciated my meeting
2:34:14
with with you save the Hills with with everybody but but when I met with you on Save The Hills um I appreciated the
2:34:22
energy I appreciated your dedication um and I want to encourage
2:34:28
you to you’ve you’ve heard already tonight that there is spaces on the commission for the Arts there’s a space
2:34:35
on there spaces on the Planning Commission please put that energy to use in the commissions as well and in
2:34:42
working on on on furthering city government uh from within as as as well
2:34:48
as well as working uh you know with uh in tandem with the city um I I think
2:34:54
that the work that the city has done on this has over the last 10 years has been remarkable um and my job here tonight as
2:35:03
is all of ours is to uh make a decision on whether or not this follows the rules
2:35:10
that we have in front of us and my judgment is that in fact fact the the
2:35:17
applicant has worked really hard to actually go ahead and follow those rules therefore because I cannot find any
2:35:24
reason not to um I there’s not a lot of choice here um I wanted to say one more
2:35:30
thing and that is about my personal history which is that uh I worked hard on the urban growth boundary uh back in
2:35:36
the early 2000s um I worked hard to make sure that uh it that we were going to
2:35:42
preserve that um and which means of course that we get d answer in internally which is actually better
2:35:48
environmentally it’s better for us as a community um when I started looking into
2:35:54
this I was actually surprised at how far out the urban growth boundary went along with my fellow council member um I went
2:36:00
I when I went and I walked uh the Bluffs I was I was surprised there were actually houses out there um because I
2:36:07
actually somehow thought that the urban growth boundary was was further in um so
2:36:13
the fact of the matter is it was set where it was set we live with it where we live with it we
2:36:18
can make those choices in the future um but I I I don’t believe in
2:36:25
changing the rules in the middle of the game so okay any other comments Mr M
2:36:33
Warner yeah I’ll I’ll just say that I actually you as I said I’ve been part of
2:36:38
this for a lot of years and I I think the uh say the hills group has done a really good job of a very
2:36:47
um very professionally is the only word I can think of of bringing this to our
2:36:53
attention and working with the council I was there for the 2015 and in that case
2:36:59
we had they were at that time I believe asking for General plan changes so we
2:37:05
had a lot of latitude and you can see that back then I think John and I you we were the only ones on this group that
2:37:11
were there for that one um and we really wanted to make sure that this project
2:37:18
was good enough and I think it has become good enough on there is no way
2:37:25
under the rules that we have to work under to get this to zero so I I just want to say is that when I look at it
2:37:32
over the its Evolution that it wouldn’t be as good as it is without the U Save
2:37:39
The Hills group so and I think that’s just exemplary the way that you’ve all
2:37:44
handled this and without it it might have been at the 76 who knows but I
2:37:50
think um this is as as best we can do and we don’t have a lot of latitude from
2:37:57
the council point of view okay was me any comments no all
2:38:05
right uh what’s the pleasure of the council do I have a
2:38:11
motion sure I’ll move we accept staff recommendation okay move by vice mayor
2:38:16
Carling is there a second I’ll second it seconded by council member kumber any
2:38:22
discussion on the motion all in favor I any opposed it passes unanimously thank
2:38:29
you very much it’s a much better project thank you I do appreciate that
2:38:35
having been an environmentalist for uh decades I appreciate that I’ve never heard an
2:38:41
environmentalist say let’s build more houses to reduce Natural Area not
2:38:46
finished thank you very much we’re not finished
2:38:54
okay it’s funny people people complained about you guys coming in
2:39:03
okay okay all right we’ll take a take a five minute break five minute break okay