PC 11-05-09CITY OF CUPERTINO
10300 Torre Avenue
Cupertino, CA 95014
CITY OF CUPERTINO PLhNNING COMMISSION
AMENDED MIT~IUTES
6:45 P.M. November 5, 2009 THURSDAY
CUPERTINO COMMUNITY HALL
The special Planning Commission meeting of November 5, 2009, was called to order at 6:45 p.m.
in the Cupertino Community Hall, 10350 Torre ~wenue, Cupertino, California, by Chairperson
Lisa Giefer.
SALUTE TO THE FLAG
ROLL CALL
Commissioners present: Chairperson: Lisa Giefer
Vice Chairperson: Paul Brophy
Commissioner: Winnie Lee
Commissioner: Marty Miller
Commissioner: David Kaneda
Staff present: Community Development Direactor: Aarti Shrivastava
City Planner: Gary Chao
Senior Planner: Colin Jung
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: None
WRITTEN COMMiTNICATION5: None
POSTPONEMENTS/REMOVAL FROM CALENDAR:
1. GPA-2008-O1 (EA-2009-OS) General Phan Amendment for 2007-2014 Housing
City of Cupertino Element Lpdate. Applicant has requested a
Location: Citywide postponement to the November 24, 2009
Planning Commission meeting. Tentative City Council
Date: Deg:ember I5, 2009
Motion: Motion by Vice Chair Brophy, second by Com. Kaneda, and unanimously
carried 5-0 to postpone Application ~GPA-2008-01(EA-2009-OS to the
November 24, 2009 Planning Commiission meeting.
ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: None
NIISC: Chair Giefer welcomed Councilmember-Elect Barry Chang.
Cupertino Planning Commission 2 November 5, 2009
OLD BUSINESS:
2. Review Green Building Ordinance process framework.
Gary Chao, City Planner, presented the staff report:
• Said the item was a review of the Green Building Ordinance process framework. Reviewed the
background of the item; stating that the work is a collection of the input into a conceptual draft
framework for final review. Five main components discussed at the October 13 meeting were:
Establishing policy objectives and goals; providing regulatory background information;
establishing policy scope; defining public outreach plan; and outlining process schedule.
• Staff recommendation is to for the Planning Commission to provide recommendation to City
Council on the final scope and process for the CTreen Building Ordinance review process.
The Commission reviewed the Policy Objectives/Goals as outlined on Page 2-3 of the staff report.
Com. Miller:
• Recommended that they have a goal stating; a preference for providing incentives over
mandated requirements; and that they focus on coming up with incentives that would help
make that happen.
• The goals should include measurability, because if they aze not measured, they don't know if
they aze successful or not.
• There should be something about identifying where what could be called the "low hanging
fruit" is in terms of achieving the objectives th<<t the State wants in terms of reductions; and the
program should be weighted towazds going after those areas in the city where we can make the
most impact with the least amount of effort.
• Some of these objectives as stated are so broad, that it is hazd to measure or define them. For
example, "(a) provide community ..... stakeholders" is going to be very difficult to achieve or
measure to determine if we aze achieving it. My comment is with respect to whatever the
objectives are, there should be something that says we clearly understand how we aze
measuring what we aze trying to achieve.
Com. Kaneda:
• Said he agreed with the comment on metrics; ~~s goals are set, it needs to be something that we
measure against to see whether we are achieving those goals; not just that we are trying to do
this, but actually on a regulaz basis some kind of check-in to see where we stand. Possibly
there is an educational component of this that especially if a lot of this is related to residential
construction, there needs to be some kind of educational components so people understand
what is being asked and more importantly, why it is being asked. Also would like to see
metrics related to the AB32 goals; there i:; a disconnect now between what the AB32
requirements aze, and what it is going to take to get there at the community level; and if it is
cleazly defined where we aze and where we need to go, I think it will be easier to have that
discussion. We need to do this at this point, otherwise what I am worried about is that people
will look at what the goals aze and say that i s way too much, in actual fact in some cases it
may turn out to be too little. That is where I se~~ that as being important.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Said he agreed with Com. Miller's points in tE;rms of things we should be looking at; in terms
of the language, it covers a fair amount of fle:Kibility to look at these issues. Adding a clause
as mentioned about something to do about measuring the effects, both costs and the benefits
would be a useful addition to the policy section; the language is sufficiently broad that it gives
room to work in different azeas.
Cupertino Planning Commission 3 November 5, 2009
• Said that the initial mailers don't produce a lot of benefit for the cost involved, unless the
project is right next to someone's residence. He suggested using the website, articles and the
Courier and not focus on the mailers.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• What we were thinking was a type of a hybrid; what we have typically done with projects of
citywide significance is send mailers for every meeting and instead of that what we could do is
send an initial mailer and ask them to sign up online, because we have the ability to create e-
lists for different projects. A citywide mailer c~~sts in the range of $5,000 to $6,000.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Undecided about the recommendation to hire a consultant, said he felt it was essentially a
facilitator; uncertain what this person would bring to the table.
Com. Kaneda:
• There are firms out there that specialize in he-lping cities through this process, and are quite
knowledgeable generally on some of the issues.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Estimate was based on a discussion with a con,~ultant and other cities contacted; it provides the
entire gamut of what we can do as part of a process.
• The process that the consultant will help with is to understand green building; they helped
communities create ordinances around this and are familiar with the issues of permitting; they
include informational fliers, meetings, stakel-older meetings. We could do a much more
limited process.
Chair Giefer:
• There are many; one of them missing from <.~tai~s list is Los Altos; they have had a green
building ordinance in effect longer than any other Santa Clara County city; there are several
other models to study. Said they need intervention and help from somebody who has greater
perspective.
Com. Miller:
• Before we decide who or what, we ought to decide why/what we are trying to achieve with
this outreach. A an example when we did tl~.e housing element update, we had a consultant
come in and run some outreach meetings; he 'was an expert on what Sacramento required and
he could help us with the details of what type:; of locations made sense and didn't make sense
and what was likely to get approved and not get approved. However, I attended all but one of
those meetings and I didn't view it as particularly successful because it was mostly didactic; he
would talk to us and we would ask questions of him, but I thought the purchase of the meeting
was to get input on what sites our communit,~, our residents thought were important and that
input would have been good for us because we had to do that ourselves because those
meetings failed us.
OBJECTIVES:
Com. Lee:
• Make certain that our existing state building ordinances don't conflict with any we are talking
about, but also identify incentives for s~;veral areas for residential, commercial and
institutional to help them achieve our goals. Do we need to put in measurability or will the
Energy Commission do it for us.
Cupertino Planning Commission 4 November 5, 2009
Chair Giefer:
• Agree that we need to make sure we have an objective in there measuring ea-r--ea~e~t the
carbon footprint and how we get to the state mandated requirements of AB32.
• Also agree that we need to include measurement; we need to have a specific objective on how
we are going to measure the success of moving; forward to the state mandated regulations and
whatever our specific goals are.
• How we are going to provide an incentive to people makes sense, but I would rather see that as
part of the language under policy scope; it is a specific item that we can include to that; and I
think that it ensures greater participation frc-m the community as well. We do have an
educational component further down under Pc-licy and Scope; and I think that the objectives
that we have are broad enough to encompass that as well. Not sure if that has to be a specific
objective of the program.
Com. Miller:
• Relative to objectives, it is important that we set out as a goal to focus primarily on incentives
as opposed to mandated items and not put it lower on the list. I think it should be a goal and
an objective and I would look to the free market as a model to do that. For example if we are
talking about building houses, if there was an incentive program which made it clear that if
homeowners or builders did this, that their product would be more or if they remodeled their
house, that it would be of more value in the market; not only would they be saving money on
their energy bills, but they would also have a house that was worth more when they went to
resell and in fact, more than the cost of putting it in, it would encourage people to do.
• I would rather do the carrot than the stick approach; however, we could have it both ways. In
the discussion with Mark Santoro some time ago, the topic came up that perhaps as an
example if we set up what the requirements are and if people do it, then they get, for example
the FAR that we have in the ordinance today; however, if they don't do it, the thing is that we
actually reduce the FAR so that we have both combination of the carrot and the stick. That is
just one example, and I am not suggesting that we do that, but what I am suggesting is that this
approach is far better I think than when I read some of the things that Palo Alto does or some
of these other cities, where it is just a mandate and there is triggers and it is pretty much you
have to do that. I would rather have it as an incentives program; I think we can make it far
more successful than forcing people to do it and perhaps some of the other Commissioners
could comment on whether they agree.
Com. Kaneda:
• Said he disagreed more than agreed.
• Likes the idea of incentives on some things; the one issue that is going to hit right away and
one of the first things we need to be talking and thinking about is Santa Clara County Cities
Assoc. recommendations. It is not something :you can put incentives in, but maybe this is what
you are talking about; you could put incentives in but you still need to require it, otherwise I
think it would be a real stress to just expect people to do these things consistently. One of the
issues that I think this city and other cities need to consider is that these policies really want to
be consistent throughout the larger region, se if one city says we require LEEDS silver and
another city says we don't require anything ar-d another city says we require LEED platinum,
then that starts affecting developers and in fact the developers that I have heard talk about this
say, we want consistent policy from city to city which is why Santa Clara County Cities
Assoc. asked Silicon Valley Leadership GrouF~ to actually come up with a recommendation for
a policy. In that way for this to be most effective, you actually want everybody to codify more
or less the same thing.
Cupertino Planning Commission
November 5, 2009
Com. Miller:
• I question how important that is; when you g;o from city to city, everything with respect to
building is different, the FARs, the setbacks; all the requirements are different today. So
adding one more requirement that may or may not be consistent I don't think helps. You still
have to study the ordinance.
Chair Giefer:
• There are differences of opinion on that particular issue in terms of where it should be; should
it be providing some incentive as a goal or as part of a policy; take a straw vote after we have
gone through this and got public input on the recommended way to move forward, and then
come up with a final conclusion.
Com. Miller:
• I am not sure because I didn't get any comments on my other suggestions. Let's bring up the
next suggestion I had, which is that we have some kind of goal there that focuses on what I
call the low hanging fruit; that we identify wr~ere we can make the biggest gains for the least
amount of effort and energy.
Chair Giefer:
• The 800 lb. gorilla in the room and in the state of California is AB32 and if we add that as a
specific objective, I think that will be a byproduct of it, because it specifically does deal with
energy and carbon output.
Com. Miller:
• I understand, but there is different ways to go about that. We can have every homeowner who
does a remodel have to adhere to stringent requirements and that is not going to get us far
because there just aren't that many remodel;. However, intuitively it seems that the place
where the most energy is used is in our busine:;ses in town, with their lights on all day, running
their air conditioner, etc. It seems like that is where the large majority of the energy use
occurs; that is where blackouts occur.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Referring to 3C, consider ordinance alternatives based on community needs and input .....
alternatives; doesn't that implicitly suggest t}iat we are looking for the biggest bang for the
buck; the most reduction in energy and other natural resources consumption for the least
amount of dollars spent.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Said they can do measurability and get some sense of where the ordinance is going to get
them, but not if they don't know who is goin;; to do it and who isn't. They can do anything,
but probably won't achieve one goal if they do the other because there won't be a way to
measure who is going to take them up on an incentive vs. not in terms of figuring out whether
the ordinance is going to get them toward AB32.
• A mandatory ordinance will ensure some sense of consistency that will tell you if we get
people to do this we can move toward this. The other thing about low hanging fruit, that was
what part of the educational process was, and the consultant was to help us identify, if it is 50
build a green points, what does that mean for a house. When you are doing a remodel what is
the easiest, cheapest way to get there. The commercial developers are very much on board,
maybe the smaller commercial developers could get some help, educational fliers; that teach
people where is that low hanging fruit that helps you get there; we can list them in the order of
Cupertino Planning Commission 6 November 5, 2009
the low hanging to the higher costs.
• Said it would be under Scope because we would look at the cost benefit analysis which the
consultant was going to help us with; so them is a certain amount of expectation and if we
come up with things we want in the ordinance, I think staff doesn't have that level of expertise
in that field and we are going to look for some help. We can go either way, with a very simple
no consultant base, we can just review the Phase 2 and do some educational seminars to say
what is out there and what we are adopting. It a.ll depends on what kind of expertise we have.
Com. Kaneda:
• I think also if we could get the consultant to give us some kind of feedback on comparisons;
since we are talking about possibly adoptin;; a LEEDS standard, or a LEEDS equivalent
standard, some kind of feedback on the draft of the 2009 green building code and an
assessment of how close or not how close then are; and that is something that seems to come
up regularly. I have yet to see a side by side comparison.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• That is important to me because if the new Chapter 11 of Title 24 is getting us at the same
level or not near it, then I question why are we- playing around with LEEDS. That is what we
need more; or a technical analysis rather than a facilitator type consultant.
Com. Miller:
• I don't necessarily agree; if staff says they don't have the technical skills, then we need the
technical skills. However, the example I was giving before was that we had someone for the
housing element who had the technical skills, riot the touchy-feely skills; and I thought that the
average was a failure because of that. We have: to have one person as both, or we have to have
two people; one doing the facilitating in a ma~mer that gets to where we are going to go, and
the other that provides technical expertise if staff doesn't have it.
Chair Giefer:
• I think that if we have the technical experti~;e and we hold public hearings, they are well
advertised; we have an optimum list and do tl~e right kind of outreach, we can get the public
input we need here and be direct and not filter through a consultant, and I would also be
comfortable with that model.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Said that any workshops that they have will be: Planning Commission meetings, hosted by the
Planning Commission.
Com. Miller:
• Said he felt they needed a professional facilitator to get the maximum benefit. He commented
that he has yet to see meetings run by the City ~~vhere it was done to maximum benefit.
Chair Giefer:
• Said there was no argument on the point; it wa:; just a matter of budget.
Com. Miller:
• If it is worth doing, it is worth doing right; otherwise we shouldn't do it because when I
attended all those meetings, the objective that I thought we were going to get out of it was a
recommendation by people from the city by oLir residents as to what areas did or did not make
sense to include in the list to go to Sacramento, we never got and we had to do it ourselves.
Cupertino Planning Commission 7 November 5, 2009
• All that it achieved, was that the people who ;rttended those workshops, were better educated
but it didn't filter up here.
REGULATORY CONTEXT:
Chair Giefer:
• Summarized that they would like somebody on board who can provide both the technical
information on the ordinances that other cities have with the state's requiring and what the
laws are and the legislation ahead; but as well, ideally have a facilitator who can facilitate
group discussion and help move people forward and summarize their ideas.
GREEN BUILDING POLICY SCOPE:
• We have comments already; adding low hangi~lg fruit to Section 3;
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Relative to Section 3, 3C already covers that.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• This policy scope is going to define what our scope is going to be for the process and for the
consultant, should we get one.
Chair Giefer:
• I hope we are going to get some great ideas from the stakeholders; that we have residents and
developers who come in and based on their experiences and their ideas that we get some other
really interesting ideas that we haven't thought of. I would like to make sure we have room for
great ideas from the public as well.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• 3C was supposed to be that catch all; we have heard from people who said we are going to go
beyond LEED, but we are not going to be LEl?D, and we were grappling with how do we help
define that so it meets something; and we w~urt to be open to those things and perhaps give
people an alternative to be able to get there.
Com. Kaneda:
• Said he brought it up in Santa Clara County (:ities Assoc., meetings; one issue that should be
discussed is the idea of green buildings just acs green buildings, vs. global warming which is
related to burning fossil fuels, so they are not quite the same thing. Energy efficiency and
global warming in my mind is a subset of th~~ overall definition of green buildings, and they
are related but there are things that if you are designing a green building that you might do that
don't necessarily help have any impact on global warming.
Chair Giefer:
• Com. Miller's example is always putting residents near transit; that is a very green idea if you
make sure you are adding housing near transit centers and housing is built green and near
public transportation.
Com. Kaneda:
• That actually does have an impact on global warming because it is transportation; reducing
storm water runoff is certainly a good environmental thing to do; but it doesn't necessarily
reduce global warming, it reduces erosion. There is a discussion of is one issue more
Cupertino Planning Commission 8 November 5, 2009
important than the other, are they both important, and do you weigh them differently?
Somewhere in this discussion it would be worthwhile to weave it in, at least think about it.
Com. Miller:
• It is a good idea; because there are three bills here and one addresses global warming; one
addresses energy efficiency and the other addresses water conservation. It adds another level
of complexity in terms of what we actually do, and which is more important.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• My understanding is that the LEEDS process,, one of its goals is to provide the individual
developer with tradeoffs that he can get points in different areas, so that on any given project,
he can move further in one area where it is presumably most cost effective; to your knowledge
does the Part 11 of Title 24 also have a similar process.
Com. Kaneda:
• The version coming into place is going to have a tier system; which it is not a point system you
can go and put total number of points; it is a Mier system that there is a base requirement that
you have to do everything and then there is ~~ tier 1 where a city can chose to adopt if they
want a stricter standard. My understanding is :you have to do everything unless the city comes
up with a point system like LEEDS, but there is no indication on how you would do it; they
would have to come up with it on their own. 7liere is two tier systems and for schools there is
actually a third tier which is grid neutral buildv~g but that wouldn't apply to us.
Chair Giefer:
• One of the things Com. Kaneda was talking about is the difference between green building and
global warming. It goes back to the concept of measurement, as we are evaluating different
portions of policy and how to move forward o-1 things, I think we do have to consider that and
we need to either acknowledge what works t-y saying yes, this specifically addresses green
building and this one addresses global warmir-g or both; or I don't like the idea of subjective
ranking on how these things work because I don't know that we will really know that.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• For example if you have a LEED platinum building or LEED silver building they could both
of them be the same at the same level but they could address greenhouse gases very differently
based on which parts they chose; the measurability part becomes complicated about how do
we get closer to achieving AB32. I am thinki~ig within the scope of this project, how realistic
are we in terms of our expectations.
Chair Giefer:
• It is a good idea for us as we are discussing policy to acknowledge what that policy addresses;
is it global warming, or is it green building policy. The whole idea behind the concept is if
you build things green, you are going to use less energy, less resources, etc. which should
impact global warming, but some things have ~i more direct result.
Com. Miller:
• Is it significant THAT AB32 is the only one v~-ith a specific objective, which is to reach a goal
by 2020?
Cupertino Planning Commission 9 November 5, 2009
Vice Chair Brophy:
• That is a future Planning Commission's problem; I agree with you that I think the people who
threw that into the law haven't really thought about; my understanding is that would basically
require per capita emissions to get back to the level of the 18`~ century.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Com. Miller is correct; AB32 is the one that ~~ets the policy; the mandate, and all of the other
bills try to achieve or get closer to it and they will get progressively tighter. That is the goal.
Com. Miller:
• That almost says that is the one we have to give the highest priority to. Chair Giefer said she
agreed.
Com. Kaneda:
• Also one missed is AB 1103; which I think ha:~ something to do with disclosing the energy use
of commercial building, that actual energy u:;e; There is one that didn't make it through for
residential, which is controversial; if you sold your residence, you would have to disclose
energy use.
Chair Giefer:
• Staff can check into that; we have not really closed Scope. Relative to No. F, it says create
guidebooks and other educational material; I think that we as a Planning Commission don't
want to create it, we want to direct staff and the consultant to do that so I don't know if that
needs worthsmithing.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We can do that, this was basically the scope oi'the project more than one group vs. the other.
Com. Miller:
• The question is where does the city fit in this? If we are going to ask our businesses and
residents to do this, the city should be out iYOnt leading the charge and the city should be
setting up some of our buildings in town as models of how to do it properly.
Com. Kaneda:
• Said he understand the city adopted that as past of the phase I.
Com. Miller:
• We are talking about far more than that; we: are talking about retrofitting buildings and all
kinds of additions here, and my comment is that I think it is appropriate that the city should be
a model of what we want our businesses and residents to do.
Gary Chao:
• That is a good point, and precisely what Erin Cook's main focus is; we are going through
energy audit and assessing our own carbon footprint in terms of our municipal operation and
the intent is to lead by example. I think Erin Cook next time can address that point more and
explain where we are at in terms of that process.
Cupertino Planning Commission 10 November 5, 2009
PUBLIC OUTREACH PLAN:
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Not really changing the language, but it is important that we do get the people from the
Building Dept. involved because they are the ones who will enforce the ordinance to the extent
that we have suggestions that as we start drafting it into an ordinance, I would like to hear
feedback from them as to how easy it is to enforce.
• Am concerned about the LEED program where as I understand for certification, you don't get
it until after the building is completed and occupied.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• I think we at this point if we did have an ordinance and I have talked to several cities about
this, would be a bill to LEEDS requirement; because you get the CO when you build to
specified specs and then they can go through their monitoring procedures but we are not going
to make them tear the building down.
• There are different LEED requirements, core and shell, the interior sometimes does its own
thing.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Is the building permit set up to process LEED type applications?
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We don't really have green building inspect~~rs; with a lot of projects, we rely on, we are
sending them to training so they can understand what some of the procedures are, but we do
have the architect certify that it has been built to the standards; it is a type of professional
certification.
Com. Kaneda:
• There are two ways I have seen cities approach this; there is a lot of discussion on this at the
Santa Clara County Cities Assoc. and there seems to be two ways cities approach it; the
concerns are, one is the cost to the city if they are trying to assess it internally and if you say
we are going to design to a LEED silver standard, but we are not actually going to require
certification, then who is going to check that because USGBC is not going to correct it, and
now the city has to check it and have the knovrledge to be able to assess is it or isn't it and not
be fooled when somebody checks a bunch of boxes and hands it in.
• Some cities have said this is too much for u;~, we don't want to do this, let's have USGBC
make the assessment. Some cities have said, do we are going to have an in-house expert, Palo
Alto does it that way, and that person does it and they have one person only right now. San
Jose is going the other way and says we ar~~ going to require you to above a certain size
building submit it to USGBC and then there is the issue of occupancy permits; and the way
they are handling it is and I think other cities also do it this way; they say you put X number of
dollars out, in San Jose's case it is very low a,ad if it doesn't work, then they will ratchet it up
but it is a nominal amount of money and if you don't follow through and get that certification,
then you forfeit the money. It is similar to a liquidated damages sort of thing. Who knows
how long it will take to get he paperwork in and the interpretations answered etc. and finally
get a call whether you are silver or not.
Com. Kaneda:
• My thinking is that it is less about what you are paying USGBC although it is in the thousands
of dollars, but when you are talking amulti-million dollar project, $SK or $7K is nothing; it is
Cupertino Planning Commission 11 November 5, 2009
the design team and the contractors' additional fees to do the bureaucracy and the paperwork.
A homeowner would probably do Build A Green, which is only about $250.
Chair Giefer:
• The actual filing and certification is very affor3able; consultants set their own rates; you would
be involved with someone who comes in does the checkpoints throughout the project. It is
about $300 to apply for it for a single family house and then for somebody to come out, you
would save $200 but it may be more depending on the lot. ,
.The city also has a fund set up that is still available to
pay for green point raters. There is a $SOK fund to reimburse people for their green point rater
fees.
Com. Miller:
• Outreach activities in the past have had mixed results; recalled the extensive outreach efforts
for the sign ordinance, and only 5 members of the public appeared at the meeting. It is
important to hear from all stakeholders and worth it to spend time talking about how to have a
successful outreach program that emphasizes the importance of the activity to the people who
are going to be impacted by it so they actually show up and provide good input.
Com. Kaneda:
• With the sign ordinance the average Cupertino resident is not planning on putting up a sign
anytime soon; whereas with policies that could potentially impact anybody who is doing a
medium to significant size remodel„ new home or business that is doing a remodel or adding a
new building, that is potentially everybody in the city. People come out when it affects them.
Chair Giefer:
We had the same discussion about the Rl rec~;ntly when we did some modifications and held
the public hearings on the first and second story, and very few showed up. It is perplexing to
the Commission because the decisions and. recommendations that we make do impact
everyone's lives in the community and how Rio we get people to attend; we cannot make it
mandatory.
It would help if there was more interest shown.. Some of the things to consider for example is
to hold meetings in different locations, such a:> on the east side of town or on the west side of
town; be a roving Planning Commission and meet in the neighborhoods, making it convenient
for the residents; or hold meetings on school sites.
Com. Miller:
• There are other organizations in town that hold meetings and people attend them for various
reasons. Perhaps the average program could use the people who lead those meetings to
emphasize the importance of attending the meeting. People attend school PTA meetings, and
the school running those meetings may have the opportunity to say that the city is doing that, it
is going to impact your lives, and you should get out and talk about it.
SUGGESTED PUBLIC OUTREACH:
Use of school's Wednesday homework packet; parents read. Work out with schools to put
information in packets going to students' homes
Use of City's Facebook page, send tweets about it; Chamber of Commerce
Com. Miller:
• The other stakeholders would include architects, architectural designers, and builders.
Cupertino Planning Commission 12 November 5, 2009
• Would it be appropriate to have a public service meeting at Sunday services; trying to figure
out how to get the word out?
TIlVIELINE AND SCHEDULE:
Aarti Shrivastava:
• It was agreed that the 9 month process was realistic. The plan was to finalize the scope this
evening, not Dec. 2009.
• I think you can look at the milestones rather than the dates, and see if those make sense and
see if we can put in more. I did hear more stickeholder meetings; we realize we were into a 9
month process when we put this together.
• What we would like the Commission to do is to recommend the process they feel is most
appropriate. If the Council feels otherwise, vie will let them know it is a very limited scope
because we can do outreach; but I think Com. Miller was correct in the facilitation part; we
might need a little help. Most of the budget vas scheduled towards mailers and the outreach,
and less towards the technical analysis because we wouldn't really have that expertise. It
would be more about providing outreach and materials about what Phase 2 meant and making
a decision about tinkering with Phase 2 a little.
Com. Miller:
• Strongly recommend to Council that since this will potentially have a significant impact on our
residents, it is worth spending a few dollars to do it properly.
Chair Giefer:
• Are there any things missing in the schedule or timeline as opposed to actually looking at the
dates. Any milestones that we would have exF~ected differently.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• The only one I would change is under May 2(110 where we say "overview of LEED/lead and
big requirements; I would like the language changed to allow for whatever formats we use
rather than necessarily indicate that those wo~ild be, that we are locking ourselves into those
particular programs.
• So overview of other green building standards and policies.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Clarified that it was supposed to provide the F'hase 2 recommendations and a context for that.
We do have a meeting where we talk about tl~.e alternative concepts and that was the meeting
after that in June and that is where we talk about what else people doing; what else is out there.
Frankly I don't know that there is much else except we do happen to know it is an emerging
area and there is going to be some discussion around it.
Com. Kaneda:
• There are some cities that have gone with percentage above current Title 24 requirements.
Everybody says Title 24, but what that really means is Section 6 the Energy Code. I don't
know who can get us this information, but I am aware that there is all types of things being
debated and developed as policies like at the CPUC and CEC level, and I am not even sure we
could get this, but it would be nice to get some: kind of download on what is coming down the
pike from that standpoint, which may have an impact on which direction we feel like we
would want to go. I am not sure if it is bill related, but I have sat in on meetings where they
talk about developing; they are at least in preP.iminary discussions about developing all kinds
of policies related to what kinds of lamps yoic are allowed to use or whether or not they are
Cupertino Planning Commission l:i November 5, 2009
going to allow certain kinds of lamps to be ;gold, zero energy buildings by certain dates and
those kinds of discussions.
Chair Giefer:
• On the first May 2010 meeting, educational v~~orkshops to review different things, I would like
to have policies and we really need to under;~tand what the State is requiring as well. So as
part of the overview of concepts of green building programs, I would also like to review the
specific laws and regulations.
FiJNDING:
Chair Giefer:
• Is there anyone who would not want to see us hire a consultant to either help us technically or
to facilitate? (Response: No)
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Since I was the one who questioned the facilitator, listening to Com. Miller's argument, I think
there is something to be said for bringing in ~i professional facilitator. There has to be a limit
to it, I would prefer it would be someone who also has the technical skills.
Com. Lee:
• There will be critics who say we have the environmental green coordinator but her job is to
coordinate within departments and she needs somebody. We want a consultant who has
experience in facilitating discussions and workshops and also who is a credentialed LEED
person; I think we can fmd a consultant who has both.
Chair Giefer opened the public hearing.
Jennifer Griffin, Rancho Rinconada resident:
• Taking the appropriate amount of time and getting everyone involved and hashing it out is a
good plan, because as we are going down the years, I think that with global warming, every
city is going to wind up with very robust po] icies. I thought it was interesting when talking
about historic structures, I saw that other cities; such as Palo Alto and Sunnyvale, have very old
homes from different architectural periods ar.~d you cannot really go in there and say we are
going to take a 1920 home that's on the historic list for San Jose and make it totally green.
You have to have a certain situations where people, particularly if you have a private home
and it is of historic proportions or a certain model, there are going to have to be policies that
are made to allow the homeowners to be able to upgrade the home but not have to turn the
1920s home into a cubic style from mid-century modern or such because of the green building
requirements. Down the road Cupertino is going to have more historic homes from different
time periods that will likely have to be dealing; with.
• Sunnyvale is giving credit to developers 5 feet. higher if they have more green certification, 5%
more lot coverage. It is not a good road for (~upertino to go down; Cupertino is a very small
intact, compact, already dense community; I think we have enough incentives without going
down that road.
Com. Kaneda:
• Clarified that he was doing a historic remodel of a 1920s office building that will be extremely
green, may possibly make it to the platinum. I think you can actually, they are not necessarily
mutually exclusive and in some cases older buildings were deigned to be more efficient, more
efficient that some of the stuff designed more recently.
Cupertino Planning Commission 1~I November 5, 2009
Jennifer Griffin:
• Said she was in London in the 70s and learned how they managed to have buildings from the
1800s look like they do and still have modern offices in them. They said that what London
does is you can strip the interior, but you have to leave the exterior intact.
Councilmember-Elect Barry Cheng:
• Suggested on Item 9, Timeline and Schedule, if you can move June 2010, review of alternative
concept with pros and cons and possible incentives" move to Mazch, when we aze going to
prepaze outreach material, so that is possible to include it in there so people can see it.
Otherwise by June you have the other alternative then people may not be able to give input.
• Said in his opinion it was not appropriate to hire a consultant for $45K when only 5 people
show up at the meetings. He suggested furthe~~ study to gain expertise and then move forward.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Said when they prepaze outreach materials, they can also provide what else is out there, as
alternatives; the deeper discussion can happen later.
Chair Giefer:
• We want to have the meeting as well attended as possible and that is our objective. Part of
what staff is providing us is a plan A and Plan B scenario, one is with funding for outreach and
technical assistance, and the other one is with all of the moderation and facilitation that would
be wonderful to have as well.
Com. Miller:
Barry Cheng made a good point; going back to the housing element, the Council designated a
group of people to participate regulazly and eve do that with the General Plan Task Force as
well and then we are guaranteed to have interested people come. If we do it the same way
here that we actually designate a group of people and we include broad segments of the
stakeholder groups, then we know we are going to get those people coming and if we get other
people coming, that is great. That is one way that has been successful in the past, that we can
ensure that we actually get a real audience here who has an interest and is ready to participate.
Com. Miller:
• We might want to put some thought into; you can always take it up with the Council and then
it becomes a political issue; or we can try to do it down here, staff could make a new
recommendation as to who or you could put out something in the Scene that says we aze
looking for people who aze interested in participating and see what kind of feedback we get,
and hopefully we get fairly decent feedback ;ind then we could pick from that list of people
that want to participate. You want to be cazefiul that you aze not subject to the criticism of this
was handpicked by staff or the Planning Commission; just think through how we do this so
that it is an open process.
Aarti Shrivastava:
Typically it would range in the 18 to 20 member range. If you promise them a short tazgeted
process, it will hold t heir interest.
Discussed how to chose the members; reach olrt to the people's names we do have.
Chair Giefer summarized that the majority felt that under Policy, Objectives and Goals we needed
to add something with regards to measurement in AB32. Regulatory context, Com. Kaneda had
some other ideas with regards to AB 1103 which is disclosure of energy consumption in
Cupertino Planning Commission 1 `~ November 5, 2009
commercial buildings and we also asked staff to see if there was a residential bill counterpart to
that.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Is AB1103 just for the sale of a building ;there is a bill that says when you sell a commercial
structure, you have to provide... I don't think it would affect our work here.
Com. Miller:
• One of the other goals we talked about which we were going to revisit was some type of goal
relative to incentives. I would like to see it under goals.
Chair Giefer:
• I was going to bring it up under policies. Not sure how Com. Lee and Vice Chair Brophy felt
about that.
Com. Kaneda:
• I think in my mind there is a base requirement that we need to look at adopting; but I think
there is this Tier 1, Tier 2 thing that I certainly think there is a role for incentives here and I
would like to see it.
Com. Miller:
• I am not disagreeing that there is a base level that we need to have, but I also think it is
important, otherwise it might tend to get lost tl-at we emphasize that we want a program that is
to the best that we can focuses on incentives.
Com. Kaneda and Com. Lee:
• Said they could support that.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• Clarified that under Part 1 metrics, do we want to measure both the need to meet the goals of
AB32 and some metrics as to costs also. Said he would like to see both on costs and the
benefit side to the greatest extent possible. (Not only in terms of filing fees, but the
professional costs as well as the construction assts).
Aarti Shrivastava:
• I would imagine there are life cycle studies for some of these building types and that could be
an example of what does it cost to build it and what are the benefits over its life that; I am not
in the field, but I have heard of studies like that that have been done; I don't know that a
building is old enough to have realized 30 years worth but I know buildings have recuperated a
significant portion of the investment within a short period of time; we can provide that.
Chair Giefer:
• At least from an operational perspective; I think some of those paybacks are immediate
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Is that more as part of the processes you would like to know about it or is it a goal where you
would like to measure every building we are approving; it is a little confusing for me; I just
want to make sure that the goals are the goals of the Commission.
Cupertino Planning Commission 1(i November 5, 2009
Vice Chair Brophy:
• State under some language similar to "to the greatest extent possible quantify the
environmental benefits and the economic cost; of our recommendation..."
Com. Kaneda:
• I actually see two types of metrics; one as we -io these things, maybe not on day one, but as we
do these things, how are we doing; so things like what percent of the buildings have been
retrofitted or what is the carbon impact of the policy a year or two later; those types of things.
Another side of metrics is things like what are the costs and things that you would want to
know before you decide what you are going to recommend or require.
Chair Giefer:
• We have discussed those as part of the green building collaborative as well, so they are
available.
Com. Miller:
• Agree that it is important to have it; it goes hand in hand with incentives' this is going to be a
benefit financially to you; even though it costs this, you are going to get this return.
Com. Kaneda:
• And possibly some of that discussion is that it may be possible for the city to do something to
help homeowners do these things if there is a l~~ng term benefit.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We could explore programs that the city can at least review and see what we can adopt or not;
I am so focused on the policy objectives; it seems to me that what you would like to do is take
A through D and try to condense it and then add these other 3 where you have the
measurability, where you have the incentives, :;o we have maybe three policies or four policies
and that is what we will try to do if that is what the Planning Commission is focused on.
Com. Kaneda:
• Said he was not particular when they end up, a~ long as they get captured somewhere in there.
Chair Giefer:
• In reading through this, I think we can combinf: A and B, this is just from a fast read ... C, it
seems that we have an objective there yield coat savings to city taxpayers; we could add the
objective with regards to incentive in there.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We can take out the first part of it and say we can look at helping provide cost savings and
incentives for people, so we can reword that.
Vice Chair Brophy:
• In the interest of honesty, going back to A, recommend changing the word "meets" to
"considers" because we are not going to meet tl~e needs of all stakeholders; we could remove
"C" demonstrate the city's commitment>
Chair Giefer:
• Agreed; it is a great language and we need another preamble but it does talk about cost
savings; and let's just change what is currently "D"; we will combine A and B; C will be
changed and we will remove "demonstrate the -:ity's commitment" and include the incentives
Cupertino Planning Commission 1; November 5, 2009
and what's the new B which was the former C and D will talk about implementation and
measurement, and include the AB321anguage in there
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We can talk about the measurability of it; revi:;e D to focus on measurability and achieving
AB32.
Chair Giefer:
• I think that would be appropriate through green building ordinance.
• Back down to No. 3, Green Building Policy ar,~d Scope -not many different ideas of what we
needed to add or change there.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We did add the low hanging fruit in the cost bE;nefit analysis; it is sort of inherent
Chair Giefer:
• I think adding something about prioritizing, easy maximum impacts, greatest gain from
investment makes sense, so we will add that.
• Public outreach, I would like to see, but we didn't have much discussion on it; I would like to
see us use the new media that we have available to us as a city; so add it to our Facebook page;
if we are tweeting, proactively tweet.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• We plan to do everything we have in our tool lox.
Chair Giefer:
• Out of the box thinking such as churches, PTA. meetings and Wed. homework homework
packets; put them on school loop.
• Timeline - we had the suggestion to take the idea of incentives and incorporate that in the
March/April outreach with materials and making stakeholders aware that it is one of the things
that we will be reviewing.
Aarti Shrivastava:
• Said staff would summarize changed and bring; it back for a meeting on November 14~' to
review.
REPORT OF THE PLANNING COMIVIISSIOrJ
Environmental Review Committee:
Chair Giefer:
• Discussed the General Plan amendment and. housing element update and are waiting for
comments back from the State with regards to the housing element; they wanted additional
information on the locations that are part of that plan; and there were two additions needed
regarding cultural resources; one is to add some verbiage regarding archeological evaluations
so that if we ran into any archeologically significant items we would stop building when any
building were ever approved and the sites started, and evaluate them correctly and the same for
paleontology finds. The negative declaration was granted.
Cupertino Planning Commission 18~ November 5, 2009
Aarti Shrivastava:
Said that as an update on the item that was ~;ontinued, our intention was to have something
from HCD that said we met, we dotted all the I's and crossed all the t's; at least some kind of
memo from them; if not an actual approval. 7'he approval process once we resubmit will take
up to 60 days and if we don't get that memo in time I would prefer to hold it until we get
something in writing from HCD that we do hive something for you to approve. We will keep
you posted on the item.
Housing Commission: No meeting.
Mayor's Monthly Meeting With Commissioneng: Meeting cancelled.
Economic Development Committee: Meeting s~~heduled for next week.
Com. Chair:
• Said that as a member of the General Plan Task Force who worked on the sustainability
section in the General Plan, she was pleased that they were moving forward.
REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF COMMUr~TITY DEVELOPMENT:
• Directors report as written; comments on first item to be entered into record, and forwarded to
respective departments for information. HCD update was also provided.
Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned to the next regular Planning Commission meeting
scheduled for November 24, 2(109 at 6:45 p.m. (The November 10, 2009 was
previously cancelled due to a lack of quorum.)
' ,., ~ • ~~~ '~• v
Respectfully Submitted.
Elizabeth 1 ' , Recordin;; Secretary
Approved as amended: November 24, 2009