The URL can be used to link to this page

PC 02-19-2014 (special) CITY OF CUPERTINO 10300 Torre Avenue Cupertino, CA 95014 CITY OF CUPERTINO PLANNI\G COMMISSION SPECIAL MEETING/STUDY SESSION AMENDED MINUTES 6:45 P.M. FEBRUARY 19, 2014 TUESDAY CUPERTINO COMMUNITY HALL The Special Planning Commission meeting of February 19, 2014 was called to order at 7:30 p.m. in the Cupertino Community Hall, 10350 Torre Avenue, Cupertino, CA. by Chair Paul Brophy. An Open House was held from 6:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. to receive public input on the General Plan Amendment,Update and Alternatives and Housing Element. SALUTE TO THE FLAG ROLL CALL Commissioners present: Chairperson: :Paul Brophy Vice Chairperson: Winne Lee Commissioner: Margaret Gong Commissioner: :Don Sun Commissioner: Alan Takahashi Staff present: Conununity Development:aireector Aarti Shrivastava Asst. Director of Commun ity Development: Gary Chao Senior Planner: Piu Ghosh Associate Planner: George Schroeder Asst. City Attorney: Colleen Winchester APPROVAL OF MIN UTES: Minutes of the January 28,2014,Planning Commission meeting: • Vice Chair requested the following correction on Page 8, second paragraph,Vice Chair Lee's comments: Delete last sentence "Down the road,.....the lead"and replace with the following sentence: "Currently there are farmers markets held two days a week in Cupertino.If the food truck usage is approved, it could potentially spread to other days in the week and we should be concerned about that." MOTION: Motion by Com. Gong, second by Vice Chair Lee,and unanimously carried 5-0-0,to approve the January 28, 2014 Planning Commission minutes as amended. WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS: None Cupertino Planning Commission 2 February 19, 2014 POSTPONEMENTS/REMOVAL FROM CALENDAR: None ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: None PUBLIC HEARING: None CONSENT CALENDAR: None STUDY SESSION Chair Brophy: • Noted that Item 2, General Plan Amendment and Item 3 the Housing Element for 2014 would be presented together. Com.Lee: • Disclosed for the record that her dental practice was located in Sunnyvale in a building owned by her parents, across the street from Cupertino Village. She stated there was nothing in the business relationship that would interfere with her decision snaking process for either the Housing Element or the General Plan Update. She said she had the ability to act with complete impartiality and will exercise her authority for the benefit of the public as a whole. 2. GPA-2013-01,Z-2013-01 General Plan Amendment; Study Session to provide update on the EA-2013-03 focused General Plan Amendment process and review land use City of Cupertino alternatives for analysis in the EIR. Proposed alternatives include Citywide Location options for citywide development allocations (commercial, office, hotel and residential)as well as building heights and densities for corridors, special centers and 7 study areas. Tentative City Council Study Session date: March 4, 2014 3. GPA-2013-02,EA-2013-03 Study Session to review Housing Element requirements and City of Cupertino sites to achieve the Regional Housing Needs Allocation(RHNA) Citywide Location for the upcoming 2014-2022 Housing Element. Tentative City Council Study Session date: March 4, 2014 Aarti Shrivastava, Community Development Director: • Reviewed the video presentation outlining the purpose of the study session on the General Plan Amendment and the Housing Element. The purpose of the meeting is for an infomlational study session in order to provide an update on the General Plan Land Use Concept Alternatives; and includes the Housing Element update of existing and potential sites for the upcoming Housing Element for the period 2014 to 2022. They will be looking at alternatives to be considered for analysis in'the EIR; the proposed alternatives include options for citywide development allocation in the categories of office, commercial, hotel and residential; it also looks at building heights and densities for corridors, special centers and 7 study areas where various applicants have requested by General Plan Amendments. Some property owners came to the city with various amendments and staff recommended to Council that they be reviewed together so the decision makers as well as the community could see the impact of all these changes at one time rattier than studying them separately. The City Council agreed and authorized staff to proceed with the process; in March 2013 the Council approved the scope of work budget and the consultant contracts for the development allocations for the General Plan and associated EIR to study the development allocations as well as the various study areas noted in the staff report. Said they were looking at citywide office, commercial, hotel and residential development allocations and consolidating the review of the individual requests. They 1 I Cupertino Planning Commission 3 February '19, 2014 have received several questions and proposals from various parties on, at least interest in bringing proposals forward on the Vallco Shopping district and felt it was a good idea to get community input rather than just bring a project that could be reviewed because it was important to the community. It also addresses recent State law requirements such as the Housing Element, changes to the circulation section to in some necessary regulations, and also address other updates that have been made over the years, some cleanup items that the Council and Planning Commission have requested staff to look at. • After the Council authorized the funding and the scope of work in March, they began working on a project website launched in June. They held a number of public workshops and meetings including two community-wide workshops, neighborhood:meeting and met with the Chamber of Commerce as well as the neighborhood block leader group. Al.so met with various members of other Commissions and Committees in the city, including the Teen Commission, the Legislative Action Committee as well as the Bike Ped Commission. There have been meetings with various property owners who propose changes,to-go over the changes so that they are reflected in the requests. • Staff recommends that the Planning Continission review the proposed land use concept alternatives, collect public input and provide continents and recommendations for the Council's consideration. As noted earlier, no decisions will be made tonight but staff values comments that need to be included in the analysis that will take place in the EM. The consultant will complete the General Plan report. Dan Iacofano, Consultant,MIG: • Thanked the community for their participation in all the meetings and activities held to date. They have heard from hundreds of people and hope to expand it beyond that large group and continue the dialog and discussion. There is a lot of information to review and absorb,but no decisions have to be made immediately; they will receive feedback and direction from the Planning Commission this evening and there will be additional Council meetings, public study sessions and joint sessions with the Conunission and Council. The next several weeks can be used to take in more information to help form a better opinion in consideration of all th.e materials. He explained that the consultant is required periodically to update the General Plan for the city, which is a State of California requirement. It lays out the ground rules for how they address environmental resources and how new projects are to be considered in design. They look at public services and facilities and overall community amenities; ultimately there has to be some benefit that will lead to an even better community over time. • They have progressed through a series of steps starting back in 2013 with analysis of existing conditions and presently are in Phase 2, visioning; and alternatives phase. They have completed some technical studies that will be discussed this evening and have to prepare draft plan materials, an EIR still to be undertaken whereby a whole range of factors will be analyzed that will address the concerns people have raised and also provide the information needed to make a better policy decision and later in the year get to a series of public hearings and adoptions. • The concept alternatives process has been well informed by the community process; they have talked to property owners who are involved and affected by these discussions and launched this series of technical reports. No conclusions about what to do; they have tried to bracket or bookend the range of possibilities starting with the existing conditions and going from there to look at various concept alternatives, and that has resulted in this concept alternatives report. They welcome further discussion and feedback from the Commission. Dan Amsden,Lead Planner,MIG: • Said their presentation would include the input and factors that went into the materials and also describe the alternatives in more detail. In 2003 the City of Cupertino published a report focusing on the current planning context in Cupertino, some of the factors facing different development allocations, some economic factors, but also a comprehensive inventory of the initial 7 study areas that Council directed staff to look comprehensively through this process for each of the 7 study areas. Cupertino Planning Commission 4 February 19, 2014 The report includes information just on existing conditions, not on any proposed projects, but existing land uses,parcel sizes,building sizes and also architecture mobility of these different study areas. • The report also included an initial set of key findings or major opportunities that were brought forth to the community in.the first workshop. Some key opportunities that came out of the report, is one possibility of creating a community benefits incentives program for any new development. If there is new growth or increased heights or increased densities; how can we tie that or should we tie that to specific community benefits back to the Cupertino community. Also another key strategy was to find ways to diversify and strengthen Cupertino'.s local economy, in particular finding ways to improve the multi-mobile circulation throughout the city. The biggest factor or possibility of the project is looking at.the Vallco Mall site and options for snaking it a more successful mall but also an asset to the entire Cupertino community. • Another technical input, all these are objective reports on data and analysis they have now; a market study was published last month, which included a detailed analysis of current demographic and economic conditions in the city, but also the larger region, because the larger region and different retail and economic factors affect the performances of local businesses and companies. The purpose of the report was to assess the trends and also demands for any new commercial, office, hotel and residential development. One of the key outcomes of this report is that there is extensive leakage in retail sales tax; what leakage means is Cupertino residents or workers could be spending their money on new retail items within town,but instead go out of the city to purchase those goods elsewhere. • Another starting point for this project is looking at the remaining development allocation within the city; the current General Plan 2005 has a development allocation tool which is really a growth management tool the city has established and when new projects are proposed they pool different square footage, or if they are hotels, room numbers out of the allocation pool and eventually as development occurs over a number of years those remaining allocations have gotten somewhat small in size. One of the directions from City Council is looking, at possible ways of replenishing development allocations. • Another key input in this process or factor when looking at alternatives is other projects taking place either by the city or other regional agencies in the area and how that could affect alternatives for Cupertino. One significant project is the Housing Element update which is one of the seven required elements of the city's General Plan and it is the only element of the General Plan that has a legal requirement for how often it needs to be updated. There is a State agency that has to review and certify the Housing Element; it runs on a different timeframe or scale than the rest of the General Plan, but it was decided it would be a good idea to pool it into the broader General Plan Amendment discussion to comprehensively look at future housing as part of the discussion. • Tied into housing is a recent project called Planned Bay Area (PBA), which was adopted by.ABAG and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC). PBA looks out into the future 2040 and establishes general targets on future housing requirements. It is a regional plan, not a city plan but is something they are required to look at and factor into the local planning decisions. • Another potential project is Bus Rapid Transit (BRT); the Santa Clara Valley Transit Authority (VTA) which is the regional transportation agency, is currently studying the possibility of creating a bus rapid transit line along Stevens Creek Blvd. It is still in the study phase and could include enhanced transit or it could also be dedicated driving lanes for buses to get through town faster. The corridor that VTA is studying is from DeAnza College to downtown San Jose and is something that has been discussed in workshops. General feedback has been received from the community, and while improved transit is a good idea, BRT is proving to be a little bit too much for the community. BRT has been added as a possibility to two alternatives,mainly because in the environmental analysis they want to be able to study what the impacts would be if BRT were to happen. However, any of the three alternatives can happen with or without BRT. • One of the main inputs to the entire process has been community input; aside from technical and other projects, the entire project involved extensive community outreach as mentioned by staff; there is a project website with a common feature, posters were made, newsletters and also held two major Cupertino Planning Cominission j February 19, 2014 rounds of community workshops. • He reviewed Community-wide Workshop #1 held on July 18, 2013; Community-wide Workshop #2, and 4 public meetings including Neighborhood. Meeting for Cupertino residents on December 5, 2013; Neighborhood Block Leaders.Meeting, Chamber of Comierce workshop. He referred to the video presentation and discussed the content of the workshops and meetings and input received. Attachment PC-7 contains a summary of the challenges and opportunities identified by the workshop participants. • Workshop#1 (July 18, 2013)was focused on trying to develop with the community a series of assets, opportunities and challenges for Cupertino, to look at what are the -key things effecting the community; what are some of the key challenges that we should be thinking about as part of the planning process. There was a lot of information on the different assets, challenges and opportunities from the first workshop, have compiled a comprehensive summary of all the inforniation which is also on the project website. Last October they started a process of moving from assets, opportunities and challenges and started to look at some more detailed mobility and design concepts or options that should be considered as part of this process. The city hosted a community-wide workshop#2; which had a good turnout and they felt that it would be good to have complementary meetings and workshops that turned into the neighborhood meeting, the Chamber of Commerce workshop and the neighborhood block leaders meeting; all four of the meetings and workshops essentially covered the same two exercises and had largely the same input. • The structure of the meetings was two part; the first was a community designed survey which was developed to test potential land use design and. mobility concepts for each of the major mixed use corridors in the city and it was broken into three categories, streetscapes and mobility enhancements, parks and plazas, and buildings and land uses. • Community workshop #2 included a facilitated discussion where images were shown, real time polling and real time results. Questions were asked under each category; we showed an image and described the concepts and asked if they liked the idea for Cupertino; and if so, where within each of those 4 corridors would it be most appropriate. It was both the concept and location. • After the second community-wide workshop #2 an online version was developed of the entire survey and it was posted online from October to January. From both the community-wide survey and online survey, a comprehensive summary was prepared of all input received and a slide show with different images that received a 65% or more vote for "l: really like it" or "worth considering". The survey helped the community discussion to get some different ideas and different perspectives on different mobility,park and land use choices. • The second exercise held at the meetings was one held specifically on Vallco Mall and for this exercise there were a series of large poster boards and mobility chips, three dimensional blocks and table groups were able to weigh in on different ideas or concepts for what the future of the Vallco site could become or more importantly what they would like it to become. Through all of the workshops there was a large range of different ideas, ranging from very little change protecting neighboring residential uses maybe opening up some areas for more outdoor shopping, some other ideas were more development, more height, different uses like office and hotel or parks, and other groups also had more significant changes both the heights, uses, residential, etc. There were a full range of different ideas and different scales for the future of Vallco, but some common themes repeated by many participants or table groups during the Vallco exercise was that future development in Cupertino should provide community benefits a.nd not impact public services in particular schools. Careful consideration needs to be taken for any new residential development in terms of density, location, and type, for example a single family home vs. an apartment vs. senior housing. h-icreased building heights could be considered if they are not adjacent to existing neighborhoods so placement may allow for different heights as appropriate. • Said they also heard a lot about transit pedestrian, bicycle mobility and also safety and how they can improve the corridors; in addition the building changes looking at the roadway and how they can improve mobility throughout the city; how the Vallco shopping district could be redeveloped, how it Cupertino Planning Commission 6 February 19, 2014 can be re-tenanted and to make it both an economic success and something that is desirable to the Cupertino community. From the input, they have put together the draft concept alternatives which is compiled alternatives report and the start of the discussion and the start of thinking about a bookend from low to mid-to higher development in the future. The report was published in February and is online and can be downloaded. • He highlighted some key components of the report: The current 2005 General Plan has a community vision; the first workshop included discussion of assets, opportunities, challenges and vision. Also looked at the community vision and if there was any need to refine it, refresh it; and the community vision in the current plan covers everything heard at the workshop. The only two changes as part'of the draft vision was addition of words "healthy" and "inclusive". Similarly, the 2005 General Plan includes 12 guiding principles; kept the same framework, the same 12 guiding principles, largely the same intent of the 12 guiding principles; some editorial cleanup, we refined them somewhat based on community input but largely they remain the same because they were verified from the first workshop. • In developing the alternatives, focused on the major mixed use corridors in town and they are areas where there is the potential for change because of commercial uses access larger roads, it doesn't necessarily mean there will be change but there is the potential for change and one of the starting points for this, the city's current regulatory structure, the General Plan Specific Plans, there is a lot of different boundaries, some overlap, we want to provide some clarity as part of this process. In clarity we developed these different polygons you see, and focused in the alternatives, developmental allocations, any heights or changes within these different corridors. The corridors include the Homestead corridor, North Wolfe corridor, North/south roadway corridor, Heart of the City corridor which matches Heart of City Specific Plan,North DeAnza corridor. • He reviewed Alternatives A thru C as outlined in the staff report,Pages 25-28. • With the alternatives prepared and framed, the next major step in the GPS process is to prepare a comprehensive EIR. No further alternatives are anticipated at this time, but instead have all three of these constant alternatives be fully analyzed in the EIR in order for all of us,the public, staff, decision makers to fully understand what the potential impacts could be from these different levels of future potential change in the city. It is planned to study BRT line on Alts. B and C but also no BRT.line under B or C; the idea is to get a full range of input and information to help the public discussion and decision making process. For the EIR process, we are looking to kick it off in March; have already scheduled an EIR scoping session on March 11 and it takes a while to do the technical analysis on traffic, air quality, noise, envirorunental impacts; a public draft will be done by late summer and final EIR and public hearings on GP and EIR in the Fall. There was a staff presentation given on housing. Piu Ghosh,Associate Planner, presented update on the Housing Element: • Said the Housing Element was one of the seven mandatory elements of the General Plan; it must include an identifications of sites and policies to encourage and support housing development in the city. It is also the only element that needs to be approved by the California Department of Housing and Community Development, and it must be adopted by January 31, 2015. There is a 120-day grace period by which they must adopt the 2014 to 2022 Housing Element. • On Nov. 14, 2013 the City Council authorized commencement of.the project and the project budget. They have done extensive community outreach on the project; stakeholder interviews were scheduled in early December; meetings held with community members, property owners, service providers, school districts, housing developers, and the business community. They also held community workshops in January and February; the purpose was to identify Housing Elements sites, sites that needed to be taken out and identified additional sites with the help of the community. With regard to public input received, there have been concerns about housing for affordability in the city, limited housing options for seniors in the city. There is significant concern about the development impacts of i I Cupertino Planning Commission 7 February 19, 2014 housing particularly related to schools, traffic impacts, noise and privacy impacts. There is also a preference to distribute new housing throughout the city; there have been concerns that housing is concentrated in one part of the city. • There is a need for greater housing variety in terms of both the types and the price range that housing is available at; there is a preference for no housing altogether; there is a lack of support for affordable and special needs housing; that concern was voiced by housing providers. There 'are financial constraints for affordable housing because there are restrictions on grants that might be available, and also because of the dissolution of the Redevelopment Agency, some funding has been lost. Also the community voiced an opinion that smaller units are preferred over larger housing units because they have fewer school impacts. There are a few Housing Element legal requirements that need to be met with their Housing Element; there needs to be a site inventory list,the final site selection will be done in Fall 2014. • The housing policies will be updated and presented at the April 1St joint City Council/Planning Commission meeting; we will also be required t�o adopt a Density Bonus Ordinance in order to be eligible for streamlined 8 city review which limits their review and also speeds up the time linut in which they have to return their comments to us for adoption, and it will help us meet their deadlines. An EIR is required for this project and will commence in March 2014; the public draft of the EIR will be presented in late summer 2014; with the Final EIR being circulated in Fall of 2014. Concurrently we will present a draft of the Housing Element to the Planning Commission and City Council which will be forwarded to the HCD for review. • The Draft Housing Element will include the final list of Housing Element sites, housing policies, potential related General Plan amendments and rezoning of sites and the Density Bonus Ordinance, and it is expected that the Housing Element will be finally adopted in Winter 2014 after HCD review and certification. Veronica Tam,Veronica Tam and Associates, Consultant: • Provided an overview of the Housing Element and site selection process. Reiterated that the Housing Element is required by State law to be updated periodically. It also needs to be updated to be able to respond to change in the housing market and make sure that the policies in place reflect the needs of the community. The Housing Element has to include a realistic sites inventory. When the city Housing Element is sent to the State for review, they would like to achieve something called"finding of substantial compliance"or a certification of the Housing Element. •. The Housing Element is required to comply with State law, having that status provides many benefits; the Housing Element is probably the most frequently litigated element of the entire General Plan. If you have a Housing Element certified by the State and it is found to be in substantial compliance with State law, it gives the presumption of validity in the event of a lawsuit; it gives the protection that a non-compliant Housing Element would not offer. • Having a Housing Element that is certified by State law also opens you up for funding; not only for affordable housing but also for some of the transportation and improvement infrastructure funds. Without a state certified Housing Element you will not be eligible for some of the funding that is specifically administered by the State Dept. of Housing and Community Development. It doesn't mean that you will get the funding,but you will not be eligible to apply. • The other reason for having the Housing Element comply with State law, is there are penalties involved with not having a certified Element particularly if the reason is because you have not provided adequate sites, then you will be under a state law penalty to actually oversee how you approve projects and what kind of densities yoU would have to approve. Having that certification status gives you more local control. • The reason it is important to meet the January 31, 2015 deadline is they will not have to update the Housing Element as frequently; if the January 31, 2015 deadline is not met, the 8-year Housing Element automatically converts into a 4-year Housing Element which means it has to be done twice while everyone else is doing it every 8 years. The Housing Element is comprised of several key Cupertino Planning Commission 8 February 19, 2014 components and looks at the needs in the community particularly market and demographic changes and looks at the constraints and opportunities they have. You have no control over the market; you have very little control over the environment; therefore under State law you are not legally obligated to mitigate those kinds of constraints; however, you are legally obligated to mitigate governmental constraints. If the rules, policies and regulations that you impose as a local jurisdiction are found to be constraining housing development,you are legally under State law to mitigate that. • When we talk about resources, we looked at sites capacity; whether you are allowing some capacity to grow in the future, whether you have administrative capacity and financial capacity to facilitate and encourage housing in the future; and lastly we look at goals, policies and accomplishments; how the city has been achieving your housing policies and how to modify your future goals and policies. • When submitting the Housing Element to the state for review, a key component of that review is the Regional Housing Needs Allocation, (RHNA)which by definition is the City of Cupertino's allocated needs as part of the region; it does not necessarily mean that it is directly related to how much local needs are generated, but is your position within the region that's your share of the region's housing needs. A key concept about RHNA is that it is not a construction goal, it is not a construction obligation; it is just a planning goal. You must demonstrate in the Housing Element that under land use policies and development standards and zoning, you have that potential to accommodate the RHNA; whether those units are being constructed or not, you have no control of the market; if the market doesn't call for it, you are not obligated to make sure that happens. However, you are legally obligated to make sure that you accommodate the capacity. • In establishing the RHNA, State law says that in jurisdictions similar to Santa. Clara County communities they have established default density of 20 units to the acre, that is the density that based on density and economies of scales more likely to be able to facilitate and encourage housing development for lower income housing. -It does not obligate you to build particular types of housing; it does not obligate you to build low income housing; it just says based-on density it is more likely that you can facilitate and encourage low income housing. • She reviewed the Housing Elements Sites Criteria as outlined in staff report and shown on the video presentation. Included are the existing uses on the site; they look at whether there is realistic potential for recycling, size of the site and ownership pattern; development density. • Relative to existing units on the site, exclude sites that have no feasibility for redeveloping, such as if it has a condo development on it. Also looked at the condition of the housing, a new building vs. an aged building; also look at the size of the site, a larger site gives more flexibility and more ability to be creative with site design; when the State is looking for sites, they are looking for larger sites. A site is not a parcel, a site can be a group of contiguous parcels; if they are owned by same owner, that is good, but not a requirement. If it is owned by same property owners, it is easier to consolidate the parcels into a larger property for development, but is not a requirement. Sites that exceed more than 20 units per acre are considered to be feasible to facilitate and encourage housing development. • On top of the State's criteria, what is equally important and makes sense for Cupertino, they looked at whether they are located along transportation routes with access to public transportation within the priority development areas. Those are sites that would give the benefit of reducing air quality and traffic impacts. Also looked at whether they are close to activity and employment centers, parks, services, shopping; those are additional benefits to look at; whether the site is suitable for the city to be included in the Housing Element. Another characteristic is the location of the property, whether it is at the corner vs. in mid-block. If it is mid-block, you may have more difficulty with constraints to handle the ingress and egress,but if on the corner you may have more flexibility. That is also another criteria; based on those criteria, and on community input the city has conducted, so far there is a master list of potential sites. At this time it is based on the previous Housing Element sites; there were 13 identified but some are no longer available and are dropped from the Housing Element. • There are also property owner initiated sites that they want included on the Housing.Element and also sites that were identified by participants of community workshops. Perhaps tonight there may be additional sites to be added. Cupertino Planning Commission 9 February 19, 2014 Piu Ghosh: • Said they wanted to tie this back into the EIR in terms of different alternatives presented with the GPA; mentioned that Alt. A where minimal change is going take place to the 2005 General Plan, not much change except in one area which is the So. :DeAnza Blvd where the density is changing slightly; there will be one identified site that would be slLudied in that alternative. Sites where the property owner has proposed a site but they have proposed a minimum density that is higher than the existing GP density for their property; they would not be studied in that Alternative,they would be dropped. • With Alt. B where we looked at more moderate growth, they would include modifications to some site densities along VTA PDA major transportation corridors particularly sites where the property owners said they only want to have their sites studied at the density of 35 d/u per acre, they will be studied at that density. Hamptons which is on. North Wolfe Rd will be studied at the minimum density that they have requested which is 65 d/u per acre. This is because the site could accommodate the bulk of the RHNA and is also served by a different school district. All other sites that have been proposed for review will be studied at the minimum density. Alt. C reflects property owner requests and therefore all the densities in that alternative will be studied at the maximum densities requested. • The potential housing sites represent the preferences from the public workshop and the Housing commission meeting held last week; the Planning Commission is welcome to add more sites to the master list of sites that have been identified. No decisions are being made tonight and all sites will be studied in the EIR; the EIR will analyze the combined GPA and the Housing Element changes discussed; once the EIR is completed and certified is when a recommendation will be made by the Planning Commission and a decision by City Council will be made at that time. • Relative to the BRT, Aarti Shrivastava said that it was the city's decision whether or not they want a dedicated lane or mixed flow; VTA can still have a BRT line within the mixed flow and it won't be as efficient but ultimately it is within the city's jurisdiction. Chair Brophy: • On the Hamptons case; this 65 d/u per acre would be a relatively unique number for Cupertino. Aarti Shrivastava: • It is a very high number and the highest density iri the current General Plan is 35 units per acre. Chair Brophy: • Said he assumed the reason they are considering; it is that it is not part of the Cupertino or Fremont school districts, and that because the property does not abut any residential areas but instead abuts the Apple II campus, that they are saying it would be a unique site in terms of minimizing impact on residential areas on the school district as well as serving as an ideal location for people who worked at the Apple II campus. Aarti Shrivastava: • Clarified that Alt. C would have included the proposal at the highest density,but the reason it is being included at the 65 and Alt.B is for that very reason. Chair Brophy: 0 If interested in looking at that particular issue he asked if they were stuck with having to look at high numbers of office space and retail shown in Alt. C or can they mix and match. Aarti Shrivastava: • We are analyzing all the alternatives so ultimately the PC and Council can recommend and make a decision to pick and chose from the various alternatives to get to see the whole gamut of impacts. Cupertino Planning Commission 10 February 19, 2014 Piu Ghosh: • There were still 7 of 13 of the identified sites; on those sites are units associated with each site. The current General Plan does identify a certain realistic capacity for each of the existing Housing Element sites. For the existing sites, there are approximately 530 units associated with the 7 sites. Chair Brophy opened the meeting for public input. Chair Brophy: • Explained that they were combining the presentations for the GPA and Housing Element because the two are intermingled in terms of the decisions on how housing affects the GPA. The format will be to allow speakers to present questions, comments or observations about the GPA and then go to questions that are focused more strictly on the Housing Element; if time permits speakers will be permitted to do both. Colleen Winchester,Deputy City Attorney: • Clarified for the record that both items for the meeting would be intenningled for discussion purposes but would be segregated out in subsequent meetings. Jennifer Griffin,Rancho Rinconada Resident: • Said she wanted to insure that when they go into GPA that the Heart of the City (HOC) was protected, as it is one of the foundation cornerstones of Stevens Creek Blvd. from Morita Vista down to Lawrence Expy. Don't do anything to compromise HOC, the public right of way, the setbacks, the 25 or 32 ft. setbacks along Stevens Creek Blvd. Said she favored Concept A — do not change anything. Said they want to protect the current heights in the city; and commented that if she wanted to live in a city of skyscrapers, she would go to San Jose or San Francisco. • Said she did not want Cupertino to become the San Jose Envision 2040 where every square foot of San Jose has been zoned 10 stories. They need to protect the neighborhoods, make sure that nothing happens to them because they are the core of the city; also protect shopping districts and tech parks and the traffic. Said they need to remember the many hours spent looking at the Apple EIR for traffic; Main Street traffic; the IHop building in the eastern end of Cupertino; that was 600 pages of traffic implications. Said she did not support the BRT, and did not want to lose two lanes of Stevens Creek Blvd.,presently she has difficulty getting onto Stevens Creek Blvd. because of the traffic load. Cathy Thaler, Stern Ave.: • Said that over 10% of Cupertino residents live between Tantau and Lawrence Expy., their only egress being Stevens Creek Blvd. or Bollinger Rd. with only a small number of streets that go straight through. Currently they are waiting for a new traffic light at Stern and Stevens Creek; all six lanes of Stevens Creek Blvd. are very heavy traffic; and it is important that it be considered in the light of the EIR. Said she wanted.to insure that the impact on the neighborhoods is considered not just a major traffic issue; the concern is not just the residents navigating out of their neighborhoods into that area, but they are also increasing it soon with the opening of the Apple building on the Santa Clara site behind IHop and with Main Street; it is adding a considerable amount of traffic. • Said any proposed restriction on Stevens Creek would be devastating to the area. Her concern is that they take the neighborhoods that are adjacent along Stevens Creek and make sure they are considered when they consider the General Plan. Darrel Lum, resident: • Said it would be preferable to determine the density, height and setbacks favored by the residents of Cupertino rather than the property applicants. He said he felt they should determine an additional number of dwelling units required by ABAG after determining the available number of dwelling units remaining from the last ABAG numbers; determine the number of dwelling units from the 7 r � Cupertino Planning Commission 11 February 19, 2014 opportunity sites; consider other sites as necessary,to meet the ABAG numbers. • He said they need to know the critical mass for commercial retail and also felt they need to be on the community survey based on the photos; it would be preferable to have the residents express their likes or dislikes of existing sites in Cupertino rather thain elsewhere. He asked what the results were of the surveys already taken. • He asked what the status of Municipal Code 1903 regarding density was;-what is the status of the Heart of the City Specific Plan side street setback; does the General Plan supersede the Heart of the City Specific Plan? With regard to increasing the;:heights for commercial or offices, he felt the retail part should be viable rather than a token amount of space. • With regard to increasing the height to a possible 130 feet, who and what criteria determines the qualifying retail and project wide benefits? He felt:they would prefer community benefits rather than project benefits. Peggy Griffin,resident: • Said she agreed with Jennifer Griffin, no BRT as they cam--iot afford to lose lanes on Stevens Creek Blvd., it is already a horrible situation. She suggested distributing the housing across the city and along the Monta Vista/Foothill/Stevens Creek/Stel].ing area; which distributes the traffic. Said she did not know what "number of units per acre" looked like, and suggested listing examples of existing buildings for reference. She asked how high the Flamptons are and how close to the street they were. She said it was not good neighbor practice to dump it on someone else's school district. Kim Hing,resident: • Said she was a frequent bus rider on the route from the fire station down to 11 t'' Street, and she does not support having the BRT as the bus makes manly stops and slows traffic down. Said she supported affordable housing, additional housing and more rental units; but would not support additional housing unless she knew how many more units would be affordable housing. She asked how many units would be rental as more rental units were needed; more specific information was needed on how many one bedroom and two bedroom units, she did not support adding more office units; Vallco needs to be revitalized; no more commercial development is needed. Said that it would be good for Cupertino to provide more affordable housing than is required. Jon Willey, resident: • Said he attended many meetings regarding Main Street and learned that there would be no more Main Street, and yet when driving by Vallco he was disappointed when he saw Main Street X was being built. At those meetings he spoke about the Santana Row traffic and expressed his concern about experiencing the same problems in Cupertino. H(-I said he never had any response to his concerns and how they planned on addressing the traffic.and he has seen an increase in traffic. He shared an incident that occurred the previous year when his wife went to Sedgwick School to register their son for kindergarten. She was unable to register him on the first day of registration and when she registered him on the second day, she received packet No. 93 of 96. • Said the high density needs to take into account the school. The State says you cannot consider the impact on schools for doing housing. He said he was an engineer and if he was not allowed to take into account the important factors they would not be doing good designs. Whether the State does or doesn't consider the 'impact on schools, they should. He said he was disappointed that only 170 people attended 4 meetings on what was being considered. • He expressed concern about the notification of the meetings as he lives on Tilson and did not receive prior notice except for this evening's meeting.He said he hoped the Board considers the factors. Phyllis Dickstein,resident: • Said that she agreed with previous speakers that the Housing Element should be lower density and scattered throughout the city and that they should consider that all the voices for more development Cupertino Planning Commission 12 February 19, 2014 come from land owners and developers. Said she did not feel ordinary citizens, the people who chose to live in Cupertino, want Cupertino to become downtown San Francisco or downtown San Jose. • She proposed that an element be removed from the housing at west side which is the northwest corner of Stevens Creek and Blaney; the northeast, southeast and southwest corners already have high density housing with an additional 80 unit project under construction on the southwest corner to complement the high density project that is already there. The northern end of Blaney as you approach Homestead already has some. multi-family developments; Blaney is a narrow street that cannot bear any more traffic. It is saturated and simply not fair to dump on one intersection. This was not taken into consideration when the Prometheus project was well under way. • The only way Cupertino is going to have any affordable housing is if the cities in the area get together and go to court to appeal a State Supreme Court ruling that does not allow Cupertino to do it in the best way for the community, for its budget and for the low income residents themselves, which is set aside in the market rate and high market rate apartment developments. They will likely have to go beyond the State Supreme Court because the sovereign rite of the city to make these determinations has been overturned. She said they may have to start going to federal court as it seems the only way to get what is fair to everyone. Jennifer Griffin: • Said it was her second or third experience with the Housing Element since Rancho Rinconada annexed in 2000. She said she felt the BRT is not a good fit for Cupertino; she questioned why many things seemed to be determined for Cupertino from the North Bay area, San Francisco and Oakland. San Jose because they have been forced to take on 150,000 units each time the housing cycles go through has had to rezone their entire city to 10 stories. It is being forced by the Housing Element, San Jose is going to start taking precedence and take over and boss San Francisco around; and San Francisco has its own housing problems. The neighborhoods need to be protected; they are all important for Cupertino. • Said they need to make sure that when they have sites in the city that may rezone for ABAG housing, they protect churches and places of worship, so they don't start selling their property and moving out of town to another city because their property is worth more money because it has been zoned for high density ABAG housing. That is deteriorating the quality of life in our city. Also, don't rezone everything in Cupertino like Envision San Jose 2040; are we going to rezone DeAnza College to high density housing? Said she did not know if was even possible. • Decisions about Cupertino need to be made by people who own property in Cupertino or Cupertino residents. We are going through another housing cycle and want to make sure that we protect what we have in Cupertino and don't compromise anything. Peggy Griffin, resident: • Said that she heard the city was discouraging condos over apartments because they had individual owners; but commented that an apartment complex often is one parcel, one parcel tax and hundreds of students residing in the apartments. One house would pay $100 and an apartment complex with 200 students would also be paying $100. She suggested that the city and school districts get together and restructure the parcel tax so that it is based on a number of units. There have been areas in southern California where they did that and if the number of units is increased, the amount of dollars that the schools get is also increased. • The Verano Apartments on Blaney and 280 is one parcel tax, hundreds of students live there; everyone in the apartments advertises the excellent schools so they are high rent and they are full and yet they only pay the one parcel tax. Kim Hing, resident: • Said they need more apartment complexes in Cupertino; not only students live in apartments, but people who cannot afford to purchase property need housing also; working people and families reside T Cupertino Planning Commission 13 February 19, 2014 in the apartment complexes. Jon Willey: • Said he and his wife learned that Sedgwick School was installing trailers to accommodate the additional students. He reiterated that the schools need to be in the equation about the density. He said that if the three options were put on the ballot:, Option A would be chosen. He said he felt the city people living in Cupertino are not being fully accounted for, it is more the developers. Chair Brophy closed the public input portion of the m(-leting. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said that the RHNA requirement for 2014 to 2022 is 1064 and they have 1895. It will translate into eventual RHNA so they don't have to make those changes now if they don't want to, but at some point there might be additional allocation; they will.come with other housing elements; Plan Bay Area is the basis for RHNA. Com. Sun: • Said he has attended several community meetings and felt tonight's meeting was constructive. Said he had concerns about the development GPA; It is proposed by 7 developers; it is the developer outreaching to the community if they want to develop their business and what they have done in the community. Was their planning to do some conm-ninity benefit to justify their development? Aarti Shrivastava: • Said at this point the city is looking at the GPA so the developers don't have any proposals they will bring to the community; if the Planning Commission and Council make the decision at the end of the process; that's when the developers know what the proposals will look like; at that point they can develop the plans and go out to the community in neighborhood meetings to update the community about their projects. • At this time they don't know what decision the Planning Commission and City Council will make so if they don't have any solid plans; they are thinking about ideas which is why they requested these but they don't have those yet and it would be too early because they may not get those sites. In terms of community benefits, it is a good idea if the Planning Commission has any ideas or thoughts; there has been input from the community; if at all there is additional height or any increase, they should come with benefits to the community: Have heard schools, parks, street improvement, retail, but if the Planning Commission has other ideas give them to staff and they can be added to the list of community benefits that will be presented in the Fall for consideration. Com. Sun: v Relative to height and density; asked if it was possible for staff or consultant to provide some visualization or comparison of what the maximum heights are compared to current building or density. What kind of a residential area can it be compared to so the public can know exactly what they are feeling in order to comment? Com. Takahashi: • Relative to a few elements of the market analysis., there was a conclusion that hotel space is adequate for the city; it is a very small paragraph in the market analysis; how was that conclusion reached? Stephanie Hager,BAE Economist: m For the hotel analysis they looked at some current rental and occupancy rates in the Cupertino hotels and found that the market is strong; they looked at future growth and realized that based on the allocations they have now, those are sufficient to meet future demand. That is at the low level Cupertino Planning Commission 14 February 19, 2014 estimate and they also produced a higher level estimate that says there is potential for some additional need for allocations by 2035 if you were to capture a larger share of the market than you have. . Com. Takahashi: • Relative to the retail leakage analysis, asked for an overview of how the dollars were calculated with regard to the various categories from the standpoint of going to surrounding areas vs. not being captured by the city in terms of sales tax revenue. Stephanie Hager: • Said they had data on retail spending in the retail trade area as well as in Cupertino and compared the difference in various categories and found that in the retail trade area spending was higher in certain categories than it is in Cupertino. What that says is that people in Cupertino are going elsewhere to spend money on items in those categories; they translated that into a dollar figure of what that retail spending leakage is to other areas in the retail trade area. Chair Brophy: • Said he read the report and found it hard to follow the logic; for example the area, it was stated that relative to motor vehicles, there is nothing that can be done given the land use patterns in Cupertino, but the highest category was building materials, garden equipment and supplies. By assuming,just looking at the property within the Cupertino city limits, that would exclude the Home Depot at Bollinger and DeAnza even though that parcel adjoins Cupertino on both the west and north sides. By using this analysis it is only looking at buildings within the city of Cupertino; it is saying that if you could magically move the property line down to include the Home Depot, there would no longer be the demand for building materials and garden supplies. Stephanie Hager: • One of the things to take into account is that there are other shopping opportunities in the retail trade area; so if you have something across the border that is meeting that demand, that is part of what is feeding into your leakage numbers. When thinking about retail in the future for Cupertino, part of that thought process would be how to position your retail opportunities here to meet that unmet need and whether or not there are other opportunities within a short distance that are going to suck up that demand or whether there is potential for Cupertino to capture it within the city limits. Chair Brophy: • What I am saying is just by accident of history we have this supposed leakage in that category, and if you just move the property line to the next parcel over, suddenly that leakage would mysteriously disappear and that raises the question of whether this concept of leakage analysis really tells us anything as to what can or can't be done in terms of retail development. Stephanie Hager: • Said they took that into account. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said it speaks more to the fiscal impacts than anything else; with everything else you have to figure out what your competition is and what your ability to compete with the use directly across that property line or city line is. This was more to get an idea of the fiscal impacts of not having certain things and then the ability of the city to have those new retail uses given that you have a Home Depot there. Chair Brophy: • The report identifies what is called supportable new square footage and in this category it says there is Cupertino Planning Commission 15 February 19, 2014 a demand for 60,000 feet. By moving the property line 100 yards, that supportable number disappears and that is a violation of common sense and everyone knows that Cupertino has a net outflow of retail sales. He said he was not sure t1lat the whole model that is used gives any insight as to how much they can or cannot have demand for. Stephanie Hager: • 60,000 square feet is not a ton of square footage in terms of Home Depot; it is much smaller than a Home Depot, so it might be saying something smaller that could capture a portion of that spending within the city that we are not thinking about a new Home Depot with 60,000 square feet. Com. Sun: • Said that at Planning Commission meetings when the discussion is about city development, speakers are always expressing concerns about the impact t:c► schools and the school districts. For the Planning Commission if they want to consider schools as a matter, he said there was no direct way to talk about impacts on a school. Colleen Winchester: © The answer is that you need to not consider schools with respect to the housing issue; you can consider things like impact on city services, but you are asking if there is a way to get around the law. You need to comply with the law and not consider the schools with respect to this particular element. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said they were trying to take a creative approach to the school issue, and are meeting with the school district to better understand their facility needs and other needs first; and then have the opportunity to look at the ability where they have entire large project sites that have the ability to have GPAs and a development agreement. They can go over and above those typical impact fees and make an agreement with the developer to feed into the school district or provide additional money. Said those are examples of community benefits that staff is exploring and as part of the EIR, would also include a detailed analysis of the impact of schools and, the school's plans for the future and their facility needs so we can understand if we are building or allowing rezoning for 1064 sites, what could that potentially means and how could we help the schools. Said they were trying to find other creative ways; if sites are already rezoned and they pay an impact fee that the schools sets, you can't consider additional impacts,because they are already paying that impact fee. Com Sun: ® Referred to the remarks made by a speaker regarding the parcel tax for apartments and individual residences, and asked for more information on who had jurisdiction to deal with the issue of parcel tax for apartment complexes and individual residences. Aarti Shrivastava: o Said the parcel tax is based on a parcel but it is also based on valuation of the parcel; the larger the parcel and the bigger the development is, the val�!a.tion is higher; a small parcel with a small valuation will pay more or less. It all depends on how it is structured; don't have all the details on how it is structured; but is an issue to look at. There are some areas in the city that are recommended to stay rentals because the city might want to maintain those sites as they are key economic opportunities that they want to turn over in the future. If they are condos the ability to make changes as they get older don't exist, so in some key areas the city may have some concerns. Sometimes the school district puts the parcel tax on the ballot; sometimes they structure it and the city doesn't. Chair Brophy: • Said since being on the Planning Commission, they have approved two fairly large apartment Cupertino Planning Commission 16 February 19, 2014 complexes, the Biltmore extension and the apartment at Main Street, and they were to have a bedroom mix much more heavily focused on one bedroom apartments. In that way it doesn't completely eliminate the impact on schools but smaller apartments might have fewer students. Said he assumed that was acceptable as long as they meet the density requirements. Vice Chair Lee: • Are school impacts supposed to be on there? Aarti Shrivastava: • School impact fees are not a specific project benefit; they are paid by everybody; that is why they weren't listed. They are over and above your typical impact fees. They were put on because it was input from the community. Chair Brophy: • If we are talking about community benefits I am not sure it is such a great idea; it sounds like it is being presented as if it is free money but this has become an issue in a number of communities, notably Palo Alto where the citizens found it a way for the Council to approve far higher densities than what the zoning ordinance and the General Plan otherwise allowed. Said he was reluctant to go down the community benefit path as a way of circumventing whatever density limits are set. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said the idea was to link whatever higher heights are already set in the General Plan to community benefits; anything over and above the current General Plan if it is set in the General Plan would come with some community benefits. The General Plan itself would bookend the maximum height; you could not go above the General Plan no matter what the community benefit was. We are no recommending going over and above the General Plan. The idea was any increased density that is given should come with a community benefit; we were looking at it in a different way. Chair Brophy: • Said he was questioning whether it is a back door way to approve projects that would otherwise not be approved. It may sound good, but it is a way that gets citizens' interest; it is one thing if you say we will give you an extra floor if the ground floor is retail; that's not so much a discretionary thing you are saying; it's just part of the deal and if that is going to be in the General Plan or Heart of the City Plan, lets present it to the city and argue it out and if people support it, it is fine. Where you get into trouble is when you start getting into Lets Make a Deal School of City Planning . Aarti Shrivastava: • Said she was not certain that was the idea; it could be that you get an extra floor if you provide a community benefit; the height would be predefined; you could not go above that height. Chair Brophy; • It is clear that what you contribute and what the specific benefit is; it is not a negotiating process. Aarti Shrivastava: • That could be clearly written out. We are looking for ideas and the decisions don't have to be made until the Fall,but the more ideas we get,the better. Vice Chair Lee: • Requested more discussion on alternatives A, B and C and how BART gets linked to B and C but not A and how that came about. r � Cupertino Planning Commission 17 February 19, 2014 Dan Amsden: • Said that relative to Alt. A, they are not looking at changing existing land use densities, heights, standards out of the current General Plan. For Alt A it is generally the same 2005 General Plan with some adjustment. This is the increase of 1/z milli.on sq. ft. of office in 261 rooms of hotel. Alt. A, the 2005 General Plan remains the same but there is some addition for economic capture. As part of the EIR process there is still the "no project" alternative which is to make no changes for the plan. The Housing Element has new requirements for certain changes but the rest of the General Plan doesn't necessarily have to change, so Alt, A is looking at very minor, in the greater scale of B and C, changes to address the economic issues without changing the, structure or regulatory Framework of the current plan. Alt. B under the same structure of dividing allocations by the corridors and changing standards and heights within some of the key nodes, Alt. B looks as increasing the office/hotel/residential development allocation so more than just office and hotel is under Alt. A; it gets residential increases to move beyond the current housing element cycle to address some of the Plan Bay Area requirements that we know will come up under the next Housing Element cycle. Another key factor of Alt. B is looking at redevelopment of the Vallco shopping mall district. • The market study is regional strategy of what it would take to help redevelop the Vallco shopping mall site, meaning certain development allocation increases to encourage or cover the cost of making the capital investment of dramatically changing buildings or layout or structures within Vallco. The difference here for Alt. B is looking at increases in development allocation. The top series of rows is the major corridors; those are the five discussed earlier; there are some other special areas within the city and these are developed in the current General Plan; these aren't new things being proposed; including Bubb Road, Fairgrove„ Monta Vista, Valley Oak and other neighborhoods and centers. There are some commercial areas that are outside the corridors, and they have some development allocation but the focus of Alt. B and C is in the major corridors. Alt. B to get the increased development allocation to try and spark a change in Vallco translates to 2 million sq. ft. of office, 642,000 sq. ft. of commercial; again it is a subtlety in the commercial number because we are assuming that the current Vallco mall gets redeveloped so we take the commercial allocation that is already there and repurpose it back into the site. It does not include additional hotel 500 rooms and residential of 1421; that additional residential under Alt. B gets us to 75% of the one Bay Area 2040 target. It's a little more than nud range. Com. Takahashi: • Relative to the impact of Vallco specifically on these numbers, how much of the residential and hotel are driven by Vallco redevelopment in the total for Alt. B. Dan Amsden: • Said they don't have the exact numbers for that because they are doing the.corridor base so its allocation is for all Heart of the City. Com. Takahashi: • Is the assumption that in order to maximize the redevelopment opportunity of Vallco some level of hotel and residential are going to come along with that to entice developers. Said he wanted to understand how that falls directly into Option B. Dan Amsden: ® Alt. C is looking at the most height, density, most intensity of allocation partly to respond to input or ideas heard from property owners but also to look at the higher end of fully redeveloping the Vallco site, creating more of a city downtown. Similar to Alt. B it is increasing office, hotel and residential development. For the increases in height and density, as we increase the development allocation which is the city's growth management tool, you could have enormous heights but no allocation and nothing gets built. The growth allocation is really the city's tool to manage growth but if we have a Cupertino Planning Commission 18 February 19, 2014 large amount of development allocation, we also want to make sure the alternatives reflect height and residential densities that would accommodate that increased development allocation. For Alt. C this translates into 3.5 million sq. ft. of office, a similar scenario for commercial; it is a wash because Vallco gets redeveloped and it gets re-used but 1,000 rooms of hotel and 2,526 units of residential; again the focus of most of the allocations within the Heart of the City corridor which we translate to Vallco as well and can get some more refined numbers for Vallco. Com Takahashi: • The difference between Alt. B and C, there is a different assumption with regard to Vallco allocations. Dan Amsden: • Under Alt. C it would be generally a complete redesign of Vallco; there would probably be midrise office buildings closer to the freeway, some re-creation of the larger shopping district, not just the mall. Aarti Shrivastava: • Page 339 of the packet contains a general summary; we don't have the specifics but have made some assumptions which gives a summary of the 7 study areas and what the alternatives could mean. Dan Iocofan: • Said it was a big part of the city strategy to look at all of the sites in an integrated fashion rather than piecemeal so you don't proceed without knowledge of how the other sites interact and affect all the others. In this way it is a more fully open transparent process with the community so you can see all the interactions. There is definitely a mix and match; the questions point to a good additional set of information they can bring to the City Council meeting. He said they want to be clear on the assumptions going in because those assumptions could be modified based on Commission, Council and community input. Chair Brophy: • Said they have heard comments tonight on the alternatives; and asked why they would even consider Alt. C; it is not just a personal preference but there is an overwhelming resistance within the community to the kind of densities that are anywhere near Alt. C. Said he felt Alt. B was pushing the limits, especially on office building; there is already a surplus of jobs over workers in Cupertino. He said in a couple of years there will be 13,000 people working at the Apple I1 campus and for them to be considering office space beyond a reasonable amount to small amounts such as is envisioned in Alt. A, was beyond his comprehension. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said the reason they would study theirs is because the proposals are by developers and staff prefers to study them in conjunction with each other rather than as separate projects. It gives the ability to have more of a conversation than they would have had if they came in with a project; it gave them the opportunity to go to the community and hear their input which helped create Alt. A and Alt. B. The information that the EIR provides and other information will make it a richer experience for the community as well as the decision makers. Chair Brophy: • Said he was not sure it could be called a richer experience; there is a fair amount of hostility to anything resembling Alt. C and maybe even B. Cupertino Planning Commission 19 February 19, 2014 Aarti Shrivastava: • Said the decisions can be made accordingly and then there will be all the information needed to make a decision. Chair Brophy: • Said he agreed with those who spoke against BR F; some are very effective but were in places like Mexico City and Shanghai and it would be a bad idea to take away two of the six lanes from Stevens Creek Blvd. to run buses in an area where hardly anybody rides a bus other than the students to DeAnza College. It is a bad idea and should not b(-,put in an EIR. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said that BRT does not need dedicated lanes; it is just a bus with a few stops made throughout the city. It could be mixed flow using regular lanes. It is being studied to provide the Council with information in the event it is presented to th-- Council as a potential project; they will have information to respond. It does not require the city to make a decision either way. Chair Brophy: • If Council and Planning Commission feel the idea is sufficiently bad that they don't need to spend money studying it, why not resolve it at this stage rather than have it hanging over them? Aarti Shrivastava: • Asked if there were any more comment on what staff needed to study or sites to look at. Chair Brophy: • If there is some way to look at some mix and match, it was previously indicated that it is important to go to the Housing Element to insure that there is more than the minimum number of units on the plan because part of the process is that Housing and Community Development will look at the sites and if they show a site that's not a real site, they won't want to be in a situation where they are short units; they need to build a margin of safety. Said it was the first he heard of higher density for the Hamptons, which is not in the document. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said it came in as part of the Housing Element; it. wasn't in the General Plan alternatives but was a recent request. They are trying to figure out how to study the Housing Element sites in the various alternatives since it is a combined EIR. Piu Ghosh• • It is also being studied in Alt. B just on the lower range of their density that they have asked for. Chair Brophy: ® Said what makes it interesting is that it provides an unusually large number of units in a city where it is difficult to assemble a number that will meet state's requirements but not unduly penalize the residential neighborhoods; which is why he is`interested in looking at that particular item at the higher density as unique and its proximity to the new Apple campus. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said if the Planning Conunission is ready to move into the Housing Element sites discussion, the Housing Commission was asked if they had any preferences for sites. Staff will study all the sites but if there is a priority listing that the Con-mission would like to suggest or certain sites are better than others or preferred at this point, it will help with the decision making later on in the process. • The sites include those left over from the last Housing Element that were not used, some sites that Cupertino Planning Commission 20 February 19, 2014 offered opportunities to consolidate with the Housing Element sites; those that were proposed by property owners and those that were proposed by the community which are color coded according to how they are shown on the map. They are recommending not considering some sites that were mid- block, primarily because it is difficult to plan housing development that spans two commercial areas. Last time around there was not many choices, now there are more sites being looked at. Those sites lost were the Saich Way Station site which was developed as commercial, the Biltmore which was recently developed as residential and the Morley site that was incorporated into the Apple II campus. Chair Brophy: • Said it was something between the two. On the General Plan alternatives along DeAnza Blvd. there is a maximum residential density of 25 units per acre; on Homestead and on Wolfe there are 35 units per acre; is there a rationale for having different numbers? Aarti Shrivastava: • Said those were developed as part of the 2005 General Plan; Homestead already had some existing apartments that were built at those densities and that may have been why they preserved those densities. The Stevens Creek densities were reduced from 35 to 25 and likely DeAnza was updated to match that in the last Housing Element. Chair Brophy: • Said it was not obvious to him that there should be different numbers. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said there are some more corridors but there might have been greater preference to have higher densities at the edge. Com. Gong: • Requested that as part of the lookover could they see if those numbers are still valid or if they can be amended. Com. Takahashi: • Asked what the thinking was of putting housing in that office,redeveloping it from office to housing. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said one option is to build something similar to Peets along the frontage and then put a housing development behind it; the other option is to put office at higher density. Com. Takahashi: • Said it would make sense for the front on Stevens Creek to be retail, thus connecting the Peets/Panera to Whole Foods better. Com. Gong: • Said the snap doesn't reflect the proposal from Hamptons. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said it would be a demolition and rebuilding of the existing complex which is why they are asking for such high densities because it doesn't make sense to demolish the existing project and rebuild at similar densities. Com.Brophy: • Is this Cupertino village where they are showing 320 to 413 units? Cupertino Planning Commission 21 February 19, 2014 Aarti Shrivastava: • Yes, that is a proposal as well. The density that is allowed there are 25 du/acre. It would be a complete demolition. They are getting ready to build an expansion; they have proposed the site as a mixed use development that includes retail and housing and hotel. Corn. Gong: • Said that going back to the study areas proposed by the developers, when looking at the list some snake sense as yes and some have questions; are they able to pick and choose which ones they would want to develop or look at further ones and say no. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said the Council authorized them to look at the study areas, which is why the alternatives are fashioned to reflect the developer's proposal but also the community's input. The decisions can come after the EIR so you have a chance to look at everything and then that gives the ability to mix and match, pick certain things out of one alternative as opposed to precluding the analysis now. Page 499 has the list of the Housing Element sites that was forwarded by the Housing Commission and the ones circled are the ones that are shown as a preference. The red lined ones are the ones that will probably will no longer meet criteria. Piu Ghosh: • Reviewed the list of further sites and recommended.action. Aarti Shrivastava: o Following the review said that other sites not circled, can be forwarded to City Council. Staff wants recommendations from Planning Commission on whether to forward the sites with preferences, or if the Commission wants to reorder the preference for the sites or add any. Chair Brophy: • Said he expressed his opinion on the desire for rruxed use; and doesn't know of any planning theory that requires every individual project be a mixed use. To the extent there are sites that will work as a small or medium size project just as purely residential, he said he hoped that the Council would reconsider. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said it was a thought, but there is strong language in the Heart of the City that says that residential will be combined with commercial. Chair Brophy: • Said to the extent that they can put in smaller proj ects like this, not only will they work better,but that they put less burden on the immediate area and some of the unhappiness of the inunediate closest neighbors would be less difficult there. Coin. Gong: • Asked how difficult it is to build a full residential development on a zoned mixed use parcel. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said applicants would prefer to build all housing; for a long time the Council has said they don't want to lose retail because they typically take out some retail to build it; staff has tried to look at different ways to incorporate retail into the developments. Said other reasons they look at what goes in on the ground floor is that most people don't want to live there; they have tried to put other uses that would Cupertino Planning Commission 22 February 19, 2014 work there, such as retail, gym lobby or other activity areas. Some of those haven't worked as well when right under housing so they are looking at the Biltmore which is different as it does horizontal mixed use; retail in the front,parking in back and housing behind that. • An example is the Bateh Brothers, which is identified as a mixed use but doesn't lend itself to a mixed use location. It's a small site; the goal is not to completely lose the ability of that neighborhood to go to a small store or drive all the way out of town. They are trying to see how to preserve that ability and yet have a housing project. • She recommended that they not include sites that are owned by the US Postal Service or PG&E that specifically said that they have interest. It is better to present more realistic sites to the State so that they don't nit pick; if they feel the sites are not probable, they end up dissecting all the sites inventory and nit picking everything. The goal is to present a realistic story rather than try to throw things in just to have the numbers. • Said that the request listed from PG&E for development was not from PG&E, but something that has been on the books for about 3 or 4 years initiated by the Economic Development staff at that time because people were looking for a large site for commercial and that came up for discussion. Staff talked to PG&E and they said they didn't have plans at this time, but were ambivalent to being included in the study. They were not opposed to it but didn't have plans to make any changes so the Council decided to include it in the analysis. Com. Gong: • Recommended it since they chose to include it in the study; circled it as being included, both PG&E corporate yard and the lower substation areas. Chair Brophy: • Said they made more sense than a fair number of the ones on the last page. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said they could run some of these criteria; typically HCD if things are owned by institutions like the U.S. Federal Government or utility. They tend not to accept them as housing sites. Said they mentioned that to the community as well,because the odds of that getting redeveloped within the next 8 years are very low. Piu Ghosh: • Said that the Council did identify it as a site for the study area for the General Plan, more to add a commercial overlay on it than to identify it as a housing site. Com. Gong: • Many properties have been identified by workshop participants, not by the property owners. At what point are they considered qualified for the Housing Element. Aarti Shrivastava: • At this point all the property owners whose property has been identified have received letters. Some of them might fall off primarily because they are owned by institutions and we wanted to check with HCD because if HCD is not going to, accept them, it doesn't make sense to include them. For example, on a site like Apple 11 campus; somebody had picked that and would probably not have included it because the odds of that ever being accepted. Some of these might fall off but we are going to.study them. The decision won't be made till Fall; that's when the sites list gets prepared. Com. Gong: • �If it is a private owner and the private owner says he wouldn't consider converting to residential, even though the potential for conversion might happen over a 10 year span, it is still taken off. Cupertino Planning Commission 23 February 19, 2014 Aarti Shrivastava: • Said staff would bring that information to the Commission and the Council to say they heard from the property owner and staff suggests removing it since they don't want to be included. Com. Gong: • Asked how difficult it was to build a full residential development on a zoned mixed use parcel if a piece of property is zoned as mixed use. Aarti Shrivastava: • Applicants would prefer to build full housing; the preference that we heard from the Council has been that they don't want to lose the retail because they typically end up taking out some retail to build it. We have tried to look at different ways of inco:q)orating retail into these developments. There is another reason why you might want to look at what goes on the ground floor along Stevens Creek because most people don't want to be living there; we try to put uses that would work there and that may be retail, lobby of a gym or other activity areas. In the last few years the Council has consistently expressed an interest in not losing all the retail on a site and we have tried to look at ways of incorporating retail; some of those have not worked as well when it is right under housing and not next to other areas like that. We are looking at the Biltmore which does horizontal mixed use; retail building in the front; parking lot in back and housing behind that. Com. Gong: • As an example the Bateh Brothers, it is identified as a mixed use but doesn't lend itself to a mixed use location. Aarti Shrivastava: • It is a small site; the goal is not to completely lose the ability of that neighborhood to go get a gallon of milk or drive all the way to town, so we are trying to see how we can preserve that ability and yet have a housing project. It is challenging but is still doable; we will have to look for the best way to build those. If.it doesn't make sense we will have to look at it when the project comes along. Vice Chair Lee: • When we send the sites for review to HCD they have to approve it and they have to review all the elements; does it help our cause or the sites analysis if we say the property owner requested it; will it be approved? Aarti Shrivastava: • Said that it does,if it is property owner initiated; they understand that there is interest; that is a criteria they use. Vice Chair Lee: • Said there are a lot of sites that participants listed; have they been reviewed for feasibility of high probability of acceptance? Victoria Tam: • She recommended that they not include sites that are owned by the US Postal Service or PG&E that specifically said that they have no interest. It is better to present more realistic sites to the State so that they don't nit pick; if they feel the sites are not probable, they end up dissecting all the sites inventory and nitpicking everything. The goal is to present a realistic story rather than try to throw things in just to have the numbers. Cupertino Planning Commission 24 February 19, 2014 Vice Chair Lee: • Asked Chair Brophy what he thought of the Marketplace? Chair Brophy: • Said unless there is some indication that the Council had some idea of some massive development that was both retail and density, based on their discussion and during the GPA that will probably be a non-starter. When you have a.successful shopping center as both are, the only way you can possibly think about scrapping them to put in residential is if you really jack up the density and that is not going to be approved here. Piu Ghosh: • Cupertino Village has requested a density of 35 to 45 du/acre and for the Marketplace they have requested a density of 25/35 du/acre. Chair Brophy: • If they are going to keep the commercial and they want to have the same amount of conunercial and the residential,there will be parking issues to deal with and it gets dense quickly. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said she did not know what the ability is of retaining all the commercial on both centers. Chair Brophy: • Said as a practical matter you have to separate the parking of the two uses; people will not accept having a shopper taking their parking when they get home. They could look at it but given where the community stands in terms of limits to density, he said he found it hard to believe it could work. Maybe you could do something over at Vallco given its lack of success as a retail center and given that at least two of the three anchors there are well known for struggling on a national basis. It is easy for me to envision Vallco being totally reinvented but I can't picture how you would do Cupertino Village and Marketplace in a way that made any sense and still fit within what this conununity is looking for as far as bulk and density. Vice Chair Lee: • Said if they put Vallco on there then that is realistic, about 600 or 800. Chair Brophy: • Said he was not certain, but said he could envision the residential component as part of a reconstruction of Vallco but that is because Vallco is a failure as a shopping center whereas the other two are successes. Aarti Shrivastava: Said the ownership of Vallco Mall consisted of 5 owners: Sears, Vallco Mall, Simeon, KCR and JC Penneys. Com. Gong: • Suggested in addition to presenting the list, prioritizing the sites for them to look at as it makes sense because Vallco is prime for redevelopment as a whole, and as a concise development. The smaller ones, the questionable ones, the ones where the owners need some persuasion would be a lower priority. Dan Iacofono: ® Said perhaps they could be grouped into tiers or levels of priority 1, 2, 3. Said to Ms. Tam that there Cupertino Planning Commission 25 February 19, 2014 is a sort of Cupertino reality filter that can be applied which would while they want to have some sites included for now for purposes of study, they might; drop down to one of those lower tiers because of the reason stated they are unlikely to be redeveloped in a timeframe given the success of the existing land use. While it is theoretically possible to cone,-live of some of these, it is unlikely thereby we drop them down and eventually what Ms. Tam said would purify the list so we go to HCD with a very solid list of contender sites that raises our credibility. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said they would likely propose dropping those sites owned by institutions and by the federal governinent because they would not pass muster; it would be pointless to study them as Housing Element sites. In an effort to balance development in other areas of the city they can continue to look at the smaller sites along Foothill but the Post Office would probably not be included. Chair Brophy: • Said in terms of getting units that make more sense and could be justified, he would consider looking at the question of why they have a 25 and 35 dwellings per acre on Homestead vs. Stevens Creek. Said he was not a fan of high density residential but going to 35 there would give a fair number of potential additional units at some of the existing projects. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said it is a worthy thought and it is encapsulated in a part of Alternative B and can be brought up; not all of Stevens Creek Blvd. but a certain portion that includes Stevens Creek Office and Marina because it is adjacent to office, and higher density residential is proposed at that 35. • Said they did not want to rezone the entire corridor, but focus on the Housing Element sites because they know the community is concerned about densities. If the Commission is suggesting to look at the entire corridor, staff can forward that to the Council. Chair Brophy: • Said it was not obvious to him why there would be a difference between Homestead and elsewhere in the city. Corn. Gong: • Once the sites are approved and set in stone in the GPA, if a non-identified site is developed for residential, are those numbers counted into the allocation and the identified site could be preserved for later for future GPAs? Aarti Shrivastava: • Said another city identified sites but did not rezoned them and they ended up rezoning other sites and HCD had a problem with that because it wasn't consistent with the whole study, the General Plan and the next time around they told us they didn't want to see this inconsistency. If a site comes up it really needs to be looked at; it should have been considered in that context so we have to be careful. That is just an aside; because of the community concerns over housing, we have told people who have come to the city to build housing that we are goijag to focus only on those Housing Element sites to the extent possible there might be one or two little ones with some minor changes but one of the assurances we gave to the community last time around is if you become part of this process, we will make sure there are no surprises later on with houses popping up. We wanted to keep the faith and so we would rather not entertain proposals all over time once the community has been part of the process. Said she would forward it on and run so ne of these by HCD through the process so when we come back to you we can give you a better sense of how the tiers fall. Cupertino Planning Commission 26 February 19, 2014 Vice Chair Lee: • Said she wanted to go back and work on more of the sites they wanted such as Vallco, Barry Swenson site, put the Loree Center back on the list. Said they only need to get to 1,000 or 1,100 and if you put Vallco on there, it is like 800 units. Takahashi: Chair Brophy: • Said he was going to do the Hamptons because that did it single-handedly; Chair Brophy: • Said he felt Vallco was a controversial site, when he said he could envision doing housing at Vallco, he didn't mean that it would be easy whereas the other ones he just couldn't envision. Vice Chair Lee: • Include Hamptons and Vallco. Chair Brophy: • Said he did not know how to frame it in the case of Vallco. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said at this point they don't have to make any decisions; there are some assumptions and Alternatives A, B and C for all of them. Alternative A, there is no housing in Vallco because there-is no change to the General Plan; B and C have a range but that doesn't preclude the Planning Commission from picking a lower number of units later when it comes time to pick units. They are studying it at this point and can leave it at that. Com. Takahashi: • Provided his feedback with regard to A,B and C. It was very good organization in terms of looking at the three alternatives but there is a high sensitivity to housing, and housing growth and everything that comes with that with regard to impact to the schools and traffic. The conflicting need is the retail element and again there is a deficiency with regard to retail so that is why Vallco sticks out. There is a great opportunity, it is a mix of the options with the fact that A meets the RHNA requirements as it stands right now with some margin 1800 vs. 1000. It is healthy margin and there is a strong desire for a major Vallco renovation and potentially elements that come with that with regard to office and residential just to make it economically viable as a large scale redevelopment. He said from his perspective it would be a good balance from the standpoint of trying to mitigate over-growth but stimulate retail in general in the Vallco area. There is already developments going on that also try to help the retail element. Over the course of the last two/three years there has been many approved projects but haven't been built yet and so their impact has not been felt with regard to traffic and parking, and the Apple campus at the Vallco/280/Wolfe interchange is going to be interesting. Said from his perspective it is a balance that is sought after with regard to how the General Plan is amended. Vice Chair Lee: • Said she did not have many comments on Alternatives A, B and C but knew the community wanted to see Vallco improved and redeveloped. Said it was the second time she has been a part of the Housing Element while on the Planning Commission. Said she felt the discussion is worthwhile if they can discuss what sites should be put on the list. As soon as whatever housing elements are on the list developers will combine their parcels and come forward with an application; it is fast, so the workshop participants expressed the desire not to have a lot of building or a lot of housing concentrate all on the east side of Cupertino; Stevens Creek and Miller are impacted; the Rancho area, and Loree. It is interesting that the Bateh Brothers came forward because not much has been heard Cupertino Planning Commission 27 February 19, 2014 from them; they came forward when they wanted a sign change a couple of years back; now it is interesting now they want to put their site on the housing Element site and also the P3 on Foothill. If the Planning Commission wants to discuss putting those two sites as priority, there could be some discussion and decide whether we should recommend it or not because nobody has talked about the sites. He said she still felt United Furniture should remain, Barry Swenson site is small and constricted but maybe should remain there; would like more feedback on Loree Center, Jack In the Box, Summerwinds and Granite Rock. Com. Gong: • Said she agreed they should prioritize the sites, and felt that 50 properties was not a realistic list; it should be scrubbed. If they could look at the list of reality sites it would be a better use of our vision. Said she respected Com. Lee's position and felt it was important that they get it in front. Aarti Shrivastava: • Said staff planned on taking the sites to the City Council on March 4 when they start the EIR, and come back with the General Plan policies on April 1. Staff will recommend removal of some of the sites because they were owned by institutions; but the prioritization can still be done once the sites are forwarded to HCD; and they can return during the EIR to present what they have -as additional feedback or bring it back after the EIR. Com. Takahashi: • Said there is the element relating to the total number of sites and what that adds up to as a grand total but there is also the element of how much growth do they want to allow or plan for. If they go through the potential sites and the total is 1,800 which adds up to Alternative C, is it effectively saying they are going with Alterative C? Aarti Shrivastava: • The idea was to list all the sites that have been brought up; some will go to the Planning Commission and City Council noting that they won't meet criteria; and some asking for prioritization. The ones low on,the priority list likely will not make it. In any case they don't need to go over the 1,064 unless the Council and Commission feel like they want to achieve some other goals with housing. It is preliminary and the decisions can happen later. Staff was looking for a general preference on the types of sites to give priority to. • There is some interest in redeveloping Vallco because that is an opportunity. It is important to spread sites around the city so there is some on the west side, some on the south and keep some of the existing Housing Element sites such as Barry Swenson that appear to continue to meet the criteria. If there are additions, the sites can be circled and. moved up to Council where they can be given a priority listing once it is known what criteria they,meet. There is no choice over HCD criteria; but for the ones they do have a choice, they are trying to locate them closer to amenities, to major transportation corridors and trying to balance there around the city to meet the 20 units per acre, that is net. When last looking at the projects it was determined that projects typically approved at 85% of the actual density, so if a site is 25 units per acre, it meets that net density of 20 units. Com. Sun: • Said that relative to the Housing Element, he felt there were too many sites to choose from for him to make a recommendation; if they could shorten the last they would have better choices. Chair Brophy: • Said they were all good .comments, and agreed that needed to scrub the list as there were some marginal sites on the list. In terms of balancing it between west and east, one way to do that is to look at allowing some of the existing complexes that are at low densities to possibly consider going up to Cupertino Planning Commission 28 February 19, 2014 35 or 30 units per acre. It is one way to get units on the west side in a way similar to the Markham project where units were added without an adverse effect. Said they have to be cautious about Vallco. There is an interest in the community seeing it redevelop but if that is being used as a stalking horse for high density office and residential, it is going to come to a screeching halt. He recalled when there were the referendums 5 to 6 years ago, one of the two sites involved was adjoining Vallco, so the number of units you could consider putting in Vallco was pretty limited, on the 100 to 200 at most; nothing resembling the 600 to 800. Aarti Shrivastava: • Another important thing consistently heard in the theme is and might have led to the referendum is the idea to redevelop the entire Vallco area to revitalize it,not just put housing units somewhere in the corner. Those wishes will be expressed in the General Plan and they will have to create a specific plan that looks at development at each site before anything can be built. There will be another chance to look at the process; if Vallco ends up being a housing site, and the community benefits; there are many things that need to be put together for that site. Chair Brophy: • Said it was a good point; but what would not fly is let us build some housing there and we promise to do our best to make retail better at Vallco. Com. Gong: • Said she echoed Chair Brophy's recommendation that they reexamine the density as it stands in the current GPA to see if it still should stand. OLD BUSINESS: None NEW BUSINESS: None REPORT OF THE PLANNING COMMISSION Environmental Review Committee: No meeting. Housin,2 Commission: No report. Mayor's Monthly Meeting With Commissioners: Vice Chair Lee reported: TIC Commission: Held a retreat and are looking at Broadband for the entire city; they are working with Erin Cook. Also looking at a concept called Smart Cities where a lot of things are automated. Public Safety Commission: Two new comniissioners on Public Safety Commission; they are doing do surveys on their event called Voltage where kids walk to school two weeks, wear RFID tags to school and also do a survey conducted by the teachers, The Sheriff said that the number one crime in the city is car breakins for laptops and cell phones. A new project initiated by an East Bay fire chief, looking at having special cell phone software so that anybody in the vicinity trained in CPR will be notified if there is an incident they can come because it takes paramedics 5 to 10 minutes to arrive. Cupertino Planning Commission 29 February 19, 2014 Parks and Recreation: Dog park opening was postponed because of rain; date TBA Teen Commission: Had a Giving Tree event; mid March planning an event for seniors and teen talk and an art social; Kennedy had a dance, entry fee was to bring a gift for giving tree. Housing Commission: Had a community development block grant presentation last week, $600,000 for 13 potential applicants Library Commission: Cupertino Library received five star rating from Library Journal; one out of five in entire country to get 5 out of 5 stars; poetry contest and in the middle of Silicon Valley reads, looking for submissions; coffee house reading at Peets Coffee April 15t, Stevens Creek:store; working on having a sustainable series, talks by Erin Cook. Economic Development Committee Meeting: No meeting REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF COMMUNTI Y DEVELOPMENT: • Aarti Shrivastava reported that on Febvruary 1'5)t'' Council will be considering the Main Street architectural and site approval as well as tree and the final map and a call for review of Off the Grid Food Truck use permit. ADJOURNMENT: • The meeting was adjourned to the March 11, 2014 Planning Commission meeting at 6:45 p.m. 4, a Respectfully Submitted: . Elizabeth E}�i. , Recording Secretary C Approved as Aniended: April 22, 2014