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PC 02-23-04 CITY OFCUPERTINO 10300 Torre Avenue Cupertino, CA 95014 6:45 P.M. CITY OF CUPERTINO PLANNING COMMISSION AMENDED MINUTES FEBRUARY 23, 2004 CITY HALL COUNCIL CHAMBERS MONDAY The Planning Commission meeting of February 23, 2004, was called to order at 6:45 p.m. in the City Council Chambers, 10300 Torre Avenue, Cupertino, California, by Chairperson Taghi Saadati, and the following proceedings were had to wit: ROLL CALL Commissioners present: Chairperson: Vice Chairperson: Commissioner: Commissioner: Commissioner: Taghi Saadati Gilbert Wong Lisa Giefer Marty Miller Gilbert Wong Staff present: Community Development Director: City Planner: Assistant Planner: Senior Planner: Assistant City Attorney: Steve Piasecki Ciddy Wordell Gary Chao Peter Gilli Eileen Murray APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Minutes of the January 26, 2004 Study Session: Com. Chen suggested the following changes: Page 4: Chair Chen: 4th line of first bulleted item: Change "or they have concerns" to "they also have concerns" Last bullet, second row: Delete "or should we have the senior homes where we call monster homes" and insert: "we have the new homes, which we call monster homes" Chair Saadati suggested the following changes: Page 3: Under Vice Chair Saadati: second bullet: Delete, and change to read: "Standardize some form of questions so everyone can provide input; bring back to the Planning Commission for discussion." Motion: Motion by Com. Chen, second by Vice Chair Wong, to approve the January 26, 2004 Study Session minutes as amended. (Vote: 5-0-0) Planning Commission Minutes 2 Pebrnary 2l200J Minutes of the January 26,2004 regular Planning Commission meeting: Com. Giefer suggested the following changes: Page 16, Com. Giefer: After comment about Seven Springs, add the following: "She asked staff to get information on the FAR between first and second floor at Seven Springs." Page 17: Last paragraph: Change "swim" pool to "swimming pool". Motion: Motion by Vice Chair Wong, second by Chair Saadati, to approve the January 26, 2004 Planning Commission minutes as amended. (Vote: 5-0-0) Minutes of the February 9, 2004 regular Planning Commission meeting: Vice Chair Wong suggested the following: Page 4, second last line from the bottom of the page: After "45%." Add "total FAR." Chair Saadati suggested the following change: Page 7, 4th bullet: change "ITom I to 10" to read: "on a scale of I to 10". Motion: Motion by Vice Chair Wong, second by Com. Miller, to approve the February 9, 2004 Planning Commission minutes as amended. (Vote: 5-0-0) WRITTEN COMMUNICATIONS: None POSTPONEMENTSIREMOV AL FROM CALENDAR: 1. MCA-2001-03, EA-2003-20 City of Cupertino Amendments to Chapter 19.100 of the Cupertino Municipal Code related to parking regulations. Location: Citywide Tentative City Council date: March 15, 2004 Reqeust removal from calendar 2. M-2003-08 Todd LeelMarketplace Use permit modification (l6-U-76) to permit new food services and restaurants adjacent to the gated Portion of the rear corridor through a use permit Process. Located at 19770 Stevens Creek Boulevard. Planning Commission decision final unless appealed. Request postponement to Planning Commission meeting of March 22, 2004. Motion: Motion by Com. Chen, second by Vice Chair Wong, to remove Applications MCA-2001-03, EA-2003-20 from the calendar. (Vote: 5-0-0) Motion: Motion by Vice Chair Wong, second by Com. Chen, to postpone Application M-2003-08 to the March 22, 2004 Planning Commission meeting. (Vote: 5-0-0) Planning Commission Minutes 3 February 23,2004 ORAL COMMUNICATIONS: None CONSENT CALENDAR: None The agenda was moved to Item 4. NEW BUSINESS 4. Planning Commission work program for 2004, including discussion of proposed amendments to parking ordinance. Ms. Ciddy Wordell, City Planner, presented the staff report as follows: Explained that the annual work plan was suspended for the last two years due to the workload of the General Plan. . Main basis for determining projects is to consider Council goals. . City Council goals, planning projects, private projects listed in the staff report. . Basic concepts of parking ordinance will be discussed. Said that more time could be allowed to make comments. Vice Chair Wong: Said the draft was appropriate. Questioned if it was possible for some residents in rural areas to not have to go through the process and keep the integrity of no sidewalks and no light poles. Said he would recommend it to the City Council with his colleagues concurrence. Ms. Wordell: . Said it was up to Public Works, and if the Planning Commission gave direction, she was not certain. Mr. Piasecki: . Said it is not a work program item for the Planning Commission, the Public Works Department prepared it, they took it through the PedestrianlBicycle Committee and prepared the idea; asked for by City Council; Planning Commission can look at that and forward comments to City Council. . Said he recalled that when the policy was written it required polling or coming together on what their desire is for sidewalks or no sidewalks, and there would be an analysis ofthe Public Works Department to determine whether there are safety issues to dictate whether or not they do need sidewalks. If there was an overwhelming opinion of the neighborhood that they didn't want them and if they weren't required, it would be honored. Said there was a process set up, and they could review it. Com. Miller: Asked to review how they would be prioritized. Ms. Wordell: If it appears they cannot be done this year, and as it stands now, they probably can, because we have put dates on them. In the past, the list has grown and choices had to be made. At this point, it may not be necessary. Planning Commission Minutes 4 February 23, 2004 Com. Miller Ifthe need arises, we deal with it at that time. Com. Giefer: . Asked about the input from the General Plan Task Force, since she anticipated there would be some things that will impact the list, be added or removed from it, what is the process for adding those to the list of projects for the year? Ms. Wordell: . Said she perceived, when the General Plan is adopted, that will reflect a lot of implementation, that will come out of it. Relative to how the task force fits into that, anything that the task force recommended for the General Plan that got carried through to its adoption, would then become an implementation program. Aside from that, it would only be as someone's direction that it be added as part of the work program. Vice Chair Wong: Asked for clarification on the nexus study and fee study. Ms. Wordell: . It is through the housing efforts, and the Housing Commission is also overseeing that; a consultant has been hired to reevaluate the nexus or the connection between new development and housing mitigation; done 10 years ago, and a number of cities are hiring consultants to determine what level of mitigation could be legally required. . It has to be established in order to mitigate through a fee or through units; there has to be some reason for the ratio chosen; the money per square foot or per housing unit; once they establish the ratio that is legally sound, it is up to the decision makers to determine where below that to actually establish the mitigation. Mr. Piasecki: . Said the purpose of the fee study is the fees were behind the times in terms of covering costs; principally in the planning area, building and also the public works fees for encroachment permits. . Money was budgeted in last year's budget for a consultant to conduct a fee analysis, and they will be presenting a recommendation to the City Council, and will likely be folded into next year's budget, and most likely be increasing some of the fees and modifying some of the fees where appropriate, to get closer to 100% cost recovery. It would not go through the Planning Commission, but a budgeting item that the City Council would decide on when they adopt their fee schedule. He said that survey forms are available at the customer service counter for applicants to complete and monitor customer service. Vice Chair Wong: . Referred to development, and questioned amending the use permit for valet parking. Ms. Wordell: The valet parking would allow them to have valet parking because it was not anticipated in their conditions of approval that they would have that so they would need to come back and amend their use permit to do that. . The valet parking was instituted as part of a stop gap because of the overflow into the neighbors' lot, originally for a few weeks to a few months. They now have to come through Planning Commission Minutes 5 February 23, 2004 and legitimize it, provide the necessary backup or do away with it or have some sort of hybrid where only a portion would be valet parking. The Barry Swenson project is a narrow lot with an abandoned house on it, and had an approved project for residential and the use permit expired. The applicant returned with a two story project for office, and the Planning Commission said they did not want only office, either residential or mixed use. They have a developer who would buy the property from Swenson and is talking about mixed use. She said that the house on the property is not on any list of historic significance, there is no protection ordinance. The Historical Commission would be informed that the house would be demolished and give them the opportunity to photograph it. Com. Chen: . Reiterated that the list of planning projects is not necessarily projects that will come forward to the Planning Commission, but is for the prioritization of the resources. Regarding customer surveys, to get a more objective survey, there is usually a pre-established performance measure; what is the goal they are trying to achieve based on their resources; when we do the survey if we don't have the appropriate level of resources it is expected that the performance will drop; is there a pre-established performance for terms of the turnaround time? Want to make sure that they have some kind of pre-established goal to measure the customer service, not just an open book for people to put in their comments. Ms. Wordell: There are for building permits and planning permits; visits to the counter would be another matter; not sure how to measure that. Mr. Piasecki: Relative to turnaround times and response times, and as Ms. Wordell indicated, they have specific times, when reviews of the individuals in the department are done, they look at whether they are meeting those standards; and close the loop that way and people are aware of them; 90% of the time they are being met. Motion: Motion by Com. Chen, second by Vice Chair Wong, to approve the 2004 Planniug Commission Work Program as proposed by staff (Vote 5-0-0) Mr. Gary Chao, Assistant Planner, reviewed staffs proposals regarding the proposed parking ordinance amendments: . Recommends unisize stalls in all parking lots instead of a compact/standard combination. . Recommends reducing the bicycle-parking ratio for apartments and condominiums to 25%. . Proposes to add residential use to the mixed-use parking table. . Proposes that the strategies to enhance the storm water quality of parking lots, such as reducing surface area, increasing landscaping area and incorporating plants and infiltration swales into the parking lot designs, be incorporated into the parking lot ordinance. . Proposes to update the parking ratio table by introducing new land use categories. Proposes to add parking lot lighting standards to the parking ordinance. Proposes to clarify and clean up various sections of the parking ordinance. Vice Chair Wong: Clarify definition of cleaning up various sections. . Questioned if parking for multi family units would be addressed. Planning Commission Minutes 6 February 21,2004 Mr. Chao: Mostly minor changes; they do not change the content of the ordinance; clarify the language and clean up redundant sections. . A multi family parking ratio will be introduced as part of the land use category. Vice Chair Wong: . Recommended three units per stall and work ITom there. Said he was pleased with the proposal. Com. Giefer: Said she understood the objective to clean up the definitions and add more clarity to them; felt they were slicing things too thin with martial arts, day care, as opposed to including them in other sections; martial arts seems to go with the gym. Questioned why the specific ones were called out. Mr. Chao: . Said they were called out because previously the categories were general in nature; there is a gym category in the parking land use category, but it could be applicable to the school gym vs. where there are inquiries where there are people wanting to do private recreational facilities. . With one ratio it is hard to apply them to all these specific uses that are in the same category, the proposal is to add some more specific land uses to clarify that and they surface usually when business licenses are applied for or developers are asking for possible sites. Vice Chair Wong: Regarding mixed use development, there is office, retail, hotel restaurant, does that take into account mixed use regarding housing? . How would mixed use regarding housing fit with the hotel, retail? Mr. Chao: . Said they were attempting to introduce a residential component into the scheme of the mixed use table since usually there would be a mixed use project with some residential component to it. . There is going to be an additional line on the table that is residential; it is a formula where developers can find out what are some of the offsets in parking, where the overlaps of parking are, and will result in a required number of parking stalls. . In this case they will look into adding a residential component to the land use category, and they have some preliminary figures in talking with parking consultants, and will introduce them into the table so they can apply when they have a similar applicable project. One of the reasons we are trying to add additional subgroups to the parking ordinance is for ease of use to our clients--to make it easier for developers to determine the parking requirements without having to go to staff. Ms. Wordell: . Said it would be for minor projects; a small project would not have to incur a hurtful expense, but a larger project, they would want that to be specified to that project and not just a formula. Com. Chen: When we do the land use on regulations, are we going to go under the different categories, are we going to go by the business permit we have or do actual research of what type of business Planning Commission Minutes 7 February 23, 2004 that utilizes the particular land use category in Cupertino and make it relevant to Cupertino businesses as much as possible, instead of using the general table. Mr. Chao: . Said it is apparent which uses frequently come up that don't have a parking ratio to apply and usually it comes up with bu~iness license applications; it can be used as reference to some of the uses that need to be addressed, but most ofthe uses are apparent. . A list has been compiled and they will be introduced. Mr. Piasecki: Said some of the sources used for the standards come ITom the ITE standards and they are more generalized. Need to review those to see if they are California specific, Northern California; are they communities like ours where there is an auto dependence that may be similar to ours, as opposed to an east coast city with a lot of mass transit. . It is a suitable question, and something that can be scrutinized as the ordinance comes forward to determine ifthere is enough information. Com. Chen: Said her point was to make it as community specific as possible; the use permit might be the way to go. Chair Saadati: If unisize parking stalls are required, would anybody have the option to go back and use the compact and regular size. . Asked if on lighting standards, were they looking at the light intensity or the light pole design. Mr. Chao: Said there would likely be a built in process, the Planning Commission could have the authority to grant permission for parking exception to use compact/standard size if warranted. Said they would have lighting intensity; there is a section of parking lot light standards in the commercial ordinance that deals with lighting intensity glare and it is going to be transferred into the new section in the parking ordinance. It has not been clearly defined what will go into that, but they will look at the light pole designs, height, etc. There are brief lighting standards in the commercial ordinance that is applicable to commercial parking lots and the police department also has a set of standards that deals with lighting in the parking lots. Said they were attempting to merge the two standards and introduce some new items. Mr. Piasecki: Said the unisize stalls would be required just for new applications. Chair Saadati moved the agenda back to Item 3. 3. MCA-2003-02, EA-2003-19 City of Cupertino Amendments to Chapter 19.28 ofthe Cupertino Municipal Code (RI Ordinance). Continuedfrom Planning Commission meeting of February 9, 2004. Tentative City Council date: not scheduled Planning Commission Minutes g Pebruary 23, 2004 Location: Citywide Mr. Peter Gilli, Senior Planner presented the staff report as follows: . Distributed updated copy of the proposed survey. . Main issues discussed at the previous Planning Commission meeting were second story area setbacks, heights, privacy, the design review process, story poles, and noticing. These are addressed in the survey. Coms. Miller and Giefer prepared a sample survey, and staff merged both surveys. Reviewed the sample survey illustrated. Reviewed the survey questions, and Commissioners submitted input on changes in wording. Vice Chair Wong: Thanked Coms. Giefer and Miller for forming the subcommittee and working on the survey. Mr. Gilli: . Said that if it needs to be in the April Scene, the deadline to get it to the Public Information Officer is March 3, mailed to everyone March 25, and a month to respond. Vice Chair Wong: . Expressed concern about the time and cost; people are asking if there is going to be a change in the RI process; applicants holding off plans. Com. Miller: . Expressed concern also that they state they will be looking at it in 3 or 4 months. Mr.Gilli: . Said that the recommendation was to approve the survey with minor changes, or conceptually approve it and direct the two survey commissioners to work out the final draft. Can mail survey to whatever target group is desired; it was mailed out to everyone who had pulled a building permit. Chair Saadati: . Suggested putting it on the website. Com. Giefer: . Said she was proposing a more aggressive schedule; they know who they are targeting: the demographic groups staff identified at the beginning of the survey, homeowners who have pulled permits, and neighbors. Those people can receive the survey in the mail immediately, post it on the website and allow 30 days for a response. When it is put into the Cupertino Scene, allow two weeks to respond. Chair Saadati opened the public hearing. Natalie Cardenas, 345 So. San Antonio Road, Silicon Valley Assoc. of Realtors: Expressed appreciation for hard work of staff and subcommittee on the survey. Expressed concern about timeline; several citizens are waiting to process their upgrades to their homes, waiting for the ordinance to be revised. Said it was important to remember why the exercise was taking place, which is because of the concern of the Planning Commission that the design review process was not doing what it was Planning Commission Minutes 9 February 23, 2004 . initially intended. Community neighbors who were getting notices were not showing up; there would be a design review where no one would show but it would delay a project by two months and cost the applicant significant resources. Said it was clear ITom the 1999 ordinance that the City Council and community tried to minimize the impact of larger scale homes. Rather than create an incentive for developing single story remodels vs. second story remodels, if questions are asked about whether or not certain rules and regulations should be expanded to include single story development, there may be the unintended consequence of amending the ordinance or putting pressure to amend the ordinance to make it even more difficult for folks who want to remodel or expand their existing house that may not meet the needs of today's modern family in Cupertino. It may have the unintended consequence of making it even more difficult for everybody instead of trying to streamline processes and provide incentives for smaller scale development. She asked that the Planning Commission keep that in mind as the process moves forward. The realtor community is excited about the notion that the ordinance can be changed because they hear first hand ITom their clients the challenges that the 1999 ordinance has placed upon homeowners in Cupertino. Certainly it has its benefits, but it has its unintended consequences and that is why this body is discussing the issue tonight. Be aware that many people are waiting for a final decision to be made and if the process can be expedited in any way, it would be most appreciative to tbe homeowners waiting in the wings. . Chair Saadati closed the public hearing. Mr. Piasecki: . Summarized that the Planning Commission was reappointing Coms. Giefer and Miller to work out the two or three questions referred to, finalize it and email it to the commissioners and meet the deadline for the Scene, with a two week turnaround time, as well as get the list for mail outs. . In response to Vice Chair Wong's concern whether or not Coms. Giefer and Miller would come to an agreement, Mr. Piasecki said that there was a backup option with the study session on Monday, as well as add an item to have the full Planning Commission take up the issue after the study session. Com. Giefer: . Said that if the survey was disregarded, she and Com. Miller would not be offended. Com. Miller concurred. Motion: Motion by Vice Chair Wong, second by Com. Miller, to continue the Planning Commission work program until the study session on March 1,2004. (Vote 5-0-0) Assistant City Attorney Eileen Murray, clarified that input on the survey should be sent Mr. GiIli, to avoid a possible Brown Act violation. OLD BUSINESS: None REPORT OF PLANNING COMMISSION: Environmental Review Committee: Com. Chen reported the meeting was cancelled. Planning Commission Minutes 10 February 2J, 2004 Housing Commissiou: Com. Giefer reported that the announcement oftbe nexus study consultant was on the agenda. The Housing Commission recommended Kaiser Marsten Assoc. to prepare the nexus study and update the BMR program, with a completion date of July. The change of membership was also held at the meeting. Mayor's Monthly Meeting With Commissioners: Chair Saadati reported the following items were discussed: Telecommunications Committee discussed more antennas in the city and possibly at the new library. . Pedestrian safety around Monta Vista High was discussed. . Goal setting for 2006 would be discussed next month. Fine Arts Commission stated that public art guidelines should be included in the General Plan. . Measure B was discussed. At the temporary library 35% ofthe books are through self check. Stevens Creek quarterly master plan review is in process and partnership with water district for creek restoration. Teen Commission will be naming the new teen center. A high school dance will be held at Quinlan Center on March 5. Seniors scheduled to have first meeting this month, with the Stelling crosswalk as its first topic. . Mayor James said that the city has reviewed 8 projects in the past three years. REPORT OF THE DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT: . Reported the recession has hit the construction activity, resulting in a slow down of projects coming forward, and the reason the ERC has not been meeting. Reported the Monta Vista annexation was approved by the City Council last Monday. Reminded the commissioners of the Commissioners' Reception Wednesday evening at 7 p.m. in Council chambers. ADJOURNMENT: The meeting was adjourned to March I study session at 5 p.m. in the City Council chambers and then convening March 2, at 3 p.m. SUBMITTED BY: a,~ Approved as amended: March 8, 2004