City Council - Regular Meeting

Thank you. Thank you. Where is he? The talker. Thank you.

Good evening, everyone, and welcome. I'm going to call our meeting for tonight, our regular city council meeting for July 21, 2026, to order. Let's stand and proudly recite our Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Madam Clerk, can you kindly call roll call, please?

Council Member Brando Cruz. Here. Council Member Melissa Lamatina. Here. Council Member David Oro. Here. Vice Mayor Mark Joseph. Here. And Mayor Pierre Washington.

Here. Report on closed session and confirmation of reportable actions. When you're ready, Mr. Summers.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The Mayor and Council met in closed session to consider two items, both of existing litigation, American Kenyan 1, LLC, and Napa Valley Ruins and Gardens LLC versus City of American Canyon and American Canyon One LLC versus City of American Canyon and Napa County and Hess Laird LLCs. There, the council provided direction to staff and council on both cases and took no reportable action. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Summers. Any questions for the attorney? Seeing none, we'll move on to our proclamations and presentation tonight. We have on the agenda one proclamation, however, we have two this evening. I'll be reading both. We have no presentations prior to our agenda so i'll read the first proclamation which is july 2026 as park and recreation month so we have any recipients to take the podium while i read the proclamation after i read the proclamation i'll give you an opportunity to say a few words and then we'll take a photograph with you lovely people reading July 2026 as Parks and Recreation Month, whereas park and recreation programs are integral part of the communities throughout our country. and are vitally important to establishing and maintaining the quality of life for our communities, ensuring the health of all citizens, and contributing to economic and environmental well-being of all communities and regions. And whereas the City of American Canyon's Park and Recreation Department enriches the lives of our community members through active participation and lifelong learning, health and wellness, community involvement, providing essential services, protecting the natural resources and habitats, and recreational activities. And whereas parks and recreation provide essential and lifesaving skills through learn to swim programs, specialized lifesaving certifications, and expert hands-on training for parks and recreation staff, And whereas park and recreation foster social cohesiveness in communities by celebrating diversity, providing space to come together peacefully, modeling compassion, promoting social equity, connecting social networks, and ensuring all people have access to its benefits. And whereas parks and recreation strengthens the community identity, by providing facilities and services that reflect the celebration and the community's character, heritage, culture, history, and landscape. And whereas Parks and Recreation sustains a steward of our natural resources by protecting habitats and open space, protecting people to nature, connecting people to nature, and promoting the ecological functions of parkland. And whereas, in collaboration with the California Parks Recreation Society, a statewide public awareness campaign, and National Recreation and Parks Association, a nationwide public awareness campaign, aim to... inform citizens and recognize the importance of access to local parks, trails, open spaces, facilities, services, and programs for health, wellness, development, inspiration, and safety for all. And now, therefore, I, Pierre Washington, Mayor of the City of American Canyon, on behalf of the City Council, do proclaim July 2026 as Park and Recreation Month, urging all residents to use and enjoy American Canyon's parks, trails, open spaces, facilities, and many recreation opportunities through our programs and services. Data today, July 21, 2026.

Thank you, Mayor and Council. My name is Alana Ben. I am your Recreation Manager. And with me accepting the proclamation is a small portion of our Parks and Rec Department. They are an incredible team, and they make programs fun happen for the community. And we just wouldn't be successful without them.

So I really want to say thank you guys to the department and what you guys do. It matters.

And just continue doing that. Thank you. I do have a short video to play. OK.

Every morning before the parks come alive, our Parks and Recreation team is already at work preparing the places where our community will gather, play, learn, and connect. Behind every beautiful park, every well-maintained trail, and every game-ready field is a team dedicated to making these spaces welcoming for everyone. Our work goes beyond maintaining parks. We create opportunities for children to discover new passions, for families to make lasting memories, for older adults to stay active, for neighbors to connect, and for people of all ages and abilities to find a place where they belong. From community celebrations to camps, sport leagues, special events, and lifelong recreation programming, every experience is designed with one purpose, to enrich lives and strengthen our community. Parks are more than just places. They're where milestones are celebrated. They're where friendships begin, healthy habits grow, and the community comes together to have fun. That's the power of Parks and Recreation. This Parks and Rec Month, we celebrate the dedicated people who make it all possible. Together, we are enhancing the quality of life for our residents by helping make American Canyon the best place to live, work, and play. Happy Parks and Recreation Month.

And before we take our picture up there, I just want to say to the whole team, you guys do an amazing job. I mean, weekends and things of that nature, I mean, everywhere, you guys are everywhere. I've seen you guys at all the locations. Dave, the softball thing, I mean, you got that thing going like crazy, man. I appreciate what you're doing out there. But all of you, you guys make this place an amazing place to live, so thank you. And we're going to take a picture with you guys.

Thank you. Can everyone tell me that Justin's happy? Thank you.

We actually have one more proclamation, and I'm hoping staff will stay.

If the staff could stay for one more, we could have one more presentation. Is that it? We have one more presentation, and it actually is affiliated to what you guys are all about as well. But I'm going to ask Alana to come up to the podium one more time. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, trying to run out of here real quick. This second proclamation, which wasn't on the agenda, but is a special proclamation, it's to honor Alana Benn for her 15 years of dedicated service to the city of American Canyon. And if we need to bring some tissue up there, let me know. Okay, okay, okay. All right, so honoring Alana Bain for her 15 years of dedicated service, whereas the city of American Canyon proudly recognizes Alana for her outstanding service, unwavering dedication, and lasting contribution to our community. And whereas Alana is a lifelong American Canyon resident whose deep roots in our community have inspired a career devoted to enriching the lives of others through public service. Whereas Alana has served on American Canyon in the Parks and Recreation Department, bringing creativity, compassion, excellence to every program and event she has led. And whereas Alana's vision and leadership have helped create cherished community traditions and meaningful experiences. including Magic of the Season, the Fourth of July Celebration, engaging programs at the Adult Activity Center, and most recently helping bring The Wall That Heals to American Canyon, providing our community with an opportunity to honor veterans, reflect on history, and come together in remembrance. And whereas throughout her career, Alana has fostered connections among residents of all ages, creating welcoming spaces where families, seniors, youth, and visitors have built memories, celebrated milestones, and strengthened the sense of community and make American Canyon such a special place. And whereas her passion, kindness, commitment, have left an endearing impact on countless residents, coworkers, volunteers, community partners, making American Canyon a better place to live, work, and play. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that the city of American Canyon extends a heartfelt gratitude and appreciation to Alana Band for her 15 years of dedicated service to the Parks and Rec Department and the entire American Canyon community. The city thanks you, Alana, for the joy, leadership, legacy, and what you have left behind. We see, we hope that you, or wish that you continue to happen to success and fulfillment of years ahead and express our sincere appreciation, differences, THE DIFFERENCES SHE HAS MADE TO THE LIVES OF SO MANY IN AMERICAN CANYON. AND IT SOUNDS LIKE YOU'RE LEAVING WHEN I READ THIS. SO YOU MIGHT HAVE SOMETHING THAT YOU WANT TO TELL EVERYBODY.

YES. SO I GOT AN OPPORTUNITY TO WORK FOR THE CITY OF REDWOOD CITY. SO I WILL BE LEAVING. MY LAST DAY IS NEXT WEEK. SO I AM EXCITED, A LITTLE NERVOUS, BUT REALLY SAD TO LEAVE MY WORK FAMILY AND BEEN HERE FOREVER.

well we know that your parents still live here so we know you're coming home yes so so we we know where to find you we need you we appreciate you for everything that you've done yeah i've been watching you grow in the last 15 years and i've been amazed and and i'm sure that redwood city just don't know what they're about to get so thank you thank you for all your hard work that you've done here in the city thank you i'm gonna take another picture with you yeah come on up

Ready?

One, two, three. Say, Team AC. Team AC.

Thank you once again, Alana. Um, at this time, I would like to open up for the floor for public comment on items that are not listed on tonight's agenda. Each speaker will have up to three minutes to address the council. Uh, you can for, you can start by addressing who you are for the record and madam clerk, do we have any comment cards?

Yes, we do. I'm going to call, uh, where are we right now? Um, Arvin Nigel.

Good evening, Arvind.

Good evening, everybody. It's a pleasure to be here today. And I'm going to announce a couple of things. I'm doing a couple of events in town for a long time. And Elena is helping all the time. From last 15 years, she helped me. In the gym, whenever I did the event, like a multicultural event, or a whole event, or in a, anything happen in the gym, you know, she was always there. Whenever I called her, Elana is there.

Thank you, Elana.

So I did the holy festival in town. I did the multicultural event in town. So everybody enjoyed that one. So I'm starting a new event now in the town. I hope everybody will like it. is for the seniors, not for, and they should enjoy one night with us, and I approached them, they are very excited to see, to come, and to enjoy one night with us. And they say the event is a prom night for seniors. And everybody's happy to see this one. Nobody has done before in our town or in our community or in Napa County. So I decided to see this one, how to make them happy, all the seniors. So... This event will happen in a boys and girls club on 29th of August from 4 to 7, because mostly seniors go to have a late dinner or they go to sleep early. So we want to finish it early. I don't want to make it late at 10 o'clock or 11 o'clock, so they should be gone by 8 o'clock or 7.30, 8 o'clock. So it's free, and it'll be a lot of events in the program, like songs, old songs, not new songs, 50s, 60s, and 70s songs, so they understand what we're talking about. And it's free, and the food is there. There's no charge for that. So it'll be fun, one night with the seniors. So I encourage anybody who wants to come, they are welcome to come over there and enjoy themselves. Enjoy with us and have a good time one night with us. So all seniors are welcome. Thank you very much. And it's in the Boys and Girls Club on 29th of August from 4 to 7. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Arvind. I have the flyers with me. If you want to take a picture, I'll leave it here. And it's on the Facebook. It'll be on the Instagram. Everybody will be there. And we can put it on the CD comments also. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you, Arvind.

Jeanette Goetz.

Good evening, Jeanette.

Good evening. Can you hear me now?

Yes.

I have a problem. Anyway, good evening, Mayor Washington, council members. I was, oh, the planning commission people, right? Yeah. My name is Jeanette Goyetch. I'm just going to respond to something that was, I think it was the last meeting we were at. You, Marquez, had mentioned that we don't really have a town center. And years ago, I think that was one of the things that we were going to do at the... over there at the ruins. Anyway, I just guess we've been waiting, some of us that have been here a long time, and I don't know if it's in the works at all, or have we forgotten about it? It just seems like it would be nice to have a center. I don't know. People drive through American Canyon. They get their food they get their gas and then they move on I think it'd be nice for us people and I guess I'm speaking in planning Commission too since I've been to a few little little towns lately well after you mentioned that it kind of sat with me yeah I forgot about the town center and then you know I've been to some you know Vacaville has a nice little one and you know even Vallejo has a nice one, if, you know, needs work, but you know. But people do meet there. That's what I think we're missing here, is somewhere to congregate. And I was, I met a young woman from, I won't say what country, but foreign country, not, you know, last couple weeks ago. And she asked me, oh, where's your town center? And I have thought for a second, we don't have one. I think it would be nice. I think we could do it. That's, I guess, all I have to say. Oh, one other question I wanted to ask was about, I thought I read in the paper about the Napa Junction area for Railroad Depot. Am I imagining that? No. Okay. So that was in the paper and I read it correctly? I think that would be really cool. Okay.

Thank you, Jeanette.

Orlando Harris.

Good evening, Orlando.

Good evening, Mayor Washington and council members. I was here last month and some of you were here. You remember that I brought forth our disappointment and this year's Juneteenth celebration and thought that we could do a much better job. And I'm just here to say that I'm happy, delighted that, you know, voices were heard and people listened. And so, you know, I'm not one to complain without also giving credit when something is being done. And so I just wanted to come here this evening and acknowledge Mayor Washington, Mark Joseph, Mark Elliott, as well as Karen Burberry. And we had a fantastic meeting. And I thought that we made a lot of progress as to what the plan could be and how we could improve Juneteenth for 2027 and so again I just wanted to congratulate the mayor Mark Mark and Karen for listening for being willing to listen and to hear and not just to run away when something doesn't go right With that being said, I thank you for everything that you've done. I thank you for what is to come. And I'm truly looking forward to it. And I guess I have a couple of minutes. So that being said, there's only one thing I wanted to bring up. I thought about this. And I've reached out before. I've actually gone over to the police station to talk over there. and asking that we really consider, I don't know if it needs to be more in the budget, but we need more presence on 29 and American Canyon Road. It is extremely dangerous. I can't tell you how many times I sat at that light and watched people run through that light at very, very, very high speed. I'm talking extremely high speed. And eventually we're gonna have something there that's gonna be catastrophic. And so I'm hoping that we can consider occasionally putting a motorcycle policeman there just to let people know that they're being watched. It's a danger to the city, it's a danger to our residents, it's a danger to people coming in and out. And so I would just ask for the council to take more consideration to having at least every now and then, maybe once a month, a motorcycle policeman just sitting there just to let people know that we're aware of what's happening. That's it, thank you so much. Thank you, Orlando.

Sahaj Takkar.

Good evening Sahaj.

Good evening Mayor Washington Vice Mayor Joseph and members of the council. My name's Saj DeCarno, 14-year-old living in Fairfields. I'm a member of the Fairfield Youth Commission and the founder of the National Association of Youth Commissions. This nonprofit organization works to establish youth commissions in cities where they're not already present, push for legislation beneficial to youth, and increase youth access to government. I'm speaking to you this evening on a proposal that I've seen work firsthand and it's one of the best things that a city can do for its young people. I'm asking you to create a youth commission in American Canyon. For some context, a youth commission is a group of young people, typically age 14 to 25, who work to advise the city council and mayor on topics relating to the youth. This can range from small youth issues to issues that affect youth across the city. Youth commissions are created with the purpose of bridging the gap between the youth of a city and the city's government. Simply put, the people who know youth issues best are the youth themselves. They're living it. As of right now, American Canyon does allow for youth to have a seat on some existing committees and commissions. But what American Canyon needs is a standalone body that can tackle youth issues independently of other committees. A youth commission would be different from just any other program in that this isn't the city giving to the youth, it's also the youth giving to the city. All the city needs to do is give them a chance. Cities with youth commissions often see real change and new laws. For example, the Fairfield Youth Commission is actively working to implement a tobacco retail license, which ties into the issue of smoking in our schools. And these types of opportunities are what American Canyon's youth need. And this wouldn't even be difficult to implement. All that is needed is a resolution that would establish the commission, and there would be minimal costs to the city. There would be no need to hire any new individuals, since the only adults working with the commission would be an adult advisor. and there would be very little administrative costs since the only real cost would be holding a monthly or bi-monthly meeting. Furthermore, through the National Association of Youth Commissions, I would be happy to offer the city with free research on how things like exact costs, appointments, and scope of work would play out. I'm requesting the city council to direct staff to report back on potential routes the city could take in starting a commission. I would be happy to serve as a resource for the city during this process. If any member of the council is interested, please contact me at 707-344-9999 or our website, youthcommissions.org. I'd be happy to help out in this process. Thank you.

Thank you, Shahid. I got your number. Thank you.

Hugh Marquez.

Good evening, Hughes. Good evening, Mayor, Council. I just wanted to give a start out with a shout out to Valerie and the evening in the streets. It's great to see how much that has blossomed over the last couple of years. And it was good to see our protective services being represented. The ambulance police, fire, CHP. It's good to see our youth businesses being represented, that she's representing our youth businesses. And it was just nice to see it blossoming. It's great to see some of our community organizations also being represented. They have their tent, they get to tell people what they represent. And during the last Evening in the Streets, there was a measure that you voted on to allow go to the voters, Measure P. And some flyers were distributed. And I wanted to let you know that at this point, I fully support it. Think it's good. We're a growing city and I think we need to think big and and there's a lot of stuff going on online But I just wanted you to know that The council whether you're for it or against it. I would encourage you to have some ideas of what if it passes What I do what you want to do for the city? we have I was part of the Utility Oh shit, the road, I'm sorry, the road commission, the west side. And I've sent emails to all the council members of my ideas on that. And we also have the Newell Road. And that's a big deal that we have to figure out in our city. And so I'm hoping that uh... if this goes through that that you guys will have some ideas to get to the city residents uh... of what what the proposal as i know that uh... police are going to read their their their the costs are going up at some point we get to redo a contract AND SO WE NEED TO THINK ABOUT ALL THOSE THINGS. AND SO I JUST WANT TO LET YOU KNOW THAT I WAS FOR IT, AND I'M HOPING THAT YOU, THE CITY, THE ONES THAT ARE FOR IT, EVEN AGAINST IT, THAT YOU WILL LET THE CITIZENS KNOW WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN IF WE DO GET IT. THANK YOU. THANK YOU, HUGH.

THAT'S MY LAST SPEAKER CARD, BUT I DO HAVE ONE HAND RAISED ONLINE.

OKAY.

Justin Hamilton-Holt. Go ahead, Justin.

Thank you, Teresa. I want to make a promotion here. I think Anna is doing a great job. I'm going to miss her. She's been here for 50 years. It's nice to see her working hard. Now she's going on. I'm going to miss her. The second thing is I noticed that somebody in there, in that room, Marianne, you're doing a great job being a board member on Tuesday. I love to think about Marianne because Dawson Way is amazing. She's working on painting the parking lot. I'm always walking with my dog to school every time. think about Marianne. And the third one is, I want to say I'm so happy that I just talked to somebody working on the hill, Karen Dunmore, doing some kills on reed or grass or something. He said the house is going to be coming soon. I hope we're going to get one new house, new sidewalk. So thank you. And Marianne, welcome on the floor. Thank you.

Thank you, Justin.

I have no other speakers.

Thank you, medical Cindy. Good evening, Cindy.

Um, I know you want me to look here and I'm going to look here, but I'm going to look over here for a minute to Alana. Girl, I'm going to miss you. I tell you what, from my heart, I will miss you, but I'm so proud of you, and I'm so happy for you. So, I mean, her and I go back from the beginning. And, yeah, I mean, you're going to leave a hole here, a huge hole. You're going to be their asset for sure. But I wish you nothing but the best, and you got my number, so take care of yourself. What I came up here also to do is about 2014, there was like a 12 year old younger version of myself that I used to come here. I know there's gonna be at least two of you guys on the council that's gonna remember. I come here once or twice a month. and say, hey, we need a sidewalk on Eucalyptus Street. I was taking three grandkids to school every day, one was in a stroller and there was no sidewalk, there was nothing but a drainage ditch and nothing but traffic. I ended up having to, Years later I ended up having to transfer them to another school so we could walk to school. Walking to our schools is a really good way to include our community, be part of our community. So now I'm gonna be back, but now it's gonna be asking for overpass, pedestrian overpass. I know I came to the NVTA meeting and they said, oh, it's too expensive. I don't think we should have a price tag on our kids' head. I'm part of your traffic problem because I drive two of my grandchildren still to the high school. and the middle school now. Next year, it'll be one trip, because they all will be in high school next year. But they have friends there. We have no connection between the east and the west side. They have friends there. I can't have them walk. They meet up at the park or something, but it is dangerous. The gentleman that was just here, this highway is crazy. I did talk to Grant here, he says it's too expensive, but we're gonna have landing pads when it's built out, Highway 29's built out. I'm like, oh great, you're gonna make the kids smaller targets. You cannot stop that car. So I'm going to be here. I'm going to be that pain in the butt again, because in 2022, we got a sidewalk. And thank you, Erica and Public Works, because it is the best looking sidewalk in the city. I'm telling you, it's got a lot of character. But I know we're going with the Highway 29 corridor. I'm glad that the planning commission's here. If we don't start doing something now, they're going to do that highway. There's not going to be any markers, nothing to be able to take care of that. Yes, I understand it's probably going to be on the city's time. But if we don't start planning it now, we're not going to get it. And we're not going to forget about it. So our kids are priceless. We all know that. So let's make sure that we get them over there safely. Thank you.

Thank you, Cindy. Anyone else in the room for public comment? Seeing none, I'll close public comment and move to agenda changes with the council. Are there any agenda changes? Seeing none, I'll accept a motion to accept a consent calendar.

I'll make that motion.

Do we have a motion?

I'll second.

And a second. Can we get a roll call, please, Madam Clerk?

Councilmember Cruz? Yes. Councilmember Lamatina? Yes. Councilmember Oro? Yes. Vice Mayor Joseph? Yes. Mayor Washington?

Yes, and thank you. Okay, next was public hearing. We have one item for public hearing, item number 11, a proposed ordinance adding Chapter 13.08 to Title 13 of the American Canyon Municipal Code, and I will... Mayor, staff requests we continue this to August 18th.

So, that makes it easy.

Do we need to do a... Motion and a vote, please. Yes. Okay, can I get a motion to continue item number 11?

I'll make a motion to continue item number 11 to the council meeting of August 18th.

I second. And we have a second. Can we get a roll call, please?

Yep. Continue to, was that August 18th? YES.

YES, AUGUST 15th. 18. 18. 18.

THANK YOU. AND COUNCIL MEMBER CRUZ. YES. COUNCIL MEMBER LAMATINA. YES. COUNCIL MEMBER ORO. YES. VICE MAYOR JOSEPH. YES. MAYOR WASHINGTON.

YES. MANAGEMENT AND STAFF OR REPORTS, ANY? NOTHING? YOU'RE MAKING THIS EASY TONIGHT. MOVING ON TO OUR MAYOR AND COUNCIL COMMENTS AND COMMITTEE REPORTS. WE'LL START WITH YOU, VICE MAYOR.

I DID SUBMIT A REPORT AND THERE'S BEEN A WHOLE BUNCH OF MEETINGS BUT I WANTED TO HIGHLIGHT THE RAIL STATION GRANT SINCE JEANETTE IS STILL HERE. NAPA VALLEY TRANSPORTATION AUTHORITY WAS SUCCESSFUL IN SECURING A $250,000 GRANT AND THE PURPOSE IS TO ANALYZE WHERE THE IDEAL SPOT FOR A RAIL STATION IN THE SOUTH COUNTY WOULD BE. Now, recognizing that the rail goes through much of American Canyon, there's a good chance that that location might be in American Canyon. So the good news is there is funds to identify, look at different sites, and do some planning. and the likelihood is that it'll be in American Canyon. The downside is it'll probably be years from now before we see anything, but at least that ball is rolling and I've been around for 30 years and there's been two rail feasibility studies and now a rail station feasibility study. So if you feasibility it enough, it will happen. That's my comment. Thank you.

I have nothing to report, sir. Thank you, sir. Council Member Lamatina.

I just want to thank the city and everyone involved for a great Fourth of July. It was really fabulous, and everyone had a great time. I met a lot of people that are not from our city, so that was fun. Yeah, so that's all I wanted to say. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam. Council Member Cruz.

Nothing to report, sir.

Okay, I as well have nothing else to add to my report which I filed future agenda items vice mayor.

Nothing at this time.

Council member Orr. No Sir. Council member Lambertino.

No.

Council member Cruz. Well then we've concluded our regular city council business for this evening and we'll now move on to our special joint commission meeting with the plan of commission and I will allow us about five minutes to kind of get set up and then we'll start that up. So I will adjourn from the regular general meeting and we'll set up for our special meeting with the plan of commission. dollar one short probably travel and i think he's going to be in new york

I am just for about an hour. I'm not going to stay long. I just want to be there to show them.

I've got another engagement for Cheryl and I to go to. You're going to go to France, too, right?

Oh, yeah. I have a few more.

I know you said you had another one.

For my family, a family member, so then I'll be a little later to bring it.

So if you come here with puffy eyes, we know why, right?

No, we didn't really like it. It's my mom's sister's husband's sister.

So if you come with a party hat, right?

Yeah, she was something else, and then she got dementia, and she was fucking mean. So, yeah, it just lasted a long time. But, yeah. How old? So she was around there, maybe 77. Yeah, but she has a bunch of work to do. They have to put her in a home. But yeah, I've been to those.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm just trying to watch this. I'm just trying to watch this. I'm always nervous. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, it is looking good.

Huh? Looking good too, man.

If we could take our places.

I don't know if I got the support. Really? Yeah. Mint? No, I don't. Oh, man. Nicole's not here. Oh, I brought my bag. Yeah.

Those are my jam. Yeah.

I have to do the sugar cream. What'd you do?

all right that five minutes is up like the call our meeting back into order This is our special Joint City Council and Planning Commission meeting. Our special Joint City Council Planning Commission meeting for July 21st, 2026. And I will ask Chair Charlie Plummer to lead us today in this evening's Pledge of Allegiance. MADAM CLERK, CAN YOU DO THE ROLL CALL STARTING WITH THE PLAN AND COMMISSION AND THEN THE COUNCIL?

YES. COMMISSIONER DEVETTE-MOHAMMED?

PRESENT.

Commissioner Eric Altman is absent. Commissioner Marilyn Avalon. Vice Chair Shelby Goss. Present. Chair Charles Plummer.

Present.

Council Member Brando Cruz. Here. Council Member Melissa Lamatina. Here. Council Member David Oro. Here. Vice Mayor Mark Joseph. Here. Mayor Pierre Washington.

I'm here. At this time, I'd like to open the floor for public comment for items that are not on tonight's agenda. If there's any comments on the speaker cards.

Mm-hmm. Yes, I have, where did that go? I have Jeanette Goiz.

Good evening, Jeanette.

Good evening again, everyone. I just have a question, actually, on the business item number one. It says removing barriers to development. So I guess my question, a couple of questions is what barriers need to be removed? And is there gonna be a discussion about this with people like me and everybody else? So I'd just like to clear it up, see what it's about. Thank you.

Just for the record, Jeanette, that is what the purpose of this meeting is, so we will be discussing that tonight, and you'll have an opportunity again.

Right, but I guess my worry, I mean, I don't know how many more people would have come tonight, but, you know, more notice to see what we'll be able to, are there going to be decisions made tonight?

Just information tonight.

Oh, it's information. Okay, well, that's better. Yes.

I have, let me see here. I do have Justin Hamilton-Hole with hand raised. So one moment. Go ahead, Justin.

Good evening, City Councilor and other team. My two thing is, one is I very miss I hope we can find that. It's a farmer market. I am helping a market on Tuesdays at Napa. I missed that one a memory year ago. It was back before COVID. We have a farmer market. And the second thing is, I think Brett Cooper I think somebody can give Brett Cooper an email so he can email me so I can get on this list, update stuff. So thank you.

Thank you, Justin, and I'll make sure Brett has your email. Anyone else online?

and that is the last person I have a hand raised.

Thank you madam clerk. I'll close public comment move on to a no agenda change would just move to the next business item which is item number one removing barriers and development. Mister Cooper.

Thank you mayor just before Brent starts wanted to set the stage. This is a council requested item it's part of a continuing a program that we have where we meet on an annual basis with each of our commissions to, you know, to discuss different kinds of issues and to provide that sort of connectivity between the bodies. So we met with PCS and OSETS at the end of June. This is our first meeting of the year that we're going to connect with the Planning Commission. And Brent Cooper has a presentation, and we'll kind of go from there. So thank you, Brent. Thank you, Mr. Hawley.

Mr. Cooper. Okay.

Well, thank you, Mayor and members of the Council and our Planning Commission, Brent Cooper, Community Development Director, and hello to the community and the folks that are watching today. I'm very pleased to have a conversation tonight. This is a brainstorming session to kind of try on some different concepts, and I'll get right into it. So in 2019, the city adopted a specific plan. This was initiated by the city to bring some placemaking and some direction for the land uses on Highway 29. And so we had a lot of outreach meetings on what might go where. I know Council Member Oro was part of the focus group for that before he was a council member. And really looking at what can be possible here on Highway 29. And we talked a lot about Highway 29 itself. The city, of course, has no control over Highway 29 directly because that's a Caltrans facility, and we all know about the effort underway today for Highway 29 under the leadership of the Napa Valley Transportation Authority, also in partnership with the city. And so you can see on the lower right hand there, there is a vision here to provide pedestrian, bicycle facilities, landscaping, underground utilities. And those are all things that are part of the Highway 29 plan, which will tremendously change the character of the highway as we see it today. But apart from that, we talked about architectural standards for both residential and commercial and looking at where we have clusters of development and kind of bringing some order and some thought to that. And so that was really the larger, bigger picture. The plan was adopted and we've been implementing it now for six years. So one of the issues that was central to the Broadway plan is looking at where do we have opportunities for change. Obviously, you look right across the street here, the Napa Junction Center is there. It's not changing, it's new. I think we're all happy with it. And we have other properties along the highway as well that fit that category. But in the blue here, those were areas where there is more opportunity to really look at what's happening. And in that time, we've had a number of projects that have been approved. And so we have some here. In 2020, there was the Home to Suites Hotel, Circle K. In 2021, we had the Hampton Inn Hotel and Napa Cove. In that time, you know, the home to Suites is built, Circle K is built, we have construction permits for Hampton Inn, and of course the Napa Cove is built. In 2023, we had the Chicken Guy project and Sun Square Mixed Use project over there on Napa Junction Road. The Crawford Apartments were more recently approved at Crawford Way and Highway 29. And then back in 2021, we had two gas station applications in the Broadway District, Rotten Robbie and 7-Eleven. And so we all know the Chicken Guy is built. The Sun Square project is in redesign. It was approved, but the applicants have changed have a different idea If fundamentally the same project, but it's it's being considered for a read redesign under the applicants recommendation the Crawford townhomes we have building permit applications for that And then as we might recall both the gas stations Politely say we're rezoned Some of the feedback over that time that we had, we had a conversation, gosh, almost about a year ago about architecture and what's happened with the way in which we have projects that come to us. And the general feeling is it didn't quite meet expectations. I do have to say that the Crawford townhomes and the Sun Square really stepped up. and looking forward to seeing them built, because they really did take to heart what the plan was saying and tried to do that. But I think for the most part, a lot of the projects were, I don't know, maybe underwhelming, I guess you could say. I do want to point out the Hampton Inn project. This one, as it was approved on the right there, that one started out with, I think, what architects would describe as a brutalist modern design. And that was what the applicant thought they wanted to build. And they weren't particularly receptive to staff's recommendations that this doesn't meet our plan and our design guidelines. And so the project did need a zone change. So we had a workshop and the council really picked it up and encouraged the applicant to redesign the project. And the idea here is to look at the canyon corners next door, which is more of a farmhouse-type style, and do something that kind of marries with that in a matter. And I think they did a very good job, and looking forward to seeing the design of the project through the construction permits being finished. So I think a real key issue here that really helped move things forward was that the council was involved in the Hampton Inn design. So save that thought for later. I think architecture aside, looking at what projects were approved, if those are all built, they do have a significant economic benefit to the city. And a couple of years ago, we had an economic development workshop with the council and where the idea isn't so much where we have sort of programs of this kind and that, but if we were able to streamline development and bring construction and new development to our Broadway district and other areas of the city, it generates revenue. And so in this case, if all of those approvals since 2019 happen, well that equates to about $150 million of private investment. So those are our sales to our local businesses. It's investment. Once it's built and up and running, they create tax revenue. Talking to our assistant city manager, he popped in just at the right time and helped me with that. It's about $1.4 million a year. And so, of course, we recently talked about the budget and what's happening in the future. And one way that we can help ourselves is to help grow the pie, as we like to talk about. So facilitating development does that. And then, of course, you have spinoff economic activity in the region to the tune of $250 to $400 million a year. So this is really important that we are able to help facilitate development. But let's maybe see how we can do it in a manner that I think we'll all be proud of once it's there. Because once things are built, they're there for, I don't know, 100 years, a long time. One other issue is that a lot of the properties that are left to be built, those sites are just intrinsically more complex and more difficult than maybe some of our past. And so you could say that the easy sites are largely developed, and I guess That's why they're developed. Now, development isn't easy. I'm not saying that these were done that were easy, because there may be people listening that are going to object to that. But the fact that the virtue of they were able to build those sites perhaps is comparatively easy to others that we have today. And some of those things that might make that true is the retail markets change. Of course, we all know about online shopping, and that certainly hasn't stopped. It's growing unabated. And so you can't build retail in the same way you once were and hope to fill it. It's more competitive. It's more of an experience. It's just you've got to do more. Inflation and interest rates. Of course, anyone who pays attention to the news, and everyone in this room certainly does, they are really creating heartache for developers. We have projects where the applicant is really looking at the costs. It just makes them uncertain, and so it's difficult. And then just going through an entitlement process itself. There are a lot of high expectations the city has in the way that we review our projects and the standards. Even apart from that, some people are just nervous about going through it. I can remember applicants who were really, really worried about going to the planning commission and getting a use permit. I'm like, don't worry about that. That's the last thing you've got to worry about. The parking lot, you've got to build a parking lot. That's hard. Planning Commission, they're going to love it. And it all worked out, and they did. But yes, that parking lot was hard. But it wasn't the entitlement. But people perceive it to be. And so with that, I wanted to bring you to here's a strategy where maybe we can move forward and kind of bring some of these ideas together. And that would be being a proactive creativity partnership and certainty are some of the theme words here. And this would be the city functioning as a proactive partner and facilitator in entitlement approval. So we have in our hands already, and these are, we have our specific plan, we have streamlined environmental, we have processes and procedures in place, If we were to identify what's important on the highway, what does the council, as advised by all of us here and others, what do we think we wanna see? Because the city has a lot of resources to help facilitate the entitlement part to happen. And I've been in lots of meetings where applicants are saying, well, what does the city want? Well, we have a zoning and look at this big list of things. I don't know that, but what does the city want? And so this is something that really hasn't been seriously pursued. And so I thought, well, maybe we should. Because if you think about it, we sort of set the table and then we sit back and wait for customers to come. And I'm not saying that isn't going to keep happening, but you get what you get. It's like potluck. What does people bring to your house? And you might not like it. And so if we start with, well, what do we want? Then maybe someone will agree. Oh, well, if that's what you want, you never asked me before, right? If that's what you want, well, OK. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. So it just hasn't been done. And so here's some, I have some examples. And these aren't, you know, these are examples, your ideas. Now they're not, I don't think they're crazy ideas, but they're ideas. And I've vetted a few with the property owners, so I know they're not crazy. So I'll start with this one. I'm starting with Rick Hess because he's someone who gets it. So one of the things that we have that you can observe along the highway here is the development turns its back to the highway. And no wonder why. I mean, look at it. We all want it to be improved. The speed limits are high. It's dangerous. It's noisy. It's not a pleasant place to be near. So I get it. It makes a lot of sense. But we do have, we'll take for example, the retail building at the corner there of Crawford Way and Highway 29 and Canyon Plaza. And the building there is lined up against the highway, and here's how it looks. Right? The building is near there. It meets the design standards, for example. It's an older one, but it's a pleasant-looking building. But it doesn't give you a here-here, right? And we understand why, because of the highway. Now when the highway is redesigned, it'll go down to 35 miles an hour, the utilities will be underground, there'll be landscaping, there'll be a bike lane. It's gonna be a different place than it is today. So if that happens, what would it happen if you were to turn the buildings around, in a sense, and have the fronts on the highway? I was talking to a restaurant owner over in his plaza who isn't in this building. He's in another building. He says, you know, no one knows I'm here. Well, what if you had your suite on the highway and you had outdoor seating and everyone could see how lovely and fun your restaurant is? Not only that, but that area for the sidewalk, for the... where you'd have the tables and the outdoor seating, that's setback. Today, it's nothing. There is no economic value to the property owner. This is economic value to the property owner. So not only does it give the restaurants greater visibility, it gives the landlord leasable space, and it gives the public a pleasant environment to be. And folks that are driving through town say, wow, this is starting to look a little bit like St. Helena, right? I mean, even AI, I admit this is an AI, right? And AI was confused. If you look closely at the sign, it has directions to St. Helena and Calistoga. So that's not a hard thing to do technically. The building is there. You just modify the storefront. You use your land, which is a setback. The city makes you set aside that you can't use, right? And then you use it. Here's another example. There is no name for the shopping center that I'm aware of. So I've coined it Lawson Center. I don't know about you, but it has an extraordinarily wide parking lot. That parking lot is not making money. It's just there. So what if they were to monetize it? And so let me show you what I mean. What if they, much like the prior example, they widen the sidewalk, they put some umbrellas up, a little landscaping and a fence, there's room for that. Now you've got leaseable space and people can sit outside and enjoy their, enjoy LaParis. Maybe there's even room if they have that space to add another restaurant, I don't know. But who doesn't want to sit outside, I would like to sit outside of La Prairie and enjoy their baked goods, but there's no room there, it's no accommodation. But it's just, there's opportunity there that's just not being used. So that's just an idea that could be done without too much expense. Now, if you wanna get a little more ambitious, I always say it's a flat building, it's been around a while. If you added a pitched roof to it and some dormers, it would look a little nicer. And then with the higher signs, it's more visible from the highway because there is a somewhat of a setback from the highway. And so if you wanted your businesses to have a little better visibility, that would be one way of doing it. The zoning on that property allows mixed use. And there is a wide vacant property that's part of this all the way back to Melvin. So you could build apartments on there. And then if you wanted to have ground floor retail, you could do that. Because it's face to the highway, so that would be nice. But perhaps the back property would have just apartments. But there's a lot of opportunity here for this property. So here's another example. You know, the bowling alley just over here. It's empty for years. It's, I would say, underutilized. But what a location. Look at the location. It is in the center of the Broadway district. It's across the street from Walmart. It has everything going for it. But it's not being used. So just What if it was used for pickleball, indoor and outdoor pickleball? Meet me in the street. I was approached by the Nebraska's and like, why don't we have more pickleball courts? Well, because they're noisy. So if you have them in neighborhood parks, they're going to bother the neighbors. Well, how about an indoor pickleball? What about one that's on the highway side? That's not going to bother anybody. And who remembers Lena's Bar? Right? There is a part of American Canyon history that's sort of gone. I had a conversation with Buzz Butler, who told me he'd be listening tonight because he's dog-sitting. He's a proud owner of Lena's Sign. I didn't forget that. I don't know what he's doing with it, but...

He's waiting for this moment.

Mounted his living room, maybe. I don't know. But anyway, why don't we have Lena's Indoor Disco Pickleball? I don't know if anyone's been in the bowling alley, but there's a disco ball in there.

Who wouldn't want to go to that? Why not?

It's an unused building. I bet the owner wouldn't mind if someone picked it up and did something with it. You paint it green because it is, after all, pickleball. And why not? What a location and what a fun thing. Did the Citizen's Academy with the high school students and they're saying, you know, we need more fun places to go and to do. Well, there you go. You got a building right there. I know that the building is old and it probably needs some work, But you have this resource in just an amazing location that could be used for something really exciting and fun for a lot of people. I'd do that. So that's an idea. Have a bar, have an arcade, pickleball. Lena's. Why not? Now, we all know that that property is big. And so on the south side, what if you were to anchor it with a farmer's market style grocery store? And along with that have some inline retail. There's room on this property. So here is an illustration. Now, to do this, I stole the architecture of another grocery store and changed the name. So there are grocery stores that look like that. They exist. So I'm not crazy out there. So why not? Why not? Wouldn't that be nice? And if you look here, all of these pictures along the highway, they have the bike lane because that provides access and makes it easier for people to get around safely and helps anchor the frontage and provide some landscaping along with what may be built along with the building. So if you're not the sort that does this sort of thing every day, it might be a little hard to visualize. You've got Lenas on the north and then Islay on the south. And in between, I guess, would be a parking lot. And so I did just a little illustration here. This is not scale. But it's a concept, just to give an idea. So imagine you have that center over there. On one side you've got Lena's, and on the other side you've got Islay, and in between there's parking. If you do that, you have both room, you have parking that's shared, and you have great line of sight. I know that retail wants to be seen from the street. So this enables lines of sight from both directions on the highway. So along Teresa, so that would be on the backside of the property. So that's more of a residential feel, and it would be unpleasant if you had all the shipping and receiving on Teresa. That would be, I think, a real disappointment for folks that lived in that street. And there's room. It's deep enough. It's a very big site. It's deep. So if you were to design it so that that wouldn't be the case, you'd have room for townhomes along Teresa, which would kind of meld in with the neighborhood. So what if you sought townhomes along there? These are just ideas. These are just ideas. It's a big improvement, I think. And this is my last example, and then we can open it up for just conversations. And that would be the property on Melvin is for sale. I saw it on LoopNet. And there's one parcel, about .6 tenths of an acre, but it says in the ad that the neighboring parcel's also for sale, so I'm grouping them to one. And so that property has higher density residential zoning, And I know that Habitat for Humanity has been looking at it, but they haven't really moved forward. But what if, for example, you put some town homes on here? This is an example that would go at 11 units per acre. It's a lot lower than the zoning would allow. And so It's feasible, this picture probably isn't to scale, but 11 units an acre for town homes, three bed, two bath, about 2,000 square feet a piece. It could probably fit on there. So, I think perhaps some might say an improvement over Napa Cove to folks that live on the street. And that kind of gets into, if we're not happy with what we're getting, maybe if we want to take the proactive step and say, well, this is what we want. If you want to do what we want, well, here's the entitlement. If you wanna do it your way, well, that's always available. But if you wanna do something that the Council and the Planning Commission think is a benefit and a need, and we've done the feasibility work in-house and we present it, then that makes it easy to say yes. So that's really kind of a different concept and wanted to share that with you. So just kind of a discussion points, maybe, okay, this is a cool idea, Brent, but how would you even do this? So just for sake of argument, just for discussion purposes, you might have like a priority sites program. Obviously, we have a limited staff. You have to pick your top priorities and then maybe select a pilot project based on visibility, property owner, concurrence. something that might happen if we could do it to help things go through the entitlement so they can go straight to building permits. So with that, kind of turn it over to all of you.

Thank you, Brent.

That was actually an amazing presentation.

And I got to actually tell you real quick that

When I first ran for city council, that's what I had visions.

When I get on city council, I'm going to do this. I'm going to have this going on, the bowling alley. I had all those. So, I mean, I'm happy you did that. It made me excited just watching it. So thank you for that presentation. And I'll open it up for the commissioners to give some feedback and then the council. But I see that the city manager has his light blinking, so he has something to add.

I do, Mayor. Thank you. That was a great presentation. Thank you, Brent. Just a little more back story and context. Brent alluded to the brainstorming nature, and that's what I asked him to do as we were preparing for this session. The interest from the council was on removing barriers for development. As we began to talk through, we were talking about what are those barriers. And it's the perception of the unknown, it's cost, it's not knowing what the city wants, the potential to get a no. I mean, can you imagine spending $200,000, $300,000, $400,000, $500,000 of your own money or the bank's money that you promised to pay back only to come to a hearing and get told no? You know, it's a very real fear and it's development activities, very high risk, high reward type stuff. And so when you combine that with the fact often the professionals that we're dealing with are from other states or other parts of California, they don't know anything about American Canyon. and they're resistive to trying to do the things that we know that would be good for the community. So I kind of tasked Brent with displaying some of this creativity. And the other real difference that's available now, many of those pictures you saw are available for some design tools that exist that really didn't even exist, you know, 24 months ago, 12 months ago. Our ability to use these tools to create what are effectively photo sims, to create tools of examples of what they might look like really, I think, appeases the eye and gives you clarity about how it might look. you would have had to pay an architect $100,000 for those pictures and now they can do it in a sitting for far less. And so the technology is coming up in a way that allows us to represent in three dimensions to scale and so forth in a way that doesn't exist anymore and we don't have to rely on a developer's architect from San Diego or St. Louis. We're able to take what's in our plan already, put three dimensions to it on the places that we know that it could be prime to meet American Canyon's needs. Conceptually, this is pretty cutting edge. I'm not aware that any other cities are looking at this. Way back when, there was a thing called a redevelopment agency. And so redevelopment agencies would do some of this. They would do it from a perspective of really downtrodden properties. You had to go through a process of declaring blight and then would allow cities to assemble properties and spin them off to developers and do things. So there is a history of this sort of thing happening, but it is several, multiple decades old now as far as when that was occurring. But this day and age, I'm not aware of really any municipalities that are taking a look at this and being this forward thinking. it would still involve the city council and the planning commission. So I don't want you all to get the impression that you wouldn't be involved. It's quite the opposite. Number one, you would be involved on your own timeframes because these would be projects that nobody's applied for yet. And so absent an application from a property owner or developer, we wouldn't be under any sort of shot clock or any sort of timeframes to respond to completeness or with conditions of approval. Nowadays, especially with housing, we have about 60 seconds to respond and then it's approved. And so I'm being a little facetious, but that's where the state has gone with housing. So doing something in advance would allow us to do it on a little more of our own timescale. And it would allow us to put in the kinds of conditions and things that we wanted after deliberation. I would still go through Planning Commission and City Council. The other aspect to this is it would allow us to ferret out any sort of questions or concerns from the community, and there wouldn't be any bad guys, right? A lot of times developers come to the podium, they have a project, and some people are excited, and other people think they're the bad guys, and they're blaming all the history and traffic and all the problems, all the things that they think are wrong with the world, and they're blaming this particular developer who spent half a million dollars on their consultant studies as if they're the problem, and it really is not fair to them. Because they aren't the problem, they just showed up with an idea that They were trying to make work in American Canyon. So to the extent we're able to bring some of these ideas forward, we can engage that community conversation. And if there are questions and concerns of the community, we can address them, whether they be conditions of approval or not. And there isn't, you know, the sort of scapegoat where it's a lot of times developers end up being. So, you know, a couple of things are kind of converging here, much more certainty about how the highway is going to look and some more realistic timeframes now of when we could start to see some change there, some advanced tools and technology that allow us to really play a design feature. And this recognition that we set the table with the Broadway District Specific Plan based on the paradigm of the mixed-use commercial market as we understood it from the prior decade, which is a great plan and would have worked if the retail market hadn't utterly changed and interest rates hadn't utterly changed and California hadn't changed, right? I mean, the broader Bay Area, the population trends and economic activity absent AI and that technology really is stagnant and Napa County's population is actually decreasing. So these aren't areas where outside investment is intriguing or is happening in any great efforts. And so we decided, you know, hey, what would this concept look like? So it would still involve you. We want to have this sort of conversation with you all about this approach. We didn't feel it was appropriate to just start bringing new projects that nobody has applied for. And you start to wonder why. But we felt like it was an opportunity to to, you know, I think Brent did a great job of highlighting those things that, yeah, we could see all those things really working. And there were some other ideas as well. So that was the purpose of this. Essentially removing the barriers is to remove the uncertainty for developers. What do we want? What am I approved to do? It would streamline their approach to go straight to building permits. And now, you know, for example, the bowling alley, it's owned by someone who lives in Sacramento. They have no interest in doing anything with the property. They have a certain amount of money. And for them, there's like zero interest. But there might be someone locally. There might be someone here with some capital who might be interested in this idea. They were never going to go approach that property owner and spend $100,000, $200,000 on plans to just get told no. But now that they have that certainty that the yes has already happened, maybe they go approach the property owner. Maybe they're ready to take some risk and do some of that. So that's the purpose of this.

Thank you. Thank you. I want to kind of give the opportunity to the planning commission to kind of ask for any clarifying questions to the presentation or make a statement about what you guys are doing and how this tool is going to be able to help you guys out, to help us out. But first, before I even go there, I just want to tell you guys I appreciate what you guys do. wholeheartedly i think you guys do an amazing job and that that's eric too i know he's not here so if he's watching he'll know that i'm complimenting him as well so i'll start with you chair if if you have some input on on the presentation and or with the excitement that i have about the possibilities

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Mr. Hawley, and Vice Mayor and Council Members. I think, first of all, I would like to commend Director Cooper on a really wonderful presentation. I think, having worked with him now for a couple of years, he certainly has a thoughtful and purposeful way of presenting and understanding what resources and assets are available to the city to identify. and possibly explore, right? It's very articulate, very creative. But I think it leads to the bigger question that we, and I don't speak for everybody here, but I think we align as a commission of what is the vision for this city, right? Like you, Mayor, I came in thinking, wow, this is gonna be great. We're gonna have all these cool things. We're gonna develop a city and a community that's tight because we are incredibly tight as a community. We all support each other. But we need places to congregate. We need things to do. It's like it's it's it's it's evident with Independence Park and 4th of July was mentioned meet me on the street People come from near and far to be a part of this, you know, the ruins events have happened Veterans Park which we had a sports complex I mean things like that that we're identifying that this community as we grow. Those are the things we need so so thank you for having a wonderful vision and and translating that to visuals for us because we all went ah everybody was smiling this is like this is all we want to see i'm going to turn it over to my commissioners i have a lot to say i know we all take very copious amount of notes but i think one of the things that i value a lot is that this commission aligns really well and we want to make sure we align with city council we align with city staff because the vision for the city is important and we do want to grow we want to grow in a right way it's a balancing act You've got commercial, you've got residential, you've got open space and agriculture. And we've gotta be very mindful of how we balance all those. But I love that you've identified existing spaces that can create these congregational areas that have been underutilized. So thank you for doing that. I do have a lot to say, but I'm gonna turn it over to my commissioners first so that they can have their input. Commissioner Avalon?

Is this mic on? Okay.

Thank you, Mayor Washington. I wanted to thank you, Mayor Washington, and members of the council. It's been a real honor to serve as a planning commissioner and to be involved as an American Canyon citizen. Director Cooper, thank you. Your presentation, again, I want to echo what Chair Plummer said. It's very articulate, put together. easy to read, I love the renderings. It makes me so excited and that's also another reason for being on planning commission to get going with these wonderful projects and to see our town. People pass through American Canyon, they really don't know what they're missing. Chair Plummer had talked about the ruins and the meet me in the street and the community comes, they congregate together Last school year, I was at American Canyon High and I had the privilege of being a judge for one of their business propositions. And over and over and over again, those seniors said, we need something where we can go and something where we can do. And I love the picker ball concept, another activity or bowling alley or something for kids to go through. And I really love the outdoor feel. So I'm really excited about this topic. I feel like I wanna roll up my sleeves and help everybody. How can we get the chart paper? How can we get people to participate a little bit more? I guess my feedback for today's agenda, and I apologize, I'm wearing my teacher hat again. I would have liked to have some more front loading because our topic, like Ms. Jeanette had said earlier, The agenda topic was rather broad, removing barriers to development, and I kind of didn't know what we were gonna talk about today. I'm really excited about this topic, I really am. Again, wearing my educator hat, I would have loved a little bit more, something to hold onto, maybe some more bullet points, what we're gonna be talking about so that I can be more of an active participant in our session today. Just some more clarity on that, but thank you. Again, Director Cooper, fabulous. I'm excited. Let's get going. Let's do it.

Thanks, Marilyn. Shelby?

Yeah, again, thank you, Mayor Washington and council members for having this joint meeting and including us in this process. Yeah, Director Cooper, the presentation was really exciting and I wanna echo what Chair Plummer and Commissioner Avalon said that this kind of work and these kinds of projects I think are what motivated all of us to wanna join the Planning Commission in the first place. I know that as a slightly newer resident to American Canyon, I've been here a few years now, I have little kids, I plan to raise them here through high school and everything. I know that American Canyon has such a strong sense of community and I would love for our town to have a physical representation of that as well, physical places together. So I am really excited by some of the ideas you shared and how, you know, especially the first couple you shared really would require kind of minimal changes compared to completely tearing down and rebuilding or something like that. It's really exciting. I would love to work on the process of how to make that happen um yeah and you know while also figuring out how to balance that um you know chair plumber talked about walking this line of helping guide the growth of the city while also ensuring that we're preserving our open spaces, preserving our wetlands, all of that, and really figuring out how to walk that line. And I think the examples you shared of potential sites to start with is amazing and are areas that would really make sense. They're already developed to varying degrees. Yeah, and I also want to second what Commissioner Abalon shared of I really didn't know what I was coming into tonight. I'm very pleasantly surprised and impressed with your presentation. But, you know, I know that for me, coming here after a long workday, my... i love to be prepared i love to have a chance to brainstorm in advance come in with some ideas because after a long day i don't know who's think best on my feet um so yeah some some more um i guess uh understanding and clarity and like uh input on what the meeting was going to look like would have been appreciated But I really enjoyed your presentation. And yeah, I want to make those things happen. So thank you.

Before I move to you, DeVette, I'm going to have the city manager make a comment.

Yeah, I just want to address real quick. We do appreciate how strange it might be to see an agenda with a single line item and not know what this is about and appreciate wanting to be prepared. We felt like, Brent and myself, felt like we needed to keep this kind of under wraps. If this presentation had been part of a packet, we felt like without the right context, people would think the bowling alley was being changed, and they wouldn't understand that this is a brainstorming exercise. The pictures that we shared on Facebook, and everyone thinks these things are happening. And so we...

Telling us that we were coming into a brainstorming exercise would have been appreciated.

Sure, no, I completely agree.

I totally understand not wanting to confuse people with the images.

I agree, and I thank you for that.

I just want to echo that comment to Mr. Hawley. I think everybody on this commission is a professional industry. We spend countless hours at work and on time on the road and whatnot. And so being prepared is incredibly critical for us. We didn't need the full presentation, but at least having a general understanding of what the topic was going to be about tonight. This is our only joint session. It's been on the books for three and a half, four months. It would have been nice to have some kind of context coming into it, as I'll simply say.

thank you chair uh commissioner devette yeah so i just want to disclose that i did speak with somebody prior to this meeting asking why the topic was so cryptic and you know miss pollyanna say oh it's just the the city council wanting to get to know the planning commission better and you know the way i am but anyways this is i do want to preface it my comments by saying that this is my last year on the planning commission life flipped on me But after hearing this presentation, I'm like, hmm, let me see. Do I? So, Director Cooper, thank you so much for that presentation. I, too, am so excited with what's going on in the city of American Canyon, and that is why I am so involved in the community and why I joined the Planning Commission, is just because I see the future of American Canyon just as your presentation. So, when I win Lotto, I'm gonna apply for the bowling alley, and we're gonna make it happen.

GOOD THANK YOU TO VET NOW I'LL MOVE TO COUNCIL AND ANY UM IF I JUST OKAY I'LL WRAP UP I WANTED TO LET THEM SPEAK FIRST OKAY UM I ALREADY MENTIONED BALANCING ACT YOU KNOW WHEN WE LOOK AT COMMERCIAL RESIDENTIAL AG OR OPEN SPACE I DO WANT TO JUST TOUCH ON THE THE RECRUITMENT AND RETENTION FOR THE CITY FOR BUSINESS IN MY LINE OF WORK WE SPEND A LOT OF TIME MODELING RECRUITMENT INTENTION RETENTION FOR MEMBERSHIP what does that mean membership right and so to be an active business member of this community what are the features and benefits of being that active business member right and so you know in this economic state you have to go out and recruit and so I agree I think however the pilot project works however we look at doing that with professional organizations or within staff or within commissions I'm in favor of that. Recruitment is incredibly important because you shape how your city's going to look, you shape how your membership is going to look, and you exact and refine those features and benefits of having that membership. And so I can only parlay it into words that I understand, but that's the similarity that I see in city government, right? We tend to overcomplicate things a lot. And I get it, there's a lot of rules and regulations and things that you need to get through, but I mean, let's just clear the noise. Where do we wanna go? Who do we wanna be when we grow up? And let's go there. And so if the pilot project is about recruitment for businesses that we wanna see help evolve this city, then I'm in favor for that. I think this makes a lot of sense. And then it's retention. How do we retain these businesses? We've lost a few businesses recently here in this city for various reasons. But again, if we're not offering a way for retention for those businesses to continue to thrive, we'll continue to lose them. So again, clear the noise. Let's make it uncomplicated. Let's have a vision plan and a pathway for recruitment and retention. And that's my big ask.

Thank you, Chair. Anyone else on the commission? Seeing no one else with a comment from the Commission, I'll move to the Council for any comments or clarification on the presentation. We'll start with you, Councilmember Lamartina. You're first.

Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Director Cooper, for an amazing presentation. I want to be so unprofessional and just be like, whoo, I'm so excited. Living here like 51 years, it was just grass, animals, and then building it up, I feel like the east side's pretty nice looking, but the west side needs a lot of love. YEAH, I THINK THIS IS FABULOUS AND I'M VERY EXCITED. I LOVE THE INNOVATION AND, YEAH, LET'S JUST CHARGE FORWARD. THANK YOU.

THANK YOU, MADAM. COUNCIL MEMBER CRUZ.

YEAH, DIRECTOR COOPER, THANK YOU FOR THAT WONDERFUL PRESENTATION. WATCHING THAT, I FELT REALLY DREAMY-EYED AND JUST, WOW, JUST THE VISION THAT YOU HAVE HERE. AND WITH THE PLANNING COMMISSION, I EMPATHIZE WITH YOU. I SAT THERE WHERE YOU'RE AT NOT TOO LONG AGO, ABOUT A COUPLE OF YEARS AGO. SO I THINK IT'S A LITTLE BIT where's all the paperwork that I got to read prior to. You're so used and regimented, reading everything, preparing for the meeting, when you come back, oh my god, it's nothing to read but just to watch this presentation. So I understand being prepared before you come to the meeting. But I do, again, appreciate everything that you guys do, because I know what it feels like to sit on that side. With this, of course, we want to build responsibility. My question would be, how would we involve the community in these build-outs and, of course, these permits that we, of course, would approve in advance? I understand what we're trying to do. We're trying to streamline the process. Because sitting, again, in that side where you guys sit, one thing that developers or builders or businesses coming in one thing that was a barrier for them was like how you know what can we do to make this process easier it would be a consistent and constant complaint so not only how do we do that how we streamline that but how would we of course involve our community like jeanette hugh and and cindy and folks out there that watch that are wondering what's going on with this so how do we do that but again Thank you for that presentation. Got me dreamy eyed. Again, the reason why I'm sitting here today is because of that concept is how can I keep my kids here? There's nothing to do here. So this is again a glimpse of what our future could look like. So thank you for that.

Thank you, Council Member Cruz. GO AHEAD, VICE MAYOR.

I WAS WAITING FOR EVERYBODY ELSE TO TALK. NO, I WOULD SECOND A LOT OF THE THINGS THAT HAVE BEEN SAID. AND THERE WERE A COUPLE OF PEOPLE WHO COMMENTED ON THE AGENDAS IS KIND OF CRYPTIC. I had the advantage of talking to the city manager so I could tell them this is what it's all about. But I do think that's a good point. And sometimes it helps to have a little more background material. As it goes, though, the presentation was great. I'm completely on board. And in particular, I like this last screen where we're talking about the steps. Because I do think... We need to pick two or three, because one of the issues that wasn't highlighted as a real issue is a lot of the parcels on the 29 corridor are like half acre parcels, which is great if you're building a house. It sucks if it's trying to be a retail center. And so one of the real headaches without a redevelopment agency is you can't just go and assemble them. But we do have three or four decent sized parcels. And if those are our priority opportunity sites and they come out well and they're successful and you create this vision and the roadmap, then all of a sudden private development might start knocking on the doors of three or four individual landowners and start doing their own parcel assemblage. So I like this idea of a pilot project in particular. The other issue that's going on is, as the manager pointed out, Napa Valley Transportation Authority and Caltrans is finally dealing with our 29 corridor. And it's maybe five years out, depending upon finding $50 million. So what I really like is the fact that if we're talking about this concept today, and assuming it takes a year or two to translate it into action, and then a year or two to physically finish it, it may all kind of come together at once. So that once the renovations that Caltrans does when they're finished, we may have two or three of these developments and it all starts to snap and happen. And I'm really reminded of Napa City because I was around long enough to be in there with the flood control tax and getting it approved and all the transformations, the physical transformations of Napa, downtown Napa, translated into an economic revival. And now it's kind of the center of the universe And I think if we synchronize this concept with the 29 improvements, we're going to see that same kind of synergy. And then the last piece to this puzzle is a lot of times, in addition to reducing the uncertainty of the fear of no and the conditions and everything else, the other advantage is once the 29 corridor is renovated, The power lines are underneath. There's some landscaping. There's bike paths. There's drainage. There's all these things. All of a sudden, the cost of development goes down because you don't have to tell the developer that in addition to building your structure, you've got to address drainage. And oh, by the way, we don't have a drainage plan, so we're not sure what we want you to do. But by God, you've got to do it. It's a lot easier to say, OK, that's covered. You don't have to worry about that. We may try to exact a few bucks from you for reimbursements, but it's a done issue. You can just focus on building this thing and making it happen. So having worked with developers over the years, they really do, it is an economic bottom line. A lot of times I think we imagine that they want to have their particular project. And your point about what does the city want, Their bottom line is, I bought this piece of land. I want to make some money. It's not like I want it to be a gas station. It's more like I want to make some money on this. And if you tell me this is how I can make some money, nine out of 10 are on board. So with that having been said, I'd like to recommend we do the Canyon Plaza thing and the Lawson Center thing simply because they look like a relatively low-cost, high-yield outcome. And you're dealing with property owners, you know, you can tell Rick this is what we want to do and he'll probably do half of it. And so I see these as two easy wins. I think the bowling alley is a little more challenging or probably a lot more challenging And then I want to make a final pitch because we talked about the town center And I think the ruins is turning into an entertainment district and I think it's going to be an incredible one I've got nothing but positive feedback on that arena and But the classic downtown center, it may not be or it may not be for another 30 years. So that sets the stage of saying, so where else might our town center be? And maybe it might be in the one biggest single owned parcel sitting between Walmart and some hotels. And I'm looking at the Adobe Lumber. That may become the pivotal parcel that we really need to sit down with the property owners and do a kind of a joint effort because how that parcel develops can not only facilitate traffic circulation but our vision of the town center and it can probably facilitate the ruins as well. And so for me I think it's a great idea. I'd like to start small with the easy ones, either tackle the bowling alley or go straight to Adobe because I think Adobe is, that's the linchpin. If we can do that one right, we'll be able to sit back and rest on our laurels. So that's my comments.

Thank you, Vice Mayor. I knew it. Council Member Orrell.

I think councilmember Joseph brought up some good points which sparked. An opportunity to provide my input as well so. I like the ideas of the easy, you know, the low-hanging fruit, right? But if we go through this process, I'd like to envision it even for the big ones, right? Because these are all conceptual things, and we need to challenge ourselves now to think through what that Broadway corridor would look like. I ACTUALLY THINK ON THE CANYON PLAZA ONE, THAT IS SMART, RIGHT? THAT'S JUST THE THING. IF THE HIGHWAY IMPROVEMENTS ARE THERE, HOPEFULLY THE TRAFFIC SLOWS DOWN AND IT'S NOT TOO NOISY. AND THE SAME FOR LAWSON'S CENTER. BUT WHY NOT REIMAGINE WHAT THE PROPERTY NEXT DOOR WOULD LOOK LIKE? and give it an opportunity. And I say to do that because it invites the public to come in and weigh in as well. We'll have many of these conversations. And we had imagined 10 years ago the Broadway district specific plan and what we wanted there. And obviously things weren't working and we've come up with some ideas of, you know, well, we haven't come up with any ideas, but we've talked about ideas of like, MAYBE SOME INCENTIVES TO INCENTIVIZE PEOPLE TO BUILD TODAY. REMOVING SOME FEES. THIS, MR. COOPER, I THINK PROBABLY TAKES A LOT OF THAT WORK OUT OF IT OR GIVES THEM LOWERS THEIR COST WHAT IS THE BENEFIT BEYOND JUST SAYING HEY HERE'S THE ONE THING THAT THE CITY WANTS THIS IS WHY IT'S GOING TO BE EASIER ON YOU HELP ME UNDERSTAND THAT AND LIKE IF WE CAN BEGIN TO COMMUNICATE WHAT THAT ECONOMIC INCENTIVE IS TO MR JOSEPH'S POINT YOU KNOW YOU BE YOU THEN YOU BEGIN TO HAVE REAL ACTION RIGHT

So the municipal code requires this sort of gatekeeping process called the planning process. So someone has an idea for a property, they have to come through and get approval of what we call an entitlement. And that's sort of a broader term that means a design permit or a conditional use permit, generally the most common ones. And so we require a lot of plans, they have to go and respond to comments from the public. We have all kinds of comments on them. We have a lot of documents. There's a zoning code. There's specific plans. There's policy documents they may not be aware of. There's a lot of reference documents that we pull together on these things. And so when somebody is trying to get this entitlement, they really objectively have a lot of work ahead of them and they don't often necessarily even care because they're confident that the city wants their project. I would take the Hampton Inn as one. What city doesn't want a hotel? Here, you're getting this and you're going to like it because everyone else does. No, no, no. We have our rules. So There is an education process that we help applicants understand. And sometimes what happens is they say, OK, you win. Show us a pretty picture, and then go build something else. So the entitlement is a very valuable milestone, because once you get through that, it spells out everything you have to do to build your project, and then you go through building permits and construction permits and improvement plans. So if we can just remove that whole step for somebody with a project that they know the city wants, because it was approved by the planning commission council, and we work with the community, everyone wants it. And if they're neutral, like what was made, I wanna make some money on this land, if they're neutral on what it is they do, and for some that might work. It's like, you know, I don't really care, I just wanna make money and go the easy route. I've had a very influential large developer say to me, I don't wanna go through your process. So I'm not going to try anything hard. So if you can come up with something easy for me, that's what I'll do. And so if we can just make it easy to get something that all of us have agreed, we would really like to see that. And if that works for them, we have a win. It reminds me of just human interactions where you might know somebody very well and you've been grumbling for a long time because they aren't doing something you want. And finally, it finally comes to a head and they say, well, you never asked me. So there may be property owners here that are sitting on their property. They don't want to deal with the city. But if someone came to them with an idea, like, well, yeah, since you asked. So that's kind of part of the process in using human interaction maybe to get their agreeable to something that all of us want. And then in return, we give them a gift of something that is expensive and valuable. the entitlement. I think it sort of helps everybody. It's not going to work for everybody, but it might work for enough to make a difference.

So basically it becomes a point to where, Hey, we want this, you got the money, go build it. Here's an entitlement. And now you get to enjoy the benefits of RENTAL LEASE RATES ALL OF THOSE THINGS AND YOU DON'T HAVE TO GO THROUGH THE THING THAT MIGHT TAKE YEARS OR MONTHS IN TERMS OF GOING BACK AND FORTH EASY WAY TO LOOK AT THAT THAT WOULD BE VERY EASY RIGHT SO IT'S A STARTER KIT RIGHT SO TELL ME AS WE THINK THROUGH THIS PROCESS AND WE HAVE THESE IDEAS AND WE COME TO AN AGREEMENT DOES THE COUNCIL THIS IS A PLANNING COMMISSION WHO GETS TO THAT COSTS MONEY TOO WHERE DOES THAT, HOW DO WE GET THAT HELP? AND I KNOW FOR THE BDSP, THE COUNCIL DID APPROVE OR DID ASK YOU TO WORK WITH, I DON'T KNOW, WHAT IS IT, A LANDSCAPE DESIGNER OR SOMEBODY WITH DESIGN THAT YOU HAVE RESOURCES NOW, THE COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT HAS. How does this work in practicality, and what kind of money are we putting forward for a project that isn't necessarily guaranteed, but is, to the rest of the Planning Commission Council here, is very dreamy?

Well, I would add your list to the issues that we would address, but it would seem to me that I did add here property owner consent. So let's just say, for example, the property owner was presented with a dreamy idea. They go, yeah, that sounds like a good one. It may not be them that builds it. It may be someone else who comes onto their property and builds it, or it might be them. But it would, I think, need to have some some agreement that this is even an idea they're willing to consider as for how do you pay for the city work well we have our finance director here but i would i would actually um point out that you know earlier on if we can help move things along it has very real consequences for our budget So there may be projects sitting out there where someone doesn't wanna deal with the city, therefore it languishes. If we can shake that loose and make something happening, although there is an upfront city cost, there is a long-term revenue stream benefit. And I don't know how one does the math on that.

What's the math on a typical entitlement?

Yeah, maybe another way of, of answering the question is some of what we're talking about is a time scale of when these costs are needed. So in the traditional process, all of the costs are up front ahead of the risk proposition of a yes or no. And so they're actually kind of untimely. BDSP already has an EIR. We already know it's a largely built-out environment. It's infill, right? So this isn't like some other areas of town where it's all green-filled and there's new roads and new plant. We know where the highway is. We know where the roads are. The amount of studies and the things that we have to look at in our normal formula really aren't necessary for infill kinds of construction, and we've already covered them. The architectural concepts are already in BDSP. infrastructure is largely there whether the pipeline is in the street or that street doesn't have to happen. The developer doesn't need to figure that out as part of a $300,000 entitlement package we can figure that out at the building permit stage so some of the cost proposition won't be incurred by the city because the the projects that would come for the city initiated projects aren't going to have every detail figured out like we might have in a traditional approach. because some of those things can be figured out later, and some of them really aren't entitlements, a condition of approval that says whether this pipeline needs to be improved or not. Like the council, the planning commission, you weren't really gonna be the experts in deciding, oh yes, improve that pipe, because you don't know, you're relying on an engineer either before or after to figure out whether the pipeline needs to be improved. And if we can, number one, put some of those costs on the rear end so that as part of a building permit process, there will be engineers involved, there will be costs that developers are doing, And so some more of that heavy lifting happens on the back end after they have no risk. So that's sort of one piece. And then the second piece is we've done some of the tools already with some of the environmental studies. So that work's already done, as is some of the architectural work that's already done. And to your point, we do have an on-call consultant, an architectural firm. And so that can help guide us a little bit in the front end process. It can definitely help us in the building permit review process. So as we get these plans in, They can help us, again, that's paid for by the development and reimbursed that way. And so they can then sort of invest in that process rather than the before I'm getting a yes or no. I really don't think we can downplay how much uncertainty weighs in on folks, in part because although we've actually been very accommodative of development, I'm not sure we've ever really said no to particular projects in other communities in the Bay Area and elsewhere in California. no's are a very common thing and so folks who work all over are used to being told no and just having to price that in that risk so some of it there will be some costs up front but I'm actually not envisioning like I'm not envisioning hiring a person to go and do these applications or hiring an architecture firm to do all these things I think we have the tools available we have the basics of what the council wants already as far as design guidelines we would you know to some of the council members points like What would be some of the low-hanging fruit? What are some of the opportunity sites? Those sorts of suggestions, we would come back to you and go, okay, like, some of the next steps would be, like, here's the dozen or so sites we think might benefit from this process. Some of them are, you know, TI's. Some of them are adding housing. Some of them are bigger reimagines, you know, and kind of break those up into clusters. But I'm not envisioning, actually, a very heavy lift on the front end. There will be some costs as we try to get the conditions of approval right and we try to, you know, get that paperwork in order. you know, I'm not envisioning big consultant contracts or bringing extra.

I mean, is it as simple as a great AI image? And like, everybody's like, yeah, let's do that.

It is.

And then you do in like the paperwork afterwards and say, this is what the city envisions.

It is. And I, that's a really great point. So what you are seeing is what would be characterized in the planning world as photo Sims. They're not architectural renderings, you know, of exact details of cornices and windows and all that sort of stuff, which, really doesn't have to happen at the entitlement stage. That could really happen actually at the building permit stage. So what you're talking about is a series of photo sims and these new tools now that are available to staff and other folks who might be helping us to invest and to do those things. In the past, no one would have ever even thought that was available. You would have had to hire an architect just to develop photo sims. And our custom process now, our normal process now, we are heavily reliant on architects and having all these architectural details and all of these sort of things figured out. when we're just not accustomed saying, yeah, give us some really great photo sims and generally do these things this way. Because again, a lot of times they're coming to us in a somewhat adversarial relationship, guessing it to what we want and not obeying our architectural guidelines. And so it starts off on a slightly sideways foot to begin with. So there's not a great amount of trust here. The comments that we're going to get about the ideas we put forward are going to be from the Planning Commission and the Council and the public, but they're not adversarial, and there's no boogeyman as far as a developer to kind of throw under the bus. So there will be comments, and we can craft those conditions of approval. But yeah, the information in those packets isn't going to be 300 sheets of architectural plans and . It will be much smaller with those AI tools.

Let's photo sim the whole corridor.

Thank you very much That's exactly what we're talking about vice mayor Yes, I just wanted to follow up on on the cost-benefit analysis has it or uncertainty is a big issue and Even if we end up with yes, if we take too long to get to yes, that's a downside so the advantage of this process is is If we bog down because there's a lot of community input and a lot of issues back and forth, that's our dime. And it doesn't cost the developer anything. The biggest issue, having talked to developers, sometimes some of them in particular are incredibly bright. And they will tell you that if they have to go out and borrow a lot of money, they have a carrying cost every month. So if it takes you six months to get to yes, and you're paying who knows what every month in interest, that's a huge cost. If, on the other hand, you could say this project has already been approved, so your clock starts the minute you sign the paperwork. Now all of a sudden their carrying cost is kind of their dime. They're going to have to go and figure out how to do it all and resolve the pipeline issues and all that, but they'd do that anyway. So saving them months of time is valuable. Again, like I said, if we get the 29 corridor improvements done, even if we