City Council - Regular Meeting

appointment um so we'll be here in a minute um can we call the roll please council member cooper present mayor wilkinson present council member mark council member carapiet here great we'll move on to city council reports does anybody have anything they would like to update the council uh go ahead you can go just briefly i attended a uh uh

TAM meeting with our Director of Public Works last week. Was it last week, Tony, or week before maybe? Which was updating the respective municipalities on TAM's work with Caltrans in relation to updating the interchange between Tiburn Boulevard and Blythedale and Mill Valley. It's a long-term project. It's one of three interchanges that is being funded at the evaluation stage currently. It's about a 10-year project, ultimately through implementation, if in fact it gets implemented. The task we were asked to comment on initially at this meeting was advancing a few different three, as it turns out, options that would go to the next level of environmental and design review. Is that right, Tony? That's right. And I'm just checking because it was surprisingly technical as far as the various levels of Caltrans review or review required for Caltrans. And They include basically potentially widening the overpass and adding a multi-use pathway and or perhaps separating a multi-use pathway as a separate bridge across the highway there still to be determined. A great deal of the direction will be determined based on the environmental review and the type of condition they find the 70-year-old bridge. So it's... long-term prospect, but that was one of the three projects interchanges that they deemed worthy of upgrade. Thank you.

Thank you. I attended the Belvedere Tiburon Emergency Preparation Preparedness Council, formerly known as the Belvedere Tiburon Joint Disaster Advisory Council. So they changed their name to make it easier and I still can't get it right. And Beth, we're gonna have to update our website with the new title. We heard a presentation from Stephen Torrance of the Office of Emergency Management. And he was questioned extensively from the group about why no one on the Tiburon Peninsula received any alerts during the flooding, which seems like forever ago now since it's been so dry weather. But he responded that Caltrans and Highway Patrol didn't share any of that information with his office so he had no way of knowing what was happening in larkspur and um in that area so they're now working with how to get first responders to let them know what's happening so they can send out the alert to alert marin if you're signed up He did remind the group that Alert Marin is the official notification system for Marin County, so please sign up. But there are some communities who use Nixle, and Nixle provides very local problems or issues that might be coming up. However, some of the Nixle localities, I think it was maybe Corte Madera and Larkspur, did send out notification. So those people knew that there was flooding on highway 101. We can sign up as onto Nixle, but what you'd have to do is sign up to get alerts from some other community because Tiburon and Belvedere do not provide Nixle updates at all. So if you wanted to know what's happening at the freeway, I signed up for Mill Valley and Corridor Madeira. You sign up by zip code. So I signed up for those two thinking that in case of another flood, maybe they would send something out if, Alert Marin didn't. But I just want to remind everyone that Nixle has nothing to do with Tiburon or Belvedere. So it should be only considered a secondary alert system with Alert Marin as the primary one for our area.

Why do some communities use it and we don't?

Marin County moved off of it. Certain communities are still paying. Everbridge is the company that does it. And so we have not contracted with Everbridge. Neither has Tiburon. I don't know who else has it and who doesn't. So anyway, he wanted to underscore that he felt that was an issue with communication. They're working on the communication And in the future, Alert Marin will click in and be able to cover those things. And anyway, the other thing I realized is that those meetings are recorded through Zoom. So I wondered if they can be added to our website and then people could listen to the meeting because there was this particular one had a lot of great information and we met the new fire hire that they had and There's going to be great updates on all the fire issues coming at the next meeting. So if we can have them on our website, it would be great. Thank you.

I also attended the January meeting of TAM and it was there, one of the action items was to vote on a reduction of Measure AA funds that we receive for roads. TAM's come up with a new idea of allocating the money. Every city received a 18% reduction in their funds. I voiced my opinion that that reduction, which worked out to just under 10,000 this year for our town while it's not huge, it is a big portion of our budget. We only get 65,000 and we're down to 56 something and change. And so I voiced our opinion that we get no, we have received no funds for a big infrastructure project that we're facing. We received no local state or federal funding. and that we've had to save and put off other projects in order to raise this $4.6 million. And that I thought it was a bit unfair for the smaller communities with the smaller budgets, ours, was 11, now it's 15, to take that kind of a hit over the long run, especially if that amount is raised. I did receive some support from Stephanie Moulton-Peters that she felt there should be a way to preserve the reduction for Belvedere. And I also spoke for Ross at the time. So they're in with the tiny towns. I'm not sure that it's gonna help. It was open for a 10 day public comment period, and it's gonna be coming back for a vote. So I just want to report that I did sort of state that we weren't happy with that reduction. And I also mentioned that we spend three to 400,000 a year for our roads and we only get 65,000. And then we had our Be Ready Belvedere committee meeting. And we decided that this year our focus is on sheltering in place. And as our plans develop, I'll report them to council. Thank you.

Thanks, Pat. For the record, Council Member Burke has joined. Do you have any updates?

Sure. Just one quick update. I attended the ranch meeting. board meeting in January. And in that meeting, the primary focus was review and approval of the 26-27 budget. And in case folks don't know, excuse me, let me turn my sound up. Jessica Hoschkiss and her team do an extraordinary job of managing the ranch and the programs. And the budget they proposed for this coming fiscal year is quite robust, it's balanced, and will support a number of programs across a variety of different categories, including youth, adult, tennis, special events. And then I thought it was also interesting to note that when looking at participation by the community year over year, participation was up fairly significantly fall 24 versus fall 25. So again, I think Jessica and her team deserve quite a bit of credit for continuing to manage the ranch so well.

Thank you. I will just give a brief update on MCE, which is in the middle of pretty protracted budget discussions. As I think I mentioned last month, we are significantly more expensive than PG&E right now, about $30 per month on a total bill basis. And the staff team there has recommended pretty aggressive cuts in rates so that we will still be above, but somewhere between $8 and $18 a month more expensive than PG&E, which is still the biggest bill gap we will have ever seen. I am certainly advocating to reduce that as much as possible. And through both a reduction in energy costs, overheads, and the attribute purchases that MCE has been buying. I don't know what the outcome will be, and I will report that out at the next council meeting. I guess we'll go to public comment. There are no hands raised. Okay, thank you. We will move on to the city manager report.

Yes, thank you, Mayor Wilkinson. I'll start off with a reminder that the council retreat is scheduled for the 23rd of this month, starting at noon. The meeting will be hosted downstairs in the community center. We'll be discussing several topics, a few of those being the budget and upcoming capital projects for next fiscal year. There'll be a presentation on preparing for the 2050 general plan, and there'll also be an update on the police department staffing. This meeting is open to the public. The community will be able to join either in person or remotely, so lots of options there. We hope you can make it. REGARDING MALLARD POINT, I DID WANT TO PROVIDE A BRIEF UPDATE ON A COUPLE RECENT DEVELOPMENTS. AT THE PLANNING COMMISSION HEARING ON FEBRUARY 2, THE COMMISSION CONSIDERED SEVERAL REQUESTS FROM THE DEVELOPER. THE COMMISSION ULTIMATELY DENIED THE REQUEST TO MODIFY THE TIMING OF THE APARTMENT BUILDING CERTIFICATE OF OCCUPANCY RELATIVE TO THE UNITS ON SITE. HOWEVER, THE COMMISSION DID APPROVE THE OTHER REQUESTS. THOSE INCLUDED AN EXTENSION OF THE DESIGN REVIEW APPROVAL an extension of the timeframe to complete demolition following issuance of a demolition permit and minor design modification, a minor design modification. That design change converted a fourplex into a triplex and add an additional unit to the apartment building. Importantly, none of these approvals resulted in the reduction in the number of affordable units or a change in the project's entitlements under housing law. Also, please be aware that last week staff received an email from the developer indicating that they have issued 180 day notices to vacate the existing tenants as required under SB 330. As a reminder, Senate Bill 330 is a state housing law that, among many things, prevents displacement without adequate notice and protections. In this case, it requires advance notice to tenants before redevelopment can proceed. This ensures tenants have sufficient time to plan and relocate. Staff is reviewing these notices with our attorney and relocation specialists to confirm compliance with state requirements. And then finally, I wanted to highlight that the shoreline cleanup work below Beach Road has been completed. You may recall a recent budget allocation for this mid-year project. The work was necessary in response to an enforcement action from BCDC last fall. Late last month, contractors removed 37,000 pounds of concrete debris from the beach. that slipped down the hillside. I'm glad to report that BCD reps were on site during the cleanup and were happy and satisfied with the effort. Staff are now working with that agency to close out the project and appeal any fines from BCDC should they choose to levy them. That's all I have for now. I'm happy to take questions.

Does anybody have questions?

Oh, okay. So my question is regarding the tenant relocation. that you mentioned in your report and to my knowledge, the city doesn't have an agreement set up yet and which would be the affordable housing agreement and I guess the relocation benefits should they be necessary for certain tenants. So I was wondering if perhaps we could have a short report at the retreat on where we are with hiring a relocation specialist what that entails, what are the details we need to iron out with the developer and what can we expect going forward. I think having gotten several calls from renters over the weekend who were pretty devastated, this is very serious for them and it is for all of us here. They belong to our community and they love Belvedere. So yeah, I would just like to know, we do have the affordable housing agreement listed in both the design review resolution as well as the demolition resolution. So I'm realizing it's important piece we have to get done before anything else moves forward.

No, thank you for that comment. And I'll discuss it with our planning director, whether or not it's the retreat or earlier than the retreat, we'll have a report, some information ready.

Great.

Thanks.

Thank you. Any other questions?

Yeah. Robert, at the last week's planning meeting, there was a question about the city's, I think Sandy Didell asked it, longstanding policy of not issuing demo permits without a building permit. And that wasn't answered at the meeting who sort of said we'd look at it going forward. I just want to remind Rebecca and you that I think the public needs an answer to that or should have an answer to that because I think the plan is right now to probably issue a demo permit for a building permit. And I think we should have a response to our longstanding policy if in fact it is a longstanding policy or if it's just a tradition or if it's a custom.

Okay.

Thank you. Thanks for the reminder.

Can I just add something? Because I have refreshed my memory on Mallard Point and listened to many hours of video. And the demo beforehand. I don't know if it officially was a waiver, but it was something that was definitely discussed. And there was a reason why they needed the demo first, before they got the building permit. And it was something that that was allowed through the Planning Commission, we were advised by legal counsel that it was something we needed to do. So it is was an exception.

Okay, I'm getting the nod from Rebecca. So we'll look into that and get back to the council.

Okay, let's open up for public for public comment. Mayor Wilkinson, I see no hands raised. Perfect. In that case, we're going to move on to the consent calendar. The consent calendar consists of items that the city council considers to be routine or council has discussed previously and do not require further discussion. Unless any item is specifically removed by any member of the city council, the consent calendar will be adopted by one motion. Council will take public comment on all items on the consent calendar when the calendar is called. Would anybody like to remove any items? No. Should I open for public comment? I see none. Wait, can I get a motion?

I can move that the consent calendar 4A to 4E be accepted as drafted.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Perfect. Okay, we're going to do a little reshuffle here, if that's okay with the rest of the council. We are going to be moving up items 6A and then 6C before the public hearings, just because they should be brief items. And so unless anybody disagrees, I'd like to move ahead with that. Great. In that case, we're moving on to... which is now to receive the priorities report of the parks, open spaces and lanes committee and provide direction to staff and the committee. And we have our chair, Charles Harrington. Welcome, go ahead.

to reiterate that I'm very grateful to be here. The parks, open spaces and lanes committee, we're a group, a rotating group, cast of characters even, who really care about Belvidere's open spaces and lanes. And we are regular citizens and I've been a part of this committee for two years. And it's been a delight and a pleasure to become a steward for Belvidere community. And today, we will be fulfilling one of our three duties. And I'll go through this letter now. It's written here, it's in the agenda. But we meet four times a year and our purview effectively is to There it is, there it is at the end of the day, the parks, recreation, open space map for the city of Philadelphia. So blue spaces are recreation, the lanes are red, so visual easements, viewing areas, Great. So we have three responsibilities under this general guidance of the vision statement of Belvedere, which I put in a bold box here, which is to preserve the special and unique sense of place of Belvedere while allowing changes that would enhance the community. So our three responsibilities in addition to meeting regularly is to provide this annual recommendations letter. I think recently Great. So in this slide I'll recap what our 2025 priorities and results were. So last year we reset our prioritization approach. We decided to come up with what we were calling specific, clear, strategic, and actionable recommendations. I think in previous years there was a larger list of these things. And we had two last year. The first was to develop an ADA-accessible viewing platform at Pardes View. And the second was to continue supporting Lane's development, maintenance, and repairs, including Centennial Park. So I'll now go through an update on progress that was made last year on each of those two lanes. So first on the ADA-accessible on finalizing the funding approval and then we'll be going to design and engineering those are the final steps before construction of that project and talking to city staff that's anticipated to be completed in this summer so um that's the update there on artist view i guess at this point i can stop for questions should i go through everything okay next uh on lanes development lanes development maintenance and repairs this has been a long-standing priority for the concrete steps and new seating area this was featured in the bell of your breeze my daughter and i were sitting on the bench chair uh really great deal and then on woodland lane there were some more I'm excited to share an update on that. As I get into that, last year, we established a lane subcommittee, which was meant to conduct a study on lane status and safety to outline the strategic opportunities. And we looked past, and it seems like this committee produces this report every five to 10 years. And I've even uncovered something that looked like it was written in a typewriter that was immensely helpful. And so we've done the 2025 version of that. And it was really quite fun going around with, committee member Maria Gershom, my daughter, exploring the lanes, documenting them, taking photos, and the report, while still preliminary, we presented it to city staff in the middle of the year, and this informed city staff's prioritized list of repairs for next year. So that study, it documents the current state, including a focus on public usability, overall conditions, There's lots of street lighting that we have updates on potential water access and other attributes. And I have some example outputs for the lanes in Appendix B. And I'd love to show that to those appendices before I go to the key findings. So rather than show a spreadsheet now, which I don't think would be good viewing material, I made and this is also part of the spreadsheet that we have. I realize this is also very hard to read. But you'll see attributes like the city's number, the view feedback was that they're all amazing, with the exception of some trees and tree work that are either way. And here we're looking at Belvedere weather. So you'll note that the overall condition is a little bit lower. Landscaping condition is lower. It's been noted even in recent planning commissions that the retaining wall is bulging a little bit. Here I'd highlight, this is a good way at a glance to see, okay, there's some orange right here. This could be something that we should take a look at. Whereas the view here is amazing. So if we go to the next one, Beth. through four different lanes as a snapshot. Unnamed lane 21. Does anyone know which one that is? Not on beach. It is on Corinthian Island. Yeah, unnamed 21. Greens across the board. Really cool. This is the one on the southwest corner that I believe is above Corinthian Yacht Club. There's a little no public access thing right there, but it goes down to a little beach. And we tried to pull in some interesting things about the history and the potential for that lane. Um, and I think what we've done here is we've left some further areas for investigation, but it was nice to document that as this. That's one that when I look at that list in exhibit six, and there's probably seven or eight that are unnamed with a, with a number next to them, it's really hard to know what that is. And hopefully this is now at the very least a way to connect unnamed lane 21 with some key facts and even the marine map. Can I go to the next one, please? Albert's Alley. Okay. So Albert's Alley, that is, uh, A really, I think, great lane I walked down tonight that is on beach and that ducks down to the strip there. And you'll note here there is no sign whatsoever. The view's pretty great. The stairs have some opportunities for improvements and things like that. So that's another key insight that you can extract by looking at the data in a snapshot. And then the last one I'll highlight, Bogota Lane. I think Bogota Lane gets a really good mark here. I know that last year there was but the view condition is a little bit lower there's a bench about i don't know 50 stairs up 20 stairs up on the left there and it's blocked by some overgrown tree work and you'll see in the later report looking at something like this this is how we work with uh the city to identify opportunities for improvements uh looking at glass like this okay great thank you guys so there's more you could um if i were to share this or this would be more easily shareable with you you could click around and explore that i think it's quite fun Okay, great. So the key findings from this. There are a lot of maps in addition to exhibit six. I think there's also exhibit five and probably exhibit seven. There's probably four or five different maps. So we work together to consolidate resources and we try to classify them as whether or not they were usable or active. that we could see that ever be sort of resumed into a lane where there are some lanes that are not currently used right now, but we see them as potentially having opportunities for future investments should that be a priority in the future. We say that we would focus our resources on those ones that are both usable, that means active lanes that we all know and love, and also potentially those other lanes that if we want to prioritize that in the future could be improved. to water access and evacuation while five of the usable lanes have water access the only one that is open to the public right now is harry v allen's staircase um there are some potential ones two of those we we've seen as sort of unuseful uh inactive and the two of them um development could be improved i'd say albert's alley is one and um unnamed lane 21 could be another one that So we have prioritized our 2026 findings here. First thing I would say before I get to our top recommendation, our top half for the reason we're here today, in addition to giving us update, we have your four bullet points.

Yeah, sure. Thanks, Charlie. Good evening, council members. The survey is very useful because it's nicely laid out in software that we already use. So it's ideal. There's also a great scoring system and you can see very quickly where the deficiencies are in the lanes in each of the different categories. So We're usually very concerned with safety. And so that's usually our top priority. And I think by identifying the worst lanes in the survey by the scores that were provided by the committee, we were able to very quickly see where work needed to be done. So we're going to be doing handrail repair or replacement at Lower McLean, Upper McLean, and Corinthian. Concrete stairs repairs at a list of lanes to Lower Cedar, Lower Woodland, Upper Woodland, Corinthian. And for some of these, there will be some probably further investigation needed. The different grades between flights of stairs means that what's existing is often not built to code. And so there's not always a simple solution. But we're definitely going to be looking into what we can to advance these repairs. Signage repair and replacement. I'm aware that this has been traditionally, each of the signs has been painted by members of the community and we would definitely want to continue that tradition. So we're working with the committee and with the community to continue that. Tree work, yep, as Charlie mentioned, there are a few sites where we are aware of plums in particular falling into the lane and we're wanting to get that cleaned up properly by removing the trees. um so we're going to be working on that um it's not always clear when it's not fruiting season where those spots are but um yep so that's that's an and then and then other vegetation work is is kind of ongoing but um it's also good to be able to um highlight where um views would be enhanced uh with with tree work so um yep all in all very useful and also that it's a kind of a living document. It's not a once-off survey. I think the scores can be changed in there. So once we've made the repairs and improvements, we can change the scoring for each of those categories and hopefully raise the overall score for all of the lanes. Thank you, Tony.

Yeah, I think that's an excellent point.

Some of this previous work had to go to the Landmark Society to sort of take out these previous reports. So our intention is for this to act as a living document tracker. And the other thing I'd highlight about these every single day while we did the research into unnamed lane 21 and other things our focus for repairs and maintenance is on the lanes that are in use and active today which is really important for us okay but now we get into our specific clear strategic actionable recommendation uh continuing the theme from last year we'd love to get your feedback and work with you on developing some form of a public-facing downloadable map that you could pin up in your garage or something like that. And we want to explore this mapping effort with D-Ready Delta here. We know that that's active and ongoing. There's also the Tipperine Fire District that's looking into this. And if you need it, there's a resource that we could work with you on that the city stood behind that could be given out at that summer barbecue or maybe be sold in the library. I know I picked up this, the Mill Valley Library. This is a very similar Mill Valley steps, lanes, and paths map. that they give out to their community members. And it'd be really great if we could take the survey that's currently, we need to keep up to date and living and make an improvement. And I'd love to get your feedback on whether or not there have been thoughts about that. I heard mention of the 2050 Belvedere plan. Maybe this could be a resource that our committee could do for city, for the city council to prepare for that in some way. And then finally, I'll close with looking beyond 2026. We're planning to extend our survey to the other Key items on Exhibit 6. So last year we focused on the lanes, but we'd love to go through the open spaces and parks. We'll do an index of those.

One of those here is, I'll mention it in a minute, like Sunset Park. It's an open mini park.

There's lots of little open spaces that we'd love to have a similar level of rigor and analysis on just for information. So a couple of bullet points here. Activating inactive lanes. We expect to talk and look into whether or not some of those inactive lanes could be ever improved for recreation or emergency evacuation. We expect that to be a topic that may come up in future meetings. Another topic that we expect to be talking about, Centennial Park. Longstanding issue that we've discussed with City Council, in addition to the stair repair

possibly looking into weather savvy planting grants and overall community engagement. This is a key open space opportunity for us to make some investment in and talk about for a while we expect

This is one that we've talked about a little bit more that could need a little bit of extra attention, maybe not 2026 per se, but we could start looking into improvements there. Incredible views, key evacuation and recreation uses. This is probably the one that I see the most runners, bicyclists, walkers on. It's got those two, it's got very good opportunity for evacuation, which is no surprise, but it's got those sort of dilapidated barriers there. Maybe we could look into that. We'll continue to investigate this. This comes up. We often receive letters from the community about this. Tiburon's also reached out to us about water access and things like that. So we expect that those things may come up and we will talk about that, but not necessarily a priority from our committee for 2026. So I will close with one last comment.

Charlie, thank you so much. Stay where you are. Does anybody have questions for Charlie, first of all?

Thank you, Charlie, and your committee for all the work you've done this year. It's very helpful, I'm sure, for our Public Works Department. But it's great that our citizens are out there doing some work for us. And we all appreciate that. When you talked about your map and you said you could click around, did you say that map is online that we can go look at that map? No, not yet.

It's a spreadsheet.

Oh, it's a spreadsheet. I emailed it to Tony. Oh, okay.

But I think it'd be very easy to just potentially add it as a section.

Yeah. So, and I also want to congratulate you on your successful fund run and fund raising that you did this weekend. It's very impressive. So thank you for all you do for this community.

Any other questions? Nope. Okay. Let's open this for public comment. I see no hands raised. Okay. Let's bring this back for discussion or any direction for Charlie and his team.

I can start, just thank you again. I'll second what Pat said about the parks, our parks and space seem to have a wonderful steward in you and your committee. So thank you for that. I think your 2026 recommendation, increasing the publicity and the documentation and the outreach to the community is wonderful, both on the website and in literature. And thank you. I look forward to seeing that. And I was joking today, your map needs some graphic upgrades that Kevin and I can probably help you with at some point. But I look forward to that. I would also encourage certainly, I mean, certainly the active... activating inactive lanes in the Centennial Park. But, I mean, Belvedere Way is certainly a, you know, clearly gem in the rough that has the real estate, the land, the, you know, perhaps regrading in some form. But it's certainly the area that has an opportunity, both, as you said, from a practical operational evacuation route, but just a scenic, you know, wonderful spot for people to recreate as well. So I'd encourage, like, the longer-term look at that, but certainly... Keep that active. Thank you.

Yeah, I would add the thanks that both Pat and Peter just said to you and the committee. I think it's really impressive with what you're doing. And I would just underscore the work that you're doing in terms of opening the inactive lanes, especially as it relates to providing water access. I mean, that's something that really, It's just crazy that we live on an island and it's so hard to get to the water. And so I think that would be extraordinary. I know you have a lot on your plate, but I'm excited to see that on the list of things that you're looking into in the future.

I always look at these old pictures of people who are playing along.

Yeah, exactly.

I think in the future we're very excited.

Yeah, that'd be amazing.

I think my only comment is for everyone to realize why I won't give up this committee because it's so much fun. Charlie's great to work with. And as you were talking, I did remember about Belvedere Way that when, Rebecca, when I think it's 101 Belvedere Way, that's 103 Belvedere Way. Sorry. Oh, three Belvedere way. Okay. That's right. Three. That when they came to the planning commission, there was acknowledgement on the owner's part that they would have their architect reach out to parks, open space and lane, or is it you that would handle it? We just don't want to forget that because there'd be no point in us putting a lot of effort into it as they're tearing everything up. And also the, It seemed to me that the new owner was willing to work with the city to figure out some ways to help improve that while he's under construction.

Yeah, there was a condition of approval put on the project that they would check the or monitor the structural integrity of that long retaining wall that goes up Belvedere Way, as well as sort of look into replacing some of those railings. Great. I just didn't want to forget that.

I know.

Okay, great. Thank you. Thanks, Charlie. And Charlie, I would just add, I mean, I really appreciate the increased focus of your committee, meaning in the past it used to be loosey-goosey wanting a million things. And this idea of staying very focused on a few projects has been really successful. And it feels like this year is sort of a slow down year to get everything completed before you launch into the next round. So I guess

the only question i didn't ask was whether there's a budget request for this year and whether you know what that is yet or we're just rolling over funds from prior years maybe i haven't been on i was okay maybe i was turned off i believe there's an allocation for the lanes maintenance and repairs that was made each year and i believe the plan that we've identified here is just within that budget request is that accurate tony

Yeah, at this point, certainly all the repairs that I have listed, I envisage being funded from the existing allocation. Okay, that's great.

One quick thing. In your survey, I'm not saying add it to your survey, but be aware of it if you're not already. There's that park that's under consideration, that water access from Tiburon at Tiburon Boulevard and Centerfield Avenue, right at the corner there. They're considering, if they still are, Robert, I don't know, but I remember talking to Greg about it, They were considering a water access there, which won't be ours, certainly, but I'd include it in the literature and the documentation, you know, because it's certainly valuable to people in that area of our city.

Absolutely. I just want to say, I want to say thank you to Tony Boyd, Director of Public Works. Your partnership's been amazing. This committee, instrumental. Thank you so much. And I should have opened with that. Thank you, Tony.

And Charlie, I'll just add one more comment on the water access. you're aware there is a community sensitivity around some of these potential attractions. So that I'm sure you're balancing that in terms of recommendations you bring forward. Absolutely.

And largely this is in that category of ongoing discussions and things that will come up in, in, in meetings and things like that. Exactly.

Exactly. I think you've done such a good job in relation to artists view to finding a middle ground and so on things like that is going to be important to be sensitive to the community as well.

Precisely. Thank you.

Thank you very much for your work.

Thank you.

Okay, we're going to move on to 6C. We're moving that up, which is discussion and possible action on a revocable license for private improvements in the public right of way for 10 eucalyptus. I am recused from this item because I live within 500 feet of the property. So I'm going to exit the room and the vice mayor is going to take over.

That's you.

We'll wait to hear out of earshot. So item 60, I believe staff has a report for us.

Vice Mayor Burke and council members, for your consideration this evening is a revocable license application for a new parking pad, guardrail, retaining wall within, and a guardrail and retaining wall within the public right of way for the property at 10 Eucalyptus Road. On June 11, 2025, city staff approved a design review exception to construct an uncovered street level parking pad. The new pad shown shaded yellow here would be eight feet wide by 18 feet long made of concrete on the parking pads north and western sides. The project would include a 42 inch tall guardrail at street level and three foot tall retaining wall below street level. While the proposed parking pad, guardrail, and retaining wall are located entirely on private property and away from the edge of pavement, the city right-of-way extends four feet, three inches onto private property via a 1966 resolution dedicating Eucalyptus Road as a public street. As a result, the applicant is required to obtain a revocable license. Existing improvements include a concrete driveway, landscaping, and public street parking. Here the north elevation shows the proposed parking pad and 42 inch tall guardrail. The pad would include construction of a three foot tall retaining wall below street level to account for the site's downward slope. The portion of the guardrail parking pad and retaining wall encroaching into the right-of-way is shown here in blue. Here is a street view of the approximate location where the proposed parking pad will be located. The rosemary shown on the northern part of the parking pad is proposed for removal. Staff recommends that the findings for the heroic license can be made as the project benefits the public. The existing driveway and parking pad permit creation of three off-street parking spaces to relieve traffic congestion, and the guardrail enhances public safety by providing a barrier between the roadway and the sloping hillside of Eucalyptus Road. Thank you, and we're here to answer any questions you have.

Does anyone in the City Council have questions for staff?

Go ahead. Let me put on my microphone. I had one question, Rebecca. Is there adding an ADU or they have added an ADU? Is that correct?

They have ADU approval.

Approval. And so with that ADU, because it's farther than the half mile to public transportation, is a parking required? Parking space? No, no, no.

The new state law does not require that.

Okay. Thanks.

Any other questions? I'll open up for public comment. Is there anyone in the room online? No hands raised. Great. I'll bring it back to the council for deliberation and or for emotions.

I'd like to make them. I have no discussion. I'd like to make a motion to approve the revocable license for 10 eucalyptus.

I second that.

All those in favor?

Aye.

Motion carries. Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay, we are now moving to our back to the order. So we're on to section five public hearings. And we are moving first to five a appeal of design review approval for 62 Alcatraz Avenue. And here Okay, we will first get the staff report. Okay.

Thank you, Mayor Wilkinson and council members for your consideration is an appeal of the Planning Commission decision on December 16 2025 granting conditional approval of design review for the property located at 62 Hockentrass Avenue. In December 2025, the Planning Commission considered a design review application to replace an existing 36 foot six inch long stone retaining wall with a new concrete retaining wall in the same location. The new wall would have a maximum height of four feet one inch, slightly taller than the existing wall. The applicant proposed constructing the wall with concrete finished with a smooth surface and in a light gray color. During deliberation, one commissioner noted that the existing stone wall lined both sides of the driveway and that replacing one wall with concrete did not fit in the character of the house. The commissioner observed that the use of the concrete would add mass to the wall and act as an extension of the adjacent pink wall at 80 Alcatraz Avenue. The vice chair noted that other walls on Corinthian Island are made of concrete without stone cladding, but ultimately all three commissioners present at the meeting voted to approve the design review with the condition that the proposed retaining wall be cladded with stone to match the existing wall. Whoa.

Okay.

There's a user error there.

And in one moment, please. Oops.

Okay, in support of his appeal, the applicant argues that the concrete retaining wall conforms with the Belvedere Municipal Code sections 20.04.130 and 20.04.140. Regarding 20.04.130, to avoid monotony and impression of bulk, large expanses of any one material, including window glazing on a single plane should be avoided and large single plane retaining walls should be avoided. Vertical and horizontal elements should be used to add architectural variety and break up building planes. The appellant states that the concrete retaining wall is not large compared with other monolithic surfaces on Alcatraz Avenue, and that the concrete wall would reduce the bulk and mass of the stone wall on the other side of the driveway. Staff finds that the 36 foot long, four foot tall wall is a large expense of a single material on a single plane, and therefore would not satisfy the criteria to minimize bulk and mass. And while staff agrees that the surfaces that are concrete exist on Corinthian Island, there are several stone walls as well, and cannot find that the proposed wall is consistent with this design review criterion. regarding BMC 04-140. Materials and colors should blend with the existing landform and vegetative cover. The use of brick, stone, stucco and concrete should be used in moderation. And retaining walls should be wood, stone or concrete. Concrete walls and surfaces should be textured, colored to match adjacent soil or plant color or faced with wood or brick and stone. The appellant states that concrete retaining wall does not contrast with the existing landform and that the surface is common on Alcatraz Avenue. The appellant also states that the concrete, excuse me, is used elsewhere, including both properties adjacent to 62 Alcatraz Avenue. Here are a few images of retaining walls made of concrete on Corinthian Island for your consideration as well. With respect to subsection A, staff finds that the proposed light gray concrete would not blend in with the existing landforms as existing landforms consists of multicolor textured stone. Additionally, due to the length of the wall, the materials would not be used in moderation. And furthermore, subsection E contemplates that retaining walls should be made and faced with another material such as wood, brick, or stone. Staff recommends that the City Council adopt the resolution denying the appeal and uphold the decision by the Planning Commission, approving design review with the condition that the retaining wall is cladded with stone for the property located at 62 Alcatraz Avenue.

Sammy, thanks so much. Do any members of the council have questions for Sammy?

Could you tell me, or do we know, when was BMC 20.04.130 and 140, when were those put in place? The two that we're citing as reasons for, yeah, that are in the staff report. I'm just curious when those.

1980, I guess.

1980 or 89?

That was the last larger revision. I think 89 was the last revision.

Okay. Great. And then would you say those other examples? So there are many examples of the retaining walls that are concrete up Bellevue Avenue. Would you say, how old would you estimate some of those walls are? Gosh. I mean, they don't look very recent, but. Yeah, they're old.

But I don't know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was 89. OK. I don't know what era they were.

OK. All right. Thanks. Oh, I'm sorry. One other, if you don't mind, in 88, it was the same wall was applied to have it also put in concrete, I believe, and that planning commission denied it. So that's something for consideration as well.

Sorry, when was that?

I believe it was 1988. 88. Wow.

Okay, any other questions? Oh, sorry. Go ahead.

Okay. I know this is a big word that we're throwing around, but can you please explain to me what cladding is? What is cladding?

the stone cladding brian's here but i believe that they'll construct the wall out of concrete and then sort of insert stone so you get sort of the mixture of a concrete wall but with some stone it's a it's it's a non-structural stone wall that looks stone but it's actually only um a veneer

Oh, it's like a veneer. And so the concrete becomes like the grout or something like that.

But if it's done well, it does not distinguish itself from a stone wall.

They just did one across the street from 62 Alcatraz. Maybe Sammy, pull it up right now. We can show you a picture.

Okay. And then in that cladding, do you use... the big rocks or they sort of cut one or something?

I think they're smoother, sort of more manufactured stone. They don't look like that old Belvedere stone.

Okay, thanks.

Just out of curiosity, the new wall is four feet, one inch, and it's a little bit taller. How much is a little? Because there was no measurement there.

Yeah.

Do you know six inches a foot, something like that?

Chris, the appellant might be able to give exact, but it looked like it was like maybe six inches, six to eight inches.

Thank you. So Rebecca, so will it, if it's clad, Will it look like the rest of it as you go around the corner? Will it look like what exists there currently as you go up the driveway?

No, if you look at your screen where Sammy's pointing the arrow, that's a fairly newer stone-clad wall.

But could you make it with... Can the rocks be other shapes that it fit with the rest of the... Yeah, there's lots of options. Oh, okay. There's lots of options, okay.

Sammy, just, I'm sorry.

Go ahead.

Just to clarify, I assume this is the case, but this is a repair for a wall failure. This isn't an aesthetic choice.

That's correct. Thank you.

Okay. If there's no other questions, I will open the public hearing. And so we should have the appellant's team, Christopher Mosher, presenting. Good evening. So you have up to 10 minutes to present. I'll give you a one-minute warning beforehand, if necessary.

My name is Chris Goldner. Chris, is the green light on on your mic? Is the green light on? Perfect. If it's on, yeah.

Just be a little closer if you could.

Oh, good.

Not really, is it?

Is it on?

Okay.

They use it to record the minutes.

Oh, that one is pretty good. Is it better? Yeah.

Lots of green things. Although you have a great speaking voice without it.

There it is. Do you switch these or do I switch these? Okay. Okay. So what we'd like to do is put in a retaining wall to replace the rock wall that's falling down right now. And the... The design of this wall is mostly structural. The rock wall that aligns the driveway is on the side of the driveway. So it's distinct from this area, which is down alongside of the road. So as you go up the driveway, there is a rock wall on both sides of the driveway. And so we went, talked to planning, and so now we're here. And what we'd like to do is look at the standards that are being applied and just ask that we'd be given the same consideration that our neighbors are as far as what planning approval is given to a wall on Corinthian Island. So what we're looking at is, as Sammy said, the large single-plane retaining walls should be avoided, minimize structural or structured visual impact, blend easily with the landscape and wood stoner concrete and if it's concrete that it should be textured. So that's on the next page. The standards and then let's jump to these are some of the walls that are on the island. This is the one next door and this one's got to be newer than 89 because Tony who's going to do our wall did that wall too. So I don't I'm not sure exactly what the date is on that one but that one's starts at four foot one on the on the left side and goes taller than four foot one so that's one of them that's on the other side the north side of the property um 54 alcatraz and um this one is down on the corner on bellevue this is quite a bit longer than ours this has got to be 100 feet long and um about four feet high This one is farther down. This is across the street from 79 Bellevue. This is taller than ours, probably five, almost six feet tall, this one. This one doesn't have the distinct colors that the other ones have. And this has a textured finish like a stucco wall. This one is an older wall. It's got a board form, but this is even taller. It's six foot six. And this is down across the street from 61 Bellevue. And if we keep going around on Bellevue, this is farther down, brighter color here. This is 30 something Bellevue. And slope, this one's about 10 feet high. It goes all the way up to the fence up at the top there. And as we keep going around, it's a little bit shorter. This is about six feet tall, 27 Bellevue. This is a board form wall. It looks like they didn't have a vibrator when they did the concrete on this one, but. This one looks like shotcrete. So this has got a shotcrete textured finish. I can't read that. 11 Bellevue. So that's down a little bit further. Just about every house down there has got a similar kind of a situation. And as we keep going around, this is number 7 Bellevue down near the bottom. And it wraps up into the driveway. And this one's got a bit more of an architectural situation going on at the top, but quite a bit taller than ours. This older one, 1 Alcatraz. I'm not even sure if this is in Bellevue anymore. I don't know where the line is. I know it's on the back. on the back of our property, but it goes through here somewhere. So this is one Alcatraz. And this one's probably in Tiburon, but 74 east view. That's behind that vegetation there. That's about a six, seven foot high shotcrete wall. And this one, this is probably in Tiburon too, but down towards the end of east view. And a couple of doors down, 84 east view. It's a pretty tall concrete wall. The other thing that I wanted to talk about that was relevant to the neighbors particularly, because Martin went around and talked to the neighbors. But this is a pretty big project. It's going to take storing the stone up at the top of the driveway to do this, because it will have to close Alcatraz Avenue in order to get this done. So the wall would take a week to shoot with shotcrete. And then this process here will take about two weeks. And that would require shutting the road down every day. So it's quite an imposition on our neighbors to ask them to go through three weeks of having the road shut down. And so you can see it's cost of it too. But closing the road too, we got price for that. That was close to $20,000 to shut the road every day for two weeks with people out there all day. So just from a public safety standpoint and the convenience of our neighbor's standpoint, we're resistant to doing that for three weeks down there. So as you go down, you can see how the wall alongside the driveway remains rock on both sides of the driveway wall. This wall is down adjacent to Alcatraz Avenue. So it's visually distinct from the rock wall as it goes up the driveway and probably more in common with the bright pink wall of whatever color that is on the house next door. So that's it.

It's rare that people finish before their time. So thank you for that. Do any council members have any questions?

I'll ask the question I asked staff because they weren't quite sure. So the increase in height is, I mean, it graduates with the road, because there was no measurement as to what was existing. I'm just curious, not that it matters.

On the right side, on the picture you're looking at, it's the same as that wall over on that side. On this side, it's about six inches higher than that wall. And the reason is, it's not because we like a taller wall, but it's just that's what's necessary to keep the soil behind it. Because right now, the rocks are falling out of the top of the wall, but the soil is pouring over the top of the wall. So just to keep, and it's pretty steep right there too. So to keep the water from pouring over the top of the wall, we had to make it a little taller. I'd love to make it shorter.

No, no, no. I'm not questioning the height in the end. It's just my old planning commission days coming out and saying what was the existing height and what's the new height. So I was just curious how much, and when I looked at it, I figured it was about six to maybe eight inches, something like that.

Thank you.

Any other questions?

Jane?

Hi, thank you for your report or presentation. I was a little confused. It sounds as though doing the cement wall would be three weeks to have that get done. But I thought in your report, it said that adding any kind of cladding would increase construction time, and I just wondered why you thought that the cladding would make such a big difference.

Actually, this goes back to your earlier question. Either way, we do a concrete wall, and it's the same. It just depends where you put the concrete wall. That concrete wall takes a week to do. You build a false wall behind the concrete wall, and then you shoot the concrete wall in front of that. then you either clad it or it stays shotcrete. Shotcrete and concrete are pretty much the same thing. But if you clad it, you build the concrete wall back four inches from the finished plane of the wall. Or if you do it in concrete, you build that up forward. But to your question, the concrete wall or shotcrete wall, that takes a week. The cladding it is the extra two weeks. So that's where the three weeks comes from. Oh, we shut it down for a week, either way, either way to do the concrete wall, and then we either clad it or it's done.

And you, you have a contractor that told you that that was the timing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He did the pink wall next door. He didn't make it pink, but he shot the wall next door.

Okay.

Okay. Thanks.

Anything else? My only question was your opposition to doing the cladding is just expense and time, presumably, or is it a cosmetic choice as well?

No, no. I, you know, I, the trouble with, with doing, when you clad a wall, it looks different every time you do it, you do, you know, you can see that thing across the street, a little corner of it. It just doesn't look the same. And this is going to look different too. As far as, As far as any other considerations besides time, it's probably the biggest one. Expenses is also a consideration. I just don't, it's just not gonna be as uniform as we would hope it to be, even if you put stone on the face of the wall. It'll be a different, it will be distinguishable. HAB-Jacques Juilland- hard to make it exactly the same. HAB-Jacques Juilland- You can see already that what was done up the driveway is different than what was original out on the street those are quite different and then, if you did something else on the street, it will look different.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- Thank you when when was that other wall, you know.

HAB-Jacques Juilland- You know when that got done up the driveway. HAB-Jacques Juilland- it's it's been there for a while it's been I don't I never saw that going so I don't know.

Okay, let's open this for public comment if there is any. Do you mind coming up to the mic? Yeah, thanks. Do you mind just identifying who you are as well?

Hi, I'm Martin Plant. Actually, I went to school in this building a long time ago. So I'm from Belvedere. I've lived in that house for about 30 years. And one of the main things, as you all know, is getting blocked by construction on Corinthian Island. It's a nightmare. And this will take two to three extra weeks. And that's why I went around to all the neighbors and said, do you want this? And they don't want it. They don't want the time that it will take for us to finish the wall. the extra time to put the cladding on there. And I would like to express my wishes that you do not ask us to put the cladding there because it will drive all the residents crazy. And I think it looks fine.

Great. Thank you for your comment.

Thank you.

Can I can I just ask you one question, please? You can ask me, gee, you just said that you went around to all the neighbors, but did you give us anything that shows them signing off on anything or letters that they give them a piece of paper?

I did you give it to us? I mean, to be mailed to to I think that's what was included, right? To be mailed to the city for their And so George Noss called me and he said, bring the pictures in. He agrees that nobody wants to get blocked access to their house. I don't know if I answered your question.

Did we receive any of those letters in? No.

What?

Staff did not receive any.

The staff didn't receive any letters. So we have no knowledge that your neighbors would prefer the concrete wall to the cladded wall. That message did not come through. Thank you.

I'll work on that.

Thank you so much. Okay, let's take this back to the council. Are there any additional questions of staff? Nope. In that case, if the appellants team would like to make any further comment, you have up to an extra five minutes if there's anything extra that you'd want to add. Nope. Great. Beth? Mayor Wilkinson, just for the record, there are no hands raised. Okay. Did I forget to ask for public comment?

On Zoom.

On Zoom. Sorry. Thank you. In that case, we will close the public hearing and we'll bring this back for deliberations and a decision. Who would like to kick off? Ernie? Jane, you start.

Okay. So I listened to the December 16th Planning Commission meeting. I did visit the site and read the material that was submitted and presented by both the owners and the staff. And I wish that if you had gotten... if there were letters from neighbors, it would have been nice for us to see them before tonight, but that didn't happen. So it's going to be difficult to take that into consideration. I do know from other friends that live on that street that PG&E has done a real job there over and over again. And the street is torn up all the time and is very difficult for people living there. So I'm sure the idea of adding a couple of weeks of work on if indeed it would take that much time is not anything welcome on Corinthian Island. I would definitely agree with that. Unfortunately for me, I just see that as I walked up the whole island, I looked at all the concrete walls, most of them are really unattractive, they're stained, they're broken around the rebar, there's holes. And really, you're suggesting a concrete wall to replace the beauty of the stone walls that exist everywhere else on that property. And I know that you showed images of other homes with painted either, I don't know if they're sucker or concrete, whatever they are, but the painted retaining wall. but in looking at those, I noted them as well on the walk, and they all match the home, so that wall is not sticking out as an oddity. Normally, the house next to you that's kind of orangey-pink, the whole house is that, and in fact, all the images you showed, or at least the majority of them, those retaining walls were matching the design of the home, not kind of fighting it. I think Corinthian Island has such a unique character and I would have to say that in reading our code, the stone walls that are there on the island are many times older, but they remain charming and visually If I look at our code, it seems that in 20.04.130, a large single plane retaining walls should be avoided. And that seems to fit entirely into that statement. vertical and horizontal elements should be used to add architectural variety, although I wouldn't call a concrete wall architectural variety, I would call the stone wall that. Anyway, so it doesn't seem to me that the proposed retaining wall complies with materials and color requirements from that from our code and cladding the Shaw Creek wall with stone matching I would hope matching the shape and style of the other stone walls would address that code as um oh sorry that's 20.04140 which is the color and um but also E under materials and colors used specifically is written for retaining walls. I would say that some of the other codes actually sound like they're relating to outside of a home when they talk about glazing and other things. But since we have a very specific one about retaining walls, and it does say that... they should be textured, colored, or faced with wood, brick, or stone. So to me, that really designates what our code is saying about this particular project. I also thought that our Belvedere Code 20.04.120 helps define the goals of the city regarding new structures. And it says... there should be a balanced and harmonious relationship among the structures on the site. And I think because this is one parcel and it's one home, that it's important that between all the structures on the site and all the other stone walls that I think adding a cladded wall also fits into this third municipal code. So, yeah. That's my thinking.

Thanks, Jane. Who wants to go next? Peter?

Sure. Let me comment first on the design review findings required. I think that they are specific, but they're designed to be subjective and reviewed by the planning commission and us upon appeal. And I think I could make findings going either way based on the specifics there, the mass and bulk finding that was referenced, I think is ameliorated to a great degree by the adjacent wall and the utilitarian nature of its purpose there. I think that the texture the applicant is following the letter of 140B as far as materials should be textured and so forth. So I only say that just from the perspective that I don't see the findings as a constraint to go either way on this. I think that you can legitimately see them both ways and I do see them both ways. all council members obviously don't need to make that same conclusion, but I do. From an appearance perspective, I do recognize that there are already a number of materials present there in that wall and across from the driveway and either choice here is gonna add a third or even arguably a fourth material to that. that list by material, I mean, a look and a feel, um, they won't be able to match that unless they literally pull down these rocks and rebuild it with those rocks right there, which is a, a task that, um, would add time obviously and expense. I do appreciate the considerations that the applicants, um, is focusing on, um, time, um, disruption to the neighborhood and efficiency from a utilitarian perspective of the wall. And I do strongly believe that the owner's design considerations needs to be taken into account here. That Would I love this to look like the old wall and make it new and functional in the same appearance that it is? I would say yes to that, but I don't know that that's achievable, certainly with the budget and the... I don't want to force an applicant to spend more money than they, than they possibly want to here. So given what they want to spend, how they want to spend their resources, uh, I take seriously their design intent and their interest in this and can make the findings that their wall is acceptable. And, um, I can appreciate the util, the utilitary nature of that and don't, um, especially that it's a repair. This isn't designed as an aesthetic choice. They're making a choice that is most accommodating to the community, most applicable to its purpose. And given the choices from an aesthetic perspective would in fact, I think be the lesser of a few evils if it were to be clad. It could work out great, cladding, but it also could work out sort of like the square cornered one across the street. So I can make the findings for designer view without that condition. So I would, pending further discussion by the council, come down on that side and say hi to Mike. I know him well.

Kevin, do you want to go next?

Sure. I appreciate what Peter just mentioned in terms of balancing the rights of the property owner from a design standpoint and design can oftentimes be subjective. But I think we also have to balance that with the application of the city municipal code and the policy. And for me, it's pretty clear that the code says that concrete walls and other concrete surfaces should be textured color to match adjacent soil or plant colors are faced with wood, brick, or stone. And so I feel like my job is to fairly and equitably apply the code. And so in this case, that's how I would apply it. I would require that the wall meet BMC 20.04.140E. I know I'm empathetic to the fact that there are other concrete walls on the island. My only assumption there is that those walls were either approved before the code existed, or it was a failure on the part of the planning commission or the city in approving those walls. And so I don't want to, you know, continue to make a bad mistake or a misapplication of the code. So that's where my head is at.

Before moving on to Pat, Peter, can you just explain why you think there's nuance in the code that others don't seem to believe there is?

Well, I mean, that specific code says a retaining wall, if covered by concrete, can either be textured or covered with a wood, stone, or brick.

Textured, colored to match adjacent soil or plant color or face with wood, yeah.

I mean, it's textured and they're choosing a color. I argue that color could change, but I don't know that I would want a different color than that, frankly. I think the coloring up there is specific to the homes.

You say tomato, I say tomato.

No, I know. Absolutely. No, but it does say textured and it is textured.

Okay, so thank you very much for your presentation. I also visited the site and when I did, I was envisioning a concrete wall in place of where the stone now exists that's going to be replaced. And my conclusion was, is that I believe the planning commission made the right decision in requiring the cladding of the concrete wall. Even if it's, different than what's there. I think over time it will blend more to what the overall aesthetics of the house is, especially if you could try and match it more to what's on the uphill stone wall side where the house is, because I immediately knew that was a more recent, though not recent in like a couple of years, but it was not of the era of the existing wall being replaced. I also agree that in our code 20.04-140E, it's very specific to retaining walls. And I know that every time we have an applicant apply to planning wanting to replace a stone wall, with a concrete wall, that there's always inks because I know that it's more expensive and it takes more time. But in the end, I think it adds to the character of Corinthian Island and the charm of the house. And I think that a concrete wall would sort of, I think one of the commissioners stated that it would almost seem like an extension, even though it's not the pinky orangey color of, I believe it's 60 or 80 Alcatraz. uh i think that the um having it uh clad um would be a a better choice and so i would um agree more with what um commissioner council members cooper and burke stated and would um uh deny the appeal and uphold the Planning Commission.

Thank you. So I would tend to lean in the favor of Council Member Mark. this is a repair. It isn't a active choice to do this. They're having to do this and they're having to already incur expense. Um, and we're now asking them to incur more expense and more, uh, difficulty for the street as a whole. Um, none of the solutions are ideal. Um, none of them will necessarily fit perfectly, but I'm not sure that a textured wall will be any, um, more harmful than a cladding which will look completely out of place with a stone wall as well. So I struggle with asking the appellant to do more for an outcome that's not satisfactory either. It just feels like a waste of money to me. But it does not sound like we are in the majority. So unless we're able to convince anybody to change their minds, I would ask somebody to make a motion.

Can I ask a question? Is it, I don't disagree with what you're saying if it becomes another different wall, if it, is there a way to condition that the stone cladding as much as possible can be in the same shape. I don't know anything about stone cladding.

Yeah, see, that's the challenging part of, from my perspective, in my experience in the Planning Commission is dictating design choice. I mean, I've always tried to... register disagreements or preferences relative to the design choices presented by the applicant or their architect. To design on behalf of the architect or the applicant, which is frankly what the Planning Commission did by talking about cladding, I'm sure they didn't bring up cladding, is introducing an element that was not their choice, was not their, maybe ever in their bucket of consideration. So that's the concern I have with this is that the planning commission, I won't say arbitrarily, but as a choice decided to design for them, which, I never feel is the planning commission's job. It's their job to say, yes, we approve this or would know we can't make the findings. And if that were the case, you know, homeowner applicants, please come back to us with a choice that fits better with these findings. And that hasn't really happened. So if we're faced with those two choices, that's why I'm falling on this side of that equation, because As our mayor just described, I don't know that that choice is going to be appreciably better. We're imagining a stone wall turning that corner and looking similar to what it looks like today or the stone going up the driveway on the right or across the driveway on the left. I don't think we're going to get that. I think we're going to get closer to what's across the street if they even choose to do it without coming back with something different or something new, which they might choose to do.

So I have a question for staff, sorry.

Yeah, go ahead.

Okay, thank you. Was it the planning commission that decided on the cladding or was it a recommendation by staff to meet the code 20.04140E?

Recommendation by staff. I'm sorry. No, yeah.

Just want to be clear that it wasn't the planning commission, but rather it was a recommendation.

Just for clarification, it started as a design review exception with the planning commission chair. It was planning commission chair's recommendation for the cladding. And so then it got elevated to the planning commission.

So you didn't make that recommendation. It was a planning commission chair.

We made it based on conversation with the planning commission chair.

Maybe you should explain how that works in case someone doesn't understand the process that.

As a design review exception, which is reviewed by the planning commission chair, we send out notices and then on a conversation with staff and the planning commission chair. HAB-Juliette Boone, It got elevated to the planning Commission, I think, and Sammy can probably comment more why it was elevated, but I think it was a greater decision that. HAB-Juliette Boone, Planning Commission chair didn't want to make on his own, and so it was elevated to the Commission level correct me if i'm wrong Sammy actually.

To be fair, we made the recommendation for staff to have it clattered. And then we brought it to Chair Seidel. And actually Chair Seidel could have gone either way himself too when I was talking to him about the project. And then we emphasized the sections of the code. And then he said, well, okay, then let's bring it to the full planning commission for review. So when I initially talked to Chair Seidel, he was able to go either way as well initially.

But he was not at that meeting, is that correct? No, he wasn't. He wasn't at the Planning Commission meeting.

No, he wasn't. He was not.

He was not. That's correct.

Jason, Jenna, and... That's correct.

I know we're not meant to be asking questions, but I'd like to ask one more, which is, with concrete now, does it age any better? Are there treatments now that make it age less deteriorate in the same way as those other large sort of concrete walls we see around Corinthian?

That's a great question. Our building official might be able to... Or Peter. No, just as long...

I mean, yes, as long as they put proper drainage behind the wall and it's appropriately formed and founded with steel, it should be fine.

I mean... Is that right, Brian?

Excuse me. Oh, I apologize. But when we, before we wrap up the side, but I do just want to remind the mayor and council that we should provide a brief opportunity for a bottle as well.

We did, and they didn't take it, but given that we've been discussing so long, I think it would be appropriate to ask if they would like to come back and make any further comment.

Thank you. No, well, I'm not, I'm not done.

I think also it's interesting that the, Sammy, thank you for the history. The fact that this began as an exemption, exception, exception, I apologize, and got elevated to the commission and now to the council upon appeal, it shows my perspective in a sense is the city's, I think it's overreach from the perspective of standing in front of a design choice by an applicant for something repair related, utilitarian related, things along those lines. So that's where I have a problem as far as making building, making development, making home maintenance more difficult than it needs to be in a community like ours. And I think this doesn't need to be this way.

And then the counterargument to that, though, is the code was written for a reason. And there are three different places in the code where the code would seem to address, not seem, I think it does, in my opinion, address an issue like this. In 2004, 130B, and then 2004, 140A, and then also E. And so I guess for me, it's just, and this is less about 62, this is more about just as we think about how we, manage and govern is it's a slippery slope it's like so when do we apply the code and when do we not because I think the intent of the code is fairly clear that we're meant to try and avoid structures like this being created in the city and I agree I don't think we should prescribe and say well I think you should do x y or z I think the challenge should be put back on the applicant say you know the code says that you need to find a way of making it more harmonious with the existing environment. And so right now it's not. So what would they propose? I mean, in order for them to raise to the level that the code has set, which is like, we'd like these structures that have mass and bulk to be more harmonious. So maybe we shouldn't have said it should be clad because you could go back. It's so painted the same color as the wall next door or come back with the different, I don't know. I mean, I'm not going to design it just per your comment. We shouldn't, But there, I think it's a fair thing to say, well, then the brief is, you know, make it more harmonious, not just a gray block of concrete, which seems to be inconsistent with three parts of our code.

Yeah, I think that's an important consideration. And maybe upon rebuttal, the applicant could suggest if they would want to, in a sense, continue and come back with an alternative suggestion in an exception manner first, if that's acceptable to the planning chair. But I think there are certainly ways, as you suggested, that they could come up with some ways to do it, whether it's notching it down slightly from the other wall to distinguish it more specifically, make it a board forum to do something that has a little bit more organic nature to it. There are ways to do that, which I think might be more design driven from their side, which I think is ultimately my objection is to imposing our standards on them beyond the findings.

just to be clear peter is it so then you would you suggest that so you would be comfortable with them going back to through the exception process right exception right yeah i mean just go back to the the city and the planning the head of planning and just say here's here's what we're proposing that we think will better fit with the code and if everyone feels comfortable then check the box they

Yeah, in fact, it is. And if Alex doesn't think it's worthy, if Sydney and I were back in Alex, they don't feel it's far enough. They send them back and say, no, I don't think that's enough. If it's if it's shotcrete with, you know, a slight gray tinge or brownish tinge, that may not be enough.

Andrew, can I just ask where we are on legal grounds here? Yeah, I was gonna say.

Yeah, so I was just discussing options with staff. Thank you, Mayor. Certainly you can continue this to a future city council meeting that perhaps gives the applicant a little more time to think about their options here and addressing some of the currents as expressed by the council. We were talking about having, I guess, a return to a discussion between the planning commission chair and staff. I guess my concern there is I'm not sure if that's achieving finality. Mm-hmm. I'm not sure if that would somehow also end up back before the council some later date.

I have a question for the applicant that might help us. Exactly. Can I ask, would the applicant mind returning to the podium? And I guess the first question I would have is whether you have other alternatives that would be more acceptable to you than this cladding that might be cheaper or you have other ideas that might be a middle ground?

I thought just what you guys were talking. On the other side of the driveway, a good chunk of that wall is covered in rosemary. I think it's rosemary.

You can't plant rosemary so far.

You can't see a lot of the other wall on the other side. Maybe there's a landscaping solution that people could be happy with. I mean, there probably will be anyway. Something on there.

I mean, would you like to have another turn at this and discuss with staff some options that might be more satisfactory to you and bring it back? Or would you rather that we just rule?

It depends on how you rule.

You haven't been counting. You've been listening.

I would like another chance at it, considering how.

Okay. So on that basis, do we just kick this back and we just continue?

We can simply continue the item until the applicant and staff are ready to present the matter again to the council.

Okay. Do I need to vote for that or I can just continue the item?

I think it's fine if we just continue it.

Okay. So if that's okay with the applicant, we will continue the item and we'll look- That's a point of order question though.

Does that mean if they agree, let's say they find a solution that they agree with. Why does it have to come back to us? Why can't he just go do it? Because it's, can we, so should we deny it? So they, and then they can just go solve it or it's just, I, what I want to do is I just don't want to make you come back to us because if you solve it with staff and why do it, why does it need to come back to us?

I think if we deny it, they're required to do what is it? They're required to do the clouding. Yeah. So that's not what we want.

Yeah.

So they could come in with a new one.

Yes, I recommend that we continue because the appeal is still pending before the council. So we need to address the appeal in one way. And I guess I'm not quite sure where we're going to land depending on some further discussion the applicant has with staff.

We don't want to lock in their entitlement, which denial would do. Right.

But is an option for us just to send it back to the planning commissioner where they're supposed to be the planning commission, send it back for another review by planning commission. He can come in with different plans and let them make their decision versus the city council. I mean, that is the third option, approve, deny, and send back. So, I mean, would it be a better format to just send it back?

That would be another option, but that would force us to vote on the appeal one way or the other. And it sounds like right now we want to keep that open.

Yeah, I'm sure that time is of the essence for you guys as well, and you want to get this done. So let's just continue this, and hopefully we can see you back here potentially next month with an alternative solution.

You saw it, or did you see it? You saw it.

I was there today. We were there today.

Yeah, it worries me when it rains real hard that something like that happens.

Thank you very much for your time. And we look forward to seeing you back here again. Okay, thank you. Maybe. Okay. And does anybody want a five minute break before we move on to the next item? Or? Yes. Yes. Okay, we'll we'll take a five minute recess. We'll reopen our council meeting and we are moving on to item number 5B, which is an appeal of the construction time limit penalties imposed for the construction project located at 431 Golden Gate Avenue. Do we have a staff report?

Yes, thank you, Mayor. Very briefly, before I hand the presentation over to the building official, I would like to, as a reminder to anyone listening, of course, us in the room as well, I'd like to acknowledge that this appeal addresses a matter arising under an earlier version of the CTL ordinance. And since this is a version of the CTL ordinance that was in place at that time, our goal is to approach this appeal with the same objective vigor and in which all previous appeals have been heard importantly that is our responsibility to apply the laws written so that the city's position and the application of this ordinance is fair and consistent so with that said i do want to thank everyone for preparing this evening and brian if you're ready i'll turn it over to you great

Good evening, Mayor Wilkinson, fellow council members. Before you tonight is a CTL penalty appeal for the recently completed project at 431 Golden Gate Avenue. The project consisted of an addition and a remodel of a single family dwelling and garage and associated landscape and site improvements. Due to the provided valuation of 1.75 million at the time of application, the project was provided with an 18-month CTL timeline. The project was also provided with a six-month extension, bringing the overall construction timeline to 24 months. With a finalization date of March 26, 2025, the project was 627 days over the prescribed CTL deadline and subsequently fined $698,400. The property owner submitted a timely appeal of the penalties requesting full relief. And on September 10th, 2025, a CTL penalty appeal meeting was held. It was at this meeting that the property owner and their team presented reasoning for the appeal as set forth in the staff report. After discussion, it was determined that the staff could only make findings to provide partial relief for the delays pursuant to the governing code. Staff recommends that 32 days of relief be provided for the PG&E delay in the final connection of the utilities, 58 days of relief be provided for the water district infrastructure leak above the property, and 197 days of relief for family illnesses that occurred throughout the course of the project. Staff concluded that these events and subsequent delays would be out of the control of the property owner. Therefore, staff recommends a total relief of 287 days, totaling $344,400 and imposing a total penalty of $354,000. Staff is available for questions. Okay. Who has questions for staff? Pat, do you want to start? Thank you, Brian.

Um, I'll ask, was the applicant made aware of the CTL at the time of? Well, when it got to you in the construction management meetings that you have?

Yes, ma'am. It would be the CTL process was explained at the pre construction meeting. The dates of the timeline are also on the permit and the approved plans.

Thank you. Do you know how many design review changes they did on this project from start to finish and how late in the project were design reviews being asked for or changes being asked for?

I do. I have 13 design review exemptions and I have three design reviews, meaning two exceptions and one staff level And in terms of permit date, the last exemption was February 20th, 2025 for a final landscape plan revision. And they go, I think they date back to 2019, so.

Okay. Pat, can I just?

Three center views, two exceptions and one staff level review.

Yeah, 13 exemptions.

Exemptions, two, three, two of which were exceptions and one was a staff level review? Yes. What's the difference between an exception and a staff level review?

A staff level is we just send out the approval notice, where the exception is we send out a pre-notice for 10 days. The neighbors within 100 feet for both of them, but one...

The neighbor just- The exception is more- It adds more time, yeah. Is it, you run it by the chair?

Yes. Got it, yeah. Thank you.

Anybody else with questions? I'm not done.

Anybody can jump in anytime. Let's see. In regards, I have their, you know, points of appeal numbered one through 17. So in their first request on the appeal was or is requesting an ADU standard practice when an opportunity was or is seen by staff? I don't remember.

Are you asking if we normally request ADUs?

No, I'm just saying that if plan comes in, is it sort of standard practice normal for, I'm trying to address the request by the planning director to add the ADU to the lower level because there was a kitchen there. So I'm asking was that sort of it was and is that sort of a standard practice by staff if you see an opportunity to suggest.

That is standard practice to this day when we meet initially with project applicants and their architects we talk about ADUs and JADUs and you know we get a lot of new single family homes and we explain that the square footage for the ADU is sort of exempt from your total and so yes it is definitely part of our spiel.

And so in the, that was done on some plans that were submitted in 2018. So was that the initial applicant or submittal of their plans for the development or early on in the development?

I think it was an incompleteness letter that director Borba sent out in 2018. Okay. Yes. Can I follow up with that real quick?

To clarify, uh, It was their initial submission, and it was one of, I believe, 27 comments that they would need to address to complete the application for a design review. And was there an existing kitchen in the lower level?

I don't know.

Just thumbs up or thumbs down. But beforehand, was there an existing kitchen? Yeah. No, I'm just asking about a kitchen.

I actually went down there.

There was no kitchen there. So what the planning staff, Irene, in this case was presented with was an application for a kitchen at the lower level in association with the studio. Correct? Correct. I believe that's the case. And my sense of her response, I'm asking for a broader, like to Pat's point about, is this how we handle it? Was that there's two ways to handle that either as an ADU because it could or would qualify or two as a second kitchen application. But either case, the inclusion of a kitchen at the lower level would require one of those two approaches.

Correct.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. This is going to the COVID. So their construction started after all local, state, and federal time extensions were applicable. Is that correct?

Correct.

And we all know that after COVID that there were supply chain issues and certain things for almost everything. Was there a, I mean, they're specifically stating that a 320 amp main service panel was in short supply for like eight months. Do you know if that was, Is there a big run on 320 amp panel services or was it a special panel that they were getting?

No, I'm not aware of whether there was a shortage or not. Again, at that time with COVID, there were supply chain issues with numerous materials and or equipment, but I couldn't speak specifically to this type of 320 amp panel.

And with the failure to have that 320 amp service panel put a stop to the project?

Not a stop. It would only hold up really the finalization of the project. You need a permanent main electrical panel as well as permanent utilities for us to sign off on the project.

Right. So they could do other electrical work. in the meantime while waiting for that AMP to show up or service panel? Correct. Okay, thank you. Several of my questions for staff relate to like the turret, the crew increase, the cabinet contractor, the waterproofing defects, the rain delays, No, not the rain delays. The flooding of the lower level, payment issues with the contractor, contractor damage to the project. Is the city responsible for any oversights to any of those issues? Does the city have any responsibilities in those areas during construction?

No, we do not promote or really provide any information to property owners as to what contractor or who they should hire. It is up to the property owner to hire a competent contractor that could do the job adequately. We would just check that they have a valid CSLB license and letting them work within the state.

OK, great. Thank you. And relating to the changes in expansion of the project in October of 2022, which was just one month before their 18-month CTL, but I believe they were going for a six-month extension at that time. Did the staff have any discussion with them regarding their expansion of the project in the 22 plans as far as their construction time limit meeting that time?

Not specifically, no. Again, it would be the responsibility of the property owner and or the contractor to understand the amount of work that they can get done within the prescribed timeline.

Okay, thank you. Regarding the holiday staffing, or the city closure during the holiday, do you give notices to all the projects in the city prior to the closure between December, the holidays, Christmas and New Year's?

Yes, ma'am.

Is that information stamped on the permit or the plans anywhere that the city is going to be closed?

We do specifically provide observed holidays. However, the closure is not within the packet, but we do provide a flyer two to three weeks prior to the closure that notifies not only the contractors, but city as a whole, that construction activity would not be allowed during that time. Additionally, on that flyer would also present the timeframe in which inspections are not being conducted.

Okay, thank you. The applicant makes mention to, and I know this part of question for the applicant or the appellants, I'm sorry, but they make reference to a December 14th, 2022 foundation inspection, but it's not noted on the job card, but the job card that was provided was from the appellant. Do you know if there was a foundation inspection? There was something on there for December 5, but nothing for the 14th.

My recollection recollection is we did have one. However, the the inspection did not pass further information or work was required. And therefore we would not sign off on the card at that time, we would only sign off on the card for approved inspections.

So you don't make notations, you know, fix this, fix that, come back.

We would have provided a correction notice to the contractor. However, we would not have marked that on the job card.

Okay, great. Perfect. Thank you. And did you give a verbal promise for a three-week extension on the CTL because of the holiday closure?

No, I did not. I do not have the authority to make that promise. However, I did let the applicant know or the property owner know if they feel that that time hindered their project, that it should be brought up at this appeal meeting.

Okay, and then I believe my final question is, were there any significant rain delays during the period they're asking? Were there any slides or road closures or any extreme weather conditions in Belvedere?

Extreme no. Again, we had a heavier than normal winter. I believe we've heard that in past CTL penalty appeals. We did provide that MMWD rainfall total as part of the staff report as one of the attachments. And we could see that again, while it may have been greater than the average, rain total was not an extreme weather event as prescribed by the governing code.

Okay, thank you, those are my questions. Council Member Locke.

Just a few, Brian, I wanna follow up a couple of things that Council Member Karpia touched on. The PG&E, you determined and recommended actually the full relief from that because it was at the end of the project and there actually was no contemporaneous work being done so that it literally was a linear delay perhaps.

Yes, that's correct.

Thank you. And the holiday closure, of 12-22 falls outside of the holiday break. So it's not necessarily a published break that we have, correct? It was the Friday before the Monday, Christmas. That is correct. No, it was 11-22 Friday. Yes, that would have been a Friday.

However, since the COVID pandemic, we have not regularly conducted inspections on Fridays.

That's my second question, is that I assume, just my experience is we don't have inspections on Fridays. So the applicant, I think, on page 24 of his response was very clear to say that it was scheduled, confirmed, and subsequently canceled. You can't confirm that, obviously, or you can't. I mean, how would you respond to that?

The confirmation would come the day of the inspection. We do not confirm inspections prior to the day of the requested inspection. So the contractor and or property owner would schedule an inspection. through our phone system, and they would provide a telephone number that they could best be reached at, at which point we would then call that number the morning of the inspection when we go out and provide a two-hour window as to which we would be there. You could schedule the inspection a week ahead of time. However, you would not receive a phone call until the day of the requested inspection.

Do we have any records that this was in fact scheduled? I mean, do we have any hard copy records of this? No, sir. Mr. Miller obtained this permit 2019-1055 individually as a property owner and classifying themselves as an owner builder, correct?

Yes, sir.

Do you mind just to give a brief description of how the city interprets that?

So by state law, I am required to issue the building permit to two legal parties, either a state licensed contractor that would perform the work or the property owner. In this case, Mr. Miller fits the property owner description, and we have him fill out a form as required by the state in which he would initial numerous responsibilities that a owner builder would take on and then sign to those responsibilities at the end of the form and he did sign that form yes sir we have it right here if need be for the council's benefit would you mind reading two three and ten on that list much of it's much of its liability base so i'm not going to read those And you're referring to the 2, 3, and 10 on the acknowledgement form? Exactly. Two states, I understand building permits are not required to be signed by the property owners unless they're responsible for the construction and are not hiring a licensed contractor to assume this responsibility. Three states that I understand as an owner builder, I am the responsible party of record on the permit. I understand that I may protect myself from potential financial risk by hiring a licensed contractor and having the permit filed in his or her name instead of my own. And then number 10, I am aware of and consent to an owner builder building permit applied for in my name and understand that I am the party legally and financially responsible for the proposed construction activity on the following address. And the address is 431 Golden Gate. Thank you. And that was signed and submitted with the application. Yes, sir.

Thank you. No more questions. Thank you.

Council Member Mark, I do just want the record to reflect that I'm going to be distributing copies of that acknowledgement to the council, and I've also distributed a copy to the applicant tonight. Thank you.

Can I just ask a follow-up question? Brian, one thing you said was that you get a signature from a certified or somebody that has the certification by the state as a contractor. I don't remember the exact terminology. But then now you're saying that as an owner builder, that certification isn't required.

Correct. So per state law, I am allowed to issue the building permit to two legal parties, a state license or not. And correct. Correct.

Okay. Okay. So in this case, by signing owner building builder and signing i'm sorry we didn't we didn't get a chance to see this ahead of time so i don't have it i can't ask questions on it but um but by signing that essentially the responsibilities that would normally be attributed to a contractor are now to the owner builder as that is the person that is the legal contractor yes yes

Okay, thanks. Kevin, do you want to go next?

No, I think my fellow council members did a great job of asking questions.

Jane, do you have any more questions?

I'm trying to see because I think most of them did get answered. I guess my only question would be for Rebecca, and that is, I actually counted around 13 or 14, but 10 of them of the design review exemptions or exceptions came after July 8 2023, which is when the penalties began. And my question is, would that many change orders from the original approved plans, obviously, all 13 of them, but definitely, the majority of them after penalties were already beginning, what would Would that normally be considered a delay in any project by having that many change orders?

Yeah, and thank you for asking that because I would like to clarify there was one planning commission design review that I did not mention. Yeah, it was in August, end of August 2022. So, yeah, they would be delays but staff is very open and honest and lets the contractor homeowners know that anything. that's getting approved is retroactive to your original ctl date so it's all part of the conversations that we have but as we all know you know when the walls are open people want to do more and there's project creep and it's it's a a conversation that we certainly have with everybody because you know potentially end up where we are yeah okay thank you um

Yeah, I think that's it. The rest of mine were already asked. So thank you.

Okay, I don't have any questions either. So at this point, we will open the public hearing and we will invite the appellant's team, which I believe is Mr. Miller, to present.

So you want to make sure you're talking into the mic and then click through and then you're. Okay.

Can I just state up front that you have up to 30 minutes to present, and we'll give you a five-minute warning before that 30-minute clock runs out.

Okay, great. Thank you. My name is Marshall Miller. My wife, Linda Applewhite, and I are the homeowners of 431 Golden Gate Avenue. Can you hear me okay?

Okay.

Okay. My name is Marshall Miller. My wife, Linda Applewhite, and I own the property at 431 Golden Gate Avenue. Thank you very much for letting us make this appeal to you tonight. I need to ask a procedural question because Pat asked a question that made me think of something and I'd like to ask Rebecca at some point, should I do that at the end or now or when's the right time to do that?

Andrew, how do you want to deal with that?

You can raise it at any point during your presentation. Okay. So Rebecca, it seems to me that we had just one follow-up design review application And in that application, we had like two dozen, what I would consider minor requests and such things as add a window here or remove it that was previously approved, things like that. And to my way of thinking that in no way slowed down the project. So when Pat asked about that, it rang a bell in my mind is not, being correct and I just wanted to ask you if you've got that record and you can look at that array of requested changes, was that like, I think of it as a minor set of changes. I wanna get your read on that.

I would say certainly design review exemptions are minor. They're repair the turret, repair a deck. I think one was to add three more square feet onto a deck or something like that. But when we have projects that are going to the planning commission in the middle of a larger project, that certainly adds time to a project. And then the two design review exceptions and then the one staff level, I would definitely say adds time to a project.

Do add time to the project. Okay. I do know that there was one request to change that we made where we had to come back to the city council to get approval. And that had to do with the raising of the garage and moving it eight inches further away from Park Lane. And I'm going to bring that up in a minute here. So I think that's helpful. Oh, the other thing I wanted to say is our contractor had applied for but not yet received his general contractor license at the time we pulled the permit. And that's why I stepped forward and took the owner-builder role. And then I think it was in May of 2022, he did get issued his contractor's license. And I came down to see you, Brian, and we did the paperwork to convert him to the

role of a general contractor on our project can you confirm that for me yes sir that did happen we do have a change of contractor application that occurred after the issuance of the permit um the date i do not have off the top of my head um but again he did the contractor did apply for a change of contractor um and we did switch the um contractor of record over to that contractor. However, that was after the pre-construction meeting and after the issuance of the permit as well. Perfect. Okay, great.

Let me begin my presentation. The basis of our appeal for relief on the CTL fine was a methodology that we used to help us estimate the impact of a given delay on the final inspection date. Without that methodology, I really believe we would have been lost and not know how to proceed. And so we had the good fortune of finding an expert in this area, Matt Levesque. And I believe Matt is on the meeting in the Zoom format.

Yes.

Okay. What I'd like to do at this point is introduce Matt and ask him to take my place and speak a little bit about his background and expertise and our application of the methodology that he shared with us and its applicability and so forth. Can you ask Matt to? Okay, great.

Matt, you should be able to speak. You can unmute yourself.

Can Matt hear me?

He's unmuted. You should be able to speak.

I wonder if he stepped away. Wow. Let's give him just another second.

Chuck Bond's here.

OK. Well, I- Can you hear me now?

Yes, we can.

Oh, there we go. Great. Matt, if you can introduce yourself, your background, and what you think of the methodology that you shared with us.

Sure. My name is Matt Levesque. I'm a general engineering general building contractor. And for the last 40 years, I've worked on residential, commercial, and industrial projects. I'm familiar with this project by way of Google Earth and the plans and so forth. The last 25 years, I've acted as an expert in construction matters and civil cases and with the Contractor State License Board on a couple of thousand projects. cases. So Mr. Miller had a long list of frustrations trying to pin down and categorize these various delays into ways that could be explained relatively easily and also understood hopefully by just about anybody but As we just heard with the two exceptions about the permit, for instance, sometimes you have to dig a little deeper to kind of get to the facts behind the facts. So that's an example where initially it was an owner builder permit, but the facts changed a few weeks or months later. And that's what happened a lot on this project. So I use that as an instant example, but there are quite a few. So Mr. Miller and I worked together to create these categories, and hopefully the categories are on the conservative side. But we do realize some of them fall within the code exceptions. And we present them without overlap and without gaps so that you can kind of see how it fits together. So, for instance, weather, a weather event in the city may not be as impactful as a weather event on newly dug up dirt or on formed construction site. where the farms fill with water for a few days and you can't pour concrete. So there are nuances in all of these issues. And that's what we've hopefully prepared for you to maybe understand a little bit more clearly. I hope that helps explain it.

Okay, great, thanks Matt. And Chuck Bond is here as well. Chuck was our project manager and he knows the project better than I do. So there may be questions that I don't know the answer to and Chuck can help. The remaining slides, I think I've got 11 slides here. There's one slide per delay. Let me back up one second. What we did, we had a total of 18 delays on our project, all of which were beyond our control. And we presented those delays to the CTL committee and explained to them the evidence behind each delay and applied Matt's methodology to estimate the impact of that delay on the final inspection date. And we did this repeatedly for all 18 delays. And as Brian mentioned early on, four of the 18 delays, the CTL committee adopted, I guess you could say, or recommended that the maximum estimated impact of each of those four delays recommended it to the city council that we get relief for those those were beyond our control and those four delays as Brian as Brian mentioned were PG&E the water district flooding and the two illnesses 287 days I think it was right Brian something like that 287 yes sir okay and we're a total of 627 days over the CTL. So what I've got in my presentation here is about a dozen or so delays, all of which were beyond our control, that the CTL committee recommended no relief for. And my task in front of you today is to ask you to ask yourself if I had control over the situation in each of these remaining delays. Let me jump into the very first one. It's the ADU. And by the way, the format that I've got here is I just repeat the same format for all of the 11 or so delays that are in my presentation. I described the event, the delay period, the estimated impact on the final inspection date, and then two additional things, which I think are the most important, which is staff basis for denial, and then my basis for relief. With regard to the ADU, Irene wrote a total of three incompleteness letters to us. This was in the very first one that she wrote to us, where she wrote, staff would highly encourage, underline, highly encourage the application for an ADU. Add that to your application. There was no doubt in my mind in reading that verbiage that Irene wanted us to add an ADU, it was not just a passive suggestion. And we felt that we could not get her support for our application if we did not add the ADU. The city wanted the ADU, we did not. We did add the ADU and we finally got approval for the project with the ADU included. In my humble opinion, I was not the person in control of that outcome, And I would argue that that was beyond my control. And you can see the estimated impact of the ADU on our final inspection date. I'm not sure if this is, okay or not, so let me ask. There's a lot of material that I'll be presenting, I guess you could say, and I don't know if it would make sense for me to stop at the end of each page and ask if you've got any questions or if I should go all the way through to the end.

You should complete your presentation, then we'll ask questions afterwards.

Very fine. Let me go to the second one, which is COVID. Are permit was issued on April 27, 2021, as Brian said. We carried the impact of COVID through the end of calendar year 2024, even though one of our electricians was sick with COVID in 2025. I've got the estimated impact there, and I've got staff basis for denial. If you look down at where I wrote basis for relief, staff had talked about awareness of COVID. And yes, we and everybody was aware of COVID. There's no doubt about that. But the question is, is one of control. Did we have control over COVID's impact on supply chain delays and on worker sickness? My answer is no, we did not have control. Now, we went in front of the CTL Extension Committee in late 2022 and got approval to add six months to our CTL. And one of the reasons the CTL Committee granted that approval was the presence of COVID. My argument is that COVID did not end in late 2022, it carried on into 23 and 24. And that's why I'm asking for relief with COVID here tonight. The third delay that was outside of our control was the discovery of dry rot in the garage. This was into the project. The stucco was removed from the garage walls. And the structural engineer said, there's no way you can leave the garage as is. You're going to have to tear that down and rebuild it. I'm not a structural engineer. I can't second guess the structural engineer. I had no control over that decision. I think it was the right one, but it was one in which I had no control. Delay number four is deconstruction and reconstruction of the turret. This is a brick turret on the backside of the house. Cracks began to appear in the turret. The structural engineer, by the way, had already seen the turret on his multiple visits prior to us launching the project. He had an original plan for supporting that turret. He decided to modify that plan after seeing the cracks in the bricks and ended up having a separate support structure built and that modification added to the scope of the project and was beyond my control. On my next slide, delay number five, staffing levels and project acceleration. Our general contractor had two work crews, one of which was on our project, one of which was on some other project. we had told him starting, I believe in 2022, I'm not quite sure about this. I couldn't find a record of this. So I didn't use 2022, but I do have a record of it starting in February of 23 that we had asked him to accelerate the project. What can he do to crew up? And he said, well, I've got a second crew. I can bring them on board and we can accelerate the project. We said, great, let's do it. Well, he did do it, but only for two weeks. Then he pulled off his second crew and we're back to the same seven to nine workers. So that significantly, uh, delay the project by losing that second crew. We tried everything we could to get that contractor to keep his second crew there and everything failed. Had we fired him and replaced him, our judgment was that that would add even more to the duration of the project. Delay number six is the inspection that we were talking about a little bit before. I heard some things there that I did wanna bring up, and I'm not sure if I can do this right. There was an inspection on December 14th. We were scheduled, and actually, Brian, you clarified something for me. I didn't know the protocol, so you clarified it for me. I think what happened was our foreman called to schedule an inspection on December 23rd. It was the rebar in the foundation of the garage, What Brian has pointed out is they don't confirm it. You wait till the day before and then it's, Brian gives a two hour window that you're going to show up. The day of. The day of, I'm sorry, the day of. And so what I had written earlier as a confirmation is not true. It wasn't a confirmation, just a request. And then after we made the request, but before December 23, the city expanded its year end holiday schedule. And that caused our, what we thought was a scheduled inspection for December 23 to get bumped. It got bumped into the next month, a total of 13 days delay. I felt that that was completely beyond my control. Delay number seven, inability of cabinet contractor to comply with timelines. When we made the presentation to the CTL committee, I had made the mistake of not realizing that the perfect cabinets, which was our cabinet contractor, was not a subcontractor. We had hired him directly. Brian saw the bid signed by Linda. He was not hired by the general contractor. So in my opinion, the section of code that I believe Brian cites here does not apply. This perfect cabinets was actually a contractor, not a subcontractor. And I can just tell you that I tried everything in my power to get him to do what he said he was going to do and failed. And we eventually, after a death by a thousand cuts, had to fire him and replace him and get the job done, get the cabinetry installed. This was a big deal because there's so many trades that follow the installation of the cabinetry that are waiting for the cabinetry to be installed before you can get them on board. The next, how am I doing on time? 14 minutes. The next delay is delay number eight, which is the detected leaks on the lower level. Now it turns out that I combined this with delay number 11, which we'll see in a few minutes, which was general contractor negligence that ended up causing flooding on the lower level. I put them both together because it was easier mentally to see all those leaks at the same time, look at the timeline, et cetera. But with regard to just the detected leaks, which are the responsibility of the general contractor, we required the contractor to build according to plans and specs and assume that he had done exactly that. We were not aware by virtue of the discovery of the leaks that he did not follow the plans and specs and the leaks were beyond my control. Number nine, a little bit of a break here. It turns out there was a huge delay on the roof, but we concluded that that delay had no impact on the final inspection date. So we're not asking for any relief there. Delay number 10, extreme weather. We estimate a total of 70 days is our estimate of the impact of the extreme winter weather of 2022-23. And we did a lot of research to see if this really does meet the requirements of the ordinance. BC reference the Belvidere Municipal Code does speak to extreme weather, but it never defines it. So how do you know if you've got extreme weather or not? So we went to FEMA, NOAA, IRS, FDB, Franchise Tax Board, and confirmed at all those sites that the winter rains of 2022, 23 are classified as extreme. And in my response document, I talk about a number of things which I don't think are in this summary, such as persistency. It's not just the volume of rain, it's the persistency of rain that can slow a project. And I would say that that extreme weather of 2022, 23, based on all those photos that were included in, I believe you've got the deck, clearly illustrate the project was hampered big time by those rains. We were at the height of what I call weather vulnerability at that time. It was just a disastrous mess at that time. The next item is, the next delay is flooding of the lower level. This is the one that I combined with aid earlier. The job site was properly protected throughout until I think it was May 4th, Friday, May 4th, 2023, when some idiot on the project pulled the protective caps off of the vents that were extending out of the east side of the house and were ultimately expected to go under a concrete slab and be properly terminated. The rain happened the following day. It was the last rain of the year and flooded the lower level. Let me talk a little bit about that. First of all, I'll say that that was beyond my control. The flooding was clearly, in my opinion, the responsibility of the general contractor. He took no responsibility for it. We filed a claim with his business liability insurance company. They took no responsibility for it. We have an open claim with them right now. But the damage that was done on the lower level took months to remediate. And it involved remediating not only the water damage, but there was mold damage because the insurance company was so slow to act. And the delay that I've got here, what is the delay? 114-day midpoint delay. That is just to remediate the water damage and the mold damage. It did not get to the lower level back to the condition it was in the day prior to the flooding. That is excluded from all of our analysis because we just didn't have time to do that. but I know that was another couple of months probably. Oh, that's the end of my presentation. So I'm happy to take any questions that you have.

Is there anybody else on your team so that you don't... You still have nine minutes left if there's anybody else on your team that would like to make any comment at this point.

Good question. Okay. Hey, Chuck, are you... Can you think of anything that... or Matt, can you think of anything that I left out that would be important for the City Council?

I see that Chuck has got his hand raised.

I have my hand up. Okay. We can hear you. Okay, great. Thank you so much. Thank you for letting me be here tonight. I had the great pleasure of working with Marshall and Linda throughout the project. And even though we encountered so many difficulties, I have to say, I've never had a better client in the history of the work that I've done. I do want to go back and I don't know if you can pull up one of your older items. And the first one I wanted to comment on was the discovery of dry rot at the garage. And I believe one of the comments Brian made was that we should have had a complete survey of the property and that we would have been allowed to open up sections of the wall according to building code to discover problems. Well, we had at that point, 2,700 square foot house that was stuccoed and plastered on the interior. And we did take note of a number of issues, but that was because there was visible evidence that there was a problem. Unfortunately, at the garage, there was no stucco cracking. There was no interior plaster cracking. that would have indicated that there was a substantial problem with that area. And I don't think it's a reasonable request that we open up areas that there's no evidence of a problem. We would have had to open up everything at the house. So I take an issue of that response that he made on that issue. The other issue that I wanted to just discuss real quickly is the scheduling of the inspection. And as pointed out today, he said there was an inspection on the 14th that was failed, but in his comments, he didn't understand why we would need such a soon inspection after the December 14th inspection. And obviously they had to do the work to correct what had been seen as inappropriate and not according to spec. So it was critical inspection. The vacation schedule was changed abruptly. We had no foreknowledge that they were moving the actual vacation earlier. than had reasonably we'd been notified. And for that reason, I called Brian at the time and he's correct in saying that he didn't have the authority, but he thought that it was a reasonable request when I spoke with him. And I definitely felt it was a reasonable request because it involved foundation work, which then delayed framing and other elements. The other item that I'll just talk about briefly is in terms of the turret. And it became apparent because of the excavation underneath that area. And because the turret had been constructed without any reinforcement, which wasn't obvious in our survey of property prior to getting the permit, And the fact that it wasn't reinforced and the vibration of the excavation below caused the damage to the turret that basically made it impossible for us to continue work without the demolition of this, I believe, historic turret and then the reconstruction to bring it back to its normal state. its original appearance. Those were the items I wanted to comment on. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Bond. Mr. Miller, would you like to add anything more?

I would like to add just one more summary comment or set of comments. If you take the 287 days recommended by the CTO committee for those four delays that were outside of our control as a starting point, and you add to it the minimum estimated impact of the other delays, the delays that I've spoken about tonight for which I had no control, you come up with a number which I think is 707. We were 627 days over the CTL. So with these, the minimum estimated impact of these delays plus what the CTL committee is recommending to you would bring the fine down to zero. I did want to make that point for you. And even though I've got four minutes or three minutes left, I'm going to give them up.

That would be great. We left to move quickly. Thank you for your time. Okay, so if you can stay where you are, because we'll bring this back to the City Council for any questions for either Mr. Miller or Mr. Bond. Let's start with Council Member Cooper.

Good evening, and thank you for your presentation. Thank you. So let's see, some of my questions were already answered before. It appears that in your original plans, you were only planning to do the art studio downstairs, is that correct? The downstairs would only be the one art studio?

If you, let me see here. I've got a hard copy, but Rebecca, you might be able to find this faster than me.

You gave us a drawing. That's why I'm asking the question.

Yeah, I'd have to look at that drawing.

Okay, but to your recollection, you were not planning to do any work on the lower level except that studio.

Is that correct? That is correct. Yeah, that was planned to be an art studio. Okay. It was an art studio is what it was. Now, Linda uses acrylic paints and you have to refrigerate them and wash your brushes and so forth. That's why we had a sink down there, but it was not a kitchen. No range, for example.

Okay. Yeah. But then I think at some point you also said there was significant damage on the entire lower level foundation. that needed to be repaired, including structural damage from earlier leaks in the building. So did the lower level require a lot of repair and foundation work? Even though you were only doing one section, you needed to add...

repairs to create uh take care of the structural damage that was let me let me give my answer and i'm going to ask chuck if he can uh add to my answer or improve on it uh the house is was built in 1927 it's an old house right and it began leaking my guess is 10 or 20 years after it was built it was not well built in my in my opinion and when we bought the property in 1999 there was plenty of evidence of dry rot etc on that lower level it also had substandard uh ceiling height it was six and a half feet or something like that it was not really appropriate for living in my opinion so we needed to rectify all or remediate all of those uh deferred um maintenance. And we thought, well, the perfect time to do it is right when we're doing the remodel. So we wanted to heighten the head height by excavating the floor, get rid of the leaks and so forth. All of that, the foundation was in bad shape. All of that had to be repaired.

Okay. So when the idea of the ADU came up, And you determined you didn't want it to be part of the studio because you didn't want to see potential renters coming and going in your view. That foundation was already there. You were you were creating that foundation anyway. And then you thought. We'll move the ADU to the other side and then we'll add on a gym and an extra laundry room and a variety of other rooms.

Yeah. So when Irene suggested that we put the ADU where Linda wanted the art studio, we didn't like that idea at all. For one reason, the privacy issue. We wanted the tenant to have privacy. We wanted to have privacy. We also didn't want to lose the art studio for Linda. That was one of the key goals of the remodel. So we brainstormed, how can we do this? And we decided, well, let's put the ADU on the opposite side of the property. And then the tenant can come down Park Lane and come in one of the side entrances. So that was the plan. Now, once you do that, then you've got to figure out what do you do with all that space between where Irene wanted the ADU and where we ended up putting the ADU. And that's where we had to do that, a huge amount of excavation. And in that area between the old idea and the final idea for the location of the ADU.

OK, thank you. Do you recall when your electrical amp actually arrived? Was it not?

I don't tonight. I don't think I did ask my electrician for as much detail as he could get. He contacted his supplier. His supplier didn't have the information, so I was somewhat out of luck. But he did tell me he knew that COVID was going to be a problem on certain things, including the 320 amp. That, by the way, is not to my understanding, and I see Chuck is here so he can comment, that was not a esoteric kind of a thing. It'd be appropriate for the house of that size. And normally he would be able to go just pick it up the same day. He wants it, goes, picks it up. That would happen in a pre-COVID era, but he knew that he would need a lead time. He gave himself to eight months and it still didn't arrive in time. And as Brian said, it wasn't a showstopper. It's not like everything came to a stop. You had to work around it. But all the testing and stuff that requires a main service panel can't be done. There are implications. You have to work around it.

And then you mentioned that I think your contractor is Mr. Diaz?

That's correct.

And you mentioned that he got his contractor license about a year into the project. So... Was there a reason that you chose an unqualified contractor to work on this large project that you had going?

It just seems like a strange choice considering. There was a number of considerations that I'll share with you right now. Linda is a designer. She's been in the field for 35 years. Every house that she has designed is owned by somebody else. Either the owner or the architect or the contractor will try to overrule her. Here we have a project we can do ourselves. We wanted to find a contractor that would not bully her out of the way. And we purposely did not hire an architect for the same reason. Chuck knows how to draw CAD drawings, and we worked with Chuck. Chuck was collaborative with Linda. It worked out perfectly. So where do we go for a contractor? We interviewed a number of contractors. We liked Edwin because he had a 20-year experience of concrete work, and he does beautiful concrete work. You know, we've got curved retaining walls that he's done just beautiful work, truly, and no problem with the framing or anything. But here's where I made a mistake that seems as obvious as can be right now. He was licensed to do concrete work. He was not licensed to do general contract. That's as obvious as can be right now, but I didn't even think of that at that time. So I knew that I didn't want to play the role of owner builder forever. And I knew that he was, I had trusted that he was going to get his license. He said he was, and he did. And then we had filled out the paper with Brian to switch him into the general contractor role. And you're right. It was about a year, I think, or 14 months or something after we pulled the permit. Yeah.

Okay. And as far as Mr. Bond, is he an experienced project manager? Is that his primary profession?

Chuck, do you want to talk about your experience, your expertise? Can you hear me, Chuck? Is Chuck on? He's unmuted. There you go. Can you hear? Can you speak up, Chuck?

Yeah.

Okay, we can't hear you, Chuck.

You've muted yourself.

I tried to do that. Can you hear me now?

Yes.

Perfect. I operated as a project manager on the San Francisco International Airport, working for a subcontractor um, that was doing the PA system. So I got to work. Uh, I went through that and I got certified in, uh, scheduling using at the time it was called Primavera P6 scheduling software. It was very complicated, uh, and use contract manager. Um, I had been, uh, a licensed contractor from, uh, 1992 to 2008. And I stopped contracting at that point. I was partnered with an architect and I did the detailing for the architect and helped him manage his projects. I also worked for a civil engineer doing detailing for the civil engineer in San Rafael. And as a general contractor. I did my own project management through that period. I was licensed as a general contractor.

Okay. I'm convinced that you're an experienced project manager. Thank you. And what would you describe were your responsibilities on this project as a project manager in a short version of it?

Okay. Um, I was brought on to do all of the architectural drawings for the house. So I knew the house pretty darn well. And originally, I had less involvement in the project management. But as the project moved forward, there was more need for interfacing with the general contractor and the subcontractor. because we weren't getting the kind of responses we need from the general contractor and some of the subcontractors. So my whole point is that my original role as project manager was much reduced in scope, but grew as the project got more complicated and problematic.

Okay, great, thank you so much. I think that's all I have right now, just for questions.

Vice Mayor?

I don't have any questions right now.

Peter, do you have any questions?

No, I'm okay for now, thank you.

And Pat? I do have questions. Here's sort of a general question regarding your contractor, Mr. Diaz. You may have answered this partly, but why when mistakes were made, claims of fraud, contractual issues occurred that you didn't move on to another contractor?

The fraud issue was not discovered until months after the fact. We were much closer to the end than to the actual fraud instance. And the other reason was we had seriously looked at replacing Edwin to the point that we brought in another contractor and showed him the state of progress and what remained to be done. and asked him to give us a bid, which he did. And I showed that to the CTL committee in my presentation to them. We were really close to cutting ties with Edwin and replacing him. But Chuck and I really thought it through. What are the implications in terms of scheduling and any other considerations, the domino effect, et cetera. And we decided the best thing to do was to continue with Edwin. As the project continued, his role became less and less expansive in scope. And other people that were working directly for Linda began to play a larger role. So it was a judgment call, I would really say.

OK. Yeah. When you talk about the garage project, you talk about that you found dry rot and you had a demo it. But you didn't just rebuild the garage, you moved the garage, you raised the driveway, you added an elevator, you added a lower floor. And along with that planning commission meeting and 22 October of 22 that you did additional changes, changes to the roofline of the ADU, changes to the windows, changes to the front entry, changes to a walkway. I mean, it just goes on and on and on, the number of changes made. So, I mean, that was a great expansion of the project. Did you at that time realize that all those expansions um, we're going to, um, well, not only add to the cost, which isn't really in our purview, but rather that it would add to the time because you can't, that, that was approved in October of 22. And you were going for your six month extension at that time. And, um, Were you aware that you, I mean, we had conversations about the CTO in the public meeting. Were you aware that all these expansions and changes were going to put you in the situation you ended up in?

I would say that you've mischaracterized the nature of that application. Now, if I'm remembering it correctly, I was thinking of it as a follow-up application, Rebecca, of something like two dozen. And we wrote minor changes. And it truly was, we don't want a window here that's already been approved. We'd like a window there that's not approved, things like that. And I would say, Pat, that it really I would not characterize it as expanding the timeline for the project. These were all minor things. An ornament above the front door, for example, that was one of those 24, two dozen different changes. So I would characterize it as truly minor. I think the label of the file in my computer is minor follow-up changes or something like that.

Well, you also added an elevator, which I don't think is minor.

Yeah, you're right. We did add the elevator. But I honestly... This is me speaking now, and Chuck may offer something else. I would actually argue that there are so many elements of this project that adding an elevator in the context of all these other activities that need to take place over X number of days, weeks, and months did not impact the project. You can insert the workers that built the the shaft, et cetera, without impacting the, or without delaying the rest of the project. Chuck, would that be a fair statement or have I mischaracterized it?

Chuck, can you hear me? Yes, I can hear you. And you stepped away from the microphone, so it was a little more difficult to hear you. I do have some comments on that. And because of the problem of the garage and needing to reevaluate and redo the foundation. Because I modeled this house in three dimensions and was looking through it, realizing that we were like, 32 inches of the current level of the garage slab was 32 inches below the upper level of the house. And the process of doing the foundation by just extending it up those 32 inches, the owner could then drive into the garage and enter on the second floor instead of having to go out in the rain and enter through the main door. So it allowed us a tremendous advantage in terms of the usage. The other thing it did is it reduced the slope of the driveway, which was extreme considerably. It made it a much easier way to gain access to the street on the driveway. And those were important considerations of the overall project. But as I was saying, it's because we had to redo the foundation that the amount of work that that added to the project was not as significant as the results from being able to elevate the slab height and improve the driveway and gain an elevator.

Okay. from whomever. Why did it take 17 months to submit a plan for redoing the garage from the time you discovered and got permission to demo?

Chuck might be better able to answer that. I imagine it had to do with the discovery of the dry rot, but I don't know, Chuck. Do you remember why it took 17 months to submit the application to redo the garage?

I know the submitting of the application didn't take that length of time, I think the discovery involved a number of different things. The engineer started to work on the changes to the structure. And I questioned him later on after he had done that. I said, well, if we elevate the slab, is that going to make another major change? And he said, no, the the way that it configured the walls and the slab and the steel reinforcement that they were minor. But I'm sorry, Marshall, that 17 months doesn't register to me as when we made the decision to actually elevate the height of the garage.

But I'm just looking through our records here.

Yeah.

And it looks like the city deemed it complete in June of 2021. But then it didn't go to the Planning Commission until October of 2022. So I'm, you know, sometimes with these larger projects, that's what it's showing in our records. Yeah.

Oh, that the application came in in 21?

That when we deemed it complete then. But this is an I work, it could be a- No, this is about the 22.

This is after the original.

Well, this is the garage one. This is the planning commission modifications to approve garage, driveway, windows, doors, and trellis, roof tiles, miscellaneous others.

Okay, moving on. So when you got back to the ADU, when you got Irene's recommendations, why did you not choose just to apply for a second kitchen? instead of going through the additional.

Probably because we didn't need one or we didn't know we could do that. It never occurred. You know, we had a certain plan in mind and, you know, I don't know the answer to that, Pat. I, you know, I guess we were reacting to her request that we add an ADU as opposed to going off in another direction and saying, how about if we did a second kitchen. I don't think we were aware of what our options were. Either do it or don't do it.

I think it was in her letter of incompleteness that it said either you apply for an ADU or a second kitchen.

Well, we didn't really want a second kitchen. We didn't need a second kitchen. That was going to be an art studio.

Okay. So this next question kind of has to do with several of the points that you're in your appeal. And for instance, overseeing the contractor to follow the structural plans. Who was overseeing the additional crew members, the cabinet contractor overseeing the waterproofing defects, payment issues, the contractor damage, the flooding of the lower level. I mean, who was responsible for overseeing that? Was that Chuck Bond as the project manager?

Well, I would say it was Chuck and me, both. We were both intimately involved in the project. We were there multiple times a day, sometimes the entire day, looking for problems, trying to stay proactive, etc.,

In terms of the structural work as required by the city of Belvedere, we had the structural engineer go through and verify all of the structural work that was done. So that was part of our rough inspection is getting the engineer to sign off on structural work that had been accomplished.

Do you mind if I, is it okay if I ask Andrew a question, not Andrew, ask Brian a question here in relation to that comment?

We're going to go back to afterwards. Pat, are you finished with your questioning? Yeah. Okay. In that case, Kevin, you've passed, correct? We have questions.

I have one question.

When did you hire the engineer? And who hired the engineer?

I hired the engineer, the structural engineer, correct? Yeah. When was that decision made? It was probably, let me see. I think it's actually in one of my answers here where I, let me, it was probably 2020, 2020 is my guess, 2020. It was well before we pulled the permit. What's that, John?

September of 2020. Okay.

The structural engineer would have needed to be on staff as part of the building plans for them to obtain approval and then obtain the building permit.

And what qualifications did this individual have? I mean, how did you choose that person?

We learned of him through another general contractor. and interviewed him. He had all the licenses, all the credentials. He was knowledgeable, creative. We felt a perfect fit for us.

OK.

Thank you.

OK, one more question.

Sorry, just real quick on that. So typically a construction set that's submitted for building permit has an architectural set that's signed off by a licensed architect and a structural set that's signed off by a structural engineer. it sounds like the structural plans were signed up by the structural engineer and the architects, architectural plans were signed up by Chuck Yu or Linda, who signed that? Say it again, Chuck.

We can't hear you, Chuck.

Oh, I'm sorry. Can you hear me now? Yes, we can. Yeah, Linda signed off. She's on the title block. and signatures on it. My signature is not on the documents.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you. Okay, if we don't have further questions, I'm going to open this for public comment. I don't see anybody in the room. Is there anybody on Zoom? Yes, we have Mr. Rothman. Good evening, Mr. Rothman.

Thank you very much. I hesitate to speak on this because I'm afraid I may, by what I consider to be telling the truth, hurt the appellants, because I think they're absolutely right, but I'm afraid that I may make you angry in what I say, but I'm speaking the truth as I see it. The law that you're applying, the rule, is defective, because the premise of the law is spelled out and it says very clearly, we consider the time period to be reasonable. And it also says it is to prevent disturbance to the neighborhood. Those are the two bases on which the rule is established. You people felt that the law that you're applying now wasn't a good law. And that's why you changed it. So it's as if when marijuana was illegal, they put people in jail. And then when they decided it's legal, they decided to keep putting that they would keep those people in jail. That's not what happened. They realized they had made a mistake and they stopped applying that law as it had been on those people. At the last meeting, I said that nobody, that I had spoken to Mr. Vanson and that no projects, major projects on the island get completed in the time that's allotted for them. And then the lawyer stood up and said, well, Mr. Van Son isn't here. So you can't say that he said that he acknowledged they don't get done. Well, Mr. Van Son is here now. So I would like him to say whether he feels that the projects, big projects, do get done. And they don't get done. Therefore, that's what I understand him to have said. on the island and therefore the premise of the law that it's reasonable to have this law, the premise is defective with respect to disturbing the neighborhood. As I looked at the packet, I didn't see a single letter where neighbors were saying this has disturbed us, it's been terrible for us, etc. So therefore, I think you're trying to apply a law If you think about it, you really don't believe in it. It's like the Casablanca movie where the hero of the movie says to Rick, I think you're trying to make an argument for something you really don't believe. So the whole premise is wrong. People do have trouble with contractors. There hasn't been a single one of these instances where there wasn't a problem with a contractor. Therefore, what's reasonable is that you have problems with contractors. I use that as an example. So therefore, what you've been assuming is reasonable when you've applied this law over and over again isn't really reasonable. So I would urge you to stop applying a law that's unreasonable. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Rothman. Beth, is there anybody else on Zoom? I see none. Okay. In that case, we will take this back to the council to see if we have any questions of staff at this point.

Just real quick. So the plans were stamped by... Linda, and then I'm sorry, Applegate? Applewhite, yes. Applewhite, I apologize.

And a structural engineer on the structural plans. So we have a stamp on the engineering plans. On the architectural plans, they are not required to have an architect stamp on that one as prescribed by the business and professions code. That code does allow for people to draw certain size structures without having an architectural license. And this was one of them. We did send this project to CodeSource, which is our third party plan reviewer. They reviewed all plans and stamped and approved them.

Does the state of California require, unless it's a stick built up to like 2,500, 3,200 square feet, something like that?

It depends on the floors, the two floors. Okay. And then conventionally framed. But with the structural engineer coming in, it now allows that person to draw basically the floor plan and the finished details. Okay. And just the ADU, was it built specifically?

I mean, was it? Yes. And is it deeded? No. So it's not recognized as an ADU at this point? I mean, I'm not saying I'm restricted from an affordability perspective, but just an ADU needs to be deeded to be recorded by, you know, with the county and then for HCD purposes.

I can check. I don't know the answer to that.

And maybe Marshall Rebecca I I had the city wanted me to sign, in fact, I had to sign something that was recorded with regard to the at you and it had something to do with a 15 year.

rent control type of thing yeah it was recorded were they were restricted to a moderate income at you when they were originally approved.

I remember that. Any other questions of staff? No, I'm going to have a broad question here and it's more for Andrew, which is, you know, obviously our code says that the reasons are, but not limited to extreme weather events, labour stoppages, natural disasters and or acts of war, terrorism as reasons for relief. A lot of the requests here relate to problems with a contractor, many of them. I would love just for Andrew to opine on that in terms of how that fits within other by other reasons that are beyond the applicant's control. Because I guess the concern I have there is, well, can't anybody say that about anything? Meaning it seems so nebulous. At what point is the responsibility with the owner to make sure that their contractor does what they're told to do?

Thank you, Mayor. I'll try to answer the question. So under the following subsection, subsection five, there are some specific things that are excluded as being excluded from being considered as outside the control of the applicant. So some of those may be contractor related activities. So those are essentially off the board in terms of providing relief. And hopefully our staff report helped highlight those areas. Now moving up to section four, which you already mentioned, Mayor, which mentions things that are This provides sort of an illustrative list of things that could be beyond the control of the applicant. It does not specifically address as a potential factor, not a financial factor, the actions of a contractor, but certainly as a policy decision, this council can decide the owner is ultimately responsible for whatever his or her contractor does or fails to do. I think that is a reasonable place for this council to land. Because I think as I've been highlighted from some of the questions tonight, ultimately the contractor reports to the owner. It's the decision of the owner to stick with that contractor or switch to someone else. Mr. Miller has already commented tonight that he and Mr. Bond were on the site every day. I assume monitoring the contractor and everyone who worked for the contractor. So I think the council would be well within its rights to include all of those contractor activities as being within the control of the applicant for the purpose of these factors.

Great. Thank you, Andrew. If there's no other questions for council, Mr. Miller, if you would like, you can have up to another 10 minutes of rebuttal if there's anything else that you would like to add. You're not obligated to take that extra time, but if you have anything extra or Mr. Bond has anything extra, now is your opportunity.

Gotcha. Thank you. I think I would like to take a few minutes and ask Chuck if he's still there, if he's got any comments as well. I heard what Andrew said. I disagree. I did everything within my ability to manage the project as well as possible considering everything. And I don't think that any amount of words that we share today go to the depth of complexity of the project and depth of dynamics of the project in terms of how best to manage it. I'm very successful in life. And I think I did a pretty good job. But I know I didn't do everything right. I know I didn't. I really made some big mistakes. But I don't think that it would be right for you to say the owner is responsible for mistakes of the general contractor. I think that's wrong. If that were the case, what is the general contractor responsible for? And why would he have business liability insurance?

I'm responsible for everything.

And if you go back to the list of delays, it would be worthwhile as an exercise to see which ones are specifically related to the general contractor and which ones are related to the structural engineer. And we know that there are at least two, right? The garage and the brick turret. So I would ask you to reconsider what Andrew told you. Chuck, do you have any thoughts as well?

Yes, I'd like to thank the city of Belvedere and the building staff and planning who processed everything so perfectly and quickly. It's been a great pleasure for me to be, to have worked on this project in Belvedere. And I recommend a lot of people to go there because I deal with a lot of different building departments and planning departments, and they far exceed any of the ones that I've worked with the last 10 years. I just wanted to make that point. And the fact that There are so many issues. I've worked on complicated projects, but never any that have had so many problems. And I think it needs to be looked at from those terms, that it wasn't one thing or another thing, but accumulation of many things. You might say some of them were within our control, but many of them were not in our control. And that I hope this isn't a situation where you're concerned with precedence, because this is one very unique project that shouldn't be put into that category. But anyhow, I want to thank you all and the town council for letting me be here today. Thank you, Mo.

Thank you, Chuck. I see I still have some time. And if Matt is still there, it looks like he still is. Matt, if you've got any thoughts in response to Andrew's comments, if you can share them now, that would be great.

I'm not sure what comment Andrew made, but I do kind of think the caller that called in Mr. Rothman kind of had a point there. And I think that's my overarching view of this situation. But I want to go on to emphasize that so much of any of these projects, I mean, you have, I don't know, you've been at this an hour, let's say, or you have an hour to go through what is essentially a multi-year project and try to dissect it there at the dais. I don't envy you your task. And the easiest thing is to go with what the recommendation is. So it does, you kind of have to look at it with fresh eyes, I suppose, to see it. I've spent more time with Mr. Miller than you have probably hearing about the stories and what all is taking place. And he does, there is some, it's just subtle. He mentioned the electrical panels. I was in the middle of doing a solar observatory project in Big Bear at around the same time period. And one of the suppliers, Schneider Electric, which you probably know as Square D, sold a product called a speedy panel. They called it a speedy panel because it was pre-built for many amperages and you could go to the local supplier and pick it up within a day or two. Those are long gone. You can't find speedy panels anymore. They're months and months out. And that's what was going on. And you'd say, well, you could do other stuff with the electrical system. And that's probably true. But when it's time to put the electrical panel in the wall, then you have to hold back the stucco. You can't finish that wall. And if you talk to a stucco guy, they don't want to come and do seven eighths of a house. They want to do the whole house. And, you know, there's things like that that people are not used to. They don't necessarily understand it if it's not in their field. And some of you apparently were on planning commissions, so you have some knowledge or maybe you work in the field. But there's a lot of subtleties and nuance. It's not like a five-day trial where every little fact comes out. And even there, not every fact, but a lot of facts come out. So I would just say, be thoughtful of that, I guess would be my overarching comment.

Okay. Thank you very much for, um, for your time. I think you can, we can sit at this point. Um, okay. We will, um, close the public hearing and we're going to bring this back to, uh, council to discuss, um, deliberate and eventually make a decision. Um, I don't think I'm looking for finding specifically this point more just for a discussion. And so, um, who would like to go first on that part? Do you want to begin?

So I first want to thank the appellant and his team for being here tonight and presenting your case. And These construction time limit fine appeals are the hardest things that the city, one of the hardest things the city council has to do. And it's difficult on many levels, one being that we're asked to penalize a member of our community, someone we know, sometimes intimately, maybe. But we are bound as council members to uphold our laws. And the law at the time was the construction time limit fine we're looking at today. And I do know that this project is, had expansion. And I did personally express my concern back in 22 about the expansion of the project and the timing. And both Marshall and Linda both admitted, well, Marshall especially admitted in an open meeting that he was painfully aware of each passing month of the price Um, he would pay and, uh, Linda was confident that they would be able to meet the CTL because they had a great team. So, um, with that, um, I, um, on, um, the finding for number one. I cannot make the finding that there was pressure to add an ADU. It was the applicant's choice to add an ADU to their submitted plans to the planning commission. And it was a failure to meet municipal code 20.04035.4 A through F factors in order to have relief. I cannot make the findings for COVID relief. It was common knowledge that there were some issues with the supply chain, and the applicant chose to construct under those circumstances. The dates requesting relief are beyond local, federal, and state relief orders, and it failed to meet 20.040354 requirements. A through F factors that are to be considered. I cannot make the finding for dry rot for relief for the garage reconstruction. on several levels. One is that there are several very unobtrusive ways you can examine for damage and could have been evaluated earlier in the process. And it failed to meet municipal code section 20.04035 for A through F factors and municipal code 20.04035 significant numerous and or late changes. The extensive redesign of the garage to accommodate the increased ridge line slab, driveway height, elevator addition and utility room and additional modifications of that design. I cannot make the findings for the turret relief based on the failure to me 20.04. 035.4 A throughout factors and 20.04035.5.B, failure to adequately protect the job site. I cannot make the findings on crew relief, um, based on being a condition that the city, um, based not being a condition that the city control can control and on a failure to meet 20.04035 for a through F factors. I cannot make the findings for the holiday inspection relief. Um, based on the failure to meet 20.04035 for A through F factors. I cannot make the findings for the cabinet relief due to failure to meet 20.04035.4 A through F factors. and 20.04035.5.C, failure of subcontractors completely work according to schedule and F, that's 0.5.F, failure of material suppliers to provide materials in a timely manner. I cannot make the findings for waterproofing relief due to the failure to meet 20.04035.4, A through F factors and 20.04035.5.B failure to adequately protect the site from damage. Item number nine originally submitted was removed by the applicant as an appeal point. And just for clarity, I would not have been able to make the findings for the forged signature as it does not meet 20.04035.4 A through four factors. I cannot make the findings for rain delays as there is no evidence of extreme weather events as required by 20.04035 for point B in the city of Belvedere. I cannot make the findings for the flooding in the lower level due to a failure to meet 20.04035 for A through F factors and 20.04035 point B, failure to adequately protect the site from damage. I can make the findings to give the relief that the staff recommended for the Marin Municipal Water District Water League at 58 days. I cannot make the finding for payment issue as a failure to meet 20.04035.4 A through F factors. I cannot make the findings for contractors damage relief due to failure to me 20.04035.4 A through F factors and 20.04035.5.B failure to adequately protect the site from damage. I cannot make the findings for the loss of a garage door Due to failure to meet 20.04035.4 A through F and 20.04035.5.C, failure of subcontractors to finish the work according to the schedule. And 0.5.F, failure of material supplier to provide materials in a timely manner. I can make the findings to give the PG&E relief as recommended by staff of 32 days. And I can make the findings to give relief for the health issues of 197 days, noting that this was originally items number 17 and 18 in the appeal application.

Thank you, Pat. Peter, do you want to go next?

Sure. I'm going to take a step back a little bit, be a little more broad and less specific initially. And the first thing I wanted to comment on, at the great risk of opening up a debate with Mr. Rothman, which I tend to lose with him, I wanted to comment on his public comment, which talks about the reasonable nature of our time limit. And That's the fourth and fifth item of this ordinance that describes the broader impact of large construction on the city, the traffic, parking, the noise considerations, the repetitious and continuous and building nature of that impact on the community. And specifically, it reads... Belvedere to place a reasonable time limit on the duration of each construction project so as to balance the needs of the property owner with those of the neighbors and the community in general. So it's not intended to necessarily absolutely say that these projects are gonna be done, but it's intended to create a motivational force to inspire or to hopefully motivate, I'm repeating myself, but motivate the timely completion of these projects. And as we chose to modify this ordinance a year and a half ago, it was not to recognize the inability to complete projects in this time. I have to personally attest to completing three projects in the city within the construction time limit, one of them on the island in a fairly large construction. but we did it to eliminate or to radically minimize the difficulty in assigning subjective accountability to the very things that we're talking about here in a manner that is as fair as possible. That takes a lot of, as Pat talked about, it's very, very difficult to account for those delays, who's responsible and whose control it is or isn't with. So that subjectivity has always been very difficult to assign, to eliminate the true cost to all parties of this process, which is significant to you, to us, to certainly our city staff, and to add as much equity and effectiveness at motivating the time of completion of the project, which we didn't think this was the best mechanism for. There might be another mechanism that might be more effective. So I just wanted to highlight that because those are really the factors for our choosing to alter the ordinance, not necessarily that we thought it wasn't achievable to accomplish a project in these periods of time. That said, I absolutely recognize the significant issues that you've had with this project and that impacted its completion. I think... our mayor pointed out, and I'll highlight that again, a very important consideration here, which is how do we assign control of the process when you have a property owner step into a very significant role as an owner builder? And as you said yourself, managing very very intentionally and deliberately the process up to including choosing a contractor perhaps lower on the experience or or or qualitative scale so that your wife doesn't get bullied around a project so so but then again you're taking in many of these um um items which Pat identified very, very specifically, you're taking layman's type of accountability for why it's not your project, why it's not in your control. That how could you as a homeowner or in quotes, layman, my words, know about the waterproofing on this or know that prior to a contractor signing on, you should do more exploratory foundation work to see what the scope of your work is. So that's where I have a sort of a fundamental split as far as, and I'm open to the further deliberation of this council, because if we're seeing the responsibility, meaning whose control is it, extrapolate through the inferior contractor, which I think we can all acknowledge by your own admission, that was the case almost by design, to the homeowner, then it's very difficult to say it's not in your control. Or if we were to say separately that it is the contractor's fault and that's out of your control, then I can see myself to making some findings that a lot more of these are acceptable because it was a complicated project and they didn't do it. I don't know that I can make that without further arguments from my fellow council members that Choosing a B minus, C plus contractor, my words again, not yours, but you did describe you didn't want someone too experienced to bully Linda and you wanted someone to fit into your perspective of how you and Chuck and your wife wanted to manage this project. And I think it manifested itself in what you would have expected or what one might have expected, which is sort of a clusterblunk, you know, that was gonna be a mess and make the project certainly compounded with real world problems, but their lack of experience or their lack of foresight or their lack of anticipation or expectations, I think might compound in many of those circumstances. I'm gonna briefly, I won't repeat what Council Member Karapet had gone through, but going through the uh, items that you've sought relief on, on the ADU. I read, I've read many, many planning. I do have experience with planning. I'd read many, many planning letters and, and, and, and, um, compliance letters and letters of, um, incompleteness, which this, this was, and there was a kitchen or a kitchenette or, or kitchen facilities proposed. And Irene proposed two ways to ways to solve this problem, either do an ADU, which was recommended. We still do recommend it. We still, still do, um, um, I support that because it does help the city from a broader housing perspective. But she also, with a slightly less level of emphasis, meaning an underline, said, or if you choose not to do that, you can do it through a second kitchen permit, which certainly is allowed in our city code. I don't think there was any further documentation or any further description by you or anyone presenting that it was further coercion or there's further description of that. You chose to elaborate and develop that ground floor more significantly. So I don't think I can acknowledge that, especially because it was well before the permit was issued. So you would have had expectations as far as how to create that space, even given the difficulties in doing so post... permanent issuance. COVID was difficult for everybody. I think we are restricted to state and local urgency ordinances on that. And I think it's very difficult because that's how we've approached it for all of these applicants that COVID, we've given the maximum time we possibly can with ramp up and ramp down time within those urgency ordinances that we stipulated in compliance with both the state and our own. Then realistically, number three, four, five, seven, eight, nine, 14, 11, 13, and 15, 11, 13, 14, and 15 all fall into that category that I described a second ago, which is If we believe the choice of the general contractor, in a sense, promoting the general contractor from not a general contractor, not that it was you're doing, but in the process, 14 months into into the into the project. I can't make those findings for any time off unless we come to a different conclusion relative to that responsibility, which I'm not there yet. As far as the holiday inspection, I'd be inclined to... recognize the disagreement between our city staff and the applicants, and I can see myself to granting those days on the vacation, even though I do believe, and in my experience, the city has been pretty absolute about their holiday breaks from a publishing perspective and also the Friday date. But if in fact they had one and then it was scheduled, but weren't aware that we weren't doing it on Fridays, it could create an unanticipated delay. Number 10, extreme weather delays. I think Pat Carapia summed that up correctly and I can concur with her findings on that. On number 12, I would agree that it's worth, I can find that the staff's recommendation is acceptable on the MMM water district break. And then we have 16 and 17. I'm okay with the PG&E delays. However, I do have to say that post COVID, any expectation that PG&E is gonna do anything but delay is a misinformed expectation. I mean, that's just anybody in the industry who has any experience with PG&E post COVID can tell you that if you don't expect a significant delay, you're the fool at the table. I'm not calling anyone. You guys are fool. I'm just broadly speaking. I apologize for that. And 17, I can make the findings for the delays associated with principal's health. Thank you.

Okay. Kevin, you're next.

Sure. Thank you. And thank you for your presentation. I mean, I really feel like it was very thoughtful and very earnest. And I can feel the pride of ownership you have in the process and how self-reflective you are now about the process as we can all be. When something's done, you can reflect on what went well and what didn't. So I really appreciate that. And I hope you're enjoying your lovely home. I mean, it's a beautiful house. For me, like Peter, I sort of stepped back and was thinking about, well, it's really, the question is about what's within one's control and what's not. And for me, I'm in reading the ordinance, which I think our job is to apply it in a fair and equitable way. And also in a consistent way, because we've had a number of these come before us over the last several months. And I'm really trying to be thoughtful about how did we decide and weigh in on any particular issue in previous CTLs. So we're being consistent with the application of the ordinance. And the CTL penalty factors, in my mind, the way that they're written, and this is in 4A through for F, under construction time limit ordinance. These are things that are sort of big and grand things, things that would be clearly out of someone's control, like natural disasters, acts of war, terrorism, labor stoppages, which I, in my mind, read as strikes, massive strikes, or I guess you could argue COVID, undiscovered, unanticipated discoveries of archaeolic archaeological resources, extreme weather events, and then administrative appeals. And so those are all things that, I mean, there really is no direct control that an individual would have over those things. I mean, the weather, I think we probably have to argue a bit about that one because that was one of the reasons that you cited or were asking for relief on. And then it goes on to say the things that are not to be considered as beyond the control of the applicant are things that are more related to the ongoing management of the project, delays caused by normal weather events or failure to adequately protect the job, failure of subcontractors to complete significant, numerous, or late design changes. So things that are very reflective of the reasons you're asking for relief. And so for me, if we are applying the ordinance in a fair and equitable way, excuse me, I have braces in today, is I feel like many of those things are within your control. And then I think it's also complicated by the fact that you chose the decisions that you made in terms of who would be accountable or who your team would be also created a lot of those issues as well. And that was very much, I mean, it was directly in your control. I mean, you made the decisions as to who would be the contractor. I guess the fact that you wouldn't have a licensed architect who would be involved in the process as well. And so you missed out on a lot of experienced people who could help guide you through that process and sort of mitigate some of these risks for you. So I very much concur with what my two fellow council members have said in terms of what they would either find support to make a finding or not on. And, you know, I wasn't thinking about, you know, whether we would add anything more. I certainly support the, PB, David Ensign he & him he's staffs recommendation of 287 days of relief, based on those three factors that both Pat and Peter had outlined. PB, David Ensign he & him he's I mean i'd be open to the holiday thing I mean that's that's again in the scheme of things I would be open to that for sure, but that's where my head's at. PB, Lupita D Montoya, Jane.

Okay, I think the first thing I want to say is a little follow up to what Peter said earlier about any changes in the CTL and what the motivation was, and I think the only place I would add a little bit more is I don't want anyone to assume that the new CTL code that we adopted does not also have a motivation to finish. It's not as if we just threw all CTLs out. We still have CTLs. We still have fines, we still have impacts for not finishing on time. So it is not, I didn't want anyone to assume that when we changed from this one, we went to nothing. That's not the case. Okay, so I also wanna thank you for coming tonight and sharing your information with us. I did listen to the 2019 Planning Commission meeting. I also listened to the 2022 Planning Commission meeting. And perhaps unlike the others, I was actually contacted by several of your neighbors about the disruption to their lives for the four years, but certainly two past the normal time. I did count 33 permits for concrete pouring alone, which I think is a huge impact on our community. And I think just thinking about concrete trucks going up and down and around Belvedere. And it was explained to me at another one of these appeals that the concrete trucks, it doesn't, the permit doesn't say that it's only one It could be several. They come, they leave that day. So that's a huge, huge amount of concrete pouring, which did go on throughout the whole project, including during the time of the wet winters. So I do think that our community impacts are real. And I do think our code is there to address exactly that. I also found that by listening to the two meetings that the planning commissioners were very clear that this project was very complex and very large. And in 2019, you were told that dry rot would be a problem and that demolishing was really more realistic. Your response was experts told us to demolish, that it would be cheaper, but we won't. So that was again, your decision to go the more difficult route. In 2022, as mentioned by Council Member Carapiette, these same issues were brought up, these same concerns were brought up. And again, both you and your wife said, we know fines will happen. but we're making these decisions anyway. I don't want to throw your words back at you, but this is what happened. So again, for me, I feel that this project was your responsibility. You hired your team. You made your decisions on the type of team you wanted. And I do feel that not just the planning commissioners, but also knowing our planning and building departments, that they would have given you many opportunities to understand about the CTL fines. It's certainly written everywhere and talked about often, as I noted. So I also would like to acknowledge unless you want me to give responses, would you like reasoning for everything? Many of these, I counted eight of the items fall under issues with the contractor rather than the owner's responsibility. So the ADU, in my mind, I can't single out the ADU as the only cause for delay when You were doing structural damage repair. You had to redo the foundation. You were adding a kitchen, according to all information that we read, and a second laundry room down there. And you wound up actually creating, I'm sure, something that you love even more. So I don't think it was only the ADU that caused those issues. So I don't find relief for that. I think the discussion about COVID and that we are dictated by the state and our own use of that dictates that. And also our municipal code is clear about receiving supplies in a timely manner, not constituting a reason for relief. So I do not find relief for that. The dry rot was highlighted in 2019, which was 18 months before receiving a building permit. I'm not saying it was specific to where the dry rot would be, but I'm pretty sure it was noted that the garage would be a problem and you'd probably find it elsewhere. So this could not have been that big of a surprise. And you had time to analyze it. So I support the staff recommendation that no relief days be added there. I feel that the turret falls under our municipal code as a job site damage, not being a reason. So I don't find relief there. I don't find relief for the inability of the contractor to increase crew. I really believe that was, again, as noted before, your decision to hire an inexperienced subcontractor who then took over as contractor. But I would say that was probably your great team didn't turn out that way, even though you had expectations that it would. Holiday closure. That is one where I also agree that I could find days of relief. I calculated eight days because of some of the dates falling on weekends. And I don't know any contractors that work every Friday. It seems maybe they work two Fridays a month. So In calculating that I came up with eight relief days for the holiday closure. Again, the cabinets that falls under our municipal code. So I find no relief days there. Exterior waterproofing falls under our municipal code. I don't find relief days for that reason. Number nine was eliminated. Number 10 is the extreme weather delays. And yes. There was rain. And yes, you had three concrete pours during those couple of months. So it does seem to me that that type of work and what was necessary to get done did get done. So I find no relief days for that. Again, flooding in the lower level seems to have been a problem with the oversight of the contractor and also falls into our municipal code. The water main break, I agree to the relief offered by the staff of the 58 days. Contractor payments. Again, the choice of an oversight of the contractor is that of the owner. So I find no relief days for that reason. And property damages fall under that oversight of the contractor as well as our municipal code. The garage door, I honestly have no clue how you lose a garage door. I've been trying to figure that out. I can't, but it falls under a supply for our municipal code. So I find no relief there. I do agree with PG&E relief of the 32 days. I support the health issues and giving the 192 days And overall, I support staff's recommendation of 287 days of relief.

Thank you, Jane. I'm not going to take time to add much other than to really just state what everybody else has said, which was that it was really a choice to select an inferior contractor for personal reasons. And that led to a whole host of problems for you. And it seems like many of these issues are issues you'd be taking up with your contractor through whatever means rather than through request to reduce the fine here. And I would also second what Jane said about real impact on the community of these projects that sometimes the person doing the project doesn't realize. I'm woken up every morning right now by cement trucks driving underneath my house, going to a big project. It's really meaningful for the community and we've all, Like Peter, I built a large project and I did run over my limit, but not extensively because we were very aggressively managing the project to make sure that we tried to reduce our fines. So we all have sympathy for your situation, but we do have our code, which we have to enforce. So I concur that... where I would find relief is in relation to MMWD, PG&E and the health issues. So it seems like everybody is in agreement here except for this one additional item of holiday, the vacation question where I know the applicant was asking for 21 days of relief. Jane, you've suggested eight days. I would like to get some input from other council members as to whether anybody else would like to support that or whether to decline.

I support the broader concept of it. I mean, there's a little bit of disconnect from the perspective that that's... you know, eight work days, especially over the holiday season, but our CTL doesn't distinguish work days from day days. So there's a 21 day delay between that and the issue of the, I sort of feel you're in or out.

But the staff report makes it clear that it's 12, 21 days because they needed to do work. So there's no way.

So the 10 days or my recommendations, what the staff recommends there, which I think was 10 days, wasn't it?

Staff recommended zero.

They didn't recommend. But they identified 10 days between the date when it was versus when it wasn't.

Well, if you count days from December 23rd to January 4th, it's 12 days when I count my fingers and toes. Not 21.

No, no, 21 was the original. My mistake. I'm sorry.

Brian?

So the original 21 days was from that December 14th date. to January 4th. However, it seems like there would have been work that had been done to correct whatever was seen at the inspection.

But the issue should be the 22nd through the January date. They asked for the 22nd, right? The 22nd would have been a Friday. But that's the one they're claiming was scheduled, confirmed, and canceled. Correct.

So how many days are we talking? My calendar says the 23rd was a Friday.

Yeah, it's the 23rd is the Friday. City Hall was closed the following week. It reopened on Tuesday, January 3rd, because we observed the New Year's holiday on the second. Excuse me. So technically, City Hall was closed from the 23rd and then reopened the 3rd.

They're saying that their inspection that was confirmed, scheduled, confirmed and canceled was for December 22nd, 2022. Right, so then you would add a day out.

But that's a Thursday. Right, that's a Thursday.

I looked at the report. It all said December 23rd. I double-checked that date, and they'll say somewhere wrong.

I'm reading what they wrote, so maybe they're mistaken.

The inspection would have had to be scheduled on the 22nd for the 23rd, because we do not do same-day inspections. So the inspection would have been conducted on the 23rd. I guess if council was looking for a relief, it would be 10 days.

It's not 12? You're saying from the 23rd to the 4th?

To the 3rd. City Hall opened on the 3rd.

No, it's one day. Yeah, 10 days. If they had made it on Thursday, the 22nd, They could have had it on January 3rd, but they didn't know City Hall was closed on the 23rd. That's what I believe I heard from Mr. Marshall. Yeah, so I'm just saying if you count those days, it's 12 days. I'm 11, 12.

Okay, so do we have agreement that...

I can agree on 12, yes.

Okay, so Andrew, what do you need here from us to wrap this up?

So my apologies, there's a couple of loose ends. So I apologize if I missed it, Mayor, but did you largely concur with the findings made by your fellow council members and the other issues?

I absolutely concurred with the findings, had no other issues, and it was just the uncertainty around the vacation days, which we have agreed.

Okay, thank you. And then one very, very minor issue. Councilmember Karapet, when you went through your findings, I did just want to follow up very briefly on the one concerning the cabinet. I think when you discuss the cabinetmaker, you still consider the cabinetmaker to be a subcontractor. I did just want to note in some of the follow-up submission from the applicant, he mentioned that the cabinetmaker was not a subcontractor, but someone that he contracted with directly.

When I was saying it, I was going, oh, he said it wasn't a subcontractor. I mean, normally it would be maybe a subcontractor, but I still couldn't find it. Hold on.

I don't know that, and maybe I'm splitting hairs, that is not defined by our law or interpretation, but I don't know that our code distinguishes a subcontractor from a contractor. It's meant to imply a worker on the project other than the owner. I mean, that's a layman's, not so layman's perspective on it, but that's, I believe, what it's intended to. So I don't know that distinguishing between a contractor who hires a subcontractor or an owner directly contracting with a subcontractor. They're still called a subcontractor because they're not a general contractor. In all terminology, anybody other than a general contractor, whomever hires them is a subcontractor.

Absolutely fair point, Council Member. I just want to make sure Council Member Carapietta is in agreement.

Okay. So do you want, so we're agreeing to increase the relief from 287 days recommended by staff to an extra 12 days. So that's 299 days of relief.

That's correct.

Which reduces the fine down to 328 days. I don't know what it is in dollars.

That would put us down to 340. Is that right?

No, 3.28.

We're at 3.40 already, aren't we? So it's 3.54. 3.39, 600. Sorry, one second.

So can I ask a question since we're figuring figures?

Additional 12 days. 3.42. Okay, great. So our recalculation is that the total relief would be 299 days of relief and the new penalty amount would be $339,339 and $600. $339,600. My apologies.

I have a question, Andrew. I never answered your question.

Yes, ma'am.

Did you want me to change my finding from subcontractor to contractor? Okay.

Not if you believe what Peter Councilmember Marks comments, then I think we're fine.

I think you're wrong with that 359. It's a max of $900 per day times 12, which is 10, eight. It's 1200.

We would take it from the back end. So it'd be $1,200 for each day. So it'd be 12 days times 1200. Okay.

So that is the final method we have down here.

Again, 299 days of relief for a total CTL penalty of $339,600.

Unless anyone has any concerns with the math, I can offer a motion for the council.

Exactly. If you can offer a motion and then let's do that first. And then let's just confirm some details afterwards.

Sure.

Yes. Okay. The proposed motion would be moved to deny the appeal. and impose a final CTL penalty of $339,600 equivalent to 299 days of relief for 431 Golden Gate Avenue and its owners. This determination is based on the findings made by council, findings drafted by staff in the proposed resolution, recommendations made in the staff report and additional materials and statements and testimony provided at tonight's hearing.

Does that recognize the adjustment that we just made to the days?

Yes. So I have, again, the final adjusted total as a penalty of $339,600, which constitute 299 days of relief.

It's just the rest of that statement seemed to say we're concurring entirely with the staff's findings and we're not concurring with all of them. We're making one adjustment.

Thank you. Recommendations made by staff as modified and as adjusted by council during these deliberations.

Can I get a motion? So moved. Can I get a second? Second. Do you need a roll call or we can just... No. Okay.

All in favor.

All in favor.

Aye.

Aye. And so, so I was going to say from here, you will bring back the final resolution to next month on consent just for approval, or do you, is that the recommendation?

Yeah, so just to clarify, just for the record, again, there's a unanimous vote of the council in approval of the motion just mentioned or just discussed. And yes, the final resolution will be brought back to council on consent at the next meeting, given the additional input provided by council tonight. Thank you.

Great, thank you so much. Thank you very much for your time. I'm sorry, I'm sure you're disappointed with the result, but I hope we considered all of your comments All of you appeal very seriously and we hope in the meantime that you are enjoying your home. Thank you so much. Okay, we are moving on to item number 6B. Helga, are you still awake? Okay, this is 6B, discussion and possible action on the fiscal year 25-26 mid-year budget review. Helga, can we have the staff report, please?

Thank you, Mayor Wilkinson and council members. I'll try to keep this pretty brief. This mid-year budget review is for our current fiscal year 25-26 and will focus primarily on the general fund. My presentation will provide a brief overview of the city's budget as of December 31st. As you know, the mid-year budget review is a crucial part of the budget process as it allows the council and the public to review the city's financial status and ensure we are on track to meet our budgetary goals and provide fiscal transparency. Here are some highlights of this year's budget so far. The budgeted beginning general fund balance was $6.14 million. However, the actual fund balance at the end of June 2025 was $7.41 million, an increase of $127 million. Per the city's fund balance and reserve policy, any unassigned balance will be maintained within the city's general fund. And the finance committee is tasked with recommending whether any portion of the unassigned balance should be appropriated for specific purposes. Upon the Finance Committee's recommendation, the Council approved in January the allocation of 1.03 million of the unassigned funds to the Critical Infrastructure Reserve to assist with funding the Beach Road Stabilization Project, estimated at 4.63 million. $50,000 towards completing the storm drain and retaining wall assessments and $50,000 for the police department upgrades and $100,000 for a BCDC shoreline cleanup project. The city's largest liability is pension funding. The city began seeding the section 115 trust in April of 21 with total contributions to date of 2.85 million. Investment gains have increased the balance to a little over 3.41 million. And the goal of this trust is to fully fund the city's pension liability by 2040. with the second review of the pension funding strategy scheduled for December of 2026. Revenue and expenditures should be at about 50% of the budget for this point in the fiscal year. Total revenues are currently exceeding those expectations at 65%, and total expenditures are slightly below at 48%. As I mentioned revenue should be approximately 50% of the budgeted amount currently total revenues are at 7.4 2 million, which is 65% of the total budget general fund revenues stand at 63% with property taxes accounting for the largest portion. totaling 4.51 million. Investment earnings are slightly above budget due to conservative assumptions and over-the-counter fees are trending higher consistent with expectations from the implementation of the new user fee schedule. The capital improvement funds revenues are showing a positive trend this year, the road impact fees have already generated 277,000 funds received from the transportation authority of Marin of 64,000 are allocated to the city's lane improvement projects, Harry B Allen stairs and the park lane project. Most of the other revenue funds are trending close to projected amount and are expected to meet the budget estimates. Total expenditures are 5.86 million or 38% of budget. General fund expenses are 3.41 million or 48% slightly below the expected 50% for this point in the fiscal year. The fire fund is at 58% due to payment of the January invoice in December and legal and insurance reserve fund is at 55% due to ongoing construction time limit legal expenditures. The capital improvement fund expenditures have reached 8% of the budget with most projects typically implemented in the spring when the weather conditions improve. The beach road stabilization project is the largest item in this year's capital budget at 2.65 million with construction anticipated to begin in June of 26 and conclude in the fall of 26. The project is in the design phase and staff anticipate going out to bid later this month. Public Works is also advancing the long term capital assessments, currently focusing on the storm drains and facilities to improve future planning and forecasting. Other capital projects include the installation of a mini split system in the police department, which has been completed, and in the founders room. The artist view platform project is in the final design phases. Projects scheduled for later this spring include city hall spot painting, sidewalk repair, retaining wall assessments, and vegetation fire fuel reduction, among others. The Equipment Replacement Fund currently reflects the purchase of the new Street Sweeper for the Public Works, a new Ford Explorer for the Police Department, and the replacement of the PD's in-car mobile data computers. And this brings us to the summary of the general fund. Some revenue categories, particularly those impacted by the updated user fee schedule are trending higher at mid-year. The full impact of the revised fee structure will not be known until later this fiscal year. Following best practice, we did not budget for anticipated revenue increases from the new fee schedule in this first year of implementation to allow time to evaluate before incorporating changes, which will be part of next fiscal year's budget. Expenditures are tracking close to budget levels and align with expectations to date. As mentioned earlier in the presentation, the general funds beginning balance as of July 1st, 2025 increased to 7.4 million due to prior year fund balance carryover And after approved reserve allocations, the projected ending balance of the general fund is 4.9 million on June 30th, 2026. And lastly, we look at the general fund reserve. In December 21, the council modified the general fund reserve policy to be calculated based on forecasted expenditures rather than current year expenditures. The fiscal year 26, 27 projected general fund expense plus fire transfer plus debt service is 9.11 million. The reserve goal is 50% of this amount or 4.55 million. The projected general fund balance of 4.9 million continues to meet this council's established reserve policy goal. And in conclusion, the finance committee did review the mid-year budget report at their meeting on June 22nd and recommended that the council accept the mid-year budget review. And with that, I'd be happy to take any questions.

Thank you, Helga. Do any council members have questions? Oh, Jane.

Just because, you know, we got to get to a nice even number tonight. We don't want to leave too early. Helga did all this work and then we're just short shrifting right now. Anyway, it was a wonderful report. Even I could understand it, which is to say a lot. And I mean, as far as a compliment to you, not to me. The only thing that stood out for me, and I've been trying to understand, is our CalPERS and OPEB liability report. as you noted, is almost half of what our operating and capital budget is. So I know that at the audit they said we had very high standing because of our low debt, but it seems like that's awfully high debt compared to our overall budget. So my question is I know that the you wrote here the finance committee will be reviewing how we want to move forward with this. And I just wondered, is this an area that would be a good idea for the city council to give some direction on ideas or questions on that topic? Maybe at the retreat or I don't know if you want to bring it up tonight, but I just thought if it's going, I know it doesn't go till next fall-ish, late fall, but it just seems to me that we don't have many opportunities to let the finance committee respond to questions we might have or statements that we might wanna make, individual council members might wanna make.

I think at the retreat might be the best place to bring this up about the pension and then we can note your questions and comments. Okay, thank you. That's all I have.

Just a quick question. Structurally, in the reserve calculation, general fund expenses plus fire transfer, which is the full payment to the district, correct?

Six months. Six months.

Wow, it'll be six months. Six months, I understand, I understand. For the 50%, what I'm saying. But that $9 million, in that nine and change, is the full transfer to Tiburon?

Yes.