Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

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[Music] All right, we're going to start the meeting in 10.

Good evening. The Thursday, June 12th, 2025 meeting of the Brisbane Planning Commission will now come to order. Staff, please call the role. Commissioner Funka. Commissioner Gooding, present. Commissioner Laauo is absent. Commissioner Patel here. Commissioner Saison here. May I have a motion to adopt the agenda, please? So moved. Second. Those in favor? I I. Motion passes unanimously. New business. Tonight we will be taking public comment on the draft environmental impact report for the Brisbane Bayand specific plan. Specific plan number 2021- SP-01 and Environmental Review 2021-ER 001. Sunquest Properties, Inc. and Bayands Development, Inc. are the applicant and owners. Staff, may we have the presentation? Uh, yes. Thank you. Uh, we'll be joined tonight by Terry Avala of ESA, the consultant who prepared the EIR for the city. But I'll go ahead and kick off the presentation and turn it over to Terry. Next slide, please. So again, um, as the chair indicated, the city has published a draft EIR for the Brisbane Bayland specific plan project. The IR was released in April of this year. The public comment period ends in September, September 2nd of 2025. So that period of time, the public can offer their written comments um on the EIR. the city and the consultant team will respond in writing to any environmental issues raised in those comments. So again, that's the the basic process. Um for tonight's meeting, just a reminder, it is focused solely on taking testimony on the environmental impact report. There's going to be no discussion of the project itself, the merits of the

specific plan. There'll be no discussion um of the plan itself other than a brief overview. Um there won't be any questions being uh responded to tonight on anything that's brought up tonight. Any comments will go into the record. Anything related to the um specific plan, we would encourage members of the audience to hold those comments to the proper appropriate hearing. There will be um a number of hearings before the planning commission once the environmental document is completed. then the public will have the opportunity to uh make comments on the specific plan, the project itself to the planning commission. So with that caveat, I'll walk through the agenda real quickly. Um Terry from ESA will provide a quick overview of sort of SQUA as well as of the project that was evaluated in the EIR. She'll touch on some of the highlevel sort of conclusions and information from the EIR. And again, we'll just put another slide that at the end that reminds people how they can comment on the on the EIR. So, with that, I'll turn over the next slide and turn it over to Terry. Great. Thank you, John. And, um, I'm happy to be here. So, um, let me start with an overview of SQA. If you could go to the next slide, please. Um uh the purpose of tonight's meeting is to provide yet another opportunity to comment um on uh the draft EIR during this environmental review process and um the focus of the comments should be on significant environmental issues. Um and as John mentioned um no action is being taken uh tonight by the commission. um nor are we responding to comments but merely um accepting comments that will

be ultimately included whether they are written or verbal tonight in the final e next slide please. Um, so here is the SQA review process and to to kind of focus on it, the purpose of an EIR is to both inform decision makers and the public about potential significant environmental effects of this project as well as how those um impacts could be avoided, reduced or otherwise mitigated. Um the process began with issuance of a notice of preparation which indicates that a draft will be prepared and that process also had a public comment period as well as a scoping meeting where comments could be provided. There was a second uh notice of preparation prepared due to some changes in the project which also included a public notice period and a scoping meeting. And we are um where you see in the green box on this slide um the required public review period under the California Environmental Quality Act or SQUA is um 45 days. Uh but the city has elected to provide an extended uh public review period, in this case 151 days to allow for uh public comment. It began on April 3rd and will conclude at 5:00 p.m. on September 2nd of this year. And then moving forward, um there will be more

opportunities for public involvement as it moves forward to the um public hearing process with the planning commission who will consider the project and the draft environmental impact report and make a recommendation to city council who will then also hear both the draft EIR and the project and ultimately make a decision as to certification and/or approval. And during both of those hearing processes, there will be yet another opportunity or opportunities for public comment. Next slide, please. Um so an EIR is um you know basically a study of both the potential direct and indirect effects of a project in this case this project on the physical environment and as I mentioned previously it's to inform um decision makers the public community agencies of the impacts and ways they could be reduced or mitigated. Um, and the scope of the EIR, and there's a slide coming up that will go into more detail, includes not only the impacts of the project, but as well, what are alternatives to the project? Um what are cumulative impacts meaning the project combined with reasonably foreseeable other projects growth inducing impacts and any significant irreversible environmental changes. Next slide. So now getting into the project

moving on. Um so the project obviously is located in the city of Brisbane in San Monteo County and it is roughly located um in the eastern portion of the city on about 680 acres. And of those um 680 acres about 558 are um land area and about 122 or so are the existing lagoon as this figure shows. Um there are existing uses um that will remain including the Rology site, Golden State Lumber, the Kinder Morgan tank farm, the city corporation yard, the machinery and equipment company, and the existing um uh Brisbane Fire Department station. And kind of more on the fire station later. Um the project proposes approximate well it proposes uh 2,200 residential units uh 6.5 million square ft of commercial office retail conference life science and office campus uses a 500,000 square foot hotel property which would be about 800 rooms middle school. Um the required infrastructure to support the project as well as sustainable infrastructure uses including a water recycling facility, water storage, uh a switching

substation, battery storage, and a solar farm. as well as um about 157 acres devoted to conservation, restoration, and enhancement uses as well as um you know, active and passive parks and recreational improvements including you know trails and the like. Um in in addition to the uses identified in the specific plan, there are other um proposed components that are not included in the specific plan but are related to specific plan implementation and as a result they have been described in the EIR as project description and evaluated in the EIR and Those include uh provision of water supply. So establishing the California water service company or cow water as the service agency for uh with the bailand Sierra Point and Batty sub areas of the city. um reconfiguration of Beayshore Boulevard from four lanes, two in each direction to two lanes, one in each direction, uh along with turn lanes, uh a trail and bus turnouts, and this is also referred to as the Beayshore mobility plan. Um relocation of the existing fire station um Um and then conversion of that station um for use as a training facility and establishment of a new station within

the bay lands and then construction um as I previously mentioned of a middle school and uh conversion of the existing beayhore school to an elementary school. Uh there are a number of approvals and I'm I'm highlighting the you know the the key approvals. Um they're not the subject of tonight's meeting but those are an amendment to the general plan land use and circulation elements. adoption of the specific plan itself, which will require a change of zone as well as amendments to the Brisbane municipal code and approval of a development agreement. And now to the draft EIR. Um the draft EIR um contents are identified by SQA and um the uh the highlights are provided here. The additional um chapter is a fact sheet which is really just kind of a summary of the project description to um you know provide the reader with a um you know just a quick highlight of what the project is. Next slide. Um, SQUA requires um 19 topics to be evaluated and they don't always have to be evaluated in an EIR. They can be scoped out in an NOP.

Um, but in this case, all 19 topics have been evaluated in the draft DIR and they are identified here. Um so the draft EIR requires a conclusion as to the significance of an environmental impact and that could be no impact. It could be less than significant either with or without mitigation or it can be significant and unavoidable and significant and unavoidable could be even with all uh feasible mitigation measures. So I'm going to start with the significant and unavoidable impacts and the first involves air quality which is uh the emission of criteria air pollutants for which the basin is currently in nonattainment and that is looking at both construction and operation. Um second uh net increase in average annual greenhouse gas emissions and that is also during construction and operation and that is based on you know a fairly stringent um net zero increase emission threshold. uh noise. Um first is um increase in noise due to temporary construction related activities. Second is an increase in noise from operational activities from stationary sources and those might be things like

HVAC. Um it could be the water recycling facility, battery storage systems or even um special events with amplified noise. um noise also um uh an increase in noise levels along roadways. And in this particular case, there were 15 roadways analyzed. And in 2035, one of those roadways exceeded the threshold. And in uh 2043 roadways um exceeded this the threshold. Um moving on. Um there are project related um hotel residential and hotel development that is located adjacent to the Cal Train ride ofway that could expose residents and hotel guests to noise and vibration levels exceeding thresholds. But that is under cumulative conditions. And that includes not only the specific but bay lands north the calrain electrification project and the highspeed rail project um very similarly um vibration generating construction activities caused by pile driving but again it is cumulative and includes the specific plan balance north kel train electrification and highspeed rail again a cumulative impact And then lastly, also cumulative, uh the city's library um was designed to accommodate population growth associated with uh

residential buildout of the general plan, but it did not include residential growth with the Bayand specific plan, which would would cause an increase in demand for new or expanded library facilities again under cumulative conditions. So those were the significant and unavoidable impacts and those were by impact statement. There are a number of um uh topics that resulted in no impacts or less than significant impacts with or without mitigation. And these are the broad categories but again there are impact statements under each of them. So um quite a number that resulted in no impacts or less than significant impacts. SQL also requires that we look at alternatives. Um one of the requirements is the no project alternative. Um and we evaluated both the no project no build alternative which means nothing would be developed on the project site. We also looked at the no project general plan buildout alternative which assumes development of the bayands would occur but would not require any amendments to the general plan. And then we also looked at uh different alternatives that include the same land use plan but in different configurations and locations. So same land use plan but different configurations and locations.

And then we also looked at reduced density alternatives where the land use plan was reduced in its overall development scale. So going a total of nine. Um SQL also requires that the EI identifies the environmentally superior alternative and in this case it was alternative seven. it was in that third category of reduced density and in this case it was both reduced density and reduced maximum building heights. Um but even with this alternative the significant and unavoidable impacts I described a few slides earlier related to air quality, greenhouse gas emissions and noise would be less but will not reduce to a less than significant level even with the application of feasible mitigation measures. So now on to the public review and comment period. Okay. Thank you, Cherry. Oh, I think there's an there are a few more slides, but I'm happy to seed the floor if you'd prefer. Oh, no, no. Continue, please. Okay, gladly. Um, as John mentioned, the public review period is April 3rd to September 2nd at um 5:00 p.m. 151 days. If anyone would like to um see a hard copy of the draft, it is available at the planning counter. It is available at the library. It is available online.

I believe um there are also um there may be CDs available at the planning counter. Um next slide. Um if you'd like to submit written comments, you may do it via email uh to the address that is highlighted in orange on this slide or you may mail comments um to the address identified here. Um and again um any comments on significant environmental issues will be responded to in writing in the final EIR. Next slide. Um and then tonight um and I might need staff's help as I'm saying this. Um but Terry, we can we can go ahead and the chair can handle the uh these instructions right here. That would be lovely. Okay. Thank you, Terry. You're very welcome. Okay. Um before I open it up for public comments, uh do any of the commissioners have any questions for staff? No. Okay. Okay. So, um we'll now open it up for uh to hear from the public. Um we'll take in-person comments first, followed by any remotely. If you would like to speak, please fill out a form and hand it to staff. Each person will have um John, what do you think? Five minutes. Um you may want to just pull the audience and see who wants to speak and you can determine. Okay. Well, I have about I think five or six here. Um can you raise your hand if uh you would like to speak tonight? So yeah, I think uh five minutes. Okay. So each person will have five minutes to speak. A timer will be displayed, a green light followed by a yellow light and finally a red light when time is up. If you find that you exceed your time,

please wrap up your thoughts so that uh we can hear from everyone. You can always follow up with written comments um later. Uh again, please focus your comments on the draft eir not on the project itself. Okay, we will start with Nancy Lockman. Thank you, commissioners. I'll take that to heart. I did drop off my comments that there are some more uh general comments, but I will not read those. I will stick to the e as you suggested. Um I'm a ris a Brisbane resident. I was a member of the yes on JJ committee eight years ago. Um and I'm truly in um after reading through quite a bit of the EI most of today um everything that I saw and have seen in the EIR so far has met the um points that we pushed for and measure JJ did pass with the voter support 5545. But in speaking specifically to some of these significant issues that are of concern, um I travel down to King Street in San Francisco. You have a Cal Train station deading there. You have lots and lots of apartment buildings there and there are ways to mitigate it and that does not seem to be a noise issue for those people for the continual noise situation. I do understand people have different tolerance levels on noise. So for building I totally understand it. But as said it will be a temporary sort of thing. I do believe with our winds we do get a cross-section of noise ever everything from uh across the bay at the A stadium when it was to a concert in San Francisco to on Trinity Road. I used to hear the Barts pulling into the station believe it or not uh in one of

the um above ground stations. So at different times you hear different things and I do know that when they were building quite a bit in South City, we did hear that continual power uh you know uh thing but I believe in the long run this is part of our destiny this day this bayands project and we really need to go forward with and we have to be very timesensitive to the fact that we've committed to these housing in our housing element density matters heightened buildings minimizing do minim Minimize heating bills. There will be more open space with taller buildings. Building more buildings to hit the housing agreed quota of 2200 is not the answer. Density is better for the environment. The view element from Brisbane is a non-issue. You have to be on Humboldt or higher in Brisbane to even see past Ice House Hill. If you're on the east side of town, you're looking west, not north. So, the view element, I don't believe, is an issue. So the issue of higher buildings should not force us into less open space by having more Lego buildings. Keep to the current plan. Make that work. I'm also personally interested in housing affordability, transportation, and street layouts. On the housing, I hope we keep the affordability at 23% or even higher by having smaller units available for people to have their first apartment, get on the train, and get to work without driving through their work week. This will be a huge win for those working the east side of 101 where there is zero housing for that workforce. Actually saw you roll riding your bike today going up uh our main street there or going up the sidewalk to uh Santa Clara I think it was. Um they can and will bike to work. Please keep the number of 514 affordable housing units within the baylands in the plan. the uh Geneva Avenue regional arterial caught a question of concern that and I have it

in my notes chapter 3-36 referencing pictures on 3-39 on that Geneva Avenue regional arterial they're saying we should have six lanes bus one car two lanes on either side and then when it gets to the freeway on ramp uh arterial street Sierra Point Parkway it becomes one lane each side. Seems like the central part of the Geneva Avenue should remain 2 plus two. Buses can be in the same lane as cars just like on the bridge. Where are the buses going? They're getting to the freeway and they will get their free lane. No sense making it a freewayish road to merge onto a single road. So, I think that six lane Geneva crossover is uh a little bit overkill. Also on the Sierra Point Parkway, it says says there will be a shared use area for bikers and walkers. I would recommend to keep walkers on the inner balin side and bikers on the bay side versus a shared use area for bikers not having um what I was concerned about is campus road visitation creek north and south looks like it's a cutthrough back to Sierra Point. you wouldn't want to have bikers having to stop at each each corner in case uh cars are beginning to merge. So, I think bikers should be closer to the bay. I'm also, as I said earlier, very concerned about the time frame of this review process. There can be no delays. We must, and I repeat this, we must keep our housing element deadline in mind, which I believe is early 2026. And I believe that's it. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you. Armando Mario. Okay, thank you. Nells Danter.

Good evening, chair, commissioners, and city staff. I understand this is about the ER, but I'd like to have this on the record. My name is Nelson Zander and I'm a representative of Carver's local 217 of Sanonteo County. We would like to have the support of the We would like to have the support of this development, but as of right now, we do not have a solid agreement for the Brisbane portion of the project from the developer. We would like to continue the conversation with the CEO of Baylands so this development can be a project we can fully support. to have our support. We would like to have this development use a responsible general contractor that provides health care for the workers, requires contractors from use apprentichip apprentices from state approved apprentichip programs and also provides livable wages for workers building this development. It is necessary that the workers have access to health care, especially if the worker in construction is not the safest field to work in. If the accidents happen, it is so important for workers to have access to the care they need so they can stay healthy and be able to provide for their families. By having contractors that utilize apprentices from a state approved apprentichip programs, you're not only getting professional work with properly trained workers, but you're also maximizing safety on this development. It is also equally important that workers get a livable wage. These workers deserve to be paid correctly for the hard work they put in day in day out. With good wages, you're giving them a fair chance of life to be able to take care of themselves and their families. We're hoping we can have an agreement with the developer soon so we can fully support this project. I'm hoping we can work together on this. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Michelle Sammon. I'm strong enough. I'm not sure if I'm strong enough to lift even one volume of this anymore. Um, there's no doubt that this will eventually, well, I don't know if there's no doubt, but this will

eventually get built, but I want to make sure that we build something that is the best possible thing that we can build both for the people that will be living and working there and for the city of Brisbane and that it doesn't break the bank. Um, there's a lot more reading than I need to do, like a lot more, but I just want to remind people that we need to fulfill all of the conditions of measure JJ, which passed. In um item H on me, me measure JJ was key habitat areas including Ice House Hill and Brisbane Lagoon and adjacent habitat as identified in the 2001 city open space master plan shall be preserved, enhanced, and protected. One of the things that we've had a discussion about recently is the definition of open space versus open area. And so I went to the 2001 plan that was published and is mentioned in the thing and I want to read to you the definition of open space and open area. So they were all very clear of what Brisbane's definition of these are. Section 65560 of title 7 of the California government code defines open space as any parcel of land or water that is essentially unimproved and devoted to an open space used for purposes of one the preservation of natural resources. Two, the managed production of resources. Three, outdoor recreation. Four, public health and safety. According to the 1994 Brisbane general plan, the term open space describes lands that are in public ownership. In public ownership and essentially unimproved and dedicated or proposed to be dedicated to the public for outdoor recreation andor conservation purposes. In contrast to open space, the general plan on page 86 defines the term open

area as parcels of land or portions thereof primarily in private ownership that serve to soften the impacts of urban development and otherwise provide primary green areas and a feeling of openness and to the development pattern. Typical open areas include, but are not limited to, setbacks, easements that are setbacks and easements that are landscaped or characterized by vegetation. Open areas might also include private parks and recreation areas within a private development. According to the general plan, an open area may consist of a combination of hardscape and landscape such as a plaza, streets, conventional sidewalks, parking lots, and similar improvements uh function as circulation facilities and do not qualify as open space. I just want to make sure we're really clear on that. streets, conventional sidewalks, parking lots, and similar improvements function as circulation facilities and do not qualify as open areas. Um, and then it goes on to state, you know, the open space plan contains recommendations that pertain both to open space preservation and the creation and design of open areas in conjunction with development. And I think that's really important because as I'm reading through the draft EIR, it's often referred to open space and open areas. And those are two very different things. And for instance, in the plan, there's a whole area that is called the solar farm. That is not open area. That is a function that is used and it's built and it's basically a parking lot for solar panels. So I want to make sure that in the agreements of the open space that the city of Brisbane has negotiated uh

in terms of the overall development is uh properly defined and properly used. Um one of the things that concerns me is that some of the there's some conflicts between things where we have open space, open area, recreational type things that are part of the plan. And um one of the areas that is mentioned about being preserved is Ice House Hill as a habitat. And yet right next to that they want to build what's called community fields. And I think that this is not a very good idea because first of all there's not adequate space there for decent community fields including parking. And one of the things that is important and sort of a standard in Santo County is that they usually have 20 parking spaces per field per so per per standard size soccer field. There's really not room for that there. And this example of Santa Clara Youth Soccer Park has has a 100 car parking lot for three fields in a building. Madera County has an ordinance that says you have have to have a minimum of 20 spaces per field parking spaces. And I just don't see where that's going to happen because of the the location where you have uh boundaries that we can't cross over. We have railroad tracks, we have machinery and equipment and we have um the railroad tunnel and we have beayshore. And one of the things that concerns me is in the draft DIR um under community fields, two two active recreation areas are proposed to provide opportunities for outdoor exercise and community sports and locations accessible from Bayland's neighborhoods via bicycle or walking as well as accessible to Brisbane residents. These areas are intended to accommodate an array of physical activities and play for all ages and abilities. And it goes on to describe the community fields. This approximately 7.4 4 acre park includes flexible re recreational irrigated turf

lawn, ball-filled picnic and games areas and amenity pavilion with restrooms, playgrounds, fitness stations, buffer plantings and shade structure. The park will be nightlighted, including lighting for active nighttime sports activities. Vehicular parking would also be provided. Pedestrian and bicycle trails will connect to the existing Crocker Trail, Ice House Hill Trail Network, Tunnel Avenue, and the proposed ecological park. The problem I have with Sorry, through the chair. The the red light's not working on there, unfortunately. Oh, it's working. Let me just finish this. Okay. Well, the the red light facing the chair then is not working. Oh, okay. I I just want to make the point that having lighted ball fields in well into the night is not compatible with the habitat restor the habitat areas that they're trying to preserve in this in this section with ice house hill and the little trail there and everything and I think there are better uses for that and I wanted to make sure that we also really are clear on the difference between open space and open area in this plan. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Corey Smith. Good evening, chair and commissioners. Uh Corey Smith, the executive director of the Housing Action Coalition. Uh we are a nonprofit that does work around the Bay Area and the state of California to support the construction of more housing at all income levels from homeless supportive housing deed restricted affordable and market rate thinking about urban infill housing trying to make our cities work better for everybody. Uh and I'm here to speak in support of the project uh but unfortunately raise some serious concerns about some of the excessive mitigation measures in the draft. The Baylands is a rare opportunity to transform a 684 acre former industrial site into a vibrant transit oriented

community with up to 2200 new homes including affordable housing that's been mentioned next to transit Cal Train Union and a future BART station and this project is essential for Brisbane to meet its housing element goals and do its part to help the region address our affordability and climate crisises. Unfortunately, the draft EIR does include some unnecessary and ultimately costly mitigations that go well beyond what SQL requires and could help push the project to infeasibility. Uh this includes requiring GHG offset credits despite the project already being designed to reduce emissions, building height limits based on a flawed wall of buildings analysis, and widening Geneva A to six lanes, which contradicts the goal of reducing our car dependency. It also calls for noise barriers that are not actually needed under SQA and would ultimately only increase the cost of the project. This is one of the viable areas in Brisbane and one of the few where the city can realistically accommodate its housing targets set by the regional housing needs allocation or the reena targets. Failing to move this project forward puts the city at serious risk of falling short of its housing element commitments and could open the door to legal consequences or state intervention. So we urge the city to revise the final EIR and remove these excessive requirements. Brisbane has the chance to lead a sustainable, equitable development. Let's not let outdated mitigations get in the way of that vision. Thank you very much. Okay. Is there anyone else here who would like to speak? Hi, good evening. Mary Rogers. I've lived in Brisbane for around 38 years. Um while I'm a big proponent of affordable housing, I am very concerned

about the transportation that um the congestion that this project would cause. We have the bailance project, we have the quarry project, we have light rail project, the candlestick project, and I think there's another one. I calculated all of that um the number of acres under development and it comes up to like one square mile. That's huge. These projects will not take six months or a year. It's many years. Transportation is going to be critical. Um the roads will be congested. And I do think that Geneva needs to be widened along with many other roads to accommodate all the the traffic that's going to come with construction of these projects. So, I I'm just asking the planning um commissioners to really take a deep dive into that. And for the uh benefit of the Brisbane residents here, I don't want to be subject to noise for the next 10 years while all these developments take place. Thank you. Thank you. Um Okay. More. Okay. Okay, Greg Vilin. I am Greg Vilin. I represent the Balins and for better or worse, I'm the founder of Balin's Development and have caused all of these issues. Um, we are delighted to uh be at this point um you remember and we were here in 2018 and we worked hard to negotiate measure

JJ is a win-win for uh the project and for the city. It is remarkable that a city the size of Brisbane has stepped up to the region to support a project that doubles the size of the city. Um we have not lost that uh support from the city. We know that this has been a a joint effort to build a project we can all be proud of. What I will tell you is the way the project is designed, it is the most sustainable project that we could possibly imagine. We're 100% electric where 85% of our utilities are generated on site through a solar field through a utility scale battery from solar on every rooftop. um from limiting to 11,000 parking spaces so that we can force change and and a shuttle system that connects both MUN and Cal Train and comes up and through Brisbane. Um for a project this size, it is a 10-year plus buildout. There's no question about that. We can't hide this behind a chair. This is a huge project. In fact, it's the largest in the state of California for urban development right now. And again we are um aed and are thankful for the efforts that the you know city has put in and as people have said you know this is going to happen. It is great for the region. It will have some impacts on the local community and we understand that and we're going to try and limit those uh and solve those much as much as possible. We are an open book. Um that's why we've uh put the general plan together. We've submitted it on the specific plan. We tried to consider all of the issues that we've heard. We've had dozens of community meetings where we've paid attention and we've listened to what people have said. Um the

location of the ball fields was not chosen by us. For example, it was from the parks and open space meetings that it was the closest to Brisbane central uh to be able to have those. So, we get these issues. We want to be responsive. We view ourselves as joining the community and so we want to be a good neighbor. So, uh, with that, I'll seed the rest of my time and thank you very much for all of the time and effort that you've put in. Okay. Thank you. Yes. Hello. Um, my name is Molita. I'm a UC Davis student. I major in community and regional development. I'm also a resident of Brisbane, hence my interest in this project. I would like to show my support for this project as well as expediting the SEO process as much as you guys possibly can after you guys hear public opinion in order to address of course our affordable housing housing crisis in the state of California. As well as I do of course have some concerns with the project as all of us should. Um however I do believe that we should continue pushing forward with it. My major concern, I'm not 100% sure this is SQL related, is in uh reference to the landfill and the fact that we are building on top of a landfill, which obviously has had some problems in the past. Um, so I would just like to ensure that the city is fully engaged with the landfill remediation process to ensure that toxins are not getting into our communities and into uh new residents homes. And yeah, that's all. Thank you guys. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay. Uh staff, anyone? Um yes, we have we have some we have some online with their hands raised. We're going to start with Lissa. Okay. Go ahead, Lissa.

Hello. Can you hear me? Yes. Good. Good evening, planning commissioners. My name is Laura Soinyatta and I'm the marketing and communications and operations manager for the Sanonteo County Economic Development Association, also known as Sama. For over 70 years, Sam has worked to work to enhance and sustain the economic prosperity of our region and its local communities, which is why I'm here to speak in support of the balance project. The balance will not only trans bring transformative economic prosperity to Brisbane and Hill County, but it will also create significant environmental and community benefits by developing 680 acres of former industrial property. This project will deliver new housing units, commercial spaces, parks, and recreation opportunities, all without disrupting natural habitats or enroaching on green field lands. We encou we recognize that analyzing a project of this size is an extraordinary effort and we commend the city of Brisbane for their efforts. We also encourage the city to find ways to streamline the ER process so that this long-awaited project can finally come to fruition. The balance is a transformative project decades in the making. 2,200 new housing units at all levels of affordability. 20,000 jobs, 140 acres of parks, new transit, connectivity, retail and commercial spaces, all powered by re renewable energy. Now is the time to make this vision a reality. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Jeremiah. Yes. Next we have uh Lewis. Go ahead, Lewis. Thank you for the opportunity to speak tonight. My name is Lewis Morante. I'm

vice president of public policy for the Bay Area Council. The Bay Area Council represents 350 of the region's largest employers, and I'm here tonight to express our support for both this project uh and um for the largest alternative in the project. I I was somewhat dismayed in reviewing the environmental document to read that uh the staff's conclusion here is that alternative 7 would have the lowest impact on the environment. We know that building housing and building jobs next to transit is our way to reduce emissions. The uh uh California Resources Board estimates that 40% of California's emissions come from transportation. Putting jobs and homes next to dense urban areas like San Francisco is our number one strategy for reducing those emissions as a state. So building more densely, building higher is the most climate friendly and sustainable thing we can do. I was also dismayed to read in the analysis that the project would uh in staff's estimation produce as much carbon and require as much carbon offset as it does. Um it's a little bit too early for me to tell, but the project would likely result would like likely incur, excuse me, millions to tens of millions of dollars worth of cost to mitigate the carbon uh staff estimates the project will produce. But that's not a reality. Again, if we don't build densely, if we don't build next to transit, if we don't build in our cities, the real alternative is that we build sprawl or we build in Texas or we build in Nevada. All of those options are ones that come with a much higher cost both to emissions and to the quality of life and people in California. Uh building this project is important. It's a regionally important project.

It's a project of statewide significance. Um, so, uh, folks at all levels of government are are keeping a close eye on the important progress you guys are making here tonight. Uh, but also on the substance of this document. I encourage uh uh the city to to take a look at some of those factors and and to try to work with housing proponents like myself to see where uh we can find projects that have lower environmental impacts, but but also to recognize that building this project and building it densely, building close to transit is a climate imperative. We we cannot not do this. Uh I think I'll seed the rest of my time and just thank you for considering my comments. Thank you. Anyone else? Yes. Next we have David. Go ahead, David. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. Uh yes. Uh I'm David Krab. Uh I'm a member of the Sierra Club sustainable land use committee and uh we are a committee of Sierra Club that it concentrates on land use in Santa Mateo County and Santa Clara County and we follow cities up and down both of those counties in terms of what's happening with them and all the issues involved in that and um we are uh happy that uh the uh speaker from Bayands is touting the sustainability uh features in this project. But the one elephant in the room that is not being addressed by anybody and it's not just Brisbane, it's every city up and down the peninsula and in Santa Clara is the jobs housing balance. And this project, if I've got my numbers right, is uh going to produce 20,000 jobs.

And based on the rule of thumb for number of housing units per job, that translates to a need for almost 13,000 uh new housing units uh accessible to the bay lands and you putting in 2,200. Uh I see there's a pretty big gap there. And uh what we get from every city uh I'm sure you're you'll probably get it from you as well is that oh well they'll come in from elsewhere they'll come in from the central valley they'll come in from San Francisco. San Francisco was already way behind on the housing requirements that they have and that's just for the city themselves. Same with South San Francisco and up and down the peninsula. So the big question is uh why is the city looking to approve 6.5 million square feet of office building and only 2200 units of housing and consider that a sustainable approach to development. Uh so uh I don't think I'd say much more. I think that's that's our basic point and again uh Brisbane's not alone but I uh it's it just continues and continues and every you know everything we see in the paper and everything the state so on is housing shortages housing balance housing this housing that and the first thing the cities do is build far more commercial than they do housing and the jobs housing balance goes out the window that doesn't even include the what we call the jobs housing fit which means that the people that have the jobs in the new development can afford for the housing that's in in the area and vice versa. Uh so there's a lot of issues there. So anyway, uh thank you for listening to me. Thank you. Anyone else? Yes. Next we have Jordan. Go ahead, Jordan. Thank you. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Jordan Grimes and I'm the state and regional resilience manager with Green Belt Alliance, an environmental organization working throughout the 9ount Bay Area on open space protection,

climate resilience, and sustainable land use policy since 1958. Infill development in brownfield restoration is critical to ensuring we move to more sustainable patterns of development away from exurban sprawl and the develop uh and the destruction of natural and working lands. We're excited about the Baylands project in this regard, not only for the badly needed new housing it will provide here on the peninsula, but for the model it has the potential to set for other projects. Uh, but after plumbing through the several thousand pages of the EIR, I admittedly skimmed, didn't read the uh didn't read uh all 2,000 plus pages, we do share a number uh of significant concerns with the proposed mitigations. The first is the proposed building height restrictions which would cap building heights to 12 stories throughout the project and 80 feet for residential development in order to maintain views of scenic resources. Um, first things first, density is an environmental benefit and not an environmental harm. And these frankly arbitrary limits would force density to be redistributed in ways that make the neighborhood more expensive and less walkable. It undermines the thoughtful tiered design that places higher density housing near the beayshore Cal Train station uh and lower density homes close to central Brisbane. Speaking of environmental harm, the recommendation to widen Geneva Avenue to six lanes would undoubtedly contribute to it. Major roadways like this will induce significant demand, encourage car usage, and create significant BMT and GHG emissions. it will needlessly drive up project costs and contradicts the project's clear emphasis on transit access and multimmodal connectivity. And then finally, the suggestion that the project p uh purchase greenhouse gas offset credits which are um frankly very expensive uh was surprising and um was very curious to understand why that would be attached to an infoousing project like this. The bay lands is

already a model for climate smart planning and environmental benefits and additional offet off offsets don't really make sense and risk making the project financially infeasible. Mel, lastly, I'll just say the project not only creates badly new infill housing um but remediates uh 80 acres uh but remediates uh hundreds of acres of contaminated land, provides 80 acres of revitalized wetlands, provides natural habitat restoration um in areas like Ice House Hill um and a lot more. So, the environmental benefits of this project to us are really unmatched. Um and we encourage the city to uh really review um and reconsider some of these proposed mitigations. Thank you. Thank you. More Jeremiah, I have no more within. Okay. Thank you. Um does anyone uh want to speak that's here? Okay. Okay. Well, then um the commission thanks uh everyone for their input tonight. I just want to remind folks that the comment period will run through September 2nd at 5:00 pm. So if anyone would like to submit written comments, they can do so by mail or emailing the city at baylands at brisbangca.org. More information on the project, the draft EIR, and how to comment on the draft can be found on the city's website. All comments that have been submitted will be responded to in the final de the final EIR. The final EIR will be reviewed at future public hearings along with projects planning entitlement applications. To be notified of future meetings, you can sign up for e not notifications on the city's uh website or write your um email address down on the signing signup sheet in the foyer. Thank you. Okay, we'll now move to the consent

calendar. If there is any member of the public who would like to pull an item from the consent calendar, please raise your hand or call in. Uh Jeremiah, can you set a 30 second timer? Do any of the commissioners want to remove an item? No. 10 seconds. All right, 10 seconds has elapsed. We have a motion to adopt the consent calendar. So moved. Second. Second. Those in favor? I. Motion is unanimous. Next is oral communications. If anyone wishes to address the commission concerning items not on the agenda, please um raise your hand or call in. Uh Jeremiah, can you um set a one minute timer?

20 seconds. 60 seconds has elapsed. No one has raise your hand. Okay. Thank you. Next is written communications. I don't believe we have any. Okay. Old business. We have none. Next is items initiated by staff. Uh none this evening. Okay. And finally, items initiated by the commission. Um is there anything any commissioners would like to address? Okay. I have something. Um, I would just want to follow up with staff. At the last meeting on May 8th, we asked if staff could agendaize two matters. Um, can you give us a status on that, John? Uh, we'll agendaize the one regarding the Northeast Ridge for the July 10th meeting. Um, maybe refresh me on the other one. The other one was it was concerning the commission had a question about um penalties and our role when there's code violations. Okay. We can agendaize that for the 10th as well. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Um well then uh that concludes our meeting for tonight and we will adjourn until the next meeting of July 10, 2025. [Music]