Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

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e e I call to order the meeting of the Planning Commission of the city of Camaro for March 18th 2025 I welcome any no committee members there are no commune members in the audience I welcome those of you who are watching at home um secret will the secretary please take roll call commissioner Vander Mulan here commissioner Murphy here commissioner edville here chair Lon here [Music] okay will you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance please stand and to your hearts face the [Music] flag thank you okay we will um move on to the consent calendar those are items that considered General business and are acted upon together without discussion unless we pull an item the first item is a Planning Commission uh minutes for February 18th and we also have the 2024 General plan annual progress report I'll make a motion that we

approve the consent calendar last second [Music] commissioner edel yes chair Lon yes commissioner Murphy um I wasn't here so I won't be able to vote on that commissioner Vander Mullan yes thank you thank you and I will note that we received a public comment on that um General plan annual forance report okay moving on to public comments this is the time for members of the public to present a matter to the Planning Commission which does not appear as a regular item um I do not see any members of the public are there any present who I don't see okay seeing none we will close public comment now I'll open up the public hearing we have two items for consideration on our agenda tonight one is a general plan safety element update and the second is a proposed conditional use permit 436 for a Chevron gas station off-site alcohol sales um and uh if if a member of the public were to come in and desire to speak they should complete a public hearing comment card and present it to the clerk so the first item is a general plan safety element update and we will start with a planning staff report good evening chair leemon members of the Planning Commission tonight's staff is going to give you um in presentation on the safety element update and tonight we have Lexi Journey from from rencon Consultants their firm has been assisting the city with the preparation of the safety element uh they they're well vered in helping other cities prepare their safety elements uh Lexi has done several across the state um and uh she's going to be giving us an overview

tonight thank you good evening Commissioners thank you for letting me present on the city safety element update tonight again my name is Lexi Journey from ringcon Consultants I've been working on safety elements for the last 10 years with my whole time at ringcon and I live here in Ventura County so I also get to work on a lot of safety element issues like wildfire with different folks in Ventura County so one of my favorite topics um let me I have a about 15minute presentation to go over the safety element update including why the safety elment is being updated and how it's complying with new legislation and then I'll talk about a couple technical analyses that were completed to inform the safety element update including the Wildfire Hazard analysis and the evacuation analysis then I'll do a brief overview of the topics that are included in the safety element update and highlight some of those new policies as well then take a look at the time line of the safety element update and all of the reviewers and next steps and then have plenty of time for discussion in Q&A so here's a brief overview of all the different regulations regarding City Safety elements of the general plan um there has been a lot already that's been standing since General plans were um created but then there's been some new legislation around safety elements in the last decade so the standard safety element legislation is that the safety element has to address hazards such as geological and seismic hazards flooding fire hazardous material and waste aircraft hazards and evaluate emergency response there's also regulations that

has to include discussion of the fire hazard severity maps that are developed by the state and also include information around critical infrastructure and emergency response and responsibility of fire protection um which is similar to some newer legislation about requiring update of wildfire mapping and ensuring that goals and policies are also updated to address Wildfire hazards another legislation is that the safety element has to align with the local Hazard mitigation plan so for Ventura County we have a multi-jurisdictional Hazard mitigation plan to ensure that emergency response and evacuation is accurately reflected in the safety element and then some newer legislation is that a climate change vulnerability assessment has to be conducted so it's not looking at just existing hazards but how those hazards are projected to change in the future due to climate change and that the safety element has to be updated at least every eight years or along when the housing element is updated or that local Hazzard mitigation plan is updated and then lastly the two most recent legislation is regarding identifying neighborhoods with less than two routes in or out and conducting an evacuation Capacity Analysis so now digging into the technical information starting with the fire hazard severity zone maps these are created by the state um until recently these Maps hadn't been updated for over a decade um but as of recent they state has updated What's called the state responsibility areas last year so designating the very high high and moderate zones in the state

responsibility area and then just this year calfire is coming out with the local responsibility area updated mapping so for cambaro in the C Central Coast those Maps just came out um last week which is the ones that are shown here and there's still um Southern California where they don't have their most updated Maps yet so these are Hazard area maps so they represent physical conditions that create the likelihood of the fire Behavior or fire hazard so that includes looking at um the standard physical conditions such as the veget which creates the fuel model also the Topography of the area and climate such as weather and fire history to create the fire Behavior but these don't evaluate risk and meaning it's not showing um the risk to say infrastructure like roadways it's really looking at okay based on those factors that I mentioned where is the more likelihood of fire and so how these maps are used is that the state um has construction design standards and depending on where your property is Within These zones that's going to dictate what those construction standards are um and so you have to comply with the state and local design structures in the very high and high zones it also influences what defensible stay standards you have to comply with and as well as real estate disclosures when you buyer seller your house and so that's a the standard state maps this is a wildfire Hazard analysis that was conducted by TSS Consultants

who is a wildfire consulting firm around for over 40 years and so the city decided to do go above and beyond those standard state maps to conduct a more specific local Wild fire hazard analysis so this isn't required for the safety element but it does go beyond um but it helps to again because the other maps are very state level State model to be able to look at the local level and have a more customized look at Wildfire Hazard and risk within the city so this Hazard analysis takes all the factors that the state has but also goes deeper and looks at vulnerability of Roads within the city also those neighborhoods that may have only have one way in and one way out this analysis also looked at the electrical lines that are exposed um and that have a lot of vegetation around it as a potential risk as well as drainages which in the city because those create a lot of vegetation they're hard to access and are a factor in Wildfire risk as well so based on this analysis done by TSS they found that 95% of the city is designated as a lwh hazard under their analyses um but there are two high areas in the city due to those drainages and that the medium and high areas outside of the city are really due to the terrain because you have the vegetation on those steep slopes that can create a higher Wildfire risk with that topography so this doesn't have any impacts for Regulatory Compliance um but it does help inform where priority projects should occur in the city in terms of where vegetation

management should occur and where protection of those assets should occur as [Music] well and then the last technical analysis that I'll go over is the evacuation analysis this was conducted by fair and peers uh traffic consulting firm that is doing evacuation analysis all across the state and this was conducted to comply with AB 747 and they looked at a Santa Ana winds driven event for Wildfire evacuation if it were to occur in the east side of the city so if that type of wildfire event was to occur and the neighborhoods of Camaro Springs Leisure Village and Upland had to evacuate what would happen on those roadways under that scenario so that looked at evacuating to the 101 and then having to move west and not being able to go east on the 101 assuming that's where the fire would be occurring and the results of that study showed that 50% of the evacuation routes designated would exceed that roadway capacity so that would take longer for evacuation and have evacuation impacts and how that's connected to the safety element is that it has policy implications in terms of continuing to look at evacuation providing education and doing a lot of coordination with the county and other partners to continually address evacuation issues so you can see some examples um is that new development has to have two Ingress egress routes um looking at where secondary access can be um potentially added within the city can continuing to look at emergency service needs continuing education and coordination now for topics covered in

the safety element here is how the safety element is organized so we have these different categories and policies under each one first one being Citywide safety and climate change where the policies address heat drought and air quality we have geologic and seismic hazards flooding hazards fire hazards hazardous materials and waste aircraft hazards and emergency response and most of the safety element update policies occurred within the Citywide safety and climate change section again to address Urban heat and drought and as you can imagine a considerable updates in the fire hazard section as well now I'll go over what these new policies look like so in the first section here are some examples of the new Hazard air quality emergency response policies first one to encourage new development outside flood planes Wildfire risk and fault zones another one is to increase Regional Partnerships to provide air quality retrofits to low income members also encouraging resident enrollment in medical programs for personal perpective equipment or p PE and increasing emergency communications in requiring emergency kits and households and also under the section these are the policies that address Urban heat and drought policies are to regularly evaluate and update heat and drought related local plans uh looking for opportunities to expand the city's Urban Forest um conducting heat illness recognition and education encouraging alternatives to AC units to reduce grid demand and exploring ing the use of new cooling infrastructure and technology and increasing drought resistant

landscaping and under geologic seismic and flooding hazards the new policies in this section include providing building updates for new existing buildings per the California building code requiring updates to minimize impacts from landslides and earthquakes retrofit older buildings with updated seismic safety technology prohibiting construction of new facilities in those flood zones and flood planes maintaining compliance with local plans and increasing education of local flood hazard in zones so um pretty standard so more of a cleanup of the policy language in this section and then for fire hazards this is where a lot of the increase policies occurred um a part of this is due to the safety element now has to go through calfire and board of Forestry review so they have a pretty standardized checklist of all of the different policies they want to see in safety elements and so that's where these come from and it has gone through their review which I'll speak to in a second but these new policies in the fire hazard section include ensuring updated construction design to minimize damage on new developments per the California building Cloe ensuring adequate Water Supplies to new developments to meet fire demand enhancing the municipal code to align with the Ventura County Fire production District standards requiring all homes to have adequate signage such as the address numbers um partnering with bentura County Regional fire safe Council to develop a Camario specific Community Wildfire protection plan increasing defensible space near homes and roadways in the wooi OR Wildland Urban interface per cow fires Direction and and the County's direction contining to pursue

Grant fundings to implement all these safety element policies regarding Wildfire as well as increasing public education of fire hazards and evacuation routes continuing to review and update the city's Emergency Operations plan and can coordinate with the Ventura County Fire Protection District to ensure they have all the necessary resources available stuffing Staffing equipment and funding and potential Partnerships for Grant there as well and also identifying the very high fire hazard severity zones in the city's Municipal Code um which the county is doing right now and so that is also requirement for the city so here's the timeline of the safety element updates and the reviews that occurred so City Staff first reviewed the safety Element last year in May then it was reviewed by by the ventur County Fire Protection District in the summer is also reviewed by the ventur county Sher sheriff's office in the summer and then the city's public works department reviewed after that and then we went through the formal calire process for review and the safety element was formally accepted by the board of Forestry at the end of last year in December so the next steps then after the board of Forestry officially approved it we are here at Planning Commission to get your recommendation and the plan is to go to City Council for approval next month that's it for my presentation and look forward to your Q&A thank you very much umiss I had a question on that one slide you had with the local Wildfire analysis

and then in the bull points it says that 95% of the city was low Hazard the map looked like it was it was less than that percentage 95 was some of that in the county is that why you know the part that had the yellow color and then it had the Reds it was the yeah I see on the map I think because the scale of the map that it looks mostly yellow and it's hard to see those red areas where it's high right like it mostly looks all yellow but there are some red areas and so in the report they've calculated that it's at 95% I me just visually it looked like it was maybe 60 40 or 70 I think it's because the whole planning boundary shows outside of City Limits yes I that maybe it includes some of the county yeah yeah the whole analysis does include some of the county thank you um I had a question and I don't know that it's your question to answer I don't know if somebody in the city knows this answer but um when we had the hillfire a few years ago so I'm in Leisure Village Santa Rosa Road comes down so it did affect a lot of Santa Rosa Valley and they were evacuating we didn't have to evacuate however there were a few people that wanted to leave especially when one of the Hills right at the back of Leisure Village was burning there was no way to get out onto Santa Rosa Road in a case like this whose responsibility would it be to maybe open up the eastbound lanes for Westway travel to get some of that moving if it involved a larger amount of [Music] vehicles so that decision will be made by our local police department in conjunction with emergency uh command

that's responsible for the the incident okay it was just we have so many questions on that so I thought it'd be handy to have the answer thank you and I think that's the only question I have right now commissioner Murphy okay so forgive my lack of terminology here but I'd like to go back to the the local responsibility area map now now is that prepared by TSS in their um fire hazard study of about a year ago no so it is confusing because there's two fire hazard Maps the fire hazard severity Maps those are produced by the state so those started being produced in the 80s and 90s when we had those big fires and the Oakland fire so the state has always provided those fire hazard severity maps for those different building code regulations and then the other analysis that one was done by TSS that's more a local model that looks at um little more specifics of roadways drainage um more fine scale vegetation data right and so that analysis was done a year ago and then we had the the November Mountain Fire so none of the Mountain Fire data is is reflected yet into the safety element that would be in in the next safety element correct um it's funny because the actual fires don't really affect those analyses because the change in the analyses is that change in vegetation right so you have a fire and you have right now less vegetation because it

burned and so as of right now if you ran that model it would show a lower risk because that's all been burned um but it's going to all grow back so if you're looking like longterm it doesn't really change the analyses shortterm yeah it might show a little bit less risk because there's less vegetation but it's going to grow back quickly so then it wouldn't change the results of the analyses yeah [Music] okay [Music] so the the local haard map are there two different Maps is there the the SR and the local Hazard maps are there's two different maps are they both prepared by calfire those ones the state and the local are both prepared by calire correct okay and then they you know they update their findings periodically yeah they're supposed to update it technically I think every five years but they haven't updated them in over a decade but hopefully now they're going to update them more regularly so the the state responsibility area map that has not changed in since that one change it and it was released last year as well and it was something happening this this month with I thought I saw something March 2025 were additional analysis perhaps including the Mountain Fire effects yeah so the ones that were released this month are the local responsibility areas so first they updated all the maps that are outside of City County boundaries that's that state area and now the calfire is releasing the maps within City

boundaries okay and and that will reflect the Mountain Fire will incorporate whatever we learned from the mountain fire at the Statewide scale and the vegetation data they have um it's not going to make a difference for those results like they know that it's they know the fire history they know the data is in there um when they ran the model I don't know the exact date they ran the model um if it was because they just came out in March I don't know if they ran it at the end of last year um but overall it wouldn't be changing that like large scale Statewide data set that they have okay thank you any other questions no no further questions um I I do have a number of questions so uh one can can you explain again the the purpose of the Wildfire Hazard analysis like how is that being used in relation to the safety element yeah so it's going above and beyond what's required of the safety element and it's used to inform polic policies and look at areas where you potentially want to do more vegetation management and it really helps with grant funding as well um when you're looking going for grant funding for projects you can showcase we are doing additional analysis these are what results show these are areas where we need to fund different projects so it's really an add-on to what's required of the safety element okay so vegetation management that that makes sense um for funding um the reason I'm asking is because it did seem a little limited especially if it's used for funding and I understand there are a numerous other

tools and information that could be used for funding purposes and um seeking additional resources uh I think going to uh commissioner Murphy's comment about the Mountain Fire um clearly you know our community has experienced um that disaster and has been impacted by the recent disasters in other areas as well well um and so it's I believe 95% was designated as low Hazard right and and that's based on vegetation is that right as I understood it yeah it's based on vegetation which influences the fuels it's based on topography so where the areas that are going to have more fire due to steeper topography um and then wind and climate effects too when you're having those wind like Santa Ana winds or other Big D wind driven events how that influences with topography which creates fire Behavior okay so that's it's all Incorporated wind as well yeah that was surprising to me because as we saw during the Mountain Fire um and unfortunately there were some little ring areas in his Spanish Hills that were impacted through I think wind and I didn't see that area covered in the map again going to the comment about whether it reflects reality you know what we just experienced yeah and I think it's hard um it's a pretty indepth analysis once you look into it it's pretty long and there's a lot of different data in it so we just showed like the overarching um Hazard but if you go into like each of those factors it breaks it down further and it shows more of like okay here are the different winds and where they're going to affect here where the different types of vegetation and that's a risk uh I think it also what I really like about it is when it goes in those factors of like here are the roadways that we're concerned about here are the neighborhoods we're concerned

about even the electrical lines and the drainages that's pretty above what you see in a lot of wild High Hazard analyses so I told you hear you and like I me the overarching map maybe doesn't paint that picture but when you dig into the rest of the results it really gives you a lot of information that can help inform um the fire prevention programs and projects that you do in the city okay yeah I did read that read that entire report yeah I think it's just looking at the map um I I think it could be misleading for a member of the public right to see what what's the risk level uh but as I understand you that's not the purpose of it it's not to inform the public at large is that correct yeah and it doesn't have any ramifications in terms of any regulations or anything like that and you mentioned um vulnerable communities as well and so when I I read it I didn't see um the designations of different vulnerable communities to identify like high-risk areas um seniors and this was this is reflected in the safety element but at least in the the study um it doesn't identify um the hospital or other medical centers where there may be patients for example um seniors limited English population speaking populations or outdoor workers so that was concerning to me yeah the way that they look at the communities it does look at the communities that have the one way in one way out is what they're considering vulnerable communities and they didn't break it down into those other factors that you said um that is in the climate vulnerability assessment we have those socio demographic factors around the

different communities and a discussion of vulnerability there in the in the safety element plan yeah in the climate vulnerability assessment that's a different assessment that's not Forest right now okay yeah I thought that was a a limiting a very limited analysis in the the Wildfire um study yeah it's definitely very technical um I think combined with the climate vulnerability assessment and the evacuation assessment it is really comprehensive compared to other communities that we see and maybe there's some ways that we can you know improve on that overarching presentation if maybe there's updates to the final results in the map with maybe more explanation of combining those together or I don't know if there's any suggestions of additional maybe a little bit more context information the saf element calfire also did say that this is one of the best safety elements they've seen just because it has so much information in context to inform the policies um but if there's things that you feel like the community also is going to want to see we could add a little bit of information for that as well or at least Point them to where to find it yeah at least a point of reference yeah I think especially because St John's Hospital is right below uh Hillside or at least in proximity and so I was surprised to not see medical centers particularly the hospital identified in it yeah there is a map with the fire hazard areas in the critical facilities so that's where you would see that overlay of Hazard and the hospital okay okay um and for the the how is that related to because we're being um the

recommendation is to to adopt the resolution recommending uh adoption by the city council as well as um adoption of the multi-jurisdictional hazard mitigation plan is did I miss that was that included in our materials um we're not asking to adopt the multi-jurisdictional um Hazard mitigation plan we're just um the resolution needs to include specific language that by reference um that it that the safety element includes um adoption of that into the safety element the multi-jurisdictional hazard mitigation plan is already adopted by the city that's already been done um but this resolution needs to in include that particular language that this safety element includes by reference that adopted plan okay so it's incorporating by reference yes and it's purely um in order for the city to be eligible for additional funding that Cal OES specifically has language that the city needs to include in their resolution to be eligible for this additional funding so it's just a technical like inclusion of this wording that they want to see I see okay thank you for the clarification um I have additional questions but I want to pause to see if any of the other Commissioners have questions at this point I know okay can you can you clarify how the the safety element is related to the city's Emergency Operations plan because it's

referenced in there but it's not clear whether the the safety element is going then informs what's required for an update for the the Emergency Operations plan yeah it doesn't require anything except it says that this it needs to be updated frequently so that it's not saying this is exactly what needs to be in your Emergency Operations plan um it's not super prescriptive it just says here are the different things you need to look at like continually look at evacu um update it periodically that's those it's a higher level description of what should occur in the emergency operation plan and then that the emergency operation plans are more prescriptive guidance from Cal OES and other state agencies and not calire I see okay so when you're saying calfire how are you relating the safety element plan to calire then yeah that's good question new legislation now requires that calfire has to review the safety element and so there's a very formal review process we have our local representative we send it to him um he has a very formal checklist we go back and forth on that policy review On's calfire um approves it then it goes the board of Forestry there's a formal meeting and they talk about the safety element and it's approved by them okay you're seeing and that's a new thing and the city's emergency operation plan doesn't have to be reviewed by calire is what you're saying correct okay um when when is the operations the Emergency Operations plan next going to be updated I don't know when it's planned for being updated or do we know when it when it was last

updated yeah I'd have to look at what it says in see filling to we can look that up real quick and we'll let you know during the meeting okay great thank you um and going to review the review process that you outlined so clearly um was there any review or discussion feedback that was provided by um the medical community don't think directly we didn't have it reviewed by the medical community we had it reviewed by the public works department and the county sheriff's office in the Fire Protection District but not sent directly to any medical communities okay that seemed to me like a big gap because when there is an an emergency um you know in addition to police and and fire and other responders of course or um the medical community is critical right and so they are responding for example the mountain and any any other disasters they're they're at the front line as well and so I I thought that was a big gap and it's a missed opportunity and that may not be required um but I think it would be very helpful to have that expertise be able to weigh in yeah I think typically we rely on those agencies like Ventura County Fire Protection districts that are on the front lines doing the Emergency Operations and the sheriff's during the emergency that are working with those Partners to provide that feedback it's just typically how it's been done yeah I think that's a missed opportunity I think that the health department or you know having some focused group of of the

folks who are actually responding to the medical um request for medical support would be very helpful so we do have an answer for you so that the cam Emergency Operations plan was adopted in 2021 okay great thank you and I think there's opportunity potentially to um if the city wants to create that in the policies and identify because there's a lot of policies suring Community engagement and getting additional feedback and so the medical community could be something that we call out specifically in those policies okay and creating the policies under the safety element plan yeah yeah and moving forward in terms of the implementation safety element of the plan okay yeah I think that that should be explosively incorporated in the safety um element okay um and then going to the different objectives there's an OB objective on the extreme heat air quality and drought and I I thought that was um I thought it would be cleaner to separate those out into different objectives I know they're they're all related but um still have their own needs air you know air quality drought and heat so I think it would be helpful to the public to understand those as as separate objectives um and I I think there was there was a comment in the the red line that was similar so I was wondering if there was discussion there was a what the justification was for keeping it together I think it was just due to the

length of the safety element and trying to find ways to condense it so there's no technical reason um it was more of a formatting and to fit the style of how the safety element was conducted before so if that's something that the city wants to do um it would be easy to separate those okay yeah I recommend separating them out to different objectives um also I I didn't see uh clear language and maybe it's in there and I just missed it on engagement with communities and um Community Based organizations NOS other experts on coordinating um through the life cycle of a disaster so you know preparedness and resilience through uh you know when when there's an anticipated event or a warning during the actual event and then immediately after and then recovery um and there was a language about Mutual Aid efforts in the emergency response uh objective but I thought it would be much more helpful to explicitly lay out what what the objective and the policies for that coordination will be um you know we saw during the Mountain Fire there you know our community is so generous and um there's a lot of a lot of care and mutual support and there were multiple efforts to provide to respond you know to the emergency and so there were a lot of donations and contributions and uh there was uh some some you know very planned and well coordinated efforts but there was also a lot of confus confusion and misinformation and a lot of sort of like scrambling and and as a result some

of the the contributions you know aren't meeting their stated aims um and centers that were receiving the contributions were overwhelmed and couldn't staff and you know weren't able to properly like organize and uh you know we're just left with like piles of stuff so um I imagine that in any future event we'll continue to see those efforts by community members who want to support and I think it would be extremely helpful to have a much more um much more a clear process and protocols and uh in Community Education so that people's um people's intentions of supporting their community members you know can really be directed to to to uh you know have have th those efforts um reach their stated aims or their intended aims and really leverage them uh so it it would be that's my recommendation is to include some um more clear and directed language around uh coordination on Mutual Aid okay we do have it throughout the different sections and then we have the last one that is emergency response so that could be a opportunity to provide more of those specifics in policies under that section um and then within the implementation actions as well because the safety element that it gets the policies get updated every several years or so but those implementation actions that you're doing that gets more updated frequently so we can provide more specifics there and maybe connect to other plans where those are going to occur as well like

the emergency operation plans the community Wildfire protection plan and hopefully get back to what you were saying before of like connecting where all the different city opportunities these things are happening so I I just want to make sure because that sounds that sounds great um but I want to make sure that there's spec clear enough language in the plan because this is what is guiding the actions right of like this out what's required and so I'd like to make sure that there's language where then we're going to have that that policy implemented in the way that's intended so if you think there's language in they're already um I'd appreciate if you could just point me to it okay so the policies and the implementation actions like for implementation actions we have developed programs that inform and educate about risks resources roles responsibility safety evacuation routes training programs and we have the different departments that are responsible in the goals and policies and then we have up using the city's website so we have some specifics there we talk about how to do that in the emergency operation plan so maybe even more within the actions you're thinking can you point me to where you're reading it's um yeah it's on page 11 63 implementation implementing actions we have D there and we have e yeah I'm just I'm not following you um on the page numbers I have like there's 11 and then Dash and they're number 11-

63 11- what 11-6 three oh yeah I don't I don't have I think you have the entire document of the general plan and so the I think our numeration is different element it's 11.4 yeah we have a different document oh okay okay so maybe you can tell me what the goal is unless yeah you're not able to share it on the screen right okay what is objective the objective number shle Mo are you looking at the the red line document or the safety element document so it's the red line document that's a is that's the safety element that is the changes that were made to the goals and objectives of the safety element the safety element is actually um an appendix of the resol or an exhibit of the resolution with the full document all I'm looking at the thank you okay it's in the full resolution you said right it's correct okay okay you said page 63 yeah 11- 63 okay I'm getting there Y no rush okay I am there implementing

actions yep so number D talks about programs to inform and educate the community yeah that's educating that's not actually coordinating and and developing a plan okay yeah C talks about City resources to provide the education as well and then K which is two pages from that as a component of the emergency operation plans develop evacuation plans perform training around different evacuation scenarios right that's regarding evacuation chair Leon if I could ask for a Clarity um are you specifically looking to address the topic of donations um or is it kind of larger coordination it's larger coordination around Community response Mutual aid from community members or from agencies okay yeah um one thing I'd like to provide just a little bit of clarity on I think um also for Community expectation is um the city may not be best positions to receive donations and distribute donations right um when we were in the emergency Operation Center this was one of the topics of conversation during the Mountain Fire um there are private agencies nonprofit agencies that are especially Adept at this um and so one of the things uh that we really tried to direct folks forward is hey look at the Red Cross look at um a couple other agencies that nonprofit organizations that were providing Aid this is what they do they they do this um a variety of different types of um events or emergency situations and look at what their needs are um and try to fill those needs um one of the challenges for um

City staff and and jurisdictional response was um we don't have um structure to provide that type of response the focus is really on kind of you know the government's responsibility in in providing the response um it's fantastic I I agreee with you there was an overwhelming amount of community response and it was great to see very heartfelt I think um the most efficient Avenue to provide that is through um these supportive types of agencies thank thank you yeah and I I completely understand that I just think that as part of the safety element plan and maybe it's not that there is a role for the city to coordinate with nonprofits and you know to ensure that there's Clarity for the community because that is you know immediately after the fire there's this outpouring of support and and there was a lot of misinformation a lot of confusion and a lot of resources that were contributed and again those nonprofits were were overwhelmed you know and just didn't have the they weren't prepared for that to didn't have a system um so there there's a gap there that needs to be addressed I agree with you I kind of wanted to say that just for General Community expectation um I think communication and coordination um can be components of that um and if there was a communication gap um on the city Side one of the things we were definitely trying do is connect people to resources um both within you know C City Cy fire c um as well as prop agencies um so um I think that is the language that we can okay I mean because this is this is the key the community response and and support efforts are in in my mind key to emergency response right it's part of our community's emergency response when um you people are at need and others are are coming with food and water and supplies blankets Etc that the city cannot

provide um and so it is part of our community safety element uh and and so I'd like to see some coordination again so that we can maximize the community support as part of our community emergency response so so where would that make it into the safety element in emergency response so that the city is there's some coordination um some resource coordination supporting community- based organizations I think there's already a lot of policies that support that so we could put specifics in these implementation action sections that speaks to that okay so is that language that you can develop now because the air the the specific language that you read doesn't go to that right that's like on evacuation and yeah we could do either incorporating into the existing actions or make a whole new action like for D specifically it says inform and educate that can we have potential risk resources and we could put um included cord like emergency response coordination like we could put that within this action here um and I'm thinking like all the ones that are similar continuing to put that language like we could put that in D we could put that in E we could also put that in K and in [Music] L make sure that it's Sugg procedurally it may make sense for the commission recommendation to provide broad Direction um and allow staff to um find kind of an ideal way to incorporate it as we bring it forward in the city

council okay but it wouldn't come we wouldn't be able to review it at that point um that's that's a a topic that we could also discuss on the's recommendation okay okay great thank you my eyesight's failing excuse me after I'm now doing this thing um I also saw the the an extreme heat um there is language about cooling centers is that right okay um or is was I saw I saw language on both cooling technology and then cooling centers and I wasn't clear on what the policy recommended policies for the for cooling centers themselves okay or emergency centers yeah let me pull up the exact policy thank you so there's policy SF 1.3b which says continue to maintain on what page um it's on page 1149 okay continue to maintain and add to existing cooling center infrastructure to provide Public Relief during extreme heat events and explore other options for public pooling centers within the city okay okay green and then there's also another policy on the next page 1150 that says investigate new cool pavement technology including cost benefits challenges and opportunities and then there's more

policies that speak to extreme heat and doing adaptation at homes looking alternatives to air conditioners and it gives a list of what those potential could be okay thank you and as as to um this goes to air quality for personal protective equipment I saw language in there and I'm sorry worked off of the redline version because that's the new language that's being added right those are the the actual updates that are being made or U the redline version yeah I'm looking at the final version that one was just a version to show and track changes what was changed okay yeah I understand okay thank you so as to the personal protective equipment I believe there is language about partnering who is it partnering with um it was just residents having access to the personal protective equipment um and I didn't see anything in there about uh partnering with again Hospital the hospital and other medical providers and schools for personal protective equipment so with the school district um or with employers okay I'm looking trying to find that exact policy of residents so you're recommending adding reference to yeah with the schools to ensure that the schools have protective uh equipment for the students and and staff as well as um Medical Care Providers okay and um also in in the

identification of vulnerable communities um I didn't see and I I think we should include again patients of medical centers and hospitals that I I think is a that was a gap um I think we it did not also mention limited English proficient communities areas of the community we I saw in their seniors um people with disabilities there are some other categories I don't think or maybe is outdoor workers outdoor workers are included yeah these are all included in the climate vulnerability assessment and there's a reference to that in the safety element but we don't go in depth in the actual safety element text okay yeah for so definitely for um yeah the personal protective equipment I um recommend adding those additional subpopulations and also on the evacuation analysis that also focuses on vulnerable populations um I think that I saw that Gap as well and that it doesn't identify um medically vulnerable people again medical centers or I don't think I saw um a reference to schools either I know schools have their own plans but

there should be coordination I believe MH yeah those are those are my comments any other questions or comments by their Commissioners just have a question if the goals to get this to the City Council next month would we be able to approve it or with the recommendations or would it be better to continue it and bring back another draft with the recommendation I mean what are we up against a time frame or do we have time to do that yeah I have a question related to that what is the urgency here we saw the timeline there and when it hurt to to table it I mean Cher Lon has brought up some well thought out and good points things that should be in the safety element um and there they don't sound like they would take a lot of time to add to the safety element but there's enough of them in there to to Merit um a an additional review I Believe by the commission so what is the sense of urgency on yeah want I yeah I would suggest that there's no stud requirement that um gives us a sense of lency I do want the commission to be cognizant that um the safety element does have to be approved by um the board of Forestry and so um depending on the amount of changes that we make um it may trigger another bard of Forestry review which will probably add several months

to the process as well um just so it's just something to be cognizant of I don't know that um Lexi do you have um any guidance on like what that threshold is for the board of for stre I would think the main threshold if there's making significant changes to the policies themselves um from what I'm hearing it terms more of clarification and some tweaking of policies so I don't think that would trigger it and I'm not hearing any taking out of policies um so that's what calire would be more concerned about so from if the comments are what we have I think we could do some technical updates to the policies provide more clarification in the implementation actions and then the context um and I don't think that would trigger that cire VI so that um that's helpful to know um so yeah we could absolutely um make some changes on to our policies based on the comments we received um and and bring it back to the commission fut that'd be very helpful and I I appreciate the question I had the same question about the time frame yeah because that way we' get to take a look because I guess if there was a deadline we would approve it with the recommendations but then we wouldn't have the opportunity to review them before they went to city council so if there's time to do that I think my preference would be to have it come back and look at a new draft before we approve it thank you any other questions or comments right and and that would also have Redline locations where those changes have been made right yeah in terms ofes are the red lines so we know come back where the new ones are okay okay great um the the other another clarification um or maybe

an additional issue is for um emergency evacuation centers and then we have cooling centers I didn't see anything about having uh ensuring that those centers or other areas in the city have um backup power generators uh that aren't don't rely on the grid um so exstensively it' be on battery powered um or emergency uh charging or um medical equipment uh that requires power okay yeah we can do another sweep through and add clarification in the language Andor point to maybe where that is already located okay great okay well thank you for your patience and listening to all of those comments and responding as thoroughly as you did any other comments or questions in this item okay then would we make a motion to continue this item so if I can interject this is a a public hearing so we'll need to open the public hearing take any public comments and then close a public hearing and then um based on uh if if the commission wishes to uh have the document come back at a later date um I'd correct that we wouldn't close it we just continue it open so we so we don't have to re advertise um so uh there are just want to confirm there are no members of the public who wish to speak to this item okay great does the staff have any

final comments on this um I think the only City attorney could also help me here um but I would suggest continuing to a date certain and as as a date I might suggest April 14th or April 15th I think um does that sound reasonable um stff that's going to work on these changes so we' recommend if that's the at course we would look like uh May immedi okay great thank you okay then um we will so we have is there a motion to continue this item close [Music] public yeah keep it open another oh okay just that's what you saying okay yeah is there a motion to continue this item to May 18th or to the May meeting yes I'd like to make a motion to continue this matter until April 15th or whatever would may may okay May 15 you say April or May May so so we wouldd recommend may may okay um and to incorporate the items that were discussed and brought forth by chair lemon items that were agreed to be incorporated into the plan um and allow the the planning commit to uh review on a on a continued basis on May 15th um the amended

document the amended document would have Redline changes so that we would know where the where the new changes occur within the document I'll second that long motion if I could just have a a point of clarification so the the meeting that we would uh recommend that we uh continue to open until the date certain would be May 6 first me in May okay I'll second that the modification to that motion so commissioner atel yes chair Lon yes commissioner Murphy yes commissioner vaman yes thank you thank you everyone I know that that um Extended our meeting and we're now past s but I I I hope that we will have a an improved and clarified um document to look at before our May meeting okay so we'll um now move on to our second item um which is a proposed conditional use permit 436 for the Chevron gas station alcohol sales and the recommendation is to find the cup exempt from seet review and to adopt a resolution approving it subject to recommended condition as of approval and we'll start with a planning staff report good evening Commissioners and member of the public members um my name is Serena Gonzalez and I am an associate planner with the planning department uh tonight I will be discussing the conditional use permit 436 for the sale of beer and wine at an existing Chevron station uh the applicant requests a type type 20 Alcoholic Beverage Control

license um per City Municipal Code this requires a conditional use permit the gas station is located at 255 arneal Road in the Camaro Commons area the site has a general plan land use designation of commercial mixed use and a zoning designation of Camaro Common's mixed use uh the site is located in census tract 502 um the areas immediately surrounding the site are commercial including auto repair services stores and restaurants there are no Parks schools or religious facilities in the immediate vicinity here you can see the floor plan of the market uh the beer and wine fridges and displays are located in the back corner of the store you can see on the Le hand side of the floor plan um in the middle of that floor plan where it says cashier station uh is it's conveniently placed to kind of guard those areas so people can't easily grab and go the alcohol will be you know monitored constantly by people working in the store uh the market is approximately 2,942 ft with only around 50 square ft or 1.7% of the store which will be dedicated to the sale of beer and wine um in order to approve this CP the the Planning Commission must make a finding of convenience or necessity um there are currently 42 on sale and 10 offsale licenses in this census tract um ABC recommends five on sale and three off sale however it is important to note the size and Zoning of the overall tract so I'm going to go back to that map there um this track stretches from arnil Road um to lososa Road and is bordered

by Ponda on the North and Ventura Boulevard on the south so it's pretty extensive um it's mostly commercial there is some residential in there but it's a lot of big commercial shopping centers so um there's not really as much of a concern as if it it was you know a residentially dominant area um so go back uh this project is exempt from environmental review pursuing to squet guideline section 15301 class one for existing facilities um and based on what has been presented tonight and the information outlined in the agenda report it is recommended that the commission find the project exempt from sqa and adopt a resolution approving cup 436 um this concludes my presentation I am available for any questions um and the applicants representative is also Al here as well thank you for your time thank you I have a question that we saw in the paper and stuff that the city council adopted some sort of resolution for liquor and gas stations and does that impact us at all or was this put in before that ordinance was put into effect sure so this um application came in around December so that was for the adoption of that ordinance under that ordinance that would not be permissible at this time at least because there's a moratorium on it is that correct but that we're not affected by that in today's not to not for this item no that would be anything that would come in after but we're not taking applications at this time yeah and then my uh I have a second question when you when they make application for

the Liquors as part of the process do they uh check with the police department and see if there's are they concerned at all about aor there we do send all of our alcohol permits that come into the police department they were not concerned about this one uh their only recommendation was just to make sure that all of the areas you know were secured um there was a door over on the side that they wanted to just have lock down so that way nobody could get in and out unless it was staff and and so that's contained in in the conditions based on their input yes it is all right thank you Murphy yeah I just wanted to confirm that city council was aware that there were prior applications and they were made aware of of that that evening I I think I've already confirmed that through the city yesware go on scre that that they were aware okay thank you okay yeah I I um also want to clarify for the the record in the community anyone who's watching at home that the the moratorium um puts a hold on any applications while there's a study undertaken on an examins any required or recommended um updates to protect the community okay um and the report indicates that the ABC license from the store that closed down that that could be transferred if renewal fees are paid before the license expires which is one year after the store is closure I'm wondering what that date is uh that will be May 2025 um I clarified that with ABC just last week okay so it's coming up so did they indicate that they plan on paying the fees to hold on to that license they

haven't heard anything from any of the 99 Cent Stores so they don't have an answer yet but it's unlikely okay okay so the the fees are not rep well when the fees if the fees are paid do they can they continue to hold on to that license even though it's not actually being used I believe they trans they have to transfer or sell it off I'm not totally sure on that though yeah they they could actually as long as they pay the fee they could keep it going keep it alive okay and and we won't know what where it will be transferred to it's just sort of we don't know if anyone's you know eyeing that an idol license that license yet or not but we're we're in constant communication with ABC and you know we'll we'll find out because we're one of the uh reviewing entities along with the cam real police department okay got it thanks and so this would bring the license uh for off-site sale sales to 11 yes it would be at 11 unless that other one was expired okay great and um also I'm just curious because I know this is a required finding is that there's uh public convenience or necessity and that language is you know regularly used and so it I just became curious as to like what's the what the nearest alternative is like how far would a person actually need a travel to to purchase alcohol uh yeah as I had mentioned in the presentation it is pretty concentrated so they're not too far this is more just so you know if somebody goes in to get gas and they want to grab a a beer or a bottle of wine on the way home it's not really intended for high volume sales okay great so it's not that it's it's inconvenient it's just that it's more convenient just just require another trip I mean smart final would be the right across the parking L walking

across the parking lot but it would require you another vehicle trip to go there maybe it's a walk across the parking lot okay I don't have any other questions um and again there are no members of the public who wish to speak on this comment oh I'm sorry commissioner edel do you have another comment okay anyone else okay and uh any other comments from staff no okay great so I will close the hearing on this item oh oh I'm sorry we do have a public will the applicant excuse me hey good evening um my name is Steve Rawlings I am uh here on behalf of Mac Associates which is the owner and operator of the uh the Chevron on our Neal Road there um I wanted to State for the record that we do uh concur with your staff's recommendation and we do agree to all of the conditions of approval that are presented to you this evening I wanted to touch on a couple of things about this particular location here um I I was really happy to see that Serena pointed out where the cashier station was in terms of um what do they call it crime prevention by Design that's a kind of a buzzword that they use this is really an optimal type of design because it does it allows the cashiers to be relatively close to every um part of the store be able to see and communicate um with the U members of the you know customers um there so that's a that's a really important feature about this particular store they have not had um a history of having you know shoplifting at in this particular store at this location I think some of it is probably because of the design there um the other couple things I wanted to point out was uh you asked about the 99 cent uh only uh license I I know a lot about 99 Cent Only considering I represented them for

about 10 years and um uh up and down the state of California they've been in bankruptcy for a number of years and that part and they are in the process of trying to sell all of their licenses as part of their um bankruptcy procedures there um licenses can go into a status of what they call surrendered so there's three statuses that a license can have one is active that means you're actively using it the second is that you can cancel it meaning it no longer exists that that license number does not exist any longer and the third status is you can be uh surrendered uh which is a status that a lot of licenses take and it just basically means we're not using it um but we're trying to sell it to another um to another user I do happen to know that there have been uh multiple offers on many many of the licenses uh that 99 cent only has I can't speak specifically about this particular license uh but I do know that they're actively trying to sell them um and again that license could only be activated in that particular space it's not like that that license could um be activated someplace else unless of course it's going into a um location that's been previously approved by a city that that is legal to do that but that's that's the story with that particular um license there um i' would also like to comment about public convenience or necessity um that's a a concept that is um that is a finding that needs to be made in order to justify um ABC to be able to issue another license into a census track ABC's um hands are tied by state law that says hey there's a maximum in any given census track that they're allowed to issue without approval from a city um and in they do it by a mathematical formula uh most cities concentrate their

commercially zoned properties into certain areas and in this particular case there's a lot of commercial property there so it's not surprising to see that there is um more licenses than what ABC is authorized to do in terms of convenience that is the number one thing I uh would submit to you that um having had four sons and my wife and I are working and often times I've picked up kids from school and I'm headed to a soccer practice and I need to go get gas the idea of filling up with gas and then making one more stop even if it's across the parking lot or walking across the parking lot with um three or four of my sons on board is is very inconvenient and this is you know just an answer item that's being sold to to people that are already our customers that um on a regular basis are asking for this type of product there um and it's a very common item that is uh carried in most gas stations and again it's just limited to uh beer and wine and we don't dedicate a lot of space to it so um with that I'm available for any questions that anybody might have thank you that was very informative anyone have any questions any Commissioners okay no but thanks for the information yeah thank you okay um so and thank you for for flagging the the public comment from the applicant um so we will now close the hearing is there a motion motion to adopt a resolution yeah all second okay a motion to adopt resolution number PC 20253 a resolution of the Planning Commission of the city of Camaro proving request from Mac Associates care of rans consulting or conditional use permit for the sale and want sale of beer and wine

under type 20 beer and wine off sale Alcohol Beverage Control license at 255 arneal Road and Camaro Commons mixu Zone further described as cup 436 move to way for the reading and vote to adopt I'll second commissioner etel yes cherylon yes commissioner Murphy yes commissioner V yes thank you great thank you okay we will close the the public hearing is now closed and we'll move on to discussion items there's nothing on the agenda just want to confirm no discussion items okay great so we'll move on to the director's report I wanted to thank the Commissioners for um all your effort and provided comment important document that go so your comments are well we see and excited to bring that changes to you um you can look forward to more um conversations like this around policy documents uh the city's current policy documents are in need of refresh and so you'll see um additional documents coming forward um likely the next one will be the action plan following this the April getting back into a little B more day-to-day business the April 1 um Planning Commission meeting um doesn't have we don't have any items um tracking for it so we'll we'll cancel that um and that's not a joke it's April 1 meeting um the April 15th meeting um potentially has an item um so we're tracking for that um another kind of um and speaking of you know kind of um some of the um role of the commission the Planning Commission serves as the landmark Committee in the city's

historic preservation ordance and we have um a landmark request and so uh we will be bringing that forward and we do want to bring forward um some dis discussion and background on the historic preservation ordinance and what it means for the commission to serve as the landmark committee um so that'll becoming um up ah head of the landmark conversation um and that concludes Mar great thank you Commissioners any questions director and it's my understanding this is our last meeting in the library we're going to be back to City Hall is that correct thank you for reminding here something very important I I'm sure you've all enjoyed um this fantastic location this is our last meeting here um that April 15th meeting it will be our next meeting uh will take place in the new theader model Chambers um was in there today kind of walking through some of it um it looks fantastic um I I feel like we're all going to be spoiled so be using such a nice facility are we going to need some training for the new equipment or anything over um yes we will be doing that um hopefully there's um a little bit less training for Commissioners and a little bit more for staff um but as as we get a little bit closer and and fortunately for um for this group um the city council will um have the first meeting there um and so if there are any um kind of links on the back end we'll get them worked out for us good thank you great thank you very much yeah thank you for that reminder else we would have all shed up late at least I would have I would have been late great um all right moving on to commissioner comments I don't have any I just want to thank the staff particularly for the all of the work that went into the safety element I know that those are very long processes and do involve a lot of people um and the consultant who's no longer here unfortunately and uh appreciate the consideration of the comments and

recommendations and um continuing to to work on it to incorporate those comments and recommendations and bringing it bring it back um it is particularly at at this time just such a a critical element of our general plan um so just much appreciation for all of the work that you've done on that element and um all of the different policies that you're working to update and also appreciation for the library for housing US during all of this time it's exciting to go into the the new Chambers okay any any other comments okay we'll adjourn