City Council - Regular Meeting

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Good evening. I'd like to call to order the regular meeting of the Campbell City Council for Tuesday, April 21st, 2026. And we'll start with roll call, please. Council member Skazola here. Council member Lopez here. Council member Hines present. Vice Mayor By present. Mayor Fado here.

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Um before we begin with the routine business of the council which would include the pledge of allegiance. I wanted to um mention a couple things about tonight's agenda. Uh first of all um item 8.3 on the agenda which deals with Senate Bill 79 that will be removed from the agenda and we will hear that at a future meeting. Um that's not why you're here. So don't worry. Also um uh for those of you that might be present uh because the very last item on the agenda is a discussion of the climate action plan. We are not going to discuss that tonight as well uh in the interest of time. So I mentioned that right up front um but you will be permitted to speak on that item if you wish under general oral requests which comes early in the meeting. However, the item itself will be at a future meeting and it's intended to bring that back at our meeting on May 19th. I I will also um mention very briefly that um under the regular public hearings, there are two what I anticipate brief items both dealing with uh fees um which is a routine item of business that we normally handle. And uh so item 8.1 and 8.4 I will handle those uh first sequentially. Um my anticipation is they won't take very long. However, um the main item of business and I know that's why most of you are here tonight is for item 8.2 um the public hearing um to consider uh options for continuing implementation of the starter home project. So of course that is going to be our major item of business. I'll have some uh procedural comments to mention when we come to

that. With that, uh I would like to invite our Campbell City Arborist, Abel Zarug Goza, to lead the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Able and to the Mr. Zeruggoza is the city of Campbell Arburs and he is the individual who led the pledge of allegiance tonight and uh first of all thank you very much. Thanks for the work you do for the city and um appreciate everything.

Thank you. He's also also here this evening to to represent our public works department because for the 44th year in a row uh Campbell has been recognized um as a tree city USA. And so as such um we add another leaf to our um plaque on this matter and I have a resolution here uh regarding um the declaration uh of Arbor Day and uh so able Thank you for what you're doing and your colleagues as a part of the public works staff. Public works director Amy Ole who is doubling as our photographer tonight as well. We will be celebrating Arbor Day uh Thursday, April the 30th at JDM Park Dundy, Oregon from approximately 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. We've invited Da Vinci School will being trees approximately we'll be planting six large maples are commonly known and we invite the committee obviously the mayor and the council if available to join us that day we look forward to seeing those of you that can make it. Thank you.

Thank you. Um item 3.1 again is the proclamation declaring April 30th as Arbor Day in the city of Campbell. We now move on to the next item of business here. We have no communications and petitions. And we now move to um oral requests. Um oral requests um uh give an opportunity for any individual who would like to address the city council on any item that is not on tonight's agenda. So, I do have some requests under that item. And I'd first like to invite uh Denise Witty to speak to us. Denise here. Now I'd like to invite Monica Faria nervous. Good evening uh mayor council. My name is Monica Faria and I'm with PG&. I'd like to take this opportunity to communicate that I'm your local government affairs representative, fairly new to the company, about six weeks in. Um, so this is a great opportunity to come and meet a lot of

the community members as well. Um, first I'd like to acknowledge my colleague Sergio Himenez who previously served as your P Gen government affairs representative. I appreciate his partnership with the city of Campbell and I'm grateful for his support during this transition. Moving forward, I will be your primary point of contact for all P Gen related matters. If you have questions, concerns, um, please definitely reach out and I'm here to help. Um, I do want to say that I value strong partnerships with our local government leaders and I'm committed to being a responsive and collaborative resource. I look forward to connecting and I'll be reaching out to each and every one of you individually so I can better understand your priorities, your concerns and be of service regarding all PG related matters and I look forward to working together. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you

Susan Landry. Good evening, honorable mayor and council members. I am here to thank our mayor Dan Fetado for your help and working with other cities in writing to our state legislators requesting a pause on any new housing legislation that the legislature undertakes and h before there's a comprehensive review of all the significant legislation that has been passed and enacted. And I would like to encourage you to also implement a that SB79 be extended until this review is complete. Enough is enough. We need quality affordable workforce housing, but we need to preserve Campbell's small town charm. Why do we need a pause in legislation? It has been way too much, way too fast, and has way too many unknown consequences. Campbell embraced the 2000 or the 16th Reena numbers of 2,977 homes. We even allocated 4,000. Campbell is a pro housing designation. But in passing all these rapidfire bills over the years, SB9, SB10, SB30, SB79, the state said, "Oh, we really didn't need mean you only need 4,000 now with SB79. You need to add more 40,000 new people here in Campbell. I'm not a nimi. I'm not a yimi. I'm a baby, a mimi. I want to understand housing for housing. I don't want housing just for housing sake. I want to see quality affordable housing. Campbell cannot handle doubling their population by 2031. There's a thing called a carrying capacity. When is it too much? Utility lines all have a supply capacity. How are we going to double our population without doubling

all our utilities and who's going to pay for it in the meantime? I have a lot of more to say. You guys got a copy of my memo, but thank thank you Dan for supporting this effort to have legislation put a pause on any new housing laws. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak under oral requests? Yeah, I checked both box off boxes some both

Audrey Key driver 1509 Walnut Drive. Nice to see you all after Thank you. Please go ahead.

Brief break. Um I want to bring up something under a request that um probably nobody else is going to really talk to you very much. I asked Grock a while back to give me a synopsis of a problem Vancouver had. Uh this is for the council members with this type of development situation. Basically, we have Chinese developers that are sending large amounts of money over. They're establishing multiple LLC's and they are purchasing property. Then they're doing developments on that property and then they're selling those developments not to the people who reside in that area, but rather to other offshore Chinese individuals. A lot of these properties remained empty. In other words, they were a great mechanism to take money out of China and invest it in something solid in a in a country that's considered a good investment. That's what's happening here. So, if you look, I even found a very nice little cartoon that makes it very simple for you and you can read the long words. What ended up happening in Vancouver is they had um uh the crisis just escalated out of because these developments were really weren't interested in making money. They were interested in spending money to take it out of China. Um as a result, the local residents couldn't afford to buy buy developments, buy the newly development developed property. Um, Vancouver solved the problem by putting a huge tax on foreign development and also requiring an occupancy level because a lot of these places were unoccupied. So, I'd like you to really consider your jobs are to look at the intent is housing. Housing that will be

lived in and used. And a lot of the requirement is for reduced income housing, which this at $1.8 8 million. These developments are not meeting that requirement. So, thank you for your time. Thank you. Are there any other or requests? Okay, we do have somebody online with their hand raised.

Yes, please. Raja, would you like to speak? Yes. Can you folks hear me? Yes. Hey, um, sorry, I'm trying to talk at this time and not at the, uh, agenda time because I'm hiking the Everest base camp and I might lose signal. So, I have been waiting patiently to do this so that so that I can resume my hike. Uh, quickly, policy should be grounded in inclusion and shared responsibility. Every Yeah. Can you hear us? Yes. This is currently oral requests. Are you wanting to speak on an item not on the agenda? Because I'm international and my signal will be lost any second. Sorry. Right now is the time for oral requests.

So, can I be the first one to talk uh on the agenda next? No, we'll um get to it. Okay. I Okay. I I'm going to make it uh totally not related to the agenda item and I'll make it general. Okay. I'm sorry. Anything that is on the agenda tonight must be spoken of under the agenda item. So I'm not trying to speak on the agenda. I I'm trying to make this general just because I'm traveling international. I'm trying to accommodate myself here. What what is the what is the nature of your subject please?

Okay. I just want to say policy should be grounded in inclusion and shared responsibility. Every neighborhood must accommodate new housing and create real pathways for first-time home buyers rather than evolving into exclusive enclaves. State frameworks like SB9 already allow lot splits and build modest units of up to four units, two floor units on each of these lots. So the question is not if growth will happen but whether we will enable it thoughtfully and equitably. We have seen how efforts in the past like the San Thomas neighborhood plan had built so much resistance on any kind of building and later the same mindset was brought to the ADUs too for creating barriers. Um so I support clear definitions around vacant lot strong privacy standards for adjacent homes but not policies that reduce densities if starter homes cannot be built on lots 10,000 ft lots with single family neighborhood question. This is an agenda item and according to the procedures and rules that we must follow, you must speak to it under an agenda item. So, um, thank you and I will move on from now. We now move to the city council announcements. Um, they include the following. Uh, as I as was mentioned earlier, um, this is the 44th year that we're celebrating Arbor Day and as Mr. Zargoza also mentioned that at 10:00 on Thursday, April 30th at John D. Morgan Park on the Rinkon side, we will have a special ceremony uh commemorating that. Um we also invite uh members of the community to provide feedback on the Campbell multimodal transportation plan. Um the community center will um be the site of a meeting. if you'd like to participate in a future meeting that will be held on Wednesday, May 6th from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. And uh more information on the

multimodal plan, which the council had heard at a previous meeting, is available at campell campbellca.gov multimodal. The next item is that the draft environmental impact report for Campbell Technology Pro uh Parkway, the Campbell Technology Park project which is located at 635, 655, 675, and 695 Campbell Technology Parkway. This is the location off of McGlliny Lane, which itself is off of Union Avenue. This draft EIR is now available for public review and comment. The 45day period for public review runs from April 15 through June 1st. Um additional information, please visit campbellca.gov/documents center. The um annual um Boogie Music Festival sponsored by um the local Campbell Chamber of Commerce will be the weekend of May 16th and 17th. And on Saturday the 16th, the hours will be from 10 to 6. on Sunday the 17th from 10 until 5. Um more information can be found at the Chamber of Commerce website. Uh the city of Campbell will be hosting um its annual Keep America Beautiful event. This will take place on Saturday, June 13th from 9 to 12. And registration will start at 8:30 and the event will kick off at 9 uh amil 12 pm on the south side of the Campbell Community Center uh near the track. Um to register, please visit the website campbellca.gov. And finally, um the Campbell Community Center um Department of Recreation and Community Services is currently hiring lifeguards. And so anyone who is a lifeguard and would like to um explore this opportunity can um contact the the

community center and recreation office um or the website campbellca.govatics aquatics. That includes the council announcements. So the council will now move on to the consent calendar and uh these are items uh 7.1 to 7.4 4 um which the council will take as a single item of business unless a member of the city council, city staff, or a member of the public would like us to pull an item for further discussion. Would anyone like to pull an item from the consent calendar for further discussion? Seeing none, could I have a motion, please?

I'll propose a motion to accept the can consent calendar items 7.1 to 7.4. I'll second. Um motion by council member Hines. Um second by Vice Mayor BY. Um roll call please. Council member Skazola. I. Council member Lopez. Hi. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor By. Hi. Mayor Fado. Hi.

Thank you. We now move on to public hearings and the introduction of ordinances. And as I mentioned earlier, items 8.1 and 8.3 8.1 and 8.4. So we'll start with item 8.1. Thank you. Please go ahead.

Good evening. My name is Michael Nakamura, accounting clerk for the city of Campbell. Thank you for the opportunity to present the public hearing for the annual update to business license tax rates. Um, per our municipal code, council may increase business license tax rates up to 2% per year. We're proposing a 2% increase for fiscal year 2027, effective July 1st, 2026. If approved, we're expected to generate an additional $14,000 um revenue on top of the 700,000 in annual business license tax revenue already expected. A total of $714,000 if approved. And with that, I will turn it over to council for any questions.

Thank you. Any questions from members of the council? No questions. This is a public hearing. Would anyone like to speak on the item um 8.1 which are the um update to the business license um fees for the city of Campbell? Seeing none, I will close the public hearing on this matter. Request a motion. I'll propose a motion to accept the uh item 8.1 uh FYI 20 27 business license public hearing and introduction of ordinance amending provisions of the Campbell Municipal Code to revise the business license tax rates effective in fiscal year 2027.

I'll second. Thank you. Motion by Council Member Hines um second by Vice Mayor Bby. Roll call, please. Council member Skazola. Hi. Council member Lopez. Hi. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor Bby. Hi. Mayor Fatos. Hi.

One second. I'm sorry. We have the ordinance being an ordinance of the city council of the city of Campbell amending provisions of the Campbell Municipal Code to revise business license tax rates. I'd like to move for further further reading of the ordinance. I'll second. Thank you. Motion to um wave further reading of the ordinance besides the title by Vice Mayor Bobby, second by Council Member Hines. Um roll call, please. Council member Scazola. Hi. Council member Lopez. Hi. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor By. Hi.

Mayor Fado. Hi. Thank you. We now move to item 8.4. Uh Shannon Dragman from our uh finance department will present this item. Welcome. Thank you.

Thank you. And good evening, mayor and members of city council. Um this item for tonight, these are reviewed annually for our city policies as um the city's goal to fully or partially do cost recovery. Um this is an interim year between comprehensive fee studies. So staff is recommending a standard CPI of 2.18% for most fees to account for inflation. A limited number of department specific updates are also included primar primarily to ensure compliance align with actual cost of service or reflect updated policies. If approved, the updated schedule would take effect July 1st, 2026, and is projected to generate an approximate $225,000 in revenue. Staff recommends adoption of this fiscal 2027 fee schedule and charges. And just to keep it brief, we're here for any questions and all the details are in the report.

Any questions by the council on this matter? Thank you. I will um open the public hearing. Would anyone like to comment on this agenda item dealing with the um update on proposed city fees for the next fiscal year? Seeing none, I will close the public hearing and ask for a motion on this matter.

Just one uh one comment, one request to consider the uh um uh development fees for commercial and multifamily um to have impact fees considered for those situations. Um similarly that we have for public for park and recrecks uh specifically for public works and public safety u because uh that we're really have no other ways with new development coming in to be able to match that and that get additional funding for uh those services that new properties coming in are going to put a demand on. So just as a as a comment for staff to consider uh for uh uh for that for the fiscal year 2027. And with that, I'll any other with that I'll propose a motion to approve a fiscal year 2027 schedule and fees and schedule of fees and charges.

I'll second motion by council member Hines, second by vice. Roll call, please. Council member Skazola. Hi. Council member Lopez. Hi. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor By. Hi, Mayor Futles. Hi. Do you need any further action on this?

Thank you. Okay. Thank you. So, now we um go to the major item of business tonight. Um item 8.2. This is the public hearing to consider options for continued implementation of the Starter Home Revitalization Act. Um, by way of explanation and procedure, I just wanted to make a few comments uh about what procedure we'll follow this evening. First of all, thank you very much for your attendance. Uh, many of you um have written letters to us um which we appreciate. uh they've been uh well thought out and planned and they've been helpful to us as this matter has come to our attention. Um it was at our last meeting under general oral request that many of you came and spoke on this matter and wrote comments at that time as well. Um so I thank you for those as well. um we did hear you and we were able to bring this back immediately at the very next meeting which of course is tonight's meeting. So the general procedure that we'll follow is is as follows. Um there will be a staff presentation. Uh so the staff will outline the basic parameters. Uh following the staff presentation, members of the city council uh then have an opportunity to ask questions about the presentation. Perhaps some of the questions that we might ask are some of the very same questions that you may have. So those questions may answer some of the reasons or some of the questions that you have. Maybe not. U but after the council asks questions then we will open the public hearing. So um I know there are several of you that would like to speak tonight and we're going to give everyone who would like to speak an opportunity to do so. Um what you say of course is totally

your business. I I respect that. What I might request is that you consider speaking to the issue that we're specifically talking about tonight. Um and and focus your comments on that. Those would be most helpful. But obviously you have the right to say what you please. And um so once we conclude, oh every person will have two minutes to speak as I indicated earlier. And I have a series of cards here and um request for for doing so um in order which I will do my best to honor. Um you are requested to fill out a card or or a speaker request a sheet if you wish. You're not required to. But for those of you that have filled out speaker requests, I will take all those first and then I'll find out if there's anyone online who would like to speak. And then finally, I will give an opportunity for anyone who's decided they would like to speak uh and I don't have a card for. So that's the procedure uh that we'll follow. Um following that, we'll close the public hearing on the matter and then the council will deliberate here of course in public and um come to some decision or um offer a resolution or whatever our decision, you know, might be. So, I just wanted to kind of outline the procedures um as we get going here. And um with that, um I would like to invite um our staff. I believe our director of planning uh and uh community development uh Rob Eastwood is going to make the staff presentation.

Thank you, Mayor Aron Council members. Again, Rob Eastwood, community development director. Also here with senior planner Daniel Plama here to support you on this item tonight. do have a presentation that hopefully will tee up this item both for you and the audience on the issue that you are considering tonight which is regarding Campbell's starter home ordinance. Uh as a way of background, uh under state law, uh the Starter Home Revitalization Act, uh was uh put into place under several state laws, including SB 684, SB123, which is namely pertains to the item before you tonight, and AB130. In general, the state starter home uh act requires or uh that cities allow up to 10 unit starter home projects on parcels in both multifamily and mixed use zoning districts and as amended under SB123 under vacant single family zoned properties. Couple other uh things to consider with the starter home revitalization act. Uh under the act these projects must be processed ministerally. Uh I know it's typical in land use uh when a project is proposed and it goes to a hearing before a planning commission or council. There are notices are sent out and a hearing is scheduled where the hearing is reviewed by the council or planning commission. Under this state law, the the city must process this minister. Thus, you cannot have a hearing for these items. And with that, as there is no hearing, uh, typically with ministerial projects, there's no noticing that's associated with that. Uh, under the state law, there are limitations on the design standards that the city can uh, impose on these projects. The city can impose objective design standards. However, the objective design standards cannot prohibit a certain minimum density or up to 10 units uh, that these projects can propose in the lot. So if they were so

restrictive to prohibit that uh the city would have to alleviate those. In addition, and as we'll discuss tonight, uh many developers use other uh housing laws when the start home projects are proposed. This includes both state density bonus law and SB 330. And briefly, under state density bonus law, if a developer proposes a low market rate affordable unit, they are afforded certain concessions and waiverss. they can wave certain design standards that the city imposes on projects and that has happened on a number of these projects. In addition, uh a developer can use what's called a SB 330 pre-application with these projects. When that is submitted to a city, it vests or it locks in the standards that are in place at the time. Thus, in the future, if the city changes its standards with respect to starter home or different types of laws, they are vested or can grandfather in under the standards that were in effect when they applied. Uh as to how the city of Campbell has implemented its local ordinance. Uh for context, often these laws are adopted usually in the fall of every legislative cycle. Usually not much time between the the time these laws are adopted and go in effect. It has been the city's practice to try and get uh ordinances on the books and and the the objective of that is to have standards in place to help the community, help residents, help developers understand these state laws. and that has been the practice of Campbell. Uh, a number of the the Starter Home Revitalization Act laws went in effect in the fall of for the years you see up there. In response, the city uh both in June 2024, subsequently July 2025 and August 2025 uh adopted interim ordinances to put into place standards uh for the Starter Home Revitalization Act. In addition, the the city has put, I'd say, a very robust web page up uh under the community development website. It lists uh the

facts of the law. It lists the standards. Uh the application process uh and we strive to maintain at least a list up to date of all the applications that are in process. Uh I know this sailing to the next meeting of course is the question of vacancy and I'll walk the council and the audience through uh the facts we have on that. uh under the starter home revitalization act and namely SB 1123 uh it does state that the starter home projects uh can be allowed in single family neighborhoods where the property is vacant. Uh it does not provide a lot more specificity on specifics of time of place and when that vacancy is applied and for context uh there are many other state laws where that does happen. So, if you'll remember when ADUs were prescribed to be allowed in in all cities in California several years back, there were actually very specific requirements that say if a garage was converted to an ADU or an AED was built without permits, there was a date in which that had to happen. In certain other state laws, a housing laws prescribed a zoning has to be in place on a certain date before it happened. So in certain instances, the state has weighed in and and declared a time a point in time when a property is eligible. That did not happen under this one. In the absence of that direction, uh when staff brought the initial interim ordinance to council, uh there was a question of vacancy and that was discussed in the ordinance. Uh acknowledging that today in Campbell a property owner can come in, obtain a building permit to demolish a single family house on a property and render it. Uh staff's intention was to avoid speculative demolition. Um to avoid having a developer, an owner do a two-step process where first they would render the property vacant. Perhaps it would become blighted. Perhaps a project in the future would not happen and at some point in the future perhaps a

starter home project would happen. Uh considering that as a potential consequence of of having uh vacancy be required for starter home application, the ordinance that was adopted by council does have language that allows an applicant to render a property vacant during a red redevelopment process. Uh so to be clear today in Campbell under our ordinance if a single family property has a house the ordinance allows a developer to apply to demolish the house during the redevelopment process. It does not have to be vacant ahead. Uh again the intent of this was to avoid uh speculative building demolition and potential blight that could happen. Uh what has happened since uh camel's adoption of its starter home ordinance? Uh we've had a total of 16 applications uh received. Uh 11 have been received this year. Approximately half of those applications are in single family neighborhoods. Uh in all of those instances in the single family projects, there is an existing single family home. And in each of these applications, the as I mentioned earlier, the applicants can avail themselves of other state laws. they have submitted what's called an SB330 pre-application that locks in existing standards. So, we can discuss more what that means. So, tonight, as mentioned by Mayor Ferado, uh the city council staff has received a tremendous amount of feedback uh regarding the applications that have come in, notably three to four of those applications in single family neighborhoods. a lot of questions on why are these allowed, the design standards that apply, uh the characteristics of these projects, namely these are up to 10 unit town home projects on single family lots. Uh probably the largest uh question that has come in as is why Campbell is using its current application of vacancy that allows

vacancy during redevelopment and has asked the city to reconsider other options for establishing vacancy and that is the reason this item is before you tonight. In addition, the interim ordinance CH Campbell has will expire in July is the opportunity for the the council to either extend that current ordinance or revise it. And tonight of course you'll be evaluating an alternative to the existing application of vacancy. So the options before uh that staff has presented for the council to consider tonight are twofold. Uh first uh would be to maintain the ordinance as it is. And that would allow a developer applicant uh to pro apply for a starter home project on an occupied or uh single family parcel that has a house on it and during redevelopment make project or make the parcel vacant. an alternative that's before you tonight and you have an ordinance that you can take action on tonight is to revise that vacancy requirement uh to be more I'd say to a conservative approach or more prescriptively to the the plain letter language of the law uh which will require at the time an applicant comes to apply for a starter home project the parcel must be vacant. So again, they cannot apply for a start home project unless the four corners of the property are vacant. And that can be either there are no there's no housing stock on the property or the housing is in such disrepair that perhaps our billing official has red tagged the property and rendered it uh unhabitable. Uh as there may be some consequences as we discussed of of declare of taking option two where an applicant or a developer could speculatively buy a property, speculatively apply for obtain a permit, demolish a house that could result in blight, loss of housing stock. Uh you may also direct staff to look into develop and bring back to the council a demolition control orders.

I'll talk to more talk to you more about what that means. Uh as a reminder tonight for the council uh this is an interim ordinance for state law. It does require four fist votes. So either option you take tonight will require four out of five of you to vote a formative vote on the action. Uh a bit more on option two. If the council pursues that tonight, an owner development uh would need to obtain a demolition permit ahead of time or it could be vacant for some time beforehand before the city accepts a starter home application. At this time, again, uh under the city's ordinance, uh demolition permits are issued ministerally. If someone applies, there's no noticing. it meets the requirements of the building code and there's no um tenants on the property or or low-income families which were reviewed. The the city is required to issue the permit to demolish the house. Uh at this time there is no requirement under the city ordinance that a replacement house uh be built if a if a demolition permit is issued. Uh with all those facts in hand uh the city could pursue a demolition control ordinance. Uh in general, what demolition control ordinances do is require that prior to the de any issuance of a demolition permit, there must be an application approved uh to replace that house with perhaps a new single. So perspectively, uh, a demolition control or earnance that could be brought back to the city council could require, uh, in Campbell, if an applicant, owner, developer applied to demolish a single family house, they would be required to replace that house with a new house or prospectively what's called an SD SD9 project, a duplex, which is allowed in single family districts. uh knowing uh some of the concerns tonight are about vacancy and starter home projects prospectively that

demolition control or warrants would not allow uh the replacement of the house with the starter home project. So that is something we would have to investigate further. Uh we would like and I have already asked uh the state housing department of community development to uh assist the city in this question uh of looking at what a demolition control rooms can and can't do in light of the state laws and start starter home projects. uh we wouldn't want staff would not advise the council to go forward if for some reason state HD would advise that the demolition control ordinance would somehow prohibits fulfillment of the 1123 law. So that's something we'd like to look into with the state, make sure we have good advice from the state uh before the city consider and adopt a future demolition control. Uh I know a lot of the question tonight uh among members of the audience that are here uh and also among council members is uh what would be the effect of any decision tonight among on the applications that are currently in process. Again I think I believe the reason most folks are here tonight they've seen in their neighborhoods at least a few of these applications being proposed and obviously uh there's questions on can those what will happen to those applications. Uh as I mentioned as a factual statement uh the developers and applicants uh for these applications have submitted an SB 330 pre-application under state law that does lock in the standards under the city's ordinance today. So even if the ordinance has changed tonight because they had submitted those SB330 pre-application requirements, they're locked under under the current ordinance. Uh per that uh the city is required under state law to process the applications if they conform with our existing ordinances. We can't change uh the standards and rules apply to those existing applications. If there is a future application that comes to the

city, it would be held to the new standard that's adopted. Uh as a matter of fact and and prior to this meeting, we had some questions on the status of these applications. Uh I will confirm on a few of the applications, the city has already received demolition permits uh that it is processing at this moment. So there may be an instance where irrespective of the actions tonight what what happens uh the city would be required to process issue demolition permits for some of these properties where they would still render the property. Just want to make sure the council's aware of uh I know a lot of related uh concerns have come up on the starter home projects. Uh I want to speak to those quickly. Uh, a lot of these areas, uh, the state does not have much, I'm sorry, the city has little to no discretion on, and I want to make sure the community is aware of that. They can be brought up tonight, but the ability of the city council to weigh in and change the direction with respect to some of these issues uh, is very limited or there is no discretion. Uh, so number one, as as stated, per state law, these projects must be approved ministerally. The city council cannot have a hearing to consider one of the starter home projects. have to process them administer. Uh number two, as I mentioned, there are no public hearings. Uh number three, uh any of these applications can avail themselves of state density bonus law. And and to reiterate, under state density bonus law, there are if you provide an affordable housing unit, you can wave many of the city standards. I know we've received a lot of inquiries of why certain height standards are not being adhered to with some of these starter home projects. Uh And I'll I'll just state plainly few of these projects have used state density bonus law to wave uh the city's height standards and they are allowed to do so under state density bonus law. Uh there's been some questions. We have two starter home projects that are directly adjacent to

each other and obviously when two projects are adjacent to each other in this instance they're proposed by the same developer why isn't the city processes processing processing them together? uh state ACD has looked into this issue and they've issued technical guidance. The city must process these process these applications independently if they can be developed and be built independent of each other. Uh finally, as a reminder uh to the city council and in general to the public, under a lot of the state housing laws today, it is very very difficult to either deny a housing project or reduce the density of the housing project. Namely, the city would have to declare and identify a public health and safety impact uh to deny or reduce the density of the project. And I just want to make sure that's clear to the audience and the city council. Uh so coming back to the options before the city council tonight, option one would be to maintain the current approach and have no change in the vacancy requirement and the council may extend the ordinance in the future. Option two would be to revise uh the vacancy requirement. And tonight, if you pursue that option, you would adopt a new urgency ordinance with revised language. And that would require vacancy at the time an application is submitted uh to the city for a starter home project. Because of potentially the consequences of that speculative demolition, uh the council may also consider directing staff uh probably as expediently as possible to pursue with HD guidance and bring back a demolition control ordinance that would prevent speculative demolition of single family homes. And again, as a reminder to council, either option does require a uh a little bit on next steps, as as mentioned, staff has already reached out to HD. We are trying to get a response as soon as possible for guidance um on some of the broader questions with vacancy and more directly on the

demolition control ordinance. Uh we would return on May 19th uh with an extension to the ordinance either way. And uh just as a note uh the author of the bill uh starter home ordinance that is in effect today uh does have a current Senate bill that is looking to do some cleanup modifications to uh the Starter Home Revitalization Act. At this time uh I've reached out to that office. Uh they're doing some modifications to the standards in the bill. I I see noations of changes to vacancy uh but that may change. And at this time they are looking at some clean up provisions that uh with that I'll close up available questions. Again, myself and senior planner Daniel Farmer are Thank you.

Thank you, Rob. So, first I'll ask if there are questions by the members of the council. Yeah. Can um can I ask staff to elaborate more thoroughly on uh the approach for the status of the starter home submissions that are in place today? get

I can respond to that. I think uh director Eastwood did a good job explaining the current applications. So there are 16 applica pre-applications. That's the SB 330 uh pre-applications that have been submitted u for these SB 1123 projects and as he mentioned those applications are processed under the current ordinance and they will not be uh processed under any new ordinance that is passed tonight. That SB 330 pre-application locks in those standards under the existing ordinance. Uh just a note, the proposed ordinance included in your packet tonight is intended to match the wording of uh government code 66499.41, which codifies SB 1123 at requiring a property to be vacant at the time the application is submitted. Uh so these developers do so they've submitted their SB 330 pre-applications. they do still need to submit a SB123 application uh within uh a specified time and so that that's to complete their project developments and to obtain the building permits and when that application is submitted the city can review the application ministerially and it can only consider objective standards. So, as uh Director Eastwood mentioned in that limited review, the city can reject those applications only if it makes clear findings that the project violates health and safety concerns. Uh and again, as Rob mentioned, the city has reached out to HCD to get some clarity as to the existing city ordinance. Uh, so an SB330 pre-application approval is not a guarantee that a project will be bit, excuse me, will be built as submitted or that there cannot be a revision to ensure project as a state law. But state law is very permissive under SB 1123 and other housing laws. Um, and the city

cannot fully prevent these projects even with an ordinance revision tonight.

Thank you, councelor. So, uh, Rob, I have a couple follow-up questions on the, um, demolition control ordinance. So, if the ordinance is changed tonight, um, and it goes into effect, an applicant can come come in and apply for a demolition permit, but is restricted to replace the structure with one house, not a starter home project. Is that was that is my cor my understanding correct? Uh two things. Under Camel's ordinances today, uh there is no require requirement for a placement home. An applicant can walk in say tomorrow to the building counter, apply for a demolition permit. There is no requirement under our ordinance that they have to replace a home. So we would we could is we would issue the permit. The house uh the property could be rendered vacant. Absent uh there being low income or tenants on the property. uh under a prospective future demolition control be brought back to council. Again, we'd have to consult with HD, it could prohibit that and it could could say something to the effect of at no time will the city issue a demolition permit unless there is an approval uh on record uh for a replacement house.

So, I I guess I'm still not clear if I if um the ordinance change to to um uh correctly or to define vacant. So, if some if there's a a property owner that has a house currently on on the parcel and they come in after this ordinance, if this ordinance would were to get changed, if they they have an existing structure and they want to demolish their their um existing structure, can they do that under the current city regulation and what are they allowed to to replace that structure with?

Uh so to make it make it very specific, council member, the answer is yes. Yes, they have a single family house. They come today post demolition permit. The city will issue it. They can render the property vacant absent per view of tenency and low-income families which will prohibit that. Uh there's no requirement that they replace the home under city's ordinance today. So it could it could remain vacant. you could see a property city issued a permit. It demolished the house uh and it could remain vacant for some time and then at some point

so so if they were to demolish the structure they could wait a period of time and then come to the city and say I want to do a starter home project. My propert is vacant. Is that um a possibility under if we were to change this and if we didn't have a control demolition control ordinance? The answer is yes, Council Member. Yes. So, under option two, if adopted, an applicant could walk in, obtain a demolition permit, demolish a house, property could be rendered vacant.

There's no time limit on it could be vacant for some time. After that, the property owner could walk back in to the planning department and apply for an 1123 starter home project. Okay. Thank you. Excuse me. Excuse me. I'm sorry. You're asking the microphone to be turned up. Okay. So, I will ask and maybe you can that you speak louder. um to speak louder into it. Elliot has questions.

Yes. I apologize. Um we go question. Council member Skazola. All right. Thank you, Mayor. Um so my question at this point is uh well I have two actually at this point. Uh, so option number two, it's my understanding that will at least put up a few guard rails or um a couple more hoops to jump through or whatever phrase you want. It doesn't make it as easy as as is the current state. Am I correct in that?

Council member Scazola, I I would say yeah. Instead of under today's ordinance, it's a effectively a one-step process where you can apply to both demolish the house and build a starter home project in one application. Under option two, if a developer, owner, applicant intends to build a starter home project, it would have to have two steps. Step one, apply for obtain a permit, demolish an existing house, wait until that house is demolished, and then apply for step two, which is the starter home project. So, it would it would be a longer process.

Okay. And can we add other, you know, government It's funny, there's so many just I'll use it again, hoops to jump through for so many things, but yeah, this seems way too easy to me. um if we go with option two, are there other layers of protections that we can throw on there? Because my biggest concern is that I know of one example in particular in my district that uh it's a perfectly good, beautiful home, uh you know, sold for nearly $3 million and they're just knocking it over. What a waste, you know, and it it's going to destroy the look and feel of the neighborhood. Everyone's upset about it and I feel for good reason. So, what I'm asking is, you know, what else can we do? Is there, you know, essentially I'm I'm trying to find a way that we can make it where Campbell is unappealing to developers that are unreasonable. I see this as unreasonable when there's a perfectly good home already there and you just knock it over. That's crazy to me. And then you put this monstrosity there. So, so is there more we can do? If we go with option two, uh I'm I'm trying to ensure that there's so many things that, you know, meticulous things for developers to do so they they won't even try anymore. or they'll just be like, "Oh, no. I'm not doing that in Campbell." And I'm talking specifically about already homes. Like, I understand urban blight. If it's a ruined home, if it's unoccupied, etc. Like, I get it. Sure. You know, that makes sense for developers to come in there and turn it into something that's actually nice and livable and hopefully affordable. But in in the case I'm talking about, that it just makes no sense. And so, I would want to prevent this from ever happening again. I I can answer briefly. Uh, council member Skazola, again, the tool that uh the city would apply. It's called a demolition control ordinance. And uh the direction tonight or council could be to staff to bring back a demolition control ordinance. Again, our advice to avoid um perhaps state

scrutiny in the future is to at least get HD guidance on that demolition control ordinance before we bring that back bring it back. But again, that would be the tool that would prevent speculative uh destruction of homes. Yeah, thank you so much. And just one last com or I guess I'll wait for comments later. Thank you so much.

I wanted to summarize what what you just said. If we accepted option two, that would return the standard to the state standard, what the state law says. And if we combine that with an instruction to develop a demolition control ordinance, um if that is successful, that would prevent someone from creating a vacancy by simply knocking a house down because the demolition control ordinance could in fact state that in order to demolish this house, you have to have an approved project for a new house within a an area that is zoned for single family housing. So, it would be sort of a two-step process. That would be, as far as we can tell right now, the best protection that we could offer. Um, am I correct in that assumption?

That is correct, Mayor Fit. Thank you. One other question as long as I have the floor here myself. Um, have there been any legal challenges to SB 330? um this idea of a walking in there have been challenges. I'm unaware of the timing issue. Yeah, there I mean there have been some questions and senior planner farmer knows a lot more about the technicalities of this. Once you submit an SB330 there's a time period on which you can submit an application that stays active. I know there's been questions and challenges on how often that can stay active.

So I I know that SP 330 was also called the housing crisis act and it was actually passed back in um 2019. So it's been around for a while and I just wondered it sounds to me like a sponsored legislation when it was first presented. I I don't know. uh sponsored legislation oftentimes are written by developers who try to create legislation uh that is most favorable to them and I just wondered therefore if there were legal challenges to it because this idea of lock in sort of like automatically guarantees the project can go ahead if I'm correct in my current interpretation

doesn't necessarily guarantee that a project will go ahead but it it makes development standard it makes it uh clarifies the process for developers so that they're aware of what the laws are. They're not having to adjust to laws as they change and so yes, it does help a developer.

Sure. Thank you. Okay. Uh any other questions by members of the council. Seeing none, I am going to go ahead and open the public hearing. So I I again I I have the speaker cards here and that's what I'll follow. I have uh one request to follow a sequence of speakers um two minutes each uh so that you can get the an organized message delivered all at once and I will honor that. Um the other thing I do request I know there might be a tendency of wanting to cheer on uh when someone speaks that only kind of delays this further. Uh I simply request that that you just honor everybody's um right to speak and and not sort of cheer or otherwise. Um that's my request. So I will open the public hearing. Each speaker will have two minutes to speak and I would like to first start off with Alicia Asano followed by Richard Drury. Thank you. Does it start?

Okay. Sorry. Hi. Um, my name is Alicia Asano and I'm speaking on behalf of neighbors on Walnut West Par Sineway and residents across Campbell. As you can see, we're here to send a clear message. We do not want our neighborhoods reshaped by out of town developers exploiting a loophole for quick profit. The ordinance passed last year not only conflicts with state law, it weakens our city's ability to protect its residents. We're asking you to fix this so Campbell can grow responsibly and sustainably. Our requests are straightforward. First, vote yes to adopt the interim ordinance so our local law aligns with state law. Second, strike section nine so projects can't be gr grandfathered under a definition of vacancy that contradicts state law. Third, direct planning staff to reject SB123 applications for sites that are not legally vacant. These actions will protect our community, but time is short. The 60-day approval window is closing fast. Please act tonight to prevent approvals based on a flawed standard. Our first speaker is Richard Drury of Lozo Drury Law Firm. Thank you.

Thank you. After Mr. After Mr. Drury, it will be uh Julie uh Krosik.

Good evening, honor honorable members of the council. Richard Drury of the Loa Jury Law Firm representing many Campbell residents. Um we urge you to take option two. The ordinance 2334 that is on the city's books is unlawful. It's inconsistent with state law. It's preempted by state law because it's inconsistent with Senate Bill 1123. Senate Bill 1123 does allow a streamline process for starter homes, but it requires that those lots be vacant. And vacant means either nothing's on them or if there's a house, it's uninhabitable. The ordinance that you have on the books doesn't say that. It allows you to render the home vacant later. Therefore, there's a direct conflict with state law which makes your current ordinance unlawful. Furthermore, for these 16 projects in the pipeline, they are not grandfathered in. You cannot grandfather in an unlawful activity. um the uh the the the the only way that these um homes are able to avoid um public hearings, review under the California Environmental Quality Act, and get zoning exceptions is under SB 1123. But none of them uh are qualified to receive SB123 treatment because none of these parcels were vacant at the time of the application. So, what the city staff and attorney have said is flatly incorrect. You ca uh you cannot grandfather in an illegal condition, which is what the current um ordinance is. It's illegal because it's preempted by state law. And so, we believe for these 16 so-called pipeline projects, they cannot take advantage of SB123 because they don't meet the most fundamental requirement of having a vacant parcel. Thank you very much.

followed by uh Ellen Pronover.

Thank you, honorable mayor and fellow councilmen. I want to expand um a bit on what Mr. Dury said and explain why the existing ordinance is inconsistent with SB1123. SB1123 allows streamlining of a project under certain conditions. One of those conditions is that the project site is vacant at the time of application. The state law defines vacancy as a lot having no permanent structure unless the permanent structure is abandoned and unhabitable. Present tense having not will have not promises to have having right now at the time of application. But ordinance 2334 says a site qualifies it is to become vacant, meaning a developer can apply to demolish a perfectly habitable home and still get ministeral approval under SB1123. This directly contradicts state law and therefore is illegal. Here's the simplest way to see why this is wrong. If you allow vacancy to become satisfied by a demolition plan, then every single family lot in Campbell could qualify. A developer can buy a home, file an application, and promise to make it vacant. If that's true, why did the legislature write a vacancy into the law at all? It becomes completely meaningless. vacancy was part of the SB1123 because they wanted it to make easier to build on unused lots, not because they wanted I'm sorry, unused lots, not because they wanted to completely destroy neighborhoods and towns like Campbell.

After uh Alan Cronover, it'll be um Jung Park.

Mr. Mayor, council members, I want to bring up some important dates. The California Department of Housing and Community Development issued a formal technical assistance letter to clarify the law on September of 2025, confirming that SB123 applies only to sites that do not contain at the time of application do not contain housing at the time of application. So, they have to be vacant. But in spite of this, on April 1st of 2026, knowing this, Alpha X went ahead and applied for uh starter home applications on houses that had houses on them that they knew were clearly not legal according to um the um department's uh technical clarification that was given in September. and they wanted to lo use this loophole provided by the interim ordinance of 2334's non-compliant definition of vacant and are planning to demolish perfectly habitable single family homes and build up to 28 family units on those properties. None of those sites are vacant. Each has an existing house on it. Every one of the houses was habitable when the developer took possession and they're still habitable. The obvious question is why did Alpha X submit application to the city on April 1st, 2026, six months after they knew the state had clarified that vacant meant vacant at time of application and these lots therefore do not qualify for starter home developments as Mr. Drury said. The other question is why did the city accept the applications knowing that these lots would not qualify as vacant per HCD's clarification. And the other important thing is why didn't they submit their SB330 at time of their application? It was funny.

I talked to Rob on Monday the 13th. There was a city council planning meeting on the 14th and then somehow they magically decided to submit the SB 330 on the 15th. Rob, did somebody tip them off? Sorry, your time has expired, sir. Because as a contractor, I would put all my paperwork in on the first

after Mr. Park, it would be uh Anne Crowley.

Good evening, mayor and council members. Uh my name is Sean. I'll continue uh speech from Alan. If the city approves these projects under the existing ordinance, it will open itself up to costly litigation. We're not going to watch our communities turn into a corporate giveaway. The city has the authority and the obligation to deny these applications since they never qualified under state law regardless of what the ordinance says. We're asking you to do the right by the law and do right by the residents of Campbell. Adopt the new ordinance and reject handing our town over the to speculators. Thank you. Thank you. And Coulson,

the spelling is K R O L C Y C Z Y K. Thank you. Thank you. After um Miss Cros, it would be Garrett Anderson.

Good evening. The developer will claim reliance on the city's prior interpretation, but the timing here really matters. The state guidance on occupancy was publicly available as of September 2025, providing constructive notice of the correct standards months before these applications were filed. This is a repeat sophisticated developer with multiple projects in this neighborhood. The SB 330 filing was submitted on April 15 for the Steinway PAR and Walnut um project just one day after the planning commission raised concerns as the city was actively moving to revise this ordinance. Those are not conditions of reliance on a settled rule. They reflect awareness that the interpretation was changing and the decision to file before it did. They had notice of the correct standard and they filed it anyway. This is not reliance on a settled rule. Thank you,

Javier Ruano. Um after um Garrett Anderson, she insisted on joining me today. So,

thank you, honorable mayor and council members. My name is Garrett Anderson and I live on Walnut Drive. I want to discuss the legislative intent behind State Bill 1123 and how the current interim ordinance undermines that intent. State Bill 1123 was passed in 2024 to help create more home ownership opportunities by allowing small housing projects of up to 10 units to be approved on underutilized land. The key word is underutilized. The legislature was targeting two specific types of sites. Lots with no structure at all and lots with structures that are abandoned and uninhabitable. Essentially, lots that are not contributing to the existing housing stock in any way. The intent was not to allow perfectly good housing to be destroyed so that an out of town developer could profit. The legislature was deliberate about drawing this line. They didn't want this law to be used to displace people or tear people or tear down perfectly good homes. That's why the statute specifically excludes housing occupied by tenants within the last 5 years. In short, state bill 1123 was carefully balanced law. It expands housing production, but only on land that is genuinely available. It was never intended as a tool to clear existing neighborhoods of homes in order to turn our neighborhoods into higher density housing. The current interim Campbell ordinance allows developers to demolish occupied habitable single family homes and still qualify for ministerial approval. This not only conflicts with the statute's text, it turns the legislaturator's intent completely on its head. We all want more opportunities for people to own their own homes, but we don't want to remove existing quality housing to do so. This is counterintuitive and only serves speculators. It also destroys communities. Adopt a new ordinance and reject handing our town over to corporate developers. Thank you.

Thank you.

After Javier will be Travis Gulio. Uh, so my my portion uh is was already covered. Um, again, my name's Javier Ruan. I live at 1182 Steinway. I just want to say I support attorney Drury's stance. Campbell ordinance regarding SB1123 is illegal.

After Travis, it'll be Roy Juvio. Can I get the clock to reset?

My name is Travis Galeri. I live around the corner. where two of these developments are being proposed. And I'm here to talk about grandfathering specifically. And I get it. Planning department is trying to avoid developer lawsuits. The logic behind this grandfathering clause is that under SP 330, developments get vested rights at the time of their preliminary application under a specific government code. However, there's a big gaping legal flaw when using this code for grandfathering, and that is you cannot vest something that was void to begin with. This is backed up by two points. Look up the Big Creek Lumber versus Santa Cruz 2006 case which confirms that you cannot acquire vested rights under a void ordinance. Secondly, SB1123 vacancy is a state law eligibility threshold, not a local development standard. SB 330 was designed to freeze local development standards, not a state eligibility definition. Think of it this way. If Campbell advertised a 100 mile per hour speed limit in the school zone, a driver couldn't win a lawsuit against the city if the CHP gave them a ticket. That 100 mile per hour speed limit is invalid because the state sets the limit for school zones. State law preempts contradictory local ordinances. The developers made a gamble filing this prelim application to try to lock in Campbell's loophole, but they can't claim good faith reliance on a local ordinance when four months before their application, HCD issued guidance to Santa Cruz, which already confirmed that 1123 is for sites without housing, present tense. Lastly, if Campbell grandfather's applications under a standard that conflicts with state law, HCD could take action and neighbors would have standing to challenge as well. I'm asking the city to adopt this new ordinance tonight, but also follow state law. Either strike section 9 tonight or recognize that developers cannot acquire vested rights where they were void to begin with. Do this before the applications are marked complete and

before these demo permits are issued. Thank you.

Thank you. after Roy Gaterio. Um, Mr. Ruano. Oh, different. Uh, this is going to be Rudy. Uh, Ruano. Okay. Actually, I'm really not going to say much because a lot of what I was going to say has been already brought up and the illegality of what the city has done according to states and the vacant rules and stuff. So, I don't have much to say just to save some time because it's repetitive. I mean, thank you. Okay.

Thank you, mayor and council members. Um, I live around the corner. I'm on Steinway, so I'm on the Steinway project adjacent immediately to the to the project going on there. So, you've heard the legal standard and how it applies to these projects. It doesn't matter what the ordinance says if the projects do not meet the vacancy requirement under 1123. the city has recognized the ordinance required uh to correct here in and align it in state law and that's what the new ordinance seeks to do. So, we thank you for that. That that that that's great. But the question that that I'm here to to raise with you is that the question becomes during these critical seven months when the ordinance was out of sync with state law. Who bears those consequences? Section 9 applies uh to valid applications. If these projects were never eligible under state law, then section 9 should not apply to them. The residents of Steinway, PAR, and Walnut become in effect the innocent bystanders who pay a heavy toll for an ordinance that was out of step with clearly established state law clarified by HCD last September that we've all talked about. If the rule needed to be fixed, it should be fixed for everyone. Our community is committed to seeing this resolved, and we hope that resolution uh begins here tonight. We've gone out of pocket ourselves to bring Richard, you know, to to plead our case from a legal perspective, but we're here as a as a community to try to fix this and want to have it uh fixed for everybody across the board. So, the choice here is straightforward. Vote yes to adopt the new ordinance and deny pending applications on parcels that are not vacant. Thank you.

Thank you, Graciella Marquez. Honorable mayor and council members, my name is Ching. I live on Walnut. I want to first thank the mayor for joining the call of moratorum. This is a deeply needed moment to address the overwhelming volume of housing bills we have received so far and reflect and ensure that we holistically have the capacity to grow in a way that's both legal and responsible. This is a shared concern of the room also share concern of the council members. Vice Mayor Bbeby rightfully stated that quote development has to be balanced and council member Hines noted that importance of quote maintain a strong sense of community. I'm here tonight because the current implementation of State B123 is achieving neither of those. It's not balanced. It's not responsible. As such, I wholeheartly urge that please vote yes to the ordinance. However, fixing the ordinance is not enough. There are 16 projects that marching towards the finish line, all under now unlawful condition. I urge you please do the right thing. Direct your staff tonight to re-evaluate every incomplete application under the correct standard. Last, I strongly support the staff recommendation to develop a demolition control ordinance. Without it, a vacant at time of application rule creates a dangerous incentive. Developers may demolish viable homes just to enter the law. We need a permanent rule that tides a molition permit only to ve ver verify legally compliant bill plans. Let's ensure that state bill 123 is truly used for its true purpose building on land that's actually vacant. Thank you.

Thank you. Good evening Marisan. Oh,

I see 1100 Normandy. And I do believe I speak for everyone on Normandy Shamrock and adjacent Eron. And I ask there what our needs have already been addressed tonight. And that is we ask you to do what is right for the city of Campbell. I have lived in Campbell since 1981. My husband bought a small little house on Normandy in 74. We wanted to live here for the rest of the life. We started south of youth soccer invested in the community not so that huge developers from out of the country or in the country can come and change Campbell. We're part of the Campbell Village Association. Seven years march in downtown San Jose to get them to give us up because we want to be part of Campbell. Now we're asking you to do the right thing because I want to make my property on 1100 Normandy a extended com family property. Give the house to my daughter that can't afford to buy here and build a granny unit for me. That's my organic land. I eat out of it. Please defend us and present to us.

Thank you. Um Mitch Sturmer

followed by um Michael Tranian.

Good evening. I had some remarks already written but they kind of void what's happened here. Um I was the person here a month ago that hit the horn of nest and said hey it says vacant doesn't say has a house on it and I really want to thank the city for doing this so quickly you listen to me you listen to the people concerned you came here you having this hairy tonight it was marvelous it's a great thing to have I also encourage you to avoid anything went ahead with this current ordinance get everything straightened out there going to SB79 coming on the line, we're going to have many, many houses put in. We don't need to go into this neighborhood and change the rule of vacant to put 10 houses in when we're going to do high density housing along, you know, the transit lines along light rail and stuff. We're already going to have plenty of housing. We don't need to ruin neighborhoods. There's also a rule in SP 1123 that says, hey, if you have a a house, it's not taking up the whole lot, you put other parcels on. I gave you up to four parties. That's fine, too. Just follow the law. Don't extend it. Let's follow the law. That's the biggest thing I'm asking you to do. Thank you.

After Michael be um Liz Gibbons,

Michael Turnman. Good evening, Mayor and council members. Thank you for your time and for the work you're doing to address housing issues in our community. I'd like to say that I support thoughtful housing development. At the same time, I'm concerned that that the current ordinance is not fully aligned with the state law. My understanding is SP 1123 was intended to apply with genuinely weighted laws and I respectfully ask council to to take a close look and consider clarifying the ordinance as such that reflects the letter of law. I'd also like to share my personal experience. An 18 unit project was proposed close to my home and I learned about it through a neighbor flyer, not through my formal notice from the city. that left me feeling that there was limited opportunity for awareness or input for projects that have meaningfully impact on existing neighborhood. I believe it's important that residents are kept informed and have a chance to be part of the process. So my request this evening is simply please ensure the ordinance is align aligned with the state law and that the process provides clear communication and transparency on residents. Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you Liz Gibbons. So good evening everyone. Um I have to begin by saying all my remarks aren't relevant given this wonderful presentation this evening. I would like to say that I am very proud to be here with the Campbell community, the council and staff to have this dialogue and understand the issues and learn from each other. The communication is absolutely superb and I thank everyone for participating and understanding what makes Campbell Campbell. So I thank you all uh for all the hard work and all the efforts the staff have gone to. I'll just offer a few little tidbits. One of which is a fascinating thing called the cobra effect. It goes back to uh India where if you uh got rid of cobras that were overrun, they ended up um getting money to bring in cobras. Well, people got into the business of re raising and breeding cobras so they can get get more money. So when we're here now, there's a perverse incentive to introduce these unexpected and contrary desires. Housing prices are not going down because the cost of land is going down. Perversely, the cost of the land is going up. And I say this personally, a year and a half ago, I got an offer for my nice tiny little 800 square foot house for 1.1 million. A month ago, I got offered 1.8 million. So on Walnut, because two houses just sold for 2.4 million to be torn down and uh the house

down the street is now being offered at 2.85 million. So it's just money exchanging and distorting the creation of housing. There've been some great things here. Um, but I just ask and recommend that I don't know if you can do this or not, but I would offer option three tonight, which is I believe you can declare a moratorum on the current ordinance that's good for 90 days and that will give staff an opportunity to really evaluate everything that's been presented and uh all the legal uh arguments are so important to understand. So, thank you. Thank you. Just wanted to add

after Audrey, it'll be uh Chris Lindsay.

Thank you. I'd like to address my comments to tonight's issue. Um, no. That's all right. I get an extra 10 seconds. Okay. Um, when I went to rebuild our house 15 years ago, we were not allowed to demolish the existing home until we had submitted and gotten approval for the plans for a replacement home. So, I understand that that law had or rule was changed sometime in the last 15 years, but it shouldn't be. You should before you can demolish something, you should have a clear plan submitted already of what needs to go in there. Um already have been addressed by so many other very capable people. Thank you. The legal ramifications of what the city has done um in passing this ordinance allowing my house that I built 15 years ago to apparently be an actual vacant lot. Um I'm just going to say it right outright. You guys screwed up. It was a big screw up. All right. It's affecting the entire city of Campbell. You need to fix this. All right. You need to fix it in the quickest, most legal way that you can, but you need to fix it. And I don't want to hear any breastfeeding or hands raised about how, oh, the state is making me do it. No. It's already been shown to you tonight that there is an actual legal consequence to the city of Campbell to continue in its current process. take care of a few other things. Just because um you don't have to build nine or 10 units on a single lot doesn't mean that a developer can't buy a nice residential home and put two sometimes as many as four nice twostory homes, a couple of which have ADUs that fit into the neighborhood. The Hawthorne development over there and that was done a few years ago um is a good example of

that. So encourage the right kind of development, homes that will fit in with the neighborhoods that provide the residents with additional housing but that don't destroy our neighborhoods and fix it. Thank you. Thank you,

Chris Lindy. After Chris, it'll be uh Katie Gallagher. Uh, my name is Chris Lindseay. I'm at 322 Industrial. Uh, I support option one. It has been successful in spurring starter home development and it has been successful in avoiding speculative demolition. Option two creates unnecessary delay and uncertainty that will impede starter home development. I don't understand the value of adding delay after a home has been demolished. It risked uh homes being demolished, not replaced, which is obviously detrimental for many reasons. I spent some time on the city's starter home web page. Two of the projects are within a block of my house. Looking at the proposed projects, I saw two things. First, I saw growth. I think that is a good thing. Second, I saw opportunity for people who want to move to Campbell and build a good life. My wife and I moved to Campbell when our oldest child was a baby. Campbell has many wonderful qualities for raising children, but affordability was also a big part of my family's decision to put down roots here. Raising a family is difficult and expensive. With the rising prices of home, I worry it is too difficult to raise a family and live in Campbell at the same time. Without more affordable homes, families will have to live elsewhere. And I don't think that is a good thing. For these reasons, I support option one so more people can call the Orchard City home. I think we're on the right track and I don't see the need to change anything. Thank you.

Hello, my name is Katie Gallagher. I live at 322 Industrial Street, right by two of these proposals. I want to make three points. One, we love our neighborhood because it's diversity of housing, including highdensity housing. Diversity of housing results in diversity of people. Two, I'm a biologist for an environmental consulting company. I have worked on numerous housing development projects across California. Some projects were suburban sprawl that destroyed pristine habitat that support rare plants and wildlife. That's bad, right? So, where should housing go then? Infill development. make urban areas such as Campbell more dense. Three, our starter home in 2021 was $1 and a half million dollars. That was ridiculous, but it's reflective of Silicon Valley prices. What about families that cannot afford such high prices? They move away from California, thus reducing school enrollment, which leads to school closures, as happened in our county one month ago. I support option one to promote more starter home development according to how the planning experts think is best. This will increase human diversity, increase development in urban areas like Campbell rather than natural habitat and save our schools. Thank you.

Thank you,

Ellen. This

Oh, okay. There we go. Okay. Um, as as all of you know, uh, uh, Mayor Fado, council members and staff, my name is Alan Zisser. I'm a five-year member of the Campbell Planning Commission. I've been involved in reviewing and approving Campbell's latest general plan and our six cycle housing element as well as numerous housing projects, but today I'm speaking on my own behalf as a Campbell residents for 45 years. I actually had another speak speech written out and ready about two hours ago, but then read the desk items that were posted and realized that I was just being redundant with those who were opposed to Campbell's ordinance 2334 on the same grounds regarding the vacancy rules. I echo their sentiments and was all quite eloquent, by the way. Um, what I'd like to quickly comment on are those favoring Campbell uh uh favoring what Campbell did for the sake of more affordable housing in our city and the state as a whole. I consider myself a housing advocate and I've been very supportive of state efforts to increase affordable housing here in my role as a planning commissioner. However, I also believe that building any housing anywhere is neither necessary nor desirable. The so-called starter homes are intended to allow for affordable more affordable homes to be available. However, these homes are neither starter nor truly affordable. A750 square foot town home with four bedrooms and four baths, which is the Steinway plan, is larger than many regular single

family homes in the city and the region. In fact, it seems to be it's twice as large as Liz's. These will most likely sell at a market rate except for the one BMR for $1.5 million. This is based on other examples of fairly new town homes in the area, including a number that are build being built right now. I know this because I've been reviewing these plans over the last three to four years. Uh a $ 1.5 million home purchase requires 300k or more in household income to qualify. This is over 50% above the area medium income of the county. I wish someone would explain to me why that's affordable. Thank you. Teresa Doe followed by Dale Look. Uh thank you council members for your time. Uh I'm Teresa do a lead of San Jose and we are joining our colleagues at South A&B to strongly support option one continuing the city's successful implementation of SB1 1123 starter home ordinance. We believe Campbell should be a place where the young next generation, teachers, healthcare workers, and young families can afford to plant roots and thrive. Reaffirming a flexible and welcoming starter home ordinance is a vital step towards ensuring that Campbell and the wider region have more housing for working families. We urge the council to reject restrictive definitions of vacancies that would block new modestsized homes on underutilized sites. By keeping these rules inclusive, you are prioritizing

people over payment and community over stagnation. Let's work together to ensure Campbell remains vibrant, diverse, and welcoming home for our neighbors, both current and future. Thank you. Thank you.

Hello. I'm I'm Dale Luck. Um uh greetings to the honorable council members and mayor. Um I'm going to keep this short. I'm thinking about um the the definitions vacancy where they are using a five-year uh statement where a house dwelling has to be not have not having had a tenant in there for five years. I think that I think that was a that should be extended to include any kind of occupant. So that because most of these developments are not as far as I can tell they are they are um uh home homeowner occupied. So they don't come under this teny rule about five years having a paid tenant there. I think it should be extended so that any kind of occupant, especially a homeowner, uh if they vacate, if they leave the property, that means that that property was was occupied. And so the that's when the time limit or that's when the time starts of a fiveyear period where it has to be now vacant for five years, whether it's a tenant or a home homeowner occupied.

That's all. Thank you. Okay, one other thing that might deal with the demolition. So that someone who speculatively demolishes a a property, they would um that was just homeowner occupied, that would prevent them from doing the uh the starter home thing because they need to wait five years. Do we have someone online? and and Pollson online. Would you like to speak?

Yeah. Hi. Can you hear me? Yes.

Okay, great. Good evening. I'm Ann Pollson. Um, the new residents who will live in these homes aren't here. So, I'm going to speak up for them because when I was a young engineer in Silicon Valley decades ago, I was able to buy a small townhouse as a starter home. Now, we hardly have any modestsized town houses such as these in Silicon Valley for young people who are setting up their lives here. I believe young people now should have the same chances I had. And I think you believe that too. New young residents are not something you need to protect yourself from. They're people to welcome. The alternative is having Campbell dwindle into a retirement community for old people like me, and nobody wants that. I commend the city of Campbell for your actions to promote starter houses like town homes, for people who grew up in Campbell, and for new arrivals that will make your city full of life. You're showing the way. 100 new homes in one year. That is fantastic. Don't stop now. Choose option one and keep welcoming new young people. Thank you.

Thank you. We have other persons online. We do not.

Sorry. I'll start again. Anyone else in the room like to speak? Please come forward. Hi, mayor, council, city. Thank you. Um I'm a longtime resident of Campbell. I um was here before I could walk. So that was like what 25 years ago. Um so I live in the Santa Moss and Kino area. I just wanted to make sure that uh that area also gets representative for the overwhelming overwhelming massive opinions we've heard here tonight about the concerns uh regarding interpreting this uh vacancy provision too broadly so broadly that it basically circumvents state law. So, um that's pretty much all I say. That's just my thoughts on the matter. What do I know? I'm not an attorney. Oh, wait. Yes, I am. Thank you so much. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak because I didn't want to get up here and fill out a form when you had a pile this thick. Um, my name is Michelle Smith and I live in the Santa Monasino neighborhood. I know you've heard from us in the past and haven't always been thrilled with what we have to say, but I think you know that we are intelligent, knowledgeable, and we have gone and done some investigation before we got up here. I haven't heard anybody talk about they've talked about starter homes. In my court, there is a starter home. we turned down um a replanning for that home and then something happened and it turned around and we had another home built on the same property. The reason we turned it down was because they the

new plan for that home took up all the existing land. There was almost no yard space left. This home's worse. It has almost no green around it. It's taken it's blocked the foothills from their across the street neighbors. So, it's like the the look of the house does not match the property. It is boxy. It is black and white. And although some people find that uh nice, I do not. But that's my own personal opinion. I agree. I understand that. Here's the problem. Have you guys been considering things like we're a drought state. What are we doing about our water? What are we doing about our schools? What are we doing about refurbishing our um infrastructure, which I'm being told now I have to pay for if my if my plumbing that goes through the court fails. It's no longer the city's responsibility. It's now mine. So, I would like the city council to start thinking about those. When you approve something, think of the farreaching results of what property is going supposed to and then make it a real starter home, not a $3.3 million starter home.

Thank you.

Uh good evening, uh honorable mayor, members of the council. My name is Jim Sullivan and I've been in front of the council many times. Uh, I'm a developer and I live in Campbell and I've lived here for 22 years. And it's kind of funny. I can remember a bunch of neighbors showing up where I live on Chamberlain Court, 9,000 square foot lots. And I was thinking at the time as a developer like, God, we should do 3,000 square foot lots, but unheard of at that point. Uh, the projects that typically we're doing right now and that are financially feasible are town home projects. And I'm going to just say that I think the city of Campbell has done a tremendous job in the past passing the housing element and I think that there was like 90 identified sites in the city um housing element sites. I know I'm working on four of them right now. I do understand uh Director Eastwood's uh kind of comment in his thinking of having it as a one-step process being more efficient um and uh not having necessarily a vacant lot where nobody can use it or a structure for a period of time. So I understand the logic there. However, I would say that going back with the state not giving specific direction on how to define vacancy, it's basically left up to cities to define that. You get to decide how we should treat predominantly single family detached neighborhoods. and does it make sense to have, you know, a 10-unit, you know, place on a 6,000 square foot lot surrounded by singlestory or or two-story homes. So, anyway, good luck in your decision and and thank you very much for listening.

Thank you. Would anyone else like to speak? Yes. Hi, my name is Leticia. My parents bought um property on Stewing Avenue about 50 years ago with my brothers living there now. Um respectfully, I feel that we should upload Director Eastwood's presentation to factcheck.org. Thank you. Would anyone else like to speak?

Yes. Thank you, Mayor Fado and city council. Um, Campbell is not I'm not a developer. I but I'm developed in Campbell. Came here in 1960 with my family. Bought a house next door to my mom 20 years ago, Chapman Drive. What I really have a hard time with is people calling me a nimi now because I think for so many years I was such a proponent of Campbell and its development and see from the time of our bike trails. I mean just wanting to see everything our you know our environment, our town and it's been so successful. It's been so beautiful. We are the the greatest cities in this county in the in the whole I would say I break I say the region but it is sad. It is sad because when we talk about the orchard city which I was so proud of to say for so long and now the sound of the tree cutters I brought this up two weeks ago. It's really hard. That's the hardest part for me is to see destruction of our city all the time. I mean it's just that's every Saturday. But I also want you to know that, you know, we all want to see the city. We want the equal opportunity for everybody. But like mayor, our mayor, former mayor said earlier, enough is enough. Thoughtful growth, you know, growth that helps us all be proud. You know, shared shared, you know, environment, trees in front of us that we once see that we could still see maybe from the side a little bit. just just a little more thoughtful planning when people destroy something when you put something back up but you're going to put it back up right but you know that's all I can say it's very hard time right now

thank you

thank you I am uh Abijit Bendale and I am resident of Peggy Avenue I'm here to speak on behalf of younger generation uh it's not just about the older generation. Uh we bought our house in 2020 uh and have really enjoyed the community. Our son goes to public school. We use the public library system and we are deeply rooted in the community. Every other day I get messages or flyers offering 4 to 4.5 million for my house. It is impossible to offer that kind of money if it is not for speculation. Starter homes are is just a front for it. The houses that will be built here will be and are being sold for more than 1.5 million. Those are not starter home prices. I urge the C council members to have a broader interpretation of the law and opt for option two. Thank you.

Would anyone else like to speak? Yes. Hi, my name is Ken Campbell. Thank you for having us here. I've been here for a couple of decades, roughly 1967. I've seen a wee bit of change. I went to Santaas um elementary school back at Fischer Park. I went to Campbell Grammar School. I went to Campbell High School. I was the first graduating class out of Westmont High School. And a little tour of the Air Force. I've seen change. I've seen development happen. I've seen grocery stores come and go. I've seen larger houses go up. I've got one. We don't need to destroy this city. It's a lovely city. There's plenty here for everyone. I really urge the council to vote for option two. Thank you. Thank you. Any other speakers? With that, I will close the public hearing. First of all, let me say thank you. Um, I appreciate the time you've taken to be here to share your opinions and um, I it's not always easy to get up in front of everyone else and speak, but you did it and I appreciate that on behalf of my fellow council members. Um, your thoughts are very important and uh,

again, I appreciate it. So now I bring the matter back to the city council um for further discussion and um which who would like to start? Vice Mayor By I I just have a couple follow-up questions um in relation to some of the comments that were made and a couple of the speakers referenced uh September 25 HCB advice letter. Does that pertain to Campbell or is that Was that specific to city of Santa Cruz? I think

I I'll start and ask, excuse me, I'll speak up legal counsel to jump in. Uh reviewed the letter. It was an HCD technical letter to the county of Santa Cruz. The subject of the inquiry had to do with a parcel uh was it subject for 1123 project. Uh the parcel in question had I believe was an abandoned or church that was no longer used. Uh the county was asking HD for technical guidance. Was it subject to 1123? HD had applied in the affirmative that there was not a house. It was abandoned in a sense there was not a house on the property. It was my takeaway and I'll subject to legal counsel to weigh in. But the advice provided in that case was very specific to the the facts of that situation.

Correct. It had to do with whether the abandoned or the abandoned religious use was considered vacant under the law and it didn't uh CD there did not chime in as to the time of vacancy. Okay. And it was sight sight specific to that jurisdiction not with our correct. I mean I think you can extrapolate it for another abandoned religious use or another non-housing use. Okay. But uh yes and then one of the comments that was made uh was considerations of a moratorium. Is that an option in this situation or No, that is not an option. Moratorium in violation of state law. violation of state law. Thank you.

Um, Sergio, thank you. I also had a follow-up question um from council member by questions um for our staff or uh council. Could we seek our own advice letter? What would be the process um or potentially time frame for that? from HC. Yeah. Yes.

Yeah. Council member Lopez uh staff has already reached out to HCD and requested advice uh both on the questions regarding vacancy and how Campbell has interpreted under this ordinance and the alternative uh interpretation and has seek uh and is seeking advice on uh potential ramifications of adopting a demolition control ord. And do you have any an You know, I I know it's not within our control, of course, and we can't say with certainty, but do you have an estimated um time frame for for that? I'm afraid HCD doesn't provide a timeline. Not surprised. Thank you.

I have a question about HCD. When they issue advice or provide a letter back to us, um is that the opinion of the person writing the letter or does that have the force of HCD itself? It would be the latter. It's signed on their letterhead, reviewed by their staff. It's a public document again as the county of Santa Cruz document was available to us. So, it does have the force and effect of that department.

Okay. I I also understand that there's some court ruling that says um that in legal proceedings um if HCD has weighed in, their opinion um must take precedence in the court's understanding and interpretation. Uh that's a question, not a statement. Is that true? Yes. My understanding is that is correct. The courts will heavily uh favor. Thank you. Um Sure.

Yeah. Um, I'll uh I'll come to the recommendation or my personal uh opinion uh with after a couple of comments that uh was reiterated before by one of the speakers that housing is important and Campbell continues to support development uh for our workers and and others that are need of housing. Uh we need to move through those efforts while maintaining our community and our feel and our comfort uh for all of us that live here. Um, so, uh, and the we need to remove the blight that drives me nuts with the the Hickory Pit and the and the Gilman Campbell U that is now an empty has been an empty lot. So, um, that that's the precursor. Um, but I really want to thank everybody that uh, gave an excellent comments and feedback. Uh, and I was thrilled to hear them all. So, there was a So, I really want to emphasize that. Um, I want to uh um show support for u option two uh which is the uh um uh revising u the ordin ordinance as presented by staff uh for uh uh for us to move forward and I'll reserve other comments of councel.

Thank you. I I'll weigh in myself actually. Um, I do think it's important that we uh honor the requests of our residents. I think that comes first. Um, I think um, starter homes um, work okay in multif family uh, zoned areas because you already have high density, you have higher buildings um, or mixed use where there's commercial nearby and so on. But I don't think um, frankly it works too well in single family areas, especially the way the law is written. Um, I know the basic law allows for it, but that's just my opinion. Um, I am in favor of option two. I think we should rem change our ordinance to reflect what the state law says. I furthermore think that we should uh put more teeth into it by developing um a a demolition um ordinance uh that would further add protection uh to that requires in single family zoned areas that if someone's going to demolish what is considered a perfectly good home that they have a approved plan for a single family home that's going to replace it so that they just can't willy-nilly um create vacant lots and then sort of apply under that rule. Uh I just don't think that should have been the intention or permission uh in the first place. So I think we should do whatever we can to to side with the residents and to interpret the law rather strictly uh to the basic state standard. Any other comments? Um Council Member Scazola.

Yeah, thank you very much uh Mayor Ferado. Uh, so I actually did have one quick question. I'm hoping to get an answer from staff regarding there was mention of a possible 90-day moratorum. So I kind of was curious about that. Is that possible? And how would that benefit potentially? Uh, obviously I'm on the side of slowing things down and anyways, what's the information about that the 90-day moratorum?

Yes, apologies if I if you couldn't hear me earlier. the a moratorum that violates state law. So essentially stopping applications under 1123. The city cannot do that. The city cannot

Okay. Yeah. Sorry it it's a little difficult to hear in the the middle of Central American jungle, but Okay. Um so now I have more or less I mean it kind of looks like I I want to thank all the residents who came out here. It's incredible. You all had so many amazing comments. I'm generally in agreement with the vast majority of them. Uh I'm not sure if I should read this. I was writing a lot of notes. It looks like a Ted Kazinski manifesto at this point, but I'm just going to go for it. Who cares? Okay. Uh so as as one community member brought up tonight, we have a massive influx of foreign nationals buying up our real estate, driving up prices, and keeping our actual neighbors from having the opportunity to have any chance to live in the community they were born into. Worse yet, they often remain vacant. And it's not just them. It's corporations and hedge fund companies doing the same. If we allow this to continue, if we allow our corrupt Sacramento politicians taking massive donations from these organizations to continue unabated, then our small small town feel gone in a short amount of time. Uh so I'm largely agreeing with the comments that I heard today and I will also be supporting option number two and I want to have a very strong uh as strong as possible when it comes to the demolition control ordinance. I like I said earlier I want to have as many hoops for these people to jump through. Not for good developers. there is a such thing uh you know when it makes sense when we have something like a vacant lot truly where there's nothing there or there's a rundown something or other that makes sense okay you know and also we we want to take into account the the look and feel of the neighborhood we want to listen to our residents we want to listen to our neighbors so uh long story short I'm very strongly going with

option number two so and and definitely with the uh demolition control ordinance thank you very Thank you, Vice Mayor By.

Thank you. Um, I want to thank all the residents who reached out whether in person or through email. Um, your comments have been heard loud and clear. Uh, I do support balance growth and and u um will maintain the character of our neighborhoods. Um, as you've heard tonight, we've had many uh state laws that have uh been uh implemented and um we've had the challenge of trying to keep up with those and implement those so that it protects the the the integrity of our neighborhoods. Um back in 2015 when we voted for this ordinance, I believe that uh I acted in the best interest of the community with the information that was at hand. And sometimes the best intentions do cause unintended consequences which is what has happened. And um it's unfortunate. Uh but again I we I've heard you and I do support the um option two with the definition of vacancy as um I believe that SB 1123 was intended.

You want to offer a motion? I are there other comments or go ahead. I I don't have Okay. Uh, Council Member Lopez.

Sure. Um, I'll I'll make some uh just some some brief um comments. Uh, I appreciate every single person who came out tonight. Um, I've I've listened closely and read every uh piece of um every email letter that that we've received. um and understand that people are coming out because of the the deep love and care that we all have for this community. Um and I just wanted to share um probably a little bit of a different perspective, but uh coming from that same place, um I I will be in the minority on this and and that's okay. I think we're all making the the decision um about um that that comes from that that love that we have for Campbell. Um but I I I just wanted to share my own experience. I grew up um in this community and it's hard for me to imagine ever being able to buy a home here. Um I I can't imagine it would be like to own a piece of property that uh people are willing to offer you millions of dollars for. I I congratulate uh those who are fortunate to be in such circumstances. Um but uh for my generation, unless we have uh the availability of starter homes, um we're going to get pushed further and further out. And um I I just can't bring myself to agree with the people. Um something I heard numerous times which was that there's a lot of collective uh experience and history uh of Campbell and of this community, a lot of change that people have witnessed in this room that has been shared tonight and I'm I'm deeply moved by that. Um, but I I just find it hard to believe that 2026, you know, we say all this change that has happened has been great and Campbell is this great and dynamic place, but 2026 is is the point at which we want to freeze things in in time. I think um change and our community being dynamic is a part of what makes this such a welcoming and wonderful community that that has welcomed me and my family and um I I don't think that welcoming new

neighbors is is a bad thing. So, I I'll keep with that. Again, I understand that both my colleagues and everyone who spoke tonight is coming uh from a good and genuine place on this, and I thank you for that, for coming out, doing your part to participate in the civic process. And um we'll we'll respectfully uh descent from what I'm sure will be the the majority. But thank you. Thank you, Council Member Scazola.

Yes. I apologize, but that was a seemingly well-prepared propaganda piece because you know what? A starter home isn't near $2 million for any workingclass person. And so I want starter homes, too. But these are not starter homes. These are just destroying neighborhoods and only rich people are buying them or foreign nationals or corporations and nobody lives in them. They're empty. They're truly vacant. It's ironic. They're knocking over perfectly good homes and putting up these monstrosities and then, you know, maybe people won't even It's just an investment. It's a portfolio investment for the rich people that are destroying the planet and destroying our community. So, okay, you can vote your way, but I'm sorry. I do not buy that line. I want starter homes, too. These are not starter homes. I'm sorry. I don't care what you call it. Words are powerful. And you hear the the word starter home, that sounds exactly, oh, beautiful. I could start my family. No, the average workingclass person cannot afford to live here. And I still would ask you, and I I don't know if you're going to say, oh, it's unrelated, but is 17% rise in rent for the average Campbellite, is that an okay amount? Is that high? Everyone else said it's too high. I still am waiting for an answer from you. I I would just respectfully ask for you to share where you think it's okay to have a start at home if if these don't meet your definition uh a real start at home because you're going to have concerns uh regardless of of where they are

right here in coming from

1.5 million 2 million $3 million is not a starter home that's ridiculous even tech bros don't make enough money you have to make like half half a million dollars a year. Now, that's what the banks are expecting here where we live right here in Campbell. The average is like, "Oh, are you do you have a two income family? Are you guys making approximately half a million dollars a year? That's not affordable. No B. There's no such thing as a starter home anymore. This is just labeling. This is just propaganda. I don't buy it." And council member, I'll just say I think you're confusing the sale price of the lot with the price of these homes which have not been built or sold yet. I'll just leave.

I don't know what technicalities you're talking about, but that's okay. We can have a discussion over coffee sometime. Okay. I think it's important that we move on here. Um, council member Hamilton,

can I can I try just uh I just want to make one comment that uh um I don't want to lose sight of uh those larger complexes that we have that are projected to be built. And I I really want to emphasize with staff to uh and I bring it up every time, you know, Hickory Pit and uh Gamble Gilman, you know, build those because that's where we're going to get housing. So, um, I was going to move to a motion, but then I see I was going to move to a motion, but I see Sergio's got his hand raised.

Yeah, I'm sorry. I meant to start with this, and I'll just be be be brief, but your comment, Council Hines, reminded me of something I want to say, which is that I really do appreciate the work of staff and again, I I completely respect uh my colleagues who who uh feel differently ultimately on on the right approach and the right balance here. that that's perfectly valid. But I do think that staff and coming up the original definition, I want this to be very clear for the community members who came out was attempting proactively to to address an issue that we've seen, which is the issue of blight um on properties like the Hickory Pit when you have something torn down and then you have this empty uh hole in the ground um for for months. So, it's uh, you know, again, I I think it's perfectly legitimate and valid to say that wasn't the right balance and that's not what we want for the community, but I I do want to appreciate and commend the work of staff who uh is deeply connect to this community and and tries to bring in innovative ideas to help serve us better.

We have the largest crowd I've ever seen in city hall. So, I want you to ask you let them know, is 17% rise in rent too high for Campbell? still silent. Okay, fair enough. Council member, I think you need to check your math, but we can have a conversation about that another time. And with No, no, that is staff. That is staff statistic. Remember, they gave us the actual statistics that I asked for and they gave us and it was 17% over two years time. That's two times if you want the specifics. So, I just want a yes or no. You're the only one that won't say yes or no if that's too high. Okay. I'd like to

We need to bring this this discussion to a close and I am requesting a motion or I'll make it myself.

I Okay, let me let me try try a motion. Let me let me just make sure I got the the recommended action had an option. Uh number one and number two, but really what I'm doing is number two. Uh right. Um so let me let me read it. Make sure that I've got it got it right. Um so that uh uh the option was uh to uh reestablish the urgency measures of interum ordinance number 2334 with an amendment revising the method of applying vacancy requirements to single family residential properties and consider rather uh and and direct staff to pursue development of a potential demolition control ordinance for future council consideration. That's my motion. I will second.

Would you like We'll take a separate motion on the uh on the demolition next. Okay. So, we'll take this motion first. We have a motion and a second basically to adopt option two as present. Well, let me let me revise my let me revise my motion then. Okay. Um so uh to adopt uh to adopt the interim ordinance reestablishing the urgency measures of inter interim ordinance 2334 with an amendment revising the method of applying vacancy requirements to single family residential properties. I'll second that.

We have a motion and a second on the floor. Any further discussion by the council? I just wanted to confirm that we are taking a separate motion for the uh the other element we were discussing. Okay, great. Thank you. I'll bring up Thank you. Ask the clerk to call roll. Council member Skazola. I. Council member Lopez. No. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor Bby. Hi. Mayor Fado. Hi. Thank you. Now

clerk, do you need to read the title? Yes, please go ahead. being an interim ordinance of the city council of the city of Campbell reestablishing the urgency measures of interim ordinance number 2334 with an amendment revising the method of applying vacancy requirements to single family residential properties for continued implementation of the Starter Home Revitalization Act pursuant to Senate Bill number 1123 in 2024 and assembly bill number 130 2025 be waved I'll second. Council member Sizzola. Hi. Council member Lopez. Hi. Council member Hines.

Hi. Vice Mayor By. Hi. Mayor Fado. Hi. Now we'll consider the um demolition ordinance. Step out for a second.

Let me try wording. Um then I'll propose the motion um once I um once we get back. So the wording that I would have uh to request staff to uh pursue development of a u potential demolition control ordinance uh for future consideration of the council based on uh direction and feedback from HCD. Okay, I won't I just was wording I was trying to um make sure that I Elliot maybe um did you want to amend that?

Uh you're mute the the pandemic term. You're muted. You're still muted. Thank you. Uh yeah, I I definitely appreciate uh your intent. I'm just a little concerned about the wording and maybe staff can help construct it best for us because I want to ensure that that we really take it seriously and um uh so maybe I mean quite frankly I'm just going to ask staff like how best we can phrase this. Clearly we have a majority of council that would wish for this to happen and I'm not sure how to phrase it exactly. Was that sufficient? I think the wording that was mentioned in the motion was sufficient. Cool. the suggested word. It wasn't. Yes, I think that was

I apologize for that. So, we have a motion. No, no, we don't. No, we don't. I wasn't going to do that without you. Um, so, um, let me reiterate the the motion on on the floor. Um, give me a second. make sure that I want to uh direct staff to pursue development of a potential demolition control ordinance for future council consideration uh with direction from HCED.

Don't you think that we could, you know, pass our motion as we see fit and then if ACD wants to weigh in, they'll weigh in and we may have to revise it based on their advice, but go ahead and take the action. not take the action pending their advice which may never Thank you, mayor. That's exactly what I was hoping to hear. That that's the route that I want to go is that we just do it and then we'll listen to them later. Ask for permission. Ask for forgiveness rather than permission. Yes. Yes. We'll just note if we do that, we do run the risk of it violating. Cool. Bring it.

I'm sorry. Would you repeat that? I say if we do so, we do run the risk of violating state law. Okay. Proceed without we proceed without HCD weighing it. Uh I will note that other jurisdictions have demolition ordinances but none have been adopted to my knowledge since passage of 1123. We want to ensure the city should ensure that uh that the city's proposed demolition control ordinance comports with the requirements. So you do recommend that we add the addition. I will providing legal advice. I certainly will will defer to your advice. So I'm sorry.

Let me I'll let me read it. Let me read it again.

Okay. Um Council Elliott or or Lopez, any comments before I try again? I do think we have to be aggressive in this. Campbell has been aggressive. We've been the tip of the spear in so many things and this is so necessary. Like nothing matters more than a roof over our heads. You know, affordability. We keep talking affordability, affordability, affordability. And you know, uh Campbell, I just I know it. I don't have a crystal ball, but I know that Campbell will be destroyed if we just allow Sacramento and all those corrupt politicians who are getting their bribes. Oh, I'm sorry. Donations, excuse me. uh they're gonna just run rampant over us, you know. So, someone has to push back, you know, and why not us? That's all I got to say about that. So, I say we do it right now.

I'll second the motion. It's on the I'll second the mot. We have a motion and a by council member Hines, second by Vice Mayor Bby. I want I'm sorry. I need clarification. Is is this this motion to ask permission or to just go for it? Actually, on the advice of our attorney, the motion includes uh seeking passing it, but with the uh seeking advice from the Department of Housing uh to see if So, we are passing it. Okay. And then Okay, great. I'm afraid that um that they're going to weigh in one way or another. So, sure validated by them. And since we're following the advice of our attorney, I I think we should. So,

in in consideration of the remote access, let me let me repeat it again. Okay. Um hopefully it will be exactly in the same wording, but I'll um that we're going to direct staff to pursue development of a potential demolition control ordinance uh for future council consideration, including the uh uh where where the whereby including feedback from HCED. That's the motion. And I assume that's the second from council vice mayor by Yes. Um roll call please. Council member Scazola. I. Council member Lopez. Yes. Council member Hines. Hi. Vice Mayor for I.

Mayor Fado. Hi. A long day.

This concludes this item of business. Thank you all very much for your patience and for your comments. You all don't want to end wait till the end and final. It's an exciting And it stop. item.

We just have a short item to finish. That's all. It'll If you want to wait a second or two, we'll be done in a moment.

Excuse me. Uh we have to finish conclusion of this uh council meeting. So, if you could continue with the conversations out in the hallway. Thank you. for a short time. And that is when now we move on to item number 10, unfinished business. We have none. We now go to item number 11, uh, council committee reports. Uh, I will ask uh either uh council member Lopez or council member Skazola any any further reports to the city council?

No reports. Thank you. None for me. Thank you.

Okay. Yeah. Um I of course I of course have some. Can't resist. So I uh had the opportunity of uh attending the uh Santa Clara County Valley Water Board. Excellent discussion that we had there. um the uh uh uh Silicon Valley clean energy board and several orientation uh discussions uh with the excellent program uh that's in place escape ribbon cutting we had uh we had that so fantastic work um I did have a conversation with Jim Sullivan at the on the Campbell Avenue project that he's talking about as well um and an excellent tour of the El Camino Hospital on Pard and the uh terrific work that they're doing there and uh you know, it's a we're streets away from the conversations that we were just talking about and they're uh going to be uh uh putting through a plan to rebuild that. So, uh very exciting that we need to watch that. And then uh absolutely enjoyed the Emerald Art ribbon cutting. My grandchildren have been there now a couple of times and it's a fantastic place. Thank you. That's all I have.

Oh, nice. I just have one brief comment. Um I attended the cities association meet last week and they uh offered a presentation on from the county office of emergency preparedness.

Thank you. And um I attended um the water council meeting of the US conference of mayors. Uh I serve on that council um and uh it was a very interesting meeting uh learning uh how things are handled um in other parts of the country. Um for example um the storm water management um that they have in um the local city there in Indianapolis is uh very unique in that they do have a lot of storm water and they've uh developed a system with swailes and sort of natural settling. So as the water flows through uh man-made sort of creeks um it settles into the ground as much as possible and sort of you get water recovery of course that way. One of the most interesting things I found was that in several Midwestern cities, the actual um treatment uh testing and delivery of water um is done completely by the city. In other words, we have the San Jose Water Company that takes care of that. It's really out of our hands. They generate the revenue. They're responsible for the pipes. They're responsible for the purity of the water, the testing that's required by EPA and so on. Um but in some Midwestern cities they actually have that responsibility as a city responsibility. They're responsible for the pipes for the testing um looking for PAS uh and and those things have put a big strain on some of the smaller cities in that area. So I guess we're lucky with the system that we have. I think we're also somewhat unique in that we have um joint powers authority boards for storm water management um and um solid waste and sanitary waste. Uh that seems to be a little unusual. Also, many cities handle all of those things individually themselves. So um we're fortunate that we have experts in those fields who that's their only work and um you know they do that work on behalf that we

don't monitor u through our public works director Amy. Thank you. uh but uh you know it's it becomes quite a burden for all of those things. So anyway, just having grown up in that area, you we get the uh water rain in one week that uh we get here in a in a good year, right? Right.

Okay. Very good. With that, I think that concludes um the council committee reports. Uh let me take a moment to thank staff, um city manager, um Rob, director of planning, uh our city attorney, uh city clerk, and the entire staff, all of you, uh this evening, uh all of our visitors and those of you that stayed to the bitter end here. Um appreciate all the work that everybody does and whether we agree or disagree, nevertheless, we we conduct business as best we can and that's kind of the way democracy works. So with that, I will adjourn this meeting until our next meeting. Thank you.