Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

ALL RIGHT. GOOD EVENING. WELCOME TO THE SPECIAL PLANNING COMMISSION MEETING OF MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 2026. I NOW CALL THE MEETING TO ORDER. IT'S TIME FOR THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE AND TONIGHT WE'LL BE LED BY COMMISSIONER DIXON.

THANK YOU. ADDRESS THE FLAG. 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, LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.

THANK YOU. WE HAVE NO ANNOUNCEMENTS OR PRESENTATIONS THIS EVENING, WHICH TAKES US TO PUBLIC COMMENTS. THESE ARE FOR MATTERS THAT ARE NOT LISTED ON THE AGENDA. PUBLIC COMMENTS WILL BE HEARD AT THIS TIME. THESE ARE MATTERS THAT ARE NOT ON THE AGENDA. SORRY, MR.

CHAIR. I'M SO SORRY. LET THE RECORD REFLECT THAT ALL COMMISSIONERS ARE PRESENT.

SORRY, I WENT RIGHT PAST ROLL CALL. THERE I GO. IT IS A SPECIAL MEETING. SORRY. BACK TO PUBLIC COMMENTS. I WILL OPEN THE PUBLIC COMMENT. IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO COME DOWN AND SPEAK COME TO EITHER PODIUM OR IF YOU ARE PARTICIPATING BY ZOOM USE THE RAISE HAND OPTION OR IF YOU ARE PARTICIPATING BY PHONE PLEASE PRESS STAR 9. ALL RIGHT. GIVE ME ONE SECOND. ALL RIGHT. YOU ARE GOOD TO GO.

Good evening, Commission, Jay Humphrey, Costa Mesa resident. Just a quick note, in the end of the documents, item six, but it's an item that's looking through at page 123, they talk about the necessity to have 575 acres of park space in Costa Mesa. if we're going to achieve our goal of 4.26 acres per thousand residents. And nowhere in there does it talk about any suggestions of opportunities to gather that land. So we're built out, and that may be difficult. But on the Fairview Developmental Center, we're going to have roughly 3,000 houses, maybe more, maybe less, but 3,000 houses. And our park fee for that group will be $30 million. And there's no comment anywhere talking about how to use that money maybe to incentivize dedication of property on there for the city of Costa Mesa to actually own and operate and have more park space and more open space for the community actively rather than park space that's open to public use, but in fact subject to the whims of the owner of that property, which it would be if they own it. That's why it makes sense for us to own it. so that City of Costa Mesa can do that. And we have the possibility to incentivize people to dedicate land to us by giving them a break on the park fee they're going to pay as part of that. Seems to me there's a way to accomplish that goal and actually get us back to somewhere close rather than what we are actively doing right now is we're taking our 4.26 acres per thousand people and blowing it right out of the window we're down to three and we're going to be down further down as we move forward just simply by the number of people you say we're going to have here in another six years thank you very much thank you anybody else in chambers wish to speak on public comments

All right, if not, Ms. Turan, do we have anybody on phone or by Zoom?

No, we don't.

Okay, I will close public comments. Now it's time for planning commissioner comments and suggestions. Let's start to my left, Commissioner Martinez.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. A few community events that are coming up. First, the Symphony on the Go. There was one, I believe, last week. And then the program will continue at Vista Park on August 19th. and at Schiffer Park on August 29th. Both concerts of the Pacific Symphony are free and begin at 6.30 PM. And I also wanted to announce and talk about the Costa Mesa Historical Society. They are having their, I believe, 60th anniversary event the weekend of August 29th and 30th. They will have a celebration at the Costa Mesa Adobe, the Diego Sepulveda Adobe, from 11 to 3 p.m. on August 29th. And then the following day, they will host a special anniversary gala event. So if you're interested, please check out the Costa Mesa Historical Society website for more information. Thank you. Thank you.

Commissioner Dixon?

Nothing tonight.

All right. Commissioner Rojas? No. All right. Commissioner Klepak? No.

Nothing for me.

Okay. Commissioner Andrade? None. And Vice Chair Zik?

NOTHING, THANK YOU.

OKAY. I WILL KEEP THAT STREAK ALIVE. NOTHING FROM ME. WE HAVE ONE CONSENT CALENDAR ITEM TONIGHT. ALL MATTERS LISTED ON THE CONSENT CALENDAR ARE CONSIDERED TO BE ROUTINE AND WILL BE DISCUSSED AND ACT UPON IN ONE MOTION. THERE'S NO SEPARATE DISCUSSION UNLESS AN ITEM HAS BEEN PULLED. TONIGHT'S ITEM IS THE JULY 27, 2026 MEETING MINUTES. DOES ANYBODY WANT TO PULL IT OR MAKE A MOTION? Motion by Vice Chair Zick. Seconded by Commissioner Martinez.

Move the item.

Second. All right. Let's call for the question.

Motion carries 7-0.

All right. We have one public hearing item tonight. Mr. Rand, can you please read the title for public hearing item number one?

This is a resolution of the planning commission recommending that the city council approve a general plan amendment to amend the six cycle housing element of the city of Costa Mesa's general plan to add additional housing element sites to the site's inventory. and associated revisions. Presentation by Ms. McGill, Planning Manager.

Good evening, Ms. McGill.

Thank you, Chair. The floor is yours. Thank you. Good evening, Planning Commission. I'm Anna McGill, Planning Manager of the Advanced Planning and Housing Team. And I've got a team here. I'm going to run through the presentation tonight. But I have Michelle Halligan, Senior Planner, here with me tonight to help answer questions. And then two members of the consultant team with DUDEC, Sohab Mehmood, who is sitting next to me, and Kathy Tang Saiz, who is sitting next to her. With that, this is the agenda for the staff presentation tonight. I'm going to walk through a little bit of background on when the city originally adopted the housing element and subsequent revisions. The revision in March of this year that caused the city to make no net loss findings and trigger the 180-day review. and the new commune DTLA versus City of Redondo Beach Court of Appeals opinion that triggered some of the decisions for property owners to remove themselves from the housing element and kind of subsequent actions we've taken from that Court of Appeals opinion. Property owners have requested to be removed from the housing element, to be added to the housing element. We've continued to honor Planning Commission and City Council direction to honor those property owner requests, so we'll talk a little bit about that. And then the process that we went through to identify new housing element opportunity sites, as well as text revisions, and then public input and HCD preliminary review that also led to subsequent revisions. Right now we have the revised draft housing element public review out for public comment, talk about that. And then staff recommendation and next steps. So for the benefit of the public, the housing element is one of seven state mandated general plan elements. CITY OF COASTA MESA ELEMENTS OF OUR GENERAL PLAN. STATE LAW REQUIRES THAT THE HOUSING ELEMENT BE UPDATED EVERY EIGHT YEARS FOR A CYCLE. OUR CURRENT CYCLE IS 2021 TO 2029. SO WE'RE GETTING CLOSE TO THE END OF THE CYCLE HERE. WE'VE GOT ABOUT TWO YEARS LEFT IN THIS CYCLE. ORIGINALLY THE CITY'S HOUSING ELEMENT WAS ADOPTED IN FEBRUARY 2022. THERE WERE SUBSEQUENT REVISIONS THROUGHOUT 2022 AND 2023 TO RESPOND TO HCD COMMENTS. The housing element was amended in March of 2026 to remove 17 sites and add two sites. We'll talk a little bit about why on the subsequent slide. The city then made no net loss findings and triggered the 180-day period to identify new housing element sites to meet the regional housing needs assessment capacity and then to establish a buffer as well. And then finally, on July 16th, THE ATTORNEY GENERAL FILING WAS RECEIVED BY THE CITY OF COASTA MESA INDICATING THAT THE CITY NEEDED TO ADOPT A HOUSING ELEMENT THAT WAS COMPLIANT WITH HOUSING ELEMENT LAW AND COMPLETE OUR REZONINGS WITHIN 120 DAYS. A LITTLE BIT MORE BACKGROUND. SO THE CITY OF COASTA MESA HAS BEEN USING AN OVERLAY DISTRICT WHICH WE'VE BEEN REFERRING TO AS THE MIXED USE OVERLAY DISTRICT OR as the tool for rezoning housing element sites. And at a high level, sites have a base zoning, as you can see the image on the right, and that allows for different types of permitted uses and regulations. And an overlay zone typically allows for additional or supplemental uses on top of that base zoning. So a property owner can either develop under the base zoning or opt into the overlay zone and meet those requirements and those additional permitted uses. In the case of the housing element, it was to allow for additional residential uses. Back in October, the new commune DTLA versus City of Redondo Beach Court of Appeals opinion issued stated that an overlay can only be used for RHNA and for the housing element if it establishes the following minimum requirements. one, that housing element sites are at least 50% residential use, and two, that they meet the minimum density of 20 units to the acre. And so the city has subsequently made those amendments to our mood to ensure that housing element sites meet those requirements. Now, this reduces the flexibility of that overlay as it was discussed back in 2022 and 2021 when we were identifying housing element sites with property owners. where it was always more seen as supplemental or additive. And so after that opinion was issued, staff started to meet and reach out to property owners back in December and January and again in May throughout this summer to discuss the implications of this opinion and the possible, you know, IMPLICATIONS, RAMIFICATIONS AS IT WOULD HAVE TO THEIR PROPERTY. AND OF COURSE, AS WE DISCUSSED ON THE PREVIOUS SLIDE, THAT THEN LED TO SOME PROPERTY OWNERS MAKING THE DECISION TO REQUEST TO BE REMOVED FROM THE HOUSING ELEMENT SITES INVENTORY. SO IN TOTAL, AS WE'VE BEEN MEETING AND DISCUSSING WITH PROPERTY OWNERS, WE'VE RECEIVED PROPERTY OWNER REQUESTS TO REMOVE 26 SITES FROM OUR HOUSING ELEMENT, ABOUT 6,000 CAPACITY FOR 6,360 UNITS. THOSE ARE ON THE SCREEN HERE AND THAT INCLUDES THE 17 SITES THAT WERE REMOVED AS PART OF THE MARCH 2026 CITY COUNCIL ACTION. IN ADDITION TO THAT WE'VE ALSO BEEN MEETING WITH PROPERTY OWNERS WHO ARE INTERESTED IN BEING ADDED TO OUR HOUSING ELEMENT SITES INVENTORY AND THAT RESULTED IN ADDING 11 MEASURE K PROPERTIES BECAUSE THEY CAN BE REZONED TO THE HOUSING ELEMENT AND THOSE ARE LISTED HERE AND AGAIN THAT INCLUDES THE TWO SITES THAT WERE ADDED BACK IN So in terms of identifying new sites, the city, after March 2026, did some internal exercises, I will call them. One was to take a look at our existing housing element sites and apply what we call realistic capacity assumption. So every housing element site has a maximum density. But in order to make a conservative assumption about what might be developed, we assume that the density is going to be Those sites would develop at about 80% of the total density So we made that assumption for existing housing element sites And that's how we got to started getting to the number that we needed to replace in terms of RHNA in addition to that We also looked at making sure that there was sufficient capacity in each income category So it wasn't as simple as just saying well, we've lost 6,000 sites. We need to add 6,000 sites We had to look at each income category the existing buffer that the city had and see where we really had deficiency and it was really in those very low and low categories that we were underneath arena and the buffer wasn't sufficient to actually accommodate it we also went back and accounted for sites that were already entitled and permitted and reported to the state on our annual progress reports and made sure that those were included as housing element sites and And then once we got that number of what needed to replace, we started looking at criteria for identifying new housing element sites. One, they had to be a Measure K site so that they could be rezoned. We didn't pick sites that were either a current housing element site or a former housing element site. They needed to be within what we call moderate high and highest resource census tracts. And at a very high level, these are sites that have proximity to transportation options, schools, goods and services, amenities, things like that. And this also ensures that the city is meeting its Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing Goals or AFFH goals at a high level. It means that housing at different income levels and that support different needs of our community still have access to transportation options and all of these amenities, schools, things like that. We also went back through the criteria and removed sites that had size restrictions. So lots that are under a half acre and lots that are above 10 acres. It's not to say that these sites couldn't be on the housing element, and they can, and in some cases they are, but there's just a higher threshold for the justification that is needed to add these sites to the inventory. We need to show more developer interest. We need to show the potential for lot consolidation in the case of smaller sites. We need to show that we've had other projects within the city that have had similar development pattern. We also removed sites with existing residential uses. We removed sites with high utilization rates, so over 60%. So if more than 60% of that site was being occupied by buildings and development, we assumed probably not gonna develop in the future. So we applied that. APPLIED A 20% REALISTIC CAPACITY REDUCTION TO THE SITES THAT WE IDENTIFIED, AGAIN, JUST LIKE THE EXISTING HOUSING ELEMENT SITES SO THAT WE ASSUME THAT, YOU KNOW, MAYBE IN NOT ALL CASES THEY'RE GOING TO BUILD TO THEIR FULLEST DENSITY EXTENT. AND THEN WE DID WHAT I LIKE TO CALL THE SORT OF LOCAL CONTEXT OR COMMON SENSE ASSESSMENT OF THOSE SITES, WHAT WE ALREADY KNOW, WHERE WE KNOW WE HAVE DEVELOPMENT INTERESTS, WHAT SITES WE KNOW HAVE ACTUALLY REALISTIC ABILITY TO SO WE APPLIED THAT COMMON SENSE CRITERIA TO SITES. WE ALSO MADE SOME TEXT REVISIONS SO WE REMOVED TEXT REFERENCES TO THE SITES THAT WERE REMOVED FROM THE INVENTORY. WE ALSO MADE SOME CHANGES THROUGHOUT THE DOCUMENT TO CONTINUE TO PROMOTE THE AFFH REQUIREMENTS. THE GOAL HERE IS TO REDUCE SEGREGATION AND AVOID DISPLACEMENT. WE MADE UPDATES WHERE NECESSARY ON THE CITY'S HOUSING ELEMENT PROGRAMS AND THEIR IMPLEMENTATION. We made text revisions needed to comply with state law, and we also included updates as needed to reflect our ongoing outreach that's been conducted this year. So that left us with 94 new housing element opportunity sites, a capacity of about 6,978 units. That ensures that we meet our RENA, and it includes a buffer to get us through to the end of this planning period. In addition to that, and I just wanted to show this quick, hopefully this actually links out, but this is an interactive GIS map that's been available to the public this year. IT'S BEEN AN EXTREMELY HELPFUL TOOL. WE'VE MET WITH PROPERTY OWNERS OR PROPERTY OWNERS THAT WANT TO BE REMOVED FROM THE HOUSING ELEMENT, THAT WANT TO BE ADDED TO THE HOUSING ELEMENT. SO THIS IDENTIFIES ALL THE MEASURE K SITES HERE IN TEAL. THE SITES THAT WERE EXISTING HOUSING ELEMENT SITES YOU CAN SEE HERE OUTLINED IN RED. AND THEN WHERE WE HAVE OUR NEW SITES, YOU SEE THEM WITH THE CROSSED, THE HATCHED IN ORANGE. IT'S INTERACTIVE. YOU CAN ALSO CLICK ON A SITE AND LOOK AT THE APN, WHETHER IT'S EXISTING HOUSING ELEMENT SITE, THE GENERAL PLAN AND ZONING INFORMATION. SO THAT'S BEEN REALLY HELPFUL TOOLS. WE'VE CONDUCTED OUTREACH AND HAD FURTHER CONVERSATIONS ABOUT THE FUTURE OF THESE SITES. BACK TO THE PRESENTATION. WE THEN TOOK THAT LIST OF SITES AND WE STARTED OUR PUBLIC OUTREACH INPUT PROCESS. So we reached out to both existing property owners that have sites on the housing element inventory and sites that were proposed to be added. We did that in May. We held telephone calls, meetings on Zoom in person and followed up by email with property owners who had questions about the implications of the Redondo Beach case and what it meant to be on the housing element. And those conversations varied based on specific properties. We also reached out to the wider community. We conducted this housing element outreach as part of our round three neighborhoods where we have long outreach. So at the open house on June 3rd that was held, you can see in the boards here in the picture, we also had a map indicating the new housing element sites that were proposed. And we have the criteria for how we identified the sites there too. We also had stakeholder meetings in June, and then after all of that, we released the draft housing element for public review for the seven-day required public review period in line with housing element law. We received nine public comments, and we've incorporated those public comments where appropriate throughout the document, and then we sent it to HCD on June 24th to start their 60-day preliminary review. HCD PROVIDED PRELIMINARY COMMENTS TO THE CITY IN EARLY AUGUST. AND THE INTENT OF DOING THAT WAS TO ALLOW FOR THE CITY TO CONTINUE REVISING AND WORKING ON THOSE COMMENTS SO THAT HCD CAN CONTINUE TO REVIEW AFTER OUR SECOND PUBLIC COMMENT PERIOD BEFORE THEY ISSUE US A FORMAL LETTER ON AUGUST 21ST. I'LL TALK ABOUT THAT ON THE NEXT SLIDE TOO. SO REVISIONS THAT WE MADE In line with HCD comments, we reflected the progress that has been made towards our arena obligations so far in the planning period. We provided more detail on specific housing element sites like existing uses and redevelopment potential. We went and identified housing element opportunity sites that were identified in prior planning periods. And for our city, that wasn't a lot of sites. We provided additional rationale for those small sites under a half acre, like the potential for locks consolidation and other projects that we've seen in the city that have similar development patterns to provide more justification. We provided additional justification on accessory dwelling units and their affordability determination. So prior to 2024, HCD allowed cities to use SCAG information to make some assumptions about rent levels. In 2024, that guidance changed and we needed to actually reach out to ADU property owners and get more detailed information. We started with a survey and then we eventually embedded that questionnaire into our TESA application system so that we get that information, what they intend to do with that property and if they intend to rent it when they apply for their permit. And then finally, we incorporated environmental justice policies. The Planning Commission made a recommendation on that. week ago today and so the draft that is out for public review includes those EJ policies that have been incorporated so now the housing element revised draft is out for public review it went out on August 12th and will continue to accept comments through August 19th it can be viewed on the city's website and also on the project web page comments can be provided either on the project web page through this common form that's on the right or by emailing the website that's here. We'll continue to take public comment tonight too, but we encourage members of the public to actually go on the comment form into email so that we can ensure we capture the true essence of the comments that they want to submit. Okay, so with that, the recommendation is that the Planning Commission recommend that the City Council PROJECT CONSISTENT WITH COAST OF MESA CITY COUNCIL ADOPTED RESOLUTION 2267 CERTIFYING THE MND AND ADOPTING THE MMRP AND FIND THAT THE PROJECT IS STATUTORILY EXEMPT FROM THE PROVISIONS UNDER THE CALIFORNIA ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ACT PURSUANT TO THE RESOURCE CODE HERE OTHERWISE KNOWN AS SB 131 AND ALSO RECOMMEND THAT THE CITY COUNCIL ADOPT A RESOLUTION TO APPROVE A GENERAL PLAN AMENDMENT TO AMEND THE CITY OF COAST OF MESA SIXTH CYCLE housing element of the city's general plan. And in addition to that, direct staff to incorporate revisions in response to any additional comments that we receive from HCD and the public during the public review period prior to city council consideration and adoption. And that's a key piece because on the next slide, we'll go through next steps, which is that we're still out for public review. So that will allow us to continue to incorporate those comments through the end of the public review period and onwards. As I said before, we anticipate that we're going to get a formal letter from the state on August 21st. Hopefully, and at best, that letter says that you comply with housing element law and you're ready to be certified pending city council adoption of the housing element. It might have additional recommended revisions, and if that's the case, we'll continue to make those updates before September 1st. And then city council adoption consideration is tentatively scheduled for September 1st. AFTER THAT HEARING IF THE CITY COUNCIL ADOPTS THE HOUSING ELEMENT WE ANTICIPATE SUBMITTING TO THE STATE FOR CERTIFICATION AND THAT'S THE END OF THE STAFF PRESENTATION HERE TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS THAT YOU HAVE ALL RIGHT THANK YOU MS. MCGILL COMMISSIONER'S QUESTIONS VICE CHAIR ZICK THANK YOU THANK YOU MS. MCGILL I'VE GOT A COUPLE OF CHRONOLOGICAL QUESTIONS FIRST AND I APPRECIATE YOUR PRESENTATION I

might have a couple things mixed up. When you indicated that the draft housing element went out for review on June 8th to the 15th, did that version of the housing element have the total planned sites of 17,042? In other words, the various sites that have since been pulled, were they part of that draft version in June?

Okay, so hopefully I'm answering the question. Let me know if I haven't followed quite. The 17,000 number that you're referring to is the original housing element adopted number that includes the arena sites plus the buffer.

Mm-hmm.

BACK IN MARCH OF THIS YEAR, 17 SITES WERE REMOVED. IN ADDITION TO THAT, THE CITY COUNCIL ALSO DIRECTED STAFF TO REMOVE 333 SUSAN STREET. AND SO THAT WAS DONE AS WELL. AND CONTINUE TO HONOR PROPERTY OWNER REQUESTS. SO THE NUMBER THAT WE PRESENTED IN JUNE WAS A CULMINATION OF THAT 17,000, TAKE OUT ALL OF THE PROPERTY OWNER REQUESTS UP UNTIL THAT DATE THAT WE KNEW AT THAT TIME. IDENTIFICATION OF THE NEW SITES. SO IT ENDED UP BEING ABOUT IN THE 6,000 RANGE OF SITES THAT WERE REMOVED AND ABOUT IN THE 6,000 RANGE OF SITES THAT WERE ADDED.

OKAY. AND THEN YOU INDICATED YOU SENT THE HOUSING ELEMENT TO HCD ON JUNE 24TH. HAD COUNCIL TAKEN ACTION TO on the housing element prior to that being sent to HCD, did they approve it or?

No, they had not because under housing element law, the city is required to go out for public review and also do a preliminary review with HCD prior to city council adoption.

Okay. So has the housing element, has there been any action taken by council to date?

NOT SINCE THAT MARCH 17TH ACTION WHERE THEY REMOVED THOSE 17 SITES AND ADDED TWO.

GOT IT. AND IN THAT MARCH, NOTHING HAS BEEN REZONED YET IN THE HOUSING ELEMENT. IS THAT A TRUE STATEMENT?

AS OF MARCH, THE EXISTING HOUSING ELEMENT SITES WERE REZONED AND HAD THE MOOD APPLIED TO THEM. IT'S JUST THE NEW HOUSING ELEMENT SITES THAT HAVE NOT HAD THE MOOD APPLIED TO THEM.

GOT IT. OKAY. THANK YOU FOR ALL OF THAT. I'm not sure I really saw in the presentation, and I didn't find it in our package if it existed, a map that showed the sites that were removed and the sites were added. I know in your staff report on page 8 or page 32, you list the sites. So I certainly could go to Google Maps and look them up individually.

So this is a table of the total sites that were removed.

Right.

And again, the total sites that were added. But when we put them onto the interactive GIS map, it got a little messy. So just for clarity, we decided not to make it any more messy.

OK. And then a related question. IN THE SECOND BUNDLE OF DOCUMENTS THAT WE RECEIVED, STARTING ON PAGE 365 AND GOING THROUGH PAGE 400, THERE IS A SPREADSHEET. LET ME TURN TO ONE PAGE IN THERE. a spreadsheet that looks like this, I don't expect you to be able to read it from there. I would expect I would be able to read it from here, and I can't. So I would like to have a legible copy of that made available. And the other thing related to that, and this was a problem in the very first version of it, and I really can't tell from this size font anyway, but is there a grand total at the bottom that says not 17042, but whatever the number is, the RHNA plus the buffer, is that on this spreadsheet, or do I have to add them up by myself?

Yeah, I can add to that. It is not at the end of the spreadsheet, but in that chapter on, and I can give you the specific page, there is a grand total showing where the sites were identified, how much was added, the total capacity for the housing element as of date, and a breakdown of where capacity was noted per neighborhood. And that page is in that chapter that you're looking at on, let me just pull that for you. That will be table B2 on page B4. It also will show you the changes that we made from the initial housing element to where we're at today.

Would you know what page number that is in our package? 325. 325? Okay. I'll look at that later. Thank you for that.

If I may, through the chair, just add, it's been a little bit difficult to have a final number because PER THE PLANNING COMMISSION AND CITY COUNCIL DIRECTION, WE'VE CONTINUED TO HONOR PROPERTY OWNER REQUESTS UP UNTIL LIKE THIS MOMENT. SO EVEN AS OF LAST WEEK, WE HAD LIKE SOME CHANGES TO THE NUMBERS. SO BY THE TIME WE GET TO THE CITY COUNCIL, WE'LL HAVE LIKE A FULL STOP AND WE'LL HAVE AN EXACT NUMBER TO BE ABLE TO SHARE.

AND I APPRECIATE THAT. SINCE WE'RE BEING ASKED TO MAKE A RECOMMENDATION TO COUNCIL TONIGHT, KIND OF FELT AN OBLIGATION TO KNOW WHAT I'M RECOMMENDING. OK. Page 65. So that's in the housing element page 65 there is a table. That shows the population growth 2010 to 2040. Are 20 20. Well, actually, the 2010, I guess that's the only actual in the table, 109,000. And the 2040 projection is 116,000. That's 5,000 higher, 7,000 higher. A growth rate of what it says here is 2.2%. Could you reconcile that growth rate to what we are LIKELY TO HAVE IF WE BUILD 12,000 UNITS IN THE CITY OCCUPIED AT A 2.6 PERSON PER UNIT NUMBER, THE 30,000, 40,000 PEOPLE. DO YOU RECONCILE THOSE TWO?

COMMISSIONER ZICK, THAT'S A HARD QUESTION TO ANSWER. THIS DATA IS TAKEN FROM SCAG AND THAT NUMBER IS DERIVED BASED ON YEARS OF POPULATION GROWTH. SO THEY TAKE PRIOR 20, 30 YEARS AND THEY EXTRACULATE IT TO MAKE AN ASSUMPTION. IT'S INHERENTLY INACCURATE IF YOU ARE PLANNING FOR A LOT MORE HOUSING GROWTH, SO IT'S A LITTLE BIT DIFFICULT TO MAKE WHAT I WOULD SAY IS A REALISTIC ASSUMPTION.

OKAY. SO THAT INFORMATION CAME FROM SCAG? And arena allocation, didn't that also come from SCAG? Correct. Interesting, okay. My next question relates to page 74. And on that page, there is a breakdown of the number of households by income category. So we have a total of 40,000 households in the city and it breaks it down. And if I add up the extremely low, very low, and low, comes to about 19,155 to be precise. If I look at the RHNA allocation for those exact same categories, so the subset of the 11760, that number is 6801. If somehow, by some miracle, we built all the affordable units that the reallocation says that should be built, by some miracle that even happened, we would only be 36% into the stated need here of people who need affordable housing. Can you help me understand what our thought is about that?

Yeah, I can respond a little bit to the math behind it and how the RHNA was determined. So as you know, SCAG assigned the RHNA to each of the jurisdictions. They accounted for a lot of different factors when they assigned it to the COGS and then to the jurisdictions, including DOF projections on population, income growth for each household, household size growth, and all of those factors including how many residents are lower income, moderate income, above moderate income. So the number that was assigned by SCAG was In theory, taking account the table that you're referring to of population share by income, so that was more of a directive we got from them.

So maybe seeing it another way, this table on page 74 seems to indicate what the need is in Costa Mesa. The RENA allocation, again, if by some miracle we built everything, only meets 36% of the need. And I have my personal doubts that we'll build 11,760 units in the next three years or the next 13 years. So I just wonder what our plan or strategy is, or are we just really trying to answer the mail on the reallocation and the planned zone for that?

VICE CHAIR, COULD I JUMP IN, PLEASE? THE TABLE ON PAGE 74 OF YOUR PACKET, WHICH IS ON PAGE 2-11 OF THE ADOPTED HOUSING ELEMENT IS THE HOUSEHOLDS BY INCOME CATEGORY FROM 2020. THAT WAS THE EXISTING BREAKDOWN. SO SHOWING IN THE YEAR 2020, 47.2% OF THE POPULATION IN COASTA MESA WAS IN EXTREMELY LOW, VERY LOW, AND LOW. THAT, WHILE THE INCOME CATEGORIES CORRELATE TO THE INCOME CATEGORIES IN THE RENA BREAKDOWN, THE RENA BREAKDOWN INCOME CATEGORY IS ASSIGNED IN USING THE SCAG METHODOLOGY THAT SOHAB WAS MENTIONING. SO WHILE THE INCOME CATEGORIES ARE COMMON, THE TWO DON'T DIRECTLY CORRELATE. IN OTHER WORDS, THE ARENA THAT THE CITY RECEIVES FACTORS INTO MANY DIFFERENT CATEGORIES INCLUDING FUTURE GROWTH BOTH LOCALLY AND REGIONALLY ACROSS A FULL SPECTRUM OF INCOME NEEDS. that the population will have versus this table, which was a snapshot in time at 2020, what the breakdown of the income category of the population of the city was. So while there is some soft math that some of these folks may end up in future housing units, they don't directly correlate. So hopefully that explains a little bit why the RHNA percentage breakdown of income does not correlate to exactly the population income breakdown in 2020.

All right, my next question. When I look at the table, and this is a very minor one, on page 45, the table of contents for the housing element, I'm on page 45, and I'm looking under number three, and do you see open space under number three? And do you see where it says page 3-14? See what I'm looking at? OK, so when I turn to that page, I don't find it. What I do find is that the discussion of open space begins on page 3-9, and that's the table. And then the actual description or definition of open space is on page 3-11. So either way, it precedes 3-14. And that might be something that happens with other elements in the table of contents. So that's just a minor nit that I want to bring forward. What I did want to point out or question, make sure I'm understanding it, on page 112, And I'm on the subject of open space. On page 112 and 113, it, what I think, clearly identifies that the minimum percentage of open space in our development standards is 40%. And on page 113, it actually is higher than 40% for a couple of specific categories. But at a bare minimum, it's 40%. So am I reading that correct? I mean, that's pretty straightforward.

Yes, correct. But keep in mind that this was written, these tables were written before the mood. So it doesn't account for the open space requirements that are in the mood.

But I'll get to that. I'm looking at the fresh, latest housing element. This is it, okay, says 40%, okay. On page 114, where it describes what open space is, I'll kind of say maybe it defines open space, one of the things that it specifically says that is not open space, driveways, parking lots, surfaces designed for vehicular access, upper floor decks, balconies, and areas under projection which are less than eight feet above ground are not open space. So to be clear, balconies are not considered open space. I'm just reading it straight out of this document

Commissioner Zick, I think you've pointed out the language in the housing element in that section has been the original definition of open space in the City of Costa Mesa for years. As part of the Neighborhoods Where We All Belong project or effort, that definition will be amended, but it hasn't been amended yet.

It'll be amended for the non-housing element sites that are part of Measure K?

It'll be amended citywide.

Because I found it and pointed it out?

No, no. It's actually part of the zoning code amendments we're going to see later tonight. So they haven't been amended officially. They haven't been adopted.

And you're saying that in that amendment, it'll then say balconies are included? Correct. Now, back in 2018... The city's policy was that balconies were not included, but could be included by discretion of Planning Commission. So if it's being changed in the mood, who made the decision that that discretion no longer lies with Planning Commission? Who made that decision? That was updated in March. Who made, the council made that decision? It was an overt decision by them, or was something in a 400-page package that maybe they missed?

Vice-chair yeah, if I can chime in sure This particular page section sorry in the housing element is under a section called governmental constraints The state law during the development of the housing element requires the city to identify policies practices regulations laws any applicable regulations of the city that represent a governmental constraints. And so this is all listed here. This was, again, talking about snapshot in time. I think we used that phrase earlier. But this identified the existing development regulations at the time that the city was drafting the housing element. And so again, this being the snapshot in time, the city was required to then evaluate all of the existing development standards, practices, policies, et cetera, to determine what governmental constraints to housing could be removed. And so one of the realities of development within the city is that the city is I THINK EVERYBODY WOULD AGREE, INCREASINGLY BUILT OUT AND THAT THERE NEEDS TO BE ADDITIONAL WAYS, I'M USING OPEN SPACE AS AN EXAMPLE HERE, BUT IN ADDITIONAL WAYS TO AMENITIZE AND INCLUDE THINGS LIKE OPEN SPACE TO RETAIN QUALITY OF LIFE FOR EXISTING AND FUTURE RESIDENTS, BUT IT HAS TO BE DONE PERHAPS IN WAYS THAT ARE MORE FLEXIBLE OR DIFFERENT OR MORE INNOVATIVE THAN WHAT WAS PREVIOUSLY DONE. AND SO I WANTED TO BRING A LITTLE BIT OF OVERARCHING CONTEXT TO THAT. did restate what the existing regulations were, but in our planning efforts through the housing element, as well as this upcoming neighborhoods where we all belong effort, we were tasked with amending regulations to not only not be a constraint to housing, but also to be objective. So hope that sheds some light on why this section lists these standards and then why the housing element site zoning was changed in March. Thank you.

Okay. Page 165. Now I'm not sure what I can rely on or what I can't in this document, but I'll try this one. Page 165. Here is a table that discusses the feedback from the community on the implementation of the urban plans. That's the title on that table. The second item down talks about limited open space. That is the concern, the concern expressed by residents. The remedial action indicates that in 2015 there was an amendment that required a minimum of 30% open space. Now I happen to know from the April version of the mood that in that table, don't know if I can rely on this either, it says 30% is the minimum. So are we saying that 30% is the minimum or, I mean, can I rely on it that this is accurate?

Yep, that is accurate.

Okay. I think that's enough for now.

Okay. Commissioners, any other questions of staff? Commissioner Martinez. Thank you, Mr.

Chair. All right. Another long set of questions.

How fun.

Okay. First, I want to get started with the staff report. Page 7 or 131. So we say that for the sites that we are adding with this new update, there's a bunch of different criteria, and they have to meet this criteria in order to be added. And the final bullet point in that list is sites that have developer interest. So of the sites that have developer interest, do we not care about the other criteria? Are we just saying developer interested and it's a Measure K site? Let's go for it.

YES, THANK YOU, COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ. FOR THE MOST PART, YES. AS LONG AS IT'S A MEASURE CASE SITE AND WE HAVE CONCRETE DEVELOPER INTEREST, I.E., WE HAVE A LETTER ON LETTER HEADS SIGNED BY THEM SAYING I INTEND TO BUILD HOUSING AND I WANT TO BE ON THE HOUSING ELEMENT OR I SUBMITTED A PREAPPLICATION OR I'M UNDERGOING ENTITLEMENT, THAT'S SUFFICIENT DEVELOPER INTEREST TO ADD THEM TO THE SITE. GOT IT. OKAY.

11 property owners who have requested to be added. And then other than that, we're adding 94 new housing element sites. So there are 83 sites where it wasn't requested to be added.

Correct.

Have we confirmed that they're okay with that? Because I don't want to do this process again where we have another 24 sites who want to get out of the housing element.

Yes, thank you, Commissioner Martinez. That's a valid concern. We noticed property owners both in writing and via email for all the contact information that we had back in May to say you've been identified as a property to be added to the housing element sites inventory. That resulted in a lot of telephone calls, emails, meetings, as you can imagine. Some property owners didn't want to be added. We removed. We went back to our, you know, list. Some property owners were okay with being added. We had some discussions with property owners about maybe not this housing element cycle, but we might be interested in the next. Keep us on a notification list. So there were a lot of opportunities. Then again, as we've been getting ready for hearing, we've made sure to notice them. So back in May before the draft documents went out, again before the public draft review and open house, and again now as we've been getting ready for hearing.

OK, so they've been noticed, and they've hopefully seen all this stuff, and someone agreed to it. Cool. Page 10, or 34. Middle paragraph, basically it's saying, the public review is still ongoing. It ends Wednesday. So we are not seeing the final version that is going to be presented at council.

So you are seeing a final draft, but this is why the recommendation includes your direction to us to continue to make, you know, minor updates as needed in order to incorporate public comment. IF THERE ARE ANY COMMENTS EITHER FROM THE PUBLIC OR HCD THAT ARE SUBSTANTIAL IN NATURE THAT WOULD ACTUALLY WARRANT YOUR REREVIEW, THEN WE WOULD BRING IT BACK TO PLANNING COMMISSION. AT THIS STAGE THAT'S NOT WHAT WE'RE ANTICIPATING.

I DON'T SEE THE WORD MINOR IN THIS RECOMMENDATION. It just says incorporate revisions responding to HCD and public review. Technically with this motion, if there's a public commenter who says actually delete the housing element, then we've directed you to delete the housing element. So I want to make sure that we get the word minor in when this motion is made. so that we've seen a substantial version of what we are recommending to city council. Let me just write that down. OK. Now for the document itself. Let me see if I can find some page numbers. I'll point out if you can just do a control F for month 2026 and just fix those when it goes to final version. I found one on page 111 or 3-8. I know I've seen them in other places. I think there was one on 3-12. So just date fix, technical fix.

I'M SORRY COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ CAN I JUST CLARIFY WITH YOU IS IT A GRAMMATICAL CHANGE THAT YOU WANT?

YEAH, ON PAGE 115 AT THE TOP IT JUST SAYS ON MONTH 2026.

OH, OKAY.

SO JUST CONTROL F, MONTH 2026.

I SEE IT NOW, THANK YOU.

Um, page 153 has map with flood zones and then 155 has fire hazard severity zones. The maps have housing element sites that have been removed. And I believe not all the ones that were added. So just updating the maps, um, to be the new housing element sites. And then. I think this might be city attorney question, might be us. Because I was not here the first time for the first go around for the housing element. So I want to make sure that I understand how this works, how the allocation and the planning works for the different income categories. So HCD, SCAG, one of those two, has told us that we need to plan for 11,760 units. And they have broken that up into four different categories, above moderate, moderate low income, and very low income. So we plan for enough housing to meet those four categories. Is that correct?

That is correct, for an eight-year planning period.

OK. So I did say four categories. So we have to plan for enough, I'll just say, very low-income units to meet our requirement of 2,919. Yes. Yes. Yes, that's correct. OK. Why is it that our total potential, I'm on page 252. Why is it that our total potential capacity for RHNA for very low income is 1,974 units when our RHNA allocation was 2,919 units?

I CAN CLARIFY THAT. YOU HAVE GENERALLY FOUR CATEGORIES, VERY LOW, LOW, MODERATE, AND ABOVE MODERATE INCOME. SO WE PLAN FOR EACH CATEGORY. HOWEVER, IN THE SITES INVENTORY WHERE YOU SEE THE HOUSING ELEMENT SITES, YOU ARE ALLOWED TO GENERALLY COMBINE VERY LOW AND LOW AND CALL IT LOWER INCOME. NOW, AT THE END, THE NUMBERS STILL HAVE TO MATCH UP. to make sure that it accounts for both very low and low. So you can see under RENA capacity on that table at the end, we kind of combined those two numbers, very low and low, to get the cumulative count across both categories. So part of this too is, for example, if you have a developer or an applicant who comes on one of these housing element sites and they say, we are going to create, um, you know, of our project, we're going to create 20 units for lower income, whether it's very low or low, you can still credit it as lower income. Then you would just break out those numbers, but you'll get the credit as lower income. And so you can often combine those two categories for the housing element purposes.

Okay. So for the purposes of like no net loss, how do we know that we're still, like are we just saying lower income and then we don't care about the difference between very low and low?

We will care about it on the applicant information. So like if an applicant comes in and says that we're doing lower income housing, they'll provide us with anticipated rents and the category for the household income group that they're targeting. So very low has a particular income category for AMI and then lower has a different one, low has a different one. And so they'll share that information with us and staff with the applicant will work to put it into the correct category.

Okay. Okay. THOSE ARE MY QUESTIONS. THANK YOU, MR. CHAIR. ALL RIGHT. COMMISSIONER, ANY OTHER QUESTIONS OF STAFF?

COMMISSIONER ANDRADE.

YES. ON THAT SAME TABLE, THE LINE FOR FAIR VIEW DEVELOPMENT CENTER, AS FAR AS THIS REPORT, WE'RE PROJECTING THE MAXIMUM THERE AT 2300, RIGHT?

Yeah, correct. I don't want to jump ahead, but I might. I'll just answer the question I think you're asking and then let me know if that's not the question. The Planning Commission made a recommendation for the City Council to approve a specific plan up to 4,000 units. So I think the question you're going to ask me is why isn't that reflected here in the table? After March, we went back and considered including the Fairview Developmental Center and updating that number in the specific plan. And we ultimately chose not to do that for a handful of reasons. One, the Planning Commission and City Council directed staff to study up to 4,000 units without committing the city to decision. So we didn't want to preemptively commit any decision in the housing element as well. And two, there was no change as we go up to 4,000 units in the amount of low, very low, and moderate units. AND THAT'S REALLY WHERE WE NEEDED MORE CAPACITY. WE WERE ALREADY ABOVE AND BEYOND RENA PLUS CAPACITY IN THE ABOVE MODERATE. SO IT DIDN'T REALLY HELP HER. LIKE IT WAS SORT OF A MOVE POINT THEN UPDATING THAT NUMBER.

OKAY. AND I JUST WANTED TO DOUBLE CHECK. ONE OF OUR LAST OR MAYBE SECOND TO LAST COMMISSION MEETING WE HAD one of the trustees of the colleges come by. Is that identified as one of the housing opportunities? Because I clearly recall she came to speak. Trustee Dorn-Parker came out and spoke that she wanted the colleges campus to be considered as housing opportunities. I just wanted to, again, I can't really tell by the color of the streets on the maps. So I just wanted to just double check that that was included.

I'LL HAVE TO GO BACK AND LOOK AT THE SPECIFIC PROPERTY YOU'RE ASKING ABOUT BECAUSE WE'VE HAD A COUPLE OF PROPERTY OWNERS REACH OUT IN THE LAST FEW WEEKS ASKING QUESTIONS ABOUT THEIR PROPERTY. IN SOME CASES THEY'VE BEEN MEASURED K SITES, BUT NOT HOUSING ELEMENT OPPORTUNITY SITES. WE'VE HAD ONGOING DISCUSSIONS WITH THEM ABOUT TRYING TO FORMULATE A PROJECT THAT MIGHT GET THEM TO THE DENSITY THAT THEY'RE HOPING TO GET TO, WHETHER IT BE STATE DENSITY BONUS LAW, BEING ADDED TO THE HOUSING ELEMENT. THERE'S STILL OPPORTUNITY. WE ALSO, YOU'LL HEAR IN THE NEXT ITEM SOME OF THE OPPORTUNITIES IN STATE LAW SPECIFICALLY FOR COLLEGES, UNIVERSITIES, SCHOOL SITES AS WELL AS FAITH BASED SITES AND THOSE HAVE OTHER OPPORTUNITIES THROUGH STATE LAW TO DEVELOP HOUSING THAT ARE LIKE ABOVE AND SEPARATE TO OUR HOUSING ELEMENT AND NEIGHBORHOODS WHERE WE ALL BELONG PROCESS. If it's the site I'm thinking of, we've been in discussion and there's a couple of different options on the table.

Part two of this. We had a great public comment talking about or making a recommendation as we talk with property owners to help us achieve the green space. Is that an opportunity that we're making available to developers to consider donating or selling their space back to the city to convert it into green space?

There's a lot of opportunities to meet open space requirements in the city. So one of the things that the city council did back in April was to amend the open space requirements so that, like, PRIVATE OPEN SPACE COULD BE COUNTED AS COMMON, COMMON COULD BE COUNTED AS PUBLICLY ACCESSIBLE. SO THAT'S ONE CHANGE THAT HAPPENED AND THAT WE'VE CARRIED OUT THROUGH THE MEASURE K SITES THAT ARE ON HOUSING ELEMENT SITES TOO. And then in addition to that, there's state density bonus options that can be utilized. I don't want to get ahead of the next item, but we'll talk about a variety of different ways that creative open spaces can be accommodated on sites.

Awesome. Awesome. I also want to take into public and to comment some of the community letters that we received for this item maybe you can help us illustrate or help us respond i think there was this great letter from mr austin madison about concerns about over developing housing predominantly on the west side where we find a lot of industrial spaces that turn into creative THIRD SPACES FOR OUR COMMUNITY. SO COULD YOU MAYBE HIGHLIGHT FOR THE, YOU KNOW, OUR RESIDENTS AND THE NEIGHBORS THAT ARE LISTENING HERE IN THE AUDIENCE, HOW ARE WE HELPING MITIGATE THAT TO ENSURE THAT ALONG THIS REZONING EFFORT AND OVERLAY EFFORT, THERE WILL STILL BE OPPORTUNITIES TO BE ABLE TO DO THAT. MAYBE WHY CAN'T WE EXPAND BEYOND THE AREAS THAT HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED FOR HOUSING?

Yeah. Thank you, Commissioner Andrade. So a couple of pieces to answer that question. One, and I'll just throw this map up here because we've obviously been confined to the sites that are Measure K sites. Those went out to a public voter initiative in 2022. So these are the sites that are not subject to Measure Y and can be rezoned as part of the, let's just say, overall neighborhoods where we all belong effort that includes now revising the housing element. So That's where we had to start. In addition to that, as part of the housing element, we also have to meet those AFFH requirements, and that ensures that incomes at all levels and for different community needs be dispersed throughout the city. That's actually one comment that HCD said like you're you are meeting a FFH as it is drafted and written and they didn't recommend any changes Which I can tell you having worked on several housing elements and the team here. That's pretty rare. You usually get comments there so one of the the good things about the measure K initiative is that it identified housing element sites and Housing opportunity sites really dispersed throughout the city. But again if we go back to then the background slide the intent of the mood of is that it is an overlay over base zoning. So for housing element sites, they have to opt into the move. They have to build at least 50% housing, but there still is opportunity to do non-residential uses on 50% of the site. For Measure K sites, and we'll talk about this in the next item, there is a lot more flexibility. They can develop under the existing base zoning, or if they choose to, they can opt into the move to do either a housing project or a mixed use project.

OK. And just going back to that map, That slide with the map, please. Basically, it's only the colored, the teal colored areas where it was approved by Measure K only to rezone and develop. Nothing else. Everything else in the gray is don't touch.

Correct. Yes, that's correct.

Not a capacity. So any property owner, even if they wanted, I mean, I guess if a property owner wanted to I don't know, you know, turn one lot into multi-housing unit. They cannot.

Well, they would be subject to measure Y and potentially a vote of the public.

Go to the public in order to create a large development. So again, I just want to, I've gotten lots of questions on why is all the development happening on these main corridors? It's going to create more traffic. And again, And it's not taken into consideration the existing communities. But again, just highlighting that we're limited to Measure K passing and only allowing us to develop in the teal color areas. Everything else is do not touch. And should a property owner want to develop, it would have to go through a citywide vote, right? And the developer likelihood of doing that probably, I would imagine, be very costly, litigious. LENGTHY.

SO IT WOULD BE SUBJECT TO MEASURE Y. NOT ALL SITES MAYBE WOULD HAVE TO GO TO A VOTE. THEY HAVE TO MEET CERTAIN CRITERIA. SO IF IT MEETS THAT CRITERIA THAT REQUIRES A VOTE, THEN YES. BUT THERE'S EXISTING R1, R2, R3 ZONES THAT ALLOW FOR SMALLER SCALE HOUSING TODAY AND DON'T NEED TO BE A MEASURE K SITE AND DON'T NEED TO GO TO A VOTE BECAUSE THEY WOULD MEET THE CRITERIA UNDER MEASURE Y.

AND YEP, THAT'S IT FOR NOW. THANK YOU.

ANY OTHER QUESTIONS? HOLD ON. GO AHEAD.

JUST A QUICK, I UNDERSTAND THAT THIS IS STILL OPEN FOR PUBLIC COMMENT AND STILL DRAFT. It would be extraordinarily helpful if in the staff report we had summary tables for all of this stuff. Like, I was a little surprised that the table of the sites didn't have the number of associated units, right, or the APNs or things like that. So just, that would be tremendously helpful so we wouldn't have to page through this thing furiously and with a bunch of post-it notes to get to the information that's really relevant. to what we're actually talking about so I think it's really important to show in the staff report the proposal the changes in clear and identifiable tables for the public who may not have the full packet in front of them maybe looking it up online and then I SAW WITH INTEREST THE REQUIREMENT FOR THE 20% REALISTIC DEVELOPMENT CAPACITY REDUCTION. AND I JUST WANT TO MAKE A GENERAL COMMENT BEFORE WE MOVE ON AND DISCUSS THIS FURTHER. YOU KNOW, THAT WOULD MEAN THAT FAIR VIEW DEVELOPMENTAL CENTER WOULD HAVE BEEN 1840 FOR INSTANCE AND THEN LOTS OF OTHER SITES THROUGHOUT THE CITY WOULD BE LOWER. You know, we're rushing through this housing. From the comment thing, it seems like there's not a real underpinning to the number of units, the developable capacity of each of these sites. It just seems like at this stage now we're reading in the report that it's supposed to be pinned to these various factors, including a realistic development capacity, and yet we sort of don't see that nexus that is obvious to me. so i'm just curious and i know the housing element uh was adopted back when we came up with the housing element sites inventory and we had this process and went through the city council but here we're doing it again and we're adding sites we're adding things and i don't think that we're it kind of feels like we're just throwing numbers and see what sticks and not having any sort of real actionable nexus between the development capacity that's identified here and what we're being asked to review or approve or move forward and i just i i Admittedly, I'm not happy with the FTC process and the numbers we got there But it just it there seems to be absolutely zero correlation between the number that's in this appendix And what's actually possibly going to get built and I'll just use FTC as the biggest most obvious most egregious example So if you could just briefly discuss the nexus between the development capacity and the number and the table, I would appreciate that Yeah, Thank You Commissioner Dixon

I AGREE. IT'S VERY DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND. EVEN FOR STAFF IT'S DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND. I'LL JUST LET YOU KNOW THAT OUR DUE DILIGENCE AND I KNOW YOU ALREADY KNOW THIS BUT FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PUBLIC IS TO PLAN FOR THOSE UNITS. WE DON'T HAVE ANY CONTROL OVER WHAT'S GOING TO BE BUILT, OVER WHERE THERE'S ACTUALLY GOING TO BE DEVELOPER INTEREST. IN A FEW PLANNING PERIODS WE MAY GET SMARTER AND HAVE MORE DATA AND INFORMATION TO ACTUALLY KNOW. If you saw what the response to the OC jury report that went to City Council on August 4th We noted that there has been a lack of transparency in the methodology process. I Think that has been true since I've been a planner It's it and you know HCD will acknowledge it and there they've already started to do outreach to jurisdictions and find ways to make sure that that methodology is is more easily understood and can be understood by the general public as well it's been even difficult for staff and experts to understand the methodology um but i'll go back to we you know we don't have a good answer to your question because we haven't yet seen what could potentially be built in the city of costa mesa with the DENSITIES, THE PLANNING TOOLS IN PLACE THAT MAYBE COULD ALLOW FOR LARGER PROJECTS. BUT OUR DUE DILIGENCE IS TO MAKE SURE THAT IT'S ZONED FOR THAT AND PLANNED FOR IT. AS IT RELATES TO THE 20% REDUCTION CAPACITY, WHAT THAT REALLY MEANS, I KNOW YOU KNOW THIS, BUT FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE PUBLIC, IF WE HAVE A SITE THAT COULD ACCOMMODATE 100 UNITS AT ITS MAX DENSITY, WE SAY PROBABLY NOT GOING TO BUILD TO ITS MAX DENSITY. let's apply a 20% reduction. We'll assume they're going to build 80 units instead of 100. And that gives us a little bit more realistic assumption, estimate of maybe what might be realistically built, along with all of these other filters that hopefully create a list of housing element sites that we feel a little bit more confident might actually be redeveloped. And that's why at the end I talked about our common sense approach. We here at the city know where there is developer interest, what sites are like, well, that was developed 10 years ago, but with a really strong community business like the AAA. They're not going anywhere. So we can apply that common sense and know where there's realistic assumptions that housing might actually be built. And then we watch and we see. And unfortunately, part of this is going to be a handful of years of just watching and seeing what comes in for entitlement to get to get that information.

All right, thank you, I appreciate that.

Okay, Vice Chair Zick, question?

Yeah, two quick ones. I just wanna make sure I got an agreement, commitment to provide a legible version of this table. And if it comes in our next Planning Commission meeting package, just as a informational item, that'd be awesome. A PRINTED VERSION?

YES.

MAYBE 11 BY 17 BUT I'LL LEAVE IT UP TO YOU.

OF THE SITE'S INVENTORY. CORRECT. YES. WE CAN DO THAT. NO PROBLEM.

THE SECOND THING I WOULD You mentioned notification letters that went to property owners and to Commissioner Martinez's questioning, some of those property owners didn't request to be added to the housing element. I would like to have a copy of one of those letters. You can black out who you sent it to. I'm not interested in that. I want to see what was actually communicated to them in writing. Um, and specifically what I'm interested in, I don't, I'm not asking you to change the letter. What I want to see and understand from the letter is if they understand that being added to this list isn't like being added to my Christmas card list. It's a takeaway of their current property rights and it's giving them a different property right that maybe they like. maybe they don't like, but the takeaway part I want to make sure is clearly identified in that notification letter. And if it isn't, we'll just have more discussion about that later.

Yeah, we can provide those letters. Thank you.

Okay, I just have two quick questions. Clearly, my colleagues have read this document very carefully, and I appreciate their diligence. I also appreciate their interest in making sure there's some consistency here. I want to kind of take it up a little bit of a level. The housing element is somewhat of an unusual part of the general plan. THE FIRST THREE CHAPTERS ARE ESSENTIALLY DATA AS WELL AS SOME ANALYSIS ON SPECIFIC TOPICS. BUT WOULD YOU AGREE FOR THE PURPOSES OF EDUCATING THE PUBLIC THAT CHAPTER FOUR IS REALLY THE OPERATIVE PART OF THIS, THE HOUSING PLAN?

YEAH, THAT'S CORRECT. IT LISTS ALL THE HOUSING ELEMENT PROGRAMS, HOW WE MEET ARENA, WHAT WE'VE COMMITTED TO DO DURING THE PLANNING PERIOD.

Right, so that's the planning piece of it, and then we will implement it, and through that implementation, there will be changes, for example, to our zoning code, and that's where we are going to memorialize these things like open space requirements. That's what staff and an applicant are going to use to determine what is really applicable for a project, not necessarily a lot of the, let's just say, background material in the housing element.

Yes, that's correct, Chair.

Okay, that's all I have.

If there's no more questions of staff now, we can ask later. I'd like to open the public hearing and open public comments. So if there's anybody in chambers who wishes to speak, please come to either podium. All right, go ahead.

Chairman Harlan, members of the commission, my name is Casey Griffin, and thank you for the opportunity to talk. I'm kind of new to the party here. I've been working with staff. We have a car dealership here in Costa Mesa that we've been working on a remodel, and as part of this, we came to learn about the overlay. I'm not a very good public speaker, so give me... give it a sec. Take your time. So anyways, we've been working with staff and we found out there was an opportunity for the overlay. We have a 3.3 acre site up near Adams that has become an opportunity for the overlay on Measure K. So we went and looked at the website and tried to find out information. And we found out that the site was designated as 30 units to the acre. We're disappointed with that primarily because A, we feel the character of Harbor Boulevard with some of the other projects that have been built at higher densities, it would be more appropriate for our site to have that. But also we're finding it very difficult to make a project at 30 units the acre viable. especially when we're trying to deliver affordable housing units. Obviously, we have to make money somewhere to underwrite it somewhere else. So I think what we'd like to do is continue to work with staff, offer whatever services we can, share kind of some of our numbers on how we think this project works. Oh, is that my warning? You've got another minute. All right. So anyways, we want to be helpful, be part of the solution here, and we want to raise our hand and say we're interested in bringing housing to the city on that site. And whatever we could do, we'd love to make it happen.

Okay. Thank you.

Commission, Jay Humphrey, Coast Mesa resident. Just two things. I note that one of the major case sites, the Nissan dealership, is now vacant. Right beside it, so is the gym now vacant. And I'm just curious if those are developer... interested sites are not since they've just become eligible just curious about that and then it's clarification on major why which staff appropriately commented on and was correct you have 2 things that have to happen for major why to require a vote you have to have a change of entitlement and you have to have Something that goes, a trigger that goes of a, some specific that goes out of a standard or of a level that has been chosen. A change in the use on that product, on that property. Itchy enough, affordable housing is exempt. Huh? Wonder how people even figure out how to calculate that because state mandated affordable housing is what we're looking at since we've just had a suit that says get your RINA done and your RINA specifically mandates a certain amount of affordable housing. I'm just curious about how that fits into everything and does not require any kind of a vote or any kind of a step sideways. Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening, Cynthia McDonald. This project has taken so many different forms that it's become the planning equivalent of the Game of Thrones many-faced god. It began as an effort to address what some called unintended consequence of Measure Y, a slowdown in development, but let me be clear. The residents wanted growth to slow long enough for Costa Mesa to create a thoughtful plan and a vision for the future. We wanted a framework that was vibrant, inclusive, a livable city where people would be proud to call home. What emerged instead is not a community vision, but a fundamental shift in the city's development framework. Critical elements of responsible planning, including infrastructure analysis, fiscal impacts, full environmental review and a clearly articulated vision for the future remain incomplete and unavailable. Measure K became something else entirely. It was sold to the voters as a way to revitalize Costa Mesa while protecting residential neighborhoods. But the environmental impact report itself demonstrates that type of development being enabled will create significant impacts and undermine many of these promises. So where is that vision promised in the Measure K campaign? I don't see it. What I see is a patchwork of spot zoning decisions. You're going to shape Costa Mesa for the next 40 or 50 years. What happened to smart growth principles that residents embraced in 2016? Mixed-use neighborhoods, walkability, housing choices, protection of open space, investment in existing communities, transportation choices, more importantly, meaningful public involvement in shaping growth. Those principles have been replaced with a philosophy that planning should be driven less by the community and more by developers. And then it got thrown in the blender with the housing element. The housing element EIR analysis shows that alternative B, housing elements only, is the environmentally superior option. That would still allow the city to meet RHNA and implement its housing element. In the end, this process has worn many faces, but each new version has moved further away from the vision that residents were promised. Costa Mesa deserves thoughtful planning, not planning by exception. It deserves a coherent vision, not a collection of disconnected projects. That's why I urge you to recommend Alternative B. Don't become the faceless men that worshipped the God, the many-faced God, because they worshipped death.

Thank you.

Thank you, everyone, for your time. My name is Anna Mendoza, and I'm here on behalf of PLC Communities. We are the owner and builder of Victoria Place. We have 40 units that we are currently demoing the site today. I am here to put on the record the expressed interest in 2148 Newport Boulevard, APN 4261211. I respectfully request that the approximate 0.8 acres be included in the housing element With the proposed sites to the north and existing multifamily to the south this property is a logical addition to the housing element Thank you for your consideration this evening and all of your hard work.

Thank you Anyone else in chambers wish to speak this trend do we have anybody on zoom or by phone I

No, Mr.

Chair.

I will close public comments.

Commissioners, any further questions of staff? Yes. Commissioner Martinez.

Just to confirm with the two public comments that we just got. First, I'll ask about the Newport Boulevard site, 2148 Newport Boulevard. Was that one already included or not?

It was not because it's not currently a Measure K site. without it being subject to Measure Y, I'm not able to add it into this process.

What makes it not a Measure K site? I don't have a good image of it.

It's just not included in Measure K. It's not included in Measure K. Measure K is a map.

Okay. All right. Okay. I don't have a Measure K map in front of me, so better see that. And then I will ask about the property that Mr. Griffin mentioned, which is South Coast Toyota, which I believe is the corner of Harbor and Bernard, which, from looking at this map, does look like I measure K site.

Um, no, that's where they're located. That's okay.

That is, uh, we, we, we, sorry, we can't, we can't have a back and forth anymore.

So, uh, I don't know what the site is, but I'll it's, it's 2850 Harbor Boulevard. So, um, Mr. Griffin reached out last week, first to, um, carry tie or community development director. SHE LOOPED ME INTO THE CONVERSATION. I RESPONDED TO MR. GRIFFIN SAYING HAPPY TO MEET, SIT DOWN AND DISCUSS OPTIONS FOR YOUR PROPERTY. THIS PROPERTY IS A MEASURE K SITE BUT IT IS NOT DESIGNATED AS A HOUSING ELEMENT SITE WHICH IS WHY HE'S REFERENCING THE 30 DWELLING UNITS TO THE ACRE DENSITY. IN MY E-MAIL I SAID LET'S TALK ABOUT POTENTIAL OPTIONS LIKE BEING ADDED TO THE HOUSING ELEMENT SITES INVENTORY, UTILIZING STATE DENSITY BONUS LAW. Staff's position is that we're willing to continue to meet with Mr. Griffin and look at alternative options to help make a viable project on his site. Obviously, the time is tight on the housing element, so we would need to know quite soon if we're going to add that site. But I will continue to follow up and have those conversations with him.

Okay. Any other questions of staff? Commissioner Andrade.

Yes. If you can comment on some of the comments that we received regarding the density. We received two letters that there are some sites that are projected for 30, but really to make it feasible, they're asking to increase the density to 90, to at least 90. I FOUND A COUPLE OF HARBOR BOULEVARD LOCATIONS THAT ARE AT 30.

YEAH. THAT'S IN RELATION TO THAT AFOREMENTIONED PROPERTY 2850 HARBOR. IT IS A MEASURE K SITE. IT IS NOT A HOUSING ELEMENT SITE. SO THE DENSITY THAT WAS STUDIED IN THE EIR AND WHAT WE'LL DISCUSS IN THE NEXT ITEM TONIGHT, IT WAS STUDIED UNDER 30 DWELLING UNITS TO THE ACRE.

We could.

There are other options. And why I reached out to Mr. Griffin and suggested things like state density bonus law avoid a potential recirculation of the draft EIR or potentially studying a higher density just given where we are in the process and getting towards the end. There might be other opportunities. State density bonus law is kind of an umbrella term. But there are other state legislations that could possibly be utilized to bring that density up, including being added to the housing element, AND UTILIZING A HANDFUL OF BILLS. NOW, THOSE HAVE REQUIREMENTS FOR AFFORDABILITY COMPONENT WHICH IS WHY WE WOULD CONTINUE THE DISCUSSION AND TRY TO COME UP WITH MAYBE SOME POSSIBLE ALTERNATIVES FOR A FUSIBLE PROJECT.

OKAY, GREAT. SO THEY WOULD HAVE POTENTIAL TO INCREASE THEIR DENSITY. AND THEN THE LETTER WE RECEIVED FROM McCRAE PROPERTIES I'M SURE THAT'S ALSO BEEN INCORPORATED IN ONE OF THE ALREADY COLOR COATED IN OUR MAP.

APOLOGIES.

Maybe I didn't see that public comment. From Anne McCray, McCray Properties LLC. She just mentioned there's one lot that was included, the second lot wasn't, but she wants both parcels to be included as housing element.

Yeah, Commissioner Andrade, thank you for that question. Some of the properties that she's seeking to add to the housing element are not Measure K properties. So we're in the same situation as some of the other property owners. BUT SHE HAS REACHED OUT TO US IN THE PAST ABOUT SITES THAT ARE IN THE HOUSING ELEMENT. SO GOT IT. THANK YOU.

ALL RIGHT. COMMISSIONER ANDRADE, IT SAYS YOU'VE GOT A MOTION. DID YOU JUST ACCIDENTALLY HIT ANOTHER ONE? OKAY. ALL RIGHT. SOMEONE WANT TO MAKE A MOTION?

OKAY. WE'LL GO AHEAD AND MOVE IT. MAKE THE MOTION.

WHAT IS YOUR MOTION?

Find that the project is consistent with City Council adopted resolution, certifying mitigated negative declaration, and adopting the mitigation monitoring reporting program. Recommend the City Council adopt resolution to approve the general plan amendment.

All right. Motion by Commissioner Andrade. Is there a second? Commissioner Martinez. Okay. Commissioner Andrade, would you like to speak to your motion?

Yes, thank you. It's been a long time coming. I really appreciate the staff and consultants that have been working on this project, the extensive community outreach and connections and relationships with the developers that are interested, curious, qualified, don't qualify, and all of that. So really appreciate the hard work and incorporating also the CAP. It was great to see that that was also peppered into this as well, prioritizing green space where opportunities lie. Yeah, so thank you for all your hard work. Looking forward to how City Council moves forward with this.

Commissioner Martinez, would you like to speak to your second?

First, I'll request the maker of the motion for two minor amendments, friendly amendments, if she would agree. First, in the second staff recommendation, where it says direct staff to incorporate revisions in response, et cetera, make it say direct staff to incorporate minor revisions in response to HCD and public comment.

Good? OF COURSE.

AND THEN SECOND JUST REQUEST AND THEN SECOND JUST REQUEST WELL I GUESS THIS WOULD BE AN WELL I GUESS THIS WOULD BE AN ITEM NUMBER THREE TO REQUEST ITEM NUMBER THREE TO REQUEST STAFF TO MEET WITH MR. GRIFFIN STAFF TO MEET WITH MR. GRIFFIN ABOUT THE PROPERTY ON Okay, cool. And with that, yeah, this item, very big item, I'd like to thank staff for all of their work in putting this together. I know when we first sent over the March, I guess it was probably February for us, but the previous amendment to the housing element, my first priority was to get us a certified housing element. And that is my number one goal. I would really like a certified housing element because Right now, I guess technically, we're subject to the builder's remedy. We want to be able to maintain this planning and permitting power, and having a certified housing element could help guarantee that. This plan... helps it'll streamline the process for a lot of new different parcels with our previous approval of the mood for housing element sites. It really streamlines this this new housing and permitting and all of that, all of the processes for these 94, 90 plus different sites. So hopeful that we can finally at last get a certified housing element, please. And with that, I will support this motion.

All right. Any other comments? Vice Chair Zik.

Thank you. I won't support the motion. I haven't supported this housing element since the beginning. You know, one of my favorite movies is Groundhog Day. If you haven't seen it, I think you'd find it entertaining. This feels like that to me. Having a certified housing element sounds pretty important. Sounds like it's a legal requirement. And in the very beginning, we were told We can't get there from here unless we get rid of Measure Y. Four years ago we did that. That wasn't enough. Then we were told we can't get there from here. We need an inclusionary housing ordinance. So we worked on that for a while. Then we were told we still can't get there from here. I've heard that maybe our sober living ordinance is now a stumbling block. That doesn't even account for this problem with property owners learning about the dilemma they found themselves in by being on the list of properties and having to go through that maturation. Now, I mean, I can't recommend it because what's in front of me isn't going to be what's in front of council. You know, I don't know. I've never liked sending incomplete work products from here with a recommendation to council for approval. Is it 98% complete? Maybe. 99? Maybe? 90? Maybe? I don't know. I don't even know what the list of properties looks like. We haven't even settled on that. No, I can't... I can't recommend this. This isn't even what the community wants. You know, this whole thing started with arena allocation that was significantly higher than even our own city planners at the time. None of them are still here. They've all moved on. But even they said it was too high, and they appealed to the state. wrote an incredibly detailed, very factually supported letter. Other Orange County cities did that too. We were denied. State says, do what we told you to do. Isn't what we wanted to do. So Measure Y came along to still protect us, but then they said, no, we gotta get rid of that. So Measure K came along. And this has always been a sore point, and every time we're gonna have this thing in front of us, I'm gonna have to bring it up. Because Measure K was sold. It was sold to the residents as the answer to all our problems. You may remember getting this flyer. Probably got it multiple times. You remember maybe getting this flyer. You got this multiple times. These came from the city. These were official city documents pushing us to approve Measure K. By the way, it passed by 22 votes through a very interesting but legal process called ballot curing. Look it up if you're unfamiliar with that process. By 22 votes, this thing passed. This document that I'm holding up from the city, from us to you, said these are the facts about Measure K. Not this is what we hope it's gonna do. These are the facts. This is what it is gonna do. That's what a fact means to me. We're gonna preserve residential neighborhoods. If you already live in the city in a residential neighborhood, that fact was really important to you. That's, of course, until SB 9, SB 10, AB 68, AB 881, AB 976, AB 1332, and AB 2097 came along from the state. Those are all attacks on your precious residential neighborhood. Is it the city's fault that the state did that when they promised it in K? Maybe not. Next promise, revitalize commercial and industrial corridors. Now that sounds like a great thing. I'm all for that. We're gonna revitalize our commercial and industrial corridors. Now is that the same thing as saying we're gonna replace them with high-rise, high-density residential? Yeah, it's not exactly the same. But somebody might say, well, that's what revitalization sounds like. But in the fact sheet, what it says is we're going to attract new businesses and revitalize a major corridor. Places like along Harbor Boulevard. Businesses, not housing. But now the Nissan dealership is empty. I'm a little concerned about that. Automotive is our number two highest tax revenue source to the city. The goose that lays the golden egg, we've got to take care of that goose. We're going to create affordable housing opportunities to meet the community needs. That's a fact. Well, what's preventing us from doing that? Well, the regulations, they create barriers. And this measure creates affordable housing. Okay, we've heard a lot about it. We haven't seen much. Protect the environment and open space. OK, I guess. The next promise, there's six of them total. The fifth promise is we are going to maintain local control. Well, if you've been paying attention, that is the last thing we still have is local control. whether it's RHNA, whether it's the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance. These aren't things we have control over. SB9, protecting our R1 neighborhoods, we have no control over that. And then we're going to require developers, this is the last fact, we're going to require developers to pay fees to mitigate traffic, to mitigate traffic. not cut down lanes on a road and put barriers in the street to slow people down. That isn't what that means. Those are the things we're doing, but that isn't what this means. And it says developers will have to pay their fair share to improve and acquire open space. Acquire open space. Excellent. It's a fact. You can take it to the bank. Nope, I'm a hard no on this one.

Right. Commissioner Dixon.

Thank you. And I'm not going to do a substitute motion tonight because I think we have a good motion and a second along with some commentary. I'm not going to be supporting this as well. And not because I'm just against what's, we need to certify our housing element. But I think we have to be realistic with how we got here. And To the credit of the staff sitting in front of me, you inherited this problem. And I get it. And Director Tai, this has been going on for years before this team was assembled and before this process started. But we've blown either intentionally or by unintentional or malfeasance or just Forgetfulness, we've blown so many deadlines and so many responses. It's documented in the HC letters to us. And so we do have a court. We've never read a mandate. I don't know the legal status of the trigger and what our timing is on that exactly. For approval of this, it says July 16, 120 days from that. Like Vice Chair Zick, I can't move something forward that's not final. And I can't recommend something that's not final. And there's a lot of internal inconsistencies. I know those will be fixed. I know we've noted some of them tonight. And I think that a lot of those will be fixed and a lot of this will be updated. But at the same time, you know, we are rushing just headlong into this. there are enough questions and there are enough issues here that I think that we can take the little bit of extra time like I was going to make a motion before I just was sitting here staring at it to do the continue to a date certain so that we can address some of the comments that were brought up tonight in the most expeditious fashion sort of clean up some of this stuff and get some of it more consistent and I just I we're headlong rushing into things that have dramatic implications. We already saw where the housing element process basically sunk Fairview with the 920 number, the 40% of, again, that number disappeared immediately. And then now we're going to be rezoning as a part of this whole process. Everything that's the housing element sites can have the mood applied to it. And we haven't really done the analysis that is necessary to I THINK FOR EACH OF THESE INDIVIDUALS, WE SHOULD HAVE SOME FLEXIBILITY LIKE THE FOLKS WHO TALKED ABOUT TONIGHT AND WE SHOULD HAVE SOME ABILITY TO, YOU KNOW, WE TOOK THIS ONE SIZE FIT ALL MOOD AND THE IMPLICATION IS THE HOUSING ELEMENT WILL, THE MOOD WILL APPLY TO THAT, THOSE SITES. WE TAKE THIS ONE SIZE FIT ALL WHERE WE USED TO HAVE A BUNCH OF DIFFERENT OVERLAY ZONES, A BUNCH OF SUB ZONES OF DIFFERENT SPECIFIC PLANS AND I THINK WE NEED TO HAVE A LITTLE MORE SPECIFICITY AND A LITTLE MORE CARE AND CONCERN ABOUT THE FUTURE OF OUR CITY. And I'm glad Commissioner Andrade brought up the comment from, I apologize, from Austin Madison, I believe. He's got a great line in here, which I think is 100% applicable to why we should just give this a little more time. The question before you should not just be how many units we can build, but what kind of city will remain once they are built. Once our unique character, local businesses, and authentic culture are lost, they cannot be rebuilt. That's true. And I think that what we're doing here is we're sacrificing the character and what makes Costa Mesa a great place to live on the altar of the most units possible without taking into consideration the corresponding quality of life impacts that the most units possible will have. We're moving into an area where nobody has ever, no member of the public has ever said, I want less open space. Never. In fact, I used to have a meme when I was on the city council, a red circle with a line through it, resign Dixon. Because we're approving the three-unit live works that had allowances for less open space due to the nature of the project. Now we're talking about making that into a citywide blanket thing for housing element sites. And I just think that this is a rush forward. I don't think that we've had enough buy-in. And I think that there's enough triggering things in this housing element that relate to other parts of our our planning processes that we should slow down just a little bit and make sure that it's internally consistent, that we have all the I's dotted and the T's crossed. I'm not saying months and months and months because I know we're under a deadline, but I cannot in good conscience approve something to the city council with so many unanswered questions and things that remain outstanding. So that's my comment.

All right. Any other comments, commissioners? I WILL CONCLUDE BY SAYING I SUPPORT THE MOTION. I APPRECIATE THE CONCERN AND APPREHENSION OF SOME OF MY COLLEAGUES. BUT I AM COMFORTABLE ENOUGH WITH WHAT WE HAVE HERE AND I RECOGNIZE THIS IS A VERY FLUID AND UNUSUAL SITUATION. THIS WHOLE HOUSING ELEMENT HAS SEEN TWISTS AND TURNS. LEGAL DECISIONS THAT HAVE HAD IMPACTS THAT NONE OF US ANTICIPATED AND I ALWAYS SUBSCRIBE TO THE IDEA THAT I DON'T WANT THE PERFECT TO BE THE ENEMY OF THE GOOD AND I THINK WHAT WE HAVE HERE IS AT LEAST GOOD ENOUGH NOT NECESSARILY FOR ME PERSONALLY BUT GOOD ENOUGH FOR THE CITY COUNCIL TO CONSIDER AND I DON'T WANT TO REHASH THE SAME COMMENTS I MADE LAST WEEK which kind of would go to your point about Groundhog Day. I feel like it is a similar comment, but this is for the city council to make a final decision about. And I think they have enough information and they can look at the analysis that we've done and whatever concerns we have and take that into consideration. And I'm sure they will. So with that, I'd like to call for the question.

MOTION CARRIES 5-2 WITH VICE CHAIR ZICK AND COMMISSIONER DIXON VOTING NO.

ALL RIGHT. DOES ANYBODY NEED A BREAK OR CAN WE POWER THROUGH? YES, BREAK? NO, POWER THROUGH. OKAY. POWER THROUGH? ALL RIGHT. WE HAVE NO OLD BUSINESS. WE HAVE ONE NEW BUSINESS ITEM. MS. TRUAN, WILL YOU PLEASE READ THE TITLE FOR THAT?

This is the study session to introduce proposed neighborhoods where we all belong, zoning code amendments, citywide multifamily residential and mixed use objective design standards, and proposed repealing of urban plans, amendments to the following elements of the Costa Mesa general plan. Circulation, community design, land use, noise, and open space and recreation, amendments to the Newport Boulevard specific plan, North Coast Mesa specific plan, and One Metro West specific plan. Presentation by Ms. Halligan, senior planner.

Good evening, Ms. Halligan. You have the floor.

Thank you for that extra time. Good evening, Chair Harlan, Vice Chair Zick, and Commissioners. I'm Michelle Halligan, Senior Planner with the City of Costa Mesa. So tonight we are having a study session to review proposed amendments to the zoning code, three specific plans, and five general plan elements, as well as new objective design standards. This all is part of the Neighborhoods Where We All Belong effort. There will be a brief background, like a refresher on the Path 1 to expedite housing element site compliance, and Path 2 to rezone the balance of Measure K sites and make other zoning code amendments and objective design standards. We'll also go over community visioning, the program environmental impact report, and next steps. So as a refresher, Neighborhoods Where We All Belong is the city's name for a series of actions to implement the housing element. The housing element, as we just learned, is required to identify sites to address the arena. And in Costa Mesa, updating zoning and land use is enabled by Measure K. So Measure K was a housing element program for a ballot measure to allow the city to change the zoning and land use on certain industrial and commercial sites. And that's including but not limited to housing element sites. In 2022, the city adopted the housing element and Measure K passed. The following year, HCD confirmed that the housing element met statutory requirements, but the rezoning is necessary for statutory compliance. In 2025, the city kicked off neighborhoods where we all belong. There were several months of data collection, analysis, and round one of community visioning. In March, we formally bifurcated the effort into two paths. One expedited the rezoning of housing element sites via an overlay. and Path 2, which would increase development opportunities on non-housing element measure case sites, new housing element sites, improve the zoning code, establish objective design standards, and so on. In April, the City Council had the second reading to adopt Path 1. Then in May, we shared draft amendments to the zoning codes, specific plans, and general plan elements. And in June, we conducted the third round of community outreach, shared the draft program EIR, as well as the draft housing element revision. Okay, so Path 1 was intended to expedite the rezoning of the remaining housing element sites by applying the mixed-use overlay district, except for the Fairview Development Center, which is going through its own specific plan process. But today, we are working on Path 2, so I'd like to reintroduce you to Kathy Tang-Sias, the project manager for DUDEC, our consultant on this effort.

Thank you, Michelle, and good evening, planning commissioners. So I'm going to walk you through path two, which consists of addressing the balance of measure case sites. So those are all the non-housing element sites. and the implementation of other housing element programs that were not adopted earlier this year. So I'll go through each of these in more detail. The mood, updates to the general plan and specific plans, updates to the zoning code, and then preparation of new objective design standards, next. So first is the mood. A refresher again that the mood is the primary means of rezoning measure case sites. So that includes both housing element sites and non-housing element sites. Remember that the mood, as Ana mentioned earlier tonight, that the mood is an overlay. It's a zoning overlay. So it means that it applies additional optional zoning regulations in addition to those of the base or the underlying zones. BUT AS ANNA MENTIONED EARLIER, FOR HOUSING ELEMENT SITES, THAT IS NOT AN OPTION. THE MOOD BECOMES THE DEFAULT ZONING. SO IF AND WHEN A HOUSING ELEMENT SITE IS REDEVELOPED, IT MUST COMPLY WITH THE MOOD TO PROVIDE HOUSING AS REQUIRED. Unlike in Path 1, where we only surgically inserted a new section into the mood to address housing element sites, and that's what you saw back in March slash April, Path 2 is different. Path 2 is a comprehensive restructuring of the entire mood. So this is Article 11 of Chapter 5 of your zoning code. And the reasons for this are as follows. We're sunsetting the existing urban plans CODIFYING OR INCORPORATING THEM, THEIR APPLICABLE REGULATIONS DIRECTLY INTO THE ZONING CODE. WHEN WE LAST SPOKE WITH YOU BACK IN I BELIEVE IT WAS DECEMBER, WE SHARED WITH YOU JUST HOW CONVOLUTED THE EXISTING URBAN PLANS ARE. SO THIS PROCESS NOW, PATH TWO, IS COMPREHENSIVELY RESTRUCTURING THAT AND SUNSETTING THOSE URBAN PLANS. So as a refresher, the urban plans, while they're these separate standalone documents, while they're going away, their intent and their requirements are not. They're getting folded into the zoning code in a way that makes it easier for someone to reference when developing a project. SECOND, WE'RE MODERNIZING THOSE REGULATIONS. WE'RE ADDING NEW REGULATIONS AND JUST STREAMLIGHTING EVERYTHING IN A GENERAL ORDER SO THAT IT BETTER REFLECTS TODAY'S NEEDS AND MARKET FOR MIXED USE AND HOUSING AND MORE ON THAT IN A MINUTE. NEXT. SO A FEW COMPONENTS OF THE MOOD LOOK LIKE THIS. SO FIRST, PERMITTED USES. The mood will allow multifamily housing, live work, as it does, already does today, commercial uses, institutional uses, and open space. All of this for the reason of encouraging what we're saying is more complete neighborhoods, where housing and other compatible uses can coexist and work together to allow people to live, work, shop, play in that neighborhood. This helps to promote walking, reduce traffic, encourage economic development, and create more livable places. Next. The MOOD will regulate new development by density and building height. So density is established by what we're calling subareas, which play an ode to the existing urban plan. So you'll see a subarea for Mesa West Bluffs, 19 West, Newport Boulevard, Harbor Boulevard, Sobeka, and North Coast to Mesa. And these maximum residential densities range from 20 to 90 Ds per acre. And the maximum allowable building height corresponds to that density. So most of the mood is set to 60 feet high, which, by the way, is the maximum allowable height today throughout the mood and the urban plans. And then we've increased that max height for greater densities consistent with HCD guidelines. Next. The mood will regulate setbacks or the separation or the distance between buildings and developments. So here of note is the requirement for the front setback where we have both a minimum and a maximum setback. So the minimum being how far the building should be set back from the street. And the maximum here is intended to disallow buildings that are too far from the street and instead require that they engage the street, front the street, interact with the street. So this is in contrast, this is how some projects today are designed or developed where they're set back too far, and instead, maybe for example, locate a parking lot between the building and the street. And this creates less safe, less vibrant places. Another thing worth noting here is the minimum 10-foot setback between mood projects and residential zones. We were previously showing 20 feet, but have since revised that to 10 feet, given more analysis of how the mood interacts with the objective design standards. And I'll go into that deeper in a few slides. Next. The mood will require three kinds of open space. Private open space, so those are balconies, terraces, porches, and patios that are private and specific to one unit. Common open space are areas like shared parks or terraces or decks or other amenities that are shared amongst tenants or residents of a project. And publicly open space. These are areas that are open to the general public, so they can be large plazas, large parks, or paseos. Note that while we've established a minimum required amount for each, there's flexibility to provide all or portions of each across other categories. So this gives the developer and the designer flexibility to figure out where best to place it, depending on site constraints or the market or the needs of those particular tenants or residents of the project. Next. And lastly, the mood will have other provisions. So for example, with regards to parking, no minimum parking will be required. This is consistent with the direction that the city council gave for the housing element earlier this year. This does not mean that no parking will be allowed or built. It just means that the city will not be requiring an arbitrary minimum amount of it. As a best practice, we're seeing this in other cities. This provides a developer and the designer again flexibility to provide it as they see fit based on site and market conditions. The mood will also require studies, fees, and other improvements. So for example, mood projects will be required to prepare what's called a phase one environmental assessment to look at any potential hazardous conditions on site. A traffic study will also be required, and a noise study will also be required. They will also be required to pay certain impact fees. And in other cases, they'll be required to construct improvements to the sidewalk, for example. Next. The second set of updates are related to the general plan and some specific plans. So in order to reflect this update, this comprehensive update to the mood, the sunsetting of the urban plans and the rezoning of the Measure K sites, we've amended multiple elements of the general plan with most of the edits going into the land use element. So these are all surgical updates meant to insert just the necessary language where appropriate and remove other languages necessary. Next. Likewise, we've done the same with three specific plans. So the Newport Boulevard specific plan, the North Coast and Mesa specific plan, and one Metro West specific plan. Again, surgical updates while keeping intact the development potential and the rights of properties in these specific plan areas while also applying the MOOD. in other words there are certain properties in these plan areas that have more development capacity or potential by using the specific plan than by using the mood. So in an effort not to take away those rights the inserted language into these plans clarifies that the more permissive provision for density and height can apply. Back to Michelle.

So we are proposing to make amendments to 19 areas of Costa Mesa zoning code that's title 13. to implement the housing element, be compliant with state law, to improve how it's utilized, and for consistency with replacing the urban plans with the mood. But of those 19 areas of change, nine of them are simply to remove a reference to the urban plan, sometimes replacing it with the mood, and others are just to add a reference to the new objective design standards. So some of the examples of things that we're proposing to change are updating and adding to definitions, expanding the base zones to which the mood can be applied, clarifying how planning applications are processed in line with state law, reorganizing the land use matrix alphabetically within use categories, updating the ADU ordinance for compliance, and adding some objective design standards to our residential development standards. We've also added a section to the residential common interest development article to accommodate condominiums and condo conversions because that potential was established in the Mesa West residential ownership urban plan. We also are expanding the mood, as Kathy spoke about, to enable the sunsetting of the urban plans and to incorporate provisions for housing element and non-housing element sites. We've reformatted a residential parking table simply to improve the use by staff and the public. Other proposed amendments include updating the density bonus ordinance for compliance with state law and to identify local criteria. And other amendments listed on the slide are really about removing references to urban plans and to incorporate references to the new multifamily residential and mixed use objective design standards. I am pleased to report that the city received a Southern California Association of Governments Regional Early Action Planning Grant to implement five housing element programs. This includes the amendments to the ADU ordinance, the density bonus ordinance, identifying environmental justice general plan policies, compliance with SB4, which Ana touched on earlier tonight, which is housing opportunities on faith-based and non-profit educational sites, and affordable housing incentives. Now I'd like to invite Kathy back to share information about the proposed objective design standards.

All right, the last set of updates includes the objective design standards. So these are new requirements for new multifamily and mixed use developments citywide. So not just within the mood, but citywide. These aren't development standards, which are the typical requirements that affect the capacity or the envelope of a project. So how many units, how much area, how many stories, how much open space, those belong in the respective sections of the zoning code development standards. These are design standards that are focused on the design of projects. So the look, the feel, and the function in some cases. So the shape and the mass of the project, the windows, the entries, the circulation. And the reasons for the preparation of these objective design standards, they're necessary for a couple of reasons. One is to comply with state law. This is how multifamily projects must be reviewed and approved using objective criteria, not involving, quote, personal or subjective judgment by a public official. This is all in order to make it more standard, more easy, more predictable to both design and develop projects, but also review and improve them on the city side. So this is all to comply with state law. But two, it's also to enable the kind of projects that are desired for Costa Mesa, based on what we heard from the community, and I'll get to that more in a second. NOTE THAT A PART OF THIS EXERCISE WAS ALSO TO FOLD IN SOME OF THE APPLICABLE REQUIREMENTS FROM THE CITY'S EXISTING RESIDENTIAL DESIGN GUIDELINES. AGAIN, TO COMPLY WITH STATE LAW, WE'VE TRANSLATED THOSE SUBJECTIVE REQUIREMENTS INTO OBJECTIVE ONES HERE. SO THAT SAID, THE OBJECTIVE DESIGN STANDARDS INCLUDE STANDARDS FOR BUILDING DESIGN AS WELL AS SITE DESIGN. NEXT. So for building designs, the standards address topics like upper story setbacks. I mentioned earlier that we wanted to make sure that the mood and the objective design standards don't conflict, but instead work with each other. So this was one place that required some thinking. So in the mood, we have a certain minimum setback requirement that projects need to meet. In addition, the objective design standards will require upper levels, so three stories and above, to set back an additional distance. This is to further enable a separation privacy buffer between mood projects and residential zones. So R1, R2, R3. We also have standards about facade breaks and modulation. So this is intended to break up what would otherwise be a perceived big mass or a long length of certain buildings. So we don't get really long monotonous structures, but instead have variation in scale and facade. Another one is about transitional entry spaces. So ground floor units will be required to provide areas for porches, for stoops, to better buffer or separate them from the street, but also to promote visibility and safety on the ground level. Next. And for site design, some of the topics include the location of parking. So this goes hand in hand with the maximum front sent back that I mentioned earlier. Here we're disallowing parking to be the main thing that you see along the street and instead requiring it to be at the rear of the lot or located behind a building. So instead the building is the main feature of a project. We're also recognizing the potential for large redevelopments and thus we want to disallow these mega block sort of projects. So requiring the breaking down of sites by using private streets that act like public streets to better promote accessibility and flow throughout a site. And then there are other provisions about open space and landscape to pair with what's required in the mood, for example. So if a project is providing private, common, or publicly accessible open space, the objective design standards will regulate the dimensions, the location, and other details about how these spaces function. Next. With all that said, know that the mood and the objective design standards and the updates to the other documents we just mentioned were not done in a vacuum. The drafting of those documents was done in parallel with talking to the community, consulting with city departments like public works and transportation, as well as the state with regards to housing element sites, all the while ensuring that we comply with state law. So this was done over the course of about a year and a half. three rounds of community visioning, 700-some community members, eight events and workshops, 12 pop-ups, seven focused discussions with stakeholders, in addition to email blasts, social media posts, postcards, website updates, and more. The city did a lot to reach out to the community. And I just want to reflect here or highlight here that the efforts of this community visioning effort for round one actually won an award by the American Planning Association Orange County sector and was a finalist for another award. But I want to extend a big thank you to staff and everyone who helped get the word out. But most importantly, I want to thank the hundreds of community members that took the time to engage with us. to talk to us, to share their feedback, concerns, ideas, and aspirations. Their input has been invaluable to this process. Next. And that work is reflected in what you see here today. So the mood and the objective design standards, in particular, because those are the most tangible, they're meant to reflect the community's input for a better Costa Mesa. A broad goal, but a goal nonetheless for the future of Costa Mesa. We heard that they want to balance growth with infrastructure, address parking and traffic, ensure we have third places where the community can gather, all the while keeping Costa Mesta eclectic. So our team did our best to reflect these priorities in the zoning regulations you see before you, while also, again, balancing the need to comply with state law. Turn it back to Michelle.

Thanks, Kathy. So we've heard a lot about the housing element tonight, so I won't go through each program in detail. But what I did want to point out is that the city has made major progress in implementing the housing element. The Neighborhoods Where We All Belong effort is going to implement 23 housing element programs. And then here we have a reminder that the city is preparing a program environmental impact report. This is a high level evaluation of environmental impacts that is appropriate for a project such as this that doesn't have a specific development project to analyze. Housing element sites are still exempt from CEQA via SB 131. However, the city is continuing to study the potential impacts of applying the MOOD to both Measure K sites and housing element sites, except for the Fairview Developmental Center. And this is done for full disclosure and mitigation. The PEIR horizon is the year 2056, so we're looking at build-out taking 30 years. The draft PEIR public comment period took place June 16th through August 13th, and we are in the process of responding to public comments and then preparing the final EIR. It's expected to be published in September. There are some other next big steps. We are tentatively scheduled to present an airport land use commission overrule to the city council on September 1st to address ALUC's comments. We are tentatively scheduled to bring neighborhoods where we all belong updates back to the planning commission on September 14th. And we anticipate taking neighborhoods where we all belong to the city council on October 6th. Thank you all for listening. This concludes staff's study session presentation. Staff and our consultants from DUDEC are available to answer your questions.

Thank you very much. Commissioners, questions of staff? Vice Chair Zick?

All right. One of the things you mentioned was that there will be, in the very first part of your presentation, traffic study, noise study, and then later in your presentation you mentioned the program EIR. Is it safe to assume that if there are significant impacts that are found that are unavoidable, that our response to that will be similar to the response that we had to the EAR for FTC, where we go, good to know, too bad about that, can't do anything about it, let's go ahead and start construction. Or would we look at the traffic study and go, oh no, that's bad, that's an impact, therefore we won't do that project.

So Vice Chair Zick, are you talking about the program level EIR because we will have significant and unavoidable impacts since we're looking at this broad scale or are you talking about the future like individual development projects?

Oh, either. If we see significant impacts that are unavoidable, do we just sort of like make a note of that and say good to know and move on?

So in a program level EIR, you will find a lot of significant and unavoidable impacts and we try to mitigate those wherever feasible. But again, we don't know where these specific in development projects will be located and what the proposed details will be So those projects will be asked to go through a phase one site assessment Prepare a noise study and a traffic study to help us understand You know what's going on at that project level once those applications are received.

Okay, and my next question is When you mentioned, I've asked this before, but I don't remember your answer. It gives you an opportunity to give me a fresh answer. We remove parking minimums from developments under the premise that the developer knows how much parking his project will need. Well, and presumably what other people say is not scientific. You know, I've heard that. Is there any constraint that we put on the developer that prevents parking impacts from their inadequate planning for parking to spill out onto our streets or adjacent neighborhoods or properties? Or do we simply accept the fact that there's no minimums, it's up to the developer, if he gets it wrong and there's impacts to others, That's just another one of those unavoidable, sorry, nothing we can do.

So Vice Chair Zik, I just want to clarify for the non-residential uses in our mixed use developments that they would be subject to the parking requirements. But as proposed in the mood today, we would not have minimum parking standards for the residential components.

Right, that was where my question was centered.

So here in Costa Mesa, when we've run into those parking issues, we look at them on a case-by-case basis and see how we can assist.

I see.

Yeah, and it can be part of the traffic study, but typically what we see here in Costa Mesa is once a project's built, then you have a better idea. And it's something we deal with with our existing shopping centers today. Some of our restaurants are especially popular, and we find ways to work with those property owners to address the issue.

Okay, I just have two other questions. When you were talking about community visioning, I was wondering about this requirement of a maximum setback of 20 feet. Where did that come from? Did that come from the community?

Thank you for the question Commissioner Zick. That comes from a couple of places. So it predominantly comes from best practices that we're seeing in planning today where we have recognized the The consequences of planning for the past 50, 100 years where we've been planning for cars as opposed to people, placing parking as the primary feature of a project instead of the building or a building entrance. So we're seeing a lot of cities move away from that and go more towards featuring the building. So a maximum setback is one way to do that. The other place that that new requirement comes from is, yes, what we heard from the community, that they want more livable, walkable places. They want to be able to live nearby, walk to a coffee shop, walk to school, walk to a grocery store. And that is easier and safer and more accessible and comfortable to do if you're walking alongside a building as opposed to a parking lot or a parking structure with cars constantly going in and out.

Why would we put a maximum setback and not leave that up to the developer? Maybe they don't want to feature their building right up against the street. Maybe they want their customers to be able to come off the street, park, and go to the business, not have to go around behind the building, wherever the parking lot might be. Why would we not leave it up to the developer?

So the requirement would require the developer, the architect, the designer, to not feature the parking for the reason that I just stated. So that parking, the movement of cars, the visibility of cars, the...

predominance of cars is not the main feature of the project and instead the people are the main building entrances are the building is I understand your philosophy on that thank you my last question you are estimating the council approval by October is that to beat the election what if this took until December January is that acceptable. IF WE NEEDED MORE STUDY SESSIONS, MORE DIALOGUE, MORE INTERACTION WITH THE COMMUNITY, IF THAT PUSHED US OUT OR ARE WE ON A STRICT SCHEDULE WITH THIS ONE?

WE'VE BEEN ON A SCHEDULE THROUGHOUT THE PROJECT AND WE'RE DOING A GREAT JOB OF MAINTAINING OUR SCHEDULES. SO WE WERE HOPING TO HAVE THIS WRAPPED UP IN OCTOBER.

OKAY. THANK YOU. THAT'S ALL I'VE GOT.

COMMISSIONER DIXON.

IS THERE A BREAKDOWN OF THE COMMENTS RECEIVED? ARE THEY IN THE APPENDIX SOMEWHERE WHERE YOU CAN SEE EXACTLY WHO COMMENTED ABOUT WHAT AND WHAT THEY SAID?

specific to neighborhoods where we all belong yeah in our outreach summary so it's available on the website and it there's an appendix that's attached to it that goes into great detail but is that the staff's interpretation of the post-its that were stuck up and the conversations that were had or is that what people actually said in letters or surveys um we had we've copied from letters we copied from their comment cards wherever possible but for spoken comments we did have to provide some you know just summarizing okay

Okay, that's my question for right now. One more thing on the publicly accessible open space. So I can see that like for instance, let's just say over by anywhere where there's a place where people gather at lunch or whatever, if it's a private development that has picnic tables or some other area, it could be a shopping center, like it could be Metro Point, it could be something like that. If there's not a public recorded easement of some sort, will the property owner be able to dictate or determine what happens in that open space? So if I wanted to go set up a pickup soccer game in the middle of Metro Point, could I do that under this, under the publicly accessible open space?

I'm not sure if I understand the question but I will say that the publicly accessible open space is intended we know that it will be privately owned privately managed privately operated but it's intended to be accessible and open to the general public so the requirements in the objective design standards there are. pretty detailed requirements as to how long it should be open to the day or hours of operation and how it should be accessible to the general public. But to your question about someone coming in and setting up a soccer game, I suppose that would depend on the size of the space and the use of the space.

What I'm trying to get at is that, and it could be soccer, it could be badminton, it could be model rocketry, who knows, but it's... It's a privately controlled public space that has significant liability and security and other implications for the private property owner. And so I'm just trying to understand if we're giving, if we're, for instance, one of the things that was talked about in the presentation was that we could give up all of the private open space if the developer discerned that they wanted to convert all the private open space to publicly accessible open space. So the nature of that open space is critically important. If it's a controlled area with security guards and stuff like that, like Fashion Island or South Coast Plaza or Metro Point or even a large apartment complex, if I walk into the Coronado at Newport and just sit down in the middle of their pool and start reading a book or playing music or whatever, They could tell me to leave, but under this scenario, what would be the implications of that?

So again, in the objective design standards, there are more details about the use of that space. So if it's common open space that they're replacing, there are requirements to the common open space that they be open, available, accessible to the tenants and the residents. So that would still transition if they're converting that. not so much with the private since that would only be attached to a separate dwelling unit, but with regards to accessibility, to access, location, and hours of operation, that's spelled out in the requirements.

Commissioner Dixon, just to add to that, larger projects that provide publicly accessible open space usually have some sort of maintenance agreement as well, and that's another opportunity for the city to further detail, like Security safety concerns. What is what what are the hours of public accessibility? So some some public accessibility space open spaces are only accessible to the public during you know, normal daytime hours So they lock up at night. So there's different, you know scenarios where we can include that into a maintenance agreement to be more specific Okay.

Thank you. And then the other question I had was regarding oh Gosh now I lost it As far as the town center application of the mood to the town center general plan or zoning current zoning district That is a very tightly controlled specific plan sub area and it's been it's been that way for quite some time and so that seems like a Was that covered was that has that been thoroughly discussed with all of the stakeholders and property owners and everybody over there and

Commissioner Dixon so the mood is something that the property owner would have to opt into and if they're within the North Coast and Mesa Specific plan we've added some language to help to help those property owners and navigate that situation But they could be advantageous for them to opt into the mood or they may have more flexible standards through their own specific plan And so for the sites that aren't housing element sites It would really be up to them if they want to choose to opt into the mood and the limitations that it has okay

All right, thank you. All right. Any more questions?

Commissioner Martinez. I've got questions and comments sprinkled throughout. So if you want, I can do it after public comment.

Let's do questions first and then comments after public comment.

OK. I'll try and separate. OK. I'm looking at the links. And I'm going to go in order of the staff report, but I will reference the language that was linked to in the staff report. And this doesn't have page numbers. So for definitions, zoning district overlay. It says in our proposed definition, the overlay zone supersedes the zoning regulation of the base zoning district. I thought that the point was that they can opt into those zoning regulations and not that they were required to have the regulations of the zoning overlay.

THANK YOU, COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ. WE CAN CLARIFY THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ON HOUSING ELEMENT SITES VERSUS NONHOUSING ELEMENT SITES. I THINK THAT'S A REALLY HELPFUL CHANGE.

YEAH. YEAH. OKAY. M, Chapter 5, Article 1, Residential Districts. Why limit townhomes to just six in a row? Is there a reason that we came up with that number specifically?

Commissioner Martinez, that is a remnant of the city's existing residential design guidelines that the city has had in place for some years now. I believe the intent behind that guideline was to limit what I was saying earlier, these long, what would otherwise be monotonous facades or the walls of buildings. So the residential design guidelines, as they've been functioning and operating in the city, for years is a limit of six. And we've just carried that over to honor that original intent.

So if the intent is to do this stuff about facades, and in our objective design standards, which I'll get to, we talk about these facade regulations. Why not just only subject the townhomes to the facade standards instead of giving them this cap of six?

Commissioner Martinez I wanted to let you know that this is an area that staff has been workshopping We're working. You know we're in advance planning, but we've been working with our current planners, and this was a sticking point for them as well, so it's We're really open to hearing your comments because this is something that we've been kind of going around about figuring out How do we want to implement this is it meaningful and?

Commissioner Martinez I'll just add that some of the discussions that we had about maybe keeping this in were about obviously breaking up the facade providing opportunities for open space for community amenities that maybe like wouldn't be achieved if there weren't these breaks like these larger physical breaks. But I would also remind you that there are still state density bonus concessions and If there's a project where maybe it's a smaller site, it's not really warranted, there could be opportunity to consider a deviation from it.

Got it. Okay. The next one is about residential common interest developments. And here we allow for multifamily essentially to become residential ownership housing. And the way that it's been applied in Costa Mesa, I think of the townhomes. So I think I wanted to ask about... if we look at applicability of the Housing Crisis Act of 2019 and like the very low income and low income current tenants, when we look at these applications and if we should include that process in our municipal code.

Okay, so you didn't specifically ask this, but I'm just going to give you background context for these changes. One of the things that we came up upon on residential common interest developments and in some other cases when we were looking at sunsetting the urban plans is that some of the urban plan or some of the sites that are residential common interest are within Measure K and some are not within Measure K. So just to kind of give you some background context, We did our best to keep all of the development rights that were already existing and make sure that it was, find a way to incorporate them in the code for those sites that were not Measure K, could not be rezoned. So there was a little bit of creative playing with some of the language and some of these codes in order to do that. Residential common interest is definitely one of those examples. I don't know if this is specifically answering your question, but any housing project is gonna be subject to state law requirements. So we are required to look if there's existing residential units, what those rents are, making sure that they comply with HAA, making sure if necessary that there's relocation, tenant protection in place, and that we're meeting all of our requirements for our housing element and state law.

OK. Thank you. OK. Next one in the staff report is the mood. Let me try and separate comments from questions. So in our proposal, we have a bunch of different offsite improvements that we're saying are required. In addition to these offsite improvements, a developer will have to pay the various impact fees that we have. So I guess the question is why have these required off-site improvements if we're also collecting the impact fee, which should in theory pay for improvements roughly in the vicinity of a project.

Commissioner Martinez, we worked with Public Works to develop these. What they've been finding is that the development impacts don't cover all of these things. We see a lot of sites in Costa Mesa where they need to redo their drive approaches, where they need to redo areas out in front of the properties, and there's been a lot of pushback. So we thought that it would be better to build it into the code to ensure that these new projects are actually meeting the needs immediately adjacent to their projects. PROJECTS.

GOT IT. WHAT WOULD AN APPEAL PROCESS FOR THIS LOOK LIKE FOR THE OFFSIDE IMPROVEMENTS?

YOU KNOW, I WOULD LIKE TO GET OUR CITY ENGINEERS THOUGHTS ON THAT BECAUSE IN THE PAST THEY HAVE, I BELIEVE, JUST USED DISCUSSION BUT I'M NOT SURE MOVING FORWARD the amount of flexibility that there would be for an appeal.

So, Commissioner Martinez, in terms of appeal, are you referring to a potential developer who may not consider to adhere to one of the public works conditions and what the proper recourse would be?

Yeah, essentially, yeah.

Okay, so in that type of situation, what we have done in the past is that we work with the developer in terms of their concerns And if the concerns are justified, we usually are able to negotiate and come to an amenable conclusion in terms of fostering what they need.

Got it. Okay. I'll have comments later. Let's see. Okay. So permitted uses within the mood. I'll skip over to theaters for a question. I didn't find it. But theaters, it's specifically broken out into two categories, which is within 200 feet of residential development and outside of 200 feet of residential development. Being a mood project would mean it has housing. So do we mean within 200 feet of residential development other than the project itself?

The permitted uses table for the mood that you're referring to, so motion picture theater within, not within 200 feet and motion picture theaters within 200 feet, it says residential zones. So this is mimicking the same language in the citywide land use matrix. So in this case, residential zones would refer to R1, R2, R3. Given the updated definition of the mood in the zoning code, the mood is an overlay zone, not a residential zone.

Got it. OK. Thank you. Let's see. That's a comment. Oh, yeah. There's setback standards. And one of these was actually presented on site 11. THERE WAS ONE THAT GOT ADDED IN THAT I WAS INTERESTED IN WHICH WAS THE CLAY VALVE 50-FOOT BUFFER. I WANTED TO SEE IF THERE WAS AN EXPLANATION FOR THAT ONE.

OH, SURE. THANKS, COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ. SO AS WE DID OUR DUE DILIGENCE ON DEVELOPING THE MOOD AND GOING THROUGH THE URBAN PLANS, WHAT WE DISCOVERED IS THAT A 50-FOOT BUFFER WAS ESTABLISHED BACK IN 2006 THROUGH CITY COUNCIL ACTION. And we worked with that property owner to make sure that that was codified here. Got it.

Okay. Let's see if I have questions for objective design standards. the upper floor setbacks. I don't have the language in front of me. But it says, roughly, abutting residential zones. So I wanted to confirm, or see if this is wrong, if the upper story setback applies only on a side with a residential zone and not to the entire property. Like the front of the property along the street wouldn't have to have an upper side setback. OK. STAFF?

YOU'RE CORRECT. SO THE UPPER STORY SETBACK WOULD ONLY APPLY TO THE INTERIOR LOT LINES WHEN ABUTTING AN R1, R2 OR R3 ZONE ON THE INTERIOR SIDE.

THANK YOU. THOSE ARE MY QUESTIONS. I'LL HAVE COMMENTS LATER. THANK YOU.

ANY OTHER QUESTIONS OF STAFF COMMISSIONERS? Okay, we'll open public comments. If anybody in chambers would like to come speak on this item, please come down to either podium.

Hi, Casey Griffin. Now that I'm a seasoned vet, maybe I'll do a little better. Point of clarification. We're the South Coast Toyota dealer. We're going to be remodeling that store To be compliant with Toyota's image to brand Kind of during this process we acquired the Nissan property next to Connell Chevrolet and that property And that Nissan dealership has relocated around the corner on the Baker So the that store hasn't left the city. We're still selling Nissan's and But with our staying in place at our current location, it's given us now the opportunity to redevelop 2850 as part of Measure K. I think the only thing in listening to the study was the contemplated design elements are going to eat into density. You're talking about setbacks and building So your 30 units to the acre could conceivably be reduced to 25. So I think there needs to be some consideration in terms of what will the net effect be based on the design criteria and actually what is the maximum density you can actually get from a parcel. We've retained, as I think you are all familiar, Architects Orange. to do a yield study for the site. And they came up with a really big number of units that could be built on the site. But I'm here to tell you that I think what the planning and staff is doing in consideration of what is appropriate for Harbor Boulevard I think is thoughtful and good. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening, Chair Harlan, members of the Planning Commission, staff, and those out in the audience that I've met over a number of years. I'm George Sakayoka, and I'm here representing the Sakayoka Company. I believe I've been to almost every one of the neighborhoods where we all belong outreach events, the workshops, study sessions, neighborhoods, walks, the RENA housing element discussions. And each time that I leave those, I leave excited and optimistic and encouraged because I think we have a tremendous future here in the city of Costa Mesa. It's encouraging to go to those and listening to a lot of things. Also, I come away and I learn new things every time I come, things I was not aware of. We've been here in the city of Costa Mesa since I think the early 50s. We look at things very long term and we're not planning on going anywhere. And so the actions that the city will be taking over the next few months going to transform how the next generation of our family can steward our land in North Costa Mesa. The city's focus on the housing of the future has motivated strongly to start planning for the new housing on our property in North Costa Mesa. We've brought in a development partner and have engaged with a world-class design team from the firm Hart-Howerton. Hart-Howerton specializes in creating new neighborhoods in cities and different environments. We are big supporters of the code revisions that are being proposed here. We think they reflect a high level of design while making thoughtful updates to the city's code to facilitate housing for everyone. There are a few provisions in the mixed-use overlay district and objective design standards we're concerned about. We're starting to engage with the city about them and staff. They've been very helpful and very cooperative. We've had very good back and forths. What I'd like to do also is introduce our development partner, Chris Meaney, with the development firm Wilson Meaney. I've known Chris for almost 20 years plus. I work with Chris on our projects here in Costa Mesa as well. Mussolini specializes in large-scale residential and mixed-use projects in California. We appreciate your time working with staff and the continued cooperation. We are thankful for our relationship we have with the city. I'd like to introduce Chris. All right.

Thank you, Mr. Sakioka.

Take out George. Commissioners, I'm Chris Maney. We've been active developers of mixed-use properties in California for a little over 35 years, and as George said, I've had the great experience of working with his family now for more than 20 years, and we are very excited to help the Sakyokas build their legacy in Costa Mesa. We look forward to introducing you to our team at a future meeting. Until then, I note that as we work with Hart-Howerton, it's really to deliver three objectives from our point of view. In North Costa Mesa, on the Sacayocas land, we want to deliver a great new residential neighborhood that will make Costa Mesa proud. want to satisfy the state housing mandates and we want to create a long-term legacy for the Sakyoka's as I said we will come in more specifically sorry we will come in more specifically with our plans, but there are a couple of things that we just want to call out that we think you might consider, particularly with respect to larger projects. Larger projects have a particular need to build more circulation than smaller infill projects, and we think building some more flexibility into your open space definitions would be appropriate. We also note that, as written now, the street design mandates fairly large streets with 60 feet of dimension, and that we think that as you get into creating more walkable neighborhoods with pedestrian preferences, that you will like to give yourself a little more flexibility. We know this is about the current planning effort, not about our specific project, but note that if we don't get some of these flexibilities in, it won't be possible to meet the housing mandates that have been set forward. Really appreciate your time. Again, look forward to coming and working with you in the future. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. Anyone else in chambers? Mr. Rand, do we have anybody on Zoom or by phone?

No, we do not.

Okay.

I will close public comments. Commissioners, do we have any final comments or questions? Commissioner Martinez.

All right. Go back down the list, but with comments instead of questions. Yes. Starting from the top. Definitions, yeah, let's fix that. Overlay zoning definition, hopefully we can, when we see that next time, we can improve that. Townhomes to six in a row. With our objective design guidelines, I do feel like we can remove that six requirement. Plus, we do have open space requirements, and we do have other requirements. that I would feel comfortable removing that requirement given the other things that we have in there. Back to the mood. I think the biggest... CONCERN I HAD WITH THE PROPOSAL WAS PROBABLY THE STREET RESURFACING REQUIRED IMPROVEMENT. IF WE'RE ONLY GOING TO BE DOING A SPECIFIC SECTION OF STREET THAT'S IN FRONT OF A PROJECT We don't get the economies of scale of a full street repaving. The city of Los Angeles is trying, attempting to do stuff like this with their large asphalt repair, which just ends up being more expensive than... doing an actual street resurfacing. So I think that's the one that stuck out to me. The other ones, a lot of them are related to sidewalks, which I'm in favor of. And it does have that provision of offsite improvements being, and I don't know if this is too high of a percentage, but being capped at 10% of the project cost. That might be a bit high. Yeah. So that was the one big concern. Let's see. The requiring of a traffic study, I looked at our code and it was like a traffic study is triggered when certain criteria are met. But for this, it just says do a traffic study. And I don't know if we're just assuming that all mood projects will meet the criteria of a traffic study that's already in our code. But if that isn't the case, maybe we just apply the base code regulations that if you meet the criteria that's already in our code, then you do the traffic study. And that way we don't have them doing all that which isn't required of the base code. Okay. The permitted uses table, I had quite a few notes on, mainly on what's a CUP and what's an MCUP. Daycare of 15 plus being a CUP and institutional and recreational. DOES THE PLANNING COMMISSION NEED TO SEE A DAY CARE AT THE BOTTOM OF A MIXED USE DEVELOPMENT? I THINK THAT IT'S PROBABLY FINE. I don't know, a CUP for a convenience store. I think we're probably fine not seeing that. For games machines as an accessory use requires a minor conditional use permit. If someone dares put five arcade games, then they have to go up to the director. I don't know if that's entirely necessary. physical fitness facilities. Also, you can put a gym on the first floor of a development and that's probably fine. The notes at the bottom of the permitted uses table, I would just encourage staff to check that all of them apply to this mood table. Like I didn't see a note nine in the table, which is about the SoCo property. And I don't know if I just missed it, but just double check and see that all the notes are in there. Okay, this is probably the biggest comment. The densities that are allowed using the mood. that are not housing element sites are quite a bit different from those of the housing element sites. And I think it would be my preference that maybe they not be equal, but maybe just the one tier below. So North Coast to Mesa right now, I think housing element is 90, and then mood is at 60. I think that we don't have anything in between there of a 70 or 80, so fine. But like Harbor Boulevard, and to the public commenter's point, is at 30 dwelling units an acre, and I think in the housing element it's at 60. So similarity between... adjacent uses. I mean our housing element sites are all over the city and then you're going to have one site that's permitted to build at 60 dwelling units an acre and then next door half that. So if not the 60 that the housing element permits, I think the tier below would be the 40. And I think that matches it up at least somewhat. And wouldn't be that, hopefully would not be too big of a difference. OK. Parking standards, I'll just make the same point that I did with FTC for these new buildings are probably going to have to follow the Cal Green code. Cal Green code has parking minimums. So maybe we just consider putting in the building code into our code. But it is already a state requirement. So it's fine to do that. It's fine not to do that. commercial hours of operation for commercial uses in the, I'll just call it the bottom floor of a mood development, the code currently states, the proposal states to limit hours of operation from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., including for delivery and, you know, like the back end parts of a business. I think we can just, if our concern is like the noise of a delivery truck or something like that, let's have noise standards. I know there's window requirements somewhere else in the code that we can have instead of limiting the hours of operation. If the concern is adjacent uses, then we also have provisions for that somewhere else in our code. So, like, I lived on top of a Target and a Trader Joe's when I was at USC. It was fine. I was not woken up. You just need to make sure that we have the good windows for it. Okay. That should cover the mood. And then objective design standards. Yeah, I think this is where I might just be disagreeing on some of the specifics. And that's probably fine. But maximum facade length. If a building is 200 feet long and it looks nice, And I know, like, the problem here with the objective design standards is I can't say looks nice in the code. That's the whole point of objective. But if there was a way to, if we could say, you know, ornamentation provided on the facade of a building, if it... If it has some of these other standards, I don't know, the top edge of a building has some sill that looks nice. I don't know what the exact requirements could look like, but I do think that requiring 150 feet, and then go in five feet, and then 10 feet, and then out five feet, might add cost to a project. It might remove, you know, that removes 50 square feet of usable space to do that. So if there was a different way to say make buildings look nice without... Saying it like that, I guess that's what I'm looking for. And I know that's a very difficult ask. And I'm sorry to make that ask. But yeah, facade modulation, I think that's kind of in the same vein. There is a requirement to have different materials at the base, in the middle, and on top. I mean, I'll go back to living at USC. It's all brick buildings. It looks nice. If they use the same materials, I think it's fine if the ground floor looks the same as the top floor. Yeah. And that also goes to the minimum of three façade materials. That's kind of the same comment. And then I will agree with the last public commenter on our standards regarding streets and circulation. So our proposal is that private streets have the same standards, including geometric standards, that the city has, and there is a state that requires that street widths be no less than 40 feet wide. You know, that's my own issue that I'll try and go solve in my day job. But it's, you know, 40 feet wide, perhaps unnecessary inside of a private development. So let's make sure that it's just... enough space for emergency, egress, ingress, which I'm pretty sure is the language we use when we talk about the paseos. So if we just want to apply that to private streets, I think that could work out well. And with that, those are my comments about the specific language. Thank you so much. OK. Any other comments, commissioners?

Commissioner Dixon?

Thank you. So just a few overarching comments. I really appreciate the public comments because it underscores, you know, just a super brief aside. When I was originally appointed to the Planning Commission, I think in 2011, one of the first things we did was hold a study session because the Westside Urban Plans had been sitting on the shelf. I know I told some of you this before. And what we heard was from a huge crowd of folks who actually build things that there was – they loved the – the idea behind them, but there were specifics in there that were a problem. And so what Claire Flynn, who was kind of behind that, and then I also talked to Don Lamb, who was a development service director when those were brought about, was that they were intended to provide flexibility. So I'm not sure how you write that into this. To mimic Commissioner Martinez's comments, like for a large development, like the one proposed by Mr. Sakioka or the one on Harbor Boulevard, you know it's not an out-of-the-box zoning code is not going to ever fit and so there should be a mechanism for a well of an extraordinarily well-designed project to be able to come in without you know a whole host of variances and so I'm not sure exactly how best to do that because I think that we do want to hold on to some of the things if you look back at the as the vice chair was showing with the metric case stuff and you look back at the the very presentation that staff put on earlier about some of the things that the public prioritized and some of the things that we were trying to prioritize in this plan, we have to stick to those things. For instance, one of the things people talked about was address traffic and parking. So outside of state requirements, as Commissioner Martinez mentioned, we should be doing everything, and I know this is a philosophical thing that council has talked about, but I think we need to be clear on the intent of getting rid of minimum parking minimums. And that is, in the law itself, is to reduce, combat the housing shortage, reduce car dependence, and meet state climate and greenhouse gas reduction goals. We live in Costa Mesa, where 75 or more percent of people drive cars. And I think we have to be realistic about that. I know this is a mantra I say, but being up here for eight or nine years now, the number one complaint we hear about is parking. Absolutely the number one. At gyms, at churches, at restaurants. We had people come down here complaining about spillover parking in their neighborhoods. We've gone into great lengths when we were doing things along 17th Street to try to minimize that, combat that. And so instead of putting the burden on the residents to call and complain to code enforcement and then to follow through on that, because I know that there are some lots on 17th Street where I frequent the small businesses and they complain loudly. about the fact that people are parking in their spaces. Nobody can come to their business because the spillover from a bar or a restaurant or whatever. So I think we need to be realistic about the impacts of parking and that people, no matter what we say up here and no matter what we design and no matter what we plan, they're still going to drive cars to go to stores and restaurants and places like that. It's just a fact of life. So I think that pretending cars don't exist inexcusably bad planning. And I'm just going to say that. And so address traffic and parking was one of the big things that people came up with. So I think we need to do that. I like the idea of a traffic study. Maybe there's a trigger on the number of units. Maybe there's a trigger on the number of projected trips based on both VMT and the old mechanism And so maybe there's a trigger there. I also want to make sure that we preserve some of the flexibility that was in the, and I know there's mood sub areas and I know, but for instance, on the town center stuff that we, We don't want to lose that vision that we have around town center with all the arts things and the very carefully planned in the past. Open space, I think we need to be very careful about open space. I think we can strike a balance, but I have a very grave concern. We saw with the, I think it was, I can't remember the name of the project, I'm so sorry, it's right off the top of my head, the one we approved. Oh my gosh, was it one Metro West where we talked about access to a trail or something along those lines? We don't want to overburden a future developer or future maintenance association or homeowners association with having to be the police for uses that could be impinging on Because when you're allowing the public to come in, if it's not somewhere the public normally comes, like they do a shopping center or somewhere like that, then you're decreasing the available open space theoretically for the residents there. And so trading a balcony or a small paseo or a park or whatever for quote unquote publicly accessible open space, I think we need to strike a balance there. So that's my comment on that. I think the setbacks from the beginning of Measure K, we talked about buffers between Measure K sites and residential neighborhood. And anything that's going to decrease that buffer, I think, is a bad thing. We can work with a large developer on a large contiguous lot as far as the second story setbacks or the setbacks are required. But I think we need to maintain a minimum of a 20-foot setback between an adjacent residential. I really think that's an important thing to do. It's going to give us the air and space and light and shade. And I note that under the multifamily, we struck... the provision that said, consideration shall be given to the effect of proposed development on the light, air, and privacy of adjacent properties. I don't think we should strike that. I think that that's an important thing we should keep in the multi-development. It was D, subsection D under the multifamily that we were talking about earlier, or the common interest developments. We also removed the requirement, and I guess we're just saying parking's irrelevant going forward, but we moved a requirement that parking be within a reasonable distance of where someone lives. We're talking about quality of life here. We're talking about how things live. We're talking about trying to improve Costa Mesa for all these people and bring all these great housing opportunities and these great neighborhoods and neighborhoods where we all belong. but you have to walk a mile to get to your place from where you parked. I think we need to build livability back into this, and we can still move forward with a lot of these needed changes and consolidation of some of those plans, but there are consequences for kind of incomplete planning, and we are trying to compensate for 50 or 70 years of California planning that was car-centric and all the other stuff. Well, that doesn't go away overnight. We have to make sure that we we make a livable community, you know, I think that those are the main themes, is that we shouldn't, anything that's going to impact the quality of life for a resident, either of these new developments or of the adjacent developments. And I think a lot of these things that are built in, such as the conditional use requirements, some of those uses may have an adverse impact that the city wants to take a look at. Like a convenience store could have some loitering or some littering or whatever impacts. A gym could have some parking impacts. We talk about some of the yoga studios where they have massive turnover of people in a very short period of time that utilizes all the parking spaces so I just I think that we can have some flexibility but we should also be able to preserve the quality of life the very important quality of life elements that are incorporated into parking and open space and setbacks and so those are my general comments along this and I know that we're coming for back with a more fulsome one but THOSE ARE MY MAIN COMMENTS. THANK YOU.

THANK YOU. I JUST HAVE A FEW QUICK I JUST HAVE A FEW QUICK SPECIFIC COMMENTS. SPECIFIC COMMENTS. FIRST I AGREE WITH COMMISSIONER FIRST I AGREE WITH COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ ABOUT INCREASING THE MARTINEZ ABOUT INCREASING THE DENSITY ON HARBOR BOULEVARD TO DENSITY ON HARBOR BOULEVARD TO TRY FOR NON-HOUSING ELEMENT TRY FOR NON-HOUSING ELEMENT SITES. DISPARITY IN THE SCALE AND SCOPE OF SOME OF THOSE ESPECIALLY ON LARGER PROPERTIES. MY SECOND COMMENT IS DIRECTED TOWARDS THE REVISIONS TO THE NEWPORT BOULEVARD SPECIFIC PLAN. So I've always struggled with the specific plan because it doesn't really operate like a specific plan. It's not traditional in any way. I don't know any property owner who's used it to their perceived advantage. My preference is just to do away with it entirely, but that's not what's going to happen. I do see the changes here reflecting the addition or integration of the mood and the development standards. WHAT I WOULD URGE STAFF TO LOOK INTO A LITTLE BIT MORE DEEPLY IS REALLY WHAT'S THE PURPOSE OF THIS SPECIFIC PLAN? SO JUST FOR EXAMPLE, I FIND THIS A LITTLE BIT AMUSING, ONE OF THE SENTENCES SAYS IT'S ALSO THE INTENT OF THE SPECIFIC PLAN TO ENSURE LAND USE COMPATIBILITY AND VIABILITY IN THE PLAN AREA. OKAY, GREAT. AND TO REATTRACT TRAFFIC BACK TO THE BOULEVARD. This was written in 1999, 98. I don't know that that condition is what people desire anymore. In fact, having lived in this area for 20 years, I've seen an emerging pattern where it looks like more pedestrian-oriented and neighborhood-oriented development is occurring in the 100 block between Newport Boulevard and Eldon. not necessarily on Newport Boulevard itself. And so we're seeing that at Virginia, we're seeing that in Cecil Place. I can expect that to happen more regularly and I think that's what people want and probably should be encouraged. The other piece of the specific plan that I think needs a little attention is that there's a section on, excuse me, on implementation actions. which just seem antiquated. I'll give you a for example. Let me pull this up here. There's a lot of redlining. And there probably should be more. Let's see here. There's something about a business improvement district. Signage about the freeway. Sorry, I'm trying to drag it all the way to the end here. Creating a Newport Boulevard organization. All of these things may have been well-intended, you know, IN THE LATE 90s BUT I DON'T SEE ANY VALUE IN HAVING THEM IN A SPECIFIC PLAN THAT'S REALLY SUPPOSED TO GUIDE THE LAND USE PLANNING. THESE SEEM MORE PROGRAMMATIC AT BEST SO I WOULD ENCOURAGE JUST GETTING RID OF MOST OF THESE AS WELL AS TAKING A LOOK AT SOME OF THE OTHER LAND USE RELATED ONES. THERE'S SUPPOSED TO BE SOME CUL-DE-SAC AND ALLEY ABANDONMENT STUDIES THAT WERE DONE. Again, these things seem not really relevant today. But this is a bigger policy question. And so to the extent that staff can tackle a few of these and either offer some justification why they're not relevant, I think that might be something certainly for Council to consider when it gets to them. YEAH, THAT'S ALL I HAVE ON THAT. COMMISSIONERS, ANY OTHER COMMENTS OR QUESTIONS? SOMEBODY LIKE TO MAKE A MOTION? COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ?

MOVE THE PLANNING COMMISSION RECEIVE THE PRESENTATION, REQUEST STAFF INCORPORATE FEEDBACK AND FILE THIS REPORT.

ALL RIGHT. MOTION BY COMMISSIONER MARTINEZ, SECOND BY COMMISSIONER DIXON. ANYBODY WANT TO SPEAK TO THE MOTION?

NO, THANK YOU.

OKAY. ALL RIGHT. LET'S CALL FOR THE QUESTION.

Motion carries 7-0.

All right. Just for the record, I forgot to close the item, but let's make sure that's official. Anyone has departmental reports? Mr. Yang, public services?

No public works report, Mr. Chairman.

Okay. Sorry. It says development services. I know it's community development. Director Tai?

Thank you, Chair and members of the Planning Commission. We will continue the march toward completing or advancing our advanced planning initiatives. The next meeting, we'll come back with another, I think our next meeting is in September. Can you believe it? We'll come back with the Neighborhoods Where We All Belong effort again. And then going to City Council coming up, We will be taking the housing elements recommendation from tonight to the city council on September 1st. We will also be taking an item to city council regarding the airport land use commission's opinion on the neighborhoods where we all belong effort. And then lastly, there is a hearing or at least an item scheduled at city council to revisit the Ohio house item that the planning commission considered long ago. So we are,

continuing to march along but thank you for your support and that's it for me tonight thank you all right thank you and lastly uh mr preziosi anything from city attorney thank you charlotte nothing this evening okay we are adjourned thank you everyone