Parks and Recreation Commission - Regular Meeting

That's just not a little frightening that the Gemini is just listening to us.

I hate it. I hate this stuff. Honestly, I turned all of it off as much as I can. I keep turning more stuff off. I keep trying so hard. I hate all this so much.

That's what I heard.

Oh, good. Awesome. Awesome. Yeah. Yeah. I think Pravani just wants to play the host, you know, and take them. And then she was going to, I think, take them to Delfino Farms to get a more Apple Hill Farm look too. So, yeah. You were available that day? yeah but i i think she wants to bring two other directors oh that's you yeah yeah which is fine you know but she's looking for some somebody to give an input if she if she wants me there then i'll be there i told her that but I guess it's 4 o'clock, so I think we can go ahead and get started in our traditional way with Myrna reading the introduction or whatever you need to read for us.

I'll read it. Welcome to the meeting. And we have a full board, so I don't have to do the roll call. And Greg, you called the meeting to order and you can get adoption of the agenda and the consent calendar.

Okay, is there a motion to adopt the agenda and approve the consent calendar? I second. Tim, you're too quiet. You got that? Check and bolster. Bolster, yeah. Okay, so approval of the minutes of May 13th. We have a motion.

You basically second that as well.

Yeah, Jim and Dave. Yes.

Okay.

Okay, and now public forum. Go ahead and read whatever you need.

So public forum is an opportunity for members of the public to address the commission on subject matter that is not on the meeting agenda and within their jurisdiction. Public comments during this time are limited to three minutes per person. The commission chair may limit public comment during public forum. Are there any public comments that are not being addressed on our agenda?

Or is there anyone on the Zoom? Make sure. Danny will want to make sure that we're covering that, right?

Neither one of the two people are. Usually you remind us.

I know.

Neither one of the two people are raising their hand. So we're good to go.

OK. OK, so move right on to action items.

Go ahead, Myrna or I was going to have Corey do a welcome.

For me. Yes, we need to welcome our brand new at Commission member Mr Kevin Jones.

Welcome Kevin. Does Kevin want to just give us a slight background of what you're representing?

A certain... You got to stand up. No, no, no. Give me a hard time already.

Just a brief background. So my name is Kevin Jones, born and raised in El Dorado County, family owns and operates Lava Cap Winery. I'm starting my own little... cattle operation right now. I'm excited to be here and, you know, protect ag for our county.

Great. Thank you. Welcome aboard. Thank you. Okay. We'll have another one here shortly, I'm sure. Okay.

And our next item, we have our supervisor here to present, Brian Bierkamp. For somebody who's been here 47 years.

Brian's been here longer than that.

No, it's for you.

Well, I'd like to say this is a great pleasure, Greg, to recognize you, but it's really a displeasure because of all your years of service to this county and the consistency is what I think has made our Ag Commission so great for all those years. I think that's something that's lacking in the Board of Supervisors, unfortunately, but You know, the voters spoke, so it is what it is. But luckily for us, we can have commissions and a commissioner such as you that has given your heart, soul, and life and family time to this county and our agriculture commission and department. So, I mean, you've outlasted Myrna, I think, right, Myrna? She's still going. I can see that. I know, I know. But, Greg, on behalf of the County Board of Supervisors, we want to recognize you for your 47 years of service to the Ag Commission, and you've probably been chair how many years? 46? No, maybe 30.

I had some honorary people in front of me that were...

Which I can mention. Yeah, but like I said, the county, the districts, everything is beholding to you and the work that you've done with the commission. And again, county wouldn't be what it is without you. So I'll present that on behalf of the Board of Supervisors. And if anybody else wants to have a little chat, I think Myrna probably wants a picture as well. OK, we'll do that.

I'll come up there. OK, yeah.

We don't want to get the stair chair going. OK, yeah. Thank you, Brian. Congratulations. You better believe it. OK, thank you.

Well, it's always good working with these old-time families, too. It works together. We're all getting older, too.

Yeah, right? You got it, Myrna? You got what you want? You guys want it? You want everybody? OK. Oh, can you fit us all in? Let the director here. Everybody gets it. The brownie's out of your mouth, Myrna.

Anything important, right, Myrna? Yeah.

Lloyd? I think you need to go up there too. Come on. He puts it on his cardboard. He may as well have everybody on it.

He just got off his tractor.

Yeah.

I feel his pain. He's been there last week.

Yeah. Oh, on the tractor? Oh, yeah. Come on in, Lloyd. I don't spoil your picture. Oh, no, no, no, no.

Want to get him in there? No. OK. Right, right. Yeah, right in here.

OK. Two icons.

OK.

Smile pretty. OK, thank you.

Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you.

I appreciate it.

We know where you're at. We'll find you. Oh, yeah, for sure.

So Myrna, I think from the commission, we have stuff. I have a few words, if I could say, or we should say it afterwards.

you can do whatever you want everybody said something but you is this on is red on yeah red's on confusingly enough okay well thank you thank you brian and the rest of the board i appreciate it i just had a few comments reflecting on this 46 years um thinking of the legendary uh figures in agriculture that i had the and pleasure to sit on the board with. All organized, of course, by Ed Delfino and Dick Bethel, who set up the Ag Commission. And that's why I got on it. Ed and Dick always, they looked around and picked somebody they thought might benefit them. But I think of the names that I sat on the board in the early years, some who are still alive and still kicking. Howard Nielsen is one that I... And Lloyd Walker, of course, he's still kicking, but, but other, other legendary folks, Bert Marchini, John Forney, Bert Threckhold over in cool with pairs, Larry Hyder, who we all know and, and Ed Bakke and Ron Houston. I mean, those are some of the early ones that I had the pleasure to, to, to work with. And, and, and learn all of their thoughts. And some of the things that we really had to deal with, I think, that you mentioned, Brian, 20-acre minimums in ag areas, ag districts, seven of them that we worked years to develop the general plan back in 86, and then later on refinements of those. And In the early years, we're really a pleasure to work with. We've had meetings and everyone seemed to talk. There would be a two or three hour meetings. Sometimes the wives would come to be entertained listening to us. And then after the meeting was closed, Ed and Dick would say, let's go down to Hangman's hangman's tree or Denny's to the bar. And we talked for another two hours. I'm sure we didn't offend the Brown Act. No. But we did solve problems. And so that went on for many years. And as my wife Sue said, they were able to come and listen to us, maybe put in a few comments. And then, of course, I had the pleasure of working with All the former ag commissioners from the start of ag commissioners in Eldorado County, I think. Ed Delfino, Bill Snodgrass, Bill Stevens, Charlene Carbath, Leanne Myla, and now we've got Corey sitting here. So anyway... It's been a real pleasure. So agriculture is facing many new challenges and need new and fresh ideas. That's why one reason Lloyd and I are stepping down and why we're getting younger, even though 38 is getting mature.

But anyway...

It's good to have some fresh blood and new ideas because agriculture is going through a lot of changes now.

Dave is well aware of it, and we need new ideas, fresh ideas, how to keep agriculture viable and relevant in El Dorado County.

So that's only the few words I wanted to say. And again, thanks to the Board of Supervisors, too, for allowing us to be... formed in the way we are, not each supervisor having a selection. We go by commodities or what we do, cattle or livestock or wineries or processing, we have them categorized, which I think really represents a much better way to, Defying agricultural issues and problems. So again, that was Ed Delfino's concept. I think it worked out really well. Okay, that's all I have.

Okay. On behalf of the Ag Commission, Greg, the Ag Commission, we thank you for your 47 years of service, your 47 years of leadership, your knowledge of the industry, being a pioneer in the wine industry, your integrity, all those great qualities you bring to the Ag Commission. We appreciate that, and we're definitely going to miss you. On a personal level, I'm sure you remember your Apple Hill President days. So speaking of Ed Delfino back in, I think I graduated in college in 1981. So 1982, started to work for Ed and he ordered me to go serve on the Apple Hill Growers Board. And I said, Yes, sir. And you were the president. So you had the misfortune of dealing with some of us young people at the time. on the Apple Hill board, but that started my adult business relationship with you. And Greg, you've been a friend and a mentor and somebody like me growing up, learned from, and you were a model for all of us, my generation. So we appreciate that. So beyond your Ag Commission role and your leadership and all the great things you've done for the Ag Commission, I think we all know Greg's role in the California wine industry. Greg's been a pioneer along with Sue and the family in the California wine industry. You're a two-time recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award, United States Congress, State Fair, and I'm sure a lot of other awards that we're not talking about. But I think all of us know you pretty well. I think your best Lifetime Achievement Award is being a great father, a great husband, Great grandfather. So I know your family appreciates all those things. So we have a couple of things for you going away.

Yeah, I pulled this off of the pallet that was going to be headed to New York City tonight, but I figured they'd be better in your hands. Wonderful box of peaches grown in Gold Hill. So yeah, courtesy of Gold Bud.

Thank you. That's great. And we've got Myrna's. I think he's giving me some wine. That's my favorite. Wine?

So Greg, now that you're at the end of your career, the secret is out. Wine's okay, but apparently you are really a tequila fan. Oh, geez. So that really would have ruined everything. So it's our pleasure to present you with an 1800 Cristalino tequila, which is reputed to be almost as good as Humberto's tequila.

Does he know it? Yeah, Justin's going to get a bit of this, I'm afraid. Yeah.

Very good. Well, thank you, Dave. Appreciate it. Thank you.

And I'd also like to echo your words, thanking the Board of Supervisors for the tolerating the Ag Commission and let us making our contribution to the county in terms of our expertise in the ag world. And it's been a great 47 year. And I think 67 is when Eddie O.

Started the Ag Commission.

50 years now.

Yeah, the Williamson Act was adopted in 65. And then Ed jumped on it and said, we need an Ag Commission to handle Williamson Act contracts. Yeah. There we went.

Yeah. not to rattle on too long but let's we remind everybody that greg and all those people back in the day eddie o and dick um the board of supervisors our our planning commission i think my my father was there in 72 i think when the sequel came along and land use planning really got started in california but uh all the successes in terms of land use planning and Preservation of Ag Lands, you and Ed and Dick and all those people that, along with the board, just did a wonderful job, enabled us all to be here.

Okay. Thank you. Very good. Well, thank you. And I want to thank working all these years with Lloyd. When I came up here to look for grapes, I needed grapes. I didn't have anything planted. Went out to... got introduced to lloyd walker out there and we've had a long term great business relationship and personal relationship and really appreciate that which will continue as long as we can keep

hobbling along so okay so thank you all right okay i know a few people want to comment so i'm just going to read this really quickly public testimony will be received on each agenda item um you will have three minutes to comment by participating in this meeting you acknowledge that you are being recorded And if you're joining the meeting via Zoom and wish to make a comment on an item, please press the raise hand button. If you're joining the meeting by phone, press star nine to indicate a desire to make a comment. And do any of you want to make comments on this? I think they want to talk about you, a few people.

Who does? You go ahead, open it.

All right, sure. It's public comment on this item.

Mike, did you bring tequila?

Michael Rinali. Hi, Michael Rinali, Farm Bureau. Chair Boger, gosh, it's going to be hard not to approach this bench and say that name and that role. Commissioners, welcome. Commissioner Jones. Again, Michael Rinali, Farm Bureau. You know, the Farm Bureau so appreciates your time and your service. Supervisor Vierkamp mentioned a really important point. The continuity and the consistency is so important to our county, and you've provided that through so many years. And it's not just been the leadership in this commission and leadership in the industry, but your willingness to help young farmers, encourage them to enter the industry to deal with the challenges that go with it is really, really appreciated. And our Farm Bureau is very, very grateful for your years of service, and we really appreciate it. Thank you.

Thank you, Michael. I would just like to add that even though you give me all those attributes, I couldn't have done it without the help of my wife, Sue, who let me do all these things while she essentially ran and managed the winery, took care of all the details that I didn't have to worry about in my mind. So it's a... Okay.

You'll probably be down fishing once a week now.

Yeah, now, boy, those bass are just, they're hiding now. They're there.

They're still there.

Did you say basses?

No, bass.

You said something else.

No, no. And Myrna, thank you for those brownies.

Yeah, and you have to go two packs. So one for your wife and one for you this time.

All right, very good. Last item. It's too bad Eddie is not here to tell some stories. And maybe it's good he's not here.

There were many stories we could tell about Eddie, too. OK. So I guess we should get down to business, Myrna.

Yes.

Want to go to that?

I'll go to action item 26-1152 is TUP 26-0001. And this is for the White Barn TUP temporary use permit assessor's parcel 089-010-057-000. And we have planning here to introduce the item.

Good afternoon, Ag Commissioners. Eric Michelson, Planning Division. The project parcel is approximately 21 acres and has a zoning designation of planned agricultural 20 acres, a general plan land use designation of agricultural lands, and it is in an agricultural district. The applicant is requesting a temporary use permit to allow for six special events, there'll be weddings, to occur on October 10th, 17th, and 24th of 2026, and November 7th, 14th, and 21st of 2026. Each event would take place between 4 p.m. and 10 p.m. with a maximum attendance of 150 guests per event. Parking would occur within an existing gravel area located on the western portion of the property with the event area located in the center of the property. An acoustic study has been submitted to ensure the project is within compliance of the Eldorado County Noise Ordinance. Please let me know if you have any questions and thank you.

Thank you. Does anyone have any questions or we can get back to you as we get into it, right? Yeah. Okay. Okay, Corey, do you want to run us through this, or is Tom going to do that?

This one's mine.

Okay, okay.

So again, it's parcel number 089010057. It is 20 acres. It's off Cold Springs Road. And we did notifications within 1,000 feet of this parcel, which was 17 parcels that were notified. It is in the Gold Hill Agricultural District. Okay. And this parcel is zoned planned agriculture, 20 acres. And its land use designation is agricultural lands. And again, it's in an agricultural district. It does have choice soils, arborite, coarse sandy loam and arborite. rocky coarse sandy loam. I want to point out on this map, the areas where the choice soils occur is where the crops are planted. Topographically, it's a fairly flat parcel. It does have a bit of a rise around the perimeter of the parcel. So the center of the parcel is in a little bit of a bowl, and that's where the events generally take place along, let me point it out to you, along this eastern edge here. And I'll show that to you better on the aerial map. So here's the aerial map. So the parcel, To the north and to the west is agricultural. They're growing a vineyard and mandarins. To kind of the south is Surreal, so that's a vineyard. And then to the southwest, that's also zoned agriculture, but they're not. doing anything on that parcel. The one directly to the east is RL 10. So that one is not zoned for agriculture.

Corey, are those lakes or ponds there that

their ponds. Yeah.

Okay.

So yeah, go ahead.

So what's the, I know the pink line, the what's the blue, the green and the, and then we got the red line.

So the lines are going from the barn where they do the events to the perimeter of the borders of the agricultural lands. Okay. So from the barn where they do the events to across the blue line, it's about 560 feet to the ag parcel. From the barn where they do the events to Surreal, it's 670 feet. From the barn where they do the events to the other ag parcel to the southwest, it's 410 feet. Okay. Does that make sense?

Good point. I didn't see those. Okay.

And then the big pond to the east, again, that's the RL10, so that's not ag parcel. And then he has two ponds on his property.

Who has two ponds? These two? The applicant, yeah.

He has two ponds on his property. Do you guys have any more questions on the maps before I move on to my photos?

I'm sure there'll be this. We'll come back to it. Go ahead.

Okay. Okay, so this picture is taken standing from the entrance to the parcel looking towards the, let me orient myself, I'm not good with directions, sort of towards the north, towards the parcel that has the vineyard and the mandarins, which you can kind of see the mandarins going up the hill here. And so if you look left across Cold Springs, that's where Surreal Vineyards is. You can see their white fence here in the background. So these are his peaches, the applicant's peaches, and that's where the choice soils are is where he's growing his stone fruit. This is just angling myself. more towards the north. He has a storage building behind this tree here. This is a gravel parking area. And the pond is first pond is kind of behind our truck here. I do have pictures of his barn. But in this picture, it's behind this large tree here. And we're facing more towards the east. Again, swinging more towards, excuse me, towards the west. No, east. Sorry. Again, I'm not good with directions. Swinging more towards the east. This property, you can see here the house, that's the applicant's house. So he lives on the property. And so this photo was taken from the perimeter fence that borders his property and the property that has the vineyards and and the mandarins to the northwest. So in the background there, you can see the barn where the events are held. is surreal also the neighbor that has the mandarins and they used to they don't own it anymore oh they sold yeah they sold it okay um again along the same fence line um just another shot of the event barn This is from the other side of the property. So now I'm standing more near the residence on the east side of the barn. So I'm kind of on the back side of the barn looking towards the northwest. So this is the back side of the barn. This is standing directly in front of the barn looking towards the mandarin orchard. And again, standing in front of the barn, looking towards the mandarins, this is his storage shed and then the gravel driveway and parking lot that he has. Before I move on, do you guys have questions on that?

Yeah, any questions? I think that looks pretty good. He has plenty of parking and everything.

Yeah, lots of parking. Yeah, well-maintained crops. So I did my site visit on June 4th for this temporary use permit. We're looking at policies 8.1.3.5 and 8.1.4.1. 8.1.3.5 says that on any parcel 10 acres or larger identified as having an existing or potential agricultural use, the Agricultural Commission must consider and provide a recommendation on the agricultural use or potential of that parcel, whether the request will diminish or impair existing or potential use prior to any discretionary permit. The TUP will not diminish or impair the existing or potential agricultural use of the parcel. The areas containing choice soils are what's being used for crop production and the agricultural crops are being properly maintained. He's already doing his 12 events a year. As by right with ranch marketing, he's asking for an additional six. He's doing maintaining everything with those 12.

And the TUP would sunset after the last event?

Yes. Moving on to Policy 8.1.4.1, which says the County Agricultural Commission shall review discretionary development applications before granting approval. There's three parts to it. Part A says they will not intensify existing conflicts or add new conflicts between adjacent residential areas and agricultural activities. The White Barn already qualifies for ranch marketing and they hold 12 events per year by right with no known conflicts. They haven't had any violations. The event barn is far from neighboring agricultural lands and neighboring structures, allowing six additional events that comply with requirements set by ranch marketing would not create new conflicts. Part B. will not create an island effect where an agricultural lands located between the project site and other non agricultural lands will be negatively affected. This one doesn't really apply. We're not doing any zoning or land use changes. So there's no possibility of creating an island effect. And then part C will not significantly reduce or destroy buffering effect of large existing parcel sizes adjacent to agricultural lands. Again, this one doesn't really apply. We're not doing any proposed changes to parcel sizes. or doing any quests for new structural developments. The location of the event barn will help buffer the impacts of special events. It's pretty much as far away from agricultural lands on the property as you can get. And for those reasons, staff recommends approval of the request for the temporary use permit 26-0001 pursuant to general plan policies 8.1.3.5 and 8.1.4.1. Any questions.

Okay. Any questions of staff or.

Sure we'll get into it, but all the events are within the barn and nothing outside.

That is my understanding. Those planning have any additional information on that.

PB, Harmon Zuckerman, I believe they do have some receptions outside sometimes I don't know you know it might be that the reception is outside and then the or know the ceremonies outside and then the reception is inside so so the latter of the two would be in this inside the barn as opposed to outside.

Okay.

So if I can make an observation, the TUP is an extension of the 12 events that are by right, and the events by right in the Ranch Marketing Ordinance, there is no restriction about indoor versus outdoor events.

Yeah, there is, yeah.

Very good, thank you.

Okay, is the applicant here and would like to address anything or?

The applicant is not here. I believe he was unable to make it due to some traveling. He was unable to make it.

Okay. All right. Is there anyone in the audience that wants to... Or on the Zoom.

Now taking public comment on item 261152. Individuals will have three minutes to address the commission. Public comment will be taken first from those participating in the meeting room and then from those participating through Zoom. For those participating by Zoom, please make sure you unmute yourself when called upon. Do you have anyone in the room that wants to comment?

Is there anyone in the audience here that would like to address this?

And I do not have anybody on Zoom.

OK. So we bring it back to our board. And have any discussion, comments, or motion?

I think we need to remind ourselves of our duty in terms of we're solely focused on the impacts to neighboring commercial agricultural properties.

doesn't appear and this is also a temporary thing so if there is issues that can be addressed the following year i assume it's this is just for this year this additional events is only for this year right the the additional yeah it would be for the events that are listed on the permit so there's six specific dates that they're requesting events for so what So next year, if they wanted to do six more, they would have to reapply? Yes. Erin, you have a comment.

Iron Mountain Planning Services.

Yeah, the temporary use permit is supposed to be just for this year. If they want to exceed the events of next year, they'd have to apply for a conditional use permit.

Right, then we would have information how they did this year, right?

Correct.

So that would be good, yeah. Erin, since you're in front of us, can you give a quick synopsis of what the process is to obtain it?

The conditional use permit, yeah, within the range marketing ordinance, it gives an allowance for the 12 events, correct?

Yes.

And the policies state that any request for events beyond that 12 per year, like I said, is a conditional use permit. It's a discretionary process, would require planning commission approval, and obviously would come back to the Ad Commission.

Great. Start to finish, three months, six months?

Six months minimum.

Yeah.

Okay. Thank you, Aaron.

Thank you. I'll make a motion that we approve the... Six additional for a year and see how that code.

Okay, I'll second. Okay, is removed and seconded. Myrna, would you call the roll, please?

Commissioner Tong, how do you vote? Aye. Commissioner Bolster, how do you vote?

Aye.

Commissioner Nielsen, how do you vote?

Aye.

Commissioner Draper, how do you vote? Aye. Commissioner Jones, how do you vote?

Aye.

Commissioner Mansfield, how do you vote?

Aye.

Chair Boger, have you vote? Aye. Thank you. Thank you. The motion passes.

OK. One last item.

Thank you guys for coming.

Yeah.

Okay, so I have action item number 326 dash 1, 1, 5, 2, I'm sorry, 1, 1, 5, 3, this is planning and building department recommending the ad commission receive a file and update on agricultural lodging and other agritourism opportunities and provide feedback to staff. And with that, we did have received two public comments. One was too late to send out to you. The other one I sent out to you from Michael Rinelli. They're both attached. And they have a survey that Karen's going to address.

And it's attached here.

And this is Karen.

Karen, welcome. Thank you. Good to be here again. My name is Karen Garner. I'm the planning and building director for El Dorado County. And so, yeah, just giving you an update on our ag lodging effort. And I should mention, this is a, We kind of ag lodgings, the short phrase we use, but we are considering low impact camping with this effort as well. So I was here before you in April and gave you an update on some of the things we were considering for ag lodging and getting some feedback. Thank you very much for your feedback. uh we then went in later in april in front of the board shared that feedback along with some examples that i shared with you from other counties of how they were managing ag lodging and at that meeting the board directed staff to return within 120 days with a summary of outreach efforts And essentially what the board was looking for was they wanted to get a little more feedback from the community of what they expected or ideas that they had before we continued on with this effort. And so one of the things that we decided to do was to do a survey. And our staff has put together some questions. The survey is actually live right now. It's a month long survey started in June and July 10th. So people still have time to participate in this survey if they have not already. uh and again so some of the things the board was looking at was not only outreaching to those that would potentially participate with ag lodging but you know the next door neighbors and the general public and those that might be affected by ag lodging operations so that was sort of the the intent behind the questions and As was passed out, you've got a copy of the survey, but I'm going to give you a little bit of update on where we are so far with survey results. And before I do that, I'm going to talk about the methodology that we've been using. So just kind of, you know, a little bit about how we set up the survey. So hopefully Mike Rinaldi is listening because that was his question was what's the methodology. So the overall objective of the survey was to gather non-biased basic understanding of what the public would be interested in regarding potential future amendments to zoning ordinance section 130, 40, 170, which is our lodging facilities. And considering expansion of supplemental lodging use on land that is zoned agriculture, grazing, planned agriculture, and limited agriculture. So we did a multiple-choice online survey, but also had some open-ended comments that people could make. And we used SurveyMonkey as the platform. Our target audience was both the ag community as well as neighbors and neutral parties. So really anybody who's interested. There was no limitations. If you were interested in the topic, you could participate in the survey. We... I got the information out about the survey on multiple county social media platforms, including Facebook X Nextdoor. We also included it in our long range planning news and updates. We have several subscription based email lists that we have people that are interested in our upcoming agendas for planning commission or other land use issues. So we sent it out to them. And then a few of our supervisors, Supervisor Parlin, Vierkamp, and Turnbull, who represent Districts 2, 3, and 4, included it in their June newsletters as well, so people reading those newsletters could participate. And again, it's a one-month time frame. It'll end on July 10th. So to date, we actually have had 670 responses, which is really good. It's actually, according to our county PIO, Carla Haas, that's about the second most responses we've had to a county survey. So a lot of interest out there in this topic.

what's the percentage in each of the categories and whether they're ag operation versus a neighbor?

I'm going to get to that.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I do have that information, so I will get to that. And I want to clarify. So the way it's set up, you can control this through SurveyMonkey. You can only do the survey once per device. So I can't go onto my computer and submit 10 surveys off my computer. I can do it on my phone. I can do it on my computer. I can come to work and do it on my work computer, but that's about it. So, and I'm too lazy to do that. So I did not do that. So in addition to the responses that we had, we had about 267 comments, you know, the open-ended comments and those of course take longer to sift through, but I've got some summaries of that as well. Just. Overall highlights and then I'll get into a little more detail. But as far as those who are strongly against ag lodging, it was about 70 respondents or 26%. The number of comments that were supportive of additional ag lodging activity was about 44% of the comments we've received to date. Comments that only provided a concern or a recommendation, didn't really state that they were for or against or were actually neutral was about 19%. And then there were just some other just random comments about 10%. While we received a pretty wide array of public input, overall, the majority of survey respondents are interested in moving forward with an ag lodging update and to allow for some temporary or supplemental uses. So the way it was structured, and again, I'll go over in more detail, there was actually some pretty strong support for that. As far as the number of survey participants that actually live in El Dorado County, that was 91%. So there are some outsiders. It could be people that work or visit here. However, only 24% of the respondents actually own or lease ag land. So what that tells us when you look at that between the number of responses that were positive and the number of responses that actually own or lease ag land, there seems to be support for expanding temporary lodging activities, even outside of actual ag users. So basically our public outside of that. Many of the opposing comments stated concerns of losing agriculture as a primary use on ag lands. So that fear is out there that if we start allowing other uses, what does that mean for actual ag uses? Also stated a concern of losing its rural character and fears of unregulated or excessive use. The highest concern listed as far as issues or concerns with if we were to expand and allow this is related to fire. So, We all know that, especially this time of year, that is a concern. So with that, those that had concerns with fire said, definitely would have to have some strict regulations related to fires. And that actually came up with the board as well when we talked about this and had some good suggestions from the board on some regulations we could impose related to fire. All right, I'm gonna go through in a little more detail, but I'm not gonna go number by number because that'll put you to sleep if I'm reading all these numbers, but I'll try and hit the highlights here. So the first question was, which of the following best describes you? And again, 91% live in El Dorado County, 25% were neighbor to a winery, farm or other ag operation, 24% own or lease land that has a right to farm, 10% own a winery, farm, or other ag operation. 10% interested in building or expanding lodging on owned or leased property for temporary recreational rental use. 4% own an accessory dwelling unit, lodging property, on their property, and only 3% said none of those things applied to them. So again, when you look at that, it tells me everybody's got some little interest somewhere, the majority of people that answered this survey. And then when we asked to rate the interest level in allowing ag land within the county to be used for temporary lodging, and this was kind of a one to five scale with one being I have no interest in that and five being high interest, the high interest five was almost 42%, 280 responses. Four was 69 or 10% of the respondents. Three, which I would consider sort of neutral, 108 or 16%. And then Two was 5.8% and no interest was 26%. So if you add up four and five, which is saying, yeah, we're definitely interested, you've got about 52% of the respondents said they have, you know, an interest or a very strong interest in ag lodging.

Were those the respondents that owned the property or were agricultural, or was that the whole thing? The whole thing.

Okay. So, yeah. So that's even better. Yeah, exactly. Again, what that tells us is that even those that don't own ag land or operate ag land, they do have an interest and support for this as well. So we also asked questions about what ag zones they believe should be allowed. And again, feedback from the board, you know, we talked about true ag lands, the limited ag, planned ag, and, you know, the ag grazing and the board gave a little bit of direction, if you will, that even though there may be some other zoning areas that have, do allow for ag, that they felt these were, these three were sort of the true ag zoning and the, indicated that rather than start big and then find out, oh, geez, we need to dial it back, they'd rather start small and get a program going. And then if things are going well and we want to consider expanding lodging opportunities to other zones, we could do that. So that decision hasn't been made, but I just wanted to share that general feedback that we had from the board. Let's see, what else can I share? So when asked about, one of the questions asked which temporary lodging uses should be allowed, 62% said low impact camping. And that was actually the highest rated. But close second was temporary lodging for visitors and guests. And that was 60%. And 58% said temporary lodging for hosting special events. 31%, again, said temporary lodging should not be allowed on ag lands. The concerns, as I mentioned, the top one, 76% of the respondents said was fire related. 63% said traffic, parking, road safety. 60% said excessive hosting of special events. 57% additional uses becoming primary uses on ag land and or loss of ag land. 58% noise, 49% changes to the rule ag character. 42% natural resource concerns, 39% light pollution, 34% theft vandalism, and 15% access for bikes and pedestrians. So even though there is support, majority of people support ag lodging and expansion of ag lodging, It doesn't mean they don't have concerns. So it's important to hear what those concerns are. And again, be able to address those as we're putting together a program. So, you know, fires, traffic, and excessive, you know, hosting of events on these properties, those definitely rose to the top and are things we'll have to consider as we're putting together programs and recommendations. Let's see. Again, we had a lot of comments when we allowed just open-ended comments to be made. We have 14 pages so far, so I'm not going to go through the 14 pages, but the highlights are common points Questions, concerns that were raised is again, ag should be and remain the primary use. Landowners should be living on the property as a primary residence. No festivals or concerts should be allowed. Noise and special event regulations should be in place. There should be strict fire regulations and neighbors should be consulted and notified. Also mentioned was to make sure we address Williamson Act compatibility. and then who people contact if there is an issue with the regulations, who's gonna be doing the enforcement. So overall, we're getting excellent feedback so far. And again, we still have, what do we have? A few days left for responses. We'll make that information, we'll bring it back to the board and share it with them. And along with some other information that they requested, more related to looking at As I mentioned earlier, the three ag zones versus expanding it out, what does that mean? How many parcels are we talking about? And some other data, such as what's the potential for collecting additional transient occupancy tax increases? and revenue for the county. And interestingly enough, the lodging facilities, we can collect TOT on that. The low-impact camping, the camping per our county regulations, we do not collect on camping. It's something that's in the back of our minds that we may try to change someday, but it is a tax that would have to go to a vote of the people to change that language to allow for TOT on camping. So with that, I'm happy to answer any questions and take any feedback you have on the survey results so far.

I have a question, Mr. Chair.

Yeah, sure.

Go ahead. And I don't know who's going to answer this. One, how does this tie in with the general plan and uses? And then two, the Williamson Act, you know, are they talking about, are we talking about, I know the camping thing, but like... Ag employee housing only for the public. I know that this wouldn't be a compatible use for the Williamson Act. I don't know, is anybody?

Yeah, so the way our regulations are written now, because you can do some ag lodging, even with our current zoning ordinance, it says whatever property you're going to have it on, whatever parcel you're going to have it on, has to qualify for a Williamson Act. It doesn't have to actually have a Williamson Act contract, but it just has to meet those minimum qualifications in order to have ag lodging. So the thought process behind that was that, again, sort of this concern of wanting to protect ag. What we don't want is for someone to take ag zoned parcel, but there's no crops on there. There's no active ag going on there and turning it into a giant campground. That is what we do not want. So we want to make sure that with any program that we come up with that it has those protections so that there's some minimum qualification. And that's actually a topic we have talked about is saying, hey, you got to meet the minimum standards for Williamson Act. Is that enough or do we want to require even more than that? in terms of ag operations to be able to have these other benefits. And we have no answers for that yet. So we're just data gathering mode at the moment.

Any other questions?

Do you have a sense that if you separate out the, say the neighbors of the farms versus just the general respondents, do the trends in their responses change at all versus the trend of the group at large?

Yeah, we haven't done that yet, but I would love to do that once the survey closes and we have the final results. I think we'll take a deeper dive and look at that and see, you know, based on, yeah, if their answers change, if there's commonalities amongst the different cohorts, if you will. Absolutely.

Okay, any other? I'm sure you'll be back before us again. Go ahead. And also, is there questions from the floor too?

If Karen's going to be done, yes, I have a question. Yeah. Process, where do we go from here? What is the next step?

So the next step is we'll be returning to the board with this updated information. We'll continue to do outreach. This was just kind of an initial outreach, but we will, as part of this entire effort, be going out to the different groups, probably holding workshops and inviting more participation and input into the process. What we're trying to get to is get some information you know, basic program in place. Like here's our initial recommendation, our draft recommendations, because that's always easier for people to respond to, right? It's very difficult to go out to folks and say, hey, what do you want? And start from scratch. So we're trying to put together some outline of what this program may look like, what you can do, how many units you can have, how many campsites you can have, Can you have both of those things or do you have to pick one or the other? We also are exploring things we talked about before, folks that may have ADUs. Can you convert that ADU into ag lodging? Is there a pathway to do that? Or maybe someone has a barn and maybe they already have you know, did some improvements out there to create a space people can stay in, but maybe they forgot to get a building permit to do that. Is there a pathway we can give those folks so they can get that permit and, you know, get in the things that they need in order to actually use that as ag operations? So we're going to bring all that together and then present that out to the public to say, hey, what do you think? Where are the points, you know, the pain points? Have we addressed, based on this feedback, you know, we're going to have to talk more about fire. Whatever regulations we come up with, have we addressed your concerns with fire? Have we addressed your concerns with traffic? And then hopefully keep refining that program down until we get something that we are comfortable with and everybody seems to, or at least the majority, seem to be comfortable with. And then we'll bring it back here to Ag Commission, Planning Commission, and Board. Okay.

So I think in our last meeting or your last presentation, we talked about our historical model of the working stakeholder group. And it's been a very successful model in terms of modifying and adopting new ordinances. At some point, are we going to return to that model and use that?

Yeah, so you're talking about having stakeholders from the kind of representative groups, you know, one representative from Apple Hill Growers, Wine Growers, and providing input.

Basically the same structure we had in that initial meeting. Yeah. Myself and the Ag Commissioner at Craig Boger's.

Yeah, absolutely. I think that would be really valuable to have that. And those are really the folks that can, when we start drafting up a program, can give some good input before we go out to the general public.

Yeah. I think it's a valuable model. I think. Danny might not agree, but on occasion we have valuable things to say.

I think you have valuable things to say all the time. I have to say that, don't I? Can I make one more? Sure.

I think I've commented on the past, but as we get further along in this, I would just, I hope that staff would be mindful of agricultural worker housing and we don't want to inadvertently, you know, create a run that changes that dynamic and further reduces the option for our farm workers for housing because a lot of these ranches do have farm worker housing and it's very important to keep that community housed.

Yeah, that is a very good point and something we can take a look at, you know, go back and especially if someone comes in and says, yeah, you know, I'm going to convert this, you know, find out for sure what was the previous use. If it had been used for worker housing, then. And that's something we can even build into the program, perhaps, that if you, as an example, we might create a pathway where, you know, what they're asking for can be approved at an administrative level if they meet these criteria. But perhaps if one of the criteria is if you're converting worker housing to that's gonna have to require coming back to either the Ag Commission or Planning Commission or some other body to weigh in on that.

If the goal is supporting agriculture, supporting the farm workers, in my mind goes hand in hand with that.

Yeah. One more question, sorry. Has there been any talk of an estimated timeline to put something in place?

Uh, you know, it's, it's never as fast as we want it to be. So, uh, of course, like I said, I got to go back to the board per their request with some data and information. Uh, and then, uh, we'll still continue doing outreach and, you know, like the idea of the, the, and the working group to provide some input. I would anticipate it's going to be into next year before we really come back with a final draft for the different bodies to be voting on and looking at. And I always put an asterisk by that because if we come across some issue that we hadn't thought of and we have to go back and You know, think about that. You know, it may add a little bit of time, but we've got some good dedicated staff that are committed to this and really trying to move this forward as quickly as we can.

Okay, any other questions? If not, thank you very much.

Now taking public comment on item 26.1153. And individuals will have three minutes to address the commission. Public comment will be taken first from those participating in the boardroom. And then for those participating by Zoom, please make sure you unmute your cell phone called upon. If you're joining by meeting by phone, press star nine to indicate a desire to comment. If you are joining by Zoom, press the raise hand button to indicate a desire to comment. Please voluntarily state your name for the record.

Okay. Do you have anyone on your Zoom with a hand up? No, but you have some people in here first.

And no, no hands are raised right now.

From the audience, I'm sure Mike has some comments. Good.

Commissioner Boger. Commissioners, Michael Rinaldi, Farm Bureau. First of all, I think Commissioner Nielsen asked a really good question. What does the general plan say about this kind of thing? While there's a lot of interpretations of our general plan. In fact, interpretations of the general plan seems to be an Olympic event in this county. But the general plan specifically encourage expanded use on agricultural lands. It specifically says agritourism, specifically identifies visitors serving uses as being helpful to the agricultural preservation. And so I think that if you look back through your county records, you will find that there has been a very specific, I believe it was grazing land, owned land, actually in my neck of the woods where I live, where there was county findings on this Williamson Act land, making findings that the camping was a compatible use. So if anybody needs help finding that record, I'm guessing it was in the probably mid 80s, early 80s. where that was done. And of course, that operation is still in use. It's within earshot of my place, not a problem, not a problem for my neighbors. And so I think that you will find that the general plan and the county's prior actions are supportive of this. Regarding the survey, I fully support the survey. I had total confidence that staff would come today identifying how the responses have gone so far. It looks like there's sufficient comments to the survey. that improve the confidence level and the margin of error. My question was really about the methodology, knowing that a lot of legacy families, husband and wife, adult children, all involved in the agricultural operation, all might have very different opinions on this subject. And so my concern was, on one hand, will that filter out those legacy families or those living on a parcel who might have various opinions about this? And I'm not completely sure I understood the answer to that. For example, if they use the same computer, were they filtered out? Were husband and wife... filtered out? If there's the same IP address using the same router, potentially a different computer, would they be filtered out? Conversely, if you're a neighbor living next to an operation, what would prohibit somebody from multiple or perhaps even obsessive filling out the survey? And so I just wanted to be mindful because those two things are kind of in conflict. You definitely wanna hear from all the legacy family and the members of the household, but you also wanna know if there's repetitive comments to the survey that certainly can skew the results. So I do appreciate that this process is not over yet, I am pleased to hear that there was that many responses and that it seems favorable because that seems consistent not only with our general plan, but with the trends in California. Thank you for your time.

Thank you, Mike. Just a question of Karen. This will come to public comment and testimony, so maybe some of the things Mike is talking about will be expressed there, and maybe it could be... factored out to answer some of those questions. Yeah. Okay. Oh my goodness, Lexi.

Good afternoon, Chair. This is where I get to tell my dad what I want him to do and he doesn't get to argue with me. But this is the last night for that, I guess. Just a couple of things. You guys know what business I'm in. I just want to turn the conversation a little that this isn't about an extra little bit of business that a farm should be able to do. We're talking about lodging infrastructure, and that is the primary thing that supports agritourism. So we really need to be asking ourselves, does the county have a substantial rural lodging infrastructure? You'll remember that the reason why this is even up is when the VHR ordinance was coming up for revisions, it triggered some questions about ag lodging. We've lost a lot of short-term rentals through the VHR ordinance from 24 to 25. I sent a report. The TOT tax revenue in that category is down 17%. And thanks to my mom, who is such an avid business person, we've tracked our foot traffic for the last 30 years. And month to month, this year to last year, we are down 17.5% in foot traffic. And this is all while the wine industry is collapsing. We need to get that foot traffic up and try to keep those sales. But when we have the very infrastructure that is supposed to support us doing that, struggling to be here, that's sort of the bigger question. I don't think it is, the rural lodging is not the business of farms. It's the business of the region to supply this infrastructure around our farms. I don't wanna run a campground. Chuck, probably you don't wanna run a campground on your farm. Kevin, you're probably not going to want to run a campground, but if my neighbor runs one and those people spend the night and then come over and buy my wine, that's perfect. So I would like you guys to back up a little, if you're going to give direction and look at all of the zones under your purview, which is RL timber, which is great for campgrounds too. If you're going to do some management of that land and some harvest and have a campground, it's sort of where people want to be. And if you look at our land inventory, RL is surrounding all of our prime ag lands, and I'll just read really quick what it says in the general plan about RL, what its use is for. Commercial support activities that are compatible with the available infrastructure may be allowed within this zone to serve the surrounding rural and agricultural communities. Although agricultural uses are allowed, these lands generally do not support exclusive agricultural use. This zone is applied to those lands to allow uses with which supplement the agricultural use. So rural lodging is a supplement to agricultural agritourism industries. I hope that that is something that gets registered when they look at wet zones. And to answer your question, Mike, I have your policy right here. Objective 824, agricultural production programs shall allow visitors serving uses. Policy 8243 of the Ag Element says visitors serving uses may include but are not limited to recreational fishing, camping, stables, lodging facilities, and campgrounds. So that is compatible as clearly stated in your Ag Element.

Thank you. Thank you. Any questions? Anyone who came up, mic or legs.

Good afternoon, Lauren Hernandez. I live in Shingle Springs and also work in community economic development here in El Dorado County and have been doing a lot of work and studying, really looking into, you know, our general plan calls agriculture to be our greatest economic asset in El Dorado County and our ag lands, as I know many of you certainly understand and agree that that is so. But really the greatest challenge, and there's been numerous studies, including incredible work by our El Dorado County Water Agency, a 2020 study of the land in El Dorado County that is suitable for agriculture. 88% of it is not currently in production. It is either sitting idle or it is being used as residential, the primary use and not creating an economic asset for our community. And so I'd like to just echo again, what has already been shared about how lodging and supporting agritourism. We have over 7 million visitors to the West slope into our recreation and to our working lands and to our agritourism areas. primarily those are day trips when they stay overnight. So we're getting the traffic, the car drives in, the car drives out, we're getting that traffic, but we're not capturing that value. And so really you all cultivate value from the land, you know how to do that. And the work we've done out in our community, Particularly, we have some of the greatest socioeconomic challenges of communities facing poverty in South County and in the Georgetown Divide and in Pollock Pines, where some of our most fertile and lands that could be productive are. And overwhelmingly, it's very encouraging. We have also done significant surveys and 594, so just about 600 responses from residents across those regions and overwhelmingly very consistent responses from them as well. And that is small folks who have a very small farm stand who are trying to make ends meet on their property. And they are looking for the ability to generate revenue and support our rural economy and our agriculture operators. So just hope that we can continue forward and not be too restrictive. I certainly appreciate that sometimes it might get crazy or it's radical to just not put guardrails around something from the beginning. But I think that's actually incredibly exciting. And in our work and when we've been out of the community, We have this saying that the best solutions come from those closest to the situation. And we have an entire community that is living on land that is called to be productive for agriculture and to generate value for this community. And they want to be pulled into that and to do that. So let's not put guardrails and be too restrictive from the gate. Thank you.

Thank you.

I will start saying I don't like disagreeing with a booger. And I don't think we are completely disagreeing. But I do think in times when there is turmoil and the industry is kind of in this flux, you throw spaghetti at the wall trying to make things hit. And it can kind of make you lose your authenticity. I agree with ag lodging. I think we need more lodging in this county, 100%. I fight for it on seed every month. But I also think it needs to be done with intention. And so maybe lowering the five acres to one acre or something like that, it makes me weary when for the first time ever, you're going to use ag land for not primarily ag. So maybe somehow incorporating that in so you don't lose that authenticity. I love the idea of people camping and coming to Delfino Farms. I don't love the idea of the 10 acre parcel next to me having campsites on it where I live. So I just, I think it's always important to remember our number one, especially the Ag Commission's number one perspective is always Ag, so.

Thank you. Okay. Anyone else?

PB John Gerstle, bring it back to the board for comment appreciate christine's comments, I think, planning director. PB John Gerstle, partner indicated the minimum criteria was qualification under the Williamson act so minimum investment minimum income.

But I mean like usable producing. Like five acres is the minimum for me. Maybe Lauren like having some producing. Do you get what I mean? Yeah, it's a good discussion. I guess is what I'm saying.

City Council Chambers, Good discussion to have next just one comment lexi referred to the decline in. City Council Chambers, visitor numbers last year. City Council Chambers, it's probably not a coincidence that we had the visitors authority. City Council Chambers, The funding was deleted there, so you know we lost our our tourism promotion Colorado county tourism promotion and people are working hard to restore that now. with the tourism business improvement district that you know we're working on and hopefully we can talk about next month we're looking at ag lodging and so you know we have things in the works to address to improve the conditions and opportunities for people in the ag industry but at the same time I still have the sense we're not doing enough and we're not recognizing the catastrophe that's in front of us. Just every week in my business, latest article, fresh hell for California's crippled wine industry as values hit rock bottom.

Napa winery owner said, what should I do with my winery?

Constellation Brands, a gentleman that was the data analyst for Constellation was the second largest winery in the world No longer there, but he came out this week and offered the forecast that we may be looking at up to 50% decline in wine consumption. Up until this point, consensus was 25-30%. 50% is just an absolute disaster. Amador County ag land values have dropped over 50%. And there's consequences to local businesses, to the county. So the residential crash in 1911 2012 every property owner in el dorado county was knocking on our assessor door saying reassess us to a lower property value i guarantee you that process is started in amador county so you're looking at less tax revenue uh that it impairs the county's ability to function so i i know i these City Council Chambers, These things that we're looking at now the TV and ag lodging, I think, are going to be helpful, but I think we also need to take a step back and look at are there measures, we can be taking now and all the patients in icu on coma. City Council Chambers, What what things can we be doing now as the AG Commission as a county as an industry. City Council Chambers, To hopefully save some of these wineries. We've had three foreclosures so far in El Dorado, and I suspect that there's going to be more. So I'm just asking the question, what more can we do to, you know, the house is on fire. I'm not sure we've actually called 911 yet, and it's time to call 911.

Okay.

Let's open that bottle of tequila.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you, Dave. I'm sure you will continue with this at the next meeting. So thank you. Okay. Is there anything else on this? Does anyone else want to comment? Or do we want to go on to the last item? Verna?

We're actually at the last item. It's a staff update on legislation and regulatory issues. But the clerk blew it. Back when we were giving you your... presentation, there was one other thing I needed to comment on, and on the 28th, the Board of Supervisors will be appointing Derek Delfino to the Ag Commission. It has to be heard there, and then so he will be at the next meeting, the August 12th meeting. He will be sitting up there with you guys. So I just wanted to let you know that.

I see it in the audience here someplace. Is their hand up? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. The seat's warm.

Can I just say one more thing? You know, Greg, you listed a lot of names in your speech, names that are etched in the lore of our proud history of our industry. But, you know, your name... I think is up there firmly with those. If you look around this room, inspiring, you know, Kevin Jones, myself to join this commission and now Derek, you know, we look at you the same way that you looked at all all those names. So thank you for your mentorship and your service.

I appreciate it. Thank you. in the hall of fame well maybe but i left out your dad's name i mean he seemed too young i mean i i was really looking for a cup of coffee anyway i'm sure there's others i've forgotten too but uh anyway well thank you very much uh is there anything else on the agenda do we need to Was there any updates?

Only if you want a quick update on the new world screw worm. Pardon me? Only if you want a quick update on the new world screw worm.

It's in Texas and New Mexico, and that's pretty much it.

It's in Texas and New Mexico, and if you have animals coming into California, there's a lot more restrictions. Okay.

Chair Boker, I didn't know it was a presentation. It wasn't something that we would direct Karen to, but she's going to reach out and have a committee or whatever. So it isn't something I can have you take a vote at, correct? I mean, there's not.

Yeah, there's no action agenda. OK, thank you. It was just received in file. And I'm sure Karen has heard these things, and she can proceed appropriately.

Thank you.

Thank you.

OK. If there's nothing else, did you have, no, okay. I thought there was something on.

Last time, Greg. Kind of loud. Make it count.

Woo-hoo.

Aw. Thank you.