Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening. Welcome to the Town of Fairfax Planning Commission meeting at January 15th, 2026, our first meeting of the year. 703, we're going to get going. First, I noted that Commissioner Bela is participating remotely, I think due to illness, but if you could just confirm and let us know if there's anyone in the room with you.

No, I'm participating remotely, yeah, due to illness. And no, no one's in the room with me. Excellent.

Okay. Because I will... I'll read the agenda notes first. This meeting is being held in person at the Fairfax Women's Club, 46 Park Road, Fairfax. It's also being held virtually on Zoom and it will be broadcast on channels 27 and 99 and live streamed at the Town of Fairfax website or the cmcm.tv slash 27 website. You can participate in the meeting virtually by joining the Zoom webinar and using the raised hand feature to provide verbal public comment. The webinar ID and links are on the agenda available at the town's website, or you can dial in via the telephone number also listed on the agenda posted on the town's website before the day of the meeting. And generally, you may email written comments to the planning commission at planning at townoffairfax.org. Comments will be provided to the planning commission prior to the meeting and become part of the meeting record, but will not be read out loud. And our first agenda item is election. Can I call the roll first? Oh, well, this is.

Did I call the roll? Yeah. Okay. Swift. Here. Kelly's absent. Jansen's absent. Petrone.

Here.

Bela.

Present by Zoom.

Newton. Here. Chair Pfeffer.

Here. Thank you. We have our. Roll call, and now we get to move on to the election of the chair and vice chair for this year. My recollection last time was that I just gave the little update on, you know, it's normally the chair is who was the vice chair, and my recollection is the vice chair is... typically the person who has been on the planning commission longest without being chair or vice chair most recently. And so I think I can first nominate Vice Chair Swift to be the chair for 2026.

If she accepts, I'll second. I accept.

Okay. Can we do a quick roll call vote on that?

Swift? Yes. Petroni?

Yes.

Bela?

Yes.

Newton?

Yes.

Sheriff Pfeffer?

Yes. Okay. Excellent. After this agenda item walk. Look at that swipe. For Vice Chair, I know Commissioner Newton deferred the last time the wheel turned to her, but Commissioner Newton, let's go.

I would like to nominate Commissioner Newton as Vice Chair, if she'll accept. Yes, I'll accept.

Okay, then I'll second that.

Okay. Swift? Yes. Petrone?

Yes.

Bela?

Yes.

Newton?

Yes.

Chair Pfeffer?

Yes. Hooray. Congratulations. Do we, should we move over now? Do you want to just, I can just hand you this thing.

Can we do it from here?

Yeah. I mean, yeah, just give you the little placard.

Thank you.

Okay, and I'll be rusty at this, so forgive me. But first, I wanted... to thank Commissioner Beffer for his year as chair. There's been a couple of meetings that have been well attended, and I've appreciated how you addressed the members of the audience and kept us in line. I really appreciate it. So thank you.

Thank you. Pleasure being on this commission with everybody.

So next, we'll have approval of the agenda. Any comments or a motion?

I'll move to approve the agenda.

I'll second the motion.

Roll call. OK. Swift? Oh, I'm sorry, no. Petrone?

Yes.

Pfeffer?

Yes.

Baila?

Yes.

Newton?

Yes.

Chair Swift? Yes.

Okay, I'm going to read the meeting protocol. The Chair shall maintain order at the meetings in accordance with Robert's Rules of Order, and the Planning Commission has responsibility to be a model of respectful behavior in order to encourage community participation and citizen input at Planning Commission meetings. The Planning Commission and the audience are expected to refrain from using profane language and or ridiculing the character or motive of Planning Commission members, staff, or members of the public and to maintain the standards of tolerance and civility. All interested persons are invited to participate in public hearings in order to give all interested persons an opportunity to be heard. and to ensure the presentation of all points of view, members of the audience should limit their presentation to three minutes, provide their comments by email as described above in the agenda, state their views and concerns succinctly, and submit any new documents to the planning staff first directly or via email to be entered into the record. So public comments on non-agenda items. Anyone who wishes to address the Planning Commission on matters not on the agenda but within the jurisdiction of the Planning Commission must do so by email, in person, or via Zoom. In the matter described above, presentations will be limited to three minutes, whereas otherwise established by the Planning Commission Chair. So this is the time for public comments on anything, not on tonight's agenda, but within the jurisdiction of the Planning Commission. Is there anyone in the audience that would like to make public comments?

Hello, Commission. This is Rick Hamer, downtown. I would like to mention for recognition that the Hummingbird, which has been a local go-to joint, is closing the end of this weekend, this weekend. So a tribute to them, and I hope someone as good as they were would replace them.

Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else in the audience? If not, anyone on Zoom? I see no hands on line, Chair Swift. So I will close public comment and go to our public hearings. And the first item is 6 Walsh Lane application 25-26, a request for a conditional use permit and a combined front-rear setback variance.

We have a staff report, please. Yes. So the owners are proposing a backyard improvement project that includes construction of a large deck along the length of the rear of the house that includes a swim spa, which will be screened from view from the property at 10 Walsh Lane with a privacy screen. The proposed deck and spa area is located approximately 39 feet from the house at 10 Walsh. and approximately 54 feet from the upper deck of 10 Walsh. Also proposed are terraced areas, one that is proposed to include an outdoor fire pit, which has been approved by the fire department. as long as certain conditions are met. And another small deck for a play area along with a tree fort in the large oak at the southwest corner of the property. Stairways are also proposed along each side of the residence connecting the front yard to the rear yard and they will be replacing failing retaining walls at the rear of the property. Project requires the approval of a CUP and a combined front rear setback variance. The improvements comply with all of the minimum setback regulations. Historically, the various planning commissions have found it important for hillside sites to be allowed some type of improvements to allow residents to have usable outdoor living spaces. The proposed improvements in terracing require the excavation and fill of approximately 95 cubic yards of material, and only the moving of 100 cubic yards of material elevates a project to requiring an excavation permit from the Planning Commission. This is at 95 cubic yards, and we had that calculated by an engineer. Additional lighting is proposed with most of the fixtures at the rear of the house being dark sky compliant. There are two new lights proposed at the front, which staff was unable to verify that they were compliant with the dark sky regulations, but we've included the standard condition in our resolution recommending approval of the project that all the exterior lighting has to be dark sky compliant. The landscaping and irrigation plans have been provided with all but one of the plantings being fire resistant and they will be irrigated. There's an irrigation plan provided. The retaining walls required to terrace the site and build the rear deck range in height from two to four feet and are permitted with just a building permit, not requiring a retaining wall height variance from the Planning Commission. The constricted nature of the 7,200 square foot site that is very steep in back of the house limits the area that can be improved to create outdoor living spaces along the sides of the house, which are too narrow. The improvements are located substantial distances from the surrounding neighboring homes and exceed setbacks maintained by other yard improvements on similar sized sites. The combined front rear setback variance is just for... It's just for a small portion of the rear deck that's proposed because the rear property line is irregular. It's kind of in a large V shape. It's not a straight line. And staff is able to make the findings to recommend approval of both the conditional use permit and the combined front and rear setback variance. So we're recommending that you approve the project by adopting Resolution 2026-2. 26, setting forth the findings and the conditions for the project approval with the following corrections and additions to the document and additional conditions. So we, actually there's a couple of changes to the staff report too. So, oh no, there's just the, just the, uh, resolution. Um, commissioner Newton brought to my attention that on page two, after the, whereas, uh, the first one does not reference the plan. So we'd like to add the project is approved per the following plans and documents. The plans by Gary Lamont of Roth Lamont landscape architectures received by the town. I'm sorry, landscape architects. I know it is architecture, uh, received by the town on October 22nd of 2024, uh, And then we want to add the following language on page 4 after Condition 11. Condition 11 reads, in accordance with Town Code 8.20060C1 and 2, the operation of any tools or equipment used in construction or demolition work or in property maintenance work between the hours of 6 p.m. and 8 a.m. Monday through Friday on weekends and holidays between 4 p.m. and 9 a.m. is prohibited. Construction outside the permitted times is a citable offense. We want to add that because we've heard comments from surrounding neighbors that construction didn't happen on the house during those hours. And then under 12, it should read conditions placed upon the project by outside agencies or by the planning department may be amended without agency's written notification. We have to add the word maybe. And then we would like to add condition 23, that the driveway for the project, you approved a project in 2020 to do a large remodel in addition to the house, and it showed a concrete driveway. Concrete driveway has never been installed. It's gravel, and that's part of the original permit that should be completed before this permit is issued. We'd like to add that condition. And let's see, I think... I think that that's it. That would conclude our report.

Through the chair, I just would like to make note that Commissioner Kelly has joined us online.

But he's watching just as a citizen because he's within 300 feet. So he's not attending as a commissioner.

Thank you.

Does the Commission have any questions for staff?

Just a few quick questions. I think there's a small typo on page five of the staff report. Second full paragraph, first sentence, there's an open parentheses, but no close parentheses. And I think it should go after the phrase property line. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Page 5?

Page 5 of the staff report, yeah.

Paragraph 2?

Second full paragraph, first sentence.

First sentence.

I think the parentheses should close that property line.

I'm looking at paragraph 5. Am I just missing it?

That looks right.

It's the first sentence, the 7200 square foot size of the site and the location of the house.

No. So the first or the second full paragraph, the strict application of the minimum.

Oh, OK. OK. Oh, yes, I see. OK, thank you.

I think after property land, there should be a close parentheses.

Correct.

And also on page five, when speaking about dark sky compliant lighting, the staff report references an expanded parking area. I assume that was part of the first permit, right, the renovation permit. This is not part of what we're considering today. Is that right?

Here, slow down a minute. So in the resolution, what page are you on?

No, still in the staff report, page five. Last bullet on the page, it just references an expanded parking area when talking about dark sky compliant lighting. And I assume that was part of the first permit, the home renovation permit. Is that right? It's not part of this backyard plan, right? All the work is in the back.

Except she just said that one of the conditions that she wants to add is to require the completion of the driveway that was part of the first one. So by definition, it's part of the second one, right? Sure.

Yeah.

And also they are adding some lights in the front of the house.

But I guess the question is, the first application required the paving of the...

Correct.

That's correct. Of the driveway. This, on page 5 of the staff report, it's saying any new lighting fixtures for the expanded...

Oh, that's an error. That shouldn't be there. It says any new lighting. It should just be for the site. I probably got interrupted or something.

It happens. And then last question, just on the topic of the driveway. I'm not a landscape architect, and I will defer to the landscape architect that we have on the commission, but know paved driveway versus permeable driveway i mean i know it's a hillside site and so water runoff is a concern but isn't theoretically from a environmental standpoint something permeable perhaps more beneficial to the general town or i'm going to defer to anyone that's a i that's a contractor because i some of the heavy rains we get i'm not sure that a sloped driveway

with like a ground, you know, concrete or a ground, whatever they call it, right, would stand up very well. I mean, this driveway is so steep that they may end up striating it so that... What I've heard from multiple neighbors is that the gravel there now, when they come up to the top of the driveway, they have to jam on their gas and it spins and makes a terrible noise and the gravel's shooting all over. So it's not going to be the kind of driveway I think that can get away with a permeable surface. But I'm not a contractor, so you probably know more about it than I do.

Well, I guess that...

I mean, you can ask the applicant that, but I... I can try to call the building official.

But wouldn't that have been part of the last application for this? If the last application for the house remodel required a driveway, wouldn't that have been part of those plans?

It was part of those plans. So you would have to, you know, make a change. I'm not sure how that would work. So I think we should just leave it alone. Okay.

Okay. That is, those are all my questions. Thank you.

Commissioner Newton. Yeah, I'm going to follow that train of thought. I'm not going to leave it alone. Sorry. In the 2020 resolution on this property, there were a number of different requirements imposed in that resolution. In 2022, it came back to us after the appeal. And at that point, our staff report indicated that the conditions relating to the drainage requirements associated with initial resolution had all been met. So now I'm very surprised to hear that the condition of completing the driveway has not been met. And I'm wondering what other conditions of that 2020 resolution modified in 2022 by a separate resolution on a separate issue have not been met. Can you tell me?

So I'm not the building official, right? He goes out and does the inspections and he inspected the construction of the house and granted them occupancy, right? Planning, we look at setbacks and stuff. So we have to rely on the building official. He assured us that it was completed. I'm not sure how the driveway... was allowed to remain unpaved. The applicant might be able to address that if they talk to the building official about, you know, sometimes if construction is going to require a lot of like equipment to come in or they don't want to pave the driveway because it'll get torn up. So I can only assume it was something like that. But then when you're done, you need to pave the driveway.

I noted a number of different provisions in the 2020 resolution. One of them was the grading foundation retaining and drainage elements shall also be stamped and signed by the site geotechnical engineer as conforming to the recommendations made by the project geotechnical engineer. as well as a requirement that the geotechnical engineer field check the completed project and submit written certification to town staff that foundation retaining grading and drainage elements have been installed in conformance with the approved building plans and the recommendations of the soils report. And that the planning department and town engineer shall field check the completed project to verify that all planning commission conditions and required engineering improvements have been complied with, including installation of landscaping and irrigation prior to issuance of the certification of occupancy. any damages to the public and or private portions of Walsh, Manzanita, Fresno, or other public or private roadway used to access the site resulting from the construction related activities shall be the responsibility of the property owner. And, you know, they're supposed to take those videos before and after of the roadway and submit them. And based on what I was reading in 2022, it just appeared that all of that had been done. And the suggestion and one of the messages we received was that the pebbles, the rocks had been put on there afterwards, and that they would not have accounted for the increased grade that was of concern to the immediate neighbors. And I'm wondering if our town engineer has evaluated that compliance beyond what I saw in the 2020 staff report, which is, oh, it's all been taken care of.

Are you relating to the drainage system?

Yeah, I'm concerned because the neighbors complained about the, not the drainage system, which I understand goes back and has the water dissipator that's addressed near the fort and all that, but rather the drainage on the driveway and roadway at the top of the property and how that affects the neighbor, because that would have seemed to have been included as mentioned in the original drainage plans.

So it's been alleged that there's been some fill-in stuff that placed on the site that, you know, or moved around on the site that changed the water, temporarily changed the drainage of the site. But that's something we would have to refer to, like, our town engineer. I can't really address it. It looks to me like there may have been some fill that's remained at the one corner next to 10 Walsh, you know, where there's a tree and they've hung a tree swing there. But I wasn't there during the construction, you know, that the building inspector is the one that goes out. And so I'm not sure that I can address that. If it becomes an issue, you should probably continue it and we can have the building official talk, you know, either address it or have the town engineer address it.

Well, as I pointed out, I think the resolution that we adopted back in 2020 had all the requirements that needed to be listed there. One of the things you've told us now is that we want to add language in that requires compliance with that resolution in terms of completion of the driveway, right?

Correct.

So what I'm wondering is if we could require completion with all the requirements Of that resolution and maybe include the 2022. You know what I mean?

Because I'm not sure that based on what you're telling me that we have full compliance idea, you can put that in and we can say, we want the building official to verify that all the construction, the conditions for the construction have been complied with.

Yeah. And I would include the drainage plans and everything that had been submitted with the original application. Yep. And I think these are two separate applicants. We had an estate as the first applicant, and we have a human as the second applicant.

Start with a different owner, yeah.

All right. Now, a couple of the other questions that I have on a different subject. I think it's a different subject. Okay. the correspondence that we have from the neighbors raises a number of concerns with the original approval by the planning commission, you know, 23 variances that were not enforced and things like that. So I regard most of that having been resolved by the appeal, non-decision process that occurred after that planning commission decision, which was, I think, three to one, and I was the no, and I was outvoted on. But I don't think it's appropriate to revisit the issues from that process, that previous hearing.

Correct, and I've spoken with the neighbor that you know, authored that and indicated that to him, that that issue has been dealt with and taken all the way to the top in front of the council. And there's no going back at this point, except if you want to get compliance with the original building permit, right? All right.

So you have spoken with the neighbors at number 10. And do you have an understanding of the concerns about the location of of the rear deck below the existing deck that extends out further and their concerns about that?

You know, everyone has different perceptions. As a planner, I look at the decks that I see throughout town and decks that are a lot closer together for neighbors. This is a long way, by Fairfax standards in these smaller lots and hillside areas, this is a large setback between the two decks. And the applicant has put up a privacy screen on it. So that's usually the condition that the planning commission puts in place, you know, is that there's a privacy screen because the deck exceeds the required setback. So it's not, you know, it's not really, you know, they may feel like it's intruding on their privacy, but you live in a town, you don't live on a 10-acre parcel where you can expect huge setbacks and not to see any changes on your neighbor's property ever. But it's hard for some people.

Is this project encompassing our approval of the spa?

I'm not sure I understand the question. Yeah, the swim spa is part of these plans.

And is there a noise concern? I mean, obviously there's one that's raised by the neighbor. And have you evaluated that?

You know, we get complaints about, like, you know, equipment for things like this all the time. And if you get the right screening around it and put it in the right location, it won't annoy the neighbors. The building department deals with that. If we do get complaints and people have had to relocate... their equipment. They've had to put, you know, sound buffers around them. So there's ways to deal with it. You might ask the applicant exactly where those are going to be. But if they're far enough away from the property, the newer equipment, the building official tells me, the newer equipment is a lot quieter. And so it shouldn't really be an issue. But if it is an issue, we do respond and we make the person that has the equipment do something to try to lower the the volume of it.

I think that's all my questions. Thank you.

Well, if you think of something else.

Any other questions for staff? And forgive me, because I don't have my cheat sheet with me. Open it up for public comments to include the applicant. Is that? Okay. Sorry. This is the time for public comments on this application. Does anyone have public comments? Come up to the dais, please. We'll take the applicant first. Come on up.

hello i'm um laura caroline i was the the architect for the original house um and i've been consulting with and to help her um to help get through um the use permit and the variance approved and um so just a summary of the proposed improvements include um a new 400 462 Square foot deck at the lower level of the residence. A patio area was previously approved for the area in the original application. An exercise spa is planned for a portion of this deck to assist the owner's father's physical therapy.

I think we need all this again because it kind of covers what they said.

Screening at the ends of the deck with landscaping will be provided to create privacy between the neighboring properties. And I think that Linda summarized most of these improvements. But some items just to clarify that were brought up by the commissioners is the landscape architect designed a project so that the cut and fill are balanced on the site with about 37 cubic yards of cut and about 59 cubic yards of fill. So that's a difference of 22 cubic yards. This calculation was prepared by a civil engineer using a new topo survey to do the calculations. And the majority of the neighboring homes have signed that letter of support that was prepared by the project's immediately adjacent neighbor. And We did prepare an exhibit that shows the distances between the proposed elements and to the neighbor at 10 Walsh Lane. And we have an example of the screen and views from if we could share that at the dais.

Should I bring this up?

And regarding the driveway, I hear the owner can explain why it was delayed.

Yeah, so the driveway was only delayed because we had to wait for this backyard permit. There's a large heritage oak in the setback between the driveway and the property line. And the arborist advises that we shouldn't have anyone drive over the roots of the tree. So the only way to get equipment into the backyard would be via the driveway. So if we pour the driveway first, it would get destroyed in the process of building the backyard. So there's never been any question that the driveway will be concrete. We just haven't been able to do it because this permit had so many delays. It took so long to get. So as soon as this project is underway and all the equipment is out of the backyard, we'll be pouring the driveway. Okay. So any additional questions were available? I guess we should also mention there was some talk about an extended parking area. There is no extended parking area. The parking is exactly as originally permitted. So really the project area is limited to the backyard.

Anyone have questions for the applicant, Commissioner Newton?

Thank you very much for being here tonight. There was a concern by your neighbor about the grade of the road wash lane. I think a concern that it had been elevated, and I don't know if that occurred after your acquisition of the property or before, or if you have any information about that one way or the other.

Yeah, we've discussed this many times. And I'm happy to discuss it again and talk about the solutions we propose, but it's way outside of the area of this project. So I don't know if that's really the place to bring this up again, because the lane isn't part of our property. And it's not part of the backyard. It's on the other side of the house.

And I guess I'm just curious about the relation of the requirements under the initial approval and how they were implemented and when and how that change or purported change in grade may have occurred and to some extent compliance with that 2020 resolution is germane to what we're talking about here.

So, yeah, this is, I mean, Lynette, I've discussed this several times as well. There isn't a significant change in grade there. At some point, the neighbors at the end of the road asked us when we got a gravel delivery for the driveway, temporary driveway, if we could add a little bit of gravel in front of the lane because it was winter and it was so muddy, cars were getting stuck. So we agreed to help them and help everyone and put it there. And it worked. maybe added an inch or two, maybe, possibly. But it was at request of the neighbors who share the lane. And we have a letter from them confirming this. Apparently, in the complaint letter, it was said that those are the people that have complained, but they're not, they have no issue with it. And they're all grateful that the lane is more stable than it was before. So there, we're not sure where those ideas come from, but it hasn't been elevated. This if you look at the original survey, you can see there's always been a bump there, like the basically the topography stayed the same, we just filled in the ruts with the mud.

Okay, thank you. And then in between the two properties, there's an assertion that there's about an additional soil fill there of about 60 cubic yards. Do you have any information about that?

Yeah, that's a bit of a mystery as well. Lynette, I looked at it, and there's maybe like a little bump like this that might be left from the original owner, but that's part of the area that's going to get landscaped, so that'll be spread out again. I think the original owner, before we bought it, they kind of pushed some dirt together to put a construction container there, but it's not really a noticeable bump. I know there were some comments about privacy that affecting privacy, but we also have some photos that show that. So it's basically an area that's open to the road from both sides. And if you step three steps back, you have the same view than standing in that area. So it's quite unclear how it's affecting privacy, but I can show you the,

Do you have concerns if the Planning Commission includes a requirement that ensures that any other requirements from the 2022 and 2020 resolutions are complied with prior to the work you're planning? Well, I guess the driveway, she's saying, would have to happen after this work.

Yeah. We're happy to include it as it being completed as part of this project.

Did the building department get the construction bond from you that they're supposed to get before you were issued a building permit? Something that ensures that all the conditions will be met? Because we have had a lot of problems with people. using this reason for why they can't pave their driveway. And then it's a battle to get them to finally do it. Either they run out of money or they decide they don't want to do it. And this one, because of the slope and the gravel that's there, It makes a noise when they when they try to get out of it because it's steep. So, I mean, I don't know if it would it be better if you just removed the gravel at the very top. Apparently the tires spin out or something.

I thought the concern was the tree roots.

Well, that this is the first I've heard of that. So I this is the first I've heard that that that's why they weren't paving the driveway is that. I don't go out during the inspections. It's all with the building official. So he may have heard that reasoning.

All right. We may have to deliberate a little bit more about some of this in terms of the choreography of compliance and your concerns and the arborist's concerns about the tree roots. Yeah.

We have no issues whatsoever to include this driveway as a condition because the driveway is our main goal. This is the most important thing for us on the whole house is to finish this driveway because it's driving us crazy. We can barely get down this driveway. We have bikes. We fall over on the driveway. I mean, there's no way it can stay as it is. We just haven't been able to because we've been trying to get this permit for so long and we can't do the backyard. If we have that driveway, are we going to destroy the driveway again? So it's really not a dispute if we want to do the driveway or not and whatever it takes to make it happen. But to answer your original question, I have no doubt. I know we complied with all the original conditions of the last permit. But if we had to hire people again and pay for all the reports and stuff, and you're going to make us go through this whole process again, we're not going to be able to build the yard because we've paid $35,000 so far to try to get this backyard permit for an $80,000 project. And then we will run out of money to build the driveway. So I think, I mean, you have your colleagues have gone through everything. They've confirmed everything. They've given us the occupancy permit and we've completed that project other than the driveway. And It would be really hard on us if you made us go through additional. So we've done so many reports and we've had like the whole excavation. We paid a landscape architect a fortune to do this. Then we had to pay another civil engineer, delayed the whole permit by a year. We just like kind of need to just build it and be done with more reports and proving things over and over and over again. We've already proven everything. We've dotted every I, we've crossed every T. We've been so thorough with this because we wanted to do it all right. Because we know there's neighbors that will object anything that isn't done by the book. So we're really trying hard to do everything by the book.

Thank you.

Any other commissioners have questions for the applicant? Okay, thank you. Any other individuals want to comment on this application, please come up to the podium.

Hi, my name is Morgan Hall. I live at 10 Walsh Lane next door to the subject property. I'm an architect and a veteran of over 50 years of combination construction and architecture, so I know what I'm looking at. And all I can say is what's transpired with 6 Walsh Lane is a travesty. It flies in the face of all many, many design review criteria. And that was initially caused largely by a developer who wanted to maximize profit on that property. And one way to do it was to make everything higher. Not only the building is 31 feet, 10 inches tall, whereas the average height of the buildings on Walsh Lane is 16 1⁄2 feet. Floor area is, I can't remember, 2,700 feet. And the average floor area on Walsh Lane is, I believe, less than half that. The excavation required was I can't remember what they applied for, 280 yards or quite a bit. And what actually happened was the excavation was kind of moved around the site such that everything was made higher, including the backyard. The yard between number 6 and number 10, where I live, I estimate there's 60 to 80 yards of dirt there that wasn't there before the job began. I also estimate there's 20 or 30 yards of dirt on the lane itself. The lane is higher by 8 to 15 inches. Between my property and Six Floss, it's as much as 30 inches high. How much higher the rear yard is, I'm not sure, but a great deal of the excavation didn't leave the site. It just stayed there and made everything higher so that the initial developer could maximize the profit. Like I said, many concerns with the design review criteria were basically ignored. The house that's there has no particular relationship to the houses around it. Very little consideration was made to blend in with the characteristic context of the neighborhood. It's just an affront to the neighborhood. When the original plans were made public, the neighbors on Walsh Lane, we were mortified, and we appealed the Planning Commission approval, and we appealed that all the way up through the town council. And the town council actually approved our appeal because the town attorney had advised the town council the incorrect way to vote in the event of a tie vote. And I confirmed that with Riley Hurd, who's one of the foremost land use lawyers And he said, yeah, the advice the town council took was incorrect. But rather than do anything about it, the town just stonewalled it. and basically said, hey, if you want, sure, you can spend $50,000 or $100,000.

I'm so sorry, but I don't have the timer working because the battery doesn't seem working. I only have my phone going right now. It has been three minutes. I just wanted to share what's going on.

Am I supposed to stop?

You can go ahead and finish your sentence.

But it's my sentence. Well, I'll just finish it on the subject of the... I think it's very important that the project that was started, the first project started in year 2020, be finished before anything can be approved for 6 Walsh after that because there's a lot of residual problems with Walsh Lane and being the next door neighbor has just been a recurring bad dream for five years. Thank you.

Through the chair, may I ask Mr. Hall a question? Mr. Hall, your concerns include a request that the work that was approved in 2020 and 2022, there was another request approved in 2022, be completed before the work that we are looking at under this application be allowed to continue. In light of what the applicant has advised us about the arborist telling her, for example, that the driveway, you know, they want to not hurt the roots of the tree as they do the work in the back of the residence. You know, I acknowledged earlier today, we're not here to relitigate all the things that were litigated previously on this application. However, I agree with you about the need to ensure that the first approval is completed. The question I have is the timing and would it be acceptable from your perspective if before if some of the timing were rearranged so that all the things you're talking about were performed, but maybe in order to spare the tree roots, things might be completed afterwards, like the driveway that they're planning to complete. I've been talking with the planning staff about going back to the town engineer, for example, and looking at the videos taken before and after completion of the job in terms of the roadway and your comments about the elevation there. So I'm just wondering if you have a little flexibility in your mind with respect to timing if tree roots need to be protected.

Yeah, I have flexibility. In terms of some of the grades, though, I know that a topographical survey existed when the project first began. And I would ask that in terms of the grading and that kind of thing, that a subsequent topographical survey be done that I believe would prove what I'm saying. But if the correction of that It has to be done in a staged way to protect the tree. I'm up for that. It doesn't matter so much to me what they do in their rear yard. It's just what's happening next door. Their upper deck is 19 feet higher than our deck. 19 feet. Those are dimensions you only get in commercial multi-unit buildings of But I'm a man about it.

Thank you. I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Rick Hamer, downtown Fairfax. Just to visualize 19 feet. Okay. That's like looking up at the top of the ceiling from here. So I remember as Commissioner Newton, Commissioner Swift, and Planner Neal, we're all here when this out of place enlargement of a modest home, which was held in an estate, was then approved by the Planning Commission. And I think Commissioner Newton's request to ensure that the conditions from those previous conditional use permits and are complete as part of this project in the order so that in other words they're complete before they start digging another 80 yards or moving another 80 yards of material around in a place which very adversely affects the neighbor I'll just say downhill because everything is above Mr. Hall here. And I think we need to look at where our longtime residents, our legacy residents, where they had a stake in Fairfax and they have for decades. And I think it's important to just go through this extra thing to make sure something's done. We do have a lapse of enforcement to make sure things are done. If this were San Francisco, they would make you finish it before you start the next project. And I think that's Mr. Morgan's request is very reasonable. And I agree with Commissioner Newton.

Thank you. Any other comments, public comments from in the room? Seeing none, we'll take it to Zoom.

I do have one commenter online. Deborah, please go ahead. You should be able to talk.

Thank you. Deborah Benson, Cascade Drive. Can you hear me? Yes. OK, good. I agree with pretty much everything that Mr. Hamer just said. I attended the Planning Commission meetings when this initial project was approved. And I want to say, how much is too much? There's a point of confusion here for me. I'm a member of the Fairfax Tree Committee, and I heard the applicant say that an arborist told her that if the, and forgive me if I get this wrong, that if the driveway was paved before the work on the backyard was completed, the roots of the heritage oak could be harmed. But I don't understand how heavy equipment driving over gravel on the top of the roots of the Heritage Oak could harm them less than having a concrete barrier between the roots and the heavy equipment. And then I heard another thing from the applicant saying that if the driveway were paved and the heavy equipment went over it to affect the changes in the backyard, that they would have to repave the driveway. So my question is what? And I would like to see an arborist report address that question that I have. And that's all I have to say. Thank you for hearing me.

Thank you. Anyone else on Zoom?

I see no other hands on Zoom.

Could we have the applicant back before we close the hearing?

Thank you for the comments. I can answer all of them, I think. If we go with the most recent one to explain the concerns of the arborist. So there's the driveway and there's a 15-foot setback to the property line. And the arborist advised us not to drive over that setback and damage the tree. So the only way to get into the backyard would be across the driveway. So as long as it's not paved, that's not a problem. But as soon as we pave it, then we would destroy it again with the heavy equipment and we'd have to go around over the tree. So we either destroy the tree or the driveway. So that isn't really a valid choice. Which also, when we were talking about arborist and that tree, it occurred to me what the comment about the additional height in that area that... Morgan, mate, I remember now that the arborist also asked us to add four inches of bark on the root area to temporarily protect it until the full landscaping is done because it was during the drought. He was worried about the tree losing too much moisture. And I think that's what caused the little bump there. But I can show photos, but it's insignificant. I don't know where the calculations come from. I doubt they were done. Also, our landscape architect and civil engineers have reviewed all the topography. And there were comments that there was additional fill in the backyard, which none of them could confirm. But also, the project currently, the current calculations are based on the current topography on site. So even if there was any extra dirt, it would be corrected with this project. Because once we're done, it's going to be like it's in the drawings. And the amount of dirt moved is based on, so I don't really see the problem except if we are not able to do the project, then it's going to stay at as is and the hillside's going to slowly slide down the hill. So yeah, so that's going to all get corrected. I don't think it's worth spending a lot of time and effort and money on putting more numbers to this. Also, there was a comment about an 18-foot high deck. I'm assuming he means the balcony of the master bedroom, which was completed with the original permit and has nothing to do with this project. The deck we're building as part of this project is level with the topography of the ground. And number 10's main level is at the same level. They're not below. And their whole house is slightly below because we live on a hill. So they're further down the hill than we are. But there's nothing we can do about it. We build a two story house and they build a two story house. So unless they go to three stories, I don't see how we could ever be level with each other. And the majority of these comments were about the troubled history of the project. As you all know, we took it over. mostly through construction. And we've put a lot of effort into correcting some of the mistakes the previous owner did and made the best of it. And in fact, Morgan supported us at the time and helped us figure out what's best for the neighborhood. So it's a bit disappointing to hear the comments now, but there's nothing we can do about the history of the project. It's done and it's been extensively discussed. So bringing it up again is not going to change it. Yeah, so I guess those were my points. Do you have anything else? Are there any other questions?

No, thank you.

And if you want to turn the mic off.

Thanks. Okay, I'm going to close public comments and I'm going to bring it back to the Commission for discussion.

Okay, thank you. I just want to, I guess, jump right into it on the substantive issue. I agree with Vice Chair Newton generally that it's not appropriate to revisit the prior decisions and sort of, you know, we have criteria for granting the variances um and making findings for the conditional use permit here and just want to focus on those i understand if there is prior work that needs to be um completed there's a process for that already through the town um you know just looking at the um 2022 resolution we have in here that building permit plans are reviewed and approved by the town engineer at the expense of the applicant prior to issuing a building permit and the projects inspected by the town engineer prior to issuance of the occupancy permit for compliance with the engineering plans. And so I don't think it's appropriate that the applicant pay to redo that now if it was certified at the time, if it's not related to this project.

I think... Could I ask a question of... Commissioner Newton, I didn't think you were asking them to have to get all the reports again. I thought you were asking us just to check and make sure we had everything and everything had been done. So it wasn't going to cost them any more money.

No, that was just a suggestion from one of the requests from the public to go back and re-measure everything and to certify that it's right now. So just wanted to be clear on that. I do think it's generally appropriate for the town to check its records on properties and make sure that it has everything it's supposed to have. But from that prior process, on this project itself, I think no, there isn't generally in Fairfax going to be renovations like this that everybody in the neighborhood is enthusiastic about and wants you to do. But I think also everybody in town wouldn't want their project hindered when it's their turn. And we've got to take both of those into account. And here, this doesn't seem like that extraordinary an amount of disturbance for the noise on the water devices. I had to think about that when we had RAC, and I know there's a lot of different structures and things they do now to stop noise from very large outside appliances. And, you know, this... Just because... we approve a project here doesn't inoculate the applicant from having to remedy issues that the project causes in the future. You know, if things go sideways that are not anticipated by the planner, we think won't happen, there should be a process for the town to say this is not in accordance with your plans or even afterwards, it's causing a nuisance if there's too much noise or things like that. So, yeah, I'm otherwise generally supportive.

Other commissioners? Commissioner Bala?

Yes, thank you. Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Okay. So just wanted to, yeah, a couple of comments. I agree with Commissioner Pfeiffer's assessment that it doesn't make sense to try to hold the current owner accountable for some of the challenges that the previous kind of owner created and doesn't make sense to re-litigate issues which have already been solved. by two previous planning commission and town council motions i don't think it makes any sense to try to hold the current owner responsible for decisions that were made in the past that they really have no control over so i agree with all of that secondly just want to say that the logic as i understand it and thank i want to thank the owner for kind of clarifying the relationship between the unpaved driveway, the setback over the heritage tree, and the desire to complete the backyard landscape construction prior to completing the driveway. That just having been around some construction work and landscape construction, Contracting project makes total sense to me. You wouldn't want to pave the driveway and then have your heavy equipment moving over that to do a backyard install because you're just going to damage and destroy the driveway. So the logic of wanting to complete the backyard improvements and then finalize the paving of the driveway makes 100% sense to me as described. So I'm in favor of allowing this project to move forward. It sounds like there's been enormous... delays, unnecessary delays. You know, this is just an aside. I know change is hard for all of us in Fairfax to see new projects come, to see significant changes in the neighborhoods that we love and value. It's difficult. And on the other side of the coin, we want Fairfax to be able to grow and accommodate new people, new families. I happen to know the owner, we're part of the school cohort. They are a lovely family with beautiful children and I can't see any reason to further delay the project that can allow them to continue to thrive, to allow their family to thrive in town. So I hear the concerns of the neighbors, change is hard and some change in the case of allowing new growth, new families to come and be part of our town is something that I think we really need to do a better job of supporting. Therefore, I just want to recommend that we approve the project with the condition of adding the addition of having to complete the driveway paving project once the landscape improvement project is complete. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other comments before I do mine? Go ahead.

Yeah, I appreciate everybody's thoughts and words here. One of my concerns is that the driveway that was required to be paved under the terms of the resolutions that were adopted by the Planning Commission previously was not carried out. so that says something to me and it uh you know the resolution that was approved in 2020 cited the general plan provision land use 4.1.4 which says new and renewed development shall be designed to minimize runoff in a manner that does not cause undue hardship on neighboring properties And from what I can tell, the failure to undertake the completion of the plan in the manner in which it was intended to be completed has in fact caused alleged hardship because of runoff, and the drainage is a concern. And while the driveway not being paved has a rational reason behind it, I am not satisfied that that's the only condition that was not met as... this was implemented in the way it was. And so my concern is that the town staff has to determine if there was a change in drainage that was not supported by that resolution that has caused undue hardship on the downhill neighbors. And I think because we cited that general plan condition, that specifically refers to drainage. I mean, we cited three land use provisions. One of those three specifically talks about minimizing runoff in a way that can damage the neighbors. So that's pretty serious to me, and I feel like if we could include a provision that required At some point, and I'm struggling with the point in time at which this occurs, at some point prior to sign-off a blessing, it's not an occupancy sign-off, it's like prior to playing in the fort. I don't even know how you write this.

Prior to the final inspection, that's what you would... The building official goes out on any project. It's not a building. They're not remodeling the house, and he will final the project.

And I would say not that I would want the current owner to have to resubmit. I mean, the plan that's submitted with this staff report is the 2019 Berzog report. That hasn't changed since the first time we reviewed this. So what I'm talking about is... the town going out and confirming that the previously approved resolution requirements have been met as well as the requirements included within this resolution. Does that make sense? And that would cover the driveway as well as potentially something going on with the elevation that was different than what it was intended to be when we approved it before?

That makes sense to me.

I just have some concerns about that. Can I just respond?

Why don't you hold that for a second? Are you done? Okay. So a question on that then would be when would like town engineer staff go out and validate the prior reso that things have been taken care of? And would that be like before anything else goes forward with this?

Well, let me make sure I'm, I think we might be talking about two different things. I believe that the building official and the town engineer are going to be able to let you know whether they received the letter from the project engineer saying that they inspected the drainage system. You know what I'm saying? And the staff, if we need to go out to the site. But a lot of the conditions I think you're worried about are paperwork stuff. And I don't know. But anyway, so you're suggesting that we just recheck that when we're finaling the backyard improvements. Did I hear you correctly? Yes.

Yeah, because the fact that the driveway is a condition that wasn't done raises the question in my mind of is everything else done? And I want to check them all off.

Yeah, so I think that makes sense. And the applicant's not going to have to do anything unless something that was supposed to have been done is determined to not have been done. Then they'll have to follow up by having the project engineer you know, write the letter that they inspected the drainage system as it was being constructed and when it was finalized, right?

And I had...

I mean, the project proponents have a little bit of responsibility for complying with the conditions of approval, you know what I'm saying? So hopefully everybody did what they were supposed to do during the construction process.

And I had a couple questions or comments. And I didn't look closely at the last two goes at this, but one of those, you know, as far as the trees, we would have had, would we not, an arborist report that would have talked about protecting the trees like the oak, do you recall? Yeah.

uh so the path the original project was not mine so i don't recall but that's the standard procedure and um you know this this was this free model was mostly done within the existing house in an area of the property that already had no vegetation on it so um I believe that if the new construction was occurring somewhere within the drip line of any of the existing trees, yes, we would have required an arborist report. Do I remember specifically it was the other planner's project? I don't recall.

And with that prior work, we had a vegetation... And I just wanted to comment on this. We had a vegetation management plan... that had to go to Ross Valley Fire and get reviewed and approved by them, we are now changing the outside area. So, and we're changing, you know, there's a landscape plan with this application that talks about new plantings. So with this new application, There's going to be a updated vegetation management plan. Correct me if I'm wrong. That has to go back to Ross Valley fire to be reviewed prior to a building permit being issued. Correct. Because vegetation management plans live with the property.

Correct. And that's condition 19 in the resolution on page five. That's why I included that. Yeah. They have to revise the, The one was approved before because it has changed. Yeah, they'll have to do that prior to issue. It has to be submitted as part of the building permit. That's what we're requiring.

And when plans have to go to Ross Valley Fire, which there's other aspects of the backyard and the design that would require them, I think, reviewing it, like the fire...

hit right fire reviews the project like three times yeah review the planning the preliminary planning plans and they make a recommendation right they review a vegetative management plan and they review the building permit so um you know when they're looking at different things in each of those reviews and each time the applicant has to submit to them so

And that would be kind of the normal cost of the process, correct?

I'm not understanding. Yes. Okay. You pay for the reviews, but everyone has to do it three times.

All right. Thanks. Commissioner Bela, did you want to make a comment?

No.

Okay. Okay.

I may just want to jump back in on you know Commissioner Newton's follow-up I think and my understanding was was more in line with what Linda said as to checking that all the filings and certifications were made but I think it's important that the you know the conditions in the prior resolutions are conditions to um having a building permit and an occupancy permit approved and they're checked by Engineers and the the town building official at the time of the project and so it's possible that they could have been in compliance at the time and not and wouldn't readdress that after the fact and I think it's from a policy perspective you're Anybody that comes with a new project then is going to think, let me look back at all the work that's been done before and make sure that I can confirm that every condition in every project has been complied with instead of just relying on the fact that the building permit was issued or the occupancy permit was issued. And I think it's sort of, it is, every property in Fairfax can, have issues where they're not in compliance and then focusing enforcement this way, I think is just a disincentive to have projects as opposed to making sure that all of the properties in the town are in safe condition for the benefit of everyone.

I mean, if I might, Chair, I hear what you're saying totally. However, the driveway, like, it needs to be paved. It's not before us to evaluate that plan right now. That was previously approved and not done. So that theory that the approval prior to the certification of occupancy is going to cover it does not hold water in this particular case, right? And water being held is the critical question when it comes to drainage and our general plan and it's really important that the planning commission follow through on things that are held to such import in terms of the neighbors and the drainage and the runoff. I mean, that's, it's, it's, I don't know. I hold the general plan in high esteem for that reason. Right.

And I, I, I think the, obviously the driveway is important here and I, believe the applicant and it's a priority for them, but presumably there is a process for the town if they weren't coming back and neighbors were still coming to complain that the driveway was never done to address it via that process. Right. If they were not coming to us with a plan now and the neighbors came and said, hey, it's been three years. They never did the driveway and it's it's causing issues to our property. I think that's the the the route to take. And I think here they and you still are getting a benefit because you're raising it to everybody's attention. But I think including it in the resolution sort of. alters the process somewhat. And I know this is very unlikely that it's the case now, but we do have all these carve outs in our resolution for if at the time the town engineer says that there can be alterations that don't affect anything. I know the driveway is not one of them, but for me, that's sort of a factor in keeping the resolutions and the conditions separate. Because I'm envisioning not for somebody extending a deck and putting in a spa, but if somebody comes in and wants to do an ADU or something, and we then say, hey, the conditions on that should be on that specific building or plan and not remedying the remodel they may have done on the original house a few years ago even if we know that something because they're still i think and maybe i'm wrong there has to be a way to address uh properties that did not do work that they said they were going to do if they don't if they're not coming to the planning commission with another uh application

So you're okay with Linda's request that we add a provision that requires the driveway be paved in accordance with the 2020 resolution or not?

Yeah, I think I'm...

So you want to open the door a little bit. Well, for me... Not swing it open. That's what you're telling me.

I guess it is different for me saying... as part of this project you have to when when you're done with all this construction do your driveway because it affects the property generally and supposed to we are everything from the prior project is okay and i hear you and in general i think also like

But maybe I want to do a little horse trading here now. Could we, before we slam that door shut, open just a little, allow the driveway issue and the drainage?

I don't know what has to happen for the drainage. What are we asking the applicant to do in that case?

I'm not asking the applicant to do anything. I'm asking the town... to check the boxes that the requirements from the 2020 resolution that I have marked here that all required that the drainage be certified occurred. And if they did not, to also evaluate the requirements of this resolution with respect to the drainage requirements. as part of the final sign-off on this project. I just don't want to limit it just to the driveway. I also think the drainage and runoff issue is important.

I see that. For me, the distinction is that the driveway, as we are saying to the applicant, a condition of our approval is you have to do this, as opposed to saying a condition is the town has to check something, and if they don't see something then we're going to have another condition after you know it's then then you are just what's the difference between that and saying the town's going to double check and see if your current uh your property is currently in compliance with everything

Would it make you feel better if I told you that the detention, I climbed out, I saw the detention basin, and I believe there would be no reason to build the detention basin if you didn't have the other drainage things draining into it. So, I mean, as a staff person, I didn't observe it, but it appeared to me like the very end of the whole drainage thing has been constructed.

Right. Now you're talking about the drainage going down the backside of the house. Correct. I'm talking about the drainage on Walsh Lane. I'm talking about the drainage at the top of the driveway. Yes. The whole front of the road where the building is, is flat and then drains down to 10 Walsh Lane. And my understanding of the correspondence from the neighbor is that that used to be on an soft decline and is now flatter at the top and starts draining right where the driveway is going to be built. I think this is all part and parcel of completion of the driveway. and compliance with the provisions of the original resolution to ensure that the driveway and the road...

I need to rescind what you said because the drainage engineers did not look at any kind of drainage in the public road for this.

No.

I'm sorry, it's a private road, right? It's a private road. Correct.

And we discussed that at the prior hearing, the fact that it was a private road. And we amended the resolution to incorporate the concept of preventing any damage to the private road. And one of the things that we required... was the geotechnical engineer shall field check the completed project and submit written certification to town staff that the foundation, retaining, grading, and drainage elements have been installed in conformance with the approved building plans and the recommendations of the soils report. The planning department and town engineer shall field check the completed project to verify that all planning commission conditions and required engineering improvements have been complied with, including installation of landscaping and irrigation prior to issuance of this certificate of occupancy. Any damages to the public and or private portions of Walsh, Manzanita, Fresno, or other public or private roadway used to access the site resulting from constructive and related activities shall be the responsibility of the property owner. And then there's even more, and we say...

Okay, so the building official and I walked down Walsh Lane, okay, and neither of us believes that it has been drastically changed. We looked at the retaining wall of the neighbor's house, and the dirt looked at the same level. We looked at the location of the tree roots coming from both sides of the road, and it didn't look like there were substantial changes to the road. The building official was out there numerous times to inspect things, and we believe that there may have been some gravel put down, supposedly at the request of a neighbor, but it didn't drastically change the road. But we're not going to have a letter from an engineer addressing the private road. He They will address the drainage plans that were submitted with the house.

Okay, that's very helpful. Another question. What would be the scope of the town's inspection after the driveway completion?

So usually damage to a road means like you like they've done something to like destroy the pavement of a public roadway. This Walsh Lane was never paved. And so, I mean, the only damage I can imagine is, let's say, I don't know, some piece of equipment tipped over and left a big, you know, pit in Walsh Lane. They would be responsible for coming in and refilling it, you know, and restoring it. But, yeah.

But does the town inspect the driveway after it's paved? OK, that's what I want.

The building official goes out. He looks at the rebar, right? He looks at the framing. And then, yes, when it's finished, he does look at it to make sure that the topography, the slope and everything is fine and that it meets up with the road without creating like a drop, you know, like being elevated above the road. So you go off a little bump. Right. So, yes, he does do that.

And do you see any problems with allowing for that to occur after completion of the work in the back of the house?

You know, now that I hear, I was not aware of what the arborist said, but the issue is not the tree roots. The issue is the gravel that has been placed at the very top of the road because it's so steep that when they come up, the tires spin and it makes a noise that annoys some of the neighbors. So it's the combination of the gravel and the slope of the driveway. That's causing the noise problem. That's why I asked the applicant if there was some way they could remove the gravel from the top area, maybe that would help. Do they need the gravel to get the traction to get onto the road? Then maybe they can't do that. So that's why I was including that condition. The lack of a driveway is causing a nuisance for the neighbors. And it's been going on for a long time, you know, four or five years. I didn't get any response. You know, it seems to me there should be something that they could maybe propose to address that issue, you know, short of short of paving it right now. You know what I mean? And then and then I'd be fine with them not paving it till the end. But it's creating a problem. We're getting complaints about it. The fact that they're not paving it.

Let me ask a question regarding drainage on the road. Once this project is completed and they pave their driveway, however the prior plans may have said either permeable or not permeable, Is there a potential that water can, because of that flow down?

You mean increase the water?

Increase the going down the road, and is that something that could be looked at when that driveway is paved or look at the plans for the paving of the driveway to ensure that no drainage?

That should have already been done. I mean, the drainage engineer is supposed to look at paved surfaces and determine when water is going to, come off of it and needs to put sub-drains and stuff in to carry it to the back to that detention basin, right?

So they would have done that on the original application, and the original application would have shown on the plans a paved driveway. That hasn't been completed, but the original plans would have already had the paved driveway there. So they would have looked at that As far as drainage, they would have incorporated the paved driveway.

They should have. And our engineer reviews those and has to approve them.

Okay. So assuming we would assume that was done and that can be something the town checks. But then what that means is that the driveway pavement has to be done in accordance with those original plans that showed it.

Correct. Correct.

So not doing something different now, necessarily. We talk, you know, permeable, non-permeable, but it has to go back to following those original.

The approved building permit plans. Yes, they have to build per the approved building permit plan.

For the prior.

Correct.

Okay. To the chair, just to point out that Commissioner Bela did have his hand up a while back. I don't know if he no longer has something, but it's my job to point it.

No, I think we asked him before when his hand was up. Did you want to speak more on this?

Yeah, sure. I just wanted to corroborate, I think, what Commissioner Pfeiffer was saying, which is that it feels like we're trying to hold this current applicant accountable. responsible for decisions that have previously been made and that trying to hold trying to use this current application for some backyard improvements to try to address concerns that should have been addressed by our building official issuing a certificate of occupancy It just doesn't make any sense to me. You know, the applicant has said that they've got numerous letters of support from their neighbors and we're making some assumptions about the stuff that may not have been done based upon one letter of complaint. I mean, this just sounds like we're taking this way too far and making assumptions about what may or may not have been completed when our building official has already signed off on the project and issued a certificate of occupancy. So it doesn't make sense to try to drag all this stuff through the mud again. It just doesn't make any sense at all. We should be talking about the current application in front of us, and we should talk about the merits of this particular application and not use this process to try to relitigate issues which have already been resolved with previous decisions by this body and by the town council.

I think we were trying to... Oh, I'm sorry. I was just going to go to Commissioner Newton and ask if if in fact the driveway that hasn't been done was part of the original plans and those plans were looked at to address drainage in the front on the road, would that be sufficient to have that again, as part of this reso that that driveway has to be completed and that it has to be completed in accordance with those original plans.

And it goes without saying, you know what I mean? The building official, you have an approved set of plans and the building official has to go out and make sure that everything looks like the approved plans.

Right, but again, what we're saying is that driveway wasn't done back then for perhaps good reasons. Commissioner Newton has a concern about the drainage, so if we go and if the drainage and the design of that driveway was addressed... in that original application, then the thought would be that when they do put in the driveway, it has to be in accordance with those original plans.

Correct. Yes.

Yeah, and my issue, Commissioner Bella, with what you're saying is we started out this item with staff asking us to put an additional requirement in this resolution relating to the failure of that driveway to be constructed in accordance with those 2025 plans, despite the fact that the certificate of occupancy was issued. We also have an applicant who has told us she intends to build the driveway. It's critical. to her and her family. So I think it's totally appropriate for us to follow the recommendation of staff and include a provision that requires the completion of the driveway in accordance with the previously approved resolutions pertaining to 6 Walsh Lane And hopefully that will include ensuring that it is done in conformance with the plan and drainage plan associated with that 2020 approval. But I would not want to require it to be completed before the work in the backyard was finished to protect the roots of the trees. And I would recommend that the commission consider including a provision that gives the planning department the authority to work with the applicant in the meantime to come up with an alternative to the gravel that is currently at the top of the driveway along the road there that seems to be the cause of the neighbor's concerns that have been expressed to the staff?

If I may. That makes sense to me. So just to sort of talk out loud on what the addition to the resolution would be that at least I think we're on the same page on if there's stuff you want to add, obviously. Feel free to suggest that. But so I think we'd be... as you pointed out, as, uh, Linda led this report with adding a condition 23 complete driveway, um, pursuant to the plans and you just referenced, you know, the plan date, uh, Frederick defined architects from blah, blah, 2019. Um, prior to the final inspection of the project. And before the, you know, and before then, the applicant shall work with town planning department to have a... interim solution for the issues caused by the gravel at the top of the driveway. That way, you know, that we have something that says the planning department can work with them. And I think, you know, that's reasonable and related. I just, well, I'll hold that and see, you know, if that works for the fellow commissioners or if there's I still hesitate to add other stuff but don't need to belabor the point if we're not going to anyway.

That sounds good to me.

And just to reiterate early on the changes that staff had Mentioned for the reso and commissioners had mentioned it was. I have all of those. Page two, the whereas with the plans. Identified page.

Yep, five. I've got a couple on.

Five, the top with the maybe. And I think those were the only two before we started on this. So does someone want to make a resolution?

Yeah, and let me just, I'm happy to do that. I just want to go over those again. The list of the plans, which was on the second paragraph one under the whereas clause on that, page. Um, after condition two, you wanted to add time of operations, eight, 6.00 PM to 8.00 AM, 4.00 PM to 9.00 AM. Okay. Conditional 11. I see he was a Roman too. Yeah. Correct. Conditional 11. Um, Number 12, add the maybe. The language about the driveway condition, 23 per Commissioner Pfeffer's recitation there. And then the one about the lighting, any new lighting for the site as opposed to any new lighting for the preferential parking. And with those amendments, I would move to approve resolution number 202526 of the Fairfax Planning Commission, approving application number 2526 for a conditional use permit and combined front-rear setback variance for rear yard improvements, including excavation and fill to create outdoor dining and spa areas Sitting patio with outdoor fire pit install walls and stairs throughout the rear yard to access the various improved areas egress and access stairways up both sides of the house and new landscaping. It's six Walsh Lane.

I'll second.

Okay. Patroni Yes.

Bela Yes.

Beffer Yes. Newton?

Yes.

Chair Swift?

Yes.

Sorry. Rezzo's been approved with those changes. There is a 10-day appeal process, and information on that can be obtained from the planning department. Thank you. Does anyone want a break or anything, or are you good to go? Good to go?

All right.

With that, we'll go on to the second item. Tenalima Road, application 25-14, discussion consideration of previously approved discretionary permits for possible revocation or modification of original conditions. Can we have the staff report?

On June 26th of 2025, the Commission approved discretionary permits to allow the operation of a collective at Tennolema Road that included artist studios, interior, exterior design businesses, retail sale of art pieces and other items, and allowed them to hold 12 special events with no more than 110 visitors per year. The approval included the condition that the conditional use permit would be reviewed by the Planning Commission for compliance with the original use permit conditions and final action would be taken on the design review permit. It was supposed to happen. It's happening tonight. You're going to review it. And In order to facilitate the operation of the collective, the owner did quite a few improvements to all the structures on the property and added a new building without getting any permits from the building department or approvals from the planning commission. And they don't comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. So the planning commission kind of gave them the ability to continue while they tried to get everything into compliance with the code. We met with the applicant after the June meeting and the Ross Valley Fire Department, and we let him know that he needed to give us detailed construction plans, showing us what he had done because we didn't really know what had happened. And then he had to submit them to fire and to the building department. We mailed him a letter on October 2nd of 2025, reiterating what he had to do to keep the use permit active and to bring the property into compliance with ADA fire and building codes. To date, the required plans to legalize the work that's been done on the site without a permit, the plans have never been provided to the town or to the fire department. We received two emails from the property owner, which we attached to the staff report, in which he indicates that he does not intend to comply with the requirements to legalize the work done on the site to date, and he's in the process of evicting all his tenants. So the findings the Planning Commission relied on to make the original approval can no longer be made. And so we're recommending that you rescind the original conditional use permit and sign permit, and you deny the design review permit for the collective to operate at 10-0 Lima Road by adopting resolution number 2026-1, setting forth the findings for denial. And that would conclude our report.

So if I may, just for clarification, because the action on the staff report says we're rescinding the previously approved conditional use permit, design review permit, and sign permit, but we're actually denying the design review permit because we had extended that. And then also, can you address the incomplete sentence in the reso?

Oh, thank you for reminding me. Yes. On page, on the first page, On the first page of the resolution, under the one, two, three, four, the fifth, whereas number eight, the sentence didn't get finished. It should read the design review permit that was supposed to be submitted within 90 days of the initial June 26, 2025 Planning Commission. Right. They were supposed to submit additional information for the design review permit in order for you to take action on it. And that was never done.

Does the commission have any questions for staff?

I do. Sorry. I do have a question. Chair Swift, and this was just regarding did the owner or staff ever make an assessment of the potential financial cost of the improvements that we were asking the applicant to conduct? I'm just curious if we ever had a sense of what it would have cost to make all the improvements we were asking to the various buildings and new construction that occurred on their property.

That's not something we normally do. I mean, the building official can sometimes, you know, guesstimate, you know, when people are trying to figure out how much their projects are going to be, he'll sometimes guesstimate for them what something might cost based on, you know, the cost of installing fire sprinklers and another similar sized building. But no, we did not do that on this project. And I don't think it's something we really want to get in the habit of because costs change and materials change, material costs change. And it's something that I don't know that the building official would really have time to try to keep up on all that stuff.

Yeah, that makes sense. And then just a follow-up question. So I noted that the owner says that he's evicting all the tenants and just wonder if if you're aware whether or not the artists group that had been utilizing this space when we last talked about this and and attempted to issue the conditional use permit if they've been operating on the site since then and what is the status of that current set of

artists that have been occupying this space are they actually now gone or are they just now receiving their eviction notices or what's the current status of the use on the property what the owner told me is that the the interior design business which seemed to be the largest use of the business is already gone and has you know they they had another place in marin another location in marin that they were also operating from so they just they they were early on just you know, evicted themselves. They, they, they stopped, uh, operating from there, but there were some, you know, kind of hangers on that seemed to be, uh, doing artwork. And I recently heard a rumor that I don't even know if I should repeat it, that there's like some, some, um, like, uh, sales of beverages and stuff occurring from there. And I haven't been able to verify that or not. So I think there may be like one or two of the artists still there, but the owner put in writing that he was going to have them all evicted by today's date. So I, you know, I'll probably go by tomorrow or next week and see, see what it looks like, you know, cause there was a truck parked there. And if that's gone, that might be a sign that everybody's gone. So,

OK, thanks for that. Thanks for the update.

Any other comments or questions for staff, Commissioner Newton?

Yeah, I noticed that the owner was asking you to confirm that the house was not historic.

I am not prepared to do that. I am not a historic architect, and based on what I know about the house, I find that a little hard to believe.

Would the planning director like to comment on the historic nature of the house at Tenalima and what potential protections might be available to a historic home in Fairfax?

Well, I think we would require that there be a historic analysis by a professional to determine whether it is historic and then maybe what options would be for potentially developing the site and retaining the historic character in some way.

Thank you. And I think that's also for that town's housing plan, that's addressed in the analysis, the CEQA analysis, the NECDF, that was one of the items that was identified historic status. Any other questions for staff?

Just one more. The owner emails that we have as the attachments, that's all you got in writing from the owner since our meeting? Yeah.

Okay. If no one else has questions for staff, I'm going to open it up to public comments on this. And I know the applicant isn't here, so.

And through the chair, just a reminder, I'm so sorry, but I cannot get the timer working right now, so I'll have a timer on my phone. That's fine.

Hi there, Tishung 31 Olima. I live across the street. Yeah, everybody moved out by Thanksgiving. There was absolutely no activity there all month of December that any of us could see. No in and out. For sale sign went on. Yes, went up yesterday. And I guess just speaking from the neighbors, it would be really important to us to understand what is possible on the property because he's been walking around the neighborhood saying he's going to sell it and make sure somebody who can put 200 houses, 200 living residences on the 1.1 acre or whatever. But it is important to understand what that property could be used for before we get blindsided. I don't know that some of the town analysis, just thinking about what's happening at School Street. I read all of the letters back and forth. Town thought it would only be able to have 160 units and sure enough planning permits are going to start for a 241 building. So I think we just want to have a clear understanding about what is possible. And as far as we all know, that building is historic from all that we know. So something will happen there if he can sell it for the $2.95 million that he wants.

Hi, I'm Krista. I live across the street. And it's nice to hear you just talk about the possibility that that's a historic house. I believe it is a historic house too. And I think that given a lot of the things that are going on in Fairfax, I would love to see that there's some of our history that stays with us. That being one of them, that whole property has, as we've been to many of the meetings, everyone has spoke about how magical that space is. And that I must say that they did a great job making it more beautiful, in my opinion, to show what it could be and preserving the way that that house still is today. If you go up on the balcony, you look right at Mount Tam. It's very beautiful. And if we, if there's a way that that can kind of fold into whatever happens in its future to help Fairfax keep its history, I would love that idea. And hopefully that there's some things that came out that are good with what Doug Wong had envisioned and what he started and how he unfolded and made something look very beautiful and maybe open up to more ideas that are a little calmer than just a big development i think there's a lot to i don't know i think there's a lot of potential on that property and i'd love to keep the history thank you thank you anyone else

Hey, Jasper Simon, 28 Olima Road. I just want to thank you for your time and agree with my neighbors. And as to the best of our knowledge, it's a historical building, which we were kind of surprised when there were alterations made to it without permits and such. But just to say that, yeah, I just agree 100% with what they're saying and I do hope that we can preserve some of our Fairfax historical and the beauty that goes with it and that I'm curious what will happen to it in the next phase and that I hope that it harmonizes with the community and with our neighborhood as well. Thank you.

In commissioners, Commissioner Newton asked a pretty important question about that site. Fairfax's consultants that did the housing element, Diet and Bacha, also did the programmatic environmental impact report for that housing element. They listed very few historical Fairfax sites. in that PEIR. The application mentions a two-story residence, but that's about it. That two-story residence is one of the oldest original Fairfax homes still standing. I believe it was built around 1894. 65 years ago, Mrs. Martini lived there, and she made picnic box lunches with sandwiches and supplied lunches for Fairfax residents and some local businesses. She made it down the basement of that home. One of the best restaurants in Marin County, Rabini's, was in a structure adjacent to the creek. In 1982, Governor Jerry Brown came to Fairfax, and they held a big dinner there. The restaurant had changed hands, and it was serving Asian cuisine at that time. The new owner, Doug Wong, purchased the property, and You know, it's unfortunate that he got off such a bad start with the town of Fairfax and the neighbors. The two-story structure, he restored it. And it's beautiful. The property's for sale, I've been told, right now. Fairfax's housing element has it in a workforce housing overlay zone, WHOB. It calls for ministerial approval, no hearings before the town planning commission or town council. The structure, if it turns into residences, will be at least four stories tall. and have 20 to 30 units there. Somehow we've got to protect that two-story structure, and I'm not sure how we're going to do that in this process, but it's important that historical structure be protected, whatever happens to that property. Thank you.

Thank you. Next.

Hi, Rick Hamer, downtown Fairfax. No, I think the essence of what I'm going to ask the town planning commission to do is to not rescind this use permit, to simply put it on hold to a date uncertain. or to suspend it so that it can be, if a proper owner comes along. Mr. Wong was very turned off by the June meeting. And it's just, if you're familiar with how some of the owners of CL property, such as my former landlord, they think different. And I don't think Doug was any exception. That house may not be listed in the federal registry, but it would be an excellent candidate for historical, for the type of... privileges issued by lytic HZ type of eligibility for mixed commercial and residential. The main problem with that structure that Doug had was it needed an elevator, it needed sprinklers, it just needed a lot more money. Uray sank a ton of money into that property. And he thought that he wouldn't need to do all that. Well, if that house could be isolated and preserved for what it is versus other structures on the property being brought up to full commercial code, That would be great, but I think that revoking the, or rescinding is the word being used, that use permit is not the course that should be done. I think that it makes the property more marketable. If Doug is asking $2.95 million, which I've heard he is, and that he thinks that it's going to be eligible for low-income housing at a price of dirt for $3 million in Fairfax, I think... I don't think it's going to be developed like that, and I think that we're just going to be stuck with that empty lot and probably have a bunch of tree-cutting trucks out there for another decade. This is really good. I was out there with Frank for the grand opening and several other people that are somewhat well-known and recognized in Fairfax, and the general feel there was this is a good thing. It's a good thing to have culture. in Fairfax. And I think that cutting that off is just not the route. So please consider putting this use permit on hold and see what the new buyer wants to do or to suspend it or whatever it is. It is possible, I believe, according to the way that things are done in the California

as uh manuals thank you next hi thanks for hearing me uh my name is fritz i live across the street from tantaluma as well um we welcome uh artists collectives and small events and, you know, cultural gathering places, classes, that part of that vision was fantastic and was a great idea. But clearly the draw and the desire to have very large events that would overwhelm the neighborhood, such as the grand opening that really created a huge scene on a regular basis was, it was not a good fit for the, you know, for the neighborhood. So, you know, I agree with all that was said about the improvements that were made. It looks great. The idea of artist collective is fantastic. You know, it fits right in with the character of Fairfax. But large events for, you know, hundreds and hundreds of people to be drawn into town and create the kind of – chaos that was created on the grand opening day is just not a good fit. So again, you know, artists collective, small events, great culture, love it. Classes, you know, lecture series, fantastic. But it's got to be done right above board and, you know, with transparency. And that's what we hope for the future. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone else in the room?

If not, anyone on Zoom? I do have a few hands online. The first will be area code 415. Caller, please go ahead. Caller, with number area code starting 415, you may need to unmute your own phone, but now is your time. Please go ahead. We're going to switch to the next hand up and come back. And the next hand up will be Deborah. Deborah, go ahead.

Thank you, Deborah Benson Cascades. Thank you for hearing me. Just a quick thought came into my head. I wonder the building, the house looks really pretty on the outside, but I'm wondering if some of the interior revisions Doug made would threaten the historical status if it does indeed have one. That's all just a thought. Thanks.

Okay, thank you, Deborah and caller at 415. We're going to try it one more time. I'm opening your mic and if you can unmute, please go ahead.

Thank you. That should do it. Uh, star six, not pound six.

I appreciate the extra effort.

Uh, it's Kevin and, uh, from San Anselmo. I just wanted to, to, you know, appreciate the, the, uh, commissioners and for in happy new year and, and just let y'all, uh, know that, you know, for an instance like this, where it was a sites list property, uh, That was conditionally approved towards a non housing as a priority use as a commercial use the no net loss laws mandate that the planning Commission and or if it were a town council action. Mickey finding at the very moment that that of that or now, for example, is what i'm calling about. And it would be something along the lines of the commission finds that this action does not result in a net loss of housing capacity. And the town retains sufficient sites to meet the six cycle arena. And I highly encourage that you make some sort of acknowledgement of that tonight during any action that you take. It always needs to be done with anything that's going to be a non-housing use. Thanks so much. Have a good night.

I have no more hands on line, Chair Swift.

Okay, I'm going to close public hearing and bring it back to the Commission for discussion.

Go ahead.

I first just wanted to thank the members of the public for their comments. I think particularly the immediate neighbors. I know you guys have been through sort of a harrowing experience with this site and this project. It's been months, if not over a year and counting. You know, we never want to condone unpermitted work. It was unfortunate the way that things played out. But unfortunately, it's just that sort of reality of what happened. So thank you for coming again. And I know a lot of you have been to basically every meeting about this project. So we just want to acknowledge that. And thank you guys for your contributions here. I think for tonight, I would just stress that we prioritize what's actually in front of us, right? I understand that there's some anxiety about what could happen at this site if it were to sell. I'm sympathetic to that. The historic nature of the property doesn't really fall under our decision to make. The process is that their licensed historic preservationist comes. That'll be part of either the due diligence effort that the new potential owner does as they assess whether or not they want to buy this property, or it'll be as a result of any kind of new development application that comes before the town. And so that is done by an expert who will gather all the data necessary to make that determination. It's not up to us. You know, that doesn't mean that just because it's not on the National Historic Register, it doesn't mean it won't be found to be historic in some way and that the historic preservationists won't recommend some sort of action to help preserve it in any future development. It's just unfortunately not something that we can determine or make any sort of motion about tonight. So it's just a question of what's in front of us and whether or not we want to rescind an application that has been made very clear is not going forward. That's sort of the long and the short of what we're discussing tonight. That's all for now.

Any other comments, Commissioner Newton?

Okay, so two questions based on some of the comments we received from the public. The first is, is there such a thing as suspension of the permit?

So the town attorney advised us that this should be revoked, not suspended. You know, it doesn't stop someone coming in and going through the correct process to legalize the unpermitted work first and then to turn in the use permit to do the same thing again, right? But that's why we headed this way.

Okay, and I think there are practical complications based on the application that we received, which reflected a snapshot in time that no longer appears relevant to be a reality given that people have moved on and things have changed. There was also a comment about making a finding that there would be no net loss of housing capacity. Can you comment on that one?

I think the planning director can. It's not something

that we would do in this type of- Yeah, this action wouldn't require that. We're just rescinding a use permit. We're not authorizing any development at this time.

Okay, and Commissioner Petroni, I agree with you that we are not here tonight to decide on the historic nature of the structure of Tennolema. However, the general plan, my beloved general plan, has provisions relating to the town's desire to identify historical structures within the town and possibly pursue historic protection under you know various federal and state uh laws to protect historic properties and i don't know that general plan was adopted in 2014 or something we still have yet to do the survey of historic homes that is reflected in that general plan that i think even identifies tenolima and a couple other historic properties within the town that you know some things have been lost you know uh the old bar up at um as you come into town inside the uh what is that restaurant bar right as you come the lodge yeah the old bar that was in the lodge it's not there i believe the the bar was they maintained the bar i think that was part of that application we talked about that okay but the rest yeah yeah but um and maybe the sign i think was another thing a vestige but um yeah so these are things you know as we move forward in terms of eventually updating the general plan in a way that's more realistic than the last update, where there were seven zillion things we were going to do, like historic property survey in Fairfax that we've never done, that I hope we can, as a town, undertake at some point.

If I could just briefly respond, I wholeheartedly agree. I understand that that's the process. I was just making the point that in this specific case for this specific property, given all of the contextual issues that we're dealing with here, it is identified in the housing element as a housing opportunity area, right? Which means that more likely than not, depending on the sale of the land, that process won't be able to happen before it's purchased by someone and before we see a potential application, right? That's all I was trying to say.

Any other comments before mine?

Yeah. Go ahead. Yes, please. Just a clarifying question. So I agree with Commissioner Petrone that we're here to focus on potentially rescinding the conditional use permit, which I think makes sense. Just want to And I know we're not talking about any future possibilities on the site tonight, but I did want to ask a clarifying question of staff related to this site's role in the housing element and what assumptions were made regarding the kind of, you know, capacity of this site to accommodate housing in relationship to those existing uses on the site. Was there an assumption that those would be remain in place with the addition of the new housing or that there was no assumptions made about existing uses on the site in relationship to the site's potential role regarding as a housing element workforce overlay sites.

There's just a generic calculation and assumptions made. So there wasn't any sophisticated analysis or design of the site to determine the capacity.

Okay. Thanks for clarifying.

Yeah. Broadly agree. You know, in June 26, we said we'll grant based on the circumstances of everybody. who was at the property at the time and all the, all the public comments we heard, we were sympathetic to the businesses operating there and said, you know, we can temporarily grant these conditional use permits, but not the design review. And it's subject to our revisiting them in six months, which we're doing now. And the circumstances are not those where we approve the conditional use permit. So I don't think that, without having a whole nother hearing about the use on the site as it is, it makes sense to keep those effective. For know the other comments we've heard and because i have an extremely tedious memory i remembered that mr egger made a comment uh included in the final eir the housing element specifically about tenolima um and its historic nature and it's included in the in all the published materials and just checking back on the exact response in and mitigation measures we the town included on that it says um Any project sponsors proposing developments on a property with structures more than 45 years old, which this would count as, will have to be evaluated for historic significance. The project sponsor would have to pay for that. Proposed development projects are then evaluated for direct and or indirect effects on the identified historical resources per SECA guidelines requiring avoidance or minimization of impacts of historic structures. So I think... There's a lot of discussion and information about this property out there for developers to see and for potential reviewers to see. And I am confident that there isn't going to be something that happens where nobody even considers the use of the property in the future. That's just my opinion.

OK, my comments on this. I went back and reviewed our June 2025 video on this so I could refresh my memory. And at that time, I didn't hear anyone who opposed the concept. Some of the comments I heard from the eight artists or businesses, one individual mentioned that the applicant had approached him to participate in this endeavor. One individual talked about how the county has lost a lot of places where artwork used to be shown and for sale. And here was an opportunity in this individual's own backyard in town to do that. One individual mentioned how they had spent time and resources to renovate their own space there. It's unfortunate that the applicant who has experience, I believe, in both commercial and residential real estate did not move forward with the required permitting and ultimately impacting those artists that spoke at the June 2025 meeting. as well as many members of the public who were in favor of the concept. But I would support the resolution, and we move forward from here.

Is everyone done with their comments? Because I forgot something crucial about the resolution.

Let's talk about the resolution.

Okay. So the planning director made an excellent point that we should reference the original resolution.

And I actually put it out in my version for you.

And I'm just going to real quickly go over them.

Okay.

you don't mind can i uh yeah so under the third whereas we wanted to add the language you know um at the june at the june oh that's wrong too at the june planning commission 2025 at the june 2020 yeah okay adopted resolution 2025-16 to approve the requested conditional use permit we just included a reference to the original resolutions to keep it all in context, right? And then we added it under the one, two, three, four, five, the sixth resolution. I mean, the fixed six whereas also we referenced it. And then at the very end under the now therefore be it resolved, we included that language to reference that 2025-16 is being invalidated. So thank you.

Hearing those corrections doesn't, yeah. I have a question. I'm a little bit confused. In the one online, there are eight conditions and we completed the sentence on number eight and now there's seven. Am I missing something?

Let me look at the original one that I have in the staff report. I'm not sure because this resolution the planning director sent back to me via email. Do you recall how it got from eight, how it went from eight to seven? Well, here's your red line. Hang on, let me look at it. It's 10. Yeah, this is 10.

You've dropped number eight off altogether. The one you finished the language of.

Yeah, we do need to. What am I looking at?

The design review permit that was supposed to be submitted within 90 days of the.

Yeah, of the initial June, June 26, 2025 planning commission was never submitted. That's what it's supposed to say. Yeah, that's true. But that's not a condition.

Well, the introductory paragraph says, here are the things that they didn't do.

Yeah, so it's okay, because it says, you know, it's pointing out that the that the owner has made no attempt to comply with those conditions. So I think it's fine to keep aid in and say the design review permit that was supposed to be submitted within 90 days of the initial June 26, 2025 Planning Commission meeting was never submitted. Right?

Sounds good to me.

I agree. Do we have a reso? You mean a motion? Sorry. Okay.

We'll move to approve resolution 2026-01, a resolution of the Fairfax Planning Commission revoking planning application number 25-14 for a conditional use permit and sign permit denying and denying the design review permit for the Fairfax Ranch Art Studios and professional offices for designers providing interior and exterior living space design services to operate as a collective at 10 Olima Road in the corrected form as provided this evening by the planning department and Linda Neal with the corrections made to the third whereas clause and the addition of the eighth condition read out loud in discussion.

Do we have a second?

I'll second.

Petrone?

Yes.

Bala?

Yes.

Pfeffer?

Yes.

Newton? Yes. Chair Swift? Yes.

So the resolution as corrected passes. And there would be a 10-day appeal process on this as well, correct? And information on that can be had from the planning department. Thank you. And thank you all. You all want to break, or you want to keep? You're good? All right. The staff need a break. Perhaps we can take a five-minute break since you're working on that and we already lost part of the staff.

Sounds good to me.

We're doing a five-minute break. We're breaking. We will be back at Five minutes, 940. Okay, so we're continuing the meeting, and we're going to have item three, the ADU update. Can we have your staff report?

Yes, thank you, Chair Swift and Planning Commission. So this is kind of an annual tradition of the state. They adopt new ADU regulations and then require us to hurry up and adopt them. This year, we did not have time to go through the whole public hearing process before the deadline. So the council was forced to kind of adopt an urgency ordinance to put our regulations in place. And so now we're kind of coming back and doing it kind of the backwards in a way where we're coming back through the public hearing process and considering a readoption of what the council already adopted. So the options for the planning commission are as if you kind of agree with how the town council adopted the code, then we can just kind of Pulled the public hearing kind of pass it on through, or there is an opportunity to make. Very minor adjustments so long as we're still consistent with the state law. So. Anyway, I'll kind of walk through and this year, the changes that the state law, we're not really. I don't want to say they weren't significant, but there were not a lot of them. There was just kind of more a strategic update of a few key things. So I'll point those out as we go through the PowerPoint. So here is the recommended is conduct a public hearing, although it doesn't look like we had any.

And I'm sorry to interrupt, but is this going to be uploaded to the website if it hasn't been already?

Yeah, it has not been uploaded to the website. In fact, I lost my technical person because Kara is sick, so we have to wait until she's back to get it uploaded. So it'll probably be uploaded tomorrow. Anyway, conduct a public hearing. We don't have any public in audience. Maybe there's some online. And then the second would be to adopt a resolution recommending that the town council adopt the code changes or readopt the code changes. So this is the background. They adopted the urgency ordinance on December 3rd so that we could get those adopted by the deadline of January 1st. And the reason we did it this way instead of just waiting until the idea is that the new state law would go into effect anyway on January 1st. However, we would have lost that. all of our unique design requirements that we have in the code until we readopted it. So we didn't want to go without that for however long it took us to go through the public hearing process. So our attorney advised us to just go ahead and adopt the urgency ordinance, and then we could kind of take it back through the process. So here are the, the state legislation that went through so the first is ab462 and what this did is it modified the coastal development permit which doesn't apply to us however it did do something that's a a pretty good idea in my opinion is that it adjusted the rules for a certificate of occupancy in the case of a disaster so the idea is if a disaster like a flood earthquake fire, what have you, burned down an entire property or flooded an entire property and it had to be rebuilt. A property owner could take the less expensive option just to be able to have some place to live temporarily, and they could rebuild or build an ADU first. Then they could live in the ADU while the primary structure was being built. So you could get basically a certificate of occupancy for the ADU prior to the issuance of the CEVO for the primary dwelling. And then it would be under that narrow exception where the governor declared a state of emergency and the primary dwelling was destroyed in the disaster. And this actually doesn't require any action by the town. It's just automatically in effect. However, we did incorporate it into our code so that people are aware of it. The second state law was AB 1154. And this changes the rules regarding odor occupancy of a JADU a little bit. Previously, the owner was required to live in the home. Now, this only applies when the JADU shares a bathroom with the primary dwelling. If the JADU has its own bathroom facilities, then owner occupancy is not required. And then also, it did change the rules regarding short-term rentals. It prohibits all JADUs from being used as short-term rentals. And Right now we allow to be used to short term rentals if approved prior to 2020 January 1st, 2020. so that's not changing. If it's an, you can still use it a short term rental if it was approved prior to 2020. but if it's a, then you can never use it as a short term rental. If that makes sense. Okay, there's SB9, and this is a different SB9. This is not the lot split SB9. This is a new SB9, if you're familiar with that term. Yeah, it confuses people that are very familiar with SB9. It is not the same SB9. And SB540, I think that's a 300. It's under my text box here. Yeah, 543. And this just establishes a... that we have to submit a copy of our ADU ordinance to HCD within 60 days, and another way that HCD can invalidate our ADU ordinance if we don't send it to them. There was also a significant change, and this mostly makes planners' lives more difficult is that it changes the size limits of ADUs and JADUs to be based on interior livable space. So you take out all the walls and the utility closets and everything that's not like livable space. And so you'd have to be able to do that calculation. So it allows a little bit more size. They can be just a little bit bigger. but it makes it extremely difficult to calculate. Although I guess if you have a fancy 80 AutoCAD program, maybe it's not.

So yeah, I think this is just occurring to Linda.

So she's having, she's, yeah. And then it also changes a little bit of an adjustment. They already had some exemptions to impact fees. So it changed the thresholds for those impact fees that they're not applicable to ADUs that are smaller than 750 square feet or JADUs smaller than, and this is in my way here. I don't know what it says. Yeah, 500 square feet. Okay. And this also applies to school fees. Now, we don't collect the school fees, but it's good for us to know this because when we send the applicant, we send the applicant off to pay the school fees at the school district. And so then they would be exempt from school fees also for these particular square footages. Okay. It also kind of, this is an organizational thing more than anything else. It doesn't necessarily change any of the regulations, but it creates four categories of kind of type one ADUs. And these are converted ADUs on a lot with a single family home, a detached ADU on a lot of single family home, and then the same thing for related to multifamily dwellings. There's also some clarifications of the permit process and deadlines that are kind of not really necessarily changes, but are just kind of structured and codified so that it's more clear. And there's also some, again, these are not new, but they're just stated more clearly. 15 days to determine completeness. You have to provide the applicant with a written statement. with a written appeal process for any complete determination or denial. So that's new. So if they don't like what you're requiring of them as far as the completeness process, then they can appeal that to the Planning Commission and say, well, we don't want to have to provide that particular document. And then there's 60 days to provide a final determination on the appeal. So these are the specific changes as far as what's in our code. Um, just we added a definition of director just to make it clear who that person is. Then we, as I mentioned earlier, we are defining things based on interior livable space. So there's a new definition for that. Um, there's the section. This was mostly, uh, some of this was just shifted around, but it's, it's not new. Um, But the couple of things are new. The ADU permits are still ministerial. It also continues the incentive program that we had and that we have in the current or previous ordinance. And there's a 50% fee reduction. And then the date was pushed out to January 2036. It also continues the amnesty program where illegal construction can be processed without a financial penalty. And then there's more clarity in terms of the process and timing. And this is the classes. This is just a new terminology where you have Class 1, statutorily regulated, and then Class 2, locally regulated, where we can apply our local design and other requirements. And then there's some significant changes to maybe they're not significant, significant, but changes to the general requirements where fire sprinklers are required in JADUs if they're required in the primary residence. Again, short-term rental is not permitted in JADUs. Owner occupancy no longer required in most cases. And then that certificate of occupancy timing, this is where that pops up, where if a structure is lost in a disaster, it can be occupied prior to the primary dwelling. Then there are some changes under the specific requirements. Again, the maximum size is now based on interior livable space. Then there's a modest change to setback exemptions where you can construct an ADU Wherever an existing structure is currently located. So this is kind of an automatic exemption for something that might be sitting in a side yard setback or rear yard setback or front yard setback or any setback. That would potentially even include things that were constructed without a permit potentially. And then a modest increase in lot coverage from 35% to 50% to allow for more flexibility. Impact fees are based on interior livables and living space, exemption from school fees, and then there's a direct utility connection are required if the ADU is sold separately because I believe last year they introduced that provision that allowed you to have an ADU on the lot and then have that ADU to be sold separately from the single family home. So that was last year and then this year they it occurred to them that maybe they should have a utility connection requirement if you have a separate ADU. So they added that in. So anyway, that's kind of the broad brush summary of the changes. In the attached to the staff report is the reso with the new ordinance language and then also a red line so you can see the changes from the existing to the new. And so if you choose to pass this on to the council tonight, then we would immediately go to the next meeting of the town council and have them also hold a public hearing. So I'm available for questions.

Since there are, I don't know how many people are on Zoom still. There's a bunch of folks there, but none of the physical presence of any audience members here tonight. I take it it wouldn't be a problem if we decided to re-agendize this for next month as well as today. Is that right?

Yeah, I don't know if there's a huge rush on it, but I mean, I just think it's... I don't know if I want to just delay it for no reason. I get you. I have a reason.

Yeah. I've been looking carefully at the red line. I had not seen your presentation, and the very first section that you said has been amended doesn't jive with what I see. So in the definitions, there's some red line where we add the definition of director, but I don't see interior livable space definition added on this red line.

I don't know if I missed that one.

Yeah, you're right. It's not on there.

So that makes me want to go through every single item on your PowerPoint and make sure it's there. And I can't do that tonight because these guys will kill me. I can go through some of the other issues that I have, however, in the meantime. Okay.

Cool.

okay do you think we have the wrong red line i'm not seeing it on the ordinance either so it makes me wonder if it was if i um maybe you want to make a recommendation that that's a change the planning commission could make to the version that we're looking at when we make a recommendation to the town but i would want you to give me an explanation I have a couple other questions, comments, questions.

Okay.

What's the difference between the red and the green in the changes?

Yeah, the green is – and this is not perfect because this is basically – I just used the word function where you do a compare document. So I compared the old to the new, and this is how it came out. And so the green is supposed to be things that are in there but are moved. And then the red are supposed to be things that are new. However, a lot of the red is also things that have just been moved. It's just that it didn't recognize them as such. So, yeah.

And this is the version that the town has adopted that is, I mean, it's not online when we go online to pick up the town code, but this is the version that currently exists as reflected in this record. Correct. I have noticed a number of typographical errors primarily pertaining to internal references to other sections and using lowercase numbers instead of uppercase numbers. and I'm a lawyer, so I noticed that kind of thing, but I really think you have to have these citations all correct in this next version that is adopted because it's too messy to have some of these things. Okay. So those are my immediate comments. I'll let the other commissioners weigh in now. I'm going to,

take the opportunity to jump in on this one before the end. So I question the need for the urgency ordinance and the process that we took. When I looked at urgency ordinance in the code, it's for immediate preservation of public peace, health, safety, containing a declaration of the facts constituting the urgency. So every year we go through this with state changes and we make and we update our code. Last year, we took up the changes that needed to be made for 2024 changes in February and March of 2025. And that's when we did our work and provided it to the council for them. And we had there, I know you mentioned, you know, we have unique Pieces and we don't want to lose those and and putting something before The new year was the reason to do the urgency, but we have done it this way and It's seemingly forever, this approach of taking it to the planning commission and working it and then sending it to the council. You know, last year's code had things unique to us, you know, the stream piece and other items, and we still did it in February 2020. and March. SB 9 and SB 543 address, and this was new in here, address submitting the ordinance to HCD within 60 days of adoption. And if not submitted within 60 days of adoption, they could void the jurisdiction's current laws. So that's new in there. So I guess my question is, Have we sent the ordinance that was approved December 5th to HCD yet? If you look at that for 60 days from that date, we would need to send that to them? Because that would come up like the 1st of February. So it's already gone?

No, it hasn't gone. It will go to them. I wasn't going to send it early because I want to see how things are going.

And just as a reminder for the commission, um, HCD has scheduled their webinar, January 30th to go over. And I think y'all got something on that to go over the updated changes and they have, um, already uploaded an addendum to their accessory dwelling unit handbook. So that's already up there. Um, Short-term rentals. For clarity, Fairfax has prohibited short-term rentals of ADUs and JADUs since 2017. At that time, In 2017, the state made it an optional choice for jurisdictions, and the Fairfax Planning Commission in 2017 decided to because they were concerned about housing availability, decided to prohibit short-term rentals for ADUs and JADUs. So that's actually been in effect since 2017. And our current, the prior current ADU has it in there. And that was Ordinance 810 that the town in 2017 approved. Looking at the, and to the comment about the red and green, I think it's easier to just have like a red line that's all red line to identify what the changes are versus the green and red. That gets too confusing. But it's good that you had the one that the council approved. So the rental term, Exhibit 1, page 7, changes the rental term for what was not rented for a term that is shorter than 31 days to not rented for a term that that is shorter than 30 days. I believe the ADU ordinance that we had that we approved in February and March and is what is in last year's is correct that it should be less than 31 days because hcd references use the phrase must be for terms longer than 30 days so i think you have that one day difference and i think less than 31 days is appropriate the section on fire sprinklers Page 7 of Exhibit 1, Paren 3, Paren B does not address the clarification that fire sprinklers are not required for a JEDU if the primary residents does not have a fire sprinkler, and that the addition of the JADU to an existing primary residence cannot trigger the requirement for fire sprinklers in the primary residence. It only states that the addition of an ADU does not trigger that requirement for the primary residence. And I think we should be clarifying that it's the ADU and the JADU. with that trigger. And I think those were kind of the brief comments I had on this. So to the point of, you know, getting more people in here to do the public having the public here to hear this, and because that was one of the comments of the council member at the council meeting, that a member of the public said that the urgency ordinance and this vast process did not allow time for members of the community. to soak this in and provide any comments. So I think making correction, any corrections we have to this would then potentially we would continue this to the next meeting and, and, and go through that. Those are my comments.

I think I, I just to clarify, I did mention at the urgency ordinance hearing that we would likely be at the planning commission at the January meeting for this. And we still don't have any public in the audience. So it might not be a big issue with the community. So anyway, we can always try, but we can't make people come.

I just have one question slash comment that I'm going to heavily preface with the statement that much to my mother's chagrin, I never went to law school, and so I'm not a lawyer and would defer to the town attorney and the two attorneys that we have here on the commission. But given the way that this played out and happened and given the fact that it seems like ADU legislation is a favorite topic of state law and this will likely come back to us next year if there's new ADU legislation Does it warrant or has staff ever heard of or thought about some sort of clause that we put in the code now, just sort of explicitly saying what's already true, which is that any state law supersedes local law that would allow us to not have to go through an urgency ordinance every time something is updated and instead go through the more traditional process where, yes, we're still having public meetings about it, we're still updating the code, we're still tailoring it to Fairfax, but in the case that new legislation is approved by the state for the interim period, that supersedes Fairfax's code per whatever specific ADU language is in there. Is that something you've heard of, or it might open more?

Yeah, well, HCD is a little ambiguous on this. It's like I think that every year when they adopt the new code, they seem to strengthen the language for enforcement purposes. So this year our attorneys thought that it's – there was concern that if we didn't adopt anything by – January 1st, then our entire code would be invalid and we may not be able to kind of come back and restore it. It would just be kind of tossed out and then it would be exactly what you're saying. We, at that point, we should just go with just. State law and not try to have our own local standards. Um, which is what some jurisdictions are doing. They're just kind of just adopting whatever. state law is and then not having not trying to make it unique to their local government acd still does require that you go through the exercise um i was recently i was reading a um kind of an an enforcement letter that was sent to a another bay area community where they just didn't bother ever updating their adu code they just had their old like 1980s ADU code, but they were following the state ADU regulations and they still got an enforcement letter because they had the old code kind of knocking around on their website.

Right, yeah, I guess I'm not suggesting that we just say state law is the law and never update the code again. I'm just saying to prohibit us from having to do an urgency ordinance again, right, so that we just say that state law supersedes it so that in the interim period between the time when the state law is passed or goes into effect and the time that staff is able to make the edits, present it to the planning commission, have the public outreach, and then go to council, In that interim, state law is the law.

Holy anathema to my whole thing about Fairfax needs to maintain its independence. You know, often the cost-benefit analysis is let's do what the state law says because there's a lot of problems if you don't. But I think maintaining that as a truly Fairfaxian decision is worth having to go through an urgency ordinance as opposed to just laying down and saying, whatever state law says is what Fairfax will do. Fairfax is never going to do that.

To the chair, I'm sorry for my own clarification. Are we in still questions to staff or have we opened public comment? Because I do actually have somebody waiting to comment online.

Sure, that's official. I think we're still in question of staff mode, although I kind of went beyond that. Oops, any other questions of staff?

No, that was my only question as to whether or not that's something that you've heard of being done or thought about. Thank you.

Any other commissioners have questions for staff? All right. I'm going to open the public hearing.

Great. And thank you, Deborah, for waiting. You are unmuted. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Deborah Benson Cascade. Drive, Fairfax. I just wanted to say that I intended to be there in body and person tonight, but I've been fighting this illness as many have over the past month. But whether or not I am able to be there and I am here engaging in this process, it's very important that whether people show up or not, that we are given the opportunity to engage. So I just wanted to make that point. So thank you. That's all I have to say.

Anyone else on Zoom? I have no more hands online. Okay. And seeing no one in the room, I'll bring it back to the commission for discussion.

looks like commissioner baylor commissioner baylor yeah thank you um so i uh i appreciate the community member who called in and expressed the you know the the desire and willingness to be to want to participate in the decision making here um i'm also kind of struggling with illness and so Not feeling well. I wasn't able to attend in person. I know this is an important issue. And now we're three hours into the meeting and really just now beginning to address what perhaps is one of the most substantive issues of the agenda tonight. Just want to express my frustration at the process that these important issues often come at the end of lengthy meetings and it's just makes it really difficult to, to fully participate as a council member. I can't imagine members of the public who have families and work obligations and so forth. And then I just wanted to say that, you know, the, the, the, the continual kind of updating of state laws, you know, eroding kind of local decision-making power and, it's a challenge every community is facing and Fairfax is certainly facing it. And I just wanted to shout out to our staff who are under increasing pressure. You know, every time the state shortens a deadline to turn around or review, it puts more pressure on Linda and Jeff. And so I know that we're trying to do our best to uphold, you know, Fairfax's role in terms of local decision making. But I also want to point out that we're, we are at the behest of what our, you know, our staff is capable of handling. And so just want to say that to the extent we can make their job easier by trying to address these topics in a timely matter and um address the comments and support them in moving forward these critical decisions to the extent that we can as council members just wanted to put out there i think that's an important part of our role as part of the planning commission to support staff in the very difficult job of adapting to rapidly changing circumstances at the state level That's all. Just a comment.

Thank you. Commissioner Pfeffer?

Yeah. Thank you. Very much appreciate the sentiments of Commissioner Bela there. Because I had the misfortune of going to law school, which such a punishment was not suffered by you to your benefit. Just I think sort of the concept that you were Getting at, which I think is a good idea is sort of some contracts have. What you call a blue pencil rule, which is if a judge or somebody later says. This provision is illegal or you strike it instead of losing the whole contract. They're required to. use a blue pencil and rewrite it just to make the minimal changes. So, uh, like a, a clause for us, like, um, you know, this RADU ordinance will stay in effect, um, subject to any future state laws, uh, until we make our amendments, minimal, uh, minimal changes to incorporate the state law, that kind of thing. I, I, mean i think it can't hurt to have that if the town attorney has seen other communities use something like that i imagine that when it's decision making time the fear of losing our existing rules will still put the same sort of pressure and urgency and people won't want to rely on that clause to protect us unless another jurisdiction tries it and gets away with it um for the amendments itself they're not changes. One of them actually is that the town council, I think actually did get to make on this one, the extension of the incentive program that I just want to reiterate. I don't think anything's going to happen because I make these comments whenever we talk about this, but the incentive program for legalizing non-permitted ADU and JADU's I understand the reduced processing fees for new construction, but I think JADUs and ADUs are incentivized to not apply to legalize until the last possible date because they're getting the benefit of not paying taxes on the improved assessed value. And I think there should be some language like, for as long as there's a documented unapproved use, any town taxes and fees will be considered as part of the, I think there should be, maybe it's reduced, but you shouldn't get to wait 10 years and not pay taxes for your use the whole time and then just get a clean slate you know now and you and the owners have known yeah well it's just you i don't know why anybody would would legalize an existing adu that they're renting out until january 1 2036 right now

Unless there was a rolling aggregation of the taxes that you owed while you were operating an illegal ADU.

Right. Um, and maybe to trigger that, you just get a notice, Hey, we noticed you have an ADU or JDU that's not permitted. Here's your notice that we currently have this incentive program that allows you to legalize a non-permitted, uh, use, um, And you have this option for a year. And after that, you're just sort of on notice. And we still want you to legalize it. So we'll consider reduced penalties in the future. But we are going to start counting from whatever date we choose. Just, again, to avoid somebody seeing these extensions and waiting until 10 years from now. And the other comment that I want to make if we're, you know, if we're considering changes to the section is actually two more. But the important one is, and this has been in the code, it says in the rent reportings there for, it is on page, 10 of the red line and it is section this is a long section reference so forgive me um yeah so it's under f so 17 0 4 8 uh Something F 9 C is where I'm going, but it's on page 8 of the red line. It says rent reporting in order to facilitate the cities. I assume that's just the state's language. Obligation to identify adequate sites for housing in accordance with the government code sections they list. Following requirements must be satisfied. You must provide the town with an estimate of the projected annualized rent within 90 days. You have to report the actual rent charged, and the town can enforce that. And then it says the rent reporting data will not be connected to the street address and reported anonymously to protect confidentiality. There's two points, and I guess one of them could have been a question earlier. Do we get that? Are people actually, for the ADUs, are they giving the town estimates of projected rent and...

Some of them do, and some of them don't.

That's what I would expect. Okay.

We don't have any penalty process set up right now, but we do send out letters at the beginning of the year asking the new units to voluntarily provide us with the information of what kind of rent they're charging.

Yeah, and I understand the department has limited capacity, and this is just one of the myriad things people would like the town to do through Chapter 1.10. Okay. For the rent reporting data, I still maintain there's no street address rent confidentiality. I don't understand the interest in not knowing what homes are rented for. And I think it actually benefits the community for people to know because... It goes to the property's value.

Well, you notice this is in red lines. So this was from last year. Yeah, I know. And that C was to appease a very loud group of people that were protesting and wanted it to be confidential.

I'm pretty sure in that meeting, not only I, maybe not that meeting, but I think Commissioner Noonan has also raised the renting rental price confidentiality question earlier. No, but that was in relation to the La Flora business. Because people were like, oh, yeah, you can ask them if they've got businesses. But I would just like to see that I am in every place I can think that there should be a rental registry, just like there's business registries. It's a business. Why is it treated differently than other businesses in this circumstance? So there's that. And then the last... change question we have the whole class one class two scheme added in for the state law i am just confused in um we're under this is i'm on page six to seven of the red line and two it says class 280 us are approved under um these government code sections, except class one ADUs, you know, you have to follow the thing. Here it says, so my understanding is that our local codes only apply to class two, but in the class two section, which, I don't know, class two locally regulated, This may just be me not being able to follow the red line problem. But when it says the following requirements apply to all class one and class two ADUs and JADUs, is that only state law stuff? Because I was just confused before we say the only thing that class one is subject to is the class one section. And then here we have a section of stuff that also applies to class one.

Yeah, it's a little muddled, but this just about comes straight out of state law, so we just adopted it. So it's, yeah. I'm sure there'll be another fix next year. Yeah. To make it clearer. But yeah, but generally you're correct, is that the way that it works, if you kind of piece it all together, is that there's kind of the general requirements that apply to all ADUs, Class 1 ADUs and Class 2 ADUs, and then... then our specific design requirements then just apply to the class too.

Any other comments?

Well, I'm curious about the other planning commissioners' reactions to the idea that we continue this to another meeting, maybe even a suggestion that we put it first on the agenda. Or do you guys feel – I mean, for example, one of my questions was I wanted to go through the – PowerPoint and compare because I found the definition was missing. I was asking the planning director if that's an area where you would want to add a definition in even if it hadn't been approved. There are a couple typos that I will give the planning department my my copy of the red line so you can see where I noted those typos. But I would not really be prepared tonight to move forward with a recommendation on a resolution here. And I don't know if you all feel the same way I do.

So I feel the same way. I've made... You know, I brought up the rental, the 31 days, 30 days issue that I think staff needs to go back and view how HCD frames that. I also mentioned that we didn't address the change of a JADU sprinkler requiring that in the primary residence. which I think is one of the changes, and I think that's key. You know, when we mention the effect of the ADU and don't mention the JADU in the same light, I think that's something that needs to be changed. And with your questions and going through it with the definitions, I'm not ready... to pass anything on to the town council. So I would like to see it come back with comments on those changes and what Commissioner Newton has mentioned and everybody else. So I would like to see a recommendation to continue this item to the next meeting so that others Yeah, I think I'm comfortable with that. Commissioner Baylor, you comfortable with that?

Yeah, it seems like there's no alternative at the moment.

So do we need a resolution to bring it back, or we just need to ask to say that we're not ready to?

I would just say I would vote to continue it to the next agenda.

Okay. Can I have a vote to continue this to the next agenda?

I'll move to continue it to the next month's agenda. Okay. And I'll move to put it number one on that, if possible.

I'll second. Sure.

Okay. Petroni?

Yes.

Bela?

Yes.

Pfeffer?

Yes.

Newton? Yes. Chair Swift? Yes.

Okay, this is just a compilation of Brown Act summaries. There was some changes and I don't know if most of them are really changes per se, but more of a renewal or a continuation of items that were going to expire. And I will say that this is kind of a, maybe a teaser because there is a desire to potentially have kind of a joint work session with the council and maybe the planning commission to have the town attorney kind of go through the Brown Act just cause kind of an update. I don't know if that'd be joint or whether it'd be kind of maybe a separate, they would come here and they would go to the council. But anyway, that's being kind of discussed at the moment. So this is just probably a preliminary kind of overview before you get the full presentation from the attorneys. So that was just the main intent. I will just say that there are a couple of things to point out in here. One item that Commissioner Bala is taking advantage of tonight was there was a continuation and some clarification of the ability for somebody that is ill, kind of at the last minute, or if a child is ill and the parent needs to stay home, that they can be allowed to participate from their house if they're within the town limits or the city limits, whatever the case might be. And then again, they have to make that announcement as Commissioner Swift pointed out that there's no one kind of over 18 in the room with them that can kind of influence them kind of behind the scenes. And so that was kind of continued and clarified. There is also some definition of kind of a it called a I want to get the terminology right eligible legislative bodies which is kind of the town council and not any of the other boards so they have additional requirements that apply to them but then most of the teleconferencing and all the other regulations do apply to the Planning Commission as well And let's see if there's anything else to point out in here. And Fairfax already does many of the things that the state is now requiring in terms of allowing the or having the online meetings and the ability to participate remotely for the public. So we're already doing that. And what else? I highlighted a few things in here. And then some clarifications of the teleconferencing procedures. Um, and a lot of this is the same rules, but they've just kind of restated and clarified that the agenda must be posted at all teleconference locations. The teleconference locations must be open and accessible to the public. And then again, at least a quorum of the members of legislative body must participate from a location within the boundaries of the agency. Anyway, and I don't know if there's other, like Commissioner Swift, did you have anything else you wanted to point out from the new legislation that you're aware of?

Well, I did, and I had some questions on it, but I'm going to let the other commissioners ask questions if they have any.

Okay. You mentioned that you think some of this applies to the town council, not us. My understanding is neither of us, neither the Planning Commission nor the Fairfax Town Council is an eligible legislative body because Fairfax is under 30,000 people.

Oh, that's interesting.

So there's only a very limited amount of changes that apply to us, and it's just sort of what you... Again, defer to when town attorneys are making a presentation, but my takeaway from this, and I was looking at it for a different legislative body.

Yeah, you're right, because the county is not larger than 600,000 or more either.

So, yeah, my understanding with that is it's just sort of the... Commissioner Bailiff present circumstance and and making sure that you get cause for yourself and your family members illnesses for teleconferencing.

Yeah. Yeah, and I think that in general, Fairfax kind of goes above and beyond in terms of the kind of allowing the zoom and because a lot of the after COVID was over a lot of the jurisdictions abandoned the kind of the zoom meetings and Fairfax continued them. So

so I agree we aren't the town council isn't an eligible legislative body um But the questions that I had, and when we went into COVID and some of these alternative teleconferencing rules came to be that were set to expire last December, but they continued them, we had our town attorney provide us with a memorandum that had a great chart in there. with all the requirements, which would have been great to just have that updated for us. Um, but that didn't happen.

I can forward that to get it updated.

But yeah, but I mean, I've got that, but I don't know if they're going to do that. Um, So we can have remote attendance, such as what Commissioner Bala is doing, and that's what we had last time. What I understand was added for that capability were... Individuals that had military service commitments that are on, let's say if we had somebody on the planning commission, they could fall under that, as well as a reasonable accommodation under applicable law, including the American with Disabilities Act. So one of the questions I had related to that was because under these alternative teleconferencing rules, we had limitations on the number of times we could utilize that teleconferencing ability. So my question was, if we had a military member or we had a reasonable accommodation, requirement. How does that relate to previously you only had certain amount of times that you could take advantage of the teleconferencing like under a family emergency? Because military service and a reasonable accommodation you would think would be last longer than the amount of time you could take advantage otherwise of the alternative teleconferencing rules. So that was one question I had on that. There was also some discussion of how you had to, and it may only apply to eligible legislative bodies, it wasn't clear in some of the things that I saw, about if you had conferencing issues like your sound was out or your video was out There are certain requirements that had to be met, and I just wasn't sure if that was just the eligible legislative bodies or it would be anybody that was doing Zoom and that type of thing to meet those, because that would be different than what we do now. And then the other part of this... is one of the requirements is that agencies provide a copy of the Brown Act to any person appointed or elected to a legislative body. And I would ask the town to provide a copy. And it could just be the government code sections. But I think it would be helpful for the members of the planning commission, even though we're not newly appointed, to all get a copy of the Brown Act as it is now. Those are my comments and questions Anything else for staff on this one? Is there any member of the public that wants to speak to this?

Let's just give them a minute. Now is the time to raise your hand if you have something you'd like to say on this item. I do not see a hand raised, but I would like to call myself a member of the public at this time and just state something quickly about this item. As somebody who is pleased, and thank you so much for allowing me to run your Zoom meetings, I don't know if anybody knows my background with this. I was a Zoom evangelist before Zoom became popular, before 2020. I have been educated by Zoom and by Zoom. Now I can't remember the name of it. I'm sorry. But how to apply Robert's Rules of Order and meeting to Zoom meetings was something I actually worked on before 2020, both at the United Nations and at Zoom. So that was the experience and why I came here. And I appreciate your patience with me if occasionally I'll say, oh, we've got to hold public comment or something. It's because I'm trying to keep you all to the rules that I know as my job. But anyway, I didn't know if anybody knew my background with that. But thank you very much for having me. I am a former Zoom accomplished person. I do lose a little bit of that memory every day. So I don't know where I stand with it today, but thank you. Thank you.

Okay. We're going to go on to the discussion item on formula business.

Okay. And just to note, I have a list of your questions and we'll try to get those figured out. So, okay. Okay. So we saved our least controversial item till the end. And I do have a screen share on this one too.

There we go.

Okay, so we have a draft ordinance from our. Town attorney's office, and this is kind of based on a similar ordinance that was done for. because we are the two jurisdictions kind of in Marin County that have formula business ordinances. And there's some court cases and some very specific ways that these types of ordinance need to be designed in order to be legally defensible. So, anyway, so I just wanted to provide kind of an introduction of what they've come up with for this meeting and then proceed from here, like, at the at the February meeting or a later meeting, we can have a public hearing. And then we may want to bring the town attorney in in for that meeting. So just, I think on this page, you know, kind of maybe this is the ideal, like a little cafe with some seating out front that's, you know, not a formula business cafe. So, The current regulations, we require a conditional use permit for a CUP, and our attorney's office is telling us that's problematic for a number of reasons. It's also focused on community character considerations. There's a 2017 court case called the Park at Cross Creek versus Malibu case. Where formula retail approvals cannot be establishment specific. So. And kind of must run with the land. So what they were doing is they were issuing a for a very specific business. And so then if a new business came in, it could have been like a. Um, a Starbucks and then a Pete's came in and so the Pete's would have to get a new conditional use permit, even though it is the exact same same use. And this court case said you can't do that, basically, because that would convey a personal right conferred on a particular operator versus just applying it to the property itself and have it run with the land. So Fairfax Ordinance has some attributes that are similar to Malibu and may not be enforceable. And so the idea is to kind of get something that's enforceable. So if a Formula businesses do come in. We have like a way to process them versus just having just kind of allow them to come in because we have an illegal ordinance, which would be worse, I think. So. So what has been proposed for discussion purposes is to replace the conditional use permit with a formula retail zoning clearance subject to objective design criteria, update the definitions of formula retail, establish district specific caps on the number of formula retail to avoid over concentration and to provide transfer for ability to accessor business in the same category. And then the one thing that I was proposing to add to this list, and this is what the attorneys came up with, I would also add a prohibition on drive-thrus. Because I think drive-thrus are where you're, if you prohibit drive-thrus, then you are unlikely to get many of the formula business uses that you may not want. So you wouldn't be outlawing any existing drive-throughs, but if you don't want a Starbucks or McDonald's or those types of uses, if you ban drive-throughs, you will not get those types of uses. So anyways, that would just be an idea that I would suggest. The alignment with case law is the ministerial clearance approvals with objective standards avoid establishment specific risks Any business in town that has a logo or a trademark requires, or employs employees to require uniforms or vague standards, suggests that currently all businesses in Fairfax might be considered a formula retail business. There's a recommended change to a numeric threshold to avoid sweeping all businesses that merely have a logo and then staff business. Proposes six locations paired with standardized features, which could be considered defensible. So I think the idea that the attorneys are suggesting is that we have to allow some businesses to come in, but we can set a cap so that there's not an over concentration. um so the benefits of this type of cap system is it would keep a diverse tenant mix so it kind of limits the share of formula retail so you can so you wouldn't have all of your businesses just completely displaced by all formula businesses these are simple to track And it's cons and it still consists on the general plans and for emphasis on a small town village character business diversity pedestrian orientation and all of those things that in the general plan and then for legal defensibility The proposed ordinance would ensure that the entitlement kind of runs the land and isn't kind of you specific. So if you if a formula business was approved for one particular property, then a similar form of business could kind of move into that same spot without having to go back through the process. So the proposed changes, there would be a zoning clearance, which would capture anything new or expanded that was over 500 square feet you can exempt certain land uses. So that's something that we want to take a close look at because you'll notice on their exemption list, they had gas stations and drug stores and grocery stores and a few other things. So you want to kind of look at that list.

When you say their list, because that was one of the questions that I had, who made this exempt use list? Where did that come from?

This is from the town attorney's office as a kind of a starting point for us. Um, so this, this, they have presented to us what I would describe as kind of a legally defensible template for a formula business ordinance. And so we can use this as a starting point and then we can kind of make changes to it and then, um, to kind of make it fit Fairfax. So the, um, Anyway, so these are the proposed changes. There's the over-concentration controls, as I already described earlier. There's a transferability, so kind of a particular storefront could go from, you know, coffee shop to coffee shop to coffee shop or, you know, restaurant to restaurant to restaurant without having to go back through the process. And the proposal is six or more locations then there's appeals are available and then i this is the other consideration um i would consider banning drive-through facilities and so i'd kind of like to hear from the planning commission because this is just you know the the planner that really dislikes drive-throughs so i want to kind of hear the fairfax perspective on this um the They're just not pedestrian-friendly. They result in excessive pavement. They have climate impacts because of emissions. There's also kind of parking rules, which we probably won't get at with this particular amendment, but that kind of is also the same sort of thing. If you have excessive parking, you end up with, like, big parking lots with lots of pavement. But I think we could... consider the drive-thru issue as part of this update, as if we wanted to just simply ban them.

Well, we do have a drive-thru in town, so that would be...

It would make it non-conforming, legal non-conforming, and so... It could stay there as long as the business operated and a new business could come in. It would be subject to the non-conforming rules. So if it closed down for longer than, what is it, six months or a year? Do you remember?

I think it's a year now.

A year, then it would lose its non-conforming rights, but it could operate. It wouldn't impact the existing use.

Where did the six numbers, where did the numbers per zoning area come from? Was that just kind of a starting point or throwing something together?

That's what the town attorney says is kind of the minimum they felt they were comfortable with in terms of being kind of legally defensible. Now, if we wanted to... suggest a lower number, a different number, we could, and then we could have that vetted with our attorney's office, see if that was acceptable.

If I could, through the chair, are we at the questions part? Yes. Just a few questions. I think first, there's a typo in the on page four of the draft ordinance in the chart. CS should be commercial service, right? We list central commercial twice. Sorry, because there aren't page numbers on the draft ordinance, but it is page four.

Okay.

Okay. And so... Similarly, I just also wanted to raise a question as to the six establishment threshold for the definition of a formula retail establishment. I was just curious about that number, and it sounds like this is just the starting point. I understand that the... town attorney is saying this is probably the lowest we can go. I just wanted to sort of think through that out loud. For example, I looked and I think it's Healdsburg and Sonoma. Both towns define it as 10. That's their threshold. Sebastopol is 25. Um, and you know, I was just thinking about all, there's some really great Marin businesses, right. That have more than six locations, right. Equator coffee, for example, was started in Marin. They have, I think 10, um, rustic bakery.

Well, there's different. Okay. So there's two different concepts. Right. Yes. So there's the, this what's defined definition of formula. Sure. And this is the number of formula uses. So the right fix kind of comes up in both places, but they're different. Right.

So I'm discussing the latter. So the definition of what a formula business is per code, right?

Okay, gotcha.

And so I'm just saying out loud as we discuss this that some really great Marin businesses would be qualified as formula retail under a definition of six or more, right? Just something to consider as we deliberate here. And then I was also interested in the, so this is the former part, the distribution of the cap of number formula businesses per zone that we have here. It's that same table that I was noting the typo. So for service commercial, We put the cap at six total formula retail establishments. But I was going to say, the CS zone is basically just Fairfax Lumber, right? And so why are we saying six retail establishments in a zone that...

I think that may have been a mistake.

Okay.

I'll figure out what happened.

Okay. And then still on the same table for central commercial, we're saying five, right? And central commercial is kind of our downtown core, our sort of like center of mom and pop businesses. You know, I would kind of think that maybe we don't want any in the central commercial, right? That might be the one place where we really don't want to have formula retail. Whereas for CH and CL, right, that seems like the part where this boilerplate is really restricting formula retail, but it seems a little bit less necessary in my mind in those areas. So just curious as to the distribution for each zone.

And I guess the question, because you said that the number, and maybe you thought that you were referring to the definition versus the numbers per zone. You said that the thought was that it was the most defensible. So I don't know if you meant that you were thinking of the definition of a formula business versus the chart.

Oh, I think it was the chart. It was the chart. But yeah, but I think that, so that these would be defensible yeah this is what we're getting from our our town attorney and but i'm i'm kind of thinking we we should feel free to deviate from this and have them push back because um i do know that there are a couple of jerseys including sebastopol right where i live that they have an actual zone that's kind of similar to what you're describing where there's no franchises now of course they make mistakes but they allowed a papa murphy's to locate in one recently or papa john's or something i think a right aid too right and that sparked the whole well that was that was a lawsuit yeah the um But it's been pretty effective. Well, you could argue, I mean, it's kind of like some people say it's just suppresses the downtown business environment. But anyway, but it has been effective at keeping the chains out. But they have a lot of shopping centers that are in other parts of town that have lots of room for formula businesses. So, and we, we don't necessarily have that many shopping areas, but, but yeah, but maybe there is a stretch where we could just say a no-go zone. So, and if we could demonstrate that we had enough other areas for, for formula. And it's defensible. Maybe we, you know, maybe we can get away with it.

Is the question that you have to allow formula businesses or can you just say no? I mean, that's another question here versus the lawsuit. And I haven't read that case yet, but I will. And I'll look at like San Francisco and other jurisdictions.

I think what the town attorney would say, and I don't want to totally speak for them, but I know this has come up with another jurisdictions. You do have to allow formula businesses because you, otherwise you could lose a lawsuit where, well, I'm just a coffee shop. Why are you treating this coffee shop? Just, you know, because what are they, your friends? And so just because I'm a big corporation, you're not going to allow me to come in. And you could easily lose a lawsuit for kind of, you know, discriminating against a person just because they, you know, want to open a Starbucks franchise versus a local coffee company. One of the things that we had with a senior.

Sorry, one of the things we had with the CUP process is looking at, it allowed us to allow formula businesses if it met the needs of the community. And from that perspective, it was looking at types of businesses. You know, B of A, example, right? I guess it's a formula business. If you didn't have a bank in town, you would want to allow that B of A to be in there. ATMs, the UPS store, as an example, things that meet the needs of the community where they don't have to go out of town. that may be a formula business, but that allowed that process to go through, you know, now the question becomes then to the court case where it was like the Pete's and Starbucks, if let's say, you know, we allowed the UPS downtown and UPS left and there was some similar type business that That was also a formula business. You know, I mean, we've done that with the CUP allowing it. We've said that our town benefits from having this type of business here. So that's kind of similar to the Pete's and Starbucks business.

Yeah, well, this particular ordinance kind of exempts banks and financial services and it exempts courier and delivery services. So it kind of takes the kind of the exemption approach for those types of uses so that it really just helps focus it just on kind of the retail and the restaurant uses the way that this is currently written.

And tell me again where the exemptions came from. Remind me. I know you said that, but...

Oh, this, it's under, it's under two. The following types of uses are exempt from the requirements of zoning clearance applicable to formula retail establishments. So it doesn't mean that other land uses.

Right, but where did that draft come up with those exemptions?

This was from, this is kind of roughly based on the Sausalito ordinance. And they kind of, the town attorney amended it for Fairfax. So again, it's intended as a starting point. That's why I was pointing out exemptions specifically, because we may want to have different exemptions. We may not want to exempt as many things.

No, but it's helpful to know what comes before us, where that comes from, and why it's there, why the six, why the exemptions. How did that get into a draft to begin with? So that's helpful.

came from some attorney's brain, so.

I should say something about that, but I would offend some here.

Commissioner Baila's hand is raised and we do have a hand raised in the audience.

Commissioner Baila, do you have a question?

No, I just have to. I'm sorry. I'm really not feeling well and I just can't continue to be part of the meeting. So I apologize. I have to go. And this is a very interesting topic, but I'm just I've exceeded my capacity to stay in the meeting. So good night, everybody.

No, thank you. And appreciate that. And you'll have another opportunity at this one and hope you feel better. Thanks. Good night.

And if we're having a public comment on this issue, we do have a hand online.

Yeah, if we're through with kind of questions, we could switch.

Any other questions for staff? Otherwise, we'll open it to public comment.

just one last quick question we don't have like an existing census of formula retail businesses in town yet do we i mean it's 7-eleven and ups store is that is that all we have or there are more yeah all right okay oh well they close maybe that doesn't count as a chain

Wasn't it the first restaurant?

It was the first restaurant, and I think they had like four locations total.

Yeah. So anyway. Okay.

We had a cannabis application go through that as well, I believe.

That was not a formula. There was no, as far as I recall, there were no other enterprises. He answered that question during the hearing.

Okay. Any other questions for staff? Okay. I'm going to open the public comments. No one in the room. Do we have someone on zoom?

Yes, Deborah, please go ahead.

Hello. Of course, I'm the only one still here. Thai Restaurant has three locations. So according to our former or I guess still standing formula business ordinance, they're a chain. I have three. Questions, why six? We're not Sausalito, we're Fairfax. Sausalito is much more commercially oriented towards San Francisco. We had two, why not three? What was my other question? Yeah, why six? And I did have another question. Oh, exempt. Why pharmacies? We used to have a pharmacy where Split Rock is now, and it was an individually owned pharmacy. Do we want Walgreens in here, CVS? We fault Chevron coming in. Why are gas stations exempt? We fault Chevron and One. They're the worst purveyors of... plastic signage that i've seen in my life so what's what's calling these exemptions and what's causing these numbers for definition of formula retail and i'm so glad this is finally coming up i've been asking for this for a long time so thank you that's all i have to say Thank you.

Anyone else on Zoom? I see no other hands online. Okay, I'm going to close the public hearing and bring it back to the Commission.

Thanks. Won't go too long here. I think for the point you were raising about Equator, Commissioner Patron, I think so long as we ensure and i think the new language doesn't really have it and i would like to see a lot of the old language back um so long as we have reasonable ways to provide exemptions i think it makes more sense to have a lower limit and then you know i think that we are a very reasonable planning commission and would not say i'm sorry um equator you started in my uh or something and you want to have your six location here and we set our limit at five um if they're i mean we have a bunch of coffee businesses but uh i think we'd want that sort of um flexibility and what i would like because you know this is just a study session i'm sure it's got to be developed more by the attorneys is for them to look into um ongoing compliance requirements. Like if we have a few different bars or something and some, you know, they all happen to sell to a corporate owner, um, How is that dealt with? I know conditional use permits can't expire, but if you are no longer in... For formula retail, I have no idea how it would work if we were somebody's third location and then 10 years down the line, they had 15 locations in California. I... I don't know how that works, but I would like the town attorneys to consider that so we can understand and then have our own input on how we think compliance should be handled, if at all.

Any other comments? Discussion? Nice. So seeing none, I think from my perspective, I need to read the case. I need to look around at other locations. I need to digest this. And I think we need to obviously have more public hearings on this and have a chance to look at this because I certainly didn't have a chance. I didn't understand. a lot of what was here and where it was derived. Now that I have a better understanding of that, then I need to go back and, I think we need more hearings on this to kind of put together what our thoughts are on this issue and then what works for our town after we do some research and all that. So I would like to see it come back at a point. I'm not sure now that we've actually started working on this after three years, I mean, where it fits in or for another meeting or how much time we think we would need on that. But I do think we need to continue the discussion on this.

Yeah, that was kind of the idea. Just have a study session and then have public hearings after this. So just to kind of get it out there, daylight it to the community. This is probably going to attract a lot of public interest. So.

Yeah, I guess I would just say to the extent that we're concerned about the lawsuit from nine years ago now, it's not been an issue yet. From what I could glean quickly, it seems like the issue there was the transferability. And so for your if we want to take the appropriate time. And I'm always all for as many opportunities for us to consider the reasons why we're adopting these things to make sure that the ordinances address those reasons. If there is some need to make sure it's enforceable by including some sort of transferability language so that we don't have the, why is it only applying to Starbucks and not Pete's Coffee question, I think then that should come on a separate track.

All right.

So to be continued, any other comments on this? Okay, let's go to the minutes. Any corrections on the minutes? I have a couple, I think, on... the 76 frust, frust stuck application. I think, um, commissioner Kelly was recused. So the vote on that should change to have him shown as recused. And then, um, On the commissioner comments, I would change the second sentence in the first bullet to read the safety element. A commissioner thanks the staff for completing and uploading the safety element in addition to updating the general plan in the Fairfax library. It was noted that neither the budget nor Fairfax code had been updated at the library. And then the second bullet, additional clarity on whether the safety element meets the requirements of AB 1409. Any other corrections or changes?

I will move to approve the minutes from the November 20th, 2025 meeting with the changes recommended by Chair Swift.

I'll second.

Trani yes. Yes, Newton yes chair Swift, yes.

I have nothing additional to report.

Okay commissioner comments and questions.

I just want to echo what you said at the beginning of this meeting about thanking Commissioner Pfeffer for his superb role as the chair of the Fairfax Planning Commission for 2025. Thank you for doing such a fabulous job.

Thank you. I would not do it for any other commission. Motion to adjourn the meeting? No.

What do you mean? Why not?

So my only comment question is on the safety element. Can you come back to us with the question of whether or not our safety element meets requirements of

I unfortunately do not have that expertise, so we would have to actually get an expert in order to do that. I do not have the authority to hire somebody.

Is that something that could be asked of the state? Because I think it's been raised by members of the community.

Yeah, it could be. I mean, I think it's probably a... I'm sure there's a consultant out there that's an expert on this particular topic. It would just require the town council hiring said consultant for some small amount to do the research.

Actually, maybe I'm making it too simplistic, but asking somebody in state government?

I wouldn't begin to know who particularly to ask. Somebody with OEC maybe? so anyway i i mean and we do i'm trying to say i'm not i am not an expert in this topic and i do not have the authority to spend days working on this without the city town manager telling me to do so but we do submit our safety element to someone at the state level correct Yep, we are consistent with state law. We do not have any issues with the state at the moment with our safety element.

Okay.

Motion to adjourn. Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Meeting closed.