Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

started. Good evening everyone. I'd like to call the meeting to order for the planning commission uh meeting for October 22nd at 6:12 p.m. If we could have roll call, please. Commissioner Scarboro Echo. Commissioner Jose Santos present. Commissioner Ortiz here. Vice Chairperson France here.

Um just for the record, Commissioner Scarboro Eckle and Chairperson Rodriguez Sea are absent. Okay, thank you very much. If we could uh do the flag, Commissioner um Ortiz, will you please help us? Yes. Thank you. Um, okay. We'll go ahead and uh open the public comment for items that are not on the agenda. Do we have any requests to speak?

Uh, we have none. Okay. Seeing none, we'll go ahead and close the public comment and we will move on to item number 4.1 minutes from the September 24th uh meeting. Do we have any questions? I'll make a motion to approve. Okay. Do I have a second? Yes, I second. Okay. We can have a roll call, please. Commissioner Santos, yes. Commissioner Ortiz, yes. Vice Chair France, yes. Motion carries. Thank you. All right, we'll go ahead and move on to item N number five, a study session item. Um, we can start with staff. Thank you.

Okay, perfect. Good afternoon, vice chair and members of the planning commission. My name is Gustavo Gomez, principal planner with the community development department. And the item before you is the Madison Point project consultation. Uh the applicant uh Schmidt Desert Investments and the applicant's representative um Jim Fitzpatrick is proposing to develop the Madison Point um uh phase one project. The current uh general plan designation is mixeduse neighborhood and connected neighborhood. The current zoning is highway is in the highway 111 corridor specific plan and the um the the project is located on a 20 um acre site on APN's um 600-24-005 uh- 016 um-020 and021. Um the project is located here's a vicinity map showing that the project is located on the um southwest corner of Highway 111 in Madison right behind the existing um Walmart I mean Walgreens apologies. Um before I get into the presentation I just kind of wanted to give a quick overview of the vision for the highway 111 specific plan. um the how um and its intent and the intent was for um for it to evolve dramatically and as soon as possible from its current residual highway commercial stripped character and identity to its envisioned future as an active pedestrianoriented mixeduse center for the city. Um the city council um assigned the corridor the highest make it happen priority. Um and in early 2022, um when they adopted the housing element, um update, it targeted, um high percentage of the city's future housing to be along this corridor. Um the applicant is proposing to develop it in two phases. As you can see, phase

one is in red, kind of fronting Highway 111 in Madison, and then phase two would be just behind it. The um 20.27 acre site will be developed um into two phases. like I mentioned and phase one of the project will consist of a planning review uh discretionary application, a conditional use permit to allow two limited land uses which I will get into more detail in future slides and a tenative um track map um to subdivide the um 20 acre lot into two um eight lots for for the um for the for the project. Um the project is proposing um a uh is proposing four retail commercial pads, three fronting Highway 111 and one fronting Madison Street, and it includes a 2,400 foot Starbucks with a drive-thru, a 3,600 ft quick quack car wash, a 5,500 ft retail commercial building, and an L3 energy EV charging station with a 3,000 uh square foot general retail store. Phase two will consist of the um uh proposed hotel, a medical office building, an apartment community, and a 1.6 acre retention basin with solar. So, limited land use. So, um, this section is included inside the, um, the Highway 111 specific plan, and it allows for, um, uh, uses that do not meet the the intent to still be able to be approved through a conditional use permit. says um so it says here that in order to enable market forces to attract near-term reinvestments to the mixeduse corridor zone um this section provides standards and processes where um by lower um quantities of lower intensity and more automobile oriented projects um

could be approved. So the project is proposed is in sub area 8 and um which allows for a total of two maximum limited land uses and the project is proposing to use both of those for the restaurant drive-through component and for the car wash drive-thru as well. Um now I will um direct your attention to the PDF that has the project plans. If I could get those pulled up please. Oh my my I guess I wasn't finished. That's why. So, um I guess I wanted to um maybe just a quick background on the project. Uh on November 21st of 2022, the planning commission did approve the master plan development permit um for the Madison Point mixeduse project. Um and I wanted to share some of the consistency um for for the project. So um it approved for a 15,000 square foot of retail commercial, 130 key hotel, 400 senior apartments, and 3 uh 30,000 square feet of medical office. And what is being proposed for phase one is um 14,500 square feet of the commercial retail. And then for the future um not part of this proposal would be um a change of 123 key hotel, 300 um market rate apartments, and 20,300 ft of medical office. Okay, now I could um get if I could get the presentation for it. It is. So here are the proposed project plans

for the project um specifically for the phase one. So it includes the the um four paths that I mentioned along Highway 111 and Madison Street. Um it includes the map the tenative track map to subdivide into eight lots. The applicant is also proposing um a landscape pallet, conceptual landscape pallet with variety of trees and shrubs. Here's a an aerial view or a rendering. And these are just some of the sites from the street. And the applicant will also be able to um in more detail kind of go over these these presentations of o over these um these renderings. But I wanted to get to the um elevations for you to to review. So this is for the um the commercial retail building. So they'll have multi-tenants for the Starbucks and drive-thru. the quick car wash and the L3 EV charging station with the general market. They are also attached to the staff report is also the um uh materials and color and materials board as well. So, the applicant tonight is um is aware or we're seeking um uh either seeking feedback from the commission for the site design, the elevations, the landscape um for the phase one and they're also seeking feedback on changing the 400 unit senior housing to the 300 unit market rate apartments. And that concludes my staff report.

Well, may I add one thing to Mr. um um Gus's um presentation. Could you put the site plan up just one more time? I just wanted to emphasize one last item.

Yeah, the other one. Um so you'll see the the limited land uses the car wash and the Starbucks. So one thing just to emphasize that the planning commission will be making a recommendation to the city council because those are limited land uses. So even though this is going to come back to you um this is just a consultation I wanted to remind you that because um those uses are limited in this specific plan um and um the re it would be a recommendation to the city council. So you wouldn't wouldn't be the final approval on those two pads. I just wanted to conclude. Thank you, Costello. You

So the applicant is also here and I believe he also has a presentation that he would like to give. Okay. Do we have any questions of staff at this time? No. Okay.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Through the chair. Uh my name is Jim Fitzpatrick. I'm the applicant's representative. Um exciting time here. We hope to build off the excitement from your state of the city yesterday. It was fantastic. Just uh all the glowing accolades, how well it was done and just to celebrate the city was really cool. And a couple of council members at the end when we said, you know, here's where we're at and like our goal is to be celebrated on that stage a year from yesterday. Uh so I just wanted to um first introduce uh members of the team. Uh Dick Schmidt is the property owner. He is a legacy fruit farmer. Used to greet you with a a grapefruit all the time. Now he gives me flowers for my wife every time I need his signature. Really cool guy. Longtime uh land bank and really excited to bring this forward this project forward and get it out of the ground. Um I just want to say thank you to Gus. Uh you guys are lucky. We are very appreciative. I always envision when I'm on the phone with Gus that he's on this three-wheel tricycle pedaling as fast as you can, bouncing balls in the air. This is no easy task to take a project of this size and kind of move it forward. It's like a game of rock, paper, scissors. Every time you try something, then the Highway 111 specific plan comes in, the code and the all these different things. So, just been uh great to work with. Here I have uh John Salman. He's uh the principal. Been working with Mr. Schmidt for the last couple of decades on all his properties and getting them entitled. has been with this project since its inception, since it started moving forward. U four and a half years ago, we originally had a specific plan. Then we pulled that back when the Highway 111 specific plan came in. Several of our members have been there through all of those iterations and participation. Um and so he's excited to be here today. We we've been driving around uh Indo today looking for uh a story to tell from you here. I'm a former chairman of the planning commission. So I hope to tell this story in such a way having sat in your seat having required to push some of the buttons. So I'll do my best

there. Uh we also have Paul D Palatus from MSA uh land use consultant. Uh longtime history with the region, lots of relationships. I'm so pleased to have him there for not only his subject matter expertise but again his institutional knowledge kind of been there all the way through the traffic studies and the wise and the outcomes and the all that sort of stuff. Um so the one thing I'd like to do is I like to keep this this picture up for us because it tells us where we we have been and those that have been multigenerational here in India this is what you've been driving past right the desert environment. I went uh Can you go to the next page? I guess I'm driving the bus here. Cool. So, to the north there on the other side of the fence is a really cool project. Uh they are in a $5 million renovation of a Mediterranean restaurant. And I got to see the steward of all that today. And he was so excited that I stopped by to talk to him because he's like, "This is going to be awesome. as you're coming down Highway 111, this is the gateway to the city and this is the, you know, we've just envisioned all this stuff with Highway 111. This is the first major project to come out of the ground and and be before us. So, we're really excited. As Gus said, we're here primarily with phase one. We have uh formally applied for uh everything that Gus and Brian had talked about. We are we're in I call it the hurry up and wait phase. We hurry up, we work, we put the packages together, the site plan, the civils and everything. We put it in and Gus tells us, "Ah, the commission's going to want to see a couple more of these things. Some of the other departments are here." We go back, we rejigger, he deems the application complete, and then it's able to be um moved out to the different departments. So, all the different departments, the fire and the and the public works all have it. They're working on giving us comments, and then we do that iterative phase back and forth. We hope to finally get that part of it complete and then we schedule to formally come back to you

hopefully I don't know early next year would be a great goal. Uh, one of the other things is I also represent the um apartment complex that what we're looking for specifically here although it's not part of phase one all in just to give you I wish I knew what I know now when I was sitting with you from a developer and the wise and the they've spent collectively through all this sneaking up on about a million dollars. So before they go and say have the next phase of construction documents and and all that they wanted to see if you we get some feedback here. Before we say that uh also online we have um Sammy with Architects of Orange again multiple projects. He just uh their team brought forward the Hagen project on 111. He's been here since the beginning. We also have David Schmidt the ne the nephew. So two on one side by the Walgreens we have Madison Point which is the uh Mr. Schmidt Desert Investments his nephew has acquired the other 20 acres. So really the team that you're in front of here are 40 acres blank canvas that we're trying to paint. We don't have anything specifically planned for what is u called Madison Crossing. Um, so the brokers are out there introducing the the opportunity. Uh, many times we've asked council, we've asked you that as you're the point of the the city out there. People are coming to you looking for space and uses and things like that. We are an open book blank canvas and we'd love to hear from you. But we wanted to just let you know that that's what is in front of you. this 40 acre once in a generation opportunity to transform Indo major market window in the gateway to the city consistent with the highway 111 specific plan. Okay. So originally we had contemplated a senior project uh in the neighborhood of 400 units about 40 units to the acre. Um it was four stories elevators wide corridors then all of a sudden we go out

to the marketplace and do two things. So although development is fairly complex, it's it boils down to a fairly easy math equation. On one side you have what's it cost? Well, the cost with the supply chain and interest rates and all that sort of stuff was a oh my goodness. And then you go over to the other side of the equation and say, well, what would rents be in order to kind of make that economics work? And for senior projects in this market area, rents hadn't gone up in two years. So we kind of we're at a ceiling of what that number would look like. And then you look at absorption rate. How many units will lease up over time? And that number was really low. It's like a 100 months to lease up to get to what's called stabilization. And you want to get to stabilization as soon as possible because what you don't want to be is the first owner handing the keys to the second owner. Right? So the economics of it just didn't work. So I was in the room when my former mayor and the president of of Mesa said, "Okay," he's looking at the construction guy saying, "You go, we have these other product types and stuff." And so they have about 4,000 doors that they manage. Go look at that and maybe something like that would work. And then he looks at me. I'm Fitzy. Fitzy, go figure out how to reduce the government side of these costs things, right? And so with the prior team and we have to have this conversation again. You never get government to say, "Oh, let's wave funds. Let's get the public funds, right?" But sometimes you can defer fees, work with payment fees and things like that. And I we can probably get to yes on that. And then there was a thing called title 24 and the building code, which is the energy code, right? it required in that project, you know, there's I'll call it 400 parking spots. There's that means 20% have to have an EV charger and another 20% have to have conduit. And I haven't heard you're in an energy constrained environment here, right? Those are stranded assets and costs. I think today I want to present to you another part of the solution that really puts Indo back on the map for its its opportunity to um energize and

electrify the community. So, basically, we're looking at now a 300 unit, about 30 units to the acre. We're still kind of pushing and pulling, but that's that's about the neighborhood. It's a two and threetory product. Um, mostly going to be one and two bedrooms. They'll have some threebedrooms in the mix, but that's just when you go out and do a market survey and what's everybody doing and what's leasing and things, that's that's what it came back to. And so, you can see that, you know, we really believe this is going to catalyze Indo's growth. It demonstrates the framework here of high quality development. You can read what I have here. And I also thank you to Gus in the the staff report are two things. The applicant letter. It's probably the longest letter that you've ever sent. I just felt compelled because there's so many moving parts. And I just wanted to share the wise and the the the intricacies of it and then a supplemental on the EV charging and some of the other things to do as deep a dive as you want. we are very available, transparent, would love to engage. Um, so looking at the two different product types then so the other thing is if you look at and I'll I'll show it in another way but along Madison are the two stories the three stories in the middle. So it's you know it's called a massing strategy. So you don't feel like you're driving down in Manhattan and everything's oppressing. So it's just a visualization strategy. Um these are the twotory. So you can see it's very well articulated, a lot of interest. It's called Spanish Mediterranean. Um so this is the twotory and this is the threetory. And the Mesa team again would just be interested. Um you see any issues, you like the fact that we're senior now moving towards the market rate uh about 300 in the apartment communities. Any questions, comments, thoughts, feedback? Yes, I have a few. Well, thank you for your presentation and thank you for

choosing India. Um, for so if you guys go through with the apartments route, will be that for sale, you just be for rent or like how you guys luxury leasing? Luxury leasing. Okay. And then for parking, how many parkings will they have per apartment or how you guys figure out that?

We haven't got that deep yet. Um, I could I'd be happy to let me get you a better answer than me guessing off the top of my head. But the intent is to they're kind of looking at from a a bigger picture of what are the what's the unit count. They did some preliminary costs. Those are working. The market study of rents and absorption rates are favorable because this is clearly what the market wants. I don't think they've gotten down into the number ratios as of yet. Uh, I know the intent is to put solar over rooftop and all the canopies would be solar and I'll tell you why that'll be important in a couple minutes. Okay,

Commissioner Ortiz, I just wanted to real quickly interject. So, unless there's going to be um a request for a deviation, they would just have to meet the standard code requirement for parking. So, it's our understanding that they would just meet the the minimum parking requirement and then from there that would become before you. Thank you, Brian. And then one last question for me. So I assume this was going to be like like a sort of HOA kind of thing that people have to pay into it or how you guys trying are going to maintain the the apartment complex.

Uh the owner Mesa is a buy, hold, and nurture. So they will be the long-term owners and it would be their responsibility to lease, maintain, you know, uh they constantly look at the amenities to make sure that they're right for the times and modify as needed. So it would be Mesa HOA is is for an ownership they would be the equivalent in Yeah. in a leasing environment and then do you know if it's going to be gated or how it will be gated. It will be gated. Okay. Y and that's one of my issues because I know 111 is very busy and then by having gated that might cause some traffic.

So um we have to go through long studies with uh the different departments but how it cues to make make that that doesn't happen. Uh so the gates are offset to allow enough cars to get through there to make sure this to look look into it 100%. Yeah. And again this is a quality project. We share the same issues that we do. We don't want unsafe conditions for future um members of the community. Um we you'll see here I think we've exceeded the Highway 111 expectations on some of the landscaping and things like that. So this but this is the exact feedback we're looking for. Okay. Perfect. Uh I don't have any questions. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner.

Uh one question is on the EV portion. Um do you guys have a letter of intent with that particular company for that or is it just up in the air at this point? Um and the reason why I'm asking is if there's any type of fire mitigation for the storage uh for the the extra power that is going to be held there during the um during the storage units. Perfect question. Could I make a suggestion? I've got a couple of slides. I go a little bit deeper in there. I can try and answer it there within that context if that that's okay. That works. Perfect.

So, I guess um the apartments are great, but that's phase two, right? So, right now we're really focused on on I think phase one. So, one of the things that um on your phase one, the architecture looks a little more modern, right? It kind of reminds me of what we just did um on in Citrus Plaza on Jefferson and and 50th and and I like that look. It's clean. It's modern. It's it's fresh, right? Um but then when you show me the apartments now, you've gone to Mediterranean and that's a very different um design. Is there some reason why you you deviated and didn't keep the same maybe modern look, clean look that you're doing on the commercial on the apartments?

Interesting. It started at modern and then through the market survey it switched to the Med Mediterranean. So there's nothing etched in stone as to to which way it goes, but I'll be sure to um relay those comments to say either we should consider a change or a justification when we come back.

That would be great. Right. I know that I think to me when you said the Mediterranean restaurant that's going to open down and I don't live very far from that area so I literally drive by Walgreens probably four or five days a week. Um so I know the area. Um so that was one concern because I would really like to see phase one and phase two kind of flow. I don't want them to be too different from each other, right? They don't have to be identical.

Okay. Yeah. Um, okay. So, that was one. Um, the other thing is one of the conversations we had with the city when we went through the new specific plan was that we wanted to have less gated communities. And as much as I understand the value of a gated community, and I actually live in a little one, um not a country club, but a little one, um that's something maybe when you go back and look at your information is does it really need to be gated? Okay. Um I know there are some pluses and there are some minuses, okay, for for both sides. But that's just one of my items. The other one would be um amenities. So to me, if you live in an apartment, right, you're in a a smaller you don't have as much outdoor access unless you have some type of amenities. And if you pull up your your site plan, I don't remember seeing too much on in in amenities um on those apartments. And I know those are phase two, but I figured we might as well talk about them now. There we go. So, what what do you see from I see the pool, which I know that would have to be gated. Yep. Um I I don't see basketball courts, um god forbid, pickle ball courts, you know, um any any other type of activity for the people that live in that development, you know, 400 units or 300 units, that's 900 people, maybe more, right? Um so I would like you guys to keep that in mind when you're going through this. Look for amenities that are good for, you know, not just little kids, but you know, high school kids. we want to give them something to do other than maybe go get in trouble or some other other thing that they might want to do. So, that was that to me was important. Um, I I think the idea of a of a drive-through uh

restaurant, you know, hopefully one that is not necessarily, you know, fast fast food, but maybe one level up with the drive-thru would be super nice. Um, if you've been in India for a while, you know that one of the things that city council has talked about for a long time is no auto related uses on Highway 111. And Quickquack has come to us for multiple requests and has not been successful. So, I just wanted to give you that as a heads up. And of course, it'll be city council that makes that final decision. And thank you, Brian, for reminding me of that. But I did want to bring that up and let you know. Um it's it's just a long thing that the city council did not want that. Now, is that changed? I don't know. I'm not on city council, but I wanted to give you a heads up that they've come here before multiple times and it has it has not worked out for them. So, um I I do really like the fact that you did the twotory, threetory in the middle, twotory. I I thought that was brilliant because it's not going to look so overwhelming when you drive down Highway 11. So please keep please keep that going. Um I think those were my my biggest comments at this point but I know you have more so I may have more questions after that.

Fantastic. Yeah and just to your point about amenities. Uh remember that retention basis is a walkable for walking the dog, you know, jogging around. Um in between the buildings that are close together, there's all sorts of and this is a bit of an eye chart. will do much better calling it out in the future, but there are botchi courts, uh, outdoor grilling, gathering spaces, and things like that. It's Yeah. Right. Um, but we agree. All right. Thank you for that. Really appreciate it. Uh, if uh at the end it'll be my contact information. If all of a sudden something else comes to mind, we are very open and transparent. We really want this to be engaging. All right. So, as we just talked about, we participate in the in the uh Highway 111 specific plan. We believe we have substantial conformance from everything from our uh pedestrian connectivity. We have a road that comes from Madison, weaves through the property with the intent to get cars off of uh Highway 111. Um up at the top, uh Madame Chair, you can see how that massing kind of looks kind of sort. It's kind of as it was intended. Um, cool. All right. So, again, remember that we are entitled to two limited land uses. A car wash is one of them, right? And so, and we had a after the specific plan, we went to uh city staff and said, we want something that we can go to the marketplace with certainty and say the city has reviewed this and approved this and come on, come on in. Let's let's make India wonderful. So there's that that side of it as well that said we came, we asked, we got approval, we went to the marketplace. Now, for example, Quickquack is is um open down uh Highway 111 in Lita. It's open right now. Very successful. It's called a soft opening. Didn't look like

a soft opening to me today. Looked like very well engaged by the community. They have a brick wall up front, right? What we're proposing here is a better than the Kina offering. If you look at these renderings here, we have spent so much time every AO is wonderful. We said no better. We want some BMS. We want some landscaping to buffer the built environment. We don't want the autos or the cars to be able to be visible because we're we're painting this pallet in such beautiful elegance in the gateway. Right? So, we think we've met the standards. We've exceeded the standards. And the other thing that we're really trying to get to the economic development to really explain how development works. Okay. The car wash is 5% of this property. If you aggregate both properties, it's two and a half percent. Do you know how developments get built? They get built on the on the basis of these uses coming forward in the beginning to provide the capital. They are credit national creditworthy tenants that the property owner can then go borrow the construction dollars against. So four times a week as you're driving by say do I want this to be desert for the next couple generations or do I want the most elegant solution in the history of India better than Lita right so just that's how I would kind of mentally kind of

I'm really good friends with most people in Lita but yeah we're good and and I don't disagree with you honestly I mean I think that the fact that it's almost not visible right because of the way you've done the design work I just wanted to give you a heads up that this is going to be a little bit of an uphill and it's going to have some conversations about it. So, it doesn't mean I mean for me it's not like it's a no. It's just this is where we've been. This is what I've heard and I wanted you to be aware. So, as you keep working this needs to be something that is discussed because I've been here way too long and seen this come by.

Thank you. U this that's what this is intended to do is to get your feedback. We greatly appreciate it. Thank you. But I just wanted to let you know we have worked we're proud really proud of this and are prepared for that conversation. All right. All right. So although not in front of you right now, we are about to get Gus our sign package. We just kind of peeled it off because the long pole in the tent, the harder thing is the phase one with all this stuff to get it out to the departments. So we kind of peeled off the signs. it's coming back in. So, it'll come before you. But what's interesting is I I watch your planning commissions. I want to understand you and how you things that are important to you. And with the the gas station uses, I've watched that. I think I have a better solution for those that are are opposed to that. You know, uh the EV charging is going to blow you away. But I come from Costa Mesa. I'm the city of the arts. I saw at the Walmart fueling station a condition being posed, right? I don't like mandates, right? Uh when I was when I was chair, I said, "Hey, if you put a bike rack in," because I was looking for active transportation and I'm very fiscally conservative. I didn't want to put that on the back of government. I wanted to put it on the back of of the private individual. I said, "If you put a bike rack in your project, I'll give you credit for one parking spot." I can't tell you how many times I watch my planning commission and they go, "You know, if you put a park, you're you're you're parked to code." I'm like, "Yes, I sit on the traffic impact fee and because of all the active transportation we've done, we get a 5% credit in the trip fees, right?" Which, you know, some of these that's a meaningful number. And then as an incentive, if you put in like protected bike lanes and things like that, you get another 5%. So, I love incentives over mandates, right? So, I have an idea. Rather than mandate murals, and I've just been driving around the city trying to get the vibe or whatever, the murals are beautiful, right? I see a lot of

blank canvases here on this opportunity and in general the property owners committed. I know that L3 is we've got some some block walls that the U equipment that I will answer the commissioner's question on. To me that looks like a blank canvas, but I read I read code a lot. Signs have all these parameters. It can only be this big and this many and this right flag poles, building heights. You know what doesn't have a height restriction? Art. Public art. Right? What if you give us an incentive to put some public art here that is iconic in the gateway that the kids graduating from high school would be taking their pictures on? Right. Just something to throw out there in the back of your mind. We would love to work with you and your your arts commission and just do do something do something cool in India. Kind of let's do India, right? Anyway, that's my thought on the science. All right. EV charging. Whatever you know about EV charging has to go out the window. This is a brand new concept. It wasn't even considered during the highway 111 specific plan. I bumped into this. Remember my my mayor and president said go figure out government title 24 the uh green code and the energy code says you must put EV charging. You shall do it right. So all of a sudden I bump into one of my buddies. He goes you love the sustain sustainability stuff over in your city. this Rove ROV is coming in. Uh and um it's like a gas station for EV charge. Really? I got I gotta talk to them. I didn't really like the company. They're from New York. I'm from Boston. I just I knew they were Yankees fans and I didn't get along. So I went back to the and said, "Uh they said, "Hang on. The former CEO would like to talk to you." I met him. Where do you live? I live in the city. Where do you office? We're like a mile from each other. Next thing I know, I'm in his office. And I say I don't even think seniors drive EVs out there in India. 6% I go you got facts do you think you could be alternative means and methods

for me rather than put stranded assets all around a 20 acre property right do you think we could aggregate it here in this elegant solution um and he said absolutely and then I said who's using charging in the region right he says 83% are renters they don't they can't charge at home they don't have these facilities right said cool you know this is going to be a a valuable asset Today I went out to the U actually I understand that Gus saw me at the Raising Cane and I and I was uh going over to the Chick-fil-A because I said you guys are open five years ago. Where's all your EVs? Oh, you got them deferred. Why? And I knew the answer because they didn't have the power. Right. So, this is very much a charging desert. When I got on 111, there was two charges at the fairground. Right. I pulled up and took a picture because I was laughing going there's a sign that says you can't stay more than four hours. like just this is such an opportunity. What L L3 is is an ultraast EV charging. There's 10 cabinets, 20 plugs, but it's really about the the customer journey. When I was over at Walmart, right, I tried to chat up a guy. I go, "Sir, do you mind if I talk to you about EV charging?" He goes, "Yeah, but I got to go to the bathroom." Right? So, he had to run in and find a bathroom. Right? This has the amenity. It's not a convenience store. It is a marketplace where there's no plastic. All of the products deteriorated to towards an EV charging. Ingredient avoiding healthy options, healthy grab and go, ultra clean bathrooms. If you're an Uber driver, it has a nice air conditioned place for a real break, not sitting in your car. You know, I was charging at Walmart today and 91 degrees. You know, that was that was I can't imagine what it's like at 104 degrees. So, this is um it's it's very different. And I bumped into one of the staff and they go, "Hey, I got EV charging. I want to talk to you about electrifying your city. Goes, "We don't want it." I go, "Wait, wait. You don't you don't even know what it is yet, right?" Like, "Give

me a shot at this." Because the more and more I I drive EV, right? I had to live charging in the wild. I had um AI said, "I need to make fun of this stick a charger on the parking lot model. What do you got?" He said, "Oh, it's a vending machine for electrons." Right? That's what we have and this is what we're trying to offer. Um, I've tried to engage I did a public records request for all the people that are against the gas station, right? I want them to be for the EV. I wanted to demonstrate that if they want the ice to be reduced in the community, this is a necessary tool. Um, the other thing is um we are trying here to be the most sustainable project in the history of India over that retention basin. Right. First I asked Steph, okay, if I put um solar in the basin and they went like no water, it doesn't mix, right? So I said, ah, sorry, sorry, words matter. How about solar over the basin so we still preserve the active transportation around. We put a pipe over into L3. The reason why L3 would pay for this is it has a two-year payback, right? That's how quickly this they can recoup their investments. And then then they get free electrons, right? we take it over, we put it in a battery. Um, so this is a really cool way and again we're reducing our reliance on the grid. U and I can tell you that we can take this all the way up. So over to the left is the L3. We have that 3,000 square foot marketplace. To the right we have about 2500 square foot of uh behind block wall, the transformers, the batteries, kind of all the all this stuff. On the other side of that is where we're proposing to put a sight specific energy plan otherwise known as a micro grid. Okay. What we're asking from the planning commission is from a land use basis just give us a shot to go to the AHJS authorities having jurisdiction if

you were to say yes I still got to go to fire public works AQMD like I got to walk all that gauntlet. But what this has is either we can just have the batteries and if if um the joint authority between IID and and the city says no, we want to recoup. We want you to buy as much energy as we we have it. We want to sell you as much to recoup our perfect. We may not need all or any of that other spot. But we can come to India and say we can do generation on site. A linear generator moves back and forth like this. It's natural gas with low NOx that AQMD will will approve and it in a safe manner creates that energy that we stick in more batteries. So we could either power the entire 20 acres off-rid or we could go to IID and in their integrated resource plan be a resource adequacy to say we can store and then at peak we can put stuff back into the grid. We can be a buffer at certain times. Um, so I just share with you that's our intent here to take the conversation of IID really off the table in its entirety. Uh, and work with everybody to say what if anyone says no then we don't do it. If they say yes, we do it or we kind of we figure out what works for everyone. But that this gives us real flexibility on the project and we hope a real solution to iid and some of the constraints that they have. How'd I do on answering your question?

Pretty good. Okay, just a quick followup. Yeah. Does L3 Energy exist anywhere currently in California?

Only in its Rove model. So we the L3 has six sites under control that they're an active um uh entitlement process. Most the first ones they have selected because the EV charging has all of these ABS and SBS that says no, you can't take away parking. No, you can't. In some cases, you can't even require landscaping in front of the stuff. Like, we're not following into that. But those to get out of the ground, to your point. Uh, right now, a lot of people want to be the first to be second, but Rove RV in Santa Ana is the CEO's model that is up and operating and wildly successful. That has a car wash attached to it. We don't plan on doing that. I'll tell you that was Wall Street. George Soros money estimated to be a build of about $21 million. So Nathan has a solution better, cheaper, quicker around $7 million build for these things. So uh and this one by the time this one starts to get even into building plants, we'll have five or six out of the ground and operating.

Perfect. Thank you. Okay. So, the five and six that'll be out of the ground before ours, where are those sites? Uh, Norco, Pomona, Riverside County, Stockton Boulevard in Sacramento. So, it's a California company. It's At this point, if you saw the opportunity, you would just do California right now because the concentration, the utilization, it's California focused.

However, discussions in Florida, the DMV, Delaware, Maryland, um Thank you. Um there's a a franchise group that is wants to colllocate and so a lot of site investigations going on there. Okay. I'm assuming these will all be, you know, rapid EV EV chargers, whatever that means. Every time you turn around, they're faster. But

so what's interesting is they will charge. The limitation isn't the won't be the charging cabinets, it'll be the battery in the car. So as fast as the advancements in the batteries occur, the faster it will go. Okay. Right now from 20 to 80, it's about 20 to 25 minute dwell time. uh some of the faster ones like the cybert truck and things like that can can go faster but energy is delivered as fast as the battery accepts and the reason why the cabinets were chosen a lot of them if all of a sudden now you want to upgrade your technology you have to take it out and put it this is all module so if state comes in with some sort of new rules and regs you take out that piece or if you want to go to a a thousand KW architecture you just out with the old in with the new

I have a question So on paper looks great, you know, just kind of walk me through it. So it's kind of like a gas station but for like EVs, correct? Yeah.

So you kind of walk So you go in and then it charges any EVs, right? Teslas and then Fors or like you name it, right? Um how do you pay it? Like it's like a subscription base or like how does it work? Like walk me through like how would I do it? Like if I had an EP and then I want to charge it. So, all right, we'll go a little deeper here. So, now that I have an EV and I'm charging the wild, I'm standing out there going, "It doesn't work. I don't know the whole AWS that that um that happened." I'm standing in front of a charger. It's giving me like everything's good, but it's not happening. I email the company and they're, "Sorry, we a a US went down." We have the subject matter experts at at L3 are top of the food chain. Uh the person who runs the batteries used to run the batteries over at uh Amazon. The individual that does all the architecture behind and has the chargers talking to the phones and everything like that was Green Bits. They were like the original folks that kind of did all this stuff. And so the CEO is frictionless. So he wants you to be able to come up and either swipe at at the pump or not even have an app. There's a thing called OCCP 2.0. Oh, only 1% of the new builds are be are utilizing this. It utilizes that technology because that's plug-and charge, right? So, you don't have to app or whatever. You just just walk up, put it in, the charger knows who you are, your the credit card stuff is already in there. So, whatever it is that the consumer chooses of what they believe frictionless in the best way. Um, and he right now he's saying no app because he doesn't like apps. So they're trying to capture all the necessary information to understand the consumer and be able to deliver value and information based on the individual with that frictionless. So the short answer is however you as

the EV consumer wants to do it, it will be available in the most frictionless I would say I'm trying to come up with another like word now like friction friction full is the opposite of what I'm experiencing and uh at my office I would to come here I was planning on had a long day I was going to charge all day and now I'm like oh no and then I had to go to IKEA and and uh that didn't work out either. So it It was very much of a challenge right now. So trying to solve for historical legacy issues with the best of breed frictionless interface.

Welcome. All right. So yeah, this is just we can flex up, flex down hybrid that we really just tried to take the whole energy conversation out and more how do you want to approach energy versus not have any EV charges in our apartment community.

Yeah. And just to touch a little bit more and going back into the mitigation on the fire side, um I own a Tesla. Yep. I'm all up uh all for EV. The my biggest concern is again this is going to be more on the fire department, the mitigation, what's in place, but once an EV or a battery uh catches fire and everything else catches on fire, now we have to start doing evacuations. Now we start looking at phase two. Hey, are the apartments too close to that? And so those are the things that I'm looking forward in making sure that we have that sooner than later. when it comes down to to phase two, we have to make a decision at that point.

Cool. If that's your interest, I'll make sure you get a more indepth answer. But the one thing that I love about L3 is they are the subject matter experts on batteries. The authorities having having jurisdiction. Um they have reached out to the person that the fire marshall will look to to is this safe and he's the consultant on the team. I forget that it's like failure methods and there's like a one of those three letter alphabet things you have to te you have to pass you have to pass uh it's called a largecale burn test. You actually have to set it on fire one of the cells and it has to demonstrate that it doesn't have thermal runaway. Right? So the only way that this is going to get in is if all those authorities and justice say has the right UL listing has done the large scale burn test uh has satisfied all these things. Then remember, I have to go over the fence to the apartment group that I work with and say, "Okay, uh, here's how I have to demonstrate to you that this is safe and it's not going to be an impediment to your residence. It's not going to be prohibitive you leasing this up with this thing over the fence." So that's why I say from a land use perspective just hopefully it'll work for you and then I got to go walk that really interesting process to get everybody nodding that it's safe and the AQMD that it's not creating environmental issues. We're in uh L3 is in discussions with I say we because I'm also now I started with the apartment and then I I morphed over into the 20 acres uh and then I worked with L3 but we are talking to a group it's a an encapsulator so we plan to have a fire extinguisher at the cabinets right so um right now the standard if your Tesla kepts on catches on fire the fire department uses copious amounts of water, they just put, you know, a lake on top of it. Um, because foam doesn't work, right? And then it's within 72 hours, it can fire back up. This is an

encapsulator. So, you spray it onto the the fire source and it encapsulates, right? Takes the heat out. The firefighters love it because it now doesn't have these noxious things float floating around. The other place is up in the uh in the canopy. Not only is that providing shade from the elements, security lighting for for those uh women that are security focused, generating energy and putting it back in our batteries, but we have this substance up there that is and remember we have all these cameras. It's going to be really techy to determine thermal issues and then deploy that coming down over that area of the batteries over it. There's plans to have misters and then we're trying to figure out a way to get it in the batteries. The trouble is it's called a dialectic uh battery. So, what UL wants us to do is to take the liquid out. Well, then we set it on fire and it's going to have thermal runaway, right? The whole point is to have the liquid. The trouble is is that for this substance, they have a foam test. It can't pass the foam test because it's not a foam. It's an encapsulator. The dialectic liquid, you know, you can't remove it and do the sort of runway. The reason why it can't catch on fire is that so we're we're working through those right now at the top of the food chain with the advisers that are advising these different groups are on this team to answer the question because otherwise we go without batteries and now at time of use we're buying energy high and selling it at the same price it's cutting into margins and things like that. So really the market necessitates not only for long-term profitability but we got to go to the insurance company. You got to did you hear about more Mo more's landing and that thermal? Well, that was legacy stuff, but that's in everybody's mind and it's in the mind of the insurance person. So, we also need to go to them and try to keep the insurance rates down. So, yeah, welcome to the world of trying to do this. But, um, just know

it's the best team out there making it happen. All right, now to land the plane. Sorry, I fell in love with this graphic and wanted to make sure I got in somewhere just to just to um demonstrate the elegance of what we're doing. But I think that this is uh the right project for the right time. It's exciting that the highway 111 specific plan will finally have, you know, a firstborn uh project coming forward. It's very uh consistent, substantially compatible. Um, I hope I've made the case for fast charging and that this is right for India and that we start to not the conversations have been concerned and I'm really trying to flip the script to well, how could our police force be electrified and utilize this and in emergency situations, you know, so we can electrify and and our fleets and and all that sort of stuff. So, um, I really appreciate you guys making the effort. I know this is the only thing here. It's important to us. So, thank you so much. Uh we're available for questions now or in the future. Um thank you so much for your time.

Does anybody have any more questions or comments? No. No. Okay. I I do think overall it's I mean it sounds very exciting. I I you know I am also an electric car owner. Um we just went to two electric cars. Now we're really scared. But um but our next long trip, you know, I'm sure we'll be just fine. Um but uh having those chargers um we do need more chargers in the valley. I have a friend who just got one and she's like, "Wait, I don't have the one at home yet. How do I charge?" Right? And so it was a little traumatizing, but she got it figured out. So, I do think that's great. Um, I love the way, you know, like I said, the twotory, threetory, twotory, I think that's beautiful. The apartment, uh, the hotel's in a good spot. Um, I love that you did all of that extra, um, consideration to shield, you know, from from Highway 111 and and landscape is very important. Um, so I think if you take back the things that we've talked about and keep some of the comments we said in mind, you know, we look forward to seeing the rest of this. I think it could be a good addition to our to our city, it's something different and no one has these rapid chargers. There's not that many out there. I think it could be very helpful. But looking forward to seeing the rest of the project and even the other portion of the project because that's a beautiful piece of Highway 111 and what we built there is really going to change how you feel as you drive into our city. So, thank you for the time and the consideration.

Outstanding. John, did I miss anything? Don't tell me in the parking lot. Tell me no. All right. Thanks for your time.

Okay, we will now move on to item 5.2, director discussion. Yeah, we go ahead and pull that item up real quick. I'll grab the clicker.

I don't need the clicker. There it is. Um, yes. Um, I wanted to bring this item up because it was something that was brought up at a recent city council meeting regarding after the project, some of these projects that are built, um, sometimes they necessitate, um, another inspection for either a planner, could be a building inspector. And so I wanted to introduce this item just as a brief discussion. U, we currently have a condition of approval that states um as as follows. Um, the red is would be added, but the applicant shall permit city staff to conduct periodic inspections to verify compliance with all conditions of approval. I'm not going to read the red yet. And then it says the planning commission reserves the right to initiate a review of the it could be the conditional use permit. It could be the discretionary um design review, etc. on verified complaints or evidence of non-compliance. that would be the conditions of approval that the planning commission or it could be the city council approved. So um recently an an item came up to city council and they um were a little bit um concerned that a project was already showing some wear and tear and so that um condition could be amended when we bring projects to the commission um or staff go out and do like a first inspection. could be six months, it could be nine months, 12 months. So, it's just to engage the commission in a discussion if they think that this um they would agree with, you know, updating our existing standard condition regarding um conducting periodic inspections. So, again, this is

something that came up. I told the council that I would follow through with bringing this back for a brief discussion um and see what you guys uh would like to do. I think it's a great idea. Okay. Something that Yes, I I agree with.

I would agree with it. Uh my biggest concern is just trying to figure out the the correct time frame. um if it's six months, four months, eight months because we do understand that once they do get some type of limited permitting uh completed, sometimes it does take a while before they actually start doing something. Um so it's just having that discussion of what that appropriate time would be,

right? Yeah, I put six months, but depending on what how the commission feels, um we could, you know, change it to some something else. Like you said, Commissioner Santos, four months. Um some of the things that we commonly see and then some of the things I've seen even before I came to India is sometimes landscaping dies. So that's very common. Um sometimes you see graffiti. That's extremely common. Um not that um I'm saying we we have a ton of it, but we do have graffiti. Uh and then other things uh might be damages to the structures. Maybe a car hit the structure or or maybe there's lights that are out. um it's real important to have a well-lit community uh if it's residential, but even at night in a commercial area, um that could um encourage crime if it's very very dark. So, those are just a few things. Um I I'm not going to pretend that we have a huge staff. Um but we have enough to go out and do these periodic inspections and especially if we're already going out to looking at other projects. It's a simple drive by and then walk around the site a little bit. It would be it would if the project's already been, you know, has a CFO, it would become um something we work with the property management with or it could potentially turn into a code enforcement issue. So,

yeah. Yeah. And I think uh again, I don't want to have with the amount of staff that we have that where they're being overworked or their task is uh being overloaded. And again going back to the six months of I agree with the completion of the project potentially but now we start having all the other uh complaints coming in stuff like that. Now are we overtasking staff with that? So just finding that the middle ground. I understand.

I mean I I mean to be honest I think that this would be great for uh new projects right. So maybe at 6 months or a year depending on the project, we look for landscape because that, you know, you put in date palms and they look great and then half of them die and nobody replaces them, right? That's a problem or the graffiti, that kind of thing. But I think maybe more than it being a building department um issue, it should be part of code enforcement, right? So that the entire city gets reviewed periodically throughout the year. And I know that's hard on time and staff, not just always reacting to a complaint because a complaint never comes in until it's really really bad versus catching it early. So, but I know code enforcement also has, you know, they they have more, I think, more resources, at least more and more people than the building department does. But yet maybe there needs to be some kind of an actual process. you know, every quarter we look at this corner of the city, the north side, the south side, the west side, and see if there's anything that really stands out and look for the issues before they become complaints, you know, but that would be a whole another thing that would have to be done in conjunction with with code enforcement. But I think that after you know u a certificate of occupancy is issued maybe there is a sixmonth or a 9month where somebody from planning goes and looks to make sure that what they said was going to be there actually is there and in the way that it was supposed to be. But I think it's a great idea. We just have to manage the time.

Yeah. I mean the condition right now it's worded um that it would just be the first inspection. So, you could argue that uh subsequent inspections would be based on verified complaints or evidence that could be staff going by the site and noticing, wow, there's a big, you know, um issue with graffiti, you know, that happened overnight. Um so, you know, it could it is um upon our discretion depending on if there's evidence. Also, I think if a new project comes in and they know this is going to happen, they're also going to be aware of what it looks like and maybe get in front of it instead of waiting for someone to file that complaint. Mhm.

Well, I think if uh once if it gets incorporated once there's a complaint, I think there should be a time frame um put in place once the complaints receive that the city in regards to our staff go and verify because if we do get a complaint and because staff is so tied up and six months later, four months later they go follow up and something could have happened between there, I think it just opens up for the liability. So I think you're just adding that time frame towards the complaint where it gets uh verified or checked on uh within a certain time frame as well.

Yeah, we we do coordinate very closely with our code enforcement department which is through the um police department obviously. So um we do work handinand with our code enforcement. Um but right now um wanted to first just see if we have a consensus on one the first inspection. So after you guys complete it, when it's built, this could sometimes be several a couple years. And then um if you if you want six months or do you want 12 months? Um what's maybe the consensus from the commission? I mean I like the six months from certificate of occupancy. Okay. Right. If they can open the doors and be serving the community, then from that point there's six months.

Okay. So we could leave the six but um from certificate of occupancy I think. Um good. But it could also be six months or as recommended because some things maybe six months isn't the right time, right? Depending on what it is, but I don't know. I mean, six months seems pretty common to start.

Yeah. I mean, and if you as projects come your way um you could change it, you can amend the condition. I know one recently that was the um India Gateway project and you wanted us to come back and report regarding the remaining of the project. So, we we promised that we would do that. We marked our calendars. Um so, we were going to come back and and give you an update on the rest of that project. So, you can customize the conditions uh when you see fit. Okay. Will uh city council have to approve this or Nope. This is just a standard condition and this isn't necessarily a code requirement. It's just standard conditions. So, no, we can we can do this administratively. Perfect.

Okay. That's all I have for that item. Okay. Do we have any commissioner comments? Uh yes. Um I was yesterday at the state of the city. Thank you staff. It was an amazing impressive event. So you guys pulled it together. It was amazing. It was good. The goodies, you know, the donuts, everything was great. You know, the box, it it was it was nice. It was it was a and it was a good program. So thank you stuff uh for making it great. just not for the residents of India but like for the Coachella Valley because I know a lot of people from different parts of the valley came and then they liked it too. So, thank you.

Okay. Um yeah, I have to really say the same thing. I've like I said, I've been around the block a couple of times now and that was probably one of the best um state of the cities I've ever seen. It was concise. It was exciting. It was energetic. The only complaint I had was that nobody told me that the candy bar was in that far back corner. So, I didn't get my M&M's until I was leaving. Okay. Yeah. See, you missed the M&M's.

So, other than that, I think it was phenomenal. Um, I also want to do a shout out to um the entire community. The Coachella Valley History Museum's annual Theos Muertos Celebration is coming up on November 7th. And I'd like to report that as of an hour ago, I'm pretty sure we're sold out. So, I'm very, very happy with that because that is a very important thing for the museum. So, if you still want a ticket, call me. I'll see what I can do. Um, but other than that, and I know staff worked really hard on the presentation and on the entire thing and do every day. So, thank you. Um, it it's a lot of work. Okay. Um, that's all I have today. We'll move on to um staff items 7.1. Few items. Um, so I periodically like to update when some of the items that you've reviewed uh goes to city council. So, on the first, the San Piper map was approved. That's that that 34 um lot subdivision. And then also on the October 15th meeting, the heir's six lot subdivision was approved. Now, that one in particular, I just wanted to give the planning commission a heads up. Maybe you watched the meeting, maybe you didn't, but they were real curious, the council of well, what's going to be built? And and I mentioned that this is just a subdivision of land. And I always want to highlight the size of the lots. So, they did notice that the lots were very small. Um, several were about 1,800 square feet. And they asked me, "Well, Brian, what are we going to build?" And I mentioned what you might see, but then the applicant, you know, came up and expressed um what they might build or just sell them off. So, I'm just bringing it to the attention of the commission that there were some concerns about the small lots. Ultimately, I think it will probably work well uh because of the location. So, I just wanted to to give you a heads up regarding that. And it ended up being a 50- vote. So, I but I just wanted to to bring that up. Um, and parking. There

are questions about parking because the site the lots are so small. I mentioned that you're going to probably see the garage right in the front, living or behind, probably two stories. So, they did have concerns about parking and and that that was um, you know, not on the docket, so to speak, just the subdivision of the land. and they didn't have a design to review, but I know we're always looking at parking and that that site would be challenging if you have people with multiple cars. So, that being said, I don't want to beat that down too much. Um, the East India annexation project is back and going. Um, we're we're moving forward again on that project. This is phase two. So, phase two, we're starting off by doing the hydraology analysis and report. And so, right now, they're they're digging for data. They're doing data requests. various departments and they're going to be working on that. Um so we will do monthly meetings on this phase two. This is going to last anywhere from 12 to 18 months to do phase um two. Eventually they'll do a presentation in front of the planning commission, but that will take a little while. Um and then another item I wanted to just bring up um there's been people who ask me about gas station research that we did. We came before you. who I know there was a a lot of uh comments and even talk of a moratorum feasibility study but that request as I mentioned in that meeting and I continue to mention there's a second part of that which is um the research that that Gus and myself and our staff have been doing on landscaping and EV chargers. So we're going to bring that back uh next month and then after that um it'll go back to the planning commission or sorry the city council with the planning commission's recommendations on how to move forward with that issue. um regarding gas stations. So, other than that, um that's what I have for the staff items. Um and that would conclude

my my points there. All right. Um thank you for that. Um seeing nothing else, we'll go ahead and adjourn the meeting to our next regularly scheduled meeting of November 12th. Thank you, everyone.