Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

That's we have a roller call. Uh, Commissioner Baron here, Commissioner Rana, Commissioner Woodson, Chair St. John here, Commissioner Chang here, Commissioner Jacobson here, Commissioner Welton here.

You have quum. Okay, before we u review the rest of the agenda, I want to acknowledge a couple of things before we get started. First, we have a mission statement from the planning commission. We have a land acknowledgement. These are at the top of our our package and we we we don't we we they're just understood but I want to go ahead and read those uh for we won't read them every meeting but for the first one is myself as being the chair I want to uh let everyone know the planning commission as an appointed body of the city council will provide the leadership in protecting Marina's natural setting while developing the city on a way that provides a balance of housing, jobs, and business opportunities that will result in a community characterized by a desirable quality of life, including recreation, cultural opportunities, a safe environment, and an economic viability that supports a high level of municipal services and infrastructure. As a land acknowledgement, the city recognizes that it was founded and is built upon the traditional homelands and villages first inhabited by the indigenous people of this region, in particular the Eselin and Olone costonian, their ancestors and allies, and honors

these members of the community both past and present. Now for the agenda we have uh the next item is a moment of silence and the pledge of allegiance volunteer for the pledge. No, I'll do okay. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible.

Okay. Do we have any special announcements? and communications from the floor. These would be announcements of special events or meetings of interest and information to the board and public at this time. No. Okay. Exportate communications and qua for quasi judicial man matters. This would be from in particular from the planning commissioners.

Yeah, I do. Um, I had one of the city council members, it's already on. It is on. I had one of the city council members reach out to me three or four months ago to have a discussion when the first property sale came up and the first look of vendors or provincial developers came in. And then Chair St. John, uh, Commissioner Woodson sent me a couple text messages identifying some errors in the liquor license, uh, staff report. Um, and, uh, we we will address that within Brian's presentation, but just wanted to disclose that. So,

okay, dear Glenn, you're your export is that on one of the items of tonight's agenda,

it pertains to the liquor license. Oh, to the liquid ISIS. Okay. All right. Anyone else? Okay. Other than the two emails which we all I think got in the mail, that was all for all of us. Okay. The consent agenda, approval of the minutes from January 22nd, our last meeting. Do I have a motion or is there any comments or corrections to the minutes from anyone? If not, can I have a motion or make a motion to approve the minutes for the January 22nd, 2026 meeting roll call?

Is there a second? You did. Great. Commissioner Baron, Commissioner Rana, Vice Chair Woodson, Chair St. John, yes. Commissioner Chang, yes. Commissioner Jacobson, yes. Commissioner Walton, yes. Motion passes.

Thank you. The next item is public hearings. Item number seven. We have two public hearings tonight. The first is a conditional use permit for the Marina Mini Mart and the second item is a uh the amendment to the short-term rental ordinance. We can start with uh the conditional use permit. Give me one second. We start with the presentation by Sam.

Thank you, Chair St. John. My name is Brian Kim. I'm the assistant planner. I'll be presenting today on the Marina Maymart located at 320 Reservation Road and it is for a conditional use permit. Next slide, please. So here is a map of the project location. Next slide. And here is a site plan of the site. The general plan designation is commercial retail service and the zoning is core under the downtown vitalization specific plan. Next slide, please. So a little background on the project. On September 3rd, the applicant applied for a conditional use permit to allow for spirits, wine, and beer sold for consumption offsite, which is a type 21 ABC license. And the site is a former 7-Eleven convenience store, which had a similar type 20 ABC license, which is only beer and wine. And on January 9th, Chief of Police Randy Hopkins confirmed that the police department does not have any problems regarding the proposed use based on the applica applicant statement that the alcohol sales will only occupy 15% of the floor area. Next slide, please. So the store will be approximately 2400 square feet in size and the store plans to sell groceries, prepared food, beverages, beer, wine, and distilled spirits. The hours of operation are Sunday through Thursday from 6:00 a.m. to 12 a.m. and Friday through Saturday from 6:00 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. Beer will be sold in the walk-in cooler and wine and spirits will be shelved behind the counter. Next slide, please. And here is a um

site plan showing where both beer and wine and spirits will be sold, highlighted in the red boxes. So um according to Marina Marina Municipal Code, a finding of public convenience or necessity is required in areas of undue concentration for an establishment or business where alcoholic beverages are served or sold for on and off sale consumption except when incidental and in combination with food or groceries. The city uh with legal advice has interpreted this incidental definition to mean no more than 20% based on previous case law. Next slide, please. And since the proposed use of alcohol sale will only occupy 15% of the floor area and will be incidental to food and grocery sales. A public uh finding a public necessity by the planning commission is not required. The proposed conditional use permit would also um also prohibit the establishment from increasing the floor area devoted to alcohol sales beyond 20% of the total floor area devoted to sales. So as seen in the previous diagram um the beer and wine area will be dedicated 200 square ft while wine and spirits both 880 square ft. So the total math would be 360 divided by 2400 which led to 15% of the floor space. Next slide please. So once again a finding of public necessity by the planning commission is not required even though the site is located in an area of undue concentration. However, it um it is interesting to note

that the previous tenant 7-Eleven holds an active ABC license which um but is no longer operating and this license expires on June 30th, 2026 of this year. And essentially, the Marina Mini Mart would replace the former tenant and would not increase the total number of businesses. Next slide, please. Since the agenda was posted, staff has received two correspondences. One of the correspondents suggested in addition to a limitation of 20% total floor area, a limitation of 20% of total store sales should be placed with the applicant requiring them to provide sales records for a minimum of 3 years. Staff does not recommend this additional limitation as planning's role should be to verify the land use and not to monitor business sales. Additionally, it would be very difficult to enforce this requirement without auditing the business. Next slide, please. So, um since posting of the agenda, uh Vice Chair Woodson found some errors within the packet. Um so, the um hours were the dates there were some mistakes on the staff report. So it should be Sunday through Thursday in the condition of approval and Saturday you know Friday through Saturday and I forgot to take out for wine production in one of the previous permits I used this report for. So there was a correction in that and we also decided to add for signage temporary window sign shall cover no more than 10% of the area of the window which is which is consistent with our municipal code and that decision was to help our code enforcement as we've been getting a lot

of businesses um violating this code in the downtown plan. So that concludes my presentation and here's the recommended motion. Okay. Thank you, Brian. Now, do we open up at this time to the commissioners before we go to public usually? Okay.

We discuss things internally as kind of question and answer comment period on the commission. Then you open it up for public comment. You can open up internal through the meeting or online if you have online [clears throat] participants. And then after that is done and closed, you come back for the commissioners to discuss and have any directions to the staff. Um generally when you open it up to the commission first, what you do is ask the applicant if they're available. They would like to statement or presentation start out discussion. There's the applicant independence. Would you like to make a segment? Yeah.

So, state, you know, turn it on. State your names for the record. Hello everyone. My name is Gabriel Abdullah and this is Rashad.

Um, basically we're very glad to be in city. amazing community and we have a lot of um expectations on the way we run our businesses and our standards are very high and regarding the uh the store at at 320 Reservation Road um you know previously 7-Eleven for many many years and unfortunately for you know I really don't know the u the cause for them shutting down their businesses but one could assume financial reasons Um, but the way we run our businesses is we usually have a little bit of everything in our convenience stores from for for this one specifically, some beach towels and stuff that you might need for when you're visiting the beach or from people coming out of town. Uh and regarding the uh the liquor, it it's just adding one more thing to the many products we would carry and showing some.

Okay, thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you. You stay here until we'll have our discussions and we probably there can be some [clears throat] additional questions. Okay, now it's commissioner's turn. Start your light on. [clears throat] Okay. Is these are Yep. So, we we adjust that air and you can turn them on and off. So if I mine off,

it's like a three-way switch.

I would Thank you, chair. [clears throat] Um my only question is, and it's more probably to the applicant, it says that there's going to be 80 square feet set aside behind the counter, correct? for spirits and wine. Yes. Is that right? That's 8 by 10. Is it going to be full bottles, little bottles, quart bottles? What's going to be back? Thank you. For the bottles, it's going to be the mixture of different sizes of bottles on the on the the shelving. So, you have that that shelving that's behind the counter. Yeah. You have about half of it are wine bottles.

Um wine bottles. There's they're typically um there's there's like one liter 750 mill for the spirits part. How did I know about this? [laughter] Yeah, for the spirit size they got multiple sides. They got like 750 ms and 350s, the 200's and for the wines different sizes. There's like I know they have something like bigger than a gallon like Carlos brand or something brandy or whatever other brands. It's it's multiple sizes. A majority or 750.

Okay. So the this 80 square feet is that just the shelf space or is that to hold space behind the counter? Behind the counter. Okay. Yeah. So, actually the shelf space that's dedicated much less. Yeah. Whatever's dedicated to it's like what is it? Uh they're like four four feet wide each. So it's like you know Yeah. And about two feet deep. Less than two feet deep. No, they're about 14 inches deep. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I thought. All right. Thank you.

Back to you, chair. Okay. Thank you chair and um just to let you know I like to support local businesses but also the care about the u welfare of the community. Uh the question here is the staff is um the previous 7-Eleven has a type 20 license and now the minim request type 21 that to include the spirit. Yeah. So basically when we came out to this location and we were looking for what some things that we could change to kind of improve business. Um, one of them was definitely the staff and have a more friendlier approach to customers and uh, you know, being a part of the neighborhood. The other thing is adding certain items that weren't previously there. So, maybe a a little bit larger uh, miscellaneous section that would include like medicines, over-the-c counter medicines and whatnot. Usually, when people are traveling, you know, sometimes they need, you know, just random uh, OTC uh, medicines. Um, the other thing was the liquor. Uh, 7-Eleven didn't have liquor. They had beer and wine, right? So, we have beer, wine, and we added the the spirit section and and a larger variety of fruits and snacks and stuff like that. That's that's usually, especially on reservation road, I think you're getting a lot of people coming in from out of town and uh that's what they're usually looking for. Um, but it's not, you know, it's just an addition to some of the other things that we be adding. Would you consider type 20 license instead of type 21 without the spirit?

So that would be we're looking to we want to stay in business [laughter] and we want to be able to have some kind of competitive edge. 7-Eleven was a bigger brand, bigger name and they were there for decades. Correct.

Um and it was, you know, it's unfortunate to see a small business in your community shut down. But so we're looking to build a better relationship with customers to get more repeat clientele. Um the type 21 is basically just as the spirit part. Sometimes when a customer comes in, maybe they they come in for a very specific item and they also wanted maybe a small bottle of a conac or something like that. If they know you don't have that, then they're not going to come to your store. Maybe they came in for a gallon of milk and some charcoal and they wanted a conac. Well, they're going to go to one location where they could get all that where there's there's, you know, many other locations where they could probably do that. So, you adding a certain item to your inventory also increases the sales of u other items. And so, that's kind of the that's what we look at when we do our businesses. And we want to have a little bit of everything to make it uh very convenient for anybody who's wanting to stop by and support our business. I'm glad you bring out the small bottle of cognac. U so would you consider restrict your spirit to a small bottles for one single drink and uh not the big bottles of spirit?

I I think and the alcohol contains maybe should less than 50%. So I I think from my understanding I I run a liquor store right now and um from my understanding it's better to have larger quantity bottles than those you know those little they have these little shooter shots right um typically you see locations that have a smaller variety of the bigger bottles and a big variety of the little shooter shots. Mhm.

Um, you don't want those, I don't want to say, um, uh, we're after, you know, our, you know, our main focus is on customers that are, you know, regulars and whatnot, but those the smaller ones are the ones you kind of want to stay away from. They're the real small ones, not the smaller, you know, sometimes that's plenty, but the the shooter shark are two ounces. Yeah. Most of them are, I think, 1.75 or two ounces. Those are the ones that we kind of want to not have um just because we notice we have uh we have better customers that way. We have less problems with customers that way. And I think that's probably the the the better route to go. That's correct.

Yeah. Because usually somebody buying a bigger bottle, it's they're having something going on in their home. Uh some kind of festivities are going on and but the smaller ones are um you know just I I think Yeah. Okay. All right. I just don't want to I don't I want to be careful the words that uh I should use. Um we noticed that we that when you have that product, you're getting the unsavory customers and we don't we want to have, you know, uh we want to have a good business and we don't have want to have any problems with any of the customers.

Okay. The the next question I had is the state license allow you to sell alcohol until 2:00 a.m. And um what is your operating hours? Say that again. What is your operating hours of your business? Um it would be 6:00 a.m. to midnight and Friday, Saturday, uh we have it up to 2:00 a.m. But we well we want to we haven't operated in Marina before. So we don't know. We might even close a little earlier than that. But we we have it started. We're going to start off that way and we'll try it for the first year that way and then we need to make adjustments we'll make adjustments. Uh but it's uh five days out of the week uh 6 am to midnight and then two days would be 6 uh two.

So you're new in Marina is that? Yes. Yes. So just to give you some background information on the Marina uh liquor store. Marina Lakers, u they open until 11:30 p.m. And Penny Saber Market and Liquor Store, they open until 11. Mhm. And uh Roger Food and Liquor open until 11:00. Mhm. [clears throat] Prince Liquor open until 10:00. Hot Food and Liquor open until 10. Dunes Market Liquor open until 10 p.m.

So would you comply with this? What what I'm hearing right now is those are businesses and they're seeing that there's no maybe um there's not a good enough reason for them to stay open later, right? Um based on their sales or maybe some other reasons might be there, but um for us, we're just we're new to the area, right? So, we don't know what the business trends are going to be for for that location. If it doesn't make sense for us to stay open in those later hours, we're obviously going to change our hours the sidewalk separate.

Okay, that's what I was thinking. That's what it seems like a nice like uh you know, it's a early bird town where everybody's up you know that's great. That's amazing. And at night I'm noticing that. So, but with the uh with the type 21, sometimes if you tell them, "Okay, I want to close at uh 11:00," and then you decide to change your hours down the road to midnight, you're you've already uh kind of uh you've already tied yourself down to that original closing time. And sometimes could be issues. I believe we'd have to change the permit, correct? they'd have to come back for us and [clears throat] change the permit if they wanted to increase the hours from 11 to 2.

Yeah. But if we wanted to reduce it, we usually you don't have that that issue. Thank you for Well, from business point of view, if there's no customer, then what's the point of opening? Exactly. You know, so I I I think it's wise it's wise that for you to just operate according to the store hours of other liquor store and and that's what and they may have an experience. They know there's no business after that.

Yeah. And that's what it looks like we're going to be ended up doing. I I don't think we're going to be doing the 2 a.m. But we just have that in there. Um just in case, but in reality, I don't see us closing at 2 am. Not an arena. Um it just it doesn't seem likely at all, you know. And I I think um what do you think? For sure, just on the movements we've seen tonight, it's a lot slower. Uhhuh. So for sure it'll be it can be adjusted not problem. Okay. It's okay. I think yeah it'll be adjusted. Not a problem.

And because of for the security reason I mean we at night when the in that area mini mark area I think the um would other than the advertising signs you're going to have would you have security cameras? Oh yes. Yes we and outside not just only in the store all around. you have to have security cameras all around. Um, and that's just even for insurance purposes, for other reasons. Uh, it's it's always better better to have more cameras around the building and in the building and, you know, be thorough in that aspect.

And you have also maybe um security measurement having a police phone number, you know, placed there just in case anybody want to call, make a report. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. the 20% alcohol law space. You will comply with that, of course. Right. And u and just there the city will have to enforce it.

Yes. Uh to be honest, we didn't even we we weren't privy to that information that it had to be 20%. They we were just told what would your linear and we gave them the measurements where we have everything set up where everything's going to be and it happened to fall under that 20% where it was 15%. And you know we we we realized that afterwards like you know but I mean it it didn't matter because that's what we wanted anyway was the 15%. And so it it worked out perfect. The surrounding of your shops would you have bright security lights and

so having bright lights is very important. I I grew up in a convenience store. My my father owned many convenience stores and supermarket and we any store he used to go in sometimes he'd purchase a business from somebody and that was the first thing he was like it has to be bright people have to feel safe so we and he would have energy efficient lights outside flood lights and just kind of illuminate the parking area at night and that also prevents a lot of which I don't see in Marina too much but like where we're from there's a lot of like just homeless and whatnot and so that's a big prevention right there. I mean, there's nice big bright lights. Nobody really wants to be right there, you know, and it's it's safer for the customer, too.

All right. I think I just want my fellow commissioner to know that my concern is operating hours. Okay. You know, you could comply with the same as other liquor store. I appreciate that. Um and also the maintain at the 20%. Yes. Yes. Thank you. We can definitely [clears throat] comply with that. Thank you, Ch. Go ahead.

Sure. Um, so I have a number of questions. I guess public for staff. Um, first off, I'm not sure on the hour side of it to be honest that we have a right to tell a business that's opening what their business model should be. Um, so I think the the the 11 the the end of end of sales time for beer, wine, liquor versus overall store hours, that almost rings to me of blue law. Having grown up on the in the south and seeing what the blue laws on on the weekends, I feel like that's kind of just an extension of that. So I don't know if that's a business decision we could do, but it is a condition that we could make if we wanted to. um during discussion. Um I my kind of take and I I want to clarify some things that came up in Brian's um letter that he submitted. So my understanding of the 20% is the 20% is a floor space issue, not a sales issue.

Uh that that's the recommendation. Yes. when there's nothing in the city guidelines that that restricts a business that has 5% sales floor space and all of a sudden does 30% business that that would be a violation of current city policy currently. Yeah, there's no that's not written down anywhere.

Thank you. That was my first question. Um, so I think what I come down to is um, and we're talking about single single serving size. I mean, call them shot sizes, but it's a single serving size. And I agree. I think that where I I actually would rather I think this was the same conversation we had with one of our other providers that we recently approved a license for in the city. And we had that conversation with that developer also about what was the appropriate size and would where they for single size or larger sizes and in that setting it was a little bit different model than in this setting. Um but in this setting yeah I kind of would agree that I'd rather see in larger container sizes than smaller. Single size is just single size is just easy. It's single size. You go in there and you just buy it and you're done with. it's it's no different if it's a single beer or a single shot of liquid and you have it. And so that I think that's a bigger issue to me is the restriction on on the size and not allowing that as a condition. Um my other one and this is really I think maybe more of a staff question which is um going back to our whole kind of the definition of um compatibility um or undue undue concentration. And so we currently when the city regulation legislation was written and as it has not been updated in a while. So we current the way it's written currently um we allowed a store convenience store to have a beer and wine license here. And all we're effectively doing is we've changed the ownership of the property and we're changing because it's the same type of store with the same

hopefully the same similar type of customer base with a the same type of beer and wine. We're going from a beer and wine to a beer wine and liquor license. And I guess mine is from looking at this from your experience on undue concentration. What would be a what would be a reason to look at this and say okay we didn't we didn't have an ungooded concentration before now all of a sudden and we don't technically right now because this license is we technically 71 still owns the license for another four months on that spot. What would what would change that from an undue concentration perspective that would make us want to to deny this permit?

Uh, that's a loaded question. There's a lot of reasons why a city could deny a permit, but I think primary would be um do the first responders and the police department have issues. Um that's why we took a little bit longer to do some research and we worked it out with the chief of police that if it's less than 20% they would not uh object to the license. Um so yeah uh that would be our primary is making sure PD is comfortable which by indications they are. So

that's fine. I I I knew it was a very subjective kind of question, but I wanted to kind of get your from the flying department. I think from mine is I guess coming back and this is where I come back to to the applicant. And so my question, one question for you is when I look at and I think of local convenience stores that are supporting of the local community. Um, and that's what I kind of see it's location that's where I look at a 7-Eleven and say, especially the way they're located in our city, they are built around a different demographic necessarily, but you're you're really looking towards fostering and developing the local population and you'll have secondary sales, but

we we have neighborhood stores,

right? And so, well, that's where I'm kind of going to. So unfortunately the way our city is built right now we do not the way it was built also. We do not have that integrated neighborhood store concept that some of the other cities in our peninsula have um for example. So we have clustered our stores along two main roads and obviously this is on one of those roads. So from a neighborhood combined long way to get to this is from a neighborhood compatibility perspective of how do you how do you foresee integrating into the community of of young so what we've done in the past and and it's not for any other reason than just to be you know just because we feel like we're part of the community you know um we like to be part of events um local events and whatnot, you know, supporting um like recently we did one in Mesto. We were supporting the fire department in Modesto. Um and you know, annually they have a a picnic out there. Um and it's just [snorts] when when you're part of a when when you're part of a big franchise and whatnot, it's like the they just, you know, the customers are in and out and that's that, right? when you're building a neighborhood store, um the customers really do feel like they they look out for your business. And when I mean they look out for like they're not littering. They're not, you know, you don't have to work like they they take care of it like it's theirs, you know. And we've always noticed that, you know, in the long run, it's always uh you know, uh better to get more engaged with the community and the customers. Okay, that's that other comments later. Thanks,

Commissioner R.

I'm sorry. I I didn't hear the first part of your uh Ryan McGathi's letter says mentions about cumulative neighborhood impacts. So have we done some kind of study or analysis? No, because that's not required for this permit. But uh if uh somebody raises this question, don't we take that that into consideration? Although even if it is not deprived by any regulations.

Um well the planning commission can take all sorts of testimony and input from a wide breath of sources and at this meeting. But for the purpose of this quasi judicial hearing, staff is duty bound to follow what's in the zoning code and what's in the general plan. that neighborhood analysis is not currently a requirement for this particular type permit. It could be in the future, but we have to follow what's on the books when the applicant submits their application.

Yeah. And are there any existing guidelines on the concentration aspects of such businesses? Uh yes. So within each census track, there's a certain number that you can have. Uh but the way the planning commission and the council rewrote the code last May or June, that undue concentration finding does not have to be made if it's an incidental use, which is why that's the focus of the hearing tonight. So,

and my next question is to the applicant. Uh what's your past experience of similar kind of business? I mean, I don't know where to start. I don't want to incriminate my dad for child labor, but growing up I mean, growing up, I mean, from filling up the ice boxes and the ice cream machines and the just I I grew up in a convenience store. Sean grew up in a convenience store. Um, and we just that was our life. It was school, work, sleep, school, work, sleep. I mean, yeah, it's uh and that's why and I think that's why we always built like strong relationships within the community. It's because we went to school with half the customers, right? This is a little bit different, but you know, um, new territory for us, but he plans on moving here. He loves the area. Um, he fell in love with the the cold, nice, uh, crisp weather here. And so he, you know, we we talked about it. He's moving over here. And I'm gonna help him manage the business in the beginning, uh, until he's got a strong foothold here. Yeah. Okay. And uh again uh another question is that uh we had the similar kind of business here and the business closed.

Mhm. And now you're going to get in. Mhm. And you mentioned your reasons like people spirits and bad services we relationship and everything. That's a good argument. But uh what do you I mean what makes you very sure that yes it is going to be a success which which is already failed.

Yes. So well I mean we're not 100% sure it's going to be a success but we want to do everything we can to make it successful. I mean it's it's a it's business right? um you know the way we're looking at it is what can we add that 7-Eleven didn't have right which is not many few there's a few things but not many things but we could add that the other thing is we our customer service right um that store had terrible reviews when it came to customer service and we always you know um our our staff it's it's it's a principle they have to be friendly you you know, it's just just not not just comedies. They have to be friendly, you know. Um, and that that's what we expect from our staff and that's how we run our businesses and and it's it's worked out good for us so far. Every business hasn't been perfect. We've had have, you know, hiccups in some businesses. We thought we'd do great and they didn't do so well, you know. Um, but regarding I feel very confident about the location at 320 reservation. Um, Mashad obviously feels extremely confident about it. Um, but we don't know 100%. So, all we could do is the best of our ability and you know the rest you know um well we we'll let fate decide but we we just have really good a good relationships with our customers. Yeah.

Okay. And uh this location already has uh and they've done this business with beer and wine and your license is seeking to add spirits into that.

If that is not say permitted, not given, you will still have business or it is your condition that you don't have. So it is it's the condition that we need the spirits. Um just it's like I said it's sometimes it's one thing that really uh one of my father's businesses uh was a check cashing well I'm sorry it was a grocery store but it did it was heavily into check cashing. We did we had a lot of customers that would bring their payroll checks in and they would cash their checks with us. Um we had some issues with our bank. Our bank decided to we're not going to deal with stores that have chick cashashing anymore. It was I guess it was too much paperwork on their end and they're charging us fees, ridiculous fees and it was still it wasn't good enough. They they they told us that they were shut our account and they gave us a heads up to look for a new bank to do business with. And so my father decided, you know what, maybe it's time let's you know check cashing. There's there's some difficulties in that in that kind of business as well. So, we decided to let's get rid of the check cashaching. Um, about two years later, we almost closed down that store and it was operating for 30 years just because we removed the check cashaching. Those check cashing customers used to cash their checks. Guess what? They used to buy a six-ack of beer and some snacks for the kids and a box of cereal. And so, when you sometimes you get rid of one thing and it really affects everything else. And the more you don't have to have a large variety. That's what we we've always noticed. But if you have some variety of this and some variety of that and like um like another thing that we're going to add that 7-Eleven didn't have, we're going to have a very vast like dry food uh dry fruits and snacks and nuts section um that complements the wine cells, you know? So, it's it's some things work amazingly well with other categories, right? So, and what we wanted to do is just have a little bit of everything

there. And I think we could manage to um exceed our expectations in that sense. And my last question again to the staff that at this moment the police has really given clearance that they have no objection and we can go ahead with the license but if there is an impact say rising incidents this store is located on the main road too much traffic won't sell out and if there is some impact active which is of police concern. Will there be any kind of consequence for me?

Uh absolutely. So the planning commission and the city has broad uh code enforcement and revocation uh rights that we don't ever give up. If a property becomes a nuisance, we have our nuisance ordinance. Uh we have administrative fines and penalties. uh we reserve the right if after giving due notice to the applicant to bring the applicant back before the commission and to revoke the permit. Um that's a little bit more of a lengthy process but absolutely we have every right to ensure the public is safe and follow up. So and that process is number 11 in the conditions of approval.

Thank you. I saw you Thank you. Okay, let me let me take the the floor right now for my questions and comments and let me start. See a good place to start. We'll start with the applicant. Um, when did the 7-Eleven officially become Marina Minor?

Uh, the 7-Eleven, I believe they closed their doors, I believe, in May of last year. Um, and then we immediately started working with the with the owner and, you worked out our lease with them and whatnot. You know, it was a lot of going back and forth there. U, but it was it was it September around September, possibly August. Okay. Okay. So, you you've been there in in business for Oh, I'm sorry. It's not It's not in business yet. It was open. I went in it this morning. No, no, no, no. Maybe. Maybe on 320 Reservation Road.

It's It's right on the corner of uh right across from the hotel and the gas station. Crescent. Yes. Okay. Yes, sir. Chevron gas station. I went into on California and reservation. Yeah, different one. That's another mini. That's the Oh, yeah. That's the gas station.

Okay. Okay, they're inside looks similar to yours. [laughter] Okay. Okay, that's good. Um the I think I I want to transition not from from the applicant to addressing more the issues brought up by Nora Wright and and our Um, city council member Ryan Brian.

Oh, okay. Brian McCarthy. And let me let me start with Brian's because I think that'll cover both of them. Um, so y'all can see. Okay. And uh yeah, Chair St. John, I just wanted to remind you it uh if if the commission wants to continue to deliberate, that's fine. At some point, uh we do have to I think the public comment period is open. We do have people online who do want to speak, but I I defer to you as the chair how you want to do that. So, okay. Well, let's go ahead and get the public comment and then I'll hold my Okay. my comments and she'll leave.

Okay. So, we have uh Grace Sila Santella who wants to speak. So, I'll put her on for 3 minutes and um go ahead, Grace. Hi, Planning Commission. Can you hear me? Okay. Yes. Yes.

Thank you. First of all, thank you very much. I really appreciate the depth of questions that you're asking of this uh proposal here for this site. One of the commissioners had spoken about how we don't really have neighborhood stores, but that in fact is not true. Just a little bit east of this location is a very popular Asian Filipino market that uh is quite busy and satisfies a large amount of needs of the marina population. And their closing hour is 8:00 at night. I think 2:00 a.m. is excessive and I really seriously hope you will reconsider the that lateness of hour. And one of the reasons I would urge you to be cautious about the closing hour, the lateness is that just directly across the street you have a very high density residential community of apartment dwellers. And then just going further south on Crescent, you're you also have a highdensity uh residential apartment uh complexes. And I think you really have to keep that in mind as you're determining what are the appropriate hours for this business. I also am starting to have a lot of concerns about the security lighting starting to pop up around Marina in the uh commercial areas. And I think that if you could please look at language about security lighting that it be downlit that it not shine way out into the street. It would be greatly appreciated

if you could have some conversation about that. And then the the last thing I would say is this is the entrance into our core downtown area for our downtown revitalization specific plan area. The city council is actually looking at roundabouts and I believe the furthest east roundabout would be Crescent and Reservation Road if they follow through on their plans. They're also looking at reducing Reservation Road to one lane in both directions uh starting at that intersection. and I'm wondering if the applicant is aware of these conversations that the city council has been having. So, thank you very much for allowing me the opportunity to speak.

Okay. Thank you. Um, next up, uh, Chair St. John, we have, uh, Brian McCarthy.

Thank you, Chair and Commissioners. Uh, thank you for your time tonight. Sorry I couldn't be there in person. Um I am speaking in opposition to the CUP. Um and for me the decision isn't about alcohol sales and whether they're legal. It's really about land use compatibility, cumulative impact, and whether adding another outlet in an already overconentrated area serves the broader public interest. The census tract already does meet the Department of ABC's definition of undue concentration. The designation exists for a reason. It reflects a level of outlet density that is statistically associated with higher rates of nuisance activity, calls for service, and neighborhood impacts. Even when alcohol sales are described as incidental, the secondary effects are not necessary incidental to the surrounding community. So although a formal PCN may not be necessary here by Marina Code, certainly the commission is still within its rights to have that discussion of whether there's undue concentration. But I also want to raise a broader policy issue and that is um that there's really no metrics on when the undue concentration stops. And I kind of want to correct the record a little bit. Um the number of alcohol outlets in this census track for offsale is three according to the ABC. Anything over that is undue concentration. I think you have like six, seven or eight. So well more than double uh what what is considered undue concentration. Um, if you do choose to approve the permit, I really urge you to strengthen the conditions. Really think about that closely. I heard some great conversation from the commission about hours of operation um and and floor sales space. Um, you know, there were many Facebook comments um that talked about how even the 7-Eleven with even their license uh some people frequently saw flashing police lights in their window, couldn't sleep at night, heard loitering noises um late into the night uh and it was really problematic. And so now you add a different kind of license that may even increase that along with increased operating hours. And I think there's some real concerns to evaluate there. I would encourage you

to make 10 p.m. um part of the business hours conditions if you decide to move forward with this permit. Um, in terms of crime, you know, I I would encourage your police chief or the police chief of the city of Marina to um provide crime statistics rather than whether they think that it's going to create a problem or not. Um, you know, right, let let's just use facts. Um, what has the crime been there for the last three years versus what we think it might be in the future. Um, I know me personally, I've seen people under the influence. In fact, um, just literally laying on the grass, um, uh, under the influence in that area. Um, the last thing I want to say is just about the floor space. I'd really encourage you to keep the language in there about sales. And the reason is is you can have 20% dedicated to alcohol, 80% dedicated to just seating area. Um, and then you effectively have 100% of your sales come from alcohol, which I know was mentioned by Commissioner Woodson, and I appreciate that comment. Um, I think that you will see a lot of sales related to alcohol, well more than the 15% that's being stated by the applicant. So, really consider conditions. I appreciate your time and good luck tonight. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you, Brian. Anyone else? Um, just giving people a couple extra seconds. I don't see anybody else's is online. Chair St. John. Okay. Thank you. Okay.

Yeah. How about in the in attendance? Yeah. Any comments? Okay. All right. Let me let me pick up where where Mr. McCarthy left off. U I'd like to I'd like to address the the uh the what is it called? He calls it the second undue concentration that issue even though it doesn't apply when the 20% of the floor area it's an incidental to other food and and sales commodities items. It's exempt from that. But just to take a look at that a little closer so that it isn't uh but I' I'd like to point out that the undue concentration metric that covers Marina and other cities in California comes from the California Alcohol Beverage Commission And the element that is was quoted by Brian McCarthy for the city of Marina is three off sale off premises sale licenses and seven on premises sale licenses. That's according to census

track 142.02. Now I did a little digging into that and that is the statistic from the year 200 two 2023. Now a little further digging that that the population context census track 142.02 02 is the estimated population for that census track was 4,452 residents as of 2023 and it was for an area that was predominantly the city of Marina but not solely the city of Murray. Now that the population today are from the the most current census taken in 20 2020 was in the neighborhood of 23,000 plus.

I saw the official one was 22,3.

Has she come in at all? for 2020. Okay. Now, for 2023, I mean 2025, it was projected to be 23,150 or so, plus or minus. Okay. And we're actually into 2026, but it doesn't we have to stop somewhere and use a number. But if we use the the number projected for 2025 of 23,150 and ratio that to the number that's listed for Marina with a population of a census track population of uh 4,452. we come up with that that that the 4452 over 23150 is a 19.23% or.1 923. So if we factor the licenses to the current population or the nominal population of 23,150 we would come up with 15.6. six factor or licenses or say we'll just take 15 or remember to bring it more up to date. So instead of three licenses allowed we would have 15 licenses allowed and we currently I think I was uh our current license count is approximately 10 That's correct.

Not not over 10. That's correct.

Okay. So to add this license doesn't exceed the factor for census track. We would not be out of uh we would not fall under a uh undue concentration. So, we can I would suggest that we can take that off the table even though it shouldn't be on the table because of the 20% floor space. Okay. So, we can put that one to bed. And we we would follow the 20% floor space because that is the city's municipal code. Okay. I have any comments?

Can can I have a comment?

Yeah, chair. Um, this 20% number is is kind of a escaping me. Okay. So, I understand that we've got, you know, like 200 square feet of a cold box for beer. And then we've got a counter where the employees stand, where the register is, where other services are delivered from. And then behind there we've got a shelf. And on the shelf, which is 8 by two at the max and 8 by two for wine and beer, the the 80 square ft does not compute for me. That sounds like a small amount of shelf space that you're putting spirits on. And so it doesn't this doesn't equate for me as being an unreasonable request, especially if it's going to be the larger bottles because I'm I'm in agreement with the smaller bottles can lead to trouble where the larger bottles may most likely will go home to be consumed and also the staff in the store will be responsible for not selling that alcohol to anybody that's any condition that shouldn't buy alcohol. So, so I'm that's that's my was it's much

much more than square footage thing care 80. You have 80 square feet listed for wine and an additional 80 square feet allowable for spirits. That's I mean a shelf that's 14 in to get 80 square feet that's a lot of linear feet. Um if you once once the store's fully you know full of product um it it's very uh it's not there's a lot of we have a lot of linear shelving in there right and u and then the I know on the diagram it was showing the big red box where the cooler would be and uh

uh but it wasn't a a good portion of that cooler is non-alcoholic. I don't know. I can't really read it from here, but like a lot of Yeah, it says walking cooler on the right side. The smaller square says alcohol. Yeah. So, the alcohol would be in the in the in the smaller square, right? Uh the rest of that would be dairy products, juices. I think I know I'm pretty sure I know where we're going with this. So if outside of beer and wine, we'll say that that we'll say that the beer is in the cooler, a walk-in cooler can be divided into two areas of usable space. One is storage space and one is consumer retail space.

So consumer retail space is when they open a door and they grab something out of a cooler. And so the the 200 feet on that side of it is part of the retail space of what's accessible versus the storage side of it. So I think that would be the maximum value there. Where I think what we're really getting to is on the wine and liquor set aside for sale space, not the storage because the storage space is back of back. That's it's an area and it's just stacked and it's it's wholesale and boxes. Yes.

From the front perspective, if we're looking at 80 feet and 80 feet and what you're saying is that okay, I'm looking at a counter space. I'm looking at a counter that is building wise it's 20 feet behind the counter is 20 to 25 feet times three shelves when I get to that I'm coming up way way less than 160 square feet so if I think that then if the discussion becomes that what we're looking at is behind the counter what they're what the concern is is if we approve 160 square feet even though currently we are saying that the the the requirement is saying that we want that it's going to be behind the store or behind the counter.

Behind the counter, but you only end up using 40 square feet behind the counter. You still have 120 square feet that you could actually put someplace else in the store

because the permit itself is for the one the total square footage, not where that square footage is definitely located. We can't we're really the C is not telling you you can where you actually have to do it. This is your plan. your plan is to have it behind you. This is your way out. But you can always change that. I mean, you have that that's it's your business. So, I think the concern if I articulating it correctly is that the intention is to restrict the liquor and I guess the wine is to me is a little bit kind of an in between. I don't care if you have beer and you have wine. Wine out on a shelf is not that concern. No, but the liquor side of it if we want to restrict the liquor behind the behind the counter. So that's restricted access. Then what we're really saying is that 80 square feet, we would rather have that defined to kind of define what that real square footage would be.

So that we could look at that true footprint and then set the boundary on that true footprint which is arguably going to be much less than 80 square feet. Yes. I mean that did that articulate what you all kind of moving towards? I wish I could have said it that way. That was very good. I don't know if I said it correctly. Eloquently. Um, so that I think that's the concern that some of the commission has

is that we we've had this conversation before um on liquor specifically across the city and different places that um liquor is a business multiplier is the way I look at it. That it's something that that does draw business in. This is a conversation that a couple of of our of different developers have come in here and and kind of had the same conversation and the same piece you are that that there are certain things that we want to provide to our customers that for X Y or Z reasons um that match their business plan and that's what you from your side of it you see one of critical business items that you want to sell is liquor. Um you're restricting it towards the back of counter. Are you willing to reooking calculating and I don't think we would have to have a condition on this but I think the condition would be to staff would if we created it to add a condition said come back work with the count work with the staff to figure out what the back of counter space

really really is and then as a cup is based on that determination of behind counter that's where the restriction of would be that's what the revised number would be for the spirits correct for the spirits for the spirit portion of it. Okay. So, let's just assume because I'm I'm not not the best at math, but that's okay. You don't have to be. Yeah. Let's let's assume that the shelf depth is I know these I believe they were 14, but let's say we're only we we'll have a couple inches of space between, right? So, let's say we're using 12 inches and it's one and a half. Make them make them 18 inches. Make it one and a half. So, I I'll do the math. I can I'll do the math for you. Okay. Um, so at 1 and a half foot depth

of a shelf times 10 feet would be 15 square feet. Okay. Right. Right. Yeah. So if it's 20 feet, then we're at 30. 30. Yeah. [clears throat] So, and if we have five of those, we have and if and if it's on a countertop, it's behind it and you have and you have five shelves. And we we'll do five shelves. So 5 time 30 would get to 150. That's assuming that you're using it from top to bottom. Um so and that's if we have you have an 18 inch depth.

Now what you're thinking about is it's probably going to be less than that. And I think that's where we're getting to at at 18inch depth and 20 ft length times five shelves. You are right at 150 square feet. [clears throat] Does everybody agree? So at 150. So if you're [clears throat] but if we're saying that the shelf depth is going to be 14 in and not 18. Mhm. Now we're going to end up you're going to end up having le you're going not have enough space behind the the counter

with five shelves just because you're you're losing 25%. Because going from from 18 down to 14 just assume well 20% you lose 20%. So 20% of under 50 is is you'd need an extra you'd end up being 30 square feet of just get the math. I got it. So, so, so, so to help out the commission and the applicant, um, for condition of approval number three, the commission can add a very simple sentence that a very simple sentence that says,

um, prior to final building permit or occupancy, uh, it will the onus will be on the applicant to verify that no more than 20% total and whatever we want to talk about with the shelves we can just it's a very simple we won't give you your final occupancy until we go out there and we measure and we verify and that it is so yeah it is less than that amount and it is behind the counter space

that's so I agree with you and that's where I was getting to is let's flexibility wise we don't need to do the final calculation because he doesn't have the final design of the depth and height and where everything is give him the give them the flexibility but control to ensure that what we're the intention the intention would be to put it behind the counter. This is what we're going to get to and this is how the council can this is this would be how the staff can drive that condition. That's we can totally do that more. Okay. Okay. So, that takes care of that one. I'll turn it back over to you for the rest of your discussions.

Okay. Let's see where I left off was this issue of uh whether the concentration of permits was within the states allocation or was un undue concentration and I think I I have demonstrated if we use the population numbers from the latest census factored up to a reasonable number for the year 2025. We are within the concentration metric from the state of California. Even though that is not on the table for this permit because this is not a standalone liquor store. This is a 20% forest maximum permit which does not require a concentration study. Correct. Okay. So that was

you're way better at math than I am Commissioner St. John. So So yes, yes, there you go. So I [laughter] don't know where the budget stand on talking um on who's who you had comments you wanted to make. Right. I just wanted to say that 23,000 is the entire city. Yes. So right. Yes. It's not the concentration is a long reservation but

no it's how many liquor stores you can have the number of licenses for your area. It isn't a number of licenses for a resident or you know subdivision. It's the number of licenses. Yeah. But I I disagree. I disagree with that that I think that

when I when I look at undue concentration and I look at the intent of what California's ABC laws are written and the way that they have defined it, I I this absolutely fits underneath the definition of um that that meets it. Now, that's the pure that's the first part of ABC regulations. The second part of ABC regulations are that they then put a caveat on it that the cities we are not going to tell the cities how to do their own business. So we are then going to give them a waiver that if they have city policies that override that that they have a better grasp of what their city is from a crime with crime location setup what whatever criteria that the city sets that then allows us to so I think in this case I think that we are in the situation where we do have an undue concentration along the reservation in this case I'm again Delmani side because that's different in this in this reservation corridor that goes from Del Monty to just past Crescent that we that we have a large number of stores that have beer, wine or beer, wine, and liquor permits. And so that said, and I think that the city guidelines give us the ability to override that. At the same time, and this is where my where my concern comes in with this, it's it goes back to community and Grace talked about it with her her comment that well, we do have a we do have community stores and I'll and I will defer to her that she's absolutely right and I know exactly what she's talking about and and I will say and tell me another place in our city. Give me one other place other than that that one block or one and a half blocks on Carmel. that we have community stores. We are not Seaside. Seaside has

community stores. They have 18 of them, I think, intermixed across all their neighborhoods. So, you can't walk more than five, you can't walk more than six or seven blocks without running into a community convenience store in Seaside. We do not have that in our city. And so, we have concentrated here. So the question to me then becomes is that con does that concentration create a detriment to the neighborhoods nearby and the neighborhoods nearby do have a prepoundonderance of highdensity right residential residential apartments

and are is that going to create the ability for increased crime and if not and I was looking at city protect and I was looking at at the statistics for because I can only go back you can only in city protected you can only go back for a year and within that six block radius there has there is not a escalated prepoundonderance of crime that exists that was aligned to the previous tenant of the building right and when I looked at then I looked at that from a perspective of where are other permitted beer wine liquor convenience type stores

of which we have a couple, we have a couple, three of them, sorry, in the city. And then you look around those areas and the only one there is only one that has a little bit of elevated crime and that is on Delani, but there are absolutely extenduating businesses that are nearby [clears throat]

that are probably more of an effect than the store itself. And so I'm not so I'm really torn on this on this issue because I do believe that that it does meet the criteria. I think it's pretty straightforward. It meets it meets the criteria of AB California's ABC requirements. [clears throat] Then I come back to the city requirements and I look at where we're at. And to your point, I think we it does there are a lot of circumstances that would allow us to approve this um as is as as is because we're transferring it and then we're asking for an additional one to potentially keep this business that had a business model that I guess we could say it didn't work. Yeah. The previous business model didn't work because the business closed,

right? And so if if we have a slight change in their business model, but they're basically doing the same type of things, a convenience store with with beer and wine, but then the big change is, you know, a few sunundry items and OTC's and then adding liquor sales. Is that going to be enough to take a a new business and keep it there? Number one. And then number two, is this the right business for that area at a bigger discussion? And is there something that we think would be that a developer would actually come in there and realistically build against not not this all these ideas we want realism. I mean at some point remember somebody wanted to put another golf course resort

into [clears throat] the se the CX plant because they thought that was a great idea 30 years ago and that obviously never worked. you know, the the discussion that that we're having. It's it's interesting because I when you talked about the concentration of stores along reservation, [clears throat] I think there is a concentration of stores along the reservation, but they're servicing the entire city of Marina. So, the larger stores that have liquor and you know those others, there it's it's not like it's a neighborhood store and we got 12 in the neighborhood. We don't. we have they're servicing the entire city. So in in that way when I thought about it that way I didn't see it as an undue what is it undue concentration

the the other the other thing um I thought about was over the years [clears throat] I've watched and spent time in that 7-Eleven because I live close by not within 150 ft or whatever it is but I live close by and there's like two types of customers that come there. They're the customers that were traveling in and out of work and they're going along reservation and they stop. When they had a gas station, a lot more stopped. When they did away with the gas station, their customer count just dropped. The other concentration of customers is from those multi- apartment complexes across the street, down the street, behind them, all there, because a lot of those people just walk to that store and and they shop in there. And so that's that's the primary clientele that I've seen over the years.

[clears throat] Now, whether this addition of alcohol in addition to wine and beer is going to impact them, I don't I don't see it. I think it's a I don't think it's a spot where you're going to have people that are uh delinquent or people that are coming by just to start trouble or drink in the in the parking lot or whatever because I've never seen that there. But that's just my observation about that location over the years. Am I still something?

I'm just worried about um I know that we don't make decision about opening hours, but I'm mostly worried about here having this place open at until 2:00 a.m. on weekends selling liquor. Um and we can't make a decision about this, but there is not a place in Arena that I know that is open. They can choose open 24 hours a day and selling liquor. We're selling wine and beer. Okay, that's a different story than our chair. Glad you recognize.

Yes. Um, so regarding um the first comments about what times we would be open, we weren't actually looking at being set at that 2 am mark. That was just it gives us breathing room, but I'm I'm I'm feeling like, you know, everybody wants to be 100% clear on that. Uh, and you know, talking with Rashad earlier, um, we have no problem removing that that 2 a.m. And we could probably set something maybe at the very latest, maybe midnight. Is that something would that address your concerns a little bit or Yeah,

I know uh Commissioner Chang had also mentioned that you know I know the hours bothered you and you know that 2 a.m. I mean, we don't have like and that would be our the latest, by the way. You know, we we still might even do it less if because if it doesn't make sense financially to keep the staff there and, you know, keep you know, the lights on that late um you know, um as was mentioned previously, um it's kind of, you know, everybody's up early and they kind of go go to bed earlier in this town. So, we might have to adjust that later on, but we just don't want to restrict it on the on on the license.

Yeah. So I think on the condition I think it's the same type of thing we could do just like I was talking about with square footage. What we could always do is we could request we could add a condition that allows them meaning if we kept the the hours where they were whatever we changed the hours to but then we could also request and we've done this in other places. We've done this with the new gas station on Im for example. We could put a condition that states that six months from now, we would like a police report of all incidents within that area to see if there was a change over time um to look at at th those things. And we could set what those conditions are um with or ask staff to work with the police department to come up with the right what the right metrics are because I'm not necessarily knowing that the planning commission is the right one to to know what the right metric is to look at. But we could set that up as a condition to look at the time period to see what happens to it and then come back after six months and if there if there is a change or if there's things we can always go back and that and then put a restriction that if there's an increase then at that point we would default back to an earlier value. So 10 o'clock or 11 o'clock or whatever. So I think that there is a way that we can work through that with conditions.

Yeah. Like a police report or study for incidents that happened after 10:00 at night and in that area something so that it would be a a metric that can be focused on. So to help the applicant and the commission, the commission can modify condition of approval 12 to either close at midnight all the days or um I would

or keep it till 2:00 a.m. uh furthering directing staff to work with the police department to identify if there's been an undue concentration of crime or however the commission wants to phrase it. So we can do it either way. So, I would be willing to give the the applicant the benefit of the doubt that that their job is to actually operate a business because the hardest part is staying in business for a year.

And if they can get past the first year, then they have a much better chance of surviving and staying in business here. And they're not with that with that assumption in place, they're going to make good business decisions on ours, what what the staff, what the stock in the store, I mean, all the the litany of business things go on. But I think having that condition of having the police side because setting the hours does not address the potential of increased crime that historically has come from adding liquor sales in convenience stores. And so this would allow us to cover that issue and address that within our city, but then also address the hours issue while still giving the flexibility to the owner to make the decisions on what's right until we prove it until it's proven wrong. So, so once again that we can craft it however the commission wants. The the condition could be uh one year after occupancy that the staff will work with the applicant and the police department to determine if the hours are appropriate and potentially could be scaled back but would not increase. It would have to go down not up. If I'm not wrong, uh the state license um allow them to on weekend 2 a.m. in the morning.

And I don't think we change that. That's not you know we can only ask the the businessman to have the kind of moral responsibility you know not to do that. U my I have one question about the intention of 20% alcohol flow space. Why do we have this 20% alcohol floor space restrictions? Why is it intentionally?

Um, so working with the chief of police and the city attorney's office, uh, we tried to craft a reasonable policy in terms of what would be a good definition for incidental and 20% seem like a reasonable way to interpret the code. Brian, could you go back to the slide where you show the um your calculation of the 15%? That's this one slide.

Yeah. I just want to clarify on this. It's not the sales is a floor space. That's correct. Correct. It's not restricting the sales. So, I mean, if I were a businessman, it's fine. 20% 10% because I will have the storage of all the liquor I keep on selling and turn over I could no restrictions the restriction the floor space so what is the intention of the floor space is to what the incidental otherwise you have to do tremendous

so so so the the purpose of this was the purpose of This was in this code which the planning commission and council adopted last May or June when we did a pretty significant rewrite of the zoning code. Uh we we had in the four years that I've been here, we had brought five or six liquor licenses to the commission. None of them were controversial. They were 70 votes with minimal um conversation with the commission. So staff last about 18 months ago had said um is there an opportunity to help small businesses by you know doing these at a staff level or if we bring them to commission um what's a reasonable way to process these permits. And so we wrote into the code which the commission and council approved that said if it's an incidental use then um and it's tied to uh food and groceries then that would be a reasonable uh accommodation for these type of businesses. So that that's the whole background.

All right. Thank you. As to as opposed to an entire store uh floor to ceiling stock with hard liquor and beer and other stuff that that's not what we're trying to accomplish here tonight. Correct? So, in other words, just trying to restrict the sales and with the minimum floor space to get attentions. Then, if I were the businessman, I'll put a big advertisement on the wind window and say alcohol is available here. Yeah, I I like your comments. Yes. So, um, uh, we wouldn't be allowed to have any signage in the exterior at all. So, you do it.

We're not Marina doesn't we don't allow that right now. We don't allow it. And I believe ABC doesn't ABC doesn't allow where we're where we currently operate. Um, a long time ago when I was a kid, we had wall to- wall so many signs. What's on special this and that, and you know, these 12 packs, $6.99. Now, we can't have not one sign regarding any alcohol products. No advertisements at all. Thank you. No problem. Commissioner Walton, I turned off my light. I'm done. Commissioner Chang.

No, I'm okay. Commissioner Ron, nothing. Sharon,

thank you. Um, I want to thank you for showing flexibility about the hours. Um, uh, I was present in the two votes we had for other license that we voted on, but both of the places were uh, kind of onsite. This one is different because people can go in by and it's offsite. So, that's one concern. It's different when I had to vote for a um permit for a restaurant. Uh and this uh kind of store is not really a neighborhood store. It kind of feels a little bit like a neighborhood store, but it's on the main drag and a lot of people that come in and out of town can stop over, buy something, and leave. Uh I understand that it can bring a lot more business for all the business knowledge I have. Uh but as I said, my main concern is the sale so late at night. If we can compromise on 11 p.m. Uh I prefer 11 to midnight. Uh and and put some conditions as uh Glenn said, Commissioner Woodson. Um I I will feel much u better about this permit. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner.

Let me So just um Guido for the conditions of approval. Yes. On condition three.

Yes. I would propose to exchange the the word floor area for percentage. Total floor area of alcohol sales. The total floor area devoted to alcohol sales shall not exceed 20% of the total floor area devoted to sales. to take the percentage of alcohol sales that imply could imply monetary. Oh, got it. So, you want us to change the title. Say total percentage of gross floor area.

Yeah. Or that's fine. Uh change I'm just typing it out now. Change title to say uh 20% of gross floor area. Okay. But but the the entry title shouldn't say total percentage of alcohol sales. That's what he's correct. Right. So that's what I was saying. Change the title of condition three to say 20% of gross floor area. All right. Okay. we do tonight. So,

can we run through? We've had a lot of conversations. We've had a lot of small changes right now. Right.

So, if I if we could run through so approved use, I don't think there's any paragraph. There's nothing changed there. On condition two, the effective date, nothing changed on that one. We just made a change on on three to fix the title or space. For four, we have compliance with other requirements. per shall comply with other requirements etc. ABC license. Basically, you're going to meet the requirements. Um, so there's no change there. Five is I don't think we discuss modifications. Any modification to the approved plan site plan conditions requires constant review approval of planning staff. I think that's that would address kind of the global level. A number of the things that we've talked about is that they come back to you for discussion. Uh, compliance. So, when we get to six, compliance with conditions of approval. Um, and I think this is

I'm going to come back to Brian's letter and I I has the applicant had a chance to see the other comments, the other letters. Did they get a chance to see them?

Um, did we send that to them? Okay, that's all right. I apologize. We should have sent So, we had two comment letters about your project. So, they're there. I We do apologize. That's our oversight. So, I'm what I'm what I'm going to do right now um just because it's to kind of give a little bit of clar to fairness to you is uh and you can look at them. They're right there. Um Norah is she has hers and her main concerns are about the area and the neighborhood kind of issues that we've talked about. Are you are you local? Are you part of the community? So, it's pretty straightforward. Um Brian McCarthy's are more very specific on conditional use and whether it meets the kind of requirements of should we be undue consideration and then he had some recommendations. Um and so if we go to page two of his recommend three of his recommendations he had option two which is his recommendations on motion to approve with strengthened conditions. And so this is what I would like to ask the staff to do which is um I appreciate what Brian specifically stated for conditions 2, three, four, and five that he suggested with the caveat that I agree with them, but I think that those are ones that we should look at as being applicable across the city with our permits with our permittes. And I don't know if we not that we can necessarily go back and grandfather clause them in, but we are we are also if we put those four conditions in place and modify them and I and I'm not sure if the wording is completely right or not. Um, the challenge with putting those four in place is I do believe that's a negative business impact that puts this applicant at a disadvantage against the other off-site stores and because it's an additional

administrative burden and consequence code system that none of the other permites in the city would have. I'm I'm sorry which condition commissioner two three four. So option two. So, if you go to the last page,

if you go to Brian's letter and you go to the last page, he had he had an option that if we wanted to modify the motion, here were some suggestions that he made and he labeled it option two, motion to approve with strengthened conditions. So, he added these these other conditions. Um, and so what I would like to leave the staff with is that I in principle understand and somewhat agree with with conditions two through five that he suggested. However, I don't necessarily agree that that this CUP is the time and place when it creates an undue burden on one business in our city while the other eight businesses don't have to follow through with that. So, I would rather look at that as a staff action to look at our overall code and say, "Does this make sense from an overall code?" So, I don't and I I'm not saying this that it's not part of our motion. I think it's more just a secondary staff action that I would like to suggest.

That's fine. We we Yeah, we can take a look at it because I do think Brian has a lot of very valid points that he raised in this and there a lot of things too. I would ask that the commission if there are further text amendments for further projects um we we can certainly take a look at that. But but the reason I bring that up is because this is a letter and we could I mean I could just turn around and make that as a suggestion right now. we can have the discussion of whether we want to put this into this and I'm just saying I would rather table this part of it address the letter but because ultimately and the reason I'm bringing it up right now Guido specifically is that our applicant didn't get a chance to see this letter before the discussions right and that's not fair to the applicant that is true

so I want to make sure that he understands that we had a chance to read this I'm you didn't get you got 30 seconds to look at it just now and I want to let you know that and just to clarify we did put it up on the city website so I mean it's not so but we we should have provided you a hard copy it's okay

I you know just to add my thoughts to what Brian has has nominated the to tie the 20% to sales 20% of of gross sales bills for a convenience store like this to say that the alcohol shall not exceed that or you lose your license. That's why I said I'd rather that's not fair. That's why I say I'd rather take that offline as a staff action to look at for future, right?

That right now this is a it's a this is an impediment to the business success of one on one business if we approve it. And so I think that it's they're they're valid discussion points. we just push them as an offline staff action and then and we so we've addressed the letter we've addressed kind of our thought promise of what Brian raised but at the same time we've t we've removed it from the conversation of this c right if if everybody else agrees to that concept all right so um it's up to him uh the chair St. John, the applicants asking to be recognized. Yes. Go ahead.

Sorry, just a very brief comment. Um, regarding the the 20% of the that sales amount um when it comes to u just even beer and wine sales, we don't have a location that does I I'm so I I think in this case, don't worry about it. We are we're we are literally taking it. So this the legis off the table for tonight. Won't be part of your We agree.

Just leave. We agree. No, no, no. You don't have to apologize. So, in the short term, I've just read it a few more times and you've had a chance to read it. We're we're we're just directing our staff to say, "Hey, this this resident of the city of Marina raised some potential valid questions that we think should be answered. We don't necessarily think that they should be answered with this Pacific applicant CUP permit request, but that they should be addressed from a staffing perspective. And so we've asked the staff to address it at a future date as a citywide issue, not as a individual issue to your business request. Does that make sense?

Sure. No, it's it's okay. I mean, I it usually we wouldn't necessarily have done that except that you just didn't get a chance to see the letter before the meeting started. Um, so Guido, is there Let's Let's finish up with the conditions of approval. We got through item. So, so Chair St. John, I I could very quickly if if it's okay, just very succinctly, uh, let me pull up, uh, what my understanding of the conditions are.

Okay. Um, so, uh, because of, uh, Commissioner Woodson did point out, uh, some real minor typographical errors, um, on condition 12 and 14. Um, and we've added that to the motion that the the commission hopefully can accept. Um, and then I don't want to write out the exact verbiage, but if the commission is comfortable with just the general idea of um, we will add additional verbiage to condition of approval number three saying final square footage for the alcohol sales will be verified prior to occupancy or final sign off by the city uh, for the building, including verifying the exact square footage of the spirits behind the counter. Um there was a recommendation for COA number three also to change the title to say 20% of gross floor area to make it abundantly clear. Um there uh we do not have consensus on the hours from the commission. Uh there's been a lot of conversation. We can write it however the commission wants to say direct staff to work with the applicant in the police department to review the hours within one hour of occupancy if that's acceptable to the commission.

One year one year one year and I think that the applicant has already agreed to to cut back the hours on Friday and Saturday from 2 to midnight. one year after I would be fine with with that with the idea that after a year we can re re-review it and then if we need to readjust to an a 10 or 11 p.m. as you're suggesting then we've got the physical police reports along with his own business experience after a year to say whether he and he may just he may do that automatically because it just doesn't make sense. So I think that's that becomes a little bit of a compromise on the hours. Um,

and it was uh till 2 am on Thursday through Friday. So, it's going to be it's going to be 6:00 a.m. to mid 6:00 a.m. to 12 a.m. So, midnight Monday through Sunday. So, it' be seven days a week. There's a song that goes with that. Seven days a week. Good night, too. I think there is another one that I would like to propose. Um, go ahead.

Which is uh, and this goes back to size. I would like to propose that we put a condition that they do not sell single servings size liquor. I am not necessarily I mean I kind of agree on what on single serving beer but I'm not going to necessarily restrict that because I think that's that's just a common thing that happens a lot but I do think that there are enough statistics to show that single serving liquor and it sounds like the applicant is actually in agreement with us that that's that has a higher risk to their business model anyway. So, I would like to add a condition that um the single serving size which is typically and I I'll let you deal with the wording on it. It typically I believe ABC consider or the liquor industry considers that one I think you're right. It's 1.7 ounces containers um as a rest as a restriction for sale of not selling.

Okay. Uh, and Commissioner St. John, if the commission's also open to it, um, the resident um, Grace brought up about lighting. If the commission's open to it, we can also add a condition and we can phrase it however the commission wants about lighting, making sure we're not basically creating obnoxious lighting, following dark sky principles, and we can work with the applicant on the the down spouting delay that we're facing if if the applicants amenable to that.

It's basically keeping if you haven't dealt with dark sky before um dark sky is something that our city has been a proponent of for years across all of our all of our businesses. And what we try to drive is we're trying to keep the lighting as the minimum lighting that's needed to provide security while at the same time keeping the light on site. Right. Exactly. That's exactly what it is. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah.

So, I think I think we just put that in there and they work with staff on on what that defines. So if if the commission is okay with it, we would want to work with the applicant. Um because the applicant brought up that lighting is really important to PE for the customer to feel safe. So we want you to have the lighting to support your customer base, but do it in a way that doesn't cause the light pollution if if that's amenable to the applicant.

Okay. Guidel you just typed in the last COA. No single serving spirit. No single serving of spirits. The hard alcohol, not the wine can be single serving. Okay. Yeah. Beer. I don't want to like belabor the conversation by putting the exact verbiage, but I'll put spirit in there. spirit because we limit it to this this the spirit piece, not beer and wine could be. He's got it. He's got it in there. You got it. You got it. I think we've addressed this signage. I

um Well, I still have I want to make sure. So, I still want to understand and I just want this is I think just a formatting thing, Brian. Um, so looking at and I I kind of talked about in the email, but I want to make sure I'm right. If I look at par current paragraph 13, it says tobacco authorization of this use permit does not permit the sale of tobacco products. I mean, it's not that you can't. It's that this permit doesn't address it, right? Then I think should there be a new paragraph 14 that is yes that deals food and beverage or health and safety?

Yes. Yeah, we can change that. And then so paragraph 14 would then be per MMC health department blah blah blah. Then paragraph 15 would be storage which then makes 16 would be signage. Okay, we can change that. Okay. I And so what we what kind of happened is that paragraph under tobacco ended up combining three different topics in one. And so I'm just asking it to be separated out. Sounds good.

I have a question. Guido what um COA I'm not so you wrote that it will be reduced only after a year. So the first year it will be um open until 2:00 a.m. Midnight. No, the applicant has voluntarily agreed tonight to go 6:00 a.m. to midnight Monday through Sunday, but that the applicant's also agreeing that after a year, we will meet with him and the police department and confer about the hours. That's that's the tenative condition that's been written. So,

okay. Okay. I think we can move on to see if we can have a u motion a motion

for you don't know I we switched after two years I gave up my chair position now I've moved into just a commissioner parole so Um, and he's the new chair. That's why he's this is his first time. You're his very first thing that he's leading. So, um, it's, you think it sounds like it's very simple to just sit there and lead it. And it's like, my gosh, it's different. Anyway, um, so I would make a motion that I make a motion to I move recommend motion. I move to adopt PC resolution 202515 approving conditional use permit 25004 allowing the sale of spirits, beer, and wine for off-site consumption at 320 Reservation Road uh APM lot number 032161014. uh named the Marina Mini Mart subject to finding conditions of approval and a class one section 15301 SQA exemption for existing facilities with the additional changes into the conditions of approval as outlined in the six notes that are added below the recommended motions. COAs 3 affecting COA 3 12 14 15 16 and 17.

Oh, second. Great. Uh, Commissioner Baron. [laughter] Commissioner Walton. Yes. Commissioner Jacobson. Yes. Commissioner Chang, yes. Chair St. John, yes. Vice Chair Woodson, yes. Commissioner Rana, yes. And Commissioner Baron, yes. Motion passes. So, can I add one comment, Chair? Yeah, go ahead.

So, so the one thing I would say is congratulations number one. Um, so it takes a lot to get a business going in today's environment. So, we completely understand the risk that you're taking by coming to the community. At the same time, um, as you can see, there's a lot of there's there is a lot more con community concern that wasn't necessarily noted here in comments or in the meeting, um, and that we've known about that are offline. And I think that that we can't make a condition of approval community engagement. We can't tell you you have to engage with community at a certain level or this is what community engagement even is defined as. Uh but as a new local business that is in this realm of operation, um it would I would hope that as you continue work through your business model that you do work to engage with our chamber of commerce, with our different population groups that we have across the city to really do become a a valid part of our community as a community store. um even though you're you're not embedded like I would love to have you embedded more into our neighborhoods than necessarily where you're at, but that's we just that's not feasible in our city right now. So, but if you can take that kind of perspective that you are you're sitting in the middle of our residential neighborhoods, not on a main road, how would you how would you want to act as that local community sore? And just kind of keep that as your kind of as part of your vision statement in the background of this is what we're trying to provide. It's not about being on reservation. It's about being at in our community

like, right? And that's and that's what I see when I look at this the Tangaras and the convenience stores in in Seaside. And if you ever drive through Seaside and you go look at those a lot of those stores that exist, that's really the atmosphere and the and the vibe that they all have is that they really look at that. Um, I forgot one. I did forget one thing during the discussion. Um, can I ask are they just are is there any permit requirement they that they would have to have to to put a food truck on site?

Uh, I mean they have to get a permit from us, but we can work with them. That's uh done at a staff level. So I just leave that as a Yeah. Thank. So you're free to stay or free to go? Uh I want I just want to thank everybody here. I just want to thank everybody here for you know your time and your considering everything and uh we're happy to be here and um we look forward on working with you know the community and the neighborhood and you know go from there. Yes. Well, thank you for coming tonight and best of luck. Yeah.

Okay. and we meet every other every the second and fourth Thursdays. Uh so you're welcome to come to any of our meetings. Second and fourth Thursdays at nominally six o'clock.

Thanks. Commissioner Walton is leaving us for the last time. So, thank you for coming. or one of those warm warm states. Thank you. Thank you.

Hey, so U Chair St. John, it's your call as the chair. Do you want to take a fivem minute recess or keep going? That's your call. What do you all want to do? go or take five. I think we just keep going. Okay. Yeah, that's good. So, we're to the second item uh public hearing or the let's see planning. Let's see. This is uh for rental.

Yeah, short-term rental agreement. If you go ament to it, I put all those notes back on. Okay. Who's that? All be in the resolution. Who's Brian? Are you presenting this one also? Oh, I'm back. Okay. [laughter]

Good evening. Uh once again, Marisa Huntley, code manager. I'm here to present on the proposed short-term rental uh ordinance amendments for chapter 17.42.170. Next slide, please. Once again, uh city council direction. It was on August 8th of 2025, city council initiated a discussion on strengthening the city's short-term rental program uh to better protect neighborhood integrity. Uh, city council directed staff to identify ordinance amendments that would improve the defic the effectiveness of the program. Next slide, please. The initial STR ordinate ordinance updates were presented to planning commission on October 23rd, 2025. uh planning commission requested a study session be held on December 18th, 2025 and planning commission uh provided feedback and recommendations. Next slide, please. Planning Commission recommendations from October 23rd of 2025. U they re commission recommended that we remove the language prohibiting STR permits on properties that have ADUs and JADUs. uh remove the language limiting STR permits to single family properties and remove the language restricting STR permit uh to properties with only one kitchen. Next slide, please. At the last uh meeting um in December uh planning commission recommended the removal of the 180day requirement from primary residence definition and uh commission supported proof of residency requirement. Next slide please.

Uh the commission wanted us to um include in the or the new adopted ordinance a requirement uh to have the ordinance be reviewed by planning commission and city council 3 years after adoption. So we added section 17.42.170 G1. Review of ordinance. This ordinance shall be reviewed 3 years after its adoption. At that time, city staff shall evaluate the implementation of the short-term rental ordinance and present their findings to the planning commission. Next slide, please. Uh planning commission recommendations continued. The commission requested additional information regarding issued uh STR permits and potential revenue. Um I listed the STR permits issued uh between fiscal year 2021 through 2026. Um as you can see at the initiation of the program it was very slowgoing. We had one initially and then it increased to three and nine permits in 2023 and in uh 2024 it increased to 25 permits and now currently we have 35 permits uh issued. STR toot revenue. This was presented initially at the first meeting. Um but you can see the increase right as we got as we had more permits issued the tot revenue increased. Um we have an estimate estimated revenue from finance. Uh but you can see that the that the revenue forecast is significantly higher uh between fiscal year 2024 25 and 2526. Next slide please. Uh planning commission recommendations continued. U there was a proposal to

require a 55 ft zone of exclusion and requested a map. Uh we added uh section 17.4217014A density limits. Uh upon the effective date of the ordinance codified in this chapter, all new STR permits shall be subject to a 55- ft zone of exclusion. The 55 foot zone of exclusion shall be drawn from the STR parcel boundary. A property shall be ineligible uh to hold an STR license if any part of its parcel boundary is within the 55 ft zone of exclusion of an existing STR uh subject to the city manager or his or her design's discretion. A property may be eligible for the STR permit if its parcel boundary is outside the zone of exclusion but an associated legal easement is within the 55 ft range. Next slide, please. This one. So, this map is, you know, you it's I'm not sure how you how it displays on your screen. Um, but it lists all our current STR permits. Um, you can see that it's in we call it North Marina or

Central Marina.

Central Marina. Um, because the HOAs and the Sea Haven and the Dunes development uh do not allow short-term rentals. So, it's all going to be in Central Marina. And then the next slide, this one's a little more zoomed in version. You can see that there's a couple of STR permits that are within the 55 uh within 55 ft of each other. Um, so they're they one of them would be excluded from the program. And next slide, please. uh STR prohibitions. Uh the commission inquired um as to why BMRs could not have an STR permit. Um the purpose of the BMR program is to provide affordable home ownership opportunities that house the home buyer rather than a profit-making venture for homeowners was the legal response from the program. Uh next slide, please. corrections. During the course of the this presentation and reviewing the ordinance, um we noticed a typo regarding um going from a letter to a number and then a letter. We had section 14 and then 0.1 one. So we just made some typographical corrections um to to have the the correct flow a letter and then a little a b and c and d and e instead of you know section correction subsection 13 and then 1 2 3 4 5 that doesn't make sense. So it's 13 a b cde e. Um and same for 14 section 14 it's going to be 14 little a and corrections corrections continued. Uh same with the section D. We had uh subsection five and then we had um big A

which is supposed to be little A and B. And we have arrived at the end of the presentation. Uh the recommended motion. Oh, sorry I didn't take. It's resolution 14. Why? Well, we're adopting it this year. Yes, we're adopting it this year. So, right, should be this. Oh, okay. Yeah.

So, third time's a charm with the planning commission. Uh, as you can see, we've tried to narrow down. Um, you know, we had the initial goaround and like I said, we got the feedback, hey, we should take a few steps back and have a broader discussion. That's what we did in December. We've further refined the edits that the commission asked for. And so we're really hoping today can be the final go of it with the commission so that we can move forward to council. Um and so the motion is to adopt the amendments. Um Brian's been doing a lot of great work about identifying other potential softwares that we can use. So part of the motion is to direct staff to identify some potential other ways to reduce Marissa's workload. Maybe find a different software. um work with our finance department in terms of implementing SP 346 and direct staff to make those typographical edits that we just identified. So really hoping to get this across the goal line tonight at least with the commission.

Okay. Thank you Guido and thank you to the staff very capturing uh this has been before the commission two or three times now. So, we've had a lot of bites of this apple. It's almost gone. So, let's open it up to the public comment first because they haven't had uh as many chances. Great. Uh we have one. It's up to the chair decide if you want to do it the in person or the virtual. Let's take in person first.

Okay. My name is Sean McDonald. I have a rental department here at the city. Thank you. Yeah, McDonald. have a short-term rental permit here in the city. Um, and we're going to be on a three minute

there. We have a a one of our rules is a three minute limit for presentation. So, let's talk over. I will try to be I will try to be brief. Oh, okay. Yeah, no worries. Um,

as a reminder, uh, we have a home that has an ADU that was built prior to the the changes in 2020 that would disallow it from u short-term rental. uh use. Um one of uh the things I'd like to suggest as a change is to I have three points here. One is to promote rentals of smaller spaces. Um prevent nuisances and set reasonable limits. Um so the first point is is about promoting rentals of smaller spaces. Uh so I I would suggest a change to allow concurrent bookings. Um, this would allow a space like ours where we move out for a portion of the summertime, um, spend time with family and so on to allow us to rent, uh, our ADU on the property in addition to the main house on the property during that time. Um, it makes a huge difference for our family's income. Um, also would allow places that have uh, couple extra bedrooms that they want to rent to be able to do that. Um, so the new amendments that are in place right now would would take that away and uh would suggest that change. uh preventing nuisances. Uh I would request that we add or that the the the commission add a requirement to add a nuisance plan and also require decibel meters uh in in homes with uh short-term rentals. We have we have a a pretty robust uh nuisance plan and it's all about preventing nuisances. Um, we know we we review guest reviews, we do guest screening, we have proactive messaging, do ID verification, we have cameras on motion activated cameras on the outside and we have a decibel meter um that proactively lets us know if if decibel lovers levels are higher than expected for a period of time which automatically gives us a message, automatically sends our guest a message and if it goes longer than that, it automatically sends a human to message that another human if I didn't see it right away. Um, so we think that really really important. Uh we think that's really really important and we think that uh other STR operators

should be doing the same. Um finally uh I have two pages there. One uh or they're both related to this setting reasonable limits. Uh Marina has one of the most strict uh requirements to operate uh vacation rental in the in the area. Um of the ones that do allow it, it's the only one that only allows uh primary uh occupants to do it. Um, if you look at the other cities, uh, if you go to the second page with the the comparisons, uh, the densities of of permits that are allowed per per resident, um, is 62 per resident in Delray Oaks with their 25 permits, 60 per resident with their 250 cap, 90 uh, they have a cap of 90 in seaside, so that's 360 uh, residents permit. and Marina doesn't allow any uh so there's no permits allowed for non non-owner occupants. Uh so which is really strict and it works for us because we're in it, but uh it's it's our suggestion that you might look at doing it slightly differently and setting a cap um so that it doesn't continue to grow too big and uncontrollable for the city. um but also allows own non-owning your occupants including other homeowners and renters to uh potentially do this business. So thank you.

Yeah. Could you give your name Sean? Okay. Thank you, Sean. Okay. And how about um on uh Chair St. John, we have one person online who wants to talk. Okay. So, sounds good. Thanks. Yes. Right. Go ahead. Do you guys Do you guys hear me good now? Yes.

All right. Good evening, everyone. Uh my name is Bishoi Bibawi. Um I just want to say that um I really wanted to prepare like a Google slide or like a PowerPoint for today. Uh but unfortunately I've been traveling uh last week and this week too. So I didn't have enough time to make it. Um, so I just want to talk uh real quick about the reason why I just decided not to speak at the last meeting is because at that time I honestly felt like I really knew where this was going. I didn't feel like speaking would change anything. Um, but today I just decided to come and speak because I truly hope this conversation can shift toward working with the with the real problem and understanding the situation the right way instead of just putting so much pressure on people that they feel like forced to just give up or even leave the state. Um, and I don't know if I should say this, but if the city's goal is for people like us to be out of business, for me that's totally okay. Um, I really mean that. just please be clear and transparent about it because what's happening right now is a lot on us. We have families, we have work, we have other responsibilities and this whole process is really overwhelming now and I would like to talk about our situation here. We own two homes in Crescent Avenue. Uh they are directly across from each other. Um it's separated by a wide public street. our guests park on our private driveways and we have never had any parking issue. We never had we have never had any like safety issue. Um never blocked like emergency access or anything like that. So when I hear about like a 55 foot row um measured like parcel to parcel, I

honestly just don't understand um how two homes across a public street are treated like they are right next to each other. And um I truly don't understand that. So I just it it doesn't reflect real life or like real condition. Um with all respect to Mr. for Guo and Marissa. And I truly mean that. Like even today, I see that the city still struggle to show like real data providing that compliant short-term rentals like ours are causing safety issues or parking problem. There isn't really a clear data showing repeated violation uh or like emergency access problem or neighborhood harm tied to our properties like ours. Um, I believe Marissa does her job. Um, and she cares and and that's what she wants to do and that's what she signed up for. I'm not against Marissa at all. This is not a personal thing. But I also want to mention something that um I remember from last meeting there was like a discussion about making making Marissa's job easier with all respect. I just think it it should be the other way around. We are the people

uh making enforcement. Can I continue? Des you've you've passed up. You you've finished your 3minut allowance. So is it okay if I continue? Uh let me give you 30 seconds more.

Okay, I'll be real quick. So we are the people making like enforcement easier should not mean putting pressure on people who are already following the rules because we are the one paying the city toot. We are the one paying the business license fees. We are the one paying the property taxes. We are the one paying the state taxes, the federal taxes, the very high insurance costs, the local cleaners, the maintenance workers, and even the the vendors. We're not we're not hiding here. We're not we're not avoiding the city. We're try we're trying to just survive and do things the right way. And I don't know if if that is allowed, but if if you guys go through the data from like the last year from like August when when we started those meetings, there isn't really much of like lots of listing or permits been approved.

Okay. Yeah. Let [snorts] me let me thank you. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Yeah, let me close the public comments for now and we'll go to commissioners comments. Um um Commission P St. John Bishoy just commented, but there's a Mina, but I think Mina just spoke. Um, so Mina and Bashoy are together. They can speak separately as long as it is

right. But I think separate. I think that was Ma. Yeah, right. So the gentleman Ma, your your hand is still raised. I'm gonna lower the hand. Okay, that's the same person. Okay. Sorry. Sorry, Chair St. John. Okay. So, uh, everybody has spoken in the building and online. Uh, Chair St. John. Okay. So, we're now going to have the discussions and comments from the commissioners. All right. Uh, start with me. Start Mr.

Ch. We start with you. So, I mean, I'm I'll um I'm not a very I'm a very trans generally very transparent person and u I'll be realistic here. The challenge that we on the planning commission have right now, the challenge that the planning staff have right now, professional staff, is that this was not started by us. This was started in a discussion that went on with the city council and there is a direction that the city council is leaning towards that if we cannot come up with a solution the solution may be presented to everybody and nobody may be a winner in the city of Marina on that respect and I'm not I can't make a decision on where the city council would go if this eventually got to that point but I can tell you that we have to come up with some level of compromise on this and that if we don't, there is a good chance that that this city will move back to where we were prior to 2019. Um, and that's just that's just a fact of where the city is leaning towards right now with the current city council and that's fine. They are they are the ones who set the policy for the count for the city and imple and are ultimately responsible for all of us and how we we do things. So that's the situation we're in right now and that I want to address that to the comments online about okay why are we here um and that's why we're here and it's a very intractable discussion we went through this five years ago and it was really hard to get to a decision then and I guess what I come down to um first off the the nuisance plan the decimal me the remote decimal meter I actually did not know that that was a capability so I would actually the first side of it to me is I will add that I I actually agree with that. I think having a detailed nuisance plan for each of our our owners of STRS and having a remote decimal meter inside I think that is a

tremendous idea. Um that the noise issue and the parking issues are the two biggest issues that come up with STRs across the country. And if the decimal meter becomes kind of a a thing that can help head off those issues from becoming raised to code enforcement to the police in the first place, then that may solve a number of the issues that that we specifically are having. Are they commonly available? I mean, it's an app. It's basically you go in. It's I mean, I just searched it online and there are multiple different ones you could find on Amazon that you can go purchase that just have a remote remote, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth tie in. and it kind of like red camera or something pricing can be a couple hundred bucks.

Yeah. And it's just a decimal it's a decimal meter instead. So it's actually a very interesting one. I had not realized that they existed. So I think that though to me going back to those those I know we didn't raise that before but I think that that those are two really very positive things for the city that would help us out from a compliance perspective. um where the challenge we get into and I struggle with this um here is we invited we invited residents we invited investors both into our city six years ago to have STRs and we did not we were the exception on the peninsula where everybody else had nothing we didn't allow anything. In fact, when I moved here, it was one that's like that was really interesting to me because we were the only city, one of the only cities I think in the state that didn't allow STRs at all. And so then the winds kind of blew in a direction and we invited our residents and we invited investors or businessmen to come into the city and create this program. And now we've kind of got this thing, well, we're not sure if we really like this or not. And but we set this up and we we've put them in a situation where they've set up a business plan and we've asked them to we've given them permission. They have toot they pay taxes into the city. They support the city and then we turn around and we say that's not good enough. And so we're going to curtail you, but we're not going to to the point online. We're not going to kick you out and just tell you we don't want you here. We're going to just say we kind of don't want you here, but we're not going to be outright on what we're going to do. We're just going to set restrictions that are so res non-b businessinessoriented that we drive them we drive STRs out of business. And I

don't agree with that. So, and I I'm I'll turn it over to the rest of the commissioners, but I think that that the issue with primary resident and concurrent bookings, and I to Sean's specific issue here, that is a very typical one with families, is that they they in this in this case especially, we're not asking them to be a non primary owner where that is living in Sacramento. Sacramento and disappears for 6 months and then comes down here because they want to live here for 6 months during the during the summer and then they go back home for 6 months. They're actually just they're living on site on in our community. And so there's there's the concurrent booking kind of the the residential issue of primary resident on-site. I would I I've I still have problems with that to be honest. And then the second one on the concurrent bookings I am again if they meet the requirements and there's not a parking they're not nuisance complaints and there's not anything I again I raised this before and I and I kind of backed off on on it last time but I'm going to raise it again that I don't necessarily agree that we can't have concurrent bookings. I think um a lot of people don't like concurrent bookings when I've done Airbnbs. the places that have concurrent bookings. I generally with my family, I've just gotten to a point where I just don't like them because it's it creates a it's a very just odd it's an odd situation usually because you have locked bedrooms and people come in and they just go to their bedroom and they lock. It's just very weird and it's not very it's not very oriented towards commute towards like communal living or hostile type of settings. Um, so I I do raise those because I do think that that and then the third thing I will say and then

I'll kind of turn it over to somebody else is that even if we put this in place as it's written right now, I think that we've got to we have to be fair to our current owners and business businessmen in our community and give them some type of grandfathering clause that allows them to to make a decision on what way they want to and not just say, "Okay, here it is. This 30 days from now or 60 days from now, we've got to give something that's realistic to them that moves us if this the decision is made to move forward as is that gives them a year or two years to get in compliance with that. Um, and the reason that I'm looking at something that's more extended is that um, in a case of Shawn where it's a single, it's a single residence and what they have as an STR is is one unit where we have MA, they've got two properties in the end with the new rules, especially with the 55, and I'm not going to come off of that one because I propose it and I think that that's valid because I don't want them next to each other. And I don't need to get into my bale. I just think that that's there. But at the same time, he has two properties that are across from each other. And in today's environment, he's going to have to make a decision on keeping or selling one of those properties

because they're not going to be 55 because they're not they're not they're going to violate the 55 foot standard. You talking about that and everybody decided that the the streets were wide enough to allow them. Well, I think that the way the final definition is written right now, if you look at from and this is what I was drawing, that's why I borrowed his pen. I was drawing it from corner to corner of the property that creates an oval around the property. And with the the if we do property line to property line, I don't think the 50 I think in his case that 55 foot is going to be in violation. And so I think we need to be able to address. Can we get staff to confirm that?

I'm sorry. The question is if we do the 55 foot exclusion, how would it impact on Babawi? I think he's got he's the he's the primary one who would be currently has two homes, one across from each other. Yeah. I I'm I'm loathed to adopt public policy based on one particular customer that you know we violated the but he's the I just

Is he in violation? but he's also the only one that we invited into our community that is in violation on a new policy that we're putting in place. So my point is that do we turn around and say, "Okay, 30 days after this is adopted that it goes into effect and then all of a sudden he he has 30 days to come in compliance." No. No. The STR permit is valid for a year. That's been in the books way before I even started with the city. It's abundantly clear that the permit is only valid for one year. This would not take effect until we renew all these permits in is it July 1, Brian, or June?

What whatever whatever the expiration date is. So, this is not going to take effect immediately. This will kick off whatever July 1st. Okay. I'm sorry. I'm looking at this. So, I just want and I'm gonna be I'm gonna be numbers wise here. Today is February 12th. This is this final approval going stops at us or doesn't this does this go to the council they be approved tenatively going to council March 17th

so March 17th if account if council approved it on March 17th April May 60 days May June is 90 days he's going to be in non-compliance in 90 days now you may think that that's a long time but as an owner of a home it may have to sell it to come in compliance. Well, it'll happen another year. Well, no, he won't because his current permit expires and his new permit goes in place on So, I what I'm saying

if the commission wants to shorten the conversation for tonight, if the commission wants, they can recommend to council that whatever, you know, provision that you want the potentially to be extended out for a year. that can certainly be part of your motion and the council can consider it and that is certainly a reasonable part of your recommend recommendation to council. So, I think that the two I I I believe in keeping the 55 foot limit. If any of our current owners of STRs are in violation of that, um, then my recommendation to motion is that we add a condition that the the city council look at giving them a at least a a one additional year of permitted approval to make a decision on what they want to do with that to un violate the code.

That totally is not the right sentence. I understand what you're saying, commissioner. Exclusion. Well, it just gives them it would give them the three months plus a year. That's completely reasonable and the commission can make that recommendation. So now, so where I do think so if that said, I think we come back to to me the issues of concurrent bookings and primary residents and do we do do we want to keep it as written? And again, these are those were some of the bigger discussions we had last time. Um so I think but we also have so the other condition that we want to add is that we want to add a condition that we want to add a nuisance plan and a decel meter as recommendation. So those are the two new conditions

I'm sorry uh yes that once again that can be a reasonable addition to the motion that a nuisance plan and a decibel plan be prepared by applicants when they renew their permit. That's a reasonable request. And so I'll turn it over to the rest of the council to the commission of kind of thing that on the issues of concurrent and primary. I mean those are my opinions on things. So I'll just let you all have yours.

Okay. Any nothing to say my left. Yeah. Thank you chair. Um thank you Sean for this table. And how do you get the u potential cap of 35 and 639? Actually, I don't have a copy of that from the commission. So, okay. You're asking me a question? Yes. Yeah. So, what was the question exactly? Numbers. Yeah. How do I get to the numbers? Yeah. 35 639.

Yeah. So, so if so, say for it was just an idea. Right now we're at 35 permits. All right. So, if you if you put a maximum of 35, if you put a cap of 35 permits, it was just what would happen is you would be have 639 permits or 639 people per available permit based on the city's population. You just took the city population and divided by. Okay. Yeah. So it was just and the other ones were much lower in this point.

That's what I Yeah. So it's still even if you were to if you were to put a a cap of 35, you'd still be much more strict than other cities. Um and this is specifically as it relates to nonowner occupied. Okay. Thank you. The the is a very good idea to set a caps. I agree with you and maybe Marissa u I know it's hard for us to set a cap right now. It's a beginning. Mhm. So maybe you could take into considerations when the times come, you could set a cap and uh again that that's good. And u and the last time we talked about it

with 100 um the cap at 100 I think we could generate about $700,000 I think. Yeah. Yeah. I I I would remind the commission that this was part of the almost three-hour discussion and the commission did not the last time we met about this. The commission did not support a cap. So I I we can certainly talk about it again, but I just wanted to just you know reiterate that we did talk about this extensively at the last meeting. All right. So I apologize just just for the interest of time just to help out you know the commission and

everybody. just to continue to respond to it though it was not a suggestion it should be 35 it was just to be ex yeah an example based on how many yeah based on the current yeah yeah thank you I think the the the question is I think marina is growing I think I believe it will be more than 35 and it will come to a time I I remember last time I say generate enough revenue I think it's good to have additional staff to make sure they're able to enforce it and make sure that everybody know everybody complying with the rules. Yeah. Thank you.

Guido, in [clears throat] particular, my recollection of some of our previous meetings, we we settled on not recommending any cat, but we didn't even consider whether they would be nonowner a any permits for non-owner. We said we would only have permits for residential owners and we said they had to prove that their ownership of that property. Right. That that's correct, chair.

Right. We didn't say we said and there could be no cap. So if if we had a thousand applications and they were all past the muster then there would be a thousand uh permits issued but they had to be to owners right the no cap this one I don't know if Delray Oaks and Pacific Grove etc etc if these are caps for the total amount of of short-term they are.

Okay. So that is their and they just do allow non non-owner or you can be an owner. They have options. Yeah. Seaside does cap only owners. Okay. Yeah. Okay. All right. So,

so just to help out the commission just uh just you know to help overall. So if you recall in October just to help funnel the conversation uh we had a discussion about do we want to have a prohibition about STRs? If you have an ADU, should you have an STR? The commission told us they felt that was unfair to people have ADUs. We took that out. Um, we had some init initial language saying, "Hey, you can only have an STR in single family homes." The commission said, "No, that seemed a little bit too restrictive." So, we took that out. Um, there was this language about, well, you can only have an STR if you only have one quit kitchen. Commission said no, that seems very restrictive. Um, and so, and we had once again, we had a pretty lengthy meeting in December. Um and then really the final three questions for today at least from the staff and what we've compiled was what the commission asked us to do was to prepare the 55- ft exclusion. So it sounds like there's some discussion today about should that be grandfathered or give people a little bit more leeway. So that's that's a decision point tonight for the commission. Um there was a a request about why why BMR units are being excluded and the answer was that a BMR unit should really be focused on how housing people not on a money-making venture. And then the final real question for today was the uh commission asked staff to what would be the projection a year from now, two years from now and and Marissa did present that in the staff in the presentation. So, those were the three kind of things the commission asked us to do and I' I feel like we've u answered those questions and so really tonight for the commission it's

do you want to go forward with the nuisance plan a decibel plan and have further discussions about the 55 ft exclusion and potentially uh allowing or not allowing concurrent booking. So that that my understanding of where we are as of right now.

Well, and I think on the 55 foot, we already have a decision. The recommendation on 55 foot is to take forward to council to look at creating a a extended period for compliance of one year past the current expiration of their permit to be able to come into compliance. if they are not in compliance with the 55 foot.

I just want to for my own mind on the 55 foot, how did we come up with 55 foot instead of 60 or 50? uh because if you recall if you recall from our presentation in December, Marissa identified that and I don't want to miss it was Seaside uh um Pacific Grove. There were three or four other cities that so that seemed like a kind of a best management practice that other cities have adopted. We didn't we weren't thinking of excluding an across the street home. No.

Were we that if if a homeowner on one side of the street had an STR permit, we didn't really want to exclude the other owner on opposite side of the street and we thought 55 foot would not exclude him or her. Is that correct? No, I don't believe I don't believe that was the Okay. So they were perfectly happy to exclude the opposite side of the street. Yeah. And we we did discuss that because

we looked at the map. So a average street design residential street design is 12T is 12* 2 plus a 4ft rightway plus a 3 foot plus 3ft sidewalk right away which would give 24T road width plus 8 foot right of way per shoulder plus which would take it to 32 which with six foot per sidewalk which would then give a total nominal width of our residential streets of 38 So we knew we were never a a house directly across from another house, right?

Was not was not going to be in compliance. And the idea was that we wanted to this [clears throat] is how this was how the whole thing came up. And this was how it started in council in the first place was that one of the council members was driving down the street and saw somebody they thought was a contract worker providing support to STRs going to two houses next to each other. and they thought that that was not conducive to the neighborhood environment and that was how this whole thing got started. So the idea was to eliminate houses that were next to each other and create a hopscotch pattern. Right. Okay. I understand. So where are we?

So I think we've got this I think we have the 55 foot one we know. So, if the commission's okay, uh, what could be added to the motion is, and I have to have Brian correct me, is it updated June 1st or July 1st every year? The Okay. So, uh, the 55 foot exclusion, if it affects current permites, it would not take effect until July 1st of 2027. Okay. Is that okay, I got it. Okay. So, what about other commissioners? Your honor, you okay?

So, the issue with concurrent is if you have a home and you have an ADU and you want to book both of them at the same time. Is this how many units do we have like that? Marissa can speak to that. Well, he's an exception because you can't short-term rental ADUs. Um, but his was built before 2020. So he was I think he's talking single he's but he's also mentioning rooms.

This is sing this is so this is a house that has two bedrooms that they want to use as STR. Currently the way that it has been rewritten or re revised is that you can't do concurrent booking. So they can't advertise bedroom one and then advertise bedroom two. You could do both or you could do one or the other. We're not the way it's currently been rewritten is you can't separate those. you can only rent the house and the bedrooms in that house. Whereas a concurrent booking, you could say, "Oh, you could do bedroom one and you could do bedroom two as a as a separate booking on that night." That's what that's that's the way the concurrent bookings are are set up for

That's correct. How do you ensure that doesn't happen? Well, you would only have one listing on the platform like a rental link only one. I think it can't be enforced. Well, if the commission is okay, Marissa can share without giving addresses. Just the difficulty of when you don't have this. If you want to share some of your

Yeah. So, the difficulty right now is with allowing concurrent listings is is that the some permit holders will will post multiple listings, right? And then you have to decipher the photos and see, hold on, is it the whole house? Is it one bedroom? What part are they splitting up? Um, when they have an ADU, it complicates more things because now they have three or four listings, right? When they're only supposed to have one technically. Um, so it just makes it harder because we don't have that in the code right now. Technically, they can have two listings or three listings and it just m it makes it harder to enforce anything right now by only having one listing or by only allowing the owner or the permit holder to only have one listing. I should only be seeing one listing when I search for the property. Right. That was the intent of that one the last meeting.

Yeah. I think for me on the concurrent listings I'm okay with concurrent listings but the condition that again I would like would would see on it on a concurrent listing is that when they apply for their permit for an STR they have to formally and definitively define what that listing looks like and they have and that includes including a photo that says this is here's the here's our floor plan map here is bedroom number one concurrent. This would be concurrent listing number one. Here's bedroom number two. This is concurrent listing. So that when you look at that, you have a document for that property. So you can go into the document, say, I can't remember what this is. Oh, here. Let me go pull the file photo. Here is the file photo on record that shows this is bedroom. Here's our floor plan and here's our our setup. because that would aid with compl that would allow for concurrent listings but at the same time take away the ultimate ambiguity ambiguity that ends up kind of cluttering up your day. So, and and if if the commission if I can point the commission to section 14 um under plan I'm sorry D 14D number five A B and C that does have the plot plan floor plan requirement. So we can um yeah

and we can that we can fit that in.

So we're already requiring the floor plans but I understand from Marissa that the concurrent language is important because even with this language it's difficult to enforce. Is that a fair correct? So are there I guess what it comes down to. Are there some additional conditions that we can put on the application process itself and permitting process that allows us to allows us to still as a city have concurrent listings, but at the same time does not that actually solves the administrative overhead challenge and deficit that we're technical deficit that we're causing for you as the single code enforcer for the city because you so and I think that's if we can if we can find a way that will give you that that answer so that you can qu you can come into this and they can't find the loopholes

to kind of get around it then and and it could be I mean know it could be as simple as if they change their photos they've got to have a ma the master photo that they've put in their listing they have to keep updated with you so that you are always you if they go in there and they put a new photo in that they think is better because it's got a different type of linens or whatever. They've got to make sure that it's yours so that you can actually go quickly pull that record up and say, "Oh, look, this photo matches bedroom number one." I I don't know what what would help. I just would I would like to be able to support our STR owners. And I think the concurrent listings is something we can I think this is a solvable challenge, but you're the one who who has to deal with it, not not us, on a daily basis. they add they add additional things that aren't in the permits.

So the main issue is um the main issue with the concurring listings is the properties that have ADUs and JADUs. Those are the main issues, those properties, which is not all the property STR permit holders, right? But so I understand your concern that it's going to affect them, the the STR permit holders that have one house and are just trying to rent bedrooms out, like it will affect them, right? Because technically with this ordinance, they won't be able to post it. Our goal was to try to um try to ensure compliance on those properties that are illegally renting out the Jedu, the garage conversion and the separate ADU um as a short-term rental

because that violates state standards because the state doesn't allow that. So we are caught in a she she literally as a code enforcer is caught is caught in the conundrum that if we if if a owner rents the an ADU that a JADU as an STR we are now violating the state standards as a city because we're now allowing a permitted rental as long-term rental as an STR. So we can't we've got to be able to manage that. I think again coming back to it if you have the converted garage is is a great example in a lot of because I mean I lived in a converted garage in college for two years and uh again that has if the floor plan is labeled and it's lab okay converted garage bedroom it's a JADU on the plan I mean we've got to make sure that the the floor plan that is submitted identifies every piece of that property correctly. So if there's an ADU that's separate or if there's a JADU here. Okay, that's exed off. You can't use that. That cannot count as bedroom number one or bedroom number two. Again, I think we have a way to work around it. So, so if if the commission wants under that section five, uh D5, uh we can add additional provision that says, and I'm just making this up as I go, um that the floor plan as provided to staff um shall not be modified upon renewal of the permit. And if it is, the applicant is required within you know, uh, a week to provide staff an additional revised floor plan, something to that effect with the additional AD, um, provision that and must be in compliance with current city J, ADU, and ADU guidance.

That that that's fine and only because that then puts us in compliance with the state because now the state we're telling the state, we're trying to do this, right? And sometimes they may try to pull a wall over our eyes, but we're we're trying to do this in what we've got it written our code. Should we specifically state that ADUs and Jadus cannot be part of short-term rental? It's already in our code. It's

Yeah, it's it's already it's already in our ADU ordinance. So, no, but in the STR ordinance, um I I hate to say refer to another one. It may have to go, right? Let me Well, you know, I think I think that's where it's always been. And uh this most recent round of edits suggests adding it as well to the STR ordinance if I'm not mistaken. I'm trying to find the section. I mean, it could go in prohibitions. Prohibition. It's not there right now. What section? What's

under what section? It's not section 13. Section 13. Um, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, we can we can add that to the ordinance. 13. Uh, expressly prohibit. That'd be good.

Okay. Well, then if that takes care of our second, that takes care of our our third, which then I think leaves us with the primary versus and I coming back to a primary versus ADU um issue and owners and ownership and on-site um which are two different I think are two different things. I mean, there is somebody who is owning the property and lives off site, and then there is the primary owner who wants to stay primary, but then wants to bounce back and forth between their ADU and their nonADU. And correct me if I'm wrong, Marissa, that we have we have owners of property of STRs and that have a a permitted ADU and what they what they would like to do if if the regulations were written correct were written that way is they would like to be able to not use the ADU as an STR, But they would like to be able to during certain times of the year live instead of living in the primary house themselves vacate the house completely and live in live in their ADU.

We actually have people that actually just live in the ADU and [clears throat] just Right. but they can't but they can't if they live in their ADU. This and this goes back to I think the ADU regulations. They can live in their ADU permanently and rent out their house. that is allowed by ADU regulations. They cannot live in their ADU right now and then you they can only use their house as a long-term rental. They're [clears throat] not allowed to use it as a short-term rental. No, they can they can. So that's the the case right now is I have several properties that Okay. that are doing that. They they Yeah. So they can go back and forth between the two.

Well, yeah. No, but they can't they cannot one day a year they can't rent the any days of the year rent the ADU right as a short-term rental it's not a rental property understand that they can make that their primary resident live in the ADU and rent their big house I have several properties day or 20 day or day by day the the con the issues I have right now with the properties that have ADUs is what we discussed in the previous meeting is is that they were trying to rent out short-term rental, the ADU, the JADU, and the main house. That's against the state law. Yeah. Which which is why the concurrent booking language was added to the draft ordinance.

Which is why the recommendation, which we've crafted about if you're going to modify the floor plan, you must submit the revised floor plan with the staff. So, right now, I'm only aware of one property that does use the ADU to live in it, right, part time of the year and and rents out the main house as a long as a short-term rental, which they can do.

All the other properties are just short-term rentals. trying to keep this I because I know the answer is I'm trying to make sure that again I want to cover all the I want to cover all all of our businesses and make sure that we've kind of covered that and given them the opportunities um without actually highlighting I'm just going to ask if that fixes the concurrent ADU requirements which I I think we've been able we may be able to address does that also fix the the second part of your issue just to make sure I understand if the if you allow for concurrent

right this the the issue that we have is if you don't allow concurrent then we basically have to if we were go we can't we can't rent our h our ADU that we have the legal right to do based on the state standards because when it was built we wouldn't be able to rent that at all any longer uh as a short-term rental. We only be able to keep the the the main house as a short-term rental concurrent because during during the summertime when when it's busy, we're able to rent out both of them able to go visit family because they're because my because my family [clears throat] works in education, so we have that time that's kind of like

their ADU is pre 2000 is preadedu regulations. So they're grandfathered in. So they can actually use so they are the exception then the rule because they yeah that's fine and that's why you know we can always work with you know if there's exceptions to the exceptions we can address that with individual my my I would like what I would like to do is address I think we've addressed the concurrent and then what I would then what I would my other recommendation to the commission to provide the staff direction

is that in the cases where we have permitted STRs that are that were part of the pre-adu process or uh state approval. I don't know how to phrase it. They're [clears throat] called conforming and non-conforming, right? that basically that that we that we direct staff or the recommendation to the council is that they work with that that they approve working with staff to address the what would become non-conforming to provide a a waiver or something or another to to keep them and allow them to continue to do business.

Okay. I I I just I I'm loathed to put in an ordinance an exception to an exception to an exception as opposed to just letting staff do their job and working with one specific customer and I'm fine with that to address a very very unique situation as opposed to crafting language that other customers or other people could potentially yes use for nefarious purposes. So and I'm fine with that

as long as we can whatever we can come up with a solution. I I think the concurrent side fixes this the high level issue, but then we still have a a outlier within our process. And I would just like the staff to work with to figure out how to fix fix this so that we are not so that we we if we can do this solve that this oneoff kind of exceptional case and I understand it's a it's an outlier. I just don't want to make the out oh they're an outlier so therefore they they lose. I would rather make it they're an outlier, but we still find a way to make it a win.

Okay. If if we we will work with the applicant and we will identify some if the direction from the commission is we will we will come up with some policy language before the council meeting to identify this very unique situ without creating a whole other problem for staff. So it is a very unique situation. Mr. Yeah. Is the reason your ADU is exempt is because it was built prior to year something.

Yes. Because because it was uh it was permitted prior to 2020. So state law that went in place in 2020 then all all ones permitted from 2020 on the city is not allowed to allow those STRs to be rental to be. So why can't we Simply put that it's not an exception. It would be Yeah, we'll figure it out. We'll figure it out.

Where we where you [laughter] you put, you know, you Yeah. figure out how do we what our intent is to be in compliance with the state regulations for ADUs and JADUs. And if the state specifically says those built after 2020 or whatever the number is or exempt from that then we shouldn't be more prescriptive than that. Sounds good.

Okay. All right. Are we done? So we're time for motion time. [clears throat]

So without having to write out the full language uh I think where the commission has landed is we have our base motion we have work with you know staff will continue to identify best management practices software uh we will work with our finance department to make sure our hosting agreements are up to date per SB 346 uh we will fix the some of the typographical errors ers that we identified in the last couple days. Um the commission landed on if a current permit T is within the 55 exclusion the recommendation to council is it will not take effect till July 1st 2027. um that moving forward we will be asking for a new incentive decibel noise plan and that uh we will add language to section D5 that says uh floor plan modifications shall be resubmitted to the city within 72 hours of modifications. Um and I don't know if we want to to ensure concurrent bookings do not occur. um ex and very rightly put directly explicitly in the ordinance explicitly prohibiting STRs and ADUs and JDUs and uh directing staff

built or Yeah. and directing staff to work with a very unique situation regarding pre2020 ADU language into the code. Right. that I would change the numbering though because you're making the motion number one. Wouldn't it be easier to make the motion and then say include one through seven? Sure, sounds good. Is it that I thought we were going to I thought we were looking at allowing concurrent bookings.

Yeah. because of the because of the additional because of the additional requirements that we're going to put on the STR permittee or applicants that that would then the staff would be able to set what those requirements are and then that would allow us to be able to do concurrent bookings. Okay, that's good. I'm fine with that. just to help clarify something that was mistyped I think with the charity. Yes. Yeah. Because I suggested a decel meter and it was written down as a decel plan. Uh decel meter. A decel decel or decibel meter. A decibel monitor. Nuisance plan.

A nuisance plan and a decibel monitor. Sounds good. Decel monitor. That's what I said. then get rid of the plan. There you go. Not read that email with glasses. Thank you. Okay. May I make a motion?

Yes. [clears throat] I move to adopt PC resolution 20226- recommending that the city council adopt the proposed amendments to title 17 article 4 by amending section 17.42.170 short-term rentals. The proposed ordinance is exempt from environmental review pursuant to section and section section 15061 B3 of SQA guidelines and including the [clears throat] uh additions of numbers 1 through eight

seven seven one through seven. Go ahead. I I I don't think that additions through one through seven make Are you going to re number it, Guido? Yeah. Okay, got it. Thanks. There's a button that just says make a list. [laughter] Just saying we could all be out of here by now. Sounds good. All right, Commissioner Jacobson. Yes. Commissioner Chang. Yes. Chair St. John. Yes. Vice Chair Woodson. Yes. Commissioner Rana.

Yes. Commissioner Baron. Yes. Motion passes.

Third time's a charm. Good job.

I think I think the general plan's going to be easier. [laughter] They have to adjourn. They have to call for the agendational items. None. None. correspondence. Um, I got a letter I got an email from the state saying we should be getting our pro housing designation in the next month, but that that's Yeah. So, I and I have announcement.

Um, just so everybody knows, we don't I think we know this notice. I had a conversation with one of the city planners in Seaside last week and really I had a question a completely separate question about the campus town and then the and light fighter exit yeah area and first avenue and what was happening with the traffic now that Dvari is two-way again and open

and he let me in on a known unknown secret um which is that potentially at the city council meeting for seaside next week on the 19th and it's not been the agenda. It wasn't posted as of five hours ago. Um they are looking at discussing the development plans for the open space that's directly south of DVD. So the the big open space that's bounded by Second Avenue, Light Fighter, Highway One, and DVardi or a mixed some type of mixed residential commercial usage

and they have not informed anybody or in the public of what the plans are. And when I talked to them about it, he like I he's like, I don't we don't even know what's going on and what the council is going to do. Now whether he could tell me that or not is a different story, but the reality is that right now Seaside is getting ready to propose some type of large mixeduse development in that open space. And so I'm going to I mentioned that to us as a commission because I think that that is that is going to directly impact us um from a transportation planning grid because that was not anywhere in any of our kind of long-term planning that's come up over the last five years

on that that area being developed by Seaside. Yeah. So, I'm gonna attend the meeting. Um, Second Street quite busy. It has a lot of it could have a lot of effects for Second Avenue from Dvari all the way down to the dunes and and Eth Street. Um, so I I have some comments I'm going to make to this council and I'm just I'm going to pass it out to you all so you can look at it and keep track and see what the agenda is because it's not our city, but it is it definitely has the ability to impact our area, especially the Second Avenue corridor because we have not cited as a city

on whether we are going to open that back up as just oneway traffic like it was before or whether we're going to make it two-way. Uh um and I think also my suggestion, my comment that I'm going to make to Seaside is that they should make the intersection at First Avenue and and like they need that one because that was the main entrance to Fort Orard, right? They already have the space. So even with that new retention basin that they're putting into campus town right there on the corner, they still have the space to put a full roundabout into that area. and the roundabout is about the only way that they could deal with traffic coming off and onto the highway and still make First Avenue two-way street.

Um anyway, I just wanted to pass that out as that's that was something that could really affect us as a as the planning commission coming up. Yay.