Historical & Landmarks Commission - Regular Meeting

6PM. Chair Lung will not be in attendance tonight, and I'll be acting as chair. Now call to order the Historical and Landmarks Commission meeting of 10/02/2025, and the time is 06:02PM. Not with a roll call. Chair Alang has notified staff she is unable to attend. Commissioner Vargas Smith? Commissioner Romano?

Here.

Commissioner Celso?

Here.

Commissioner NCRT?

Here.

Commissioner Varshney?

Yeah.

I'd like to attract a motion to excuse absent members.

I motion to excuse chair Lung from the meeting today.

All in favor, call aye.

Aye. Aye.

Or aye second and an aye.

Aye. Alright.

Continuous continuances and exceptions. This part of the meeting allows for applicants, members of the public, or other interested parties to request an item to be a continued without hearing or withdrawn or taken out of order. Are there any request applications to public or the commission for a continuance or exception for any of the items on tonight's agenda? None in the room. Any online?

Historical landmark commissioner seven members, whenever their full commission is not present, applicants have the option to continue their item to another meeting. K. Let's move on to the consent calendar. The procedure for the consent calendar is as follows. Consent calendar items may be enacted, approved, or adopted by one motion unless requested to be removed by anyone for discussion or explanation.

If any member of the Historic Landmark Commission staff, the applicant, or a member of the public wishes to comment on a consent calendar item or would like an item to be heard on the regular agenda, make this request now. Items listed on the consent calendar with associated file numbers constitute public hearing items. The following items are on today's consent calendar. Number one, HLC commission meetings, minutes of 09/04/2025. Number two, historic landmark commission twenty twenty six calendar meetings.

Promotion here on the consent.

Have a question. Because I was going to review the meeting minutes from the last meeting, you know, quickly after the photograph that we took at 05:30 before the meeting. But since the Internet's not working, I wasn't able to ask access the packet to see the meeting minutes. Would it be possible to put the meeting minutes up from the last month's meeting so that we could just scroll through them briefly,

please?

K. I think the only other item besides the one that we're looking at now is the voting election. Eliminate. Thank you.

Concerns?

No. But there is another meeting minutes, I I believe, that gets you know, has been continued a couple of times, and I wasn't at that meeting, I think. But I don't know what's going on with that one. Are we gonna do do we have the necessary people here to be able to vote on that?

Me It's not on the agenda tonight. It was approved at the last meeting.

Oh, it was. Excellent. Exactly what I thought. Great. Thank you.

Any other comments from the panel or entertain a motion on the consent calendar?

I make a motion to approve the consent calendar.

I second.

K. All in favor, call aye.

Aye. Yeah. Abstain since I wasn't here.

Abstain.

Thank you. Moving on to public presentations. The chair will are there any members of the public that would like to briefly address the commission on any items not on the agenda? Notes are the commission has very limited ability to discuss items not on the agenda. Items may be referred to another agenda for discussion if agreed upon by the LTSC.

I don't see anybody in the room. Any hands up online?

None online.

Are you looking for a motion to close public presentations. Do I have a motion to close public presentations and move on to public hearings?

I move to close public presentations.

I second.

Thank you. K. Moving on to public hearing items. Oh, sorry. We need

to take a look. Thank you. Aye.

Hi. Hi.

Okay. Public hearing items. The consider item number 25Dash985, public hearing consideration of a historical presentation preservation agreement, contract 41458 Lexington Street. Staff, please proceed with your presentation.

Thank you, vice chair. So this item will be presented by Summer Foss. She's our newer assistant planner. I don't think she's been before HLC before, so she'll provide the presentation. The applicants are present after the presentation if you have questions for them.

Hi. I'm Summer Foss, assistant planner. I will be presenting the presentation for 1458 Lexington Street. This is the request for the consideration of a historic preservation agreement Mills Act contract for 1458 Lexington Street. The lot size is 7,500 square feet.

It is zoned r one six l single family residential, which is consistent with the general plan designation. The surrounding uses are all single family. The architectural style is a pioneer style, which is characterized by its l shape, gabled roofs, v side group v groove siding, and little to no ornamentation. Here is a map of all the HRI properties within 200 feet. The subject property is marked here with the star.

It is an HRI property currently. Here is a photo of 1458 Lexington Street from the street view. Their ten year plan, they are proposing year one for plumbing, year two drainage, year three, seismic seismic anchoring, years four through six, painting, year seven, electrical improvements, years eight through nine, window replacement and restoration, and years 10, replace front door, repair interior doors, and interior trim. The Mills Act contract is exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act pursuant to section fifteen three three one of the CEQA guidelines class 31 historic resource restoration and rehabilitation. Staff has received public comment from HLC adviser and city historian Lori Garcia, noting that the term pioneer style used in the DPR is considered outdated and that the home's design is more accurately described as reflecting the national architectural style.

Staff ref received a revised DPR form this afternoon. So staff recommends that the Historic Landmarks Commission determine the project to be exempt from CEQA pursuant to CEQA section fifteen three three one of the CEQA guidelines class 31 historic resource restoration and rehabilitation and find that the Mills Act application and associated ten year plan for restoration and maintenance accomplished the intent of preserving and maintaining the historic significance of the property. And, therefore, this recommend the city council are approve of the contract in adoption of ten year restoration plan.

And just to add on to what Summer mentioned about the revised DPR. So the reviewer did agree with Laurie's comment letter in that he updated the architectural style to be national, and he also fixed those two other kinda empty spots that were in the DPR. So he concurred with her valuation.

Alright. Thank you, staff, for your presentation. We'll start off with any questions for staff from the commission. So I have one. Laurie's mail had a lot of information in it. Would it be acceptable or proper to to make that an appendix so that I traveled with the DPR and the future records for this home?

We can definitely put it as part of the project file. I don't know if we can make it an appendix because it's kind of unofficially prepared.

I see. Okay.

I have a question. Does the home already have a plaque? No? Okay. And would you like a plaque for the house? Okay. K.

I believe we're done with questions for staff. Move on to the applicant presentation.

Commissioners, I could see familiar faces, some new ones I haven't seen before. Rob Mayer, architect. I reside in the old Quad, and I'm helping my neighbors here with this process. And they're former tenants of mine, so I'm excited that they decided to stay in the old Quad and fix up a house that's been needing some love for a while. It's exciting to see on that map where it showed how many Nelsak properties were in the vicinity.

The more we fill it in, the less likely that people can put vinyl windows in and do things that I've been seeing in houses that aren't on an HRI aren't HRIs. So super excited about that. In reference to what Laurie said, the honorary historian city historian had said, you know, I talked to the the the historian, Bill Quetzura, and he he was hesitant to go against what the house was already put on the HRI as a pioneer style, and so he was hesitant to mess with that, feeling, well, would it jeopardize any kind of status it had within the city? So he was wholeheartedly, if you read his email eventually, in agreement. He refers to the same book that Laurie does as well as the sort of the unofficial bible.

But what's interesting is there's 27 houses on our HRI that are listed as pioneer style. One, interesting, South Caruso's property over on El Camino, which is was in the time that I've been here, so it's kind of interesting why that one maybe sort of slipped through with the pioneer style. Sunnyvale, in fact, has listed the first style as pioneer style as their architecture. So it's a really interesting thing, it may be a matter of sometimes people push push new things, and it's not accepted with others. But I think, generally, the pioneer style meant to be a sort of a simple structure, much like the pioneer cabins that when people went west, they're very just simple, not a lot of detail.

So, nonetheless, that's enough of my discussion on that. Certainly can ask any answer any questions you have, but the homeowners are here as well. So may come on a state, say a little thing.

Welcome.

Thank you. Hi. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Rachel Law. I'm one of the homeowners.

And I'm Cameron Carty.

We're so excited to be here, and we're so excited to be able to stay in the Old Quad. As Rob has said, we had rented here for maybe four years before we we were able to purchase a home. We had a really hard time leaving the neighborhood. We we tried finding homes outside of even just a five block radius of where we are renting and just not find anything we love. Ended up placing most of our offers in the old plot and love what we ended up with.

There's a lot of deferred maintenance that we are excited to put work into. Whenever this picture was taken, the sticky notes in the window indicate all the work we were planning to do for that one bedroom, which we actually just finished this weekend. There's so much character to this house, and we're very excited to specifically keep all the,

you know,

windows and all the the just the characteristics that would, you know, make it fit in with the.

I think Rachel covered it pretty well. The one thing I'll point out is that that window on the upper right that has piece support across the bottom annoys me to no end, and I'm very much looking forward to putting double.

Questions for the applicant from the panel?

Will you request a plaque?

If we're eligible for it, which I know we're on the HR, which so we are eligible. We just moved in in February, and lots of lots has happened since then. But, like, it's black.

We we definitely encourage that, and I can't blame you. It's once you're living in Santa Clara, you don't want to leave. And and congrats too.

Thank you. We feel so lucky.

Yeah. I think it's a beautiful home, and I really think it's a very thoughtful ten year plan. You know, a lot of this stuff is really dedicated to restoring it, you know, to its original, you know, configuration or yeah. A lot of times we see ten year plans which have more kind of, you know, basic stuff like restoring the foundation, things like that. But it seems like you put a lot of detail into the you know, like, for example, the windows and making sure even I think you have, like, aluminum window or vinyl window that you're planning to replace with wood window with a wood window.

And, you know, if you can't find any salvaged ones, you're planning to have it, like, custom milled. You know? And I just think you guys put a lot of attention to detail into the plan. It's very thorough, and it's just really good to see because you can tell in the plan that you're really, you know, like, passionate about keeping the home, you know, well maintained and kinda restoring some of the original parts back to it that may have been lost or deteriorated over time. So thank you very much for bringing this Mills Act contract, you know, application before us.

And most people usually request the plaque at the time of requesting the Mills Act, so we're happy to do that for you. Thank you.

I'll just add thank you for bringing the house and to put it on the mules act. That's wonderful to see another house that's gonna be maintained and cared for. Appreciate that. Welcome to the neighborhood as homeowners. I also appreciate the fact that even on the front door replacement that you're trying to avoid creating false history too, so you're taking into consideration not only restoration, but appropriate restoration. So thank you very much.

Echo all the other comments. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you for bringing this project. It looks really neatly organized. The documents were very interesting and well prepared and thorough and a good ten year plan, we think. So thanks again. And and with that, I make accept any motion to close the start up a public applicant presentation.

We don't need a motion for that, but we do need to when once we do public hearing, then we'll need to close that.

Thank you. Thank you.

We have a question for

Ron. I

I think you brought up a good point that, you know, we've been calling it a pioneer forever, and then suddenly, we're gonna switch over the new gear and say, now on, it's natural. How do you I mean, do you go retrograde? Do you go back to the previous Pioneer Homes, and now we gotta call them something else now? I mean, we're setting a precedent, so I was just concerned about.

Laurie and and the historian were in agreement. In his email, he said, I'm thankful that I I can can call it national style. But, again, he didn't wanna go against a minority. He didn't know what history had happened and when it was placed on the HRI, so he didn't have that knowledge. But again, this could be a thing of you have a generation of historians that I mean, there's the book, and that's they're both using it as their sort of unofficial bible, but it doesn't mean that I mean, I always believe history isn't people's view of history changes over time.

And I think if someone feels like there's a more interesting or another way to frame or phrase a a of architecture, especially when they're a little more simplified, then I kinda like the pioneer stuff. For me, it kind of rings national seems a little and I don't know these styles nowhere near as well as the historians do, but national seems a little more official and formal to me just saying national style, whereas pioneer, it it invokes a different kind of feel. Mhmm. Kind of people coming west, and, again, they were simple. This isn't more of a simple, although it's a story and a half

or. Anyway,

thanks for bringing that up.

Talk. Staff, are there any public speakers on this item?

I've seen none online.

Anyone wishing to speak on this item can line up at the podium? Is there a motion to close the public hearing?

I move to close public comments. I second it.

Thank you. Hello?

Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Thank you. Okay. Let's move on to deliberations, and I'll also entertain motions.

So it was interesting that they mentioned the, you know, the national registry definition in Santa Clara's. So should we update our definition, or how can that how can we do that? I mean or how can we go about the procedure and maybe updating it, something that aligns with Santa Clara versus National Registry? Because, you know, every region has its own uniqueness. So what do you guys think of that?

Any thoughts?

Is this property on the national registry?

I think

you mean the term national architecture. Is that what you're referring to? Right. Okay.

I think it was mentioned earlier, you know, history changes as things move along. Going back and revising is time consuming, but, ultimately, it could be worthwhile. I think at the same time, you discover other properties, whether it be in the neighboring city or or other areas which may have a more common style, and then you can decide that, you know, whether a national is the correct way to categorize a home. Those homeowners might, you know, be interested to know as well.

So the list okay. So there's the HRI versus the DPR. So are the 27 properties listed in the HRI as PIONEER? And if we change it on the HRI, then do we have to request DPRs on all those properties to change it there as well? Right? This kinda goes down a rabbit hole.

My recommendation would be to modify the HRI as projects come through and as we get these updated DPRs to leave what we have as is. So, for example, since this we have this updated DPR that identifies this as national

Mhmm.

Say this is national moving forward on the HRI, we can do that, you know, over the years as the other properties maybe come through.

Yeah. I think that would be easier, and I don't think that we can ask owners to go and change everything and incur the cost of the BPR. But it makes sense as they come up that we could refine and firm up that that definition.

There was a book mentioned to a bible. Maybe a copy of that bible might be something that I should invest in so that we can, you know, know when DPR comes forward if if, you know, we should be asking for a a correction.

Mhmm.

Just personally, I think that would be somewhat of a tall order. I have a copy of that book. It is big. And even as the architect, mister Mayer, said, you know, the people that really are most familiar with those different styles are the historians. So I think, you know, that's part of the reason why we have the advisers on the you know, to advise the commission so that we don't necessarily all have to be the experts on that kind of stuff.

Gets into very minute details. But, yeah, I agree with you. Like, having a copy would definitely be helpful for all of us. Just my 2¢. I

would agree that I understand that you wanna use the latest term or as we learn more and that sort of thing. I consider this inconsequential, personally. I would almost say we're setting precedent that do we have to update every product that comes in front of us. Now we have to look and see, is there a better, you know, term for each one? I don't think it's necessary to make,

you know,

standardized changes across the board.

Yeah. I I were you gonna say something? I was just gonna say I agree with miss Bustos that I think, you know, as they come before the board, we can address them. Like, we already know that there are these, I suppose, 27 properties that are identified as pioneer. And I don't know if we can just necessarily make the leap and say that they're all gonna be national, you know, architectural style. Maybe they will. Maybe there are subtleties to them that they might fit under some other category. Even within the national style, Laurie had said that it fits within a particular subtype of that style based on its gable and l shape. It had some term. You know?

So I don't even know if we really can make just a blanket statement that if we see something that comes in as pioneer that then we automatically label it as national. That might need you know, that might be something that the historians might wanna look at to make those nuanced judgments.

So fair. K. Maybe we guide it a little bit back to this particular project. Any discussion points around this one or emotions? Very much enjoyed reading about the the porch and and for the the door and the and the windows, I I thought that that would you know, this house is obviously in already in very good condition.

You can see here roofs, repaired fences, and so on to the garden. So I I like that those points were part of the ten year plan. I think that that, you know, really helped the home without being too invasive and being sympathetic with it. I enjoyed that part.

As far as the as far as the project goes, I don't see any changes necessary to the ten year plan that's been proposed. I'm fine with it.

I'll make a motion that we find that the contract is exempt from CECA, CEQUA, and that we approve it as is with the addition of a plaque for the homeowners. And what year would be on the plaque? It was a I

think the DPR had a range. It didn't have a specific year.

I don't have the updated DPR, but I don't think he changed this. The original said 1899.

1925 it is. No. I'm just kidding.

Sure.

I think that's fine. Right? They can reach out to the the city manager's department.

No. It's just me.

Oh, okay. Alright. Thank you.

I second, by the way.

Thank you. Okay. Let's take a vote. All in favor, call aye. Aye.

Aye. Aye.

Unanimous. Motion passes. Congratulations, you guys.

Congratulations.

Alright. Let's move along. Let's move on to the staff report.

I yeah. I do not have any updates this evening.

Training and travel requests. Anything to discuss on those?

No. That's for the group to bring forward for budgetary reasons.

I'm just looking around. Does anybody have anything they need to raise or training? Commission work plan. Take one.

No. We still don't have you said work plan. Right? Work plan. Yeah. We still don't have a date from the clerk's office for the work plans to be reviewed by council, but I'm in communication with Patricia on that to make sure she's available because I know she said she wanted to attend.

Is there anything that you need to

Well, we did prepare the work plan, but, like, months ago. So yeah.

K. Been away for

No. We're we're good. Just waiting for the meeting date.

Date. K. Let's move on to commissioner reports, subcommittee reports. The Santa Clara Arts Historic Consortium.

I'm allowed to report on that. They did do the repair of the house.

What did they repair?

There was a large hole on the back.

Do need it?

The rat or the house? That's it.

Historic Preservation Society of Santa Clara.

Meeting was canceled last

Alright. Old quad. No chair along today. What? Yeah. No. No. So a development review hearing? The BART high speed rail and VTA.

They canceled the last meeting, so the next one's October.

Okay. Next up is the El Camino Real specific plan. We don't have chair along tonight.

I can say there's no updates on that.

Downtown precise plan?

We're regrouping to do meeting with the consultant to do the next study. So

What do you hope to get out of it? You know, it's

a Community benefit.

Well, I mean, with the architect. So what do you have?

The consultant? Yeah. It's hard to put metrics on what community contact a developer and says four stories, but this category. Oh, he's enough. I have ideas.

I have to see that one move along. I know it's a populous object. Stanticleer Station Area Task Force, I don't me and I don't have an update on this one.

So the October meeting will be canceled. We did meet a few weeks ago in September, and we reviewed some refinements to the preferred land use plan. And now the consultant, we are moving forward with planning commission and city council study sessions. So the planning commission study session will be October 8, council on November 18. And then based on the direction we would get at those study sessions, the consultant will start working on the drafting the actual document.

K. Board mission reports. Anything we wanna schedule or discuss handling to the

I don't think we have any active subcommittees right now.

Okay. So with that, we can talk about adjournment. Is there a motion to adjourn the meeting on Thursday, November 6, historical landmarks

meeting? I have a question as a new member. Well, one thing is that the way we have written the board committee lead and alternate, how are they appointed? Or second question would be it's a kind of his I'm not sure if the meeting days can be changed in 2026, or is it fixed for Thursday, 6PM?

So each of those board committees, you just volunteer for one that you would like to be involved in. So for example, our there's a couple up there where where you only have one person. We have the chair. Right? Or if there's something that you're interested in Okay. More than welcome to participate.

Yeah. But before selecting anything, I would like to know the what is the agenda there? What are

the goals? Oh, what each one is?

Yeah.

Oh, okay. Well, maybe we go through them?

Yeah. Yeah.

So, like, Anna, you wanna talk about the ones you do?

Yeah. Santa Clara Arts is even in Manhattan. That's the same nonprofit that property that's nonprofit. The 501 C. And we do have twice yearly.

Been around for what? It's the one what street is that?

Oh, it's on Warburton. You know where the Triton Museum is? There's a few historic homes that were moved there. Eden And Edmond is one of them. The other one two prop

Yeah. That's the truth. Sorry. I have

seen two mirror, two actually

two exhibitions there. So that's really a good point because I'm technically the alternate for it, but I have no idea when they meet or anything. Is there is there I just realized, oh, I'm the alternate, and I've never been to any of their meetings. Is there a place to look up?

No. They're not very techy. They do one Oh. Step two.

Do let me know if they

do such as I know?

Or if you need to back if you need me to back up, let me know. Just real. I've never done it.

Yeah. It looks like we can put agenda item for, you know, explaining one slide for every committee and if somebody want to volunteer.

Oh, so you know what's coming up. Yeah. For yes. Everyone.

Really a committee. It's more like a liaison.

Li liaison. Yep.

It's like three. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, all that boards and committees which are which are listed here, some one slide about everything, perhaps we can put it in an agenda item in one of the meeting.

Oh, as an agenda item to go through each one?

Yep. Maybe we could agendize it, you know, as, like, just discussion or something. And then that way, like, commissioner Varshney is suggesting there could be just, like, one side brief summary, something like that. Is that what you're thinking?

The process for adding something to the agenda would be to email the chair, and then the chair would liaise with staff to add it. So why don't we do that, Ask her if she's willing to expand on these topics and add it to the agenda. Okay. Send her an email, or you can send it, I believe, to staff.

Email to them. Okay. Yep. Yes. Thank you. I'll send email to you. Yes. That part was just to is it there a possibility to change that day from Thursday to some other day?

For this?

Yeah. In future. Not nothing urgent. But

You mean to move the whole meeting to a different day?

Yeah. Yeah. Maybe in.

I don't think we can. Okay.

What about different time of day? 7AM? Just kidding. Alright.

With that, I make a request a motion for adjournment.

Motion to adjourn.

Second. I second.

And a little vote.

Aye. Aye. Thank

Thank you, everybody. The meeting motion carries, and the meeting is adjourned.