Downtown Committee - Regular Meeting

Okay.

I'm ready

when you are. Alright. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. I'm calling meeting to maybe to call someone who's safe. Can we have the roll call?

Yes. Committee member Ryder, absent. Katz?

Here.

Lynn? Here. Malera? Absent. Shake?

Yep.

Vice chair, Baird? Here. And chair Kasperzak will be absent today. Alright.

Our next point of order is to approve the minutes, that everyone had a chance to review them. And are there any comments or corrections? Do we see any comments from the public?

No. No one's online and nothing in person.

Alright. I'll

make a motion to approve the minutes. Second.

K. So can I just please show of hands to approve the minutes? Aye. Aye. K.

The minutes have been approved. Public order is upcoming agenda topics. This portion of the agenda is reserved for identifying agenda items for future meeting. Items currently on future agenda items list are making store fronts, parking lot, parking plan update, art murals in downtown, research plan update, state performances in downtown, street signs, PG and E, retail coach support, next steps, bike parking, historical markers, busking ordinance, and downtown parking strategy. We're going to add anything else to our upcoming list?

She does interest in the community about talking about the public bathrooms. Mhmm. Are there any upcoming agenda items for the city council that we should make sure that we pay attention to?

Or

Yeah. We're we're coming on May 26, the second meeting in May with an update on the economic vitality strategy. And so there is a whole goal related to downtown. I'll bring the that update to the next committee meeting as well, but it's on consent. But if there is any discussion, it might be of interest.

The other thing that's in interest, but it's kind of like we're keeping an eye on it, but it's already passed since the entertainment zone.

Yeah. Yeah. That that's also a

discussion. That's been that was approved at the April 28 meeting. Yep. Yep. So we're just waiting for that to go into effect. Yeah. And I have some updates on that as well to share.

So if we don't have any other input, we'll go to oral communications from the public. This portion of the meeting is reserved. Persons wishing to address the committee on any matter not on the agenda. Speakers are limited to three minutes. State law prohibits the committee from acting on non agenda items. Are there any speakers? No speakers online and seeing none in the in person. Then we will move on to the next point of business, which is unfinished business. 6.1 downtown to development update. It looks like we have a staff person ready and should be.

Good morning, everyone. Good morning. It's the account associate planner just to give you guys a development update. Not too many updates this month or quarter that we are doing it now. One thing that I wanna point you guys to is item number five, which is for 881 Castro Street. So that's a new residential and mixed use development We're on 81 Castro. So towards this end of the vlog. It's towards El Camino side, the Castro Street. So that was recently approved by city council by four two. So that was approved last week.

What what building is that replacing?

It's at the corner of Astro and El Camino, so near near where that park is. Well, like the corner park.

That includes the furniture store. Yeah. That at that whole block. I think it's where there's a flower shop.

Oh, they're tearing that whole thing down.

None of the

furniture's still locked. Yeah.

Go someplace.

The park is still gonna remain. It's just the other build buildings in that general area.

That is a

lot of sense.

Yeah. I

know that whole intersection will be you know, there's a lot going on. Yeah. So can you explain exactly what was approved,

that their entitlements were approved?

Yeah. So their entitlements were approved. And then right now, because it was just recently approved, there's no schedule, for, you know, building permits at this point, but that that would ideally be their next step is that they would be start preparing the documents for and plans for building permits, that from there, staff would review and that should everything be okay, then it would, building permits would be issued.

That's a year and a half. Yeah.

I mean, it's generally, that's a that's a, like, a pretty aggressive timeline, I would probably say, through. I mean, generally, it it would take some time for that to be completed. So

So you said the park would be there. Yeah.

Park's still remaining. It's all it's the adjacent parcels, like, that are closer along Castro Street. So, like, people have mentioned so far, like, that where that furniture store was and some of those adjacent businesses.

Salon, like

Yeah. A few of those other kind of businesses. The that entire building and block would be

Here you go. Demo. Yeah.

So we're at the corner here. Right? Yeah. We're down.

Because at one time Furniture store

and then all of the Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

So

At one time, they were talking about heart issues some some years back or something.

Yeah. Yeah.

So I just wanna make sure I'd like to pause. Yeah.

Yeah. So, basically, what we're showing here, it's like these these new buildings, they would be demoed and rebuilt.

Also, so both sides?

Yeah. Yes. It's both sides.

Both sides of whatever that street is. The street's being

Yeah. Was sold.

The street

the street

where they're opening it up.

I thought that was the other developer that was gonna, like

No. So this street is it's basically gonna be, like, closed.

Permanently. Mhmm.

As part of the development.

Yes.

But there will be a walkway through, so you can Yes. Come side to the other. The sad part is is that, you know, that's always kind

of an underused retail part of the

street, and we're now closing off even more retail.

Yeah. That gonna be ground floor There will be commercial states as well, close to 10,000 square feet. But, yeah, majority of it's gonna be mixed use residential.

Okay.

K?

Are there developments?

Yeah. And then I can direct you to item number 17, The 185 Cashless Street. That is the Down Cashless Street. They're just doing it storefront, facade improvement. So that was that had been approved back in November, but they are they had submitted field building permits. That's under review. And then next item would be item number 18, which is 748 Mercy Street, which is just the minor facade modification to an existing church. Again, that was approved back in September, but it's just currently under construction. And then

Let me go back up.

Is there any update on 16 on the end designs?

I know it's under construction. Do we have a completion date at this point? Pretty close.

They're very close.

Yeah. They've they've been they've been under construction for a little while now, but I can find out, see if there's any timeline that they've done.

They're planning an event. So

Yeah. Okay.

They should have an outbreak. They won't know. Yes. All the time.

Next item is it's not necessarily a planning permit, but it was just a area in downtown. It's for 250 Bryant Street. This is the new Mhmm. Going into that space. It's just under construction. No planning permit was necessary, but it's just kind of a f I FYI that a new business will be coming

into. Bryant?

Yeah. 250 Bryant. That's item number 21.

Right there. Well, that's good. More. Yeah.

Yeah. And couple of things about this one. One, I love that they've preserved the tree. Just the building in general. I know that's part of the history, but they this tree here in the front was they built essentially built the building around it. That was obviously a while ago. But this is the company that's going in here is Lightmatter, which is a tech company that started here in Mountain View and really intentionally chose to stay in Mountain View and and locate to downtown. So this is a really cool success story of an expanding growing company who moved to downtown. I think they're they're looking to really increase their numbers. And in meeting with them, they're just really thrilled to be part of the downtown.

They they said they they're at signs all of the time. So it's a it's a really it's really great to see an office development come and and be so involved and participatory. So Yeah. It's exciting. It's an it's exciting win for us.

So this is under construction. What kind of modifications are being made or or updates?

It's

all tenant improvements. So it's all interior, nothing exterior wise. But that's typical for any kind of Yeah.

Interesting. The 1st and the 3rd Floor. So I have to The 2nd Floor is fine. Things look good. The Cateria or something. And

then lastly, item number 20 three, which is for 747 West Dana Street. So that's the new construction that's at the corner of where that flower shop is. So that's just the provisional use permit to expand the Ground Floor office space that's inside that building. It was already previously approved, but, they wanted to expand it as part of their, their permit. So that's already currently under construction, and, that was approved by the zoning administrator back in February.

Of course. That's an expansion of building that faces El Camino?

No. It's just in, like, interior space. They're expanding it. You know, it was previously allocated to for some other use, and then they are expanding that office space at the Ground Floor.

So they're not gonna do commercial at the bottom?

I don't believe there was any commercial at the bottom.

Okay. I thought they were putting in a,

like, a

cafe kind of thing.

So okay.

That's I think there was there is, like, some sort of dessert shop. There is, like I think that you're

Towards the towards the Yeah.

There is, a commercial aspect to it, but this is a expansion of the other office.

We have the. So they bought number 20 and it's Yeah. The same address.

Yes. Exactly. So there there is, like, a restaurant, commercial, cafe type of use at the bottom, but this office space is kind of, like, in interior more expansion at the Ground Floor.

I

mean, because so a couple of places you've mentioned that they are doing the facade improvement. Do they use, the money from our program

for those? The first one, the hummus plates, I think, debt. Yeah.

Yeah. So 1185, which is item number 17185 Castro Street. That one, I believe, used the facade grant. Yeah. And I'm not sure about the other one. I think the three, four, I guess, is that's the end design.

End design did. Yeah. They're they're using a. Yeah.

Have a

quite a

few, and he's been doing some great outreach. So we have a a number of

projects in the pipeline. Yeah. Awesome as well. Yeah.

More to cut. More to do.

I'm curious. So what is MS doing? I thought they were fairly new.

Yeah. There there's so it is fairly new. You are correct. But they wanted to change kind of, like, their storefront window design. So, substantially, it's gonna be pretty similar, but the window design will change because they wanted to add it. What I recall on the plans, they wanted to have, like, to be more a little bit more activated. So this, the windows would be, like, operable where you open it up, and have it be full, like, flow between the interior and exterior.

I feel like that would be another good example of a since that story, like, we were talking about last time how examples of other downtown buildings looking that they're new, I guess, or barely new. Feel like

others can use this too, and you

don't have to be super, super, I guess,

is that been around for ten years already. And, like yeah.

Yeah. And

then I don't know if Diana had any, last updates on the downtown So I plan to end. Morning,

everybody. Hope everybody is doing well. Diana Pancholi, principal planner with the planning division. So a couple of updates. Thank you, Vincent. Regarding m design number 16, we are working very closely because m design would like to pursue some minor modification to the facade design that was approved. That that is under construction. So we are working with them to make sure that those changes can be accommodated pretty efficiently. Downtown Precise Land, there is no movement. It still remains on hold, and we will pick it up back again sometime in 2027, hopefully, in q two.

But one important update that I wanted the committee to know about is one of the upcoming council meetings on May 26. I think Amanda mentioned it earlier when we are taking the update to the economic vitality strategy. The same night, planning division is also going to present some code amendments to the city code. These code amendments are targeted to introduce a administrative approval process for residential developments, which are proposing to use AB one thirty CEQA exemptions. So a little bit of a background.

Back in July, our governor signed a lot of bills that affected how we process our permits. One of the significant ones we have talked about a lot, which is s b 79, which affects, you know, our downtown and couple of other areas around transit stations in Mountain View. The other important one was AB one thirty. What AB one thirty did was it introduced an exemption from the California Environmental Quality Act, CEQA, for some qualifying projects. There are criterias.

And if they qualify using those criterias, they don't have to do any significant CEQA review. Now again, this is a state law. And the other thing that AB one thirty did was it changed the permit streamlining timeline, the timeline that we have to review the project and approve the project. And it the timelines became more stricter in terms of shorter amount of timeline that we have available to review the project and get it to a decision as well. So the staff is going to be proposing some amendments.

Earlier this year, in January, we went to the city council for a study session where we actually discussed, you know, some of the options, and we presented an update to a b one thirty. And city council directed staff to look into a ministerial approval process. What it means is that in a ministerial review, we are still looking at compliance with the city code, but there is no public hearing. There are existing s p 35 affordable housing projects, which go through ministerial process because it is allowed by the state law. So based on that we are proposing administrative approval of these qualifying residential projects utilizing a b one thirty.

And as, you know, it was an interest from the city council to kind of incorporate incorporate a noticing mechanism to the surrounding neighbors. So we will be doing a notice. It is going to be a courtesy notice, and the residents who are being notified will have ten days to provide any input. Now it's up to the developer to consider that input, but we feel that that is an opportunity where, you know, if the city staff is missing out on looking at any aspect for compliance that can be, you know, pointed out and that can be used in order to improve the project. And yeah.

So this is gonna help us bring the projects, qualifying projects to a decision pretty soon, but it will it will include no public hearing. Very important, update, you know, because we are taking we are making changes to chapter 36 of the code, which is zoning. We're making changes to the subdivision code because there are maps which are associated with these residential projects. And then we are may we are also making a minor change to the chapter 41, which is the Parkland or in lieu fee thereof, chapter of the city code to allow, you know, if somebody includes a POPA request in their project, that can be approved administratively as well. So this is part one.

Staff will continue working on further, exploring a ministerial approval aspect of the of, you know, possible approval processes. Yeah, that's an important update. Please, you know, keep an eye for the May 26 agenda packet. A lot of details will be presented in there. We did go to EPC, which is our environmental planning commission back in March with with these proposed code amendments.

But the purview of EPC is only on the zoning code, so it is only limited to chapter 36. If you wanna look at it, you know, we can send you the agenda link, for that particular EPC item. That's it. Thank you.

Okay. Question about the processes that if, a public notice is given to neighbors and they have ten days in which to react or make a comment, what kind of comments could people make, and could there be any influence on the layout or the appearance or the materials used on the a building?

Sure. So even right now, when we take these development projects, if the developer likes to do a voluntary neighborhood meeting, we send out notices. The developer sends out the notice to the same radius around the project site. People historically, what we see is that neighbors present comments related to design. Sometimes it's about, you know, opportunity to save trees or maybe some issues related to traffic or just inquiry about what is this going to look like?

What does this detail mean on the side? They can provide all those kind of comments. Additionally, the opportunity that staff sees is that, you know, when we are reviewing this, going to our checklist, if there is any aspect which we have determined, like, oh, you know, this qualifies for this kinds of kind of an exemption based on this physical aspect of the project, it sometimes people point it out to us and say, no. It doesn't seem like. Can you look further into it?

And And then then we look further into it, and we make sure that, you know, our compliance is our compliance analysis is pretty robust. So those are the kind of stuff. The comments received on the design, we always work with the applicant to see if they are amenable to kind of look into design modifications. Of course, the budget involved, the cost involved, and the time involved in making those changes is a big decision for the developer because it's you know, if it's gonna take a lot of time and cost to make that change or the change is going to result into increasing the operating budget, then, the developer might not pursue it. But we always strongly encourage the applicant to consider the comments that we receive and the suggestions we receive.

Thank you. Any other questions from our committee? Any questions or comments from the public?

If you have a question online, please raise your hand if you'd like to speak. Not seeing any online. Great.

Thank you, Vincent. Thank you, Diana. Yes. Okay. Now we go back around. Let's see. We

6.2.

We are at 6.2 Castro Street update, which is probably Amanda's queue.

Good. Yes. Alright. Good morning. Amanda Rotella, economic vitality manager. Lots of updates to share with you. We've had a lot going on in the downtown, as you know. Kind of the most visible and one of our more exciting updates is that we have completed installation of the downtown Dustford Street Ballard project. I was looking back, and I provided an update to you all two years ago on this project. As you know, we were delayed quite a bit by state law and needing to work through the exemption for muralists as contractors.

And so this is a long time coming and a really exciting addition to our downtown. So I've provided pictures. We had five artists who prepared a pair of bollards. So you have one bollard of each of the artists. Can see and it's been really fun downtown because the artists have been painting, and people have been chatting with them. Kids come by and ask them questions. So not only do we end up with these really beautiful pieces of art, but it was this activation in the downtown that the artists have been working over the last couple of weeks. So this is a really exciting addition. We've gotten lots of great content. We're looking at ways to further tell the story of these projects and these art pieces.

So more to come, but if you haven't seen them, it's worth a stroll downtown to check out all the pieces.

And I've taken a close look, but is there a little plaque or something that

just has the artist's name or something on it?

So a number of the artists have signed the wall art that included, like, their Instagram handle so that you can or their website to get more information.

Yeah. So I conducted walking to her two weeks ago, and the artist in center upper panel was describing what she did, and she said she painted those are peaches. And I felt like saying, we didn't grow peaches. It's apricots. So I don't know who in the visual arts committee did this, but this should have been an.

So we might wanna if we're truly reflecting our history, somebody needs to vet the images, and I don't know who that would be on the visual arts committee. But I when I give a walking tour in the future and ask me, I'm gonna say that's. So that's it looks very not.

But I will say, you know, part of the challenge with this is that we selected these artists. We provided feedback, and then multiple years went by. And and typically with these, you know, artists provide a concept, but, you know, we still give them a certain level of artistic freedom. So in this case, it it it it there may have been a a misalignment with what was there what we had historically, but we'll see this as an interpretation.

And There

was a pomegranates. Did we

grow pomegranates here too? I mean, like, it's just Yeah.

I know. I yeah. I thought too. I thought, oh, come on. But it should be a plum. But, anyway Oh, it's a plum.

Well, and I will say, again, these are you know, they're not necessarily all reflection of history. Some of them are just, you know, modern day visuals that they that they really feel strongly about. So, you know, take it with a you have to view it through an artistic lens. I know it's hard as our, you know, standing historical member. But, again, it's starting conversation, which is really great, and we want people to be talking about that. Yeah.

I've seen the the adults and kids. They they commenting on this thing going around, talking about it even now.

Yay. But

I I was thinking about when I came up here. I need a Bluetooth so I can put my my radios at the door. What I did, I went around to eat water and and took and make a video.

Oh, cool.

So if all those things could you believe all those things are running right now, get a different view of it because different on the other side.

Yeah. And they

they came out really good. It's hard because we sneak in from the other side. Well

and and not only the hard to videotape them, but if you could imagine the artist needing to work on a circular canvas, the first artist in the upper left hand corner, she actually created little mini replicas of her art that she then could be replic because, you know, if you think about it, you're trying to put art on this circular shape. And so it was really interesting to see how each of the artists approached that. And some of them actually created, like, you know, lines and little, like, quadrants for them to work in. Anyway, very cool. Huge success. And and to your point, Jamil, I mean, I hope that maybe we could do, like, a little, like, listening tour where we could have, you know, information about all the art that's it's sort of a little pet hope that we can have with

I'm sorry. Go ahead.

Oh, sorry. My question was just my husband and I were debating whether or not it was okay for

our kids to climb on them. I'm just like, what's the verdict?

I will say, you know, these aren't play structures, and so we leave it at the discretion of the parents to determine the safety. Oh, safety. It's more like ruining the art. Yes. So they are coated with an anti graffiti coating, and so that should provide a level of protection. Certainly, there's you know, people are out there scratching stuff, but if you're sitting safely and monitoring your child sign. They know. And I was like,

I'm pretty sure they're coated with something. He's like, I think they're gonna scratch it. I don't think they should

be on it. And I was like I mean, we I will say, we want these to last a long time. And so if people are rough with them, they won't last as long. But if people are careful with them and enjoying them in an interactive way, that you know, it's part of the reason they're in the pedestrian space is that they are meant to be interacted with. So There's no sign. And there's no plan

to put aside that says

do not touch. Right?

It's kinda rare that we see in our public art, like, you know, in front of the library or whatever, in any of the structures there. I don't have to think have a no sign on or anything signed. So

I will say while we were installing them, though, a number of artists midway through the project came, and there were little footprints all over them. So during the process, people were not as careful, and there were some touch ups that had to happen. But now that they're completed, they're coated, there is a level of protection.

Quick one. They will be shown in the, I mean, the downtown digest next Yes. I am I was thinking about in that one, you will make a note in there asking people which one is your favorite. Oh, okay. I have two favorites. Really

fun idea, Jamil. Okay. I'm gonna I'll put a little survey out.

And see you get.

Although, we wouldn't want the artist who is the least favorite.

I know.

Most favorite one. Yeah.

We love them all, but what is the one you love the mostest?

I like the roosters.

You like the rooster.

Yeah. The

pomegranate my favorite. Be

careful. Ballards are not running for governor.

I'll start off. So in addition, as I mentioned, at last month's meeting, we did complete the train depot mural. We are in the process of putting together a ribbon cutting. We are, we're targeting June 11. I will send out more information as we have it. But, the thing that's really special about the Train Depot mural is that this really is a true public private partnership. You know? It's the VTA grant, and city put in funding, and Arts Mountain View coordinated it and brought in an artist. So there's just so many different players that were made this happen. And, again, it's adding this color and history.

As we know, this one did work with the Mountain View Historical Association, so another player in there to really help make this come to life and bring color to a really highly active part of our community. So more to come on that. If you're able to join the ribbon cutting, that would be very special. We'd certainly like to have the Mountain View Historical Association there and We're going to start the cutting. We're targeting June 11, and we're working on final details. 3PM. I think, yeah, I think it's somewhere in the afternoon.

We'll City's actually has a website.

Oh, we do. Okay. So okay. If it's 3PM then. Events count. Alright. Hold that. June 11, 3PM. That's good to know.

You need the scissors?

I'll give you both. Yeah.

Alright. Drum roll. Summer of soccer. So, we have pivoted a little bit in our naming. We are no longer FanFest, which is, a little too close to some trademarked, FIFA trademarks. So we are pivoting, and we are rebranding as summer of soccer, which I think is actually great since this is a more extended period of time. We have our our web page up that we're starting to put information on. And a couple of things I wanted to update you on. The first is we are actually working with the chamber and in particular around outreach to the businesses. So the business the chamber ambassadors will be going out to businesses.

We're doing lots of communication, and there are two well, there's actually now three opportunities for businesses. The first is to take our survey and add both business promotions and events that are taking place so that they can be added to both our interactive map and our summer soccer calendar. So we'll be promoting both of those elements. And then, additionally, we're doing some activations in city parks and in downtown. So we're gonna create a foot golf course at Cuesta Park, which is essentially, like, you know, Frisbee golf but with soccer balls, and they're gonna be little holes that we're putting in the ground.

So that'll be up the entirety of the World Cup series, and so we encourage people to go out and play some foot golf. We're also in the process of bringing a mini pitch to downtown. So we are going to set up a mini soccer pitch, hopefully, front of the chamber in that part in that empty parking lot. We're finalizing the details, but we're also looking to do business pop ups at that mini at the mini pitch. So, you know, if a business with a coffee cart wants to come downtown, if an ice cream per you know, business wants to come and serve ice cream, we wanna really bring the community together around play and fun and and find ways to get the businesses involved.

So that's the third way for businesses to participate. And then lastly, we are targeting July, which are the final days of the tournament. Or eighteenth is the bronze bronze final, and July 19 is the final final. And we have been approved by FIFA to show those games, which is huge. A lot of back and forth. So we are very excited that we're gonna be actually able to show the games downtown. We're gonna have music and big oversized games and hopefully face painters and photo moments. So it should be a really fun weekend, and we plan to activate the entertainment zone. So we'll be creating a two block entertainment zone, the one in 200 block. And so we're gonna have this big festival like environment.

You can take your drink and bring it into the street, and there's gonna be activities and games, and you can watch the watch party, and there's gonna be a lot going on. So we're super excited to be bringing this to downtown and to find a way that you can involve the businesses even further. And we'll say we're doing lots of outreach to the businesses. We're hoping to host a informational meeting in the coming weeks, and then we'll do some targeted outreach specifically around the entertainment zone as there are specific rules that participating businesses have to follow. They also need to register with ABC, their intention to participate.

So there's a lot of different layers, involved there, but we'll be doing that targeted outreach to make sure businesses understand the opportunity but also the responsibility. Any questions on that before I move on?

I'm not

going home for two two days. I'm telling you.

Just camp out. It might be a good time.

Right. A local. Yeah.

But we will have bathrooms on-site, so we're gonna be bringing in porta potties, and we will also, in our last conversation, talked quite a bit about trash and the need for additional trash receptacles. So all of that is being built into the project plan. Yeah. Just a reminder that our don't eat me pop up is still up and running on the 200 block. They they've had sort of their first couple of months, actually yeah.

Almost a the whole six months of, of being soft opened and then officially opened, but, they're, you know, continuing to be out there. I encourage you to visit them. You know, a big a big part of this one year pop up is to really test viability, so we want them to be successful. So stop by. Bring your friends.

Have you received any feedback from any of the, participants in that?

Yes. Our we've spoken to Moment and got sort of the initial update, and they said that it's one of their highest performing pop ups that they've done, which is really excellent and, that, you know, the vendors there have been really successful.

Are they gonna stop doing the cafe element? I think we talked about that a while ago.

Yeah. So they're gonna do occasional cafe pop ups, and then we're working with them on sort of the approval process for that. We're also gonna think they maybe wanna do a pop up at the mini pitch during the World Cup tournament. But it's a little tricky because they don't have cafe space inside of there, and that would require some tenant improvements that would be acceptable to do. So they're kind of popping up on occasion with, like, a coffee cart outside. But we really wanna be cognizant of the brick and mortar cafes that they would be providing competition to if they were there more long term. And so we wanna just be careful about the entire environment down there.

I think we're going to invite them to

be part of the mini pitch pop up and potentially serve coffee there. Nice.

Yeah. Jamil?

They also have a grand opening I mean, soft opening of of that new Japanese

one Mhmm.

Cross Street 475 Castro. Yaki, Niku, and they they had beautiful flower that I haven't seen it. You know? They have a lot of

What a nice sign.

Yeah. They had it what?

495. That was pretty

475 were next to the dental place or next yeah. Casa It's Casa Lupe.

The new Japanese place there?

Yeah. Where is this?

I think it's between is it between a hot pot place and Casa Lupe? It's at the center?

No. The end. At the end.

Oh, it's at the end.

Okay. Black. Where where the okay. Where the In place? Yes.

Okay. I know you're talking

about it.

I have seen it. I didn't

I didn't know it'll be. But okay.

But in the evening, I think they would still have it maybe soft opening. Just look at the the flower displays. It's about nine to all those, and I just I saw you can picture I took panoramic. It's just beautiful.

Another hot pot place.

Yeah. It's kind of.

Alright. Well, moving right up Well,

it's grilled. It's grilled meat. It's it's it's green grilled.

It's green grilled. I'm, like, three on Castro.

It's like, how many fucking tea places can you have? Really? I mean, like,

I'm gonna snap straight to market on bubble tea.

One a day. It's all

I have.

So just a reminder, music on Castro is up and running. It started last month. I provided just a little snapshot of the musicians that'll be playing this month. And Concerts on the Plaza will start next month in June. There's the June lineup for you there. As you know, this is a really fun time, downtown.

When does the stage go up?

Don't know. I can find out.

Right before June 5. Probably, yeah, I was gonna say

at least before the first one.

I think. Yeah.

Yeah. TBD on that. What's wrong with June 19,

but there's no performance?

It's Juneteenth. Oh,

it's a holiday. Forget it.

Alright. And that does conclude my updates.

Okay. Any comments from Margaret? Further comments? Any comments from the book?

I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Okay. Great. Then we will move on to What do do? Business. She's in

person now.

Okay. I

have one more.

Think that one. So

sorry. Have too many updates.

I also wanted to let everybody know next week at the council meeting, staff will be bringing forward the citywide transportation demand management order.

So please have a look

at it. This is our first step at creating citywide PDM policies and strategies. The idea is to create a live document which can get updated over the years as new strategies come out to help all the project developers and applicants to kind of choose from variety of strategies so that they can reduce their trips. The goal is to reduce the single occupancy with goals. We have seen a lot of this in North Bayshore, but I think with a lot of development happening throughout the city, it's important we kind of bring forward policies and strategies which are consistent throughout.

That has been one of the biggest complaints that we have received from applicants, So we are moving forward. Okay.

Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for delivering in person. Yeah. Okay. So now we've got a new business, 7.1 Downtown Trucking Maintenance Assessment District 115.

Yep. Downtown Parking Maintenance And Assessment District or PMAD for short. Oops. So this is the annual approval of the EMAD district. So this is for fiscal year 2627.

You can see from the image that I've included here, the dotted line outlines the parking district. You can see it's sort of a funky shape. I I don't know the history of why the shape is the way that it is, but it was created back in 1979. So it's been that way for quite some time. You can see the number of parking facilities that we have in the downtown, and the assessment along with, there's a number of funding sources for the parking district, and they all go towards the operations and maintenance of parking facilities and parking programs.

And, so there are 224 property owners that are within the parking district that are assessed, and the formula is based on the type of land use and the square footage of the parcel. And one of the things that's interesting about this assessment district is the total amount raised is a 158,000, and it stays the same every year. So if we get new uses in, that money just gets sort of the pie just gets cut up in a new way. So it is a interesting challenge of this district is that we don't actually make more money every year. If there's new development, it's just you you know, if there's a big development that comes in, all the other businesses get assessed a little bit less to kind of carve out.

So it's something that we're hoping to explore a little more about the the value and whether there's a a better way to kinda provide those services. But for now, we have the parking district that we have, and the next step will be to take this to council on May 12 for approval, and then we will engage with the county's office to get this onto the property tax rules.

Amanda, is there any adjustments made when parking goes away? For example, Lot 124 And 8 are are likely gonna be under construction in a few years and so on. So does that affect this at all?

So Lot 12, no, because it's not in the district. It's outside of the district. It would have been

didn't know if it was purposely removed or if it

was Yeah. No. I took it out. You can see the district actually goes no. It's actually here.

It's this

it was here. Yeah. So it's out of the district.

So

in the case of Lot 4 going away, those spots will hopefully be relocated into another facility or exploring a parking garage on on Lot 5. And so the spaces will be the number of spaces should be retained in And so it's not something that we evaluate, know, that the assessment would change as a result of the parking reality changing.

The objective is to keep the same.

The objective is to try and maintain parking and to provide the amount of parking needed to support the district, and that can fluctuate as we know.

One other piece of this too is that we've also been talking about parking in private spaces and, you know, kind of sharing the wealth, if you will, because there's a lot of private spaces that go unused. And I know that councilman council member Hicks has been very, very strong on, you know, use what we have rather than build new or we build new, understand what already exists and all of that. Does that play into this at all?

So, certainly, there are recommendations in the downtown parking strategy around shared parking agreements.

Yeah.

It is something the city has explored, and we've had some challenges because, as you can imagine, you know, private enclosed spaces maybe don't want to have, you know, public access. And so it's been difficult on it from a public to private partnership, but we have seen some success with other private developments reaching out to their neighbors and seeing, hey. Can I use some of your space for my uses? And so the private to private agreements have been more successful. Diana, don't know if you have anything to add on that note.

Well, I just wanted to say with the AB twenty ninety seven coming to an effect, we cannot require parking for new development that comes in for the qualified projects. So So a lot of times, we used to collect the in lieu fees, the parking in lieu fees, which would contribute to this. That is going to diminish over time. What we're seeing is that a lot of prospective, developers still wanna have enough parking because, you know, that's an important thing for them to make the space marketable. And in those cases, Amanda and I make sure that, you know, we bring it up like, hey.

There is a lot of private parking space where private to private kind of, agreement can be done, and that reduces their cost of development as well. So that's where we look for opportunities and help as staff to find solutions. But, yeah, I think we'll just have to be more creative as the time goes by. Yeah.

It's it's a tricky problem.

It it

is. We are also exploring, you know, very innovative kind of parking solutions in downtown because we have narrower lots, and people wanna utilize the absolute amount of square footage they can get on the site. So that is another thing we are trying to look for. But, otherwise, yeah, continue to find creative solutions

for this.

Yeah. And I will say, you know, we are gonna as we know, Lot 12 is offline. Lot 11 will be used for construction staging for the public safety Building. Lot 4 is is moving towards hotel development. So we have a lot of moving pieces that are help happening in the parking district.

So we will be looking at, you know, creative ways to ensure that we have the parking needed to support the needs of our downtown. I will say in some recent parking counts, we've seen that we're generally, you know, we generally have enough parking that we're not even in our most prized, parking lots, our highest used, there is still capacity there. So we're not in a place where we are we have we don't have enough supply. At this point, we're looking at ways to better utilize the supply. So included in this year in this next fiscal year's CIP budget, capital improvement project budget, where we've included some requests for some funds for parking wayfinding.

So part of the challenge is, hey. If you're driving around this parking lot and it's full, that doesn't mean there's no parking available. Like, come over to this parking garage and have some parking. So we're trying to find ways to better utilize the supply we have, and that can be done with wayfinding. It can be done with better parking enforcement or exploring technologies, you know, to support our police department in that area. So we have a couple of different, things that we're we're exploring as we implement the downtown parking strategy. More to come on that?

Any other comments? I have

that's a small comment. Then there's not it's about parking. Do we look at it? There's some kind of construction going on board pass on shoreline at villa and off. And one lane is closed, so it will trickle down all the way. It will affect the back up in the downtown. Are we looking into anything like that maybe if we

So you're talking about the the access from shoreline to downtown? No.

The access. Oh, the Out of town. Backup would affect all the way down. The whole lane is closed. Two lanes and but everybody in the evening out to see if

Okay. I'll look into it.

Well, there were challenges this last Saturday with performing arts come from away at 2PM. The

Multicultural. Filter Festival. Yeah.

And there was a third thing going on, so I had come back down to to finish my booth time. And it took me fifteen minutes to drive around to find the parking space. So there are constellations of events that will create some challenges.

Yeah. And, certainly, we know with Lot Lot 12 going offline that there were a variety of users that were using that space. You know, city hall users, library users, office users, you know, center for performing arts. And so, yeah, we're you know, a big piece of that'll be making sure there's proper wayfinding. Because oftentimes, we do see that the parking garage number Parking Garage Number 3, you know, those upper floors are rarely full. I would recommend if you're ever struggling to find parking, just go to the

That's

it. Top Floor. Go to

the Top Floor. Go make yourself crazy.

Don't just circle. Just jump right up to the top, and you're there you're really the chances are very, very good that you'll have a spot up there.

And if you park at the top, you won't forget where you parked.

Yeah. There you go. There you go.

Secret trick. Always pop up.

Stop. Yeah. Yeah. All that

for you.

Yeah.

So so Lot 12, the street behind that Lot 12. Mhmm. Right. You know, this is going, you know, tiny one. That that is now one one way, and that's kind of very confusing. I've seen some people coming in this side and said that let's go in there. You know?

Yeah. I mean, there's construction staging. So for you know, that's a temporary closure, but I'll I'll, I have regular meetings with that team, and so I can let them know that we maybe need some more signage.

There's just someone there too. Like There's usually someone there. Someone there. I feel like what I've seen, they've been pretty good about it. Yeah. Not like, you know, like, do not come this way.

I commute in every morning, and I've just learned to go around it. You know? Like, if it's gonna be there for several months, I just have started to go around on the church. Yeah.

Yeah. So so I I have gone there all different time of the day. I've seen it different time. But it didn't no way there because when I go evening. And then, I mean yeah.

Okay.

Well, let me know. Yeah. You're all over the place all the time. You will to sure. Good sample size. So I if the committee is open to it, taking a recommendation to rec or a motion to recommend the approval of the annual, parking district. Council, as

I said, will be looking at this on May 12. Okay. Can I entertain a motion from someone to approve the staff report?

I mean,

one second. Be faster. Okay.

I gotta jump in there.

Those in favor, aye. Aye. Opposed? Okay. Did

we get public? Did

we get public input?

I don't see anyone with their hands raised. I think you did ask. Yeah.

Okay. Alright. Onto item 7.2, downtown committee work plan. As required by city policy, the committee will hear an annual work plan that will be submitted to council for review and approval in the 2026. Staff seeks input to develop a work plan for the fiscal year 2627. Staff will bring back the work plan to discussion and input today for adoption as the next. So we have a document here that we need to review, which is 7.2. Do you have any input?

Yes. Thank you. So it's not in color, so I pulled it up on the screen. But I do have a red line version of the the work plan of last year's work plan that I thought we could work through. Couple of things to note. So, originally, we were breaking things up into ongoing and what's the other one? There's another category with, like, ongo ongoing and something else, and it just didn't make sense. So it maybe as needed. Yeah. And so I've just created a single, you know, a single bucket of things.

And so for the most part, a lot of the pieces remain the same. So, you know, bullet number a here, you know, getting updates on downtown development, providing input on projects and policies, policy consideration. All of this is part of, you know, the work that we continue to do, supporting economic vitality initiatives. So, again, things that are in our economic vitality strategy, receiving month monthly or receiving monthly updates, obviously, on Castro Street updates stuff happening on Castro Street that I provide, you know, talking about opportunities to support businesses. I removed this develop a downtown committee budget to support activation and implementation.

We have our economic vitality strategy budget items, and so we're getting a separate budget budget bucket for the downtown

community

seems less feasible to me. And we you know, most of the projects and policies that we are working on come out of our economic vital economic development division strategy. So I removed that. I will say, you know, when we did our joint ad hoc committee artist reception at the CPA, that those funds came out of the economic development budget. And so including it in there makes the most sense.

I updated to add the entertainment zone to our work plan. We have a ad hoc committee. So rather than forming it, we'll continue that work. We have some of the approvals that we do for the downtown business assessment business improvement, district that we have and, obviously, the PMAD. So those dates have been updated since the that we do every year.

We've talked about collaborating with the visual arts committee. I'll actually make a note here to add that the public art strategy is we're targeting October for the approval of that strategy. So just something for you all to be aware of your advocacy and or as it relates to downtown. Continue the downtown parking strategy. I removed that because I thought we had it in a different section.

Let me Can

I just ask a quick question on the vision? You know? Wasn't there going to be wasn't there a new position created Mhmm. It's like

Yes. The public art administrator position is open and accepting applications.

That's what I was gonna ask.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for that. And I'll actually share that with the committee. If you have people you know who might be interested, that opened on Friday and will be open for the next couple weeks. Yeah. Thank you for that. I'm just confirming. The downtown parking strategy is part of our work, and I think I deleted it because it was duplicative, but I'm we'll have to double check that.

It is in here. Is it also part of the economic psychology? No.

Alright. So I'm gonna just note to keep that because we do wanna be able to talk through real. I know.

Oh, yeah. So you're

So unless you've got a part of

the assessment? Item number d.

Ah, okay. Thank you. I knew I knew there was a reason I deleted it. So okay. So that's the duplicative because we already talked about the downtown routine strategy as d. Okay.

Thank you all for your help

with that. So, yeah, I will Mhmm. If they are preferred.

Any discussion or comments about? I'll go ahead and say something about collaborative. That's item number. I was on that committee in Berlin. That event was really great.

The fact that the Metropolitan Historical Association, we put it in our newsletter, history happening now, because that was the first time we've that we had a open discussion presentation with an artist. I thought it was great, and I would like to see us continue to try to put something together. I know there's challenges with performing arts center because you have to find an evening when there isn't anything happening, But we probably need to start working on it soon because the schedule does fill up quickly and trying to time an artist and an open evening for the forming arts center would be is a challenge. So I would recommend that we start working on that sooner than later.

Yes. And I do have an update. We do have a we do have a date targeted at or a couple of dates we're looking at is the first, early in the New Year, right around Lunar New Year, I believe. We're hoping to work with an artist who, you know, has yeah. Who who's dealing with trying to think that I think they are a Chinese American artist, and so doing something around Lunar New Year will make sense.

We're also looking at maybe we we could have the presentation in Chinese and have it be each live translated in English. So, anyway, we're exploring some fun concepts for that, but we'll be reforming the ad hoc committee to really start diving into that. So rest assured that we, are already trying to target dates and times. We're we're hoping to do this twice a year. And so, you know, we do a fall and a Great.

Winter timeline. Yeah. Once a year, which is wonderful. Once a year. Good. Yeah. It's pretty aggressive, but that's great.

Well, and we know how, again, how successful it was. There is a real desire for this kind of content and artist connection out there. So we wanna be receptive and responsive to that. So, yeah, thank you for the question. And and, yes, keep an eye out for a a doodle poll because we need to start planning.

Yeah. Yeah. So that would sort of reinforce our desire to be known as an arts friendly, art centric. Especially if you're hiring a public art coordinator, that would definitely play into that concept of being artsy and creative. Good.

Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. So I don't know if we wanna add anything to that or just continuing the work of the ad hoc committee is sufficient. But I

don't think we need to add anything. Nobody else has another suggestion. I just wanna reinforce. I thought it was a great idea. Kudos to staff for getting that already put together.

Well, as you said, we know we gotta put we gotta grab on to any open spots we can because the CPA is very busy and active. Yep.

Okay. Good. Any other comments? Any other comments from the public?

I'm not seeing any hands raised.

Well, I do wanna I do wanna thank Pat for for doing the the revisions on this.

And and I'm excited too about what you've put together for on that section number c, the summer of soccer.

Summer of soccer.

Yep.

Yeah. Thank you. And we'll be, you know, hoping you all can attend and participate. It's gonna be a fun time.

Yeah. So make sure that we all get our letter updates. Mhmm. Absolutely.

Color your shin guards.

What other protective things? I guess if you're a goalie, you need your big gloves too.

Yeah. We're hoping for games that don't require protection.

Liability. Yeah. Exactly.

Actually, we are hoping I'll just say for Jamil, we are hope we are hoping to bring back the three sixty photo booth, which as we know, have some great video of Jamil dancing in the three sixty photo booth. So

So I was thinking, think that was just bringing up a whole week for that the we have the visual art with art, you know, all that. I think we need a poet.

Sorry? Poet. Oh, a poet.

Some poem by. Coming down out of the open mic. A young gentle a young kid, you know, twenty twenty years, twenty two years. And I asked him about this, oh, I missed it. You know? How was it? He's done. Three, five minutes, he just played the whole thing, but beautiful. And I think I like to see that.

Alright. Fine. Alright. Well, we'll we'll, we'll provide that feedback to our our new public art administrator.

Yeah. Thanks.

Yeah. Do a little poetry slam. And that's new. I mean, Santa Cruz County has a poet, a a county poet laureate, and a youth poet laureate. I wonder if Santa Clara County has something similar. Yeah. So maybe we could do some sort of engagement with county poet laureate. Something we could do. Google that. That

should've been

a bot. Now my hair is It's

not your tease. Alright. Alright. Well, if any further comments, I'll bring back an unread lined official document at our next meeting, for review.

All right. So, have we input from the public?

We did, and, we have no one online with a hand raised and no one to talk. Hand raised.

Bring this to item number eight, committee staff. So comments, questions, review reports, etcetera, etcetera. So I'll go ahead and start first. I conducted a walking tour on April 26. We had 13 people registered. Yep. That's always big fun. And coincidentally, one of the artists who was drew a peach was working on a baller. So we walked by. She wasn't working on the peach.

But anyway, so It was fun to stand there, and she explained her artwork and her philosophy in what she was trying to do. So that was perfect timing on that. So but in any case, that goes over well. We will not have a walking tour in May because it's the same weekend. It's a memorial. We will have it at the this fourth Sunday in June.

I will say we are doing a little special department walking tour with the Mountain View Historical Association on Friday, so an opportunity for staff to get a tour. You know, it's so relevant to the work that we do, so we're excited to have that time with Pamela.

Yeah. I've gotta pare it down and tell a lot of stories. I actually need to talk to you about what how far you wanna go and what you wanna do.

Okay. Alright. We'll talk offline.

So I also talked to two artists. Okay. They were very friendly. You know? I mean, they went out their way to tell us about how the paint, how they started, like that. The local almost local.

You know?

And but the next next project's coming in, so somebody is interested like the art. They can go and see them in art some other places too. Yeah.

So Thanks

for engaging with them. Juba, do you wanna add anything about your event next week? You're too far into that. Yes. But I was

thinking about

this whole time. No. So celebration of leaders next week. We are honoring a couple of our downtown businesses. And then we'll be honoring Marina as business person of the year and then simply saw work for small business of the year. It's gonna do a full house. Very excited for that. And coming up in what days are today? Coming up in June, we are gonna have Taste of

Mountain View downtown. Taste

of what?

So that is the wine, beer, and food walk. So it gives the the downtown business a chance to spotlight whatever it is that they have in their doors that they wanna show off, whether it be food, tea, a drink, a book.

What's the date on that again? June 17.

Wednesday. To 8PM.

And those tickets are on sale, and it's available on our website there.

It's a very good time. It's a great way to engage with the businesses. Is it gonna be soccer themed? That tastes soccer.

I'll throw a soccer ball on the side.

Alright. Alright. Perfect. Then we'll add it to the summer soccer calendar. Wonderful.

I think

that's about it. Amanda mentioned that we are collaborating, getting the ambassadors out, ready to talk more about summer of soccer.

Should we say anything about Tech Showcase?

It's also happening.

Tech Showcase will be in July, so July 30. We are taking it down from two days to one. The second day was really, a panel, so we're just the only difference is the three. Sorry?

The first day was first night was a panel.

The first night was

a panel, the second night was a panel and the exhibitors. This time, we're sticking to one day

for the exhibitors and then the panel to close.

I don't think that we've decided on panel theme just yet, so TBD. But we are looking to partner more with, makers that may that are based in Mountain View but also may be from outside of the Mountain View area as well as continuing to engage

our mountain based businesses.

We're really looking to find people who are using tech in their makers. Like, are they three d printing things, you know, XTool who with their etching dog tags last year, I believe, you know, looking at ways that technology is being used for the creation of artistic and work pieces. Be real fun.

I have a random activation thing. Was just, I don't know you guys saw the article about the guy, people who buried, like, a $10,000 treasure chest in San Francisco. And it's like and then they,

like, would have prolonged,

like, trying to basically, like, clue where you have to, like, go around. But, I mean, I'm not saying you have to do that. But, like, you know, geocaching is also, like, kind of popular. I feel like if you're trying to get people to, like, roam around during

the summer of soccer,

you could do some sort of, like, thing where you go to this thing and you go to that thing and you're like people love adventures like that. So You know? Yeah. Scavenger hunt. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly.

You've seen the around Pioneer Park doing Pokemon.

Yeah. So yes. This is the Pokemon hot spot.

It is. Can

just tell you.

They are roaming.

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

There was a person to bury 10,000 in dollar coins somewhere in San Francisco. People have just been, like, digging all over San Francisco.

Oh, great.

Yeah.

So it's like a too far down this unagenized item, but that is a really bad idea.

Yeah. I did a deal deal cashing. You know?

Yeah. Deal cashing. Know? Something to get people moving around. You know?

For sure.

Alright. You supply the $10,000 of cash, and I will hide it somewhere now.

She won't keep it safe. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay.

Alright. Any other comments? And then if there are no other comments, I will adjourn the meeting at 09:12. And when is our next meeting? Our

next meeting will be in June. I believe it's June I'm right. June 2.

June 2.

Then we will be off for July and August because you will all be doing summer soccer things.

Yeah. And what's happening in September? Because labor is a little early. Or

Oh, good question. I'll look into that. I can't remember if

we should right. I don't know.