Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. Calling to order the regular planning commission meeting for Tuesday, May 20th, 2025. Roll call. Um, Chair Tidy Zamora here. Vice Chair Michael Sid Alterman here. Commissioner John Dyn here. Commissioner Joan Stewart here. and Commissioner Natasha Baso here. And in the audience, we have our alternate Armando Rodriguez. Excellent. Sorry. Any planning commissioner, member or staff who has a direct conflict of interest on any schedule agenda item to be considered to declare the conflict at this time? Seeing none, we'll move on to public comments. At this time, members of the public may comment on any item not appearing on the agenda and within the subject matter jurisdiction of the planning commission board. Individual comments will be limited to a maximum of three minutes and time cannot be yielded to another person. Under state law, matters presented during the public comment cannot be discussed or acted upon. For record purposes, state your name and city residents. Please make your comments directly to the planning commission members. So, we open public comments for anything not appearing on the agenda. Okay, seeing none, we'll move on. We'll close the public comment period. Uh the consent calendar. All items listed on the consent calendar are to be acted upon by a single action of the planning commission board unless requested by an individual planning commission member or member of the public for special consideration. Otherwise, the recommendation of staff will be act accepted and acted upon by motion of the planning commission board. The items on the consent calendar are item 2.1 posting of the agenda. The agenda of the for the May 20th, 2025 planning commission meeting was posted on the city community center bulletin board, city hall north and south bulletin boards post office city website and email to the library on May 15, 2025. Item 2.2, approval of the May 20, 2025 agenda. This provides an opportunity for the planning commission or staff to recommend that an item be

placed on the agenda for discussion or to adjust the proposed agenda to allow an item to be taken out of order. Item 2.3, approval of the April 15, 2025 planning commission meeting minutes having been read by the individual commissioners and stands approved as submitted. So, do we have a motion to approve the consent calendar? Move for approval. We get a second. A second. Um, Chair Zamora, yes. Vice Chair Alterman, yes. Commissioner Dinan, yes. Commissioner Stewart, yes. And Commissioner Boso, yes. Okay, moving on to the planning commission public hearings. We have two today. We'll start with item 3.1, the architecture and site plan review 10-2024, the Sierra Triplex at 2924 Sierra Street. Good evening, Chair Zamora, members of the planning commission. Joshua Man, community development director. I'll be um handling the presentations tonight. Um, as you mentioned, this is um, architecture and site plan review 10-2024 for the Sierra Triplex Apartments. Just a little bit of background on the site itself. The site is currently vacant. It's a little over 10,000 uh, 10,710 square ft in size. It's located at 2924 Sierra Street. currently has a general plan designation of highdensity residential and um specific to this site, it's within the downtown specific plan area and it's designated as mixed use. Um in in summary, the applicant, Mr. Sammy Altree, is requesting planning commission approval for the architectural site plan and review to allow the development of the triplex multifamily um residential unit. Um here's an air photo. Shows you

the site. As I mentioned, it's currently vacant. You'll notice just to your the right of your screen is the um Riverbank, the old Canary, and then Railroad Avenue, which kind of leads into Patterson. Um you also have Palmer um to your on your left hand of your screen. Um in terms of the proposed site plan, this is the layout. It's um as you can see, three units kind of identified by the three indentations which would be kind of the entrances of the apartments. Also notice the parking is in the rear. This property also can utilize alley access which it will use. Um in addition, it doesn't show up very well. I think it shows up on my next slide a little better. Um the landscape plan, there is some public open space towards the front of the the property along Sierra Street. Um here's that landscape plan. You'll see the applicant's proposing kind of a table barbecue area. Um the remainder of the landscaping would be like perimeter landscaping along the property line and the rear property line um adjacent to the alley. On the proposed architecture um it would be a twostory um triplex. I'll get into some of the other details here. So the colors uh the main color um the body of the building I'll call it would be a stucco Swiss coffee color. There is some um stonework along the perimeter bottom of the building and um I think it's proposing composition shingles barnwood algae color. Um the proposed floor plan is identical for each of the three units. As I mentioned it's two floors. So the first floor is approximately 636 ft. Second floor would be 644 square ft. Um first floor is comprised of the living

area, the entry area, the dining room, the kitchen, laundry facilities. Um and then obviously a staircase to the second floor. As you get into the second floor, you'll notice that it is a three-bedroom unit. Also, it's a three bath unit. um total square foot is a little bit over 1,200 square feet. Um in in terms of approval of the project, we looked at um is this project consistent with our general plan. So one of the one of the policies that stuck out to us was um policy land 2.4, which states the city will encourage reuse of vacant or underutilized land in the infill opportunity area through policies that seek to encourage more intense infill development. Um staff's evaluation of this uh found that the proposed project includes the construction of the new multifamily building um on an unimproved vacant parcel. As such, not only will the proposed project add value to the existing neighborhood, we'll also add three additional residential units to the city's housing stock. Um this project as all are required to provide public notice. Um, and this was provided in the Riverbank News on Wednesday, May 7th, or I should say published in the Riverbank News on Wednesday, May 7th. And public notices were mailed to property owners within 300 ft of the project site on Wednesday, May 5th. In addition, on the right hand side, you'll notice a picture of the sign that was posted by the applicant at the property. Um, that was done uh prior to the 10 days um that it was required to do. And then lastly in looking at this project um staff is proposing that it's SQA exempt falls under SQA guidelines section 15332 which discusses infill development projects such as

this. Um staff recommends a planning commission adopt resolution 2025-00004 which would approve architecture and site plan review 10-2024 to allow the development of a multifamily residential triplex based on the findings outlined in the staff report. That concludes my presentation. I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have. Thank you. I got one. Uh Josh, the layout on the second floor, um was there any sort of like a balcony or exterior exposure? Just just the standard windows. Okay. That was pretty straightforward. Any other public comments? Do we want to read the public comment that was submitted? Yeah. Um I was going to mention that we did receive one public comment letter um copy of which was provided to each of the commissioners before the meeting. Um other than that, we received no other public comment. Okay. Very good. Can we get a motion to approve? Are we open public comments? None. We'll close public comment. Okay, then we'll close public comments. Can we get a motion to approve the architectural site plan review? I'll make a motion to approve the architecture and site plan review 10-2024. I'll second.

Hey, roll call. Um, Chair Zamora, yes. Vice Chair Alterman, yes. Commissioner Stewart, yes. Commissioner Boso, yes. And Commissioner Dyn, yes. That's approved. 50. Excellent. Moving on to item 3.2, architecture and site plan review 11-2024, which is the commercial office at 3205 Sierra Street. It's a proposed project as an application for an architectural site plan review to establish a commercial office located at the address 3205 Sierra Street. Uh good evening again. Um as you mentioned, this is architecture and site plan review 11-2024 located at 3205 Sierra Street. Um just a little bit of details on the property itself. This is um currently considered a residential property. It's about um 6,250 square ft in size. Again, this project falls in the downtown specific plan area. Um it's zone it's um designation in the specific plan is mixed use, which is um the same as the general plan designation of mixed use. Um the applicants um Mrs. Anna Merllo is requesting the planning commission approve this request to allow the um existing home to be converted to an office. Um here's an air photo that shows um the general area. Um La Chakita Market is just um to the right of the site itself. That gives you a little bit of location info. Post office is a little bit further to your right. Um so so the floor plan is pretty much going to stay the same as the existing home. Um I have on the left hand side of the screen kind of a larger view of the

entire site and then on the right hand side is just kind of an enlarged um area of the house itself. Um in terms of exterior modifications, one of the things that they'll need to complete is an ADA ramp to the front door. The house currently has um three or four flights of stairs to get up to the front door landing. So, they would need to accommodate ADA access from the public rideway to the entrance and or exit of the building. Um other than that, it's mainly going to be um finishes changes. I think they're proposing some paint colors. Um but generally itself, there's going to be no modifications to the exterior. Interior wise, I believe they're just making a few modifications to the restroom to again meet ADA or or make the restroom ADA compliant. Um here's kind of the proposed architecture colors at least. The colors don't show up the greatest through the um the exhibits that were provided, but on the right hand side it kind of lists the um the color the colors and the finish types. I'll just kind of walk through them real quick. So the the exterior would just be wood siding. Um all the window and door trim would be kind of um enhanced with this. They would just be using existing um shingles which are asphalt. There would be no changes to those. Same with the doors. Um they're just looking mainly for um it's a neutral color with like a rosecoled trim. Um here's here's the side views. same color color scheme proposed. And then here's kind of a floor plan of the layout. So, as you walk into the entrance, it would be the reception waiting area um that would lead into uh two office spaces. You also will notice that there is two restrooms,

one of which would be required to be um modified to meet ADA or make it ADA compliant. And then in the rear of the building would be the employee break room and the storage room. Um again when we looked at this in terms of the general plan we did pull out one of the policies we just wanted to highlight um design uh 8.3 which states the city will require the use of durable highquality building materials to lower maintenance and replacement needs to ensure the aesthetic appeal of new development rehabilitation. Um staff's evaluation found that the proposed improvements to the existing structure will improve the overall aesthetics to the site, will improve the um view along Sierra Street, and potentially enhance the surrounding commercial properties. Another policy that we just wanted to highlight was design 10.1, which states, "The city will require site and building access for pedestrians by providing the most direct pedestrian access from sidewalks and parking areas to building entrances while minimizing conflicts with motor vehicle traffic. Again, our analysis um in summary, we found the existing sidewalks on Sierra and the proposed ADA compliant ramp will provide this direct access to the site. In terms of SQA environmental review, this project is considered category exempt from further SQA or environmental analysis pursuant to SQA guidelines 15301 which outlines um exemption for existing facilities. Um the public notice um again like the previous project was published in the Riverbank News on Wednesday, May 7th. Public notices were also mailed out on Wednesday, May 5th.

Um the uh picture on the right is just a picture of the posting at the property itself. And then lastly, just um our recommendation is that the planning commission adopt resolution 2025-00005 approving architecture and site plan review 11-2024 which would allow the conversion of existing structure to an office use based on the required findings. That concludes my staff report and presentation. I'd happy to answer any questions you may have. Question. Do you know what type of business will be in this unit and how many employees will be there? Sure. Um, I do not believe the applicant's here tonight, but in discussions with her, she mentioned it would be a real estate office and it would most likely be herself and her husband as the primary um occupants of the office. Uh, I have a question too. I didn't see anything as far as uh signage for, you know, naming what the business is on the face of the building or a separate signage monument out front. Is there anything uh allowable for that or is that going to have to come under review separately? So yeah, that would be a separate review. Um right now the applicant is currently debating um you know the type of sign that that's appropriate for a business. Regardless of that, any um sign in the downtown specific plan area would have to comply with the guidelines or the sign program in the specific plan. Um, so that would be a separate review by our department um when they decide to to submit something. Okay, no other questions. Let's open it up for public comment. We did receive one written public comment regarding this matter

which has been distributed all the commissioners. Okay, seeing no public comments, we'll close public comment and we'll take roll call approving resolution 2025005 approving the site plan review 11-2024. I'll move to approve the item as stated. Oh, we Okay. Yes. Let's reopen public comment for Zoom. Well, we'll close public comment for that. We have a motion. Do we get a second? Second. Okay. Roll call. Chair um Zamora. Yes. Um Vice Chair Alterman, yes. Commissioner Stewart, yes. Commissioner Boso, yes. And Commissioner Dyn, yes. Approve 50. Excellent. Moving on. Planning Commission comments. Any planning commissioners have any comments? No. Okay. Any county referrals or any correspondents? Have none. All right. Any staff comments? I do have a few comments. Um first of all, I just wanted to mention um at our June meeting, we're going to be having three items. Um just wanted to kind of summarize those real quick. One of those items is a project called Sierra Village. This is a 27 lot tiny home subdivision located on Sierra and Claus. This is a market rate project. It's not an affordable project. So, it's a little bit different than the other tiny home projects that this commission's seen in the past. Um, the second project is Elgusto Italian Restaurant. So, um I'm not sure if anyone's noticed, but they've they've recently purchased a I think it was a former cell phone business, cell phone store business, a couple doors down from

them, and they're going to be requesting um a conversion from a cell phone store to a banquet room. They would still utilize their existing restaurant, just use that for overflow seating or special events. Um and then the third project is Meadow View subdivision. This is a 31 lot subdivision on California and Snediger. So, um should be a should be a pretty busy meeting next month. Um and then lastly, just two other things I want to mention. Um in case the commission's interested, um on Tuesday, May 27th, we'll be providing an update to the housing element. Um just a status update as we wrap up kind of our first round of comments, addressing the comments from the state and then um eventually resubmitting this back to HCD. And then finally wanted to mention um July 9th we'll be holding a a joint city council planning commission workshop. This is anformational workshop on the Riverwalk project. So uh make sure you you place that on your calendars. And that's all I have. Thank you. Okay, looks like those are all the items are on our agenda. Meeting adjourned.