Planning Commission - public_hearing

I was going to bring my pickleball out. Was that on the agenda last night? That was on the agenda last night.

One of the 33 consent calendars.

I was pretty amazed. I was going through it and I was like, gosh.

Oh, what happened here? That was crazy. Okay. Are we in? Do we have people in there?

Okay.

Well, hopefully we're hopefully we're in and on. All right. Good afternoon. Welcome to the administrative zoning public hearing of June 24th. My name is Amber Blodinsky. I'm presiding over the hearing as the zoning administrator. I'll call the meeting to order at 4 p.m. So today's hearing will operate in a hybrid format. Staff, the applicants, some community members are in person. However, we'll also ask if community members joining us virtually want to speak on an item at certain points in the meeting. When those opportunities arise, typically during the public comment portion of each agenda item, members of the public wishing to comment may do so by clicking on the raise hand feature in Zoom when I announce the item on which you wish to speak. Speakers will be notified of their turn shortly before they're called on to speak. All speakers, virtual or in person, will have two to three minutes to provide comments with the timing dependent on the total number of speakers for each item. If you're in person, I don't know everyone here, if you're in person and you're going to comment on an item, like you're not an applicant so you're here to make a comment on an item, if you can fill out one of those yellow speaker cards there and hand it to Roxanne so that way we can call you for your item, that would be great. And then we can also accurately spell your name for the meeting minutes. So the next portion of the meeting is oral communications from the public. This is the time set aside for people wishing to address the zoning administrator on any matter that's not on the agenda. Speakers are limited to three minutes and state law prohibits any action on any items which are not on the agenda. So is there anyone here who would like to speak on any items that are not on the agenda? Assuming no, okay, thanks. Anybody online? None. So we'll now move to item three, which is the public hearing. So item 3.1 is 700 to 810 East Middlefield Road and 1100 to 1200 Vaude Avenue with a request for the zoning administrator to forward a recommendation to the city council to amend a previously approved development agreement to grant a five-year extension of the term for phase two of an office development and a recommended determination that the city certified an EIR for the project in compliance with CEQA and no further environmental review is required. It's important to note that this decision made on this item will be in the form of a recommendation to the City Council, who will make the final decision on this project. And that public hearing is tentatively scheduled, and I say tentatively, for October 13th, as of now, of this year. So George Schroeder is the project planner. George, do you have a staff presentation?

Yes, I do. Good afternoon. George Schroeder, Planning Manager of and have a presentation. So this is a proposed development agreement amendment for LinkedIn at their LinkedIn Middlefield campus at 710-810 East Middlefield Road and 1100 to 1200 Lawn Avenue. So here's an aerial photo of the campus. And it's bounded by 237 to the north and Maud Avenue to the northeast and Middlefield Road to the southeast at the Bernardo Avenue terminus. And as you can see, the lower right corner of the campus, this is some of the newer buildings along with some of the existing buildings that have been there for quite some time. So just to give a background on the original approval, So the Council had originally approved this project back in 2018, and it had consisted of three new office buildings as well as two new parking structures. Three of the existing office buildings in the middle were to remain, and two of the office buildings along the periphery were to be demolished. So altogether, this is about 612,000 square feet of net new office. that offered an initial seven year term with an option to extend for three years. Also part of the approval was a heritage tree So just to give some updates since 2018, phase one has been completed and that was completed at late 2021. As you can see, just going back to the slide, phase one is the area that's shown in blue here. So the building one and park construction one towards the bottom of that graphic have been completed. as well as various site improvements, publicly accessible open spaces, biking, pedestrian paths. Most of the offsite improvements have been completed with the exception of a cycle track. And fee payments have also been paid for the city. Some in advance are exceeding what was required for the phase one portion. And then back in 2022, the LinkedIn worked with the city to extend the expiration date by three years as part of the terms of the original DA and made a fee as part of that. That extended to the end of 2029. And then LinkedIn did work with the city a few years ago to start conversations about extending it again due to circumstances beyond their control. We did have a zoning administrative hearing scheduled back in last September, but it was continued to a date uncertain, and now we are hearing that again. And this is really to go over the DA amendment request and some revised terms. So LinkedIn is requesting a five-year extension that would bring the expiration date to 2034. And along with that request would be a public benefit fee payment to the city of $1.6 million. And it would be payable within 60 days of the execution of this DA amendment. This amendment would really help to complete phase two of the campus. And this is the two new office buildings, which is about 430,000 square feet in that new office area, and then completing the rest of the impact fee payments in the city. So therefore, Steph recommends that the zoning administrator forward a recommendation to the city council to approve the amendment to the previously approved development agreement to grant five-year extension of the term for phase two. And as the zoning administrator mentioned, this is tentatively scheduled for October 13th, by 26. Will, for any questions.

Thank you. So it's now your turn to make a presentation. If you have anything, you don't have to. If you want to say anything, you can step up to the podium.

So my name is Don Young. I'm representing LinkedIn, and I've been the development manager and advisor to LinkedIn since this project was conceived back in the pre-approval. And in 20, when the project was, the first phase of the project, as George showed you, was completed at the end of 21, we had 22, which happened to coincide with the pandemic. What that did was like a lot of companies through kind of a monkey wrench into the works of LinkedIn's plans to begin the next phase. And the original concept was that LinkedIn would build phase one and immediately build phase two. The pandemic happened, those plans changed. And then what ended up happening as a result was that office utilization patterns for corporations and employee tenants in office changed dramatically. What that meant for real estate was the company was still growing. Employees were still being hired. They just weren't using real estate the same way. And what that meant for this campus was the absorption rate of square footage started to change. And the idea was we don't need the square footage as fast as we thought. We will need it, which is not as fixed. So linked in together a different strategy, which was essentially to remain a Mountain View company, still stay headquartered Mountain View. This would be the headquarters in perpetuity. But as they got rid of other buildings in the area, notably at Sunnyvale, they would relocate those staff into this until the point was when breaker in the next phase. That required more time. And that's what brought about the request for the extension. The extension was initially requested in 2023. Why did it take three years? Again, the PAMP Enterprise part of it. It's a lot of staff change within the city, but also a lot of staff change within LinkedIn. All of those things contributed to why we're kind of here today. But we look forward to your your approval of this and are moving on to council.

Okay, great. Thank you. All right. So I'll open the item up for public comment. So I'm assuming since no one jumped up to get a card that maybe there's not anyone here in the room that's here to make a comment on this item. Nope. Okay. So is there anybody online? Okay. So again, this is 3.1 comment period now. Okay. Oh, do you want to stop shooting? Okay, so if there's nobody, then I'll go ahead and close the public hearing and move forward in making a motion to recommend that the city council approve item 3.1 based on the findings and conditions posted online, public comment, and the application materials reviewed by staff. Again, with the reminder that this decision is a recommendation to the city council will take final action on the USDA amendment. Well, thank you. Thanks for being here. Nice to meet you.

It's like, it's like you can't. You ready?

Okay, so item 3.2 is 1132 Independence Avenue with a request that the zoning administrator approve a conditional use permit to allow an animal service establishment, including overnight boarding in an existing industrial building, and a recommended determination that the project is categorically exempt pursuant to section 15301 of CEQA. Aben Tassu is the project planner. Do you have the staff presence?

Oh, you have to do it over here.

Thank you. My name is . As highlighted, the request from the applicant is for a conditional use permit to allow an animal service use establishment for doggy daycare, including On the screen, you'll see a site plan for plan layout and an image of the building located at 1132 Independence Avenue. The city staff has completed the review of the application and the project as proposed complies with the city requirements. For that reason, staff is recommending approval based on the findings and functions for approval in the attached report. Further, city staff recommends a determination that the project is categorically exempt to 15301 existing facilities of California and this will conclude staff presentation.

Thanks, Abed. So I'm assuming you're the applicant, so you're the only other person here. Did you want to say anything? This is your chance to say something if you want to.

No, you don't need to.

No, you don't need to. It's fine.

All right. It's been a long process, but it is getting through.

Okay, great. Well, thanks for being here. So I'll open this item up to public comment. There's nobody else in the room. I don't know if there's anybody online. So it would only be people online who wish to comment on this item. Is there anybody there, Roxanne? Okay. So we'll go ahead and close the public hearing on this item. And I will move forward in making a motion to approve item 3.2 based on the findings and conditions posted online, public comment, and the application materials reviewed by city staff. So please note this decision of approval is appealable to the city council within 10 calendar days. So this concludes our public hearing today at 4.14 PM. If anybody has any follow-up questions on the items on the agenda, you can contact the project. Thank you. Thanks for being here. Congratulations. Mm hmm.