Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Twenty five planning commission meeting to order, and, our first order of business is a roll call. I'm gonna welcome two new members to the, to to the proceedings. So, commissioner Derby? Here. Commissioner Roche? Here. Commissioner Stokenbroker?

Here.

If you can recognize your own name from the way I pronounce it. Yeah. And Commissioner Ternan. Here. And Bill Crockett here. Then we will stand for the Pledge of Allegiance, please.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States and to republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty, justice, and justice for all.

Okay. So our first order of business is approval of the final agenda.

So moved.

The second? Second. Commissioner Derby? Aye. Roche? Aye. Steggenberger?

Aye.

Tiernan? Aye. Motion passes? The motion passes. Second the ayes have it. I think with ayes, we definitely have it. Thank you. Now we can open the meeting. This is a portion to and I apologize for my voice. For public comment, if there's anyone, any member of the public that is here that would like to speak to some item that is not on the agenda, now is the time or we're open for that.

And seeing none, do have some members of the public, but they're here for the items on the agenda. So we thank you for that. We do have one consent item that I will look for a motion on and that is to approve the meeting minutes of the January 27 hearing.

Move to approve the minutes as presented January Let's 20 see.

We'll ask for confirmation. Commissioner Derby? Aye. Commissioner Roche?

Aye. He should abstain. Was I

not there on the January? No.

It's me.

Oh, yeah. That's right. You guys can't. You thought I was. And I will jump past and then ask commissioner Tiernan. Aye. And I will also say aye. So the ayes have it again in this case. So thank you for that. The we don't let's see. Are there any other unfinished or other business items? I'd say none. None listed. No other items. So let's move right into the first item on our agenda which is the or the next item. The general plan consistency report to be presented by staff.

Good evening. This evening, have Tim Burke, the city's interim public works director, who will be presenting the capital improvement program update for the fiscal year twenty five twenty six program. And with that, I'll let Tim go into his presentation.

Thank you. So good evening, commissioners. Yes. I am the interim director of public works. I've been here for only the last four months or so, and I'm here to present to you the capital improvement program update for fiscal year twenty five, twenty six.

Let's see. That going? No. There we go. So tonight's request is to adopt a resolution reporting to the city council that the proposed new capital improvement program projects for fiscal year twenty five twenty six are consistent with the Novato general plan.

The city is proposing 16 new CIP projects for the next year. The new c new projects are identified and prioritized based on assessment reports and transition plans, the general general plan and master plans, city council, community input, city department inputs, and funding restrictions. Staff strives to initiate new projects wherever the need is greatest and funding is the has the most impact. Under California government code sections sixty five four zero one and sixty five four zero two, municipalities are required to submit an annual list of projects to the planning commission to prepare the report to the city council whether those projects are consistent with the general plan. Municipalities are also required to submit public projects involving the construction or authorization of new public structures to their planning commission to make general plan consistency findings.

So we've we've gone through these 16 new projects and put them in different categories on which these projects may fall for general plan consistency and and the objectives of the general plan. The following projects are consistent with the public facilities objective number one, management of public facilities and infrastructure, which aims to manage city facilities and infrastructure in a safe, functional, and well tamed man well maintained manner as practicable. The first project listed is the is basically city hall workspace reconfiguration, which will reconfigure several workspaces to on the 2nd Floor of the City Admin Building to accommodate new staffing and rearrange and help make the offices more equitable, adequate, ergonomic. The next project, the police department water infiltration. This is to engage a consultant to investigate some significant water infiltration issues that we've been having on the building.

And once the investigation is conducted, then we'll develop a full cost estimate of the improvements. But the the project is to figure out what's going on with this water infiltration and and stop it. The annual traffic striping and marking project, this identifies key road corridors within the city that have faded stripe signing and striping areas that we'll repaint, get them up to current code. The next category also fit fits in the public facilities objective one, but also fits under the objective 22, which is accessibility improvements. The accessibility improvements, which is to create an accessible system that is consistent with the guidelines established by the Americans with Disabilities Act allowing mobility impaired users such as the disabled and seniors to safely and effectively travel with in the and beyond the city.

These include our annual rehab rehabilitation pavement project, our parks master plan phase two priorities project, which is based on our 2024 master plan, the Hamilton Amphitheater playground improvements, which seeks to replace existing playground structures, and the Mewok fencing phase two, which will install fencing along the remaining portions of the creek in Mewok Park. Then we also have two projects that are safe pathways to schools. One is called the Quick Build Improvements at Various Intersections, which proposes to install traffic calming measures such as traffic striping, crosswalk designs, things of that nature. And then the Sutro Avenue sidewalk gap closure, which proposes to install sidewalks and curb ramps, driveway approaches, things like that. Next category also includes the public facilities objective number one and also objective number two, which is for planning and budgeting for public facilities and infrastructures.

So these following projects are new projects. The Margaret Todd Senior Center HVAC replacement, Nevada Police Department HVAC replacement, and the Hamilton community room HVAC replacement. A lot of replacement of old infrastructure at at these facilities. The Hamilton community gym modernization enhancements. This is a project that is a joint use facility between the city and the Nevada Unified School District, and we anticipate the needed facility repairs and improvements for given the age of the facility.

And this is in conformance with one of our facilities reports. Is that it? That was it. And then the final two projects are under the government governance objective number three, fiscal sustainability. One is for the new financial system study that will analyze what financial system that we that the city will move on to and develop.

And and then this is more of a kind of a this is under the CIP program, more as a tracking tool. And then governance objective number four, technology and communications. The security hardware refresh project is intended to improve our network security for the city of Nevada. And then that concludes our 16 new projects that we have in the budget. So Thank you for that. I'm here to answer any questions I can.

Yeah. And and we're being asked the commission's being asked to if we deem it appropriate to approve this resolution. And so the next thing I'd like to do is see if any commissioners have any comments for mister Burke or questions for him. Please.

Thank you. So this is for this fiscal year and next fiscal year.

This is for the upcoming fiscal year, which which starts, 01/01/2025 and goes to, 06/30/2026. And so it's it that's why they have it fiscal year 2526 because it starts January 1.

And so I'm I'm looking just for a little clarification on something maybe that either of you can help me out with that. As we're talking about the safe pathway to schools

Uh-huh.

And then we're talking about the Sutro Avenue sidewalk gap closing that, Where is that gap? Is that kinda specific to the middle school, Sinaloa Middle School? Is that what we are addressing there?

I believe it I believe it is.

Okay.

And there's certain portions that don't have sidewalk and it would start and stop. And this is mainly where we've gotten funding from the Transportation Authority of Marin to do both of those projects. They've taken a look at the scope of work for those two projects and authorized funding for it.

So then with that said, I'm aware between DeLong and 7th, I know that Novato Boulevard has been held up for numerous years, if not decades, and I've been informed that the PG and E is doing the work at this point in time. Sewer and water is going to be doing the work at this point in time. In terms of safe pathways to school, I know that there is no pathway for these young kids on that stretch of row busy road to have a safe pathway to school. And I'm wondering, because I didn't see that here, whether that is gonna be included for fiscal year twenty five, twenty six. Are we thinking that's gonna be happening a year in the future?

So the Nevada Boulevard project is, like you said, is is starting with PG and E's work for undergrounding. So PG and E is currently under started the work to begin their undergrounding project. Their project's gonna last about nine months. And then we're gonna follow that up with the city project. The city project's going to include the sewer and water district's upgrades to their systems at the same time, but we're gonna have PG and E go first with their project.

So we'll probably go out to bid for the city project to do that work in early two thousand twenty six.

Got it. So then relative to

And just just as a clarification, sorry to interrupt. No. It's All these projects, they they some of them are small that we'll be to, you know, put out any in within a year's time. Some of them are are just getting started. So some of these projects that were included in here are just funding for the, you know, initial assessment and maybe the initial design of the project.

And the design's gonna take, you know, over a year's time, and then, you know, we'll back to city council for funding for that project to fully fund it. So it it may take several years to to get those get these projects that that we've identified in this presentation to be done.

Right. So at this point in time, we wouldn't envision seeing a safe pathway to schools, improvement of the white lines for safety measures along that between 7th And DeLong for this upcoming school year then.

On on Nevada Boulevard?

On Nevada Boulevard between 7th And DeLong.

I apologize. It's okay. I apologize for my hesitation. I am I am not totally familiar with with Novato. I'm I'm still getting up to speed. But I believe that's part of the project. And so that's gonna happen in in '26 at some point.

Got it. Thank you.

Sure. Sure.

Other commissioners have questions for staff? None for me. Do we have any members of the public that are here to speak to this item? Okay. Thank you. May I ask, commissioners are willing, if they don't have other discussion, questions for staff, if we could entertain a motion to approve this item?

I'll move to approve. Second.

Okay. Any discussion? Alright. I'll change the order a little bit. Commissioner Timmins? Aye. Commissioner Steckenbuckerman? Aye. Commissioner Rosh? Aye. Commissioner Derby? Aye. And aye. So the ayes have it. Thank you very much for your report and for your hard work.

Thank you. I appreciate the time.

Take care. Okay. That brings us to our next item, item f two. And we're to come, conduct a hearing to consider adoption of a resolution with respect to the city's climate action plan. And so So

we'll just take a take a moment here to plug in laptops. But this evening, we have Gretchen Schubeck, is the city's sustainability coordinator, who will be presenting the item this evening. And then we also have Christine O'Rourke of O'Rourke and Associates who is a consultant to the city on the climate action plan. And so if you're ready to go, Gretchen, all yours.

Thank you very much. Good evening, commissioners. Very excited to be here this evening. This has been a long process for for myself and Christine. We've been working on this for a couple of years now, bringing draft actions to our community and to our sustainability commission for review before getting to this point.

So just a little bit of background. The climate action plan is currently integrated into general plan 2035. And that was an intentional decision that was made back when the general plan was first being developed. And in most recently in the twenty twenty three, twenty five strategic plan, the city council directed staff to update the cap and to identify priority actions to reduce our local greenhouse gas emissions. Now just for context, the city adopted a climate action plan in 2009, and that plan was used that formed the foundation of what was included in the general plan as it was being developed.

And the general plan wasn't adopted until 2020. Quite a number of things that were in the cap had either been completed or weren't included at all. For example, there was no mention of electric vehicles or building decarbonization, and so those are the things that we have now included. So as I mentioned, it's been a two year process. We entertained the the CAP development at 10 sustainability commission meetings.

We had four community workshops in late twenty twenty three with a total of 81 participants. Most recently, in February, we did a community survey and we had a 161 responses. So the objectives of developing the climate action plan, which which we're referring to as CAP twenty thirty, so it's a five year plan, was to develop a standalone climate action plan to make it more easy to update because the cap was embedded in the general plan. Anytime you wanna make a change, you have to do a general plan amendment. And so by having it as a stand alone document, we can be more flexible and and make changes as we see fit and as technology and funding changes.

The plan is built off the Marine Climate and Energy Partnership's climate action plan template. And so Christine is the coordinator of the Marin Climate Energy Partnership. And so the the CAP that that is in your agenda packet resembles other CAPs that have been developed throughout Marin County. And this has been great for cost efficiencies and also cross county implementation of the measures. The the goal of the CAP is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions consistent with the state goal to reduce emissions 40% below 1990 levels by 2030.

And it's also to identify the most impactful measures that will reduce emissions based on achievable performance metrics and substantial evidence of effectiveness. I think it's important to emphasize that really wanted to make sure it was an action plan and not an aspirational plan that was really important to our sustainability commissioners. Now I'm gonna pass it over to Christine, and she's gonna talk about the components of a climate action plan.

Thank you, Gretchen, and good evening commissioners. So the CAP has these five components. These are the components that are required under CEQA for what we call a qualified climate action plan. That just means that the climate action plan can be used to streamline the cumulative analysis of greenhouse gas emissions for any project that has to undergo CEQA. And then also is just standard industry best practices.

So the first thing we do is we quantify emissions for in the area that's under the city's jurisdiction. And at Marin Climate and Energy Partnership, we actually do these greenhouse gas emissions inventories every year. So we use the 2022 inventory as the baseline for this climate action plan. The next component is to forecast emissions under a business as usual scenario. And for that, we look at population and household and employment forecasts.

And so the forecasts that we use are consistent with the general plan and the most recently adopted housing element as well. The third component is to set a greenhouse gas reduction target. And as Gretchen just said, the sustainability commission decided to use the target that would be consistent with the statewide goal 2030. And then also we're looking at having a plan that has a trajectory to meeting the state goal for 2040, is zero net emissions. And then the next two things, first we identify the state and regional agency actions that will reduce emissions, and then after that, so that's what we call the gap analysis, and then we look at local actions that will help to get us to our target.

So this is kind of a pictorial representation of what I was just talking about. So the blue line is the actual greenhouse gas emissions, which, again, we've been measuring. We've been measuring it since 2005. So by the year 2022, emissions from the Nevada community were 18% below 1990 level. And where we need to go, our target is that green line, is 40% below.

So as you can see, we're actually kind of on the right trajectory. And then the cap target for 2045 is indicated there, that's emissions. And the business as usual forecast is that orange line that's on top. And again, that is taking into account the growth in population and households and employment, which is not much. Next slide.

So we're going to talk, we have a few slides about the state and, well, mostly about the local actions, but I just wanted to give you kind of an overview of the state and regional actions. And altogether, these make up about 45% of the expected greenhouse gas reductions. So the first one is vehicle fuel standards. And so the state has standards to increase fuel efficiency of vehicles and also zero emission vehicles. So as you may know, the state's goal is to have only zero emission passenger vehicles for sale in California by two and thirty five.

There are also the state building code, and every three years, those standards actually ratchet up and and require solar, some electrification measures, and more energy efficient buildings. The state also has passed a ban on the sale of gasoline powered small off road engines. This actually went into effect January 1, and this primarily affects landscape equipment. So if you go into a store now and you wanna buy a leaf blower or a weed whacker or even a lawn mower, they're going to be electric. That's why.

The next one is a requirement for transit agencies and they have to use renewable diesel operating all of their buses and they also have to start purchasing electric buses on a certain schedule. And then finally, the last state action is a requirement, we call this the renewable portfolio standard, and so there has to be a certain amount of electricity, has to come from a certain amount of renewable sources, and the goal there is that by 2045, all of our electricity will be coming from renewable sources. At this point, we have a lot of greenhouse gas free electricity on our grid, and so that's been actually very helpful in reducing emissions. And then the last one is a regional action. It's a regulation that has been passed by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.

And that is going to be, it's a ban on the sale and installation of natural gas heating systems and hot water heaters. And that goes it's it kinda goes in. It's phased in over time. The first part of that will happen in 2027, and so residential hot water heaters will have to be electric. And these are probably will be hot water heat pump hot water heaters because those are much more efficient.

And then it goes the heating systems will be in 2029 and then in 2031, it extends to these hot water heaters for commercial and big multifamily projects. So those are the state and regional ones. And so we're looking, you know, to leverage those and kind of build off of there. Most of the local actions, 75% of the reductions that we have calculated will happen from the local actions come from mobility and land use actions. And it's not really surprising because 64% of the emissions come from the transportation sector.

So it does look like a lot, but but there's a good reason for that. And a lot of these emission reductions are gonna come from zero emission vehicles, but we also have many programs related to alternative and active transportation as well. The next one is materials and waste. And so waste, the emissions come from organic material that's put into the landfill and that creates methane. Some of that gets released into the atmosphere and it's a very potent greenhouse gas.

So that is where those emissions reductions would come from. And then the last one or the the next one, is buildings and energy at 12%. So as I said, our electricity is very, clean at this point. So most of these reductions are gonna come from switching to our natural gas appliances to ones that use electricity because it's a much cleaner fuel. So and so at this point, Gretchen's going to give you some high level a high level overview of the local actions that are in the CAP.

So so the climate action plan 2030 was attached with your agenda. I'm sure you read it cover to cover and were riveted. I'm teasing. But I do want to point out that there were there are six focus areas that we really drilled into when we were developing the plan. They are mobility and land use, buildings and energy, waste and materials, natural systems and sequestration, community engagement, and also implementation and monitoring.

And so the first four that I mentioned are really where the bulk of the emissions are gonna come from. And as Christine, as you saw on the slide before, the vast majority of those emissions reductions are gonna come from the mobility and land use focus area. And so we have a big focus on zero emission vehicles, and we've been working really hard to get charging stations in town so people can get rid of range anxiety. There's permitted streamlined permitting already for for electric vehicles. Big emphasis on active transportation and school related travel.

You mentioned the safe routes to schools programs and having more multiuse paths and more protected bike lanes so that people feel safe increasing public transportation ridership, and working with local businesses around increasing their employee trip reduction programs. There are some there's some legislation through the air district around businesses that have more than 50 employees. And so part of that is just partnering with the air district to make sure that people know about the programs that are available and that they're they're complying. There's some traffic system management programs that we can look at and also reducing vehicle idling. And then obviously, growing smartly, making sure that that we are making the best use of the land that we do have available for development.

In the buildings and energy section, we you know, big emphasis on renewable energy generation, but also storage. So making sure that that battery storage is is being promoted as a great alternative to to islanding if you do have solar. Emphasis on clean electricity. I mentioned building electrification is not even included in the general plan as it was written. Obviously, conservation is really important and one of the first things you wanna actually look at before you make big investments in your home or your business.

There's actions around energy auditing, streamline permitting, and obviously, green building and water conservation. Materials and waste is another important section, and I it's about 13% of the emissions that were emissions reduction we're projecting. And it is important to note that there's a pretty aggressive state law, SB thirteen eighty three, that is around organic waste diversion, and so there's actually a compost law that that requires people to separate out the food waste and green waste because it is such a potent greenhouse gas when it gets in our landfill and starts to decompose. And so working really closely with Nevada Sanitary District to implement programs to to increase waste diversion, but also really to educate people around plastic pollution, single use plastic disposable items, and the effect they have on our our environment. Natural and urban environment, so more trees, more healthy trees, more healthy soils, looking at water conservation and recycled water, catching rainwater and graywater to reduce water potable water use, and then zero emission landscape and small off road equipment.

And I mentioned there are there are four other sorry. Two other CAP sections. One is around community engagement, and this is a big focus on educating our community about the steps that they can take as individuals. One thing we didn't mention is that the the inventories that we've been doing since 2005 really clearly point out the vast majority of local greenhouse gas emissions are generated from our community. They're not through the, you

know,

city operations. And so it's gonna be really important for us to empower our community, educate our community, help them to understand the steps that they can take to to mitigate climate change. And then we also have the last section is on implementation and monitoring, so really paying close attention to how things are tracking, course correcting if needed, and then updating the climate action plan. I think it's important to point out that one of the benefits of of having a stand alone cap and having more flexibility to update the plan is that things are changing so rapidly now, not just in terms of technology, but in terms of funding availability. We had a lot of funding.

We don't think there's gonna be a lot of funding for some of this work. There's currently a protest, I guess, on the California waiver around the electric vehicle mandate for 2035. So it's gonna be really important for us to have that flexibility built in to our plan so that we can course correct if necessary in order to reach the the state goal.

Okay. So in addition to the climate action plan, there are a couple of other documents in your meeting packet. One of the things we need to do is an amendment to the general plan, specifically the environmental stewardess stewardship chapter. And so we took the opportunity to update the narrative so it's reflecting the 2022 greenhouse gas emissions, and it's giving a very brief overview of the latest CAP and the the greenhouse gas reduction targets. And then we also revised some of the policies and programs because, first of all, we wanted to reference document and talk about updating the climate action plan.

And then some of the policies and actions we wanted to update in order to align them better with the CAP 2030. The meeting packet, it had said in your meeting packet as the attachment to the resolution that it was in underline and strikeout, but when it was converted, the Word document, which was done into RAC changes, was converted to a PDF, it accepted the changes, so it's not showing up like that for you. If you are interested, we do have the slides with the policies and actions in underline and strikeout if there's anything in particular that you wanna look at and you wanna understand what specifically was changed.

The other Just really quickly, I wanna point out that what you have in your packet is the final version.

Yeah, it is the final version and it's correct. In addition, we're going to be repealing appendix E. So appendix E in the general plan is all of the calculations and a lot more specific detail about the programs to implement. It is kind of the heart of the climate action plan. And so repealing that appendix and no longer referring to it and referring to the climate action plan, that kind of an appendix E is now in the appendix to the climate action plan.

So it's just no longer necessary. The other document is the addendum to the general plan EIR. And the addendum finds that there's no new significant environmental impacts or increase in severity of previously identified significant impacts. And so therefore, the previously certified EIR is adequate. It just means that we don't have to do an additional environmental impact analysis or other documents.

We're just having you recommend to the city council to adopt the addendum. So tonight there are two resolutions before you. One is to, and again, this is to recommend the city council to, one, approve an addendum to the general plan 2035 environmental impact report. And then the other resolution recommends that the city council adopt climate action plan 2030 and amend the environmental stewardship chapter and repeal appendix e of the general plan 2035. And with that, Gretchen and I are happy to answer any questions that you may have.

Okay. Who's questions? Commissioner Gerbe. I'll start.

So when you looked at all the state and the regional actions being taken, was it determined that there's no way we can achieve some of the state's goals without taking our own Novato dictated actions?

Yeah, that's correct. And one of the things too about like the emission factors that the California Air Resources Board provides us for calculating transportation emissions, it assumes a rate of electric vehicle adoption that's actually pretty low, and we're we're like achieving we're much higher than that, and we're much higher than the the state averages, so we wanted to take advantage of that. And then some of the other things like the waste, even though it's a state law, the SB thirteen eighty three, it is it's necessary for the city itself to implement that and the Nevada Sanitary District, the the waste agencies to implement it. So there are some things that yes, we have to we have to achieve through through local action and we can't just rely on state action.

Can you give an example of when skimming through it and there was a lot in there and I appreciate by the way that this is a large document and I appreciate what you guys are doing and it was asked for by the general plan so I understand why it was done. Can you give a good example of an action at least in the land use section versus you made the action versus aspirational. I'll be honest a lot of the bullet points I looked at felt a little aspirational and we should do this and we will work with so and so and we will consider this. And I get that that's kind of a general plan in a nutshell but I'm curious. I'm I'm most interested in actual actions that this will, that approving a document like this will see to fruition.

Sure. So when you're, we're talking about land use, some of the way we calculate the emissions, there's guidance, there's a document that's called the CAPCOA document. And for when you have transit oriented development, affordable housing, there are methodologies to calculate emissions reductions that are going to occur. And so we used that, we looked at the housing element sites and the ones that are located near transit and, you know, like the smart stations and the frequent bus stops as well that have frequent service and the number of housing units that will be built there, and also the percentage of affordable units that will be in those in those developments. So that lends itself to emissions reductions.

So that that's an example of of how land use reduces As

far as an action goes though, it's more of it's you're you're measuring that but are we in approving something like this, is it now allowing that project to move forward? Is it allowing it to calculate its GHG emissions differently? I'm just curious what what is it doing?

Yeah. It's it's just taking it's basically we're taking credit for, you know the emissions reduction that's going to happen. It's not an approval for for that development. And

yeah. To to kind of piggyback off of that, I'm curious. Is there nothing in here is acting as sort of an ordinance or something we're now not allowed to do or have to do in that case.

No. And I just you know, I do wanna appreciate you with sort of sometimes the willy nilly language that we had to that we ended up with around the consider this, explore that. You know, that really is to give us some flexibility as things potentially change over time. And, you know, ultimately, the council, when they entertain the climate action plan at their public hearing, I'm sure there will be questions about the ramifications of some of the some of the actions that we've identified in there.

Like for instance, the tree, know, we're gonna you know conserve all trees and we should have a whole plan and all that sounded like we should do this and we will Steve, maybe you can speak to this. Would an ordinance come forward that would tie into that? Or would we a project come forward and someone wants to cut down a tree and they go, well, actually, it doesn't comply with our cap.

It depends on how you wanna implement it. You could certainly use the cap. It's referenced in the general plan and in the hierarchy of plans, general plan is is the king. So you can certainly reach back to that. There may be a desire for an ordinance, so many projects we see are now housing projects, and most of those are subject only to objective standards, so you would want a measurable criteria in an ordinance to represent what the city's expectation is for tree removal.

So say, for example, let's say the cap policy is to preserve all trees. We know that that's a laudable goal, but it may not happen within the context of a housing project where tree removal could be allowed. So you would want a policy or an ordinance that would say something along, if you remove a tree, you're gonna replace it with x number of trees. So something that objective and that defined. Is this enforcing though that

the council and commission, maybe designer view, are gonna need to come up with policies such

as this or is this I think it depends again on implementation. If we're going down the path of an ordinance that ends up in zoning, that certainly comes back to Planning Commission for recommendation to the council. So I haven't gone through. I think there's work going on a draft implementation plan that's going to follow this effort, and I think at that point we'll be deciding, okay, what does that look like? What's the work effort involved? What's the ultimate product? What's the timing of that? So feel free to correct me if I'm No, that's correct.

I'm just concerned again some of my questions are in looking through the full cap there's a few things I don't fully agree with. Know just and I would be concerned about how they were implemented and I think they could actually deter from other goals within our general plan. But not all of them. So there's some great stuff in there. I'm just curious how what I'm supposed to vote on if don't agree with what is a very large breadth of work here? And again, you for putting something like that together.

One way to think about this is general plans are intended to be internally consistent. But oftentimes there's a balancing between perhaps competing policies, and you'll find that through the public process with the commission or the council, you start to figure out how a policy should be implemented and which one's given greater weight, which one may be applied in a different context. So even if there's something that isn't necessarily what you like in this report, there may be a subsequent action where you get to shape how that balance works out. So an ordinance that comes back, a program that's implemented, they could certainly end up back here at the commission, depending upon what's involved. Certainly ordinances affecting zoning definitely come back here.

There may be other programs that don't.

Okay. Those are my questions. Thank you.

Okay. Other commissioner? Commissioner Tierney?

Tom, so I heard I'm seeking a little bit of clarification, guess. I had heard, I think, Gretchen say that because it's part of the general plan that the cap needs to go through, if there's any modifications, it needs to be a general plan amendment. But then I think I just saw something that says that there's a resolution that says this will be a standalone. So what is it? It's no longer part of the general plan?

Right. Right. Where the general plan itself will no longer be the climate action plan. Climate action plan is a separate document.

Yeah. So I can also clarify. So when when the general plan was being developed

Mhmm.

The decision was made to embed climate the the climate action plan from 2009 into the document. And what we're doing now is creating a standalone document that has that can be more flexible and updated more frequently, and it is consistent with what's in the general plan currently. But the general plan will no longer serve as the city's climate action plan. So currently, general plan 2035 serves as the city's climate action plan. And so this this creation of a standalone document will will mean that that is our new our new climate action plan. Mhmm.

I would also say that most most cities and towns have a stand alone climate action plan. Mill Valley also had their climate action plan integrated into their general plan, and I just was working with them, and they actually, it was about last year, took their climate action plan out of the out of the general plan and adopted a stand alone climate action plan as well. It's just it it ends up being a lot easier to, again, to update it in the future.

Okay. So perhaps you can enlighten me. What makes it so much easier?

Because you don't we don't have to go through a a general plan amendment process So like we're doing

public hearings.

Like we're doing now. No. It's not that there it was there would still when the general plan when the climate action plan is updated, it would still be a it would done be done in a public process as well as this one was.

Okay. I guess that that does answer. And I wanna say compliments that or at least for the whatever views is that we're getting more and more clean electricity, and that it does appear that the mobility is going in the right direction. And I'm sure a lot of that has to do with the pandemic, that so many people stayed home and the freeways were empty. My guess is that that's gone out the window. I mean, now that people are going back into the office, when I go on that highway, it's bad or worse, at least two days a week. Are we is that getting monitored by the Bay Area Air Quality Control Board? Who who keeps track of what's really being put into the air?

Yeah. That's that's a really good question. So with transportation, there's a model that's updated every few years where they do a regional transportation plan. It's basically when when the housing element, the re the regional housing needs allocation is done. And they do this model for the county and it's actually for the entire Bay Area and they update it then.

So and then they use that, they see what's actually happening on the ground, and then they make estimates or projections about what transportation patterns are going to be over the next few years. So the data that we use for transportation, it does come from this model, and it doesn't really very it doesn't show, like for example, the impacts of the pandemic. When it's updated, it will they'll set a new baseline. So it's not it'd be great if we could have, you know, real time data that reflected what was actually happening. We do have other ways.

I mean, there are other studies that have been done. There clearly was a reduction in VMT from the pandemic. We also see it in, like, the census. They have questions around commuting. And we see that you know, stay at work at home has gone way up where the other ways of commuting, you know, single passenger vehicles went down, stay at home work went up. And that persisted over a few years, but I think at this point, a lot of the companies are requiring people to come back to work even maybe it's, you know, two days a week or three days a week, and we'll see how that that plays out.

Yeah. I think getting some real time measurements of actually what's going into the air would make a lot of sense instead of theoretically guessing because it's it's horrible out there. And I've been led to believe that actually a lot of improvements to the air quality got diminished through wildfires, that all the stuff that was being put into the air from the the forest fires eliminated a whole lot of that effort to reduce Is that accurate?

Well, that is absolutely true. In the world of calculating emissions because that is a natural process, there's always been fires, we we don't we're more concerned with anthropogenic emissions. So the emissions that are coming from the fossil fuels essentially that we're burning.

Mhmm. Mhmm. Thank you. Alright.

Commissioner Steubenberger. Sure.

Thank you.

Yeah. Thank

you. Good questions, everybody. Thank you. So basically the idea here is that we're moving away broad macro here. We're moving away from natural gas, going into electricity as though we are moving away from coal, going into oil, from oil to natural gas, and now into electricity. And this is this is how we create these efficiencies. So I'm I'm working towards making that segue. You know? So that's interesting. Then I've always thought of as the comprehensive plan or your master plan, you're pulling the climate aspect of it out for flexibility is what's happening here, so you can move more easily.

Yeah. And and also the climate action plan has way more detail in it than we can put in a general plan. That's that's really the other thing.

And also, can I just add quickly as well? The general plan is a weighty tome and it doesn't necessarily resonate for every person, whereas a climate action plan has a different, you know, a different feeling to it. It's it's about climate only. It's not about a whole range of of issues. So it's more I'd like to think it's more user friendly for for our for the public.

Is appendix e part of the climate action plan or is it the climate action

Essentially, is the climate action plan. Okay. Yeah.

Got it. And then we talked about smart growth. It was noted. What is smart growth, and how do we see that happening? And also, it would be as just a bit of a sidebar, it would be very interesting to see how the emissions change North of Atherton once the freeway is completed. And if there is any possible significant changes, that that's interesting. You know, it's a legitimate idea to pursue maybe. Mhmm. Mhmm. But you talked about an urban forest. When we talk about urban forest, without going too far into the weeds, are we talking about we simply plant the tree, or do we come back in a year? Or two, to ensure that this urban forest that we're identifying as a metric Mhmm. Is actually viable and still alive?

Yeah. Well, that's a very good question. And there is actually a policy or a program in the in the general plan around a tree management program. And that is part of the intent of that is exactly what you're talking about is are these trees healthy? Are they surviving? Doesn't talk specifically about carbon sequestration from those trees, but that is something that we would wanna look at as part of the climate action plan. You know, are these trees thriving? Are they giving us the environmental services that we expected?

Right. Exactly. And then along with that, when you're mentioning smart growth, what I'm identifying in my brain as this is a manifestation of that are the townhomes that were built just south of the Birkenstock Complex. That would be identified as one of those metrics. And then

I'm not sure if that's half is that within a half a mile of the smart station? I think it might be further away then.

Oh, okay.

It's further. Yeah.

So then with the fireman fund potential idea, that would be an identifier. That would have a greater concentration closer to the closer to the tracks. That would have affordable housing closer to the tracks and more detached further out upon the hill.

Right. Yes. And that would and we did include the fireman's fund redevelopment in our calculations.

Got it. Thank you. Mhmm.

Okay. Thank you, commissioners. One thing I I wanted to just mention is that and ask the staff to comment on one of the items. We had received, at least as of this afternoon, three different emails that have been recently submitted by members of the public. One of whom I think is here to speak tonight and will call on you in just a couple of minutes.

But I don't remember the detail, but one of the concerns that was raised in one of the emails was that it cited an example of a relatively recently permitted project that made some references to requirements to preserve and then replant trees etcetera. Then it was the observation of this Navado resident that that the city didn't seem to have the ability to follow through on seeing to it that those requirements were met. Does that question make sense? Can you

So that was a comment about the henhouse brewing project. The commission may recall that particular project had a housing component that was planned on the upper floor, and the owners of that property decided not to advance that particular aspect of the project. It was that aspect of the project that required modifications to the parking lot, which would have included new landscaping and trees. So since that component did not go forward, the city could not require the owners to make those improvements to the parking lot for the commercial business. Nothing was let go to my knowledge on that project.

It was the fact that there were two different sets of standards in play there. One set for the residential component and then a different set for the commercial component.

Thank you. That's interesting. That's kind an of example when I think of some of the other things that are aspirational versus actionable that we aspire to requiring that, but if it's not complete in terms of the scope of the project, ultimately that doesn't follow. Okay. Okay. I think at this point we'd like to open the hearing up for public comment and we do have one card. Ms. Valentine. Is

it on? Yes, now.

Thank you. Good evening, planning commissioners and staff. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Silke Valentine. I have been a resident of Nevada for over a decade.

I'm a mother, a grandmother, and very concerned about our climate breakdown. I'm the steering committee of three fifty Marin, a grassroot organization. We all know by now that human caused climate change is an existential threat. Extreme weather events such as fast moving fires, atmospheric rivers, record floodings, or prolonged regional droughts are becoming increasingly common. The ten hottest years on record are in the last decade.

Due to burning fossil fuels, the concentration of carbon and other heat trapping greenhouse gases in our atmosphere is still rising globally. The only hope I have is our state and local policy, which moves in the right directions, boldly and swiftly away from burning fossil fuels towards clean and green energy consumptions. It was great that the Navato acknowledged the climate crisis and declared a climate emergency five years ago in 2020. So sustainability commission was established in 2022. Thanks to the great work of our sustainability program coordinator, Kretchen Schubeck and the climate conscious volunteers.

I attended many of the sustainability commission meetings and it was exciting to witness and participate in the development of the updated cap 2030 during the last two years. Kretchen Schubert, sustainability commission, public agencies, nonprofit partners, and community members, we all work closely together. It was a great process and a true team effort. Now the cap twenty thirty is on your desk. Adopting the draft resolution and recommending them to the city council is essential for our sustainability here in Novato.

I have to turn. I want to urge you, please approve the city of Nevada Climate Action Plan draft 2030 and approve the text amendments to the environmental chapter and repeal appendix E of GP 2,035. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Well, okay, here we are.

Our we've got some good discussion. I believe some good questions. Always, the staff has been very comprehensive presentation addressing questions. Are we in a position where we entertain motions and if necessary we can create this out of

individual conclusions? I might want to say something just because I'd like to give some context to what I think will be a minority vote here. I just wanna say. So I'm very very supportive of every day I live in my job of state and regional environmental code that's constantly coming down and I think they do a terrific job and I respect many of the PhDs and experts that lead a lot of that change. Very supportive of it.

I however do have some concerns about making decisions on a more local level trying to again I'm not trying to say we're doing this here but in many instances we're always trying to one up the state, push a little further, have a little bit more conservation focus than the next city over. It's just something I've noticed in many cities and I'm not saying that's necessarily what's happening here. I think this document is very well intentioned. I was thinking CEQA is very well intentioned, but often CEQA is used against projects in a form of nimbyism. And again, I'm not saying in any way that this plan is trying to do that, but I do think that this plan could lead to more no's, more projects, more excuses to stop projects, concerned about trees, etcetera.

There are parts of this gap I'm very supportive of. I think all of the measurement is fantastic. I think waste and number of other items are great. I think recommendations of what city ought to do is great and I like the flexibility you're going for. And again, I think I'll be in minority here.

So I did wanna say I like that we're at least this is being pulled out as a separate plan. I do think the city has a sort of a an excitement for more and more plans and one of my biggest pet peeves is I've been on the commission for ten years is just seeing how many layers of plans and rules that we continue to put onto our city and every project that moves forward. Again, it's just that's why I'm gonna be a no tonight. But I wanna let you know that again I very much appreciate you were asked to do this by council and I'm not a council member. There it is. Thank you.

Thank you commissioner. Other other comments? Suggestions about a possible motion?

Well, if you're prepared to take motions, we have four different resolutions before us. I would move resolution number one, the CEQA addendum to the general plan.

Can we get a second for that? Alright. Any commentary? Any

suggestions? No. Makes perfect sense to

me that we attempt on a local level to try and address what we can address.

It's I think a real blindside at a lot of levels of government about what's actually happening out in our environment, and we only have, as far as I'm concerned, plan a, and that's this planet. So I'm in favor of whatever incremental efforts we can do to try and improve it. I hear precisely what Commissioner Derby is saying that more layers of more regulations make things more challenging. I don't see that here, but so anyhow, that's I think that's I can support moving forward with all these resolutions, and we'll start with one.

Alright, so unless there's a consideration to make any kind of amendments to this, I'll move for a vote Commissioner on Tiernan's resolution. Commissioner Derby?

Nay.

Commissioner Roche? Aye. Commissioner Steukenberger? Aye. Commissioner Tiernan? Aye. And aye for me. So we have four, so that one will pass. Four ayes and one nay.

I would move approval of the attachment number two, the resolution for the cap 2030 adoption and general plan 2035 amendments.

Alright. Further discussion, and I and I too, I understand. I'm a retiree now, but as an architect practicing the state for decades, the list of hurdles and new and different things to comply with is seemingly endless and ever bigger. It's not a pro development and in some ways it gets it in in its own way by just the sheer volume of that. But anyway. Alright. Yep.

I I can add to that too. Before I moved out to Nevada, I'm from the Midwest, and we had four basic commissions. And I moved out here, and we have many more than four basic commissions. And I am very much a yimbi, not a nimbi. And I'm fundamentally aware that the population of California has stagnated at 40,000,000 for the past decade. Now that could be a good thing or a bad thing. But I know what I'd like to see. I'd and this is total against sidebar. I'll take the I'd like to see some more fair housing in Tiburon. I'd like to see some more fair housing in Mill Valley.

I drive up and down the 101, and it looks like 1974 when I'm driving across the country because nothing has happened. So I'm all for stuff happening, and I'm also going to intuitively trust that you three over there know that, and we're not gonna throw out more red tape. Because if we get more red tape, we don't get more business. If we don't have get if we don't get more business, we don't have people that wanna live here, and we want people to live here. This is a desirable community, and the business partners are are are the key component to making this work. With that pomposity, I

am in favor of this.

Well said. Commissioner Crockett, before you call vote, did we get a second on commissioner Ternan's motion?

I don't believe we did.

A second? Sure.

K. Thank you. Alright. I'll run through the same order. Commissioner Durbin? Nay. Commissioner Roche? Aye. Commissioner Stockerbroker?

Aye.

Commissioner Ternan?

Aye.

And I will vote aye as well. Also a Midwesterner. I don't if the city council's aware of what they've done to this. Thank you for that. And then are there other resolutions we

can There is. There's a third one and this would be the draft climate action plan

Okay.

In 2030. So this is in advance of

That was captured in the second resolution. Just two resolutions.

So attachment, although it says number four, the third resolution would be the CEQA addendum to the general plan 2035 EIR.

That's always attachment number one.

Sold. Let's call it a night. We're good. They bookended this in a way that we Okay.

That's that's okay with me.

Alright. Well, thank you for that. And let's see. Are there other items of general business or committee and liaison reports from Citi?

So no general business items this evening. In terms of a liaison report, just wanna note the commission's next scheduled hearing is June 9, and we are supposed to have an SB nine ordinance. And so just for a little bit of background SMI is? SB nine is a housing bill. It's been amended by the state effective earlier this year, so we're modifying our ordinance to comply with state law.

So we'll be bringing that back to the commission here in June, and he'll be making a recommendation to the council on that. And if you need more detail, it's basically what they call the duplex law. So it allows single family properties to be developed with up to two units apiece.

Commissioner One of

the things that really do like getting is the project report.

Mhmm.

You know, what the current projects that are under process and all like that. I noticed that there's a number of lot splits. Yes. Is that related to this SB nine?

That is correct. So SB nine has two components. One is constructing or converting a site into two units or subdividing a property with what's called an urban lot split. So you could take your existing single family property, divide it in two, and potentially build two units on each property.

Mhmm. And I think that the previous report I had seen, which was two or three months ago, had one on Clausing.

That's correct. That one was approved.

But it didn't seem to reflect in the new one?

No. Once the projects are approved, they can either move into the there's section at the bottom for approved projects. I believe that one is still there. Sometimes the projects are small enough, we let them sit on the list for a month, and then we take them off.

Uh-huh. Yeah. Because I went by Clausing. I was very curious to see is it an empty lot that they're just splitting, or is it an existing home, or whatever? And it's a pretty good sized lot. It's a corner a lot.

Right? It's an existing home, and there would be one SB nine unit added to the property and two ADUs. So a total of four units on that property.

Mhmm. So when you're talking about something like this, are you talking about keeping the original cement footprint?

No. This most of this would be new development, so expanding footprint.

In addition to the existing structure. A new home and then two other accessory units.

Ah, okay. Yeah, so when we write the staff report for that item, we'll have a full background on SB nine, we'll have a section on the changes that occurred to it, and then we'll have a red line and strike version of our zoning code or excuse me, we won't have a red line and strike version because we've been operating under an urgency ordinance. So you will have a whole new ordinance to review.

And do you I I would expect we'll see more of those lot splits.

Mhmm. Yeah. They're becoming more popular.

Uh-huh. And and part of the issue is there's no parking required.

The one question I'm not fully ready to answer. I'd have to go back and look at the statute.

And because we meet someone frequently, it gets murky as well, but I believe that there was also an element, and I don't know if it's SB nine, to be able to put things in front yards.

That's part of ADU law. That if there isn't an option to get a what we'll call a state default well, I should say there's two separate things there. There what we call the state exemption ADUs, which aren't subject to any local requirements. Those can go into a front yard setback, and then you have a situation where it's possible that an ADU can go into a front yard setback if there's no other option to conform to the other setbacks.

Yeah. Because I think part of

the as I recall, part of

the the premise behind it was that, gee, people need backyard so the kids have some place to play, so the front yard can be sacrificed for, you know

Yeah.

I don't know that the legislature was so explicit in that. I know we had somebody who wrote a comment letter that expressed some ideas as to why the legislature wasn't preserving a front yard setback. So I haven't seen anything in the legislative record that would indicate clearly why.

Yeah. And you're saying it exempt. So even if we put an objectionable or Yeah. An objective standard. It wouldn't It wouldn't apply. It wouldn't cover. I see. Okay. Fireman's Fun update.

Fireman's Fun update, they are still working on their demolition permit Still, this is being a bit. Component. Minneapolis. And actually just spoke to their representatives today, so that seems to be moving forward. They're talking about future projects, so they have to come in and get a design review for each of the different areas, so they're looking for development partners as I understand it, and that's where it stands right now.

Thank you.

Any other questions or Alright, with that, we'll call the meeting to close. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. And again.