Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

I'm calling the planning commission meeting to order. We have at 06:02 could we have a roll call please?

Chair Murphy? Here. Vice Chair Chesley?

Here.

Commissioner Reich Smith? Here. Commissioner Steward?

Here.

Commissioner Hanson?

Here. Before

we begin tonight, I would like to take a moment to welcome Bruce Hansen to our commission. This is his first meeting and we are very, very glad to have

you

aboard. Would you like to tell us just a brief bio?

Well, I am a retired business professor, so that's dangerous to but I taught at Pepperdine here locally at the Grazerio Business School and so that's been the latter part of my career. Moved in a number of places and recently retired here in 2019 and in Ojai. So I traveled in to Ojai frequently before that even had my card to Cortana Library. But before that, my first career is a neighborhood planner in Saint Paul, Minnesota. I had a master's in planning and urban studies there and also studied in University of Aston in Birmingham, England.

And so that was the is in neighborhood and housing are the two areas. Housing was with Metropolitan Council and Como Park District was my where I lived was my area. So it's nice to get back to that. I've been interested in a lot of those things wherever I have been. So but as a demographer for a long time in corporate life in the middle.

I think otherwise, my main interest right now is has to do with sustainability. I'm inspired by the Chumash who lived here for ten thousand years and with 30,000 people stretched out and in harmony and abundance and they didn't overtax the resource so it's inspiring and so I think there's something to learn there but otherwise very interested love living here and really want to figure out how to help the Ojai be sustainable and live healthy healthy and happy in the future.

Thank you, Bruce. We welcome you and your experience. Brad, would you like to lead us in the pledge, please? Thank you. Do we have approval of the agenda?

There No any recommended changes.

No changes. Okay. Thank you. Then it's time for public communications. And I have one card for public communications. Mr. Wyrick or? I have number

one on there.

Number one. Public communication. Oh, you want?

Agenda item one.

Agenda item one. Okay. Sorry. Okay. Is there anyone else who has a public comment that is about something that is not on our agenda tonight? But bring up a card if you got one. Okay, no one here. How about online? No. Okay. Closing public hearing. Okay.

At this point, I am sad to tell our audience that we are going into closed session.

I don't know how long that will take but we will be back here to proceed with the rest of the agenda as soon as we can. Thank you. Anything else Lucas?

Also for the closed session Commissioner Stewart you will need to recuse as you will be recusing from what I understand for the first item. Correct?

Yes. So I'll just move to the audience. Correct. Just moving

to If another you could state the recusal, I mean, terms of what the the reason is for the recusal.

Yes. I am going to recuse myself from all matters related to OMF due to potential business relationship.

Financial interest? Yes. Okay, understood.

We're going slowly so that Mara has a moment. Is Tony here? Pardon me. Is Tony here? Join

is he?

We're waiting for one more person. It should be soon. Okay, our closed session has been concluded and we are moving on to disclosure of site visits.

Chair, yeah, hold on chair.

I just I wanted to report that we conveyed information related to potential anticipated litigation to the commission, no reportable action was taken.

You need to go away.

Elsewhere? Yes.

Commissioner Stewart, this is where you

Depart. Correct. He has a personal financial interest. So we are now on disclosure of sites and ex parte contacts. Katrina?

I went by the backside of Ohio Mountain Farm item one. No ex parte contacts.

Okay. Jonathan?

No ex parte contacts. Yes, I walked back there as well.

Bruce?

Commissioner Hansen, is your microphone on? There you go. Just make sure you hit that button. There you

go. Yes, I walked around in the back in the patio and that's all just looking around.

Okay. The same here. I have visited the site again and had no ex parte contacts. So we are now opening the public hearing on item one, the design review permit DRP 20 six-three and conditional use permit CUP 20 six-three. Could the staff please give us

your report? Yes. Thank you, chair and commissioners. My name is Maura Macaluso. I'm your principal planner.

The project located at 242 East Ohio Avenue is proposed modification of existing outdoor dining. And you just labeled the discretionary permits which is a conditional use permit number 26003 and design review permit number 26003. So the outdoor dining history within the Arcade Plaza includes the original approval for 242 East Ohio Avenue through a director back in 2007. This is one of seven approved permits. The outdoor dining permits range from two fifty square feet in size that would be Sam's Place to approximately a little over 1,200 square feet in size for magic hour.

The existing approval for 242 East Ohio was for three sixty square feet and at the time there were six tables and 24 chairs approved for the outdoor dining. The first approval for outdoor dining in the RK Plaza was for Rainbow Bridge back in 1997 and the most recent approval was for Bonnie Luz in 2022. An outdoor dining approval requires an encroachment permit through the public works department And the community development department has relatively recently shifted to a proactive code compliance system and where compliance review used to be through public works for the Arcade Plaza area, future compliance is going to be conducted through community development.

If I could just jump in. On this piece before we go, before we jump to the next slide, you see the context and the history dating back to 1997. That's really when the ordinance came online. So this is really the first the Rainbow Bridge is really the first outdoor dining permit that you that's out there even today. The standard still exists today.

And with that process there was established the requirement for an encroachment permit. That encroachment permit is required to be renewed every year. Out of the seven that we currently have within the Arcade Plaza, mind you there are other ones outside of the Arcade Plaza, so we're only focusing on the Arcade Plaza, there are seven. None of them have an active encroachment permit. So we're actually working through getting them into compliance by today's standards. Just want to make you aware of that. Included with that in that is what was previous business, Osterio Grappa? Monte Grappa.

Monte Grappa.

Osterio Monte Grappa, thank you. And still continuing is the Ojai Mountain Farm, but they are have already identified that they are willing to go through that Encouragement Permit process. But just know that they are will have to be consistent with the rest of them which we're working on getting the rest of those up to speed with current standards. And when I say we, I mean community development with co compliance and then working with public works.

The next slide is a location map. So here you see pretty much in the middle of the arcade is 242 East Ohio Avenue. The restaurant fronts onto East Ohio Avenue. The zone designation is general commercial, that's C1, and the general land use designation is downtown commercial. That would be DC.

This slide here is the it's a

little

bit hard to see, but in your packet and also on the screen, it's the existing outdoor dining conditional use permit, it's in red. And Lucas is going to go through with the cursor to show you the outline of the originally approved in 'seven approximately three sixty square feet and what that comprised of as he goes along there with the cursor, if you can see that, and I believe that in your packet it should be in red. And so in the next slide, that line remains. However, you can see here that although the entire area is proposed to be well, let's say the entire outdoor patio areas is proposed to increase to 600 square feet, but the dining area specifically is to remain at 360 square feet. And that's indicated by the dark line that the director now is going to follow on the screen for you, and it's a dark line in your your packets.

So the 600 square feet includes the pedestrian path and the screened area where the freezer is. The dining area specifically is 300, approximately 360 square feet.

Thank you. Where are the restrooms at in the house?

The restrooms would be in the upper left or to to the to the left. See the there's an existing tree there? Yeah. To the left. So in the next slide, we have a proposed roof plan.

So this is a proposed roof plan, however, all of the equipment is existing. The equipment is labeled as number one, and so all those boxes are labeled number one. Number three is an existing parapet which is approximately two feet two and a half feet high. And then number two is a proposed screen that it is proposed to visually camouflage the equipment but also dampen the noise from the equipment. And the screen is approximately five feet high, so it will extend approximately two and a half feet above that parapet.

The director and I visited the site a couple of times, and we went there before business hours and also during business hours with a sound or noise measuring device, which is right here. And the decibel measure the decibels measured during business hours or before business hours were approximately 58 dBs and during business hours in the middle of the day around noon were about 62 dBs. And both of these measurements are below the maximum in the C1 zone which is 65. So during the day or in the middle of the day obviously the noise were people walking and talking and there was actually a little bit of music playing subject site.

Oh,

and there was construction nearby, yeah, hammering. Well, and actually that hammering was happening in the morning hours when we measured it at 58 dB. So the next slide, thank you. This is the proposed outdoor dining elevations. So the top top elevation there is the west elevation, so that's facing east.

The second one is the east elevation, so it's facing west. And the third is the north elevation, so facing south. The elevation includes all of these elevations include the existing freezer and screen and also the proposed 2.5 foot high steel fence and also an umbrella that stands approximately 11.5 feet in height, and it is a 16 and a half foot square umbrella. It's made of forest green Sunbrella fabric. And the fabric the fabric color and then the fabric itself meet the Arcade Plaza design guidelines as Seth feels that the fence and the the umbrella do as well.

As you can see through and it's an open area, however, you know, somewhat private for the for the guests. The fence, if I didn't already mention it, it's it's a solid steel and it includes planters. You can see the screen here for the, for the freezer, and I think I'm gonna describe that a little bit more on on another slide. So the next slide shows you the existing, their existing photos of the site, and they're from looking west, looking south, and looking east just like the plans, just like the elevations that you just saw. But this is what's actually existing today.

In the looking east or actually in all of them, can see the existing screen which is approximately six feet high and the freezer at approximately eight feet above that. The next slide is another screen material. So the applicant is considering raising the height of the screen to eight feet because the arcade plaza design guidelines what would conform to the guidelines would be a screen that is the height of the equipment that it's screening. And the applicant is considering this, potentially this material which is an overlap lap screen to replace the existing wood screen and it would be painted to match, the existing color of the furniture out there and and the existing screen. It's a lightweight design and it would the existing posts would be used and this would this is proposed to not, impact the existing oak tree any further than it's potentially been impact.

So there are key conditions of approval in your resolution. Well, let's let's start over. You have a you have a draft resolution in your packet, and the resolution includes conditions of approval. And I called out just two conditions of approval here in this slide in these slides for you because they're they kinda stand out. One is that if there is discontinued use of a restaurant for a period of six months, then the freezer shall be removed by the property owner of 242 East Ohio Avenue.

And then the other one is required if there is required maintenance and repair of the freezer that the at the property owner's expense and within thirty days of the diagnosis, the freezer would be repaired. If it needs to be replaced, then it would need to be replaced within the building walls within thirty days. And again, all expenses accrued by the property owner of 242 East Ohio Avenue. And the reason I want to make make it clear that it's the property owner of 242 is because the the property owner ultimately has to sign off on the conditions of approval. So and the next slide has to do with CEQA, California Environmental Quality Act.

Every project is reviewed pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act. And for this project, the director has identified three exemptions, categorical exemptions. They're in your packet. They're in the staff report as well as the resolution and they include section fifteen three zero one e one which includes minor alterations of existing public and private facilities and that in this case would be the outdoor dining area. Section fifteen three zero three e, that's construction and location of small facilities or structures and those would be the walk in freezer, the screen and, bless you, and the umbrella.

And section fifteen three eleven, which is construction and placement of minor structures, accessory to existing, and these are accessory to the existing restaurant facility, and that would be the walk in freezer, the screen, and the umbrella. This project is within the state designated historic downtown district. The existing brick facade on the rear of 242 East Ojai is identified as a contributor to the state designated historic downtown district. The existing Edison panel, the utility panel, and the walk in freezer and the screen do visibly alter the view of the rear brick facade. However, they do not alter the materially physical characteristics of the resource as they're temporary and they are reversible.

They do not permanently modify the physical characteristics of the structure and therefore, they are not considered significant. The last Hold on.

Before we go to the last slide, I just want to clarify a couple of things. First, I think I had mentioned something to the effect a couple of months ago as it relates to CEQA. So anytime that you're that staff is reviewing CEQA as it relates to a qualifying project, we look first at the exemptions or the categorical exemptions as to whether or not there are exemptions that fit the mold here. And looking at this project, I know that there have been comments received by the Historic Preservation Commission that identify that a full EIR is required. But there's no material information that justifies the reference to an EIR.

Instead, what you do typically if there is the possibility of moving into the box of CEQA or the California Environmental Quality you look at the initial study checklist. And within the initial study checklist, you then evaluate the material pieces that would qualify as fitting into the realm of moving forward with some sort of what's referred to as a Negative Declaration or a Mitigated Negative Declaration or a Full Blown EIR with Overwriting Considerations. Instead of just running straight to an EIR, there are parameters and process for which you go through. In this case, you run through the exemptions first and if there are no exemptions that apply then you immediately go into the initial study checklist. Here we have three exemptions that have been identified here that qualify for this project and then clarification as to how this relates to a State Designated Historic Downtown District.

This is a State designated historic downtown district. This is not a locally designated historic downtown district. Two very, very important distinctions to be made here. Okay? The difference is, is state designated historic downtown really only falls into the CEQUA category which is what we're looking at here versus a locally designated downtown historic district which would absolutely fit within our standards as it relates to Ohio Municipal Code. I just wanted to unpack that just a little bit more. You've only got four points here but there's a little bit more that goes into it.

You. So the last slide includes recommendations. So the commission is to consider the following. Receive the information and presentation provided by staff. We do have the applicant here as well. Open the public hearing for public comment and input, and consider approving the resolution and associated conditions of approval for the modifications of the outdoor dining area and use of the walk in freezer as an outdoor use located at 242 East Ohio Avenue. And And I am open to hearing any questions you may have of staff.

Was am I remembering correctly? We've seen this twice before, right?

This has been before the the Planning Commission. I know it I know that the previous time that you saw it, it was denied based on I just answered the question, which is yes.

Yes. Was referred, yes. So the first time it came before this body, it was then referred to the Historic Preservation Commission for comments and then it came back to this body for denial.

Okay. So the first time it came in, it had a certain design, the big umbrella. The second time we saw it, it had smaller umbrellas, a little bit different Correct. And then now it's going back to the big umbrella.

To the large umbrella.

It's a large umbrella. It's a different one. But yes, it's a large umbrella.

Okay. Just wanted to clarify Okay.

I got a couple other kind of similar questions. The last time we met well, let's get started with the questions, I guess. Oh, I was wondering if we could clarify the distinction of the different spaces on the interior of the building.

So the conditional use permit is specifically for outdoor use and so is the design review permit.

Okay. I think that part of this question sort of relates to the interior of the building though. And so I'm not really sure how to really unpack the question I think at hand without understanding like how the interior space I mean, there's a drawing but typically there might be, you know, just like a note of what this room is, you know, storage, this, that or the other thing, kitchen.

Yep. Vice chair Chesley, it might be good to to ask the applicant that question just to kind of clarify how that's being used currently. Okay. Happily.

Can you speak a little bit more to this idea of permanent and impermanent with relationship to the electrical equipment

on the building? The electrical equipment on the building is specifically for the freezer. So if the freezer is no longer installed, then there's no need for that electrical panel.

Right. But the freezer is away from the building. So obviously, if it's moved, that's not a big deal. It seemed like the concern, the historic preservation concern would be about the impacts of the physical application of the electrical panel to the building. So if that was removed, just was that, like, reviewed in any way? It seems like that's more of a question. You can do anything, but if and take it away. But if when you take it away you've disturbed in some sort of way that seems inappropriate, you know, then I don't know if I just to understand what permanent or impermanent kinda means.

Yeah. So, it's it's not permanent but it is attached to the building. Mhmm. There is no there's no so so the building didn't so they didn't remove the brick in terms of putting the the panel there. Okay.

And I should also like just to clarify that the panel serves both the freezer and the use itself. Right. So, the existing or the previously existing electrical was significantly under serving the restaurant use. Previous years, I think there's been some historical context identifying that at one point this was in fact a grocery store that then turned into a tea house, that then turned into a full blown restaurant. So, over the years, it's evolved into what you see today.

But the electrical and all the either wet or dry utilities hadn't. So, was an opportunity for that to take place with this new restaurant that went in and that then required and necessitated utilities that you see there. Do we do we

know where those were located before the new ones? Like, where were the utilities and the electrical

So the small the small box was interior. I've seen some old plans from the nineties. Okay. And those plans show the the box on the inside of the building, a very small box.

Okay. Understood. So the electrical is interior. And then, so HPC saw this just before this us us seeing it this time, right?

So, there was a, I made the determination recognizing the process here giving the Historic Preservation Commission an opportunity to comment first, not typical and not certainly within the process but recognizing the process that we had seen before, just getting their comments first so that you could see them first and foremost.

And then this is the first time and so they saw the whole, they saw the project that we're seeing right now? Correct. This is the first time that we're seeing anything about the roof equipment. Was that, did they have any comments on that?

Well, this is the first time that you're seeing the roof equipment and the roof they did not see the roof equipment screening on May 14.

Oh, they didn't see it on the pre

They did not. It wasn't included in presentation on May 14.

Okay.

So that's new information as of this presentation. And just to clarify, is that installed already? Is that similar to the refrigerator here or is The equipment

is all existing.

Existing.

The screening is not existing. It's proposed.

But the equipment was existing from this current renovation that went through?

I would like that question to go to the applicant

We'll when they have the app, Applin can confirm it but that equipment is used for the the walk in freezer.

For the freezer. Correct. Got it. Understood. Okay.

I think that's it.

Okay. At this time, before we open to the public, I think we'd like to hear from the applicant.

Hello?

Hello. Tony, would you please state your name?

Tony Yano.

Thank you. Is there anything that you would like to add to the conversation that you have heard so far?

There's a couple things that were inconsistent with my understanding.

We can't hear you. Could you?

Is that better? Is on?

It on?

Yeah, it's on. All right.

Okay.

I'll do what I can. Is

that better? Yeah.

Thank you. The only thing that was materially not in line with my understanding, the visible utilities on the roof are preexisting from before me and the equipment for the walk in cooler are nowhere are not visible. That's one kind of package. The second thing is that the electrical panel that when we took the restaurant over, it was woefully undersized. And in fact, there had been multiple electrical fires there.

And when we went to SCE to upgrade, we had no we didn't ask for we got a permit from the city. We submit to SCE. We don't like pick the size of the panel or how it's attached or anything. I don't know how any of that happens. But that was kind of outside of our control.

And then the last thing I just want to mention is there is some misunderstanding in the community that we have done some kind of end around or tried to sneak by people or anything like that. We applied for a permit. We got the permit. I got a permit that said restaurant store renovation with outdoor freezer that was posted on our wall for a year while we did construction. This is like the whole uproar about the freezer came after it was installed after significant expense had gone into the space, which I think you were alluding to, which is outside, why isn't it inside, which is what I assume you were talking about, Commissioner Chelsea. I

was just also curious as to what the other space is.

Microphone, please.

I was also just curious about where the other, yeah just what the other spaces were. Think to some degree it feels like the, you know, there's like a request here that the, what's happened which I understand how the process got us to this point, but it was also something that was kind of necessary and I guess we have to make some sort of judgment on that or make some of of that.

Sure. So just a little background. I know you talked about environmental sustainability here when you were doing your introduction and I think a lot of people at Ohio care about that. This project, my family and I own a farm in Upper Ohio. All the produce, everything that we grow there is what we sell in the store. We create goods and food with that. That system, we're up on the mountain where we can't freeze things. So the only way to keep food fresh in this regard is to take it from the tree and either use it right away or freeze it. Our entire system, the whole concept of the restaurant, the whole everything we're doing requires that a large freezer. In fact, wanted a bigger one.

That was all we could get approved for. We are working with it, but there is no opportunity for us to take that inside. Every inch of the interior is very busy with doing functions that we need in order for the business to exist. And I would encourage any of you, I know some of you have done walk bys outside. If any of you want to see the inside, can see we've gone to great pains to use every inch of space in the most effective and in my opinion beautiful way.

Is there room at the farm for this refrigerator?

There is not.

At farm?

There is no power at the farm.

No power.

We are solar powered. We a, we cannot put a freezer there.

I see. Any questions for the applicant? No? Okay, thank you Tony. Thank you. At this point I will open the public hearing. We have one card from William Wyrick.

I feel really bad for the position that staff has put both the applicant and the Planning Commission and the public interest in the situation. Clearly inappropriate piecemealing had allowed permitting to be done for something that should be considered, have been considered in a holistic fashion and was not. It's not the fault of the applicant, not the fault of the planning commission, but the kind of the entire situation should have been considered holistically according to basic planning principles before any permits were issued for the effective privatization of outdoor public space. I think most people in this community viewed the RK Plaza as a public art project, frankly, as a public art common area. When we started to be using it for dining, was a lot of controversy about that.

And one way to think about that was and I know initially was to say, well, perhaps we should allow some leasing situation rather than providing a property right through a conditional use permit. And if the situation that the liability of the city has put everybody into for this situation, And if it's not reasonable or possible to look at some sort of maintaining the public interest and the integrity of what amounts to our outdoor public art project or our public art installation, which is the RK Plaza. Perhaps at least a leasing situation that doesn't convey a permanent property right, or some payments to the applicant for compensation. But clearly, when you're talking about a situation where I had a problem with Sam's Place myself. I still do, but at least I believe it's still a lease situation.

I don't know if it's an actual CUP. But the idea of conveying property right for privatization of public space is disturbing to me as a precedent. The fact that staff allowed this thing to be piecemealed with permits issued in good faith, and the applicant acting in good faith for the installation of the cooler and all of that situation, without it being holistically through going through the governance process, planning commission and everything, and opportunity for appeal to counsel, is really disturbing. And I just think that we really ought to find a way to limit the precedent of establishing property right for privatization of public space. And I'm not trying criticizing the applicant here.

I'm criticizing the way this was handled that defeated what should have always have happened. And that is a holistic consideration of the situation before any kind of permits were issued that involved privatization of public space. So anyway, that's my short comment. I'm gonna go have dinner with my wife now. Thank you. Bye bye.

Thank you, Bill. We have one more card on this item from Larry Steingold. Okay. We'll get there. Go ahead, Larry.

Larry Steingold. I feel for the applicant. He was given permits in good faith. And now try everybody to me, and it seems like everybody's trying to figure out how to thread a needle and straighten out this mess. Because I've been to most of the meetings, and I don't remember the freezer ever coming up for director's exemption. Which means it probably we should probably no longer provide director's exemptions because it shouldn't happen now in the future, what have you. But for me, if you don't make the freezer part of the arcade, I mean we're already stuck. Because if I was him, I'd be ripped. Okay, because he was here, he's here in good faith. And I agree with Bill regarding property rights.

But requiring it to be bricked up so it looks like the arcade because if it isn't, the locals, the residents, the natives, the people in the arcade will remember a metal box being put there from now until whenever. And it was done under whatever the reasons were, It was a mistake. And now we have to live with it because you gave him a permit. And that's why. And if you can try if he wants to unwind it, that's fine.

But it's it's his restaurant. We'll eat there for dinner, and we'll see the freezer because it's there. And unless somebody wants to pay out big bucks to move it and replace his business model or something, it becomes a real problem. So brick it up, make it look like the arcade, and it'll just be eventually people will accept it as part of the arcade brick model. And it'll just just like every place else in New England and anywhere else where they make a McDonald's look like 1750. It's just part of the landscape and will disappear after a while. But to have a lawsuit, to get involved, to waste time here, the ship has sailed. It's just part of the deal.

Thank you, Larry. Renee Roth next.

Oh, good evening. Renee Roth, I was a big fan of Osteria Montegrappa, OMG. That was a go to place, and it was a special place for us. And particularly liked that the oak tree was not behind a fence. It wasn't enclosed behind a big walled in fence, which it is now.

How can you put a big fence right close to an oak tree? I thought we had regulations about how you can't put big fences against an oak tree. And I've already come to the I've already crossed that line with permit people. You're not supposed to have a big, huge fence surrounding an oak tree. It's just not right.

I enjoyed eating there under the oak tree in the artistic community setting that used to be there, that used to feel you were a part of. People didn't make a ruckus. There wasn't e bikes. There wasn't a lot of noise. You felt like you were part of the community, part of the Arbolada, open tables, open fences.

The eight foot fence just does not feel like it should be there. That is a wall stay out, stay away. I also wonder about why did you have to get such a great big freezer. Freezers come in many different sizes, and I'm sure you could get three freezers that would go inside instead of outside the building. So, So I think a rework needs to be done on this project, and you've got to think inside what is inside the box.

There's a lot of room in that restaurant. I don't know about the kitchen and all that stuff, but I just don't I I wouldn't feel comfortable sitting right next to a great big I I heard the of that freezer when I walked back there. It's pretty loud. And if I were to eat back there, I'd say, I don't wanna eat next to the freezer. Put me on the opposite side.

Also, are they talking about putting tables in the little walkway and the pathway that goes to that community or that artistic community building in the back? Did I see that as part of the plan too? It just doesn't feel right. It feels like it's encroaching and making things bigger and less friendly and less inviting to be a part of for the Ojai community. And I am opposed to it.

So I think that just needs to be said. But I'm biased. I like the way it was before. So please open up the tree, open up the fencing, and try to get rid of the freezers if you can. Thank you.

Thank you, Renee. Is there anyone online? No. Okay. Thank you. And no one else in the audience, right? Okay. In that case, we will close the public hearing and bring it back to the commission for discussion. Where to start? Anyone? Go ahead. I always go first. I know. But you're brave, so.

Well, I also, like William Wyrick and Larry Steingold and Renee Roth, feel for the applicant. I feel terrible because I also agree with what has been said that the oak tree shouldn't be behind the fence. And we used to enjoy the oak tree, you know, eating under the oak tree, and the open feeling without fences, that was the whole point of the arcade design guidelines. That's the whole point. The whole point was let's create an area where it fronts onto a beautiful public open space.

It's not closed off. There's examples in the arcade design guidelines with open fencing. And so my comments are as follows. I feel like this recent application didn't really listen to any of our comments from either of the previous Planning Commission meetings. The second time it came back, it was getting closer with the smaller umbrellas, more open feeling.

It came back again with another huge umbrella. It's out of scale for the Arcade Plaza. The Corten steel planters, I don't think that's consistent with the Arcade Design Guidelines. And I believe it creates a solid barrier around the patio that's not compatible with the intent of the arcade design guidelines. If you look at the arcade design guidelines, there are several pictures of outdoor dining. There's there's not barriers around them. It's open fencing or, you know, small planters in those photos. That's the idea. The feeling you wanna get is open. It's an open feeling.

It's not closed off. This is our space here on public property. This is public property. It needs to be for the public, enjoyed by the public. And I think that was the intent of the design guidelines.

I think the walk in freezer and the fencing does not reflect the intent of the arcade design guidelines. If you look in the arcade design guidelines, there's a checklist. And the first three check items on this checklist says, the design reflect or complement the Mission Revival style? Well, nope, this freezer does not. It doesn't, and neither does the fence.

Is the building oriented to the plaza with elements such as entrances, the walls? So the idea for the arcade plaza was this is supposed to be the front of the building, not the back of the building. It used to be, back in the day, like an alley, alleyway. And the community decided that we don't want the alleyway. We have a public space here.

Let's do something nice with it. Let's create design guidelines that show that we want to have mission revival architecture. We want to have the entrances facing public plazas. We don't want the alley effect. We don't want it to look like that's where the trash bins go, where the walk in freezers go. We want it to be a place where you have nice tables. I appreciate your outdoor dining. And I'm speaking through the chair, the outdoor dining is great. I loved sitting at Astoria Monte Grappa. It was our go to place too.

It was lovely. Back to my comments. I just don't think that this project orients to the plaza in a front doorway. It's back of the building elements, which is completely opposite of what's desired there. I think the form, scale, and proportion of that freezer, the fencing, and the large umbrella, again, that came back is out of scale.

It's out of scale with the adjacent building. So aside from architectural design, scale, use, and historic preservation, aside of all that, which I don't think this project fits, I'm not in favor of giving away public land for a walk in freezer for a private entity with little to no public benefit. And I am not, supportive of this for those reasons.

And you wondered why I go to you first. And that's what you're here for. Jonathan?

Yeah. I mean, I think that it is difficult because, you know, kind of leaving maybe the the bigger elements out of it. We have this is the third time we've seen it and we have made comments and recommendations about other things when we weren't allowed to talk about the big thing and I and I don't really feel like those have been heard and sort of appropriately responded to. I've asked on several occasions why the shape. I think more of your diagram that you put up with the old Mantegrepa and the new layout, know, is a perfect example where now it's getting pushed out towards more into the path of travel, pushing out down, you know, to the east.

And there's clearly this portion that used to be part of the Manta Grappa outdoor space that's not being utilized. So which still even at that point is not really in the path of travel to the back door of the of the art gallery space that was was mentioned earlier. So that I definitely brought up at least once or twice. Going back with the umbrella feels it's a very strange move as far as I'm concerned. I think that was the one thing we actually said in the last one.

They were real happy to see that these umbrellas have been brought down in scale. And now that's kind of like gone the other way. I don't really know what the intention of it is. So I think it's just like a little bit concerning. Also like I guess to just in the points that Katrina just made.

I mean, think it's interesting, you know, there's there's our role to kind of ensure that the design guidelines and all these things are being administered properly. There's also a role of those who are making proposals to check out those guidelines and try to follow them. And there's also been room I think between even the first meeting to now to look at them deeper and try to really respond to them. Like try to really make a if you know that this thing is gonna be something that nobody's gonna like and it's complicated. Right?

To at least I don't know. Where are the olive branches about, well, this is how I'm really trying to do such a good thing on some of these other things. How can we make this thing work? And I I don't really feel that in this application. I'm not saying that, you know, maybe I'm misinterpreting it.

I guess I'm, you know, I think those are those are kind of broad broadly speaking. How, you know, I'm interpreting this application as it comes comes forward. I think, you know, I've thought about Larry's suggestion too, just make it part of the building. The problem is the way that it's even located, it's actually not possible. You know, it's under an oak tree.

So even if that was solution, like, let's just let's brick it up. Let's make it like, okay, we're gonna like kind of there's been mistakes on both sides like let's figure out the path forward but we can't even do it because this has been located so close to something that is one of our most, you know, aggressively protected elements in California, never mind Ojai. It's not impossible. There's no possible way to make this, you know and I know we're we're here now, you know. So yeah.

It's it's it's kinda hard to see how this can feel like like we're having an actual dialogue about this backspace which is a request to make something bigger that there's no reason it should be bigger. So there has to be a good reason for that to happen. I think that's how I feel about it.

Thank you, Jonathan. Bruce, do you have comments? A couple. Okay.

I guess one of the things that I noticed was that with the comments from the historic preservation commission. There were some critical comments, but again, I don't see anything reflected in the design that would address some of those issues. So I guess one of the things is like the well, the organic nature back there, if it had more of an organic feel to it. I was concerned with the end of the the square that came out for the seating going into the pathway. And so it's kind of doesn't blend in to the way the the landscaping was done.

And so, I mean, I think it'd be helpful to be sympathetic to the mission revival as well as the organic nature of the and I think it'd be much more pleasant for dining in that way. It'll have more organic food. It would have organic place to it. But any rate, I I think that's one of the pieces too. It'd be I for instance, the the fence that is in there, there could be an attempt to make it elements of mission revival.

You know, as part of that. So that they're not straight lines so much as they are curves and they're more organic materials. Just thinking that that would enhance the the arcade itself and be a good contribution. So, I guess my comment.

Thank you, Bruce. This is a very difficult situation for the applicant, for the commission who is being asked to make a difficult decision. I agree with Mr. Wyrick about public spaces and the need to protect the public spaces. Renee, your comment was interesting.

I really hadn't thought about the fact that we should not have a fence around an oak tree but of course that's true. The fence as it is obtrusive making it eight feet I understand to hide the refrigerator but that will make it even more in your face. I don't like the idea of expanding the eating the area out further than the original CUP. Again it's just taking up too much public space. I would like to make some comments about other businesses that have extended into the public space too much but I won't because Lucas will yell at me.

Yes. Okay. It's I agree with everything Katrina said and she said it so very well that I don't think I'm going to just sit here and try and repeat it. So those are my feelings as well. It did not come back to us with any apparent attempt to come to some kind of consensus, it feels very much like the first plan and that got denied.

Okay. Additional comments now that you've heard everybody else Katrina you're done?

I'm finished.

Okay. Jonathan. Okay, in that case the chair would like to hear a motion on this item.

Make a motion to deny the application for the CUP.

Is there a second?

I second.

Just to clarify is that for the CUP and for the design review permit for the entire

I thought they were all together. Yes.

I just wanna clarify.

Okay.

Yes for both.

Okay. Yeah.

Thank you. Okay. We are ready for a vote then. Would you please call the vote? Murphy? Yes. Chesley?

Yes.

Reich Smith?

Yes.

Hansen?

Yes.

I hope this project is able to be saved. I do like the idea of a restaurant there. We all like the idea of eating outside. I hope that somehow you and your designers can find a way to abide by the design guidelines of the plaza as well as our city regulations. Thank you.

Okay. We are now going on to the next discussion item. No, wait a minute. Sorry. We've got a consent calendar here in the middle. I don't know what We

have minutes, I know. But here we are. Because of the order by which the items were happening, ended up doing consent after

We should bring Commissioner Steward back in.

Oh yes, that's right.

Yes. Where did he go?

He might be, right.

He's on his way. Okay, thank you.

Have the minutes of the planning commission of 05/06/2026. Are there any additions or corrections?

Hearing

none, could we have the vote please? A motion to accept.

I make a motion we accept the minutes of the May 6 planning commission meeting.

I second.

Roll call. Murphy? Yes. Chesley?

Yes.

Reich Smith?

Yes. Steward?

Yes.

Yes.

Hansen. Okay, now we will move.

Hold on. Hansen would have to abstain. Pardon? Did you abstain? You here. I wasn't here. Okay.

Discussion item number three, the general plan update. The safety element second administrative draft. Would you like to address that first Lucas or do you want public comments first?

Yeah, hold on one second. Have a, there's a PowerPoint and I'm gonna kind of give some introductions and give like a before two minute I introduce everybody and then

Okay. Do the PowerPoint.

So, good evening. Good evening commissioners. My name is Lucas Seybert, community development director for the city of Ojai. The item we have here before you tonight is a discussion regarding a long awaited process by which the safety element is being reviewed and discussed tonight. This is seven years in the making.

There was a just to give some historical context, there was an agreement reached with Raymond Associates which is the consultant that's been working on this since 2019. In fact, it was the first city council meeting that I attended where the agreement was reached between the city and Ramy and Associates when I had started in October 2019. So, since then, there has been a lot that's been been going on and the item that you see before you tonight for discussion and comment is an overview of what you're what you can expect to see for not only this item, but future elements as the general plan update has progressed over the years. There are five elements that are being updated, this is one. You will also see the circulation element, if we're looking at everything kind of following in line, as well as the land use element.

And then the environmental justice element is being folded into all those other elements, and the housing element has already been before this body and adopted and state certified. So, with that being said, I'd also like to introduce and the individual that would be doing the PowerPoint presentation is Ron Whitmore. He's been involved in this since the early stages. Been working closely with him. He'll be going through the PowerPoint presentation.

Lexi is also online and is with RingCon and she'll be speaking to the safety element and will also be able to provide some context and answer questions as well. To my right is Ryan Schirmer. He's been instrumental in getting it to this stage that we're seeing here tonight where it was basically taking what was the original draft from I think 1987 and 1997. 1997?

'97.

'97, sorry. Write

down here. 1991, '97 is the circulation.

Okay. So, there's what we're basically getting at, it's been a while since this has been freshened up and there's been a lot of regulations that have It's come a long time coming and we're super excited to bring this forward and hear from the community and kind of wrestle with some of those pieces as well. So, just know that there's been a lot of work in the background to get to this stage where we ended up providing both a red line which was very a very daunting task, but recognizing how effective it was for the housing element, we thought that was necessary here. It just takes some time to go through that to make sure we're getting it right. So, you're seeing the overview, a red line, as well as a clean version.

So with that, I'll introduce Ron. Aida, if you can bring him up to the status for him to be heard. Thank you.

Thank you, Lucas. Good evening, Planning Commissioners. Can someone give me a thumbs up or let me know verbally that audio is fine?

We can hear you.

Okay. Great. Thank you. Yeah. Good evening, commissioners. I am Ron Whitmore. I am a principal with Ramey and Associates, which is a mission driven planning firm, which was recently acquired by Alta Planning and Design, a much larger national firm. As Lucas mentioned, I've been the principal in charge of the OHA general plan update since the inception. It's had its fits and starts in part due to the pandemic and then just city staff, capacity challenges. It's been great to have Brian on board recently to help keep things move along.

I'm gonna give you a very brief, overview presentation and otherwise, Lexi and I are here this evening available to answer your questions and help you digest this first of several elements that will come before you. Next slide please. So we're gonna quickly provide you an update on the general plan update process and then provide you an overview of the safety element starting with some of the work that's been done that served as the foundations that kind of were the drivers of some of the updates that, are being recommended to the safety element. And then at a high level, provide you an overview of what's new, how the element is organized, and of some of the basic policy direction. Next slide.

Go ahead. As Lucas mentioned, this is a focused general plan update. It s not a comprehensive update so we re only updating a handful of elements. As he mentioned, it's land use, circulation safety, environmental justice, and housing. And the housing element has already been updated and adopted as part of the six cycle statewide housing element update process.

One element that actually should be on the list that was added midway through the project is an economic diversification element, which is also in progress and will come your way probably either before or after the circulation and land use elements. Next slide. We're nearing the end of the process, but it's been basically a five phase planning process. Started early on with a lot of listening and learning, and that was primarily a lot of upfront public engagement so that we could get a very good handle on the opportunities, the issues as perceived by residents, and probably most get a good handle on the vision the community has for the future and what they'd like to see in Ojai over the course of the planning horizon, which is twenty, twenty five years. At the same time, we did a lot of background existing conditions analysis to make sure we had a solid technical foundation for the work that followed.

We used the public input to draft a vision statement, which was phase two, which went through, I believe, public planning commission review and then was, accepted by the city council. All that foundational work then set the table for phase three policy options. And so we went through a quite thorough process starting with review of existing policy, in this case, extensive review of existing safety element policy. So many of the revisions that you see reflected in the red line version are very much a product of a joint city staff and consultant review of the existing policies to bring them up to date. And then we also, as Lucas mentioned, there's been a number of new state laws adopted since the last time the safety element was updated, and so that was another major source of proposed revisions.

And then also checking it against the community's vision and everything we heard from the public about desired issues to tackle and opportunities to take advantage of, as well as key findings from related analysis. So we went through that policy review and then an initial administrative draft, which was reviewed by staff. And now we have a second administrative draft, which we're taking through Planning Commission and City Council study sessions. We'll then prepare a public draft based direction we receive from these policy making bodies and take that through public review before adoption. As we prepare the public draft and move towards adoption, we'll also be preparing a programmatic environmental impact report, which will be certified along with the adoption of the updated general plan.

Okay. I alluded to some of the foundational work that was the impetus for some of the proposed revisions. There's been a lot of engagement over the years, as you see on the screen. I'm not going to go through it all, but have been met with a variety of bodies, planning commission a couple several times already, city council several times already, and lots of initial public input that was the inspiration for much we tried to do with these elements. Next slide.

I'm not going to read this vision statement to you, but none of it should be terribly surprising. People obviously highly value and want to retain much of the community's character, and also, make sure it remains, accessible, welcoming, place for a variety of people from different backgrounds. And obviously, sustainability is a very high priority for the community. It's not part of the general plan update, but as part of this contract, we're also preparing a climate action plan for the city, will identify a road map for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And then also a key element, as we'll say a bit more about later, of the safety element is a lot of climate adaptation strategies, again, consistent with the community's desire for a sustainable community.

And then obviously, folks want a vibrant local economy composed of, small, locally owned businesses to the extent possible. Again, there's more to the vision, but, this very much drives much of the work we've done. And everything you'll see in terms of the goals, policies, and actions are intended to realize this vision over the planning horizon. So, as I mentioned, a variety of sources of some of these recommended revisions you are considering this evening. Obviously, lots of new and updated data since the safety element was last updated, I think, over thirty years ago.

All the inputs I mentioned from the planning process, been the number of laws adopted specific to the safety element, not the least of which require climate adaptation strategies and also wildfire mitigation and protection strategies. And then also, you know, try to be true to the original document, but try to also be thoughtful about the structure and accessibility of the document. And then make sure that policy language is clear and easy to interpret for folks who will be using it in the future like yourselves. High level, I kind of alluded to this already, but, we started with the recommended policy updates. Rincon took the lead on that, and I'll refer many of the questions related to the technical aspects of this to Lexi this evening.

And then staff, took a stab at updating much of the front end language in the element, trying to retain the, themes and OHAI specific aspects of the background and context that was in the original safety element. Brian in particular took the lead on identifying well network generally and identifying what we have been calling ohayisms or fun facts and integrating those into that front end work, really to make sure that it is clear that this is not a generic element. It s one that s very specific to OHAI. We re now at that process of getting yours and the city council s input before, as I mentioned, we go to public review and on to adoption. Okay.

I'm just going to get a quick overview now of what you have before you this evening. So, as I mentioned, we're trying to both balance retaining what's really good about your existing element while at the same time bringing it up to speed and consistent with current statutory requirements. So, the existing setting is largely the same, but been reviewed and updated by city staff. And then most topics that were addressed in the safety element because many of the fundamental hazards that OHAI faces are not new. They have faced them for some time.

It is s just that many of them are worse and we in many cases have better data and information about them. And so we ve done our best to update the elements to reflect the best data that we have available. And so, oh, I should have mentioned too. So, because it s a focused general plan update and not a comprehensive update, we had to decide whether each element is going to retain a bunch of upfront information that s kind of generic to general plans generally and not specific to that element. Or if we're gonna create a separate document, in this case, a general plan overview, that would serve as a high level introduction and overview of the entire general plan so we don't have to each element doesn't have to repeat a lot of the same information.

So we opted for for option b. And so you also have that in front of you this evening. It's really just designed to set the stage for a general plan, explain the statutory context, the requirements, introduce the the different elements, and what have you. So that's new. And then, in the safety elements, specifically, there's new topics focused on evacuation, climate adaptation, and environmental justice.

I I don't if I remember I've mentioned earlier or not, but we're not because, OHAI is not required to, and is every city is given, option of either having a separate environmental justice element or integrating environmental justice goals, objectives, and policies into other elements. The city opted for the second choice, and so you'll see within the safety element and other elements that come before you an icon that identifies certain policies as being, inspired, at least in part, by the analysis we did specific to environmental justice. There's also updated data figures and regulatory information, as I mentioned. Some policies that are new, mostly because state law requires them. And then we supplemented some aspects of the implementation and program monitoring section of the elements.

And then, as I mentioned, Brian's done a nice job of maintaining the character of the city reflected accurately in the documents through the OHAISMs that are sprinkled throughout the element. Next slide. High level, you got some introductory, information on the element and then we, outline the issues and opportunities. And then, the heart of the element really is the goals and policies. And then you've got, as I mentioned, some new a separate section at the end, implementation program monitoring, also has some new components to it.

Yeah, just a quick orientation. So, this is important in terms of how to interpret, the plan and in the future, check for consistency with the general plan. A goal is not designed to be policy per se. It's really designed to describe the preferred future the community aspires to or aims to achieve. It's really important to be clear about what it is you prefer to be and what what your what your future character is intended to be.

But there's they serve as high level kind of direction setting pieces under which you'll find many goals and implementation measures or actions. So next slide. Oh, one thing I should mention here. This is true both for goals and policies. There's a what we call a signpost, which has the number and then a short short descriptor.

But it's important to remember that the text that follows that, in this case, the part that starts with a city that mitigates the risk is the actual goal. In this case, it's also true for policies. We we use the signpost because it we find it helps with people kind of zooming in and out between the forest and the trees, but it's important to remember that the actual lang the goal or policy language is the language that follows. Similarly, next slide, policies. Oh, yeah, sorry.

So the safety element high level is organized around these six goal areas. Again, we tried to retain and honor the current safety elements. The first four, are retained from the current safety element and then the remainder are new, in many cases based on requirements of state statute. But as you see, it's organized around community preparedness, mitigate generally hazard impacts, make sure community is well prepared in terms of disaster response, and that the city community and other regional agencies are collaborating appropriately to keep the community safe. And then, focus the section focus specifically on seismic hazards and then flooding and dam failure, wildfire, hazardous materials, heat, and finally drought.

Again, policies organized in a similar fashion to goals. There's a signpost and then the text. The important thing to remember here is it's the policies that are really probably the most important aspect of any general plan element because they are the specific statement of intent or direction, that is being expressed through this policy document. And so that those are usually the key reference points when checking for consistency with the general plan. Next slide.

And so some of the refinements you'll see in the draft safety element are just trying to be as clear as possible, so that there's less room for sometimes difficult and challenging interpretation. We try to maintain a consistent structure. So goal areas, there is the 10 goal areas, and then under each goal you have several policies. And often under the policies you have one or more actions which are designed to, achieve the policy through through specific action steps. And as I mentioned, a lot of the what you see are is is included to bring the safety element up to speed with state law.

And then as I mentioned, we've also integrated environmental justice oriented policies. Next slide. And then as I mentioned, so the third tier and the three tier hierarchy of goals, policies, actions are the actions themselves. It's, it's very difficult in most cases for a community to achieve its vision just through policy implementation, although that is a significant part of it. There are also many things that actually need to be done, programs, projects, new studies, updated plans, capital improvement projects, that also are required to achieve the be consistent with the policy and ultimately to achieve the community's goals.

Next slide. Okay. So, then after tonight, and after our meeting with, similar meeting with city council, what's coming up next are the draft circulation and economic diversification elements, and then the land use element as, Lucas mentioned. And then we'll go take them all out for public review and then things will come back to you again, as part of the adoption process. Is that is that the I think that's it for our presentation. Again, we're we're happy to, support your discussion, answer any questions you may have. There's a lot of material in here, so, our job is to help you make sense of it, make sure you clearly understand what's being proposed.

Do you have questions, commissioners, to address to our guests?

So this is going to be forwarded to City Council after this discussion,

Yes.

So any comments that come forward tonight we'll take those in combination with the draft that we're seeing here.

And they'll come back again with environmental document for adoption, right?

Yes. So I think to Ron's point, there is gonna be another round before we do the environmental document. So there'll be a final round. I think is Ron correct me if I'm wrong here, there's going to be a final round with the comments being addressed or at least identified by both the Planning Commission and City Council. So, that's why, so there was an option to do all of them at the same time which seemed like a daunting task instead we're separating them out individually.

So safety element is the first one where you're to have the opportunity to provide comments on that. It goes to City Council and then the next one in line is going be the Circulation element and then the next one in line is either going to be land use or economic diversification depending on where economic diversification is in its process. Once all four of those are bundled up and ready to go forward, then you're going to see a final round. That's basically a final draft before we do the environmental document which is going to be an ER in this case.

Okay. Yes. Gotcha.

Does that make sense?

Yep. That's exactly for. Okay. You.

Anything else? And I want to remind the commission, I think everybody here with the exception of Commissioner Hansen had ample time to review this and I am hopeful and encouraged to hear all of your comments and wonderful insight into the things that we are doing right, the things that maybe we missed the mark on, But certainly wanna hear those comments tonight.

Well, I really appreciate the oh hi isms. So good job.

I can't take credit for that. Is right

over here. I love that.

So if you if you aren't married to the name, Ojai ossophy or Ojai ology, that could be something to consider. But yeah, I mean, it's just we were originally thinking of calling it Ojai Folklore, but it just didn't it it just didn't have the same kind of punch to it, you know, so.

I like it. Nice touch. Mhmm. One thing I just wanted to say is a lot of times this looks fabulous to me. It looks great. And I love that addition of the fire more of the fire policies and actions. I guess some of my general questions have to do with how we're going to act on this. Like, one for fire says, discretionary permits, you know, as a condition of approval need to provide adequate water supply and access for fire protection. How are we going to do that? Is that just a letter from Cacitas?

Or how are people gonna provide adequate water? Like how will we as, you know, decision makers?

So, is that is that a policy that's being identified there?

That's an action, yeah.

Okay. So, that's an action specifically. So, more than likely that be some sort of a policy that would then be derived from that, more than likely. It's not as simple as saying, oh we've got a letter that, well maybe it could be actually, we already have that going forward to, for a part of the plan check review and clearance is that they have to identify that they have adequate water to serve the site.

At what point does the fire chief get involved? Is it on an individual residence or does it require like a

In terms of the review of this document or in terms of some of these action?

There are actions, yeah.

I think it depends on the action that we're talking about. So, they will be reviewing, so Cal Fire as well as Ventura County is going to be reviewing and commenting on this. And I think either Lexi or Ron, can you speak to how that process works? Because I think once we get comments here, we're gonna then send it off to Cal Fire and to Ventura County and wait for their comments on this. They haven't or maybe they have seen it. Lexi, have they seen it at this point?

Ventura County has seen it, but not Cal Fire yet. Because Cal Fire will have a more formal review process. So it'll go through a Cal Fire checklist, and then we they see if there's any updates that they would like to see before it goes then to the Board of Forestry for their approval.

So are we gonna have a list of implementation measures, you know, for each action? So we've got the policy, the actions underneath the policy, and then usually we need implementation measure. Like how are we gonna get this stuff done?

Right. Ron, can you speak

to that a little bit?

Sure. I mean that really varies city by city. General plan is a high level comprehensive plan intended to provide kind of long range policy guidance and not equivalent to, say, a functional plan which is designed to be very implementation oriented. And so for policies where there's an obvious step that needs to be taken, we identify actions, but it's recognized that very often those actions have embedded within them a full set of, you know, sub actions, if you will. And what what is every city is required is after adoption or or adoption of an updated element to develop an implementation strategy.

And so so I would suggest that after adoption of the city, when it gets to that phase, we will have to prioritize the actions within the general plan and for the high priority ones, figure out who is going be the lead and the initial steps to take. Does that answer your question?

Yes. Can I even take it a step further with the question, Ron? So from a processing standpoint, let's say for instance, all the elements have gone through the review and we're looking at the final review, would the implementation be built into that, each of those elements at that point or would it be it would be a wait and see through the environmental review process that then helps to inform what the implementation pieces would be or those marching orders to a certain degree?

Well, most EIRs will have mitigation measures if that is what you are referring to with the C Corp process. And the city's also required to develop a plan for monitoring implementation of those. Many cities will do the two together and basically create a combined implementation strategy for their GP and the associated EIR and then use that as the foundation for their annual progress reports that are required to be submitted to the state. But again, city has some discretion about how it approaches that specifically. The safety element, and we're going to do this for all the elements, does have an implementation and monitoring program section.

And so if you look at that section, I think it starts on page 46. We've tried to provide kind of a roadmap for some of those initial steps by identifying some of the physical improvements required in a table format, identifying some of the plans that'll have to be updated, code updates may be required per state building code updates. Just giving you some examples from that section of the plan. There's obviously, as as people have already alluded to, ongoing collaboration will be necessary with regional, partners. And then it's often wise to develop a system for regular review and update of elements, particularly given the rate with which the state legislature is adopting new, new mandates related to specific, excuse me, general plans and safety elements specifically.

How hard is it to, say this gets adopted, just in its current form, and the planner and this planning commission starts using it and starts analyzing projects, looking at the safety element. And that's when you start finding the real nitty gritty stuff, that internal inconsistencies or something's not jiving with the land use element. That's really when you find all the errors. Not errors, just inconsistencies, put it that way. So how easy like, I would imagine that we could come back at some future point and fix those inconsistencies fairly easily, you know.

You would potentially call it like something like errata where you're looking to find and maintain that consistency. Absolutely. I think one of the things and I think Ron, I'm not sure if you touched on this not but with with each of these elements that we have that are gonna be coming before this body as well as city council, there is an inherent understanding that each of them are are we're looking for consistency with all of them. And on top of that, while we're not going in and doing a deep dive with their existing elements already there, we're looking for internal consistency with those existing elements recognizing that those are are somewhat stale to a certain degree recognizing also that these were the core elements that really needed the, the polishing up at this point. We can certainly look at that down the road, absolutely, but not necessarily with this group.

So we're focusing our efforts and in finding that consistency currently but you're right, there is the potential for oversight and even a misstep along the way. The revisions to that aren't necessarily through an ordinance but instead through a resolution. So it's a little bit of an easier relaxed process. Right? Yeah. As long as we got justification. It.

Right. The state would actually appreciate that.

Yeah, I would think so, yeah. Okay.

Are these actions requirements or suggestions? I'm looking at one in particular for example that says ensure that all new residential developments have at least two emergency evacuations. I'm thinking of developments that are in the process that do not have two emergency evacuation routes. So is this an item that would slow that project down or is it just a recommendation that that would be a preferred route?

Yes, so these, so I think it's important to kind of derive at the 30,000 foot level how we, how you should be looking and kind of absorbing the information here. The hard and fast pieces are within our ordinances or within the zoning ordinance, right? Here, these are like guiding principles. Okay. It's meant to be a blueprint more than it is to be the hard and fast you shall do this. Okay. That's why you shouldn't be seeing, if we are seeing shalls and musts and absolute language that really needs to be teased out of a document like this. Well, okay that It's really

meant It's sure, that sounds pretty strong.

Ensure is a stronger

language next but says not require, that sounds pretty strong.

Require is pretty strong. So I think it depends on the context of what we are looking at here. Okay.

If I could just add, and this, we try to be clear about this up in the key terms section, the front end of the element. The intent is that actions are not mandatory. We recognize that a general plan can cannot trump the city council's authority to allocate resources and to specifically, you know, adopt budgets. And so it'd be inappropriate for a general plan to mandate a future action that required staff time or funding or whatever the case may be. At the same time, policies are designed to direct future decision making, and so consistency with the general plan is required for all future land use actions and capital improvements.

That being said, it is city council that determines whether an action is consistent or not. So there is room for interpretation. If you have those are really good catches. I don't know what the language you're referring to, which section it was, or whether you're reading actions or policies. But if you note, if you find actions that sound like policies, please bring them to our attention because that's not the intent and maybe we should clarify that it actually should be a policy.

But in most cases, look up at the policy that is over that action and that is really what is intended to drive future decision making and the actions are intended to in inform follow-up steps.

Let me use an example to what you were just talking about. So, if I look at policy on page 43, policy SF-7.6 which states, require fire prevention divisions to review all development applications. And then it states within the body of it, require that the fire prevention division review all vacations for new development in hillside areas to assess potential impacts to existing fire protection services. Require is the correct term there, right, for obvious reasons. So in that case, I would say yes, it needs to be that type of, of kind of push forward, lean into versus saying maybe they should, no, no, no, no, that's not what we're looking for here.

Okay. I think that's not the intent.

Okay. Yes. And so our zoning ordinance has to be consistent with this. So So when it says require all discretionary permits to provide adequate water or to provide fire resistant vegetation, the ordinance has to match that and basically we shouldn't allow any fire or planting material say that you know isn't fire resistant, right?

Well, I don't if there's any But more like fire, so Yes.

Because you're saying require

To your point, yes. Because there are new mandates that are out which is the reason why we're doing this, that we have this refresh. There's new mandates that have just come online as of January 1 and those are fairly strict in terms of how, how we're to, to, to assess and modify our either existing or, or potential proposed landscape to meet those guidelines. I think it's WULO or WULO standards are, WUE standards are extremely restrictive. And to a certain degree even having initial conversations with Ventura County Fire, they're trying to sort through how they're going to assess and evaluate and enforce the regulations that are currently in place.

So, to your point, yes, absolutely. Does it need to match our and show consistency with the existing ordinances that we have in place? Yes. Is there is that the potential for some of our regulations that are in place currently that are maybe out of touch with the standards that have been adopted as of January 1? For building, no. Because those standards were adopted and are now a part of building code. So we're consistent there. We may need to take a look at, it may require us to take a closer look at some of the landscaping standards that we have already in ordinance.

Yeah. And other standards. I mean

Yeah. There could be Yeah. Yeah. There could be other standards. That's just one example.

Okay. Alright. And this is just a question for everyone. So once this is adopted and we've got things like this with that language that says require all discretionary permits to have fire resistant vegetation, and our current zoning ordinance doesn't really state that, we would review that project requiring all fire resistant vegetation from here on out, right?

Well, we would, yeah. So, we'd end up going back and basically updating it to find consistency, right, through some sort of implementation. Absolutely. It's no different than when the housing element was adopted, there were 19 programs that were adopted with that. And this body has seen that, those 19 programs on multiple occasions.

And now that we've got a new body, we'll be doing that again because there are still ones that are outstanding leaning into kind of the end cycle of the sixth cycle leaning into the seventh cycle. So, the work doesn't end once these documents become and are adopted through resolution. The real work starts with the implementation that you start seeing moving forward. You're seeing some of those pieces to that puzzle with the safety element. You're going to see a lot more with the circulation element, with the land use element, with the economic diversification element.

So, it's not to say, oh, we get to pat ourselves on the backs after this is done. The rubber hits the road once these become enforceable.

Along with that fire and flammable vegetation comment on page 47, middle of page, it says require all properties in the very high fire severity zone to enforce precautionary measures to create defensible space including but not limited to maintaining a fire break by removing brush, I assume that means dead brush and flammable vegetation. Again, I hope we have a list with located within 30 feet of the property. When the fire folks came to my house to do an assessment, they were very interested in five feet, not 30. So is this is the 30 a new and updated number for the fire folks? Anybody know?

I can help answer that question. Yeah. The defensible space regulations right now are currently being updated. So the state has standards for new development. That's pretty in place and a little bit easier because having new development comply, you have your pant planting palette, that's easier.

But what is more complicated right now is how to regulate for existing. And so there's regulation for Zone 0 which is that zero to five feet that the state is still currently providing guidelines on what to do in that five feet and there's a lot of public comment happening in terms of like what vegetation if there should be any vegetation there, should we allow potting plants, so that's why this doesn't go into that specific detail and we stuck to more of the broader 30 feet because that's more of a standard practice where there has to be regulated vegetation management in very high fire severity zones for 30 feet. That's been a standard for a long time that you look at different tree spacing and types of trees and making sure that distance from the building or the house meets certain standards. But some of those smaller ones, even though fire departments are figuring it out on the ground, the safety element doesn't reflect that yet since that will be more on the once the state gives out the new guidelines and code, then the city and county codes will be updated.

Thank you. Is

it possible just to remove all the require language and that be part of the implementation. So, you know, for policies and actions have, you know, what our goal is, you know, the the policy is to reduce fire hazards, you know, simply stated. I'm just in general. And then the implementation would be, you know, five feet, 30 feet, you know, and not have these, you know, where it says require, you know, in here, that kind of thing, but have more of policy statements that are not requirements. Policies are not requirements.

Mhmm. You could dress it down and take it take it down a level. I'm seeing the reason why like for instance, some of these are are obvious ones like the require for the review. That's already being done. It's just basically kind of furthering that conversation and kind of informing that conversation.

Right? If you say should versus the require or could, right? If you soften that language, it gives the impression that maybe in that case it's not necessarily as impactful or necessary when the requirement exists already. So why why dress it down? But there could be other ones that get your I mean, I've already heard one or two where those could be dressed down and you're still meeting it and then, you know, through either the action or the implementation, you have some some stronger language.

Yeah. I mean, I just think policies are, you know, exactly that. Their their policies is their it's we have goals and policies and policies, you know it's our policy to have it's our policy, you know, it's a policy of ours to have fire safe landscaping.

Yep.

Should follow the standards existing within blah blah blah. Yeah.

Right? And then the standards you know you're really putting the details in. Don't know.

I got it.

That's what I think.

So I'm thinking like I'm seeing all these policy with require require require all throughout that to me seem to me it doesn't seem like it's the right place for that. It needs to be this is our broad policy statement.

Yeah. Can I Ron and Lexi, can you guys speak to you're doing other general plan updates, right? So are you seeing in the safety elements because it's a part of the requirement as a part of the housing element that you're required to also update the safety element. So in 2021, 2022 when all cities were required to do this, did you see a lot of cities kinda leaning into the requirement, the harsher language or was there within these policies and, you know, goals and policies and action pieces. Are we outside the boundaries of what what you guys are seeing out in the industry right now? What's going on here? I'm just kinda curious.

No. I can help answer that especially for the safety element like you said, the new requirement of the safety element having to go through Cal Fire now, that's a recent requirement. And so they are more firm in terms of the language that they like to see. So that's why that latest trend is having the stronger language for require. And typically, it's not an issue because these are already requirements that are coming down from the state that are then filtering in through the county and then in the city.

So it's just being consistent with all of those different layers of regulation. So and it says specifically in the very high fire severity zone. So all of these regulations already apply within the very high fire severity zone. So having that requirement saying that requirement language is making it consistent. So like you said earlier, if it said if it didn't say require, that could cause confusion because it is required from the top.

So can I because I like to ask questions too? Yeah. Can I just do a follow-up? With CAL FIRE and working what was the the commission that you said that it has to go before?

Board of Forestry.

The Board of Forestry. So the Board of Forestry, you've gone through this process before. Right, Lexi?

Mhmm. Yeah. Many times.

So do they look for this type of language? Are you are you recognizing that they're gonna be already providing comments that lean into this type of language as it relates to the policy, as it relates to the goals, the action pieces. Because I mean, historically when I look at general plan updates or even overhauls to general plans to commissioner Reich Smith's point, it typically has softer tones to it. Is this one the exception to the rule? Is that what we're talking about here?

Are we going to see, maybe that's a question for Ron leaning into Ron for the circulation and the land use elements. Are we gonna see this across the board for all elements moving forward? I'm just trying to

I can speak to the safety element one specifically because that kinda like housing goes through HCD. Now the safety goes through CAL FIRE. And so CAL FIRE has a very specific checklist of the exact language that they would like to see in all safety elements. It's pretty organized, and so that's different than a lot of other elements. Although their elements don't have some other state regulatory agency that's reviewing them, just housing and safety.

So the other elements won't have that same approval process, but the safety element now does. And so Cal Fire has gotten really organized, created their checklist, has land use planning departments specifically to review these safety elements, provide this guidance that they want to see. And that makes it easier for that when they go to the Board of Forestry for approval, they can feel confident that the board will approve it because they're applying what the board wants to consistently throughout all the agencies or cities and counties in the state.

Thank you. And just to add to that, you're right, Lucas. A city has a fair amount of discretion in how where they want to fall on the spectrum between very specific and regulatory versus more vague and flexible. And it really varies city to city where they prefer to land on that spectrum. And so, yes, with the elements with the exception of housing and safety, they have some flexibility there.

It really depends on, you know, how a city wants to use its general plan because everything, all the land use actions that follow have to be consistent with it. Some want to be highly regulatory and controlling, others want to maintain maximum flexibility. Just one thing I should note, what's helpful about the redline version of this is, in many cases we're simply adapting existing language from your current safety element. And so the red line shows you where basically we're just rewording an existing policy or action versus introducing something brand new. And so it helps you kind of tease out, like, what really is the new policy direction versus what is just a reinforcement of what has been on the books for thirty plus years.

We expect to see developers have to come in with reports on expansive soils or an area that's prone to liquefaction and so forth, will that sort of thing come to the Planning Commission?

So, are typically technical documents. So, if the project is large enough, then yes. But you wouldn't necessarily be evaluating, this Commission wouldn't be evaluating the completeness of a technical report, instead you'd be evaluating the impacts of that project as it relates to the supporting documents technical standpoint. So, for example, if there's a project that's large enough that doesn't have any of those exemptions and we're moving into an environmental review as I talked about a little bit earlier, right. So, there are a number of technical documents that are required as a part of the clearance, right.

And then a lot of times what ends up happening is like for instance geotechnical or soils reports have mitigation measures that go along with it to ensure safety concerns are in place.

I haven't seen anything like that come

through. We don't have large projects that come before this site.

Nothing that big.

But we

have mostly infill which are smaller types of projects. I can only think of one site which could have a, and certainly would be a part of an environmental review, probably to the point of an EIR.

Maybe a couple. Okay.

One in particular.

Bruce, did you have a question?

Well, I had a general question with it. I was wondering how it interfaced this plan would interface with the Ohio Valley or other catchment areas. Is there a general plan for the valley itself or?

Yes, there is. So, Ventura County has a general plan. They updated the general plan, I wanna say two years ago. Oh, okay. Maybe three. And I think that goes to 2050 or 2045. And it has pieces that interlock with what we have going on in the city. This general plan is really the general plan updates that we're seeing here is really focused on what's happening in the city and not necessarily in the Valley.

Okay. And you're aware of any contradictions there would be like with that different?

So, the I'm glad that you're bringing this up because further down the road when we send that EIR out for comment, Ventura County as well as other agencies and cities will be having an opportunity to review and comment on the EIR.

How does it work with other like utilities? I was thinking particularly with hazards from the power company.

Like with Edison or water or sanitation.

Sanitation, yeah, obviously.

They would have the opportunity to comment on it as well.

Okay. Are you privy to some of their plans?

Am I privy to

I mean, are they included in here? Meaning like the power and gas, a variety of some of those things would have a big impact or their vegetation mitigation?

I'm not aware of any plans that either. I mean Edison kind of runs their own show independent of anything that we have going on here. They play along with our rules to a certain degree but also recognize themselves as kind of on the outside and not necessarily holistically within the parameters that we have here. So

I'm just curious like

Yeah, I'm not really sure how to answer that because it's not something something where

else, welfare, those who have impact on this and I wasn't sure what kind of interaction there might be.

I mean there's certainly interaction. We have regular interaction with Kissidus Water, with Ohio Sanitation District because we require will serve letters for any new projects that come in. Those from a review standpoint, we're actually, I mean those services are required to identify that there is capacity. Okay. For any sort of expansion. So, yeah, there's conversations. Are we pervy to any sort of plans that they have moving forward, large scale or small scale? I mean, if it's an EIR then absolutely because it would be circulated just like what we'll do here.

We have some public comments that are cards. Yeah. This might be a good time to take those.

First

one is Dennis Colburn.

Hello. Pleasure to meet you all for the first time. I'm a forty year OHAI citizen, and really my goal here is basically an interest is the evacuation plan that we do not have for the Valley that, at least as a forty year citizen, I have never ever seen one, never been privy to one, never even a hint of one. And so in reading through, I only learned about this two days ago, so I just have a very few notes here. But inside this draft, they referred to evacuation 10 times and how they work with the public on it and how they have these plans and how they're so transparent and all these things.

But I have no idea. Anybody I ever ask, they have no idea. We all jump on the highway, which is not a good idea. Anyway, in one of these sentences, it says, preplanning evacuation needs help. Needs.

Basically, you need a plan, but they pre planning evacuation needs help prevent chaos during an emergency. Well, at the stage we're at, we're basically guaranteeing chaos, in my opinion. Due to the study from 2024 from the fire council, zero to twenty four hours, it's a gridlock. Basically, there's overcapacity highway in the valley. So in in one instance, they say that the major wildland fire has the ability to shut down any one of the major highways leading out of the city.

It is not likely, however, that all major routes out of the city would be shut down simultaneously. Well, gridlock is shut down, so they all would be shut down. They it's highly likely that they will all be shut down. And then next to it, it says law enforcement agencies will therefore need to react according oh, no. Here it is.

Formal fire evacuation routes have not been predetermined due to the unpredictability of a fire. Law enforcement agencies will therefore need to react according to the needs of each situation. That is an escape route to not having a plan. We'll do it when the time comes. We'll bust open our shirts with the big ass on the chest.

The two officers that are in town, they're gonna make it happen while everybody jumps on the highway to uncertain uncertain terms of what might happen to them. So I I'm very concerned that that the the way it's all put in here and stuff like that is not really well thought out. I think they should remove the part in regards to the not making the plan at the very last moment.

Thank you. Thanks. Next, we have Randy Coggin.

Thank you. Good evening, commissioners. Commissioners. I I would would like to suggest that should the commission forward this particular element to the city council that you forward it to them with a recommendation that has an opportunity to be reviewed by the Public Safety Commission, which is in the process of being established prior to its adoption. I believe not only with this element be within their purview, but I also believe that they will have the expertise to review it and offer meaningful comments.

There are many examples that I could provide why this additional level of review would be helpful, but one example of such need of review is found on Page 54 of the red line and Page 49 of the clean version, the title Butch City of OHAI Community Wildfire Protection Plan. Without reading the whole paragraph, the element states that the OHAI Valley Fire Safe Council is in the process of finalizing Ojai's first ever CWPP to provide the community with a comprehensive wildfire risk mitigation plan for the Ojai Valley and the Ventura River watershed. In all deference to Ramey and Associates and all the great work that they've done, stating in this element that a CWPP is needed or is being finalized is incorrect. The fact of the matter is that the Ohio Valley Fire Safe Council under a $1,500,000 grant developed CWPP for the city during a period from 2021 through 2024 and the CWPP was in fact adopted by the city council on 09/20/2024 by Resolution 20 four-thirty five. I hope this body takes my comments and the appropriate request in the spirits that they're made.

My intent is only to make sure that this element has an additional set of knowledgeable eyes to do an additional review before it's adopted to ensure that all the relevant data that is needed has been considered. And in Lucas' opinion, correct me if I misunderstood, based upon how full upcoming agenda are. It will probably be late July before the settlement gets to counsel. So there should be ample opportunity for that review by the soon to be public safety commission. Thanks for your time.

Thank you. Larry Steingold.

Good evening chair and members of the Planning Commission. My name is Larry Steingold and am a Ohio City resident speaking tonight as a private citizen and not on behalf of anybody else or any City Commission. As you review the administrative draft of the safety element for the general plan update, I want to focus on ensuring that our public safety policies are as thorough, coordinated and legally aligned as possible. The decisions within this document will shape our infrastructure, land use and emergency preparedness for decades. One thing that stands out that the city has already taken an important step in this area.

Through ordinance, the city council established a public safety commission and specifically tasked it with reviewing and making recommendations on transportation safety, evacuation planning, fire hazards, seismic hazards and broader community safety issues. Those responsibilities closely align with the core topics within the safety element before you tonight. In a valley with limited ingress and egress, transportation infrastructure is evacuation infrastructure. Road design, circulation capacity and traffic control measures directly influence whether residents can safely evacuate during an emergency. Your staff report also highlights that the safety element was shaped by the impacts of wildfires, flooding, debris flows and addresses seismic hazards as well.

These are all areas that fall within the scope of the Public Safety Commission's role as established by ordinance. Given that alignment, I would respectfully offer this for your consideration. To the extent this fits within the scope of your discussion on tonight's agenda, you may wish to consider whether a referral of relevant safety element sections such as evacuation, circulation, fire hazards and seismic hazards to the Public Safety Commission for advisory input would be helpful or alternatively that this potential referral be considered as a future agenda item or that staff be asked to return with options for such coordination. My intent is simply to support a coordinated review process that fully utilizes the city's existing framework for public safety oversight. Thank you for your time and your continued commitment to the safety of the Valley.

Thank you, Larry. Renee Roth, please.

Good evening, Renee Roth. Oh, hi. Hello, Lexi. I don't know if you remember me. We met at another workshop. So I have been looking at the safety element for several several years. The city of Ventura adopted a safety element recently. I've been looking at those documents to find out what's in them, what's good, what we should be having in it. I've been sending emails to Lucas for months, about getting the safety element going. So I'm really glad to see that you've finally taken a step to get us here.

But I do want you to know, think you're at a disadvantage. And I think one of the things the consultants really should have done is give you a list of all of the state laws that you are mandated to follow right now. And there are about 10 of them. They're interspersed in the document, but you need to ask what are all the state laws that we need to be following because you don't have them in this document. They're not all here.

They're not all spelled out clearly. So there is some good work in here, and we definitely needed an update. However, I do have serious concerns, so I do hope that you do not pass this tonight until it comes back to you with the required background information that I think is essential. First of all, I want to show you this map right here. I don't know if the consultants can see it. But this document has this 2010 map in it. And this is the current map for fire safety. So the fire hazard area is not even acknowledged in the document. It it recognizes an older version of the map.

It say that again.

Yep. The document recognizes an older version of the fire hazard severity zones. It was just updated in 2025. Ventura County adopted it. We had one hundred and twenty days to adopt it. And it's not in the document. Those are the kinds of things that are glaring inadequacies in document. Also because we do have the OHAI Fire Safe Council. They've done a lot of evacuation planning. They've worked with consultants to do that kind of work.

You should be working closely with the Fire Safe Council. There should be money in the budget to update the general plan with the Fire Safety Council hand in hand, because that is a required element. So the inadequacies are basically you have to create scenario based evacuation analysis and neighborhoods lacking the two routes. As you were saying, route capacity assessment and designed evacuation destinations. So there is a lot in these requirements that are not in the document, And you need to know what your requirements are and what should be in there.

And I've got a list. Thank you. I don't have time to ask the questions and explain it all. Thank you.

Thank you, Renee. Is there anyone online who wishes to speak? No. Hearing none, we will close the public comment. I'm glad that we got a chance to listen to the public comment because I certainly agree with you.

I would like to hear from the Public Safety Commission. I would like their review of this document before it comes back to us. I would like to have included Renee's suggestion for a list of the applicable state laws. We certainly need the updated fire zone maps included. So thank you for coming and and sharing your your thoughts with us. We appreciate it. Commission gets back to us.

I'll go next if that's okay. Couple of things. I file all of this under the famous Mike Tyson quote that everyone has planned until they get punched in the face. And that's the spirit that I read the document in. I have a question for the staff. Being new to this a little bit. Can you tell me how community members engage with this? We've already seen tonight they're substantially adding to the dialogue. But how do community members engage with this document?

Do you mean at its current state?

If I live here in the city and I want to know what the plan is, how do I go about learning this? If I haven't participated in any of the groups or I don't know anybody or the gentleman mentioned that if you ask 10 people in Ohio how to get out of town during a fire, maybe one knows.

Yes. So I think the first and foremost is we have our city website and there's a landing page for the for the general plan update. So any of the information that has gone before either this body or city council or has been casted to the community through various workshops that we've already had or meet and greets that we've had for like Ojai Day in the past. All that stuff lives on the city's website. So we always encourage anybody who's interested in learning more information to start there.

Mhmm.

That's kinda the the foundational piece. And then, in addition to that, we have a a third party referred to as Tripepi who is constantly pumping out information at this point to help inform the community. So it's a social media blast that happens on the regular. So it's it's hitting a crowd that is more interested in maybe what the city has on their landing page or on their website. And then there's also the group out there that is that is more interested in scrolling on and finding information through the social media post, whatever is your pleasure at that point, a lot of times that you'll end up getting hit with that information and then there's an opportunity to to engage that way.

Mhmm. In terms of if you're asking me how does a community member that's not aware of the journal plan become aware of the journal plan? Well, I certainly encourage you to start reading it cover to cover. It's not like a zoning ordinance where I would never encourage someone to read a zoning ordinance cover to cover because it reads like stair instructions. But this does not because what this does is it provides you and kinda gets you engaged into what the community has, what it offers, what its values are. That's all entrenched into the either the safety element or any one of these elements that you're seeing here, that you will be seeing here.

So in the spirit of what you're saying, which I agree with, there's a way of communicating a thinking construct called BLUF. I don't know if you've ever heard it, B L U F.

It's the bottom line up front.

Bottom line up front. And when I read this, I had to dig pretty deep to get to the bottom line up front. And then we just heard some bottom line up front information that was very valuable and made notes here. And I think there's a communication piece of this that I would call a more modern style maybe of communicating. Mr.

Schirmer might not have even been alive when this process began, so we owe it to him to kind of create a living modern document. But I think that bottom line up front piece is really important and could actually help the digestibility of this document. People read information and receive information differently today than they did even five years ago. A little bit of a question of, I'll call it the can we catch what we're pitching question. Sounds like we're pitching a lot here.

From an infrastructure standpoint, are we prepared to catch some of that? Do we have the link between our codes put together correctly and our language correctly and kind of if there is some sort of homologation or a naming convention piece here, do we have that built all the way through, so somebody can quickly see what's going on with the language. You know, the other, know, kind of two, one other, actually I'll be quicker, one other point kind of strikes me here. There's no economic resilience or business continuity dimension to this plan at all. And I guess my question is, is that by design and that kind of contingency planning doesn't live in here?

Or is that an oversight in this? I wonder for the people who have businesses after we have protected your land and your property and everything else, What have we done for you who live and work here and have a small business or something like that here? So that kind of business dimension seems missing to me and there's a giant piece of what's a roadmap for the local local economic recovery. And I can tell you from having lived through it in COVID, there was no economic road map. People made adjustments.

It was an ad hoc approach. And because people in the Valley are resilient, everybody made it through. But I would like to see at least some piece of an economic recovery plan, or what are we doing kind of that before, during and after perspective. And again, that's maybe another communication convention we can learn here. We already know from the community here today, our before is way behind the eight ball. We know during, we have our own little version of the Strait Of Hormuz here in the valley, where there's one or two ways in or out. And then after, if I live here and I have a business like I do, I'm out of luck in this plan.

Point taken. I would the only response that I would give to that is either Ron or Lexi, we have state general plan guidelines that we typically follow. So then my my question to either one of you would be within and those are those are derived and have been updated, I wanna say like maybe five or seven years ago. And those those standards are are the blueprint by which cities follow, but it doesn't necessarily mean that that is the only path forward. So your point on is there a missing link to to what we're talking about here and only focusing on probably what that blueprint has been has basically outlined, right, for the safety element in this case.

Because each of these elements through the through those those guidelines, the SQL guideline or not sequel guidelines, but through the general plan guidelines derived from the state give you really kind of a road map by which to to develop, modify, update each one of your elements.

Mhmm.

Right? Yeah. I mean, kind of the a few of the comments that Ms. Reischmidt was talking about too are all around how to make this a living document. Because it is, there's the saying VUCA, volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity.

That's kind of the world we're in today. Most of the storms are super, like there's no such thing as a mellow tragedy anymore. And so I think keeping this living and flexible is actually an important piece of it. Last comment I'll make is if we do have the website, that's great for you know, most people who cruise websites. I don't know anybody who cruises websites anymore.

And I think that there could be a strategy here that we add in where there is a very aggressive social media campaign and meeting the people where they are. And maybe even involving some of the local people on Instagram who are prominent and actually, you know, I think of people like Small Time Citrus as like the best way to get something into the community today. And so I think that having a regular cadence there that's part of the plan, two times a week we are going to communicate something about this plan to you. That might help get it into the brain of people a little more.

Yeah. And it's interesting in the very beginning when we started this process years ago, there was a constant contact list that was created. Mhmm. And that constant constant contact list has grown to I wanna say 280, close to 300 emails that we then send blasts out to each time. I'm not sure if it's stale now because it started in in 2019

Mhmm.

And has grown to the level that we have today.

Mhmm.

But that's an interesting one because you're immediately sending to the people that have intentionally gone on to the website, have put their email in there and shown like a true interest. Whether they're in a city or not, there's no differentiation between whether you're located within the city or outside the city's boundaries. So but it's getting the information.

Yeah. Would just be careful and this is a little bit my world. You know, the open rates on that are gonna be like 2%. And so now we're talking about 25 people in the valley, what's going on. So I would just think carefully about that strategy.

And I do think it ties into what's the through line, what's the thread line. And then obviously, desired outcome here is everybody knows what's going on. Everybody knows how to get out of here. And I'm not sure when I read this, I had to dig pretty deep to kind of figure it out. And I was one of those people sitting in the Straits Of Casita Springs in my car with fire on both sides during Thomas fire. I'm sensitive to it.

And we had hours and hours of notice on that one. The next fire comes quickly, we'll be in trouble.

Thank you, Lucas.

Or flood. I mean, there has been time since I've lived here where all three routes out were not. They were flooded out. You know, so we were stuck here. It was with a baby without milk. You know, Vons ran out of milk. So, yeah, it was it's scary. Do we have policies, any kind of economic development document like that?

Not at the moment. But council did adopt a a provision that we are working towards right now. Ron and his team are developing an economic diversification element and that is in the works as we speak.

Because that might be a good place for that Yeah. Recovery plan to reside.

You got it. And one lens you could look at that. The strategic question is what happens if 50% of the city revenue gets shut off? What happens? That's the strategic question. And so you could look at it through that lens, it's a continuance of Citi, it's a continuance of if there's nobody around to execute the plan because you can't afford to pay the salaries, the businesses contribute that 's a problem.

And that probably leads into having a reserve that makes the city solvent for X number of days, months, years, something along those lines.

Yeah. And we know a few things. We know it took around ninety days for the city to kind of get an economic plan together for the people who were phoning, just based on personally living it. We know there was kind of ninety days of hang on, we're looking for county and state guidance and city guidance and so on and so on. And in general, a good rule of thumb in a business is have around three months of operating sitting somewhere tucked away in a cabinet that nobody can touch until all hell breaks loose.

Right. Coffee jar.

Right. You got it. And so in general you could start there. We don't have to be perfect from day one with this. We do have to talk to the community and we already we've learned we have a couple of really valuable mandatory, these are mandatory people to check-in with in my book. And so we know we have some things there, but a business check-in would be good as well. Thank you. And good work on this as well. And I can see a lot of effort went into this as well. So thank you.

Yes. Look, I have thick skin here. I think everybody realizes that. Especially with something like this, it's important that we get this right. Right? I mean, is it a living document? Yes. But I don't want this to be I I think the idea here is isn't isn't for it to be a living document the second day that it gets adopted, we're like, Jesus, this thing that we missed. Right? It's the whole reason for this review and comment period. We're gonna do everything we can to try to mitigate that to the highest of levels. So, yeah.

I wanna live up to my reputation. I will have some corrections. I will just hand my document to Brian and he can do with it as he chooses.

As as a teacher of trade.

Yes. Respect that. Gotta gotta do it. Okay. Is there anything else that we would like to add to this conversation?

Can I just make two two comments? Hearing from the community and then also recognizing that I do believe council is scheduling to have the final public safety commission representative on board which then will allow for that body to become a meeting body. I think it makes sense for the safety element to go through them before it goes to counsel.

How does that happen? Where, who decides this process?

Pros and Alexi are unaware of this because it has just developed over the last couple of months and I wasn't sure how quickly but it has developed very quickly. So I do see the mayor raising his hand to provide maybe some insight.

The chairs, wishes that all

come up.

The chair wishes.

A couple of points. So the Public Safety Commission was instituted by the council. We the intention is to have it fully populated by the first meeting in June. I think we're we're I think we will achieve that, meaning we have the five candidates. Then they will become instituted with they will do the normal thing like elect a chair, etcetera.

They will have some issues that will be particular like reviewing the speed hump policy or some specific things in neighborhoods, but I love this project for that that sort of like the way you're looking at general, let's say, ordinances in relation to individual projects. So I see this as something that they would also be doing, which I think is fabulous. And and then I just wanna speak, you know, Brad, in one point that you were making is there are so many issues related to what you're talking about here. Landscaping, some are what's the evacuation plan. The and they're so different in a way, you know.

But on those evacuation plan or emergency things, I can name 10 things right now. For example, Firewise community being instituted in the city is part of that is the communication plan. So there are several communities in the works of that. Another is when we had the big wind event that was that turned into the Malibu fires, realized we don't have a backup power source in the city. And the city is the communication center.

So as a response now, we do have the backup power. So all these things are coming on. But the resiliency centers that the Fire Safe Council are proposing for the Honor Farm and Summit are also a response to a stay in place if you can't leave. I mean, there's like many, many things. Another is at the federal level, we hope, fingers crossed, we're in the home stretch of sirens that would be at either end of the valley that the federal government hopefully will allocate the money for.

And that would be the siren blows, the protocol is check your communication channels. So the issue is if you say you don't have the evacuation plan yet, I realize that sounds like trying to not say the answer, but if you have something on the East Side, you don't wanna say the evacuation plan is set because you wanna you need to respond to the situation. But that means you can have a few plans. So anyway, there's many many things. So I'm imagining, again, Brad, your point, the website is not sufficient. Or if there's a PDF

My neighborhood is on fire. Let me let me jump on mine. Have to see. So it's See what's happening.

It has to be pushed out is the answer, right? So in other words Yes. That became really clear everybody. All this communication has to go out, like we're actively doing it including people who aren't on their phones. So literally it's probably gonna mean we're going to neighborhoods literally in person. So those are all part of the things that are happening. The disaster committee which I was surprised, I assumed, well there's a disaster committee that meets all the time. No, there will be now though. So it's part of this response to saying there was Thomas fire obviously, what happened in LA and what's happening right now. So again, there's many many things.

So I'm imagining the general plan is not what's gonna go out to the communities, read the plan. It's no this is the guiding document and there'll will be really specific instances where we're proactively reaching out. And it's already begun.

Yes, I mean this is I hear you and I just think you always on things like this I think you do have to go to what's the end game. So the end game is everybody in Ohio got something in their mailbox that told them, here's what you need to do if everything is on fire. We have backup power, we have all of the other things planned for and so on and so on. But there's a huge marketing component. I don't know that that belongs in here.

But at the very least it deserves budget. The committees that you've mentioned and the sorry, the public safety commission and things like that. Those are marketing partners is how we should think of those people. Are people who can help connect the community and they are also an information resource to us.

So just a small example, the VC alert that did go into everyone's mailbox, that was the the hope of that, that was part of the outlook, but then separately was here's the the app and the the website you can go to. The app on your phone is fantastic because they'll give you that notification pop up and tell you like watch duty is the one that I also use on fire. So those would be the things that we would wanna reach out to get everybody to be using. And so you're completely right. It's marketing one zero one. We just gotta keep pushing it up. Yeah. I agree with that. So anyway, Public Safety Commission, the hope is that and I believe it will happen. July would be its first meeting and this seems like a great task among its first tasks.

Because in addition to that, you'll have the public works director, Lucas when appropriate, but then you'll have the fire chief and you'll have the police chief and etcetera. Sometimes the ranger. Yeah. So anyway. Yeah?

Thank you. Yes.

When when I was listing off what the public had suggested and I said Public Safety Commission and that we should have the state laws written out for us. I failed to mention the Firewise Prevention Group and I would like to see them at least review this as well. They've been very very active and I'm sure they'll have some good advice for us.

Input received, comments received at this point.

To sorry to put a pin in it, did we capture kind of in terms of staff next steps? I heard public safety commission engagement. I heard some sort of business component up to staff to define. We heard a consideration for marketing on the back end. So started the deliverable and work back actually right, we're in the deliverable. Clear understanding of the laws, so kind of a checklist. What's our preflight checklist for making sure this effort gets off the ground, all these laws. Right.

Some plot piece that you're speaking about earlier.

Yes. Mhmm. Okay.

Okay. You know what?

Also, all the things that the mayor discussed as responses to evacuation plan. I mean, is just one component of this, and it's kind of an aside. But it would be really nice to say, hey. We have been working on that. So a communication piece for that issue itself. So it's not out there that we have nothing because we do. And so that would be nice to communicate to people. Maybe that's a social media blast too. Mean, just something simple. But that was really helpful for me to learn that all these things have been done in response to a disaster.

The city is at work for it. Yeah.

Yeah. Think that's great. Brag a little bit.

Okay. If there's nothing else?

Do we send our public comments to you, Judy? I mean, if we have additional comments and edits, who do we send our comments to?

Community development department.

Yeah, they come to the community development department.

They will, the community development department will forward them to the commission members.

Correct. Yes, come bring those comments to me Renee.

I will.

I've got

about 10 pages

of them.

Oh dear. Okay. We will close the discussion item and move on to informational items for future agenda. What do we have?

Right. So you

can

see June 3, it looks like we will have a meeting. We have already sent out notice for the what's the zone change for 1124 Maricopa Highway. Sounds familiar because this item did come before this body already. We have met that notice and requirement, so you will be hearing this item on the June 3. I'm not seeing any other items on the agenda, so it will be the sole item at this point, at least from a public hearing standpoint. Okay. For June 17, I will admit that I will not be here. I will be out of country, but I do know that Mara will be here to

Okay.

To guide you guys through. So, I have full confidence that she'll be able to do that and more specifically with the item that is gonna be before this body. So, you're seeing a farmer's market, that really is that local farmer's market that has been at Chaparral for the last several years. They're looking for a new home, so that new home is looking to land at Libbey Park. So, you'll get to hear all the fun bits and pieces that go along with that.

And then there's several pending items. Those are all either in review or out for corrections at this point.

Okay.

I have a question for you. Renee Roth suggested that we needed to know the state laws that we're dealing with, right, for the safety element. And Jonathan and I are tasked with objective design standards. So, I was hoping to have something similar to what are the laws we are reacting to.

Can we talk about that off offline?

Yes. But, I just wanted to give you would like to have that list of

Absolutely. You need that. That's your baseline.

Can start with Renee's list of 10.

The list of 10 with the safety element. Yeah. Independent of

I what we're talking mean, just a similar issue. It's hard to put together a document without having

Got to start from What the

exactly are we, yeah. Understood.

We're

playing. Okay. Do we have a director's report? I'm sorry. Yes. I'm right here. Yes. Yes. Again, everything comes