Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Here.

Okay. Items from the public. At this time in the meeting, we will take any public input on items that are not on the agenda. Anything related to what we do here that is not on the agenda, now would be the time to come forward. Or if you're on Zoom, tell us you're there. Anyone?

As a reminder, if you're on Zoom and you'd like to make a comment, please press the raise hand function. We have no one on Zoom asking to speak at this time.

Alright. Then we will move move on. Statement of conflict by commissioners. We have one item with two different portions of it on tonight's agenda. Commissioners, are there any conflict?

None here.

Conflict? None. None. None. No conflict. Okay. And no additional correspondence. We do have two items of business to deal with December, and February. Let's do December 18.

Move approval.

Let me let me ask if anybody's got any changes here.

I'm sorry.

That was last year. That's a long time ago, remember. Anybody okay with those minutes? I was missing half the time you ran the meeting, so I'll let you decide if it was all right. No changes?

No changes.

No. Taking that, give me your motion.

Move approval.

Perfect. We got a second somewhere. Second. Motion second. Let's call the roll.

Commissioner Appland? Aye. Commissioner Alexander? Aye. Commissioner Sadhu? Aye. Vice Chairman Bendix?

Aye.

Chairman West.

Aye. All right. February 12. Now that's more recent. We can remember that. Everybody okay with those minutes?

Yes. Move approval.

Okay. Motion to approve. Motion. Second. Is there a second? Second. Good. Okay. We got a motion and a second.

Let's call the roll.

Commissioner Applin? Aye. Commissioner Alexander? Aye. Commissioner Sadhu? Aye. Vice Chairman Bendix?

Aye.

Chairman West?

Aye. Okay. We do have a public hearing on two related items, an architectural and site plan review 2406 and conditional use permit 2403 for Jay's Food Court. All right. We got a staff report.

Do. And we got a brief PowerPoint presentation to you and the public through the process, through the report. So before you, there is a proposal and a request for conditional use permit and architectural site plan review approval for Jay's Mobile Food Court, which is proposed to be installed and constructed and developed at a location on the on 111 East Las Palmas Avenue. The site is indicated underneath the star on the image on the screen. It's on the North Side of East Las Palmas and just to the east of North 1st Street.

And the site is currently zoned heavy industrial, as are the surrounding properties. There's an existing food court business immediately to the east of the project site, and they actually abut each other in the northern portion of the project in about this location here. There's the existing Valero gas station that I'm pointing to with my laser pointer on the screen to the southwest of the project site. There's an existing residential neighborhood, very small neighborhood to the Southeast. There's a currently vacant industrial commercial service building to the immediate north.

It used to be a tire and auto repair facility, and I understand that the property owners of the subject property acquired this site a couple of years ago, and so they are the owners to the north as well, unless that's changed. Please correct me.

Is that not an approved project?

Which one?

Next door to that.

You mean to

The building next door?

The one I just pointed It's it's currently vacant and

Is that the soccer thing?

Yes. Oh, you're right. Yes. That's correct. That's correct. My bad. Yes. That is correct.

We approved soccer indoor soccer there.

That's right. So all the area is industrial to the surroundings as well as to the South and to the South West as well. Of course, there's a county pub facility building here across 1st Street. The site, the owner's property in question has access available to it off of North 1st Street, and there's no access to the site other than the existing auto sales facility that was approved and began operation in the fall of last year, and they have their own driveway right about there. And, but that site is separate.

It's enclosed and sort of self contained as its own auto sales business. So, the proposal involves a request for 13 mobile vendor locations. They would be either a trailer or a food truck, and they would be spread amongst the site. Okay, so let's see here. Let me go to the next screen.

So this is the site plan of the proposal. The food vehicles would be situated primarily along the majority of the eastern boundary, and there's 10 of them here, and then there's another three spaces at the northeast corner.

These Is that the connection right there to the other

There's a potential connection right there.

So the other side of that line is the other food court?

That is correct. And so to elaborate this area to the east and below as well as above it slightly is the existing food court business that's been in operation for several years. And this area here in this quay, that's the residential area, and there's a vacant commercial building here. But you are correct, there's a potential connection site right here. The applicant is proposing a small gate.

They're not proposing vehicle access at this time, but the two properties do abut. So continuing with the presentation, these elongated rectangles are proposed gazebo structures to provide shelter from sun and rain during inclement weather. There's a number of them here as well. Each one is approximately 12 by 20 feet, and this is a conceptual rendering of them. I've been told by the applicants the style that they prefer has sort of a wood grain appearance, so they look like wood, but they're resistant to deterioration because they're metal.

Corrugated roof design, I don't have a dimension for the post, I would imagine they'd be at least four by four inches, preferably six by six or some somewhere in between. Going back to the site plan, the proposal shows that the site would be somewhat separated from the existing auto sales facility, which is right here, by either existing and or new landscaping, a new walkway that would lead visitors in this parking lot area here to the majority of the food court area. There would be a pedestrian gate located right there at East Las Palmas along the sidewalk. There's parking that's currently allowed along this stretch of East Las Palmas. Trash enclosure located along the North property boundary, which would serve the entire food court operation.

The applicant is showing landscaping buffers along portions of the perimeter of the project site, as well as at the entry off of 1st Street. There are no detailed specific landscape plans at this point. As a condition of approval, we would require those prior to completion and occupancy of that development. There are 38 regular parking spaces proposed as part of the development. I pointed out in my staff report presentation, there are no current accessible, handicap accessible parking spaces.

Any part of our additional plan review process would call out a number of ADA spaces that are required, that they would be required to put those in there before occupancy. And they would work closely with our building staff to determine the appropriate locations in order to make access most available to those that rely on special ADA spaces.

What would the new number of spaces be if they make that change, do you think?

That's to be determined. I mean, so the if they have 38 right now

And they two.

And they need two of them, that would cost them at least three spaces, maybe as many as four. There could very well be, based on the current layout, there may be ways to absorb that. They've got a generous amount of landscaping over here. When they get into the greater detail of designing the site, things like that would be ironed out. I can't imagine it being greater than two, but the city building official, chief building official would make that call.

During our review of the proposal, access to the site was a pretty important consideration. It's somewhat sensitive because there are currently a number of driveways along this stretch of East Las Palmas, primarily the access point at the existing Valero property, the access point just, you know, a couple dozen feet away, serving solely just the auto sales facility. Nothing existing in place currently for this portion of the project's frontage. And then another driveway serving the residents in this area, and then another driveway serving the existing food court further to the east. There's not much consensus at the staff level, at least, that a new driveway location in here would be desirable.

We would Any discussions about that would need to be backed up with a specific traffic analysis. So, applicants are aware of that constraint. They propose that their main access come off of North 1st Street at the northwest corner of their site, where there would be a gate that would be open during business hours that would allow patrons to come through and into the site to park and then go to their favorite food facility. Staff talked at length with the proponents throughout the course of this project review about the possibility or their preference or lack of preference for the actual connection to the existing food court. I presume the applicants may touch on that, their rationale for how we arrived at this design.

I don't want to speak for them. Staff does believe that connectivity between this site and the other site is a good thing, at least from a pedestrian standpoint. We feel that there could be advantages if it was able to be opened up to vehicular traffic as well. I understand that there are important considerations the applicants maintain or that if they have held to shy from that approach. But again, I encourage them to elaborate on that as an important part of this discussion.

The predominant access issue is the access between the Valero and the proposed the proposed project. The what I have not said thus far is that the property owners for the prop the project site own the property to approximately this point here. What the site plan doesn't show accurately is the relationship of an easement that exists on their own property that that was established to provide the Valero business or the property owner at the corner a legal right for ingress and egress and parking. I'd like at this point to pass out an exhibit that shows the actual plat of the property where I have highlighted the actual easement that is in place currently based on the information submitted to us at this time. This is for the public, Lisa, and then three more copies for all of you.

And I have an extra copy if we need to pass it out. So the orange area, I don't have a slide of it, I just ran out of time, but the orange area on the sheet shows what we understand based on information submitted by the applicant, that the easement area is approximately, well, is 15 feet wide. And according to the deed that defines the access easement, it extends northerly off of East Las Palmas approximately 200 feet. The site plan as it's been prepared shows a 30 foot wide easement, which we don't have confirmation of that, and I think that that's been done in error. And so it creates a bit of confusion about the relationship of the access.

And so while we're on the topic of access, the fire department has indicated the need to have two points of access to the site that are a minimum of 20 feet wide each. That's easily provided at least off of the North 1st Street area. They've got more than 20 feet, plenty of area. So to specifically focus on this one here, we have information showing that there's a legal access granted to this property for 15 feet beyond the property boundary of the subject property. In addition to the 15 feet, it appears based on aerial photograph imagery that there's at least an additional five feet that would provide a minimum of 20 feet between the existing building of the car sales facility and the property boundary that is in the possession and ownership of the project's property owners.

In other words, there's likely to be enough width to technically meet the fire department requirement of 20 feet in width for secondary emergency access. Because it's shared though with the Valero property, whoops, With the Valero property, staff has concerns about an over intensification or demand of new traffic trips placed upon that. So it's staff's position that this should be a one way access into the site, and we've discussed that with the applicant there. They agreed it during our last discussions at the staff level with the owners, with the applicant, and that's a way that it could function. I don't want to speak for them.

They're welcome to comment on this during the public comment period. But, so there's a way to technically provide for secondary access point, which is important for two purposes. First and foremost, access to provide life safety responses if need be, and then secondly, to provide the most immediate possible access into the site off of East Las Palmas possible. People over time may find this just easier to round the corner, head a block, you know, not even a block north on North 1st Street and then turn into the development. But it technically could become available with the proper care, the proper attention to it that involves another issue, which is that there's an ongoing dispute currently between the Valero property and the owner's property due to the placement of an existing food court, not food court, mobile vehicle food truck and an existing carport structure over it providing shelter that is right in the easement area.

And it appears to be on the property owned by the applicant without their permission. And a brief bit of background on that is that at the time that the owner of that business for that mobile food vendor approached the city, they gave the city an address that was the Valero address. So based on the information the city was provided, city approved first a conditional use permit by the Planning Commission, and then ultimately after the conditional use permit, a city business license. It's clear, it's obvious at that time that nobody, and it's not a practice of the city to go and verify property boundaries at the time of a business license application or even a conditional use permit. We rely upon information to be true and accurate.

If it's not, then that's that's there are errors that those proponents will need to address however they may be able to. I would imagine as per standard city protocol, at the time of the use permit hearing for that business, that existing mobile food court business, that there there would have been a public hearing notice sent out to property owners of at least the surrounding 300 feet and probably even the 500 feet, which it was greater at that time. And so that would have invited property owners that own property within the 300 foot perimeter to come and comment, support or oppose the proposal of that use permit at that time. That predates my time here. Others may have some comment on that.

I do not see value in that being the focus of tonight's meeting, but it's an important part of the discussion because ultimately it's important and we are recommending a modification to one of the conditions to address the issue of that food vehicle and the wall. There's a vinyl fence also on the applicant property owner's property that creates the illusion that the Valero site is bigger than it is. If we look at the Valero site as being within the wall or the fence, that's misleading because it's actually 10 or 15 feet beyond Valero's property boundary. So Valero's property is actually skinnier than the way our eyes and our minds would interpret it to appear. So that's important to understand.

And I'll discuss the condition of approval that our city legal staff is recommending. And I will mention that, do I have that handy here? Let's see here. Yes. This is the way it reads and we'll revisit it, I'm sure, as this discussion continues.

But just so it's clear at the onset of this discussion, it would be a modified condition number 41 that reads, prior to city approval of improvement plans and issuance of a building permit, the applicant shall submit a current title report and proof of adequate access through the proposed ingress and egress. So we're we're attempting to if if the commission takes an action to approve the project this evening, city legal staff is is imploring that we do so knowing that there will be access through that easement area. There's more on the topic of that easement and the dispute and the current lack of access right now, I'll I'll I'll I'll conclude those comments with the statement that, the city has heard the applicant and owner's concerns expressed to us about the the existence of these facilities, the food truck and the carport structure and the fence being on their property. And we have represented at the staff level that we will begin looking into what our options are for potential enforcement activity. There is also existing legal action that's occurring between the applicant owner.

Don't wanna say applicant. Technically, the applicant is not the owner, but they're a team. So there's legal action between the subject property owner and the property owner where the Valero site is at. And because of that current legal action still in play, the city's position on enforcement needs to be somewhat cautious. Our legal staff is on is attending via the Teams meeting link or the Zoom link, and Josh Varinsky, our legal staff, may likely have something to add to that whenever he feels it's appropriate.

For right now, I think I'll just conclude my staff report touching on some of the other considerations that staff went through as we analyze this development, this proposal. We talked about the access. We talked about the parking considerations. Staff wanted to make sure that the community, the commission was aware of some of the safety considerations that could be at play, not not necessarily definite, but primarily the I keep doing that.

The

the subject of the Northeast portion of the property, Staff has felt like that's been that's been a challenge for everybody, the owner, staff, to what to do with that. It's it's a it's sort of a flag piece. It's low profile. It's it's out of it's it's obscured by visibility. It's in my report, I I referenced that, staff has concerns that that area may attract nefarious activity and create vulnerabilities to unsuspecting visitors.

Because it's low profile, it's not very well observable from the rest of the development. And that's particularly heightened if this gate were to remain closed right here. If it's a free flow of activity between both sites, that has the potential to create more visibility, and maybe there's value in that. But I don't want to overplay that hand. It's something that I would feel remiss if I didn't bring it up as an area of of special attention that I felt the commission ought to be aware of.

Design considerations, were discussed quite a bit at length at the staff level and with the applicants. The the Planning Commission in the past has indicated a preference for master planning the site for food food courts to be somewhat master planned. And that's a relatively loose term when it comes to applying a master plan towards something like a food court. Typically, plans are very magnanimous documents that apply to master planned communities, an entire downtown, a section of town. But the intent, as I understand it, has been that a master plan for at least a uniform food court project in and of itself as it relates to its own property is a desirable objective when reviewing a food court.

And so that was achieved through the last food court project that the city reviewed in terms of a uniformity that was proposed and presented to the Planning Commission. And that created a uniform, planned out, attractive design that received a five o vote from the Planning Commission. There's not really a theme with this development, with this proposal. There's and not that there has to be, but it helps. And it helps the city administer and enforce the appearance over time to rein in out of control elements that something like a food court might have.

We don't have a, food court is not a series of physical structures that the applicant says, here's our architectural plan, and we evaluate that against our design guidelines. These are mobile vehicles. So we're challenged in being able to enforce the the appearance over time. So the city is somewhat vulnerable in that. So we we end up having to be trusting that they will be maintained well and attractive and clean, and that the structure whatever structures are out there look good, but without a without physical or without literal architectural plans, it's it's a struggle.

And is there a condition that says they they need to be maintained, or is there any any way to address that in the condition?

I've put conditions in there that require that litter and debris needs to be picked up daily. And there's conditions that apply to signage so that it's not obnoxious, that it's not violating the city code. For instance, condition number 11 reads, no temporary tenant flags, banners, wind advertisements, etcetera, shall be allowed that are not outlined in the master plan, the master sign program, which is another condition. That whatever signage that they're proposing, that there at least be some uniformity with that. So that we can hold them to that.

Because signage is the first thing that goes crazy and that can get out of hand and we can receive complaints about and it can detract from the overall atmosphere and surrounding property values, etcetera. So violations, continuing with that same condition, it reads, violations will be subject to code enforcement actions. So it's an important one. I do we all know that the existing food court just to the east, they depend on those banners. They depend on their signage.

I expect the same dynamics to play out here. I hope that we learn lessons from where we've missed opportunities with the effective conditions of approval in the past that we get them now. That we we learn from wherever we've been lacking in our design review and capture the the the intent of what the city wants to see as far as the design and that we have things in there, either codes or conditions that help us enforce that. Because without that, it we're we're on a whim. We're we we're we don't have much legal authority to stand on.

So I brought that to your attention as the the primary design consideration that I wanted to talk about. There aren't really any structures other than the gazebos. I do but talking about structures, I do need to also focus a bit now on the existing car sales facility, which would be doubling as a part of this proposal. That sounds bigger than it really is because, but the reality is that it's about an 878 square foot existing structure, not big. So doubling would add another eight seventy eight ish square feet.

On the north side, relatively out of view from East Las Palmas. So it'd be on the backside, the north side, it would be highly visible to patrons coming to park and visit the food court. And so, moving the slide to that part, I'm zooming in now to that existing auto sales facility, and the dark gray area, well the striped area is the existing building, whoops. I'm sorry everybody, when I keep doing that, let's go back. The striped area is the existing auto sales facility.

The tenants there have done a fantastic job of cleaning that up, repainting it, breathing some life into it. Looks it looks looks good from the front. The new addition, probably a little bit more than doubling the existing site. The existing building would be on the backside. And now to go to the the elevations, these are the the the existing and proposed elevations of that building.

So this would be the existing front that we see along East Las Palmas. This would be looking at that building towards the east, towards the west, and looking at the backside, the new construction, that this is what it would appear from the new parking spaces within the food court.

And what's this use?

It would be an expansion of the auto sales.

Okay, part of the same building.

That's correct. That's correct. I don't have that wrong. If I'm incorrect with that, please correct that. But that's my understanding.

I've talked about the surrounding area being heavy industrial.

Does that include the homes there? Are they sort

of They're they're existing nonconforming? Those are everything that's Everything. Not heavy industrials, existing nonconforming. You're correct. Historically, the city has allowed some mobile food vendor businesses within this district in limited cases following conditional use permit review by the Planning Commission. So there's been a precedent. And so the question of land use compatibility is a bit complex because we have existing mobile food businesses. This proposed use would not conflict with those. It would not conflict with the fuel sales. We don't anticipate that it would conflict with the property to the north as it's detached.

It's separated by a fence. Staff does have concerns about potential land use conflicts between this proposed use and the residences that I talked about earlier that are immediately to the east. And their backyards would be right up against the new mobile food vendor vehicles. There is a CEQA exemption for these types of developments under CEQA guidelines section fifteen three thirty two. There are findings that the Planning Commission is required to make in their consideration of these permits and the architectural site review, and those are provided for in the staff report.

Then finally, staff recommends that the Planning Commission conduct the public hearing, allow members of the public to testify, then consider the issues discussed in this report, as well as by the members of the public, and then to consider one of three of the following alternative actions provided in the staff report, including to approve the project, the use permit, and the architectural site review, or approve it with changes or revisions as may be determined to be necessary by the Planning Commission, or to determine the third and final option is to determine proposal is not consistent with the applicable policies of the city and to deny the proposal. I am there's a the attached the I'm sorry, the report has a list of proposed conditions attached at the back of the staff report, and I am happy to answer any questions at this time.

What's the crosshatch period? There's a portion of the thing that has crosshatch. What's that for?

On the site plan? Yeah. So this I presume this area here? Yeah. What that is showing is the potential for a fire truck turnaround. These are the dimensions the fire department would rely upon for being able to turn around. And so the cross hatched area is intended to illustrate that this portion of the site has enough room to turn around.

So they wouldn't have to back out? Correct.

So and that's assuming that the gate is open. And

the gate would be

We'd have a Knox.

Yeah. Knox. Correct. So they have the

That's ability conditional approval. So

the other the other question I had is, why wouldn't we consider an emergency access where the the test screen gate access is on, Las Palmas. It makes more sense to have two different accesses of egress and exit for the fire department rather than just having both of them in the same general area.

So we did talk with the applicants about that.

No. How about the fire department?

And the fire department as well in a joint meeting. And so the so there's two there's I've got two responses to that. One is that it would require a 20 foot wide gate, and it's my understanding the the the proponents want to have a pedestrian gate there. And because they have legal access at the other location next to the Valero, that mitigates the need for the secondary access. So the project team, the city, the applicants agreed to pursue that secondary access being at Valero, which then forced the condition, the the expectation that that be a one way access so that we're not impacting the existing circulation dynamics at that corner, which can be busy, which can be, you know, complicated because of the different there's three different uses.

There's gas pumps, a mini market, and there's an existing food vendor. Well, the food vendor would go away. You know, it it would have to go away in order for the easement to open up. And, ideally, they would be located right inside. So but nonetheless, that's the answer.

The the other thing is the obviously, there is a the over covered structure has to go away. Otherwise, the fire department couldn't possibly egress or in enter that area.

Not in the fire truck.

Not in the fire truck. Mhmm. But, well, it wouldn't be there long.

Is your mic on? Make sure

you're No. It's not. It is now. On.

We need

So the the I wanna make it clear the opportunity for additional fire access. The site has really four viable locations for emergency secondary access. Whatever the secondary one ends up being needs to be 20 feet wide for the fire department to count it as viable. The the frontage along East Las Palmas remains an option, but it it the and I don't wanna speak for the applicants, but I understand that one of the reasons why that's not it is because it's a industrial kind of gate that would be needing to be open daily. Maybe that's not the end of the world. But that's that is an option available to them that

could work. It could be partially gate and a chain, so the fire department could crash the the chain if in fact they needed access to it.

That wasn't listed as an option by the fire department.

Oh, okay. Sorry.

That's okay.

Anybody else have any questions? I'm sorry. It's your meeting.

You're doing great. You're doing great. And then we're getting some good questions down here, guys, or staff? Just

a clarification. Is it just gonna be a one way entry or it's gonna

Guys, get your mics on.

Oh, sorry. The question is

Is it gonna be one way?

Yeah. The question is, would the circulation just be one way? The entry off of North 1st Street would be two way. If this ends up being as proposed, the secondary access, this would need to be ingress only, inbound traffic only, and not outbound. Is outbound already historically because of the gas pumps. Staff did not feel that adding a new use to that existing dynamic is desirable.

Alright. Other questions?

So the the whole issue is the the easement exists, but there's also an encroachment on the current owner's land by the food truck and the fence?

That's what we understand based on the information we've been given thus far. Yes.

Okay. So that has to be adjudicated before anything else can be solved here.

Basically. Okay. Everybody clear on as clear as we can get on this? A little complicated, but we're getting it here. Okay. If there are no more questions, then I will open the public hearing. Let's hear from our applicants and maybe we can get some answers to some of the questions. Who would like to tell us a little more about this project?

Okay, just checking. Good evening, commissioners, chairperson, city staff. My name is Renu, and I'm open to any questions that you have in regards to this project.

Okay. We got commissioners, anybody have any questions? Did have one. That area along the back that we've been talking about where you're showing three of the units, how would that open on to that other food court? What would make these one court instead of two separate courts? How are you how is that being addressed?

At the moment, it's only going to be pedestrian access. There will be NOxbox on all of the gates that are accessible to that property, whether it's pedestrian or it's an open driveway. We would like to keep both projects separate, both project sites are separate. The conditions that will be applied to this current location are obviously separate to the existing for the other food court. And at the moment, we would like to make sure that we are addressing that corner.

I know your concerns are for security and safety in that area and visibility. It's quite an open area. It is visible from the existing food court and also from the North 1st Street as well. Security wise, there are going to be cameras everywhere. They do have on-site and off-site security that will be out of hours for that location.

Obviously, people have a lot of equipment there. It's accessible. There's going to be lights. There's going to be street lights over there that will have that as a well lit area. What we're actually concerned about more is about the residential area just on the south side of that, which is what we see as of the last couple of years and since the last eighteen months that I've been here in Paterson myself.

We've been trying to address that as something that I will classify as a scout house where activities happen in there. We don't know who's in there, who's residing, if the owners maintain it. It's badly presentable as it is. If anything, it's kind of degrading looking at that property. So, that's more of a concern for us on how that's going to affect us on the project site on the North Side.

So that's something that we have brought to the city's attention multiple times to see how that's going to be addressed as well. If that was well maintained as it stands currently and enforced by the city, I'm sure that that area behind will also be very visible and maintained and safe and secure too. So the concern that I would like to address with the city is that residential area and how that would be enforced to also meet some sort of compliance and also adhere to some sort of security and safety as well. And that will also elaborate and follow through for the north side, which is that little section of this site at the moment.

Well, in terms of overall circulation for both of these, having vehicles go through there would solve this problem very nicely where you've got both of your accesses here on one corner basically and not connecting a vehicle through where someone has to come through. Why would you be willing to open that up to some vehicles and get the and move some circulation through the two projects that

So we

Would that work?

Okay. As the applicant presenting this for the owners, this is something that we did bring to the city back in 2024. It's taken from 2024 to today to get to this optimized site plan in coordination with the city planners. We did initially request that we do a through access point, but at that time it wasn't so feasible or recommended by the city planners or the city staff. Hence why we reoptimize the site and then we are today presenting what we have right now, including the access points, the turn points, the parking, the allocations of where the food trucks sit currently, the gazebo.

So this was all optimized according to recommendations with the city planners.

I need to step in. I need to be emphatic. We highly encouraged from the onset. I walked the site with Renew and the property owners, and we stood there at that location and discussed the value of connecting the two sites. Connecting the two sites stands for everything city planning talks about, so I need to make a correction right there.

I I have a question. Most of these food trucks are not going to be mobile, so they're not picking up and moving. Otherwise, I'm not sure how they they would be ingress it and exit out of on first Street or they're they're basically fixed. They're not moving.

They're stationary. Yes. That's correct. So once they're in place, they they they will not be moving, hopefully, unless they are Yeah. Are Yeah. Direct to whatever the

Okay.

Whatever the rules are.

I get that that was always a concern. If in fact they're gonna be moving, then we need to have adequate access for them to be moving. But I if that's not gonna be the hopefully, that's not the case. They're gonna be permanent, and they're gonna stay there and make money. The other thing is, never mind. It went away. It's a senior moment.

Interesting. Interesting questions. What do we got here, guys? Something down here? Is this are you guys how are you guys feeling about this? Well, let's not get that yet. I want to continue our public hearing. Anything else to add to that?

Yes, please, if you don't mind. I just wanted to touch base with the reference to easement for the Valero gas station and the current existing property owned by the owners of the proposed food court. I'd just like to clarify that that's not we're not trying to state that as an easement. It's actually a property owned by the applicants as well. If you can have a look at it, I can see that there was some confusion with the three lines that are coming up with the drive approach.

The current existing drive approach, which is on the Southwest side, that drive approach actually is in the property of the owner. 50% of that drive approach is owned by Mr. Gill. And the setbacks that we have from the existing building to the property line, if you look from the East side, you've got one line, which is what's currently available to him. The actual property line is the one in the middle.

And if we look at that setback, should somebody have not encroached into his property would have been available for him to sufficiently use that as his ingress as a one way direction in and out sorry, into his site and out through North 1st Street. In regards to the CUP, this has just come to my attention after Brian's update on the food truck that's currently situated in Mr. Gill's property is that if he had gone for a CUP similar to what we are doing currently now, a site plan would have been presented at that time to where his truck is going to be placed. License was issued to him, he would have done his due diligence and the city for him to be situated in that property. And I would have assumed that he would be in Valero gas station's property and not encroaching on Mr.

Gill's property right now. So we wouldn't actually be having this confusion coming backwards and forth on how much access he does have and how much access he doesn't have, should that have been addressed. And we have been bringing this backwards and forth to the city over the period of the last one year. According to my knowledge, it's been over a year. In regards to having a setback from the building and what we have available in his actual owned property, we have more than enough sufficient setback and also access for a 20 foot driveway for a fire truck to be accessible without any issues.

I know that some I'm sure one of the chairperson, I believe, asked the question about the red hashed lines. That's just an illustration. It's not something that will be done on-site. It's to show that we do have viable and sufficient space to satisfy the conditions of the fire department.

Okay. Let me clarify one more time. Are you guys willing to talk about vehicle movement through there? Is that doable or not?

At this time, I cannot answer that question, but I'm sure that the owners will be open to discuss that and join the actual optimization with the site and taking it through acceptance with the building and engineering department.

Because that solves the overall circulation problem. Clearly, the two axes so close to each other, that's a problem. But with it being in court and the easements and all of that business, that's a little shaky in terms of a solid second access that we feel comfortable, that I feel comfortable with at the moment.

But if

you had vehicles that could go in your main your existing driveway for the existing facility and come through there and stop at any one of the food courts, to me, that's that would be a no brainer.

I'm sure that's something that the owner would consider. However, looking at the current circumstances on how we've got to this current stage, I'm sure he's going to be very hesitant to look into something like that because the conditions of approval that will be applicable to the current proposed site and the conditions of approval for the existing site, it could mean that crossing over into the and merging both of those locations together may actually put inconvenience to the existing business owners there because we don't know what would be conditioned to there that can also affect their business, which is currently operating and is sufficient. The community are in there a lot. It is used. There are some very good vendors in there.

And primarily, that food court and the current food court that we're proposing, it's a multi cuisine food court. So, we're trying to use it as a multicultural a cool kind of area where they can come in with like different types of food, not just a Mexican palate, but also Indian, Chinese, dessert, piles, things like that. So, we're trying to attract different types of cuisines, different communities to come in and try it. It's supposed to have the presentation of a more of a community zen area and we're trying to incorporate that together by keeping and maintaining an aesthetic view. Whatever is going to be conditioned to the current proposed site is going to follow through with the other one.

However, we don't want to cause inconvenience to the existing owners that are currently operating within the existing food court.

I thought there was a connection there between the owners.

Yes.

There is no connection?

At the moment, I'm not going to be able to answer that question, but I'm sure during further Okay, dialogue anyway. We

Okay, all right.

Oh, yes, sorry, my bad. I'm so sorry. Yes, they are the same owners, and yes, they

will be open Okay, to so we're not we don't have an owner problem here?

No, we don't.

Well, all the international thing I love, and that's all the more reason to connect them. If I want Mexican food and have to drive out on the highway over to 1st Street to go get my Jamaican food, I want to drive right through. Okay. Well, okay, think we've okay, anything else to add? I need to move on here. Anything else? Do we have any questions for okay, let's see who else would like to speak to this. Anyone else like to address this?

Hi, I don't typically talk much, but my name's Jamie, and I do the daily management of the current food court on 207 East Las Palmas, and then I'll be overseeing the daily operations of this food court as well. So for me, I just I know you guys go over the site plan. Just more of the the vision that I have, that we have for this plan is is more about beautifying the heart of Patterson. The property is currently right in the center of Patterson, and we're beautifying everything by the highway, and we're beautifying everything in the new developments, and we're trying to take Central Patterson and make it where it's not overran by transients, we don't have all this shady stuff going on. And we want this to be a place I currently have multiple food trucks already committed to parking and staying stationary at this location, barbecue, Dan's barbecue, who does Apricot Fiesta every year.

He wants a spot. I have a cheesesteak truck that wants a spot. I have a dessert truck. I have a pizza truck. I want families to come, and I want we want families to be able to kids can choose different trucks, and families can choose different trucks, but everyone can still eat together, and we have a big seating area, and the aesthetics are nice and pleasing.

And we do we had talked about vehicle access from one to the other, And I understand that, that's something that they can decide with the planning and all the CUPs and permits and the red tape that goes along with that. Either way, it's going to be accessible through walking or driving, whatever's decided amongst. You'll be able to join. So we'll have the current food trucks, which are mostly taco trucks, on 207, and then you can walk through or drive through, and you'll have, 111, 111 East Las Palmas that will have also a much diverse, and we're trying to get away from the monotony of what all the food trucks currently are in town, and make it a very, like, just an open community family setting, where so many people can come and just access the Asian, and we have jerk chicken coming, and we have, you know, Creole food coming, and we have all these different types of food coming. And just having an area where kids can play and you can eat, and just have a big community and aesthetically pleasing.

As far as litter picking up every day, that's not a problem. And making sure that, you know, it's aesthetically nice. I just want to get the vision, you know, and I know we look at all the site plan in the black and white, But what we're trying to achieve here is not anything but bringing the community together. And if we can work together to do that, we're all for it. You know, nobody's we don't want to do anything that that the city's not happy with.

You know? We we want to work together and and make it however aesthetically pleasing we need it to be, and whatever we you know, just work together, and just really kind of take that part of Patterson that's so run down and so forgotten, and and bring it back to life. And that's really what we're trying to do in the safest and most feasible way, you know, for everybody.

And I think that is kind of a rough looking corner that could be beautified a lot. And if you did the two together and got your circulation working properly, you could do a theme like the director's talking about and make it an international sort of a theme. Yeah. And make it look proper all the way across. Make a uniform thing that looks like it was master planned. Think that could work nicely, but you're gonna have to connect You gotta make these work together to become one rather than two, I think.

And I think that the connection is there, and I'm just speaking from I think that there's fear. There's fear if we open it up to, like, where cars can go through. There's some fear that where we're gonna get held up in the red tape of that, and what that opens up in. And that's just my like, it does bringing allowing cars to go through that area, I could I don't do the building If development part of

that's a concern, let's ask. Okay. Any more what else you got? And then I'm going to ask our director if there's going to be a problem logistically for you for doing that. Mac, go ahead. Is some condition we're going to make her do you have something if they run cars through there?

The only condition would be that there'd be traffic calming measure that prevents people from using that as a raceway or something like that. And there's different ways to do that, speed bombs or narrowing of the actual opening, the signage and monitoring. Staff welcomes that connection, staff considers a connection to the other one an asset to both developments. We understand that there may be a vendor in the existing development that would be affected because or two, I don't know. There would be room for them in this one as well.

Or shuffling around. There's probably different ways to achieve the accommodation of the existing vendors over there. But to answer your question, wholeheartedly staff supports that connection at a minimum pedestrian wise and definitely even with vehicles. The fire department would prefer that. Staff would prefer that as well. It's not something that staff has tried to force. We've tried to encourage it. But yes, would desire that open for vehicles.

All right. Who else would like to address this? Anybody else want to address? Thank you. Thank you folks for all your patience as we go through this.

Commissioners, thank you for looking at this proposed site. I'm gonna make this short and sweet. You asked about a theme.

You asked Name and address, please.

Oh, sorry. My name is Kyle Buida. I live at 87 or I'm sorry. 830 Madrone. You asked about a theme. K? The theme is this is a dream of a man that we lost. Two zero seven Las Palmas, my grandpa created because we lost the property that we had. And he gave the people that were currently residing at 401 North 1st Street a place to continue to do business. Thank you, Harry, for finishing that project.

This is what my grandpa envisioned for 401 North 1st Street when he was when he was alive. We lost that property. Then the 207, that became that was the goal to make this happen, and it didn't. So can you tell me what the measurement is on where you're saying the the vehicle act that you want the vehicle access on that? Can you is it 43 feet?

Up here? Yeah. It's 43 and a half.

K. Is that even feasible to have vehicle access with the trucks on one side and a

I don't know. I don't know if all those if all that stuff would fit in there in vehicles or not. I don't know the answer to that. K. So I'm gonna It may be that all that stuff doesn't fit.

I'm just gonna throw this out there that I'm sure everybody heard about what happened down in Crow's Landing, That this town does not need that to happen.

And Just for the record, what what

The the the child that got killed on on 33 because somebody was driving down 33, and he ran out into traffic. Okay. This is that is a spot that if somebody's getting food and walking across to the the proposed pavilion

Yeah.

That vehicle traffic should not be going through there.

Yeah. Yeah. For the way I'm look I'm looking at it, and it doesn't work the way it's designed there for sure.

Right.

Certainly, that would have to be modified somehow.

It's nice because they have three extra trucks, then, you know, you have pedestrian access. That's that's that's great because you can, like they said, you can join the two the two locations.

Yeah. And The landscaping doesn't look like there would be adequate space for a vehicle to go through.

Right. Correct. And and you might have to put them both on one side, one one vehicle or one of your your trucks and the food cover and leave the rest open. You may actually lose one. If vehicles went through there, it may cost you one a couple of those one or two of those. I don't know. I haven't done that. That's not mine. I didn't design the project.

If there's a sincere interest in making a vehicular connection, there's a whole host of different ways that could be achieved safely. Safety is going to be our first and foremost consideration of that. Convenience in that interconnectivity is would be secondary to that. So we would look for a way to blend the two, even if it meant swapping some of the parking spaces perhaps, you know, in one of these other clusters, like up in this area and putting them maybe as parallel spaces Well, and or something like that. There's different options.

Just from just from knowledge of the the 207 Las Palmas, you also have to consider that where that fence fence area is, there's existing electrical. There's existing vehicles parked there, if I'm not wrong. Was that correct? Yeah. So, I mean, they're now now you're displacing others to make restrictions. You know? So, I basically, I just wanted to come up here and say that, you know, you asked for a theme. The theme is a dream. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Who else would like to address this?

What's the area there's three what's the area below below that that's a square? What's that thing?

This year? Yeah. So if you look at the the dimensions or the shapes of these, these are the gazebos. So these are sort of side to side. These are there's two of them. There's they're end to end.

Okay. So that that it was basically the additional gazebos.

Correct.

Okay. Correct. The other question I have is, why do we have both of these projects together? The card car dealership, and it's it seems like we're building a building that isn't associated with the with the food trucks. Why are we doing them together?

I understand. That's a a very good question. And the reason is to be as least bureaucratic about this as possible. The common denominator is that both the car business and the proposed food court business are on the same parcel. That gives us the excuse to run them through the same process and to not require them to go through yet another process of site review.

It was just a question. Yep.

Fair question. It's a shame that wasn't part of the whole master plan and it's rather a different business.

How can we get rid of some of these residences that that appear to be more dilapidated than

that. That's that's Another issue. A completely different issue.

Different issue. It's residential at the moment. That's all we can that's all we have to get to.

Close the public hearing.

Anybody else? Yeah. Question.

Handicapped spaces would be somewhere in the mix. So they would lose some of the regular spaces and

need to

convert them to at least a couple ADA spaces.

All right, anybody else want to address the

Chairman West, we have Marco online who would like to speak.

Great. Marco, welcome.

Hi, all. Can you hear me fine?

Yep. We can hear you. Long time, man.

I know. I have I've been having to come on virtually. But, so, I mean, there's a lot with this one, it seems. And and I I could see the concern from the city side on with planning, and I could also see, you know, the concern and benefit and and the strategy between the from the applicant side as well. I'm curious if, compromise could be something where because there seems there seems to be there that we want to connect.

You know, there's those I want to connect the two. There's they could there's benefit to that. There could be also, you know, risk to that. I'm I'm one that I would not want to experience maybe this the what I envision for this from what's described is that cars driving or traffic going through their vehicle traffic could be dangerous, you know, or or kinda ruin the whole idea of this being an area where you could convene, where an area where you could gather, due to increasing increasing the the traffic. But I also do see, the potential, you know, safety risk of not having that that through.

And I'm curious if if there's I I believe the proper word is bollards bollards, almost like the the blockades that you maybe see on, like, college campuses or whatnot. Maybe if there's something where we could where the applicant would be able to consider that. That way during if in the event of an emergency, you know, first responders or vehicles could pass through at that time while still making it inviting where if those were up to block, you know, regular pedestrian vehicle traffic where foot traffic could still, you know, walk back and forth if needed. I'm not sure if that's something either party would be interested in. And and separate from that, I think the idea of this and and simply any individual that's looking to invest in this part of town in this specifically in that corner, we have to try to get to yes.

Right? And I know I know that's always the goal with these meetings is trying to get to yes, but finding some kind of compromise. I would hate to see this fail or not, you know, receive its CUP, especially when we're in a, you know, economic, you know, time and just the country in general where those that are looking to invest in low traffic communities like like ours or low residential, residents, in our community like, like Patterson, that we need to take advantage of anybody that's looking to invest in. And currently right now is a is a older gas station, you know, unsafe, residential structure and and gravel, really. You know?

So, again, going back to my original inquiry, if if maybe bollards, if I'm making sense with that term, could be compromise.

Good good idea. Good idea. Thank you, and thank you for your comments. Okay. Anyone else on Zoom?

Anybody else? No more Zoomers? You there? No more Zoomers.

All right.

I'm to close the public hearing and thank everyone for their input. Some interesting discussion. This is indeed an interesting area because of the circumstance. And this could very well be the thing that really cleans up that whole miserable corner out there. It's got to be done in a way that kind of works. And so I'm excited. I think this could be okay, guys. The public hearing is closed. It's up to us. What do you guys think? Give me some input down here on what how we can make this thing be the dream that these people want. What do we need to do, guys?

We need to make motion. Yeah. Okay. I'll make a motion to oh, you wanna make the motion? I'll go. Okay. To approve the conditional use permit, actually and back to the original conditional use permit and the architectural site and plan review twenty four zero three and twenty four zero six with the conditions as listed, 41 conditions.

Anything about the circulation on the

street? Actually, at this point, we can't make a decision on that. Yeah. I know you We can't. Well, we can, but it's that's that's a decision between the owner and what he wants to do with the adjacent property. He owns both of them.

Okay. Then your your motion is to approve it as it's shown.

Right. K.

I'd like to interject real quickly that I wanna remind the planning commission of the need, the legal advice from the city attorney is that condition number 41 be modified to include the language prior to city approval of improvement plans and issuance of a building permit, the applicant shall submit a current title report and proof of adequate access through the proposed ingress egress areas. And no permanent obstructions shall be allowed in the ingress egress routes. All ingress egress routes shall remain clear of obstructions at all times.

I'll add that as a condition. Do you have it? I'll add it to the motion. Do we have a second? Second. Thank you.

All right. Let's call the roll then, I guess.

Commissioner Aplin? Aye. Commissioner Alexander? Aye. Commissioner Sadhu? Aye. Vice Chairman Bendix? Aye. Chairman West?

Aye.

Okay. So ordered, and I really would love to see some connection of these two projects. Connect them, you guys. Connect them. Don't have two separate projects. Just don't do that.

Well, the two projects are connected by the management.

Yes. Yes. And and they should be. This that that corner needs help, and you guys are the right people to make it work.

So the other question is, should we have access to the the sports complex to the north too?

Yeah. Right. Okay. Or do we have to

go out to 1st Street to

access it?

We didn't address that.

We didn't address that.

We didn't address that. Okay. Is there anything else to be brought forward to the commission?

Yeah. I do.

Let's get from staff. Let's get staff first. Staff, what do you have for us?

Nothing to add at this time.

Okay. Items from the commission.

When are we gonna get Rogers finished? I know it's a PG and E problem. Can't we play the fire under him?

All I can say is hopefully soon. I don't have a date. I will inquire with the engineering division to, see what where they're at with it and let me know on Monday or Tuesday.

Okay. The other question is the letter that we sent to Save Mart, did it go to corporate? Did it go to the store? It went

to the local store.

Nobody needs to know anything it.

They have not done anything about it. And so I'm gonna need

to pay the rent. Personal visit. Made it out the door.

Yeah. Right. Yeah. Sort of have to smack him on the head so we can get some ADA additions there. Yep. I mean, Walmart is significantly improving the Mhmm. ADA without any question. Yeah. But the Save Mart is not doing SWAT.

You're right. Sorry. Alright.

No. No apology needed.

Yep. He's gonna stay on it for you.

Next meeting.

What else from commissioners? Oh, sorry.

The next meeting is Lisa, what's the date for the next meeting? The next scheduled meeting is the March 26.

Are we doing anything about the our unknown area to the north, or is that still in litigation? That's

a wide open question.

I know. I mean I don't

even know what you

mean by that. Well, I you know, the housing with our friends at from South Carolina, are we getting any cooperation from them?

Or Oh, we we've we've I can't say a whole lot other than that we have been actively involved in negotiating a series of development agreements with all of the developers in that area. So we hope to see the development agreements come before the Planning Commission and ultimately the City Council, hopefully as soon as April.

Okay. Musseltough. Alright. We need some more houses, and that's the only way we're gonna

get it.

It's the

only way we're gonna get them.

Get off their ass I mean, off their, dairy air. I'm sorry.

Good. Yes. Questions for comments, staff, commission? Commissioners, anybody? Nothing else to add?

I've created enough havoc here.

You have indeed. I'm adjourning the meeting. Thank you all.