Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

CONVERSATION ABOUT ALL OF THE WORK BEING DONE BY THE PLANNING DIVISION AND IMPORTANTLY AS IT RELATES TO OUR HOUSING PART OF THE PROGRAM, WE DID HAVE CONVERSATION AS WE DID HERE WITH YOU ABOUT PURSUING ANOTHER HOUSING ELEMENT TO ADDRESS THE VERY SMALL SURPLUS of land that we have zoned appropriately to accommodate our lower income arena. Uh, the board did provide direction to not pursue a, uh, an amendment at this time due to, uh, the current surplus that we, uh, that we have as well as the pipeline of affordable housing projects that will add to that surplus. However, they did, uh, mention that we should continue to sort of proactively identify potential properties that could, be included in our residential land inventory if needed, or as part of our next housing element, preparation of our next housing element. I should also note that at the meeting earlier this week, the CEO's housing division did provide an update to the board on the housing action plan. As part of that conversation, they also did speak to the affordable housing and employee accommodation ordinance. You should all have received an email letting you know that The April 7th nexus fee study presentation to the board has been postponed as well as the presentation to the planning commission that would have occurred on April 9th. The housing division is going to continue to work with the board's ad hoc committee to really focus on housing funding strategies and then they will kind of circle back to the ordinance and the Nexus study and so I will continue to keep you apprised of that progress through my planning director reports. In terms of upcoming board items, the board is scheduled to take up the Sheba Estates at Eden Rock project in Granite Bay on April 7th. In terms of upcoming planning commission meetings as you can see on the report we do have 3 meetings scheduled for April the 1st on April 9th there is one item scheduled for that meeting it will be a public meeting to. receive comments on a draft EIR for the Granite View condo project in Olympic Valley. I have provided the link to the webpage where you could begin looking at that draft EIR if you choose. On April 16th, we will hold a meeting at the North Tahoe Event Center. We have two items scheduled for that meeting, most notably the Village at Palisades Tahoe Specific Plan, the revised project and the entitlements associated with that project. I should also note we will have a 10 a.m. start time for that meeting. And then As you can see on the report, April 23rd, it is looking at this point to be a very full agenda. We have five items, two of which I should mention are consent items, but of the three items that are hearing items, we are expecting to have quite a bit of discussion around them. So plan for a... full morning perhaps going into the early afternoon. Also wanted to make note that we continue to progress the residential care home zoning text amendment. I'll continue to leave that link on your planning director report so that you can view progress as we post new information to our web page for that initiative. We have completed five MAC meetings to receive input on that package and we have two that are upcoming, the Forest Hill Forum on April 6th and the Central MAC on May 20th. And as I mentioned at your last meeting, we will also be taking this to the PLACER COUNTY AIRPORT LAND USE COMMISSION IN LATE MAY BEFORE BRINGING IT TO THE PLANNING COMMISSION. IN TERMS OF ADMINISTRATIVE UPDATES, JUST HAVE TWO FOR YOU. I WAS TRACKING THAT WE RECEIVED THREE PUBLIC COMMENT LETTERS. One this morning, a couple I believe yesterday, all related to the Gateway Park project sponsored by the 40 Acres Conservation League. That is a project with a filed application. It's currently an incomplete application that we're working with the project applicant. It will... or they've just recently signed the contract for the preparation of an environmental impact report. And the entitlements for that package include a minor use permit and variance. So as that project works through through its processing currently, it would be scheduled to be heard by the zoning administrator. That decision will be made by me in terms of the hearing body or decision body at a later date. But as you can tell from the letters there's quite a bit of interest in that in that project and i suspect that you'll continue to receive some correspondence on it and then lastly wanted to mention that your next quarterly report of items that are in the pipeline to be considered by the planning commission will come to you on april 23rd that completes my director's report and i'm happy to answer any questions that you have

Chris, I have a question about the nexus study, the completion of task four from the statement of work, which is the local jurisdiction comparison study. How will we get a handle on that? Will there be a second update draft posted to the website before the final draft is released? Because there's still a component of it that's not out there that's pretty critical to doing, obviously, comparisons.

And I know that I don't I don't know the answer to that. I will get an update from the housing division and I can provide an update at at our next at our next meeting.

Awesome. And I also wanted to give a plug again for residential care homes ETA that I would prefer if it comes the larger one seven to 16 residents comes to the Planning Commission rather than just zoning administrator. I said it before, but I just wanted to put a plug in there.

Just a quick, remind me on the 16th at the North Tahoe Events Center, will there be a sitting chair or a substitute?

Um, so we have, my understanding is we have both the chair and the vice chair absent from the hearing on the 16th. And so you're self serving as a second vice chair would be next in line.

I just wasn't sure where that stood. Yeah. And I but I work with your office to get a more thorough policy briefing in the next week, which is the most convenient for me. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you.

Do we know we have a quorum for that meeting?

My understanding is that we do have the other five members, um, for that meeting.

And are we staying up there?

I'm staying up there separate from, we will work on logistics with, with the members.

Anyone else? Thank you, Chris. Thank you. Uh, we'll move on to a planning commissioner reports. Does any commissioner have any, issue they would like to discuss or report on. Okay, then I will open it for public comment. First will be public comment for those items that are not on today's agenda. Do we have anyone in the audience? Anyone online?

We have one online. Caller, go ahead and unmute your mic and give your comments.

Greetings, commissioners. This is Diane Louise Alessi from Christian Valley Park Community Services District, District 5, six decades in Placer County. Sacramento's housing policy has undergone what is called an inshification. And yes, that's a word in the Webster's Dictionary. That's a technical term now for how the American dream got systematically hollowed out. Right now, Placer families see nearly $500,000 per door with low-income housing tax credit projects. That's likely to become luxury condos after 15 years. Developers paying an average of $4,000 in loose fees instead of building the poorest and most needy families' homes. And Rena rezoning, turning into raw land grabs for the new McMansions. But hey, here's a light bulb moment for you. What if we stopped selling the RM30 rezoned properties cheap to developers and instead incentivize those landowners to lease it for the tiny home ownership villages? Imagine a five acre RM30 parcel base zoning allowing 150 units, state density bonus WAP kicks in for 50 tiny homes serving the 0 to 45% AMI households, unlocking 270 total units and estimated $92 million project instead of a one-and-done $2 million land sale. That same landowner gets incentivized with 100% property tax exemption through the WELFORG welfare exemption, plus 50% off their own personal houses, property taxes, and plus approximately 40,000 in a year in passive income from the lease while retaining land appreciation. Residents buy $75,000 tiny homes and in Detroit's proven CASS model, They're paying $800 a month for the pad, occupant owning the home outright in seven years. That's step-up housing, tent to tiny home to traditional single family. For Placer County, contract housing trust Placer, who then manages everything using your existing in-lieu fees to fund the first 10 homes. RENA compliance achieved. HCD satisfied. No more nearly $500,000 per door with reliance on massive subsidies. This is all legally bulletproof with welfare exemptions, density bonus, and Williamson Act precedent. How about 180 days from dirt to keys? Commissioners, this is your moral imperative. Planners, this solves your math problem. direct staff to draft the RM30 ground lease plus density bonus ordinance for the April 7th board consideration, which I just heard got shifted, but the ends with the step up housing. Thank you Diane. Thank you.

Anyone else online?

I see none.

Thank you. We'll now move on to our single hearing item today. Item one is, or our only item, is a consideration of entitlements for Phase 2A East Subdivision of the Placer Ranch specific plan. For this item, the Planning Commission is the decision body, and the presentation will be given by Senior Planner Kara Conklin. Good morning.

Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you. My name is Kara Conklin with the Planning Services Division. And the item before you this morning is a vesting phase small lot tentative subdivision map for phase 2A East of the Placer Ranch specific plan and an administrative modification for a residential unit transfer. I'm just going to check this pointer real quick. I want to make sure I have a pointer available. Okay. All right, so here's the vicinity map for the project area. Placer Ranch specific plan is 2,213 acres located in the southern portion of the sunset area plan. It's north of the city of Roseville, west of the city of Rockland, southwest of the city of Lincoln, and then just south of this Lincoln sphere of influence. This is an image of the Placer Ranch specific plan and its districts. So the plan encompasses about 5,636 residential units. It has almost 300,000 square feet of commercial, about 637 square feet of mixed use, and 4.3 million square feet of campus park uses. There is a 301-acre university site located in the center of the specific plan area, over 70 acres of parks and recreation, and over 276 acres of open space. Placer Parkway, the future construction of that east-west connection, is located just on the northern boundary of the specific plan area. So back in August of 2022, Phase 1A came before the Planning Commission and was approved with 769 single family lots with one four acre neighborhood park, three mini parks, and then the necessary backbone infrastructure to start construction out there. I believe right now the backbone infrastructure for Phase 1A has been accepted as complete. I'm not sure if any of you have had a chance to go out in this area, but there's a lot of development taking place. Homes are being built in Phase 1A right now, and Phase 1B and 1C are also under construction. In June of 2024, Phases 1B and 1C were approved by the board, which includes 1,060 single-family low density residential, low density age restricted residential, and then medium density residential lots, as well as 437 high density residential units. It also includes parks and recreation sites, open space sites, a public facility site for a PG&E substation, and a campus park parcel. Phases 1B and 1C also included continuation of the necessary backbone infrastructure out there for Placer Ranch-specific plan and beyond their boundaries. The project site encompasses a little over 86 acres and includes 347 single-family residential lots. The lots range in size from 2,400 square feet to over 4,500 square feet. This tentative map also includes 15 landscape and roadway lots one open space Paseo lot which is located here in between PR 14 and PR 33 and then a large open space Paseo lot Or I'm sorry open space preserve lot and that is a little over 22 acres of that open space area The project entitlements for Phase 2A East include an approval of the Vesting Phase Small Lot Tentative Subdivision Map to divide the three large lot parcels into 347 single-family lots, 15 roadway and landscape lots, one open space paseo lot, and one open space preserve lot. And the second request is an administrative modification to transfer 17 low density residential lots from Phase 2A East to future phases of the specific plan and 13 medium density units from other large lot parcels within the plan into Phase 2A East. So the specific plan allows for some flexibility in transferring residential units between the LDR, age-restricted, MDR, HDR, and campus mixed-use parcels. And so when transferring, those parcels have to be transferred to, like if you're transferring LDR, it has to be transferred to an LDR parcel. So they have to have the same land use designation. And also the requirement is that the cumulative increase or decrease in units resulting from that transfer cannot be more than 20% compared to the allocations that were provided within the specific plan. So originally, well actually in 2024 with phase 1B and 1C, there was a specific plan amendment that kind of changed the number of units within each parcel. So within the 2024 specific plan allocation, A total of 351 units were allocated for Phase 2A East. And with this small map, they are proposing 347 units, which is about four units less than what was allocated in the plan. However, there's also allocations specific to each parcel. So for example, PR 14 has an allocation of 163. units and with this map they're proposing 146 units. So that's a unit change of 17 units less with a 10 percent change. So with this table as you can see none of the percentages exceed 20 percent. So it is within that unit range to be able to transfer these units. And this is just a more detailed description here. So you can see phase, or I'm sorry, PR34 and 33, those are MDR parcels. And then PR14 is low density residential, but then these crosshatch have some medium density residential intertwined in there with some smaller lot sizes. So what has happened is PR14 is transferring out 17 low density residential units to future phases of the specific plan. Eight units will go to PR02. Six units will go to PR06. And three units will go to PR07. And those are future lots to be developed. For PR14, they're also transferring in 34 medium density residential lots. Ten of those units are coming from this parcel here. Eleven units are coming from this parcel here. And then seven units from PR31 and six units from PR32, which are future phases. The required infrastructure improvements and phasing for Phase 2A East include an extension of Fittiment Road. So this blue area is the improvements for Phase 2A East. The orange colored lines, those are improvements that were constructed with Phase 1A of the project. So a portion of this Fittiment Road extension that goes beyond the Phase 1A terminus is being constructed here. And then also the extension of Catalyst Boulevard from the edge of the project at PR 14 to the end of construction from Catalyst at Phase 1A. There's also mass grading included, intract roadway improvements, stormwater and multipurpose basins, treatment swales, trails, and landscaping improvements. So with this phase, there is a 0.62 open space Paseo that bisects PR 33 and PR 14 right here that kind of goes out to this open space lot. And then there's also the 22.6 acre open space lot that bisects the residential lots here and also connects into this open space lot south of Catalyst Boulevard that's located in Phase 1A and then there's also in-track trail connections that provide existing trail connections to Phase 1A. So as far as consistency goes for the placer ranch specific plan, um, phase two eight East, uh, was anticipated for residential and open space unit uses within the original specific plan. And it's consistent with both the phase one large lot, final map, the phase two large lot, final map, the placer ranch specific plan, design guidelines and development standards. So this area was allocated within the specific plan to have that medium density, residential low density, and open space uses. And that's exactly what's being developed here. So within the sunset area plan, as we mentioned earlier, Placer Ranch specific plan is located inside the sunset area plan, the southern boundary. has a buffer requirement next to the landfill so up here is the landfill and here are the buffer sites as you can see there is a 2 000 foot residential buffer limit and that buffer limit also crops down into placer ranch specific plan and so the requirement within the sunset area plan is that any residential use is beyond 2 000 feet but within one mile of the landfill property would require approval of a specific plan, which is the Placer Ranch specific plan. And then also within that are some requirements to notify those property owners about their proximity to the landfill, as well as paying a fair share payment to the West Placer Waste Management Authority for Tier 1 capital improvements for odor control. And so as you can see here, Phase 2A East, although it's outside of that 2,000-foot residential buffer, it's still within one mile of the landfill. So those residents there would be required to be notified about their proximity there. Affordable housing. So affordable housing for Placer Ranch-specific plan, it's outlined within the development agreement, Section 5.12. And I just wanted to note here, it doesn't mention the medium, or I'm sorry, moderate units. So I'll talk about that in a minute. But the development requires that 10% of the total units for Placer Ranch specific plan shall be constructed as affordable. So 10% of the 5,636 units is 564 dwelling units. They are required to construct or cause to be constructed 25% of the required low and very low income affordable housing units, no later than issuance of the building permit for the 2,818th market rate unit, which is likely triggered within this proposed phase. Next, their next requirement is to construct or cause to be constructed 50% of the required low and very low income affordable housing units no later than the issuance of the 3,945th market rate unit, which would likely be triggered in the next phase, phase 2B. And then 100% of the affordable units shall be constructed no later than the 4,059th market rate unit, which is also triggered within phase 2B. And then their requirement for moderate income affordable housing units is no later than the issuance of the 1,690th building permit, which is likely triggered at the end of phase 1B going into phase 1C. And with that, staff recommends that your Planning Commission take the following actions to determine that the proposed Placer Ranch Specific Plan Phase 2A East project is exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Section 15182C. residential projects implementing specific plans on the basis that the project is a subdivision of large lots for the purposes of single-family residential development and is consistent with the land uses and zonings identified within the previously adopted Sunset Area Plan, Placer Ranch Specific Plan, Final Environmental Impact Report, Mitigation, Monitoring, and Reporting Program, and the subsequent addenda. Also approve a vesting phase small lot tentative subdivision map for the subdivision of the 86.29 acre property into 347 single family residential lots, 15 landscape lots, one open space lot, and one open space paseo lot subject to the recommended conditions of approval. As well as approve the placer ranch specific plan phase 2a east administrative modification to transfer 17 low density residential units from Phase 2A East to future phases of the Placer Ranch specific plan and transfer 13 medium density residential units from other large lot medium density residential parcels within the Placer Ranch specific plan into the Phase 2A East area. And with that, I am available for any questions. We also have our applicant team here. Anton Garcia and Angelo Obertello. And with that, I can take any questions. Thank you.

Yeah, I have maybe a couple questions. One, the density transfer, how is that managed?

So we have a tracking sheet internally. So I believe each phase so far has transferred units either in or out of their respective phases, and so we have been tracking that with each phase to be able to know which parcels have a specific amount of units.

Okay. So I'm assuming in this case it's all one, the whole property is owned by the same entity?

Correct.

Okay. So the transfer then is going to be handled by the entity, where if you had separate owners it would be a problem, kind of a last project out problem maybe.

Yeah, so the transferring actually, so we do have different property owners now for phase 1A and 1B and 1C. So those have been, those transfers have already been completed. So as we're transferring out, we can only transfer to future parcels that haven't been developed. And so they're still under the same ownership of Placer 1. Does that make sense? So I can't, we couldn't transfer units into phase 1A right now because they're already being built out and that entitlement is approved and has a separate property owner.

So I assume that the owner that owns the rest of the property is managing this with the county? Because it seems like otherwise if you have several property owners, the last property owner would have to eat all the density changes in.

right no yeah it's still owned okay you won't have that okay and then uh or i did have another question here but i i'll come back to it sure thank you when is um phase two be likely to be triggered we have an estimate so that's when um the low and the very low 50 are required to be constructed

So per the development agreement for the affordable housing, it's triggered by unit count. Sure. So currently, just to give you an update, we have issued 224 building permits for Placer Ranch specific plan.

So we have to get to 3,945 to trigger. That's a lot.

Well, so the first trigger is 100% of the moderate income affordable housing.

Sure.

And that Building permit trigger is the 1,690th building permit. OK. So that will likely be triggered at full build out of phase 1B.

OK. That's quite a ways away.

Yes.

OK. Years. OK. And then I had another question. I don't think it's, it might not be for you. It might be for the applicant. But we had a letter from the Native Species Plant Association president, whatever that is. about the landscape plan for this whole area. And they had said that only five of the 200 species of plants recommended are native. And do we have a requirement that any teeth to something that we can hold them to say, yes, you do need to use native plants because that's beneficial to wildlife and flora, fauna, et cetera. Do we have something in there that holds them to that and that the landscape plan is out of alignment with that?

That's a great question. I'm glad you asked. So the specific plan itself has, I believe it's in the design standards, there are materials for landscaping on the main corridors. So we don't have any landscaping direction within the specific plan for in-track development, but it's all for the major street landscaping. And so At this point, that specific plan has been approved with those. They have a list of the required street trees, shrubbery, grass cover, that kind of stuff. And so we just look to ensure that they're following and are compliant with the specific plan. It's master plan palette is what it's called. As far as in-track landscaping, we always work with the landscaper to encourage native landscaping and to comply with the Placer County landscape design guidelines. So in tract landscaping, we work with them to really focus on using native plants local to the area.

OK, encourage, how do we make them comply? Encourage is one thing, and then how do we make sure that they comply with at least, I think the letter recommended 70% native plants, whatever it is. What are the teeth? Or can we make past something that says, yes, you must do this?

So we do go through a design review process for each of those. It's not necessarily a formal design review process, but we do look at their landscaping plans. And we do suggest, and then there are requirements, for example, like each lot has to plant a street tree. And so we have them, when they start constructing those homes, and once they've installed all of the landscaping, we don't sign off. We don't sign off on occupancy of those building permits until they've sent us pictures because we can't go out there and examine every single lot. So they actually send us pictures almost of every single lot and show us the landscaping for it. So that's the best we can do as far as compliance.

I would say, Commissioner Dahlgren, the other thing to make note of is that in addition to those reviews that Kara's mentioning, we also are required to ensure that they're meeting the state model water efficient landscape ordinance, the WELO, and that is also performed as part of our review. Kara's right to require anything above what's included in the specific plan would require an amendment to those requirements in the design and development standards. But we can continue to work with the applicant, and perhaps they can talk about how they approach landscaping as part of their project.

That was my question. Not going back to amending the specific plan, obviously, but strongly encouraging the applicant? And since we don't have teeth, I guess that would be the best we could do. Thank you.

Yeah, just a quick one. Definition of cause to construct?

So I believe that means that they would They would have an affordable housing contractor be able to construct it, not necessarily the developer. I'll defer to Michelle Kingsbury on what cause to construct.

Yes, just in the slide where it says construct or cause to construct.

Good morning. Michelle Kingsbury with the CEO's office. So what we would look for in this is basically with the triggers for affordable housing, every development agreement is different. So for this particular specific plan, we would look for initiation of construction of the site and completion of the triggers by those building permit triggers. And so that's what we would look for to satisfy this requirement.

Thanks. Anything else for Kara? At this time, thank you. Would the applicant care to comment, approach? Please state your name.

Good morning, members of the commission. Anton Garcia with Gen California Placer Ranch, the developers of the Placer One master plan community. Wanted to first of all thank staff, Kara, everyone in CDRA, DPW, CEO's office. Not only is it getting to a tentative map, a lot of details that we go back and forth, we collaborate on, but implementing what you have already approved is a lot of work for everyone. So many thanks to everyone, the county for helping, you know, implement this vision that has been in the works for at least a couple of decades. I wanted to really provide, you know, I'll go into Phase 2A East a bit, kind of give you a global picture of the project as well as where it currently sits. But I did want to answer a couple of questions that came up, I think, with affordable housing. We do have about 324 units with a developer right now, an affordable housing developer. We are working with the county to implement that. in the next couple of years, well ahead of any trigger in the development agreement. So that'll be something that would come to you. We've been working with the CEO's office on that component. So we're excited to get that component going again. It would come in much sooner than what the development agreement requires. It would actually exceed, beyond the moderate, it would go to the low and the very low. So I think that'll be an exciting component for you all to be able to hear here in the next, I'm hoping the next six to 12 months. There was a question about plants. You know, our landscape architects look at the specific plan and they try to live right within those means. We are always pushing for anything native. As it was mentioned, there are water budgets that we have to stay within a consistency of from a state level. In other words, you cannot just put any type of plant out there and ignore how much water it needs. We also do submit those ultimately The county parks department does maintain it, so they have a lot of say of what gets implemented. If there's a letter that can get forwarded to us on the species or that whoever wrote the letter said there's not enough of, we'd love to see it, and we would look at it and look to implement more so. Throughout the the streetscape the parks and the in track landscaping at this point all of the landscaping that's been implemented or has been approved Is going to be maintained by the by the park district through the CFD? So we always encourage trying to do everything we can to be trout tolerant and consistent with a specific plan With phase 2a East what's in front of you today? it's it's a continue to it's another component of the project to deliver more housing in our region of the 3, 4 different product types that we have by that I mean just the size of lots those ultimately drive the type of home these will provide and other housing stock to it's already been approved. There's some of those lots the widths and the depths or somewhere in the middle or smaller than what we previously had approved by the commission, and that allows for a different type of buyer as well. We want to be able to deliver homes for first-time homebuyers to the move-ups. A couple years ago, you approved a project for Placer One that had an active adult or age-restricted community as well, and so we want to be able to implement a wide variety of homes for every type of buyer, and additionally with affordable housing as well. And this really complements that. As far as the infrastructure, as Kara outlined, there is an improvement on Fittiment Road that needs to go forward. Not only does it meet the frontage and major improvements obligations of this project, but it addresses development agreement obligation to deliver THE ROADWAY TO THE UNIVERSITY WHERE A FUTURE FIRE STATION WOULD GO. THE CEO'S OFFICE IS WORKING WITH THE UNIVERSITY ON THAT LEASE AGREEMENT. SO WE'RE ADVANCING THAT MAJOR INFRASTRUCTURE TO THIS SPRING. WE'RE HOPING TO GO TO CONSTRUCTION IN THE NEXT TWO TO THREE WEEKS. OUR PCCP FEES ARE BEING PAID RIGHT NOW. IN THE NEXT FEW DAYS THE WIRE WILL GO THROUGH. SO IT'S BEEN PERMITTED AND WE'RE VERY EXCITED TO GET THAT COMPONENT BECAUSE THAT WILL FULFILL THE BALANCE OF FITMENT TO PLACER ONE BOULEVARD. which will help traffic circulation out there, meet the development agreement obligations, and get ahead of the interactive elements that's in front of you today. As Kara mentioned, I think we have a total of 224 building permits that have been issued. I think roughly 55 or so certificate occupancies have been issued, and that means we've got 55 new families in Placer One, called Placer One Home now, part of the community. So we're excited to see that. James C. Holmes, who's based here in Roseville, is one of our merchant builders. We have KB Homes and Pulte Group. So at this point, we have three merchant builders out there that are building homes and welcoming families into Placer County. I did want to chat about just briefly the university. With phase 1a, that was the major public improvements were accepted in November of last year. That fulfills the southern edge of that university parcels major infrastructure. So the university is about 300 acres. We completed the major infrastructure to support the southern end of it. Right now the county and The CSU is working on a forensics lab that will receive utility from that first phase for your sewer, water, storm drain, and we're going to be working with them to help them build the ceremonial entrance to that forensics lab, and ultimately over the next couple of decades, that university starts to mature and become no longer just a CSU classroom campus, but it will become its own CSU as it evolves and gets built out. With affitament, there are some easements that we're working with the university as well to obtain because now we're going to be building the western perimeter of that university site. So we've been working with our chancellor's office on those easements, working with ESD based upon prior experience. We feel really good where we are right now to get those easements in time to be able to deliver the backbone infrastructure needed to support their development and also phase 2a east. Placer Parkway is a critical component to this project. While it's not immediately adjacent to it, now it does bring help traffic circulation but also brings in much needed redundancy in water. There's a 42-inch PCW line that comes with that. So as part of us developing these These villages, we will also be obtaining a will cert from PCWA as that project commences. I believe that project for funding goes to the board on April 7th. That will be a major milestone for, I think, for the entire region to get that development going. So we're very supportive of that project. We provided the highway easement needed for the balance of Placer Parkway as well. knowing that the first phase is the biggest one to get going. And that hopefully gets going here in the spring, if not summer of this year, by the county. With me, I have Angela Viterlo of CBG and Curtis King of King Engineering. If there's nothing that I can't answer or Kara or anyone else on staff, I'm certainly sure that they will be able to answer any questions. Thanks again for your consideration. If you've got any questions for me, you let me know and we will patiently wait through your deliberation. Thank you.

Any questions of the applicant?

Yeah, I'm not sure it's for the applicant, but I'll put it out there. I'm just looking at the open space from the north side to the south side of Catalyst. And it looks like the only way to connect your human is to go to the corner of the streets and go up and go across. There's no intermediate crossing. And I'm not saying that there should be one. I'm just kind of curious what thought process goes when you have open space on both sides of an arterial?

Good question. So this, as we come forward with it, I think someone asked about 2A West or the 2A, 2B, it'll extend Catalyst. And so it's just, it's a matter of time as those improvements extend further west to fulfill the balance of the obligation to deliver those open space. and pedestrian connectivity. If you look at it just as a standalone, it's a little hard to get to it, but as the project continues to be implemented, as we come back with future tentative maps, you will see that the routing to get there will be much easier. Thank you.

Does Placer Parkway align with Sunset Boulevard West?

It's just immediately south of it, yes. So it's along the same parallel. Yeah, I think the way it's envisioned is Sunset West would be essentially a frontage road.

And Sunset turns into Catalyst.

So there's some confusion here. So there's so sunset to make a sunset that comes into catalyst. That's the sunset you see when you drive down Highway 65. There is a sunset West, which is just to the north of Placer Parkway. So they're essentially ones on the south ones on the north. easy to get confused. So the Sunset, the major one, is the one that becomes Catalyst. Sunset West is the smaller frontage that will ultimately be a frontage road.

Yeah. Sunset is from 65. Sunset Boulevard West is from 50 Mint. There you go. Exactly.

Other questions while I have you? Are you, as the applicant, agreeable with the recommended conditions of approval? Yes, we are.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

With that said, any other comments, any other questions? I'll open it to public comment. Is there any public comment here? None. Any online?

I see none.

Thank you. We'll close public comment. Does staff have any further comments, recommendations?

No, we don't.

Thank you.

I kind of have a question. It's a little bit not necessarily totally related to this, but my memory serves me that at one point in time, the county did have a recommendation for planting native plants. It might have been when they were working on the housing program. But somewhere in the background, I've seen something like that.

Commissioner Johnson, I think what you're likely, uh, recalling, uh, given your, your time on the commission is, is, uh, probably around 2016, I believe it was that the county's current landscape, uh, design guidelines came forward as a revision. Uh, and that plan does strongly encourage the use of, of native, uh, uh, drought tolerant plants throughout, uh, developing communities throughout Placer County. And as Kara said earlier, it does not specifically require. So that is something that we do work closely with our development community on during the review of improvement plans and design review agreements to find available nursery stock that will, you know, in many cases, you know, there are native plants available at nurseries on an increasing basis because this is becoming a more relevant issue with the water efficient landscape ordinance requirements that Mr. Pahuli mentioned. And so we're always looking for those opportunities. That's still in play. That's good. Thank you.

I'll add on to with what Alex stated as well. During the development of the specific plan in and of itself, it worked extensively with our parks division regarding the backbone infrastructure species list that was there. And there was some back and forth on that with our parks team consideration about the native plant species as well as maintenance. What types of trees or shrubs, things of that nature can be more easily maintained. We're accepting that into our system. I just want to reiterate, we had a significant amount of conversation with our parks division to land on the list that at least for the background that's included within the specific plan documents as well.

So would it be fair to say that some native plants are not drought tolerant or harder to maintain? And that's why they're not or are not as available at nurseries currently. And that's why according to this one letter. I don't know that it's accurate. Only five of the 200 are native. Are any of those things true?

Mr. Yeah, I think really it comes down to the availability of what is available through nursery wholesale suppliers and what is produced. And as I said, you know, more and more and more, there is a prevailing trend towards plants that are drought tolerant. Those tend to be native to your question about whether or not they're California native plants that are not drought tolerant. Absolutely. We have many climate ecotomes is what they're generally called throughout the state. This is one of the most diverse ecological states for its habitat types. But specifically for the purposes of this discussion, this is a Mediterranean climate could be also considered semi-arid in terms of some of the summer conditions that we experience, and so the trend is towards more drought-tolerant party plants that have lower maintenance requirements and water-dependent environments.

Thank you. I had no idea about any of this. I was just asking the question, but that was very helpful. Thank you, Alex.

Any other questions?

I did want to clarify with Commissioner Alves. Related to the affordable housing, it's construct or cost to be construct. Construct basically means developer constructs. Cost to be constructed can mean that the developer enters into an agreement with another entity to construct it to meet their obligation. So I just wanted to break it down to more simple terms.

OK. Thank you. Do we have any deliberation or comment amongst the commission?

This is my district. Nothing additional. It was an interesting conversation on the drought tolerant plants and the conflicts with state regulations and just an ongoing battle of local versus state in the use of those materials.

Any other comments? Can I retain a motion?

Yeah. Again, my district, so I'd be happy to do that and each separately.

For this, you can take all motions together.

Okay. All right. Well, then I'll combine that, and I'd make a motion that Planning Commission accept Item 1A, Determination 2, Approval, and Item 3, Approval, as read into the record by staff.

I'll second that.

Motion and a second. Roll call, please.

Alves? Yes. Watts? Yes. Jewell? Yes. Dahlgren?

Yes.

Johnson? Yes. Yes.

With that said, the decision of the Planning Commission may be appealed by anyone who appeared at today's hearing and provided comment or anyone that submitted written comments on this item. An appeal must be filed within 10 days of today's date and shall be accompanied by a filing fee of $752. With that, we are adjourned. Thank you.