Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Oh, boy. You two again.

All right. We'll call our meeting to order tonight at 530. And Kelly, will you call roll?

Yes. Commissioner Debra Pauly is absent. Commissioner Frechette?

Here.

Commissioner Hewn?

Here.

Commissioner Raymond is absent. Commissioner Stoss? Here. Here. Vice Chair Stevenson.

Here.

And Chair Molden. Here. Thank you. And then will you announce the meeting's video recording, please? Yes. Tonight's meeting will be recorded via Zoom and can be viewed on the city's website within 48 hours of adjournment of this meeting.

Thank you. And Commissioner Huynh is going to lead us in the pledge tonight. thank you you did nice job okay evidently we have to recognize birthdays in mine is one of them tell us about that no we'll skip right over uh but also we have birthdays commissioner hewn and vice chair stevenson have birthdays in june so uh and my gift to you we will not be singing happy birthday to you so yes you're very welcome Moving on to item four, public comment. Members of the public wishing to address the Planning Commission for any matter not on the agenda may do so at this time by completing and submitting a speaker card to the Planning Commission clerk. For items on the agenda, speakers will be called by the chair at the point on the agenda when the item will be heard. Speakers are encouraged to keep comments to three minutes or less and to state the name and community of residence. Under the provisions of the California Government Code, the Planning Commission is prohibited from discussing or taking immediate action on any item not on the agenda unless it can be demonstrated to be of an emergency nature or the need to take immediate action arose after the posting of the agenda. Kelly, will you announce a public comment?

I have no speaker cards for our general public comment period.

Great. Thank you. And we'll close that public comment period? Yeah. Okay. Item number five, consent calendar items consist of matters deemed routine and non-controversial by staff. Unless a member of the planning commission wishes to pull an item for individual consideration, all items will be approved by one motion. Are there any items planning commission wishes to pull from the consent calendar? Seeing none, is there any public comment related to the consent calendar? I have no public comment for our consent calendar. Okay, thank you. We'll close the public comment period. And can we have a motion to approve the consent calendar?

So moved. Second.

Thank you. And then Kelly, will you call roll, please? Yes. Commissioner Debra Pauly is absent. Commissioner Frechette?

Aye.

Commissioner Huynh?

Aye.

Commissioner Raymond is absent. Commissioner Stoss? Yes. Vice Chair Stevenson?

Aye.

And Chair Maldon? Yes. Motion passes with a 5-0 vote. Thank you.

And there are no consent public hearing items. So we'll move on to item 7, public hearing items.

Yes. Item 7.1, Walmart expansion major design review exempt pursuant to section 15301E2 existing facilities of the California Environmental Quality Act CEQA guidelines project number PLND-0325-0123. Thank you so much. And Lindsay, you have a staff report for us?

Okay.

Okay.

Good evening, Chair Malden and Commissioners. I'm Lindsay Morrow, Senior Environmental Planner with the Planning Division, and tonight I'm presenting a major design review for the Walmart expansion project on Folsom Boulevard. The applicant is requesting a major design review for a 5,149 square foot expansion to add an online ordering grocery delivery area on the east side of the existing Walmart Supercenter. The request also includes paint improvements, accessibility upgrades, parking style signage, landscaping, asphalt, and striping upgrades. The project is located at 10655 Folsom Boulevard. It's boarded by Folsom Boulevard to the south, Safeway to the west, and single-family residences to the north and the east. The parcel is fully built out and it contains a 122,175 square foot Walmart Supercenter and associated parking lot. There's an adjacent parcel right next to the building that is separate. It's a separate retailer, Dollar World, and is not part of this project. The site is designated in the general plan as commercial mixed use within the downtown planning area. And it's zoned for commercial mixed use within the Folsom Boulevard specific plan. And this zoning figure shows that the other surrounding uses are also zoned for commercial mixed use in the Folsom Boulevard specific plan and a residential use. So the major design review is for a 5,149 square foot building expansion. It would be utilized for online ordering grocery pickup and it includes parking stall, striping and signage for 24 spaces on the Eastern side of the building. In addition to the online pickup area, the project includes a striping and signage for 19 ADA spaces that are in the front entrance of the store and over by the garden center and overall paint improvements. This slide zooms in on the proposed expansion so you can see more closely the east side of the building and the parking lot area. The parking spaces already exist, but the proposal includes new striping and new signage to direct the online pickup customers to this portion of the parking lot and two proposed new light poles in this area as well. This slide shows the floor plan of the store. It shows that the expansions on the east side of the building adjacent to the grocery sales area that's internal to the store. For parking, the project includes modifications and improvements to the existing parking lot. So currently the online pickup stalls are in the front of the store. So these spaces would be restriped as normal parking stalls. And then 24 stalls on the east side of the building will be restriped and designated for the online grocery pickup area. There's existing ADA spaces. As I mentioned, that would be restriped with new signage. And this table shows that there would be a net loss of eight parking spaces from the actual building expansion. But the site provides a total of 512 spaces, which is in excess of what is required by our code, which is 446. The applicant provided a preliminary landscape plan and conducted a tree inventory by a certified arborist to assess the condition of the trees on site. There's 65 trees on site. 12 are proposed for removal, two because of the expansion and others because they're in poor condition and could be replaced. They also identified three empty planters where they would plant new trees. And our municipal code requires mitigation for tree removals, including replacement and mitigation fees. The applicant provided a preliminary photometric plan, which is shown here. A final photometric plan would be required at the building permit phase along with a final landscape plan. According to the zoning code standards for outdoor lighting, to minimize light trespass on abutting residential properties, illumination at the nearest residential structure or rear yard setback shall be one-tenth foot candle. So these measurements show that the lighting standards are currently exceeded in several of the residential backyards at a distance of 10 feet from the existing lighting, but the two new proposed light poles don't exacerbate that condition or cause any readings above a 10th candle foot, 10 feet from the property lines. Or in other words, the existing lighting wouldn't exacerbate or the proposed new light poles wouldn't exacerbate the existing conditions. This slide shows the front and rear elevations of the store and the new paint colors. They are leaving the exposed brick and revising the colors to blue and gray to match their current branding. And the slide shows the left and right elevations and this one has the best image of the new expansion area down there on the bottom. It shows the two ramps, doors. The ramps both have a handrail and the one on the right has a canopy over the top. For environmental, the project falls within CEQA exemption 15301E2, existing facilities. This class of exemptions is intended for minor alteration of existing public or private structures that involves negligible or no expansion of existing or former use, including additions to existing structures that are not over 10,000 square feet. So this project falls under this exemption because it is under 10,000 square feet. It's already supported by existing public services and utilities, and it is not in an environmentally sensitive area as the area is all built out. So this project falls under exemption 1530182, and no further environmental review is required. So with that, staff recommends that planning commission determine the project exempt from further CEQA review. per exemption 15301E2 and adopt the resolution approving the Walmart expansion major design review subject to the findings contained in the resolution and the conditions of approval. I'm available for questions. And I believe we have the Walmart team on Zoom. The architects are out of state, but we have two architects from, I mean, the engineers from Kimley Horn and representatives from Walmart and the Walmart store.

Thank you, Lindsay. We'll go ahead and open the public hearing period. And Kelly, is there any public comment?

Yes, I have two speaker cards. I have Barbara Lindsay. Following Barbara will be Sarah McMinn.

Okay. Thank you. Oh. Good evening, Commissioners. My name is Barbara Lindsay, and I live at 10652 Sharvona Way behind the Walmart Supercenter at 10655 Folsom Boulevard. My family has lived in this home since 1959. It's 66 years now. It'll be 67 in the summer. I returned to care for my elderly parents and inherited the home as the last surviving member of my family of origin. This neighborhood was established in 1955, and our community is worth caring for and why we are here today. My neighbors and I are here today because 25 years of unaddressed impacts caused by Walmart are about to get worse. I have submitted a signed neighborhood petition from residents of Sharpona Way and Shosella Way and my written comments to the planning clerk. Walmart's lights shine directly into every rear bedroom in our homes. Most homes have the same floor plan, bedrooms facing Walmart. Last September, I photographed a new light so intensely bright the city required Walmart to hood it, just that one fixture. Every other light remains unshielded. My photos show light so intense it penetrates closed curtains. Every neighbor who signed my petition independently raised the lighting as a significant concern. They also raised a persistent safety threat from individuals who congregate behind the store at all hours, screaming, leaving trash, throwing garbage and food over boundary fences, making it unsafe for residents to use their own backyard and putting children, grandchildren, and pets at risk. A sign on the boundary fence restricts deliveries from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., with engines off at all times. Yet a commercial cardboard bailing and compressing operation runs for hours at a time just behind our fences. Sometimes at 11 p.m., midnight, 1, 2, 4 a.m. It's very random. I have complained repeatedly. The city has intervened and Walmart reverts every time. This is documented noncompliance and Walmart is now asking for more. This is not a complaint about the past. It is a warning about the future. More deliveries mean more unpredictable bailing operations at all hours. 24-hour new pickup stalls mean more engines and headlights near homes around the clock. More customers mean more illegal U-turns at Shosella and Zimbabwe. The city would be approving growth on a site already out of compliance with its own lighting and noise standards. I am asking this commission to require demonstrated compliance before a single shovel hits the ground. I am asking this commission to deny this application, but if approved, I request enforceable conditions requiring full cutoff shielded lighting, meeting the 0.1 foot candle standard of RCMC chapter 23.725. compliance with posted delivery hours and the 50 DBA nighttime noise limit, a traffic study of the Chisella Way and Zimadil Drive intersection, a security and homeless management plan, and demonstrated compliance with all existing operational conditions as a prerequisite to any construction permit. Thank you. My full written comments and photographic exhibits are in the record. Thank you.

Good evening, Commission members. Thank you for your service to our community. My name is Sarah McMinn. Rancho Cordova has been my home since 2014, and I've been a homeowner on Charbonneau Way since 2017. I have been a teacher at White Rock Elementary since 2021. My family and I visit Hagen Park at least twice a month. I enroll my daughter in almost all of the peewee sports, swim lessons, soil borne farm activities, et cetera, through the Rancho Cordova Parks and Rec. As you can see, I am an invested member of this community. There have been positives and negatives with Walmart as a neighbor. Being a former foster parent, a mom to a three-year-old, and a pet owner, there have been countless conveniences to having a super center right around the corner. The negatives were minor and expected until last August. One day, I went out to water my plants to discover a huge gaping hole with tire tracks on the ground as if a car had driven through my back fence. Thankfully, no one on my home or my neighbors were injured. I immediately went to my local Walmart manager who kindly informed me that in fact, we don't share the fence. The repairs were 100% my responsibility. Additionally, that surveillance footage could be provided only with a police report. I promptly filed the police report and notified the proper utilities. Per the police report, Walmart did not have any surveillance footage of the area, even though there is a camera pointing in that direction. So I made the $900 payment for a new fence as I needed to immediately keep my home and my family protected from being accessible to the activity of a major super center that grosses billions annually. Note, my homeowner's deductible is 1000, so the full 900 was out of pocket. I have to admit this was surprising because in the duration of my home ownership, I've had to replace both my side fences due to wear and tear and each time the costs were split 50-50 between my neighbor and I. Additionally, the fence I had installed is not commercial grade and the rest of the fence is pretty flimsy. For the protection of my family and for the value of my home, I have been saving for a higher quality reinforced fence that will withstand damage from Walmart traffic. I think it reasonable to expect a multi-billion dollar neighbor to demonstrate responsibility for the property under their current stewardship before discussing expansion. Thank you for your time and attention.

Thank you. No further public comment?

I have no additional speaker cards for the item. We did receive a comment via email from Ms. Barbara Lindsay that was distributed to Planning Commission, posted on our website, and provided at the back of the room.

As well as a petition.

Thank you. Okay, we're going to move to Planning Commission comments and questions.

I think Elliot should start. This is his neighborhood.

Actually, let him finish. It's his neighborhood. He should ask the questions that nobody else has thought of. I'll start. So you had a couple of questions here, but a few of them were already answered. First question for Lindsay. What is the minimum foot candle requirement for the parking lot?

I wish I had it in front of me, but there are different requirements for different areas. So I believe that the internal to the parking lot is one foot candle. And then one that needs to be a tenth of a foot candle or 0.1, 10 feet from the property line.

Okay. And your staff report showed that there are going to be some homes where we're going to exceed that 0.1 foot candles requirement.

So related to the expansion, the two new proposed light poles would not exceed that tenth of a foot candle, but the photometric study does show that there's an existing exceedance from the light pole that's a little further to the north at a couple of those residences along Charbonneau Way.

Is there a reason that we wouldn't require the applicant to address and make those corrections as part of this process?

Oh, so when I reviewed the project, I was focused on the new light poles. And I wasn't aware that there are so many lighting problems in the past. And I think the application came in March 2025. So during that time, there was one code case that came up related to a light issue that was trespassing into a bedroom. And we addressed it at that time. We worked with the resident and code enforcement and the Walmart store to get that one addressed. But we didn't know about the existing issues. So since the project wasn't exacerbating, we didn't push further but i would say that it's a the photometric plan is preliminary and they're required to submit a final one during the building permit phase and so we could certainly address it during that time um has have we had a chance to look into uh any of the uh complaints about uh uh compliance with the existing uh

conditions there. It seems that when an applicant's asking to expand or make major changes, which in this case it is, that we would want to look at, as the public said, demonstrated compliance issues.

Yes, we did. So we did work with the applicant. So when the project started, there were over 20 unpermitted storage containers along the rear and the eastern portion of the site. And lots of stacked material along the back fence in some areas that exceeded the fence line. So we worked with the applicant to address that code case. And they... Over time, it removed all of the shipping containers that were out there and most of the stacked material by the fences. And then the lighting issue that came up was kind of an isolated incident. So that's what we worked with them through. And then some of the other issues that came up. we were unaware of until the public comment we received yesterday.

Commissioner Frechette, if I can add, we also did ask the neighborhood services manager from code enforcement to come. You know, there have been, excuse me, historic cases there. So she can speak a little bit to how the city has kind of addressed them as if you'd like, she can kind of just talk about in summary of some of the things that we've tried to address and intervened on.

Thanks, Arlene. And Brittany Mariscal is here from Code Enforcement to help with those questions too.

Good evening. I'm Brittany Mariscal. I'm the Code Enforcement Manager, as Arlene mentioned. We have worked on multiple cases for the last Since 2021, there have been about 19 cases at that particular property, but they vary from different type of issues. We've had sidewalk vendors, other things that aren't necessarily associated with Walmart. But on that property, we have addressed the lighting complaints that have been mentioned earlier in this public comment. That was addressed. It was an isolated incident that we were aware of. So we did have them hood that. They did come into compliance. On that, that case has been closed. We have received one or two noise complaints in regards to deliveries that are outside of the posted time. Typically, when that happens, we would communicate with the planning department and then also reach out to property managers or store managers and let them know of the issue, and then they would make contact with their delivery drivers or their employees, and then that would cease. It does sound like it's kind of a reoccurring problem. But at this point, there are no active code enforcement cases. Everything has been resolved. But as Lindsay mentioned, if there are reoccurring issues after the final photometric thing is identified, then we would definitely look into that and assist where we can to follow the enforcement process.

So the areas right now where they're exceeding the 0.1 photometric limit, we don't have an active case of?

That would be correct. We weren't aware of any of the other issues at that point. Okay.

Can I take him under that one real quick?

Yeah. So it's complaint-based. So just because, I mean, you were out there and you looked at them. You did not notice the other ones? So it's complaint-based, and then our, if...

We're doing our investigation. It's clear when you go out there, and based on the photos and complaint that we received, that obviously the light, based on the photos that we were provided during the complaint, and then you can see that the light is not shielded, it's not pointing down, and contributes to light pollution on the neighboring properties. So that's why we were able to address it at that point.

But you saw that one, but didn't you see all the others too? Because I've driven out there, and it's not just one.

So probably the inspection was completed during the day, so we're going off the basis of... based on the information that we had, as well as overall looking at the light and just telling that it's not pointed downward. But definitely now that we have documentation that it's in other areas, we can definitely work with. addressing those things from an enforcement perspective.

So, but all of them, because I have talked to Arlene, all of the complaints are only complaint driven. So there are other violations out there. I'm sure, I don't know if you live in Rancho, but if you go there after hours, it's, I mean, the applicant's on the phone, so I'm not to steal your thunder here, Lee, but there are a lot of violations that, you know, people just get used to. And the fact that we're used to them does not make it okay. Okay. And so the fact that they're coming in and asking for an expansion when they are frequent flyers in the violation department, I have concerns. So, and I know you are only doing your job. I totally get that. So you're putting the onus on us residents to write these complaints. And I honestly did not know that until yesterday that you guys don't go around and just, you know, unilaterally check code and things like that. So, um, I guess as the residents are saying, I have the same issue, you know, in my neighborhood. So thank you for coming and having a voice tonight, neighbors. I think we have a lot of work to do on this and the applicant needs to hear from us that this is not okay. They're not being a good neighbor. And so that's gonna be where I'm going. So go ahead, I'm not done yet.

So while you're still up there, Brittany, what is the decibel limit at the boundary of the property Along the backside for the residential property.

For residential property, it would be 55. 55? 55 decibels after 10 p.m., which is probably why the sign is up there that says no deliveries between 7.

And I'm assuming that since everything's complaint-driven, you probably haven't had a chance to look into what the decibel level is of the crash compactor.

Currently what's going on now, we would not be aware that that was an issue unless somebody brought it to our attention. We do have the ability to do noise monitoring and install devices and things like that if it's a reoccurring issue. It does sound like, at least from what I've heard and from what I've seen in our case history, is that when the conversation is had, compliance is met, maybe temporarily, and then it just reoccurs. So it's definitely something that we can continue looking into and monitor.

I agree. I share my fellow commissioner's concern that there seems to be a repetitive pattern with compliance or with other issues in that, at that property, especially in terms of code enforcement. And also just, you know, we have a applicant who's coming to us asking to do an expansion and we would expect them to be good neighbors. And it's not your position, I guess, to really say whether somebody is a good neighbor or not, but I am concerned by the reports that I'm hearing from you and from the residents that it would seem that being a good neighbor is not always the top priority in terms of the operation. uh the applicant um and that's that's really i was trying to formulate a question there but i don't have a good one so i won't ask that but and i'm not sure if you're the person who can answer this um normally and i i don't know lindsay maybe you'd have the answer to this normally if this was a new center being built we would require a cmu wall or some kind of sound barrier to be built between the project and the residents. Is that correct?

Well, I think it would depend on the location, probably, but between the residential and commercial use. We did look at the original Walmart documents and found that we were trying to find out where the fence originated. If it came with the store, it was before. So it looked like the fence was in place before the original Walmart was permitted and was kept open. as is as part of the project for two reasons. One, because there's a public utility easement along that property line. And the other was because there were residents at the time who wanted to keep their backyard gate access. So, but yeah, I think currently if there was a situation where there was a large commercial property adjacent to residences, that might be more appropriate for.

This is another example of a project that we've more or less inherited. This project was approved under Sac County before the City Ranch of Cordova existed. And, you know, so we're having to deal with what Sac County would allow back then. Of course, there's a reason we all voted to become our own city was so that we had more of that control. I would be inclined to think that maybe we should be thinking about asking the applicant to come up to standards with things like sound wall or whatever, you know, if they're undertaking a major project like this, it seems to me that it's appropriate to, if you're going to be going into a major construction mode, to require them to bring everything up to snuff. And given the history, you know, pretty well documented series of complaints. I don't know that I would be willing to accept on faith that it would be addressed as a good neighbor, but I think it might be something that needs to be a condition of approval. There's a couple other things, but I think I'll stop there. That kind of outlines, answers most of the questions.

So you're off the hook with me, Brittany. Can we get the applicant on?

Thank you, Brittany.

Can we get the applicant on?

They have been promoted to panelists on Zoom.

Okay, I don't know. Which one are they? Is that Jacob?

Good afternoon, Commissioner Jacob. Please continue to answer any questions. And I can also introduce your team when you get a second.

Totally did not hear that.

That was my old ears.

So Jacob, are you the manager or what's your role?

Yeah, good afternoon, Commissioner. Jacob Blaze, Kimley Horn. We're with Kimley Horn. We're the civil engineer and applicant. On as well with us is Jen Buesloff from Kimley Horn, who is also civil engineer. And then we also have our Walmart design manager from Bentonville, Arkansas, the market manager, and then the local store manager on as well. I think they're still in the panelist area of attendees, though.

Okay, my questions are for the management team, not civil engineering or architects. So can we get them on?

I will try to promote them again. They initially declined when I was doing that earlier.

Okay, let's try again. I guess, Jacob, I do have one question for you. In reading the residents' complaints and then doing my own visit over there, there is a perfectly good a nursery that's abandoned over there that would be a much better location for this market. It would not affect the residents. It's still part of the footprint of the store. I know it would inconvenience the grocery department in the layout, but to me, that makes more sense. Was that ever discussed? And if so, what was the outcome of that? And again, I understand it's a hardship because that's not where the grocery is located.

Yeah, Commissioner, great questions. And I'll be happy to answer that as well as a couple other items while our team jumps on here. But we did ultimately look at the garden center itself. The concern that we had generally with the garden center is it's relatively close to the actual kind of the intersection there. And in doing so, what it does is it requires our associates as well as anybody that primarily utilizes that pickup area to be directly walking in front of where if you were to come in off of Folsom Boulevard, make a right-hand turn into there, it forces anybody to directly walk in front of that area, which we didn't find is the best and safest location for somebody that's necessarily unloading goods or walking with a full shopping cart to go ahead and fill up someone's car. So we did look at it, but from a traffic circulation side, as well as from what we appear to be as a safety side of We didn't think it was the most viable option. We also did look at the topic that you're talking about with the grocery as well. And so there probably will be future plans made for that garden center area, but it just didn't work for multiple reasons. One of our couple of which was discussed, which I just mentioned.

So that's fine. But the current delivery for online ordering is also at the front of the store. So it's the same situation. You could modify that entrance or something. I mean, if you go there, you're still going to be at the front of the store. So that's not a different impact or a different risk. I don't feel you could put that door farther down to where the current door is. Obviously, I shop at that Walmart. I go there a lot, so I understand the layout, and I also understand the traffic flow, but I feel like there's a better location that doesn't impact the neighbors. Jeremy, are you with Walmart? Did you just sign on?

Yeah, so I can introduce real fast if that's okay, Commissioner. Yeah, we have Jeremy Murphy, who is from Walmart Product Design. We also have Craig Holder, who is the store manager also on. And so I think that they're happy to answer any questions and go from there. But if I could just, if you let me go back to the one question regarding the front of the store. So Walmart is trying to get away from having the pickup on the opposite side of the front drive aisle. And so that was one of the reasons why we're trying to eliminate that from the associates as well. So What our new proposed location does is it does avoid that conflict of where someone would have to walk across that front driveway with loaded groceries and everything else and do it. And so that's more or less why we've located the pickup stalls as well, directly adjacent to the new pickup door. And it's right there preventing anybody from that future walking. And so it's more convenient. And then if I could go through real fast, just because Jeremy and I were sending a couple notes real fast. In terms of the lighting concerns that are currently occurring in the rear of the site, we are notified that that one correction of the hooded light was a concern. As part of the overall photometrics and kind of noted by Walmart in some discussions that we've been having online here, we're happy to go ahead and conduct a photometric study of the entire rear drive aisle, but also any of those and any of those additional lights that are behind there, we're happy to go ahead and correct accordingly to the requirements of the code. I think some of the lighting, I think the lighting that's currently off is 0.2 foot candles. We're currently, we're at 0.1 foot candles, so it's not a substantial difference. I'm sure that we can modify the lighting in that area. For the trash compactor, those hours of operation are posted. I think Craig can probably speak to that and making sure that we're following the guidance there. And then the discussion regarding the rear screening of the sound wall, it was mentioned that a utility easement is currently running along that fence line today. I think there would be a concern with adding additional wall or other sounding measures inside of that area because that does go against some of the utility easement area, but also starts to kind of limit access. The dry violence and the construction there. So again, happy to discuss those a little bit more. But those three were made by your fellow commission. I want to make sure I address this before I hand it over to Jeremy. Jeremy or Craig, are you on?

Yes, we are on or I'm on.

Looks like you're both on. So one of the questions I have is obviously the lighting will have to maintain and look at that. Security and general overall upkeep of that shopping center is significantly less than even the Safeway next door. It is not maintained to the level that we would like to see. There's been multiple complaints about it. As far as being a good neighbor, I think it goes two ways. So what's the assurance we would have? I mean, I won't go over to that Walmart after 7, 8 o'clock at night. It's just not safe. So in my opinion, that is, I was a single parent. That was not somewhere I would go. My son's a deputy sheriff and would not go over there at night. I think we need to improve the lighting. We need this whole shopping center. You're bringing up a project at the perfect time to make a positive impact. change for the neighbors and for the community. And this is a time to talk about it. So I just don't feel like that Walmart has been a good neighbor. I guess we need some reassurances. And I mean, I still don't love that location. I think it's a bad location. But let's talk about the security, the cleanup. You know, you guys have let all those trees die. There's trash in the planters. It's an eyesore right now. And it needs some love. So where are we going to get that love from Walmart?

Well, Commissioner, consistently, I've been at the store for the last three months. And in that three months, we have made huge improvements in regards to security. We've switched out security companies. We've extended hours of parking lot patrol. They are a very established security company. that you can actually sit out in the parking lot now and we've gotten many compliments um on the upgrade with the guards um and they operate from when the store is open from 6 a.m to 11 p.m but you know the underlying issue is obviously the zinfandel light rail station um jack in the box safeway and us have to deal with the transients that come and are dropped off by the light rail station. But we are addressing it, made significant strides with it. We have hired additional staff to keep the parking lot clean and In regards to the trees, even on the assessment, there were three trees that were bad, which we'll replace, which is not an issue.

I thought there was more than three. Yeah, 12 marked for removal because they're not in good condition.

Okay, 12 we would remove.

And what about the good neighbor part? You know, these neighbors come to you and I think they're not feeling heard. That corner where you're proposing that has been an area I would never park in. So, you know, the lighting is an issue. Also, I'd like to see a traffic study kind of how that, you know, you're taking away parking stalls. But also, what is, you know, I think I like Brittany's idea doing a noise study overnight over there to see what these people have to deal with. Because if you add this pickup, it is only going to increase. So I think the lighting, I still would like to maybe continue this to talk about a different location on the Walmart property. Those are just my thoughts. So I've talked long enough. I'll let somebody else talk.

In regards, Commissioner, to the hours of operation for our online pickup and delivery, it only operates until 10 p.m. There wouldn't be any additional traffic according to the noise abatement guidelines by the city.

I understand, but you're going to now be having grocery pickup right in somebody's backyard. So they're going to be getting their orders, backing their cars up. Before, the traffic at 10 o'clock would have been out at the front of the store. Now you're going to move that to the side right where the houses are. Imagine if that was your backyard. Would that be where you'd want to have the grocery pickup?

Well, I mean, it's not about debate, Commissioner. It's about adhering to what the city is requiring. So as far as, you know, the guidelines for businesses along that corridor, 10 p.m. to 7 a.m., we'll abide by that.

But you haven't. That's the problem. Sorry.

but give us an opportunity. I'm brand new to the store, three months. You can look at the past records of stores I've ran in the city of Galt. That was an opportunity that Walmart didn't fulfill. We came in, we made the necessary adjustments and under my leadership, We can get this done. But we have not had any complaints from the neighbors since I have been there.

If I can, I realized one of the questions that I kind of dropped off my... And it's for Lindsay. Is there a reason that at least in the section... the parking lot that's going to be redone for this drop-off center that we wouldn't require them to put up a sound barrier, a CMU wall or something like that. I would like to see that addressed all the way along the backside of the property. I think that that would be the appropriate but clearly the area where we're gonna be doing the construction and increasing the traffic flow, it seems that that should be part of the, part of the project.

So I'm not aware of a city requirement where we'd have to add a CMU wall to this project. So the parking spaces that are in that portion of the parking lot already exist. So the area would be more activated and utilized more. So because the use is already there and was already approved and is intended for parking, we kind of see it as a continued use. And as long as the... So as... The applicant said the operating hours and the grocery pickup hours and at 10 o'clock. And, you know, that's when the normally people would stop parking in those spaces. And then anything beyond that noise wise would be something that would be out of compliance and could be addressed through other means like a code case or. something like that. So if there's any traffic or noise or deliveries that were occurring outside of those hours that have already been established, then I think we would address it through those means. But I'm not aware of a city requirement that would wanna.

Commissioner Frechette, if I could just add to what Lindsay's saying. So I'm assuming you're looking to, you're asking a question about adding a CMO on the property line around there. So there isn't a utility easement there and there are restrictions on the types of structures we can build on that easement.

And that includes... That was going to be my next question because I'm an engineer and I'm not aware that CMU wall along a utility line. There's no buried utilities there, right? It's all overhead utilities, correct?

I think water was one of the ones in the existing use permit where, correct me, Lindsay, because you guys did the research on the use permit itself, were one of the utilities that had an issue with a CMU wall.

Is that correct? Aren't the meters on the sidewalk over in that neighborhood?

My meter's up near my house.

Yeah. I would have to look at the previous approvals. Again, I just recall there's a 10-foot public utility easement along the property line on the east.

I think that was for the overhead. But a CMU wall isn't the only sound barrier that can be built. I tend to favor them because they last forever. But it seems to me that the neighbors have brought up a legitimate concern with noise, and we're talking about adding more traffic into that. area of the property. I don't think anybody can deny that.

So Commissioner Rochette, you can certainly make the request. It's a design feature. We're focusing on a design review. And we can look into it if it's doable. We can do the research and review whether or not the easement is existing, if it's still operating, if they allow CMU walls. We can certainly do that if that's a request that you'd like. That's perfect. Thank you.

Thank you. Is it Mrs. Lindsay? Yes. Great presentation, great research, very easy to follow, very concise. Thank you. Okay.

I'm so sorry. We can't have you. I read all of it. Appreciate it.

I read the whole thing and it was very good. Okay. First, I'm a little disappointed in code enforcement that they only go to complaints and not general observation as they go around the city. But that's a city thing. Okay. To the subject. Walmart is a valued member of the community. They're in every city and they serve a purpose. They belong here. But the people who live behind there also belong here and they were here first. Now, when we build something like a super center in an area that is known to have transients because light rail, we have a compounding problem here. With the proximity of the houses to the store in such a hidden space behind the store, a lot of bad things can go on. So, you know, Lee, you kind of stole my thunder a little bit because my solution was ACM, you block wall tall enough to block the light, the highest light. You can require a hood on a light, but after a couple years of rain and sun, that hood can fall apart. And no one will notice except the people that live back there. So I think if we're able to make it a condition of approval to put up that CMU block wall, that would be a great thing. I don't know if we can do that or not. But to say that it's unprecedented, I'm going to call you out on that, Lindsay. Over at the shopping center at Sun River, they had noise complaints when the condos were built. on Trinity River Drive, I wanna say it is. The cooling towers behind the supermarket were too loud and the city forced them to build a sound barrier. So it's not unprecedented, we have done it before. And to Cynthia's comment, looking for an alternate spot, And I know it's probably not convenient for the Walmart folks, but there's a building right on the other side of Sunrise. It is a dilapidated shack that's about 5,000 square feet. It would be really nice to see that thing scraped and rebuilt into a purpose such as this. It's a it's just an idea as you were talking. I thought about that The posting of signs saying oh you can't run the stuff after 10 p.m. Posting a sign is meaningless I see those red octagonal signs all over the streets and people violate those Signs are just suggestions the people who are working there are They're not, they don't care. They're on an hourly basis. If it's time to crush the boxes and it's 2 a.m., they're crushing the boxes. And it's just, it's very difficult when we build something like that that operates 24-7 and is such a close proximity to residential. It's a difficult thing. And I think the only real solution is a 15-foot tall CMU block wall. It does a sound mitigation, light mitigation, and traffic. And any of the transient community aren't going to scale a 15 foot wall.

We have agreement that staff is going to get into that.

I've been thinking about this whole day. And then Lee took my idea. Anyway. And on the easement, easements, just like Lee, I'm a mechanical engineer. I deal with this stuff all the time. I'm dealing with it at Tower Theater right now. The easement is for the overhead lines and a wall that is in line with the overhead lines is not a violation of the easement. If you built something that stops them from elevating a man lift up to those lines, then that becomes a problem. But a simple wall does not violate an easement. And as far as the underground utilities, the residents on the residential side, all of their stuff comes from their residential street. All the stuff from Walmart comes from Folsom Boulevard. So there is no underground utilities to be accessed between those two properties. And... I have one thing to look at.

One thing to the fence, and I wasn't here in 1950 or 60, but I did talk with one of our council members. And when that shopping center was a bowling alley and a See's Candy, it's been a lot of things, right? And it was a lot of different things. The developer actually went to every resident and talked them into the fence versus the sound wall. That sound wall was discussed back when it was a bowling alley and all these things. To be clear, I wasn't even born yet. So, you know, that was back in the day where your word was good. So, you know, a handshake. And who knew that Walmart would be as big and as amazing as they are? And, I mean, we're all consumers. So I just wanted that little bit of history on that, that sound walls were even required in Sacramento County back then. But they had convinced the neighbors that your gates will be great. You can, you know, come bowling. So...

Yeah, it was a very different time. And, you know, to the point of the transient community, I know the Jack in the Box is, I won't go there, not even in the day. And it's not Walmart's fault. It's not Safeway's fault. It's not Jack in the Box's fault. It's just a bad place, bad time. That's unfortunate. Not a lot we can do about that. But, again, with the wall, you can separate and keep the residents safe.

All right. Well, I have to say, um, I was just there at Walmart last, uh, Memorial day weekend and it was probably the worst I've ever seen it. So, um, To me, the problem is the parking lot. There's carts everywhere. There's rocks from the landscaping that are just in the parking stalls. I mean, you can barely park in a lot of the spots because the carts are there. So my question to Walmart would be, when is the last time the parking lot was actually addressed in terms of cleaning it or putting the rocks back in the planters? I mean, any of those things happen in the last six months?

Commissioner, we are in the process of gluing down the rocks. Weather permitting, now that it's starting to clear up, we're going to continue gluing down those rocks. We've already identified it as a safety issue without any customer complaints. And again, with the changing out of the parking lot patrol and adding staff to the parking lot, That obviously will take time. Every day is, like I said, getting better. But we already have a plan on addressing those rocks and the landscaping.

The other concern I have is with the residents. I mean, a lot of those parking spots like we're talking about, you can literally back your truck into the spot and Fumes are going straight into the people's backyards and their windows. I mean, that certainly can't be healthy. What other questions or concerns was I thinking about? Oh, the surveillance. One of the residents here said there was no surveillance on the side of the property when her fence got destroyed. So I just don't see how a large corporation such as Walmart doesn't have surveillance on every corner of their property. I mean, certainly you have several cameras in the inside, but I think it's important to have cameras on the outside as well.

Commissioner, we do have cameras, and according to the resident, that was a number of years back, the store has been upgraded to the latest technology and it is serving its purpose.

My question for you, Mr. Holder, what would be your analysis of the condition of the parking lot currently?

Again, The performance of the previous guard company was that question with Walmart. We elected to go with a more seasoned company. And again, they are very, very proactive on customers come in, buy the merchandise that they need, and customers leave. So as far as loitering, that is something that I'm working with them on. I spend quite a bit of time out in the parking lot to make sure that the checks and balances are in place.

What about the carts?

As far as... I mean, that, that kind of ebbs and flows as far as like Memorial day weekend, obviously there's, there's going to be higher traffic, um, more staff. Um, we keep the parking lot as clean as possible, but it ebbs and flows on, um, the traffic of customer flow.

So would you agree that the parking lot is an issue?

It had been an issue in the past. And like I said, it is getting much better.

Okay. What kind of assurances would you be willing to give this commission and give the public that the improvements are going to be made? It seems like it's been such a long time. It's been in disrepair now. You know, things are just supposedly going to get better. What kind of assurances are you going to provide?

Well, again, with changing the hours of our parking lot patrol, the parking lot patrol previously only was on site from 12 to 10. We've extended those hours from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m. And that's seven days a week, 365 days a year. Questions?

Has any traffic studies been completed regarding circulation? I know there's that you turn right there on Zinfandel. Have you guys looked into any traffic concerns?

Commissioner Stevenson, is that question for the applicant? Yeah.

Applicant.

Commissioner, this is Jacob Blase. We have not looked at Any traffic concerns based on, we did not feel that given the expansion and that we're utilizing the existing parking field that additional studies were warranted nor needed in there. We did have conversations with staff and there wasn't any additional need for any additional studies beyond what has been provided to you all as part of your package.

So Vice Chair Stevenson, if I could, Kwok Nam is here, the Principal Engineer from Public Works. If you'd like him to just speak on, you know, the thresholds and kind of the requirements for traffic studies for specific projects like these, so.

Good evening, Chair, good evening, Commissioners. I'm Kwok Nam, Principal Engineer with Public Works. So based on the expansion of Walmart with what they're doing, It doesn't trigger traffic limits that requires a traffic study. So they already have online operations for online ordering and pickup. It's not gonna generate additional trips. They're gonna utilize what's already existing. So we didn't look at additional traffic studies on that. Regarding the U-turn, Public Works did do an improvement back in 2013. So there were some collisions that we did look at. The median was extended prior to Walgreens going in. And that was mainly to address the multiple conflicts within that intersection. So if you look at the aerial of the street layouts, that segment is pretty short from... from Folsom Boulevard to Alicante and from Alicante to Chisella. So there's not a lot that can be done. So what was done there with those improvements is to eliminate some of those conflicts. And what I mean by that is with the Walgreens driveway where it's at, a lot of the folks leaving that um leaving that driveway would um make a southbound make a left to head southbound on zinfandel so with all the traffic that's coming northbound that creates quite a big quite a huge conflict with the volume of traffic that's coming through there so improvements were made in 20 around 2013 2014. we did receive a complaint in 2020 about the u-turns that were being made our traffic engineering team did look at the operations with that, and it was determined that because the collision history from what was documented from the improvements to the 2020, it was only noted that there's two collisions that were non-injury broadside collisions. So it was determined at that time in 2020 that there were not significant collisions that warranted improvements, additional improvements to that area. We did note that there has been significant time that has passed. There is an opportunity to continue to evaluate that intersection. It is, we do have a program to do that. And if that is something commission wants to, wants public works to do, that's something we can evaluate.

Can I ask a question about that? So not collisions, but how many, I mean, because if you go there, you see so many illegal terms too. How many violations have we had tickets? So can we look into that? Because there's so many, I don't know if we can get that documentation as well. When you're doing your...

We can definitely work with the police department to get that information of violations that have been documented.

I'll just add on to that. If there is an opportunity to update the traffic study, I would be in favor of that.

On-site circulation, or are you referring to the operations of the whole intersection?

The operations of the whole intersection, all the way down to Chisella.

Yeah, so our traffic team has a program we can evaluate that.

Yeah, that would be, I think that.

But that is outside of this project. Yes, we understand that. Does it meet those limits that trigger additional traffic studies?

Since you offered it up saying that the.

Yes.

Since you offered that up as something you could do, I was just saying I would like to see that.

There is additional data now, so we can definitely look at that.

I think it would be timely to do that. It's been a little while and a lot has changed.

Any other questions? Thank you.

Well, I'll just say, to me, it's just kind of like that broken window theory. And Walmart has the money, has the power. If you keep your parking lot up, it entices people to keep it up with you. But if the leader of the organization, you know, if the leader of that lot, which is Walmart, just continues to let it go down, people aren't going to take pride in it. It's just going to keep going down. So, I mean, we keep hearing about, you know, stuff's going to get better. We're going to get new security. We're going to get this. We're going to get that. But to me, it's like, when? You know, it's going to happen in a week, in a month, in a year. So... I'm not really in favor of the, um, seems kind of vague as to, you know, things will get better. Okay. Well, Walmart's been here for 25 years now and it doesn't seem to be getting better. So, um, I'm hopeful that that Walmart can, uh, fix it up and, and, you know, so we can get a little bit more pride in that area. You know, that's my area. So it means a lot to me and it's, it really is kind of a eyesore right now. Um, there's another citizen that told me a story. She, she had to get a cane for her husband and they closed down the Rite-Aids and Walmarts or Walgreens and stuff like that. So she wanted to go get one at Target. Target didn't have any and she's elderly. So she had to go to Walmart and, um, she was just kind of, kind of terrified. And to me, it's all about this, um, the parking lot, and we can blame RT all we want to, but it's still the responsibility of the property owner to maintain and upkeep the stuff that they have on their own property, in my opinion. So asking for an expansion, to me, it's some of the key things need to be addressed before we build upon something that's already in such disrepair.

Thanks, Commissioner Stevenson. I will admit I'm not a Walmart shopper. So maybe Jeremy or Craig, if you can help me understand, where is the pickup happening right now when customers come for their online pickups? Where does that occur today?

Currently it is in front of the store.

So someone has to get out of their car or park, get out of their car, walk to the front of the store, get their order and then back to their car. Is that correct?

No, they stay in their car. Um, we cross, uh, the main, uh, thoroughfare in front of the parking lot and, um, put the merchandise in their car.

The employee does. Okay. So this is taking 10 of those spaces now and then, uh, making that 25 spaces in a different location. So I recognize that there's a lot of sensitivity around the experience that the community has had with Walmart. And we have a platform to be able to share that and advocate. And so I hope that you're hearing some of the concerns and taking good notes on how to help mitigate some of these. I do go back to the fact that this is a design review and that our job is to look at this project. And then do better, right? And take these things to figure out how to make this a better experience for the community. That said, I think there... I heard your argument about why it wouldn't go in the garden center, but it seemed, Jacob, when you were talking about that, that it was more of a safety concern and the traffic going in there. And even though I don't shop at Walmart, I know that shopping center well and the space between how far that is from Folsom Boulevard and that stoplight. So I have a hard time buying that argument that that's the reason it couldn't go there. And I do recognize from a business perspective, right, you want efficiency and you want your, it needs to be near refrigeration and there's the, you know, walking back and forth from where you're delivering this to where employees are pulling it from. And so that I can see from a business perspective why that wouldn't be ideal. However, given the concerns of the community and wanting to get this project forward, it sounds like that might be an opportunity to revisit. That way you're not having to shield light poles and address sound barriers, which isn't even related to this particular project because the pickup hours are until 10 p.m. The things that I do have concern with are the tree removal. As a citizen who's looking holistically at this area and wanting our city to present really well, the things that really get me are that 12 tree removal. And then there was mention of replacing three of those. Commissioner Stevenson's concerns about the parking lot, I think, are very valid. And then painting the exposed brick, which I mean, you know, that's something I think I'd like us to revisit. I realize for everyone else, this is a really minor issue, but as someone who drives by this area, painting that exposed brick to blue and gray, I think changes the feel of the whole community area. So I don't know. Those are the things that I took issue with. I don't know where that leaves us other than I think there's a lot of things, a lot of opportunity and a lot of things for there to be revisited.

I think the city attorney wanted to just make a few comments.

Sure, it sounds like the commission is not of the opinion to move forward with the application, that there are a lot of different comments to change the design that the commission might be interested in. And I think procedurally, rather than take a vote, it might be beneficial to send this back to staff to work with the applicant to incorporate some of these design elements that the commission has expressed an interest in.

I think that's probably the best path forward. So should we make a motion before closing public comment?

Yes, the motion could be made before closing the public hearing. That helps with noticing. Okay.

By all means. I move that we continue this until the commission's comments and concerns have been better addressed with the applicant, considering the sound wall and possibly relocation of the garden center.

I'll second.

City Attorney, is that motion adequate for you?

Yes. To a date certain?

Continuance to a date certain.

Continuance to a date certain.

Do I need to change it? So just for the date certain, we want to make sure that we're giving them adequate time to basically provide improvements on the design. There's quite a long list here. It's lighting, CMU wall, right? Noise, sound issues, painting. So I would be a little, we would have to basically choose what time that is now and give them adequate time so we can

I don't know that a date certain works in this instance because there's clearly a lot of work to be done.

But I would say that a wall of sufficient height solves all the other problems.

I don't know that I agree. Okay. Yeah.

Barring relocation, I think that the wall solves many of the problems that we've brought up.

Well, I wouldn't just point out that while everybody was talking, I was looking here at the satellite image. There's 24 residents that back up against this property, and that's including the Safeway. Actually, if I take out the Safeway and just go with the Walmart, there's less than 16, and eight of those residents are directly back up against this new construction, this project. So that means that better than half residents that back up to the property are being directly affected by this new work. So I think that there's, you know, sound wall, CMU wall, something to mitigate noise and light pollution and deal with some of the other security issues is something that's a traffic you know, it's appropriate. Because there is clearly, this project clearly impacts more than half the residents that back up against the- And Commissioner, if I could just add also, you know, we also want to be conscientious of

neighbors who may not want the CMU wall, great, because there are existing gates on that fence. And I don't know the utilization of those gates at this point for all of those people who have that access. So we just need to be able to do a little due diligence to make sure that that's appropriate. And then all the other things of checking with utilities, all of the things that we would do.

Yeah. Yeah. I do want to recognize the raised hand. So Jacob, did you want to comment?

Yeah, this is Jacob and Jeremy, if you wanted to speak as well. But it would be our request, and Jeremy can definitely correct me, that the project be continued to a date uncertain. that what was just discussed is a concern. I can appreciate the other commissioners were professionals as well, but there are restrictions with easements and other items that possibly lead with gates that have already been installed and access rights and CMU walls underneath of power lines. And there's utility structures that are currently back there as well. So there's a lot of stuff that needs to be looked at. And I think there's a lot of operational things that, we want to look at as well. I think the chair also raised a great point in the fact that there's a lot of items that have been discussed that do appear to be some more code enforcement items, more so than design review items. We want to make sure that we take that into consideration as well. But I will speak on behalf of us, but also on behalf, again, unless Jeremy corrects me, on behalf of Walmart as well, and the fact that we've heard the concerns and the questions and We're happy to go back internally and we have a meeting already put on the calendar tomorrow to review the comments that were provided to us by you all on the commission and the vice chair and the chair and by the residents as well. And we'll be looking forward to bringing back this case and working with staff to hopefully address as many of the design review questions as there is. But it would be our request to continue to a date uncertain until we can have that established.

If I can chime in, if you are continuing to a date uncertain, the public hearing can be closed because it'll have to be re-noticed anyway.

Okay. Are there any issues with that?

So it changed the motion to a date uncertain, but...

Yes, can we get the public hearing closed and then redo that motion?

Yep, we'll go ahead and close public hearing right now. You want to make your motion?

Yeah. So I'm making the motion that we continue this to a date uncertain for staff and the applicant to address all the comments raised in this commission meeting.

I'll second.

Commissioner Devrapali is absent. Commissioner Frechette?

Aye.

Commissioner Hewn? Aye. Commissioner Raymond is absent. Commissioner Stoss? Aye. Vice Chair Stevenson?

Aye.

And Chair Molden? Yes. Motion passes with a 5-0 vote. Thank you all.

And Chair, if I may, just a couple of comments from city staffs. And we appreciate the comment letter and the public coming to this meeting. We do appreciate the input. And our RCNS manager, our code enforcement manager will be reaching out to you if you'd like to follow up with her to kind of sit down and have a meeting with you um or anybody else from your neighborhood if you'd like so that we can get an inventory of the issues that are out there so right now there are no open code cases but certainly we can treat this as an open code case right you're here um lending us um giving us an idea of what's going on out there and and unfortunately we can't be everywhere and we we do try our best to to make sure that we're trying to intervene when we can. So Brittany and Nick will follow up with you up there and set something up with you.

Thanks, Darlene. Yeah, we echo those comments. We appreciate your engagement and your voice. Thank you for being here. Okay, we'll move on to item 7.2.

And I'm going to need just a second.

Okay.

Item 7.2, a resolution providing a recommendation to city council for the adoption of an ordinance amending title 23 zoning code, article nine specific use provisions of the city of Rancho Cordova municipal code exempt pursuant to section 15061B3 of the California Environmental Quality Act CEQA guidelines. Thank you so much, Kelly. Chance, you have a report for us?

I do. Good evening, Chair and Commissioners, Chance Finley with the City's Planning Department. My item tonight won't be quite as interesting as the last one, but I will try to make it short for you. Staff will be requesting that we continue this item. we just as a brief explanation why we did receive some public comment that we want to take some time and do our due diligence to address prior to moving forward with our recommendation to move this along to city council so

Yeah, and just to add to that, Chair, so we did, you know, this ADU ordinance update came up because we did receive a letter from the state, state HCD, and they've been sending letters out to a lot of jurisdictions just making sure that their ADU ordinance is in line with the recent changes that have happened in state law. So we did specifically address those comments that are in the HCD letter, but we did receive, as Chan said, another letter from an advocacy group, and so we want to make sure that, you know, we're doing our due diligence and If we're going to do an update to the AD ordinance, we might as well do it correctly first time. So we just want some additional time. So we'll bring it back to you for another meeting.

Great. We appreciate that. Do we need a date certain for that?

Yes. That would be great.

Do I have to pick a date? What happens? Do I just say a date certain? Or do I have to pick a date? Okay.

Arlene, do you have a date in mind that this could be ready?

That's a chance question.

I would say most likely by the next commission meeting. So what are we looking at? June 10th. All right.

I would push that back a little bit just to make sure we got enough time. Give yourself a little bit more time. I would probably try to do it the first meeting in August. Kelly, what date is that?

That would be August 12th.

chance uh yep august 12th then is that is that adequate yeah we request that and we push it to august 12th yeah yeah vote on it well yeah right move motion i'd like to move that we move uh item 7.2 uh to uh the first august meeting august 12th second does that work for our continuance

Yes, we also should take public comment even though this is being continued.

Okay, so we'll open the public comment public hearing period.

And is there public comment?

We received no speaker cards.

We've received no speaker cards this evening. But we did receive one public comment via email from James Lloyd, which was distributed to planning commission posted online and available in the back of the room. Great. Thank you.

but we leave it open, right?

Yes, that's fine. And the motion is on the floor, so it's ready for a second. Second.

Okay, Commissioner Stevenson, second.

I'd appreciate that. Otherwise, I have to recuse myself.

Continue this item until the August meeting.

Perfect.

Commissioner Deborah Polly is absent. Commissioner Frechette?

Aye.

Commissioner Huynh? Aye. Commissioner Raymond is absent. Commissioner Stoss? Vice Chair Stevenson?

Aye.

And Chair Malden? Yes. Motion passes with a 5-0 vote.

All right. Item 8, Planning Commission comments, ideas, questions. Dave, shall we start with you? Go ahead.

Got us all signed up for the 4th of July parade. Confirmed? Done. Hope you all can make it. And I just wanted to say, I've been spending a bit of time out at Hagen Park, going to the dog park a bit. And the residents that I talk to out there, I'm out there for an hour at a time talking to a lot of different people. They are really, really happy with what our city has done with that park. And I'm particularly proud of it. And I'm proud of the city council and it The Parks and Rec Department, they're doing a great job.

Well, that dog park is courtesy of my leadership class 10, so you're welcome.

All right. It's good to be here at a good time at the Memorial Day observation at Cordova High School just last Monday with Commissioner Frechette was there. And so, yeah, that was a very... Uplifting event. It's good to see. I didn't know about the 13 folds of the flag. So if you don't know about the 13 folds of the flag, check that out.

How did you get through OCS and not learn about the 13 folds? Well, you know, they didn't teach us that. Just confirms what I always thought. Air Force is better. Anyway, that's all I have. Thank you. No, bye. Yeah, I'm outnumbered here. One Air Force guy to two Marines. You guys always had the better looking uniforms.

So I don't usually have a comment, but tonight I'm locked and loaded. You guys are getting me after a great day. I don't know if you guys noticed last time we had the convenience store on Coloma Road. Did a lot of research on that, back and forth with staff and Elliot, and in turn decided to not call that up. But in doing so, I've learned through this general plan update, I want to be really clear about my intentions, and that is to improve that street, improve the safety of that street. It is not safe. When I joined Planning Commission, that was one of my goals, was to improve my neighborhood. So I'm going to personally take it on with Elliot's help a little bit to meet with enforcement. I did not know. This is where the code or the complaint-based information came to me because I'm wondering why these buildings haven't been painted, why their weeds aren't pulled. If nobody's complaining about it, which makes me derelict, like it bugs me every day and I never say anything, so... I think the neighbors really need to have a voice. We don't live in Stone Creek, but I'm going to tell you the Mills neighborhood is going to start having a voice. That's going to be my personal mission. With Elliot running for council, I hope that I have his support to get my neighbors on the other side of the street. I think we need to beautify that. We need to find some funding to put pavers and potentially a fence down. There's accidents on Coloma Road. What, every month there's a new fence going down? So you're hearing a very impassioned commissioner tonight, but that's because I didn't know I had the ability to ask those questions, and it's only taken me, what, four years on the planning commission. So I welcome your support and your help with improving some of the older parts of Rancho. I'm excited about it. I think it's something we can do, and the neighbors just need to have a voice. Only two people showed up tonight for the Walmart. And it's because they're tired. They've been there a long time. That's our neighborhood, Elliot, Dave. I mean, it just falls on deaf ears. And I got a different sense of that when I talked to Arlene and I talked to staff. They're willing to help. They just need to know where they need to help. So I think we have an excellent city that can do a lot of good things. It just takes somebody to push and to ask the questions. And so that's my mantra for the next six months. So every month I'm going to report on my latest findings to improve Coloma Road.

I will stand with you a thousand percent. You're absolutely right.

Me too.

Thank you.

Yeah, I think it was kind of interesting tonight. I didn't realize that our code enforcement only responds to complaints. I thought that as they're driving around the city and doing their various tasks that if they spot something, they would address it. So that's, you know, that's a bigger question of, you know, if that's the correct procedure. You know, that's not something for us to address tonight. But I think it is important to make our fellow neighbors aware of the fact that there's a lot of power in picking up that phone or writing that email and saying something. Cause if you don't say something, you know, nothing's getting done. I totally support your efforts to make your neighborhood better. I think that's why most of us are here to make our city better, especially for those three of us that have been here, you know, since Christ was a Lance corporal. So using, using a military vernacular, But other than that, Fourth of July is coming faster than I want it to. We had a really nice turnout at the Memorial Day service, and it was nice that it seems that in the last couple of years, people have started focusing back on what the original tent for Memorial Day was, is that it was supposed to be a solemn day of remembrance. It's not a day that you, you know, people used to come up and thank me for my service, I'm going, no, that's not appropriate. That's Veterans Day, but Memorial Day, we're only supposed to be focused on, you know, those that didn't come home and their families. And so it was really nice to see that seems to be the direction that people are moving. So for me, I really appreciate that. I'd like to thank the ROTC kids at Cordova High who did a great job during that service. And our community band also did. did a wonderful performance, including Brigadier General Johnson, who was a member of the band. With that, I think we'll have one more meeting before 4th of July, and I will try and make it. But I encourage everybody to show up to our community's largest civic event of the year, which is the 4th of July.

I'll just add that at Village Green Park, the movies in the park start every Friday night in June. So it's something fun to do. It's a really lovely evening on a Friday night for the family.

Oh, and can I add something to that? I should be the one. You always steal my thunder on that because I never think to speak about that. But we're making a huge technological improvement to movies in the park this year. We're no longer using the projector. And we're bringing in a video wall, which means that the movies can start much earlier before sunset, which means we can now do a children's movie. We're doing double headers this year, a children's movie followed by a movie that's more appropriate for older kids and adults later into the evening when the little kids have already fallen asleep. So come on out. It should be a great time. Thank you for mentioning that.

Yeah, love it. Arlene, do you have a planning manager report for us?

Yes, it's not really a report, but just a general comment. You know, this week, last week, I've had a lot of calls with the commissioners about various things. And... I just want to just express, you know, thank you so much for your thoughtful comments and questions, and I just want to reiterate, like, staff is here to provide you all the information, right, that you need to make good decisions, including if you want to understand how code enforcement works, right? So, you know, we work closely with RCNS on a lot of things, and we can always set up meetings to go over how do code cases go through, what happens with intervention, what happens with fines, enforcement, all of that. We can definitely provide that information and education to the commission so that we can make informed decisions. Brittany wanted me to just let you know for Commissioner Frechette's comment about complaint-based. It is mainly complaint-based. but also in my experience when we've worked at RCNS, if there is an area in the city that has had a lot of complaints about specific things, then they will do some proactive code enforcement. They will do drive-bys, but it's mainly targeted to certain areas. If there's an opportunity to do that, they do do it, but a lot of the things they do intake are complaint-based, and that is... you know, a conversation we can have with Brittany and her team when that's appropriate. But, you know, with anything else, public works, right? If you have questions about what happens out there, we can certainly request them to come, you know, do a presentation. If there's questions about the CIP, we talked about how do we do improvements along Coloma? How do we get that money that they used for Folsom Boulevard? something like that. We can certainly get the engineers and other city staff to come and provide information just so that we understand how things operate so we can make change where we can. right, as a commission. So I think, please, you know, don't hesitate to let me know if there's something that you need information on. Like, you want to know all about CEIF? Like, all the funding that we provide the community? I can have them come and do a presentation to you. So they're more than happy to just provide you information because they do do updates, but they only do it to council, right? And if you don't get to watch the council meeting, you won't get those updates. But if you'd like, we can certainly... start having them come and provide just some information to commission. So that's just want to share that, you know, your your role in the city isn't contained in these four walls as all the things that you guys do in the community now. So if you need more information on how to make good decisions there, then we'll certainly provide that to you.

So thank you so much.

I appreciate that, Arlene. And I do appreciate you reaching out to me two days before the meeting, every week, every time. I really appreciate that because it really gets me thinking. And I'm sorry, I didn't have a lot of good questions, but I will. Secondly, do we still have the Blight Patrol? That's more of a proactive thing.

Do we have the Blight Patrol anymore? Can you?

I'm just curious about that. I didn't want to start anything. It's just...

Running. No, I'm just kidding. No, we don't have light patrol. We have currently 11 code enforcement officers, five are assigned to the rental housing inspection program, and then five are assigned to the general nuisance team, which does all property maintenance, commercial corridors, one per district, and then one homeless outreach coordinator. So we do proactive enforcement, but it's primarily for neighborhoods. We'll do proactive sign sweeps or other things like that based on whatever the need is. But overall, we don't have that to answer that question. Yes.

I had a question. Not complaints, but what am I trying to say? Reports, are they anonymous or not? Because I've heard some neighbors, they don't want to call because they're afraid of retribution, basically. So I was just wondering, are they anonymous or does that work?

It's totally understandable, and we do get that question a lot. So most of the complaints come in. We do ask for contact information for reporting party in case we have to follow up or ask additional questions or share information back about what may or may not be a violation, but that information is never shared. So it is considered confidential. It's not shared outward, but it is requested internally. We will accept complaints that are anonymous. If somebody is completely not open to it, they just have to know that they won't be getting that information relayed back or have that open line of communication.

And Brittany and Lindsay, thank you both for your reports tonight. They were good.

Nick, yours was good too.

Oh, you know Nick. Yes.

Chase.

No. That's all I had, Jared. Oh, wait. We're at 7.07 right away.