Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Evening, everyone. I'd to call the meeting of the Planning Commission for April 13 to order. Stand and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance, Sorry. Roll call? Roll call first. Okay. Can we do sorry. We'll do roll call first.

Okay. Members rocks Rockenstein? Here. Members Virga?

Here.

And members Devlin?

Here.

Okay. And let the record reflect that members Borja and Corona Sabanana are absent at this time.

Awesome. Alright.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible,

with

liberty and justice for all. And then I will go ahead and read our announcement.

Thank you.

The county fosters public engagement during the meeting and encourages public participation stability and the use of courteous language. The commission does not condone the use of profanity vulgar language gestures, other inappropriate behavior, including personal attacks or threats directed toward any meeting participant. Seating may be limited and available on a first come, first served basis. To make an in person public comment, please complete a speaker request form and to the clerk. The individual will be invited to the podium to make a comment.

Members of the public may send a written comment which is distributed to commission members and filed in the record. Contact information is optional and should include the meeting date and agenda off agenda item number to be sent as follows. Email a comment to board clerk at sac county dot gov. Mail a comment to 708th Street, Suite 2450, Sacramento, California 95814. And that concludes the announcement.

Thank you. And that brings up our first item. Can we call first item to order please?

Yes. Item number one is PLMP2023Dash00085. This is the 2023 zoning update. This is an informational workshop to be discussed and receive feedback regarding a zoning ordinance amendments, and this is countywide.

And let the record reflect that our esteemed chair has made it.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Good evening commissioners. Wendy Hartman, Principal Planner for Planning and Environmental Review. And with me tonight is Matthew Jamone, who is the lead planner on this project. Given that this is a workshop and the length of the presentation and ability for us to have kind of a back and forth conversation with the commission if they if you have questions during the presentation. I'm going to go ahead and just have Matthew stay seated for this presentation, if that's okay with you. All right. Thank you.

Okay. Good evening, commissioners. Again, I'm Matthew Chamomoy. As the clerk mentioned, this is a workshop. It's a nonvoting item. So let's go ahead and get started. So today's workshop will be split into four parts. I'll go into the background of how we got to this package here today, commercial and institutional amendments within this package, residential amendments within this package, and then feedback and next Okay. So just some background here. We have some members of the public.

So the zoning code is a foundational document that we have. Okay. Is that regulates land use in the county. It provides guidance on what goes where, how do uses operate, and how do uses look, And how do they construct structures on property? Here on the screen is an excerpt of section 1.3 of the zoning code, which goes over the purpose of the zoning code, including key things like the zoning code enhancing public safety, promoting health and healthy communities and convenience and accessibility, and promoting a sustainable and efficient use of land, which overall supports the goals of the general plan.

So, our zoning code is a living document that evolves and changes over time. Our zoning code was first adopted in 1936, That's a typo there. Our first full ordinance was adopted in 1950, and we're currently on our seventh edition. So as it is a living document, we regularly update it with different levels of updates. So there's fix it packages, which are sort of topical updates that occur from time to time.

Some recent ones that have come through are massage and coming through soonest growing foul. There's also state legislative updates, which was recently seen by this council. And then this is an example of a major amendment package. This is the largest one that has come through since this addition was first adopted in 2015. So, just for a sort of metaphor of what this is, those other updates, those minor updates that I described are kind of like if you're thinking of maintaining your car, changing your oil, replacing air filters or rotating your tires.

This is more of a 30,000, 60,000, 90,000 mile major update to your car. And it's been ten years, so it's time for us to do this major maintenance. Just to quote the, board of supervisors, in a resolution they passed in 2023, which is kind of like our North Star in thinking about how we drafted this ordinance. This ordinance that the board passed, this resolution says that the board generally supports amendments to county codes and regulations that allow for more ministerial by right development, more approvals at the staff level or lower hearing bodies, and other changes that make it easier to do business with the county and build within the unincorporated area. So, this package, it is quite large.

It has 131 different items. And, mainly these items have come through constant feedback that we receive as members of the planning department. So we work with residents, business owners, developers, and other county divisions on a regular basis, and we get to see where our planning codes, our zoning codes have issues. And whenever we run into those issues, we record them, and then we bundle them to different packages. Just an example of how much interaction we get on a regular basis within the last six or so years, we've received and sent about 100,000 emails just through our general inquiry inbox.

So just formally today, the request is for feedback and comments on this zoning ordinance amendment, which affects all chapters of the zoning code, and title four, which is the interim zones of the zoning code. So 131 is a lot, And what we've done for this update is that the first major attachment in this package is a matrix, which lists out all of the items listed from A1 to A131. It provides the name of the topic, the affected sections, and a brief summary of the typo fix that's being addressed, along with a subjective degree of change from one to five, a quick sentence or two on the issue and what we're doing to fix it, and then the affected communities or specific zones. Subjective degree of change is ranked from one to five, going from one being like a minor clarification, so typographical errors and clarifications of definitions, all the way up to five, which are more substantial policy updates which affect a larger community. So just for some background about how many are in each of these, there's 45 in rank one, twenty one in rank two, twenty eight in rank three, twenty three in rank four, and fourteen in rank five.

So basically, there's more at that lower level of review, lower subjective degree of change, and then the more intensive the updates, the less quantity there are in this package. Okay. So I'll be going into detail on 20 of the 131 that we've selected that may be of more general interest to the county as a whole. So I'm gonna start with the commercial and institutional amendments. So this first one actually, before I start, I'd just like to note on the screen, you can see that on the top there's going be a number on the right hand side.

That's the subjective degree of change, one to five. And then the bottom right, if you'd like to reference on the matrix, is the specific items that I'm going to be referencing on that list of 131. So this first item, bucket use classification. So our zoning code puts all uses on private property into use classifications. There's about 200 of them in our zoning code, and we used to have a lot more prior to 2015.

So in 2015, we consolidate a lot of them and put them into buckets, which are more broad use classifications that encompass similar uses with similar intensity and operational characteristics. So for example, we created general office uses category bundling doctor's offices, accounting offices, all that sort of thing. We created different levels of different uses as well. So, primary problems with the existing bucket use classifications we have. There's some that have unclear terms or unclear definitions.

And sometimes there's barriers between the two that aren't very clear. So we might have a use that might fit into either one of them. So we want to make that delineation clearer. For example, our repair services classifications, we have one that's general repair and then tool based repair. And some of those use classifications of businesses that fall into them might better fit into other classifications.

So what we're proposing is cleaning up our various bucket use classifications and moving around certain businesses where they best see fit based on what we've experienced in our regular inquiries working with business licenses, just working with these various types of businesses. So here on the screen is a general hierarchy that would be clarified by this amendment where just for general industry uses, there's basically going from least intensive and commercial areas like general office all the way up to outdoor assembly manufacturing and processing. So if we have a use that might not fit inside of our specific classifications, we have these buckets that we can take a look at when we classify businesses that may not fit into our zoning codes current classifications. Moving on to the next item, digging back on the idea that we had in 2015 where we created these bucket use classifications. We used to have a lot of school based classifications, but we condensed them into only a few classifications.

Notably, we have one private school use classification which kind of lost the nuance for smaller type of schools, small training academies. Additionally, there was sort of an incentive structure in our previous zoning code where industrial trade schools, so operation of large trucks, cranes, teaching people how to do that. We incentivize our industrial zones, and this simplification kind of removed that incentive structure. There's also some clarifications that are needed for our automobile driving school and art gallery art studio use classifications. So going back to the small school issues, so our current code, if you are Kumon Mathnasium, you do language classes, you

do

CPR, That's really low intensity activity, but how our code reads, those are classified as private schools. And those require a use permit in a wide variety of zones. So, what we're taking a look at is creating a training, tutoring, or testing center, 25 or less students use classification, which really allows these type of uses in a wide variety of commercial zones where it makes sense that they would operate. So a Kumon or a testing center would fit well inside of a typical shopping center environment, or it could work in a business park. So I'm just opening up those opportunities there.

There is a typo on the second slide here. We do want to allow for these type of uses in the agricultural residential, not AGAR, and RD zones in conjunction with an existing institutional or commercial use during off hours. So, what this means, what we are thinking about, if you have a church in a residential zone and they may have they may may have a ministry for reaching out to the community for language classes or similar, they could operate that during off days. So if they have services on Sunday, they could operate those classes with up to 25 students on Tuesday or Wednesday. Additionally, for our classifications, this one really needed us to clearly define them similar to the bucket use classifications.

For the incentive structure for industrial trade schools, we want to have it be at a lower hearing body level in our industrial agricultural reserve, light industrial and heavy industrial zones. So, inside of those zones for industrial trading schools, if they have 100 students or less, they're now provided a lower level overview of a minor use permit. Our art gallery art studio use classification is pretty vague right now. It just says wherever you do art activities. So we want to make it clear what exactly that means and what we're envisioning.

So we're making that definition close to what a maker space could be where you can create small electronics and have limited equipment with limited effect on surrounding areas because it's a use permitted by right in a wide variety of zones. So we have a specific use classification for that. Additionally, standards are added for automobile driving schools. So these are just passenger vehicle, driving schools. Moving on to animal and pet services uses.

So do you have any questions thus far? Okay. Animal and pet services uses. So our zoning code currently only has three use classifications for animal and pet related businesses. What we found is that they do not encompass a wider variety of animal based businesses that are out there.

Notably, we've run into issues of classifying doggy daycare as a use. We've also run into issues where wild animals are not addressed. We've received inquiries for people wanting to keep elephants and giraffes and that sort of thing. And additionally, we've received some complaints about our current standards of saying that if you have more than four dogs or four cats, you're subject to a use permit, is over $9,000 So what we're proposing on the front of classifications is five different use classifications daytime animal services so that's dog day care, grooming, pet salons, that sort of thing Animal boarding, which I'll go into more detail on the next slide. Wild animal sanctuary, so any wild animals that you're keeping as defined in the county code.

Veterinary animal hospital stays the same from our current code. And then finally, zoo, So we have a use classification in case we ever get a request for that. Okay. So I'll go on to the animal boarding definition. So what we're trying to target here in this use classification is specifically people who are keeping animals on behalf of others.

They're doing it as a commercial operation. Or you're a domestic animal sanctuary, so you rehabilitate and keep them on your property. This does not affect specifically agricultural uses. Agricultural dogs, agricultural animals are not counted in this. So this revamped classification says, if you have more than five dogs, five cats, or domestic animals, and there's certain criteria based on your zone, you can be under this animal boarding use classification, which is at a lower hearing body level in our agricultural zones as proposed.

So if someone wanted to have, they want to have a tortoise rehabilitation center, they would be subject to a lower level minor use permit rather than paying $9,000 for a conditional use permit to the zoning administrator.

Just to help explain what you're saying by minor versus the major, if you want to call it that way.

Yes. So we have different levels of conditional use permits. I believe there's four levels. So there's a minor, which is our planning director level, so it's administrative. There's still, public noticing, so we're able to apply conditions to that use permit. The next level up is to the zoning administrator, and then planning commission and then finally board. So those are our four levels. So really the big difference for like these smaller operations, 9,000 versus $1,400 for the minor use permit can be a big help for these type of smaller operations.

And where do where does the rooster fall into this? We just laid it sleep done a whole different change in the roosters.

Yeah. So the crowing fowl ordinance, that is completely separate to this. So crowing fowl has all of its own regulations.

So it's gonna be all separate from

Yeah. This is separate regulation from that. So that's going to the board soon, I believe, in a month.

So this one is primarily on what's considered a domestic animal or pet, and we have a definition of what a domestic pet is where, your roosters and chickens fall under our livestock.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. Any other questions here? It was not clearly specified in our code. We just addressed dogs and cats. So What triggered the What triggered it?

What triggered the Yeah. The kennel. Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

You were automatically a kennel which was only allowed in certain zone districts and required a higher level use permit. Okay.

Yeah. So that's that's here on this next slide.

I'm saying I would have four cats. But just in terms of just for clarity, it's more the it would trigger the $9,000 if you had like five, let's say five cats or.

Correct.

Yes. So on this slide, this next one here, I'm addressing personal keeping of animals here. But on the left hand side is our current allowances. If you have four dogs, four cats, that's okay. Five dogs, four cats, now you're subject to being considered a commercial kennel, and you pay $9,000.

So what we're proposing here is a new allowance. If you look at this graph, in the pink, you can have up to 10 dogs, 10 cats, or a combination thereof, up to 10. And basically in zones where there is two acres or one acre lots typically, you'd be subject to that minor use permit. And then over two acres, those zones, you're just permitted by rights or agricultural zones, all that stuff. You could have your additional dogs and cats. So additional allowance there.

What's driving the increase? I mean, 10 dogs on an acre aren't necessarily all that easy to deal with. I mean, five dogs on an acre aren't necessarily all that easy to deal with. So what's driving the change?

Sometimes we receive inquiries from people who want to take care of fostered animals, as an example, that may wanna be on their property. But it it is something I receive from time to time where people just happen to have one or two more dogs and then they need to pay up $9,000. And that's been an issue from time to time.

So what you're but what you're saying is I could have 10 dogs on an acre for however long I want to have them on an acre?

You'd be subject to that minor use permit, our typical agricultural So residential we'd notify your neighbors to see how you work with your current dogs, and we could apply appropriate conditions as necessary on where they are situated on the property.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. For the next item here, vehicle use standards. So, similar vein to the previous ones where we are trying to make the changes we made in 2015 better. Our previous zoning code, we had about 44 use classifications just on vehicles, and then we simplified them to 18. However, the implementation we did in 2015 wasn't complete, whereas similar to the other issues, there's missing definitions, conflicting use classifications, and there's some uses which should probably be together that we separated for some reason.

So what we are proposing for this use change, which I have a graph on in the next few slides, but reducing the use classifications, defining them clearly, combining use classifications that naturally work together boat and RV is the most common one. We currently have a separate lowering certain reviews in industrial zones where it makes sense and increasing the level of review for RV and boat storage and LC since we're combining those. So this table here, these two tables summarize the changes that we're making. So, the first thing I'd like to point out, I'll just flip between these two slides. On the top left hand corner here actually, on the columns here are what you're doing with your vehicles, and then the rows are the types of vehicles.

So it's just a matrix of what those things are doing. On the top left hand corner here, you'll see for automobile repair, we currently have two classifications, which are based on the intensity of auto repair that you do. What we're proposing since these types of businesses may want to repair motorcycles or other types of vehicles, for any sort of vehicle that's 10,000 gross vehicle weight rating or less, we would just say you can repair any of those, subject to the intensity of the type of repair you're doing. So it allows these repair businesses to have a wider breadth of a similar type of vehicle for their business.

Don't mean to give you a hard time, but how do you distinguish between minor repair and major repair?

That is a good question. So our zoning code currently is not very clear on that, but we're clarifying the definition more. But really minor auto repair is more of your jiffy lube type of places. They're not really going into the motor very often. Major is really your under the hood body repair painting more intensive use classification, where it would fit better in a more intensive commercial area rather than being in your shopping center where a Jiffy Lube could operate without annoying the surrounding businesses with impacts.

So, you're combining the two costifications minor and major basically, right?

No. So, it's saying so if the minor and major being shared now between automobiles and small vehicles. So your mopeds, motorcycles, that ATVs, that sort of thing. So those businesses are able to do that type of operation between the two.

Thank you.

Yes. Yes. Yeah. Over here in the middle, sales, lease, and rent. Again, on the on looking at vehicles under 10,000 pounds gross vehicle weight rating, combining your operations regarding those businesses into one classification.

However, we're keeping automobile sales as a separate classification because of historical precedent for wanting to regulate auto sales and controlling where they can operate in the county at a higher level of review. So this use classification combines vehicles that are under 10,000 pounds. You can lease, rent, or sell them, but it would not include auto sales. It's a little bit of a nuanced one there. And then finally, on the right hand side is combining wholesale and storage of automobiles, small vehicles, RVs and boats since those types of businesses often just store all those things in the same place or do wholesale operations of them.

So, they are under one use classification. And then finally here across the bottom, for boats and RVs, they are combined together. So, they used to be separated out. Boats and RVs are together and you get to do whatever you want with boats and RVs across the board since those types of businesses do all these things in one place usually anyway. And then for large vehicles and heavy equipment, it's remaining the same for those, delineations.

May I have a quick question, sir? Yes. If you go back to that slide, I'm concerned that you're creating an unfair disadvantage for electric vehicles. GMC Hummer right now and the EV Silverado is without any additional modifications tip about 9,500 pounds. You put a rack in there, you're gonna be at over 10 k.

Are you creating an unfair disadvantage for EV owners who will not be utilizing as much space in order to fix because they don't have, let's say, as much hood to fix. Mhmm. Their batter packs are heavier. Mhmm. As batter packs are getting bigger and there's extended longer ranges, now you're having to force folks that will potentially be fixing vehicles with gross weight of over 10,000 pounds into a large vehicle category.

Yes. So the 10,000 pounds is based on the DMV's classifications. But on your point about the issue of these vehicles that are right on the middle, in our zoning code definitions, what we've included for basically, it's noncommercial and commercial vehicles. We provide a way for the planning director to, make a determination on if a vehicle that's right under or right over to be on the different side of that classification. So, we do have allowances for those types of vehicles, but we did want to create the base definition to be, what the DMV does for most of their business. But we do have an allowance in that sort of scenario.

Understood. And then under the gross weight, are you breaking it down by like Class one, medium duty, Class two, heavy duty at all? Or we're just again basing this primarily on gross weight?

Just gross weight, 10,000 above, 10,000 less, just making it simple there.

Okay. Thank you.

Typically for enforcement purposes, if it's clearly a passenger vehicle, we treat it as such regardless of the weight. Our definition will clarify that a little bit more so that, yeah, your box trucks and things of that nature are always going to be considered commercial. But we recognize that big pickup trucks and things of that nature, sometimes depending on whether they have a tonneau cover or something like that. DMV may classify them one way or another. So there is some flexibility for that.

And then to kind of add to why we're keeping automobiles separate is we still have a large portions of certain areas of our county where we have the Auto Commercial Zone District that was very specifically identified in certain areas like around Fulton. And so, really preserving those auto commercial areas, and they do get treated. The Board has historically wanted to treat those areas differently than other types of vehicle sales and repair.

Understood. Thank you. Okay.

Any other questions? Okay. Moving on to the next one, which is drive through reservoir space. So part of this update, we worked in, extensively with different county departments and one of them was the Department of Transportation. And they raised the issue that our current standards for drive through reservoirs, so the amount of space that basically is from where you pick up your food at a drive through window and where it's clearly delineated drive through is too short to accommodate certain businesses.

Our current standards say that for food or beverage based businesses, there's a 180 foot reservoir space minimum. And for all other businesses, it's 60 feet. So generally, the amount of space you have for your vehicle plus the area in front and the back is about 20 feet. So that would be about nine vehicles for queuing and three for other businesses. Our Department of Transportation in recognizing this concern of vehicles backing up onto public streets and adjacent property, They did a study in twenty twenty of different businesses to see what the queue lengths were at our local sort of higher traffic type of drive through businesses.

And in addition to that, they reviewed a study by studies at the national and regional level to see if those results were in line with those standards. So, after reviewing those standards, the Department of Transportation came to us and had this recommendation, is our current proposal today, is for this more detailed version of the required reservoir space for businesses, which is based on the eighty fifth percentile of drive thru queues. So, for restaurants with drive thrus that primarily serve beverages, so coffee shops, that's 14 vehicles. For restaurants with drive thrus that do not primarily serve beverages, 12 vehicles standalone car washes, 12 vehicles accessory car washes at nine vehicles, financial institutions like banks at six vehicles, and office use type of drive thrus, which are typically pharmacies, would be at three vehicles. So, is an increase in different stepping for these types of businesses.

Of course, these businesses are not all the same. Some have more traffic than others, so the Department of Transportation would be provided the ability through these applications we receive to allow for a reduction in the reservoir space based on engineering justification that's provided to us. So if a business, has different locations in our area and they all have lower queuing lengths since what's in our standard and they provide that information to the Department of Transportation, they'd be able to take that into consideration and allow that lower queue length without getting an additional special development permit for deviations. The change also includes a codification of a queue management plan for these types of businesses. So when they if in the event they do go over the reservoir space for the business, they would have the queue management plan to outline where they would direct traffic and queuing if they do exceed that reservoir space.

Additionally, if it is a use that's not listed in that previous slide, the Department of Transportation would be able to request for a study and justification to figure out what would be the best queue length for that type of business.

Just have a question here. The previous slide talked about banking. Does that banking cover the parking lot drive through ATMs that aren't in a bank, they're basically in a parking lot?

Yes, they would cover that, yes.

So it'd be six cars in the queue for 120 feet?

Yes. If let's say Bank of America, they have these all over the place and there's not always six cars there, they could just provide DO2 with the information, hey, this is the amount of vehicles we get on a daily basis. It doesn't necessitate six, and they can reduce that.

Okay. Thank you.

Go ahead. And that's for drive up ones, which is different than a lot of them that we see in, like, shopping center parking lots are actually walk up kiosks, and walk up kiosks are are dealt with differently than a drive through kiosk or drive through teller would be if that

was I just I can see in my mind four different ones in my general neighborhood that are both.

Yeah.

And Bank of America, perfect example, right off of Elkhorn is got both.

Yeah.

Drive thru and walk up. So that's why I was asking the question.

Yeah. And then, this would be for new drive through businesses, existing ones, only if there's like a significant change in their use. So, if it was a financial institution and it's going to a Dutch Bros, obviously they would need to bring it up to standards. But if it was just switching between different bank entities, then we the existing standards they have in place would be fine.

Next item is service yards in the

Okay. Sorry, Mr. Jermaine. I another question related to that. Was hoping you can kind of share with me or Ms.

Hartman. When we're proposing an extension of more queuing lanes for a vehicular type of business, but we then overlay that with other specific use planning, North Watt specific plan, for example, that is designed for a transit oriented development because of high propensity or areas of pedestrian accidents. We're telling businesses that have drive throughs, you need to be able to accommodate more cars. But just in case you go to a place that has a transit oriented development plan or a specific use case that is dis incentivizing businesses to not have as many cars, now you kind of have a juxtaposition of two policies that are going against one another. I specifically remember in this dice, I don't think that these are the same folks, but we turned down a Popeyes on North Watt because that had a drive through, a Popeyes.

Okay? It's a business that a lot of the community members wanted to support. We turned it down because in the name of transit oriented development. Now we go to Ordinary Care and use this is 2020 study. Now we use In N Out as an example, and there's still people walking in and out of, pun intended, across the streets from The Ordin Arcade Mall.

Now we're saying that you're gonna be having to have more vehicle queuing. I understand the name of levels of service and traffic and vehicle miles traveled against outdated methodology by DOT. There seems to be just a disconnect of are we trying to be a car less than a car centric type of organization in highly impacted areas and encourage the use of walking and biking versus now you wanna invite new businesses, but then you have to require them to have longer queues. That's probably a way. And, again, I'm having a little bit of a disconnect here. So how would you overlay that?

Certainly. That's a very good question. So currently, in some of those areas, because of the transit quarters that they're in or because of a special planning area, they prohibit drive throughs. Your commission, the planning commission, did see an update to one of those plan areas to allow drive throughs with approval of a use permit because it was prohibited in that area. So that is one of the things that happens is in some of those areas we just don't typically allow for the drive throughs.

That being said, we have recently hired a position called our infill coordinator this past year. And they have initiated an infill it's not a council. What is it called? Developer. There's a subcommittee for infill.

And they are looking at each of the county's 14 identified corridors within our general plan and coming up with some policies that would be specific to those corridors and some of the within a buffer of those corridors. And so within those areas, they may have different standards, not just for drive throughs, but for what types of uses in general do we want to see along those areas that we are looking to have more of a mixed use, higher density, walkable environment. So there may be a different list of allowable uses. There may be different types of development standards for those areas that are currently in the works. And so hopefully, that will get rid of kind of the discord that you're mentioning right now.

Yeah. I would I mean, in lieu of a queuing management plan, if you have a good actor of a business, good actor or actress of a business who is again not trying to create more traffic by providing more access for folks who are not in single occupancy vehicles. I I hope that we would be at least flexible and recognize that that's the case and not inadvertently encourage them to do the opposite. Right? Especially if it's gonna be in a transit corridor plan, which, again, I believe there's gonna be a disconnect there. So I I really do look forward to to seeing that kind of come to fruition. Sorry for interrupting. Thank you, Mr. That's a

good comment. Yeah. Okay. Any other questions on this one? Okay.

So, next one is on service yards in the industrial office park or MP zone. So, our current definition of service yard workshop is quite broad in the type of businesses that it encompasses. So, it says that it's used for office storage yard or maintenance shop of a garage for service use. This use is currently prohibited in our MP zone. However, if you kind of drive around our MP zones, there's a lot of these type of business these types of buildings that you'll see on the screen, where there's an office in the front and then there's roll up doors in the back.

Where it really works well if you're someone who is doing a contractor business for landscaping, pool cleaning, that sort of thing. There's a lot of businesses that already exist that sort of operate as a service yard in the MP zone. And when they come in through business licenses, we often see that they are erroneously classified as an office type of use. And realistically, they're doing all this stuff in the back, and the building is designed for that sort of use. So how did this situation came to be?

It seems like there was some nuance that was lost in our previous zoning code on the types of businesses that could be allowed in the MP zone. So what we wanna do is to change it to be permitted by right as long as the type of operation is completely indoors. So these types of businesses, if you drive around, they're usually on in in Northgate Boulevard in Natomas near between Trucksville and North Gadex on the North Side Of 80. And in Gold River, there's some along Coloma Road. You'll see these type of buildings here.

So as long as they operate completely indoors, there's also limitations that we're proposing for how they store their company vehicles outside, as long as they meet those standards, they would be permitted by Wright. If they need more vehicles, then they'd need to come in for a minor use permit to allow for more vehicles to be stored outside. But generally, we want to allow these types of businesses, landscape contractors to be permitted in this zone where many already operate. The next item is the temporary uses section. So, it's quite a big one for us here.

The existing section in our code, the big issue that came that comes about when staff is using this section is that it was largely copied over from our pre 2015 zoning code, there's some conventions that don't match with our current code. So it's quite a bit hard to read if your mind is in our current code, And there's a lot of outdated requirements that are from that previous edition of our zoning code. Just an example of some things that are missing from our current temporary uses section is that if you want to store a pod in your driveway, let's say you're cleaning up your house or moving, we currently say you can have it for seven days, and then after that, it's $1,400 for a use permit. Wanting to be realistic in the type of temporary uses that occur today. So what we are proposing is rewriting the section to match our current sort of conception of how our zoning code is being written.

There's many standards that are staying. There's some that are going, and there's different ways of being how these are going to be regulated. So we're looking at permitting them based on the active type of use on the ground at the property rather than just zone since there might be different types of operations that don't match in the zone that they're in. There might be a convenience store in the residential zone that may want to have some event. Currently, our code does not account for that sort of use.

One of the things I'd like to highlight here is a new allowance for temporary outdoor operations. So if a business or institutional use like a church has a catastrophic disaster or they're undergoing a large amount of renovation or they cannot use the space, this would allow for a new allowance for this type of operation to occur outdoors temporarily. So a church could operate outdoors if their area if their worship area burned to the ground. Our current standards do not have provisions for that sort of temporary use. An additional allowance I'd like to highlight on the example here on the screen, you see a picture here of the Midway of Fun Carnival at the Florin Mall shopping center.

Currently, our zoning code says that you can only have temporary uses of up to temporary uses not specified, which is a term we use, it includes most carnivals, concessions events, that sort of thing. Those are only limited ten days a year. And in order to incentivize greater use of these underutilized parcels in our corridors, what we're proposing is that for these larger shopping centers with a lot of empty space, over 20 acres, they can have these temporary events for up to thirty days a year. So we can have more activation of these empty spaces until they're committed to permanent use. So really our Florin Mall Center would one of the eligible areas, Country Club Plaza and Arden Arcade, so we can have more activity at these areas.

Some other miscellaneous things that are being addressed a rewritten section on tents. We have tents at a very high level of review right now if you want to keep them up on your property. So making it be more realistic to how tents are being used for businesses. So if a business wants to have a tent outside for canopy, for eating outdoors, they could have that during the summer months. Enhanced standards for temporary occupancy in RVs.

So this is if your house is undergoing renovation or is being reconstructed or is being built, you can temporarily live in an RV as long as the building official deems that it your house is not habitable or it's still being constructed. For the point I brought up earlier on pods, more allowances. So if you want to go to up to thirty days or have two pods, can do that with a temporary use permit. So there's a pathway there for a cheaper permit to have longer term storage. Additionally, we're proposing a new major temporary use permit, is for these larger type of projects where we have more than two hours of staff work or we distribute to more than two agencies.

Currently, temporary use permit is about $270, and that's the same cost for someone who wants to do, like, a 500 person festival, and we lose money on that. So we want to be able to get more cost recovery, not complete cost recovery, a little bit more on those types of permits that take more of our time. Additionally, just some clarification on a new standard for staging areas, are currently not addressed in our code. So if you have a, someone that's building a subdivision and they need to store their, items or implements the construction crew, they might have a lot off-site. We have standards for that not included in our code.

And the hot ticket item here for temporary uses is mobile food facilities and compact mobile food operators, so your food trucks, your food carts. So, currently, before I start, I would like to note for planning regulations, we cannot regulate these type of businesses if they are within public right of way. So, if you have a food operator, food truck operator, or food concessions vendor that's inside of a bus stop area planning, we cannot have regulations on that. Our environmental management department still has regulations on all these type of businesses, but for us, we can't regulate that. We can only regulate these businesses if they're on private property.

So what we're proposing is some standards for their operation, like how they need to maintain certain setbacks. One of the things is that we're proposing is that they would need to maintain a 300 foot separation from other food concessions vendors that are on private property. So they can't really cluster in one area. There'd be separation distance there. Again, we can't measure that from those that are on public right of way.

And additionally, for these types of businesses, to sort of take into account our brick and mortar restaurants. If someone wants to operate a food truck, let's say, and they are within 300 feet of a brick and mortar restaurant, they'd have to obtain a letter of support from that brick and mortar restaurant in order to, go through our process. If they're unable to get that letter of support, it would go for the CPACs for a recommendation on their permit.

Can I kind of ask some questions? Yes. I want to go back to the pods. So you're saying that you want to allow pods to be left in residential areas longer than the existing, what, seventy two hours?

So currently it's seven days. So if someone's unpacking that

Seven days.

It would go up to thirty days or have and the ability to have two with a temporary use permit. So that's about $280 If they want to go beyond that, then it would be subject to our cargo container standards, which is the existing 1,400 permit, which we'd see it as a permanent use, on the property. And that's subject to moving it so it's in the back of the property and other standards.

I'm baffled by the change considering, you know, the reality of the fact that those things are in place in a lot of places for a lot longer and enforcement doesn't seem to make a difference. So now we're going to give them thirty days before enforcement can do anything about it.

Most of these tend to be for those moving companies where you're getting ready to move someplace and they'll drop off a pod

Usually in someone's driveway.

In someone's driveway, they'll come and pick it up. Or you're doing sometimes some major house renovations, and you might get a different type of pod set up. That's more of what these are focused on. If they actually are using a cargo container, we have a separate section on cargo containers that limits the number they can have and where they can be located. We would treat these pods the same way if they're going to be there longer than the thirty days.

Okay. I understand you don't do enforcement, but it's just an issue, anybody's neighborhood, that you go around, I mean, go down here to Rio Linda, go down here to Antelope, go down to Alberta. It's an issue in terms of seventy two or seven days or thirty days. You know? Some of them are there for years.

So it's more of an enforcement issue. I just hate seeing opening it up to a longer period of time, but I understand what you're trying to do. The other issue is your food trucks and your temporary food distribution pop, for lack of another term, pop ups. I'm sure you've all been dealing with the hugest issues. I mean, I was at the my last supervisors meeting.

It took up about a third of the supervisors meeting because the brick and mortar folks are done with food trucks and pop ups that park on private property and end up staying there for long periods of times. This 300 foot issue with existing you know, brick and mortar stores. I'm going right down here on Elkhorn Boulevard by Main and Elkhorn and ask the McDonald's who has to deal with the guy who sits in the old Rite Aid parking lot. Mhmm. How you say that they gotta get a permit to do that.

How they dealt with it, they

don't. Yeah.

Yeah. If if they cannot obtain a letter of support from, like, that McDonald's because corporate just doesn't wanna do that, then it would go to the CPACs for recommendations. So the CPAC would be able to discuss the situation of that business and make a recommendation. And then if neither

wants them there?

It would be recommended denial to the zoning administrator at that point.

To your point, Commissioner Varga, yes, the board has been talking about these and actually directed our staff to come up with some provisions for private property. Right now, the mobile ones that are the actual food trucks have kind of an exemption in our ordinance. And so that's been really hard for us and for code enforcement to regulate. For the ones that are doing the compact mobile food operators or from a stand, We do have a provision in our zoning code right now that requires they get a temporary use permit from the planning commission. And the board indicated that that's too high of a level.

And so that's why we're looking at treating both the food trucks and the compact food vendors essentially the same with just a regular temporary use permit added administrative level with some standards. But if your commission feels that these standards are not strong enough or the distances are not adequate to protect our brick and mortars. Those are good comments for us to bring forward to our Board as well.

I can tell you for a fact, especially if you go down in that area. It it's more of a bigger issue in the high traffic corridor areas, than it is, I guess, with in the city of Sacramento or in Downtown County or anywhere else. It's an incident that's run most of those businesses out. Most of them are gone because they can't compete with that. I just believe we need to think about these a little bit differently than we have done in the past.

Nothing wrong with food trucks, not an issue with food trucks that are properly done and properly permitted. But I'm more concerned about allowing even anywhere close to some of these things to the brick and mortar stores. We just won't have them very much longer in that general area. If you drive down that road tonight, you'll see exactly what I'm talking about. So just whatever you can do to try to bolster that piece of it will make a big difference, at least in that those areas down there. Thank you.

Any other questions, comments here? Okay. Next one, on a completely different note, we're updating our death care use classifications. So death care includes funeral establishments, crematories, that sort of thing. So one of the issues that we run into is that our current death care classifications do not account for death care of pets.

So people want to do pet cemeteries, that type of thing. We're allowing it now to be at the same classification that we consider for those same death care of humans. So if you do a cemetery, it would be treated the same in our per zoning code for both pets and humans. Additionally, we're proposing lowering the level for funeral establishments without crematories or just funeral establishments. They're currently at quite a high level of review if you want to do it.

It would need to be planning commission in our light commercial zones, lowering it to administrative permit given they don't really have a lot of impacts on surrounding areas and also lowering the level one level in our business professional office zone. Additionally, our death care standards for crematories do not account for modern a new modern sort of use for reducing bodies. So there is something called alkaline hydrolysis, an image there on the right where there is a big sort of metal container. You put a body in, and it applies heat, water, and pressure to reduce the body to powdered substances. Our current code is specifically for sort of your crematory type of use with fire involved.

So generalizing it for any sort of advancement in this field where any reduction of the human body to this use is treated the same as a crematory use given that there's still hazardous material sort of considerations no matter the way that you reduce a body.

Sir, would that require additional vetting by the sewer to water district to make sure that those types of effluent

Definitely.

Are safely gone through Definitely. The wastewater

So any sort of crematory use, that type of use, would need it would be a use permit to the Board in most cases and it would be distributed to those departments for appropriate comments.

Awesome. Thank you.

Okay. Next one is battery energy storage system facilities, which I'll refer to as BESS to be clear here. So, BESS facilities that we are taking a look at are those that have a large array of electrochemical devices, so batteries that charge or collect energy from the grid or a power plant and discharge them at a later time. So, as we are aware, we've had some projects that have come in with BEST facilities. Previously in 2023, the planning director made a determination that the BEST facilities are substantially similar to our commercial Solar two facilities because we don't have a use classification for BEST right now.

So we applied those standards the best we can. In addition to that, we applied industrial standards to those uses that are more stringent and also it would be subject to a use permit to the board. So what we're proposing here is codifying standards for best facilities, given that we're compelled to by our climate action plan in addition to the SMUD 02/2030 carbon plan. So, the targeting of the facilities for this use classification is for utility scale best. There are smaller accessory BES for businesses.

So we recently had an AutoZone that just wanted to have a battery backup that's technically classified as a BES facility. That's not something that we're regulating here. It's the primary use of BES. So we did work with our staff who's knowledgeable in BESS facilities and updated and created standards for BESS facilities that are proposed to be codified. There are some that are still taken over from the commercial two standards that our planning director determined before.

I'd like to note that we are permitting them in less zones than the planning director's determination, so removing certain zones that might be closer to residential areas. So it's still subject to a use permit to the board, and it would be in our agricultural, interim agricultural, light industrial, and heavy industrial zones. I'd also like to note that these types of uses, they locate near existing substations or other electrical infrastructure, so they're typically in specific areas with that existing setup already there. So recently, the Arboleda BEST facility came in on Ishinger, which is near a substation in the city of Elk Grove. And then the Coyote Creek solar facility was near a major transmission line heading into the city of Elk Grove.

Can you maybe just kind of go into a little bit about how primary use is defined? And then what other uses are maybe more commonly associated with those uses.

Mhmm. You might have heard the term behind the meter. So behind the meter means that, basically, the best facility or battery backup storage is being just used for that specific business. So in that case, it would be accessory to the primary primary business. What this regulation is focusing on are the ones where the primary business is actually just storing power, selling it back to the grid or other entities at a future time. Does that kind of help? Or do you need kind of a little bit more on M and A accessory use?

No, I think that gets my that answers it. So when it's not a primary use, it's really just something that is attached. It's a secondary use to the business itself.

Correct. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah.

All right. Thank you.

And in those cases, there still might be review by the fire department, environmental management department as part of their building permits. Or if they trigger a discretionary entitlement, it'll be reviewed as part of that. But it would be treated much differently than these where their primary focus is just the best storage. Because given the amount of of, battery capacity that's involved with some of these, there have been some, issues in other jurisdictions with, fires, explosions, things of that nature. So we're treating them quite a bit differently than when it's just small secondary battery for a business.

And do you sorry, it's a follow-up. And do you have an idea as to like the scale or the range of kind of possible scales for these primary best uses? I mean, we my gut tells me that we're going to be looking at more of these in the coming years the grid kind of modernizes? Are we looking are we preparing for the different kind of possible scales of these? Are they all going to be kind of big facilities? Or are we looking at kind of more of a distributed model?

They could range in scale. A lot of it's going to depend on the type of substation that they're near. They also need to usually have a purchase power agreement of some nature, either with SMUD, PG and E, or some other provider. And so sometimes that kind of regulates the the size based on what that purchase agreement contract is going to look at. We could see more of these potentially at a smaller size related to things like data centers, which we are not specifically addressing in great detail in this package because we have a recent working group that we're working with our sustainability division under general services, along with our long range staff and economic development on coming up with some specific criteria for data centers because we are seeing a big increase in those.

And they have a huge a very significant energy need. And so as those things kind of change, this could be an area where we adopt it now, and then we just have to keep following it and doing our kind of typical fix it packages as either technology changes and gets safer or as either state or federal regulations kind of provide more of a standardization.

Thank you. And again, obviously, your home solar battery backup isn't part of all this, right?

No. That's kind of what we refer to as like behind the meter sort of thing.

Yes. Were just talking about behind the meter for businesses. I didn't know if we were equating it the same for homes.

Yeah. It's also for homes and multifamily. Yeah.

Yeah. Tend to be a very small small unit. Yeah. Any

other questions here? Yeah. Have a couple of

follow-up questions, if you don't mind. I was wondering if you guys considered Assembly Bill two zero five, the 2022 bill, and kind of discussing this requirement under that provision. Large care utility provider or large care utility, any anything over 50 megawatts can just opt in to, like, the CEC purview as opposed to the local jurisdiction. So the energy commission would be the lead sequel agency for that type of project. It's to kind of alleviate the the burdens because, you know, it was part of the go business initiative by the governor to kind of incentivize more of these types of battery storage solutions.

So I was wondering, you know, if they were to opt in to that kind of scenario, it would kind of kind of put some of our restrictions in certain areas kind of, I don't know, in a little bit of a friction with state law. So that's one thing. That same thing with, like, SB 38, which would require certain certain facilities to have like fire suppression. And then the last thing I wanna say, as as you mentioned, miss Hartman, kind of in the future fix it approach, you know, we're slowly shifting away from lithium ion batteries as we go into solid state batteries. This is going to be the technology and the data has shown that the fire risk goes down from like 20% to 15% of what is currently in lithium ion.

And so especially when we have the 2030 plan, which has very stringent, again, very high reaching rules that a number of our developers and a number of our organizations around in the county are required to abide by, if you're not allowing for solid state batteries that by the genuine, you know, kind of kind of kind of the just the design of technology being water based away from highly urbanized areas because of the restriction that we had artificially put in these guidelines. Kind of hard for SMART to get their 2,030 plan in places, right? And so, I would really hate for communities, especially disadvantaged communities, communities of colors that tend to carry a lot of these environmental issues, traditionally speaking by our land use types of decisions to, again, inadvertently be disadvantaged because they can no longer have battery energy storage solutions, especially if they're using solid state batteries because our county system disallowed that because we're basing it off of risks of lithium ion, which again is technology that my mom and my grandmothers used. And so again, I'd like to encourage the staff to maybe look at potentially providing the planning director some flexibility and some leniency with the technology improves in addition to, again, that layer that certain projects can just use the energy commissions kind of purview to just say, let's not artificially create like this electrical barrier, especially in communities that need it most.

Because these are the types of communities that do not have the ability to buy Tesla Powerwall banks, right, are gonna be most reliant for the grid, and they're typically not the ones that are gonna be having, solar panels, especially when we're at an M3.0. So thank you. I appreciate you guys hearing the feedback.

Okay. So the next update here is on accessory parking and storage of commercial vehicles. So this is on accessory use. So it is in conjunction with an existing business. So this is more if you think about a Pizza Hut, if they have a delivery car, that's the type of vehicle we're regulating or Walmart has delivery vans, that's the type of thing we're regulating here.

So our current standards are based on zones when there could be different businesses in different zones that don't match their conceptual zones. So again, prototypical idea of like a convenience store could be in a residential zone, so making it based on use so they have the same allowances. Our current standards also do not account for commercial and company vehicles in our agricultural use properties. That's been a common issue where if you have, like, a big pear farm, technically, code says you can't have your commercial vehicle to haul your pears out, and that would be not permitted or it would require use permit in order to do that. Additionally, our standards for commercial and industrial storage of vehicles are kind of sparse.

So, in creating this amendment, we worked closely with our code enforcement division to create more enforceable and reasonable standards, which take into account the type of business that is being affected and the purpose of the zone that it is located in. So, for agricultural uses, what we are proposing is that at the current time, the way it's currently written in your packet is that if it has at least five acres dedicated to agricultural uses, then you could have your any vehicle weight agricultural equipment or agricultural vehicles that are road legal, so hauling the pairs again. We did receive feedback from our Delta Seamac and our Southeast areas CPAC where they did want to see it at a higher acreage minimum. So we're currently looking at 20 acres as being the minimum size or having a Williamson Act contract in order to have these storage of vehicles given that we don't want to incentivize kind of like hobby farms that don't really need these large commercial vehicles to have it there. So sort of preserving the intent of going for these larger commercial agricultural operations.

For commercial and institutional uses, so your typical shopping centers or offices, what we're proposing is two company vehicles that are stored on-site. This takes into account the average. So if you have a big office complex, chances are not all of them will have two company vehicles there. So, kind of going with what these businesses could have. For every 10,000 square feet over 10,000 square feet of space they have, they could have one additional vehicle.

So, if you have 20,000, then you could have three vehicles. Any additional up to 10 is subject to a minor use permit, and it's still subject to our parking guidelines that we have. And in industrial areas, there's no limitation on numbers since that's where we'd like for them to store their vehicles. On the flip side of the number of vehicles you can have is sort of where it can be stored on the property and what the screening is. So for our commercial institutional uses, specifying in which zones where it can be stored within the buildable area of the property if it is like these more intensive commercial vehicles.

So just making it be based on zones so we can fit the look of the zone that it is in. I'd also like to note that we are loosing the standards for any sort of storage of vehicles that are under 10,000 pounds. So currently, there's some language where if you store if you have a business and you like you're a Pizza Hut and you put your delivery vehicle within the front setback of 50 feet where there's already parking, technically that's noncompliant. So just saying, hey, it makes sense to store those vehicles and no one would see that see that as an issue, within the setback areas if it's a typical passenger or, light fleet vehicle.

Mr. Giamami, is there a typical number or ratio of number of allowed trucks or like heavy duty vehicles per hundreds or per acreage of agricultural use? So for example, if I South County area, right, let's just say South Of Cameron Road, I I I own a peer farm, also operate a trucking business. What's the Help me out with that dilemma. How will Yes. That

So this specifically covers accessory storage again. So it has to be related to that agricultural use. So it has to be related to that Pear Farm. If they are renting it out to other people that are storing their vehicles there, that would be a completely separate use classification. That's not permitted in our agricultural zones.

Understood. Thank you.

Any other questions on this item? Okay. Next one is on hazardous waste and materials. It's Continuing on the theme of working with our different departments, we work closely with our environmental management department to create these different standards, which I'm discussing here. So currently, our zoning code, if you are a business that stores hazardous materials, there's two use classifications you can go in, warehousing or hazardous waste treatment storage, and that's very different uses on those two spectrums.

So warehousing is permitted in a large variety of zones, hazardous waste treatment is use permit to the board and only in the limited zones. So what we want to do is to create a use classification which clearly allows for this type of use subject to certain standards. Additionally, when working with environmental management because of a business that could be storing these materials, they could be considered as a warehouse or just permitted by right. So, sometimes there might be a registration issue with environmental management where they don't have the appropriate registration or regulation on file for these type of businesses. So, trying to fix that issue.

So, what we are proposing are two new use classifications to encompass the storage and distribution of hazardous materials. So, hazardous material storage and distribution and extremely hazardous material storage. So hazardous material storage and distribution triggers EMD's permitting requirements, but it doesn't trigger the California Accidental Release Prevention Program, which is more intensive sort of hazardous materials in larger quantities with more things of issue. So if you are a business that let's say you are storing and distributing propane tanks, you would be able to be classified under the hazardous material storage and distribution use classification. Extremely hazardous material storage, again the triggering of State's accidental release prevention program requirements.

Just to sort of visualize what that type of use is, here is a picture of the suburban propane facility in Elk Grove, is two gigantic tanks of propane that are about I think 12,000,000 gallons. That's an example of an extremely hazardous material storage facility. We don't have one in our current jurisdiction, but we want to account for that sort of use. So there's those two levels that we're proposing. Hazardous material storage and distribution, again, if you're like a propane distribution facility just for giving out propane tanks to regular public, you're subject to a use permit to the zoning administrator if you're within 300 feet of different sensitive receptors like residential zones or public parks.

If you do meet the separation distance, you'd be permitted by right in our industrial, light industrial and heavy industrial zones, and then subject to a minor use permit in our industrial office park zone. In our general commercial zone, it would always require a use permit for review. Extremely hazardous material storage would be subject to quite large setbacks and distance separation. It would only be permitted in our heavy industrial zones, so really targeting this more potentially dangerous use classification. Questions on this one?

Okay. Moving on to agricultural uses in schools. So for this one, we worked with our agricultural commissioner. So in 2018, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation issued regulations restricting the application and timing of pesticide application within a quarter mile of a school site or child daycare. These standards were further strengthened in 2024 with AB eighteen sixty four.

Our agricultural commissioner, we worked with them and they emphasized the need for protecting agricultural resources from schools that may want to site inside of agricultural zones. So, what we are proposing is that for these sort of educational uses, private educational uses, it would get bumped up to a board level review. So, it goes to a much higher level of review in the agricultural zones and they are subject to certain findings. The two notable findings, first one is that it doesn't it's not within a quarter mile of sort of high value agricultural land. And then the second one is that it doesn't affect existing agricultural operations where they wouldn't be able to control their pests by putting in pesticides, so they aren't put under those unneeded additional standards.

I'd also like to note that we are not including public schools in here because public schools do have the ability to override our zoning code with a vote of their school board. So this specifically targets what we have the ability to regulate. Yes. If

you just compare those buffer zones to current residential.

We don't have buffer zones between schools and residential right

now. The agricultural spraying. Sorry.

Like distance from residential? I'm not aware. I don't have that off the top of my head right now.

Okay. Maybe we can come back with that at some point. Yeah. It's just an interesting I mean, if we can't spray within a quarter mile because of the school, because there is a concentration of children for

probably,

I'm assuming very legitimate reasons. Just curious as to like what's the buffer zone requirement for where these children live and we all live?

Yes. I do know that the Agricultural Commissioner regulates pesticide uses. Folks have to get permits. And so some of it might depend on the type of pesticide being used and how it's being applied. We also tend to look at some of that buffering issue as we approve new developments at times within those existing agricultural areas, but we can get you more information for our when we bring it back to your

Okay. The next item is body art. So currently, our zoning codes, tattoo shop use classification, that's the name of it in our code, originates from 1980 and it has definitions that are quite outdated and are not matching the state body art act which has more comprehensive definitions for piercing, branding, different types of modern body art uses. Additionally, we have received over time numerous comments about the high cost and level of review applied to tattoo shops, body art facilities. Currently, where they want to most situate in the light commercial and general commercial zones are subject to a use permit to the zoning administrator.

So that's about $9,000 for that use permit. So what we're proposing here is addressing those two main issues. So first, updating our definitions to match those state regulations and lowering it from the use permit to the zoning administrator to a minor use permit at the administrative level in our light commercial, general commercial zones where most of these want to situate. It's still subject to neighbor notification conditioning and it allows us to direct these businesses to the environmental management department so we can ensure that they're getting those appropriate permits from them as well while lowering the review still. And also in our industrial zones where they don't really want to situate, but lowering it one level from the planning commission level permit.

An ancillary change here is allowing it in conjunction with beauty salons, so permanent makeup, the eyebrow tattooing, that is a common thing, saying that that is a permitted use, allowing it there and clarifying that standard and allowing it in conjunction with art galleries and art studios as an exhibition since that's something we've actually received inquiries on. Questions on this one? Okay. So this table just outlines our history of the regulation of our body art classification. So you can see it's changed different levels and had different standards over time.

In 2015, we did lower it to the administrative level, but we did have distance separation. In 2017, that was deemed to be unconstitutional through the court case Anderson v City of Hermosa Beach. So we removed that distance separation requirement, and then it was bumped up by the board to the use permit to the zoning administrator, which is a 9,000 permit. And what we found is that it's caused quite a high barrier for these type of businesses given the high cost and the timeframe, so lowering it down just to be a minor use permit. Okay.

Next one is a new Title IV. So this is our interim zone classification. So Title IV was introduced '72. And 1977, we worked on it during that time period. It holds our zones that were in effect prior to 1972.

So we create our modern zones in '72, but we didn't get rid of all of our old zones. So we just said, we're going to put it in this appendix, and we'll get rid of it at some point in the future. Fifty years later, it's still here. So what we're proposing is starting a winding down of this entire title, because it has a lot of duplicative or unnecessary standards for these zones, are still applied to a good portion of the county. Some of the changes we are proposing, notably in our agricultural areas, a lot of them use the A zones, A dash, there is the modern agricultural AG zones, so just saying, hey, you have A20, your AG20 simplifies things because there's not really much to differentiate them right now.

There's also our interim residential zones that are applied in some communities. And some of our other older zones are just saying, go to our modern zones. There is just one table you can go to old zone, new zone, simplifies things significantly. Additionally, we are proposing some additional allowances where we can begin the phase out of our planned development and county initiated planned development combining zones. The notable interim zones, one of them is our residential estate zone or RE zone, which is applied to the Sierra Oaks Vista community and other planned developments in Bareford Heights in Arden Arcade.

It was a special zone we created for sort of the large setbacks, estate style living that you see out there. So simplifying those standards, so just putting inside of our new format with some clarifications. Additionally, permitting home occupations in those zones. That was a restriction we put in in the 70s where we couldn't imagine, you know, online work or that sort of thing. So permitting home occupations inside of the RE zone.

I would also like to note that the current standards call for a use permit to the Planning Commission for these home occupations is quite high. Over time, the enforcement of the specific standards has changed based on the decade, just permitting these home occupations. A travel commercial zone is one that we tried to eliminate in 2015, but we received basically the purpose of why we seemingly kept this zone is that it's the only zone in our zoning code where hotels are permitted by Wright. In further review of the travel commercial zone, we found that there are few affected properties. There's only eight hotels or motels left and 10 vacant properties.

So, what we are proposing is for these businesses that have active business licenses, while we wind down this zone and eventually turn into general commercial in most cases, which requires a use permit to the planning commission for any hotel. If you already have an operating hotel with a business license, we will issue a free minor use permit. So they apply and we can issue them for free so they can stay at that lower they can stay at a lower administrative level of review even if we get rid of the travel commercial zone. So if you're a hotel in this zone, you get this permit, twenty years you wanna expand, you can just amend that permit with a low cost compared to going to the Planning Commission. Additionally, the 10 vacant properties, if they do want to open a hotel or motel in the time period before we finally get rid of TC, they would be able to apply for that minor use permit $1,400 as well.

Then, Wendy mentioned earlier the auto commercial zone, which is applied to a lot of Fulton and parts of the county, simplifying those standards. I'd just like to note that we're keeping the core of auto commercial that makes auto commercial what it is, so permitting auto sales, auto repair, car washes, all those auto uses continue to be permitted by Wright. Okay. Moving on to our residential amendments. We are getting to the end here.

First one is on our mobile home park combining zone. So, in 1980, we introduced a combining zone to allow for mobile home parks and residential zones. Prior to that, we only allowed mobile home parks in one specific zone. So this was an idea that we came up with to allow for potentially more mobile home parks. In 2015, our zoning code was amended to allow for mobile home parks in our commercial zones, but we kind of created a weird situation where you're required to rezone into the mobile home park combining zone, but you can only do that if you're in a residential zone.

We have a catch 22 there on if someone wants to open up a mobile home park in commercial. Realistically, haven't gotten a lot of mobile home parks since this was introduced. We only have three, but we want to make mobile home parks treated like any other residential or commercial use that we have where it's in our mainline zoning code rather than being its own special combining zone in our code. Additionally, just some updates to the mobile home park standards that would be codified as a part of this update. Another update we have is for paving restrictions in low density residential developments, which is quite a common thing that we deal with here at the planning department.

In 2015, the zoning code was amended to add paving restrictions to the front yards of residential properties, sort of to, we believe, combat the urban heat island effect and runoff inside of residential communities. Currently, we have a standard that says that you can only pave up to 40% of your front yard. And the problem with that standard is that it has specific definitions on what the front yard is, and it's quite time consuming to calculate that standard when we get permits in. We worked with our code enforcement staff to propose some revised regulations for this. They did they do receive quite a large volume of code enforcement cases for this because most people, if you do want to pave your yard, chances are they don't get a permit for it.

Most times, there's not a permit needed unless you touch your sidewalk. So that 40% limit, if you buy a new house and vineyard and you want to pave the side, oops, you are now over 40% and you need to pay for a special development permit or rip it out. Of course, we receive a lot of inquiries for people who want to do this. There's multigenerational households, there's homes with ADUs, and there's more cars that need to be parked there rather than have it on the street. So keeping in mind these changing times, for proposing revised standards for paving that allow for basically more parking on your property.

So for lots that are over 65 feet in street frontage, it would be 50% sort of 40. For 40 to 65 feet in driveway length, that's kind of our RD three, four and five zones, the most popular one. You'd be allowed to have a three car driveway apron in most cases. Our RD seven zone, you'd have a two car driveway apron. And then RD 10, which is more of your townhouse zones, just similar to current standards, or it's just leading up to the garage or carport that you already have.

Additionally, what we're proposing is lowering the standard for deviating from these standards. Again, it's a special development permit, so that's about $8,000 If you go over paving, lowering it to a minor special development permit is about 1,400. So we still have teeth on the regulations, but we're keeping into account what people want to do, on their properties. Questions on these? Okay.

So next one is kind of grouped together. We have home occupation tweaks. So currently, our home occupation section, as I mentioned, is created in the '70s and '80s. We did not imagine modern home occupation uses, people being able to operate Etsy stores, eBay stores from their house without causing disruption on their neighbors. So what we're proposing is some minor tweaks to really account for Internet based reality that we have today.

Of the limitations I'd like to note, we a limitation on thirty two hours for home occupation, not sure how we would regulate that, but getting rid of that regulation and just saying you operate seven to 9PM with limited exceptions. So if you're operating at 2AM on your consulting business in AutoCAD, that's fine. So we have standards that account for that. Our standards for repair at the time were kind of geared more towards repairing lawnmowers and that sort of thing. If you are operating repair of phones or computers, our current standards say you can only have 12 items being repaired.

You probably have more than that to survive. Removing that standard just saying you operate and repair those things indoors. Additionally, some standards being updated to account for home occupation fleet based vehicles businesses. So, we receive common increase for non emergency medical transport. So, these businesses that have small passenger vans that bring people to appointments saying that they can operate from their house with one vehicle.

If they need more than one vehicle, it is a minor use permit. There are also minor changes being proposed to other home occupations. One of the ones I would like to highlight is prohibition on private recreation facility rentals when your property is developed with a home. In 2023, the planning director found that this cannot be operated consistent with our home occupation section. The most common use that we see for this is people who want to rent out swimming pools independent of their house or just putting it on an app.

The most common one is Swimply. You rent out your pool. Don't rent out your house, not like Airbnb, just your pool or your tennis court. It's really there to facilitate parties, so it's not really cohesive with the purpose of our home occupation section, so explicitly prohibiting this type of operation from occurring in our residential zones.

Coaching type scenario?

So

Whether would that would that like, whether you're helping teaching swimming, teaching tennis?

No. So if you're if you're doing coaching, you're providing the service of teaching someone to do it. That is allowed under our home occupation section with limitations.

How about to a third party?

No. So it's just if you're operating it as, I'm good at tennis, I want to teach someone how to do tennis, I'm having them I'm having a client come over limited time to teach them how to play tennis. That's what the intent of the regulation is.

Thanks.

I have one question on the previous slide. Do you have a lot of permits for gunsmithing in the private homes?

We do receive it from time to time. Have people who work with the ATF and we get inquiries on the ATF on people who want to modify firearms from their home. The most common thing we get related to firearms though is more transferring of guns. So people doing the paperwork for federal firearms license transfers. But from time to time, we do receive inquiries on people who want to modify firearms.

And these are in personal dwellings?

Mhmm.

Yep. Okay. Thank you.

You can't do ammunition I just lost the term.

Reloading.

Ammunition reloading as a home occupation, but yes, you could do some repair or modification or transfer.

So you can't do home loading as an occupation, but you can do home loading as for personal use? Okay, thank you.

Okay. The next one, quick one is permitting the private car share home occupation. So common one is Turo. We found in 2023, the planning director, that it can be operated in compliance with our standards. So this type of use would be permitted as long as the vehicles are parked on a paved surface or inside or in a carport.

They cannot be parked on the public street, and pickup and drop off of the vehicles has to occur off-site from the home. Okay. Can you there is one slide that I forgot from the presentation, but quickly on residential accessory structure heights. So, our current zoning code provisions, we have three different ways to measure height to peak to midline and a combination of the two with plate line. What we are proposing generally in this amendment is to simplify it where we go for the accessory structures to peak.

So, if you get your shed from Costco or Home Depot, it's pretty easy to find that. And then for the primary structure, your house, commercial structures to midline. Additionally, something that is in our code that we receive a lot of inquiries for are people who want to store RVs on their property. So this is regarding accessory structures to homes. Our current standards for residential accessory structures have a limitation of 16 feet.

If you're storing your RV, sometimes 16 feet doesn't work. So you change out the AC unit or something, you might need a taller structure. So oftentimes we deny those permits, and then a few days later, they come back and now they're labeled as a barn. Why people do that is because our current standards for incidental agricultural accessory structures, so the structure is sort of holding your farm implements, chicken feed, that sort of thing, is allowed to be 24 feet with increased setbacks. So to encourage truthful implementation of our code, residential accessory structures would be allowed that 24 foot height allowance if they are able to maintain 10 foot setbacks from the rear side and from the house.

So you need to have quite a large lot, but if you're able to, you can get your RV storage structure. Additionally, there's a proposed amendment to basically apply the same height standards that would go for an ADU for any residential accessory structure attached to it. So if you have a detached ADU, we only apply the height allowances to the part, which is usually it can be 20 feet in certain circumstances. But the garage attached to it is considered a residential accessory structure, and it's limited to 16 feet. So we have to do some weird looking at the floor plan to see if it's over 16 feet anywhere over the garage, which doesn't make sense.

So just saying we apply the ADU height for that entire structure.

So

that's the end of the marathon 20 items. I'd just like to note the workshops that we have done thus far. So, we went to every single CPAC and CMAC in the community and delivered a presentation on this item. We focused on 10 items of interest that we saw that could be of interest to each specific community. We also did a county wide workshop here on the sixteenth.

Of all the CPACs we went to, we have generally received positive dispositions from the CPACs with minimal comments and the comments that we have received, we are going to be taking a look and incorporating them as appropriate into the amendments before it eventually comes back to you guys for a formal recommendation, is currently slated for June and then final action at the July at the Board of Supervisors. So, that's the end of my presentation. I'd be happy to answer any questions on any of the items I've provided or any of the 131 items in this package.

Any questions from my fellow commissioners? Not

necessarily a question, but thank you very much for a very thoughtful and complete presentation. Again,

not really

a question, but just something that of all the things that we kind of covered today, the home occupation of the business is the one that's like, are we setting up kind of a slippery slope here? And you combine that with like maybe some of the paving like limitations and are we starting are we opening up the door to turning residential homes into what are really businesses? And that's the only and I don't know what the solution is. I will definitely spend some more time kind of thinking about it. But it may be just one of those kind of cases where you know it when you see it.

But by then, maybe it's permitted within the code, and it's a problem for the rest of the neighbors, and we don't necessarily have the tools to address anything about it. So I'm going to spend some time kind of thinking about those different situations. And I just don't want to end up in a place where we're trying to define something that's potentially really difficult to define, but ultimately kind of creating a problem. We end up in a Justice Stewart obscenity kind of definition. But I don't want to create problems down the line for neighbors.

I understand like the economy is changing and transitioning. But of all the things that we covered, I guess that's the one that kind of gives me a little bit of unsettled, I guess, is the word I'll use. But thank you for a great presentation.

Take a look. We have existing standards that we aren't proposing to change already on home occupations that talk about that you really shouldn't be able to tell that a business is being operated from the outside. We restrict operation to being either in the primary dwelling, the garage, or an accessory structure. There is an exception for larger properties where we allow for a family contractor's yard, but that's kind of an anomaly one. We have standards regarding traffic generation.

And when you do have businesses that we do allow or the public is allowed to come, we do have currently restrictions on most of those that restrict it to a by appointment only and no more than eight appointments in a day. And so that would also lend to the person, whether they're doing piano lessons, dance lessons, they have a pool and they're giving swimming lessons, they're allowed to have one student at a time up to eight a day. And so it's so we already have some of those standards in place to already ensure that that the primary purpose is still the residential purpose. But if you see something in there, yeah, feel free. We are still taking comments.

I'm gonna look to our attorney, Bill Burke. I'm I'm assuming that the individual commissioners can send us if they are reading through this before it comes to hearing, can they still send us comments, or do they have to do it as long as they're not doing it as a a group email. If they just, like, they themselves individually Yeah.

As long as

Yeah. They're not communicating

to each other and as long as you don't send back

To everyone.

Or cry to everybody. Just keep it one to one.

Yeah. So if there are sections that you're really interested in, please read through those. And before, you know, maybe be be probably mid mid May, have those to us. We can take a look at them and at least be able to accommodate those comments or come back at the hearing with the why or why not we didn't include them.

Thank you.

I guess one of my bigger issues with all the changes, I appreciate the fact that you seem to be knocking a lot of the different areas out of the more expensive permitting process to the least expensive permitting process. And the fact you're trying to consolidate stuff to make it easier to understand is a lot of this and the home business is a perfect example. A lot of this is creating scenarios where it's not enforceable. It's unenforceable to tell somebody they can't run their audio CAD in their house at 02:00 in the morning. So part of the problem with some of this is we are recreating some of this stuff to the point where we can't enforce any of it.

And that's a concern because when you look around, some of the bigger issues that you get hit up when you go to these different meetings is enforcement of existing rules. And if we continue to set up scenarios where who's going go knock on the door at 02:00 in the morning and say, turn off your audio CAD, I mean, so I just would appreciate when you look at it, try to look at it as from an enforcement standpoint as well as making it easier for folks to get through the system.

Sorry. On the point about AutoCAD, what we're allowing is people to actually operate outside those hours. So, if you're an architect and you're operating at 2AM, that's fine. We don't care about it. So that's a change we're making. So removing that unenforceable provision. So

No. That's fine. I understand your your point. That's my point, though. We how long did you have that unenforceable thing there before we made a decision to remove it? The question becomes, are we creating even more of those categories that are unenforceable? And yeah.

Hopefully not. We had several folks within our code enforcement division review the draft document before we even went to the various CPACs with the draft that's before you today. So we sent we had some items where different departments or divisions told us ahead of time there were some topics that they wanted to be addressed in the package. And then once we had a draft of it completed, we sent it out to just about every department or division within the county that touches some aspect of land use as well as some of our outside folks. So code did read through all this and hopefully feel that the standards that they're required to enforce are done in such a way that they can enforce them.

I'll just give one last example. Your last slide, you talked about that 16 foot RV height would create a problem. You can't tow an RV in General Road over 14.9. Against Department of Transportation rules, bridges are set at 14.9. That's when you see these videos of people taking off the top of their trailers. So I'm just saying, you're going to allow it larger than that, I mean higher than that because it's an RV. Really it shouldn't be even on the property at that size.

Our residential accessory structure, if you were to look at this though, this is to the peak of the structure, not the usually the doors on them would be much lower. So so it's it's kind of a combination of the two. The taller structure allows for you to have a a taller door that your that your RV could go in. So even even on the 16 peak, which we had 14 feet currently in our code to the plate line, some of those wouldn't even be able to even if you didn't have a door, you just had it more like a carport type structure, they wouldn't be able to get in through the plate line because of our plate line restriction.

I'm sorry. I misunderstood your calculation here. I thought you were talking about the RV could be 16 feet. No.

Oh, no,

no, no, no.

It's a structure that houses the RV. No problem.

I have one thing. Please, if that's okay. So thank you very much, very thorough. In terms of just kind of going back to Commissioner Verga's comment about home uses and so it's not really would be the changes wouldn't really impact. Let's say somebody is doing tech support at three a. M. In the morning for IT. And what would be would there be a significant impact? So if they're doing tech support, they're doing it remotely? And they're not it's not physical assets, but just remote assets. Would that be where would that fall as an example? Very service line oriented.

That would be perfectly fine. So our code Yeah. So the code provision that we're proposing is that if you do administrative tasks, for your business and that occurs after seven after 9PM and before 7AM, then that's fine. We're like, these type of regulations would be on complaint basis. So if

Yeah.

It does violate the noise ordinance and people report it, then we'd be to take a look at it.

I think that is where I would have the enforceable aspect of it would be more related to if it is complaint based. Because in terms of just the actual action of performing work where it is very administrative, let's say, or support in the case of an IT technician, then really one wouldn't know outside the doors of that dwelling you know, that they're performing that work.

Exactly. And that's what we wanna allow. Yeah.

So currently, we have this weird thirty two hour thing, which we know is absolutely unenforceable. And so the hours of operation are kind of going along with kind of our noise standards a bit for those home occupations where they that that we do allow that could have some noise or some customers. Like, for example, going back to your recreational example, we would not want somebody doing pool lessons, you know, at two in the morning. So it's it's it's kind of like those things. If you're if you're in your if you're inside your house and it's not something that's generating noise, nobody's gonna know.

Nobody's gonna care. But for those uses where you could be generating noise or have people coming and going, that's where we're just doing an hour because it's easier for our code enforcement to regulate on just strict hours.

Right. And so what I would say on that is that really the intent of these original regulations was really designed more for physical assets. So somebody is repairing a lawnmower going back to the 1970s, somebody has got a shop doing like woodworking for welding, whatever it is. And so now it's trying to you're still taking that into account because there still are uses for those. But you're also considering the more of the service oriented industry, which is more from an IT based, maybe more services based, etcetera.

Correct.

Okay. Thank you.

Use the word administrative tasks and if that is unclear

Maybe that's something to delineate a little more from that would be okay, could couldn't you cite some examples of that where you can say, administrative tasks could be somebody supporting it from an IT perspective, somebody is let's say they're responsible for, let's say, an accounting function, that they're working for a company that you're doing accounting work, let's say, those types of things. Yep. Yep. Okay. Thank you.

Sorry.

No. My apologies, commissioner. Just a couple of minor minor questions not even a question. I I think I can email email offline, but I just wanna make sure on a 43, that's the caretaker dwellings and live work units. You know, I recognize that Cordova and the vineyard community where I reside is area of special interest.

Again, I just want to ensure that we're not inadvertently creating a disadvantage to folks that would like to at least have an opportunity to convert some of those dwellings to an allowable and restricted use already. Here's a funny one. Coin operated kiosks and arcades. What if you have something that is both an arcade and a coin operated kiosk? Are you gonna treat them one and the same? You go to CoinOff in Roseville. It's an arcade, but they also allow you to use coins. Just more of a question. You don't have to answer that right now, but I just wanna make sure that as newer new a lot of these, like, new newer places. Right?

CoinOp being an example. They're both a coin operated kiosk and an arcade. So and then the last thing I just wanted to ask, a one fifteen, CPAC review exemption for updates predicated by state or federal legislation. Staff is proposing to completely remove presentation to the CPAC. I I think that is I think that's gonna be a big challenge.

I really do. I'm hoping that you guys can at least look into a middle point where staff is not required to make a presentation, especially in areas where CPACs have a challenge in in hitting quorum. But I think that a lack of information is just as troublesome as the burden of staffing to provide the information. And so I'm hopeful that we can find a middle ground. I would encourage the planning director and the planning director staff to at least inform the CPAC members and by virtue of the CPAC members, the community members who attend the forums, even if it's not a presentation that's gonna be attended by staff to at least provide them with information to pack it that a change, no matter how ministerial, is going to be made.

Right? And so I don't know if my fellow commissioner saw that, but I encourage you all to read a one fifteen. It is CPAC review exemption. My notes here say that how are we facilitating public feedback if we are removing that ministerially and a modification of a hearing. So again, I encourage the staff to hopefully take a look at a middle ground where I don't want to be burdensome when creating a a a big long presentation, but we will be remiss if we don't educate our community members that there is a change that's happening no matter if it's being required by the state or the federal legislation for that matter.

Alright.

Awesome. I think we could provide you with a number of feedback today and questions, and encourage the commissioners to continue engaging with the staff again making sure that we don't inadvertently break the brown act requirements. Madam Clerk do we have any comments for this item?

We have not received any public comments for this item.

Okay. Thank you again miss Hartman and mister chairman. It's quite an endeavor here and I appreciate I really applaud you all for going to all of the c packs and the c max and and creating this workshop. Okay. Now let's move on to the next item and thank you vice chair for starting the meeting. Really appreciate that. Planning director's report, item number two.

Sorry. I had we had announcements for all the CPACs, but apparently not for the planning commission.

Okay. Understood. And okay. Well, would that conclude the planning director's report, miss Harmony? Sound good for now?

Okay

thank you item number three Madam Clerk.

And for miscellaneous scheduling items I have nothing to report.

Okay it looks like we are still scheduled two weeks from now?

Is correct yes.

And then item number four public comments.

There are no public comments.

Okay. With that said, we're concluding the meeting at 07:38 p. M. Thank you and have a good evening everyone.

Thank you.