Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

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Moving on to public comments on non-agenda or non-public hearing items. Secretary, does anyone wish to speak?

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Thank you. Moving on to the consent calendar, where it is one motion for all consent items unless an item is pulled for separate discussion. Is there a motion to approve item A, minutes from July 27th, 2026, and item B, excused absences?

I'd like to move item A and B.

Thank you. We have a motion from Commissioner Wu.

I second it.

And we have a second from Vice Chair Benninger. Secretary, can you please call for your roll call vote?

Commissioner Guzman?

Aye.

Commissioner Leo?

Aye.

Commissioner Oliva? Aye. Commissioner Pham?

Aye.

Commissioner Wu?

Aye.

Vice Chair Benninger?

Aye.

Chair Ramos? Aye.

Motion approved by majority vote with Commissioner Oliva absent. Thank you. That concludes the consent calendar items. As there are no public hearing items tonight, that concludes the business calendar and we will be moving on to the work study session. The item up is a part B of the work study session for the comprehensive zoning code update. Principal Planner Siri Champion will provide a presentation.

My apologies for being clumsy through this. Very good. Good evening. Thank you, Chair, Vice Chair, Commissioners. Thank you to all the staff and stakeholders that are here in the audience tonight. This is a very significant project for the City of Santa Ana, and I'm really proud to see all of the people that are here tonight. It's very exciting to be presenting the comprehensive zoning code update. And as a reminder, the underlying value statement that we have for this project is that good codes make good communities. And so we're here tonight to work together in that forward movement. As chair almost said tonight is part B of a two part study session on July 27 we presented on outreach the project approach and the status and tonight we're focusing on the zoning map and the zoning code code and many details, having to do with both of those. First i'd like to lay the foundation for tonight's presentation and for the comprehensive zoning code update, and that is the general plan. The comprehensive zoning code update is an implementation of action of the general plan and it's an effort to make sure our zoning is consistent with general plan policies. So, first I wanted to share the core values and the planning principles that we use in the comprehensive zoning code update. The general plan has five core values which are health equity and environmental justice, education, culture and sustainability and it's working toward these cold or with these core values that we are presenting the comprehensive zoning code update. The principles that we've really worked with involve multiple. First, housing production is an important part of what we're trying to achieve, or continue to achieve, actually, I should say, because Santa Ana's done a great job at housing production, but we can and need to continue with housing production. Economic development is an important principle for jobs and the overall economy. Health and environmental justice are important because we need to have healthy communities and we need to have fair, equitable communities as well. Lifestyle and livability have to do with the way that people want to live their lives, both in more traditional neighborhood settings as well as in more urban places in the city where they can go obtain services, shop, dine, get entertainment and so forth. Sustainability and resilience is important. We are talking tonight about making changes to the city that will facilitate use of transit and other aspects of sustainability and resiliency through the smart use of land. Neighborhood character and preservation is important. Many of our community members want to see their neighborhoods remain as they are, if not be enhanced. And so character and preservation are important part of the code. And then finally, streamlining entitlements is an important thing because we need to be processing applications for development in an expedient manner for the good of the city. City Council Chambers, Diving into more specifically general plan policies we've aligned the principles that have underlaid the project with the different prints or policies of the general plan. City Council Chambers, With respect to housing production there about 17 policies with respect to economic development, we identified 25 policies. City Council Chambers, With respect to health and environmental justice we've identified 20 policies and for lifestyle and livability 14 policies. For sustainability and resilience, there are 32 policies that relate to zoning. And for neighborhood character and preservation, there are 26 policies that relate to zoning. And then finally, there are seven policies that relate to streamlining entitlements. So first, we'll take a look at the draft zoning map, and then we'll dive into many pieces of the code as it relates to the zoning map. So this is the draft zoning map as of June 29th, 2026. And you can see a wide variety of different zoning districts throughout the city. The majority of the city is in the single family residential character or zoning district or low to medium residential. Beyond that, we have golden and brown colors that represent higher density housing. We've got red that represents commercial types of uses. Pink is offices. And then we have purple, two different shades of purple to represent our mixed use categories. And then industrial are in the shades of gray. And then we have institutional and open space, which are blue and green. And then finally, we have a variety of specific developments and specific plans that will be retained. At the very bottom, you'll see supplemental standards districts. And these are a few different districts on top of the zoning districts that I'll describe later in the presentation. City Council Chambers, So, first of all, we'll look at areas where there are no no changes that are proposed, and these are all in the spirit and. City Council Chambers, and fall under the principles of economic development, housing production lifestyle livability neighborhood character and preservation. So there are key ordinances that we've adopted recently that will not be changed those include the a frame ordinance the group homes ordinance and the smoke shop ordinance. And then there are more long term policies or ordinances that have been in place, including the affordable housing and opportunity creation ordinance which has to do with inclusionary housing. And then we have a handful of specific plans that are being retained and specific developments, including for specific plans, we're retaining the harbor specific plan, the main place mall, the village specific plan and related Bristol. And later you'll see or hear about rezoning of midtown specific plan and the Bristol Street corridor specific plan. With respect to specific developments, we currently have 97 specific developments and through this project we would be rezoning a significant percentage of them and arriving at a total of 39 remaining specific plans as specific developments. City Council Chambers, For supplemental standards districts, we actually have two different maps that show height exemption areas and adaptive reuse or an adaptive reuse incentive areas. City Council Chambers, These will be retained and not only will they be retained but they'll appear on the zoning map to minimize how many maps, a person has to go to to understand the policies and standards of the city. City Council Chambers, Next we'll look at minor changes proposed, which also cover many different principles, including economic development, housing production lifestyle and live ability neighborhood character and preservation. First, the residential, commercial, and office zoning districts are illustrated on this map. Again, you can see the residential in the yellow gold colors and the brown, the commercial in red, and the office in pink. So these districts are changing in a limited manner. We are looking at changes to uses permitted and to development standards. And the main goal of doing this is to reduce barriers to reinvestment. and to allow flexibility and streamlining in the review processes. By reducing barriers to reinvestment, we're talking about policies that include standard regulations that include allowing people to develop on non-conforming lots. And also another example is changing our parking standards to make it easier for commercial developments to redevelop or re-tenant their properties. We've also talked about or not talked about, but we've also incorporated objective design standards which provides clarity for owners applicants our staff and so forth, and it also minimizes the amount of negotiation that staff need to do with our applicants. For new supplemental standards districts, we have agriculture, which would be applied to the Little Texas area to enable the continued use for horse keeping. Architectural resources is a special area or is applied to a set of areas in the city where we have historically sensitive areas that have been identified by the city council. Then we have what what are called public realm plan supplemental standards district, which is an area of the city or represents areas of the city within the general plan focus areas where we don't have enough. Right of way with to accomplish the improvements that we want to see and so we're looking at asking for addition not asking requiring additional setbacks in order to achieve the public realm. And then finally South main we've drafted supplemental standards for South main to to maintain and achieve an enhanced main street feel. Next, we are proposing some changes to standards applicable citywide, including off street parking. We have drafted regulations that simplify parking for single family residential and multifamily development. We also have made some flexibility for commercial development, as I previously described. And then next for signage, we've increased the number of sign options to business owners, which will improve their visibility. City Council Chambers, Another change is the incorporation of a minor conditional use permit, which would be a discretionary land use entitlement under the decision making making authority of the director. City Council Chambers, The director of planning and building many examples exist, but i've included several here, including indoor commercial recreation adult daycare facilities and other examples include large retail establishments vehicle rentals laundromat and so forth. The map here illustrates the specific developments that are to be removed. And this map shows the rezoning that's proposed. So you can see that the specific developments are a wide range of them, including residential specific developments, more commercial specific developments that would go to mixed use, and then some industrial specific developments. City Council Chambers, So we do have some major changes that are being proposed, which are based on some significant changes that that were made through the adoption of the general plan in 2022. City Council Chambers, Those major changes are also in the spirit of economic development, housing production, health and environmental justice lifestyle and livability and sustainability and resilience. These major changes occur largely in special planning areas, including the five focus areas identified in the general plan, as well as a few others. The five focus areas include West Santa Ana Boulevard, South Main Street, South Bristol, Grand and 17th, and the 55 Freeway West Dyer Road area. In addition, we have a few other special areas that are being rezoned or proposed to be rezoned. Those include the Midtown Specific Plan, which is proposed to go away. The Metro East Mixed Use Overlay is proposed to be removed. And then SD 76 and 43, which are Hutton Place and I forget the other one. McArthur, thank you. Yes. I forgot to look at my notes. I apologize. You might be missing some good nuggets. So these special planning areas are proposed to be rezoned. Many of them are proposed to be rezoned for mixed use, including two different categories. One is the urban neighborhood, and the second is district center. First, in terms of the urban neighborhood, we have four different categories, and the urban neighborhood ranges from 20 dwelling units per acre up to 50 dwelling units per acre. The urban neighborhood is the lowest, and that's intended to be a transition between the lower density areas and our more urban non-residential districts. Those are located largely along South Main Street and West Santa Ana Boulevard. The moderate density, the proposed moderate density would be located in the UN 30 zone representing 30 dwelling units per acre. And those are largely located along Grand and 17th and South Bristol. The urban neighborhood medium zoning district is proposed to be 40 dwelling units per acre. And that is located in the Metro East mixed use overlay area along with some district center zoning. And then lastly, the urban neighborhood medium high at 50 dwelling units per acre is intended to be more urban scale compared to the others. And that's located in a little area now at the south end of flower and Sandpoint neighborhood. The urban neighborhood districts are similar to those that we have in the current transit zoning code, there's a minimum density to promote higher density development, the setbacks are narrower and we have a maximum setback of 10 feet. For height, we are proposing, not proposing, not now, but the general plan includes a maximum height of 35 to 65 feet. We're proposing publicly accessible open space to be included to promote social activity and interaction in those important areas to the community. There are transitions adjacent to single family residential and low medium residential districts to make sure we're keeping privacy and we're not going from a low density single family resident right next to a tall apartment building. And then lastly, we have regulations that promote mixed use ground floor or require ground floor commercial. The district center districts range from 90 dwelling units to the acre up to 125 dwelling units to the acre. These are intended to be more urban environments mixed use corridors and transit oriented for a multitude of uses, including multifamily office commercial business, education and so forth. These district center districts are similar to those that are in related Bristol specific plan, as well as in MacArthur Place. So we're proposing a minimum density of 20 dwelling units to the acre, which supports townhome style development, which is really in high demand in the market right now, as well as other types of more moderate density developments. And then it would go up to 90 90 dwelling units to the acre for several of the districts up to 125 dwelling units to the to the acre in the DC five zone. This too would have publicly accessible open space and transitions between our transitions from single family residential and low moderate residential to the more dense areas. And I forgot about height, the height proposed is 65 to 255 feet. And here again, there's there's a there incentives to have ground floor commercial as well as residential above. And in some places ground floor commercial would be required. Next, we'll look at the two industrial districts. I know that these aren't in the industrial category that I'm going to present later. I'm including them here because these are a major change that was introduced through the general plan. And so the flex districts are intended to be Office industrial spaces that can go back and forth between different types of uses easily to meet the different demands of the market. The ideas to promote small scale clean manufacturing research and development, as well as corporate campuses and commercial retail, as well as other types of manufacturing spaces. The flex districts have it's a new industrial type district, so we don't have any other districts that are similar to this, but here we have larger setbacks than in other mixed use areas. The taller the heights are taller in the flex industrial than in other industrial areas and there's a higher fa are for these types of developments. The intent is for these to have job rich uses. And so when you look at the zoning code, you'll see a long list of a mixture of uses ranging from commercial and assembly to industrial and research and development type uses. Again, there's transitions proposed adjacent to residential, all residential uses, including those mixed use districts that have residential. There are also objective design standards incorporated to achieve a higher quality of development and, finally, we have supplemental operational standards. City Council Chambers, So now we'll dive more deeply into the industrial zoning districts as a broader category. City Council Chambers, The goal, the principles that underlines the industrial zoning districts approach are both economic development and environmental justice, and these are two things that are very important in the general plan. City Council Chambers, However, as we've heard through our input through stakeholder from stakeholders, these can be challenging to achieve together and we're working hard to make that happen. City Council Chambers, General plan policies say to protect industrial land general plan policies also say to ensure compatibility of uses and general plan policies also have economic development. City Council Chambers, Economic Development priorities and those include the production of living wage employment. This is a map that shows all of the different types of industrial uses or districts in the city, including light, which are called m one heavy which are our m two. And, and then the flex industrial that we just talked about, and you can see pockets of these and the northern half of the city, and then there are also larger areas in the southwest and southeast and along South main. The light and heavy industrial districts are not proposed to change very significantly. So the uses and development standards are largely remaining the same. However, we have incorporated objective design standards to help with the quality of development and the noxious uses ordinance would continue to apply. So in terms of feedback regarding the relationship between economic development and environmental justice we've heard about pollution and other types of impacts that are of concern we've also heard about a lack of open space Community serving uses and Community benefits. From the business community, we've heard about nonconformities and what might happen to a use of zones or standards change. We've also heard about standards for outdoor operations, which are a keen concern because of potential constraints to uses such as contractors' yards, equipment rental and sales, and outdoor storage of equipment. City Council Chambers, we've also heard that we need to clarify what is meant by fully enclosed industrial districts. City Council Chambers, And that's an important piece, because some permitted uses could operate indoors or outdoors and some really could only operate outdoors so by enclosed we mean fenced or walled and not necessarily all operations interior to a building. City Council Chambers, we've also heard from the business community about reconsidering the residential industrial interface districts near century high school and we've heard about applying flex and residential industrial interface standards to new uses, but not existing uses. City Council Chambers, So really we're looking at a trade off approach, which is to create buffers and improve air quality, while maintaining the ability to to have industrial businesses in the city. City Council Chambers, And the way that we can do that is to look at changes to allowable uses changes to development standards and changes to operational standards. The areas where compatibility is most important are illustrated on this map. So in the upper left hand corner of the city, there's a small pocket of industrial near residential. In the southwest, there's a strip of industrial that's immediately adjacent across the street along Fairview to residential. North of the transit zoning code, there's a little pocket of industrial that's adjacent to or mixed in with residential uses. And then the western side of the city, or eastern side of the city, going from about First Street all the way down south to almost the bottom end of the city, there's a corridor that's industrial and residential adjacent to one another. And that includes communities such as the Cornerstone Village community, Madison Park and Delhi. And then to the south end of Main Street, we have pockets of industrial that are also adjacent to residential uses. So to look more closely at trade offs and potential for mutual benefit. The trade offs include moving the most intensive industrial uses into the heavy industrial M two zoning. Second, modified development standards, including deeper setbacks of budding residential and adding operational standards in the residential industrial interface. Finally, for mutual benefit, the draft zoning code proposes to add non industrial uses into the residential industrial interface. You can see the interface illustrated on this map, you can see a dashed areas that overlay the one zoning district and those are along those strips of land where you see residential next to industrial. So the residential industrial interface would allow for the operation of enclosed and industrial uses offering increased opportunities for non industrial uses and have a set of supplemental standards that guard. neighborhoods and other sensitive uses to those industrial impacts, generally speaking, this area applies on properties, ranging from 300 to 1200 feet from sensitive land uses. I know this is a lot to read in one slide and I don't expect you to read it, but I wanted to illustrate that we've made a concerted attempt to identify non-industrial uses that are appropriate in the residential industrial interface. And so we've done things like change commercial recreation indoor to a minor CUP. We've added commercial recreation outdoor and added fitness facilities. We've added things like adult daycare, which is increasingly in demand given our senior population. We've added things like business and professional offices, veterinary uses, grocery stores, hotel, motels, commercial businesses, and so forth. In terms of operational standards in the residential industrial interface, we've talked about applying standards. We have the standards that exist citywide, which includes screening of outdoor storage, loading areas, and other outdoor business activity. But in the residential industrial interface, we're proposing additional operational standards, which include limitations on hours for excessive noise or vibration. It includes enclosed operations. It includes more restrictive standards for air emissions and dust. Restrictions on hazardous materials and waste materials. And finally, limitations on truck parking, loading and idling. As mentioned previously, the noxious uses ordinance would still apply. We've made one change that's proposed to the noxious uses ordinance, which is consistent with what was changed for the transit zoning code. And that is to apply the noxious uses ordinance when a primary business operation involves any two or more of the following. So instead of just business operations, generally speaking, it's the primary business operation. And I won't read the list there again there's a lot to it, but essentially it's whether or not a business emits or generates emissions exhaust whether or not they're handling regulated compounds or hazardous materials chemicals or substances. If they have operations that require an outside permit if they're storing processing or disposing of hazardous waste or if they're not within a fully enclosed building and located within 1000 feet of a sensitive use, including residential schools and parks. Not just uses ordinance requires a CU P in all districts, but they're prohibited outright and the industrial flex district. Because of proximity is sort of the residential and combined with a desire to see cleaner technologies and corporate campuses and those industrial flex areas. And all the end the nonconformity section has remained unchanged as proposed in the draft. So we're reaching the end of the presentation. I'm sure you're thankful for that. And you're ready to start discussing. But first, we wanted to share the remaining steps just to remind you of what happens from here forward. City Council Chambers, So, as you know, the draft of the public of the zoning code was released on July 20 and it will. City Council Chambers, will continue taking comments on the draft zoning code up until the planning Commission public hearing on the 24th of August and will will likely keep the draft open for public comment beyond that time. City Council Chambers, The staff continue to have ongoing meetings with stakeholders and I welcome and invite anyone in the audience to contact me if they'd like to have a meeting with staff. In terms of upcoming milestones, we have the Planning Commission public hearing scheduled for August 24. Those notices have gone out to property owners and occupants citywide, as well as being noticed in other areas. On September 15, we are planning a City Council study session. And October 6, we're planning to have the first public or the first reading and public hearing with the City Council. So if you have a pen and paper or a phone, take a picture of this and please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or comments or would like to organize a meeting with staff. Finally, it's time for discussion and questions. And the key discussion points that we're hoping to hear from you on are the zoning map. City Council Chambers, The residential industrial interface, the new zoning districts, including those mixed use districts and the industrial flex. City Council Chambers, As well as the new supplemental standards districts, including the architectural resources, the public realm and the South main standards and then we'd like to hear about parking and signage and the minor conditional use permit with that I will close the presentation and i'm available for questions, if you have any.

Thank you for the presentation. And I just want to inform the public of the process here. So now is the time for the Commission to ask any comments or questions of staff. After that, we will take public comments from the audience. After that, the Commission can ask additional comments and questions. And then we that would essentially be it for tonight. So I'm going to go ahead and take any questions or comments that the Commission might have for staff. And if I can ask you as a favor, can staff please bring up the last slide on the topics that you hope we'll ask questions on tonight? Thank you. Who would like to begin? Commissioner Pham, go ahead.

I'll get out of the way. I was hoping for some clarity on the zoning map where it looks like previously and, you know, obviously the map is really big and the zoning code has a lot of changes. So I'm just going to do some nitpicky overview of certain areas for explanations. Previously we had SFRs, R2s, but now it's rezoned to just, I believe, SFR. And then there is a seven unit per acre designation to it. I wanted some clarification on, it's a single family property, but why would there be a seven unit per acre designation on it?

Thank you for that question, Commissioner Pham. So the density of the lowest density residential district, the single family residential district, is seven dwelling units per acre. But that doesn't mean you can have seven units on an individual parcel. You can develop seven units per acre when you're creating new properties. So on an individual parcel, you could only have one unit unless you apply for an ADU or use something else like that.

Okay. And then, you know, state law currently has SB9 designated lots splits, urban lots split only applicable to single family zone parcels. Now, previously, there are parcels that are zoned R2, which would designate it as a multifamily lot. But now we're down zoning those R2 lots down to single family lot with that then open door for more parcels to be to would qualify for SB9. That's what that was my train of thought when I saw that.

First to clarify, through this process, we are changing all of the zoning to match the general plan. And so those types of policy decisions have already been made by the city council. And there isn't a direct correlation between SFR and the current R1. Instead, it's dependent on what the general plan said. So there may be situations where SFR, a current R1 goes to R7. It might go to R11 or R15, the densities that are in the general plan, meaning So it isn't necessarily the case that we have more opportunities for SB 9 lot splits and the like. Instead, we could do that calculation, but I don't believe that we are ending up with an increase in those overall numbers.

Okay. So it's not that we're rezoning down. It has to correlate with the general plan as well?

Correct.

I'm pretty sure it's just a matter of tabulation, but previously the schools were calculated as open or shown graphically as open space. Now they're shown as institutions, space in the zoning map. Previously, we didn't calculate the schools as open space, you know, the city's open space, right?

Correct. We would not have.

Okay. So then that wouldn't change. We wouldn't have less open space technically on paper, even though the map shows less green hatches.

Correct.

That's it for me. Yeah.

Thank you, Commissioner Pham. Commissioner Wu.

I want to review Article 1, page 1. And this has to do with the purpose and authority. The Zoning Code and this chapter is enacted based on the authority vested in the City of Santa Ana as Charter and the Santa Ana Municipal Code and the State of California, including but not limited to the State Constitution, Planning Zoning Law, California Government Code 65800 and the California Health Corps. In other words, the City Council Planning Commission and planning department invested with the authority to follow the general plan and establish those visions that you showed in the first slide for environmental saving neighborhood and all those kind of stuff right and um so also you're invested with taking that general plan and updating the zoning codes. Is that correct? Correct. Okay. Then there will be conforming, there is existing non-conforming and conforming uses that has come up over time. And so as those arise, it's up to the property owner to either conform or seek a permit non-conforming use. So there's a process in which we go through to answer those things and there's a process for comments from the public when they arise. Is that correct?

If I heard you correctly, you're saying that there are existing non-conformities and there could be more non-conformities and there's a process by which people can make improvements or changes to their properties?

Right. The way I see these 400-some pages is that You've taken the general plan and the visions and the guiding principle, and then you organize them by different sections and zoning areas, and try to put as much information that is available for the public to see, including a website. When they go on that page, they could click on something, leave a question, which you guys will answer, right? And how many comments have you gotten on that already?

Oh, goodness, we've gotten over 100 comments.

I mean, over 100, over 100. So over 100 people took the time to to read and answer right. So we're getting to the point where we are getting participation and we can comment, but other non conforming will arise in which you'll come back to the planning commission to kind of decide on through conditional use of other things, right?

Correct. If I could just go back to a comment that you made earlier about the nonconformities. Yeah. So it's important to note that code changes over time regularly. And as a result, nonconformities exist currently. Right. And they will continue to exist for those nonconforming properties unless we're modifying the code to be consistent with that existing development. And

Yeah, great.

And the nonconformity section does allow for properties to be maintained over time. But the concept is to phase out nonconformities as time passes so that they can be released, replaced by new developments that are in more demand.

Yeah, so so you know, the enforcement of the zoning and the application of the zoning for the property use are all in play there and they will arise and we will have a chance to adjust for it, comment on it, and use the new guiding principles and value systems, right? And the point I'm getting to is that this is no mean crystal ball that can encompass everything, but it's a well-done, organized way of looking at each of the zoning areas specific to the specific area. If I was a property owner, I would be looking at the specific area in my zoning and say, oh, this is my property, it's affected this way. Now, am I in compliance or am I not in compliance? If I'm not in compliance, what do I need to do? So that's where I would find that number, call you and see what I need to do to continue operating my business in their property. So that's the opportunity there, right? It's not that you're coming down to them and say, okay, get out of here. So it's just a guideline to talk about uses. of the land and property, and we're trying to clean things up along the way. So now to get to the districts, you've taken the major businesses where the large housing development and office building and research, but there's another series of small businesses, because I also am involved with the Black Chamber. uh of commerce we're also looking at the small business and i'm looking at 17th street from briscoe to the five freeway and there's a lot of old office buildings and and a retail shop and they're all out of business and they're looking for new things like there's a blind store where you get blinds and and shades and that's gone and there's a bakery that's kind of gone and and so these small businesses, I see disappearing. And also the little office park near Temple Carvalho, we approved someone to do a DoorDash type business. I don't know if they went out of business or if they ever got started. So while we zone these areas, it's going to still take investors and business people to take advantage of it, right? So we just have analyzed the areas that are designated and try to be as consistent as possible. Am I correct in assuming that?

I didn't hear that last statement. What was the last statement?

So anyway, the 17th Street and these small businesses may not be in any specific plan, but they can be covered as businesses within that zone. Correct. Okay. And if the opportunity comes up, we can report things like there's an abandoned building there that no one uses and all that. So it's up to, again, the public, neighborhood association, and anyone that cares to call you guys and say, OK, this has been boarded up. We see people hanging out there. And is there something that can be done with it? So there's an opportunity to take care of those problem properties. There's a property that used to have a fence around it across from Stately Brother on, what was it, Tustin Ranch Road. And we're waiting for, I think we approved a fast, what do you call it, like a 7-Eleven property to go on there. But they haven't done anything yet, right? So if I call attention to that, well, are they going to do something? But at least they're taking care of the property by mowing down the lawn, cleaning up any trash there, so. Again, that takes, again, civic opportunity there. So I'm looking at the zoning map, the residential industrial phase, like Commissioner Chris Leo. I'm interested in increasing the economic base of the city because we have a very young population, 75% is an ethnic minority group. Income is only about $70,000. About average in the city, you know I like to see that race, so the only opportunity for raising it is not only more residential property as residential property that generate revenue and income, so that we could support the services that we want. As well, so I think you got a balance of that looking at the areas that you're trying to develop looking at pain place looking at a presto main street and all these other districts so. Now, as parking go, I think, as everyone has complained, parking and traffic is one of those things that we've got to mitigate in some way or another. So those are just some of my view in looking at that, looking at the notoriety and the opportunity to participate in change when we get very specific about it in terms of informing the planning department so we can work together in resolving some of these. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Wu. Okay, Commissioner Leo, go ahead.

Okay, let me start off. First of all, it's a lot. Thank you. Second of all, people asked last meeting, I didn't get a notice. I got two. I don't know how many you sent out, thousands probably. People, please look in your mail if you live in Santa Ana or your business. You got three. There you go. See, so city is notifying people. This is one way they're notifying people. For me, it comes down to Santa Ana's competitive advantage. And I wanted to ask you a little bit about that because zoning is tied to the general plan, which is tied to lots of things that you talked about, right? When I think about, you mentioned housing. Well, we're way above the arena numbers and we're now picking and choosing what we want. And if you listen to our residents, there's too many people. Right? You talked about lifestyle and open space, and Val mentioned open space. There's three schools that could close because populations declined. We could have three new parks. But they don't show up on the plan because the school district hasn't closed the schools. It's a lack of students. So there's open space, possibly housing. School district has to decide, and hopefully soon. You talked about, there were some other ones in here, neighborhood character. We do really well at trying to protect neighborhoods. As you know, many of them have one way in, one way out. Not gates, but one way in, one way out. They seem to be walled off. We try to keep heavy traffic out of neighborhoods. So that's what we can do. We're the urban core of the county, so we have some other things we have to deal with. Mayor Mrakas, So I wanted to kind of ask you a couple questions and see kind of where it goes, because I have some questions on the industrial flex, but. Mayor Mrakas, What do you see as after doing this, what do you see a Santa Ana competitive competitive advantage compared to the rest of the cities in the county. Mayor Mrakas, What do we do well, what do we have here what assets, do we have here and how do we enhance those assets through this process. because as Commissioner Wu said, if we generate enough revenue, we'll be able to provide the services and the other things that the residents demand and ask for. So when you see competitive advantage, what do you see? What do we have from an asset standpoint?

I think that's a great question and one that I'm not sure I'm prepared to answer in total. But in terms of competitive advantage, I think we have a lot of opportunity and a lot of land that can transition over time into more clean technology and more campus style development.

So let's take that a little further. I know recently we approved the and a real project at the south end of town, I assume that's a version of. Industrial flex that you're the are are are industrial interface that you're thinking about, even though it doesn't about any right well actually there's residents across the street actually now they think about the homes alpha Susan. Is that what you're thinking, like when we look three, five years out, that's what we're hoping to do in other areas to kind of do it in that style? Yes. Because there are parts of the city, you go down Dyer Road, I don't know how many buildings we slapped up along the 55, which is still Santa Ana, more buildings. Is that where we're headed, at least from a competitive advantage? Because when you go to other cities, they're completely built out, they have homes, they have a little bit of retail, and that's all they got. Is that one of our advantages?

That's one of our advantages, and also we're creating opportunities for a larger building envelope, so higher intensity types of uses that fall under that category of the industrial flex. For example, in the higher intensity industrial flex, I just lost the FAR. Ricardo, can you remind me? The FAR in industrial flex is 1.5 and 3 1.5 and so the larger building can fit in those places, as well as a taller building.

Okay, because go ahead, thank you, and I think series doing a great job answering these questions and I just want to offer some more macro level perspectives to answer your question so. As someone who routinely attends events from the bia. from ICSC, you know, we're retailers, developers. I can share with you that time and time again what we hear about Santa Ana's competitive advantage are a couple. Number one, it's geography. People love the location, being centrally located. We're a very fortunate city that in many ways freeways don't bisect us the way they do as much in other cities, right? Most of the time the freeways go around Santa Ana with the exception of the five. They love the access to the airport. They love our rail access. So it's just a not to sound cheesy, but it's just unilaterally described as a great place to have a business. Secondly, what they often cite is access to our skilled and trained labor force. We have a very highly skilled labor force, very highly educated labor force and a labor force that is more positively working and living in Santa. So this is not a community like Moreno Valley, where by a ratio of almost 20 to one, the number of jobs to residents where people have to leave the city to find meaningful employment. This is a city that really is capitalizing off its location in the core of the business complex that is housed between us, Costa Mesa, Irvine, and Tustin. So it's really a great central economic ecosystem that exists among the four cities. And so when we look at examples like Andrew and the example that you brought up, Commissioner, those specific examples were used actually to inform some of the updated proposed development standards. If this commission remembers about two years ago, we brought forward that amendment to that specific development. It wasn't done for Andrew, by the way. It was just done because the Sagerstrom family owned an asset and they said, hey, proactively, we think it's time for a refresh. And ultimately, the development standards, the architecture, the output that came out, we said, huh, If we stood behind this as a recommendation for approval to our Planning Commission, and if anyone's driven by, it came out pretty darn good, then that should be good enough all throughout the industrial area, right? I mean, if we like what it put out clean, modern, well landscaped, well aesthetic, contributing to the community, this should be good enough for the whole city, not just one little pocket of property in the city. And Commissioner Leal, just for the audience's benefit, the homes on Susan Street are technically in City of Costa Mesa. and that's important that i note that not as a correction but simply as this is a general plan that's actually trying to not allow intrusion further intrusion of residential into the industrial areas in many areas because we have to maintain the ability of businesses to operate without sensitive land uses flanking them but also prevent um creating future households that are flanked by industrial in many ways right that's that balance the general plan uh currently seeks So overall location and proximity to a very skilled and educated labor force come up time and time again when staff attends these sort of development conferences. And I really wanted to highlight that as a sort of macro level approach to what the general plan and the zoning code are really trying to build off of that series describing.

Because before we used to hear the competitive disadvantage was we didn't have a general plan. It was all spot zoning. In addition to that, we also didn't have the infrastructure to handle some of it. I think people fail to realize that many trucks in this county go all the way through Santa Ana on a regular basis. And that's why our roads are torn up to a large extent. So let me get into a couple other things. There's a lot, the two longest letters we got in comments, one was from on environmental justice and the other one was on economics. and business retention and development. They're kind of intertwined. And what happens in certain neighborhoods and communities that are in the urban core, they get pollution, they have no green spaces, and higher risk for other things. But at the same time, they lack jobs, access, and lack of investment. So they tend to go together. What I've seen over 30 years is there was an attempt by the environmental community to clean things up. However, the environmental community left behind large chunks of Santa Ana. And I'll give you three policies that didn't help Santa Ana whatsoever. You had the EV mandate. We started in 1990s, California. Did it ever apply to the working folks in Santa Ana? Did they ever get an incentive, a tax credit, to be able to move up the ladder? In 30 years, I'm not talking last week, 30 years, the state went through multiple mandates, and who benefited most from those so, in quotes, environmental policies? Newport Beach? Whoever could afford an EV? Not the people of Santa Ana, not the workers of Santa Ana, not the families of Santa Ana. Very few could afford it. Let's keep going. Let's talk about the recent attempt by some communities to ban gas stoves. Didn't work. AQMD decided not to do it. And here we are. Many of our communities, many of our older apartment complexes use gas. But there's no program to help them. They were going to say convert over at what cost, $3,000, $5,000 a unit, and no money to help them. Then we had this do-good law that has gotten in the way for mostly everybody called CEQA. It's a four-letter word. For some people, it's a good one. For others, it's a bad one. And over the last 10 years, The state has decided to start carving up CEQA because it got in the way of development and it got in the way of housing specifically. So while we all care about the environment and we think it's really important, it never trickled down. It never trickled down. And they made no access for it and they say, yes, it's important. From my standpoint at this point, what we've done in this city is appropriate. And now we're headed towards we need to keep the economic engine going, period. People are struggling. And we have high-skilled jobs. Rents are too high, everybody knows that. You guys turn on the TV, I don't have to tell you what's going on. So from our standpoint, three to five years from now, I want those kids who graduate high school to be able to get a job near their home. Hopefully they don't have to live with their parents. It's a stretch. I got four. I still have two at home. But we need to figure out where we're going to go. And for me, it's about economic development. So as best we can do it, take input from the communities, try to create the buffers that we're trying to create. It's not easy. We just went through the, what was it, the whole mess around the train station. That's messy. There's other parts of the city that are messy. It's going to take us a long time. 100 years to get in this mess, it's going to take us a while to get out of it. So for me, you're going to see me as we go through this more about pragmatism. If you say I want to do it in two years, I'll probably say let's do it in five to 10. Because it's not going to happen overnight. And other cities are going to try to poach our businesses, that's for sure. Because they need money. I spent a lot of time in Orange. Orange is hurting for money. They never pursued any business, pursued housing. Well, that doesn't get you any revenue. And it doesn't provide you services. It doesn't clean up the meetings. It doesn't get you new fire stations, get you any of that. So that's kind of how I'm going to look at it. But I want to say, first of all, you've done a hell of a job. Really done a job. It's not easy. There's lots of factions in this city. And from my perspective, on the industrial side, we need to create the flexibility to allow new businesses that may be emerging. I think to myself, right, South Orange County, who was it, San Juan, somebody turned down a battery storage facility, right? I don't know how many jobs it was, but they just turned it down outright. What if there's an entity that wants to come into Santa Ana and it's a cleaner business, but yet we don't allow it, how would we do it? Does it have to be a minor CUP or should we just allow it by right? Because as we evolve and as we are watching the evolution of the defense industry and the SpaceX, We have a lot of those subcontractors in Santa Ana. A lot of people don't know that. We got to create some flexibility to allow it. And then we got the old businesses. Storage, equipment rentals, big stuff that nobody else wants. Well, it's jobs. It pays for itself. So to me, we have to figure out how to keep existing and grow and maybe steal from others. So that we can benefit. And as we said, we have a competitive advantage. So we should use it. That's kind of my framework as we go through this. And I listen to other commissioners. First of all, thank you. It's not been easy. It took us 100 years to get in this mess. It's going to take us a long time to get out. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Leo. Commissioner Guzman.

Thank you, Chairwoman. Thank you so much for that presentation. I have a question about the residential industrial interface, mainly because I don't understand necessarily how it works. So I've been reading through the draft here, looking at comments, looking at the zoning map. But is it an overlay? Or is it a buffer? How does that function between the light industrial and where you're establishing these residential industrial interfaces? What is that exactly?

Sorry about that. You have the base zoning which applies. In this case, all of the residential industrial interface is over the top of the M1 light industrial district. And then you have this district that combines with the M1, which is the residential industrial interface, and so it adds a layer on top of the M1. And because of that additional layer, we can allow for additional uses and we can allow for additional standards that apply in those areas.

So in that residential industrial interface, there are additional standards being put on that area, correct? So, and from what I understand, once the zoning code gets adopted, the existing uses would become non-conforming or no?

No, a lot of the uses would remain conforming as it's an additional because it's an additional layer and the M one zoning would be remain intact. Okay, there are some that are uses that like, I'm trying to think of an example like the storage of not noxious usage, not noxious chemicals, hazardous, thank you, like the storage of hazardous waste. That's something that doesn't belong in the M1, it doesn't belong near residential, so that would be moved. Such a business would become nonconforming.

Nonconforming, okay. I'm still thinking through this. I may have more questions, but I'm going to revert it back to the chair.

Thank you. Vice Chair Benninger, would you like to go next?

Thank you. Mayor Mrakas, I can attest to the fact is give Syria called and she'll answer and I appreciate the hour that I had with both you Ricardo very helpful. Mayor Mrakas, Again hats off is a heck of a large project ahead of an undertaking and our people are going to feel that they win and others feel that they lose, but. Mayor Mrakas, As long as we are keeping in mind with Chris was talking as Commissioner Leo was talking about. Where are we going long term? And what are we doing to the city? And we do have a lot of advantages. I've heard an awful lot in the last six months as this discussion has taken place of what the advantages that we do have. The question I do have, has the economic development group, and unfortunately those who don't know, we are going to be losing Mike Garcia to the city of Yovalinda, but has his group looked at this plan?

We have shared the plan with, or the zoning code with them, and we've also shared with CDA, or sorry, with housing within CDA.

Okay. And was Margarita's group, Environmental Justice, involved? Absolutely. Good. And they both have given a blessing to the plan as is? I'm sorry, what was that? Have they given a blessing to your plan as being proposed?

I don't think they've said blessing.

Okay. But they've reviewed it, yes. Did they have any concerns? No concerns. Okay. Very appreciative of the information we got from various people today. And the one I'm going to refer to is the NAIOP letter that was coming up. And the one concern, so we'll just kind of take it apart. They talk about equipment rental, light rental. And I have my favorite place, United Rental, right on Seeders Room, actually Dyer Road and

and mean are small operation like that going to be affected by this change by outdoor equipment rental correct um the way that the code is drafted at this time there would be impacts to those that have outdoor business operations related to equipment rental yes okay some of it i see good reason for because i've there's two rental places that i've used united rental there on the dire does a good job of will fence keep things low but if i read this they'll be affected by keeping equipment outside right that is something that needs to be clarified in the way that the code is drafted so we've received a lot of comments about outdoor storage of equipment uh outdoor equipment rental and sales okay well you've been responding to the letter from the naiop We'll be considering their comments, yes.

Because the other one that they're concerned about is no heavy rentals. And if I read their letter correct, they're assuming that that'd be nowhere in Santa Ana, even in the midst of an M1 zone. And of course, businesses do need cranes, and they do need some of the heavier equipment from time to time. When I worked for Dow, we were constantly renting stuff like that out. They're concerned about no heavy rental equipment in the city. Is that correct by the way our present plan is written?

Could you repeat the last part? They're concerned about...

They're concerned that this plan will eliminate any heavy rental equipment, cranes and such, even if it's in the midst of the M1 zone.

That is their concern, yes.

Yes, and is that true?

I was just looking up to make sure that my information is accurate. I know that in the re, give me one second here. I'm almost there. Ricardo, can you find I'm looking at

Thank you for that.

In the flex 1.5 and flex 3 districts, equipment sales and rental establishments heavy would not be permitted. In the M1 and the M1 with the residential industrial interface would require a CUP. In contrast, equipment sales and rental light would be permitted by right across the industrial districts, but there would be limitations on outdoor storage in the flex industrial.

Would that apply to Say the Home Depot near my house that is actually, I don't think it's a residential area. I have to look the map again. But Home Depot, Lowe's both have outdoor storage of their rental equipment. Are they going to be affected by this?

They would be affected by this, yes.

Okay. So they would have to cover it over or do something of that nature?

If they, for outdoor equipment rental or for outdoor equipment storage, the requirement would be to fully enclose them with a fence or a wall.

If I can add to that, Commissioner, or sorry, Vice Chair, the Home Depot example that you provided, the equipment rental that typically happens in a store like that is ancillary. So that use would be regulated by the primary use. So they wouldn't be categorized as heavy equipment rental.

Okay. Okay. You can tell all the favorite places I visit in the city. Okay. Um, also are concerned about limitations and there is a project that you and i discussed possible with a eb company that wants to put a training center as well as be able to repair and based on the fact that if they do their repair indoors and then outdoors they would fit into an m1 without a problem correct Mayor Mrakas, You said repair was yes, they wanted to repair indoors not out yes, as long as in indoors, yes, which is a reason for that limitations, just like we went through lacing neighborhood. Mayor Mrakas, And he limited all the out auto repair that was out outdoors and actually for just exposure purposes people had seen it so Okay, I see your concerns there okay.

All right.

I'm sorry.

In the flex, a vehicle repair and maintenance would be a minor CUP for minor and permitted in both the M1 and M2 in the residential industrial interface. And for major, it's the same.

Mayor Mrakas, All right, very good again. Mayor Mrakas, At now, we should actually say that we earn our pay this week and again say to staff is you guys definitely earned your pay over the last few months, putting this together so very much very much appreciate it, thank you.

Mayor Mrakas, and vice chair and Commissioners just want to touch on a few just broad macro level concepts too so. City Council Chambers, When our staff is giving feedback about when a uses and is not allowed in a certain zoning district as proposed let's just go back to the flex the general plan that Siri was describing earlier, the vision images that you see. Are meant to evoke more like corporate r&d campus style developments that we recognize you don't get there overnight it's not like if this code were adopted the next day we'd have applicants lined up but it's that's the future vision that's what your general plan wants to see over decades right when the general plan was being updated. This question came up repeatedly. which was how is it, and I'm going to be totally candid, how is it that Fountain Valley got that Hyundai headquarters building right off the freeway? How did they get the new hotels right off the freeway? How is it that Tustin got two hotels right off the freeway? How is it that Irvine keeps getting Hyundai and Edwards Life Sciences and all these businesses? And the answer internally was always, well, Santa Ana is a blue-collar city. These businesses will never come here. That's internally what was being said in City Hall, right? So even at that time, I'm being totally candid, we were internally selling ourselves short on what the possibilities were, right? This approach that Siri's highlighting, as I think Commissioner Leo phrased it, is additive, right? So in many aspects, the uses that are permissible in the residential industrial overlay and the flex, it's meant to say, okay, we'll maintain what's allowed in light industrial, and then we'll sweeten the deal by saying, okay, by the way, in many other cities, like in Irvine, you see CrossFit studios now all over their industrial areas, right? You see indoor go-kart racing, right? Why is it that if they came to the counter today, we'd have to say, sorry, not allowed? Straight up, if a CrossFit studio came today to the counter, we'd have to say it's not permissible, right? If an indoor go-kart racing or indoor sport facility came, we'd say that's a conditional use permit. So that's a minimum $5,000 development review application with staff. You go through about four to six months of staff review to make sure high level everything's working out. Then you pay another $5,000 for a CEP to come to planning commission. Oh, by the way, the cost that you incurred also on the notification, the architectural plans, all that. Whereas in many other cities, it's either a staff level review, a decision with the director with some conditions maybe, or just go straight to plan check, right? So this is where City Council Chambers, What we're trying to do is take the general plan and say okay high level, what is it trying to achieve. City Council Chambers, And then nitty gritty in these use tables, how do you get there right, but there are certain uses, and I remember committee vice chair manager, you brought this up during the transit zoning code. City Council Chambers, What is with this question about everything be indoor right, I remember it, and the answer was because what we're finding in other cities like our competitive surrounding cities is that. By and large, if the majority of the operations are indoors, then the 90% of the impacts pretty much go away, right? So that's how in Irvine on Vaughn Carmen Avenue, you can have like a logistics center somehow next to for sale condominiums, right? Not just renters for sale. People are willing to actually put a down payment, have a mortgage in a quasi industrial area, right? Why? Because largely when you're in that area, you don't see outdoor operations. Now there are some uses by their nature that are outdoors like equipment sales equipment rental right you can't store bulldozers and cranes inside of a building in many areas. So that's where in those instances like hazardous waste disposal staff are proposing to just draw a line and say. It doesn't really matter how many operating and development standards, you have there are some uses that are just incompatible. Not only forget the residential because I mentioned earlier we're not trying to allow intrusion of residential. they're actually incompatible with their neighboring industrial business uses, right? Like having hazardous waste storage and disposal. Many business owners would agree they would not want that as a neighbor, especially in light of what happened recently in some surrounding cities, right? So again, I just don't want these points to be lost on the Commission and our community about why these uses have been so delicately curated. But again, The feedback process tonight from the audience and from you is to tell us, did we get it right? That's the context I want to share with you guys.

Thank you. With that, I'm going to ask a few questions and then we'll go to the public comments. So my first set of questions are on the residential industrial interface. So we just heard you explain to a previous commissioner kind of what that how that is going to work. And we heard that some businesses will become nonconforming. Can you please provide examples of what type of businesses will become nonconforming? And if the list is available on a slide, if we could pull that up, that would be great. If not, it's okay.

I don't believe I listed what would become nonconforming. But among the nonconforming, is this what you're talking about the non industrial uses?

Now I'd like to know what will become non conforming when this residential industrial interface is added as a layer?

Yeah, that's a good question. The hazardous materials storage and waste would become non conforming. And there are a couple of others that I had on my notes, but I can't find them right now. I apologize. But there are a handful of the most of the most noxious uses that would become non conforming and then the rest of them would be retained. and would be subject to the operational standards and the development standards and the design standards in the code.

Okay, I'm curious if other staff may know what other businesses are going to become non-conforming.

Thank you, Chair. I was just going to add the way the code is structured currently and proposed, it lists permitted uses. So the way you're framing the question, the number of non-conforming businesses that could be out there could be infinite, because we only list what's allowed. City Council Chambers, Anything that's out there that doesn't conform to the listed permitted uses would just be considered non conforming.

City Council Chambers, Okay, is the staff know how many of the existing businesses in the areas where you plan to add this interface would become non conforming or the types of uses that they have.

So many of the changes that are being proposed in the re have to do with operational standards so to be able to determine which business precisely would become non conforming. we'd actually have to look at how each business operates to see if they conform with those operational standards so that would be pretty challenging to see how each business is complying with the proposed operational standards.

City Council Chambers, Thanks, and you know I just want to go back to the transit zoning code, because that was this commission's most recent interaction with this concept right so as our planning manager just said. City Council Chambers, When it comes to the residential industrial interface staff's approach is to say look we're not proposing to eliminate tons of uses and render buildings obsolete the approach is instead more economically incentive by saying again i'm going to go back to. conversations at City Hall for the 15 years that I've worked here. For a large degree of time, it was, hey, you know, someone comes to the counter and says, can I open a professional engineering office in this industrial building? I draft plans, you know, I have a team working. No, that's an administrative office use. That's not allowed in the industrial area. Okay. So the building was clearly built as an office building, but because of zoning, it was rendered already a little bit obsolete. In this approach, instead, it's an expansion of the menu of uses. So there's actually only a handful that would become nonconforming to answer your question, like hazardous waste storage. But to the planning manager's point, The operating standards are what would change so that is similar to the transit zoning code we're saying look if you're in this area where geographically, you are close to residential. or schools or other sensitive land uses in these areas, for example, your operations cannot result in 18 wheeler trucks idling on city streets anymore. Right, I would argue that that's not just good for the transit zoning code that's just good city wide right we don't want 18 wheelers. Mayor Mrakas, Being left with their engines on with the noise and emissions and safety hazards blocking a roadway. Mayor Mrakas, that's just an example of what now does that render a business non conforming automatically know because the business, as we saw with the transit zoning code. Mayor Mrakas, Some businesses actually came forward during the hearing process and said i'm already changing the way that i'm operating because I didn't know my operations were impactful this way to the Community. City Council Chambers, So there's still that opportunity through how they operate to become conforming to the code it's not necessarily about what's inside it's how it's being operated.

City Council Chambers, Thank you for that clarification and for alluding to the transit zoning code which, for those of you that may not know, there were many updates similar to these that happened. City Council Chambers, In the transit zoning code which is by the train station, where we have the Logan neighborhood the lacy neighborhood. So that is very helpful. And I was asking because I was wondering what if any similar approach there had been to consulting with the businesses as we go through the zoning code update. Because I know with the transit zoning code, Margarita's team, I see Frank here, and planning worked very hard to City Council Chambers, literally go survey those businesses see what they were doing and see how they were operating, so I was curious was that similar was a similar approach to that taken as some of these recommendations were being made for where there should be a residential industrial interface.

City Council Chambers, chair, thank you, because i'm just going to keep building on that in some cases, the approach has been different and i'll explain why so, for example in the transit zoning code, the ordinance created a process for amortization. City Council Chambers, Right, so the way that it ended at City Council approval was that noxious non conforming businesses in the transit zoning code would be subject to amortization. City Council Chambers, Over a multi year period with staff right it takes a long time you go through studies, you do economic valuation and then one by one, you go down a list. City Council Chambers, There is no proposed amortization in this city wide ordinance so I said it before at City Council and i'll say it again there's nothing in this proposed text that if this were adopted as written. By the Commission and Council, that would give me or any of my staff the ability to go take away someone's keys to their business the next day. That's just not how the law works. Secondly, the geographic conditions are different in the transit zoning code, because the neighborhood was built pre zoning and I fifty years before zoning. There are literally examples where it's like home industrial apartments industrial home commercial restaurant home industrial like on one block. Right, because back then, when they built it, it was just like whatever goes. Right, we don't have that we have an interface right where homes and industrial come up against each other, but we don't have the checkerboard pattern that we have in the trans zoning code. So while many elements were used to inspire this, it's not as wholesale of an approach to really eradication of industrial in that area through amortization. It's more economic incentive to see change over time. But in the meantime, have these good neighbor operating standards that say, look, we have to recognize as a community that we are unique. that there are blocks of this city where people's backyards line heavy industrial properties. That is not normal. It happens in other cities, but it's not normal, right? That's why these operating standards are being proposed.

Thank you for that clarification and for stating how this approach is very different. I also heard the noxious use ordinance be brought up a few times. I don't know that everyone is aware that that ordinance exists or what it is. Can you please share with us what the noxious use ordinance is? And then also remind us of the existing language on nonconforming that's in the ordinance.

Thank you for the question, Chair. Noxious use first, to explain the noxious uses ordinance, I'll first start with the definition. So a noxious use is one that satisfies a few different conditions. First of all, it has to satisfy a set of characteristics having to do with emitting, polluting, having some kind of Some kind of material that is a that is a problem basically so emitting generating or discharging particulate materials. Exhausting emissions or handling storing emitting or discharging regulated compounds hazardous materials chemicals or substances. that's one possibility, a second possibility is operations that are regulated by and required and require a permit from a federal state or regional agency. The third is storing, processing, or disposing of listed or hazardous waste or operations that are not contained within a fully enclosed building. So if a primary business operation involves any two of those things, then it may be considered noxious. And I say may because it also has to meet the second criteria, which is its location. And it has to be located within 1,000 feet of a public park, school, or residence. And when you look at those together, you determine whether or not a use is noxious. And then we go to the noxious uses ordinance that says anywhere in the city that one of these industrial noxious uses is located would be required to get a conditional use permit, regardless of whether or not it's permitted by right in another part of the industrial areas of the city.

So if a business was non-conforming, it would just require a CEP?

This is noxious uses as compared to nonconforming uses.

Sorry, I just wrote a quick note, but throughout the presentation there was mention that regarding nonconforming language as was in the noxious use ordinance. So my question was to remind us of that.

Yes, I'm sorry. The nonconformity section that pertains to noxious uses has not been changed. And can you remind us what that states? And that means that if a noxious use is sold or somehow modified in a manner that requires a new certificate of occupancy, the nonconforming status goes away.

So thank you, Siri. And so when that nonconforming status goes away, then an owner has three options. They either cease operations, that's the most extreme, modify operations to modernize it to not trigger the noxious uses ordinance. So for example, instead of having a little emissions pipe that emits compounds into the atmosphere, they have carbon filtration systems where they closed loop capture it and dispose of it. And then the third option is to apply for the CUP.

Thank you for that. And then my last question on the noxious uses. So I did see that we had one letter mentioned how we were regulating odorless and non visible pollutants. Do we feel the noxious use ordinance also encompasses that?

If those are regulated, and if another of these conditions applies, then yes. But I think it's important to note that staff City Council Chambers, Ricardo help me out with this when you have a chance, so we don't have other agencies regulate visible or non visible. City Council Chambers, emissions it's not within our. City Council Chambers, it's not within our regulatory framework to be regulating those.

City Council Chambers, Thank you chair, I would just add to that, I would say yes, since those outside of regulatory agencies are responsible for. regulating these kinds of emissions and compounds, thereby they'd be subject to a noxious use of CUP through our municipal code.

Thank you. Those are all my questions on the noxious use and the residential industry interface. I also have a question on the architectural resources, the new supplemental standard district. So can you please provide more information on exactly what that means, what is allowed on them, where they exist throughout the city, and if there's a map where that highlights where those areas exist. And if it's small, we can zoom in. That would be really helpful to me. Thank you.

Okay. Can we see my cursor if I point at the screen? Okay, good, we can. So, Architectural Resources Supplemental Standards District is intended to apply in neighborhoods that have been designated historically sensitive by the City Council. Those are distributed throughout the downtown areas or close to the downtown areas, here south of the transit zoning code, below Henninger Park.

Are those the specific color?

Yes, they have an outline. I don't believe there's a way that I can zoom in on this. You do control plus. That might work. I didn't realize that applies to PowerPoint as well. Very good. So we'll go up a little bit further here. So you can see, I apologize, I can't think of the names of the neighborhoods right now. But south of transit zoning code, south of Henninger Park, up here, Okay, thank you.

So Pacific Park was the first one. And then the next one was Wilshire Square. Go down. Yeah, that's Wilshire Square. And then keep going. Washington Square. Park Santiago. And then to the left is West Floral Park. Thank you. And then Fisher Park up to the north above the Santiago Creek. And then Morrison Park.

So those are mainly residential neighborhoods? Yes.

And the intent of those standards is to create an environment in which well create mate to maintain the environment. So it's context sensitive standards, which means that the prevailing setbacks would apply to new development, prevailing height would apply to new development and that type of thing so that we avoid McMansion ization of these neighborhoods.

City Council Chambers, Thank you, and are there. City Council Chambers, Does that supplemental standard district apply anywhere throughout the city or like apply to any other type of use that is not residential throughout the city.

City Council Chambers, The South main supplemental standards district is similar and that's the only where only place where we have an architectural a set of architectural standards that apply for commercial areas beyond the base standards.

City Council Chambers, Okay, so with that supplemental standard district it's essentially to protect them preserve historic resources, it does that. City Council Chambers, dictate what new uses can or cannot exist. City Council Chambers, district is applied.

City Council Chambers, The supplemental standards district doesn't alter in the architectural resources case doesn't alter the uses only the only place where it affects uses is in the residential industrial interface.

Okay. Thank you for that clarification. And then I just have two more questions that should be a lot faster. So I know there was a mention of parking and how some of these zoning code updates will facilitate parking. Can you just share more detail on how that is happening?

Sure. The main place where we're facilitating Well, it's really about facilitating economic development, not facilitating parking per se, but it's creating opportunities for commercial developments to look at their own parking needs and to design projects that meet their parking needs as a whole. And to have the ability to kind of combine so that if you have two uses that are complimentary, but they operate at different times of the day, then that parking can be counted once rather than having to multiply the parking requirements for each of the individual businesses.

So is it essentially changing parking requirements or standards?

I'm going to ask our consultant, Laura Stetson, to come to the mic, and she can do a better job of explaining than I can. Thank you.

Thank you, Madam Chair. For the record, Laura Stetson from MIG, and I'm joined tonight also by Brent Gibbons from Interior Harnish, who's been working with us and staff on the project. When we were looking at parking, we were looking at parking, and I don't know if your question was specific to commercial or if it was looking at residential as well.

Not specific to either. I just remember seeing on the slide mentioned that the zoning code would facilitate parking in some way. So curious as to what that means.

In terms of parking for residential, we did a really hard look at what the city's requirements are versus what best practices are for communities throughout Orange County and specifically nearby. So there was some minor adjustment to parking to really reflect what, as I said, best practices and industry practices are so Santa Ana can remain competitive with other communities in terms of what it's requiring in terms of parking. for non-residential for commercial and industrial those were also examined for best practices and i think the key thing that siri is pointing out is that there's much more flexibility given to commercial centers to dictate what they think they need for parking rather than looking at on an individual use base within a parking within a commercial center because that changes over time and so there's more flexibilities for them to provide what they think is needed for parking because They want their customers to be able to park.

Thank you. And then if you can just clarify, does this then change any residential parking? Does it make any changes to what is required for residential parking?

Yes, there are adjustments in terms of what's required for residential parking. I basically say, Brent, we reduced it a tiny bit. But if you could indulge me for just a minute, Chair. When we were doing our community outreach, even starting at the beginning, there were concerns about parking and people saying, our streets are crowded, there isn't enough parking. A lot of that has to do with the fact that there are older apartment developments in Santa Ana and they were not built requiring multiple parking spaces for each unit. And so the concerns that people are expressing are associated with longstanding concerns because not enough parking was built from the get-go. Moving forward, the standards that are proposed in the code are to address parking moving forward and to make sure that there is sufficient parking for the new uses that are going in.

Thank you. So the way that parking was assessed for the zoning code, then there was no. So there was no interaction between that and the city's ongoing parking study. I can respond to that. Thank you.

Yes, we worked with Public Works to consider the findings of their efforts and found that combined with some research that we had done as staff within the Planning and Building Agency. And what we found is that for newer development, the projects were parked sufficiently, even if they received a parking reduction through their development review process. City Council Chambers, We found that these newer developments have sufficient have sufficient parking and they actually had parking spaces empty during the day times. City Council Chambers, When it comes to the problems that we see in the residential neighborhoods as Laura alluded to that largely has to do with development being older and being constructed before current development standards. What we've done with the zoning code is to simplify the counts, so that it's easier for us to calculate but does it but it's not a major change from what we have right now. City Council Chambers, Another important note is that when it comes to parking our hands are really tied for the majority of the city. City Council Chambers, Because the majority of the city falls under ab 2097 which does not allow cities to require parking. City Council Chambers, So, ultimately, what happens is that the developers did look at what the market will demand and consider what they can actually rent or sell and they'll park a project accordingly.

Mayor Mrakas, Thank you, so I just for the sake of the Community and the Commission, I want to highlight a few proposed changes to parking so. Mayor Mrakas, For example, retail right now in Santa Ana if you would just want to open like a T mobile store or a panda express to go let's say five spaces per thousand for retail. Mayor Mrakas, we're proposing to lower that to four, which is actually more consistent with competitive neighboring cities, they require a similar parking ratio. Offices right now three spaces per thousand So if you wanted to just open an administrative law office three spaces per thousand we're proposing to lower that to 2.5 per thousand. I know point five doesn't sound like a lot, but these offices often have a huge floor plate so that actually meaningfully adds up why the changes will there's been significant changes in consumer habits, following the pandemic. And there's estimates out there that for every one parking for every one vehicle in southern California there's at any given time seven parking spaces everywhere so. So I know that we are a parking impacted city, but when you consider that our parking standards as currently written today can mean that a business is told yes you're allowed by the zoning district like that table says you're allowed. But there's not enough parking so we actually have to deny you at the counter. It doesn't add up, you know, so we're trying to make sure that every section of the code is in sync with one another. The other wish list that I always had which we're finally pursuing in this code is the ability that as Siri was mentioning right now in multi unit centers and many of them across the city. There is such a hodgepodge of variants for that shopping Center minor exception for that shopping Center legal not conforming for that shopping Center. That we're simply streamlining it to say if it's a multi tenant shopping Center, and you know that it's a shared parking situation where the gym has different demands. City Council Chambers, And the restaurants and the retail stores, and you can just look at a combined share parking situation and that can be approved by the planning manager, instead of having to come to the planning Commission and why that matters. is that that's the difference of maybe four to six months of processing before a tenant is told yes or no, versus maybe two to three weeks of looking at a shared parking study, making sure the math checks out and then having it approved administratively. And I don't know how many small businesses can afford to pay rent on a space that sits vacant for four to six months at least before a hearing is conducted. So these are the small business sort of incentives that are being built in to the code that tie to parking.

If I could add one other incentive that we've incorporated. One of the comments that we've received from some of the business interests is that there's concern in the residential industrial interface area that to transition over time to a new type of use, like a commercial use, for example, industrial requires less parking than commercial does. And so they're saying, well, we might want to do that, but we can't do that because we don't have sufficient area for parking. So one thing that we've done in that part of the code is to say for that type of use in the residential industrial interface, you're not required to add the additional parking that you would otherwise be required.

Great. Thank you for that clarification. And just for anyone, for everyone that may be listening to understand that the zoning code update is not going to address our existing issue, parking issues in residential neighborhoods is what I understand, but will help. bring new businesses in by reducing parking requirements and making it easier. Great. And then my last question is on the environmental justice policies. So I think one of the early slides showed that there were 20 new policies in the environmental justice realm. So I'm wondering if you have a list of those that you can put on the screen. And if not, if you can list what those 20 policies are.

I don't have them in a format that I can put on the screen. But I can certainly put the list together and share them with you.

Thank you. Can you share some of those tonight?

Of the policies, we can pull up the general plan and actually look at some of them, yes.

So I'm referring to environmental justice policies that are being addressed by the Zoning Code Update. Councillor Osanic Oh, I'm sorry. As referenced in one of the early slides where it mentioned how many policies per realm arena, and I believe it was 20 under environmental justice, but I could have written that number down wrong.

Yes. So in the land use element, that's the primary place where we see environmental justice policies that come into play with zoning. And so examples include policy LU 1.1 compatible uses to foster compatibility between land uses and to enhance livability and promote healthy lifestyles. And then another one is policy lu 1.3 equitable creation and distribution of open space, promoting the creation of new open space and Community serving amenities and park division areas. This is one of those things that we've addressed through requiring publicly accessible open space on private development. I can keep going through these another example is active transportation infrastructure lu 1.7 so we've incorporated requirements for bicycle parking, for example, and other things that promote walking and biking. So i'm happy to prepare a list of these i've already started to prepare a list of these alongside exactly how we're addressing them through the zoning code and I can share that at our next meeting.

Thank you yeah that would be great if I can be sure that the next meeting and also be uploaded on the website for members of the Community to be able to review before the meeting. So that is all my questions i'm going to go ahead and move us over to the public comment portion of the work study session, so the public comment portion of the work study session is now open recording Secretary have we received any written communication or is there a member of the public that would like to comment on this item.

chair we have received a total of 10 emails in the form of public comments for this item before the 3 30 p.m deadline which has been distributed to the commission and posted online if you are attending this meeting in person and would like to comment on this item please fill out a request to speak form and turn it in into the secretary If you are participating via Zoom and would like to comment on this item, please select the hand icon to indicate that you would like to speak. If you are calling in and would like to comment on this item, please dial 9 and then 6 to unmute yourself. I will wait a few seconds. Chair, we have 14 speakers in-house and one speaker via Zoom.

Thank you. Just a reminder, every speaker will have three minutes. If there is a speaker that will need interpretation, we are allowing for simultaneous interpretation, I will go ahead and begin with the Scott Williamson begin please step forward.

My name is Scott Williamson. I realize this is not a Q&A moment, so I'm just stating some concerns. I'm a 42-year small business owner and a 42-year small business property owner, currently in the M1 zoning between Dyer and Warner, just off Red Hill. I'm destined to be a DC2 zone. So retail, residential mix. And from M1 to residential retail mix. I'm not sure quite how I'm going to fit in that. I put in a call to Suri. Thank you for taking my call. And she was very gracious and said that it's nothing that will happen overnight. they're not going to come imminent domain and tell me to leave but i still want to know what it's going to look like the transition and what it means to my investment in that business property and my ability to do business and how much time will that take did recommend suggested that it's really developer driven by somebody who wants to make it a DC2 property and in my case my business Park is a condominium business Park so I have 16 unit owners that would have to be brought together and agree it would not be a simple task so it will take time what does it mean to me and the value of my real estate do i sell now quick while i can before this gets ugly or do i wait to the bitter end and hope some developer has to throw money at me i just don't know what to think of all this and i'm seeking clarity so i mostly wanted to just put that up verbally on record tonight that Yes, I've attended meetings and I've attended community gatherings, but I still am not clear what it will mean to me in the long run after this passes, because it is going to pass. I understand that. I'm Mayor Mrakas, And i'm willing to take a call with staff later or look forward to some other clarity that I can have and that i'm also President of my border association board and i'd love to bring whatever information I learned back to my owners, because they're all thinking the same thing, thank you.

Thank you Jeff Mohammed.

My name is Mohammed Qureshi. And I want to say good evening to all of you. I'm here because I'm being impacted with the new zoning I've been in the city for over 40 years and own the property located at 711 North Fairview, streets corner of Fairview and Civic Center. I've been there 40 years. This property has always been commercial, even though it was residential since 1950, they gave a variance and I've been there and I purchased it in 2000. So I've been going through, or prior to this, me and my brother, we owned the property across the street, 720 North Fairview. It's an 18 to 20,000 square foot building. We were impacted by the school district and the city. They took over our building on eminent domain. And we suffered millions. They couldn't find another building for us. So with that in mind, I come here tonight not knowing if I'm going to be eminent domain again and lose a lot of money again. The suggestion has been they've re-zoned the property UN20. I've attended a lot of meetings with the city and thanks to siri i found out today that i do not have to build residential on that property i can keep it commercial it's been commercial since 70 years but it was rezone to un20 and they kept telling me you got to put residents and business at the bottom We talked to many developers and they say it's not possible. You will lose money, nobody will come. And then the third thing happened. OCTA decided to put a train right by my property. Not only did they go right by my property, but they built a station right at my property where people are gonna get off, get on. And nobody took into consideration that when the train comes, makes a lot of noise warning people that it's coming. And the signal drops, it makes a lot of noise. So I've been hearing that noise. They're doing some practice runs for about a month.

Thank you, Mohamed. I apologize. You're at three minutes.

I just want to make sure that They're not going to eminent domain me again and treat me as nobody. But I appreciate if you could check it out that we're not going to be eminent domain in the future. Thank you.

Thank you. Jeff, I need you to fill out your individual speaker card, but you can speak and fill it out afterwards.

OK.

You can speak now if you'd like and then just fill out.

Yeah, I was just here with Mohammed here regarding the property at 711 North Fairview. We've been marketing the property with First Team Real Estate for about over a year now. We've had a lot of people come to us like In-N-Out, other gas stations, car washes, a lot of different opportunities, a strip center, like maybe like a strip center to build like maybe Arby's or like a, Mayor Mrakas, restaurants, all kinds of different businesses have approaches, but it wasn't the zone for you, you end 20 was a mixed use with units on the top and maybe read residential with commercial on the bottom and just didn't fit the. area. And now thanks to Siri that we've been able to get that are one combined with the R two properties, it would help expand the uses for the property. So I think it's been excellent opportunity to maybe you know, to set up a commercial business that would create more income for the city. Thank you.

Thank you. And we can please submit a speaker card, Jeff. I'll need you to submit your own individual. Thank you. And up next, we'll have Maribel Tuan followed by Rocky Shin.

My name is Maribel Tuan and I am with New Song Church on 17th and Flower. And we are very concerned. We're very concerned about the rezoning. We really would like to learn more about it and have some more time. This is something that That means a lot to us. On behalf of our community, this is a message. To create a strong, vibrant community for people to live in, you also need to have the right services available to support families in the neighborhood. New Song serves diverse communities from different socioeconomic backgrounds. The programs that we provide are important for the overall social determinants of health of the community. From a good education with scholarship prep to supportive services and spiritual support, the things that we are able to do are critical for a healthy neighborhood. Sony limitations will prevent us from being able to look into the future and serve the community with their basic needs. We want to be good neighbors with everyone around us, and we ask that you give us time to examine the impact that your decisions can make so that we can provide input and feedback that could potentially work for everyone. Thank you for allowing us to make a comment and thank you for all the work that you've been doing in the planning.

Thank you, Rocky.

I rocky Shen also with new song i'm an architect by trade as well. By the way, thank you Siri for really thorough and informative presentation, and thank you planning Commissioners for your thoughtful comments and questions. What you talked about earlier. regarding the planning principles that were established by the general plan and the study session. It was amazing how much of those principles really resonate with us and what our goals are also to really embody and to kind of move forward. So I'm with New Song and as Maribel mentioned, we also have scholarship prep, a charter school that operates out of our campus. we also have the mix academy a non-profit that acts as like a community center for the local neighborhood and a lot of what we do the really the three entities our goal is to really build and strengthen the community of santa ana and so what we're hoping to do is contact siri and city staff and find out a little bit more about the nitty-gritty of what the impacts are gonna be and how we can continue to evolve and also continue to positively impact the local neighborhood and the larger city in general. So everything from the ODS to how the impacts of the uses that are there that may not be conforming and what are the subtleties of what that looks like in time. So appreciate the time and look forward to our correspondence. Thank you.

Thank you. Up next, we have Tom Steen followed by Sam Greek.

Good evening, Siri and commissioners. My name is Tom Steen. I'm here to speak about our family property at 1315 and 1317 North Santiago Street. John Potter, My family's connection to Santa Ana goes back nearly 90 years we have owned this property, since the 1940s, and it has continuously operated as general contractors office yard and warehouse. the same type of use that exists today with our current tenant. My grandfather built a successful construction business here at this location. My mother and aunt also grew up in Santa Ana and graduated from Santa Ana High School. Our family has deep roots in the community and we care about the future of this city. City Council Chambers, We support Santa Ana schools and being clean safe attractive and economically strong, however, we respectfully oppose the proposed rezoning of our property from him to to him one with the are I overlay. City Council Chambers, We simply do not believe this change is necessary or appropriate for our location. North Santiago Street has always been an industrial corridor and the surrounding conditions remain industrial. Directly across the street is a fueling station with 21 hoses. At the end of our street is the cul-de-sac created by Interstate 5. And next to our property is an electrical substation. There are no residential homes on our street. That would benefit this rezoning if the city's goal is to improve the appearance of the corridor, we are willing to be part of the solution. Our property is already fully fenced and we would gladly work with the city to additional screening landscaping or other improvements. But changing the zoning would unnecessarily restrict future business and uses reduce flexibility for quality industrial tenants diminish the long term value of our property and potentially discourage investment in a location that has supported local businesses for generations. Our tenant and our family share the same position we respectfully ask for the existing into zoning to remain in place. We believe the city can achieve its beautification goals without sacrificing the productivity in the economic vitality of long standing industrial properties like ours, we respectfully ask the Council to preserve existing into zoning for our property.

Thank you, Sam Greek. Followed by Matt Nichols.

Good evening, Chair Ramos and Honourable Commissioners. My name is Sam Greek and my firm manages and leases several industrial properties in Santa Ana. We've been in the city since 1958. And many of those properties are located in the M. One zone, and now several of the properties are going to have the Rii residential interface, industrial interface, supplemental standards. So I want to start by acknowledging something that the city got right. I've reviewed Table 41, 188 a and the definitions in Article nine. And I want it on record, contractor's yard, vehicle fleet parking, corporate yard and storage warehouse all remain permitted by right uses in the M1RII zoning. The definitions themselves describe these as lot-based and premises-based uses, not confined to enclosed buildings. That appears to mean that outdoor fenced yards, storage and vehicle parking, which is how most of our tenants use these yards, are preserved under this draft. I appreciate that the City drew that distinction and I'd ask the Commission to confirm that understanding on the record tonight. There's no ambiguity for property owners going forward. That said, two provisions in section 41-195 still create real unnecessary burden for these lawful permitted uses or operations. First, section 41-195 imposes a flat curfew, no exterior noise or vibration generating activity between the hours of 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. for every business in an M1RII zone, regardless of whether the use itself is permitted or how long it's operated there. A yard that's simply staging equipment or loading a truck at 6 a.m. shouldn't be treated as an actual nuisance. This standard applies uniformly with no allowance for businesses that were operating on this schedule before the residential development nearby existed. Second, section 41-195 requires outdoor storage to be screened by an eight foot solid wall. Many of these properties predate that specific standard and the draft code doesn't clearly explain how that new standard applies to existing lawful fencing or provide a reasonable path to compliance. These are longstanding industrial properties that have predated or coexisted with nearby residential uses for many years. That's not incidental. The city itself is the one that allowed that the both to coexist, recognizing that these yard uses remain legally permitted as a good start. But the operational standards layered on top of of them should reflect that these are lawful ongoing businesses, not something to be quietly squeezed out through curfews and unclear compliance deadlines. I'd asked the Commission for three things tonight first confirm publicly that contractors yard vehicle fleet parking corporate yard and storage warehouse uses in fenced outdoor yards remain permitted conforming uses under him one are zoning. Not something property owners need to fight to preserve later. Second build in a reasonable compliance window for the eight foot screening standard and revisit the blanket overnight curfew so it's based on actual demonstrated impact, rather than flat clock that doesn't distinguish between loading door distinguish a loading door as a nuisance. Finally, several of the properties we manage are interior industrial parcels with no direct residential interface, and we asked Commission to reconsider whether the RII designations is necessary on these parcels at all. We don't think they are. I really appreciate your time tonight and all of the work that's gone into this draft from Siri and everyone else. Thank you.

Thank you. Matt Nichols.

Matt Nichols here with Alan Matkins. Honorable Commissioners, thank you for your time. Commissioner Pham, a great suggestion to have this be the only agenda item that served us well tonight. Left a lot of time. First, credit to planning staff. You get a lot of credit, but it's well deserved. I think the July update was critical. Represent several industrial stakeholders in the city. I think the adjustments made to the applicability of the BP zone versus in the flex zone should be preserved. Those were a great step forward in the planning process. An asset does not be retracted or adjusted. Those strike the right balance in our view. You heard from Sam Greek with Martin. We've been involved with him. And Sam already says, I want to highlight, everything I'm saying was submitted in letters to the commission. I want to highlight a few points. First, the R2 overlay, it's predicated on being for properties adjacent to or in proximity to districts allowing residential use. I think that's key here. I think in some areas, and we've highlighted this in our letters, a few properties, in some cases, it seems that that is being applied based on proximity to a school. And ask that planning to take a look at our letters. There's a few properties that seem to be just solely based on next to a school, not by a zone or property allowing residential use. So I ask that that be highlighted. Third, Commissioner Leo, you brought up competitive advantage in the long history of defense. We submitted a letter today on behalf of Enby property on Hathaway. And Ricardo, you've been involved in this and appreciate your efforts on that. I think a point there is that there's an overlap between the noxious use ordinance and the student zoning code update. We're certain where MBIE is one example of an old noxious use. There's required remediation. They'd like to move to the building next door. We've offered some red lines. It's a very technical narrow red lines that would allow remediation to happen on a site like that. And we ask that you take a look at those. They're very narrowly tailored to serve the purpose of the overall ordinance. The other comment more generally, Mayor Mrakas, Is that the deflection are to overlays have in section 41 one into five speaks it has operational standards apply to all uses of businesses. Mayor Mrakas, we'd ask that the zoning code update make clear those apply and, hopefully, these are hopeful interpretation that those applies solely to forward looking and aren't retroactive. Mayor Mrakas, And hopefully that's the case, if not, we would ask for that change we made. that it wouldn't retroactively make non-conforming operations. Another comment is noise. The code speaks to noise being restricted, all exterior noise from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. Just wanna make clear that doesn't mean no operations can occur indoors, for example. Thank you for your time. Appreciate your consideration and very productive discussion tonight. Thank you.

Thank you. Up next, we have Emilio Ramirez followed by Yesenia Amarujo.

hi good evening uh chair ramos and commissioners and city staff my name is emilio ramirez i'm a board member for santana active streets and orange county for people-oriented places and most importantly santanero from ward 3 and a proud parent of six-month-olds i want to first thank siri for the effort that has been put into this plan It is looking really great. And it's, I think, a very good compromise with all the different conflicting interests in the city. That being said, I think we need, I'm gonna swing for the fences for some of the things that I think could use some improvement. as i heard a little bit here and in the part in the past meeting a lot of talk has been done about parking and i think we should let the free market do its thing if there is a developer that wants to uh put out business and they don't want to allocate parking to that business it is should be within their right to do it and if no one comes because there's no parking then that is on them but that shouldn't be a city requirement and for as an example for a development that was previously approved near my neighborhood which i'm very happy about there was some discussion about the parking a lot of there and how like it would bring traffic into that into my community I think that implies that people have to drive great distances to these businesses if we don't let the city be flexible to have this everywhere if there is a coffee shop or a dry cleaner miles away in another neighborhood i'm not gonna drive to that neighborhood just because there's a dry cleaner if i have one five minutes away from me so my interest in this is to allow for as much thriving economic development and housing development in the city in what which way we wouldn't be needing and to have so much discussion about driving because ultimately People don't want traffic, but they're part of traffic. And we talk about parking, but that's just assuming people need to have these cars. And that only happens because we are using, I'm using a very inefficient way. so that being said i think this is backed up with the a couple of the general plan elements like capture local spending cost and benefit development benefits of mixed use and home ownership opportunities last thing too as well i wanted to uh say that there could be more allowance for single family units i own a house and i can't build an edu because the setbacks are too big so a lot more flexibility use less shelves and more mace thank you thank you next up is yesenia marujo followed by kim fortune

Buenas noches a todos. Mi nombre es Yesenia Marrujo. Soy residente y líder comunitario de Cornerstone Village y asociada de la investigación comunitaria de UCI en Echo Gap Lab. Quiero aprovechar mi tiempo esta noche para recordarles las instrucciones que el fiscal general de California envió a la ciudad de Santana en el 2020 para garantizar el cumplimiento del proyecto de ley del Senado de California, el número 1000, que es SB1000. This law requires that cities like Santa Ana, which have many communities in environmental disadvantage, integrate environmental justice policies into their general plans and, in turn, implement these policies through zoning codes and other ordinances. La carta instruida a la ciudad a realizar lo siguiente. Primero, reducir activamente los riesgos para la salud y las cargas de contaminación que enfrentan las comunidades afectadas por problemas de justicia ambiental, tal como le exige la SB 1000. Presentando especial atención a los receptores sensibles, o sea, nosotros, las personas que vivimos ahí, como escuelas y guarderías. Segundo, establece requisitos concretos de separación entre usos industriales y receptores sensibles en las comunidades desfavorecidas de la ciudad. Siguiendo las recomendaciones de la Junta de Recursos del Aire de California, que es CARP, sobre zonas de amortiguamiento de al menos mil pies. La carta hace referencia a investigaciones de CARP que demuestra que la contaminación atmosférica localizada disminuye en un 80% a una distancia de mil pies. Número tres, elaborar planes detallados específicos para comunidades desfavorecidas como Cornerstone Village que aborden los desafíos y necesidades particulares de dicha comunidad. La carta señala a la ciudad Plasencia como modelo a seguir. Cuarta, abordar las preocupaciones sobre seguridad pública mediante mejoras en el entorno construido, la creación de un sendero peatonal separado de las vías públicas conecte Cornerstone Village con la Escuela Secundaria Century High School, would be a way to achieve it. Fifth, finally, the letter encourages to maintain a constant community participation in the implementation of the city's general plan. It is not enough to include a single page on environmental justice in the annual reports of the progress of the general plan. We also need a clear method and a chronogram for the participation of the community, integrated in the implementation of the zoning code. Los residentes de Santa Ana merecen más de lo que ofrece el actual borrador del código de zonificación. Les pedimos que cumplan con la ley y sigan las directrices de nuestro fiscal general. Debería leerlo en voz alta, perdón, sería todo. Gracias.

Good evening. I am Yesenia Marrujo, a resident of Cornerstone Village, leader of the Cornerstone Neighborhood Association, and community research associate at UCI EcoGov Lab. I want to use my time tonight to remind you of the instructions that the California Attorney General sent to the city of Santa Ana in 2020 to ensure compliance with California Senate Bill 1000. This law requires that cities like Santa Ana, which have many environmentally disadvantaged communities, integrate environmental justice policies into their general plans, and in turn, implement these policies through zoning codes and other ordinances. the letter instructed the city to do the following first actually actively reduce the health risks and pollution burdens faced by communities affected by environmental justice issues as required by sb 1000 paying special attention to sensitive receptors such as schools and daycares Two, establish concrete separation requirements between industrial uses and sensitive receptors in the city's disadvantaged communities following the recommendations of the California Air Resources Board regarding buffer zones of at least 1,000 feet. The letter references CARB research demonstrating that localized air pollution decreases 80% at a distance of 1,000 feet. three develop detailed and specific plans for disadvantaged communities such as cornish or village that address the particular challenges and needs of those communities the letter points to the city of placentia as a model to follow four public safety concerns through improvements in the built environment the creation of a pedestrian path separated from the public roadway connecting cornerstone village with century high school would be one way to achieve this five finally the letter urges maintaining constant community participation of the implementation of the city's general plan. It is not enough to include a single page on environmental justice in the general plans annual progress reports. We also need a clear method and a timeline for community participation integrated into the implementation of the zoning code. The residents of Santa Ana deserve more than what the current draft of the zoning code offers. We ask that you comply with the law and follow the directives of our Attorney General. Thank you.

Thank you. Kim Fortune.

Good morning. Sorry. Good evening. My name is Kim Fortune. I'm a professor and director of EcoGovLab at the University of California, Irvine. I'm again here to comment on the city's zoning code update so far. First, the current zoning code does not reflect input from the community's most disadvantaged communities given so far, nor does it bring new protections to those communities as promised in the general plan update. Nor does the draft realize the legal obligations of Senate Bill 1000, which requires cities and counties to address environmental justice in their general plan and in turn in their zoning code updates and other ordinances, as Yesenia Marujo pointed to. As she also pointed to the Attorney General's 2020 letter, encouraged indeed said affirmatively the city should actively reduce pollution rather than either simply maintain the status quo or allow more polluting facilities near environmental justice impacted communities. Third, I want to comment on how many in the city are thinking and talking about economic development and the city's economic prosperity. Frankly, it seems outdated. Cities like Detroit, mentioned by one of the commissioners in the last meeting, have not rebuilt through traditional industrial approaches. Of course, pipes need to be laid, construction needs to be done, but these cities have been rebuilt with creatively green approaches that I think the city of Santa has a lot to learn from. Finally, I want to voice my sympathies for the business owners who have shared their concerns about the lack of detail and uncertainty in the current draft of the plan. This lack of detail is certainly of concern to residents in disadvantaged communities as well. I also want to suggest that the ways that business interests and economic interests are being pitted against equity is not the only way to approach this. Businesses can prosper in step with environmental equity and protections, and not only through trade-offs that leaves disadvantaged communities disadvantaged. I grew up in a family that ran a small construction company with a welding shop and big heavy equipment yard. I was taught that these businesses could run in a neighborly way and that a good business deal and business operation benefited all the stakeholders involved, the owners as well as their workers, neighbors, and the cities that they were in.

Thank you. Up next we have Jack Haley followed by Irma Haurigin.

Mayor Mrakas, Thank you for letting me speak, I appreciate the updates that have been made to the zoning code from when I first saw it at the end of last year to today wasn't very good, but they planning departments done a great job of meeting with us in the business community to work with. Mayor Mrakas, owners and operators of many of the buildings throughout the city, my name is jack haley i'm a partner with lead associates commercial real estate services. I'm on the board of directors for the Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce. I've been a longtime property owner in the city. I live in the city. I raised my kids in the city of Santa Ana. Santa Ana today is not a heavy manufacturing city as it was 50 or 60 years ago. A large majority of the businesses in the affected rezoning areas are clean small businesses and buildings less than 20,000 square feet. They're not heavy manufacturing companies. They don't have semi trucks parked in front of their businesses. They don't have loading docks that would take large, you know, tall trucks to drop a product. Enacting regulations that make properties unusable for their intended purpose will devalue these properties and create vacancy and will drive good employers to other cities, other business-friendly cities. In the rezoned areas, most of the small industrial properties were built with fenced yards to hide employee cars, company vehicles, raw materials, and finished product. We need to clarify what is meant by fully enclosed industrial uses in the current zoning code. Most of the M1 RI areas on the zoning map are not near residential. Some of the properties do face residential, but what has happened with the zoning map is there's been a very broad brush approach that sweeps a lot of properties into it. They're really not Mayor Mrakas, affecting residences nearby. Mayor Mrakas, And I think there's been some mistakes in the general plan that was put together and it's too bad we can't modify that today was done a while ago. Mayor Mrakas, So far, like I do a lot of work in the area bounded by fairview on one side rate to the east first street to the north. Mayor Mrakas, fifth street to the north first street to the south there's about 50 industrial buildings there that were built in this late 70s early 80s and there's no adjacent residential. They all have little fence yards. They're all heavy manufacturing properties. To have that whole entire area go from M1 to flex is a real problem. So hopefully we can work with the planning department further to really define what these people do for business and hopefully allow them to continue and allow the operators and the property owners to transfer their property in the future by selling the business, by selling or leasing their buildings in the future. Thank you for your time. I'd be happy to talk to you all in the future in more detail about how it affects this community. Thank you. Bye-bye.

Thank you. Irma Jauregui, followed by Jennifer Salas.

Hello, commissioners, staff. I'm Irma Jauregui, past historic commissioner. I live in Wilshire Square. I have been in the city since 1979 and have seen the changes. I have a question. This is very deep, and there's many layers that I'm not totally clear on, but I'm definitely very concerned about the area in Wilshire Square, which is St. Anne. 1322, 1344 South Main, and 1319. That is St. Anne. It's a historic building. That is the anchor and the image of the historic South Main corridor. That is the school, and that is their parking lot. What does this mean that it's going to be a mixed use residential? Are you opening the door to developers to make money? And if something ever happens to the parking lot, it would change the character of the next street is Sycamore, which is the 1400 block fourplexes and the 1300 block duplexes and some single family homes with a high density occupancy. I know that because I walk those streets to pass the prize for our events. Everybody knows I chair the summer concert, the parade, so I'm very, very familiar with Wilshire Square and this is affecting a historic building that I don't see why it would change. It's not even a residential, it's a church and a school. So just to have some clarification, and I would love maybe if we can have somebody come to Wilshire Square to our neighborhood meetings, general meetings, so we can get a detailed explanation of this, just because I might have a total misunderstanding on it. I would love clarity, very specific clarity for now and in the future. On the other hand, I've been listening to everybody, and yes, the economic engine and the health of the city is its income from business. The healthier our businesses are, they produce two-thirds, I mean, they produce the income from the city and consume only one-third of the services, where residents consume two-thirds of the services from the general funds and all the services. So to raise the density in areas that are already heavily impacted is not helping. It's hurting because of the present residents and business owners are not healthy. Putting a heavier weight on them is not beneficial in my eyes. So thank you very much. I do know you've put a lot of work into this and I appreciate a little bit more details. Thank you.

Thank you. Next we have Jennifer Salas followed by Brian Hendricks.

Good evening. My name is Jennifer Salas. I'm here representing UC Irvine EcoGov Lab, working in partnership with the Cornerstone Neighborhood Association. I'll use my time to comment on ways that the zoning code update could better address air pollution, especially in the city's environmentally disadvantaged communities. First, the zoning code draft states that no land use shall generate or cause any visible dust, gases, or smoke to be emitted into the atmosphere. This fails to address invisible and odorless emissions that are equally, if not more, harmful to residents' health and well-being. This passage of the draft should be changed as follows. No land use shall generate or cause any pollution known or suspected to have negative health consequences at levels that would exceed applicable air quality guidelines and reference exposure levels at the fence line of the facility. Facilities permitted to pollute at particular levels should be required to install fence line monitors with real time data from the monitors available to the public. The list of contaminants that need to be monitored includes PM 2.5, VOCs, lead, hexavalent chromium, and other metals and PFAS. Second, industrial activities throughout the industrial corridor near Cornerstone, part of which is now designated a residential industrial interface, should be strictly restricted. Mechanisms for this include the following. A designation of all current industrial operations in the cornerstone area as nonconforming to disallow expansions and allow for up zoning when the property changes hands. This can follow the example of the National City amortization policy, which establishes a process to terminate a nonconforming use after a period of time that is sufficient to allow the owner of the property and or business to recover their investment in the use business. You can also see California Air Resources Board's guidance on this. Proactive, transparent use of the city's nuisance ordinance, revoking business licenses and or terminating utility services when the business violates its operating permits. The Attorney General recommended the latter mechanism in his 2020 letter to the city. Restriction of failure land use to non-polluting green businesses, which is an effective way to revitalize older industrial areas. This means that most uses listed as allowable in the RII in the current zoning draft should not be permitted. Currently allowable uses include freight, truck terminals, heavy recycling processing, general manufacturing, rail facilities, and hazardous material storage. These uses are not consistent with your general plan's commitment to environmental justice. This is only a partial list. I encourage you to explore these options and more proactively. Thank you for your attention.

Thank you. Brian Hendricks.

Good evening. Brian Hendricks with Magis Realty. Commissioner, staff, thank you for this discussion tonight. I want to thank Siri and Ricardo who met with us last week to discuss certain concerns, but I want to draw your attention specifically to the area that actually Mr. Stine had mentioned, which is north Santiago, north of Washington, just right below the five freeway. It was interesting, on the map of all the industrial space across the city, this is a very small piece on the north, really on the whole north half of the city that would be great to preserve as industrial. It has already been moved from M2 to M1, and it also has the residential industrial interface, which we'd like to request that the commissioners and staff consider removing the RII from that small section. Eyeballing it, it seems like about 90% of the M1 RII designation across the city has single family homes directly abutting it. There's large lines of properties with the yellow single family homes right behind it. This piece is very different. As one of the speakers mentioned, there's the five freeway on the city map. It shows the five Right right on top of these properties and you've got railway you've got fuel station and you've got a southern California Edison substation that that won't be moving for a long time, so we just like to request, we think it's it's. Or more than necessary, the operational standards that are already in place which guard the neighbors and protect their interest, but that the RII just goes a little bit too far and requiring standards that are not that are not. Probably inappropriate for that space so would appreciate the Commission staffs consideration and making that adjustment to the comprehensive zoning code up.

Thank you. Secretary, do we have anybody online that would like to comment?

We have one speaker via Zoom, Ms. Erika Gonzalez. If you can please unmute yourself. Thank you.

Yes, hi, good evening everyone. My name is Erika Gonzalez and I am a lifelong Delhi resident and a leader in the Delhi Neighborhood Association. I'm also a director for Orange County Environmental Justice, and I would like to comment on a few items, but first I wanted to uplift a comment that was made earlier about EJ policies and not being very effective. We've mentioned one, well, folks had mentioned one already, the Senate Bill 1000, which did help to usher in a moratorium in the Logan Barrio neighborhood against the crematorium. So EJ policies do work if we know how to work them. And EJ policies only work in cities that have infrastructure to support them, which is what we're trying to build here today. So working class families deserve real opportunities and real solutions to transform their communities for future generations. So with that being said, the two zoning code updates that I wanted to specifically discuss was first the South Main urban neighborhood zoning update. I think someone just mentioned it about St. Anne's and how historic preservation of buildings should be at the forefront. We really want to avoid displacement of any current residences and businesses, or in that case, religious institutions that have been in the neighborhoods and in the communities for generations. So what protocols will be put in place to ensure that this doesn't happen? Tenants' rights should also be upheld and considered when we're constructing these policies. And then I also wanted to bring up renovation of existing structures versus new development, because we know that Santa Ana has a very dark history of opening doors to development and then developers just running amok in our city and with very little oversight and accountability. So I want to make that very clear that if we're going to be opening up these doors to development, there needs to be specific protocols, procedures and accountability measures in place to ensure that we do not run into the same situation that we ran into in the early 2000s. And then I also want to note that along Main Street, most buildings are a single or two story and they all have or most of them have an ADU. So I want to know or I want to ensure that, like I said, the existing buildings, especially historic buildings, are preserved and that the current tenants are not displaced. The second point I wanted to comment on was the flex or the residential industrial interface. As a Delhi neighborhood, as a Delhi resident, I've lived along these industries my entire life. And I can tell you that I've heard numerous stories and have a number of family members that have been directly impacted by the pollution caused by these industries. So I want to note that we were asking for a carbon sink, not this residential industrial interface. We wanted a carbon sink and what a carbon sink does is that it creates a natural remediation of the environment. Urban carbon sinks can be well integrated as a strategic approach while planning.

Thank you, Erica, you're at time. Thank you. Were those all of the speakers online, recording secretary?

Yes, we no longer have any more speakers via Zoom or in person.

Thank you. That concludes the study session and we're well actually that concludes the public comments, do we have any other questions or comments from the Commission for staff after hearing those public comments, Commissioner.

The role of churches in community and there's only seem to be important anchors historically as not only. a place of worship and service, but also serving as a community service and providing other services that are needed in the community. And I was wondering, we recently approved a different kind of church that had no pews and no services, but they were more like an office building, you know, and our zoning allows for those kinds of services in a business complex area. But I'm looking at the neighborhood character of some of the other established churches in the community, like not only New Song, but Tempo Calvario and some of the black churches in the community that have been providing food services, daycare. and other things and was wondering if we need to kind of look at it to kind of ensure that they could operate the kind of social service program, even though their main service is a place of worship, they may be doing other services that we needed in the community. Then there are other kinds of churches that we may want to distinct from that Do not provide any religious service, but we kind of wonder what are they really doing? They have more of an office set up. So I don't know how to reconcile the two. I don't know where to go in terms of the new zoning update. And I just thought I'd bring that up for consideration to be examined.

Thank you, Commissioner, we're not sure if staff would like to respond to that.

Absolutely. I think it's a great comment and churches do provide an important service to the community. We'll take a look at your comment in more depth, but the churches are allowed in many different districts, both in more office type environments as well as in more residential or even commercial corridors. And they would be allowed to offer services to their parishioners without having any problems with the zoning. So we'll take a look and see and potentially follow up with questions to make sure that we're understanding correctly the types of services that you'd like to see in those churches.

Just did a brief research that there's at least four defense area businesses operating in Santa Ana, of which two of them are having to do with drones. and other military uses. And I think that is allowed under our industrial, you know, flex plan and all that. But I just thought I'd bring that to our attention.

Thank you, Commissioner Wu. Commissioner Pham.

Are these our closing comments?

These are comments or questions for staff.

Yeah, I think the main topic that seems to be brought up is there needs to be clarity. And I'm glad Ali brought up our other, was it the TUD with the overlay? And there seems to be a similar feedback. There needs to be clarity. So I think, you know, next meeting, if we're able to just kind of, you did a great job today as well, just to kind of, clarify that it's not going to be a, you know, the zoning code is adopted, and then the next day, you know, a business is kind of hit with a code enforcement letter, right? I think those are similar kind of ideas that we've discussed previously, that it's not going to be, you know, planning is not going to go out and flag properties and flag businesses that are non-conforming, you know, planning has other issues to deal with. So I think some more language on that would be good for our next meeting. And then I think the other issue that seems to come up, there's a lack of clarity about property values and potential impact that the zoning update will have on future sale value. I think that there's nothing that will affect your property value more than the Mayor Mrakas, postponement of this zoning update, because once the zoning update is done, then there's a clear direction on what it can or cannot be you know there's discussion about there needs to be more time to discuss issues, there needs to be more meetings. There needs to be more outreach, which I agree there does. But more meetings, more outreach does not mean that there won't be a day when there's a definitive answer whether or not the property is zoned this way or that way. So my suggestion is, you know, reach out to CERI as the time allows. clarity and a definitive passage of the zoning update would be probably the best for your property because it gives you a definitive answer on what you can or cannot do with your property. That's all. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Fram. Vice Chair Benninger?

You made some very good points, Commissioner. I agree with them. I would encourage staff to go ahead and respond to the NAIOP letter. I think they deserve it. They brought up a number of items that I think we should address. I also continue the work of letting people know. And anyone out there who has a question of not clear what's going to happen long-term to your property, give Siri a call. She'll gladly answer it. She'll gladly explain it. And put it in writing if you don't want to call. But seek the answers on it. The only thing I would like to know at our next meeting, two things. One, I'd like Margarita Macedonia to come and speak from an environmental standpoint. What does she see and how this change is going to affect the environmental justice that this city has gone out to go after on it. So I would like to see her here. And really the question for staff too is parking. Public Works has been conducting a study for too long, and they promise to have an answer by October. The input we hear today, I know that's going to be part of the October response, but is parking in the right place if it's Public Works? It should be planning.

You know, why don't we take down everyone's comments, because I do want to provide some clarifications for the Commission and the audience, too, just at the end. So thank you, Vice Chair.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Benninger. Commissioner Liu.

Today we spent a lot of time on the industrial interface and how that's going to work. We didn't talk about the retail corridors. So next time we come back, can we talk about the retail corridors? Can we talk about what Commissioner Wu brought up about the empty storefronts on 17th or on Main Street and how the plan is going to impact them, possibly revitalize them? Because we have large swaths of buildings that are just empty and understood that small business has been under attack for many years. But what we're doing in that place so that people who own those properties or who are looking to invest can understand what we'd like to see done along the corridors of 17th, Main Street, and others. Because when you think about it, we've got a lot on 17th that we could improve, just like on South Main Street. So just... This time, I understand what we focused on. Next time, focus on that, because those are the two pieces that are going to help the city kind of move forward.

Thank you, Commissioner Leo. Commissioner Guzman.

Thank you, Chair Ramos. Throughout this, first, I want to thank members of the public who came in and voiced their concerns. It helped me understand all the issues. I'm fairly new to this commission, so that was very insightful. One of the things that was acknowledged and I think is going to be City Council Chambers, addressed is the vagueness around the enclosures, I think a lot of the comments from the industrial businesses and properties really didn't understand it, or maybe they do now and after this whole conversation. City Council Chambers, And the other thing I wanted to address or comment on is the fact that this zoning code really does try to strike a balance and addressing the corridors with. The. City Council Chambers, The way that the city of Santa Ana wants to envision itself for the next 100 years of it takes to redo the zoning code, so I really you know hearing all. City Council Chambers, The comments really helped me kind of focus on what I needed to focus in terms of understanding what the zoning code is aiming to do so, I think, everybody and staff you've done a wonderful job and members of the public as well coming in with your comments that was really helpful to me.

Thank you, I have a few questions for planning to add to their queue of questions i'll answer afterwards. But when I heard a few business owners and property owners mentioned the residential industrial interface and it seemed like there were questions on. Why it was applying to areas where they weren't a budding with residential so staff can please explain. What the rationale was for adding that overlay in areas where we don't currently have residential existing and I think I heard the reason why, but would be great for staff to clarify at the end with all of the answers are going to provide and then I also heard three public comments mentioned churches. So that just brings up a few questions for me as of now, how are churches owned. or how are they zoned in this zoning code update and I think I heard that maybe they don't have a specific zoning and they kind of exist everywhere so we could get more information on that why they're zoned that way and why and what does this mean for them so I know the churches that we heard mentioned all have schools on site so just curious about what that means how if at all they're impacted or what if any additional flexibility they have knowing that The existing churches at least I think many throughout the city, but at least those that were mentioned have multiple uses and I think multiple some of them have. Multiple zoning designations right now, including commercial and I think some of the churches have been interested in exploring so would be good to understand how, if at all, does the zoning code update change what they can or cannot do. So those are my questions for now. And also want to say thank you to staff. I realized I didn't say that earlier. So thank you to staff and for providing a much a very thorough presentation, I think much more thorough than last week. So I'm glad to see the improvement. And I heard also a few new maybe approaches for the next meeting. So excited to see us just continue to get more thorough as we continue.

and then i'll give it to our staff now to answer the queue of questions they have uh first of all thank you to everyone who came out and spoke and uh to the commissioners of course and thank you chair um i do want to just uh ensure a couple of principal ideas are answered for anyone that just feels like they just need a straight answer on something and then they decide whether they still are interested in this process or not so First of all, this is not an eminent domain process there's nothing in the zoning code that results in a property being taken acquired anything for a road widening zoning does not mean that the city comes in and builds a project on a private property. So if there's any concerns about what this means for me in terms of developers knocking at the door, that's all driven by the private market. Zoning is simply a set of rules and regulations that's applied to all properties and basically allows property owners to decide what they want to do with their properties and how they can do it. That's just statewide what zoning is, no different in Santa Ana. So again, this is not an eminent domain process by any means. Second of all, and this is more for the commission to think about just policy wise, because you will be put in a position next meeting where now you're being asked to recommend approval of the document to the city council. One of the comments touched on this directly, but a couple alluded to it in the residential industrial interface. And in fact, anywhere else in the code where there's proposed standards for how you operate, those are forward looking. Right, so they don't apply retro actively in the transit zoning code. From spring summer of last year, the code actually does say you have X amount of time to come into compliance with these new standards so even if you're existing, even if you're not conforming. You still have to build a wall for screening, you still have to change your hours of operations, you know. But with this code, just like most other codes, these are applying to new new businesses moving in forward where there's physical improvements that are being asked for. City Council Chambers, And then thirdly, the questions about you know why is the residential industrial it's not our to just for clarification, the residential industrial interface. City Council Chambers, Why is that being applied to schools, for example, not just residential so again, that is a policy question for the Commission. City Council Chambers, Do you want the zoning map to take into account that interface, not just between residences and industrials but also schools and industrial. We have our reasons for including it all because as staff, we don't want the community or the commission to feel like we withheld something, right? Like we didn't actually identify where the schools, where the residences are. Ultimately speaking, this is purely a policy choice of the commission and the council, right? So again, going back to the operating standards that I said are forward-looking, does the commission want it to be transit zoning code style where it applies everywhere? City Council Chambers, With like a let's say six months compliant window compliance window question number two do you believe that that interface overlay should apply with schools and residences or just residences or neither. City Council Chambers, or one or the other and that's totally up to the Commission and your recommendation to city council. We hear loud and clear about what is meant by enclosed operations like does this mean my employees cannot park their cars in the parking lot. versus Does this mean I can no longer carry out manufacturing operations outdoors. Staffs intent and we'll make sure this is ubiquitously clear in the zoning code when it comes to manufacturing it's not meant to be allowed. Outdoors so obviously if there's a parking lot where employees park. it's okay to park your vehicles if equipment can be stored outside and properly screened again we'll make sure that's abundantly clear in the code, but I do want to highlight for the Commission and for the audience. As part of our outreach staff did multiple site tours of property citywide not just industrial but residential commercial everything. on some of the industrial site tours we saw some pretty gnarly things you know there's some stuff that's great where there's good neighbor policies and there's you know proper walls there's proper screening there's a compatibility of uses and in other cases we saw businesses where there's just straight up outdoor dipping and processing and chemicals and manufacturing and you could literally see vapors and steam rising from open barrels of chemicals and that is not something that is allowed in many other cities. And as I said earlier, Santa Ana has situations where people's backyards abut industrial properties. So that is what the core of what the code update is proposing to get at. But again, we will make sure to close that out with the industrial groups to be clear what we are proposing and what's not meant to get scooped up with all that inadvertently. And then, that's it just in terms of like black and whites i wanted to offer for the community this evening and for the commission but of course there was a whole litany of comments that were made about churches and you know parking and all that uh vice chair benninger so yes the public works agency for i think nine years has been carrying out this parking study city-wide and it's meant to look mostly at like the parking districts and the street parking impacts City Council Chambers, zoning codes are where you contain your regulations for on site parking for private properties. City Council Chambers, And then the public works agency manages basically everything that street sidewalk sewers if you can think about it that way. City Council Chambers, But that doesn't mean we operate in silos were in the same building or on top of each other, different floors and yes we've had the coordination to make sure that when this question arises that city council that will be prepared to answer it as well, so thank you.

So there's a process for school districts to clear the property excess surplus property, right? At which time then private market might step in and say, oh, I like to do this with it, right? So if we designate a zoning today, it may affect how the property is decided later on when the school district takes on a character. So maybe what we have right now, you know, suffice, you know, I don't know, but I just thought, to reflect on that. Things change when other jurisdiction makes a decision about regarding the properties under their jurisdiction.

Thank you, Commissioner Wu. Are there any other comments or questions for staff before we close the study session? Great with I just like to go ahead.

I know I mentioned about environmental justice coming, but I also like the economic development group. I realize that Mr. Garcia is gone, but still we'd like to have someone come and have their view on this proposal also because they're greatly involved also.

Thank you, Vice Chair Benninger. Well, without any additional comments or questions for staff on this, the study session has now concluded. Moving on to commission comments for staff. General closing comments. Or staff. Staff has any comments.

Go ahead. Let them go first.

No comments from staff. With that, we'll go ahead to commissioners. Commissioner Leo.

I keep referencing the schools. The peak of the student population in Santa Ana was 61,000 students. School started this week for some, starts next week for others. It's 36,000. How do you keep open that many schools with half? I mean, it's almost half. At some point, the district has to have discussions with the city on what's going to happen with the property. We lack park space and everything else. And if we can't get the district to the table to discuss, then other people in the community need to speak up. The school district has lost 25,000 students since 2002. The city doesn't function with all those employees. If you lose revenue, you make cuts. At some point, the school district, we all need to realize the school district is a partner in the city, but they also need to come clean and be honest with us and say which schools are empty, which we need to condense. And so that the city and the school district can plan, okay, oh, look, here's one with a playground. Oh, we can make it into another park. Because everybody comes here and complains about parks. I get it. School district can help us. Instead, we gerrymander parks at Centennial Park shares with Godinez. At some point, the district needs to come clean and tell us what they're going to do with the surplus properties. Like you mentioned, Alan, at some point, we need workforce housing, which was moderate level housing in the city. I don't know what else. I'm going to keep saying it because the school district needs to understand they're almost half the size now. Let's be realistic. Those are public assets that we all paid for. Somebody's got to fess up, be honest, and let's just move forward so we can have more park space. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Leo. Commissioner Guzman.

Just piggybacking on that comment, I know that there was a person on the phone that talked about cabinet sinks and, you know, not pie in the sky kind of thinking, but should the school district come to the table, a lot of those could become cabinet sinks in the form of parks. So I think that that's one of the ways that we could address all these environmental justice issues at some point, pie in the sky kind of thing. But the school district has to come clean, I guess.

Thank you. Commissioner Wu, do you have any final comments? It's also okay if you don't.

I just want to congratulate staff on the good job you're doing on this document. It's a difficult thing to explain to people that it's forward thinking, and it's not designed to punish any property. But we do need to clean things up, you know, and you have an opportunity to do it.

Thank you, Commissioner Wu. Commissioner Pham.

Thank you, staff. Thank you, Siri. And I was going to thank the consultants, you know, because the actual physical zoning code, it's very well done, in my opinion, good diagrams, I've always asked for it. As opposed to our current zoning where it's very hard to navigate. But I really like the way it's organized. I prefer table formats, which is what is being presented right now, or is being proposed. I think that, you know, It will really help facilitate developers own even homeowners to be able to point to things point to diagram and for us planners to point back. To the homeowners developers hey love you know it's very clear, these are your setbacks, these are your usage, and you know, whatever the content of the zoning code is. The actual manifestation of what you kind of facilitate in terms of the structuring of things, I think you know it's very a success, in my opinion, because it's it's a great way to communicate to the Community that. you're actually looking into things and that you're putting numbers to setbacks you're putting numbers to heights you're considering you know the facade needs to be pushed back X amount of. feet before a change in elevation, things like that. You know, I think that's, you know, if you're a resident, I think you should really see that it's communicating that city staff is looking at the minute details, and not just saying, stucco boxes in this area, you know, three story stucco boxes in that area, it shows a level of care that you know, Obviously you want to see in every city, but it does show a level of care that this specific city consider for its residents to take the time and the level of detail to look at every district, look at the architectural aspect of it, and the parking, the landscaping. It should be a testament to the level of care that the staff has for the city. Thanks.

Thank you, Commissioner Pham. Vice Chair Benninger.

Unfortunately, Commissioner Leo, we are not controlled with the school board. I just recently was at the Rob Richardson Welcoming Center. Beautiful building, and they're revising it to include We Share, but I looked at the hunk of land that it sits on close to Monterey High School. Unbelievable. If we converted that to a park in the city, it would be wonderful. But it's really for the city officials to work with the school board. And I don't know what the secret is either because LA has the same problem. They've kept the same staff, but they have half the number of kids. Somewhere along the way, it's got a break on it. I do appreciate all the comments tonight. I thought there was a lot of great input. I do encourage anyone that is questionable how this plan is going to affect them to please give planning a call, especially Siri. She will answer it. I do like to comment about my beloved Detroit. God, I don't want to go back to what the industry was in 1960s. I was there when the River Rouge caught fire because so much pollution on top of it by Ford Motor Company. And I do admit that, yes, greener industrials come back, but the question was brought up because a comment was made, who needed industry? Well, we all need industry, but it pays the bills. And someone sent in very good information to us about, and from Pepperdine University, talking about how much industry funds and what it puts in. And with that, I also said, too, you don't have to stand for releases that are above limits. I don't support that at all. As a chemical engineer who worked on that stuff, I was very disappointed what happened in Garden Grove. And I expressed my feelings to Phil Becerra, who sits with the fire department, because they had no emergency plan. The manufacturer of that chemical didn't come up to them and give them ideas. And that's totally not acceptable. When I worked for Dow Chemical and other companies, we had emergency plans. We had MSDS sheets ready to go. So when the fire department showed up, they knew what they were dealing with, and we could explain to them. It wasn't just cut and run. And when you look at that, I remember one comment by the fireman saying that, well, the tank split, but it didn't release anything. That's not how it works. But anyway, with that in mind, I hope you are getting on EPA and the government and Air Quality and Department of Talk and Substance, who regulates those emissions and releases. And I would like to see some data. I know Madison green used to do collection of data on particulates and showed good example what happens when fireworks are used in the city. All those levels go up that's data that you can use and that data, you can work with to make changes so with that again, thank you to the city, this is a great undertaking I know it's a lot of work, a lot of effort and and definitely appreciate it, thank you.

Thank you, Vice Chair Benninger. And I'll just say once again, thank you to staff for the presentation today. And I also want to sincerely thank everybody that came out to speak tonight, everybody that came out to watch the meeting and engage with us. It's been great to hear from residents, from business owners, property owners, church representatives. So I hope that you will continue to join us, not just at the next meeting, but that you will also join when this goes to council, where we'll go through two readings. So Again, thank you all. And our next regular meeting is scheduled for August 24th at 5.30 p.m. With that, this meeting is adjourned.