Economic Development, Communications, and Marketing Committee - Regular Meeting

I now call to order the downtown community task force meeting of 10/16/2025. Staff, please call the roll.

Thank you. Member Thompson?

Here.

Member Ondersack? Here. Member Mayor? Here. Member Von Hoon? Here. Member Vargas Smith? Member Reid? Member Coyne?

Here.

Member Collins?

Here.

And member Varginay is not present. I do need to say that we do have a member participating under AB two four four nine. So when we take votes, I'll be asking him a couple of questions. Okay. So you can go ahead, chair. We want to excuse.

Is there a motion to excuse, member Varshney? So moved.

Second.

And that passes.

Oh. Oh, all in here.

To do a we'll have to do a voice roll call vote. Sorry.

All

in. Because we have a member participating remotely. So I will start with chair Thompson. I just need you to where's the list here?

So I I'm

Disclose, yeah, disclose that there no individuals 18 or younger present in the room with you.

There are no individuals 18 or older older. Right?

18. Yeah. Over the age of 18. Sorry.

Over the 18 age of 18 would be no.

Correct. Okay. So we'll take a roll call vote. Member Thompson? Aye. Member Ondersec?

Aye.

Member Mayor?

Aye.

Member Von Hoon? Aye. Member Vargas Smith? Member Reid? Member Coyne?

Aye.

Member Collins?

Aye.

That passes unanimously, member of Arjunae's excused.

Motion passed. And then page two.

So then we go to staff. Please read the DCTF meeting procedures into the record.

Yes. Thank you. Meetings are conducted by the chair in accordance with the following procedures. The chair of the DCTF directs all activity during the meeting. Any item on this agenda may be continued to a subsequent meeting. Special procedures time limits may be applied to any items as prescribed by the chair. Copies of the current agenda and any staff reports for items on the agenda are available online on the Downtown Precise Plan website as well as on the city clerk's website.

We now move to the consent calendar.

Thank you. We have no items this evening.

K. And

to public presentations, is there anyone that would like to address the task force on items that are not on the agenda?

We do have one person in the audience who would like to address the task force.

Hello, task force. I'm Rina Brio. I'm in our city manager's office. I'm the director of economic development and sustainability. I know all of our task force members.

I am here to give you a very quick update. As you know, many people are interested in the redevelopment of our downtown, and we have begun an effort to provide an RFP for the potential redevelopment of the city owned property in Blocks A and b. So a couple things to note about that. Just want folks to be aware that we have an office building that's on the corner of Lafayette and Homestead. It's 900 Lafayette, commonly referred to as Commerce Plaza.

That building over the course of a year has actually been vacated. And so we now have the opportunity to do some programming, which we've been working on for our big events for next year. Simultaneously, city staff, myself specifically, as well as a couple community members, specifically Adam Thompson and Rob Mayer, have been meeting frequently in order to kind of understand the requirements that we have in our precise plan, as well as in our form based code for what redevelopment entails on that city owned property, recognizing it's a catalyst property. And we have a lot of benefits that are to be included in that in that development. So the reason for doing this is we want to be able to an issue an RFP that would help potential developers understand all the areas that they might want to explore with the property, and all the benefits that would need to be included, as well as maybe some of the areas of flexibility, not related to the precise plan or form based code, but in terms of how the city might see development occur.

And I think, really, we've done a lot of work looking at prototypes, for instance, to fit development within these two blocks. So, originally, we had thought that we could bring forward an RFP as early as December and have that out on the street. However, this is actually kind of a longer process, and more work needs to be done. It's it's absolutely very useful work that I think will lead to a better RFP getting issued. We also wanna time this so that when an RFP hits the street, it's given the due attention that it deserves and isn't sort of in the shadow of big events that are happening at the beginning of next year.

So, really, the the tentative timeline for that is probably in the late February, early March time frame. But I wanted the task force to know, because I know this is near and dear for all of you and for people listening, that the city is working on an RFP process. There's a a fair amount of outreach still yet to be done. So this isn't a official, if you will, status update on it, but just wanted people to, first of all, know that this is work in the process and the general time frame for when it would be released. And I did want people to know I I am gonna be leaving our meeting, but a topic you guys are discussing is also important to me tonight, your community benefits assessment. So I'll be joining remotely for the rest of the meeting.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Thank you. Are there is there any other public comment that's not on the agenda?

I have no hands on line.

K. Okay. Moving on to general business. Moving on to general business, and staff announces first item.

Alright. Thank you. So this evening, we have for you an introduction and discussion of the community benefits program for Downtown Precise Plan. Through a competitive RFP process, we selected our consultant, RSG. They have a presentation for you. I'm gonna let them introduce themselves and go through their presentation.

If you want to. Yeah. That's fine. There's not

a clicker.

Oh,

even better.

Alright. Good evening, members of the downtown community task force and the public that are watching today. My name is Jim Simon. I am president and principal of RSG. We're a California based consulting firm with offices in Oakland, Los Angeles, and North San Diego County.

We've been in business for about forty five years now or approaching forty five years. I've only been there thirty five of those forty five years. Although you couldn't tell by looking at me, I suppose. We do work primarily for public agencies, mostly cities, a 120 clients throughout California. Locally, my clients include cities of Fremont, Redwood City, San Carlos, Belmont, South San Francisco, Daly City.

I know I'm forgetting some in the immediate area, obviously, and now Santa Clara as well as, you know, several other many clients throughout the Bay Area and throughout California. I think our, you know, work tonight in the discussion about this phase of project that you guys are at is on the community benefits. And so this provides you this slide provides you a little background about some of the work we've done. I've been up here since Tuesday because Tuesday night had a council meeting in San Carlos where they approved another development agreement with the Minkoff Group to develop a 370,000 square foot life science project, which is pretty uncanny in this market right now because there's entitling those things is entitling anything these days is is is rare given the situation the market's in. But, you know, we're grateful that the developer continue to move forward over the past five years that project since that project was initiated.

And Citi received about 4.1 or will receive $4,100,000 of community benefit assistance from them. We do all of those. Those projects are done on negotiated basis. We'll talk about that in a subsequent meeting, but and what that means. We've also done projects that involve hotel projects, life science projects of up to 1,700,000 square feet.

Alexandria Real Estate earlier this year was another project that we were worked on that got about 50,000,000 in community benefits. Redwood City, we've been involved with their downtown with their implementation of their, what they call, the downtown gatekeeper projects, which if you're familiar with that, those are projects they release through a competitive RFP process to let developers bring forward proposals for sites. And through that, they had to submit submit proposals for community benefits along with those those applications. We're also presently working on I can't get into too many details about it yet, but some infill projects on city owned property that that we're looking at. And then earlier this year, we worked with the city of Belmont, initiate their efforts to start doing community benefit agreements.

They've been one of the the latter cities. Throughout all this work, we've studied community benefits throughout the state, but particularly in the Peninsula because there's been a great deal of activity here. And so we've often, you know, studied the different ways that these programs are done, you know, fee based negotiated combination, and have obviously a lot of expertise on that. We have a YouTube channel if you're interested to watch our our video on community benefits programs, which you're welcome to check out, subscribe, and as they say, and and whatever, like, subscribe. But and we've presented on the topics, like, events like CALLED, which is the California Association for Local Ocular Adultment, and the APA Annual Conference in in Riverside last year.

So we have done a fair amount of community benefits work. So, you know, from the city's RFP, this is kind of really discussing now what is our role, why are we here tonight or and and starting this work? So, you know, we understand the, you know, the precise plan prescribed, the objective of creating a community benefits program that would obtain the desired investments in the community. There was an outline of those projects, and we'll talk a little bit more about those tonight in exchange for either height and or floor area ratio. At the time, there's been discussion about a fee based program to be put into place.

A fee based program means that applicants would have the option of paying a fee in lieu of providing on-site community benefits or project based community benefits. They may be off-site in some cases, but that's that's the the mechanics of what was kinda laid out in the RFP. Our process, which pretty much follows what was in the city's RFP, is project initiation, public outreach. I think we have three task force meetings. This is the first of those that we'll be having throughout this process.

There's a couple of community workshops that will occur later in the process as well. An economic and financial analysis looking at what the cost of the program would be and for the prescribed or the identified community benefits that this city is seeking as well as ways in which that could be applied to different types of development that occur within the precise plan area, and then developing documentation to sort of implement that. That would be the sort of rules of of of how the program would work. Things addressing things such as if someone chooses to pay a fee or not pay a fee, how's how does that translate? What happens to the fee revenues that's collected?

And, ultimately, how do we make sure that the projects that are anticipated get billed? And then, ultimately, that'll be brought forward to public hearings with the planning commission city council and then adoption of the actual program. Some of the key considerations to doing this work is to reset to the current market conditions and then do a forecast of what build out might look like. Anytime you're looking at prescribing any kind of a fee based program, you have to sort of know what's the quantity of development that's anticipated. Obviously, the precise plan as a form based code did not prescribe a a a total cap on that, but there are some guidelines that we can pull from some of the representative documents like the sequence study and other things that we've been looking at that, for example.

And then and then really refining the scope of the buyer community community benefits. There was not, you know, in the precise plan, an extensive list. There was some bullets and high level things, and I think one of the things that we're hoping to talk about tonight is getting your input on that as well as anyone that's here from the public. And then allocating those benefits across the various types of development that are proposed. There may be some situations too with the city owning about a third of the developable property within the area that there could be the opportunity for the city to extract those community benefits through that RFP process that was alluded to earlier tonight.

We've worked with the city or the county of Los Angeles on a project in Chinatown on a two acre property recently, which was a very difficult long time project. The community had been waiting for for over forty years to try to get this parking lot redeveloped. And through extensive efforts, now entered into a county's entered into a development agreement with Link Housing, which is an affordable housing developer, to build 300 affordable housing units, restore some of the public parking, not all of it, and and also, hopefully, provide perhaps a grocery or some other type of community serving use. That's an area in the Los Angeles downtown, if you're familiar, that doesn't really have those types of uses. They've seen a great deal of gentrification and displacement take place and loss of businesses as a result to that serve the China the Chinese community in the area.

The program recommendations would include things like which would would be the fee and how would that correspond to the various types of incentives. How do you deal with things like credit? So if a developer says, okay. I'm going to build this facility or this plaza or whatever it is that the program just prescribes. What is what's the value of that? Right? And that could be tricky because those things can be can be a little complicated as implementation. And then any other corresponding details that may come come about. Here's the schedule that we're on. So we're in the 2025.

So we're we've already begun some of the work in terms of, you know, picking up from what was left off before and updating some of those financial analyses, initiating the project, and and now moving into starting to develop the framework document and, obviously, the engagement with the task force. You see there that we expect this to be about, you know, about a year, year and a half project that would probably, you know, wrap up sometime around this time next year by the time we're done. So I wanna make sure. Yes. Okay.

Tonight, I don't know how to move out of the window, by the way. See if that's in the way of anybody. Maybe someone does. But tonight, what we wanna do is we've brought forward some discussion points, and we're gonna be taking notes. So as we're listening, that we'll get into referring to the list of the community benefits that we put forth in that slide.

Trying to see it away. We can put it up on screen so that you can see it as well as have the camera not be in the way. Can't really move that. Can you just you can't yeah. I can't really That might work.

That might work. We can we can have we can manage this. We won't go through all the questions at once, and we'll kinda go through the list. Yeah. And then so pay the little box being on the screen.

Well, that's interesting. Well, that's really interesting. Okay. So we're gonna hopefully, the computer will stop moving for us. But we have we really wanna get into a conversation tonight to try to add some perspectives from the public on what type of community benefits.

I mean, we have some categories of things, but we really would like to get some some details from you. So we kinda developed some questions for you all to think about, and we can kinda go through those and maybe one at a time, talk about it in terms of offering some perspectives. So the first one is, you know, we as you can see, maybe we can start by just reading off what's in the precise plan. It says arts and cultural destinations. I that may or may not be cut off.

I don't think it is, though. Arts and cultural destinations that include the Santa Clara Theatre, Cultural Arts Center, and Market Hall. The second was a public parking garage that can support these venues, visual and performing arts, art venues or movie theaters and locations that are other than the arts commons, but downtown. I'm reading them right off the screen here. Conservation of historic resources are contributing buildings to historic districts.

Land dedication for the public realm that exceeds the district average. Enhanced contributions to public realm improvements above fair share development impact fees, including infrastructure, paving, planting. This is a good eye test for me. Furnishings, public art, and implement other implementation elements. And then finally, enhanced contributions to district transit infrastructure and operations.

So that's what we had to work with, which is, you know, candidly fairly general. So we would like to try to find out, you know, if there's some examples or specific types of projects that folks had in mind that would really help us obviously establish what we're looking at. Because in order for us to really come up with a fee, we have to know what it is that's getting created

from the fee.

So trying to create some definition, we're numbers people, so, obviously, metrics are always helpful. But, we'll appreciate any kind of feedback that you can offer on that. So the first thing that we wanted to talk about is with that list in mind that we just went through, it maybe hopefully, you've seen the last two years, since you last met. Describe the community benefits program that you envision and walk us through how you see the program working. Now if if there's things that other than what we've already said, of course, I'm not you don't expect you to offer any additional thing or looking for additional comments or thoughts on that. So I guess we'll start with that question.

I I got a question, cochair.

Dan, can I

Go ahead?

So one thing I noticed was that you said that it was gonna be a fee and lieu fee, and I think that's problematic from the beginning. We wanna make sure that any benefit for said density in this area is the the benefit comes back to this area. It we have a pretty large list of things that we want. Mhmm. So to get those things, we we I I don't wanna put it into a fee and have it taken away to some other area of the city.

So that's for starters. And then for the way you were asking about metrics, I mean, originally, it was actually brought up that, potentially, what we would do is for the floor area ratio that we would be giving them, the additional in the bonus density, that we would be receiving in a lieu payment on an annual basis. So we basically would be partners on those upper floors. So that way, those funds would then be self reported, auditable if the city so desires. Those funds would come into the community district for the downtown, and then those improvements would be made as see as needed and as time permits.

I mean, one of the things that I think that was kind of the genesis of this is if you look at Santana Row, they have rebuilt their plaza, I think it's three or four times, one one of the two since they built it in 2000. The reason being is because the demographics have changed, the use has changed, they've made additional improvements, they've enlivened it, and I think that's really kind of the the downtown's only gonna survive and and be relevant if it continues to maintain itself and be relevant. So I don't know if you've seen anything like that before where, you know, there's a percentage of, hey. You get the upper floors, but you share a certain percentage of the annual gross revenue to the city. And that way, they can continue to maintain and improve that downtown district over time.

Okay. Is

there other I I'm just, yeah, I'm just here listening, so we're not trying to get into discussion. I will say that any any when we talked about that, I do wanna clarify that the fee program that any type of fee program for some community events program is always dedicated to some specific purpose. So it wasn't to that just to be clear, we're not saying that that would be a fee program that go into the city coffers and use anywhere in the city.

We've unfortunately seen those fees collected and not get used. So I I prefer that the fee is you know, I think I think we need the construction built, the capital built as, you know, as they build their development up front. I mean, right now, we have gateway crossings across the way that was supposed to build a tavern in the the park, and they didn't build it. And, again, that was one of the community benefits that was negotiated and agreed to in the DA agreement. And, ultimately, the developer chose to sidestep that and has yet to build it.

The park's built. They got their housing built, but they haven't built the community benefit portion. So it is a a deep concern. We've seen issues with, you know, deferred benefits in the past, and so we wanna make sure that the benefits are realized with the development successful. So Can

I just follow that up? So what's the recourse of the city when they don't do that?

That would be probably defined in the development agreement to be candid. That's a legal agreement between the city and the developers. So if the developers obviously, I don't know the development agreement, but, typically, every city is gonna enter into a development agreement that prescribes penalties if they do or do not do something on a timely basis when we again, I use the examples of projects I've worked on. You know, we take that into consideration. So if it's not delivered by x date, there's a a penalty effectively. And what that penalty is is negotiated, but there's a there's an impact. So, obviously, I don't know this project or what that's called for.

Yeah. I don't I don't know if they had a a DA.

Feel I like have Adam, did they have a DA?

Just a a plan development zoning.

No. They have a they have a DA. They have

a PD

Okay. Which required them a DA because the hotel, when they wanted to kick the hotel, that was a big fiasco as well. So

Yeah. The phased development. You're right.

Yeah. It's phased project. So yeah, but yeah.

Thank you. Thank you.

Any other thoughts on the first question about the sort of overall sort of framework of the program?

I do you want me to go? Yeah. Where are you gonna go? K.

So you've named them, you know, as far as what our group has has been after is the theater. What I'm interested in, and we we could be getting into this, is required parking for if a theater was to go in. So I know it's a different scale of parking spaces per, I think, square footage or something like that. I don't know if, you know, we're gonna go down that,

but that's a substantial, you know, amount of cost.

Also, architectural facades of the theater, you know, we've got yeah. I belong to the group that, know, began this this crazy effort. And one of our main I think our main visions was at least in two or three cases that the facade of one of

the

buildings replicates, especially in the theater's case, is it's an easy cast art deco, you know, super simple, with a very complicated neon sign, but things like that. Right? Amenities like that, put in. And then the last one is very complex and would take a meeting in itself is relief for the retailers below. These guys aren't making money up top. They're making their money up top above the 2nd Floor. Is there a way of helping out the retailers below so we get a full set of

This is a this is a common question these days. Let me tell you. I've been asked just in the by another city in the Peninsula just just this week that very same question. So yeah.

Oh, so in short, I think what our vision is is a thriving downtown that is an a destination for everyone who lives in Santa Clara and even beyond. But there's something iconic about it, not just the theater or the the art center, but there's lots of placemaking. There's lots of places to go meet your friends, hang out. There's some green space. There are permanent places for temporary art, rotating exhibits, things like that, and just have it be a very vital, like, heart of the community.

So when you say community benefits to me, I'm thinking not just the people who are living there, but the people who are living all over Santa Clara and the people that we want to come to, you know, to buy things from the retailers or eat in the restaurants and not just the the people who are living there or working there. So

Yes.

I I can't stress that enough that we want something place making, vital, and iconic for the city. And and that, I think, is gonna need somewhat of an endowment, whether it's these fees that go into, you know, a a bucket that becomes an endowment or if it's something, as Adam described, that is an annual kind of investment in the placemaking, that's what we'd like to see.

Mhmm. Sure. Got it.

I just wanna reiterate that. When we started this committee, one of the very first things we said is we wanna place it to destination that's eighteen seven. It's not about building a strip mall that maybe people will come and do an arcade or something like that. The the basis of this discussion was it's destination that'll be supported by the buildings around it rather the other way. So I think that's been very important to this committee as we've gone along.

We don't believe if you build it, they will come. We believe if you have a destination with things to do for all Santa Clarins, as Deborah said, for families, for the university students, for the community, that's what we're looking for. We're not in my opinion, we're not looking at, let's pull people from San Francisco or Oakland. Let's take care of our community. What does our community need?

What do they want? So as we look at this, we've gone through this list before, that public accessibility physical spaces, you know, a gathering place where people feel comfortable just to come and spend time. If they shop, if they live there, that's great, but it's a place you feel comfortable coming to. You we've talked about the art center and the parks and the galleries. Those things are very important.

So some of that retail space could be pop up galleries, could be things that draw people there also. We we we talked a little bit about the public aesthetic projects. We think it's vitally important to have public art projects that reflect our history, that reflect our community, whether that's streetscapes or murals or things like that. Again, ways to draw people into our downtown, a draw for tow tourists that are coming downtown, making sure we have spaces for public events. So concert spaces, street performers, festivals, things like that that aren't that are easily accessed to our community, both for the presenter who's bringing something down and also the community.

So not something that is so formal that let's put up dates, let's put up walls, Let's charge a lot of money and do things like that. But that feeling that old fashioned feeling of community that we should do. I wanna make sure that we also have infrastructure, that public infrastructure. So if we build parks that we have money to put playgrounds in. You know?

A funny part of this is we wanna make sure we have public toilets so that somebody that's downtown, you don't have to go knock on the door of an apartment or something like that. And then the other thing is, which, Dan touched on, I think, is important, is this the community service part. We have a lot of small retailers here. The last thing we wanna do is build a downtown that chases them away. So how do we work out an arrangement to make sure they're here? Is there rent subsidies? Is there tenant improvement subsidies? Things like that that might be available as we move forward. And then finally, we had a discussion at one point. Who manages this?

How does this work? Do we have our own downtown association that actually is a nonprofit that these community benefit funds sit with, and they're the ones that help manage and help direct it. So it doesn't have that chance of falling into the big bucket of the community operating budget. So those are the main parts. And then the other part, I don't know if this fits into it or not, but I know we've had conversations about housing.

So can we have housing for families, for low income? And I don't know if that's on the construction side and the development side or if that's something that falls in the community benefits. But there's a lot of pieces that we put together over the last many years that we wanna make sure don't fall to the wayside, that we really know what our focus is. Thank you.

Let me guess I don't project that much. Alright. A lot of the things that they mentioned, you'll see we're all interconnected about. I'm gonna seven years, I've been doing a parade in downtown. The infrastructure is like There's, like, no way to have wonderful activation.

Is kind of equipment. Can we drag down here on a large truck, put a dumpster here? I mean, it's not conducive to activation. The spaces that we have in downtown, demolished, much of it is land. So I just need so hard. There isn't any So we do need a way to tell our history again. It's the history. There is one great building there. It's the post office that survived. Other than that, you could walk our streets, look at our sidewalks. Even the street signs say nothing about who we are. It's like we don't

Can I can I ask you a question just as a follow-up? Because I'll I'll I wanna circle back on something you've said because a lot of the discussion so far has been very clearly things like within the the 10 blocks. But some of what you may be talking about could extend beyond the 10 blocks in terms of infrastructure when you mentioned that in place making. Do you see things happening outside the 10 blocks as a benefit to downtown or something that you would not see as a benefit to downtown?

Yeah. I think we need to consider what's nearest, and that's the train station.

Also a very

Originally, we were one of two train stops, and it had a lot to do with the university that made that happen.

We

are the oldest university in the state of California. There is history around

Can you speak into the mic, please?

Sure. Is that better, Adam?

Yeah. Thank you.

So I was saying, Adam, that there's a lot of history around the 10 blocks that we absolutely have to connect to because that's where people will land. And if they don't land there and know about 10 two blocks from here is the downtown, then we are never connecting with these people. And so we have a very disjointed downtown that isn't connecting to what's around us, university, the train station, art that's coming in. I mean, we're like this well kept secret in 10 blocks. Yeah.

So bringing a community benefit that connects to those very important busy places around us, that's gonna revitalize our downtown. And then once they're there, we should have places that tell our story. And that means bringing the history back into it, whether it's art, but also bringing the technology into it. Our next generation is amazing. They know what to do with more of these devices than I ever will, and our downtown's not set up for that. They get frustrated. There's no Wi Fi. The kids want to leave. They want to go home. There should be that kind of connection, technologically speaking, to make it a successful activation.

We can see now, talking about the games, how frustrated we're getting that we can't have these great festivals because it's such a huge cost to bring in that connect connectivity to make it a successful event that happens easily in other cities. So we are 1955 Santa Clara.

Mhmm.

Yeah. I think that we talk about everything that Anna just said and and and Dan. Connecting the university to I'm not talking just about this the daily population of the campus there. I'm talking about the hundreds of thousands of visitors that come to the campus every year for events and public events and all our open venues. Whether those are I mean, it's it's an endless list of, of a draw of the campus has the open spaces, but our venues are almost exclusively open, and we host numerous community events.

So how can we I mean, it's a bit I mean, if I was a developer looking to, okay. How many people are what's the foot traffic gonna be at this place? We can be a great funnel into the downtown and vice versa in terms of extending venues we have with the downtown, to enhance the experience.

So when you said the 10 blocks, like, the 10 blocks, if you from an urban planning standpoint, the last eight years has taught me the original folks who planned this knew a hell of a lot more than anybody today. No offense. What they did to connect the 10 blocks are things like light poles, you know, that were the exact same going down Benton Street to the train station. And there's still, I think, out of 50 of them, there's probably four left who are at the university. These art deco, you know, lampposts that we should recreate and connect, you know, these the downtown to Santa Clara University to the stationary plan that's being done right now,

you

know, things like that

Mhmm.

To where you look down a street and you just see that that connection.

Yeah. One idea.

Okay. So, basically, you know, we've been spent over five years creating this precise plan on the form based code and everything, and one of the big things was height. Right? And so here we are talking about this program is gonna allow more height in the town. And so it was a big fight.

A lot of people wanted the town of the, you know, the nineteen fifties and before, and that's not what they're gonna get because it's not economical. So I kinda concur what Adam said is that, you know, for for example, you you right now, you do in lieu fees. Let's say, for a parking garage, it's a onetime fee and you're done. But somebody that gets those extra floors with getting rent through history and through time is benefiting long term, and and it would be great to make to capture that. And so, like Adam said, that we're partners over the long haul.

It's gotta be fair, obviously. We're not trying to take advantage of anybody, but that we're our finances are are going along as theirs are going along. Like, we're getting money continually. It's it's it's return on on that give. Right? We're still getting more for it over time. And so that's important to me and also making sure we really whatever is said in terms of how the benefit, you know, is written financially, that that adjusts based on economic conditions. It can work, like, for us and against us, but we want it to be fair. We don't wanna be stuck with, oh, wow. This rate is so low, and we're twenty years down the road. Know?

Right.

Nothing. So getting to the one of the import most important things. I mean, the form has all been taken care of in the form based code as you get as good as we can. But the the arts commons, essentially, it says, I think, the precise plan, that's really like the town square. It's fairly small, but it's still what the intent was a town square as a gathering place.

And the the neat thing about Santana Row, because Adam and I are both on the RFP process, is Adam found out that the the little plaza that's in Santana Row has a couple of, there's an ice cream shop that popped up and another. I forgot what the other thing is, but it's evolved, but it's about the same size. So it's kind of interesting. And if you haven't been over there, I encourage you to go over there, and see it. I forget it's Maggiano's is the restaurant that kind of flanks one end of it, but that's that's a pretty successful I wish it was bigger.

It feels a little cramped. They packed a lot in, and I think I haven't been there in a while. But that's a good, you know, just reference point of something that, you know, you can look at. But, yeah, I'm trying to think if there's anything else that comes to mind. I know we talk a lot about these things, but it's it's it's you know, there's obviously big things that are gonna make a greater impact, and then there's smaller things that that maybe will evolve over time. Like, there is a precise plan or a specific plan, sorry, that's going on with the station, the train station. That's 200 plus acres, and some several of us are on that that committee as well. So that there that's going on there as well. But I am worried. I don't want the money.

I just given the history of the city, where someone pays in lieu and it doesn't go on the property. Right? We we need as much bang for our buck in this location to catalyze our downtown because you know? So that's enough said from

here.

Yeah. I mentioned San Carlos, like, was one of the places I work in, and they've done a lot on the community benefit side. They've also created a child care linkage fee was one of the few cities that have done that in the in the area. And the good news is they've been collecting a lot of child care linkage fees. Bad news is they haven't built any more child care centers. So it's like sometimes sometimes the challenge of of getting the fees. Right? Because and, you know, cities aren't exactly in the business of building child care centers. So so, you know, you do have some of those challenges to to to, you know, a fee based program and collecting revenues, but all all good points. So I don't think we've heard from Matthew yet, though.

I will try not to repeat, I think, the captured well from folks. I think just the big picture, I think, that we talked about is that we're trying to figure out how to build a destination, and that's a challenge. We talked a little bit about interaction outside of the space. I think a lot of it is how do people get to that space that we've created that's gonna be great for everybody. One of the things I think I said it, but I've heard it from a couple other people over the years is part of the question that we've been working with is what do we have to do to get what we want?

And I think there's a pretty good understanding of the outlines of what what we want. And the question is, and this is part part of your task if if you accept it, which I think you have, is what do we have to do to make that real? I it's really great to see the kind of evolution of ideas. Believe it or not, we're a very tight knit group, but we haven't brown act unless I've been the odd one. We haven't been coordinating, so I think some of it has developed over time.

But I think the point is, how do we get those resources to sort of function in that space? And you talked about the risk of fees sitting in account waiting for that other 70% that they need to actually be spent. Good point. I think we're also conscious of the fact that this is a difficult market, and I think that's part of the inspiration. And so there's a a hope that we can understand how to continue to invest in the long term.

One thing I would say about the list is I think we recognize that the parking garage, really important to the art space. It's also really important to the rest of the space. The the reality is to have enough people in that space is gonna require us to have a place for them to park, and that's been pretty critical to downtowns in Santa Clara. And so it's both acknowledging that there are big events that need to be accommodated, and we're gonna have to reuse those. Good news is we will be challenges figuring out how to how to pay for that.

I would raise one more thing that which alluded to. I think the question of the housing has been really important. I have been an advocate for making sure that this space is a place that's accessible to everybody in the city and people who work there. My guess is the market would provide zero housing opportunities for 90% of the people that will end up working in these retail. Or and so we really wanna make a commitment to making sure that that space is accessible and shared and integrated, and that's tough.

Yeah. I'll just say one thing because it was off second part of my housing conversation because it was off agenda. There has been an assumption that the public parcels would go through some version of being declared surplus before they were sold and would be responsible for following the surplus land act in California and that that was likely where we were gonna negotiate our way through some portion of the housing to be affordable. So I don't know what's expected in the RFP. I know some folks have been involved.

I don't know if the intention is to declare the land surplus and follow the law or if there's some other way that that it's being thought of. So the reason it's not on the list is not because we didn't talk about it. It's because we sort of assumed that that was gonna be, yeah, solved or something in a different way. But I think the intention of making the space accessible to folks that that that don't otherwise have the means to Right. To have access to it's important. Right.

Just like to add one other thing you'd mentioned about the 10 block area. We took a extensive amount of time to discuss the areas outside the 10 block area. If you look at Benton Street with the single family homes, we specifically talked about housing that would fit into those homes. So we're talking about townhouses at that point. We talked extensively about the thoroughfares, how Benton Street would work in into this whole project, especially tying into the train station, but also Lafayette, which runs the other direction.

We talked about the corner of Lafayette And Benton Street being the gateway or entrance or something that would really draw attention to draw people into the downtown. We talked about the university, which directly across the street has the Arts paseo with the Mayer Theatre, the Fest Parker, the music Recital hall, art and art history, and how we could tie in that arts common in the downtown on Franklin Street right across from it, which would have the movie theater, which might have the outdoor venues. I'm trying to think about what we talked about going up Homestead because there were a lot of different discussions about what's happening on the other side of Homestead, and I don't know if we came up. And then the last block, of course, is already being developed. So we really had conversations about how we can reach into those neighborhoods and feel a part of those neighborhoods.

So, yes, you have a 10 block downtown, but it becomes a part of that entire community, whichever street we're facing.

Yeah.

I I wanna maybe re reframe the question a little bit just for clarity because I I certainly understand that the downtown's more than just 10 blocks. I'm not suggesting that. My question is really more focused on if a developer came in well, what did I forget a developer? Would would an investment outside of the 10 blocks from development within the 10 blocks be of something you would be interested in seeing happen as a community benefit? Would you not feel that that's a community benefit? That's the question I'm asking.

I think and I I only know this because I've been starting to do a pro form a on at least the city owned land. Ultimately, I don't think there's gonna be any money left to do any improvements outside the 10 block area if we want the things that we've already listed and been committed to. I don't think we can even get all of those. I'll just say that.

Can I

ask a clarifying question? When you say outside of the 10 blocks, do you mean if they, developed a park elsewhere in the city? It could

be any. I'm not sure. Anyway doesn't matter what it is. I'm I mean, we talked about things like lights, light poles being replaced, for example, and that could be one. And I I'm not I'm not saying what it should be. It's more of a question of what's a priority. That's really what I'm trying to understand. Is the priority to see as much of the community benefit menu within this this 10 block area get developed? Or is it or and at at at the expense of potentially nothing happening outside that might be of value to the 10 block downtown area? I think downtown has different definitions from everything we're talking about tonight, and that's what you so that's what I was trying to get.

I mean, let me just mean, I think, ideally, it would be within the 10 blocks. We don't know what the offer would be, obviously, but it's Sure. So it's hard hard to answer that. It just

I'm just trying to understand priorities. That's why I'm trying find Yeah.

Catalyzing the downtown is the priority. You know? Mhmm. It's just it's like a soul. The soul of our city has been ripped out Yeah. For sixty years, spirit and soul. It has to start again. It's been hard enough. This is what? How many

times have they had a precise

at that precise? 12 times, seven times. So this is you know? So it's no pressure.

Yeah.

You know? But do do your creative you know, we love creativity. I think the city has needed needed creativity for a long time, and so we're looking for you to push your limits of creativity. I know finances is finances. I get it. Yeah. But just in terms of protecting us and protecting our giving up this density. Right. Right?

Well, where where priorities come into play, and the reason why I'm trying to steer you on that direction in this conversation a little bit is because there is going to be potentially some challenges realizing everything. Yeah. Right. Some of these identified activities, we'll start with the parking garage, are expensive and could take an overwhelming preponderance of the dollars that might become available through redevelopment of the the the downtown. I'm not just talking about the two city owned blocks.

I'm talking about everything. So it could be difficult to achieve all of it. So what I wanna what I'm trying to get a sense of is there's something here that's more important. You know? For example, if you had and and I'm just speaking hypothetically here, but if you had 10 the sufficient parking garage, you know, you could have an outdoor stage or something like that and still have the place making take place.

It wouldn't be inside of a building, for example. And therefore, the parking garage, it's would perhaps then if that was something you were open to, would be very, very important on that list. Because the the priorities are un important to understand, not just from a development economic standpoint, but from a community standpoint. Because this fee and the way that the fee program is admiss is going to be written up needs to speak to your priorities, not just the development economics.

Yeah. So I'll add on to that. That's good clarification to steer this. For example, the theater. Our first I'm speaking for myself and Dan who's who's really this is his thing. But the facade is is the first thing. Right? Movie theaters are challenging right now. We all know that. So and I'm sure Dan will speak.

We've already been talking about this a little bit about the reality of whether a movie theater would make sense. But but the facade can be recreated, and I think that's super important. The parking garage, yeah, I mean, it's super expensive, and it takes up a lot of square footage. But but it is important. I mean, you need a parking garage somewhere, but maybe like, what you were saying is, let's say there was an adjacent parcel somewhere near the downtown that a parking garage could go.

I I if it was in close proximity, theoretically, I could see that. I mean, the university has a it's relatively a public parking garage that's just down Benton, for example. We wish it was bigger. Then it would even be more beneficial, but I wouldn't necessarily, you know, rule that out. But I, you know, I think I'm I'm I think a lot of us are just worried that, you know, we're gonna get taken advantage of, and then something's gonna happen somewhere else. And then it just really doesn't do what we're we're trying to do here.

So And I would remember early conversations, we had actually looked at the Wells Fargo lot or possible parking, so which is outside the 10 block area. So we had looked at that. Yeah. My concern is is all of a sudden, all this money goes into a parking garage, and we no longer achieve our goal, which is we want a there there. Yeah. We want a destination. So it's great we can park, but if nobody's gonna park in it, what good does a parking garage do?

I would say of all of these on the list, bullet number five kind of encapsulates what I'm hoping for from the community benefits. And, of course, there needs to be parking. And, of course, we want, you know, destinations like a theater. But what we really want, our ultimate goal, is the improvements above the fair share development impact fees, including infrastructure, paving, planting, furnishings, public art, and interpretation elements. I think that encapsulates what we've all been saying. So that, I think, is the priority that we're talking about.

I wanted to piggyback on that. There was a this had come up years ago. If you know a little background about our history is we used to have a cable car that went down Franklin Street from the train station, did a a u-turn, and came right back. And that was the public greater benefit is how people got around before cars. And if an opportunity came up where we had a trolley of some kind, it doesn't have to be rails, obviously.

We've seen it work very well in other towns, Santa Barbara, Monterrey, you know, some trolley system. If they came back and said, we would provide that with you, some kind of connectivity to the train station, maybe through the university that that even talked about that at one time, bringing the train through the university straight down into downtown, that would be a tremendous benefit and maybe something to consider because now we have a way of connecting to visitors and bringing them where we need them to go. So that could be something that's outside of the the 10 blocks that would benefit us.

But, also, wouldn't you all agree that the arts commons is like I mean, if we don't have that, alright, that's a huge commit that's, like, to me, the most important thing. If we don't have a town square yeah. I mean, what are we talking about here? Parking, we don't know what parking is gonna be like in ten, fifteen, twenty years. Everybody I Uber, you know, from the airport.

It's so easy. Although, I'm sure the parking garage is less full there than it with Uber, but I don't know. I I just talk talking about priorities, large common is number one. And I also wanna be clear, You know, infrastructure, there's infrastructure fees that are separate from community development fees. Correct?

Right? That that's that's that's already going to be baked in within, but they're they're separate fees. Right? We're asking for what are the fees to do this density. We can use those for whatever we choose, but we wanna make sure that we're not you know, if the infrastructure fee is already gonna handle some of those improvements, we don't wanna you know?

In the cities after, and this is, you know, aside from this, you know, grant money or a connection to the train station, possibly the airport. To Rob's point, you have new technologies. So we our group started looking at this in 2018 and called DOT and, you know, went after grants and so forth, which is obviously separate from this. And now you have Glideway. You have you know, have you seen it?

In in the form factor is like the size of a bike lane. You're moving a ton of people. So what you know, by the time this thing comes around, it's, you know, it's ten years from now. What are we gonna have? Right?

Yeah.

You know, to your point, does a parking garage down the street make sense because they can come out and just get on that thing and be right downtown? But Right. To pulling it back to this, I think we want a destination point. We want every dollar that we can get into this area to attract people into it. They'll find a way.

You tell us. Well, what do we need to do? I'm not here to tell you what you need do to get what we want? I think, yeah, you know, everybody's giving you a pretty coherent the second question, we spent a lot of time talking about their vision. Like, you can't even Yeah.

So I think there's there's a fair amount of focus. I think it's been shared with council number of times. They supported the pieces of that vision that we were able to complete. And so part of this is how do we fill in the holes that we know are necessary to to make this place a functioning hole, a destination that has the infrastructure that it needs. The so if you tell us, you should consider.

Yeah. Well, that's that's here or there because that will help you get what you need. Yeah. We're we're willing we're willing to listen, but we're real conscious Yeah. Of how resource intensive it's going to be to create the kind of space that we're Right.

Right. Right. Right. We've I mean, a lot of what we've talked about is is touched a lot of what the other questions already touched on things that we've and we've reviewed all of your 41 meeting agenda packets, believe it or not. So we've we've kinda looked at that as well and seen the conversations and the feedback and the ideas from whether you've looked up in other communities and things of that sort.

But the priorities were kind of really something we wanted to kinda drill down a little bit because that really does help us to think about, you know, what is a community benefit that's most important. When we advise Citi and I and I do presentations on this to Citi economic development directors and community law directors all the time, you know, I I use this example, and I won't name the city. I will not name the city. But there was a community in California that I did a talk about what community benefit programs are. And I, you know, I talked about how important it is to nail down the menu of what it is you're after at the be at the outset.

And because if you don't do that, you find yourself being underwhelmed. And so this example that I'll tell you about is a true story. It's a community that really was a relatively poor community. They they do not get a lot of development activity. They're quite a distance from here.

And it didn't have the economics, the real estate economics that that you all have advantages of, you know, in general in this region. And but they were approached at the time by a developer who wanted to build a, basically, type of a type of industrial gotta be careful about the details here. Like, type a type of development that was an industrial use that was potentially gonna bring some new jobs into the community. Was sort of something like a game changer from what would otherwise be an agricultural community. And and they and I say, great.

Well, you should be negotiating a community benefits agreement. This is this is could be this is significantly valuable investment that that developer is bringing in. You know, there's all kinds of needs within this community. Parks were in really bad shape, and, you know, it really wasn't seen much in the way of, like, new development at all. So it was like, try to leverage what you can from this. So I wound up seeing, like, a staff person from that city a couple years later at a conference and just, hey. Did you ever get that, know, you commitment agreement together? They said, yeah. I said, and then we did. And we're like, so what what did you wind up getting?

And they said they got entry monuments to the city. That was their community benefit. You know, welcome to downtown in this case, which why I emphasize the importance of being really clear about your menu, what you want. It's and it's candidly one advantage, and I'm not I'm not trying to talk I again, my client's been talking to us about a a program that's prescriptive and set forth in stone. But I'll be honest, I think this is an effort that probably evolves over time.

I don't think this is a onetime activity. I think you're gonna set it up for the best vision that you have today. And then probably in five or ten years, definitely by ten years, maybe after five, you're gonna reset, you're gonna look at what's actually happened. Because some developers are gonna come in and bring you a project that nobody really in this room anticipated, and it may bring a particular user in. You know, when developers build things, they don't know who the users are. Most developers are spec builders. They either especially if they're talking about Ground Floor. We don't know how many art galleries, if any, will open up, but it could blossom. It could shock us all. Nobody would have seen that coming.

You know? And and I've seen it all the time. You know? I know I know a lot of folks look at communities like Redwood City and see the success that they've had in their downtown. We work there. I just had lunch with the assistant city manager yesterday, and they've been rolling back their community benefits program. Just last month, I think, they scaled down because in response to what's going on with the market because they're just not getting much activity. And so they thought, well, look. We we wanted to lower the asks for now so we get some investment coming in because something coming ends and some dollars because they're looking for dollars to get money to make investments in the parks. And that was a lot of it was tied into community Bradford projects for developments that haven't moved forward.

Well, let's let's try to figure out how to renegotiate some development agreements. So it's like the city is coming back to lower the ask. Now that's a you know, it's a policy decision that may be made, but it's something to consider, I think, from just helping you all understand how, know, you the nature of development works. We talked a lot about cars and things, and Waymo didn't exist, you know, four years ago. So my my future son-in-law works for a competitor to Joby.

You know? And so, you know, we're we're all finding new ways to move around. And so who knows? You know, that that's a really big fixed cost to build a 65,000 k per space parking garage, which is costed one out in Redwood City. So, you know, that's that's a big it's a big nut to crack, and that's a real permanent investment. You know? That that sits there for a long time. And if it's not maximizing its potential, you could put a lot of money into that one thing and then and then maybe not maybe not have been the best thing. Of course, then I understand the implication is then they're all parking on your streets in the neighborhood, which you don't want either. So there's there's some trade offs there, something that some things to think about.

But, you know, I would encourage you all, and this is probably something we would suggest recommending into our program and for you all in the city to consider. But is, you know, looking at this as, like, a this is phase one, if you will. I mean, it's a program. It's a community events program for this, but, you know, it's gonna be revisited based upon market conditions. You know? It's gonna be revisited based upon what have you. We do inclusionary housing programs in our in for a lot of our clients too, and I've baked into them, like, an annual review. Like, it just has this program helped or hindered development. If it's hindering, then maybe we need to tweak. If it's going people are too many people are paying the fee, then we need to increase the fee.

We wanna see the units built. So, you know, it needs to be agile. And, you know, we may be smart people, all of us in this room, but, you know, nobody can predict what's gonna be happening in the real estate market in five years, let alone, you know, the next ten, twenty, thirty. So I think that's what's gonna be important. But that's why the priorities are helpful for us because, you know, you you'll see some some communities I wanna say Mountain View. I might be mistaken. They've they they have, like, tiering structures around their community benefits program. So it's like a tier one. So you gotta pull something from tier one and then a tier two. I'll I can come back with more details on that later.

But you know? And so that's a sense of priority. Right? You have to pick something from tier one and one or two things from tier two. So that's a way you give a developer a menu.

There are other communities I mentioned in San Carlos where they've created, like, the East Side vision plan, which is not a codified document, but it's basically an all vision plan for for what development may look like on the East side of the Caltrain line over to the Bayshore Freeway. And it's primarily all industrial, and it's it's gonna be very different over than as you started to see if you driven up the 101. And so so there, you know, the the list of community benefits is pretty general. It but it but we it it directs developers that we wanna see you bring in projects like this. And, candidly, what happens is the developers typically will bring in a list of improvements that, you know, candidly, as consultants and staff are like, okay.

Yeah. On-site open space, we kind of expect you to have that. That's not really a community benefit. You know, 642 Quarry, which is a Presidio Bay Adventures development that's gonna be developed, has a pickleball court that's gonna get built into the project. It's gonna be publicly accessible. They got exactly zero credit for that. It was negotiated with the city in terms of how to do that program. So that's a great amenity for a part of the city that really has relatively few amenities of that sort. There's creekside improvements and things of that sort. We had prescribed this goal to build a cafe, very prescriptive, like, you know, kind of goal that was in the East Side vision plan.

Okay. Well, you get one cafe built, then does everybody gonna build a cafe? So it's like, you know, sometimes they gain that that agility of that community benefits program has to be at you know, work with the market. So we have one project that's agreed to bring in a cafe. It's gonna be a net loser for them for a few years. We gave them essentially credit on their, you know, essentially pro form a, if you will, through through, you know, through what their cost of their community benefit contribution and put a value to that. It's about 500,000 to put in a cafe. They got a $500,000 credit to build that cafe. That might not get them very far. We'll see how it does, and, hopefully, it works.

You know, there are gonna be other examples like that. So but, again, the agility because, you know, your vision may change over time too, you know, depending on what form of art really works, you know, and what form of, you know, land use planning, you know, actually starts to gel together. The good thing is, I will say, is you do have ownership of the properties. That is you've got and and the ownership that you have is actually fairly sizable in terms of it's not tiny little quarter acre lots in a few places. That is that's a game changer. That is something that very few communities have.

Can I ask you? We've got, for example, the the theater and the cultural arts center in one of our priorities. So would the theater actually be a community benefit, or would we find a developer to come in who wants to build, you know, a theater? And that wouldn't be subsidized by the community benefit. Right? That would be up to the developer to build the theater. I

all others I can't I gotta be careful because I'm not involved in the RFP process, so I don't wanna speak for the city's RFP process. Yes. There there are there are limits to what the city can ask for in that RFP. Because for the most part, housing has to be included in that, and it has to have some affordable housing. That, right out the gate, candidly, makes it pretty difficult to to provide what would may not be a profitable venture to build a theater.

You know, you would need a benefactor, a foundation, to be clear, to come in and drop the investment in and say, this is we're gonna put our name on it. It's the I don't wanna say the name, but Zuckerberg, you know, theater. And that's how it happens. I've worked in projects in South Los Angeles in, like, the Willowbrook neighborhood, and, you know, they're trying to build a sports complex associated with Charles Drew University, which is a historically back college down there. It's a very successful university.

It's and and, you know, they're very much focused on getting outside capital to make that happen, and that's probably the only way that's gonna get built. It's actually Jeff Bezos's ex wife that's been one of the investors that's been helpful to that university. So it is gonna take something probably like that to make that happen and probably not gonna come from development.

Got her number?

Anyway, I think everybody's calling her. But it it might be difficult to do it through the development process is my answer,

There's two there's two theaters. So there's I think the theater you're thinking of is the 300, 400 seat. You know, that'd be 60 feet height. Let's see. Chains that are making money right now can you hear me alright?

Are the 50 to a 100 seat theater, you know, one foot riser and fit it in 25, 30 feet. And if it fails, which is what your I think your initial point was, if it doesn't work out, it can revert to retail. So that's that's the difference. Right? If you build a, you know, a mega theater, you know, a performing arts theater no.

Just one screen, like one big theater, maybe two others, you know, on top of that, That's not the format that's making money right now. It's the Alamo Drafthouse, one large theater for Black Panther or Marvel or some crappy movie like that brings in a lot of people. Then you have the the 50 to 70 seat, you know, theater that that pulls together. If you pack those in, you make a lot of money.

Well, that's

a community benefit.

The point is is they'd have to format so they're coming in for the housing. They want the money on the split or two up. We have to figure out you know, to them, the benefit is we're gonna format retail.

Depending. You know what?

Right. And then the question, you know, would be, what's the value of that if the developer's coming in to do that and that type of thing? So

I'm gonna put Adam on the spot. We've been talking about parking garage and use and whatever. Adam, you did extensive research on converting parking garages into housing and retail. Did you wanna touch on that at all?

Yeah. I don't I don't know if it's gonna be feasible based on the lock configuration and whatnot. So I know we all had that idea that it would be a separate structure. But as I'm kinda laying it out and going through it, it might not be a reality. So I I don't because when you build them flat, you know, you're not building them on you know, you're you're basically having to have an external ramp to go up and down the parking structure because you're not gonna want to have the floor of the structure itself, you know, have its ramp built because then you can't make it a usable living space at a later date.

And all that's gonna be post tension concrete, so it's not gonna be something you're gonna wanna modify at a later date. So, unfortunately, Butch, I don't know if that's gonna pan out or not.

You're talking a little bit about being dynamic as we move forward. Of course, it's dynamic. I had an opportunity for to work in the city of next door, the big one. I won't use their name. And two projects that I sat on the committee for.

One was a office building that was multistory, and the agreement was made that they were gonna do community benefits, and part of that community benefit was a public art project. What the corporation did is on their 14th Floor conference room entrance, they put a beautiful painting on and said that it is accessible to the public, so we're considering that as community benefit. The second part of it, which was a big one because I I I'd spent eighteen years in Downtown San Jose. When the light rail system went in, the city of San Jose built this beautiful mall in the center of downtown. It was supposed to be a Santana Row type.

Failed miserably. It it was, what, three blocks, four blocks long. They ended up turning it into a server farm in the middle of downtown. Part of my concern is or my priority, and I'll go back to what we said originally, the initial statement was we want a destination in a there there. I don't know how we protect ourselves to make sure that all of a sudden the theater isn't closed down and become a corporate headquarters or performing arts center or the park. I think, Rob, you said it right. I know Santana Row because I was a part of those discussion. That park was a lot bigger. And as they developed Santana Row, it got smaller and smaller and smaller. It still functions, and it's great.

If you go by there, I was just there. It's packed. So we're trying to figure out. We're not the experts, but we're trying to figure out how do we protect this destination, this there there, this sense of community, this community you wanna have community. And I don't know how we do that because this is a dynamic project that moves forward. So if there's any advice and because I've seen it not work in the past.

Yeah.

I'm cognizant of time, so I don't know what your time for these meetings go. But we've touched on a lot of the sort of priorities and themes. I wanna find out if there are other thoughts about the, again, the, like, components of the of the community benefits program that are important to you that we should know about that you haven't discussed yet?

You know, you you mentioned that this is gonna be a project over time and that we all can't have well, we don't have a crystal ball, right, so we can't see. I think we also need to remember that, you know, the catalyst for this is only gonna be two blocks, right, which is the majority of the city owned land. And so that's not the lion's share of the downtown. That's, you know, only one fifth. There's still a lot left that is left to be redeveloped or developed.

And so, again, I I I really think forecasting something out that has a long term revenue stream and a continual annual revenue stream is more important for a long play than it is for a short play. Because as other developers come and or landowners come with their ideas on the rest of the eight blocks, we're gonna need to make improvements in street light poles and wayfinding and art districts and all that kind of stuff as well. So, I mean, again, it I and I I think the other benefit to having a plan where you go in as a partnership for a long term, you know, share of that additional floor space, it also defers the payment. So instead of them having to pay a park fee or an impact fee right out of the gate when they're going through all their softcuts. They're already up and running.

They're starting to generate revenue for their, you know, newly constructed building. And now at the back end, they owe for a fee on the gross revenue. So I think it also plays into that way where it's not an upfront cost per developer. It's a it's a deferred cost, which is a little bit easier on their books since they're not financing it. So, yeah, I think I don't think you wanna take one one bird in the hand early because I think we're gonna need more a lot more in the bush.

What do you I wanna unpack that a little more. What is it that you're hoping to get from the recurring stream? So you got a recurring stream of money for what? Like, what what is it that you're

Well, to so as as we well, we have to rebuild Franklin Street on the on the Prometheus property that we had negotiated a land easement. So we're gonna have to do improvements for that, and that's what's gonna connect the the downtown the new downtown portion that's gonna get built out for the blocks a and b to the Franklin Mall portion that has been built out and continue to service retail for the, you know, foreseeable future. And with that, it's gonna be a lot of additional cost. I mean, it's not just that. It's it's when somebody does go to redevelop, there's money available to enlarge in that park or actually make it a vibrant park and not just something that was cookie cutter.

I see it as, you know, over time, redeveloping, you know, or doing programs there to to drive people down to the downtown, farmers markets every week. That will drive people down there, but that has a cost. Right? There's an operational cost. There's a capital cost. You know, public restrooms, that's one that, again, the Gateway Park that was just built fails. There's only one public restroom for a two acre park. So there's a lot. And whatever we miss, I mean, that's the other thing. Well, like you said, we're gonna miss stuff for sure.

And what's gonna be really sad is if we miss it and go, oh, we already kind of, you know, took the fee. We did one thing, but now we realize that wasn't really a good idea. We really should have done this, and we have nothing left to do it, but they're generating revenue every single year. And then they're barking at why they don't have, you know, a downtown either. I mean, it's it's going to improve their own property value by enlivening the that downtown, making it a place, making those units the most desirable units to rent in Santa Clara. That's how I see it. But you're gonna need continual revenue.

So so in other words, it sounds like you're thinking that continued revenue would be used for both operational costs of programs and other operating costs of the downtown as well as potentially capital costs is what we're thinking. It's it's helpful to understand because there are limited, abilities cities have to to do something like this, under state law. So, obviously, if the city owns the property, they could negotiate anything they want and deal to the extent it's feasible and they can get that deal. We've done that before on projects where there's, we we did the project in Wheeler Plaza in Downtown San Carlos, which was a parking lot, and they built the condos and that are there in the public parking garage, and the city got a it was a onetime payment as the unit sold. Once all the final units sold, the city got onetime payment out of that.

Had it just been rentals, that could have been done a different way. So when you own the property, you can certainly negotiate that into a deal. When you don't own the property, you've got normally a couple of different ways cities can go to do something like that. One would be to create a CFD community facilities district, which could be used to fund either capital or service costs. One of my clients, Harupa Valley, down in Southern California, they're strapped for operating expenses.

They're a relative they're one of the newer cities in California, and and they've been trying to focus on how to to make that work. However, to to do that, you need the owners the property owners to approve that. And so in that case, these are, like, single entity owns the entire, you know, 200 acre property. It's easy to get the property owner to agree to you know, annex into the the that district. If you don't have site control over the whole area, you would basically be asking a developer to annex into the district as a condition of development, which may have a couple of challenges.

One is that scale may not be big enough to get a significant amount of revenue stream from it because of the small scale of how development's gonna get paced out over time. And then there's legal issues associated with, like, what a two eighteen district I mean, what a a community facilities district can do. And then the third option would be, like, an improvement district, like, sometimes of property based improvement districts, bids, business improvement districts, which can do a lot of, like, the types of things that you're referring to in terms of providing services and, you know, that that could work as well. But, again, those would be it would take all of the owners or the majority owners or businesses to vote today to be into that district, they and may not necessarily all wanna be doing that. So then you're only talking about a small portion of the area.

And, again, what can you do from that small portion? So it's it's it could be difficult to to get scale, but we can kind of look and run those numbers and see what it was like.

I I think, you know, to that point, I think Francois Mall would be very difficult to do. Obviously, there's a multitude of owners in there. But for the other four blocks in the center of downtown, it's three majority owners.

Right.

Prometheus, Swenson, and the state of California and and Santa Clara. So, again, you'd be able to get potentially six of the 10 blocks probably under an agreement with only real really needing, you know, two adjacent. I think the state has its own issues, and it'll it'll work itself out, I think. I don't think it's yeah. But the other two I mean, it's not like we have to go and whack a mole with 50 different, you know, landowners. It's it's a few large, well known developers, landowners, so I think it is feasible.

Well, we did this in San Jose. We started a bid there, and we did it as a graduated scale. So the large property owners were charged more. The small mom and pop restaurant was charged some nominal fee. All received the benefits. And as businesses grew, their fees grew also. So it worked very well. The San Jose BID with the Downtown Association is a very large organization that runs downtown, does services, and I know that project that type of project.

Yeah. I'm just my point is more scale that this is gonna generate enough. This even six blocks, if you'll get enough, how much how much we're actually talking about. Yeah.

Can you go to the next slide for just a second?

I don't think there is a next. Oh,

okay. I I think just to put some context, I think there's a couple of challenges that we talked about, and I think, unfortunately, they're still here. One is it's a tough market, particularly for mixed use space, so that's hard. The other is we're all optimistic. The market's gonna turn at some point.

Cycles tend to do that. And so, one, we wanna support stuff happening. Two, we don't wanna miss the opportunity to create public benefits in the future. And I think the value goes up as it sort of aggregates in the space. So the challenge that we had was, as you said, sort of what's the tipping point and what is the best mechanism.

And I think we recognize that if it gets built now and that's a huge piece, then maybe at this stage, we're getting less of that public benefit that we might get if it had been built at a later time, but we wanna facilitate the construction. So the question of how do we capture that future potential is really important, and I'm not sure we had a great I mean, as I think as Adam's describing, there's a couple of different ways to do that. You've talked about them. So the you you have up there, what are the local market conditions? I think we're all confident that this is going to work and going to be great.

The fact that we own a bunch of the parcels to help shape that future, as you said, has a has a big impact. But that's really one of the challenges is how do you design a long term program for a current moment that's gonna facilitate development, but to potentially on the scale that you're just not gonna get

Yeah.

Another shot at it again.

And

so tell us what we need to do to get what we want. Okay. Yeah.

I had one to add. Sorry. Going back to retail. Is there any example nationally where that's been done, where the reduction of rent for a retailer has been subsidized or considered?

There

have been the the projects I'm most familiar with that's been done has been projects that have received outside funding. So in Little Tokyo down in LA, there's a nonprofit organization that's Little Tokyo Service Association, and they they have been a a a sponsor behind a project that was originally called Go For Broke, but it's basically a mixed use development with ground floor commercial. If you know anything about Little Tokyo, and this is supposed to true about many ethnic districts across this country. There was massive displacement, in their case, obviously, in the forties. And and so and then and then the second wave has been gentrification, which has pushed a lot of those businesses out.

And so the developer is Citi marshaled with the developer numerous outside resources for which, candidly, this community might not be eligible for, new market tax credits, foundation assistance, and others to bring back in some of those displaced businesses that have maybe moved to East LA or other Boyle Heights, I think, in particular so that they could basically get sub subsidized lower cost rents, rents at around a dollar, $2 a square foot comparable to what they were paying at one point in time. And that's how that particular project, it's under construction, is is designed to work. But it did take, you know, cash. Now, again, I think at the at one time, I think the community benefits that you were considering were really about, you know, $76,000,000 or something like that, I wanna say. We'll I'm sure that's a bigger number now.

But you know? So it's a question of how much of that portion. How far does that go? How many tenants does that get us? If it's gonna be art space, you know, what's that rent gonna look like versus if it's sometimes a commercial revenue generating space?

What does that look like? I've had yeah. As I mentioned earlier, we were somebody was talking about, like, the incentivizing of occupancy and even developers building mixed use buildings right now, particularly around cities are no longer allowed to prohibit ground floor residential, which was something that, you know, was was being done. So now it's kind of in a lot of cases, we're trying to figure out, well, how we we don't want residents on the Ground Floor, so how do we incentivize the developer to build the commercial on El Camino Real, for example? And so, you know, candidly, the tools that are out there are not tools you're gonna love to hear, but they're things like reduced parking.

So that's in the opposite direction of where you wanna go because you wanna build parking. So, basically, same thing you see with residential development. You know? Density bonuses allow us to build more residential density in our exchange for building and filling that commercial with less parking requirements, you know, instead of so many spaces or less amount of spaces. You know, it's it the economics are are what they are.

So also being more flexible about what's considered a commercial. It could be makerspace, for example, or something like that. Maybe that's something that's not for and I I you know, maybe not allowed in a particular city zoning code that would have maybe worked on a ground floor, maybe not otherwise be allowed, but maybe could work in this area to activate it so at least it's not a storefront with a, you know, something on the window, and that's it. So, you know, those are the types of incentives that we're we're aware of that are out there. They're not great from a standpoint of, like, placemaking because, again, you're trying to bring something that you have two challenges.

You're trying to create an asset that attracts people to the downtown. And I'm hearing, and I don't wanna I'm not trying to put anyone on the spot here. I'm hearing that's the first priority. And and then secondarily, to make sure that that has long term staying power. So it's not just like a works for a year or two, and that's it. That long term staying power might be, again, the production of, like, parking and other things that are, you know, costly but necessary to make it really work long term.

So yeah. We're in a little different market than Little Tokyo. So Mountain View does have a couple of specific plans that have it's not really an incentive. It's kind of a requirement that goes into locally serving retail. I could dig those up.

Yeah. Just to tell you as a

caution, Mountain View has the highest rents in the county right now, and that area is not moving. People are backing out of projects because the market is tough even if you're the strongest market Yeah. In the county, and they they've won a lot.

Yeah.

Now, you know, do you hold out and and wait for the market to turn to get what you need in that space, or do you prioritize the current development to kick it off? So I'll just say there are costs. We're asking for more, but we are a much stronger market than Little Tokyo, and I think we probably have more capacity to to to use different leverage tools to address that. Yeah. Again, particularly if the starting point happens to be publicly owned. Right?

Right. Right. But you do have to build affordable housing on that publicly owned land now, so don't forget. The state's got you on that one now. So okay. Anything else that you all wanna share?

How do we organize this conversation?

I think we've all been taking Uh-huh. Lot of notes here. So,

you know, you've you've gotten some substance, and you've got some process. You talked about tier one and tier two. We wreck it part of the reason we kicked this down the down the road was we couldn't figure out exactly how to price these pieces in a way that would make them sort of commensurable with the value of the additional height. But I think we did come up with a list of, like, things. Lot of them are covered there, but those aren't necessarily broken out the way that they might be.

This question of ongoing, I think, you know, we have a couple of more meetings, but I think it would be really helpful for us to sort of get some ideas ahead of time and think through, again, for the professionals.

Yeah. Or I'll tell you our process, our next steps. So our next meeting, whenever it will be, probably I'm gonna guess after the first of the year because we're approaching holiday season, is when we'll be coming back with, you know, kind of results of the financial analysis, which will look at quantifying some of the things we've talked about from probably different vantage points. You know? Option a, option b, option a slash b, things of that sort.

So you kinda see costs and what things might look like. And then also sort of, you know, we're not basing this community benefits program on the development economics today because the answer would be zero. But so we we do know that it's gonna be based upon aspirational assumptions around the market, which, of course, inevitably will happen. Don't hold me to when that's gonna happen because nobody knows. But if if we did, we've we would all be very wealthy.

But but we can definitely project what those what what conditions would need to look like for the ability to fund these community benefits would need to be and give you some scenarios on that. We're working through that. And then I think bringing back, you know, that kind of in the context of, you know, sort of a framework document that, you know, we can kinda present to you to give you some things to react to. There'll be a variety of options as what we're anticipating. You're not gonna like all of them.

That's the idea, candidly, because we're trying to navigate to again, I go back to that example of the entry monument. We need your insight as to what's most important. And we're gonna give you data and analysis to help you see what different ways to look at it, and you're gonna have to make ultimately discrete choices about what you all believe to be most important, at least as a task force. And then, of course, there's community discussions that still have to take place as well. So not to mention planning commission and city council.

So you get to shape some of that input about how that would go. So I see that as our next step, and that's what we'd be bringing forward to you to discuss. So today was really trying to, like, get around our where we're at in terms of of that aspect.

I think Adam had a comment.

Yeah. Thank you. So, when you run the financial analysis, are we gonna be able to see that ahead of the meeting? Because it would be good to understand kinda where you are and even even some of your guys', you know, suggestions because it would be good to digest them ahead of the meeting so we can come in with, you know, specific questions and or, you know, you know, suggestions.

I don't see why not. Yeah.

Perfect. That'd be great if we could get that a couple days, at least, maybe even a week ahead of whenever we schedule that meeting.

I I'll do it. Yes.

It's still, honestly, still blows my mind, but this task force does homework in a way that I promise you've never seen before.

So it

you would have actually had a meatier conversation if we had had these questions ahead of time because three fourths of us would have spent the time to think through it and write it down. Yeah. And if you share that stuff ahead of time, we will have very specific questions about I guarantee we'll talk about comparables.

Well, I'm just telling you that it You can can direct any thoughts you have or anyone else from the public or in the committee to Leslie, and she'll be sure we get them. So we've got plenty of months to

do that. Just wanted to share.

Yeah. And so, yeah, this is our introduction meeting. So we're here to say hello. That's why that was my main thing. I wanted you more than say hello and say and say nice to meet you. So wanted to kinda get going and get started on this because I know you are antsy and anxious to move forward as much as we are. So we're looking forward

to it.

Tim, can I ask you a question? Have you all walked our downtown and checked it out and saw the

just just had dinner at the Thai restaurant for the second time. Yes.

We went to Jasmine Thai and got a feel for the

We've been we've been here in town a couple two or three times already.

So You're good.

You've seen the parking lot. Which one?

Exactly. We do have a lot.

Yeah. We parked in the parking one of the parking lots. Oh, yeah. We have we've yeah. We've been on foot. We've you know, we that was the last the last trip we were

up here. So yeah. Yes.

Vice chair, if you're ready, we do have a hand raised on Zoom for public comment if you all are ready for public comment.

Okay. And there's public comment. Go ahead. I think someone on the

Actually, go ahead in the chambers first.

Their hand

just went chamber? Their hand just went down, so let's go with the chambers first. If anybody online scared. Would like to comment during public comment, please raise your hand.

I'm

the cochair for Reclaiming Our Downtown, and I want to commend everyone first for keeping Santa Clara's true downtown vision alive. I used to dread hearing the word Santana Row. We're gonna look like Santana Row. But, actually, if you go down to Santana Row, it's exactly what we want in our downtown with one exception. We don't want the tunnel vision with the tall buildings, all the same height, with the same architecture.

That's the only difference. We want the liveliness, the fun, the activities, and the art. We want all of that in our downtown. I do have a question tonight, and it is for the University of Santa Clara. We know we now have two Santa Clara University executives sitting on the downtown community task force.

Albeit one sits as a resident instead of Santa Clara University executive. In past meetings, we were held we were told that the university was waiting for the city to show its commitment to the downtown before making its own commitment. Now that the city is moving forward with the downtown RFP expected to be ready by March 2026, my question is, is Santa Clara University now committed to developing its parcel on Block A? And would that commitment would that commitment include participating in or partnering through the RFP process, or does the university plan to develop independently? That's it.

Thank you very much.

Hi, Mary. So the university currently I know the answer that the committee and the task force would like. The university is not going to enter into a joint development project on that parcel. We're certainly open to ideas, though. If a developer came along and had an interest in in in the a and b plots, including ours, We're certainly open to that.

And the main reason is we don't know what our long term future will be there. It serves a purpose right now for academic use. So, anything that we would do would be if we did it, would be prioritized in support of our academic mission. I mean, that could be housing. It could be an academic building.

In terms of a joint development project, I don't see that happening. I know that's what a lot of people would like, but we're certainly supportive of the project. And there's a lot of other ways that we can bring value to the downtown by working on ways that we can connect the campus to the downtown. And what we bring is we bring the people as well, plus what we've done on Franklin Street and wanna continue to do. So the short answer is we don't have the final answer now because we're in the early stages of doing our master planning effort for the next five, ten plus years, and I just don't have an answer for you exactly what's gonna be on that parcel in the future.

But we are certainly interested and willing to talk if opportunities are presented that include that parcel.

Okay. Thank you. I do have three hands online. We're gonna start with listed as test,

which

think might actually be Rena. You can unmute and speak.

Hi. Can people hear me? Yes. Hey. Hey, everyone. Yeah. No. Loved hearing everyone's comments and thoughts. I think the thing that I've been wrestling with is that we have state law that supports added height through density bonus law, waivers, concessions, all sorts of things like that. And so for me, I'm trying to understand how do we craft a community benefits program that is going to be more attractive for people to choose rather than the options that the state state law presents for them.

So that's not like a you can give the answer today. It's more just I think that adds another layer of, hey. It's not just a mathematical problem. It's also a mathematical, you know, valuation in comparison to what someone could just choose from state what what is offered with state law. So, I just wanted to share that as kind of, like, an added complexity to how this community benefits program would need to be designed.

K. Could I ask a question to that question

Sure.

Or to that state?

Vice chair.

Hey, Rina.

Hey.

Does form based code still preclude that? In other words

No. Yeah.

We've come in with form based code. It used to be the kryptonite to this lunacy.

No. You know, actually, it's not kryptonite. We do have so many different requirements that people may you know, with, many of these state laws, they are given, like, a specific number of things they can waive. So it's possible that they will waive certain things, but not like, they wouldn't be able to waive all of them, but they may be waiving the things that we care about. You know?

And they may come in with a level of affordability that that gives them the right to have height, beyond what we have zoned in. So it's more about how do we create a community benefits program where somebody is willing to give us the benefits in exchange for height versus, like, taking off the shelf what the state has allowed them to do. And that that there's a trade off for them, and it's usually levels of affordability or percentages of affordability of the project. So it is trying to create a a benefits program that people will choose versus, you know, the state the state. But no, Dan Dan, there isn't anything about the precise plan that precludes people from utilizing all those state regulations.

It's just that usually they are you you can't waive everything. Right? And we do have just so many different requirements that just by the sheer number of things we have baked in that, you know, we'll get some we'll get a lot of what we've asked for, but we may not get the things that we know are really important.

Thank you.

Okay. The next hand I have is Bud. So you should be

able to unmute and speak.

Okay. Great. Can you hear me?

Yes. We can. Thank you.

Okay. Perfect. You know, I think this is a very unique location that's different than other downtowns because we're right next to a university. And we have all those students that wanna, you know, have ice cream and and activities to do in the evenings. I really like the idea of flexibility and periodic revisiting of the community benefits program because, you know, it's clear. We cannot predict the future. We don't know what's gonna happen with retail and parking and stuff. I really wanna see a strong role for public art. Someone mentioned Santana Row, and I love those mosaic lizards that kids climb on all the time. And, of course, the ice cream is a big benefit.

I'm trying to figure out how we would spend the money for the community benefits program. I would like to see it spent on programming of events. And then the question is, are those events, going to be student oriented or kid oriented? So just some food for thought. Thank you.

You said Alright.

We have one more hand online. Donna, you should be able to unmute and speak.

Hi. Hi.

Hi. Dan asked a question about what other places across The USA are doing. And just to let you know, can Downtown Kansas City offers specific incentives and programs for businesses located along the street cow streetcar route. In October, the city just rolled out a major grant program to fill vacant storefronts and support local businesses with a special emphasis on properties along the downtown streetcar line in preparation for the twenty twenty six FIFA World Cup. So that's very current and right along, what Santa Clara is facing with their challenges.

And I thought you should know that, and you can always Google it. It comes up if you want more information. But thanks. I look forward to this.

Thanks, Donna. Those are all the hands I have online. Moving on. If the the task force has no other discussion that they would like to have, the next item would be your adjournment item.

So moved. Second.

Didn't load.

Meeting is adjourned. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Dan.

Thanks Thanks, Adam.

Thank you, everybody. Have a good night.

Thank you, Adam.