Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

It's time. Yeah, it's now um 2 minutes after 6 and I'd like to call to order the uh June 18th meeting of the Santa Monica Planning Commission. Can we Can we get a roll call? or pledge of allegiance. Sorry. I pledge allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Oh, can we get the roll call now? Commissioner Cho here. Commissioner Fresco here. Commissioner Lambert here. Commissioner Landress here. Commissioner Hamilton here. And Chair Tolken here. Uh planning director's report. Uh yeah, Armen is um out of the office today and she will actually be out of the office uh from June 20th this Friday. She'll be returning July 14th. Um, so if you have any need for her assistance, please reach out to either uh me or Roxan as we'll be covering in her presence or while she's out of office. Um, we want to count, let's see, let's take a look at upcoming planning commission meeting. So July 2nd is your next regular meeting. Um, where we will have the election of officers. Um, we'll also have the recommendation on the uh, economic recovery ordinance. Um, and along with that, um, you requested an overview of the sign code. So, um,

that's the meeting where Michelle Hugard will be covering, um, that when Heidi's not here. Um, so we'll be going over that. And then also an alcohol CUP at 1348 Pico Boulevard. Um, July 16th doesn't have any items, but we are holding space for that should the commission not make a decision tonight on the ARB appeal. Um so that otherwise if we if that doesn't happen then we do not currently have items on that meeting and it may be cancelled. Um August 20th um is a tenative um couple of tenative items actually on a text amendment and then also a recommendation on digital billboards but those are very tentative um at the moment. So that's just a bit of a look ahead. Um on the architecture review board agenda, um July 21st is the next meeting and there are uh three items that are tenatively marked for the ARB agenda at 2901 Santa Monica Boulevard. Uh 13184 Street and 1645th Street. Those are all housing projects. uh at the landmarks commission um next meeting in July 112518 street um hearing on a structure of merit and then the commission will also be getting an update on the mills act monitoring um efforts and the new batch of mills act contracts for this year. Um recent city council actions um at the June 10th meeting of the city council they uh formally adopted um the fire hazard uh severity zone maps um for Santa Monica. Um there was also the uh adoption of a final map for the Providence St. John's Health Center uh DA. It's a bit of a prefuncter step um with respect to that development agreement. There actually is no development application that has been submitted with respect to that DA yet. Um they also uh adopted an emergency ICO um to allow ADUs in conjunction with SB123 projects. Um these are the

ministerial subdivisions of up to 10 units. Um and that law comes into effect July 1. Um that's why it's an emergency ICO um as the council wanted that enacted um in time for the effective date of that law. They also provided additional direction um to come back with um when the extension is brought forward for the ICO which will be heard at their um July 29th meeting. Um and it had to do with uh with respect to interior setbacks um eliminating upper story setbacks allowing such projects to be up to three stories and 33 feet a maximum of 1.5 F reducing front setbacks and also um no inloo uh fees for the HPP for projects of five units or less. Um so that that will be brought back to council as part of the extension um of that ICO. Um, council also heard a study session um on the uh uh prominade uh digital signage um program and also uh floatups for the two um DA applications that we've received uh at 310 Arizona and 1202 Third Street Prominade. It's actually two of four that are currently um pending. Um and council gave um very clear direction around the creation of a new sign district for the prominade that would allow digital displays. So, we were returning to council with that ordinance. Um, and they also gave very clear direction on priorities for community benefits to be negotiated um for those development agreements. Um, just to give you a flavor, they're very interested in repayment of the housing trust fund um restaffing the libraries and um uh funding towards uh clean and safe um in downtown. So, in that order um that's what uh council communicated. Um they also adopted a new 16 item um uh for a new off-site affordable housing incentive pilot program. This

essentially would uh provide more flexibility in the off-site option um for the AHPP which is the inclusionary um housing program. Uh right now those units um can be put off-site but the certificate of occupancy has to be uh you know before the market rate uh project. So, they're looking for more flexibility in that and ultimately opening up options that would allow um units on land that the developer owns. Um would allow an acquisition rehab option to count uh towards off-site units or um a situation where a developer could fund affordable housing on city- owned land. So, all of that is being worked out uh together with the city attorney's office. um we will be returning to council um with with that program. Um there was also uh I know uh mobility uh issues are of interest to the the commission um and the council also voted to uh allow bikes and bus lanes. Um and actually there is an ordinance that well second reading I guess is coming you know at this upcoming uh June 24th uh meeting. So um that the next meeting of the city council June 24th that is uh budget adoption uh night um and uh the budget that is being brought forward is uh responsive to uh council's direction given at their budget study session which was the uh second meeting in May. Um and then just want to note for you a couple of changes coming up on the city council schedule. Um there's been some date changes. So, the July 22nd meeting of council has been changed to uh July 29th. Um the August 26th meeting is cancelled for the city council and um uh it looks like the November 11th um council meeting which would have been Veterans Day that will be moved. Um that looks like based on um some uh new

negotiations with bargain units that is going to be a new holiday um in the city. So, you know, that meeting will either be moved or cancelled um TBD on that. Um and just to give you some updates from the director's chair, uh just on some economic development activity. So, um on June the 4th, uh CDD hosted along with a a host of other city departments and city staff um at 1212 um a business fair. It was kind of a meet and greet between city staff and business operators in the city. had about 90 um people come out to that. It was, you know, the first of many opportunities we hope to hold um as a way for businesses around the city um to get to know city staff and, you know, get a sense of, you know, where to get help and things like that. So, that was a a great event. Um we're also going to be holding a resource fair for displaced Palisades businesses. That's in the works. Likely look for that towards the end of July. Um and of course the entertainment zone launched um this past weekend. It was the soft launch. Um pretty quiet uh you know but it it occurred um a sunny day um you know it it was it was busy um nothing noteworthy to report. I was one person who strayed from the boundaries and then was brought back um by private security but um otherwise you know it went off without a hitch and you know in this case no news is good news. Um and uh this weekend um is the official launch event pride on the prominade uh June 21st. So come on out. Hope to see you there. Um it's a 2:00 p.m. to 700 p.m. uh event. Um on the prominade the uh entertainment zone is otherwise active um 11:00 a.m. to 10 p.m. And so far we have seven businesses that have signed up to participate. So hopefully it's a fun and festive um

event. And let's see. I think that is all we have to report. Thank you. Questions? Just like to announce Sam I have a question. Okay. Um, so July 2nd, uh, right? Okay. So, I see that there. Um, the off-site affordable housing pilot incentive program. Just noting I is that similar to what we actually re recommended when we set up our our zoning the housing element. Yeah, remember we was it's uh this is definitely not new territory. Um you're remembering during the housing element we did uh commit to kind of looking at just kind of other different options um for compliance with the AHPP. I think we ended up not really moving forward with it. Like we we we knew about all the options but because we hadn't heard a demand for that and it seemed the program was being used, it was working well, there wasn't a reason to expend the resources to look at that. Obviously times have changed now. Um and this is really in the interest of um unsticking uh projects that have been entitled already but are stuck in permitting in plan check you know and unable to get to full building permits. Um I remember when we did the implementation of the housing element we did a we sent something up where we were incent improving the incentives on on the inclusionary and we noted with some we asked council to consider doing the same on off-site and council at the time did not. Right. So would if this goes presuming this goes through that would actually solve that problem. Right. Right. And and again it's intended to address a pretty discreet class of projects that are already entitled and they're basically we're trying to unfreeze that pipeline. Is there an opportunity to unfreeze the stuff that hasn't been proposed yet? Also yeah I I mean I think this is obviously a policy

discussion we haven't had in totality with the council. So, you know, you might imagine this is a pilot, you know, and the direction was to, you know, in the short term to deal with this class of projects. Certainly, depending on how it rolls out, right, there there certainly could be longer term implications um for how this works. Okay. Thanks. I just want to second that my understanding from talking to the council person who's doing this or one of them is that as you said it's really to unstuck the pipeline um because they're stuck there because of interest rates and construction costs and in some cases like Gelson's GS um what am I trying to say measure GS um and I think it's a great idea anybody else um I'd like to just make a general announcement For all those who have never been before this body uh and want to speak about items before the body, please give your chits to the secretary of the bo of the commission before we get to talk about these issues. And if there's anything that in public comment you want to make, it must be something that this commission would be responsible for. must be about something that this commission would be responsible for. I've got uh All right, let's I'd like to make a motion actually to put um item 11 A on the consent calendar. Can somebody what? DA. I'm sorry. Okay. Can Can we put a Can we

put a DA on the consent calendar? That's my point. It's a public hearing. I do not believe the rules of order expressly prohibit it. However, I we've not seen that happen. In our experience, it's probably better just to conduct the hearing. We can't. No. Okay. That would be nice. All right. You You may consider waving the staff report if that's something you want to do. There are other options for you. I'll do that. Yeah. You got We ready to call? Oh, you want general public comment? Yeah. I have one public uh comment, Chip. Um it's Jerry Rosen. Ruben, I mean. No, we're we're not at your item yet. We're not at your item yet. Yeah, this is just this is it. Tell me when. All right. Well, thank you, Jerry Rubin, Santa Monica resident. Uh, honorable chair Tolken, first of all, I just want to say all the best to you. You've been a great chair and really chaired the meetings wonderfully and I want to wish you all the very best everyone. Well, I think you already heard me speak about the airport closure and what I think would be good and what a lot of other people would to have a great park there. So, I'm not going to go into all that again, but I do want to uh invite you to my younger brother Marty's memorial we're

going to have at the airport park. And uh he and his wife Joan worked for couple decades to uh convince the community that it was in our best interest to see the Santa Monica airport close. and it's happened. People spoke. So, we're going to have the memorial and give people time to set their calendar because because everyone's invited, whatever your views are. I stopped into the airport administration office yesterday and they knew Marty and gave me a big hug and said they would be there. So, we're tenatively set right now for Saturday, August 2nd. at 11 a.m. at the airport park on uh and you know where it is. And Marty passed away on the 29th of May from cancer and his wife passed away a month earlier in the bed next to him from cancer. Who knows how that happened? speculative, but kept it secret for a while. Didn't want people to know. Didn't want to upset me or his friends. He was a good guy. Ted Lou knew it. Came to visit him personally. Karen Bass knew it. Came to visit him personally. Tracy Parks visited him personally right here at the medical facility. Bought him a proclamation. Sure. Bill Rosenthal would have been there. He were still around. Lots of other people. So mark it on your calendar. I'm going to invite everyone from all the commissions,

the airport commission as well. He spoke there a lot and he's missed. And may Marty Rubin and his wife Joan Wyinners rest always in peace and love. Thank you very, very much. Thank you, Jerry. Sorry. Um, do any of the commissioners want to pull items on the consent calendar? No. Can we uh get approval? I move approval of the consent calendar. Second. Second. All those in favor say I. I. And approval of the minutes committee meetings. That's we just That was it. That was it. We just did that. Oh, you just That was part of it. Okay. Can I just take us back to item five for a moment and acknowledge the chair's service to the commission? We want to do that now. Oh, is that item five? Yeah. Thought we were going to do that at the end. Sorry. Can I start? I'll start. Go ahead, Sam. Um, well, for one thing, you're not off the hook. I think until they appoint someone else, you can still be coming. So, I I know it's tempting not to, but but you could. Um, so we may see you again. Um, it's been a just a pleasure being with you. You're such a kind, gentle person. It's really nice to have that voice on the commission. Um, and I I appreciate your years of service to Santa Monica and your expertise. And I will miss you, but we may see you next time at the next meeting. Thank you. I I should record this for my ex-wife. So, it's being recorded. It actually is being recorded. It's on YouTube. You can tell her to turn it on right now. And while I'm speaking, I mean, um, I I can't speak to your ex-wife, but, um, uh, it's been a privilege. Uh, it's been a privilege to serve with you. Um, I, uh, was have been familiar, I mean, like

we didn't know each other, but, I read your writing regularly when you published it as part of the smart column. Um and uh and so uh I I just want to acknowledge that you've been a um a terrific colleague and uh and um a thoughtful um a thoughtful colleague uh dedicated to making everything better that comes before us and trying to get through it quickly. So yeah, thank you. So thank you very much. And Sam, I'll just follow all that and say I echo what everyone has said. It's been a real pleasure serving alongside you on the planning commission. I think you uh come at your your ideas very thoughtfully. Um I think you have a you're I get the sense you're a kind-hearted person and that comes through. So just want to thank you for your years of service for Santa Monica and um I look forward to hopefully seeing you at other meetings. Okay. Yeah. Same. I am really It was just great to have your thoughtful point of view. sometimes you brought a whole new angle to our conversations that none of us the rest of us brought up and I really appreciated that and it sort of seemed really quick like even when you told us you might not come be re-uping I was like well that's not for a while well who knows if they don't appoint anybody I mean you might be here for a long time so let's hope for that well thank you for your service thank you chair Tolken thank you for your service as Well, although it's been brief, it's been a pleasure serving with you. Thank you. And Sam, just on behalf of um the city planning staff, it's really been a pleasure to have you on the commission. Um you know, this is we've really appreciated your perspective um and everything that you've brought to the commission. This is an all volunteer job. It's busy, you know, and we expect

a lot and I just appreciate you uh showing up um and for your service to the city. So, thank you. Thank you. All right. There's no study session. So, we're we're now at the public hearing for 1776 Main Street. Chair, could I move that we wave the staff report? Yeah. Is there a second? Well, okay. We do. All those in favor of waving the staff report say I I All those opposed? None. Yes. And we may have questions later, but we think we understand it. Do you want to tell them what they have? There's an applica uh presentation from the applicant first. Chair chair I just want to briefly mention that I had met with the applicant and applicant representatives it's not thank you all for making the time this evening I'm Jeremy Rawich I'm the managing director of communications and external affairs at Rand joined by Eric Peltz our senior vice President for Finance and Operations and Ken Kutcher, our land use attorney from Harding Larore. Paula Larmore is not here because she's on vacation. Uh I'll keep it brief tonight, but first I want to thank uh city staff Roxan Tanamorei, Armenia Traparian, Wayne Pichek, and city attorney Susan Colola. We've worked closely with them over almost the last two years to reach what we clearly believe is a win-win for both Rand and the city of S Santa Monica. I'll keep the remarks short

tonight because I think we're all pretty clear on the issue. I think the staff report really lays it out quite well, but there are some points we want to illuminate because we think it's important to help folks understand the opportunity before us. Just a quick bit about Rand. Uh, as it says on the presentation, our mission is to help improve policy and decision-making through research and analysis. Rand does objective analytical research to bring evidence to public policy problems. And through that, we help communities around the world. As some of you may know, we started as a project within Douglas Aircraft and then spun off into an independent nonprofit in 1948. Since then, we've been headquartered in Santa Monica. We were previously in the area where Tongva Park is, and then we built our corporate headquarters. I think many of you are familiar with the building. It's large, as you can see some of the specs on the screen. Uh we've got five floors of office space, three floors of underground parking. We are proud that because of our care and concern for the environment and the community we serve in uh it's gold lead certified. We make extensive use of recycled water for both landscaping and toilet flushing and that means a lot to us. It's something we're quite proud of. The building was uh approved under a DA agreement and that's largely why we're here today. It was almost 25 years ago that it happened and largely because everybody assumed this would be our forever home. uh a new category of use was created called institutional office. But the practical implication of that is that really only Rand can operate that building. It has to be a very randike entity. So that means for anything including a transfer or sale of the building, leasing out anything more than a very small part, we would need a DA amendment. And unlike today's DAS, uh this DA is much longer. It runs till 2055. And that's largely why we're here. Uh this slide helps contextualize the challenge we're facing in that our headquarters uh presence has changed dramatically. So just to briefly quickly orient you the orange line is how a typical office user would use the space. Could probably hold 1300 people. We're a

little more uh office focused a little less a little more generous with space. So we never really had more than a thousand RAN people assigned. So the green line are RAN staff assigned to our headquarters office. The red line is who comes to the office. And the gap in those years 16, 17, 18 is because we allowed remote work for our researchers, many of whom would work either at home or in the communities they were operating in. So we were never fully using that, you know, thousand person space, but we had 700 people coming in pretty regularly. The pandemic hits, we remained open because we were given an exemption as an essential provider. We do, as many of you know, classified research. So the people that were doing the classified research and the people who literally were needed to keep the lights on continued in the building. The pandemic subsides. We come back to work. But as you see in the later part of the red line, we never quite return to where we were. And that's largely because we rewrote our remote work policies, extending the flexibility to work remotely to a much wider swath of our staff who have taken advantage of that flexibility. And we now believe if you look at the last couple years and going into the future, that's what that's what our future looks like. So today we have an average of 225 people coming to a building where we have you know 800 plus assigned and where 1300 could work and that represents both opportunity cost but also an opportunity for a win for Rand and the city. So what we want to do is unlock some of those resources to help further our mission. As you just noted our needs have changed because of technology post pandemic. Uh, also we have offices in Pittsburgh, DC, and Boston. And particularly in DC, we've been hiring and assigning more staff as our federal sponsors have craved more in-person interaction, briefings, presentations, interacting with our researchers. So, what we want to do is further our mission through more independent research. We could sell the building or we could lease out a significant portion of the building. uh

if we sold, we'd move to a much smaller building in the area, which I'll talk about in a moment, and then we'd invest those proceeds in independent research over time. A little bit of context on those final two points. When we say it'd be in the area, uh we have been asked by people we've talked to, even our employees, others, will we be in Santa Monica? The answer is we don't know because we haven't we don't know what we're going to do yet. And so, we haven't started looking for any future home. We do know it will be nearby the west side of Los Angeles, East Santa Monica. And we know that because our main asset is our people. We don't have factories. We don't make products. We have brain power. That's what brings our mission to life. And so we have mapped where our people live. And we know that we'll be somewhere here on the west side, eastern Santa Monica, because we don't want to lose our talent. And so we'll have our offices uh in California uh here in the western part of Los Angeles. Where exactly, we don't know. When we talk about investing in independent research, some of you may know RAND's business model operates largely under contracted sponsored research. Governments, federal, state, local, hire us to do research. Another portion of our research is independent research. So much like a university, we operate what you could think of as like an endowment. We call it a long-term investment fund. And that's money we use to study public policy challenges. And what that looks like is there is a public policy problem that might be too new, too complex, too novel, too controversial. And there isn't funders. There are not government sponsors that are funding that research. But RAM believes in looking at that problem, it could use RAND analysis. It could use Rand brain power. So we use our funds to study those problems. We recently did a look at the opioid crisis as an ecosystem. So not just addiction, treatment, recovery, but an entire collection of things that make the opioid crisis an ecosystem that has to be considered thoughtfully with all the interdependencies. That's one example of dozens if not hundreds. That research matters. It impacts communities, impacts real people, and we want to do more of it. And if we can unlock some of the

resources we're spending on unused office space, we can do more of that research. as the as the staff report uh makes clear uh we initially when we started this almost two years ago it was going to be a DA termination full transparency it's now a DA amendment and that's largely because we think it's a better vehicle city staff and the Rand team think it's a better vehicle to both track and lock in some of these benefits and create some certainty so what the amendments would do reasonable use of uh commercial usage business professional creative office uh R&D for life science including up to 40% % wet lab. Uh Rand wouldn't do ground flooror pedestrian retail, but a future op operator could have ground flooror retail uh under these changes. Um I talked about a win-win. Here's a big part of it for the city. We recognize the city has big priorities and big challenges. So we've agreed with city staff to a $5.5 million community benefit payment, $3.5 million upfront upon DA amendment, the remainder the remainder after coastal commission approval. In addition, if Rand or a future owner operator wanted to lease out unused parking, the city would have right of first offer if they wanted to take that parking. Uh we will continue a $40,000 annual contribution we make to the growing place, the early childhood lab school nearby. The DA term would be extended by 10 years. Um and we think the almost in all likely buyer scenarios, it would be a for-profit enterprise given the size and the price of the building. But if somebody who was exempt from Measure GS was the ultimate buyer, we've agreed to pay 4.6% of the sale price uh to the city to help true up what wouldn't come through with in Measure GS transfer tax. I won't really get into this. I think you're all very familiar with Loose. This is just to make clear that everything we're looking to do is completely consistent with the LE plan and implementation. Uh in terms of the civic center plan,

the adjustments there are really pretty administrative. one acknowledging that the DA is being amended to be consistent with both Loose and the CCSP, but also there are references to Rand headquarters that will make clear refer to 1776 Main Street in case it's no longer Rand's headquarters. There is still more win for all sides here in addition to the community benefit payment and the lab school payments. Uh there is substantial economic benefit for the city here. We've commissioned an independent third-party study that found that if a for-profit buyer purchased a building and used it to a more reasonable capacity, we're looking at $3.3 million a year in various taxes for the city, 3.6 million per year to the county. And then if we sell the building at the price we would expect to sell it for, it would produce between 20 and $25 million in transfer tax under GS. If you aggregate that, it's $130 million over the life of the DA to the city. So that is either benefit to the city or alternatively opportunity cost if the status quo remains. In addition, activating the area businesses on Main Street, the Santa Monica Place Mall, the restaurants behind the building that are not often open for long, all of them would stand to benefit. Rand gains here as well. The funding for the independent research I already referenced. Uh but in addition, if we can reduce our operating costs, that makes us more efficient for our sponsored research. we'll be running a tighter ship because we're not paying for floors of unneeded office space. So, we benefit there. And we also think in the non-economic way, right sizing our office space is also a win. In DC and Pittsburgh, in Boston, we rent. And so, we've shrunk our space. We've moved to hoteling. And we found that's a more vibrant environment. You work with people. You interact with them. You get innovation and collaboration and creativity. I work in that building. It's pretty empty. I can go a day without seeing anyone. That does not lead to those things. So, we think it will just be a better work environment for our staff. So, winding down, obviously, we're here

tonight hoping to get your recommendation of approval for this proposal. We're scheduled to present to the council on July 29th. Then we'll formally kick off the coastal commission process. Uh, and then we could, assuming that goes well, truly market the property, see if in fact we can find a buyer, and if so, look for a new location, Santa Monica or somewhere else on the west side, and then ultimately, if it becomes the appropriate decision, build out our new facility and move. Uh, like I said, we see this, as it sounds like many of you do as well, a great opportunity for all involved. Proud to say that through the stakeholder briefings we've done, through the public comments we've reviewed, through everything we've heard, we are not aware of any opposition to this proposal. whatsoever. So, happy to take any questions. Thank you for your time. Do commissioners have any uh questions of the applicant? Commissioner Fresco? No. I have a question. Why would you sell the building? Couldn't you I mean, I've done stuff buildings for research groups. Couldn't you expand and contract um as needed depending upon your you know what what kind of studies you were done doing or is it just too inex expensive to do that to run the building that way? Well, it's very expensive to to run the building. There's a lot of empty space and it's really hard to expand and contract our space. The building is not designed at all for multi-tenency. It's one big open space and we obviously have to have pretty tight security for the type of research we we do. So, we can't have people wandering in the space. Uh there's narrow corridors where the bathrooms are, the elevators, and it's really hard to divide it up. That's why we we think it's much more financially beneficial for Rand and create a better environment to ideally sell and move. And we are looking at potentially leasing. But even if we did that, we

might divide the building in half and then um we estimate have to spend about $10 million in renovations to secure half of it and then get another tenant to to fill the rest. But if you were to, you know, look at our narrow corridors, you couldn't put mult multiple um less in those corridors. They're just too narrow to to do things. It's really designed to be an owner operator uh building with pretty much free free throw uh throughout. Thank you. If there are no other questions. I have like 11 chits. I just I just have question for staff. Can we do that before the public comment? Is that is that all right? Um and this is mostly that I want to we've exchanged an email on this. I just want to put this on the record for total clarity. Um when I visited the property, uh we w we walked the outside and it's basically turnkey except for one corner of the property where the there could be a right of way built linking the southeast. It's not really south or east, but what feels like the southeast corner to the alley off of, um, off of, um, ocean, right? And so, um, I just wanted to make sure for the record that and and the property has still about 10,000 square feet of undeveloped, uh, land that it could that a new owner could choose to like put up some improvement in the facing pedestrians. So, just so that it's all on the record, uh, can we confirm that if Rand or a subsequent owner wanted to link that back portion of the property to the alley in a public with a publicly accessible right of way that that would

not count against their development remaining development aotment for the property. Thanks. Okay, good. I do understand the question. So the area that you're describing based on the conceptual use of that area would be based on the code we have today excluded from our definition of floor area. And um so we don't see that that would as you've described it in concept would be counted against their floor area cap and even if it's locked at night or the new owner needs to have lockable gates. That's correct. the floor area exclusion that that references accessible by the general public does not speak to whether or not there can be a gate um okay to the area. Thank you. Any other we have about I'll call up call up the people who want to speak up about this. Uh let me call up four people and you have two minutes. Amanda Honda, I guess Jerry Rubin wants to speak again, Bill Parrot, and Jim Cow. Thank you everybody for having me. Um, I'm sure you all are familiar by sight or by sound of the Early Childhood Lav School, uh, just down the way here on Fourth Street. I am fortunate to be the director of the school there and, uh, I have been for a couple of years. Uh, we serve children from three months to six years old and part of uh, one of our goals at the center is to provide uh, 15% of our student population to be low-income city of Santa Monica

residents to have access to highquality early childhood education. Um, and one of those things that it sounds really, really fantastic when you think about the goal and it's really, really challenging without the funding to back it. Um, but what we have found is that between the city of Santa Monica and Rand supporting us with a lot of seed money to get this process started, we've been fortunate uh over the past few years to have enough money. Um, and then RAND contributes about $40,000 a year every year to this fund, which they have also um graceful graciously uh offered to extend um provided that they're able to amend the development agreement. And without this money, we couldn't fund the tuition assistance and the tuition subsidies that are so so so vital to the families that participate at the program. Um what's really big for us too is that recently Rand has uh decided to let our staff park in their parking lot. um they've been able to amend some pieces in their contract and allowed our staff to park there, which saves us over $60,000 a year, which then all gets dumped back into tuition assistance. And now we can fund 15% of our families to be tuition assistance families at the school. And it's a huge thing for us. Um I know I could keep talking for a long time about tuition assistance and all of those pieces, but really we're here to talk about Rand. And I just want to say that Rand is a really positive community partner. They've been a positive partner for us at Growing Place and for the Santa Monica Early Childhood Lab School. Um, there's been a pandemic. There's been a lot of different things and when funding keeps getting pulled out of the rug from so many different organizations, it's nice to know that there is a company for us to rely on. I have a I have a question. Thank you so much for being here. Um, in our meeting, uh, one of the things that came up was the value of the $40,000 over the next 30 years. And um and I understand the I understand the economics of that. Um for

Rand it does not make sense to make a present value contribution in the current uh you know what what is the present value of of all that 40,000 times 30. Sorry it's bleeding into the mic. Um, but part of the conversation was some concern about whether there was a a an entity that could accept that money because right now Rand is paying it directly to you every year and if there were a present value contribution, it might have to go to another entity. My question in the spirit of adding flexibility to this deal is if a future owner wanted to make a present value contribution in lie of writing you a check every year for $40,000. A is that something you'd be interested in because you could take the money and invest it put in a capital you know put it in a restricted fund and then release every year. If you don't want it, that's fine. But would you have a financial vehicle to accept a present value contribution? Because the reason that I'm asking the question is that um I would love for, you know, like if there's a new owner and they want to do this, I don't want them to have to come back to us to ask for that kind of an amendment. And I'm just curious whether it's workable for you. Yeah, I appreciate the question. I think for me, um, we'd probably have to bring that back to our financial office and I'm happy to circle back with you at a later date because I I honestly don't have the answer to that question, but I'd be happy to talk a little bit more about what that could look like. Okay, this is all theoretical at this point. Correct. Well, it is. I'm just trying to limit the amount of effort that has to be gone through like let's make this the last DA amendment that we get that we have to process. And so, if we can add that flexibility, well, this this GA doesn't apply to a new owner, does it? Yeah. goes with the land. The 40,000 is coming from Rand, correct? I'm sorry. I do have a question for you.

I'm sorry. The $40,000 annual payment would be from Rand or the successor in interest. Okay. I do have a question for you. Um, where are you parking that is $60,000 a year? Uh, we're parking at the Hilton parking lot. At the what? We were parking at the Hilton across the street on across on Fourth Street. Who owns the Hilton? Hilton. Hilton. Omni, right? Um um couldn't you have worked out a deal with the city for their parking structure? Presumably that would be cheaper. That hasn't been successful so far in the few years of operation. God knows it's not at full capacity. It is correct. That's something that's definitely something we should pursue or somebody should pursue. Thank you, Leslie. I appreciate it. Okay. Well, they don't have that many people. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Jerry Ruben, Santa Monica. Oh my gosh. Uh, I'm not an expert in financing, but Ram Corporation is one of the main places in our community, been there for so long. I know some of the old guards, they'll remember the late Daniel Ellburg and Anthony Russo and the hard times there, but things are different now. I remember they put out great reports on homelessness and so many other things. I can't imagine they wouldn't be able to put out reports on Ukraine that Donald Trump should read or the foundations of our democracy, which he might want to read. But I hope they stay in the building, especially with the Olympics coming up and all the positive things that are going to happen. And I hope that whatever they're asking

for will at least give them the ability to decide to stay there rather than to move to some other location because that would be a blemish on our city if they moved and a blemish on the good work that they're doing. Someone's going to publicize that in a bad way. So that's all I could say. I still remember when Yao Katagari supported us when she was on the arts commission to reassess the chain reaction sculpture and I thought that was beautiful. She was a great person. May she rest in peace as well as and I remember Josece who was on our school board and worked for Rand and supported the chain reaction culture. So all I can say is Rand is one of the main places in Santa Monic and I hope they stay here. Wait, Mr. Ruben. I'm I'm Jerry. I'm sorry. I just have to ask for an acknowledgement of this moment that Jerry Rubin is before the planning commission defending the Rand Corporation. I I was hoping that somebody would come up and just for the sake of argument remind us about the history of this entity in Santa Monica. And of all people, I just want to appreciate this moment. So, um thank you for that. We we are we we are truly living in the upside down for for the good of the community. Just just to say it first of all, I can't imagine that I would have a different opinion than anyone in this whole room. So, it's not that unusual. But don't forget, I'm not the original Jerry Rubin from the 60s. You all know that. So, but remember that. But uh there's no pie anywhere near you. No, no, no, no. But uh anyhow, thank you very very much and I hope this all works out.

Good evening, uh Chair Tolken and commissioners. Thank you for uh taking this up and and listening to us. I'm my name is Bill Parent. I'm a 25-y year resident of Santa Monica and I'm here because um in previous lives I spent uh 15 years at Harvard at the Kennedy School of Government and 20 years at UCLA in School of Public Affairs. I have no affiliation with Rand, but I do have a lot of expertise on how to keep the lights on in a research institution, especially one that depends on federal money. So, I was I came here just in case there was opposition. I'm not sure there is, but I'll so I'll make my point very briefly. uh and a little bit sharply and it and it's very much in line with uh Jerry Rubin's um comments. There are four institutions of enormous public value in Santa Monica. A flagship NPR station, a world-class community college, a university research and teaching hospital, and rand think tank. Each one of these, you could say, is on the enemy's list of the current anti-science um and anti-intellectual agenda of the current administration. And each and and and research institutions all over the country, the strategy is to uh put them down by a thousand paper cuts. And it might not look like that uh a a waiver and a development agreement is a blow against the empire, but uh these are the kinds of things where communities have to stand up behind these institutions. And any little thing that can be done to again allow people to keep the lights on and do that and and keep Santa Monica having the reputation it does as a progressive intellectual community is uh you are to be commended even for this little act. It's uh I never thought, by the way, when I was in college that I

would be defending Rand as a blow against the empire, but um that's the way it is. Thank you very much. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Jim Chow. Uh I've been a resident of the Santa Monica zip code area for about 20 years. I've worked at Rand in the Santa Monica zip code for about 28 years. Uh I currently serve as the vice president for RAND project air force which is one of our national security research divisions. Had the privilege of working on a variety of national security issues, defense strategy, um air force planning, improving the lives and the resilience of our men and women in the air force. So um I have been at RAND such a long time because I'm passionate about our mission. Part of our charter is to serve the public good and I think we've had a good track record of that. Jeremy mentioned working on important public policy issues like the opioid crisis that benefits the Santa Monica community and our nation and our service people too and and so I'm passionate about our public uh charter and and serving the public good. um continuing to operate in our current building is costly and inefficient and and for our workforce. Um it's it's not a work vibrant work environment for our folks. Uh you know I I started when that building first stood up. It was about 800 people. We had you know capacity for and it was a vibrant much more vibrant work environment. right now 200 250-ish people, it's it's just much more harder to to sustain that that exciting work environment. It's still it's still um we still have great people um but but it's hard to to make it such a vibrant work environment. So, um by unlocking some of

these costs that we currently have, reducing those costs, allowing us to do more good work, I I appreciate the comments from Mr. Ruben here. Um, we want to do that good work. We want to do more. Getting agreement on this uh DA will help us do more good and that's what keeps me at Rand. Um, so anyways, you know, bottom line, please support this amendment. I I'm not hearing any any dissension on that. It It's not just about Rand. It is about ensuring Santa Monica remains vibrant. And it's I care about both both places. So, thank you. Thank you. Slicer, Sangita, Alumalia and uh Jill Jill Cannon. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Dr. Wendelyn Slusser and I'm a professor and a pediatrician and have lived and worked in Santa Monica for 20 years. I practice and taught pediatric residents at the Venice Family Clinic Sims Man Pico site. One story that continues to inspire me is our collaboration revitalizing Virginia Avenue Park. At the time, it was considered unsafe, even in broad daylight. But through dedicated community collaboration, that space was transformed, and many of you were pro probably part of that. Today, as many of you know, it's a vibrant hub of health and connection where family shop the farmers market, youth attend afterchool

classes, and neighbors gather outdoors. And there is even a library there now. That change wasn't just physical. It was social and emotional. It became a public health intervention that continues to foster well-being across generations. And this is where Santa Monica shines. The city has long been a leader in building a flourishing community. Years ago, it helped shape a well-being index, setting the tone nationally for how cities can prioritize health, equity, and quality of life. Supporting Rand's proposal builds on that legacy. Rand is seeking flexibility to adapt its underused building. This isn't just about space. It's about revitalization. Increased foot traffic means safer streets, stronger local businesses, and renewed civic vibrancy. As a public health professional, I see the alignment clearly. A fully activated building supports mental and physical health, promotes economic equity, and strengthens community ties. Rand has shown consistent dedication to the city, such as near and dear to my heart, the growing place. Virginia Park taught me that the right partnerships can transform dead space into community lifelines. Rand is offering that same partnership today. This amendment isn't about updating zoning. It's about choosing vitality over vacancy, connection over isolation. I believe that this um proposal will be a win and a success for both for Rand and Santa Monica. Thank you. Good evening. Can you hear me? My name is Singita Alawalia. I've been at Rand since 2014.

Um, I am the associate director of Rand Healthcare, which is one of our research divisions that focuses on social and economic policy. I'm also a senior researcher there and I conduct studies on aging, end of life care and doctor patient communication. I'm also very lucky to have been able to step into the position that Yao Catageri held um on the board of wise and healthy aging um which as you all know is a Santa Monica nonprofit that provides services and supports to older adults and their caregivers in the community. Um as you've heard our mission at Rand is pretty simple. It is to improve lives through research that matters. We are nonprofit, nonpartisan, and completely committed to public interest. Without hesitation, I can say that myself and all of my researcher colleagues work at Rand because we are deeply connected to our mission and we want to do all we can to advance sound policy through the research that we conduct. As you've heard from others already, uh we are using less than a quarter of our building's capacity on a daily basis. And of course, allowing us to lease or sell it would free up critical resources to support the kind of research that I and others do that supports our communities and inform social policy. It would create a more dynamic and collaborative environment. And most importantly, it would allow us to reinvigorate the businesses and the communities around us. This proposal in particular would provide a significant financial infusion to the city, including 3.5 million upfront to support strategic priorities. I believe strongly in RAND's mission and its longstanding commitment to the Santa Monica community. Supporting this amendment is the opportunity to strengthen both of those things. Thank you for your time.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Jill Cannon. I started at Rand in 1999, so I remember move in day to what I still consider the new building after 20 years across the street. My work as a senior policy researcher focuses on early childhood programs and policies, examining how they shape outcomes for children and families. and as a board member for connections for children stepping in for YAO category in that role that's a nonprofit in West LA that supports child care providers and parents including in Santa Monica specifically but also through my work um in partnerships with agencies uh such as First Five LA I've been able to see firsthand how research can empower communities and improve lives and I think we've heard a lot today about how Rand has a long history of conducting research that addresses important social issues. The amendment that we're requesting would provide us with resources for independent research, which we've also heard today. And I want to say that that's the kind of work that organizations and nonprofits like Connections for Children and some of the government agencies that I've conducted research for. It's what they rely on to better serve families in Santa Monica and beyond. and the current climate makes it even more important that Rand be able to fund this type of research on important topics that are affecting our communities. We've heard about the unused space and I can speak to it firsthand. I see this as an amendment that's an opportunity to both strengthen RAN's mission but also improve Santa Monica's vitality and I concur and I believe very strongly in RAND's mission and I also believe very strongly in Santa Monica's vitality. So I hope that you will join me in supporting this amendment. Thank you. I have just two more chips. Alice Huguay and uh Bill Parent. It looks like Bill. Yeah,

just me. Hi, I'm Alice Hugi. I'm a homeowner in Santa Monica and I'm a researcher at the Rand Corporation, a senior policy researcher. I'm also director of our center for qualitative and mixed methods and a professor at our school of policy analysis. Um I used to be a teacher in LA USD. So my research focuses on K through2 education. I've been uh working on projects funded by a variety of sponsors. Um for the last eight years that I've been at Rand, but some of the most impactful of that work has been work that was funded by Rand. So, I've done work into media literacy education for children, teaching kids how to navigate the information landscape, work that's really important, but that we may not have uh ready funders for. And I think that's one of the very important um dimensions of this amendment is being able to continuously fund that kind of work. Uh especially in the current environment that we're in. Um, these projects really exemplify RAND's dedication to research that serves the public good. Um, and it's a commitment that's really necessary right now, as much as it has ever been. And as you all know, what has set Rand apart for nearly 80 years is our steadfast nonpartisan approach to research. This enables us to pursue really important work regardless of whatever the political trends might be. And I think that that is a really important statement to be making um in the current environment regardless of external pressures. Um so this amendment we're requesting would allow us to continue this tradition of independent inquiry. Um selling or leasing portions of our building would generate resources that go directly into funding that kind of work that I've had funded for my own projects and many others at Rand have had funded as well. Um, on, you know, the other side of this, I am a Santa

Monica resident and homeowner, and I walk uh a mile south of our building to and from work. Um, and I've seen the churn of businesses over the last five years. And I think there remain far too many vacant storefronts and restaurants. And this area is vibrant and deserves to be activated. Um, it deserves to be a hub. It has a caliber that is unmatched and I do believe that filling our building will not only benefit Rand research but will benefit our community and I find that very important. I love working at RAND and I love Santa Monica and these things I think uh can work together with this amendment. So I appreciate your attention to it um and hoping for your support. So thanks for your time. Thank you. wave rebuttal. There's obviously nothing to really rebut, but happy to answer any other questions from any commissioners. Thank you. Commissioners have any questions of the I don't know. Did you want to ask him if what you were proposing is acceptable or is not the escalation in the 40,000? No, no, no. The I'm not asking about the escalation. It's it's if it would help to understand. So what a present value contribution is is right you take the 40,000 calculated out over and right you know what it is. So the idea is um and maybe this is a question for staff um is there a way for us to recommend that additional flexibility because I know that that was part of the RAND conversation and Rand doesn't make and it doesn't make sense for Rand to make that payment and then sell the building right it's that's not good math but for a new owner coming in that a new owner I would like to suggest have the

flexibility to be able to negotiate that with the city without coming back to us for yet another DA amendment. That's all I'm trying to avoid is like just to negotiate, but it may not end up being they may choose to spend the $40,000 every year. It may be cheap. They may decide that given interest rates and economic growth that they want to keep doing that, but um I just would rather add that flexibility in so that we don't have to do this again. I get it. Thanks for that suggestion. Um, based on what you're describing, we could um staff would need to work on that language and al obviously consult with with Rand. We could create a provision for a minor modification potentially. There's a few details that I can think of that we would need to establish in the text of the amendment um addressing how the net present value will be calculated on what basis those kinds of things. But in concept, it is something we could if there's agreement between parties, both parties, we could potentially insert without requiring a third amendment. That's all I'm looking for. We could do that tonight. We could recommend that tonight and staff would. Yeah. I also make just a quick followup. Go ahead. Thank you, Ken Kutcher. Um it's I've also uh understood that in some preliminary discussions about this there may have been some concern that 30 years from now the lab school may not be there and the city wanted to know that if that happened the DA now provides that money goes to the city. Got it. So I just wanted to point that out assuming we're still there. Yes. Right. But thank you for that clarification. I think again in any present value contribution negotiation, the city could presumably sort that out. I think that's not my client issue. It's not your issue. I just wanted to put it, you know, out there because it's been

discussed. I'm just trying to put this over our transom once. Does that answer it? Does you have a question? To make a motion. Do we have to do all separately or can we do it at once? You can do it all at once. Okay. Okay. I would move that we recommend adopt that we adopt the class one exemption uh pursuant to section 15301 of the state California environmental quality act uh regarding this project. Two, adopt a resolution recommending approval of the Associated Civic Center specific plan amendment. And three, recommend approval of a second amendment to the Rand Development Agreement. And I'll second that if it's friendly to include our recommendation on number three, that the amendment include provisions to simplify um the option, the future option to simplify provided that the that the equivalent value is received. Well, to be negotiated to be negotiated, right? Okay. Yeah, we'll let Roxan and team figure out how to say that, but you know what we're trying to say. Thank you. Commissioner Joo, do you have something? Should we Can we take a a vote? May I just I just wanted to say that you know I always have to add my little historical note that um you know Douglas Aircraft I've been deeply immersed in the history of Douglas Aircraft and they really put Santa Monica on the map. We were podunk without Douglas aircraft and the Douglas aircraft wasn't famous for jet engines and like really crazy stuff. They were really solid research and they built solid reliable things that really worked and it was really based on this

really strong intellectual rigor and that Rand came out of that is really one of the defining moments of Santa Monica today and all of the Silicon Beach and all of the other high-tech industries that have been here since the 50s because of what happened at Douglas Aircraft. And Rand really is Santa Monica. And personally, I feel excited and proud every time I see something from Rand anywhere. And I really, really hope that Rand finds offices in this city because you're us and we're you. So, thank you. I have a question. Is it is I mean, I don't know exactly what our economic economic development function is or capacity in the city. Would could they be working with Rand? I mean, would that be helpful at all to you to have the city behind you? And I know not since we don't have redevelopment anymore, it's kind of limited, but in terms of just helping you find a space in Santa Monica or do you need that one? We're very open to staying in Santa Monica. We think there there's good office availability. we've sort of we've browsed the options if you will, it's too early for us to make commitments. Uh but the eastern part of Santa Monica would be pretty central. Uh but if we do have, you know, collaboration with the city and and hope if um you know, they've brought told us about a couple potential opportunities, but we'd be glad to have that collaboration going forward uh to help us find that the best opportunities or they know of things that may come out come about in the future. So certainly we we would welcome that collaboration. If we had a redevelopment agency, it'd be really helpful, wouldn't it? Your motion to recommend um No, I mean, I think they know what they Okay. Right. If we if we vote quickly, a gentleman

from the national the national could we get a national security briefing on what the heck is going on in the Middle East? If we do this quickly, can we just take a break and get a get a briefing? No one else. No one else knows. Nobody knows. Ready for a vote. Okay. Commissioner Chako I. Commissioner Fresco. Yes. Commissioner Lambert. Yes. Commissioner Landrew. Yes. Commissioner Hamilton. Yes. And Chair Tolken. Yes. Two years later. When is this going to cancel? July 29th. July 29th. Now take a break. You want to take a break? Five. Yeah. Five minute break. Five minute break.

We're now on um 11B 1437 6th Street. Appeal of the uh 20 the ARB approval. See talking to the mic. Yeah. Appeal of the the ARB's approval 25 ARB-009. Is there a staff? No, we have exparte on this. We might have exparte disclosures on this. Oh, is there any experte? I will say only because I was just standing in the back chatting with uh Mr. and my personal affection for him and his wife who's a former we did a fellowship together. We did not talk about this matter while we were standing in the back of the room in any way, shape or form. Okay. Is there a staff presentation Good evening, commissioners. My name is Becky Jones, associate planner at the city of Santa Monica. The item before you is an appeal of the determination of the architectural review board for project 25 ARB 00009 at 14376 Street. After review of the appeal, staff recommends the following actions. To adopt the findings, deny appeal 25 0070. To approve the ARB application 25 ARB 00009 and adopt the attached statement of official action.

To give you a background, the property is 14376th Street, situated between Santa Monica Boulevard and Broadway in the neighborhood village zone in the downtown community plan area. The surrounding uses are multif family residential and mixed use. The project is associated with an existing administrative approval application for the development of a new residential project under the state density bonus regulations. The project proposes 172 residential units inclusive of 26 affordable units. Waivers and incentives include a reduction in bicycle parking, reduction in the threebedroom unit mix requirement, increase in F to 10.18, and an increase in building height to a little over 194t high. The administrative approval was filed last year and approval pending after the conclusion of this design review. For design review, the applicant filed an ARB application in January of this year. The project uh design was first brought before the architectural review board on February 3rd. The item was continued for revisions and then the board reviewed the resubmitt on April 21st and conditionally approved the project. The appeal was filed within the 10day period um appeal period on April 29th. The appeal request is for the denial of the board's approval of the building design, colors, materials, and associated conditions. The criteria for decision-making by the architecture review board is described with the following findings. In summary, the project should be expressive of good taste and design, not of inferior quality, compatible with the surrounding developments, and consistent with it zoning ordinance and municipal code. Additionally, state laws prohibit

conditions or decisions that have the effect of denying a housing project, which is also listed in our code section. The con decision made by the board came with project specific conditions to ensure that these findings are upheld. Such conditions include a provision of operable windows, consistent design expression on each facade, a more efficient planting plan, and things like placement of balcony drains to ensure proper maintenance of the building. To reiterate, the appeal is of the ARB approval of the project design. The grounds for appeal as explained by the appellent revolve around the argument that a sequel analysis is required by the architectural review board. However, the planning commission is reviewing the appeal of the decision based on the design findings mentioned previously. The ARB does not review or make decisions on environmental reports or SQA guidelines and it is not granted authority to deny housing projects that are otherwise ministerally approved according to state law. There we go. Uh, the project was duly noticed and published in the local newspaper. One comment was received. Um, but it was basically a letter from the original applicant in response to the appellant. Staff has reviewed the appeal request and recommends acceptance of the SQL findings. Setting of the appeal hearing date to today, June 18th, 2025 for the time frames under the builder's remedy settlement agreement, denial of the appeal and approval of the ARB application and the STOA. This concludes my presentation and I am available for questions. I have a couple questions um which just came up on my mind. How does this how does the settlement agreement

if at all impact the appeal? I mean does that at all direct where we go or if we granted it would that violate the settlement agreement or there is um there was a 60-day time frame to schedule an appeal if the ARB decision was appealed. Okay. So this would have been the uh the only date within our time frames. The other question is and you've pretty much made it clear but let's repeat it. What exactly is our jurisdiction tonight? I mean, what are we looking at? What is is it just the design elements? That's not what the appeal is based on. Correct. This is a denovo hearing. So, you have your ARB. You are the you you are the planning commission, but you're actually sitting as the ARB, you know, so the purview is the same as the ARB. The findings are the same. So, you're not looking at, you know, other kinds of issues um that the board otherwise wouldn't be looking at. But the appeal has nothing to do with the design. So, I'm not really sure how that relates. Again, yeah, you're you're you're decision will be based on the findings as required by the ARB ordinance, right? You're being asked to to essentially do two things. Rule on the appeal and then either approve or deny the actual um design since it's denovo. Okay. But but basically our our purview is the design and all that entails that the ARB would otherwise be looking at and that's it. Okay. Thank you. I think I was next. Oh, go ahead. Yeah. Um, so we've established that this hearing is consistent with the terms of the settlement, so that's not an issue. Um, the denial of the appeal. Um, unless I Well, never mind that we are not the Santa We are not the city of Santa Barbara Planning Commission. Um, and I do want to note that uh I really

would appreciate receiving appeals that are addressed to the correct city. Um but for and would be inclined to say come back another time but um for the sake of getting this over with um it I would like to hear from the city attorney the extent to which the subject matter of appeal is in fact within the purview of the ARB and it's that the actions that we're being asked to take are actions that we can actually take. It's not clear to me that I understand I I understand the argument that's being made, but we've so limited the scope of the ARB in Santa Monica that it's not clear to me that if we were sitting as the ARB, we'd have the power to even opine. So, understood. Um, before uh I answer that question, if I may, uh there is a procedural step that we would like to ask you to take. Um I don't know if you noticed in the staff report, but there is a procedural step about setting the hearing date um and actually conducting the hearing. Uh so if you um would if somebody would bring a motion to actually set the hearing date um and bring the hearing and then and then we can recommence the hearing. I I'll move that. But just making sure that we are we have the power to hold this we have the power to hold the hearing. Okay. So, I'll move that we set the appearing the hearing date for and conduct the hearing on uh the appeal for 25 ENT 0070 and related to ARB application 25 ARB 00009 for June 18, 2025 at 7:26 p.m. Second or 7:20 because we got started. Second. Thank you, Commissioner Cho. Yes. Commissioner Fresco. Yes. Commissioner Lambert. Commissioner

Landress. Yes. Commissioner Hamilton and Chair Tolken. Yes. So that was just part of the DA that we had to do that. So now we're having a legally noticed hearing. Procedural. It's a procedural step too. I mean not DA. Yeah. But for the appeal, right? You're So now that we've opened the taken a hearing, can we hear this? Yes. So the the municipal code does not limit the subject matter of the appeal. Right. So, so it is not it does not say you can that this that the subject matter of the appeal i.e. the sequa challenge could not be brought in this. However, the commission is still limited to design materials and colors. Okay. How do we do this? That was well that was uh my essential question is it was appealed based on a subject uh matter that we don't have perview over as an ARB. Well, correct and also as you will note for the as you will see in the record that this was a ministerial project. The the determination at the time was when the AA was approved. Right. Right. So because this is just a limited design review after the AA was approved. The secret determination already happened more or less at the time the AA was issued. That's helpful. What are we doing? So, so it is still a denovo, it is still a denovo hearing. So any so the if the commission so chose you're being asked to rule on that and you're also being asked to rule on the design. So you are still voting affirmatively to approve the design if you if if you so choose. So let me ask you something. Suppose I don't like the design. Can I just abstain or vote no on it? Yes. Yes.

In what order should we take up these items? Should we take a vote on the appeal itself and then um take a vote on you? You still need to hear from the appellent and the second. Yeah, we have to Okay. Can we have the uh appellants presentation after all that? Mr. Rand, I guess. No, he's the applicant. What? Dave's the applicant. Jordan's the appellent. Oh, that's Yeah. Good evening, honorable commissioners. Jordan Sison, land council. I'm appearing um um pinch heading for LZA Drew, who was not able to be here in person, who is the author of the appeal, but on his behalf, I apologize for the the typo for insitting Santa Barbara. SMMC could could easily be Santa Maria Municipal Code. So, we got to be careful. Absolutely. Absolutely, Commissioner. And again, no expartes with Commissioner Landre um talking about county uh matters, but um again, I am here um appearing on behalf of that law firm on and really the supporters alliance safer. Uh their appeal speaks for itself. Um, but I think ultimately the big picture question is not whether discretion was exercised, but whether or not the decision inherently has discretion. I think that's the core of the appeal. And in my limited time, I just want to hit four points. That's all outlined in the appeal. First point is that state density bonus law does not exempt SQL. There is no exemption for SQL under the state density bonus law which this project relies. Second point is let's core to this point is is it discretionary or ministerial that is the the contention and under SQL the lynch pin really comes down to whether or not there's an exercise of

judgment whether or not there's deliberate deliberation required as part of your decision-making process that's the lynch pin. The case law has demonstrated that where there is discretion that's retained by the county or by the the lead agency and even building safety permits, if there's enough discretion retained for there's to be conditions imposed upon it, that suggests it's discretionary, not ministerial. And furthermore, the guidelines does uh make clear that where there's a mixed bag where you've got some ministerial, some discretionary, it should be handled as a discretionary. My third point is looking at your code uh because that's a big core issue of this appeal is whether or not it falls with a mccoral. So it'd be helpful to look at the code notwithstanding it some of the references to Santa Barbara. Um but I want to highlight four points. First chapter 9.55 this is where the architectural review board is established. The stated purpose of that chapter is quote to promote the public health and safety and general welfare by establishing such procedures and providing such regulations as deemed necessary to preserve existing areas of natural beauty and cultural importance. It continues to include to eliminate conditions, structures or uses which by reason of their effect tend to degrade the health, safety and general welfare of the community. That sounds like environment to me. Another another example is section 9.55.140. That's the criteria and it was posted up earlier. Criteria two includes quote, "The proposed project is not inferior quality such as to cause the nature of the local neighborhood or environment to materially depreciate in appearance and value." It's another example of what sounds like environmental consideration. Next, as another point of reference is

the architectural review board's own website. It provides handouts to design teams. Chief amongst its questions that it provides to the design is a question. Does the project minimize its environmental impacts? It begs a question. Why ask a question if you are not allowed to consider environmental impacts? And the last example in municipal code I want to raise is in terms of the contents of this project. This project ca involves the demolition of a potentially eligible resource and that's why there was a public hearing before the lands commission. Now if you look at the lands commission the code provides tremendous discretion to that lands commission again section 9.56.020 I want to read it. It hereby declares as a matter of public policy that the purpose of this chapter is to promote the public health safety and general welfare by establishing such procedures etc etc etc. That's environmental. It continues under subsection uh 060 about some of the powers and authorities of that body. Amongst them is subsection G which again certify and or ratify applicable environmental documents in accordance with SQA. Um in some on this point it seems as if the code very clearly thinks of public safety and environmental considerations. My fourth point and last point will be very quick is Mccoral. Um there's a lot of emphasis on this case involving Mount St. or not San Hel but the city of Helina that project and I just want to highlight a couple of distinguishing factors. One that municipal code section very different from the Santa Monica's municipal code. If you look at the the decision that ordinance quote expressly restricts the planning commission's and city council's discretion and expressly precludes the planning commission and city council from disapproving a proposal for non-design related reasons. This is very

explicit in that case holding here as I just went through at least four examples of your code not nearly as strong and expressive of saying you cannot consider these issues in some um we respectfully again the appeal stands for itself respectfully request that you grant the appeal and have it done the appropriate sequel review. Again the question is not whether or not discretion was exercised but whether or not the decision involves discretion where it could have been uh decided. Thank you so much for your time. Good evening, commissioners. Dave Rand Rand Pastor Nelson representing the applicant. Uh Mr. Chair, before I get started, how much time do I have because I would like to bifrocate our rebuttal to address 15 minutes. Okay, that's more than we're going to need, but I want to do this in two parts. Uh the first to address the legal questions before you. The second to address the denovo nature of the hearing that given that you will be sitting as design review board tonight. Although I must admit to being very frustrated at having to go through the design review portion of it, given that the appeal, the reason you have jurisdiction, says nothing about the actual design of the building, materials, colors, landscaping, or otherwise. nor does it say anything about environmental impacts. Although supposedly this is a big exercise in the sanctity of SQUA but as I'll explain this has nothing to do with SQA. This is a smoke and mirror exercise because the there is an appellet court decision that is crystal clear directly on point that says design review and the architectural review board in Santa Monica just like the architectural review board in St. Helena, just like the design review board in Westwood is a design review

board. In this case, Mccoral East Side neighborhood uh organization for city of San Helena says design review boards when your jurisdiction is limited to aesthetics, design review materials and colors. That is too narrow of a scope to trigger SQA because in such a narrow review authority you don't have the ability to impose environmental mitigation. Argo SQA can't be triggered because this is just too limited in nature. That is a 2018 case. It is crystal clear. There is no disputing that your architectural review board, notwithstanding the creative cherry-picking of a few words that Mr. Sison pulled out of chapter 9.5.6, your code has a design review section which limits the ARB and your uh appeal authority to design review materials and colors just like any design review authority. Mr. assistant points to case law or actually I should say the Lzelle Drury firm points to case law talking about how well there's a doctrine that if a ministerial process like a building permit uh gets so involved in discretionary review that it can convert a ministerial process to a discretionary one and yes there is a 38-year-old case called friends of westward versus city of Los Angeles 38 years old where the city of Los Angeles in the course of issuing a building permit started doing crazy things like imposing environmental mitigation measures and granting an exception to give extra floor area and that was a really weird aberrant situation and bad fax made a very bad case and in that weird situation yes administerial process was elevated to a discretionary one and the court in that case said SQL was triggered a very weird

set of facts a very old case that has not aged well flash forward to 2018 the moral decision ision which is directly on point which clearly says SQL review is not a part of design review. Mr. Sison brings up density bonus law and the lack of a SQA exemption in density bonus law irrelevant to you tonight. You have no authority over density bonus whatsoever because density bonus uh incentives concessions waiverss are granted by the director in the course of a ministerial administrative review process. Um and the law is quite clear that the limited nature of design review benefits are even so constrained that they're ministerial in nature which is why those actions are granted ministerially. Um and a mixed bag where you have certain discretion and certain uh ministerial actions results in an overall discretionary uh process not relevant here at all. We have only ministerial actions that are part of this project. Ones that are not before you at all tied to the administrative approval and the one before you again clearly uh uh dictated by case law to be outside the scope of SQA because it design review is so limited in scope. Um and lastly I would say um this appeal has nothing to do with squa environmental impacts or design. I hope you dispense of it quickly. Um as Jesse Ainger will go into more detail when he comes up right now. Um this project did what an applicant did what it was supposed to do. They worked with the staff. They worked with the architectural review board. We had multiple hearings before the board. We listened. We responded. We incorporated changes. The architecture review board granted approval. This is a denovo

hearing tonight. We really hope you don't disturb that already uh approved designed approval because there's no reason to. So, please resist the urge to reopen up this process. Um it's your legal right, but we think it would be manifestly unfair for you to do that this evening. But out of courtesy, Jesse, if you could share with the commission what we went through with the board and how the project evolved from a design perspective to where it is today. Yes. Hello. Thank you. Um, and my name is Jesse with Ainger Architects and we worked uh, as Dave said with staff and with the ARB who we presented uh, in two occasions and went through uh, several revisions uh, to get to the approval point for the project. Uh just to talk very briefly about the concept of the design because this is a 100% density bonus project. We were going from uh a base height of of eight stories around 84 feet and um and doubling basically the density that we could achieve with that on the height which gave us a high-rise building. We set that building in from the property lines on the sides creating a narrower bar. The the project site is 100 by 150. Um so it created a narrow bar building with single circulation uh core going from one end to the other. So we opened that circulation core up at the ends providing glass at each side and then that created a bifurcation of the two halves of the building in which we uh decided to treat them uh differently. So the the the portion of the building that's facing north towards the mountains, we created more of an organic form to that. more glass uh balconies that open up uh to take in those views uh of the mountains to the north and then uh the southern portion which faces more of the urban grid creating more of a grided uh design using GFRC uh high quality materials uh both GFRC and the

glass uh window walls for the project. Um and that creates the two halves of the of the building. So you can see that here with the more gritted facade with the punched windows of the GFRC uh creating undulating patterns as we move up and then the more glassy facade with the balconies to the north. Um you can see the glassy facade here to the north with the balconies that that change uh and shift as they move up the building at the ground floor relating the entry into the building to the scale of other entries. Uh creating an entry portal for the project uh treating that with wood u with community room spaces at the ground level uh creating a nice pedestrian experience uh along uh Sixth Street. Um so some of the comments that we received from the board were about the entry portal that I just discussed about um creating more of a singular expression for that. We did revise the entry uh to the project reduced how deep that entry was uh and and the board was happy with those changes. Uh the initial design that we presented to the to the board had more GFRC on the north side um not a window wall. So the comment was to have that more glassy. We addressed that comment um and what we presented to them uh was uh addressed those and and they approved that. One of the conditions that we got uh was on the west facade uh creating more undulation of the of the balconies. Um we did revise the front balconies but not as much as they wanted us to. So what you see on the very right is uh how we're addressing the conditions. We've yet to present this to back to the city but that's how we're addressing the condition creating more undulation. So we've been working on the design further even after uh the approval. And then there was a a condition for the east facade. Um the one on the left is what we presented. Uh they wanted to see the glass uh come

around more uh to the central uh corridor spine and then the uh more undulation in the windows of the GFRC on the other side. So the um design on the right is what we have done to address those conditions. And then there was a condition also for uh changing the lighting and which we did. They wanted to eliminate the the lighting that we had on the vertical there. So we've uh went through um all the conditions that that we received from the board and have been working to address them and continue to address them as we're working through final uh uh plan check approval. So thank you for your time and I'm here to answer any questions that you might have on the design. I would just I want to finish one one point which I neglected. Thank you Jesse. Um there's no historic issue whatsoever. The pro project went through the code required process because the building was the existing building is more than 40 years of age to seek a demolition permit. That demolition permit could be reviewed by the landmarks commission if someone filed a nomination. it wasn't and 75 days lapsed and an application was filed just like every single project in Santa Monica that proposes demolition of a building more than 40 years of age. So that is a non-issue as well. Um so we're done. Thank you. Here for questions. I just have one question. Um the affordable units are there three bedrooms among the affordable units include some three bedrooms or are there any three bedrooms? There are no three bedrooms on the project. Okay. But but the bedroom mix is distributed among affordable units. Correct. Yeah. Okay. Thanks. It's the same. Just um question for staff. Really? Well, let's ask a question for Mr. Rand and a question for staff and this is mostly just to establish a super clear record on this. Um number one for Mr. Rand. Um, if somebody want because you went into the SQA point, if somebody wanted to

object to the absence of SQA review, are would you be saying that this appeal is not the venue to do that? Um, that there is some other venue that it should have been done in or that one is not possible at all. No, on this particular project there is no opportunity or possibility to um to to argue that SQA should be involved in the process and okay you may there depending on your vantage point that people may not like that but the reality is the underlying land use approvals not before you tonight are ministerial. There is a clear exemption statutory exemption in SQA for ministerial actions. only discretionary actions trigger SQA the architectural review board review as I as I mentioned ministerial not subject to SQA based on case law so there is no SQA as part of this process you'd essentially have to argue that that piece of code is unconstitutional and sue the city of Santa Monica uh and take it all the way to the California Supreme Court to resolve whether or not that exclusion is constitutional or not but there's no process in the land use dispute facility to have this conversation. No. And M Mr. Sison as a good attorney did his best to try to distinguish uh the the Mccoral case from from this. But there there is no distinguishing that. If that my my view, my opinion, if that went before a judge, uh a judge would see right through that and see your architecture review board process as no different than St. Helena or any others because if your discretion is only design, materials, colors of landscaping, you don't have a broad enough review authority to shape the project and impose mitigation measures and that is the type of discretion that trigger sequence. Okay. So then my question my question for staff is about the landmarks piece which is the assertion and the again I just really

want to clear this up. There's this assertion in I should say Mr. Drury's letter cuz I don't even think Mr. Sison addressed it. Uh that somehow that there's some discretion on the part of the landmarks commission. My understanding is that we went through a whole long court case that resulted in the landmarks commission ultimately have no having no discretion to landmark stuff on its own and an independent nomination is now required. Is that correct? That is correct. The discretion that is being referred to would be if a nomination had been filed by somebody other than the landmarks commission and then at the hearing there is discretion to determine whether or not something is historically significant. But that is not the demolition permit process. Right. And in the absence of that nomination and the end of the t of the tolling that discretion goes poof and there is no more discretion. Yes. Okay. I just Yeah. Really want to clear that up. Thank you. I'm Do we hear back from the appellent? Yeah, he needs to talk. Yeah. Is there any public comment? No, I have no questions. No public comment. Uh, no. It should be applicant first and then appellent last. So if there's no public comment then okay there is a there is one public comment but that's Mr. I think. Yeah, that's the Jordan. Just to be clear here, are we past the applicant's rebuttal of the non-existent public comment? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, chair, and thank you, commissioner. Um, again, the appeal speaks for itself. Um, and I want to thank, you know, very competent and very

esteemed council. Um there's a difference of opinion, but the PEL stands for itself and uh we appreciate your consideration. Thank you. I'm I'll move. Can I move it? Yes. Okay. I'm going to I I actually I want to make a really clear finding here and I and I want to ask the city attorney how to do that. Um I don't just want to deny the appeal. I believe that this it's very clear that this is the wrong venue, right? It's not just that that somebody came in with an appeal that we could actually deal with that we said that we thought about and we said, you know what, we agree with it, we disagree with it. Even if we agreed with it, we're not the venue for it. And I think it's important for the planning commission to make that really clear. So, is there a way for us to find that on the way to denying the appeal? That's not our job. Right. So, I I understand your concern. Um because this is a denovo hearing and because the code does not limit the the subject matter that you review on appeal. Right. So the appeal the squa question is outside of the purview of the of the landmarks of the exactly planning commission and the ARB. Yes. Yeah. However, any if if this were an appeal that brought forth something related to the design but it was limited in scope, you would be able to discuss anything with respect to the design. Right? So, so this is a similar this is a similar situation. It's just if you dispense of the appeal because you don't believe that you can rule you can rule in favor of the of the appeal, you still need to address the design. I understand that. So, but that but that doesn't mean that the appeal itself is prohibited under the code. Right. But what I'm saying is I understand that they had to

write to file the appeal. I would like to deny the appeal with the statement on behalf of the commission. Maybe it's direction to staff that that we're denying it because it's not in the right like it's not even in the right zip code. Right. So the so the staff recommendation includes the analysis of the appeal which is consistent with what you're saying. If you would like to separately after you vote on the appeal and whether or not to approve the design give separate direction to staff as well that is uh absolutely appropriate if you would like. Right. And I will move that we deny appeal 25 ENT 0070 and approve architectural review board application 25 ARB 00009 based on the findings in attachment B and that we approve the statement of official action. Second we're a team. Well I I don't have any I don't have any questions but thanks Dave. I wanted to know if No, I I I had a question for staff, but I'm going to let it I'm going to let it go in the interest of time, but I just had a question about SQA status, and it looked like it was already predetermined by the time it already came to the ARB. Yeah. So, by its very nature, the the project itself is is a ministerial application. So, it's a the underlying language entitlement is administrative approval. Um it's not a discretionary permit whatsoever. It's just a straight compliance with the code. Um so you know under that SQA has a statutory exemption for ministerial projects but that that had been already settled. Yeah. And um I think the you know I'm I'm reading the the ARC the ARB Stowa and there is a statement about SQA status and it I

think it is simply a statement not a finding and I think I just wanted to draw that out that and just kind of basically second what I've already heard. was outside of there's really we're we're in a culde-sac here where even if we wanted to take up the appeal based on its merit, we we wouldn't have an ability to make a decision anyways. Correct. So yes, I have a clarification point which I need to understand that even if this project came to us as a DRP because of some kind of variant whatever it needed other than um administrative approval we aren't we considering the housing element EIR is covering all house housing projects that are coming to us. That was my exper my memory that basically the EIR for the housing element is a program EIR and as long as the units that are in the pipeline whatever don't exceed the numbers studied in that EI that EIR covers projects. I think Rachel said that at some point I I mean yes o overall the housing element you know had a program EI but that honest that doesn't have bearing on this. No I know it doesn't. This is just a general question. If we had an if we had a ministerial a discretionary project come to us the sequel response would be we have the housing element EIR and that program you're talking about a hypothetical totally hypothetical. Yeah. I mean if if you had a discretionary project and I you know again hypothetically um assuming you know there there are a number we we certainly would have to see what kind of a project it was or what have you. But if it was a housing one, you know, you could certainly rely on the analysis in that. There have there are other there are also other um other sections, you know, in in SQA that could be relied on as well. I think we had a second. We did, but Nina had a question. Oh, I wanted to

know if uh the ARB in Santa Barbara is exempt from secret. That's a good question. Sorry. Sorry. Let's vote. Sorry, I didn't mean to waste your time. No, that's good. That's good. Okay. Commissioner Czecho. Hi, Commissioner Fresco. Hi, Commissioner Lambert. Yes. Commissioner Landrew, yes. Commissioner Hamilton, yes. And Chair Tolken. Yes. We just voted. You need to vote. Yes or no? Vote on this. We just We're voting right now. We are. Yes. Okay. So, I don't know if we want to. Do we want to add anything expressing concerns about this? I don't. I This is Yeah. Okay. I just wish I'll say it out loud. I mean, I just I would have felt this is unusual and I would want the us to be able to override it, but I I would have felt comfortable with this with the city attorney saying this appeal is not ripe for this body. Um I would have felt comfortable with that. I don't know if my colleagues would have and I certainly wouldn't I certainly would have wanted the right to say I disagree with you and I want to hear it but um but uh yeah this yeah we would be okay since there are no resolutions for written communications. Um, planning commission member discussion items. I move I move we adjourn with appreciation to Sam Tolken for his service to the city of Santa Monica.

Thank you. All right.