Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

If you want to lift this warm and just leave my heart alone in the dark. I remember we used to smile, but please

Good evening, planning commissioners. Chair Lightfoot? Here. Vice chair Wilkerson? Here. Commissioner Vargas? Here. Commissioner Banter? Here. Commissioner Vermont? Here. Commissioner Dingmann? Commissioner Hampton?

Here.

Chair, we have a quorum.

Now I ask everyone, please stand for the pledge of allegiance, and I'll ask commissioner Banta to please lead us in the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag Thank you, commissioner Banta. So we'll now move on to, regular business starting with communications. So at this time, I'll ask director Morris if there are any communications or announcements for this evening's meeting.

Thank you, chair Lightfoot. We have a variety of supplemental communications on the battery storage item and also on the housing project. Those have been, copied and given to the commission as well as posted on the web page. Thank you.

Thank you very much. So next, we'll move on to item number four, the approval of the agenda. Do I have a motion and a second to approve the agenda?

So moved. I'll second.

I've got a motion from vice chair Wilkerson and a second from commissioner Beaumont. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you. So next, we'll move to item number five, business from the floor. This portion of the agenda is available for the public to address the planning commission on any issue that's not on the agenda this evening. So if there's an item that you wanna bring up to the commission or discuss with us that's not on the agenda, now is the time to do it.

So I welcome anybody that wishes to do so, please step forward. Seeing none, I'll close business from the floor. We'll move on to item number six, the consent calendar. So now it's time for the consent calendar. We'll have one item on consent, which is the minutes from the 10/21/2025 meeting. Does anyone from the commission wish to pull the item for discussion? Since none, do I have a motion and a second to approve? I have a motion to approve the consent calendar by commissioner Beaumont. Yes. Second by vice chair Wilkerson. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes. Thank you.

So now we'll move on to item seven a. This is a public hearing on the North Orchard Oak Apartments. So we're first gonna hear a presentation by staff, but followed by commissioner questions. And then, we'll invite the applicant to come up to to say something on the project if they wish. Then we'll open up to public comment, and everybody's gonna be allowed three minutes to speak on the item. And, then we'll bring it back, and we'll have deliberation and discussion with staff again. So please, seven a.

Good evening, chair, members of the planning commission. Brought in before you tonight is referred to as the North Orchard Oaks Apartments. This is a request to construct 36 units on the vacant point nine eight acre site located at the Northwest corner of West Monte Vista and North Orchard Avenue. The project involves a variety of entitlements including a determination of a category coal exemption, density bonus, major design review, and a true removal permit. The project itself would yield a density of 36 37 units per acre.

The proposals for a four story project that would include two units that would be reserved for very low income households. Bedrooms, and unit types would be broken down into seventeen one bedroom units and nineteen two bedroom units, that would range in floor area from 501 to a thousand square feet in size. The project itself would provide 47 on-site parking stalls. For reference, the site is zoned residential high density, allows a maximum range of 20.1 to 30 units per acre. Project access would be provided on North Orchard Avenue.

This site map shows the location boundary of the project site again at the corner of North Orchard Avenue and West Monte Vista, abutting single family homes in Westwood Court. Some background on that's related to this project involves the city adopting a updated housing element for the next cycle. With that housing element adoption, there was also a rezoning of the site, which was originally commercial office, and it was changed to residential high density back in June 2023. This project first started May '24 when the property owner and applicant submitted a, preliminary application in accordance with senate bill three thirty, which we'll explain a little bit later in our presentation. And then we later received a formal application November 2024.

Between 2024 and today, there were a number of back and forth between city staff and the applicant to refine the project and obtain additional clarifying information for, moving it forward. September 2025, we we held a neighborhood meeting virtually on Zoom to go out and hear what the public had to say about the project. The existing general plan is residential high density that allows 20.1 to 30 units per acre, and the zoning is residential high density as identified in the map on the screen. The Housing Crisis Act of 2019 which is also known as Senate Bill three thirty and the Housing Accountability Act is a pertinent topic to this project because this project qualifies for it. There are a variety of different applicable projects that fall under protection under state law.

These are primarily residential development projects with multi family housing units and mixed use projects. Essentially what state law does is it restricts, locks in, and requires a very narrow point of view from decision makers for the project. With restrictions, it prohibits city from being able to rezone or lower the density that's permissible under the general plan. It also limits the number of public hearings to no more than five. This would count as one.

The neighborhood meeting that we had in September counts as two. It also locks in development standards at the time that they submitted their preliminary application in 2024, So all the standards that were in effect at that time in May, are still the ones that we review for compliance with. Also locks in policies that are identified in the drone plan and zoning ordinance and all those other development standards. And essentially, projects that comply with all the policies that are identified in our regulatory documents, the city cannot deny or lower the density without specific findings related to health and safety, and it can impose any fee infeasible conditions that would render the project undoable. The project itself is designed.

You'll see North Orchard on the bottom of the screen, West Monte Vista to the left of the screen. The building would be fronted along those two streets at the corner with the parking located towards the back up against the single family homes along North Orchard Avenue. To the bottom right of the screen, you'll see where driveway access will be provided. And then interior of the building, you'll see some of that open space that would be afforded to those residents. This is a view of the project as if you were standing on North Orchard Avenue, four stories in size, the parking to the right of the project site.

An area review that was provided by our tech team shows the identification of the site in red. It is currently occupied by a variety of existing oak tree species that are large in size. City staff's job is to to evaluate the project and the requested entitlements, so we'll start with the density bonus. The applicant is requesting to increase the allowable density. We mentioned that it's 20.1 to 30 units is what's allowed by our general plan, but they can request to increase the allowable density.

In this case, we're increasing it from 30 units to 37 units per acre. And they're allowed to do that, because they're providing two units that would be restricted to very low income households. So out of the 36 units, 34 would be afforded to market rate units, while two would be limited in rent to those that are, I think it's earning in the area median income of less than I think it's 30 to 50% of the area median income. And so they're requesting that increase, but also, they're also requesting concession, which is to decrease the setback, and we'll talk about those development standards later on in the presentation. They have access to a limited waivers and reductions under density bonus law that is adopted by state.

They are requesting a variety of different deviations from our city standards in exchange for providing those two units for their own households, And they're meeting the state's parking requirements. In this particular sense, because the project is providing two affordable units, they have access to be able to increase the density but also obtain concessions and waivers. The city is obligated to approve those concessions, waivers, and reductions. The second application that we'll talk briefly about is the major design review. It's strictly reserved for the architectural and site design of the project.

It's required because the project involves more than 10 multifamily units and the applicant is requesting to construct a four story building with 36 units. Mentioned this earlier vehicle access will be provided by a driveway on North Orchard Avenue. The site layout as condition provides sufficient access for emergency vehicles as confirmed by our fire department and police departments. Driveway locations were not creating a vehicle conflicts as confirmed by our traffic engineering team. Architectural design reflects a meta training design with stucco, clay tile roofing, and ornamental tiles.

The project would provide on-site amenities, open space for those residents through private courtyard, landscape planners, a tile fountain, and some two rooftop decks. This visual rendering is intended to show the primarily stucco exterior with those different colored dark portions that are decorative tile and some ornamental tubular steel design for the gates in the front of the building. With regards to the major design review and our application review of the complaints with development standards. It's provided in the staff report, essentially the table on the right hand side of the screen shows what those standards are in the back of old municipal code and what the applicant is proposing as concessions. Maximum building height that's allowed in the code is 45 feet and one of the concessions that the applicant is requesting is to increase to 55 feet.

Building setbacks along West Monte Vista is being requested to reduce to 12 feet. Private recreation outdoor space is being reduced by five ten feet, to five ten feet with compensating open space area for the common area. Parking is being reduced from 67 that's required in the municipal code to 47 spaces that's being proposed. Under senate bill three thirty, the project is subject to compliance with these objective design standards to setbacks building heights. And our job is to determine whether or not they're complying with that.

And those objective standards, a definition for everyone is it's defined as a measurable, verifiable criteria for residential development that does not involve any subjective judgment. So it's a checklist that involves, again, I said those setbacks, building heights, as well as open space. This is a provision that's afforded to them underneath the government code for density bonuses. The main idea behind this is that if we're in a housing crisis, so if a developer proposes to provide any units that are 5% or more for lower income households, they can they have access to requesting an unlimited number of waivers or reductions. That's how bad the housing crisis is, is that the state has outright said that.

Last item that we wanna make mention to was a tree removal permit request. They're looking to remove 26 mature oak trees and trying to plant 32 new trees on the site. The site doesn't have enough room to be able to accommodate enough trees, so a few different things. This is one of those things where the applicant could have asked for a waiver for, but we worked intently with them. They believe that it was necessary to try and find another way to make trees work.

They'll talk a little bit about it, but one of the things that they're going do is they're going to try and plant more mature, larger trees with the project. They're also going to partner with the Elmira Cemetery District to find a way to help fund the planting of trees for loved ones that are looking to have trees planted along their loved ones over at that site. And that is the method that they're looking to try and satisfy the mitigation requirements for replanting those trees. Overall, when we're looking at all the entitlement staff as identified as proposed and conditioned, project complies with the city's objective development standards, in accordance with senate bill three thirty and meets the required findings for approval with the provisions that are granted to them to ask for those concessions and waivers. With regards to California Environmental Quality Act, the project does qualify for categorical exemption under section 15,332 for infill development, And this is supported by a separate case study.

Staff did conduct public outreach for this project. Normally, a project of this size would require a 600 foot mailing radius, but staff felt that was necessary to make sure that people were aware of the project, which is why we expanded that notice to a thousand foot beyond the project boundary. We initial initially had a new project notice in January followed by the neighborhood notice and neighborhood meeting in September and then additional publication for the notice for today's meeting. Public comments primarily circulated around concerns about the building heights, tree removal, and impacts on parking, traffic schools, utilities. For the since the time that the staff report was published, city staff has received 13 emails and communications about this project for the commission that should be up on your dice.

12 in opposition and one in support from the California Housing Defense Fund, CalHDF, just reminding the commission about existing state laws that are in place. In conclusion, staff supports the proposal for the variety of reasons that are identified in the screen in front of you as well as what's identified in the staff report and the findings. We do have a recommendation for the commission that's by simple motion affirm the projects exempt from environmental review and that the commission would approve a variety of entitlements for the North Orchard Oaks Apartments. That concludes my presentation. I'm available to answer any questions as well as the applicant and the property owner.

Thank you, Mary, very much. Doug, do you wanna say something or I wanna invite the applicant up to say something first?

Sure. Would would you like

to say something now, or I can invite the app enough to say something? That's fine. Okay. If the app came and would like to come up and, address the project, can do it now. Yeah. Right up here.

Good evening commissioners. My client is the owner of the project, Alex Withers, and I am Ingrid Anderson of Anderson Architecture and Planning. We'd just like to thank you very much for the opportunity to present this project before you tonight. The owner is a generation multi generation resident of the Fairfield and Vacaville area. His family has lived in Vacaville for three generations, and he does now with his family as well.

He acquired this site with the view to be able to add to the City Of Vacaville an enduring safe, stable and attainable workforce multifamily housing project. And the site planning and the design of the building, the planning of all the parking facilities and other amenities were all intentionally designed to add benefit to the neighborhood and to the city. The project is four stories, but the architecture is intended to continue the heritage of vernacular Mediterranean architecture that exists in this area. It draws from precedents for the use of the courtyard apartment housing type as well as the Mediterranean architectural style to create a project where using these archetypes and the stylistic traditions that are associated with them, such as tile and ornamental metals, varied varying the planes of the facades, barrel clay tile as well as the colors that were employed in the project. The owners seeking to mitigate the scale, height and apparent bulk of the building.

Also, the building is sited far to the south of the site so that its frontage on the single family neighborhoods is minimized as much as possible. The owner also values the landscape benefit of the existing site and wanted to preserve that as much as possible. 26 trees are removed but two of the mature trees that were found to be the most likely to be able to be preserved during the construction are being preserved and they actually are trees that provide the most visual benefit to the neighborhood because they're located on the corner of North Orchard Oaks and West Monte Vista. They actually are the focus of the entry courtyard to the project at this location. Also, the owner is aware of the concerns about traffic and parking.

The parking and entry driveway have been reviewed very completely by the engineering traffic and fire departments and has been found compliant with the building code with the Vacaville zoning code for emergency exiting and or the site distance triangle from the driveway additionally the project exceeds the parking requirement from the state density bonus law for parking in inclusionary projects like this one by one space. That is the summary of the owners project mainly wanting to emphasize that he did everything he could to exceed and to provide a benefit to the neighborhood to exceed just the the objective design standards and to make this a lasting contribution to the neighborhood. Thank you.

Thank you.

Commissioner Beaumont.

Thank you. Thanks, Albert, for your presentation. Let me start off by asking, would this project be in front of us if if we didn't have two very low income units in the project?

Question. So you're saying so in in it in this form, if it wasn't for state law, would this this wouldn't meet backfill standards for for building. Correct? But

that's your point. Well, I'm just wondering if it just was 36 units of regular market rent apartments, would we be looking at this?

I mean, that that that's a it it's a tough call because it's a tough site. It's a very small site, and so you might have a separate project that comes on here and can't meet the development standards because they need a certain number of units in order to be able to make the bottom line worth it, the return on the investment worth itself. And this particular observation staff understands that the applicant is requesting deviations to city standards because they have to build a certain number of units in order to be able to make the project viable. The property owner can talk about what that looks like. We don't consider the financial component as part of our review when looking at these different things.

To your to your question, if somebody was proposing to build multifamily apartments on the site and they needed exceptions to our city standards, that's when it would come before the commission. In this particular case, they're requesting a density bonus. That's the first trigger that requires it to become before the commission for a review.

Okay. And so all the exemptions waivers were based on these two very low income units. Is that right?

Correct. Yes.

Okay. Could you explain to me that no net loss on page twelve and thirteen that says we lost 24 low income units? Does that imply that this would have been a 26 unit, low income apartment building and you're gonna make it up somewhere else?

Page twelve and thirteen is what you

said? Yes.

Something something that occurred with the city's housing element that was adopted 06/27/2023 was that one of the things that the state said that you had to do was if you have a bunch of vacant properties around the city that haven't developed for the last two cycles, now you need to rezone them to residential high density. On top of that, we have regionally housing needs allocation that's disseminated from the states to each county, to each city within that county, and it's each city's job to identify whether or not there's available lands within the city to be able to accommodate those. It doesn't obligate property owners to actually build them, and so in this particular case when we looked at all the available properties that were zoned and designated for residential development we said we thought that we could accommodate that property owners could accommodate and build those residential units at a variety of different categories throughout the city. Now as properties develop, those properties are removed off of that inventory and we gradually lose our cushion until. And so what this is identifying is just being transparent with the Commission with the public that here's another one of those sites that was originally planned to potentially accommodate lower income units but the property owner isn't obligated to come in so what it puts it puts the obligation back onto the city to start looking for other sites that could potentially be rezoned to take over that responsibility of identifying other sites.

It doesn't stop the project we certainly can't It's not one of the findings for denying a project. It just puts the responsibility back on the city to have to try and find those other locations.

Okay. And could you put up the site plan again that shows the parking lot and the building and the hedges? Yeah. That one right there. Are those trees along the parking lot in South Orchard that go up to the egress ingress point that could be blocking the view of people exiting that you couldn't see kids that are running, that are on bikes, that are on scooters. That's what bothers me is that that that look and the next one that you show flip to the next slide, I believe. That doesn't equate to what shows on that slide. So what it what does the actual, type of vegetation along the North Orchard look like?

Yeah. The these are intended to be illustrative maps that inform the commission that landscaping can be provided and and help staff understand where are the limitations and where things need to be focused on. Before the commission, in addition to the recommendation, there's also a list of conditions of approval that require revisions to the development plan. So the way that the site plan works is the developers take a site plan, they get it as close as possible to development design standards, and then we take over the review of it. Any areas that are deficient in design, we assign conditions of approval to make them bring it into compliance with.

So one of those examples of a design would be this driveway where the landscape plan shows a previous iteration of how landscaping will work, but we worked with the applicants as well as our engineering team to change the design of the so that way we did not have that particular issue that you're describing where you got vehicles that are queuing up to turn on to North Orchard Avenue, and they can't see down the street. And so the design and the conditions that are before the commission fixes that problem.

Okay. Let me ask the attorney one question real quick. If this project isn't approved, are we liable could we be liable for a lawsuit?

Thank you for the question, commissioner.

So, yes, and I'll I'll try not to belabor the point too much.

I have a whole bunch

of stuff I can share, as needed. But the housing accountability act, the state law that is applicable to this project because it is a residential project, says you cannot deny or reduce the density of a project that meets the objective standards, which for all the reasons that Albert has laid out is the case with this project. So what that state law does is constrains the ability to deny the project or to reduce its density or to impose conditions that would have those effects. If that is the direction that the project goes and there is a denial, yes, the project applicant can sue housing organizations, can sue the state, can refer the case to the attorney general. Fines are high.

Remedies for a violation of housing law are severe. We've seen projects like this. We have gone through litigation on a project like this. You know, those those are lessons you only wanna learn once. So, yes, this project, as proposed, as staff received, it complies with the applicable state laws, which really ties the commission's hands in terms of approval.

Okay. Thank you. Thanks.

Thanks, Jerry. Thank you very much, commissioner Beaumont. Commissioner Wilkerson.

Thank you so much, Albert. Thank you for the presentation. Can you go back to the to the slide that showed the street view to where the other one.

There was one

there was one more that showed an from from up up high. I wanna see yes. How far down is the ingress an egress, on on Orchard for the entry of that? I may have missed it. I I'm just curious.

How far down?

How far down the street is it from the corner?

The edge of the project site down here. That's the that's the project limitations right there.

Right.

It's identified on the side.

So with with the my question, I guess, is is the ingress and egress gonna be even with the street across the street right there?

Oh, is the driveway gonna be aligned with what's across the street? I I no. I would not say I I they're not they're not aligning with across the street. No.

Okay. What's the what's the timeline on this project?

For construction?

Yeah.

I defer to the applicant to be able to tell that.

So leave.

Can you come up to the front, please?

Once before I ever hang out.

Construction is expected to take approximately one year from the start to the finish.

Okay. Do you if approved by planning commission and council, do you have any idea when that would be, like twenty sixth, like May, or what would you be looking at?

Well, there are many factors involved, and one of them is the how long will it take to get a permit. But we'd like to get the project started next year before the end of the year, well before possible. But again, it depends on how long it takes to get a permit. Okay.

Thank you. I I don't have any other questions at this time. Thank you, chair.

Before we open up to public comment, does anybody else have any questions? Okay. So now we're we're gonna open up to public comment. Anybody that wishes to speak on the item, has we'll have three minutes at the podium here. I'll turn on your microphone. And I wanna I just wanna make sure that we keep every everything respectful as we can. There's people in here that are probably for and against this project. If we can keep clapping to a minimum and just just here's the time to have a conversation and give your input to the people that are here.

Timothy Randolph. And I live Kitty Corner to the parking lot area. I've lived there since I was eight. And I have to say that I am just so angry about every little bit of this. I really am. Is there anything that you can do to stop this, honestly?

So and I'll I'll give you some more time at the end. So

Yeah. Sure.

Right now, what we're gonna do is take every comment, and then, at the end, we'll give it back to staff for questions that we need answers from it. There's not gonna be interaction between, like, and us answering questions. Really, we're here. We're citizens just like you.

And we're hearing from the lawyer and you know? Because there's two low income, it's like, you're obliged to do so much of this. And that is not coming from you. It's coming from the state, but it is really enraging. So what I'm wanting to find out is can you actually say no? And I'm not sure you can. But if you can, I would really like you to say no? I'm just wondering if any one of you people here or anyone in this audience, if somebody wanted to plop a four story building looking right down into your backyard, would you vote yes for that? It's madness. It's absolute madness.

You can't accept that. The house that is kitty corner to that building, I used to go to as a boy, And they are so upset because these people are gonna be staring into their backyards, and it is unacceptable, and you know it in your heart. There is no way you would say, yeah. I'm okay. Two low density units. That's good. I feel groovy about this. This is gonna trash their property value, and everybody here knows that. And it's like, was so relieved when I first found out that this building, this monstrosity was not gonna be right behind my a 100 year old house, the oldest house in that neighborhood. I was so relieved, and then I thought after hearing that last Zoom meeting, and I was like, oh, I'm selfish.

That poor guy is gonna have his life ruined. You know, they sleep in there. I mean, they hang out in their backyard all the time. I don't think anybody here would be acceptable. I'll try and race through some. You know, has anything changed since the meeting we had in September? No. Nothing's changed. You know? People were on that Zoom meeting for an hour. Everybody was passionate. Nothing changed. Did you guys review that information? Maybe. Maybe you didn't. I did a video. I went walking out my front door and I looked to the right and I see all of these cars, the Jepson, the Hemlock students backing up. And I'm walking up there getting my phone out to take a video of it to send to Noah who's disappeared. And I'm like it's like, oh, shoot. The cars are moving.

I'm gonna ruin my propaganda moment. Oh, no. I needn't have worried. I got up to the corner. I turned to the right. I start filming. Seven seconds all the way back all the way back to Elder. It's just a line of cars. Constantly, constantly.

I'm gonna give you, like, forty five more seconds.

Alright. Alright.

Said that part. I just feel like especially for that guy whose house is gonna be right next to this monstrosity. Your job is to protect him from this happening. Right? He's a citizen. Protect him. That's your job. You should do that. So many exceptions. Some of the exceptions are because of the low income thing. I I love the idea of there being low more low income housing, and it's like, oh, we're compelled to build on this tiny little neighborhood site when right next to Depot Street is a massive open lot that has been a wasteland forever. You could you could put a huge number of spots there. There's only

Thank you. Your time's up.

Alright. Appreciate it.

But I have lots of I Alright. You for your time.

Just one second. So and, again, like, there's there's gonna there's gonna be people for this and against this. Like, if we have an overwhelming, like, of people that are one side or the other might suppress somebody else from wanting to get up and talk. So just let's, you know, let's just try and make sure that we're polite to everybody. Thank you.

Alright. Hi, y'all. My name is Steve Loon. I live a few blocks away from where the where this is gonna take place. I live up on Cherokee. When I saw the sign out there, I was kinda conflicted. But then I I drove a little I drove around a little bit, and I thought to myself, you know, you got you got five schools within a within a one mile area of this place. And somebody had brought up the sight lines coming out of those places. And I I think, one, that's a safety thing. The other thing is is they're asking for a variance from 67 to 47 spots parking wise.

Where are you gonna park? You're gonna park in hacking spot or you're gonna go across the Maya Market? You're gonna park across the street? There's gonna be cars everywhere. The the tallest building in Vacaville was the Credit Union. I think they got a variance for that at one time. You're gonna put a four story with a variance for 55 foot on the corner of one of the busiest intersections in Vacaville in a housing area. They there's there's no reason to put that there. We have plenty of open space in different places to put that there. You know, if you're looking at high density, the high density is what?

20.1 to 30. If you, if you look at that, you might be able to put, I don't know, couple townhouses in there and and make it a high density area. But to have a have a 37 unit building right there in the middle of that area is is just ridiculous. Let's see. What else did I have here? I'm I'm I'm telling you guys, from the bottom of my heart, do not provide the variances that they want, period. You have that in your power. Do not provide those variances. Okay? Even though those two, the two, low income, things are part of that, you guys have the power not to provide those variances.

They do not fit within your general plan. You guys are trying to fit. I this is the only way I can put it. They're trying to put 20 pounds of stuff in a five pound bag right there on that corner. Okay?

All those all those areas over there, all those housing areas, all the people that live in those areas over there have an eighth of an acre or so. Right? You're trying to fit 37 people or 37 units, which means you're gonna have a 100 people at least in those places, and that's just too many people for a small area like that. Let's see. And if you guys haven't been down to the apartment buildings as you come off of the freeway and go down past Duane's bar and and harvest church there, They got the apartment buildings all there.

Those are two story, three story. Imagine a four or five story, 55 foot building on that corner. Just take a drive by there and look. It's crazy. That should not be there. And then when I heard about somebody, you know, looking down into my backyard, that's gonna bring a bunch of ill will, and I wouldn't want that in that area.

Thank you.

So that's all I got.

Thank you very much. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Catherine Jessen and I live in the neighborhood directly affected by the proposed project. I live on the corner of Monte Vista and Westwood Street and I grew up in Westwood Court where the proposed project would view my parents' backyard. Just three blocks away, we have a middle school serving approximately 979 students within a half mile to a mile and a half radius of the site. Three elementary schools serve an additional 1,500 plus children.

This means approximately over 2,400 students regularly travel through this quarter on foot, bikes, and in vehicles. Traffic is already strained with any new and without any new development, especially between the hours of eight to 9AM and two to 4PM. These are peak school hours when surrounding streets routinely back up, creating hazardous conditions for children navigating crosswalks and sidewalks. West Monte Vista is not just a neighborhood road. It is a key alternate route during Westbound I-eighty congestion, which seems to occur frequently in recent years.

Adding a 36 unit four story building with reduced parking will inevitably increase parking spillover into residential streets and amplify congestion at an already overloaded intersection. Not to mention this intersection serves as a primary response route for Fire Station seventy one and any additional congestion especially during peak hours would significantly impact emergency response times. This is a clear misuse of the affordable housing density bonus and variances. This developer is attempting to utilize state density bonus and concession provisions based on providing only two affordable units out of 36. However, these provisions were designed primarily to support meaningful affordable housing production, not as a loophole to justify a four story height increase, reduced setbacks, reduced parking, or removal of protected heritage trees.

These bonuses are intended for developments providing a substantial number of affordable housing units, not two. The fact that a project offering such minimal affordability can claim such sweeping exemptions and force approval reveals a misuse of intent. Approving this project sets a dangerous precedent, letting developers exploit loopholes to bypass environmental protections and community standards while providing minimal affordability. The city's responsibility is true responsible growth. Responsible growth does not mean building anything anywhere simply because a developer wants to maximize density.

It means balancing safety, traffic capacity, environmental protection, school impacts, and neighborhood character. This project in its current form fails on all five. I urge the planning commission to deny the proposal as currently designed. Vacaville deserves growth that aligns with its values, not growth that circumvents them. Thank you for your time and your commitment to responsible decision making.

Hi. I'm not really looking to speak

to But I

live in this neighborhood or I live a block away. I was retell I I've just recently retired, and I cannot believe the traffic that goes to that school from eight to nine in the morning. And and and this I'm not a urban developer either, but if I was gonna make something to where to get across the light and make a left turn across traffic to get home, that that makes no sense. You should be going through the light and make a right turn into the property. That would create less traffic and less problems there.

That's a that's a busy, busy street two times a day, in the afternoon and in the morning. And this is a classic use overuse of a small property to get the maximum profit we can get out of this property. It's in the wrong neighborhood for this. There was a property that you guys it was supposed to be across the street by the firehouse, which

is

more you get three story to a four story. It would would would bother nobody, but it didn't go through. I don't know why. And I don't see how you can get sued. They were they were asking for concessions, concessions, concessions. If you yeah. If they wanted to come in under the the guidelines of the city and want to build this project, I could see if you denied it, you might get sued. But they want all these concessions to give you two units of low income. And if you deny it, I don't see how you can get sued. You know? But because you to undo the concessions, go back to the 30 units, which is still too many at that property. You know, it it I'm I'm all for cleaning up the neighborhood and making it beautiful. This is not gonna make it beautiful. You know in your heart it's not gonna make it beautiful. It's gonna be a mess.

It's gonna be overcrowded. And when you get overcrowding, you get problems. I've lived there for thirty years. I've seen it come and go. Get it was bad when I moved in. It got better. And this is just not helping it get better. It's gonna get worse. Anybody could see that. It's just it's just too much in that little small area. I'm sorry. And and the trees are gonna put back. Doesn't say what kind they're taking. They're taking out all oak trees, and they're gonna give you back trees. Doesn't say it could be ficus trees. You know? Who knows? Doesn't doesn't say. But they're not gonna be oak trees. I'll guarantee that.

The two they're keeping, that's that's great. They're gonna keep them. But they're that that's those trees in there have been there a long time. And I know to develop it, you're gonna have to take some out. But just at least leave two and put all these little trees in to to and call it greenery. I I don't think I don't see it. I just see it as a mess, so I'm sorry. And you guys, if you vote for it, I I hope you don't. I hope you don't let that pass. There's other places in this town.

Thank you.

Hi. My name is John Lackey. I'm actually gonna get a little selfish here. Is that garbage can? On the other side of that fence and that, that's where I live. And I have a pool back there. And who's to say, you know, with those cars parking right there, somebody don't jump on their hood, jump over the fence and jump on my pool. They drown. I'm liable. Is that gonna be addressed? Also, I'd like to know, you know, I I can see where the parking's at. Is there gonna be a noise ordinance, you know, with noisy cars? You know, parking there, revving up their cars or whatever early in the morning, late at night. I mean, me personally, I I got crazy hours with my job. You know?

And I feel bad when I fire up my truck out in my driveway, you know, with my neighbors because I wake up at 02:30 in the morning. You know? And I don't want somebody waking up, you know, me up during the night, you know, because they got a noisy car on the other side of the fence. Also, I'd like to address, they're proposing an eight foot, masonry fence or something like this. Well, I just bought a new fence, you know, last year. I paid over $6,000 for that fence as well as my neighbor. She just bought a new fence. You know, what's gonna happen with that is my question. And, you know, if those fences are gonna get torn down, are we gonna get reimbursed? You know, I also have solar on top of my house.

That four story is gonna shade my solar significantly. I know the oak trees already do, but there's times of days where I get a lot of sun on my solar, know, without those oak trees or those oak trees not impeding. That's gonna impede it quite a bit. You know? If somebody gonna pay me, you know, the energy I'm losing. You know, I'd speak a lot on everything else, but a lot of these people are covering a lot of other things. That's why I'm kinda being selfish with my own house. But, you know, privacy. The gentleman that spoke first, I think he was probably, you know, pertaining to me quite a bit on, you know, do I want somebody looking down in my backyard when I'm going swimming? No.

I don't. You know? I bought that house in that neighborhood under the impression, you know, being told by the realtor, nobody's allowed to build back there because those free trees are protecting that lot. And I was like, okay. Great. You know? I know nobody's gonna be behind me. That's why I put money into my house and and done things for it, you know, planning on staying there. Well and my last question is, you know, the guy the owner proposing to do this, how many does he have an apartment in his backyard? That's what I wanna know. You know? Would he be okay with a four story apartment looking down in his backyard? I don't think so.

That's all I got. Thank you.

Vicky Lewis, I have done some research on this, and then according to my research, I found that the residential zoning districts, if there was any single one story or single family housing abutting that property, it couldn't be more than two stories high. And four stories is quite a bit more than two stories. The only other four story building in Vacaville besides the Travis Craig is Kaiser. And that's huge. That and the Mediterranean style that he said that was prominent in that neighborhood, there isn't anything like that in there.

I just toured CMF the other day, and it kind of reminded me of the prisons that they those buildings at the prison. Other than that, I've just agreed with everything else that everybody else already said, so I will keep it short and leave it at that.

Hi. I'm Sheena Molina. I'm a local realtor here. I'm also a licensed insurance agent. When we talk to clients about remodeling the outside of their homes, we tell them you don't want to put a Spanish style home in a colonial or like, historical neighborhood. This does not belong there. You don't want a four story building in the middle of a residential neighborhood. It's

not

gonna belong there. Not to mention, the resale value of these people's homes is gonna drastically decline. It the property taxes the city's gonna get is gonna drastically decline when their home values are lower. Not to mention insurance is already difficult enough for people to get. When you put a commercial building, that's when an apartment building is considered within 300 yards of a home, their ability to obtain homeowners insurance drastically declines.

Now I don't know if you guys already realize how hard it is to obtain insurance. When you put a building like this next to it, one of the questions they ask you is if you're next to a commercial building. A resident or a an apartment building qualifies for that. So when they go to renew their policies or when they purchase a new home, they're gonna have to disclose that they're next to an apartment building, making it so that they're ineligible for homeowners insurance. So that's something that you guys need to consider that you guys are now doing to these homeowners.

They're not gonna be able to get homeowners insurance, which means they're not gonna be able to have home loans. So besides the fact, where are they gonna park? 36 units. Each person has two cars. That's 72 cars in 47 spots. Plus, on the street when they have visitors, it it just doesn't make sense. So with all the exceptions that they have, there's no way a residential homeowner can even do that in their own home. And a four story building in the middle of a residential neighborhood just doesn't make sense. So thank you.

Hi. My name is Julio. I'm a neighbor. We're like a block away. But we just wonder, somebody's recording everything that the people saying? Somebody's does? Okay. So my first concern is about what was the criteria for saying that all those trees, they are they are in the bad bad health Because they got mentioned under the presentation, they're saying that they they are in a really, really bad health. What was the criteria used to say in that?

So at the end, all all the public comment, we're gonna address with staff again, and, we'll we'll make sure we have staff.

Right, though. Because those trees, they just should be protected. Nobody can cut them down. If one of the neighbors wants to cut one and come to ask for a permit, the city says no. The city says no. Why they're gonna cut down 20 some trees out of the blue when no one here present can cut one. That's all I have to say.

My name is Melissa, and I live close by. I I'm low I'm actually low income, so I I live actually right across from there in the in the apartments. So I I don't like staying where I live normally, but I am concerned about this whole project just because I know I know it you know, they're saying that, oh, well, there's two low income apartments, but I would think that they're probably getting funding because of the two low income apartments units for that project. I think it looks nice and they give all these great ideas of why it's a positive thing to go right there. And we do need housing, but I would say take this project and put it somewhere else in Vacaville just because when I'm leaving my apartment complex, the driveway, it is very difficult to come out from my own driveway.

I see, I mean, I could say hundreds, but it looks like hundreds of students crossing on just walking from school from Jepson, going, maybe coming, you know, from home, going walking to Jepson, coming from Jepson. So they're on that same street right

there where there's supposed to

be a driveway coming out from those apartments. It is gonna be a madhouse if this goes through. So I hope you do not let this go through. Not just that, but where I live, two bedroom apartments, three bedroom apartments, some folks have six cars for one unit. Six. So these people are parking all along that that street there. Just take a drive. You you guys who have probably, you're probably all homeowner homeowners, I'm guessing, and most people in here are. But single people, you know, younger folks, maybe they rent. I don't know why I said that.

But people people that live in apartments, you know, they double up. They stack up in these units. So there's, like, three to four cars in one unit. So there's gonna be way overflow of parking, and they're gonna park on these little side streets, and that's already happening now. So this is it. Just a re I don't I don't wanna say anything rude, but this is just not good planning at all. Where are the cars gonna go? You know? I know I'm repeating myself. And the I mean, repeating other what other people are saying, but also, the trees, we're not gonna be able to breathe in Vacaville soon because the trees give us oxygen.

And everywhere that's green is getting cut down, and this is old Vacaville. I've lived here all my life, but I don't like to see the green just disappear and all the trees disappear. Like, these are old, beautiful trees. And I heard I I read somewhere that, oh, these are very unhealthy trees. Can't they just be, you know, kept up, you know, or treated? Anyway, thank you.

Thank you.

I live on Westwood Court, and if I understood him correctly, he said it really quickly, but he said as long as this fits the safety standards, we have to do it. But I I've seen that it doesn't fit the safety standards. For one, people have already addressed the school. There's hundreds of kids walking to and from school in the morning. There's gonna be a problem at that when people drive in there. A kid's gonna get killed. K? That's one thing. Those of us on Westwood Court, we have privacy and security concerns of our own and safety concerns. There's rooftop terraces. Right? Yes? Can you answer that or no? Rooftop terraces?

Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. So that's essentially as far as people's heads, that's five stories. Because you got people now standing five stories up, looking down, seeing when packages are delivered, seeing when we come and go to work, taking note of our comings and goings, seeing what's in our backyard, seeing what's on our driveway, looking down. You can have a spotter up there saying, oh, so and so just left. They work eight hours, have a friend go in, take stuff, and you've got a spotter there because they're looking down on us.

So this is a safety concern. It's safety because of the schools. It's safety because of property. And it's already been addressed as far as insurance. We might not be able to get insurance to cover the things that people might be looking down and wanting to take from us. So I don't see that this complies with the safety issues. I just don't. And as far as what everybody else says, I agree with all that, but it's already been said.

Hi. My name is William Case. I've lived here. I'm a local electrician. I've built homes here in the Vacaville area. I've lived here for forty years. We already have two monstrosities similar to this that were built recently. One over there right across from Brendan Theaters, the other one they put over by Target, it doesn't match anything we have in Vacaville. From the photo I've seen, doesn't match anything downtown or in that Orchard area. It's gonna be an eyesore, a four story eyesore that everyone will have to look at.

Everyone before me has already brought up the fact that, hey. We have safety concerns. We have insurance concerns. We have home concerns, as you mentioned, be easy to hop over a fence, and he would pay the bill if something were to befall someone and break it into his home. This is not something that needs to be built there.

We have other open areas they could build this and have plenty of space with no concerns, no other houses next to it, let alone the concessions. The the parking is atrocious. I mean, that that's a horrible design to begin with. You're dropping all the parking at for two low income housing. Yes.

VACCO needs housing. I grew up here. Housing has always been a problem even for low income housing. For two things and all the concessions, that doesn't help Vacaville at all one bit. And I can't see any reason this should move anywhere forward with all the concessions they're willing to be up just to give two low income housings so they can meet a net profit out of it.

Everything else has already been said, but when, as a lady mentioned before me, a kid gets hit coming out of that driveway or someone makes a turn, anyone that planned this and agrees that this is a good idea is gonna have second thoughts. That's all I gotta say.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Jay Rooney, and my family and I live on West Monte Vista, about seven houses from this corner. First, I wanna be clear. We are not opposed to housing or renters. We understand Vacaville and California are in a housing crisis, and we want teachers, nurses, and other working families to be able to live here.

Our concern is that this particular project at this intensity on this already very constrained corner isn't safe or compatible in its current form. I'll focus on three points. Traffic safety, school impacts, and neighborhood fit. First, traffic safety. Every school day between around 07:30 and 08:30 and again in the afternoon, North Orchard already backs up with parents dropping off and picking up kids.

Cars queue in front of driveways, kids are crossing at that very intersection, and visibility is already marginal. Adding 36 new new units, a new driveway onto North Orchard, and dozens of additional daily trips at exactly those peak times creates a very specific safety risk for children walking and biking to school as well as for emergency vehicles trying to get through. The project's traffic memo says impacts are not significant, but it's not clear that it truly captured these school hour conditions. We're asking you to require a more detailed peak hour safety analysis and condition approval on concrete fixes, whether that's improved crosswalks, signage, or adjustments to driveway operations before you make your findings. Second, schools and services.

The staff materials say the school district still needs to determine whether local schools can accommodate students from this project. We all know our schools are already crowded. My wife teaches at one of them. State law may treat developer fees as a mitigation, but for families on the ground, class size, parking, and drop off chaos are very real. We're asking you not to act until Vacaville Unified is weighed in and riding on capacity and on any safe routes to school improvements that they believe are needed.

Third, neighborhood fit, trees, open space. This is a four story, 36 unit building on a sub one acre infill parcel surrounded by one and two story homes. It removes 26 of 28 existing trees and even asks for a reduction in the usual tree replace placement requirement down to 32 new trees. That dramatically changes the character and shade of this corner and increases heat and noise for nearby homes. We are asking you to tighten the conditions on height transitions and landscaping and avoid granting concessions that permanently diminish our neighborhood's tree canopy.

In short, we support adding housing, but we want it to be safe, scaled appropriately, and respectful of the families already living on the block. Please either require substantial changes to address these issues through conditions of approval, or if that's not possible under state law, do not make the findings that this project is compatible and safe in its current form. Thank you for your time.

My name is Mitch Corso. I live on Elder Street. A lot's already been said that I'm not gonna repeat parking traffic. First, I want to start with math. Somehow they got to 36 units. It's not an acre, so it shouldn't be 30. If do the math, 29.4 is how many dwelling units they should be allowed. They rounded that up to 30. I don't know. Whenever I do math, would round to 29. It changes all the math. So think about that. Hopefully, it's not a foregone conclusion that this is going to go through. I mean, conclusion. Yes.

So SB 30 is there. Unfortunately, city is kind of getting bound by it. But this place, it's they're shoehorning this in by having two very low income units. How come all these other developments don't have a requirement for very low income units? I mean, they may I didn't have a chance to go through every development that's gone through lately, but I don't see that happening. They I think they're being very creative in doing this. I wish Alex was is Alex here to hear all this? I don't know. One gentleman answered or talked about his solar. Was that investigated?

Because I think there might be a law that you're not allowed to shade people solar. I don't know. At least in some places that is. So then there's somebody asked about the trees. There is a tree study that was done, pretty extensive tree study that identified and looked at every single tree on that property. They've identified two trees that are viable. There are more viable trees. And I understand that one of their comments back from the project was that why did they save more trees? It's because it didn't fit into the project plan. We'll change the project plan.

Can't do that. Maybe they can. The other one is it was brought up that they're going to mitigate this by planting trees. They're going to try to find a place to plant the trees. I would say that before this is approved, they have to identify that and make that make that happen instead of just all the words I saw was just going to be tried. I think that's all I have to say. So thanks. Thank you.

I'd just like to say I live on Buckeye. I've lived there since 1975. My children are grown. However, I am a good neighbor, I think, and I see kids playing in my neighborhood that I already live on a corner where I have seen accidents many times. They finally the city did put up two stop signs, which no one says.

And we always have accidents, at least one or two every single year. We've had several very bad bicycle accidents where kids riding their bikes have been hit by cars on Orchard. It is a busy street, not just during school hours. It is a busy street. There's all those homes in Crestview.

They build all the apartments on Fruitvale, or the single dwelling homes are not apartments. I just feel that if you want to make Vacaville the same city that has always been a safe environment, a place where people want to move to, I know we have so many people coming here from other areas, San Francisco and all. They don't shop here. They don't spend money here. They don't eat here.

They come here, and they just live. And I don't want more people in my neighborhood that are just living there. I want them to be compute you know, be involved in our community. And I see kids walking by my house every single day, all day long, not just during school hours. And we have to watch them all the times. When I come around the corner to come to my house off of Orchard, onto Buckeye, I

have

to be very cautious because people already park on the street. You can't even hardly see what's coming. So if there's kids there, I don't even go down Monte Vista in front of the other apartments because kids can run out in front of you. It's not safe. And I want to have kids to be able to live in their neighborhoods and play in their neighborhoods and enjoy their neighborhoods like my sons did. I'm also a third generation of Vacaville too. So not just the owner of the apartment complex.

My name is Carla Von Mielfeld, and I live on 514 Westwood Court, which is right behind the parking lot, which I have four trees that line my backyard. One of them divides the two properties, and I don't want my tree taken out. Because that's privacy. And that corner with the little trees right there? There's already a tree there.

There's no reason to take out the tree that's already there to replace with little decoration. Now those trees are supposed to be endangered, and we're not all even allowed to trim the trees off our property line. So why are we allowing them to go through and take all these trees out when you have told us for years we can't even trim them? You won't give us a permit to trim the trees because they're endangered. And now you're saying they're diseased? They live behind my house. There's nothing wrong with those trees. They're healthy. Believe me. Those trees are almost a 100 years old or or older.

I've lived there for over twenty years. This is an abomination. You've heard everyone say, we have traffic. We have parking issues already, and we drive this all the time. We never not drive there to get to our homes. We're going in one direction or the other. You have a grocery store. We have all this stuff, and we have kids, so many kids that walk this. We do. We have to be very careful turning our corners.

And it's all day long. It is not just during school drop off and school pickup, because there's a lot of kids that are homeschooled, and they have they're out all day, all all times of the day. This is way too much crowding, and they can save a lot more trees than they actually are. I mean, two viable trees out of 28? That's a joke.

Truly. And it's going I I don't want anyone looking at my backyard, and you're putting trash cans behind our house, so now our house is gonna smell? Are you kidding me? How dare you? I don't want my backyard smelling like trash, and you're putting trash cans right behind our home. I'm appalled. I mean, these are our homes. Now you're telling us we're not gonna get insurance? I'm a single woman in a home. It's just me. I am the only provider. I can't afford to move.

Thank you very much.

I'm Linda Jacobs, and I've been here since I joined the Air Force in 1975. So I love Vacaville. I was stationed at Travis. And I do not live in this neighborhood, but I have been here for over fifty years or fifty years. And this is such an eyesore. This I was at home and saw it on TV. I didn't have time to read all the facts, but all those guys gave you the the facts of what's wrong with this. But I want you to know that if everyone in Vacaville had been notified of this, more people would be down here. It's to me, this is emotional because it's it's gonna ruin it ruins the whole landscape. Four stories does not belong in that area at all.

And so I just I just hope that each of you guys would really consider what this is gonna do to everybody who drives, everybody who enjoys our city, everybody who drives down Monte Vista, that they have to look at this. It doesn't belong. And so I just ask you to please please do the right thing, and don't allow this. And there has to be some kinds of exception to being sued or not by you guys denying this. So thank you.

Hi, I'm Suzanne Murray. I've lived on Westwood Court for almost forty years. And I was it was interesting when the owner the lady that gave the owner summary, because the owner, I guess, couldn't come. She spoke about the safe environment that we have. Well, I get about 10 messages a week about crime within one mile from my house.

So I don't know that this is you know, we're gonna have crime because of people living there. But it struck me when she said she wants a safe environment. Well, it already isn't a safe environment a lot of times. Would you guys want to live below a four story apartment building looking down on you and having trash cans lined up along your backyard where you go to swim and maybe get in your hot tub? I don't think so.

We have a lot of electricity shutdowns. PG and E is always going out. We lose our food. You know? It's out for eight or ten, twelve hours, and I don't know what this is gonna do to the grid for our homes. I walk along that area often. I go for a lot of walks. Different times of the day. There's always cars parked there already. I don't know where the cars are gonna go.

And whoever said it earlier, you have x amount of units, you're gonna have way more cars than the amount of units and no place to park. I also am concerned about a 911 call that comes in from people in the unit. What if it's during the time school is getting out and the cars are backed up all over? Because if you guys would go hang out over there around those times, you would see what it's like. Somebody in the apartment calls 911, the paramedics can't get in there, somebody dies, then what?

Who who do they who do they go to? Do they sue someone? Do they sue the city because you guys approved this? I actually stopped in the fire department that's right there the other day, And, of course, they couldn't say anything. They just said, well, everything's based on city codes and state codes. And I told them I said, well, I'm really sorry. Next time, you have to go in there with, you know, with your paramedics and everything, and you can't get to the people. When I moved in, my realtor told me that we live in the tree Streets. And we all have big trees in our front yards, and it's just beautiful. And maybe he should consider putting a park in there and enjoy the trees.

Thank you.

Thank you.

How you doing? My name is Mike Nussbaum. I live a few doors down from Carla. I'm right there in a full view of its four floors and fifth with the thing up there. Everything is gonna be seen, and there's no privacy. It's a great area. Love the spot. I'm a retired plumber. Worked my whole life in construction. But love to see the work local for those that are still working in the construction trades and anything like that. That's not the spot for it. I've traveled. I've been all over to have to travel. Would love the work to be in Vacaville. Vacaville's been a very smart city for a lot of things they've done through the years.

That's not one of them. That ugly eyesore. What's the biggest building even even close besides the the Travis Building? What? Those California, Hawaii building? How tall is that? You know? That's too big. And we're talking traffic safety and everything. I think everybody here knows. Just from deliveries alone, from prime and from every package and anything, the traffic's everywhere. Those places are gonna be completely that place is gonna be closed down at times. There's so many everywhere you go. Right? It's not just my house and our neighborhood. It's everywhere. So the deliveries, everything like that, that's gonna add more to the safety of it all. Very ugly, very out of place. It's been there forever. Those trees, they're carbon filters.

That's what we were all taught in school. Don't cut them down. They're carbon filters. Replace them with some twice as many, something. That's just it's aggravating. It's it's really hard to see what this plan is. Don't let the state push you around. I feel like his big brother trying to make us do this. That's not acceptable. Thank you very much.

Thank you. My name is Kara Valentino, and I don't live near this project. I live on the other side of town. But my father and my husband are developers, and we've developed properties and malls and things like this. And just looking at this, I'm very concerned that there's one way in, and the fire trucks would be coming in the same place that people are trying to evacuate in this driveway. Also, the garbage can, they get picked up by garbage trucks. That sound has to go where? Is there one garbage can for 37 units? One debris box? Anyway just for the design element I just can't imagine that this would be too code.

Something to consider. Thank you. Good

evening. I'm Jess. I live in the neighborhood, last fifty years. And I've spent the last forty plus years in the construction industry. One of my assignments is safety. Going into job sites, evaluate where the issues are. And I'm not going to articulate each of the safety issues that were brought up tonight, but I will emphasize that would be one of the first things I would have put on a safe report. Turning left on that complex is a big problem, especially with all that traffic and the children. That in itself, there should be declined, this project. I have visited thousands of projects throughout the Bay Area.

And I have to say, I've been thinking back the last forty years, all the different projects that I really felt good about, some I didn't feel so good about. This one is the most ill advised project I have encountered in my career. And I hope that California state law is not going to intimidate you somehow, Let's say not deny the project there, but we could say we'll okay that project for another location. That's more appropriate. This is not appropriate at all.

Now, let me leave on a positive note. Whoever put the planning binder together, it's about a ream thick out there on the table, that person or persons I would recommend they get a raise. That was phenomenal. I went and prused through that and it was just impeccable. And then the other thing is I would actually give the designers an A on their their project, but I would give anyone and everyone an absolute F if they're seriously considering or approving this in this in this neighborhood. Positive recommendation. I'd be willing to lead, set up a fundraiser to buy this lot from

the

developer, pay him true market value, and donate that to the city of Vacaville for either a walking park or a dog park.

I'm Alex Withers. I'm the owner and developer of the property, and I'm just gonna say it to most of you behind me, the bad guy in the room. We looked I've had my eye on this parcel for about five years, and it was recently rezoned right before we purchased it about a year and a half ago, high density residential. And my vision for the project was to see families who couldn't weren't fortunate enough to purchase homes in the area, build a razor family, and utilize the schools in the area for their children. I just wanna get up here and address a lot of the concerns.

A lot of them I've done on the Zoom call with the neighborhood, but I wanted to talk about some more of those. We are required to plan we we felt with the density bonus that we could ask for a waiver on the trees. We didn't feel that was appropriate here. The trees are very important to the residents and they're very important to us. So we're any trees we cannot fit on-site, we're work as Albert mentioned, we're working with the Vacaville Elmira Cemetery District to plant a 150 new trees is what we're replanting. I also wanna address some of the issues about the neighborhoods concerned about residents from the apartments getting in their backyard and into their pool. And part

of this

project for one second. So my my timer went away. Thank you. We

are doing an eight foot CMU wall, as again, I know was in the presentation to block the single family homes from the parking lot and the rest and the proposed building.

If please. Let's please be considering letters. I'm gonna give you ten more

seconds. Oh,

sorry. I've heard a lot of concern about fire egress issues. Fire the local fire department has reviewed this, and we've gone back and forth and worked with them on access accessibility to the site that they're comfortable with that meets local codes. And I also wanna talk about the building height being 55 feet. The whole building isn't overheight.

It's it it's my understanding. It's just the elevator shaft and the stairwells that are overheight. I just wanna say that this was rezoned prior to us buying it. And, you know, a lot of people could come in and do this. You know, I'm not some big corporation, you know, from another town or another state looking to develop this, make a quick buck, and get rid of it. I'm a local guy. I'm raising my family in North Vacaville. My kids all go to school on all these schools that have been brought up. I drive by the site every day. My wife drives by the site every day.

We're around here all the time. We understand the area and the neighborhood. I just think that's a lot better for the community than someone coming from out of town looking to develop it. I also want to talk about some of the solar issues. As he mentioned, one of the residents was concerned about the building blocking solar. I would think the trees that are there that are proposed to come down are doing a lot better job of blocking the solar than that.

Just ten more seconds.

I've heard a lot of other things as far as insurance. You know, people worried about their insurance dropping, and and and I don't I don't know. I've never heard of that, and I've never seen property values decline over a project like this.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

I live real close to that project. I think you'd hear a lot from other people, a lot more people, but standing in front talking publicly is that's hard. So this this is a project that's driven by the bottom right hand corner. I don't hold any fault to Alex. He's in the in the business of making money.

I'm concerned that property had been for sale for as long as I've lived in Vacaville, which is over forty five years. And all those attempts to do what other property owners wanted to do with it have been denied by you guys. And then all of a sudden, the zoning changed. They got by us. Now with the new zoning, he sees an opportunity to make some money, and you guys are being intimidated by the state.

We got your back if you guys got our back, But this is absolutely wrong. The guy's is gonna make a ton of money on this project. There's nothing wrong with it. But it just doesn't fit in our neighborhood. But, again, for the average person to speak publicly, it's it's absolutely terrifying. Not as terrifying as something like that moving into my neighborhood. So, anyway, thanks for hearing me out.

Thank you.

Are

there any more public comment? Seeing none, I'm gonna close public comment. And, so now we're going to, bring us back and, ask questions to the, staff about anything that's raised. If anybody wants to can you hear me better now? Still no.

You're fighting spirit.

Is that any better? No. Okay. They're gonna work on it. Okay.

What about now? No. Okay.

Yeah. It's as loud as they they could make it in the back.

So Okay. So so now we're gonna so we're taking public comment. We're, if anybody from the commission has questions about public comment to address with staff, I'll let you guys see that. Commissioner Beaumont?

I was hoping that we could hear from Albert on the rebut on whatever they ask questions on first.

So I mean, let's give so I've got a long list. If there's anything that you're at list on your list that you want Albert to bring up no? Anybody else? Albert, is there anything that you, wanna bring up from public comment? Or else we can start going through my list.

I'd certainly love to hear what the chair thinks.

Okay. So so let's get started. So was the the city or was the school districts spoken to about the size of this project and were they did they give input?

Yes. They did. We received communication from them on October 23, indicating that they're aware of the project, they're aware of how many students would be added potentially based off of the total unit count in the population. And their conclusion was that they, they determined that the current schools, can be housed. They they can house the additional students that would be provided by this project.

The the existing the existing fences, what's the what's the current plan for the any new fence and homeowners fences that are existing? Is there is that a part of the plan?

Sorry. Could you could you repeat that? I'm I've I've got a lot of

Sure. So the the existing fences around the surrounding homes, how does the project play into affecting those?

So those existing fences will be improved by the property owner's installation of a new eight foot tall masonry wall.

Are the existing fences planned to be removed?

I think the details of whether it'll be directly on the property line or directly adjacent to those fences, some projects, they can be directly next to those fences. In our experience from other projects, property owners go out to those residents, ask them how they wanna handle those particular situations, and then they go back and determine what would be the best scenario. But the project itself has to provide an equal neutral wall.

Does so does the current, like, layout of the project, and does it reflect on the property line or a setback for that masonry wall?

Believe it believe it's currently shown on the property line.

Okay. The so was there a traffic study done, or did traffic have an an attempt to take a look at this and what the impacts would be?

Yes. Our traffic engineer and traffic engineering division from public works did review it. No traffic study was required based off of the total number of units and the anticipated anticipated

Please. Go ahead.

The anticipated number of trips that would be generated. We do have the city's traffic engineer with us tonight if the commission is interested in hearing more about that.

I think we do. Could, traffic come up? So I think can you hear me now? I does it sound better yet? No. Okay. So do I think there's two thank you very much. I think there's two main major things. So the what tell me about the consideration with the proximity of the turn into the building or to the parking lot to that stoplight. Does does does that reviewed in the distance and Yes.

So let me answer the the your first question about the requirement for traffic traffic study. Whenever developments come, we would do an initial analysis, and we would anticipate the potential traffic that would be borne by this new development. And we use the ITE trip generation analysis, and that's what every traffic engineer uses. And so for the 37 units, because it does not generate over 30, peak hour trips, then we can't require the developer, to do a full traffic study. So

and understood. Thank you. And, what about the proximity of that turn lane? Or is it gonna be a left and right turn lane into that parking lot? Yes. You can make a a

ride in and a ride out. And the driveway's location, we want to make sure there is adequate sight distance that's provided because there is a fence to the to the north and there is a a a utility box. So we did we do require, we did condition the project to make sure that those things are outside the visibility triangle.

And so they're gonna be able to make a left hand turn into this. It's not gonna be restricted. Is what's the minimum what's the minimum or maximum that that left turn lane can be from the that stoplight? Is there any regulations there?

Yes. We we looked at that, and we and it it is adequate distance Okay. From the stop.

Do you do have something you

wanna No. IT. Can you explain that?

So It's the it's in it's it stands for Institute of Transportation Engineers, and they do studies nationwide and develop trip generations for different projects, different uses for single family homes, apartments. So that's what generally traffic engineers use to determine the trip generation for each project.

Thank you. Do you have something to add, Albert?

Yeah. For my colleague, Rick, over here, you mentioned the the level of trips that how would have to be created to require a traffic study. How many trips are anticipated to be created during the peak hour time for this project?

For the peak hour time in the AM, it is 13 peak hour trips. In the PM peak hour, it is 14. And, generally, our muni code states it's 30 before we can require a full traffic study.

So to clarify for the commission, for during the peak hour, which is a two hour window, any hour time, you could expect to see 13 vehicles making a trip from this site.

In in the AM.

Within the AM peak hour.

Yeah.

So within our time, sixty minutes of that time, 13 vehicles moving in and out of the site.

K. Please.

So

was what considerations are made for the drive the driveway the driveline and and pedestrian traffic or bicycle traffic or anything like that?

Well, like I said, for the the initial what's actually was shown, the driveway location, we didn't, think it had adequate visibility, so we did require, we we did condition a project to move the driveway so that it it does provide adequate visibility.

Have you have you seen any enhancements to a project like this that is near near school or high congestion that you wouldn't consider as an added amenity to that that driveline? Whether it's a a lighted crosswalk or something like that. I've not seen one on a just on a sidewalk, but it what is what are some traffic things that for safety from pedestrians and bicyclists?

Well, we we do have a program, but those are geared more closer to the schools Mhmm. Within school zones. So we have done a lot of a safe routes to school analysis Mhmm. Over the last couple of years. We've and in fact, in this area, Hemlock, Orchard, and Jepsen, we've we reduced the speed limit, from 25, to 15, during school hours.

So there are some things in the safe route system program that that have been developed and there are some for Jepson, Hemlock, and Orchard that were developed and we that did go to council and they were prioritized. So we do have certain things that we are considering for for the schools in that area.

For this project itself, like, drive lane, is there any enhancements, like, truncated domes? Like, what like, is that sort of safety feature that might be able to give some people some better feeling about pedestrians or schoolchildren?

We didn't feel like there was really

Any suggestion?

We're we're talking when we look at the trip generation, we're talking this project adds, like Albert said, fourteen in the peak hour and PM. You're essentially talking about one car every four and a half minutes. Mhmm.

Can I touch that? Over there? Through the chair, if I may. If we need to call a recess, we can do that. But Yes.

We'd ask that conversation from the audience.

So here, we're we're really trying to we're really trying to get your questions answered, trying trying to really hear hear them out. And, you know, the jeers from everybody, it it's it's just It's

not a jeer.

It's bad.

Oh, if and it's so if you guys like, if we can't really keep it under control of it, we'll just have to take a break and let everybody cool off. Like, we're we're really trying to get to the bottom here, and these are these are our resources that we have. I just please ask everybody. Please be respectful.

Say what every four minutes is.

Please stop, sir. It's not your time to talk.

I'll I'll speak anytime I'm gonna do it here.

Okay. We're gonna take a five minute break. Thank you.

Have lieutenant Willis here to support, but not to be heavy handed. He just and you talked to the general when I saw that. That's fine. So yeah. I think

it will be.

We're gonna bring the meeting back to order now. Does does that help at all? Is that better? Still not good. Okay. I'm gonna go back. Okay. So, you know, the public comment, you know, we gave everybody three minutes to come up and and speak, and it's really hard. Right? It's hard for us up here too, to be honest with you.

The with could you imagine doing it with somebody talking while you're talking or jeering you or mocking you in any way? It just doesn't make it any more comfortable. So just please, please, please, just be respectful and give each anybody who's talking their time to speak and relay what they've got to say. That's all I'm asking. Please. Let's let's all try to be respectful with that. So we're gonna dive back into some items. So did anybody else think of anything that they want Albert to bring up at the point for them?

I just I

just got

a question for clarity. So so going back to to the the traffic study or the reasons the traffic study was done, and I

think you mentioned the ITE, I think,

for explaining. I thought I heard 13 trips during morning peak hours. Now factoring in, you have the three schools, which is Orchard, Hemlock, Jefferson. But then

you also have Vacaville High School,

which is up the way. Right? So seems like it'd be a lot of cross traffic. And and so I just how does that process play out? Does someone else actually physically go out there, or is it just based on some sort of mechanism that you use to determine the 13 trips

for the group, please? Yeah. So, generally, the way we do it like like I mentioned, the the ITE, trip generation manual, they gather a lot of data for, you know, like I said, single family, multifamily, different uses, and they they, have, trip rates in there for these different uses. So that's how we develop or how we predict how much that specific project, produces Okay. In in the peak hour.

And the peak hour in this case is in the morning, it's between seven and nine. So it's either seven or eight or or eight to nine, and then the peak hour in the, in the afternoon is between four and six. So actually, in this case, the peak hour is in the afternoon, which is fourteen and which is actually it's outside where a lot of the schools come out. So we don't really look at it because because the project is producing its own traffic. It hasn't it's independent of the school traffic.

Gotcha. And I ask because I I and I think with with every resident who drives through for example, I trucked my son all the way to Markham Elementary from the Cambridge side. So I drive through Cambridge. I was driving through I think it's I'm trying to call the I think it's just and a few other schools. Right? And and I will tell you there's more than likely more than 13 trips during during that time for for that just particular school. So that's why I ask. It seems like a low number in comparison to even what I see going through Cambridge.

Right. No. So it doesn't include what it we're only looking at what the project generates.

Okay. Gotcha. Thank you. Does anybody have any other questions about traffic or anything like that? Okay. Thank you. I think that's it. Yes. Oh, yes. I'm sorry. Commissioner Hampton.

Given that the traffic light is not too far from that egress area from the parking, was there any consideration on the backup of what traffic implications cause because the traffic light in addition to the egress exits from that lot?

Yes. Generally, we do wanna make sure driveways are positioned in what we call the the decision zones prior to the to the traffic traffic signal. In this case, yes, we did look at that, and, yes, we did determine the driveway is far enough away from the intersection.

Okay. So a scenario would be as if somebody's turning in making a left into the parking lot in the morning Mhmm. And there's traffic going the opposite direction. Okay. There's gonna be a significant backup. Was there any considerations for that, when doing the traffic analysis?

No. We did not look at that. No.

K. Would that be something that would be a consideration that could be mandated as a requirement for the developer?

Well, I don't I don't know what we could do in terms of requiring a developer because it is a situation I I agree with you. It can be a a situation where, yeah, it's difficult to to make a left, but it is a situation we see in a lot of places. Yeah. And so, again, in this situation, what we are looking at is what the project itself And and what we can do is, you know, we can look at and it's in it would be us in traffic engineering is we can look at the signal timing. We could, you know, we can look at that in terms of there are things we can do where we can increase the green time during, you know, during the peak hours when school is out, and we can go out there and actually determine how many cars are going through the intersection.

So there is there are those things that we can do.

Thank you. I appreciate that. I I'm just really concerned because, again, with the parking, the lack of parking spaces, that street is gonna be packed with cars parked along that access way. And middle schoolers being middle schoolers, sometimes they're not the best decision makers. You know, there's gonna be a limited line of sight and vision because if those kids are darting between cars, okay, and things are backed up, you know, sadly, there was an incident that took place back a high years ago that, you know, could have tragically, you know, hopefully been avoided.

So I I'm just concerned because, again, you're gonna have parking on the street. You're gonna have parking in the you know, by Mayas. And that you know, like I said, and with exit vehicles coming in and out of that area, particularly during school hours decades ago, I drove that many a day, Monday through Friday. I and that was decades ago, and it was a problem way back then. So anything to address or mitigate or at least provide the council or at least me more information on that because I just see a big traffic jam, particularly with the light and everything else backed up in that area, if there's egress coming out of that lot.

You make a condition. Could you make that a condition?

Could we make it a condition of approval?

If I might additionally add some context to this one, commissioner Hampton. I think there's a couple of things that might be helpful for the commission, which is if there are existing conditions that are experienced out at the location with traffic, with people trying to get to school, those are existing conditions and it's not this project's responsibility to solve those existing conditions. We talked earlier about the objective standards that the city applies to these projects. Those objective standards have been reviewed by the city already. Examples of those are are the driveways located far away from the intersection that's there at Monte Vista and North Orchard, such that you have enough queue time to stack those vehicles to where it's not going to affect that intersection.

Another example of an objective standard would be the driveway location placement, vehicles that are looking to pull out, do they have an adequate line of sight? That's a measurable number that we have. It's a measurable diagram that we can apply to projects. The tough part that state law has ripped out is the discussion I fear we're kind of going down, which is the subjectiveness of what it feels for residents that are out there, which is it's a valid concern, and it's necessary for the conversation because these residents are the ones that are out there and experiencing this every day. But the state has already spoken about those particular scenarios.

And so I just want to make sure that I add that as it maybe might be helpful because as we've talked about here, we've looked at the number of trips that this project could generate. We are aware of how many additional vehicles it will add to this intersection. There are existing conditions that people can see with those vehicles out there. The hard measurable amount that is based on IT trip generation is that the number of units added to this project and the vehicles that would be added to the circulation that's out there is not going to significantly create any new impacts. And that's the that's the heartburn right there is what do we define as a significant impact.

Right? And that's the thing where it's what's the what's the level of vehicles moving in and out of the site that warrants a traffic study that's necessary to determine off-site improvements that fix a particular condition. The number of units that are being proposed at the site are so low that it doesn't generate that much more traffic that's necessary to require a new traffic study, if that's helpful for the commission. Thank you.

Vice chair Wilkerson.

Albert, I have a question. Let's say let's say the commission denies the project and then the council denies the project. Do you know the fines that are imposed on us?

I'll turn to our city attorney for that question.

And I know we discussed it earlier, but is there, like, a number you could kinda highlight? And then once that fine hits, couldn't they build something even bigger?

Yes. So the most likely outcome and and this is assuming there is litigation, we lose the litigation. The court can expressly direct the city to approve the project. It can order the city to approve the project. In addition, if it finds certain things about the way the city went about approving or denying the project, then the fines at a minimum are $10,000 per unit of the project that was denied.

And that obviously, like I said, can result in the the original project being built there. It can also result in a denser project being built there because we've been talking about density bonus. There's more that could have been done with density bonus here, so I I just forest for the trees. There's more units that could theoretically go on the slot. So the court can direct the city to overturn its denial, go forward with the project, and pay. In this case, it would be 37 times $10,000 at a minimum.

Okay. And I ask that question because there's a lot of feelings. Right? Everyone everyone has a lot of feelings regarding this intersection. Mister Hampton knows this intersection pretty well. I think my family and I know this intersection pretty well over a few decades. And so the hard part is is knowing that the subjectiveness of what could potentially happen. Right? But that I don't think unfortunately, that's not the planning commission's job tonight. I think other bodies can take that into consideration, but I don't think that we can. And so as we look at it with state law and what's on the books, I'm having a difficult time probably like my colleague next to me, with the project, but I will be voting in favor of the project.

Thank you, vice chair Wilkerson. So I've got a couple more things to run down here. So how was it emergency services, were they reviewed, and how how did that go about?

Yes. Our fire department staff and police, staff that assist with development activity and review these, they do, review these projects. In this particular instance, one of the examples of an objective standard is the city has a turning template, an approximate area where the wheelbase moves around on a project site based off of the apparatus that fire departments use to access the site. So example is, can you drive a fire engine into the parking lot, make a loop around, and then make a successful area to get back out with vehicles parked in there? Are those drive aisles wide enough to be able to accommodate those things?

And so that is something that we do work with. We have driving we have a template for this project that was applied to it. The fire department reviewed that template and was able to confirm other objective standards that would have to be applied later on down the road when they're applying for building permits and fire permits is the location of fire hydrants. That's not the level of detail that's applied at this level, but at some points, they're gonna have to show where the fire hydrants are gonna be located, and it's gonna be subject to the fire department's approval before they can even build.

Got it. Does anybody have any questions on fire, life safety, anything like that? No. Okay. Can you talk about the, the size of the parcel and the allowable units? There was a question brought up about the size and the allowable units. Can you confirm the size and what the city would have allowed and what why we arrived at 30 and how?

Yes. So density in our municipal code is defined as the number of units per acre. And so when we get to fractions, the code provides direction on how to handle that. And so when you're at point one, rounds down. Anything above point one rounds up. And so that's why it says 30 units is the maximum allowed is because if you arrive at 29.4, it automatically rounds up to 30.

Got it. Can you hear me now? Still no? Better? Little okay. Because I can hear myself. Okay. So can was what are the level so the the trash the trash bins that are on-site? Did were were those standard city setbacks for for trash against a property line, or were there any concessions made on that?

No. No. It does meet the minimum setback away from it. I I will say that when you're looking at the access for a trash truck to be able to access site, somewhat similar to what you'll find for a fire apparatus. So they should be able to access the project site successfully.

Its location is permissible by the code. We have other residential developments around town where they're located in the same location. One of the other questions I'll touch on before I get to the noise component is this project came in in May 2024. The city adopted new standards when you're dealing with multifamily housing next to single family homes in June 2024. So something that the state has afforded to people who are applying for projects under Senate Bill three thirty is that if you come in and you submit your preliminary application to a jurisdiction, whatever the standards are in effect at the time when you submit that application are applicable.

So the new standards that we adopted in June wouldn't be applicable to this one, and those are the ones where I think some residents had signed it would be no taller than two story when you're abutting single family homes. So there's other standards about masonry walls, about additional setbacks away from property lines that are just not applicable because they were adopted after they submitted their application. With regards to noise, the city already has an existing noise standard. So if there's any situations between these uses that arise, we can enforce noise complaints through our code enforcement division with the fire department. The typical vehicles starting up trash enclosures, those those are not considered to be a nuisance to properties.

The and the the just the proximity of the trash cans to the property line, there's there's no there's been no considerations or concessions made about where they sit on the property or how close they are to any single family homes, or is that by city standard?

That's by city standard. Yes.

K. Okay. Now I think shading was a big thing to me. So not only the solar, but even just shading on homes around it. But what what's it wasn't something that I researched before, but very valid point. How do we address other buildings shading adjacent properties whether it's just a building or even solar which is a monetary type of situation for a homeowner.

I sense there's two questions. One that's about trees which I'm excited to talk about, but about the shading of buildings onto solar and the shading of trees.

So build shading of first, number one, shading of a building onto another structure even itself. So this is a four storey four storey structure onto a single family, single story home or two story home. The shading that's caused by the building just on that property in general. What does do we have anything in the city code that No. It do do you know?

There is a state law that talks about protection of solar panels specifically, not about necessarily just shading resulting from a taller building. Uh-huh. That specifically, that law has to do with a tree that is planted after the solar goes in. Mhmm. I can't speak to why it's only trees, but it is only trees and buildings that go in that would shade a solar structure are explicitly written out of the law. I can't I can't tell you why, but that is what it says.

To me, that is a valid concern. Well, not only just not even just this solar by itself, yes, even on other properties, I thought for sure that we'd have something about, structure shading, other uses.

We don't have any standards. If anything, we strive to acquire more shading. And permanent shading provided by canopies that are in parking lots is one way, getting more trees. There were some comments about trees and the removal of trees and the trimming of trees. I felt that since we have the public here, it might be good to at least clear the record and help everybody understand with regards to how do we handle tree removal of permits.

Before we get to trees Yes. Doug, do you have something you wanna add?

Well, it's it's different, but it it piqued my interest was why did this get changed from commercial office to residential high density in a short period of time and was bought?

So this has to do with its lack of development that had occurred in the past. So if the housing element runs in cycles of eight years and so the previous sixteen years no development had occurred on the site. And so what the state has said is if you've got vacant properties that haven't developed in the last sixteen years, you need to change the zoning to residential high density.

Okay. Thank you.

I don't have a comment on this tree top.

You have a tree top?

I do not have a tree top.

Oh, do you what's your question now?

Oh, you're good.

So, let's get into the trees then. So, yeah, please explain to us the the tree removal permit process for any homeowner as well. I'm just interested too in trimming oak trees that are over your property line.

So I'll I'll start with what our code allows. There's nothing in our code that says you cannot remove a tree. The key is is that if you're going to remove a tree, you need to get a permit for it. And we have a permit. They don't cost any money.

You can submit one to the city. And then what we do is we go through an evaluation of criteria, its suitability, its health, the type of species it is in a native species, whether it's impacting property value, whether it's affecting people's driveways or affecting people's sewer water lines. And we go down that criteria. And in some cases, tree removal permits are denied around the city because people, you know, frankly, they'll probably they're sick and tired of having a rake up leaves or they just don't like the tree because it drops sap or acorns or different things like that. So we have to have tough conversations with residents about the other goal that the city has, which is to retain a tree canopy throughout the entire city, which can help lower the city's urban heat island effect.

Your asphalt surfaces, your concrete surfaces, your roof, depending on the color, can really absorb heat rays from the sun. So the more that you have shading from your trees, the lower the temperatures can be. And so when we run through, I just want to make sure that everybody knows, I've been with the city for, you know, over fifteen years. You can always get a tree removal permit from our office. You can request to have it removed. We're gonna ask you for information about why your reasons are for removing it. In this particular case, an arborist report was submitted with it. That's the standard protocol that we have. And we have an arborist, a certified arborist, evaluate the health of the tree. They do a number of different inspections to make sure that they understand what the species is.

Are there any signs of decay or death or or is it something that needs to be removed? At the end of the day, when development has to occur, there are provisions within this body as well as other decision makers to approve the removal of trees. In those cases, in order to be able to accommodate development for other needs, there is a replacement requirement. And so that's the second series of we go through the criteria of the type of species, whether they can be removed. Is there any way that we can save them?

On this site, we were able to save a couple. But at the end of the day, if they need to remove all of them, there's a method for which they have to replenish that canopy elsewhere. And those, depending on the species, it can be significantly more. And I think as the applicant had mentioned, they're going to be working with the cemetery district to find a way to plant over a 150 more trees as compared to the number that are gonna be removed from the site.

Commissioner Banta.

Thank you for the presentation. I just wanna thank everybody for all their comments and passion about the project. I also wanna thank the developer for being a local developer and not selling to a larger company to come in and and build something big and being mindful of that we do need low income housing, and we do need building, we need housing that's built by design that is gonna be affordable. Also, these are 500 square foot units, which are smaller units. So by design, they might be more affordable as well.

There's a possibility of that. So I appreciate that as well. Again, within our purview of the planning commission is to approve the project or deny the project based off of what has been presented in the the objective standard design. The state has certain laws and certain things that do have to be abided by due to the fact that we haven't been building affordable housing and that we haven't been building low income housing. We aren't hitting our arena numbers for very low income or extremely low income, and this is starting to to shine light on that. And so I think it's important that we do have the two units. My only comment was I wish there was more, but I understand the feasibility of it as well. So I as well would am in favor of this project. And when the commission's ready, I would be happy to make a motion.

Does anybody else have a comment they'd like to make? Commissioner Hampton.

This is pretty frustrating because, again, it in my humble opinion, sort of takes the element of local control away from the constituents that we serve. And it's very frustrating to be able to listen and hear the concerns and, again, have our hands tied because of state legislative mandates. So it's unfortunate, but the consequences that outweigh are significant, which means that even something more dramatic could be placed on that property based on the legislation is challenging at best. So, reluctantly, I'm going to vote and approve or approve this.

So

I make a motion

to approve. No. I'm not.

Made mean, a commissioner.

So I'll I'll, yeah. I'll entertain the motion. Commissioner. Commissioner Vanta.

I'd like to make a motion to approve to adopt a resolution of the planning commission of the city of Vacaville affirming that the North Orchard Oaks Apartments is categorically exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act pursuant to CEQA guidelines section fifteen three thirty two, class 32 infill development, and approving the density bonus, major design review, and tree removal permit for the North Orchard Oaks Apartments project subject to the conditions of approval. I

have a second from, commissioner Wilkerson. Could I please have a roll call, though?

Commissioner Vakis?

Yes.

Commissioner Banter? Yes. Commissioner Vermont? Yes. Commissioner Hampton?

Yes.

Vice chair Wilkerson? Yes. Chair Lightfoot?

Yes.

Motion passes.

We're we're gonna take we're gonna take another another recess. There we go. Still no, though. So next, we're gonna move on to, seven b. This is the public hearing.

I'm sorry. That's not the name. Yeah. So this is the public hearing on the battery energy storage system best study session. Oh, I'm sorry.

Lane. Seven b is right.

It is seven b. I'm sorry. So seven b, this is the land use and development code and downtown specific plan update. First, we're gonna receive a presentation by staff followed by commissioner questions, and then we'll open up to public comment. May we please have staff's presentation?

Good evening, members of the planning commission and all those in attendance. We're proposing updates to three divisions of the land use and development code and chapter 10 of the downtown specific plan. The updates for the land use and development code are mostly minor and include additional language clarifying standards and procedures, incorporating user friendly formatting and tables, and adding additional minor requirements for development. Several noteworthy updates are proposed to implement in various general plan and housing element programs, and these were designated for completion this year. I will discuss these in the following slides.

As for the downtown specific plan, there is one update proposed. The downtown specific plan identifies priority pedestrian frontages, which are key streets designated in the plan that prioritize more active uses, encouraging more foot traffic in downtown, supporting businesses such as restaurants and shops. Land uses that are considered nonactive such as residential, offices, banks, clinics, and other similar uses require a conditional use permit to be placed on the Ground floor along these priority pedestrian frontages, and staff are proposing to amend this requirement so that offices may be permitted along these frontages with a minor use permit instead of a conditional use permit. And here is a map showing the pedestrian priority frontages. They include Dobbin Street, Main Street, and Merchant Street from Mason Street to Main Street.

And as for the land use and development code, significant updates to the LUDC include adding a zoning designation that is compatible with the agricultural buffer designation, adding standards for telecommunication facilities, incentivizing infill development by allowing an increase in density, and modifying open space standards to encourage various types of housing including affordable housing. Updates also include requiring vacant properties to register with the city and establishing new requirements for their maintenance and adding setback and noise control requirements for construction. Staff presented the updates to the Solano County Airport Land Use Commission on 10/09/2025. They requested one minor statement be added to clarify that any density bonus allowed for infill development projects shall not conflict with the maximum densities of the airport plan compatibility zones for the Travis Air Force Base and Nuttree Airport. To conclude, these updates create consistency with the general plan and zoning ordinance.

They provide clarification for standards and procedures. They provide a user friendly formatting, implement the housing element, and allow Ground floor office uses along priority pedestrian frontages within the downtown specific plan area with a lesser planning entitlement. Staff recommends that the planning commission recommend that the city council perform four actions. The first action is to adopt a resolution reaffirming the Vacaville general plan final environmental impact report or EIR for short and a final supplemental EIR concluding that no additional EIR is required for this update. The second action is to adopt a second resolution reaffirming the adoption of the downtown specific plan addendum to the general plan update EIR and the 2021 supplement to the EIR.

The third action is introducing an ordinance to amend the municipal code for the division shown on screen as and as shown in attachment four. And the fourth action is introducing an ordinance to amend chapter 10 of the downtown specific plan as shown in attachment five. And staff are available for any questions or comments.

I'm seeing, commissioner Beaumont. Thanks, Noah. Appreciate it.

On page two ten, number c, under noise, I noticed that the city's exempt from all restrictions about twenty four seven. They can operate whenever. I'm just wondering why that's not a case by case when everybody else is restricted as to when they can operate.

Thank you for the commission, commissioner Beaumont. There are situations where the city absolutely has to be out there at extremely random times, but it's not something that the city staff embark on lightly, like, for our public projects. It's really gonna be on that case by case basis based on a demonstrated need.

But it doesn't say that.

Well, it's I just wondered

It it it's more it's probably more in the policy about how our public works department others implement the code. We didn't want we don't usually put a lot of those details into the code, but honestly, with these public projects, especially the big ones, we have a lot of notification that goes into them. There's always there's a website, lots of transparent information. In the case of an emergency, they are just gonna go out there and make the repair at whatever time it needs to be made.

Okay. Alrighty. Thank you. And then 2163 a, under billboards. We approve the digital billboards, and it says we can reduce so many static billboards. Who decides which static billboards to reduce when they

So who's the decision maker for those types of projects? Albert, would you like to speak to that? Thank you.

Commissioner Beaumont, who makes the decision? Oh, it's a negotiation process with whoever the new user might be for wanting to build a new billboard. So there's kind of a tier process. A new billboard provider, we're looking to come into the city and establish a new one. We do have one that's looking at coming in.

We ask them the first question is, hey, our ordinance says you need to remove, so what work have you done to contact other property owners or other sign manufacturers? Or if they're a larger company like Clear Channel who might own multiple signs along the freeway, they might have the opportunity to remove or suggest the removal of one of their own signs along 80. So it it's a little bit about who's proposing it. If it's Clear Channel, likely, we're gonna have the removal of some billboards. If it's a brand new that doesn't have any billboard signs along the freeway, then we're looking at other negotiation options where maybe they're making more contributions to the city for private community funded things, maintenance of freeway landscaping, things like that.

Okay. Great. Thank you. And my final question is under page two twenty eight, I think, under vacant and abandoned properties. I don't see any provision in there in Johnna like this for housing that's a for sale that's been vacant for over thirty days. Do they have to report that they're vacant now to the city because of this code?

I believe we have a clause in here exempting

I didn't see it. Properties.

I can actually speak to this, commissioner, because I also represent our code enforcement division. Okay. So it's a voluntary process currently. Okay. The registration on the vacant property list that we keep as a city.

Okay. So properties for sale would not be looked at. Right. Okay. Fine. Great. Thank you very much.

Thank you, commissioner Beaumont, vice chair Wilkerson.

For the presentation, can you go can you go to slide five, please? Can you explain the last one? Reduce outdoor recreation space, standard for multifamily mixed use in affordable housing. What was the what's the reasoning behind that?

Yes. Let me pull up the exact page so I can read out the specific standard to you all. Yeah. So the justification for this one was to encourage multifamily mixed use and affordable housing by reducing the stringency stringencies of that open space requirement, specifically to incentivize on multifamily infill and mixed use types of housing products?

I I just I I that one doesn't sit with me because it the it's already gonna be multifamily mixed use and affordable housing. As we've just seen, it's probably gonna be in a tight space. And so now you're already reducing that outdoor recreational area for them where we just went through this for the last two and a half hours. And so I don't there's that's just a code that we just have to adopt. Director Morris?

So it I'm sorry. It's currently existing. It's just been modified to also incorporate affordable housing, mixed use, and three bedroom units or more. So that is something we can consider lowering the percentage. Currently, it's it allows a reduction of up to 25%. Mhmm. So that is something that we can consider lowering if the commission thinks that's too high or this is something that could be problematic.

I do. And so, I mean, I would I would just maybe note it and, you know, dig deeper when you present to counsel, maybe bring it up, but that's just something that jumped off to me. Sorry about that. Thank you, Noah. I'm good.

Commissioner Banta.

Hi. Thank you for the thank you for the presentation. On the proposed changes to the downtown specific plan, I know when it was presented to us before, there was a lot of conversation about the pedestrian priority frontage is being for, like, ground floor uses such as restaurants and retail shops. I'm assuming that in on page one seventy one, says there's an kind of an analysis done that says on in some uses office would be better fit for that on the ground floor and residential on the upper floors. To be able to have residential on the upper floors, would the land use and the zoning still permit residential on the upper floors if office is on the bottom?

Yes. It would, and it wouldn't require the conditional use permit. It's only along the Ground Floor.

Okay. But residential wouldn't need any extra permitting to go on the top?

No. Thank you.

I was getting a little feedback in that mic, but the, I'll now open it up for public comment. Anybody like to speak on the public or topic? Please proceed. No. Seeing none, I'll close public comment and, bring you back for commission deliberation.

Yep. Commissioner Beaumont.

Yeah. On the downtown specific plan, it allows medical offices but not clinics. Is there a specific designation what clinics are different than medical offices other than maybe they're open longer or something?

Yes. They're classified as two separate uses. Office can be something like a law law firm, whereas a clinic could be more medical. So that's the distinction between those two uses.

Well, you're you're allowing medical offices, but

not Yes. Yes. I see.

So that's my question.

I can pull up the exact use classification definitions and share those with you. There is a specific distinction, but I'm not aware off the top of my head exactly Okay.

I just it just seemed a little vague on the differences. Thank you. Any

other questions? So I'll I'll entertain a motion or if anybody wants to so it we I think there's some questions on some of the topics. The remind us. So the decision this evening is to pass along our comments to city council, or we amending the the situation now?

You're being requested to to make a recommendation, a formal recommendation by motion to the council. They will make the final decision about these code amendments at a future public hearing.

And is there a way for us to know other than amending the the verbiage in here about some of the comments that were were made or, questions?

If the if the majority of the commission wishes to amend the draft land use regulations, that's something that could be included in the motion. If you want to make the motion of staff recommending and just make sure that staff's gonna note the comments that came out, we would do that in the staff report to council. We would absolutely identify the topics that the commission discussed.

So would anybody like to add to the topics that are discussed with the, city council? Okay. I'll entertain a motion. Thank you. Commission I have a motion by commissioner Beaumont.

I'm gonna do a simple one. Simple motion recommended City council, the city of Vacaville recommend one, two, three, and four as outlined with the comments made by John on the reduced space that was recommended or to be looked at.

Second. Are we good with that motion?

I'm assuming that your recommendation is to make sure that that's addressed when the item goes to council and not to change the specific language at this point. Okay. As long as everyone is okay with that, then I think you can let the motion stand. Or if you want to adjust it,

you can

I'll be

happy to read it, but I

If everyone's okay with that, you can proceed as as stated.

Okay. I have so I have a motion by commissioner Beaumont and a second by vice chair Wilkerson. Can I please have a roll call vote?

Commissioner Bakers? Yes. Commissioner Banta? Yes. Commissioner Vermont? Yes. Commissioner Hampton? Yes. Vice chair Wilkerson? Yes. Chair Lightfoot?

Yes.

Motion passes.

Thank you very much. So now, we'll move on to, business item number eight. This is a to receive a presentation on the battery battery energy storage system study session. So first, we're gonna hear presentation followed by commissioner questions, and then we'll open up for public comment. So this this item on the agenda nights is informational only. There's not gonna be any any voting. So this is this is I'm telling you, this is the right meeting to be at. Right? So this is the one that's usually skipped over. This is the draft in what really is going in.

This is our time to give input into what it is that we wanna see there. Again, there's not gonna be any anything done tonight. The next step is to to go on to city council, and this is the time for input. The next session at city city council are also gonna be input only. Correct? So this is the time to really, you know, give what it is that you think that this should be or shouldn't be, and, that's what we're here tonight. So please proceed.

Thank you, chair and members of the planning commission. We're holding a study session on battery energy storage systems and a new ordinance that will be coming in the future. The purpose of this study session is to collect public feedback, but also to introduce the subject matter to the commission so that it's not gonna be the first time that you hear it at an actual action that would take place at some point in the future. So the request for tonight is to simply conduct a study session on battery energy source systems. I'll refer to them as best here on out and to receive public comments on the draft ordinance.

For this discussion, we wanna introduce a number of definitions and terminology. Back of the meter is something that you'll hear. It refers to energy systems or resources that are located on the customer side of the electrical meter, such as those for a home, business, or other facilities, your solar, and then you might have a secondary battery that's in your garage that is specifically for your home that supports your home. That's a back of the meter. Front of the meter is an energy systems or resources that are connected directly to the utility grid before the electricity meter that measures a customer's consumption, such as a utility company, independent power procedure producers or grid operators.

Another important term is thermal runaway, which is a self reinforcing uncontrolled increase in temperature within a system often leading to damage, fire or explosion. There is some background that we wanna introduce to the commission regarding this particular topic, and it really starts in 09/10/2018 when the state legislature adopted Senate Bill 100 signed by the governor, and it set a goal of all retail electricity that is sold in California must be renewable by 2045. It also obligated the updating of the state's renewable portfolio standard, RPS, to ensure 60% of California's electricity is renewable by 2030. And then also obligated the creation of a joint policy report on SB 100 by 2021 and every four years after. So the state set out this goal and said, show us how it can be done.

Now that joint agency policy report was published in 2021. It is a report that is a culmination of work from the California Energy Commission, California Public Utilities Commission, and California Air Resources Board. And what they found in order to be able to achieve this goal set by the state was that there is a core scenario, likely scenario, in which the state has to add 145 gigawatts of utility scale capacity by 2045. Out of that 145, 49 would have to consider would would have to consist of battery storage. Lastly, another pertinent piece of information is AB two zero five that was adopted inside by the governor in 2022.

And what it did was it offered an opt in certification process with the California Energy Commission. And the California Energy Commission is responsible for the permitting and reviewing of new power plants. And so it offered a new process for which power plant providers who are looking to install these BEST systems could go through a separate streamlined process of two seventy days upon the application being complete, and it doesn't require compliance with any local regulations for a city or county. There is one caveat is that whatever is decided upon for that project, that provider must have a community benefit plan already adopted with local organizations. Doesn't have to be a city.

It could be local nonprofits. So battery energy storage systems are a hot topic right now, and they're really coming up because the state has clean energy goals that are driving the demand for these. These are primarily front of the meter best facilities that store grid energy and discharge that energy during peak demand. Primary method of collection of that energy is through solar. So the solar is collected during the day.

It's stored within these batteries. And then during the nighttime when we're not generating anymore, it's used to help backfill that additional use. But the main goal is to improve the grid reliability and efficiency. Of course, there are concerns. There's concerns about fire, thermal runaway, and shelter in place orders, as well as potential contamination from fires of these batteries.

Some other important background information is why is it coming up in Solano County? Well, in February, CalPeak Vac Addiction submitted to Solano County a proposal to install a 100 megawatt RGES, is what the name of the project was. And it was a best project that was going be located next to the Vaca Dix substation along Interstate 80. Another application was submitted to the California Energy Commission in November where they notified the California Energy Commission that they are seeking to use that opt in process for a new Corby BEST project in the county. In September, California Energy Commission received an opt in certification request from new Middle River Power BEST project, but this one's in city limits.

Those other two projects were located within Solano County. And the last nail in the coffin was adopted by the state legislature and signed by the governor SB two forty five in September. So it built upon AB two zero five, which created that streamlined process, but it did a couple more things. It bypasses local review and community input. It allows more projects to be eligible for these types of streamlined process, and it assumes that these projects that are going to be built, they are providing a net positive economic benefit.

The previous iteration of two zero five stated that, there was no net positive benefit, that it had to be proven. But now with this bill, it assumes that they are going to provide a benefit, an economic benefit to society. We wanted to provide for context those preliminary applications that were submitted. There is that Middle River Power that's on the screen on the map to the right. That one's in Vacaville City limits along Kilkenny Road and Interstate 80.

The Corby battery storage one is unincorporated Solano County. It is on Kilkenny Road and Burns Road. We already received a CEC public notice. That was a community meeting that was held in this month. I think it was November 7 over at the Lattice Community Center.

The previous project that we wanted to make reference to was a Cal Peak Vac Dixon. That one's also an unincorporated Salon County. That one was more of a referral, just letting the CEC know that there's an intent to file an application, but that one's at 5157 Quinn Road right next to the PG And E Substation. That is a gas natural gas power plant that provides energy. So with all of that happening with the state and with Solano County and all these new projects, there was something that had to be done about it because we were experiencing significant community concern about those thermal runaways and these projects coming in with the city.

Well, BES is not allowed anywhere in the back of the city limits. There's no specific developments except for the Middle River power one that has submitted to the CEC, but the city does not have any applications on hand at all. There are growing concerns about the potential impacts to sensitive receptors, and this was all being made very well during 2014, which is why City Council adopted an urgency ordinance in May that outright prohibited new best facilities within city limits, and it provided a forty five day window for the city to look at potential options. Well, on June 25, city council made it more of a a semi permanent moratorium that goes into effect and then is ending on 05/14/2026. And, really, the whole intent behind that was to provide staff more time to be able to evaluate this subject topic, to evaluate potential ordinances, to figure out best practices that are around other jurisdictions and other municipalities, and figure out potential options for city council.

And that's where this ordinance comes in. And so since March to June, we really have been working with the city the the county to coordinate and participate in a number of technical working groups to figure out how to regulate these types of things. So we have crafted an ordinance, and that has been published for public review. And the framework is pretty much laid out here where you'll notice as you're reading it, it starts off with definitions and the type of applicable projects. It'll talk about the land uses, where they can be, and citing standards, minimum setbacks, how much landscaping has to be provided between them.

There is also development standards on what has to be done for emergency vehicle access roads, for perimeter fencing, for lighting and security. There is also a permitting process within our ordinance that identifies the routes that people would have to go to should they decide not to use the CEC process but rather submit an application to the city. There's also requirements to establish a public benefit agreement and there's criteria outlined within that municipal ordinance that we're proposing. There's also a commissioning and decommissioning. And this model of an ordinance is generally modeled after Solano County's ordinance, which they've already moved forward with.

So I'll dive down into the this is a study session, so I'll dive down a little bit into what each section's gonna cover for this public review. Definitions and applicability explain the purpose of why we're doing this. It'll identify the applicability to the facilities with a capacity greater than 40 kilowatts per hour with smaller BEST facilities that are associated with large manufacturing businesses that would be behind the meter. Those wouldn't be applicable. We're primarily looking at grid, which are larger projects.

And then also defines BEST systems too. The land use and siting standards will identify that a conditional use permit is going to be needed in all cases when there's a proposal for public facilities, zoning, whether the project's in a industrial park zoning or a business park zoning district. The ordinance doesn't allow these types of facilities in any high or very high fire hazard severity zones. It's not gonna be allowed within any compatibility plan zones of the Nutri Airport. It won't be allowed within the Northeast Growth area until there's a specific plan that has been created that identifies what the plan is gonna be for that area.

And then there's also a sizable buffer that would be applied to sensitive uses such as residential uses. Your next sections that talk about development standards will cover lighting and noise, security and screening, as well as landscaping. The permitting process identifies a heavy preliminary application process that they would have to go through, which includes a public meeting that they would have to facilitate with the public prior to even submitting an application to the city. There's a formal application process. There's lots of technical studies that would be required, such as a hazard mitigation analysis.

Then there would have to be separate environmental review that would have to be conducted for the project if one is proposed. The other components include a public benefit criteria that's really applicable to those larger tier two and tier three size projects. These are larger battery energy storage systems. Examples can include training and equipment for emergency personnels, investments into local organizations or community projects or contributions to city initiatives or projects that benefit the whole community. There's also a commissioning plan of how they're gonna be able to set set it up, what emergency response plans look like for responsible agencies such as the evacueable fire department, police department, maybe even Solana County OES, as well as outlines for safety requirements and then weed abatement.

Then should it all be removed off the site, there would have to be requirements for a decommissioning plan and restoration of the site. Well, along with this, we wanted to provide a suitability analysis that took into account when you apply a buffer to all the sensitive uses, when you remove it from the compatibility zones, when you remove the eligibility of unsuitable sites like hillside areas where you're not likely to build them or existing commercial developments and when it's not built in the Northeast Growth area or other known future developments. What areas are left? So we're gonna go through suitability site analysis. And again, well, wouldn't say again.

I just wanted to clarify. This is not intended to state there is a desire to allow them on these potential sites. It's mainly an exercise to just show how much the buffers really, how much land gets eliminated when you apply all these buffers. So this first map is intended to show all the residential uses with a 300 foot buffer. You'll notice that we also took out some county properties that are located outside of our city limits.

We want to be sensitive to those areas Really, we're more of a vacant land. We didn't do anything towards the Northeast sorry, the Northwest Side because those are mainly hillside areas. But there's also a lot of county development land, and it's far away from major transmission lines where it wouldn't be suitable for anyway. We're seeing a lot of these sites be located potentially east of our city limits in Solano County. That's where we focused on trying to identify as much as the county residential uses as possible.

And that's an example of the buffers that are on the screen. So here's what happens when you identify all the other unsuitable sites such as your hillside areas, your areas that are already developed with developments such as industrial parks, your commercial areas. They're just not suitable to accommodate these larger project sites. You can see that entirety of Lagoon Valley is off limits. Our industrial parks are off limits.

The Nutrae Airport and the surrounding areas are not suitable for those areas. And we also took out conservation areas that you'll notice that are in areas like North Village. Now, this next one eliminates the areas with the Northeast growth area that really the city has a separate vision for our future to establish a method and a specific plan for allowing high manufacturing uses, high job generating uses that really is going to be good for the city. And so we don't want to allow development to occur out there for best that would take up that highly valuable land until we've had an opportunity to develop a specific plan that might identify it. Perhaps sometime in the future, it could be allowed if we know that a best facility would be able to support those high manufacturing uses.

That is an example of community benefit. But for now, our recommendation in the ordinance just to not allow it within the Northeast growth area. And then future development East Of Legitown, that's in that turquoise color that's on the screen. That is stuff that we know is gonna be coming forward down the pipeline for the East Of Legitown development that is just not gonna be suitable at all. So what that looks like is it kinda leaves you some remnant pieces within our city limits because it's the ordinance for regulating property in our city limits.

So you're left with a the former Gibson Canyon wastewater treatment plant sites that's over off of Leisure Town Road. You've got a small agricultural portion that's along Elmira Road, and then you got the city's wastewater treatment facility that's they're off on the eastern edge. This is just an example. We're not suggesting that they're gonna be built on these sites, but this is just with the ordinance. Any best facility that's proposing would have to demonstrate how they're meeting the minimum buffers away from all these uses.

We've already done some legwork to reach out to the community. On October 22, we held a community meeting that was attended about by 75 people, I believe. For the commission, the public comments that we received were, mainly residents were wanting just outright with this ordinance permit all lithium ion batteries. There was concern that the 300 foot buffer from sensitive receptors was insufficient, and some people decided that they wanted to see a thousand foot buffer. There was recommendations about establishing a private a public and a private partnership that provides exclusive benefits to backfill, and then there were concerns over the potential impacts to agricultural land and Interstate 80.

If there's a fire, it would have closed down regional traffic, along Interstate 80. So this draft ordinance has been published. We have a forty five day comment period. We published it. It's on the city's website. We're asking for people to take a look at it and give us your comments from November 7 to December 22. You can find this ordinance at cityofhackable.gov forward slash best. And you can send those comments to me, alberty dot enal dot city of hackable dot gov. And we will take those comments, and we've received a party amount of comments for this public study session. We received, last I counted, 21 emails, communications regarding it.

So it is a hot topic, and we have a schedule for the commission as well as the public. It's the same schedule that we advertised to the community on the October 22. Published it on November 7. We're having our study session today, tonight, I might add. And our next stop will be a study session with the city council.

As I mentioned, you don't wanna you you wanna introduce these hot topic items ahead of time so that way it gives everybody an opportunity to kinda read up on this stuff before an actual public hearing is scheduled. So we'll make our stop with the city council on December 9, but shortly thereafter in January, the turn of the year, on January 20, we intend to bring this back as a action item for the commission to make a recommendation for the city council where they would intend to see this on March 10. Eventually, a second reading would be on April 14 with the final effective ordinance date, if it does get passed, right in time for that moratorium to be done. That concludes my presentation. I'm available to answer any questions.

This is the time to talk about the ordinance, ask questions about the ordinance, and receive public comments.

Commissioner Beaumont.

Thanks, Albert. One quick question. Who came up with the 300 feet buffer for sensitive areas?

That was a value that we found through researching other jurisdictions, not just in California, but other states like Washington and Michigan. This being a very hot topic, there are a lot of technical reports and technical guidance for adopting model ordinances. And so we found that 300 foot was applied for those sensitive uses. Solano County also arrived at that same conclusion as a best practice is that 300 foot radius away from those sensitive uses. The alternative approach of applying a much more generous use of 1,000 foot is what we heard.

What you run into is the potential for providers to just outright use a CEC process, where they would say, you know what? We can't work with these standards. We're just gonna use that opt in process with the California Energy Commission. So 300 foot was the attempt to try and develop an ordinance that seemed reasonable and consistent and was defensible with other ordinances that were adopted elsewhere that we found.

So if they use the CEC process, they can put it anywhere that's available?

Correct. Yeah.

So no buffer zones, no anything, just whoever's property is available to use that for that purpose.

Correct. There's other smaller buffers that are required from the National Fire Protection Agent Act or agency. There are other buffers, but they're much less. You're talking about 30 feet buffer away from other uses, maybe 10 foot in some cases. And so when compared to those other standards that would be applied, our ordinance is more strict.

So I guess I missed it. What keeps them from doing the CEC process no matter what we do?

What we've heard from these power providers is that the CEC process is it's tough. It's tough. And so there, we've heard from some providers that they would much rather like to work with local jurisdictions. But because this is such a big goal for the state, they created this opt in process because it's a big deal.

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, commissioner Beaumont, vice chair Wilkerson.

Thank you for the presentation, Albert. You only want questions from us regarding the ordinance. Is that what is that did I hear you on that?

I am not in the position to limit the commission on what they would like to comment regarding this topic.

Thank you.

In regards to on one of your earlier slides, you had a, CEC, CPU listed as some of the agencies. I didn't see Casio listed. Is there a reason why the California independent service operators weren't listed on that? Because they have a role in this as well, don't they?

I I couldn't tell you. This was part of the research that we found, on the Internet about the background behind this.

I I would I would say maybe look at Casio as well. That's Casio, California independent service operators for, energy. That's all I have for now.

Any other questions? No? So now, we're gonna open up to public comment. Each each individual is gonna be allowed three minutes to speak. Please feel free. After we receive public comment, we'll address your questions with with staff, and we'll try to get them all answered or receive it and then go from there, please.

Thank you. My name is Kara Ike. I live in the Brighton Landing community, which is on back of around Elmira and Leisure Town, so right in between two of those little purple boxes that was proposed. So I wanna make a couple points. I've been at all these meetings making lots of points.

So to not repeat myself in something like a broken record, I wanna just reiterate that the city council has a duty to represent the best interest of the community residents and the public and not a private energy company who is profiting off of the risk that this community will bear. So why would the city release this draft ordinance benefiting a private company that's not even local to Vacaville and doesn't benefit the community at all? This energy is gonna be funneled to San Francisco. It's not going to stay in Vacaville, so that just doesn't make any sense. And then why would they approve all of these new housing developments?

My house is four years old. So now they're saying, we're gonna take all this ag land and allow these best facilities when these homes are brand new and they are doing a bunch of developments still in that area. And then another point I wanna bring up, and and I know Sheena mentioned this as it related to the apartment complex project, was that the homeowners insurance situation. So we've worked hard to buy these homes in Vacaville, and this project puts our investments at risk, which means that there's less of a likelihood to get homeowners insurance once these residential areas get classified as high risk zones. Homeowners insurance will either increase tremendously or policies will be dropped because the fire risk in the close proximity.

300 feet is honestly laughable. Like, that's ridiculously close to residential areas. And then a Department of Insurance moratorium post event is not sufficient in this case. Is the city essentially saying that if these insurance becomes impossible to obtain because of the ordinance, that that's just too bad for homeowners, and we're just, you've bought these new homes, and we're at a loss now, there's nothing we can do about it. So our home values drop.

Insurance is impossible to get. What is the value add for bringing families from the Bay Area to move to Vacaville and continue to grow this community? And then, again, the city council doesn't have to pass this or like, they don't have to pass it as it's currently drafted. So this just feels like it's really benefiting these energy companies and not doing what's best for residents. And I understand this has to be a cohesive effort, and, like, we are not pro green or anti green energy.

We certainly are. But this just feels like we're saying because we are out near this ag area, it makes the most sense, and it's just going to poorly impact a lot of these families who've bought these expensive new homes out in this development. And, personally, I would sell my house and leave Vacaville if this passes, and this is gonna be a moving target because yeah. I don't know. Okay. That's all I have to say for tonight. Thank you.

Hello.

My name is Ross. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak. I'm here today because I am deeply concerned about the proposal to place a large lithium ion battery energy storage facility near our homes, especially when primary energy benefits will go to another city while our community bears the safety and environmental risks. First, the type of facility comes with documented hazards. Lithium ion batteries can experience what is known as thermal runaway, a chain reaction that can cause extremely hot fires, fires that are difficult to extinguish, can reignite, and require specialized equipment and training.

Incidents in Arizona, New York, and even in California show that these events are real, not theoretical. Second, national safety guidelines such as NFPA eight fifty five, I'll repeat that NFPA eight fifty five recommend that large battery storage systems be placed in industrial zones with significant setbacks, distances from the from the housing. This location does not meet the spirit of those guidelines. Before moving forward, we deserve to see whether the project complies with NFPA eight five five standards, UL nine five four zero a testing, and all applicable local fire codes. Third, a fire at one of these facilities can release hazardous gases including hydrogen fluoride that poses both an air quality risk and a potential need for neighborhood evacuation.

Placing this type of facility in a residential area exposes your family, your children, your seniors, and your residents vulnerable to unnecessary danger. Fourth, our local fire department must be fully prepared before any approval occurs. These fires cannot be handled with standard firefighting methods. Has our department received the specialized training that were promised? Where's the funding gonna come from?

Has a formal hazard mitigation analysis been completed? If so, we should be able to see it. If the answer is no, then the approval would be premature and unsafe and negligent. Fifth, this project raises serious land use fairness issues. Our community takes on the safety risk, the environmental risk, and the potential impact on insurance and property values, like previously stated.

While another city, they receive the electrical benefits. It's unreal. Land use decisions should not export benefits and import hazards. Finally, this project should not move forward without a complete CEQA environmental review, which we should also be provided.

Thank you very much. Your time's up.

Appreciate it.

Hi. My name is Laura, and I live in Brighton Landing also. And we just moved here in March. We are new grandparents, and our grandbaby, and our kids, and everybody are here in Vacaville. So we moved here from Petaluma.

And never in my wildest dreams did I think that something like this would possibly be built literally at the end of my street. One of those little blue boxes is at the end of my street. There are high tension power lines that cross that property and there's a Amtrak line that goes right through there and there are multiple trains going through day and night. So if something happens on that, we're looking at taking out Amtrak, a major thoroughfare for commerce, for people. There's a lot there.

Moss Landing, let's put it out there. That was awful. It's the same kind of a facility that they want to build here. And look at what happened there. What if we need to evacuate everybody from that area? There's limited ways to get in and out. We are looking at one of those boxes was near Kaiser Hospital. Really? You want to put something right near a hospital that has a trauma unit that, you know, services so many people from such a wide area? They say that the fire suppression system in this has been improved, but let's be realistic.

Systems are designed by people. People are fallible. Systems are fallible. If we're going to allow something like this, are they going to have redundant systems to back up their backups so that we don't have everything catching on fire? Lithium ion batteries are bad news. Look at it. When you go on an airplane now, you can't put something in the hold of the airplane. You can't put it in your checked baggage because it's such a danger. And yet we wanna have a 300 foot setback. That's less than a football field.

I mean, do you all wanna have something like this 300 feet from your house? It's a huge danger. We're looking at a city of over a 100,000 people, and we're looking at three possible areas that you could put it. What happens if 80 gets destroyed? If Amtrak gets destroyed?

If the local streets, the hospital all get destroyed because there's some major event? How are you gonna evacuate a 100,000 plus people and deal with the injuries, deal with the prod the destruction of all the property? When we moved here in March, we had a hard time getting insurance. And as everybody else has been saying, it's gonna make it even worse. Please. We have to try to keep this from happening here. You.

I'm a local realtor, but I also live in Brighton Landing. So between Brighton Landing and Roberts Ranch, which is right off of Elmira Road, one of the proposed sites, we have over a thousand homes. We also have a new high school, Kairos. So there's also the play for all park. The proposed site, 300 yard setback. You did you know that you can't even park a semi within a 300 feet of a residential home because it's an eyesore? But the average home price in Brighton Landing and Roberts Ranch is 700 to $750,000. So every time I sell one of those homes, guess who reaps the reward of that? The city of Vacaville from the property taxes. So what happens when you put a battery storage facility site?

That drives down the home sale price. So what happens to the city's taxes? It goes down. So what happens when there's a fire and the home value is decreased and we can't even sell a home? Because that's what happened in Moss Landing. They can't sell their home when they price dropped at $300,000. So now homeowners now have to foreclose, and the bank owns it, and the city gets no money. Nothing from property taxes. They now have to foreclose. They're bank owned. The whole neighborhood goes downhill. And people are now homeless, or they move and they leave Vacaville. That's what's gonna happen if you guys put the battery storage facilities in residential neighborhoods because now you're ruining the land. That ag land is no longer usable. These sites belong in industrial areas.

If you can keep them out of Vacaville, keep them out of Vacaville. But you're gonna lose tax money. You're gonna ruin neighborhoods. You're gonna you're gonna put people in harm's way, especially a new high school. I bet Kairos didn't know that. I tried to get them here, but they didn't even know about the meeting because nobody knew about this. And we've been trying to get the word out, and now these people that are building homes, KB Homes is building homes there, they're building more and more homes, and you guys are just gonna put them in danger if you put this site here. So thank you.

Thank you.

Hello, commissioners. First off, I wanna thank the, staff for a good presentation and kinda bringing everybody up to speed on what's going on in Vacaville. And this is a really hard issue, and I feel for you guys and the city council to have to make this decision because what Vacaville is facing is kind of unprecedented, honestly. We have the largest substation within 50 miles, So all these developers are just swarming on Vacaville wanting to build here, and they're utilizing that state process. And then we have our our city trying to get some kind of control out of the situation.

It's it's not a good situation to be in, honestly. But I do wanna say that I do appreciate the city creating an ordinance. I think it's actually really necessary that we do this. And I feel like the protections that are in the ordinance, I a 100% agree with most of them. And I feel like it is a good model for the county.

I do have concerns with adopting it for the city. When looking at the potential sites that would be viable, obviously, they're too close to populated areas for my in my opinion. And the information on setbacks is a big concern. And I understand you don't wanna make the setback too big because then developers feel like the the project site is shrinking down and they don't get as much for their buck bang for their buck building these kind of facilities. But 300 feet is not not very much, especially when you're talking about smoke plumes moving around, and the winds we have in Vacaville could move that plume quite a distance.

I did provide a public comment by email that had some other jurisdictions in there and their setbacks that were more than 300 feet as well as some plume modeling studies that demonstrated that the plume would travel further than the 300 feet barrier. But, again, I do understand that it is hard to come up with a a guideline that won't be superseded by that state loophole. I just wanted to point out that this could also affect businesses. Last year, in Escondido, there was a battery storage fire, and it evacuated over 500 businesses and two schools for two days. So not only could it affect the property values, but it actually could affect businesses and economic growth in our city.

So it's a challenging situation to be in, but I do wanna say that the county is not allowing these kind of facilities near Vacaville. They've done a great job with their ordinance, making them only, be able to be permitted in industrial areas that are remote in our county. So if the county feels like they should not be within, you know, nears us of our city limits, then why should our city feel like the same feel like that they should be close to our city limits or in our city limits? I that just doesn't make sense. So it might work for the county, but I don't feel it works for the city. And I just want you to consider looking at alternative battery types because there are other viable alternatives that are not lithium that are commercially available today, and that would be the best solution in my opinion.

Thank you very much.

Hi. I just want to remind you that the best ordinance should be one that reflects what the Vacaville community wants, not what the energy companies want. It has already been made very clear that the community does not want lithium batteries due to lack of safety. These systems take up large amounts of land and is targeting ag land. Nobody wants these near their homes.

Solano County already designated a spot away from ag land and homes. Allowing one best system in opens the door for more to come. Over the last two years, the community has given enough information to justify not allowing BESS in Vacaville. The only ones wanting BESS in Vacaville are the people that want to make money from it. They're not Vacaville residents. So do what's right. Write a strong ordinance against having best systems in Vacaville. Giving in to bullies only attracts more bullies.

Thank you very much.

Good evening, commissioners. My name is Derek Johnson. I wanna thank the city staff for the work that went into drafting the best ordinance. No easy feat given the controversy that surrounds the topic. That said, the ordinance leave the ordinance as written leaves Vacaville vulnerable. Though the ordinance encourages safer battery chemistry, it still leaves the door open for lithium ion facilities. In practice, every applicant is going to argue their design is safe and that lithium ion is the only economically viable option for their use. The residents have made it clear, no lithium ion period. Safer non lithium technologies need to be the baseline requirement. With respect to location, these are industrial scale projects.

They should be restricted to industrial zones only. Even with setbacks, the draft still permits siting near North Village, new housing developments in Southern Vacaville, and the easterly water treatment facility. A fire or plume event is already a known concern near the residential areas. However, if a plume or fire incident near Easterly occurs, are we risk risking the city's ability to treat wastewater? Can it operate without staff?

And if it can't, how long can it be offline? Have the consequences been evaluated and remediation taken into consideration? When we talk about responsibility, both accountability and financial responsibility, we need to be very clear who we're doing business with. This ordinance vacillates between the terms owner and operator, which is understandable. Someone could own the land, someone could build the facility, and yet another company be the operator.

At any time, any of these entities can dissolve or be sold off to yet another company. In the event of an incident, can we truly say we know who is responsible? If we can't, how can we enact the consequences? This ordinance must dig deeper to holding the to holding the holding companies tied to these energy LLCs to secure ironclad financial instruments to cover everything from emergency services, remediation, and decommissioning. Finally, though the ordinance talks about community benefit agreements, it doesn't explicitly state they must be negotiated only between the applicant and the city.

Failing to name the city as the sole negotiator for the community means applicants can go fishing for anyone, anywhere, and for any amount of money in the vicinity of the project. Now the developers were gonna continue to remind us, they can opt in through the state's AB two zero five process, and they're gonna do that the entire way of the negotiation with the city. Anytime something is too steep for them, they're gonna make that threat. If we write our ordinance out of fear of state preemption, then we're risking letting these developers dictate the terms that are gonna put our city at risk. Thank you.

Very much.

Hi. Good evening and thank you for the meeting here. Okay. So I'm nervous. No.

I

I am not against battery storage. I'm against lithium ion. It's just too volatile, and actually, I feel it's a it's a big money issue. I'm sorry Corby jumped the gun and bought that 40 acres. It sits right in front of one of the most beautiful Victorian homes that you'll ever see.

One that I even think could be historical. And here is this gorgeous properties, and then you've got air conditioners sitting on top of huge buildings trying to keep lithium ion cool. Now your cows won't moo anymore. They're gonna Okay? Because that's all the noise that everybody is gonna hear.

It it's I've lived next to that gold mine of Vaca Dixon Substation and have always felt safe. If they reopen where Menards wanted to go and the one that's I mean, it it's gonna be terrible. You're gonna it's gonna be both sides. It's a money issue. Corby needs to have it finished. Well, fine. Corby can finish it if he wants it in that spot. Use something that's not volatile. Okay? Take lithium ion. My opinion, three options. Two of them are safe. I mean, so what's the gist? Take lithium ion to an industrial park. It can be done.

Lambie's, and I believe there's another one. Okay? That's a safe option. It will keep people happy. Okay? Another safe option, if they want the properties that they want right now, come on, but don't use lithium ion. Use something that doesn't burn. You got smud. How long has smud been going and they don't burn? You've got so many battery types out there that they cost more money.

And Corby and these properties don't they don't wanna pay the money. I feel like they're putting a price on on everybody's life, everybody's health, and it's so they can make some more money. And that's you know, please be considerate. What is not safe is lithium ion in the existing locations that they want. And please, please keep Vacaville happy.

You're gonna have a lot of people selling their homes. I've heard it mentioned. I've thought about it. You know, you won't have a job being a planning commissioner because it's just gonna be batteries, and they can, know, operate those remotely. Thank you.

Hi, everyone. My name is Noel DeMartini. I am a fourth generation Vacaville resident from a family of farmers, ranchers, and small business owners. My family sorry. My eyes are getting a little tired tonight. My family has protected and invested this community for nearly a century, and tonight, I'm here to continue that responsibility. We are here discussing where battery energy storage systems could be placed under a new city ordinance. But based on everything we know now, this the conversation shouldn't be about where. It should be about whether they belong inside city limits at all. Lithium ion best facilities come with documented catastrophic risks, thermal runway, explosions, toxic gas, heavy metal release, and fires so intense they cannot be extinguished, only contained.

This isn't speculation. It's happening across the country. Take a look at Moss Landing where we get messages to keep Vacaville safe from those residents daily from Moss Landing who were who are still suffering. The experts closest to the risk agree. On October 30, the Vacaville fire fighters local thirty five zero one issued a formal warning stating, there is a clear and documented danger posed by lithium ion best fires, and these events release highly toxic gases and heavy metals that pose both acute and chronic health risks.

They also made it clear these events require major resource deployment, potentially delaying responses to everyday emergencies like medical calls, structure fires, and traffic accidents. If the people who would be running toward the danger are raising red flags, we should not ignore that. And Vacaville would not be the first to act. The city of Escondido has already banned new best facilities within city limits because the risks outweighed the benefit. Their mayor put it plainly, it does not make sense for Escondido to have these facilities, and it doesn't make sense for Vacaville either.

A remote industrial area such as Lambie Industrial Park is the only appropriate setting for this type of infrastructure. The Midway Amazon areas out there in our rural Vacaville don't make sense. That corridor is already overwhelmed with dangerous truck traffic and many other things. And not to mention, it's still ag land, and there are still many residents in the area. So tonight, I am asking you to choose the strongest option. Ban best facilities inside Vacaville city limits. Protect neighborhoods, schools, first responders, and the families who live here. Vacaville deserves energy solutions, but not at the expense of safety. Let's ban it. Our firefighters are against it. Our community is against it. Now our ordinance needs to reflect it. Thank you very much.

Good evening everyone. So I'm gonna try to motivate you here because I know you're in a tough position and you can't always get a win but you can get a win here. Vacaville has always been a family and a community ordinance in the town, and that's what drives me that's why I love living here. But this particular company that's trying to come in, they're not bringing any jobs here. They're just taking up space. It's not what's best for the community, and it's not an actual need here in Vacaville. We got solar. PG and E is about to raise their prices now. They're already saying it due to their mistakes. Here, they're talking about storable energy, but we're not reaping any of the benefits.