Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay.

The Planning Commission is now, meeting is now in session at 7.05. And we can start off with the Pledge of Allegiance. Commissioner Dugas, can you lead us off please? Great. Thank you, Commissioner Douglas. I appreciate that. And we're going to move to the next line item, which is a roll call.

Commissioner Blind?

Here.

Chair Taylor? Present. Vice Chair Douglas?

Present.

Commissioner White?

Present.

For the record, B.C. Stansberry and Medeiros are absent. We have a quorum.

Great. Thank you. So we're going to move to the next line item, which is the consent calendar and approval of the agenda item. And we're going to move to the next line item. I guess we can get a motion to...

I'll move to approve the consent calendar.

I second.

Through the chair, we're going to do a voice vote. The system is off. Off for a second. So Commissioner Blind?

Aye.

Chair Taylor? Aye. Vice Chair Douglas? Aye. And Commissioner White? Aye. We have four ayes. The motion carries.

Great. Thank you. So we're going to move to the next agenda item, which is a report of the city council liaison. We have Vice Mayor Matulik.

good evening chair taylor vice chair douglas the rest of the planning commission staff and the general public um thank you all for being here tonight uh no true report um per se um maybe just a recap at our last city council meeting we did approve um the um uh increase in the dwelling units over at the fairview costco project so that went through with the last one and once again um As a reminder, we have our interim city manager that's been in office for what, three weeks now? So he's obviously needing some time to get caught up to speed. And so I would highly encourage this commission to actually pay a little bit closer attention to our city council meetings, because then you may see a little differing of direction on some of the items that may pertain to the planning commission. because once again similar to what i've been talking about um for the past year so is that economic development and the planning commission are going to be our or i mean economic development along with public safety are two priority main goals right now and the fact that you've been this commission has been tasked to look at the specific plans in a lot of cases to where that's going to tie to a lot of the economic development that we're looking at so i would highly encourage you to kind of look at pay a little bit closer attention to some of our city councilmen. So that way you can get an understanding of kind of like the direction that our new interim city manager, Harry Black, is kind of moving us. And I can tell you for a fact that he comes with a wealth of experience when it comes to economic belt and running cities. And that's probably why we put him in a position that he's in right now. And so we're relying on his expertise and his experience to kind of lead us into our, a lot of the things that we haven't been able to accomplish lately. So right now, obviously with where we're at in June right now, his primary task right now is looking to balance our budget. So we're we've got that is his number one task right now. But once again close behind that is economic development. This is where once again this planning commission that I'm looking forward to this commission playing an important role in looking at the specific plans to see to see and identify ways to help advance some of the economic development opportunities. So With that, that would be, oh, and also tied to the Fairview Costco project, I had the pleasure and opportunity to actually take a site visit over there, probably about a week and a half ago. And so I met with Danny Liu, who's the construction project manager, for the Lewis Group that is the developer on that project. And he gave me an extensive site walk, a site visit on there and talked about a lot of things and a lot of scheduling issues that are upcoming. So in the next two to four weeks, you're going to see a lot of activity going on there. The Costco construction team is going to be ramping up there and setting up SETTING UP SHOP OVER THERE PRETTY SOON ALONG WITH LOUIS GROOM GOING TO BE STARTING TO PUT UP THEIR CONSTRUCTION TRAILER THERE IN THE NEXT TWO TO FOUR WEEKS SO ONCE AGAIN WE ARE THE FACT THAT IT'S LOCATED WHERE IT IS RIGHT NOW THAT IS THAT IS GOING TO BE OUR FOCUS ON POINTING TO A LOT OF THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT BECAUSE PEOPLE WILL BE ABLE TO SEE THAT FROM HIGHWAY 80 AND JUST IN THE SURROUNDING AREAS SO THIS IS WHERE ONCE AGAIN THIS IS GOING TO BE OUR BIG PUSH OF OF LOOKING TO VALLEJO AS as that particular project showing the economic development opportunities that we do have here in Vallejo. So with that, that will be the end of my report. And any questions at this point?

I guess for you as well, JR, as well as staff, I'm just curious what happened with the memos that we provided.

I'm sorry?

I was curious about the past, the memos that we provided.

So we as a council we've actually been having little discussions in the background right now and the fact that we've got so many things on our plate right now that's going to be part of once again looking towards tying that with the economic development a lot of the advancement of some of the planning planning issues that are going to be coming in front of us to where we may have to take some some action or sort of directive on that. So thank you for bringing that up as a follow up making holding us accountable to make sure that we're doing what we're supposed to be doing. And if you feel that we as a council are moving a little too slow or not taking fast action, by all means, reach out to me and let us know. And I can bring that up to my colleagues and potentially if we have to get that on the agenda or kind of in a separate conversations, then I'm happy to move that forward. So thank you for that.

Through the chair, I just wanted to provide a little bit of an update on that. We had a scheduling issue, and we were not able to get the memos for the special council referral to the Economic Development Commission on their June meeting. However, we do have it on the calendar for their July meeting. So as soon as that is presented, that it will be forwarded on to the city council for further consideration.

Thanks. Thank you, and have a great meeting, everyone.

All right, thank you for the update. It's like some great news and some great things are happening for the city of Little moving forward. So it's like we have a clear roadmap of what the next steps will be and I'm excited to see how everything unfolds. So thank you for the update, I appreciate that. Okay, and so we're gonna move to the next line item, which is the community forum. And the community forum is for anyone who wish to address the commission on any matter for which another opportunity to speak is not provided on the agenda and which is within the jurisdiction of the commission to resolve. It's requested to submit a complete speaker card to the secretary. I believe you could do that online. If you're here in the audience, you can use our

Through the chair, currently no one has signed up to speak, and currently there are no one that has raised their hand on Zoom.

All right, great, thank you. Okay, so I guess we can give it a few minutes, and I think we can move on to the next line item, which is a public hearing, and then we will close the community forum if no one has raised their hand. So we can move to the next line item. So we're going to open a public hearing for the project that involves the legalization of an existing pawn shop and installation for cash and gold signage. And this will, the business will operate on Monday through Saturday. This is on our location at 3716 Sonoma Boulevard.

Through the chair this evening, we're asking the Commission to continue the public hearing for this resolution to a date certain of July 6th, 2026 at 7 PM. So we don't have a presentation for you this evening, so through the chair. that the next step would be to open the public hearing and then take vote to continue this item to the July 6th, 2026 at 7 p.m., the regular scheduled planning commission meeting.

Absolutely. Okay, so we can close the community forum if we don't have any updates and we can open up the public hearing. Let me give each speaker three minutes to speak on this matter.

Through the chair, we do not have anyone on Zoom that has raised their hand to make public comment.

Okay, great. Thank you. I guess we can, at this point now, we can close the public hearing if we don't.

I'll move to continue this item to the July 6th meeting.

Second. I reserve a new voice vote again. Commissioner Blind?

Aye.

Chair Taylor? Aye. Vice Chair Douglas? Aye. And Commissioner White? Aye. We have four ayes and the motion carries.

All right, great, thank you. So we're gonna move to the next agenda item, which is line item 7B. And this is to, this is for, to adopt a resolution to find the project exempt from an environmental review pursuant to CEQA guidelines section 15301, the class one existing facilities, and approve major use permit. This is for the location on 480 Redwood Street, suite 33, on the parcel, located 0051-010-630. And I believe Robby will be presenting for us.

All right, thank you. Good evening, members of the commission. My name is Robby Thacker, principal planner for the planning division. This project before you tonight is the La Cayenne Goods Alcoholic Beverage Sales Major Use Permit. And just again, purpose of tonight's meeting, we'll be asking the commission to consider the major use permit application and determination of public convenience or necessity and to take action on these items tonight. All right, and as a reminder, this item is subject to the Levine Act. All parties, participants, and their representatives must disclose on the record of this proceeding any contribution of more than $250 made to city officers, such as mayor and or city council members, within 12 months prior to the date of the proceeding. City officers are prohibited from accepting, soliciting, or directing a contribution of more than $500 from a party, participant, or their representatives during a proceeding and for 12 months following the date of a final decision is rendered. This project site is located at 480 Redwood Street, Suite 33, between Sonoma Boulevard and Sacramento Street. The tenant space is within the Redwood Square Commercial Shopping Center, which includes a variety of uses, including restaurants, personal services, general retail, and medical offices. The site's general plan land use designation is Neighborhood Corridor, and the site is located within Zone 3 of the White Slough Specific Plan. The site is surrounded by White Slough itself to the north, a general retail and vacant property to the east, Redwood Street to the south with a multifamily residential development and commercial shopping center beyond that, and another multifamily residential development to the west. A LITTLE BIT OF BACKGROUND HERE. THIS SLIDE SHOWS THE INTERIOR OF THE EXISTING TENANT SPACE. THE STORE OPERATES AS A SMALL HIATION SPECIALTY STORE THAT HAS BEEN OPEN SINCE 2024. PRIOR TO 2024 THE TENANT SPACE WAS UTILIZED AS OFFICE SPACE FOR A VARIETY OF BUSINESSES. In August of 2025, the applicant submitted an application for a minor use permit to allow for the retail sale of beer and wine for offsite consumption as part of the existing grocery store sales. The applicant has also concurrently filed an application for a type 20 off sale beer and wine alcohol license from the California Department of Alcohol Beverage Control, or ABC, which regulates sales of alcoholic beverages at the state level. The project was subsequently deemed complete for processing in October of last year. And then after reviewing the application further and consulting with ABC, it was determined that a finding of public convenience or necessity would be required due to an over concentration of active off sale alcohol licenses within the census tract. Because of the over concentration of existing licenses, the director did refer the application to the planning commission for consideration. Because the application is being elevated to the planning commission, this entitlement is now considered a major use permit. This slide provides a view of the existing floor plan for the store. The store is just over a thousand square feet in size and the layout of the store includes shelving and coolers for various grocery products as well as a storage and employee area in the rear of the store. The applicant proposes to utilize no more than 10% of the existing retail sales area to stock the beer and wine products. This limitation is also included as a condition of approval so that any future business that occupies a space will also be limited to the amount of space that can be dedicated for alcohol display. And that would be unless the use permit is modified in the future. The business currently operates from 9 a.m. to currently 7 p.m. Sunday through Friday and closed on Saturday. The hours of operation are not proposed to change and no alterations to the existing tenant space are proposed to accommodate the sale of alcoholic beverages. According to the Department of ABC, any number of retail off-sale licenses exceeding two licenses within the subject census tract is considered to be over-concentrated. Currently, there are 12 existing licenses that are active within the census tract, although not all of the businesses are currently operating. This census tract covers the area generally between Highway 37, Sacramento Street, Valley Vista, and Broadway, and includes all of White Slough as well. Of the 12 active licenses, there are nine type 21s, which allow for beer, wine, and spirits. And then there's three off-sale beer and wine only licenses. And then just a little clarification, the way that ABC determines what is considered an over concentration is large in part relative to the population in the census tract. So because this census tract is mostly composed of commercial development, multi-family and white slew, there's not a huge population, so that's why the number is pretty low compared to how many existing licenses there are. So just a little bit of context on that. All right, so for the PCN and the criteria for determination, the zoning code does provide a list of criteria for evaluating whether or not the PCN would be served. The criteria is intended to ensure that any new licenses above the threshold for over concentration is justified in the request and that impacts to any residents and sensitive uses would not result from the issuance of the license. The applicant is seeking the license to improve sales and drive additional customers to the business to promote economic development, employment and sales tax revenue. The proposal would be limited to beer and wine only and display of the beverages would be limited to no more than 10%, as I mentioned, maintaining the principal use of the business as just a grocery store or specialty store. While there is an over concentration of licenses within the census tract, the vast majority of the tract is developed with neighborhood and regional commercial development and shopping centers where these licenses are most appropriately allocated and common within large scale retail businesses and small scale convenience stores. Additionally, the Vallejo Police Department did analyze the crime statistics within the vicinity of the project site, and they did not find any record of abnormally high crime rates associated with alcohol related crimes compared to other areas of the city. The license would also allow customers looking for specialty groceries to also have convenient access to beer and wine products in one location. With these considerations, staff believes a determinant of public convenience or necessity could be made for the project. In addition to the PCN requirements and the use permit requirements, any new establishment that commences alcohol sales are subject to the special use standards contained within the Vallejo Municipal Code. These are operational standards that help to ensure potential impacts to the site are mitigated. These include prohibiting loitering, limiting the hours of operation for the sale of alcoholic beverages from 8 a.m. to 12 a.m. daily, with the clarification that this business only operates until 7 p.m. maintaining the site free and clear of litter and debris, maintaining signage relating to alcohol sales, a copy of the use permit conditions of approval and the ABC license, and allowing for city inspections when necessary by staff. These standards have been incorporated into the draft conditions of approval for the project. Additionally, the project was reviewed for consistency with the general plan and the White Slew specific plan. The project is consistent with several general plan policies which focus on promoting efforts to improve employment and tax generating business enterprise, business diversity and economic vitality. The project will also aim to incorporate responsible sales of alcohol by limiting the percentage of the store's dedicated floor space and incorporate standard compliance measures and limiting hours of operation for the sales. Separately, the White Slough Specific Plan provides goals and policies to address various conditions within the plan area, which include The protection and enhancement of wetland and marshland habitat, public access policies for north and south White Slough, designation of appropriate land use designations for wetland preservation areas and commercial land use opportunities, as well as other policies. Per the White Slough plan, the project site is designated mixed use plan development and is located within zone three. Zone three authorizes food and beverage sales as a permitted use. Additionally, there are no exterior changes proposed to this tenant space that would impact the White Slough or any existing wetland preservation areas. And lastly, after conducting the analysis of the special use standards, the considerations for the PCN and the general plan and white slew plan policies, the project must meet the required findings to support approval of the major use permit. Based on the analysis, staff finds a project to be consistent with all the required findings. As mentioned, the request supports the intent and policies contained in both the general plan and white slew plan. ALL PROPOSED SALES WOULD BE CONDUCTED INSIDE THE BUILDING AND WILL NOT ALTER THE CHARACTERISTICS OF THE EXISTING TENANT SPACE OR THE COMMERCIAL SHOPPING CENTER AND IS THEREFORE COMPATIBLE WITH THE ADJACENT LAND USES. THE SITE IS PHYSICALLY SUITABLE FOR THE ADDITION OF THE OUTCALL SALES AND HAS EXISTING PARKING, PEDESTRIAN ACCESS AND IS DESIGNED TO SUPPORT AND ACCOMMODATE RETAIL USES. AND LASTLY, THE PROJECT HAS BEEN REVIEWED FOR COMPLIANCE WITH THE PROVISIONS OF THE CALIFORNIA ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY ACT. Okay, the project is exempt from the CEQA section guidelines 15301 for existing facilities. The project will not expand the existing tenant space or site, and there are no unique environmental conditions that would create an impact from the addition of alcohol sales. Therefore, the project is exempt. On May 12th, notice of the hearing was published in the Times Herald, mail to all active neighborhood groups and property owners within 500 feet of the subject property in accordance with our municipal code standards for noticing projects. No public comment has been received on this item. Staff recommends that the Planning Commission adopt resolution finding the project exempt from CEQA guidelines section 15301 class one existing facilities and approve major use permit and public convenience or necessity collectively PLN 25-0151 based on the findings provided in the attached resolution and subject to the conditions of approval provided in exhibit A. I WOULD LIKE TO ALSO MAKE A REQUEST TO THE CONDITION OF APPROVAL NUMBER 6 AS IT RELATES TO LIMITED HOURS OF OPERATION. THE STANDARDS FOR ALCOHOL SALES IN OUR MUNICIPAL CODE ALLOWS FOR SALES UP TO 12 A.M. HOWEVER, BECAUSE THE BUSINESS IS ONLY OPEN UNTIL 7 P.M., WE WOULD LIKE TO MODIFY THAT CONDITION TO SPECIFY IT WOULD BE 7 P.M. AS THE LIMIT FOR THE HOURS OF SALES AND ALSO THAT THEY WILL BE CLOSED ON SATURDAYS AS WELL. SO WE WOULD LIKE TO MAKE AN AMENDMENT TO THE CONDITION ON THAT. Okay, and yeah, that completes my presentation. I'm happy to answer any questions. I believe that the applicant, Leanne Garcon, is available online. Thank you.

All right, thank you for your presentation. I appreciate that, and it appears that the work and the review was thorough, so it was definitely helpful to give us a perspective on the analysis that was done. At this point, we're going to open it up.

Through the chair, just for the record, I do want to note that Commissioner Beasley-Stansberry joined the meeting at 7.24.

Great, welcome. And so I guess we can open this up for a public forum.

Through the chair, this would be the time that the commission ask any questions. Absolutely, thank you.

So we'll open up for our fellow commissioners if they want to deliberate or have any questions.

Through the chair, just a quick one. So the liquor license isn't under our purview. Is that something else? I mean, we're just approving the use in the particular facility, right? Great. If they get a liquor license, because liquor licenses are hard to get and expensive, and I, do they stay with the, that's the question. Does, if we approve this, does it always have an opportunity to provide liquor there no matter who owns it, or is it, how does that work?

Yeah, so the licenses are issued by the state, not the city. We have purview over issuing use permits, which allows for regulation at the local level. But I believe that the alcohol licenses need to be transferred from person to person. Am I correcting that? They have to be transferred. So what we're doing with the use permit would allow for alcohol sales to commence on that particular site, and that will run with the land. So the use permit will run with the land, but that doesn't necessarily mean that someone would have to have an active liquor license from ABC in order to sell from the space.

Thank you.

I have a question as well. So this census tract has already 12 licenses already existing. In this particular situation, considering it is deemed to be more licensed than what is typically allowed for this particular census tract, is there anything about this particular applicant or this project here that makes it a public convenience or a public necessity?

Yeah, so one of the things that supports these types of requests is that when someone goes to something like a grocery store, having the ability to also purchase alcohol along with their specialty goods, whether it be at a Walmart or a Target, that provides that public convenience factor that they're looking to make that finding for, if that's the case. But we also are looking for any other negative impacts that could happen. If you're selling alcohol, is there a school right next door or something to that effect? where do we really find it a necessity to sell alcohol from this location? So I think that's kind of the piece of it there.

Great, thank you for asking. And so there is a homeless encampment mentioned in the report that's nearby. How close is the homeless encampment to this particular grocery store?

I want to say if we're referring to encampments that are periodically out at White Slough, I'd say that that's several hundred feet away, if not more, maybe 500 feet, something around there.

Okay. Do you see there could be any potential concerns? Because you said you have reached out to the city of Vallejo Police Department to determine if there are any alcohol-related crimes in that particular area, and the findings have shown that there have not been any or anything that's significant. Through the chair? Yes.

If you can get closer to the mic, please. Thank you, I appreciate that.

So my question is, in your report you have mentioned that you have reached out to the City of Vallejo Police Department and there is no significant data showing that there are any alcohol related disturbance in that particular area for any alcohol related crimes. Is that accurate to, accurate?

Yeah, that's correct. Yeah, the police department, they did run their analysis of the surrounding area. They didn't identify any abnormal crimes related to alcohol in general. When I made a site visit, you know, I kind of was looking around and observing the site. I didn't see any homeless people or I didn't see any sort of issue with people loitering around or anything like that. And because this is a specialty grocery store, I don't think that that would attract probably that type of element. You know, it's a pretty small 1,000 square feet. It's not a gas station or a liquor store or anything like that. I don't think that the addition of alcohol sales in a small section of that store would generate the type of element that you're referring to of, you know, attracting those homeless people or anything like that.

Yes, and yes, that actually kind of aligns with my observation as well. When I went down to the area, I just drove to take a look, and that was pretty much the same observation I saw just from just driving through several different times just to kind of get an idea of the environment. And the report seems to be in alignment with that as well. So I definitely see that. At this point, I don't have any other questions right now.

Through the chair, I have a question, if I may. You mentioned, thank you so much, you mentioned that the hours of operation are until 7 p.m. and they're closed on Saturdays, but I could imagine that their business could possibly increase due to the alcohol sales, so I would hate to limit them and restrict them on at a seven o'clock hour when something maybe a little bit more reasonable, maybe eight or nine, and then they are closed on Saturdays. And usually a business will re-open, start to, you know, re-calibrate their hours and then think about, you know opening for a short amount of time on weekends to be able to accommodate their clients and their customers especially being that this is a specialty so is there um I'm wondering if we would be pigeonholing them into being less successful if we do put those um time parameters on them for Saturdays.

Through the chair? I just want to let you know I was reading the staff report and it was my recommendation to reduce the hours of operation because it was stated in the staff report that they did not request the hours of operation for the liquor license to be longer than their existing business hours. Okay. SO THAT'S WHY. BUT YOU CAN HAVE THE DISCUSSION, BUT I DIDN'T WANT YOU TO PIN IT ON ROBBY OR THE CITY.

NO, I WAS JUST WONDERING. SOMETIMES I DON'T EVEN THINK BUSINESS OWNERS ARE AWARE, BECAUSE IT'S SOMETHING THAT SOMETIMES YOU JUST CAN'T FORESEE. AND SO IF WE ALREADY, YOU KNOW, IF WE MAKE THE DECISION NOW, AND THEN THEY HAVE TO COME BACK, YOU KNOW, A YEAR OR TWO LATER,

I will mention that I did have a conversation with the applicant prior to the hearing. And when I wrote the staff report, I originally said they were open until 6 p.m., which was the case when I had last talked to her about it. But since then, they do change their hours. So now they're open until 7 with the longer daylight hours. And so it sounds like they could want to change their hours of operation in the future. But you guys could offer an amendment to allow for a later time if you would like. The municipal code does allow for 12 a.m. just by itself on its own.

Thank you.

I've got one, I guess.

I've got a question. It's actually more on process, I think. Last time we had one of these permits that involved liquor sales and off-license. One of the topics of conversation we had was on notifications. We typically do 500 yards or 500 feet, is it, around an establishment. I find, and we talked about it last time, that this particular aspect could use greater notification and at one point we talked about perhaps that being 500 from every license that has been issued in the census tract so that people in this area that are may have something to say about their off license establishments within that census tract could then be notified of another one that was being permitted because our analysis is really about the cumulative effect on the census tract. But we continue to have this kind of, we're treating them one off of the notifications and no one shows up, no one says anything. But I have a feeling that there may be people that live within 500 feet of another establishment in this area that may have an opportunity if we provide it to then say like, can I share with you some of my thoughts about the saturation of off-license establishments within my neighborhood and i think that that could be an effective way for us to do some notifications on this while still respecting that we're trying to treat every project unto itself 500 feet we're not trying to say this one gets a thousand feet or this one gets 1200 feet but because of the nature of the decision we have to make i do think it would be worthwhile trying to look at how we could do more notifications about those types of things

Through the chair, it could also be a language barrier to your point. And so maybe those notifications have to go out in Spanish and Tagalog. Since those are in that area, business owners, it's pretty prevalent Spanish speaking in Tagalog. I believe those are the two languages that have the highest percentages of business owners in that area.

Great, I don't have any other additional questions. I'll make the assumptions that the fellow commissioners asked all the questions they could ask. So at this point now, we can open up to the public forum. Let's see if we get the public feedback.

Through the chair, there are no current members of the public signed up to make public comment, and there are currently no members on Zoom that have raised their hand.

Great, thank you for the update. We can leave it open for a couple of minutes just in case anyone may decide to change their mind. In this moment here, am I providing any feedback or ask any additional questions? Okay, great, thank you. So overall, one thing I was thinking about with this project that I thought was actually very unique in terms of just kind of just driving through the area and seeing what their different options are. And one of the things I was thinking of in terms of considering that, you know, the main point has been driven that, you know, there's the over concentration of license there. But I was thinking about what is the uniqueness there and the uniqueness about that specific census tract. As my fellow commissioner said that, you know, the greatest area, considering that most of it is primarily industrial, how to be able to reach that as well, or commercial, excuse me. And part of that is a major role leading through the city of Vallejo. So walkability is not as available or as feasible. In addition to that, what I notice is that I think that it would provide a perfect public service considering that it is providing a unique service. As a Haitian grocery store, is that correct? So I'm sure I'm going to make the assumption that whatever service that they're going to provide will be in alignment with that. I haven't saw any other unique service in the area, but I did notice there's an adjacent restaurant, which is a sushi restaurant, and they have unique beers and wine as well that they offer. I think that it would be only appropriate to think about the uniqueness and the diversification of providing these services specifically for this, that census tract. So I wanted to add that aspect of it as well in terms of I'm thinking in the direction of maybe moving forward with my vote on this particular project. So if anyone has any other comments or deliberations on that, we're open. And if we can check to see if there are any hands raised in a public forum.

Through the chair, I do want to offer additional information regarding the item Commissioner Blind brought up regarding the notification. So we, for any public hearing project, we do notify all the property owners within 500 feet of the subject property. So that's actually from the property lines and not the specific tenant space. We've actually received feedback from the community, and we have updated our internal policy where we're not only notifying the property owners, but we're also going to be on what our zoning code requires and actually notifying the tenants for each specific location. So the notification is going broader than that. I did take notes of the comments Commissioner Bisley-Stansberry made regarding the translation from these notifications to different languages. It is something that we could look into but as we know it's additional costs and we may have to reach out to a third party consultant if we don't have the specialty translators in house. So that's something we can definitely look into just to see what the average cost would be for translating these notifications.

I just wanted to follow up on Commissioner Beasley Stansberry's point. I visited this establishment today and what I saw was a lovely getting off the ground Haitian market that had a lot of Haitian products that I had not seen before, but I would have enjoyed if there was a Haitian beer or wine that I could have sampled. I think that is in keeping with the kind of business this business owner wants to do. And with that in mind, I don't actually, beyond their own individual hours that came through in their application, I don't see any city interest in restricting their license or their permit to then say you can't sell anything on Saturdays. I don't see any particular advantage to the city of Vallejo to limit their days I feel like a consistent set of hours across the week would probably be better than if they've already adjusted their hours once from six to seven as a business getting off the ground it may be worthwhile to have a kind of a blanket set of hours that they could adjust within that we didn't feel like they needed to extend beyond and I would think something like eight or nine seven days a week would be good

I second that. I think that's a good idea. I think it provides some flexibility there considering that if you want to be able to get a business off the ground and be profitable and be able to serve the public needs and those needs can change and it can vary.

So we want to be dynamic.

We would like to be dynamic. Thank you. I appreciate that. So I second Commissioner Blind's point. So I'm going to follow up if we have anyone in the public forums.

Through the chair, there's one person that has raised their hand on Zoom. I'll go ahead and allow them to speak.

Great.

Looks like they put their hand down. Currently there's no one wishing to make public comment on Zoom.

Okay, great, thank you. All right, so I guess at this point now we can close the public forums. And I would like to motion to adopt a resolution finding the project exempt from environmental review pursuant to CEQA guidelines section 15301 class 1 existing facilities and approve major use, permit and public convenience or necessity collectively PLN25-0151 for the addition of alcohol sales at 480 Redwood Street, Parcel 0051-010-630. And I'll second the motion.

Do you want to do the modification of hours?

Yes. And I will motion to do a modification of the hours from the time frame.

To include seven days a week and from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m.?

8 a.m. to 12 a.m. 8 a.m. to 12 a.m. is what it was previously before I recommended a change.

Okay, thank you. So I motion to modify the business hours, operating hours, from 8 a.m. to 12 a.m., Monday through Friday, seven days a week. Is that right?

That would go like eight or nine. Is that right? If it is, that would be it.

That's the full extent.

Robbie, could you repeat what the applicant is asking for again one more time?

What the applicant is asking for?

What the applicant is asking for for their hours.

Oh, for their hours? Right now, they are 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. I believe they were closed on Saturdays. But currently, yeah, they're open until 7 p.m. They had mentioned that they don't feel a need to open later than 7 p.m., but maybe that could change for them in the future. Let's see. This condition, by the way, it's specific to just alcohol sales and not hours of operation of the business. I just want to specify that.

Through the chair, the way the condition of approval is currently written, it allows alcohol sales from 8 a.m. to midnight. So if the commission wants to leave it the way it is, then you just make the motion as it's presented. So no need to make a modification to any of the recommended conditions of approval.

Okay, moved.

Absolutely. So yes, I motion to leave the major use permit exactly how the municipal code have outlined it. Is that how you say it? How do I?

That's OK. OK. That's good. We're happy. Great. Thank you. OK.

I'll second that. All right. We're going to do a voice vote. Beasley-Stansberry?

Aye.

Blind?

Aye.

Taylor? Aye. Douglas? Aye. I mean, aye. White? Aye. We have five ayes, and the motion carries.

All right, perfect. Thank you. All right, so we can move on to the next agenda item. And Robbie, thank you for the presentation, assisting us in this process. So we'll move to the next agenda item, written communications.

Through the chair, we do not have any written communications this evening.

Great. Thank you for the update. And we'll move to the next agenda item, which is a report of the presiding officers and members of the Planning Commission. Starting with item A, the secretary's report.

We should have a presentation for the secretary's report.

THANK YOU CHAIR. JUST TO GIVE A QUICK UPDATE OF RECENT CITY COUNCIL UPDATES KIND OF ALIGNED WITH WHAT VICE MAYOR MITULAK BROUGHT UP. The City Council did approve the street paving of 6th Street, which is right in front of Muscatie's Coffee. I think that was a big achievement from the community that was pushing that. Recently, at the last City Council meeting, as Vice Mayor Metulich mentioned, City Council did approve the amendments to the Fairview at Northgate master plan, which included the increase in residential development from 174 to 245. So that was an introduction of an ordinance resolution for CEQA and as well as resolution for the project. So that's scheduled to go back for a second reading for the ordinance on the following city council meeting of June 9th, I believe it is. If city council approves it, then the ordinance goes into effect 30 days after that, which includes the amendments to the master plan and as well as the amendments to the below zoning code, zoning map. and then the developer can go ahead and move forward and submit their appropriate permits in order to do the site improvements and building permits for development of the residential component. As well, that evening, the City Council did pull and continue the EDU ordinance, so that's expected to come back before the Planning Commission for an additional recommendation of City Council. I have a couple more slides where I'll go more in-depth into that. And then as well, just want to make the Planning Commission aware of the upcoming City Council items where there's going to be a conversation about making a pro-housing designation. It's tentatively scheduled for the June 23rd City Council meeting. So if that, whatever the conversation is, we'll come back the following regular scheduled Planning Commission meeting and provide an update on that.

I just want to jump in really quickly. The pro-housing designation did go to the Housing and Community Development Commission. Is that correct? Yeah. And they did recommend approval of that, and it basically just positions the city to be a pro-housing city that makes us more competitive for certain grants. I don't think it's something that needed to come through the Planning Commission, but I wanted to give you just a little bit of extra context on that.

Just to make the Planning Commission aware of upcoming regular scheduled meetings on June 15th, we do have two items coming before you. One's an informational item where the Maryland company will be doing their development agreement annual update where they provide an update on what's going on out on Maryland as well as the zv permitting ordinance which is intended to streamline ev charging stations so that ordinance will be coming before the commission making a recommendation to city council to amend the zoning code regarding those changes to the municipal code as well we have generally scheduled for the july 6 2026 regular scheduled meeting is for a use permit and sign permit for cash for gold which is a pawn shop located on cinema boulevard as well as generally scheduled is the the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance, where we'll make a presentation to the Commission and a recommendation to City Council, as well as the EDU Ordinance, which is an additional recommendation to City Council. So the reason the EDU Ordinance is coming back before the Planning Commission is, once again, it was pulled from the May 26 City Council meeting in order for staff to be able to address some comments that were received from the California Housing Defense Fund. revisions to the ordinance ordinance are necessary and those revisions are tentatively scheduled once again to come back before the planning commission on july 6. so there's some minor modifications that we need to make to that ordinance and we'll present those before the commission Apologies for the QR code on the bottom right hand corner, but it cut off the number of inspections that were completed by the building division. Just give me one second and I can pull it up real quick. Oh, there we go. So this is just kind of highlight level activity tracker for the building division. We have kept everything from December to April, 2026. So overall, you know, it looks like, you know, the flow of permits are coming into the building division, go up and down, fluctuate throughout the months. But it looks like the inspectors are, of course, staying busy doing about 834 inspections back in April. We received a total valuation of about $5.3 million, have collected around $231,169 in permit fees. I just want to remind the Commission that the Environmental Justice General Plan Amendments is still published to the public. The public review period for that was extended and we are taking comments until July 20, 2026. And the draft document is available online if anyone wishes to read it and review it and submit any comments that are, submit any comments to staff. As well, just kind of some future items that are tenderly scheduled coming before the Planning Commission, of course, is the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance. The comment period on the draft ordinance closes on May 27th. We have received a total of 10 comment letters. We are contacting an environmental consultant to help us with an environmental review for the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance. And once completed, the draft will come before the Planning Commission for a recommendation to Council. We're shooting to bring this before you guys sometime at the end of the summer. So once again, the 80 ordinances, we have a 10 of these scheduled to come before the planning commission to make those minor modifications based off of the letter we received. So we should see that before the commission in the near future, as well as the EBCS, which is kind of like what I mentioned already, the ordinance in order to expedite permitting process for the electric vehicle charging stations. That's required under Assembly Bill 1236. So that should be coming before the commission in the near future. So this here is just a highlight, kind of what we've mentioned in the past, where we get monthly reports from the Maryland company. This is just showing some of the commercial updates that they have done to different type of buildings out there, out on Maryland, you know, anywhere from fixing sinks to replacing door knobs, resealing epoxy floors, and removal of overgrown palm trees. So it looks, yeah, it just shows what the activity is happening out on Maryland. And then just continuing with that slide, you know, there's been, in April, Maryland Company has received a new lease from Cal Poly Maritime University, executed a new lease on Berth 4 and the yard. There was a lease extension for the Maryland Art Studios, as well, the great news, there was no move outs for this time period, so. And this here is just an overview of staff level approvals that the director has issued between April 28th, 2026 and May 31, 2026. We have issued permits anywhere from zoning verification letters where people are requesting verification on the existing zoning, from sign permits, zoning compliances for ADUs and mobile food trucks, A hillside development permit for a new single-family residence on the lot with an average slope greater than 15%, and a couple of temporary use permits. One for the temporary replacement of an office trailer and conics boxes for the rebuild of the Skyview Reservoir. That's a water department CIP project where they're dismantling an existing RESERVOIR AND REBUILDING A BRAND NEW ONE AS WELL AS A TEMPORARY USE PERMITS FOR A COUPLE OF SPECIAL EVENTS SUCH AS LIKE THE PISTA SA NAYON EVENT OUT ON MARYLAND AND AS WELL AS THE BELOW WATERFRONT JAZZ FESTIVAL SO WE FISHED TEMPORARY USE PERMITS FOR THOSE ITEMS AND THAT CONCLUDES MY REPORT FOR THIS EVENING

Great. Thank you for the report. I appreciate it. I think we can go now we can move on to the next agenda item is the city attorney's report.

I have nothing to report. Thank you.

Very great. Thank you for the update. And we move to the next line item C is report of the chairperson and members of the commission. As of right now, I don't have any reports to my fellow commissioners have anything to report or update.

It's not really a report from myself, but it was a belated question for the report you gave, Cesar. One of the things that's come up quite a few times that I think, first of all, that report is great. It's really helpful to see everything that's going on. One item I was curious if it could be added at some point in the future is code violations and any collection of fees that goes on around those, a lot of those codes are violations of our use permits. And I know there's been discussion about seeing how much revenue there may be able to be in collecting these code violations, as well as there's a lot of questions I receive from the community is, this property's been had multiple code violations does anyone actually get charged does anything actually happen with this so some sort of tracking around that would be helpful so we could say that how many had been done and how much has been collected

Through the chair, it's not really your subject matter jurisdiction. Like if there is actually a use permit that you granted and you have a question, I think that's fair to ask staff. But to have them report code enforcement violations and revenue is not really within your subject matter jurisdiction. So I don't feel comfortable with you tasking them with extra reports.

on that subject. That's why I premised my request with the idea that the conditional use permits are usually the code that's in violation.

Not really. And so they already do report on code stuff, perhaps. Who's they and what stuff? Staff might. Well, I already told them they couldn't report to Code Enforcement Appeals Board because that was not within their subject matter jurisdiction because they have They're like an adjudicatory body and they have to have, there's due process and they can't, they're not overseeing staff, code enforcement staff. You know, they're looking at things objectively. But what I wanted to say is that to go in and dissect which ones are violating their, you know, use permits and which ones are not. is a whole nother layer of work, another level of work that they're already overworked. So I just wanted, I'll let them answer for themselves, but I just, it's not really within your subject matter jurisdiction with all due respect.

I will jump in just to add a little bit extra context, I guess. Sorry. With regard to use permit conditions, we have not been proactively looking at existing conditions on use permits and doing enforcement on them. So we don't really have anything to report from that standpoint. If we had a specific case that came up and there were conditions that were not being violated and it triggered some work associated with that then we could perhaps on a case-by-case basis share some of that information with the Commission if it was relevant I also will add that we do give periodic reports to the City Council with regard to activities for the whole department and The most recent one we did was actually a year-end report for 2025. That full report is pretty detailed, and there's a lot of good information there, and it's on our website. It's on the Planning and Development Services Department homepage, so you can get a copy of it there. And we don't have another report scheduled yet, but we're trying to do them quarterly or at least biannually. So when we share those, we can make sure to let you know when we're doing it or get you a copy.

All right. That would be helpful, yeah. It was just in the same tabular format. You had the building permits. I thought there could be something high-level like that that just give gross numbers, don't need addresses, don't need names of anybody. Yeah, understand.

And we're providing the building information just to kind of give you a sense of the development activity and kind of like how that's going because, you know, you tend to see trends maybe in the springtime. Things start to pick up a little bit just so you can see how much is getting built.

Right. Thanks.

All right, great, thank you for the update. And we will move to the next line item, D, which is report of ad hoc subcommittees, which is a work plan ad hoc subcommittee. And I can give an update on that. Okay, so last week we had, it was two weeks ago, right? Yeah. Two weeks ago we had our first ad hoc subcommittee meeting where we were to, where we review uh... the outline or drop the outline for our work plan for two thousand twenty six two thousand twenty eight based on the template you provide us with uh... commissioners there is a uh... lead uh... the process and drop it up uh... for us to review and we provided our feedback and one of the biggest things that we had ordered in our discussion is just focus on making sure that the work plan is useful, clear and aligned with the planning commission role under the municipal code. So we were trying to determine what's in our preview, what we can actually recommend, what we can actually decide on, and where we can revise. And so those are some of the key points there, and something that we did want to be inclusive. I know Madaris wanted some feedback from the other commissioners if they had a chance to review it, if you guys were able to forward that information out that she provided to you, just to get some feedback on ideas that can be shared with the ad hoc committee. moving forward. And as of right now, we did discuss some possible focus areas for the work plan, but we're still in the process of really trying to define it to really determine what's in our preview and what we can do before we can actually narrow down and solidify what would be our top three items within a time frame within the next two years or we're going to select. Hopefully with feedback and guidance from the planning department, we can have a direction to go and hopefully maybe if they reach the city council or our liaison can provide us some details on if we're in the right direction or not moving forward. And so once we kind of have all those details outlined out and hopefully we have a clear consensus on moving forward, then we can present our final work plan to the planning commission and to the planning division. And Commissioner Beasley, if I capture everything or? Perfect. So that's my update for our report for the ad hoc subcommittees. And if there's no questions or any other concerns? All right. And we can move to the next line item, which is other. If there's anything you want to add that we might have missed about this? uh meeting and we can move to the next line item was enjoyment and we can conclude the planning commission meeting at 805. all right thank you yeah the pressure always