Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Yep. Good evening and welcome to the June 2nd, 2026 meeting of the City of Vista Planning Commission. I call the meeting to order. Would you please rise and join us in the Pledge of Allegiance led by Commissioner Grimm.

Ready? Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you. Ms. Loomis, roll call, please.

Chair DeJesus? Here. Commissioner Grimm?

Here.

Commissioner Redding?

Right.

Commissioner Jolliffe? Here. Commissioner Martin?

Here.

Commissioner Simmons?

Here.

Commissioner Thompson? Here. Student Commissioner Nguyen. Student Commissioner Parrish, absent.

Thank you. Commissioners, you've been provided with the minutes from our April 21st, 2026 meeting. If there are no changes, can we hear a motion to approve? Commissioner Jolliffe.

I will move to approve the minutes.

Thank you. Can I get a second? Commissioner Grimm?

Second.

Thank you. It's been moved and seconded to approve the minutes from our April 21st meeting. Please cast your votes and lock it in. The vote has been approved with Commissioner Martin abstaining. Thank you.

Do you want to re-vote?

Okay, so let's do a re-vote. Please cast your votes and lock them in. The minutes have been approved with the commissioners present except for Commissioner Martin and Commissioner Grimm who have abstained. Ms. Chau, are there any changes to the agenda tonight?

Good evening, Chair. There's no changes tonight. Thank you so much.

Thank you. The next item on the agenda is oral communications. This is the time the commission sets aside for members of the public to address the commission on items that are not on our agenda. Are there any speaker slips?

There are no speaker slips.

So, are there any ex parte disclosures, communications from the commissioners? Okay, we'll move along to our first Public hearing item. Daisy, we're looking at the EDR1.P26-0029. You have the stage.

Thank you, Chair. Good evening. The EDR before you tonight is for a 47-unit townhome condominium project located at 206 Cedar Road, planning case P26-0029. The purpose of the early EDR process is to provide opportunity for the Planning Commission to review the initial proposal and provide preliminary advisory comments to the project applicant. The proposal has not been routed or fully reviewed by all city staff, review only in terms of basic zoning compliance. Applicant can answer specific questions about the project design and the thought process behind the initial proposal. No formal vote or action is required or necessary for an EDR item. The projects I previously have an approved project for in 2020 for a 35 condominium units, multifamily residential project per planning commission resolution number 2026. The current proposal is to develop a multifamily residential project consisting of 47 townhomes inclusive of four affordable units. The general project scope is to develop a multi-family residential project consisting of 47 town homes, inclusive of four affordable units on a 1.94 acre site located at 206 Cedar Road. The site is currently vacant, Proposed improvements include six three-story residential buildings with attached two-car garage for each unit. Access to the site will be provided from Cedar Road with furnished improvements. Associated site improvements include surface parking spaces, landscaping, and open spaces. The general plan land use destination for the site is high density residential, $21 unit per acre. The zoning for the project site is RM21, which stands for multi-residential, $21 unit per acre. And to the north, south, and east of the project site is also RM zone. And on the west side is the City of Olsen side. These are the existing side photos. The one on the left is taken from Cedar Road and the one on the right is taken from a private driveway from an adjacent property. Surrounding land uses to the north of the project site is apartment buildings. Further north is a school, which is the Casita Science Center. To the south of the project site is some more apartment buildings. Further south is the Vista Buddhist Temple, and further south along West Vista Way is some medical uses. To the west of the project site is City of Oceanside's single family residential and to the east of the project site is some more residential uses and apartments. The project is utilizing state density bonus law. The project qualified for 25% density bonus pursuant to state law. The maximum allowable density per DRM zone is 41 units, which is 21 units per acre, and the proposed density is 47 units, which is 24 units per acre. By providing an allocation of 7%, which is three units for very low income households, and 2%, which is one unit for moderate income households, state law allows for a density bonus of 25% or 11 additional units. The project qualifies for one concession and unlimited waivers. Concessions and waivers may be requested to relieve open space, building height and minimum setback requirements. Density bonus parking requirements are as follow. For two to three bedroom units, 1.5 spaces is required per unit. And for four or more bedroom units, 2.5 spaces is required per unit. City has limited discretion regarding project density and concessions. Some details about the proposed project. The proposed project has six multifamily residential buildings, total 47 units, including one four-plex building, one seven-plex building, and four nine-plex buildings. There will be 26 three-bedroom units and 21 four-bedroom units. Proposed density is 24 units per acre. Zoning allowed for 21 units per acre. Setbacks, the required front setback is 20 feet. The project proposed 18.2 feet for front setback. 15 feet of side setback is required, 11 feet and six feet are proposed for the side setbacks. Required rear setback is 25 feet and 70 feet of rear setback is proposed. Height, the project proposed three-story buildings with 37 feet. Maximum allowed under the zoning is two stories and 35 feet. Parking, 99 parking spaces are provided. 91.5 spaces required per density bonus state law. Common open space, 20,250 square foot is required for open space. 6,427 square foot is provided with landscaping. This is the site plan. There are a total of six buildings as highlighted in brown on the screen. Access to the site will be provided from Cedar Road. The project will include internal private drive aisles and guest parking areas. The site contained wetlands along the rear portion of the property as highlighted in green at the rear of the property. No development will occur within this protected area and no land disturbance will occur within the provided wetland buffer. And the wetland and the residential building would be separated by a retaining wall. This is the proposed landscape plan. 9% of the site area would be landscape consisting of a combination of ornamental and drought tolerant planned material. So there will be some landscaping around all residential buildings. These are the floor plans for the floorplex buildings. The floorplex building is located in the rear of the project site as highlighted in red. And there would be two three-bedroom units and two four-bedroom units on this building. And the three-bedroom units would have tandem two-car garage, and the four-bedroom units would have a standard two-car garage. These are the building elevations for the fourplex building. The architectural style for the project is Spanish village theme. The proposed architecture design will incorporate articulated building elevations, varied roof lines, and facade modulation. These are the floor plans for the seven plex buildings. The seven plex building is located across the driveway from the four plex building, which is also in the rear of the project site. And the four plex, the seven plex building would have four three bedroom and three four bedroom units. These are the building elevations of the seven-plex building. These are the first floor plan and second floor plan of the nine-plex building. There are four nine-plex building for the project and they are highlighted on the key map on the left. All the three bedroom units, Floor plans are the same. Some of them are mirror or like flip, but they have the same configuration and also the same for the four bedroom units. This is the third floor plan and the roof plan of the Nine Plex building. These are the elevations of the Nine Plex building. Staff request that the Planning Commission provide comments to the applicant related to the proposed design of the project. No form of vote or action on this item. And that concludes that presentation for this EDR. The applicants also have their own presentation that they can share.

Thank you. Thank you. Are there any questions right now for staff from the commissioners before the applicant comes up? No? OK. Applicant, if you'd like to make a presentation.

Well, good evening. Thank you so much for this opportunity. My name is Jonathan Frankel, and I serve as Vice President of Forward Planning for Rincon Homes. We're a North County-based local home builder. And tonight, I would like to spend just a couple of minutes introducing our company and our approach to design for this particular project. And then I'm going to invite our design lead with Kevin Alkirk Architects to talk to you about some of the particulars about the buildings themselves, the materials, and some of the more architectural vocabularies. So, who is Rincon Homes? It's our 17th year in operation. We're based in Carlsbad, and we work pretty much exclusively in North County, San Diego, inland all the way to the coast. We are very much a family company. It was founded by two brothers and their college roommate. We're a small, privately held firm. We are unique in the development space because we acquire, build, and sell everything that we do. We are exclusively focused on creating opportunities for homeownership. So everything that we do, all of our projects are 100% for sale. We never build rentals. We need all sorts of housing. We just really enjoy being able to provide that homeownership opportunity for folks to achieve that dream and that milestone in their lives. And it's something we're really proud to do. So just a few photos, precedent images. I know these are small. These happen to be projects that are recent. They all happen to be in Carlsbad. But we are very, very familiar with the three-story townhome product. We have built dozens and dozens of these types of communities. And it's something that we're really, really comfortable with. So kind of four foundational components to our approach to design. Number one, of course, is understanding the community context, citywide to citywide level, but also getting granular on the site, what's around it, what's there, who's there, and why does the site make sense for this particular community? Number two, we generally focus on communities at a smaller scale. So we are not a large public builder who builds three, four, five, a thousand units at a time. We do anything from two homes at a time to about 50 is generally what we do. So we really look for those opportunities for underutilized properties within existing urbanized areas where we can add value and create those opportunities for homeownership. Thirdly, site-specific architecture. So we like to look around the vicinity, but also the city. You know, something timeless in Spanish. We saw a lot of great representations of Spanish architecture in the city of Vista. It's something that we felt was very complementary to what was already here, as we kind of did a survey of the existing built environment here. And as I mentioned, number four, a key focus on homeownership. So we're really excited about this opportunity. This is our first chance to work in the City of Vista. And we're really excited about this opportunity for a number of reasons. Firstly, this particular site is very well located to jobs, to amenities, to shopping, schools, and a lot of existing resources within the city. We're less than a mile, just over half a mile from Tri-City Medical Center. Vista Village is about three miles away. Of course, Highway 78 and transportation just about a half a mile and the Sprinter is just under two miles away. So it's very well served by existing infrastructure. It's no surprise that this site has been identified in the city's housing element. So the cities, of course, are thinking about where it's going to accommodate new growth in sites like this really fit the bill in terms of suitability. So I won't go over all the key project details. They were just mentioned in great detail by our project planner. She did a fantastic job with that. I will just say that 47 total units, of course, is what the project proposes. The density bonus would allow us to do 52 here at a 25% bonus. We did not feel that that was appropriate for the site. We really were looking around and surveying the local marketplace here in Vista. There's a lot of young families that we've connected with that are looking for an option at a three and four bedroom home. And so we didn't want to make these units small, very small and get 52 units. And that's just not the approach that we wanted to take, although that would have been permitted by the state density bonus law. As the planner mentioned, parking, each one of these units has a two-car garage. We're finding, especially amongst first-time homebuyers, a growing acceptance of tandem garages. It's something that you historically haven't always seen. We've incorporated a number of recent projects, and we found that particularly for younger buyers, they are really okay with it and very happy to have an opportunity to get into the marketplace. In terms of the size of the unit, just under 1,600 square feet. So they're really good size. Three and four bedroom units can accommodate young families and also growing families who need a little bit of additional space. Each one of these units has a private open space associated with it. So they all have second floor decks and spaces to get outside and enjoy time with their families. So at this time I'm gonna invite our project design lead, Jeff Addison, up to talk a little bit more particularly about the site plan as well as share with you some of the architectural details and renderings for the project.

Hi, good evening. My name's Jeff Addison with Kevin Crook Architect. So yeah, just as Jonathan had mentioned, I'm gonna walk you through the illustrative site plan here. And again, staff did a great job kind of describing what's happening here, what we're proposing. But there's six buildings on site. You can kind of see that they range from four plexes to seven plexes. The way that the site's arranged is off of Cedar Road, there's a spine road. And we did pay attention to the vista fire turnaround, which is kind of that point there that's about 2 thirds of the way back. And as far as the paseos, there's a paseo to the north, there's a paseo to the south. That's where the front doors are for each one of the units, which is obviously kind of separate from the vehicular access to the site. There's also kind of a wetland buffer that's kind of happening over there to the west side. I think what I'll do is go to the next slide here. You can kind of see on the site plan, though, one thing I did want to point out is that there's two car side-by-side garages. You can kind of see that in the footprints here, and there's also tandem garages. So it's around 50-50 as far as the distribution of those. So this shows... the nine plex building and what we tried to do is get plenty of articulation on the front elevation as well as a rear elevation. You can kind of see we've got arched entries that are happening, that are gonna be happening along that Paseo. Jonathan also mentioned that there's some decks that are happening on each one of these units that are off of the front elevation. And those decks are all about 16 feet wide by, I want to say, five to six feet deep. But you can kind of see there's a lot of plane breaks happening on the front and the rear elevations, and then the side elevations as well. We've got the similar kind of level of detail happening on those. Again, traditional, timeless Spanish architecture. As far as the materials go, let me go to the next slide and we can kind of look at some of those details. I'm sorry, I'm gonna look at my notes here a little bit just because it's a little difficult to read up on the screen there. But... So just some of the materials that we have, obviously stucco is the predominant material. We've got concrete, low S-tile roof throughout. There's fully trimmed windows with window grids, mullions and muntins. We've also got simulated wood shutters just to add some color accents. There's a gable accent vent up at the top there.

as well as the second floor and the third floor.

There's also some wrought iron or tubular steel railing that's happening off of the deck areas on some of the deck areas. We kind of alternated that to get some variety. And let's see. There's also some lintel details that we have that are happening on some of the deck elements. Off the rear elevation, those are metal sectional garage doors. And we have some arched elements happening there with the corbels off of the rear elevation. So that middle elevation there. As well as decorative coach lights with addresses and arched soffits at the porch as well. Yeah, so this is just a good example of 3D visual, photorealistic rendering that kind of gives you an idea of the feel and the scale of it, as well as some of the landscaping that's going to kind of soften the base of the building as well. and just the level of articulation that's happening on there. Obviously, you've got the arched element where the front door is. You've got that deck up on the second floor, and that's what I was talking about when I kind of mentioned the variety of, you've got some tubular steel railing that's happening there, and then some of it's solid as well, so that's alternating. Just another view, just to give you an idea of some of the articulation there off the Paseo. And then of course each one of the entries has a coach light and an address placard as well. But yeah, those decks are, they're gonna be functional decks, they're not, I wanna say between five and six feet deep, and again like 16 feet wide. So this is the color and materials palette. I know it's probably a little difficult to see on the screen here, but I do actually have some samples. If you guys would like, I'm happy to pass those out so you can take a look at those as well. But generally speaking, like we talked about, Stucco, more of a 1620 finish with a stucco sand finish. And then low S-tile roof. And then, you know, we've got different colors for the fascia trim, the garage door. The front door and shutters are usually the same color just to provide some accents. And those are usually like more of a jewel tone is what we would call them. Gable-in detail accents. which is more of a terracotta-type color, and then, of course, the wrought iron, which is more of a blackish color. I'll let Jonathan come back up.

Thanks very much, Jeff. Thank you so much for your time. Of course, we are here to answer any questions you may have. Thank you so much for your feedback.

Thank you. Any input from the commissioners? Commissioner Jolla?

The open space is 6,427. How much of that is the wetlands?

Yeah, I don't think the wetland is included in that 6,000 square foot. That would be addition, it would be on top of the 6,000 square foot of the landscaping.

OK, thank you.

Any other commissioners? Well, I'd like to say thank you to staff. That was a great presentation. And thank you for the input. From an architectural standpoint, it's early design review. I just want to let you know I appreciate the arched fronts, the vents that you put in there, the articulation. It shows that you've done this before and that the three-story home is your sweet spot in the design itself. I like the color palette specifically. As far as density is concerned, we know as a city we can't really say anything because of the state's density bonus laws, that you're using some of those. But I appreciate that you went to 99 spaces for the parking. I appreciate having a product that we can sell here, that home ownership is part of the product. And really, everything that I was thinking as a planning commissioner and as a citizen of Vista is the density bonus stuff. But I don't think that this is cramming. Like you said, you could have put 52 in there, and we've got 47. And to have three and four bedroom options for home ownership in a townhome, to me, is going to be a benefit to the community.

Commissioner Simmons.

Thank you. I agree, I think the architecture is really good. The things that I have questions about, a comment first is I love that you're bringing more home ownership opportunity to our community. I absolutely advocate for that. What makes me sad is When I look at that community and the lack of open space, you're building homes that are for families, and I don't see anywhere where kids can play and have a good time. I don't know if it's possible, but that actually really breaks my heart from a homeowner perspective and children in the community. I don't know if anything can be considered, but I would love any kind of consideration regarding that. family aspect of needing to have your kids close but giving them the opportunity to go outside. Another question I have is regarding setbacks. Is there a, and I don't know who to ask really, but when it comes to the fire department and emergency services, how is the reduction of the setback viewed at from emergency services perspective? Is anybody, I don't know who I'm asking here.

Yeah, like a setback is used to make sure that all the construction comply with the setback. From a zoning perspective, like a planning perspective, it's more for the consistency of all the buildings in the same zone. But it doesn't necessarily affect emergency services. And the project does include a fire turnaround on the site plan, on the driveway. Yeah, the setback wouldn't, yeah, Ms. Child would correct me if I'm wrong, but yeah, the setback usually doesn't affect any of the emergency services.

Okay, so fire department's not going to have an issue with being able to access any of the homes on those sides in the event of a rescue or a fire? I'm just confirming that there's not going to be any emergency services issues regarding access.

The plan hasn't been reviewed by the fire marshal yet, so I cannot confirm that 100%, but from a plan perspective, yeah, it may not be an issue with fire.

Okay, okay, thank you. And the only other note that I have is kind of a silly one. I do love the design, but I wonder if there's any, and it may go against the Spanish theme, I'm not a designer, but I wonder if there is a way to incorporate more texture aside from just stucco for the buildings.

And that's all I have. Thank you. Commissioner Thompson.

I initially when I was looking at the project I thought it did look a little flat but I appreciated the renderings that show and it gave it a little bit more color to it because it kind of just looked white and brown on the printout so I appreciate there are these jewel tones and then you know I was just hoping these would look nicer than some of the, you know, similar ones from the 90s that, you know, what's gonna make these look fancier, you know, nicer than the older, kind of larger units like this in the community. So I'm glad you're putting in the details to make it fresh. And when I drove over there, I think it'll look really good in that neighborhood, and it'll fit right in right there. So I'm excited to see the final drafts. Please consider putting in as much shade as possible. I saw there was some trees on the front, and that's just nice for the whole community if anyone's walking. Just to kind of fit in with when you look out at Vista one of the best parts is just seeing all the trees So you're gonna remove some please consider putting more in Commissioner Jolliffe

Okay, I wasn't sure we were moving on to comments. I'll start by saying that I really appreciate that you brought this to early design review. It gives us a chance to have this dialogue. I appreciate that you're preserving the freshwater marsh. I really like the architectural design. The layouts make sense. And having townhomes as an ownership opportunity, that's really great. My concerns are that it's really tight. It feels tight. And I think perhaps what Ms. Simmons was getting to with setbacks may have been, I don't know if this, this is my concern, the space between the buildings, so the side setback is very tight. And I love the landscaping. I want to have trees. I love the trees. I saw trees there. between the buildings, and it looks like it's very much in zone zero. So maybe that was the comment on fire, or that's my comment on fire. Will that fly? And so I wonder, I know that you get concessions and waivers, that the things that I was kind of sad about were the side setback being reduced, the minimum common open space being reduced, and the two functional amenities being eliminated. So like it was said earlier about where kids gonna play, it won't feel like a welcoming neighborhood if people just drive in, go in their homes and that's it, right? The front doors are all facing the properties next to them. So I don't know how that's gonna feel. But yeah, if there's any way to get some more open space, I don't know if it's possible for you to go from a nine plex to an eight plex, if those numbers could make sense. But I do like the design. I like the idea of it. I just would love to see if you could figure out how to get some more open space in there and give those trees and the landscaping some room. give people somewhere to meet their neighbors. Thank you.

Commissioner Grimm.

Yes, I'm pretty much in agreement with WITH WHAT EVERYBODY SAID SO FAR WITH A COUPLE THINGS OR EXTRA COMMENTS. I REALLY LIKE THE ARCHITECTURE AND I'M NOT SURE REALLY AND I MAY DISAGREE WITH COMMISSIONER SIMMONS ON THIS BUT I'M NOT SURE ADDING ADDITIONAL MATERIAL WOULDN'T BE DETRIMENTAL TO WHAT YOU'RE TRYING TO DO THERE. I also was concerned about having a, those are long, narrow lots, and they're kind of, you create the garage court look where you have garages all the way down. There's nothing you can really do about it because of the narrowness of the lot. And what I did like about the architecture is you use the balconies and other things to provide relief along that corridor, so it really helps break that up. Finally, parking, and it's been talked about by a couple other commissioners, but I think one of the really saving graces here is the fact that it is an ownership unit. I think if you were doing another apartment here, you'd be increasing the problems with parking on the street. I think the fact that everybody has a garage there, even though some of them are tandem, you won't have to scramble after dark when you come home to try to find a spot because that's pretty much always what happens when you have apartments and there's never enough parking. So I appreciate the fact that you are doing an ownership unit and the fact that it also, they have garages. So I think that's something really important. So those are my comments.

Commissioner Martin.

Thank you. I had a couple of comments on the civil plans. First off, I'm really happy to see the frontage improvements. It's kind of a little bit of a missing link there. So I think that's a real benefit to the community that the frontage is going to be completed and that sidewalk will be kind of connected both to the north and the south. I think that's a That's a really good thing. I have a little bit of concern with the retaining wall. The retaining wall pretty much wraps the entire project, but my concern lies with the southwest corner, where the wall height gets up to 11 and a half feet, and then you're gonna place a three-story building on top of that, which seems pretty overbearing to your neighbors to the south. And so what I'm wondering, because it appears that you're draining backwards to the wetland area if you can break that grade somehow and bring that retaining wall height down. So if you could take a look at doing that, I think that would be a huge benefit to your neighbors to the south. With respect to the architecture, I agree with the other comments. I really like it. I think it's very well done. Balcony patios are a big plus. Breaking up the wall planes, both the front and the rear, which is great because usually the rears are kind of, you know, left untouched. But I think the architecture is really well done, and I don't have any additional comments with respect to that. Most importantly, I'll absolutely agree with Commissioner Simmons and Commissioner Jolliffe when it comes to open space. I mean, you mentioned during your presentation that you're targeting young families, but there's really no community that you're creating here. You're basically just creating units that people can come to and leave, and there's nowhere for residents to gather, meet their neighbors, talk or kids to play, because there's going to be a lot of children in this project. So I think it's imperative that you take a look at creating some opportunity for open space where neighbors can get together and children don't have to go off-site to play. So that would be my comments. Thank you.

Thank you. A couple things I've been thinking about based on the comments by my fellow commissioners, and that is because they're so tightly bound to each other and there's no open space, limited, very limited open space, And there are three- and four-bedroom units. I'm not sure if this is the place to talk about CC&Rs or what, but what is it going to be like for rentals and ownership if you have renters in there and you have four of the four-bedroom units rented to college students or whomever that has several cars? there just seems to be such an opportunity for density upon density. So just something to be thinking about. I'd love to hear about anything put in place for those. Other than that, I mean, I know this road very well. In fact, to the southwest corner, I'm sorry, the northwest corner of the property just south of this, one of my son's first apartments was in that gated community. And there's quite a distance between that unit and the next lot. I remember, because I look at lots and think of development, I think there's a small bit of elevation to the north, but I'm not sure that it won't be anything but a benefit to have something there that looks this nice. Those apartments were great for him, but there seems to be a lot of open space in those apartments, so the density... being put next door to them could be a relief or it could be, you know, I don't see it as an eyesore. And I like the open space that's acknowledged here that the wetland buffer allows for a little bit of open space feel, even though it's not accessible, it's a feel of open space. So that to me is a benefit. And with that, if there's no more speakers up here, I'd like to... have the opportunity, do we have any public speakers or any speakers from the public? Okay. So if there's no more discussion, we don't, oh, sorry.

Students.

Oh, sorry, student commissioners, I'm sorry. Do you have any comments? Would you like to make a comment, Leigh Ann? Come on up.

Hi, I really like the architecture. That was probably one of my favorite. I really love Spanish style. So I thought that was really pretty. I also really liked how when you showed like the 3D image, it kind of the balcony like really broke up like kind of the flat thing that I saw like when it was originally shown. I also agree with the other commissioners that definitely open space. I was looking for like playground or a pool or like a dog park or something like throughout the presentation um i think that would be like a really good addition to it thank you sure this is looks like we're gonna have one public comment here coming up thank you

Mr. Morales, would you like to step up?

My name is Gilbert Morales. I live on Morningside, Oceanside property that backs to the lot that they're proposing to do their work in. And I've been there since 2010. So we've kind of seen that back lot over the years. The wetlands that you keep referring to, it is at a sloped angle to the south. To me, it's more of a drain than a wetland because that comes off of the street up the way. There's just a drainage that just runs all that rainwater. So at times, there's quite a little bit of water that flows through there. But most of the time, it's more dry. But my concern is because I know they just cleared out a bunch of brush, overgrown palm trees, just that. years of neglect and what happens is there's a bunch of pile of just brush that can get dried out so if they do build this retaining wall what's going to happen with all of that current vegetation that's there um is it just going to get pushed to the back because again we we plan on living there long term it's just or to be an eyesore or even get access to it to clear it out um you know what's the plan of you know, fire hazard in my backyard or neighboring yards to, you know, clear it out. Because I know they, like I said, a few months ago they cleared a bunch of brush, and that being like the first time in 15 years that they had done that. So is there going to be access to clearing that area out if it gets overgrown? And again, like you said, the drainage, it is elevated in that back corner. Is all that water going to start flowing into, again, that wetland area? That's just more concerns for me to be able to clear out the area if in 10 years from now it gets overgrown. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Marlon Mullins.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Marlon Mullins. I live on 3136 Morningside Drive. It's on the west side of the proposed development. Speaking of the wetlands in that area, I moved there in April 2020. And when I first moved in there, there was all kinds of wildlife. We had raccoons, we had squirrels, we had possums. We had rabbits, skunks even for that matter, and some coyotes. That place seemed to flourish until they cleared that about a month or so, about two months ago I guess it was, and all of it disappeared. All those animals are gone except for the coyotes, and they have moved their den into the wetland, into my backyard basically. I have a clearing back there. And I don't know, California is a state of conservation. We care about our animals, but yet we're developing and putting more houses up and we're killing their habitat. And it's heartbreaking. I know we need houses and things like that, but that place has seemed to have been like a sanctuary. That whole lot has been a sanctuary for all the wildlife until just recently. We had several neighborhood cats, and now they're gone. We would feed them and stuff like that. I think maybe the coyotes, because the other animals have been pushed back, the coyotes have been able to just kind of Corral them in and I don't know you know survival of the fittest when it comes to that matter, but I'm not very fond of this idea mainly because of the wildlife you know and and We need a wildlife, so I just wanted to say that I think that's pretty much that I had written down Yeah, but thank you for your time. I just want to express my concern on that.

Thank you Karina Mullins

Hello. Hi. My name is Karina Mullins, and I lived at the house that's shown right next to the Waterlands. It's shown on the plan just on the other side, Oceanside, the Oceanside border of it. So yes, that's our backyard. Literally, when we look out from our patio in the backyard, we look right into that. And what I see is what I've been used to seeing is a whole grove of eucalyptus trees. Eucalyptus trees and of course the lands below and the open lot that he was talking about. And it's really sad to think that I won't be able to see that anymore. It'll be a huge giant building. Our house is one story. That is three stories. That's going to block out everything. There's going to be so much less privacy. Our deck is completely open. There's no wall. We go right into the marsh, basically. So my question, well, my concern is our lack of privacy, our neighbours' lack of privacy. The elementary school right next door that we also see across the marshlands, what is that going to, what is a building like this going to affect them? The morning and afternoon school traffic is very difficult regardless, and I can't imagine how much more difficult that would be for those kids and families with months or years of construction of this and hundreds more people living there, more density. That's a lot of parking spaces, but as of now, there are no parking spaces on the street, none. And I know that because I jog regularly in the neighborhood, mornings, evenings, middle of the day, whatever it might be. Parking is a problem regardless. There's not much open space at all that I can see there. And that's also really important. One of the things that I love about being in the neighborhood is that it's walkable. It's walkable. It's accessible. It's safe. But there's just such a concern for what does it mean to have so many more people there when it's already feeling very tight as it is. Of course, there's the thought of pollution, what it means to have so many more people living there, energy usage. I don't see anything about solar, clean energy, whatever it might be. I know our house has that, luckily. We were able to add solar panels, and that's important. I don't know if that's been considered in this plan. I didn't hear about it. trash, all of those things that also affect and can pollute our backyard, literally our backyard, our neighbors' backyards with the waterlands. And all of those issues add up to just the fact that something like this is too big and it's too much for where we live. This might be suitable in a place that's more dense, but as it is, our neighborhood is not dense like this. There might be apartments there, but they're nowhere near this size. There might be townhouses.

Thank you. Thank you. Any more speakers?

Chairman, just a question. The last speaker, maybe I'm not sure she's aware that there will be future public hearings.

Yeah, I'm going to say that right now. OK, great. Thank you. So just to understand, this is called an early design review, and we get to see it as planning commission, as planning commissioners, as the design part of the project, like looking at the style, looking at the heights. And in the packet, it talks about California's state, the state's density bonus laws. And I highly advise the public, regardless of the city that you're in, because you're all affected by it in the state of California, the density bonus laws, they are... there's little that the city can do as as our planner daisy mentioned in her report there it's something the city can't really say anything that doesn't really have a say in it because the state made the rules so one thing also i'd like to tell you is that particular neighborhood your residential and next door across the wetlands is an area that's designated for multi-family use up to 21 units per acre that's what it's that's what it's zoned for and And because of these state rules, the city has to designate areas that they mark as, hey, this is a good area for development because it's already got these designations. And developers can come in and offer us a project like this, like they did today. And they can show us, hey, listen, we're going to go ahead and use some of these state's density bonuses. We call them waivers, concessions. You're going to hear all sorts of words like that. And you can dig deeper and your city can tell you about it or... Please stay tuned because this is early design review. We're not going to vote on it tonight. But as the project moves through this process, we do get to vote on it eventually. But I invite you to look up those things just because it helps us understand. Sometimes it's the most uncomfortable thing to look at growth in any community. We're all experiencing it in this state. We have a sunshine tax because we're California, but then we also have a housing issue. And so this is the state made some rules and we have to adhere to those. So I invite you to review California state's density bonus laws and how cities have to adhere to those rules. And if I've missed anything, I'd be happy to invite another commissioner to offer their two cents if they'd like. Okay, so we've had some speakers and I don't have anybody on my list. So if you'd like to, I'm sorry, I'm going to start with Commissioner Jolliffe and if whoever else wants to say something, can you please push your, there we go.

I was just going to add to what you've said that because this is an early design review, this is such a great time for the public to give comments. because they're still working on it, right? So I'm sure they appreciate having feedback now that they could act on more than when we get to the public hearing and we're actually voting on it and things are very, very final. So this is a much better time to get comments.

Commissioner Thompson.

I just wanted to confirm, it is state law that new homes require solar on them currently, right?

Yep. For single-family?

For single-family homes, that is correct, yeah. This is a multifamily project, and obviously we'll be going through building plan check review, and we'll make sure that it meets all the state requirements as it is.

And lastly, I would just like to say about the clearance of those wetlands. It's not the developer that is clearing wetlands, and that's not something that they do. So I would ask that you could investigate that, because I feel for the raccoons and the opossums and everybody that's lost their homes. Fire is a big deal in California. mitigating fire problems. I don't want to answer questions because I'm not in that position, but I understand from a fellow resident is that that's something that you could look into there, but it's not this developer that changed that, nor prompted it probably. So to that end, I think we're all set, and thank you, staff, for the for the presentation and the developer for coming in here to answer some questions for us. And with that, we will move on to the action item, capital improvement program budget for the City of Vista and the Buena Sanitation District. We have a presentation from staff.

Good evening, Chair DeJesus, Planning Commissioners, Patsy Chow, Assistant Community Development Director. Pleased to be here this evening to actually present item A1, which is an action item regarding capital improvement program for fiscal years 26, 27, 27, 28. With me tonight, I have in the audience actually sitting with us is Matt Atterbury. He's our Engineering Division Manager, and knows all about capital improvement projects. So I invited him to the meeting tonight in case obviously I cannot answer your questions that you have specifically on projects met here to assist with that. So moving along here. So capital improvement program is basically a plan, a budget document that allows for capital projects to be listed over a period of two fiscal years. So these are essentially public projects. According to government code section 65401, it requires the City Council to actually first make sure that there is a recommendation from the Planning Commission regarding a conformity of the CIP projects with our general plan in terms of our policies and our objectives so that they're in sync with each other. So basically the staff will bring CIP projects before you for an action item. In this case, it's part of the fiscal year 26, 27, 27, 28. As I mentioned, it is a very large budget document. There's projects that are carried over many years, period of time, that are already found to be in conformance with the general plan. So every couple of fiscal years, we come back to you with new projects. not with things that have already obviously been reviewed and identified as to be in conformance with our general plan. This time around, we have a total of 14 new projects, so bear with me, and what I'm planning to do here tonight is to basically, I batched the projects in terms of how it meets the general plan policies in terms of what it's found in the general plan and then on the upcoming slides, I'm gonna have a slide for each of these projects and I'll kind of run through what they are and if you have any questions, if you wanna just hold off until the end and ask specific questions or if you wanna just as we go through each of these. If you want to have any questions that if I don't have answers for, Matt can assist, we can do that too. So I'll leave that up to you to decide how you want to have that addressed. But starting from the top, starting with project 8403 through 8405, these are park and community services projects. So these are proposed new parks. And how that relates to our general plan is basically we're reflecting back on the resource conservation and sustainability element, specifically goal number nine, which talks about provision of parkland recreational facilities and programs that will actually serve the recreational needs of the community. So as we go through Breeze Hill Park phase one, Buena Vista Park, and the Bringo Terrace, these are all bashed together as obviously being synced with RCSE goal number nine. The next batch of projects have to do with transportation and mobility. So if we look at the circulation element goal number two, it talks about supporting improvements to safety and efficiency of existing transportation facilities. And the other acronym here, it's Public Safety Facilities and Services, which is goal 16, as far as promoting provision and maintenance of public infrastructure and utilities to support land uses. So from that standpoint, we look at projects 8406, Downtown Vista Plan, there's traffic signal improvements in North Santa Fe, and onto the next slide, more traffic signal improvements, drainage improvements, that are all associated with those two particular goals just mentioned. The last batch has to do with waste, last but not least, very important subject, Vista sewer, Buena sewer, and obviously have to do with public safety facilities and services, in this case, Goal number nine is promoting provision of sanitary sewer facilities to accommodate safe, efficient, and cost-effective disposal of waste. So projects 8410 all the way to the end, 8416, they basically cover a variety of improvements as far as sewer improvements and revisiting some of these old facilities that need to be addressed. So on the upcoming slides, now I'm going to go through each of these 14 projects. So first starting with Briz Hill Park. Would you like me to just kind of go over these and run through all of them at once? Or do you want to stop at each one and ask questions?

I reviewed them. I have my own comments. So I would just, I think you should go through them all and then let us ask at the end if everybody's made notes, if they should make notes if they haven't gone through it. That way we don't take, I think each one by themselves might take a little more. Sounds like a plan. Thank you.

That sounds great. Thank you, Chair DeJesus. So Breeze Hill Park phase one is basically phase one, including four pickleball courts. That's replacing courts that got removed at Thibodeau Park. And in here, there's also installation of a sound wall that's going to support the new courts. The dollar amounts there are actually representing the project costs for these particular projects. so in the order of $940,000 or so from park development impact fees for this particular project. The next one is Paseo Buena Vista Park, around two million, and it's a passive recreation, dog-related activities for designated small, large dog parks, shaded picnic areas, bench seating, and a central open lawn area as depicted on this slide. The next one is Brangle Terrace parking improvements phase one, about 897,000 to include the design and construction of a perimeter walking trail. Next one, Downtown Vista Plan. Some of you may have heard the discussions in the recent past about redoing parts of the downtown area. Still studying in terms of how to refine some of the concept plans in terms of cost estimates for improvements along the streets there, road diet, or introducing streetscape, diagonal parking, whatnot, and evaluating all these potential particular elements, I guess, of the Downtown Vista plan for future improvements. The next one, it actually goes and start going into traffic signal improvements. This is North Santa Fe and Angeles Vista Drive, $750,000 for these signal improvements there. More signal improvements at South Santa Fe and Santa Anita Drive, and the order of $750,000. Drainage improvements is the next project up on South Melrose Drive and Sunset Drive, about 500,000, and as shown on the slide, the improvement area with the retaining wall. Next project, East Broadway, South Citrus to South Santa Fe Veterans Park, about 2.8 million in terms of the particular improvements associated with that. Next project, Hill Drive and Flower Lane to Tiley Street, 1.6 million, also related to sewer improvements. Maryland Drive and Olive Avenue to Melrose Drive is about 2.6. And a lot of these, as you go through the report, is like replacing and upsizing, you know, improving the amount of service to be provided along for these particular facilities. The next one, North Melrose Drive, Copper Drive to West Vista Way, approximately 5.2 million. This one on North Santa Fe Drive, West Beaubier Drive to West Indian Rock Road, about one million. And again, replacement, resizing. Delpy Ditch Sewer Relocation, and estimated at 1.9. And the last on this project, I believe it is, it is Verona Hills Parkway and Savona Court 1.2, as identified here, replacing, upsizing sewer mains located along these particular streets. So that would actually conclude the 14 projects here. Obviously there is a resolution, but I'm going to go backwards here in terms of before you actually make a finding here in terms of your questions. So I guess I'll go to the beginning here and then maybe you as a commission, if you have any questions, then we can kind of go one by one. Is that okay?

Sure. Well, if you would like to ask a question, if you can request, I'm going to start with commissioner Martin.

Yes, thank you. So with this one here, the Breeze Hill Park phase one, I notice there's no design money for the balance of the park. Has that design been completed? And now we're just starting through the funding the construction phases?

Good evening. The design has not been completed, and those are the only funds that we have to start the project, so that's why we're starting with phase one, which only includes the pickleball courts and potentially a sound wall. Thank you.

Any other questions on this one? I believe Commissioner Grimm.

Going by project?

Yes, I think so. It probably makes sense. Go ahead. Commissioner Grimm.

Anybody else have a question?

I had one on Breeze Hill, if you want me to go ahead. Yeah, just a quick question. That the four at Breeze Hill will be replacing the four that we're losing at Thibodeau. And I'm wondering if there was any discussion when this came up about replacing it at Breeze Hill, if there was any chance of expanding to more than that just because of the demand for pickleball, or is there just not enough room there, or were there any issues, you know, that money, whatever it might be, to keep from increasing the number of courts?

That's a good question. We're starting with the four courts at Brees Hill. That's what's initially been proposed. There hasn't been any study as far as increasing those based on demand, but in the future, that's something that can be considered.

Okay, so there would be, if possible, there might be room for more courts there.

Potentially, there's a large parking area there. Depending on the use for the future park that's going to be designed and installed there, that's something that can be considered. But at this point, it's just four courts.

Sure. Thank you very much.

And those four courts replace the ones that were at Thibodeau?

That's correct.

There were four there, and there's going to be four here. Okay. Thank you.

So the next one up is Paseo Buena Vista Park.

Anybody?

Go ahead, if you have, go ahead, just. I am so excited. We're gonna put a dog park in. That is gonna be awesome. This is such a dog community. There's so many dog people in my neighborhood. Everyone's gonna go crazy for that. Great.

The next one, Brangle Terrace Park Improvements Phase One.

So this is for, it says design and construction of perimeter walking trail, but I thought I read on the broader information that Future improvements, oh sorry, future improvements. I was thinking if you're doing a perimeter walking trail, future improvements don't show maybe adding a restroom along that walking trail, because it's quite a distance between them. So just thought I'd throw that out there. Since you're doing all the work on the sewer, add a bathroom.

Okay, next one, the Downtown Vista Plan.

Okay, I have something to say about this one, because I was on that committee, and we spent lots, months and months, Director Baca can attest to this, and it was a lot of fun fun with a capital W work but it was really great to see the participation to see all the different ideas I'm super excited to see this get some funding to broaden it and to keep looking at it it's my first my mistake was I thought it was a hundred thousand to implement I was thinking why they can't why does it cost a million dollars to do pickleball but what we were talking about in this committee would only cost a hundred thousand so I'm really excited that we're getting money directed at it and looking forward to how that evolves. So thank you for that.

next one is the traffic sorry commissioner thompson i apologize she had oh i'm sorry let me go back here so that's shade going in the that little area right there because i i went to the i think i understand i went to the beer festival there and there was no shade and i got severely sunburned and it's such a like great outdoor space but there isn't shade so

Well, the design, this is just to keep moving on with the idea, right? To further refine the concept.

That would be awesome to have shade there.

Stay tuned so you can be involved because it's a really fun process. Yeah. And Commissioner Jolliff? Support that.

So this is a general question, not specific to this, but how do the projects get into the list that we're looking at today?

I guess, Matt, would you like to address that or I can throw my, go ahead. So basically this is a result of past information received either from city council, from community, a combination with obviously staff being aware of particular ideas that are out there for improvements. It's pretty much what you call it a wish list. And once they start looking at these projects and funding becomes available or there's the ability to obtain funding for some of these projects, much like this Downtown Vista plan, obviously the $100,000, to be able to refine the concept plan for downtown Vista. And obviously as there are more interest towards it from the community like I said, from residents, business owners, from the city council as a group, from the staff, grant writing and all of that. It's a combination of collective effort as it becomes real and it gets added onto the CIP budget over time. That's why it's such a large document because it's a big wish list. Thank you. Thank you. Next one. The next one, it would be the traffic signal, North Santa Fe and Angeles Vista Drive. Is this adding one, or is it? It says it, Matt can expand on that, but it's a new traffic signal at that intersection.

Thanks, I have it right here.

There's a description towards the back of the report that has more detailed information on each of those projects. Also, it says it includes a short sidewalk to connect the intersection to the existing bus stop to the north, and a new crosswalk, actually, too. So there's several elements to this. Any questions? Okay. Moving on. Traffic signal south Santa Fe and Santa Anita Drive. And also new traffic signal there. New crosswalks. Let's see here. Conversion of Santa Fe Place to one-way traffic flow southbound.

So I know exactly where this is. So there's going to be a stoplight there, a stoplight at Civic Center, a stoplight at Postal Way. And this made the list, kind of beyond me. I mean, I'd rather see one up further, well, I guess not where that new development is, but I'm just surprised that this got picked.

It looks like this has been on the list here on the 2023 traffic signal priority list. So it's been there for a while. And I think now we are in 2026, 2027. So that appears to be the next highest priority right now on that signal list from 2023.

And so it looks to me like it's going to, that's a T intersection from Santa Anita Drive. So is Santa Fe Place going to be affected with a light then? So will it have, or just be like a three-way or two-way light coming off of Santa Anita and then going east-west or is that north-south, north-south on South Santa Fe? Okay.

Yeah, it's a signal at a T-intersection, so it's for all three phases or all three streets there.

Because off Santa Fe Place to the south of that, the new, I don't know how many units are going to be on Postal Way, but those efficiency units that are going in, those apartments, there's going to be like, I don't remember the number, 70, 50 units. And then just to the east of that, I'm sorry about my directions, but it seems to me it's east and west, but it's north and south. So South Santa Fe going towards Mar Vista, and particularly Mauna Vista, there's going to be 100 and some units going in there in the five-story building. And so having this light, I can imagine, will be kind of a traffic calming measure and a traffic safety measure. So I'm not terribly, not that we're voting on it, but as a citizen and as somebody that lives in this neighborhood, I can see the benefit of it, just adding more safety in the area. Thanks.

Okay, so the next one is drainage improvements on South Melrose Drive and Sunset Drive.

I have a comment on this. I take this way a couple times a week to go to the gym, and I have to tell you that the sidewalks that are being put in are so awesome. First of all, they're pretty. You guys do an amazing job in public works. Whoever's doing this thing, it looks really nice. And the traffic management, because I will tell you, that time of the morning to go to the back way from Mar Vista down to Buena Vista, I think it is, and then you turn and you go to Sunset and you make a left to go to South Melrose, It's tight and there's now there's speed bumps and trying to get to a class and then they've got you know Flag men standing there directing traffic. It has been the most efficient pretty thing of I was so proud of our city when I go when I'm going through development like that so Hat goes off to the city for the work that you're doing on the sidewalks and has nothing to do with what you're talking about but thought I'd throw that in there because it's It's where the sidewalks are

Okay, the next one is East Broadway, South Citrus to South Santa Fe Avenue, Veterans Park. And it has to do with replacing, upsizing 1400 linear feet of trunk sewer main.

That's a big budget.

Yep. Okay, no questions on that one. Moving along to Hill Drive and Flower Lane to Tiley Street. And that is also replacing and upsizing 1,600 linear feet of trunk sewer main on Hill Drive and Flower Lane to Tiley Street. And reconstructing and rehabilitating associated manholes as well. Okay. Next one up, Maryland Drive and Olive Avenue, Melrose Drive. Any questions on that one? It's also related to upsizing, replacing 2,100 linear feet of trunk sewer. And I believe North Melrose Drive, Copper Drive to West Vista Way. Also similarly, 3,500 linear feet of trunk sewer remain to be replaced and upsized. Okay. I think there's a theme here. North Santa Fe, West Beaubier and West Indian Rock Road, same as far as replacing upsizing. We're good, okay. Delpy Ditch, sewer relocation. This is a reconstruction relocating 1,500 linear feet, approximately 12 inch sewer main and manholes appears to be away from the eroded banks of the Delpy Ditch area. No questions? Okay. Last one. Verona Hills Parkway and Savona Court. That has to do with replacing, upsizing 1,200 linear feet of sewer main.

Thanks. Well, I do have a question.

No questions on that last one.

On each of these items on Section 2 project description, it says where the money's coming from, park development impact fees, Buena Sanitation district fees, but Vista sewer fees. So these impact fees that are parsed out. So the park development impact fees, where does that come from? Like building? For example, I'm trying to find out or trying to understand that the development we saw going in tonight, that developer's going to pay an impact fee, correct? Correct. And does the impact fee then get broken down by the city so that some goes to parks and some goes to this? Or how does that work? How does a park impact fee come about?

So I'm not a finance person, but from my understanding, as far as the fee schedule, because I do work on the fee schedule update. So on that end of things, there are definitely PARC fees, part of their development impact fees or DIF fees that get charged on any private development project. So PARC fees included. There's a different percentage rate as far as how much goes every year. The rest of the other fees are based on the engineering fees. COST INDEX AND CONSTRUCTION COST INDEX FOR OTHER TYPES OF FEES THAT WE COLLECT FOR THE CITY. BUT TO YOUR QUESTION, THOSE FEES GET COLLECTED BY PROJECT, THEY GO INTO A POT OF MONEY AND I GUESS I'LL BE SIMPLE TURNS BECAUSE I'M NOT A FINANCE PERSON. AND SO IT GOES INTO A POT OF MONEY AND AS FAR AS DECISIONS MADE ON THAT, OBVIOUSLY THE CITY COUNCIL WILL LOOK AT WITH THE FINANCE DEPARTMENT, THE ENGINEERING DEPARTMENT AND THEN DECIDE WHERE THE PRIORITIES, WHERE THEY NEED TO GO IN TERMS OF These particular priority projects that you are seeing in front of you as part of the CIP budget And you know fortunately as monies get accumulated into these different pots of money then you know they're utilized as the projects come before for actual realization and

I like that explanation. I think a lot of people, because they're not city folk and they're not understanding budgets and these are, I think this is why a lot of us like just to go about our business and hope the city's running just fine. Thank you very much. But if we don't have development, then we don't create pots of money. And if we don't have sewer upgrades, then we don't have the ability to create these fees. Maintenance is maintenance and you have to have it. But development is important, I think, what I'm hearing from a city, I'm not trying to be a finance manager, but we have to have these pots of money in order to create, replace pickleball courts or to add the sidewalks or the parks. So I'm really, I just want to understand and I think it's important that as an average citizen that we understand that this money comes from development and that's paid for. It's not something that necessarily that the taxpayer pays because unless they're doing the building, that this is brought on by whoever's improving the community by development, they pay a fee, and that part of that goes to parks. Correct. In a very simple way. Correct.

Thank you.

Anybody else? Commissioner Jolliffe?

Okay, so this money is basically allocated, and the list that we have here is is really for transparency, right? Describing the project and what the money is and where it's coming from. But our task isn't to evaluate the projects or how much money they are, but to say, does this conform to the goals of the general plan, correct?

Correct. Okay. That is the charge of the Planning Commission.

All right. I don't know if we want to make a motion.

Yes. We have a motion.

Yes.

Yes, so I will move to adopt this resolution finding that these goals and these projects conform to the goals of the general plan.

Commissioner Thompson.

I will second.

Thank you. It's been moved and seconded to approve the What do we call it? The adopt the resolution. Can everybody cast their vote, please, and lock it in? And that motion passes unanimously. So let's move on to reports. Thank you.

Thank you, Matt. Yes, thank you, Chair DeJesus. I just wanted to mention that we will have a meeting on June 16th, sorry, back to back, and it is going to be a busy meeting because there are three public hearing items that night. So that's all I have. Director Vacca, I believe, does not have any updates at this point, so that's it from us.

I just want to thank my fellow commissioners for all their input tonight and specifically thank Daisy for a great presentation. We really appreciate that and look forward to seeing y'all on the 21st, 20th? 16th. The 16th, not the 20th at all, the 16th. I'll adjourn the meeting.