Chair weeks it is 430 whenever you're ready to get started Are you ready to get started? Okay, great so with that I'd like to call to order the Meeting of the Planning Commission Can you please call roll? Commissioner Carter Here Commissioner Cisco your Commissioner Holton here Commissioner Peterson here Commissioner Sanders Present Vice Chair Duggan here chair weeks here Let the record reflect that all commissioners are present Thank you, then we'll move on to approval of the minutes the first set of minutes are from July 13th. Do have any changes corrections? Okay, and seeing none on those those would stand approved I Then August 24th minutes are there a commissioner Cisco? Yeah, I noted a couple of corrections Under the Holly Hawks subdivision when its sites Ex parte disclosures that said no disclosures were made But I believe you did say you visited the site so wanted to get that captured and then under 9.3 the 7-Eleven sale of beer and wine our ex parte disclosures It indicates that I noted that there was a member who was inebriated at the actual site And what I had said was on my way to visit the site I noted a police confrontation with an individual out in front of the Ninth Street Market So I want to get that clear so that the site isn't getting loaded up with it. It aren't appropriate And I believe commissioner Holton did that as well He did not witness someone inebriated at the college Site it was on his way to the site at the Ninth Street Market. So those corrections Thank you, so those changes will be made. Thank you. I got it. Thank you so then before we start I wanted to Mention that I'm going to be reordering the agenda tonight moving the study session to the end of the meeting and Moving item 10.2 Before 10.1. So the way the agenda will go the first items will be 10.2 10.1 and then the study session so wanted everybody to know about that before we got to that spot So with that we'll go ahead and take public comments on non-agenda matters if you have Anything to say on an item that is not on the agenda Please make your way to one of the podiums up there and you will be given three minutes to speak See no one there Is there anybody on zoom? We do have about five attendees via zoom if you wish to make a public comment on non-agenda items, please raise your hand Chair weeks no hands are raised Thank you, so with that I'll close this first public comment period or this Public comment period on non-agenda matters and we'll move on to commission business I'll start by reading our statement of purpose The planning commission is charged with carrying out the California planning and zoning laws in the city of Santa Rosa duties include implementing of plans ordinances and policies relating to land use matters assisting in writing and implementing the general plan and area plans Holding public hearings and acting on proposed changes to the zoning code zoning map General plan tentative subdivision maps and undertaking special planning studies as needed So with that I'll move on to four point two commissioners reports. Are there any reports from my fellow commissioners? Commissioner Carter Yeah on the September 5th the Subdivision subcommittee approved a three-lot subdivision on Guernville Road for low-density housing development Thank you. Are there any other comments? Okay, so with that we'll move on No, I do need to ask if there are any public comments on item 4.2. Are there any public comments on Commissioners reports if so make your way to the podium at the top Seeing nobody is there anybody on zoom no hands raised on zoom Okay, so then we will go ahead and move on to Department report Thank you. Yes, Chair weeks and members of the Commission Jessica Jones deputy director of planning Just one quick item of note for the Commission. We have scheduled the Shanate at Woodlands neighborhood meeting It is scheduled for Monday October 2nd It'll be held here in the council chambers at 6 p.m And it will be both an in-person and a zoom meeting so kind of a hybrid where people can participate in both both ways We are expecting a lot of folks attending So we're hoping that and you know anybody who wants to participate via zoom will do that So that we can make sure that we've got enough space here in the chambers But we will be providing speakers in our courtyard should we have an overflow And then just a reminder to the Commission if any of you are interested in attending to please just let us know And then also a reminder that the meeting will be recorded So you would be able to go back and watch it after the fact. That's all I have Thank you. Are there any public comments on the department report? Anything on zoom? No hands raised on zoom Thank you Are there any I will move on to item 6 statement of abstention. Are there any statements of abstention tonight? No seeing none we will jump over the study session and Move on to Public hearings So I would like to do I will check with the Attorney to see it. Do I need a motion to move 10.2? to 10.1 You just have reordered the agenda and then if you are we going to take 10.2? And someone's going to explain about the request for a continuance so then Okay, so I don't need to make a motion of any kind or have a motion made of any kind not to Reorder your order. Okay. Thank you So we'll go ahead with Ms. Murray item 10.2 Sorry to interrupt Planner Murray before you get started chair weeks. He skipped over item 8 and item 9 No, sorry There's nothing on item 8 and nothing on night of item 9 So now we'll go to Ms. Murray. This is a public hearing coffee park self-storage Exempt project conditional use permit three two eight two coffee lane CUP 21 dash 101 And good afternoon chair weeks and members of the planning commission I would like to request a continuance for this item to a date Uncertain we have a little bit of research to do still Do I have a motion chair weeks? I'll move that we continue this item to a date uncertain. Thank you Do you have a second? Commissioner second. Thank you. So that was moved by commissioner Cisco seconded by commissioner of near Holton We have the vote, please Commissioner Carter I Commissioner Cisco I Commissioner Holton I Commissioner Peterson I Commissioner Sanders I Vice chair Duggan I chair weeks. Hi So that passes with seven eyes and it is continued to a date uncertain. Thank you So now we will take item 10.1 This is a continued item It's a public hearing Bunya Bunya tree removal. It's an appeal 102nd Street t r 22 dash 0 6 2 and Ms. Murray would you and I did want to mention that this is an exparte item So can we have any disclosures start with commissioner Holton? I visited the site and I have nothing further disclose. Thank you commissioner Cisco I also visited the site and have no new information to disclose Vice chair Duggan I Visited the site and I also reviewed the video from the August 24th meeting and have nothing further to disclose Thank you Commissioner Peterson. I also visited the site and have no new information to disclose commissioner Carter I Visited the site and have nothing further to disclose. Thank you and commissioner Sanders I also visited the site and have nothing further to disclose Thank you, and I also visited the site and have nothing further to disclose So with that Ms. Murray Okay Hello again the project before you is An appeal of the director's decision to go ahead and or to deny the removal of a Bunya Bunya tree that's located at 1082nd Street Here's a photograph of it the tree is approximately 125 feet tall and And a beautiful tree The part of the appeal process the required the Appellant is required to provide grounds for appeal. They provided to the first The that the denial of the application to remove a hazardous tree constitutes a taking in violation of the state and federal constitution and other laws And as you can see here staff's response is that the adoption Implementation and enforcement of a land use regulation such as the city's tree or again ordinance Constitutes a permissible exercise of police power The second grounds for appeal was the falling branches and cones from the tree pose a health risk and a safety hazard to people Utility lines sidewalk, etc. The tree has a history A resident has been hit by fallen debris a shed or a shed was destroyed by falling material and Roots are lifting from the sidewalk or I'm sorry roots are lifting the sidewalk Staff response to those is the falling tree branches and cones is a maintenance issue a lot of people in Santa Rosa and all over the state probably all over the world have Large trees on their properties large trees require maintenance So if required maintenance measures are implemented the trees overall risk factor is reduced to low And I'll talk a little bit more about that further into the presentation Roots lift sidewalks city-wide Property owners city-wide are responsible for those repairs I Apologize for the highlighting on this slide. I Neglected to I was on vacation when this got posted and that was a reminder to myself So there there were actually three evaluations Completed by three very qualified arborists in the city The arborists all agree that the characteristics that are related to safety Include some co-dominant stems. There are three of them at the very top of the tree heavy branches Which is typical of a bunny a bunny a tree Falling cones some of which get very large if they're allowed to mature and Of course fall falling and fallen debris the the leaves on a bunny a bunny a tree are very sharp A lot of times people that are working on bunny a bunny a trees We're protective clothing and I will say that I haven't met a arborist or a tree climber That likes working on bunny a bunny a trees so Something that all three arborists also agree on is that cabling the co-dominant stems Fitting the foliage removing the cones Before they mature and removing fallen debris will reduce that the risk hazard for the bunny a bunny a trees Here's a an aerial view of the site And the circle represents the location of the bunny a bunny a tree Here is gosh. It's hard to see the the property outlined in blue is Adjacent to Santa Rosa Creek is the subject site and you can see around it. Oh, there we go There's the circle from the bunny a bunny a tree and there's the silver crest apartments Memorial Hospital There's residential and commercial surrounding the subject site and just to give you an idea about the neighborhood context So this this tree has a lot of application history the the first application that I'm aware of that I could find is from back in 1999 where it was a staff level director level review and and The the tree permit was approved the tree we approved it for removal. It came to the Planning Commission on appeal from the neighbors Staff's decision was upheld and the appeal was denied The neighbors then took it to the city council on appeal This is one of those funny permits that we have in the city that actually has two opportunities to appeal one first to the Planning Commission and second to the city council Back in that in June of 1999 the council granted the appeal and denied the tree removal Then the second application came in in 2006 Director denied that permit and there was no appeal submitted Several years later in 2019 again and the director denied a tree request to remove the tree An appeal application was submitted But they did not include the appropriate fee the appeal period was extended so that they could get the fee to us and No, no fee was well a partial fee was received So subject of tonight's discussion is the fourth application It was submitted on September 1st Last year we have conflicting arborist report We The applicant submitted a report and I again I want to reiterate we have three very qualified arborist weighing in on this The the applicants first arborist Gave us a report Knowing the the background of the tree staff to decide visit and we have a con another arborist that's under contract with the city since our our Lisa grant was has retired. So we we contracted with them to go out and do a second Evaluation After the results of that the two were in conflict, but there was email correspondence between staff and the first arborist where again, you know, there was I want to say that the assumption that cones would not be removed But when you consider that cones will be removed branches will be lightened foliage will be removed from both the ground and The tree lightened They we came to the agreement again that there that does reduce the risk The permit was denied in March and 10 days later. We received the appeal application The meeting was scheduled the original meeting back on August 24th and that afternoon we received the third arborist's report And we continued the meeting since then We also had let me go back to that since then we had the city's arborist weigh in again on that report and That was that was addressed in the staff that's in the staff report and copies of all those memos Were available. I believe I know of at least at least two of those arborists are in the room this evening So if we need any clarifications, we've certainly got the the expertise here So the the the site is located in an area designated as office on the general plan I kind of threw this in as a force of habit Unlike most projects that you see This has nothing to do with the zoning code at least those that I present to you This has everything to do with the tree ordinance, which is city code chapter 17 24 that was enacted by council and And and and to protect trees. They're an essential part of the city's heritage That that Section of the the city code also recognizes the individual properties owners rights to utilized privately owned property But and that is also the section of the code that allows two appeals one to the commission one to the council What it it requires us to consider during our Review during staff's review is the overall condition of the tree the surrounding area The trees symmetry aesthetics how much shade it provides Density of trees in the area. So sometimes we want that density Bunya Bunya trees happen to be the trees that don't like to be crowded Impacts on air pollution historic values the general welfare of the city and not just the property owner all point out and Good good good urban forestry practices So I've also added that, you know, it's been acknowledged that the city has two Bunya Bunya trees on our Railroad square and courthouse square and here we have a photograph of the tree over down on railroad square on the image on the right and on the left the Railroad square there we go the star shows where the tree is located and Then in courthouse square, I'll just get that star up now Here's a photograph of the one in courthouse square and the location of it Similar to other property owners in the city the city Does maintain these trees? We remove the cones within the branches and we Eliminate the debris that falls under the tree again those those those needles are sharp the trees as I've learned through this process have to both male and female pods and the female pods grow to be about you know, they can get pretty large 24 pounds and You can see some images here. These were taken off Google and gives you an idea of the size and That's at full maturity so so if if If the Planning Commission upholds staff's decision to deny the tree removal permit The project would be compliant with the California Environmental Quality Act because there wouldn't be any change It would have no effect on the environment We did receive several public comments that was uploaded or those were uploaded as an attachment to the staff report of All the public comments that were received I Received one voicemail that expressed opposition to the removal of the tree and she was concerned about the pods following So with that it's the rec it's it's recommended by the Planning and Economic Development Department that the Planning Commission by Resolution deny the appeal and uphold the director's decision to deny the tree permit Requesting to remove the bunya bunya tree at 1080 2nd Street and That concludes my presentation and I'm throwing my my my contact information up here now And if there are any Callers that can't see that my name is Susie Murray and my phone number is seven oh seven five four three Four three four eight and you can also reach me by email at SM you are our ay at SR city dot org Thank You miss Murray. Are there any questions of staff before we go to the appellant? commissioner Carter Do we know in the first action where the permit was approved who appealed that approval I I Don't know who appealed it. I know it was appealed by a neighbor But I should say it was not appealed by the applicant. It could have been a resident of the Salvation Army But it was not appealed by the applicant missioner Sanders Do we have any information on the cost of maintaining the other two bunya bunya trees that we have at At the courthouse square Railroad Square, do we know what you know the frequency of maintenance? What it costs? I don't know the cost I don't know that it would be apples to apples because I It used to be city staff that did the maintenance. I've seen the cherry pickers out there and what have you So I would have to defer to our public works department or our parks department I would also defer to the applicant. I think that they would have a more realistic cost on their own tree I think I think they their report said $3,500 a year And that was just the tree maintenance I don't know what their their costs were that was associated with the sidewalk rocks But I'm sure that they'll be able to answer that question And I'm sorry. Are you done? Sorry, I didn't mean to jump on your toes I have a question the tree that gone the tree ordinance slide slide 11 Says that it allows two appeals one to commission and went to council. So this is that two appeal per site Year per it's per tree per action our Action director action on the tree removal permit So what they they requested the the tree permit to remove the tree they had We acted on it denied it. They had 10 days to appeal that and Depending on the outcome of this This action there will be a 10-day appeal period and anybody can appeal the action of the planning Commission So I guess what I'm asking is it is it two appeals per? Permit application. Yes. Okay. Yes. Yeah, and if I could just quickly clarify And we wanted to bring that to your attention because it's not typical all of our other entitlement applications have one opportunity for appeal The action is taken they can appeal that and that appeal is then final in this instance The tree ordinance Allows an appeal of the director decision to the planning Commission and then a second appeal of that planning Commission's Decision to the council. So just if it's an oddity and we just wanted to make sure that the Commission was aware of that Great. Thanks for highlighting that so with that if there's no other questions of staff Oh vice-chair Deggan. I have one more that Commissioner Sanders questions reminded me of so do you have any information about how often the our the city bunny bunny trees at courthouse square and railroad square are Maintain to the it's at once a year twice a year and how often Do the how fast do the pods grow? So again, I don't know the frequency of our maintenance of the maintenance of our trees I I am sure that it's more frequent You know cleaning up the debris under the tree, but as far as removing the pods They take about three years to develop and I am learning that through the process. I've had two of our three Tree professionals confirm that for me. So but they don't just Pop out at 24 pounds. They take three years to develop to that size So they're they're very visible before they're that big Thank you. So with that We'll go to the appellate You will have ten minutes and if you could please state your name for the record Thank you Can you get really close to the microphone? Actually, and you can raise the podium. Can you hear me? Okay better? And speak really close to the microphone, please so Okay, good afternoon chair weeks and members of the planning commission My name is Michelle Zairomsky, and I am the attorney for the Salvation Army I do work downtown at 613 4th Street I also live downtown and I would like to just let you know that our initial presentation is going to be comprised of Myself with some opening remarks, and then we have James McNair an arborist And then Catherine Anderson on behalf of the Salvation Army, and then I will wrap it up I do believe in response to a question from one of the commission members that back in 1999 when the request to Take down the tree was approved It was someone by the name of Alan strong Who then voiced opposition and then the decision was reversed and I believe I've seen that in the file again This is a very large file So the basis of our appeal is not that we are anti-tree and it's not that we are not respectful of certain trees This is not a heritage tree. This is a dangerous tree and Aesthetics does not outweigh the safety because the question here is a serious legal issue of Liability for severe injury or damage and the Salvation Army's inability to handle that type of a risk The primary concern as you will hear Are the cones because they fall they have fallen before and also the branches Which have fallen before and have hit our residents before Being a lawyer. We are very cognizant of risk And the fact that the cones and branches can do very serious damage including death We are just not willing to assume that type of a risk when it is a known risk and it's a proven risk The Arborist from the city has some solutions But his solutions are pricey and they're year after year after year That the burden of doing this is placed on the Salvation Army There's also no guarantee and no warranty for mr. Fry that that is going to work We're asking to eliminate the risk He does not state in any report that he has ever done that his proposals will eliminate the risk That is our concern. We are very aware of our exposure to premises liability under civil code section 1714 and the problem is that we are being unwillingly Subjected to that exposure by the city's refusal to allow us to eliminate the risk that is on our own property That's where the taking part comes in but again I want to emphasize it is a serious risk of serious injury bodily injury property injury and death and With that I will yield to Mr. McNair. Thank you very much Good afternoon commissioners. I'm James McNair. I'm a consulting Arborist Also happened to be the contract Arborist for the city of Healdsburg So I'm very familiar with these type of applications and and issues and I've been a tree risk assessor. I'm in my third five-year qualification phasing so a lot of experience with trees and tree injury tree fatality cases, so I Take this very seriously When I did my risk assessment, you know the the primary premise of doing these our methodology our best management practices for assessing risk is really you're you're trying to Capture the likelihood of an event happening in this case a tree part falling and the severity of the Consequences you know what happens when the tree part falls and hits a target whether it be a person a car building and So we have a very standardized methodical approach to Developing a Risk assessment procedure. I rated this tree as moderate to high risk category Especially during the three or four months when cones if they were left on the tree would be maturing and these cones are as you can See by the weight are definitely capable of serious injury and or death so very serious concern they're known worldwide around for being dangerous and And this is not your typical tree that you're trying to maintain This is much more intensive much more complicated. You have a hundred and twenty foot tree You're up in the upper crown doing this work It's been proposed to Cabling procedure because you have three trunks formed in that upper crown that need to be supported and And then just and that requires an annual Inspection on maintenance is just the cabling support system and then you have the cone removal. So, you know, you're up there in this tree Someone brought in some of the leaves leaflets of this tree. You can they're extremely sharp. So it's very dangerous work very high off the ground very tedious and The problem is You can have the best of intentions now and saying okay property owner take care of this tree, but my experience You know, if you're looking out 50 to 100 years is maybe the potential lifespan of this tree You know property managers change budgets change and all it takes is you know one year or series of years that It's not maintained as you're requiring that then you could have a serious problem so it's it's an onerous kind of Commitment to the property owner, you know, which I question if it's if it's reasonable in that sense the And it's also this kind of you know, we projected a cost of average of two to three thousand dollars per year and You know extrapolated over 50 years You know it's serious money and and that money is going to be taken from the budget of the landscape budget for the rest of the You know the low-income housing, you know, they have said budgets. It's not unlimited and this tree will be requiring a lot of monetary support, so I Guess in closing the You know, this is a tree. I would never recommend be planted in a spot like this and always, you know You want to look for the right tree in the right place? And I think if if there is historical interest in the tree you could Probably take cuttings from the tree or or when a cone does develop take the seed and and plant it somewhere where it's not Going to be near people and it'll kind of carry on at least the genetics of this specific tree so my in my opinion it's not reasonable to Layden the property owner with this kind of burden, and I think it's highly probable At some point in the future won't it just won't happen and then the risk of someone getting hurt goes dramatically higher Thank you, and I believe Catherine Anderson is on the zoom and can you please state your name for the record when you come on? Thank you Catherine we sent you a prompt to unmute yourself my apologies I Little problem So my name is Catherine Anderson. I'm the regional property manager for overcrossed property management I represent the owners the Salvation Army and thank you for having me and please accept my apologies for not attending in person I've been put on travel restrictions because I'm about to give birth any minute now so I'd like to discuss with you today my obligations to the safety of our beautiful diverse senior community and The majority of whom are extremely low income The and many of which are disabled or otherwise vulnerable and my obligation to the federal government Who holds the contract in place for us to house our community? Our goal is to put the needs and the safety of our community at the forefront of our priorities It is my role to evaluate risk and liability for our community It's also my role to make sure we are in compliance with the rules of the federal government to keep our contract in place We are federally funded, which means That Usually we're inspected annually sometimes more to make sure that our properties and safe condition If we do not provide safe conditions, we're liable to lose our contract this includes but it's not limited to all of our common areas both inside and out and Losing our section 8 low-income housing subsidy would affect over 150 members of our community I bring this up because the bunny bunny tree does not just drop the over 20 pound watermelon sized cones but also drops the small branches and What we have the staff to maintain the grounds on a daily basis Monday through Friday During normal business hours these branches are two to three feet long They're basically sticks wrapped in razor blades and dropped daily So which I initially found out the hard way the first time I came around the property and cut myself our seniors have mobility issues and If one were to fall after hours With spin skin and lack of mobility Walking around our parking lots and our sidewalk. It could be a trip hazard that could make it so that they would cut themselves and Potentially fall on them or cause the serious injury a small branch Trip hazard may not be a large liability for you or I but for a resident using a walker or a cane Simply trying to move the branch cause a trip and fall which could mean sing serious injury or death in the wrong Circumstances and I've seen it happen at other properties with other types of trip hazards And this is an unexpected trip hazard on a regular basis, which is quite scary for us and the residents It's also my main safety concern when it comes to our resident on a daily basis now No matter how much maintenance we perform And how careful we are pods do get messed and the small branches continue to fall freely even with the trimming It's only a matter of time before a branch or a pod the serious harm either alert HUD and Eventually and our contract or lose a lawsuit that could plea our limited funds They're intended for items such as keeping up our 50 year old building a current building standards While the Salvation Army has a big name We are a non-profit and all funds are meant to help our community to maintain safe clean and affordable housing So costs that be estimated to be $3,500 and maybe a pod removal and some free trimming Not include the cost for permits other damages Liability which includes rising property and liability and parent costs. We estimate that were between You know seven to ten thousand on our annual base s between all the different costs and the more incidents that occur such as the destroying of the shed destroying of our backflow device Which limited water to our community for a little while? And other types of damages to cars and humans Just keeps the cost rising every year. So What may not seem like a lot of cost on one end can long-term be quite a high cost on that on the reality of things I appreciate your time they and I hope that you take into consideration our vulnerable community and The rising costs on our annual base s and liability to our community Thank you Thank you. So just to sum up the closing of our initial presentation I know that there are several members of the community here who would like to speak to you I would ask that you seriously consider our request to please allow us to Take the tree down eliminate the risk and if there's anyone on the fence on that Then give us a chance to talk with risk management the city attorney the city manager to answer any questions that you might have So in that regard perhaps tabling a decision for a while to allow us to have those discussions But we do very much. Thank you for your time and your consideration and we do have other people who would like to speak to you Thank you Thank you So Do you it does the appellant have any more in their team Anna? How are we doing on time? Can we hold on just one minute? the appellant it's my understanding had some people from Silvercrest or from That is all part of the appellant Presentation the residents will speak during the public hearing item. That's correct portion I just wanted to make sure that that's thank you So is there anybody else speaking in? As part of the appellant item and then also if there are if Any if there is anybody how are we doing on time because the appellant has ten minutes? We're we're past the ten minute mark. Oh, okay. Well then We'll go ahead. Thank you Are there any questions of the appellant at this time before we open the public hearing on this item? I do have a question for you. You talked or actually miss Anderson talked about That they have sex you have section 8 inspectors coming To inspect the units for health and safety Have they ever said that the tree posed a health and safety issue? During their inspections Let me check with the managers on that Not that we're aware of. Okay. Thank you So with that Okay. Yes, vice chair Duggan. Could I ask a related question about? The inspectors to come and make sure everything is safe and good for your residents Have the inspectors ever expressed concern? I think you have a bunch of redwood trees that are very close to the building in a Fenced off courtyard at the side of the building have they ever expressed concern about those trees So again, that was probably a question for Sharon King who will be speaking who is the longtime resident manager? All right. Thank you. Thank you Okay, so with that. Thank you. We will go ahead and Open the public hearing on this item if you would like you can go to one of the two podiums You'll have three minutes. Please state your name for the record And if I could ask Captain Corcoran to help maneuver the podium if people need it, I would appreciate that help. Thank you Thank you, and if you could state your name for the record and as I said, you'll have three minutes. Oh, my name is Sharon King I'm a part-time employee of the Salvation Army having recently retired and Had had direct supervision of the Santa Rosa Silvercrest property from June of 2002 until March of 2023 We are asking the city of Santa Rosa to permit silver crest to remove the subject by new bun you tree This tree and the property on which it stands Excuse me our holy owned by the Salvation Army Residences Inc. Which in turn is holy owned by the Salvation Army a California corporation? The city would have you believe the question of whether the tree should remain is just a matter of maintenance The Salvation Army has gone to great expense and effort to maintain the tree in the surrounding areas We contend that no amount of maintenance will remove the risk of damage to persons and property Or the liability the Salvation Army carries as the sole owner Two weeks after the tree was professionally stripped of cones in 2006 a missed cone totally obliterated a tool shed in the senior garden area We don't blame the tree service because this the city knows The cones are the same color as a tree and are exceptionally difficult to remove The most recent cone fall damaged our backflow device for the garden area I witnessed myself a cone fall squarely in the middle of the sidewalk, which we do not have the right to block Beyond the occasional cone fall The branchlets are extremely sharp and have caused injury to our staff and at least one senior working in the Excuse me working in the garden area I brought some branches To show you but if you're going to touch them be careful The easily pierced skin and could cause infection We love trees We maintain about 20 trees on the Silvercrest property including several redwoods Which were planted when Silvercrest was built and currently exceed a hundred feet We have already agreed to replace the tree in accordance with code 17 dash 24 point zero seven five With a more suitable specimen on the approved tree list Those who object to the removal bear none of the liability for its natural behavior They do not own it Or insured against loss or injury It is unjust that the Salvation Army is required to continue to bear risk And liability without recourse for public private property Especially when that risk cannot entirely be eliminated Short of removing the tree and I thank you for this opportunity if you have any questions Thank you Anybody else would like to speak on this item? Please go to the podium And that your name Thank you Thank you commissioners and staff Excuse me. Um, I think he was first. Oh, sorry go ahead It's actually better. Oh, okay Go ahead Sorry, I'm captain Sean Kelsey. I'm the Sonoma County coordinator for the Salvation Army I just want to remind everybody if you don't know that the Salvation Army has been supporting our community Helping those in need for over 134 years We do have the twin towers, which is a government funded HUD program for our Our seniors that are in need but also right next door To the twin towers. We do also have a community activity center for our seniors as well Which is privately Funded by our donors One of the things that is difficult for us is we're trying to provide assistance for those during the summer who can't afford Their ac bills and in the winter can't afford to keep the heat on Not to mention all of the other programs that we do throughout the year and particularly here in santa rosa is That we have those that are supporting our seniors at our senior activity center that is privately funded and we're using funds To maintain a tree that is so potentially harmful To our seniors to be honest with you as being the really the the main person in responsibility for The Salvation Army's activity in Sonoma County I dread the call to get in the evening that from our senior director That somebody has been struck by one of these Either the branches or the pods and so I just wanted to make sure and share that with you I just thank you for the commission to listen to us and to have some very thoughtful questions tonight and We would really love to Be able to Get approval for it to be removed. We love trees We have as was mentioned some beautiful redwoods that we just adore But because we do have a parking lot that is Where the seniors do need to walk by the bunny a bunny tree to get to our activity center and also To go home at night to sleep That there's just so much potential for hazard and so thank you very much for the time Thank you Next Hi, my name's my name's evan hughes. I live on pier street Near downtown. I live about a hundred feet away from this tree I'd like to if if if it's okay bring the discussion Back down to earth for a second. I have a two-year-old daughter Her health and safety means more to me than anything else in the world I walk under that tree at least two to three times a week with her one of her favorite things to do is Go over to what she calls the big spiky tree and stomp on the branches I'm always very careful to tell her be careful, sweetie Don't touch them You know what scares me a lot more than the tree is the traffic five feet away from me on the road so We embrace risk And make risk risk assessments every day of our lives If the approach that we're going to take when we're confronted with the reality of an organism that's older than this building And older than everybody in it Is to kill it Because it's inconvenient I don't think that says a lot of things that are good about this place or the people that live here And I know that that's not a reflection Of who we are The reality is this tree is a heritage tree There is only one person in santa rosa who would have been here 110 years ago Running around with exotic Tree seeds from australia. That's luther burbank Nobody else would have had those seeds but him I don't know that for certain but he had a boony boony tree growing in his front yard So he almost assuredly played a role In planting it or in protecting it And I think given his importance to the city that qualifies it as a heritage tree The reality isn't it sad but the reality is that large mature trees like this are a precious resource And every year more and more of them burn down Or are cut down They are quite frankly an essential part of what makes the city such a special place to live and Once they're gone There's no amount of money that can bring them back And there's nothing that we can build to replace them Ultimately, this is about money It's about saving money Because the fact of the matter is they could put A budget line item in there for cutting these pods down every three years And they don't because they want to save money I would ask the city Given that you have what three of these trees on your property how many people have been injured or killed By falling branches or cones I have a feeling that if anybody had been killed by one of these things that you'd know and the tree would already be dead That's all I got Thank you Mr. DeWitt Hello, my name is dewayne dewitt though i'm from roseland. I've been going by this tree all my life You might not know that I have a master's degree In urban forestry and urban greening from the swedish university of agricultural sciences All-NARP campus Earned in this century I pay attention to trees I think what you should do is perhaps follow the attorney's uh suggestion of tabling this advice And make them proof up There's been a lot of reference to the risk and the cost So get the cost records everything they've spent and the last 10 Let me yeah 10 years of the amount of money they've spent on maintenance for this tree I haven't seen them do that much maintenance and I go by there all the time One of my boyhood friends lived on that street the mcvay family We just had our 50-year high school reunion for santa rosa high school. So, you know, we've been around a bit Then also Look into the records and get the proof up on everybody that's been killed By the following bunya bunya seed pods All the local risks all the different stuff That has been referenced here needed to have some proof in the record today To have it be submitted so you could use that for you to have a balanced approach to your decision Now after you get all the proof and you look into what is appropriate perhaps In the terms of cutting the cost for the salvation army organization And especially make sure and get those inspections from the federal government Anything from the federal or the state government that has said the tree is dangerous Once you get all that look and see what the replacement idea is If they decide they have to kill what I feel is a heritage tree And they have to take out something older than any of us here Maybe they could put in two or three really nice redwoods there at that site and have that be What would be a Grove in a sense a nice healing type of spot to sit I have never felt any fear going by that tree And I really feel that what's happened here today has been a bit of a fear mongering And a bit of unfortunate exaggeration of the risk because they are a business first and foremost That's what they are and they have to make sure and eliminate any of their financial liability And that's what this is about perhaps more than anything I also work in healthcare so I know about the people who use the chairs and People who use the walkers and how they have to be protected So I think if you table the matter Give everybody a chance to come back Bring their proof and you folks get to talk about it. Thank you for your time Any other anybody else yeah, there's a man up here. Okay Thank you, mr.  I live in summer cross departments um The sad part about this is that they're not allowed to do whatever they want with their own tree And and you have roots in sidewalk Here's living proof Of a problem that I had it was a sidewalk Lost a leg And you think that's all right Like I said a month ago I I dare any of you guys To take this wheelchair for a half hour out onto the streets I dare you to go right across the street at this park There's a two inch or three inch lip But you don't care about it What about our safety? What about our people? I mean We're talking about lies We're talking about injuries that can create A massive down stretch all the way to the end And I think this is ludicrous And the way you guys are handling this situation. It's a bunch of malarkey Thank you Thank you. Uh, is there anybody else who'd like to speak? Thank you Thank you My name is Henry garrison My name is Henry garrison and I've resided silver crest And I've been there approximately about seven years now I grew up in the bay area here as a kid. I worked with trees You know, I love trees We cut them down and split the wood and sold it for court had seven brothers So we could easily do this now When I came here about six years ago. I uh Saw this tree, but I didn't know what it was so I was kind of curious and I found out that it was a banyu banyu tree I think it originates from austria And they tell the people they have force there and they tell the people not to walk into the force because they don't return They don't come back So when those pods drop I've seen five or six pods drop out of that tree and they come down really quick But before they drop When when they fall from the tree They'll crackle up top and the branches as they're hitting the branches The pods the branches send the pods in different directions Now all this gravity straight down Now the branches kick the pods out 30 to 25 feet way beyond the base of the tree and You know, I've seen people that were almost hit Not walking on the sidewalk the sidewalk was coordinated off. They were out in the street And a pod came down About 10 feet away from these people I heard this scream and I turned around look And they were running down the street and I seen where the pod landed out in the street about 10 feet Now, um, I I have a garden out there You know, which is about maybe 50 feet away from the tree the trunk of the tree itself One day in spring Early april I was tilling my garden Turning the soil over and one day all of a sudden the wind started blowing And one of these fronds with stickers on it hit me straight in the back I didn't know what it was. I don't know if I screamed or not, but It did hurt, you know, the wind was blowing pretty hard And as time went along I sit outside near a pine tree Almost every day two to three hours And I see the pods fall You know, they fall in people's gardens. They almost hit people's cars They fall out on the sidewalk the streets. It's just a dangerous tree Not only that it has three different types of hazards that fall from that tree Little tiny pods you step on them.  It's back again You know working in trees. This is about one of the worst dangerous trees I've ever seen in my life or ever experienced Like I said, I sit out in the garden. I see these pods fall They come down a lightning speed. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Garrison. Oh, I'm out of time. Yes, you're out of time Thank you. Thank you Anyone else? My name is Ethel Rogers and I live at Silvercrest. I've lived there for 22 years This tree is very dangerous. They've been trying to take it down the whole time I've lived there and longer I was driving through the gate one time To park my truck And one of the pods just barely missed the front of my truck If I had been there two seconds sooner It would have hit the truck It's a very dangerous tree and it needs to be taken out Thank you Thank you. Uh, any one else? Is there anybody on zoom If you wish to make a comment via zoom, please raise your hand Chair weeks no hands are raised and uh, just an fyi. We have about six attendees With that, I'll go ahead and close the public hearing and bring it back to the commission. Um, are there any final questions? Um, then would somebody like to make a motion for the resolution? I move a resolution of the planning commission of the city of santa rosa denying an appeal and upholding the planning and economic development director's denial of a tree permit to remove an approximately 125 foot This is why no one wants to read this our acarya. Good. Really? Bunya bunya tree at 10 82nd street assessor's parcel number 009-082-003 City file number t r 22-062 and wait for the reading of the text Thank you. Is there a second a second? Thank you Okay, so, uh, we will start making comments. Um, so we'll start with uh, commissioner sanders Oh, I helped you start with someone else This is tough for me. Um, this is not easy. You know, I love trees. I love the salvation army I love for people to be able to walk freely throughout our city without fear of falling Some of the trees in our city are kicking up the sidewalks pretty bad I love the concept of private property, you know, what one should be able to do with their property um, the idea that we are potentially forcing the salvation army to Shoulder this expense. It's uh, and we know it's an expense And then you weigh that with you know, we have Other similar trees same tree as a matter of fact It would be really good to know what those costs were what what cost are we talking about? I think mr. DeWitt kind of nailed this on the on the Right on the head is it'd be nice to know what we're talking about in terms of maintenance how much right now just is Nebulous it's just sort of a concept that we're That that it's too much it's too much of a burden This is difficult. It's very difficult But as I sit here We the risk We all take them we all take risk every day we walk out of the house and do we remove a tree Where do we stop removing the trees? because Something might break something might fall something might You know, how do we drive down the street? How do we drive down the freeway something might something might and yet we find The way to uh, you know get our days done so With that said I I'm going to support the Resolution as it stands and I can make the findings to do so Thank you commissioner carter As commissioner sanders said this is a difficult one In in the history is It's long and fractured. Um I think the the choice here is between Protecting a resource that is essentially public street trees are public but the way we maintain those public resources is by uh asking our property owners to keep the trees healthy and keep the streets Free for passage and use by the public And that's done all over the city and by adopting such ordinances. We've determined that's reasonable In this case, I think there is a maintenance requirement that's unreasonable here No one would choose to plant a tree like this as a street tree And the the problems it causes continue I would certainly support If the staff gave any indication that there was room for negotiation on this one Tabling it and and allowing some sort of Mutual resolution to be made but As the ordinance is now written. I can't support it as the resolution is now written. I cannot support it Chair weeks, can I please just make a clarification? The tree is planted very close to the street, but it's on private property. It's not a street tree So just I understand it functions as a street tree though. Okay Uh, so if I could get some direction Um regarding uh commissioner carter suggestion around tabling Which was also the suggestion Of the appellant Yes, thank you chair weeks members of the commission Because this particular Application as we mentioned has an opportunity for a second appeal to the council Staff's recommendation would be for the commission to move forward with an action rather than continuing this and we would certainly You know work to gather additional information for the council should the applicant appeal it to the council Thank you Okay, then uh commissioner peterson um I think you've heard from my fellow commissioners. This is a surprisingly. I think challenging item in in front of us um Looking at at the findings from the city code uh that the director made. I think the thing that I Struggle with is This is not a native tree. This is not a live oak. This is not a valley oak a redwood And I think you know staff reference the rarity of this tree in this area I think that's because it's Not native to this area And We've essentially got two dueling opinions from arborists on the safety and You know what maintenance would be required Like my fellow commissioner. I think at this point With this particular tree The maintenance requirement is unreasonable and I would not support This resolution Mr. Deggan Thanks. Thanks guys This you know, this is a hard one obviously But it's true that we're surrounded by risk. We're also surrounded by trees And I have no doubt that if these trees were really as dangerous as They're telling us their particular tree is that we wouldn't have one at railroad square and we wouldn't have one at courthouse square um I also think and i'm not saying this to be flipped and it might Sound funny, but I think it'd be a lot easier to fundraise for the salvation army to maintain this tree on a yearly basis Then it would be to grow anything of this size and this height. We it's taken over 100 years to be this big and beautiful and and You know, but I was on Taylor mountain the top of Taylor mountain the other day and you can see this tree from the top with binoculars Um, I would much rather help them fundraise to do their regular maintenance than cut it down. So I will be Denying the appeal. Thank you commissioner Holton. All right So as all my fellow commissioners have stated This is most certainly a difficult item um, however Like planter Murray did, uh, I did quite a bit of research about the bunny bunny trees And I found out that uh, they typically live about 700 years Um, and I'm pretty sure that when the property was acquired by salvation army that tree was there Um, but that's beside the point Um, the point that I'd like to get at is there are alternative methods of Mitigating liability and concern So this bunny bunny trees are not exclusive to snow. It's santa rosa Uh, this has been an issue in other municipalities across the country There are a myriad of city state and articles Referencing the same thing. There's also a myriad of mitigation So they actually make netting that you can actually place around the base of the tree And it will actually catch a lot of that thing. So that is definitely something if the cost of actual maintenance for the tree is one that Salvation army doesn't want to continue to occur annually then maybe they might want to take a look at Looking into the possibility of netting systems or something else That will mitigate the danger So all that being said I most certainly will be uh denying uh in support of denying the appeal and um And I can make all the required findings Thank you. Commissioner sisco I think it's important to make sure that we're looking at um our policies and you know, we're not responsible for Any applicants about salvation armies budget and costs um and so And I don't want that responsibility To to be factoring that in can they afford it shouldn't be one of our reasons for Allowing the tree to be cut down as A tree owner owner myself with a lot of really really large trees. I was told by an arborist There are no safe trees And you know, we do what we do to maintain them like a couple of our commissioners have said There's risk in waking up in the morning and walking out the door So I think that uh like commissioner holton said there are mitigations that we take for all kinds of risk every day but I think um This is the fourth time that we've brought this in front of The city each time it's determined that um our policies for preservation apply and I'm going to support the resolution as it stands and deny the appeal Thank you. Um, I'm also going to be supporting the resolution and denying the appeal I'm not going to reiterate what my a few of my fellow commissioners said but um This has been around a long time and Like like has been said life is full of risks and It is following our policies. So, uh, I will be Approving the resolution denying the appeal supporting staff's recommendation So with that if we could um have a vote that was uh moved by commissioner sisco seconded by Commissioner dug in or vice chair dug in commissioner carter No commissioner sisco hi commissioner holton i commissioner peterson no commissioner sanders i vice chair dugin I Chair weeks i So that uh passes with five eyes and two nos and I do want uh you to Know that this action is final unless it's appealed With it the city clerk's office within 10 calendar days of today's decision pursuant to zoning code section 20 dash 62 0.030 And with that we'll take about a five minute break before our next item. Thank you Okay, I think we um are going to get started with our Next item So this is um Reordered item 7.1 Uh draft general plan santa rosa forward Uh miss meads. I think you will Be kicking it off Hi, good evening. Well, good afternoon chair weeks vice chair dug in. Yes I'm going to go ahead and get started on this item But I will be having my co-presenter and colleague um Beatrice Guerrero-Auno We're going to share the Share the information sharing with you. So let's go ahead and get started. Um the item tonight is Not chewing up. Okay Now we can get started There we go. It's always tricky for me. It shouldn't be but is I need my mouse Okay, so the item before you tonight is the city's draft general plan The general plan 2050 is the uh project that you guys have been participating with over A decent period of time and we're going to get to some details about that So as you know, a general plan looks at the built environment of a city which includes schools neighborhoods roads parks Where is housing? Where are new neighborhoods built? Where are stores built? It looks at all land use types and the location of them but in addition to land use A general plan looks at all aspects of a community It looks at what the fabric of the community is what makes santa rosa so livable so wonderful to be at That includes things like art and culture historic preservation things like climate resilience safety And all of the things in general that together combine to make santa rosa great So this general plan update process is known as santa rosa forward It is an opportunity that comes about every 10 or 15 years A general plan is the city's highest level planning document and provides a foundation and roadmap for how the city will change and Grow over a certain period of time The city's existing general plan was adopted in 2009 with a planning horizon year of 2035 So since that plan was adopted a lot of things have changed some of it just normal course of business A lot of state law changes And then there have been some local regional and national things that have Caused us to take a pause and want to reevaluate How we want the city to grow and that includes things like the pandemic the wildfires a reawakening of the need to create policies that are socially just Um looking at climate as it's changing All of those things were reasons for us to decide now is a good time to update this high level policy document That we call the general plan Why have a general plan well the state requires us to the state of california requires all cities counties other jurisdictions to create this long-term planning goal for a How a city will accommodate growth over a certain period of time There are nine required elements, which are listed here on the screen But how they are organized or addressed in a general plan Is not prescribed we can you know any city or jurisdiction can do it however they would like to So this general plan we've done things a little bit differently and we'll get to a little bit more of that in a moment So let's talk about how we got to where we are now. This has been a multi-year Effort it started back in the summer of 2020 so just about three years ago And the first thing to do was to develop a work plan And then what was called a community involvement strategy And the community involvement strategy was taking a look at how we wanted to Get the information we would need to create a document that fulfilled goals For the city all members of the city So we developed this outreach plan and ideas that we knew we would have the flexibility to adjust throughout the The process and each phase of the general plan update process We had to start with some type of a outreach Foundation and that's what the community involvement strategy did. We also established two advisory bodies a community action I'm sorry community advisory committee and a technical advisory committee Each that would provide different Support for this effort the cac the community advisory committee They prove they are sort of a liaison to the larger community and helped us with all of our outreach To make sure that we were reaching deep into the community And then the technical advisory committee is made up of internal and external stakeholders from a variety of neighborhoods agencies and subject matter experts to make sure that we are getting The the most information we can to help us develop a Wonderful plan for the future of the city of santa rosa. So we are currently in the draft general plan phase Before getting to the draft general plan phase and after the community involvement strategy We did a bunch of research and created the existing conditions report and that looked at things like demographics economic development health outcomes Equity in the city that type of thing. So we we it's a really thick document But it gives a really good baseline for where santa rosa was at the start of this process and from that visioning that we did early on Community engagement that happened throughout all of this process, which you'll hear more about later We developed three different land use alternatives. We called them and they were A way of looking at how the city would accommodate the growth required for the number of housing units planned and How that how we could best configure those in the city So i'll talk a little bit more about that in a moment Once the alternative was the preferred alternative alternative was determined we Decided to move forward with drafting goals policies and actions that would implement that preferred alternative And that's where we're at now. So it might look like we're kind of in the middle But there's been a ton of work and we're actually nearing Somewhat the end of this process. We still are Going to be releasing an environmental impact report that should be coming out sometime in november And for the environment environmental impact report, we did a water supply assessment So santa rosa water did that for us to evaluate um existing and future water If we would have enough to meet the growth Anticipated in the general plan and that's already gone to council and was adopted And then as part of the process once we've figured out all of the goals policies and actions that we are going to move forward as a final general plan we will do and um Zoning code and amendments to make sure that all of our policies are consistent with the new general plan goals policies and actions And then finally we will go through a whole another public review and adoption process We'll be coming to you again and then city council sometime early next year These are some of the work products that have come from these different phases that I just briefly Hit on there the community view involvement strategy existing conditions report is really beef Beefy lots of technical information Which we've synthesized into a briefing book The vision statement which i'll get more to in a moment the alternatives workbook and then the final preferred alternative map All of this is available on the city's santa rosa forward website Which we will provide that information Just a bit later in the presentation Mr. Dewitt, please wink tell public comments So as part of the visioning um for this project there was a lot of community outreach and through that Discussion with staff and looking at all of the existing conditions and where we felt there might be some things that needed some new innovative ideas They we came up with 13 complimentary ideals That you can see in the word flower to the right of this slide And then once these this word flower and these words were established that gave us a guide We formulated um the general plan vision statement, which i'm going to read to us Santa rosa is a diverse equitable and sustainable community built on civic engagement that empowers everyone to provide and support Equal and affordable opportunities to obtain good housing education and jobs To enjoy vibrant cultural events and arts and to live healthy lives in resilient neighborhoods that adapt to social and environmental change So that's a lot. That's that's a lofty aspiration But we feel that santa rosa can do it and deserves nothing less. So That has served as a guide for as we've moved forward into this process So as i mentioned Once we did the existing conditions and then developed our vision statement We decided to create different alternatives for the public to evaluate on how we would achieve The growth that we envision through the year 2050, which is the planning horizon year for the General plan that we are working on at this point The the existing general plan already had A ton of housing units anticipated So we didn't need to increase that number of housing units But what we looked at was how best to disperse them throughout the city to reach the other goals that we had incurred including equity sustainability Reducing greenhouse gas emissions and such so the first alternative was called established corridors It really built off the downtown station area specific plan where we look primarily at building up the downtown area and With the most high density housing and you know the most transit and that type of thing the second alternative looked more at Including the same type of downtown focus and downtown growth But also recognizing that there are other areas within the city that are also really prime for maybe just improved transit or improved Increased housing density maybe additional public services are necessary to create areas where it ends up being a complete neighborhood so that you would be able to With an easy walk or bike ride ideally Meet all of your daisy daily needs get everything you need healthy food a doctor All of those types of things so that's what the neighborhood main streets alternative Considered housing everywhere is more status quo. It's very similar to what the existing general plan considers which is pretty much housing anywhere without as much regard for Where it makes the most sense to achieve the goals that we decided we need to achieve through this general plan update process So would we decide well through a lot of community input planning commission input city council input surveys lots of outreach Folks said we want a combination of number one and number two So that's what you see here. It's very difficult in the small text that you see on this map to to really make You know a whole lot out on it But it is included in the executive summary and the preferred alternative workbook And the general plan itself which all of these documents are available again. Like I mentioned online So you can see here that it includes all of the The downtown Growth and intensity as we mentioned before and then these areas of change which you'll hear a little bit more about So that's how we got to where we are all of those phases all of those work products All of those steps have built off each other to get to the point that we're at tonight asking you to review the draft general plan 2050 it As i've mentioned there's a lot of goals policies and actions that really Propel us into the future that we would like to see here at the city the general plan is Made the structure of the general plan includes all of the mandated elements And there we've combined certain topics that we felt like really had a good synergy to achieve the goals and policies They work together really well land use and economic development for example is one chapter The set chapter two urban design historic preservation art and culture. That's entirely optional elements The city recognizes how important those Components are to increase and improve santa rosa's quality of life So we consider them incredibly important and they all work together in one chapter Chapter three looks at circulation open space conservation and greenhouse gas reductions so all of those things work together to Look at how people move through and across the city of santa rosa and um Beatrice in a moment in a little bit will go through a little bit more information about what's included in that chapter, but all of this structure is based on Putting things together that that have a synergy Chapter five again safety climate resilience noise public services and facilities Looks at how to keep santa rosa safe. It looks at our Our hazard assessments it looks at how we can mitigate the change in climate It includes things like education our water storm water recycled water and solid waste It looks at public police and fire health equity and environmental justice is our our sixth chapter And it is a new requirement But also something that we would include anyways and include some really important policies looking at how to improve the health of our community and then also To note a housing element is required as part of a general plan They are required to be updated every eight years And santa rosa just this year in april adopted a new housing element So we are not including any changes to that housing element and that's why it's not specifically in the documents you see now But that housing element will be included with the final general plan as adopted originally so to keep in mind when looking through these different chapters the The structure is we start with a goal and that goal is the the end result. We want to see It's our aspiration for the end product of of this plan What do we want to see overall and then supporting the goal are policies and actions which can provide the regulatory framework They can provide work plans for departments and all of that stuff How do we get to achieve the goals of this plan? And now i'm going to turn it over to my esteemed colleague Beatrice Guerrero Anna Thank you. Sherry Good night planning commissioners chair weeks By chair vice chair dugen. My name is Beatrice Guerrero and I work for the planning department and a senior planner there But i'm also my role is health inequity public health inequity planner so our Our work in the general plan has also been embedded by a health inequity vision Part of this was The collaboration that we've had with kaiser permanente in terms of creating Healthy city policies on on this general plan and i'm just mentioning this As I start the presentation with one of the maps that defines One of the topics that addresses equity issues in in the city And this is the equity priority areas map as you can see the purple areas in the city What is this well, basically we we identify the areas in the city that have been under invested and How did we do this? Why did we do it first of all to create policies that reverse the under investment that we have on those areas in the city and How was this created? basically three Three items that that we used as as the methodology following the metropolitan transportation commission Methodology that has been adopted by the plan bay area 2050 And it is number one identifying low-income communities And this is in our case the percentage of poverty and we used the highest percentage of poverty in the sonoma county So that means we're identifying census Blocks and i clarify census blocks and not census Not census tracks because it's a smaller area and we wanted to identify at a smaller level What we were talking about Number two, we have the highest concentrations of communities of color and the reason that we Did this analysis was also because you probably are aware that Santa Rosa as many other american cities in the in the 30s had a lot of discriminatory policies that were connected to land use Including redlining but also racial covenants that prohibited Communities of color to live in particular areas of the cities So that's the reason that these two variables were included. The third one is data from call embarrassed screen, which Defines the areas of the city that are overburdened by pollution so that's how we built this map and That's why we included as some of the areas where we apply specific policies that you would see throughout the whole document The second map that i'm presenting It's the areas of change and this map was built as you can see has some areas that match the equity priority areas of the city, however This areas of change match what sherry previously presented on Related to the preferred alternative that the residents and the city and the city council as well as planning commission chose for For our preferred preferred alternative where we focused on neighborhoods that have Neighborhood centers as well as the potential to become areas where we concentrate growth as well as providing services and other Needs that communities have at a walking walking or or biking distance this focused on on our ghg reduction in mission and This areas of change are also relevant because throughout the whole general plan We talk about specific policies that address these areas of change So that said sherry already helped us describe the general topics that were included on each of of this chapters and Elements of our general plan, but i'm just going to go a little bit in connection to What are the chapter goals as well as the new ideas that have been included in this general plan and For anyone who would like to review the specific goals policies and actions We actually are are going to have them here for for the public But besides that they're public on our website as sherry was mentioning we have documents that All our community can access at center rosa forward.com. So if you have not Been able to see this this this slides or have been Able to see the general plan please access our website so you can get the details if it's not If you're not able to see what we have on the screen right now. So that said For for the land use and economic development part of the of the general plan. We're basically focusing on Doing Building all the housing that we need to build to comply with our housing element But at the same time serving our community needs and we know there's a A big number of housing units that have to be allocated throughout the city However, we also want our residents to have Um To have their needs addressed as well as protect our environment And that's the reason that we're focusing on a Centric growth as you probably saw on on on the map and the preferred alternative We also want our investment to be neighborhood Focused which means we are paying attention that people can have access to their daily needs at in an easy In an easy way by biking or walking which is something that we mentioned before But I am just highlighting it again Because this is a big part of what would come next and I don't know that we have mentioned this before But I don't mention it before we go there Our dhg reduction strategy greenhouse gas emission reduction strategy would be available in october so this part of our Our general plan that we're presenting today includes policies that are already addressing climate change and green greenhouse Gas emissions. However, we are still missing a big part of it that will be presented In the next in the next month. So I'm just I'm just saying this so we can continue Giving you this information ahead of time There's two ideas that we are highlighting for the land use and economic development chapter element And the first one has to do with requiring construction measures that Make exposure to our exposure to air pollution less severe for development um doing it with 500 feet away from highways 101 and 12 and we can elaborate more in this in relationship to this policy if you're interested in Besides this one. We have another idea included in the goals policies and actions that we have in this in this chapter, which is supporting neighborhood centered businesses and this is something that has been requested by community members that we paid attention to And that we included in here We're talking about micro entrepreneurs. Uh, basically as well as mobile food home-based business and other opportunities that are not only Focused on what cal what the state of california is doing but also what our residents have been requested through through the community engagement that we have been doing our next Chapter element is circulation open space conservation and greenhouse gas reduction as mentioned before We have some of the elements of the greenhouse gas reduction Strategy in here, but this is not the final document. We will receive it and share it with the community starting in october and it is on the Next presentation that we're going to have on the climate And the climate action subcommittee, so that will be the first November 1st in case you want to know when it's going to be presented Um That said for the chaptery goals in this in this element. We have um A lot of connection that sherry mentioned before of our integrated land use with transportation systems And I I'm mentioning this because transportation is a big part of our greenhouse gas emissions 60% of it So we are very conscious that our land use has to match the services and and access to transportation that we provide And besides these we also want To have a safe and accessible transportation system and considering active transportation modes This includes pedestrians Bikes and other modes of transportation that are not cars and We also want to ensure that traffic Related impacts are mitigated through the goals that we have in this in this element And last but not least you probably know that this is a goal that we have That is achieving net carbon neutrality by 2030, which is a challenging goal, but it's included in this chapter The new ideas that we have in this in this element are basically three New ideas we have a lot of of previous things that we inherited from from our previous general plan, but we want to highlight Number one prioritize our transportation investment in active transportation modes This is something something very new that we Actually worked on with our transportation and public works team and this means focusing our investment in prioritizing modes that are active So this is a big shift from what we had on our previous general plan And we're mentioning it and it's connected to all the objectives that you have heard as well as the vision of the city That our residents have created Second we also have to continue reducing parking requirements and number three we have Prohibiting drive-throughs and this is very much related to to the greenhouse Gas reduction strategy that we have that said I'm going to talk a little bit more about the urban design history preservation and arts and culture I think sherry mentioned a big part of what was included and as the goals of this chapter, which is basically Engaging our community in terms of urban design and historical review of our of our Properties and things that are owned by the city of santa rosa But also that are around our community as well as fostering arts and cultures for Placemaking which is something that our city has taken care of and that is pretty unique and that we want to continue fostering The ideas that have been included in here are connected to many different topics that Have been already mentioned, but there's two new ideas that I want to highlight number one Providing planting strips with large canopy trees between roads and sidewalks. This is something that has been Mentioned plenty of times at our residence and that we decided to include in here Which is part of of urban design But we believe that it's also part of something that is pretty unique to the city of santa rosa And that we want to keep and foster and continue including in neighborhoods that have been under invested Which are also neighborhoods that are considered I forget the term I apologize But that have higher temperatures and that trees can help reduce Heat in those areas. So that said We also want to remove obstacles for owners of historic properties to support preservation We have heard about this specific idea that is a little bit complicated. I want to elaborate a little bit more on it We're we're thinking about property owners who want to Like keep their properties. However, it's pretty expensive and the process is complicated So we want to make that an easier To reduce the burden for for them figuring out how we can do that This is not something that we have finalized on how we want to do However, I just want to mention this because this has been something that we have heard through the Community engagement that we have had within the community Element number five safety climate Climate resilience noise and public services and facilities as mentioned before basically this element focuses on reducing Harm for it for our community and taking care of the safety for for santa rosa residents specifically in this in this In this element We have two new ideas that we know are ideas that are still in the process of exploration And I want to mention that this These ideas were supported also by our fire department and can be elaborated on we have started We are including Some policies to do pilot programs on proactively reallocating existing development in high High fire risk areas of the city and to explore also options to prohibit increased density in In the same fire prone areas so This two new ideas would put us as one of the first jurisdictions including manage retreat, which is the term that is usually Used by by people in this in this field But we want to we want to bring it in because we know there's communities that are interested it also This is something that that has has harmed our community in terms of of Risks and we want to be aware of it and try to figure out how else we can work with it Last but not least we have the health equity and environmental justice element This is a new element in terms of the environmental justice for it This is our requirement that we have under sv 1000 And the element does not require to have health inequity in the in the element however Because of the health perspective and equity perspective that our general plan has we believe this was a A good part for us to include it since it's very cohesive with the topics that are included and just to mention A few of the of the topics that have been included in this in this chapter We are including A lot of of different initiatives that are actually That came up from from workshops and community residents and some of them are connected to How the health and the well-being of our community can be fostered through the built environment Which is something that we have not explored before in in our specific general plan that that we are including in this in this new element as well as advancing health equity and when we talk about health equity we're talking about The disparate health outcomes that we have in our community due to different Built environment connections, but as well as different inequities that are faced through different Demographics in in our population including age ethnicity race as well as as many other demographics so For this chapter, we are also including new ideas and we want to highlight a few of them and Um, first of all, we are including um health in all policies. This is a type of of idea and Approach for for the city where we will try to make decisions made on people's health And we talk when we talk about people's health in this chapter We make very clear that we're not only talking about diseases We're talking about the well-being of community, which means having access to green spaces having access to a walkable distance to the places that provide services to community members as well as having access to clean air and Places that are not polluted to to leave in so Besides this we included also restrictions for tobacco and alcohol sales where they're already high concentrations of them So this these are topics that we're exploring. These were particularly included because we know there's there's a racial A racial focus on on this analysis that a lot of researchers have have seen where We know that communities that are communities of color usually have a higher concentration of this Of these types of businesses that do not foster the health of the community and Additionally to this we're also proposing that stores as well as supermarkets and liquor stores or other neighborhood markets can Carry fresh produce and in their in their Establishments the reason that we're including this is to address foot deserts. The name foot deserts has been changed to health equity priority foot foot access priority areas and we want to make clear that We have a few of them in the city and you can see the map on the document that we have provided As the general plan draft 2050 Besides this we also Are including a policy that is requiring an additional review a conditional use permit for a new restaurant chains And to also address an at a 300 feet Buffer in between fast-food restaurants This is exactly the same logic that I mentioned before particular for neighborhoods that are low income as well as Neighborhoods that have a higher percentage of communities of color last but not least a big issue a big issue and a big topic that we're including in this in this element is Foot access in urban agriculture this for this specific topic. We partnered with different organizations also Hosted a specific workshop for for this topic where we partnered With the food food system alliance and the county of sunoma that help us address the policies that were included in this in this document so Just To mention where we are at in the community involvement strategy that cherry mentioned at the beginning of the of the Presentation we have included for this specific draft some Some methods that we are using to receive Feedback on the policies and goals and actions that we're including on on this draft The first one we have been hosting open houses and pop-ups We have hosted five in-person workshops one on each quadrant of the city and one additional one that has been focused on food access in urban agriculture One virtual workshop that was hosted yesterday on zoom and we have been attending public events as well as Events that community members have invited Invited us to and we have been tabling and on 10 different places around the city where people are gathering at so That's the way that we have been trying to get to people who are not necessarily aware of What is going on in terms of planning in the city and trying to get closer to them to provide them with an opportunity to provide feedback We have an online survey that will be Active till October the first just before we release the greenhouse gas emission Strategy reduction document and this online survey is both in English and Spanish And includes all the new policies and actions that have been included in the in the general plan and we were very Focused on including the things that can be controversial for the community because we want to hear the feedback We have a conveyor app on our website Santa Rosa forward.com This is a platform that the city owns where the document can be reviewed in pdf And we have collaborative comments coming from the community. So they can be very punctual and can be Liked or disliked by other community members who see the comments We also are receiving comments received by email on Santa Rosa forward At srcd.org or they're coming from our website all those comments you have them on the correspondence that was received for for this item today and Last but not least we will be hosting focus groups with equity priority populations of Santa Rosa We are waiting to close the survey to know which demographics we missed or which Uh each ranges we did not address and we will be doing an additional outreach in connection to the to the People that we believe was not included in this in this Survey or in the in the involvement strategy that we have been implementing Uh, this is our um our link to the general plan survey that is both in English and Spanish And if people of the public would like to scan the qr code We have it there it will get you directly to the to the survey And it will be active as I mentioned before until october the first our website That was mentioned throughout the whole presentation is Santa Rosa forward dot com you will find here all the documents information and materials that have been mentioned throughout the presentation As well as um the links to all the recordings that we have Throughout the project and the sum Meeting that we hosted yesterday will be posted to for people who have not had the chance to see Or participate on any of the presentations or open houses that we have had Just for general Information the next steps that we have for this general plan draft 2050 is we are presenting um to city council on september 26 we are Presenting the greenhouse gas reduction strategy and we're opening it for public review and engagement starting on october and we'll go through uh november 2023 And as sherry mentioned before, uh, we'll be doing the environmental impact report public review And that will be around november our final general plan And final environmental impact report will be um ready by spring 2024 And our final adoption And general plan and er certification would be the last step of of this Of this project And I think that's all that we have for for today in the presentation And we're happy to respond to any questions and hear your comments. Thank you Thank you very much. Um I think how we're going to handle this tonight is um if we have any specific questions of staff ask now And then we'll do the public hearing portion and then bring it back to the commission for comments So this is now the time if you have like Yes Sorry, sorry to interrupt. Um, I just um, there was a question earlier about copies of the general plan itself So as mentioned, um copies of the full general plan are on our website And we also have a copy at the front counter at the planning and economic development department and they are at Local libraries as well But what we do have that is up at the top of the chambers that anybody Here in the chambers can get a copy of is a summary of the goals policies and actions from the general plan And then also an executive summary of the general plan itself So those are up as I said at the top of the chambers if anybody here wants to grab one Thank you So does anybody have specific questions? Um, I do so let me start it off Um, so you can see kind of how I think how we're going to do this so, um Will the city council be given our comments when you go to them in uh later this month Will you have an opportunity to provide them with kind of our themes tonight because I'm sure we'll end up with some kind of themes Yeah, we'll summarize your comments. Um And I think that's really important to point out In the slide that Beatrice went over it's not We typically get a summary from the consultants from all of the engagement per phase And so for the draft general plan phase because the survey is still open and that type of thing We don't have a concise summary of community comments yet Obviously, we've heard things at the pop-ups and at the community workshops But I just want to make it clear that especially to folks here That the emails that were included with this item packet are such a very small sliver Of the um comments we've heard from the community. So we can Relay what you guys have said here um at the City council meeting, but we won't be providing that big bulk We well, we may actually have it probably not not. I'm not sure We may have the big summary by then but we can definitely summarize your comments Great. Thank you. That was a very long went and answered your question And then the other question I have just because I see a lot of bike folk here Is there I heard and I'm not sure if I was If I heard correctly or if there is and I'm just not paying attention Is there going to be a revised bicycle master plan or call something else now? I can respond to that question. I know our uh transportation and public work team Is updating their active transportation plan that is now the name of the bike and pedestrian master plan So they're going to be doing that this year starting this year But that said we also want to mention that Yeah, the the We've been in constant communication with them as well as addressing the letters that we have received. So that is that has Created meetings within the planning team and the transportation and public work teams and I know that as of this week They also met with the team that is Here the organization that is here to talk a little bit more about the details of the requested. We're addressed in the letter Thank you So any other questions before I open the public hearing? Vice chair dug in I have one bringing up the active transportation plan and its Revision that's coming up forward Are you I know you're making a Presentation similar to this one to the cultural heritage board. I believe coming up. Are you going to make a similar one to the bicycle of the advisory committee? Yeah, we actually did um a few weeks ago. I think um two or three weeks ago We presented to the bike and pedestrian advisory board too. That was that was probably our first board that uh where we presented the general plan to You're very welcome Mr. Sanders Thanks for all that. Well, that was a lot And thank you for this whole process. It's pretty amazing I'm nervous about it because this is not important, right? Um, but my question is when you were doing the community outreach. Did we go far and wide? Did we were we out in oakmont? We're up in found grove where we You know Molesbury, where where did it all go down? We hosted the in-person workshops on the four quadrants of the city we selected areas where that word Accessible through transit and pedestrian activity, but particularly your question about uh fountain grove I don't think we hosted any Any um events over there, but we did one on You attended that one. What was um Yeah, we hosted one at oakmont. We did not host it. We attended we attend to any invitation that uh organizations or community members Offer us and we're still in that process just to mention a few organizations like have invited us and we're doing a second round of of Community engagement with them next week. We have a meeting with sonoma land trust for example But just since we're here in in in council meetings We're offering this to any organization neighborhood group that wants us to come to them We are happy to do it and we have done and attended every request that we have had so Not for every neighborhood as of the pop-ups. We selected places where people were gathering already. So we did The wildfire ready event that the fire department hosted we did Some of the races that the city had in downtown center rose and the square We also have been attending The rose and parties that have been hosted at mitote. We have been attending some of the bike rides that have been hosted by by Some of the organizations we have been attending Um, I mean farmers markets farmers markets. Yeah, we have done more than 50 event we've attended more than 50 Events and we have long lists of all the places that we have gone to honestly in particular for the pop-ups. We just Played it by by the schedule that organizations have city events Are hosted at But if you have any ideas, we're more than happy to to take them to we still have some time And if I may commissioner sanders, we did um have one of our community workshops at maria curio high school So while not exactly in fountain grove, it did represent the northeast quadrant Thank you And it I can also elaborate a little bit more on community engagement if you would like Um, it's the statistics are actually available on our website, but we do Recognize that we have attended more than 100 events meetings activities and um had Surveys included in that so 100 100 plus activities Now this is not just specific to the draft phase that we're in This is all encompassing the the phases to get to where we're at We've had more than four thousand three hundred and forty individual community members either attending or giving us a comment Reached out to more than 80 community groups organizations and neighborhoods And more than 21,540 Individual community member comments and ideas so And just to add to that that does not include what we have done for this draft because we're still waiting to gather the whole number of Events and um people who have been participating in this process You make me tired So just for all listening if what i'm hearing you say is if there's a group out there who wants to hear from you You're on it And so hear that now if you have a group and you want to get involved in this process It's being offered Wherever in our in our town, right? So thank you for that and also one more thing I just want to brag a little bit more. Um, we will be presenting to every single board or commission except for And i'm not sure exactly why we skipped them the um the bpu and not the economic development subcommittee because That is made up of of just three council members not just as and not important, but since we're going to council already Acknowledging that the climate action subcommittee is also comprised of three council members, but because we are Focusing on the greenhouse gas reduction reduction strategy and climate in general at that meeting That's why we are attending their meeting on november 1st And you did a fantastic job at the presentation at the waterways advisory committee. So Good job Any other specific questions? Okay with that i'll go ahead and open the public hearing on this item If you have comments, uh, please go to the podium And you'll be called upon in order, but i'm am going to um Make a couple comments first one is i'm going to take the blue card first mr. Dewitt since you filled out the blue card um, and then also if um Since there are a number of you from probably i think the same organization if Somebody says something um, and you want to repeat it. Please don't repeat it. Just say ditto or something Um, that would be great. So mr. Dewitt you're up first I'm going to use the overhead Typically i'd go ladies first The overhead thank you She's working on it. That's good See it's a delicate line just one moment You know rather than hold up the meeting and all these people who are up here We'll just go with it. I'm going to wing it as they say All right, my name is dwayne. Dewitt. I'm from roseland And I want to thank all of the staff the kind ladies that have worked on this plan I especially want to thank miss beach or succunia and uh Amy lile Who was here and they used to come a year ago? They came out to roseland a couple times and met with us community members 10 people each time Separate people people really like that. So we're inviting them back right now based on what mr. Sanders said Pointing out that yes, it's important to come and speak to people in smaller groups and give them the news to use There's a lot of people in our area which is known as a Area of um equity priority That's because we're a disadvantaged underserved and overburdened community in the roseland shopping center area The thing that's important here You can see that they had meetings And then here it said reserve your spot So somebody saw this and they thought well you have to reserve to go to these meetings People didn't go from our area So here on this map Which was just put up here today in the past they used to have the actual general plan document here in a binder where we could look at it 30 years ago The process was actually much better for us because you could go through the pages and see all the different stuff Now you can't even see the parks so well That we're looking at over here in our area of roseland. They used to have symbols that would show you Where the parks were going to be? And if you'll remember any of you that when I first started to come here The whole thing was About our area being the most underserved and under parked area of the entire city so Neighborhood parks pocket parks. That's what you need more of think a humble park just down the street here I've been going there all my life a wonderful spot. Juilliard park things like that We've been advocating that there would be a greenway Along roseland creek We helped to advocate for the city to be given land purchased by the agricultural preservation and open space district to then become A park and preserve which we have been now working with Our representative eddie alvarez and his representative on the board of community services Madonna feather crews of pomo indian to have that called pomo park and preserve And make sure it's a neighborhood park not a community park Make sure the preserve is an important part of it which in the last general plan. They said you could have special parks That that needs to be kept in the future I'll let all these bicyclists now come up to talk. I ride my bike too and you know that but See you out on the road somewhere all the best to you Thank you, mr. Dewitt. So if you could when you come up to the podium and there's a button on the side, thank you It's not your first rodeo If you could please state your name for the record And you'll have three minutes and you see the clock Thanks. Hello everyone. My name is alexa forrester And I am one of the co-leads with the all volunteer group bikeable santa rosa First of all, I want to thank you all for taking this very seriously And studying this matter and I want to thank the amazing team that has put in so many hours to getting this great plan in front of you I wanted to provide a little context for why we're here We are definitely aware that there's an active transportation plan in the works. We were at the b-pab when These fine folks presented there a couple Last month and we plan to be there next week when they kick off the atp planning process We are worried that some of the language that is in the general plan will constrain And undermine the goals of the active transportation plan And so we are action we are asking you to look at the detailed language That might be at cross purposes with some of the of the overall goals, which we really support I also just want to take a moment to remind the commission Of the many benefits that we get every time someone chooses to get around town by foot or by bike When people travel in that way they create no air pollution.  They do less damage to our roads. They create less traffic They leave more parking open for those who really need it and they help contribute to better overall health There are also subtler less tangible benefit benefits that accrue One of our volunteers told me that their favorite part of riding a bike Is that they can sneak past the kids playing basketball in the street without interrupting their game Given how good it is for our city and our communities when people choose active transportation Reason would have it that city planners and road engineers would be going out of their way to ensure our streets And roads accommodate such travel Unfortunately, the situation we have had for the past decades and still currently have mostly is the opposite Right now roads throughout the city, especially our collector roads Arterials and intersections are designed to prioritize automobile level of service and speed above all else The design of these roads sends a clear message to users if you choose to go by car You're covered. But if you choose active transportation, the city makes no promises This has to change it has to be clearly stated in the guiding document for our city the general plan And then it needs to be backed up by detailed language that supports the priority and accommodation of active transportation users. Thank you Thank you Next Hi everyone, my name is chris Gunther. I'm also one of the co-leaders of bikeable Santa Rosa Um, I also want to say thanks to the planning team and everyone else for all the work That's already gone into this plan and to the commission for hosting this discussion tonight There's a lot to like in this plan Ditto to a lot of what alexa said from bikeable's perspective the acknowledgement of the need for more multimodal transportation options Including building out a complete and connected bike network is really welcome But I want to draw the commission's attention To some of the bigger picture concerning transportation in the city Which I think is illustrated by the plan's approach to the issue of vehicle miles traveled or vmt It's well understood that high levels of vmt correlate with the host of challenges faced by cities like ours Including air and noise pollution climate change traffic congestion increased traffic violence high infrastructure costs and the list goes on For these reasons the plan rightly endorses the goal of reducing vmt and However, it sets no specific target for how far or how fast And although many of the policies and actions that articulates are encouraging They're not sufficiently strong or coherent enough to ensure real progress Worse lurking in the plan are some policies and actions that will actively undermine the effort to reduce vmt Most conspicuously as alexa mentioned the continued reliance on autobase level of service as the primary metric guiding the design of our city streets and intersections And with it plans for massive and costly expansions in road capacity to address traffic congestion I understand why city officials think we need to build big new road projects In addition to managing traffic impacts There's just a fundamental need to ensure that people can get where they need to get to go or where they need to go So that they in the city as a whole can thrive The problem is this approach doesn't work Whatever temporary improvement might be achieved is nearly always erased by the additional vmt these projects induce So then we're right back where we started only with more public debt More pollution and greenhouse gas emissions more dangerous streets and lower quality of life The only long-term solution for traffic congestion is building mixed-use neighborhoods and creating viable alternatives to driving Giving residents safe convenient ways to get their needs met without a car and vehicle miles Sorry Without a car and vehicle miles traveled will fall and along with them traffic congestion will too In cities around the country and the world this principle has been demonstrated again and again We simply cannot build our way out of traffic and we will continue to drive the city into bankruptcy if we try It is time to move past the failed traffic solutions of the last 70 years and chart a different course One that prioritizes genuine mobility options for citizens and doesn't force people to drive If traffic is a genuine concern for the city then a bold vmt reduction target is the key way to address that concern And such a target will also support progress toward nearly every other goal of this plan and our community including Climate mitigation and resilience economic vibrancy fiscal responsibility public health and equity We're excited to help make this future a reality. Thank you. Thank you Planning commissioners. Thanks for giving me an opportunity to comment. Can you speak a little louder and closer to the mic? Thanks. Can you hear me now? Yeah, okay My name is avry figaroa And I live with my husband and two children in a neighborhood to the south of hoan avenue My kids both attend schools visit friends participate in extracurricular activities in the neighborhoods just to the north of hoan avenue They are physically capable of walking or riding to all of these destinations And in fact, they would enjoy the chance to do so But more often than not we drive them where they need to go because the roads are too dangerous for kids outside of cars Sometimes I worry I'm being overprotective and start considering giving them freedom and independence to venture north on their own But then I read another story of a pedestrian or cyclist being hit on a santa rosa road And I decide it isn't worth the risk This week it was a student walking to calmstock middle school a few days earlier a pedestrian on sabasta pool road The week before that a young man on college avenue last year It was atticus on his way to spring lake middle school where my son goes When are we going to say enough is enough? These incidents are not inevitable Other cities have demonstrated that it is possible to dramatically reduce the frequency and severity of traffic violence with the right changes to street infrastructure It's not technically difficult nor particularly expensive to make the needed changes What we do need is the political will We need bold leadership and a clear consistent message If streets around a school do not ensure that the children can make it safely to school on foot or on bike Then those streets are failures and they need to be redesigned Please ensure that our general plan prioritizes transportation networks such as connected and protected bike lanes and projects like the south East greenway project that allow our children to move freely and safely around their communities. Thank you for listening Thank you Next Hello, my name is justin borton Hello planning commission. I had a whole nice speech written out, but i'm going to ditch it and just talk to you From the heart. I am a bike commuter. I am a father of four A domestic partner to one I ride my kids to school most days and uh, you know with four kids you'd think i'd get up here and talk about safety and Describe some of the difficult routes that we have to take, you know to get from the school to the library or to the library To their mom's house or you know, whatever that may be and it's It is difficult, but we manage, you know We can we can be a large enough group sometimes that we can occupy a whole lane of traffic um But what I want to talk about instead is The vibrancy of our community now my kids are growing older and actually two of them are Adults now, which is weird But uh, I would like for them to be able to stay in this community and they have a desire to And in order for them to want to stay here Santa rosa needs to become a better place to live And what do I mean by better place?  You don't want four more cars driven by my kids on the road You'd rather have them safely traveling around town Um, but a but a community where my kids can you know go from high school Or from the junior college or from santa rosa middle school to downtown Spend some money at the candy shop go to the mall Get home. I mean that's a place where we want to live And that's the place where we're gonna stay and that's the place where we're gonna continue to invest and um And so I encourage you to please consider bold action Um in order to create a more livable and and and bikeable Santa Rosa, so thank you for your time Thank you Hello My name is jenny bard and I am Want to thank you for your time and all the two years of work that has gone into this plan I have my santa rosa forward tote bag That I got I think three years ago I just want to start by applauding the staff for the plan that was mentioned that Specifies establishing a framework that prioritizes investments in active transportation over projects that benefit vehicle travel This is a first for santa rosa and we can't emphasize enough how important that is And how important it is that all the accompanying policies and action items support that goal So I just want to highlight your attention on the letter that bikeable santa rosa presented To you it has very specific language that will help get the city there To meet your climate goals your equity goals your active transportation and health goals So in your packet is very specific language that will strengthen what's there It also identifies inconsistencies across the plan as we know when you're trying to put a whole report together You forget what's in the first you don't forget But you haven't gone back to make the changes to a company the changes you made in another part They did that we're very fortunate to have had their Their expertise and brains looking looking into it Um We know transportation is a leading generator of greenhouse gases and that Thus we have a most central opportunity for ghg reductions. I'm sure all of you Are frankly frightened by the amount of climate catastrophe that is exploding around us The quickest way we can get Reduced emissions and improve our community health and connectivity is to make it easier and safer for people to ride a bicycle So I urge you to incorporate all the specific suggestions since I have 47 seconds. I'll include one Incorporating the use of national association of city transportation officials Otherwise known as NACTO design guidelines for urban streets as the default standards for design of streets within the city's control if you do that It defaults to all the best practice Street designs that will make it easier for us as cyclists And even walkers and people in wheelchairs to get around similarly The general plan must include greater specific goals for for reductions in vmt This also is so necessary to meet the city's climate goals. Thank you so much for your time Thank you Hello, I'm Emily sharton. I'm the advocacy coordinator for the Sonoma county bicycle coalition Um, and I also want to of course thank the city and the staff for all of the hard work on this draft Um, we've submitted our comments to the planning commission and writing So I won't take long tonight. Um, but we definitely want to support all of the comments You've heard from the bikeable santa rosa team The bike coalition agrees with many of the goals and actions in the draft And it's highlighting of the importance of building a complete and connected bike network That's safe for users of all ages and abilities And I think quite simply as as you've heard from other speakers tonight one of the most Noteworthy actions included in the plan is the provision that specifies Establishing a framework that actually prioritizes investments in active transportation Over projects that benefit vehicle travel We of course fully support this shift in priorities and we look forward to become a guiding vision as the city finalizes the general plan And works to achieve its goals Thanks Thank you Is there anybody else in the chamber who'd like to speak on this item? Okay, then we'll go to zoom Chair weeks. There is one, uh, there are two hands raised. Okay. Thank you Caleb weeks. I'm going to allow you to speak You may unmute yourself and you'll have three minutes to comment. Please identify yourself Good evening. My name is kellen weeks on the policy director of generation housing Thank you so much share weeks commissioners and staff for being here this evening for this very important item I just want to start by you know, as did everyone thanking staff For all the work they put into this I know it's been a really really challenging process And we're nearing the end and thank you so much for investing all this time and energy into it And for the sake of chair weeks, I will say ditto Not to belabor the points of of all the regional partners who have stated things before we are in complete alignment and thank them all for their efforts in time That they've invested on a volunteer basis in this process It's it's certainly notable and really a testament to our community and the interest that we are hoping to Uh, essentially secure as we proceed Forward with santa rosa's plan. So I'll just close by, you know, noting the simple fact that housing is not an island It exists in a matrix of transportation and land use policies that either facilitate or or frustrate our collective well-being and And given that transportation accounts for over half the city's greenhouse gas emissions Really, we hope that uh more specificity and and more concrete I think commitments come forward and it certainly sounds based on what the staff has said during the presentation That would be the case. So with that, um, I will follow up later with any comments or additional comments in a letter And thank you so much for your time and thank you for being here and have a wonderful evening Thank you All right mark I'm going to allow you to talk. You have three minutes to speak for public comment. Please identify yourself Thank you. My name is mark franzek. I live and work in downtown santa rosa. Um, I just wanted to say, um It's very important that You not only meet these co2 reduction targets But we do it by the deadline because climate change is the type of thing that snowballs Every time you pass one of those tipping points like melting of the permafrost or big Changes in the ocean currents It gets that much harder to fight climate change or that much harder for human civilization to function I won't go into that because people could talk about the consequences of that a lot better than I can So, um, you know, say if our goal is to cut co2 emissions by say 40 by 2030 Then it means around 20 27 There needs to be a moment of reckoning and to make sure we're really You know about halfway to that goal And not just getting started, you know We really got to be looking at the clock because we start doing our co2 reduction in 2045 It's kind of too late. You know, you might as well just party it up and enjoy the last of your life um And I guess the other thing I want to say is uh, I couldn't agree more with the Folks advocating for active transport. I think it's about I don't know if I have the statistic exactly right Someone can correct me, but I think half of all car trips are less than four miles That's very bikeable and active transport, which is not only just bicycles That's also walking wheelchairs mobility scooters e scooters That is like probably the quickest most cost effective way for a city to get down at co2 emissions Because you don't have to go building giant new roads and ripping things up It's a matter of just restriping streets and putting in protective bikeways. It's not, you know, major major surgery um Oh, and I'll just close with a quote. I always liked, um When you build a city that's great for an eight-year-old and an 80-year-old you build the city that's great for everybody Okay, that's all I have to say Thanks very much Thank you Are there any other hands raised? There are no additional hands raised chair weeks Thank you. So with that, I'll go ahead and close the public hearing and bring it back to the commission um, and so what we'll do um, as I said We'll start with chapter one the introduction we'll go around to make comments and then Go back around on chapter two um And for staff if you want us to slow down or repeat something so you can capture everything Let me know, okay So with that, um, we will start with chapter one which is the introduction and we'll go ahead and I'm gonna be nice and say who wants to go first Oh vice chair dug in. Thank you. You're always nice. Thank you. I have very few specific ones for the introduction I just want to thank the team and um say that I Going through all this material. I didn't really key on um The new ideas on each of the chapters that you highlighted tonight, and I think they're all fabulous So I'm in favor of all of those and otherwise. I think um chapter one was fine And my a general comment I have about The maps In the entire document including chapter one the scale is so tiny. They're very difficult to read If there's anything we could do for some of the maps to make the scale Larger that would be really really great Um, so that's all I've got on chapter one. Okay, so um commissioner peterson anything on chapter one No Commissioner carter I will reiterate commissioner dugins comment on the maps i'm The maps are challenging throughout the document and I'd love to see them formatted differently The introduction was an excellent summary of the process that we've been through and it shows the The commitment to making this a public process and I have no Negative comments about it. Thanks Commissioner sanders a ditto to both commissioner carter and dagon Um with regards to map I don't almost have a question Will the maps because I think that most people will be interacting with this online More so than having a printed copy are the maps interactive online like I can click something And it will take me to somewhere So the curiosity I don't think our maps are interactive However, you can zoom in and see at street level if that's what you mean Actually, the documents are really heavy because of the size of the map. So yes, you can zoom in That said we have a couple maps in our Website that are actually interactive, but not all the maps that we have are And then I guess being able to zoom in will Handle a lot of the tiny map issues All right. Thanks Mr. Holton, do you have anything on that section? In regard to chapter one I'll just go ahead and echo my fellow commissioner sentiment and I'll leave it at that. I have no other feedback Mr. Siscoe I appreciated the Overall, but it's more or less introduced in the introduction That this consolidation approach of the elements I just find just really Helpful and appealing that it does streamline this. I like the outlining of the Goals policies, but particularly the action items because I think overall this is going to make this so much more usable Particularly for members of the public if if I Waiting for that sidewalk or I'm waiting for that zoning code amendment I'm going to be able to look at that action number and Approach staff and see where is that in the process at all? So I just think this is a Really nicely put together a package and it's going to make it much easier for all of us to to work with And I appreciated the inclusions of the descriptions as to What's the difference between mandatory mandatory or consider? So I think the introduction was very well done And I just appreciate the whole package and I think it's going to be very usable to the public and to us and to developers Um, so I think you already have my comment regarding the statistics around the pandemic and then um I I would like some, you know, I know there's a reference to the housing element in this section, but maybe it could be more upfront Somehow so that's just a suggestion, but And I agree even with my glasses the maps are a little hard Okay, so with that, um, we'll move on to Chapter two Uh Let's start let's go the other way this time Actually, why don't instead of just going down the row if you have a comment raise your hand So who has a comment for chapter on chapter two? commissioner sysco um, I actually have several um And it's it's sort of a question I think sort of a statement tagging onto what I was saying earlier for the priority areas and I'm assuming that the city will city departments will be looking at those first in terms of when they Maybe are budgeting for an action item And that that's going to be how how that goes. Okay um Within the land use uh narrative, um, I did mention this to Amy Lyle that we Need to add the narrative description for maker mixed use on page Two dash one six That was omitted And um I'm following the roberts 7u thing pretty closely and when I didn't see it. I went wait a minute So that needs to be added um For action two dash 1.7 where it says amend the zoning code For the requirements and definitions related to community care very happy to see that Because we ran into a problem recently so I'm glad to see that and look forward to That happening. Let me get to your door. I'm going And I guess again an overarching kind of curious question for those Items that are listed more in a mandatory form amend the zoning code versus consider I'm curious and you don't need to answer that now But how that process will be handled in order to bring Consistency to the zoning code in the in the general plan So looking forward to that um One of the concerns I had is on under action two dash 1.8 where it says address the infrastructure and service needs of disadvantaged unincorporated communities I don't know what address means And that policy or that action item follows a number that talk about annexation and preparing To make sure it's financially feasible to do these annexations and so if We're addressing the service needs of Unincorporated communities. How do we do that without annexation and what does it dress mean? Which action item was that that's action two dash 1.8 and then Just got a couple more here Just appreciate the the action items for preservation of An inventory of industrial lands. Those are two dash 1.16 and two dash 1.17 And appreciate the uh action two dash 1.18 about discreting more opportunities for live work units and Compatible uses but differing uses than Then we do now for the industrial areas Oh, I have this one a lot of these are appreciations one though that was a kind of a concern was action two dash 2.2 um Requiring design of mixed use projects to focus residential uses in the upper stories or towards the back Curious about that hasn't been our typical design standard for mixed use And just a general comment. I think this plan as well as some of our other plans Relies heavily on the mixed use concept and I believe there's a policy or an action in here about Um removing obstacles for mixed use but We're going to really need to do that because our first and Most exciting that turned out not to be exciting at all the more building Is not mixed use yet. It's still no retail on the bottom and empty So it's just a concern for me. I love the concept, but we need to really figure out How do we make this happen and this plan really relies a lot on it? and Moving on to Economic development Again, it's action two dash 5.11 Updating the zoning code to allow for more maker mixed use again. I appreciate that. I just How we're going to get that to actually happen Action two dash 6.9 requiring a market analysis If they want to eliminate or change Out of an industrial land use. I think that's just really really important So that's all I have for that section Thank you Let's start with commissioner sanders um Just overall Throughout the entire Tired of the document one thing that I was curious about is When we talk about senate bill x or assembly bill y is that going to be a clickable link? That could take people to because sometimes when I'm reading this Certain things are defined as done as denoted in senate bill x y and z Are we giving someone homework at that point? Could we make that homework a little easier by having that having senate bill whatever it is be a hyperlink? To have a box come up to explain what that is or actually take them to With and get more information about that does that make sense It does and we can work with the consultants on that My fear is I don't know about you, but it drives me nuts when I go Click on something and the hyperlink is no longer active So it may be better like you were saying for us to create a box maybe that provides a summary Exactly just a box I could pop up and right there. We control it right great suggestion Just one just weigh in that it is difficult to do the the link I will work with the team on that another suggestion that I was going to bring up to the teams I think it would be more helpful to just refer to the state code section Instead of to the senate bill or the assembly bill because those change On the regular so what you might think this year everybody talks about senate bill nine and This is a long-term plan in five years and ten years senate bill nine is going to be something completely different than it is Today, correct. Okay. So that would maybe help address it because the government code of the public resources code would be the same And easier to look up than finding when you go into that legisla