e fact is people who get a better education get more money, pay more taxes. We should see it as an investment, not as a going to school, I mean, and yet they've made it a burden with the high costs. People get out of school in trouble. Anyway, but I really agree, I feel real sorry for Doug and I'm only a couple of houses down from him. But it is a burden already parking across the street, they're building a house. Okay, single family residents as they're being allowed to put new houses in back. So there's two houses with, and I'm not sure where the zoning stuff has gone and where our vision for a city is. We're being the universities dictating things and the states dictating things and promoting things that I think we should stand against so that we have the quality. I've lived here 50 years, lived in the 1220 house for 25 years and it is a great place to live. For a while I rented to six students. I had a house on Western and was renting the house on Laurel but then I moved to Laurel 25 years ago. Anyway, hopefully you take that into concern that the quality that we're seeing when we jam up big density, we have problems in the traffic, we have problems with the dams, the water and just the services and the whole bit. So take it into consideration. Well thank you. Hello, I'm Dave Wallace and first off I commiserate with all the Laurel Street neighbors but the fact behind it is is that 50 years ago UCSE had 4,000 students. UCSE now has 20,000 students. In 20 years they're gonna add another 10,000 students. Where are you gonna put them? If it's not here, is there some other magic places sprouting up on Mission Street? The west side has really not carried much of the burden as far as any density housing so far as what I've seen. I live on the east side and we have bigger lots and we've seen a lot of it and a lot of these projects that we are upset about never get built anyway cause they don't pencil out.  I mean I don't know where they're all going. Is this project perfect? Absolutely not but at some point we need to build some housing and it's not, I mean there's a few downtown but not nearly enough to absorb what we have coming in the next 20 years and I think that's, maybe it's the shape of the things that come and I don't know. Good evening. Jeff LaPierre, I live on King Street so I'm a little less impacted, been there 20 years. Most I'm here to talk about parking. A lot's been said. I just, one idea I wanna contribute. Any housing development I think would reasonably have a system where you have some guest passes, right? We could ask Doug, I vaguely support the project. Doug, least 20 parking spaces nearby. There's a clothing store, used clothing, big parking lot right across the street. Maintain these 20 spots, have guest passes. You know, that way when friends and neighbors come in out of town, they can rent a guest pass, put them somewhere responsible. If we don't put any kind of requirement like that, and that doesn't seem like that far fetched, then we're obviously just dumping those people into the neighborhood. There's just no two ways about it. Thank you. Hi, my name is Sarah Smith and I live on Van S Avenue and I've lived there 40 years and I love the food bin and walk there with my grandson and I drive there on my way to and from home. And I like the idea of affordable housing and I support that idea and I really feel like this is too much. It's, there's too many problems with what it does to that, in that location. And I feel like if it were just over where the old mellis market was, it would have been a better location. And it's just, it's way too much and it's dangerous. And I guess I'm a nurse, I'm a public health nurse and I was at community hospital when we had the big earthquake. And from the standpoint of safety and the challenges of dealing with getting in and out and that many people in a building where it's very little access, I think it's dangerous. And I just, I feel like with the bicycle, so much of it being bicycle friendly, all of us on the West side know that the bicycles have challenges and there's safety issues with bicycles. And I probably won't drive to the food bin anymore if that gets built. I'd rather go to the West side. And it just, it's not like you're gonna have my business there because I don't wanna have to deal with a lot of bicycles, a lot more people. And even with my grandson walking across over to Emily's, it felt like a safety. I mean, we really practice major safety things. So I think consider the challenges with safety, consider the public health challenges of having that many people. It's way too big a project for that space. And I don't know what tools you have to deny or to change the system, the way it's set up. And I know your hands are tied, but I'd sure look to try and find a way to make it more suitable so that it would work for all of us. Thank you. Hi, I'm Natasha Guy. I live on Otis Street. Clearly not from here, but I've lived here a long time. I hope to stay here forever if they let me. I am a color and material designer by trade. I specialize in aesthetics, the way things look and how that makes people feel. If we're looking at health as one of the reasons why we would or wouldn't build something, mental health is part of that. This is a dangerous precedent. If we build this kind of thing all a long mission, the mission traffic is already insane. And I worry for that in terms of our mental health and I worry about what that means for King Street and people using that as a way to cut through. I have two kids, one and three, who I hope will go to the local schools. I will not want them to walk around the local neighborhood if this sort of thing continues to be built up in the area. And I'm really disappointed and emotional about the fact that this could happen because I love it here and I wanna stay here and I didn't choose London or San Jose. The style of this, I come back to aesthetics, is neither in keeping with the landscape, the area, the beautiful wood eclectic houses that we all know and love. Neither is it modern in a timeless way. And I stress that I do this every day for a living. So this is something I feel really strongly about that a 12-foot butterfly is not gonna curb how we all feel about how it looks. I would urge that we, again, I've probably funded partially this project because I love the food bin. I've not shopped there for the last year out of my own morals because I can only vote with my buck here. But I also would love them to continue with this in some form in a more considered beautiful manner and bearing in mind us residents who are either affected dramatically like Doug or the rest of us who live in the neighborhood. I hope you'll take another look at it. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Susan and I live on Brig Street. First, I just wanna say I really applaud the students that have come down tonight and used their voice on behalf of the plight of affordable housing. It's vital, but it's also transient and temporary. Students graduate and move on. I'm here as Natasha, I believe, on behalf of families in the neighborhood, having recently moved to the area with a young child and the intention of being a long-term permanent residence. It's equal parts insulting and laughable that this project is proposed as a solution for families whether directly as housing solutions or as a positive impact on neighborhood safety or quality of living. I reiterate the critical problems on the height and the parking. This can maybe come up in future things. I've certainly not seen debate or discussion on why all the SROs. I don't know why when we're talking about two-bedroom stats and young family stats and all kinds of things why we're looking at studios of such size. I would just say if you want to nurture families to thrive here this proposal needs swift reconsideration and to involve and respect the community on a deeper cross-functional level, please. To echo previous thought leaders tonight, let's harmonize. Thank you. My name is Donna Haraway and have a little different perspective. I live at 312 Cleveland and I've lived in Santa Cruz for about 40 years and I've taught at UCSC most of that time but I speak as a neighborhood person and a person who uses Mission Street a lot, shops at the food bin and the air room all the time. If housing of this kind, three, four and five story, SROs and also other kinds of housing with commercial space on the bottoms more of that kind of building along Mission Street in my view would make for a much more vibrant community if coupled with serious enforcement of no car, no parking permit, sorry. If you're gonna park your car you gotta find a building to park it in. Serious enforcement, serious development of safer bike areas, serious development of better crosswalk. My problem is my dogs are terrified of Mission Street and won't go across, children and dogs are not safe on Mission Street. Little things are not safe on Mission Street, it's a big problem, this building doesn't solve it but this kind of building including five stories of I think a lovely design belongs on Mission Street. I think the people on Laurel Street bear the burden and suffer for it and I think that should be mitigated as much as possible but this kind of development is what I want as a neighbor in this immediate area on Cleveland Avenue. Hello, my name is Kare Frazier and I live down by Neary Lagoon. I work at the food bin and I've worked there for more than a year. I've shopped there for decades and the thing that I would like the council to be noting is this concept of the place that uses bicycles and having a place that where the premise is that you don't get a parking permit when you live here and you travel because we live right on the transportation corridor. I'd like the city council to be encouraging that model. I didn't have a car when I was going to the university and my kids have gone to the university on the bus too. And I think that that is something I'd like to see more of. Thank you. All right, thanks everybody. Anyone else like to speak? Yeah, be sure to get your name over there when you're done. Yeah, Rustin Hognas. I just live around the corner on Cleveland. I go to the food bin all the time. I love it. I like this project and I want to leave you just with an image that of someone who might move into there that isn't a student. My sister, 74 years old, rides her bike, walks, takes public transportation everywhere, had to move to Seattle to take care of my father. Would love to be here if she went to school in Santa Cruz. This is an ideal sort of place for her. So think not only of students, think of retirees, other people who want to get away from cars, it's a good place. Thanks. All right, last call for public comment. Thanks again, everybody. We'll go ahead and close the public comment period. So if I remember right, we need a motion to go past 10 o'clock. Is that 11? Okay, thanks. How are people doing? Do anybody want to take a break or just keep going? I'm all right. So next, I want to give the applicant a chance to rebut anything that was raised during public comment if they'd like to. We'd like to address the car issue. Obviously, that's a really big concern for everybody in the neighborhood. The owner, any owner of a building is allowed to legally not rent to somebody who owns a car. You can check it with a DMV. You can, so to speak, be prejudice against the car owning class. They are not a protected class of people. So we can choose that. We can say that you cannot rent to anybody who owns a car. You can fact check it with a DMV. And I don't know what the measure would be for this, but I'm assuming there could be some kind of long-term protocol that checks that as you renew your lease or every six months or something like that to make sure that people aren't moving in and then buying a car and being an impact to the neighborhood. So that's one big thing that we can do around vehicles. A couple of comments about the commercial drop-offs in the traffic. I think we could manage that much more effectively with our vendors. So ensure they're not in the neighborhoods. Doug and Peggy are really committed to making this as manageable for the neighborhood as possible. I thought the recommendation about shared parking with another commercial space is a really great idea. There's obviously a longevity issue to that. If that property gets developed, then that parking goes away, but we're absolutely open to exploring those options in the meantime so that that impact is mitigated for as long as possible. Another comment about parking on Laurel Street. Yeah, we do buy five permits for our employees and now heard from the neighbors. And so what we do now is we buy them on Cleveland I look for like the neighbors where there's wider streets and there's less cars, which there's quite a bit like north of Laurel and Cleveland. So down Cleveland, there's some just wide open sites.  So I think there is parking in and around some of those neighborhoods, not all of them. Laurel takes the brunt of it, but spread out into the neighborhood, there are some spots. So I think some of it could be, you know, mitigated, but yeah, there's, and the residents have first option on those spots. They can buy those spots in front of their house. I don't know if you guys knew that, but you can buy the spots or they become available for the businesses on Mission Street, apparently. So that's how I understand that. Doug, I live in the neighborhood, sweatily walk around in the early morning, you may see me. My memory is that most of the streets have neighbor permit parking already, not saying it's effective or enforced or any of that, but the signs are up in most of those blocks already. Exactly, yeah, two hour parking, Monday through Friday, and I think it's mainly for those students don't park there and then just leave their car there all day. Again, I'm not saying that that solves the problem or anything, but I just wanted to recognize that the tool that exists, which is a very weak and sad tool. Correct, yeah, and we get, our employees get tickets and then I go down and try and get them waived. Okay, thank you. All right, so let's bring it back up to the commission for more discussion and I'd like to hear a motion to see. I've got a few things. I have a few things. John? There were comments made about the base density not actually being 20%, et cetera. Our inclusionary ordinance specifies percentage of units in a project that have to be made affordable can be done at different levels and that affects other aspects of the design, but the incentives that are offered and the density bonuses that are offered, they do not reduce that amount. They reduce, you could read it that it reduces the percentage required, but the truth is we don't lose any affordable housing based on these inclusionary, the density bonus or any of the other incentives. All the units that would otherwise be required under the base density, they're still there. That's one thing. I think a lot of the people here already know that with a lot of the incentives, the prohibitions on parking under maybe under 2097, those are state requirements that we don't really have a lot of control over and so to a degree, we're not able to really affect that. There are also comments made about UC housing being the problem and the difficulty is that housing at UCSC can only be paid for out of the proceeds of the people that are paying rent that live there. They can't, there's not money that the state gives university campuses for building housing. They can't use tuition money, they can't use other sources of money, has to be strictly paid for by the people that live there and with all the sustainability requirements that the university has, it's very difficult for them to keep the price of housing down. We all wanna be sustainable, but that really costs a huge amount of money for the university and anyone that's trying to do it. The corridor plan, I am very sympathetic to arguments about that being better, but that was rejected by many members of the community and a previous council and it's, we could maybe be avoiding a lot of these discussions if it hadn't been. Similarly, all housing, I think it's fairly well known, it improves affordability, accessibility and equity and I'm a strong advocate of density for all those reasons. I feel like, if small units are not considered family units, I think it's pretty easy to see that if you have three couples living in a three-bedroom home and each of them can move to a small unit and have their own place to live, that makes a family home affordable or available and it's difficult to look at all the nuance of everyone's housing situation, but I think just as a general rule, small units relieve pressure on family homes and make them more available. I'll just leave it there, but I'm very sympathetic to the impacts on the neighborhood, but the ones that are mentioned most routinely in the comments, they're largely things that we as a body don't have that much control over. Thanks for all your time coming in though. Thank you Commissioner Conway. Thank you and first of all, I want to thank everybody for coming and for being a great neighborhood and I've read every single letter, most of them more than once. And Doug, I really want to thank you for bringing this project forward. I was there one of the days when the freezer broke and you were handing out what was being in the freezer just so it wouldn't go to waste because please take this, we can't fix it. I was genuinely worried that we were gonna lose the food bin altogether and it just made me so sad and I'm really pleased that you have come up with a way to sustain the food bin and way into the future and I do feel like you've done it in a way that is really thoughtful and I appreciate that. I feel like this project is the respectful outgrowth of our times which must continue to change and I think that this really is bringing it forward. So in the midst of much change, we're continuing with our fundamental value of protecting open space by focusing growth within the urban boundary that is one of the, that is I would say the key value within this community. This project makes that possible and sustains it. And it also, another one of the choices that we made with our general plan, we decided that we don't want to spread the growth that we must accept into neighborhoods. We decided that we don't wanna have four plexus and six plexus and small apartments which would have been a perfectly acceptable choice and we decided not to do that and instead we're gonna put it along our transportation corridors. Now, inevitably someone lives next to it and there is a transition space. I know as I've watched this project be conceptualized and looked at the solar on the house next door, and really thought about how do we manage the impacts of change? So again, I'm gonna stand up very loudly in support of staying within our urban growth boundary and developing density along corridors. I wish that as a city, and I think that we do have opportunities to look closely at what those impacts mean. There's not that many properties that are gonna be like the Martins. We looked at a multifamily project, also of SROs, further up mission, but across the street and that shadow, it shadows Mission Street. I thought I was very touched by your description of your garden and of course I go by there all the time and I'm really aware of it and that is important. The impact there, it is important. But so is this project. And small units mean that the single family homes, I have one across the street from me. It's five bedrooms in that one. The owners are doing better than they were, but two kids, two students, sorry, in every single room, that was a lot. So another thing that I'm committed to is housing policies that allow housing to be built. So in other words, we have to accept that it has rebuilt at the densities that make it pencil. And I know a lot of people think it would pencil just as well at three stories. And I can tell you, I haven't looked at this performer, but I've looked at a lot of them and I just don't think so. And also not burdening projects with, we've really killed so many projects by burdening them with more and more layers that we think are making it a better project, but what it does is it makes it impossible to build it. And let's see, I think there were quite a few misunderstandings about the approval in the development process, but I don't need to take that up right now. I would like to address what is really a red herring of saying that if you rent to students and they all have cars, therefore all of these students are gonna have cars. I just have to call BS on that one. Tell them they can't have cars. Tell them you're gonna rent to students who don't have cars. And those are the people you'll rent to and there are enough students. And it's true, a lot of students have cars. They live across street from me. I know that they do, but I just don't think, I think it's disingenuous to say that there's not a way to manage that. Let's see. I guess I could go on about a lot of other things, but instead what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna move the staff recommendation. I need a second first. I'll second the motion and then we can, I think some conditions of approval coming when there's some things going to work. Yeah, yeah, that's fine. Cool. Thanks everybody for coming out and speaking. I know I lived on King Street for six years and raised my kids there. Now I live on the lower side a little bit further away, but I know that area very well and I used to go to the food ban quite often. Obviously there's a lot of emotions around seeing this kind of development on Mission Street. The size of it is quite large. The largest that I believe is on Mission Street right now. The thing that I think one of the, I forget his name, but he brought up a really good point is we are gonna start to see a lot more of this development. It's a necessary, we are growing, but what kind of development, where it is, how big, these are all, this is why we're all here right now. That's why I'm here, sitting here. When we have these density bonus laws, it gets really tricky and our hands get tied, but we're not totally tied. And the way we decide our base density, I brought it up earlier around, including commercial space using, I don't believe that that is a necessary requirement. Am I, I'm checking in with staff right now? When we, when we are, because we're gonna see a lot of these mixed use developments, you know, storefront on the bottom, residences up top, when we're looking at calculating the base density and we're using that commercial space to kind of bump up the numbers of the base density, is that like a, do we have to use the commercial space to do that? Is that in some sort of a code? Just it would seem to me that using the commercial space would actually lower the base density, right? Because it eliminates area that would be dedicated to residential uses. Yeah, that's my point. So when we're looking at size of buildings, and especially when we're getting into density bonus, we're adding 50% on top of that base density. That's when we're losing affordability. That's where I'm gonna disagree with John. We don't, I agree that we don't lose affordable units, but we also don't gain affordable units. And this is a big, big issue that we're gonna have to look at as we move forward with density bonus law. And in this case, if we took away that 2,675 square foot commercial space out of the base density calculation, I wonder if that would, I mean, that would affect obviously this project quite drastically. It would also probably make it a four-story building. That would be interesting. I just think it's interesting, I'll give me one more second. We have a general plan for a reason, right? It's been, these are kind of our guidelines of how we'd like to see things move forward. Now we have a base density law coming in and really drastically changing.  FAR is kind of a way of determining density. This is 3.86 over twice what is in the general plan allowed. That's crazy.  We're gonna start moving forward and we want density, but three point like over twice is what is in the general plan right now. That is a lot. And so my thing is, you know, this is one project is before us now and we do need density. We all love the food bin, let's be honest. It's beautiful. I love it's very Santa Cruz. It is Santa Cruz and I'm glad that it gets to stay. I do feel that five stories is a lot and as much as our hands are tied up here, it's not totally tied. And I do believe that if we look at the way we calculate base density and projects moving not just this project, but projects moving forward that we could somehow mitigate where we do have some control as a community, you know? So and on that note, you know, I'll let staff talk to the space density idea around using commercial space versus not, but also I wanna say to the public as we are just a public body, we're just a commission. This is gonna come before the city council as well. Probably in February, I imagine if everything goes passing with things get passed tonight. We are only one bump along the way of this project.  I was just gonna offer some clarification that with the objective standards that were approved, there is a more specific requirement for the area of commercial on the ground floor. So there will be some more, I guess, assurance of how much of the ground floor is gonna be commercial. At least there's a minimum that's set. So, and then beyond that, you could put residential units and I don't have it all memorized, but it might be live work units, but there are some ways that you can get residential on the ground floor as well. But this one is before. So it's not subject to the objective standards. So then my question is, when we are determining the base, the density, I think Ms. Dawson talked about earlier is like, where is the limit? Like, I said, if it's 25% smaller a lot, are we talking eight stories? Well, the base density is gonna be calculated on what you can say within the site standards. Yeah, so any hard setbacks, yeah. And we don't have any sort of code around or law in a law around using commercial space as base density calculations, correct? We just decide if we wanna do it or not. Do you mean like counting the commercial space as a residential unit? No, just using the square footage to calculate the base density. Like we were talking like you just said, you could use some of that commercial space, but with the objective standard, no, we're getting into weeds here, but do you understand where I'm coming in? The idea that I'm saying is do we get to decide, do you get to decide as staff how much of the commercial space or not to use it or not to use it when calculating the base density on a mixed use project development? So you're asking, once they reach the project that's subject to the objective standards, once they reach the minimum amount of commercial space that's required, if they go beyond that, do we say, well, that could be residential space and that could be a unit? That's one part, it could go that way or it also could be like, whatever the minimum, that is just not gonna be calculated at all. And whether they choose to add to it or not, that's their choice, right? I think that that's been considered. I know there's state laws around that protect these types of developments and that tell us to look at the project as proposed, that specific language is included in a lot of the state laws. So it would be something we'd have to look at. Okay. And I recall there being some litigation around that. I could imagine. As well with certain jurisdictions on density bonus saying, hey, your project could be this. Right. And then getting that ruling overturned at the courts. All right. I'm thinking back to when we read the downtown plan, it's a different context than this project, which we're kind of straying away from, but we had all these discussions about ground floor. And like you, in my opinion, you kind of want to read to, you know, I hear what you're saying, like just some exercise of it. The whole, the whole point. It was harder than you think. The whole point, the reason I'm bringing this up, the whole reason I'm bringing this up is that we do have control. Like don't act like we, we do have some say here. So like for us to say, for, for me to say that, I just have to say yes to this, that's not true. We do have some, we do have, we do have some say. I'm not saying we can, I can totally say no to this, but we can at least ask for, you know, we can figure out a way to make this a little bit more agreeable for everybody. I think I'd like to. Yeah. I think for, so to respond to the density bonus and what you need to make in the way of findings, I mean, there's, there's a few first, it needs to meet the minimum affordability requirements, which are ADU or I'm sorry, our SRO ordinance automatically qualifies a project for a 50% density bonus to get the, the waivers. There needs to be a finding that the standards in our zoning code physically preclude a development from achieving that density that's allowed. Which one of them is whether it's a negative impact on the neighborhood, correct? Right. Well, no, it's so in order to deny a density bonus, you need to find that there's a specific adverse impact upon the public health or safety unless the project is disapproved. And then it says, as used in this paragraph, a specific adverse impact means a significant, quantifiable, direct and unavoidable impact based on an objective, identified written public health or safety standard policy or conditions as existed on the date the application was deemed complete. That's a pretty tall order.  We've got a biotic study that says there's no habitat whatsoever. I mean, there, you know, there's really nothing to hang your hat on to either reduce density or deny the density bonus. The only, the only question is whether, what do we use to calculate base density? That's what I'm bringing up, which is arguable. Yeah, and also responding to some of the comments made from the public, you know, the state's getting serious about housing laws. They have a new housing accountability division within HCD. I know, I've talked to them. We've had inquiries about it. If the city violates the Housing Accountability Act, we're on the hook for $10,000 per unit. So if you were to reduce density by 20 units, it would cost the city $200,000. We'd have to reverse our decision within 60 days and pay employer fees. That's if we go against that. If we, if we lose in court, right. Which we would. Cindy, I just want to, the motion is like to pass the project, so I want to hear what you have to say, but if we're moving toward a different motion, that should be a separate discussion. I have a couple of comments and then I'd like to propose a friendly amendment a condition to add. So just to build on what Commissioner Maxwell said, I do want to remind the public of the process again that we are an advisory body and the decision-making body is a city council and the folks that you elected there. So hold them accountable accordingly. And I would also just say that, the people passing these state housing laws are your elected Senate and assembly members. So just as engaged public, we need to keep an eye on the ball here and a lot of, and you're hearing about these state laws that continue to pass in Sacramento. And so I think that's something just to remember that it does trickle down and you're feeling these impacts in your neighborhood. I do want to just make a couple of general comments and disagree with, respectfully disagree with Commissioner McKelvie, math is math and the way that the density bonus law is implemented is that the overall percentage, we have a 20% inclusionary in the city of Santa Cruz when a density bonus project gets put forward and the numbers get, and you get the density bonus, the overall percentage of units you get is not 20%. That's just math on this project. It's about 13%. So that's also just something to keep in mind as we move through thinking about these projects. A couple of other things I would just like to recognize one of the local contractors who come up and just again say, city council is in charge of project labor agreements and using local labor. That's something to continue to mention. That's not something under our purview. And then when we're talking about these projects, I also want us just to be very honest about what we're building. We're not building family housing. SROs, that's not what this is. We do need smaller units and we do need more affordable units. This is 13% affordable. That's not enough, but that meets the current standards. And as the commission, we are tasked with looking at the laws as they're written, seeing if a project meets that and moves forward. I do want to just second this idea of continuing to bring up with council and staff how we calculate base unit because that's gonna, when we apply the density unit, if it was 30 units and we were applying a density unit, it'd be different than it was 40 units and the height of buildings would be differently. And this idea of using commercial space and that calculation, whether we do it or not, I think is something to continue to pursue as this moves through the process. Lastly, just a general comment before I make my condition. As someone who bikes as their primary mode of transportation, we really need to get serious about conditioning on projects on these corridors, bike and pedestrian safety as a condition and not just as a, it's something we'll think about as density increase, traffic increases, people's patients decrease. It's very dangerous. I actually walk more now than I bike because it's so dangerous to bike and I certainly never bike on mission. And when campus opens every year and I see students biking on mission, I roll down my window and say, go to King, do not bike on mission. So we need to get really serious about it. So along those lines, we did, the developer did seem to be open to a condition. So I'd like to make a friendly amendment for a condition. And I think the wording would be something like for the developer to work with Metro to take advantage of existing programs to develop bus passes. Is that something you guys would be okay with? I'm not seeing any. Are you talking about free bus passes? What did I just say? That the developer would work with the Metro to take advantage of existing programs to implement bike passes for residents. Bus passes. Bus passes, yeah, not bike passes, bus passes. Thank you. In pass, we've added the words like for residents that request them because a lot of times they have them and like nobody wants them, they're needed for Doug to pay for them. I'm happy. As for residents that request them. I also need to jump in and I add here in all caps, do not ride your bike on Mission Street. So thanks for mentioning that. Do not ride your bike on Mission Street, people. You'll die. The sign that says it's okay. Okay, I have, as the maker of the motion, I'll have to accept it as a friendly amendment. And my problem with this, and I don't know that I'm dead set against it, but these residents are already gonna have bus passes. I'm doing the same thing. If they want them, they're gonna get bus passes. I don't think that there's a financial reason why they couldn't. I certainly think that working with Metro and linking property management company to make it as easy as possible and seamless as possible makes sense. I see no reason why we would burden the project financially to have them take on a financial cost for it. I don't think that, I don't feel like the resident necessarily need it and it doesn't seem fair to the project to me. However, I mean, if you don't care about that responsibility, I think what you're asking Doug to do, maybe I misunderstand, I might. Yeah, I think you misunderstood. So you're not asking the project to provide bus passes. I'm asking them to work with Metro to take advantage of existing programs. Oh, if there's programs, that's great. I'm totally fine with that.  I just didn't wanna add an extra cost. I think adding some coordination and ease of use makes sense. So yeah, I would accept that. Thank you. Yeah, I just wanted to, I think we're coming too close here, so I just wanted to make a few comments before, before we wrap this up. First off, just in, I received some emails actually during the meeting from a engaged citizen that was just talking about all the improvements that are gonna be coming from Caltrans to this particular intersection and they include, as I see it, high visibility crosswalk improvements, bike boxes and renewed ramps and other things like this. So the need for a condition on the development, I don't think is necessary as these improvements are coming. So I just wanted to address that as there were some concerns about people crossing mission. I have some of those same concerns with some of my kids at Santa Cruz High. And so that seems to be in the works, which I'm really happy to see. Secondly, I just wanted to touch base about affordable housing and just talk about that for a second. So on these individual projects, many of the projects that seek density bonuses do have overall affordability percentages that get watered down beyond what, on the surface, we ask for as a local community, right? That is part of the density bonus issue that ruffles a lot of feathers. And ultimately the courts have decided that these density bonus units cannot have affordability requirements applied to them. And that is the incentive for the developer. They say we're going to include X amount of affordable units in return to make this project pencil out. You're going to get X amount of density bonus units and it does water down that percentage. But this is, it's a forest in the trees issue because these types of projects allow us to meet our rena goals, which make us eligible for a pro housing designation, which makes us eligible for more funding for affordable housing. And if I'm remembering correctly, I think our last housing element we secured close to, if not over 50% affordable units out of all the units we built out of that eight year period. And the reason we are able to do that beyond other fees that we charge and other grants that we can secure is because we build housing, right? That's one of the best things that we can do in this particular situation. And I just want to highlight that, that our overall housing output is geared very much towards low income earners or at least it has been over the past eight years. And now with the pro housing designation and projects like this that will add eight very low income units, those are very, very difficult units to build. And in fact, every single one of those units requires close to $20,000 in subsidy from the developer. So that is a big ask and that is the reason that they get these density bonus units. So I just want people to be reminded of that and that there are benefits to these types of projects. And while yes, there are costs, there are costs to this approach. This is done at the state level, as Commissioner Dawson did mention, talk to your state representatives about how this is impacting you and that at this very moment, that is the way things are. But I also think that one of the big upsides to this particular site is that, yeah, you have some very accessible amenities here. You have good restaurants, you have within walking distance, you have a medical clinic, within walking distance you have athletic fields, within walking distance or biking distance. You have a lot of these other things going on and the economic potential of clustering businesses and dense housing in this particular place could add some good benefits to your neighborhood as well. And so I understand the parking issue. I think that the parking issue is probably one of the biggest downsides to what the state is doing right now. And I do think that some of the conclusions that the state is reaching around just eliminating parking requirements, I think, are somewhat unrealistic. But at the end of the day, I'm gonna support this project as amended by conditions of approval or I'm sorry, a friendly amendment. And I think that these types of projects are beneficial to the community. And with any kind of luck, that Emily's across the street is not gonna be a medical marijuana facility. It's gonna be a coffee shop, all right, if I have anything to say about it. So marijuana delivery is a thing. So you don't need to, it doesn't need to be that close. So that's my comments. Thank you for everybody that came out to speak. All right, anyone else have a few things to talk about? I have a question. Sure. I know we did talk speaking of the parking issue. I know you guys, the developers, and talked about the somewhat idea of not agreeing not to rent to car owners, but that's just, you could not do that. You know what I mean? Like that's just a saying of, is there anything in like, I mean, this is the thing, if you have an empty unit and you're the only people that, at some point you gotta fill the units, correct? Can I say something? Sure. Yeah, come on up just so the mic can hear you. In case anyone's still awake at home. Okay, so if somebody has a car, they're not gonna really be able to park because you have to have a permit for Laurel.  We, the food bin, only get permits because of some magnanimous, something rather than God, because we don't know where we'd have our employees park. So we're, on the one hand, we intend to not have cars there because that's one thing we can do to not piss off the neighborhood. Yeah, yeah, there you go. And then another thing is we are feeling like people might be logical who wanna live in these places that they're gonna self-select not to have cars because what are they gonna do with their cars? They're gonna get tickets. Enforcement will probably increase because everybody's gonna be pissed off and start hassling the city to increase enforcement. I've gotten a ticket in there. I don't know what people are talking about that you don't get tickets. I've gotten a ticket there. So anyway, there is a self-selection aspect. There's, and yeah, we don't want cars. This is like our idea. I wanted the roof to have plants. We want no cars. This is like progressive. That's my say. All right, Commissioner McKelvie. Did you have someone else? All right, I have two quick friendly amendments to propose. One, would you put that text I sent you earlier up? I don't wanna add crazy conditions, but I think these will be pretty mild. Let me know if you feel differently about them. So what you'll see here, everybody, I copied the conditions that are in there. A Vivian, I don't know if you can zoom in on the top one. Yeah, whoever's got it. Sweet, thank you guys for putting that up. So the numbers changed, but there's two, those are the two light trespass conditions that are in there. They're pretty solid. Like we started this process many years ago. They were hardened up. They're already in there. Guys, folks, those are in there already. Plans submitted for building permit issuance shall show all exterior site lighting locations and fixture details. All exterior building lighting shall be shielded and contained in a downward direction. No exterior lighting shall produce offsite glare. That's a big one, really, glare is huge. Exterior site lighting shall be provided along pedestrian pathways and in the vehicle parking area, which right there is conflicting with that neighbor, which we get that. Security lighting shall be motion sensor only because always on security lighting is not effective according to science. And so then I'd just like to add that photometric site plan and she'll be provided to verify this. And then I get kind of cheeky writing conditions and I put three more in there just for y'all to think about. I'm not suggesting we put them on this project, but like we could clarify, maybe the first one I'll suggest it. Let's see how you feel about this one. Building department staff shall observe the final lighting at night before the CFO is granted. Maybe that happens already. We have to do that for green building inspections to see how it looks, you know? Yeah, if the majority of the commission wants to go there, I'd recommend that it be planning staff to check on that. I'm not the one to go there, but. Yeah. And if you wanted to go the direction of an ad hoc committee, I know we've done it. Let's leave that one there. That's pretty aggressive. Okay. Yeah. We should go look at these buildings and see if we did it or not, but we wouldn't want you to coordinate us for that inspection. I think the words no lighting shall spill off the site in the direction of the residential neighborhood nor the creek is too strong. And then we talked about that lighting facade issue, so I trust that will be handled naturally during design now that I've raised it. So I'd like to propose the friendly amendment to add that photometric site plan. She'll be provided to verify, and I think it was better with the top condition, Ryan, which I believe was 15, but put it wherever you want. Do you have a condition or just have it stand alone? Well, let me look at it. So plan submitted for building permit, issuance, blah, blah, blah. Let's add it to the end of that condition. Because the plan just puts in writing what condition, what says one up there is actually saying. So is this all one condition? No, just that first line. Just this first line? Yep. Thank you for doing the editing for me. Cool, do you guys get it? That's just my ask there. I do, but I have a question in the first sense. Suggesting or modifying the language so that, sorry. Modifying the language so that we also kind of favor the placement of any luminaires lower to the ground. I love this. I thought a lot about it. Ballards and things that are going to illuminate the ground that needs to be illuminated rather than having large light fixtures. It's more economical because there are fewer of them, but it would be much more, do you want to respond? Please. Sure, yes. Oh, of course, of course, yes, right. No, because there's gonna be that conflict. I don't know what that language should be, but that's I think that would be an effective thing to keep the dark sky objectives in mind. Two questions. So that's good, right? I like putting that in there. If everyone's all right with that. I have a couple of questions. Yeah. Well, I wanted to just get input from all the commissioners. Okay, I have a couple of questions. I love that this is your area. It's not my area. I'd like to know how much does it, additional cost is there to the project to create a photometric site plan? Is that negligible? Is that easy? Don't know, but are there... Is it a lot? I see it on every 40-init apartment building on my desk. Okay, all right. Because I hate how some, one of the things we've done to prevent getting any housing built is just to make it too expensive. I agree. Hanging, treating COAs is like a Christmas tree. I hear you, Julie. All right, thank you. I'm not sure that I am so keen on the planning department staff going out to the final lighting at night before it's granted. Aren't we just, they're doing all of this. Why are we doing this extra thing? It's staff time. They're going out at night. I don't think we're accomplishing anything. Okay. So I hear you. My experience with this is the, it's now the Hampton Inn down at the end of Mission Street. Yeah. You know, is the sunset in? Is that right? I can't remember what it's called. So it's a large building. We put these conditions on it. Contractor blew it on the wall packs and they're just like blasting light.  You're right. Nobody noticed. You're right. And I'm planning commissioner, volunteer walking by at night and I'm like, what's going on with these lights? Don't we have these conditions? I know it's that building. Don't spray light into your neighbors. So contractor came out with these little metal thingies on.  So I'm not coming out of left-wing. Okay. I just want to. I think if Eric would have been out there at night, we would have immediately been like, yeah, those aren't going to work and it would have saved everybody a lot of pain. You work well past dark. Cool. Well, and I was just going to say they are after dark pretty. I would just like to add to that that on Hanover Street, there's also a same thing. Like all those conditions were there and I can guarantee that they do not meet the conditions right now, which is a block. Okay, that's interesting. Yeah, so. So Julie, I hear you and I really thought about cost because I'm here to build some housing. Okay.  It's really? More input? A little. Yeah. I thought about approve, but what if it's a different panning commission and they're all just like we hate that light. It's not even us, it's staff making that. To confirm. To confirm that the final lighting is consistent with photometric study. It's consistent. Well, no, that's a good point. The staff shouldn't be, is not technically qualified to evaluate if it meets the photometric study. So, yeah, no, no, that's perfect. But she'll, I'm just trying to think of a word. Why don't you just say, verify this by observing the final lighting at night before CFO is granted to the satisfaction of the planning director. Too hard, too hard. Is that too much? Okay, I've opened the stand doors box. Yeah, I just want to interject. So we will go out to the site. The planning staff go out to the site anyway and we'll observe and confirm that everything is done to the condition. So this seems clear to me if we see any offsite glare or if there's any bright lights or if something looks different than we're showing on the plans, then we would have a conversation. Does that work? All right. Okay, good, good, good. This is not to catch y'all. It's to just highlight it a bit more and put it in the document. And I will accept that. Cool, okay, I got one more. Can we scroll down to MAC equipment? Did we, I'm not sure that mic is the same mic. Oh, I'm sorry, are you good with that one? Okay. Thank you. This again is one I've worked on for many years. Mechanical equipment screening is in the code and we talked about earlier to like visually screen. So this is my brainstorming. Ryan, can we add the word heat pump or remove air conditioners, one or the other? Mechanical equipment covers heat pump and air conditioners, but when you say air conditioner, it sounds like we're still living in the combustion fuel age. Is it, I'm sorry, you want? Just add heat pumps there. Add heat pumps. If that is all right with everybody, it's just a clarification. So the idea of this is that you don't have to see it, right? And acoustical control is super tough and expensive. So I'd like to simply add the words sound control shall be considered when designing the screening and stop there. And I don't know anyone to talk about this next couple there. Excuse me, chair. Just before more people leave, I wanted to clarify that this project is not going to, this does not require city council approval. This is the final approval. So if it gets appealed, then it would be. So I want to, yes, I want to touch on that too. This can be the last meeting unless the neighbor's appeal. And we could actually just go start building this project whenever these guys are ready to go. So I understand that everyone always appeals. And that's all right, but just please try to be as constructive as possible. And like us with choice on this density bonus, you neighbors have the choice of appealing and extending the bane here in hopes of some other concessions or not. But I just want to say it does not by nature go to city council. Yeah, let's take a stop. No, this is too much. We're out of public comment. Nope, I'm sorry, you're violating the rules of this meeting. We can talk more afterward. No, this is enough discussion. Stop, please. This is, we're not in public discussion. We're here talking amongst the commission. So now is not the time to give us further input. I'm sorry, it feels that way. Nope, public comment is over. So mechanical equipment, I'd like to add those words. Sound control should be considered when designing the screening, not asked to be decibel 40, whatever. Okay, that's it. I'm all right with that one too. And then Eric, I'm not gonna do the zoning administrator. She'll suggest best practices. That was bad, bad idea. I know. Okay, thank you. How do you guys feel about that from the amendment? Good, excellent. So I have a few comments and then I'm looking forward to a vote. So you know, I live in this neighborhood. I have kids, I have a mom. I grew up by Mission Hill on King Street. I think God got a house way down on Miramar. So I walk through here all the time. I've seen so many of the people here. So I feel the impact I really do and there's serious impact here. I was thinking about what's like the something this big that's ever happened in our neighborhood. The closest I could come to was that monster redwood tree at Laurel and King. Like that might've been taller than this building. So let me just say it.  It's big. It's gonna stick out. It's gigantic. It's gonna shade people. It's higher than most people in this town want, I think. And like, I don't wanna, Sean kind of alluded to it earlier and we do this thing where, and I've said it before, oh, the state's making us do this. Oh God, we have no control over this. This is just like political padding, you know? I want these units. I want more housing. And you know why? Cause I have two kids and the odds of me getting them each, a single family house to give them, so they can live in this damp town, like my parents did for me, the odds of that happening are zero at this point in my life. That's 47. So I hope by the time they're ready for it, they could get an apartment and these eat affordable and however many other is not gonna do it but we're heading in that right direction. Also, my mom lives right there and she's at 75 and getting older and lives in a 3,000 square foot house with five bedrooms and it's crazy. So I'd sure love to have her move into an apartment right there than somewhere else much further away from me and my family and my kids. Can't say again, like the terror of crossing Mission Street, I really felt that me, my kids, someone said it's like extreme safety. It's totally like that. It's like, you stop your bike 20 feet ahead. This project's not gonna change that. Traffic's already terrible. This is gonna add a drop in the bucket. I forget the numbers. I think peak traffic on Mission is 6,000 cars an hour, right? So if all 60 people hop in their alleged car, it's not, it's a drop in the bucket. So I get it, like it's a small thing but things are bad. This is not gonna make it that much worse, I think. Okay, I don't wanna ramble on it's late. For street cred, I totally remember earthquake in 1989 after the power went out and I could be, I was 13, but people were trading food in the parking lot of the food and that's like, that doesn't get much more Santa Cruz than that. Like, hey, I got these beans and you know, so I just love that hippie part of our community. This small business will go on. I can't say that enough. Inarguably, the project increases pedestrian safety on Mission. A lot of people said that. We're getting a huge sidewalk. It's, what, 12 feet wide or something with a row of street trees? We got nine street trees, including around the corner. That's gonna make this stretch of mission in that corner a whole new experience. You know, new sidewalks. So I am fine with just updating it. It's gonna make things safer for most everybody. So I get a little bit grouchy and I'll try not to express that on everybody but this idea that it's an okay to be a landlord in the single family neighborhood two blocks away, renting the 17 UCSC kids who park on the street, but not okay for Doug to build a building that's designed for people to not have cars. I mean, that really just rubbed me the wrong way.  I have a minivan, I ride bikes. Anyway, that just rubbed me the wrong way and I had to get it out. The parking is a shared resource. Like, I used to pretend like the parking program worked, you know, but it doesn't. Public Works hates it. It's a pain for reinforcement. They don't have the resources to do it, right? Nobody has the resources to do it, right? Like a real city would do, which is charge for parking everywhere, right? Anyway. So I don't think the parking permit thing, whatever way it goes, is gonna have any impact. My mom's house is the perfect example. She's the first street without permits over on Kirby and King Street there.  So I just don't think it had, we have plenty of parking. There's eight parking spots in the US for every car in the US, you know? So anyway, let me stop on that soap box. Oh, I have a quick joke. This will be the only bodega of all time where you can't buy weed once it's approved, right? That'll be across the street and not part of your operation. I used to live in Berkeley. Okay. And then a bit more of a rant. Suburbia sure as hell is not high density. Single family zoning is by nature an intent racist in my opinion.  So in my opinion, every apartment bill affordable or not is a tiny step toward racial justice, equity, all these things that I really value. And I know that racist word is strong, but go research it. It's literally true. Zoning was invented in Berkeley to keep black people out. So, you know, again, I'm not saying we're forced to do this. I want to do this clear eyed about the impacts. And that just is how this goes. So we just can't do this anymore. You know, the NIMBY word I try not to use, but so many people said, I love this project, but not by me. And that speaks for itself in my opinion. Okay, so I'm in favor of the project. My last joke was, is it possible to keep the sign going during construction? Because boy, do I love that sign. And I think putting it in the rendering, like you captured my heart. So, nice job, nice job. Yeah, cool, cool. It's an important news medium in our town. Okay, that's all that I have to a vote. All right, Vivian, could we do a roll call vote, please? Missioner Dawson. Hi. Missioner Conway. Hi. Missioner Kennedy. Hi. Missioner Maxwell. I don't agree with the way that the base density is being calculated in this project. I do not say no to housing. I like the housing. I think it's too big. So I'm gonna say no. Mission or Paul, Miss? Yes. Mission or Calvi? Yes. So with that, the motion passes unanimously. No. Nope. I'm sorry. Excuse me. With that, the motion passes five to one with Commissioner Maxwell against. Excuse me. So that ends the item. We have some more business. So if you wanna keep chatting, if you can scoot out of the room, we'd appreciate that. Thank you everyone for coming. Do you have a long one? I have a speech, but it's not 11 minutes long. It's tired, I understand. So, this is the end of my year at chair. So some brief words. Can I do that under informational items? Sure. Sweet. So I don't have a long speech. It's been a great year you all. I wanted to appreciate you all. I remember like whipping out that housing thing a year ago.  So thank you all. I really appreciate you all showing up and contributing. This commission is so much stronger for each of your unique inputs. Mike, I love your teacher knowledge and reason. You know, you wanna study things and get to the bottom of it, which is super refreshing to have some facts applied to this process. John, I love your architectural expertise. Thank you. And you always caution me against COAs, which I appreciate. Sean, it was fun working to save that senior housing deck on the top of the Eucalyptus project. I was thinking about that one. I think that's when we first connected. It's like, oh, we can do things together. And that was a fun moment. And that's Soquel Street bike death ride. That was a fun one too. So anyway, I love you, man. Cindy, you have good thoughtful comments on gentrification. You're always reminding me of the broader social justice perspective, which I really appreciate sincerely. And we don't agree on math, but that's okay. Timory's not here, but she has such great comments on materials and how important those details are to the building coming out nice. And Julie's like my rock. Thanks for slowing me down when I tried to go too fast. And you always get all those details about affordable housing and like proformas, right? So that just impresses me. That's the end of my comments. Any other informational items? Sure, I got a couple. So at the January 9th city council meeting, they approved the Warf Master Plan. They did it subject to removal of the Western Walkway and references to the landmark building. I'll say at the hearing, the petitioners who don't morph the Warf folks who have filed lawsuit against the city, it indicated that if the Western Walkway was removed, that they would not pursue further litigation. So that may have played into the decision. Measure M, the analysis of that measure, which the drafters call the housing for people measure, is on the council's agenda for this coming Tuesday, the 23rd, the city did hire a third party consultant to prepare the analysis. And just briefly, the consultant's report finds that the measure is broadly applicable throughout the city. It would constrain housing supply resulting in less affordable housing and less market rate housing. It would constrain the city's ability to comply with state law requirements and would have a significant negative fiscal impact. That full analysis is on the city's website for that council meeting. It's item number 40. I'd encourage you all to take a look at it. And then, yeah. No, it's a presentation. Yeah. Right. So upcoming schedule for February, we have the oversized vehicle ordinance coastal permit that'll be before you on February 1st. And then you'll recall the downtown hotel on Front Street was continued to the February 15th agenda. So we've got those two projects locked in over your next two meetings. That's all I have. Great. We don't have any, oh, one more. Yeah. I have an item to refer to future agendas. Oh, yeah. I believe this is my last agenda. And I just wanna thank staff. I know four years has gone by quite fast. The pandemic ensuing and not meeting in person. Yeah. I've learned a lot in four years. And yeah, I just wanna appreciate you guys taking your, I mean, you guys have to do this. I wanna appreciate you guys, my other fellow commissioners. We all bear a brand now that we walk forward forever being a planning commissioner and knowing what that means as we reach close to 11 o'clock tonight. But yeah, I just wanna say thank you. It's been a pleasure. And maybe I'll see you guys around the corner somewhere. Thanks. I just also wanted to thank staff.  And it's really, really appreciated. I know it's your job, but you all do it very well. And it's much appreciated. So thank you. Yeah, thank you both too. I've worked in a number of jurisdictions and I can really say that both of you, everybody on the commission for that matter, I can tell really takes the time to read the reports and puts a lot of thought into your decision-making and that doesn't always happen in other jurisdictions. So really appreciate the input and thank you for your service. All right, with that, this meeting is adjourned. Thanks, everybody. Made it. Five minutes. Five minutes. It's not a record either. No resolutions.


Okay, Virgo. Welcome back to the channel. This is going to be your weekend reading. If you're new, please smash that like button and subscribe if you enjoy the reading. Just keep in mind, some of these messages may or may not happen for you. Just let it play out. Let it play out, Virgo. And as always, this channel for Virgo, Sun, Moon, Rising, and Venus, but all signs are welcome. Alright, Virgo, so let's get into this weekend reading and keep in mind if you want to get a personal reading with me, go ahead in the description box down below. There's a link to my website. You can just book it whatever you need. Okay. Well, your Friday looks pretty damn good, Virgo, starting with passion, work in a brunette female. Okay, let's just do it like this. Okay. So, yeah, Friday looks like some chemistry or passionate feelings. You know, it could be with another person or just you're feeling it on your own. You know what I'm saying, Virgo? Doing your thing there. Please, TMI. Let me take a look here and see Friday. Very passionate energy. So, maybe you have a date or you have a connection with someone, chasing your passions, having a good time, some flirtation. So, it's going to be flirting with you on Friday. Okay? Extending that lighthearted energy to you on Friday. Okay. Alright, let me get into this. Let's get into this energy. Okay, starting. Who's flirting with Virgo on Friday? Passionate, lusty feelings, flirting, flirty feelings. Who is flirting with Virgo on Friday? Okay. Oh, hello, King of Swords. Like, come on. I don't know. I don't know what. Look, don't blame me. I know some of you are like, are you kidding? But yeah. So, Gemini, Libra, Aquarius, or they're coming in in that energy if they're another sign. Okay? Which is strange because King of Swords isn't generally a big flirt, but I feel like they're kind of going out of their comfort zone to get your attention on Friday. Any other female energy, this person, you will be getting some flirty messages or phone calls on Friday or sometime over the weekend. Okay. And go out for drinks. That's my bartender card. You see her? She's mixing them drinks right there. Yeah. Some drinks, get together, some flirting and some fun.  But some of you might be having someone reach out. Okay. You want to go get some drinks and flirting with you? And it could turn into a lovely evening, Virgo. A very lovely evening, Virgo, my darling. I think you might enjoy it. Just one more card for Virgo for Friday. Okay. Kind of like some feel-good vibes. Yeah, this is like, should I have that ninth drink? No, I know some of you might not drink. That's fine. But this is like wishes coming true. I mean, this kind of thing extends into the evening. It's what I'm hearing here. I feel like you're going to be temporarily unavailable, maybe like your phone. Not going to answer some calls or just be out there trying to get your wishes met here, having a good time. Friday looks good. I don't know if this is a past person or a new person or someone, just a friend or someone you're talking to. They're showing up in some way. Okay. Let me see. Nice. I just get one more card. Oh my god. 10 of cups. Wow. Total emotional contentment, total emotional fulfillment. Friday looks great. If you need a little love in Virgo or you need a little hug in or some kiss in or some lap dancing. I'm just kidding. That energy definitely playing out. Okay. And this is a potential to actually go the distance with this person. Okay. Like hopefully this isn't someone that you just meet at a bar and then all of a sudden you're going to get married. I mean, hey, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. Sometimes people do that. It doesn't mean it's not going to work out, but anyway, this person could be, there could be a connection with this person in a family event over the weekend or with friends and other people, a celebration or a party or something along that line that you can meet them at one of these places. It just feels like an outdoor kind of event that could lead into the night, that kind of thing. And it's a lot of fun.  So yeah, this looks great. This just looks like maybe you're going to a wedding or you're attending some kind of party or going somewhere either with a plus one and it just gets hot and heavy or you're going by yourself and you connect with this person. Friday is for lovers. Friday is for lovers. Okay, let me take a look at Saturday. So you've got work and you've got calling in your soulmate. Oh, okay. So Saturday looks like somebody you work with. Okay. So either you're working and you're making phone calls and you actually like talk to your soulmate or your soulmate calls you Saturday while you're at work or vice versa. They're at work and you get a phone call. Like that's the calling card that feels like a phone call of some sort. Okay, so this is like the next day and maybe it's this person, you know, where someone's at work and then reaches out during work. Hey, had a great time last night. I would like to see you again. It could be that energy as well. For others, this could just be a situation where I feel like you're, if you're working over the weekend or doing something while you're occupied or distracted, profession, college and workplace.  Okay, I will say this because you know, it's me. A lot of different messages come.  Okay. Some of you may also get a call from someone while they're working or while you're working to tell you that they've made a decision. These are both decision cards about committing into a long-term sacred union or a loving relationship. Could be this person. Could be that Friday fun, loving Friday flirt too. But yeah, Saturday looks like, you know, you can take these piles separately. For example, you know, Friday doesn't happen. You still have Saturday to look forward to, right? If you want that. But okay, let me see. Wow, yeah. You're definitely going to be getting some kind of message. There's a lot of like, the pentacle and the work card kind of fit together for me because I feel like there might be a conversation about work or, and it's connected to career and profession. I'll tell you that, but it's going to be a shock because there's a risk being taken here as far as love goes on Saturday. So I don't generally have these turn into love readings on the weekends once in a while, but it feels to me like that's the way it's going. And maybe I'll continue and go into other things to see other areas of your life because I know it's not always about love. Sunday.  Okay. And if you happen to be connecting with a brunette female, it may be time to free yourself from them. All right. Let me see what other messages there are here for you. Also, I want to tell you Gemini, Scorpio and Aquarius Energy here on Saturday.  You got a new beginning in love. What? Wow, look, it's like all love all weekend. Yay. And I'm not seeing any past things. It doesn't mean it can't be, but it's not coming up specifically yet. So it could be somebody new for this weekend. Let me see. Okay. Oh, shoot. You got the hermit that I can't pick up because, yes. Okay. A lot of self reflection. Sunday is like, you know, I'm ready for new love. I'm ready for a new start freeing myself or freeing, letting go of somebody else, taking my power back and I'm starting over. Done a lot of self reflection Sundays, you know, Sundays a day for reflection. Sunday is a day of like, you don't work Sundays, a day to relax, right? Monday through Saturday. Get busy on your goals. Sunday is like, we don't work. We enjoy, we relax R and R. We have fun. We, you know, we do, that's our free time. That's our, that's our day to replenish and regroup and nourish our souls mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. So this looks to me like spiritual enlightenment, a blessing coming in on Sunday here for potential new start could be with another Virgo. Yeah, look at this making a transition Virgo. Seriously, starting over Sundays, Sunday is something Virgo. Like Sunday, it looks like you make a huge decision to free yourself and have a new start in your life. Okay. I feel like this is something that you really think about on Sunday. It just kind of comes to you and you're just like, you know, I got to do, I'm ready, you know, I'm ready to have this new beginning. I'm going to free myself from someone from the past, free myself from an ex, free myself from the energy of waiting for someone to come back or hoping they'll return and give this new situation, which I kind of feel like it all ties in together, give this new situation, try here and make this transition. Okay, so yeah, it kind of looks like a new relationship is coming in. Yeah, look at you, Virgo. You're here with this Empress energy and it could also be, you know, if you're into, if you like women, the woman is showing up, yeah, as an Empress. This is Taurus energy, light brown hair, not dark brunette, light brown hair. Okay.  If you have dark hair, maybe you can lighten it a little bit or you're, you have a connection with a dark brown brunette female and there's somebody new who is kind of like lighter complexion or lighter hair. Some of you are going to also make a decision to go and do the IVF or to go ahead with a pregnancy or focus on that, okay, on Sunday. And I know most of my subscribers, you guys are all up in age, but there's some of you who are still here, who are still a childbearing age, okay? And if you're males, you're always a childbearing age, right? So there may be a decision being made also about pregnancy or starting, it's all definitely starting something new on Sunday, making a decision to let go of some kind of past energy and start something new. Relationship, a new baby, thoughts about getting married, maybe thoughts about getting divorced, all that kind of stuff. It could, for some of you, could be about a new job, making a decision about that, starting new projects or feeling inspired to let go of something old and have a new beginning. All right, let me see what your messages of love and then I'm going to pull some like randoms as far as like what other things could be showing up for you over this weekend. Okay, the messages of love to end the love portion of the reading. Sit tight. Okay, mastery, you've learned the spirit to lesson, Virgo, so this is good. You've completed a cycle. That's what I feel like here and you, you're ready for love. I'm ready for love. I'm ready for love. That's a very old band. Does anybody know who that is? Those two little lyrics. We got Jukebox House of Virgo here. I'm ready for love. Oh baby, I'm ready for love. If anybody knows that song, I will just die. When I come back to read the comments, I will, I'm dead. That is so old. Okay, here's passion again. Try something you've never done before, Virgo. It looks like, I mean, I'm serious. You're starting something new here.  Somebody else is taking a giant leap of faith. There's definitely like new starts. Okay, external party and treating on this relationship.   Okay, yeah, you need to get away from whoever it is that you're letting go of and taking your power back. You need to get time apart from this person either mentally or physically, because there's somebody else showing up here that's interested in you. Maybe some of you just need to take a break from that other person. If something's not working out, take a break from waiting and hoping and give somebody else a try. Because I kind of feel like it's not like when the mouse is away, or when the cat's away, the mouse will play. It's more like, I feel like maybe some of you, oh my goodness, hold on. I feel like maybe some of you have been pushing away.  Accept other offers coming in. And I don't know, kind of get your feet wet or just go out on other dates. Jesus, what's the matter with you? Stop holding on to somebody who's not even there. Let go. And go on them other dates.  Go live your life for God's sake. I'm getting sassy. I'm getting sassy. All right, let me get a couple other messages here. There you go. Time to go.  You know where you're going, how to get there. Now it's time to go. Don't waste any more time. Just do it. Go after what you want. No hesitation. Blockages are being removed. Do it, Virgo. Go on that date. Take that offer. Moving to a safe place. Some of you might be moving or relocating to a better area. Maybe you're thinking about it or maybe you thought you moved to a safe place and you didn't. And now you're reconsidering relocating to a safer place. Okay. Trust your intuition, Virgo. The answer lies deep within you. Trust spirit. Wait for answers to be revealed to you. Just go for it. Yeah, you might be bored. Maybe you're just done. You're getting bored waiting for somebody who's not showing up. I feel like you need to get out of this, this boredom.  Luck is on your side. This is the Wheel of Fortune. The wheel is turning in your favor, Virgo. Good things are coming. So be ready because you deserve this. Karma is on your side for all the good you've put out. It's coming back around and it's going to be beautiful. Okay. Good karma coming to you. Okay. Somebody has a financial loss and it might be a little bit of a shocker here. So keep your eyes peeled, dot every I cross every T when it comes to your finances. I know some, a lot of people are having financial losses. So I don't feel like this is really a surprise, but maybe it's hitting you now.  I can't afford that $12 toilet paper. I gotta figure out, I gotta go to like the dollar store or something or just like I told somebody today, go get a leaf off a tree and make do girl, guy, make do. Okay. Some of you are learning a new skill and that is how to ghost or block somebody. It's first timers.  You know, I have an opinion on that, but my opinion doesn't matter.  I'm going to do this. Some of you are doing this for the first time. You've never done it before. Maybe you never wanted to do that before, but now you're going to. Okay. And yeah, you got a low offer and some of you might be just like, you know what, let me show you my skills. I'm blocking you. I'm ghosting you because I got new love coming in here. I'd like it, Virgo.  So a couple more messages for Virgo because I got to end it early. You guys, my grandson took a nap and he's going to be up like any minute. So I do not want him to wake up and me not be there. I mean, I'm in the next room, but you know, right, let's just get a physical features for the person who's showing up over this weekend, specifically that king of swords. Okay. Oh, well, you'll know them by their mohawk. Okay. Alrighty. Maybe they do a cosplay kind of thing, but yeah, we got a mohawk.  They can be, but it could just all be separate descriptions plus size. Somebody with a beard.  This might be your beard coming in. Someone may also be slender. For some of you, this could be you too. So let's just say, oh gosh, I must ask you a question, Virgo. I must ask you, would you like to go on a date to have some drinks and we could flirt until the night's end? Okay. We got a mustache here. I'm about to draw some eyeballs on here. I think that would be funny. Okay. We've got someone who's got very long, luscious, luscious, and made a word long, luscious, beautiful, thick, shiny hair and they have a headband on. Is that you? Is that your lover? Oh, well, somebody else has short hair. You know, I don't get it. That doesn't really look short to me. It's kind of like that Mrs. Brady look from the Brady bunch. Do you remember? What was her? Carol Brady? Doesn't that look like her hair? Not her face. I mean, I feel like if Carol Brady were alive today and young, this is what she'd be looking like. Maybe the name Carol rings a bell for somebody. Somebody's name is Carol or Brady. Okay. Somebody else has wavy hair. Do you notice how like all the Brady girls were all blonde? I feel like the Brady's were around today. They'd all be dark hair because that's kind of the thing, the brunette thing is really in and someone is also short. Okay. Very short. That's not like, like I'm five-four, but this is like five-two, five-one, and less. Okay. And if it's a guy, I'd say short between like five-seven and down. Okay. We've got someone who's average height. Like it's all confusing. Okay. So I can't keep pulling cards because then you're going to be looking at every single person and be like, is that my person? Is that my person? Is that them? So these are the specific features. Okay. And I feel like I would bookmark this reading and if you have any of this, like check back, if you meet someone over the weekend, check back to see if any of these features show up. And if they do, let me know because that's pretty cool. If they don't, that's okay because you've got other messages going on here. And if the rest of the messages resonate, then that's still your reading. So yes, this was short and quick. And you guys, I just want to say I put up that four-hour reading yesterday and some of you reached out to me and told me that it was so awesome because you guys put it on in the background. One person put it on in the background when they were doing their chores. So they were listening like the whole thing. Another person listened to it when they were going on a road trip and like the whole trip kept them occupied. Somebody else listened when they were working out. I mean, four hours, maybe they only worked out like for some of it. But it just the whole background thing made me really happy. I know some of you were like, what is this? But I put it out and I will tell you, I wasn't going to say anything, but I had an incident at the gym yesterday near where I live and I was so shook up by it that I could not do a reading. Like I could not even get my, like I tried so hard to get myself kind of like mentally focused. By the time I really was feeling even slightly better, it was way past the time that I would do the reading. So I actually had someone put together the four readings, the four hour readings so that you guys would just have something. I know some of you were disappointed about that and I'm sorry, but I have to take care of myself first. And so I put that out so you guys would just have something. And I don't even care about the views or anything. I just wanted you to have something. So yeah, that was my reasoning for that. And I know those of you who are subscribers and who appreciate the channel and support the channel fully understand that. And I want to say thank you for that means a lot. You know, I'm a one man show Virgo, one woman show here. So I'm going to leave that there so I can be at my station when the little guy wakes up. So I will see you all back here on Sunday for the members only Q&A. If you're not a member yet, please become a member for 999 per month. It's like 33 cents a day. You can pop in on Sunday afternoons Eastern time here on the channel and you can just ask me some questions and I'll pull cards and you know, do many readings for you.  As usual, I am here Sunday through Thursday, 10 30pm Eastern. And also if you want to book a reading, there's a link in the description box below. Thank you guys for being here. I love you all. Make good choices. Have a great weekend. Be happy. And we'll see you back here.


Thank you so much for every one of you who's here with us today, and thank you to Lisa for that wonderful introduction. It has been incredibly meaningful for me to have her as the director. She was my mentor when I first got here at Gustavus ten years ago, and so it's been a nice kind of circling back around experience. So as I said, thank you so much for being here with us today.  And we thought it would be good to take a moment to share with you all how this particular conference came into being, and how it was conceived and gestated, if you will. Sorry I had to do that, I felt like I was obligated to by the theme of the conference. But we wanted to provide you with a conceptual roadmap of what you can expect over the next couple of days. Now, some of you may be wondering what's a classicist, someone who studies ancient Greek and Roman culture, doing, chairing a science conference. So I wanted to talk a little bit about how that happened, and because I think it says something really important about the Nobel conference, and what makes it so special and what we're here to do today. So my research focuses on representations of pregnancy and childbirth in Greek literature and medicine. Essentially I'm interested in the questions of, you know, what do these texts have to tell us about attitudes, concerns, and desires of ancient people. And I love putting ancient and modern issues side by side, and seeing the ways in which each one illuminates the other. We can understand both of them more clearly if we kind of compare and contrast. So I was working on my own research, you know, the first couple of years when I got to Gustavus, and I decided to sit in on a course taught by my colleague, Lisa Rosenthal, in the political science department, because at Gustavus you can do that, you can just hang out into those classes. And she was teaching a class that covered the history of US governmental interventions into the reproductive lives of men and women in the 19th and 20th centuries. And so I was kind of thinking about these ancient and modern issues together, and during that time I read an article in New York Times about reproductive technologies on the cost and benefits of IVF and also new technologies that seemed to me like something straight out of a science fiction movie. And I remember two things about this experience. One, it got me thinking about all the ways in which ancient people also sought to shape their own futures, both individually and as a society. And these questions, how do we enhance or suppress fertility? What kinds of babies do we want to have? What does that say about our society? These questions are really old. They're not new questions. People have been asking them and trying to wrestle with them for a very long time. On the other hand, despite the enduring nature of these questions, there is something really different and revolutionary about the technologies you're going to hear about today and tomorrow. They have the potential to impact not only many people's lives and societies, but also human life itself. And in light of what we've been talking about in this political science class I was sitting in on, I became very curious and conflicted. I really didn't know what to think or where I stood on these issues. I remember wanting to know more, like, what is this really? What's really going on? What's really possible? Who will this impact and how will it impact them? And what's the right thing to do and how do we get there? And I was talking to another colleague in biology, Joel Carlin, and I was saying, man, I wish there were some really smart people who could just, like, help me figure this stuff out so I could know what to think. And he said, well, that sounds like a really good Nobel conference topic because it gets at those two sides of the mission to engage audience members and experts in pressing scientific issues and to consider the social and ethical implications. And so I thought, okay, so I submitted the suggestion and here we are. And I remember being struck at the time, and this was my second year at Gustavus, I remember being struck that it was kind of significant that any faculty member from any discipline could suggest a topic and then chair the committee. What it says is in true liberal arts form that this may be a scientific conference, but it's not only for scientists. It's for anyone interested in and invested in the way that science affects us as humans, both individually and on the social level. And we all need to be a part of that conversation. This philosophy infused the composition of the planning committee itself from the students, the faculty, and the staff who came from the sciences, humanities, social sciences to volunteer their time to help shape and bring this conference alive. So I'm going to shift gears a little bit and talk about how the conference itself came to you in this form. So how we chose the topics, what we were looking for that led us to the amazing speakers you'll see here over the next couple of days. So when we started out as a committee, we cast a broad net to consider what kinds of reproductive technologies we'd like the conference to cover.  But we decided to focus on developments that were maybe not so far away and to think about developments that were no less revolutionary but were more immediate and would have far-reaching impacts. And so essentially topics that were in most urgent need of public discussion. And in choosing our speakers, we knew we wanted essentially three things. One, we knew we wanted top-level experts, obviously. But ones who could, no matter what area of expertise they had, they could speak to both the science and the ethics on a given issue. So I want to make that very clear that everyone here can speak to both sides because they need to be looked at together. They should be siloed off into separate kind of talks. Number two, we wanted to make sure that we had engaged and engaging speakers, individuals who would be able to communicate really complex ideas to audience members and then also to communicate with one another and do so in really compelling ways. And number three, we wanted speakers who would welcome the opportunity to be one among many voices at the table, to engage seriously with many perspectives and viewpoints and to model for our community and for the general public what intellectually rigorous but also civil discourse looks like. And I think we can all agree that both of those things are in short supply these days. So what are we going to experience over the next couple of days? The way I think of it, it's kind of like visiting a city for the first time. In order to really get to know a place, you need to hit the streets on foot. You need to walk around, pop into some shops and cafes, talk to the locals, get lost, find your way out, and then discover unexpected gems. But you also have to zoom out a little bit and get a bird's eye view of where you are and look at a map and see how the one neighborhood you become accustomed to relates to other places within the city. And you want to get an idea of the landscape more generally and where your place is within that landscape. So we hope the two days of this conference mirrors that experience a bit. Day one will be kind of a close-up exploration of a particular reproductive technology situated within the context of history, ethics, and society. So what is it, what might it do kind of theme. And day two we'll pull back a little bit and get a bigger picture of the scientific lay of the land by exploring the regulatory and funding structures that shape the science we get because it's not just scientists go off into a lab and they do their thing and then they show up and say here this is what we found or this is what we did. There are larger structures that provide both opportunities as well as barriers to this research and there are reasons for both the opportunities and the barriers. So what are they and what is the role here that they play. And it's our hope that you, our audience, approach these conversations with a combination of two things. Curiosity and caring concern. Because I think we need to have both things as a society. We need the impulse to explore and understand and to push boundaries but also concern about where those explorations might lead, what unintended consequences might occur. And also to extend that a little bit further, caring concern about those who stand to benefit from these technologies and those who do not. So I said at the beginning that the idea for this conference grew out of a series of questions that took root in my mind and I can say that after all this planning and research and collaboration I'm still deeply curious and uncertain and I feel fairly confident that at the end of these two days that's probably still going to be the case. And I think that's okay. For the mass majority of us here we won't be personally directly responsible for making these big decisions but I think that we are responsible for wrestling with the questions. What is this really? What's going on? Who will it impact and how? What's the right thing to do and how do we get there? These are questions that apply not only to this conference topic but to all kinds of issues facing the world today. And the more we can do this work the more we get practice at doing it better. So I want to close with just a little... I'm a classics professor so a little classics thing. As Lisa said we're expanding the discussion sections of this conference and the reason we did that was the conversation is kind of where it all happens. Plato, the Greek philosopher in his dialogue The Symposium said that everyone is pregnant with ideas and it's only through intellectually rigorous conversation with others that those ideas get birthed and see the light of day and go out and do things in the world. What we hope to have happen here is for those ideas to take root to grow and develop and go out and do things in the world. Ideas that come into being from the conversation speakers have with each other the conversations they have with you, our audience and conversations that you have with your friends, your family with additional attendees at those lunchtime sessions Lisa mentioned and to engage in civil discourse with intellectual rigor and with open hearts and minds. I can't think of more meaningful and important work. This is what we are here to do today, the conference in general and I think all of us just in this world. So thank you all for joining us in this work and without further ado let's get to it. Thank you.