Amigail Gibbons (Friends of the Bap City) appeals a Gail Lane development, led by Joseph Reistorf, arguing major procedural and environmental-review flaws, including inadequate CEQA analysis, last-minute changes, and due-process concerns, along with Brown Act, ARC, and public-notice/fee shortcomings; the appeal urges restarting the review. The appellants claim the project is too large, would rely on unjustified variances, and requires full environmental review due to hillside/slope and historic mine-tailings issues, with governance issues undermining transparency. AHBC counters that a steep-slope variance is necessary to avoid undevelopable land. The project proposes a San Corridor–compliant landscape plan with low, single-story buildings, heavy tree retention, and a mitigated negative declaration, plus on-site water infrastructure, off-site water/sewer improvements with two sewer options, Caltrans site-distance mitigation, and a 2:1 tree replacement; fees have been paid and revisions in May were minor, with no creek-bed disturbance anticipated and permits contingent on city concurrence. Environmental studies by outside consultants were deemed adequate, revisions prompted by ARC/Planning Commission reviews, and the speaker acknowledges past missteps in housing-element and revitalization-zone efforts, signaling anticipated public input and legal guidance on council voting.

Full Transcript of the Video:

>> Yes, this appeal was put in by- >> Can you come to the microphone please?
>> I'm Amigail Gibbons, I'm president of the Friends of the Bap City group and we've elected and Joseph Reistorf has graciously agreed to deliver this appeal, coming from the entire front of the Bap City.

>> Good evening, my name is Joseph Reistorf.

Other than 122 888 Gail Lane, not a long term resident of Bap City, so I can't really speak with the passion and the emotion that probably a lot of the other speakers have, but perhaps I can provide a little bit of perspective.

In my real life, I work as an environmental consultant for cities and counties around the state primarily on various types of projects.

But I also work for some private developers who are interested in developing different types of recycling and composting projects.

And in that capacity, I've spent a lot of time on this side of the table and various planning commission meetings, public hearings, city council meetings.

And really getting a perspective of what it takes to get a project through.

I think Gary in his comments mentioned when he was discussing the variance issue, talk about how cities and counties typically make it very difficult to get a variance for the very simple reason that they're trying to preserve the integrity and the character of their communities.

And that's been my experience and I've had several opportunities, in terms of where I've had to tell clients that I've advised them not to proceed with their variance application because the bar is just too high.

That no matter how much they wanted it and how much they thought they could make their case, it didn't meet the criteria set in the city's zoning code.

And that's the case here.

Before I go on, I just wanted to kind of back up a little bit.

And it's, first of all, thank you for providing this series of meetings for the next three nights and also, I mean, go ahead with the hearings tonight, despite the fact that legal counsels advise you that there might be a different alternative or different approach.

But the look around the community is clear that the view and your predecessors and people that have lived here for the last 50 to 100 years have really taken good care of this community.

They've worked hard to preserve its character to make it really stand out.

I've sent postcards, copies of videotapes and so forth, relatives that I had in other parts of the country.

And it's always been a maze of beauty and the character of this place and how it stands out from a lot of other communities.

Well, when you, given that though, when you look around and see how well the community's been preserved, it really raises the question, well, how did we get here tonight?
How did this project get this far in the process?
And there are a number of serious laws that have occurred at this point that have allowed them to have that.

In preparing our appeal, we spent a lot of time going through the documents and the record looking into the process of human procedure.

And we really saw three primary reasons why this project should be denied.

The first is that there are series of procedural errors that in total make it difficult, if not impossible for the Planning Commission to have made a recent informed decision about the potential environmental and community impacts for the project.

The second is that the environmental review conducted by the city was inadequate, failed to consider all of the potential environmental impacts of the project.

And the third primary reason is that the Planning Commission improved variances for the project without making any of the necessary findings or determinations required by the zoning code and without complete details of the project's scope, design and layout.

These are all fatal flaws and I hope you can consider all the arguments that have been made tonight.

I think everybody spoke quite eloquently.

And I'll attempt not to be Dr.
B.

Or Matishas, but maybe just to highlight some of the things that I think are some of the most significant issues that we should consider.

Regarding the procedural errors, the single guidelines and in fact your own policies that you've established for processing secret documents are fairly clear about how projects should be analyzed and processed.

It talks about the pre-application phase, application phase, and then an analysis phase.

What really happened here?
And I think this is probably a characteristic that can be applied to everything as this, heading up to this point.

And that was really a rush of judgment.

There seemed to be a lot of impetus to move this project forward before all the details of the project were known.

And that, I think it can be evidenced by the fact that on the very night that it was presented before the Planning Commission for Final Action, new site plans, new changes to the design was still being presented.

And even though the Planning Commission approved the architectural review, they're really wanting the architectural details to be approved.

They simply defer that decision later to a committee and that is simply not good planning it.

So approving decisions, making decisions, and then grant approvals when the details are coming in the future almost always leads to bad decisions.

It's just amazing to me to see how far the project had moved forward in the process before an application had even been filed.

Again, no guidelines, no secret guidelines talk about a very specific event that's supposed to occur in the process.

One of which is the actual submittal application.

And that's actually a significant event because it sets a couple of clocks in motion.

A lot of time that a city or a county has for each other a letter of completion, completing the initial study, or actually grant them the mission of coming to a decision on the project.

That event never occurred.

The Advisory Review Committee made a decision on the title of the bar loan document that will be required before even receiving an application from the applicant and before many of the supporting documents and studies that were to go along to the project were presented.

There was no basis for making that decision that early in the process.

During the planning commission meeting, several of them were brought up that were addressed partially in some of the documentation up to that point.

Traffic, water supplies, advocacy, and public services.

Many of those issues were clear that there weren't any answers yet.

It was amazing to me to see the planning commission in direct conflict to some of the advice given to them by the city staff to approve the project.

The city engineer made it quite clear that he didn't believe that there was adequate water pressure to meet the needs of the project and it could determine what additional, what impact staff that the project would have on the water supply for the community.

Because you have the planning commission simply ignored that advice and moved forward with approval of the project.

Those that are some of the serious flaws of the approval process, we hope that you will certainly consider the advice of the legal counsel and recognize that the department will review the project in what's inadequate and that you really need to kind of go back to the beginning and start hoping.

But I think you have to kind of look at what, if you go through the process, where will you end up?
What should really be done at this point is have the developer present to you the final design and details of the project.

Up to this point it has been a moving target with details, a constantly transmitting change and new skills being given throughout the process.

Once that is done, then the comprehensive and thorough initial study using the checklist of your own guidelines should be completed.

That point is no doubt that the likely decision will be to do a full EIR.

It will be prepared as a subject of public review, comments submitted and so forth.

And then we will be back here where we are tonight, which is still trying to see if a project that is incompatible with the character of the city too large for the site should move forward.

And that gets back to the final point of the linear argument, which is that the variances which were provided by the city, which were approved by the planning commission were approved without any justification for finding the main data that are in the zoning code.

This morning I picked up a copy of the approval letter that the city recently sent to the developer after the planning commission meeting.

That is the letter dated May 14th.

In the initial staff report, the sections that dealt with the variances there really were no attempt at all as being to be provided by any type of justification that there was a standard for something of the planning.

The wording that was provided in the approval letter based on the planning commission's action that essentially the developer stated that special circumstances applicable to the property include the depography due to previous uses on a drawing by site and then to apply a strict standard to this applicant with reduced his utilization of the property or potential as many as any units found to 24 creates a hardship which is inordinate compared to other people's properties and would preclude any type of affordable housing.

There's no justification for that statement.

In fact, it applies as a city's responsibility to guarantee developers full utilization of their property regardless of what it takes to achieve that full utilization, in this case massive grading, construction of the canning walls, encroachment on seasonal streams of wetlands.

That is what the purpose of the zoning code is and that is that there comes nowhere near providing any type of justification.

Several of the other speakers vindicated the depography of this area is consistent with a variety of slopes, 30 percent, some greater, some natural, some man-made and we live with those slopes.

That's the character of the community in which we live.

We construct homes, we construct buildings, roads and so forth to deal with those.

We don't come in and level them and then try to maximize, so just so we can maximize use of the property.

That isn't a right of any property or any property that's listed in any way or supported by anything in the zoning code or the general plan.

The same has to do with the branch grading for the setback from the seasonal stream.

Again, no justification or substantiation was provided in the staff report or in the planning commission findings.

So, this is an effort that will be that if you decide that the project really needs a thorough environmental review, which it has not had up to now, and that you submitted to that, you'll be back here and still have a project that will require some significant variances to be approved and the findings for those will not be there.

No information is going to come forward that will substantiate that and it's all likelihood that during the course of conducting a full environmental impact report, additional environmental flaws and significant impacts of the project will be identified.

We just heard a very interesting presentation regarding the historical impact of the project.

One of the things that was not done with the initial study and proposed negative decoration for the project was that it was not sent to the state clearinghouse.

There are characteristics of the project because it has impacts that fall into the jurisdiction of the various state agencies required under the sequence of statutes that it should have been sent to the public clearinghouse.

This is a very convenient way of making sure that the projects that have the significance are reviewed by appropriate state agencies.

If it had been sent to the state clearinghouse, a letter that was received from the Office of Historic Preservation and Department of Parks and Recreation would be made to the first after the planning commission hearing took place would have been received and put in the record so that it could have been considered prior to anybody making a decision on this.

This letter pointed out several significant factors that should have been considered regarding the historical impact of the site.

I'll just quote briefly, this is a letter from Dr.
Knox Mellings, the state historic preservation officer.

He says, "The 1988 amendment to the CEQA guidelines also includes a stricter definition of what constitutes substantial adverse changes to historical resource and therefore what constitutes a significant effect on the environment in relation to historical resources.

The guidelines now state, quote, substantial adverse change in the significance of historical resource means physical demolition, destruction, relocation, alteration of the resource or immediate surroundings such that the significance of historical resource will be materially impaired.

"
That describes exactly what the plan is for this site.

In summary, we encourage you to take the advice of the legal counsel and recognize that the environmental review that was conducted with this project is woefully inadequate.

It has many issues unaddressed, the traffic issue, while some impacts were identified, there was no mitigation provided, an issue was just dropped and left there.

And so those speakers pointed out by proving this project, you're increasing the population of the city by over 10% with one simple approval.

There's really been no analysis of whether the city's infrastructure and public services can accommodate this.

And thirdly, the variances that were awarded made this project have been obviously instantiated.

There's no evidence in the record, there's no indication that even if we did the former environmental impact report came back four to six months from now that any new information would come forward that would help you instantiate the granting of variances.

So we asked you to overturn the planning commission's approvals of this project and to help maintain the character of our community.

Thank you.

>> Are you aware that the letter you referenced in the state was in response to an inquiry on a residential piece of property, not on this project?
>> It's not clear what actually prompted the letter, colorizing to the tone of the letter and the way in which he characterized the impacts, certainly applied to this project.

>> But just so everybody is clear, that's not a letter sent from the state.

It responds to any inquiry on this project.

And in fact, I was with the city planner when a call was made to that office to clarify that point.

That inquiry was made relative to private residences on Boulder Street.

>> Thank you.

And my point of bringing up is the fact that if the negative decoration for the project had been made in the state clearinghouse, this envelope probably would have been serviced as part of our overview of the project.

>> You mentioned a letter from the city, the justification of the final approval.

What was that again?
>> I was with those, a corner earlier from the- >> The letter from the commission.

>> It's the standard of approval after that, that the Planning Commission essentially developed for action by the Planning Commission and stated May 14, 2001.

>> So this one right here.

>> Okay.

>> There's the final findings that were adopted by the Planning Commission.

>> Thank you.

>> Thank you very much.

>> Where we start is about 500, according to some stretch of height.

[ Inaudible ] [ Inaudible ] >> I'd like to commend the eight of talents that worked out to exactly two hours, which is what the designated amount of time was.

So thank you very much.

We will now then hear the rebuttals.

So are you speaking?
>> Here.

Okay.

And again, you're going to be speaking about the- >> Sign plan.

>> Okay.

Keep in mind, 15 minutes still.

Johnson, Newton, Drummond Street, and our city.

This will be brief because the reasons for the rebuttal are very simple.

The site planner was not approved by the Planning Commission because the city engineer, the Planning Commission, and the public never had a chance to review the plan that was put before the Planning Commissioners for a vote.

So, further, this site planner was not in the Planning Commissioner's packets, nor was it available for study by the city engineer in advance of the May 10 meeting.

I believe that it was received at the city on May 7th.

That was after the packets were sent out and it just wasn't available.

So, it seems presumptuous on the part of the developer to even expect the passage of this document with no review.

I was amazed that it seemed like they just walked in here and dropped one in front of each Planning Commissioner and with the expectation that it would be approved.

Further, after a full-size site plan of which, I'm going to ask Victor to co-lute.

After a full-size site plan was submitted for the required amount of time, one that you can actually lay out on a table and read, they came in with this, this little 11 by 17-size, reduced-size document and dropped it in front of everybody and had the expectation that they would be able to vote on that.

So, it just seems incredible that we could even consider that that approval could even consider that the approval could possibly happen.

And what in fact actually happened is that the site plan wasn't denied.

What happened was that the modifications to the previously submitted site plan were not approved because that's what the new site plan was, was modifications to the site plan that they have reviewed.

So, how could they approve a site plan that they haven't really seen?
They certainly couldn't approve it by looking at it for a couple of minutes.

So, I urge you to uphold the decision of the Planning Commission and deny the appeal.

Thank you.

And if there's anyone else who wants to use some of this time from our group to add any additional information, then I will defer the rest of my time today.

Thank you.

I would just even make more clear what Gary's talking about here is that the developer came up and spoke earlier during their appeal and said they don't understand what they're really supposed to point at because there wasn't a recommendation.

Well, that's really because they were putting heavy pressure on the Planning Commission not to ask for a continuance for another two weeks because then they missed their June 15th deadline.

And what the Planning Commission really should have done was said we don't have enough time, not enough information to look at this new site plan, so let's have a continuance.

But of course if they've done that, there goes their funding and so Harry Stewart and the other commissioners in a sense didn't pass it because there wasn't enough information there.

And really what they should have done was just ask for a continuance, but that's not something the developer would have wanted.

I do have one more brief comment that I forgot to mention and that is that the developer got a few moments ago, Mr.
Spann, where the developer's representative, and said that the changes to the new site plan were minimal.

That was his word.

And he also said that they were not substantial.

We went from 50,000 cubic yards of grading to 18,000 cubic yards of grading.

I would call that substantial.

Thank you.

And there was no grading plan with that new site plan.

Okay, Mr.
Spann.

Actually, number two was actually the city planner's report.

Oh, that's true.

I'm sorry, my mistake.

I guess this is to be never true.

Well, I did write, Council Members, a memo to you in which I discussed some of the issues that were mentioned by Mr.
Hammerton.

I think one of the concerns that I've heard this evening, the greatest concerns was the processing of the CEQA document, whether CEQA was followed or not, and since there was a rush to judgment, we had a preliminary application meeting in December, and that was with the full staff.

And we decided to go to the mitigated negative declaration route at that time, and that's what we did.

We heard this evening from Council that a project of this type, what's been disclosed since then, looks like we might be in BIR territory, and that seems to be have come as a result of this.

But at that time, we had spent three years working on this site.

We had already approved two projects on this site, parcel map on this site, road alignment on this site.

Our knowledge from the staff point of view was pretty thorough about this site.

There was some things we didn't know.

We asked for a large group of studies to be done.

Studies came in.

They were reviewed.

They went back for re-damping.

For instance, the original traffic study said, "Here's the model of six trips per unit and per day.

"
And we changed that to 10 trips per day because we thought that would be more realistic.

So we made an attempt through our peer review to have real good objective studies.

There's a lot of questions.

There's questions about the January 22nd ARC, and I can understand that.

There's been some quotations of the CEQA guidelines.

And I do understand that when an application comes in, a clock starts ticking.

You have to have a CEQA document done by a certain amount of days that's required by a public agency.

I'm not sure we have a CEQA expert here, or you can jump in any time.

But what I read in CEQA is that you can begin the CEQA process earlier.

And that's what we were attempting to do this to make a better application and what we felt we were going to receive.

In my memo, I did quote what I was relying on.

That was CEQA guidelines section 15004D.

And I've got that here in front of me.

And so you can -- this was what the decision was based on for that January 22nd ARC.

CEQA guidelines say this, "Choosing the precise time for CEQA compliance involves a balancing and competing factors.

The IRs and negative declarations should be prepared as early as feasible in the planning process to enable environmental considerations to influence project, program, and design, to get late enough to provide meaningful information for environmental assessment.

With private projects, the lead agency shall encourage the project proponent to incorporate environmental considerations into project conceptualization, design, and planning at the earliest feasible time.

"
That's what we were attempting to do.

And we made a shot at it.

You know, the results are what they are.

The CEQA document that the Planning Commission approved, as we said before, is not that document.

It was a document that was prepared and approved by ARC after the application was deemed complete.

So I think that's probably enough on that.

Now, to some of the specifics of Mr.
Pempton's appeal, the question of whether staff has worked on behalf of the applicant.

Well, the file says for itself, and on that, he descored.

He mentioned a letter that was written to the California Tax Credit Allocating Committee.

That's a letter that was never sent out.

It was shelved.

It was a zoning verification letter that was requested.

It was shelved because of the September meeting that the Council had.

So we were waiting until you made your decision on whether to send that out and it was never sent out.

The letter to the home administration, that was the letter of, it was an informational letter that was requested.

Now, as a city planner, I provide letters all week long to anyone who asks for it that concerns public information.

And on request, I send letters verifying zoning and project information and planning procedures.

And they go to title companies and public agencies and developers and all kinds of people.

And where I get my information is from our ordinances, our resolutions, our planning processes, and the project information that applicants supply me with.

At the time that letter was written, we had not received our preliminary site plan.

We had not received our application.

So I asked Mr.
Spann what his application would involve.

And he said it would involve site plan and architecture approval.

And there'd be no discretionary approvals asked for.

No variances requested.

That's what I put in that informational letter about the zoning.

This is what the project is going to be or will be put in a future tax.

When I read the letter now, I go well and write for staff that should be clear about where the information came from.

And that explains what that river is.

That was something that, you know, had come up.

There's a letter about a repo idolization zone.

That letter I'd never seen before a couple weeks ago.

It was never circulated to staff that was not to me.

And there was an on-city council agenda.

So that was news to me that that letter was in the file.

But I do remember Mr.
Spann calling me and asking me if I would be, he expressed the ideas in that revitalization zone several months ago.

And I remember advising him that it was extremely unlikely the city council would want to have a revitalization zone for a project that has not been approved.

Not even, no application has even been submitted yet.

And so I suggested that if you wanted to pursue this idea to contact some other land use planner, I suggested.

Nevada City Engineering was our retainer at that time.

Their land use planner and his son might be one person you might consider since they were involved in this project at that point.

And then I immediately told the city manager about that conversation.

So that's all there is to that letter.

There was a question about the ARC meeting.

As you know, as I mentioned before, we did have a public noticing snap vote was the first week in the new city hall.

We didn't have the agenda board up.

But that doesn't justify a mistake.

The mistake was made.

And to that end, I have had discussions with the city clerk and we discussed how staff procedures can improve.

So the mistake like that would never happen again.

There was a question about Brown Act discussion at the ARC meeting on January 22nd.

And what that was when it was, I do recall that conversation when Commissioner Stewart left the meeting.

They left the meeting for several reasons.

And I went to I caught Jim Anderson, he was in the building.

I asked the city attorney if the chair could make a substitution without a violation of the Brown Act.

He said he could.

So Ruth Bolter stepped in to this place.

And I that's what we were talking about when the tape started.

The question of the fees being collected is another question that's come up.

The on December 7th, I wrote to AHDC that is to quote, "The fitted application must include the application fee.

Based on the preliminary site plan, the application will require environmental review for a 13 acre site, $1,050.

"
Now, in the move from the York hotel to the city hall, this is the only thing I can think of.

With all that was going on, we didn't collect it in a timely manner.

And before the planning commission agenda was set for April 26, we reviewed all the fees at the staff level.

And certain fees were due and that was the fee that was due.

And Mr.
Spanner, I'll check with him out.

And since then, I've discussed with city manager and the city clerk and office clerk how well improved procedures are.

So that we don't get a mistake like that happen again.

But if it was a mistake, that's what happened.

And I would say that's about it.

Mr.
Templeton brought up the American Institute of Certified Planners.

And yes, I am a member and I do subscribe to your code of ethics.

And I do believe that if you review the record that anybody reviews the record, that it'll show that I'm trying to process this application in the interest of the public good.

And to bring it in front of the decision makers that have to make the decision.

And my job is professionally, you know, because it called forth.

So that's pretty much my statement on those issues.

I have one quick question if I could carry.

We had a letter from Mr.
Spanner to the city that was never distributed and asked Lee I got it and he said he asked for everything he got.

Did I hear you say correctly that Lee has made reference to a letter that never even mailed?
Yes, but it was in the file.

You made reference to the letter, to the tax.

How did you obtain a letter that was never mailed?
It was in the file.

The original was in the file because I never mailed it so I never made it out there to stuff the original in there in case it was going to be used someday.

Question for the city attorney don't answer immediately, but at what point does a document become a public document?
At what point is it a contemplated public document?
Basically the rule is that it's still in the draft form and it's being circulated.

It's not a public document, but I've never gotten into this permutation of it's a letter that never got mailed.

I'm sure it was a public document.

I'd be interested in it.

Not tonight, but I'd be interested in your opinion at some point.

There's a sign that's like.

.

.

Do I get a chance to.

.

.

If that was where he was, it's like.

.

.

He had his say and now he had his say.

No, no, I think there was some discussion.

Okay, thank you.

Okay, now Mr.
Spann, the representatives from AHBC.

There are no appeals which order am I?
Probably not.

Maybe a little longer on some than others.

Well then, if you have a copy of the agenda in front of you.

Yeah, I can just go down it as.

.

.

In response to addendum meeting variances, there are special circumstances applicable to the subject property.

The 30 percent slope is not natural.

No other property in the vicinity of the site has this unique man-made feature.

Mine does.

This sets the site apart from all other natural slope conditions.

The same variance was applied to the by prestige care facility on the subject property using the same hardship justifications and was approved by the city.

A significant portion of the site will be lost to development of steep slope variances.

If steep slope variance is not approved.

With regard in addition to that, the issue of variance is such that this site has two streams flowing through it and without the ability to cross those streams, virtually well I'd say over 50 percent of the property would be unattainable.

You just can't get to it.

You can't develop it.

Now if that's the city's pleasure then there's your decision but it clearly hinders anyone's ability whether it's for affordable housing or for high-price housing or multi-family, single-family, commercial, whatever.

If you can't get into the land, you cannot develop it.

That's clearly a hardship on whoever, when you own it or you're in contract to acquire it or whatever the case may be, you can't do it.

You can't develop it.

So clearly there's a hardship right there alone in just being able to reach the property.

Just to reiterate the 30 percent slope issue, I heard someone say that they have a similar situation.

I cannot dispute that.

I don't know if it was a mining site as well but I know that we are on a mining site and that these conditions were handmade.

I don't think that that was the intent of the ordinance.

The intent of the ordinance was to protect the hillside.

This was a devastated piece of property.

I know there's history behind the mining operation but the results of the mining operation have obliterated this land.

With regards to addendum C, tree removal permit.

Though some trees are being removed, they will be replaced two to one.

Leaving aside the more trees after development than exists now, special potential will be given to tree placement to provide maximum screening to neighboring properties.

San Corridor.

Our project is designed in landscape plan that focus specifically to comply with the San Corridor ordinance.

Low single-story structures have been utilized to minimize any visual effect on the corridor.

Tree retention and heavy landscape screening along the corridor are incorporated in our landscape plan.

In response to procedural issues, addendum E, number one.

City staff.

Actually what I prepared was response to the items as they were indicated in the appeal.

So with regards to procedural issues, I felt that the city didn't need to respond to some of the questions that were asked and I think Paul has pretty much addressed them.

But I did want to indicate that we did pay an initial fee of $560 in October and additional fees were paid on request by staff.

The mitigating negative declaration was granted on a basis that sufficient documentation was provided.

Mitigation conditions have been placed on the project that will assure that the identified environmental issues required requiring further investigation will be analyzed and mitigated prior to the issuance of a grading permit or building permit.

Revisions to site and grading plans were minimal at the May 10th meeting.

What was submitted in terms of the changes to the site plan I addressed and responded to previously, there were very minor changes to the footprints of a few buildings to remove them from the street bed setback.

Where at this point the only portions of the development that affect the street bed setback is one corner of the parking lot area in just one location and the bridge crossings over the street beds.

And in the case of those bridge crossings they will be free span.

There will be no structures, no disturbance to the creek bed whatsoever.

But those bridge spanning spans will be crossing over the 25 foot setback area.

The adjustments are beneficial to protect the sensitive nature of the seasonal street beds.

By making these changes the only approach to the street beds are the two bridges which will be free span and spanning and will not have an impact on the street beds.

Though further studies and reviews are being required at later dates, the importance of these studies will not be diminished in any way.

Unless the city concurs that all conditions have been met the project will receive a grading and/or building permit.

The purpose of deferring these studies is as a common practice in the development of real estate in California.

The intent of this practice is to allow the project to receive ample review and conditional approval.

Then to allow the developers to secure project financing prior to paying considerable expense for engineering, working drawings and other studies that will ultimately require the city's approval.

At the end of F with regards to housing element.

The city's housing element is not in substantial compliance with state health like Taylor and Carl.

The Department of Housing and Community Development to verify this fact.

The city does have responsibility to promote adequate housing opportunities for all segments of the community's housing needs.

We would not be taking the financial risk involved in developing this project if there wasn't a need.

Our marketing information reflects a need far greater than the proposed 80 years.

With response in response to the trends of Nevada City appeal.

Here I'm going to address as the items were identified in the reveal A through M.

A hardship justification for steep slope variance was provided to the planning commission.

Both sites steep slopes are manmade not natural.

Mine tailings left over from past mining operations have devastated the site's topography.

Development of the site and in reasonable density will require variances to the steep slope ordinance.

It should be noted that the previously approved prestige care facility received the same variances on the very same site.

This is not a similar site or a similar piece of property that a variances required for requested.

This is the very same site.

Placement of the water tank has been altered prior to the planning commission hearing.

The present location is screened by existing vegetation from Highway 49 and Broad Street.

The addition of landscaping will add to the screening of the water tank.

No visual impact will be caused by this improvement.

Permission for clearing natural vegetation has been given the formal community measures pertaining to site distance disability from Highway 49 onto Mony Broad Street.

The project site has proper zoning and general plan designation.

The allowable density far exceeds the density proposed for the project.

Seeking variances does not negate the project's consistency with the city's general plan.

Trees being removed will be replaced with new trees at a ratio of two to one.

This is a replacement factor generally found acceptable in most other jurisdictions.

Further one thing, a thick, dense stance upon a rust of hives is thought to be a good forcing practice which enables selecting trees.

The project can be served by the city's water system.

We propose mitigation measures to adequately address water and sewer source improvement that will more than adequately cover the project's impact on these systems.

What I mean by that is that we have recently read the letter to the city manager and asked for it to be distributed to the city council offering our contribution to improvements to off-site water and sewer line improvements in the city.

These improvements have recently been communicated to us as a need by public works director and upon hearing those results we have made this offer and we have also made that the offer is twofold.

One is dealing with sewer and that is that through the process of the application we had paid for Cramer Engineering to give us a report on what kind of off-site sewer improvement needs would be required for the project and they indicated that a gravity flow line would be required to be improved and to the extent of roughly about $100,000 of cost.

At that time that was the chosen way to go and still the recommended way to go and mitigate the negative degradation.

The letter that I had submitted to the city manager reflected that there is an alternative and that would be to pump sewage up to Broad Street and make improvements to Broad Street.

Those off-site improvements for the Broad Street connection is far, far less than what the other improvements would be required by the Cramer report.

By now we are being required to put in a sewage holding system which will require pumping station and emergency generator in case of black house.

This now opens up the alternative to pumping to Broad Street and saving perhaps as much as $70,000 off-site sewer line improvements.

The offer that I made to the city manager was that if the city chose to have the Broad Street improvements made as opposed to the other gravity flow improvements that we would contribute to the city the difference of that savings at approximately $70,000 presuming that that is the number to the city to make improvements in other sewer lines throughout the city that may be causing infiltration of storm water into the sewer system.

So we felt that that was a very fair and adequate way of dealing with some of the problems that the city is dealing with in the sewer system at this time.

We also agreed to make a contribution up to $50,000 for off-site water improvements and this is over and above all the improvements and all the work that we're going to do on site with regards to the water.

This is in addition to putting in the hydromatic pump station on site and our water holding tank as required or as discussed with the city manager previously.

So we think that we're making ample contributions to the city system to deal with existing problems that go beyond the need of our comical system.

Excuse me, don't worry.

Because you're going to be there while before you move on.

But when was this letter sent to the city?
This was sent and I just got it as it copies the distribution.

June 7th.

We don't.

.

.

I've indicated I gave that letter to.

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.

I don't think that that letter is.

Yeah, don't give it.

Just put on the arrow right.

I gave a letter to the city manager.

Okay.

I remember Beth was referring to Will-Serve letters and to my knowledge the city staff has not requested or required that we collect Will-Serve letters for the project.

"Gee, it is common practice to grant mitigated negative declarations on the project that require studies and documentation.

As long as the needed studies and documentation are provided and approved by the responsible local government agencies, projectations of a building permit, a reading permit, the material provided to staff and the Planning Commission was sufficient for them to make a decision on the project's architecture.

All items requested by the Planning Commission were provided, enabling the Commission to make a knowledgeable decision.

"
All right.

"The review of the environmental impact is a separate action from the planning.

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from the site plan review.

The NILASite plan review has no bearing on the advocacy of the environmental review process.

Consultants prepared all of the environmental studies for the project.

The applicant prepared none of the studies.

"
Jay, the environmental document is adequate for this project.

"Cultural, historical, biological, and water resource studies have been provided and mitigation measures are in place to assure that if necessary further review and studies are required prior to the mission to the building.

Okay.

"
It was being asked that on-site traffic safety studies be done.

And I asked why should this be done.

This is something I've never heard of before.

I've been developing apartments for 16 years and I've never been asked to provide such a study song.

I'm a little more curious than anything.

Are there accident reports or any other information that supports such an on-site traffic study analysis?
Site distance mitigation measures spread with the April 25th, 2001 Caltrans letter was incorporated into the mitigation.

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in the mitigation and negative degradation.

L, we have agreed to make off-site infrastructure improvements required by the city.

Such improvements will correct existing problems that will be beneficial to the community for many years.

And traffic impact on broad Pine Street intersection was adequately addressed and attracted reports submit to staff and discuss regarding the project's potential impact on the intersection was explained by the traffic engineer to the planning commission prior to the approval of the mitigation negative degradation.

Cultural historical significance.

Historical value of the site has been determined in the reports submitted to the staff by a cultural resource consultant.

The report reflects the historic value of the site to be known.

There's little evidence that a historic act took place at the site.

Mitigation measures assured that areas of the hillside will be preserved and interpretive signage will be provided for public information.

But basically the way the news explains to me that the value of historical sites has a great deal to do with what is left to be viewed.

Well in essence what's left to be viewed here is the torn away hillside and to be at back then there's no equipment, there's no foundations, there are no structures evident or existing that has any historical relevance.

We all agree that a historic act took place at this site and we agree as in the mitigation measures to preserve the hillside by clearing out the brush even interpretive signage leaving in the area for the public to view and walk up to the site because it is taken.

So we agree to all of those conditions.

Water and sewer mitigation measures have been provided for sewer service issues.

We have maintained that we are willing to work with the city on needed improvements to the infrastructure impact cause wire project.

Whether or not there are hazards associated with the onsite contamination will be determined prior to issues of the grading permit.

The potential impact from the closed city burnt down and the possible presence of asbestos on the site will also be determined by the conditions of the grading permit.

Wildlife impact was discussed and analyzed.

The site is essentially the final piece of land to be developed.

The site is essentially surrounded by existing or planned development improvements.

Habitat patterns have been adjusted to the development in the area of the site and will adjust to our development as well.

There is no known critical habitat existing on the site.

And adequate provisions have been made in the approved mitigation, mitigated negative decoration to improve environmental clearance of all identified project impacts and summation.

The mitigated negative decoration has several conditions that must be met prior to issues of the grading permit.

The project is consistent with the general plan and the sand core regulations.

In conclusion, I feel that we keep an involved in this proposal since last summer.

We made initial applications in October.

We paid initial fees at that time.

We had numerous staff meetings.

We've had several ARC meetings.

It wasn't until the April 6th ARC meeting that the city engineer indicated to us that our grading plan was unacceptable.

It was at that time that the modifications of that grading plan remained and a more stepped approach was adopted.

And it was at that time that the retaining walls were the majority or more retaining walls, I should say, was added to the plan.

April 6th is a long time from October 23rd when we made this initial application.

It's a bit frustrating to find out that you have to make those kind of adjustments so late in the process.

But we did.

And we addressed those issues.

And we will respond to everything that staff has added.

Well, nevertheless, our plan, our submittal and our documentation had been with the city up until April 6th.

And also, on May 10th submittal, in reference to the different size of the plans, we had submitted a site plan on the 7th.

And we had provided what was requested of us in size of the plans.

The reductions were provided so that the planning commissioners could have that size in front of them to you during the meeting.

The president had the big 24 by 36 each of you pulling it out.

The whole purpose was to show that the modifications could be made and that we could remove the buildings from the setbacks.

We thought it was a good thing.

And I noticed when we created such an uproar, we wouldn't have left it alone.

Everything we've done throughout this process has been a good thing to try and make this a better project.

We've modified the building elevations.

We consulted with local architects.

We think that we've come up with a better plan.

And every time staff mentions something or brings something up, we address it.

We respond to it.

As far as the mitigating negative declaration, there are still items in here that shouldn't be in here.

I don't know why there are conditions in here to pay a fee related to annexations.

I think a lot of this could be cleaned up.

I think this mitigated negative declaration, we could sit here in the next couple nights and we could go through every item and we can correct it and we can make the problem findings to improve this project.

And I think we would certainly appreciate that.

I mean, we think that we've done a lot.

We've certainly, you know, addressed just about every concern.

If there are concerns that we haven't addressed, let us know.

We'll address them still.

But we would appreciate the cooperation and making the problem findings to this document so that we can make the right decision.

I have a question.

We need to clarify this.

We don't want anybody leaving here and any bad impressions about the process.

You indicated that you were advised by the city engineer on April 6th that the grading plan was unacceptable.

The city engineers indicated it wasn't at the meeting on April 6th.

Can we resolve when did you, Bill, indicate to Mr.
Spann that the grading plan was unacceptable?
The grading plan was dated April 13th.

So I don't think it existed on 6th.

Or we didn't have it.

But even narrow it down even further.

Did you recall, Bill, when you advised Mr.
Spann that the grading plan was unacceptable?
I don't recall that.

I know that one we're talking about, the first one I saw.

People mix up the site plan and the grading plan.

We had a site plan.

I'm just trying to get the old man.

Mr.
Spann has indicated that the advice from staff that the grading plan was unacceptable came late in the process.

So I'm just trying to determine when did it arrive.

So how late it was?
We had, we asked, I'm sorry, Mr.
Mayor, my name is Gary Horne.

I'm the civil engineer for the project.

We did have comments at the ARC meeting regarding the grading plan.

One of the comments was that there was too much dirt being moved that the initial grading plan that we did that was considered at the ARC meeting had a volume of about 50,000 yards of excavation.

And we received the comments at the ARC meeting.

We went back and revised some aspects of the site plan.

We also revised the grading plan and resubmitted those for planning commission.

The second grading plan showed yardage of about 18,000 cubic yards, dirt to be moved.

The last minute changes to the site plan and I agreed it where they were made the week before the planning commission hearing to mitigate the encroachments into the stream setbacks were sent to the city with a full intention on our part for them to be in the package of the planning commission.

At that time we did not revise the grading plan to reflect those line movements.

So we we tried to respond to all the comments and to address those and do the best we can to meet staff concerns.

That's my recollection of the history.

I skipped over a response to Mr.
Hamilton's appeal and perhaps I might just take a couple minutes to explain my position and some of those issues.

Dating back to last summer I did approach the city manager about requesting to make a massive city to work with this on making home application.

And in moving forward with that thought I started working with Mr.
Cogley from a planning standpoint researching the property determining whether or not it would be suitable for our plants.

And in that process I explained that in order for the city if the city were to be interested in making the home application with us it would require, not require, but it would improve our competitive score of the home competition if the housing element was in substantive compliance.

And this is where I admit an error in judgment in my zeal and in zeroes to see this happen.

I felt that this is a good thing for the city and I took it upon myself to engage a consultant in reviewing the housing element.

Now this was done in some cooperation with staff because I did receive the documents from staff but in hindsight I wish I never would have done that.

But facts are I did take that on.

With regards to the revitalization zone I did approach staff I did approach Paul Cogley and asked him if he would be interested in working with me and creating a revitalization zone to present to the city knowing that Mr.
Cogley worked part-time for the city knowing that he had an extensive background understanding of the city's makeup.

I felt who better than he to write revitalization zone or work on it.

My intention was not to do anything devious, it was simply because he was in my opinion the best person for doing that kind of work.

Mr.
Cogley was kind of quickly telling me that it just wasn't appropriate so it stopped there.

But to explain the reason for the request to form a revitalization zone had everything to do with improving our competition for tax credits.

It had nothing to do with the home program, the housing element, but yet it was another segment, another competition that we were seeking to finance the project.

I apologize if it's caused Mr.
Cogley any problems and I just want to express Mr.
Pemperton it was by no means an intent to try and sway folks in any way shape or form and had everything to do with trying to improve our chances of seeking financing.

Great.

That's about it.

Thank you.

Jim, a question for you.

A question for you.

You have given us the legal counsel's opinion earlier this evening.

Question that I had was, is the council able to take a vote at any time prior to Wednesday evening on the new edition?
Yes, I think that legally given the advice you received that you wanted to go on that direction you could go there at any time.

Just on that item or?
I think on that item that yes, because of the advice you received, if the council at some point wanted to feel that they had enough input, they can't want to follow the advice, but they said to do that and not go into the full public hearing if that's what you want to do.

Because if we do have further environmental reports done or work and environmental studies done, the whole matter will come back before the council assuming that you have the chance to go forward and we'll all come back.

As I understand that if the consultant was hired, I would assume he or she would get input from the public before coming back with a report from the council.

Okay, well I guess I just want clarification on the point that if, and to throw this out as a what if, if sometime before the end of Wednesday's meeting the council feels that it's prepared to make a vote on something other than C-Qa, is that allowable or does it need to wait until the end of the.

I think for any other motion, in other words, you're going to approve it and I have a project itself, I think you can get the public input because that would conceivably be a final result when they wouldn't get a chance to speak again versus if you go back and all that there is, if you review the environmental impacts, you're always going to get a chance to speak again in the sense that the consultant will take a testimony and look about the URC, which we notify when there's a chance to speak and that presumably the project will go to the Planning Commission and perhaps another appeal.

So, we're going to have their day in court so to speak, but if you decide to approve the project or deny the project before you have public input, that's basically the end of it.

You wouldn't have a chance to get their input before that was done.

Okay, thank you for that clarification.

Then, it seems that we're finished for this evening and like, who wants to be a millionaire?
We're on three nights this week.

I will be here to see you again tomorrow evening at 6.

30.

Thank you very much.