Crow Canyon Specific Plan - Public Workshop No. 1

Date:

Start:

End:

Next Meeting:

Next Time:

Prepared By:

27-Feb-03

7:00 PM

9:15 PM

10-Apr-03

7:00 PM

Victoria Walker

Purpose:

Location:

General Notes:

To identify opportunities, constraints and vision for CCSP area

Terrace Room San Ramon Community Ctr.

First Public Workshop Meeting

Attended By:

Advisory Committee:

Mary Hanson

Pat Tuohy

Jeff Rhoton

Jim Livingstone

Maurine Behrend

Steve Cortese

(Not Present)

Hassan Sharifi

(Not Present)

Public Participants:

William Pisani

Jopiel Buendia

Richard Lam

Tom Weigel

Micky and Melanie

Radojkovic

Consultant Staff:

Jim Adams

ROMA

Hung-Chih Lui

ROMA

Greg Leong

ROMA

Jim Musbach

EPS

Eve Stewart

EPS

Fiona Hsu

EPS

Hans Baldauf

BCV

City Staff:

Phil Wong

Planning

Victoria Walker

Planning

Brooke Littman

Housing

John Dillon

Economic Development

Chris Low

Engineering

Shinei Tsukamoto

Planning

RECORD: These minutes represent a true and accurate record of the meeting. These mintues will be entered in the Project Record and deemed accepted and agreed to by all parties in attendance unless a written request for correction is received within 7 days of the date of issuance.

Item:

Description

Open/Closed/Info

Victoria Walker (VW) welcomed everyone present, introduced the project, and introduced the Advisory Committee, the City staff and the consultant team. She described the project schedule and indicated the next Public Workshop would be held on April 10, 2003.

Info

02.27.03 - 1

Opportunities and Constraints Analysis:Jim Adams (JA) described the Crow Canyon Specific Plan process, the Stakeholder interviews that were held in January 2003, and the seven main objectives of the Specific Planning process. Jim gave a Power Point presentation that outlined the Opportunities and Constraints in the CCSP area.

Info

02.27.03 - 2

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Maurine Behrend asked the team to describe the value of land in the planning area. John Dillion (JD), Economic Development Manager, noted that the land values have increased on an average of 2.5% - 3.0% per year. Jim Musbach (JM), from EPS, stated that the team would be solving for land values based on the proposed uses.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Jim Livingston noted that unless properties are aggregated things are unlikely to change in the planning area. San Ramon Valley Road is not pedestrian-oriented and traffic levels are a problem at certain times of the day. However, that land is worth more today than 15 years ago with the previous Specific Plan. The City should investigate and possibly encourage owner participation agreements. He also expressed the desire to see the Twin Creeks Extension implemented.

Jim Adams (JA): The team will try to determine the correct residential density for the project. He indicated that a 4 story or 50' height limit seems to be the level people are interested in. We also need to focus on how much of that area will be open space (private and public).

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Pat Tuohy noted that a number of higher density building types are untested in the San Ramon market, although they are highly successful elsewhere. Be willing to look at the new products because the feasibility of these projects may occur as economics change in the future as the plan is implemented. Don't sacrifice a good vision - revised entitlements through the Specific Plan could change financial feasibility.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Mary Hanson noted that EPS should look at the retail base in San Ramon and how it relates to the City as a whole. Focus on business types we lack and don't duplicate existing uses. One theme may be Home Improvement. Some already exists there and the tax dollars going elsewhere could stay in the City. Her vision is "a downtown of sorts". There should be an emphasis on two areas: regular convenience retail as well as regional serving home improvement retail. Also, the service commercial uses should be accomodated in the plan area. Their sites are often underutilized - reconfigure the sites but continue to allow for the function.

JD: Consider the possibility of using taller buildings along San Ramon Valley Blvd. on the east side as a noise buffer. The road could be narrowed and additional buildable land area made available to the east side property owners.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Jeff Rhoton asked staff to confirm that amendments to allow increases in density as discussed here would require an amendment of the General Plan. He noted that Measure G requires a 4/5 approval of both the Planning Commission and City Council for these sorts of changes.

JM: Noted that the analogy to 4th Street area in Berkeley is not a bad model for us. That area was primarily warehousing and other service commercial uses in the past and has been revitalized as a specialty regional-serving retail and neighborhood center. It was noted that the addition of food-serving uses (restaurants and specialty markets) really brought vitality to the area and "turned it around". Wholesale retail uses turned into retail uses.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Maurine Behrend noted that Pleasant Hill has redeveloped an area into a downtown. Similar to our planning area, the major perimeter street is still oriented to vehicles while the more meandering interior street (Cresent Drive) is pedestrian friendly. Adding new residents to the area is important to support the retail development of the area.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Jeff Rhoton asked how many housing units is this area supposed to provide according to the General Plan Housing Element? Does the specific plan need to provide for all of them? VW noted that the Housing Element draft calls for about 135 units of housing affordable to very low income households to be built in this area, with 405 units of additional market rate housing to be constructed as well. If the 135 very low income affordable units are not built in the CCSP, they would need to be accomodated elsewhere in the city to meet the housing need assigned to San Ramon by ABAG and HCD.

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Maurine Behrend noted that favorable tax financing is available for affordable housing projects. She also noted that opportunities to use the Creek as a resource that could change the identity of the area. Discussion of the "Creek Walk" in San Luis Obispo.

Comments from the Audience: Tom Weigel asked to get a copy of the "Susceptability to Change" exhibit. A San Ramon resident discussed the difficulty of affording a home to purchase and the resulting "commute culture" that has developed in the region. It was his perception that rental rates in the "moderate" affordability range are not that different from market rate. Staff noted that rental rates are significantly lower than market rate for "very low income" affordable units, and therefore those usually require a subsidy, often from the City.

02.27.03 - 3

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Jim Livingstone noted that many of the business owners in the planning area are not the property owners. He noted that although all the property owners were notified of the workshop, it would be good if all the businesses could be notified as well. VW agreed and will follow up so that future notifications include the businesses.

OPEN

Comments from the Advisory Committee: Jeff Rhoton noted that using taller buildings along the east side of San Ramon Valley Blvd. could block views of the hills and Mt. Diablo to the east from the planning area. JA agreed that this was a possibility; however, with multiple story buildings and the grade change over the site, new residential uses may still maintain favorable views of the hills. This would be evaluated in the planning process.

02.27.03 - 4

Future Public Workshops: The next Public Workshop is scheduled for April 10, 2003 at the Community Center at 7:00 PM.

CLOSED

Minutes of the 2/27/03 CCSP Public Workshop were approved as corrected on 4/10/03 by a vote of the members present.