check one two check one two three all right good evening and welcome to the
Thursday August 24th 2023 regular meeting of the Walnut Creek Planning
Commission at this time I'll ask our Commission Secretary Andy Smith to please
call the roll. Yes Commissioner Reiser. Here. Commissioner Needing. Here. Commissioner Lezak. Here. Commissioner
Pickett. Here. Commissioner Anderson. Here. Vice Chair Strongman. Here. Chair Ward. Here. All members are in
attendance. Great thank you very much. Next up we have item two which is the
consent calendar. We actually have one item on the consent calendar so I have
to ask does any Commissioner wish to pull this item for discussion? No, all
right. So seeing none, yeah does any member of the public wish to comment on
the item which is on the consent calendar? So this is the Walden Garden
Town Homes tentative map to your extension request. It is not anything else
that is on the agenda or anything else not on the agenda.
Only that item.
So would anybody like to comment on that?
Is there anybody online who is interested
in the commenting on this?
Sorry about that.
That's okay.
So I would ask if any member
of the public is attending via Zoom.
If they would like to comment on this item,
please press the raise hand button and we'll let you in.
And I'm not seeing anybody.
Great, thank you.
All right, so at this time, I would entertain a motion to approve the consent calendar.
So moved.
Second.
Okay, we have a motion and a second.
Commissioner Secretary, can you please record the vote?
Yes.
Commissioner Reiser?
Yes.
Commissioner Neating?
Yes.
Commissioner Lezak?
Yes.
Commissioner Pickett?
Yes.
Commissioner Anderson?
Yes.
Vice Chair Strongman?
Yes.
And Chair Ward?
Yes.
And the motion carries.
Okay, great.
This is the portion of the meeting that is reserved for comment on items which are not
on the agenda.
So this means comments which are not about the spoon tonic lounge conditional use permit
or the SB 9 ordinance.
Under the Brown Act the commission cannot act on items raised during public communications
but may respond briefly to statements made or questions posed.
Request clarification or refer the item to staff.
Additionally I would like to remind everyone that not all speech is protected and I will
not tolerate or allow hate speech during public comment at any meeting that I
chair. Hate has no place in our community and our words must reflect our community
commitment to equality and inclusion for all. So that being said are there any
members of the public who would like to address the commission at this time? And
again I would note anybody attending via zoom if you wish to provide public
comments on items not on the agenda please press the raise hand button and
and not seeing anybody.
Okay, great.
All right, so next, moving right along here,
our next item is public hearings
and I'd like to start by asking if any members
of the commission have had any ex-party communications
relating to any items on tonight's agenda.
I'm seeing only shaking heads indicating no.
So with that, we'll move on
to the first item of public hearing.
That is the spoon tonic lounge review
of the deemed approved status and conditional use permit
for the sale and service of alcoholic beverages.
It's applications numbers Y09-042 and Y00-113,
location 2580 North Main Street.
And we'll start with a staff presentation
by Chip Griffin, Principal Planner.
Thank you Chair Ward, Planning Commission.
My name's Chip Griffin, Principal Planner here
with Community Development Department, Walnut Creek.
I'm here tonight to present Spoontonic Lounge Review,
a review of their deemed approved status
and their conditional use permit
under application numbers Y-00113 and Y-09042.
So what's the ask?
The ask here tonight is for review and operation
of the Spoontonic Lounge for conformance
with their deemed approved performance standards,
take public testimony, make written findings
and modify Spoontonix CUP to bring them into conformance
with their deemed approved standards
and CUP conditions of approval.
Back a little background, Spoontonix Lounge
is located at 2580 North Main Street.
It's in the lower portion of a split level commercial
building with a restaurant on the ground
or the main street level floor,
main street level of the building
I guess it would be the upper level.
It operates under a Type 48 ABC license,
has an occupancy around 90,
and they're open seven days a week till 2 a.m.
Although there are two CUPs,
and in the entitlement history,
you can see that they've been granted two CUPs
in 2001 and 2009,
and then in the adoption of ordinance 2109,
they were considered deemed approved
as were restaurants and bars in the city.
Although there are two CUPs, for ease of reference, they're best characterized as one CUP with
two elements, with the two elements that are collectively referred to as the CUP.
The conditions of approval set forth in both CUPs are still applicable.
The deemed approved performance standards differ from CUP conditions in that they are
general in nature, can be applied to all alcoholic beverage establishments equally, and focus
on nuisance and criminal activity that may be associated with alcoholic beverage sales
instead of land use.
Existing establishments operating pursuant to a CUP like Spoontonic continue to have
to operate pursuant to the conditions of their CUP as well as the deemed approved performance
standards.
All right, little context.
Let's see now is when I need this.
As you can see, this is northbound, North Main Street.
This is SOS drive right here.
And as you can see, here is our parcel.
It's the land use designation is service commercial,
as is the zoning designation.
And here is an aerial of the same.
Here's the site right there.
And we can look a little closer.
Off of Maine, Spoon Tonic is accessed from SOS Drive
and in this fashion following the yellow arrow
up into, up across a private drive.
And this would be there considered their parking
lot in the rear of the lot.
This arrow would point to their main entrance.
And it's down below the soror Indian restaurant.
And that's their main and, as far as I know, only entrance.
And you can see down here, this is
what it looks like from North Main.
This is a soror restaurant.
And Spuntana can be accessed from this driveway, as well.
And right there is a steep grade that goes downwards.
These are the deemed approved performance standards.
An alcoholic beverage establishment
shall retain its deemed approved status only
If it conforms to all of these deemed approved performance standards, we will take a look
at the considerations for these standards that the Planning Commission can make in a
minute after we discuss some of the police activity and violations that have occurred
since 2021.
Here's a table.
The table shows by year across the top in the type of violation that they are and the
number of occurrences during that year and all. There was 39 total calls for
service. I'd like to point out that 87% of those calls and mostly the real
serious ones occurred after 11 p.m. The asterisk in line under gun
possession would say that there were seven guns recovered over those events
and a combination of these violations have occurred or resulted in
multiple arrests. If we look at it, drilling down a little bit and the
violations looking at occurrences from year to year, in March 21 there was 12
incidents of fights, alcohol sales, the minors, public intoxication, drug sales
and sexual assault and the most serious offense that occurred was a homicide.
There was a quadruple shooting which led to one person being deceased.
In 2022, there were fights, public intoxication, brandishing of weapons, knives, and guns, DUI,
assault with a deadly weapon, and possession of a firearm.
And then this year there was public intoxication, possession of firearms, assault, fights, and
possession of cocaine for sale.
The Planning Commission may use all of the evidence on record and may use these standards
referred early to as the considerations for the performance standards to decide whether
the establishment has violated their deemed-approved performance standards.
The staff report includes an explanation of how they do not demonstrate compliance with
the deemed-approved performance standards.
As well with the CUP, in addition to finding, as well along with the deemed-approved, in
In addition to finding the violation of deemed approved performance standards, the Planning
Commission may use additional considerations in making a finding that an establishment
is in violation of their CUP as well.
We have listed these two relevant considerations here.
I believe there are four or five and they need to be in violation of just one and that
is outlined in your staff report.
staff including the community development department, the police department, and the
city's attorney's office has set forth these findings for the planning commission's consideration.
And with that, staff would make a recommendation.
Due to the severity and long-term ongoing nature of the violations of the deemed approved
performance standards and CUP conditions of approval described in the report in your hands
in this presentation, and given that most
of the serious criminal activity occurs after 11 p.m.,
staff recommends that the Planning Commission move
to adopt the draft resolution modifying spoon tonic CUP
by limiting the hours of operation to 11 p.m. 7 days a
week, as well as imposing any other necessary
and appropriate conditions on their operation.
This modification will allow spoon tonic
to maintain their deemed-approved status, and their CUP to sell alcohol, and with some
added limitations, of course.
These modifications would not affect Spoon Tonic's ability to have live entertainment.
And I would like to point out that any decision made here by the Planning Commission tonight
is appealable within 10 days of the mailing of the resolution or the decision out to the
applicant.
interested person may appeal there is this decision or a planning commission
decision to the City Council by filing a notice of appeal with the city clerk. Are
there any questions of staff and I'd like to point out that we have Captain
Andy Brown, Lieutenant Bruce Jower and Camilla Mahaladi from the City Attorney's
Office to answer any questions you might have. If not the applicant would like to
make a presentation as well.
OK, thank you very much for that excellent presentation.
Now is the time we have questions
from the commission.
We'd like to start.
All right, Vice Chair Strongman was click on the draw here,
so you're up.
More for my clarification, education.
We have the CUPs, CUP, and the deemed status.
Which controls, which ones?
You have to see your piece as you could do with this.
How does that balance out, I guess?
Well, they do two different things.
The deemed approved status is more general in nature,
and it applied to only those restaurants
that were in operation prior to the adoption of,
I believe it was ordinance 2109 in 2012.
What it did is it added more performance standards
for the operation of such establishments
where the conditional use permit
is their permit to operate.
Thank you.
I would add, they're of equal weight from the standpoint
that if there are restrictions
in the deemed approved performance standards
and restrictions or rules in the CUP,
they both govern and if there were to be any conflict,
the most restrictive provision would apply.
Thank you.
Okay, great.
Any other questions?
Commissioner Stroman, no?
Okay, Commissioner Anderson.
Thank you.
I understand that there were several letters
that were sent to the owners or the managers of the lounge
to bring to their attention the concerns
of the city or the police
when the activity's going on there.
Can you guys give a little summary of that
and what the response was to those letters?
Well, I have the author of those letters here
and he could probably give you more detail than I could.
Good evening, Planning Commission.
My name is Bruce Jower.
I'm a Lieutenant with the Police Department.
I'm also the Watch Commander of Sector Two
that oversees the same area
where Spuntonic Lounge is located.
So yes, I authored three letters to Spoon Tonic Lounge.
They were directed to the owner, Ajit.
And I apologize if I don't pronounce the last name
correctly, but it's Adawalia.
Adawalia.
Those three letters stemmed around activities
throughout a specific time period explaining police response.
and with those letters, I would advise that the police
had responded to these incidences.
We would talk over the phone about remedies
and how to prevent further police response
and how to maintain further order
and management of public safety during the operations
of Spontaneous Lounge during certain time periods.
And I would have that conversation with Mr. Ajit
over the phone before sending those letters to him.
So, these conversations were at had
before these letters were sent.
So, that's how they were notified.
And what was the, you say the remedies were discussed
and actions that could be taken.
What actions were taken in response to the letters?
Well, one of the reasons why we're here
is because, basically, what we saw from a police standpoint
that there was no actions taken.
We had further discussions.
I've had further phone calls with both Ajid and the manager
Jazz during and after certain incidences.
And I would try to reach out to him.
We would have good, productive conversation
in how to remedy certain situations.
But at the end of the day, nothing that we could see was changing.
We were still responding to calls for services.
The fights were still occurring.
We still had response where it would require a large number of officers
to arrive on scene just to handle certain situations.
So we didn't see any change from our perspective.
Thank you.
other questions for lieutenant or just generally specifically for lieutenant
Commissioner Pickett oh actually it's probably more for chip
all right why while we have them up here why don't we okay ask our questions and
then avoid too much music okay yes what were the remedies you suggested a lot of
conversation was about security, about when to call the police, when to give us
heads up on certain events, but more more or less about when they have a
problem to give us a call, let us know what's happening so we can help be there
to solve the problem.
So we even had conversations, I mean, giving examples
and giving suggestions on how to better run
their business in terms of crowd control and just kind
of tactics and, we would say, tactical communication that
would be used by the security in order
to de-escalate situations with patrons.
So a lot of our conversations had to do with that.
Thank you.
Any other questions for Lieutenant Tower?
Okay.
Mr. Lezak.
So a number of years ago,
I sat with members of the Planning Commission
and had discussion about other CUPs in Walnut Creek.
And in that particular case,
police department had had similar conversations and and that owner in
response had put together you know like a security plan brought in like security
consultant to try to to improve their situation had been working closely with
the police department still continue to have a number of these problems but at
at least showed kind of some proactive response.
And then even prior to coming before the Planning Commission
had presented some of that material,
and I'll ask the applicant or the business owner
to present some of the same kind of information
in response to the similar question,
but was any of that presented to you in that formal way
other than you're asking these questions
and over the phone, did they provide any written responses
to your letters?
And in doing so, provide like more specific answers
that might document how they were gonna respond
to the items in your letter.
Was there a formal back and forth
other than your phone calls?
The answer is no.
There was no formal back and forth.
One letter, the first letter was responded by
at the time their attorney,
saying that they received my notification letter,
they recognized the contents within the letter,
and we will be willing to work with you
to remedy the situation.
But other than that one follow-up letter
from the attorney's office,
there was no formal plan suggested or provided to the PD
to suggest that they're working on
how to improve their security.
conversations between me and Jazz.
We talked about a lot of ideas,
but after the conversation,
there was really no further follow-up
to really demonstrate their seriousness
of trying to come up with a formal plan.
When you've worked with other businesses in the community,
are those typical things that you would see
from other establishments
that would have similar kinds of challenges?
I mean, what is a, I don't know if it's a standard,
but what would you see as being appropriate
for a business of this type in terms of their communication
with the police and a plan
to handle these kinds of situations?
Regarding communication with the police,
it's not common to have back and forth documentation
or letters.
We do have a monthly downtown business association
and bar meeting every month
where all the bar owners come
and talk about issues like this,
how to better their procedures and processes
regarding security and serving, under serving,
over serving, staffing and all those kind of issues.
And I, at the time was the person managing our bar scene
and I would attend all those meetings
and that was a perfect forum for all the bar owners
to formally talk about things like this.
Specifically, at these bar meetings,
we're always the same bar owners,
and unfortunately, I've never seen any representation
from Spoon Tonics at any of these bar meetings.
Did you suggest to them in your verbal communication
that that would be an appropriate venue for them
to communicate with the police?
I mean, in what way were,
other than general knowledge of this,
in what way would they have been invited or suggested?
And I only mention this because for those who weren't there
in the previous discussions,
it was absolutely a recommendation of the police
in prior discussions with establishments like this.
And it seemed like that that was something
that was almost a requirement of the Planning Commission
in terms of conditions to move forward
or repair these kinds of things.
So I just want to understand the context
of that invitation, if you will.
Yes.
In fact, one of the last conversations
I had with Jazz the manager, maybe about a month and a half
ago, maybe two months ago, I did specifically
mention we have bar meetings.
We talk about these issues specifically to similar issues
that you might be experiencing regarding
security and procedures.
And I never see you guys there.
And it should be nice.
It would be nice to see your representation.
so we can help your business thrive
in more of a positive way.
And my recollection of that conversation
was that he knows of these meetings, he doesn't go.
And I forgot exactly his reasoning at the time,
but he is aware of these meetings.
And I did make sure I said that, yes, we still have him.
He should come, it would benefit his business to do so.
So last question.
So is it your opinion based on your interaction,
your response to these calls that this has reached
kind of that nuisance level of unsafe conditions
for both folks in the community
as well as patrons to the establishment?
Yes, sir, and that's the main reason why we're here
to modify their hours to 11 o'clock.
Okay, thank you.
all the questions I have. Anybody else have questions for Lieutenant Dower?
Okay, Commissioner Neeting. It says here that the majority of the calls made for
assistance from 2021-2023 were not made by Spontonic employees. May I ask when
the police, sorry can you hear me? When the police were called to the various
incidents were the Spontonic employees there trying to resolve anything were
they present were they aware because I'm assuming this is all happening in the
parking lots most of the stuff was happening in the parking lot there was
many incidents that started inside that traveled outside regarding the response
before you in the report Spontonics was the reporting party about on an average
of 33% of the time, whereas we would arrive on scene through other means, such as a 911
call that came from a witness patron or a victim patron or an officer happening to
be patrolling the area and on viewing a situation.
So when they did call the 33% of the time, they were very cooperative, very responsive,
they try the best to work with the police department.
And that's one thing I must add is that when we are there,
when they do call, they are very cooperative with us
and they do their best to try to help us with evidence
and video and stuff like that.
The problem is that the other 67% of the time,
we are called there without their knowledge
until they find out later on
or an officer patrolling the direct,
the area directly observes on their own,
on views of crime, and has to deal with it.
And on those type of calls,
when we do need their assistance, they do help us out.
Occasionally, there has been one or two incidences
where when we have arrived on scene,
where bartenders, not the bartenders,
but members of the security was not so cooperative.
In one instance, they actually was trying to help the suspect get away.
And I believe that was in last year in 2022.
So more or less, yes, they help us out, they're cooperative, but there's a few instances where
they have not been cooperative with us.
So, I mean, this is a bit of conjecture, but the 67% that is in the parking lot, they have
no idea that these incidents are occurring because there's no sort of
cameras or anything that they know of so that's why they have no idea what's
happening outside of their establishment they they know what's happening it's
just how it gets reported to us 33% of the time they actually report it when
these occurrence are happening they get involved but we we we get the
information from other means it's just not by them but they do know that these
things are happening so no I would say most of the time no cameras that would
immediately alert them to what's happening outside of there that you know
of that I know of thank you okay I have a couple questions first of all these
community bar meetings group meetings they're not required as a condition of
the COP or anything else it's just a recommendation that everybody similarly
situated kind of get together and talk about things right? That's correct.
Okay, but you're always available for direct communication whether over the
phone or by written communication and like you're that's another avenue of
communication with you. That's correct. Okay and the report seemed pretty clear
but I just wanted to confirm and clarify that this this particular establishment
seems to have a very disproportionately high number of serious crime and safety
issues as compared to other similar similar bars is that correct as well
that's correct okay all right anybody else have any questions for lieutenant
Jower all right does anyone else have any other thank you very much for that
appreciate that does anyone have any other questions for chip or mr. Anderson
chip it looks like you know the most of the concern has been the last two and a
three years. Do you know I mean is there been a substantial change from previous
periods? We've asked the owners that question I mean they've
been in operation since 2001 and up until you know 2021 there you know
there's relatively a pretty calm pretty calm establishment. I think what
happened and the story goes is that when with COVID, like everything else in this world,
the clientele kind of changed. And that's when these things started occurring.
Thank you.
But up until then, nothing that would really blip the radar at all.
Commissioner Pickett.
Yeah, a little bit off of the behavior issue.
What is the parking requirements?
I know there's other businesses down there,
and there's private driveway and all that stuff.
Are they allowed to park on adjoining properties down there,
or is there?
That I'm not sure of.
I mean, they have their own parking lot.
I don't know if it meets their parking requirement.
I mean, they've just been there for quite a while.
And I don't know that the parking was reviewed in 2009.
I don't know if it was or wasn't.
But there is a private access easement
between their property and SOS Drive.
And I don't know if they have a parking easement or a parking
easement there.
I'm sure they have an easement to access it.
Yeah.
And how about the occupancy load?
Does anybody ever check to see if there
We don't have any reports on that and it's it's it's never come up as an issue.
Okay, the PD may have more on that.
So at one point of time, we got information of criminal activity, which sparked the question
is how's the occupancy during normal business hours.
So we asked code enforcement to do a site assessment to walk through to see if there
is any issues with overcrowding associated to the 90% maximum occupancy level for the
business and what the code enforcement reported that there was not.
Now, if the staff recommendation is to modify the operation hours to 11 o'clock from, I
assume it's 2 o'clock now?
2 o'clock, correct.
So kind of back to 11 o'clock.
And we did receive some videos from, I guess, property owners nearby and it's pretty clear
that there's a lot of activity after hours, even at 2 a.m.
What is the management of the crowd after hours
when they flow out of this thing?
If it shuts down at 11 o'clock,
then there isn't even a responsible bar owner
to monitor this.
It's a blind spot, you can't see it from anywhere.
So has any thought been given to that consequence?
Even if we close at 11, the party just doesn't flow out into the parking lot and the private
driveways around there?
Well, and that's going to be part of the test.
I think part of the solution is a security detail that will keep eyes outside at all
times, and especially when it's closing time.
to make sure that that occurs in a proper fashion.
And part of that, of course, is to make sure
that there isn't any trash or debris, cans, bottles,
left behind, public urination, that kind of thing,
that it just doesn't occur.
And that's gonna be part of the test.
But the bar closes, assuming the employees go home.
So who's monitoring the activity out there at 1130?
The owner of the business.
So is there a condition in there that says the owner
or employees have to stay around
and monitor it till 12 o'clock or one o'clock?
I don't know that we have a,
we added the standard conditions
that were written for CUPs,
not for AUPs but for CUPs in this resolution.
And I don't know if that resolution has that specific condition in it.
The commission is welcome to add conditions.
So in light of all the thorough documentation that the police
department provided, which I'm very thankful for,
it was very thorough and very analytical and subjective.
So that's very helpful.
But considering that and the length of the historical poor performance of their, why
is staff even recommending that they stay open at an 11 hour time frame instead of just
closing?
Why would we keep it open?
Well, the Planning Commission, well, the city can take two roads, three roads.
One is to do nothing.
The other is to modify and the other is to revoke.
We landed on modification because, A,
they've been in operation since 2001
and done a pretty good job up until 2021.
Some of their business model change,
their things change there that we think can be fixed.
We don't necessarily want to put them out of business.
We want to see them succeed.
And that's what our goal is.
And when we like to work with Spoontonic
and help them make sure that happens.
In my 20 years, 10 year on the planning commission,
I think we've closed down about three or four establishments
with similar, maybe not even as egregious behavior,
but we closed those down.
Now those were all in the downtown area,
which had a more significant impact on the public
because they were right in the middle of,
mom and dad's taking their kids out.
Well not at one o'clock in the morning, but anyhow,
So we've taken the harsher action before on establishments
that had similar type of activities.
So I'm not sure that I fully understand why 11 o'clock
is even a consideration.
And since there's, I guess, some consideration
would be given to the other 18 years they were operating.
OK, so I guess that's the only questions I have.
OK, does anybody else have any questions?
Any other commissioners?
OK, thank you very much for that excellent presentation.
We appreciate it.
At this time, I would like to open the public hearing.
So Spoon Tonic, a representative from them,
you have 15 minutes for your presentation now.
Planning Commission, I'm Michael Biggs.
I'm an attorney, and I'm representing Jazz and his father,
Ejie Aluala.
And they're the owners and managers.
And they brought some of their employees this evening
to speak to you as well.
I wanted to thank the lieutenant for the wonderful two
and a half hour meeting.
We and eight other, was there eight people there, lieutenant?
Five of us.
We had an extensive meeting.
The lieutenant didn't mention that.
And we brought together everybody.
And we brought some proposals.
And we tried to find out what the heck's going on.
Chip just said the place was running fine up till 2020.
20 years.
Went bad.
The police officer gave you all some graphs
that's showing the crime's going down.
It's dropping like a rock.
Look in the last eight months.
Seven incidences down.
And then you take the 69 incidents as total,
you average that over three years, that's two a month.
There's a problem here though.
We don't wanna split hairs.
We know what the problem is.
It's the problem nobody wants to talk about.
They've got the wrong crowd in there
because they're playing music
and they have things that are going on
that are attracting a criminal element.
That has already stopped.
Ajeet's gonna come up here.
A jazz is gonna come up here
And they're going to explain the modifications
that they're making.
Different music, no DJ, no more gangster rap.
That's the problem.
That's what attracts the element.
It just happened to go that way.
It wasn't that way before.
And they're going to fix it.
Now, I went to the establishment yesterday.
It's a small establishment.
It was smaller than what I thought.
And when I was meeting with the police officer and his captain
and the other representatives, I thought,
well, we need a big security detail there with, you know,
something that's run by a retired law enforcement officer.
But the scale is really small.
I think they could make do with a three-person security
detail and perhaps make some improvements
over what they have.
But when Jazz comes up here, five,
he'll explain the details and such,
what they wanna do to get on common ground with the city.
They don't want this problem.
They think it's a problem themselves.
They hate it.
They don't like the people that are coming in there.
They're ugly and they're mean, and they want them gone.
Jazz was under the misnomer that he thought the police would
do that for them.
Well, explain to him the police can't clean everything up.
The criminals just move around.
This county is highly impacted with gang activity.
It's huge in Contra Costa County.
It's at a third world level, with all due respect.
The statistics don't lie.
And these people will simply go somewhere else,
but my clients will take action to get them out of there.
And they'll explain to you what they're going to do.
Now, there's one thing that would hurt them bad.
If they were forced to close at 11,
about 70% of their revenue comes after 11.
And they will respect what the Planning Commission does.
I don't know if they'll appeal or not.
that's something they'd have to think about,
but right now where we're all at
is we just wanna solve the problem.
We don't wanna fight with anybody.
We think it can be done.
So I'd like to have, come on up.
This is Ms. St. Pierre, Don, and she'll introduce herself,
and she'd like to, excuse me Lieutenant,
she'd like to talk to you folks.
Hi, thank you for letting me speak today.
My name is Danny St. Pierre.
I'm the lead bartender at Spoon Tonic Lounge.
I've been employed at this establishment
for nine years since April of 2014.
Over the years, we have operated
with little to no incident,
and it wasn't until the reopening after the pandemic
where we started to see a shift
in our customer base and their behavior.
We have communicated with Walnut Creek PD
every step of the way,
perhaps to our own detriment at times,
but we have done this to maintain the safety of our staff,
patrons and the surrounding community. I could stand here today and tell you how much I love
Spoontonic Lounge, how much I put into this bar, into making it better, but we are here today to
determine whether or not cutting our hours to 11 p.m. would be the best decision for our business
and for the community of Walnut Creek. Spoontonic Lounge on an annual basis brings in a gross
revenue of almost a half million dollars and 342,000 of that is generated between the hours of 11 p.m.
and 1.30 a.m. Changing our hours would ultimately take away over 65% of our
revenue. No business can survive that cost. Ultimately changing our hours would
mean certain failure to our small minority owned bar. Starting at the
beginning of the year we have made major changes all recommended by Walnut Creek
PD. With these changes we believe we are on the right track and have seen a
downtick in bad behavior. Please give us a chance to show you that our changes
are working. Thank you for your time and consideration. I'd like to have Jazz come up and speak please.
Thank you guys. I just want to say I took over Spoon Tonic Lounge nine years ago and
it was smooth sailing until the pandemic happened. Everything's shifted. The
the clients change, the regulars
that used to come to the bar, they stop coming.
And all these, I'm 44 now, some nights,
I'm the oldest one there.
And it's all a younger crowd.
And they don't know how to behave.
They don't know how to do.
They drink 1942 with pineapple juice.
So that's the kind of crowd that's coming in.
And I've had it.
And whatever Lieutenant Jowers suggested,
start doing a cover charge.
I started doing a $10 cover charge.
He told me to get more security personnel on board.
I got five security personnel.
Two outside, two inside, one floater.
And he told me to do parking lot sweep,
be considerate of the businesses that are around the area.
And I did that.
We've been doing that ever, it's been keeping it clean.
We've been contacting Wanna Creek PD whenever it's needed.
There's only so much we can do.
And we're on a, I think we're doing good.
And whatever is in the report, I think
It's a little fabricated, I don't know,
but it's statistics-wise,
retro junkie has way more calls than we do,
but we're being penalized for it
because we needed assistance from Walnut Creek PD.
Whoever you like, just come on up.
Hi, my name's Jason Orambula.
I work at Splatoon's Lounge as one of the security guards since 2001, about.
So I've been there from the beginning of the pandemic and
have seen the change in the crowd.
I do believe Splatoon's can operate at a level that we all wanna see for
a place in Warner Creek, the first 18 years that you guys spoke up.
A small local place where people, a lot of the industry workers around here,
like to hang out at Spoons when they get up and work.
The restaurant servers, the waitresses,
other bars around here.
I think that's a good type of place.
And what's been going on, kind of the music and the dancing,
I believe it's too much.
I think that would be a nice change.
I think Jazz has talked about changing that atmosphere,
and that'd be a good thing for everybody.
We don't wanna see any problems at the bar.
I love the bar, I like hanging out there.
I don't wanna see any problems and I work there.
I don't know what's gonna happen after this commission
decides to do, but we'll accept whatever.
But I think closing at 11 would drastically change
the ability for spuntonic to stay open, I believe.
Specifically with the restaurant above it,
doesn't close till 10 o'clock.
So we were not allowed to make any noise that would just serve the restaurant until 10.
So any kind of music doesn't start until 10.
They would have an hour of any kind of live entertainment or anything like that.
That would affect his ability to operate.
I think cutting away the DJ is a good idea.
I don't think he needs or wants a nightclub there.
I don't think Walnut Creek really needs a dance club nightclub.
but I think a small local bar
that doesn't have a negative impact on the community
could be nice for the people that live and work here.
I think that's proven over the last 18 years
and I think hopefully we can see it happen in the future.
Thank you for listening.
So Spoon Tonic is changing the venue.
No more DJ, no more music that is thought
to attract certain criminal elements.
And that's what we think the problem has been,
is the music and the dancing.
And again, I point you to the police officer statistics.
The incidents are going down, not up, markedly so.
I think seven, look to 2022 and compare to 2023.
Spuntonics is part of the community.
They don't want to fight the city at all.
They want to fix the problem.
There may have been some misunderstandings
between Ajit and the police, but they have been talking.
And I think the lieutenant, if he spoke again,
he would speak about the meeting we had yesterday.
And I heard lots of talk in that meeting about talks
that they were having with Ajit over there nodding his head.
It isn't like they were sticking their heads in the sand.
I don't think the police officer intended
to give that impression, but if he did he was wrong,
and I think he would clear that up, I'm confident he would.
They have not been ignoring the police, that is not true.
They can't change the social problems that affect us all.
Anybody in this room could be a crime victim walking
out to our cars, and crime is rampant everywhere.
We all have to work together, and Spoon Tonic is going
to be working 100 percent with the police department in the city to get that bad crowd
out of there. Actually, they started taking action last week. They disbanded the former
music they were playing. They were playing country western, I think. They're trying different
things. They're moving in good faith. But if you shut them down after at 11, boom,
there go their jobs. The income goes. Okay. Well, thank you very much for listening.
it's three minutes still so come on up. My name is Glenn Pineda. I'm the lead security over
at Spontonic. I'm aware that we are on the radar as far as like the planning commission goes and
that we do need to make some changes in the way we operate. Now as far as our game plan goes we
have been making the changes necessary as much as we can. Obviously the changes aren't going to
happen overnight but with the changes we have made things are changing slowly but
steadily. Things are getting better for us as far as I could see personally. Got
no problem working with law enforcement. Also as far as like any other flaws that
we got like other supposedly one of the security was working with trying to let
when the other guys go, we have no problem getting rid
of other employees that don't exactly fit our bill.
So, I don't know, cutting us down to 11 o'clock,
definitely gonna shut us down eventually
because we definitely won't survive with those hours.
Thank you for your time.
Great, thank you very much.
Yes, you have a one minute and 49 seconds.
Good evening, City Council and everyone.
My name is Will Bamberidge.
I'm actually a longtime patron and also assistant to the bar.
I've definitely seen the demographics over the last five,
six years in this area change quite a bit.
You take a look at what happened to Krogan's in downtown
where that entire crowd dispersed, went to dance.
They went to Tiki Tom's.
They went to Lucky's.
They went further out, Mass Say's, Spoon Tonic.
The issue is not Spontonic.
It is the demographics that's happening in this town.
You're the social center of Contra Costa.
Take a look at retail crime that's happening right now.
It's up 18%.
I work within retail.
We've had to hire on additional security.
This is crazy.
Shutting down at 2 o'clock for a venue that does 60% to 70%
of their revenue is just not right.
They deserve to stay open.
They have been making changes.
I have seen a lot of progress.
Ever since Jazz has taken over,
he has changed the venue to be more proper
for the neighborhood.
He's bringing in neighborhood business.
He is bringing in the folks to actually be able to come in,
such as late to service in the industry workers
on their nights that they are coming in.
they are leaving properly like in cabs, Ubers to get home.
They are not driving drunk or anything like that.
The responsibility like after 2.30, 3 o'clock,
when these folks are hanging out in the parking lot,
there are folks inside.
They do sweep the parking lot.
They do it at night and even when they open.
They come in, people will actually say
that they are doing a better job.
Thank you.
Okay, thank you very much.
All right, so now is the time we have questions
from commissioners for Spoon Tonic
and folks that have just addressed us.
We'd like to start.
Commissioner Lezak.
So my question is a little bit about
kind of the program that you guys have talked about
individually in different ways.
And, you know, we can maybe explore this as a group
after a public hearing is closed,
but to the degree that there's a problem
and you've talked about the things
that your group has been working on solving,
I think the intent is that there be some kind of a program
that the city, the police department understand
and is communicated to them, that is method of change,
something that the city can follow up on
to see that there's change.
And so is there a way for you to articulate
those changes in a meaningful way,
kind of a written plan, a description of security?
Because I suppose what I think the city is looking at
is if there's some kind of modification to the use permit,
folks would certainly like to make that
kind of a temporary condition
that the establishment can sort of earn back, if you will,
the right to be open later.
So I'm looking for the idea of are there some specific things
that you could put down?
And are you willing to do something like that
to try to work toward sort of expanding hours over time?
And the use permit process in the city
is typically most of these businesses start
within 11 o'clock period of time,
and then they come back to the commission over time
and request, hey, I've had a year of no incidents,
can I have my hours expanded, extended?
That's the typical process.
And because of the timing of when the use permit
was originally done, this establishment
didn't go through that.
But I think that's kind of the direction
that maybe we were gonna talk about.
And my question is, are you and your client,
is your client open to some program like that,
that might give the city something meaningful
to be able to track, to be able to work with you
to get back to some hours that would be help,
you know, that the establishment needs
to be able to stay open.
Yes, I would propose a 90-day period for Spoontonic
to implement the changes to change patrons
and keep the hours the same,
stay, maybe vote to curtail the hours,
but then have a proviso in there that it's stayed
for 90 days pending study.
Let them implement what they're doing,
what they've told you about.
The problem is a criminal element.
And you know, none of us in this room can change that.
It's here, it's everywhere, it's all around us.
And what a business owner can do is take proactive actions
to do things that don't attract those kind of elements
to their business.
And they think that in light of what's
going on these days, if they change by getting rid
of the DJ and getting rid of the dancing and the music,
that the folks that are causing problems won't come there.
And I would submit to you that if I brought a criminologist
here, the criminologist would corroborate what I'm saying,
We talk about the roots and the causes of crime,
what makes criminal elements,
birds of a feather flock together.
And they go to places where they can all do their thing.
Well, they're over at Spoontonic.
They've been there lately.
Okay, they're gonna go somewhere else.
They're gonna be somewhere else in this county,
maybe not in this town, but they will go somewhere else.
It's a social political problem that the police can't solve,
you can't solve it, and Spoontonic can't solve it,
what we can do is we can control things within our arms grasp.
And what my clients will do, they're going to do it.
They're going to change the venue.
But if you cut their hours, this is a business that since 2001
has had a property interest that's
been functioning in a certain way that
has given them an economic benefit.
And I have here, I'm not going to submit them to you,
But I have the charts here that show most of the income
comes in the late evenings.
So to cut the business to 11 is to destroy the business.
And you're looking at crime statistics
that show that the incidences are going down.
That's what the police gave you.
And they also gave you statistics
that show that when you take those 69 incidences
and you divide those over three years,
you get a very low ratio.
They're talking about a shooting that happened
two and a half years ago, all right?
So, there's shootings happening in this county,
you know, on a weekly basis, if not a daily basis.
It's just my clients will do things
so that those activities won't be likely
to be happening there by not playing the type of music
they've been playing and having the DJ.
That's what attracts it.
And there's another element that goes there,
the working people, the industry people, they go there too.
But when you have the Friday night dance thing going on at one o'clock in the morning
and people are on social media, you know, and they're saying, let's go to Spoontonic.
Well, it's for the dancing and it's the music.
And it is that certain environment that's attracting a certain element.
That element won't be there.
But if you cut the hours to 11 now, the business likely won't be there either
because by doing that, their cash flow will be cut off.
Thank you.
But they will work hand in hand with the city
and continue a meeting.
We had a meeting yesterday.
They're willing to bend over backwards and maybe
be in a probationary period for 90 days.
That's what I would suggest, a probationary period.
Maybe have action stayed, like where you can drop the lever
if you have to without an administrative process perhaps
like this but give them some time, give them some time
to implement what they're going to do.
They've got a good plan.
Okay, thank you.
I've got a question.
Do you have a question?
All right, Commissioner Pickett has a question.
So I only heard three actions that are being proposed
by Spoontonics.
One is to eliminate the DJ.
Another is no dancing, is that correct?
That's right.
And the other is to change the type of music.
That's right.
Did you choose a type?
Well, it's not.
It's not going to be criminally inducing.
You know, it's a hard subject to talk about.
And sometimes tempers can become invoked.
It's a touchy subject.
But the fact of the matter and the reality,
at least in my view, some street smarts behind this,
is there's some music in the entertainment industry
that caters to what I call prison culture and gangster
culture.
Any special agent, any detective, any criminologist
would tell you the same thing, as would any school teacher.
And there's a little too much of that been going on at Spoon
Tonic.
It got out of hand.
I don't think the owners could see that happening, all right?
I think that's a big thing to do, is to change the venue.
Get a different crowd in there in the evening,
different group of young people.
There's a lot of good young people out there
that aren't misbehaving and doing criminal stuff
like what you folks are reading about here.
But it isn't Spoontonic's fault this is happening.
They're not the moving force, it's happening anyway.
But what they can control is they can control
their property that they control.
So who chose the music that they've been playing
for the last three years?
They did, but they weren't aware of it.
They didn't think of that.
So what type of music are you proposing?
Well, you'd have to bring, can I bring jazz back up?
He could elaborate a lot better than I could.
Sure.
OK.
Is that OK, Madam Chairperson?
Here's jazz.
I'll answer his questions, please.
I was actually planning on taking the DJ permanently
and putting in a jukebox or maybe actually
making spoon tonic like a little karaoke bar because I don't think there's a karaoke bar in
Wanna Creek. I think that would be kind of fun for, okay, thank you. Commissioner Anderson? Yeah,
oh, I have jazz there. You and your security fellow there, um, indicated that, uh, you know,
you seriously upgraded the security.
You know, we've gone to five people there.
And when did that change occur?
That happened after I talked to Lieutenant Jower.
Yesterday, six months ago.
It was months ago.
You don't know exactly when?
No.
The last time he called me, actually.
I don't know.
Okay.
Yeah.
But I did hire new staff, new everything.
I started whatever he had suggested I should do, I did.
He even told me, make the Hennessy Prize higher,
or stop selling Hennessy.
I like Cognac.
But what I did was I made the Hennessy Prize $15.
And lately, not many people are drinking Hennessy.
they're actually drinking a lot of tequila.
Okay, I have a question.
With regard to, you said 70% of the revenue
is generated after 11 PM,
and I'm wondering if you have statistics
for what percentage of revenue is generated after midnight.
Yes, Madam Chairperson,
if I may approach my client prepared some graphs.
Okay.
Will you come and explain that, explain the thing?
On top of the paper, it shows the date
And from August 18th or 19th,
I printed out last weekend.
And it says 5 p.m. to 11 p.m.
And that's how much we did from that time.
But on the other sheet, from 11 p.m. to 2 a.m.,
you could see how much we made.
So these aren't all the same?
No.
OK, so bring them all back.
Sorry.
I have 5 to 11.
They're not different.
I didn't realize how many people there were.
I'm just trying to figure out, because what you were saying
is what I have here.
All right, so I'm not the math person on this commission.
So do you have any just estimate?
You're saying 70% after 11 PM, but is there
some rough estimate that you have
as far as how much is made after midnight?
She did the math.
Oh, good.
A math person.
No, that's fine.
You would know.
I estimated I had.
We were going over the numbers.
It was around 65% of our revenue comes in between the hours of 11
PM and 1.30 AM.
The 70%, like the 1.30 to 2 is not a big category.
Well, we do last call at 1.30.
And then we get everybody out by 1.40.
Got it.
So we don't, nobody is in there by the time it's two o'clock.
Okay, but you don't really have any good estimate
of the difference between 11 and it's that,
if we suggested you close at midnight,
like how much revenue would be lost is my question.
We could probably pull it up in our system,
but I wouldn't have that information
at hand right this moment.
But it's usually, we start carving,
or we start charging a cover charge at 11 p.m.
The DJ was going on at 10 p.m.
Cover would be at 11,
and that's when people started to come in.
Okay, all right, thank you, appreciate that.
While we have you up there,
sorry, I just had a quick question.
Commissioner Reiser.
As long as we're talking about trends,
what are the, in terms of days a week,
obviously it's Friday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday,
or the busy days, or?
So Thursday night is karaoke,
and it's pretty, it's mostly regulars
and industry people that come in.
It's, I work Thursday nights,
It's pretty mellow for the most part.
It does get busy, but it's fun.
It's not, we don't have people in there
that are causing problems.
I'd say Friday and Saturday nights
are the main days where it,
we've really started to see the shift of behavior
in people and the clientele.
And staying to the maximum hours,
well, how about Thursday night?
How about, is it open seven days a week?
Yes, we are.
How about Sunday through Wednesday nights?
It's seven days a week.
We're open until, we do last call at 1.30 every night.
But in terms of just business in general,
What percentage would you say is a?
The bulk of our income is Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Right, okay.
Okay.
A quick question.
You talk about industry people.
Who are we to, please explain.
Bartenders from the other, the surrounding bars,
like Massay's, Retro Junkie,
which is another bar that's down the street,
Yard House, True Food Kitchen.
A lot of those people who, Sunday night,
would normally be their day off.
They come in and hang out.
Obviously it varies between whatever shift they're working,
but that's what I mean by industry people.
Thank you.
Other commissioner needing.
Do you ever not serve alcohol to someone who seems like
they're not gonna be able to control themselves?
Cause I'm reading in here, there's a lot of intoxication
and obviously it's a bar, so I get it.
Right.
All the time.
We cut people off all the time.
even if they're starting to act,
I don't know, being loud or jumping around as an example,
we'll let the security guards know,
hey, please keep an eye on them
and we won't serve them anymore.
Are they removed from the premises?
Sometimes they are if they're acting
like they might be violent or might be a problem.
So even if they're,
because I'm breeding in here cocaine,
the part that is interesting to me
is the violence towards females that I'm reading in here.
So even if someone doesn't have, is not intoxicated,
but they're using another substance,
should there be, look like they're acting inappropriately?
Yeah.
Would they be immediately removed?
If they look like they're causing problems,
we've had instances before where a woman will report,
hey, just grab my butt and we'll remove them over that.
and do you work Saturdays and Sundays?
I work Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
Anybody else?
All right, I just had a question for the security folks.
I know you've said that, many of you,
that now you've implemented more parking lot sweeps
or parking lot presents,
and I'm wondering when that started
because the reports we're getting are,
and some of the resident neighbor reports that we received
didn't seem to have any security presence at all
during these incidents in the parking lots.
And I'm wondering if that's still occurring
or if you've changed your protocols in regard to that.
We're still doing our security sweeps.
Now, as far as these things going down or happening,
for the most part, we're gonna happen without us being there.
As you said, the blind spots, you know?
So there's no one that just is stationed outside
and the parking lot just to stand there
and be there as a deterrent presence
and make sure that nothing happens.
Well, in our personal parking lot,
we do keep an eye on that.
And as far as like the neighboring parking lots,
like the big blind spots, no.
We don't have anybody stationed up there watching,
but when we are aware of something going down or happening,
we do respond real quick.
It's all hands on deck at that point
when something does happen in the neighbors.
You're relying on neighbors or patrons
in the parking lot to come back in and report to you?
Or do you have surveillance cameras
or other means of keeping,
how are you keeping an eye?
This is my question,
personally or through camera or just by reports?
Like as far as the neighboring parking lots?
Your parking lot.
Oh, our parking lot, it's us, you know,
like as far as what's going on after
or in the parking lot, that's usually after hours.
But we still keep an eye on that at the same time.
So my question is how are you implementing keeping an eye out?
Is it by somebody standing there
and watching during the whole time?
Or are you just coming out when it's reported?
Or do you have a surveillance camera that?
It's both, or all three actually.
We got surveillance camera out there on our parking lot.
We got eyes out there.
And whoever's not out there,
they'll be aware, come right out.
Okay, all right, thank you very much.
Are there any other commissioner questions this time?
Okay, great, thank you very much
for all that information.
We appreciate it.
Thank you, Madam Chairperson.
Now is the time when members of the public
can provide public comment.
So we have, I see there's somebody who's had their hand up
for quite a while here on Zoom,
but let's give anybody in the audience a shot too.
If you'd like to speak, please come up
and I guess we have one card.
Yes, Madam Chair, we have Paul Saria
submitted a speaker's card.
Also, I would just note for those who are attending
via Zoom, if you do wish to speak,
ahead and hit that raise hand button now and so that it'll be raised when we're ready to call on you.
Okay, thank you. Hi, my name is Paul. The whole idea, I have something written down but I'm going
to kind of wing it here because there's more to this to what has been said. I mean the window
from 2021 on is the window that was opened by the shooting and the killing. That's why they're
they're on the radar.
But this has been going on much longer with the garbage,
with this, with that, vomit, urination.
I've even found defecation, you know,
and it's not fun to pick that up.
I mean, I'll pick up my dog's poop any day over this.
It's awful.
Vomit at the doorsteps, at your place of business,
you have to wash it down before your customers get in
or whatever, illegal parking, loitering.
It just, the list goes on and on,
and I hate to waste your time with all this
because Lieutenant Jower has made a great report.
But all the conditions on the CUP permit have been violated.
Commissioner Pickett asked the perfect question.
As a fellow business owner, I don't
want to see a business owner fail.
But I'm a firm believer in live and let
live until it starts affecting the person or the other people.
But surrounding parking lots, they're not parking lots.
They're private property and cars park there.
Things go on, you know, drug use, drinking, everything.
You know, I've even had a truck hit a building, you know.
As a matter of fact, the district attorney
is pressing charges.
They're attempting to anyway, you know, because of this.
So there are things that have been going on for a long time,
but the thing that put the whole thing on the map
or is that shooting?
So not to interrupt, but just to clarify,
you're an adjoining business owner?
Yeah. Okay, thank you.
Go ahead.
Yeah, so I had to put up a camera in the likelihood
that I may be able to see who hit the building.
Because they broke the window, damaged the framing,
moved the whole window sill in,
and it's every weekend.
This goes on every weekend.
Friday, Saturday, Thursday is pretty mellow.
Every other day, it's mellow.
Before this, it was like a rockabilly bar or something.
And it was calm.
You'd never see this.
So I don't know how far back that was exactly,
because it's all a big blur.
But I mean, it's a long time.
So the three-year window is a very small window.
But this has been going on longer.
I'm all for chances, but even three years is a long time.
And like I said, live and let live
until it starts affecting you.
If this was happening here,
people were vomiting or causing issues here,
I guarantee this wouldn't be allowed.
And this is hidden away, so nobody really sees it
except the officers.
One of the security guards came out
and was walking by the police officers
that came a couple weekends ago,
and one sec, and said, you guys, jokingly, he says,
you guys get called every weekend, huh?
And the officer's response was pretty much.
Okay, thank you for your comment.
Do we have anybody else in the chambers?
Oh, question for our commenter?
No, okay.
All right, is there anybody else in the chambers
who'd like to make a public comment at this time?
Right, it looks like we may have people on Zoom
If our secretary could try and sort that out,
that would be great.
Yes, I'm gonna be bringing in Justin Mculich.
Okay, if Justin Mculich, I apologize if I'm mispronouncing.
Oh, there we go, the microphone's on.
Mr. Mculich, I see your microphone is on, go ahead.
Madam Chair, maybe I'll-
Yeah, why don't we see, we have a couple other people
with their hands raised, maybe we can go back
and see if we can get that working later.
Yes.
Okay, I'm gonna let in Willie Johnson.
Hello, can you guys hear me?
Yes, we can hear you.
Go ahead.
Hello, my name is Willie Johnson.
I have been going to Spoons for the past two years,
and I now work there currently.
I've been working there for the past few months.
I got to Spoon Tonic Lounge when the crowd started to shift,
and I can say that the crowd has definitely shifted.
None of us like it.
It annoys everyone that works there
because they cause problems.
They don't listen to younger crowd, like Jazz said.
If we close at 11, it doesn't help us.
And for everybody that works at the bar, bartenders, bouncers,
whatever, we won't have any place to work.
Also, if we change the music, this should change the crap.
Now, the other day, we played country music.
And as you can imagine, when everybody heard country music,
a lot of them left.
But a lot of them stayed because that's
a different type of music.
Yesterday, we did punk rock, a whole bunch of people,
almost the same amount of crowd, almost the same amount
of people on Friday and Saturday, yesterday.
And there was no incidents.
And everybody was just having a good time.
And that's just from a music change.
I understand that Walnut Creek is fed up,
and I understand that.
And, but this is, I love this bar.
I love jazz.
I love everybody that goes there.
I love just everything.
And I don't want, you know, to see the bar go down.
And I definitely don't wanna see it not succeed
because it shut down at 11 p.m.
But I understand everybody's gotta do what they gotta do.
It is what it is.
but that's all I have to say.
Okay, thank you very much for your comment.
Okay, Andy, do we have, we have somebody else?
Okay.
And next I'll be bringing in Liz P.
Liz P, if you want to go ahead
and turn on your microphone, please.
Looks like they're not responding.
We'll go and...
Okay, sorry.
I'm just learning Zoom.
This is not Liz P.
I'm just using my wife's phone at the moment.
My name's Brandon Bear.
I own Black Sea Tattoos across the street,
and my wife as well is a business owner
in the same parking lot as I am.
Her business is Timeless Beauty Bar.
We are patrons, friends, and at this point,
I've considered some of the employees,
family members at this point.
It's really hard to see any sort of,
I don't know, time restraint on them being open
because for me, being a customer at this bar,
even before Jazz and his family took it over,
it's always been really, really chill.
There haven't been a lot of problems.
I agree with William, who was up speaking earlier
for the bar, including the new patrons
that come along with COVID.
I agree that it also came from the closing of bars
like Brogan's.
These crowds disperse and they go wherever they want.
and these problems are still gonna happen.
I think it's a great idea to change the music.
I think whatever they are already doing
and are currently doing is a great move.
The bar looks better.
I've personally seen less problems.
We see less problems in our parking lot
in the past few years since things really hit.
We're close proximity just across the street from North Main.
And I think that's one of my main things
that I find a little one-sided
is to see Walnut Creek Police Department's Instagram
stating that they have multiple officers patrolling downtown
to help these bars.
I've been a patron of Retro Junkie as well,
where they have police station at their bar
from what I've seen most of the time.
I think some sort of help like that
in between Massays and Spontonic Lounge
would be a great help to security problems.
Other than that, just as another business owner,
I think they have been moving in great ways
to improve their business and everything involved.
I also think it's way more fair,
like their attorney brought up
maybe a 90 day probationary period.
This seems all very quick
and it seems like a lot of information came late.
Everybody that works there
is always taking care of their own.
They're taking care of their problems
and they're busy working.
And that's why there's not a lot of police response
because they're able to take care of it themselves.
That's basically all I have to say.
I just think it would be a little more fair
to see more police presence in that area
just because it does seem pretty barren
to be in between downtown and Pleasant Hill.
And that's all I got.
Okay, thank you very much for your comment.
Thank you.
All right, Andy, it seems like we have more.
Yes. Excellent.
it in Johnny. Hello, we can hear you, go ahead. Hi, so my name is Johnny Herrera. I've been a
I've been a worker at an employee at Spoon Tonic Lounge for the past six years. I first started
off as a DJ, just mostly all vinyl. Then I really, you know, I met with Jazz more closely and, you
you know, it kind of became, you know, we got really close.
I started doing security.
I did security there for about three years
and then I've been bartending there for three years now.
I agree 100% with what everybody said
with the music change.
It's been night and day since, you know,
pre-pandemic as to post-pandemic
as the crowds just changed.
a lot of people coming from different towns,
and it's just, it's completely different now.
None of us that currently work there,
we don't like it at all.
It's just been a tonal shift,
and I believe that, I mean, yesterday I was the host
of the, we had emo punk rock last night,
And a lot of people that used to go to Spoons
that no longer do go there anymore
because of how the crowd has changed
and everything like that.
A lot of people came yesterday.
It was fun.
Everybody was having a great time.
I hosted the entire thing.
And I believe that if we change the music,
it'll completely change the demographic now.
I mean, I fell in love with the place
when I first started going there.
Everybody has been a family to me,
jazz, Danny, everybody that's worked there past and present.
We're all really close.
I am actually a new business owner as well.
So I understand that aspect of everything.
And I believe that with changing the music
will change the demographic.
And I think I agreed with the 90-day probation period.
We've been doing all that we can
to try to nick this in the butt.
And we, I'm a new business owner
and it's taking away those hours
would really affect everybody that works there.
we don't start getting busy until 10 or 11 o'clock.
So I believe that the 90-day probation period
would be great to show us how much we really care
about this place and how we wanna do all that we can
to make it like old spoons used to be.
Thank you very much for your comment.
Andy, we still have a couple more, right?
Yes. Okay. So I'll bring in Ethan.
Hello. Can you all hear me okay?
Yes, we can hear you. Go ahead, please.
Oh, perfect. Thank you.
Hi, my name is Ethan.
I am a former employee of Smootonic Lounge
and a longtime patron.
I stopped working there shortly,
just around the time of the pandemic,
and as a third-party observer,
I could tell you that very much the shutdown
to have a drastic sea change in terms of clientele
at Spontonic Lounge.
And I think that's kind of evidence in the police report,
too, if you look at the number of incidences
that happened in 2021.
And I think anybody who's been out in public
or on a plane or at a concert will test that
it seems like people have kind of forgotten
how to act since then.
That said, I think it may sound silly to some of you,
but the effect that music has on a clientele,
I do not think can be overstated and I think changing the music can do a lot in regards
of changing the culture of the Friday and Saturday night at Spoontonic Lounge.
That said, I've also believed that there has always been a kind of an undesirable element
to the nightlife at Walnut Creek and I've seen the effects of shutting down bars like
Krogan's and Redux and Farrington's and it never really solves the problem it
just kicks the can down the road to another establishment so I think that
maybe the the 90-day grace period to see the effects of the changes that
Spontonic Lounge is making is a great suggestion and I'm worried that if you
do something more drastic like close them down at 11 or shut them down
entirely, you will find that it's just a new bar that has this problem, whereas by keeping
them open and letting them make adjustments, you could still kind of spread out that element
that may not go away, but at least they won't congregate all in one spot anymore.
And I think that it could be a drastic improvement to the benefit of everyone involved.
And thank you.
I don't have my mic on.
Sorry.
Andy, who's next?
make it here either. Let's see, next up is just have a single letter B. So I will bring them in.
Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Go ahead, please. My name is Brittany. I just wanted to speak on
behalf of spoons as well. I frequented the bar for probably about the past four to five years,
so pre-pandemic and now. And I just wanted to echo what everybody is saying.
There was a shift just with the demographic that was in the area.
The workers at Spoontonics have done everything that they can.
And just in regards to the parking lots and things like that,
there are two parking lots. They can't see everything that's going on upstairs.
If they were to have somebody up there, that's going to take away
security being downstairs with the actual customers that are in the bar
and also what somebody brought up,
the police presence at Retro Junkie.
I frequented there as well.
And they have a car parked outside,
so that's gonna be their deterrent.
So they're able to have more of their staff
and more of their security,
focusing on what's going on inside,
instead of having somebody outside
or roaming the parking lot.
When there is an issue, the security at Spoons,
they get the issue outside
and the people are out on the street.
They can't control what's going on up there.
When they call the cops, it seems like they're being penalized in this report.
They're calling them for assistance, but would they rather not have them call?
It just kind of isn't making a lot of sense to me that it's going in the report
that they're being penalized, that the police are responding, but they need the assistance
if something's happening outside, they're going to call.
So it's kind of a catch-22.
If they keep them in the barn, something happens, they're going to be penalized.
They're calling, they're being penalized.
And with the changes that they're making,
if you close the bar down at 11,
the numbers on the report show
that the incidents are happening after 11.
So they can't effectively change the issue
and you can't see their progress
if you're shutting them down before that.
You can't see the changes that they're trying to make.
And how other people have decided
it's just going to go somewhere else,
the issue is going to be somewhere else.
It's just unfortunate that Spoon Honnocks
is away from downtown,
so the cops can't watch more than one bar at a time.
When they're downtown, they can stand on the corner,
they're looking at dams, they're looking at modern China.
It's a very close proximity to each other.
And I think the police don't like go in over to spoons
because they're pulled away from that.
Again, that is what it is, it's not anybody's fault.
But if the issue, as the city is saying
that is at spoon tonics right now,
then there needs to be more effort with the business owner
and with them calling.
The response needs to be that they're working together
they're a team not that they're being penalized for calling them when that's
what they've been asked to do. That's all I wanted to say. Thank you. Thank you very
much for your comment. Andy who's next? I'm gonna give another try now back to Justin
Mikulich. Mr. Mikulich if you would turn on your microphone. I'm guessing they're having some AV problems on there. I am enjoying the variety in the closed
captioning of the ways to spell Mr. McCoolidge's name. It's been quite spectacular.
All right hopefully we can get a mic on here. Looks like the mic's turned on but
we're not hearing anything so I think it's and now it's off and on. I suspect
there's a technical issue on their end. Looks like there's another person who's
raised their hand, I can give them a try and give Mr. McCoolidge a chance to
hopefully get their microphone to work.
Okay, that sounds like a good plan.
Somebody would be bringing in Katerina Honturok.
Turn on your microphone, oh here we are.
Good afternoon, can you hear me?
Yes, we can hear you, go ahead please.
Okay, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Katerina
and Spuntani has been the first bar
since I ever moved to Walnut Creek.
I was in summer 2021.
And since then I fell in love with this place.
I felt welcome and I felt safe.
Even if there's some weird situation going on,
the staff made sure that the patrons are safe and okay.
Considering that, I would say that I would sincerely ask you
to seriously consider the 90 day probation
for the Splintonic Lounge
because the changes are happening, but they need time.
The staff needs time to implement them.
Thank you, this is all I wanted to say.
Thank you very much for your comment.
Who's next, Andy?
let's see here we've got Frank now we'll go ahead and bring him in hello members can you hear me yes
we can hear you go ahead please oh thank you for the time uh my name is frank as stated on
uh i've been a i've been a patron of many of the bars such as farrington's retro mr lucky dan's
since since I got out the military and I've met a lot of friends in those areas and I preserved a
lot of things as being older. I can't get out as much as I used to but I have noticed for example
I wanted to point out an example as I've been listening to this meeting in the last hour and a
half. I remember when Farrington's was stated or issued with a closing at midnight I believe or so
along the same lines and it was a, it was, there was, it was a distinct,
other distinct point I want to make is you could see the Farrington's people come
after Farrington's close down to Spoons. So to, like many people said, it's just gonna move down
the road. When I would be at Spoons, it'd be chill, midnight happens, you can even, you can notice.
I would say to myself, oh, here comes the Farrington's crowd because they got hit with
the same sanction to close early.
So it's to echo the point, as many people have used that term already, it's really not
going to fix the problem, but I don't feel like a place such as Spoons that has regulars
from before I was even around that I'd love to go there.
That won't be the main thing that fixes it.
The music, yes, I hate, I don't like the kids to, I leave early to avoid those kids.
But being that spoon has been so good to me over the years.
It would be a shame to penalize the hard work that jazz folks like Danny and other employees
that I've worked there, that I've got to become good friends with.
Be penalized, because you can't handle the knuckleheads.
They're overpowering.
There's too many of them.
I would say that I feel like noticing
at Farrington's recently, the ID card reader at the door,
deters a lot of those folks that either have something
that they don't want the ID card reader to see.
I've seen people turn around and not want that to go and that's kind of, I feel like
what is needed, a deterrent on the folks that know that they're up to no good and have no
value to offer besides a good time but instead just juvenile acts of ignorance.
So that being said, the 11 o'clock that that really is that's harsh.
I understand.
I would say I would say like a 12 o'clock on the weekends possibly but I've seen other
bars just come right down to the spot time is up now.
So thank you.
All right.
Thank you.
Thank you very much for your comment.
Andy, do we have anybody else?
I would just ask if there's anybody else attending via Zoom who wishes to speak on this item
who has not yet spoken, if you'd like to raise, please press the raise hand button
to let us know and it looks like not anybody and Justin McCoolidge does not appear to be
in attendance anymore either.
Well, he gave it a good try, I have to say.
Is there anyone else in the chambers who would like to make a comment at this time?
Okay, so let's close public comment on this matter and
So now is the time when spoon tonic folks can
Have the opportunity to respond to the public comments or provide any additional information you'd like at this moment
If you like you don't have to but if there's anything particular you'd like to respond to now would be the time
um, I think the ID reader isn't a really really good idea and I hadn't thought of that but that is
I feel like that would be a good deterrent to people who have things that they want to hide and being up to no good.
I do like that idea. That's why I actually started looking at Amazon.
Okay.
I'm willing to do whatever I can to keep this business going.
I invested too much money, too much time, too much blood, sweat, and tears.
Danny and I, when I hired her...
she stuck around with me for like nine years and I just want to have it succeed thank you yeah
thank you we appreciate that very much all right so um at this time I'd like to close the public
hearing I have a question of the applicant oh you do um okay yes go ahead there seems to be a
strong support for the notion that the problem
is the music.
It is the music.
So why didn't you do something a year ago or two years ago
with the music?
I did tell the DJ, stop playing that kind of music.
And he did kind of implemented it,
but he did want the crowd to start dancing.
that kind of stuff, but now it's been totally,
I'm done with the DJ not having him.
I'm gonna get a jukebox, they could play their own thing.
How long have you not had a DJ?
I'm gonna actually implement it this weekend.
So you're still, up until right now you have a DJ.
From now on, no DJ.
Thank you.
Well, I guess we're, it's a little bit chaotic,
so why don't you come up if you have another comment
you would like to make in response to the public comments.
Yeah.
You know, this is just subjective, my opinion, okay,
but based on a lot of experience.
In terms of criminology and criminal behavior,
jazz is a lay person.
All the time, I've seen a lot, okay,
in my 20 years as an attorney
and other things that I've done, been involved with,
involving criminal elements.
Many times I've spoken to city councils, politicians,
and they don't understand the gangster lifestyle.
And a lot of people don't understand
the lore of the music, what to look at.
A lot of people don't even know what gang tags look like.
When your town is cut up into sections,
the tenant knows about that.
But when I asked him about, well, what kind of variance
you see in here, criminal elements, serenial variants,
nortenial elements, he couldn't even answer that.
But the fact of the matter is there's such a thing,
it's referred to in popular culture as gangster music.
And if you just turn the dial around on the FM,
you'll find it, you'll be appalled.
A lot of parents don't know about it.
Jazz didn't know about it, I told him about it.
He hired me and I came in and gave him straight talk
about that with the police, had straight talk with them.
Jaz knows about this element of criminology now.
He can act on it.
I told him about it.
That's why he didn't act on it before in the way
that you were asking, you were inquiring with him.
He knows about it now.
A lot of people don't know about it, and they should.
It's a matter of public concern all around.
Okay, thank you.
any other questions with the applicant not the applicant the spoon tonic representatives
all right now i'm really going to close the public hearing it's closed um and i'd like to
bring it back to the commission for any comments questions or deliberation who'd like to start
vice chair strongman you're up um probably a question for our attorney
that if we did some sort of a probation period,
how would we word that and how would we structure it?
So that less work for the police, less work for our staff.
I think you met our attorney, not the attorney.
Sorry, you can sit down.
It's okay.
Sorry, sorry.
So many attorneys.
It's okay, thank you.
So, yeah, the commission does have some discretion
and I guess kind of summarize a couple of options.
One is, and I heard 90 days thrown out,
there's no specific timeline,
but one, the commission could defer its decision,
meaning you've heard evidence,
if the commission so desires to hear more evidence
at a later date, and some of that evidence being that,
what's happened between tonight and a future date,
the commission could choose to continue this hearing
to a future date and then take up the consideration
at that time with the benefit of any additional evidence
that it might want to hear.
And I raised that, I raised it in that format
because, you know, this item's here due to a fact
that there's been a notice of violation,
you've got evidence in front of you.
And so arguably if you said,
hey, we're just gonna create a probationary period,
I wouldn't characterize it like that
because there's an argument down the road
that when you go to take a final action,
there's a due process argument that says
you didn't take action before,
how can you take action now, x days later?
And so if the commission chose to do that,
I would characterize it as you're deferring action,
you're deferring a decision to a later date
because you wanna hear more evidence,
but it's the same public hearing.
another option and again I wouldn't characterize it as a probationary period
but another option that the Commission could undertake is you you could do you
could delay again I'm not gonna throw out a specific time the staff proposals
11 o'clock you could change the hours and you could delay that for a period of
time and but it would be automatic meaning those hours will change in X
days and you could invite the business to come back and effectively apply for
longer hours based on what's happened between today and that future date. So
again that would be taking a final action tonight to say the hours will
change but we're staying that and they don't go into effect until a date in the
future and then it would be the onus would be on the business to come back
and basically apply to have the hours you know have that overwritten with a
new with a new CUP provision that says okay because you've made these changes
we now have effectively changed our mind and we're gonna not you know that final
action can be overwritten so I guess what I'm a little long-winded but I guess
what I'm saying is if you're gonna take final action that final action should be
clear as to what the hours are now or you should defer your final action we
would be able if we did some sort of a continuously hearing to X date could
there be a rubric to between the police department and the business to come up
with how we're going to measure progress yeah you I mean you could provide
direction you could provide direction to staff to work with the business and you
know it would be the businesses obligation to come back with that plan
but you could provide direction that says hey you need to work with the
police department and come up with a plan okay thank you
Other comments? Commissioner Lezak. So a few years ago we as a group heard a
similar discussion about Krogan's and in a Krogan situation similar to this one
it was a restaurant which is what I understood this originally to be that
that then got a use permit in 2001
to expand their wine and beer sales to full alcohol.
I mean, I don't know that this is a full bar
in and of itself, right?
I mean, this is a business that has a series
of use permits that, as they went,
established additional timeframes and additional rights
and that as part of that, for a variety of reasons,
now is not managing their business in accordance
with the responsibilities that go with those rights.
And so my perspective is that there are consequences
for that and changing their hours,
to me, is a reasonable consequence.
In the case of Krogan's, we didn't shut them down,
we reduced their hours and suggested
that there be other requirements,
I believe a security plan and a number of other things,
and they said how great that was
and how much they appreciated that,
and then they were gonna go back and implement those things,
and after further looking at them,
they realized that they couldn't survive economically
and they closed.
But my perspective was we didn't close them,
we set a set of conditions based on the consequences
of their actions and that that was financially
infeasible for them.
So based on that experience, my concern here,
based on some of the testimony that was provided,
is that if we do a similarly make 11 o'clock,
the timeframe, which is recommended by staff,
that we would essentially be establishing
the same situation, that they would have to go back
and likely not survive.
So the question is, what really is the intent
of the staff recommendation?
What really is the recommendations that we might have
for a process?
And I'll throw this out there just for conversation
and let you respond.
But if the idea would be 11 o'clock is so punitive
that they would close, if we would consider 12 o'clock
as a timeframe with the idea that there really is,
you know, consequences of your actions,
and that there then be a process that they could come back
and apply for an extension to later hours
based on providing a plan.
You know, I heard discussion of ideas,
but there is no real plan.
This is like an incredibly unprofessionally run facility
that has no plan, is making it up kind of as they go.
And I'm not suggesting that this doesn't give them
an opportunity to get some of the right help on board
to help them fix that.
But I'm putting it out there that, you know,
that I would think that if we punish them
by changing the hours till midnight,
that creates the opportunity for them
to still have some hours of operation,
and yet will create a timeframe
in which some of the element probably won't want to be there.
And I recognize that those people will leave
and go elsewhere, that's the nature of this.
And maybe then the business can come back to the group,
you know, in six months or a year,
whatever seems the appropriate amount of time,
with an appropriate plan and ask to then have their hours
extended to one o'clock.
And then, you know, with good behavior,
come back again six months or a year later
and asked to get back to two o'clock.
So that's sort of a process and idea
that I'm gonna put out there.
And I'll ask you all to respond
and what you think about that proposal.
Commissioner Pickett.
Sorry, it was suggested by Spintonics
that we consider a grace period,
letting them continue to operate for 90 days and review it.
The city attorney addressed that,
but I don't think that's an appropriate action.
One option we have is just to close them down.
Not certainly worthy of considering by this commission.
We've closed other establishments
or by enforcement of very strict conditions,
other establishments have been closed by this commission.
I think our society is becoming too tolerant of bad behavior
And, you know, to put it in a two-year-old's term, spontonics needs a timeout.
I can't see any reason to allow anything other than 11 o'clock closing time.
We can consider, like we've done with other establishments, establish something like that
that is very punitive for the actions that have occurred
but allows them an opportunity to recover from that in the future.
If they can really pull it off and prove it to us, they can pull it off.
And as Commissioner Lezak mentioned, we do not have a plan from Spoontonics.
That would have been very helpful to have, was something submitted to us
and saying this is what we are going to do and we don't have that
which gives me a lack of confidence
that we're going to see any progress.
So I guess my support, and I'm really not even
comfortable with 11 o'clock.
I know 10 o'clock would be fatal.
I think businesses can survive with an 11 o'clock limit.
It reduces their revenue substantially
for maybe two nights a week.
I didn't say it does it every night.
but since most of the revenue comes in in two nights,
I think it is survivable and I would be most comfortable
supporting the staff's recommendation
and nothing more lenient than that.
Okay, Commissioner Anderson.
I'm looking at the list of events here
and I'm listening to the testimony here.
There are sort of two ways I can look at this.
One is that, you know, the owners have talked to the police.
That was yesterday.
They wanted to do away with the DJ and change the music,
but maybe next weekend.
So it seems it's very, very late in the game
to be addressing issues that have been here
for quite a while, as we've heard.
On the other hand, I look at the events more recently,
And there's been only seven so far this year.
There's actually only been three in the last six months,
one of which took place before 11 o'clock.
And the last three months have been zero.
Maybe it's just coincidence.
Maybe it's a trend.
I'm not sure.
I also look through these, and most of the events
take place after 11.
But the vast majority of those take place after 12.
So I would not be averse, I think, to, you know,
give spoontonics a better chance of surviving economically
with a 12 o'clock curfew or closing time.
And set, you know, a time when they can come back,
show that the changes they've made have actually
made a difference, and request extension later date,
later time to close.
I tend to agree with that as a reasonable approach.
With a 12 o'clock stop would be at 11.30 last call.
Give them about 90 minutes into when the restaurant upstairs
shuts down at 10, that gives them 90 minutes into it.
If they're open from 6 on or whenever they're open
until then it gives them plenty of opportunity
to fill the bar up to two hours of music,
90 minutes of that between the 10 and the 1130 poor time, if you will, the prime time
for pouring seems to me to be a good approach in terms of if we're going to play with times
and give them an opportunity to straighten it up.
But I agree with you on the lack of specificity.
I'm still concerned for the neighboring businesses that we haven't really discussed in terms
of how it's affected their, their, the properties in the surrounding area there.
And anything that we, that anything that we do decide on would come along with a specific
plan with measurable objectives, including how they treat the neighbor's properties.
So it's my two cents.
Any else?
Okay.
I am, I am very concerned about the complete lack of any written security plan that was
as presented to us in other situations of this type
that I've experienced on this commission.
We have been given either a fairly simple plan,
just outlining basic additional security
or alcohol control or whatever the issue is,
but some means of addressing the specific problems
that have occurred.
In this case, we have quite a bit of conflicting evidence
as to whether or not there are actually security people
in the parking lots at any given time.
and there was nothing in writing
and apparently nothing was done that we're aware of
really to change specifically in response
to some pretty serious incidents that occurred.
So that's alarming to me.
It shouldn't take us saying you have to come
to the commission and we're gonna take drastic action
before an owner modifies their security protocols
to address ongoing issues.
but I do see some improvement in statistics at the same time,
but I don't think we can just rely on that,
and I don't think we can put something in place
that isn't specific,
because we don't want to deter people
from calling the police for assistance,
but we need to have some plan in place
to deal with the problems that have been documented.
So that's my biggest concern with regard to this.
I would be open to a later time than 11,
that doesn't seem late enough given the business model but I don't think we can
be regulating the specific music that they're playing so some other security
plan has to be in place as a condition I think of considering anything other than
what staff has recommended. Those are my thoughts. Anybody else have any comments?
Questions? Would anybody like to make a motion of some sort?
Commissioner Lee-Zack, you move.
I started this, so I will motion that we adopt the the resolution for
modification of the conditional use permit for the spoon tonic lounge and
based on the conditions that are included in the staff report with the
modification to condition number one to allow in spoon tonic lounge shall close
at 12 p.m. seven nights a week and that we would add an additional condition
that would allow spoon tonic to come back before the Commission no sooner
than 12 months from the expiration of the appeal period of this to request an extension
of their hours or a change modification to their permit and a last condition that would
be a suggestion that Spoontonic work with city staff and the police department to come
up with a plan to present to the commission if they so choose to come back of how they
they would address the, you know, A, the security issues,
B, their communication with the city police department,
in particular, you know, a suggestion
that they had started attending these meetings
with the weekly meetings with the bar group.
And the last item would be that they include an item
on how they will handle security
for the neighboring businesses and parking lots,
so that we not only will see a reduction
in the number of instances here, the responses,
but also a reduction in the impact on the neighbors.
And all of those things are really a direction
for them to work with staff,
because if they would like to have any change
to their or modification to those hours,
I think those are all criteria that we would agree
would need to be presented to us to even consider that.
Okay, is that a modification you can understand?
I believe so, I just want to clarify it.
So clearly the first condition is very clear.
With respect to the other things you mentioned,
I want to make sure I'm understanding that correctly.
That's direction to the business that if they come back,
when they come back to reapply
for an extension to their CUP hours.
Those are the expectations
of what the commission would see
in connection with that application.
That's right, it's a suggestion.
So if they choose to come back at that time,
they can present to us anything they want.
But I wanna make it clear,
at least in writing from what our discussion is,
what a minimum expectation is.
I mean, to the Chair's point,
we've seen a number of these before,
and they've all been fairly thoughtful.
We've had some folks who've had some problems
and had their hours reduced and come back a year later,
so this is not without precedent.
And those people, when they came back,
not only came back with this support
of the city police department,
which is a huge factor here,
but they came back with some fairly detailed explanations
of what they had changed
and what they were gonna do going forward.
Is it also fair to characterize the one year
as a suggestion from the standpoint that,
instead of having it as a specific condition of approval,
that the commission's not inclined,
the commission wants to see a track record?
Explain to me what the standard use permit,
there was, we've had this before where,
that we've had conditions where they couldn't come back
for a certain period of time.
Is there a standard in the ordinance
that was created in 2012?
There are no time limit standards of that nature
in the ordinance.
In terms of just general practice,
typically with a business wanting to introduce alcohol
into it, usually they're encouraged by staff
to first apply for an administrative use permit
to allow service up to 11 o'clock
and then to see how things go for about a year
before applying for a conditional use permit
for later hours.
But there's no actual requirement in the code for that.
So it could be a condition that the commission puts on,
which is an expectation of a certain period of time or not.
I mean, if we didn't specifically write that condition,
they could apply for an extension next week.
Right, and if they did so,
and they were in front of the commission,
the commission could say, we told you at the last public hearing that we weren't inclined
to approve any additional hours for at least a year.
So it can be a formal condition or it can be kind of direction to the business that,
look, you have the option to reapply in the future, but from the commission's perspective,
we want to see a track record for a year.
Well, we can make the conditions specific, correct?
We can say you can't come back for a year. Yeah, I think we just jet we generally don't tell an applicant
They can't apply for something. We evaluate the application at the time. It's made so I
think that's where I guess I'm steering you a little bit away from making it a formal condition of approval and instead just
communicating expectations
which
get the
should get the same result.
Which is, if somebody, if you communicate
that you expect that you want to see a track record
before they come back and reapply for hours,
if they apply earlier during that process,
if they want to take that risk and go through that process,
the commission has the discretion to say,
look, I don't think, you know,
we just changed our hours six months ago.
And from our perspective,
this isn't enough of a track record
for us to increase your hours.
So you can still make that decision
and it would be the applicant's risk
if they applied before that time.
Yeah, my sense is that in other situations like this,
that we have waited a period of time
that was, I thought, a year before folks came back.
And I couldn't remember whether that was an expectation
or a condition.
So at your advice, I'll go ahead and make it a suggestion
that the applicant, if they choose to come back,
would provide a minimum amount of time
for there to be sufficient data
for us to be able to determine
that it's not just a short-term trend.
And I'm gonna suggest that that be a year.
I'd like a second, if I can get a clarification.
When you said 12 p.m., you meant 12 a.m.?
Midnight.
I guess, yes, I did mean that, yes.
closing the afternoon would be a little draconian. Yeah it depends on if they
stayed up all night. Sorry I was interpreting off of the conditions
itself and yes that it was that is correct thank you for the clarification.
I do want to clarify one one additional aspect of that condition. I think
Commissioner Reiser raised the issue of kind of
last call versus closing.
So the condition as it reads right now
is just closing at midnight.
And I don't know if the commission wants
to be more specific about...
Well, this typically has more to do with their ABC license,
does it not?
That most establishments have to, you know,
can't have alcohol out past a certain point.
So, do we need to be more specific that their last serving hour is 11.30?
Many of our CUPs have a specific provision that will state sales and service of alcohol
will end at a certain time and the business will close at a certain time.
And it's essentially there to ensure that, you know, in this example, you don't have
orders at 11.58.
And that's typically worded as sales service and consumption
with sales and service ending at whatever the last call time.
Consumption and business close being ending
at a certain time.
Okay and I understood from the testimony that was provided
that their sales and service ends at 130
and that their consumption and closing is at two
and that their practices that they have people out of there
even before that to make sure that they don't exceed that.
So I would agree that we should be that specific
make sales and service 11.30 p.m. and consumption
and closing at 12 a.m.
Okay.
We have a motion.
And we have a second. Seconder agrees, yeah.
By Commissioner Anderson.
So, commission secretary, can you please record?
Could you, could we have a repeat
of what exactly we're voting on?
Sure, sure.
And I can read, I can read that,
I can read that provision as amended.
So section one would basically now read,
Spontonic Lounge shall see sales and service of alcohol
at 11.30 p.m. seven nights a week
and shall close at 12 a.m. seven nights a week.
But we're voting on saying that you can't come back.
Right, as it sits now, it's basically advice
and direction to the business that, I'm paraphrasing,
so if I'm stating it in a way that the commission
Correct. You talked me out of a formal condition into a more advisory and
suggestive tone in terms of we do want the businesses to succeed. I think that
was the general consensus of the discussion that we're trying to give
them some advice and without directing them to hire certain professionals or to
behave in a particular way. But we'd certainly have an expectation as a group
that we would see something of that nature
before we would make changes to this.
So thank you for the clarification.
And you'd see a track record of 12 months.
So if that, sorry, if that comes back to us,
if they choose to do something in six months,
and we have some change of commissioners and stuff,
how's that stuff regurgitated?
Is the staff report gonna tell us
that we recommended that at the time,
or how's that historically, how's that brought forward?
Yes, absolutely.
There would be administrative record, of course,
from this meeting and that information would be relayed
in the staff report.
Okay, very good.
So we have a motion and a second.
So commission secretary, can you please record the vote?
Yes, commissioner Reiser.
Yes.
Mr. Needing.
Yes.
Commissioner Lezak.
Yes.
Commissioner Pickett.
Yes.
Commissioner Anderson.
Yes.
Vice chair Strongman.
and the motion carries. And I will just mention it was mentioned once earlier
that this matter is appealable within 10 days of this decision to the City
Council. Okay so thank you very much everybody for coming at this time I'd
like to take maybe five minute break just to let everybody clear out and
before we start our next item. Okay so we're back from our break thank you
everyone and now I'd like to move on to our second public hearing which is the
project the project is SB 9 ordinance zoning ordinance amendment there's a lot
of ordinances in there and first we'll start with a staff presentation by Andy
Smith computer good evening Andrew Smith senior planner and actually not
providing the presentation but merely an introduction and we'll keep that short
tonight and given the the lateness of the hour you may recall about oh it's a
month ago jeez I'm sorry was it two weeks ago a month ago it had to have been a
month ago we heard in front of this Commission we had a study session to
discuss possible provisions to be included in a local ordinance for Senate
Bill 9 SB 9 and we took that input from this commission as well as there was a
community survey which will be spoken of later and we have prepared a draft
ordinance for this Commission's consideration and recommendation to the
City Council so with that said I will go ahead and turn it over to our consultant
Heather Coleman who will give you the presentation and go over the staffs
recommendation. Thank you. Good evening commissioners, as Andy mentioned we are
bringing to you a draft zoning ordinance amendment that reflects the input that
we received from you last time. For anybody who's new just to a quick SB 9
recap. It was a law passed in 2021 that went into effect January 1st 2022. The
intent is to help alleviate California's housing crisis and provide housing
variety. It requires cities to allow duplexes and lot splits in single
family residential zones and it allows but does not require cities to adopt local
ordinances and by doing so they can set standards over some aspects of SB
projects. Okay. So the city adopted an urgency ordinance in 2021 and extended
that in 2022. It expires in December 2023 and cannot be extended any more times
per state law. We held a study session with you on July 27th and took the
comments we received from that to draft the ordinance. There was an
online public survey posted on the city's website open from July 23rd to
August 3rd I'm sorry July 13th to August 3rd and it's getting a little late. We got
over 600 responses to that, and that was included as an attachment to your staff report.
The proposed ordinance would revise the interim ordinance in certain respects, but keep it largely
intact. As Andy mentioned, the task tonight would be to review the draft ordinance and make
recommendations to the City Council, which is to be yet to be scheduled. Just
mentioning that adopting a local ordinance implementing SB 9 is
consistent with many goals, policies, and programs in the 2023 to 2031 housing
element, particularly calling, you know, for new housing development, development
affordable housing, increasing housing opportunity outside of the core area, and
codifying Senate Bill 9 locally is is specifically one of the programs in the
housing element and therefore something that needs to be done. I thought it was
worth bringing in also the 2025 general plan chapter four built environment
talks about infill development being compatible with its surroundings and so
that is another important value to keep in mind. We heard the Commission's input
on overall approach and while it was you know there were a variety of perspectives
Some of the common threads we heard were providing some appropriately skilled
infill housing, recognizing that it may not be a big, it may not be a large
quantity of housing, but there at least is some opportunity, while maintaining
the character and scale of existing single-family neighborhoods
and minimizing potential impacts on adjacent neighbors. Another thread we
heard is increasing the flexibility of the SB 9 regulations in comparison to
the interim ordinance which was as on the very strict end allowing only what
is allowed under state law. And creating some greater parity between SB 9 and ADU
regulations so that property owners who may be interested would have some
incentive to use SB 9 regulations. There was a wide range of opinions expressed
in in the online survey and in public comments received so yeah it's it's it's
it's all over the place. Some people advocated for flexibility and other
people wanted their regulations to be as strict as possible or even say they
opposed SB 9 but but that's not really something that we can handle at the
city level. So I thought it was worth mentioning that we're, you know, we're
trying to balance various objectives and values, providing some housing variety
and opportunities for infill development. Some people commented
that it provides an opportunity to build small units for family members of older
younger generations. The SB9 units can be affordable or moderate. They're not
required to be, but they may be. But we also heard that it's important to
respect the patterns of existing single-family neighborhoods and respect
the privacy of adjacent neighbors. So floor area, this is going to be your most
challenging topic tonight the other ones are pretty straightforward but so state
law says that you must allow at least two 800 square foot SB 9 units. The
comments that we heard last time ran ran the gamut but we thought there was some
concurrence around allowing larger around using zoning the zoning regulations
such as setback, height and lot coverage to really establish the building envelope, establish
what can be allowed and we also heard some concurrence around allowing slightly larger
units, somewhat larger units on larger lots.
Wide range of opinions expressed in the public online survey.
Our staff recommendation is to allow larger SB9 units if the project complies with standard
setbacks and lot coverage and use a sliding scale for larger lots.
So we've provided some possible alternatives for you to consider on the floor area issue.
The first one would be flexible size units, limits for both units, but those flexible
size limits would depend on on both units needing standard setbacks.
So yeah and we're actually we think we understood the intent of the commission to be that all
buildings on the lot need to comply with standard setbacks and lot coverage requirements of
the zoning district in order to qualify for this.
And then if they don't comply with the standard setbacks, then they would be limited in size
and the degree to which they'd be limited in size, we will get to that in a moment.
So then the other major alternative would be that your first unit would be unlimited
in size, in floor area, as long as it meets the setbacks, but your second unit would be
restricted whether or not it meets the setbacks.
And then, sort of our sub-options under each of these is how, you know, so your one that
meets the setbacks can be unlimited, have unlimited floor area, how small can the second,
how large can the second unit be?
So sub-option A is to just use the ADU floor area limits.
They vary by lot size and they vary according to whether you have a studio one bedroom unit
or two or more bedroom unit.
Sub option B would be to use a broader sliding scale.
These net lot areas are based on your single family residential zoning district lot area
minimums and we provided a larger range of floor area as well.
sub option C is sort of a hybrid in which we are combining lot areas with
sizes that you know maybe that can be affordable to I think Andy can explain
this better maybe but um you want to go ahead you have the correct wording for
this I think so this what we have here is kind of a combination of sliding
scale that's just allowing larger units on larger properties but still scaled
back such that the resulting unit sizes are generally affordable to moderate
income households when taken into consideration rental rates and utility
These ones are not, shall I say, scientifically connected to the actual, what is actually
affordable, at least with regard to the three- and the four-bedroom units, because the research
that we've done that establishes what is generally an affordable, what size units are affordable
to moderate-income households, we looked at studios ones and twos, not threes and fours,
But I will tell you that what is considered in Walnut Creek affordable to a moderate-income
household for a two-bedroom unit, and that's assuming one person per bedroom is a resident,
it's about 1,060 square feet based on recent rental information.
Okay.
Thanks.
Sorry to put you on the spot like that.
So then, our next topic is building height.
We heard majority commissions support for allowing SB9 units that meet standard setbacks,
so the setbacks required by the zoning district to be the same height as other buildings in
the same district, other buildings including single-family homes, and those that do not
meet the standard setbacks but meet the state's minimums of four feet from side and rear,
those would be limited to one story and that is consistent with the recommendation that we're
making. Parking state law says that the city cannot require more than one parking space per
SB 9 unit and
No parking spaces can be required within a half mile of a major transit stop
Which in this case is one of the BART stations or within one block of a car share
There was a range of opinion in the public
in the in the public comments
The Planning Commission also expressed a range of opinions
but the majority supported requiring one part one parking space but allowing it to be uncovered and that is what we're recommending
Design standards
State law says that cities can
Adopt objective design standards as long as they don't physically preclude at least two 800 square foot units
The Planning Commission comments forgot were majority said maintain the current design standards with an updated reference to
the draft design review standards and guidelines.
I would point out that it would only be
the objective standards of that document
that would apply, not the guidelines.
It's clearly, and the documents clearly divided
between guidelines and standards,
so that shouldn't be a problem.
And the public comments arranged.
We did hear concerns about two-story projects
in predominantly single-story neighborhoods.
but we are recommending retaining the design standards
of the interim ordinance and adding a reference
to the new objective design standards
that will be effective once they get adopted.
We had a lively discussion about impact fees last time.
There are a lot of different ins and outs of that.
And we did hear majority support
for keeping development impact fees for SB9 units.
Those consist of park fees and traffic fees, I believe.
Yes.
But waiving the inclusionary housing in lieu fee
for smaller SB9 units, which makes them more on par
with smaller ADUs.
Do not pay the inclusionary housing impact fee.
Public comments, it wasn't one of the issues
that we asked about in the survey,
but people volunteered that both permit fees
and impact fees could be obstacles.
So we are recommending, our staff is recommending
continuing to charge development impact fees
for SB9 units, but exempting units
that comply with the ADU floor area limits
from the inclusionary housing requirement.
lot-width and frontage, cities can set standards for this,
as long as they still allow an urban lot split.
Planning Commission comments were pretty unanimous
that instead of setting the 24-foot minimum flagpole
width that we had an interim standards
that we should just go ahead
and refer to the requirements of the fire protection
district and other safety and utility agencies.
That's what we're recommending.
With easements, we heard comments from the commission
that easements are not an ideal or preferred solution,
private access easements.
But they should be allowed if it's the only way
to create a lot split.
So that's what we're recommending,
that access to a rear lot could be via easement,
rather than direct frontage on a street, on a public street.
However, that whatever type of access way, private drive
is used, it should meet the requirements of the fire
protection district.
A new topic that we didn't bring to you last time
but came to our attention is that there are different ways
that cities have responded to this.
The state law says you can't physically
preclude the development of at least two 800 square foot
units on each lot.
So in the interim regulations, we
had a pretty generic statement that said,
standards shall be waived as needed
to accommodate these two units.
And the planning manager shall make that determination
about how much they need to be waived.
We noticed in another jurisdiction that we reviewed,
they establish a priority order for waiving these standards.
And we thought that was an interesting approach
to bring to you.
So it would say which standard needs to be waived first
and then waive that as much as needed.
And then if that still doesn't accommodate the two 800
square foot units, then go to the next one
and see how much that would need to be waved in order
to accommodate an SB9 project.
So this is the order that we're proposing,
and we'd like to have your feedback on it.
So the way it works is you'd start with number one,
wave that one, wave the next one, wave the next one.
And I want to point out that lot coverage on here
comes before setbacks.
And we think that I took a look at the lot coverage
and setback requirements of the various single family
residential districts.
Lot coverage is more constraining.
And we also think that putting the setbacks
and the height limits toward the latter part of the list
will help address some of the concerns about development
that's gonna be really close to neighbors
or that will have like higher units close to,
say four feet from a neighbor's side property line.
And front setback has to do,
it will really help maintain the character
by not having these units be too close to the street
or in front.
Another item that we didn't bring to you last time,
but we noticed it's a correction
to be more consistent with the state law.
This has to do with once a property owner
does a lot split as allowed under SB 9,
they can have up to,
they can have two units on each resulting lot,
and per state law, those can be any type of unit.
So they can be an existing house,
they can be a new SB 9 unit,
or they can be some combination
of a primary and secondary unit,
like an existing house plus an ADU,
or a new SB9 unit plus a JADU,
but they can be either accessory units or primary units.
And we just wanted to correct that
to make it more consistent with state law.
So our recommendation is to choose a floor area option
and sub option and adopt the resolution as amended,
recommending that the city council adopt
their proposed ordinance.
So we are, oops, that one, ideally it would say questions.
but now you've seen under the hood
that we actually have additional slides on,
backup slides.
Right, backup slides, I love it.
All right, so yeah, this is very confusing
from a kind of procedural standpoint,
obviously we don't have an applicant
or questions with regard to that.
So maybe I can propose that we do these decisions
that we want to try and reach some consensus
with regard to that and then open it up
for public comment, questions, public comment, and then.
I would suggest if there's any questions for staff that you start with that before there's
any deliberation or comment and then take public input.
I do know that there's a member of the public in attendance tonight who does speak and then
start deliberation and making decisions.
Okay.
All right.
I can see that.
I can see it both ways, but let's do that.
So questions from the commission to start?
clarification that we only have we have to choose the floor area options and
sub options that's the only thing we really need to hash out we can object to
the rest of the we could object to the rest of it and we have let me actually
clarify try to explain that because it is admittedly a little bit it can be
rather confusing and as the chair did note of course you don't have to follow
the staff's recommendation at all you can come up with something entirely of
of your own if you so choose as a commission.
What our recommendation is with regard to floor area
is there's first two choices, two primary options.
One is to allow the potential for both units
to be unlimited in size if everything on the property
complies with setback in lot area.
Second option is to only allow that
for the first unit on a lot.
And then the second one be subject to floor area limitations.
and in either case, if everything on the property
does not comply with setback and lock coverage,
both units are going to be subject
to the floor area limitations.
So you pick one of those two,
that's primary option one or primary option two.
Once you've made that decision,
then you go to the sub options, A, B and C,
which is to decide for the SB9 units
that will be limited in floor area,
how do you want to limit them?
So pick one or two and then choose A, B, and C,
or A, B, or C.
Or come up with something entirely of your own making.
Okay.
Should I flip back to those slides?
Well, first we're gonna see if there's any more questions
from the commissioners based on what you presented.
Seeing none.
Oh, sorry.
I was, you didn't move fast enough here.
Commissioner Pickett, please.
I'm moving slow tonight.
It's okay.
The table you gave us on page six of the staff report that has alternates 1A, 1B, 1C, and
are showing all sorts of, you know, studio, one bedroom, two bedroom sizes, three bedroom
sizes, four or more, can we limit the number of bedrooms?
Say, we don't want anything more than two bedrooms.
I have to think about that.
I can't, I can't think of a reason that we can't,
but I don't know if we, if we can't.
I haven't seen anything in SB nine that says we can't.
That, ooh, and our assistant city attorney
is looking at the, at the,
Okay, while you're looking at that,
I have one other, I have one other question.
I mean, I've looked through the actual SB nine texts
many times, but.
totally lost me on the waiver thing.
Oh, OK.
When has somebody permitted to ask for a waiver?
I mean, I'm used to the multifamily stuff
where you put in affordable housing
and you get concessions on waivers.
Is this related to that?
Or when do you get to ask for waivers?
This is different.
It doesn't require such a formal process.
Yeah, I'm not sure exactly what process it would be,
but it would have to be just part of the application,
part of the ministerial application,
and then there would be a determination of,
if somebody said, well, I can't fit
an 800 square foot unit in here
if I were to comply with your lot coverage limitations,
so I need you to waive your,
35% lot coverage limitation in the R10
up to be this amount, 40%,
let's say hypothetically, 40%
in order to get my 800 square foot unit.
And then it would have to just be a administrative decision.
Go ahead.
Let me jump in.
I think you're first asking about what the process
for requesting a waiver and is that correct?
Well, okay, so if these things are available to an applicant,
then all the other stuff we're talking about is out the window
because the applicant said, I don't want to have to do that.
Oh, so okay, so that is a situation in some cases
for when you're doing like a density bonus application
for multifamily residential
where there's what I kind of informally call freebie
variances, that's not the case here.
What the case is here is that they have to follow our standards
But if our zoning requirements, our development standards,
make it physically infeasible or physically impossible
to actually fit at least two 800 square foot units
on the property, then they can say,
hey, I need a waiver of these standards.
And under state law, it's just kind of wide open
that we just have to grant waivers as necessary
to allow that.
What we are proposing here,
and this is actually based on a neighboring jurisdiction.
I want to say that.
That was a really good idea.
It came upon it after the planning commission study session
is to establish the order in which waivers
can be requested.
In other words, the order of development standards.
Basically starting with what's least important
in our recommendation,
what we would feel would be least important
that could be most easily waived to the hardest
for the city to accept, essentially.
And you basically the developer,
could you bring up the slide that's got the list?
The builder would, and that laptop's running really slow today apparently, oh there, oh
no it's just zoom is really slow, it's fast up there, okay.
So essentially if the applicant can make the case to the planning manager that hey with
all the rules in place it is physically infeasible to build the minimum that I'm allowed under
or SB 9, then we would refer to this list and say,
okay, well, we can waive the requirement
regarding the placement of mailboxes.
And honestly, that's probably not gonna do much of anything.
So then next, okay, well, location of exterior entrances
for if it's an attached SB 9 yet.
Again, probably not gonna affect it.
Okay, distance between buildings.
In most of our single-family zones,
there's a requirement for five-foot separation
between buildings.
Does that make it feasible?
Nope.
Okay, lot coverage.
Let's waive the lot coverage requirement.
Bingo.
That's enough, right, we can do it.
Okay, great, they still then have to comply
with the tree preservation, hillside performance,
all the setbacks, the height,
and all the rest of those damage.
I get that, and I get the priority notion here.
Is, can the applicant,
other than the physical, geometrical accommodation on a lot,
can they complain about it not being economically feasible?
They can complain about it,
but we would not be able to take action on it
based on that.
economical feasibility is not a valid support for asking for a waiver, it's just really
the geometry.
It's physical preclusion.
I can't get the box on here because of those requirements, so you're going to have to let
me do some things different than the requirements, because I can't put the box on here.
It's the state law, the exact wording in the state laws physically precludes the development
of the units, and that's the same language as what's in the draft ordinance, and most
cases that probably is just going to be a simple geometric, you know, question.
There could be other factors like, you know, if there's an earthquake fault that
you're not allowed to build over a fault trace or there's a creek in the way, that
kind of a thing. And okay, so we have to waive some of these things. Maybe that's
when setback waivers, you know, you get down the list of that before it's
feasible. One thing we talked about, I don't recall if we talked about it, but
how does the hillside ordinance play into all this stuff? So what's in the interim
ordinance and in the recommended draft ordinance is actually the same as
what's in our ADU regulations which is we basically took the and actually to
back up for everybody's benefit so we have a hillside portion in the zoning
ordinance called hillside performance standards basically anytime you're doing
construction in a residential zone with some exceptions where the average slope
is greater than 15% that's 15 feet of rise over a hundred feet of run if it's
steeper than that these rules apply and there's a special review process that
requires a public hearing at the zoning administrator it's sort of you could
think of it as like almost like hillside design review but it's different
findings criteria and that's special approval and subject to special rules
about being on ridge lines and protected trees and any number you know protecting
rock outcroppings those all apply we cannot apply the city is not allowed
under state law to apply a subjective process and standard like that to ADUs and SB9 units
and some other things as well.
So what's in the draft ordinance here, and as I mentioned is in the interim in the ADU
ordinance as well, is we basically took those subjective standards that would normally be
reviewed by the zoning administrator at a public hearing and as much as could be done
and still preserve them, converted them to objective numeric standards.
So as an example, one of the criteria under the subjective process is, I forget the exact
wording, but it's basically you really shouldn't build on anything more than a 30% slope.
In the objective standards for ADUs and proposed for SB9, it just says you shall not build
on more than a 30% slope.
Thank you.
I wanted to jump in on Commissioner Pickett's question.
So I don't see anything on point,
but I would say that I don't think there's any other area
in development in the city
where the city regulates bedroom count.
So we regulate setbacks and lot coverage, et cetera.
And so I'd be hesitant to,
in none of our objective design standards to date,
address bedroom count.
It's the, to use your phrase a few minutes ago,
it's the geometry of the structure
and where it sits on the parcel.
so I would be hesitant to regulate bedroom count.
Well, in the table, it is suggesting that our criteria
for size is a function of bedroom count
and not just the physical size of the unit.
So I guess my inclination is to avoid that.
But we'll get into that discussion.
That's the thank you.
I'm going to throw a complication to that question.
So we talk about being able to fit two 800 square foot units on the SP9 lot.
If you want to apply SP9 to your lot, but there already happens to be somewhere in the lot,
a 2000 square foot home, it's been there for 30 years, but SP9 will allow you
to build a second 800 square foot unit.
If you're geometrically precluded from building
at 800 square foot unit considering that you already have the 2000 square foot unit there,
that has the same ability to waive issues.
As the ordinance is written,
and I'm gonna actually double check this,
but as I should say as the draft ordinance is written,
and as I believe the interim regulations are as well,
it's just two up to 800 square foot units.
So in theory, if you've basically gobbled up
off the property on your land by building a giant house,
Reducing the size of that house or converting it into a duplex would be your way of achieving
You know maximum number of units under sp9 and of course you could also just do an adu
Where there's a lot of a lot more waivers under state law
Okay, so now is the time for public comment, I think we have some
I knew this one wasn't going to get you.
No, this is good.
We're good.
I'm Aaron Williams.
I live in the city, work in the city.
I'm the only one with a building permit on SB9
right now to the city.
And I've been working with Andy and the community development
director.
They've been helping me out navigate this thing like crazy
because it's different.
It's weird.
I'm also an architect by trade, so I kind of understand it.
So it's going to be really hard for people
to understand it that are trying to go through it.
But I do support your guys' findings from the study.
I wasn't here last month, but I do support it.
There's nothing in there that I don't think is good.
It's going to help promote these and create flexible options,
but not over-promote them.
These aren't the neighborhood killers
that a lot of people thought they were going to be by the fact
that it's been available for two years,
and I'm the only one that has the billing permit.
So I like the flexibility of the impact fees.
That was my main concern.
These are affordable units, they're 800 square feet
and this gives away with it.
When I was designing them, it was real hard
to put in a covered parking and still meet the physical,
that you could still put it on there, right?
That was really hard.
And it's going to, if you kept that in there,
If you kept the covered parking,
all of a sudden you're gonna have four car garages
in the front of your yards, right?
So that's gonna ruin the neighborhood more than anything.
Or you're gonna have these little tent structures
people buy at Harbor Freight in their front yard to do it.
So it's good to get rid of that.
The two parking spaces on the property are fine.
I don't think it's really needed
because the only area where neighborhood in Walnut Creek
that we really have compaction of parking
as Freakside and you can't do those in that zoning anyway.
But it's totally fine to keep that.
And to answer Mr. Pickett's question
about the waivers and the priority of it,
when I was going through the design,
it was really hard to understand
which ones I can ignore and which ones can't.
So I had a bunch of trees on my lot.
So I was like, okay, I can go two stories immediately
because I can't take care of it.
I can't remove the trees, right?
So it was a priority thing.
And so I asked Andy a year and a half ago
about, well, what is your guys' priority?
Which ones do you want to see more than others?
So it is helpful to have a list in there.
I do suggest probably raising the two-story limit lower
on the list to like 9 or 10, because it
did look like on the survey that was a lot of people's issues.
But it doesn't bother me.
That's it.
But I do want to say thank you for all your help
trying to navigate everything.
Right, thank you for your comments.
I thought that we had suggested one parking space
that was uncovered.
Yes.
Two, okay.
For the SB9 units, yeah, the draft ordinance
does propose one parking space uncovered
for the per SB9 unit.
And so one covered, one uncovered.
Just one uncovered, one each, right?
So for the primary existing house,
it's still the two covered spaces,
but anything new built under SB9,
so the SB9 dwelling units,
each unit would be one uncovered space, full stop.
So reading that, that would mean you would have
your existing two-car garage
and possibly two parking spots in your front yard, right?
Or on the side yard or however they're gonna split it.
It's kind of odd if you think about it.
I can make it work on my property,
but it could be weird all of a sudden
you see all these cars in people's front houses.
So, better put them on the street.
And these are small units,
so most of you are gonna be riding bikes.
Okay, thank you for your comment, appreciate it.
Do we have anybody else standing?
No, we have nobody attending via Zoom and I, there we go.
I was looking through our draft ordinance into,
I actually answered Commissioner Pickett's question
incorrectly so I do want to correct that.
With regard to the exceptions due to physical preclusion,
having an existing large house on the property,
if the property's gobbled up by an existing big house
and you can't fit that a second 800 square foot unit,
you can get waivers for that second 800 square foot unit.
So you would not be forced to reduce the size
of the primary dwelling.
Okay.
All right, so now I guess technically
we're closing the hearing because we've had public comment.
And so now I would like to go through the alternatives
and decide on those
so that we can make a recommendation and vote eventually.
So I think we need help.
So maybe Heather can come back and guide us
through the slides that give us our choices
we're visual learners here and we need to have the slide in front of us that
shows our options. Alternative one is that for both units on a property the
allowable size would depend on whether or not they meet setbacks actually
further that that all buildings on the property meet standard setback for the
type of building that they are.
And that contrasts with alternative two,
where the first unit can be any size, any floor area,
as long as it meets the standard setbacks,
or all buildings on the lot do.
But the second unit on a lot is automatically
subject to a size limit whether or not it meets the setbacks so maybe I should
stop there before we go on to the second part. Yeah I think we pick one or two and
then we'll pick the sub parts based on what we decide. So okay so we could start
with like a little straw poll or we could have a lot of conversation.
Mr. Anderson house I
Don't understand alternative one
Thought I did but
Alternative one is both dwelling units are not limited in size as long as they meet the setbacks
Yes, and I would add that everything as long as everything on the property meets setbacks and not coverage, right?
But then we have alternatives 1a 1b and 1c and all the limitations on the size
for the second unit those would be so then
if you have a unit on the property that meets,
that does not meet the zoning setbacks,
the setbacks of the zoning district,
say you've got your 20-foot front setback,
or front setback, your 15-foot rear,
and then on the side, you have a requirement of,
most of the districts have a requirement
of five feet minimum and 15 feet cumulative,
so that comes out to like five on one side
on the other side. So those are your standard zoning setbacks. Now SB 9 says that the maximum
that a city can require for a setback on your interior and your rear is four feet. So people
are allowed to build an SB 9 unit in that area between what the city requires for a setback and
what the state requires. So it's not a question of can you build a unit. It's how big of a unit
can you build in that area that is the difference between what the zoning district, the city
zoning district requires and what the state allows? Does that help? I think I may have
solved my own confusion here. It's confusing. What I just read on alternative one, that's the
first paragraph alternative. Alternative on paragraph two deals with what when it does not
comply with the standard setbacks. And that's what one, A, B, and C, applies to.
Exactly.
Okay, thank you.
So it's sort of like your first home is your main home and then your second home.
And they're both the second one is your SB 9.
I'm good.
Smaller.
Okay, any other questions?
All right, so I guess let's do a straw poll and just see one versus two.
and then, oh, Commissioner Levek, are you voting?
I'm voting, yeah, I'm just giving you.
Okay, so everybody, everybody, okay, this is a strop hole.
Everybody in favor of alternative one,
just raise your hand.
Sorry. Yes.
Sure, and, yeah, so.
This is like the eye doctor, you know.
I have so much anxiety about that, I have to say.
I don't know whether it's better or worse, okay?
and maybe it helps also to say that when we were talking last time about let the
zoning govern or that was that was one comment that I hear is let the zoning
district standards govern that's sort of this alternative one and alternative two
is for your your first unit let the let the zoning district standards govern
your second unit on a single family lot as allowed under SB 9 is automatically
going to be smaller whether or not it meets the standard setback so it could
meet all of the setbacks of the district but it still would need to you know
adhere to a size limit that you set so it's going to be a smaller unit it's
not going to be an unlimited floor area unit no matter where it's placed on the
lot does that help okay okay all right so let's put one back up and we're gonna
just do a little straw poll and then and then and then people can comment okay
we're stropoling all right so everybody in favor of alternative one just raise
your hand all right well that's pretty clear but vice chair strongman you want
A comment is that I don't really want to see two McMansions on one lot.
That would be a pretty darn big lot if you were going to be able to do that, so.
Okay.
All right, thank you.
All right, so it seems that we have selected alternative one pretty definitively, so if
we can go to the sub-alternate sub-options.
So this, yeah, this again is for your unit that does not meet your standard setbacks,
does have at least four feet from the side and rear yes sorry I'm a mic on
this is for any SP in this this would be floor area limitations for SP 9 units if
any building on the property does not meet the certain standard setback and
standard lot coverage requirements okay all right so what's sub option B so B
is a wider range and slightly more floor area than the ADUs. So instead of the
ADU maximum only goes up to a thousand square feet and under this option if
you have 20,000 square foot or more a lot you could build up to 1,400 square
If you have a 15,000 to almost 20,000 square foot lot, you could build 1,200.
You could build 1,100 if you have, you know, 12 to almost 15, and so on, you can see it.
And then...
And, again, the sub-option only applies if the setback requirements are not met?
Exactly.
Yeah.
Okay.
And then 1c is a different sliding scale?
Yes.
It's a different sliding scale based on number of bedrooms.
The thinking being that you want to allow more floor area if you're creating family
housing units.
Like three or more bedroom units are in demand, especially affordable three and four bedroom
units are in demand.
So allowing more floor area for if you're also providing more bedrooms, rather than
just having a gigantic place, but not having more bedrooms.
So.
But again, the other, the height limitations are separate, and they would apply to.
The height limits just apply.
It doesn't need a setback requirement.
Yeah.
The height limits just apply unless they have to be waived, because you otherwise couldn't
build an 800-
Number nine of twelve or something. Yeah, okay. Yeah, okay. So, I guess it's a
little harder to do a straw poll with three as opposed to two, but let's give
it a shot anyway. So we'll start with 1A. So everyone in favor for the sub option?
Just before you do that, I can't really vote on one without expressing my
opinion so I don't know when you want opinions. I guess now it now would be the
time for your opinion but you have to turn your mic on if you're gonna have an
opinion. You might prefer that I don't turn it on until you hear what I say. I just
want the mic on if you're gonna be talking. Go ahead. Okay and I said this
at our last meeting but I think it is our obligation to the residents of
Walnut Creek to protect the single-family neighborhoods that they bought
into and I think SB 9 flies in the face of that but being that we can't overcome
our draconian state government I'm leaning towards more conservative of the
options. Last time I did say that I would remain open-minded though and so
although I would prefer the A option which is appears to be the most
restrictive. I would consider the B option provided that we didn't go as big
as 1,400 feet. I think the sliding scale goes a little too far in a 20,000 foot
lot but that's my opinion. Okay do we have any other comments regarding this
before we try to vote? Yes I mean not really vote vote we're kind of half
The question of the bedrooms came up and I mean my feeling is that bedrooms are in the mind of
the beholder. You know we downsized from a three-bedroom house to a four-bedroom house.
It's much smaller but it has four things relabeled bedrooms. Now we only have beds
and two of them, you know, but we sometimes have been using three rooms as bedrooms.
You know, it just sort of depends on what you call them and, you know,
I'm not sure that it really matters a whole lot how you divide up the space inside.
So that's just an argument for alternative one B instead of alternative one C.
Okay, anybody else?
Commissioner Lezak.
So, Andy, thank you for C, which speaks to the the affordability by design concept.
Andy and I talked a little bit about this today because I really got comfortable with the idea of waving the the affordable in Luffy,
Because the concept is these are affordable by design,
and if they really are of that size,
I thought that was a great concept to talk about.
But I really don't like C, because A and C both speak
to this bedroom count thing that was just discussed.
And I think, you know, in response also to the survey,
you know, we need to try to come up with a way
to keep this as simple as possible.
And I felt like bedroom count is more complicated,
and some of these other things are complicated.
I like the idea that A was consistent with the ADU policy,
but at the end of the day,
I felt like B was the simplest and I liked it
because it didn't have the bedroom count.
And Bob, a 20,000 square foot lot is still big enough
that a 1,400 square feet house is not a McMansion,
even though I live in a 1,400 square foot house.
So it's really, I think of it as McMansion,
But, yes, but I'll tell you that I am in favor of B
as it is for all of those reasons, thank you.
Right, any other comments?
Okay, since I have the mic and I'm like drunk with power,
you know, being the chair,
we're gonna vote, do our same straw poll,
but we're gonna start with alternative B.
So everybody who is in favor of alternative one B,
raise your hand.
B.
One B.
Okay, so that's everybody so that there you go there it is
okay, so
All right, so there there's no other
choice decision-making we have to make unless there is somebody who objects to one of the
stated
recommendations on the part of the staff in the
Resolutions just a quick question one of the comments from our
correspondence was that we need to mention, by the way, there's CC&Rs.
Is there a way we can inject that to beware of CC&Rs?
I mean, there's nothing that says, you know, I mean, there's nothing that says that basically
we can't just put a thing in the ordinance that says we'd really like you to be kind
to your neighbors and your HOA.
I mean there's nothing
Legally preventing us from doing that however it does put the city in a somewhat
Shall I say uncomfortable position in that?
HOAs and CC&Rs are mentioned and referenced in the ordinance or would be under that
But the city actually has no ability no legal authority to enforce them
And so I wouldn't want to give
You know members of the public any false hope if you will that because it's mentioned in the ordinance that we can somehow do anything about it
Yeah, and I would be not in favor of any sort of reference with that. There's there's
Significant problematic issues with SB 9 and whether they apply to a choice at all at this point
It's not clear and I would not want to
Muddy that water any further by putting something in our ordinance that would make that situation even worse
So since we don't have to I don't want to that's my opinion
Okay, so we have made our straw poll decision with regard to the option and the alternative
and the sub-option and now if there are any comments, which I know Commissioner Lezak
has one, just let me finish this sentence of what we're doing here.
If there are any staff recommendations that people would like to discuss or have issues
with now is the time to bring them up.
So I had one that came up in the slide presentation that I'm not sure that I picked up in the
staff report and that had to do with this new idea that we would limit the total number
of units on a split lot to two and therefore, if you built two, you were then limited, you
you couldn't then have an ADU or a JADU.
And I heard that though, I didn't understand that
in any of the previous documentation,
and I interpreted that to be inconsistent with ADU law.
And so I object to that because of that.
And also, I think everybody should have eight lots,
eight units on their lot.
Actually, you couldn't have a J2 JADUs
because you got to have the intent to live in one
and you have to have a restriction to live in your J,
anyway, nevermind, but yes,
but I just felt like that was inconsistent with ADU law
and I didn't think that that was appropriate, so.
I was gonna say, let me provide a little clarity,
but I'll admit, I'm actually a little bit confused
right at the moment.
And I'm hoping I'm speaking to what you're talking about,
but our existing interim ordinance simply says
that when you have an urban lot split,
You cannot have ADUs or JADUs on either of the lots.
And that was based on our early reading of the law
when we were very hurriedly putting together
the interim ordinance.
Since then we've read it more closely
and what SB9 actually says is that the city can limit
each resulting lot from an urban law split
to no more than two units
in whatever form those two units may take.
So SB9 units, existing homes, ADUs, JADUs.
And so what we're recommending is that
in the draft ordinance that that language be corrected
to be consistent with what we're allowed to do
under state law, just that you're limited to two units
in whatever, per urban lot, split lot,
in whatever form they may be.
And again, that was language that I don't agree with.
That is language that I do agree with.
Commissioner Lezak, you mean you don't agree
with the interpretation of what's allowed
or you don't like it?
I don't like it.
I wouldn't be that clear in our ordinance to say that.
And apparently Bob would.
So there's just a point of disagreement
on that one particular issue, which was just new.
It wasn't discussed at the last meeting, that's all.
Are you proposing a change to that
that you'd like us to?
Yeah, I mean, I personally would propose
to just not include that language.
and didn't see it in his staff report previously.
So it was kind of new to me and that's why I brought it up.
Okay, so let's do a vote.
Who would like to leave the section as is
as the staff report suggests?
Everybody wants to leave it as is raise your hand.
All right, so that's five, okay.
All right, are there any other any other sections
in the staff recommendations that you would like to discuss?
Yes, Commissioner Peterson.
Just a thought on the waivers, the order of waivers.
Don't want to get into like the rearranging of them,
but my thought was that if you're going
to have additional units on single family lots,
preservation of trees would be an important thing
if you want to keep the look of the neighborhood the same.
people put in second units or third or fourth units
on the lot and cut down the trees.
That's gonna make a much bigger impact
than just putting the unit in there.
So I would move it down at least a couple of spots
in the waiver list.
But-
You would move it.
Move it to-
Lower on the list.
Lower on the list so it wouldn't,
so you wouldn't get to taking out trees.
Do you think it's more important than hillside performance standards or a second-story windowsill height?
I would think so, yeah.
Isn't the waiver the other way around? It's the last items on the list, the higher the number
on the list, the more important that is to the city in terms of something to preserve,
so you would move it further down.
Further down.
Okay, got it, okay.
I would agree with that.
I would too.
So you're saying it should go down to, it should swap with second story sill window height and
it would be seven and outside performance and second story sills would bump up.
I heard you say swap, is it just that you would move preservation of trees from its current perch?
No, I misspoke. We would move five to seven and seven becomes six and six becomes five.
just move it down the list so I'm just have it so it would come after preservation of trees would
come after rear setback no second story windows so height oh so actually let me just ask because
I think I saw on the slide there were 11 on the list 12 12 can you bring that up okay I'm looking
at one that just has four I'm sorry 10 is on the staff report but the slide had 12 the staff report
Yes, we pulled a slide back up so you can see it
There's two that are missing on the staff report
It might be the second one though, too. Yeah rear setback six and seven are not included
On the slide, there are two sixes.
This was the result of where I thought I had made a mistake
in the ordinance and then we realized no,
that's the ADU state law.
Anyway, I apologize, this was just a mistake.
So there's 12 on the slide,
but there's only 10 on the staff report.
So it's the second number six and number seven
rear setback and interior side setback
that are not included in the staff report list.
But I think we still want to move preservation of trees
from its position at number five to down two slots.
Nope, down three slots now.
So it should go down to number eight.
Five should become eight and then.
So rather than the numbers since we've got mixed up numbers,
if you could just tell me.
second-story window sill height.
So we would give up second-story window sill height.
Preservation of trees gets inserted
after second-story window sill height.
Gotcha.
And everything.
And everything else notches up.
Gotcha.
OK.
Did I do that right?
So what's being proposed is it would go second-story window
sill height, then preservation of trees, then maximum height.
Yes.
Great.
Thank you.
You can have as many sixes as you want.
We don't care about that.
So, you guys would rather give up the Hillside performance standards over trees.
And the reason I say that is because the civil engineering is like, I mean, I agree with
you, but this is what's proposed.
because can you describe to me usually hillside performance has to do with
slopes benches whether it's a debris bench I'm too tired right now because
the three-year-old woke up at 4.45 yesterday in the morning a.m. were they
still serving? Milk, yes. So that's all I say is trees are extremely
important but hillside performance standards, the structural aspects of
those, that's my only, unless in the hillside performance it doesn't have
any structural global stability, slope stability, if it has nothing of that in
in there, then I'd be like, okay.
So, and I'm happy to read some of this,
but just for those, if you want to follow in writing,
I would actually suggest that you go to attachment two,
which is the red line version of going from our interim
ordinance to what we're recommending being permanent.
And then on page 17 of that,
section V, Hillside Performance Standards,
this is what is in the current ordinance
and what we're recommending for the proposed,
page 17 of attachment two, and the very first of the performance standards is
due to the high levels of risk of property damage and personal injury, there
shall be no grading or construction of any kind on any portion of a site where
the true slope exceeds 30%. So that, and that language is really taken from the
existing subjective criteria that would otherwise apply under Hillside
performance standards, but that, I think,
speaks to Commissioner Needing's concern over structural.
Aren't you saying that that would be waived?
That these would be waived under,
when hillside performance standards are waived
for physical preclusion purposes, these would be waived.
Now, the units still have to, of course,
comply with building code and all normal safety things.
It's just rather than having a blanket prohibition
on more than a 30% slope, they would have to
engineer the building in such a way that it would still
be safe and meet building code and the like.
Well, yeah, if it's on a slide it can't build it, right?
It can't get that wave, right?
Yeah, yeah, there's-
It's a slow stability.
Yeah, if you see commissioner on number three,
it says slope stability purposes.
If you wanted to move it back under, you know,
below the trees, that's okay.
Because I think actually if you've got a hillside lot,
It's really, I don't think you're gonna be worrying
about second and third and fourth units.
I, yeah, it's-
Probably.
I would think so, I mean,
I've designed uphill and downhill lots
and they're not just the getting to them
and having the, it's not easy.
Sorry, I just, I'm-
So where would you recommend
that we put hillside performance standards?
We've moved trees down,
but where do you want to move that to?
I think it's okay where it is.
I was just scared that it was getting too closer to one
where I would want to have it closer to 11 or 12.
Where are we number?
12, we have two sixes.
To me, it's the question is how often do we have
the need to preserve trees and hillside at the same time?
We're assuming that we're going to give up the trees
than to hillside.
It's very likely that the tree thing would kick in,
much more likely than the hillside performance standard.
So that's the only reason why I'm not feeling
that strongly about any of this,
especially since it's fairly unlikely
that anybody's gonna do an SB9 split at all.
So by the time you're done and you've got a hillside lot
and you got a tree on the hillside lot,
you're probably not doing this, so.
And I will actually point out
that the one of the standards under the hillside performance standards is that you can't do any
grading or construction within a distance one and a half times the distance from the trunk to the
drip line. So the preservation of trees standard for in the draft ordinance is you can't build
within the drip line of a highly protected tree which is you know certain oaks and you know native
species over a certain size.
Hillside performance standards say 150% of that.
Can't build in that.
So that would actually make sense just with regard to the tree preservation issue that
hillside performance standards would be waived first because there it's, there's actually
a buffer around the tree, whereas just tree preservation is you just can't build under
the tree.
Okay.
Thank you.
That's a good clarification.
All right, so let so we've opted to move preservation of trees down below
Second story windows. Oh, right
So let's take a little straw poll. Does everyone agree with that re organization of the order for waving standards?
You do raise your hand, please
Okay. So what's your concern still? I mean, I I haven't I have no dog in this fight
I'm good either. Okay, and
Yeah, I'm you're sticking with your
Okay
All right, so is there any other any other section in the staff report where staff has made recommendations that we'd like to discuss
or a modifying anyway
Okay, is there any other thing that I need to do like asking people to comment or something that I didn't do at this point
No, you've done everything. All right. I'd like I'd like to just thank Heather and Andy. Yes and our
Chair for guiding us through this almost painlessly I
Won't say I didn't go home with some bruises, but you've made it really a lot easier
Yeah, so at this time I would like to entertain a motion to
To memorialize these the the option. I'll move all that we I'll move all that we talked about
Okay, so that's picking alternative one
Suboption B and changing the order for waiving standards and moving the preservation of trees
below second-story windowsill height, and other than that, everything that's recommended
in the proposed resolution and staff report is the same.
Second.
Okay.
So if the commission secretary could please record the vote.
Yes.
Commissioner Reiser.
Yes, Mr. Needing. Yes, Mr. Lezak. Yes, Mr. Pickett. Yes, Mr. Anderson. Yes, Vice Chair strongman. Yes, and chair Ward. Yes
Excellent. All right again. I would also like to thank everybody for the
Amazing amount of work and education that you provided us with regard to this very complicated new legislation. So, thank you
All right. So moving on to item 5 Commission considerations. Do we have any Commission considerations?
No, okay. Thank you
Item six. Do we have any commission member and staff reports or announcements? I
Will just say that in light of this meeting be running so long and all the hard work
I have added a fifth Thursday to this month, which means that you have three weeks until the next planning commission hearing
All right, well with that I would like to adjourn at 9 36, thank you all very much we'll see you in a while