All right, good evening. I'm Cindy Darling, the Mayor of Walnut Creek and welcome to the Tuesday,
April 15th, 2025, regular meeting of the Walnut Creek City Council. The City Council is conducting
this meeting from the City Council Chamber. This meeting is being video streamed and can be viewed
live or later on the City's website. As some attendees may be participating in their first
Walnut Creek City Council meeting, I want to welcome everyone and talk briefly about the
the public comment process. For each agenda item there will be an opportunity
for public comment on the item. Thus, if you desire to speak on an item on the
agenda this evening, please hold your comments until the City Council
considers that item. Additionally, we have a section of the public agenda on
the agenda titled Public Communications, which is for public comments for items
not on the agenda. Any comments during public communication should not relate
to an item on the agenda this evening and consistent with section 9.5 of the
City Council Handbook, 30 minutes will be initially allocated for public
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And so now please rise and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.
call the roll.
Councilmember Davini?
Here.
Councilmember Francois?
Here.
Councilmember Silva?
Here.
Mayor Pro Tem Wilk?
Here.
Mayor Darling?
Here.
Alright, this time I'd like to invite up President Ernesto Avila from the CCWE and Director
Luz Gomez who represents ward two for East Bay Mudd to provide a short presentation on our water
and utility districts. Welcome Ernie. Thank you Mayor Darling and members of the City Council.
Thank you for the great opportunity to give me give you an annual update on what's happening
in the world of water and Contra Costa water. Going to the first slide what many folks may or
may not realize is the Contra Costa water district is its own special district in terms of having its
own members of the board representing five key regions or the multiple regions within
Contra Costa water where they're separated into divided into five regions that are noted here.
I am currently serving as the president of the board with Antonio Martinez as vice president
and we've got a great board of directors. I think the one of the things that most folks don't realize
is that we did a little bit of a tally and we have about between all of us about 120 to 130 years of
water and water utility experience so just to let you know if you're in good
hands in terms of the kind of policies we're dealing with right now
but most folks may or may not realize that so I thought it shared that little
tidbit. What most people also may not realize is
that we get about 99 percent of our water from the Bureau of Reclamation
so a Bureau of Reclamation through the Central Valley Project
is the main facility and set of facilities that provide us water in
Walnut Creek and throughout our region. If you were to try to figure out how
what our water supply situation is at any given time, look up what the
situation is or how full Lake Shasta is. Lake Shasta provides just about all of
our water. So when Lake Shasta is full, that means that the water supply
circumstances for contrast water are in good shape. Now downstream of that, when
we get the water and put it into your controversial water facilities, another
great indicator of how we're doing on water is looking at the Lowsfick Carroll's reservoir.
We're currently at 87% full and we're filling even as we speak during this time frame. One of
the things it governs how we fill our reservoirs is the water rights that we have and the conditions
by which we have to follow to assure environmental compliance. So many folks, what's that? Very well
written conditions. Absolutely yes. Darling I think you wrote many of them years and years ago.
And we're fully compliant in there, so.
But those are some of the key parameters that dictates how and when we fill the reservoir.
I think what's very interesting for climate change in terms of the impact that it has
for us, one of the key things that's happening in the Delta is in many cases when you have
a large amount of flows that are happening at a high intensity and not coming in more
regular storms, you have a lot of storms that happen all at once versus having storms that
happen over a greater period, it forces us to try to get as much water as we can when
that flush of water goes through the Delta.
And so that also dictates how many pumps we have in the system and how we work our intakes.
And that's one of the things that most people may not realize.
This is the depiction of the various divisions that we have.
If you look at the area in question here, we have we serve about 520,000 people, half
Half of the people we provide raw water, and the cities that receive our water, have their
own treatment plants and distribution pipelines.
The other half, like Concord and Walnut Creek, Clayton, receive the water and we have our
own treatment plants.
And so we treat the water and deliver the water to the home.
So when you draw that water from the faucet, that's coming from CCWD in the Walnut Creek
area.
The main area I'd like to point out here is one of the things that's very important in
in terms of having a large amount of flexibility
is we have four key intakes that is where we draw water.
And we have four intakes into our system
because the water quality in the Delta
will vary throughout the year.
So in order to make sure we get the sweetest water,
we look at the various water quality parameters
within the intakes, we'll take the best water
and we will store it into Los Vicaros
and we'll provide it on a daily basis for our customers.
The key thing that's really important here to note too
is that the large blue line is the Contra Costa Canal System.
That delivers 100%, nearly 100% of the water
that gets delivered throughout the region.
So it's a very critical element
that I'll talk about here in about another minute.
Folks may not realize,
but the water system has very complicated.
For us, aside from the four Delta intakes
that I talked about,
we have four major storage reservoirs
throughout the system for reliability.
The canal system is about 48 miles long,
and we have a shortcut pipeline
crosses right over the Concord Fault. Our treated water system has three water
treatment plants and almost 62,000 connections that also
servicing over almost 900 miles of pipelines, 41 storage tanks, and
31 pump stations. So it isn't just about the drop of water that you take. The
infrastructure that's necessary for you to get water is pretty extensive. Many
questions that we're getting has been we learned a lot so there's been a lot of
situations, a lot of documentation, a lot of news reports about water supply
reliability in light of what's happened in Southern California. Rest
assured that one thing that is most many people already come to realize, the
conflagration of that type simply is one I'm not about trying to extinguish is
to try to contain it when you have that much fire happening. But for other major
fires we certainly are doing our very best to try to make sure that we're as
prepared as possible. Back in 1995 the district took an extensive evaluation of
the system. Because the region is very large, we looked at the types of events
that would put the maximum pressure on our system. It was not just a wildland
fire, that wildland urban interface fire that was an issue, it was fire falling
earthquake that was actually found to be the most prevalent issue to be concerned
about. Why is that? Because aside from the fires would likely result from such a
major event, the mains that would be providing water to extinguish them
extinguish them would be broken in many cases. In Kobe, for example, during their
major earthquake they had over 900 main breaks that happened at that particular
moment in time. So we've got to be prepared for that type of work in our
system. What we have done at Contra Costa Water since 1995 is we've expended all
over 130 million dollars to improve reliability in the overall system. That
includes we added a redundancy with our existing treatment plants. We can now
provide treated water both east and west of the entire region. We have improved
the seismic improvement of one of our key major intakes at the M Allard Slough
Pump Station and we have we conduct emergency exercises with East Bay Mudd
and many of our partner agencies to be prepared for these types of situations
that may occur. We coordinate very carefully with the fire department as
well and with the refineries so there's a lot of coordination that happens to
try to make sure we're going to be as prepared as possible. The big project
that is driving our current planning
is the replacement of the canal.
And I was saying that's a long overdue investment.
The canal is about a 80-year-old facility.
We've had many drownings, unfortunately, in the canal,
not because of anything we've done.
It's just that it's, we have it near roadways
where we have, as you can see in the depiction in the photo,
cars actually would run into the canal
and unfortunately, there's loss of life associated with it.
The other thing that's happening,
if you look at the left picture,
is we have, whenever we have major storms,
we can have up to 200 to 275 landslides
in the canal system.
That means we've got to clear that out
and get water flowing because water is used
every day in the system.
The other thing that's happening is because of its age,
we have cracks in the canal system that's occurring.
The result is that about 10% of our water loss
occurs along the contrast of canal due to leaks
that have to be repaired on a regular and annual basis.
Regulations now in California require us to make sure that we are as efficient about
water conservation as possible.
So aside from the fact that it's long overdue to try to improve the reliability of our water
supply system for not just this generation, but for 100 years, it means that we're going
to pipe the canal.
And so that's going to be important because it would be a multi-generational improvement
and we're looking at ways of financing that overall.
But we're talking about one and a half billion dollars plus in terms of an investment.
already got well underway. We've been already replacing the first part of the
canal, the first reach. We've done about five miles, almost five miles of pipeline.
This is a depiction of the 10-foot diameter pipeline that's being installed
out in the Oakley area that's already well underway and installed. We also have
a great and regular pipeline renewal program where we replace about three to
four miles of pipeline every year and that's important because wherever you've
got leaks you've got to take care of those wherever they happen and so we
worked very hard to prioritize where those repairs take place. One of the
other questions we get Mayor Darling is how is it that in drought circumstances
we're able to accommodate growth? This is a fantastic graphic that depicts how
well Walnut Creek and our communities have done in terms of water
conservation. If it weren't for conservation growth wouldn't be possible
within the area. So what you're looking here in the dashed line is the
population growth of our specific area. So as you can see, we're up to 520,000
people on the right-hand side. That's population. The blue line represents the
amount of water that's actually used in the system. So you can see that even
though population has been growing steadily, look at the water consumption.
It's actually been going down. And that's because conservation works. Whenever
we've asked the community to respond to conserve water, they respond with
incredible zeal and because of that and when conservation takes place especially
after a drought in many cases the conservation sticks it doesn't grow back
after the demand so this is the reason why we're able to accommodate growth
even when droughts happen. When we look at what our future water supply needs we
work very closely with the cities like Walnut Creek whenever they do a general
plan update we work with them very carefully to make sure that we
anticipate what kind of growth you're likely to have. In the case for example
example of Concord, the Naval Weapons Station will represent 12 to 15,000 new housing units.
We've already anticipated that demand in our overall planning, and that's why we worked
so closely with the cities.
We also used the urban water management plan process to make sure that we're ready for
the next drought that could happen.
Recycled water is an integral part of our future supply.
Right now, about 10% of the water that's provided in our region is from recycled water.
We coordinate very carefully with central sand, especially to work with them in terms
of recycled water.
We anticipate where they're going to be providing recycled water so we don't double count.
So we anticipate that ultimately in the next 15 to 20 years, 15% of the water provided in
our region will be recycled water.
In the case of the naval weapons station here, 30 to 40% of the water will be recycled.
When you look at what dollar, how will we spend our dollar for rates, this is the depiction
of the May, where your dollar goes, on average, we spend about $3 a day that the customer
pays for an average customer. And this is where the money goes. It goes to purchase
water. It goes to the O&M. It goes to the administration associated with billing. It's
also there to help for water conservation specialists that provide free water conservation
investigations and review with our customers. So there are many key elements associated
with where those $3 goes, but this is a great depiction of how that all comes together.
There are many rebates.
When I talk about water conservation being an integral part of our process,
Contra Costa Water has many key great conservation rebates that are available
for residential and commercial customers.
They're noted on our website.
We have many programs that allow you to monitor your water use over the year.
And there are many different coupons and rebates associated with land seeping that
are there and available to help folks get even more water wise.
I encourage you to go to our website.
you'll see that information at ccwater.com, slash rebates,
or to call our number at 688-8320.
And I know that you have a big agenda,
and so I'm gonna pass on this great baton
to our great East Bay Mudd representative
whenever you're ready.
Thank you, and we'll go ahead and hold questions
until after Luz Gomez's presentation,
we'll put you guys, we'll have you guys compete.
Well, good evening, my name is Luz Gomez,
And I represent Ward 2 on the East Bay Mudd Board of Directors.
Ward 2 basically covers from San Ramon to Lafayette
through the 680 and 24 corridor, including parts of Walnut
Creek and parts of Pleasant Hill.
So it's a pleasure to be here.
I was here about a year ago when I was introducing myself
as a brand new board member.
Following on your footsteps, I'm like, man,
I've got so much to learn.
There's always a lot to learn about water.
And it's a very exciting world to be in.
So a little bit about, let's see,
making sure that this is moving.
We'll cover a little bit about who I am, who Isbeamud is,
what we're doing to prepare for emergencies
and for our water future.
So a little bit about me.
I come from a background in public health.
And I also come from a background
of having worked for one of our county elected officials
for over 10 years.
I also worked for the Air District,
and I managed to let poisoning prevention program.
So over the years, I feel like my background prepared me well
for this role.
And I'm very much committed to providing
a reliable, healthy water supply that's also affordable.
One of the top commitments of mine
is also community engagement.
I believe that we as an agency do better
when the community is engaged.
So who are we?
You probably know, because last year we
celebrated our 100th anniversary,
that we've been around for 100 years.
And our mission is beautiful.
It's one of the things that attracted me
to the agency to begin with.
and it's to manage the natural resources
with which the district is entrusted
to provide reliable, high-quality water
and wastewater services at fair and reasonable rates
for the people of the East Bay,
and to preserve and protect the environment
for future generations.
I love that that last clause is right,
part of our mission, it's part of our DNA.
And one thing to remember is that
we all have been investing in this system
for those hundred years, right?
It's ours, those of us who have been paying rates
all this time.
And we have a system that we can be very proud of.
This map shows where our water comes from.
And now I've had the privilege of going up
what we call up country, which is where the water comes
from, Party Reservoir, Party Dam, the aqueducts that
bring the water 90 miles down from Party Reservoir
to Walnut Creek.
They terminate in Walnut Creek, and then they go to other places.
And then you'll see also, oops, sorry,
there's that little line in the middle going up
that goes to the Freeport water facility.
This is where we get our water, supplemental water,
when we have dry years.
And we have had to use that facility
about three times in the last 10 years.
So it is an awesome infrastructure
that it takes to bring this delicious water
all the way to our East Bay.
This is our service area.
And we are the second largest water agency in California.
We serve 1.4 million customers.
We have a total of seven reservoirs,
two up country, Pardee and Comanche,
and then the five reservoirs
that you may be familiar with in the bay,
including Briones, and upper San Leandro,
and San Pablo, and Lafayette.
And we have six water treatment plants,
including one right here in Walnut Creek.
We maintain 4,200 miles of pipe.
People like to say that that's enough
to go from here to Chicago and back,
and that's right under our feet,
And imagine maintaining that amount.
So how is our water supply looking?
Right now, we're doing really well,
thanks to a robust rain season, rainy season.
We're at about 103% of the average amount of fullness
for all of our system.
And we anticipate that our reservoirs
will continue to be full or near full
by the end of the water year on September 30.
So that's really good news.
So what are we doing to invest in the future of water?
So we know that our infrastructure is aging.
And it really upgrading and maintaining our infrastructure
is a herculean effort.
Every day I wake up and I'm like, oh my goodness.
What it takes is really, truly amazing.
Climate change is already upon us.
And therefore, it is even more important for us
to invest in resiliency.
And now that I've been on the board a year,
I've seen firsthand what it takes to bring us this water.
And we take fiscal responsibility very seriously.
As you can imagine, maintaining all of this
costs a lot of money.
And we just finished our cost of service study, which is
basically, we can only recuperate in rates what it
costs us to do business.
And we are finding that we're going to need to raise rates
come July 1.
But we also are finding that it's not,
We're hoping that is not an unreasonable rate increase.
The median single family residential water bill
will increase by about 12 cents per day in fiscal year 26
and by about 14 cents per day in fiscal year 27.
Earlier this morning,
I was at the East Bay Leadership Council meeting
where we talked about this really wonderful collaboration
with UC Berkeley about innovation
and how do we make our systems even more resilient
and able to last maybe 150 years.
So like the investments that we're making today,
we hope will really pay off with a longer lasting system.
So safeguarding our water future,
let me tell you about one of the key things that we're doing
is right here in Walnut Creek.
And this is the Walnut Creek Water Pre-Treatment Project.
So because of climate change, the quality of our water
is changing.
We're seeing algae blooms, and we're
seeing, we have already seen that wildfires impact our water
quality because ash and other debris can
come into our reservoirs.
So that can easily overwhelm the filtering system
at the Walnut Creek Water Treatment Plant.
So that's why we need to invest in this project that
is one of the most significant that we're doing right now.
We're in the planning phase.
And phase one construction will begin in 2027
and go through 2030.
And phase two, if needed, would be for future expansion.
So it would expand the capacity up to 160 million gallons
per day.
But that phase really, really depends
on future demand and water quality trends.
It's a forward-thinking option that positions us
to grow if conditions require it.
Also, just as important as the infrastructure
is how the project has been developed.
Since I came on board, I've really
prioritized making sure that we're engaging with the community, having conversations with them,
and working to see that we're going to be good neighbors in the process of making this important
upgrade happen. I won't go into details about this slide but I just want to share with you,
because it's something that brings me great pride, Isabella has established a goal to become carbon
neutral by 2030 and to be saving up to 8,700 megatons of CO2 per year, which is equivalent to
to removing about 1,900 cars off the road every year.
One thing that you may have heard in the news
is this little booger called the golden mussel.
This is an invasive species that was just found last year
in the delta.
And it comes from Southeast Asia.
They spread rapidly by attaching to pipes and boats
and other infrastructure.
And they cause blockages and damage.
And their rapid reproduction allows
them to spread quickly across waterways.
And once established, they're really difficult,
because they could impact native fish, and plants,
and other species may have a hard time surviving.
So we have taken multiple steps to try
to prevent this guy from coming into our system.
One of the key things is that we are closing all the boat
launches on our facilities that allow boating.
Also, it's important for folks out there
to know that if you do spot one of these guys,
to please contact the California Department of Fish
and Wildlife so they can keep track of where it's going.
And I'm hoping you've all heard that we
had the best Chinook salmon return on the Macombi River
ever since we started counting back in the 1940s.
This is also another source of pride.
It's a remarkable achievement, and it's not
just for East Bay mud, but for the entire ecosystem that
relies on the river's health.
Statewide fishing restrictions have also
played a role in this year's success,
helping to protect the Central Valley fall run.
So this shows how thoughtful water management, science-based
conservation, and strong partnerships can reduce,
produce real measurable results.
I totally invite you guys to visit our fishery.
If you haven't already, it's close to Lodi.
And it's amazing.
If you go between October and December,
that's when you're most likely to see grown salmon just
jumping in and going through the ladders.
is pretty remarkable.
So I'm sure one of the things that we are hearing a lot,
and I'm sure Nestle is also hearing a lot about,
is emergency preparedness and the need
to be ready for wildfire risk.
So one of East Bay Muds' top priorities
is making sure that our water system is resilient and able
to handle wildfires and to be strong even during emergencies.
So we've made major investments in backup power
to keep our facilities running during PG&E shutoffs.
That includes permanent generators
and a fleet of portable units
that can be deployed as needed.
We also actively manage over 60,000 acres of watershed land
through grazing, fuel breaks, and prescribed burns
to reduce wildfire risk.
On red flag days, we pre-fill our reservoirs
to make sure that water is available for firefighting,
both from the ground and from the air.
And we work closely with CAL FIRE, local fire districts,
and the Hills Emergency Forum to stay coordinated.
That includes hosting annual fire forums
and standardizing hydrant fittings for mutual aid.
With over 31,000 hydrants in our system,
we test and maintain them regularly
to ensure that pressure and flow are reliable
when crews need them most.
And finally, East Bay Mudd is part of California's
mutual assistance network.
So when other regions like Paradise or LA
face water system emergencies, we're
ready to provide assistance.
We've done a lot around strengthening our system
for earthquakes, especially since the Loma Prieta
earthquake.
Following that event, East Bay Mall
launched a comprehensive seismic improvement program
to harden our system.
We've spent over $350 million so far to harden that system.
And one of our most significant efforts
was the reinforcement of the Claremont tunnel,
a vital pipeline that carries water across the Hayward Fault.
We've also upgraded fault crossings,
installed emergency bypass systems,
and improved our distribution grid
to ensure water can be redirected around damaged areas.
At East Bay Mudd, we have emergency response teams
trained and ready.
And we coordinate closely with local, regional, and state
agencies to ensure a swift and efficient recovery
after a disaster.
We've learned from the past, and we're continuously
refining our approach to keep East Bay's water system
resilient.
So how can the community prepare?
I think it's really important that folks sign up
for our emergency alerts.
People can go to eastbaymud.com slash subscriptions.
I encourage folks to also sign up for the Contra Costa Warning
System Alerts, where you see on the screen,
And also, the city of Walnut Creek has your own alerts.
So that's a good thing to sign up.
Please, please, please store water.
Folks always underestimate how much water you're
supposed to be storing.
So please remember to store at least two gallons per person
per day for seven days.
And then, of course, prepare a kit and have a family plan.
And with that, I am happy to take any questions.
Thank you very much.
And I don't think we have enough water in our garage.
Questions for President Havila and Ms. Gomez?
We'll start with Council Member Francois.
Thanks Mayor, I'll try to get some questions in
before you leave the conversation on this
as the water expert on the council.
So just to confirm then for whoever wants to take it,
that both your districts are relying on all surface water,
no groundwater.
We serve, we probably have about half a percent
of groundwater that's used.
The rest is surface water.
Okay. Yeah.
And then just a couple of curiosity questions.
So East Bay Mudd has the five reservoirs,
Contra Costa Water District has the canal,
one reservoir in the canals.
Four.
Well, you have four reservoirs as well?
Okay, I missed that part of the presentation.
So you're both kind of storing water in a similar fashion.
And you've got more surface delivery
you've got more underground delivery with pipelines? So we have the the aqueduct
that is a closed system that brings the water 90 miles from our source and then
underground we have 4200 miles of pipe just because we're a much larger agency
but yeah but in terms of like the major water purveyor the largest water
conveyance system is our Contra Costa Canal so yes it's more of an open
channel type of system for us then East Bay. But that's why the canal
replacement project will pipe now at least 25 miles of the canal. So it'll be
replaced from a surface facility to a pipe? That's correct. Okay. And we're
looking at whether or not it's a gravity flow or a pump system and that's how that
will be integrated with Lustre Carroll's reservoir as well will be very an
integral part of how the piping works. That's why it's really going to be a
hundred-year investment. It will be good for a hundred years and it'll be have
multiple ability to deliver water both from most Picaros and from the Delta and
the other reservoirs as well. The whole width of the right-of-way then will be
still you'll retain that but it'll be in a small the water will be piped in a
smaller segment of it. Yeah that that's the goal in a smaller section the
sections one pipeline or a couple pipelines that will parallel each other
we'll stab a right-of-way we'll need to maintain that right-of-way and the reason
why that's important. It isn't just to install it. It's just that if there's
ever a problem with the pipeline system, we need to be able to mobilize the crews
to take care of any repairs that may be necessary. So even though the right-of-way
may be smaller because it's a smaller facility, we need to maintain a high
level of footprint to make sure that our equipment could get there quickly and
have all the room necessary to make repairs. So we can't partner with you on
a skate park or some park facilities, you're still going to need access. Well
the key, absolutely, but remember that one of the things we've been very working
very closely with is the East Bay Regional Park District, right? We
currently have a pretty substantial partnership with them on the canal loop,
which is a great walkway for so many people here in the Walnut Creek area.
We're gonna do, we have a similar partnership to work with them on the
right-of-way as well for the future. I'm glad you mentioned that. And then last
question, why do we have two of you here tonight? Why, historically, I'm just curious
why our city is divided in half between two water districts?
I'll let you take that if that's OK.
I haven't been here long enough to know.
I'm actually curious myself.
Well, our water district was formed
by a variety of smaller districts
that existed at that time.
East Bay Mudd was well-established.
The Contra Costa Water System had smaller water systems
in Pleasant Hill area and the Concord area.
And when Contra Costa Water District embarked
into being a treated water purveyor,
they started taking over the existing facilities
that were in place.
So East Bay Mudd was already in place.
The smaller outlying areas that had not been fully developed
have their own mutual water systems that were operating.
So East Bay mud had already established their boundary,
the mud act in other ways.
And so at that point that was the demarcation point
between the two.
Okay, thank you.
Good question, as to why exactly down that way,
that's not totally clear.
Yeah, and you can see the history
of agricultural development for CCWD,
that's why they have the open canal
because who cares when it's going on crops.
Can I ask a follow up question?
So just out of curiosity, I asked this question last week at a California Seismic Safety Commission
meeting. How many water districts are there in the state of California? You'd be shocked.
So there's over 500 water agencies in the state of California. I think it's closer to 7,000.
Well if you look at this mutual water companies, but in terms of the largest,
if you look at the the agencies that provide 90 percent of water in California, that's 475 of them.
The reason I know that is because I'm vice president of the Association of California
Water Agencies and our membership represents them.
Okay. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem? Just a couple questions,
actually a question and a comment. So Ernie, let me direct this one to you. On the purple pipes,
the recycled water, you mentioned that 40% will be recycled in the Concord Naval Weapons
Station when that is complete. I think 30 to 40%. And is the reason that would be higher
than is because when construction happens, you can start putting the purple pipes in
at that point.
Exactly right.
Because the rest of us, it's already built out.
Yeah, exactly.
And the whole goal is to use the purple pipe for landscaping.
If you look at where most people use their water, 50% of the water is used in the home.
You have 50% outside of the home.
So the goal here is to try to use 34% of recycled water for outside landscape use.
And what would recycled water come, where would that come from?
What is the definition of recycled?
Well, it comes from wastewater that's treated to a high level of pure, that's purified.
And then from the sanitary districts, Central Sand will be the key purveyor for the Naval
Weapon Station.
So you could drink it, but we don't.
Well, so there are two levels.
One need to recall that you can provide the water for non-potable uses.
But direct potable reuse now is making a very big introduction into California.
The state of California just passed direct potable reuse regulations that allow the use
of wastewater in certain conditions is with a high level
of purification and equipment in place to treat it.
So, for example, El Paso, Texas is now providing the largest
direct potable reuse facility, I think, in the United States.
And so California is now passing regulations
to facilitate its, you know, its movement into part
of the portfolio of water supply tools in the future.
Interesting. And last two, three years ago, I took a tour of CCWD and like from the sourcing
it to where we're getting it in our homes. Yes. I thought it was great. I thought I'd give you a
little bit of a plug there to just mention that because those that haven't gone I think would
find it very interesting. I think it's open to everybody. It is actually. So if there is a
request for a tour go to ccwater.com and you just put in the keyword tours and you'll be able to
sign up for tours when they become available. Yeah we have a great program
with the kids especially. We'd love to bring the kids in and get educated about
the water system at our facilities and anybody's welcome.
Does East Bay Mudd have one too? Yes we absolutely have water tours as well and
I'm considering setting up like an elected tour for maybe the water
treatment plant and so I will reach out to you all when the time comes and see
if anybody would like to take us up on that. Great thank you. Councilmember
sort of a big picture question. Sounds like you know 90 percent or more of our
water is surface water. We get a very tiny amount from groundwater. We're up to
maybe 10 percent recycled. Where does desalination come in anywhere in the
future? Does it and are there other places that we've looked to water besides
that source and the one we've mentioned? So one of the big programs we have with
East Bay Mudd as a matter of fact and others is we have a regional looking at
at regional desalination as an option.
So we've got a major study underway working
with various California, the San Francisco Bay Area Water
Agency to see whether or not desalination could play a role
into future water supply sources for the area.
The dilemma still remains electricity
and the cost of electricity.
It still represents is 15 to 30% higher in cost
than providing water in the current way that we're doing it.
So it provides a different level of treating water
when there's a high level of salinity.
But removing salinity is a direct cost driver.
You need more power, more equipment
to take that salt out of the water.
So when you factor in those elements,
it becomes more costly to try to use desalination.
But we continue to study it.
We even have preliminary sites that have been identified
in terms of where it can be located.
And we're also watching what Antioch's doing
with their desal plant as well,
since that just got constructed as well, so.
Yeah, and for East Bay Mud, we know
that the cost at this point, what we're estimating,
would actually be higher than direct or indirect
portable reuse cost per acre foot of water.
So for us, it seems like it doesn't make financial sense
at the moment to embark, to go too far down the road
in that direction, yeah.
And are there any other future water places
that we think about, or?
You mean to diversify our portfolios?
Well, just not necessarily from a reservoir standpoint,
but just different ways to capture water.
Or is desalination the only other thing
that's even on the table?
So I know we have a project to capture some of the water
when we have plenty of it and storing it underground
as a way to offset some of our needs down the road.
We did a pilot study, a pilot project, a couple of years ago
that was very successful.
And we think that we'll be able to do more of that.
So we're basically like banking water underground
when we have it and then using it when we don't have it.
That's another strategy that we're using.
And the conjunctive use using groundwater storage systems
I like that.
Definitely provides a great way of storing water.
But again, you have to think about the electricity
associated with injecting the water into the aquifer,
making sure that the aquifer is well protected
and doesn't integrate with other pollutants
or other aquifers that may not be of the same quality.
Then you have to draw a power to draw that water
and extract it back out again,
then bring it up to a higher pressure to deliver the water.
So this is where the costs start coming into play.
That's why whenever we do capital project planning,
we have to look at the cost-benefit analysis.
At what point is it beneficial,
more beneficial to look at a long-term investment
like DSAL, conjunctive use for groundwater systems,
before looking at what we currently already have,
surface water systems, treatment plants,
the existing reservoirs or modifications
to existing facilities.
So that's how it comes into play.
Thank you.
I'll just have you do a couple did-you-knows.
One of the things that most people around here are surprised
is that there is no groundwater underneath Walnut Creek that
is usable.
And that's.
Yeah, actually, at our last board meeting,
we had a map that depicted where there are wells in our region.
And I was surprised by how many wells actually exist.
But I was told that very little water, if any, comes out anymore.
Maybe there was a time when it did.
So the wells exist, and we are mandated to regulate them
and check on them, but very little water comes out of them.
And the other thing that I think both districts did a few years
back, it used to be the systems operated completely separate
from each other, even though the pipes crossed.
And as I understand it, you guys negotiated interconnection
between your two systems a few years back to.
Yeah, Mary Darling, exactly right.
We actually have one of the largest
inner ties I think in California.
Right now we have the ability to provide water
to each other from Los Fakaros
and the aqueduct for East Bay Munt.
So that was a great mutual aid and great agreement
that we made between our respective agencies
to improve water supply reliability
for both of our customers.
We used to put up a map of the Balkan states
when we talk about the Bay Area water districts
because nobody was connected
and you guys have really stepped it up.
I know East Bay Mudd has a lot of connections
over on their side of the hill too.
So it's always been really great to see.
And that's as far as I will go with Downwater Lane.
But congratulations to both the good presentations.
Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for having us.
This was great.
Thank you.
All right, next on the agenda is the consent calendar.
Does any council member wish to pull any item for discussion?
staff need to pull an item. All right seeing nobody looking to pull one, does
any member of the public wish to comment on an item on the consent calendar? As a
reminder each speaker will have two minutes to make their remarks. Written
comments submitted have been posted on the city's website for public review and
are included in the record but will not be read separately. Hi my name is Stacey
I'm a Walnut Creek resident. I'm here to comment on consent calendar item E. Mayor Darlene,
council members, community, thank you so much for considering the adoption of a resolution
to declare support for the Akalani's Union High School District Measure T parcel tax.
Walnut Creek is home to two of the five campuses that are encompassed by the AUHSD district.
So AUHSD has some of the highest student outcomes in the state, the district struggles with
the lowest state allocation of all high school districts.
Measure T would continue to advance academic programs including math, science, engineering,
and the arts, preparing students for both college and in-demand careers.
With increased funding, the district can attract and retain highly qualified teachers, maintain
manageable class sizes and provide library services, academic counseling and career training.
Top rated schools preserve the attractiveness of living in Walnut Creek.
Thank you for being supportive of our schools.
Thank you very much.
With that, do we have a motion?
I'll move to approve consent calendar items 2a through 2i. Second. Roll call
please. Mayor Pro Tem Wilk? Aye. Council member Silva? Aye. Council member Davenny? Aye. Council member Francois? Aye. Mayor Darling? Aye.
All right thank you very much. Next on the agenda is public communications.
This portion of the meeting is reserved for comments on items not on the agenda.
under the Brown Act, the council cannot act on items raised during public communications
but may respond briefly to state statements made or questions posed. We could request
clarification or refer the item to staff. Consistent with section 9.5 of the City
Council Handbook, 30 minutes will be allocated at this time for public communication for items not
on the agenda. Additional time will be provided at the end of the meeting if necessary. So this
This is the time for public comment.
Please step forward to the podium
and complete a speaker card if you care to address us
once at the podium.
Introduce yourself in the city of residence for the record.
Consistent with city policies related to public comments,
each speaker will have two minutes to make your remarks.
Written communications have been posted
to the city's website for public review
and are included in the meeting record,
but will not be separately read into the record.
At this time, I note it is 6.45,
And so we will go no later than 715.
And any comments will be at the end of the meeting.
So anybody here for public comment?
This is the time to come forward
if you want to speak publicly.
Anyone?
Anyone?
This is so easy.
Okay, next on the agenda is council member
and staff announcements,
reports on activities or requests.
So the city attorney,
Is there any report out from the closed session?
Madam Mayor, there's no report out this evening.
Okay, is the city manager, do you have a report tonight?
I do have just one public announcement this evening.
We did just release announcements
sharing that there are some openings
for advisory commissions to your city council.
We have a few unplanned vacancies,
so anybody who may be interested
in participating in the design review commission,
planning commission as an alternate
for our library commission or building appeals board.
You have until May 12th at five p.m. to apply.
I would encourage you to find more information.
We posted this on multiple social media channels,
but you can also go to walnutcreekca.gov
to find more information.
I would encourage anyone who is interested
to contact any of us in the city manager's office
to find out more.
Obviously, I'm sure many of the council members
would be happy to talk with folks
who might be interested in learning how this works.
And please, please check it out if you're interested.
It's a whole lot of fun.
So share that with your friends and neighbors.
There's a couple good positions there.
Now we'll start with city council member reports.
Council Member Definney, do you wanna start?
All right, sounds good, thank you.
I wanted to announce that the Challenger baseball jamboree
is gonna be taking place at Heather Farms April 27th
from nine to three with the ceremonies beginning at 10.30.
This is a little league baseball event
for kids with physical and mental disabilities.
It's a tournament that's grown to 24 teams
from as far away as Reno and Santa Barbara.
In addition to the games, there'll be a large food court,
Carnival, Home Run Derby.
And I want to thank the organizations that
support this program, the Little League, Elks Lodge,
youth volunteers from Boys Team Charity
and the National Charity League, high school sports teams,
corporate volunteers, and City of Walnut Creek.
Challenger Jamboree has grown to be one of the largest
tournaments of this type in the Western United States.
Volunteers are welcome all day long there.
Check-in starts at 7 a.m.,
but you can show up at any time
and check-in at the volunteer booth,
and they assured me that they would have
something for you to do.
The event used to rotate around the Bay Area,
but for the past 15 years it's taken place in Walnut Creek,
so proud to be hosting that event.
I went to the Limitless new exhibit
at the Bedford Gallery, the leisure for its opening.
It's recognizing outstanding artists
with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
There's media there ranging from ceramics and textiles
to statues, paintings, and drawings.
It's really impressive.
This is not just a sort of local
put-in-art exhibit together.
This is something that tours nationally
and I believe even internationally.
One of the artists, just to give you a sense
of what you'll be seeing there,
name is Monica Valentine, and she's blind, and she puts together these sculptures with beads
using what she perceives to be the warmth of each color, and arranges it, and they're beautiful,
and she never sees them, so it's something to behold. On a lesser note, but also significant
And for some people, I went to a new restaurant in town,
and not so new, but in the last year,
I had a lot of skina with my son for lunch.
And while we were there, I said, man, this
is a really good fish taco.
And as we were checking out, the owner
asked us how the food was.
And I said, you know, it's one of the best fish tacos
I've had.
And lo and behold, he shows me the sign
where they've won best fish taco.
So if you're looking for a fish taco,
La Astuina is over on Broadway across from the post office.
So Sister Cities, we're going to be welcoming students
from Soy Folk, Hungary, and Noceda, Italy.
That will be this Friday.
They'll be arriving.
As a reminder, this was a program set up
by Dwight Eisenhower post-World War II
to promote peace and person-to-person contact
between cities and countries and peoples around the world.
So the youth ambassadors from Soy Folk in Nochedo
will be arriving on Friday.
And on Monday, Mayor Darling and I
will be giving them an orientation here.
And then they will have a tour of the city infrastructure.
And from what I understand, that's
a highlight, one of the highlights for them on the trip
is touring all the back workings of how our city works here.
And then I did want to also give a shout out
to Measure T, even though I know it's on the consent calendar,
I missed my mark there.
I just wanna say that we really need to reframe
how we view funding for our local schools.
It's not all paid for by our taxes
and without contributions from parcel taxes
and local education funds.
Our schools would be underfunded, inadequate,
and provide our students
only the most basic education. If you're, you know, say, oh well, my kids are out of the house or,
and I'm kind of a no-tax person, you know, fiscal conservatives, so to speak,
what I would argue is that the $130 parcel tax will, you know, do more for your property value
than the cost of the $130. When you think about why people move to the area, why people want to
to live where they want to live. Strong schools is a big part of that so even if
you don't have kids at home or you don't like taxes still might be something
worth considering. Thank you. Thank you. Mayor Pro Tem. Thank you. So one of the
one of the things that I like to do a few times a year is speak to government
classes and I had the opportunity to go to Los Lois and speak to their senior
government classes again and it's always great to be able to at least well I was
also the very first class after spring break so I don't know if that was so
great but but getting them engaged and just getting to know that their local
council members are the people they are closest to in government they hear about
the president they might know who their senator to congress members are but it's
their council members that have the most impact on their day-to-day lives so it's
always great to be able to have those conversations I attended the new hire
welcome for city new city employees over the last quarter that's always great to
see a turnout of not just the existence of the employees but the excitement of
the new employees that are coming to Walnut Creek,
which is, I have to say, is a highlight of their career.
Wouldn't you say so, city manager?
I also was able to attend with the mayor
the Wingstop opening, the new chicken wing place
that's across from Kaiser, and I mention this,
I don't usually mention all the different openings,
but I mention this because 49er great Bubba Paris was there,
three time Super Bowl champion,
brought one of his rings, it weighed my hand down
pretty much to the ground, those rings weigh about a pound.
And just terrific not just to see the opening,
but the enthusiasm that he brought
and other people brought to being there.
As the liaison to the DRAA, a couple of points of note,
DRA is excited about the new partnership
with San Francisco Jazz, and will incorporate SF Jazz
into the headliner series of the Lester Center next year.
It represents an exciting opportunity for DRAA
in the Lesser Center and also aligns with the strategic vision
to evolve the Lesser Center for the arts from a rental focus
to a nationally recognized mid-size presenter
of great art and artists.
In addition, big plans are underway for the On Broadway
Gala on October 8th, I think most of us go to that,
celebrating the 35th anniversary season.
Sponsorship and tickets are available on the DRA website,
DRAA.org on Broadway Gala.
And the gala will launch a spectacular 35th anniversary
year filled with unforgettable performances, exhibitions,
special events, and surprises throughout the year.
And on a fun note, Kiana Fanene,
who performed in college notes in 2024 just last year,
and at the East Bay Women's Conference,
is among the final 24 contestants for American Idol.
So you can vote for Kiana, go to American Idol,
and vote for her.
She is, I think, from San Leandro,
but obviously her heart is performing in Walnut Creek.
And lastly, along with Council Member Davini,
I was at Bedford Gallery Limitless.
Great summary of what that all involves.
I do wanna mention that it's open through June 22nd.
And of course, as people know,
that go to the Lesher Center,
your tickets can get you in for free
on any of the performance nights
to go into the Bedford Gallery.
Smart report.
Thank you.
Council Member Silva.
Evidently, I'm invisible, not just limitless.
I was there too.
And Council Member Silver was there as well.
In fact, you said hello to me.
But I'm glad you mentioned that the gallery exhibit is running through June 22nd.
So there are many opportunities to see it.
I also would like to mention that Center Rep's new production of The Roommate is fabulous.
It is so funny, so entertaining.
It is about two women in Iowa in the middle of America.
They're middle-aged and they end up as roommates.
It goes to show you what two people how they can come together even though
they're polar opposites and just learn and adapt from each other. So it's a
great production and it is playing through April 20th so you don't have as
much time to see it. So get your tickets now. On a more serious note, the Assembly
will be hearing AB 650 next week in the Housing Committee. This is the Regional
Housing Needs Allocation Bill.
I hope we're sending a letter of support
because it would tremendously improve the process
of securing our housing elements over the course of time.
It would give us more time, each city more time,
as well as greater clarity and consistency.
One of the challenges we faced in this last cycle
to get our housing element approved
was that they kept changing,
they requested information in the first round,
then they changed the standards.
They moved the goal post.
And by the third round,
they didn't just move the goal post, they changed the game.
We were playing football
and suddenly we were playing basketball.
And so it changed, we want them to be consistent, so.
So I hope we can send that letter.
The letters are due by the 17th,
which is only two days from now.
Check, Mark.
Good.
The Recycle Smart will be getting a presentation
at its next meeting of the board on April 24th
for the two proposers for collection services
for our upcoming franchise agreement.
So you might think that the garbage truck
moves down the street and picks up the three different cans
and that's basically what they do.
There is every one of those cans,
the contents are processed differently
and by different processing firms
and they go to different places.
So it is a very complicated franchise agreement.
And we're looking at a new franchise agreement
that will last anywhere from 10 to 20 years
depending on which services the provider is providing.
The Association of Bay Area Governments,
I represent, I'm one of two city representatives
on the executive board for ABAG from Contra Costa County.
And we are having an executive board meeting this week
to get ready for the annual General Assembly of ABAG,
which is Friday, June 20th,
and we have a representative
that will be there voting for us.
The big issue on the agenda in June is the annual budget.
ABAG runs a number of programs that are self-funding
through grant monies that come from the federal government
and the state, the Estuary Project, Bay Ren.
But what isn't self-funding are really the services related
to helping us with housing elements and density.
And as it turns out,
dues don't adequately cover those services either.
And so there probably will be a proposal for dues increase.
And one of the challenges at ABAG
is because of the way it's reorganized and structured,
it has a closed pension system.
So no one is paying into it,
but we have the same kind of liabilities at ABAG
that we do in the city for our employees.
So that is on the docket for this week
and more to follow on that.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Council Member Francois.
Thank you, Mayor.
I missed the last meeting on April 1st
due to a war conflict.
So I'm going back a little bit here,
but on March 19th,
I had three events actually.
It was a very efficient city day for me.
I attended in the morning the economic development
working group meeting hosted by the chamber
out at the COPA facility at the Shadelands Sports Mall.
And highlights included an industry update
from various different realtors with focuses
in office, retail, medical.
And it's interesting that our retail,
as you're probably not surprised,
has very healthy low vacancy rates, under 6%,
which is considered normal and a good range.
On the office standpoint, it really depends on where you are
kind of in the downtown area.
If you're closer to downtown, even like think Grower Square
and in a block or two from Locust or Main Street
where there are restaurants and things to walk out
and do at lunch, their vacancy rates are markedly lower
than the office vacancy rates in and around
the two BART stations.
and certainly lower than they are out in the shade lens.
So kind of interesting dynamic that kind of when
we're thinking about the future of office in the city,
kind of that the amenities and services
near those office parks, which weren't necessarily
built into the office parks when they were constructed,
are kind of an important feature for bringing people back
to the office and kind of wanting
to be in these co-working environments again.
We also talked about the effort on health tech and sports tech
with the following up on the chambers,
hosting a successful Founders and Funders
venture capital event in late January out in Shadelands
and building on the success of that
to host further events in the future.
Following that, apparently I was invisible
at the housing meeting, because you didn't mention that.
I didn't mention the housing meeting.
Did you mention it last time?
Yes.
Okay, then I can skip that one.
and go right on to Walnut Creek downtown,
where I'm the council liaison,
and we've just come off meetings
talking about their successful bid package
and their annual report,
which I believe was finalized on April 1st.
Their plans to come up to develop a strategic vision plan
that will be for all of downtown
that they'll be working on
in conjunction with city staff this year.
And then one thing that I'm really excited about
that they're working on,
and I think this is gonna be really a positive addition,
is a interactive map on their website
so that you can see where to park,
where the restaurants are, kind of you can click
on something and get right to kind of their website,
find out their menu.
That doesn't exist right now,
and I think that'd be a really, a real positive addition
to the Walnut Creek downtown features.
And they also put out, if you don't subscribe to this,
this is how I get most of my source of news
is through This Week in the Creek,
which is a weekly email update
that you can subscribe to through Walnut Creek Downtown.
It talks about all the activities and events
and programs they're putting on
and it's gonna be an active summer, spring, summer and fall.
So check it out, subscribe if you don't already.
Let's see, following up on that,
I attended, I'm chair of the personnel committee
for Recycle Smart our garbage and recycling
joint powers authority with six entities including
the county, Lafayette, Moraga, Arinda, Danville,
Walnut Creek and we had an annual salary review.
We made our recommendations to the finance committee
and that'll be incorporated, assuming they agree with us,
into the budget that'll come to the Recycle Smart board
in June and then I also serve on the ad hoc committee
for Recycle Smart for the selection of the new
collection contractor that my colleague Councilmember Silva
mentioned and participated in pretty much a day long
interview with the two proposers who are familiar
because they provide services to us now,
Republic Services and Mount Diablo Resource and Recovery.
So we interviewed both firms, they had an opportunity
to make a presentation and staff did a great job
of kind of indicating issues or concerns going forward
that they wanted and we got a lot of good answers
to those questions through that interview process.
And then finally, I did not attend this event,
but I know council member Wilk did,
but I wanna give a shout out to the Chamber
and to Walnut Creek TV.
The Chamber hosts a civic affairs event on a monthly basis.
I was out of town when they did this one,
this was really interesting, the history of Walnut Creek,
but you can catch this on Walnut Creek TV,
which is my must-see TV, or the city's YouTube channel.
I think the chamber probably has it
on their website as well.
They had two former chamber presidents
and two former mayors, Lynn Leach, Angie Coffey,
Sue Rainey, and Bill Armstrong.
And it was just fun to hear their perspectives
about issues that we still deal with today
that they dealt with back then.
And the thing that stuck with me
was when former Mayor Sue Rainey said how proud she was
of being on the council and that how collegial
this group was.
And she said that that really stood out to her among,
and she brags about it still, among other agencies.
So we've got to keep up that tradition
because Sue's watching.
And that is my update.
Thank you, Mayor.
Thank you very much.
I'll just run through it.
It sounds like lots of things have gotten covered.
On the legislative front, we have opposed SB 79 and 647,
which are two housing bills
that would put additional requirements onto cities
that we find to be not so helpful.
And we have supported 650
because that really is Cal City's answer
to the problems that we had
in this last go round of the housing element.
We are just starting to dig into the homelessness bills
and the fire response bills.
At this time, I think 634 is a bill
that would preclude cities from passing any restrictions
on homelessness in the city.
We're opposing that because we feel like
we need a multitude of tools to deal with homelessness.
The finance committee is gonna start working tomorrow
and it's gonna be fun this year
because things are a little tight.
visit Walnut Creek met earlier this week or late last week past the budget will
come which will be coming to us we did hear a report from the local hotels they
have said that it is businesses soft and you know we are still we're better than
we were during Covid for sure but the the economy and the turmoil that we've
been experiencing and the the slowdown overall in the economy is starting to
impact them. And last but not least today we got to go pull the golden
shovels out and put our hard hats on for a event to commemorate the beginning of
the construction of the turf fields at Heather Farm and the new lights out at
Tice Gym. Those are two of the bigger projects that are coming out of
Measure O and they represent our commitment to the children of the city
and it was just great to get out there.
We had chamber representatives, we had all the staff,
we had folks from the soccer club
who were providing a significant cost share.
And it was just a great opportunity to celebrate
something that is gonna be really great
and then also gave us an opportunity
to look at our public work staff and say,
remember, on the pool, toes in the water in 2027.
And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
So that was a good event.
And that's pretty much it for this part of things.
Next on the agenda is a public hearing tiled.
Public hearing pursuant to the Tax Equity
and Fiscal Responsibility Act regarding the issuance
of revenue binds by the California Municipal Finance
Authority for the benefit of RCDGP LLC slash YVR LP
for the 699 YVR Road Housing Development.
And that's a heck of a mouthful.
So I will invite staff to come up
and provide the presentation.
Good evening, honorable Mayor Darling,
Mayor Pro Tem Wilk, and fellow City Council members.
My name is Jennifer Yamas, and I'm a housing analyst
here in the Community Development Department.
Tonight's first public hearing is being conducted
pursuant to the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act,
also known as Tefra.
The hearing is regarding the issuance of revenue bonds
by the California Municipal Finance Authority
for the 699 Ignacio Valley Road
Affordable Housing Development Project,
also now being called Civic Crossing.
Here tonight to discuss the bonds in detail
is Jared Suzuki, who is a financial advisor
with the California Municipal Finance Authority.
Also here is Norma Guzman,
who is the project manager for Civic Crossing,
and she's here to answer any questions
related specifically to the Civic Crossing Project,
if any questions arise.
So without further ado, Jared will now give an overview
of the bonds, thanks, Jared.
Good evening, honorable Mayor Pro Tem
and council members previously stated.
My name is Jared Suzuki
with the California Municipal Finance Authority.
And just to provide a quick overview,
so RCD Housing has asked the CMFA,
California Municipal Finance Authority
to be the issuer of tax-exempt revenue bonds
in an amount not to exceed $65 million
to finance and refinance the acquisition,
construction, development, and equipping
of a 93-unit qualified residential rental project
as previously discussed.
The CMFA is a joint powers authority formed to assist
local governments, nonprofit organizations,
and businesses with the issuance of both taxable
and tax-exempt debt.
As a reminder, the city has no legal
or financial obligations in the repayment
of this proposed debt.
All financial documents will carry disclaimers stating
that the repayment of the loan is not an obligation
of the city and the city will also bear no cost
in the issuance of the proposed debt.
It is recommended this evening
that the city council adopt a resolution approving
the issuance of the bonds by the CMFA for RCD,
for the benefit of RCD housing and such adoption
solely for the purposes of satisfying Tefra the code and the California
Government Code section is 6500 and with that I would be happy to answer any
questions that thank you and good job with the mouthfuls of Tefras and oh
thank you very much yes practicing in the mirror does the council have any
questions for staff or for the municipal finance authority actually just one
question just for staff as an as an update just curious if we have an
updated project timeline yet. The financial closing is set to be scheduled
on May 15, 2025, so very soon, exactly one month actually, with construction to be
started shortly after. That's great. That's a great update. That is a great
update. I'll take that update every day of the week. Thank you. Any other questions?
All right, thank you very much. Now I will open the public hearing for public
comments written comments submitted have been posted to the city's website for
public review and are including in the record but will not be separately read
into the record. Is there anyone here who wishes to comment on this item? Seeing
nothing we will go ahead and close the public hearing turn over for council
deliberation and a motion. It's always a pleasure to be able to do these because
it brings so much benefit to the community. Tefra financing has been used
by John Muir Hospital in the past, so it's great and I am happy to move to adopt the
resolution approving the issuance of the bonds by the California Municipal Finance
Authority for the benefit of YVRLP, which is now called the Crossings to provide financing
for that project. Second. Roll call, please. Councilmember Silva?
Aye. Councilmember Francois? Aye.
Councilmember Davini? Aye.
Mayor Pro Tem Wolk? Aye.
Mayor Darling? Aye.
all right we've been going strong for an hour and a half so we'll take a
short break and be back at
7 20 hour and 15 okay yay all right and we are trying to warm it
up in here a little bit because usually cindy and i are the cold ones
now everybody up here is cold so we're frozen
so next on the agenda is a public hearing titled wave reading and introduce
an ordinance making zoning amendments to update
provisions for off-street parking and transportation demand management. I'll
have the staff come up and do the presentation. We have received an updated
attachment one which is the draft proposed ordinance and copies are
available in the back of the room and a copy has been posted online. So go ahead.
Good evening council members my name is Henry Roode, transportation planner for
Public Works. Tonight I'm going to be presenting an update to the zoning
ordinance which will amend multifamily residential parking minimum
requirements in accordance with the policy option
directed to staff on the April 1st meeting by city council.
So just a quick run over a bit of background.
The right sizing parking study collected data
on multifamily residential sites throughout the city
looking at how much of their parking
was actually getting used.
The study was expanded after initial presentation
to council last year and using this expanded data
we were able to prepare four policy options on April 1st,
these four options were presented to City Council
and staff was directed to proceed with option C,
flexible demand.
So we prepared a proposed ordinance
which sets the minimum parking requirements
in accordance with that option,
which is 0.5 spaces, one half space for studios,
one space for one bedroom,
and 1.25 spaces for units with two or more bedrooms.
We collected this data using several sites around the city.
We exempted those that were within a half mile
of major transit within BART because per state law,
these are exempt most of the time under most circumstances
from parking minimums being enforceable.
So we wanted to ensure that our data was sourced
from study sites that would be affected
by these policy changes.
We used a figure called a required parking to demand ratio.
This let us set hypothetical new minimums
and compare that to the existing demand that we observed.
This also allowed us to incorporate unit vacancies.
So for example, if a building had 100 units,
but only 80 of them were occupied
at the time of data collection,
we could calculate it as if it only had 80 units period.
This does have some limitations.
It assumes the developers build the exact minimum amount
of parking that is required,
and it does not account for any potential changes
to parking management strategies,
like how parking is assigned to tenants,
especially in rental units.
Looking at our existing requirements,
we would require, across our study sites,
1,150 parking spaces to be built if they came in today,
whereas only 765 of them were occupied.
So that 1,150 divided by the 765
gives us a ratio of 150%.
This is in comparison to 100%,
which would assign one space to one car
with the demand we observed.
So that 50% is essentially excess parking.
based on the demand that we've observed.
So under our existing requirements,
every single study site would have excess parking.
This is just a spectrum of the policy options
that were presented on April 1st.
On the far left, this was not a presented option,
but just for reference, zero parking minimums
as is true in the half mile transit proximate area.
The next option was North Downtown specific plan,
implementing those minimums city-wide,
followed by balance and flexible demand,
which were sort of in the middle,
and then option D was trying to set it to
as close to the demand we observed as possible.
And all of them would represent lower parking minimums
than our existing requirements.
So after receiving direction from City Council,
to proceed with flexible demand, option C,
this sets parking minimums close to,
but still slightly less than the exact demand
we observed across all of the study sites.
This allows greater flexibility than setting them
at exactly that observed demand.
does slightly exceed the parking management strategy
of one parking space assigned per unit
that we observed at most of these study sites.
And just in terms of efficacy,
looking at that required parking to demand ratio,
you can see that roughly half of the study sites
would have somewhat lower required parking
than the demand we observed,
but it's not as significant
as in some of the other policy options,
the lowest being 77% for Camelback South,
but most being closer to 85%.
And then roughly the other half would have excess parking
with San Marco being exactly 100%.
So as far as process, staff's recommended action
is to waive first reading
and introduce the proposed ordinance
to adjust the minimum parking requirements
for the multiple family residential zone.
Alternatively, I do have the data and slides
and other policy options available
from the April 1st hearing,
if you'd like to adjust and then adopt as amended.
And currently we have a second reading scheduled
May 6th. So with that I will open it up to Council if you have any questions for
staff. Thank you. Questions for staff on this one? I know you were not here when
we gave him direction. No, great presentation. I did go back. I didn't
watch the hearing but I read the staff report and obviously the refresh. I
understand the balance that was made here. I guess one question, I understand
that the flexible demand is flexible, whatever we're calling it, option C, is
slightly less than the demand. It's also less than the density bonus law would
require, right? So it's still providing an incentive versus going with the
parking standards under that state law. I cannot speak to the density bonus
requirements. I would have to look into that and get back to you for comparison.
and I'm not sure.
I can.
It is because I think it's one space per one bedroom
and then one and a half spaces for two and three bedrooms.
Then it would be lower, yes.
Great, I didn't have any other questions, thank you.
All right, thank you, anybody else have questions?
All right, thank you very much
and thank you for bringing this back to us
after all that discussion the other night.
Thank you.
We have now, we are opening the public hearing
for public comment, written comments,
we did get a couple written comments they have been posted on the city's
website for public review and are included in the meeting record but will
not be read separately into the record if there is anyone here that wants to
provide public comment see nobody I will close public comment and bring it back
here to council for consideration I unless anyone has any comments I would
move to waive the reading and introduce an ordinance making zoning amendments
to update the provisions for off-street parking
and transportation demand management.
I want to second that and I wanted to make a comment
which is I'm really enthused by this
because land is really valuable and expensive.
And when it is being utilized for parking
that's not being utilized,
it's not actually supportive of the community.
But what I think is exciting also is that
even existing properties have the opportunity
to redevelop some surface parking areas
and get additional units,
which is what West Cliff Trail did a number of years ago.
And I think we need to,
I was talking to the community development director
this afternoon and I said, I had this brilliant idea.
It turns out she did it in Redmond, Washington.
Yay, Erica.
But we could be encouraging the owners
of multi-family properties that are older,
particularly those downtown
that have a lot of surface parking
to capture some of that space and redevelop it
which would get us more units a piece at a time
without having to invade additional infrastructure
that is not necessary, so thank you very much.
Madam Mayor, if I may, I just wanted to make sure
that we understood the motion.
That was including the amended ordinance
that's on the dais with the changes.
Yes, it was.
Great, thank you.
All right, with that clarification,
roll call please.
Council Member Francois.
Aye.
Council Member Silva.
Aye.
Council Member Davini.
Aye.
Mayor Pro Tem will.
Aye.
Mayor Darling.
Aye.
All right, so next on the agenda is a consideration
titled Builders Remedy Process Briefing,
and I invite the staff to come forward
and provide a presentation.
Thank you very much, Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem, Council.
I'm Erika Vandenbrandt, the Community Development Director
here at the city of Walnut Creek.
And I will quickly go over an overview of this presentation.
So first and foremost,
you're gonna hear this several times tonight.
This presentation is about the builder's remedy law
and the process.
It is not about a specific project here in Walnut Creek.
And I know that people will be itching
to be able to talk about specific projects,
but it really is about the process.
also we'll go over state legislation
with regard to the Builders Remedy
and the Housing Accountability Act.
And then where we were at during this process
with the City of Walnut Creek's
Regional Housing Needs Assessment,
going over the process about Builders Remedy
and then the timeline.
With that, I will pause right here
because just like most things, housing,
takes a village and I have a supportive set of partners here with Claire Lye our
assistant city attorney and then Steve Mattis our city attorney. And I would
just jump in at this time just to again remind the council as we've been talking
about that tonight's presentation is really about the law itself that was the
request we had it's not about a project as the council is aware the project that
has been filed is an SB 330 project there are five hearings that are allowed
under that process and so if the council were to move into a substantive
discussion of that project then this here this presentations and I becomes
one of those hearings and we have made it clear through the agenda that this is
not one of those hearings tonight okay thank you and then I guess the other
caveat is that I'm the community development director not a legal
council so I'll be deferring all legal questions to legal counsel. So what is
the builders remedy? So it is a provision under the state's Housing
Accountability Act and it applies to housing development projects that are
proposed that includes statutory percentages of affordable housing. I'll
I'll speak to that just a little bit later, some examples.
But in order for a builder's remedy project to be rejected,
it requires a jurisdiction to make specific findings
before a project can be denied.
And then lastly, the housing project does not need
to comply with the general plan land use.
So a little trip down memory lane over here,
And back whenever there was a kinder, gentler,
California Housing Accountability Act.
Way back in 1982, that there was the same concern
as we have right now, that there's not enough housing.
So this has been a long-standing issue within this state.
And the Housing Accountability Act
became law specifically to address housing supply
and affordability.
In 1990, so eight years later, the builder's remedy was added.
And the builder's remedy had special provisions,
and I'll get to that again later,
but essentially there was a 20% affordability required
if a builder's remedy project were to be proposed.
In 2024, that percentage was lowered,
so going from 20% to 13%,
and then in addition,
that that percentage could be applied retroactively.
So if the builder's project and remedy project was currently,
you know, in place and going through a process,
it could, the percentage of affordability
could go from 20% of the units being required
to be affordable to 13%.
Also of interest are two other pieces of legislation,
SB 330 in 2019,
that established streamlining
and preliminary application processes.
And this is important because of this deemed complete status
with the preliminary application locking in the project
before filing a complete application.
And so as we go through some timelines later on,
this is going to be an important component.
Also, AB 1886 in 2024, so that basically it said
the housing element is only substantially complete
for the purposes of Builders Remedy
when either HCD or court makes that determination.
And that substantial compliance is pegged to the date
that a Builders Remedy project
submitted an SB 330 preliminary application.
So we have excerpted the language from AB 1886
and it references confirming a 316-2023 HCD.
HCD regulatory interpretation.
And I'm gonna do something I very rarely do
whenever I do presentations and I should read this verbatim
because it is very important to go through
each of these elements.
So that where a jurisdiction submits
an adopted housing element before submitting
an initial draft or before considering HCD's findings
on an initial draft, HCD will consider the adopted
to be an initial draft for purposes of both HCD's review,
and the jurisdiction's statutory compliance.
And a jurisdiction does not have the authority
to determine that its adopted element
is in substantial compliance,
but may provide reasoning why HCD
should make a finding of substantial compliance.
In addition, a jurisdiction is in compliance
as of the date of HCD's letter finding the adopted element
in substantial compliance.
Any other letters are not a finding
of substantial compliance.
In addition, in the legislation,
it also states that it does not constitute a change in,
but is rather declaratory of existing law.
When can a city say no to a builder's remedy project
so that there are specific findings
that a city would need to make.
One is that a city has a substantially compliant
housing element, and this is a condition too,
so both of these conditions need to be met,
has met or exceeded its share of regional housing need
for the types of housing the project would provide.
And in a subsequent slide, I will show you where we were at
in terms of the prior housing element implementation,
and why we were not able to make this finding.
The second finding where a city could say no
to a builder's remedy project is if the project
would have a significant quantifiable,
direct and unavoidable impact on public health or safety.
And those conditions were not conditions
that the city was in during our housing element journey,
I'll call it for the moment.
a project violating a specific state or federal law,
and that there's no feasible method to comply,
rendering the project unaffordable
to low and moderate income households.
Again, those conditions also weren't present in the city
during our housing element journey.
The project site zone for agricultural
or resource preservation, or lax water,
or wastewater service.
I think that from our earlier presentation,
we know that water certainly was not an issue,
nor were any of these other things.
Then, fifth finding that a city can make
is when the preliminary application was submitted,
that a project is inconsistent with the city's zoning
and the land use designation of its general plan,
and the city has adopted a revised housing element
and substantial compliance with state law.
And so going back to the earlier slide,
talking about what substantial compliance means,
the state has, and the state HCD,
have been very consistent in recent times,
just underscoring that.
And then lastly, if the city did not have
a substantially compliant housing element
when the project preliminary application was filed,
city may deny the project if its proposed density does not meet
specific thresholds in state law which were established in 2024 and that also
is not part of our journey. So you know this is where all the great you know
legal court decisions and everything you know come about so that there have been
a number of trial on court decisions in Southern California because Southern
California as a cohort, went before Northern California in the arena, which is the regional
housing needs assessment process, to develop a housing element and that the cases there
relate to finding number five and focus around being substantially compliant, having a substantially
compliant housing element and that consistency with the statutory intent that the substantial
compliance means HCD certification and there have been no appellate court
decisions so that those court cases that just referenced only apply to those
specific court cases but again I'm not a lawyer I'm not playing one here on TV
and you can have that affirmed by our legal staff. Now to give you you know a
snapshot of where we were during this RINA journey. We as a city had not met
all of our RINA numbers for the various amounts of housing overall. So we were
234 housing units short and we were far greater deficit with our
moderate low-income and very low-income units that still needed to be produced.
So we were not able to demonstrate that we're meeting, you know, our prior
RINA numbers for the fifth cycle of the housing element. So this is where things
get a little bit touchy. So just to remember this is an example. We're not
talking about the specific project but it's just simply to, as an example, the
city of Walnut Creek did receive a builder's remedy project which consisted
of 422 townhomes. This is on the city's website. 13% of them, 55 units, are affordable to
low income and it's proposed in the Shadelands Executive Business Park. And just so that
there's clarity about timeline, the applicant filed an SB 330 builder's remedy application
October 18th and that it was for 371 townhomes, 78 would be affordable on April 9th, so that
was back in 2023. In April 9th, 2024 the actual application was the formal application was received
and consistent with state law was able to increase an additional 20 percent with 422 townhomes and 86
6% or 20% of them affordable.
And then we were notified on October 11th about the desire and intention to be consistent
with what state a law allowed, retaining the 422 townhome units, but reducing the total
percentage of affordable units to the 13% or 55 affordable units.
And then, subsequent to that, there was a CEQA scoping meeting for environmental impacts.
Again, this information here is not intended to speak specifically to the project, but
to be able to demonstrate that a builder's remedy project at sort of time one was able
to come in with a certain number of units under state law that was allowed to be increased
whenever the formal application was submitted and then subsequently whenever the new state
law was adopted and signed into law that the percentage went from 20 of affordable units
went down from 20% to 13%.
Okay, so this is a journey map for housing element and builder's remedy and everything
So basically, you know, the city council adopted on until this all 2023 on the
24th of January City Council adopted the housing element and
Then it was submitted to
the state HCD on the 27th, so just a couple days later and the
Deadline in order to have it into the state was the 31st. So we made our deadline over there
What were on this colorful chart before we leave it?
You had put up a slide earlier from HCD, one of their advisory policies, and it referenced
the situation where the initial draft had not been submitted to HCD, but the agency
still adopts the housing element.
Refresh my recollection, we had submitted our initial draft to HCD prior to adopting
the housing element.
No, this was our initial submittal.
I see.
And if you will humor me for a moment while I go through the
timeline, but then come back to that because it may be
important.
So essentially then we got it in to the state, but then the
state had 90 days to comment.
And then after that, you know, time went on.
And then council, you know, we've been having discussions
back and forth with state HCD.
And then council adopted an addendum on the 21st of March.
And then we submitted it to, you know, the state.
Then there was a second addendum approved
on the 1st of August.
And then the city submitted it.
Then there was a technical update in October 13th.
Five days later, we received an SB 330 application
for a builder's remedy project.
And then between the 13th to the 20th,
the state had required a seven-day review period.
And then on the 24th of October, we
had received a letter from the state HCD
saying that they're, or certifying the city's housing
and all that.
Now, going back to your question.
So, you know, why, you know, I think it might be
a reasonable question about why had the city submitted
an earlier, you know, document, et cetera.
Our understanding up until,
within maybe a month of that point,
and the advice we'd been getting
from all of our consultants and legally
and then also from others, you know,
with an A-bag and so forth.
The expectation was that this was gonna be handled
much like it had previously in the past
with former cycles of the arena.
And that by having a council adopt, you know,
a document and then transmit it to HCD,
that would meet the expectations.
And as we were gearing up toward that,
we were being told by HCD staff that no,
they had 90 days to review.
And that we, and others, not only just us,
but in Northern California,
and still in Southern California,
had legal vulnerability with regard to builders' remitting.
It had gone out for public review before we adopted it,
It was a 30 or 60 day public review period.
It had gone out for review, yes, but it hadn't been transmitted, you know, specifically
to the state HCD for review.
And just, you know, for general understanding that there was a 90 day period for their initial
review, and for each subsequent review that the HCD would take, they were then allowed
60 days to review and, you know, up to 60 days and it could be as many 60 day
periods as it was as was necessary that they would take. And then I guess the
other thing that, you know, is might be of collective interest is that the
expectation in terms of going into all this is that this Southern California
cohort of general, you know, housing elements and general plans would have
already occurred and Ben, you know, had gone through and that we were the next
cohort and instead there was quite a backlog of housing elements from
Southern California that had yet to achieve certification so that the HCD
staff was doing double duty. Erica, if I can just jump in on part of this too. We
did, when we did the public review, we did submit a version to HCD earlier but
But HCD advised back that it was insufficient.
And so then when we submitted in January,
it was technically a second submission, if you will.
So.
And so, and then I think also that there was experience,
what everyone was experiencing over the time,
just, you know, there was the reference earlier
to the, you know, to supporting the legislation
to get clarity, you know, in this legislative session,
because the goalpost kept changing.
and specifically as they affected
a firm really furthering their housing standards
as well as the standards by which one would be able
to have an acceptable number of sites identified
for housing.
So everybody wants to know what the next steps are
in terms of next steps for a project
so that for our current Builders Remedy Project,
we're in the process of the CEQA,
Environmental Impact Report preparation,
and then have not yet scheduled
any of these subsequent meetings,
but there's a Design Review Commission study session,
and then it would go to Design Review Commission
for recommendation of the Planning Commission,
and then the Planning Commission hearing
where a decision would be made about the project.
Would it not come to City Council at any point here?
the only
Yeah, so it in these stages and and I want to just be clear for the council and be clear for the record
So this would happen if we had any builders remedy project
We happen to have one but any builders remedy project would follow these same
Procedures that might have been filed now
We all recognize it because we ultimately got our housing element certified right now
If someone were to try to file one we would deny it because we have a certified housing element
But with regards to
Mayor Pro Tem's question
under the city's existing zoning requirements this
Project as it's proposed would not come to the City Council for the initial levels of approvals
It would only come to the city council if it were a doc if it were appealed. I'm sorry
Is that because the presumption is that the fact that it may not meet your current zoning or general plan land use designation requirements is
a moot point
Yes, it it's not legally necessary for that determination they can be non-compliant the
applications that would be needed here are
applications that by the town's municipal code go to the Planning Commission or action and only appealable to the City Council a
Similar project not under the builders remedy with that might not be consistent with our general plan land use
Designation would have to get all the way to us. That's correct because if it were inconsistent with the general plan
That general plan amendment as a legislative act would have to come to the City Council
Thank you or to be clear or alternatively it might be denied at the Planning Commission level because it's inconsistent with the general plan
Let me just do a quick check. Are we through the presentation or do we have a little bit more to go?
We're through the present. Okay, so let's get into the question portion of the evening
I think mayor pro tem has another question just on on on that line then
It sounds like from
Could we go back one slide?
From from this slide that there is no point that
The City Council our City Council or any City Council would even be reviewing a builder's remedy project to see
from a council determination if that would
Be validated under a builder's remedy
so
The answer to that question is in part very Walnut Creek specific
some cities
have their zoning code set up, such that actions of the sort
that are necessary for this project are required
to go to the city council.
They just set up their zoning structures in a different way
and the city council becomes the final decision making body,
even absent an appeal.
They become the final decision making body.
And so, but Walnut Creek, for the reasons the council
will recall before, in an attempt to kind of streamline
some of the regulations did actually place
the final decision making authority
for certain types of decisions at the planning commission
with the right of appeal to the city council.
So it's not as if the council would be,
could potentially be forever cut out of it if you will,
but it was a situation where the council made that decision
and this application and this had nothing to do
with builders remedy at the time,
but this application now for the approvals that it needs,
they stop at the planning commission.
And I want to just add a little bit more to that too.
The case law that the council is aware of from advice we've provided to you does support
kind of the general comments that Erica has put in her staff report and that we've advised
the council about I'm being careful with my words here purposely and so a city
were to say that well we did think that we actually had a substantially
compliant housing element and that it was one that would should be recognized
by the courts as substantially compliant then a council could choose to kind of
step into this and provide some direction but I want to be clear
that that's there are a lot of ifs in that and there are a lot of assumptions in that statement
because the courts have both well more than just the courts. HCD has taken the position
that you're not certified until HCD has certified you. The courts have recognized that.
State law has now changed to say that explicitly and there's now another state bill there's a
proposed state bill that would kind of walk that back a little bit but that's a proposed law to
change what is existing state law which which is very clear that you HCD determines when you have
a certified housing element or in theory a court could do it as well too the um the council
receives some correspondence tonight from another law firm that cites to an appellate court case out
of out of the central valley and in that case HCD had said a housing element was sort of was valid
Substantially compliant and the court overturned that determination because they said you hadn't actually complied with it
So the court disagreed with HCD in that instance
It's just that there there's uncertainty out there
But mayor pretend to the comment you're asking is that the is there only one way that this could ever come before the council?
The answer that is it's not completely just one way. So I have some more questions. Okay, why don't go you and then
Thank you. So staying on the legal issue of this, Erica had referred to the goal post
being moved and changes at different times. Were the goal posts moved from what the city
submitted versus what was versus the time that HCD then approved it? I want to go through
the timeline in a minute as well but did did something change that essentially
made it more challenging for Walnut Creek to be able to submit our housing
element? From the city's perspective and Erica can answer from her
perspective from mine HCD was each round of comments that they provided
had certain components that seemed to be
a bit beyond what was asked for before.
And the AFFH, the Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing,
was definitely one that came in,
and we were very far into the process.
And when I say we, as a councilor,
we work with other communities as well too.
This was a common experience in other communities,
that you thought you were getting very close,
and then you were all of a sudden given a comment
that made you have to go do something else.
And probably to me, the clearest example of that
is how HCD was commenting towards the end of the process
on, well, you've met your renin numbers,
but you haven't really shown us yet
that you fully met your FFH requirement,
which is, in a very simple way,
it's, AFFH looks to, how do you distribute the housing
within the community so that you don't,
so that you're not concentrating all the housing
in one area, but you're giving opportunities
for new housing to be geographically
throughout your community.
And that was a very common comment.
Interjecting to ask one question on the AFFH.
So that, as opposed to the RINA process,
would you characterize it as a more qualitative analysis
than a quantitative one?
Clearly, and HCD,
that you know, HCD was imposing requirements
or setting expectations that I think
in a lot of people's observations were morphing
or increasing a bit.
So if for instance, we had come in and said,
well, we know that CityX got approved this
and we're proposing this too, then HCD might say,
well, that's not what we're looking for here
and we're looking for more.
And we definitely experienced that
as we were getting compliance with the AFFH requirements.
If a city had met the RINA numbers
as we had understood them to be,
knowing that they would be within reasonable distance
from major public transit, from major transit routes,
and then there were areas that were far outlined
that weren't supported by the infrastructure
that would allow easy public transit access,
is that something that the HCD took into consideration
or not?
They did take into considerations
when they were kind of rating available sites
and viable sites.
They did look at criteria like that,
like what was closer to transit
where transit was available,
where they seemed in particular to comment
on the FFH issues were communities,
not dissimilar from Walnut Creek,
where you have a number of specific plans.
Remember, Walnut Creek didn't have to rezone any property
to meet your RINA obligations,
because the council had been so far out in advance
in improving the specific plans,
but the specific plans were placing a lot
of the new development here in the core area,
in the downtown areas and whatnot.
And when HCD was looking at AFFH,
they're saying, well, we wanna look out
at your entire community,
And the way that they played this out
in a lot of communities is they started to ask for,
well, what about the potential for duplexes and triplexes
out in your single family neighborhoods?
So that you're, again, spreading the availability
of housing units more geographically
across your jurisdiction.
So they were looking at it really through two lenses,
not just transit and transit availability,
but also where's the available housing
gonna be located at?
I may add to that just briefly, the numbers was a necessary condition, but it was not
a sufficient condition.
In order to address, as Steve had said, the AFFH requirements, that was a new dimension
that had been added into this cycle of the housing element development.
Okay.
Thank you.
I just want to go over the timeline.
if we can go back to that one, a very colorful slide.
And I just want to understand some of the specific,
and Easter, yeah, the Easter colors, right?
So the questions I have here,
I don't want them to be duplicative,
and it's obviously, this slide's a little bit different
than what I, the questions that I had thought about.
But let me first ask and go through these with you then.
So the January 24th, we adopted the housing element,
it was submitted to HCD ahead of the deadline of January 31st.
Correct.
So far?
Okay.
The first, the first addendum of the housing element was approved on March 21st.
What was the deadline for submission on that?
So the deadline for some, uh, the, that's a difficult question to answer and the reason
why is because we've gotten the feedback from HCD that there is still more to be done and
particularly on the AFFH side, they had 90 days to get back.
So they were on a time clock.
We weren't.
And so after the 31st of January,
technically we had exceeded the amount of time
that the state HCD was giving us.
And so that everything after that
was as quickly as we could get the work done and back to them.
And we were talking with them along the way
and asking the question, what would it
take in order to receive HCD's certification in writing?
So January 31 was the deadline to have it certified.
But the questions that HCD would come back with to us requesting
additional amendments, addendums. The clock didn't stop for that. It just kept
ongoing. It had to be January 31st and back and forth, back and forth. Similar
to somebody who speaks for two minutes and we're asking them questions, we
wouldn't just cut them off at two minutes still. We would let them be able
to ask the question, answer the question. So it's actually much more similar to
were the requirements that we have as a city that we're required to respond back
within you know 30 days for example to development you know permit you know
and give that feedback but then the applicant has as much time as they need
to be able to respond to those comments. But we're not penalizing them if they
don't get back to us. No we're not but. But they're but they're not there's
There's really one date here that January 31st is the date, right?
So after January 31st until HCD sent a letter saying we were certified, during that time
period there's a risk that you get a builder's remedy project.
And that's when most cities have gotten their, that's when cities, not most, that's when
cities have gotten their builder's remedy applications.
Yet they were delayed in getting back to us as well because they had so many submissions
from 500 something cities in California, is that right?
So just for clarity, they were in the first round of review,
they were allowed 90 days, and then each subsequent round,
they were allowed up to 60 days.
So it's that up to, so they were within their,
you know, they were within their number of days.
We just were not able to get them to answer us
prior to the end of that period.
So each case they waited for, you know, the end of that 90-day period and then the end
of the 60-day period.
So they waited until the very, very end, got back to us, then by the time we were able
to turn things around, that clock continues to run, still January 31st is the deadline.
Correct.
This is probably more of an opinion question than anything else, but was that the intended
loophole?
Was that HCD's intention to put us in essentially
a no win situation?
Or not just us, but any city?
Well, a lot of cities experience the same delays.
And so HCD would say they wouldn't present it
as a failure on their part.
I think they would say, and I'm not speaking for them,
but I think they would say,
We responded within the timeframe
within which we were required to respond.
And they did.
And throughout, well I wouldn't say throughout the process,
but later in the process,
we would schedule phone calls with them
and we would talk to them
and see that we were moving in the right direction
and getting things set up so that we could get them
to ultimately approve, and so they were willing
to work with us more towards the end of the timeline
as they saw that we were getting closer,
and that was an experience that a number of cities had.
But there was a lot of frustration about the fact
that it was taking so long to get those initial responses
because it was leaving cities exposed
to builder's remedy applications.
And not just so long, but they then were adjusting the,
we'll say adjusting instead of moving.
Adjusting the goalposts to put additional requirements
on cities.
So taking a while to get back and additional requirements
requiring cities to take longer and longer
to be able to get those submissions in.
Do I have that accurate?
That's correct, but again, I'm quite sure they would dispute
that they were adjusting, moving the goalposts.
That might've been the perception of a lot of cities
and we all experienced it directly,
but they would go back and say,
Very well, everybody had the F.F.H. obligation since it was adopted in.
2018.
2018, thank you.
And so, I'm just like wanting the council to understand that HCD has their side of this
story as well, too.
Right, right.
And all fairness to HCD, I think that whenever they spoke with us, they would, they were
consistent in calling it a clarification of the requirement as opposed to a new requirement.
Those are my questions for now.
I may have one or two later.
Thank you.
Council Member Francois.
Thank you, Mayor.
Whoever wants to take it.
In terms of following up on some of Mayor Pro Tem's questions
on the process, so my understanding is that
a full environmental impact report,
we have one builder's remedy project
and we're talking about the process, I understand,
But so the process is that a full environmental impact
report is being prepared for that project?
Yes.
And that would look at things like air quality, and traffic,
and noise, and all environmental issues.
In terms of the entitlements that
would be needed for the project, it's a subdivision map
and design review, essentially?
Largely.
OK.
So design aspects of the project.
The environmental issues are gonna be addressed
or looked at in the EIR process.
That's a public process.
Correct.
The design review will be looked at
by the design review commission, not by staff.
That's a public process.
Correct.
And the subdivision would be looked at
by the planning commission and that's a public process.
Also correct.
And then the subdivision could be appealed
to the planning commission's action on the subdivision
could be appealed to the city council.
Yes, or the planning commission is also now the body that makes the final decision on design review
And that could get appealed up to the council too as well as any
Certification of the EIR all the environmental issues could be appealed up to the council to EIR certification could be a bill to the city council
That's correct. Then I wanted okay, so I think I've got a good handle on the process
There was a comment in the letter that we received today that
arguing that we were substantially compliant as of August 25th, HCD told us
in a letter of correspondence or something that we weren't and that's why
we prepared the third addendum I believe. That's correct they did communicate to
us that we were not that it was their view that we were not fully compliant
And because as the council is aware, there's also a seven day public comment period that
is associated with the submission of each draft.
So we had a conversation with HCD prior to the receipt of the builder's remedy application
in which we had received their final set of comments and we had put together the final
draft but it was out for public review during the time period and they and HCD
will not certify until there's a seven-day public review period for each
version that is made available and that HCD is considering. So so but just to be
clear then HCD said our second addendum on 825 was not substantially
compliant with state law. That's correct it didn't meet it didn't meet all the
requirements, that's correct. Okay and then we submitted the third addendum to
them on October 13th. So that was a technical update and Council had given
staff the ability to do that earlier on whenever the adoption in the... That
that technical update process was a process that was recognized by HCD as
well too and that's why it was structured that way so that you know
from a practical standpoint, for the council to meet, you have to have a meeting.
We didn't submit anything to them between August 25th and October 13th.
Do you remember the answer? I don't think so. Okay. So those technical updates that were
submitted on the 13th were really in response to them saying, you're still not done. Well,
they were, you know, we were doing minor, very minor clarifying edits in the document all the
all the way through that last technical update.
That's correct.
We were close, but we weren't there.
Correct, all within the authority
that the council had delegated to us.
And on the October 13th technical update,
a third addendum, whatever we're calling it,
I mean, we never went to court, sought declaratory relief
that that version was substantially compliant.
We know that HCD told us the 825 version
was not substantially compliant.
and the last version that we sent,
we got approval from them less than two weeks
after we sent it, saying you're substantially compliant.
I don't see how we could have got court relief
for that within that short period of time.
I agree.
Okay.
Let's see, I think that's,
I think that those are my questions for now.
Okay, I've got just a couple.
So just so that we're all on the same page,
what is the current standard for determining
whether a city has substantial compliance
with their housing element?
So the two ways that that can be determined right now
are a letter from HCD or a court determination.
And on this chart, that is the purple.
That is the purple.
That is the purple.
And there's been a lot of talk about different court cases.
Has there been any broadly applicable court cases
that could be relied upon to change that interpretation
of state law relative to when we have
a substantially compliant housing element.
There have been no reported appellate court cases,
which are the types of cases that can be relied on as law.
There have been a series of trial court decisions
in Southern California, some of which have gone,
most of which have gone in favor of the interpretations
that we've been talking about here,
that you have to have HCZ certification.
And the one or so that went in favor of a city
was on a very narrow issue that we don't think
is relevant here and wouldn't be controlling anyway
because it's a trial court decision,
not an appellate court decision.
Okay, and then just because this is probably gonna be,
people that are interested in this
are gonna come and watch this,
I wanna make sure people understand
this is a briefing for us on the builder's remedy
and the Mitchell Town Homes Project
will have its own process.
So the places where members of the public
who want to raise issues or discuss elements of the project
really are going to be through the EIR process,
written comments on the EIR.
It sounds like there will be a design review hearing
and a planning commission hearing.
That's correct.
And if there were to be an appeal to the city council,
they could make their views known
at that appeal hearing as well too.
So if members of the public want to provide input
into that project, that would be where we would direct them.
That is correct.
So to go.
All right.
Council member Silva.
Thank you to staff for all of this work
and trying to provide some clarity for all of us.
And I know it's very frustrating
because it feels like we have no authority,
but we have some.
And many cities have more of these.
Are we, are most only having one,
or how do we stack up in comparison to others?
Because I know Santa Monica has thousands of units in play
in builder remedy.
Yeah, in our experience,
they're often more than one.
As the council's aware, I'm city attorney of another city
that is a 10th of the size, 10th of the population here,
or maybe 20% of the population here,
and they have two right now.
And Palo Alto has a number,
and Mountain View has a number,
and they are so that Walnut Creek only has one is,
puts it in, you know, in a,
I would say in a pretty good position in that sense,
and it's also important, and I will say this too,
there are a few cities that have lost their certifications
since they received it.
And then you've seen an uptick
in builders remedy projects in those cities as well too.
And so maintaining compliance with all the requirements
of your housing element is really critical.
Upper Dola Valley was decertified.
All those AFFH and those interim check-ins on progress
towards your RINA numbers, they can pull our certification.
They can take away our good housekeeping seal of approval.
That'll show you how old I am.
and then you're subject again to the prospective builder's
remedied applications.
That is correct.
There were actually cases that they have pulled it.
I mean, I know there's a threat, but there's.
Portola Valley, I think, I'm sure it's Portola Valley,
not Woodside, right, it was Portola Valley.
It's Portola Valley was pulled.
So you're approved, and then something happens.
No, they, the argument, the argument was that they didn't do
what they said they would do as part of the housing element
and HCD does monitor that and so it is important
that cities take all the actions that they can
to implement the steps they said they would implement.
It will be a number of this cycle's housing elements
like Walnut Creek's have a mid cycle review now
and it will be interesting to see what happens
when the mid cycle reviews start coming up
to whether cities have to go identify some additional sites because they're not meeting
the numbers that they thought they were going to meet.
And AB 1886 is now the law.
All right, Councilmember Dithinney.
Yeah, can we put the timeline back on again?
So I was just wanted to jump in while Mayor Pro Tem Wilk was going through this, but I
didn't want to complicate things.
So when we look at that first, Council approves first addendum to housing element submitted
to HCD on 321.
I mean, it sounds like we got feedback much sooner than the 90 days during that stretch,
right?
I mean, like we submitted the deadline, we submitted on 127, and by 321, we're already
sending them back comments on their comments.
sending them comments on their comments and trying to respond to their the
issues they've identified. And then on 327 they sent another letter so asking
for some changes right that's the 327. Asking for providing more specificity
on what they're asking for and the things that they're asking for required
more work and more analysis and more diligence.
So it took a longer amount of time
to respond to each one of those items
that they'd identified.
Okay, and when did they bring up the AFFH,
the Affirmatively Furthering for Housing?
When did they first bring that up?
Was that in the first round, the second round?
Like when did that get brought?
So AFFH was actually part
of the marching order instructions
that were given for the most recent,
It's called the sixth cycle of the housing element.
And because it was still relatively new,
they were down in Southern California first,
essentially rolling it out.
And there was a learning process that happened.
And then we followed in Northern California
shortly on the heels of Southern California
so that we got the benefit of the learning that
took place in Southern California
about what AFFH really meant,
and that it went beyond just the more cursory guidelines
that HCD had given all the jurisdictions.
And then as we were going together as a cohort
within Northern California,
it was a further learning process.
When do we get the okay time to start working
on your new housing element starting
that's due on 123, like when does that process start?
Is it six months ahead of time?
Like when is the new requirements rolled out?
Typically about two years beforehand.
Two years beforehand.
And the process is the state has a global number,
then it goes down to the metropolitan planning
and the council government's level,
and then it gets distributed out to the jurisdictions.
When do we receive it?
when does the city get the final language off the top of my head I don't
know but it's you know certainly a year and you know within that 18 months to
to your time frame so it happens pretty quickly be and to be clear it wasn't
necessarily just language it was our actual allocation numbers that we had to
we had a year and a half two years I think we have to remember there's the
ABAG is in the middle of this.
And so that's right.
ABAG was calculating those numbers.
And then there's actually an appeal process
that you can go through at ABAG as well too.
And we can get the council the exact date.
I don't remember, but it.
I remember either we were arguing with ABAG
about their allocation of the 440,000
across the nine counties in the 100 cities for a while,
because I was in Seattle testifying.
There was considerable, across California
where the MPOs had allocated out the numbers,
there was considerable response and consternation.
The statute is set up that the appeal process is very,
you know, it's a very, it's intended to be very fast
and specific in the sense of you get to final resolution
quickly in that process.
And in Southern California, communities like Coronado
attempted to challenge that determination and lost
when they attempted to challenge their allegation.
Yeah, I mean, I'm just trying to clarify
because some of the new legislation that's being proposed,
I forget the name of it, like 660,
or it's giving the city an additional six months, right,
of planning.
Right, that it doesn't change the process.
It just makes the timeline longer.
Longer, that's what I was trying to figure out.
What is that timeline, like making it longer?
They haven't adopted it yet, so.
A year and a half to two years,
or from six months to a year,
but okay, that's fine.
What happened from 327 to 8.1?
This might there's a big break there.
Hey, that was a period of a lot of analysis,
a lot of trying to work together with HCD
to get time to get clarity
because there were questions about some of,
we'd gotten additional questions about some of the sites
and so they were doing an additional level
scrutiny that as an example asked for well do we have letters from the
property owners who said that they're willing to sell the property as an
example and that was an additional level of scrutiny that we were given on
specific sites. Then with the AFFH there were many dimensions so it wasn't just
simply okay here if you do this check the box it was like a three-dimensional
dimensional box checking exercise to be able to get and we are known as a highly resourced
jurisdiction so that as the
Because we're considered to be highly resourced. We were given an additional level of scrutiny and had to go through some additional
discussions in debate with
with the state and
many of their
out-of-the-box proposals
We as Steve had noted earlier that there are alternate pathways to be able to get to success other than just simply rezoning
Their significant swaths of their single-family neighborhoods. I
Was wondering the builders remedies been around since the early 90s
Why are we just hearing about it now like 30 years later? What why wasn't it's being utilized previously?
It really wasn't
In my experience Matt might have a different experience, but my experience it really was not used that much until this cycle
this cycle is when it was really utilized and
You know there are factors at a very basic level the 20% affordable housing requirement
Under the builders remedy is a pretty substantial burden on a project a lot of you know
When when communities adopt inclusionary housing ordinances and whatnot when you propose 20% there's a pretty significant community
or at least development community opposition to that
because the expense that's associated
with doing 20% affordable.
And so I suspect it was a combination of those things.
It's the gateway that you have to get through
to be able to be eligible.
We're now in a situation where there's a lot more intense,
higher density development that's going on.
And so maybe that makes it a little bit more viable.
and the recent changes that drop it to 13%
also bring it a lot closer to what you see
in a lot of inclusionary ordinances and communities.
I think all that is right, Steve.
And I think one thing that happened in 2020
was that the legislature enacted SB 330,
which allowed for an earlier vesting right
than ever existed in state law before.
You submit a preliminary application
at the very beginning of the process,
that vests your project for the entire length
of the entitlement process.
So meaning if you submit that SB 330 preliminary application
when an agency is out of compliance
with its housing element,
that non-compliant status of the housing element
sticks with that project through the whole
entitlement process.
That didn't exist until January 1st, 2021.
and then our housing cycle, it's hitting now
because our housing elements were due
at the end of January, 2023, but that never existed.
Cities were going and fixing it
and then saying, oh, well, we're in compliance now,
so we'll reject your project.
Yeah, it would have taken you,
you would have gotten into compliance by the time
the project would have gone up for hearing to get a group.
Okay.
And it's interesting because I, you know,
Mayor Pro Tem Welt kid on this about some sort of like consequence or did they have some sort of
Plan in mind with this, you know, when you think about things that are submitted, you know
The builder's application is deemed complete upon submission
you know, we but the but the housing element is deemed incomplete until the very end since seems like a
Double standard there and then another example would be you know
if you file your taxes on time,
you don't get hit with late filing fees,
you get hit with, you didn't,
you maybe didn't file your taxes correctly,
but you filed them.
So it's interesting that they've taken that position here.
It doesn't seem that the, I wonder,
does the state just feel that like the cities
are just not acting in good faith in general?
So they're kind of taking a fairly punitive approach.
Is that, would that be,
Would that be too far to answer that question?
I have a better idea of how the,
it's like saying the system seemed rigged against us,
it seems like, yeah.
483 cities, 58 counties,
all of us have housing elements that are due
and we're all in different cycles.
But it only takes one to make a splash in the newspaper,
to make people think we're all like that.
We all know of cases.
Habitat and Woodside.
Mountain lines.
So it isn't fair.
Yeah, but I suppose from a legal standpoint,
the fact that we can clearly from a common sense standpoint
say it wasn't fair, that there's not really a legal place
to say, hey, this was really unfair.
They would argue that homelessness
and the lack of housing and housing availability
and affordability is the ultimate humankind unfairness.
And I don't know if this is a good question for this time.
So, Steve, there's another city out there
that had a favorable outcome
when challenging their builder's remedy.
And I was wondering if you could share
how similar or dissimilar that city's circumstances
are to our circumstances.
That was a, I think you're referring
to a Southern California case.
Yeah, that.
A beach city I used to live in.
That's right.
That was a very unique ruling to the facts in that case
that don't really apply under our circumstances.
No.
Okay.
Yeah, and you know they.
I know it's just a trial.
That city is a charter city.
That's not really the dispositive issue.
It's a very unique set of facts
and it is also highly unique in the trend line
the Superior Court cases right now that tend to go the other way.
All right.
If we want to take a moment.
One more question.
Why don't we use some public comment?
It's just this refers to exactly what we're talking about.
So the final question that I would have would be, did HCD give an indication prior to, let's
say, 10-13 that the housing element would be accepted if the specific criteria requested
were amended?
Did they give an indication that submitted this way,
it will be approved?
I would say that they said you're close,
but we need to hear back from the public
during the seven-day period, and then we'll let you know.
So yes, but.
But to follow up on that, the two gates to certification
are the court or HCD.
We didn't have either of those as of 10-30.
We didn't have either of those.
HCD, in various letters to various communities, used wording that, and I put Claire, this,
including one of our letters too here, right, they used wording which said, if you do X,
you will be substantially compliant.
And so, some might try to argue that if you did X, then that should revert back, and that
is part of the rationale that Senator Becker's bill is proposing that if you were in that
scenario where they said, if you do X, then the time it takes us to process, you might
not be subject to the builder's remedy under this new law that they're considering.
But that is a change to what the current law is right now.
And there's no, you know, again, we don't know whether that will ever pass, and it would
apply prospectively.
And so, it is a situation where when you're in this discussion with HCD, you do get to
a point where what they really say is, we have no further comments.
And you can, and if you want to start your seven-day review, go ahead and do that and
then submit it to it and we'll respond back, but we cannot respond back until the seven
day public review period is gone.
There were a series of seven day public review periods we went through in this process.
The last one was in October.
We did not change the housing element at all from what we submitted to start that seven
day review period, and that is the housing element that was certified.
Okay.
One more question?
Yes.
And based on what you just said, we were subject to being required to make further
changes if the public had said something that HCD thought was substantive from their perspective.
There was a – I would word that slightly differently.
I would say we were at the risk that if a public comment had come in that HCD thought
needed to be addressed, they could have told us, go address that comment.
And so yes, it wasn't guaranteed that we were going to be certified.
Okay thank you Erica.
Now it's time for public comment.
Anybody that wants to comment on this item, step forward everybody gets their two minutes.
Yellow speaker card, name and city of residency.
Good evening.
Steve Elstyrm here for Friends of Walnut Creek. The builder's remedy is state
legislation designed to disenfranchise voters at the city level when it comes
to development issues. We elected you, our City Council, to represent us when
various issues come before you, including regarding the proposed
developments. The builder's remedy strips you of your ability to represent us, thus
essentially nullifying our votes for you when it comes to these issues.
However, the builder's remedy does not strip the California courts of their function.
The determination of whether a city's housing element is in substantial compliance can determine
whether projects may proceed under the builder's remedy.
While certification by the HCD is one indicator of compliance, a court has independent authority
to determine whether a housing element was in substantial compliance at any given time,
regardless of when HCD certification is announced.
In Walnut Creek's case, this distinction matters.
You approve the current housing element on August 1st, 23, with an addendum incorporating
HCD's requested changes.
That revised element was submitted to HCD on August 25th, and HCD then issued its letter
on October 24th, finding that the city's housing element was in substantial compliance
with state law.
So while the HCD announced the housing element to be in substantial compliance in its October
letter, the housing element that HCD certified was approved by the City on August 1st. That
means a court could reasonably conclude that the City's housing element was in substantial
compliance as of August 1st, the date it was adopted by the City Council. HCD's letter
confirmed that the August 1st housing element was compliant. If a development application
was submitted after August 1st, 2023 but still proceeds as if the builder's remedy applies,
meaning your ability to represent your Walnut Creek constituents is thwarted, an interested
party can ask a court to decide whether the city's housing element, approved on August
1st, and later deemed compliant by the HCD, was compliant as of August 1st.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Never quite fits me.
Charles Creline, Walnut Creek.
My comments are just in the form of some questions.
Did we know or should we have known we were legally vulnerable to builder's remedy?
What could we have done differently or what did we miss leaving us with an open builder's
remedy window?
As an example, could we have submitted early enough that this maybe could have avoided?
Why didn't we submit maybe the prior July for a stronger position?
Why did we submit so close to the deadline?
If we submitted everything timely and good faith, what will the council or city do to
assert that position with the state?
Did the state possibly act in bad faith?
And if so, what will we do?
Thank you.
Thank you.
Any additional public comments?
All right, we'll go ahead and close the public comment period here.
This is a briefing for us and we can sum up with observations, we can thank staff for
their report, we can add additional discussion on.
I will ask one question that Mr. Krelling brought up which was when were we notified
that we needed to initially submit for the housing element?
We submitted it, what was it, January 27th,
just ahead of the deadline.
But when did we essentially understand
what the foundations were that were needed
to submit the housing element?
I know why it took a while to do
because we sat through multiple meetings
and we know how much staff worked to do it.
And I wanna add, that's the same question
I've been trying to get to the bottom of
with my previous question, which was,
when did we have everything we knew we needed
to start the process?
What was that?
So I'll tell you up front, I'm going to give you
an incomplete answer to your question
because I only arrived here in that prior May.
And so, but what I do know is this,
that the consultants that were available
and the consultants that were available
to assist not only us,
but others here in Northern California
had had to continue their work in Southern California
so that there was a lot of overlap.
So that's one thing.
The second thing is that the guidance and advice
that ABAG had given to the jurisdictions
and that we as jurisdictions were following,
our goal posts were initially to make
the 31st of January of 2023.
Now that having been said,
I know that shortly after I arrived here
within Walnut Creek, there was suddenly a lot of discussion
happening within planning and community development
directors forums about differing expectations.
And the differing expectations were because in prior cycles
of Lorena and housing elements,
meeting that you've met your timeline
seemed to have been a sufficient condition.
And then as more and more jurisdictions
Southern California had exceeded the time frame of being, you know, meeting their legal
deadline and then it was starting to come into the Northern California time frame.
People recognized that there were more consequences potentially in play and so most of the consultant
contracts that for the majority of the jurisdictions had been designed to be able to achieve success
by that January 31st deadline and had not built in, you know, additional amounts and
rounds of, you know, back and forth with, you know, the state because in prior experience
there hadn't been as many different rounds.
And so, that is my explanation and the AFFH element in particular was a learning experience
that the state HCD was going through and how to be able to communicate effectively with
jurisdictions to explain it most appropriately.
And in order to be able to staff up with an HCD to be able to meet the demands of the
reviewing and so forth, there were a lot of new staff too.
I think that all these things were, so they did not have as much time and capacity to
be able to do one on one coaching and so forth.
So and then, you know, keep in mind, I know it's hard at this point, but we're also just
in the midst and then coming out of COVID. So all of these things were a perfect storm.
Let me just add to that with a little more detail because I know Erika wasn't here in the beginning.
The city began working on this in 2021 to give you a sense. The information came out, I don't
remember the exact date, but the prior community development director and staff was actively
involved. We were providing updates. We did in fact submit an early version to HCD in October of 2022.
In fact, I remember the timeline.
I remember there was a little consternation with Council.
We actually submitted it to HCD as a draft
before it came to the Council
because we wanted to meet the necessary timeframe,
and we did.
And then additionally,
just to add to the history that Erica provided,
is cities were under the impression
there was an additional 120 days to this process,
and HCD, partway through the process,
cities view, HCD may have a different,
reinterpreted the process and cities had 120 less days
to submit.
So we started basically as soon as we could,
we submitted on time or even early,
and then the process was subsequently shortened
by 120 days and we met the January timeframe.
So were there a lot of lessons learned in this?
Certainly, would we have done some things differently?
Absolutely.
I would also add that there was so much frustration
among cities and counties throughout the state
that our former local state Senator, Steve Glaser,
has set up, I believe it's a Senate committee
to investigate the process related to HCD
because there were so many complaints
and so many challenges with changing requirements
or changing interpretations of requirements.
And since we're using the goalpost analogy,
I'll use a slightly different one
and we're all old enough here to appreciate this.
Going back to the Snoopy days,
it felt like HCD was Lucy holding the football
and we're Charlie Brown trying to kick it
if you want more of a generic description of the process.
So actually the California League of Cities
gathered information from cities throughout the state,
submitted that to this Senate inquiry committee
that is reviewing the process in hopes of clarifying
because ultimately the goal is the same
amongst the state and the cities
to have a certified housing element to achieve housing goals.
That is the ultimate goal here.
And so in theory, we should be all in the same page
working in partnership to get there
and haven't quite felt that way throughout this process.
I think that was, I know I'm not staff,
but just to add comments, I guess,
and kind of my perspective is,
I think all of that is correct.
I think the, thank you for reminding us about the 120 days
because I had forgotten about that.
And that was very relatively late when HCD said,
nope, you don't get a 120 day bonus surplus period.
It's January 31st and that's hard and fast.
But also I think historically,
I think what you said Erika about,
you thought you'd submit
and it would be like it had been in the past,
it would be a 90 day review period,
you'd get back the letter that you were certified
that would be within the 120 day cushion period.
And I just, I do appreciate the inquiry,
what could we have done differently?
I would say from the city standpoint,
We had done a lot before we got to that point,
back when we were on the Planning Commission,
adopting major specific plans,
the west downtown and the north downtown specific plan,
doing exactly what the state wanted us to do,
concentrating more higher density development
in and around the BART station in downtown.
We had gotten grants from the state and had done that.
And as a result, we didn't need to rezone any sites,
I think for the AFFH we did.
That was an extremely frustrating process.
So I'm glad to hear
that there's a legislative inquiry about it,
because in my mind, that was very qualitative.
It was very subjective.
I know it was a state law, a new state requirement.
I think HCD was fumbling through it
and figuring out as they were going along,
it was a game of hot and cold, in my opinion.
And I think that if there's an area for legislative fixes,
it's to provide more objective, quantitative standards
as to how an agency meets that.
Because that was the part that I found very frustrating.
And I mentioned it to an attorney general
at a conference who does housing law.
I said, you need to provide very clear guidance to us.
We're trying to do the right thing.
We're trying to get in compliance.
And that was the element plus the SB 330 plus 128 change.
But from my perspective, we did a lot more.
And the other thing is everybody's housing numbers doubled.
I mean.
And some of them tripled and quadrupled.
I mean, it was 2,500 in the last round
and it was 5,800 this round.
Which is 100%.
With a, yeah.
So there were, it was like a perfect storm
of very challenging regulatory environment
to get into compliance.
And if I may add just briefly that, you know,
thinking back to the whole process,
you can't really sort of start the process
about alignment until you actually get the numbers,
in our case, from ABAG.
And so, as you point out,
the city had done quite a bit of work prior
in terms of rezoning,
particularly for the North Downtown Specific Plan
and then the West Downtown Specific Plan,
but until the city received the numbers,
we couldn't begin to solve for X mathematically.
And I think we all, and I think if you got HCD
and gave them a beer, they might admit
this was not the best process.
And that's why CalCities is working on AB 650
and other bills like that to help improve the process
in the future because this didn't satisfy anybody.
I think we were all very frustrated.
We all felt like wait, we're Walnut Creek.
We do the right thing.
How come you're being so hard on us?
But at the end of the day, we are in a housing crisis.
And there are much as I like to think
every city is doing what their fair share.
I am a little skeptical of some of our brethren
and they might be the ones that caused this for us
by the fact that they all became mountain lion habitat.
So, and starting earlier under AB 650,
doesn't mean we just start.
It means that we would get the numbers earlier.
But getting the numbers, 440,000 new units
in this eight year cycle was what the state gave ABAG.
And ABAG had to figure out a formula and a process.
They didn't just start pulling numbers out of a hat.
They had a 25 person committee that meant for months
to decide what the criteria were for sorting the deck chairs.
And then the numbers were allocated.
And then there was a review process
where people could protest.
And 40 some of our colleagues protested.
And I remember we made a decision,
I can remember that meeting.
It feels like it was summertime,
where we made the conscious decision to send a letter
that said, well, we would like to complain.
We're not going to.
And we sent that letter.
But we got one of our colleagues in close by location
sent a letter of protest saying Walnut Creek
could take some of their numbers.
Now that was an interesting letter to read.
So it was a dog fight.
And until those numbers were settled by ABAG,
we couldn't actually put pen to paper.
And there's a public process involved in it as well.
There are community meetings you have to have,
an input design, and then you pull it all together,
and then it goes to the planning,
and it's 1,000 pages.
With charts, with charts that go on for days.
And so I'm just hoping I'm dead
before the seven cycle starts.
There's a little PTSD up here on the dais tonight.
I don't think we did anything wrong.
We just, it was a perfect storm.
But the other thing is it was in COVID
and the big agency that had the bigger numbers
was Southern California Association of Governments.
And they have 188 cities across those counties.
And that was just humongous.
They were in the middle of COVID
when they were trying to do it
and they were stumbling through it.
And they had 130 cities complained.
So it's a perfect storm.
Yeah, and I think we're at a point
where it kind of is what it is.
We've learned a lot.
We know a lot better going into the next round.
We are hoping that we are continuing
to work with CalCities to reinforce for the legislature
that what happened in this round should not happen again,
that there are changes that need to be made in the system,
adjustments that need to be made clarity on requirements this you know it's the
classic I used to tell in case you couldn't tell when Ernie and I were
joking about it I used to be a regulator and my whole thing with my staff was you
cannot tell somebody to bring you a rock and then look at that rock and say
that's the wrong rock and throw it out you have an obligation as a regulator to
say well this is a gray rock I really want brown rocks it has to be under five
pounds. It has to be smooth on the outside and Ganesha and Shish would be
good rather than granite. That that rock process is not what HCD was doing this
time. They were they were saying, hmm it's a nice rock you could do better, and they'd
send us off. And so we're at a point where I think most of the cities that
we've talked to are have been frustrated with the process. I think if you talk to
HCD, they're probably a little frustrated with the process. I'm hopeful that we
can make some changes before we embark upon this again and we're at a point
where we have the legislation that we have, we have the definition of what a
substantially complete housing element is. We don't have any legal precedent
that we can cite that would that I would be willing to spend money pursuing in
court so my recommend a oh say I would recommend that the council hold off on
that kind of conversation okay anyway my recommendation to the council is we
accept this report and move on? I still have comment too. Okay. Appreciate your
recommendation though. Pick one. All right. So I appreciate what you're saying about
that. I'm not sure I'm ready to go that far yet. I do think that HED requesting
housing elements being amended, submitted with the understanding of approval, only
to allow for a loophole that then delays the response to us isn't just bad faith
it can appear dishonest to the public. Other cities in the state are dealing
with the same issue as we've heard and I don't understand how a major city can,
a major change to a city can occur due to delayed responses from a government
entity like HCD while the city acted in good faith to comply and did comply but
due to the delays of the HCD department. So I'm not willing to go as far as you
who are right now.
I think that yes, appreciate all the work
that staff has done, not just for this presentation,
but for the last couple of years
as we've dealt with this and understanding
because we moved on a dime as soon as we heard
that there were changes that were needed,
we moved on a dime to quickly get,
we pushed other projects back
so that we could address this.
And so I'm not willing to say that we're out of compliance
at this point without more discussion.
but I appreciate your comments.
Oh, that wasn't going to be my comment,
but I will echo your state of mind.
I have a similar state of mind.
But I wanted to speak about why, at least according
to my reading, and since we have some experts here
on the panel that can clarify this,
why the numbers went up so much.
And my understanding was that historically,
arena numbers had been allocated based on population growth,
and that some cities that weren't building
weren't experiencing any population growth.
So like an example being Beverly Hills
was only given like two or three units,
one housing cycle I heard.
And so they changed it to perceived need
from population growth.
And that's why the numbers exploded this housing cycle,
as they went from like projections of population growth
to a more subjective perceived need for housing.
So I would actually say it's the fundamental economics
of supply and demand.
And so prior to this, there had been the Great Recession
in 2008 and following.
And where from the earlier slides,
there had been a historical need for more housing
and certainly more affordable housing.
But during the period of the Great Recession
and then following, there was not the level of housing
that was being produced to be able to even try to catch up.
And we fell further behind as a state.
And so it's a supply and demand issue.
So then when you could say calculated need instead
of population growth.
Yeah.
But that was the fundamental change
that made these numbers double.
And I mean, just we look out into the real world.
We see that the housing prices for ownership properties,
et cetera, have just gone up astronomically.
There's a reason it's playing demand.
And in terms of apartment housing and so forth,
there just simply isn't enough.
And so the numbers in the state, in the Frida,
are just simply representative of what our reality is.
And this wasn't regulatory.
This was the state legislature that
made a very conscious decision that these numbers needed
to reflect better formulas.
and they stipulated it and then they had to go out
and figure out how to do it.
And they had to figure out how to set the regulations
at the start of the regulatory cycle.
Ordinarily, they would have had five, six years
to figure out how to interpret this and express it.
The legislation didn't say,
this is what affirmatively furthering fair housing means
on this and this and this.
And so everybody was rushing at it and then there was COVID
and staffing just diminished.
People were working at home and they were not as productive working at home because
they didn't have that water cooler environment where they're in a complicated situation
and they can compare notes and figure things out.
It slowed the work process.
People were sick.
People were worried.
So you can be mad at them all you want to, but I feel fortunate that we only have one
we could have many more like many more communities do because we did a good
job of getting a almost over the finish line really close and only had the
opportunity for one to come in and it's not that we don't love all opportunities
but it could be five, it could be ten, it could be thousands of units and it's not.
yeah I would just say it I think I said it already that the process was
punishing it was not a good process it was not a government at its finest and
I don't blame the city for that we were submitting drafts before we even got the
comment letters back from HCD I remember that that we knew what the comment was
going to say and we preempted it and sent our draft in before we even got the
formal comment letter and then we did this robust planning and zoning process
years before that so that we wouldn't be in this predicament. So I think that the
fix should be at the legislative level and the legislature should say come
back HCD you don't have quite as much leash as you think you do this this the
legislature needs to be very clear what they want to see in that AFFH and I
I guess, I know there were comments made,
the court can decide this too and I totally agree with that.
My concern is that we had our August 1st version,
we had HCD tell us that was not substantially compliant.
So, I would be hard pressed to see a court
overstepping HCD on that ground saying no HCD, you're wrong.
I know better, I lowly trial court judge,
no better than you, HCD,
whether they're substantially compliant or not.
So given the current state of the law
that we didn't have a certified,
we didn't have a letter from HCD,
and we didn't have a judgment from a court
saying your housing element is substantially compliant,
I think the city, the process is what it is,
that I'm not gonna opine on whether that's right or wrong
other than to say there's still a process.
And it's, in a lot of ways,
it's very similar to what our process would be
for a non-builder's remedy application.
The difference is there wouldn't be a,
there's no general plan amendment or rezoning,
but the design aspects are still being reviewed.
The subdivision aspects are still being reviewed.
And a full-blown EIR, there's no CEQA shortcut being done.
That's the most extensive environmental document
you can prepare is being prepared for this project,
subject to a 45 day or more public review process.
And all those comments will have to be responded to
in the final EIR and there could be revisions
to the project as a result of the CEQA process.
So it's not a get out of CEQA free card.
And the legislature has made that clear too.
You're still subject to CEQA and mitigation measures
under CEQA in terms of traffic, air quality, noise,
all the typical things.
I do agree that I'm glad and I feel fortunate
that we're not in the position of some of our sister cities
that, not Shia Folk and Nacetto,
but sister California cities that, you know,
like Los Gatos, I think has 15 builders
from the applications.
And I just read about a builders remedy application
Pacifica. It's a former quarry site for a thousand units in Pacifica. Pretty small
coastal community in the coastal zone. So I'm not saying that I'm sitting here
and saying I like the process because I really did not like that process and I
really would advocate to the extent we can advocate as a city for that to be
revised and clarified for the next housing element cycle. I think we'd all
be well prepared for that. And the other comment I would make is, I felt like we were, you know,
I think you're exactly right when you talked about why the number went up so high. It's because of
the historic deficits from the state as a whole for not meeting, for leading us to the housing
crisis we're in. But I think, you know, it was a frustrating process to get through and we got
through the other end of it and I'm glad we did and I don't necessarily want to
go through it again. I'll second that. Councilmember Silva. Mayor Darling. Aye. Councilmember
Davini. Aye. Councilmember Francois. Aye. Mayor Pro Temo. Aye. And we have received the
report and we have relieved ourselves of some anxiety and now we can go on with
life and I'll go sleep tonight and with that we are adjourned.