Good evening. I'd like to call the April 22nd, 2025 meeting of the Le Haber Heights Planning Commission to order. I'll take roll call. Laura Hess, absent. Stephen Blackden. Here. Rick Brooks. Jim Lucas. Peter Espinoza. Here. And Ray Fernandez, I'm here, the chair. Mr. Lucas? to persons. Oh. Mr. Parsons. Good evening. It's been a little while. I just wanted to take a second and preview something that's going to come before you guys next month. 1700 Canola, the big project that's under construction. One of the conditions of approval called for and and at the time we had agreed to do this, it called for having the solar panels mounted on the ground, as opposed to on the roof of the building. At primary concerns, I think, were any potential view blockages, especially if the panels on the roof had been elevated at an angle. My client, Kevin Yang, is working with his contractor right now to figure out the best way to deal with this. They have a serious concern about mounting a fairly large solar array on a steep hillside, mostly because it limits the ability for them to maintain the area under the panels around the panels, and could trigger some erosion concerns Because we'd have to clear vegetation From that area There were really aren't any suitable flat areas on the property for it and at the time that this came before the commission about a year ago We didn't see that there would be an issue, but now that we're in construction, the contractor has some concerns. So we're going to submit to Rafferty a package, including some renderings, so they're going to show how those panels will look, that they'll be mounted flat, that the tops of the panels will be lower than the top of the curb or a parapet around the roof and that we don't believe that they would create any additional elevation on the house or any view. So I just wanted to bring that up and mention it and that's about it for now. I'll see you guys again in a few minutes. Okay, thank you Miss Parsons. Thank you. Moving right along to the minutes of the March 25th meeting. Have you all had a chance to review the meeting minutes? Do we have any comments or questions or corrections? Mr. Blagrin? Yes, on number 8, last sentence, fencing, do-dry standards. I wasn't sure what that word was supposed to be. Probably should be development standards. Okay. We can make that change. That was it. Motion to approve. Second. All in favour, say aye. I think you have to interview a job. Really? All right roll call miss has been Elsa. I Miss blinding yes, mr. Lucas. Yes, mr. Brooks. Yes, and I vote yes Minnesur approved I admit the monthly community development report. Can we have a staff report place Thanks chair Fernandez and the CDD report is in the packet for you The biggest highlight out of this particular month was just a building apartment through the bunch of the month of March We had a lot of permits of an outdoor of the ones that we we capture for this one You know building permits swimming pools, re-roofs and grading. There was 25 permits that were issued But when you look at the aggregate of all the permits and MEPs and encroachments and everything They should about 72 permits. So building building staff was very busy issuing permits this Last month in March, so it's been a busy couple of months. Other than that, we did have two co-inforcement complaints. We closed four co-inforcement cases. Co-inforcement officers issued seven stop-work orders. We closed four cases. We took in two planning applications and improved two projects. A little bit earlier this month we sat down with our new city prosecutor's office, city council authorized to enter us into an agreement with a law firm that specializes in code enforcement and code enforcement cases. So we met with a couple of the associates from that law firm to talk about our code our code enforcement list, our process, the letters, you know improvements or things we can include in our letters that we send out to property owners and some potential ways to move some projects along through either letters from the City Prosecutor's Office going through abatements and or looking for receiverships as one of those those remedies so we had a very good meeting with them kind of went through our code list and kind of talked about those putting together a list of of cases for them to start to consider and then that will be coming a little bit further forward. We do have the Code Force Committee so we're going to look to try to have that meeting next month with attorneys here. At that meeting, we're putting it on their calendars so they don't end up in court that day. So we can hopefully have them here and have the code enforcement committee meeting and then move forward with some of those things related to moving some of the code enforcement cases along a little faster. So there was definitely a good meeting with them. They have any questions? Happy to answer. Okay, any questions? But Mr. Weldrich. Mr. Blackden. Thank you. On the permit cost, I know there's a, none the valuation, there's so much per thousand. Does that go down? As the value goes up? Now you're testing me, it's been a while since I've had to hand-calc. The reason I asked is the one there for 1.2 million and the percent works out to like 2.5 percent, which is like a lot less than the lesser valuations. It may, I don't remember. It's been a while since I've had to hand-calc the fees for it, so I don't know the off the top of the man as that percentage moves through the increase in dollar amounts. All right. And then the one on the last page, 2598 project, 1347 West Road, there's a 13,700 for the permit, but there's no valuation. That one's grading, so it's based off of units. So it's based off of the Cupiards of soils move. Yeah All right Then there's one in here on 1368 cash one That has it's for a 3000 square foot garage And that kind of caught my attention for a couple of reasons. One, it looks like there's a code conflict similar to the one we saw on Avocado Crest where one part of the code says one thing and the other says something else. And then also it's an example of why we might want to look at the accessory building maximum size and light of SB 9. So this is just one to follow and possibly call for review in the future. Which one are you talking about page here? Project 25-002. I think it's on the last page. 1868, Cashland. I don't see a Cashland on the last page. The fourth one up from the bottom. Oh, you concern is that they're too big. An accessory unit is too big. Yeah, as I said in light of sp9, you could have someone put in the except lot, because you're only limited to 800 square feet with SB 9 But you can convert and existing building so someone could build 3000 square foot garage and then just Split off that part of the lot and turn it into a 3000 square foot house Yeah, but they'd have to come and get a permit and get that approved You couldn't just start building walls and bathroom. No, no, you couldn't. You couldn't, the garage gets approval. But under SB 9, they can convert the garage to a house. And it's just kind of ministerial to my knowledge. Is that a problem that you foresee? There's always a potential with the larger structure when you look at people looking at the sizes that they can build. Like Commissioner Blagnan was saying 800 square foot is, you know, a studio one bedroom for ADU, two bedroom up to 1000 square feet. But the code, the SB 9 regulations, sorry, the ADU regulations allow for you to convert accessory structures. So you can potentially convert something larger to an ADU. And if you have a large accessory structure, then there's some potential to create that into a larger ADU. So it's just something first to keep an eye on for now and maybe look at it later. Any other comments, Mr. Brooks? Lucas. Then Ben Olson. Okay. We're actually one quick question. Besides 1452, Erosso Road. Are there any new homes that are close to being permitted? We do. The other project, the 1730 canola is getting close to having Everything completed and ready for permits. Okay. So that is another one that is pretty close, probably the next closest to being ready for her issuance. Two men, 19 number two men is also getting very, very close as well. Which one? 19 hundred two men. Okay. Getting that one's getting close to you. I think the grading just got approved for that one and the building is already approved. Yeah. Is that the one, the lot? The had the chance. That's the fence in the front. It had some kind of foundations that one. Yeah. That's been for sale forever. Yeah. And Mr. Parsons is doing that one. Okay. All right. If there. All right. If there's any other comments or questions we'll receive and file. Okay, so that brings us to we're going to review PRJ 2025-015 a request for a tentative parcel map to subdivide of vacant 13.49 acre parcel into two lots on Castle Arrowero Drive. Can we have a staff report, please? As the chair in planning commissioners. This is the initial submittal for subdivision for that lot. There are lots, you know, a little over 13 acres there. It does have some pretty steep hill sides and canyon areas to it. The way our code is written and the size of the lot is dependent upon the average properties and that also then goes into another calculation for minimum lot sizes to it. So due to the steepness of those properties, the required lot sizes five acres, this particular property has the room to be able to be able to split those two off. It falls within the residential agricultural specific plan overlay section. So as part of this project, a specific plan will be developed and approved along with the map and the houses for it. But since this is a project that's a tentative parcel map, requires commissions approval. We wanted to get it to you guys to be able to take a look at right out of the gate. So this is one that Mr. Parsons is working on. So you can see there is like the early stages of the map in there of how it would potentially be split. The large process for there is essentially the south side of Casalero down towards the very end of the coldest second of Castellero is where the property is located. So it kind of goes at the bottom of it. There's another parcel and then loop and hill in the end of Los Palomas is kind of the area to where this particular property falls within to it. But so the proposal will be to split it and then build a house on each lot, included in your plan there as a little exhibit of potentially what the houses would look like. Instead of just providing you a generic diagram of what a house would be potentially on the lot, these are kind of ones that the property owner and the architect have been working on to try to have on the property to give you an idea of the whole package. Hopefully, we get to that point to bring it for the commissions for review and approval. We'll bring in the complete package with map houses specific plan everything in one shot for you to be able to consider and look at. The lots are very steep and it's going to be a little bit of staff review to look at driveway accesses the way the houses interplay but you know there's a little bit of an area on the property where you can get to a couple of lots. It will work obviously with all the other departments. It's gone out to engineering and building and fire to review as well. All those comments will be coming in. We'll be working with Ken to put that all together so we can finalize this one. We wanted to bring it to the commission to let you take a look at it earlier there just to kind of see if there's any thoughts or concerns or issues that the commission may have. We can work through as we kind of go through the review process of it for that aspect of it. Mr. Parsons probably could walk you through a little bit of how they were looking at how to line the property lines potential property lines to it the steepness of the lots some of the calculations related to the average slope and the minimum parcel size to it They have been in the process of doing like soils and percolation tests or those those are forthcoming Here in the very very near future. We should their working on those. So as the package moves along, I just wanted to provide any comments to it. We'll report to address any concerns. Commission may have as part of it. So if you have any questions, I'm sure Mr. Parsons can walk you through a little more thought and detail to where the houses are going to be placed. The thought into how the properties will be split and we can kind of go from there. Okay, so we could do a couple of things here. Mr. Parsons would like to speak to the project. We can listen to him first or would you rather We talk amongst ourselves. It might be better to have him. Okay, all right. So would you like to start some questions? Okay. Thank you, Chair. Rafferty, I do have a couple questions, and maybe Mr. Parsons could answer it, but are they looking for just a lot lot split or is it going to be a complete Package that they're going to do a lot split in two houses and design the two houses and We approve a big package with a lot split in two houses. From my conversations with Mr. Parsons, you'll probably clarify, the thought is to bring you a complete package with the map for the lot's blood and the houses and everything. Specific plan has one large package that the commission can review and approve. So as we go through the process, all of the parts will get developed as we go through it. Okay, and then is it a developer or is somebody going to live in one and sell the other one or is one for their kids or do we know what kind of resident or development it's going to be? Mr. Parsons, maybe able to speak a little better to that one from what I do believe it is the parcel has been owned by Person for several years now in a long time the thought has always been to develop it. I believe they're going to live in one and then the family member or somebody who's going to live in the other one. But yeah, there's I believe the potential for them to live in the. Okay. Well, I went up there and took a look at where it looked like the two pads were going be and It looks like the houses to me are gonna be low enough that the roof even on a two story house is gonna be below the street level So I don't see any problem with that You may have a challenge with the driveways being steep with the fire department, but that's kin's problem The only thing that I would probably like to add or that I would try in condition to it is that in light of the fires that we've had, that we make a requirement that they do 100% weed abatement, like every other lot. I know it's large and we have a part of our fire code that says if it's too steep or unsafe, I don't know the exact verbiage that you get this exemption. And I don't see giving that exemption. My neighbor behind me, the hill is just as steep as this and they have a crew that comes out and they actually repel down the hill with weed whackers and they do full weed abatement. So that would be my only real concern and question or condition that I would see on it. But it'd be nice to see two more houses up there, I think it'd be great. So I don't see any problem with the project. Mr. Lucas? Yeah, same thing I don't see any major issues. I went through yesterday as well and saw the property and kind of saw where the more level paths were where the houses could be. We'll have some great views. It looks like from the property. It sounds like they won't need any standards, modifications based on the staff feedback and set this point in no comment. I'll leave it more to the experts on the home building side to find more feedback. Access penalty, have any comments? No thank you. Mr. Blaglin. Thank you. I appreciate you bringing this to us, Raffi, as good to take a look at these things out of the gate. It would be good if there were just like two or three stakes down where the property line between the properties was going to be. And then just some poles at the perimeter. There ought to be the right height, just four corners, so we could see where the house was in relation to the slope. It wasn't falling off. The parcel won. The house looked pretty close to the edge of the slope. And actually where the driveway was going to go between the two trees or a cut down. And then it had a graded driveway with some stones going over the side. That like about where the driveway's gonna go. That will take some engineering. The scope of work says there'll be pools and pateos, but those weren't on the plan. I know we'll get more detail later. That I imagine'll be on it. It is gonna to be doing a specific plan and it is in the county SEA and it looks like on the city's environmental resource map at least some portion of the lot has some environmental resources to account for. Code 71440W, the size and dimension, that's the circles. The diameter, it does meet the minimum requirement, but it doesn't include that the circles supposed to contain 75% of the parcel size. And if the area of a circle is still pi r squared, parcel 1 is only 54% of a lot and I suppose it contains 75 and parcel 2 only contains 44% of a lot. So those circles will need to be enlarged and moved so that it complies with the code. Then if they are going to be developed at the same time, that same section, letter M, will be quiet variable setbacks. The plans show 35-foot setbacks. But the code said you need at least 30% difference between the setbacks, which could be a problem if I go over the edge. And then variable structure design, if they're developed, you know, in the same time period, the variable architectural styles and the building footprint varying by at least 30% between the adjacent structures. Let's see. Oh, and then I just might view I would object to them doing 100% weed clearance because that'll just create a a erosion problem. And it's been there for 100 years, and it hasn't burned. So I think that complying with the brush clearance should be suitable. And that's all I have. Thank you, Mr. Blackden. Now, I have a question of you. Where do you come up? I'm very familiar with this process. I think you can correct me if I'm wrong Mr. Walter. I understand I'm the last person to have subdivided land in the city when I did the 1287 West Road. So I'm familiar with it. Maybe somebody's come since then but I don't think so. Have you had anybody? One on Vista that did a tentative map, but hasn't moved. It hasn't. Okay, so this is going to require a tentative parcel map. This isn't a lot split. So we're seeing a very preliminary, right? Is that correct? It's going to have to be a tentative parcel map. They will HB individual parcels, right? Yes, so yeah, the parcel will be split right now, the way they're looking at it, it shows the potential split between them, the two lots, creating the parcel, you know, one in parcel two for it, yes. Mr. Black, in this diameter circle, that's also moving around and fits 75% of the lot. Where do you see that? That it doesn't fit 75% I can't see the- Well, as I said, the area of circles pi are squared. The diameters 4, 10, so the radius is 205. So that's square times pi is, that's on parcel 1, is 131, 958, and if you divide that into the area of the lot, it's 54%. Well, see the thing too is that when I did my map this circle, we showed it in different locations of the lot. So he's just showing one circle. Maybe we can talk to Mr. Parsons about that. Because on parcel one that circle obviously can go further north which would cover more of the lot. So I just, I didn't see a dimension that said this circle has to, for you, that don't know this circle has to be able to be moved and fit in 75% of the lot. 75% of the area of the circle. So we don't know that exactly and maybe it's in some dimension we haven't seen. But what I wanted to know is right in the circle it says the diameter of the circle per exhibit 7.12. I could never find exhibit 7.12 maybe that would have explained it. So is that anywhere here? It's that's the exhibit in the Harbor Municipal Code that has a whole municipal code. Yeah, it refers back to our Harbor Municipal Code is the calculation to make the lot to mention the required. On page 7-55 at the top. Okay, no, I misunderstood that. I took that to be an exhibit on this plan, which would have been helpful, right, to know that. Okay, as far as that, my comments, this is a very difficult site. I would not want to own this and have to do the weed abatement on it and Mr. Brooks, I don't know if we can require this one applicant that they have to do weed abatement on the steep portion of the lot and I don't know what the code I've run into that with the inspectors, you know I have a steep lot around me and I've been told well his weeds It's okay because it's too steep, you know, but then right across I I have a that's perfectly clean and it's the same steepness. So it's a code that sometimes it's enforced and sometimes it's not. So maybe we need to get a little clarity with the FAR department because you can't require to want person because it's too steep. I mean this lot is, where did I see, 68%, yeah, 62.54, and 48. That's pretty steep. You might need a parachute just in case you fall out of that hill. So anyway, so if we can maybe get a little clarity on that or from the fire department, when is it too steep that you can just leave it raw land? Okay, Mr. Parsons, did you want to say something? Thank you. Yeah, to kind of quickly look at some of these items, the intention is to submit a full package. And I think it's probably to everyone's advantage that we look at this holistically as the tentative parcel map along with the two residences to be designed along with, as Mr. Blackin mentioned, things like pools and spas, patios that are yet to be developed in the plans. It would probably be best to do it that way. Even though technically, we can probably say that this wouldn't be required to come before the commission for each house because of the visual impact potential and also because we are getting up close to height limits and things like that, I think it is a very strong chance that it would end up before you regardless. So let's just, yeah, my impression is, let's just do that now and get it going. The owner has owned this land for about 20 years, maybe a little more than 20 years. And while I don't have any insider knowledge as to how he plans to use the properties, he's represented to me that he wants to keep them within his family, possibly live in one of them. I think he's got a daughter and her family or something that wants to use the other one. But as far as I know, they're not a development project in the sense that you would like build a track of houses and sell them off. Could he sell them? Well, I don't know that any of us can restrict that, but I don't believe that that's the impression, the intention that he has. We have met with the neighbors, and as you know, I know Mr. Smith pretty well, who's above that property on Castellar, I designed his home 20 years ago. And it was really important for us to meet with him and the neighbors directly to the east, I apologize, but I think their last name is Brady, but I'm not sure, I don't remember. And we met with them back over the holidays and presented these plans and went back and forth a little bit and talked with them and they both agreed that this was a good development in their opinion for this neighborhood. The only thing that Mr. Smith made a real point of was that we keep the ridge lines, the high points of the roof, below the level of the street so that they wouldn't have any potential to impact his view. And the way these are designed, the pad elevations are roughly 35 feet or so below the street level. So the roof lines being a one story elevation toward the street are going to be anywhere between 15 to 17 and maybe 18 feet at the most. So they'll be at least eight to 10 feet below the street level. The major impact will be from the downhill side. And we have a couple things working in our favor. One of them is that the nearest properties, the nearest homes on the downhill side are many hundreds of feet away. I believe the closest one is down on Lupin Hill and it's a good six to 800 feet away. There's some other ones that are well over a thousand feet away. We have some on the sides that don't look over these projects out their primary views. The impacts on those would be pretty minimal. It's important to us that we create an element of safety with these projects, especially considering the steepness of the lots. As you had correctly surmised, there's really only two places on this entire 13 and a half acres that are suitable for building a decent sized home without asking for setback reductions. And those are the two locations that we chose. You can see if you've been up there that there's been some tractor work and that's for soils testing. That tractor work is at or just below the location of where each of these houses will be. The pepper trees were removed, I was a little bit surprised, but the fire department will require that they be removed anyway. So I wasn't too concerned about the pepper trees. Now if they had been trees that were on the OK list, I think it would have been a problem. But knowing that pepper trees you could look to some of the pines, there aren't any pines in that property that I can think of, would be removed. I didn't think that was a major issue at this point. The plans you see in front of you are preliminary, actually pretty schematic, if you will, pretty rough. They've been refined a little bit over the past week or so. When we do come back in front of you, they will be completed plans, you know, preliminary plans. There will be a lot more differentiation in style between the two homes. The Westerly home is going to be a bit more of a modern look. We're gonna get rid of some of those sort of, frankly, and I designed it so I can say it. Some odd pitched roofs on that house that are gonna go away. The right or the easterly home is gonna remain pretty similar to what you see. The locations on the property aren't going to move really more than a few feet here or there because there's really no other place to put them. As far as the weed abatement, I understand where you're coming from, Mr. Brooks, and I tend to agree with most of it. The lots are so large that we can meet the California Fire Code requirements for clearances out to the furthest zone, I think without having to dig deep into some of the really treacherous areas here. And Mr. Black, and you mentioned that there's a potential for some habitat as in 20 hills habitat, because they're not bordering us, but some environmentally sensitive areas. And we want to keep that in mind. So whatever studies we'll need to do to look into that will take care of. One of our major concerns up there is going to be fire, accessibility and infrastructure. There is currently one fire hydrant within, well, it's just directly across the street from the West Rally House, but it's a bit of a distance from the East Rally House. So if the fire department requires that we upgrade that infrastructure, of course, we'll do that. The driveways will be fairly steep, but nowhere near is steep. Some of the ones that I've been involved with up here. I think the West Rally House will have the steeper driveway. It's going to end up being somewhere in the neighborhood of 18.5%. The eastern one's a little bit less than that. As far as the circle and all of that, that's kind of interesting. My reading of the code is that 75% of the lot area must meet the minimum dimension, not necessarily in a circular fashion, but let's say it's 410 feet, which I think one of them is roughly that. We've got to have that 75% of that lot be within that 410 feet dimension. So I think there's going to have to be some discussion about that too, because I know your experience was different Mr. Fernandez. And at a certain point, we have to look at how we can practically deal with this. I think this is about as low impact a development as we can see for a lot this size. The owner had talked about selling this some years ago, and he had a person talk to me that wanted to take this and turn it into eight houses. And I basically said, I can't do that for you. There's no way I can see doing that because of the steepness. Three would be a problem only because of the fact that because of the steepness, we got to have a five acre minimum. So in order to even consider a five acre minimum, we got to We don't. We have 13.72 or something like that. To prohibit the owner from subdividing it into two lots when it's this large, I don't think the optics are very good, frankly. And I don't know how that can be justified. I think we should be careful about how we approach that. And I would like to have that conversation as we go forward. We will be providing renderings of the house so that we can visually locate it within the environment, within the landscape. The landscaping element is going to be critically important here, especially the masking and screening, especially as seen from down below and from a certain, you know, from a decent distance. Typically owners don't want to use trees to block their own views, but in this case, because of the steepness of a lot, I think we can screen from down below without taking away the distant views that will be enjoyed from within the houses. And then I guess my last point would be just the procedural question and that is, I'm gonna be asking Rafferty for some more information as to what exactly a specific plan needs to be in Lehober Heights. And I know that it's a little funny when you're only talking about two houses, but because of our environmental sensitivity on that hill, I'm gonna be asking for some input from Mr. Woolridge and from any of you that you wanna funnel it through him or however you wanna do it, because that's the one gray area that I don't really have a good understanding of yet, because I don't think I've dealt with that in La Haber Heights before. So I can answer any other questions if you have them. I have a question. Yes, Ken, what did you mean by optics? Well, I'm kind of looking at appealing to you on more of a practical level and that is how do we tell the owner of a 13.7 acre parcel in La Habra Heights that he can't sub divided? Is that simple? And nobody suggests that. I know, but I'm anticipating that coming up based on Mr. Black in earlier comments. That's all it only comes up if the numbers don't work. And I think there's ways to make those numbers work. That's your the expert. Anyone else? I don't have any questions, but I do have a couple comments. And you know I understand about the wildlife and all that and you know to say that well it hasn't burned in a hundred years and so we shouldn't worry about it that's probably the most ignorant thing I've ever heard you say Mr.. Blackden. It's pretty disappointing. And to say that it would cause erosion, like I said, my neighbor behind me, they get weeds three, four feet high. They cut them down every year. It's the back of my property line, and there's no erosion because the weeds are still there. The roots are still there. You're not taking the roots out. So anyway, fire safety is gonna be a big thing. City Council is gonna be making some changes. And, you know, they've owned this for a long time, and I've been up there and haven't seen a lot of weed evapment done, and it's a lot of fuel. And so, I just think they should look ahead to have a 200 foot perimeter or whatever it's required around the property. I think now is the time to address it in light of what happened up in palisades and Altadena for that matter. I mean, Altadena isn't like us. And it burned to the ground, like Lahab are burning down. So anyway, the weed abatement should be something that we should definitely discuss. As far as the circle goes, I don't know the whole intent of what that was and why that got written into the code. I would guess that it's so that people didn't divide long skinny lots. And so I would argue in favor of this being seven and a half acres with this circle size and this house size, that there's absolutely no reason to try to bring in part of the code and say, oh, this doesn't meet it by, you know, a few hundred feet or a couple thousand feet in the grand scheme of this project because the circle doesn't fit. As Mr. Fernandez said, my understanding was that it had to be encompassed 75% of the lot. And as you look at it, it's taking up, you know, because you have on each side you have plenty. So I wouldn't overly worry about that or start trying to change it because I'll argue till the pigs come home that this should go forward without this ridiculous rule on these being seven and a half acre parcels. If it was a two and a half acre parcel and you're trying to split it into some weird little shape, I'd feel entirely different about it, Ken. But in this particular case, I don't even think we should spend a lot of time talking about it. I think we should just accept that and be more concerned about the design of the house and the safety of the house. And that was one of the reasons I asked, are they gonna live there as it just a developer? If it's just a developer, he really doesn't care about the community. He's just going to build houses, try to make the best about a profit, and then get out. And so, I mean, if it's the property owner that's owned it for 20 years and he wants to live in it, I'm probably much more lenient with whatever standards modification than if it's just a developer, you know, is just in it for the profit and not the community. So anyway, that's all my comments. Thank you, Ken. Any other comments? Let me call them, says Benelza. You have a comment? Mr. Lucas? Yes, I have one comment question. Probably more for rafferty, but as far as the environmental attributes and that concern, have there been other examples of other parcels where the applicant has had to do some type of environment review or something based on the size of the lot and things? We definitely had to do not a lot of parcels we had to do a lot of environmental because generally we are looking at one house on a lot and a developed area. So there's a lot of exemptions within the sequel process for that. Obviously in this area there has been other environmental studies that have been done for other parcels that are in this Jason area. But it's one of those things as we go through that process. We look at the environmental aspect of it. habitat that's potentially there and is is there a need to do it as the exemption that exists in the code for those purposes? You had another comment? Thank you. Yeah, there was one some years ago on the east side of the city, a 25 acre parcel that needed to be subdivided. They wanted to subdivided the EIR in a specific plan. As far as the weed abatement, it's not what I want. I just don't think this person should be treated differently than anyone else. You clear the weeds to the code. I don't want to say that him clear to 100 percent And we're not telling anybody else to do it. It doesn't seem fair. And then the specific plan is right in the code that its specific plan is done to the state requirements. And it's basically the whole project is done once you are including the house development. And there's also no standards modifications or variances. So I don't see how you can read this parcel size and dimension other than that the 75% has to be within the circle. Can I address that? No standards modifications are allowed because I went through that on my parcel That was too acres a little over two acres. There was an existing home For me to sub divided in two one acre parcels the existing home I could not get a standards modification which I think is unfair as hell so for example The site setback was 25 feet and I was very close on one little corner of the house. So I would have had to cut off, let's say if the house had been at 22 feet, you know, I would have had to cut off three feet. So the code, they made this and I think you brought up, why is this circle and all that is because at one point time, when they were reviewing the code, they wanted to make it more difficult for people to take odd-sized lots and try to put a house on it. So they came up with this circle and they also came up with no standards modifications allowed. So in my house, I couldn't have subdivided the land into two parcels if, for example, the house was 10 feet from the property line. So I think that's what you're talking about, right? Well, no, there's no house on this. There's no house, so he doesn't have that problem. Now, but someone was mentioning about, we can give him a standards modification if there's a problem, but it specifically says for the subdivision it has to show development without standards modifications. And that can't be. He's got every single right. Except for the two, the height and the footprint. Yeah, and the footprint. So. But no setback mods or grading mods. And he showed in his numbers that he's way far from needing anything like that. So I don't think that's really an issue. And there was, that is what has happened in the past. There was a subdivision on Escopardo, and they wanted to subdivide a lot. And they had to remove a garage because it was in the setback. And then just my opinion, it doesn't make any difference if it's a developer or the owner, the issues of the same, it should be treated the same. That's Mr. Parsons, I do have a comment. And before that, Mr. Blackden, I kind of agree with you that I was like, trying to figure out where is this house going to be. There was no stakes, but from looking, I took the full-size plan and you can see where the fire hide is in the polls and that kind of gave me an idea, but it took a little detective work, so it would have been nice if there was a little mark. You know, you made us work, you know? What's up with you, Ken? So, but I was kind of disappointed when I went over there and I saw obviously some grading work and then those peppertrees cut down. And I talked to Mr. Woolridge and he said, well, they had to kind of go down there for the pad, so that was okay. But you stated that those peppertrees, the fart department would have had you take them out, but I'm looking at the list of the undesirable plant species and peppertrees do not appear on this list. And I'll give you the ornamental, Pampus grass cipers, you can lift it, juniper and pine. So I don't know where you quite came up with that that perpetries are abandoned species. Mr. Oldridge can you address that? When we do it they're not a preferred tree for us to have on the list. So they're not a preferred tree obviously because there's lots of chaff. We do happen to have our fuel fuel mod expert with us and he can also probably weigh in a little bit too. So they're not there not up yet. So they're not trees that are there's an approved planting list and then there's also a prohibited planting list. So the the pepper trees aren't on either list. So can somebody just come with a chainsaw and cut down a 24 inch tree? Pepper tree? Well the property property owner did it. That's what I would assume so. I believe it was probably either the contractor he's working with or the soils guys. Yeah, I don't think that there's anything unless there's some rule that an ordinance that the city has on having to go through a process to remove trees. Yeah, there's an ordinance tree removal permit required to take off any tree that's 16 inches I think and hide above four feet. And that's often violated rule in this city and I saw it at your parts on those are way bigger than 16 inches. I was like, wow, what happened here? And now it's not on the list. So it's one of those things. Do it now and ask for forgiveness later. It sounds like to me. Where were the trees in proportion in respect to the proposed future residences? They were right, basically at the top of the hill, right alongside the road. They were far enough from the houses to where it might not have been an issue, had they remained. And obviously, I was surprised when I went up there and saw they were gone too. Here we are. There's another group of pepper trees right near the easterly house at the bottom. And those will pretty sure, those will have to go. But one of the things that I will make sure that we do is prepare a tree removal plan as part of our landscape plan so that we'll identify the two that have been taken out and the others that will need to be and also deal with the replacement trees with appropriate trees as this or a couple of other comments when we're ready for them. You have a couple of other comments I'd like to make before I'm finished. I'm glad you mentioned the, you brought up the standards, Mod, and I'm also glad that you mentioned Mr. Fan is that it's not for footprint and height, because obviously a lot of this acreage to be limited to 1,500 square feet and 16 feet high, we can all do the math and figure out that that's probably never going to fly. So yeah, we're not asking for standards mods on setbacks or anything else. The height limit, the variable height limit is something that we'll have to look at and discuss. is the upper side, the visible side from the street, from the neighbors up there is very low. This is something that has come up before in the hover heights and will come up again as we go forward with some houses on steeper slopes. I have another one in design right now on Piccacho, that's very similar. That's a different one. There's no lot split there. That's a lot that's under two acres and we're going to do one house on it. We are going to be asking for a setback mod on that one because the slope off the street is actually steeper than these lots are. In this case, if we use the variable height limit based on the back side of the downhill side of the house, which would be taller, it would take these houses and basically push them right into these canyons. And this is a problem. Can we do it? Yes, it's physically possible. Is it a smart thing to do? I would argue that it's not. So that particular issue is one that I think we're going to want to have an open mind toward. And when we do present the full package, we'll be asking for the houses to be approved ultimately with the 35-foot offset back off the front. And the, what is it? 5 or 600-foot set back set back off the rear something like that Okay, that's got it for my comments unless there's any other questions Thank you, miss parts. Thank you. Good luck to you Okay, let's go to item number eight review Review of landscaping, fuel modification and fencing standards. And this was continued as you all know from March 25. Ms. Walgreens, did you want to give another staff report on this? I just handed over to Commissioner Blackden. I know he worked with Vice Chair Hess to make some revisions toisions to the language which is attached for you. So I mean, I handed over to Mr. Blackden to let him run through some of the changes and then we can see if the commission would like to send it to the council for request to authorize a good amendment. Yeah, we took the suggestions of the commission and modified the suggested code language. I did go down and talk to the fire marshal, in looking at flammable things. What are acceptable and unacceptable materials for fences? And he said no wood, no. So even treated wood or fire resistant wood wouldn't fly. So that's why you still see wood is prohibited. And we did remove the part about gate opening onto the street, although the reason that I had put that in there was because the main gates of houses, but often people have accessory gates and went to the back of the yard or a side yard, and they've seen those where they open into the street, but I guess that can be dealt in another way. So if you had a chance to look at it, if you have any questions or comments. And I put in there about the minor exceptions rather than a stands modification. So it's not as onerous to do and also the last change is to add the wall offense to minor exceptions. I have a question, Ray. Yes, Mr. Brooks, go ahead. So, Rafferty, if we make these changes to the code, is this going to apply to new developments only, or is this going to be the code whereas existing properties will end up having to comply with it as well? You guys have the potential to affect that right now whether you want to go across the board everything or all new. I think it's best to do it across the board. It just makes it easier as you try to apply it to look at versus the date when the code went in to worry you're at at the time. The only one that's time dated is the chain link fence, which are prohibited going forward on new construction. Okay, but that doesn't answer my question. Maybe I didn't phrase it properly. If this is the new code, does this mean that if I have a wood fence, I'm in violation of the code? Or does it mean because it's already up, it's grandfathered in and people put in whatever they want and say, oh that's been there because they didn't get caught with their putting it in. If you already have a wood fence there, it would be grandfathered in, but if you went to replace that fence and go through the proper process to get approval for fencing and all those things, you wouldn't be able to replace that wood fence with the wood fence. But how many permits do we get for fences? Not a ton as more of us chasing them down as to when we see them out there doing it. So then what you're saying is that it's for new development only. It's not going to be the code where somebody would be in violation because we changed the regulations. Yeah, what's there today will be there today would be if you want to replace that in the future than those things would apply to these circumstances, like Safari was saying, like, chain link. Would the part about requiring them to be maintained in good repair also be exempted of existing. That's probably something we need to do no matter what. Look at just property maintenance aspects of it. And we've had some conversations about stretches of Hossienda, especially just up from here and the condition of the fence in those things as you're looking at us. The entrance to the city entrance and exit and Deadlands keeping in a chain will chain link fence that's got some Broken slides on it or not the best appearance for us Well, yeah, so the first property you see on Hacienda has Bob wire around it Even though it's been in the code as far as long as I remember that you can't have Bob wire on the top of Chainlink fence you know makes us look like a third world country and yeah and then as you come around by avocado crest they have a fence with the white fiberglass that's on the inside and a bunch of dead plants on the other side but yet you see the whole chain like fence I mean and then the tarp that's down just past the park that everybody sprays graffiti on. So that's what I'm saying is this something that we want to impose upon existing residents or just new development. So I understand both arguments and I know that this particular City Council would never pass for existing residents. Well those things you mentioned Rick are already prohibited. Those are just a code enforcement problem. Okay. Okay. So that was my only questions. Thanks. to Lucas. Thanks. Yeah, first, thanks, Commissioner Blinden and Vice Chair Chester. Continuing to work on this and going through numerous iterations, I know it's taken a while Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you classifier rating. So when it says accept as otherwise noted, is that referring to that split rail where you could install say a, you know, a classifier rated piece of wood as is that? That's that's that's that's exactly. Yeah, if it exists. Yeah. Okay. Got it. And then I guess the second question word says unless approved by a minor exception for properties with demonstrated excessive street noise, etc. Then you go to the added minor exceptions where it says increased, increased, allowed solid wall and fence of six feet in height. I assume that is for properties with demonstrated excessive street noise, right? So do we want to add that to the end of that? Just to make sure it's clear on the section 719 110, pace 6, add to the end of that? Yes, sure. I mean, the bottom of that left page, the money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I'm spending money on the property. I other section for the minor exam. That's a good change. It does my only two comments. Okay. I didn't quite follow what paragraph you wanted to add to. I didn't quite catch the number when you said it Yes. So for for where it says on the right. There's no page number but which sections section 7 19 110 or says minor exceptions. The right hand page of the bottom. The right hand page at the bottom. Okay, minor exceptions. Okay. Yeah. So at the end of these was is so the new number six would say increased, allowed solid wall or fence to six feet in height and then add on for properties would demonstrate the excessive street noise. Okay. Mr. Espinoza, do you have any comments? Just in light of Mr Mr. Brooks' question about whether this is prospective or retroactive. I think it would be helpful to have a statement in here. Changes to the code or effective August 1st, 2025. So there's no question about retroactivity. Well, the part that the last sentence in the first paragraph, the chain link fencing is prohibited for new construction after August 1st, or whenever it passes. But you just talk about the whole thing. Is that something that you do with code changes is put in the effective date? We have in the past and I think it's something we could include to set that time frame. that it's ability to look at existing. I think it's all in the way you've rooted for us to be able to look at existing. Mr. Blackdance, 7, 11, 50B, a couple of questions. You keep mentioning on the subject property as if to say a home and is gonna go build a fence on somebody else's property. Why is that on there? Well, because it's not unusual for the fences to be put in the city right of way, which creates a liability for the city. And in the case of putting them in the right of way they need to get an encroachment permit. You can't legally put a fence on the city's right of way. You drive around the city and say, okay, half of them are. All right, and I don't, I quite don't understand this whole sentence and I'm going to read it to you. Maybe I'm missing something. Says fences or walls not used for earth retention on the subject property. Now I get that. Six feet or less in height above the finish grade of the fence or wall. What do you mean? Six feet above the finish grade of the fence or wall. That makes no sense to me at all. Where are you looking? That among the last page, 7 to 750 B, that first paragraph. Yeah, that's just the language that's always been there. It sounds like six feet above the grade of the fence or wall. I don't quite get that. Okay, but yeah, if the fence or wall isn't used for earth retention, so it's a typical fence or wall, is six feet or less in height above the finished grade. So that's just your typical fence. Six feet or less. OK, it almost sounds to me like it's saying the six feet above the fence. But okay, forget that for now. You know, I want to kind of remind a commission how we got to even discussing fencing. It was because I thought that was kind of ridiculous that somebody can't build a six foot solid, masonry wall in this city without having the upper third open. What is it? 75% I figure what it is. So that's why we started all this. And I wanted something simple. Let's allow the block wall. Then the city council kind of derailed it just actually one councilman that he didn't think a six foot wall was good. And I went actually at the end of the meeting when you have public comments at the end, I said, well, the commission felt that, hey, if somebody wants to have a six foot wall for privacy, it's always a nice wall and landscape that should be okay. But then it came back to us and now we're back to the same thing. And it works. Okay, so now we're no wood, which was in the code, but everybody does it. No vinyl, no fiberglass, no chain link. So we're left, oh, and no six feet wall, unless you get a minor exception, unless you can demonstrate that your property has objectionable traffic noise. Okay, so on my street, if I wanted to do it, it's a quiet street, so I can't have a block wall, but you go down 200 feet where there's maybe a little more traffic, he can have a block wall. I can't, I'm not going to vote for this. This made things more complicated and made it more restrictive. And as all of you that know me, especially Mr. Brooks, I want government off my back. We just made things much more difficult for homeowners. And now we made it even more difficult for future applicant. Guy wants to do a room addition to his house. And now he wants to put a chain link fence on the side of his house. He can't do it now. And you can do a nice green chain link fence, you know, a green post and green fabric and landscape. It doesn't look bad. I wouldn wouldn't recommend that in the front yard, which is not allowed anyway. But I don't know. I just... Yeah, well, as I said, I don't mind the chain link fences, but the objections, the chain link. Yeah, but you added, but you added, you can get a minute section. That was made on what commission comments. Well, whoever added that, okay, you can get a minor exception and build a six foot block wall in order to reduce objectionable traffic noise. That's to me that's again a worms. Yeah, it absolutely is subjective. We could put in if you know over so many decibels for such a time period and make it even more complicated. Okay, there you go making things more complicated again. So go go higher traffic, study engineer and set up his decibel meters so you can get your belong. I didn't think it would be good to get into that. It does leave it subjective. Could I just interject something? Yeah, go ahead. I'm done. I'm just... Well, no, I understand your point. But I thought you put that wall in because your house is below grade and to block the noise. And when I lived on avocado crest, I don't know if you know which house I lived in there, but my house was just below the street, and it was loud as heck, and they wouldn't let me put in a solid wall more than 42 inches high. And I really wanted, I ended up putting a wood fence at 42 inches high to try to block the sound, and it did make a difference. So I think that saying that about the road noise, if any car drives by and you hear it, you could argue that that's objectionable and who's going to say that it's not. So in my opinion, this opens the door to allow it rather than disallow it. And I agree with you that it's got a little more complicated but you know no offense to Laura because I really appreciate it but you know when we get you know attorneys involved in verbiage and all that stuff it starts to get much more complicated. So I think this kind of meets what you want to do in a roundabout way. So anyway, that's all. Okay. I don't know how that meets what I want to do. When now you've got this reduced objectionable traffic noise, what's objectionable to you might not be objectionable to staff. They might go out there, well, hey, this is a quiet street. We're not gonna allow six foot wall. I mean, I've done so many projects in the city. There's so many things in the code that you can be turned, your project can be turned down. We're just adding more stuff. I would just rather say, if you wanna build a six foot wall, I'm okay with the minor exception, you know, show that it's stuck-oad. I don't even like the thing earth tones. We don't have architectural review of colors here. Now you want to add another layer. Now you're telling people what color they can paint their walls. Because you said last meeting, oh, I don't want white. Well, you don't like white, lagged in, but other people do. So, but the whole year, tell people they can't paint their wall white. White isn't in here, is it? What? White isn't in here anymore as a prohibited color. But you put earth tones. White is not an earth tone. Well, let's just go with the rest of the code that asked for Earth tones. White is not an earth tone. Well, that's just to go with the rest of the code that asks for earth tones. Well, that's my piece. Yeah, you know, I agree. But we just say that it has to, you know, it needs to be landscaped. But my concern is that somebody's just going to build a white center block wall that I think looks pretty tacky and then they never do anything with it and now you've got a white center block wall. That's in there. You can't have a center block wall. We're all in agreement with that. Yeah, because that wouldn't look good. Yeah. So I'm fine with taking out the objectional noise and get this approved. And letting people build a wall and if they're going to stuck away and you know they're going to put some landscaping on it. I'm fine with it. Well the reason that was put in there was because the council rejected just a solid wall because you want it. You're privacy, whatever you like, look at walls so that there had to be a reason and the reason that is there is objectable street noise. If you can think of some other. How about security? That's my main reason. I don't want somebody and I stated this at one of the meetings. I don't want somebody coming up to my house and grabbing the rot iron on top and climbing over the wall. So it's security and noise and that kind of thing. So. Well, security, the six-foot wall, coyotes can clear it, people can clear it. If you want security, you plant a boogan vel or a pi ricantha or cactus. That's no one's going to go through that. They're going to go over a wall. It's allowed harder to jump a six foot block wall for a burglar that's solid wall and then that's got plants in front of it. So I would be okay if we do a subjection. Well, traffic knows that, that kind of bothers me. Let me ask Mr. Walter, what do you think of all this? I mean, you're the one that's gonna have to deal with this. And am I making too big of a deal that this is too subjective a term where you can get one applicant comes in and you said no you can't. You're on a quiet street and then you let his buddy down the street have a block wall. I could see how that could cause a city a problem. We have to be very careful and fair that we don't target certain people and let certain people do one thing and other people not do the same thing. As the commission was having that discussion, I was kind of thinking about, okay, streets with ejection will noise. Obviously, our major thoroughfare, so Hossie and the East, West, Cyprus, Fortun, but I didn't necessarily think about avocado crests, but then being on avocado crests and being there, avocado crests gets quite a bit of traffic And that wasn't necessarily a about Albuquerque crests. But then being on Albuquerque crests and being there, Albuquerque crest gets quite a bit of traffic. And that wasn't necessarily a street that I was thinking of off the top of my head of, like, what would I think of like streets? They have a good amount of traffic, that have some objectionable road noise to it. You go to like the more major, Hossie in a for sure east and west where you have traffic all the time. Cypress has a lot of traffic forward and then there was like that it was Alvacara Crest that didn't necessarily think about Alvacara Crest as having a lot of traffic on it but obviously every time I'm out of Alvacara Crest there's cars back and forth and there's there's a good amount of traffic and that didn't immediately jump into my my mind as far as like objectionable traffic noise. So here, you're the planning director, the city manager, you were many hats and you didn't even think that his house at objectionable noise. Now, if you came to Sharpless Drive, you'd say, what, you get a car every 30 minutes. You know, you can't have a wall, but then you go down to the bottom where a sharpness meets a Skyline drive there's more traffic than they'd be able to put a wall. Yeah, we're even there. That's kind of my Well, we could put in as I said either a Dessible thresholds for over a certain time or you can put in a traffic count so many over so many cars per day I mean I, I thought that- That's it. I let's just stop. There's no way I would go for anything like that. But if I could add something, when I came down to the city to talk about putting this fence up in my front yard, the explanation I got was we wanted solid only to 42 inches and then open above that so that you can see through the fence and the landscaping on the other side and in the house and everything. Well, to me, once again, this is where our code doesn't make sense because of one hand, you're saying, oh, well, you can only only build a 42 inch high fence so that we could see through the fence But we want you to block 50% or more of your house with landscaping so we can't see your house so It doesn't make sense So anyway, we're spending a lot more time on this than That I really think is necessary. I would be fine if we took out the objectionable noise and said they could do it as long as it meets the criteria and move forward. And the little bits of thing that the council objected to, there needed to be some criteria. No, one councilman objected. We're five. All right, what do we do? If we say, no, this is what we want. Who is he to tell us five what to do? Because I feel strongly about it. They can either approve it or just approve it or they can make changes. Yes. Just because this is what we recommend to them, if that one councilman wants to make the argument strong enough to convince two other ones so that it's a three to against it, that's up to City Council. It's not up to us. I think we should do what we feel is right for the community and let City Council do what they think is right for their politics. But didn't we send this up already with this request and it came back as they no redo it. So we're going to send back the same thing again and probably I know it's one kind of, I think it might have been two that had some ejection so it might get sent back to again. And now we're back at square while we've been doing this for how many months now? Did it go up or did it was it just a question of could we do this? Because in order to do this we needed permission from the City Council, right? So we brought the draft language that the commission had at the time to the council to say, commission would like to make this code change, you authorize us going through that process. A couple other issues where that were. There were some thoughts around chain link fencing, and especially allowing it for existing properties that have chain link today to be able to do it in the future, not outright prohibit completely with some of those concerns. A couple of the other council members had a concern about kind of what you're talking about, being able to see into the property, see those landscaping, those disinviews and things like that. But then I think at the most part towards the end there they were looking at if it's not something that's just simply over the counter but something that has to go through another level of a review of like a commission, like a standards modification, it puts something in there that you're going to go through a process, it's going to get looked at, it's not just me at the counter saying, good, move along, that someone who's gonna go to that level of effort is going to go through a process, it's going to get looked at. It's not just me at the counter saying, good, move along, that someone who's going to go to that level of effort is going to complete the wall and install landscaping. And we're throwing them a bone. We're saying, OK, we feel strong about the 6 foot wall. But it's going to have to go through a process, like you just said. It's not a rubber stamp. and Mr. Luke as far as they didn't we already do this with the council now we're going to have to go through a process like you just said. It's not a rubber stamp. And Mr. Lucas, as far as, hey, didn't we already do this with the council? Now we're going to go again and try. Yeah, it's called persistence. Anything I've ever gotten my life is because I don't give up in persistence. I believe that people, you made a great point, Mr. Brooks, that you were told, oh, we want to be able to see your property. Why? Where is it? Anybody's God given rights to look into your property? Where's our privacy? And then they want us to screen 50% of it. It's like, this is nuts. I mean, it really is. So, all right. So what's your proposal? Anybody? How about you, Mr. Blaine? My proposal is that we just remove the, for a sound and leave the rest of the verb in here because that's too subjective. Well, roughly, can you think of some language you would prefer other than for demonstrated excessive street noise. I mean it just gets hard. I mean obviously you can include decibel levels but if you're there with the noise reader and a car drives by you're gonna hit those and noise levels pretty easily. If it's gonna be like demonstrated over a certain period of time, then that just gets hard. Like, staff isn't going to be able to go out there and listen for three or four times during the day or do a traffic count, have somebody author to do traffic counts and we're relying on the applicant to submit, oh, we get 75 cars that come by today. I don't know if there is an easy way to put that one. I was originally thinking like, okay, you're looking at the major thoroughfares. You're obviously going to have a higher traffic volumes. You get more people in and out through it. But yeah, even you're looking at some of the smaller streets have a good amount of traffic on them. But it's not just that. I mean, I remember when I lived on Avocado Crest, there was a paper boy that had a little Honda car with a loud exhaust on it. And at 4.30 in the morning, he would go up. I could hear him private through the whole canyon. So you know who I'm talking about that. So again, it's. Well, we could make a list of streets that it applies to. Oh, Jesus. You know, you know how easy I could get around if I wanted to put a block wall and you stuck me with this noise meter and decibel counter. I'd had a couple of teenagers with some of these Hondas with Laudix, Soc, just keep driving my house and I give the city this report while it's horrible these kids and the newspaper kid too. So, no, I'm not in favor of anything with noise meters or anything and the other thing I would ask, I think that people should be allowed to put a chain link fence on side yards as long as it's green, polls, and rails, and green fabric. Because so many people in the city have chain link. I mean, we have it on Housi and they're like, you've pointed out. So again, we're discriminating against new people coming in. And I don't think that's right. Our whole code discriminates against new people. Yeah, well, look what I had to do at my house versus the people across the street that got 15 code violations that the city doesn't do anything about, right? What about black... We'll do a black chain link. So, but now we're talking about color, right? And you just said you don't want color for the wall, but now you want it for the fence. But this is a little different. I'm not telling people what to paint their fence. Chain link fence is objectionable to many people. But when you do a green chain link fence with landscaping, it really doesn't look bad as long as it's not in your front yard. So I'm not changing, I want color isn't this. I'm just saying you can get chainly fences galvanized, black, you said, and green, right? That's the only colors. Brown, I think you can also get that brown. I'm never as long as it's not galvanized. Well I have to say as long as we're on this, when that guy that lives, I'm not sure where he lives, but his property comes down on Haseyenda by Kaneda-Sombrae right there. And he put up all that chain link fence, which probably is within the setback, which is illegally probably should had to rip it all out. But he planted it, it's covering it pretty fast and I feel so much better about it being planted. It looks so much better because I thought it looked absolutely horrible. And you know, Haseyenda should be the pride of our community and it's not and it should be. So, I mean, if you wanna add green chain link fence or something, I'd rather see people put rot iron up. It's not that much more expensive. Yeah, but it rusts and it becomes a big maintenance nightmare. Go look at anybody's Rhode Island fence has been up for a few years. And so... Well, most of it's powder painted down, so it lasts a whole lot longer. So just to be clear, do we all agree that for chain-linked, fencing and front yard areas, are we saying for front yard moving forward that won't be allowed allowed? No. Okay, so you're saying front yard is still be allowed? No. No, I said side yard. Okay, so yes. I agree. So, but side yard would be like the house on avocado crest. It's their side yard that faces Haseyenda is is prohibited for new construct. That's the change, right? So they're not going to be allowed to front yard. Okay, so. So I think at the change that should be made to this last sentence here on the first part of this, chainly fencing in front yard areas is prohibited for new construct that's the change right so that you're still a paragraph are you looking at the last sentence first paragraph yes so basically you can check you're still allowed chain link fencing in in in your back that's adjacent to something else not front yard but you for if we add the front yard areas that would make it clear that you can still install it in other parts of your property. Is not front yard areas. Just in yard areas. I saw in here someplace not allowed in front yards. Where was that? It's the last sentence on the first paragraph of 71840, I think. Yeah. So we would have to chain link fencing as perator for new construction. After August 11, we'd have to strike that. We'll just add a loud. Just add front yard chain link fencing as perator. Okay. Good. Mr. Walridge, do people need to get a permit to put now? Forget this. Chilling fencing in the side yard now. Chilling fencing doesn't require a building permit. We do have site plan approval for location, design and height offencing. So people will still be required to come through, give us a little diagram of map of where the fencing is going to be the material to height so we can approve that one. But only building permits are required if you're moving into like masonry walls, masonry walls or gates like driveway gates because those have load bearing things that will fall and there's design standards to it. Okay, did you want to have colors, Ray? Well, I'm open. I'm a reasonable guy. We'll leave it or not. If it's if it's landscape, but you know, we require landscaping then people don't do it. So I would prefer, how does the rest of you feel? Say that galvanized chain link fencing is prohibitive, must be some, you said there's brown, I've never seen that. Coatier. Coatier can get coated chain link fencing, so it's like a PV. Yeah, you could say. A loud chain link fencing must be green, black, or brown. Are you okay with that? Yeah, it's fine. I'm getting some green in here like this. Alright. Okay, so let's see, why are we prohibiting vinyl again? That white vinyl horrendous, but they have colors. Why are we... Fire marshal. fire marshal fire marshal fire marshal really boy would just it would just melt to the ground, you know Just melts in it can catch other things on fire it can catch of vegetation on fire right adjacent to it Okay, it's really hot. There's a good reason You know Miss Freely a senator you pronounce your last name. Yes, perfect. I went up to the fire areas, the eating fire in Althadena. I was horrendous. And I could not believe on once, particular street, all the homes were burned on both sides. And there was a wood fence running between two homes. It was in pristine condition. Didn't burn. I couldn't figure it out. I mean, how could these homes, and I'm talking, they're burned to the ground. I'm not talking to smoke coming out windows. And the wood fence survived. Was that maybe they put a preservative on it or? Or it could be. It could have been an ignition resistant. It could have been ignition resistant would. It could have just been just in terms of if there was nothing else around the fence and it just didn't get anything. If there wasn't vegetation around the fence, it's just completely dependent upon which way the wind's blowing. if houses were burned on both sides. Usually... depending upon which way the wind's blowing. You know, if houses were burned on both sides, usually you have that radiant heat that's going from house to house. That's just so hot that usually that must have not been in the... because that's just enough to just basically auto ignite offense because at eight or degrees, that's when that nominal lightweight would like that will just catch on fire. And that's what you were seeing with house to house. So it's just one of those random things. You could have seen that, and then you could have gone, you know, three houses away, and all the fencing materials burned. So it's all, it's just an embers, embers are just going to find something. So they're just going to be looking for something to ignite. And if it just happened to that, they weren't an alignment. Maybe maybe the wind was blowing longitudinally with the fence. And it just blew, you know, in and Yeah, it's just one of those one of those things but it was amazing. I could believe it actually took a picture of it Oh, let me mention one thing of that the the material being Class A fire rated The fire marshal referred me to a website where there were different types of fences that were class A fire-rated and some of them were hideous, a corrugated metal. So I didn't want to get into finding and every type of fence, prohibiting certain ones, but the part that says must be architecturally compatible with the primary structure design. So someone couldn't put up a corrugated metal fence unless the primary house was like a storage container. So I think that can block off some of the objectionable ones that wall with the metal slats above it on Hacienda. I don't, do you like the metal above the top part? I think it looks better than the tarp next door. So I think they changed it because they wanted to block the sound and it's not 90% through. Now it's 90% covered with the way that they did it. So, you know. I'm saying just that material, that strike to you like, oh my god are to just blend it in. No it's not my style so I mean it's not something I would put up in my house but but my neighbor on skyline is just remodeled his house and his driveway and he put up some walls and he put up rot iron and it's all horizontal and And if you like that look, you like that look. So I don't try to let my personal feel so if you saw those popping up around time I wouldn't you know it's a design that people like now and I think it's a fad but for me there's no security to it so anyway I just wanted to I wouldn't make the guy tear it down I would say that. So anyway. So to put this matter to rest I don't want to delay it for another meeting. Mr. Woodridge you've heard what we've said. Do you think you can just kind of rewrite this? And maybe send us a draft? And if we have any other comments that way, it can just get to the next meeting. Yeah, we can. Is that okay with everybody? Don't we have to make a motion to move forward? Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm asking them if he's willing to do that, because I know. Well, is the noise language staying in a gun? No, that's gone. I've already crossed it out. The Lord's language is gone. Right. I know. Well, is the noise language staying or going? No, that's gone. I've already crossed it out. The noise language is gone. We're gonna have to have that. No galvanized. We can have chain link fence on the side yard, but it has to be a color, you know, whatever. No galvanized. And that's it. And so we've gone, now we can allow rot iron, block wall and chain link. So we've given people a little bit more leeway of what they can do. So we're not changing anything regarding the first sentence of the second paragraph. So it'll still state unless approved by a standards of modification, at least 90% of the portion XYZ. Now, it's approved by a minor exception. Yeah. And you cross out there with demonstrated excessive street noise. But what's the reason then? What's the reason you're allowing on the wall? What is the reason why I'm allowing a six foot block wall? Is that your question? For security and for noise. That's it. But there has to be some guidance as far as why someone would approve that minor exception, right? I mean, there has to be something there that gives someone that decision of, okay, I'll approve it because that's YZ Right. I've got to put something there. So that would be up to staff, right? So it would come to you and you would say, well, that sounds reasonable. What sounds reasonable? So I guess, Rafi, have you received standard modifications to build six-foot walls? Have we received that before? In a And so what were the reasons? I'm trying to think of my time here if we brought a standard's mod. I remember there was one on, I think, before Raffty was here on Harrel Boulevard, where they wanted the wall for road noise, but on the code they needed to apply for variance, which they did, and they got it. Yeah, I don't think I brought one for, I typically hold them to those requirements. I'm just for Nana's and I've had that conversation a few times about that. But I believe in taking to the commission one for over six feet night, so taller than what's allowed at staff level. was the only one that I think I brought to the commission at one point in time for a fence that was above six feet so I can eat for a tall fence. That was nauseated? That was more like security related. So then can we put either noise or security related? So at least there's two things that could be considered for a minor exception. That's what I think most. Right, well Mr. Blind, if you're the one that suggested you want to stand as mine. Now you went to a minor exception and what was your reasoning for a minor exception? You asked me, well what's the- Yeah, yeah, well you had ejected to the being of standards modification. You wanted it simpler and less costly and so a minor exception fits that bill. Okay. So then if a guy comes to you an applicant and wants a block wall and he wants a minor exception, what are you going to take into account? I mean, does it look reasonable? The exception would be it's not, it's stuck code, it's a north tone and it's going to be landscape so you give them minor exception right? There's still a process to minor exceptions we have to notice the directly adjacent neighbors and take those comments from those neighbors and not any neighbors is it a 500 foot radius map? No that one is just directly adjacent neighbors. So it would be kind of the people that are in the area of where the property is, not the 500 feet we normally do. Now we're letting the neighbors decide if the applicant can have a block wall. It's just one of the steps in the process. It's not like a site plan approval where I can just approve it the counter. There's a little more steps in the process to it. I don't know if we've answered your question about what's the minor exception, what's the Reasoning we could put for security and for noise, noise and security. Obviously, in the end, we've had a couple properties there that wanted to do 12-foot tall, solid wall, you know the sound wall to it but obviously now it's something we can do in our approve but here so here's something as I'm reading this I really didn't want to get into the weeds here but it says unless approved by minor exception for properties and it says demonstrated which is a big word and excessive. Those are, you have to demonstrate it, and it has to be excessive. What is excessive? So why don't we take out demonstrated and excessive, and for properties with street noise or security concerns? I'll speak to anybody Anybody can say that one car. That's the whole idea, isn't it? I need to. Well, the, the, the, what I was looking for was the, the council said no walls needs a standard of modification. There needs to be a reason. How about the reason the homeowner wants a six-foot block wall for security and for noise abatement? Isn't that reason enough? I mean, well as I said security, it's not a reason, but I mean I can think of a city council member who I wish would put a six-foot wall up in front of his house so that we don't look at it. I won't mention any games. All right well Mr. Woodard you got enough to go on. You can send us something and then we review it. Make comments and hopefully get it. I don't mean to be the dead horse here. I don't like long meetings, but I think this is important. I want to give people the choice. Okay. You have a puzzled look on your face. No, I was just saying if somebody could phrase that in an emotion. Okay. So, somebody make a motion that we're going to refer this back to staff. Want to make the. Wanna make the motion, Mr. Brooks? All right, I'll do my best here. So I'd like to make a motion to refer these changes in our code to go up to City Council with the following changes. No, it's coming back to us. Didn't you say it's coming back to us? No, he's just going to once he re-writes it, he's going to email it to us for like a last little check, then go to the council. We can do that, right? I can share with you and you can respond to me, not as a group, but to make sure that it's kind of what we talked about here. So we'll take out in the second paragraph, demonstrated and excessive street noise. And where is the chain link fence on side yards shall be green, brown, or black? Well, you don't want to say side yards because it's other yards. The language was allowed, chain link fencing must be green, black, or brown. Okay. I'm fine with that. So allowed chain link fencing must be green, black, or brown. And I think that's it, right? Right. Okay, so that's the motion. Is there a second? With those specific changes you mentioned, I will say. Seconded. Okay. Okay, take a vote, Mr. Lucas. Yes. Mr. Brooks. Yes. Mr. Blackden. Yes. Mrs. Spinoza. And I vote yes, so it's unanimous. Thank you guys. Sorry that took so long. Okay, now we're going to go to agenda item nine. item 9. This is harmonizing fuel modification requirements with landscape screening ordinance and this was continued from February 25th. Is another kind of tough one, huh? So this is more of like a series and an ongoing one that we've had a little conversation in the past about landscaping and fuel modification. Council on it, the commission and public safety emergency preparedness committee to look at the fire dangers and the concerns, especially after everything that happened in January and look at as they're a way to harmonize our landscaping requirements, the fuel modification requirements and put those pieces together. We've had some of those conversations in the past year at the planning commission level. One of the other components to it is fuel modification, which has some very specific set of guidelines. It's a component of the fire code and building codes that require those type of things. It's done, it gets very technical very quickly. Now as part of that, we do have a specialist that review those fuel modification plans and landscaping plans to make sure that spacing of plant materials work with groups and other different types of plant materials. What is being planted is nothing is fireproof, but a fire resistive material. It's going to have a higher component to catching on fire and burning in those things. We obviously see a lot of that conflict between our screening requirements and fuel modification requirements. Sometimes it gets down to be very technical in how you place trees and shrubs and groups on properties to be able to get to screening and those things like that. But we do have our technical expert, Mr. Frailey here. He works for Dennis Crab and Associates and has been reviewing our fuel modification plans. He has had a long fire career and specialized in fuel modification and those review and inspection of those plans. And we were at our emergency preparedness committee last Thursday. We wanted to come tonight and have him be able to give a little bit of background and information on fuel modification, the requirements and also for the commission be able to ask Mr. Freely some of those questions and comments and get a little bit of a discussion. And then from here we'll probably end up doing is having a joint study session with City Council of Plenty Commission and the emergency preparedness committee to kind of talk about some more of those. Fire concerns, fuel modification, reducing fuel loads and our landscape requirements for projects and housing to make some changes as we see just this ever climbing fire risk in Southern California and our community. I'll hand it over to you. You're okay? I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to you. I'll hand it over to Mr. Freely. You can touch on a little bit of it and then I'm sure you guys have a bunch of questions for me. Mr. Freely before you start and thank you for being here. I just want to be kind of clear on something and you probably know this but just in case so. We're kind of battling. We have a requirement that new homes have to be screened by trees, shrubbery, whatever, 50%. And then, but then we have all these new codes. So that's where the conflict is. Some people want, hey, we don't want to see the house on top of your rich line. And then, of course, we have the fire. So to me, it's pretty clear and cut. I would think fire safety trumps screening of a house. So I would think we're going to have a working group, right? Because that's too big of an issue, I think, for us to, you know, settle in one night. So I think that's where the conflict is, and I for one, I'm really scared of fires. I've rebuilt many homes that have been burned, and I don't like it, and I want to prevent it in this city. So if you go ahead, please. No, yeah, thank you for having me here. I'm glad to be here. And I know that you guys had had, you know, started a discussion back in February. And since we're here with such a relatively small group, you guys have familiarity, awareness of what a field modification plan is. And to your point, what you're talking about, you know, I definitely notice like in the screening ordinance just kind of going through the report and there's like some definite conflicts that stick out and even in like the pictograms from the screening form because virtually you know a very large percentage of your city is in the, you know, if somebody's going to build a new house or do an addition because that's on the books, they're going to have to do a fuel modification plan. And so when you have a screening ordinance that shows the trees literally against the house, but that's in direct conflict with the fuel mod plan plan. Fulmont plans are part of, it's a safety element. So like all the way down to like we were talking about splitting the parcel map earlier today. It's all the way down the subdivision map back to level. So it's super important that, so it's tricky like we were talking about, you have this situation where, okay, you can't have a much more tree canopy within 10 feet of the structure, but then you have the screening requirements that you're trying to accomplish. And so it just gets down to every project, is going to be super specific because you're We're going to be trying to meet the spirit or the intent of the screening. But because of the tree spacing, you know, that's going to be the main thing. And then shrubs, you can't, the shrubs, you can't have big massing and groupings of shrubs. And there's ground cover that's required in certain areas. So that's the, I think that's the biggest thing with this screening thing is, and with appreciation to your concern for the big, I'll call them campaign fires, the two fires that we had, but we're just catastrophic here early in the year, is there really, in my opinion, the focus has to be very principally on the construction features of the house. And those are already a requirement, like the project that was here earlier, that's all I was thinking about was, okay, and I know that that will come up when there's a preliminary field mod plan for that example that we had where the lots are gonna be split. But for that project with so much topography below the houses, and yeah, they'll be able to do their maintenance, but the question that you have to answer is, okay, what is going to happen when the embers from a fire in the area, how are they going to communicate with that structure or that house? And then, you know, what you do to design your fuel mon plan and how this interplay for the screening, that all works together. So that's a big challenge, but I would really look at those pictograms and go, okay, well, what percentage of projects in the city are not going to have a fuel mod plan? Because from every time I do a review, I look at the zone and it's the high, high percentage of the city is in the old map. It was in the very high, farce of very zone. They've kind of diversified the zones out. But at the end of the day, whether it's a moderate, high or a very high zone, you're still going to be doing a fuel modification plan and you're still going to have the same construction features. All those colors really mean is just that the map that the state put out is they're just saying that those are their hazard maps. So they're just saying that if it's in a moderate zone, they're just saying that it's not as hazardous, as if it's in the very high, they're saying, oh, that's a higher hazard level, where insurance is looking at risk. These maps are hazard maps. A lot of people like to try to say, oh, these maps have to do with insurance companies and how they look at it. They have insurance companies have their own algorithm for what they're looking at. That's one of the things that jumped out at me. And we're talking about having harmony between fuel mod and the screening. Because I'm not sure how this screening, I could see how it's manifesting itself in the current pictograms that I saw. It's directly adjacent to the house, the way it's shown, and that's just in opposition of what we're trying to accomplish with a fuel mod plan. So most houses have that I've seen or reviewed, even on the additions, they have large yards. And they have, so the screening could be farther away, not in all cases, but it doesn't fit with that. So like when you're trying to review for or the screening coverage versus what I'm looking at, they're just gonna be, it's gonna, you're not gonna accomplish the screening, what you're trying to do with the screening there based on what I've seen. Another thing too, I know you guys were just talking about the prior item about fencing. And there is fencing in the fuel modification guideline also. And what I've come across in other cities where they do have a very specific ordinance for fencing. And a lot of times with bill modification, alternate means and methods are used because they can't meet the spirit or the straight intent of the code intent for the fire code for chapter 49 for certain distances for film odd and things like that. And so lots of times in my past doing reviews for other areas, they integrate C and U walls into the fire protection plan. So they've referenced it as a radiant heat walls. So it's actually part of the overall mitigation design. And so it's very common that we would have the four foot walls with like maybe the tempered two foot of glass or a full six foot CMU wall. Or even in some cases when they do a fire behavior report they're going to try to do a taller wall. So I just wanted to and fences and you know non-combustible wood it's in the fuel modification guideline. You guys have that in your fencing guideline, but not specific to the way it stated in fuel mods. So I don't know if you wanna have any kind of leeway to if somebody's doing something with a fence to reference back that there is fencing criteria in the fuel modification guideline, which my understanding it's an ordinance that's adopted on your city books. The field modification guideline is actually codified, right? Those are the big things that jump out to me in terms of harmonizing what you're trying to accomplish with screening and feel modification. Just in terms of the overall big picture, when somebody's, it's just really important that the, you know, I know you guys are a fire wise, recognized city and it's just really important that the community members really focus on what's immediately adjacent to their house, whether it's just an existing house or they're building a new house and really that immediate zone, that first 5'10 feet, if they can do a good job there or improve maybe some of the issues you might have with the older home, that's going to make the community safer. Because what you saw with these fires is you, these weren't wildfires, these were conflagrations. So you had it started in the wildfire, but once they started and they got into where homes were in alignment and in proximity to each other. It's kind of like the tip of the spear. When you get that first house that starts and then we had these winds that were you know consistent for hours and hours 60 to 90 miles an hour you're just taking fuel and putting it in alignment and so once it's burning and then the you you know, the fuel and the heat and everything is just basically pushing horizontally down through the drainages. However, the topography is going to yield it and that's what we had with those fires and that's that's the worst case scenario. So you want to try to get in a situation where you have better breaks and you have situations where when those embers from the actual initial wildland come and hit those initial structures, they don't find anything receptive to burn. That's the ultimate the ultimate goal when you're trying to mitigate in these communities. And so that's specifically kind of like what we're talking about with the screening that's really close to the house because you're just creating, you're creating, you know, if you have the wrong type of stuff there, you have mulch on the ground as opposed to pea gravel. I know that's not popular. But you have that kind of stuff, or you have shrubs under the windows, or you have trees that aren't maintained. Those are all possible. Or patio furniture, or the wrong type of construction for patio covers and things like that. And it's just a challenge because you have a lot of, you know, ornamental, developed vegetation and construction that runs the gamut of being 50, 60, 70 years old all the way through a new construction. So that's the challenge. But what other questions that you guys have that, in terms of the screening versus fuel mod, what's come up in the past because I'd be curious to learn from you guys because in my experience, there's very little or no coordination between the city landscape review and a fuel model review. There's just kind of disconnected. So I appreciate this opportunity for us to have this conversation. Hopefully it's hopeful. Let me, one quick comment before I call on the commission. I don't know how you could say that's a little coordination. When plans are planned, they're submitted. They go to the fire department. So how can you say that it's a little coordination? What more coordination do we need in to send you complete set of plans that have landscape plans and a fuel modification plan Included in the whole set. I don't understand your comment. Well, right. He's with Dennis Grubbs office and correct me if I'm wrong when they do the first planning does it it doesn't go to Dennis Grub It goes to our fire department, doesn't it? Or does it go to Dennis? No. Our fire department over there, they're purely operations. So all the planning and building review go through Dennis Grab and Associates, so it goes through that. But it's more of that like us in the planning side are trying to build a lot more landscaping in. and the fuel mod side of it is trying to place that in a strategic manner so we are not creating a greater fire danger so there's some sort of right between that. I guess my question is so if there is a landscape review in the city is that a concurrent of you like it's given to us and we were looking at the same thing? Yes. Okay. Okay. A good example is that one on aerosol where we had the applicant come back multiple times to refine the landscaping plan. And then it went to fire chink plan check and basically threw it out the window. And you know the applicant wasted all that money paying the landscape architect for revisions. It would be better I think for them to have the landscape architect do the landscape plan and have it checked by fire before it comes to us so then we can maybe Make some other adjustments that might make for more landscaping Because how many times is that happened that we look at landscaping plans and approve them and then they go to Fire plan check and they cross everything out. Yeah, but that's been I think more recent when the new fire codes and you're right about aerosol, but they normally I would think the landscape architect does the fuel modification plan, isn't it? So, landscape architecture are the ones that do the fuel modification. No, they should know. They can read the code just like we can. Other questions, comments? I mean, yeah, you would think they would have our fuel modification plan in screening requirements and build that into their design, but it sounds like when we get them, a lot of them don't and they get sent back and forth. So I'm not sure how we reinforce that with the architects to make sure as much as possible, we first receive is pretty accurate and meets the code. Well, I think that's the whole purpose of this is to combine the two and because the fuel modification trumps the landscaping, I just feel like we should change our landscaping code to be the same as the fuel modification. Only say screening of the house is at 50%. So that they're looking at the landscape rules and regulations about trees and clumping and distances and heights and plants, you know, with what they can put in the different zones because we have our landscape plan and then we have our fuel modified, it's two separate parts. And the time that I've been on the commission, they get landscape architects from out of town and they don't really look at the fuel modification and they just go over here and it just goes back and forth so I think the goal should be to make our landscape plan the same as the fuel modification plan and then just add the things that we want the fuel modification plan to do as far as you know partial screening of the house that's I think that should be our ultimate goal here so I think it'll be a lot easier in the long run for people to get it approved if they start with the landscape or with the fuel modification plan. So, anyway, that's my thoughts. Yeah, and that's, I appreciate everybody's feedback. I mean, that's in my experience, that's what has happened many times, is where the fuel modification review would be, would happen, but then it goes through a landscape review and it can even be, just depends on what's going on. It can be even changed because landscape review, it gets changed because they have other requirements that, you know, basically wouldn't align what the requirements of the field mod. So that's where it is just very challenging. And you know, when I'm not embedded with you guys and working with you right here at the city, it just becomes, you know, just becomes challenging. But at the, you know, really, I mean, the, you know, I don't have to say this, but the wildfire thing isn't, it's just a matter of when it happens here, you know, it's going to happen. And we just, so many communities have been fortunate, but it's just, it's just, and it's just, it's not, it's not going to go away. It's just, it just gets to be more and more of a challenge. And so I think the more clear that it can be for applicants as early as possible. And most of the landscape architects that, you know, when I come across, especially on single-family houses, But there's only a small percentage of them that have a higher level knowledge of the film modification stuff. A lot of them are not used to it. Because the majority of landscaping is not going to be, they're not going to have to do a film modification plan, because it not in one of these identified zones or you know, wherever the area is because most landscaping is down on the grid away from the hills in terms of just the numbers of it all. And so that's a big challenge just to have them have that information. But that's the main thing I see is that screen is showing so close to the houses. Well, does any of the other commissioners, I mean do you guys have a problem with us changing the landscape plan to be the same as the fuel modification plan and then just add a little bit that we can to the fuel modification plan about screening. And because they can put trees but they're spaced. And so if their goal is to put in accordance with the fuel modification plan and do the screening, they'll take that approach and it won't bounce back and forth a dozen times. I think that's the solution. And just combine the verbiage and a few meetings ago when we first started talking about that. I brought up about the pictures that are in there that it's like we can't put trees right up against the house anyway you know with 10 foot minimum setback from the fully grown canopy you know I'm not even sure that safe. I have a big oak tree that's It's probably 15 or 20 feet from my roof line and I'm starting to trim that back. So anyway, so I don't know where we're going to go with this. So let me miss us, Finale, do you have a comment? Only then everybody's basically saying the same thing. I think we need to be as concerned as possible about fuel modification and a secondary concern is screening. So I don't know how to do that, but I think that's what we need to do. I think perhaps the approval process should start with fuel modification and screening to be secondary. And I think about the block wall thing, in terms of screening, that clearly doesn't make sense under these circumstances, but I agree. I think everybody's saying the same thing. We want to be safe, and we want it to be pretty, but we want it to be safe first. I have a couple of comments of Ms. Blagden. You have anything else? Yes. Yeah, I think they can, I don't see that there is necessarily that much conflict between them. It's just a matter of adjusting the landscaping to meet the fuel modification requirements and the proposed plan. For example, the shrubs and trees are supposed to be staggered, so many feet apart. But if you have a couple of rows of them, they can fill the gaps so that you get your screening. So someone might come in with a plan and they want to set back modification and Doing the setback modification won't allow that extra row of landscaping for the screening So they just need to modify the plan not to have the setback modification Is the possibility same thing grading? Through the way you grade the lot affects how much landscaping you need to screen the structure. Now there's the alternative means and methods, and it's mentioned here in the handout. So other things people can do with the house, like external sprinklers or materials, so that they can have more landscaping. Yeah, they can exceed the construction requirements. So if you're building a house, you're using the residential code. So there's CRC-333-R337 is the wild land, wildfire mitigation codes and the residential code. So yeah, there's basically for each type of component like say a roofing, siding, windows doors. It gives you the best case scenario of how to build that and they all start with like more of like a non combustible assembly versus and it works its way down to like an ignition Resistant type design tells you how to you need to assemble you know Wall assemblies and different things like that and it goes through a detail So yes, there are cases where somebody could propose to exceed you know or show the. Instead of, you know, can do like a flat-seeing metal roof and no eaves and no vents and all sorts of stuff that is pretty common. But typically they get into that when they have some sort of a deficiency for distance or setback. one of the things that I'm not gonna talk about it too much, you guys have this fuel modification guideline, but I also have to consider the California fire safety, fire safe regulation. So California has this, it's called Title 14, and anywhere that's in the very high fire severity zone, so like if we're talking about the old maps, I know they just proposed the new map that's coming, but when you look at the map and you look at this city, and you look at anywhere that's read that Title 14 California Fire Safety Regulations apply. So there's other things that are very challenging. One of the things that comes up is there's supposed to be a 30 foot setback. So these aren't the normal planning setbacks that you would think in a city. The setbacks are 30 feet from the center of roadway or to property lines. Now here you guys, I haven't seen too much of an issue with it because the, you know, the lots tend to have more distance. But anywhere else in Southern California, nobody has that set back. But they're in the severity zones. And the code does allow for you to have less than that if you have other provisions. So, there is a someone can have more landscaping with the alternative means and methods possibly. That's typically not a practice where you have more landscaping because you're still, yeah, you're not building in trying to, you're building an alternate means and methods because you can't meet the intent of the minimum code. We can't create a situation where, okay, we're going to have, we're going to exceed the construction features so that we can not have to follow the planting code intent. You're just the ire's. The fuel modification guideline here, page three, F. If you cannot meet the requirements of the fuel modification guideline for total distance of the zones, alternate plant species, a horizontal spacing and group distance, and alternative materials and methods of request lettuce will be drafted and submitted with the plants. Correct. So pretty much most new houses that are here have an AEM and M, and frankly most projects have an AEM because you get into distance to hydrants, Like our hydrant spacing is a little bit wonky up here. And then also you get a lot of property that are down long driveways. And when you're measuring those distances, those host-bull distances, they can't meet those host-bull distances. So pretty much almost every new house that we approve has an M&M. And a lot of times people that are doing just large additions or in that AM&M requirement which kind of takes ratchets is up our requirements for you know class A roof. A lot of that is in the building code anyways because we're in that wildland urban interface area so we have to do like the class A roof and the embraces and vents anded windows and Fire sprinkles we have additional fire sprinkler requirements and in closets and bathrooms and garage and attic and Some of those requirements just because yeah, we get into like those pull distance issues and things like that So that's why most of our projects end up with the NAM and yeah, so the the projects projects currently don't meet the letter of the whichever requirements they are, fire building, and so alternative means and methods is a way to get where you want to go. So I'm just saying that landscaping can get that too. Yeah, then if you look on page five, number four, halfway down, I talked roughly about this before. It says the purpose of the setback zone is to provide a de-vensible space in no-case, shall zone A be less than the 30-fit minimum width. The entire zone is to be located on a level graded area at the top or base of the slope, which is almost impossible to do here. And this isn't bold print. Yep. So this is something that can't be done in the city for the most part. Yeah, so that's a case in point where somebody's showing an A-zone with a slope. That's where they should be doing an alternate means and methods because the way that's explained it's, you know, so worst case scenario. the operational groups that are trying to respond to the house, they need to be able to, the whole idea of it being flat is that it's, if there's the fire behavior with flat is going to be less effective, in a way the fire moves, if it's flat versus with topography, because then fire can come up from below towards the structure or however that's oriented. And then obviously it's very difficult in dark smoky conditions to navigate walking around up and down on a slope versus flat ground. So to your point, this is the intent, but most every addition and everything, they're going to have, they're, their, their A zone is going to be sloped. If you have a, a traditional like tract where it's done by a builder, let's just say they have a, a piece of land that has a little bit of topography, but they're going to grade it because they're going to break it up and they're going to build a little track of like 10 houses. Those are going to be mostly like they're going to be able to maybe make the in that situation they'll make the lots. Each lot will be maybe more flat, but that's the intent here. And so, but yeah, I mean, for most of the reviews that I've had, that it's sometimes they might be flat-ish, but there's slope. The other thing that I was kind of talking to before, we started the meeting, and when I do a film mod review, I'm doing it. The understanding is that it's very early in the project. It's, you know, at the time, like if you have to do, if there's a map that has to be involved, we should be doing a preliminary film mod before that map is moved forward. Because when we do a film mod review, I mean, we're accounting for the location of where the structure can be. I have to, some of the title 14, some of the big things are the access. So like just as an example of the one we were looking at either with the two lots, if those driveways are more than 150 feet from the public roadway, then they're supposed to be a turnaround within 50 feet of those houses. So those look like they were maybe a little bit, they drive ways to look like they might be short enough on that example, which is optimally that's what that designer, that's what they should be going for. If they're longer, if it's like a 250 foot, then they don't have the flat. They don't, they don't won't be able to do the turn around. And that's, that's minimum state code. Now in your review, are you able to or desire to make recommendations? Like if you saw that the tentative map with the lot splits in the driveway, maybe went to 160 feet. Do you just say this needs its own hydrant? Can you say if you reduce the driveway length 10 feet, you're okay? Yeah, there's cases like that where I mean, chapter five of the fire code allows for, so this is the fire code. This isn't the fire safe regulations. It allows for when a building is sprinklered, it allows for the access to go beyond 150 feet. It allows the fire code official to say, okay, well, the building is sprinklered. So the code intent of the access to the building is 150 feet, but if it's more than 150 feet and the building is sprinklered and every new house has sprinklers. So we can extend that. That's what chapter five of the fire code says. So, but I'm not looking at it through that lens. I'm looking it through the fire safe regulations But you you just when you look at them it's Up or down can you say if you know it's if you put in sprinklers you'll be able to do this well sprinklers Already requirement they look at additional like dry standpipe and other other things like that as well And those are alternatives that can work on that plan review process. So we've had projects where driveway links or distances to hydrants have necessitated the installation of like dry standpipes or other, we've had somewhere, they've been conditioned to add a hydrant if it's available to do, but yeah, typically plan reviewer will say, okay. All right, so I'm just seeing if in the process you have to help people comply with the codes rather than just saying no. Right and where it's really challenging is because the ordinance for additions that trigger fuel modification plan so you'll have folks that you know have any whatever size house and they're doing in addition that's relative to the house that's small but they're doing a fuel mod plan. And then they have obviously have an existing driveway. It could be well over 150 feet and they don't have a turnaround. And so now that they're doing a fuel mod plan because that's what's required of whatever their project with their addition. So with each one of those case by case, you just kind of look at it and you just wanna make sure that it's gonna meet the intent of what the code is. It's not always gonna be a perfect fit. There's a certain amount of, you try to be as objective as you can, but with these types of, everything is different. And when you have an alternate means and methods, or you have a code deficiency, there has to be sort of a give and take with whatever the given situation is. So there is gray, it's not just black or white. Yeah, I mean there is absolutely, there is no way to like absolutely do the same mitigation over and over again in a bunch of different situations. It's not the same. Now when I've looked at the pictures like of Altadena, palisades, or actually other fires, or when the first thing that was was your Belinda in background 2008, is that the houses burn, but the vegetation right next to them is green. So, and there were articles in the, I think, the Eaton Fire where people saw the embers go into the tree, it was the odorseters that happened to be, and the embers died. So the trees were actually protective. They weren't heightened risk. Yeah, they can be where they don't, certain types of trees can basically not spread the fire, they're resistant, they're resistant to it, but you've got to remember that if we're going to just talk about the fuel, if we just talk about BTUs, you know, so if we talk about what the vegetation is and if, you know, how much heat and what it's going to put off compared to a structure, I mean, if we were going to take this house and say, okay, we've got, you know, some palm trees and some pine trees out in the vegetation and, you know, they're literally, Okay, the pine trees are 80 feet feet tall and if we're gonna take that house and go okay well if that fuel was converted into trees if we were just to try to match like and say that that fuel was trees then we'd be looking at 300 foot tall pine trees that's what happens when we have conflagration it asks so much heat and fuel. And then when it's in alignment, and it's just blowing horizontally into the house that's 18 feet away, 12 feet away. Yeah, I'm just saying that the vegetation isn't automatically a fire risk. Ir irrigated vegetation can be protective. It can be, but also too, with irrigation, like on these types of properties, the more you irrigate and the more you get into that, the more you're just growing fuel. So it's a slippery slope with just irrigating. You want to have? Oh yeah, you've got to clear the weeds. Yeah, you want to have the type of vegetation that will basically sustain itself, you know, basically in the natural environment with very little water and also be fire resistant. Problem is, is those types of plants, most of them are high in resins and oils because they don't need that much water because they have resins and oils and those types of, it's shifting to more like succulents and like cacti and things like that to where they need very little water. So that's, it's just a challenge. All right, thank you Mr. Fraley. All right, I'd like to wrap this up. One thing that occurred to me, you brought up a good point. Block walls can act as a barrier. And when we're trying to give the city council why, they should allow the block walls can act as a barrier and when we're trying to give the city council why they should allow the block walls I think obviously I mentioned security, privacy, noise reduction and we can add fire protection to that. Then just one quick comment, you mentioned landscape architects don't do the fuel modification, they're not keenly aware of it. I think they are starting to become more keenly aware, but the problem is they're hired to make the house look pretty. And to do the screening, this privacy, and the last thing on their mind is that, and Mr. Brooks, he hit it on the nail. All we got to do is the landscape requirements are by the field modification and then at a paragraph, hey, try to screen the house the best you can as long as it meets field modifications. I don't know if we need a big long committee to come up with that. But what do you think? We'll have that joint study session so we can also let the EPC members weigh in along with council I know it's and it's also looking at Like mr. Ferrier was saying It's the stuff in our yards as well So it's not just like the landscaping it's the other things that are also fuel and looking at that's one of the things that council wants Brush Claire to look at this year is Stuff in people's yards if we have people that have a lot of junk trash and debris, that's also fuel. It's not just the vegetation that becomes fuel. It's also the other things that are there as well. So we're gonna see a larger impact in a bigger conversation. But we'll get together with a much larger group and kind of have a good discussion and make some changes from there. You know, you bring up fuel. I mean, we always talk talking about code enforcement. I can point you to two houses that have piles of lumber right close to the house. And I mean, there's one on East Road that house by the golf course at all. Why Spanish style? They've had wood. It's turned color. Why? You know, that's an obvious, you know, it's a nuisance and they're still there there for years Same thing down the street from me. So we're talking about all the stuff making all these plans for people You can have a tree here, but not there, but you can have your old construction debris next your house so I think that's That should be a priority for the city So okay anything else? Yeah, I just have one final because it would be quick So I think this may be a priority for the city. So, okay, anything else? Yeah, I just have one final, because it would be quick. So, I think this may be a heavy lift, potentially a lot of different opinions and committees and so on. So, what is the process to get eventually, pen the paper and who takes that role to actually make the modifications and edits and reviews? I mean, is that the city or how's that hit? Typically that would be us at staff level. We would take all of the bits and pieces from the groups, get direction from council. Ultimately we'll give us the ultimate council direction on what to include, how to make those changes, and then get those drafts out to the committees and the council to review and tweak before we go to the formal ordinance quoted option process. Okay, thank you for your presentation, Mr. Frailey. It's much appreciated. Okay, do we have any public comments? We don't have people calling in anymore, right? There's still the option for people to call in, but not as much anymore. Okay. So we don't have it. Okay. How about staff comments? Just a couple of things that are coming up here pretty quickly. This weekend is quarterly cleanup, speaking of traction debris and yard waste. So this coming Saturday at the park where we'll have the quarterly cleanup. And also in the morning we're gonna be doing the Hossian road cleanup as well. So if anybody's interested in volunteering for that, you can give us a call here at City Hall or email beautify LHH at gmail.com and Mr. Dominguez kind of puts that group together. We typically meet here at City Hall at 645 and then go out out onto Hossianda and pick up some letter along Hossianda. So that's first thing in the morning and eight to noon is the quarterly cleanup. And then coming up on May 3rd is a compost giveaway. So where we'll be doing a compost, give away at the park between 8 and 10.30 I believe. So if you have want some compost, you need to bring your own containers and they all have the truck there and you can load up some green waste or some compost and add it to your vegetable gardens or whatever you may have. So that's all I have. Thank you. Commission Commissar and Mrs. Penosa. Ligdon. Thank you. When I was looking at the Castellero site, I drove down past it and looked back up at it. And then I continued on to the turnaround. And at the bottom of Castellero is supposed to be, it's like at least 20 or 25 foot wide fire road improved for a fire truck. That's for both for the people on West Skyline and Castileiro to escape if there's a fire and they can't get out to us, the under-arge hill, and also for the fire truck to be able to come up. That was a subdivision requirement and a building requirement for those houses and doesn't look like it was done to me. A few years ago, a planning commissioner and I drove up from loop and hill up that path and it was fine, but it looks closed in and it doesn't look like it was improved. So that's just an observation. Mr. Brooks? No, I didn't have any comment till Mr. Blackden brought that up. And I didn't know that that was part of the subdivision or their requirements. I thought it was just something that was their property and they attached it. I know there was some conflict with the person who, like the road actually goes right through their middle of their driveway. And there's a lock to gate on it now. So I don't know whether the fire department's aware of that. If it's the right kind of lock but but yeah see as how I live on that street and that would be one of my potential exits maybe that's something that you could look into so I hate to be selfish or personal here but it is something that I actually wasn't aware of it so So anyway, thank you. Mr. Lucas. No further comment. Yeah, you know, I was down there too. And you're talking about at the end of the call sack on the right that dirt road. Yeah, right between the, actually, I think the house, the, with the brown. Yeah, I don't know if that is a six foot wall. But yeah, but just to the right of that house at the bottom. I thought that was just an off-roading trail. I can go on my Jeep. But the only comment I have is I just want to thank my fellow commissioners. I know you have other things that you could be doing. Being home with your wives or researching the code for you. So I think it's a big thing that you want to contribute to a community, so I appreciate that. And with that, meeting adjourned. And thank you for staff too. I know you put up with a lot of abuse sometimes at the counter.