All right, hello everyone, good evening. Thank you so much for joining us. Tonight is Tuesday, May 6, 2025, and I am calling this meeting into session of the Berkley City Council meeting. So we would like to start off with a roll, please clerk. Okay, council member Kessar Wani. There's a lot of it here. Kaplan, present. Bartlett. Bartlett? here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. going to meeting of this month, and so that means we'll be reading our land acknowledgement statement. And I'm going to, we've been taking turns, and so tonight is Council Member Blackbees night, and he's in District 6. So thank you so much, Council Member. Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to read the land acknowledgement tonight. The City of Berkeley recognizes that the community we live in was built on the territory of Hujun people, the ancestral and unseated land of Fichocenio speaking O'Lone people. The answer... recognizes that the community we live in was built on the territory of Hujun people, the ancestral and unseated land of the Chocenio speaking Olone people, the ancestors and descendants of the sovereign Verona band of Elameda County. This land was and continues to be of great importance to all of the Olone tribes and descendants of the Verona band. As we begin our meeting tonight, we acknowledge and honor the original inhabitants of Berkeley, the documented 5,000 year history of a vibrant community at the West Berkeley Shell mound, and the Olone people who continue to reside in the East Bay. We recognize that Berkeley's residents have and continue to benefit from the use and occupation of this unceded stolen land since the City of Berkeley's incorporation in 1878. As stewards of the laws regulating the City of Berkeley, it is not only vital that we recognize the history of this land, but also recognize that the Olone people are present members of Berkeley and other East Bay communities today. The City of Berkeley will continue to build relationships with the Legion tribe and to create meaningful actions that uphold the intention of this land acknowledgement. Thank you very much. Now this evening, for ceremonial items, we are actually going to push back the adjournment in memory for John Bo-Laurier. Bo-Laurier, thank very much for the pronunciation. His family won't be able to come until a later meeting. And although we did adjourn in the memory of David Chicken, Nezmith, his, when it was not able to attend until this evening. And so I believe that she is on Zoom to join us. And I'm going to ask the clerk to help us find her to give some commentary. Thank you so much for joining us this evening. I appreciate it. Thanks for your time. Overshed. Can you hear me now? Yes, we can hear you now. Oh good. I just wanted to thank Igor and all the council members for honoring my beloved spouse, chicken, David Nessness last week. And I'm really grateful to accept your invitation to follow up tonight with a few words, further words about my hero. He was known as a super effective political strategist for the environment. and I'm going to share with you tonight his secret potion for success. Respect and love your opponent. He'd take his opponents out for tea, he'd learn all their children's names, and he'd never forget them, and he'd invite them to get in a boat with him where they would inevitably fall in love with the river or the part of the bay he was battling for. He fought the East Bay mud to protect the McCallamy River as wilderness. That's the water we drink every day. That's the river that gives us our clean water, some of the cleanest in the world. He sued the pants off of them. He was a pain in their ass and he took them on river trips to fall in love with the river. And when the McCallamy came up for a vote, it was right after his big stroke, and he came to the board meeting in his wheelchair to speak, halting in his few simple words as he had practiced over and over. And he said, this is before they voted by you. He said, thank you for saving the river for the fish and for the birds and for all the young people who will enjoy its beauty for generations to come. And the board leaped up and gave him a standing ovation. And then they sat down and voted unanimously to protect our McCallamy River. I have one other thing about him. I wanna hold up before you, that he loved young people. And that's what gave him hope for the future. He mentored teenage drafting guides for inner city outings, and he mentored young activists for the environment, and he played a critical role co-founding with me Bishop O'Dodd High School's living lab, large restoration project powered by students on a former quarry site, and now it has an environmental study center and native ecosystems and a farm, and he uplead weekly field trips and international science expeditions and camping adventures, and in the process, he mentored hundreds and hundreds of teens who have now gone on to become many of them activists. A month ago, as he was dying, hundreds of people came to pay their respects. And all who came told him that he had inspired them to dedicate their lives to working for the environment, for justice, and for joy, and to having fun all the way. Thank you for letting me speak about chicken David Nessmith, my hero. Thank you so much for sharing that with us. I'm really glad we were able to hear from you this evening. I'm so sorry for your loss. So one thing that I need to do before we continue on our meeting is to report out from our closed session City attorney. I have the paragraph that you sent me and the City Council directed the City Attorney to initiate an action Once formally commenced the action defendants and other particular shall be disclosed to any person upon inquiry Unless to do so would jeopardize the city's ability to effectuate service of process on one or more unserved parties or jeopardize the city's ability to effectuate service of process on one or more unserved parties or jeopardize the city's ability to conclude existing settlement negotiations to its advantage. That completes our report out from closed session. Thank you very much. City manager, did you have comments? I have one Madam Mayor. Thank you. Just wanted to let folks in the audience who are here for the two I related items know that those are both going to be moved to June 17th. That's item one, which is a Cal Fire map item and also the item nine, which is the fire code amendments. So we wanted to have more time to work with the community on both of those. And for today, if you're here for those, we have both Assistant Chief Arnold and Chief David Sprague in the back. Who are happy to talk to people today if you're here for that? That's all. Thank you very much, City Manager. And so just to clarify, so for items one and nine, if you're here for either of those items, we've got folks who are experts that you can ask questions to you in the back. and I will probably ask you all the step outside since I imagine that will get noisy. But before that happens, I'm going to pass it over to Councillor Boulacca be who also has a related announcement. Great, thank you. I just want to thank the city manager for moving the consideration of those two items to June 17th. As we've discussed over the past few weeks, our office, I think many offices have received a lot of emails and calls about neighbors with questions about Ember and what the new zone zero requirements will mean for them. As district six is elected representative to the C council representing nearly 1800 households in the very high fire hazard severity zone and thousands more that are in the high zone. I do wanna make sure that every constituent, every neighbor, every person who lives in Berkeley has a chance to get the facts about Ember before the proposal receives a vote and asks questions and gets clarification. It's really important that we work together as a community in this important effort and I want to make sure that we take the time to answer questions before we move forward. I've reflected with a few people this week, it's important to me not that we just pass a policy, we could pass a policy, we could pass the policy tonight. But ultimately it's more important that we reach the 60, 70, 80% participation that we need to make the defensible space in the community hardening effort successful. That's really what success is about. It's about being safe and protecting the community. So if people have questions and concerns, let's absolutely address them. Let's explain the fire department's thinking. Let's hear what other people have to say. Let's make tweaks to how we'll implement it and finance it. I do want to move expeditiously so we can do the work that we all know we need to do to make our homes and neighborhoods safer, but more important than passing the policy is that we all commit to doing the hard but necessary work together. So to that end, over this time period, let me just share one thing really quickly and I will be done. I do want to invite folks to two important Ember workshops. The whole reason for taking this time, people want time for questions, let's do it. On May 15th, we're having a Zoom webinar open to everyone. Questions, answers, we're going to take directly some of the challenges and the concerns that people have had, give people chances to ask questions of people who can answer them. Please RSVP at this bitly link. It's bit.ly slash May 15th, and that'll get you the link to the Zoom. And then we're also doing an in-person workshop on May 27th at Northbury Community Church. Use the bit link there to RSVP. Please come. The whole point of taking this time is to do more of this outreach and to have the conversation with the community. So please come to one of these meetings. I'm pleased to say the mayor is going to be there. Many of our colleagues will be there. The fire department will be there. We'll hear from other academic folks who've got a lot of work in this area. And we will hear from you. We'll hear from individual constituents. So please do come. Let's make best use of the time before we come back on 17th. So thank you Madam Mayor and thanks to the City Manager. Thank you all so much. So if folks have questions about that, I'm gonna ask that you go meet our chief and our chiefs outside. Thank you. Thank you all so much. So if folks have questions about that, I'm going to ask that you go meet our chief and our chiefs outside. Thank you. Is our city auditor here? Do you have any comments, city auditor, if you are online or? Is she online? Do you see her? No. Okay. I just wanted to make sure. Okay. In that case, we will move on to public comment on non-agenda matters. And it matters. Oh. Okay. So for the cards, for in-person comments, we have one card for Steve Tracy. for the city manager. That's a communication? Yes. Okay. I think it's better. Sorry. So we just have one card that's been submitted for in-person, and that's Steve Tracy. Yes. Right, so the time to submit cards ends when the mayor calls for non-agenda public comments. Steve Tracy. But are you Steve Tracy? So are you Steve Tracy? Okay, go ahead and come up for your comment. Two minutes. Well, there's, uh, there's three hands raised. Yes, you may have two minutes. Excellent. 10th count. You need to, you're going to need to move closer to the mic. 10th count. March 14th and 21 April March 24th April 14 way. So I'll be at the workshop. I'm not directly impacted. I just don't drive that way anymore unless I want to lose my lunch. But now in Cornese's Park where I go every day, I'll have to add a line. Oh, Civic Center got one back too. Courtney Cs Park is now up to one. The police visited there May 1st, five days ago, warned the camper to leave. So what's the process? It's murky. Neighborhood services has to come and offer them an alternative. What's the deliverable? How long does that take? Anyone? Days, weeks, months? I'd like to know the deliverable. Anyway, the neighbors that are stones throw away upon Tamropa's drive are going to be real concerned that somebody might be lightened something in their backyards. So I've got a little piece of paper, I gave you guys a copy, Mr. Boonehagen, I may be passing this out at people's doors to try to get them involved too, because they want to know, what's the process? Does Berkeley police and neighborhood services share their to-do lists? How does neighborhood services know there's someone to visit at the parks, excuse me, I'm wondering. And then once they visit them, how does that get back to Berkeley Police? There should be shared information here. Then do I have to reinvent the wheel with a new citizens arrest? Once there's one tent, they'll be more. Thank you. Thank you for your public comment. Is that clear? Your time is up. Okay. Thank you. I just would like to know the bill. Sorry. Your time is done. And I'm going to allow this woman to speak who wanted to speak as well. Hi. My name is Gina Reeger. And I'm here. I was here to speak about the fire issue. It was taken off the agenda, so I couldn't speak to it as an agenda item. And so here I am. I want to commend you Brent for taking a very active role in responding to your constituents about their concerns about Amber. I have concerns about the way the workshop is being set up, however, I really feel this has to be a dialogue. It has to be something that isn't just the Berkeley Fire Department making its presentation again and explaining to the constituents what Ember is about. There are people who disagree with the proposed zone zero. They feel that it's overreaching. our experts who feel that keeping vegetation within the five foot zone could be beneficial, both in our climate and to preventing, preventing fires. It's not said in stone and I've urged the council to slow down, but also to engage in a dialogue and find out what your constituents' concerns are rather than dictating to them what is going to happen without hearing from them. So I would like to ask the council or whomever is going to be involved with this meeting to invite some of the experts and you know who they are because we have been sending out a lot of email with articles from fire researchers, from people who are doing up to date research as a result of both the palisades, as much as the palisades fire all the way back to the camp and paradise fires. There's conflicting, there's conflicting, everybody agrees with home hardening, everybody agrees with fire resistance, but nooking gardens isn't necessarily the answer. And I want to see the information from both sides prevented at a workshop. Thank you. Thank you. I see that there's somebody else. Are you here to speak on non-agenda public comment? Can I ask that if anyone else is here to speak on non agenda public comment that you come up because that time has technically ended but I'm going to allow you to speak. Okay, so go ahead. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Ann and I live in Berkeley. I'm really happy that we're working towards supporting wildfire prevention. However, I think we need to focus on what actually works. So the rule that you're potentially going to enforce would make homeowners spend thousands of dollars to remove plants, trees, and fences near their homes. But that's not what causes most wildfires in California. Many of the biggest and most damaging fires that start when trees touch power lines. So some clear examples are campfire in 2018 started when a power line hit dry vegetation. It destroyed the town of Paradise. Zogue fire in 2020 started when a tree hit a power line. Bob cat fire in 2020 started when a fire started when a tree made contact with a power line. Thomas fire in 2017 started when strong winds pushed two power lines together. So these are not rare events. Fire investigators confirm that these fires started because of problems with power lines and nearby trees. That means if we really want to prevent wildfires we should keep trees and branches away from power lines. Put power lines underground and high risk areas. Focus fire prevention efforts on areas where lines and trees are too close to each other. Removing plants near homes doesn't stop fires that start from a spark on a hillside power line, but stopping trees from touching wires can prevent those fires from ever starting. Also taking out all the plants near homes reduces shade and air quality can harm people's mental health and cost homeowner is a lot of money and potentially putting them in debt without solving the real problem. The city of Berkeley should divert the budget and resources that it would have devoted to enforcing investigations and fines of Berkeley residents. Instead, they should redirect those resources. Thank you. Thanks so much for your public comment. I think we have some folks online. Yes, we will first go to Kelly's iPad. Should be allowed to unmute. Okay, we'll go next person. We'll come back. Daniel Brownson. Hello. Yes, go ahead. People don't want to live intense anymore than the fascist who spoke earlier wants to see tents. If you want to actually do something that will, you know, fix the problem instead of moving it around, moving it around Berkeley, moving it around the Bay Area, that the problem is that people need a place to live and don't have one, either because they can't afford it. Well, actually that's usually the reason they don't have one. So if you want people to live in houses and not tense, you need to actually provide the housing. You need to have public housing, not resort to fascist sweeps, like suggested by the gentleman earlier. That does not work. If it worked, it would have worked already. That's just the way, like you were not fixing the problem by kicking people out of one part because they still need a place to live. If you have not provided a place for them to actually live, then you have not fixed the problem. The problem is that they don't have a place to live. The problem is not that they exist. And saying you want to vomit when you go past, you know, people just trying to exist who have nowhere to live because they are poor or because they got evicted, that is pure fascist talking points. Also free Palestine passed with PJC resolution. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Numenool. Good evening, Mayor and council members. Karen, I'm with the bridge association of realtors. We just wanted to raise concern about the lack of public information and internal awareness regarding the city's fire hardening transfer tax rebate. This rebate has been adopted and active in the municipal code for five months now. Yet it's nowhere to be found on the city's website unlike the seismic rebate, which is clearly posted. Also concerning when we called relevant city department staff had no knowledge that the rebate program even existed. Now that's a serious breakdown in implementation that causes major concern with new fire code requirements on the horizon that were required. Significant costly hardening measures. So homeowners deserve to know that a financial incentive is available and city staff need to be prepared to explain it. We're asking the city to immediately publish this information online and then share all relevant is available and city staff need to be prepared to explain it. We're asking the city to immediately publish this information online and ensure all relevant departments are trained on the rebates existence and eligibility criteria. Thank you. Thank you. Next is George Perez-Veles. Thank you so much George Pres Perez for the alliance for practical fire solutions. Thank you to the City Council and the City Manager for changing the perspective and allowing to be greater transparency and accountability by the city in terms of good governance. I will say that it is important to know that they are concerns and not questions and the concerns are what being addressed. I will add my voice and say that it is important that this be a collaborative process. The next two meetings cannot be as stated by the former speaker, a dictate or regurgitation of information that we already have, but hopefully an exchange of ideas and exchange of positions so everyone can get different perspectives that will serve the city well. And all our hopes are that we continue to contribute as you make great public policy. We are supporters of our hardening of homes and fire making nation practices. We're just looking to have a full engagement, practical and pragmatic approach to this really impactful proposal. And thank you for your time. Thank you for postponing this to June 17th. And thank you for your continuing belief on good governance and inclusivity in how you make your decisions. Have a good evening. Thank you. And the last speaker is Ken. Ken is the last speaker. I think you hear me? Yes. Yeah, I just want to bring to the Council's attention, Senate Bill 607 by Senator We have a . We have a . We have a . We have a . We have a Thank you. Okay, that's all of the non-agenda public commenters. Thank you. Now we'll move on to public comment by employee unions since it is the first regular meeting of the month. Okay. Are there any union designated union representatives participating remotely for this portion? He's here in person, actually. I know, says there good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. since behind me. My name is Mori Langmo, I'm the President of the Berkeley Fire Federal Association of Local 1227. I'm here to speak to you guys tonight about the budget deficit that the city is facing. We are also aware that one of the potential solutions that budget deficit is a hiring freeze. I want to caution the council regarding the hiring freeze of public safety positions. The fire department is currently looking at a projected 10 to 15 positions due to retirement over the next year. In our labor agreements, we have minimum staffing requirements, section 38. Those minimum staffing requirements are not only for the citizens of Berkeley, but for our safety as well. So those vacancies would have to be filled by mandatory overtime. Whenever we've had periods, where we've had to use mandatory overtime to fill vacancies, most recently the COVID era, which you see after several months is an increase of sick leave and an increase in workers' comp. Given the nature of the work that we do, it's both physically and mentally taxing. The traumatic cause that we see, the sleep deprivation and just the physicality of the work itself. When we do need to hire firefighters, it takes us about 12 to 13 months. From the time we advertise to put accept applications, do interviews, put people through backgrounds, and then put them through 20-week fire academy. When we do come out of the budget deficit and the hiring process lifted, that long-term mandatory overtime will still be in existence. Um, so I just want to say like that, um, the local is always willing to come to the table to collaborate and find creative solutions, uh, to help with the long-term financial health of the city, but not at the, uh, health and well-being of our membership. Thank you guys so much for your time. Thank you. Thanks for being here. Are there any other union representatives here? Or online? Thank you. Thanks for being here. Are there any other union representatives here? Or online? Okay. I don't see any. Okay. All right then. We will be moving on to the consent calendar. Okay. Council members, do I? I don't see any hands. Are you trying to move anything? Go ahead. Go ahead, Council member. I don't know. Sometimes these little clickers don't work. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Yeah, I think my Mike is working on. I just wanted to highlight item number seven on the consent calendar, which is the contract for painting red curbs to enhance compliance with California. California's day lighting law assembly bill 413. I'm really excited to see us getting this work underway. It's consistent obviously with the California law, but also with our ordinance. We were pioneers, we passed it ahead of the California law. We're going to have funding to paint a really significant number of curbs. and red curbing, crosswalks and intersections have has has incredible safety benefits for pedestrians in the varied in cities of Hoboken, New Jersey, and Jersey City, New Jersey. The cities haven't seen a serious pedestrian or cyclist death in the past five years, largely both cities, largely because of red curbing and some additional associated safety improvements at intersections. So this is really exciting and I think once we get this underway our city is going to become safer as we do this. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Trigger. Thank you. I wanted to briefly speak to item 8B, which is on consent. And I wanted to thank the Commission on the Status of Women for bringing to us their recommendation. And I want to be very clear that this is an important law that is, I think I can say, I speak for everyone here on the dice. I think we all believe that making ensuring that a training to prevent sexual harassment is taken using the periodicity that is circumscribed in state law is important, We are in a challenging financial time and so often the decisions that I make on the dice that I think we all make on the dice are evaluated through the lens of having to do more with less. There are however opportunities I wanted to invite members of the commission, should they want to pursue this? I don't know, they extend to which conversations have happened with the Chamber or business improvement districts. If by office can facilitate those conversations with members of the commission and the business owners in my district, I would certainly be open to doing so. And there may be some opportunities to still achieve the intended outcome in a way that does not institute a new program that unfortunately at this time, even the challenging fiscal situation our city is in, we are not able to do so I wanted to explain that my support for 8B which is to to take no action on this item, should not at all be construed as a lack of support for the overall concept. And again, I want to thank the former Chair of the Commission on the Status of Women in the Commission for all your work on this item. Thank you, Council Member Blackbeard., Council Member Blackaby. Thanks, Madam Mayor. Two brief comments on the consent calendar. One, I agree with Council Member Humbert. Really happy to see item seven, additional support and financing for the Red Curb Program to help public works complete the day lighting of the 20 feet of curb before intersections throughout our city. We know the implementation of this state law will help improve visibility for drivers and pedestrians and reduce pedestrian derives and deaths in the city. So I appreciate seeing that. Also, I want to comment on item three and thank the same management fire department for bringing that. It's great that the Diablo Fire Safe Council will be able to serve as the fiscal sponsor for donations that will support home hardening work in Berkeley, especially, again, as we continue to identify more and more sources of funding to support the ultimate proposal of moves forward on defense, post-pacing home hardening this fall. So, really appreciate seeing that another mechanism that we'll be able to use to make funding available. So, those are my comments and thank you. Thank you. Any other comments from Council Members? Okay. I will close Council comments and open comments on consent items and information items only. From the public. Thank you. Kale, just make sure you move the mic. Thank you very much, Council Member Trigger, for your comments on item eight. Again, I have stated both in this report at the time that I authored it and to the follow-up letter to you. The state OCR has said they only address these enforce these issues when they're complaint triggered. And with the letter that you have and the supplemental packet too, as I have touched, Complaint triggered. Does that work? It's actually been found to be ineffective. The larger employers are most likely complying. I don't believe our small employers in Berkeley are complying that they even know of this law. And the end of the employees, they're even know that SB 1343 exists and that they have these rights or the nor the employers know that they have these responsibilities. I understand the budget crisis currently. There are things we can do that you stated Council Member Trigab, and I included that in the email that I sent that you have in Supplemental Path to, which is precisely what you stated. Reaching out to the Berkeley Chamber of Commerce, reaching out to the BIDs to do education. What we can do to scale this down in such a fashion that the education is still going on, we're getting 1343, which has been a blow off for six and a half years. And yet, small businesses and burglary, small and non-profits don't know this exists. It seems if it would be easy for us to engage with our contractors and have them send a dendum that their in compliance would SB 1343. There are small things that we can do and I hope that this, I am no longer on the commission but I would be glad to work with you with the guidance that is in Councilman. Thank you for your comment. Are there other comments on the consent calendar and information items? There's one hand raised on the Zoom. That is Karen Chenoy. Good evening, everyone. Again, Karen Chenoy with the British Association of Realtors, just fine on item six of the consent calendar. Just wanted you to know that we sincerely hope that the proposed Bay So software contract can support public access to aggregate escrow deposit data because transparency here is critical given the cost of recommended upgrades will that will often far exceed the $5,000 deposit let alone the $2, portion from the buyer. It's highly likely that many of these deposits will be forfeited, not refunded. That means the escrow will function less as a compliance mechanism and more like an exclusivity tax on homeownership. With around 600 transactions expected annually, this policy could generate approximately $3 million a year in forfitted funds. Public access to this data would help ensure that residents can see where these funds go, whether they're being used for resilience upgrades or redirected to equity programs as promised. If we're going to impose this kind of burden on home buyers, especially in a challenging market with so many other expenses for homeowners on their horizon. The least that we can do is ensure open accountable management of the money as it generates. Happy to follow up with the appropriate folks on City staff, Benchup. Thank you. Other, any other comment? No other, no other raised hands. Okay. Thank you very much and is is there a motion? So moved. To approve the consent. To approve the consent calendar, including 8B, which is to take no action on the recommendation by the commission on the status of women. Thank you. And I heard a second from Councilmember Taplan. Okay, and I think we're all here. So unless there's any opposition, I will have us all recorded as eyes. Very good. The consent calendar has passed. And thank you all so much. Moving on to the action calendar. So just a reminder for folks, we only have one item on the action calendar now, which is the public hearing on the ZAB appeal 1048 Keith Avenue use permit and ZP 2024-0014. And we're going to start with our staff presentation. Just I'm guessing that's what most folks are here for. I'm sorry Mayor, I have to say something. Yes, please, sorry to interrupt you. Yeah, I have to recuse myself from this because it's a Zab appeal. I thought I didn't have to because I wasn't at the September 26th meeting nor the January meeting, but I was at the October 10th meeting where it was continued and I did vote to continue it. So technically I waited on this. So, I regret that I have to go, so I don't have fun, everyone. Thank you, Councilmember. Okay, anyone else? Okay, very good. All right, so just folks know how this goes because I think many of you out here today are here for that issue. We are going to have staff presentation. I will open the public hearing, oh, sorry, we'll open the public hearing, we'll have the appellant and then the applicant speak each for five minutes. And then we will take public comment, take council questions only, we'll close the public hearing, and then we will deliberate. Sound good? Okay. I'd like to have a roadmap for folks. I know what they're in for. Okay, go ahead, take it away then, please. Thank you, Mayor. You should get even in council members. Jordan Klein, Director of Planning and Development, presenting this item for staff. We'll be Robert Rivera, Senior Planner. Also the staff table with us is in Hersch's the land use planning manager. Robert's just pulling up the presentation now. All right. All right. Good evening, Council members. Mayor, my name is Robert Rivera. I'm a Senior Planner with the Land Use Planning Division. Before you this evening is an appeal of a zoning adjustment board decision for 1048 Keith Avenue to approve a use permit to demolish a 2,760 square foot single family dwelling and construct a two story 25 feet, 3,600 square foot single-family dwelling. I'll present the review history of the proposed project and specific project details before addressing the appeal issues. See, sorry. All right. The use permit application for 1048 Keith was submitted a year ago and deemed complete in February of 2024. The project was properly noticed and scheduled for a public hearing before the zoning adjustment board on September 26th, 2024. At that meeting, the members of the public raised concerns about the accuracy of the submitted survey. And in response, the ZAB requested a revised survey and continued the item to October 10, 2024. The hearing was subsequently continued, again to allow additional time for the applicant to revise a survey and to review the updated materials. Once the revised survey was received and its accuracy confirmed, staff properly noticed and scheduled the project for a zap hearing on January 9th of 2025. At that meeting, the zap approved the proposed project and then on January 25th, 2025 the Zab's decision was appealed to City Council, which brings the project to today's hearing. The project is located at 1048 Keith Avenue and is zoned single family residential within the hillside overlay. The site is situated on the south side of Keith Avenue and features a 20 foot downward slope from the street to a level section And the site is currently developed with a single family 2,700 square foot single family residents The site plan shows the proposed residence the proposed project includes a reduction reduction of the rare building setback from 20 feet to 15 feet. This is permissible within administrative use permit in the hillside overlay zone. The existing residence is set back approximately 17 feet from the rare lot line. As shown here is the Residence proposed to be demolished. It has an average height of 13 and a Half feet and a maximum height of 17 feet. The front elevation of the proposed new residence. This shows a resulting approximate average height increase to 21 feet and a maximum height of slightly under 25 feet. As shown here is the west elevation. The project includes un-inclused off-street parking within the front setback that's shown in orange as well as a construction of a trellis and installation of a fence and retaining wall shown in red. The fence is along the lot line and is approximately six feet in height, although this very slightly depending on the downward slope. I'd like to briefly summarize the key pill issues and staff's response. More detailed discussion can be found in the SAF report. The first issue raised by the appellant is the claim that the proposed project encroaches onto their property, and that the boundary and topographical survey prepared by more engineering is inaccurate. As noted in the project review history, staff required the applicant to submit an updated boundary and topographical survey and in response to applicant provided a revised survey that was stamped and signed by a license surveyor on October 15th of 2024. The updated survey confirmed the property boundaries to within an inch of the lot line. It was reviewed and verified for accuracy by staff from the Public Works Department and the Building and Safety Division. Based on this information, staff lines of the proposed project does not alter or modify any existing lot lines, and we found no evidence to support the Pellens claims of encroachment encroachment or in accrues in accruesies in the survey. The second appeal issue concerns the project's impact on neighboring properties. A Pellens claim the proposed project creates a lot line adjustment, which would shift property lines across multiple adjacent properties, creating legal and logistical complications. The proposed project does not include any lot line adjustments. Property boundaries were confirmed to remain unchanged. The applicant submitted a verified survey, which was reviewed and found accurate to within inches by the Public Works Department and the Building Safety Division staff. And staff is aware that there have been historic slide issues in the hills at Varie by Street and Block. Currently, there is no city policy that addresses the issue of sliding land. This known physical condition and the lack of corrective policy were discussed at the ZAB hearing in January. And identified as broader issues that must be addressed separately from an individual project. The ZAB recognized that the survey submitted by the applicant, which was peer reviewed by city departments, was satisfactory. And as a result, the ZAB voted to approve the project. The third issue raised by the Pellent is a broader concern that a comprehensive survey of the surrounding properties is needed to ensure fair and equitable lot line adjustments across the neighborhood. While staff understands the desire for a more holistic review, it's important to clarify that development applications are evaluated based on specific conditions of the project site. This is standard practice and ensures that each proposal is assessed on its own merits for feasibility and code compliance. The scope of staff's review does not include surveying or adjusting neighboring properties, as each parcel is subject to its own conditions and zoning and development standards. That said, this project was reviewed for compatibility with adjacent properties, and its overall impact on the surrounding community. Based on that review, staff finds that the project to be consistent with applicable regulations. The fourth appeal issue centers on the perception that the zoning adjustment board approved the project without adequately considering neighbor concerns. The appellant argues that by not promoting property boundary adjustments, the decision leads private property owners to resolve disputes individually, potentially leading to incursus and outcomes. Staff recognizes the importance of public input. And in this case, the ZAB held two public hearings where community feedback was received and considered staff mailed public hearing notices to property owners and occupants within 300 feet of the product site and to interested neighborhood organizations. The city also posted notices at three nearby locations within the neighborhood. And then after thorough deliberation, the board found that the project is consistent with the public health, safety, peace, morals, comfort, and general welfare of the surrounding neighborhood. The project was evaluated for both its compatibility with adjacent properties and its broader community impact. Ultimately, the ZAB determined that the proposal reflects a reasonable scale of development while maintaining the character of the area. It's also important to note that lot line adjustments and parcel map changes fall outside the scope of the ZAB's responsibilities and quasi-judice authority. Their role is to evaluate the project based on existing conditions, not to facilitate or impose changes on private property boundaries. The fifth issue raised by the appellant are concerns that the proposed project would relocate the structure over existing sewer and storm drainage systems for neighboring properties at 1050 Keith Avenue and that no relocation plan has been provided in the project documents. Staff has reviewed both the been able to identify the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of the evidence of is subject to standard conditions of approval requiring that if any underground utility serving adjacent properties are uncovered or damaged during construction, the contractor must immediately notify the public work department and the building and safety division and take all necessary corrective actions. This condition helps to just ensure that any unforeseen issues are addressed promptly and responsibly during construction. And then the final issue alleges that the applicant demolished the chaired fence on March of 2024 and that the structure, including an animal sanctuary and pet burial sites and some mature trees, were removed from the disputed property. They also raised ongoing concerns about property boundaries and requests that the city adjusts property lines based on deeded square footage. In response, it's important to clarify that property line disputes are private civil matters between property owners and fall outside of the City of Berkeley Sturgeon. The city does not have the authority to resolve enforced claims related to ownership of land or property line disagreements. Further, lot line adjustments are not part of the proposed project and there's no evidence that has been presented to demonstrate that the project would alter legal boundaries or encroach upon neighboring properties. Staff recommends that City Council conduct a public hearing and adopt a resolution affirming the ZAP's decision to approve the use permit and the findings and conditions and dismiss a appeal. Alternatively, Council may continue the public hearing, reverse or modify ZAB's decision, or remain the matter back to ZAB. This concludes that presentation, and I'm available for any questions. Thank you very much. I'd like to open the public hearing now. And then we have presentations also from the appellant and then the applicant for five minutes each. Are they here? First is the appellant. Good evening. Thank you, Mayor and thank you, Council Members. My name is Autumn Johnson and I'm here representing the Genji family opposing this permit use permit. In the side zones up in the hills of beautiful Berkeley, gravity takes a toll. Over the many decades since the original city survey maps were drawn, the land has slowly moved downhill. Sometimes as much as a year, an inch a year, taking with it fences, gardens, homes, and even roads. If we were to draw those original property lines on the ground today, we'd often find that many fences and even some houses now sit well below them having slid down onto neighboring lots. You might expect this would cause endless conflict but it doesn't. Why? Because neighbors on this hillside areas have developed a practical and peaceful solution. They agree to adjust lot lines to match where things have ended up, making sure each person still has the same amount of land as originally deeded. It's not perfect, but it works, and it keeps the peace. I'm here tonight because one neighbor at 1048 Keith Avenue has broken with that norm. 14 months ago, they tore down a fence that has stood since 1949 without notice, without agreement, and began claiming and building on the land of their uphill neighbor at 1050 Keith. They've done this with the city's blessing, using outdated survey lines that don't reflect the reality of the terrain. As you know, the Berkeley Hills are geologically unstable. The city's own records and geotechnical experts acknowledge that parcels in this area may have shifted up to 20 feet since the original surveys. This is not speculation, it's documented. By approving this use permit, the city is endorsing a dangerous precedent, letting one household ignore decades of settled boundaries and take over 1,560 square feet from a neighbor. If that's allowed, every surrounding homeowner will be forced to do the same, redrawing fences and deeds to keep from losing their land. In fact, one nearby property may be pushed all the way into the public street. We understand property disputes are usually private matters, but when the city steps in and legitimizes a land grab like this, it becomes your responsibility. That's why we, the eight affected homeowners, ask you to deny this permit in its current form. Instead, we urge you to require that both neighbors, 1048 and 1050 Keith work with Moran engineering to update their lot boundaries based on today's topography while preserving each parcels rightful square footage. The city should support solutions that preserve neighbourhoods, not tear them apart. Please help us protect ours. Thank you. Thank you. Is anyone here from the applicant to speak? Okay. Sorry, just come up here, yeah, to the podium. Oh, you have like slides. Oh, I see. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I'm looking at the walls. Sorry, we better just keep it. Join the... slides. Oh, I see. Yeah. That's OK. If you if you want to join, but if they want to join the zoom so that they could share slides. Lindsay Newman, we've just clicked out actually. Sorry. Thank you. I'm just the IT guy. It kicked us in again. Yeah, we're trying to expand the list and kick it out again. Sorry. That's okay. Yeah, oh we're trying to expand the list and kick it out again. Sorry. That's okay. Technology is not always our friend. Okay, one more time. It doesn't work. So maybe we do it without the presentation. I'm so sorry. Can you do it without the presentation? Oh, sure. But I can still scroll away. Yeah, it can. Okay. Well, this may be weird, because I'm going to be describing shares that are not existing. Okay. Is it possible to connect here physically or no? Mark. Let me see. Maybe you say it's an update of Zoom, maybe again. and well know the approach to that people to find the evil. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. I'm not sure if you can see the comments. No, yeah, yeah, to share your screen to share your screen you have to be in the zoom meeting. Okay. So otherwise You can't share it on, because what everybody's watching is the Zoom. Yeah, okay. Okay, sorry. Okay, I'll just start. Okay, can you just move closer to the mic? Sorry. Yeah, it doesn't pick it up that well, so you have to be pretty close. You can describe them for us perhaps. Thank you. Okay, it may take a little longer because I'm going to have to talk very fast to get through. Hi, thank you so much for having us here. Thank you also to the City of Berkeley's Planning Department for offering us valuable advice throughout this process and their amazing presentation as well as a Zab Board who approved our use permit in January. I would also like to thank the community that came to talk about our project today. My name is Lindsay Newman and I am the owner as well as the designer of this project and have my PE license and civil engineering for the state of California where I've worked in this field since 2005. I'm currently, sorry, first I'm going to give you a little background on the initial sign process and how I got to where the sign is currently. At the end, I will address the appeal. I'm originally from Ann Arbor, Michigan, where I grew up in a mid-century modern passive solar house that was built by the Dean of Architecture Architecture Walter Sanders at the University of Michigan in 1953 as a student project. Mr. Sanders and his wife's ashes were spread in the yard. I took my first steps there before I turned one, and my husband and I got married in the same yard three children ago. We have four total. It's a very special place for me, and it inspires me to design houses that are environmentally friendly while also blind and with the surrounding landscape and community. And this is a picture of the site plan. Here's a simplified version of the site plan that was approved in January by the Zabboard. I've designed the proposed house as a mid-century modern and wanted to match the angles of the uphill and downhill neighbors of Keith Avenue. I also used the decks to help tie in these angles with each other. Another consideration I took with the building, the house was the location of the main house on the lot. Before submitting the plans, I contacted the uphill neighbor at 1050, who is the pellant, and their strong preference was to have it located in the sunken part of the lot where it currently is. From there I worked with in the existing and allowable setbacks and put the house eight feet from the shared property line between our house and theirs instead of putting it closer at the four allowable four foot setback. And then I have a picture of our construction of the current house and story poles. Since the original house is a one story over crawl space and the proposed two story houses does not have crawl space, the new maximum height is not much higher than the existing house or tree line. The proposed house is also less than the three story, 35 foot height limit, and I tried to match the adjacent houses and the hillside surrounding us. I also took care to preserve our neighboring neighbors' existing views. Though we are not part of the active side, I intend to add a Mat SLAB foundation and retaining walls that are properly drained to help with any land movement caused by the highly expansive soil in our area. And then this is a 3D sketch that my daughter drew. Here's a rendering. I commissioned my daughter Alex, who's a freshman at Berkeley High to draw for me based on a picture. I took of the story poll locations from the previous side. One of my family's favorite features is that the two flat roofs have been designed to have fire resistant vegetation growing on them. This is a thing that my dad has been minorly obsessed with since the 1990s and we are excited to implement it here. And then I have pictures from around our neighborhood and our house. This slide contains pictures from our own renovation next door as well as design ideas from houses around our neighborhood. We really wanted to use the design of materials that matched our surrounding neighbors. In our current house, our exterior materials consist of standing seam metal roofing, stucco, hardyboard paneling, concrete and other fireproofing materials. Our intent is to build something sustainable, safe, fire safe, and beautiful that our neighborhood can be proud of for years to come. Now onto the peel that has been filed by our neighbour, Baram Gangi, who lives at 1050 Keith Avenue, which is directly a pillar of our project location. This appeal is not about engineering or about the zoning code. The appeal is a request for a lot-line adjustment, just in case on the false assertion that our project encroaches on the appellance property are surveyed by a local license survey are confirmed that our home will be built entirely on our land and fully compliant with required setbacks. The survey is consistent with plans filed for 19 for sorry for a 1050 Keith in 1949, which shows their house three feet from the property line. It's also consistent with Mr. Ginghi's permits for his house addition in 2008. It has also been validated by the Public Works Department and it was confirmed by two fair surveys. The app has hired since filing this appeal. The app talent has submitted a geotechnical report and an adumbed to the city, which concludes that the site is not part of the active Keith slide. But this contradicts his claim that the street monuments used by our surveyor and accurate. Sorry. Thank you, I'm sorry, your time is up. If you just have any other questions, I'm happy to answer. Yeah, thank you. Appreciate it. We will take public comment. Are there folks here to speak on public comment? Any way you'd like to speak just line up along this wall over here on this side. And anybody who would like to speak to the Savipeo for 1048 Keith Avenue who is on the Zoom, please raise your hand to indicate that you would like to speak on this item. So since there's more than 10 total speakers, one minute per person. And so, Mark, is there anyone on mine to just answer? Currently, two hands raised online. Okay, so folks, during our public comment, you will each have one minute to speak. So just to be aware of that, and then I will ask you to stop if you have not stopped at that point. And somebody can yield? It doesn't matter. Yeah, you can be in whatever order you'd like to be in. Whatever order you're in now, currently in line. Yeah, okay. Time can be yielded. You can, a speaker can yield their time to another speaker. No speaker can have more than four total minutes. Thank you. Go ahead, you can come up. And just be aware that this mic is a little finicky, so you just want it as close to your mouth as possible, but not touching. Hi, thank you for being here. I support the appeal. I have a minute, so I'm going to go fast. The requested zoning regulation waiver around is the states that there's no financial implication to this approval of this waiver. That's incorrect. This structure will tower 25 feet over my small, but formally private backyard. That will have a direct impact on the resale value of my home financial implication. When the property was last sold in 2019 it was listed at about 1,400 square feet. The second question I have about the whole process is the replacement size and the incremental growth in size of the property. So while it's claimed to be 2, square feet that's gonna be knocked down, it's closer to 1400. So the new structure will be about three times the size. It will be 25 feet rather than 17. I do not believe that that is compatible replacement nor is it reasonable development. Thank you for your comments. Good afternoon. I support the appeal. This property is not being allowed to violate the setback from our property. We're right behind it. They are getting a 15-foot setback versus the 20-foot. Five feet of what they're using is our property. When the survey was done, they grabbed 20 feet of the uphill neighbor and then told us that the survey wasn't accurate enough and Berkeley told me directly that five feet of our property was on the other side of the fence and that was being speaking the mic. Yes, and that was being used for the setback. We talked to the property owners that are doing the development to make sure that was correct and they said no, it's not. They are taking the 20 feet of the uphill neighbor, but they're also taking the five feet of our property that's over the line. And why are they allowed this variance, not for an additional housing unit, not for low income housing, not for an ADU and not for an accommodation of a disabled person, simply because they want a larger property which impacts our property. Thank you. Hello, I'm here to support the project at 1048 Keith. I feel that they are well within their rights as property owners to improve their property and want to support the foundational principle that all people who own properties should be able to work within the law to improve their properties. Beyond that, I think that this property will enhance the neighborhood as Lindsay described already in her presentation. And also she's a structural engineer and understands deeply how to work in this area of expansive soils to create something that will be a great property when it's done and the current property is in poor condition so it's time for it to be replaced so that more homes can be in there in the neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry, you kind of have to go out the same way you came in. Go ahead. Go ahead. You might want to pull the mic up. Okay. I'm here to express my strong support for the proposed Home Construction Project at 1048 Keith. As an East Bay Hills resident myself, who is known, the homeowners for over two decades, I can personally attest to their commitment to responsible development and community values aligning with the city's planning and development department's mission. This project represents their commitment to putting down lasting roots in Berkeley, creating a sustainable home that embodies the city's environmental values. The previous projects have demonstrated conscientious approaches to building on challenging terrain, employing structurally sound engineering practices specifically designed for hillside construction, the use of environmentally conscious building materials that minimize environmental impact while ensuring longevity. And an unwavering commitment to maintaining neighborhood character while enhancing property values. The track record speaks to the reliability as neighbors who enhance rather than diminish neighborhood value. This project represents an opportunity to add another well constructed to the St. Abel home to the community's housing stock. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all for your very timely comments, I appreciate that. I'm in support of the application we build 1048 Keith Avenue that is currently in a state of disrepair. I have voiced it as the right of the property owners to legally build on their property within the confines of the city of Berkeley regulations. Lindsay and Shetter designed with me. It's fabulous. She's a talented engineer, the architectural aspects of the home are beautiful. It's a plus for the neighborhood. I would also like to point out that the Newman family are dedicated and involved in our Berkeley community. Zab has approved the project back in 2025 and I trust that you will help them move forward with their project. Thank you. Hi, I'm here to object to the current footprint of the 1048 house. I think it is encroaching on the neighbor's property. I'm here to say as a Keith Avenue neighbor that I'm concerned about a domino effect of neighbors grabbing land via lawsuits from their uphill neighbors in this well known slide zone. And the neighbors at 1048K should not build a new home on disputed property that perhaps they do not own. If they build within the boundaries of their non-disputed lot, no one would object to their house or the design. It's nothing about the appearance of the house or the materials. It is about the location that encroaches on a disputed area between two neighbors. Once the, so if they move the house out of that disputed strip of land, the property line dispute could be resolved between the two neighbors. And there won't be the greater near-bohydrate issue of domino property line lawsuits. Thank you. Thank you. Hello, my name is Anthony Acosta, 1058 Keith Avon, you just set the block. I am also concerned about the property lines, so I would like at least for the lawsuit to complete until a judgment is made. And I'd like to yield the rest of my time to my neighbor, Robert Matthews. Sure, thank you. My name is Robert Mathews. I can't pull the mic up. There you go. My name is Robert Mathews. I live at 1060 Keith Avenue. Five houses up from the Bropros project. And I oppose it. These neighbors bought the property here and then tore down a fence and decided to build their new house in the disputed area. The only justification they've given for claiming that they own that disputed area is a survey that says on it, it is very likely to be off by five feet or more in magnitude and that's because the ground has moved significantly over the last hundred years, no matter what they say. It's absurd to suggest the ground around that house hasn't moved. Why is this my problem or the city's problem? Well, one of the Zab members suggested that the neighbor who's going to lose more than 10 feet of his property should get his own survey, which would also have such a disclaimer, and sue his neighbor, and so on until everyone gets their 10 feet or more back. There are many reasons that's a terrible idea, but the one the city should be interested in is that at the end of the chain, seven houses away, up the hill here, is Euclid Avenue. And the last person would be suing the city of Berkeley to move Euclid Avenue by 10 feet to get his property back. I don't think that that's something the city has the money to do at this point. So I would have no issue, one emphasize, I would have no issue with the House. Just the location is the only problem of it. They are building it on their neighbor's property. And there's a pending lawsuit between the two parties. And I think no permit should be issued to build anything until that lawsuit is solved. Thank you. Hi. I hope you all are doing well. My name is Alex Kines. I am a freshman at Berkeley High and the daughter of Joaquin and Lindsay Newman. My family moved to Berkeley in 2017 when I was in first grade. My mother is a civil engineer. Ever since I was a little girl, my mother and my grandmother have taken me on architecture tours around the Bay Area. This largely inspired my mom and me as a young child. This home could only be an improvement to my neighborhood. All right, thank you for your time. Thank you. Always great to have young people come and speak at meetings. Thank you. Hello, I'm here to support your community. I've known them for many years and I know them to be serious, deeply serious, careful people. I know they're a current house which they renovated and it is beautiful and I have every confidence that their new building will also be a credit to Berkeley. One more comment since I have some time. I live around the corner on Euclid also in a slide zone. My house says I think moved about two inches in 90 years. I find the idea that houses moving 20 feet absurd honestly. Thank you. Hello, my name is Dan and I'm here to support the project. I was born and raised in Berkeley and live in the Northside neighborhood, not far from the project. Now, one makes some points about the project itself. It's going to remove 228 cubic yards of soil. That is actually the weight of a two-story house. So if there's concerns about slides, this project should be engaged for deloting the hillside. Secondly, the house is sunk, so it gets two stories for an overall seven-foot height increase. And third, there's been no active slide zones in the particular area that's been surveyed. And there are no issues that have been shown with the lot lines. So I'm supporting this project as an example of responsible and thoughtful development in the Berkeley Hills. Thank you. Good evening. I'm here supporting Lindsay's Newman application to rebuild, then 48 KS Avenue. Lindsay is a talented engineer. Not only she understands Berkeley's soils and architecture, she understands culture and values. Lindsay is an artist with an eye for integrity and authenticity. Her design concept will improve the neighborhood in organic way and integrate into current landscape, transform it into more beautiful. Her careful engineering has utmost respect for community and surrounding. And I want to point out, when we talk about sliding land, and I'm not an engineer, but it sounds that new construction with strong engineering will have less chance of sliding over the years than dilapidated property that is falling apart. So we should consider that as well. Lindsay is very talented. I've been to her house many times, I've launched your remodel and she's very special. Thank you. Thank you. That's okay. Your time only starts when you start speaking. Go ahead. I live at 10.5 Keith. I'm not really in this fight, but I live on the dry stone rock side of Keith. We only slide about a quarter of an inch a year as opposed to the downhill which slides sometimes a foot a year or six inches. But I just wanted to say it sounds to me like everything was dependent on that survey. And I have been trying to get a survey for six months, because I'm putting up a new fence that's rotting. And I got a persnickety neighbor. So I said, I'm going to put it where it should be. I've called marine engineering. They said, we don't do surveys in the hill. We can't guarantee it within 25 feet. I've called, what if DR engineering? I've called every survey place I could find. I ask, They said, we don't do surveys in the hill. We can't guarantee it within 25 feet. I've called, what an FDR engineering. I've called every survey place I could find. I asked Moran for recommendations. They gave me two. They wouldn't do it. I can't get a survey. I can't get anybody to confirm it within one company. It told me 25 feet. The other one said, we just can't hear and tell you any survey. So if you're depending on just that survey, I just wanna know how they get one because I can't. I mean, maybe there's something special if you're a designer and all, but I can't. Thank you. Appreciate it. Hello, I'm Lisa Rose and I'm in support of the project. I live at 1047 Keith, which is directly across the street from both of their homes. The one that's proposed and the one that they rebuilt. We had a survey when we moved into our home. Our property has not moved at all. Our home is not moved perfectly sound. We also were within the whole time that they did their rebuild. They were incredibly thoughtful. Chakden with us, the home is incredible. The home that they redesigned, the new home is going to be beautiful. They're incredible people and we are very fortunate to have them in our neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you. I think we've got at least a couple of folks online. First speaker on Zoom is Lee Bridges. Lee should be able to unmute. There you go. Oh, can you hear me? Yes. Yes. I own 1054 keys just on the side from Baram. I support the appeal on this project. I'm sure the proposed house is gorgeous. That's not what this is about. It is about the lot lines. I don't care who says there has not been a slide that is incorrect. I have a satellite photo of the current lots as well as the original lot lines. There's no comparison. On the north side of the street, there is rock. It hasn't moved. South side of the street, the lots are dog legging. If we go back to the original lot lines, barum takes my office and I take Anthony's garage. Some of the original lines split those properties in two. I understand Zab did not have the authority to make a decision because they cannot resurvey the area. I tried to get surveys. Four professional surveyors laughed at me and said they couldn't do it. We cannot approve a project on an unstable, undetermined lot line posentable lawsuit finishes. Thank you. Next speaker is Kelly Hammergren. Hello. This is a single family home. You're not required to approve it as you would be if it was an SB 330. This area is mapped as a landslide area by the Department of Conservation California Geological Survey, 1048 teeth. That's what we fondly call the Berkeley Tri-Fecta. It's right on top of the Hayward Fault. It's in the very high fire severity zone and it's in a landslide area. Why? This is moving to me is just crazy. And when I went to the first meeting, I described to other people that what makes Berkeley meetings entertaining is what happened that night when people talked about their houses moving and that somebody wants to build a brand new house on an active landslide. This is all crazy. Nobody knows where the lock ends are. Thank you, Kelly. Okay. Next speaker is John Docky. Hello. Thank you for having this hearing. I support the appellant as well. I live across the street from the appellant just a couple doors down from one of the other speakers. On our side of the street on the north side we are, as my neighbor, a 1005 mentioned, much less effective by the slide. But when I first made an offer on my house, I heard a geotechnical engineer who told me that if I had given him an even number to dress on that street, he would not have come. We all know that that slide has been happening for decades. I don't know what's active or not, but the very prospect that the domino effect that many of my neighbors will face from this decision is really terrifying that that president would be set. I trust fully that Lindsay's design will be beautiful and will respect the environment. I have full respect for her abilities. I'm entirely concerned by the president and I ask the city if it's not this app's responsibility to look after the president and the business will set for all of the hills then who will prevent a chain of lawsuits from taking place. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, that's it. There's no more raised hands, no more commenters. Okay, so we are going to take council questions only starting with Councilmember Chaplin. Thank you very much. I just have two questions for the applicants. Would it be possible to share your side deck with the City Clerk so that it would be published in the materials? Thank you very much. And then your last sentence was cut off at the end of your presentation. I was just wondering if we could re-hear your last sentence. Oh. Yeah, please come to the podium. Yes, in fact, both the applicant and Helen, it might be helpful to be nearby because we might have questions for you. I'm just trying to address the claims of the of Helen's. Okay. I mean, I can read that part here and then the next like sentence. Thank you very much. I'll be back. Okay. The palan has submitted a geotechnical report and an endundum to the city, which concludes the site is not part of the act of Keith's slide. This contradicts his claims that the street monuments used by our survey are inaccurate. Beyond offering his own opinion, the 1050 owner has not supplied a competing survey or any actual evidence. As to the need of a lot light adjustment, the pellant has admitted many times that the growth, from his uphill neighbor is due to unpermitted addition at 1054 Keith. That neighbor's trespass on to 1050 Keith does not justify 1050 Keith's, you know, laterally claim to 20% of our land. The requested lot line adjustment can be resolved only by the Superior Court, where the parties are litigating 1050s encroachment and trespass on to 1044 Keith. There is no need for our project to be delayed on the basis of ongoing lawsuit. The Pellent has previously filed for a preliminary injunction to halt the project as part of his lawsuit, but it was denied on procedural grounds. A Pellent should renew his challenges in the lawsuit instead of requesting the city to reform a lot line adjustment under the guise of zoning ordinances. Thank you very much. Those are all my questions. Okay. Council member, Trigab. Don't go too far. Just in case we have other questions for you. Yeah. Thank you. Maybe stay over here since we might have other questions. Yeah. Okay. I'm sorry. Go ahead, Council member. No. No problem. Thank you. I was looking at the administrative record because I was curious the reasons for the dissenting opinion on ZAB by, I believe, Commissioner Sanderson and it starts on page 180 of the record. And so my question for staff is if you can provide some background of the extent to which it has been the practice to make recommendations based on lot line surveys, how that relates or does not relate to being able to make a non-deferment finding. And if there are alternative methodologies, you're aware of by other jurisdictions in situations like this. I'll just say first that,iddle of a stamp survey is part of the application semiddle requirements. I'm not aware of any other practices from other jurisdictions that we could cite here as a precedent. Yeah, I'm not aware either. And to address the point related to Commissioner Sanderson and her vote earlier this year, she is probably no worked for the city as the land use planning manager over 10 years ago. And noted that the concerns around slide were kind of an ongoing issue that or haven't been addressed or resolved through any sort of city policy. And there was, you know. that the concerns around slide or kind of an ongoing issue that were, haven't been addressed or resolved through any sort of city policy. And there was some frustration she had had that we continually end up in this situation where an application comes in. It's evaluated, we have the same concerns, but we don't have a mechanism by which to address the slide issue. And so the problem just goes unresolved. But you're not aware currently of any other methodologies in other cities to resolve them. No, I'm not. Well, do you want to mention the? Yeah, well, we are aware of's a broader policy it's known as a geologic hazards assessment district And there are several in the area so for example San Leandro has one and the town of Moraga has one and it follows You know a known slide area can enter into a district and there is a guiding plan that's required that's prepared by a geotechnical engineer. I distinguish it out a little bit from the zoning issue because it's a special district, so it doesn't follow entitlement review, which is before you tonight, but it is a broader mechanism that is used by other agencies. Thank you. So, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but can you speak to how the non-detriment finding was made by staff? So, the non-document finding for this project was evaluated based on the subject property and the specific topographical survey that was submitted to the city and that was reviewed by public department and the building department and it was based on the subject properties conditions and the overall effect of the surrounding neighborhood relative to the reasonable development that's being proposed on the site. What's being demolished is a 2,670 square foot single family dwelling and in its place is a reasonable development of approximate the same size. Thank you. Okay, Councilmember Lacabee. Thank you. Following up on Councilmember Triggub's line of questioning, because I find that interesting about how we evaluate and determine the non-detriment finding. So it's really, as you say tonight, it's based on the non-detriment with respect to that particular property, whether it's following the particular rules and conditions and has been basically faithfully submitted in that historical practice. Is there a way that we can evaluate the detriment to the community from this sort of domino effect that would be introduced that if we allow one and then the next neighbor proceeds and then the next neighbor thinking it like one step further about what happens from the detrimental perspective thinking about it in that way. Can we think about it that way? Have we thought about it that way? If that make sense? Yeah. We have and recognize that different areas of the hillside have different sub-conditions based on the subject properties, the individual site block, and that may vary depending on the different side of the street. We've heard from, you know, neighbors tonight that the north side is separate from the south side. And that would require a more extensive survey of the entire neighborhood block by block or area to know exactly what we're dealing with in terms of the soil conditions and which properties are sliding where, it's necessarily because one slides in one property that this relates to the entire block and the entire area. So a more comprehensive analysis of the different blocks and effective soil conditions would be necessary. And I think that's partly what the Bateman District or are, the GAD, the geologic hazard, abatement district, mediates as those those different conditions between those properties. Great. So within the context of this development, looking at the subject property and the neighborhood context of character and if the development fits within the neighborhood is what was evaluated. Great. Yeah. Thank you. No, I appreciate that. I mean, from all the pictures and descriptions and the, I mean, it looks like an amazing project. It would be a beautiful addition to the key. Sorry, just to be careful about comments before we close. Okay. Thank you. But I am thinking about this the the detriment in terms of a broader sense. Question on a pill issue when we talk about not altering or modifying existing lot lines. Again, help me understand is that? Is there any commentary this, you know, yes, it may not modify the existing lot line but how it comports with what the kind of current community understanding of the property line is? Right, I mean, those are two different things. Right, the lot line that might be understood or have been accepted by community standards over time might be very different than this particular lot line. Is that fair to say or the historical piece of this? Yeah, the lot lines are what is being reviewed is in the title report that's described by Meets and Bounds. And that's represented in the survey. I'm not familiar with if that coincides with what is expected on site. That's a different kind of interpretation of the lot line. Yeah, I think that's right. I'm not sure that we have the capacity to value as far as the community understanding. Sure, right, I'm not expecting, yeah, I wouldn't be expecting, but just thinking about what that standard is, that's helpful to understand. And the last bit, in terms of the process of filing an appeal, if a neighbor does file an appeal, what's typically necessary? They can just sort of file an appeal letter and say I object to this personally, right? It only takes one neighbor to file an appeal. Yeah, any party could file an appeal. Is it typical that you'd receive an appeal letter that's signed by like 45 neighbors in a neighborhood? Yes, that's okay. Because in this case, does feel like, you know, they're a number of people that as we saw tonight, that all are interested. I think that's it for questions. Thank you for the clarification. Thank you Councilmember Taplin. Did you have additional questions? Oh. I was good. Oh, okay. Very good. All right. There is a motion to close the public hearing. Is there? Oh, okay. I don't know which one was first, but unless there are any objections, I will have us list as I to closing the public hearing. All right. It is unanimous. Thank you very much. The public hearing is closed. So we will not be asking any more questions. We'll be moving on to deliberations. And in that case, Councillor Mabra-Cappellan, did you have comments? Yeah. Thank you so much and thanks everyone who spoke. I did want to speak about hazard because we did just adopt a Updates to our local hazard mitigation plan. And the plan update sites that one of the challenges to our older structures are that they are a has a new structure built under modern standards. So I wanted to share that with the community. And I wanted to say that I don't think us upholding the appeal would make any of the existing homes safer or materially protect them from landslide. And I recognize that there is a civil suit happening. I don't think it makes sense to leverage the city's discretion as part of that. And I did just want to thank the applicant for your proactive outreach to the The, the sensitivity that you gave to the architectural history of the neighborhood and the city, and I want to also, and for, you know, your for your attention to modern standards, and I want to thank you for your generosity in sharing your your family history and your personal history. And I will be supporting the Suffolk Foundation. Thank you. Okay, thank you. Council member Traykab. Yeah, thank you. This is a really interesting case. I think I'm heart pressed to think of a zoning board hearing or appeal I have dealt with, the deals with this particular set of issues. We are, as a council, legally bound to approve projects based on the, you know, if we can make a non-deperman finding or we can agree with the zoning board that did, albeit not unanimously it not unanimously, but did by supermajority make that non-datrament finding that's based on the staff put it, the individual attributes of the project. It could be a no pun intended but a slip-free slope if we started to create, inadvertently, a new precedent tonight on the dice by doing something that looks at the domino effect that has been talked about. That said, I certainly do not wish to dismiss the concerns of the appellants out of hand. And perhaps this is something in the legislative arena where in quasi-jud tonight, but I was interested in hearing about the presence of these geologic hazard assessment districts and that is something that I would be curious to learn more about. That said, I think we are, my opinion pretty well s for conscribed by the limitations of how we are able to rule on this tonight with the understanding that to the extent that there is a pending appeal in the courts or a court hearing anyway. And it would be up to the courts to look at some of these attributes that would not be within our abilities or powers to address here tonight. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Humbert? Yes,, thank you, Madam Mayor. But this is not in my district. I'd like to give Councilmember Blackaby the opportunity to speak before I do. Thanks, Councilmember Humbert. I have real concerns about the precedent that we do set. And I do believe we have the discretion here. It's not a multi-family project. It's a single-family project. It's a neighborhood that has dealt with these landslide issues for decades, and sort of a generally kind of community-accepted process of respecting where the lines have settled. And in terms of community cohesion, and the good of the community and respecting neighbors, I mean that feels like in the absence of policy, it feels like a pretty good place to be. I know that there's the letter of that is harder to define, but I appreciate the community standard in this neighborhood and other neighborhoods in the hills where we deal with with those issues with those issues. So I have a lot of respect for the, I appreciate the desire and the project and that would be an improvement over what's there, but I also respect the interests of the neighbours who have sort of lived in these conditions for a while and have houses in these on these lots where lines have moved and if then all of a sudden the game changes Anyway, I so I have a concern so I my my thought process is more that I think that we should ask I'm intending to ask I I intend to ask Zab to look at the community detriment finding in a broader way. If they have the mechanism to do it, if we need more evidence to do it, it'd be hard pressed, I think, tonight to make a decision overruling the project. I do feel like it warrants additional attention and additional data. And so that's kind of where my heads at, and that would be my intention tonight. OK, back to Council Member Humber, and just for the record, Council Member Bartlett did get skipped. But go ahead. Oh, no, I'm happy to. No, no, he got skipped. He got skipped when he jumped to Councilmember Blackaby. Oh, sorry. My apologies. I guess I want to start out by acknowledging Councilmember Blackaby's concerns. And there is something there. Unfortunately, I don't think it's something that's within the Bailey Wicker jurisdiction of Zabber or this council, at least at this juncture, this point in time. I would align my comments with those of council member Tregub. I reviewed the staff report and the administrative record for the project and I find nothing there and that was wrongly that indicates this was wrongly adjudicated by the zoning adjustment sport my Understandings that the site has been the site of multiple surveys the results of those surveys have not presented any material issue with us with respect to the zoning questions before us. My read is that the key question is whether, and really the only substantial question for ZAB was whether the rear setback is justified, per the hillside overlays various criteria and purposes, but I believe ZAB rightly found this encroachment and it's not an encroachment, it was an adjustment in the setback, is justified given the topography of the lot and it's generally consistent with the existing layout of structures on the site. And although this is not necessarily strictly germane to the zoning questions we are being asked to adjudicate, it is my understanding that the applicants have conferred with neighbors made revisions to the proposed project to address concerns. If anything, this reinforces staff and the Zabs finding of non-detriment, all there for be voting to affirm the Zabs decision and deny the appeal. Thank you. Councilmember Bartlett. Thank you, Madam Mayor. And thank you both sides for coming and presenting such good arguments and staff for your diligent work here. This is one of those instances where, or a sort of regret having to be in this role, doing these land trials, because they hinge on so many, I guess, you know, architectural and engineering planning nuances that it's almost not appropriate, not the root venue. And essentially, we're asked to override the staff recommendation, the expert diligent focus present is tonight. There's a bit of, it's a big leap and that's to be glaring. And the thing that keeps leaping out to me is actually outside of our purview, this property line issue. But again, I remember hearing tonight that the D did state that there's some drift Possibly so many feet right over the last number of decades and it just seems like this is something that the courts should figure out It disputes among neighbors around property lines the very common But in this in my preview in our preview tonight. I don't see how we could vote against this with any proper basis within our powers. And I'm curious to about this jihad, the geologic hazard assessment district, I want to learn more about that, and what we could do with, we could explore that for our city. But thank you. I'll be voting to maintain the decision. Yeah, I want a strongly disagree that we're setting a new precedent tonight. As it says in the report that the city of Berkeley does not have jurisdiction over property line disputes as these are private civil matters between property owners. So I just want to say I really appreciate staff. And I understand that when it comes to neighborhood disputes, that things can get quite intense. And so I just want to acknowledge that there are clearly a lot of feelings around this. And I hope you all are able to come together after this as a neighborhood because we also live here each other. We also live in this really small community. So I hope you'll have opportunities to kind of heal and recover from this situation. And with that, I will ask if there is a motion. I will move to affirm the SAP decision and deny the appeal. Second. And a second from Council Member Keser-Wonney.. Yes and I think we should take roll in this. On the motion to affirm the zoning adjustments for decision and deny the appeal, Councilmember Kessirwani. Yes Tapplin? Yes. Bartlett? Yes. Trega? Aye. O'Keefe is recused. Blackaby? No. Lunapara? Yes. Umbert? Yes. And Mary E. Sheep. Yes. Okay, motion carries. Thank you all. And thank you all so much for coming here and being here this evening. And I now that we have finished our action calendars, are any public comment on items not listed on the agenda? Carol is coming up. Thank you. So I'm slowly, exclusively speaking in my individual capacity. I am not speaking on behalf of the Peace and Justice Commission, but it is regarding something that happened transpired of vote last night. I was in the dissent with four other commissioners, so I'm definitely not speaking on behalf of the commission. I attempted to before I talk to the actual vote, I attempted to bring a alternate resolution that would have supported. Sorry, folks, can you? You can come in. So we can hear her comments. So what have supported the city's efforts on the legal deportation fund was introduced by Council Member Blackaby and the mayor's efforts on the immigration. And this critical importance in the city as well as continuing to do provide education and to also refer to the city manager to have community education on the internments, deportation and detentions during World War II to show the parallels that are going on. Unfortunately, the main resolution passed, or unfortunately, might be. But it is asking essentially an lengthy resolution for the council to, I'm trying to recall the word now, the council to write a letter to President Trump and President, invite President Vance and Secretary of Defense, Pete Hebsitt, condemning the Alien but Animes Act. I just tend to endorse the neighbor, but enemies. A neighbor's not enemies act, which has been sitting in Congress for two years since the Biden administration has stalled in judiciary. And I'm really concerned that we focus on our legal strengths and our legal I mean I local strengths and our local I'm sorry if your time is up. Yeah, if I can thank you include briefly. No, I'm sorry. You've had two minutes. Okay. Thank you Okay, looks like we have two hands raised on zoom one first is Lee bridges Yes, can you hear me? Yes, so briefly I just want to correct for the record. I am the owner of 1054 Keith and the applicants for the project at I believe turn 50. Something on the agenda. We've already closed that conversation. So it's a factual correction very briefly. No, I'm sorry. You can't speak to an issue that's already been heard. Next is Tony. Good evening, Council. Getting back to Berkeley City history, I would like to tell you about one of the greatest mayors in Berkeley history who was Lewis Bartlett. Lewis Meldefontonée Bartlett was the mayor of Berkeley from 1919 to 1923. In a vote of the City Council, three to two, he overturned the zoning by petition method that the real estate interest tried to get through to make Elmwood Park single family. You've heard a lot about this. And then he passed the first comprehensive zoning ordinance for the city of Berkeley, Oregon 666. Not perfect, but it was ratified by a vote of the people. What is so interesting about Oregon 666 is that it was passed just before the Berkeley Fire September 7th, 1923, which destroyed 600 buildings. So when Berkeley had to rebuild Northeast Berkeley, it was according to that zoning ordinance. And that's the most important thing about the zoning ordinance is that it sets up a pattern for a city to rebuild after a great disaster. Two other great accomplishments of Louis Bartlett was that he started the city manager form of government and he also started the East Bay Municipal Utilities District. And one of the reasons he did not run for reelection was that he wanted to serve voluntarily on Edmud. His great accomplishment was clean water for Berkeley. His papers are at UC Riverside. Nobody has ever written a biography of Lewis Bartlett, so if there's anybody out there getting a PhD in Berkeley. Thank you, Dr. Hart. Thank you, Tony. Maybe you can write us the story. I appreciate the history less than always. Is there anyone else online? No other. Okay, I see there's another person in person. Thank you, Council. Yes. Go ahead and move the mic up. Good evening, Council members. My name is Tosh, I'm speaking today to strongly urge you to not forget about emergency medical services in our city. During this time of funding uncertainty. EMS professionals are critical part of our city, our critical part of our public safety and healthcare infrastructure. They're often the first to arrive during a crisis, whether it's a medical emergency, a mental health episode, or a disaster situation. Yet despite our essential role, EMS services are chronically underfunded and stretched thin. We are asking these professionals to do more with less, longer shifts, outdated equipment and increased call volumes all within all while managing complex situations with professionalism and compassion. This is not sustainable. Our community deserves an EMIS system that is adequately staffed, well trained, and equipped to respond quickly and effectively to emergencies. Increasing EMIS funding would not only improve response times and patient outcomes, but it would also help retain experienced personnel and reduce burnout. Which is a growing concern across the profession. Furthermore, stronger EMS services can help support community health initiatives such as non-emergency response teams and mental health crisis interventions. Areas where traditional policing is not always the most effective solution. I heard you can consider EMS not just as an expense but as an investment in public health, safety and community well being. Thank you for your time and leadership. Thank you so much. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The security spoke. Can't keep it yet. Yeah, you four. All right. I think that's it for public comment. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move. Move., we are adjourned. Thank you very much. Sorry we didn't get a break, but I thought we were really close to the end, so I... Yeah, this... Recording stopped.