At tonight’s Santa Clara city council meeting, the 900 Kiely project was again up for discussion.  We would like to thank all of the people who came our for this meeting.

The council voted to approve the EIR and the mitigation monitoring for the project, but deferred approval of the project itself to the 18 August 2009 [edited] city council meeting, by a vote of 5 to 1 (Dominic Caserta was absent).  The one dissenting vote was from Jamie McLeod who felt that the EIR had enough issues with it to not recommend approval, and wanted to find a way to allow the developer to continue with demolition of the project site without approving the EIR.  She also asked that the project changes go through the Planning Commission, but her input was lost on a majority of the council that seemed intent on passing the EIR regardless of circumstance.  Councilmember McLeod’s suggestions were probably the best course of action, and it seemed that she was one of the few that actually read the comments from the Planning Commission.

The residential input was quite good.  Residents were consistent with the message that we were not against development of the site, but simply wanted an appropriate development that fit in with the neighborhoods and truly addressed the problems with traffic, pollution, and open space that the mitigations in the EIR missed.  To all of the concerned business owners and construction workers: there are many developments that could benefit our neighborhood and the city, it doesn’t have to be this one.  We should pick something good for everyone, long-term.

Mayor Mahan had some excellent closing comments.  She was concerned about the density of the project, specifically the design and massing which resulted in smaller lots and building heights (32 to 58 feet) that were higher than allowed (25 to 45 feet); to put this in perspective, the increased heights add almost another floor to each unit: the 2-story units are as tall as 3-story units, the 4-story apartments are are taller than 5-story buildings.  She was concerned about the setbacks of the front and side yards (3 feet) and the use of tandem parking.  She noted that the park land amounted to less than 4% of the total project area and opined that, despite the responsibilities of ownership, Fairfield Residential should dedicate the open space to the city: “We would take care of it better than (the developer) would.”  She estimated that the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) was higher than the city preferred, although also noting that the city did not have an FAR ordinance, and stated directly that the project’s lot coverage exceeded the allowed maximum by 12%.  Consistent with her opening comments, she didn’t like the design of the single family homes, and pointed out that Fairfield Residential’s 2000 square-foot lots next to the existing 6000+ square-foot lots on Marietta and Miles Drive hardly constituted “like-next-to-like” design.  These really were great comments.

Although we did not get what we wanted, which was stronger direction to correct the problems with the EIR and facilitate developer discussions with residents, it was what we expected would happen.  We are grateful that we had the turnout from the residents that we did; without you, it is possible they would have approved the project as well, although with some weak conditions for the developer.  The question that remains after tonight’s actions: What opportunities will the residents have to give input to the developer before it goes in front of the council on 7 July 2009?  How many meetings do they expect residents to go to before the city stands up for its citizens over the desires of developers who can’t manage a public relations campaign to simply find out what the neighbors think?  It is disappointing how easily a 7-0 vote from a commission can be overturned, and without much discussion in public by the council members; the motion to approve the EIR was the first thing out of councilman Jamie Matthews’ mouth the minute public comments were closed.  Each of the Planning Commissioners had reasons for denying the EIR and project; it would have been easier to accept the council’s decision if it appeared that they had tried to address any of the concerns.

[Edit] The DVDs of the meeting are now available at the library (16 June 2009 City Council Meeting); the replay of the events doesn’t look any prettier, and raises even more questions.  We may post snippets later.