01 - Laserfiche WebLink

Ms. Dennis stated that affordable senior housing on the Pleasanton Gardens site was a part of the original MOU for some time. She explained that the Board removed that to allow the City greater freedom in working with the neighborhood to determine the most appropriate use for the site. She would have to discuss it with the Board but in general, their mission is to provide very low- income senior housing, and any use that supports that mission would be acceptable. Councilmember Thorne acknowledged the list of unresolved issues but said the important thing is to move forward with the project at this point. He said he did not believe he would ever support market rate housing at Pleasanton Gardens and that some sort of assisted living facility would be a marvelous use for it. Efforts should be focused on devising a plan that fits the property, the goals of the City, the goals of the Board, and what the neighbors can support. Councilmember Sullivan thanked staff and task force members for the work that went into putting this together. He supports the process and believes the project in general to be very important to the community. The difficulty is in devising a plan which manages to balance an increased number of units with community values and neighborhood impacts and that other options need to be explored in order to do so here. He said the 3 -story model with 150 units on the Kottinger site is too dense and a poor fit. He cited over 10 years experience studying computer generated simulation, said the end product never looks anything like what is presented, and cautioned against putting too much stock in the images shared this evening. He said he could potentially support 128 units if certain design elements were changed, although he noted that moving the proposed buildings back would not alleviate the impacts to homes to the west of the site or the overall institutional impression. He strongly favored a design which spreads 150 units across both sites and suggested that, if done correctly, it could maintain a portion of the garden type units. He stressed the importance of establishing general policies for what will happen to the Pleasanton Gardens site moving forward and said that, if spreading the units across both sites will not work, he would like to see the land used for another public use such as affordable senior housing, assisted living, or skilled nursing. He said that market rate housing at the site is not in the best interests of the community and concerned neighbors should be assured that market rate housing is not the City's intent. He also supported additional neighborhood representatives on the task force. The Council set the priority several years ago to spend $4 million here and he would be amenable to spending additional funds if it will improve the project. He encouraged revisiting the MOU with Pleasanton Gardens in an open dialogue that discusses all possible options and concurred that the project needs to move forward, but cautioned that moving into the PUD process too quickly would only result in a divided Council and unhappy neighbors. Mr. Fialho reviewed what he heard as a consensus and recommended that staff return at an upcoming Council meeting with a set of recommendations reflective of those comments. He said that, falling short of pursuing a PUD process, a non profit developer must be selected to assist with some preliminary plans and address issues such as an increased range of options and general parameters surrounding future use of the Pleasanton Gardens site. Staff could suggest modifications to the MOU that strike a balance between the objectives of the Pleasanton Gardens' Board while remaining flexible enough to achieve the Council's goals. Staff would also articulate the issue concerning task force representation and return with the recommendations on December 15 City Council Minutes Page 15 of 16 December 1, 2009