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questioned property owner rights and asked whether owners are really that dictated to on what they can and cannot do with their own property, and asked the Council to think about this. Jon Harvey said they sold the property to the Cunningham's in 2004 and was surprised the staff report was able to be fit on 7 pages, given the history the Cunningham's have gone through. One paragraph stood out to him; on page 3; "Staff notes that an application to construct a new single family home is usually processed at the staff level and may go to the Zoning Administrator; however, the Planning Commission requested this project come to them" and it is from there that this project really took on a life of its own. He asked the Council also not to lose sight of the house at 215 Neal which has been spoken about which is the historic house. When he bought it, it was trashed. He crawled through it, fixed leaky pipes, pulled dead animals out, and the Cunningham's have since taken it over, painted it, put a new roof on it, put a new HVAC system on it, and they should get some credit for preserving the property and taking care of it. The house proposed looks great. He looks forward to having them as neighbors. He thinks if it were there now, no one would notice it. He noted there was a huge amount of controversy when he put in a driveway on 215 Neal, and many people may assume that it has always been there because it blends in. He hopes the Council will uphold the Commission's approval and let the Cunningham's move on. Kitty Harvey said she feels bad for the Cunningham's, knows they sense this is a hostile environment and she wanted to let them know it is not. She welcomed them as neighbors, is looking forward to porch parties, thinks the final version is very similar to what is seen in the downtown, and it is replacing a converted garage. She felt this is a major improvement and she looks forward to this enhancement. Charles Huff, project architect, thanked Mr. Dolan and planning staff members and feels the project will enhance the historic fabric of the downtown. They received further encouragement and votes from the Planning Commission and thanked the 60 letters of encouragement that Dave Cunningham presented at the Commission meetings of neighbors living and working in the downtown area. He also thanked the PHA where one letter made the comment that the home is lovely. He is now concerned with recent letters that speak of this house as a condominium or a townhouse looking project. All components of the house presented tonight that they have presented to the Planning Commission employ historic details such as wall window roof materials found in many historic homes. Two items repeated have been about mass and the assumption that the garage is historic. Mr. Macci will tell the Council later that this is not a historic structure. In terms of mass, they have made many changes to the plans throughout the process, and he is concerned they were here tonight, as these changes were approved. Franklin Macci, architectural historian, said he was retained as an environmental consultant at the request of the Planning staff and the applicant has asked that he be available if the Council has questions. Bonnie Shamblin said she does not know the Cunningham's but is here because of their project which she passes by everyday on her way home. The project meets guidelines for remodel and just because some people have negative feelings about it, the Cunningham's have done everything they can to comply and the neighbors most closely affected will have stronger ideas. But, it does seem to her that issues regarding regulated issues in Pleasanton should be made based on ordinance and not on people's opinions. People do not have to like every single thing about every design of every project, but to allow opinions and feels of just a few people to dictate above regulations and City ordinance sets a dangerous precedent. Her family has been in town for 5 generations since the 1870's. She understands historic preservation and also improving the neighborhood and at the same time, very few residents have lived with the number of changes that have taken place in town as her family has. Most has been for the good of the City whether they liked them at the time they were being done or not. She worked on the DSP committee and at that time, the Historic Preservation Task Force made some pretty solid attempts to put some teeth into an ordinance about this very situation, and the neighbors of the downtown made it impossible for them to do that based on their fear of infringement on their property owner's rights. It seems like what they really wanted was the right to tell the rest of us how we could do City Council Minutes Page 17 of 26 February 7, 2012