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VIA EMAIL December 13, 2021 Planning Commission City of Pleasanton 200 Old Bernal Avenue Pleasanton, CA 94566 sananthan@cityofpleasantonca.gov RE: Steelwave Site -- Sixth Cycle Housing Element Update Sites Inventory (December 15, 2021 Planning Commission Agenda Item No. 3) Honorable Commissioners, USL Pleasanton Lakes L.P. ("Steelwave") owns Site 28 ("Steelwave Site") as described in the City of Pleasanton's Sixth Cycle Housing Element Update Preliminary Sites Inventory. The Steelwave Site could provide the City with more than 1,300 units of high-quality housing at varying densities, but City planning staff have recommended that the site be excluded from the Housing Element Update. We appreciate the considerable time and effort City planning staff have devoted to the Housing Element Update process, but we disagree with their assessment of the Steelwave Site. We ask the Planning Commission to recognize the housing development opportunity our land provides by recommending it for inclusion in the Housing Element Update Final Sites Inventory ("Inventory"). Inclusion of sites in East Pleasanton (like ours) has been raised repeatedly by Planning Commissioners and members of the public during the Housing Element Update planning process. City planning staff has cited many complexities of planning for large development as the basis for excluding the Steelwave Site, arguing that due consideration should be given to the property only as a part of the East Pleasanton Specific Plan (EPSP) process. Given that the EPSP process, including significant evaluation and studies, has started and stopped numerous times over the last 25 years, it does not seem to us that the EPSP should be relied on as a reason for delaying consideration of the Steelwave Site as an opportunity for housing. In the Housing Element Update the City is empowered to identify the Steelwave Site as a housing opportunity site, and to rezone it for residential development, without the EPSP process. In fact, staff's recommendation to include in the Inventory other large, relatively complex, and similarly situated sites (including land within the EPSP area) suggests that any complexities posed by the Steelwave Site can be adequately addressed through the Housing Element Update process. We therefore ask the Planning Commission to recognize that Site 28 is actually available for housing and should be included in the Inventory. A History of Deferred Planning As the timeline below demonstrates, the City has grappled with the question of whether, and if so, how to develop East Pleasanton since the mid 1990s: 101 California Street, Suite 800, San Francisco CA 94111 1 PH 650-571-2200 1 WEB SteelWaveLLC corn