PC 030911 - Laserfiche WebLink

Mr. Dolan stated that staff has done this with several projects in the past. He noted that the direction is clear on what is supposed to be done, but it is unclear with respect to what to do with the results and if staff has the ability to ignore them. He added that there is language that suggests that the City has the opportunity to make its own judgments if it is not satisfied with the conclusion; however, if a professional opinion is obtained, the inclination, when making a recommendation, is to defer to the person more qualified because that professional is more likely to be correct than staff. be more valuable than that of staff. 3. Demolition. This prohibits the demolition of any building found to be historically significant with regard to the California Register criteria unless such buildings is determined by the Chief Building Official to be unsafe or dangerous and if no other reasonable means of rehabilitation or relocation can be achieved. Mr. Dolan indicated that determining a building to be unsafe or dangerous does not happen very often, because even if the house is in bad shape, it is difficult to say it is unsafe or dangerous because sometimes there is a whole area in a building which may be unoccupied. He noted that relocation is not a viable solution because there is no place to relocate; there are not a lot of vacant lots in historic areas available to take these buildings. Mr. Dolan stated that in determining whether or not other reasonable means of rehabilitation or relocation can be achieved, -which basically means that the cost to rehabilitate the building should not exceed 50 percent of its current value. He noted that this is a good attempt but not perfect because it involves an assessor to determine the value of the current structure minus the land, a contractor to determine the costs of improvements and rehabilitation, and the ability of staff to verify whether or not an expense listed is justified or actually necessary. Mr. Dolan stated that another item that arises is the definition of demolition. noted that there is no law that defines a demolition; some people say everything has to go down, and others say they are not demolishing because they are leaving one wall up. He stated that staff receives applications which are essentially remodels, with the demolition plan showing the extent of what will remain and what will be new. He added that sometimes only the studs and foundation remain. He indicated that staff uses the 50-percent standard, related to - which is an imperfect system because a plan can show that only 50 percent of the house is being taken down, and then during reconstruction, it is discovered that there is dry rot in the remaining studs. He indicated that this becomes a difficult matter because the whole issue is to take care of the neighborhood so it looks like the historic place that the community values. PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MINUTES, March 9, 2011 Page 7 of 24