Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout00 - Written CommentsReceived After Agenda Printed December 12, 2023 Written Comments December 12, 2023, City Council Agenda Comments The following comments on items on the Newport Beach City Council agenda are submitted by: Jim Mosher ( iimmosher(aD-yahoo.com ), 2210 Private Road, Newport Beach 92660 (949-548-6229) Item Vl. MATTERS WHICH COUNCILMEMBERS HAVE ASKED TO BE PLACED ON A FUTURE AGENDA (NON -DISCUSSION ITEM) This item requires an action by the Council: In this case to "Consider forming a City Council ad hoc committee to work with staff and provide guidance regarding Citywide transit, etc." One hopes the item means what the all caps title says: namely, a vote to bring back a future item to consider forming a committee rather than authorizing the Mayor to make appointments on December 12 Either way, the "non -discussion" notation suggests there will be no opportunity for either the Council or the public to comment prior to the vote. While the Council may be able to restrict itself in that way, this gives the public the impression their representatives with questions about the request will be learning about it, and possibly discussing it among themselves, prior to the meeting in potential violation of the Brown Act. Not allowing the public to comment before the decision is made would appear to be a clear violation of the Brown Act. My comment is that the description is ambiguous. Who will the committee be providing guidance to? Hopefully, it is to the Council as a whole at a public meeting. If the committee will be guiding the staff, all the committee's deliberations and guidance will need to be conducted in public. Beyond that, is this study of mobility options mandated by the recently -adopted Circulation Element? If so, why is an "A-1" vote needed? If not, isn't this a topic the GPAC should be reviewing? Item 1. Minutes for the November 28, 2023 City Council Meeting The passages shown in italics below are from the draft minutes with suggested corrections shown in cfrikeoui underline format. The page number refers to Volume 66. Page 1, Item VI, paragraph 2: "Jim Mosher noted that parenthetical digits were not placed after some of the numerals which were spelled out in Item 3 (Allowing Short -Term Mooring License Agreements and Establishing Fair Market Value License Fees for Offshore and Onshore Moorings) and suggested edits to the Newport Qe Gh Municipal Code (NBMC); stated that no hotel should be included in Item 4 (Tennis and Pickleball Club at Newport Beach); pointed out that in Item 5 (Adopting Housin_a Element Implementation Noise -Related Amendments), *he amendment to the housing rules to allow fer housing outside of the 65 decibel contour is already allowed in item 5 (Adopting Housing Cement ►mn/emenfatien Noise -Related Amendments); and indicated challenges with reading the NBMC in Item 6 (Adding, Amending, and Repealing Various Provisions of the Newport Beach Municipal Code), questioned the reason for the amendments, and encouraged a no vote." December 12, 2023, City Council agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 2 of 4 Page 6, paragraph 4: "Jim Mosher questioned why all mixed -use areas are not included, why there is a separate 20-unit separate units ownership requirement Cap as opposed to projects with 20 or more units, noted an increase in the maximum number of permits, pointed out a misprint, suggested the correction read "until the total number is less than ..."for new permits, and thought the item was not ready for approval." Item 3. Ordinance No. 2023-23: Newport Beach Municipal Code Amendments Related to Short Term Lodging (PA2023-0116) As detailed below, while I agree with the objective of moving short term lodgings from purely residential "districts" into mixed use districts,' I disagree as to how best to achieve that. And if the Council adopts this ordinance as written, I don't think they will be doing what their public prefers. But first, I have to question why the Council would be adopting language with obvious errors: Page 3-10: Subsection "T appears to be a definition of ""Short term lodging unit" rather than of "Short term." "Short term" presumably means simply "for a period of thirty (30) consecutive days or less." Page 3-11: In "5.95.020 Permit Required," the phrase "located within a residential district or multi -use area" should be deleted. It adds nothing, and creates the impression an STL outside those areas does not require a permit. Page 3-12: In Subsections B and D, saying something has to be filed "within 30 days of a certain event is ambiguous. It could mean either it has to be filed in a 30-day window ending on the day of the event, or that there is a 30-day grace period after the event, or that it has to be filed somewhere between 30 days before to 30 days after the event. It is apparently intended to create a grace period within which filings will be accepted after the event. However, having a grace period creates a pool of permits whose continued expired or unexpired status is unknowable, since the owner may or may not choose to renew. Why not require these filings to be made well ahead of the expiration, so they can be processed before any discontinuity in status occurs? Page 3-13: In "5.95.042 Maximum Number of Permits," the end of the second sentence of Subsection A was presumably intended to read: "..., no new permit shall be issued to any person on the waiting list, as described in subsection (F) of this section, until the total number of residential district permits does not excee is less than one thousand four hundred seventy- five (1,475)" and in Subsection B, "... until the total number of multi -use area permits is less than seventy-five (75)." [As I tried to explain orally on November 28, saying the waiting list will be tapped when the number does not exceed 1,475, creates a logical roadblock. It means staff is told to issue a new permit when the number gets to 1,475. But that would increase the number to 1,476 in violation of the maximum allowed.] ' The use of the term "district" in Newport Beach planning is non -intuitive. It conjures up an image of a extended area of lots all with the same zoning. But it is more of a lot -by -lot land use designation. A single lot from one "district" can be found embedded among lots from other districts. December 12, 2023, City Council agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 3 of 4 As alluded to above, even if these technical errors were fixed, the adopting the present language does at least two things contrary to the public input the Council has received: It takes something like 24 existing STL permits in mixed use districts out of the 1,550 cap previously agreed to by the City and the Coastal Commission. Unless those permits are abandoned, this effectively increases the overall citywide permit cap to around 1,574. 2. It allows up to 75 new permits to be issued in the "multi -use area" before any attrition occurs in the residential districts, still further increasing the potential number of active permits. Both these problems could be avoided by making the following simple change to the proposed rules for adding new permits from the waiting list: • For residential districts, issue a new permit only when: (1) the number of active permits in all residential districts is less than 1,475, and (2) the total number of permits in the entire City is less than 1,550. For the "multi -use" areas, issue a new permit only when: (1) the number of active permits in those two districts is less than 75, and (2) the total number of permits in the entire City is less than 1,550. This would ensure all STL permits are counted toward the 1,550 cap, and since condition "(1)" is currently fulfilled only for the multi -use areas, it would allow an orderly, if gradual, movement of permits from the residential to the multi -use areas without raising the citywide cap, even temporarily. If it is the Council's wish that the eventual number of permits in the multi -use areas be 95 (including the 20 staff says are already there), rather than 75, while maintaining the 1,550 overall cap, then they need only adjust the limits in the above formulas to 1,455 in residential districts and 95 in multi -use areas. Item 4. Resolution No. 2023-85: Approving Revised Salary Schedules for Key and Management and Part -Time Employees It is good to see staff being forthcoming about the need to make corrections to a previously adopted resolution, and to see that those corrections are being made through adoption of a new resolution rather than quietly altering the already adopted one. However, I am unable to find any indication of what is being changed. Although not clearly explained, the previous resolution had some lines in italics, which I assume meant they were being revised. I see nothing in this one calling attention either to the revisions or the error corrections. Item 10. Resolution No. 2023-86: Setting City Council Regular Meeting Dates for Calendar Year 2024 The alternative of holding the second meeting in November on November 19, 2024, rather than on November 26, 2024, seems like a poor one to me. December 12, 2023, City Council agenda comments - Jim Mosher Page 4 of 4 As I understand it, staff normally begins work on the agenda 11 or 12 days before the meeting date. Work on a November 19 agenda would have to be begun while the November 12 meeting was still pending. The likely result would be that the more "serious" items would be deferred to a later date. But since our Council normally performs no "serious" work in December, and staff needs time in January to recover from their time off, there would be no serious Council work conducted for nearly two months, instead of just one. Since the last meeting in October is scheduled for October 22, which is three weeks before November 12, it would seem to me a better alternative would be to hold the November 2024 meetings on November 5 and November 19. That would give a more even spacing of meetings, and give extra time to prepare for some real work on December 10, rather than holding a purely ceremonial meeting then. Since November 5 would be the first Tuesday of the month, PB&R would have to find a different place to meet, but I think they would be able to accommodate, although they might have to make due with less senior support staff if their normal ones are needed in the Council Chambers. Item Xll. PUBLIC COMMENTS REGARDING CITY COUNCIL REORGANIZATION It will be difficult for speakers to comment on the reorganization without knowing who will be nominated in Items 12 and 13. As I have noted in prior years, since there will be no new member joining the Council on December 12, 2023, the City Charter places no obligation on the Council to reconsider its selection of Mayor. Only when one or more new members are seated is a reconsideration required. Since the Council has, by policy, chosen to take these votes more often, I think the City would be equally or better served if, by policy, it agreed to generally vote for the longest serving member who had not previously been Mayor. That way everyone would get a chance, there would be a predictable transition, and the public would not have any reason to think nefarious backroom deals had been made. Since the outcome would be known in advance, there would also be less reason to party and the Council might actually be able to do something in December.