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HomeMy WebLinkAboutNOVEMBER 28, 2006 (2) " (i) .. . MINUTES ARCADIA CITY PLANNING COMMISSION Tuesday, November 28, 2006, 6:30 P.M. Arcadia,City Community Center The Planning Commission of the City of Arcadia met in regular session on Tuesday, November 28, 2006, at 6:30 p.m., in the Arcadia Community Center of the City of Arcadia, at 365 Campus Drive, with Chairman Olson presiding. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE ROLLCALL: PRESENT: ABSENT: Commissioners Baderian, Beranek, Hsu, Panilleand Olson , , , None OTHERS ATfENDING Community Development Administrator. Jason Kruckeberg Senior Administrative Assistant Billie Tone EIP Representative Alison Rondone SUPPLEMENTAL INFORMATION FROM STAFF REGARDING AGENDA ITEMS Community'Development Administrator Kruckeberg presented a letter'fTom Cbatten, Brown, Carstens to the Commissioners regarding the public meeting on the DEIR'.for the Shops at Santa Anita. PUBLIC BEARING ITEMS Commissioner Olson said that the purpose of the meeting was for the Planning Commission-to hear public.commeI!tS on the draft environmental irnpacireport for the Shops at Santa Anita project only. He also reviewed the procedures applying to speakers. 1. PUBLIC MEETING Draft Environmental Impact Report Shops ~Santa Anita Park _ _ The City of Arcadia Development SerVices Department has completed a Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for the Revised Shops at Santa Anita Park Specific Plan (also referred to as the Caruso Project) located in the City of Arcadia. The purpose of the meeting is to allow an opportunity to comment on the Draft Environmental Impact-Report (DEIR) only. The .Planning Commission wilLbe hearing comments only, no decision will be made on the project. Mr, Kruckeberg presented a brief overview of the project to date and stated that the public comment period will end on December 14 at 5:30 p.m, The public hearing was opened. . . Following is a list of the speakers. Please refer to the draft transcript of the meeting (attached) for their comments. Dirk L. Hudson, 428 Stanford Dr., Arcadia Stewart Bell, MD, 150N. Santa Anita, #300, Arcadia, CA 91006 Larry Williams, 130 Garfield Place Brian Golden, 1 022E. Camino Real Sanford Shulman. 427 Harvard Dr. Sonia Williams, 130 Greenfield Place Douglas Carstens, 3250 Ocean Park Blvd., #350 Nicky Hunter, 120 W. Sycamore Ave. Scott Hettrick, 67 E, Arthur Ave. JeffB()wen, 1919 Wilson Ave, Rebecca Ruiz, 955 EncantoDr. TalinNigolian, 951 Paloma Dr. Paul Herr, 515. E. Wisteria Ave. Sung Tse, 240 Renoak Way Ruth Dunlop, 824 Arcadia Ave. Bob Kimbal~ 140 Santa Cruz Rick Limo, Caruso Affiliated Vince Foley, 320 Cambridge Dr. Tony Henrich, 431 N. Altura Rd., Arcadia Unidentified Speaker Michael O'Conner,370 W. Colorado S1. Kevin Norton, IBEW Mike. Manis, Portola Drive Richard Martinez, 301 W. Magna Vista Ave. Frank Razi, 2210 S,Siidh Ave. Eina Sirene, 824 Arcadia Ave., #11, Arcadia Paul Becket, 2016 Canyon Rd. Ralph Roy.Ramirez, 504 Sharon Road Marco Valle, 4939 Rupert Lane, La Canada, CA~91OU Carmen Thibour, 1215 OaklawnRd., Arcadia 91006 Stella RosS; 881 W, Huntington Dr. Mary E, Hansen, 900 Hugo Reid Dr. AnnA. Duirgerian, 122 E. Foothill, #113, Arcadia, CA 91006 Dennis Goldenhouse, 400 block ()fFairview Dick Harris; 143 W. Santa Anita Terrace Kelly Mandu, 30 E. Newman Colleen Brennan, 315 S. AlturaRd., Arcadia, 91007-6239 BettyHarris, 143 W. Santa Anita Tr. Ed Casey, Westfield ScottSaire, 444 W. Huntington, #113 Vidal Hernandez, 540 Gloria Rd. Mark Bower, 300 Monte Vista Rd. Jerry Garing, 122 E. Foothill Blvd., #113 . PC AGENDA 11-28-06 /'age 2 . . Mary Daugherty, 1110 Rodeo Rd" Arcadia, Ca9I006 Laurie Thompson, 229 S, A1tura Rd. Robert Blake 871 Colorado Drive Victor Ceporious, 32 E. Camino Real MOTION: It was moved by Commissioner ParriIle, seconded by Commissioner Baderianto close the public hearing. ROLL CALL: AYES: NOES: Commissioners Baderian, Beranek, Hsu, ParrilJe and Olson None TIME RESERVED FOR THOSE IN THE AUDiENCE WHO WISH TO ADDRESS THE PLANNING COMMISSION ON NON-PUBLIC HEARING MATfERS - Five-minute time limit, per person None MAnERS'FROM CITY COUNCIL AND PLANNING COMMISSION Councilman Amundson thanked everyone for their pllIticipation in the hearing. MODIFICATIONCOMMITrEE MEETING ACTIONS Chainnan Olson said that all items on the Modification Committee agenda were conditionally approved. MAITEJl& FROM STAFF None ADJOURNMENT TO 12-12-06 AT THE ARCADIA CITY COUNCn. CHAMBERS AT 7:00 p.m. 9:00 D.m. Is/Jason Kruckebertl Secretary, Arcadia Planning Commission PC AGENDA 11,28-06 Page 3 . . 3204 1 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 '22 23 24 25 o ARCADIA CITY PLANNING COMMISSION TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 2006 6:30 P.M. ARCADIA COMMUNITY CENTER 365' campus Drive Arcadia, california 91007 2 1 COMMISSIONER OLSON: I'd like to call to order 2 the meeting of the Arcadia City planning commission for 3 Tuesday, November 28, 2006. 4 would everybody 'please rise, and join me in 5 the pledge of Allegiance. 6 (The pledge of Allegiance was recited.) 7 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Roll call., please, 8 MS. TONE: Commissioner Baderian? 9 COMMISSIONER BADERIAN: present, 10 MS. TONE: commissioner 8eranek? 11 COMMISSIONER BERANEK: Present. 12 MS. TONE: Commissioner HSU? 13 COMMISSIONER HSU: Present. 14 MS. TONE: Commissi oner parri 11 e? 15 COMMISSIONER PARRILLE: present. 16 MS. TONE: Commissioner Olson? 17 COMMISSIONER OLSON:' Present. 18 can thave supplemental information from staff 19 agenda items?, ' 20 MR. KRUCKEBERG: We do have one item that was 21 passed out. It's a memo from Chapman Brown Carson. 22 It's dated November 28, 2006, and it's been placed at 23 each of your places. 24 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. TO 25 start the meeting, I'd just like to briefly describe o 3 1 what we're here to do tonight, and that is to accept 2 public comments on the draft environmental impact report 3 for the shops at Santa Anita project only. 4 I'd like to go ahead and turn this over to the page 1 ~ , 'Jto . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 staff for a brief presentation on the project, the process and the procedures we will follow. MR. KRUCKEBERG: Thank you, Mr. olson. welcoTe. Thank you to you all for comins tonight. My name 1S Jason Kruckebers, I'm the communlty development administrator for the Clty of Arcadia. Also with me toni ght is Alison Rongodi from EIP Associ ates, consultants on the project, and we have additional staff in the audience. The purpose of tonisht's meeting. as Mr. Olson mentioned, is to receive publlC comment on the draft EIR for the shops at Santa Anita project. The draft EIR was released to the public on 'October 23rd. It's available for review at City Hall. It's also available at the library. You can also purchase copies, both in hard copy form and CD. and it's available also on the city's website. So there's plenty of 'opportunities for you to review the document. The california Envi ronmental Quality Act requires a 45-daypublic comment period. That public period will be ending oil December 6th. However, the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 .17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o , 4 city did extend the public comment period un~il oecember 14th, 2006. At each of your places here tonlght, there is an agenda. On the back of that agenda is a notice that shows that extension of the comment period and also the method with which to give comments to the city on ~hat. so, again, 5:30 P.M. December 14th is the end of the public comment period. All comments received in writi ng upunti 1 the end of the peri od wi 11 be added into the administrative record. as well as any comments verbally made tonight. As you can see, we have dual reporters here so we are recordins the meeting tonight so there will be transcripts avallable at the city. As most of you know, the Shops at santa Anita project was revised and resubmi ned to the ci ty in Apri 1 of this year. Just a quick description on the project. The project contains a specific plan for the 304-acre property that includes the racetrack and surrounding area. Included in the application are zone change! general planning minutes, architectural designrevlew, design guidelines 'for the proposed buildings. The major change of the revised project was the removal of resi denti a 1.. units from ,the proj ect., -' 'The project weare lookins at tonight in this draft EIR does not include resident,al. The project as 5 1 proposed is approximately 829,000 square feet of retail, 2 commercial and office, designed as a pedestrian main 3 street, pedestrian-oriented main street in a north/south 4 orientation on the southern part of the racetrack 5 parking lot. 6 The northern portion of the project includes 7 1.4 acre -- it's called paddock garden, which would 8 actually interface With the grandstand in the paddock 9 area of the racetrack. At the southern portion of the 10 project area is a proposed three-and-a-half-acre water 11 feature, which is included within a seven-acre, roughly, page 2 . . 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 open space area. The ~roject will also include an approximately 98,000 square foot simulcast center which would De located within the actual grandstand structure itself. In addition to the project that I jLlst described, of course, there will be on and offsite public improvements for streets, pedestrians. et cetera. As required by the Cali forni a Envi ronmenta 1 Quality Act, the EIR does three things. It assess the expected direct and indirect accumulative impacts of the project. It identifies means of voiding or minimizing potential adverse impacts from the project. And it evaluates a reasonable range of alternatives to the project. The EIR in this case analyzes 15 topic areas, 6 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ,9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o including transportation, traffic, aesthetics, water quality, air quality, et cetera. This meeting is one of the key steps in, our process. AS you remember back in June we held a similar meeting called a public scoping meeting where we invited input on what items and issues should be included in the draft EIR. This meeting is to receive again comments from you on how that information was presented, are there things that still need to be looked at, and how are the issues presented within the document. The meeting allows the planning commission 1:0 hear public comments, and they will be taking those public comments, alon~ with additional comments that we receive, as I menboned in writing, along with our responses when the planning commission and the city council reviews this project for a decision. And that, we estimate, will occur -- will begin in March, April of next year. The 1'1 anni ng cammi ss; on wi 11 be maki ng a recommendation on to city council, and it's at those meetings where planning commission will have the benefit of all the public comments received during the comment period and the consultant team and city's responses to those comments. At those meetings in early next year, we will be able to receive all your questions, the planning commission, I'm sure, will have plenty of their 7 1 own. Again, this meeting tonight is to receive those 2 commentsc. So we won't be discussi ng necess'ari Ty the 3 content, answer questions. we will be receiving comments 4 from you. 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 One final thing we wanted to mention, we did get a number of calls on the recent initiatives and whether those recent initiatives that passed which dealt with public paid parking and also dealt with signage have a si9nificant impact of the EIR. And the answer iS,tlieres no signfficant impact. They do riot necessarily change any of the conclusions of the draft EIR. So with that, I'm going to turn it back ove~ to Oave olson to go through the procedures we'll follow tonight. I'd like to ask folks to please turn off cell phones and pagers. We have a lot of folks in the au~ience, and w~'re going.to try to.get through this as qUlck1y as posslb1e. Agaln, oave wl11 go through the Page 3 . . 19 20 21 22 23 24 25, o 3204 procedures that we will follow tonight. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you, Jason. First of all, the commission is not here to answer any questions on the project because we do not have all the project materials yet, and, plus, we're basically here to hear public comments. Because of the size of the crowd, we have determined that all the speakers will be 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 8 limited to three minutes. we feel that's an appropriate amount of time for each 'speaker to say what they want to say. If you don't feel -- you've got a lot more to say, you can write that down, submit it in. whether you speak tonight or put your comments in writing, they're given the same amount of wei9ht and' wi 11 be answered in thei r enti rety and i ncl uded 1 n final reports and the comments that the consultants wilT look at, the city will look at. when you're up here, as 'you come up here, I'll ask that if you want to speak, start 'to form a line behind the podium. ~tate your name and your address for the public record, then you may speak. I've got a stopwatch up here. we willmoni.tor the three-minute time limit very closely and kind of give you a warning when ~ou're' gett~ng close to trye three minutes. Also, theresa cllpboard at the podlum that we also need .you to write your name and address, once again, for the public record that -- sometimes it~s hard to understand the .spelling of your name without it written down there as well. I'd also like to mention, normally we also have up here with us at our planning commission meetings alia i son from the (:'i ty counci 1 . ou r liaison is councilmember Peter Amundson. He's here tonight, but 9 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ,9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 he's sittin9 in the back. we've got some limited space up here. H1S job as a councilmember and as our liaison, is, just to observe us as a planning commission and to help bring information to us from the city council, as well as report back to the city council actions and thin9s that happened during the planning commission meetlngs. And with that, again, all cell phones off and I would..goahead, and like to open 'the public meeting. And if anybody would like to speak, now is the time to come forward. State your name and address. MR. HUOSON: Oirk Hudson, 428 Stanford orive, Arcadia. As Arcadia residents who live just north of the racetrack, we urge prompt consioeratlon and approval of the Shops at santa Anita. we have toured Caruso projects at Thousand oaks, calabasas arid The Grove, and have come back deeply impressed. Our con"cerns are two-fold. One, to preserve the economic Viability of historic santa Anita park and with it Arcadia's racing heritage. And two, to obtain from Arcadia as part of its future heritage, the demonstrated beauty and style of Caruso landscaping and architecture. Thi s woul.d be a vast improvement over Page 4 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 ' 25 o 10 today's empty pa. rking lot, and it's uno, bstr,ucted view of the trashy 100kin9 eastside of Westfield Mall. The posltive environmental impacts, the Shops at Santa Anita would provide at least seven benefits to Arcadia, One, preservation of Arcadia's racing heritage in Santa Anita for which Westfield has no plan. Two, an attractive and relaxing outdoor environment as may be observed in previous Caruso projects. Three, over two mill i on doll ars annually in new sales tax revenue to the city, benefiting schools and vital services, police, fire and ambulance. Four,a wider spectrum of goods and services 'with greater competition for the consumer dollar. Fi ve" an auditori um and performi ng arts center for school and communitY events, and offices for the Arcadia School District all without charge. Six, an atmosphere and architecture in harmony with ,Santa Anita offering views of horses being brought up for racing events and perhaps even i'i des in horse-drawn carriaQes. seven, an attractive open-air complement to the lndoor Westfield Mall, enabling both malls to exchange visitors and better compete with malls further away by offering greater variety and choices to customers, the same strategy that works for food courts in malls such as westfield and jewelry and garment districts in cities. Negative impacts. 11 Havi ng said allthi s, there's some co'ncern over increased traffic, whether attributable to westfield's expansion. tlie good traffic, whether Shops Santa Anita. the bad traffic. 30 years ago when we moved to Arcadia, the racetrack was flourishing and the traffic was much worse than i,t is today. Nevertlieless, the college street area, above the racetrack where we live" continues to be surrounded on all sides by traffic creating problems for both ingress and egress. COMMISSIONER OLSON: One minute. MR. HUDSON: AS a statement in our comment. to the first draft EIR effort, much could be ,done to alleviate this situation by placing signals at Baldwin and Harvard on the west and princeton and colorado on the east, and inserting a dedicated northbound~feeder , lane on Baldwin fromStanford'to-Ha'rvard.--In addition, through traffi c woul d be di scouraged by closi ng the intersection at Harvard and colorado which is also a blind intersection. , unfortunately, the second draft EIR contains no discussion that we could find of traffic impacts and riliti9ation,proposals for the coll~ge street area that we submltted ln our comment on the fl'rst draft fIR on February 27th of this year. One would have thought the comments provided by the city would have been 1 2 3 4 12 considered, discussed, the solution, the caruso project. unlike other alternatives -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: we're at three minutes. wrap it up in the next ten or 15 seconds, please. page 5 . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 MR. HUDSON: -- provides its own solution to the traffic problems in the adjacent neighborhoods. First I'd like the city, as reflected in this draft EIR, unlike Westfield, Caruso will provide a 250,000 bond to address t.he impacts of increased t.raffic in the adjacent neighborhood. second, unlike possible alternatives, the Shops at Santa Anita will provide over tWo million annually in sales tax revenue to the city which. will enable the city to mitigate the traffic impacts. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Mr. Hudson, thank you. If you've got more to add, please submit itin writing. It sounds like ,you have a speech there. MR. HUDSON: I almost reached the last sentence.' ' COMMISSIONER OLSON: We hav~ got a lot of peopl e here. MR. HUOSON: I'll put my name down, if I may. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Yes, please do that. MR. BELL: My name is Stewart Bell. I'm a physician. I practice at 150 North Santa Anita. My concern of the mall is two-fold, I don't 13 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 '19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o disagree ,with much of what the previous speaker said about the attracti~eness of some malls, but that's possible. My concern is the traffic impact. A recent article, about a year ago, in the Star News mentioned that ~rcadia traffic has grown much worse, much faster tha:n the traffi c engineers had anti cipated, whi ch tell s us something about the traffic projections which can .be i naccur'ate. I thi nk, since' we' re looki ng at a statement that's claimed that this adding of 30 to 50,000 cars a day to the city is going to actually improve, traffic. if we just improve the signals at the intersections. A good way, to check out a r'eaHty check out on it is to take a look at what's happened in the prior caruso malls. My understanding is his last 100,000 square foot development tremendously worsened traffic, and they're now after the city to try and mitigate some of that. It's a permanent effect. It isn't once we build a mall, if he's worse, if the traffic's worse, he takes it away. It's there. Second, my concern is the extra thousand square foot of gambling pOint, non-gambling industry people, study of the economic impact of gambling, posi tive, negati ve, i,t turns: out negati ve. Increased police, fire, bankruptcy rates, et cetera. drain on legitimate business. It's a negative. And this is part 14 1 of the plan. 2 Lastly, just tell you as a physician, some of 3 the saddest, wounds I've seen are self-inflicted ones. 4 We're talking about changing a city of homes to perhaps 5 a chy of traffic gridlock I would just, ask you to 6 reconsider that. Thank you. 7 COMMISSIONER. OLSON: Thank you very much. 8 MR. WILLIAMS: My name is Larry williams. I'm 9 from 130 Greenfield Place. 10 And t want to discuss one aspect of the new 11 ma 11, that is the so-call ed water feature. Thi s is Page 6 1 . --2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 . . 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 about three and a half acres of basically still water. And'I want to analyze it in terms of benefit versus risk. AS I see it, this three and a half acres has basically relatively little benefit, after all this water isn't being used by anybody for anything, other than to be looked at. I would suggest there are two down sides., two risks to this large water feature. The first, of course, is the West Nile virus situation. The situation is that, for example, if a human is showing symptoms, their death rate is somewhere between 5 to 10 percent. For a horse, rather ironically, it's something around 40 percent. If you 'go on the Internet and check the State of california or the State of New York the number one 15 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . method to reduce the incidents of west Nile Virus is simply to remove sites of standing water. we've been urged to do that locally. and pe()ple in this region are guite concernecl about that. we've been told, for example, to do things like takinl/ away spare tires or trash tires which may have water 1n them, or animal dishes that are left outside. It's somewhat ironic, of course, because of the horse involvement, a loss of just one horse from a racetrack of this type would be a real disaster. The second downside is that, of injury due to the, water. Although the new EIR has increased the security around the water feature, there still is no complete security around it. children can walk in, fall in, be thrown in from a variety of sites of this water feature. And you can imagine a scenario where you're there with your children or grandchildren and you suddenly discover one of them might be missing at night, for example. what are you supposed to do? Are you supposed to look in this 'water feature and try to find someone? I think that the security around the feature has to be at least as good as those we require around swimm,ing pools, for example, which this is basically a replica of. , My alternative is to convert, this into either 16 a grassy area or a xeriscape that offers you two _ _ - possibilities. Increased'parkin'g for overflow, and also a place for athletic events. I think that, we do have to be careful of not having security around the feature and the disease threat. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. Also" could I just add, I haven't heard any clapping or anything, but please maintain civility throughout this hearing. Everybody's got different view points and would like to say them, and we would like to hear them all. Even though everyone has many different viewpoints, at the end of the day we're all neighbors. so please show respect here for the speaker at the podium. Next speaker, please. MR. GOLDMAN: 8rian Goldman, 1022 East camino Real. I'm just going to read a brief paragraph from page 7 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 the public notice that we should have all receiv!!d in the mail but many of us may not have read, "si gn'i fi cant environmental effects. The proposed project would result in significant, unavoidable adverse environmental effects to aesthetics, air quality, cultural resources, noise, transportation, traffic and utilities and service systems that cannot be mitigated to less than 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 c16 17 18 19 20, 21 22 23 24 25 o 17 significant levels. The EIR provides further discussion and the environmental effects resulting from the implementation of the proposed project." My question is, why on God's green earth do we want to put something in there that's going to have significant environmental effects that we cannot fix once it's done? so my question is, on this for caruso, as many of you have heard many times on T.V., deal or no deal? And, it's no deal. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you, Mr. Goldman. Next speaker, please. MR. SHULMAN: The gentleman before me forgot to sign, but'I don't know if that's mandatory. Nevertheless, I'm Sanford Shulman. we live at 427 Harvard, in what is called the college district as the first gentleman mentioned. ,My concern is that I do hope that within the traffic report, within that environment report., that it's difficult now to access Baldwin or Colorado from Harvard and Stanford .and cambridge, I do hope that they do look at that particular area and have some kind of solution as far as the access and ingress from those streets. Thank you very much. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. MS. WILLIAMS: Hello my name is sonia 18 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 ,11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 w,illiams. I live at 130 Greenfield Place. And my comments concern the panoramic and scenic views from the south and southeast of the santa Anita racetrack when you drive along Huntington Drive in front of Holly Avenue. These ,are described in the 1996 Arcadia General plan as worthy of preservation. They are Arcadia's heritage and must not be obscured. The racetrack built in 1934 is now eligible to be listed on the country's most'prominent nati ona 1 register of ' - - histori c places and the 'Ca 1 iforni a Register of Hi storic Resources. The revised DEIR has numerous adverse aesthetic plans that .needto be changed. For example, in the before pictures of the parking lot with the grandstand behind it, it shows the dull, grey cloudy day not highlighting the background as being vi.5ually distinctive or beautiful. when one dri ves by on Hunti ngto'n Dri ve eastward, one's eyes quickly scan a grey parkin!] lot and look immediately to the grandstand, the mountalns, the greenery, the fabulous vista which we just cannot have taken away from us. In the after picture with the shops now loading the hei!]ht to four-plus stories, the view looks outstanding, qUlte picturesque, and unbelievably .attractiVe. Thi s vi sua 1 effe'ct is decepti ve and that page 8 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 [] . . 3204 [] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 2l 22 23 24 25 [] 19 even with the buildings lowered in height, the visual effect of the grandstand would still be obscured. Note also that all the shops will be visually blinded with perhaps advertising signs, store names, et cetera, taking the eye from the racing track grandstand and showing only gray" roofing. we keep asking for alternatives .to project, I submit, this layout of the shops be split into a horseshoe effect with green path in the middle, no lagoon and with the west and east flanks built with some' shops of a limited number, say at least half the present proposal. Let's not fill in all the land. Give us something aesthetic with limited shops, some restaurants, the auditorium, a beautiful hotel, a medical plaza of offices, school offices, a science park, etcetera. Let us not rush into this very important future investment in our city. Our ci~y cannot be asked to make an amendment to our general plan to allow for the loss of our vista and heritage. Our ,city forefathers voted on this for a good reason, and we need to uphold this part of our heritage. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much, Ms. williams. Ne-xt s'peaker, please. , MR. CARSTENS: Good eveni ng, my name is Douglas carstens, and I'm an attorney with Chatten-Brown 20 & carstens. And we are here representing the 4300 members of Arcadi a Fi,rst. And I did submit that 1 etter for the pl anni ng commi ssi on members' consi,derati on. , I appreciate the time that you'are devoting to this, includin~ tonight and the numerous hearings that we will behavlng on this., It's obviously a very important project. probably one could argue the most important in Arcadi a's l1istory and for its future. so obviously the time spent on this'is time well spent. This is a project that is going to generate about 30,226 vehicle trlps a day. It has those significant impacts that we heard about earlier. It has the dramatic adverse impacts on the historic resource in Arcadia, the Santa Anita Racetrack. So this is something that we urge everybody to take the ttme :that_'s requ,i red to find a bette"r coifsensus. Come up with better alternatives, find a way that you don't have to choose between this group and that group, but find a way that people can come together. I think there are ways, ' if only a better range of alternatives can be developed. We ask tonight not to comment about the details of this EIR,we are going to be submitting a detailed comment letter, we, have done that already on the prior draft EIR. What tonight I'd like to ask is that we extend 2l 1 the comment period just a little bit more. I mean, we 2 had asked that it be extended to January 8th. Staff had 3 determined it would be extended eight days, to the 14th. 4 It's reasonable to ask that it goes just oneinore week. Page 9 . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 Q 3204 This is a regionally significant project. It took seven months for professional consultants to revise this EIR. It's a busy time of year. so it's not unreasonable to extend it a little bit further to give folks an , opportunity to comment and to do so on a good long look at this. This revised draft EIR is still inadequate. There were hundreds of comments, literally hundreds submitted on the prior one, including from members -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: one more minute. MR. CARSTENS: one more minute? I can do that. And public agencies, and they were not responded to here. I. think perhaps th~y were responded to, there were changes, some errors were corrected, some errors were created. But this draft EIR is hard to work with. It's not a redc1ine version where' we can see where changes were made and what responses were made to parti cu1ar comments.. so proceeding 1 i ke that actually discoura~es people who have submitted, taken time out from thelr busy schedules before, submitted comments, 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 .20 21 22 23 24 25 Q 22 and they don't know what happened to those comments. So it's a discouragement to submit comments again. we ask that the EIR be responsive not just to comments that are submitted on this draft, the revised draft, but also on that previous one, the original. That would meet the California Environmental Quality Act's purpose of involving the public in this process. 5-0 we ask for that conti nuance of a dead] ine. And we ask that the EIR be responsive, both to comments that 'are received in this process and in the prior one. And I thank you for your time tonight. I know that there wi 11 be more ab.out this. Thank you very much. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. We have a lot of empty seats throu9hout here, so those that are in the back, if you would llke to sit down. Go ahead, please. MS. HUNTER: I'm Nicky Hunter. I, live at 120 West Sycamore Avenue. This report made by experts is extremelY large, excellent bedtime reading. But I wclu1d say that all the points that I want to make, I just want to take one, and that involves traffic. 42 intersections were actually looked at in depth. And of those, only 20 intersec~ionscwere deemed'to be impacted by this report. NoW, I have a graphic here that I want to show you. This -- just look at the colors because I know you 23 1 can't read anything. Red, this is the project if 2 nothing happens at all. If we don't build anything, 3 this is what our traffic is going to look like. Red 4 means it's going to be at the worst 'pbssib1estages of 5 congestion, the lowest two levels of congestion. Yellow 6 means that traffic is going to be okay. It'S the middle 7 two levels of congesti,on. Green means that the traffic 8 is goin9 to be good, excellent at the top levels of ,9 con~est1on. Just look at, the amount of red without the 10 proJect. 11 Second thing I want to show you is what page 10 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 happens when we do have the project. Again, of those 20 intersections, if we do all the developments, mitigations, including improving the signs and physical restripinq of the lanes, as stated in the report, white on this vlsual shows that there's no impact, or very little. Lots of white. Green shows that those intersections are siqnificantly improved. quite a lot of green. of those 20 lntersections, 16 are qoing to be better, or at least to the same level, as lf no project was there at all. The last remaining, yes, there are four which be improved, I agree, that's the grey. But of four, the levels that the project will actually be the top two levels and just one down in at the won't those is at 24 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o middle level. To me, I just think that's a huge improvement of where we're going to be in 2009. I don't think we can afford not to do this, in terms of improving our traffic. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. MR. HETTRICK: Good evening. My name is scott Hettrick., I live at 67 East Arthur Avenue. I first wanted to commend the city and the independent agency responsible for 'the preparation of this revised environmental impact report. It's good to see that all the issues that were fully addressed from th,e comments we Arcadian's made after.the first report, including concerns that were expressed again this evening about the west ~ile virus and the traffic, they're addressed pretty substantially in the revised report so it should alleviate any concerns some have .had about that., , while I'm happy to see that 84 of the 100 potential areas of impact would result in no si~nificant impact 'with the approval and the building of thls development, there are a few areas that were not covered that I would like to address. First, there's nothing in the report that notes the potential negative impact on the santa Anita 25 1 Pa"k Horse Track if this development is not approved. 2 For instance, will on-track attendance continue to 3 decline? The city has already lost about 1. 5 million 4 dollars ion annual revenue from the 'track in the past 10 5 or 15 years. And as a result -- as an indirect result, 6 we have had to reduce the size of our fire department 7 and .other city staffing during that time. HOW much 8 fur.ther will our city be impacted if this development is 9 not built. 10 There's also nothi ng in thi s report to note 11 the positive impact that an extra two million dollars or 12 more each year from sales tax revenue alone could have 13 on all 'city serv.ices.. Nei ther was it noted how much we 14 could improve fire and police protection for the entire 15 c,i ty by earmarki n~ the fi.rst dollars generated from thi.s 16 development to brlnging those departments back up to 17 full string. 18 In the section about alternative uses for the page 11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 racetrack parking lot, which gets a lot of ink in the media and from other organizations, I don't believe the report provides any perspective on the realistic chances of forcing or convincing the owners of this private property to implement any of these alternatives, whether we want, them to or not. After all, this is private property, and I don't imagine they would be any more willing to have others tell them what to do ~han you I would want someone to tell us what to do wlth our property. 26 or COMMISSIONER OLSON: One minute. MR. HETTRICK: Thank you. There's also nothing in the report to explain the negative impact of having the owners of the race track property build an Indian casino or residential housing or car lots on the property, none of which will offer the tens of millions of dollars of community improvements that Caruso Affiliated is voluntarily offering, The report also doesn't describe the positive impact on our schools if the development is approvedi especi a 11 y ih 1 i ght of the new bond measure, that cal s for new buildings on the high school campus. HOW much more croWded will the campus be if school district offices are not provided a new 22,000 square foot building for free by the developers across the street? In all of the findings relative to the imllact on the traffic, almost all of which show the traffic flow will be even better wi th the improvements provided by the developer' than it is now, as Nicky just so adeptly pointed out, The report does not really factor in how traffic may be even further improved if and when the owners of the westfield Mall provide all the 27 1 mitigations they have promised for years. 2 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Go ahead and wrap it up. 3 MR. HETTRICK: Finally, the report points out, 4 that even without the development, traffi c wi 11 continue 5 to get worse and worse in Arcadia, but there's no 6 mention about the impact on the pocketbooks of local 7 residents if we are required to pay the tens of millions 8 of dollars in higher taxes to make improvement rathe,r 9 -than--letting,the developer of The Shops at Santa Anita 10 foot the bill. Thank you. , 11 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. 12 MR. BOWEN: My name is Jeff Bowen. I live at 13 1919 wi 1 son in Arcadi a. And I've lived in Arcadi a ',si nce 14 1950, and raised my family here. 15 I vi ew thi 5 ErR a 1 i ttle di fferently. , Yes, 16 there's going to be environmental issues to deal with 17 that the vacant parking lot. is built on, but the reality 18 is that somethi ng wi 11 be bui h on that parki ng lot. 19 And I thi nk we ought to, just face that real i ty and move 20 forward with the quality project that's been proposed 21 for that property and b~ thankful that we have it to 22 look for. That's my comment. 23 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, 24 please. 25 MS. RUIZ: My name is Rebecca Ruiz, and I live page 12 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 o 28 I knoW that little dry. mi ssi ng at 955 EnCanto Drive. well, after two EIRs, they are independent and very factual! arid a so part of the life that really, I th1nk, is from these, reports, I wanted to focus on. ' In the project description we have a community theatre added. Now the communitY, at least those who have ~hildren in school, have really been looking for a community theatre. It's a real benefit. school admiriistrativespace, the high school is approaching occupancy maximums. Arid I was at a school board meeting and they were ecstatic to have caruso offer what he's offered, in terms of spaCe. Reinvigorating the racetrack. The purpose of bringing Caruso in there is ,to draw people into the racetrack. So any alternatives would really have to address reinvigorating the racetrack. when people are on the property, they can see the grandstand, they can be invited to come in instead of dri ve by. . Lastl y, I wanted to talk about the footprint of this project. If you go to The Grove; this is just to give a little perspective, The Grove is 13 acres, of which about 20 to 25 percent is open space. The shops at Santa Anita, it's going to have 46 acres available for development that the project is proposi ng, 'of whi ch 26 acres i,s open space. And about 14 acres is park, the water feature, 29 that's the size of The Grove. So i,n addition that's over 50 percent open space. And that's huge. COMMISSIONER OLSON: One minute. MS. RUIZ: In closing, I hope -- I see there are a lot of supporters here, and I hope others come up and talk. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. MS. NIG9LIAN: Helloi my na'!le is Talin Nigolian, and I 11ve on 951 pa oma Dr1ve. And after all this well-researched information, I just want to say to my fellow intelliqent tasteful and concerned Arcadians, really, what more 1S there to think about? More money to the city, very much needed office space for Arcadia High school. A beautiful and safe environment to shop and dine with our famili es. , A community theatre that we' ve all been waiting for. And a developer who cares what we think. And most importantly, let's all remember that competition is good. Have we all noticed the Cheesecake Factory and the finer retail stores such as Banana Republic, Guess and H&M that are all of a sudden coming in westfield. Bottom line, we are Americans and we are about progress, so why not progress forward With a top-notch quality development that most other cities would die to have. 1 Thank 2 3 4 I'm a 30 you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker. MR. HERR: Good evening, my name is Paul Herr. 3D-year resident of Arcadia. Grew up in the san Page 13 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o Gabriel valley. And my main concern is the traffic. ,I notice somebody got up here and said 16 intersections would be better. I'm an accountant. I've been an accountant for many years. The numbers don't add up. I don't see how you can add 30 to ,50,000 car trips a day and improve the traffic no matter how you change things, unless you put in a double decker system or something. I'd like to address the -~also the traffic, as it's going to be five years, ten years and 15 years down the, way. As all of you are aware, anybody who's dri ven on the 210 over the 1 ast 30 or 40 years, it's gotten progressively worse year after year. If you have that many more cars comin9 into Arcadia on the 210, on the 60, and whatever, you ore going to have major cause of additional qridlock. You take the effect that has on the people's tlme, as far as how much time it's going to take us to get to 'and from work, that's increase. That's a cost. It's going to ,slow down your progress so you're driving longer, you're going to use up more gas. 31 I think these need to be addressed in the ErR. I've also been over to The Grove. There is a. lot of gridlock around there. It'S very difficult to find parking loot on occasions. And I don't think we need to add that to Arcadla. Arcadia is known as a city of homes, and I don't think we should make it a city of gridlock. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. MS. TSE: Good evening my name is sung Tse, T-s-e. My address is 240 Renoak way, Arcadia. Ido live in Arcadia. , I would like to squash the rumor that Arcadia, Fi rst, fi r's't of a 11., is a shi 11 orqani zati on for'. Westfield. Iam not paid by Westfleld. I'm a very b~sy mother of tWo. You know what, I just -- I just wonder now people could just glOSS over the fact that we are going to have increased smog that cannot be mitigated. I haye a calendar that was sent to me by the Air Quality Management District, and it says here that the --I'm sorry. Nearly half a million calffor:nia chilpren have asthma, leading cause of children absenteeism. children are more at risk from the effects of ai'r pollution because they breathe in larger ., ' quantities of air, spend a lot of outdoor -- doing outdoor activities, and have lungs that are not fully 32 1 developed. we are talking about the children, the 2 schools, and all the impact, the negative impact, the 3 traffic. ' 4 You know, I'd really love to address all the 5 mothers here. why did you move to Arcadia? Why do you 6 live in Arcadia? Isn't it for your children? I mean, 7 this says the environmental impact -- the DEIR, all the 8 impacts here -- excuse me, I'm sorry. It's listed right 9 here all the impacts, 4.2, 4.2-2, 4,2-3, 4.2-4. And 10 this is black and white. It says that our air will -- 11 it's going to get worse. If you just look at the Page 14 . . 3204 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o okay. If the impact -- 4.2-2 says, "Construction activities associated with the proposed project." It has a lot of initials here, VOC, NOX and Co2. That means smog. Bottom line, that means smog. And it says here, black and white, that it will be -- the impact is significant, and unavoidable. The bottom line here, if we are talking about the overcrowding of schools, this community theatre that's supposed to be so great for our children, this outdoor space that's going to be inside, that's as large as The Grove. My goodness, that's going to be very lar~e, and all that and we're saying that's for our commun1ty, for our children. What about the air that we breathe? You could ,say the lights are not going 33 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o to affect me, I don't live near the mall. I am not affected by the traffic, I don't live near COMMISSIONER OLSON: About 30 seconds. MS. TSE: well, I would just like ever:(one to just instead of -- all these little badge, Arcad1a First and Arcadia wins, whatever, if we are -- if we truly are concerned about ou r chjl d ren, please don't i gno re the fact that thei r ai,r is goi ng to get worse. Thank you. ,COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. please no clapping. MS. DUNLop: I'm Ruth Dunlop, and I live at 824 Arcadia Avenue. Many things have been said tonight that ,I was going to say, like the fact that Caruso is planning on having the Arcadia High school or the Arcadia offices on their property, not charging rent, which will keep the school from bursting at the seams. Somebody said something about calling these people of Arcadia First shills for westfield, I don't think anybody has thought that or said that; however, When Westfield has thrown over three minion dollars into this campaign to defeat carusoi I think that they may be misled. I won't go to the ma, 1 at night. I had two friends who had their purses snatched at Westfield. one was when Broadway was still there, and this friend of mine was going into 34 1 Broadway'and there was a woman standing by the d~or~ she ,2 thought she \vas -- 3 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Can we limit this to 4 discussion on the -- 5' MS. DUNLop: okay. well, one thing, though, 6 that Caruso project is, they do hi!-ve great security. 7 And I know that at one of the pollce meetings that we, 8 had this last summer they said something about putting 9 in cameras and things at the westfield Mall. well, 10 Caruso has that sort of thing. I was wondering who is 11 paying for this? IS westfield paying for this or is the 12 city paying for this. 13 A city of homes doesn't' put the police and the 14 fire people in -- the caruso is up-scal,e shops, they're 15 no threat to westfield. And certainly they would not be 16 a magnet for the teenagers and such that hang around 17 there. I know that Caruso has tried to work with the 18 city"and I know that when the mayor called westfield, Page 15 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 they wouldn't listen to him. So as I said, the theatre, the school district, the, -- all the -- all ,the ways that they have tried to work together. And I don't -- talking about West Nile and the lake, well, we have open water -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: 30 seconds. MS. DUNLOP: we have open water at the 35 arboretum too" and I haven't heard anybody with the; r children falling in or West Nile. Thanks. MR. KIMBALL: Bob Kimball, 140 santa Cruz. Just to echo what the lady said, I work with water parks and water features, and the health department would shut you down in a heartbeat if there was standi ng water. . Anyway" I am areal i st and the ci ty of Arcadi a has to make a huge decision. Santa Anita iSl for laCK of a better word, doomed. There's so many d,fferent venues for qambling, there's so many different venues for entertalnment. I go to the track, I entertain guests, neighbors, friends, out-of-towners goinq to the track. The attendance i,s 1 acki ng and the park 1 s doomed. It'S either that, or have 1100 homes and then all of a sudden the city of Arcaaia has to figure out traffic mitigation, smog, timing of lighting, the . ,traffic signals, et cetera,et cetera. ' The other impact is tax qenerated __ I'~ sorry, tax revenues generated by elther1100 homes -- and this is just a plus or ri1i'nus of what people have been saying with, the 86 acres. Keep in mind that Westfield did get 20 acres from the track in 1978, I think it was. ~nyway, the caruso project will continually , 36 1 generate taxes as opposed to permit fees and new water, 2 sewer, electrical, et cete'ra, et cetera. A lot of those 3 fees are just goi ng to be !I one-ti me hit, and then the 4 city is going to have to try and figure out what' to do 5 with those 1100 homes, times 2.3 people per home, per 6 dwelling, whatever. I'm in favor of the Caruso project, 7 just because there has been a lot of thought gone into 8 how to lessen the traffic, what to do with it, and I 9 know that Westfield has tried and they've not" had ~heir 10 hands tied as to what to do. I mean, they've been 11 recommended but haven't rea 11 y fl i ppedthe buck to do 12 it. So, that's my time. 13 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. 14 MR. LIMO: My name is Rick Limo, and I'm with 15 ,Caruso Affiliated. 16 council member Amundson, commissioners and city 17 staff. out of respect for your time and respect for the 18 guests here tonight who have come on both sides of the 19 lssue, I want to congratulate the city and the residents 20 for 'literally crafting the project that has been studied 21 in this EIR. And to save time for a lot of folks and a 22 lot of people who were robbed fro~ their Tuesday 23 evening, if I could just ask that everyone here who is 24 in support of the work done in th,is EIR, and support of 25 the mitigations that Caruso will be putting in the page 16 . . 3204 o 37 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o project, would please raise their hand so our commissioners would be able to see what the numbers are, so we don't tie everyone's time tonight speaking. And, as you can see, it' 5 a si gni ficant amount of the room. I have to tell you that we're humbled, and we're very grateful, and we thank you all for turning out'tonight. Thank you. , COMMISSIONER OLSON: If I could. I'll remind everybody, this is not a popularity contest, number one. Everybody, whatever is said tonight or in the comments is getting equal consideration and discussion and thought to it. And so it rea1.ly doesn't matter 'how many people are here or not, quite frankly. And if somebody has already said what you want to say" you don't need to repeat i.t because it will be answered in the report. Next speaker. MR. FOLEY: Gee, David, you have to say that just when I get up there. "Not a popularity contest, don't forget." My name is vince Foley, I live at 320 cambridge o'rive, which, as you can ten by the name is one of those college streets places. A lot of the thin\ls I was going to talk about have been said already, obv10usly. So I want to just tal'k about, one thi'n\l that I got in the mail just today, and it's from Arcad1a, First. And it says, of course, 38 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 '13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o it's paid by Westfield, we all know that. One of'the things they ,want me as a citizen to talk to you about tonight, is the need to include a new public park. And, of course, we know there are no public parks anywhere near westfield, but we know there are some, as we've heard 20 acres of open green space proposed for this new project. so I would agree that we certa,inlyneed in Arcadia in that area a new pUblic park. Ana I would suggest we pTaceit immediately east of Baldwin, just north of Huntinqton, kind of right where westfield's purposed expanslon is going to be. Because they say we neea a park, I think that's where we ought to have a park. MR. HENRICH: My name is Tony Henrich. I live at 431 North, Altura Road in Arcadia, over the lower ,Rancho. ,My wife and, I have lived in Arcadia for-over 30 years. I'm past president of th!i! homeowner's association and currently architecture review board, chairman for 'the 900 homes which surrounds the racetrack on the north and on the west. Speaking for myself, I have revi ewed the EIR, and I, fi nd it comp'rehensi ve and complete, but I would like to ask the planning commission to consider the EIR to ,reflect the added goodwill that this project provides to the citizens of 1 Arcadia. 2 3 4 , 39 The Caruso project will finally ,give us a downtown, a plaza. A place where we can go and stroll and dine and meet with our neighbors or what have you. Page 17 . . 5 6 7 8 9 10. 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 we don't have that in Arcadia. Just think of the added value and goodwill that downtown Monrovia provides to its citizens, or the added value that sierra Madre downtown adds to its citizens. I can't imagfne these cities without their downtown. . Here in Arcadia we have an added value provided by a great s~hool system, which our kids went throuqh. we have added value from the arboretum, and most 1mportantly, we have added value from this great crown jewel of Arcadia, Santa Anita Racetrack. I would hate to lose that track. I think this project provides the enhancement and will help save this pro~ect. So in closing, I support thispro)ect, I ask- the planning commission to look at the qoodwill and added value that this project will prov1de all of us. Thank you. , COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. , UNIDENTIFIED SPEAK: I th,i nk the average Joe 'blow citizen like myself -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: Can I have your name and 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 40. address, please. UNIOENTIFIEO SPEAKER: I prefer to remain anonymous, if that's all right. I think the average citizen of Arcadia is not interested in the squabbling that's going on between westfield, the city, Arcadia First, and any other organizations. I moved here from Northern californfa 11 years ago. Init-ially, my wife and t lived in, south Arcadia, on the other side of Live oak. We lived in a small house off of Live Oak for two years ana then we bought a house very close to the back side of the track. And li,ke so many other people, we enjoy Arcadia, ,we enjoy the track. I take my nine~year-old-daughter over to the track quite frequently to see the horses, to ride the tram on saturday mornings. I love the track. But just some comments I'd like to throw in. Again, I think another point that's being missed is, I think the duty of any ci ty counci 1 and any p 1 anni ng commission is indeed to protect the interest of the people" and make sure that the public hea'l thi s safeguarded. And some of the speakers have been saying, well, sometlii rig's got to go in there" somethi ng "s goi.ng' togoin there._ ,That may be true, a~d ,maybe it .is owned lly pri vate interests, ,I can't argue with that, but that's missing the point. 41 1 City councils are to safeguard the interests 2 of their citizens, regardless of whether or not it's 3 private property. Look at the eminent domain issue, 4 that's a perfect example. I'd lJke to see a commission 5 appointed, just like Monrovia did. old Town Monrovia, I 6 don't think anyone can argue, it's been a huge success. 7 They appointed a Blue -- I don't know if it's properly 8 called a Blue Ribbon Commission, but it was an 9 independent commission that Monrovia went with to get 10. input. I'd really like the City of Arcadia to do that, 11 to study Page 18 12 13 14 15 16 17, 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 COMMISSIONER OLSON: One minute. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I work in Enci no, it took me an hour and a half this evening to drive 35 mi 1 es from Enci no to get here. If this proj ect is goi ng to ,be successful, people have to take that 210 Freeway. AS one other speaker poi nted out, it's i ust goi ng to g'et steadily worse. I don't think the traffic can be adequately judged until you put a whole bunch of cars there. Go out and get, ,some rental cars and actually put them in that area and judge the impact. The impact on the power grid has not been addressed at all. In prior sessions I've been told, well, that's Edison's resl?ons1bility. I:Ihat if Edison can't deal successfully wlth It? I d l1ke to see 42 comments sol i ci ted from neighbori ng ci ti es and ' communities. sure, the school district is going to get a buil di ng, but it's just goi ng to be ashe 11 'from what I understand. COMMISSIONER OLSON: You have 15 seconds, could you please wrap it up? UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Sure. Also, the track, from what I understand, was one of the original promoters of offsite wagering. And sure enough, that's reduced the number of people coming to the track. This proj ec't, is muchbi gger than anythi ng else that Mr. caruso has tackled. COMMISSIONER OLSON: If ~ou'v~ qot any further comments, you can please put them 1n wr1t1ng. UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: My final comment would be. I really encourage the city to appoint an independent commission to study this. Thank you. . COMMISSIONER OLSON: Next speaker, please. MR. O,'CONNOR: ,My name is Mike o'connor, I live up on the college streets. When I first heard about this project, being' neutrali I just waited to see, what it was all about. My persona op1nion, I would like to see -- I want to see progress in Arcadia, but I certainly don't want to see a lot of additional building right in the middle of 43 1 Arcadia. we alreadY have a lot of c:ongestion and ,2 traffic. Important thinqs -such as pohce, fire, 3 hospital, doctors' build1ngs, there's too much traffic 4 for those important services as there is right now. 5 Adding to that is just going to make things in Arcadia 6 extremely difficult, even possibly unsafe for somebody 7 who's in an emergency. 8 There's no way that -- no matter what you are, 9 told or what people claim Will happen! there's no wa~ 10 anybody is going to improve the trafhc in Arcadia after 11 ther put in a new mall. It's riot going to happen. I 12 don to care if they consult the number one foremost 13 traffic facilitator in the country. It's not going to 14 happen. I live up there. I know what it's like. 15 There's a school up there, Barn Heart, they haven't 16 talked about all the racetrack traffic leaving out 17 through that direction. people living on the hill, the 18 only Way they're going to ~et down to this mall is Santa page 19 . . 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 Anita or Baldwin. There's no way you're going to handle that traffic. ' You're going to back up traffic on the freeway on busy days. That doesn't even talk about pollut~on. How would you 1 i ke 35,000 cars goi ng around us, here in thi s buildiny? All that pollution, smog, you're breathing it in. It s not the city's obligation at all to save the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 44 racetrack owner from making a, bad investment. That's not our job. That's riot your job, because your job, as the man said before, is to safeguard the citizens of this town. , I would like to see Arcadia improve and get better, but I also want it to stay the way it has been, a decent fine community, not a congested overloaded place where people can't get from one place or another. when L went to one of the earlier meetings, the real estate people, a spokesman stood up and said, "We want more apartments, there's not enough." Obviously most'of them don't want' apartments. I called them and said, "You don't really mean, that." The real estate 1 ady, she said, "Have you lived here long?" I says, "Yeah, I remember the way Arcadia was wnen the racetrack was going." she goes, "Yeah, I heard Arcadia was hopping then." Yeah, you'couldn't drive anyplace between 11:30 and 1:30, you couldri't drive anyplace between 4:30 and 6:30. NOW we'll have it all day long. And on special days like special race days or christmas shopping or something like that, might as well walk. The racetrack -- COMMISSIONER 9LSON: you've got 15 seconds, please, if you could wrap it up. , ' . MR. O'CONNOR: I'll just get to one thing. 45 used. when I 1 I'm concerned about some of the taCtics I've seen 2 Obviously, everybody has different opinions. But 3 saw a Ayer come to my house that said, "NO new 4 apartments in Arcadia," small print, "unless the city 5 counci 1 approves. " small print. . 6 I went to date night, when I talked to other 7 people, there were people in a number of ,those meetings 8 who stood up and said the traffic around The Grove is a ,9 .lot better. They're-obviously 'working for Mr. Caruso.' 10 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Mr. O'Connor, if you have 11 anything else to say, you can put it in writin~. 12 MR. O'CONNOR: I go to Meet-the~Cand~dates 13 Night and the homeowner's association, and what is in 14 the back of the room? The racetrack. It's the Santa 15 Anita -- or the owner's association, Day At The Races, 16 right in the back of the room, but we're sitting up 17 there listening to the candidates. 18 C:OMMISsIONER OLSON: Mr. O'Connor, your time 19 is up, please. we have other speakers. 20 MR. O'CONNOR: So anyway, my last comment is, 21 just follow the money. 22 MR. NORTON: Good evening. My name is Kevin 23 Norton. I represent International Brotherhood of 24 Electrical workers, we're the electrician's union. 25 we're a community stakeholder. page 20 . . 3204 o 46 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o We have members that work on projects in Arcadia like the hospital in front of us, the Westfi~ld Mall when that was under construction, and they'll be working on this project., we all represent electricians who work at the racetrack, so we're concerned about the future of that racetrack so we can have these jobs. we already have half the amount of jobs that we used to have ~ust a few short years ago because of the diminlshed traffic at the racetrack. We feel that Caruso project will be an added value to the community. It will also help shore up the racetrack, which is deh in Arcadia history. It's a beautiful facility that they're going to build over there. And we fully support the project and hope ,that you- move"forward with 'it. ' Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Next speaker, please. MR. MORRIS: My name is Mike Morris. I've lived on portola Drive since 1964. What I'm concerned ,about is a simple situation that nobody has bothered to ask Caruso to guarantee in writing with a situation where it will cost them dearly in the pocket if they don't go throu9h with all these promi ses. Tney promi sed a school bUll di ng, it's a, she ll. Let's gi ve them a bui 1 di rig that's quality, that won't fall down with the first earthquake and get it in 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 47 wr1t1ng. Make it hurt if they don't give you a quality buil di ng. Next thinqis, I have yet to see caruso say anything about PUtt1 ng a tram in between thei r faci 1 ity and the Gold Line, and pointing out in their ads it will cost three bucks a day to come to their facility if they take the Gold Line and the tram, and maybe even refund ,the three bucks. That will cut traffic. That, will cut exi sti ng traffi c to westfi e 1 d. parking situation. I've been a Holy Angels parishioner since I moved here. There used to be a problem witf:1 people parking in the Holy ,Angels parking lot when they went to the racetrack. In fact, Monsignor O'keefe had to pull the candles (inaudible) so people would light a, candle for their horse. well, let's make it to where_on, where if -- 1 et"-s' make the parki ng- free in the parking lot where this won't happen. They're talking about putting gambling in there. No, thank you. I'm a sheriff's volunteer in their communications group. I hear about the problems the sheriffs have in the gambling dens done in other parts of this country. Ask any sheriff's officer if the crime rate improves around where there's gambling. please. And then ban the gambling. I'd much rather see that parking lot be zoned parking only forever than to 48 1 see something go in where my personal quality of life 2 drops, I also want to see caruso guarantee my personal 3 property value won't go down. Thank you. 4 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Next speaker, pl ease. Page 21 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 .23 24 25 o . . 3204 MR. MARTINEZ: My name is Richard Martinez. I live at 301 West Magna Vista. And I think a lot has been discussed here regarding the quality of the Caruso projects and 'so forth, many people have gone over and taken advantage of going over to The Grove and so forth, which is flagship, as far as we're concerned, here in Arcadia. , I think the issue is not really whether it's a good project or not for the residents, it's the quality of life in Arcadia. And over and over what do you hear? You hear about the traffic. Right now I would suggest that probably most of us at qiven periods of time avoid different intersectlons in Arcadia or we just don't travel in Arcadia. when they talk about addlng between 30 and 50,000 extra trips per day and improving, with a project improving traffic, that is not so. I'm sure most of you have already seen numerous articles in the front page of the business section of the L.A. Times that says -- I have a copy here which came out in page 1 of the business section of 49 the L.A. Times wednesday, April the 19th. A comment from an area resident that says, "Traffic in this neighborhood is much worse than it 'was before The, Grove." . Also" the arti cl e states that "Traffi c congestion is so bad that noW the state is conducting and provi di ng,addi tioria 1 grants t() try 'and sol ve the problems at The Grove." And The Grove adjusted 40-some traffic lights. They built new streets, new ingress and egress. And they still are congested where the state is trying to resolve this problem. If adding lights is ~oingto solve the traffic problem here,whY don't we do 1t now? We don't have to build the project in order to adjust the lights if that is the answer. And also,as far as traffic is concerned, if you look in the EIRs, it says -- there isa note, I'd like the planning commission, to follow up on it, that the~ are going to work, I believe. with about f1ve other cit~es probably contig40us ,to our city, to try to resolve the traffic. In other words. if we get the traffic out of Arcadia because of minor adjustment, san Mari no, pasadena, sierra Madre, Monrovi a wlll say ,yes, _ give us your traffi c? 'NO; - they "are not. - COMMISSIONER OLSON: 30 seconds. MR. MARTINEZ: There was a comment saying that 50 1 we, will be getting together with them to resolve this. 2 I say this has to be resolved before anything goes any 3 further than that, because rsuspect that they don't 4 want, our contiguous neighbors do not want Arcadia 5 traffi Co Thank you, 6 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, 7 please. 8 MR. KRUCKEBERG: Folks, if you could please 9 remember to sign in after you speak. Thanks. 10 MR. RAZI: I live at 2210 south 6th Avenue. 11 I'm one of the few people here that actually grew up in Page 22 . . 12 13 14 15 16 17 1.8 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o Arcadia. 3204 I moved to Arcadia when I was about eight years old, and I moved away for about four or five years and now I'm back. And a couple of the issues that have been issued 'is the issue of the parkinq, I mean, of the traffic oil the 210 Freeway, ,the pollut10n. The fact of the matter is, the_growth of the Inland Empire has really created, tcaffic on the, 210, the additional smog that we deal with. I am a developer in that area. I do that run just about ,every Single day, and I know that the traff1c is bad, but not because we're going to have an extra mall here. It'S because there's about,3QO,OOO new homes in that area. ,so anybody who thinks that this little mall is going to create more traffic on the 210 51 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 .20 21 22 23 24 25 o or more pollution, they're highly mistaken compared to that other issue. The other issue that I have is that of all my classmates that I grew up with there's probably maybe, three or four of them that actually stayed in Arcadia. And it's not because we can't afford the homes here" the big issue is, there's really not a whole lot for us to do that goes beyond just going to the mall. Many people that are here are retired and only have a certain amount of period of time that they're going to still live in Arcadia, but I'll probably live here at least another 30 years. Let's be serious. There's really not a whole lot, for us to do. The track has become a -- not an exciting place to go anymore. The Arcadia Mall is just filled with these corporate entities that really don't have the kind of stuff that we're looking for. we don't have good restaurants. I have to go to Pasadena" the fact of the matter 'is, it has affecteCl our home values. If you think I'm joking, I'm not. If you look at the average price of a, say, 1500 square foot home in Pasadena in a poor neighborhood, it" s equivalent to what a -- that same si ze home is in Arcadi a. And you' 're not getti nq near the schooling, the beauty of Arcadia. And why lS that? Because pasadena has a lot of stuff to do. It's 52 1 a place where people want to be. There will be some 2 hiqher traffi c in ,the ci ty, but that may be asma,ll 3 prlce to pay for the welfare of our city. 1hank you. 4 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 please. MS. 5IRENE: My name is Edna sirene. I, live at 824 Arcadia Avenue. I've lived there for 85 years. The block west I was born and raised. I have a whole list of things to talk about but many people have already covered. If I hear about the Grove one more time -- it's so wonderful because people love it. Why don't they move to The Grove? It's a good idea, huh? And as far as the racetrack, the racetrack brought more to the City of Arcadia than anything else. It isn't the racetrack's fault that they don't have the people there, crowds. Because the State of California Horse Racing Board are the ones that all9w the off-track betting. Page 23 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 -17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 . . 3204 19 So if you bet the races, if you live in, let's 20 say, Pomona, why would you come to Santa Anita, when 21 you've got an off-track right there in Pomona. Or the 22 same with people going to Hollywood park, it's not a 23 popular place any more because people can go right here 24 to Santa Anita to bet Hollywood Park and so on. There's 25 a lot more I could cover, you don't have time, and I o 53 don't have time. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, MR. BECKET: Good evening. My name is Paul I reside at 2016 canyon Road here in Arcadi.a. a member of the executive committee of Arcadia please. Becket. I'm also First. AS you a 11 know, we're opposed to the proj ect. I have a number of concerns, most of whlch have been express~d here, from the traffic, to tile pollution. to the obliteration of the skyline, to the increased police, fi.re services. I've heard the comments of a number of the supporters of the project here this evening, and some made comments about the wide open green spaces in the lZaruso projects, the safety of the Caruso projects. I think if rou do visit The, Grove, as I guess mariyhave done, you 11 see that The Grove is not Known for wide open spaces, it's wall-to~wall concrete with a meandering path through the middle. I think the same is true of Glendale'. I think what you see in each of these areas is density beyond your wildest imagination. And in our,case here, the del(elopment will introduce new elements, to our community here which are not present here. I' think if everything went as the 54 most opti mi sti c proj ections say, you kept all the retai 1 spaces full, your ailjoining business remained vibrant, maYbe you get the increase in revenues that we're talking about, but it comes at a ~r,eat cost. Because what is associated with these proJects, the Caruso projec,ts in particular" is density" density, density. Try today to drive anywhere 'near 3rd and Fairfax at any time of day. Try to drive from north to south in Glendale any time of day. I think the revenues are certainly something to talk about, but the costs are very; Vf~ry great. And wi th what I know of our current projections in the city budget, our current situation in the 'city budget, we simply don't need those kinds of revenues. We can do with lesser revenues and preserve the kind of community that we have here. i: would like to add one other thing. There's a lot of talk here about the imminent demise of the racetrack. From the numbers I've' seen, and I've said that here before, I don't see a basis for that. I thi.nk those claims are without foundation. I think on the contrary, Santa Anita Racetrack i.s the highest revenue-~enerating racetrack in the nation, talking in the mill10ns of dollars, 80 percent of which is off-track betting. So I don't think hanging this project on, Page 24 . . 3204 [] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 55 well, we have to save the racetrack. I don't think you can go forward with the, pro~ect solely based on what you may get by way of revenues lf everything goes just right, police, fire services don't run higher costs than what you project, crime levels aren'-t higher. As the gentleman earlier said, show me a place where there's gambling, a,casino atmosphere where crime, has gone down. It just doesn't happen. show me a pJace where you add 30,000 cars or 5Q,OOO and how you get traffic getting better. where has traffic improved in and around any caruso 'project? You 'ore tal ki ng about someplace 1i ke Ca 1 abasas. Maybe you don't get a major impact. we're not calabasas here, we're also not west L.A. here either. This is a community of homes. Consider some alternatives. COMMISSIONER OLSON: could you sign the clipboard please. Before the nex't speaker, I'm going to -- because the reporters, they need a short break, if we do take a fi ve~minute break. If you want to stand up you'll be the first speaker. we'll reconvene in five minutes. (A recess was taken.) COMMISSION~R OLSON: Next speaker, please. MR. RAMIREZ: Members of the planning commission, city staff, good evening. My name is Ralph 56 1 2 3 4 5, 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o Rami rez, my wi fe and I live at 504 sharon Road. . And the thinq that has been a~dre~sed to you bnefly here" but not ln the depth I th1nk lt should be, is the issue of public standard. Public standards o'f conduct, which are -- I think i's a very imJiortantissue that is enforced at 'all of the Caruso pro~ects. since thi s is pri vate 1 and, you can enfo",ce it 1 n an effort, of public conduct. These posted standards. And I thought it was quite interestinq, and that having toured their security system, and w1th their cameras and their security force, whenever they see somebody with inappropriate attire or inappropriate behavior, or even people who are at the point where they're mitigating the possibility of ~ood behavior but of errant behavior, their security is 1mmediately posted to, that area. "(h,ese standards are read to the people., they're said, "Do you want to stick around here? Do you want to be arrested? DO you want to leave the premis'es?" And as a result of that, those enforcement of a standard of code of conduct at all the Caruso projects, and verified by the police chiefs of all the cit1es involved, as well as the city of LOS Angeles, police requirements have been lessen, crime has been reduced, even with more people. So I think it's a very important issue that 1 should be addressed. 2 to go to westfield in 3 shootings up there at 4 things, if thi.s would 57 My wife and I are very reluctant the evenings. And with the Dave &, Busters and those kinds of have been mitigated to begin with, page 25 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 you wouldn't have those kinds of people in the location to begin with. I think it's a very important issue. And we're talking about police and fire and safety issues. And we have a number of vacancies in our police department, we can't afford to nire anybody. So when somebody says we can do whatever we want, yeah, you can downsize it, and can have crime increase. If you don't have enough police, you don't have enough fire. I think you necessarily have to have the revenue to support a city of thiS size and a city of this quality. And it needs adequate public safety. And the standard of code of conduct I think is an important ingredient of that. Because of that issue, I felt that I had to get up and impress upon -- the woman addressed it earlier, the issue of safety and of public safety for a 11 those people who parti ci pate is a very, very important' issue,. And I think if you visited any of these locations 'at any time of day, I think it's very important. And if you visited their security locations' and seen where the cameras are at the entrances of their 58 parking lots, as wel1 as the egress of their parking lots, that could be tied very easily~with the CHP 'stolen automobile issues so stolen cars don't get out. They're immediateiy arrested. There's so many issues that pertaining to public safety of that program. COMMISSIONER OLSON: 15 seconds. MR. RAMIREZ: SO anyway, public safety I think is an extremely, i.mportant is~ue, ,and it can be mitigated by 'approvlng thlS, ca~uso proJect. C COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you Very much. Next speaker, please., ' n ~ MR. VALLE: Hello, my name is Marco valle, v-a-l-l-e. I live at 4939 Rupert Lane, which is La canada, Flintridge, not in Arcadia, although, i have worked in Arcadia for years and so have members of my family, and do a lot of shopping here, have over the years. , , And just felt compelled ,to share a short word about change and the process of change. In my business, I've had the opportunity to look, at how communities like Arcadia have become cities of homes. It's because over the process of many years southern californi~ and the suburbanc;:uTture that"sfraying out of'it, became very autocentr1C. I think a lot of the challenges that have been 59 1 addressed tonight, a lot of the concerns that have been 2 concern'ed at this meetin~ and the p~evious one, stem 3 from the process of gett1ng away from a traditional town 4 with a town center, which was centered around 5 pedestrians and retail that was in a central location. 6 These problems are stemming from decades and decades of 7 getting away from that and towards the culture that we 8 now have, which is very focused on cars, and has 1 ed to 9 all the traffic problems and commune issues that we have 10 now. 11 so what I'd like to share is that I think I page 26 . . 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 represent a lot of people from La canada, Flintridge who would love to come to the Shops at Santa Anita and to spend our leisure time and our money here, because we don't have anything like that in La canada, Flintridge. It'S projects like this th'atrepresent a renaissance in developmental thinking now. ,With new developers such as caruso, Caruso Affiliated that are embracing working with communities'and getting back to the fundamentals of city planning. I do recognize that there are issues that come up with any kind of big changes like this. The 30,000 cars keeps being mentioned over and over ad nauseam. At the same time, though. it is projects like this' that are now beginning to happen as people are changing their 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 60 minds and looking back tOWards the more traditional ways of city planning, going back literally centuries, if not, millennia. They provide a catalyst for business, civic leaders and residents, to not simply have change for change Sake, but to embrace how cities like Arcadia are going to deal with change that is beinq imposed on them with increases in population and changlng of demographics. , COMMISSIONER OLSON: 30 seconds. MR. VALLE: Thank you very much. That's actually all I wanted to say. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. ' MS. THIBOUH: r'm Carmen Thibouh. I Arcadia. Good evening, commissioners. live at 1215 Oaklawn Road in ~efore I make my comments. I would hope that the commission in the future, i.f an individual refuses to give their name and their residence, that their comments should be stricken. If you don't have the cOl!rage to give your name and your address, then; don't thl nk they shoul d have been all owed to speak earl 1 er. My comments are regarding the traffic flow. The EIR states clearly that the traffic flow will improve as a ,result of the 8tci 10 million dollar 61 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 investment by Caruso in upgrading the current 1970s traffic technology 'in Arcadia. This isa 'technolciqy that the city would like to have been able to prov1de for over the last few years, but has not had the money to do so. Contrary to a letter that was written to the pasadena Star News from somebody, caruso has not made extravagant promises to improve the Arcadia , intersections. New state-of-the-art traffic technology has proven to be effective in his other projects. what a gre~t deal for Arcadia. Much needed traffic improvements at no cost to the taxpayer. Some of the congestion that we are now experiencing is because when Westfield expanded, they did not follow through with mitigating traffic, thereby creating the mess that we're in now. I applaud caruso in bringing first-class shopping, dining and facilities for our Schools and our community eVents. I also want page 27 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16, 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o It . 3204 to strongly caution cltlzens to consider the ramifications of bringing a petition to reject the Caruso project. Remember, this project is being built on private property and would you want the city or any of your neiqhbors to tell you how to build on your private property? Keep that in mind. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. 62 Next speaker, please. MS. ROSS: My name is Stella Ross,and I live at 881 West Huntington Drive. several people have talked about traffic, and I can't resist reminding us in the '70s and '80s, 80, 90, 100,000 cars went to the, racetrack. And the traffi,c was reversed on Holly in the morning north, and south it was reversed south in the afternoon. I had three children that went to Baldwin Stocker, and you know what, no problem. Everyone talks traffic, traffic. And now there was -- I for9ot something. oh, I know what. They talk about our ch11dren, our children. What are we going to do. Don't some of you remember how we drank water out of the water hose outside because we di~n't want to go inside, and we ran after the ice truck? I did. And my little brothers and sisters did too. We got ice, and we licked it. , It was great, and we ran throughout barefooted. Do I look like there's something wrong with me? I don't think so, Rea 11 y ,I'm here -- I,' d rather tal k about this other stuff. I am so upset with westfield. I don't even'know how to tell you.' The misrepresentations, the half-truths, the bullying, bullying, bullyin~. And as a matter' of honor and principle, I am very senous, I 'made 63 1 a decision or:' Novemb!!r 7th, I don't shop there anymore. 2 And I don't 1 ntend to Shop there., Thank you. 3 COMMISSIONER OLSON; Thank you, Ms. ROSS,. 4 Next speaker, please., . 5 MS. HANSEN: My name 1S Mary E. Hansen, 6 spelled ,H-a.n~s-e-n. And I live at 900 Hugo Reid orive 7 for 45 years. 8 ' I can remember attending many. many meetings 9 where the city has been offered good deals topui-on 10 that land. And they said no deal all the time. We have 11 something now and I say deal. Thank you. 12 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, 13 please. 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 MS. DU~RGERIAN; Good evening, members of the planning commiss10n. My name is Ann Duirgerian, 122 East Foothill Boulevard, Arcadia. over the last ten years or sQ, we have watched as proposal after proposal has, been presented to the city regarding th~ southern parking lot of the Santa Anita Racetrack. Each proposal was different, it had one common thread, improving,the bottom line of the racetrack, and; hence, the city. This year Santa Anita had a great year. According to Magna's own financial report,Santa Anita generates twice as much revenue as any other racetrack page 28 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 -17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 o 64 they own. And this year the racetrack's revenue had increased by another two million dollars. That meant additional funds for the city, and those funds, when combined with other revenues coming into the city, have put us in great financial shape for next year and solidiJied the years to come. I'm surprised that the revised draft, environmental impact report did not disclose this information but used older revenue i nforlTlati on as justification for the need for 'this proposed regional mall. we also know that the near future may bring additional race days with the closing of Hollywood park o~ perhaps the future ,will be almost,2,OOq machines that w11l allow people to place bets on h1stor1c races, all of which means more mpney for the city. I am concerned that the environmental documents prepared for the proposed regional mall did not include any analysis of the impacts of these additional race days and site uses, especially the increased traffic all of this activity would bring to our community. The RD -- EIR'should be revised to reflect the improved economic picture that we now have on hand. ' The~e is no immediate need for this proposal. ,AS a resident, I wonder why we don't sit back and take a look 65 at what we would like to have Arcadia look like 20, or even 50 years from, now. There is no urgent need to save entities that don't need saving, and that gives us the opportunity to take a look at not just the racetrack proposal, but what we want our city to look like and be known for in the future. I know Arcadia First has asked the city to consider creating a Blue Ribbon commfssion, to use a consensus building process that wi 11 identi fy alternatives to the proposed regional mall at Santa Anita Racetrack and I support that idea. The commissi on could look at the current proposal, the alternative to the proposed Ilroiect submitted to the city during the comment period of the last EIR and perhaps even develop other ideas that would meet the go~ls of.enhancinq revenue streams for the track ana'1mprov1ng'tneoty's financial picture even further: I hope you will consider the Blue Ribbon commission pro'cess asa chance to identify what we want our community to look'like in the future. And I want to say, my husbanil and I are on the executive board with >!Ircadia First, very proud to, and we're volunteers. Thank you very much. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. 66 1 MR. GOLDENHOUSE: M~ name is Dennis 2 Goldenhouse, and I live on Fa1rview in the 400 block. 3 I've been to several of these meetinqs, and 4 I'm reminded cif the audience each time in looklng around , page 29 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 when I first got here. There are a lot of people who are in the same ilk I'm in, unfortunately or fortunately, I don't know, we're senior citizens. And I see the same group that banned together to fi9ht westfield. It's the same doom and gloom, trafflc, Brue Ribbon commissions all the conversations that people have when they don't have a lot of time to -- or they have a lot of time in their lives, basically they're retired, so westfield has tapped into that ener9Y of people like myself who are senior citizens. And 1t's really very sad because the very people that they've tapped into are the ,ones that fought the very the very existence of Westfield. So myself, looking at all this conversation, I've come to the conclusion, espeCially on that ballot and the way that ba 11 ot was written, Westfi e 1 d -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: Can we limit it just to discussion about the environmental -- MR. GOLDENHOUSE: Oh, okay. The environment is really simple, then. The environment is, westfield has been a good addi~ion to our community. The, shops 67 lover on Baldwin and Duarte anchored by Pavilions have 2 been a very good addition to our community and the 3 quality of our community. ' 4 And last but not least, the addition of the 5 caruso project would increase the quality of life for 6 the people who live here, especially the younger 7 generation that will be here long after we're gone. And 8 I don't think we're going to be here that much longer. 9 Thank you very much. 10 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Next speaker, please. 11 MR. HARRIS: My name is Dick Harris. I live 12 at 143 west santa Anita Terrace. My predecessor spoke 13 about the senior citizens here, I'm a senior, senior 14 citizen. .I'm not going to speak for or against this 15 project. I want to talk about traffic. 16 I,'ve read the EIR report, I've read it again 17 and I've read it again, and I still don't: understand it. 18 I'm going to, make a sugqestion. It comes up with 19 approximately 34,000 tr1.PS per dilY to the new proposed 20 unit, the new shopping center. I assume that means 21 that's an average, and on Monday you would have 15,000, 22 on Friday or Saturday you would have 50,000. I don't, 23_,know. - But my..suggestion, thi snumber i's aWfully 24 important, it becomes the base of this statement that 25 caruso is going to put: in traffic enhancements, that we o 68 1 will not have any increase in our traffic problem. His 2 statements are based on this figure. All of the 3 projections of the future are based on this figure. 4 NOW when you read the report, the person who 5 did the stud~ points out how difficult it is to project 6 the number of visits that will be made to a shopping 7 center. This is a computerized process using statistics 8 that are available for different types of retail space. 9 Now, I'm so old I remember when Santa Anita went in, the 10 shoppin~ center, and I remember how bad -- how far off 11 the proJections were there, of the traffic, to that unit. page 30 . . 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 So this figure is subject to, some question. NOW! there's an awful good advantage that you have here. S1tting just to the wes~ of the proposed development there's a shoppi nq center. coul,dn' t you take and run the same statistlcal projection for the existing one, using the same data that was used in the EIR, and see how many automobile visits there are using those statistics and then check it against the actual one? We could tell -- you could tell how many are going into Santa Anita every oay, you could compare it and it would verify, at least give you some semb,lance of confidence in the projection that is made here. 1 think 'that we are all concerned about the traffic. COMMISSIONER OLSON: You have 30 seconds. 69 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o MR. HARRIS: Beg your pardon? COMMISSIONER OLSON: 30 seconds. MR. HARRIS: That's it. I think we're all , concerned -- this will help verify the figure that you're using. It would take some of the question out of the minds for many of us. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you for your comments. Next speaker, please. , MS. MANDU: I'm Kelly M1lndu, and my address is 30 East Newman. I went to Arcadia High SChool and I g'raduated this past year and I now attend cal state Long Beach. And I know that there -- in my high school ye~rs there was definitely a place where my friends and I wanted to go and hang out and feel safe and just get dinner, watch a movie, do something fun together, and'we didn't feel that at westfield, we didn't feel that it was safe. . And I think that caruso definitely will make us feel safe. Arcadia is known as being a community of homes, and how are we a community if there's no place that we can meet as a community, and feel safe as a community? . And one more thing, about the smog. Everyone says that the caruso project would add smog in our 76 1 world, news flash, we don't live in the '60s and '70s .2 anymore .peopl e drive cars,. Ki ds don' tride thei r 3 bikes to school, they don't walk to school. They're 4 either getting dropped off in a car, or they're riding 5 to school in a car.' So there's goi ng to be smog no 6 matter what. 7 Also, on what the one man sai d about there 8 being a gambling problem with the Caruso project and it 9 would increase the crime rate. Yeah, he's totally 10 right. cuz there"s no gambling going on at the 11 racetrack, right? Everyone goes to look at the pretty 12 horses? Thanks. 13 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Next speaker. 14 MS. BRENNAN: I wrote a few notes down here to 15 make it short. 16 COMMISSIONER OLSON: State your name and 17 address, please. 18 MS. BRENNAN: Sure. My name i.s Colleen page 31 . . 3204 19 Brennan. And r have resided on Altura ,Road for 44 years 20 in Arcadia. 21 And I would like to address a few subjects on 22 the West Nile virus. A shallow pool, just liKe a 23 swimming pool, could be checked every two hours, the 24 water. And I can't understand the panic about this 25 pool, no one is suggest)ng draining the arboretum, the o 71 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o lagoon or other water on that particular land as Ruth brought up about the arboretum. The second issue is parkin~ of non-residents for fees. And I have a number offr1ends that attend this senior center. we eat lunch together most days. And they're very concerned about them having to pay for parki ng. I i nqu;'red about thi s thi s eveni ng from, one o,f the trusted individuals that I've talked to before on this project, and he said validated parking is available through the me<chants, for a certain amount of time. You ask them for this validation. And the same is true for going to a movie. And in closing, I'd like to say that we have no control over what goes in, to a degree that is, should Caruso not get voted in. In other words, what if a law is passed that had -- they have to put a Title 8 on part of that parking lot or some lesser desirable type thi ng? And, persona 11 y, in endi ng, I'd li ke to, say that I'm going to vote for a financially sure thing for Arcadia's property values, their schools, and that type of thing. Thank you very much. ' , COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. MS. HARRIS: Betty ,Harris, 143 west Santa Anita Terrace,' Arcadia for about 44 years. 72 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 ,18 19 20 it 22 23 24 25 I ~ust want to say thanks. Thanks to a counci 1 who 1 s li.stening and do'i ng the best they can in trying to bring something they consider of value, and these are people I trust. Thanks to a planning commission, again, who I trust, for listening to all these people tonight,. Thanks to everyone who has spoken tonight. It's been interesting and fun hearing friends from both sides of the battle and friends on staff speak to_this issue. It's been very interesting, a beautiful. display of democracy, I guess. One point. Traffic seems to be of concern to everyone. And we 'do live in a beautirul, beautiful city with a lot going for it. Even things for senior citizens. AS a senior, I find I 'have a lot going for me. And a lot,of things that do interest me right here within the city. One thing I would consider on the traffic thing is, why not promote bicycles? Build bike racks, and do a real promotion. Bikeways on the streets and build bike racks and see if we can't get people 'back to ri di ng a bi cycl e . All they're going to do is go to the mall from home, get on a bike and go and reduce the traffic. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. page 32 G 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 ,19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 73 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o MR. CASEY: Good evening, commissioners, my name is Ed casey, appearing tonight on behalf of westfield Santa Anita. And given the time limits on remarks tonight, let me limit my own remarks to a single issue, and that is, alterna'tives. And what I want 'to focus on toni9ht in connection with alternatives is what is missing ln this revised ErR. And what is missing is any discussion at all of the detailed altern~tive proposal that westfield submitted in connection with our first comment letter in on the original EIR. And I think you have a copy of that si'te plan in front of you. NOW, the revised EIR is broken -- the alternatives analysis is broken into two parts. The first part has a detailed ,discussion of four project alternatives, that alternative you're looking at is not among them~ I't also lists all the other alternatives that were proposed in the past but were deemed infeasibl,e by the city. This alterna'tive is not even listed there. That's kind of curious" because as we demonstrated in our first comment letter, this alternative achieves more of your city's general plan objectives' with fewer environmental impacts and substantial tax revenues in the million dollars of dollars. Let me just go walk through some of the key 74 elements even though it's here, and try to go through this y.ery quickly. Md:the poin't of me.go~ng through the hst of these uses 1S not to saythls 1S what should De done, but to point out that this is the kind of alternatives that should be discussed and analyzed in this document. Because what this does, is create a campus-like, setting for the collection of uses, and it achieves a couple of key general plan objectives. First, the sites, as you'll see, the whole project in ihe southeast portion, i~ keeps the middle open for a number of otner open space uses. By doing so, you achi'eve the fi rst general plan's objective, that is, preservinq the views of the h.istoric grandstand from Huntington Dr1ve, that's in your general plan. , Two other key general plan objectives, "That any development, on this parking lot has to be compatible with adjacent uses and create economic synergy." That's the words in the plan. 'This f)lan does this, how? By having more different types of uses than in the project you're considering tonight. ,It has a medical office building and some assisted-living component that would work very well with the adjacent hospi tal. It has a site for another auto dealer at the site, which could work well with the existing dealers in the she, which may also be looking to expand. It has a hotel that has 75 1 business conference facilities that could achieve a 2 number of different uses. 3 COMMISSIONER OLSON: One minute. 4 MR. CASEY: In the middle it has a small Page 33 . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 park-like setting that could work well with the entrance to the grandstand as opposed to demolishing two of those building. we've also included in this alternative, a small retail component of 50,000 square feet. And we picked that number because it's the size of Mr. caruso's project, and hiS other project in Thousand oaks at The Lakes. We think that kind of collection of uses could achieve your general plan objectives as we showed in the first comment letter, we show in the second one, with few envi,ronmental impacts, and, it Will create millions of ,dollars6f tax. revenue to the city. YOU add those three things up, achievin~ general plan objectives, fewer impacts to the proJect, substanti'al tax benefits for the city, that' sthe definition of a feasible alternative under CEQA. CEQA says you have to look at feasible alternatives. This EIRshould look at this alternative, and if it doesn't, I urge you to ask one ,simple question, why not? ' COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you, Mr. casey. Next speaker, please. Saire. across here. MR. SAIRE: Good evening, my name is scott I live at 444 west, Huntington Drive, that's the street. It's about a five-minute walk from 76 I'ma licensed architect in california. I'm doing mostly commercial work, so I'm ki,nd of familiar with what we're tal ki ng about. I have to say somethi ng to the previous speaker who is apparently a westfield rep -- well, I hardly know where to begin. Westfield-- COMMISSIONER OLSON: If you could keep your comments just to discussing the EIRimpact report. MR. SAIRE: It's relevant. That Westfield is withholding receptacle access to the project. And that's driving the Caruso design, in what I say is, the wrong direction. What I say :is that they need to join the party. They need to start working with us and not agai nst us. Let's see, the items I wanted to talk about specifically, hopefully it's something different than what some of the other people have been talking about. Just real briefly about the traffic impact. I know nobody wants to hear the word traffi c agai n, ,but the summary" which I've got here, says that if we make a']-l of the improvements that everyone'sproposing, that the impact would be less, than si'gnificant. However, if -- a 77 1 number of those improvements take place in other 2 jurisdictions, mainly in Cal Trans and L.A; county 3 areas, and that if all of the mitigations aren't made, 4 then the impacts would be significant and unavoidable. 5 So I guess my statement would b.e that we should make 6 approval of the project conditioned on approval from 7 c;>ther agencies so that we don't have significant 8 lmpacts. 9 Let's see, the other thi ngs I wanted to talk 10 about. Someone else mentioned a dedicated shuttle, the 11 report, actually, mentions a dedicated shuttle' from the page 34 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 2S o . . 3204 track to the Gold Line to try and reduce traffic. I'd like to just tag onto that,that one of the ways the track could induce people to use the Gold Line is to give some sort of entrance fee reduction. That's not specifically mentioned in the report. It would be nice if they added that in as a potential incentive on the super busy track days. COMMISSIONER OLSON: You have one minute. MR. SAIRE: okay. I'm trying to go as fast as I can. Let's see, pedestrians' access. when westfield was building their project, we specifically asked for some kind of a real pecestrian entrance from Huntington orive and it was in the ErR, it was approved. They never di d it. The ci'ty di dn' t enforce it. we '.ve been 78 aSking about the same thing here, it's just a one-line sentence that pedestrians' access wi 11 be provided. I'd like to see a little more detail in exactly what we're asking. As the response, what that mitigation is going to be. What kind of access, how big, what sort of landscaping, so we actually get something this time. The last things lS, I'm really just kind of unhappy with the project and where it's sl~ed. There's a number of alternatlves, none of which I think are very good., I took the libert~ of making ~ sketch, but rather than bore you with it, I II just hand it in and you guys can take a look at it. COMMISSIONER OLSON: You need to wrap it up. MR. SAIRE: Exactly. The project should be moved south and west so that it's actually linked with the mall. I believe that if you 'want to get 'some synergy happening between the two projects, which I believe is in the general plar1, as. the westfield rep said, you need to have them joined. So the project needs to be ,reconfigured so 1t actually feeds together, the mall and the neW Caruso project work together. If someone wants to walk over from the racetrack, I'm sure they wi 11. Anyway" thank you very much. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. The next speaker, please. 79 1 MR. HERNANDEZ: Good evening. Vidal 2 Her'lan.dez, ,5,40 ,(;loria Roadi nArcadia': - , 3 The prior speakers already discussed all my 4 three pages. I am just goin~ to make a one statement. S Free enterprise, and competit10n for joining the 6Cinaudible) is the key of the success of this country. 7 we know that without competition we are nowhere. 8 Monopoly is out of the question and I don't know why 9 we're trying to fight over here. It's competition, and 10 that' s it. 11 Mr. Caruso is one of them, entrepreneurs, 12 after seeing the projects that he has, I know that he's 13 thinking Dig with class and style. And that's what we 14 need over here, shops in Arcadia, we ma.ke stronger 15 Arcadia with class and style. Thank you. 16 COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you very much. 17 MR. BOWER: Mark Bower. I live at 300 Monte 18 Vista Road in Arcadia. page 35 . . 3204 19 I'm all neutral ,as you'll see my comments. I 20 think that any new construction in Arcadia, any major 21 construction, should include (inaudible) easier to do 22 when it's gOing up than think about it later. 23 Also, in the model of calabasas, 24 unfortunately, I get tired of smokers, not so much from 25 the smoke, but throwing cigarette butts on the ground. o 80 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o And I would like to see the car.uso project, should it materialize, be a total non-smoking'area. It gripes me, this is -- those are my input comments, but this is an additional comment. The Arcadia High school campus is crowded. A number of parents feel the junior high school at Foothill, I think it was about 15 years ago, I have a bad memory, and we tried to keep the 8th graders from moving to that campus" and we tried, everybody in the crowd, basically, did not want to see them move. It's very hard to have sympathy now that they're stuck there. It was a mistake, in my opinion. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. MR. GARING: Good evening. My name is Jerry Garing from 122 East Foothill. I'd like to continue with (inaudible). I hope that all the members of the planning commission and the city council have either read or attempted to read the rev1sed draft environmental impact report. It's a daunting task. It's 5200 pages, which you're aware of. However, in the sl?ecific plan, in chapter 1, page 3, there's a disturb1ng paragraph, ,quote, "wherever the regulations of the santa Anita park Specific plan contain provisions which establish regulations, 81 1 including, but not limited to heights, densities, uses, 2 parking, si~ns, open space and landscaping requirements 3 which are d1fferent from, more restrictive than, or more 4 permissive than would be allowed pursuant to the 5 provisions contained in section 9263 et S~,q: and 9273 et 6 seq of the AMC, the santa Amta park speClflc plan shall 7 prevail and supersede the applicable provisions of the 8 Arcadi a Muni ci pal code and, those ordi nan~es. " I'd 1 i ke 9, 1:,1:\ repeat that. "Santa Anita Park Specific plan shall 10 prevail and supersede the applicable provisions of the 11 Arcadia Municipal Code and those ordinances." 12 If I understand this paragraph correctly, 13 it basically supersedes and overrides any and all 14 current regulations and ordinances passeD by both the 15 planning coiitniissiol'1 and the elected cit:y council. ,If 16 this speci fie pl an passes, then the city i sadvo'cating 17 all of its le~al obligations and power with Arcadia 18 Electric as g1ven to you. 19 If this paragraph is allowed to remain, then 20 all these community meetings over the years have been a 21 sham. when Arcadia property owners approach you 22 requesting variances for setbacks, you inevitably ask if 23 the occupant -- if they knew what the, regulations were 24 before they designed their project. The paragraph I 25 cited earlier is one example of how this developer Page 36 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 82 p~oposed not to follow the rules that govern the rest of us and have you let him set his own rules. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. MS. OOUGHERtv: Good evening. My name is Mary Dougherty. I live at 1110 Rodeo Road. I've lived here since 1971. I,'m a 16 year past member board of Arcadia unified school Dlstrict Board of Education. I think the citizens of Arcadia owe a huge debt, of gratitude to the Santa, Anita Racetrack management for selecting the Caruso Affiliates as the project developer. Arcadians recently passed a 218 million dollar bond issue to improve the facilities at each and every school within the Arcadia unified school 'District with the major emphasis at the high school. Caruso has offered 22,000 square foot development for the administrative offices for the school district. That i~ ~ ,huge asset for the school district and for the commUnl ty. There's been a lot said about traffic. I remember when the racetrack was crowded and traffic jams were in the morni ng before the first post, and in the, afternoon at the close of the race season -- the race day. With additional shops at Santa Anita, any additional t~affic will be disbursed throughout the day rather than an opening and a closing time.' That is a 83 huge difference. And with increased technolo~y, which is not provided fori nthe i:i ty budget, there s the opportunity to provide increased technology for uaffic management and signaling. And I' think that is a huge benefit. , COMMiSSIONER OLSON: You have one minute. MS. DOUGHERTY: Thank you. '. And an additional factor that no one has menti oned yet, KCET in August of thi,s year, honored Mr. Caruso as bei ng -- for hi s, contri buti ons to the communi,ty wi th 500 in attendance at the Bever' y H'il ton. I think his reputation at The Grove and his other developments speak to the quality of his developments and his caring for the community. In additio~, he served on the police commi ssi on for L. A. ci ty. I thi nk we 'reo deal i ng wi-th somebody 'who has' a quality ,reputation. I'm proud to endorse his project and hope that it will go forward. Thank you very mucro COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Mrs. Dougherty. MS. THOMPSON: Last but not least? My name is Laurie Thompson. I' live at 229 south Altura. I have lived in Arcadia, both in south Arcadia, I now live 'in The village, where I serve as the architectural review 84 1 2 3 4 board chairperson, gladly serving my community. AS a science educator, I believe decisions have to be based on facts and evidence, and riot ' emotional hysteria" such as throwing children into page 37 . . 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 3204 ponds. And when I slogged my way diligently throuqh the EIR, my impression is ana my belief is that the eVldence in ~he EIR is overwhelmingly supportive of the Caruso proJect. o And if I could ask the City of Arcadia to do anything, we know that there will probably be an ensuing battle, but I'want the facts and evidence of the EIR to predominate. And if information comes out that is untruthful and unbiased, I wish tl'iat ,both you and the city council would take a stand. And I overwhelmingly support this project and the EIR., And good luck, Arcadia, because I think we are at a turning point. Thank you. COMMISSIONER OlSON: Thank you. Next speaker. MR. BLAKE: Hello. My name is .Robert Blake. I live at 871 coronado Drive. I think Mr. Caruso, without a doubt, makes a wonderful mall; however, i,t' s the traffic. It's the traffic as more than half the people here mentioned, it's the traffic. I don't feel like pooping in my nest. This man, Mr. casey, he proposed something to you that 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 ,9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 85 I'd never heard of. I'd like to know more about it. I don't work for this man, I don't even go to that mall. But he's proposing something that seems that it would add to your tax base, and if he's getting short shrift, I think that's an error. I think that's a very large err,or. This project that's going to be put in here, it's going to be for, I assume, years and years. Is it going to be productive for years and years? If we have 30 to 45,000 cars, by the way, on the weekends, goodne'ss, what' si t going to be in ten years? What ' s it going to be in eight years? Five years. These women who -- the woman who mentioned about her children, that's a valid point. I don't know if you have children, it's a worth while point to 'think about. pollution. There was a medical doctor here. In fact, a former mayor, Mr. lilli, am I ri ght about the pronunciation of the name? Also a physician. Made a comment previously about the possibility of there being hillher levels of pollution than would be healthy for ch1ldren, and I assume adults at the same time. This is the last comment, again, ~ don't have- no, connection with Mi"'. casey here, could we also hear about his plan? And also from an economic standpoint. 86 1 Again, I have nothing against Mr. caruso's mall, nor Mr. 2 Caruso. He builds a beautiful mall. Economically, I'm 3 not sosure it's viable. I haven't heard a single' 4 person come here and talk about financials. Not, the 5 fi rst person. Good Lord. I hope we can tal k about 6 finance one day, gentlemen. I hope we can talk about 7 what thisi s really goi ng to cost Arcadi a for 8 protecti on, fi re depiirtment, pol i ce department, thei r 9 salaries, their retirement, over a lifetime, over a 10 career. 11 At any rate, that's all I have to say. Page 38 If I'm 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 12 13 14, 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 3204 a little bit passionate, I don't mean to be. I wish I could be more cold about it. But, again, I'd like to hear about more alternatives besides this single project. Thank you very much. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Next speaker, please. MR. CEPORIOUS: Name is Victor ceporious. I' live at 32 East camino Real. I've lived there, I think approximately 30 years now. :i: just had to say something because this dribbling I've been hearing, just like chicken Little running around saying the sky is falling. It's interesting ,to me how westfield, at this late stage, jumps up and says, oh, we have a wonderful alternative 87 thing. where were they two or three or four years.ago? They keep putting every obstacle into getting this project to move forward. This project is ~ood for Arcadia. I think we're all in favor of it, 1rrespective of that baloney vote that went in for Nand P. That' was a travesty. I couldn't believe what ,kind of underhanded things that westfield was involved -- COMMISSIONER OLSON: Can we stick to the discussion of the environmental -~ , MR. CEPORIOUS: I'm sorry, I just had to get that point across. Anyway, but that additional thing westfield is now ,throwing up, oh,we've got this wonderful alternat'ive plan. baloney. It's just another stalling tactic, and woe should proceed on it. We waited a long, lo~g time. I'd love to see ~he thing qet done before I d1e so I can get some benef1t out of 1t. We've been waiting long enough. Anyway, that's alJ I have to say. Thanks. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Is there anybody else? It's your last chance if you'd like to speak. I'll entertain a motion to close the public hearing. COMMISSIONER PARRILLE: So move. COMMISSIONER BAOERIAN: I'll second the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 motion. 88 COMMISSIONER OLSON: It 'sbeen, ,moved by commissionerparrille and seconded by commissioner Baderian, , without an objection, the publiC hearing is :cl osed . We're not quite done with the meeting,. but we'll go ahead and ,wait; a few seconds i'f you'd like to go ahead. we'll be done. NOW is the time reserved for those in the audience who wish to address the planning commission on non-public hearing items. If you would like to say anything to us tonight, now is the time. Not about the item that we've just di scussed, though.' , seeing none, I'll move to matters from city ~ouncil and planning commissioners. City counci 1 member , would you like to say anything? COUNCILMEMBER AMUNDSON: Nothing, but the council appreciates everyone's interest and efforts and page 39 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 o . . 3204 taking the time to come out tonight. That's all I have. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you, councilmember. Manaqement Planning commission? None? You have the modif1catjon meeting agenda, it's in your packet. The mi,nut'es came out. the mi nutes were essentially approved. There were some conditions attached to it this ,morning. 89 Any matters f,rom staff? MR. KRUCKEBERG: Not tonight. COMMISSIONER OLSON: Thank you. Then we will adjourn to regularly scheduled meeting December 12th at 7:00 o'clock P.M. in the City council chambers. Thank you very much for your patience. (TIME NOTED: 8:44 P.M.) 90 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 STATE OF CALIFORNIA ) 55: COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES ) I! CATHRYN L. BAKER, CSR NO. 7695, do certlfy: That the foregoin~ hearing was taken before me time and place thereln set forth. That the comments made at the time of the hearing were rec:ordedstenographically by me, were -thereafteY transcribed under my direction and supervis;onand that the foregoing is a true record of same. I further certify that I am neither counsel for nor related to any party to said action, nor in any way interested in the outcome thereof. IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have subscribed my name this 29th day of November, 2006. hereby at the CATHRYN L. BAKER, CSR NO. 7695 page 40 ,,' . IJ . SIGNING TIllS DOCUMENT IS VOLUNTARY - YOUR ATTENDANCE & ,PARTICIPATION DOES NOT REQUIRE SIGNING TIllS DOCUMENT, PRINTING YOUR NAME, ONLY ENABLES THE SECRETARY TO CORRECTL YSPELL YOUR NAME & ADDRESS, Please PRINT your name and address below: NAME r Lo f\lJfo~ S~U\....,\V\t\J <),GAJ{\\Cr H&-L m~ S~ ''1 t'Vr '.!.l'(j\ f>0 ~W',~ ~ , 1.' /~A ' cO'/;r (""'l!,"./ /(I[~ y-,e;r 13t!Jw'tFJJ , 'eCLa. kU) 2-- ADDRESS rca.J j~ (?L 'f 'J-I) -5 tr~ ~ .( ~ 0 ~ ,~-ft~ t D'J- l.- i? ~ R-a..J. A- ') '1 ~) (L I Ii 0 N ~",-J.. 1\..10 "'II ,~"v f\12C~"i 1\ "1' I ~06 I ~.JJ , U1? ()~ vA. . :fI6S7J RECEIVED NOV 2 8 lOOG PLANNING SERVI,CES vJ C;'? ,5": ..#rnJ-d-1. /j tk-- . / 9/1' VV-J '- ~,t!J~ five. J a.nlo J-J, ,'j {l.j; A _ Itv, ,;24l' 1?e.1ttil t J1)1tI. (t.() ~~ ~~. ;' . . RECEIVED SIGNrnG TIllS DOCUMENT IS VOLUNTARY- YOUR ATTENDANCE & PARTICIPATION DOES NOT REQUIRE SIGNrnG TIllS DOCUMENT, NOV 2 8 ZOD6 PLANNING SERVICES PRINTING YOUR NAME, ONLY ENABLES THE SECRETARY TO CORRECTLY SPELL YOUR NAME & ADDRESS, Please PRINT your name and address below: NAME .. , ~ H,qP,,41.$ ec,L,L.~ 'B'Ra\\.~ 13r &!(?(0 ADDRESS 61-A5 C4rl3 (( I ,~'Tk., 2~4 U~(j)/)(, '501 xu tJtA ~l\~ ~~-AJ, \--::~ ^ M""P #b~ ~ - ,r'~ 1'i"3 ~ $,4w;-A ....) JA I'": -S15' s. Al-tURFt R)),~~~~<j' ~ Y791~~ i . . RECEIVED Nav 2 8 2006 :~G SIGNlNGTInS DOCUMENT IS VOLUNTARY - YOUR ATTENDANCE & PARTICIPATION DOES NOT REQUIRE SIGNING THIS DOCUMENT, PRINTING YOUR NAME, ONLY ENABLES THE SECRETARY TO CORRECTLY SPELL YO.uRNAME & ADDRESS. Ple~e PRINT }'Our name and address below: NAME ADDRESS W' /d7~1\J <#= If..? ?; lfo ~ her. 7?c/ /