Recommendation to receive supporting documentation into the record, conclude the public hearing, and consider the third-party appeals of Ann Cantrell and Anna Christensen representing the Sierra Club Los Cerritos Wetlands Task Force; Corliss Lee representing Citizens About Responsible Planning; Juan E. Ovalle representing the Riverpark Coalition; Renee Lawler representing the Historic Equestrian Trail Association of So Cal; and Robert Gill representing the Los Cerritos Neighborhood Association (APL20-004, APL20-005, APL20-006, APL20-007); Adopt resolution certifying Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND 07-20), making certain findings related thereto, and adopting a Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program, and approving the Pacific Place Project at 3701 Pacific Place;
Thank you for that. And and we didn't have consent. Okay. The proper comment, we're moving on. Now, that concludes that concludes the consent calendar. We first thing on the agenda is our hearing. So we're going to begin with our our hearing. I know it's a it is a lengthy hearing, and we do have a multiple appellants. And so I want to after the hearing is read by the court, you're going to want to go over the procedure for the hearing. So please, Madam Court. Report from Development Services recommendation to receive supporting documentation under the record, conclude the public hearing and consider the third party appeals. Adopt a resolution approving the Pacific Place Project at 3701 Pacific Place. Declare ordinance approving zone change on four lots at 3701 Pacific Place. Read the first time and lead over the next regular meeting of the City Council for Final Reading and uphold the Planning Commission's approval for the construction and operation of the project at 3701 Pacific Place, District eight. There is an oath for this hearing. Mr. Mayor, if I may recuse myself from this agenda item, I. I am an employee with the Rivers Mountains Conservancy who has been engaged in the discussion and potential future discussion. And out of an abundance of caution, I'm recusing myself on this item. Yes. Thank you, councilwoman sorrow. And with that, let me just kind of briefly go over some of the how the order the order works for for this hearing. So we'll in a minute, the clerk will swear any witnesses. We will have our staff report from the planning department. Then I will turn this over to Councilmember Austin, who may have can give questions at that point. If there's counsel has questions, we can do questions off the staff report. We can also save those towards the end. Then we'll have the applicant will make their their presentation. And the presentation should for the attorneys time here in consultation between 15 and 30 minutes for the presentation. The applicant will also be provided with time for a short rebuttal at the end. Also, after the applicant is present, then we have the appellants present. The appellants. There are five separate appellants. Each one is provided a reasonable amount of time to appeal. And so, again, the city attorney has noted that a reasonable time would be 10 minutes per appellant. And so each appellant will go for ten up to 10 minutes, of course, and we'll go through all five of those, get a total max of 50 minutes of of appellants. And then after that, we will go back to the city council. If there are questions there or counsel wants to hear public comment, first we'll go to public comment. And then after that, the applicant is able to provide the rebuttal and then we go into council deliberations. So we'll take our lead from the councilman as far as when the questions and that piece happens as the hearing starts. But of course, there's always time for questions and deliberation at the very end as well. So with that, let me begin having the court call the witnesses. Thank you. And as a reminder, the council members will have their cameras on any witnesses. Please make sure your cameras are turned off. Please raise your right hand to you and each of you solemnly state that the testimony you may give in the cause now and pending before this body shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God. I do. I do. I do. I do. I do. I do. I do. I do. Yes, I do. I do. Okay. I think we've heard from from the witnesses that are that have been sworn in. Before I start the staff report, just as a reminder, the clerk will be keeping time. And so once the applicant begins, then the appellant's and then public comment, the clerk will be monitoring time on all of those and making sure that time is, is noted. And and then with that, I will go ahead and start with the staff report. I'll turn it over. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, for the staff report. We have Patricia Devendorf, her friend, Development Services, who will give the report. Good evening, Mayor. Vice Mayor, Council Members. Patricia Devendorf. The item before you consists of a request for a zone change and appeals associated with a project proposed at 3701 Pacific Place. The items before are the actions being requested of counsel to today are to deny the appeals. There are five separate appeals, as was mentioned, to uphold the Planning Commission's approval of a number of actions, including a site plan, review standards, variance, conditional use permit and lot merger associated with the proposed self-storage and RV parking lot on the subject site and declare an ordinance approving the zone change from the light industrial asset. I'll zone to the commercial storage see US Zoning district at the subject location. Just a little bit about the project site. The site in question located at 3701 Pacific Place, is a nearly 14 acre site that is currently vacant. The property is currently and has long been zoned for industrial use. The 2019 General Plan Land Use Element designated the property as neo industrial. An early draft of the general plan land use element showed the subject location as having an open space general plan place type because of its former use as a driving range. Ultimately, the neo industrial place type was adopted based on the fact that the driving range use had was no longer on the site and the property has is and always has been privately owned. And because of its characteristics and its historic industrial use, the site is located or is an ice, is isolated and is bounded by railway tracks to the north and east. The four or five freeway to the south. And vacant land. And the Al River to the west. All right. I wanted to just point out also that uses to the east across their rail tracks in Del Mar Avenue include the post Cerritos Elementary School, the Los Cerritos Park and then residential neighborhood . Beyond that, due to its location bounded by the river and other infrastructure, the site has limited access. Some history about this site. The site had oil related uses for many decades, beginning from the 1920s, and it was used as an oil brine treatment facility and for oil drilling. More recently, the uses included a privately owned and operated golf driving range and golf related retail and equipment rental. The site has been vacant since 2015 and has been a source of nuisance activity since that time. Given the historic use of the site, it has significant contamination and any re-use of the site require substantial environmental remediation. Just a little bit about the project briefly. The proposed project on the site is a three story, 153 square thousand square foot storage self-storage facility consisting of over 1100 self-storage units and a 6200 square foot office space. There's also a 578 space recreational vehicle storage, lots proposed, and a approximately 2100 square foot car wash that is accessory that would be used only by the vehicles stored on the site. So the action before the council is the zone change would be, which would be a zone change from the current ial industrial zone to the proposed zoning district of commercial storage. There were a number of actions taken by the Planning Commission on December 17th of last year. The Commission held a hearing on the proposed project and approved a number of actions. Included among them was Site Plan Review, which is required for projects of greater than 50,000 square feet of nonresidential development. At the time, the Planning Commission found it was able to make the findings in support of the site plan review action, including the fact that the project was harmonious and consistent and compatible with its surroundings and the project presents the most compatible use given the previous contamination. The Planning Commission also acted on a standards variance. The standard variance would allow for height in excess of the height that is allowed by the commercial storage use. The commercial storage district allows for 28 feet. The proposed project is just under 40 feet, with some architectural elements projecting above that to about 40 to 40 3 to 44 feet. The standards variance was supported by the fact, again, that the. The site is an isolated location and is located away from residential users. The general plan allows for greater heights of 40 feet. And the industrial zone also says industrial zone allows for 60 feet. The site being irregularly shaped and having an isolated location and limited access bounded by the river and other infrastructure supported the the rationale for the standard variance, as does the limpid viable uses based on the historic use and site contamination. The Planning Commission also approved a conditional use permit, which is required for the subject to use a self-storage RV parking and car wash. The Planning Commission found that the use would not be detrimental to the surrounding community. The project site is appropriate for this lower intensity use that is deemed appropriate again due to the site's heavy contamination . The proposed zone change is consistent with the land use element new industrial place type. The new industrial place type promotes low intensity, uses next to low density residential. It encourages the resident the retention of restricted light industrial activities associated with startup businesses and creative design offices. It encourages new developments that consist of office and commercial uses. And the proposed zone change is consistent with a particular policy allows for which encourages abandoned buildings and properties to transient transition into more productive uses through new development. As previously noted, the city council must act on the appeals that are have been filed on the project. The main appeal points are shown on this slide here. They have to do with the environmental document that was prepared for the project. There is one of the appeal points was that the initial study mitigated negative declaration that was prepared for the project as insufficient and that the project required a full environmental impact report. Another point is that the project is inconsistent with the vision of the Los Angeles River Master Plan. The standard variance for building height of more than 43 feet is not compatible with the surrounding neighborhood that the proposed zone change is a smart zoning and the planning that the Planning Commission's decision was made on false information. The proposed Cerritos Neighborhood Association was in support of the project, and there was no consideration of horse trails. So these are the primary points in the end, the five appeals. In the next few slides, I'll quickly address the primary appeal points. An initial study was prepared and mitigated. Negative declaration was prepared for the project to analyze and mitigate the potential environmental impacts of the project. The initial study mitigated negative declaration found that the project would not result in significant environmental impacts with the incorporation of mitigation measures. Areas of potential impact that were mitigated to less than significant levels include the impact areas shown on the slide here, which included air quality biological resources, cultural resources, geology and soils, hazards and hazardous materials, noise and tribal and cultural cultural resources. All of the public noticing in common periods and other procedural requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act were carried out. The public comment period for the mitigated negative declaration took place from October 19 through November 16th of last year. Extensive responses to comments were prepared and published throughout the process and in excess of those required by secure. There was a 30 day comment period on the environmental. And this table here just shows all the different comments that were received in response to the mitigated negative declaration during the comment period. Some of the main topics include concerns about toxic dust and contaminants, lost opportunity for open space, consistency with the L.A. River Master Plan, the river link plan, air quality, environmental justice issues. The rezoning of the property and cultural tribal resource impacts. Amanda, you just to be more specific that Amanda includes mitigation measures to address the hazardous materials and to remediate the environmental contamination on the site. They include a mitigation measure, HRC, one which requires the applicant to have a qualified professional prepare an approved response plan prior to any building permits being issued for the commercial industrial development on the part of the city. The response plan outlines measures that will be taken to remediate the site, institute various engineering controls to minimize exposure to hazardous materials and to restrict future land use to prohibit residential school, daycare and other more sensitive uses that would potentially to limit the exposure of future occupants. The response plan outlines measures for all phases of the project, including grading construction and recovery, and requires monitoring and reporting to DTC during the operation of the project. Similarly, the committee also includes a mitigation measure that requires the State Department of Toxic Substance Control to certify the response plan and to ensure that all the different mitigation measures as outlined here are complied with again during all phases of the project, including construction and operation. Just a point of note about the issues related to the river master plan and open space with respect to the use of the site. The subject area is shown on the Draft L.A. River Master Plan that is currently being updated as a major project area, which incorporates components of the Long Beach River River Link Plan. The L.A. River Master Plan is a long range vision plan that identifies opportunities but is not a land use plan, identifies opportunities for open space, but is not a land use plan. The city's adopted land use plan designates the subject privately owned property for industrial job generating uses plans like the L.A. River Master Plan and the Long Beach River Link plan, however, aid the city in its efforts to identify potential parkland and to identify funding for parks. And the Albee link plan in particular has helped the city secure grant funding for the DeForest Wetlands and the Wrigley greenbelt. So as previously mentioned, that the Planning Commission did approve a standard variance for additional height on the basis that the additional height would not be detrimental to the surrounding properties because of the unique side characteristics and the unusual circumstances of the site, including its environmental contamination. The fact that the proposed use is appropriate. The the proposed use is appropriate for the site and the the CRC zoning does have particularly restrictive height provisions at which the project was unable to comply with. The zone change is appropriate when looking at existing zoning patterns and taking into account the context and historic uses of the site. On the map. One can see the institute that institutional industrial zoning are both found in the area, as is the case zoning district, which is prevalent, which is the prevalent sounding south of the site. That concludes the staff presentation and we're happy to answer any questions and we have the applicant and others available on the line as well. Thank you for that. Coulson often. Do we have any question at this time? But you want to just keep going and go through the the application and presentation right now? Yeah. I would like to just hear from the the appellants first and the applicant and then. Okay, fine. It's great. Let's go ahead and start. Why don't we then if there's no objection to it, that we will then do the applicant and then the appellants, and then we'll go to the counsel in Austin. So let's go ahead and go with the applicant. Madam. Hi. Good afternoon. Thank you. Mary Garcia, members of the Council for taking time this evening to hear our proposal for 3701 Pacific Place. Our saw, our property borders, the 710 freeway to the west as well as the four or five freeway to the south. And the metro line runs to the north and east of our site. We acquired the site in 2019. And currently surrounding our side is the L.A. County flood plain to the west and another private parcel to the east. So the site's current geo industrial zoning allows for up to 600,000 square feet of industrial buildings. But we think a low impact self-storage facility would be a better fit for the site. We also would like to relocate inside property groups headquarters to the site and a little background about Inside Property Group. We design and build self-storage facilities throughout the country. We currently own and operate about 40 projects around the country and this would be our global headquarters for the site. We'd also like to provide a public access path to the L.A. River for future access to the river. We'd also be built building a viewing pavilion to overlook the L.A. River and provide 24 seven security cameras to help ensure safety for the pavilion. We're also giving free parking for members of the community, as well as free car charging stations, for electric vehicles for people to access the site from. We'll also be building a new nature preserve to the northwest corner of the property. And we really feel this nature preserve would help set the stage for the future expansion of the LA River Park development as highlighted in the city of Long Beach Park Acquisition Feasibility Report that was just issued a few weeks ago. So this is this is Zach. Thank you all for giving us the floor tonight. The site has been underutilized for 50 years due to the challenging environmental history. As the city planning department went through and in more detail, and our plan significantly improved the site's environmental performance with no significant impacts. That's essentially the summary of the city's response. 15 months of expert third party studies confirm the project will have no significant impacts, and that's after implementing the mitigation measures required by the city of Long Beach and the California Department of Toxic Substances Control. That's the overseeing thousand employee California state body tasked with protecting human health. This the third party studies and again the city's review. These just once more. We've done an environmental impact report in the form of the MMD, traffic and Noise Impact Studies, Hazards and hazardous materials impacts. Cultural Resources Impact Water Quality Impacts, Air Quality Impact, biological resources assessment. And all of these studies were reviewed by the city of Long Beach and the California Department of Toxic Substances Control as necessary. And again, the M.D. committee's finding is that the site will have the will have no significant impacts after implementing the mitigation measures. So neighborhood safety through construction is our priority. We have a fleet of water trucks on site that will soak the dirt to contain dust during grading, which is one of the major concerns been raised. Site air quality will be monitored by an array of air quality sensors. Third party experts will be on site to monitor air quality all day during grading. And if unacceptable, air quality is detected at any point, grading will be halted until it can be controlled. Neighborhood safety after construction is is our our priority as well. And in terms of the mitigation efforts we're taking, we're spending three and a half million dollars of site environmental mitigation as required by the DTC in their remediation plan. This includes putting a cap on the site to contain impacted soils, which includes a vapor barrier system that will mitigate any existing gases underneath the site and a state of the art engineered stormwater mitigation system to control any runoff, etc.. So in our experience, we've as Paul said, we've got 40 current projects and we've done over 100 similar projects in the last decade. These efforts sufficiently address the environmental concerns of the site, and notably we will be occupying this site ourselves and obviously have a good incentive to ensure that the site is safe when we finish. That's correct. And. Oh, go ahead. Go ahead, Paul. Back up. No, that's exact that. Go and go to the next slide, please. This is yours. So back in December, we went to the Planning Commission and the commission approved the project to a 6 to 1 vote. I think it was the first redeveloped. They approved the redevelopment, the remediation project. I think this is the first one that they have approved on the site. So the Department of Toxic Substance Control decided that the remediation plan will protect human health and the environment and would be implemented after the City Council adopts the amend and approves the project. So in terms of outreach and it's been a obviously a tough year for everybody all around to follow our normal processes. We would typically be organizing in-person meetings and whatnot, but instead we've held weekly webinars to engage the community, particularly before and during the the planning meeting. And we've amplified our outreach efforts with local door knocks, a major social media advertising campaign to let folks know what's going on, and then also being interviewed by Long Beach newspapers and stations and advertising in their business journal to show the community, the project and the outreach campaign results. We knocked on thousands of district doors. We targeted district specifically, given that that is where the site is is located. Over 10,000 district residents watched the entire video presentation online. That's that's not just opened it, but actually watched on your mobile phones and devices all the way through. And over 90% of digital campaign respondents clicked on. I like the plan button in support of the project. We saw the comments come in and responded and integrated those where we could and we generated over 300 plus resident emails and support cards from within District eight to the City Council. And again, narrowly targeting that at District eight, we got a good, solid response feeling. Obviously, self-storage is not the most exciting product type in the world, but in general, the community seems to really like the idea of cleaning up the site, providing amenities and the access to the L.A. River trail. Thanks, Zach. And during that outreach, I think the biggest comment we got from the small opposition was that the property should be used for a park instead. So working with the city of Long Beach before we purchased the site and answering the most common questions we received during the campaign was about the park and the city gave us a quote that said, This location has never been designated by the city of Long Beach as a park. The zoning is and always has been industrial. We also read in. The city's park feasibility report that, you know, the location of the park would make it difficult for people to access the site, given the auto oriented location with the freeways around it and the train tracks. So like you want to take the summary? Sure. So in summary, we're proposing to rezone our privately owned site for low density, low impact, self-storage and RV parking. Instead of pursuing the higher density, higher impact industrial use as per the current zoning. We've listened to and worked with community in the Planning Department to include benefits with the L.A. River Access Bike Pavilion, charging stations, public parking, the plant preserve, cleaning up an eyesore, eliminating illegal activities and providing security, and also bringing new jobs. We'll have more than 40 positions moving to this office. We spent 15 months working with third parties to deliver expert studies which have confirmed there's no significant impacts and have provided and put together a comprehensive neighborhood safety plan for before, during and after construction. And finally, the cleanup and remediation plan will be overseen by the California Department of Toxic Substances Control and significantly improved the site. And as noted, we have community support behind this project. So we're going to introduce Fernando Vila from Allen Watkins. Fernando is one of the most experienced attorneys in the area in terms of working with California environmental quality at Sequoia and can address some of the the comments directly. And he's going to hit you with a fire hose a little bit here. But we wanted to make sure that we we were complete here and promised it will only take 5 minutes. So, Fernando, are you are you on and on unmuted? I am on it. I'm muted. Thank you very much, Zach, for that introduction to VR Land Use Counsel and seek or counsel for the applicant. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor and Councilmembers for this presentation. I'll be brief. I will try to keep the fire hose too reasonable. Full circle. The so our ask is very ably presented by your your planning specialist here is really straightforward. We're asking first and foremost, please adopt the agenda for this project. We think it's very conference fully put together. As noted already, please approve the following rezoning from light industrial to commercial storage site plan review standards variance to give us a big nudge up in height that we need that's still within what's currently contemplated by the general plan and the existing zoning we asked for because we need a conditional use permit for the self-storage RV parking and accessory carwash uses. And we asked finally for a lot merger to combine the four separate parcels into one because we need to meet your minimum parcel size. And of course it benefits the city to have this project all on one site that can be controlled that way by next slide, please. We asked the City Council to approve the entitlements for all the very good reasons already presented in the City Staff report. I just simply want to highlight the key elements of why we believe the city staff supports this project and why we think it makes ideal sense for the city to support it as well. It is the ideal use for the property due to its unique location, shape, access and the need to remediate the site and the proximity to residences which is quite which are quite a distance from the property. There's a natural buffering there that protects the residents from any close proximity to the site for self-storage use, as as noted by your planner, aligns perfectly with the General Plan's new industrial designation, which seeks to locate low intensity, uses near homes and adaptability, reuse blighted properties. Again, bearing in mind we're asking for, believe it or not, work is open for thousands for a reduction in intensity, not an increase in intensity. The project, she says, also internally harmonious and compatible with the surrounding community, with its innovative architecture and landscaping. We work very hard with the city staff to come up with a design that made a lot of sense for your for your design guidelines and what we would like to see on this property. As already amply noted, we will have a very comprehensive remediation that will protect human health and the environment. And that is evidenced, by the way, or the letter from DTC that I believe is in your packet that the DTC, a state agency, issued a short while ago, indicating that implementing this remediation plan will constitute appropriate care and it will fully protect human health and the environment. That's not coming from us, that's coming from all from the regulatory agency and as noted already by Zach. And so we will also voluntarily provide community trail access to the Los Angeles River and our dedicated greenspace. We also now would like to turn our attention to the legal to the appeals that have been raised. Next slide, please. We're asking that, as per the planning staff's recommendation, that each appeal. With all due respect to the appellants, be denied because we believe none of the claims or positions raised have any real merit to them. First, as already very nicely presented, the remedy is in fact the appropriate singular review in the it was not needed simply because the project once mitigated, as already outlined, will produce no significant impact. And here we are going to have not one, but two agencies. Your city, of course, and Dtsc overseeing our implementation and mitigation. We have to get it right. It's not simply up to us. The low density use, the state of the art design and landscaping, the comprehensive remediation plan, the robust storm drain and bio filtration systems all structurally and operationally will ensure we will not significantly impact this property or the surrounding residences or other uses. One of the claims raised indicated that a traffic impact study was needed. In fact, your Department of Transportation and planners told us otherwise because there was a very careful study put together that showed because of our low intensity use, our daily trips are well below your city's VMT screening thresholds if we fall below the stress thresholds. Your regulations say no traffic study is is needed. We simply followed your your lead and your guidance. The MVD, contrary to what was also claimed in the appeal, shows that there a very low likelihood of any tribal cultural resources impact by virtue of the nature and scope of our excavations and project design. Notwithstanding that low probability we have, we are going to abide by a mitigation measure that we crafted in consultation with the tribal represent representation that indicated they would like to see. And we fully agreed to have a tribal consultant expert onsite during the entirety of construction. If there are any tribal cultural artifacts or resources found, they will be identified and adequately protected, preserved and stored and added, and construction can be halted if any such artifact could be in fact harmed by that activity. The response plan, as noted earlier, has been the product of Gaetz's comprehensive investigation that spans many years period of time , including our last two years of effort. And as a result of that comprehensive investigation, sampling has indicated it is prepared to act on the response plan that will, as we know, fully protect people and the environment. That's the result of this MMT that opponents we believe incorrectly claim does not adequately protect the environment. Next slide, please. The appellants have also raised I'm sorry, the yes, the appellants have also raised a claim that our project somehow will impact equestrian and other trails. But that is really a strange position with all respect to the appellants, because none of these trails are anywhere close to the site. The nearest equestrian trail is 200 plus feet away. Likewise, with bicycle paths, there are no known pedestrian trails across the property. There could not be because it's private property that would be a trespass if in fact such efforts were made to impose this trail without the owner's consent. The project site, which is a bit of concern to the court, claiming that it is not compatible with surrounding uses, in fact is compatible with surrounding uses and does comply with the current general plan designation. We're right about where the hype is already contemplated by by the general plan. The current zoning would even allow a greater height, but because we are down zoning our site to allow for our lower density use, we do need a slight 15 foot high increase. Most of that and much of that increase, by the way, is not due to the building itself, but rather to architectural features that are designed to enhance the beauty and the functionality of our building. As previously noted, although there has been much concern expressed about a need for park space, this property has never been zoned or designated for park space, and there will be no park space impact for that very reason. Notwithstanding that, as noted, we are providing for greenspace to the north of our property and pedestrian trails and bike paths to provide access to the trails and to the county property. That as and when the county sees fit will developer for park space. And the last two points there has been a claim made that the zoning that has been proposed for your approval constitutes unlawful zoning. But none, nothing could be further from the truth. Number one, this site is not the same type of use as the surrounding residences or the the publicly owned county property or the the freeways that surround our property. This site is unique by virtue of its isolation, its terrain, its contamination. It has always had unique zoning. The industrial zoning today, for example, is very different from all of the surrounding uses. We're asking for a reduction in that zoning to allow our lower impact much more environmentally compatible use. So there is no spot zoning. Your city has put a lot of thought into this. Finally, as I think the planning staff noted earlier, the commission was not told that most of Reno's neighborhood supported this project. We scoured the record. We could find no such indication and that support is not necessary for project approval. Although of course we respect any and all comments submitted in support of and in opposition to the project without a closed. Thank you very much for your time. And as indicated earlier, we do reserve our time for rebuttal following the presentation by the opponents of the public hearing. Thank you so much for this opportunity. I am done. Thank you very much. That is the applicant's presentation. Now we're going to go and move on to the appellants. As a reminder, there are five separate appellants. The first one is and Control and a Christianson. The second, appellant is called Oxley. The third one is Juan, or via. The fourth one is Renee Lawler and the fifth one is Robert Gill. And the clerk will we'll do the time on each one and called each appellant up after another. And so, Madam Clerk, please take it away. Mayor Garcia, the appellants would like one of you to speak first. Sure. If you want to. If that's okay. If just Madam Clerk, you just. You facilitate which one's coming up after another. That's okay. Each one gets the same time. Thank you, Mr. Avaya. Your time begins. I my slides. Hello, my love. I can't see my slides. Did you provide us with your presentation? Give us one moment to check with our team. It's a public review. We will check with our team and pull them up right now. One moment, please. Oh, sure. Mine. Okay. We. We have them up now. Can you see them? I can see them. Fantastic. So we start the time. We will start time. Before I start, they would like to note that all of the 20 people who are on the speakers list for the public comment are Alan all aligned with the Lower House lobbyists. In the spirit of fairness. I ask that you, Mayor Robert Garcia, stop violating the intent of the Brown Act and open the phone lines to more than just 20 people. Our city clerk's office has informed us, and it's up to you. It's as easy as that. Next slide. The Rural Party Coalition. I request said you denied the M&A and requests it requested so any change for the following reasons. The premature and inadequate M&A. The proposed project will make an environmental disaster worse. The proposed Sony change and height variance are not compatible with the surrounding neighborhood, which is solely residential. Next. The call of the California Environmental Quality Act sequel. Congress has a review and approval process of all large developments in the state, both public and private, and as and is implemented primarily by local governments like our city. Today, you have the authority to exercise on behalf of the residents of the city a process that respects the will of the people and acknowledges the systemic inequity and racism inflicted upon our Western working class neighbors and people and people of color. Next. This map clearly shows the inequities. And a disproportionate burden placed on the western half of the of our of our residents, along which we suffer from the higher rates of asthma and cancer. And we live shorter lives than people in East Long Beach, our polluted environments, robust of both health and of life. Not only do we bear the burden of our disproportionate pollution. We are now here before you humbling ourselves, practically begging you to follow through on your earlier votes to provide a larger arc to our half of Long Beach. The very least you can do is to require an air and deny a zoning change. Next. For some reason it seems like you have missed out on your slice and it looks like you skipped a few slice. Memories doing the slice. In. Yeah. Back up, please. Jesus Christ. Next. Next there. The. We find it unconscionable that the city of Long Beach would. It is incredible that city of Long Beach would allow construction on this site without a complete air to protect the local residents. At this moment, £1,000,000 of contaminated and imported soil sits on 50 feet of highly toxic sludge with the consistency of toothpaste crashing down and displacing a storm drain. Abandoned oil wells adjacent to the Inglewood False Zone nicely. Align. Across an elementary school and homes, contrary to the opinion of the development services. The best and ideal use for this land is green open space, not more asphalt. Next. We've seen users. I think you're kind of going backwards and forward. Next slide. This. I'm sorry about that, but this is totally unacceptable. The slides have been missed by your city clerk's office. They cannot. Yeah. I don't know. Even this is just have different sides of what was provided to us. You could share your screen. Yeah. Can you see why this will be called the crown jewel of the Los Angeles River, a trailhead for visitors from different areas to easily enter from the A-line. A short walk from bisphenol A or from Wrigley arrested on the 405 to welcoming Park for all, where you will find a meadow repairing wetlands and trails. For those of us that grew up here, we can surely imagine this area becoming a beautiful gateway not only to our city and the lower Los Angeles area, but also to a future in which we celebrate and enhance and enhance our Native American and historical equestrian cultures along the river. This is a moral change choice. You can't choose to do what is right for the underserved half of law. Or you can choose to be part of the same old system of corporate control of government. The evidence is crystal clear. You should reject the MMD we are requiring in the air and the dying deny the zoning change. We know that the road ahead will not be easy, but we know the will of the people as there are 1500 people have signed a petition or in the air, all understanding the dire need for more green space and environmental equity. Some of us have suffered on a personal level and saw how some of our children and neighbors asthma, cancer and death that we have attempted are attempting to leave a better legacy to the next generations so that they can be proud of us. While Legacy, do you want to leave the next generation of residents? Your next generation? Thank you for your time and I will share the remainder of my time with our part legal counsel and our board member, Laurie Angell. Thank you. Good evening. Honorable Council members, this is Douglas Filmcast in the chat and Brian Kirsten's been here here on behalf of the River Park Coalition. We've also submitted a letter on behalf of L.A. Waterkeeper and the River Project. The letter details in extensive detail, the environmental injustice that would occur here by approval on the basis of a mitigated negative declaration. And we ask that you prepare an environmental impact report. And amend is not an appropriate document because there is a fair argument to support that. The project could have significant impacts on the environment in numerous ways, which I will detail and others will detail tonight. The Air or Environmental Impact Report is how the public is able to participate in decisions where a CPA has a Bill of rights for a participatory democracy. And we ask that you respect the rights of the public to have fully informative air. And here's why it's required. There's oily contamination that has been deposited on the site over the years by oil operators, including the city of Long Beach. That could be spread with compaction of the site to offsite locations. And deferred mitigation through a future response plan is not acceptable. Recreational opportunities will be lost and they are set forth in the river linked document. That is a plan for the city which is not being recognized or implemented as the general plan requires in lieu 86 . There are also biological resource impacts which Fish and Wildlife has identified, including to the southern parkland and the crashes bumblebee. The variance here is not supportable, even if it is an irregularly shaped vessel. The height has nothing to do with the shape of the castle and it cannot be supported. We explained that in our letter out. Rather than detailing all of that, I ask you to refer to that. And I would like to turn to Lori Angell for the rest of the presentation. Thank you very much. Laura. Angel, are you on the line? I'll bet I am. I'm getting here. Okay. I don't have any slides, but I have just a quick few words. My name is Laurie Angel with the River Park Coalition. Make no mistake, this hearing is important and the outcome will affect the health and well-being of tens of thousands of people on the West Side that have been deprived of open space. Others in the city enjoy. Today, our decisions will set the tone for this city's future. This body has recognized the need for open space on the West Side. Time and again, we are at a point where every single parcel along the river is needed for open space. We need to protect and enhance the watershed. We need to improve our environmental situation and sustainability. Not continue to detract in this area. This time is done. Pardon? The time concluded. No, it's not. I am part of one thing for 10 minutes. And once 10 minutes has been concluded. So all the technical problems are just. We did add extra time for the technical problems. That's right. This has not been a fair process. But thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Speaker number two and control. Before I start, I want to make sure that the other present presenters for this are Amy Valenzuela and Anna Christianson. Are. On connected and able to speak. I'm here. And. Anna is having problems, but she phoned in. And she'll have to speak by phone. Her phone number is 5625675011. Are you able to connect her? SH is she on the line if she needs to hit Star six to unmute herself or she unable to get on the call? She? She. Now I'm. Unmuted. Okay. Okay. Can you hear me? All right. I cannot see the computer screen. Cisco Systems froze up. So. But I'm online. I can give my talk. Go ahead. All right. Good evening. This presentation is being presented by Anna Christiansen, Amy Vallance, Weller and myself and Cantrell on behalf of the Sierra Club, Los Arenas, Wetlands Task Force. Next slide. Our task force agrees with the appeal arguments presented by the other applicants and attorney Doug Carstens. We urge you to deny this inadequate mmd the impossible mitigations, excessive unnecessary height variance, unwanted land use. And see you. We suggest that if there is any zoning change, the site be returned to open space as it was before the l u week. Next slide. This is the city's map of the project property. However, it shows only half of what was once the oil operators site. Next slide, this map. Next slide. Slide four. This map from the River Link plan approved by City Council in 2015 shows the Pacific Place property on the north and the 712 Baker parcels on the south divided by the four or five freeway. What was planned to be park lands are now proposed to be self-storage, RV parking and car wash on the north and a gated housing development on the south. Next slide. Before being separated by the freeway in the 1960s. This was one large site performing the same operations on both the north and south sides. Both sites contain hazardous waste, the same cultural history, air quality, biological resources, recreational and transportation issues. However, a complete air with alternative uses is being prepared for the Baker Site Streets project. An inadequate negative deck with impossible mitigations and no alternative uses was done for the specific place. Next slide. We are asking you to deny the M and D. And. Require an air for Pacific Place as was done for the Baker Street site. Next slide. Next slide. There are many issues needing environmental study which our fellow what I once will discuss. Sierra Club will be addressing biological and cultural tribal resources. Next slide. One of the inadequacies of the media is the lack of studies for biological resources. The very thorough comment letter written by Felicia Salt, Silver, California Fish and Wildlife States. More studies are needed for the endangered, threatened and special species. She also says mitigations for the rare southern tar plants are inadequate and undoable. Now that all the vegetation has been removed from the site. Next slide. Southern Tar Plant is a special species plant, which required mitigation. In the many surveys done in early August 2020 found 830 southern tar plants on the Pacific Place property. Next slide. Every blue areas where southern tar plants were found in early August 2020. The green hash marks on the upper right are areas cleared of vegetation before the surveys were completed. Many southern tar plants were possibly destroyed before being counted. Next slide. In August 2020, the Department of Toxic Substances Control DTC posted notice of site investigation and remediations of 37 over one Pacific Place. There is no record that remediations were done. Instead, a test known as a surcharge was performed to measure the bearing capacity of the building footprint. Soil was moved from the northern end of the site to the southern end, creating a 15 foot high mound of dirt. Next slide. In the process, every shred of vegetation, including trees, were removed. This renders useless the biological mitigations of all the sensitive plants and animals on site. Yet you are being asked to approve these mitigations along with the negative declaration. Next slide and next speaker Amy Valenzuela. Hi. Thank you. This whole project, there's huge opposition to it. It's not. Small. Opposition at all. And and importantly, my I myself am a descendant of the tongva people. We have lived continuously on and near this site in question since time immemorial. This movie is only the latest example of my family's history and indigenous peoples lives in general being obliterated. The MMD completely ignores the value of this land as the site of an ancient village. It fails to address how this loss of a historic site, one of the last opportunities we have and habitat would be mitigated. It cannot be mitigated. Next slide, please. This map shows the there are tongva villages and um, we usually built near a water source and followed the seasonal changes to the water. So this site absolutely encompasses an ancient village and there have been midden, shell middens as well as arrowheads and other artifacts found on the site. So the developer saying having a tribal consultant after construction has started and after the destruction does not mitigate in any way the destruction they've already done or what will be done in the future by paving over it. It also irreparably damages any chance we have at maintaining some type of open space where native flora and fauna and cultural practices can be utilized. The next slide. States that there are no cultural tribal resources to consider. The prepared did not bother to look at the history of this land, nor the documentation that is easily available, which clearly identifies the significance of this area as an ancient village site. I am a survivor of cultural genocide and I still live on this site. My great great grandmother, having been an indentured servant on the on the mission San Gabriel. So that just isn't true. And only an air will be able to adequately address this many inhabitants who had to work the Rancho to survive, meaning the Bigsby Rancho . Continue living in this area. The Valenzuela family is just one such example. Still living on a part of a parcel given them by the Bixby family in present day Wrigley. That doesn't even include my family myself in love Cerritos. Next slide, please. Artifacts. Middens. As I talked about and exceedingly rare, cog stones have all been found in this area. My own family history documents that this exact land has been continuously occupied by indigenous people since time immemorial. Yet there is no acknowledgment of that precious and irreparable part of our heritage in the. Next slide. The city and oil companies have poisoned this land and exposed generations of children to toxic waste, including myself, my my father, who used to ride his horse down the river and see the green pools, and he himself found arrowheads at that site. Now it's time for you to take one small step to right the wrongs of the past. You could be working with us to heal the river and create a wonderful green space. Forget about calling it a park space. It has been zoned as open space and open space. It should remain. It could be a wonderful resource for all of us. You promised you would do this. Your city council and mayor. Please. When you unanimously voted for the River Lake Plan, which was not just some piece of paper, we all invested in that and we need that to be seen and put to practice. Thank you so much. Next speaker is Anna Christianson. When it comes down to it. What we have here is a failure to communicate the city's vision of, quote, compatibility and profitability, meaning a parking lot runs counter to traditional tribal understandings of relationships and responsibilities as regards both community and the natural world. Tribal leaders and members who continue to advocate for the protection and preservation of places as sacred species of plants and animals, as relatives of air and water, as life find themselves caught in a web of regulations meant to control the degree to which all of the above can be owned and regulated and exploited, but never allowed equity with societies that privilege people and the accumulation of wealth above all else. The low Cerritos Wetlands Task Force takes our lead from tribal peoples and we support the community and we support life, not RV parking lots. Thank you very much. Could you show the rest of the slides, please? Yeah. One final slide. I'm sorry. That final slide is the Tongva tribal leader, Anthony Morales, his son offering a prayer. Tribal people are still here. Genocide hasn't worked. It's not going to work. And now, like Dennis Banks used to say, the canary in the coal mine. This is happening to all of us. It's not just tribal people who are suffering the loss. Thank you. Your time is great homes and helped. Thank you very much. Next speaker is Rene Lawler. This Lawler. Good evening. I'm speaking through the telephone. My finger on my computer doesn't work. You can hear me. Yes. We can hear you. Okay. Very good. Thank you so much for putting up my slide deck. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I am representing the equestrian interest and my information is on file. Next slide please. Please uphold the appeals and produce any I are. There is sufficient there is insufficient review for known overland stormwater runoff and conditions that are present within this vicinity. This project will increase flood risks to adjacent properties, to the levees and the structures to the west and to the south. Please reject the zoning change to commercial storage. With that height variance, it is incompatible with the adjacent open space trail and low density residential community class 1341, three, five and 11 sigma guidelines have not been addressed with the amended class. One guideline states that if a proposed project consists of significant alteration to graphical features such as grading, that it needs to be further reviewed. The surcharged is already consistent with significant changes in the unique terrain, and there are therefore also not green solutions that have been considered despite the robust bio swell system that the developer is proposing . So it's not exempt and an R is required. The Class three simple guidelines all have to do with significant change in structures. Equipment are major modifications to the site. This is occurring class five sequence guidelines. If there is a major alteration to the land use and average slope changes which has occurred and will occur then changes in density and lot. Line adjustment for setback sequel class five needs to be reviewed. Class 11 is a categorical exemption and this project is not exempt. It's a sensitive river environment. It is a historic wetlands environment. It will have impact on the habitat corridor and there will be significant changes of use beyond the time of the lead agencies determination on air as required. Next slide, please. The result of stormwater runoff. These are some example photos showing runoff coming off the levee, showing runoff standing at the levee based floodplain. These are additional stormwater runoff photos that are from various times and years, not all the same time, but is showing land, storm water runoff conditions in the southern reaches of this watershed. Next slide. There are hydrological and topographical changes that will be occurring. Developing Pacific plates will add cumulative storm water flow. This property has been used as a retention basins for decades and water has been diverted onto it from an overland situation where there are no stormwater pipes. By changing the use of this and developing this property now, that water that had been going to the retention basin is going to continue to flow southward of the natural water, does flow west toward the levee and then it flows from a north south direction. The bio soil system is assuming that there are good pipes to tie into which there are not and there already are. The developer is acknowledging that the excess will still flow over the edges of the property lost lives. This is a example of a denial by the city to the county of tangible flood control to tie in into pipes for a project within the sub watershed because they've acknowledged that their storm drain pipes are under seismic flood. In fiscal year 2015, the city of Long Beach and addressing various storm drain have admitted that it is in a circumstance where its pipes are undersized and that that has been a infrastructure used since the 1930s. It's become undersized and insufficient based upon the growth, development and age of infrastructure. In the flood, the levee project, the lack of project created topographical hydrological changes itself in this sub watershed. That alone, by bringing the levees closer to these hard shoulder locations, created less permeable space. As the project also will do. That means less area for absorption increased velocity because of the change in elevations and increased density and volumes of overland flow not only from the levee but also coming from this property. Next slide. This is an example article of just how long these types of issues have been under review and have insufficiently been addressed for this sub watershed. Next slide Title 33 is a federal code and it covers navigation and navigable waters. But Part 208 has to do with flood control regulation. And part of the flood control regulation has to do with erosion control, where erosion is not to be allowed to occur adjacent to the structure of the levee that might endanger its water tightness and stability. Furthermore, Title 33 requires that there be inspections and also that it requires that there be permitting, so that if there is any construction, earth grading, any land movement, any FIL activities, anything on the river land or any private parcels adjacent must be permitted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in advance. Next slide. We also have the cultural and historical resources. The trail itself was dedicated in 1947. It is considered a scenic and esthetic trail, and despite what the developer says, this project is close enough to where it will negatively impact that trail experience. There will be added crossings that the developer is proposing, and those added crossings over that trail will have a cumulative impact in terms of the safety for the horse and rider, the lack of education, lack of signage. That has been a problem for decades without erecting proper signage on these trails. This will be a negative impact and needs to be reviewed. The overall height of the building will be non-conforming with the trail, even though it is set on a location closer to the freeway. There is still plenty of area of construction of this project that will, by the time you add the height variance loom over the trail and open space lands up to about 100 feet. That's an insufficient buffer for an esthetic and scenic and historic resource, and that's why the Coastal Conservancy supported open space and equestrian within this sub watershed and within this area of which this project is also a part of. Next slide. This is an example of the historic equestrian map. The city of Long Beach and the county of Los Angeles both enacted legislation in order to create this trail system. This property is adjacent to this trail system, and this trail system ties to a more historic trail system that's acknowledged through the 1968 federal trail. These these trails are feeder trails and connector trails via the rail hondo up to the Anza and should be given the same equal federal protective status. Next lime property is in a liquefaction zone as identified on this map and it is the third highest liquefaction zone identified landslide. It is also within a fault zone, as indicated on this map. Next slide, this map in. Next slide, please. Thank you. This map has a grand jury and map 22 as well as area mid-range map area 29. They both show the drainage system and for the experience. For those of you that don't see what you're looking at, basically you're looking at a map system of where there are not drainage pipes. There are not any storm drain pipes in this lowland area. There's no drainage pipe below the ridge line of country club drive there. The natural diversion of water that doesn't make it into any storm drain pipe is diverted overland to a westerly direction for the levee. That means it flows over this land. You develop this land, you change its topography. You're now going to start condensing overland flow, which also has a natural tendency to flow to the south. So you're going to be impacted property to the west and you're going to be impacting dramatically property to the south and a cumulative overland flow of which will also bring potential toxins and many, many other negative impacts. Next slide. This is an example of the overland flow that's coming on to this property from the Cerritos neighborhood off of Del Mar. Without addressing all of these overland flow issues, as well as the inefficient, insufficient storm drain pipe infrastructure. You can't adequately approve this and consider that in mind. Is is correct. Also, I'd like to provide some notable quotes of background history that shows that the storm drain overland runoff situation in this sub watershed, which is a part of the L.A. River watershed and this sub watershed needs further review. It has not been accurately reviewed, but there's full knowledge that there is a problem. And to quote a few notable, do you have Tony Zabel, who was formerly deputy director under Don Can? Harvey said, I understand the flooding is knee deep. You have Mary Ann Bennett, a landscape architect, associate, architectural engineering, L.A. County Public Works. I realize we have. This all the time concluded. It is unethical and probably illegal. Thank you very much for your time. Speaker number four is carelessly. Can you hear me? Yes. Yeah. Okay. This is cordless. I haven't seen my slides yet. This is carelessly speaking on behalf of Karp, and I agree with all the statements made by the appellants. Next slide. Currently this project does not have an environmental impact report. The city as lead agency chose to do a mitigated negative declaration instead. The site is fraught with environmental issues, and the public deserves to have a comprehensive study done to include the stormwater drainage problems that have not been addressed. And MMT is not sufficient. We ask that you do not approve zoning changes that would allow this project to move forward in the near term. We ask that you allow the facts to speak for themselves. The facts will be better, will be determined by an environmental impact report. Next slide. The values we hope our council will embrace is to consider the best use of this land for the greatest good. There are land use issues that include years of promises to make this into parkland. Plans were put forward in the L.A. River Master Plan and the Long Beach River Links Plan, which was approved at council in 2015. There is a dire need for more greenspace in this area and precious little land left that could fulfill the promise of those plans. This is one of two parcels that were considered the jewel in the crown of the L.A. River. Open space plans large enough to accommodate a good sized park, and Mundy does not allow for consideration of alternative uses. While you are asked those questions, would the public be better served by fulfilling 20 years of promises for green space? Or should you put in an installation that benefits the few instead of the many? If you want those questions examined and IRR is the vehicle, that's slide. A park or a parking lot. Remediation of this site for open space is a simpler task than putting in structures. Emissions can be harmlessly released into the air as they do in Davenport Park. Building on the site that has numerous risks that have to be addressed and monitored throughout the life of the building. Toxins in the soil will travel into the storm drain and contaminate the river either way. We need an air. Next slide. There's a storm drain pipe under the side that was not studied in the MMD. The developer's plans show a 30 inch diameter storm stormwater pipe, but county docs show it is a 24 inch pipe. So the real pipe has 30% less capacity, but is expected to handle runoff from 14 additional acres of land. The pipe is in the highly contaminated, compressible soil. Thousands of pounds of soil are currently on top of the storm drain pipe because of the surcharge test. The plan is to put £1,000,000 structure on top of that pipe and contaminated soil. The pipe is undoubtedly already compromised and cracked to build the proposed development. A cap and cement will be installed that will make a permeable side impermeable. Water will not seep into the soil. It will wash into a series of drains that will bring it into the existing pipe. The water and contaminants will get into the pipe and empty into the river. Next slide. This is a cross section of the problem. Showing the Pope under the weight of the surcharged has probably been crushed and damaged. A damaged pipe will allow the contaminated soil to enter and flow into the L.A. River and flood. There is a request for a zone change to commercial storage with a height variance. The reality is that the grading already added nine feet of height. The request is to add another 44 feet that is almost twice as high as the standard of 28 feet and is not compatible with the neighborhood. This will be an eyesore. Also note a storage pole was not erected on the site showing the proposed building height. Please do know the height variance and the zone changed. Next slide. I want to share a little of the history and the location to illustrate the magnitude of the oil drilling activity and how it affected this site. The Long Beach oil field was discovered in the 1920s. The star indicates the location of the project site. The gray blobs indicate oil deposits throughout the county. But the black area was the richest. Find the mother lode. Enormously productive. In 1923 alone, the field produced over 68 million barrels of oil. Next slide. This is an example of what neighborhoods looked like in the Long Beach oil field. Those tall structures are not trees. Those are oil wells. Next slide. Many residents had oil wells in their backyards. This is on Pacific Avenue in the 1940s. Next slide. Nearly every lut on Pine Avenue, Western Avenue, Pacific Avenue and Chestnut Avenue had an oil well. Children could not walk to Lowe's through school without an escort because of the oil fires. Between the fires and the noise. Some residents chose to abandon the neighborhood. The residues and contaminants from oil wells were delivered to sow ponds. 3701 Pacific Place was a serpent. Next slide. This is what the site looked like for 25 or 30 years up until the mid 1950s. It was operated by oil operators as an oil brine water treatment facility. They pumped oil into some sun. Water was allowed to evaporate from the brine or seep into the subsurface below the surface, leaving sludge behind. Following evaporation, remaining sludge was left in the slopes or dumped elsewhere. Next slide. The pie shaped piece of property is the project site. You can see Low Street, a school just across the road less than 200 yards away, as well as the Cerritos Park, left side. The map on the right shows contaminants throughout the site. The words elevated concentrations means more than what is safe. Lead, arsenic and TPA are the heavy metal contaminants in the soil. Total petroleum hydrocarbons is a term used to describe a large family of several hundred chemical compounds that originally came from crude oil. And that is what you have across this site. I am concerned that the soil sample only went to 20 feet. The history on this site says the residues go down 30 to 50 feet. A core sample should be done to cover the depth of the site. Next slide. What is important on this side is what is in red, that arsenic, a carcinogen, is present at unsafe levels and just below the surface. Next slides led in benzene are also toxic substances. President and dangerous concentrations. Elevated concentrations of benzene and methane were detected in soil vapor at nine locations. Next slide. The neighborhood already knew this site had contaminants. There was a sign there that was posted that told the residents about the dangers of lead and arsenic and told them to contact the South Coast HQ, M.D., to report any dust leaving the site . Next slide. Work commenced without adequate public notice soon for a surcharge test. No meetings were held with the public prior to the bulldozers arriving. You can imagine that neighbors were alarmed when they saw them kicking up billowing clouds of dust. The school and residences were bathed in dust and that likely contained lead and arsenic. That sludge. Sigma stands for California Environmental Quality Act. CEQA requires public engagement through a series of project steps. However, a mitigated negative declaration skips a lot of these steps. The public deserves to have a serious study of the environmental and cultural issues, not with the L.A. shortcut, but with a full air. As a public servant, your commitment to transparency and keeping the public safe is center stage as you make this decision. Next slide. This is the California enviro screen website. It shows today's environmental scores by census tract covering many sources of pollution. Pollution. So this is not just air quality. The area around Pacific Place has more people living with asthma or emergency department visits for asthma symptoms and deaths from asthma than 91% of census tracts throughout California. So this is heavily contaminated. The west side of Long Beach is already burdened with high pollution. Do you think it's fair to further burden the West Side with additional pollution? So go at 500 Harvey's many automobile trips to and from self-storage a three story building with employees going to and from daily along with a truck dock for nine trucks. All this will add significant impacts. Next slide school law says no projects would which would cause significant environmental effects should be approved. Approved as proposed. If there are feasible alternatives or mitigation measures that would lessen those effects. The desired feasible alternative. Thank you for. Your time has concluded. All right. Last speaker is Bob Gill. Mr. Gill. We said Star six. Mr.. How are you going to speak for Mr. Gill? Okay. My apologies for my audio problems. Can you hear me now? Yes. Thank you. Okay, terrific. So Eric Garcia, Vice Mayor Richardson and council members my name is Joseph Hauer. I'm here representing the Lower Cerritos Neighborhood Association Board, and I live in the Low Street this neighborhood. Well, L.C. Enable is the best use of this land area, would be an urban forest with walking trails, all the possible uses. We think that's the highest quality use for the people of Long Beach LLC and is concerned about several environmental issues that I'll talk about in a few minutes and believes the project approval should only come after a full year as many of the other appellants have asked for. This should evaluate all the potential environmental impacts and require mitigations that the current MSD does not properly address. We do not agree that the project is harmonious with its surroundings. It is only at its closest point a few hundred yards from residences and a primary school. Project description also includes a warehouse that has not been talked about today. We are quite concerned that at some point someone will build that warehouse using this M&A, despite the fact that there was very little discussion of what that warehouse would or could do, how many trucks would be there or anything else. At a minimum, this warehouse should not be approved as part of this or any other secret document. Without a thorough review. It appears from the two of us that the self-storage facility would be visible from our neighborhood, particularly from most Laredo's Park. We can find no analysis of this on the neighborhood in the Mandy. The residents deserve to know what they will view on the project site as it is now. The they have added quite a bit of soil, as I understand it, as part of the test to determine the geological stability in that land. That soil is pile is very visible from many places in the neighborhood. Further clarification and analysis of those vehicle impacts, the property border wall and the proposed landscaping need to be there. We understand that there would be a wall along the north and east borders of the property, which is probably generally a good idea. But we're concerned that that wall could reflect the noise from the A-line trains back towards our neighborhood and exacerbate the noise impacts from that light rail system. And we did not find any analysis of that kind of an impact. There is an existing sound wall on the other side of the tracks from this site, but if we're reflecting the sound back from a higher elevation, there could be a significant noise impact from this project. The traffic study does not address the current city of Long Beach Traffic Impact guidelines and does not address the traffic congestion at the adjacent intersection of Pacific Place and Wardlow Road. It can. The study concludes that the magic maximum contribution of 33 peak hour trips to the adjacent intersections is nominal and the potential for an intersection impact is unlikely. The current. Impacts are pretty bad. And the project proponent told us there would be 40 employees there, plus the number of Arby's in there. So I'm not quite sure how they're saying that. There's only 33 peak hour trips. There's 40 employees. Carpooling just hasn't caught on yet. It also does not account for the effects of all the large vehicles, heavy duty trucks and whatnot that would be coming through this intersection. Again, a Pacific place in Wardlow Road, which operates poorly today, is impacted significantly already by the line, which can cause frequent closures at that intersection as much as every 3 minutes. While this is no longer a see SIEGEL impact as traffic injection, it is something that the city council should be concerned about. We've got a lot of folks in our neighborhood and others who use that intersection. And this project is going to make that intersection even worse than it already is. So before the city council should approve that project. We really need to understand what's going to happen with that intersection. In addition, there's a planned sewage dump station for recreational vehicles, which is likely to cause air pollutant emissions and odor nuisances. In a note to readers neighborhood, which is downwind of the site, that should certainly be evaluated in the air. And we could find no evaluation of that in the documents before you. Having said all that, if the city council chooses to deny our appeal. Yalcin I would like the project to comply with all the special conditions referenced in the city staff presentation during the Planning Commission meeting. One can condition notice that attractive landscape buffering and screening for parking lots and car washes should be there, in our view, in a review of the documents. We did not see such a buffer facing the Lost Mill or Cerritos Elementary School or the residential area. We request that any DI denial of the appeal require the project to have an attractive noise suppressing and maintain landscape buffer on a project boundary facing all Cerritos neighborhood. A neighborhood already has impacts from the noise of the airport to freeways, freight trains and the metro line. The homeowners have extensive noise from the interchange of the four or five in the 710 at the end of Pacific Place. Thank you very much. I believe Laurie Angell didn't have enough time to finish her remarks. If she is available, I invite her to use a little bit of our remaining time. If not, our remarks are concluded. I'm available. Won't take me, but 30 seconds, probably. May I go ahead? Absolutely, yes. 2 minutes. Okay. Well, I can start over then. My name is Laurie Angel with the River Park Coalition. Make no mistake, this hearing is important and the outcome will affect the health and well-being of tens of thousands of people on the West Side that have been deprived of open space that others in the city enjoy. Today, your decisions will set the tone for this year's future. This body has recognized the need for open space on the West Side. Time and again, we are at a point where every single parcel along the river is needed for open space. We need to protect and enhance the watershed. We need to improve our environmental situation and sustainability, not continue to detract and diminish it. You must follow through on your promises. In the early 2000, the City Council rejected a strikingly similar project across the street because a full year was inadequate due to the traffic issues. It was a full EIA and it was rejected by the council. That project did not happen because the council did its job. You must too. This must serve as a precedent for this project. You are fully aware that the worst land uses continue to be piled up on the West Side. The actions you take in your land use decisions either attests to your commitment to the community, or they show a reckless disregard for all the critical issues that continue to lead to extensive health issues and diminished life expectancy. Open space will help. Please uphold the appeal and request a full air. Thank you. That concludes the testimony from the appellants. Thank you. At this time, we will have the applicant. Is there a rebuttal, short rebuttal to any of that? No. The applicant has the ability to do so. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Again, Fernando Vila, on behalf of the appellant, we do have just a handful of points we would like to bring, but most of what was raised today, we already addressed in our presentation. I will first begin with a comment made by Mr. O'Brien regarding environmental justice and how our project would undermine that. I would actually say quite the contrary will occur today. Environmental justice pervades this community because you have had for decades an environmentally impacted site that's put residents at risk. We will eliminate that remediate to prevent that contamination via remediation. We will make this place a safe community asset. So we believe environmental justice will be absolutely promoted, not undermined, as incorrectly stated. The comment was also made that it is required because it would somehow provide greater protections in the or would not make any difference in providing protections because as mentioned, each and every tropical area needed to be addressed was adequately studied. Every mitigation that needed to be addressed and included we included in the air would make not one iota of difference. The Mr. Parsons had a handful of comments to which I would like also to respond. He indicated that there is a fair argument exists that would support because we did not sufficiently identify and mitigate impacts that would support an air in of course. We beg to differ. He has found in he focused most of his comments on the contamination. He said oily contamination fear could spread recreational lost DTC thoroughly, carefully for many years, adequately investigated the site and barely, after 15 months worth of effort, required a response plan that in great detail addresses all of the contaminants and will require CAP and all the other systems already addressed. And most importantly, based upon all those systems that we didn't propose the DTC required. The DTC is determined, and it is not our finding. It's the agency's finding that human health will be more than adequately protected, as will the environment if that response plan is implemented. So that is not a fair argument to make because it has been more than adequately addressed by that action by DTC, not by US and air. We simply had nothing to. This impacts analysis. Biological resources was another area that Mr. Carson raised as as a fair argument. And in fact, we had a very detailed biological resources assessment that was submitted to the city, and the city reviewed and approved. And, in fact, the city requires, as conditions of approval, the preservation in perpetuity of a green space that will protect the southern tar plant and all of the species that were found that needed some form of protection or another soil surcharge program did nothing to impact those tar plants that were found, because guess what? All of those species, all of the tar plants that were on the site were moved to that area where they will be preserved and protected, not under our oversight, but under the city's oversight and fishing game to the extent they will do so as well. So that is not a fair argument. It's been more than abundantly addressed. Miss goes way. With all due respect, raises excellent points. I really found her description of the Tongva Tonga tribe history gripping and really fascinating. With all due respect, there was a very careful survey done onsite or artifacts were found. There were research conducted. Over 100 years of records were reviewed. No artifacts, no indication that artifacts would likely be found. Nevertheless, in consultation with this tribe representation, representatives of the tribe proposed having a very robust mitigation by having one of their representatives onsite during construction to make sure if any artifacts are found. Despite our research that suggests otherwise, those will all be preserved and protected. Ms. Lawler raises a handful of issues that I think merit responses. She cites to various exemptions that this project doesn't meet. Well, that's not terribly surprising because we seek none of those exemptions. Those exemptions would have excused this project from having to prepare immunity, which in fact we all know it was prepared. So that was really, frankly, a red herring. Stormwater impacts were robustly assessed, contrary to what she said, and mitigation, and mitigated with new infrastructure. That new infrastructure includes, among other things, catch basins, storm drain pipes, storm drain pipes, bottle preparation, which the city reviewed and modified and ultimately are going to require as mitigation if this council chooses to approve the project. So we beg to differ with that mischaracterization that was made about stormwater impacts. The study that we that the city had conducted. The site concerning topographical changes showed that no topographical changes are or major hydrological changes or impacts would result in a project that's been refuted by study. That was very abundantly done. The Miss Lawler claims that we are in a flood hazard area and in fact it was demonstrated by the studies performed that the property is not within the 100 year flood zone hazard zone area. And so that is a misstatement of fact. A statement was made that various pedestrian crossings will be impacted. Well, in fact, there are no pedestrian crossings on this private property. We will create a pedestrian right of way for the public, none of which today exists and has not existed since this property has been privately owned. So that is a misstatement of fact. The property, by the same token, is also not an equestrian property and has not been used as such. And if it is used that says, with all due respect to those that are on the horses on that property, that would constitute a trespass. Liquefaction and faults with thoroughly assessed in the amended and the city are concluded. A deal with the staff indicated and recommended to the to the to the to the planning commission and out to your body that no significant liquefaction faults were do exist based on very careful, thorough studies that were done not by us, but by independent consoles. Mislead carelessly. If can't raise a few issues I'd like quickly to address. She indicates that in fact a a park use is appropriate because it can simply be remediate, just like our project could be remediated after much consultation with the city and with the DTC. However, these agencies have told us otherwise. DHS has made it clear having a park use would require tens of millions of dollars and years and years of use of soil removal that would be extremely infeasible to undertake. The city has not ever seen fit to acquire remediate the site. No private owner has ever seen fit to do so. It wouldn't work. And guess what? Dtsc doesn't believe park use is appropriate for this historically impacted site. The there was a comment made that the community was not properly noticed and that dust control measures were not taken during the search are. In fact our client acquired a permits. That agency reviewed the proposed surcharge and found that with the permits issued and with the appropriate watering and other measures for dust control that we undertook, each and every day would be appropriate to mitigate these dust controls. So this was in fact properly permitted, and the committee made sure that we maintain compliance with those conditions. Mr. Hammer raised a couple of points that I'd like to address. I hear the case that the project includes a warehouse that was never mentioned in any of our application papers. Well, that's not terribly surprising because that warehouse will not be located on our property. We understand that the McDonald Trust property owners next door at some point may or may not develop a warehouse facility. That property was evaluated in the media along with ours, but it is not a part of our project. So we wanted to clarify the record. There was also a statement made by Mr. Howard again with Mr. Howard Stewart, with all due respect, that somehow our project will in fact be visible from the neighborhood. Well, of the building, the building itself is going to be more than 700 feet away. We will have topographical impediments, we have railroad tracks, we have a floor. And we also have site photos that show that being 700 feet away with all those natural and manmade buffers simply would not enable a viewer from that neighborhood to see that building. And then lastly, Mr. Howard indicates that that the proposed that that the traffic analysis done did fail to comply with the city's VMT guidelines. We did not make that we that is, the applicant did not make the determination that our VMT study that showed we were well within the threshold that required no traffic study, no mitigation, that was not reviewed and approved by us, that was reviewed and approved by the City Engineer with assistance by a secret consortium that the city hired, not us. That determination therefore shows that we are in full compliance with the with the VMT guidelines that the city set forth. Mr. Ward. Can you please conclude your comments? Yes. And I think with that, we're going to thank you so much. Thank you. We are going to go ahead now that we have heard the appellants. We will now go back to the council member, Austin, and then we will gather. We can do questions now or we can go have a comment or unless you have some comments or questions there. Mr. Mayor, thank you so much. And really taken a lot in from both the the applicant and the appellants. I'm going to reserve most of my questions and comments for after public comment. But as been discussed by so many of the appellants in the narrative around this, this this project, much of it has to do with park space and open space along the river. And so before we go to public comment, I just want to ask the city manager, I think, has shared some information about the Park acquisition feasibility report that was recently released in response to a request by this Council. And in particular, I would like him to talk about the opportunities sites that were identified as relates to the Park Equity and how the recommendation was made as to the most feasible sites for park development along the L.A. River. And then I'm going to answer that question in a couple of hours. Yes, sir. So I can start with some a couple of comments on that. And I'd like Meredith Reynolds, our park development officer, to talk to your manager to talk a little bit about the specific projects. Can I ask the in the back, can we put up the staff presentation again? I want to actually show a couple of images that help her talk a little bit about that concept. And so one of the things that this council asked was about two months ago to really embark on a feasibility study along the entire L.A. River and really look at opportunity sites. The team took that very seriously. They put a tremendous amount of time into it and really looked at hundreds of sites that were potentially available up and down the river, focused on about 11 and had some criteria that Meredith can talk about, about how we picked kind of those as the as the most advantageous. And in the end, we did find a property right next to this property site, an 11 acre site, which is which is owned by L.A. County. And there's been some really exciting development on that. So before I get into that, I'd like Meredith Reynolds to just talk a little bit about kind of all the other projects on the L.A. Park Project or L.A. Park, I'm sorry, L.A. River Park development projects that have happened. Park planning takes a fair amount of time. These are complex projects. You've got to assemble money, you've got to do all the planning. And but we've delivered some pretty spectacular projects over the years. So Meredith, can you talk about those a little bit? Yes. Good evening, Mayor, vice chairman of the city council. Thank you, Tom. Just a couple quick slides here just to showcase some of the great planning and development work that's happened along the river. The first project is the Dominguez Gap Project. This is a project that was led by the county. 37 acres of new wetland property was developed and opened in 2008. This is on the east side of the L.A. River, just south of Delano. It is a great opportunity for trails and habitat and hiking. The cost of this was about $7.1 million and you can really see that investment in the site. Next slide, please. Next site is the forest wetlands. This is 34 or just almost 35 acres. That covers both districts, eight and nine from just south of the Forest Park, all the way to north of Delano. This was open in 2018, but much work had been happening in this location from planning and grant writing for the balance of about 12 years, where we were able to amass $8.5 million from multiple sources that features this really great wetland, seasonal wetland and upland habitat with trails and boardwalks and habitat. Next slide, please. The next site is Molina Park. This is a more traditional park that is just south of Delano in District eight. This was a park about 3.3 acres that was made possible by a private developer who was developing adjacent housing. And so this site was anticipated to be developed as a park, as a part of our city's redevelopment agency. When that was dissolved, the plans for the park were stalled. And so through a development agreement with the private developer, this was constructed this is open in 2018 and features a sports field, a very large playground, some fitness stations with ADA components and a parking lot, along with landscaping access to the L.A. River Trail. Next slide, please. The drink shop is Greenbelt down in District one toward the mouth of the river is a eight acre property that was opened in 2018. This was an investment of several grants that were amassed over a handful of years. About $3.8 million. And this project connects the Willmore neighborhood from the Anaheim Street all the way south to Drake Park. And so this features a multi use sports field, picnic benches and open space, some really dynamic murals. And we have several partners, including a community garden that is present on the site. Next slide, please. At Wrigley. Greenbelt is another project that is currently under construction. And this is a rendering that you see here. This is 9.8 acres on the east side of the river, starts just south of the four freeway and several county grants were secured about $1.6 million to develop this. And this will take folks along trails and habitat in the Wrigley neighborhood and also includes signage and connection to our city's equestrian trails in District seven. Next slide, please. There are several future park projects there that are on the horizon that have some level of funding for some of the initial steps. So the first is 51st Street Greenbelt. This is just under an acre in District eight that runs from 52nd Street to 51st Street behind Lindsay Middle School and adjacent to the southern end of the forest wetlands. This project is initially funded for design and landscape components by the Port of Long Beach Community Grants Program. We are in design for this currently. Next slide, please. Another project that is upcoming is a Drake Chavez expansion. This is just under six acres in the first District and represents the next component of development of the Drake Chavez masterplan. This idea is coined by our community, where nature meets play with some open space elements, some traditional park elements and perimeter walking loop and community garden. Design funding has been secured again through funding from the Port's Community Grants Program, and we will be beginning design here in the summer. Next slide, please. The Long Beach Municipal Urban Stormwater Treatment Facility includes a connection to a series of wetlands, the first acre of which is being developed with the site. This is at the southern end of the Drake Chavez greenbelt and connects to Drake Park right around the corner. This is currently in design and has a wetland feature with a perimeter walking path, some areas for contemplation, seating and also some picnicking areas. Next slide, please. And finally, the county property is listed here as a future potential park project. This is the site, the ideal site that was a recommended site that was included in the park feasibility study. This is 11 acres that is county owned. It is in District eight and it is adjacent on the east side, but adjacent to the River River Trail. And the city is currently in discussions with the county for a new open space. As our city manager indicated. With that, I'll turn that back over to Tom or Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much, Meredith. So clearly there's a lot of work that has gone into the L.A. River and continues to happen. It is quite the jewel and Long Beach. And we're really trying to reorient our community back to having a lot of that historic open space and really be able to enjoy that. So as you see, we went through a feasibility study and a lot has happened on this river, excuse me. And so a lot has happened in a very short period of time. This is the county property. So within two months it was identified. Once we really saw this site as an opportunity site and we contacted the county councilmember Austin, you know, help with that. A number of people help with that. And Janice Hahn actually asked the county public works director to kind of stop any other types of planning on that project. They were really looking at making that a maintenance yard in the laydown yard. So basically having trucks and pipes and equipment. And so they have officially put that on hold at the city's request and at the supervisors request as well. And we are starting some discussions. So park projects do take some time. This would be when they we'd have to go find funding for and do some initial planning and designing work and all the appropriate outreach. But we are seeing that as a very good possibility. I'm very glad that the county has made it available, at least stopped what they were doing so we can really get into the next steps on this project. So we're available to answer questions. Well, Tom, I appreciate and Meredith Step. I appreciate the clarification on that. I wanted to just highlight some of the great work going on throughout along the lower L.A. River here in the city of Long Beach and areas that are truly deep park space. And I'm glad you touched on what was proposed at 11 acre site next to the proposed project site, because it's important to note and to have that transparency for the community. Had this not come up with this project development not been proposed, we would not have gone into and looked at and had these conversations with the county , and nor will we have known what would what was being proposed there. And so this 11 acre site ultimately I see will be a win for our our community and for our city as a whole. With that, I'd like to allow public comment, Mr. Mayor. There is. Okay then let's let's go ahead and consider Austin's a well, go to public comment, Madam Clerk, and then we'll go back to Councilmember Austin. Our first speaker is. Anne Reynolds, because. Actually. Mr. Clarke? Yes. Just one more thing. One thing there. 1/2, ma'am. 1/2. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And please don't start it. Don't start our time. I just wanted to say there was someone that mentioned one of the appellants earlier. I had made a comment. I just want to clarify. I'm an appellant had mentioned that as mayor, I can just change the comment rules or that I created the comment rules on my own. Just to clarify, the 20 speaker cap was actually set by the city clerk's office last June, almost a year ago, not by our office. And the clerk set those numbers that she presented to the city council for after a review that she made on a variety of technical reasons, staffing and to provide public access . And so I just want to clarify that that is a rules that are set by the city clerk's office. And Madam Clerk, I know Madam Quirk is there is just want to confirm that that is all correct. Absolutely. Last June, the office of the city clerk released a press release outlining the public comment, telephonic public comment, the number of speakers that would be allowed per item, and also the signup procedures to sign up for telephonic public comment. It is not an arbitrary number and it is not. Something that was set by the mayor or nor can it be changed arbitrarily. There was a lot of research that was put into that number. Okay. Thank you, Madam Clerk. I just wanted to clarify that. And why don't we go to start public comment? Thank you. Our first speakers and Reynolds. Hello. My name is Ann Reynolds. I love the community aspect. I support the project and love the community part to bring into it. It allows everyone. To safely jog and bike. The trail is something we needed for a very long time. We, the people of our communities, deserve a beautiful park. Thank you very much. Think your next speaker is Cora. Mary Louise. Cora Morelos. Our next speaker is John Moreland. Oh. Can you hear me? Yes. Please begin. Okay. Good evening, Mary Christie and council members. My name is John Moreland, resident of seventh District and very close to the eighth District. I do support and uphold the Planning Commission's approval of the Commercial Office Building Itself Storage Facility. This process has been vacant for over five years when the driving range and golf shop shuttered its doors. It's no secret that the site is contaminated and will require remediation at a significant cost to the applicant. The applicant is essentially proposing an assault lid over the site to stop pollutants in its place from further going down into the ground and to essentially mitigate that soil contamination issue. Opponents of the project that are the opponents of the project essentially wanted to build a park here. But there's simply three main issues with that idea. First, building a park when I help this oil pollution situation, in fact will exacerbate it with a park. Additional excavation will be necessary to remove contaminated soils and put a vapor barrier low enough to allow for adequate plant growth, which may be more costly. Which leads to the second issue. Who's going to pay for it? Where will that money come from? The county has some funds to improve the river, but only on parcels they control, not money to acquire and remediate private property. There have been no plans to improve this car park, nor has funding been earmarked for it for a while. It's been vacant over the past six years. Lastly, a park does sound great at almost any location, but a park at this location will not be using sound planning principles or guidelines used by the City of Los Angeles . And the National Recreation Park Association referenced that a surface area for a neighborhood park is about a quarter to one half of a mile. This property is located within a half mile, within a number. Think your next. Speaker is David. Nutter. David Sonata. Our next speaker is Mina de Attari. Good evening, Mayor. City Council. I'm a Long Beach formal resident. I live in the neighboring city of Lakewood. I was born and raised in the eighth District, and I happened to also be an attorney and a product of Long Beach Unified School District. I've watched Long Beach grow and change and morph into the city it is now, and I support this project because it is the best and highest use for that parcel. It's a good blend of economic opportunity for the parcel, as well as keeping it in line with some public use. If there's any opportunity to. Support this in any other way. I offer my support. I was just really impressed with the presentation that I saw on Facebook, and I believe the council should go ahead approve the CFP. And the zoning variance requested by the applicants. That's all. Thank you. Our next speakers, Mason Wright. Hello. My name is Mason Wright. I appreciate all the work and efforts done by the Insight Group engineers, scientists and city officials who have worked on both sides of this project. I am a third generation Long Beach native. My grandpa Glen. Right, moved here in the thirties. I was unaware of the vast history of this site. It has been amazing to hear this background, and I'm also appreciative of that. That said, this site is currently a blight on the city and unusable in its current form. Long Beach is becoming a destination for many Southern Californians, and space is limited. As an RV owner myself, I think I qualify as a nature lover and outdoorsman, and I am in absolute favor of this project. The amount of environmental testing that has been done and that the developer has offered to do for the duration of the project is satisfactory. I trust the process. I am looking forward to at its storage a new modern building accompanied by vehicle chargers, bike path access and a green space. Thank you for your time. I think your next speaker is Tracy Hodel. Hello? Can you. Hear me? Yes. Please begin. Good evening, Mayor and city council members. My name is Tracy Hazell. Murchison and I have lived in the Lower Cerritos neighborhood in the eighth District for over 20 years, and I'm very proud to call this my home. I purchased my house as a single woman 22 years ago. I spent many years enjoying biking along the L.A. riverbed to downtown Long Beach, practicing at the Golf Learning Center and running my dog at the Wetlands. Most of my activities were halted due to an increase in crime and homelessness over the years. When the Golf Learning Center closed, it was an open invitation to additional vandalism, homeless camps, fireworks, fires and noise. This has been a problem for our neighborhood and a major concern for our safety. I welcome and support the RV storage development because the developer has addressed all of my concerns. The development will provide new native landscaping, lighting, 24/7 security and most of all, it will clean up a contaminated site. It will be a nice addition to have a development at this site rather than the homeless encampment, which is what many of us see today when driving through Long Beach on the four or five and 710 freeways . With the approval of this development. Many of my neighbors and friends, including myself, will sleep better at night, knowing there are some additional safety measures for the low Cerritos neighborhood. Thank you for your time and thank you for listening to me. Thank you. That concludes public comment for this item. We're going to go ahead and go back to Council member Austin. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I've already put a motion in the electronic system. I'm not sure if there's a second, but I'll get to the most. And then second. You know, there's been a lot of information, and I just really would say there's been quite a process leading up to this evening that has involved a lot of community engagement. I would like to thank our development services team and their for their presentation for all their hard work getting us to this point, particularly on this this project, but many other projects that they are working on simultaneously in our city. This item was reviewed by our Planning Commission, as mentioned on December 17th, 2020, and after a full public hearing and review, it was approved overwhelmingly 6 to 1 by the commissioners. And during the months prior to the Planning Commission, as well as the City Council hearings, there had been much community engagement on both sides of the issue . Unlike many issues that have come before the Council, over 500 residents. I have provided input to my office both for and opposed to the project, and I don't want to give the numbers, but most of the feedback that my office has received has been in favor of this project. There's also been interest and collaboration from a number of our elected officials. I'd like to thank the state and federal levels who shared their commitment to more open space along the L.A. River and who are also working to identify, as we speak, additional resources to make these open spaces possible. I'd also like to especially thank Supervisor Janice Hahn and her Long Beach deputy, Linda Chico, who have been engaging with the community and the city on making additional public park space along the L.A. River possible. Providing political will to make 11 acres county flood control property into public open space is a huge gain for our community in our city. And so I'd like to thank Janice Hahn again for her partnership. I'd also like to thank the city staff for their work on this project project as well as the Park Acquisition Feasibility Report, which I think provides us a framework to do a whole lot more work, a lot of good work in communities along the L.A. River because several opportunity sites were identified. And as well, as I mentioned earlier, earlier, that park space is has become a common narrative related to this park project. And if you review the park feasibility report, you'll see that many park projects in the city's history have come as a result of development projects. Right. This evening, my colleagues and I must look at the facts as it relates to this project on private property and the zoning rights that are in place. Most, if not all, of the environmental questions, I believe, have been addressed through the city's environmental review, as well as through the review of soil and water contamination issues by the California Department of Toxic Substances and Control. Ask the questions that I'd like to go over, and I'm sure my colleagues may have some questions as well. But at this point. And so. Mr. City Manager. Or whomever. Please, can you. I do think that there was some some interest in the water runoff issue. Right. Raised. Can you tell me what happened to the dust and dirt and water runoff at this site prior to the proposed application as authentic or in its current state with the applicant? And what was the applicant allowed to do on an interim basis before the project approval? And why? And maybe that that's a question for developers. So Councilman asked and I'm going to start with the before and Patricia is going to cover the after. So this site, like many sites in Long Beach, you know, it doesn't have proper drainage control. And what we refer to as something that it doesn't have water quality controls for drainage exiting the site. So today and in the past, water on the site would enter through a storm event or otherwise and would drain downhill into adjacent pieces of property and eventually into the storm drain system without any on site treatment or retention. There was some discussion earlier tonight that it was a past detention base on, which is not factually correct. So that's the past. The recent events. There was a permit issued just for the soil testing, stockpiling, and that did require a review not just by the city, but by DTC and AQAP. And that includes water control measures to track to where the water will go and promote onsite infiltration rather than exiting the site. Once the project is developed. There's a number of water quality control measures to achieve the goal of having water quality leave the site better than it enters it. And Patricia is going to talk about that future piece. So the the response plan that has been prepared and is in draft form currently outlines a number of different measures that will be taken, and it includes a engineered cap that will be placed over the site and it will minimize the infiltration of water into the underlying impacted soils. And it will be required to follow all of the stormwater urban stormwater management mitigations. And I think you also asked about dust. There are construction mitigation measures that require the control of fugitive dust. Oftentimes that involves watering down the site. And I think the applicant's team described some of those measures that would take place. And the fact that if there were if if there was, you know, dust and there was substances in that dust, that the grading would be halted. So if we were to reject the or uphold the appeal and reject the project, what would be. I would. How would we deal with water runoff and an air slope, soil contamination or air contamination as a result of the site? If we reject that, if the project is rejected, then the conditions will remain as they are and all of the mitigation measures that would be put in place to deal with water infiltration, control of dust, all of those things would not would not be conducted and would not be done in the and the current conditions would remain . And if the Council were to deny this project, what will be required to make this site a public park as outlined in the feasibility study? I.e. eminent domain, legal costs, site acquisition and soil remediation. We're giving much consideration to that. If if the if the city were to try to make the this site a park, it would require significant remediation. The city would have to identify funds for that remediation. The remediation would be required to be at levels that are greater than they are for the proposed commercial and industrial project. This would be a significant hurdle that the city would have to cross in order to to consider this site as a as a park. Thank you for that. I understand that we are on a five minute rule still. And so I'm going to yield to one of my colleagues back to the mayor. Or now. Okay. I have and I do have a motion by Councilmember Austin to believe the motion is you have here to approve the staff recommendation, which is a denial. Denial of the appeal. Councilman. That is my my recommendation. That is my motion to deny the appeal. I can read the motion if you want. Sure. I want you to read it. Due to the consideration I move that we receive the supporting documentation into the record through the public hearing, deny the appeals and adopt the resolution certifying the mitigate, get a negative declaration and declare an ordinance approving the zone change to commercial storage and uphold the Planning Commission's approval of this project. That is my motion. Thank you. And I'd love to have a second by Councilwoman Price. Councilman Price. Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. I had queued up to talk, but that's fine. If I'm next in the queue, I can second as well. Okay. Councilman Price. Thank you. So I want to I want to thank the appellants. You have worked really hard on this issue. You're very passionate about your beliefs in regards to this project. And I really appreciate the respectful dialog that you've had with any of us who have met with you. I certainly appreciated the opportunity to meet with you and hear your thoughts. When I did meet with some of the appellants who reached out to me, I committed to them that I would definitely do my homework, read the materials, and also talk with city staff. And I have done that. I have spent the past few months really educating myself on this topic, understanding that whatever we do with one project proposal obviously has precedence to other proposals and and vice versa, whatever we don't allow in some areas, that too will carry a precedent. So I've really tried to educate myself on this topic, and I want to thank our development services and planning teams for meeting with me and talking me through these the this particular issue and some of the. Arguments that have been raised by the appellants. I will say that while I appreciate the passion that has been raised and a lot of the talk, the arguments and a lot of the documents and letters and things I have seen, some of the the realities that have been conveyed to me from staff are in direct conflict with some of the allegations that I've heard from the appellants, and that may be just miscommunication or a lack of understanding. But based on my understanding of the ownership of the site and what it would take to achieve the goals and. Asks requests of the appellants. I don't believe that that is a feasible or viable option for the city. So with that, I do want to thank everyone who spoke in favor of this and those who spoke against it. And I want to thank Councilman Austin for the diligence that he's put into this effort. And I will be supporting his motion. Thank you. Vice Mayor Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I want to take a moment and just acknowledge it's been a lot of work and this is certainly spilled out citywide into a larger conversation and things like equity brought out. And, you know, when it's a hearing, you really can't talk about these things publicly. And typically when these things come up, you defer to the council member or the council members and the closer proximity area. One of the topics just asked a couple of questions. More specifically, big picture here. Thank you, Councilman Alston, for asking about the process of what it would actually take to develop this into a park if that were the direction that the city wanted to do. Well, I didn't hear what I didn't hear from city staff is what would be did we do any analysis on what the cost would be to acquire and develop this into park space? Yes, we did. That was part of the park feasibility report. Meredith, can you give a summary of that specific 11 acre parcel breach since. The height of the high level? Certainly the identify I recommended site is included in the park feasibility study. And what we did do is a rough order of magnitude due to cost for the development. And the acquisition, development, maintenance and operations. We are focused on the recommended site of the county property. And so at the 11 acres we were looking at a cost, a development cost of 291 million with some additional costs for maintenance and operations. So I think that's what. I needed to hear. I want to be with my 5 minutes here. So forgive me if I'm sorry. Sure. So 291 million, to put it in perspective. That's more than the rebuild of Jordan High School. That's how our community center was, about 10 million. That is a significant, significant cost. And when we talk about park equity and I'm a big champion and supporter of Park Equity, I think it's important that we think for the sake of equity, that we actually prioritize area with respect to proximity and access. If we're going to make a $300 million investment to expanding of open space, they should be in areas that are walkable to communities that don't have access to open space. And and staff. Have you done some analysis? What are the top three or four districts with the least access to open space? Yes, I can answer that question. I'd also I think we're going to take a second to look at the 291. That number is a little higher than what I remember. But I will if that needs to be corrected, we'll let you know. And so we did take a look at what the we do look at Park Ridge Park acreage throughout the city. While parks are open to everybody, they're not always located in the same areas and not every area has the same amount of access. When we do look at where the the districts with the lowest amount of acreage, they really fall into districts one, six and nine. Those have between 50 acres and about 67 acres each. When you look at your highest districts, those are four, three and five. Those have between 356 acres and almost 2000 acres. And so there is a disparity, and that's something this council has embraced and acknowledged. And a lot of our park development efforts have really been focused on the areas in the past several years that have the least amount of park space. So I'm gonna conclude with this because we have this five minute limit here. The disparities within east and west part of town are really driven by deep, deep disparities, hyper focus in about three areas. The town of west of the 17 north Long Beach, sort of north of the Alamo and central north downtown area. That's really where the disparity is so high. It pulls down the broader disparity between east and west, and that's where we need to continue to place our focus. There are plans we need to implement and invest in those plans. I think the 11 acres on going plot 11 have been identified. I want to acknowledge the speakers on both sides for reaching out. I think they've been they've made strong cases, particularly, you know, particularly some of the appellants. I thought Mr. Gillis offer some very realistic I mean, some reasonable requests. And so my final question I would ask is Mr. Gillis talked about a list of things if this were not to be approved tonight, I mean, if the appeal were not to be approved tonight, there were a list of requests. Our staff addressing some of those requests raised by Mr. Gill Gills or Gillis. I just wrote down Give. One of the comments from Mr. Gale was about landscaping. And I think there's an opportunity to look at the on the site plan and look for opportunities to do some additional landscaping. There are walls between, you know, along the property that perhaps could be landscaped on the outside of the wall with vines to soften those edges. So that is one of the possibilities that can be looked at. Let's just make sure, though, there was a list of things. Let's make sure what can't what can ever be done to accommodate those steps are taken and factored into the plan. But that said, I don't see the grounds to vote to uphold the appeal on this. I think we should continue to express our opportunities to invest in the river, but really take out the scalpel and invest in the areas that are truly our core. That's where we need to make sure that Austin Young people think. Councilman Richardson, I'm sorry. Okay. Thank you. And Mr.. Mayor, can we go to are we able to correct. Something real quick, Mr. Mayor, before we move on to the next speaker, just that $291 million number. Sure. Thank you. Meredith, can you give a quick update on that? Yes. I apologize, Vice Mayor, I misunderstood the question. So just to clarify, the information that you're looking for is on page 28 of the open space feasibility study, and it's for that 11 acres. The total development cost is $27.5 million, with some additional funding for maintenance and operation. I apologize. Thank you. Thank you. The next speaker is council member Ranga. Thank you. I'll be brief. Unfortunately, I have to disagree with Vice Mayor Richardson's comments on that. It doesn't rise to the level of. Of rejecting the appeal. I think that. When it comes to the to the appeals that were there that were presented today. And by the way, I have to thank them for a very extensive, very thorough testimony. And they provided it was very compelling. And to me, also, the responses of the of the applicant, of course, were very strong and very compelling as well. However, I think that the community is asking for one thing only. Do a full year and I in support of that because through the equal air you're going to get a lot of the information that they want because we want to be comfortable that whatever goes in that property is going there because there was a whole extensive year performed. All the concerns regarding contamination, regarding the the environmental justice issues that were that were brought up were in fact, addressed and looked at. I'm not. I know what it's going to take to build any kind of other kind of structures, various mitigation. Lots of points for that because of the contamination and the history of that area there. So I'm I'm I'm not in favor of this project. I will be supporting the the appeal under those conditions, because I think that the the E.R. will provide an opportunity for the residents to provide their ideas, their concerns and with with additional scoping that would need to take place. And that's all they want. And that's and that's what that's the direction that I'm going to be. Date. Thank you. I think next I have Councilman Mongo. Thank you, Mayor. I've had some technical difficulties. Can you hear me? Good. Thank you, Mary. I want to thank all my council colleagues for their comments this evening. I also want to thank the appellant and the. The both sides of the. Presentation tonight. I thought that there was a lot of really great testimony and the quality of those presentations was excellent. I think that one of the things that comes to mind is that there are personal property rights, and I recognize that I may want my next door neighbor's house to. Be a park, but they have some personal property rights. And I appreciate hearing a applicant who takes into consideration the requests of the community, because I do know that we've had some parcels across the city where we don't have any cooperation. And by right, they are able to do things that are not only not in the best interests of the community, but sometimes to the detriment of the community. And those are from decisions that were made a long, long time ago. I think we as a body came together during the process and. Recognized a lot of needs across the city. And while I, of course, see that there are greater needs than what the space potentially is being used for, especially with our economic downturn and the need for jobs, it's also important to recognize that each and every piece has to come together to have a greater impact and lift up the city. And so I think one of the things that's really drawing on my heartstrings tonight is the excellent efforts of Councilmember Austin and his leadership in finding a parcel of additional park space and working with the county on making that a reality. I hear his commitment to the community and making that possible, and I think that's critical and important. I think that it's unfair to talk about parks based by districts as the district that has the most park space. I'm happy to talk about it by districts, but I think that it really disproportionately disadvantages Council District four because there are areas that are just on the edge of his district, such as the nature center, that we're kind of looped in. And depending on the dividing line of any given census year, park space is added to and fro. And that really is disingenuous to the communities that live on the other side of this district that really do need additional park space. So I would just say that as a community, even if our districts are split, we should really talk about the city and the park need in regions. And I think that that would be a more. Realistic and sincere a way to describe where things are, because in the next census tract, the nature center could be in the fifth District versus the fourth District. So I think that those are some things to keep in mind. And furthermore, I want to I want to thank the community for coming together behind so many projects. I think that this project would not be what it is today without the appellant and all the requests and coordination that went into this. You really made the presentation and it sounds like had the community input along the way to ensure that that. Developer and land owner are working in tandem with the community. And I think that that's a lot about what this process is for. And so congratulations. I think a lot of big wins tonight on on what the state will look like. And I think that you'll have a big win in terms of I'm continuing to work with Councilmember Austin and his legacy to pull that all together with an additional park space with the county. Congratulations. Thank you. And then finally back to Councilman Austin. Thank you. I think we've had a lot of great conversation and I really appreciate the input of my colleagues. I do want to just address a councilmember your rhonda's assessment about a poor e.r. I disagree with that. And and i think there are some differences between the projects being proposed in our districts. The project being proposed in his district is a housing development, which would I think it may necessitate airport air. This is a storage facility that has low and minimal impact on community. There won't be people living there, drinking the water or anything like that. And then I wanted to just just also address Councilmember Richardson's concerns. I haven't had a chance to really talk to the applicant or the appellants since this process has been under appeal. But prior to I know the applicant has given his full support toward being a great community partner. And I know that a lot of the plans and considerations were done with the input of neighborhood association residents. I've been emphatic about them speaking to. And I'll just say throughout my time on the Council, it's been almost nine years of several, maybe a dozen different development proposals have come to my attention regarding this particular site. And when I met with the developers for proposed projects, I've always encouraged them to engage our surrounding communities, neighborhood associations and referred them directly to the most Reno's Neighborhood Association. In fact, when the city was considering the lands element in 2017, Councilmember Urunga and I received a communication from the President of the neighborhood association at the time , Mr. Bob Hill, who indicated that the board of the most serious neighborhood association like to would like the former Golf Learning Center driving range land, which is approximately 15 acres, to be zoned as light industrial instead of open space. And I quote The land uses available under light. Industrial are better for our neighborhood and better for our neighbors and better for our for the city of Long Beach. But a city staff and attorney has already indicated, even without the Neighborhood Association's input, the city could not change the zoning of the property to open space because of the objections of the property owner at the time. So private property has never been zoned open space. And I just want to be very clear with that. Let me be clear that this particular site has been industrial use for the past 100 years. Right. And for the past 14 years, ever since the driving range closed, it has been a blight, blighted and vacant site. My office has received countless complaints about nuisances and blight and from this site since it's been vacant. These include dirt, bike and off road vehicles on the weekends kicking up dust, this very contaminated dust that we now know about as well as noise contamination. And there's also been complaints about encampments and brush fires in this area, which has been a drain on our public safety services. Also heard from residents who have a direct view of this property from their homes and support this project, property project, I'm sorry, because they see it as a way to permanently remove nuisances that are a blight that they've had to endure for many, many years. And so with that council, I do appreciate that the robust conversation. And again, with all respect to everyone who've been involved in this project, the applicant as well as the appellants. I do appreciate the robust engagement. I would like to channel all of this wonderful energy that we've heard here tonight. The last two and a half hours. I'd like to channel this energy toward actually working together and building park space. And so I'm going to extend an olive branch to all of our community members and stakeholders who've been engaged here today, but also to the project applicant, because I think there's a lot of work to do and we can win together as a city. So with that, those are my comments and I appreciate your support. City Council. Thank you. And your customers. And they are. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I know that this is an issue of great interest to our community, and I'm glad to have heard from everyone who called in and who reached out to my office, both in support of the applicant and the appellant. I'm very appreciative of all the appellants that contacted me and met with me and really to educate me on the reasons that they were appealing this project. I also want to add, during that time that we met, you know, I, I was able to reassure them my personal commitment to open space and parks. I also want to make sure that that I you know, that even though I don't represent that area in in the Y in the eighth District, I'm very, very committed to the needs of our less west site community. I know that we are definitely on. You know, it's lacking in open space and parks in in this side of Long Beach. And not not only that, but we are also the parks that we do have. You know, I think we have a lot of violent crimes, a lot of homeless encampments, a lot of drug use and sale. And so those are, of course, for other conversations. But I think that that is something that we need to deep dig deeper into. I also want to share my many concerns, you know, about having real true access to parks in these disproportionately impacted areas. I am so happy that this the city staff went and did research. And I'm very thankful to Councilmember Austin for working with staff, working with County to actually see and and find opportunities for open space and that can be developed. I know that this is private property, so this is a very difficult and, you know, decision to be made. But I think that it is very important to to make sure that we that we followed through with helping not only find open space and parks, but maybe not on this property, but and finding them along the most needed areas. I'm particularly excited, like it's said, for the parcel of land that Steph described that we are working on and partnering with the county on. So that's that's really good. I'm I'm happy to stand in support of the efforts of my colleagues tonight. And just wanted to thank staff again for all their hard work on this project. I wanted to thank wholeheartedly the community for advocating for open space and parks, and let's continue that advocacy together and find more open space. With that, I just want to say thank you. Thank you, Councilman Austin. Yes, Mr. Mayor. Before we vote, I'd just like to just give the applicant an opportunity to make a public commitment to to to the neighborhood and the community to work on the issues of concern, to be a partner with with the stakeholder groups in the community. Is the applicant still on? And I know some commitments were made a few months ago. I want to just make sure that we hear those commitments again. Councilman, I don't think the applicants or the appellants are still on, but we can. And certainly if there are if there's a question, we can always contact them. So. Madam Clerk, do you want to contact one of the appellant? I'm sorry. The applicants to see if one of them could come back on. We will make that call right now. Is there a specific applicant that the council would like us to contact? Mr. Paul Brown available. We will contact him. Mr. Brown. Is logging in right now, if you can give him one. Are you there? Yes, we can hear you. Hello? Can you hear me? Yes, we can hear you. Okay. Sorry. We were asked to leave the call before the voting. Al Jazeera asked to leave the confidence building. Sorry if I have a bad connection. Okay. Go ahead, Mr. Brown. Thank you for joining us. Mr. Brown. I'm not sure if you were listening to the meeting, but I know, you know, we're in the community meetings and early on in the process, I know you committed to being a great of a strong, committed partner with the community as you were going to move your your headquarters here to Long Beach at the site, as well as you make commitments of, again, being rooted in our city. Several comments were made and concerns related to some some buffering esthetics, as well as studying noise from the site related to the A-line. My question to you is, will you commit to working with our community to the neighborhood association as well as community stakeholders to work on these issues as your project moves forward? Yes. Council Member We will gladly work with staff on the Council to appease the concerns that were given to us tonight. All right. And I do understand also that, you know, as we are considering, you know, building this 11 acres and we're in the works and building 11 acres next to your property, will there be some some access points, public access points from your property for that that that a private for that public space. Yes, Councilman. We will be providing parking for our access to that future park or open space. Parking. Is there a is there a trail? Yes, there is. There's parking spots as well as a trail and an easement that we have been working with city staff to complete. And I do believe there's also some some some open space development on your property that you're also developing that would be in conjunction with that 11 acres, is that correct? That is correct, sir. Well, thank you. And again, I appreciate the commitment. We look forward to working with you in the future. Okay. Thank you. That concludes that concludes questions. We'll go ahead and now go to a vote. I have a motion by Councilmember Austin, a second about Councilman Price to approve the staff recommendation. So, Madam Clerk. District one. I district to. My. District three. I. District for. Right. District five. I District six. Six has a count, six is recused. Thank you. District seven. You may. District eight. At the No. District nine. All right. Councilmember Urunga, we have you as a neighbor, correct? Correct. Motion carries. I'm going to get through. Item number nine, please. Communication from Councilwoman Sorrell. Councilman Super Anna recommendation to receive and file a presentation in recognition of Cambodian New Year. Is Councilman Zorro back on yet? She? She might not be. So if she's not on yet, why don't we come back to those? I am for has been pulled from the agenda. I'm sorry Adam. 11 has been. We'll come back to nine and ten when Councilman Ciro is back on.