Howard - Just Heard About It - Please Postpone Decision on Vallco

To: CityCouncil@cupertino.org

City Council Agenda Item 17

Vallco Town Center Special Area: Specific Plan and associated amendments to the General Plan, Sept 18 2018

 

Dear Cupertino City Council,

I am a local resident. I did not even hear about the many very dense Vallco proposals until last week. Please postpone any decision until you have given time for the residents to chime in.

Voters voted No on Measure D. These plans are significantly denser. Based on recent history, the residents have indicated they do not support denser plans.

Our schools are already overcrowded since we see it daily in the number of portables. Adding thousands more units at Vallco won't be good for schools no matter how much in "benefits" the developer offers; CUSD has stated upwards of 1000 students will be added, and the cost to build additional infrastructure or student transportation options hasn’t been defined yet. We will pay more in the future in school bonds to build more classrooms, like Fremont Union and Santa Clara Unified School District are doing now. 

Furthermore, the developer is inserting a clause into the benefits offer that allows the benefits to be rescinded if anyone objects to the development, even if the objections are valid. You should decline to accept any offer that allows the developer to renege on their commitments.

Traffic is already terrible around Cupertino. Both Tier 1 and Tier 2 will add 8,000 to 10,000 more workers to commute in for jobs, and another 8000 residents who may commute out. There is no significant fixed mass transit planned, proposed or linked to this development. 

A year ago, Councilmembers Rod Sinks and Savita Vaidhyanathan co-authored an opinion letter with Santa Clara Mayor Gillmor in the Mercury News stating that the Stevens Creek Blvd “corridor needs significant transit improvements that are lacking” and “The Stevens Creek traffic problems are a result of decades of inaction that preceded all of us. But we, as responsible leaders, should feel compelled to act before entitling more growth. We owe that to our current and future residents as we seek to improve the economic vitality of our cities and our quality of life. We simply cannot wait any longer.” Furthermore, “We’d like to see a new transit study done of the Stevens Creek/280 corridor; we suggest including Interstate 280 because it doesn’t have the cross traffic that impedes the speed of much of VTAs light rail system.”  

https://www.mercurynews.com/2017/08/06/opinion-san-jose-needs-transit-in-urban-village-plans/

That idea made a lot of sense. You need to work with surrounding cities to complete these studies that you suggested prior to approving these plans. Please postpone any decision until you have given time for the residents to digest, provide input, and further revise the plan.

Regards,

Howard Huang

Liang - PAUSE: Investigate former City Manager, Compliance of SB 35. Citywide Survey for Vallco with specific numbers

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Wed, Sep 19, 2018 at 1:14 PM
Subject: PAUSE: Investigate former City Manager, Compliance of SB 35. Citywide Survey for Vallco with specific numbers
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org

Dear Mayor Paul and Councilmembers.

The City Manager is responsible on determining the ministerial approval of a SB 35 application. But you, the City Council, is ultimately responsible for the conduct of your employee, the City Manager. If the City Manager approved the Vallco SB 35 application without following the General Plan, it is your responsibility to look into the conduct of the City Manager.

I hereby formally request an investigation into David Brandt's handling of Vallco SB 35 application. He has put the City at risk of lawsuit by allowing a humongous project with only 5% square footage for BMR to mascaraed as an affordable housing project when it's not.

The total square footage of all 1200 BMR units add up to 0.5 million square feet and they are all studio and one-bedrooms, according to the Vallco SB 35 plan. The total square footage of the entire project is 10 million square feet. Therefore, only 5% of the entire project is dedicated to BMR units. 5%! 

As an affordable housing advocate pointed out, in order to qualify for any state or federal funding, the project must have units of mixed sizes, which the Vallco SB 35 project doesn't have. Therefore, the Vallco SB 35 project will likely NOT ever quality for ANY state or federal funding for BMR. Likely, none of the BMR units will ever get built since Sand Hill won't fund the BMR units from the profits they made from the office and market-rate houaing portions.

Therefore, the Vallco SB 35 is a bluff. However, if you feel that you are forced to approve a Vallco Specific Plan almost as dense as the Vallco SB 35 threat, you should ask yourself. Why you could be threatened in the first place? You did not approve the official and residential allocation in Dec. 2014 at all since no Vallco Specific Plan exists then. So, Vallco SB 35 plan does not comply with the General Plan you approved.

Please do not take any action on Vallco Specific Plan until the following happens:

1. Look into the handling of the former City Manager on the Vallco SB 35 application. You are responsible for the conduct of your own employee.

2. Look into the compliance issue of SB 35 for our General Plan and Housing Affordability Act and SB 35. The City Council should not take any action under threat, especially false threat.

3. Please do a citywide survey on Vallco project with specific numbers proposed in Tier 1 and 2. You have done surveys for head tax and other issues. Why not do a survey or multiple surveys to find out what your residents want? (But please include a question on whether the survey taker is a Cupertino resident or live within 1 mile of Cupertino.)

You can still take control of the situation.

Many Cupertino residents simply do not even know about the scale of the Vallco project you are considering. Please do not let the multitude of nonprofits hijack our City when they are only advocating for one tiny piece of the project, which the Developer may or may not deliver.

Sand Hill promised to build senior housing at Main Street originally. They converted them to market-rate units because they cannot find financial backers. The same thing could happen for those BMR units they have included since Sand Hill is NOT going to fund these BMR units themselves.

Some of the public comments are simply asking for BMR units or units for people with disabilities, but they do not even support or seem to understand Tier 2 at all. They should not be counted towards any support for Tier 2.

Apple Park (on top of HP allocation) and Main Street would have added 26 years of office growth since 2015. Tier 1 (750,000 sqft) will add 18.75 years worth of office growth. Tier 2 will double that amount to add 37.5 years worth of office growth. 

Both Tier 1 and Tier 2 are office-heavy projects. There was NOT one public comments supporting any office-heavy projects. Many public comments appear to support a housing-only project, which is neither Tier 1 nor Tier 2. So, the comments simply asking to resolve housing shortage should not be counted towards any support for Tier 1 or Tier 2.

If every City Council uses office space to trade for token benefits, we will sink deeper and deeper into housing shortage since every project digs us into a deeper hole.

Please do not approve any office-heavy project for token benefits, which might never be delivered or might cost millions more later.

First "do no harm." The project should "stand on its own", not rely on sugar coating.

Please think back. How many Cupertino residents come forward to support the project itself, instead of token benefits? How many Cupertino residents oppose the project itself, despite the benefits?

Please PAUSE.

Please do not take any action on Vallco Specific Plan until the following happens:

1. Look into the handling of the former City Manager on the Vallco SB 35 application. You are responsible for the conduct of your own employee.

2. Look into the compliance issue of SB 35 for our General Plan and Housing Affordability Act and SB 35. The City Council should not take any action under threat, especially false threat.

3. Please do a citywide survey on Vallco project with specific numbers proposed in Tier 1 and 2. You have done surveys for head tax and other issues. Why not do a survey or multiple surveys to find out what your residents want? (But please include a question on whether the survey taker is a Cupertino resident or live within 1 mile of Cupertino.)

Liang Chao

Cupertino Resident

==============
REFERENCE:
The annual office growth for Cupertino in the projection done by ABAG in 2010 is 805,428 square feet of office by the year 2035. That's about 40,000 sqft per year for 20 years. Main Street already added almost 260,000 sqft office space + 35,000 sqft incubator space. Apple Park added 750,000 sqft on top of the HP allocation. Together they are 26 years of office growth since 2015.

Tier 1 (750,000 sqft) will add 18.75 years worth of office growth. Tier 2 will double that amount to add 37.5 years worth of office growth.

Liang - Compliance of SB 35 and the Removal of City Attorney

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Wed, Sep 19, 2018 at 12:37 PM
Subject: Compliance of SB 35 and the Removal of City Attorney
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Clerk <CityClerk@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org

Below is my speech last night regarding the compliance issue of SB 35 and the City Attorney.

The City Manager is responsible on determining the ministerial approval of a SB 35 application. But you, the City Council, is ultimately responsible for the conduct of your employee, the City Manager. If the City Manager approved the Vallco SB 35 application without following the General Plan, it is your responsibility to look into the conduct of the City Manager.

===================

Subject: Vallco SB 35 plan does NOT comply with the General Plan since they have NO entitlement without an approved Specific Plan

Dear Mayor Paul and Councilmembers.

I'd like to comment on the compliance issue of the SB 35. I have confirmed with the City Attorney that this topic should fall under Oral Communication for non-agenda items.

Any SB 35 project must comply with the General Plan and the Municipal Code. The existing General Plan, which you approved in December 2014, clearly states that the office and residential allocations do not apply until a Vallco Specific Plan is approved with a list of agreed upon community benefits. It is not your intention to give away the office and residential allocation without any benefits. For that very reason, the Housing Element even includes Scenario B where there is zero housing at Vallco. However, in the SB 35 application, Sand Hill has claimed the entitlement of 2 million sqft office space and 2400 housing units, when the Vallco Specific Plan doesn't exist yet. It clearly does not comply with the General Plan.

The former City Manager David Brandt has somehow allowed a noncompliant SB 35 project to pass, which in fact gives away billion-dollar-worth of entitlement for free to the Developer, when it should be contingent on an approved Specific Plan. David Brandt retired soon after this action.

At the same time, the City Attorney Randy Hom was silently removed from office in May 2018 when the City Attorney is the only other person who could oversee the compliance of SB 35 application. Why has Randy Hom been removed without any explanation? Why has the City not even started to recruit new City Attorney when we are facing the largest development project in the history of Cupertino?

I urge the Council to take immediate action to look into the former City Manager, who is responsible for an action that likely gave away billions-dollar-worth of development rights. I urge the City Council to give Cupertino residents a sufficient explanation on why City Attorney Randy Hom was removed in the first place and why we continue to pay his salary 4 months later today.

By not taking any action on the compliance issue of SB 35, the City Council is in fact admitting that the General Plan was poorly written so that you would willingly allow Sand Hill to claim a billion-dollar-worth provisional allocation as entitlement without providing any community benefits. Do you admit that YOU are the ones who give away billions-dollar-worth of development rights for free, not the former City Manager?

Vallco SB 35 has other issues. It does not comply with the Housing Affordability Act, which require 2 / 3 residential use in the entire square footage. Vallco site is still in the hazardous material site list, specifically excluded from qualifying for SB 35. The list goes on.

So, the Vallco SB 35 plan is a bluff. It's a result of potential misconduct of the former City Manager.

Although SB 35 project only needs ministerial approval by the City Staff, it is the responsibility of the City Council to ensure that the City Staff is following the law. It is the responsibility of the City Council to take action to investigate any misconduct immediately.

ya

Qin - Please vote No to vallco specific plan

From: Qin

Date: Wed, Sep 19, 2018 at 9:08 AM
Subject: Please vote No to vallco specific plan
To: CityCouncil@cupertino.org


Dear Mayor and City Councils,

I'm writing to you urge you to vote NO to the vallco specific plan.

I gave my 3 minutes time slot to fellow citizen last night after waiting there for 6 hours, as that fellow citizen injured her feet and limp to the room . She was hoping can finish earlier, so she can rest her feet at home. It showed we are caring citizens , not evil citizens as some of the speakers paint us.

I'm all in for the BMR housing for those really needs. But with the developer build all those non-affordable apartment in main street , I don't see any thing this developer done will help improve the housing affordability in this region.

One speaker talk about the transportation improvement within 20 years his father experienced many many years ago, but from my experience of living in Cupertino for the last 20 years, I saw 0 improvement in terms of new highway , new transit system into Cupertino. I only saw more crowded road, more crowded school.

My kids attend Cupertino High, CHS used to be one of the smallest school in the district, now it's pass Monta Vista! Kids cannot have more than one electives compare with other high school most kids can have two electives. The traffic is horrible during school start and finish time, it's become dangerous now for kids to goto school due to the over crowded road in the area.

I heard FUHSD board speaking for the housing for teachers and me personally love all the teachers . On the other hand , with over 1000 staff in the district, only 40 left the district last year, it's actually a very good turn over rate compare with any company I works with!  The percentage even smaller for CUSD!

Vallco only build around 200 BMR unit, merely enough to cover the additional teachers housing needs for all the kids they going to bring in ! The math doesn't make sense to me at all!

Please vote No to vallco specific plan!

Thank you !
Qin

Sent from my iPhone

Balaji - Your vote on the VSP today would decide your political legacy with residents of Cupertino

From: Balaji

To: Cupertino City-Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>

Sent: Wednesday, September 19, 2018, 7:06:53 AM PDT

Subject: Your vote on the VSP today would decide your political legacy with residents of Cupertino

Dear Mayor and Council Members,

I am a resident of Cupertino for 2 decades , I have spoken to many Cupertino Citizens in East Cupertino- Rancho Area

they are in complete anguish with the monstrosity you are planning to approve.

We are not against re-vitalizing vallco, sensible housing is needed, not buying into false promises from Sandhill properties

who has never kept promises look at Sunnyvale where they went and made a mess of the town center.

As a resident, if I come to planning,  ask for 4 story building approval with the green roof on the top will you approve it,

why then the City is changing the planning code just for Sandhill properties.

Please listen to Cupertino residents who voted for you not to developers lobby/ threats.

Balaji

Cupertino Resident

Ignatius - Your vote on the VSP today would be your legacy as a member of the Cupertino City Council

From: Ignatius Y. Ding

Date: Wed, Sep 19, 2018 at 4:18 AM
Subject: Your vote on the VSP today would be your legacy as a member of the Cupertino City Council
To: Cupertino City-Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>

Dear Mayor and Council members,

For the last time, I would have to write you again before the vote on the Vallco Special Plan and the certification of the associated FEIR taking place.

As Joan Lawler Chin has mentioned during the Oral Communications at the Council meeting Tuesday night, please keep in mind: The Principle of "Thou Shalt Not Harm"

The City residents will remember how you cast your votes here today.  What would be your legacy if you would vote against the majority of your constituency despite of the obvious violation of trust, ethics and your fiduciary duty to serve the public good.

Here is the deal. If you seek for re-election, another office in November or in the future, our votes at the ballot box will depend on whether you choose to change the future of our city for better or worse.  Your first test might be in about three weeks.

This is not a threat like what Reed Moulds of Sand Hill has made against Cupertino if we do not comply to the wish of his boss, Peter Pau.  This is just a promise of what would happen in real life after one betrays the trust of the public.

Ignatius Y. Ding

Cupertino Resident

--

Ignatius - Request Council to deny certification of FEIR

From: Ignatius Y. Ding

Date: Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 2:24 AM
Subject: Request Council to deny certification of FEIR
To: Cupertino City-Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>
Cc: "Amy Chan (Acting)" <manager@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, "Grace Schmidt CMC (City Clerk)" <graces@cupertino.org>, Cupertino City Planning Division <planning@cupertino.org>

** To City Clerk:  Please place a copy of this letter in the city archive as a public record.  Thank you.

Dear City Council,

I strongly urge you to not certify the Vallco Final EIR for the following reasons:

EIR is Inadequate because:

• failure to have a community based project, the "revised project" is a concoction of and recommendation of a portion of City Council and City Planning Commission instead:

"As discussed in the Draft EIR, the City is undertaking a community-based planning process to develop a Specific Plan for the project site, the Vallco Special Area. Based on input from City Council at its June 4, 2018 Study Session on the Vallco Specific Plan, the City has identified another alternative to the proposed project that would achieve all the goals expressed by the different council members at that meeting,..."

• The Vallco Specific Plan (VSP) were developed with no substantial participation of community members since most of the meetings were conducted in the middle of workday while residents were at work and unable to attend any of the meetings, except the "kick-off meeting" in one evening.
• the FEIR is biased and clearly states that while it's a "community-based" Plan what we ended up with came out of some people on city council:
• a substantial number of components in the VSP were taken from the failed proposal known as "Measure D" in 2016.  Many of the drawings in the plan do not match with the numbers in the spreadsheets which makes the calculation of space, cost and reserved areas impossible to determine the environmental impact throughout the VSP, including, but not limited to, the following pitfalls:

-       failure to provide a stable project, creating a moving target EIR, bait and switch Proposed Project with completely different objective Revised Project

-       failure to properly notice schools within 1/4 mile of the project

-       City of Cupertino undermines and disregards FUHSD as Lead Agency to determine efficacy of the project site, which is contaminated, for students' use (See attached)

-       failure to study General Plan Recognized Scenario B as an Alternative to Project

-       failure to study Performing Arts Center and Outdoor Concerts for noise impacts

-       failure to study impacts from expanded Recycled Water production construction and Sewage Treatment

-       failure to study impacts from relocating students to other schools

-       failure to study cafeteria workers' traffic and housing demand in office amenity space 

-       failure to study air quality modeling under the green roof for safety of stagnant air impacted by freeway exhaust

-       failure to study city anticipated freeway cap at Wolfe Road and I-280.

-       failure to fully indicate direct and indirect growth inducing impacts.

-       failure to write an unbiased EIR, statements include that Measure C was to increase house allowable height to 45'.  Or that City Council recommended the Revised Project are biased and not allowed in an EIR.

-       failure to notice FUHSD and CUSD 30 days prior to certification which are within 1/4 mile of Vallco

-       failure to clearly state that the site is listed as a hazardous waste site multiple times pursuant to 65962.5 and subject to corrective action (See SCC-DA Memo attached)

-       failure to inform the public by having soils testing of a contaminated site before certification.

For these above reasons, and the others unlisted here, I urge you to deny certification of the Vallco FEIR.

Ignatius Y. Ding

41-Year Resident of Cupertino

Liang - Adopt strong policies to ensure promises are kept

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Wed, Sep 19, 2018 at 12:07 AM
Subject: Adopt strong policies to ensure promises are kept
To: City Clerk <CityClerk@cupertino.org>, City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>

Please put this in the city record for Sept. 18 Council Meeting.

========

Dear Mayor and Counculmembers,

The current plan is conceived behind closed doors since May. Those who participated in the Opticos process city did not even get informed the details of Vallco plan until last week. Please do a citywide survey first before moving forward.

The theaters, ice rink, bowling alleys, gyms would all be gone from Vallco. In their place, there will be 10,000 more workers who commute in and 8000 residents with almost no real parkland.

I oppose all very dense options with mega office, since they all worsen housing shortage. Please stand up if you agree.

We want a vibrant community friendly Vallco. Please don't let various outside forces hijack our city.

In case you do go forward, It's important to adopt strong policies to ensure that promises are kept.

1. Please set an expiration date for all allocation granted so that there is an incentive to build sufficuent housing units before 2023, the end is Housing Element.

2. Please set a condition so that the office allocation would be taken away or not issue occupancy permits if the BMR is not built.

3. I support quality affordable housing for families and people with disabilities. But there is no quarantee that the BMR units will ever get built since Sand Hill will NOT fund them. They will seek public funding, which they may or may not get.

The Specific Plan is NOT a solution for BMR housing.

Please require a completion bond for th BMR units.

4. If you want market-rate units that are actually affordable for mixed population, you need to specify unit sizes in the Specific Plan.

5. Please don't be blinded by token benefits, which will in fact cost more for taxpayers like the empty-shell PAC. Your approval of the Specific Plan will give the developer an instant boost in property value. You have no quarantee that any housing will be built before more profitable portions might be sold off or the entire site might be sold off for double and triple the price.

6. The Tier 2 Plan has double the amount of office of Tier 1 with a similar amount of housing units. 

It will worsen housing shortage, worsen traffic and worsen Greenhouse emission.

Tier 2 is NOT a solution for the housing crisis we face.

7. Both Tiers will add about 900 students to CUSD, which is about one elementary school and half a middle school. If you do care about CUSD, you would demand contribution to CUSD for Tier 1 also.

Vallco could have been such a great opportunity for a community-friendly center for many residents to enjoy. But you have allowed it to morph into something that's much bigger than anyone could have even imagined for Cupertino. Who do you represent? Cupertino residents or some outside forces?

Liang Chao

Cupertino Resident 

Liang - Completion Bond on BMR housing, BMR units for families, not on separate parcel

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 2:08 AM
Subject: Completion Bond on BMR housing, BMR units for families, not on separate parcel
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org, "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

Dear Mayor Paul and Councilmembers,

Please insist that at least 60% of BMR units should be 2-bedrooms or bigger so that they could accommodate families in need, or people with disabilities or seniors who need caretakers. Singles have more options for affordable housing by sharing apartments. The Municipal Code requires BMR units to be comparable in size with market-rate units, but the Development Agreement appears to not comply with our Affordable Housing Manual.

Please insist that the Low and Very Low Income units follow the City's Affordable Housing Manual so that they are constructed with materials of comparable quality and they are scattered throughout the development (inclusionary). The Development Agreement appears to not comply with our Affordable Housing Manual. It is highly likely that the Low and Very Low Income units will be placed in a separate parcel and gets constructed last.

Please insist that the BMR units are constructed as early as possible so that these units could help with housing shortage. The Development Agreement now only requires the occupancy permits of BMR to be issued before the LAST occupancy permit of the market-rate units. In case any of the market-rate unit gets delayed for any reason, the BMR units might not get built.

Please insist on a completion bond for the BMR housing portion. If the BMR units are not built within a designated time frame (perhaps by the end of the current Housing Element cycle). the completion bond will then be used to fund the construction of the BMR units.

The Development Agreement for the draft Vallco Specific Plan suggests that the Project Developer will seek public funding, which might take several years or may never materialize, instead of funding for the construction of the BMR units from the profit of the office and market-rate housing portion. That seems to defeat the purpose of the plan. If the Vallco Specific Plan is approved, the City would have given the developer an instance boost in land value just from the upzoning from retail only to add a significant amount of office and residential allocation. Once the project is developed, there will be more profit to be made. Yet. the developer won't fund the construction of the BMR?

Under the "Timing of Delivery of BMR Units" in the Development Agreement,

"Developer will endeavor to build separate BMR Unit residential buildings at approximately the same time and that BMR units must be developed roughly in proportion with the delivery of market rate units, provided that City recognizes that delivery of BMR units may be affected by and delayed due to market conditions, logistics, and financing considerations.

....

If Developer is unable to secure LIHTC financing after three rounds of applications to TCAC, Developer shall provide the City with security in a form acceptable to the City in an amount to cover the otherwise applicable City Affordable Housing Fee, and Developer shall be responsible for securing feasible financing for the BMR Units to complete construction within a reasonable timeframe mutually agreed upon by the parties."

The above section seems to suggest that the Developer will simply pay in lieu fee if they can't find public funding for the BMR units. So, in the end, the City might still have no BMR units needed to fulfill the RHNA requirements. If meeting RHNA requirement is being used to push through the massive allocation for Vallco Specific Plan, shouldn't the City ensure that the BMR is built on site, no matter what happens?

Your job is not to rubber stamp everything the developer asks. Your job is to keep the developers accountable to deliver their promises.

Sincerely,

Liang Chao

Cupertino Resident

Liang - Limit the Unit Size so that market-rate units are more affordable

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 1:00 AM
Subject: Limit the Unit Size so that market-rate units are more affordable
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org, "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

Dear Mayor Paul and Councilmembers,

Both Tier 1 and Tier 2 have no limit at all on the size of each unit.

This would allow developers to create more luxury units, which are not affordable by most people, as we've seen in Main Street with one-bedrooms of 1200 sq. ft. and even up to 1700 sq. ft.

In order to produce "affordable" housing, the size of each unit needs to be small enough.

Palo Alto City Council puts a limit on the square footage of each unit in order to ensure affordable market-rate units are produced.

Please put a limit in the total square footage for the living space in residential units to ensure or specify a minimum percentage of small units.

Please set clear objective standards. Please do not leave anything to "assumptions".

Your assumption that Sand Hill won't submit SB 35 puts the City under the threat of a massive (likely non-compliant) SB 35 application.

The office and residential allocation in Dec. 2014 General Plan should depend on the approval of Vallco Specific Plan with agreed upon community benefits. Unfortunately, Sand Hill took advantage of "your assumption" and simply claimed that they are entitled to the office and residential allocation in SB 35 even without any approved Vallco Specific Plan.

Please do not leave anything to "assumptions".

Sincerely,

Liang Chao

Cupertino Resident

---------- Follow-up Message ----------
From: Liang-Fang Chao <
Date: Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 1:32 AM
Subject: Re: Limit the Unit Size so that market-rate units are more affordable
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org, "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

The Development Agreement refers to an average unit size of 1250 sq. ft. in the Specific Plan in the following clause:

"City shall not limit square footages of permitted uses or the number of permitted residential units (based upon the presumed general Project average unit size of 1,250 gross square feet assumed in the Specific Plan), or modify parking requirements or access in a manner that is inconsistent with the Project Approvals;"

However, the draft Specific Plan did not mention any reference to "unit size" at all.

The School Impact Analysis assumes the site will have small units mostly for singles and reduced the Student Generation Rate from 0.32 to 0.17 for CUSD, based on such assumption.

Therefore, the Vallco Specific Plan MUST have a limit on unit size for at least 50% of units in order to be consistent with the assumption made in the EIR. Otherwise, the School Impact Analysis for the EIR would have to be adjusted to reflect the Student Generation Rate based on the actual unit size in Vallco Specific Plan.

Liang Chao

Liang - Set an Expiration Date for any Allocation or Approval

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Tue, Sep 18, 2018 at 12:49 AM
Subject: Set an Expiration Date for any Allocation or Approval
To: City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>, City Attorney's Office <CityAttorney@cupertino.org>, manager@cupertino.org, "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

Dear Mayor Paul and Councilmembers,

I hope that we learn from past failures, intentional or not, so that don't hand out free giveaways (upzoning or massive allocation) without keeping the developers accountable.

Caution 1: The Developer A could get the increased allocation (both in Tier 1 and Tier 2) and sell Vallco for a higher price since it is already upzoned. Developer B might pay double or even triple the price to purchase Vallco. Then, Developer B will come back to the City and cry out that he cannot make any profit and demand the City to give him more concessions. At the same time, Developer A already walked away with hundreds and millions of profits, if not more, which he made all in one night from your approval of massive allocation for Vallco. You can see an example from Mountain View already. Developers want Mountain View to waive Development Impact Fees because the land value is too high.

Please never "assume" something won't happen. Anything that could happen to make more profits for someone will happen. Like SB 35 application.

Caution 2: The State gives us a deadline to produce housing units in the 8-year cycle. You must also give the Developer a deadline to produce housing units; otherwise, their allocation should be taken away so that we could give it to other developers. The Council has approved 600 housing units at Hamptons with a 10 year or more expiration date. They might not get anything built before Housing Element cycle is up. We should provide incentives to ensure the production of housing units. If the housing units are not produced within the specified deadline, both the office allocation and the housing allocation would be taken away, for example.

Since there are thousands of units involved, perhaps 25% of the office allocation would "vest" only after 25% of housing units have started construction, for example. This way we ensure that the developers won't make profit, while not delivering the housing units.

Your job is not to rubber stamp whatever that's put in front of you. Your job is to make sure that the General Plan and the Development Agreement has clear and objective standards to keep the developers accountable, even when the property changes hand.

Sincerely,

Liang Chao

Cupertino Resident

Jon - Comments For Sand Hills Vallco Specific Plan

From: Jon
Sent: Tuesday, September 18, 2018 12:32 AM
To: citycouncil@cupertino.org; CityClerk@cupertino.org
Subject: Re: Comments For Sand Hills Vallco Specific Plan

Cupertino Council,

First, as a resident of Cupertino, I am absolutely against the massive Vallco Specific Plan.  This overwhelming proposal clearly goes against our Municipal Code section 19.04.020 which says "to prevent overcrowding of land and undue concentration of population".  How can three complete levels of underground parking, and 14 story buildings on top, not be considered "overcrowding of land" in Cupertino, this is not San Francisco.  How can 3000 apartments on top of 2M ft2 of office buildings not be considered "undue concentration of population" in Cupertino, this is not San Francisco?

Well, the SH VSP clearly violates the Cupertino Municipal Code and is clearly not what I want.  

But is it what our residents want?  Do you remember Measure D?  The residents voted down Measure D.  

And I have knocked on hundreds of doors and talked to hundreds of residents, totally at random, and the almost unanimous answer is they also do not want the Massive Vallco Specific Plan Proposal, they do want Sensible Growth.

So it is then your job, the elected city council, to represent the will of the people and put an end to this continuing developer attack.  Again, the residents voted down Measure D.  So tell Sand Hill that all projects proposed in Cupertino must meet the General Plan, and be consistent with the building density and scale of our community. 

As our elected officials, your responsibility is to represent the residents of Cupertino first, not the developers, and clearly not the people from other cities showing up at our council meetings and making statements "you must do this".

You are elected to represent the residents of Cupertino!  That is Democracy!

Jon Willey

Cupertino Resident

KM - Vallco VTC Specific Plan FEIR Insufficiencies= Do Not Certify

From: KM
Date: September 13, 2018 at 10:02:19 PM PDT
To: citycouncil@cupertino.org, cityclerk@cupertino.org, cityattorney@cupertino.org
Subject: Vallco VTC Specific Plan FEIR Insufficiencies= Do Not Certify

Dear City Council,

The FEIR for Vallco Shopping District Specific Plan has insufficiencies and must not be certified.

Here's an EIR primer out of San Jose State I referenced:

http://www.sjsu.edu/urbanplanning/docs/URBP229Materials/CEQAbriefing_229.pdf

Other than errors and omissions in their science, I think these are solid insufficiencies with the EIR and process:

1.  The project description must be accurate and consistent throughout an EIR.  PDF 11. We did not have this. They even changed what the proposed project is in the FEIR with another alternative and call it the Revised Project.  Previous Project is the original Proposed Project:

DEIR, original:

Amended DEIR:

FEIR, bait and switch proposed project:

2.  Segmentation due to sewage system and recycled water issues.PDF12. Having insufficient capacity for recycled water or sewage treatment requiring construction of new facilities.

3.  A fundamental requirement of CEQA is that an analysis of the cumulative impacts of a proposed activity together with other past and reasonably foreseeable activities be included in an environmental assessment.PDF 14. Must study the 7 SB35 towers for example.  Vallco SB35 is a foreseeable project.

4.  The FEIR is too long and includes public comments inline and the changes to the DEIR and Amended EIR are included as lines out edits making it a mess to read.

FEIR part 1

https://www.cupertino.org/home/showdocument?id=22378

FEIR part 2

https://www.cupertino.org/home/showdocument?id=22380

5.  The addition of the necessity to Amend the General Plan was briefly mentioned at the June 4 CC Study Session, 4 months after the Specific Plan process began.  This means the project clearly isn't consistent with the General Plan.  Does anything say they can't slam a GPA Amendment concurrent with a project EIR?  What if the amount of housing in the entire GP is less than what is studied?  Does an entire GPA city-wide need to be redone?

6.  The effects of moving school boundaries requires EIR study and mitigations.  That is allowed even with SB 50.  Refer to the SB 50 memo to city:  https://files.acrobat.com/a/preview/a081262d-8ab9-4d6e-b427-4fdf8b10bd20

Excerpt:

"Therefore,  a  lead  agency  may  consider,  in  an  EIR,  among  other  factors  the following impacts potentially caused by school expansion or construction: 

 ·  traffic  impacts  associated  with  more  students  traveling  to  school; 

 ·  dust  and  noise  from  construction  of  new  or  expanded  school  facilities; 

 ·  effects  of  construction  of  additional  school  facilities  (temporary  or  permanent) on  wildlife  at  the  construction  site;

 ·  effects  of  construction  of  additional  school  facilities  on  air  quality;

 ·  other  "indirect  effects"  as  defined  by  CEQA  Guidelines  §  15258  (a)(2) (growth-inducing  effects,  changes  in  pattern  of  land  use  and  population density,  related  effects  on  air  and  water  and  other  natural  systems).  See Chawanakee Unified School District, 196 Cal. App. 4th at 1029.   

CONCLUSION 

When  it  comes  to  arguments  about  the  impact  of  a  proposed  development  on existing  school  facilities  and  their  ability  to  accommodate  more  students,  the  CEQA process  is  essentially  ministerial.    Agencies  must  accept  the  fees  mandated  by  SB  50  as the  exclusive  means  of  considering  and  mitigating  the  impacts  of  the  proposed development  on  school  facilities.    However,  nothing  in  SB  50  or  in  CEQA  or  current  case law  prohibits  an  agency  from  conducting  environmental  review  of  an  application  that creates  significant  environmental  impacts  on  non-school-facility  settings  or  sites, regardless  of  whether  the  applicant  has  agreed  to  pay  mitigation  fees  under  SB  50. "

Due to the above insufficiencies of the Vallco Project it must not be certified.

Sincerely,

KM

Muni - Vote against Vallco Specific Plan on Sept 18, 2018.

From: Munisekar 

Date: Mon, Sep 10, 2018 at 11:21 PM
Subject: Vallco Specific Plan on Sept 18, 2018.
To: <svaidhyanathan@cupertino.org>

Hello Council member Ms.Savita Vaidhyanathan,

My name is Muni Madhdhipatla and I am a Cupertino resident. I have been very concerned about the way our city council has been handling Vallco shopping mall issue. You are one of the 5 council members and hence my appeal to you.

Vallco is a regional shopping mall zoned for retail only and should not have been allocated with 2 mil SFT office space and unlimited heights in Dec 2014 General Plan amendment. Nevertheless, it was done late night of Dec 5, 2014 despite massive protest from the residents. I understand it was only one month on the job for you at that time.

In 2016, the developer tried to maximize profitability by taking advantage of the allocations by proposing 2 mil SFT of office space and 900 units of apartments and measly 16% of the build out for shopping. Basically, Vallco went from 100% shopping mall to only 16% shopping. I don't need to remind you that the residents rejected their plan in 2016 elections by voting down Measure D.

It is my understanding that Dec 2014 GPA allocations were conditional upon the developer having an approved plan for Vallco by May 2018. That means, those allocations should have expired automatically after May 2018; to make things clear, the city council could have voted to remove those allocations in early June 2018. Given the residents repeated concern about traffic congestions and lack of shopping experience in Cupertino as evidenced in city Godbe surveys, you had an opportunity to revert this space to original zoning of shopping; but failed to do so.

Cupertino is a suburban community without any mass transit capability; highway 280 is the 3^rd worst congested highway in the bay area. With the addition of 2.8 mil SFT Apple Campus II, roughly 10,000 more daytime workers are likely to enter and exit Wolfe exit from 280. With the latest Vallco proposal of 2400 to 2900 housing units and 1.8 mil SFT office space, we are likely to see additional 9000 daytime office workers and 5000 residents overloading that same exit. Our freeways and backroads cannot handle that load.

As a mayor in 2017, you sent a letter to San Jose city [attached here] on our behalf of residents opposing their plan to build 180 feet tall buildings along Stevens Creek Blvd adjacent to Cupertino. Now, our city will be considering approving seven towers of 22 story tall buildings [230 to 240 feet height] at Vallco. We don't want to be getting a letter from San Jose reminding our city's double standards. BTW, even the cities like Sunnyvale with CalTrain are not building such tall buildings in residential areas.

Except for Regnart and Blue Hills elementary schools on west side, all other schools are overflowing with kids; 252 portable class rooms across 25 CUSD schools are a proof that we have overcrowding of our schools [attached doc]. BTW, these portables are built at the cost of open playing space for the kids. Adding 2400 to 2900 housing units at Vallco will exacerbate this problem by adding more than school going 800 kids; I arrived at this number based on 0.32 kid per household from CUSD demographer.

Moreover, adding 1.8 mil SFT office space will create housing to office imbalance in our city. As per ABAG guidelines, we are supposed to build a housing unit for every 1.4 jobs created. With 9000 jobs created out of that office space, we will be forced to build 6500 units of new housing. Cupertino does not have infrastructure to handle such housing and office growth. Also, please take into consideration the water shortage and overloading of sewage pipelines.

As an elected representative of residents, I request you to vote against the most egregious plan being presented by the developer for Vallco on Sept 18, 2018. I understand they are trying to maximize profitability; but it is your job as our representative to safeguard the interests of residents. 

I am writing to you as you will be one of the key votes on this matter. I am writing to you so that my silence is not interpreted as supporting of Vallco Specific Plan. I hope common sense prevails.

Thank you.

Muni Madhdhipatla

Cupertino Resident.

Liang - Comment on Vallco EIR - impact on civic services should be based on real data

From: Liang-Fang Chao

Date: Mon, Sep 10, 2018 at 6:57 PM
Subject: Re: Comment on Vallco EIR - impact on civic services should be based on real data
To: "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>, City Council <citycouncil@cupertino.org>

I have sent the enclose EIR comments for the NOP of Vallco project.

However, none of the issues I raised were studied. The impact on civic services, like police, firefighter, libraries etc. are still based on off-record phone communication.

Now the proposed Vallco Specific Plan development will be even denser Measure D.

Please at least provide some real data on the impact for police, emergency services and firefighter services, especially for high-rise buildings of 14 stories tall.

It's a matter of life and death when you do not provide solid data to back up your claim.

Below is a recent report where Police and Firefighters say they can't get through traffic

Rapid Growth in Sunnyvale Spurs Concerns in Public Safety

https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Rapid-Growth-in-Sunnyvale-Spurs-Concerns-in-Public-Safety-492660451.html

Police officers and firefighters in Sunnyvale are going public with their concerns that the city is allowing business to boom without enough consideration for public safety.

On Thursday, the public safety officers union sent a letter to City Council members formally requesting they take a closer look at the Sunnyvale's looming development plans, especially the proposed massive Google campus.

It's yet another sign that Sunnyvale is losing its small-town atmosphere to Silicon Valley growth.

For the city's public safety officers, who alternate between being cops and firefighters, it's becoming more than they can handle

In one national survey, Sunnyvale has been hailed as the country's safest city for the past three years. It's probably one reason Google has applied to build massive projects there, including a reported 1 million square foot campus as well as another 400,000 square foot project, adding thousands of new employees.

Google is also asking the city to consider building new high density housing.

The president of Sunnyvale's Public Safety Officers Association, made up of 200 cops, firefighters and dispatchers, is worried.

"I'm sure they're kind of star struck with some of these big companies wanting to come to the city to do business, which we're all for," union President Frank Bellucci said. "But we just want to make sure that type of growth is done wisely."

So, the union sent the letter to City Council members, formally requesting impacts to public safety be specifically analyzed. The letter points out the city last year saw a 13-year high in some major crimes, including rape, aggravated assault, robbery, larceny and vehicle thefts.

"We are also seeing huge problems with traffic in our city,' Bellucci said. "That will add response time to our being able to get to you when you call 911, and it's also causing some problems with some of our pedestrian collisions that are occurring in the city.

A union consultant and adviser said the focus is on protecting public safety but added litigation has not been ruled out.

I urge you to specifically analyze the impact on public safety, response time, ambulance trip delays with real numbers for both residents at Vallco site and residents in surrounding areas who will be impacted by the added traffic volume.

Thank you.

Liang

On Mon, Mar 12, 2018 at 2:03 PM, Liang-Fang Chao <lfchao@gmail.com> wrote:

RE: Vallco Shopping District Specific Plan (NOT Vallco Special Area, which doesn't exist in the General Plan)

The impact for civic services should be based on real data, not personal communications that cannot be verified or quantified, such as done for the EIR for 2014 GPA.

Specifically, the emergency response time for ambulance and fire station should be quantified.

How the response time has changed in the pas 4 years as the traffic is getting worse? How the response time will become with increased residential or working population?

What's the response time of other cities with denser population for comparison?

What's their investment in police forces per capita? Would we get reduced police services as the population increase?

(I have heard of comments that San Jose police department doesn't have resource to come to schools to give students safety instructions as in Cupertino schools because San Jose police has to deal with a lot more incidents due to their population density.)

The 2005 General Plan used to have noise level data. Please use quantitative analysis for noise and pollution.

Please refer to the enclosed email for more details.

Thank you.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Liang C <lfchao@gmail.com>Date: Sun, Nov 15, 2015 at 9:22 AM
Subject: Comment on Vallco EIR - impact on civic services should be based on real data
To: "City of Cupertino Planning Dept." <planning@cupertino.org>

RE: Comment for Vallco EIR

Please study the impacts on civic services, such as library, police, fire station, medical emergency services based on real data.

Please study the impact on medical services, emergency and otherwise. The non-resident population would increase the demand for medical services since medical offices are open mostly only during working hours.

Even though the city doesn't provide any service for ambulances, the response time of an ambulance often means life or death even by just one second. Please study the response time of emergency vehicles to various points in Cupertino since traffic congestion could delay an emergecy vehicle to reach a residence on the other side of the town.

Please study not only facility and personnel needs, but also the impact on level of service. Especially, the response time for medical, police, fire emergencies. And the response time during peak hours in average and also worse case scenarios. Any delay in response time could mean life or death for both the resident and non-resident population. Please study the realistic impact supported by real data.

Please please study the impacts of non-resident population on these civic services since the employees do spend more than 8 hours a way in Cupertino and they need the parks and recreation services, police, fire and medical services as any other resident.

Please include cummulative impact, including ongoing projects like Apple Campus 2 and Main Street, and also proposed projects, like Marina, Hamptons, Oaks.

Please provide real data and statistics to support your claim or conclusion, instead of any undocumented personal communication, as it has been done for the EIR of GPA.

If any personal communication is documented through email, it should be provided in the appendix for reference.

e.g. Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Derek Wolfgram, Deputy County Librarian for Community Libraries, April 4, 2014.)
e.g. Personal communication between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Cheryl Roth of the Santa Clara County Fire Department on April
24, 2014.

e.g. Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Captain Ken Binder, Division Commander, West Valley Patrol,
April 11, 2014

Please do not make assumption that employees generated do not add any impact without providing sufficient data to back it up, such as the following:

e.g. EIR of GPA states: "Although the proposed Project would result in an increase in employees throughout Cupertino as well, only residents within Santa Clara County can apply for a library card; therefore, the following analysis considers expected population increases, and not employment generation as a result of implementation of the proposed Project."

Most of the employees in Cupertino are probably Santa Clara County residents also. If the EIR would claim that most residents are NOT Santa Clara County residents, statistics should be given to support that claim. In fact, even non-resident of Santa Clara County can hold a library card, according to an official from Santa Clara County Library:

"All public libraries in Santa Clara County allow free reciprocal borrowing regardless of address.  Currently 45,312 non-resident have a library card from our system.  This is 18% of our total library cards.

In the EIR for GPA, the impact level for fire station and police are also derived without any data. With 30% increase in residence population and 50% increase in non-residence employee population, the EIR concludes that there will be no additional staffing needs for fire station or police. But the conclusions were only based on "personal communication" with no document and no data to support it.

For example, based on personal communications, the EIR concludes that there is no need to expansion for police for 30% increase in residence population and 50% increase in non-residence employee population.

e.g. "However, the West Valley Patrol Division has confirmed that future development

under the General Plan would not result in the need for expansion or addition of facilities." (Personal communications between Ricky Caperton (PlaceWorks) and Captain Ken Binder, Division Commander, West Valley Patrol,
April 11, 2014.)

If there is no need to expand, a written letter should be provided so that whoever makes the statement would be responsible for the claim. And attempt should be made to estimate the realistic impact of population increase and to explain using data why there will be no significant impact.

Thank you.

Liang Chao