Community Advisory Board Minutes

April 27, 2005

Present: Sally Mullen, Derrick Castillo, Donna Zapata, Ai-Chu Wu, Lettica Romero, Paul McKairnes, David Johnson, Anne Hudgins, Mike Behler, Bonnie Hasenbeck, Sam Rosales, Benita Kimball, Lee Dibble, Chris Carrieri, Cassie Beldon

Excused: Don Taylor, Nancy Wang, Monica Baldenegro

Staff: Pat Fruiht, Lisa Kranz-Mueller

Chairperson Sally Mullen called the meeting to order. There were no personal appearances.

MINUTES

Corrections: Anne and Alby both attended the Guess Who's Coming to Dinner and the Bicycle and Pedestrian group is a committee not a board.

HIGH RISE POLICY

Lisa Kranz-Mueller, representing Advance Planning, gave a short background on the recent discussion in front of Council regarding whether to allow buildings higher than 10 stories in the downtown. She shared that Council had decided to maintain the General Plan policy of the 10 story limit for now. There is also a discussion going on among Planning Commission, Design Review Board, City Council and the Downtown Committee regarding the "mid-rise" policy. This policy would have a "step-down" from 10 stories to seven to five as it goes closer to the residential neighborhoods.

Members of CAB expressed the following concerns:

Property values

Impact on small businesses

Cost of services vs. revenue

Traffic

Impact on historic areas

Higher vacancy rates

Change from the historic downtown feel to an urban feel

The lack of broad community input on the process to date

There is a joint meeting in May of Design Review Board and Planning Commission.

ACTION: Get colored map being used as part of the mid-rise policy to CAB members

ACTION: Sally/Pat will develop a letter to Maureen Rich about concerns and request for a "profile" view of what it would look like.

ACTION: CAB would like a copy of the high rise policy.

COMMITTEE REPORTS

Technology: Has not met.

Gangs: Derrick met with Scott Swanson and Ernie Oliveras about Cinco de Mayo planning for potential problems at the event on May 1.

Environment: Meets May 17 - Reminder City Fair May 7th

Dave Johnson attended the Climate Protection meeting and was impressed with the variety of activities and programs going on around this issue.

Ai-Chu attended a meeting with the Water Agency about water saving    landscaping.

Economic Development: Meets May 16

Downtown: No meeting

Diversity: There was a draft work plan submitted for the subcommittee and there were several ideas that CAB might want to be involved with.

Traffic: Looking at Street Smart program from San Jose. Cassie and Nancy are attending a conference in San Diego about community based Traffic Safety programs.

Budget/Infrastructure: No meeting

Neighborhood Safety: No meeting

AREA REP REPORTS

Chris shared that Burbank Gardens used emails for urgent news and if others would be interested he would pull together a cheat sheet about how it works.

Derrick noted that there was a recent public hearing in South Park and if the signage had been in English and Spanish there may have been a better turnout.

ACTION: Notify department heads that a suggestion from CAB is when there is a public meeting in a predominately Spanish speaking neighborhood the notification signs should also be in Spanish.

Bonnie shared that she, along with a number of CAB members, has been following the "Walkable Mendocino Avenue" issue closely.

OTHER BUSINESS

Donna is doing a monthly column in La Voz on a person or group of the month and wants to feature CAB at some point. She asked for CAB members help in identifying individuals or groups that deserve notice.

Anne stated that Friends of Smart and the Leadership Institute for Ecology and Economy has tours of public transportation in the Bay Area that are very educational. The next one is scheduled for May 12 and she urged CAB members to attend on if they were interested. She also suggested that the Cultivating Community brochure needs to be updated and brought back for discussion at a future CAB meeting.

Benita shared that she is moving to Sacramento and will be leaving the CAB for a variety of reasons. The CAB encouraged her to share her thoughts about the community. She stated that Santa Rosa was a difficult place for a single woman, and even more so for a single African American woman. She encouraged CAB to continue to work hard on the diversity issue. She said that often she has heard " those Mexicans" and it brought back many feelings related to race and translated those feelings into not feeling accepted in Santa Rosa.

The CAB expressed their appreciation for her forthrightness and stated that it was definitely Santa Rosa's loss and Sacramento's gain and that she will be missed by all.

Cassie mentioned the May 5 Mayors Prayer breakfast.

Letticia encouraged CAB to attend a meeting on May 24 at CAP on a 20-minute video about race.

Sally indicated that she hoped CAB would help identify Merit Award recipients for this year.

Pat reported that she will be making a quarterly report to Council on attendance so Council Members will be seeing who is attending the meetings on a regular basis.

Meeting was adjourned at 7:35 p.m.