07/29/2014 Council Preview – Homestead/Canary Appeal

Looks to be a relatively short general meeting.  We start the evening with a closed session regarding ongoing labor negotiations with the Sunnyvale Managers Association and  SEIU 521.  Then we get to business.

The general meeting starts with a special order of the day recognizing National Safe Digging Day.  There is a nationwide emphasis on what’s called “call before you dig” services.  This is a free service offered by utility companies to mark the presence of underground utilities before doing any sort of digging work.  This prevents gas breaks and accidentally severing underground fiberoptic cable, both of which are extremely expensive and sometimes dangerous to deal with after a break has happened.  Locally, I believe you can call 811 and the utilities will mark the relevant utilities within 24 hours of the phone call.

The consent calendar is fairly typical.  There’s another  contract for asphalt supplies.  There’s an $8m OBAG grant for six major projects:

  • Rehabilitating Duane Avenue (I assume east of Fair Oaks, but that’s a guess)
  • Pedestrian safety improvements on Sunnyvale-Saratoga
  • Bike lanes and streetscape on Fair Oaks
  • Bike lanes and streetscape on Maude
  • East and West Channel Trails
  • SRTS improvements

There’s a contract for a new software system for managing capital projects in Public Works.  There’s an important one – a contract amendment for designing a continuous recycled water system.  Currently, we do not continuously produce recycled water.  We either discharge to the bay or we recycle, but never both at the same time.  So when we want to produce recycled water, we have to stop and shunt the entire system over, then go back when we’re done.  As part of the WPCP redesign, we intend to convert to a system that allows us to do both at the same time. This would cover the design of the new system. Finally, there’s a pro forma tract map approval for Arques and second reading of the sign code updates.

The main agenda has only two items.  Item 2 is an annual resolution to place unpaid citations on the tax rolls.

Item 3 is the biggest issue – an appeal of a Planning Commission decision regarding an application for a seven-home development on a large property at Homestead and Canary.  Staff worked with the applicant and came forward with the 7-unit proposal, in no small part to respond to concerns expressed by the neighbors.  And after two different sessions, the Planning Commissioner rejected the proposal and told the applicant to come back with an 8-unit proposal.  As a result, another councilmember and I both appealed the PC decision, and we’ll be hearing it ourselves.

That’s about it.

 

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07/29/2014 Council Preview – Homestead/Canary Appeal — 3 Comments