Economic Development Committee meeting – May 12, 2022

With a presentation by Jennifer Dart, Deputy Director, Arcata Community Development Department
Her presentation starts at around 7:21 on the video.

Note:  This is an UNDEDITED artificial-intelligence transcription. There will be multiple errors including a variety of misspellings o “Arcata.”  Any discrepancies between what was spoken and what is written here are unintentional and are not the fault of this website. Many of the “uh” and “you know” and “um” words have been removed.  Some sub-headings may be added.

Please do not contact me about errors — unless there are gross errors that distort the meaning of the speaker.
This transcription may be edited in the future.

The transcript is in black text. Highlights may be added as bold highlights.

On May 12, 2022, Community Development Deputy Director Jennifer Dart made a presentation to the Arcata Economic Development Committee and fielded questions from members of the Committee and from the public. The May 12th presentation is considered to be better and covers more material — the discussions of the Gateway area went on for over an hour.  This presentation went into some of the thornier issues at greater depth, and includes discussions with members of the Economic Development Committee as well as comments from members of the community. 

Transcription of the video:

Length of Video:  1:45:05

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

business, Gateway, area, people, plan, community, economic development committee, zoning, build, question, students, city, housing, meeting, opportunity, important, jen, property, bit, arcata

SPEAKERS

Linda Kjesbu, Colin Fiske, Amanda Hickey, Chris Richards, Aaron, Serg Mihaylo, Travis Cunha, Walt Geist, Humnath Panta, Scott McBain, Jane Woodward, Anthony, Patricia Cambianica, Jennifer Dart

Jennifer Dart  00:01
Yeah, there we go.

Serg Mihaylo  00:03
All right, we’ll call it start to this meeting, the Economic Development Committee may 12. We’ll start with the roll call. We have Travis Cunha you have Humnath Panta present. Yeah. And then we have Walt Geist present. We have Amanda Hickey. We have Linda Kjesbu. Here. And then Monique Molina, who has also yet to join us. And then we’ll move into Oh, and I’m here Serg Mihaylo the chair, of course, we’ll move into the oral communications. This, this item is provided for people to address the economic development committee and submit written communications on the matter on matters not on the agenda, or the conclusion of all oral and written communications Economic Development Committee may respond to the statements. Any request that requires EDC attention will be set by the EDC for a future agenda or referred

Walt Geist  01:10
to staff. So, do we have any?

Jennifer Dart  01:15
We do we have one person I’m gonna go ahead. Go. I have not No. Hi Patricia. You’re on mute. Yep. There you go. All right.

Patricia Cambianica  01:28
Hi. So I watched the historic landmarks committee meeting. And Gerald Takano, who is the preservation consultant working with Planwest, very eloquently talked about the notable historic sites within the Gateway area and one of which included the L Street railroad corridor and he thought it was a very important economic asset for the city. He also felt that it should be ended integrated into of that part of Arcata’s history should be integrated into all planning for the area, it would make for a better entry into the city he felt if that history was highlighted. And so I’m, of course a big proponent for really, it’s really enhancing that L Street bicycle pedestrian path, I think it would be a just a great Gateway, on bicycle, or for the cyclists that are coming and visiting into Arcata, especially if the railroad history was highlighted. And those Pratt those tracks I didn’t know before, but they were previously determined to be eligible for for the national national registry. So that trail is actually going to be part of the great Redwood Trail, which is the 320 mile conversion of tracks to trail that’s coming from Sacramento or from San Francisco, excuse me, to an ending and blue lake. And the blue lake section will be on the anti marry trail which we are currently trying to get underway. And so I really, really would advocate for doing rail to trail and not rail to road as it’s kind of proposed to kind of squash a pretty main thoroughfare in there along L Street with the Gateway plans. So I also think it would be an awesome linear park. And that’s kind of what it’s used for. Now I live right on the edge of it. So I see the activity I’m kind of biased. But I think there’s you know, Sandy G Antilles bird sanctuary memorial in there, there could be a great area for art installations with the creamery district. There’s it could be like bocce ball or table tennis and I think it would just be a really good way to highlight the arts community with the creamery district as well. And playgrounds, basketball courts, etc. So anyway, so that’s kind of my push and I just think that corridors such a huge asset, it was such a great addition to our city that we should really be enhancing it. So and especially for the economic economic of it, I think it would bring a lot into Arcata so anyways, thank you for letting me talk.

Serg Mihaylo  04:43
Thank you, Patricia. And then Jen, are the the comments from the last one from I have it in the email

Jennifer Dart  05:01
about the event to this section. I was wondering, now the next so you’re gonna move into approval of minutes. Those were come public comment about the item, the business item one.

Serg Mihaylo  05:13
Understood. Okay, so we’ll move into item three the approval of the minutes number one, we will approve the Economic Development Committee a regular meeting from February 1 of 2022 minutes. Would anyone moved that we approve those

Walt Geist  05:31
Move to approve the minutes.

Humnath Panta  05:33

I second it. Okay, here

Serg Mihaylo  05:35

a moment and a second, or should I go? I’ll go one by one, Travis. And then, Linda,

Travis Cunha  05:48

Aye

Serg Mihaylo  05:50

remember. Hi. I also will either we approve the minutes. So move into to the approval of the minutes from the regular meeting of April 5 2022. There’s anyone moved to approve those minutes are

Walt Geist  06:05
moved to approve the minutes. Second. as well, to prove those minutes, which will move us into number four, the business and action items. Number one, we’ll have a discussion on the business types located within the Gateway area plan boundary. Which I suppose is the one that that what is the item B? Yeah. Yeah. Item B discussion?

Jennifer Dart  06:42
Yep. So I will go ahead. And if you’ll bear with me just a second. I have a slideshow to go through with you. And this let’s see. Okay, can you see that? Yep. Can you just see the businesses in the Gateway? Or do you see my notes?

Humnath Panta  07:18
We went to the notes.

Jennifer Dart  07:21
Okay, good. Last time I shared it, I shared it with all my notes. You don’t want all my notes, you just want the actual flight. So good evening, economic development committee members. I’m bringing back the topic that we had at our February meeting to discuss businesses and economic development in the Gateway area plan. And that Gateway area in general, I know that EDC members and members of the public had some questions at that meeting. And so I’m going to try and address those tonight. I’m sure there will always be more questions, but I wanted to at least go back and, and go over some of the questions that came up with that meeting. So the topics I’m going to go over tonight are allowable land uses in the draft Gateway area plan, business and employment data. For that area business types in the Gateway area, we’re gonna go briefly over some retail sales tax data. It’s it’s relevant, but you know, not quite as exciting as the rest of it. Go over a definition of what non conforming means. And then some common questions and concerns address some of those. So the purpose of the Gateway area plan is to move away from use based zoning. Based on the current draft plan, all the uses that are listed here would be allowable. And the large majority of businesses in the Gateway area fall into these categories. We’ll talk a little bit more about that in a later slide. One of the comments that we’ve received is that light industrial uses should be kept in the plan. And I just really want to point out that light manufacturing, which is a light industrial use is actually part of this plan. And based on the current draft, it would be an allowable use. Any new construction or expansion would need to have a housing component in order to take advantage of the streamlining allowed in the plan. So that is true. If housing isn’t a component, then they would need to go through the planning and design review processes that currently exists. So I just want to make it really clear that there is a pathway if if housing is not a component.

Linda Kjesbu  09:31
So Oh, go ahead.

Walt Geist  09:32
Is it appropriate to go ahead? clarification. So functionally, you have light industrial light manufacturing is manufacturing a subset of light industrial,

Jennifer Dart  09:42
you know, it’s just how it’s classified. I was looking at that as well. And I think that it’s just it’s just for our our business license purposes. When we get down to talking about how the different businesses are classified. It is a little it is a little funky. I should probably get the definition, the specific definition for light manufacturing, but I can do that. But yes, I would think that that would be correct. Well,

Walt Geist  10:08
yeah, I would like to make sure that’s clarified. So there isn’t, you know, you get down to the 11th hour and suddenly rejects the source says, yeah, that’s not the same thing,

Jennifer Dart  10:18
I think in the land use code. And I think this is something that’s come up. This has come up before. And I think that part of the tricky part is that right now we’re looking at a plan. But we don’t have the zoning code associated with that plan, which gives much more detail. And so you’re looking at kind of a overarching plan, like a big, you know, centralization, exactly. And the difficulty for people to like, not be able to dig into the minutiae of the actual draft. Form base code, makes it really complex, complicated and and unnerving to many people. It’s like, okay, what is this exactly? And what are those definitions? And so I think that once we get that draft out, it will make a little more sense, there will be a lot more clarity. And I’m excited to hopefully be able to bring that soon. Because I think that that would be something that I know that this group and many other groups would be interested in digging into more.

Walt Geist  11:15
And my piggyback question, oh, sorry, when they go ahead, go ahead. Go ahead.

Linda Kjesbu  11:19
Oh, I was just wanting to make sure I heard you correctly, Jen, that there is a path for some businesses. I don’t know, you know, pick some Holly Yashi or something that they they want to expand that

Jennifer Dart  11:35
they don’t need to have the housing component or does all expansion have to have house? No. So in order to take care in order to take advantage of the streamlining that’s allowed in this plan, you would need to have a housing component. But if you did not have a housing component, and you’re Holly Yashi, we love Holly Yashi, we don’t want you to move to somewhere else, a less desirable city, that Arcata, we want you to stay right where you are. And our our planning commission, I’m sure is going to agree with that as well. And so there’s a process, which is the same process as they would go through right now. Yeah, it’s the same process that they would go through right now in order to do that. So nothing really changes on that aspect for that particular thing. Because there’s no housing component, which we would love for them to build housing above their manufacturing site. That’d be fantastic. But if it’s not feasible and doesn’t make sense, there’s still a pathway for those businesses. Oh, yes. Yeah. So sorry. Yeah.

Humnath Panta  12:38
Actually, my question is just, you know, follow up question of Linda. So the Gateway plan, you know, my understanding was, like, you know, everything going under have housing components. So that’s how he’s going to help us to deal with these sorts of the houses we have here in the city. So how does this, you know, the plan will help us to address this housing situation, right now we have because if somebody wants to have office space, and doesn’t really have to have the housing component, and can make retail, you know, things, then there is no housing component. So how it’s going to help us actually increase the number of houses or affordable houses or the community.

Jennifer Dart  13:17
So it allows for streamlining for housing. So it encourages housing development as the priority. It doesn’t require it. So if you’re an existing, if you’re something new, like you’re coming in, and you have a new, vacant lot, then you’re going to need to go through this through the same steps, you’re gonna have to go through this process. But if you’re and there’s not a lot, honestly, of vacant lots here, it’s really more to encourage housing development, and to allow it, where right now this isn’t the zoning isn’t set for that. So yeah, it’s more of an encouragement, I think, than anything else. But it doesn’t mean that if you’re an existing business, or an existing single family residence in this area, that you suddenly have to go out and change, you know, change what you’re doing. So that’s, yeah, it’s definitely

Humnath Panta  14:09
this is kind of rejoining. So, you know, allow to build residential.

Jennifer Dart  14:15
It’s increasing the allowable uses is what it’s doing. So it’s increasing the allowable uses were right now, the allowable uses are much more limited, this is going to increase the allowed it increase the allowable uses to include more residential and high high density residential.

Humnath Panta  14:32
So what happens if a business you know they have you know, office space or something they would like to build residential? Is that going to be covered on that thing?

Jennifer Dart  14:42
Yeah, we would welcome that. As a matter of fact, we would encourage that.

Walt Geist  14:46
 Yeah, that’s actually the that’s the loophole that would let somebody basically build additional facilities. You know, the thing that strikes me and I you know, I’m picking up on some of the the, the correspondence that’s been submitted and You know, and listening to the presentation, I understand where they’re coming from because that anytime you have residential interfacing with agricultural, manufacturing anything, really anything other than just peaceful, quiet enjoyment of your living room, people complain, and it can be, you know, very disruptive to the business to have to address the, you know, to try and mitigate something that they’ve been doing for 50 years. Because the new neighbor doesn’t like, well, and I’ll give you a perfect example, the logger bar, the logger bar has been around for 100 years. And now they can’t have music, you know. And it’s, it’s a shame because that really is an institution and Blue Lake, and the neighbors don’t want it. And they move next to a bar. They knew when they bought their house that they were living next to a bar. And that’s not to specify anybody. It’s just you, I’ve seen it 100 times where people move in next to agricultural properties, and they don’t like the way sheep’s milk. And it’s, it creates a real problem for the farmer who is now suddenly dealing with, you know, an obstructionist neighbor. So, I, you know, I don’t know how I don’t I don’t have a good answer for this. But the concern is very legitimate.

Jennifer Dart  16:22
No, I completely see where you’re coming from. And I think that, that there is a concern like that, but this particular area of town is already very mixed. You have single family homes in here that are right, next, you have single family homes right next to America. So you have single family homes, you know, butting up to many of the businesses that are that are here. So I think in a lot of ways, this already has some of that. You know, it’s really nice and walkable, the creamery district district is there the rest, you know, the poem is there, it’s just the trail, which a lot of people have been talking about recently. That’s, that’s there, I walk it all the time. I think that also the ability to be right downtown, is something you know, that I think people will maybe look at and say, you know, what it’s maybe worth living next door to whatever this might be,

Walt Geist  17:14
until they move in?

Jennifer Dart  17:16
Well, like I said, some of them I mean, we can do, we can only do so much.

Walt Geist  17:21
Yeah. And that is, and that’s exactly the point that I wanted to get to, which is that we, you know, when you move from a consumer concept to actually like putting ink on a map, these businesses, I think, deserve some level of protection, to the extent that they’re an existing conforming use, and that they are going to have people who with very few permits are going to be allowed to build high density housing directly next door to the guy who’s running an auto shop, or, you know, or America gas, which, you know, you look at LPG, the, you know, the, you know, the the concerns around terminalling. For on the coasts, I mean, that’s no joke. And you will have people who are very concerned, regardless of the track record, they will have a concern that will have a glimmer of, of legitimacy, and you will find those businesses getting a lot of pressure. I do not know, if there is a way to incorporate assurances into this to say, hey, look, you know, you are under notice, if you are building within X, whatever period of space, you’re building a residential unit within this area that has an impact with light industrial, that you accept that that is, you know, your lot in life that this is, you know, that’s built into the property value that’s built into everything else. And it’s just a possible solution. But I do think it’s an important thing to address because at the end of the day, businesses are the lifeblood of our community, and we need them.

Jennifer Dart  18:55
Yeah, we do. And I’ll keep going. I’ll keep going through my slide and you’ll get to some of the some of it’ll, I think,

Walt Geist  19:02
but I do this is where a lot of concern has been leveled. So I want to make sure we’re on it. Absolutely.

Jennifer Dart  19:10
Okay, so one of the questions that came up with the previous meeting was how many businesses and jobs are in the Gateway area currently. So based on the data from the city business license, from our city business licenses, there’s approximately 166 businesses in the Gateway area. This information is from 2021. I’m trying to get the 2022 data but I just you know, it’s it’s a little bit old, but not terribly out of date. These businesses employ about 376 people total. The Gateway encompasses about 9% of business licenses in the city and about 4% of the total jobs. About 20% of the businesses in the Gateway area do not have employees. So I was working with the Employment Development Department To get the jobs data, because I felt like it was more accurate than our business licenses, we do actually ask for that information on the business licenses. But I just feel like the Employment Development Department has obviously the most accurate numbers. And so we got that information from them. The employment develoment department also provided the heat map, which I think was interesting. And I wanted to share it with you guys, because I thought that you would all find it fascinating as well. You can see downtown and HSE view, the HSE was the bubble to the east of the highway. And the cluster downtown obviously, is, you know, a lot of our businesses, there’s also quite a few that I wanted to point out up in the valley, West and Alder Grove area. So you’ll see some larger employers there too. So the bigger bubbles are the larger employers. And we can dig a little bit more into this map. I can actually he just sent this over as like a reading to you guys. But we can we can dig into that a little more at a different meeting. Possibly. I mean, I’ll go ahead. 

Amanda Hickey  21:05
Just wondering, Jen, and thank you for having sent some of this information in the thread in advance was useful when I looked through there. And it seemed like Currently, there’s 12 or 13 businesses that are manufacturing. I’m not sure what other ones down there would be considered part of that light industrial bracket that’s become such a hot zone of discussion. Do you know about how many others I should include? Like if I were to determine which of these 166 are the light industrial?

Jennifer Dart  21:36
Yep, I can get that information for you as kind of, they’re listed as manufacturing, that are

Amanda Hickey  21:44
being businesses employing it looked like some of them employed, maybe 15 or 20 people.

Jennifer Dart  21:50
Yeah. And I’ll actually go through some more slides and get to some more about data

Amanda Hickey  21:54
Great, Thanks.

Jennifer Dart  21:57
I think this next slide will help you. Okay, so this graph shows business types in the Gateway area. So we broke it up, broke it out, based on what they put on their business license. So this is what they’ve self identified as there’s retail, which is the highest manufacturing and consulting is the next. This is where manufacturing is where I think you’ll find and I can double check on this. But I think it’s like being inflatables. This is where you’re going to find marimba, this is where you’re going to find Hayashi. So those are all in there. Rental is a category which it says, oh, no, there we go. Consulting is the next one. So consulting firms, and then rental is a category in orange. That’s actually because we require rental rental units with a certain number to list to pull a business license. So I wouldn’t I put them in there just because I felt like it’s important to show that that they are part of the number that they’re part of the whole 166. But I wouldn’t assume that most of those have a lot of employees if if anyone maybe you know, a property manager or something like that. Let’s see, there are 11 businesses that identify as auto repair or parts. And I know this question has come up before, but these would be allowable uses. So I just want to be really clear on that. Because that question has come up multiple times. Miscellaneous services includes things like marketing, detailing, seamstress work, and graphic design. And then the next one that actually isn’t even doesn’t even show up on here, because it just sort of falls off at this point. There’s a lot of individual just like one off businesses. But home occupations was the next one on the list. And so that was more of like yoga, there was a dance kind of something. handyman services, those kinds of things.  So this slide gives a snapshot of the retail sales tax that’s generated in the Gateway area. And I wanted to also include the creamery district in this just so that you can get an idea now, the creamery district numbers are inside the Gateway area. So this information is from HDL, which is where we get a lot of our tax information from the Gateway area represents about 8% of our total sales tax revenue depending on the quarter but that’s that’s about what it what it averages to. Just I thought that this would be helpful. I’m not going to go into this in too much detail. If you guys want more information on this at a later date. We can also talk about it and I can I can pull more HDL data, we just asked them to add the Gateway area as a boundary so that we can pull this information so we obviously it was not a boundary before the creamery district has been but so yeah, it’s just an information there on retail sales tax. So This question has come up a lot. This is from our land use code. This is the definition for non conforming use. Based on the information that I’m seeing here, there’s about five or six businesses that would be considered non conforming use. With the current draft plan, these businesses would be allowed to continue indefinitely. They could rebuild if they were destroyed, and they could be generally maintained, but they would lose non conforming status if they cease to operate for 12 months. If the structure, like we talked about earlier, if the structure didn’t conform to the code, but wanted to expand, they could still do so through the planning permit process, they would just not get the streamlining if they were conforming. So if they were like you said, maybe Hayashi, if they came in and said, We’re going to build, we’re going to expand our business, but we also want our employees to have a place to live. So we’re gonna build second storey or third storey apartments above us, that would be considered conforming, and they could potentially use the streamline process to do that. And I also, while we’re here, just wanted to point out that there are many non conforming uses and structures throughout the city. This is very common. I would say an example of this is the current residential uses that are in the Gateway area. They’re currently legal non conforming, and they have been for a very long time. So this is not not an uncommon, not an uncommon thing at all. The other thing that I just feel like to touch on is, again, the purpose is to give more flexibility, and allow more uses with an emphasis on housing development. So it’s not to take away that flexibility. It’s really to move away from the uses as the reason it’s like we want there to be you know, whatever it is that that the community needs. We want there to be able to be there. And so trying to limit that. Hopefully that makes sense. So some common concerns how many businesses and jobs would have to you know, how many businesses would have to close and jobs would be lost due to this plan? Not and so we’re not asking businesses to close, we’re not even asking heavy industrial or many storage businesses that would be identified as non conforming to close. And we anticipate that the many storages are going to continue to be many storages. We hope someday they decide they want to build housing on top of those, that would be fantastic. Based on the business licenses we have, and I’m going to say five or six here, how many businesses will become non conforming? I’ve heard rumor that there’s two lumber mills, our business licenses only show one and the one that it does show to me. Doesn’t seem to be to fit the heavy industrial, but I’d have to look into that a little bit more. So I’m not that familiar with that business. So this is an approximate five or six. As what we’re showing right now. I think this is really important to point out because this question has come up a lot. Will local landlord, owners and developers be able to build in the Gateway area? Or are we just giving giving outside investment corporations and developers a gift to be able to come and build giant buildings. So the plan isn’t designed to benefit large developers and I just also really want to be clear that the minimum new building height is two storeys. Incentive start at three storeys, and most of our local developers have the capacity to to develop at this height. So we want to encourage our local developers to continue to work in our area, and to develop housing like they have been, we really appreciate our developers and our local community employee employing local construction workers. So and another common concern, and this one, this one is it’s a good concern. And this came up. When we were doing the commercial cannabis Innovation Zone too. It’s like, what’s going to happen if my business has to be relocated because housing is being built there. The plan is really focused on affordable housing. So I’d like to just start with that. Most if not all, of our affordable housing is developed using state and federal funding. Relocation Assistance for both businesses and residential uses is required with this funding. So if you’re having to relocate someone who is renting, or even a business that is in that space, you would have to go through and create a relocation plan that would have to be approved by the state or federal funding, usually its housing community development HCD through the state, they would have to approve that plan and financial assistance and relocation is distance would be required for businesses or for someone renting a home. So if it’s market rate, that gets a little trickier, and I want to just say right off the bat, that the city is willing to work with businesses to find appropriate locations to relocate. And I do think that we need to be more explicit in our plan. I know that that language that’s in our plan right now, the policy language isn’t really clear. And so I do want to talk about that a little bit more, too, because I do think that this is a really a really legitimate concern. It’s like if I’m renting a place, and now somebody is going to build housing there. What’s going to happen to me, where am I going to go. And we do want to continue to keep businesses in Arcata, we do have a couple sites. So I don’t know if you’re all familiar, but we have the Happy Valley site over an older growth. It’s a fairly large property. And the idea when it was purchased was that it would be subdivided into more of a business park similar to Alder grove. So that’s one, one possibility. The other is the little lake industry site, which is off Samoa, which we had applied for a cleanup grant for and I’m happy to announce to everyone today that we learned actually this morning that we were awarded the EPA cleanup application. And so we’ll be we will be getting to clean up that site and start potentially planning for reuse. So I’m really excited about that. That was the win for today for me. So yeah, with that, I’m gonna go ahead and turn it over to you guys. And it looks like Linda and Amanda both have their hands up. So feel free to shoot questions my way.

Linda Kjesbu  31:43
I think Amanda has had her hand up before me so

Amanda Hickey  31:48
it could be a possibly really quick one. I was just wondering if there had been any analysis on how, you know, rezoning the Gateway district to, you know, put the plan in action would impact property values.

Jennifer Dart  32:02
Yeah, so we did some of that with our infill market study at the very beginning. And from everything that we have, we have learned so far as it would just increase the property values, because there’s more development potential and opportunity there.

Amanda Hickey  32:17
So thank you for the big transfer to those owners in that zone. It’s great. Yeah, thank you.

Jennifer Dart  32:23
Sure. Go ahead, Linda.

Linda Kjesbu  32:28
Yeah, I was just I apologize for being ignorant about this, but I don’t live that very far away from Alder Grove and I the Happy Valley. Is that the old LP mill or is that a different because I thought the city had bought that at one point. I don’t know us for some business type.

Jennifer Dart  32:49
I don’t know if it was the old LP mill or not, but if you know where ELBs is, yeah, it’s behind us. Behind out so you would drive we have a I think an easement or they have an easement I’m not sure through like where you would actually just go drive right through there. Like into their into their yard. And you all the way back and there’s a gate back there and the city right now leases it out to I think a couple different a couple different businesses for different purposes. A log a log deck, I think for Mad River last

Linda Kjesbu  33:24
year, I was wondering if it was the old the old flake board mill because they have a long pond.

Jennifer Dart  33:28
No, it’s not the flake board. So we actually Oh, no, it’s not the flake board. So the the flake board we had a lone Bob figgus bought the flight board. From Yeah, it went through a foreclosure process and then the city ended up ended up with it. We had a fairly large loan with humble with a humble Flipboard plant. And they defaulted and went through that whole process. But Bob Figgis ended up purchasing that so no, it’s it’s a vacant part. It’s a big one. It

Linda Kjesbu  33:56
was just Britt lumber that he bought. So

Jennifer Dart  33:59
he might have bought that too. I’m not that familiar, but I do know that no, it’s not the board and it is kind of an interesting property because it is back there behind shelves. So okay. I’m just curious about that. Yeah. I had a quick question.

Travis Cunha  34:21
I was looking at like the in particular like what like the businesses and stuff that would open and I saw like a lot of like restaurants and stuff like that. That’d be cool. Definitely needed in the area. But I was just wondering if there was any special considerations to prevent because with all these new spaces, I just worry about thinking about like a bunch of dispensaries opening like more than they’re already are in. So using that to Yeah, they’re already now it’s kind of crazy just walking through like the lower half the Gateway. I know it’s humbling stuff.

Jennifer Dart  34:54
I know. I know that the dispensary actually that went to the city council. At the last meeting to have the conversation about whether or not we need to reduce the cap, I think the cap was set at 15. And they’re discussing reducing it to 10, I believe. So they’ve instructed our staff to go back and start looking at that language and what we need to do there. So we just brought, we just brought it up as a topic, just because there are quite a few now. And, and it’s somewhat saturated in particular areas, one of the council members did ask for just some more information about whether or not we can set something up so that you could space them so that there would have to be distance between them instead of having like right next to each other and that kind of thing. But yeah, that’s actually being discussed separately from from this. It’s, it’s just something that has come up, though. So yeah, good question. Humnath, go ahead.

Humnath Panta  35:51
Well, you know, I was just wondering, do we have any incentive for the bonuses to move in that Gateway area? Does that plan include any of those like, you know, giving some your tax break or some incentive, so that we can get more businesses in the area?

Jennifer Dart  36:06
It doesn’t, at this point, have anything like that in it? There is some information if you want to look about employment in the plan. I do think it could be more robust. I think that when we’re looking at in our next topic, which we’re going to talk about what we’re going to what, what surge is going to bring to the City Council Chair study session, I think that the updates to the economic development strategic plan would be something that we can start identifying, identifying areas that that would be maybe appropriate for. You sure.

Serg Mihaylo  36:46
Thank you, Jen. I actually had one question and play. As far as the business types and uses, is there going to continue to be the limitation on franchise? Yeah, B. is, are they going to get a certain number through the Gateway?

Jennifer Dart  37:03
There’s a number overall for the whole city.

Serg Mihaylo  37:05
I know. But are we going to add more for the Gateway district? Do you think or we’re just spread the Oh, and

Jennifer Dart  37:10
I cannot fathom them adding more to it.

Serg Mihaylo  37:13
Okay. I mean, if you want

Jennifer Dart  37:15
to open a franchise and

Serg Mihaylo  37:16
the Gateway, I’m just wondering, of course, I would love to see that continue to be that but maybe it would be nice if there was one, you know, her other kind of like, spaced out? Yeah. Zones? I don’t know. I thought maybe it would be appropriate to him. Because some people do like it, you know?

Jennifer Dart  37:33
Oh, I know. We’re getting a subway across the street. It was one of the last ones. Yeah, there was I think that that, that? And Domino’s Yeah, the

Serg Mihaylo  37:42
Domino’s got one, I’m

Jennifer Dart  37:43
pretty sure those two are the last two. So I think we’re at our cap right now, for franchise businesses. They had a conversation about this maybe six months ago, at city council about what they wanted to do. And it seems like, you know, really looking at local trying to keep it more focused on local businesses. And you see what’s happening, you know, in Eureka, and, and places like that, that are kind of they’re actually looking at doing something similar to what we did, because they’re kind of inundated to, it seems like,

Serg Mihaylo  38:12
yeah, they kind of absorbed, I think what we didn’t, what we didn’t allow, you know, they go they go took them on, but I suppose something to think about. As they open up, there’s going to be so many more people down there that maybe it would be an idea to have more subway style if people like, I don’t know. Anyway, thanks for that wonderful presentation. That

Jennifer Dart  38:35
was Amanda, did you have questions?

Amanda Hickey  38:38
Yeah, but it’s actually more about the allowable housing types and building types. And it’s overlaps a bit with some tidbits we received in written communication. So if you want me to reserve that for later, I can.

Jennifer Dart  38:53
Now go, I mean, go go ahead. And I’ll try to answer it. I don’t know. If Oh, okay. Yeah, I’ll do my best. There was

Amanda Hickey  39:00
the one of the written the comments we received over it and communication brought up the issue of building equity in the Gateway area, home equity for current and future residents of arcade and I think it’s a really important point. The respondent, whoever was was writing, I think erroneously commented that when you have a six story building, it’s it’s going to be a rental apartment and that owner occupied and that’s not true. You can absolutely develop even affordable housing on like a community land model, but I am wondering what incentives or what kind of like appropriate parcels that have been identified in that area to encourage you. So that

Jennifer Dart  39:46
kind of some of that actually will be coming out, I think in the form base code as well. I think more details surrounding that. We have worked, we actually partner with what used to be housing Humboldt, which is now Rural. munities on their community land trust program. And I reached out to Beth a couple of weeks ago, because we’re looking at potentially applying for additional CDBG funds. And we’ve talked about the community land trust as a way to allow for ownership opportunities for lower income folks. And expanding that would be something that we would definitely be interested in doing. It’s difficult to operate a community land trust on a small scale, and not have a lot of, of those kinds of opportunities. But yes, there is ownership opportunities. In in those types of developments, like you said, I know that it’s not common here. But when where I lived in Southern California, briefly, I’m from here, but I did live there for a brief amount of time. And the first ownership opportunity I had was a condo. And that was something that was very, it was very familiar a lot of people lived in, in those types of it was a three story. I had the first story, I’d think about it. And you know, we, we had a little yard, and it was great, I loved it. So there is the ability to develop with ownership models. And I think that that’s going to be something that we’ll have to look at as far as an amenity. And I think we’ve talked a little bit about the amenities and what those might look like. But those would be coming out in the form base code. So yeah, more to come on that. But I will, I will definitely bring back to the team that and I think that they’re aware, but the ownership opportunities are something that that are really important. And I agree like building that equity, and having that ownership. It just has a different feel. And it is nice, and it’s difficult to it’s difficult to do that, because we don’t have a lot of single family housing being built right now. So looking at other models and ways that we can do that are important. Thanks, Amanda.

Humnath Panta  41:55
Well, you just Just a quick question before we move forward. So Jennifer, I was just, you know, wondering, like, you just mentioned that we have the cap for franchise business. So really, what is the cap for categories? I mean, what kind of business? Are we have any category? Or you know, how many numbers in total?

Jennifer Dart  42:16
I think it’s 10? I don’t know, I don’t I don’t have the ordinance memorized. But I believe it’s 10. And they have a definition for what they consider a franchise business. One of the questions I think that was being kind of discussed was, you know, the Church’s chicken inside a Chevron, is that considered a franchise business? And I think what they actually came back with was yes, they felt like it was. So obviously, you know, a chain of any sort. So, like McDonald’s, Carl’s Jr. One of the one of the ones that I think is coming to valley West is Dutch Brothers, Dutch Bros. And so that was another question like, okay, Dutch Bros, obviously, it seems to be a franchise business. And so they had some discussion around it, but it is in our ordinance. And I’m not, I can point you to that, so that you can get more information on it if you want to get clarity about what isn’t isn’t considered franchise business. And I do think it’s 10. But okay,

Walt Geist  43:15
yeah, there’s also subsets of where they can be located, which is an interesting aspect of that regulation. So that it’s something to be aware of,

Jennifer Dart  43:24
I’ll send it out to all of you, because it sounds like you guys are interested in it. And I think that it wouldn’t be worth looking at.

Humnath Panta  43:29
Yeah, it’s definitely important part of this committee, because I mean, you know, we talk about economic development, and then we have all these kinds of caps. And, you know, you obviously, we want to protect our local businesses, but at the same time, also, we want to be competitive, you know, in terms of opportunities, employment and other opportunity for our citizens. So obviously, it’s very important thing for us.

Serg Mihaylo  43:52
Absolutely, yeah, I think it keeps us keeps Arcata Arcata. You know, by by standing on that ground, and then on the more hometown field, so I love that I also live with Amanda said about the equity. I think that would be really something special for us to do that doesn’t happen a lot of here. And we are totally that spirit was Arcata of spreading the equity and allowing it to be investable, but not just a huge developer. But, you know, I’m not like that could be very creative. And I think people would really appreciate that.

Jennifer Dart  44:25
And that’s one model that oh, sorry, another model that I’ve been thinking a lot about, and that has been brought up at some of our previously at some of our housing equity group meetings was the coop model. And I am not completely familiar with them. But I do think that that is another way that we should start maybe looking into I know that I do know from my past experience in finance, that it’s difficult to finance them and I don’t know if that’s because of California regulations. I know that on the East Coast, they’re very, very much normal. That’s something that that happens there. But I think it’s something we could look into more to is that Co Op model. And that’s something I think people here would really appreciate. We love our co op models, so Well, go ahead.

Walt Geist  45:11
Yeah. I want to say yes, I agree with that I was going to ask if you know, one of the things that’s kind of a center pin of this plan is that you get brownie points and offset points for, you know, whatever it is, but it’s a cafeteria plan, right, you can put in a bike rack, or you can do this or you can do that, you know, incorporating something that is, you know, an ownership related might be a way to facilitate to get, you know, to grease the skids a little bit for people to own. The other thing I wanted to say, and this is wheeling effects a little bit, is you were talking about employees being jobs. And a single sole proprietorship may not have an employee, but it does provide a job. So you’ve got family owned businesses that may employ several family members. And I just want to make sure that that’s not getting lost in the translation. That employee and job is not necessarily the same thing. Right.

Jennifer Dart  46:17
So do we want to open it up for public comment? Or did you guys have any other questions or want me to?

Serg Mihaylo  46:23
I think we’re ready to open it up for public comments. Anybody? Everybody agrees?

Jennifer Dart  46:30
Okay. Okay. Oh, what the heck? Sorry, I’m having technical difficulties. Hold on. There we go. Patricia.

Patricia Cambianica  46:54
I’m sorry, I never unmuted for the first for the first time. Sorry. Oh, okay.

Jennifer Dart  47:03
Okay, I’ll go to the next one. All right, Colin.

Colin Fiske  47:11
Hi. Can you hear me? Yeah. Great. So my name is Colin Fisk. I’m the Executive Director of CRTP, the Coalition for Responsible transportation priorities. And we’re big supporters of the Gateway plan. And I think, really, the potential for vibrant mixed use development with improved transportation amenities, you know, better transit, better bike and pedestrian facilities as a really big economic opportunity for the city. I really wanted to pick up on the point about alternative ownership models as well, I was going to bring that up and was very pleased to hear that, that that was already a point of discussion. And I think that is a great idea to to incentivize those types of models coops, land trusts, condos, etc. And I think one additional benefit of that potentially, is that since we’re hopefully looking at mixed use buildings, that might provide sort of internal governance structures to minimize the kinds of conflicts that were discussed earlier between business uses and residential uses. So we encourage you to pursue that. Thank you.

Jennifer Dart  48:26
Thanks, Colin. Oops. I just promoted Scott to panelist, I think. There we go. Hi, Scott. Sorry about that.

Travis Cunha  48:48
So should I click attendee or panelist?

Jennifer Dart  48:52
Attendee because if you if you click panelist, I’m gonna have to kick you out after you’re a panelist.

Scott McBain  48:57
I thought I got in decision-making chain. If I hit it, you could,

Jennifer Dart  49:01
You could always apply to join our economic development committee. We don’t have any vacancies right now. But when we do,

Scott McBain  49:07
oh, great. Go ahead. Thank you. Yeah, I’m Scott McBain. We own a business just on the edge of the Gateway area. And I’ve been encouraged just by hearing what Jen had to say today. So I guess, to me, the Gateway plan from kind of our local surrounding area and talking with other business owners, it’s kind of dug itself into a little bit of a hole because of the the lack of emphasis on the business part of things. And for us. You know, an important part of Smart Growth is a healthy community that has jobs, it has good paying jobs, not just minimum wage jobs, it has diversity and those kinds of businesses with houses. And the tone of the current Gateway plan was really problematic on a lot of things. In the zoning, the zoning issue was one being called blight wasn’t very helpful either, as far as just setting a tone of the existing businesses that are down here. So one question just to put a pin in it for Jen is just we still don’t know what the process is for based on all this input. What is the next step on the Gateway plan? Like is there going to be a revised draft that hopefully the city can dig itself out of this trustful with some of the local businesses and community members, that would be helpful just to know, because it’s causing a lot of anxiety amongst the folks down here, because they don’t know what the next steps are. And a lot of this input just feels like it’s going into a black hole that will never see any results from it. So if you can just put a pin on that. One thing that would be really helpful in the end, developing the Gateway plan itself is to develop future population goals that drive this, as part of this this trust issue that I mentioned, you know, 3500 units, or 8300 people doesn’t really make I mean, it’s not like a real number. It’s just something that was thrown out there. And so that really kind of undermines like, what kind of planning is actually going into this, it would be really helpful if the city develop future population goal. This based partly on the arenas, as well as just what we think the city is going to be to develop the housing goals for the Gateway area. And I think what we would find is that that would leave lots of room for a greater emphasis on business development, as Mr. Potter was getting at. Were saying, we’d really like to see way more emphasis on incentives to get businesses in here. And the tone of the current document is discouraging existing businesses. And I’m hoping that we can overcome that some of the things that that you’ve said tonight helps that I think we have a ways to go. And I’m hoping that the economic development committee can help the city on finding ways to achieve a more balance, a better balance in this plan. With residential and businesses, they need to go hand in hand as part of that foundation for health and community. And I just have concerns the current plan doesn’t have that. And that’s giving us a lot of concern. One quick thing on the the zoning and the allowable use, that’s also been something that’s a new thing that that Jen, that you had mentioned today is that they’re only five businesses would be non conforming, that’s quite a bit different than what we’ve been told on the city walks. So that that that number was going to be much higher clarify again, hopefully, in the revised draft of the Gateway plan, specifically what that means, because it’s pretty vague right now.  And I also want to just to point out that allowable use, while you’re, you may have an allowable use, you’re being put into a zoning doesn’t equal zoning, conformity. So being a non conforming zoning introduces a lot of uncertainty about the future of that business. And, you know, you have vested rights to maintain that use in the face of a zoning change. But your ability to expand that nonconformity does not exist, from my understanding. So if you expand your non conforming use, that’s not allowed. So that’s where it gets into this issue of whether an existing business like a auto repair shop or something if they want to build another day, that that would be expanding their nonconformity. And that would not be allowed. And that’s what we’ve been implied on some of our field walks is that that would not be allowed. And that’s really concerning to existing businesses in that area. So it’d be really helpful to clarify that because that’s part of the hole that I think that’s kind of been dug with the existing the draft plan. So kind of our suggestion is why change zoning just expand the allowable uses within the existing zoning that does emphasize residential that would provide that as that surety to the existing businesses that may be an unconformity. So anyways, that’s why we’d really like the economic development committee to help solve these problems. And I’m really encouraged as well on the on more detail on ways to improve the ability for equity in housing. That’s just going to be really important again for healthy community, as well. Love to see way more detail in the plan on how we may be able to do that. There’s some really smart people out there that can help us on that. And I hope you guys can take advantage of those folks to help develop those.

Jennifer Dart  55:12
Thank you. Go ahead, Anthony.

Anthony  55:28
Thank you. Hi, everyone. My name is Anthony. And I’ve been in Humboldt County since I was 12 years old, about 20 years now, I’m an Arcata resident, and I do a lot of networking with local businesses. I’m kind of building up a network of productive interests. But that’s not the point right now. I wanted to get into a lot of what other people had been saying, and also to thank you all for considering ways to help people on residents in these homes because I guess the main point is that our key that has to benefit from the developments, if there’s going to be a large amount of growth here, then it’s probably wise to consider the the existing infrastructure and how we’re already handling the growth that is coming. Now. So my my basic point is, why would we build a whole lot without improving the existing infrastructure. And that may be a good way to use those state funds for development would be to incentivize current businesses to grow and expand their operations. And that would be something that I think would fit the attitude that a lot of us in our cater are feeling is that if their state funding and the need for population growth, the plan has to reflect Arcadis culture in his best interest. And also, I think that it’s important that we have a little bit better outreach, because it’s not really easy for everybody to follow on Facebook, what’s happening and make their way to the meetings, it might be good to post like a block party or something like that. And do it real responsibly and with the community in mind to make sure that everybody gets their input. And because this community has always been about community sustainability, and we have a local business culture that is loved by many people who not only live here, and I think that if we do this right, we can make an impact and what we do from here forward, I don’t want what happens from here forward to destroy Arcata and make it like everywhere else in California, and I think I speak for not only myself,

Jennifer Dart  57:22
thank you. Thanks, Anthony. Hi, Aaron.

Aaron  57:35
Hey, guys. One of the unintended consequences of the proposed Gateway plan is the forced relocation of businesses that rent space in the infill area. Take for example, 130 911 Street where Brio bakery country living flora, Renaissance Computing useability thrift store and northern Humboldt Union High School District’s community integration and employment program operate. This building employs around 50 people, probably the more right now, while providing much needed services for Arcata. We’re all renters from Kramer properties. Currently, the zoning density does not provide Kramer an incentive to build housing, which has allowed a business community to thrive despite their housing crunch. If the city rezones and he finds that residential will be more profitable than commercial, where will we go. And it’s not just us at 1309. Think about minority owned businesses like Jimenez glass, and all the artists that represent what’s great about our cater like, like in the kinetic sculpture land, which is also their renters in the Gateway area. So I think you just have to understand that in the business community, there’s a lot of renters in the Gateway area. And we’re feeling at risk for relocation. In my in it personally, I work with this northern Humboldt Union High School District’s Community Integration Program and provides employment for adults with developmental disabilities. We also our proximity to Arcata high is very important because that’s the training grounds for people with disabilities to get work experience. There’s also the students that are going to school there that are able to walk down and kind of do a transition into the employment experience. I mean, I just don’t see if we’re out and Alder Grove are happy valley or wherever that is, or even little lake industries, which I that feels like that’s going closer to sea level rise to me, but I just don’t see how we can do it. So I think that it’s worth considering that. You know, we do want to make some rentals, you know, available for residents, but we have people that are currently renting in the Gateway area, and we don’t have the power to say, Okay, well, you Know, it’s our choice, you know whether we want to stay there build or do whatever, we don’t have a choice if our if our landlord says, Hey, this is, you know, I see I can build a seven storey place, I can replace my five tenants with whatever 72 tenants or whatever it could be. I feel like that it’s just given an incentive to relocate us. And so I think it’s pretty important for you guys to think about that as we move forward. Thank you.

Linda Kjesbu  1:00:30
Thanks, Aaron. Okay, we’ve got one more Oh, Chris,

Chris Richards  1:00:41
hello. Thank you, for your presentation, Jen. That was good. I mean, you brought to the table, some language that was definitely lacking in the proposed Gateway draft. And I mean, you know, a lot of the concerns, I think, in the fires that have arose out of all this has to do with the presentation with that Gateway draft. And they really didn’t have a lot of the language that it could have to help people understand a lot of what’s going on. It sounds like, either there’s been some backtracking, or there’s been just, you know, the ability to discern some of these issues that people are having, I still would agree with what Walter said that there needs to be some specific language written into whatever becomes the plan that gives folks some sort of assurance, you know, that they’re not later down the road. I mean, you’re, you’re removing land use existing codes, and you’re replacing those with others that are diluted as far as what the current use is. So, you know, I, I tend to think what Scott said makes a lot of sense, you know, you could move some of it the other direction, where you leave the codes, and the land use forms the same. And you add those allowable uses for folks that want to build housing on and get away from light industrial uses. And it kind of relieves the tension from the other side of it. So maybe instead of a blanket, zoning for the entire 138 acres, you could do some more groupings, that would make a lot more sense for things. But anyway, that’s, there’s a lot of discussion that could go on. And I know, we keep trying to discuss, we’re not getting a lot of marrying back or reflection with what we’re saying. And we’re waiting to hear that. But definitely your presentation tonight was a good form of that as a reflective voice from the, from the city. So I appreciate that very much, Jen. Anyway. Yeah, Scott said so much of what I wanted to say. And he says it a lot better than I do. So anyway, thank you so much. I’ll let anybody else talk that wants to. Thanks, Chris. Okay,

Jennifer Dart  1:03:13
I think we have one more. Patricia has your hand up? Or was it just up the whole time?

Patricia Cambianica  1:03:21
No, I put it back up. Okay. So anyways, I kind of wanted to go through a little bit more, I think it would be really useful. If you guys went back and listen to the planning commission meeting, the prior one, just prior David Lloyd I have a little bit different take a different feel to the non conforming uses. And if they were going to expand their business and what it would entail, it had and I can’t remember the exact wording but have a little bit of a flavor of, well, if it fits within the vision of the Gateway area and what we’re trying to achieve, then it would go through planning and then be up with counsel as a boat. So anyways, it was kind of like if it if it’s conforming to what we want to do with the Gateway is kind of the language and it was I think that type of language is very disconcerting for the businesses. My husband and I actually bought our house because it was within the working area of Arcata and it was close to town but we really really liked that aspect of the mixed use. I love taking my car to the mechanic and walking home. And, and then you know going then you reckon glass was there and, you know, I would have electric I can’t think of the name John, the electrical General Electric I can’t remember just didn’t material. Anyways, around Samoa, we go there all the time. And I just really, really liked the fact that we can walk to those light industrial areas, and businesses. So And another point that I brought up in the past is, I’m really concerned of future light industry being blocked and barred from coming into the Gateway area, there’s not a lot of other areas for an, you know, industrial, limited industrial. I know. There’s some polluted areas of who trying to I thought it was gonna become a dog park, actually. But um, so I think that area is getting really tight. And I think for the viability of our community and our city, it’d be great to be have like an open door welcoming door to those light industrial, especially with Cal Poly can kind of piggyback some of those people that want to stay in the area and open the businesses. So anyways, that’s I just wanted to add that to everybody else’s comments. I thought were fantastic and right on. And so thank you, Patricia.

Jennifer Dart  1:06:10
Okay, I don’t know. Aaron, did you just have your hand up again? Or was it just up?

Aaron  1:06:18
Am I supposed to take it down here? Yeah.

Jennifer Dart  1:06:21
I just wanted to make sure if you had something else to say I was gonna let you say it.

Aaron  1:06:24
Well, that’s nice of you. No, I’m done. Thanks. Okay.

Jennifer Dart  1:06:27
Thanks. I didn’t want to miss anybody make sure we got everybody covered. So I’ll just kind of address at least a couple things that I can address. So we are working on putting out information that’s really specific about the timeline going forward. David, I think did bring some of that to the planning commission. So we’re working on getting some timeline and dates so that everybody will have that information upfront. Moving forward, we will be going to the city council, I believe on the 18th, if not the 18th and June 1, to discuss some of the engagement to date and the outcomes from that engagement. Not just the open house. I know a lot of people are really interested in the open house, but we’ve done a what feels like a million engagement events between for the whole process. So we’re writing up that engagement, engagement information for everybody. We’re working we’ve been we’ve been working on that. So trying to collate and process that and get that out to not only the city council, but the community, I know that that’s something that really is needed. We are planning a study session. So that is something that has been in the works and will be really important for us going forward. Yes, this is a draft. Yes, there will be edits to it. And I know it’s really frustrating that some of the some of the community’s comments and, and ideas haven’t been able to be incorporated yet. And I know people would like to see it a lot faster than it’s happening. But at the same time, they’d like to slow it down a lot slower than it’s happening. So we’re trying to balance that we’re trying to balance that. And also with some of the things that have gone on with our council members. And with waiting to see whether or not certain people were even able to participate in the plan. It’s definitely it’s definitely taken a little more time for us to get guidance, I would say, from city council. So we’re we have an election that’s coming up, we’ll have a full council at that point, hopefully, the idea is that we will then have some type of a study session where we can have more conversation about the draft as it currently stands about the engagement, about the input from the public that we’ve received so far, which is really important input, and then start looking at changes and start looking at how do we okay, what sections need to be enhanced? What sections need to be adjusted? What are the things that are just definite no goes I mean, we really need to get this information. And then a lot of that will a lot of the definitions and some of the more clarity will come out in the form base code. So there’ll be a draft of the form base code. And I think that that will be really helpful. I know that that that’s one of the things is that this this plan is isn’t real clear on some of the definitions and getting some of those definitions really clear and out in the public will be helpful. Let’s see. I love the idea of a block party. I am down for a block party, but only if I can have a beer at the block party at the pub maybe would be a good idea. I like that though. I’m going to use that. I get the concern about the business that are renters and I’m definitely going to bring that back as well as the equity, the equity component and Community Land Trust coops condos, those kinds of things. And making sure that that’s that’s highlighted as an amenity And in our form base code that that’s something that we’re really looking for with developers, because I do I do get that. I’m trying to see if there’s anything else I can address while we’re here. I would, I would agree with what Scott said about maybe the tone. I do think that that blight is not a real great way to be described. And that’s unfortunate that that was the way that this sort of started out. I don’t think that that area is terribly bladed, I mean, I’m sure there are some, some business, some places that need to be fixed up, there are definitely things that can be improved, probably everywhere. But I enjoy walking through that neighborhood, I am there almost every day on that trail, and I think a lot of us are it’s something that a lot of people use. And so it’s unfortunate that that was the tone at the beginning. So hopefully, I addressed some of the next steps. As far as population growth. We are working on some models for that. And so that is in the works right now. And I think more information will be coming out about that. And yeah, I hear the balance with businesses. So really just making sure that we achieve a better balance in the next version of the draft plan going forward. And I appreciate the economic development committee’s participation and really your, your questions and guidance and, and the public as well. So thank you guys. I think that wraps up my Well, unless you’ve got something else. Yeah, well,

Walt Geist  1:11:40
I just want to crystallize some of the things that I heard. I mean, because I think the public comment is so critical to what we’re trying to do. The way I see this, and one of my concerns, that’s kind of been really clearly daylighted, especially with the conversation about removing current tenants to you know, basically re rebuild their property into something that they can’t live in, is being called gentrification, if you want, but the idea of shuffling out existing people so that you can shuffle in new people is gentrification. And that is not Arcata. And I do think we run a very, very high risk of doing that, you know, the disability thrift store. It’s an incredible cause I, you know, I they’ve done a lot. Brio. I mean, you know, businesses like that are so fundamental to this community, and to shuffle them out so that we can have, you know, Dutch Brothers in a little boutique II shop is not progress. Nothing against Dutch Brothers. I’ve been there plenty, but it’s it’s I, I am picking up what people are putting down and I completely concur. I don’t know if there’s a way to prioritize which properties are fasttrack for development, such that, you know, you’re not, you know, if there’s a business elimination like that, that’s a negative. So that you’re not, you know, the the low hanging fruit isn’t the place that’s already got a team, you know, businesses in it. And that’s the first one that gets wiped off the map. And that’s a very real risk.

Jennifer Dart  1:13:25
So there are, well, there are key opportunity sites identified in the plan. So I would definitely take a look at that. I don’t believe that any of the key opportunity sites are opportunity sites that have a significant amount of rent to businesses, except perhaps the barrel District, which we all know is where wing inflatables is. I think that that is potentially identified in here, but I’d have to look, but there are Yeah, there, the key opportunity sites are identified in there. So it’s something something to look, take a look at, and dig into more. And I’d be happy to bring that back at one of our next meetings if you guys want to talk about that, and kind of highlight those on a map so you can see where they are and what’s there and just sort of go through those a little bit more in depth. Because I think that that’s a good a good, good thing to highlight.

Walt Geist  1:14:13
Yeah, so I want to just clarify this. I’m not talking about incentivizing development in places because if you own a piece of property, it doesn’t matter if they’re incentivizing building somewhere else you’re going to build where you own your property. And if you have the means to do it, that’s the way it’s gonna go. So it’s more of a an acknowledgement of the negative impact of developing certain sites. I mean, that may not be, you know, even possible, but I do think, you know, not just prioritizing certain places to make it easier for those to be developed, but to acknowledge that development that has a fundamentally negative impact on the existing community is not where you want to start. And I don’t know how you do that. But I do think it’s very important to

Jennifer Dart  1:15:12
go ahead Amanda, I think you had your hand up next.

Amanda Hickey  1:15:16
I just wanted to thank everyone for their thoughtful comments. And I guess assure folks that the process of public engagement is working in the sense that concerns have been raised adjustments to the language are happening. And, you know, I raised that I also would like to understand what the revision timeline is, and it seems like that’s been addressed. So to thank you all for, for that response. But I’m also to think, acknowledge that I think it’s everyone’s duty to make sure that we’re not also like spreading misinformation, because I’ve definitely had people up here on L Street knocking on doors, saying some things about the plan that are frankly untrue. And of course, when there’s vagaries, then that creates opportunity for that, but just think people who are engaging the process in good faith and emphasize that I think this issue of opportunities for equity building, which is the answer to risk of gentrification is something that this committee should stay engaged with. It’s a topic of, you know, key import to overall community development. And so definitely hope that we can continue to engage with that. And just remind folks that I think, to my understanding commercial properties, right, or we have the opposite problem in commercial real estate here than we have in residential, don’t we like there’s more vacant than there are businesses, and these market dynamics will always be shifting. So fear that something’s going to displace you something other that’s impossible to, you know, to circumvent and it’s always a dynamic atmosphere. But if we make sure that all the you know, priority areas are put in the plan, it’s going to naturally mitigate that fear. I think so. Yeah, just look forward to continuing engage with this.

Jennifer Dart  1:17:05
Thanks, Amanda. Humnath?

Humnath Panta  1:17:09
Well, you know, it’s actually I really would like to thank the public to be here. And, you know, having all these inputs, really, they are very important for us. And I just want to echo, Walter and Amanda as a thought, because when you are doing this kind of big project, like really have to do like both sides, what are the positive impact they’re going to bring here, and then what are also the negative impact they’re going to have on the community. So really, you know, this is a really important topic, and need to have more conversation. Before even we go to the end. So really, you know, important. So, first of all, you need to have more conversation on what how we can contribute this committee can contribute towards that hearing the public comments and adjusting those and then putting the right recommendation to the City Council. Thank you.

Jennifer Dart  1:18:05
Yeah, I think there’s definitely gonna be more opportunity to have discussion about this. And to really nail down kind of what this committee’s recommendations are, are for the plan. I think that that’ll be ongoing. So hopefully, we’ll bring it back to you guys in June, which at this point is only a few weeks away. So I think with that, surge, do we want to move to

Serg Mihaylo  1:18:35
Yeah, let’s move then to Item four, number two, discussion and recommendation on the upcoming chair, city council study session.

Jennifer Dart  1:18:48
Yes. So Serge, you and I will be going to the study session on the 31st. And I think we kind of talked about some of the ideas for what we wanted to discuss at our last at our last meeting, but I wanted to just nail down from the group and just make sure that we have like a good understanding of what you guys would like us to talk about at that meeting. So that Serge has his kind of marching orders. What I’ve got is obviously the economic development strategic plan. So that’s a big a big thing and really discussing the importance of updating that plan. I think the Gateway plan, the Gateway area plan and remaining engaged in that and the process as it goes through the process is something that we want to talk about. And then I had homeless impacts to Arcadis or Kaitos economy and ways that our economic development committee can participate in assisting with those programs. So I’m not really sure if we want to clarify that a little bit. or if there’s something else there. And I think those were kind of the main topics that I had but open to.

Serg Mihaylo  1:20:12
So those are the big three. But I think there’s probably going to be a lot of more technical kind of pieces, maybe more applicable just having to do with the parent, if the Gateway plan and proper, it seems like with all the all the different things, I would imagine that that’s going to be a lot of what this study session is about is it just,

Jennifer Dart  1:20:37
it’s it’s broad, it’s really broad. It’s a study session for each of the committee chairs. So each of the committee, so energy, parks, us are going to be going to the study session to meet with city council, and just really talk about what our main kind of priorities are going forward and get maybe direction on if, I mean, if we were, if we were talking about something completely off topic, they might redirect us back to one of their priority goals. And I think we’re going to talk about how some of what we’re working on relates to their goals, and how we can be more, you know, maybe be more effective. And communication, maybe communication styles between us and you know, our committees and making sure that the council is getting that feedback, I’m not sure exactly what they’re going to what they’re going to want to discuss. But I think it’d be good for us to have kind of our Hey, these are the main things that we’re really talking about at our meetings and, and working on and, and just making sure that that those things are on track.

Serg Mihaylo  1:21:41
Okay, well, I love it. That’s the big three things I feel like that we do. You know, as a committee, I think, just to get in and get more comfortable with what exactly you know, her function is and how we can function and be part of the whole general big picture of it. And we obviously get together ourselves, and we’re getting comfortable within ourselves. But it would be great. And Jen, you’ve been great. And you’ve been really, really awesome the entire time. Just taking your time and explaining stuff to us and making us feel empowered. You know, there’s never like a silly question, you’re always there to answer your question. So like, I really appreciate you. Thanks. So besides those three, is there anything else that you guys think that we shouldn’t report back or anything that we need clarity on, I can bring back to us and

Jennifer Dart  1:22:31
I’m gonna ask you had your head raised?

Humnath Panta  1:22:39
so is this. I mean, it’s, uh, I don’t want to talk about regarding what you’re going to have that I think those three points are good. But are we going to end or be No, can I put some agenda item for our next meeting? Are we going to that process? Or? Yeah,

Jennifer Dart  1:22:54
we can. We can not. We’re not at this at this very moment at this item. But during correspondence committee and staff communications, we can talk about our agenda items for our next meeting. Definitely. Thank you. Alright, so everybody’s comfortable with those kind of three main topics. And okay. Great, and Serge, I’ll be there to help with whatever I can.

Serg Mihaylo  1:23:17
Thank you. Really appreciate it. Again,

Jennifer Dart  1:23:20
I’ve just come back from vacation. So hopefully, I’ll be tan.

Serg Mihaylo  1:23:26
So we’ll move into item number four, which I think I said, for the last time. This is Oh, is there any member of the public we should ask that wanted to have a discussion about the upcoming chair City Council study session? I don’t see any. So we can go move into a   Okay, we’ll move into number four business action items, number one discussion? Or excuse me. So that was number four. So then we’re on number five correspondence committee and staff communications. Which I guess is a great place for him notice. Last question. We’re bringing something to the new to another meeting.

Humnath Panta  1:24:11
Yeah. So the idea here is, you know, so during this election campaign, I have talked to many people, and everybody has a concern that our businesses are struggling. We need more help kind of, you know, the idea. So, so I teach, like entrepreneurship at our school. So I’m coming up with an idea with involving our students to support our local businesses. So you know, I can work with my students and then my students, they can work with the business and, you know, just figure out you know, what can be done, kind of, you know, working together, so it’s always a both way helping other students to understand the business and also or paint a solution for them. So it’s a both way and support supporting students in terms of, you know, understanding business and the business announced and also have a lot of experience, we do a lot of projects and like creating new venture, like doing turn around with the bench or so I think it’s going to be two way help. So it’s a committee can we just discuss about it, and then maybe make a subcommittee and you know, get some feedback from the local community local business, so that we can help each other, we can help the student and the student can help the business to figure out what can be done. And I will be happy to write a grant for supporting our students. So business, they don’t have to pay the money for that. I mean, basically, I’ll try to get some money from, you know, from outside from different foundation. But I would like to have that discussion in our next meeting. And you know, maybe we have to have a subcommittee to get the idea from the business, then we can move forward. What would you guys think about it?

Walt Geist  1:26:18
I’m thrilled, I brought that up years ago with the, with the Presidential Advisory Commission, to get to get interns into the local business community, which is roughly what you’re talking about, but in a slightly different business development sense, then I think, you know, we were missing a huge opportunity to not leverage off the university’s acumen for lack of a better word. Thank you. So yeah, fantastic.

Serg Mihaylo  1:26:52
I love the nose, I guess. So the idea is that you want to connect the student pot, but I just want to clarify and to connect the student population to the local business community is your main goal?

Humnath Panta  1:27:04
Well, the main goal is, you know, so I have students in my entrepreneurship, you know, finance class, right. And also, we have a new venture, so I want to work with our students and get them some funding, because I want to support them too. So and they’re gonna work with the business, and they’re gonna work, you know, like, turn around, like, what is happening, learning the problems, what could it be done, so they’re gonna come up with a lot of recommendation, or maybe they’re gonna really work on the business. So basically, my students, they’re gonna work with the business, and they’re gonna work with the business to find the solution. I mean, you know, sometimes you no small thing could be changed, that’s going to really make a difference the way the business to do. So it’s going to be opportunity for the students to learn from the business and the business also have opportunity to get help from our students. So it’s basically, and I’m gonna write a grant for that, and I get funding for that. So I’m going to support the students. So it’s, it’s kind of not really intrinsic model. But you know, it’s connecting the community, with the students and you know, it’s a community member, or is a community organization or is a community it is also our responsibility that we get involve our students in our things, right? Because so that they feel a sense of being being a part of the community. It is, in calculates very important for us to as a community, so we can have a better link. And it’s going to be I mean, you know, it’s supporting the business, basically, the idea is supporting the business through student participation. Probably they will be working for the whole semester, maybe they will be working in summer and work with the businesses not actually working like they are, you know, selling the items or doing things, they are working with them and identify what could be done in terms of, you know, being more like, you know, being more I mean, increasing the business or maybe solving their problems. So that kind of thing like it’s more like benzer perspective.

Serg Mihaylo  1:29:24
Yeah, I suppose I think that it would be great Genndy DC, is that somebody anything that would be in our scope as economic development committed to continue to talk about here on YouTube, you’re muted, Jen.

Jennifer Dart  1:29:45
I have this little button that sometimes gets pressed. Sorry. I was gonna say definitely, I think that we could, we can put that on the agenda. And I think that that is something that would fall within our committee’s scope. And I really think that community development at least our department, has been I’m really focused for quite some time on ways to connect more with students. We always have interns in our in our department like pretty much all the time. And we’re always trying to do outreach at HSU. So tabling and that kind of thing, obviously not during Covid because that wasn’t allowed. But now we’re kind of back to being able to do some of that and participate. And it’s fantastic to have connections with the students and to have the students be more connected to, you know, businesses, I think would be right in line. So yeah, we’ll definitely put that on the agenda.

Humnath Panta  1:30:36
Amanda? Yeah, I

Amanda Hickey  1:30:38
just want to say I think it’s a great idea. I used to run a similar program with a business school out east. And we would also have our students write case like business cases afterwards, based on their experiences, and I share an office was with the SBDC. Maybe they would want to support you to whom not that I wanted to take opportunity of the mention of subcommittee to remind everyone that we were still waiting. So we meet for the Mako subcommittee. And, you know, I’ve had people actually approached me to talk about how they kind of want to launch their pierogi businesses, etc. And this is held up so I’m not sure where we’re at with that. Thank you.

Jennifer Dart  1:31:21
That was something that was supposed to get on the meeting that got canceled. So I’m glad you brought that up. That would be something we could bring back up to the next meeting, too.

Humnath Panta  1:31:29
Yeah, absolutely. Okay, and

Jennifer Dart  1:31:34
then we’ve got, oh, I thought there was two people that were interested in commenting on this. So I read, ready to open it up. We’ll go ahead and add that to the agenda. And then making sure that gets on the agenda for next meeting. Is there anything else that anybody would like to have on the agenda?

Amanda Hickey  1:31:52
I think Jen, just a correction. I think we were supposed to meet and subcommittee for

Jennifer Dart  1:31:57
Gotcha. Okay. Okay. Okay. And you guys all have each other’s contact. Right? So many?

Amanda Hickey  1:32:03
I think we have, we have to have you connect us. Right? Okay. Okay.

Jennifer Dart  1:32:12
I’ll put that on my to do list and then you guys can meet? Because I don’t think that by June, you’re probably gonna have much to report out. Okay, fair. Anything else anybody wants to put on the agenda before I open it up for public comment? Okay. Hi, Scott.

Scott McBain  1:32:34
Oh, again, I think that’s a great idea. We do. We do that with HSU students on technical things, but not from a business management side. And when I went through the engineering program, I had absolutely zero classes in business management. So I still don’t know what the hell I’m doing. But I think it’d be really a good learning experience for for both, and it could actually help out some businesses. So I’m really glad that you brought that up. Second is, I guess, it also just occurred to me and some of our other comments, not necessarily to this group or this committee, but to city council and others that it kind of gets back to the Gateway plan is that there’s just a huge opportunity to integrate and build off of Cal Poly humble in building opportunities for STEM businesses like ours. And it may be really helpful, I don’t know if if you’ve got some thoughts on how the university in the similar type of approach way could help the city encourage that kind of business development, since your doctor Ponta at that at the university can help us encourage that sort of development within the Gateway and within the city itself? Because it’s a huge opportunity that, you know, those kinds of jobs for hire.

Humnath Panta  1:33:58
Absolutely, that’s a really great feedback, Scott. Well, definitely, I’m working with, you know, engineering and our departments. You know, I also have a plan like, you know, in reaching the community with financial education and going to high school and, you know, community and making presentation. So, really, you know, I’m trying to connect the business department with the other departments and also have the similar kinds of things. One of the thing I found in our university is we are not really connected with the community, really, you know, without connecting with the community, you know, we cannot help each other. And so it could be business, it could be, you know, technology, it could be any other area engineering, I think the engineering program are more probably involved in the community, but, you know, the business or the one day and leading the community through different social service are different, no servicing to the community through, like expertise on solving business problems. So definitely, I’ll take the VC And, you know, I have my colleague, in my same department also, I have, you know, my colleagues in New Venture management program. So we’ll work together. And definitely, you know, it’s my personal interest to be connected with the community. And we just want to guide our students and get them involved. So that you know, they have practical experience, and also our business get more support, like, you know, I mean, it’s, it’s for them, it’s an opportunity to get help. And for us, our students are exposed to practical world, so that the employment employment opportunity for them in the future is going to go up. So basically, engaging students helping serving the community. Definitely. I’ll work around on that. Thank you very much.

Jennifer Dart  1:35:52
One more public comment. Hi, Anthony.

Anthony  1:35:59
How are you? It’s, it’s me. Again, I wanted to build off of what you guys are all talking about. ticularly Scott, and Dr. Panta what you were just saying, I agree, and was going to mention as well that a great way to help get students involved in the community would be for them to volunteer, you know, doing things such as working in the community forests, or working in the community at the Plaza cleanup, and different things like that, then they can see the problems that are in the community. And not only help businesses do what they’re doing already, but come up with other innovative ways and entrepreneurship kind of look at this program. And it’s also the best way to get to know different business owners and people and things happening in the community, I can see some people being reluctant to having an intern come in and tell them how to run their business. But if a student is coming in and providing services and getting to know people and seeing what the culture and the significance of the services is, then we can all kind of it will bloom and grow from there. And I really support the idea. And we’ll probably reach out and offer my assistance anyway, I can’t thank you.

Humnath Panta  1:37:13
Absolutely. If you can just search my name and you’ll find my email as always, we can be connected. Definitely. But you know, I just want to have more more discussion so that, you know, we can go exactly how we want to do I want to have more perspective from the community members. Thank you.

Serg Mihaylo  1:37:33
Very nice.

Jennifer Dart  1:37:34
All right, Jane.

Jane Woodward  1:37:37
Hi there, Jane Woodward. Nice to see you again. Jen Capp spoke to the brown bag lunch program. Or we could go, we could go Monday. And I suggested that they consider setting up a mentorship program, because we have so many people, retired faculty, business owners, professionals that are retired in the community that have the time and would be interested in mentoring students in their professions. There are a lot of us here. And whether they’re lawyers or engineers, or geophysicist, or whatever they happen to be marine biologists, there are lots of IT expertise, in our case in the surrounding communities, that if the, if the university were to reach out and the city were to work with the University along those lines, I think we could have a very in riched mentorship program. We have things like equity Arcata equity, equity Arcata, we can have a mentorship program for Arcata. And for the students. I also suggested that the university consider having because the issue was how can you have there’s so many rigid requirements for your field like engineering or marine biology or whatever habit, there’s very little room for some of the academic areas that kids should get exposed to, whether it’s art, whether it’s music, whether it’s ethics in logic, whatever it happened, philosophy that they consider setting up one credit programs, that would be in essence enrichment. You know, you don’t have to put in a full three credits, but boy, if you want to learn about logic, here’s a one credit course you can take and and it will count. Okay. And again, you could call on community members potentially, to do some of these things. So those are just some of the ideas floating around. And, and from an economic development perspective, there are many people I think around who would be happy to be business advisors, to students, not just have them have to work for them or something like that, but simply work with them as a mentor, so I think it would be terribly useful to consider promoting that kind of thing in the community. Anyway, thank you,

Humnath Panta  1:40:36
thank you very much. And well, you know, it’s really, you know, if we cannot connect with the community, like, you know, we have a lot of expertise. And definitely, you know, one of the thing I’m trying to do is, you know, like alumni, and, you know, the Emirates faculty and parish staff, and, you know, having connection with them, so setting up a system where we can, and nowadays, it’s very easy to be connected, like, you know, we can, we just have to set up a system and have more students or faculty recruiting into the members on that group. So, definitely, you know, next, you know, maybe a year or so we’ll have much more different situation. I mean, you know, a lot of faculty, they retire, and they are not connected with the university, I mean, there could be a lot of help to the community, a lot of student they graduate, and they are in different parts of the country. And they could be a lot of, you know, help other community in terms of bringing expertise or resources. So definitely, that was really, really great, you know, comment, and I have taken all these notes, and I’ll work slowly. And, you know, I’m a person. And you know, somebody has to initiate that process. And I already have initiated that process. So hopefully, we can do something. And let’s, let’s continue this conversation. Thank you.

Jennifer Dart  1:41:58
Thanks, I’m not the only thing that I had to share, I kind of shared already during my presentation, but we were awarded the EPA cleanup grant for the little lakes property. So that’s very exciting. That’s a property that I know, someone mentioned that it’s slated for a dog park it is that’s a very small portion next to the marsh, but the rest of the property will be open for business, business development. So that’s exciting. We’ve been working on this for a really long time, it’s a property that’s needed to be cleaned up. It’s just been difficult to get the funding to do so. So that’s that’s a really exciting thing. And there’ll be a lot more engagement about what happens the reuse of that property going forward. So that’ll be that’ll be really exciting to see that open up to opportunities for redevelopment.

Walt Geist  1:42:51
Jim mentioned directly adjacent to the marsh,

Jennifer Dart  1:42:55
yep, it is directly adjacent to the marsh, it’s off I street. So it’s the empty field is on the left hand side that’s gated. As you go into the marsh, I think I street Yeah. And it’s kind of a triangular shaped so and it Butcher Slough kind of goes around it. And so that area, there’s a lot of there’ll be wetland mitigations, there’ll be a dog park, kind of in that, you know, closer to the marsh area, and then the front part of the property. The idea is that that would be for economic development. So businesses potentially, like a smaller business park, it’s not a huge property, but it’s still a pretty, a pretty decent size. So you know, if you did business kind of condo sort of model, you could put quite a few different, quite a few different businesses in there. So there’s a lot of opportunity there. There’s a lot of discussion about it in the economic development strategic plan. And some of our other planning documents. So if you want to we can we can talk about that. Because I think that that’s definitely going to be something we do talk about as a group later on. And it’s something that we’ll want to update in our economic development strategic plan, but just the idea that we’ll actually be able to clean it up and move forward with a reuse is exciting. So that was my only my only correspondence for you guys today. So I think we’ve got some agenda items. And I think we’re good to adjourn whenever you guys are ready.

Serg Mihaylo  1:44:30
All right. Well, that was a great meeting. Thank you guys. I love all the public comment. I think that it was great to hear from all the from everybody, and just kind of engage and ease everybody’s mind. But everybody’s listening. And we’re here. And we’re all together. So that sounds good. So without further ado at 6:47. I’ll call on adjourning this meeting. And we’ll see everybody next time.

Jennifer Dart  1:44:56
Yep, we’ll see in just a few weeks.

Humnath Panta  1:44:58
Bye everyone.

Jennifer Dart  1:44:59
Have a great Have a good night everyone thank you

Amanda Hickey  1:45:02
thanks everyone