"The third floor in each building would be stepped back so that decks would not look directly into neighbors’ yards..."
Can anyone explain how deck occupants would have their view of neighbors' yards blocked? A fenced deck?

Overall, sounds great! Makes a lot of sense.

This project backs up to substandard size lots on San Carlos Court allowing the Sutter residents to look directly into the interiors of the San Carlos homes. The proposed “trees” are 5 gallon containers that will take years, if ever, to block the view. It may not be feasible for San Carlos properties to install rooftop solar panels. Fire truck access to the property relies on a shared driveway with a separate owner.

This project removes 8 older apartments which are lower in rent than the average in Palo Alto and replaces them with 12 condos, only 2 of which are "affordable housing" and both of those are the smallest square footage planned for this development; the remaining 10 condos will be at full market rate which is out of the price range of those who were renting the current 8 apartments. The 3-story buildings will back up to the 1930s - 1940s sub-standard lot houses on the private street San Carlos Court and be placed just 6 feet from their back fence, meaning a 3-story structure will TOWER OVER the one-story houses. To screen the proposed condos from the existing houses, the developer is offering to plant small, slow-growing trees along that back fence, and these small trees will take over 50 years to grow tall enough to provide full screening. Add to that their fire safety plan requires throwing the hoses over the front building to reach the back building because the "private street" in the development will be narrower than allowed and not allow a fire truck to use it.

There are rules in place for planned communities in Palo Alto that provide proper screening, and placement of new structures in ways that don't impose on existing homes, but those rules are being thrown out to allow this project to proceed. This project does not provide adequate affordable housing and instead creates a dangerous eyesore in the Midtown neighborhood. There is a better way to plan this development and the developers are clearly going after maximum profit without a care to what happens to the neighborhood.

If this project gets approved, you will see more of this in the Midtown neighborhood and throughout Palo Alto. This is not a good plan for Palo Alto!

Only 12 homes to replace 8? That's such a disappointment. If we want to revive the midtown neighborhood and support the businesses there, we need to think bigger. This is a prime spot in walking distance to great amenities. The lack of ambition from this developer illustrates the roadblocks in our zoning codes.

How many bedrooms are in the 8 units? Are these designed for families or couples? How many bedrooms will be in the 12 proposed new units? Will those who are presently living in the 8 units get priority for renting the 12 new units? It sounds to me that we are replacing 8 low income units with 2 low income units and 10 not so low income and no idea if they will be able to accommodate families larger than 3 or 4 at most.

How did this proposal come to be in the first place? Did the owner of the apartment complex put it up for sale? Have the tenants been evicted already? What's going on here?

Does Palo Alto need more unaffordable housing that requires sidestepping zoning rules for setbacks, landscaping, height, etc.? Is there any chance of back yard privacy for the small one story houses with three story homes only 6 feet from the rear property line? A stream-lined review process is not warranted.

This is another horrible project that will displace lower income Palo Altoans with a high end over scale condo building construced lot line to lot line.

BEWARE THE "BUILDER'S REMEDY" !!!!

The neigbors, neigborhood, and city planning concerns will be washed away by "Builder's Remedy".

Get rid of this and politicians who brought it to us...or watch our city turn into a SoCal nightmare.

HEY JOSH BECKER...ARE YOU LISTENING?

And Mark Berman since there's an election coming up.

You might be interested in the Huntington Beach lawsuit against the state for usurping local governments who will be stuck with the costs of doubling their population, environmental damages etc etc. by the state's refusal to consider any and all lawsuits against the state's unilateral housing dictates.

Web Link

You also might be interested in the January 21 meeting at Lucie Stern at 4PM on our local housing situation.

A great project and we need about 100 more of these "Missing Middle" projects in Midtown. This is great for area businesses and schools. No amount of making the sidewalks prettier is going to make the difference to Midown that a whole lot more customers would.

If people are really worried about "displacement" (which we are absolutely not as a City), we would build more A LOT MORE housing and add tenant protections to the Housing Element. We are doing neither of those things so please do not talk to me about the" poor renters being displaced". The most likely cause of displacement in Palo Alto is high rents and the Housing Element/renter protection ordinance has almost zero for displaced renters. So please stop the fake hand-wringing.

And be very careful RSVPing to that event on the 21st. You very underhandedly get your name added to an anti-bridge-toll petition, which is not disclosed until after you click through. What? So not a cool move.......

Further, if we want to get out from under Builders Remedy then our Council needs to approve a compliant Housing Element. It is that simple.

@ vmshadle

The developer bought the property over 5 years ago. They've owned it for a while now.

This project is using the density bonus law not the builders remedy.
The two affordable units will be at 100-120% of AMI average median income.
At such I high income level the small units will not reduce the rent significantly at all and provides basically market rate income to the owner or developer.

Vote Becker and Berman OUT.

We should absolutely be concerned about displacing those who work at jobs that do not pay tech salaries, which are by default designed to displace existing residents.

What we need to do is to keep existing residents housed in older less expensive buildings. These are the people who actually contribute to the community, including journalists. That is, unless we want to continue our transformation into a dormitory town for a single one note industry, where remaining goods and services are provided by those who have to commute in and residents have to drive out to access. Which, ironically, is increasingly degrading what was a “walkable” town that the so called proponents of density claim they are creating by supporting increasing density.

@mjh is absolutely right. People are continuing to leave the state, raising the costs for remaining residents while the state invents new ways to tax those who remain because the budget surplus is now a growing deficit.

And it's going to get worse. Here are just a few of today's many articles about the continuing local and global layoffs as workers are being displaced by AI

The tech sector is pouring billions of dollars into AI. But it keeps laying off humans
Web Link

5,500 tech layoffs less than two weeks into 2024

AI to hit 40% of jobs and worsen inequality, IMF says
Web Link than

So the need for TRULY affordable housing will keep rising along with the budget deficits thus reducing CA's ability to subsidize it (and fund basic services).

This raises the obvious questions of why 80+++% of the new housing cities are forced to absorb are MARKET RATE units for rich techies who can afford monthly rents of $4,000++ -- that's at least 800,000 NEW MARKET units in the Bay Area

So why are candidates pushing market rate housing for techies whose companies are funding their campaigns when cities can't afford the infrastructure to house 1,000,000 NEW Bay Area residents, when we're forced to drink toilet-to-tap water because we're running out of water for the CURRENT population, when our electrical grid can't support the existing population ???

We need specifics, not puerile virtue-signalling.

Every candidate should be forced to disclose how much of their funding comes from people vs organizations -- lobbyists, developers, tech billionaires, outsiders...

For those who complain about this "high-end" project displacing non-tech workers, please realize that it is not Ms. Li's fault. The city only allows so much density. I'm sure Ms. Li would rather build 24 units, or 48 units, if allowed, which can economically provide more, perhaps 8, below-market units.

"The city only allows so much density."

This project relies on the State's Density Bonus Law, which overrides the City's limits completely. A good introduction is here: Web Link

The most significant barriers to housing construction are economic, not zoning. I recommend the study (updated annually) on the feasibility of high-density housing in San José. In short, the main problems are cost of labor, cost of materials, financing, and market rental and sales rates. As a result, high-density housing is infeasible in most of the city. You can find the summary here: Web Link

I don't know, but I'd guess that this project is limited by what's currently marketable and financially feasible. Many proposed projects around the Bay Area have downsized lately for those reasons.

(Speaking only for myself, not the Planning and Transportation Commission.)

I do not blame developers for what might be called locally “Berman’s Remedy” because their mandate is to maximize profits. The problem is that those who profit from building, either housing or tech offices, have huge lobbying success with their deep campaign coffers that benefit the likes of Berman who represents us in Sacramento. When circumstances align there is a lot of money to be made from both pouring cement and expanding the local tech footprint. Which by default continues to bring in ever more employees at a rate that will likely continue to be faster than economics dictates can be accommodated with new housing builds in an already long built out town.