February 14, 2015 Meeting Summary

Agenda Items:
Preparation
Attendees
Acknowledgments
Meeting

Preparation

E-mail and phone reminders

Attendees

7 members

Acknowledgments

Susan brought mini brownie/muffins

Meeting

Agenda Items:

The meeting began about 11:25 am

  • Association Officers Election on March 14
    • Our March meeting is time for the annual election of officers.
    • Current officers are willing to stand for re-election.
    • Anyone new want to run for election as an officer?
    • Officer positions are:
      • President – chair meetings; officially represent the association to external parties
      • Vice President – support and act in place of President or Secretary as needed
      • Secretary – publicize meetings; record and distribute meeting minutes; maintain contact list.
      • Treasurer – receive, keep safe, track, report on, and disburse Association funds.  (So far the Association has never collected any funds.)
  • Newsletter Distribution
    • The Association’s annual newsletter should be ready for distribution in about a week.
    • Volunteers to distribute to each doorstep?  Typically we sign up by street or street segment.  Estado is spoken for.
  • City and School District Election on March 10
    • There is a City and School District election on March 10!  You should have received your sample ballot a week or two ago.
    • The campaign for Mayor is more significant this year because Mayor Bogaard has chosen not to run for a fifth term.  There are six candidates.  If one doesn’t get a majority vote on March 10, there will be a runoff in April.
    • The current City Council Member for our District 4, Gene Masuda, is running without official opposition.
    • A couple of years ago the Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education was divided into separate voting districts for each board member  instead of a citywide election for all the members.  Half the districts vote every two years.  We are in District 2.  This is our first opportunity to elect a member on a district basis.   There are three candidates.
    • Candidate forums:
    • Campaign Finance Disclosures
      •  Interested in seeing where the campaign money is coming from?  The state required financial disclosures are readily accessible on the City Clerk’s website:
      • To navigate the website:
        • Click on the first choice, labeled “Campaign Disclosures – Public Portal”
        • On the resulting page, the easiest thing to do is scroll down and click on “03/10/2015 Primary Election” to expand it into a list of potential types of campaign.
        • Click on “Candidates” to expand it into the various races.
        • Click on “Mayor – City of Pasadena” for a list of those candidates.
        • Click on a candidate’s name to bring up a page with all the disclosures they’ve filed.
  • General Plan Update, EIR comment period
    • The City of Pasadena has released Draft documents for updated Land Use and Mobility Elements of the General Plan along with a “Programmatic Environmental Impact Report” (EIR).
    • The Land Use Element of the General Plan includes the general specification of how each parcel of land can be used, including the upper limit of intensity.  It also specifies overall caps on the number of new residences and square feet of new commercial space that will be allowed in each Specific Plan area as those documents are subsequently updated.
    • The East Pasadena and East Colorado Specific Plan areas are heavily impacted by the proposed changes, with the upper limit of density in the commercial and office areas on Foothill, Colorado, Sierra Madre Villa, and Rosemead increased significantly from the current limits, most of which already are many times higher then current buildings.
    • The General Plan includes vision statements and goals for the city as a whole and specific areas that are used to justify or deny future proposed development.  It is intended to look forward 30 years.  Although there is a general intention to update the General Plan every 10 years, the last revision to these elements was in 1994 and this update process has been underway for at least 5 years.  The process tends to wear out all but the most persistent, but those who do speak up can and do have some impact.
    • Comments on the drafts need to be submitted by March 24. “If you wish to challenge the EIR in court, you may be limited to raising those issues that you or someone else raised at any public hearing or meetings where these documents were considered.”
    • The documents can be found online here: http://www.cityofpasadena.net/2015_Draft_Documents/
    • There are two Community Meetings on this subject in the coming week.  They will include a presentation about the proposed updates and an opportunity to provide comments.
      • Thursday February 19, 6 – 9 pm
        Church of the Nazarene, Gilmore North
        3700 E. Sierra Madre Blvd.
        Free Parking in the church’s lot
      • Saturday February 21, 9 am to noon
        Pasadena Presbyterian Church, Gamble Lounge
        585 E. Colorado Blvd.
        Parking on the north side of E. Union St between Madison and Oakland Ave’s
  • Proposed Probation Office
    • In late January, Council member Masuda sent an e-mail out saying he’d heard from Pasadena planning officials that the County was considering placing a Probation office at 2650 Colorado, on the corner Vinedo Ave.  He’d sent a letter of opposition to Supervisor Antonovich, and suggested constituents also do so.
    • On January 28, Council member Masuda sent out another e-mail saying Supervisor Antonovich had contacted him and said the site was no longer under consideration.
    • The County had previously proposed putting a probation office in the building of the Lincoln Ave post office, but was successfully rejected by that neighborhood.  Expect the County to try again somewhere else in Pasadena.
  • CRV Container Recycling update
    • On Monday January 12 the City Council agreed on new regulations for recycling facilities for CRV (California Redemption Value) containers.
    • The city staff’s proposal was described last month.
    • The Council decided to impose even more onerous set back restrictions then city staff had proposed, with no site specific adjustability.
    • The resulting regulations seem likely to result in closure of the facility for Ralphs in the Hastings Ranch shopping center (even though no one objected to that facility), and possible closure of the facility at the Ralphs at Walnut & Lake Ave.
    • Staff did not do due diligence before suggesting to the Council that the Hastings Ranch facility could be moved into the area where trucks back into the loading docks.  No place on the north perimeter of the lot will work under the new regulations because a 100 foot setback is required from the nearest street (current location is just under 30 feet from Rosemead) and 200 feet from the nearest residence (current location is just about 150 feet across Rosemead).
  • Drought Tolerant Landscaping Guide from PWP
    • Pasadena Water and Power “has created a new webpage, PWPweb.com/Landscapes, that offers an easy to use five-step guide on methods for removing grass, determining how much grass to remove, how to apply for rebates, tips for altering irrigation schedule, as well as design ideas and layouts.  This spring, PWP will expand this online guide to the classroom in a series of free landscaping workshops. “
    • Pasadena Public Works is claiming to be making free mulch available again this year at Victory Park on February 13, March 13, April 10, May 8, June 5, July 17, August 14, September 11 and October 9.  (Last year there either wasn’t any delivered after about April or it was gone almost immediately).
  • OSH remodel
    • OSH has been in the process of remodeling for several months now.  It’s a mess, but the store is still open.
    • The OSH company was bought by Lowe’s about a year ago.  That company is spending money to update the remaining stores.
    • Reportedly, our OSH store had been operating under a month to month lease for a long time as the land owner considered doing something completely different.  This is partly where the rumors of being replaced by a condo development came from
    • The area where OSH’s garden center and big/heavy item pickup used to be, on the west side, is going to be converted into independent shops such as a coffee place.
    • The garden center is being moved to the east side.
    • A new front entrance is being put in roughly in the middle of the new OSH portion of the building.
  • Local Crime Summary
    • For the last month, from crimemapping.com:
      • Tues January 13, 11:33 am, 600 block Sierra Madre Villa Ave., disturbing the peace
      • Sat January 24, 12:04 pm, 3200 block Del Vina St, theft from insecure vehicle
      • Thurs January 29, sometime during day, 400 block of Santa Paula Ave (corner of Alameda St), Residential Burglary
    • Appears in the general area to be an uptick of residential burglaries and thefts from vehicles since the beginning of the year.
  • anything else attendees wish to discuss
    • Homeless on Kinneloa
      • After an e-mail was sent by a member to Council member Masuda in December, the encampment under the bridge was abated somewhat, at least during the daytime.
      • It’s still much worse then it used to be.

Next meeting is March 14, 11:15 am, at Hastings Branch Library meeting room

Adjourned about 12:40 pm