Membership Feedback for 2005 January, 2006

Dianne Edmonds, LANN Advisor

We know what’s on the mind of the community, and our membership feedback for 2005 confirms it’s on the minds of our members: TRAFFIC

Whether it’s speeding on Cuesta, Covington or San Antonio, preventing Los Altos from becoming a commute artery, or debating the pro and cons of traffic claming, these inputs from our membership represent the sentiment of the community.

During the course of this year, we have received close to 150 comments from the "area of interest" section in the remittance envelopes for membership dues. We compile all the responses for the year (and have been doing this since 2001). We use this information to perform a litmus test via our articles to make sure we are on track with providing articles and information relevant to our members. We also share the basic data with community leaders to highlight what LANN members are concerned about, what’s on their minds and the importance of LANN in the community.

In the past, traffic and pedestrian safety have always been a major concern for our members, but it currently ranks as a real standout, garnering twice the number of responses as did downtown and "village," our second most mentioned item. The chart below shows just how passionate our members are about traffic and pedestrian safety.

Membership Feedback, Con’t.

The boxes below show the areas of greatest interest to LANN Members over the last five years. Traffic has been mentioned as a primary concern by 20% of respondents on average over the years, while schools and civic/city general issues have remained high interest topics with between 10% and 15% of respondents. Design guidelines remains as an important interest of LANN but has fallen from the top three lists.

This year, once members had voiced their concerns about traffic, approximately 11% of the comments were focused on downtown/"village" comments:

Here are some of the downtown/"village" comments:

We also appreciate the specific comments regarding civic/city issues, including several references to ethical behavior of city officials,

We also received an extraordinary high number of comments around the subject of property maintenance of homes. In the past, these comment we minimal and part of our miscellaneous category. This year, however, it received more comments than a community pool and park/recreation suggestions. Individual concerns over property maintenance include:

Last, the LANN Board is honored and overwhelmed by the volume of kudos we received from the membership feedback. To actually see our members acknowledging our work and contributions is extremely humbling. We appreciate the feedback, and will carry it with us as we move into 2006. We’ll finish our membership feedback with this comment from a member:

From the Board, we thank all the members (new and renewing) who have taken the time to let us know your areas of interest.

So, Your Neighbor Just Sold His House…

Jerry Wright, LANN Webmaster

Let’s suppose that the property behind you has just been sold to a developer who wants to tear down the existing house and put up a large two story house. What happens? What is the process? Two story houses in Los Altos are subject to review at a meeting of the Architectural and Site Control Committee of the Planning Commission. The committee meets on the 1st and 3rd Wednesday of each month at 4:00 pm. If you live within a certain distance of the property (approximately the 12 immediate neighboring properties), you should receive a postcard noting the date and time of the review. A notice should also be posted in front of the property (of course, that doesn’t exactly help you if you live behind the property and never travel down the street that the house is on).

Now let’s suppose you don’t like the proposed house or some of its features. You should consult the Design Guidelines (available on the city website or at City Hall) and then attend the Architectural and Site Control Committee meeting and voice your concerns. You should also write the Architectural and Site Control Committee to make your concerns part of the package that A&S members receive prior to the meeting. If you want your concerns to be heard effectively, you should meet individually with members of the Architectural and Site Control Committee before the meeting. This comes as a shock to some people because we expect government officials to listen to us at a meeting. Some of us are also hesitant to contact busy people we don’t personally know and initiate dialog, but it is the best way to get consideration of your point of view (see the article, "Avoiding Surprises in Politics", by Leslie Lodestro in the November/December LANN newsletter.)

Finally, let’s suppose that the Architectural and Site Control Committee approves the design with features that you really do not like. What happens now? You can file an appeal to the City Council. The time period to file the appeal is limited (15 days) and a significant fee is involved ($500 for a neighbor in the notification boundary, $1500 for someone outside the boundary -- be sure to contact the Planning Department for timelines and exact fee amounts if you are actually involved in considering an appeal). Again, it is important to contact each member of the City Council personally to discuss your concerns prior to the actual City Council meeting. The people on the other side of the issue will be trying to contact City Council members, so you need to also.

New Applications for Two-Story Homes

Kathy Putman, LANN Housing Chair

This month marks my last regular column on housing. I have found an excellent replacement who will continue to report on all applications for new two-story homes and two-story additions.  Her name will be announced upon her approval by the LANN Board.

I will continue to serve LANN. I have been asked to serve as president and will take office after the first of the year. Dianne Edmonds and Mike Abrams will be stepping down as co-presidents and will assume the roll of advisors to our organization. I would like to publicly thank them for the many hours they spent working for the betterment of our town.

The LANN Board continues to work in the interests of our members. If you have a community issue you would like to discuss, or a problem with the City where we can help, please call us at 650- 949-5560. We truly appreciate your continued support.

Thank you! Kathy Putman

New Applications, Con’t.

1.  05-SC-65 -- D. Fazekas / K. Askarinam-- 630 Rosita Avenue.  Consideration of  design review for a new two-story home.
2.  05-SC-66 -- Chapman Design Associates / K. Harikrishnan and D. Kalavagunta -- 140 S. Avalon Drive.  Consideration of design review for two-story addition.
3.  05-SC-67 -- K. and A. Armstrong -- 653 Jay Street. Consideration of design review for a pool house.
4.  05-SC-63 -- J. and D. James -- 674 Arrowood Court.  Consideration of design review for a new two-story home.
5.  05-SC-62 -- A. Ho / J. and C. Bohlin -- 618 Orange Avenue. Consideration of design review for a new two-story home.
6.  05-SC-64 -- S. Estrada / R. and P. Aredo -- 641 Hawthorne Avenue.  Consideration of design review for a new two-story home.
7.  05-D-14, 05-UP-04 and 05-SD-03 -- Charities Housing Development Corporation / M. and K/ Mouney -- 1579 Miramonte Avenue.  Consideration of design review for a mixed commercial and residential use project containing 12 residential condominiums and a tentative subdivision map.  Project Planner: Banks
8.  4-UP-04 -- Cingular Wireless PCS, LLC / West Valley Properties, Inc., et al -- 280 Second Street. Consideration of a modification to a use permit to add antennas to the cellular telephone facility.

So What do you Want to be When you Grow up?

Jonathan Baer, LANN Treasurer


So what do you want to be when you grow up? It’s a question often asked of children, young adults, and sometimes not so young adults. As parents we often ask ourselves the question...what will our children become when they grow up?

It’s a good question to be asking-and asking of Los Altos.  While the city is no child (it is either just over 50 or just under 100, depending on where you start counting), it is now passing from one life stage into another.


Our little town has been undergoing some radical change over the past 10 years-a huge turnover in people, housing and business. An estimated 20-30% of the residents have lived here less than 10 years, upwards of 30% of the homes have taken out building permits and more than 30% of the 600 plus retail businesses have changed owners or gone out of business in the past decade. Much of this change is good-the schools are once again filed, neighborhoods are brimming with young families and our homes reflect the changing needs and tastes of the community.  And then there are the business districts--Rancho, El Camino, Loyola Corners, Foothill and downtown. All are changing as old businesses disappear, new ones open, and a number of others continue to struggle in a challenging retail environment.  High rents, on line competition, long hours and high wages have combined to make retail businesses often unprofitable.

So why should we care what happens to the businesses in Los Altos?  We should care because a significant portion of the city’s operating budget comes from sales tax revenues. A viable and robust retail environment is a critical part of the city’s continued viability. So, what to do about our town--particularly the downtown, since it represents the largest single cluster of retail stores in town? It’s been studied and dissected by people far more knowledgeable than me, yet no one has answered the key question: What do you want the downtown to be like when it "grows up"? 

What do you Want to be, Con’t


I don’t claim to have a solution to empty storefronts and shuttered stores after 6 pm nor the premature death of numerous restaurants in the downtown area.  But I do have a process to figure out what we should do to improve our situation.  I offer no fancy high priced consultants or glossy covered studies.  And I recommend no piecemeal solutions such as banning chain stores, limiting the number of nail salons, restricting fast food restaurants, etc., no matter how good (or bad) each one may appear to be. The approach is simple-show me.  Show me a community that looks like what we want to become. I already know that we are not a Mountain View (much larger size, downtown close to El Camino, etc.) nor a Palo Alto (college town, larger, significant focus on restaurants). There must be a town in California, or the United States, that looked a lot like Los Altos and which has successfully transformed itself into something that we want to emulate. That’s only one step in the process.

A second step is to talk with business owners in Los Altos and surrounding communities. Identify retail establishments that we would have liked to locate in town and ask, "Why didn’t they?"  What would it take for them to move to Los Altos?  I realize that some of these questions have been asked (and presumably answered) by the recently formed retail task force. 

We also need to come to a consensus on some questions. Do we want chain stores-of what variety, and do we want to/need to expand the present 25 foot storefronts? Do we want a movie theater-how big, how many screens?   Do we want to allow property owners to add a third floor in the downtown for housing?  When you think of Los Altos, what would it take for you to send friends to shop downtown? What should be the relationship between downtown and the other business districts? How do we keep the charm that makes the Village so appealing while reinvigorating our retail center? Can we attract a significant number of non-local residents to shop here? Do we want to? An article in the December issue of San Francisco magazine looks at this question. The downtowns of Berkeley and Los Gatos are cited as examples of what the magazine identifies as "lifestyle centers." Menlo Park and Orinda’s downtowns are labeled as "traditional small towns" while downtown Los Altos (along with Larkspur) is called a "locals-only village." Interesting.

In taking a "show me approach" combined with lots of soul searching so we can avoid some bad alternatives (I personally was and will remain opposed to a mega movie theater complex in our downtown), we can identify those elements that we want to encourage.  We have a number of needs that the right kind of business should be able to fulfill (safe, viable alternatives for our teens, casual places where we can create and foster a sense of community, etc.). But most of all we need a vision of what we want to become and we need to build a consensus in the community for whatever that vision turns out to be.

And how, you ask, do we do this without hiring lots of consultants?   We can get the work done in a number of ways.  Start a contest-residents can nominate a city that Los Altos should emulate-entries must have basic info as well as the rationale. Top three entries win a prize. The City gets some fresh ideas and the cost of the prizes is substantially less than hiring a consultant. Another approach-make Los Altos a project for a college class; there are a few decent schools around (Stanford, Berkeley, etc.). Again we get the benefits without the six-figure cost.

Show me what we want to become and then the path toward that goal can be charted. But if we don’t know what we want to be when we grow up, then all paths, even though they ultimately are wrong turns, look like viable alternatives.

 

LANN Board Members

President Kathy Putman

Vice President Ken Lorell

Treasurer Jonathan Baer

Secretary Karen Greguras

Editor Vickie Clements

Housing Chair Kathy Putman

Membership Chair Leslie Lodestro

Traffic Chair Bill Crook

Schools Chair David Luskin

Webmaster Jerry Wright

Advisors Dianne Edmonds

Mike Abrams

Tom Anderson

Lou Becker

David Casas

Kate Disney

Bruce Skov