The future of Sebastopol city council meetings, the makeup of its planning commission and more will continue to unfold at the city council meeting scheduled for 6 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 21 over Zoom. The full agenda and Zoom link is available here.
Council meetings, committees and the draft Local Coastal Plan
After so many virtual meetings over the pandemic, the council will discuss holding hybrid or in-person-only meetings going forward if a state executive order easing Brown Act rules for virtual meetings in the COVID-19 emergency expires — and if AB 361 is “not acted upon as of this meeting date,” the agenda said.
The official recommendation from the city manager is that Sebastopol hold virtual meetings while there’s still a “state-proclaimed state of emergency” if AB 361 becomes law or if Governor Gavin Newsom’s Executive Order N-29-20 gets extended. The regulations on public meetings under the executive order are scheduled to expire after Sept. 30, 2021, per the agenda report.
According to AB 361, cities could keep holding meetings with the adjusted Brown Act requirements, calling for cities to ensure the public can access the virtual meeting and provide comments.
But first, the city council will continue its discussion of its committees since an earlier meeting on Sept. 7, regarding three committees that didn’t receive the consensus of the council then. These are the budget committee, the housing committee and the Park Village/West County Community Services/Group of Advocates committee, the latter two with proposed new names.
The council is also recommended to “affirm the actions for Disbanding of Various Committees as discussed at the Sept. 7, 2021 City Council Meeting,” per the agenda report.
Council members are to decide whether to permit Mayor Una Glass to send Sonoma County a letter about the city’s issues with the draft Local Coastal Plan that “regulates land use, protects coastal resources and guides coastal development,” described as “functionally similar to the inland General Plan.”
Some of these concerns include that LCP’s plans could lead to more short-term rentals in the coastal area that make housing less affordable and available, increased traffic that could interfere with emergency response times and evacuation routes and more winery and tourism development where water is already in short supply.
The Bodega Bay Fire Protection District, the Coastal Municipal Advisory Council and residents at the coast share these concerns, according to the agenda report.
What else is coming up for the Sebastopol City Council?
Next and on a more local level, the council will go over possible changes to the geography allowing a resident living in the area but outside of city limits to qualify for a seat on the Planning Commission. Revised maps created by city staff, seeking more direction, are attached to the report. The agenda states that the 95472 zip code continues to be a limitation.
At the March 16 city council meeting, council members eliminated the commission’s alternate position, leaving seven seats on the commission. They were willing to later consider cutting down to five members like the Planning Commission proposed, per the report.
A different member stepped down and left six commissioners remaining. The council chose to hold off recruitment until either the Planning Commission’s makeup changes are finalized or the committee recruitment period in December 2021 begins.
There isn’t a restriction on how many seats on the Commission can belong to commissioners living out of city limits right now, the report said, so the council directed staff to go over the number of such positions and possible geography alterations for applicants qualifying for the role.
The report also states the council wanted to reassess the 95472 zip code and “requested staff provide options for a 2-mile and 3-mile buffer from the City’s existing city boundary limits.”
Toward the end of the meeting, the city council is slated to give direction on whether its voting delegate will support, oppose or abstain from voting on resolutions coming up at this year’s League of California Cities Conference and Expo, from Sept. 22 through Sept. 24.
Finally, another discussion on the table for the council is its direction to staff regarding the 2022-23 fiscal year budget and the council’s initiatives fund, with a recommendation that council members direct staff to assign funding for “newly elected council members” every election year.
Editor’s Note: This article has been corrected to more accurately explain how there came to be fewer seats on and alongside the Planning Commission this year.
