It was a short weekend of working with rain showing up at 5am on Saturday. But on Friday we got a bunch of work done. We finished the digging under the existing slab for the footings of the garage wall. This work was done over two weekends, the first footing (east corner) took almost a full day of 2 people working. The ground was very compacted. Also, we had to use a full sized jack hammer to break up the ground.

The west corner footing only took about 3/4 of the day, with 1 person full time work and the second about 1/4 time. This time, not only was the ground marginally easier to work with, we also more appropriate tools. The hand held Makita mini jack hammer with the ‘Clay Spade’ bit worked wonders. What a different having the right tools for the job makes.

The footings were 36 inches long, 31 inches deep, and 24 inches wide. Not too big of a task except for one detail. Of the 24 inch width, 12 inches was outside the existing slab, and 12 inches was under the existing slab. So we had to dig blind with a claw hammer and e-tools to get under the slab. I guess this was a preview of work to come in digging the new footing pads under the existing house.

UPDATE 2 Jan 2006 : It finally stopped raining enough that
I could take a picture of the covers I made for the holes to protect against the rains.
I hope they did some good…

On 8 December 2005, Toby picked up our ‘wet stamped’ set of plans from the City of Carpinteria along with our inspection sign off sheet.

We have permits.

Our first weekend of work was finishing up the 3 foot high block wall in the front
yard that will be a raised planter to hold the dirt that is excavated from the footings
we will dig. Below is a picture of the finished wall.

Tonight, despite a well reasoned, strongly articulated presentation by our architect,
Bill Araluce, and a recommendation for approval from the City staff, our request for
a revision of our project to increase the overall height of the building from 27.5
feet to 28.5 feet was rejected by a 3-1 majority of the Planning Commission.

This denial of revision allows our project to move forward at the already approved
27.5 feet height. We have finished with commissions and review boards and the like.
Now we just have to go through plan check and corrections, and we should have our
permits. I will be visiting the plan check front desk to give some face time in the
near future so that my permits won’t be shuffled to the bottom of the pile (hopefully).

Prior to tonight’s meeting, I was preparing to appeal a denial verdict and had spoken
to the family lawyer about appealing the Planning Commission decision to the City
Council. As I wrote about in an
earlier post, the municipal code states that 30 feet is the max height for buildings
in my zone. If that is the law, then it seems to me that the Planning Commission has
the burden of proving that there are compelling reasons for not allowing up to the
maximum height. However, at our meeting, we were required to prove our need for the
increased height. The commissioners made comments like ‘I feel the project is already
too big’, or ‘I don’t think they need the extra foot’. It shouldn’t be up to them
to decide what I need or don’t need. The law is in place to avoid these arbitrary
decisions.

<sigh!>

Anyway, after talking to my dad, we decided that it is more important to move the
project along than to have the extra foot on the second floor. So, no appeals, and
we continue down the road….

UPDATE: Our local paper, the Coastal
View News, had a reporter at the Planning Commission meeting who filed this
report. We are at the end.

Last night we received final approval for our project for the ARB. The vote was 2-1 in favor with our architect, Bill Araluce, abstaining (of course). One of the Board Members, Wade Nomura, who had previously been a supporter of our project, was not present for our presentation. The same ARB member, Gary McCarty, who opposed us in the previous meeting continued to oppose our project due to its ‘massing’ on the west side.

One potential problem, though. When we went to the Planning Commission (and previous ARB meetings), the plans called for 8 foot ceilings on the second floor. One of our original design specifications was for 9 foot ceilings on the second floor (or in the jargon, a 9 foot plate). Unbeknownst to me, the architect lowered the plate height from 9 feet to 8 feet in order to lower the overall building height to 27 1/2 feet. When I found out about the change, I explained to him that a 9 foot plate was a greatly desired feature. So he altered the plans when submitting to the city.

The new Community Development Director, Jackie Campbell, stated that she would be discussing with other staff members whether or not the additional 12 inches of building height (now 28 1/2 feet) warranted a return to the Planning Commission for our project. If so, I believe we would be scheduled for the September meeting. To my ears, she sounded like she was personally against the new height of the building. But it is very possible that my biases were reading into her words, that which was not there. It irritates me to no end that although the City’s Municipal Code calls out a 30
foot building height maximum for my zone (and all other zones, as far as I can
tell), that there is so much concern over the 28 1/2 foot height of our proposal.
If the maximum is 30 feet and the ARB has said that our design is acceptable, I don’t
see that any one can arbitrarily say that 28 1/2 feet is too high. So, I will await
the City’s decision on whether we will re-visit the Planning Commission. At
our previous meeting we had a unanimous approval, but as I recorded before, 3
of 4 expressed ‘concerns over the size’ of the project. So, it is up in the air. If
we do run into problems with the Planning Commission, my brother-in-law Ray
Chandler (the family attorney) has graciously offered to help out in any appeal. I hope it does not come to that.

Our project took a huge leap forward tonight with the unanimous approval by the Planning
Commission of the project as presented. Bill Araluce, our architect did a good job
of allaying any concerns the commission members had. 3 of the 4 members had ‘concerns’
about the size of the project, echoing the lone dissenter on the ARB. (Bill thought
that at least one member may have been previously approached by the lone dissenter.)
Bill made our presentation and answered all of their questions and detailed our use
of the city’s general plan as guidance in developing the property.

Planning
Commission Project Details

Bill will now draw up working drawings and submit them to the city as the basis for
the building permits. Then he estimates the city takes 5-6 weeks to issue permits.

Thank you, God.