CHC Minutes-2011-07-26MEMORANDUM
TO: Karen P. Brust, City Manager
Grant Taylor, Development Services Director
FROM: Teri Delcamp, Historic Preservation Manager a
Cultural Heritage Commission Secretary
SUBJECT: Cultural Heritage. Commission Actions of July 26, 2011
July 27, 2011
This memorandum summarizes the actions taken by the Cultural Heritage Commission
at their Tuesday, July 26 meeting. No action is required unless the City Council wishes
to hold special review of an item.
CALL TO ORDER
Chair Porter called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m.
1 7071WiTANN
Present: Lorie Porter, Chair
Don Tryon, Vice -Chair
Rhonda deHaan
Janet Siegel
Absent: Nathan Banda (excused)
Staff: Teri Delcamp, Historic Preservation Manager/Cultural Heritage
Commission Secretary; Laura Stokes, Housing/Redevelopment
Coordinator
ORAL COMMUNICATIONS
None.
OLD BUSINESS
None.
NEW BUSINESS
Consideration of Historic Los Rios Street Circulation Study Concept Plan; a
request for review of the recommended concept plan for future improvements to
Los Rios Street from Del Obispo Street to Mission Street. The project area is
located within the Los Rios Street National Register Historic District and Los Rios
Specific Plan area. Project Manager Teri Delcamp presented a brief overview on
the project background, followed by an in-depth PowerPoint presentation by
Steve Lang, MIG Inc. The recommended concept plan includes re -paving the
Karen P. Brust, City Manager 2 July 27, 2011
street; improving and/or adding speed humps; replacing/adding appropriate
lighting; improving street drainage and existing utility line issues; enhancing
pedestrian amenities; and landscaping within OCTA rights-of-way located along
Los Rios Street. Staff recommended that the Commission provide comments and
input regarding the concept plan's consistency with historic standards and
guidelines which staff will forward to the City Council when they consider the
project.
Bill Hardy, owner of properties within the Los Rios Specific Plan area, noted that
recently since July 4, the parking lot and the streets have been bumper to
bumper with parked cars. He suggested consideration be given to adding parking
for possibly 40-50 cars in the vacant parcel at Ramos Street and Paseo Adelanto
(Los Rios Park Phase II).
Several CHC members noted they had attended the community workshops. The
CHC commended the consultants for doing a good job, for listening and
responding to the community's desires, and they are pleased with the resulting
recommended concept plan.
Specific input provided by the CHC to forward to the City Council was:
• Keep the paving simple and consistent the entire length of Los Rios Street
and carefully design a rustic edge.
• Concurred with the tan asphalt color (and very strongly opposed putti ng
pavers in the central area that had been suggested at earlier workshops).
• Ensure we have the ability and funding to maintain landscape in the OCTA
right-of-way area if we install it and ensure pedestrians can still step off the
pavement to get out of a car's way.
• Concurred with Design Review Committee that the oak leaf bike rack should
be a different design, as simple and rustic as possible.
• Encouraged a simpler, plain wood bench either with or without a back, like
there used to be along Los Rios Street where the Park Plaza is now.
• Keep the lighting levels ambient and low key.
PUBLIC HEARINGS
1. Consideration of Site Plan Review (SPR) 11-001, Silvas Adobe Restoration, a
request to allow the repair and seismic retrofit of the historic Silvas Adobe's
unreinforced one -room adobe dating to 1794 with a circa 1868 wood -frame board
and batten addition, and restoration of the Adobe to its circa 1871 appearance in
accordance with the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for the Treatment of
Historic Properties with Guidelines for Restoration, located at 31861 Los Rios
Street within the Los Rios Specific Plan area and Los Rios Historic District, with a
General Plan and zoning designation of Specific Plan/Precise Plan, Historic
Residential. (Applicant: Tom Ostensen, San Juan Capistrano Historical Society) Due to
time constraints, Chair Porter dispensed with a staff presentation and opened the
public hearing.
Karen P. Brust, City Manager 3 July 27, 2011
Jerry Nieblas, resident, said it is a great project and he appreciates the Historical
Society taking the lead to restore the Adobe. He hopes the project will be done in
a careful way and will set the example to the town for protecting our heritage and
our historic adobes.
Tom Ostensen, Historical Society President, thanked staff and responded to
Commissioner questions. The Historical Society is honoring the town's history
with this project and he acknowledges their leadership role with this effort. They
are working with historic adobe expert Roy Tolles and conditions require them to
benefit from a historic preservation architect peer review. The project is tiny but
very significant. Due to the seismic repair proposed, they will retain the
beadboard ceiling in the Adobe.
Commissioner Siegel, after a query to staff, noted a correction to page 9 of the
staff report that the public review period of 30 days for the Mitigated Negative
Declaration ended on July 25, 2011.
Commissioners commented that this will be a great project. Because of the board
and batten addition that is being restored and the wood interior floor, it will be
different than the Montan ez Adobe and other historic adobes in town. It will
represent a different aspect of adobe history. Restoration of a wood front porch
was encouraged.
After due consideration, Commissioner Siegel moved, and Vice -Chair Tryon
seconded, adoption of a resolution approving a Mitigated Negative Declaration
and approving SPR 11-001, with conditions of approval and the Mitigation
Monitoring and Reporting Program as presented, subject to Resolution No. 11-7-
26-1. The motion was approved unanimously by a vote of 4-0.
COMMISSION/STAFF COMMENT
Teri Delcamp reported that staff and the City's environmental consultant on the Historic
Town Center Master Plan environmental impact report agreed on a creative way to
augment the scope of the cultural resources study and complete the much-needed
survey of the downtown revitalization area's historic buildings. They survey began
yesterday, thanks in no small part to Historical Society members Jan Siegel and Ilse
Byrnes who volunteered to help and walked the downtown streets with staff and the
consultants to photograph and write down physical descriptions of the resources. The
information recorded about the buildings is being transferred by Ms. Delcamp and the
consultants to the state historic survey forms. This approach is an alternative to the
more costly procedure of hiring a consultant to do a historic survey by using community
resources and volunteers with oversight by qualified preservation professionals. It is
hoped that additional similar efforts in the future by staff with preservation volunteers will
gradually provide more complete historic records.
Karen P. Brust, City Manager 4 July 27, 2011
On that note, Commissioner Siegel reported she will be approaching the Historical
Society Board about surveying the Los Rios Historic District as a next phase of this
survey work. She also commended the weekend's program by the Playhouse at
Zoomars presenting 200 years of San Juan Capistrano's history in 20 minutes. The
program was very well done, and in typical San Juan style, one of the presentations
was even viewed by a woman on horseback. A recording was made and copies will be
available for purchase. The CHC commented it would be beneficial if the performance
could be put on again for other occasions.
Vice -Chair Tryon asked if either Costco or Marriott are required to install Historic
Depiction Programs, to which staff responded that they are and the CHC should be
seeing them in the near future. He also reported on the recent joint meeting between
the City Manager; Mayor and Commission Chairs which he attended on Chair Porter's
behalf while she was out of town. He shared a binder of information that each of the
CHC members will take turns reviewing.
ADJOURNMENT
Chair Porter adjourned the meeting at 6:08 p.m. The next regularly scheduled Cultural
Heritage Commission meeting will be Tuesday, August 23, 2011, at 5:00 p.m. in the City
Council Chambers.
cc: Teri Delcamp, Historic Preservation Manager
Christina Gomez, Administrative Specialist
CHC Members
CHC Minutes File