La Cañada Council postpones accessory dwelling unit law, will defer to state
Due to the lack of a quorum, the La Cañada Flintridge City Council postponed Tuesday passing an ordinance that would bring the city into compliance with state laws for accessory dwelling units that will go into effect Jan. 1.
Mayor Len Pieroni and Council members Mike Davitt and Terry Walker were the only three officials on the dais, as Mayor Pro Tem Greg Brown and Councilman Jon Curtis were absent.
Two urgency ordinances on the agenda — one designed to immediately enact city regulations for ADUs and another adopting by reference the 2020 edition of Los Angeles County Building Code — required a four-fifths vote for passage.
The ADU urgency ordinance was a stop-gap measure to put some minor local regulations in place while the council adopted a regular ordinance, a process that typically takes more than one month.
While council members could have heard the regular ordinance in a first reading, they elected to continue the matter to a date uncertain to allow the full panel to participate in the discussion. The matter could be heard in the council’s next regular meeting, scheduled for Jan. 21, 2020, or a special meeting could be called sooner.
Without the adoption of an urgency ordinance, the city of La Cañada will defer to the new state regulations for ADUs as of Jan. 1 until the regular ordinance takes effect. Even then, the laws will mostly mirror state regulations, as cities can make only only minor additional amendments regarding hillside development standards under the new state law.
The new laws allow homeowners to build one regular accessory dwelling unit of at least 800 square feet, even on properties where the maximum floor-area ratio has been reached, and one junior ADU attached to the primary residence on the property.
Side and rear setbacks will be reduced to 4 feet, and approvals for ADU applications will be largely ministerial and will not require commission review. On Tuesday, the council members present did take comments in a public hearing to allow those who’d come to the meeting a chance to speak on the record.
La Cañada resident David Haxton suggested the city allow property owners to create separate addresses and utility accounts for ADUs if they wished, a stipulation not referenced in the state law, to avoid confusion if they rented the units to strangers.
While he recommended some minor tweaks for the city’s local ordinance, Haxton praised the effort by state lawmakers to pass legislation to respond to a statewide housing shortage.
“There’s an affordable housing crisis in this state, and cities like La Cañada have not contributed. They’ve said it’s not our problem and have done nothing and tried to keep cities like La Cañada the way it looked in the ‘50s,” Haxton said. “I’d like to thank Sen. [Anthony] Portantino and Assembly member [Laura] Friedman for voting for these bills.”
Also Tuesday, council members:
• Approved a fifth one-year tolling agreement extending the city’s lease and operating agreement with the Community Center of La Cañada Flintridge, to allow for “continuing discussions regarding various issues, concerns and terms of the original lease agreement,” according to a staff report.
• Appointed Councilman Mike Davitt to fill an unexpired two-year term on the City Council that would have otherwise appeared on the March 2020 election ballot but was uncontested. City Atty. Adrian Guerra explained the appointment required a majority approval, indicating Davitt would have to cast a vote but would not create a conflict of interest in doing so.
• Heard a presentation from Los Angeles County Fire Department Assistant Fire Chief Anderson Mackey, who reported four fires in the month of November. In addition to a Nov. 14 1-acre fire near the La Cañada Flintridge Country Club and a Nov. 18 fatal fire near La Cañada’s Rockmere Way, which caused $75,000 in property and contents loss, the department responded to a Nov. 25 dryer fire on the 1400 block of Flanders Road and a Nov. 27 vehicle fire that occurred in a garage on the 5600 block of Bramblewood Road, causing $100,000 in property loss and $25,000 in contents loss.
• Learned from Crescenta Valley Station Capt. Todd Deeds that November saw four residential burglaries. With help from the department’s Major Crimes Bureau, deputies detained three fleeing suspects found in possession of property from two burglaries. On Nov. 27, a patrol deputy spotted a suspicious vehicle and found a burglary toolkit inside. So far in December, just two burglaries have been reported, Deeds said. “Once these burglary crews are taken into custody, it always seems like there’s a major decrease in the number of residential burglaries,” the captain added.
• Received an update from Public Works Director Pat DeChellis that the search for engineering firms to potentially submit design and environmental proposals for sound walls on the Foothill (210) Freeway above Hampton Road (segments S-335 and S-336) was successful and that a request for proposals would likely be due by Jan. 23, with the award of a contract anticipated for March 2020.
