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Planning commission modifies 2025 Measure D recommendations, directs city council on transfers
Summary
The Half Moon Bay Planning Commission reviewed and amended staff recommendations for the 2025 Measure D allocation process, reallocating two allocations from a downtown applicant to outside‑downtown proposals at the score cutoff and asking City Council to consider September transfers for remaining downtown allocations.
The Half Moon Bay Planning Commission reviewed Measure D 2025 allocation scoring and ratification and took multiple actions that alter staff’s initial recommendations.
Planning staff reported 47 allocation requests outside downtown for 22 available outside‑downtown allocations. Staff recommended ratifying 11 projects totaling 22 allocations and asked the commission to resolve 1 remaining allocation where the next applicant requested two allocations but only one remained.
Applicants and members of the public asked the commission to rescind or rescore specific applications. Kevin and Colton Palmer asked that staff rescore their duplex-with-two-ADUs application for an apparent checklist interpretation issue. Connor French and Katie Barnes, applicants for 460 Poplar, asked the commission to award the final available allocation to their shovel‑ready ADU because they argued it would immediately produce housing for a multigenerational family.
Commissioners discussed procedural fairness, the interpretation of scoring criteria (including whether certain small grocery stores qualify for a walkability point) and the potential for City Council to transfer unused downtown allocations in September. Staff explained how the scoring checklist was applied and that meetings with staff before the January submittal deadline typically cover neither full point‑by‑point scoring nor guaranteed outcomes; staff also noted an interpretation history and that applicants may request reviews.
During deliberations the commission used its authority under the municipal code to modify staff’s recommendations. The commission voted to reallocate two of the allocations that staff had recommended for 940 Main Street (a downtown project that will seek phasing and has not completed implementation) and instead assign those two allocations to the higher‑priority outside‑downtown applicants sitting at the cut line (the two items flagged in staff’s exhibit as “in yellow”). The roll call for that modification recorded four votes in favor and one dissenting vote.
The commission also unanimously recommended that City Council consider transferring remaining downtown base allocations (to the extent they remain available on September 1) to qualified outside‑downtown applicants, prioritizing ADUs and projects that yield immediate housing. Commissioners asked staff to present a clear transfer recommendation and to return to council with options that would prioritize affordable and shovel‑ready projects.
Finally, the commission adopted the resolution to ratify the modified 2025 Measure D scoring and allocations (resolution adopted by recorded vote). Commissioners asked staff to improve applicant guidance for future cycles (clearer directions on pre‑submittal check meetings and documentation), to review and clarify the grocery-store/walkability scoring interpretation, and to provide a recommended approach for handling ties or cusp cases.
Commissioners and members of the public frequently described the annual Measure D process as technical and emotionally charged; several commissioners urged a city‑level review of how ADUs are treated under Measure D (including whether ADUs should consume full annual allocations) and asked City Council to revisit any statutory or ballot‑measure constraints. The planning commission’s actions are appealable to City Council.
