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San Carlos council introduces objective design standards to streamline multifamily review amid debate over El Camino commercial protections
Summary
Council introduced Ordinance 1626 to adopt objective design standards (ODS) for mixed‑use and multifamily zones to comply with SB 35/SB 330, eliminate subjective review, and refine setbacks, stepbacks, facades and landscape buffers; council amended the draft and voted to introduce the ordinance unanimously.
After a multi‑hour public hearing on Sept. 22, the San Carlos City Council voted to introduce Ordinance 1626, a sweeping set of objective design standards (ODS) for multifamily and mixed‑use zoning districts intended to bring the city into compliance with state housing laws and speed ministerial review of housing projects.
Principal planner Rucha Dandi and consultant Rick Williams presented the draft ODS, saying the rules replace subjective design findings with measurable standards for entries, massing breaks, facade hierarchy, window proportions, landscaping and transitions to single‑family neighborhoods. Dandi told the council the effort was prompted by state law: “Pursuant to the state law SB35 and SB 330, it is required that multifamily housing projects be reviewed based on objective criteria only,” she said.
Consultants argued that carefully drawn objective standards can increase development feasibility without changing height limits: in test‑fit modeling they found that revising stepbacks, setbacks and removing a redundant residential floor area ratio (FAR) could increase housing capacity by roughly 10–15% on studied sites while maintaining visual scale through facade articulation and enhanced landscaping.
The proposal drew extended council scrutiny over two linked concerns: how ODS interact with state density‑bonus provisions and whether allowing by‑right ground‑floor residential along El Camino Real and other corridors would hollow out commercial corridors. Council members pressed staff on alternatives to preserve street‑facing retail, including requiring commercial uses at key nodes, incentives for priority commercial tenants, or targeted overlay rules tied to the downtown specific plan.
Councilmember Dugan praised provisions favoring family‑sized units and asked staff how community concerns were incorporated. “We heard a lot about increasing the buffer zone or making it more robust because the community identified that the existing landscaping is not as robust as it should be,” Dandi replied.
The ODS package also creates a new compliance review and a two‑tier deviation process: minor deviations would be handled administratively by the director, major deviations by the Planning & Transportation Commission. At Council direction, the final ordinance includes language that minor/major deviation determinations must be made by the community development director in concurrence with the city manager (administrative concurrence added as an amendment), and it exempts certain downtown blocks from the proposed stepback changes so the downtown specific plan process can make localized decisions.
Councilmember Rack moved to introduce Ordinance 1626 with the amendments; the motion passed unanimously on a roll call vote. The ordinance was introduced for first reading; second reading is set for Oct. 14 and, if adopted, the ODS would become effective Nov. 14.
What’s next: staff will prepare compliance‑review checklists and application packets, return with retail activation strategies for El Camino/Laurel and continue coordination with the downtown specific plan and northeast area planning efforts.
