Hanford council and planning commission review draft objective design standards for single-family homes

Hanford held a joint special meeting of the City Council and Planning Commission on May 12 to review draft objective design standards (ODS) for single-family residential development and proposed updates to subdivision regulations. Consultants from Minteer Harnish presented the draft and solicited direction from elected officials and commissioners; no formal action was taken.

The consultant team, led by project manager Michael Gibbons, told the council and commissioners the ODS are intended to make design expectations clear and legally defensible while helping the city comply with state streamlining and environmental-justice requirements. "This is supposed to be facilitated as a study session item," Gibbons said, adding the standards are meant to reduce back-and-forth during project review and set objective criteria for developers.

The draft divides the document into three parts: purpose and applicability (covering subdivisions and many new single-family developments), design-oriented definitions, and site- and structure-specific standards. Hannah Woolsey, a planner on the team, said the standards generally supplement the zoning ordinance but will supplant zoning provisions where the city needs more objective clarity.

Key technical proposals in the draft include a definition of "small-lot" development as lots between 2,800 and 4,999 square feet; reduced front setbacks for small lots (a 12-foot front setback with an 18-foot front garage setback and a 10-foot rear setback), and minimum interior side setbacks of 3 feet on one side and 5 feet on the other. For larger lots (5,000 square feet and up) the draft proposes a 13-foot front setback, 20-foot garage setback and a 10-foot rear setback. The document also sets private open-space minimums of 250 square feet per dwelling on small lots and 400 square feet for larger lots.

On building form, the draft requires vertical and horizontal articulation options to avoid monotonous facades, limits how much of a house a garage may occupy (front- or side-loaded garages not to exceed 75% of the primary-structure width; rear-loaded garages capped at 90% of the primary structure), and requires a porch or patio on the street-facing façade with minimum dimensions (8 feet high, 5 feet wide, 4 feet deep). Fenestration rules include at least one window per façade, a minimum opening size for street- and rear-facing windows (2 by 3 feet), and minimum window-coverage thresholds (15% of street-facing façades and 10% for other façades).

The draft also addresses site improvements and public-right-of-way features: driveway-width limits (40% of lot width for larger lots; 50% for small lots), options for alternative on-street parking configurations (angled or perpendicular parking to replace up to 50% of traditional on-street parking in select cases), a required direct pedestrian path to front entries and a 48-inch minimum walkway width for ADA compliance, and a proposed minimum of one streetlight per intersection with pole-height limits.

Council members and commissioners pressed consultants on several practical issues. A common concern was whether adding objective design requirements would raise costs and undercut affordability. "Any additional feature that you require of a developer, sure, it has a cost element to it," Woolsey said, but added that the consultant team solicited developer feedback during stakeholder interviews and believed the standards could be met without making homes unaffordable in most cases. Deputy City Manager Jason Waters told the body the city is mandated by state law to accommodate higher-density housing and that the ODS are partly intended to shape how that density looks in Hanford.

Several speakers asked about emergency access with narrow side setbacks; consultants said the 3-foot/5-foot side-yard combination preserves at least one side for access and that fire-department minimums informed the proposed setbacks. On utilities, staff said water and sewer capacity are verified on a development-by-development basis through required water studies prior to permitting.

Accessory structures drew substantial attention. The draft would require enclosed accessory structures larger than 120 square feet to "match" the primary structure in material, color or roof form. Council members and members of the public urged flexibility when original materials are no longer available; a consultant recommended clarifying the rule so matching could be achieved through color or roofline rather than an exact material match.

Public comment underscored mixed community views. Alex DeWiggens, a resident with development experience, praised the 75% garage-width rule as a way to avoid multiple PUDs and reduce back-and-forth at hearings. A local realtor expressed concern that many small-lot, two-story homes may be harder to resell and could expose first-time buyers to financial risk. Dolores Taylor, CEO of the Builders Industry Association of Tulare and Kings County, asked that the association and local builders be given time to review the draft and participate earlier in the process.

Consultants also reviewed planned updates to the city's subdivision regulations to align with the ODS and state law. They cited the Subdivision Map Act, recent state changes such as SB 9 and other amendments that impose shot-clock review deadlines and require cities to update procedures. The consultant said the next draft will fold in subdivision-wide items such as street widths, driveway standards and phasing rules.

No vote or formal adoption occurred. Council and commission members asked staff to clarify several provisions (particularly accessory-structure language and fenestration definitions such as transom windows versus egress windows), to reach back out to local builders who said they had not yet reviewed the draft, and to bring a revised public-review draft forward. The consultants indicated the items will enter a public-review process and later adoption hearings.

The joint session concluded with the direction to staff and consultants to revise the draft, expand developer outreach and return the refined proposals for formal public review and subsequent hearings; no action was taken at the meeting.