Summary of this communication to Council

Patricia Tuttle Brown, PhD, MFT, LAc Acupuncture, Chinese Herbs, Counselling 513 Petaluma Blvd. South, Petaluma, Ca. 94952 ph 707-762-2240 fax 707-762-9290 To: All City Council Members and City Manager

From: Patricia Tuttle Brown Date: 5-28-2019

Subject: Concern about current Petaluma Blvd South Road Diet configurations being considered.

Summary of this communication to Council

I: My comments today, 5-22-2019 about Road Diet Configurations : Comments written by me today elucidating my concern regarding the Petaluma Blvd South Road Diet configurations currently being floated, as I've seen them.

II: My previous 12-19-2016 Road Diet Testimony to Council: This was the meeting in which, (after a previous try in 2012 for the same type grant for the same road, which did not pass), the Council unanimously voted for Petaluma Blvd South for the MTC money. 15 businesses had agreed to be named as supporting. All had had expectations of retained parking, stated by me at the time of my testimony given to Council.

ATTACHMENT

S, 5 pp Attachment 1:

Scan of postcard: This postcard was created & printed by Dave Alden's "Petaluma Blvd South Road Diet Committee." It was the "visual" distributed to businesses as I--along with Steve Kirk on some days-- canvassed Petaluma Blvd South businesses in 2016 for support. This card shows: car parking; a Class II bike lane; two regular traffic lanes; and a center turn

lane/unloading zone. This is the concept and configuration to which the business owners agreed, as they each said, "Yes, you can use my name." In addition to feeling secure about existing parking, they were also enthusiastic about using the center lane as an unloading zone, slower traffic, less broken mirrors and calmer pedestrian life. It should also be pointed out that much of this area is assessed yearly as part of the Downtown's BID.

Attachment 2:

11-10-2016 Argus Opinion Piece, penned by me: This opinion piece was also discussed and distributed to the businesses, along with the postcards, to businesses in 2016. It reiterates the intention: "Remember: the road diet plan maintains commitments to retain parking, slow down traffic, provide more bicycle safety, give buses the room they need and allow pedestrians to walk along

and a cross a slower but steady traffic flow..." Attachment 3:

2003 Central Petaluma Specific Plan : 3 pp from the 2003 Central Petaluma Specific Plan, pertaining to Road Diet

Configuration, including Section 5 p. 28, which includes parking. From my perspective, the minimum interpretation of that is "parking retention" where it exists.

I Comments written today 5-28-2019, for 6-3-2019 Council meeting:

The great Road Diet victory in 2016:

It is important to remember: there was no opposition in the audience at the hearing in 2016, there were approximately 15 speeches supporting, 15 Pet. Blvd South business owners signing on enthusiastically, and the vote was unanimous in favor of moving forward with applying for the MTC grant for Road Diet money (which included re-paving too) for Petaluma Blvd. South as the #1 priority. A terrific win for the City.

Thank you notes sent to the businesses who supported:

After the unanimous vote at the hearing I wrote and delivered a thank you to each of the businesses listed, letting each know our Road Diet passed, and with a personal letter of thanks. I included the following: "We who helped push this forward, this time so successfully, need and want to stay involved as the actual grant application language and road configuration unfold [to the degree we can be permitted to do so!] and we continue to solicit feedback from everyone involved!"

Are we now double-crossing the businesses who supported the Road Diet Grant in 2016?

Already in early 2017 shortly after that final Council hearing and vote, I had concerns for the businesses and the existing parking. Mr. Alden and 2 members of his Road Diet group had a closed meeting with staff engineer Larry Zimmer in which they proposed a road configuration different from the group's previous postcard configuration. In specific, their suggestion to Mr. Zimmer was

eliminating car parking along areas of Blvd South to create a north/south bike lane. I stated to Mr. Alden and the group, directly, at that time when I heard, that in my view: it was wrong to quietly ask for changes after businesses had signed on, and there had been no discussion with the larger group of us about a change in configuration. I did not receive assurances that Mr. Alden or the group concurred. I then called Mr. Zimmer to see if the road configuration change--that is, of parking removal--was actually being considered at staff level, unbeknownst to the business owners who supported the 2016 "yes" vote. Mr. Zimmer told me directly that nothing had changed, that he and I were "on the same page." In addition he said, "In the unlikely event that it is something we consider, there would be a process that would have to be gone through."

Jump to present time. That "unlikely event" has now been casually included in all 2019 Road Diet discussions, with no discussion by the two staff engineers of previous commitments/expectations.

In specific, on 3-29-2019 I attended a meeting with Mr. Alden's Petaluma Boulevard South Road Diet Committee to hear a Road Diet presentation/discussion by/with Ms. Benedetti-Petnic and Mr. Stutsman, the two new engineers. In their presentation, I observed that eliminating existing parking was one of the proposals floated. At this meeting, they presented a page with the label "Proposed parking to be removed" on it, also saying their "eye-balling showed them it was not much used anyway." They said that their drawings were "pretty quickly sketched out," and that lane widths really were "not decided on." From the engineers, there was no knowledge of the "retain existing parking" expectation held in 2016 by the local businesses. It is important to note that neither of these engineers was employed by the City at the time of the meeting in 2016 which adopted Blvd South for the Road Diet Grant, nor did they know about the previous business support expectations. At this 2019 meeting, however, Ms. Benedetti-Petnic and Mr. Stutsman were informed that their alternative of "removing parking along the Blvd South" did not match what the businesses supported in 2016. There was a lot of discussion. About eyeballing not really being a very accurate way to assess existing use of the street. About existing parking being under-utilized because currently mirrors get knocked off daily. That eliminating existing parking would break a promise, the kind of behavior which could very well seed distrust and discord among the business owners who had agreed to publically support the Road Diet. It was also mentioned their "removing parking" configuration did not match commitments made in the much-earlier 2003 Central Petaluma Specific Plan Smart Code 2003, in which the Road Diet was officially proposed. There was broader discussion too about the possibility of narrower lane widths to squeak out more bike room, etc.

Following that meeting, however, the exact same 2 proposals were brought by Ms. Benedetti-Petnic (Mr. Stutsman was on vacation) to the subsequent PBAC meeting for discussion, with no changes, and with no mention of the concerns that had been raised on 3-29. The only public hearings have been with groups founded by Mr. Alden and no staff discussions with the local businesses have been scheduled.

What will happen now?

What I truly hope, is that at tonight's Council meeting, there is not a staff report which ignores all the issues that have been clearly raised. (The staff reports and agenda will have been finalized AFTER this letter must be sent in for the packet.) If things move forward as they seem to be, this Road Diet process might evolve into the sort of bureaucratic/government behavior which seeds distrust among the citizenry as "things morph" and those affected most directly don't even know nor do they have their expectations honored. That would be so unnecessary.

I myself live and work on that street. But my prime concernis not that I personally might lose on-street parking--although every day it is used, if not by me then by the Metro Hotel, people stopping to use their cell phones, neighbors in a multi-family dwelling, etc. It is rather that the businesses which pledged Road Diet support in my presence would feel personally double-crossed! Thus I write this note in distress for them, my neighbors. And: I remain the bike/ped advocate I have been for 26 years.

Patricia Tuttle Brown 5-28-2019

II MY 2016 COMMENTS/LETTER AT BLVD.SO ROAD DIET HEARING

MY COMMENTS DURING THE MEETING AS I HANDED IN MY LETTER: 

I want to specifically thank the 15 businesses who were willing to go on record in favor

of this! Thank you!! You are listed below, in the testimony and your names are all

being read by me at this meeting. I want the City to do right by you, in your support of a

big change.

2012: In 2012 there was a different MTC grant available for a Road Diet. Staff supported Petaluma Blvd. South as the best option. Someone who just re-listened to the tape said I was the only Pro speaker in 2012. With one Con speaker as well. At that time, I and other advocates of calmer streets had thought it was a slam dunk to use grant money to finish off the 2003 adopted CPSP Road Diet, for this “zone C” part of the downtown. But, it did not garner a Council majority, so it did not happen here.

At that time, one criticism was, “there seems like there is no community support behind this.”

2016: This time, I and many others who have cared for years about this entryway to Petaluma, have walked the streets. We have the heard the stories. We have observed the overwhelming support for this Road Diet, the enthusiasm over repaving, over 2 lanes of traffic with a turn-lane/unloading lane for businesses, over traffic calming and slowing, over promise of safer pedestrian crossings and bicycle travel, and of friendlier sidewalk ambiance. There is no doubt here, tonight, in me anyway after walking the streets for hours, of the

overwhelming support for that checkbox on this grant to go to Petaluma Boulevard South.

COMMITTEE SUPPORT: Those who work on City council appointed committees like the Pedestrian Bike Committee, have long supported this.

STAFF SUPPORT: There is staff support for this, beyond just Larry Zimmer who found and has worked on this grant. I had the privilege to speak directly to long-term Petaluma policeman Ken Savano, current interim police chief, whom I have know for the 20 years or so in my role as a biking/walking advocate and his as young policeman often on the Traffic end. He told me that it’s about safety. He told me that from a safety standpoint, a law enforcement standpoint, that the police support the Road Diet Concept. He told me to feel free to speak of his comments. He said “We know they work from a traffic safety standpoint. We have managed to deal with traffic flow and in the end know they improve road safety...”

BUSINESS SUPPORT: The following list, accompanying my testimony, is businesses and their owners-- all on or near the Blvd.--who have either verbally expressed clear support, to me or another of the advocates here, for Petaluma Boulevard South to be the #1 choice for this Road Diet/re-paving grant, or who have written letters to the Council supporting it. Some have done both. [5-28-2019: It should be noted: the issue of "retaining the parking which exists NOW" was an inherent part of the scenario to which the businesses agreed as we discussed this Road diet, and was included in the materials we distributed, for illustration.]

Businesses / Owners who tonight give full support to the Petaluma City Council For making the MTC application for PBS Road Diet 12-19-2016

“yes tell the council I am supporting this”

1. Aqus Café      John Crowley  2. Charley’s Wine Country Deli,   craft beer/ wine/ spirits   Don Badaglia 3. Clavey Paddlesports         Jeff Kellogg  4. Della Fattoria      Kathleen Weber    5. Foundry Wharf      Bill Cover  6. Keith O’Brien Hair Design        Keith O’Brien  7. Metro Hotel      Marie Saint‐Clair [Attachment A]  8. O’Brien Painting      Dustin O’Brien  9. Petaluma Chiropractic Center      Steven G. Jones  10. Petaluma Home and Garden      Alonda O’Kane  11. Pinky’s Pizza      Joe Kreger  12. Tuttle Kilter Clinic      Patricia Tuttle Brown  13. Van Bebber Steel      Royce van Bebber   

These people wrote letters of support to that we were told of

14. Century 21 Bundesen        Karl Bundesen 

15. World Centric      Aseem Das  

This list is pretty inclusive. And it does not include the resident neighbors, each with a story. One of these gave me a letter today. [ATTACHMENT B] [5-28-2019: did not attach to today's document]

NEIGHBORHOODSUPPORT: We who stand here tonight are not a well-organized “constituency group” per se. We are people who came together because we all saw a need. We are part of the neighborhood living and working around the downtown, whether it is people living on La Cresta, or on 12 St, or on East D St. or in the Warehouse District, or those who just like going to our quaint and still-flourishing downtown. For all of us, it is a question of making our main thoroughfare via the south into town safer, more inviting, slowing the speed limit via a more calmed street, and enhancing street life for businesses and homes, cars buses trucks bikes and pedestrians. I do not have space in public testimony here, to tell all the stories I heard, just in my walks, about broken mirrors never reported to anyone, crashed cars, dead animals, people frightened crossing the street, and speeding cars frightening even pedestrians on the sidewalks.

HISTORIC SUPPORT FOR NEIGHBORHOOD, ONE STORY: Keeping neighborhoods “friendly in-scale neighborhoods” is no new battle. My mother told me a story long ago—a family story, where of course the facts are shrouded in myth and fog but it was about her father, my grandfather, Joe Tuttle a pharmacist, who lived in this house where I live on the Blvd, which was then Third Street. I don’t know the year. But she told me that Safeway wanted to come in, had an option or wanted an option to buy this whole block 2nd _{to 3}rd_{, and G to}

H. But her father Joe Tuttle—who walked to work every day downtown to his drug store and came home every afternoon for lunch and then back to work till 9 every night at the drug store? He seemingly was the holdout. He said “No. I won’t sell. You won’t do it.” Why? Well, worth more than the money involved was this: it was his home, his neighborhood, his downtown to which he walked and the place where his kids lived and played with other kids right near the River here. It was houses, mixed with businesses just as it is today.

AN ENTRYWAY & NEIGHBORHOOD OF HUMAN SCALE: Well, we are still working to preserve this neighborhood. And preserve our downtown. Please choose this road for this wonderful grant opportunity. How about unanimously!!