Dear City Council:
I just read the site 38 text in the new Housing Element Update. Despite several emails from Suburban Park neighbors of site 38, our public comments at City Council meetings and Housing Element meetings, and our comments in the Almanac newspaper, our concerns regarding this site do not appear in your Housing Element. We also had the majority of City Council members come to Suburban Park and talk with neighbors in person about site 38 and yet the concerns voiced in those in person meetings do not appear in the Housing Element regarding site 38.
Please allow me to briefly list the vital issues the Housing Element is missing reagaring site 38 and ask you to please correct these omissions in your housing element document:
1. Site 38 has only one narrow road leading to it called Sheridan. Neighbors have repeatedly requested an evaluation by the fire marshall of the narrow roads in Suburban Park leading to site 38 regarding access for emergency vehicles. Your housing element makes no mention of this safety concern.
2. We have requested that TWO access points be required of the developer before the site is approved by the City of Menlo Park for development to reduce traffic from site 38 through our deadend community of Suburban Park. The proposal makes no mention of this community concern and second entry/road request.
3. It is my understanding that this property has air pollution from highway 101 that prohibits it from being rebuilt as a school. How is it appropriate to put families in apartments on this polluted site 38? Is this not a social justice issue?
4. This site has an incredibly LOW AFFH scoring site of 2.
5. Currently there is no binding legal guarantee that this site will house mostly teachers and staff of Ravenswood School District which is an idea that we as neighbors support. Ravenswood City School district has made no binding or legal guarantee that this site will house 80% teachers, 70% teachers or even 50% teachers. Several neighbors recently wrote and asked in writing that the city and the school district legally and contractually make this site majority teacher housing as advertised by Ravenswood School district. We have not received any public promise of a legally binding contract as we have requested to insure teachers and staff are actually the majority renters at site 38 over the life of the 90 year lease.
Please update your housing element to address the concerns of your residents, the missing information about air pollution, narrow streets and emergency vehicle access, the community request for two entrances, etc. Thank you.
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Cordially,
Jill Olson
Email: JillPrimuthOlson@gmail.com
Phone: 650-330-1795
