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Home My WebLink About10/22/2025 Item 4a, Cooper Allan Cooper <allancoope@gmail.com> Sent:Friday, October To:Advisory Bodies; CityClerk; E-mail Council Website Subject:Letter To The SLO Planning Commission Attachments:110_17_25...lettertoplannningcommission.pdf Dear City Clerk - Would you kindly forward the letter attached below to the SLO Planning Commission? This letter pertains to the Planning Commission's October 22, 2025 review of Updates to the Historic Preservation Ordinance and Historic Context Statement. We would also like this letter to be placed in the City's Correspondence File. Thank you! - Allan Cooper 1 Save Our Downtown _______________________________________________________________ Seeking to protect and promote the historical character, design, livability and economic success of downtown San Luis Obispo. To: San Luis Obispo Planning Commission Re: October 22, 2025 Meeting: Item PH4A) Review Of Updates To The Historic Preservation Ordinance And Historic Context Statement From: Allan Cooper, AIA, Secretary Save Our Downtown Date: October 17, 2025 Honorable Chair and Commissioners - The following (see “C Actions” below) is proposed to be deleted altogether from “Chapter 14.01 San Luis Obispo Municipal Code, Historic Preservation Ordinance”.. Why? In our September 27, 2025 letter to the CHC, we stated the following: “Our over riding concern is a procedural one. When tracking a project through several advisory bodies starting with the CHC, never do the CHC minutes (or a summary of the CHC’s deliberations) appear in the staff reports for either the Architectural Review Commission, Planning Commission or City Council. These subsequent reviews fail to beneﬁt from insights that can be gained when reviewing the CHC’s deliberations on any given project. “ Are we to understand that from hereon the Cultural Heritage Committee will no longer be making recommendations to the the ARC, PC or City Council? This runs completely counter to what we believe is simply good city planning. C. Actions Subject to Cultural Heritage Committee Review. The committee shall review and make recommendations to the director, architectural review commission, planning commission or city council on applications and development review projects which include any of the following: 1. Changes to the inventory of historic resources. 2. Changes to historic districts and applications to establish new historic districts. 3. Statements of historic signiﬁcance and historic inventories for existing and proposed historic districts. 4. New construction, additions or alterations located in historic districts, or on historically listed properties, or sensitive archaeological sites. 5. Applications to demolish or relocate listed historic resources or structures. 6. Referrals to the committee by the community development director (“director”), architectural review commission, planning commission, or council. 7. Proposed actions of public agencies that may affect historic or cultural resources within the city. (Ord. 1557 § 3 (part), 2010) The following is proposed to be deleted (again, see “14.01.055” below) from “Chapter 14.01 San Luis Obispo Municipal Code, Historic Preservation Ordinance”. Why? Instead, this section ends up being “buried” in the appendix under “deﬁnitions” and in designated sections of the revised 2025 edition of the “City of San Luis Obispo Citywide Historic Context Statement” (if you can ﬁnd them!). 14.01.055 Historic gardens, site features, signs, and other cultural resources. A. Historic Site and Landscape Features. Historic gardens, site features and improvements, accessory structures, signs, Native American sacred places, cultural landscapes and areas or objects of archaeological, architectural, cultural or historic signiﬁcance not part of a designated property may be added to the inventory of historic resources through CHC review and council approval as speciﬁed herein. B. Cultural Resources on Public Property. Cultural and historic features on public property, such as Bishop’s Peak granite walls and curbing, sidewalk embossing, ornamental manhole coversand hitching posts, may be added to the inventory of historic resources through CHC and council approval as speciﬁed herein. C. Sign. A sign which contributes to the unique architectural or historic character of a building, site or historic district may be designated as a historic sign. Signs that meet at least one of the following criteria may be designated historic: 1. The sign is exemplary of technology, craftsmanship or design of the period when it was constructed, uses historic sign materials and means of illumination, and is not signiﬁcantly altered from its historic period. Historic sign materials shall include metal or wood facings, or paint directly on the facade of a building. Historic means of illumination shall include incandescent light ﬁxtures or neon tubing on the exterior of the sign. If the sign has been altered, it must be restorable to its historic function and appearance. 2. The sign is well integrated with the site and/or architecture of the building. 3. A sign not meeting either criterion may be considered for inclusion in the inventory if it demonstrates extraordinary aesthetic quality, creativity, or innovation. The following in 14.01.070 is also proposed to be deleted from the “Chapter 14.01 San Luis Obispo Municipal Code, Historic Preservation Ordinance “. Why? b. Rarity of existence at any time in the locale; and/or current rarity although the structure reﬂects a once popular style; c. Traditional, vernacular and/or eclectic inﬂuences that represent a particular social milieu and period of the community; and/or the uniqueness of hybrid styles and how these styles are put together. These descriptive qualities in 14.01.070 are instead buried in the appendix of the Revised 2025 edition of the “City of San Luis Obispo Citywide Historic Context Statement”. We believe that the following statement (see 3. below) in 14.01.060, i.e.,“ distinctive characteristics of a type, period, region, or method of construction”, simply does not address either the “rarity” or the “social milieu and period of the community”. 3. Architecture. Embodies the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, region, or method of construction, or represents the work of an architect or design professional of merit or possesses high artistic values. Thank you for your time and consideration in addressing this important matter..