All right, welcome everyone to our planning commission meeting of
the city of Marino Valley. Nice building. This is nice.
I like this, okay. Now call this meeting to order
at exactly 601 p. m. I invite Commissioner Stephan and
lead us into Pledge of Allegiance. Right hand over your
heart, please begin. And to the Republic for which his
hands, one nation, under God, indivisible. We lift in justice
for all. Of us. Thank you. Can we have a
roll call, please? Yes, Chair. Commissioner Zites is absent tonight.
Commissioner Taylor is also absent tonight. Commissioner Stefan. Present. Vice
chair Baker. Here. Chairperson Djeni. Here. All right. Maybe we
have a request for Commissioner Taylor's and commissioners likes for
an excuse absence. So do we have a motion. All
motion to excuse absences. I'll second. Can we have a
vote? We'll do a roll call vote, chair. Commissioner Stefan.
Yes. Vice Chair Baker? Yes. Chairpersoned? Yes. Motion carries. Okay,
well now move on to the approval of agenda. Do
I have a motion and a second for the approval
of the agenda. Our move that we accept the agenda
submitted. I'll second. Okay. Well.
The motion does carry. All right, before we hear public
comments this evening, I ask and encourage everyone participating to
keep their comments respectful towards others, especially towards individual speaking.
I embrace the support the First Amendment right to free
speech, including everyone's right to speak at this meeting and
share their views about issues concerning our city. Any person
wishing to speak either under the public comment section of
the agenda, schedule items or public hearings, must fill out
a request to speak form available at the door. The
completed form must be submitted to the Secretary Prior to
the end of the public comment period. During the public
comment period for each item, including items not on the
agenda, each member of the public who has signed up
to speak will have a maximum of three minutes to
speak. The public must direct their comments to the chairperson
of the commission. All right, let's move into public comments
on any item not on the agenda. Are there any
speakers? Yes, Chair, we personally have three speaker cards. Our
first speaker is Ishmael Gonzalez, followed by Fred Bunuelos, then
followed by Christopher Bacca.
Good evening. Planning Commission, city staff, everybody here in the
audience. And at home watching. My name is Osmo Gonzalez.
I reside in District 2, and I have resided in
Miranda Valley for the last 20 or so years. At
the last previous Planning Commission meetings, I've brought up the
weather. I'm gonna do so again. Uh, at a levely,
I'm gonna go ahead and call it climate watch as
a little fun segment. Most of you have already heard
this on the news or maybe from me in the
past. But climate change is real. It's happening to us
right now as we speak. Uh, we are pretty much
past beyond the point of debate. And we should be
approaching this concern with an adaptive approach and resiliency in
mind. Just, uh, yesterday, or maybe the day before 100
to maybe a thousand people died in Tibet, uh, in
China, because a huge, massive glacier, broke off, uh, created
a five point magnitude earthquake. And then had a flash
flood tear apart. Tens of bridges in that community. It
was with no warning. And that's what it looks like
every day. I see a meme always coming up. Climate
change is coming to you until you're the one recording
the video. Right? Um. I want to mention this important
fact that I found on E, uh, MWD, where we
get, or most of our waterfront, they describe on their
website that we get approaching Deadpool. I don't know if
you guys know this. Uh, this week, it's a hundred
degrees, maybe 110. People are suffering. And it is because
of the actions of this government and other governments all
around us at every level, having poor management decisions. Catering
to corporations who pollute our environment with no regard for
the people that live in those communities. Here, it is
manifested by warehouses. It is manifested by what we will
talk about later today. Refueling stations. I appreciate the sentiment
that is written in the 2040 general plan. There is
an effort, although on paper to transition to a green
sustainable future. But the actions of this city continue to
go against that. How long do we have to suffer.
I know in my lifetime, every summer has been getting
hotter and hotter. You guys have lived longer than I
have. Please do something about it. Thank you. Thank you.
Our next speaker is Fred Bonuelo's followed by Christopher Bacca.
Hello everyone. Um, I recently saw that our council meetings,
they are bringing in these weapons detection devices. So I'm
wondering if you guys are getting them here. It's a
pilot program. Uh, if you do, get them here. I
would suggest that we have an arm trained good guy
with a gun to take out the threat. Uh, when
I came out to the meeting last time. Uh, motion
detector went off with one of our candidates. It was
kind of funny. I thought, but, uh, that would have
been a bad guy with a gun. Who's going to
take that person out. You know, you have deputies that
are inside of here, but the side that was manning
that weapons detection device. I went to city hall to,
uh, kind of check it out over there. And the
little issue with our security team that was there, uh,
you can see the issue that I had with them
later. We have, uh, virtual for our city council. So
I'm hoping that we can do it here for the
council. I mean, the commission meetings here, uh, the equipment's
here. It'll put our media time media team to do
more stuff, but it's, we need that, you know, the
times where people can't make it here. And I hope
we have the option to call in and go Zoom.
Uh, the other thing is, uh, the chairperson, Alvin, Dijonay,
I think you made a comment and other meeting about
parking around schools during school times where it's, it can
be a problem. Um, I have an issue with people
parking in bike lanes. It's against the law. And we
need protected bike lanes. I'm a bike rider now. If
this is a planning commission and the people in here
that plan things, let's plan to make the parking lots
where people can get in and out of there quickly.
Let's plan it where everybody's happy. So I'm bringing that
to you guys planning commission. Make it so everybody's happy.
But these, these people that are parking illegally in the
bike lanes after school, it's, it's ridiculous. It needs to
be fixed. I think that's it guys. Thanks. Thank you.
Our next speaker is Christopher Bacca. Good evening community and
officials. I'm here on behalf of myself as a private
citizen. And I just want to point out that here
we are in the middle of the election season. And
I just want to point out that, uh, our usual,
um, corrupt developer here, Highland Fairview is already interfering in
the elections. We have several kind of, uh, candidates up
here on the city console. I mean, while the city
console, of course, and there's, um, two here on the
planning commission that I'm running for office. And I ask
you why is Highland Fairview reaching out to ask for,
if, uh, if, if you want monetary donations for your
campaign, um, they're in the middle of bringing out, um.
Agreements or wanting the city to create agreements for them
for the Gilman Springs project that is going to be
brought onto you. Um, if he's interfering in the elections,
why is he bringing out these projects that he can't
do that? That's illegal. Uh, he's hiding behind LLCs and
lobbyists to do the work with our corrupt staff here,
which, uh, includes our attorney and our city manager who
capitulate for highland fair view. And they do, they bent
over backwards for whatever edel benz EV wants. And which
is full corruption. And then we have, uh, staff that
overlook these things and it starts here. They pack the
agenda with nonsense unknowingly what you're doing. Uh, I believe
some of you commissioners don't do your job diligently and
pass these issues without knowing what you're passing, which started
illegally with a MOU with the Gilman Springs project. That
was an illegal under the table agreement. And it's going
to continue. And we're going to see something come up
to the city so that, uh, the city can pay
for his infrastructure. That's all it's about. All these projects,
Aqua Balland, um, real logistics center. Now the Gilman Springs
project. All of those are farces. They're never going to
get built. But the city is pouring money into them
in infrastructure when he is supposed to be paying for
this. But yet the taxpayer is paying for this by
because the city are corrupt city staff again, uh, for
whatever reasons they want to continue putting these fake, um,
developments on the books. Maybe it makes a city look
good. It's like, Oh, wow. They're top rated because they
have all this development coming in and they know very
well. You staff know very well that these projects are
bullshit. So you got to stop and we got to
clean up this city hall and we got to clean
up the staff and that will happen. And several of
you officials. Thank you. Our next speaker is Nikita Wilson
followed by Tatiana Flores. Good evening everyone. My name is
Nikita Wilson of course. She just said that. And tonight
my comments are of my own. And now that we're
going to be talking about this later in, um, the
meeting, but I just want to address it because I
don't want to talk about a specific item. So my
thing is how many gas stations is enough. Oh my
goodness. When does development become over concentration. I mean, just
look at Sonny Meat Boulevard at 23021 Sonny Me Boulevard.
We have a gas station. 23050 centimeter boulevard. We have
a gas station plus a car wash at 23550 sending
me boulevard. We have a car wash at 23960 sunny
me boulevard. We have another car wash at 23991 sunny
made boulevard a gas station 24055 sunny meat boulevard at
car wash 24840 sunny meat boulevard gas station and a
car wash two four nine. I think I said that
one. I'm not going to double that one, but you
get where I'm going. We have eight sites. And it's
not even within a mouth. We have A sites one
corridor. Moore is not always development. So my question is
at one point at what point does the city stop
approving more of the same and start asking what do
our community actually need. We don't need more car washes.
Thank you. Thank you. Next speaker is Tatiana Flores.
Good evening planning commission and everyone listening here in person
and online. Um, I wanted to take some time today
to talk about a bill that's being proposed right now,
um, for the state. It's AB 1804. And it's about
keeping California state parks accessible to everyone. So I wanted
to share that last week on Friday. I had the
day off cause I was working Saturday at an event
that I actually shared here last time. And I actually
went to the library on all the soundre and was
able to get a pass to go to state parks
for free. And this bill is essentially trying to secure
this, um, future for good to ensure that, you know,
residents have the opportunity to go to state parks without
having to pay. And it's a good program, you know.
I always advocate for having these resources, um, I know
the Latino community oftentimes doesn't actually enjoy the outdoors as
much as they should due to like, like a resources.
Also, you know, growing up in families that are always
working. So I can speak for myself and say like,
for example, I've never even been to Joshua tree, even
though it's like right here, you know, um, not too
far. So just wanted to bring that out there. Um,
or bring this up and encourage people to use these
resources that are available in the library, but also to
encourage people to, you know, reach out to their representatives
and tell them to support this bill. Um, urge, you
know, governor, um, the governor to, you know, support this
as well. Um, so yeah, everyone go to Lake Paris,
you know, take a stroll and enjoy it. Yeah. Thank
you. Thank you. Do we have any of our speakers?
We have no more speaker cards, sir. Okay. All right.
The next item on the agenda is approval of the
consent calendar. Items listed under the consent calendar are consented
to be routine and non - controversial. And may be
enacted by a motion unless the memoir of the commission
request that the item be removed for separate action. Items
with drawn for report or discussion will be held before
action on the consent calendar. Questions or comments from the
public on the consent calendar. Matter must pretend. Say that.
Must pertain to the subject matter under consideration. At this
time with a commissioner like to pull an item from
the consent calendar for separate vote. Okay. Take that as
a bell. Uh, do we have any public calendar public
comments for items on the consent calendar. We have no
speaker cards. You have a motion second to approve the
consent calendar. Okay. I'll move that we accept the, um,
consent calendar submitted. All second.
All right. The motion does carry. Next item on the
agenda is a non public hearing items. And at this
time, we don't have any. So let's move right into
the public hearing items. The next item on the agenda
is public hearing item number one. That is a plot
plan PN 22 - 0250. That's in district one. Do
we have a staff report. Thank you, Chair. Regine Kennedy,
Principal Planner. I will be giving the staff report this
evening. Miedia can we pull up the
presentation. Thank you. The project before you this evening is
a request for a consideration for a plot plan for
a Penske truck rental and sales fuel station and maintenance
facility. As a reminder, staff has reviewed the project for
consistency with the development standards and provisions set forth in
the city's municipal code. The project has objectively met the
requirements set forth in the municipal code and has been
duly noticed for a public hearing where it has been
brought to you for your consideration today. The project site
is relatively flat in topography and consist of eight contiguous
parcels, totaling 9. 1 acres. The project site is bounded
to the west by the city of Riverside and the
old 215 frontage. And to the north by Alessandro Boulevard.
Surrounding land uses include a warehouse facility to the west
across old 215 furniture. Industrial uses to the south and
east. A vehicle repair facility in an office to the
north and commercial uses and illegal non - conforming residential
uses across Alessandro Boulevard. The site is zoned business park
BP, which allows by right the development and operation of
eight truck sales leasing service and fueling facility subject to
a plot plan. The business park district is intended to
provide light industrial research and development office - based firms
and limited supportive commercial retails in an attractive and pleasant
working environment. The project consists of two buildings and a
fueling island for Penske customers only. The project provides 50
parking spaces, 157 trucks spaces and 32 trailer spaces. The
project also provides 10 electric vehicle automobile parking spaces and
20 electric vehicle EV truck parking spaces. Access to the
project site will be from OneDrivery on Alessandra Boulevard and
two driveways off of old 215 frontage road. The project
has been designed to provide safe, efficient, and organized circulation
for both vehicles. And pedestrians. The facility will operate Monday
through Friday from 6 a. m. to midnight. Saturday from
7 a. m. to 4 p. m. I'm sorry, Saturday
from 7 a. m. to 4 p. m. and Sunday
from 7 a. m. to noon. The proposed buildings feature
contemporary design using a combination of materials and colors that
are consistent with penskis, corporate branding. Building one located in
the central part of the project site, will include office
space, wash, and service bays, totaling approximately 19, 200 square
feet of building area. Maintenance fueling and washing of Penske
vehicles would not be available to the general public. Two
located in the northern part of the project site near
the entrance will include a rental and sales office approximately
1792 square feet. The fuel island consists of two lane
fuel island for gasoline. Diesel and diesel exhaust fluid, which
will be located in the north central part of the
project site. Fueling service will be limited to Penske customers
only. The project includes comprehensive landscaping across the project site.
And an end is intended to enhance the projects overall
character while ensuring compliance with the city's municipal codes landscaping
requirements. There will also be perimeter fencing and decorative block
walls on all sides of the project site for added
security and screening of trucks. An initial study was prepared
by ultra systems, environmental ink and compliance with the California
environmental quality, CEQA, and the SQL guidelines. The 30 day
public comment period for the initial study mitigated negative declaration,
also known as ISMND began on March 15, 2024 and
concluded on April 15, 2024. Seven comment letters were received
in response to the ISMND and mitigation measures were recommended
for the project, which are summarized in the mitigation monitoring
and reporting program, also known as MMRP. The MMRP includes
mitigation for biological resources, cultural resources. Geology and soils, hazardous
materials, and tribal cultural resources. The project also went through
an ALUC review where a consistent determination was found. As
a condition of approval, the project is required to prepare
a final determination of biologically equivalent or superior preservation, also
known as a DBESP prior to the issuance of a
grading permit. The proposed project complies with section 9. 02.
070 plot plan and all applicable development standards of the
zoning code. The projects enhanced building site and landscaping design
enhances the built environment consistent with the goals of the
general plan's land use element. Would the recommended conditions of
approval staff is recommending that the planning commission adopt resolution
number 2026 - 28, adopting the ISMND and the MMRP,
and also adopt resolution number 2026 - 29 approving the
plot plan subject to the attached conditions of approval. This
concludes staff's presentation. I'm available for any questions. The applicant
team and their environmental consultant is also available for questions.
Thank you. Thank you. How many trucks did you say
we're going to be on site. So there will be
157 trucks spaces. Are they all going to be diesel
and fossil fuel. Gas. Is there, are there any other
trucks. Zero emission. I would like to invite the applicant
who can talk more about that. Well, before the applicant
comes up, is there any more questions for staff for
commissioners. Wait, Joanne looks like she might have another. And
it's zoned for, what did you say the zoning was
on there? Business part. It's business park, correct. And because
when you were going through it. It said it was
kind of be something that the public would be able
to utilize and not just, I guess, not just for
trucks per se. It would. So, so this facility would
not be open to the general public. It's limited to
the, um, customers that Penske is serving. Okay. But when
you were reading the description of that classification, it kind
of said that it was kind of something that maybe
the general public or for residents. That's kind of what
I got at the take of it. Our residents aren't
going to be able to really utilize it that much?
Is that what? I believe you might be referring to
the statement, um, about the intent of the BP district.
And there wasn't anything in my statement that referred to
the general public. I did say that, um, the BP
district would or is intended to provide limited, supportive commercial
uses in an attractive and pleasant working environment. It did
not refer to, um, specifically for the general public. Okay.
Maybe I misunderstood. I'm sorry. Any other questions? No.
Thank you. All right. With the, uh, applicant.
Good evening chair. Good evening. Planning commissioners. My name is
Mike Barnes. I'm the director of facilities for Penske Trekkleesey,
Western region. I'm presenting to you our project that we
wish to develop on the corner of two fifth old
brute 215 and Alessandra Boulevard. We are very excited to
work with the city on this project at even more
excited to work with the community. So looking forward to
the feedback you have and, uh, share the services and
the specifics of the project as well. Roger Penske, obviously
the owner of Penske Truckley seeing has many variable different
businesses out there, some of which, uh, really adapt and
focus on the local communities he establishes Ocean. And I
want to hit on a couple of those. Obviously, uh,
the middle one here, the professional sports is really a
national international kind of business that he runs. Um, the
top one is the corporation is really built on these
three different core businesses. The first one is retail automotive.
Penskey automotive is a bunch of car dealerships throughout the
country. You know, from, from Northern America. And very successful
company that, uh, really involves the community. The next one
over Penske Motor Group is really focused on longer Toyota
Lex longo Lexus. Those are out of Il Monte. And
a lot of the business is created from the local
communities in there as well. The last one is, you
know, the transportation solutions. And that's where I'm going to
kind of really focus my presentation tonight on. We offer
four different services to our structure, our businesses at this
location. We do truck rental. We do full service leasing.
We do a contract maintenance. And we also sell use
trucks. Truck rental is obviously what, what you see is,
is what we offer. We offer moving trucks to local
consumers, but more importantly, um, we offer that option to
consumers that use our trucks, but also in the commercial
businesses as well. We are open to the public for
rental. Okay. So we would, our typical customer for renting
a truck. Would be the parents taking their daughter, you
know, out of state to college. Uh, typical customer for
the, uh, for the commercial business is in a small
entrepreneur, um, somebody who doesn't have the capital to buy
trucks and utilize his own trucks. They use our trucks
for a small business person building millwork cabinets maybe for
a restaurant. Something to that aspect. Um, next one is
full service leasing. This is, um, really an option for
a benefit for a lot of businesses in the local
community and are outside the community that really don't have
their own trucks, but we offer them a lease program.
Typically about a five to seven year program. We really
do a full a la carte process with them. We
will, we'll, uh, get them set up on a truck.
Maybe more than one or two trucks. Um, they will
add, uh, we'll add maintenance to that truck, uh, we'll
add the, we'll help them with the tags, the licensing
of those trucks. We really take a lot of the
items that they, as an entrepreneur, as an owner of
a truck, away from them, let them focus on their
businesses. The business at hand. Contract maintenance is another one.
Difference there is we might be servicing trucks that are
not our trucks that were releasing, but their trucks that
they own, they just don't have the capacity to service
their own trucks. So they rely on companies like us
to service their trucks in that, in that area. We
still offer a lot of benefits 24 seven, uh, repair
service. If they're broken down somewhere, we can get to
them if they can't make it to our shop to
repair those. Um, a lot of benefits there is in
that contract maintenance, uh, program. First service leasing, when a
full service leasing, that I mentioned that prior to this,
um, when the term ends on a full service release,
um, obviously the customer, we hope they lease more tractors
or more trucks from us. When those trucks come back
into our circulation, we might decide to wholesale those out
or auction them off. Or we might just try to
sell those ourselves on our lot. That's where you get
the last used truck portion of this. Now, obviously when
we sell trucks through our dealerships, our maintenance facilities, a
tax revenue based out of that, that helps the city.
Um, I wanted to kind of get into specifics on
the servicing of, uh, the trucks at our shop. We
service Penske trucks only. We are not open to the
public. Rental is obviously open to the public. We consumer
and the commercial customer, um, we set a contract up,
like I mentioned, uh, in the previous slide with our
customers. So you're not getting, you know, traffic coming off
the street, uh, to park on a truck, uh, cause
we, we, they have to sign up with us. We
don't do heavy duty repairs in our shops. A lot
of this is really all of this is based on
preventative maintenance. A big driver of this is our customer's
uptime. Uptime on a truck. The more, uh, you know,
uptime weekend have our customers the better off they are.
So we were very big on the preventative maintenance. We
do a lot of engine tune - ups, clutch repairs,
tire changes and washes. We're not doing a engine overhaul.
We're not dropping a transmission. Those are not what we're
doing on site. We're not a truck stop. Obviously we
limited our, uh, our traffic coming in. Everything's designed on
an appointment program. We might have a furniture delivery company
that use at least as our trucks come in. He
might not need that truck for two or three or
four more days. We might have another truck that is,
uh, delivering essential goods to a medical clinic of what
they need that truck. That might take supersede, the time
frame to get that truck service, while the other one
maybe has a little bit more time. Typical turnaround on
a, on a preventative maintenance truck is about a day.
So our, our goal is to get the truck in,
get them into the service base, service that truck. And
again, uptime. Get that truck back to the owner or
the leaser. Lycée and then get it back on the
road so they can deliver the essential goods or the
services to the local community. Um, another portion of this
location will include, we mentioned it by regime and the
staff is zero emissions trucks. Obviously with Title 24, we
have a responsibility to put in level two chargers. We're
also putting in DC fast charging for 20 stalls. We
know this is coming. We believe in it. We support
the EV program. Um, and it's a great thing to,
you know, zero missions with a fleet. It's better than
the environment. A lot of benefits to that. So this,
this location will have the most modern infrastructure for DC
fast charging. Excuse me. Again, this is not open to
the public. It's just our customers. We sign up. We
also fuel. We fuel trucks here. That's not open to
the public either. It's just to our customers. Um. We,
our fuel programs are fuel systems. We rank above and
beyond the average standards. We obviously know the fire codes,
the CUPA requirements. We honor those. Um, again, it's very,
uh, process is very, uh, easy to work with this
as far as our customers. We have dedicated employees working
on the fuel islands that they all they do is
service that truck for fueling. We do not have the
driver pull up and feel himself. This really helps with
uptime. They're in and out. And really eliminates any possible
spills and drips and whatnot on this lab because of
the person who's doing that day in day in and
day out. Again, it's not over to the public. The
rental building I mentioned, um, consumer, not really a big
portion of our business. It's really this smaller entrepreneur. The
business person that again, can't afford, um, his own trucks.
He's using our trucks for his, his business. I kind
of mentioned earlier, the customers that we focus on really
with the, with the consumer rental. So. Um, I want
to get into the site and kind of, um, you
saw some staff what the current condition of the property
looks like today. This is really a site plan of
what the layout's going to look. Um, staff mentioned building
one, building two. I'll kind of go into that further,
um, when we get into the renderings I brought. Um,
if you look at the very top, there's a bunch
of stalls up there that are empty. That's all going
to be our zero emissions tractors dedicated for EV tractors.
Really medium duty and heavy duty trucks. We also service
a smaller, small duty truck for EV as well. This
is a rendering that we had put together based on
our plans. Um, I kind of want to explain the
process on the layout of the property, um, if you
look at the far right, you're going to see more
like a medium and heavy duty trucks. Those are the
ones I mentioned earlier that might sit for two, maybe
one day. Could be two, three, four, five days until
they get to them. Because they are part there more
than 24 hours. We are putting up a 14 foot
screen wall. To, you know, basically the camouflage, those trucks,
whether it be in part. Again, they're not sitting there
long term, but we want to make sure that they're
screened to the public for to honor the code and
the planning requirements. If you look in the middle, you're
going to see a couple of smaller trucks, parking lots
with smaller trucks. Those are turning a lot faster. That
might be a little bit of overflow for some rental
fleet. Or those are trucks that would really be picked
up for the customer, the consumer to pick up that
day. Um, I kind of like showing this slide for
a couple of reasons. You'll see the white truck coming
into the entrance there. We always do a counterclockwise to
our buildings to show that when the drivers come in,
safety is a big, big priority with us. That driver,
he or she can drive into that lot. No, what's
in front of them, but also can track and see
if anybody's coming into the building. If you're on the
opposite side, it's a little bit tougher to see that.
Um, sometimes we get asked, boy, it's really organized law.
Does it always stay like that? Yeah, we try to
do that. That's an emphasis we put in our company
that's more efficient. We label all the stalls to where
the truck goes. Um, we back in all of our
trucks. There's a reason for that. Again, it's safety. It's
organized, but we know when we're pulling a truck out
backwards, a lot riskier to hit something or someone. We
don't want that. To illustrate a little bit more about
the site plan, we've got really mature landscaping. Um, you
know, obviously per the local landscaping ordinances. Um, the building,
we kind of went into the elements. The height of
this building is about an eve height of 24 feet.
Smaller building to the front for the rental and offices
that eve heights is about 18 foot. So a little
bit lower, uh, profile height on that, that building.
This slide, I brought, cause I really believe this is,
this shows a huge impact. Um, when we bring the
heavy duty trucks into the property, those will enter and
exit off of old root 215. We do not want
trucks heavy duty trucks, medium duty trucks coming in off
Alessandro. That is not the way we design this site.
The entrance off alycero is really for the consumer and
the commercial rental on the smaller light duty trucks being
rented. Um, the, obviously another benefit here is the location
in proximity to the 215 freeway. It's an easy access,
easy off the freeway to get to our property. You're
not meandering through a residential section if you can't find
our property. It's right there. You can't, you can't miss
it. Next profile is I think is really looking southwest
of Alessandro. Um, again, you'll see the trucks in the
background. The space in the back there with all the
green trees as our employee parking. Um, and then you
see the, the Penske building, we mentioned with staff mentioned
in the beginning for rental and offices, um, that's really,
again, catered to that business. Uh, rental light 2D trucks
entering and exiting off of Alessandro. You'll also notice where
the pickup truck is parked right in front of the
smaller building. There's a gate there. That gets locked after
hours when rental is closed. The benefit here also is
if somebody can't see us or meet us after we're
closed, they have the option of returning a rental, um,
into that front lot where that box truck is sitting
and they drop their keys off. And then we just
close them out the next day we come in. That's
a big benefit because some places if you drop a
truck off, we don't want them parked in the streets.
We want to make sure there's a space there for
them to drop that truck off. That's not interfering with
the traffic. Um, I mentioned earlier that obviously the access
ingress for the bigger trucks off a road Route 215.
And then the consumer and light duty rental will be
off Alessandro. This property will be lit with LED lighting
and building to eliminate the property and comply with all
Title 24 energy codes. There is no truck idling at
night. If staff or the, um, audience, please, we're going
to hear him rumbling noises. All of our services are
preventative maintenance or be done inside the truck shop. You
mentioned, we mentioned earlier on this one, um, the big
building. If you'll see on the, on the bigger building,
you've got wings out there. Those are canopies. Those are
really what we call drive up repairs tile root, tire
replacements, windshield wiper replacements, light duty stuff that doesn't revolt
any oils, any petroleum products. Something that can they can
drive up. We switch it out. They're back on the
road uptime. Landscape trees. Obviously those are part
of those I planned along the perimeters. Those also, uh,
act as a natural buffer. Which helps any kind of
a noise reduction, but, uh, that's all part of the
planning that's, you know, we would go through the planning
department and make sure that's approved. Security, all this property
will be, uh, fenced in, gated, I mentioned earlier and
have a security system on site as of all of
our properties do. Um, environmental consciousness. We are committed to
committed to proactively protecting the environment state of our fuel
island equipment and monitoring systems. I go well above and
beyond the federal regulations. I mentioned the fuel island, California,
obviously we know, uh, the regulations here are much a
little bit more strict. We are geared with that with
our environmental team and the process that we have in
place to eliminate any potential drips or spills.
Unfortunately. The applicant staff to ought to be aware that
there is some contamination to the northeast of this property.
We didn't do it. It's been there for 60 to
70 years by a prior. Building owner to the north
to the east of us. Contains, I believe it was
a dry cleaners building, had PCEs, I believe that's product
is used for cleaning uniforms. For some reason, somehow it
got into the soils and some of it migrated into
the property we bought. We are doing the right thing.
We're going to take care of this. On our property.
We'll remove the PCE. The soils, the contaminative soils on
site are mitigation. Measures include working with DTSE on this.
In addition, I mentioned earlier, the right away, the landscaping.
We are adding trees along the right of way as
well as some light poles. I want the, um, committee
and staff and the honest to be aware that Penske
believes in environmental resilience in the missions controlling and gas
emissions on these buildings. We put a lot of capital
and thought in engineering into our buildings. We want them
to last, but we want them also to be echo
- friendly to the environment. Some of the things we
are doing, obviously, in this building and throughout the country,
we're doing light, LED or lighting retrofits and all of
our buildings. Obviously this new building will have the latest
LED lighting fixtures. But we are doing this all over
the country just because, you know, the benefits of using
a brighter light, but you know, something that's better for
the environment. We are devoting about 1. 3 megawatts installed
to date on solar. Currently seven sites in Southern California
are getting retrofitted with solar arrays on the rooftops. We
believe in this technology, this is, this is what I
believe we benefits the consumers, but also benefits the areas
to show that, uh, you know, we're making more eco
- friendly buildings. Unfortunately, this building cannot have solar. We
would still put it on if we could. This interferes
with March Air Force Base and the trajectory of the
landing and the takeoffs with high reflective glare that they
might get. California is going to
battery operated forklifts. No more natural gas. We're also using
a lot more battery operated tools. The technology and battery
operated tools these days have come tremendously much farther than
they were in the past. We began, we believe that's
better for the environment. HVAC equipment, another thing we're doing
could be a higher nerve filter rating, um, VFDs in
the very frequency drives into the HVAC units, uh, obviously
units today, these days run much more efficient than older
units. And then a highly efficient trek wash system, um,
this, this location, obviously we'll have a truck wash. It
will, um, probably produce about six to eight trucks washes
per day. And we use a company called, whiting system
that uses a super scout gantry system in this. The
average is on this are about six gallons per a
standard 26 foot truck. Basically this gantry system will, a
driver will bring this truck into the wash bay, the
driver will get out, punch a code into our, our,
uh, key box there kind of registers the side of
the length of the truck. This gantry will go back
and forth to clean that truck. Six gallons on a
truck has come way far, farther than using pressure washers,
which pretty much use double the amount of water. We
believe doing anything right thing at first. I kind of
mentioned some of the things with the contamination on the
site with the, uh, environmental, uh, improvements we've, we've made
to the, uh, the eco - friendly buildings we're wielding.
We produce buildings. We conduct our business in a safe
and ethical manner. Maintain a facility in a first class
manner that's compliance with all laws. We sustainability, energy, efficiency
in reduction through lead design, including EV and solar. Every
single building that we produce these days throughout the country,
including Marina Valley will be a lead certified building. This
is no different here. We believe in the efficiency, the,
the, uh, engineering in this design. We just, it's a
great thing. And we're using that going forward. Um, Penske's
capital annual CAPEX budget. We put a tremendous amount of
effort and capital into making sure our buildings last. We
want the buildings to be efficient. We want our employees
to be safe. Our customers to be safe. Therefore, we
put a lot of emphasis in the safety and the
building as far as being lasting much longer than the
average. An active participation in the community and assistance with
relief efforts. We're very much involved in the community. Uh,
we step up when there's a need. We've had departments
that deal with this on a, on a program basis.
This location. I'm sorry, this, with all of our locations
in Southern California, we have 35 buildings similar to this
one. Um, out of those 35 locations, we employ over
1, 200 full - time employees in 90 - time
employees. The early projections on this location are 50 or
31, excuse me, 31 full - time employees projected. That,
I think, the staff mentioned the hours. Um, those employees
will come from the surrounding areas. We mentioned a little
bit earlier about the tax revenue when we sell a
truck on the property. That's a benefit obviously to the
city. Um, and we, we do a lot of local
supports in Southern California as well as the country. Some
of those examples are the blood drive and awareness week
we do in Southern Count. Hard health day. The holiday
toy drives in currently where we've been involved many years,
which is coming up the annual pink out, which we
spent a lot of time with, uh, employees and devoting
time and efforts into recognizing that program. That concludes my
presentation. I, uh, willing to answer any questions from the
council. If they had any. Well, thank you. Appreciate that.
I just want to go back and, uh, I don't
think I mentioned that the public testimony is open at,
uh, 6 30 p. m. just want to make sure
that that's, that's in there. Are there any commissioner questions
for the applicant. Um, how many EV trucks do you
have right now that are going to be at this
site. Do you have any. We, we have them deployed
at probably the closest locations, maybe in Fontana, in Ontario.
Probably eight to 10 trucks right now in those locations.
As far as the bigger trucks, the DC fast charging.
Do we have an actual count on that? Yeah, I
know that you're going to be putting it because it's
more or less the wave of the future, but I
was just wondering if you guys already had gone to
that wave of the future. We have. We've got a
devoted team that's really looking at, uh, the benefits of
that. I wanted to also add in, if I do,
if I may, we also serve as C and G.
Hydrogen trucks as well. Those are alternative fuels as well.
Obviously the zero missions trucks is the wave of the
future. And we're already using those now as we speak.
And I noticed on the sustainability, um, you did list
solar. But on this site you said that you cannot
put solar. So that's going to be out. So that.
Yes. We will still be leads. We will be leads
certified. If you put in a solar, you could, the
chance you can get up to a silver rating or
even a gold. But we will make still certified by
the other, uh, items that we're putting into the building.
Okay. And then I notice that you said about the
washing of the trucks that you, you know, are minimizing
the usage, but you're not recycling your water or anything.
We do not recycle as if yet. Um, that technology
is not offered to us yet, but yes, we are
not recycling. Okay. And, uh, are you bringing any employees
with you to this site at all. I did not
know that answer. Um, I know you said you were
going to employ 31, but I'm sure even employing them,
you're not going to, you know, they might not be
up to speed. With the way you guys handle everything.
So I was far as training and whatnot or, yeah,
no, we would have them mirror probably the closest location,
uh, work from that location while this one is being
built. We also, one thing I wanted to add is
we really, um, I think we set ourselves above and
beyond any competition out there for training employees. We send
our technicians, although do we have great knowledge to Texas
to train for two weeks on the Penskey ways of
doing the servicing and the preventative maintenance. They will probably
go to a similar program like that, but also shadow
with local other branches throughout Southern California. And I understand
that you, um, do Reynolds for the consumer, but they're
usually smaller trucks you said or even leases. Uh, so
basically the way I'm looking at this, and you can
correct me if I'm wrong. It's more like a service
station for Penske where you service your trucks, you put
brakes, you do all that. Is that basically what it
is? Well, again, we're not open to the public. We're
just servicing our own trucks through our customers at our
sign up with our programs. Right. So it's something that's
going to be basically for Penske to do their business
on that site and not really for the general public.
Other than rental, right. Correct. Okay. Sounds like at a
courtroom, I'm sorry. It'll make you feel that way. I'm
just going line by line, um, because these are things
that I would just, yeah, I just want to get,
get this all out. And as far as tax revenue,
we, we, the city would just get them from the
trucks that you would sell. Is that it? That is
it for any. I assume it's a tax revenue. We
don't have projections yet. Yeah. We were a little far
out, but yes. Okay. I just wanted to know about
that. And then, um. Well, she's looking at that. Arthur
taxes associated with rentals as well. You know, I don't
know that. Let me see. Um, and tax and rental
tax. Okay. Right. Are you going to have underground storage
tanks and above ground storage tanks? This will have underground
storage tanks. Underground. So you won't have above ground. Because
I know at your other for some of your facilities
you did have. Um, we do have some. We do
have some, not many. Okay. And the hazardous waste. How
do you dispose of that. Um, I can, if I
can, I can bring up an associate that deals with
that program, if that's okay. Okay. Well, um.
Cause I believe there was an issue environmental issue about
that in the past. There was a, I just happened
to come across it. They sent us some paperwork. We
can, we can address a comment. Yeah. Yeah. It was
an environmental lawsuit that you guys just settled. That had
to do with that. Um, I could tell you that,
uh, we worked with the DA's office on that. Right.
Yeah. And, um, so I was just concerned with that
site because the last thing we want is to have,
you know, anything, um, and I know you guys are
going to have to rectify all this and come up
to, you know, speed on everything. But, um, we just
don't want any of the public in our area to
have to go through anything, you know, that mirrors some
of these horrible things that we've been seeing happen. We
can clarify that further with our, um, council we have
with us tonight. Okay. I just wanted to kind of
just touch on that. I know it's a very touchy
subject, but I think it needed to be brought out
because that site is going to be there. And it
is in our town. So would you mind if, uh,
council came up and addresses that now? Sure. Thank you.
Good evening, commissioners. Sigurd Wagner, council for Penske. Absolutely happy
to address that. Yes. Um, Penske just engaged with its
regulators in a full and fulsome settlement that is before
the court right now for ratification. And what that means
is that Penske is now compliant with every environmental regulation
at every site statewide. That was a very long and
very collaborative process between the regulators and Penske. Um, what
is good about it, um, people don't think about it,
is the fact that now every single operation and every
single operation going forward is up to stuff. 2026 standards
and beyond, um, again, that was a lot of work
and a lot of collaboration, but Penske is devoted to
good responsibility and good operatorship. And that settlement is public.
Um, the terms are available to be reviewed. That's on
the court's docket. And you will see in the settlement,
rec idles about all of that. So or for the
good of the hearing tonight, please keep in mind that
now Penske is at the top of its game. Regulatorily.
Okay. That was, that was basically my thing. I know
that now going forward, I was just, you know, having
to be good stewards of the community, you know, we
have to watch out for our residents. Because we live
here. And so basically that's, you know, I had to
bring it out. I know that was the elephant in
the room, but it needed to be addressed. Okay. That's
all my questions. I don't know if any of the
other commissioners have any. You know, I have one. Um,
you have a operation in Ontario and Fontanas or any
other close by Riverside off of Hall in the 60
would be probably the closest. Riversight, where's that in Riverside.
All in the 60? I think it's just north of
the 60. And where's your corporate headquarters in Texas or
Reading Pennsylvania, sir? Do you have any plan on expanding.
The operations for EV. As far as on, on the
site? Yeah. Increasing the amount of, Oh, yeah, absolutely. 20
stalls would probably be the biggest we've ever put in
an end of your locations for the DC fast charging.
And as well as a level twos, absolutely. Okay. Okay.
So I guess my, my thought process on this being
that it's pinsky. I guess my, did you equate it.
This is like a just a really, really large. You
all. You know, you got semi trucks. You got rentals.
You got sales, but you haul doesn't sell their trucks.
But you know, we're renting trucks. We're leasing trucks and
selling trucks. Again, a big portion of, I want to
say 90, over 90 percent of our business for the
rental is the small commercial business owner. So then I
think I heard that a lot of it has to
do with the, uh, the longer use is five to
seven year leasing, that sort of thing. Uh, for the
service, yeah, the leasing. Okay. Nope. I don't have anything
else. You guys have any other questions. I'm just, um,
wondering, is it fair to say that basically this is
more, um. I don't even know if I should, I
have to choose my words very carefully. It's more a
benefit really to Penske, this area than it is actually
to the residents of myrtle valley. Is that fair to
say or no? I don't, I disagree. Um, again, a
lot of our, uh, rental fleet is geared towards a
smaller business person he or she that can't afford their
truck. So therefore they're using ours. Um, some of our,
our big customers that are average customer fleet, uh, services,
our trucks only utilize around six to seven trucks. That's
a small portion. Those are used primarily in local areas.
Okay. Cause it just seemed like, um, it's more like
an operation that Penske, because everything that was on there
wasn't open to the consumer wasn't open to the consumer.
Wasn't open to the consumer except for just like you
said the smaller trucks and the lease trucks. So for
me, I just kind of took it that it was
more something that, which is fine. There's nothing wrong with
it. You're doing business and you, you know, you've got
to service your trucks and maybe they're not going to
be so much utilized from renow valley residents, but there
are surrounding areas. That would utilize them. Riverside, um, Beaumont
wherever. Because I don't know where, you know, like my
colleague, Ray said, the, um, other places, but I guess
there's, um. Room for, to have one more. There's room
for one more. So basically I was just, yeah. You
guys have done a demographics on this, I'm sure. Right.
Yes. Okay. Yeah. Okay. But that was my thing. Got
it. Because sometimes we're up here and we are, you
know, looking out for our residents and what benefits we
can get for, you know, get the most bang for
our buck for that. Property that is going to be
used. Okay. Um, are there any plans for. Street improvements
around the area. Around your, your right of ways and
the outside. You know, I don't know if we had
any major social do you call. I do want to
add that the project is conditioned to, um, put in
some street improvements. And I have our principal planner of
land development to explain what those might be. Good evening,
commissioners. Laurie Gonzalez, principal engineer with land development. The project
is conditioned to install sidewalks along the frontage on old
215. The existing street already has curben gutter. In addition
to that, um, conditioned to install, um, the two driveways
per the city standard plan for commercial driveways. Um, and
they will be connecting to an existing storm drain, 24
inch storm drain within old 215 for drainage from their
property. There are existing, I believe five existing streetlights. Um,
along the frontage on old 215. And those existing streetlights
will remain. One will be relocated in order to accommodate
one of the driveways. Thank you. And I ask you,
um, what is the, um, the road look like on
that side of the old 215 because I know the
other side has been repaved. It's been, it looks really
nice. It used to be in bad shape. Right. Um,
the condition of the roadway is a, it's a four
lane, uh, minor arterial. So you have two lanes northbound,
two lane southbound. And as I recall, um, I would
have to double check, but I seem to recall that
it's, um, in good condition. They are not, they were
not conditioned to, um, do any additional street work beyond
adding the sidewalk. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I have another
question for you. I'm not done with you yet. Um,
of poor guys, stop it. How many trucks do you.
Even think might be going on from your site. Onto
the roadways. On two old route 215. Oh, 215 to
the onto the freeways. How many trucks do you surmise
will be going on there. You know, it's, um, it's
the ballpark. Yeah. I mean, again, it's all done by,
um. To traffic analysis, but also the, um, accounts that
we have when we make the appointments, right? You're not
seeing, uh, tremendous amount of trucks on the lot, you
know. So I would, you know, I would say maybe
your 10, 10 to 12 or 10 to 15 per
day coming in and out. Okay. Yeah. Cause I mean,
it might not even come into the equation, but it's
just that the truck traffic on the freeways on the
roads, they're just getting worse. That was my question. I
mean, you know, I mean, it's not your fault. It's
not your fault. You know, it's just gotten that way
through the years. So I just want to know how
many might be added. I could show an inch with
Penske with the facilities team. I wanted to give you
a little bit more. Maybe metrics or data to kind
of answer some questions to support Mike. As you think
about your question on trucks, what you're not seeing today
is all the business, um, commercial consumer and elaborate that
a more. That's transpiring business within the city today is
driving those trucks within the city without our presence. So
when we go back to the common R, what does
this facility do for the city of Moreno Valley. And
we're very cautious to say how much we spend. We
spend millions of dollars on these facilities. And that's not
bragging. But we choose our destination or a domicile locations
wisely. So based on geometrics of the customers, the customers,
what brings us here, not Penske. So we're not going
to stand up a multimillion dollar facility to just rent
for, you know, moving your house or maybe some commercial
rental. We're bringing the business here really for the full
service lease, which is supporting the businesses, like I said.
It's a lot of small businesses. So as you think
about the world of trucks and the whole industry, not
us. of six trucks or less. Now we have Costco.
We have Trader Joe's. We have a lot of big
entities. That's no lie, right? We are a big company.
We're a network just like others. But really the focus
in this town and others that we travel around is
we're basing our decision to come here based on they're
already the business of the trucks that are used. So
the trucks that are the businesses today that are in
your community are driving to riverside for that first full
service lease, the fueling, all the complementary services, which you
are not seeing the benefit for. But you are seeing
the increased traffic. And flow and everything else that goes
with that. So the reason that we are here today
is because when we look at a concentric ring, so
we do drive times of where all the dots of
the customers that we support, we find the zoning that
complies. And we find the closest to the highway, right?
So we talked about all this, but all of the
strategic things we try to do to minimize our footprint
on the community. Kind of brought us to this site
because we have the revenue to help with the cleanup.
This light has sit and vacant for many, many decades.
So we feel like it fits our needs. We can
support our customers that are already within the city. We
can concentric that ring. So now our traffic is a
lot less because we're not commuting that half hour up
and back. So when you ask how many trucks are
on the roads, all of them, they have to go
somewhere. But we are very strategic on keeping them out
of this, you know, out of the residential areas. A
lot of them are more, you know, the flower, when
you think about the small truck, so EVs, we made
a public statement many years ago. We bought 250 electric
vehicles. They're the 40 little bands, right? A lot of
those that we see around all in, they're all in
California for the most part. Uh, I would say 95
percent. I don't know the actual count, but out of
250, about 200 or so are in this state. We
see electricians flower companies, you know, food deliveries, Amazon has
taken a few, although they're converting to the roan. So
those are the people that are using it. But we
know they're concentric here. So that's what brings us here.
We're not coming here to try the build the business.
We're coming here to support the business. And that's why
we're not open to the public. The public facing side
is if you or anybody in this room says, Hey,
I want to move to another state or I need
to take my kid to college. You can come in,
you can get a truck for as long as you'd
like. You can drop it off at any state. That's
the beauty of us. It's a network. So it's not
concentric there. But the commercial side of that rental is
the FedEx and the UPS. And at one time Amazon.
So when the Christmas holiday comes, they do not have
the volume to keep up with all our shopping online
anymore. They can't. So they come to us and say,
give us some trucks temporarily. So a lot of our
trucks are delivering all these packages in these big flow,
you know, from black, uh, black Friday all the way
through the holidays. So that's the commercial rental. That could
be a week, a month, the holiday, uh, but the
full service lease is what really brings us here. That's
the five to seven year commitment. That's with a Kroger,
a Costco, uh, we have business here. We have a
lot of small businesses within the community. And we're just
providing that service. We give them the truck. We do
the license. We put the decal on. You don't even
know it's our truck. And we service wash and fuel
on site. We try to keep it contained. So it's
not negative to the public. It's we're supporting what's already
here. You just, it's not invisible, but you don't see
it. We're not driving around with pentacle in every truck.
Does that make sense? It makes perfect sense to me
now. Cause I was thinking you guys are just wanting
to do Penske and monopolize on everything. And it didn't
make sense to me that it would even be a
value to our area. If you guys are just going
to do, you know, a centralized location and just do
that. But now that you're saying that we might not
see it. It is a pencil truck. It's just kind
of incognita. The own showed value for us is because,
and I know the people in here that want to
have a conversation, that's, that's beautiful, right? That's what the
country's for. And we'll disagree and agree on a lot
of things. But what we do know is we come
here for the customers and a lot of customers follow
us. So if they're in Riverside and they're like, Hey,
we want to go to, we want to pensky as
a service because of some of the values we provide.
When we establish in Moreno Valley, they will come to
us because they know that's the value we get. We're
not the cheapest on the block. We are never a
U - Haul. And the differentiators U - Haul is
just a transaction for a rental, right? They don't do
their own maintenance. They do have their own vehicles. Uh,
and another misnomer that maybe I could clear up is
we don't build trucks. We don't, we don't, we're not
a truck manufacturer. So we're agnostic to anything out there.
We've got, we get a Tesla truck. We can get
a four truck, a Volvo truck, a Daimler truck. Anything
out in the market. And that's what we do for
our customer. Because if you came to us and said,
I didn't want to be zero admissions. We will say,
I do want electric. C and G. We can do
hydrogen as they come online. Right. There's a lot of
technologies coming. It's our job to be that advisor. We
have the, you know, the network to bring in whatever
you need as a customer. We spec the trucks. You're
going to say, I need a refrigerator truck because I
deliver, um, you know, ice cream. We have a lot
of those or breads. Food is a big industry for
us. Auto parts are a big industry for us. So
all these warehouses, they have to get fed from somebody.
And we're kind of the unsung hero because you don't
see us delivering a Penske truck. It's in their trucks.
Right. So as we're kind of branching out. So we
want to be very strategic. We don't want to leave
a big footprint within a community, but we want to
be able to transport the goods, get in and off
the site and do it cleanly and respectfully. And that's
really what we're trying to do. Okay. Can I ask
you, do you have contracts with some of the bigger
businesses in our city? Absolutely. Okay. Well, I just wanted
to clarify. Okay. No, it's okay. And if you, if
we want to get into the names, I'll have to
bring up the operators because I'm, uh, I'm the construction
guy. I can tell you all of that. Okay. I
know you had a question way on in the presentation
about why so many truck stalls. And that's a very
common question we hear all around the country. And I
can give you two simple answers. We follow the zoning
code. So if the planners say, Hey, 70 percent of
the site, you can have impervious We try to maximize
this time. We do that for two reasons. We want
to make one impact and one impact only. We don't
have to come back and grade and disturb and make
all kind of disruptions for us or you or the
environment. But we also, as you think about yourself, so
when you drop your car off to get serviced, if
the parking stalls around the garage, what do you do?
You drive around and you're like, Oh my God, what
do these people doing? There's no parking area. What do
I drop my car off? We're very much molded in
a commercial atmosphere. So even though we have about 160
stalls, we have a rotation. So we have stalls that
might not have parking so that when a customer drops
their truck, they can put it in a stall and
be organized, safe and organized. The next person that comes
in, they're going to take a truck from another stall.
So it's, it's kind of a rotational parking lot. But
we can't do that if we just designed for exactly
what's in the shop, if that makes any sense. Yeah.
That makes sense. And you are going to make it
aesthetically pleasing, right? I mean, I kind of wish you
guys would go a little above and beyond because I
know sometimes the city hasn't really, you get a certain
size tree that you have to put in, but it
takes forever for it to grow. And the last thing
I would like to see is, uh, it looked like
a commercial. Area rather than a business park. So we
were open to any suggestions you have. What is the
size of box trees we have to put? You know,
we, our code is, does anybody know if we're answering.
How tall are they. So we have in our project
plans, the preliminary landscaping plans, um, and let's see here
what they have as far as. So it's a minimum
of a 24 inch box. And you go a little
bigger than that. We can and we'll work with the
planners. Okay. Can we put that as a condition of
approval if it were to be approved? Because I would
like to see a little more mature. No, I don't
think they don't. They won't. Well, I mean, nurseries. I
mean, that's where you got to go to the nursery.
You get a bigger tree. I'm just saying because I
know that there was some buildings that we had around
town and it's taken forever for them to cover up
what's actually there. I know your buildings aren't going to
be, you know, super tall. But I know the area.
I've been here 40 years. Yeah. Most Sonico we see
inch and a half caliber is a very small treat.
It takes 10 to 15 years to get anything like
you see in the landscape plan. Right. Uh, we typically
like to go a little more dense because we, we
do want maturity and we also have a lot of
screening requirements. I think some might be here. Uh, but
we are not opposed to changing that at all. Right.
We start with something and then we work with everybody.
Right. Because that area, I know you, you've probably been
to the site. And it just would look nice. Cause
that is an entrance to our city. And so if
you want, you know, for us to at least start
somewhere to look nice coming in, I would like it
to look nice because that area has been a very,
um, almost, I just want to say, uh, it hasn't
been built up very well. It was the, the stepchild.
Of the city. I know we have fence. We have
some screener walls which are not unusual for us. Trucks
are not always the most kosher world. Is that I
wouldn't want to see the trucks. I just want to
see something that looks good landscaped. You know, the greenery
and things like that. It makes a place just look
cleaner, nicer. Understood so bad. Um, I had another question,
but I'll let the speaker speak and then maybe I'll
bring you back up to the firing range. Yeah. Maybe
two more things to kind of maybe help from discussion.
Cause I know you're going to hear a lot. And
I know, uh, trucks aren't the easiest thing to think
about, but we aren't a cross doc. We're not the
warehouse across the street. Our traffic footprint is very minor
as much as you want to not believe that. Uh,
most of our traffic generated by our employees. So if
we have 31 employees, we have 15 coming in and
we have an overlap of 15 coming out. So at
any given time, we want to have all 30 at
one time, but the rotation, right? As people do shifts.
We know there's a vernal pool on there, right? So
we're very sensitive to that. It's not unusual for us
to transport prairie dogs and turtles and spotted out. We
do this all the time. Very sensitive to that. But
I would recommend that when we, or one thing to
know is when we went through with March Air Force
base, it was made clear to us and with the
planners that we could not have an open water source
on that property. And the reason is they don't want
waterfowl conjugating there because of the end of the runway
and getting into the engines. So that's one thing we
had to do. We had to put that detention underground.
I think it might be a bio swale. I'm a
little out of touch. Mike probably knows. But we have
to relocate that anyway, right? Because of the water getting
larger that was brought up to us. Can you fix
that? Absolutely. We have to mitigate. So we will do
that. A lot of things are just maybe unwritten, but
we know why and where we're doing them. And we're
welcome the questions to kind of explain that to you.
And I, and honestly, I would hope that you would
employ Marino Valley residents if they're qualified because, um, everywhere.
Everybody needs a job. And if we can get some
people jobs, then that's what we would really like. I
think your question earlier about, are you hiring within? Do
you bring people without just like any business, we would
have a management team come in, right? We have to
have consistency in training. We do have texts that live
down here that go to riverside. So we are very
conscious of trying to get somebody more quality of life.
So there will be some texts that come down here.
And that keeps our base strong and consistent. But we
do also go out to the tech schools as Mike
said. And we go out to the colleges for management
trainees. And what are those? We put college kids on
the counter and we train the business and they go
up through and we give them opportunity to become a
salesperson or a VP or whatever they want to be.
So we do have a lot of opportunity. A lot
of opportunity to bring, uh, talent in. It's a, it's
a, um, just like any trade out there. It's really
hard to get talent. So we welcome anybody that's willing
to come. Okay. Yeah. Cause we've, we've kind of battled
with Riverside for a long time. We're competition, but I
just would like our kids to get some training. And
it would be a good future for them because a
mechanic, they pay good money. You know, a lot of
kids aren't geared sometimes to go to the four year
college. But a trade school or something like that, you
know, they make good money. Okay. One more comment. What
do we have two buildings? This is very unique for
us because it really splits our management and how we
handle transactions and that. And the reason is March Air
Force base. There's a far ratio. We can only have
so many people in a building at the end of
that runway. It very much limits what can be built
there because you can't have a high density population within
a building on that lot at the end of the
runway. So we worked with them. And I think the
planners and everybody else, it's been years now, right? Uh,
so we split our, our workforce, office and technician so
that we could come within March Air Force bases requirements.
And I say that because it's very challenging aside from
the contamination cleanup and the amount of money we need
to spend to get this operational. It's very hard for
anybody else also to try to meet those, um, uh,
floor area ratios for March Air Force. Let's say nobody
can and we struggle to meet it. So we had
to get creative. And that's why we have two facilities.
So you won't see that everywhere. Um, but we're willing
to work to make everything, uh, be compliant and, you
know, kind of work within the letter of the law.
Okay. I'm glad you answered a lot of questions because
I'll be honest with you, um, I came in with
that elephant in my hand. And I, it had a
bad taste, actually. I didn't really care for what I
was reading. I think our legal counsel addressed some of
the elements in the room. Yeah. I would say take
the time you have a past like that. You know,
I know they're going to make you come to compliance
and do everything. And I'm sure that our facility is
going to be up to par. But it's just kind
of like I was looking at that. I was saying,
Oh my goodness. So just so you know where I'm
coming from. I know I really don't ask that many
questions do I guys. I'll stay very topside on this,
but I'll give you one last parting comment and then
we can open it up. Your state is one of
the most stringent and challenging to work for, uh, as
far as regulations. But a regulation doesn't mean you're doing
something wrong. It could be a procedural issue or it
could be a documentation issue. It doesn't mean you have
made a spill. It doesn't mean anything leaked. It could
be strictly paper oriented. So I'd encourage anybody to read
deeper into why and where everybody is coming around with
the information. And I think you might find that we're
not really the enemy of the community that many people
think. Thank you. Any other additional questions for the applicant.
Okay. Well, let me, let me say this. Uh, how
many speakers do we have right now. We presently have
five speaker cards, sir. Thinking we may need, we've been
up here an hour and a half. Now let's, yeah,
take a 10 minute break. Yeah. Let's take a 10
minute recess and then we're a week of being at
735.
All right, like to bring this planning commission back to
order at exactly 738 p. m. And it looks like
we're now going to move into the public testimony. The
clerk will call upon each person who has requested to
speak and remember that you have a maximum of three
minutes to speak. Do we have any speakers? Yes, Chair.
We presently have seven speakers. Our first speaker is Ishmael
Gonzalez, followed by Marco Hernandez, then followed by Tassiana Flores.
I want to begin by saying thank you to the
applicant for that long - winded explanation of his project
or their project. Thank you to Stacey Dunning for printing
out my seven page letter for Citistaff and the commissioners
to review. I think it's very thorough as to why
you should oppose this item. I want to direct you
to page for online. I know this is maybe unreliable
information, but I did pull people directed to Marina Valley
over this issue. I've received 75 responses with a majority
of them. 67 percent to be a cube exact saying
no that they would not prefer any more gas stations
or car washers. I think this can be considered a
gas station, but for trucks, right? And you heard from
commissioner Wilson that within a mile on Sonny Me Boulevard,
there are countless car washes, gas basins. We are plagued
as residents with how many of those businesses are here
in our city. I also want to, you know, just
remind you the first couple of questions I ask you
in this letter. Who are these applicants? What are the
relationship with Marina Valley? Are they interested in benefiting our
community? I will give you an observation here. There are
a lot of rich white people behind me who are,
I bring race. Why? I heard a lot of gasp,
right? Why? Because Marina Valley, according to the 2040 general
plan is overwhelmingly Latino Hispanic, almost 60 percent. So why
are these people coming here dressed with a quilted sweater
when it's 100 degrees out to propel to advocate for
this business? They do not live here. I'm like confident
of it. You could easily see what their response is
depending on what happens here. They're going to leave after
this item. The residents will stay here for the next
item, but I encourage them to stay all night if
they do live here. There are communities in Edmont, the
closest resident will be 220 feet away. 220 feet away
across the street. You are going to affect their lives
forever. You are basically sending them out of the city.
Their city staff in their report said that the residents
are out of compliance. Why? It's because of lack of
leadership in this management, in this city for decades. You
have forced them to be out of compliant. Let me
remind you, the Edmond community was originally known as Alessandro,
one of the most historic places in the city. And
now it's riddled with warehouses. That is why they're out
of compliance. And I mean, this letter speaks for itself.
It goes against what we have in mind for Renovelli
2040. The applicant says. Thank you.
Our next speaker is Marco Hernandez, followed by Tatiana Flores,
followed by Christopher Bacca. Good evening, Mered Valley. My name
is Marco Hernandez. I work for Wabash National here on
Alexandro 22135. You know, we're a truck buddy manufactured propinski.
Pinski is a well - respected vendor. Customer in the
transportation business. You know, for us, why is it important
for us to bring Pinskin Moreno Valley. Pinsky brings a
lot of business to Mary No Valley. Why? You know,
we employ at Wabash 200 employees when we ramp up
up to 250, 300 employees. Uh, 80 percent of our
employees work, you know, live in Reno Valley, uh, that's,
that's why it's very important that, you know, that, you
know, pinski's, uh, has this opportunity in Murrna Valley. They
bring a lot of, uh, a lot of business here.
And we're fortunate to partner up with Pinsky to not
only, you know, help the community also. But, uh, we're
very involved with Myrnal Valley during the, you know, holiday
season. Um, we're going to be ramping up, uh, in
the fourth quarter. And, um, you know, a lot of
employees are going to come out of, um, valley. We
hire a lot of, uh, residents here. We build all
the 26 footers, um, you know, all the 26 footers,
18 footers. Pinsky commercials, pinsky consumers, uh, we build, uh,
trucks for the food industry, uh, for pinski and users,
Costco, uh, Kroger, et cetera. So I'm just here to
represent Pinsky. And, you know, just, um, just communicating, you
know, communicating to the city valley, the residents, uh, Pinsky,
um, is, uh, you know, a valued, you know, customer,
very respected. And, um, you know, all in all, it's
going to be good for the community. Okay. Thank you.
My next speaker is Tatiana Flores, followed by Christopher Bacca,
then followed by Nikita Wilson. Hello, commission. Thanks for the
opportunity to speak again. My name is Tatiana Flores and
I'm a resident here in Moreno Valley in District 4.
Um, I'm here to express my opposition to this item
for the development of a new truck sales leasing fueling
and maintenance facility. According to the initial study provided with
this item, it is stated that the edge mount community
and Marino Valley as a whole canel face an additional
184 truck trips per day. This is concerning when the
nearest resident will be across the street around 220 feet
from the project site. You know, we just spent several
months discussing truck routes in the city and the importance
of the importance of keeping truck traffic away from sensitive
receptors, yet industry development continues to be proposed in a
community that is already overburdened with pollution exposure. According to
Calenvir screen and SB535, Edjmon is one of the most
disadvantaged communities in Moreno Valley with a 95, um, percentile
for pollution birding. Burden, sorry. In areas designated disadvantaged communities
and with heavy industrial usage, um, we require more meaningful
and thoughtful planning that is required to ensure that residents
do not continue to be harmed by future development. This
is another reason why we spent several years working on
the general plan update to ensure that this is the
blueprint for the next 15 to 20 years and that
it reflects what the community truly needs. This project alone
contradicts many of the goals outline for the city in
various different elements, including the environmental justice element that outlines
policies meant to reduce pollution exposure and improve community health.
This company has been mentioned earlier with sued up to
7 million dollars for several environmental law violations related to
their above ground storage tanks, hazardous waste control and hazardous
materials at facilities it operates in Riverside County. Um, I
know they said that, you know, it could have been
an issue of documentation, but they also mentioned in their
presentation that a lot of their staff is trained super
well and even sent out a state. So how did
that even happen? Like, how is this an issue that
happened? Um, so, um, yeah, those are some concerns that
I have. And I guess I would say please consider
your health and the health of your constituents when projects
like these come before you. And I know something in
the presentation that was mentioned was like, we find that
a lot of people that are using these trucks are
just moving like to go to school and stuff. Um,
so why. Why, why, why? But okay, thanks. Thank you.
Our next speaker is Christopher Baka followed by Nikita Wilson's,
then followed by Rory Blicker. Good evening again. There were
two, um, questions that weren't, were addressed but really weren't
clarified or didn't seem to mean much other than just
rhetoric. Just to say that they said something or addressed
the issue. One of them had to do with the
disposal of hazardous waste. The other one had to do
with, uh, the employment of people. Um, one of the
issues with the employment I would ask that you also
put conditions there that the upper management and people employed
are from Moreno Valley because most likely they're going to
bring in the 30 employees are going to bring in
are obviously going to be transfers from other areas and
like, uh, our other, um, speaker mentioned about the racial
issue. We have, you know, like raising canes that's in
the middle of the ghetto and you have nothing but
lily white people employed there, uh, Penske also, when they
come to their upper management, just like it's represented back
here is a lily white, um, uh, views and they
don't, um, necessarily hire upper management other than, um, uh,
their own kind. Um, not my kind, but, you know,
I don't have a kind of, we're, but certain aspects,
uh, always show their awful faces with, uh, with racial
hiring, uh, you see that in many of these million
dollar corporations. With that in mind, you know, you're bringing,
uh, this is a billion dollar corporation, uh, coming into
one of the most impoverished, um, areas in our city,
which is polluted, uh, they didn't answer the environmental issue
as far as a disposal of hazardous waste, uh, they
brought up legal console that just, I don't know what
they actually was talking about. Just nonsense just to make
it seem like she knows something or a dress that
issue, but it was all BS. Otherwise, uh, that needs
to be addressed to the area as far as, uh,
we have groundwater there. We have box greens mutual water
that is very sensitive that feeds all the lower income
disadvantage community of Edgemont. They're going to have car washes.
They're going to have hazardous waste. That needs to really
be addressed. Um, they also need to address the citizens
that live there. Why don't they reach out and go,
if they're so concerned like they claim with the community,
why don't they reach out and put, you know, higher
fences, may for give them some, um, air filtration, water
filtration, you know, just do something. You know, you come
into our community's and pollute it and make a billion.
And the community suffers. Thank you. Our next speaker is
Nikita Wilson, followed by Roy Blecker, thin followed by subcox.
In my comments are of my own. At this point
we can just call Marino Valley the city of trucks
and suds. Because if it's not a car wash or
a truck, we are tired of seeing diesels. I don't
care if they have pinskis on it. Disneyland, whatever. And
then to be getting right off the freeway, and that's
going to be the first thing people see is what?
What we are famous for, diesels, trucks. At this point,
we just should tell our kids to become mechanics or
something. Or, I mean, it's the representation that we are
giving for our city at a point has to become
better. And even with the, and I hate to sound
redundant about the jobs, it was very, very clear that
jobs were not spoken about for this community. Okay. It's
not, nothing is open to the community, but you can
rent the trucks, which I'm not against that because I
have brothers who are in the trucking business and they,
they like to rent trucks and deliver their goods and
those things. So I'm not opposed to that. That sounds
great. But we also need jobs for our residents. I
mean, and then stating that they go to colleges and
training facilities. Is that something that we can get commitment
to, not just a brazen, okay, this is what we
do. No, we need commitment that the, the colleges and
the training facilities in merino valley. That they will be
also hired. And so yet, I just want to speak
on that because I just find it at, at this
point, it's just really ridiculous. My 14 year old at
the time, she's 15 now, but she said at one
of our city hall meetings, uh, a city without places
together is a city that people leave. And I hate
for her to see that the only places to really
gather in merino valley is going to get a car
wash or going to get a truck to go to
college away from here. Thank you. Thank you. Our next
speaker is Roy Blecker followed by Seth Cox followed by
Manuel Topeli. So this is about three blocks from my
first home in my native area of edgemont. On top
of that. Back in the day, a guy named Roger
Penske and Les Richter and others owned a series called
the International Race of Champions or I Rock. Zoll served
raceway that Lesrector owned and they kept a, one of
the Camaro race cars for testing and stuff out there
in the old good year garage. Guess who used to
maintain that car. Yours truly. So I'm very familiar with
the term Penske perfect. Which has me a little bit
concerned. And I brought these concerns up many times and
a lot of this over 40 plus years of this
city. What concerns me about this is not so much
of what the project's going to do left or right
or up or down. It's how we present that. We
should have when we're coming up, and I've noticed this
in a lot of them, the presentations made by the
ones by the city staff and the project planners that
are proposing these things back in the day used to
be much better and much more specific of what. The
effects were going to be, good, bad and indifferent. Do
we know how many people are coming in? Are we
going to do this part? What part are these companies
coming in going to do the uplift the community. So
much we hear so much more. It's just the arguing,
hollering and back and forth. Instead of everybody working. To
make our home better for everybody. Business has got to
make money. I say that all the time. The only
no one color in that screen. So the purpose of
our public policy is to make sure that there's a
benefit to the community when they come in. Because this
is the basic shot you got to do it. So
hopefully in the future companies like Penske, entities like the
city of Marina Valley. Will give us better presentations and
more information so you can make better informed decisions. Because
like I've said many times up here. Comfortable with any
decision that's made as long as it's made on complete
and accurate information. And so many times we don't, and
especially now we don't get that. And I think that's
what causes a lot of the angst in the community
and what you hear at these meetings. One day, maybe
we'll fix it. Thank you. Our next speaker is Hefkotz
followed by Manuel Topelli. Evening commissioner staff audience. Anybody listening
out there in the world. I'm going to surprise everybody.
Gosh, you know I come up here most of the
time against most things. Okay. I won't say I'm against
this or for this, but I would like to give
a little history of what that property has been used
for in the past. I first came out here in
1977. Alright. March Air Force Base was what? Number one.
They did anything they wanted to. They could have emanated
the soil with operations they had out here cleaning companies.
They clean uniforms on a mass scale. What was the
property used for later on in life? Okay. It's been
vacant for how many decades. It was used for an
auction yard. Where they brought in caterpillars, tractors, semi trucks.
And they set their on the ground for a month's
own in leaking stuff into the soil. Nobody raised one
word about that. They just let it happen. They don't
do that anymore. Uh, they got to be small business
around there. But here we have a national company, probably
international company. I know Mr. Pinsky from what he does.
And Pinsky themselves does a lot for the community that
they're in. Okay. They're setting back here saying they will
clean up the pollution that they're at their expense. That's
a good thing. Right? Um, they're going to have employees.
Yes, they will hire some locals, but they'll have some
people that will move in. That's just the nature of
the beast. We as a city, I don't think can
dictate that all 31 of those people have to come
from arena valley. That is not lawful. We can't dictate
their employment policies. Okay. Um, what else? Good things. Um,
they pointed out they have a lot of community activities
blood drives, the peak program, some of the other ones
on there. They didn't mention something I'm aware of because
I work with charities. They have programs where charities can
sign a contract and they can do all the paperwork
they need to do and go in occasionally if they
need a truck. And get it at a discount rate
or sometimes free to go pick up stuff to bring
into the city to give out to people. That's a
good thing. So they can't stand up here and tell
you every community event that they support. But worldwide, pinski
supports. Everything most of the time good. Have they done
bad things? Sure. Every big company will. If you're a
multi - billion dollar company, you're going to have mistakes.
Okay. Things happen. I would say another word happens. But
it happens. So I don't know why we're giving them
such grief other than people want to ask questions. I'll
call it politicking. Okay. Let's face it. Thank you. Thank
you. Our next speaker is Manuel Topelli. Manuel Topete is
my name. They call me memo. I'm a business owner
here, Marino Valley for 36 years, but I've been a
resident of Marino Valley for 54 years. Now here's the
thing. I live right down the street from this project
is getting done. You guys are abusing. First of all,
you ain't spent a penny on anybody in Edgemont. We
got no lights. We got people getting killed on Alessandro
Boulevard. We just had a shooting. You guys are doing
nothing for the community. I've been in the same corner
36 years. People say you're not going to make it
in that corner. And guess what? 15 years ago I
came on this stage and I spoke out about another
developer just like this one. Highland Fairview. Okay. The next
day I was home invasioned. My teeth were knocked out.
My wife was tied up. And I was beat up
and no suspects. Now this is the problem. You guys
do not hold these developers accountable. As a merino valley
resident. You three up there who laughed at me and
blocked me on Facebook. Need to be held accountable. It's
time you guys move on and let young blood get
in there and do what needs to be done in
this city. Dejouned. Let's find out why he got fired
from the school district. Joanne, you announced you're running a
meeting. Give every other person the same ability that's running
for district to to come up here and say I'm
running in front of everybody. This is a TV ad
right here. And you're using it illegally. Where is the
people's safety in Edgemont. As much the original original capital
of Marino Valley. When you get up, when you get
off the freeway and you get off that freeway and
you see where are we in Mexicali. That is embarrassing
that you take our taxpayer funds. I want to know
where our taxpayer funds are going. The east side where
it's empty where ito is, is fucking nice. Brand new
lights, LEDs. And what do we got? Yellow lights. You
complain about a light. They change it like this and
put another yellow light in. You need to hold these
developers accountable. They come up here. They screw with your
head. Somehow an envelope gets in your guys'pocket and we
get screwed. Now this is the thing. It's got to
stop right now. Penske's going to do nothing for edge
one. Nothing. There's no room for trucks. There's no lights.
There's nothing for them to come in to edge one
and do what you guys need to do is finish
the bathroom and edjuand that you guys have been working
on for three months. Police don't come. Fire department don't
come. Let's get everybody held accountable. And I don't want
to go home and get home invasion again. Because no
suspects. Alright? So who's working with who? I know there
watching this. I need help. I can't do this by
myself. People are scared. I'm not scared. I'm here to
tell you I'm going to hold you guys accountable. Manual
stares been there 36 years against all odds. I made
it. I've been robbed over 30 times. Over 40 crimes
against me. Not one has been solved. You guys want
me out of hedge. One. So you can knock it
down. You illegally rezone my property from commercial or residential.
I lost over a million dollars. Nobody's sticking up for
me. Why? Somebody watching me. I know. Thank you.
Do we have any other speakers. We have no more
speaker cards, chair. Good. All right. If there's no more
speakers, then. We'll off that up the applicant, an opportunity
to come back up and maybe respond to comments if
you like. Thank you, Commissioners. And if there's anything specific
that you would like to direct me to address, I'm
happy to do so. Um, I think just to close,
I'd like to remind everyone that this has been a
very robust and comprehensive project processing. Timeline. Um, this project
went through. SQL review. All environmental impacts identified. We're either
mitigated or determined to be less than significant. As to
the air quality issues that folks were alluding to this
project individually and cumulatively is below all thresholds for health
risk, for lifetime cancer risk. All of those analyses are
performed. That's all part of the record before you this
evening. All those conclusions were developed by independent SQL consultant.
That's not a Penske document. Those are qualified experts coming
to those conclusions. Everything has been done in accordance with
the law. Specifically the environmental quality act. And so I
do want to emphasize that there were no corners cut
here. Um, this project went through a very robust and
rigorous review. We worked for several years with city staff
on this project. We did not make haste to come
before you with something that was incomplete. If the, um,
I can address specifically. I'm happy to do so. Thank
you. I would like to touch on the disposable waste.
Uh, where does that going to go? Because I mean,
they said that nobody really answered that question. Can you
answer that question? Yes. Absolutely. So again, a project is
always obligated to comply with the law. That's not a
condition of approval. That is a background requirement of doing
any business. And in disposing of hazardous waste, you have
obligations to comply with local fire code, coupa regulations and
overlying state health and safety codes and statutes, all of
which the operation must comply with to remain operational. And
we'll do so. Thank you very much.
All right. We'll now close the public testimony section at
804 PM and moving to deliberations.
You know, I don't know the deal here on Edmond.
I know they feel like it's a stepchild, but. I
don't let this project has to do with edgemon on
the other side of Alessandro. But, um, all I can
say is my experience with Pinsky's been very good because
I've worked with them on the corporate level. And they
do what they said they're going to do. So I
like the project. I think it's going to be an
asset to that part of the town down there. I
know a lot of people don't agree with that. But
I think it's going to be an asset. So that's
where I'm at on it. Okay. Thank you. And my
understanding is, is that the soil was contaminated long before.
And they're going to clean all that up. As far
as the houses that are there and they're very close
to other warehousing, that's Riverside. Anything on that old 215
on the other side, that's all Riverside. Riverside put that
up there way before anybody could even build anything in
adjunct. Because edgemont's infrastructure was not very good at all.
Once they started building there, they kind of been able
to tie in. So bottom line is, is that for
us to get the blame on all those warehouses, those
weren't ours. They're not ours. So the demographics there is
totally off for people to say that that's what we're
building on there. And, uh, this is actually a business.
This is not a warehouse. This is a business. And,
uh. You can't build too much on the. You've got
bass right by there. So they can't even put solar.
I mean, they would put solar if they could. I
mean, I just, uh, and they are employing a lot
of people because they're actually got a contract with, um,
WABAS. So by even seeing that, I basically, um, don't
know what else could actually really go there. You can't
put a shopping center there. So let's get that out
of our heads right now. I don't believe we could
put a shopping center there and have, you know, people
there. So, um, they're not really going to be causing
a lot of traffic because it's not like, um, a
U - Haul. U - Haul's coming in and out
all the time. And they are supplying other people that
are already in our city. They're doing business with Penske.
Maybe they don't have the penske logo on there. Like
he said, but I'm sure that they are doing that.
So a lot of people, they get very upset. They
storm out. They do whatever, you know. And anybody can
come up to the diocese and say whatever they want.
But, um, when I walked in here, I came in
with like a bad taste in my mouth with Penske.
I really did. And I wanted to hear everything. That's
why I asked question after question after question. Because I
want to make sure that I make a good informed
decision. That's my job up here. People don't like it.
It's not a popular thing to be. It's not a
popularity contest. I really don't care. I have to do
what I feel is right for the city that I
live in and have been here for 40 years. I'm
not somebody to just move here. TF5, 10 years ago.
I've been here a long time. I know what Edgemont
looked like. And hopefully we can start getting better businesses.
That's why he said I would like the aesthetics to
look really nice coming into the city. Because it has
been a blight there for so long. You've got, I
know exactly what you got next door because I used
to go there all the time. To, uh, service my
car. I know the owners of that place. But there's
not much you can do if it's an auto body
place. You know, you can't really do much there. But
that's my, my concern is if we could at least
make it look nice. And it's coming into our side
of town. Like I said, the other side of town,
Riverside has always done what they wanted. And then we
can do about it. And a lot of people are
wondering why those houses are out of compliance. That's why.
That's why Ishmael that it's out of compliance. Those houses.
That's why, because Riverside just put all them warehouses there.
Well, this is all basically, I think this is the
only thing that can basically be a value to the
city to even go there. And like I said, once
I heard that wall bash has a huge contract with
them in a valley, they're employing them. And not that,
you know, I just, you know, I think it's going
to be a good fit for that area because they're
going to clean it up. All those things that were
there were prior. To them even getting on there. And
they're going to clean up all that stuff. And as
far as the lawsuit, they're going to have to put
the fight just like we had the fire put to
us by the attorney general. They're going to have their
feet to the fire and a magnifying glass on them.
And that's just the way it is. When something like
that happens, believe me, they're not going to let them
skip or, or do anything. So I'm leaning toward, um,
voting for it. You got some.
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I hear
a lot of things. It's, um, sometimes it does get
emotional. This is my 57th year in the city. And,
uh, I used to live right on the corner band
day, lived there for years, walked back and forth from
band day to marina Valley High School on a daily
basis. So Edmond is really where I started. When actually
the 215 wasn't the old 215, it was a 215.
He's drive up and down the 215 run. Yeah. Yeah.
Oh, 395. And it changed to the 215. It was
before it turned into a street. I think one of
the things that happens here is there's two things. Laws
do change. And we have, uh, if people don't know
what A luck is, that's the, uh, airport. I didn't
get that right airport land use commission. Over the years.
Some of that has changed because March Air Forces there
back in, you could put houses there right now with
the new laws, most of the edgemod wouldn't even be
there because you couldn't put houses there because of the
planes flying over it. Um, you know, we get a
lot of folks. We actually get the same folks that
come in and, you know, their environmentalists and they, you
know, everything would be nice if they were parks. You
know, and waters and lakes and dog parks and stuff
like that. But I really don't think someone's going to
spend millions of dollars on a piece of land and
put a park there. Um, it'd be nice. If every
place there was a warehouse. It was a park, but
people do come to the city to put businesses in.
The thing that people have to understand is this. We
do have land that is business park. We do have
lens that is designated for commercial. We do have land
that is specified for those uses. And we got to
understand if that's what's going to, that's going to happen.
You know, it can't stop every commercial building and every
business part from coming in the marino valley. I wish
to, you know, be great as all houses. One of
the things also was that we are, we are evolving
into, for instance, you build apartments. You can't wash your
car at an apartment because unless you can somehow get
that hose in your window and out to where your
car is parked. It's not going to happen. Because you're
not going to plug F and an apartment at a
general faucet and the apartment's going to pay for that
water. Um, because you're washing your car. Those, I think
we put up 179. Every time we build apartments, every
time we put that type of use here in the
sea, a couple of things are going to happen. I
mean, we're looking for storage. And then we're looking to
wash their car. There's a couple of other things that's
going to happen. And I get it. I get it
that Marino Valley used to be this very small place.
I've been in this city longer than anybody in this
building. No? Okay. Longer than anybody in this building and
I get it. It's changing. I think right now we're
the 44th largest city in California. And we're still growing.
And we still have a lot of land out to
the east and it's going to grow even more. And
growing, you've heard it. There are growing pains. I get
that. However, like I said, I've said this before, that
dirt is going to turn into something. And I wish
it could be houses. I wish it could. But that,
that, that the A luck laws have changed. You can't
put houses there anymore. Can't even put, you know, solar
panels there because of the glare. You can't build certain
things that have glare that would obstruct the landing or
takeoff a plane. And that's change. And guess what folks?
We have to change with that. We do. Um, you
know, I, I, I wish we could stay the same.
And, you know, the poor guy that had the horse
and buggy, then somebody decided to invent a motorized car.
And then if he didn't change or, you know, before
Pac Bell or Marbelle was back and somebody decided to
create fiber optics. And guess what? You have to change.
I remember using Thomas guides and paper maps. And then
pretty soon somebody comes along and now I can use
my, uh, right there under my screen on my computer.
You have to change. So, um. One of the things
that the planning commission is, um. Tasks to do is
if we were to look at a project and say,
we're going to deny a project, we have to look
at very specific things to do that. And it isn't
that we can just say, well, I, I don't want
it there. There's too many of them. Stuff like that.
We can create lawsuits for the city. You know, and
we don't want to do that. We don't want to
do that either because guess what? Now we're harming the
city as well. Um. I looked at the project and
I'm like, wow. I, you know, I actually glad that
things are going in the edge mark because that was
one of the last frontiers that seem like a lot
of development skipped. And went into the, into the city
and just edmont stayed older until we started coming up
days tree. And there's portillos and all that. And that's
fantastic. For me myself, I'm for the project. I think
it's great. We got to, now we have, and please
forgive me the quein phrase. We have, we have the
high end U - Haul. You know, and yeah, this
apples down. But, um, like my colleague said that my
car is more like the pinski and she's driving the
U - Haul, you know, Murner Valley does want better
things here. We absolutely do. And we want higher in
businesses here. And we want people that thrive and we
want people to get hired and stuff like that. And
we don't want everything that gets stopped. I just want
people to understand. Just get that like in your heads.
That empty land is going to go. And if it's
zoned for that. They're coming. Because we're putting up houses.
We're putting up apartments and people need to have jobs.
It's going to happen. Now again, everything is not going
to go through the approval process. Um, but when somebody
comes in and they're dotting eyes and they're crossing tees
and they're helping clean up trash that we have created
a long, long time ago, that's a good thing. And
guess what? Lawsuits are also good things just like some
of the losses that we see. It puts people on
point. You have to do the things that are prescribed
within the lawsuit. And that's a good thing. I'd rather
the lawsuits that they had happened before it came here.
And then we have to do it. No, it's a
good thing. And so that's my two cents. I like
the project. I just have a closing thing to say,
even though, um, in a roundabout way, the way I
see it, um, they may not be actually, it's for
Pansky, but it isn't just for Penske because their employee,
by the gentleman that came up, I'll go back to
the wall bash. They are actually working with Penske. Then
the other ones working with Penske that are in this
city. So they are actually providing a need in the
area for, and that's not, you know, they're not going
to come here unless it is economically viable for them.
To be able to come here. They're not going to
put a big old Penske hub here simply because they're
not going to do good business within the city, within
the surrounding area. So I just think it's actually, um,
a good thing. And there is a need for it.
So that's where I'm at with. You know, it's kind
of like what the online shopping, you know, the more
we online shop. These stores don't have storefronts and they're
going to have to put their stuff somewhere. And that
means a warehouse. We want our stuff to show up
at our front doors. We want our ease. We want
the convenience. But we want, do we don't want the
growing pains that go along with that. We got to
get out of that line of thinking. Um, what do
you got? Well, the only thing I would say is
besides wall bash. I'm sure they buy tires locally and
the lubricants and all that's going to come out of
Marino Valley somehow. At least the general area. So it's
not only what they're doing. It's kind of vulp a
bunch of other businesses. I'm sure you buy maybe by
contract. But it'll eventually like wall bashes a big deal
there for them. And, um, it's a dominance. Yeah. I'm
glad. Yeah. I think it is a domino effect. So
I think it's a good deal. Do a motion or.
Okay. Let's move on this adopt resolution. How about this
one right here? Yeah. Resolution, um, 2026 - 28. Then
also adopting the initial study mitigated negative declaration prepared for
the plot plan PEN 22 - 0250, which is completed
and compliance with SEQA and the SQL guidelines and reflects
the planning commissions independent judgment and analysis of the proposed
project potential environmental projects and also adopting the, uh, mitigation
and monitoring and reporting program prepared for the proposed projects,
potential environmental impacts. We're going to adopt resolution 2026 -
29 at proving the plot plan PEN 220250 subject to
the attached conditions of approval included and exhibit A on
the resolution 2026 - 29. And as shown in the
approved plan. And I'll second that. We have a vote.
Alright. The motion does carry. Uh, do we have a
staff wrap up. Yes, we do chair. The motion passes
30, the project is approved. There is now a 10
- day appeal period. Any person who wishes to appeal
the project must submit an appeal application and the required
fee to the community development department within 10 calendar days
of the hearing. Thank you. All right. The next item
on the agenda's item number two, which is a plot
plan, which is PEN 22 - 0215 in district one.
Do we have a staff report. Thank you, Chair. We
have given the presentation today our associate planner. Our associate
planner. I would like to hang on just one second.
I'd like to rewind the public to please remain respectful.
And please allow us to speak so that we can
hear what's going on. This is a hearing. Just a
reminder. Thank you, Chair. Our associate planner, Dijun Patel, will
be presenting the next item. Good evening, Chairman and members
of the Planning Commission. Dijun Patel Associate Planner. The project
before you this evening is to request to consider a
plot plan for the development of a new 4, 767
square foot automated car wash. And associate parking and landscape
improvements. The proposed project is permitted used by write subject
to the upper wall of a plot plan. Staff has
reviewed the project for consistency with the development standards and
provisions set for the in the city citizen municipal code.
The proposed project is located on the east side of
pigeon pass road between ironwood, avenue and hemlock avenue. The
site is located within the community commercial CC zone which
allows the use. So rounding land users include an apartment
development to the north, a home depot to the west.
A commercial shopping center to the south and a storage
facility to the east. The prepose project involves development of
4, 767 square foot single - story commercial building. For
the operation of an automated car wash on a 1.
02 acre vacant parcel. The project site is accessible via
two new drivers along the northeast side of pigeon passroad.
The sudden driveway allows both entry and exit. While non
- driver is for exit only. Both the drivers also
serve as the project sites, emergency access route. Redestrian walkways
are uprotted throughout the project site for adequate pedestrian circulation.
The side provides total of 29 on - site parking
spaces, including 25 standard parking. With vacuum stations, 4 employee
spaces, and 2 AD spaces with 1 for the standard
use and one for the employees. The number and the
type of parking spaces complies with the immensible code requirements.
Reply's project features a modern commercial design featuring a mix
of high quality materials and distinctive architectural elements. Exterior surface
will be finished with smooth sand floor stucco painted and
corniate color schemes of page, white, orange red, warm -
up and brown tones, resulting in a genuified visually appealing
facade. The project includes a comprehensive landscape plan with landscape
setbacks, parking lot landscape landscaping, street trees and perimeter plantings
around the project site. The proposed landscaping is indetted to
enhance the oral appearance and experience of the development while
complying with the city's municipal code for landscaping requirements. Following
the further review staff has requested the addition and modification
of conditions of approval, planning condition number 10, staff has
requested a condition number 10 be modified to address noise
associated with the drive - thru operation. Under the proposed
condition, the project would utilize a silent strike system and
also the noise level should not exceed the 55 decibels
at any time beyond the property line consistent with the
applicable provisions of the municipal code. Staff also requested the
addition of conditions. For the site access and driver design.
The prepose driveways would be required to confirm to the
city's standard plan for commercial driveway approaches. Access would be
provided as follows. Dry V1, notherly right turn out ecrest
only. Drive it to southerly right in, right out only.
Appropriate signing and strapping would be provided as required. The
purpose project complies with the section 9. 0 to 0.
070 plot plan and on applicable development standards of the
zoning code. Staff recommends that planning commission adopt resolution number
2026 - 02 and thereby determining that the plot plan
220215 is exempt from the prohibition of the CEQA. As
a class 32 exemption info development. In accordance with SQL
guidelines section 15332 and also approving the plot plan PEN22
- 0215 subject to the attach conditions of approval included
as exhibit A of resolution number 2026 - 2 and
as amended. To public comments have been receipt for the
project. This concludes staff's presentation. I'm available for any questions.
Also present with us tonight is the applicant steam as
well. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any commissioner questions
for staff. Um, while reading through this
I saw a couple things that don't really seem to
see this all the time. Did this... Did I read
this correctly it says that the proposed project is consistent
with the goals, objective, policies and programs of the general
plan. Alright the proposed project, this is a question is
correct, the proposed project complies what all's zoning in other
regulations. So that's correct. So, okay.
Yeah, not bad. Any questions. Alright, we're going to now
open up the public testimony at 828 PM. And what
the applicant like to speak.
Good afternoon chairman, dejeunette and members of the Moreno Valley
Planning Commission, uh, it's a pleasure to present to you
this evening. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is
Michael Paul's. I'm the applicant's representative. With me this evening.
Um, are the, or is the architect of record Mr.
Andrew Pisterico as well as the property owner Mr. Ahmed
Serrafi. This gentleman. Uh, to begin my presentation, uh, we're
proposing a quiet environmentally friendly water saving car wash, uh,
which consists of 4, 767 square feet of car wash
building in conjunction with 25 quiet vacuum stalls. Our proposed
car wash utilizes state of the art equipment, which recycles
up to 90 percent of the water used in the
wash process. The proposed vacuum stalls incorporate an exceptionally quiet
centralized vacuum system, which will be completely enclosed inside a
building. Again, um, as articulated by staff, uh, our request
is consistent with the goals objectives of the general plan
and the project also complies with all of the development
standards of the zoning code and underlying community commercial zoning
designation, which permits car washes as a principally permitted use.
I'd like to, uh, discuss some of the community benefits.
Um, associated with car washes. Uh, car wash capacity. Uh,
is underrepresented, uh, in the surrounding community. The closest express
car wash is the GO car wash on Frederick Street,
a small - ish car wash approximately half a mile
south, uh, which comprises 13 vacuum stalls for customer use,
um, the next closest would be the eye wash, uh,
express smallish, excuse me, accessory car wash located approximately one
mile from the subsight and provides eight vacuum stalls. And
the lastly, uh, the closest comparable express car wash is
the quick quack car wash, uh, which is located approximately
1. 5 miles from the subject site. I'd also like
to point out that there are no express car washes
north of the 60 freeway. So the question offer often
arises, why are car wash is important to a community?
Well, the simple answer is the car washes save water.
And they removed pollutants that would otherwise be washed off
the car if a car were to be washed in
the street or, or in a driveway. In this world
in which we live where water is becoming a scarcity,
new automatic car washes are viewed as an important environmentally
friendly drought tolerant use. And let me give you an
example of why car washes are important. When we service
a car, when we wash a car, we use anywhere
between five and 12 gallons of water during the wash
process. The remainder is recycled. If an individual were to
wash their vehicle in their driveway, should they have a
driveway? Um, they would be using anywhere between 80 and
120 gallons and up to 200 gallons of water. That
water that in this driveway wash or a street wash,
um, would wash all the soap, would wash all the
brake dust, the oil, the grit that collects on the
car. All of that would flow into the curb and
gutter system. And it would wind up in our storm
drains, in our rivers, in lakes, and our local ocean
environment. Um, whereas a single wash does not make that
much of a difference. The tens of thousands, hundreds of
thousands, millions of washes, uh, that occur in driveways and
on streets, cumulatively are a, uh, are a major environmental
issue in Southern California. When we wash a car, um,
all of those constituents, all of that pollution gets washed
off the car. It gets collected in our recycling clarifier
system. Um, and then it is disposed of in environmentally
appropriate fashion. Some additional project information. Uh, the site is
going to incorporate high definition security cameras providing 100 percent
coverage of the entire property, both inside and out. We're
going to be providing a DVR system, which is going
to record the images and maintain them for a period
of 60 days. We'll also be providing lighting, which will
encompass the entire site, inclusive of the sidewalks along pigeon
pass road, fronting the property without impacting adjacent and adjoining
properties. We're going to incorporate solar rooftop solar, um, as
part of the project. And I'd also like to indicate
that this project represents over an eight million dollar investment
in the Moreno Valley community, which utilizes again, state of
art technologies. Uh, we will also be creating 15 new
jobs in the community and give preference to Moreno Valley
residents, especially those individuals that can walk bicycle or use
public transportation. Incoming to work. Additionally, and most importantly, um,
we're also providing marinal valley residents with a choice of
selecting green, tolerance services within their own community. Um, with
that, um, that concludes my presentation. I would like to
make myself available for any questions. And, uh, I would
also like to introduce the next speaker, the property owner,
Mr. Ahmed Seraphi. Good evening, Council Members. Planning commission. My
name is Amedsorafi. I am the applicant, the owner of
the property, uh, in question. And I just wanted to
come up here for a few minutes and want to
introduce myself to you as a aspiring new business owner
in the city as well as the developer and the
builder of the project. A couple of things that I
just wanted to point out because these are important to
me because the way I grew up and the way
I lived my life is because you do things right
the first time. I've been around many projects, many developments
where people cut corners. And they spend a lifetime fixing
things. Right. I have built and been part of a
very large project teams. I have built colleges civic centers,
city halls. I've been part of a lot of public
construction. I really understand the process and the benefit of
building things right the first time. So a few things
about me. I am not from out of the area.
I live 20 minutes away in Rancho Cucamonga. I've lived
in the Empire for getting close to 20 years now.
I have been coming to Marina Valley for most of
my life, whether it's going to, uh, the Air Force
Base for air shows with my grandparents or attempting to
learn how to water ski 40 years ago in Lake
Paris, which was a disaster, uh, by itself. Um, a
few things also that, um, when they talk about is,
um, I already have a management team in place. One
of my best friends, Carlos Prochtla here in the first
row. He is also a citizen and living here in
the city of Murneau Valley as well as his assistant
manager also living in the city of Marino Valley as
well. So my, my team has already started Carlos Springs
25, 30 years of retail experience of managing and operating
some of the largest retail establishments and businesses in the
country. And he's bringing that skill set to the car
wash that we are going to be building here in
Marino Valley. Carlos is also, and he can confirm this
that, you know, our employees for this type of business
are living in the community. And this type of business
will bring in employees at a maximum of three miles
from the property. Meaning all 15 employees most likely will
be from Marino Valley. And the very strong chance and
I will encourage Carlos to make sure as many of
the employees as possible are from here in the community
name. Another thing about me, I am not a 250
billion dollar hedge fund. I don't have a quacky car
wash with 200, 300 locations across the country. We are
a small family company here on Sunday, California where we
live, play, and work. And responsible for the communities that
we also live in. Another thing I like to point
out now these is an estimate and the numbers are
not solid, but looking at our pro forma and our
anticipated numbers. In terms of property tax and sales tax
that we will bring to the city. We're hoping to
hit on year one at least a hundred thousand dollars
tax to the city, uh, at least 100, 000 dollars
year one and growing from there on out, which would,
I would hope to, uh. Provide, you know, whether city
services or hiring additional staff or things like that. Another
thing I like to point out also is when I
build things, I do things the right way. I build
with the best materials with my best contracts, my best
people. Meaning my property will have solar panels, which, uh,
Mr. Paul's already spoke about. We're not going to put
cheap flimsy canopies over the vacuums. We're going to put
structural steel panels over that. We're going to have 163
solar panels generating up towards 75 percent of the power
that we consume on site. Meaning for every kilowatt that
we use, we will be generating three quarters of that
on site. Meaning we're only going to be generating requiring
a quarter of a comparable properties energy requirement. As for
the environmental issue, I'm a big environmental in person. I
recycle every bottle. You should see the back of my
car. It's full of the plastic bottles. They all go
through recycling center. And when it comes to the environmental
issue on this, our equipment is electric. So we're not
using, um, loud compressors. We're not using hydraulic oils. We're
not using anything that can hurt the environment that way.
Nothing is going to be seeping into the ground as
well as our water recliimed system, which Mr. Paul spoke
about. We will be recycling 90 percent of the water
on site. And what is not recycled, uh, goes into
three stage clarifier system. Which is part of my equipment
package. I'm going to be spending close to 2 million
dollars on just equipment alone for this property. Meaning water
reclaim system reverse osmosis, the car wash equipment, the vacuum
equipment, as well as, uh, high tech VFG dries for
my vacuums to keep them extra quiet during the day
as well. So, you know, I'm not here to cheap
it and build quick, build fast, sell it, turn it
over to someone and walk away. I live 25 minutes
away. This is a business that is for me and
my family. We've been in the community for the last
40, 50 years here in the inland empire. And I'm
looking forward to working with the city, with the staff,
with you members of the Planning Commission and anyone else
to, to, uh, to be a productive and contributing member
to the city as well. Thank you. Thank you. Are
there any commissioner questions for the applicant? I'm not trying
to make any comparison whatsoever with the operation that's there
on Alessandro. And I believe it's Graham. Is it similar
to that one. Um, I, if you would give me,
it's the only great big car wash. We do have
in this city. It's, it's really, it's a, you drive
through it. And it's a big one. And then they
have all that stalls. Does anybody beyond down there? Beyond.
Is it called Bianca words? It started off some different
owner. And I went to that when it first opened
years ago. And then, um, I think they changed hands.
Is that the one behind the gas station? No, no.
It's been there for a long time. Is it Graham
and or is it. Gramman Elisandro? Ram and Alessandro. And
if you told me the name of the business, I
would know it. It's probably a quick quack. It may
be. Did it turn to quick whack? I haven't been
on that area for a while. It wasn't quick back
to begin with. Mr. Pauz is aware of the location.
Yeah. Yes, I am aware of the site. The site
was actually developed on, um, uh, it's kind of behind
a little strip ball. It is behind somewhat of a
strip mall. It's also built on a unique parcel of
land that has, uh, the state water system that runs
through it. So it's very limited. Um, is it similar.
It's, it's, it's, yes or no. Yes and no. Um,
it is similar in the sense that it is an
express car wash, um, it's similar in that, uh, the
requirements, uh, they're imposed by the state of California are
similar to the requirements that, that, uh, will be imposed
on this project. Uh, where it is not similar is
the quality of the machinery, the quality of the car
wash itself. The dryers, um, the, um, the, the investment,
uh, that's being made by, by Mr. Sarah. I'm just
trying to get a visual on what it kind of
going to look like. Cause the quick wax look totally
different. So when somebody said it was a quick crack,
I didn't think it was a quick quack. They have
a duck. Do they have a duck on their? I
don't know. I don't need to go to the iron.
I don't have a duck. I don't know about that,
but I'm, I'm not in. You have a pigeon. An
eagle, right? All the equipment that's going to my car
wash is manufactured here and then I just wanted to
know more or less what it's going to look like.
Cause I know that there are different types of looks
to the car washes. So when I develop property, I
develop for the long term because I'm a long -
term owner. Right. So meaning that the style and the
design of the property would be consistent with something that
you would see for the long camera in Southern California.
If it's an apartment complex, it's built Spanish style with
how roofs and white stucco. So it means like I
don't want to go and have a quick gimmicky look
that is. Okay for five or seven years. Then all
of a sudden it's outdated and all that. I want
something that's going to stamme the testament of time and
have a design and look to it that will look
good for the next 50 years versus the next five
years. Right. So when I say my projects have red
tile roofs, they have white stucco. They have traditional sun
in the California landscape versus steel and glass and all
this modernism that you see that looks good for a
number of years, but times change some styles do. Some
styles don't. So whatever I build, I like to have
a timeless design to it. Okay. Yeah. Just the, I
know that you're saying, yeah, the other one has windows.
And you can see the car going through and stuff
like that. I just want to kind of get how,
you know, what it was going to look like. Okay.
Did I catch that correct? We have two managers that.
Are city residents, Carlos and, uh, okay. Carlos's wife. That's
what I'm talking about, Carlos. The question is who's going
to be the manager and who's going to be the
assistant manner? Right. No, she's, she's managing it. Carlos, you
got to come to work on time. Any other questions.
Well, thank you. I appreciate it. All right. We're now
moving the. Public comments. The clerk will call up on
each person who has asked it to speak just a
reminder. You have three minutes to speak. If you are
speaking, just keep your eye on the timer that it
would be just, uh, to your right there. Do we
have any speakers. Yes, chair. We presently have three speaker
cards. Our first speaker is Ishmael Gonzalez followed by Lisa
Ariano, then followed by Tayana Forrest. Hello again. Um, let
me begin by, uh, first saying with all due respect,
I think, uh, from, as a resident, uh, I want
to say same on all of you for that vote,
uh, same, uh, commissioner baker, uh, specifically with all due
respects here. I don't know you, but I think it
was a saintful admission of you to say that you
just worked for Penske and approved their project for the
most historic place in Maryland Valley. I'm here looking at
the settlement announcement. The district attorney Lauren R. Martini now
of the environmental protection team. I hope that the residents
are able to, I'm speaking to you all, Mirano Valley.
I'm hoping you could talk to her and see what
her thoughts are considering that Penske just settled for seven
million, uh, I'm the Riverside location. That's the same. We
just there's another facility not too far off. With this
item. I think Commissioner Joanne Stefan sticked your guns. Please.
You're the one that directed staff to take a look,
uh, study system into these kinds of properties, uh, these
types of uses with car washes. Again, 67 percent of
75 people residents said no to not wanting anymore. There
are more than 18. Already in the city. I think
that's very sainful, you know, uh, where are the diversity
of businesses, the variety of businesses that, uh, you guys
just approved in April, the general plan 2040, you guys
indicate on so many fronts, um, let's see, land use
character goals, economic goals, circulation goals, noise goals, environmental justice
goals, healthy community goals. All of those are being affected
by this proposal and the last. And it's really a
shame that you guys approved all of this. You guys
spent so much time. And now you guys are still
considering projects that go against the general plan, uh, it's
really, it breaks my heart to be honest, you know.
I can't believe that we're even considering having more car
washes here when there is a study sussing coming up.
Where is that? Where are you guys like, can we
get the ball moving on that please here we have
another instance where there's a car wash. I looked on
Google Maps to see where the next one is. There
is an arco on Hemlock. I called that Arco. The
worker there answered, I don't know who it is, but
they did answer the Arcos number and they did tell
me that they have a car wash there. It might
be broken right now, but they do have it. And
that's less than a thousand feet away from this proposal
site. You are going to stick this project right next
to apartments and homes within a hundred feet will be
the closest resident. We are becoming the laughing stock of
Riverside County. Dame. Thank you.
Do you have any other speakers? Yes, sir. I'm sorry.
Having a technical difficulty. Our next speaker is Lisa Ariano
followed by Tatiana Flores. Thank you. Good evening planning commissioners.
My name is Lisa Ariano and I'm a 26 year
resident of Marina Valley and I've lived on the north
side for the last 12 years. The proposed project would
be something that I would pass every day going to
and from work. And I'm speaking in opposition of this
project. Over the last couple of months, I have been,
um, meeting many residents, especially in district two and overwhelmingly,
our residents are saying we have too many car washes
in marina valley. Marino Valley residents want more useful and
diverse businesses. I know the last speaker spoke about the
various car washes in this area, but also somebody mentioned
about a mile and a half up towards hemlock. There
was a quick quick car wash that was open that
is large in size comparable to this car wash. So
I think that with this vacant land, we could be
using it to support retail dining family services or another
business meeting an unmet need in the community. I do
understand that this, uh, area is a community commercial district
intended to meet residence general shopping needs through a variety
of businesses and services. And so I, what I didn't
see in the staff report was a market demand for
a car wash, a commercial saturation analysis. And so my
main question to the planning commission is what evidence shows
that another car wash meets an unmet need or contributes
to the variety intended for this commercial corridor. This is
a large car wash 25 stalls is, is, is a
lot right next door is an apartment complex. And this
business would basically be open every day. All day, every
day seven days of the week. And I do understand
that there's conditions to the project being approved that do
address the noise, the disruptive activity, the vacuum sounds, the
vehicles, the disturbances to the surrounding properties. But, and I
am concerned about all of those, but I'm also concerned
about the traffic. The area that this is going to
be in is right in front of Home Depot in
an area where there's numerous traffic accidents that happen annually
because the stop sign or no light. So I, I
would ask that you consider before even thinking about this
project that you would consider the current inventory of operating,
approved or pending car washes, a market demand and saturation
analysis and clearer evidence about the noise traffic and compatibility
with the neighboring apartments. Even though a use may be
permitted, the commission must still determine whether it is the
right use for this location and whether it advances the
commercial diversity merino valley residents are asking for. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next speaker is Tatiana Flores.
If she's not here, we have no more speaker cards,
chair. If they're no more speakers,
we're going to close the public testimony at 852 PM
and move into deliberations.
Yeah. Go for it. Okay. Well, the thing is with,
um, the car washes, if they're already coming down the
pike and the developer wants to build what he wants
to build, it meets all the requirements. What people don't
understand sometimes is that we don't say what goes on
somebody's property. Just like if you want to build on
your property, you can build. And if it meets all
the requirements and you've gone through all the planning, you
can do it. And the thing is, is that area
is zoned for that. It meets all the requirements. There
is a shopping center right next door to it. It's
been there for many, many years. In that parcel, I
go buy it every single day because I do live
in district too. Um, we don't have one like this.
There's only one other car wash that's even close to
it. Now we do have a lot of those real
quick car washes that go through the arco. They go
through the star mart or go through all those convenience
stores. But one like this, we really don't have. In
that area. And I don't really, um, you know, we
can't say, Oh, you can't build that there. And then
we get sued. People don't realize that's why we go
to academies. We go to, uh, learn all the laws
or regulations. So the city does not get in hot
water and doesn't get sued because we get some people
up here that don't know what they're talking about. That's
what's going to happen. I don't plan on being here
forever. But I'm just hoping that my predecessor will at
least know what they're doing when they're sitting up here.
Because that's the last thing merino belly needs is another
lawsuit. So people can say, you know, we got a
lot of car washes. And yes, we do need to
study it, but we can only say we need to
do this. We can only present it to staff. But
it takes time to do that. And some people don't
realize that. So it's not us. That makes these decisions.
Dave. And also the commission. I mean, the, the council.
They make those kind of decisions. We got people that
we have to answer to. So basically if the developer
meets all the requirements, we can't just say, well, no
more call rushes. Just like we couldn't say no more
pot shops. We could actually maybe say we only want
so many, but it has to go through channels. Everything
is a process. And some people can just say, you
know, but if there's a viable reason, a safety and
hazard, um, the accidents there. There is up there where
Jose's was on Ironwood and pigeon pass. Yeah. There's a
lot of those. I don't see so many coming on
that area. I don't know. Uh, you know, you can
check with, uh, the police department on that one. But
people can come up here and say all kinds of
things and try to put us on the hot seat,
but we're here to do a job. And, um, he's
doing everything that he's supposed to do. And I don't
really see a viable reason. We don't really have one
like that. All those other ones aren't even really being
used anymore. You go to the gas stations. I don't
see very many cars going through that kind of a
car wash. Yeah. The quick quack. And then even the
quick whack wasn't even being used that much up there
by sprouts. They had to get a big old sign
and bringing people and say you could have a free
car wash just to drum up business. So, um, I
really, really feel like, you know, people are trying to
think that we're the ones that bring in these projects.
We don't. But on the other hand, unless we have
a viable reason to deny a project, we can't do
it. And I'm just letting the public know that. I'm
not up here. It's not a popularity contest.
Uh, gender and I, we do utilize car washes and
we used to wash it home there. And it's just
a takes you an hour to get everything out. And
you can go through the car wash. And now you
can buy the memberships and makes it a lot easier.
So I think this is a good, good looking. I
like the aesthetics of this. It's unbelievable. It's a big,
big plus for that end of town. So I like
it a lot. I think we can make it work.
Thank you. The free enterprise system says if there you
can still compete. And I think we have 18 car
washes here in the city. And again, we're growing. The
more houses, the more apartments we put in. There's probably
going to be more people coming out here looking to
put in a car wash. Got to understand that's part
of the growing. Now I'm not, now again, I absolutely
agree with, uh, Mr. Joanne over there. The planning commission
does not go out. Look at an empty plot of
land, go over and say, Hey, can you come over
here and buy this? That's not even anywhere near. We
say, I get it. People want restaurants. People want these
other types of businesses they want, you know, the diversity
and this and that and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But guess what? We don't go out and say put
a Ruth Christ here. You know, I need you to
come out here and spend two million dollars on this
land and build that restaurant. That's not even anywhere near
the scope that the planning commission does. And I think
people think that when, cause I hear them say you
put this here, you do that. You know, no, no,
no, we don't put that. There's land out there for
sale. If you wanted to go out there and buy
that land and you wanted to put a business down
there and you wanted to go within the zoning and
the scope of sequence of the general planning, you're, you're,
you have every right. You have the freedom to do
that. You absolutely do. And then of course you have
to go through all the hoops and jumps and bells
and whistles and dotting the teas and, you know, or
dot nines and crossing the tees that you have to
do. And you have to follow all the regulations and
laws and everything from California and federal state. You got
to do all of that. But you have that right
to go out and buy that piece of land and
put something there. You have that right. So today, they
have that right. They can go out there and say,
you know what? I think I can take a chance
with this car wash. I know the other car washes
out here, but I think mine's the best. And I
think I'm going to make money on this when people
get the word. I said, wow, all electric. Wow. That's
fantastic. I haven't heard that one yet, you know, all
electric car wash. Wow. You know, you hear the big
motors going on and this and that. And, you know,
you got recycled water. I mean, I don't get it.
Think about it. The more car washers we put in
the city, the less pollution we're putting in the gutters.
I don't understand that. Yeah. That's absolutely true. We got
car washes and we recycle the water. Now let's take
all the car washes out of the city and let's
put the soap and all the pollutants in the gutters
and stuff like that. That's the alternative that we're thinking.
No, that's awful. That would be bad. Let's put recycled
water in and let's put some environmental friendly, you know,
uh, reclaimed water. Let's do that. That sounds like an
environmental. It's like, Hey, that's a great thing. That's fantastic.
Guess what? We're, we're, we're lessing the carbon footprint and
we're in a valley. You would think that what happened.
Absolutely. Um, anyway, I'm for it. I love the fact
that Carlos is sitting right there. He's from Marina Valley.
I love the fact that the owner's not too far
away. He's local. That's what we're looking for. Yeah, absolutely.
Let's Carlos. Like just, you know, I hope your wife
don't make it work too hard. You know, so I'm
for it. I don't know anybody else want to. I
don't, I would actually act like to add. I've lived
in the city for 40 years. And that I was
wondering what was going to go there because it's been
vacant for longer than that. And we can't really have
another restaurant because that would be even more traffic. Um,
we got the shopping center right next door. I mean.
I was afraid of storage was going to go in
there. I really was. I didn't think we needed another
storage. But, um. I'm just glad something is going there
because we've got a lot of commercial around there and
we've got a lot of businesses like the girl said
that we've got Home Depot. They're going 24 seven practically,
you know, from morning to night. But they've got their
area pretty well where everybody can go in and out.
So I think it's a good, it's a good fit
for what is going to be going in there. And
it isn't like every other car wash. It just isn't.
Motion. Second. I'm not even on the page here. There
we go. All right. I'd like to recommend that the
planning commission adopt resolution 2026 - 2 and approving plot
plan PEN 22 - 0215. I believe that suffices. And
also to include, um, steps, modification to conditioned. Ah, and
to include SAS condition to modify. Modification to conditions. Modification
to conditions. Correct. That works for me. And I'll second.
Okay. The motion does carry. Do we have a staff
wrap up. So we do chair. The motion passes 30,
the project is approved. There is now a 10 day
appeal period. Any person who wishes to appeal this project
must have submit an appeal application. And pay the required
fee to the community development department within 10 calendar days
of this hearing. Thank you. Thank you. All right. The
next item on the agenda is other commissioner business. And
we don't have any, um, the next item is staff
comments. Do we have any staff comments? No staff comments.
Thank you. Really. Looking forward to those. All right. The
next item on the agenda is planning commissioner comments under
the items of preview of the planning commission. Do we
have any planning commissioner comments. It means that it has
to be within the scope of what we do. Okay.
I think you had one for Steve over there from
Palm Springs. We'll talk to them later about that. I
talked to him later. All right. So at this time
the planning commission is adjourned at 904 p. m. to
our next regular meeting on September 10th, 2026 at 6
p. m.