Roseville City Council approves permit modification for North Industrial Plan Area Parcel 56

Roseville City Council approved a permit modification for an industrial project at Wednesday's council meeting. Roseville associate planner Escarlet Mar presented the North Industrial Plan Area Parcel 56's Major Project Permit Stage 1 Modification and Major Project Permit Stage 2 Appeal. The North Industrial Plan Area Parcel 56 is an industrial project located in the Blue Oaks Commerce Center (BOCC), according to Mar. It is owned by Schnitzer Properties. The initial plan had 10 buildings, which totaled 260,000 square feet. In the revised plan, four industrial buildings will total 310,000 square feet, "an increase of 50,000 square feet from the original approval," Mar said. "Overall, the proposed buildings are similar to the previously approved design and are consistent with both the north Roseville area design guidelines as well as the city's community design guidelines," Mar said. The original plan was previously approved last Sept. 22 by the Roseville Planning Commission. The Planning Commission received an appeal letter on Sept. 30 from Lozeau Drury law firm, representing the Laborers' International Union of North America, Local Union No. 185. According to the staff report, "The appeal letter alleged the project should have completed an Initial Study and Mitigated Negative Declaration instead of an Addendum because mitigation measures are necessary to address the project's significant cumulative air quality impacts and air pollution emissions and energy usage." The appeal letter also said there was a potential danger to wildlife at or near the site project. They said trucks coming to the site could hit wildlife surrounding the site. On Oct. 20, 2022, the city received a letter from Buchalter Law Group, which represents Schnitzer Properties. The letter concurs with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), according to the staff report, "an Addendum was the appropriate environmental document for CEQA compliance." Attorney Alicia Guerra of Buchalter Law Firm, representing Schnitzer Properties, said that in the previous "thorough" study for the previous plan, it was determined that prior to purchasing the land, there was "no habitat." There could be no additional "harm to animals," Guerra said, since it was "already disturbed." Roseville Planning manager Greg Bitter said, "It's not that these trips would actually cause the specific impacts" of hitting birds, "that is a speculative circumstance. There is no actual direct evidence that birds are in this area." Councilmember Tracy Mendonsa said he can't recall hitting birds being a problem in Roseville. Guerra also said that the increase in square footage of the buildings doesn't have "a greater or new impact" of emissions. Although there might be "potential air quality impacts," Mar said, the appeal letters provided "no project-specific impacts." Attorney Amalia Fuentes of Lozeau Drury Limited Liability Partnership (LLP), representing the appeal, said that offsite animal deaths from trucks affect the local biology of the area, which they said was not addressed in the plan's previous study. The new plan was approved unanimously by the council. In other news The city of Roseville is beginning to "modernize" the city's electric metering system by implementing additional Smart Meters that can communicate electricity usage by driving by, according to the staff report. However, Roseville Electric acknowledges potential privacy concerns and created an opt-out program for customers. Smart Meters can send energy usage data to Roseville electric via driving by the meter. Roseville Electric financial administrator Eric Campbell said the reason customers might want to opt-out is "for a number of reasons, for privacy or health reasons." To be eligible for the opt-out, customers must live in a single-family home, duplex or a townhome "where the meter is attached to the premise," according to Campbell. Net energy-metering customers, customers with a history of meter tampering and multi-family homes are not eligible to opt-out. Customers who wish to opt-out must pay a one-time fee of $119 ($59.50 for low-income customers). That fee helps recover the cost of the manual meter and its installation. Those who opt-out will also need to pay a monthly rate that covers the "additional costs of serving opt-out customers," Campbell said. Roseville Electric will need to manually collect the energy usage data from the manual meter instead of driving-by with the Smart Meters. The opt-out program was passed unanimously by the Roseville City Council.