Historic Preservation Commission

On Thursday, October 8th at 6 p.m., public participation is encouraged. The meetings are conducted in a hybrid model providing both in-person attendance and virtual public comment via the Zoom link below. So you could reach us on Zoom. You can also watch us on YouTube. If you do it on YouTube, you can't do public comment. And you can use the hand function through the Zoom link if you want to speak.

So let me do the roll call, please.

I do coming from our executive director, Wendy Barker. And she says this is the Ojai Studio Artists annual tour weekend. Just putting that little promotion in there for everybody's hoping it doesn't rain. It starts with a free party at the museum on Friday night which is from 5 to 7 PM The following Friday, October 16th is Third Friday. We always have great activities on Third Friday.

In this case you can go behind the scenes and visit our collections wing and see what spooky stuff's back there. So that's in research library get a hands-on with a few of the artifacts and view a presentation of historic images After Sunday, October 18th the museum closes for four weeks for a few upgrades like the floor reopening November 19th. So it will be a very nice addition when we come when it reopens on the 19th of November so thank you

Thank you. OK? Sorry, I have a question. Yes. Before the public communications there was approval of the agenda. Yes. And Commissioner Pisaccia abstained.

Because I was absent.

No, it's it's approval of this agenda not of the previous that right? Yeah, and I got confused as well. So oh okay, so It's of this agenda that's in front of you that you're approving Would you like to change

your I'll approve it.

Okay,

just it's just The reason I brought it up is because I was looking for an opportunity to do something I might as well Just do right now if that's okay with the chair, which is introduce a new planner we don't have a place in here for except at the very end and I'll approve him now since it's been a Asked who he is, but I wanted to do it to everyone and also on the camera. This is Addison Hernandez his nameplate is not correct He's not an assistant planner. He's an associate planner he's been with us for a week and a half and He's going to be joining me to these meetings and he also was at Planning Commission last night and he's We're so excited to have him here Is there anything that you want to say about yourself?

Could he tell us a little bit about himself? Sure.

Yeah, so I grew up in Ventura County. Came up to Ojai quite a bit growing up. A family that lives here in Ojai as well. So very excited to be able to contribute back to the community I grew up coming to all the time and visiting. I have a master's degree in city planning from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and a bachelor's degree in planning as well. And before this, I was an intern with the county of San Luis Obispo in their public works department.

Nice! Thank you.

OK, so thank you for letting me.

All right, so now we're going to go to the minutes if anybody has any changes to the minutes

of Gina. Yes. Yeah, on item number four. And it's just the way it's worded and it might be my fault for the way I explained it but it says that Commissioner Walker explained and stated that the signs along the trail are good for 10 years. And what I had intended to say, I thought I said it but maybe I didn't was that they are guaranteed not to fade for 10 years Per side and they double print it one on either side. So they're guaranteed really not to fade for 20 years, and they could last a lot longer. It depends on some of them will be in the shade like in Libbey Park and no less quite a bit longer so Anyway I don't know if we can just get rid of that 10 years or change it to be, because I wouldn't want people to read this and think oh these signs are only good for ten years cause they're quite a bit longer than that.

OK. So my thought is that we could change these minutes, or since the trail signs are on the agenda for this evening it could be stated again. It's really up to the commission.

Can we at least take that out then? Because if anybody just happens to read just this one who is looking to be a sponsor I wouldn't want them to have the wrong information.

I think then that's fine. We'll correct these minutes.

Yes. Thank you.

All right. Is there anything else that looks funny?

So I'd move approval with that change.

Anybody want to second it? I'll second. All right, roll call please. Aikens? Yes. Sims? Yes McCattin? Yes Walker?

Yes

Moore?

I think I'm supposed to abstain since I was missing.

Basasha?

Yeah. Abstain.

All right. Now we're going to go to item number two, which is our public hearing item. Do we have the staff report?

Yes, thank you. This is returning from the last meeting. It's a signed permit for 208 East Ojai Avenue new it's the naturalist and at the last meeting the applicant presented staff presented for the applicant a hanging sign and It me it meet met and continues to meet all of the requirements in the The design guidelines for the Ojai arcade, however The commission asked the applicant to come back with or to change the application of the poppy on the sign and to paint it on instead of having the application of the, we'll call it a sticker. And so what they've done is they've agreed to do that, and I put in front of everybody and at the dais outside a photograph of a painting that's actually in the establishment. So the photograph that you have is actually on canvas.

You can see the bumpiness of the canvas. And that artist will paint the flower on the sign. Great. So with that, staff's recommending that you approve the sign permit as requested and as changed with the painting on the wood. And we do have the applicant here in case you want to talk about it with him at all.

Thank you. Do we have any questions for staff or for the applicant?

Thank you very much. It's lovely.

Yeah. I move approval.

We have to open public hearing? Yes. Is there anybody that would like to speak in public hearing on this item online or in chambers? Not online. OK, I'm going to close public hearing and I'm going to bring it out to anybody who wants to make a motion now. Do you want to do it again?

Oh, I move approval.

OK. I'll second. OK roll call please. Aikens? Yes Simms? Yes McHatton?

McCattin? Yes. Walker? Yes. Moore? Yes. DeSacha?

Yes,

thank you.

Thank you so

much.

Thank you.

All

right just for your information the sign will be inspected once it's installed so there is follow-up with that.

I think it's important that we keep it the way it's always been without the sticker, with hand-painted. It has more of what you would have done during that time. OK. We're going to go on to discussion items. The first one is the scanning of the HRRs and creating a master list. Do we have a staff report on that?

Yes, so on September 10th the Commission discussed and Commissioner Aikens actually stated that he was willing to complete a listing of what the museum has as far as historic resources reports. And also in the meantime staff has initiated a list tonight Initiated an electronic file of HR ours that The Commission may add to I think chair stated that there would be discussion about who may Come in and you know, and also follow through with this process as well. So just to let you know we have initiated an electronic file and Anything can you know be put into that any way it is that the commission decides to start going through this process?

And as we've discussed in the past, and I definitely spoke about this with the chair. Whenever a project comes in, we have an address file for every address in the city. And we go to that address file. And if there's an HRR in it, we will see it. And now that we're keeping this electronic file, we'll definitely make a copy of it and pop it into the file so there's one location where all HRRs are.

Great?

So is it possible to search on files that have an HRR and have them come up?

So, that's actually what staff did. They went in and did like a search and that's how they came...they just kind of...they did it on their own and that's how they came up with the HRRs that they have. That doesn't mean that they're not going to come up other...in other ways. In the 80s they may not have been called Historic Resources Reports some you know there they're called all different things and they're also done in many different ways over the years So we did what we could do thus far.

Okay, because when I talked to the HRG they were asking about those files so can they contact somebody here?

Of course yeah there they have our contact and we've actually been working with them. They've been in the city and looked through some files already.

Do they know that we want a column if it gets checked if there's an HRR?

I don't know.

How many did you find? You know, I'm not sure. I'm thinking five or eight. I am really not sure. Not 50? Yeah unfortunately it wasn't that many, no.

And we did have, you had offered to volunteer as well as Councilwoman Meng said that they would start going through the files.

So I think instead of, well there may be another way besides going through paper files so once you decide who's going to do it And you know that you want to come into the city and kind of go through files. How about you talk to me and or Sherry, and we kind of assist with how to do that and maybe make it a little less cumbersome than literally going through all the paper files that we have?

So we'll talk about it as soon as you decide how you want to go forward or who's gonna go forward.

So is that something that we're talking about right now?

Okay. Yeah, exactly. So whoever's going to do it please... so you're gonna decide who's gonna do that and then I think it would be appropriate for whoever that is if it's gonna be Commissioner Sims to contact either me and or Sherry probably both of us through an email would be best And talk about, you know, hey I want to come in on the 14th. You know between 11 and 2 is that okay with you? Is that a good time for you to assist?

We'll schedule something and get that moving for you.

So my understanding is the museum side of things that Brian has been accumulating over the last decade, he's going to continue to organize that and make sure that those have been incorporated into the city file. Right.

And so- So that's step one. They should, Brian should send them electronically to me and Sherry. Yep,

handle. Brian, I'd be glad to tell you what he's done when we get to it. OK.

All right. And then Commissioner Simms will take care of working with Councilwoman Mang and you'll contact? Right. OK, and then you'll talk to HRG and let them know that we would like a column that has like a check mark so we'll know which properties have an HRR.

HRR, yeah.

OK Commissioner Akins?

Yes. So. I was at the museum this afternoon, but one of the things to figure out first is what do we already have. And if somebody asks me about an HRR, the first thing I'd do is go to our list of landmarks and click on the hyperlink because not all of these hyperlinks are good to a historic resources report. Some of them go to different varying things depending on what's needed for that. So a lot of information, especially this stuff that the City of Ojai has can be found just in that hyperlink. The other thing I found in going through...

so I went over to the museum and I was going through their files Just as fast as I could in getting here is that there is a great variation. We kind of started hinting on that, on what is available and they have files going all the way back prior to when this commission was first put in place. And some of them and even like they'll have an address or a name, and they'll have very some summary information. But even that can be helpful in understanding what happened to this home. So part of it's capturing that information and then part of its Finding a way to scan it and get it in where it says searchable PDF, so we can link with that. So I only dream of the day to have all that amount of time. But again, I would look at the landmark list. A lot of information in those books that's there.

Like I said, the issue in adapting those Specific addresses is that there's really only a time in there. There's nothing you know that you can say hey search for it You know this item search for you know, this kind of house They're basically in there based on There being an article or somebody sending it to the library, and we used to have wonderful docents who clipped newspapers like I'll see when we are doing a scan on ancestry in those. And so occasionally people have come in and have done that. So there's some reference if you're looking at the binder to find out what the focus is of that. But, and we have a whole binder that's on the Ojai gel that I'm going to try to enjoy between now and a week from Saturday.

So again different levels of information that's available Whether it's a historic resources report, or it's just a summary of who was living there. And maybe when the house was built that are probably before maybe some of them and maybe not even included in some of the records that the city had because back then I don't think everything came before the city as it should.

I've heard that.

All right. I guess we have a plan.

You're still on to do the searches for the, OK. Great. Thank you,

Kim. So now we're going on the next item which is item number four, the Ventura and Ojai Valley Railroad Heritage Trail. Do we have a staff report?

Yes, so I put in front of all the commissioners and at the front door a brochure for you to review. That is an example potential flyer Offering people the opportunity to be a to sponsor a sign along the trail so this is for you to review and comment and Get the comments to me and Commissioner Walker, and then we will be taking this to council to get their blessing on it. That's my understanding.

We did have a meeting recently about sponsorship, and there is an ordinance recently that opens that door for us to allow that. So we just have to follow through with the process for this particular project.

I read through that after you had sent it to me, and it did seem like it needed just another little chunk about a sponsorship because it was so much more about donations and renaming. It didn't really have what a sponsorship—I don't know if

that's possible. So the ordinance has been reviewed and I believe it was adopted by the council on that Tuesday. Okay, so we'll just make it work? Exactly. And so when we were talking about it with the city attorney the day that we had the meeting, it sounded like this would fit right in there. Okay, so if you have any other updates.

Okay, so my I was wondering will we have these available on Ojai day? Will we have that all done but my thought was that we would just ask for pledges or interests So that we wouldn't take people's money and if the council voted something else We'd we just say, you know It's not happening But it would be nice to be able to either get pledges from people who are really interested and they say, yeah my organization wants to do this. And we write their name down on one list and then those that just say get a hold of me and talk more after Ojai Day. We could have them on another list. Is that something we could do even without the council formally?

So what I need to do is go up the ladder and talk about that, and inform you ASAP before Ojai Day. We just that the council just adopted an ordinance that allows sponsorship and This specific item, you know They're they're allowing all different types potentially of sponsorship But this particular item has to go back to Council. And so to hand this out That says hey you can sponsor a sign for $2,500. I don't think that would be appropriate So I think I think the answer is no but that doesn't mean there can't be something perhaps

So what if we had this, but this whole part here just said coming soon? And then it was just we didn't make a million of them. We just made enough for Ojai Day and we had a list that we had talked about with Bethany about just creating an interest list.

I mean, can we take an interest a list of people interested?

So I'd like to get back to you.

Okay Yeah, that would be one way of doing it even the amount Could be you know Whatever we can get approved, it would be better to have something to hand out than nothing. So if we have to do To Be Determined or Coming Soon or something at least the idea of it would be passed out and the interest could be starting to be developed.

I am right there with you. I think that there are some things on this particular brochure that might be too definitive, too detailed. But let's work with getting something out there for Ojai Day that we can give out and have a sign in.

Would the city be able to print a couple of hundred of these to hand out?

I mean, we have our budget to do it.

Yeah It's in your budget. Absolutely So so staff is going to get back to you ASAP regarding What what exactly can be? You know, how do we how do we? Modify this to be able to hand it out or present it on Ojai day. Yeah, okay and

Can I just get a verbal OK from everybody to use our, this is an educational, broad educational project that we can use our funds to make brochures for Ojai Day. Everybody okay with that? All right good thank you. Anything else?

I didn't know if you wanted me to discuss this on our discussion of Ojai Day or here, but that's fine. Just an update it's all in process the company is fabricating the signs and they're still on schedule to ship on the 21st so we should get them by the end of the month And then I'll notify Public Works about the schedule, so hopefully they can plan to put them in. But there won't be the rush because we can't get them in by Ojai Day anyway. So whenever we can get them on their schedule to do it would be great.

And no news is good news. They told me we would hear from the company if there was some problem and We haven't heard anything out of them, so I assume everything is going well and that we'll have them on time.

All right. So I think you have been communicating with Public Works on your own, which is totally appropriate and probably have been directed to do so. But don't hesitate putting CDD on your email correspondence.

OK.

Yeah. Just getting those installed.

I haven't sent very many. She wanted to be updated on the schedule, so I just told her when they were going to ship and that I would keep her informed of the schedule That's all.

All right.

Any questions?

Yeah, just one thing. So I was in a meeting and Carla Ferrante de Rufano who is the Chamber of Commerce Executive Director and was this close to me getting her on the HPC She asked me about the science and different information, and I gave her just a brief quick thing. But I suggested that she contact you directly, Craig. Great. So yeah, if you haven't heard from her, reach out to her because we talked about that. OK, that sounds good. And she was one that originated the question so that's even better.

You know, if the city wants to fund those signs that would be fine with me. It would be a lot less work. So you might throw that out. We

figured it'd be about $51,000. We're

very appreciative of the $10,000 for the first four so it'd probably be about $50,000 to do all of them 25 so there might be an extra few dollars around

Also, I know we're going to talk about this. But if you want to tell her that we will have a booth by the jail with examples of what this is all going to look like on Ojai Day to have her come by and visit?

Yeah, that I knew it by that time when she talked to me. It was just a meeting last week or two ago. So yeah, she's aware of that and was definitely going to come by.

All right. Anybody else? We're good? OK, let's go to number five of the Historic Resources Survey update. We have a staff report.

Actually I'd like to turn this over to Commissioner Walker to give us an update.

Thank you. Yeah, I talked with them on Tuesday and got an update from them as to how things are going with the survey. And the last time we talked they were about halfway through their reconnaissance survey where they drive every street in Ojai and lay their eyes on every single house. Or building and make some judgments about it, and they're just finished with the field work on that. And so now they'll be going through them. They've taken those all the properties in Ojai and they've kind of distilled them down to this point at about 170 properties that are possibilities of being historic but They haven't really been studied yet and that's the next phase that they're doing now is to go through and look at the Sanborn maps, look at aerial photos, look at various things that they have to try to narrow that down.

And they assume that'll be narrowed down quite a bit. Then what they do is they take these whatever it is 100 properties They talk back with the people doing the context statement to update the context, because there's a lot of information they get just by looking at the properties that will help them to flesh out the context statement. So they hope to have that finished by the end of the month, the full context statement and so That's where they are now, and then after that they'll start it on the final phase I guess which is to kind of distill out the ones that are potentially historic. So that's what we're going to wind up with just like with the other survey. We don't get a list of landmark quality houses there just ones that need to be studied further They may need an HRR.

They may need some other study from the HPC.

And only if they wanted to do something to their property, not just because they exist?

Yes, that's right It's only if they want if they want to be a landmark They say I would like my house to be landmark You can check the list and say well there's potential there That doesn't mean that they get to be landmark. They have to get an HRR done and have it investigated further And the same is true if they wanted to demolish part of the house or do some major alteration, then it would simply be a question of doing a further evaluation to see if it meets all the qualifications of a historic property. Or if we want a landmark or give it a structure of merit this list will be invaluable for helping and mainly because it excludes 95% of the properties in Ojai. It'll be a big Boone to planning I would think because they don't have to then think well this building is 75 years old.

Is it historic? And they can just go to the survey and check and see no, it's not they don't have to even think any more about it So it'll be a useful tool for everyone. I think

Yes Thank you. Does anybody have any questions about that? The survey OK, moving right along. Ohai Day number six. Do we have a staff report?

So at the last meeting on September 10th, the commission discussed having two separate booths but in the meantime the chair has notified staff that there's only going to be one booth slash table and that'll be down by the jail. In previous meetings well first Just to make sure everybody knows, October 17th is when Ojai Day is. And in previous years there's been a schedule of which member of the commission, which commissioner is going to man the booth and when, and there'd be a schedule of times. And so this is an opportunity for you to do that.

Item that you have here in the in your packet. There's an example of that not that you need an example of how to schedule yourselves But it's usually at the meeting where where? You do that scheduling so that that's a chair,

so Last year we had an event we were doing our our plaque for the State Historic District and And so it made sense to have a booth, which was the first time we had a booth as well as had the jail. And we also had an event at the museum that Wendy Barker helped us with. So this year we were hoping to have the four trail markers done and in the ground And when we knew that that wasn't going to take place, that it was going to be more in November then it was like well why do we?

It's always hard to man. It's hard to man when you just have the jail but having more than one place and trying to get everybody in these rotating times and everything why don't we just move the pop-up that Craig is letting us borrow my husband's bringing his tables. Brian always has incredible amount of stuff going on down there so if we have We have it all down there. Then what I don't want is it to just be Brian, because Brian he is always inside that jail very animated with all the kids, with Richard Sinnott. I don't want him to have to worry about the booth as well, because we are going to have information about this project and any other time. It's a time for anybody want to speak to their HPC when they don't want to feel uncomfortable coming here.

They can come talk to us in an informal way and last year when we did it, it was just non-stop people talking to us about everything so it gives the community an opportunity to come and talk to us. So it would be nice to have two people at all times and it'd be nice to give Brian a bathroom break this time because I didn't even think he had that last year

That's not a bathroom we're in? A jail? People tell me that all the time. This is a bathroom,

right? You can just close the jail door and I'll be right back.

No, I tell them the quick way to go either up or down to get into the bathroom.

Yeah, but so that's what I think because we aren't doing an unveiling in the month of October. It's going to be the month of November. I think that it's not a lot of justification to try to have this be spread thin. Let's focus it on the jail and do both information in one spot.

Just to let you know, what I've done is I've taken those life-size prints of the four and I've laminated them and I've gotten a foam board that I'm going to glue them to. And I got some easels so my thought was that we would have You know, the canopy and we'd have the tables and we'd have these set up. You can have some of the easels that'll be standing and then some that will be on the tables but they'll show the four that people can look at and it would be an opportunity to talk to people but I like the idea of having it on the street because Then we could kind of go around and talk to some of the other organizations, you know who have these

to hand

out.

We can go for walks because that could be part of the thing is that You know one person or is taking a walk and bringing brochures and introducing themselves to the different booths because then you're going up to the ones that you think might be

Right. It's just that you might be closer to the other groups if you were up on the street.

Well, I know that last year you weren't able to come and we were at six at the time. We didn't have a cat and then you both were unable to come so it was the four of us trying to demand for...I was just concerned that we were going to be in the same situation where one person Manning it this year. Commissioner Simms isn't gonna be able to be with us So I'm just I didn't want to stretch us well if we

have a manpower shortage

that was my concern like just Because I don't know if we're going to be able to cover all the spots. It was long days, to have that many... I mean, I've been on this commission for a while now and every year it's like just trying to get the jail covered has always been a challenge. So last year was a big effort and I don'y know if that's something that we are...

I'm willing to put in the whole day wherever I need to be but it is stretching us a little thin

So we were there for hours, Rick and you and I for the entire way like six hours. Yeah. And it was fun. I had a good time. And Brian, he never left. You never left.

I think they finally let me close the jail down about 645. So, and that's fine you know I love people coming by so and I plan to be there so but yeah last year was usually I get up and walk around in my jail clothes. Last year I never made it past the bike trail it was that busy in the jail We do have Richard Sennett who's coming at 11 o'clock in the morning to in the afternoon Mark Lewis may come over and tell stories. He's a natural storyteller But yeah, I mean it's nice I enjoy it

so We will have our banners, the ones that Roger made for us last year that are so beautiful. And we will have a display, flat displays of different postcards that are historical that Brian is letting us borrow and then we'll have information about the trail and pictures of what they're going to look like. So that's the gist of it. I don't know, I mean, I'm up for having both places. I am just worried about the manpower for it. Just concentrating in one area and then maybe doing a walkabout sounds better to me but I'm going to be there the whole day anyway so either way I'm fine.

Do you want to try to make a schedule? Well, I don't know if we're doing two places or one place. I want to get a consensus okay? Sorry What is everybody's availability on October 7th? I

can be available the whole day

me too have it everyone cat says and that she could be here Commissioner Nielsen that she could set up and She could do any but she would prefer to do setup and do the morning shift You don't never know because you might be deployed and out of here at any moment.

I volunteered to help out with the Red Cross booth on Ojai Day. And I can certainly help with this, and I was here last year. I went between the jail. I was there at the jail briefly, and then I came up to your place. But anyway, I can definitely help out. OK. Not because I'm going to be there but between the two.

OK, and how about you Rick?

I'm more or less available the whole day, just like last year. OK.

And on the jail, so I saw that you asked me. So two of the banners were in the jail. I haven't unfurled them to see which ones they are, but there were two in the jail. They're at home

now. There's a third, right? Yeah.

I don't know.

There's the jail.

I'll take a look when I get home. After all, I'm the one that had no idea where his binder of all those postcards was until I snuck in the jail and went, oh, that's where you're hiding. On the jail side, I had put phone calls into Lindero and then I talked to Joseph Padilla. Go to guy and so he's gonna the gel is going to be cleaning ready for us by Friday of this next week. So that'll be good It's a little spidey at the moment But yeah, it's fun I'll get there early in morning and then I'll leave whenever they let us close. I mean even going in and getting the boxes yesterday was Four kids, maybe about 11 on bikes who said can we sit inside there? I said you better run because my wife's waiting for me to take her to the trains. They ran right down took a look and then went back to their bike so it's crazy

Gina, I think your idea makes sense to me because of the manpower shortage and if there is time to do a walkabout and speak to other people great. But this is going to be a long process anyway. It doesn't have to all be completed on Ojai Day. And the concern about manpower and consolidating it down there I think is smart move.

I'm sorry, I'm not going to be available. We could change the date and I'd be fine but my grandkids said no we're not doing this.

And to be honest, the reason I don't want to overextend myself is it's exactly one week before my son's wedding and that is where my brain is going to be at. So this – I was just trying to go okay, I'm not going to have the brain power because it's just constant phone calls and things I have to do so one Saturday before is kind of scary for me. If we had to, I just want to make sure that everything is ready to go and everyone knows what they're going to do. I just want to make sure that we're not short.

The wedding is number one, period. Period. So if duty family calls we'll figure it out.