Life science project stalls in San Carlos

The Sobrato Foundation is seeking to build a life science campus on a 3.4-acre lot at 841 Old County Road, neighboring other large commercial projects by Alexandria Real Estate, Menlo Equities, Presidio Bay and Minkoff Group. The projects collectively would transform the city’s East Side Innovation District into a commercial hub largely catering to the life sciences industry.

The Sobrato Organization’s project would consist of two buildings, one four-story structure amassing about 134,000 square feet and another five-story building totaling about 205,000 square feet. The brick structures would be split by a partly publicly accessible courtyard with an additional public plaza and cafe at the corner of Commercial Street and Old County Road.

Additional landscaping would surround the site and an 8-foot wide bike path and 4-foot wide pedestrian path would be added along the northern side of Bransten Road. Buffering the paths from the street would be a 2-foot strip of landscape and another 4-foot strip would separate the paths from the building.

The project would also underground utilities, reconstruct the sidewalk and create a cycle track along Old County Road. Two levels of below-grade parking with 745 stalls would be built and additional surface level parking will be behind the buildings.

In exchange for permission to build the campus, the Sobrato Foundation offered to pay about $6.9 million in contributions to the city’s Downtown Improvement Fund, Community Improvement and Recreation Fund, and Green Energy Sustainability Fund. About another $13 million would be paid in fees including the city’s commercial linkage fee for affordable housing, sewer fees, traffic impact fee and child care impact fee.

“Our company has been both a highly respected real estate developer and also a nonprofit family philanthropy foundation operating in the Bay Area,” Development Manager Jeff Sobrato said. “We’re still excited by all the activity that’s occurred in this area since 2019, and believe this will become a vibrant new office hub.”

But a majority of councilmembers argued the city could be getting more out of the deal, pointing to a development agreement with Presidio Ventures, the developer behind a life science project at 642 Quarry Road.

While the firm is only offering to pay $4.3 million toward different city funds on top of the $12 million of fees it’s required to pay, councilmembers noted the project includes a number of on-site amenities including a child care center, restoration to Belmont Creek and a new public creek path, plazas and an amphitheater, and athletic courts.

Councilmember Ron Collins was the lone “disagreeable voice” arguing in favor of approving the development agreement as it was proposed. Collins acknowledged the developer could probably offer more, however, they could also likely offer less. Ultimately, he said he was happy with the deal and expected other benefits would come from future projects.

“If we keep raising the bar, I think we do ourselves a disservice. We get quite a community benefit out of this. I’m OK with making a few modifications here and there but it really concerns me if we’re sending this back for the simple reason that we don’t feel like we’re getting enough. We’re getting so much and we’ve gotten so much and we’re gonna get so much more,” Collins said.

Like Collins, other councilmembers also praised the foundation, their work throughout the county and the design of the proposal, but a majority still agreed they’d like to see the Sobratos offer more benefits before the project could be approved.

With a 4-1 vote, the item was continued to a date uncertain and will need to be publicly noticed before it can be taken up again.

“This project has a ton of merit and it is delivering a lot,” Vice Mayor John Dugan said. “But I think Sobrato is the kind of organization that would want to be well represented in town and would want to put its best foot forward here so I would support a continuance.”