San Mateo delays any ADU ordinance change

The council initially approved the ordinance at its March 15 meeting by a 4-1 vote to, with Mayor Eric Rodriguez voting against, and final approval was scheduled for the April 5 meeting. In March, several councilmembers cited concerns about insufficient public input and the lack community outreach before the vote.

Papan said input was needed based on promises made to the public last year regarding changes to policy regulating Accessory Dwelling Units, or ADUs. An ADU is an attached or detached secondary residential dwelling unit on a property.

The ordinance would put the city in line with new state laws and simplify the regulations for staff and the public, the city said. The city planned to have a two-step process of passing a temporary ordinance and then conducting public outreach and consider ordinance changes based on feedback.

City Attorney Shawn Mason said officials were concerned that ADU applications without regulations on features like height could come in during the public outreach period, and the city could not deny the applications because of state law.

The ordinance would require local agencies to allow ADUs of at least 800 square feet in size and at least 16 feet in height with 4-foot side and rear setbacks, notwithstanding other development requirements floor area or lot coverage, Associate Planner Phillip Brennan said by email.

The maximum unit size for detached ADUs was increased from 640 square feet to up to 1,200 square feet to align with state law. The council established maximum building height for detached ADUs to 16 feet to the top plate and 24 feet to the top of the roof ridge, as measured from existing grade, to allow for two-story detached ADUs for home property owners, the city said.

Not wanting to obscure the process, Deputy Mayor Rick Bonilla felt it would be best for officials to make a decision after receiving input from the community.

“I dissented at that time because I felt like approving these changes, number one, was just not good sound structural choices for people wanting to build an ADU in San Mateo,” Bonilla said.

Councilwoman Amourence Lee agreed, saying the city had been out of compliance with state laws for over a year and that a couple of extra months devoted to a public process would help. She thought the attempts to use an arbitrary deadline to reach compliance without hearing from the public were not appropriate.

Papan reminded her colleague that everyone said there would be public outreach if a city ordinance had tougher restrictions than state law. She asked to shorten the public outreach time and bring back the ordinance with more haste and revise it accordingly.

“We all want to see ADUs help us with our housing crisis. That’s not the issue. The issue is what did we say to the public,” Papan said.

Councilman Joe Goethals initially offered a motion passing the short-term regulation ordinance at the beginning of the meeting but later favored delaying passing the ordinance after public comments from Lisa Diaz Nash, who ran for City Council in 2020, who suggested waiting for public input.

“I’m leaning towards that at this point, based on her comments,” Goethals said.

Director of Community Development Christina Horrisberger said the city wanted a thoughtful and comprehensive outreach process while also closing loophole risks. She said the city would look at ways to condense the public input process to ensure a revised ordinance is presented in a reasonable amount of time.