Los Gatos eases story pole restrictions for new developments

Story poles may help Los Gatos residents get a sense of how much space new developments will occupy, but the state told town officials that requiring the poles may keep new housing from being built in town.

After receiving word from the state’s department of Housing and Community Development that the town’s story pole policy “poses a constraint to the construction of new housing” and could therefore impede approval of its Housing Element, the Los Gatos Town Council in a split vote approved easing the requirements.

The town council sent a draft of the Housing Element to state officials in March, paving the way for state approval later this summer.

The council on April 16 voted 3-2, with Mayor Mary Badame and Vice Mayor Matthew Hudes dissenting, to limit the scenarios in which story poles need to be installed at the sites of proposed developments. Poles won’t be required for projects over 55 feet tall, and signage will be allowed in lieu of story poles for certain residential projects.

Jennifer Armer, Los Gatos’s planning manager, said the effort to revise the town’s story pole policy goes back to requests for exceptions to the policy that the town received before its efforts to develop a new housing element began. Outcry from residents who saw story poles go up on the North 40 property led to the developers filing a lawsuit in 2016 after council rejected plans for the first phase of the development in East Los Gatos.

Though members of the council largely agreed on the essence of the updated story pole policy, they disagreed on a revised policy for notifying residents about new developments. Hudes and Badame voted in favor of implementing revisions such as posting information about new proposed developments on social media, but the motion failed in a 3-2 vote. Council asked town staff to return to the council with a new notification policy at a later meeting.

“I think what I’m hearing is that we support the spirit of the motion, but I think some of the details need to be ironed out,” Councilmember Maria Ristow said. “I think if we bring the noticing back, we can get further into where the noticing happens (and) when the noticing happens.”