Novato advances design standards in response to state housing laws

The Novato City Council is expected to approve a list of approved architectural styles for future development projects next month in an effort to maintain some local control amid more strict state housing laws.

The council voted unanimously this week to advance a list of “objective” standards for architectural designs, including a list of six approved styles, for residential developments. The council is set to make a final vote on the ordinance in October.

City Planning Manager Steve Marshall told the council this week that changes in state laws during the past five years aimed at accelerating housing development have limited cities to only using “objective” standards for deciding on certain projects. These developments include those with two or more homes or affordable housing projects that often can qualify for state density bonuses, Marshall said.

Where before these laws the city could use more subjective decision-making based on the proposed design of a development, the objective standards must be those that can be clearly measured or defined, Marshall said.

While the city has objective standards in place for other aspects of development, none are in place for architectural design.

“If a city does not have standards, a developer has free rein over design,” Marshall told the council.

Staff said the intent of the standards is to prevent “cookie-cutter” developments with identical buildings and to set community expectations for architectural styles.

The six allowable styles proposed by the city would be contemporary, craftsman, Main Street classical, Mediterranean, Tudor and Victorian. From these styles, developers are able to use a “palette” of different features and design features.

“There is a real complete package of things for an architect to work with when designing a project,” Marshall said during the Novato Planning Commission discussion of the ordinance on Sept. 11.

Developers who wish to deviate from the styles would need to forfeit their rights under state law and would undergo a discretionary review through the city’s Design Review Commission and Planning Commission. However, Marshall said there are waivers in the state laws that would allow developers to bypass the city’s objective standards.

“There is a lot of power a developer has to get out of some or all of these standards,” Marshall said.

The Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend adoption to the council, with a modification that would not require all four sides of certain developments, including single-family detached and two-family homes, to have architectural features on all four sides of a building.

“It’s a big change in how we do business,” commissioner member Curtis Havel said before the panel’s vote on Sept. 11. “It’s a whole paradigm shift in how we approach land use and development.”

City staff stressed that these standards can be changed later if any issues or concerns arise.

“I don’t think this will be over yet,” Mayor Susan Wernick said after the vote on Tuesday. “We’ll see how this works in the real world.”