To: Honorable Mayor and Members of City Council
From: Jessica Lowe, Public Works Director
Prepared By: Tim Wood, Senior Civil Engineer
TITLE:
Title
First and Oxbow Hotel Project Improvement Agreement
LABEL
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Recommendation
Adopt a resolution 1) authorizing the Public Works Director to execute a Project Improvement Agreement with Pacific Hotel Oxbow, LLC for the First and Oxbow Hotel Project; 2) finding that the Agreement satisfies the requirements of Resolutions R2024-030 and R2024-031; and 3) determine that the actions authorized by this resolution were adequately analyzed by a previous CEQA action.
Body
DISCUSSION:
On April 2, 2024, the City Council approved a 123-room hotel at the intersection of First Street and Soscol Avenue commonly known as ‘Hotel Oxbow’. As part of the project approval, the City Council adopted three resolutions: R2024-029, R2024-030, and R2024-031.
Resolution R2024-029 established the project’s conditions of approval. Resolutions R2024-030 and R2024-031 conditionally abandoned slope easements and portions of Water Street, respectively. Both abandonment resolutions require project conditions to be satisfied before the abandonments are finalized.
Consistent with Napa Municipal Code §15.48.010., Condition of Approval 60 requires the project conditions be satisfied prior to issuance of the building permits or secured through a Project Improvement Agreement and accompanying bond or other security for the public improvements. While the Municipal Code clearly allows a secured project improvement agreement to satisfy improvement requirements for building permit issuance, it does not explicitly address the use of an improvement agreement for conditional abandonments.
The proposed Project Improvement Agreement is intended to satisfy the public improvement requirements for both the conditional abandonment resolutions (R2024-030 and R2024-031) and Condition of Approval 60, while ensuring the required improvements area completed. This approach is consistent with the City’s standard practice of using Project Improvement Agreements and security to guarantee construction of public improvements while allowing building construction to proceed.
FINANCIAL IMPACTS:
None.
CEQA:
The Project falls within the scope of the Downtown Napa Specific Plan Program (DNSP) Final Environmental Impact Report (DNSP FEIR) certified by the City Council on May 1, 2012 (SCH #2010042043), as documented in the 2020 Addendum prepared for the original project and the January 2024 Addendum prepared for the revised project and on file with the City Clerk, and no further environmental review is required under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Sections 15162, 15164 and 15168 as documented in the CEQA Memorandum prepared for the project.
DOCUMENTS ATTACHED:
ATCH 1 - Resolution
EX A - Project Improvement Agreement
NOTIFICATION:
None