Saratoga's City Council will decide Wednesday, Nov. 18, whether 69 homes can go on a vacant 3.85-acre lot on Quito Road, a month after the Planning Commission voted unanimously to kill the project. City staff is recommending the council overturn that denial and approve it.
The developer, Acme Development LLC, wants to split the land at 14076 Quito Road into 14 lots and build 12 three-story buildings there. The plan calls for 55 three-bedroom townhomes or condominiums, 14 of them with a 504-square-foot attached unit to be rented below market rate to lower-income households. Each home would have a two-car garage, and 15 more spaces would go to visitors.
Of 109 protected trees on the site, 67 would come down.
What happened at the commission
At the Oct. 14 hearing, about 16 people spoke, according to the staff report for next week's meeting. They raised traffic on Quito Road, walking routes to schools, privacy for the single-family homes next door, the loss of trees and whether fire crews could get through if the road backed up.
Commissioners also pressed the developer on the lack of a second emergency entrance and on its refusal to build a sidewalk all the way from Pollard Road to Allendale Avenue. The company offered $30,000 toward that stretch instead. The commission then found the project "objectively unsafe" and denied it.
Why staff changed course
The project falls under the builder's remedy, part of California's Housing Accountability Act. Because the preliminary application came in on March 18, 2024, before the state certified Saratoga's housing plan, and set aside 20% of the units as affordable, the city cannot use its zoning or other subjective standards to turn it down, the staff report says.