Urgent help requested to hold City of Sausalito Accountable for ADU Violations

Dear Governor Newsom, Deputy Attorney General Pai, Senator Scott Wiener, Senator Mike McGuire, and the California Department of Housing and Community Development,

I am writing to bring to your attention to a significant and ongoing issue regarding the enforcement of housing laws in the City of Sausalito. Over the past three years, I have been diligently working to construct a 2196-square-foot home that meets my family’s needs. A modest urban square-footage for a family of 6 (myself, my wife, our children ages 7, 5, and 2, and new baby on the way). More about our journey can be found at www.renovate426pine.com, including the project timeline.  Relevant here is that our home remodel includes an attached Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU) that fully complies with state laws. However, the City of Sausalito unlawfully obstructed our ability to build a fully compliant 800-square-foot ADU by misinterpreting outdated municipal codes and ignoring California State laws, resulting in significant financial and emotional harm to our family. Now, the City of Sausalito is ignoring our good-faith efforts to rectify this injustice. Given that California is in the midst of a housing crisis, we are urgently asking the State of California to hold the individuals and the City of Sausalito accountable for their violations and related damages.

History and Context:

After two years and hundreds of hours of negotiations with neighbors, we submitted our plans to the City of Sausalito in January 2023. It took the planning department six months to schedule our first planning commission hearing in July 2023. Then, just days before the hearing, we received an unexpected email (see exhibit A) from the community development department that reversed its recommendation for approval of our project. They alleged that Sausalito Municipal Code Section 10.40.070(D)(1) applies to the extension of the attached ADU from our primary dwelling. According to their interpretation, the City mandates an additional setback of 1 foot for every 5 feet over 40 feet for both ADUs and primary dwellings. The City calculated the length of our primary dwelling together with the ADU before applying this burdensome setback rule, which for our 45-foot-wide urban lot, would have mandated an unreasonable 13 feet in total side-yard setbacks. Instead, the City demanded that we remove roughly 45% (or 363 square feet) from our proposed, state-allowed 800-square-foot ADU. 

Whether an ADU is attached or detached, the state of California has declared the ADU an "accessory structure'. This means that ADUs should not be included in the total building length as defined by Municipal Code Section 10.40.070(D)(1). This particular code was enacted decades ago, long before our current housing crisis and newly enacted state laws. In the diagram below, the yellow highlighted section indicates the portion of the ADU that the City of Sausalito forced us to remove. The purple section is the ADU that was approved, and the red shaded section is the footprint of the primary dwelling that was finally approved earlier this year. See the full site plan here, (exhibit B).

For argument’s sake, let’s assume that the ADU and the primary dwelling could be counted together as part of the total building length. One would then ask whether the state of California has enacted any laws preventing municipalities from enforcing such a code, designed to maintain open space between urban lots. A simple web search reveals that AB 670 specifically voids and prohibits local restrictions used to maintain open space when those restrictions would constrain ADU development. AB 670 explicitly states that any covenants, conditions, or restrictions that effectively prohibit or unreasonably restrict the construction or use of an ADU or JADU on a lot zoned for single-family residential use are void and unenforceable (Civ. Code, § 4751). State ADU Law also requires that factors like lot coverage, floor area ratio, open space, or minimum lot size must not preclude the construction of a statewide exemption ADU.

If we continue along this line of reasoning and for argument’s sake assume that AB 670 does not apply to our project, one would next look at whether the state has enacted any laws that prevent cities from unduly constraining the creation of ADUs. Here, the situation becomes even more egregious. The City of Sausalito’s legal counsel, Sergio Rudin, has proposed that we build our ADU in two phases (see his email as Exhibit C). I had to email the city every week for nine weeks just to get this response. A two-phase approach to building an 800-square-foot ADU would require us to complete our primary dwelling project first, and then begin the second phase to expand ADU afterward. The financial and environmental impact of this recommendation is staggering.

Building the ADU in two phases means:

1. We would have to pay the ADU application fee twice.

2. We would need to rip out and re-pour concrete for the entire sidewalk in front of our house—twice.

3. We would have to rip off the front of our house after completing it in order to build the additional 363 square feet of the ADU.

4. The most costly consequence: we would need to install additional structural shear walls in the primary dwelling to make it a standalone project, an engineering requirement that would not exist if we were allowed to build the ADU concurrently.

The extra cost of this two-phase approach is estimated to be well over $100,000. This is financially devastating and, under any standard, completely unreasonable. The City's action is a clear violation of multiple state housing laws, all of which were enacted to prevent this very type of municipal obstruction. We informed Sergio Rudin, the city attorney, Brandon Phipps, the Community Development Director, Kristin Teiche, Principal Planner in Sausalito, and even presented the violation to the City Council during our appeal hearing. Before drafting and sending this email I made numerous attempts to connect with Sergio Rudin, the city attorney, Brandon Phipps, the Community Development Director, Kristin Teiche, Principal Planner. Our good faith attempts were completely ignored. See exhibit D, our most recent email to complete 'Step 1' of the ADU application for the City of Sausalito was sent one month ago and still has no response.

Broader Implications:

Beyond the specific legal violations, it is important to recognize that this is not an isolated issue in Sausalito. The City is already far behind on its obligation to add 724 housing units by 2031 under the state’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA). At the current rate, it is impossible for the city to meet this goal. Another family, just a few blocks away from us, spent seven years battling similar issues while trying to build their home, culminating in the publication of a book, 'I Am Applicant'. These are symptoms of a systemic problem: the City of Sausalito is making it prohibitively difficult for families to develop housing that complies with state law.

Our own experience highlights this issue. When our project was appealed from the Planning Commission to the City Council, instead of approving or denying the project, Vice Mayor Joan Cox instructed us to continue negotiating with our neighbors—despite the fact our project was fully code-compliant and had already been approved by the Planning Commission. This decision invited further harassment from one neighbor, causing significant emotional distress for our children. This forced us to seek a restraining order against that neighbor, see exhibit D. Luckily, this resulted in a stayaway order. This is not how a family should be treated when attempting to build a modest, energy-efficient home, that complies with all local and state laws. 

Another example of systemic abuse obstructing housing development in Sausalito is the blatant conflict of interest involving Vice Mayor Joan Cox and the City’s legal counsel, Sergio Rudin. Both Cox and Rudin were partners at Burke, Williams & Sorensen LLP, the same law firm that for many years represented the City of Sausalito. While Cox served as a Planning Commissioner and later as Vice Mayor, Rudin was hired as legal counsel for Sausalito. This relationship created a situation where Cox created unlawful and unnecessary delays to directly increase the billable hours for Burke, Williams & Sorensen LLP at the expense of Sausalito residents and in doing so exacerbated the harm done to project applicants. One example involves a family’s seven-year battle to build a home in Sausalito, where Cox’s actions caused significant delays that increased legal fees for the city and directly benefited her law firm. The partnership between Cox and Rudin and their conflict of interest raises serious ethical concerns and warrants a formal investigation. I believe Joan Cox should be impeached from her current position as Vice Mayor to restore fairness and transparency to the city’s governance.

My plea is straightforward: how can we hold these individuals and the City of Sausalito accountable for their unlawful actions? How do we ensure that Sausalito complies with state housing laws? How do we ensure that what happened to our family never happens again in Sausalito or elsewhere in California? I would request immediate state intervention to ensure the City of Sausalito follows state law and allows us to build the ADU as we originally designed. We also request that the state begin enforcing its housing laws to protect families from arbitrary and unlawful decisions by local municipalities.

Thank you for your attention to this urgent matter. We look forward to your prompt response.

Sincerely,  

Jake and Georgia Beyer

Dear Sausalito City Council

It is with immense frustration and disappointment that we write this letter following the events that unfolded at your City Council special hearing on January 22, 2024. We believe that what transpired must be made broadly known, so it may serve as a catalyst for positive change within our community. This is our official request for you to schedule a hearing and decide on the appeal.

For the past three years, we have doggedly pursued the expansion of our home in order to accommodate our growing family of five. Our dedication to Sausalito and its potential as a vibrant, family-friendly city has been the driving force behind this seemingly fruitless endeavor. It is no secret that it would have been easier to move to Mill Valley, as many have suggested. However, we believe that would be a disservice to our community of local families as it would perpetuate the red tape and rampant sense of entitlement that Sausalito is known for. Last Monday night, your Council did not uphold the unanimous approval of our remodel designs granted by the Planning Commission for our home. Nor did you overturn the Planning Commission's decision by taking up the appellant’s grounds for appeal. In fact, you did not decide at all. You deferred the appeal of the approved project to an indefinite future date, placing your burden of proof as an appellate body back onto the applicant. In doing so, you undermined your own planning commission’s expertise. And you failed to support your burgeoning constituency of young families, leaving the future of families in Sausalito hanging in the balance.

We are aware that the City Council was acting as the appellate body and  tasked with considering an appeal for a project that had already received approval. Now it is essential to underscore the distinction between the appeal process and the separate Planning Commission Design Review process. The Design Review is the determination of whether a project meets zoning requirements and the findings under city code made by a panel of experts. The appeal hearing is not a mechanism for considering the merits of the project, but simply to assess the appeal’s assertion that the lower governing body misapplied the law or made a procedural error or evidentiary error in their process. The Council's options are to 1) affirm the Commission’s decision denying the appeal, 2) modify the decision or remand the application back down to Planning Commission for reconsideration in light of stated procedural error or misapplication of law, or 3) reverse the original decision (see Sausalito Municipal Code, Section 10.84.050 of the Zoning Ordinance)

None of these actions were taken.

We acknowledge Mayor Ian Sobieski and Council Member Former-Mayor Melissa Blaustein’s sincere attempt to move our project forward, and thank Mayor Sobieski for moving to deny our project (approve the appeal) and thus provide us a path for recourse. Yet, their effort was road-blocked by Joan Cox, Janelle Kellman, and Jill Hoffman. Despite their 18 years of collective experience as planning commissioners and clear preference toward the appellant's baseless arguments, they refused to move to approve the appeal. Therefore they did not have to defend their unspoken assertion that the Planning Commission's decision was flawed. The Council completely ignored the Staff Report meticulously prepared by their Community Development Department (link to report here), which states,

Staff recommend the City Council deny the appeal, uphold the Planning Commission’s decision, and approve the project, subject to Planning Commission imposed modifications and conditions. (emphasis added)

The City Council is NOT tasked with rehearing our Design Review application. That can only be undertaken by the Planning Commission if the project application is remanded back down for further consideration. Nevertheless, Council voted 4-0 ( Mayor Sobieski abstaining) to continue the hearing, ordering a removal of a proposed rear deck with a stipulated deed restriction prohibiting us submitting a future application, and ordering the appellants to determine whether they think any additional modifications are required. 

Not sure when the neighborhood appellants were allowed to usurp the Planning Commission’s job. But as Mayor Sobieski astutely pointed out, the appellants have no incentive to ever reach a compromise with us, since as long as they do not, our project is stalemated. Further, Vice Mayor Joan Cox nor the City of Sausalito hold any authority to place a deed restriction on a property.

It was a disheartening lack of leadership and an obstruction of due process in the three-hour deliberation. The Council's disregard for the Planning Commission's 5-0 unanimous decision in support of our project raises serious concerns about the integrity of the system. They have opened a wide new door for all future design review applications to be appealed and left to wither in purgatory. 

Vice Mayor Joan Cox's staunch reliance on outdated statements made by a city planner and her attempt to undermine the fire department's determination on fire code compliance was an alarming belittling of our public service professionals. It was disconcerting to watch Vice Mayor Joan Cox proudly highlight her yet unsuccessful five-year collaboration with Michael Rex to create an “Objective design review process”, only to succumb to the subjective and ambiguous interpretations that are keeping our project in limbo without clear resolution. This contradiction raises serious questions about the fairness and consistency of the decision-making process and has created a hardship for our family.

Moreover, it became apparent that certain Council members had not thoroughly reviewed the facts and history of our project application before the hearing. The lack of preparedness adds another layer of frustration to an already exasperating situation. We provided comprehensive documentation, including a full set of approved plans, a photo-realistic 3D model, multiple sun studies, communication logs, and emails exchanged with the individual appellants over the years in order to ensure transparency.

• See email correspondence here.

• See communication logs here.

It has been 1,115 days since we started our collaboration with the City of Sausalito's Historic Preservation Commission. During Monday’s hearing, Vice Mayor Joan Cox expressed delight, incorrectly stating that it had not been a year since we submitted our design review permit. In reality, we submitted our plans 366 days ago on January 25, 2023. These plans were subsequently, and erroneously, deemed complete on February 23, 2023.

As anticipated, Michael Rex presented testimony on behalf of appellants Conrad and Shana Gann. His testimony was fraught with false and inaccurate statements. Two additional appellants, Sam Chase, and Stuart Rabinowitsh, asserted view claims without providing A SINGLE PHOTO of their respective views. Appellate Sam Chase persists in asserting that our project obstructs his cherished bay views, a claim that lacks merit. See the photo below from Sam's third-floor library window.

In reality, any potential obstruction would involve inches of minimal "blockage" of his panoramic view from a specific, constrained vantage point at the edge of his third-story library, offering secondary views. The blockage could simply be mitigated by taking two steps away from the edge of his library. See below a photo.

It is crucial to note that Sam's property at 19 Bonita Street exceeds both floor area ratio and lot coverage, featuring a four story, 2,486 sq ft house for only two occupants on a mere 2,787 sq ft lot. In ironic contrast, Michael Rex, the architect with four decades of experience, persistently characterizes our proposed 2,192 sq ft house on a 3,598 sq ft lot as "massive" and "out of scale" with the neighborhood. 

Additionally, Rex claims that we failed in our neighborhood outreach, despite dedicating 3 years and over 150 hours to working directly with the neighbors who are now appealing. Rex in fact never responded to any of the four attempts we made to work with him as seen in this email thread. Not to mention that he canceled the only meeting he actually scheduled with us just minutes beforehand. Now Rex is pleading with the city council to force us to go back to the drawing board to redesign our entire project under these false pretenses. Thus it appears that Michael Rex's mathematical acumen and logical reasoning have long expired, along with any semblance of a moral compass. Though some assert that he never possessed one. Regardless, it is regrettable that he has chosen to destroy his own legacy and take down the credibility of our city leadership in the process. 

The unsubstantiated claims and inconsistencies presented by these individuals further underscore the need for a fair and impartial evaluation of our project and all design review appeals that follow it. We remain committed to transparency and adherence to the facts, and remain confident that the City Council is capable of acting in good faith to opine on the validity of the appeal, and by extension the validity of the Planning Commission’s unanimous decision for a just and speedy resolution.

In light of the aforementioned, we request you, City Council, to schedule a hearing date to perform your appellate duty; approve or deny the appeal, or remand it back to the Planning Commission for reconsideration. We request confirmation of a hearing date from the city clerk no later than January 30, 2024, with the hearing taking place no later than February 10, 2024. Considering the unnecessary cost and delay the city has imposed on our family, we believe that this is ample time for Council to re-review the facts at hand and provide a fair and expeditious resolution, potentially avoiding any protracted litigation.

As stated by our Designer during the hearing, we remain willing to remove the rear deck over 40' 3.5" to resolve any outstanding concerns. But we will adamantly protect our property rights and oppose any deed restriction stipulation prohibiting future building applications not presented here.

Sausalito deserves a City Council that values due process, transparency, and the well-being of its residents. We believe in the potential for positive change and hope for a swift resolution to this matter.

Sincerely,

Georgia and Jake Beyer

Project Update + Michael Rex and Associates

This is a response to our Nextdoor post regarding Michael Rex and Associates. Thank you to everyone who has reached out privately. Your solidarity means so much. While we are continuing to assess next steps with regard to Rex I thought I would provide some context.

We are a young family of five attempting to remodel our house so that we can stay here in Sausalito, a city we have grown to love and call home for the last 7 years. We are now over 3 years into our journey.

Michael Rex and Associates was hired to shut down our project by Conrad and Shana Gann, the owners of 428 Pine and 104 Bonita, the two-building investment property on the lot immediately west of us. Their lot is identically sized to our lot, yet is over lot coverage and has legal non-conforming setbacks on 3 of the 4 sides. The Ganns live at 26 Cedar Ave. in Larkspur, CA.

In the months prior to our Planning Commission Hearing last fall, we spent over 40 hours working with the Ganns and Michael Rex, addressing one purported issue after the next. They never reached a point of satisfaction with our home’s design. 

Upon being hired by the Ganns, Rex demanded a full set of printed plans which we immediately hand-delivered to his office free of charge (normally a few hundred dollars in time and services), sincerely hoping to collaborate. I’ll note that the Ganns were already in possession of a full set of digital plans and a photo-realistic 3D model.  My wife and I have been transparent with all of our neighbors throughout this entire process (read the full story here). Yet the more we tried to work with the Ganns via Rex, the more we realized Rex was creating issues, rather than resolving them. Rex requested a last-minute meeting with me and David, the owner of our design firm, G Family Design. We both cleared our schedules to meet with Rex at Conrad and Shana’s investment property. In true Rex fashion, his secretary called 30 minutes before our appointment time to cancel the meeting. Prior to the Planning Commission vote, we heard an account of Michael Rex bragging to group of people that he"shutdown that project," referring to our family home where we plan to raise our kids. 

Conrad and Shana Gann went so far as to circulate a map of the neighborhood that falsely represented the opinions of three surrounding neighbors. They labeled the three properties as “in opposition” when they actually supported our project with positive letters on our behalf! Rex and the Ganns know no bounds when it comes to misleading the community and trying to intimidate us. 

Fortunately, on November 15, 2023, all five Planning Commission members unanimously approved our project. We are forever grateful to have received over 25 letters of support from the community we love and equally grateful for the amazing show of solidarity by certain Planning Commissioners. Although of course, Rex likely charged his clients thousands of dollars for his failed attempt.

In the months since our Planning Commission approval, locals and people familiar with Sausalito have reached out with their own anecdotes of Rex. Many describe him as "arrogant," "manipulative," "a prick," "an a**hole," "a slime-ball". This went on from one person to the next. I've heard from multiple former Rex clients that they believe he overcharged for his work. These former clients claim that Rex and Associate's approach of: “its better to as for forgiveness than to ask for permission” needlessly cost them a lot of money. He certainly costs our volunteer Planning Commissioners and City Council Members a lot of time in appeals and hotly contested meetings. 

Fast forward: per the guidance of Michael Rex, Conrad and Shana Gann have appealed our approved designs to the Sausalito City Council. They further indicated that even if the City Council upholds the Planning Commission’s unanimous vote of approval, they intend to file a writ of mandamus in California Superior Court in order to block our project. Which unfortunately means we will end up in Superior Court either way the City Council decides.

We believe it is highly unlikely they will succeed considering the State of California’s effort to promote housing development. As Vice-Chair Commissioner Junius stated during the October 25th Planning Commission hearing,

“One of the things that we’re going to be seeing in the coming years, the conversations were having here, is not gonna happen anymore with respect to multifamily housing, two-unit projects and above. The state, because of what happens in commission hearings like this and this type of really, really, difficult, confusing, hard-to-pin-down process has caused enormous problems around the state. So the state has taken away that power from commissions and cities for larger projects. 

Recent legislation like the Housing Accountability Act were enacted to stop the interference of disgruntled neighbors amid a housing crisis. Our approved plans are currently for a single family home plus an ADU, not a multi-family structure, although our lot is zoned for multi-family. Not only are we adding an ADU, but we are proposing a highly energy-efficient and fire-resistant home.

Rex and the Ganns recruited four other appellants to join their appeal and are collectively working to intimidate my family and drive us out of town. We are in the process of filing restraining orders on two of these appellants (Ray Swanson of 422 Pine and Lorraine Cline of 425 Turney) as well as on Zane Chess, the owner of Giligan’s Poke Shop, for harassing us in front of our children. Cline’s pattern of harassment started on her anti-family Nextdoor post and then continued in person. Cline routinely flips the middle finger to my wife and kids (6-year-old, 4-year-old, and now 16-month-old) when they pass her in the street. Zane Chess and Jeffery Konen made false statements to the police about a “physical altercation” when I had to step between Zane and my then 8 month old baby because he flew off the handle after we asked them for design feedback. Security camera footage and the police report confirmed that I did not touch him at all. However, they never did take up our offer to work with us to remedy their strong dislike of our home design. We’ve since heard multiple reports of Zane being highly aggressive and confrontational to a well-loved and respected business owner that publicly supported our project. All this because you don't like what some else’s house is going to look like?  We have worked too hard to overcome each obstacle and won’t be intimidated into backing down. But that doesn’t stop these people from trying. 

Michael Rex and Associates is a well-known critic of the Planning Commission and design review in Sausalito, while simultaneously fueling (and profiting from) the approval and denial of people's homes. Rex is like an arms dealer criticizing the war while selling arms to both sides of the conflict. Michael Rex doesn't live in Sausalito. He is not a community member. 

As some folks have pointed out, he has offered up his time and services to projects like the ferry landside project. But, this pro bono work is frankly a great lead generation tactic and I doubt he is doing it purely from the kindness of his heart. Some people have been bold enough to say that we should have hired Michael Rex and Associates to get us through the process. We disagree. We chose G Family Design because of the excellent work they do, their integrity and their commitment to this community (David is a Sausalito resident with a young family). And we are 1000% confident they will get the job done. G Family Design got us unanimous approval on our first try! If Rex weren’t lurking on the sidelines, we would already be on our way through the permitting process. Honestly, even if Rex had offered to design our house for free, we wouldn’t have hired him because of his shady reputation and the way he conducts business. Our values are not aligned with his. And while I personally do not care for Rex’s design aesthetic, it is NOT my place to tell other people what they can or cannot do with THEIR LAND. 

 A hired gun like Michael Rex and Associates should not be the gatekeeper of who can stay and who must leave a community. Building or remodeling in Sausalito is already incredibly difficult and cost-prohibitive for most people. Add in a bad actor and it becomes impossible for families that were lucky enough to buy a home in the first place but need to expand or modernize. 

We knew it would be a long road, but this journey has been crazier for our family than we could have imagined. Our hope is that through transparency we can incite change to improve the design process for our entire community. 

Onward!