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7.E. - Page 4 of 43 Floor Area: State law requires allowance of an ADU of up to 800 sq. ft., exclusive of local FAR regulations, whether the ADU is attached, detached, located on the ground floor, or an upper floor. Attached ADUs are not allowed to be greater than 50% of the floor area of the main home. State law requires that all ADU applications must be reviewed as ministerial with a building permit and does not allow for discretionary planning review for ADUs. ADUs associated with duplex or multifamily dwellings are not subject to the floor area ratio (FAR) ordinance. At the July 13' City Council hearing, staff recommended exempting all ADUs from floor area ratio calculations, however there was Council support to apply floor area regulations to ADUs above 800 sq. ft. On August 18th, the Planning Commission did not support staff's recommendation to exempt all ADUs from the floor area ratio calculation, but rather to apply floor area to the extent allowed by State Law. The Commission expressed concern with homeowners using the ADU regulations to circumvent the additional procedures established by the soft cap floor area ratio ordinance. The City's FAR regulations for single-family homes include a soft cap threshold that requires Planning Commission consideration for single-family home projects that exceed in 3,000 sq. ft. or 0.45 FAR, whichever is greater. Exemptions from the FAR regulations include detached ADUs, projects on lots less than 5,000 sq. ft., ground floor additions, and second story additions of 100 sq. ft. or less. The FAR ordinance does not prohibit additional floor area, but requires additional findings (Section 48.4) and discretionary review. Since ground floor additions are already exempt, existing FAR regulations would be limited to second story additions attached to the main home. Applying floor area from attached ADUs towards the total floor area of the main home could trigger discretionary review of the ADU, which is not allowed by State law. A second -story addition with an attached ADU would need to be designed and constructed concurrently as they would share walls, structural weight bearing loads, interior utilities, and roof design. City regulations for structural calculations, energy insulation calculations, and fire separation would need to be reviewed together at the design phase to ensure safety and code compliance. Floor joists, interior plumbing, electrical wiring, roofing, and exterior siding would be constructed generally at the same time in order to reduce the length of time and associated impacts of construction. Application of separate levels of review for the same structure is not reasonable given the shared design, code regulations, and construction phasing required for second story additions and attached ADUs. Staff recommends exempting all ADUs from floor area requirements. Staff Recommendation: Exempt all ADUs from FAR calculations (as noted above, the Planning Commission did not support staff's recommendation to exempt all ADUs from the floor area ratio calculation, but rather to apply floor area to the extent allowed by State Law). Lot Coverage: State law requires that cities cannot impose lot coverage standards which would prohibit development of an 800 sq. ft. ADU (attached or detached). Cities can apply lot coverage to ADUs, but this would only be applicable to a narrow range of ADUs between 800 sq. ft. to 1,000 sq. ft. in most cases. During the July 13, 2020 City Council meeting there was support for requiring lot coverage for ADUs above 800 sq. ft., however some of the support was contingent on a maximum allowable height that would allow a detached two-story ADU. There are tradeoffs with reducing height for detached ADUs that may require Page 4 of 8 City of Redwood City 1017 Middlefield Road, Redwood City, CA. 94063 Tel: 650-780-7000 www.redwoodcity.org 627