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- - - - Attorney Schricker agreed, and said, "It is confusing because of the shift with respect to the description of the project. We have a less intense development as was proposed, and .......- the assumption is that the environmental review would be adequate for that, unless you find out that it is not adequate for the purposes of the 26-unit development. A new development deserves another look at it ITom the environmental stand point. . .. If you find that the Environmental Review for 26-units is adequate, you will then deny the appeal. Then you can move on to your next question." Councilman Ruskin asked, "If one finds that the mitigation measures as presently in the current project for 26-units are not sufficient, does that obligate one to uphold the appeal on the Negative Declaration?" City Attorney Schricker said, "You have to find that they do not address the environmental impacts, or the adverse impacts on the environment." City Manager Everett said, "The environmental impact doesn't look at issues other than those that they can best quantifY." He said an Environmental Assessment looks at ranges, and sometimes those ranges are very large. In response to Councilman Leipzig's question, "If we were to uphold the appeal... does that further analysis (mentioned earlier) automatically include an EIR?" City Attorney Schricker said, "Not necessarily. The only time you may use a mitigated Negative Declaration is if the mitigation measures specified in that document adequately address all of the adverse environmental effects. If you were to find that the present Negative Declaration does not adequately address the adverse environmental effects, then you must .......- do one of two things: Either add additional mitigation measures which do address the impact which you found deficient; or submit the matter to the scrutiny of an EIR. The major distinction between a mitigated negative declaration and an environmental impact report is that where you cannot mitigate all the adverse environmental effects, by law you must go into the EIR scrutiny of the project, because when you cannot mitigate all the adverse environmental effects, then you must make overriding considerations which allow you to approve a project even though not all adverse environmental effects can be mitigated." Councilman Ruskin asked regarding a proposed recommendation to the project to mitigate an impact that "could not be mitigated in its current configuration, am I obliged to uphold the appeal or may I still approve the Negative Declaration and be consistent by later offering changes to the current configuration? City Attorney Schricker said, "It would be helpful if we moved the discussion towards a description of the deficiency you fmd in the present documentation, if you find them." Mayor Hartnett asked that a motion on the appeals be made, so that Council Members could address the motion, and at that time, describe deficiencies, if any in the Negative Declaration. ~ REGULAR COUNCIL MEETING MINUTE BOOK NO. 55 MAY 12,1997 MINUTES Page No. 315 PAGE 9