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https://www.almanacnews.com/menlo-park/2025/01/22/recall-effort-underway- against-menlo-park-mayor-drew-combs/

Rob Silano, a resident of the Suburban Park neighborhood in Menlo Park, is leading a recall effort against Mayor Drew Combs following the Planning Commission’s final approval of an educator housing development on the site
of the former Flood School at 320 Sheridan Drive. Silano also serves as a director of the Menlo Park Fire Protection District, but says he is
working to recall Combs as a private citizen.

Combs announced the recall effort in his monthly email newsletter to his constituents, saying that Silano had sent him an email about the recall.
Combs told this news organization that the recall attempt against him is “beyond absurd.”

Silano and other residents of the Suburban Park neighborhood have opposed
the development since it was first proposed on the grounds of public
safety due to there only being one exit for the property. The educator
housing project was granted entitlements at the Menlo Park Planning Commission’s Jan. 13 meeting.

The approximately 2.5-acre site, owned by the Ravenswood City School
District, has sat vacant since 2011. District educators and other
employees have first dibs on the development’s 88 units, according to a
staff report for the meeting. In November, the council committed $1
million of the city’s BMR Housing Fund to help in the project’s
construction.

Silano and other recall supporters have not yet filed any official recall paperwork with the city of Menlo Park, according to City Clerk Judi
Herren.

Combs wrote in his newsletter that he is open to exploring a second access point, but that he is “skeptical of the option in part because it would
require the creation of a new street.”

According to a staff report prepared for the Jan. 13 Planning Commission meeting where the project was given final approval, the developer has “negotiated with Haven Family House to allow an emergency vehicle access easement through their property” to allow for a second emergency exit. The property at 320 Sheridan Drive is bordered on one side by Interstate
Highway 101, and the other side by Flood Park, so the only access point
other than Sheridan Drive is through Haven Family House’s property.

Plans published by the developer show that the second emergency access
point would be blocked off by a chain link fence, and not accessible by
the residents of the development.

“To be frank, a full second access seems to be a disingenuous effort to
have the future residents of this project mostly access it through the
Flood Triangle neighborhood instead of the Suburban Park neighborhood,”
Combs wrote in his newsletter.

Silano said that his involvement in the effort to recall Combs isn’t about wanting less traffic in his neighborhood, but rather about the safety of
the access points.

“Mr. Combs is providing lip service to the community, his biggest gripe
about providing a second entrance is the city would have to build a road
but mentions a random emergency second entrance,” Silano wrote in an email
to this news organization. “Wouldn’t that emergency entrance require a
road or does Mr. Combs plan to use a muddy grass patch in the winter with
a 50,000 pound fire emergency vehicle[?]”

According to Combs, the project design complies with all applicable fire
and building codes, and has been reviewed by the fire marshal and
approved. Silano said he does not believe this is enough, and that he
believes the city will be exposed to millions of dollars in liability.

“Is a minimum requirement of the fire code good enough when considering
the safe construction and when the community could be in greater
jeopardy(?)” Silano said in an email to this news organization.

Though other City Council members have also supported the development,
Silano said that he is only seeking to recall Combs as he represents
District 2, where the educator housing project is located and where Silano lives. Silano says he and other supporters of the recall understand the
need for affordable housing, but that this particular project is
“extremely poorly managed, putting lives and property at risk and future taxpayers in extreme liability exposure.”

According to the state Elections Code, to initiate a recall, Silano and
other interested parties will have to obtain signatures from three times
the number of people that were required to sign to get Combs on the ballot originally. According to Herren, candidates are required to obtain at
least 20 signatures to run in Menlo Park, so Silano will have to obtain 60 signatures to officially initiate the recall. According to Silano, there
was already a petition circulated in the Suburban Park neighborhood asking
the City Council to consider a second access point that has amassed over
300 signatures, and he believes it will be easy to obtain the necessary signatures to initiate the recall.

“I look forward to the discussion of my record as a member of the City
Council that will occur in the weeks and months ahead,” Combs wrote. “I
also look forward to demonstrating to my two children that leadership, at
its best, has to be about being grounded in core values such as inclusion, empathy and fairness.”

The educator housing development at 320 Sheridan was the subject of a
citywide ballot measure — Measure V — in 2023 that sought to block it.
Over 60% of Menlo Park residents voted against the measure, which would
have put any rezoning of single-family lots to a citywide vote at a
regularly scheduled election. The measure failed in nearly all city voting precincts, with only three precincts winning majority support. Two of
those precincts are directly next to the Flood School site.


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