City of Napa planners delay bed and breakfast decision to avoid Brown Act violation

But before the discussion began, the commission decided to delay their decision because the item hadn’t been properly noticed, and therefore represented a possible violation of the open meeting law known as the Brown Act.

The meeting discussion likely would have gone forward had commissioner Beverly Shotwell not pointed out that the location of the proposed bed and breakfast had been incorrectly identified as 741 Seminary Street — the location of the historic William Andrews House, approved by the commission for a bed and breakfast in January 2022 — in the meeting agenda.

A few minutes later, Assistant City Attorney Sabrina Wolfson noted that the same incorrect address had also been used in a legal notice in the Napa Valley Register, and recommended the city continue the item at a later date so the item can be properly noticed.

“If someone were to look at the agenda and see that address, they might think ‘that’s not relevant to me,’” Wolfson said at the meeting. “Then they wouldn’t come to the meeting and have an opportunity to participate.”  

When the commission does, in the near future, get around to making a decision on the proposed bed and breakfast, city staff are recommending they deny it. That’s because staff felt the proposal doesn’t fit the intent of the city’s bed and breakfast ordinance, Senior City Planner Michael Allen said at the meeting.

For the most part, according to Allen, that’s because the home is small enough that it doesn’t “lend itself to needing adaptive reuse,” and converting it to a bed and breakfast would reduce Napa’s limited rental housing stock.

“It’s a home that would be ideal for a small family or even a single couple,” Allen said at the meeting.

Allen noted that the ordinance had been passed by the city well over 20 years, “at a time when the city didn’t have a lot of transient uses we had a lot of older Victorian homes, large homes that were in poor shape and use.”

At the time, he said, property values weren’t as high, so there was a need to renovate the “large, old, grand homes that, because of their size, were costly to maintain and also heat and provide other utilities to.” Such homes generally include many bedrooms and other rooms that lend the structure to a bed and breakfast use.

Allen also noted that there’s been a significant rise in hotel rooms and bed and breakfasts since the ordinance was added.

“We have several hotels now, we have over 24 bed and breakfasts that are currently operating in the city, and we do have a housing crunch,” Allen said. “So when staff reviewed this application we just didn’t see that it fit the mold for the bed and breakfast use.”

Applicant Robert Devlin contended, however, that owning a bed and breakfast is “his dream” and that he doesn’t have the money to buy the type of larger house that has in the past been approved by the city to be a bed and breakfast inn.

He compared the proposed use to the 60 hosted vacation rentals that the city permits, which he said are about the same size.

Devlin also noted he currently rents the property out on Airbnb on a monthly basis — anything less than a 30 day rental isn’t allowed by the city of Napa if the property doesn’t have a vacation rental permit — and he would plan to hire his housekeeper’s daughter as a manager to live at the house.

“With Airbnb, everybody’s so scared about them, including one of my other neighbors who’s a teacher and she likes her peace and quiet,” Devlin said. “She’s always amazed at how quiet everybody is that does stay there, even though it’s on a monthly basis. I do rent it out on Airbnb monthly. So I have experience with Airbnb, I have great experience with it, and again it’s my dream. I just hope you can approve it.”

But, owing to the noticing error, a decision on the project will have to be made at a future meeting.