Los Altos City Council members approved the demolition of the caretaker cottage at Redwood Grove and appointed a number of commissioners during last week’s city council meeting.
The demolition of the caretaker cottage, a small building near the entrance of Redwood Grove, 482 University Ave., was approved unanimously Sept. 9 as a consent calendar item. The cottage is the only other building in the grove apart from the Halsey House. It historically housed the caretaker of Redwood Grove and the Halsey House, according to Manny Hernandez, parks and recreation director.
In recent years, the caretaker cottage has been used for storage.
“Since that caretaker cottage is no longer working in (a housing) capacity, camps have been using it for summer work, and storage, as well as Grassroots Ecology,” he said in a phone call. “The contract we have with them, the city has with them, they do a lot of the nature plantings and similar things like that in Redwood Grove. They have an agreement with the city to do that and they work and store their tools out of there, too.”
Demolition and removal of the cottage will be conducted by Castroville-based Randazzo Enterprises, Inc., and is set to not exceed $98,900 – the initial cost a maximum $86,000 with up to 15% contingency not exceeding $12,900.
The city is currently working on the contract and insurance, so there is no established date for when demolition will begin, Hernandez said. However, he estimated it should begin sometime in early October. While subject to change, the city is estimating the demolition of the building and removal of debris to span four weeks. Access to Redwood Grove would also be affected.
“That pathway down the hill into the cottage area, and then across the cottage that goes to the grove itself and the Halsey house, the public will have limited access through there,” he said. “Obviously, we don’t want to mix people with big equipment that are coming down to pull out pieces and get some of that debris out. During certain intervals of the demolition, there’ll be no access across that area when they’re working with big machinery or big trucks.”
The official council meeting lasted a short 30 minutes following a longer special session including interviews of applicants for a variety of city commissions. After the interviews, city council members filled out paper ballots and submitted them to City Clerk Melissa Thurman.
Council voted Clara Roa to a vacant one-year seat on the Complete Streets Commission; Angelo DeGiuli to a short-term Environmental Commission seat expiring in September 2028; Jonathan Chang to one of three full-term Financial Commission seat expiring in September 2029; Karen Scussel to one full-term Historical Commission seat expiring in September 2029; Pierre Bedard, Ambica Bhardwaj and Jeanine Valadez were appointed to three full-term Library Commission seats expiring in September 2029, with two possible reappointments; Teresa Morris, Erin MacDonald, Misti Sangani, Ellen Dolich and Alexandra Nguyen to five full-term Parks, Arts, Recreation and Cultural Commission seats expiring in September 2029 and Yvette Stout to a short-term seat expiring in September 2027; Daphne Ross to one of two short-term Planning Commission seats expiring in September 2026; and Kris Olson to one of two short-term Senior Commission seats expiring in September 2026.
Vacant Planning and Senior commission seats will remain open, Thurman said in an email.
