Kingsbarn Developer Meeting Recap: 39 North Project Update & Next Steps

On June 5, Kingsbarn developers hosted a community meeting about the proposed 39 North development in Kings Beach. The developers shared significant project changes but faced strong community skepticism and concern over transparency, process integrity, and genuine community benefit.

📝 Key Updates Presented by Kingsbarn

(These updates reflect what was presented by Kingsbarn at the June 5 meeting. Community interpretations and additional context follow in later sections. Looking for the full history of 39 North? View the complete timeline of County decisions, developer changes, and milestones. »)

🏨 Hotel

• Revised Architecture to look more “Old Tahoe”
  
• Reduced Hotel Height from 6 floors to 4 floors (from 75ft to 56ft, a 25% reduction)
  
• Reduced hotel room count from 179 rooms to 132 rooms (a 26% reduction)
  
• Kept 189 parking stalls
  
• Relocated hotel car access from Hwy 28 to Salmon Ave
  
• Broke up hotel with visual break at street level

🏘️ Condo-Hotels

• Created open space with visual breaks between townhomes on Fox Street
  
• Revised Architecture to look more “Old Tahoe”
  

🏘️ Understanding Condo-Hotels: TRPA vs. Developer Descriptions

• TRPA Definition: According to the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, condo-hotels are considered lodging (not housing). These units are privately owned but limited to 90 days per year of owner occupancy. The remainder of the year, they function as hotel rooms. They require TAUs and are not counted toward affordable or workforce housing goals.
  
• Developer Description: In the meeting, Kingsbarn stated that townhome owners choose to rent their units or that they could be managed as part of the hotel’s rental pool—raising questions about whether the units are de facto short-term rentals (STRs) or housing for the community.
  
• Community Concern: Attendees expressed unease that these ownership models prioritize investors over locals and could contribute to ongoing issues with housing accessibility, neighborhood character, and tourist impacts.

Workforce Housing

• Decreased length of Workforce Housing Building from 247 feet to 192 feet (a 22% reduction)
  
• Increased workforce housing count from 62 to 63 units
  
• Added seven 2-bedroom units
  
• Increased number of Workforce Housing Parking Spaces from 50 to 68 (a 36% increase)
  
• Increased Green Space area
  

🏗️ Snapshot of Public Input: Challenges & Expectations

Process, Procurement & Developer Selection
Community members expressed lingering frustration with how the project has unfolded behind closed doors for years. Many remain troubled that the 2018 Purchase-and-Sale Agreement was executed without a formal RFP—even though a Request for Information (RFI) went out in 2016—so no competitive public process followed, despite the land being taxpayer-owned and highly visible. That 2018 agreement outlined a concept for the Kings Beach Center including 80–150 hotel rooms, 10–40 condominiums, approximately 15,000 square feet of retail, and 2,000 square feet reserved for civic use (with a library among the options)—features that have since evolved or disappeared from view.

In 2019, Placer County designated the adjacent Eastern Gateway parcel as a complementary workforce and commercial hub. That Purchase Agreement envisioned 45 workforce housing units and 10,000 square feet of mixed-use commercial and office space, intended to balance the hotel-heavy Kings Beach Center site. Today, however, neither commercial space nor civic-use square footage is proposed, raising concerns that promised community-serving elements have quietly been dropped without public explanation.

At the June 5 meeting, Kingsbarn told the audience it is the fourth developer on the deal and has been involved for about four years. That turnover, without any fresh public vetting, has amplified distrust. After seven years of waiting, residents now see the scope realigned to meet TRPA and TBAP ordinances—but fear that CEQA review could be fast-tracked, curtailing the meaningful public input long promised but not delivered. As detailed in the 39 North Kings Beach Timeline, this cycle of developer turnover, sparse engagement, and long silences has already eroded community trust.

Transparency & Public Access to Information
Residents noted that no updated site plans, financials, or timelines have appeared on Kingsbarn’s or Placer County’s websites for more than a year. Several said they have relied on word-of-mouth, meeting screenshots, or public-records requests just to track basic facts. Without a single, frequently updated project page—posting drawings, traffic studies, financial asks, and deadlines—locals argued they cannot stay engaged or hold decision-makers accountable.

During the Q&A, one attendee asked point-blank, “What’s the population of the site?”—only to hear the developer reply that they would “have to work up that number.” Yet a January 2024 staff packet already lists about 105 permanent hotel jobs and roughly 636 construction jobs—figures that presuppose an internal occupancy and staffing model. The memo’s job totals show Kingsbarn does, in fact, run detailed head-count projections, but the underlying “heads-in-beds” assumptions have never been shared. That discrepancy—detailed staffing numbers on paper, but no public population baseline—reinforces calls for full disclosure before CEQA moves forward.

Public Subsidies & Incentives
Kingsbarn repeatedly said the project “isn’t getting a subsidy,” framing any transient-occupancy-tax (TOT) rebate as visitor-paid. Yet a January 2024 Placer County memo shows the developer previously sought a performance-based TOT rebate worth up to $38.6 million over 20 years—a request the Board rejected. If revived, that rebate could divert about $2 million a year from parks, transit, and visitor-impact mitigation. Kingsbarn is now pursuing a revised rebate and a TAU transfer through the North Lake Tahoe Economic Development Incentive Program (NTEDIP), scheduled for Board review on 23–24 June 2025. Residents asked whether a decades-long rebate should flow to a single private project or be shared across multiple initiatives that lift the broader economy.

Public Land Transparency
Kingsbarn has not yet closed on the property; the development still sits on taxpayer-owned land. Several speakers said no community-driven alternatives—such as higher-ratio housing, civic space, or a public-private marketplace—were ever vetted. They questioned whether public land should advance without a transparent process and clearly defined benefits for the community that owns it. One speaker asked bluntly, “Why does public land move forward for private profit when the community never saw an alternative plan on the table?”

Traffic & Safety
Ongoing worries include congestion, emergency-vehicle access, and wildfire evacuation. One speaker cited Bonta v. County of Lake (2023), which bars approvals that worsen evacuation conditions unless fully mitigated. Attendees asked whether shifting the hotel driveway from Highway 28 to Salmon Avenue was designed to keep traffic counts off the main corridor that will be studied—potentially understating cumulative impacts. A formal traffic-and-evacuation study may start in July 2025 under the four-party agreement; residents asked if approvals would wait for its findings or outpace the data needed to keep people safe. A retired firefighter called for an independent, parcel-level evacuation model—separate from the developer-funded traffic study—to verify worst-case clearance times. Another speaker asked whether 50-foot fire engines and large ambulances can make the turn onto Salmon Avenue, noting that no public turning-radius diagrams have been shown.

Hotel Parking & Post-Office Lot Replacement
Kingsbarn told the crowd the current 22-stall Post Office lot would “come back as 19 free public stalls” split between the underground garage and Salmon Avenue: “Anybody can park there for free—to go to the post office.” County records from an October 2023 Board vote, however, require all 22 public stalls be rebuilt underground—or the parcel reverts to Placer County if the garage is not open by January 2030. Locals who rely on those spaces for every piece of mail remain wary that “free public” could become hotel overflow without a detailed operations plan and strict enforcement.

Workforce Housing Parking Adequacy
Kingsbarn increased workforce-housing parking from 50 to 68 stalls (a 36 percent bump) but called further underground expansion “cost-prohibitive.” When pressed, the developer said: “If more parking is required, we can reduce the workforce-housing unit count… we’re only required to do 12 units.” One resident then asked where visitors or a second household car would go, noting that “no one can visit” if every stall is reserved for tenants. Community reaction: using parking ratios to threaten a cut in unit count—and offering no plan for guest overflow—reinforced the sense that workforce housing is leverage, not a locked-in benefit, and that spill-over parking could migrate to already-packed neighborhood streets.

Workforce Housing Affordability
Kingsbarn pointed to its Carson City complex, the Marlette, as the closest comparison:
“Studios lease for about 1,560 dollars a month, and two-bedrooms a little over 2,000.”
With Kings Beach service wages around 19 dollars an hour, residents doubted such rents would truly serve local workers. Kingsbarn said units will be filled from an open waiting list—not prioritized for Kings Beach employees—leaving uncertainty about who benefits. The developer also repeated it is only obligated to build 12 apartments and could scale back if parking rules tighten, stoking fears that affordability remains a bargaining chip.

Mixed-Income Integration
Several commenters urged Kingsbarn to weave the 63 workforce apartments into the hotel-and-retail block rather than clustering them at the site’s edge—warning that “pushing all the affordable units away builds two towns in one.” They noted the Town Center/Eastern Gateway Plan specifically encourages vertical mixed-use (housing above shops) to keep residents, foot traffic, and daily spending in the core. A longtime renter added that mixing units downtown “keeps eyes on the street and daytime customers in the cafés,” echoing the plan’s walkability goals.

Retail Footprint & Design Priorities
Attendees worried that the hotel lobby dwarfs retail space three-to-one, fearing permanent loss of leasable downtown frontage. Walkable, local-serving storefronts, they said, are critical to Kings Beach’s identity and year-round economy. Questions arose about how much square footage would remain truly accessible to local entrepreneurs versus transient-oriented uses, and whether any remaining space could be priced within reach of small businesses. The lack of clarity on tenant mix left many wondering if the commercial design was ever meant to serve residents or merely complement hotel operations. A local shop owner warned that without small, street-level storefronts, “you wipe out the very businesses that give Kings Beach its character,” urging the developer to publish a leasing plan that prioritizes community-scale tenants. Another nearby retailer cautioned that multi-year construction fencing and lane closures could choke off pedestrian flow, forcing some existing shops to close long before any promised new storefronts appear.

Economic Vitality
Kingsbarn described the hotel as a catalyst that would “kick-start Kings Beach and attract more patrons,” yet many locals were unconvinced. Speakers noted that lodging alone doesn’t ensure prosperity: if storefront rents rise, the very entrepreneurs who give the town its character could be priced out. One shop owner warned that multi-year dust, lane closures, and staging areas could choke off foot traffic long before any promised influx of guests. Another asked whether the new jobs would be stable, year-round positions for local residents or mostly seasonal roles recruited from outside the basin. Without safeguards—affordable retail leases, clear local-hire goals, and a construction-impact plan—will the project boost jobs and small-business growth, or simply inflate rents and operating costs that push locals out?

Everyday Services & Grocery Supply
“Our grocery shelves already go empty in peak season—what happens with 130 more hotel rooms?” asked one resident, pointing to limited supermarket capacity and potential stock-outs or price spikes during wildfire evacuations. Speakers urged the County to study cumulative visitor demand on essential goods and services.

Trash, Visitor Behavior & Nightlife Noise
Speakers said guest education must go beyond trash disposal: visitors need guidance on bear safety, neighborhood courtesy, and explicit rooftop-bar hours to prevent late-night noise. Without a robust visitor-management plan, they fear behavioral impacts will strain public services and fray community relations.

Community Aesthetic & Scale
Although some liked the lower roofline and “Old Tahoe” materials, many felt the massing still reads as a city hotel dropped into a mountain town, blocking lake views and eroding small-town character. Several called façade tweaks “window dressing” that fails to tackle scale.

Environment & Native Landscape
Speakers asked Kingsbarn to embed native plants, dark-sky lighting, renewable energy, and robust bear-safe features—arguing façade changes alone will not offset the ecological load of a 132-room hotel and 38 condo-townhomes unless paired with strong operational standards.

Developer’s Tone
Finally, several attendees said the developer’s occasionally defensive—even threatening—tone undercut trust and raised doubts about future willingness to adjust the plan in response to community feedback.

🌲 CEQA & Meaningful Community Engagement: Critical Concerns

County staff and Kingsbarn say environmental review is the next step, but residents have heard “wait for CEQA” for years without seeing the process begin. People now worry the review will be fast-tracked to meet deadlines in the County’s purchase agreements.

Since the last community meeting in May 2024, much of the official effort has gone into policy tweaks that would make the project easier to approve. Many of those changes fell through, and Kingsbarn has come back with a design that fits existing TRPA/TBAP rules—yet, as attendees noted, that pivot happened with little public collaboration.

Residents stressed that CEQA is not a box-checking exercise; it is a legal and ethical safeguard meant to protect both the environment and the public interest. They asked for four concrete commitments:

• Publish a CEQA timeline showing every milestone, comment window, and decision date.
• Prepare a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR) that evaluates wildfire evacuation, traffic, and cumulative impacts.
• Release a detailed pro forma and financing plan so the public can see cost assumptions and subsidy requests.
• Negotiate a community-benefit agreement spelling out rent levels, local-hire targets, and affordable commercial-lease terms.

County staff and Kingsbarn said a formal CEQA process will occur, yet the developers remark of—“I didn’t have to do this today”—left many feeling the meeting was more about checking a box than opening a door.

Core concern: if CEQA is rushed or narrowed, will the community ever get the deep, transparent review it has been promised? For residents, CEQA is not a technical hurdle; it is their right to understand, evaluate, and shape what happens to their land, environment, and neighborhoods.

📆 What Happens Next?

Placer County Board of Supervisors Meeting (June 23 & 24):

Two 39 North–related items are expected to be on the agenda:

1. TAU Incentive Request (Round 2): The developer is requesting TAUs from the North Lake Tahoe TAU Bank through the NTEDIP program. This follows the Board’s January 2024 rejection of a larger TAU and rebate package.
2. Four-Way Agreement Amendment: The Board will consider proposed changes to the existing Four-Way Agreement that could alter current CEQA expectations, possibly giving the project more flexibility to proceed without a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR).

This meeting represents an essential opportunity for public input. Residents are encouraged to attend, comment, and ask: Should public resources and long-term tax rebates support a project that still lacks clear community benefit, affordability, and transparency?

Environmental Review Initiation:

A formal project submission to Placer County is expected soon, which would officially begin the CEQA process.

Community advocates continue to call for close oversight to ensure that CEQA is conducted thoroughly and not fast-tracked to meet developer or contractual timelines.

📚 Additional Resources

• Keep a lookout for upcoming posts in our Strong North Tahoe Blog Series, including a detailed deep-dive into what’s at stake with 39 North and why TAUs, incentives, and public land use matter for Kings Beach.
  
• 39 North Kings Beach Timeline
  
• If you are passionate about this project and want to help advocate for our community, please consider joining the Strong North Tahoe 39 North Action Group.

Stay engaged. Your participation is essential to ensuring this development genuinely benefits Kings Beach residents and businesses. Mark your calendars for June 23 & 24 and prepare to speak out!