Yountville officials will reexamine a planned workforce housing project after the Town Council this week favored overturning earlier changes, including to zoning, that had previously set the stage for project planning.

The project is intended for the former site of the Yountville Elementary School, known as the Yountville Commons, which the town purchased in 2024.

But residents and prominent business owners — including French Laundry chef and owner Thomas Keller — over the past few months have called on the town to carry out more outreach and to clarify aspects of the project such as finances, unit mix and parking before moving forward with it.

That pushback arose while the council prepared the commons property for development. Among other changes, an ordinance approved Feb. 3 rezoned the property and a tentative subdivision map divided it into 18 parcels. The council at a Feb. 17 meeting reviewed possibilities for the first project phase of about 40 units — including a possible cost of about $25.6 million — though most aspects of the project still had yet to be solidified.

Still, community members sought to overturn the zoning change with a proposed referendum, submitted March 4. Because the referendum received sufficient signatures from local voters to qualify — 215 of 174 needed, or 10% of Yountville’s population — the council on Tuesday, April 7, had to either move to repeal the ordinance or bring the question to voters in November.

Council members favored repealing the ordinance 4-0 on Tuesday, with Council member Hillery Trippe absent from the vote. That action starts a process where the repeal will be evaluated by the town’s Zoning and Design Review Board before going back to the council for a final decision.

Council members said at the meeting they thought taking a step back and restarting the conversation around the project is vital.

“I don’t think it really serves the community at all to wait until November to probably accomplish what we can just do here today by council action,” Yountville Mayor Margie Mohler said.

Mohler said the conversation around the project had been “hijacked,” adding that there had been no opportunity to have a community conversation about the details and financial options that first emerged on Feb. 17. Several council members said there’s a need for a neutral facilitator to help move the project forward.

“If we are not able to talk about this anymore as leaders here in the community without having doubt cast upon us, we are at the point where a facilitator is going to be the only solution I support,” said Council member Robin McKee-Cant.

You can reach Staff Writer Edward Booth at 707-521-5281 or edward.booth@pressdemocrat.com.