001e e e good evening and welcome to the Tuesday December 15 2020 meeting of the an arbor Planning Commission this meeting is held electronically to protect public health and safety due to the covid-19 virus and to comply with orders issued by the governor the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services Andor the Washton County Health Department we intend to conduct this meeting similarly to an in-person meeting however please be patient if there are technical issues um public comment will be via telephone only and so to speak during any of the comment public comment opportunities please call 877 85352 47 or or any of the other numbers that have been published on the agenda and the meeting ID for tonight is 99577 68 1361 this information is also available on the published agenda in the Public
002Notices section of the city website and on the broadcast of this meeting on CTN Channel 16 AT&T channel99 and online at a2gov.org CN and once you're there you would select the government Channel item number two on the agenda is a roll call Mr Chang could you please do that for us uh yes commissioner abon commissioner dis here commissioner sa here commissioner Lee here commissioner Gibb Randall here commissioner Mills here commissioner hamers Schmid here commissioner milin here and commissioner Clark we have a quorum very good and we're on item number three which is introductions and so those of you who normally follow Planning Commission might note that we had two new members in our uh roll call tonight welcome commissioner Lee and commissioner Clark um I'm wondering if you could please briefly introduce yourselves to us
003and to those who are following us on the broadcast of this commissioner Clark can we start with you oh you're muted it's okay happens to the best of us all right hi thanks um so my name is sadira um I've worked in housing now for or nonprofit development for about 10 years now housing has been my focus for majority of that um I have a degree from the new school in New York in urban policy analysis and management um and I love of Eastern Michigan and I guess I consider h of my hometown I grew up in s Township right outside of town um I'm really excited to be here and contributing and I'm looking forward to it well welcome we're glad to have you commissioner Lee yeah sure um I've been in Ann Arbor
004since 97 um I went to Bryant Paton Guild taen Pioneer uh Michigan undergrad Michigan grad school so I've been here uh for a little while um right out of school I worked on zoning analysis for the D1 D2 adjacency to r4c I created renderings for that and um since then I've worked at McKinley as a real estate analyst portfolio manager and I'm I've been with Oxford now for about five years so um I'm glad to be here I think I've you know I'm here to serve listen and hopefully contribute in a meaningful manner so looking forward to it well we're glad to have you and it's really nice to be up to our full contingent of nine again U makes it a lot easier to make quum so um item number four on the agenda
005is approval of the agenda so can I have a motion to approve the agenda or to move it uh moved by commissioner milstein seconded by commissioner hamers Schmid is there any discussion of the agenda as drafted all in favor of the agenda as drafted please raise your hand or say I I I any opposed I don't see any so great the motion carries item number five is the approval of minutes from the previous meeting we actually have two bet two sets of minutes and I propose that we take them together um may I have a motion to approve the minutes of the November 17th and nove and December 1st 2020 meeting moved by commissioner dish second by commissioner milstein is there any discussion of the minutes seeing none all in favor of the minutes as
006drafted please raise your hand or say I hi any opposed okay the motion carries we'll move on item number six is reports from City Administration City Council planning manager Planning Commission officers and committees and written Communications there are some written Communications that I'm sure you saw in the packet um council member dish do you have any report for us I do I have a brief report um and I hope I'm not leaving anything out but hopefully someone will correct me if I do um at the last meeting Council approved the Brighton condo proposal and made uh an interesting modification in response to neighbor concerns about traffic cut-throughs and so there will be uh the resurrection of a proposed gate that was in a previous iteration of this very long Saga um and it will be
007temporarily installed um where the connection was going to be at um I think it's was it Eli yeah thank you even though you hear it said probably 50 times in the public comment my what the Mind puts away so um that uh it was a very constructive and polite and collaborative encounter between the neighborhood and Council and that felt good I think they are excited to have bright Dawn they were just concerned about you know the way uh the way their neighborhood the way the traffic flows in their neighborhood and so hopefully that gate will will really be temporary um it is of course you can get through if you're an emergency vehicle so no worries there and then the other um M I think the only other thing that's interesting to Planning Commission is
008that the S the sign ordinance did pass um and it was very amusing because the mayor had to read all of those numbers every single time he called on us to amend it and so it tested his enunciation and elocution and I think he passed as did the sign ordinance so if if I'm forgetting anything please chip in anybody Mr Chang do you have anything to add or anything from the planning manager there was nothing to be added from the planning manager all right very good um are there any other commissioner officers or committee Liaisons that have anything to report been quiet on the committee front I guess all right then we can move to item number seven which is the first opportunity for audience participation this is an opportunity for persons to address the
009commission for up to three minutes about an issue that's not listed as a public hearing on the agenda so the three public hearings um that are on the agenda tonight are for the St Francis proposal the West here on parking lot and the Lewis Jewelers proposal so now is not the time to talk about those but for any other matters including if you want to talk to us about the communications to council for um site plans or for the C1 a C1 a um this is your opportunity to do that you can please call 877 853 5247 and enter meeting ID 1361 City staff will select on callers that have raised their hand digitally um calling on You by the last three digits of your telephone number to raise your hand you press star n
010on your phone um you'll hear an automated announcement when you have been uh moved to speak um when speaking please move yourself to a quiet area and mute any television or background sound so that we can hear you clearly you might also have to press star six to unmute yourself um and at the beginning of your comments please state your name and address for the record so I see a couple callers on the line um if you'd like to speak about an item that's not a public hearing tonight you can press star n and raise your hand and it looks like we have a taker all right caller ending in 534 you have three minutes to address the Planning Commission good evening my name is Tom stalberg I live at 1202 Traver Street in lowertown
011Ann Arbor and I want to talk uh about the c1a and C1 uh update uh but I want to start uh welcoming the two new planning Commissioners uh with a little review and background of the Lower Town issue itself which is the reason we're here for the C1 AR uh and c1a review um and I know there's only three planning Commissioners left from uh 201 17 when lowertown was before you and even those three didn't see a wealth of materials that have come out uh regarding this matter since then um for those who don't know the uh after it passed through Planning Commission um the Lower Town um 1140 Broadway morning side uh application um the neighborhood hired uh a top expert attorney not to sue the city but to educate Council our attorney uh
012Susan frander did the research she did the homework and uh we've been making all that information available to you uh hopefully you've been able to uh read my emails in the attachments um there's a 30-page letter from her from uh late maybe November 2017 uh there's the actual lawsuit filing which is full of a wealth of both factual information as well as um claims um so my relationship to that is I am the official spokesperson I'm a board member and spokesperson for the neighborhood association that did file the law suit uh after it was improperly approved uh and why me uh I was a developer I developed subdivisions uh throughout um Oak County uh going back almost 30 years now I've been presented to multiple planning commissions City councils Township boards uh did a lot
013of resoning uh did resoning even when a master plan was required in order to entertain my application first which takes me back to some history here of 2017 the summer of 2017 when Ethel pots who sadly passed away this past year uh es pots and I were in front of the city uh Planning Commission your body saying that the process was wrong on this approval and the first thing to note is that if you look at the March 31st 2017 letter that I sent you all uh planning letter to the developer that uh properly claims that this is a residential development um and that the site was master plan for mixed use uh so at that moment in time there should have been a master plan review for this issue a r um process and
014if the communi if the community had decided we no longer wanted mixed use on the site we wanted residential then the proper way to do that would be to have that Master Plan revision I don't think we would have ended up with that conclusion given the momentum towards TSD and mixed juice and then we'd be done we wouldn't be here talking about this right now because the master plan would not have been changed from mixed juice the application would have had to be turned down because it's a residential application not a mixed use application and we wouldn't have this discussion about why c1a and C1 a r were so badly improperly misused to get around our zoning ordinance uh so where am I with c1a and C1 R if they're going to be misused just
015get rid of them they haven't been used in 50 years 20 years respectively uh they weren't missed they aren't need and theyve only been misused thank you thank you thank thank you very much caller ending in 556 you'll have three minutes to address the Planning Commission hello can you hear me yes my name is Ralph mcke I'm in the Fifth Ward I sent you an in-depth email today which I'm betting you probably haven't gotten through yet because it has references to several other documents so I'll try to hit the main points in my three minutes I listen to and spoke at the recent ordinance review committee meeting on the review of these districts and have reviewed the staff recommend ation just submitted by Mr Leonard I'm not surprised but I'm still very disappointed with that
016recommendation it does not follow the direction given by Council to analyze restriction or elimination of these districts and it ignores the public input provided at that meeting instead the recommendation supports a vague expansion of use of those districts the recommendation doesn't address properly one the original intent of those districts to the problematic and arguably illegal use in Lower Town and Garnett development which resulted in community push back a lawsuit and the council directive that brought us here today three their use allows developers to avoid including affordable units or paying into the affordable fund for the difficulties inherent in having a district with no boundaries and five usurping the master plan process the original intent is laid out in the lower toown complaint in in the other letter that Mr stalberg just referred to it was
017to complement campus business districts not campuses that's an essential point Point next expanding their use can expose numerous neighborhoods to high-rises next door with no standards for approval and without getting a single dollar for affordable housing which would otherwise likely be required under other zoning approval routes therefore in my view it's intellectually dishonest to advocate for use of these districts and at the same time claim to be for affordable housing those are inconsistent uh next the Lower Town approval is maybe the worst zoning decision in recent history it cost us almost 9 million in affordable housing dollars the complaint is essential reading you just can't have a coherent discussion of this issue without reading that two main points the approval process completely ignored applicable law and the master plan the original planning report said the
018project was inconsistent with the master plan because one it was too dense and two it wasn't mixed use somehow Mr L Leonard managed to do a complete about face in on that issue without explaining why ever recommended approval and got it passed we shouldn't allow this to happen again next I'm amazed that the affordable housing advocates in town haven't picked up on this issue every single use of this District or these these two districts would otherwise likely fall into a category that you're working on right now the ppms or maybe into a PUD all of those would get us affordable housing dollars so every single time that that a development like lower toown is approved it costs us affordable housing dollars that's really really important and needs to be focused on and I haven't heard
019any affordable housing Advocates pick up on that uh so that's the the gist of what what my email says I would en uh hope that you get a chance to read it and assimilate it you need to read those other documents there's a lot of detail but it's essential thank you thank you very much and we did receive that in a packet um the communication was passed along before the meeting so thank you very much for that if there's anyone else on the line who wishes to address Planning Commission on any item that's not listed for a public hearing this is your chance uh you can press star nine to digitally raise your hand all right seeing no one um I will close this opportunity for audience participation and again um in addition to the
020public hearings there's another opportunity for audience participation at the end of the meeting um and we'll move on to item number eight which is the public hearings for the de next business meeting um Mr chain you have those you're muted Never Never Fails okay we have quite a few uh the first one is for the fiscal year 2022 2027 Capital Improvements plan uh this is a plan for city capital Investments to be undertaken over the next six years this plan describes projects that address needs for municipal and park facilities Transportation improvements and utility infrastructure along with proposed costs and scheduling upon adoption by the City Planning Commission the CIP becomes a supporting document for the city's master plan the CIP is also used as a source document for the city's capital budget planning uh next
021we have the ruthin nature area addition resoning 3301 Gettys Road resoning an 8.84 I'm sorry 8.48 acre addition to Ruth V nature area from r1a which is single family dwelling District to PL public land District this addition was purchased and approved by city council on April 15 2019 uh next we have the oakwoods nature area addition resoning 3382 Nixon Road rezoning a 6.58 acre addition to oakwoods Nature area from r4a which is multifamily dwelling District to PL public land District this addition was acquired and approved by the city council on April 6 2020 and then finally we have amendments to permitted uses in the c2b and C3 zoning districts they propos amendment to chapter 55 the UN unified development code section 5.15 table 5.15 D1 primary use table to eliminate warehousing and indoor storage as
022a primary use in the c2b and C3 districts thank you very much and just to be clear for all of us that those um many items are going to be at the January 5th 2021 meeting so we'll see you next in the new year um all right the next item or now we're on to section uh nine within the agenda which is regular business I need to recuse myself from item number n9a the St Francis of AI petition since I am a parishioner and donor to the project so um commissioner Gib Randle has agreed to step in and I will be demoted and you'll see me once you're all done discussing all righty thank you chair Mills um this is the St Francis of AI which is on 2150 freeze Avenue petition which is a
023proposal to construct a two-story 14,500 foot Parish addition on this 10.6 Acre Site zoned r1b single family residential in which church uses and expansions require special exemption use approval in a residential district a landscape modification from installing the required parking lot by a retention is also requested we will start with the petitioner presentation for up to 10 minutes and Mr changen will provide any staff comments and then we'll have the public hearing before our commission discussion can we have the uh petitioner presentation I I think you promoted the wrong architect yes I believe Mr cerr is for the ladder lad project correct um Chris sh do you know who um it's the correct yes it's going to be either Dan or Brian we have thanks Rob good to see you guys yeah we'll see you
024in a little bit be Dan ker Brian bagnick hello can you hear me I just hung up my phone hello lots of feedback there e yeah try try again that that sounds a little better why don't you give that a try now any luck oh sounds good much better hello there any luck there hello we can we can hear you can you hear us Mr Ken can you hear us can you see me at all no I can't see you but they can hear they can hear me okay good evening my name is Robert Keane and I am the business manager for St Francis the CCE Parish we are a Roman Catholic community of nearly 3,000 families in southeast an arbor established in 1950 St Francis has grown from an original church building off East
025Stadium Boulevard to a campus spanning across approximately 10 acres the community expanded steadily with its first edition in 1955 another in 1961 with the existing Church Building completed in 1969 in 1980 the parish Activity Center known here as the PAC was added to provide Gathering space and a kitchen which is shared by the school several Church groups and various organizations from other churches and from within the community among its many Ministries St Francis provides a Catholic Education to approximately 425 prek through grade8 students additionally religious education and sacramental preparation to more than 450 students that attend local public schools like tap and Middle School across the street and during pan non-pandemic years our vacation bible school welcomes nearly 300 youth during the summer we have an active Outreach Ministry to provide relief to those needing
026financial assistance lacking food and shelter or craving spiritual Direction our ministry to the Hispanic Community has grown in the past few years and we are working actively to provide a spiritual home for our Spanish-speaking sisters and brothers in the iilani an arbor area the parishioners of St Francis have provided General Financial and material support regionally in Wasau County and throughout the Catholic dases of Lancing as well as around the globe to missions in kapuram India and kakaa Kenya even with the Tac being in use for the past 40 years the growth in our community has caused us to be without ample space on a regular basis the construction of the new Parish Ministry Center on the hill to the west of the church building will Al alleviate this bottleneck to better support our diverse Ministries
027various School functions and scores of volunteers that serve the community very simply put more space to meet and congregate will allow us to better serve God and our neighbors in all respects more specifically the construction project of more than 14,500 Square ft will provide ample seating for 600 people seated in rows for a stage presentation or school performance the space can also be used to seat up to 300 people at tables for a banquet meal there will be a movable wall that will allow the main hall to be subdivided into four breakout rooms for small grp Faith Fellowship or to accommodate meetings of our Outreach groups a commercial kitchen and a shower facility are included in the design for when the Ministry Center is used for Sheltering the homeless there will be ample restrooms to
028support a large function such as a wedding reception or a funeral luncheon the second floor will include modern office space for the parish staff to work and meet with parishioners in summary this latest project follows a long tradition of gradual expansion by the St Francis Faith Community within our Ann Arbor neighborhood our building was designed to be practical energy efficient and costeffective and there has been a successful Capital campaign in place for several years to fund its construction with us here tonight are our Architecture Firm Hobs in black and our civil engineering team pea group we welcome input from Ann Arbor residents and questions from the Planning Commission as we seek approval from the city for our plans to build the St Francis Parish Ministry Center in 2021 thank you for having us here tonight
029anybody else to present on your team or shall we move on to the um the staff report I think he's not hearing us so Mr Chang can you uh provide your staff report I can it does appear that uh Brian bagnick has raised his hand ah I believe he might be making the site plan presentation got it I'm not seeing the audio um indication next to his Zoom name um so I'm I'm wondering if he's having an audio unable to have audio also um so you may he may need to call in to provide audio let me see if I that number [Music] and I'm happy to start the presentation um if that's acceptable just to while we don't have dead air uh and if he can happens to chime in by all means uh
030he can take over at that point that sounds good why don't we do that and and perhaps if they're not getting audio from us that he can have a chance just to to call in okay uh so I'm Chris changen the city planner on this project for those of you not familiar with uh St Francis of the CCE it's located off of Stadium Boulevard uh just west of St Francis and north of Winchell a it does have access off of all three streets um and in fact there's actually another access point from the neighborhood to the West they are proposing a 14,500 square foot addition um onto the site and that's colored in the orange that you can see that the arrow that I've got on there it'll be two stories we will see what
031it looks like with the elevations uh it does meet the minimum parking standards it's uh required to have I think eight 800 a little over 800 and it's got uh 880 somewhere in there that that amount of parking spaces so what they're requesting is a special exception use since this is Zone r1b single family so any type of church and school use requires special exception use approval by the Planning Commission other items that will need to be addressed uh it will need a variance from the zoning board of appeals and that is for Street trees along West Stadium Boulevard I'll kind of put my arrow over it it's very very narrow between the sidewalk and the public right of way so they don't have room to plant trees there but they have proposed trees on
032private property so it'll need approval by the zoning board of appeals they are proposing to meet the street trees that are along St Francis and along winshill Avenue so they will meet the street trees along those two streets they're also uh requesting a landscape modification uh that's for the bior retention it is supported by our landscaper our Forester uh because they're outside of the grading limits and it's a previously approved site plan they're not going to touch these parking lots the large parking lots let's see if we've got what other slides they have I'm gonna start moving through some Chris oh yes can you hear me now yes yes we can hear you sorry I apologize little technical problem here on our end um but but thank you thank you for filling in I think
033you described uh very much what we're we're proposing to do if I could just kind of walk through the plans real quickly hopefully won't take very long um if we can start on the east side in the light blue color that's the existing School the kr8 school um what Rob Keen had mentioned the activity center that they currently have if you look at the um kind of toward the left of that blue area you'll see that yeah right where Chris has his his cursor right now that's the existing activity center it's it's kind of a multi-use space it's a cafeteria for the school it's also the music room for the school they've got cabinets for the instruments around the sides of the room um that's the space that they're really trying to supplement with this
034Ministry Center so it's it's not like we're adding any people to the school we're not adding any people to the church what we're really trying to do is create a space that's more functional for the adults to use a space that's more readily available for meetings um funeral dinners lunches um wedding receptions and and the other things that go on in the facility um so if we and what Chris was saying showing the parking lot there's a gray stripe that runs through the parking lot uh one of the things that the engineering division had asked us to do is to Loop the existing 8 in water main U the site has a 6in water main Loop right now so the only real Paving work we're doing is we're carrying up the existing asphalt to put
035in that new water M and then patching the asphalt um again the Ministry Center doesn't require any additional parking um the parking is based on the church church the church seats about 850 people so roughly about 283 284 parking spaces okay first floor plan Chris can we go to the next slide uh yeah you can't see it not yet no we're not we're just seeing that first Slide the first slide well I've got having all kinds of technical issues can see it from at home but it's a it's a new share you got to go up and it's like new share maybe close out and and share again Chris okay I'll close out and I'm GNA put in a new let's try we wanted to let's do that here we go okay thank you I
036don't think we've ever had a presentation where there hasn't been a technology problem we'll get it right just when it's all over and it ends um this is first floor plan um as as Rob had mentioned earlier that this is kind of tucked into the hill so it's a one and a half story building um what you're seeing on the south portion of this is the kitchen and the storage rooms the toilet rooms the mechanical rooms the things that don't necessarily need daylight that are tucked into the side of the Hill below grade and then what you're seeing on the North side is this kind of this multi-purpose uh Ministry Center um the light walls that go through the space are operable walls that are intended to subdivided into different size rooms for different types
037of meetings and different conferences and activities that may occur when all of the operable walls are open and that full beige space is available it seats about 300 people at tables and chairs and it seats about 600 people if they were seated in rows and again the the big key here was they wanted a space that had nice ceiling Heights we got about 16 to 18t ceiling Heights in here um a space that was very inviting and very usable not a cafeteria Music Room multi-purpose room all rolled into one so if we could go to the um the second floor still don't have anything on the screen not there huh yeah I'm there quite clearly right now let's uh let's try this again share screen let's see here almost wow let's see here why is
038this it says your screen sharing is paused is that something I hit I think so okay let me let's try this again then it's pause let's try this [Music] again let's give it a screen share there we go that's the that's the roof plan that's the roof okay let's go to the roof let me see if I can get on the second floor then if we can go back just one real quickly yeah let's try it all right let's try it again let's try it again I don't know why it's I'm sure it's operator error on my end but let's just see if I can get while we're working on it let me get at least get something that I can see that we've had in the site plan tell you what let's see can
039you at least see this for right now exterior elevations are up there now okay do you mind I'm going to see if I can open up the the files to open up the other ones I'll reopen the other the other Sheets if we can I know it's going to be a little bit out of order but I'm going to see if I can't open up okay see if I can open up the second page if I may I would suggest that we focus on the exterior if we're if it's getting clunky just in terms of time um because I think that's really what we're most concerned about about in terms of the uh the Planning Commission um so the exterior elevations or or any other site issues I that's really what we are we're going
040to be discussing tonight so if you could just verbally describe what's happening in the second floor I think that would be helpful but I don't think it's critical for us to see the floor plans of the second floor yeah okay that's fine um the the second floor is is basically the offices um there are some Parish offices right now that are attached to the school and we would like to do is move those offices up to the second floor um they were they were put into the original building was like a a n the convent for the nuns for the school so it was more of a residential structure and they're they're makeshift offices so we would like to create new offices make them fully accessible um make them uh acoustically appropriate make them more
041functional um all on one level all on the second floor and again because this is tucked into the side of Hill they would all be um accessible from grade on the upper level and there's a few parking spaces off to the South Side to accommodate the people that would work in the offices um Chris had the elevations up there just a second ago and um we've lost them again but yeah hold on one second let's get that up there let's you can't see them yet not yet all right that's let try right again I can see them at home unfortunately but those of you at home can't let's let's you could try to share your entire screen instead of just picking documents maybe and then as you sort of flip through it we should be
042able to see because it seems like stop she keeps stopping sharing yeah maybe we won't judge you if your desktop is messy well no you know what just guide me through that commissioner Hammer Schmidt I I I'm looking at the elevations but unfortunately you're not and I you have to share your screen again yeah because it look like it looks like it's sto so if you just click share screen and then um click the top share your yeah what does it say like it's the top left the top left choice in that grid will be to share everything I don't have a chop left I've got the share screen at the bottom and that's what I'm hitting is share screen then what does it what does it bring up so like a menu of try
043to share my screen chis I think I found him did you great I think so do you see I do plan you got can you toggle through it to show there you go y there we go thank you Kristen thank you next one was the offices if you could go one one more yeah that was the offices you can see shaded in there in yellow what you're seeing to the north is just the ceiling plan of the um of the Paris Center okay okay the next one oops yeah this one is is the roof PL and what it kind of what it helps us demonstrate is that we've got a pitched roof on the Paris Center to match the pitched roof that's on the church it's going to be the simulated uh Cedar Shake metal
044shingle and then there's just a few flat roof areas where we're proposing to put the mechanical equipment U most of that will be concealed by this pitched roof so if we go to the next one the elevation sheet um the elevation at the very top that's the north elevation that'll be the most prominent elevation off Stadium Boulevard uh we've only colored in the new portion on the right on the left is the existing portion um the church being a little bit taller than the Parish Hall because the church is more prominent more important on the site um the west elevation will be an elevation that's less obvious than the north but still able to see from Stadium if you were traveling East on Stadium or west on Stadium you would see this west elevation and
045then the elevation at the bottom is the one that's tucked into the side of the hill and this would be the entrance to the offices Parish offices up at the top of the hill so next sheet this is just a conceptual rendering um that our design Department put together to show how it would look if you were again if you were coming on Stadium going from the West to the East you would see the Parish Center first and then the church in the background um again the church taller more prominent element but the Parish Center takes all the design cues from the church uh we use the same brick we use the same metal roofing we use the same colors uh we use the same style Windows the same uh entrances with the little peaked
046roof the idea was to keep it very traditional and make it feel like it was part of the campus like it belongs there like it was always planned to be there um so again we tried to try to keep it contextual as much as possible not necessarily trying to change anything that's there just trying to complement it all and uh hopefully everyone agrees that we did a good job on that um the parking lot in the foreground is the existing parking lot um we will reseal it and everything when construction is all complete so if there's any other questions or comments be happy to answer them anything else to add Mr Chang before we move on to the uh public hearing oh yeah just a couple of other things just to add to the staff
047report uh there will be three Landmark trees taken down and that's to accommodate the addition plus the storm water detention it does meet 100e storm they are over detaining on site because of the clay soils um we also had a discussion if the electrical vehicle ordinance is passed before this this petition has passed we've been coordinating that the petitioner will have to install some electrical vehicle charging stations uh at the time right now they're planning on possibly uh uh installing a couple of stations but it wouldn't meet code so we have had discussions but it is not required at this time so we're we're looking to see where the the new ordinance come comes into play and then finally I think when I was giving the presentation I did missp on the parking there is
048uh 260 spaces that are required on site uh and they're proposing 282 they're not increasing the the maximum number of students permitted at the school or the number of parishioners at the church so if you have any questions staff is going for recommending approval for this petition and I'm here to answer any questions you may have great thank you Mr Shang and now I will open the public hearing this is an opportunity for persons to speak up to three minutes about the St Francis of AI petition public comment may be made by calling 877 853 5247 and then entering meeting ID number 995 1361 City staff will select callers that have quote raised their hand one by one using the last three digits of your phone number in order to electronically raise your hand after
049dialing into the meeting please press star n under your phone you will hear an automated announcement once the host is allowing you to speak in speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television or background sound so that we may hear you clearly please state your name and address the beginning of your comments no callers have indicated okay why don't we give it a little bit of time nobody coming up one caller okay all right caller ending in 335 you'll have three minutes to address the Planning Commission hello can you hear me yes yes thank you my name is Lisa fine I live in 2033 Medford Road and I was wondering if um one of the presenters could give us a sense of when they expect construction to start and complete I'm very
050concerned about the noise that this is going to create in the neighborhood okay we will make sure to address that during our discussion here did anyone this is Brian with Hobs and black did we actually don't usually answer these question questions as they're coming up we close the public hearing and then we have it as part of our discussion so hold tight to your answer and we will make sure we address it during our discussion okay appreciate it thank [Music] you any other callers no callers have indicated okay uh now I will close the public hearing and read the Motions we actually have three petitions tonight so I'll take them all together unless um anybody has any OB ctions anybody have a problem with that okay seeing none the first motion um the city of
051an arbor Planning Commission after hearing all interested persons in reviewing all relevant information finds the petition substantially meets the standards in chapter 55 Andra unified development code section 5. 29.5 special exemption use and therefore approves the St Francis of St Francis of a c special exception used for church and school uses this approval is based on the following findings the proposed uses will be consistent to the objectives in the master plan permitting churches and schools by serving residents in the district the proposed use will not adversely impact traffic pedestrians bicyclists circulation or Road intersections based on the location and the existing uses a site plan documenting the existing and proposed conditions of the site has been submitted as part of this application the special exemp use approval is based on the following conditions The Church
052Must the church use maintains a maximum seat capacity of a thousand persons and school occupancy is limited to 675 students the floor area total for both the church parish and school does not exceed 78,000 square feet second motion is reads as follows that anabor City Planning Commission hereby approves the proposed landscape modifications in order to maintain the previously approved landscape plan according to chapter 55 zoning ordinance section 5.3 0.2a 2E subject to approval of the site plan and the third is the anber City Planning Commission hereby recommends that the mayor and city council approve the St Francis of AI site plan subject to approval by the zoning board of appeals to not plant Street trees in the public right of way an installation of required EV parking spaces if the EV ordinance is passed before
053the site plan moved by uh commissioner hamers Schmid seconded by commissioner milstein okay um so we are in discussion this is Brian go ahead commissioner Lee oh sure um when do we expect construction to start and how long this will this take we hear from for that this is Brian with Hobs and black did you want me to try to answer that please yes that would be great okay we're expecting to go out for bids here in January um and then construction would start probably um late spring early summer best case scenario um obviously everything's dependent on fundraising and making sure that we get diois approval um but that would be our goal would be to start in the late supper we would probably take 14 to 16 months to for construction to be completed
054then what level of decibel um noises can uh neighbors and tap in Middle School expect from the construction you know I I I can't give you actual decel levels um but we would we would restrict construction to you know hours of 7:00 am. to 4 p.m. uh we wouldn't necessarily have to do anything at night or on weekends we'd like to keep it you know during weekday um there'll be the usual you know trucks backing up with the beeping sound which is usually the most annoying thing and we'll try to make sure that we do those again between 700 a.m. and 4 p.m. that's all the questions I have commissioner aons hi um I noticed in the staff report there was a mention of um neighborhood participation meeting and a note that says that you
055have not heard any feedback from residents regarding the proposal uh and the sorry I'm just scrolling quickly to make sure that I don't mate the date um and I believe the postcard that's attached to the um uh report that we got sites a meeting from October 2018 uh I wondered if if there have been any other meetings or if if if there was anything to report from that meeting that might be of interest to this Commission in terms of neighborhood support or opposition just questions around the project uh we we had a couple of meetings again yeah they were a couple years ago because the project started in 2016 and it's it's been an effort to try to get everything planned and pulled together and and organized and there were a couple neighborhood meetings I
056think one was in September and one was in October um there were a handful of people that showed up um mostly the questions revolved around are you going to have a stage are you going to be able to do presentations for the kids they there weren't really any um objections or or anything outside of that it was mostly you know what's going to be the function of the space how are you going to utilize it okay thank you that was my only question for now thanks commissioner hamers Schmid thank you to actually follow along with that because I had a similar question um I noticed that the the citizen participation meeting was a couple of years ago and this is actually more of a question for staff do we have any sort of statute of
057limitations on citizen participation like does it come to a point where it's been so long that we need to do another one and I guess I'm asking because in a couple of years new people could have moved into the neighborhood have no idea that this project is happening because they wouldn't have gotten the postcard the first time yeah there were actual minutes that I requested from the petitioner after reading them I didn't think they were going to be that helpful so I just included the postcard so that may fall on me a little bit and I'm happy to share if you go into E Track you could see the minutes but as the petitioner was indicating there really wasn't too much feedback or anything of concern so I I kind of left those out and
058just wanted to document when the the meeting was as far as uh notification for the Neighbors I did post a couple of signs because it's such a large lot um facing four streets so there was that aspect I I posted that uh I think two weeks before the meeting it's also advertised in the news and also we uh send out postcards within 300 feet of the subject site so the neighbors should be you know at least in close proximity um you know been notified of the upcoming meeting the one two years ago no no no for this upcoming meeting for for tonight yes there's been recent notifications in in the last couple of weeks excellent thank you um I was curious if there were minutes from that meeting so good to know that they were
059pretty benign um my only other I guess this is not really a question it's more of a comment based on the construction noise I'm wondering if um during the construction process and this might be standard practice but you might be able to put up um a sign or something with contact information in case things get noisy or neighbors you know this is happening adjacent to a residential area just in case there are issues or concerns that the neighbors have that they might be able to you know call somebody that could help them deal with whatever noise issues um out of the ordinary might be happening and I you know I think especially like we have no idea like where people are going to be working next year we could all still be working from home
060so I can understand why there might be some concern about noise during the day so that's a request to the petitioner if you could look into some sort of signage with contact information during the construction period yeah this is this is uh Brian with Hobs and black again um T typically what we would do is when we award the contract uh we would have a neighborhood meeting with the contractor there and the contractor's field superintendent who's there every day we would give that contact information out so that that person could be reached um and they typically do get a phone call every now and then there might be you know a little bit noise there might be a little uh dirt and dust in the road that needs to be cleaned up um so that's
061what we like to do is have our kickoff meeting um invite the neighbors and say Here's the person that's going to be out here here's where the trailer's going to be here's where the fence is going to be one of the nice things about this project is all of the construction access will be off Stadium Boulevard so there won't be any cars or vehicles or anything driving through any of the neighborhood they'll come right in off State where that existing parking lot is and they'll use that for their staging area great great so just so I'm clear if a resident does not come to that meeting will there be so signage or something that they know that or that they have that contact information during the construction period we can post the number on the
062construction sign sure no absolutely you willing to do that there'll be the names of the owner the owner the architect and the contractor will be on that sign so we'll put phone numbers on there that great I think people just you know having it just in casee they need it I think probably makes people feel a lot more comfortable when they see construction projects going on um other than that I thank you for the presentation the rendering looks beautiful looks like it fits in seamlessly with what is there right now and the space Sounds like it'll be a great and flexible space for your students and pishers thanks any other Commissioners commissioner Lee yeah and I'm sorry it's just because I'm new to this so please excuse me if anything seems out of um has
063there been any coordination with tap in middle school the only reason I asked is I just uh you know ages ages ago I used to be there in the the tennis courts and the basketball court kind of face stadium so I just wonder if uh you know when school does eventually go back in um if there's been any effort to kind of coordinate you know uh it's it's again it's the construction you I just don't want middle schoolers you know affected by dust and things like that so I don't know if that's ever been given thought that's just a comment I have uh just thinking about I guess it's a little further down the road but um just just the thought has there been any contact with like the the middle school just to let
064them know hey this is uh this is happening and and we could probably coordinate we we haven't specifically reached out to them at this time but I think they would certainly be one of the neighbors we would invite to this pre-construction meeting just so that they were aware when we were starting and with the of construction were and everything and if there was any interference like with the pickup drop off for the kids in the school um then we would certainly want to be aware of that and coordinate that with them gotcha than thank you and as Sarah said um or commissioner hamers I think as how I'm supposed to technically say it um the architectural renderings the materiality consistency I think all looks admirable and yeah Flex Space is really what uh you know
065I think is useful so uh that's all the questions I had thank you any other Commissioners I have a question actually um and this is for staff um with the the not doing the street trees in between the sidewalk and the back of the curb along Stadium are those trees still the number of trees still included but just Elsewhere on the site or they just less the whatever it would be required like 10 trees or something like that along there as part of their site plan I can't say definitively it's possible that the petition the petitioner may know uh during the review I do know I think there's only an areas there's only a two- foot wide gap between the sidewalk and the road so there just wasn't room for certain species of trees there
066they did propose trees that were going to be on private property but I can't say definitively if it was going to be the same amount that was required on the street trees and hoping I could either go back and look in the e trck or maybe the petitioner knows yes they are planting what was required chis the petitioner address that please yes this is Tom deont with PA group landscape architect yes the trees that that are required along Stadium now are on the on our property just outside the RightWay so so we need the number of trees but they're just not in the right location okay that's great I'm I'm glad to hear that because um it's a it's a a stretch that doesn't have a ton of trees that shade the street and so
067um that I'm glad to know that at least they're going to be on the private property side and when they get big enough maybe they they'll shade the sidewalk and the bike Lanes there so any other comments questions from the commission Al righty so I think we may be ready for a roll call vote Mr Shang okay commissioner abon yes commissioner dish yes commissioner sa yes commissioner Lee Yes commissioner Gibb Randall yes commissioner Mills oh I'm sorry she recused herself commissioner hamers Schmidt yes commissioner milstein yes commissioner Clark yes okay motion passes Al righty I think we are on to the next agenda item and I believe commissioner Mills will need to be promoted back into the meeting so our next item is 9B which is the 4 416 West herum parking lot pavement Improvement
068site plan for Planning Commission approval thank you commissioner Gib Randle you're welcome thanks um you teed up the title of what's coming and while people move around um while the development team comes in and out uh I'll read what it's all about so this is a proposal to reconstruct an existing parking lot adding storm water controls and Landscaping subject to restrictions due to the Gallen Creek drain easement the parking space count will decrease from 96 to 72 spaces four new bicycle parking spaces will be provided on this 081 Acre Site which is zoned D2 downtown interface um the petitioner is propo is including two landscape modification requests uh requests to wave the requirement for trees in the interior landscape islands and two RightWay screening trees due to restrictions of the Allen Creek drainage easement and
069a variance is also required here so as per usual we'll start with the petitioner presentation for up to 10 minutes and then we'll move to Mr Kowalski um before opening the public hearing and then our discussion so did um do you have your full development team here even yes I I believe we do Mr uh Matthew buds will be presenting for the uh petitioner at this time great whenever you're ready we'll start the clock Mr buds I go even if he has permission to share screen in a minute you we can see it all right good evening can you hear me we can yes we can good good evening Commissioners and staff uh my name is Matthew buds I'm an attorney with more buds law and I am working with the uh property ownership team
070also on the call is Hugo Cerone Fromme who's been providing the engineering for this particular project uh what we have is a set of parking lot improvements and to give you just a bit of the oversight that's the property uh if you'll recognize it on West here on just west of the railroad tracks just west of downtown I guess is the best way I would describe that and uh that's a view of the exterior of the property we are talking only about uh parking lot improvements essentially at this location uh that will show you the area of work just again west of the old an arbor Railway and on the north side of hiron street the current situation uh inside that property is a somewhat deteriorating asphalt parking lot on the uh Southern half I'll
071call it approximately of the property the northern half has on the picture to the right the gravel parking lot and that stretches towards the rear of the property which is to the north the overall goal here is to uh rehabilitate and repair resurface the existing asphalt parking lot and to uh remove all of the gravel and replace that then with a contiguous asphalt parking lot stretching to the north of that the overall goals for the project are to improve the quality for tenants customers in the community again describe the overall uh there have been a number of I I'll say hurdles to jump in and obstacles that we had to deal with uh based on the nature of this property um if you review the plans you'll see that the the uh Allen Creek easement
072which is a county drain easement runs uh pretty much right down the heart of the parking lot property here which makes it very difficult to well I'll say do much construction and certainly to plant any significant uh trees or anything like that um and therefore we had the I'll say dual challenges of adding uh parking Islands but then also not really being able to uh due to our obligations with the county drain be able to plant inside those and so that's uh the request for the lands skate modification we will also need to proceed with the zoning board for variance from the street trees because the pretty much the only location where those could be placed also uh within that uh Allen Creek uh drain easement so those are some of the challenges that we
073were uh dealing with there have a a quick snapshot of the overview of those plans so that you can see again adding the landscape Islands the other part that I think will be uh good for both the community and the property is the addition of the Green Space that is along the Eastern stretch of that property right now if you see the pink uh hashed line that's a retaining wall for the railroad that is right in that area and the parking currently goes right up to that wall which is I'll say been deemed sort of an undesirable and condition that we'd like to remove there is uh the addition of Green Space uh sort of Bio area along that area and then the addition of the angled parking spots all in that uh General vicinity
074there's also going to be compliance with as many of the requirements as we could without having to be within the drain easement as far as uh conflicting land use buffer uh addition of plantings inside the interior of the property and so overall it's our view that the improvements that are provided here will be better for the tenants the clients in the community we're also removing um impervious surface so actually reducing that down and eliminating gravel parking which I'll say I believe uh City staff and myself believe it will be an improvement uh to the community and the property uh also increase and bring the uh parking lot into more uh compliance with the city's standards and uh overall increasing the landscaped area and the green space I think one thing that's important to note is
075presently there are 96 parking spaces in this parking lot and due to the improvements and the uh necessity of complying with some of the obligations that's reducing down to 75 but we think uh will be an overall Improvement to the project as a whole and with that I won't uh take up any other time with presentation if there are any questions I'm happy to answer them but hopefully that's a a brief and succinct overview as to where we stand very succinct thank you very much um Mr Kowalski anything to add um sure I I would just like to I'll highlight a couple of items really at this time um as uh Mr buds mentioned there really the the couple items I want to bring your attention are regarding the variance request in the landscape modifications
076there's actually two landscape modifications that are being requested um for one is for the uh the modification to allow landscape Islands interior landscape Islands to be planted without the required trees um we do have um I'm I'm sure this the question will come up probably maybe by commissioner Gib Randall um we do have the amount of required landscape islands are provided in there however the trees are not provided um and there they are also providing vegetation in those uh in those islands as far as like shrubs the most that uh the drink the uh Water Resources commissioner would allow them to plant um so that is regarding the one modification for the landscape Islands to not have trees the other landscape modification request is for the RightWay buffer um as you probably know there's a
077buffer that's required between the parking lot and uh the RightWay they have the required area but they cannot put the required trees in there because of uh again the Water Resources commissioner uh prohibition to put trees above and as again it's we're not just talking in easen I'm sure you all know but the creek actually runs directly under the site which is the the reason and it's not that deep so again the second modific if ation would be to wave the requirement for RightWay trees in the sorry not RightWay trees for buffer trees with the RightWay buffer the variance request is regarding the street trees um so there are five Street trees that would be required for the site there are three that are currently existing um and those three will remain however the other
078two that would be required to be planted again are about directly above uh the drain so the Water Resources commissioners not allowing them plant those trees however that is not uh an item that's eligible under landscape modification so that would if the petition is approved tonight it would go forward to the zoning board of appeals in the um January meeting for approval of that variances so the modifications um could be approved tonight um the and if the petition is approved with the modifications the variances will be approved in January um and another another thing that I would be willing to point out here also that the petitioners as you could see from the site plan there's there's a lot of green space that is ADD being added to the site um some things that are
079will become compliant they are providing the required conflicting land use buffer along the um W sorry west side of the site adjacent to some residential so they will have the required excuse me required trees as well as require distance in there and um also as many of you may know that this site is directly um in the area that it was planned for the tree line Master sorry the tree line Trail and then that master plan so the petitioner did work with us initially to agree to provide some of that that land where they're removing parking that's now currently encroaching into the uh right of way along of the railroad in that area they're pulling that back it's entirely upon their on their property now and there's an additional Green Space so the petitioner did
080um expressed that they would be willing to negotiate with the or willing to Grant an easement in the future for some of that tree line along that along that area so that is again it's not part of this proposal tonight it's not being approved as part of it but that was something that did come through these negoti sorry not negotiations but through the meetings to discuss staff requirements um for this site and as we noted that was a master plan requirement and petitioners uh agreed to entertain that idea going forward in the future so really those are the key Main items and again staff is recommending approval of both the landscape modifications as well as the um parking lot improvements tonight thank you thank you very much um I'll open it up for the public
081hearing Mr buds if you wouldn't mind stopping to share your screen just so that um thank you um this is an opportunity for persons to speak for up to 3 minutes about the 416 West hon parking lot Improv movements public comment may be made by calling 85352 47 and then entering meeting ID 1361 City staff will select callers that have raised their hand one by one calling on You by the last three digits of your telephone number again you raise your hand by pressing star n um you'll hear an automated message uh allowing you to they're telling you that you can um unmute your phone you can do that by pressing star six and when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television or background sound so that we can hear you
082and please also state your name and your address at the beginning of your comments um are there it doesn't look like we have any callers we'll give it a minute because there may be a TV delay so in case people do want to call in in seeing no one I will close the public hearing and read the proposed motions which I plan to take together unless there's any objections no okay um they are the Anarbor City Planning Commission approves the 416 West hon parking lot site plan conditioned upon a variance being granted by the zoning board of appeals for two Street trees and the Anarbor City Planning Commission hereby approves the proposed landscape modifications according to chapter 55 unified development code section 5.2.3 pointa to require one tree for right of way screening where three
083trees are required and section 4.2.3 pointb to require no trees in the interior landscape islands where six trees are required due to the location of the Allen Creek drain directly below the site commission uh moved by commissioner seconded by commissioner dish we are in discussion commissioner Gib Randle is there any way that um we could somebody could share the plan so that we could um I'd like to get a better sense of um where exactly the easement is and isn't in relation to the property just so I can get my I can um oh oh there we go I think yep Matthew buds I believe is there we go now does this show your landscape plan on it to if you could go to the sheet that shows where your your landscape plan is be
084helpful and if you could just zoom in a bit um yep that's great okay um so could you just let us know is it that it's this dashed area in the middle talking about the easement correct so the dashed area correct it it I don't think you guys can't see my mouse moving but um the uh the dash area as you can see there it's outlined it says approximate location of the Allen Creek drains easement that's well that is the location what we don't know exactly where that that Creek is kind of exactly underneath there but I mean they have a really good idea so but that's the whole ease mines you can see it it it cuts through the entire site I mean kind of any place that's not building and as a matter
085of fact towards the back there is a building located on it so um you know that's it's an issue for any Redevelopment of the site is kind of locked by this as well so right okay and could you scroll down just a bit so we can see its interface with hiron as well okay so um so in terms of Street trees I'm just trying to get a sense of this the building to remain the 416 West West hon does that have existing Street trees in front of it is that what I'm seeing there with the green or those proposed yes if you can see those are exist there's three kind of if you can see the circles just south of the existing building those three three three three Street trees are there and then kind
086of if you obviously if you move over a little bit there's that landscape Island that doesn't have one and then adjacent to it there's a little area that also doesn't have one okay okay yeah I was just wondering if there was any kind of room on a different part of the site but it looks like they already have Street trees kind of placed placed in those areas um already I did misspeak slightly about regarding the trees for the right of way buffer there is one tree in the bottom corner there that does count for uh the right of way buffer trees um and again they are planning the required uh shrubs in lower plants that are required for the right of way buffer just not the trees okay all righty I just wanted to get
087a visual on it a little in in a more clear way um so this this lets me know I think you know what's going about the limitations that they have and and there's just not a lot of room I was hoping that there might be places to kind of place these trees in other spots but really everything looks pretty um pretty filled up yes we did with the landscape our landscape staff reviewer we did um look or she did also look at that and we went back and forth about trying to like literally put but between buildings or their Pro you know leads to buildings or Mains as you can see it there just isn't y yep I can I can I can see that so okay well thanks for thanks for Illuminating me I
088appreciate that commissioner gibri do you have anything else no that was really I was just trying to see if there were really any other opportunities for for where to place something because it is just such a um as commissioner Mills knows we're we're both kind of neighbors to this site not too not too far so we walk by here a lot um and it's a lot of Hardscape it really is so um any any way to Green it and I'm glad that it's it's tightening and getting more efficient um so that there are some leftover green spaces um and that they're planting what they can essentially um just looking to see if there are any opportunities but it looks like they've maxed out what they what they can so other questions or comments from Commissioners
089commissioner commissioner abon um I wondered if you knew when those Street trees were planted because when I look on Google Street View uh there the image is July 2019 and there are no trees there I just want to make sure they they maybe there are very new little uh saplings which is fine just want to make sure they are there I believe uh well from my l aper said they were existing and they just redid that street last remember and I think they've gone through and completed the tree plannings and when I went out there I was pretty sure they were out there too but maybe one of our commissioners that walks by the site because I did double check him when I posted it so I think they put them in after they redid
090that street last summer and I think they actually replaced it had to replace a bunch of them yeah that makes sense May if we discover that they're not there between now and the city council or if the if this moves forward insert an amendment but no I just yeah so that's fine I just want to make sure they're there thank you commissioner milstein commissioner abens I am looking at the waston County GIS which just updated and I can sort of see three little things coming out of the ground there so I pretty sure there's there's something there more reliable than Google Street View thanks Mr buds it looked to me like you wanted you had something to confirm I I did if it would be appropriate this time uh the the trees did it's on
091my understanding uh died the first set that were there and were replanted as part of the street project so there are three trees there uh in a very uh young State I believe commissioner Gib Randle just one other thing I would say is that there's a really big honey locust there that looks really nice and so um just doing whatever you can to be able to protect that tree during the construction process and I what I've found in my own experience is that um contractors just want to store stuff under trees they just want to and so the more you can try to you have you know tree construction pets and all that sort of thing but to create some barriers around that to really try to keep that um that one going I think
092is really important because it's really like the the best tree in that area in terms of the species and the health and everything and it's kind of amazing given its location but anything extra you can do in terms of the construction process itself um would be great to try to be able to support that tree through the the rough time of construction I assume commissioner Gib Randle that this is the one that's right on the sidewalk which is a nice tree I was actually I looked at the plan to make sure that that Circle remained because it uh um it is well established and so that's great yeah it's a really nice one any other commissioner questions or comments I'll just add that I do walk and I have to cycle on the sidewalk there
093because there is not bicycle infrastructure on the street um and I appreciate it looks like there's going to be a stop line um where like when you're I guess the Western curb cut I feel like cars have been pretty safe there that one is not quite as blind as the other side of the tracks where that alley is which is super blind and super dangerous um but I appreciate whatever you know the the accommodations that have recently been made um and continuing that just to make it safer because that sidewalk is heavily used um and so um I I think that this is not going to make that situation any worse um than it is right now so I appreciate that um Mr kski I think then no seeing no other hands I think we're
094ready oh commissioner Lee go ahead please um staff please feel free to tell me hey that's not uh something that we normally ask about here um kind of talking about that you a lot of pedestrians using that sidewalk I'm looking at the signage the monument signage that's on the sidewalk there and I'm not sure if it's representing that particular building um but it looks like a fairly autoc Centric you know sign with a lot of diversity I'm I'm wondering you know we've done a lot of work on Monument signs uh from the ownership standpoint is there any plans to either redo the monument signs uh I don't want to you know get off topic with respect to what's being requested but as far as this particular psychos um it's a very autoc Centric sign very
095large um just just wondering is that a appropriate question staff sorry yeah certainly you can ask question regarding signage on the site that's not something that that we would typically examine right at this point however um they do if they were I mean the commission or sorry U maybe Mr buds could comment whether they have plans to replace a sign or anything else like that going forward so it is a question that could be considered as far as if it's blocking your visibility or something else of that nature so yeah that's that's absolutely Fair um at this point I like I said I would defer to uh Mr buds to see if they if they have plans to if they reface the sign eventually things like modifications it's going to have to be brought into
096compliance with the current code and I I have no idea I'm willing to bet it probably isn't but I I don't know that so I decent question uh Mr buds could you comment any plans for the signage sure uh at this time I'm not aware of there being any plans the sign hasn't been something that's been part of um I'll say the focus or discussion as far as this site plan uh has been but that's certainly something we can go back and and talk with the uh ownership about and see if that's something that is uh you know things move forward that there could be Improvement in that regard and again commissioner Lee I think it's a fair question because if our traffic when our transportation and traffic team when they do look at items
097they they do look at Vision things like that that signs that could be blocking Vision so um uh I I mean I can't say for a fact that they did exactly on this one but she did examine this site and and felt that it was appropriate so yep thank you um that that's all the questions I had okay want me to call the uh roll call vote yeah I don't see any other hands so go for it please okay uh commissioner Abron yes uh commissioner dish yes commissioner sve yes commissioner Lee Yes commissioner G Randall yes commissioner Mills yes commissioner hamers Schmid yes commissioner milstein yes and commissioner Clark yes it was a quiet yes but I heard a yes oh I'm sorry find you on my little cube of people and I'm like where
098she okay that the uh item is approved so I'm sorry was this regarding you guys took both all the Motions at the same time correct so this is regarding the landscape modifications as well as the site plan I just want to make clear okay great so it needs to go to zba but there are at least so long as that is positive it need not appeared from the Motions go to planning or to city council correct yep so after this again pending zoning board of appeals approval of the street tree um which again for Commissioners you guys could probably figure out staff does support that variance so but that'll be scheduled for the January meeting very good thank you thank you thank you all okay so oh sorry let commissioner Mills yeah so um we're
099our next item of business is 9C which is the Lewis Jewelers retail Plaza site plan for city council approval and special exception Ed for Planning Commission approval um what i' propose Commissioners is that we hear the presentation um by the petitioner and staff and have the public hearing and then we'll take a break before we start discussion of that just because be about halfway great um so this is a request to redevelop 300 South Maple which is a 1.98 ACR site Zone C3 Fringe commercial um and looks like we have the development team so as per usual um uh you'll have up to 10 minutes to provide a presentation and then we'll turn it over to Mr Kowalski to fill in any staff comments do you see everyone from your team here that you're expecting
100I do I believe Mr cerr is going to give the presentation and I see the other members um also online excellent very good okay hello everybody um can you all see my screen we can good good okay great well thank you for having us here tonight um as you can see uh we're going to speak about 300 South Maple uh it is a um it was the um uh beasto uh property that's been vacant for quite some time um our project team uh that's on the line tonight is Steve Brower from AR Brower and K canis Brier from uh Metro Consulting and Associates uh and I'm Robert Kerr with Metro Group Architects and uh we're gonna have a quick show of what we're looking to do on that project all right so if you all
101can see this on the screen um it is the existing uh quarter beastro uh the building's been vacant for a couple of years it's at 300 South Maple Road um it's a 1.98 acre piece of property Zone C3 uh the existing building is 9,330 Ft um the way the property works right now it slopes uh from the West to the southeast um and there's quite a bit of slope uh as you'll see in the way we've responded to the property uh there is an existing Common Parking agreement that uh for with Westgate Shopping Plaza uh again um to the north of the property is the Zingerman's Roadhouse uh Westgate is all along um as you see in the back there and then Kroger is to the Southwest west of us um our uh our plan
102uh the model plan uh shows what we'd like to do and propose to you tonight um it consists of uh three Suites um as you know Lewis Jewelers is down the street on Stadium Boulevard um they have been there since 19 or theyve been servicing um an arbor and Detroit since 1921 and they're uh very much looking forward to moving to the new site they would be in what we're calling suite number one which is um here I'm hoping you can see my arrow um and then uh there are two other Suites we call this suite number two and Suite number three to the north of us again is um uh Chase Bank and um uh Zingerman's and to the west of us is the shopping center so uh our plan shows here that we're
103uh going to U we would like to construct 24,000 square feet the building will be 28 feet high uh we're moving all the building down to this uh east of the property and uh right up on to South Maple we're right up at the uh setback line the 10 foot line so we're right up at the street and uh we do have and a request ing a um drive-thru here at the base uh next to suite number three we um are looking for a tenant there right now we do have patio space out front for dining so we're expecting that the possibility of having somebody like a coffee shop that would be serving coffee and then have the ability to sit outside and to be um in the um uh out being outside would be
104great additionally uh on the site we're showing another patio area we're we're thinking that this would be another opportunity for uh some sort of uh quick dining location with outdoor dining and then um there's a we've created a a park here if you will sort of a green space within um you know within the shopping center that uh folks could uh sit there and have uh their lunch if they like to um some of the um things that we've shown here uh We've responded to some ideas and requests that a sidewalk that uh to connect from South Maple into the shopping center uh so we've uh gladly uh propose a sidewalk here to allow pedestrians into the property um to either go up to the shopping center or on into our uh Center Lewis jewers
105will be here uh their main entry is um on the North and then we will have uh four tenants we're up to four tenants here with their face uh entry here on the uh on the North side uh the sidewalks are uh wide uh excessively wide or they're doubly wide uh the intent there is if again we wanted to have some kind of seating out there or just a a break from uh the pedestrians and the parking at the rear of the property um or um uh here between us and the um shopping center again we have a green buffer and um we have um quite a bit of uh landscape um for all of us to uh actually in excess of what we U are required to there is uh underground retention um and
106uh we have on on the property again some of the statistics vehicle parking for 81 people 81 cars 10 bicycle parking and then on the North side or the west side of the property excuse me we have some EV stations that are being plann for electric vehicles um so with that uh let me go to the next slide this is just the architectural breakdown just showing you the Suites um and how they will be divided and um this is a uh um rendering of the facade from the north uh this would be the north elevation so the main entry into uh Lewis is here and then the other four tenants from suite number two and then the the patio area and the other two Suites are here um on the that would be on the
107south side of the property and looking back on the south side of the property um shopping center is over here this is the bank and then uh zingerman is up ahead there and this would be the drive-through area and again the outdoor seating and Patio area here with a patio and green space here um so that is our description of the project um Steve Brower and Candice are here if we have any questions on the um site plan Candace would be happy to talk about that uh and Steve is um the general contractor very good thank you very much thank you Mr Kowalski um thank you I don't really have a lot to add um I did want to as as Commissioners have noticed we are requesting postponement here tonight um really the the main
108item regarding the postponement is uh is a transportation review that we're still waiting for um a final review and really where the concern lies was regarding the um the drive-thru and its its location as my report notes um this is this is more of a revised plan than what was originally reviewed by the transportation engineer so this version had come back uh last week that shows a two-way drive on that South part of that site um previously it was a one-way exit only drive um our transportation engineer expressed concerns regarding that because of the uh use of this this area that goes through it's it's kind of an isleway that goes directly through to Westgate to the West um and there is a recorded access easement that um requires two-way traffic through there um so
109with that the the Fishers agreed to convert this back to two in egress isway um however uh so again the review of that has not been completed but where the transportation of my preliminary feedback she did have some concerns regarding the queuing of cars at the drive-thru and whether or not that they they could jut out you know they could stick out into traffic um again depending on what type of use it is proposed there I mean some drive-throughs can have quite a bit of traffic as we see especially nowadays um and if that if the cars were sticking out um at that end it would be sticking out directly into the traffic lane that that through Lane there so but I do not have a final confirmation on her official review at this time
110things that I can add to it is that it it was it the the source of the drive-thru itself is is not sorry the source of the concern is not the drive-through itself on this site however it's more of the the location of it here um and perhaps that the drive Arrangement and the queuing line so um again but one of the reasons we wanted to with this before Planning Commission tonight is also to get some planning commissioner feedback on the drive-through use as well as the general site plan layout um as I said my report staff supports the the the site plan layout in general I mean it it's offering a lot of upgrades to the site as it currently sits now with no existing detention um and Landscaping out of compliance also one
111key feature that we wanted to stress here which is something we had requested and the petitioners agreed to install is the sidewalk connection that goes from Maple to Westgate that was a pretty important connection um there is and again as you all know westgate's a pretty popular um shopping center and it gets a fair amount of uh vehicular as well as pedestrian and non-motorized traffic there is no direct link to Maple right now so that sidewalk would provide um a nice linkage directly to the Westgate site um they are providing the required amount of electrical vehicle parking spaces that will be installed um compliant on the site they're located on on the west side of that site and um Also regarding parking they are at the the bare minimum of parking of what's required which
112again is obviously allowed and and preferred in some um instances and as you know and they do have a cross parking easement with Westgate however it's not necessarily needed because they have the required parking um at at the site already but that was an easement that's been in place for quite a while so um really with that um that kind of cons concludes my staff presentation at this time and um as I or put it back to commissioner or chair Mills thank you very much and um Mr KT we may well ask you to share your screen again uh later if when we have questions but if you can um stop sharing for just the moment uh during the public hearing I think that might be helpful be happy to thank you very much so
113um now I will open the public hearing this is an opportunity for persons to speak for up to three minutes about the Lewis Jewelers retail Plaza site plan public comment may be made by calling 85352 47 and then entering meeting ID 99577 681 1361 City staff will select callers that have raised their hand digitally you do that by pressing star n um you'll be called upon by the last three digits of your telephone number and should get an automated response telling you that you've been um enabled to speak when speaking please move to a quiet area and mute any television or other background sounds so that we can hear you clearly and please also state your name and address for the record at the beginning of your comments um I see that there's one caller
114on the line if you'd like to speak about this item you can press star nine to raise your hand [Music] we'll give it a little bit of time too in case there's the delay with the broadcast seeing no one pressing star nine I'll close the public hearing and before we enter into discussion why don't we take a five minute is that okay a five minute break we will reconvene at 8:50 e e e I see everybody all squares filled so um I will read the Motions there are two of them that I'll take together okay the Anarbor City Planning Commission hereby recommends that the mayor and city council approve the Lewis Jewelers retail Plaza site plan subject to obtaining the required off-site private storm sewer easement and the off-site public water main easement prior to
115the issuance of any building permit and the second one is the an arbor City Planning Commission after hearing all interested persons and reviewing all relevant information finds the petition substantially meets the standards in chapter 55 an arbor unified development code section 5.29.18 as part of a retail use this approval is based on the following findings one the proposed use will be consistent with the C3 Fringe commercial District zoning District which provides commercial activities accessed primarily by automobile two the proposed use will not adversely impact traffic pedestrians bicyclist circulation or Road intersections based on the location South Maple Road provides access to the site and the proposed use is consistent with other surrounding uses traffic impact moved by commissioner hamers Schmid seconded by commissioner milstein um as discussed the staff recommendation is for postponement but if
116there are any questions when we see this again in I think it was proposed maybe in February does that sound right yeah they we and again I requested to a date certain so that commission it it could give the petitioner and staff a a definitive time line but as always again that that was that's a the staff thing I mean it's always open for Planning Commission um discussion as well okay but when we see it then if there's any things that you would like questions that you have or comments in the interim this is an opportunity for that commissioner milstein thank you um so I have a lot of questions and concerns regarding the drive-thru um more importantly it has to do with um just access points and trying to figure out how many cars
117can fit into the into the drive-thru and what traffic might occur because of that um I just think that we are looking at having um quite a bit of traffic and and because that drive even when quarter beaser was there was heavily used um I see this as being something that's heavily used as well just because a lot of people get that driveway confused with uh the krer drive driveway so not only are they going into uh Westgate but they're also going to the uh Kroger parking lot and I'm not sure if that's going to be super safe so I have a lot of concerns around that um so I would like to get a better idea of how that driveway is gonna or how that drive-through is going to operate and how the cars
118are going to be queed um and how the parking around that area is going to work because I think that's going to be a uh a major issue that I think we're going to have to sort through at this point I'm in favor of the development uh that's there um but I'm not if if the drive-through is what it appears um that it's going to be I'm not in favor of granting that um special special exemption used for that um the other thing oh and just to bring up uh an item in regards to the drive-thru um I frequent some drive-throughs especially recently with what's been happening with uh the pandemic but similar situations Arise at for example the Starbucks at an arain Road uh right by Meyer that's sort of right on an ARB
119road that is a somewhat of a similar drive-thru and that has you know where cars are queued up and they are into the main road at that point so that's problematic the other drive-thru that I'm thinking of that's having a similar concern is the bank drive through drive-through for uh the University of Michigan Credit Union on South State Street where the cars are literally parking in on State Street to get into the drive-thru um just because there's not enough room for people to maneuver around that area so drive-through is my biggest concern the second thing is uh that I wanted to talk about is the trash um I you know I don't know if anybody's talked to Westgate but uh having a trash container that's pointing right at the Westgate Shopping Center uh doesn't really
120look all that great um especially if you are right there at Westgate um and you're looking out into the trash uh where the trash containers will be removed um so just getting a better understanding of what that's going to look like as well um so those are my concerns at this point Thank You commissioner hamers Schmid and then commissioner Clark thought you're gonna say something different about the trash but that's a good point my concern is actually the fact I I like that you've put in this this green park space but then this trash is like right the corner of the park um so besides I think I share similar concerns about the drivethru I think when this comes back I'd like to see a little more detail about everything that commissioner milin just said
121but um the the garbage right by the park um was my my other big concern I love that this is pulled up to the sidewalk I think we need more of that around town so I I love that this is working to um really activate that stretch thank you go ahead commissioner Clark he so um I hope it's okay if I ask for a little bit of clarification on the circulation um here and I'm just wondering if I'm understanding and reading it right that when if traffic enters on South Maple that they're going to have to cross across the exiting drivethru traffic because it looks kind of like the people exiting the drive through in order to exit or have to cross over the entryway traffic does that make sense or can they kind of
122clarify a little bit on that we could if you want I mean I could I could bring up my screen share if you want to see the image of that I mean I know then that kind of blocks out uh so hopefully have better luck than L Chang on this but I should um I've been practicing and it works fine every other time so in theory it should did that work see your desktop yep hey yeah take that Chang all right um okay so yes the really the traffic circulation I guess o overall I mean your main concern was I think regarding you had mentioned through this drive-thru and as you can look um so in general though I'll just really quickly this is the another you know the main access drive right here that
123goes into the Westgate that's the existing drive now and the exist curb cut into the Lewis Jeweler site is about right here or kind of right there where you can see that so they're kind of Shifting that over and they still maintain an access to the rear there um so those that access is the is the same as existing don't do that and then so right here is is the main point of contention I believe which is you can see the two-way traffic is maintained here but correct I mean this is the FL how the traffic would enter here and then obviously yes you would have to cross the traffic entering the site there to just to get to the exit to leave so I I believe that was your AR it's kind of your
124question correct yeah in that area there the circulation my concern is just kind of the traffic in Westgate to begin with like I have um my daughter loves going to the library there so we're always over there um in normal times but you know walking around the parking lot even when you're in the area you know cars are kind of going every which way to cut across and that that was my only question is if the traffic um pattern around the drive-through I'm not a big fan of drive-throughs I think it's great that it's going to be closer to the curve but then I kind of wonder if the drive-thru negates that benefit a little bit um and just kind of the general walking patterns if people from the sidewalk enter in on South Maple
125entering people into that Dynamic with the traffic on just kind of if we're adding more conflict points there um but that was just my only concern on that and that's a it's a good point again that that the traffic and that circulation that was that main concern that was identified from our transportation engineer regarding that the cross uh the exiting traffic and the amount of traffic that Westgate generates um you know to and from so that that's actually one of the major concerns with why that drive wanted to be maintained as two way and the new element of the sidewalk there is just something to note you want me to keep the screen up for now or or I can stop sharing if there's another commissioner question and I have a question about that so
126I'll jump in now and I also think that um I Mr Kerr I feel like I saw you raise your hand so if you have if you wanted to respond directly to that might or maybe I'll ask the question and then let you respond to both of those kind of things together do we have any idea how many cars based on the the Quee right there for showing the drive-thru how big it's difficult for me to get a sense of scale about how many cars can fit in there what if somebody is at the at the window at the building how many like how many cars back is it to that Arrow that's kind of pointed Northeast right here I mean I would so if you can I sorry I'll let Mr Kerr answer as
127well but I think if you can see across here these are the standard parking spaces parallel spaces right below there um so I mean using that as kind of a guesstimate I mean depending on where their drive up window actually is located on the building and then you also have a concern which is where a menu board or ordering board would be located um on the as well so I mean it looks like probably two three cars possibly but um I maybe Mr Kerr can add to that right now thanks guys um so yeah we we were planning three in the queue there um so that there would be three um I know that there's concern with that and we can lengthen that uh drive a uh to make it longer we can push it
128Forward more for the for the window and allow for more cars we could probably allow for five uh cars to sit in that queue um when we bring it back we can show that um one of the things that I wanted to to mention um Matt you talked about uh a an easement or a um you know an agreement that that the um rest of the shopping center can use that drive we're not aware of that that's that's not there's there's not been an agreement that we have uh in our paperwork that shows that that property um has to be a two-way drive and we proposed it as a one-way Drive understanding that it was it would be better for traffic circulation but traffic said no we want to main it as to so we
129would prefer it was a one way and we would prefer that it's it's not uh set up for that Collision if you will that's my only comment I I could say just lightly respond to that um we did when we looked up the actual we got the easement language for the easement that's cited on the Liber and page and it does specifically state for two-way Ingress and egress access but we can um I mean I we can certainly send that back to the petitioner and let them look and and not to say that it couldn't be changed eventually but that was what our interpretation as well as Transportation it says must maintain access to and from through there the libr and page but we can again we can certainly sort through that in detail but
130I think even and and he is correct that there was originally proposed as one way that was um a big that was a def definitive uh push back from our traffic engineer that absolutely did not want that converted to One Way due to the amount of traffic that goes in through that drive to Westgate and again this is the main if you look up at the traffic pattern that goes up along West Stadium and well kind of where it bridges into uh Maple and West Stadium there this is is one of the main access drives that allows left turns into the site um so and then left turns out but anyway so that but so with the response to that traffic concern is where the petitioners come back with a two-way drive so again and
131that's where we're at right now for um that's being reviewed I would to to that end like while we while we're talking about that and the safety of the drive-thru because that's one of the standards that we have to think about when we think about drive-throughs I I mean I I I'm not sure to in my mind the one way seemed safer the Q issues seemed lessened by having it one way um and I do think it does get confused the first time I drove to that Kroger I thought that that was the entrance to the Kroger I subsequently learned that it was not and so you know you make that mistake one time and if there's a oneway sign then you realize that um what I'm actually like I'm not so worried about cars
132I recognize this is a car Centric potentially like there are this is very frequented but this is also one of the most accessible grocery stores by public transportation in the city um and like commissioner Clark like we're often there in nice weather and non- covid times and usually arrive by bicycle and um I and that's like you know that's one of the ways to to get in but I looked at where the bus stops are I confess that I don't usually take the bus here but you could and the bus stops are actually South on South Maple are south of this site just a little bit and so what I worry about from a pedestrian safety point of view with that with the drive-thru is that that is where foot traffic going to the bus
133stop from the shopping center like maybe Kroger because they're just going to go out the Kroger parking lot but farther up could be using that because it's a straight shot right they're not going to walk to the to the North End of the property I appreciate having the sidewalk by all means but without having a pedestrian access along that South part of the the um uh drive with those cars coming in and out and a drive-thru like that is my safety concern so I'd like to better understand that or to have that looked at to think about like where people are going to go like what the paths of travel are to the bus stops um because I I often see people waiting for like at those at the various bus stops and I'm I
134don't I don't entirely know myself but they're not gonna they're not going to walk to the north of the property like it just will seem to be as that since that one is closer to those bus stops I think that they will tend to go towards the South so that's my concern over the the drive-through and safety commissioner gibel yeah just one one more thing I think about the the drive-thru and that is even if it's a one way if it cues up in any kind of you know you have a few cars they're going to be blocking the parking lot as well in the interior parking lot so the drive-thru just seems really tricky and through here to me um so it doesn't I mean I don't know if you all have tendance yet
135or not I know we've had some drive-throughs with banks and things like that where they have a specific tenant the way you made it seem is that you're sort of trying to attract one and so I don't know that that's like an essential part of that I mean that's for you all to figure out but I I just see the drive-thru here as really problematic no matter how you slice it whether it's one way or two-way and two-way just seems ridiculous to me like the crossing of the traffic and the way that in both kind of on both ends of it it just it seems like it's completely counterintuitive um so I I'm like commissioner milen I'm for the development but I think that the drive-thru is a real problem so I would have a
136really hard time supporting it with the drive through the way that it is commissioner sve yeah I'll just kind of add I'd definitely be interested in seeing the easement language part of it is because if you look at the stadium Maple intersection there is a Westgate sign at the light it's very small and people don't follow it but you're supposed to turn left into Sou Maple to enter into this driveway where people do turn left into Westgate from the turn lanane for Jackson right and so you've got people like stuck at Jackson trying to turn into Westgate while other people trying to go through the turn lane to turn at the light and so if this goes one way we're going to get one less entry point and we're going to get more conflict up
137at that light going from Jackson where we're going to have more Westgate entry you know Gap there so thinking of like right now it's like the tail wagging the dog about a drive-thru requiring one way to make it safer but in in the context of this neighborhood going one way creates more traffic congestion and issues and risk-taking to turn left up at that other Westgate entry too so the traffic flow of this whole thing has to work in concert and so I can understand why there's probably an easement here trying to get people to turn at that light to manage this as an entry point as a right turn so I'd definitely be interested in seeing that language when this comes back and it's hard for me to support a one way to make a
138drive-thru work to the detriment of traffic flow for this overall area servic in the community and so that's where even if you can go one way it's because you want to way for a drive-thru not because it's bettering the site and when we look at special exception use there is some assessment into the overall need uh and quality of it so it' be really hard for me to support it as two-way driving into traffic uh exiting the drive-thru and one way thinking about the overall traffic flow in this area so overall the drive-thru doesn't feel like a fit here just my feedback now it's up to the petitioner of how they present it moving forward but uh it's giving them the opportunity for the heads up right now and one last little thing is that
139there's no sidewalk connection to the patios of the suet 3 so we've got the South Maple sidewalk I'd love to see just a sidewalk going to that patio um because right now it's like you're either walking in the driveway or walking across the grass and so if there's any accessibility issues of somebody taking the sidewalk say from the bus stop to this um I don't see a way for them to navigate to those Suites U without a sidewalk connection any other Commissioners have feedback commissioner milstein Mr Kowalski it would be great if the traffic engineer can be here for our next uh for whenever this comes back to us um so if you can please ask uh uh s get to be here that'd be great yes I appreciate that again we were thinking about
140it for tonight but there wasn't enough feedback to really give at this point so I mean we're getting a lot from you guys but there wasn't enough for her to really give so yep that's a great point we will definitely do that um one one H follow-up note that was just mentioned regarding that sidewalk to the front Suites um I think the petitioner can also U chime in on this a little bit but there's a pretty big grade change there so I think they would have to add steps because we did inquire about that with planning stuff to at access that and I I think that there would have to be steps in that location um is the architect or uh engineer can you guys North that it should match if they well either way
141we could definitely have that advice I thought we had pointed it out and there's a grade change issue there there is Candace can is Candace still on she could maybe she could chime in on that corner oh yeah so the the slight generally slopes as you're going along Maple so we were able to make that pedestrian connection at the northeast corner um but even that's pretty steep it's actually it has railings all along it just to make it ADA Compliant um and you can see there's steps on that patio in the Southeast Corner um kind of coming out of the building to get to the patio um for Access so we can look at it again again but if there is any type of pedestrian connection from that patio out onto the public walk along
142Maple um it wouldn't be ADA Compliant so I guess the question is is it better to have a connection with steps to have a connection or does it have to be ADA Compliant um that's I guess a question for the city I'm I'm sorry Candace you're saying at the southeast Corner this where the hand is now that's what you're talking about yeah yeah so a connection from that patio directly out to the sidewalk would be too steep um to meet ADA requirements um and I think the City generally requires that all connections to the public walk be ADA Compliant so um we could look at potentially putting steps there to make that connection um but there's not a way with the grades to make um just a a standard sidewalk connection work work right there
143you know if commission would prefer steps we could um again we could request that they can install some steps or and they would not be Ada accessible I mean for me I guess because I raised it right like when I basically try to draw a line of a pedestrian moving around the site once you get to that Southeast Corner you're you're going all the way around the site to the inside entry of those Suites or you're cutting across the grass so like making sure people can get from a public sidewalk onto the site without walking in a driveway I think is the ideal scenario so you know just and it's helpful you know when they come back and do a full presentation to maybe talk through those scenarios too would be great or elevations that
144kind of show that like what it looks like I mean what actually I didn't realize that there was such a difference between that patio and the sidewalk and it makes me wonder then if whatever I mean it's not a retaining wall cuz now there's a patio on top of it but whatever is up there like what the sight Line is now from that sidewalk or from that from the in andout the driveway to the sidewalk because I think that that's you know that is a sidewalk that gets used so um I think that to that point that might that would help me next time to look at that commissioner abens um there is on uh towards the end of the the second to last page of the site plan review set that we were given
145some renderings that show that elevation along Maple and if I'm reading it correctly I think the there is a retaining wall like the kind of adjacent to the sidewalk what The Pedestrian would be kind of walking adjacent to as a small grassy BM a retaining wall and than the building uh so but I just encourage my fellow Commissioners to look at that oh there oh whoops page 20 yeah if you're concerned about that it tapers off and that's where it's just like questioning a little bit more of the push and pull of the landscape to be able to slice something in right at the end any other I I I saw that but I didn't it didn't register to me like where the driveway was so I'll go back and look at that um and
146it's not necessarily that I need a 3D rendering kind of of what it looks like from the sidewalk but I think that just so I mean if you can't pick up from this discussion the for the special exception use I think understanding how that entrance and exit on the Southeast side works like like there's a lot of convincing that needs to happen about this about The Pedestrian safety right there associated with that I think overall like like the other Commissioners I think that I'm excited to see this building I'm excited to see it moved up to the road I'm excited that it's that it's um thinking about parking in various ways and not like tons of parking it's not like a sea of parking working right like it I like that it's on multiple sides
147so I think that there's lots of there's lots of good here but to what commissioner s said about you know if you know if the one way is only to solve the the drive-thru like that's not that's not what that's supposed to be for so I'm I think that's clearly like you know that that's the area that you're going to need to pay attention to but like if you can't hear that's the area really to pay attention to for coming back um commissioner Lee yeah I I just wanted to I think everyone has really great points and I just wanted to uh actually say I I'm really actually I really like the layout of things um I like how it does pull the building towards the road it helps to slow traffic down on South
148Maple with the landscape uh kind of buffer on that side so I just want to say overall from a materiality kind of what the elevations look like um I actually really like what's proposed here I think it's better than what the quarter Beast row used to be uh and then in addition to that though uh again the the question of how how I think there's a question about the sufficiency of that stacking Lane um could you imagine it going all the way back uh I had a qu you know in my head I did think about how it fits in with the overall like you know you got the Roadhouse you know kind of got a funky architecture and how it fits in with the other numerous outlots that kind of sit there with I
149guess Chase is pretty sterile but I I um overall I think the design is great we have to address this Ingress egress issue and then the sufficiency of the stacking Lane uh and I think that that's really but uh overall though I think you guys will do a phenomenal job I mean I have great respect for what AR Brower does you know all across Dexter and Arbor um so I'd love to see that issue of the grade as well as the stacking Lane and the Ingress egress conflict get resolved and then would' love to see that I mean I think this has been in the works for quite some time so I'd love to see this obviously time is money in real estate world so I'd love to see you know that get addressed quickly
150uh the question I have for staff um would be on the actual application for special exception use does it have to get revised number seven the relationship of the proposed use to main traffic thorough fars and Road intersections it does say there it's a oneway Exodus proposed blah blah blah does that have to get revised and like resubmitted essentially yep we would have them Revis that so again depending waiting for some additional feedback here tonight from the Commissioners but yeah that that's just as simple just to update that to reflect the current layout of what's right what the special exception use if approved will actually Grant so yeah that's correct that will be updated to reflect one of the reasons again we're kind of waiting for that to see what the final layout maybe if
151this inway 2way or whatever so that they if they need to update it but yes that will be updated so that when you guys vote on this if it's approved it will be approved um pursuant to correct language in the special exception use okay thank you uh and then last question this one's for the partitioner on the last page of the um revised site plan page 21 you guys have a photometric analysis does that usually get um like the analysis does that fit into the larger site in the city as well I see you know it's quite dark kind of on the peripheries just just for my edification um is that done in concert with the existing lights that's kind of like surrounding it uh or is that just kind of independent I like how
152you're using LED the specs on it but um just a question if that was considered I for safety of like walking all all along the site I can address part of that actually maybe in the petitioner can if they can add something but typically that's only done on a per site basis so they're only looking at their actual site there it's not I think this is where your question it's not we don't get photometric plans in relation to how the other sites are how that lighting is it's only so unfortunately we kind of do this at a peace meal uh you know kind of work is that once one site comes in their existing lighting is all brought up to current city codes and everything but what's surrounding it on the other sites no I
153mean Westgate although they've just redone some things so they may be closer to being compliance but we just look at each site is a photometric plan to see that that site kind of stand alone by itself okay got it standards thank you for the clarification overall I think I'm I'm excited to see this come to reality so it's not a vacant former quarterb show so that's it for me thank you before I entertain a motion to postpone from uh my one of my fellow Commissioners I'm wondering from the um petitioner if there is a date in the future the the what the proposal from planning staff was February the first meeting in February based on what you're hearing do you think that's reasonable or um yeah we I think we would prefer to come as
154quickly as possible uh to keep the project moving if there was a date before February we would like to do that and we can meet the time the time frame I think Matt I mean that's that's we only have a few things to take care of and Mr Kowalski from your perspective remind me of I always forget the pros and cons of like having a date certain versus a date unknown um for this yeah well one of the so the first meeting of January would not be available and so the first possibility would be the second meeting um the planning manager had concerns regarding the the amount on that agenda but um but also it this could be scheduled I mean really the concern regarding the date schedule is just to make sure that we
155have depending on what the feedback was tonight whether planning commissioner was or Planning Commission in general was you know if they would be pushing for more of a a redesign we don't want to do it too uh too quick because we won't have we'll be back in front of you saying staff didn't have time because obviously the petitioner needs um time to reflect your comments here tonight but then again we need time to kind of follow up with that and if there's any major concern concerns regarding if there's redesigns that you know the drive-through Lane adjusts the only problem with that is once you know it's that trip trickle effect if they kind of adjust one thing on the that plan then you know engineering everybody has to kind of go through that long L
156list of reviews again so the only thing we didn't while in theory it is correct they don't have a lot right now we're just we were waiting for the transportation feedback on the plan but again given what we hear what they hear tonight whether or not they want to do larger revisions to the plan or not dep on on that depends on staff timing after that and their timing to get it back to us um and I know the petitioner would like to go forward as soon as possible but we also don't want to and then you everybody knows we have a holiday season coming in here which unfortunately for better for worse also affects reviewing times for everybody so um we were trying to balance something where I know the petitioner wants to get
157this addressed as soon as possible but we also don't want to push it where we have something back before you that's an incomplete plan um or that we have to request postponement again but and if we just postpone without um without mentioning a date then could and then it comes before us when it's ready yes and then we could that that's also and we may be able to make again with conversations I'll followup conversations in the next couple days with the petitioner we'll hear back I mean if there's not a lot of major changes I expect to have the traffic review done on the plan that it that with the two-way drive that you see before you here um hopefully really soon um and if there's no other major changes then that could work out
158fine but if there's other major changes regarding Isles and things like that then we get into that ripple effect where engineering might have to look at again and Landscaping and so forth I'm willing to entertain a motion from a commissioner unless there's more discussion before we commissioner milstein I move to postpone to February 5th just a minute commissioner milstein February yeah it should be February 2nd sorry looking at the wrong year second say we don't meet on Friday nights come on want to put us back in 2020 did you we might as well start meeting on Friday nights there's not a whole lot happening it's it's true it's true um the so the motion has been made second it is there was is there anybody who would like to Second it um seconded by commissioner
159s discussion of the proposed motion to postpone this until the the first meeting of February seems realistic to me personally like and it gets us on our agenda so that we don't have ridiculous amounts of things on the agenda too it's also for the you know the petitioners benefit that we're not here all night is it a question how do how do the petitioners feel about that date uh I guess I'd like to hear from you guys what you think about February 2nd well we we would like to be there in January um because I think that what we heard tonight um I think we have a I I think we could we could say we have a direction that we're going to have to go to to get approval for the next uh and
160it's not going to take a whole change of the site plan to do that so if there's any way to get us in January it would be great um that that's our that's our feeling and I guess then I'll the question that um commissioner milstein why February would work better if if they can make minor changes that would help to address all of our Collective concerns uh um is is there like a particular reason that you were thinking February sorry I if you could elucidate on your thinking there sure it's based on what Mr Kowalski was saying that you know if there are major changes to the plans it has to go through all the city departments um so being that we're also now middle of December and pretty much the rest of December is
161shop because of the holidays re realistically you know with the way the City Works I you know the last thing we want to see is you know people watching at home are expecting this to come back on February 2nd and it doesn't or if we move it up and make it February or January our second meeting in January and we can't meet that date you know I I think it's better for uh to give staff plenty of time to review this as well as the traffic engineer here uh plenty of time to review this especially if they are going coming if they are going to be coming back with a drive-thru thank you I'm going to defer to your guys's you know expertise I'm new here so I I just want to make sure to
162you know keep the petitioners in mind you know time time does matter quite a lot so I just know what that means so uh so I I'll yield um thank you I may for a moment go ahead yes yeah I think it's obvious that we just need to delete the drive-thru that makes all these concerns pretty much go away and doing that would certainly make this thing reviewable in January to be ready for your second meeting in January because old Traffic Engineers concern is the drive-thru so there is no drive-thru basically there is no concern and the change is that CID would have to make to accommodate that are very minimal I I could say that does see sorry can I yes please I mean that does seem realistic if that is the direction at
163the petitioner want to go I would uh tend to agree I hate making promises on City Review times but it it would be just a my I mean if they eliminate the drive-thru uh again that does eliminate the ripple effect of changing plans I mean they can more or less eliminate that lane and put parking there put grass there and there's no more reviews so that does change the that changes the equation to uh to commissioner milstein milstein's uh Motion in my concern which was Express that what Mr Brower just said does does change all of that now whether or not you guys it's ultimately up to the Planning Commission of course to to set that date for postponement but um yes that does change significantly the amount of time staff would probably need for
164review commissioner dish and I just just want to that sounds really sensible um but I do think the concerns about the trash being next to the park it would be good to not that that requires major engineering but to remember that and then there is the decision about you know whether you install an escalator to be ADA Compliant for the uh Southeast corner and I am kidding [Laughter] if I may one other thing the the the trash area is the exact area that it's been for West Gate and or for the quarter beastro the Mexican fiesta whatever that was in Mountain Jacks before that if you can some of you remember back 40 years ago but that's where it's always been so it's nothing new or different to any of the tenants at Westgate other
165than this one would be actually a much better location than they have now in terms of the construction of the existing dumpster screen on the site well it it will be now it is required to be brought up to code the one that was there previously is not to code this one is screened properly with Gates that have to be closed and things but but yes we will put that as a concern that um will be noted as well I might chime in that since the speed of review depends largely on whether or not that drive-throughs there and how much engineering and review that takes if that Pro potentially just leaving it open-ended and letting it see how F quick it gets through the process um doesn't seem in my mind to cause any harm
166and so if it if they're able to go we won't I feel like it doesn't make sense to bring it before us if it's not ready like having this three times just seems silly that's no good for anyone so if um that it gets brought before us when it's ready and if that's quick because you know the controversial thing has been taken care of and you figured out what to do about you know the couple of other items then great and then if not then um as quickly as it can come I think would be my inclination rather than tying us to a particular date commissioner so I'll just like I think we we stay for typical practice to put to a date especially when we have kind of community input and involv so that
167we're putting together a date when people are listening uh I don't know who's you know watching on the TV or streaming or whatnot I mean there could be 40 people figuring out the outcome but um since nobody called in for public input uh and we haven't received any letters I I feel I feel comfortable and I'll I'll leave this to commissioner mil's um proposal but uh since there wasn't too much I'm not too concerned with an an open-ended date from my side for that reason Mr milstein there are four people watching us on YouTube right now so not a multiplier of 10 so I'm commissioner hamers go ahead does it need to be Ren noticed if we don't have a date certain and is there like is there any sort of issue with like the
168amount of time that we would need like would that potentially delay it even further if like the petitioner puts everything together and then they're like ready but there's not enough time to Ren notice no there so there is a time with the ren notice but that's it's months it might be like six months and we're not going to get to that point so we would not need to Ren notice it because we had the public hearing uh here tonight um it'd be one of those items that again Planning Commission could open up additional public hearing continue the public hearing if but that it all the issues were addressed tonight I mean there is no public hearing so you would not need to it would not be Ren noticed we would not need to Ren notice
169it even if we don't have a date even if we don't have a date correct unless we're talking again is if it's six months down the line then yes but we're not talking about that kind of time per period we're talking about weeks um you know maybe a month here so yeah no that that but that is always a concern right again because there's certain limitations on on staff uh the scheduling just based on the limits of of Public Notices but the second that's why I say the first meeting well we wouldn't even notice it either way but um yeah so I'll stop talking but answer your question no there's no consern okay thank you and then I don't want to bber the point on dumpsters next to the park understanding that that is where
170the dumpsters have always been located but I just don't think I mean it feels almost like a nuisance to have a dumpster with smell next to something that you're basically saying is like a public good as a public space I just don't think people would necessarily use the space if it's right next to a dumpster so it's not really like the visual thing for me it's more just like like from the adjacent property it's more just like the fact that you're locating a dumpster next to a public space any other comments about the proposal which is to uh postpone until the 2nd of February um Mr kski let's do a roll call vote on the proposal to postpone so again this is to the February 2nd Date correct to the February second date because there
171I've not heard any motion to amend that I make a motion to amend that I think what we have to do because it's already been moved and the Mover has not changed that I think we need to vote it up or down and then there can be another proposal if it is unsuccessful to a different date commissioner milstein since I moved it I would be open to whatever commissioner Abram has to to a potentially to a friendly Amendment depending on friendly amendment to postpone to a date uncertain sounds good and it sounds like commissioner s was okay with that great so now we are moving to postpone to a date uncertain whenever you can get back to us reasonably um commissioner GI brandle discussion of this yours muted within reason in terms of our agenda
172as well because none of us wants to stay up until 1:00 to be able to get you on the first January meeting I know time is money but it also is you know difficult for us if we're up past midnight because we have six agenda items that are all big and beefy too and so I just want to put in we have limits also in terms of that so you know if they can get it in you know and and it's that second meeting in February and and we can stay within reasonable hours that's fine with me but I don't want to stay up past midnight doing it just to be able to get it in to January I guess I just want to put that on the table we don't know what you you
173had intimated um uh Mr kski that one of those meetings was really full I can't remember which one was it the first one in yeah yeah so if there's room on the in the second one that that's great I'm all for that I just don't want it to be a huge pylon and I appreciate that again I I ultimately it is up to the planning manager his called whether and I'm not entirely aware what's for the 15th but again we we have this we want to get it addressed we don't like things hanging around any longer than than we have to but again we know that you guys have concerns petitioner has concerns Staffing but we will do our best to get it on as soon as possible let's vote on it I think u
174based on the discussion I think we can probably do a Voice vote that's okay on the PO postponement uh although if we postpone actually let's do a roll call just because if we postpone it then we're done um discussing it so go ahead with a roll call vote of the postponement to a date uncertain to re this thank you commissioner aons yes commissioner dish yes commissioner so yes commissioner Lee Yes commissioner Gib Randall yes commissioner Mills yes commissioner Hammerman yes commissioner milstein yes and commissioner Clark yes okay I is postponed to an uncertain date but as soon as possible we'll see you then but it will be in the new year so happy New Year will thank you very much thank you all right we are done with the new business and on to other
175business um these two items won't have public hearings uh um because they are effectively Communications to council so the first item 10A is an update um of response to city council resolution R20 d260 which is the site plan review thresholds Mr Kowalski do you have a report for us no not really I mean I'm here for I can answer some questions um what really as uh chair Mills had indicated these are really update memos they're meant to communicate the status to city council these uh as you know we've had uh the the requirement part of what council had originally directed is to kind of have reports back at different stages so this one would be reported back to council before the end of this year so I'm also available for any comments um it it's
176the same with the next communication as well really um these they both have the same intended effect so um yeah that's really all I have but again I I can answer some questions I may not have a lot of the details but I can certainly take notes and get get a respon resps back to you and as a reminder for all of us this is um the communication that was shared with us two weeks ago um Mr Leonard during his staff communication gave us a draft of that and it was also circulated later today kind of as part of the packet so um so that's what we're the the site plan thresholds I'm going to read the motion and then I saw commissioner dish so then we'll be in discussion um the motion is this
177annarbor City Planning Commission hereby recommends the following update to City Council on resolution R20 d260 and summarizes planning commission's intent for proposed amendments and then it's attached to the document moved by commissioner milstein seconded by commissioner abens we are in discussion commissioner dish would you like to start just a a couple of quick questions um would the so the idea of adopting an F threshold would that would would it be possible to this I'm I'm thinking about this in relation to the work session that we had on adus would it be at all likely or possible that that threshold would be generous enough that you could actually do an Adu without needing a full blown site plan and I think some people might see that as a good thing and some might see it as
178a bad I'm just just asking to clarify that um and then the one other thing was I would have asked this earlier in the day in private and I'm just going to go ahead and say that I couldn't quite understand from the way it was written on the on the two add-on Parts where it spoke about planning a commission approval of byrite site plans and my assumption is I think I'm interpreting this right from what I understand from the previous drafts we had presented that the idea there is that there would be that that we're talking about recommending um some projects that would only have to clear Planning Commission if they are by right and not have to go on to council the way it's written it's a little confusing because it sounds like not
179even go to Planning Commission but I don't think that's what's the intent I think the intent is that Planning Commission make the decision on certain byright site proposals and I just wanted to clarify that um so those are my two questions okay that second question first that that is correct I mean um yes as it was meant for Planning Commission and not but we'll make sure that that's that's clear um the first question regarding the a the adus uh the threshold so your question was really um it does this remove the required the threshold for an Adu for a full sight plan um is there well okay so the idea here yeah maybe I I'm sorry if I if I wasn't clear the idea here it looked like that to expand the development activities that
180would be exempt and one approach to doing that would be to set a threshold of f below which you wouldn't need a sight plan review right and so I'm just asking would that threshold be generous enough that an Adu could conceivably fit under it am I making sense yes I I think I think so and I'll add maybe additional Commissioners too but so so the eth so the adus that when we when we've been mentioning the adus commission and Council those for the residential areas so for like the single family and and two families so these changes that are before you here do not change that they they don't have any effect on the the Singler family uh the single family and there are the separate set of AD Adu revisions that will be going
181forward so what these would be because right now um these are dealing mainly with the site plans for the you know the larger projects that three units and above so single and two family do not require site plans at any time now the adus do have a a process that they go through which is one that we've been trying to condense over years but it's not it's not the same as the site plan thresholds so it is kind of a different process so this itself would not have any effect on the adus in single or two families um so they're kind of it's it's another Avenue that we're looking at is the Adu revisions but that's separate from this so I hope that helps does that answer your question and and Commissioners if I missed
182anything on that please let me know it's a great question any other feedback or edits to the document before we vote on effectively advancing it as written to city council I'll just say I think it reflects um what we've discussed and I think also importantly it encourages us to evaluate and consider things knowing that this is the first step there's more work we're giving ourselves a whole lot more work by forwarding it but I think it's also our opportunity to ask Council to weigh in and if there are things the council effectively that tasked us with this is not the council that is before us now and so um commissioner dish since you will be on that body that receives this you are both forwarding it to you're forwarding it to yourself effectively but I
183hope you know going forward if there are things on here that are higher priority in your minds um or things that aren't aren't priorities that that would be good feedback for us because you know our work plan is quite full and also to highlight that the two things that are enumerated at the end were not within our remit but what we heard a lot as opportunities um that again so that I'm I'm happy that they're in there but also KN where the the the council feels um we might focus our efforts initially would be helpful um I think we can take a roll call vote on this Mr qualy okay uh commissioner aons yes commissioner dish yes commissioner s yes commissioner Lee yes commissioner Gib Randle yes commissioner Mills yes commissioner Hammersmith yes and commissioner
184milstein yes and commissioner Clark yes yes okay thumbs up also work commissioner Clark sometimes we have to do that so that's okay okay item 10 B um we're getting lots of communications off to council this is the c1a C1 a zoning District analysis um and response to the city council resolution Mr Kowalski is there a a presentation or anything on this one no I have I have the same report kind of as just um kind of the memo before before you he tonight so no I don't actually have a report to give other than that and again I'm available for questions and comments all right um again there's not a public hearing on this but uh we did have some comments earlier about this um so I'll read the motion uh the city an arbor
185City Planning Commission hereby approves the following update in response to city council resolution R20 d267 and summarizes Planning Commission intent for proposed ordinance amendments moved by commissioner milin seconded by commissioner s you guys are fast tonight um uh discussion commissioner dish yeah again um a couple of questions that I would have tried to ask of you earlier in the day normally so I didn't waste time but um so I I wondered what was behind the removal of Premium eligibility and was that actually in order to set a height cap um because I know sometimes premiums mean that you get to go higher than normal and so I was curious about that and then also just based on the some of the feedback that we're getting um I I sense that there will be concern raised
186that any portion of the site within 300 feet of a residential zoning District could go as high as 10 stories I sense that there will be concern about that there's going to be concern that we keep these as live zoning designations anyway and I think that there's a reasonable question as to whether or not these won't Simply Be supplanted by T1 when we finish T1 um and these may never even come into play these may not come into play in the next year so this whole discussion may be moot but I just wanted to raise the first thing just as a as a question I didn't understand which I would have asked you during the day if I had done that and the the last one just to voice the concern that I think I'm
187hearing from constituents about height okay um unfor so the the first question you said removal of the green elements was that the no it's removal of Premium eligibility the premium so right so I I wondered if that was an attempt to restrict height because when we when we uh you know when a when a developer says well I'm going to do X number of affordable housing we say oh you can go X number of floors and so I just wondered at the motivation for re removal of Premium eligibility also because some of the criticism that we're getting of these zoning districts is that unlike puds um once we offer density by right we can't extract concessions like affordable housing am I putting that clearly or in okay uh yes unfortunately I don't have an answer
188um I I I was not involved with the this the development of this the memo and the study behind it um I don't if other Commissioners that have been involved with the process could and I don't have an answer for you uh commissioner dish but I I can definitely get I will we will have an answer before and we can report that back to regarding um why that the premiums and that removal but unfortunately I don't have that right now I wasn't the main staff member working on that so I apologize um I don't know if other Commissioners have anything to add regarding that but I will get or will be able to get a communication back to you that has the answer because it's a good question regarding the premiums my sense commissioner dish
189is that having been on orc which looked at this a couple I mean it came before us right as a whole before you were on commission so um uh we kind of talked about it a couple times at a working session ultimately came we didn't have tons of discussion about it because we thought like uh we didn't we didn't have we we thought we should give a quick response we didn't necessarily see this as so broken and I think that's reflected in here that there's that there are that there may be an element like this typology something that we don't want to entirely throw out um but the discussion on the premiums was I think both that fa like with a premium doesn't always come additional height but in some of these districts there is
190not a limitation and that's actually one of the concerns is that there's not a height limit as there is in the D2 and so putting those things together that was providing some additional protection is my recollection of all of that and to your second point I think actually like the last two bullets in my mind go together and are under like um the one helps make it a little bit clearer um that if you want to be 100 feet tall you have and you're you're adjacent to a residential district if you're adjacent to a residential district you now have to have based on the multiplier that's in that second to last bullet you have to be 100 feet set back from that setback line so you so even if you are right next door in
191order to be that high like for every foot over 30 feet you have to move back so maybe it's maybe it's 70 feet then if I I did the math a little bit off um but this is providing an additional layer of protection over that and again the idea is that this is borrowing from what we have in other neighboring districts right so we're not recreating the wheel here but also that we know that this concern over unlimited height potentially it's not it's not often used and developers often when they're proposing resoning or when we seen rezoning to one of these classifications have volunteered a height limit and so that seemed not controversial and to hopefully quell some of the concerns is my recollection of those discussions and I'm seeing some nods from commissioner milstein
192but commissioner s is also on orc so she can add in where I was had off nuances I'll just yeah like the premiums was the uncertainty especially in neighborhood areas the premiums only apply to D1 D2 and these designations and so to remove it from this it only applies to D1 D2 which has a clearer boundary where the boundary of this is designated following you know the campus area so what it did was for any neighboring especially residential by removing the premiums any Resident that could be next to this zoning designation they know the density that's going to happen on that site there's no possib ability to go denser or higher than those two limits so I think that was it too because increasing F all of a sudden you're seeing a lot more on
193that site than what is zoned for but premiums are still by right if you do this you do that so I th that's why it's was just like eliminate it because it's less uncertainty I think that's the only other kind of thing I'd add about the premiums but commissioner aons hi um I wanted to just get a little Clarity on the process so this evening what we're doing is we're voting on a memo which is an update to city council and the and in a way we're not committing to anything we have a we have a list of things that we are we've said we might consider but we're not kind of locked into anything is so the reason I'm asking so I'll just say this to is there there are like details that I
194would like to discuss but based on communication we've received the the um you know community members who've called into to us but my sense is that tonight is not necessarily the moment to Hash that out because what we're doing is we're essentially just agreeing to discuss this further in in the coming year but I'd like some just affirmation or confirmation I guess that yeah I think I from staff's point of view that's exactly correct is that really this is It's just meant to be kind of an update memo is that this is what Planning Commission we've been working on these are some of the areas that we want to explore but it's by no means they're not code amendments they're nothing like Yeah by agreeing I I we can understand the concern like just by
195accepting or voting to pass this communication on doesn't mean you're agreeing to any of these things that are in here it's just really saying this is kind of what we've come up with over the past uh year or so that we've been looking at this this is our update and this is areas further that we're going to explore so you're correct and it's not committing or committing you or any planning commissioner to anything really so maybe I just would like to say I I support kind of just uh voting for the memo but I do think I I just want to make sure that when we bring this up for discussion next year we do take the time to go through the points that are being raised um in the communications that were're receiving and
196kind of address those concerns which are like height relative to D2 or um affordable housing as we're talking we're kind of hashing that out right now I think that's helpful um and G of how to um what we think the appropriate criteria for evaluation would be in when considering whether something qualifies as uh in a rezoning petition so um I don't want to kind of hold us up tonight I don't think it's appropriate for tonight but I do want to just maybe go on record saying I hope we have time have time to have that um conversation when we do talk about these in the future commissioner mil sorry Mr Kowalski I cut you off though did you have something to okay now commissioner abens um so part of the reason why I think it's
197good to send memos back versus us actually taking the next several months to come up with this plan is because there's been uh a change in city council and so what we don't want to do is we don't want to work for the next several months on something um and then find ourselves that city council voted down because things changed so um because you know for example at our last meeting we talked about edus we worked for months and months and months on edus by the time it got to city council they voted it down and we spent so much time when I personally I like the idea of sending memos so that we can get some feedback from Council so that we know where we stand because our work plan is already long enough
198so let's work on things that are going to be productive versus things that we're just wasting our time more or less so yes if council is still on board with all this and uh commissioner dish I hope that you'll get us feedback um you know within next month or so so that we can figure out what we need to concentrate on um so that we're not spending time having a conversation about something that's really not going to go anywhere just because I know we have way more pressing items on our to-do list right now um that I'd like to get to versus something that's going to go nowhere maybe just can I briefly respond so thank you that's very very helpful context um is is there something in the memo that we need to say
199that where we kind of request feedback or is that already written into the kind of mechanism there's nothing in there that kind of formally says that but no there there isn't but they will we will get feedback from commissioner BR Brett Will and yeah we will have feedback from from the Council on it okay that sounds great thank you commissioner milstein by no means am I saying that we're wasting time looking at these things I just want to make sure that we prioritize what we look at um and there may be other things like Council thinks that we should be working on versus some of these items yeah that's that's a great great Point commissioner Stein because we do you're right I mean the work program long so these kind of memos provide that kind
200of touch base with council at various points to let them know exactly what was said whether we're going right in the right direction or things need to change commissioner dish so you're also asking really for a little bit of an indication of priority and so if there's some overlap between the issues that are raised uh the concerns that are raised raised around these designations and uh T1 Council might you might want to know whether Council would like Planning Commission to really you know work on this and get c1a and C1 a r right or work a little harder on T1 and you know put you know put this one you know obviously we're not going to but the issue is that maybe we can address these issues of density adjacent to residential through another way
201um rather than trying to refine this these zoning designations that might be out moded if we move forward with T1 is that I'm not I'm trying not to um I'm just trying to get a little bit of clarity about where the what the choices are that that you would or I I I feel like it would be useful for Council to prioritize but to prioritize one needs a list of tradeoffs and I'm asking a for a little bit of guidance on it um that if it's possible but maybe that's not appropriate to ask for and if not that's okay I would I would withdraw that question I think the basic tradeoff in my mind is Staff time and our time right there's only so many hours in the day so I think that that's the
202you know and actually I'm commissioner abon I'm really happy that you raised this point because act the way this ends this is stuff that like was in our packet this week but we hadn't looked at it the way this ends it says that we do that we will explore the the final bulleted list of four things and anticipate um presentation for change you know ordinance changes by April 1 I wonder if that's a if that that does not suggest to me like that were asking Council to call us off or say like go forward and so I think one of the questions that I would have back to Mr Leonard um is whether this is indeed part of our if that's how it's structured in our work plan and that we anticipate being able to
203get to this and all of those other things or if this is one where closer to what commissioner milstein was saying is like give us some feedback Council like do you think these are these four things are okay I would also suggest though that to commissioner abon's Point like this is not this is there are things Beyond this list that PE that we have heard people ask for right that you were talking about digging into and some of that is what is the original intent in the language of these districts and a lot of that that the things that we're talking about here on this list are not going to solve is where our master plan calls for this specific District or where it does where it doesn't call for this District um that is
204I think that this concern over whether this is an appropriate District to apply is going to come back and back and so actually one of the the critique that I had of this is that I remember perhaps one of our working sessions where we said like we're not ready to scrap this until we look at the master plan again like we think it's okay but but really before we determine where is where is an appro district for it like we need a review of where that might look and so I recognize that that's not on in the cards budgetarily right now and so maybe that's why that's not in here but I that's the thing that I kind of feel like is missing is to say like maybe it's kind of between the lines about
205this evolution of where campuses and that but it it does not NE it's not necessarily tied back to the plan but but I can given having read through the communications that we've gotten that is a and the and the basis on which we rezone this the concern is not over the existing things that are Zone C1 and C1 a it's about when we rezone people say this is not what's called for in the master plan and so that and it's what element of the master plan are we talking about right and is it the so um I think that that's going to be a continued concern and I wonder if it wouldn't be wise to at least flag to council that like from planning's perspective we we see that as one of the challenges going
206forward that even this list of four things is not going to solve all the problems commissioner s yeah that's how I read it is like this is a two-step communication that there's we're we're sending a memo before do additional work on the harder part which is about questions of master plan and placement and all those things that requires a lot more staff time the four points that we're looking at really kind of Tidy Up what this district is and I think are very feasible and reasonable ordinance changes to accomplish by April 1 um without losing the intent of the thing um while addressing some of the the concerns that we're starting to see um um but to commissioner milstein's point this gives us a checkpoint um to go back to council and say these are
207the bigger issues that we're seeing is that something that you want to pursue now that we've highlighted what they are because when this was brought forward to us it was a different form of council directing this hearing different things that what we might hear so we want to have that checkpoint to have the conversation of you heard one thing we looked at it we're see seeing this instead are we on the same page are we on a different page how do we move forward is it a priority to move forward or are there other similar things that we should be looking at so I feel comfortable that like it balances those two we can take some some smaller actions because we think it's appropriate to keep up you know as an available tool in our
208master plan but there's bigger issues and we want to have a checkpoint point before we spend a lot of time on what might be a big issue or what might not be relative to council also weighing in on what priorities are so it does a twofold is how I kind of read into it and so I like for me even with this I feel like those four last bullet points are feasible action items and very specific ones um that we might get you know input back from city council don't do those but otherwise we're prepared to do them if the feedback is yes this sounds good so commissioner abon I wonder if it would make sense to just propose an amendment where the um the last sentence before those four bullet points currently reads this
209is proposed to be accomplished in the following manner that might be revised to say um uh like okay I'm not going to get the words right the first time but you know ways to achieve this might include but are not limited to the following list those bullets and then maybe the last paragraph would could be amended to say to actually explicitly request um feedback from Council and take out this hard April 1 date um but yeah I would be interested to hear what others think about that possibility commissioner milstein I'm 100% on board um especially with that hard date as I think about it April 1st in all reality uh we have a lot on our plate uh and there and in also in all reality we also only have three working sessions before this
210date um and three orc meetings before this date um there's still a lot to be discussed especially depending on the feedback that we receive from Council so I definitely I'm in total agreement of removing that date um and you're changes uh commissioner abon's are great um even though it's the first draft it was a great draft muted you're muted shoot no you're fine so you could thank you the that's what you were saying I hear that that's a motion to amend that would be seconded is that fair I make a motion to amend seconded by commissioner milstein um discussion on the amendment which would um not limit the potential changes to those in the enumerated for list of four and strike the certain date certain at the end commissioner dish sorry go ahead commission or
211Mr was trying to make sure sorry that I got uh it's part of the wording exactly that is kind of not limited to I mean I think that was kind of the main uh Point you're trying to get across for the the first change was that you wanted to include kind of those four but it's like not limited to just those four it could be other ones well maybe if commissioner just has additional language you want to add to that or no I just wanted to actually I felt like we should read read the amended language okay yeah that's v on it um so instead of saying this is proposed to be accomplished in the following manner uh my Amendment proposes that it would say this may be accomplished no wait hold on what did
212I say um accomplishing this no something about may include but not limited to but I need help remembering how I how I phrased it um we propose the following yeah but I wanted that little you know includes but is not limited to following this this may be accomplished in [Music] um oh if I may inter um th this is proposed to be accomplished in the following manners including but not limited to removal of is that that's fine yeah so so the phrase including but not limited to is yeah including but not limited to and then I was proposing to leave the four bullet points as is and amend the last sentence I didn't propose specific language but I can try and do that now um I would uh instead of so instead of saying with
213anticipated presentation of ordinance changes blah blah blah I would say um pending feedback from City Council on regarding this memo or something so this is after the comma rather than with anticipate it's pending feedback from city council correct instead of feedback Direction yeah would it be helpful to outline Direction on the two kind of Parts the four bullets and the two four seven bullets above or just ask for direction overall I don't know I think overall or or or leaving it on leaving it vague allows them to provide feedback on it or Direction on any of it in reality actually now that's looking at this and the way that kind of Lisa laid it out the first um sorry commissioner s laid it out the first seven bullets right like effectively what we suggest if
214you numbered them let's say one two right all we're really doing is addressing bullet number five that's there are a whole bunch of different things that could be done we're saying number five is the lwh hanging fruit that may take away like a lot of the heartburn but it's not going to solve this and so maybe I mean I think it's important that does not come through we know that but that I don't think is coming through here and so I kind of feel like we need that and and what we need to say to council is effectively here are the four bullets that you can do to address number five but maybe number five is not the right thing like and we don't think that number like doing number five alone is going to
215solve the whole problem there's a lot of other things that could be done and I think what we really want is feedback on all of it do we want is that fair Direction on all of it which seems to me like we're going to have to edit this a little bit more and that we probably shouldn't be doing it on the fly right now at 10:15 but um commissioner so I mean if if we just leave it open-ended I guess that's where we leave it open-ended and just say direction to all of it the benefit of having a council member on Planning Commission is to relay that sort of filter to it um to kind of unpack it more in the discussion in city council or we could be more explicit about these things are
216not specific ordinance recommendations we have yet to um resolve into you know recommendations is it something that city council would like additional effort towards and in what priority so like we go that far maybe yeah it's like we take another day to look at that or we just say look at it all and commissioner dish relays all of this discussion I'm open either I'm just opening up the conversation of a couple different ways to go commissioner milstein and then commissioner dis there was kind of a question to you if you want to answer it um so and for some reason I can't find it right now um the uh didn't we didn't the original motion from city council ask for a response by the end of this year I think so I I don't think
217we have an option of I think we do need to get back to them uh by the end of this year just two weeks away and we don't have any additional meetings so unfortunately I think we are going to have to do this on the Fly and I'm all in favor of sort of leaving it open-ended and having commissioner dish deliver the message to city council uh with the memo yeah yeah so I'm I'm I'm looking again I hadn't I didn't go back and relook at the memo but it's an extremely it's an extremely broad like the the first half is really broad so um I would interpret that what this memo is asking for is are you interested in us further exploring bullet points the the last four bullet points and translating those into
218ordinance in some amount of time and then there was a we had a very broad ranging discussion which uh includes a lot of other things and do you want us to keep talking about those things um and develop some ordinances develop some like more tidy fixes I mean but I think the expression that I've heard from commissioner so is here's a tidy feasible fix that helps provide some security for people who who have concerns about this zoning District but it it really doesn't reach the very Broad range of concerns that have been raised about this but do we need to reach that broad range of concerns by fixing this zoning designation or are there other ways that we could go about that that might be more a more fruitful use of planning commission's time I
219what I'm yeah I think yeah I right I think we want to we don't want to launch a giant thing on Council either because that can go till two in the morning so um but I do so but you know but I think this is a great you know this is an update right this is an update this is what was asked for we have a great set of Tidy fixes that people can say yes or no on and then there's a request do you want us to keep talking about requiring mixed uses do you want us to keep talking about how much the city has changed and is if you want us to have that conversation which I think we do want to that conversation is this the venue for it or is there
220another venue for that conversation I think that's what you're asking for so I think I can um because the the yeah I think commissioner Mills called my attention to the fact that there's definitely a distinction between the seven and the four Direction on the four is straightforward Direction on the seven is Broad and so um I will communicate that great yeah and the in the and I think where this all originated from is we're talking about what to put after the comma in that very last sentence um because that's what the kind of the the motion before us um Mr Kowalski do you have where we left it there we go um well I the first part which is you above the bullet points you want that that summary how we left it or which
221part are you saying after discussing about taking out the date but I think it's described above are the proposed amendments that will be explored and considered by the Planning Commission pending direction from city council right that's yes so that's after directly after by the city council pending Direction that's directly after that comma in Planning Commission correct so the whole last part of that sentence with anti presentation that's gone it just says pending direction from city council right and and the way I would read that is the Planning Commission is asking for direction immediately on the four because the four are the proposed amendments right and then there's a whole another piece of this memo that we can also give direction on but those are not proposed amendments those are pretty big action items and it
222would be helpful to hear whether this is the venue to cons continue those action items or whether there are other projects that might better address those action items so do you want another sentence or are you just going to verbally communicate that I'm gonna verbally communicate that great unless you guys want to make another sentence yeah thank you for calling my attention to that thank you commissioner s all right so we have the proposal to amend this which would add including but not limited to before the bullet list of four alter that last sentence after the comma to Simply pending direction from city council any or more discussion on those two changes to this memo all in favor of the amend of the amendment this is not for the whole thing to forward there can
223still be discussion this is just so particularly newbies know kind of what this is this is just for the amendment um we'll just do a Voice vote so raise your hand or say yes yes yes I see everybody's hand so there can be no one opposed no one opposed okay so now the motion that we has before us is amended so it's it's the the motion is to forward this memo that we have now amended and other discussion of the amended memo all right let's vote and be I think we can just do a Voice vote on this one too all in favor raise your hand or say yes yes yes yes yes there's commissioner Lee okay um there can be no one opposed because I said everybody's hand so it is approved it is
224it passes okay thank you um let me go back to the agenda we're in item number 11 which is public comment this is an opportunity for persons to speak for up to three minutes about an any item of Interest public comment can be made by calling 877 853 5247 and then entering meeting ID 995 1367 City staff will select callers that have raised their hand you do that by pressing star n on your phone um staff will call on you using the last three digits of your telephone number um as usual please move to a quiet area mute any background noises so that we can hear you clearly uh please also state your name and address for the record at the beginning of your comments and the two people on the line have their hands
225raised caller ending in 534 you'll have three minutes to address the Planning Commission hi this is Tom stalberg again 1202 tror Street um well I guess you've already passed something I wish I could have helped you along before then um I'd make your job real easy I would uh scrap the list and scrap the uh the two zoning categories all together uh spend your priority time on uh Transit supported development instead um there's only been two uses of these you know maybe c1a in 20 years and C1 AR R in 50 years uh the c1a was turned down and C1 R was approved but both were inappropriate um there were some things in the Garnette the c1a application that made that a non-viable application uh it starts to strain some other issues like conditional zoning
226but that was a non-legal conditioning zoning that was um proposed for that um so it's a good thing that it didn't pass it would really had the city in in significant Jeopardy and would not have stood up in court so what do we do with c1a and C if they've only been used twice or attempted to be used twice and and inappropriately let's just get rid of them you have no loss there but you've already passed that moment so I think what you're trying to do is you're trying to make something palatable that it's fine where it's left alone where it currently exists it's small Lots so you don't have to worry about the F pushing the high high height limit anyhow um and and they Urban core areas and that's why the premiums are
227for D1 D2 c1a and C1 because they are Urban core areas so you can leave the premiums there if you keep them where they belong then you solve the whole problem so I think the real issue here was not to try to make them palatable so they could be spread everywhere it was to caral them so that these things which could become not palatable elsewhere you know there specifically C1 AR you know there's all these small locks so the F can only get so big but if you let it spread to elsewhere where it could be Big Lots then all of a sudden you get into the height issues because of the F so you wouldn't have to put the fixes on if you just Corral these to where they really belonged in the first
228place so you still are kind of stuck looking at that issue when this comes back to you where do these really belong uh and that's you know that's probably the biggest issue and that solves the most problems but you've uh you've send it off to council that's a done deal you passed the motion and I know you want to get by the end of the year so you've accomplished that um but as we look at this further I'd really like to provide a lot more input on um why it really isn't appro in appropriate to spread these past where they were really intended to do uh and I urge you uh in the time between now and when this comes back to you after direction councel to read the documents that we provided to read
229the actual lawsuit filing to read the November 2017 letter from Susan uh freedlander which includes a report from a previous uh from a prior planning director to Planning Commission there is a wealth of information in there and it is all conclusive that the these do not belong to be spread outside of where they belong which is a very limited area thank you thank [Music] you caller ending in 556 you will have 3 minutes to address the Planning Commission hi this is Ralph mcke can you hear me yes we can I'm an 1116 r I have a similar take to this uh that Tom did but from a little different perspective I I think the original direction from Council if you go if you looked at the or were at the meeting that that this was
230sent to you from the direction was pretty clear figure out how to restrict these or get rid of them and somehow in the initial discussions and the initial comments from staff it took on in a completely different direction which was more like how can we expand these to use them and still make them palatable that's exactly the opposite of the direction that was given and that's what's causing you the heartburn here in terms of how to figure out how to deal with it because the original Direction has has not been followed and the the the point really is if if these these cause all sorts of decisional problems and and Zoning twists and turns if you take them out of the original area where they originally intended if you try to make them fit other
231places you run into all sorts of problems which you've correctly identified and been told of others and if you go back to the original Direction you can cause or solve a lot of problems and I I got to say the last bit of the discussion that's one of the most confusing discussions that I've heard in a long time about what to how to Grapple with it and I appreciate the the the problem but it's sort of a self inflicted problem and if you want to prioritize you know you'd be a lot better off getting rid of that problem there is however something that you that all of the materials and all the thinking that you're doing will be very productive and that's because virtually all the issues that Tom and I have identified are front
232and center when you're dealing with the transit uh supported or Transit Orient or T1 or whatever you want to call it all of those many of those issues are front and center so thinking about the issues that you're doing will be very very helpful and and so I would encourage you to do what Tom just indicated which is to read those documents which will give you background which will be totally applicable to your other problem which is going to be your priority going forward as as I understand it so that piece will be will be helpful I I I have one other sort of more a little bit lighter but maybe not that light uh comment about the process and what you're using your time for I remember at the first or earlier council meeting
233uh a council member dish waving the book about the endless meetings and and and all that and and that that's light to some degree I'll try to keep it that way but you guys spent 35 minutes talking about what date to to to move the the uh Lewis Jeweler's site plan review too you spent 35 minutes on that I just want to let you know that I'm not sure about the use of time if you want to prioritize and keep your meeting short thank you thank you very much I don't see anyone else on the line so um I will close the public comment period and move on to item number 12 which is commission proposed business is there any commissioner milstein I'm going to keep it very brief and this is for M Mr
234Kowalski to take back to Mr Leonard um one of the items that was added to our uh communication uh late today was a letter from uh the village of Barton Hills saying that they are embarking on a master plan revision and also stating in there that they are planning to make revisions to their master plan and one of the things that's happening right now is the lower toown area Mobility study um and it's very close to where the village of Barton HS is so I think there's got to be some communication from the city in regards to that that that study is happening because I think we are going to want that study to be a part of their Master planning process and I don't know how that communication works but uh Mr Kowalski if
235you could just take that back to Mr Leonard um and if he can address it at our next meeting that'd be great thank you yes I can I mean we have the the ability to comment obviously that's why put it out there so yep I will mention it to him and and we can um update you on the next meeting of how that communication will go forward any others it's not really um proposed business as much as I want to thank City staff for stepping in tonight and taking on roles uh so MIA Kristen Matt and Chris filling Mr Leonard's big shoes um and Mr Leonard if you are watching us speedy recovery um I hope you're sleeping and not watching us but just in case um but also like legitimately we are I think
236we're super fortunate to have such a professional staff who can do this um so thank you thank you we do what we can but I wish I could have answered more questions for you tonight but but thank you for the note yeah um anything else also I won't see you until the new year so happy holidays and we'll see you in 2021 um because I think we're ready to move for a motion to adjourn moved by commissioner milin seconded by commissioner abon all those in favor please say I or raise your hand I I that's everyone we are adjourned have a great rest of e for