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HomeMy WebLinkAbout03.21.19 P&Z Minutes_exppdf 1 City Staff and Others: Scott Johnson – Economic Development Stephen Zollinger – City Attorney Natalie Powell – Compliance Officer Tawnya Grover – P&Z Administrative Assistant Chairman Rory Kunz opened the meeting at 6:30 p.m. Roll Call of Planning and Zoning Commissioners: Present: Bruce Sutherland, Greg Blacker, Steve Oakey, Darrik Farmer, Rory Kunz, Kristi Anderson, Council Liaison Brad Wolfe (Not voting), Keith Esplin, Vince Haley, Todd Marx. Absent: Melanie Davenport, John Bowen. Minutes: From Planning and Zoning meeting – February 7, 2019 Kristi Anderson noted one error, in one place in the minutes they say, “Melanie Hepworth” instead of “Melanie Davenport”. MOTION. Motion: Motion to approve the minutes with the change noted, Action: Approve, Moved by Keith Esplin, Seconded by Kristi Anderson. Commissioner discussion. None. VOTE. Motion passed (summary: Yes = 6, No = 0, Abstain = 3). Yes: Greg Blacker, Keith Esplin, Kristi Anderson, Steve Oakey, Todd Marx, Vince Haley. Abstain: Bruce Sutherland, Darrik Farmer, Rory Kunz. Public Hearings: 1. 6:35 P.M. - (#19 00096) amending the Comprehensive Plan Map from various Government owned properties to Public Facilities (PF) in the City of Rexburg, Madison County, Idaho as per requirements in the Rexburg Development Code. (action) Staff Report: A new procedure has been suggested by Attorney Stephen Zollinger, which is to have the Staff Report first, but when the applicant presents, it will be in the public input portion of the hearing. Chairman Rory Kunz opened the public input portion of the hearing at 6:36p.m. Favor: Applicant Presenter: Tawnya Grover – City of Rexburg Planning & Zoning Administrative Assistant - Tonight the proposal is a change in the Comprehensive Plan 35 North 1st East Rexburg, ID 83440 Phone: 208.359.3020 Fax: 208.359.3022 www.rexburg.org Planning & Zoning Minutes March 21, 2019 2 for all of the government owned properties in the City limits. If a property is owned by the City of Rexburg, Madison County, or by the School District, those properties are being changed. In total there are 150 properties. Initially, the City was starting with a rezone, but Tawnya identified that many of the properties involved were not identified on the Comprehensive Plan Map either. The Comprehensive Plan Map shows some of these properties. The High School, an elementary school, and the airport were identified on the map. The map was zoomed in to show the downtown. There were no Public Facilities identified. There are several government-owned properties in the downtown, like the Fire Department, the City Hall, the County Building, and a school building. Scott Johnson, our Economic Developer, tells people all the time much of the land in the downtown is off the tax rolls. But, if you are looking at our Comprehensive Plan Map, you don’t see many properties identified. A mixed message is being conveyed. One of the objectives the former planner, Craig Rindlisbacher, had before he left was to change these properties to Public Facilities to enable transparency. In addition, in the Public Facilities section on page 229, section 9.03.010. in the purposes and objectives section it says, “This zone is intended to reduce the affect which the location of these facilities may have upon zoning statistics in residential, commercial, or industrial areas. Typical uses will be allowed in other zones to initially accommodate public facilities in appropriate areas without undue difficulty, however, it is intended that the Public Facilities zone would then be applied to all such facilities for ease of recognition and accurate statistical indexing.” What this means is, these properties can start out in other zones, to enable the projects to get started, and serve the smaller pieces of our community where they are needed, but then they need to be changed over in time over to Public Facilities. We are using the zone, Public Facilities, for its intended use. With this, came a few difficulties, some of these properties owned by these government entities, were not identified or permitted in the Public Facilities’ use table. In the documents provided to the Commission, there was a document that identified those changes; items were identified such as, the fairgrounds, the golf course, sports fields, swimming pools, and theatres. Also, many of the city-owned properties have items like lift stations on them to serve the population. These uses required conditional use permits and now show a permitted status instead of requiring a conditional use permit. These are those more minor utility uses. In addition, some of those properties are really, really small, just enough to handle a lift station. This created problems with the lot width, lot size, and lot frontage. These government entities do not need a lot of land to have the facility or service in place. The city does not need to eat up a lot of land. An adjustment was needed in the Development Code in the “lot area, lot width, and lot frontage” sections of the Public Facilities zone. Chairman Rory Kunz asked the Commissioners if they have any clarification questions for the applicant. Commissioner Darrik Farmer noticed on the public hearing notice the change identified was to change the Comprehensive Plan Map and not the Development Code. Tawnya answered, the Comprehensive Plan includes both the Comprehensive Plan Map and the Ordinance. She believes this is why the notice was worded this way. 3 Commissioner Haley asked, as we are amending everything to change to Public Facilities, how about in the future? Tawnya answered, the property purchase will start out in the zoning in which it is currently, then those properties will have to be rezoned to Public Facilities. There are a couple of sales pending with the city right now. Commissioner Haley is thinking about the water tank by his house right now. The city would still have to rezone the property. The property would not automatically change to Public Facilities upon purchase. Right now, this is a blanket change for every piece of property these government entities own currently. Tawnya responded, this is an attempt to catch the city up, show some transparency, and allow anyone to see the government-owned property in the city. Today is the Comprehensive Plan Map change being proposed, a rezone of these properties will also come before the Planning & Zoning Commission as the next step. Commissioner Kristi Anderson asked, under lot area, there was an “a” and “b”, which discussed an option for a caretaker dwelling on 5,000 square feet. The city does not have any properties owned by the government that we allow people to live on as a caretaker. This item has been removed. Chairman Rory Kunz noted with the lot lines having no minimums, is there setback requirements. Tawnya answered, in this zone, there were no setbacks identified. The only three items were lot area, lot width, and lot frontage. Some of the properties are behind others, so they don’t have any lot frontage on a road. Keith Davidson, our Public Works Director, only has certain places he can put lift stations. Depending on the grade and the number of lift stations on a line already, Keith was determining where a lift station would go, and he had the option of two possible places and that was it. Those placements depend on engineering constraints and don’t have a lot of options. Commissioner Steve Oakey asked if there was a concern with an ongoing problem he sees with the lists on all of the zones. Instead of adding to the lists, but work to eliminate the lists. It is difficult to foresee the numerous possible uses that could be placed in these zones and so we are confronted with someone coming in to develop, but don’t find the project on the list. He feels adding to the list is moving in the wrong direction. Can we create verbiage that captures the idea of the structures that the public facilities can be defined by? This could apply to any of the zones: manufacturing, commercial business, etc. Any of the zones, we could probably imagine appropriate uses, but by cluttering the code book with multiple lists. Steve Oakey wanted this item repeated in the public record, not necessarily eliciting a response. Tawnya responded, she has wrestled where the balance is. There is some safety in having a list, enabling people to say, I am sorry, this is not a use in a particular place, so we are not going to allow it. On the other hand, I have seen staff see an application be presented, and find a similar use in the list and allow that use. She believes the balance is probably a description like “Group Housing” on the left-hand side of the table, but she believes those 4 items on the right-hand side, where those items are listed, serve more as examples. There are going to be people that look at groups of housing and they won’t have the same picture of what group housing looks like. The lists serve to paint a picture of the kind of use we are looking for in those different places in our city. The conditional uses give people an idea of the intensity that may be allowed in those places. With verbiage, I don’t think you could get away entirely from the lists. She has seen in some of the commercial zones, a list of a whole bunch of different services, “miscellaneous services.” It makes her think, why would you list them all, if you are going to allow any service among them. There is work to be done. Commissioner Steve Oakey talked about three levels of people that are included as these types of decisions that are made. One is the staff, the second is the Planning & Zoning Commission unelected volunteers from the community, and the third are the elected City Council members. These three layers of people have a common understanding of what uses are to be used in each of the zones. The collective knowledge among the groups about the area in which we live may serve to eliminate pages of rules. Tawnya responded the Development Code is ages old. The code has pieces of many different codes used by communities and refined to work for our area. She has stated before, the first effort was to organize the code to show the requirements that are there. Next, the efforts going forward are to improve the code and take out those things in Scott Johnson’s words, “that are hindering development.” What is hurting our community and the people in it or stopping them from improving the community as a whole. As you look through the Development Codes that have been provided to the Commission, is to find those items that need to be fixed. Commissioner Steve Oakey noted the lists at the very end of the Development Code. Chairman Rory Kunz thanked Tawnya. Neutral: None Opposed: None Written Input: None Rebuttal: None Chairman Rory Kunz asked if anyone else would like to speak? None. He closed the public input portion of the hearing at 6:56p.m. Commissioner Steve Oakey thanked Tawnya for the work she has done on the Development Code. Chairman Vince Haley suggested many pages have been removed. Kristi Anderson stated this action seems very common sense. This application is in line with the Development Code. Should there be two different motions? The code is being amended and the Comprehensive Plan Map is a second action. Attorney Zollinger confirmed two separate motions would be needed. MOTION: Recommend approval of amending the Comprehensive Plan Map, because it puts the city in compliance with the Development Code., Action: Recommend, Moved by Kristi Anderson, Seconded by Bruce Sutherland. 5 Commissioner discussion. None. VOTE: Motion carried by unanimous roll call vote (summary: Yes = 9). Yes: Bruce Sutherland, Darrik Farmer, Greg Blacker, Keith Esplin, Kristi Anderson, Rory Kunz, Steve Oakey, Todd Marx, Vince Haley. Commissioner Darrik Farmer stated a public hearing has not been noticed for a Development Code change. Stephen Zollinger suggests the Development Code changes be noticed for conjunction with the rezone. 6 If changes in the Development Code are needed, the Commissioners would need to communicate those changes to Tawnya to notice them for public hearing. Adjournment: Kristi Anderson motioned to adjourn the meeting. Commissioner Rory Kunz adjourned the meeting at 7:01 PM. Heads Up: Hearings: April 4, 2019: #19-00093 – Citywide Public Facilities Rezone & Development Code changes to Public Facilities.