July 3, 2023 — Meeting Transcript

Good evening, everyone.

Welcome to the Planned Commission for July 3rd. If you have any electronic gadgets, please silence them. Brian will start.

Steve Lichtenfeld. Here. Carolyn Gatiss. Bridget McAndrew. Bob Denlow.

Steve Lichtenfeld. Here. Carolyn Gatiss. Bridget McAndrew. Bob Denlo.

Here.

Helen DiFate.

Helen DeFayette.

Here.

Kami Waldman.

Here.

David Gipson.

David Gibson.

Here. Okay, we have minutes from the previous meeting on June 20th. Are there any changes? No. Okay. Do we have a motion? I move to approve the minutes.

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Opposed?

Okay. Let's move on to new business.

All righty, so we'll begin with the site plan review for 7452 Byron Place. The subject property is located at the southeast corner of the intersection of Byron Place and Glen Ridge Drive. The property is zoned R2 and is developed with a two-story single family home. The project scope includes the demolition of the existing home, garage, driveway, and walking paths to construct a new single family home. I'll provide a summary of review criteria, but a full analysis is available in the staff report and can be found on the city spending applications page. The property is surrounded by a combination of single and multifamily structures and meets the requirements of the R2 district. HVAC units are proposed on the west side of the home and trash is proposed to be stored at the rear. Both are proposed to be enclosed with treated wood fencing and plantings. Impervious coverage will increase to 40.3% from 37%. The MSD 15-year 20-minute storm calculation is projected to increase from 0.5 to 0.52 cubic feet per second. Landscaping plan proposes removing all 17,264 square feet of existing canopy coverage. The plan proposes adding 4,250 square feet of canopy coverage, which is 18 square feet more than the replacement requirement. The plan also exceeds the native species requirement with 84.6% native proposed. Water, sewer and gas will connect underground in the front yard. Electric line connects via the rear. Staff are of the opinion that the project meets the criteria for site plan approval and recommends approval with the following condition. To ensure future maintenance and protection of the drywall system, the applicant shall record a deed restriction identifying the location and details of the system with the St. Louis County Recorder of Deeds and provide proof of the recording with the building permit submission.

Okay, thank you. The applicant? named the site plan. All right, my name is David Bowles

and Bowles Engineering and what you see here before you is the existing drainage on the left and the proposed drainage on the right. And what I outlined here in yellow is the existing home and this would be the post home on the right side. And the red area pretty much drains to the west towards Glenridge Avenue and the green area currently drains towards Byron Place and In the proposed condition, it's going to do the same thing. We are proposing to put a dry well at this location right here and the water from this blue area of the roof would go into that dry well and be treated. So I can say after we do this that there is going to be less water that's going towards both streets and there won't be any water going on any adjacent properties towards any adjacent properties. This is actually right here, is the high spot in the whole area. So all the water pretty much comes down here, down the street, and then to the south along Byron Place. And with that, I'd be happy to answer questions about it.

No questions, but I really like that you outlined the existing and the new house. That

helps. Well, doing it with a PDF makes it easier, so... Well, that's

good. You added color a while ago, and now we have the house outlined, so we're making great progress. All right. I don't have any questions on the drainage. Does anyone else? No. No. But I do have some questions on the actual siding of the house,

but that may go to Lauren. I'm curious about the

decision of the garage being a rear entrance in lieu of a side entrance, if you could do that. Because there's not much backyard left at all. But there's a huge front yard and a huge side yard. And you can see it on the proposed drainage plan. It just seems like it's not the best use of that site.

The problem, we did look at doing it as a site entry. There's just not a lot of room between the garage doors and the street. And Scott and Blair didn't want the open garage doors right there on what is really a very busy street facing the public. And we do have a big site and there still is an awful lot of green space. And we did really carefully consider that decision with Bowles to turn it to the rear. It gives more room for someone to park a car outside the garage door off street, and it leaves more privacy for what may be inside the garage, not facing a busy street. So we did really consider

that.

Come up to the mic.

So just to add on to that, we actually pulled a number of- Can you identify your name? Sure, absolutely. Blair Melman with Melman Brothers. Thank you. Everybody, thank you for being here, especially on a holiday weekend. But yes, just to further Lauren's point, our really main concern was the security. We actually polled a number of people that live in the neighborhood and just other young families. And kind of the feedback from three or four of the different people we talked to, young mothers, was that they would just feel a lot more comfortable being able to pull into the driveway and then pull into the garage as opposed to just kind of have a little bit of separation there. They felt that was more secure. So that was kind of a final straw, if you will, that decided. Because originally we did have it facing Byron like the existing house was. And so that was kind of what led us to making that final decision. Thank you. To put it in the back of the art.

Okay. Well, the house and everything fits into the required space. So I understand that. It just seemed like there's a lot of open space and in the front and the side of the house and very little in the backyard so that's a comment i don't know if anyone else has any other comment on the usage of the site

oh can i just say is this a spec home okay and um The reason not to put the, I mean, it's always more attractive if you can hide the garage door. Don't get me wrong. It really makes a difference. But I assume a family will be living there and I assume there'll be swings and objects like that. Do you feel there's enough room?

Yeah, we actually feel like in the rear of the yard there will be, especially we have kind of a covered patio and deck off the left side of the house. And where that will kind of then lead out to more of that useful backyard space in the left corner, if you will.

I do want to say we also have a really pretty front yard and it's a beautiful street. But the living area, the terrace on the front of the house to enjoy that garden. So there are doors.

Terrace, you'll see it on the...

And I assume the reason that house is being demolished and a new one built is there are a lot of problems with the existing house?

In pretty poor condition, yes.

Current owner has owned it for... Anything else about the site, Lauren

or Dave? No. Okay. There is a staff recommendation. I'm sure you're aware of it. Okay. Any other questions on site planning? Okay. Do we have a staff recommends approving with the one condition that's already been read? Do we have a motion?

I move to approve approve the staff recommendation with a condition to ensure future maintenance and protection of the drywall systems. The applicant shall record a deed restriction, identifying the location and details of the system with the St. Louis County Recorder of Deeds and provide proof of recording with the building permit subdivision. You're aware of that? Okay.

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed?

Okay.

Let's move on, Ryan, to item two,

architectural review. So for the same property, the surrounding neighborhood comprises a combination of single and multifamily structures. Building styles vary with Tudor, Mediterranean, colonial, and touches of American craftsmen. Variations in roof and window styles also provide character to the neighborhood. In a neighborhood of varying styles, the majority of homes feature unique design elements that contribute to the character of the area. Proposed house will feature elevated design elements, including varying roofline, use of shutters, stone headers and sill, brick soldier horses, and rowlock sills. Nearby structures are primarily red, brown, orange, or gray brick with stone, stucco, or wood as secondary materials. The structure to be demolished is a two-story single family home that comprises of brick, stucco and wood. The new house is proposed to be constructed of light gray brick, fiber cement board accents, brown architectural shingles, brown windows, shutters, and brown doors. The front facade features a new concrete front path leading to the covered entry with a recessed door. A terrace with an iron railing is positioned east of the entry. Rear facade includes basement, at-grade garage entry, patio with covered and uncovered sections, trash enclosure, and plantings. The driveway and rear patio are proposed to be exposed aggregate. Trash and HVAC are to be screened with treated wood and landscaping. Exterior incandescent lighting is proposed to all doors and the garage. Staff recommends approval with the following condition, that if exposed aggregate is not used for the front path, it shall match the city's standard pour with an 8.5 sack mix of Meramec sand and gravel.

guys again to Blair Melman with Melman Brothers and I just wanted to thank city staff, you Chairman Lichtenfeld and the rest of the board members for being here this evening especially on a holiday weekend. I know a lot of challenges with the weather this weekend so I hope everybody with electric issues those have been resolved. Scott and I are just thrilled to be continuing what we think is a will hopefully be a longstanding legacy of homes that we've built in Clayton. I don't even know the number, but we're probably over a dozen or so. So we love Clayton. We're all about Clayton. Grew up here, continue to live and work here. So thank you for this particular house. I'll turn over the rest of the presentation to Lauren and just thank you all as well. Thank you again.

All brick home. There's just one person in there. Lauren, can you just hold the mic with

you or lean it back towards you? You can pick it up. It can be moved if you want us to do it. And

we're going to be using this very pale gray brick and dark bronze windows and a dark brown roof. And we'll be having some limestone accents on the windows. And I think the house is a really nice traditional design that will blend in on the street. And I'm here to answer any questions you have.

So it is a gray brick. It's not going to be whitewashed or

anything? It's going to be a brick. OK, great.

I think the house looks good. However, when I look at your drawing where you show the house next door, The house seems to be very standard in today's trendy design. It looks good. It doesn't pick up anything of the tradition in the neighborhood, like the house that's being demolished. Do you have any

comments on that? Actually, I didn't print the pictures, but I have driven up and down the street and there are a lot of very traditional two-story homes on the street. I know the one immediately to the left or east is a little bit of a different design. But there's a lot of lighter colored brick homes and a lot of just traditional, very not trendy Clayton homes. And I feel like what we've done here is a traditional design with the shutters and the traditional windows. It's not the Clayton horizontal bars or Clayton gardens look because we did really try to fit into the neighborhoods.

I like it. I just wanted to hear your comments because it's quite different from the house that's replacing.

Yeah, and the house next door is pretty different than everything else on the street. It

has sort of a Spanish influence of some sort. I think the materials look good. Is that a gray roof?

It's a dark

brown roof. Dark brown. Ah, okay.

Can you pick that up? If you could pick it up and make sure everyone can see it in the audience, the various materials. That's the roof.

I mean, in the picture, the roof looks like it's some unique material you're using. It's like an artistic rendering of the roof. That's the brick. Brown's window. Whose window is it? Other comments, Bob?

I love the roof rendering in the picture more than I like the real McCoy. But you definitely could go on some game show, you know, with your skill set.

It's okay. Ellen?

I like it. I think it's well done. You know, simple but well designed.

Amy?

I like it too. I'm actually happy to see that it's brown and not gray shutters. With the rendering, you can't really tell, so I'm really happy that it's brown. I think that'll help fit in a little bit better also. So overall, I really like it.

David? I

don't have any concerns. Any comments from the audience? No hands up. Oh, there it is. Is that what we have here? This is the updated one? Oh, on the screen. Yeah. We do have someone online.

Nick, would you like to comment?

Sure, yeah. Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Great. Thank you. Yeah, so we live Nick acres we live across the street at 7445 Byron place, you know, appreciate this opportunity to review the design and and make some comments. One, somebody mentioned character of the neighborhood, house seems standard. So I don't disagree that at the far east end or the east half of the street, the homes do look a little bit more standard. But on the west end, the house directly across the street, our house, our neighbors, the two houses directly adjacent on the same side of this street, I think They definitely have a different character to them than kind of the standard traditional style. So maybe just some consideration there in terms of matching the character of the neighborhood. There was a comment about pulling on the garage placement of talking to families in the neighborhood, young mothers were a young family. You know, I don't know who was pulled. We weren't. And then, you know, just another comment. There was another really nice home that these folks are doing across the street from the Glenridge school. And we really enjoy going and playing on the soccer field in the morning there with our kids and And I don't know exactly what phase of the construction was going on, but there was a considerable amount of dust in the air that caused us to leave the soccer field. So just would appreciate any thoughts or comments on dust control during this construction. Those are my comments. Thank you.

I'm

sorry, go ahead. Sorry, the last thing I wrote down, just the, I think the color of the light gray brick next to kind of the tan house next door and kind of the brown houses across the street. Just a comment there for you. Thank you.

And thank you for your comments. We really do appreciate it, Blair and I. So I'm Blair's brother, Scott Melman with Melman Brothers Development. And these comments, questions, concerns that neighbors, staff, Blair and I have will all get answered. We will get out to every single neighbor. That's one of the things that we have pride and joy in doing just to make sure everybody in the surrounding areas, 200 feet within, which is a requirement by code, to meet and greet as many people as possible. And we encourage that. If there's something that does come up that you would like to see tweaks of, we're happy to take all that into consideration. most certainly. The comment about the dust and stuff from the Oxford house, that's actually our dad that's building that house. Yes, it's a totally separate company, but it's our father building that house. And there are times things like that happen. However, Blair and I will do everything humanly possible to make sure that the dust settles elsewhere other than neighboring properties, whether it's with hoses or with sprinklers or whatever. We take pride in this and we don't want anybody upset when this project is ongoing or completed or at any point in time so i encourage people to ask questions call us we'll give it our phone numbers you know we want to make everybody happy including

ourselves any other comment nick he's off thanks scott absolutely okay any other uh comments

We do have the staff recommendation.

We have one more hand up.

Oh, we do have another person. Sir, if you'd like to speak, please come up and then. Oh, thank you.

Hello.

Can you hear

me? Hold on. We have someone

speaking in the chamber. I'm Joe Connolly, lives

at 7451 right across the street. The corn blooms and Leonard. So House was born in 1931 when I was born the same year. So I've been there a long time. I would not have the house maybe as light as it is because there's one up on Skinker and It really, really is of a different tone than the rest of the houses. So I'm in favor of it soften up a little bit so it doesn't shine out too much. Now maybe that's just a picture of it looking really white. But I don't think it should be the centerpiece of the block if it's

really light.

I guess it's pretty well set to go, isn't it? I mean, this is a chance to give some feedback. Is that correct?

It's correct. We haven't voted on it, but this is a chance for us to hear comments.

Is it about 3,400 or 3,800 square feet?

Lauren, could you confirm

that? 3,800, including the garages? Does not exist. 3,800 without the garages. Correct. I heard 6,000 one time, so I wouldn't have been in favor of that, but maybe 3,800 can fit on that lot well. So I've said I'd like to tone down a

little bit if possible and still be nice. You know that house on Skinker?

is odd shaped you're talking about a clayton road

right

very odd shape different materials it's stone instead of brick it really doesn't fit in and that's the city of st louis that reviewed that

terrible

i agree

yeah

And I don't see this and that in the same comparison.

Oh, anyway, this is the end of the neighborhood. It's going to be larger than the other houses, but any way that it can fit in, I'm in favor of it adapting to fit in. It's going be larger than the houses already, but I don't think it needs to shine out by its brightness or anything. Sure. So I'm not going to fight it. The corn blooms have been neighbors for a long time. glad that it's going to hate to see their house go. I'd probably rather all things considered that they kept the house the way it was, you know, kept the house and fixed it up. But we'll be pleased with the new neighbors and hope everything works out well. Thank you.

Thank you. See, we have another hand up. Can you let him in? Oh, you can

unmute himself and speak.

Can you unmute? Yes, we hear you now.

Okay, so the only question I had was about dust. I know somebody else asked about dust. And as well as since it's a hundred year old house, we are more concerned about asbestos or lead because we will stay just next door. So that was our only concern.

so if i understood that correctly the question was or the concern was more about the dust um during construction during demo during demo so on and so forth one of the requirements that clayton does have for us will obviously abide by is dust control we're required to outline probably you know a process procedure ways that we're going to keep this dust under control, from sprinklers, hoses, irrigation, whatever it might be. During the dusty days and during the times that the winds do blow, we can't control which way the wind is blowing, but we can certainly control and make sure in our best effort to make sure that dust is not blowing to a neighbor or elsewhere.

Okay, the only thing is we don't have garage in our houses. So all dust also goes onto the car. So I just since you know, the most impacted will be our house with the dust because we are just next door. That's why I have this concern about dust coming into the house and what remedies would be there once the construction starts.

Absolutely. And I'm sorry about missing one of your other questions was about asbestos remediation, asbestos removal. So in terms of that, there is asbestos in here. We are required to have it removed by a reputable company who has approved by, you know, the HBA, who we've worked with many, many times to find the demo of our existing homes and past homes. So, you know, being our neighbor and back, you know, if I'll reach out to you, I'm sure within the coming days, or if you want to tell me what your address and name are right now, I'll even write it down and, you know, come by and stop by, you know, whenever it's convenient for you.

Okay, my name is Vijay Anand and my address is 7446 Byron Place.

Perfect. Thank you. And we really do encourage and appreciate all the comments and thoughts. So thank you.

Okay. Thank you. Let's see, Nick.

This is Diana. I'm Nick's wife. So we live right across the street there, next to Joe Connolly, who just spoke. I wanted to second what Joe said about the brightness of this house. I thought that actually from the picture, I thought this was more of a white brick. But hearing that it's a gray brick, in addition, concern is... BJ's house next door is is very much a tan, then you're putting a gray. It doesn't necessarily look very nice next to like a tan color that there's so many options for colors of brick that I feel it would be interesting to me and it sounds like Joe if you could come up with maybe a different color, a slightly darker color that would not stand out so much and then also go better with the houses next door and across the street, which would be our homes. If

possible.

Can we show that where they would see it online? The brick.

It's not going to appear very well, even if we tried to zoom the camera in.

I was going to, Diana, I was going to comment. We're looking at the brick. It is a gray brick, but I would call it a warm gray. It is not a cool gray, which would have more blues or real gray in it. But to me, I thought it was a beige brick when I first looked at it walking in.

There's just a little gray in the beige, yeah.

Yeah. So... I personally, and we can ask the other members, thought that it would actually look very complementary to the house just to the east of it. And with the brown shutters and the roof color, I think it'll be a much warmer composition than if it had been a white brick.

Oh,

okay. Thank you. I appreciate you commenting on that. I definitely, you know, since we're starting from scratch, it would be great for it to look great next to the house next door and across the street. since the world is wide open to color. But I hear what you're saying, that you're saying it looks nice. I don't know if maybe when the Melman Brothers team comes around to introduce themselves, they can maybe bring a sample just for us to be more certain in what you're doing as well. We meant to come in person today, but it didn't work out. So sorry about that.

Absolutely. And I think that's a great idea for

us. Thank you. I don't know. Did you hear that?

What Scott Melman said?

All right. I was saying, so when we do make our final rounds through the neighborhood and people aren't home, we'll obviously leave business cards and they can call us whenever, but we will have a sample of that brick and all the other exterior stuff if needed or if wanted at our availability, if you guys, for a closer look.

Yeah, that would be fantastic. I don't know how soon you plan to make your way out this way,

but... I would say we'll be on the roads, on the streets within a week or no more than two.

Okay.

If that works for you. Yes,

this coming week is

fantastic. Thank you.

Absolutely. Thank you again.

Okay. Vijay? Okay, if you would unmute. Jay, do you hear us? Oh, okay. Okay. Any other comments?

Please wait, we need to record it, please. Yes. Identify yourself.

I'm Charlene Conley. Joe and I lived across the street. What I wondered is when construction would start and how long it would take. And also what the hours of opera, you know, hours of deconstruction and construction. Thanks. Scott.

And thank you very much for that question. It's an excellent one. Construction should start, well, tonight is our first step of getting approvals. From here, what we're going to get going on, hopefully not tomorrow, but on Wednesday, is finishing our construction drawings. Our construction drawings are actually kind of underway with structural, civil, and architectural, and landscaping stuff. We hope to have everything submitted to the City of Clayton. I'd say within... four weeks, maybe a little less? Okay. From there, we'll apply for our demo permit. Hopefully, demo of the house can be within the next four to six weeks as well. So there's something new, I think, with the city now that we can no longer apply for our demo

I mean, we're going to have to go into details on that. But the timeline was to get all of your SWIFT documents approved and other demolition permit requirements. It helps to have this first. Otherwise, you have to do that twice.

So we want to make sure we're going about it the right way, most importantly. The other comment was or question was when construction will start. If demo starts within six weeks, construction is going to start probably about then. But the actual construction would start, I'd say, two to three weeks after that. So that puts us what? Middle of, you know, end of August ish. timing for the full construction it's probably an eight to ten month possibly 12 month build eight i'd say eight to ten months build from the time we start our foundation so if we start our foundation september 1st uh that's nine that's what does that put us in you know in may mayish may june of next year when the house will be finished The other question was hours of operation. We are able to have due construction only Monday through Friday between the hours of 7 a.m. and 5

p.m. Yeah, most of the time everybody's out of there. All of our contractors are out of there by 3 p.m., so yeah.

Okay, thank you. Did that answer your question? Good, thank you. Any other comments in the audience? No more hands up.

Any further comments? Sorry. Well, that's Clayton rules for

construction. So hopefully they'll be on the

later side than the earlier. PB, John Gerstle:" We do have a staff

recommendation with one comment and, as we said before, do you have any comment on that Scott. PB, John Gerстle:" or lauren. Then do we have a motion?

I move that we approve the staff recommendation with the following condition. If exposed aggregate is not used, the front path shall match the city standard pour with an 8.5 sack mix of Merrimack sand and gravel.

Second.

All

in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? Okay. Thank you for coming. Same to you. And we'll be watching the house as it goes up.

Good luck with it. Okay, we've come to

item 3, 118 South Hanley Road.

Ryan? The applicant is seeking a conditional use permit to allow the operation of a marijuana dispensary on the subject property, which is located on the east side of South Hanley Road between Grandolet Plaza and Bonham Avenue. The property has a zoning designation of high-density commercial and is located in the Clayton Plaza Overlay Zoning District. The site is currently developed with a one-story commercial building previously home to Palm Beach Tan. The applicant is seeking to operate Sunrise, an agrogenesis LLC marijuana dispensary. The proposed hours of operation are 8 a.m. to 9 p.m., seven days a week. The structure measures roughly 3,600 square feet and will include a waiting room, sales floor, private employee spaces, and restroom facilities. The site contains a 23-space parking lot and may be accessed from South Hanley Road and Colorado Avenue. Deliveries will be handled via Colorado Avenue, which functions as a rear alley to buildings fronting South Hanley Road in Crandallet Plaza. Refuse will be stored and handled via an existing dumpster on Colorado Avenue. The applicant has stated that marijuana products will be rendered unusable if they are required to be discarded. I'll provide a summary of review criteria, but a full analysis is available in the staff report and can be found in the city's pending applications page. Adjacent uses include a car wash and offices. Restaurants and residential units may be found on adjacent blocks. Proposed use is compatible with surrounding uses and neighborhood. There will be no changes to the footprint or size of the structure housing the proposed dispensary. The applicant has provided facility operations manual that identifies odor mitigation methods and security procedures and has been reviewed by local law enforcement. Staff are of the opinion that they meet the performance standards and regulations governing marijuana facilities. Staff are of opinion that proposed dispensary will not result in adverse impacts related to traffic, noise, odor, utilities, and emergency services. Staff recommends that this board recommend approval of the conditional use permit to the Board of Aldermen.

Okay, thank you. Good evening. Good evening.

Thank you for having us.

If you would identify yourself and your company, and then make any further comments that you would like.

Yes, my name is Neil Minor. I'm the Chief Administrative Officer for Agrigenesis, which operates Sunrise Dispensaries in the state of Missouri. A few of my co-workers are here with me today. Duke Olinger is our Director of Security. Sean Carragher is the president of the company. Chris Nelson is the manager of our current St. Louis dispensary. And Antar Schaefer is kind of a utility player for the company who does a little bit of everything, and he's actually the one who found this location for us here in St. Louis, or in Clayton. And so we do currently operate four dispensaries. We have one in St. Louis that's on Michigan Avenue, and... We're in the process of working with the state to relocate that to a different place. And we're kind of doing that in parallel with working with the city of Clayton to get our conditional use permit.

Okay. we understand that you are within the boundaries without affecting any religious institutions or schools, et cetera. We did see it on what was proposed to us. But could you or your security person go over some of the security items that will be taken care of?

Yeah. Duke, would you like to speak to that?

My name is Duke Olinger. I'm the director of security for the company. And I can answer any question you might have about security, but we follow all the state guidelines that are put in place. And I feel like we exceed the state guidelines when it comes to the security equipment that we do put in place for the building. It does have access control to where it does not allow customers to get anywhere else inside the facility without an employee opening that door. We have all the required CCTV, intrusion alarms, everything that, again, is required. And we do a good job with the amount of equipment that we do put in that building because we want to keep it running properly and keep everybody safe.

So would the CCTV and any other apparatus be operational 24 hours a day?

Yeah, the CCTV runs at 24 hours a day, yes.

Both during operating hours and closure hours?

Yes, yeah. We are required by state to maintain that. For the video surveillance, we have the intrusion alarm that is on after hours that would not be on during business hours. It does have certain panic alarms throughout the building for any issues that may occur. haven't had to use any of those systems with any of our facilities. But yes, we have everything that runs during the day. The few that are on during the day, but most of our security equipment is definitely 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

How will you monitor the 23 parking spaces?

are you asking about how we would make sure that they're only used for our customers or their signage and on the parking spots now from the previous business that was there that says these spots are reserved exclusively for customers of the building. Um, and we would probably do something similar, but at our dispensaries, um, transaction time is between 10 and 15 minutes per customer. So there's a lot of turnover, um, in the lot and, um, No, we wouldn't really want people just coming in there and parking if they're not our customers. But at the same time, the transaction time and turnaround time is pretty quick. And I don't think with the 23 spots there, I don't think that we're going to have any parking problems.

And then in looking at the driveway, would cars exit? on Colorado, or do they turn around and come back out to Hanley Road?

Currently, the parking spot, most of the parking spots that are in there are angled in the direction that they would enter off of Hanley. And then backing out of their parking spot, they would exit onto Colorado. That would probably be our preference to do that. I'm not real familiar with the traffic flow patterns of downtown Clayton. I don't know if people would want to enter off of Colorado. I don't We're certainly open to input and we're going to have an architect design everything, including the parking lot. So we would get their input on that as well.

Well, just a recommendation. Hanley Road is fairly busy.

Yeah.

And the way I'm looking at it, if you would have Hanley Road be your entry point. and encourage people to go out Colorado, I think would avoid a lot of congestion on Hanley. If you watch your potential next door neighbor, the car wash, you will see the cars coming out, trying to maneuver, getting out into Hanley road.

Sure. Yeah. And I'm sure making a left turn onto Hanley is nearly impossible coming out of there.

Yeah.

Uh, we did myself and Duke had a meeting with the chief of police and captain last week. We did a video call and presented our security overlay plan today while we were in town. Captain Thuitt came down and did a walkthrough with us and looked at the interior, the exterior. We got his input on things and then Duke invited them to bring all of the police officers to come back when we're finished. so that they know what the store layout looks like and they know where everything is and the cameras and everything once we're ready to be operational.

Thank you.

Let's go around. Bob, comments?

Yeah. The door is locked until an employee lets somebody in?

So the door on the entrance of the building is open so that customers can walk in, and they walk into a reception area. And then they have to register with the receptionist, and they can't enter the sales floor until they're buzzed in.

Is the division like a glass wall or just a

desk? No, it's a solid wall.

Solid wall. Floor to ceiling?

That separates the reception area from the sales floor. Yes,

it is. There's another door that has to be opened up to let them into the retail area.

Correct.

Oh. And the security. Are the requirements overkill or is there a real issue going on in the business? I mean.

There was a rash of break-ins in St. Louis last summer, and I can't remember exactly how many. Duke can probably tell me off the top of his head, but I want to say it was like 25 in St. Louis City, attempted break-ins, and in no case did they ever get away with product or cash because of the way the state has rules regarding the design of the facility. So we have an interior vault so that if someone even does get into the building, they're going to be caught on camera, but they still can't access the vault where we store all of our products because of the way it's built.

And is this a cash business? Can they use credit cards?

Currently, it's a cash only business.

And tell me just a little bit about you guys. You have four stores.

We do. We currently have four. You're in St. Louis? No, we have one in St. Louis and the other three are in the Kansas City area on the west side of the state. And our company is headquartered out of Macon, Missouri, which is north central, just south of Kirksville, where we have a cultivation facility and a manufacturing facility there.

Am I looking at the Macon crowd here?

What's ahead?

Looking at the Macon cloud here.

Just one. Yeah, go ahead.

Name's Sean Carragher, president of Agrigenesis. Just wanted to introduce myself. Duke's being a little coy. He's a former police chief himself, so he has a good line of communication, speaks the language very well. Something that Neil pointed out is controlled access from a security point of view. DHSS, our regulator, has very clear rules and regulations about what controlled access looks like. We don't make these decisions. They have very clear rules that separate public access from controlled access areas which is our showroom floor that's why we have a solid wall with a key fob or secured entry and exit it's to prevent any sort of public access to controlled substances so all of our security parameters are very well defined and it's actually the state regulators that put that in place and they also go through you know countless inspections and audits to make sure that we're compliant at all times and they actually have access to live feed to see what's going on 24 hours a day. So they can always check up on us if they feel like they want to.

So this is a type of operation where people really aren't going to be milling around. They have their car, they go in, do their business and they kind of leave.

There's a rule about the number of customers to workers. There's a three-to-one ratio, so we can't just allow as many people that want to browse and shop at their leisure. We certainly encourage dialogue and have a very educated staff for questions and comments and education, but no, there's not... You can't just kind of walk in and it's not shopping for a t-shirt per se. It's more of a controlled environment where you have a guided purchasing experience with pretty close attention with workers to customers.

Why Clayton?

Why not Clayton?

That may be your answer. You pay more rent would be the answer why not.

I think access is a really big thing that's important for all kinds of people. Adult use is allowed now, but there's a significant number of medical patients. Clayton's no stranger to people who benefit from medicinal use of cannabis. We think it's a great place to do business, safe environment, good, what seems to be a supportive, conducive business atmosphere. We're very excited to be here.

I thought maybe you'd be doing an alternative, have coffee tables outside and people token away instead of drinking coffee. Hey, if you

want to see that, we can talk.

Thank you. Ellen?

Yes, I would like to comment on your manual. It is impressive. I did read it, and I presume that you follow it. It is enforced.

Correct.

It's not just something that gets put on the shelf and dusted when the inspector comes?

No, it's another one of the items that is required by DHSS that we have an operations manual. Most of the procedures within that manual follow different parts of the state regulations. And as Sean said, the state has access to our cameras and they can log in whenever they want and see how we're operating our facility.

Okay. The other thing I noticed in reading it is that it seems geared to the medicinal user, and is that because that came first?

Correct.

And will you be putting out another manual? Is there a different way that the recreational user would be The interface would be?

No. When someone enters our store, other than the way that they register with the receptionist, we really don't treat anyone different, whether they're a patient or an adult use consumer.

Okay. And you mentioned that cultivation will not be on site.

Yes, there is no consumption on site.

And your odor control looks good. So

nothing further. Thank

you. Okay, Amy.

I did have a question on safety again. I mean, I understand that you guys have your employees and your product all safe and sound. But if you are saying that there was like 25 break-ins at whichever facility, is that asking criminals to come into Clayton, you know, your location is right down the street, you know, from a bunch of residential homes and, you know, other businesses and people walk up and down Hanley and all the things like, how does that kind of play in? And I know, I think you're moving from your previous one because you've had a lot of safety issues for your employees. So

we have low traffic counts there. It's an area that probably has as much black market transactions as we do inside our dispensary. And We just, we really feel like we can be more profitable and do a better job in a different location. Our license was awarded in Congressional District 1, and we have to stay within Congressional District 1. And as a company, we want to maintain a footprint in the St. Louis area. And I think... Duke stays up more talking to all the other directors of security around the state. Since the string of break-ins last year, there really haven't been any more because I think the people that were committing those realized that there's nothing, they can't actually gain access to anything of any value just by getting into the store, if they're even able to get into the store to begin

with.

Yes, go right ahead.

We'd be happy to provide some sources and statistics, but there's actually a lot of data out there to support the presence of a dispensary and all of the security measures that come along with that actually decreasing crime in those neighborhoods. We have a lot of sources to back that up. Be happy to share that with y'all. But yeah, no perceived negative influence because dispensary is present. In fact, it's a deterrence because there is so much security present. Yeah.

I saw your hours are going to be to 9pm.

Correct. Yeah, the after work crowd folks that can't leave during business hours

really are trying to create a nightlife here in Clayton.

It hopefully has a good synergy with the restaurants around the local area too so There you go. Yeah. The jazz club down the street, he said it would be beneficial for that

synergy there.

Correct. Correct.

David.

I don't have any questions. How often will DHSS actually physically monitor you?

They will come at least one time a year and do a physical inspection. DHSS is adding 20 new employees by the end of this year because they want to be able to do more inspections more often. So we just try to act like they could show up at any time, any day without notice. And that's how we operate. But they will come and do an inspection at least one time a year.

Yeah, an annual required with the expectation that there will be random inspections also. We've experienced at least two additional randoms at every location.

And I'm sure you're aware that there are two other dispensaries relatively close by, but within a different jurisdiction.

Yeah, we feel like this location and the traffic patterns within the local area, those dispensaries, while I think they're 1.6, 1.4 miles away from this current location, feel like they really service different areas. And this will be much more convenient for the local population.

What about signage?

We have included in the documents proposed a image of our company logo and branding. It meets all of the city codes in terms of percentage of face of the building. That's our standard logo, sunrise with kind of a round sun looking logo to it. So it's pretty basic. That's what we include in most, if not all of our dispensary locations. It's just the word sunrise. In some locations, we do add the word dispensary to that. But as proposed, it's just sunrise. We think of being discreet in this neighborhood and no real need to scream it from the mountaintops.

Okay. Let's see. Are there any further comments? I don't see any hands up.

Everyone here is with your group. We do have a staff recommendation to recommend the conditional use permit to the Board of Aldermen. And if there are no further comments, do we have a motion? I move that we approve the staff recommendation. Second. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. Thank you very

much.

You're welcome. That'll go to the Board of Aldermen. I'm not sure when that'll be on.

Next week on Tuesday.

Okay, next week.

Okay, good luck. Thanks for coming in. Thank you very much We got through our holiday agenda

quite quickly. But let's go around. Kami?

Nothing further.

Ellen?

Nothing further. Happy 4th.

Bob? Is Clayton now going into a change, a real change with this business? It'll be interesting. But no, I leave for Romania tomorrow morning and see you guys in a couple weeks.

Have a

safe trip.

David? I would just encourage everybody to check out engageclayton.com. There's a planning effort underway with Concordia and Washington University over in Ward 1. So we had a community meeting to kind of roll out the project a little bit, and that was last Thursday. We're going to have some neighborhood-level meetings coming up over the next few weeks. So we'll engage residents again there, and then we envision another community meeting probably in another week month, month and a half, somewhere in that timeframe. But if you go to engageclayton.com and check it out, there's actually a voiceover presentation. So the information that was presented at the community meeting, you can see all of that there. You can look through the slides and there's actually an area for residence leave feedback and all sorts of things. But just be aware that that's out there.

I thought it was excellently done, the entire Engage Clayton. It's easy to find what you want, and then it's very directly descriptive. I think it's fabulous. I hope our citizens will be looking at it.

I think they will. We've got some hits on it already. We just have one comment that's been left, but we've had a lot of people check it out and we didn't want to just put the slides out without any context. And that's why we added the narrative, but it's going to be a clearing house for everything. So all the meeting dates will be there. We'll put together signs that will go in the neighborhoods and we're going to have a neighborhood meeting, scan a QR code. It'll take you to that site. with all the information you need so we're going to we're going to utilize that page and it's the same if you go to engagegladen.com that's where we also have the comp plan the livable communities master plan so we're really using that uh cool and resource the way we should

it's the most comprehensive communication device that I've seen in 20 years

yeah

so

thank you really good thank you

Brian Bob, are you going to be gone for the July 17th ARB meeting? Or will you be back by

then? By 17, I

will not be here. Gotcha. Ana? I don't have anything else.

No?

Okay.

Well, then we are adjourned. We'll see some of you and maybe others on the 17th. So enjoy the holiday and stay safe and cool.