November 18, 2024 — Meeting Transcript

Good evening, everybody. Welcome to tonight's Plan Commission Architectural Review Board meeting. If you have cell phones or electronic devices, if you could turn them off. If you wish to speak on an item, please wait until I ask for public comments. When there's an item you wish to speak, click to raise your hand if you're on Zoom and you'll give them permission to speak. If you're in person, please come up to the podium and make sure that the green light is on on the podium at the bottom of the microphone. Please start by giving your name and address for the record. Ryan, if you could start with the roll call.

Richard McAndrew?

Here.

Bob Denlow? Here. Helen DeFay?

Bob Dinlow? Here. Helen DeFay?

Here.

Kimmy Waldman?

Here.

Jim Arsenault? Here. David Gipson? Here.

Jim Arsenault? Here. David Gibson? Here.

All right, great. We have minutes from our meeting on November 4th. Are there any changes from anyone? If not, I will entertain a motion.

Second.

Second. All those in favor? Aye. Anyone oppose? All right. Motion passes. Our first order of business is 808 Francis Place, and it's an architectural review for 808 Francis Place. Is there a representative for the project present? Great. We'll have the staff report first, and then you're welcome to come up to the microphone and make any comments if you wish. All right. Brian?

The property is located on the east side of Francis Place between Roxbury and Halifax. The property is zoned R4 and is within the Clayshire R4 Urban Design District. The property was approved for a residential addition on April 15th to commence construction in the following months. The addition was approved with a brick veneer painted to match the existing brick. The applicant would like to revise 50% of the rear facade to include beige LP Smartwood siding. The Clayshire R4 Urban Design District requires that secondary materials comprise no more than 25% of the facade. The applicant is seeking approval via section 410285 alternative compliance. To approve, the architectural review board must find that the proposed alternative accomplishes the intent of the design standards equally well or better and would be an approach that complies with the design standard. The proposed use of siding would likely have a limited visibility given its proposed location on the rear facade. Siding can be found nearby, typically on roof gables or rear additions. The limited visibility of the rear facade will likely result in the siding have a minimal impact on the neighborhood character as perceived from the street. Given that siding is found nearby and it would likely have no impact on neighborhood character, staff are of the opinion that the proposal is compatible with the surrounding area and would accomplish the intent of the design standards equally well. Staff recommend approval is submitted.

Great. Thank you, Ryan. So I will open the discussion. Sir, would you like to make any comments or? Okay. Okay. Okay. Sounds good. All right. We will go around. Bob, do you have thoughts on this project? I

have none.

Ellen?

No comments. Okay. Yeah, I have no issue with what you're doing here.

I was just curious, what was the reason for the change?

You're going to have to speak into the microphone to

be on.

Hi, I'm Rich Mayfield representing 808 Francis Place. The reason for the change is pretty much predominantly budget.

Okay, the only reason why I ask is under the section are alternative compliances that this approach is intended to apply in unusual circumstances that might arise when an alternate approach would provide a result that is equal or superior to that which would be provided by the approach outlined by standards in this chapter and says economic consideration shall not be a basis for alternative compliance. So if that's not basically an approved reason for alternate compliance. I didn't know if there were anything else that came into the decision other than budget. Why didn't you come forward the first time, I guess, with this material selection?

The first time... It, it was kind of overlooked by me. I was just trying to push this through with how long I had owned the property and, and completely get started on it. Uh, I also miss looked at the prints. My architect had drawn things in with horizontal lines, and I've always seen that to be siding on plans, not brick. And I missed looking at the fine print up until the day of the meeting. But it was neglect on my point, but budget is the main reason.

Okay, thank you. Can I just ask, is the owner also going to inhabit this building? No. This is a rental? No, it's for resale. It's for resale? Yeah. I would just say... The staff recommended it, and largely because the siding was not visible. It kind of backs up to the highway, I

guess it is. Yeah, it's got like an 18-foot wall or so for the exit ramp for 170. Right. And I can only see cars if I'm standing on the roof, so you can't see the building from the highway either. Okay.

David?

I don't have any comments or questions.

Okay. Thank you for your comments. Um, I would, I would just say, I, um, Jim, I, I, I appreciate your comments as well. I, I would tend to lean on the side of the staff's recommendation given that there aren't, um, any, there's really not any visibility, um, related to this. Um, given that, as you just said, it backs up to 170. So I would be, um, I'd be in support, but, um, if anybody doesn't, does anybody else have any other comments or If not, I would like a motion.

Thank you. I move that we adopt a staff recommendation to approve the applicant's submission.

Second. All those in favor? Aye. Anyone opposed?

No.

Sir, the motion passes.

Thank you.

You're welcome. All right, the second item on the agenda is the site plan review for 917 Concordia Lane. Is there a representative for the project present? Okay, Ryan will read the staff report and then we'll ask for any comments.

The property is located on the west side of Concordia Lane between Alamo and San Benito. The property is zoned R5 and is developed with a single-story, four-unit structure and detached rear garage. The applicant is seeking to demolish the existing structure and construct a new three-unit, three-story structure. HVAC units are proposed to be at the rear of the home and would be screened with a combination of landscaping and existing fencing. Trash should be stored within a trash storage room adjacent to the garage. The existing driveway curb cup would be widened to 10.5 feet. The R5 district limits impervious lot coverage to no more than 55% of the total lot area. The existing coverage is 85.2% and the proposed coverage is 60%. The applicant is requesting an additional 5% of coverage beyond the maximum of 55% per section 405.2380B. To approve, the plan commission must find that the applicant has presented just cause, a valid sufficient reason or grounds to take particular action. Zoning regulations aim to limit impervious coverage to preserve green space and manage stormwater runoff. The additional coverage requested is focused at the center of the property. This results in the appearance of the site with balanced green space similar to the surrounding area. When new construction reduces runoff from the existing conditions, the applicant is not required to mitigate runoff. New homes in Clayton typically see increases in runoff, which is why new homes are often proposed with well systems or other similar stormwater mitigation. If this proposal met the coverage requirements, they would not be required to install any kind of mitigation system. Rather than provide a proposal with 55% coverage and no stormwater mitigation, the applicant would prefer a proposal with 60% coverage and invest in a direct storm sewer connection as justification for additional coverage. Residents of Tuscany Park have reported growing concerns about flooding due to runoff flowing westward from High Point to the Tuscany Park area. Current conditions result in most of the surface runoff going to the adjacent properties in the northwest direction. The proposal diverts much of this runoff away from Tuscany Park. A 55% coverage proposal without mitigation would likely reduce runoff compared to the current conditions, but still result in more runoff reaching Tuscany Park than the proposed plan. By connecting directly to the MSD sewer, the proposal captures additional runoff and prevents the runoff from going onto the adjacent properties. At this time, the applicant has not provided a letter from MSD approving the connection as shown. Staff are of the opinion that with approval of the direct connection, the proposal has met the qualifications for just cause given that it will likely result in less runoff flowing to adjacent properties. Should the direct connection be denied by MSD, then the applicant would need to provide mitigation of runoff in another way. Existing runoff per MSD 15-year storm events are calculated to be at 0.44 cubic feet per second and are projected to decrease to 0.41. Runoff to Tuscany Park is projected to decrease from 0.46 during a 20-year event to 0.06. The site contains 20 square feet of canopy coverage, which is proposed to be removed. The plan proposes adding 1,750 square feet, which is 587 more than the required replacement. 57.1% of the plantings are proposed to be native. Staff are of the opinion that the project will meet the criteria for site plan approval upon approval by MSD for the sewer connection and recommend approval on the condition that the applicant submit plans to MSD for review and shall submit proof of MSD approval to staff prior to issuance of a building permit.

Thank you, Ryan. Sir, would you like to make any additional comments?

Hi, my name is Arthur Kotetz. I reside at 7739 Davis Drive. And I guess if you have any additional question, we'll be happy to answer.

I think at the outset, especially related to the site plan review, what... Have you heard from MSD in terms of the, I guess, the connection?

Well, it's still in the review process. We did one round of comments, and my engineer is here, Clay Vance from Vance Engineering. But we, under opinion, it should not be a problem to make that connection.

I guess on just some clarification, Is the recommendation that the site plan not be approved until we get the MSD's approval? Because otherwise then they'd have to reduce lot coverage without mitigation. So

it's up to you. The staff recommendation is to approve under the condition that they provide that letter. Otherwise, they'll have to go back with the revised plan. Otherwise, they would have to come back? Right. If MSD decides not to allow the direct connection, then they would have to revise their site plan and show how they are mitigating that additional

runoff. Do you have any understanding as to when you might hear back from MSD?

I hope within the week. Yes. Okay. Actually, they do with the answer on the 25th. So the MSD give like a two weeks review time. So they give us by the 25th, November 25th.

And I mean, I don't know. I don't work with MSD all the time. So I'm not sure if this is something that they routinely approve or I don't know if your engineer has any comments to that. I mean, whether or not.

Well, but it's also not the first project. I mean, last time I was here at that board like five years ago. And prior to that, I built quite a bit of homes here. And in my experience, I didn't have a decline from MSD for connections.

Okay, I just was curious as to whether or not you had heard yet. I mean, have you thought about continuing this matter for two weeks in order to get that approval or just related to the site plan just so that we have some idea as to whether or

Like staff recommended, if we can get approval subject to MSD approval, then if we're getting approval by MSD, you know, like we're good to go. And I guess if we're not going to get approved by MSD, we're going to need to come back anyway with a different plan.

So your preference would be to, like, move forward today contingent on?

Yes, MSD approval.

Okay. Okay. That was my, I guess that was my question. But we'll go around and see if other people have questions related to site plan.

Have you developed any other properties in this area?

Yes. Which one? I built four homes on Stratford in Clayton Gardens, 8147, 5155, and 8120. One on Demand on Alamo, 6350 Alamo. It was in 2000. It's like east of Demand. It's a two-story new home. One on Davis Drive, 7739 Davis Drive. And I did a lot of complete remodel projects. Actually, one recent one got converted to condominium, 7527 Oxford. I did that project like in 2007 or 2008.

Well, let me say the site that you chose has the one property that completely is out of sync with the rest of the block and the rest of the neighborhood. So to me, I applaud you for that site, but there are two issues that bother me. With regard to the site plan, if you have your engineer here, I would like him to explain to me his perception of the drainage because there's a steep drop in grade as you go north, I guess it is. And I just want to hear how he perceived the present problem if there are, if there is one and then what your solution is. And then the next phase, I want to talk about the height of your project.

Okay. Okay.

Good evening. Clay Vance, Vance Engineering. Office is at 10537 Lackland Road. So the question is currently... The site does drop off to the west, I guess it is, kind of northwest. All the drainage goes that way. It's paved, 85% of the site's paved. The new condition will capture the water off the roof and the water off the drive, pipe it back to the storm sewer that's in the street. and that it's a separate storm and sanitary sewer system out there, so I don't expect them, MSD, to have a problem with that. And

with the MSD connection, your conclusion was there was actually a slight decrease.

It's a pretty big decrease. I mean, the existing conditions is almost a half a CFS, and the proposed condition would be under a 10th. So, you know, I mean, in real terms, it's not that much water either way. I mean, in, in real life, you're, you're not talking about a tremendous amount of water coming off the site and its developed condition or its existing condition. Um, but everything adds up as it goes downhill. So, you know we w we would be, um, we will be reducing it by, you know, 70% or so probably go in that direction.

70%?

Something like that. I mean, my math in my head isn't really very good. But we'd be taking from 0.46 to 0.06. Okay.

I do have a question about the north property line. Currently, there's a retaining wall and a fence. Is it... on the property line, or who does it belong to?

You can come in.

I can answer this question. Yeah, that belongs to us, the one on the north side.

OK. So when you excavate for the new garage underneath, you're going down nine feet plus?

No, we're going to meet the height. I talked to Atelier, the neighbor, like the owner of the property to the north. And... We're going to match the height of the driveway. So it's going to be more or less the same. But the reason why we sent the water to the sanitary sewer, so my water from the driveway does not run to him. It's going to go to the drain into the sewer.

Okay. The retaining wall that you will be building, replacing?

We're not going to have any retaining wall there.

No retaining wall. How are you going to get down low enough to get cars under?

Yeah, so current condition is we are from almost level at the street level to like 30 inches height of it's not a tanning wall. It's just a drop currently on the right side. And with the new condition, we're putting the garage lower two feet from the existing driveway. It's basically matching the height of that neighbor driveway.

Okay. So in essence, then my next question was the driveway at the garage for the turnaround where you try to get in and out. You've got 16 feet plus or minus.

Yes.

A sedan, not an SUV, is 14.7 feet.

Yeah, we actually have on one of the plans model how the car will, if Ryan can show, how the car will turn in and out. But also... Like my house, 7739 Davis Drive, I have retaining wall and my condition actually it's narrow than this. And home is the one that people building in Clayton Gardens with the side garage. This situation is better than a lot of other projects, the one that we do in the city. But you can see how the car goes into the garage and with the other car sitting inside the garage.

Can you reverse that when you're leaving and turn around and go forward on the driveway or are you backing out?

So you're basically going to drive into the garage, and then when you're going out, you're going to reverse with the back of the car to the back of the driveway and drive forward to the street.

Okay. Without the retaining wall and the same height as the adjacent, can you encroach on the adjacent wall?

I mean, I don't think they need to, but we have no plans to build any fence between me and a neighbor. But let's just say in the future, if the neighbor will come and say, hey, I want to have a fence here, I cannot tell them not to do it. But even with that condition, there is still, and we actually modeled it on the other apartment complex here like with the cones, and I actually provided a picture to Ryan. I showed him how we did as well.

Okay. Are these, curiosity, are these condominium ownership or rental?

It's going to be rental.

Okay. Nothing further.

Thank you. I

just had a question about where the existing stormwater runoff goes right now on the existing property.

It runs to the back west, northwest. So kind of up and if you're looking at the screen there, up and to the right.

Okay. And so then right now your plan is to take all the like the roof drainage and then the driveway drainage and put that towards the front?

To the street and the sewer.

Okay. And then what happens with all the like green space, all that water.

It goes the way it's going today. It maintains that drainage pattern to the northwest.

And so right now, is that causing issues with neighboring people? I

don't know that answer, but it's going to be significantly less in the future with this plan.

Okay, because I think it is causing problems right now. So we might need to mitigate.

It may be, but it will be dramatically reduced.

Okay. And then also with the car turning radius, I did have a question. So I noticed a diagram. But what do you do with like the bay further towards the back? You know, if you're trying to like back out and then go forward out of the property?

So even the last bay, I still have the driveway. The driveway is extending past the building line another, I believe, three feet. So you can still drive back, hang the car, you know, to the back and drive to the front.

Because it just seems like it's probably not quite far enough back to do that.

Well, it's three feet. So, you know... Obviously, the wheel will go to the edge of the driveway. The car itself can overhang more. But as I said, I don't know if you drove by like anyone, like Stratford block and my personal house in Davis Drive. I mean, they're tight. Yeah,

sure. Well, I'm just saying because you're kind of you're at 60 percent. You're beyond capped out on how much more space that you can add to that. I just want to make sure that

you're aware that that No, I think it's efficient. And also like that dimension we took, it's like for like a Tesla Model Y car, but actually the size is with the mirrors. So in real life, the car itself, if you're looking like Tesla Model Y, it's actually smaller than what you see in that rectangle vehicle. It's narrowed.

jumping with you there's like two crosses are those physical structures right there

uh yes

supports

yes

yes yeah if you switch the car like instead of the second car but the one in front of it i don't see how that car can turn and not take out that support

um you're talking about the car the one that park now

yeah the other one there

yeah yeah so when you're driving in or when you're driving out

when you're driving now let's say

yeah i mean it's doable the door is 17 feet wide so it's not like six 17 foot wide the doors

And between the driveway and the property next door, how much change in grade will there

be? It's going to be zero. Zero. Well, that's why we lowered the building. And that's also when I requested from engineer to send the water of the driveway as well to the MSD. So I'm not creating a problem to the neighbor.

Is the driveway going to end up almost being, I mean, not a shared driveway, but will there be like how will it delineate one driveway from another? I mean, you're going to

have a little curve actually on the plants. You can read that is a proposed small curve between me and the neighbors. Oh, you know, just like a three inch roll curve. And that's what basically I'm going to keep the water flowing to them.

And you may have answered this. Once I turn off the street onto this driveway, how much drop will there be till I get to the garage?

Um, one feet. Well, it starts the whole like from front to back. It's just one, like almost two feet on the 70 foot length.

And my I don't want When I, right now the building is flat and one story, you know, and the first floor is on grade with the front yard in the street. If I go to your new house and I come off the street, am I going to be walking up to the first floor? Are we raising it?

So the garage floor gonna be two feet lower than existing floor of the building. raising the first

floor two feet about.

The first floor going to be matched approximately to the neighbor to the left. So if you're going to see the building to the left, the first floor of that building and the first floor of my building going to be pretty much at the same height. So that building to the left that you see, so the first floor of that building and my first floor, they're within a foot difference.

Yeah, that was all my questions.

Jim?

I don't have any additional questions for site plan.

David? Would anyone in the audience here tonight or on Zoom like to make a comment? If so, you're welcome to come up.

down downy nine Tuscany, so the office of historic preservation and Jeff city describes this property 917 concordia lane in their historical inventory. Which is available online and i'm sure your committee is aware of this 300 some odd page report where every home. is described and pictured in the High Point in Tuscany Park area. The current description, I agree with your comment of replacing this unattractive one story thing, says this one story four efficiency apartment has American Craftman elements, although it is a poor fit with the two story buildings that surround it. The building would have been disallowed under the original restrictive confidence, because they don't allow one story buildings with flat roofs. I hope this committee does not approve any building taller than two stories so as not to approve yet another poor fit into our neighborhood if I understand. These complex plans, from one view, we're going to look at four stories effectively visually. And from the other view, we're gonna effectively see three stories. All of that will reduce the quality of life in the backside, the east side of Tuscany Park. We'll wait longer to see the sunrise. We'll throw shadow. onto the um yards and we will all be looking at um four stories at night of bedroom lights from any park

where do you see four stories

if you're well i don't think the garage seems to be counted this is billed as a three-story but visually depends on which direction you're driving from You're coming from the Concordia looking at something. It looks four stories visually. I mean, I don't know what the rules are for calling things three stories. I'm not an architect planner. But from the other side,

it's pretty tall.

It's very tall. It's going to be a minimum of two stories taller than any home on Concordia Lane. It's not a massive apartment building, which does look like three and four stories further into DeMond. But you can read this really nice description online from the Office of Historical Preservation when the Daman Tuscany Park area was surveyed for our historical designation. Thank you.

Thanks. Hi, I'm Sanjay Jain from 6 Tuscany Park. And I think my neighbor, Joan, really articulated some of the technical points. And I would like to reiterate that looking at this diagram over here, what I fear is we are creating a precedent for like a Manhattan kind of plots we talk about in biological sciences. You can see that The garage is elevated and the roof of the garage and the entry is above the grade level. So it's really three plus stories over here, about 44 feet. And then you can see all the adjacent properties. The historical aspect of this neighborhood is all two stories. So I have no idea why we are allowing this four story or three plus story building here. And this sets a precedent for all the other development projects who suddenly increase the skyline of this beautiful residential neighborhood, impacting sunlight, greenery, privacy of the homes that are surrounding it. So we strongly object this project.

Thank you, sir.

Oh, David Gipson, a Tuscany As a two-story, it would be a welcome probably because it would fit nicely into the block. This is as much a sore thumb as it's conceived as the property it replaces. It's gonna block sun in the morning to my house and it'll be ugly windows to look at at night. It just doesn't fit in a block that is at least 10 or 11 or 12 houses or buildings, all of which are two-story. This just doesn't fit.

Oh, Gibson, a Tuscany As a two-story, it would be a welcome probably because it would fit nicely into the block. This is as much a sore thumb as it's conceived as the property it replaces. It's gonna block sun in the morning to my house and it'll be ugly windows to look at at night. It just doesn't fit in a block that is at least 10 or 11 or 12 houses or buildings, all of which are two-story. This just doesn't fit.

Lily Canelcats, Three Tuscany Park. I'm on the other side. A few years ago, I had to put in some drain tile and I was told, no, no, no. The water couldn't come out near the street where it would have been lovely for it had to come out. It had to come out on my lawn, which of course, you know, wasn't easy to do, wasn't perfect. But I, as a single homeowner with just some drain tile, was not allowed to connect to the sewer. So... I would urge you at least to postpone until you have the MSD determination. And I completely echo what my neighbors have said regarding the consistency of style and size of the building with the other buildings on the street. Thank you very much for your hard work slowly.

I think we have someone online, Stephanie Raymond.

Yes. Hello. Thank you. I am at 7 Tuscany Park. So this proposal will be right behind my house. I have a couple of concerns. First off, I want to say thank you for purchasing the property and wanting to make it prettier. That being said, I feel that the building being three stories is not consistent with the neighborhood. I feel that it will block sunlight. I am concerned about the number of people that will be living there. I have concerns also about water, and I know that you feel that it's going to address it. It is an issue. It does run into my yard, and I understand that you say that this is going to help it. However, like what Lily said, I would feel more comfortable if we waited until MSD granted their approval because I'm concerned that water runoff will be just as bad, if not worse, if this proposal is passed. And I'm concerned also that we're setting a precedent for other tall apartment buildings surrounding this property if this is passed as it stands. Thank you so much. I appreciate your hard work. And again, thank you for trying to beautify this property. I do appreciate it.

Thank you, Stephanie. Anyone else? I was curious, Anna, the building that's across the street, or maybe Arthur, are you able to tell me, I know there's a building right across the street that's three stories. Do you know if this will be similar in height?

Yeah, so the building across the street, it's 41 feet in height to the gutter line at the entry. They have two entries. One is 40 feet from the sidewalk to the gutter and second entry I think is 41 feet. So our building is not going to be taller than the building across the street. And through the neighborhood, they're not only three-story building that we're proposing. We have one on Alamo and the other one on San Benito. The condominium building on Alamo, you can see it's adjacent to like two-story home. And we try to hide the third story inside the roof. I mean, if you can look into the front, I mean, it is three-story building, but we try to cover the third story in the roof line as much as possible just to give a look of two and a half story building. I mean, you can see like half of the third floor is basically behind the roof.

And then, and we'll get to, I guess, and some of the architectural elements we'll get to next. I mean, that's more...

And also, regarding the water, some people ask, existing condition, they're 85% concrete. It runs to the multiple directions. I mean, with what we proposed, you're looking by the numbers, like you're looking by everything, we are improving this property not by 70%. I think from current condition, it's going to be probably 80% the water runoff. If you're going to calculate how much is going to be EFMSD approving compared to what we have now, the improvement of offsite water is going to be close to 80%. It's like 79%.

Is that though, you know, it sounds like a lot of the water goes Northwest as you were saying. So the water that I guess is coming off the property to the Northwest is I mean, it is your opinion, though, that that water should be captured. I mean, in your words, would you say 70% less, a 70% decrease? I mean, it actually somewhat remarkable because most of our properties in Clayton that are redeveloped, a lot of the impervious coverage, I mean, this is a strange project in that 85% of the property right now is cement. And obviously, you know, apartment buildings. So it is comforting to me from a water sewer standpoint that you're actually, you know, increasing the pervious coverage significantly, which I appreciate. But I'm still concerned to make sure that the water that, you know, is coming off the building will be captured into the sewer.

The downspouts will be piped towards the front and also the driveway. Okay.

So there won't be any pop-up emitters, all the sewer. I mean, I guess everything coming off the roof will go directly into the...

Correct. And it's closer to 85%. And so the 0.46 to 0.06 that's going to the northwest is closer to 85% than 70% as far as a reduction. And like I said, it all goes there now, 80%. percent plus of the site is covered and so when it starts raining it runs off there and it gets there pretty quickly um so they they see frequent and then in the in the future with with this developed with only the grass running off you know you won't even notice the water coming off of the site at that point

and then also just i mean again and um cammy mentioned it but we just i mean there can't be anything else hard added to the site. So no additional, no additional patios, no additional driveway. So, and I, you know, I, with respect to site plan only, I think obviously everybody's biggest concern is the sewer runoff. So I would just say that because of the increase of over 55%, the fact that you have to mitigate and pump everything to the sewer, you know, gives me comfort rather than you know, adding pop-up emitters and stuff. So I, you know, I think that that's a good result, hopefully for the surrounding neighborhoods or surrounding communities and homes. So I do appreciate that. I don't know if anybody has any concerns about, if there are any thoughts from the board members about waiting for the approval from MST before going forward, or, I mean, obviously they would just have to come back if it's

Right, so if they're not able to go, MSD rejects it, then they come back and we do this again. Yeah.

I would say it saves a step. Assuming MSD approves it, then you don't have a more cumbersome process and you delay the business decisions that need to be made. So I think the Planning Commission is protecting us, protecting the city.

So are there any more comments from the board or the audience just related to site plans? we'll get to architectural review. So this is only a site plan.

Just to summarize, I mean, you did mention about as water being one of the main concerns, which is true, but the main concern also is the height and the privacy and of the neighborhood and the value of our houses goes down with the skyline.

Yeah, no. And I appreciate that the height is something that will come up in architectural. Thank you. Yes, this is really this does absolutely deal with drainage site plan. But it seems given the engineers analysis, it looks like there will be far less water coming on to Tuscany Park than what is happening now. Thank you. Yep. Are there any more comments online or from the audience? Or up here? If there are no more comments, do we have a motion?

Yes. I hereby move to approve the staff recommendation regarding the site plan submission and with the condition that the applicant shall submit plans to MSD for review and shall submit proof of MSD approval to staff prior to issuance of a building permit.

Second, all those in favor.

Hi,

anyone opposed? Aren't the next time on the agenda is also related to 917. Concordia lane, but it's related to architectural review. Ryan, if you could summarize the report.

Property resides in High Point, a mixed density neighborhood. The comprehensive plan describes the vision for this area is to grow at a human scale with dense developments, active streets, a variety of residential options, and a walkable commercial district while retaining the area's historic character. The new structure is roughly one story taller than adjacent structures. Story height differences are common in the adjacent blocks with structures on Alamo, St. Rita, and San Benito presenting story height differences between neighbors. New structure would be primarily comprised of red brick with bronze windows and asphalt shingles. A copper roof is proposed over the front entry. Indiana limestone is proposed for the foundation of the front, and stucco is proposed on the sides and rear facades. Exposed aggregate is proposed for the driveway and front entry path. Staff are of the opinion that the proposal is compatible with the existing property and surrounding area. Staff recommend approval is submitted.

Thanks, Ryan. I'll open the discussion. go around, are there any questions or comments? I guess we'll go around first. Yep.

I would say this. What concerned me was the height, of course. I drove around the area. I know the area really well. There's a couple of newer projects around the corner, so to speak. One is three stories. It's pretty sizable. And it blends in well with the two-story buildings around it. I don't know if that's San Benito or Alamo, which one. And then there's the newer one that's on the corner across the street from the, I call it the CBC football field. That's really a two-story, though, and beautiful. It blends in terrific. I think the people out there who said this is a two-story street is accurate. In fact, largely the whole neighborhood is two-story with some exceptions and the street that backs into Concordia, it's all older three-story apartment buildings. I would say this, the present building is an eyesore. It just is. It has no place being there at the same time. Um, the older two story buildings, um, I'm kind of emotionally attached to a little bit and, um, it affords, uh, that concern about these are more affordable rentals for the community around there. Um, But I think this project, it is taller. The street slants. But I think when I look around at the newer buildings that are around there, it works sufficiently to make it. He's building three units. Most of the apartment buildings have four units. These are not big lots, so I'm always a little bit concerned. How does one economically make a development work? You can't repeat the old past to make the numbers work. You have to bring it up to... 2024. I haven't seen the developer's books, but I think that's probably why he has three units, why he moves up in height a little bit. It's a tight fit with the cars, no issue about it. These are going to be rentals. I think if you ask a lot of the neighbors in the neighborhood, not Tuscany, but in this neighborhood, they would rather see this than the existing glorified garage it looks to me what's there now so that those are my comments

thanks Bob Helen

okay I too am concerned about the height it jumps out I like the building if I block out either side I think it looks really good but as soon as I put it in context It bothers me. Now, you've got a flat roof. How tall is the parapet on the three sides of the flat roof?

It's only two feet. We did just accommodate that water to go to the back and hide the roof, but... Like there is no room to even cut it. I mean, you can see if the middle of the window of the third floor is basically sits inside the roof line already. So there is only like maybe two feet above the two feet. The roof line starts like on the back. If you look in, it's only like two feet high at the highest point.

Could you lower it to a foot? I mean, it's picking up a foot here, a foot there, small changes that can make something that looks great fit in and look even better?

Well, from the original proposal that we submitted in the first, like before the round of comments, the building was like foot and a half taller. And when I proposed to send the water to the storm, to MSD, it allow us to drop the building one and a half feet lower. So we did like an effort to lower the building by sending this water to MSD so the driveway can be, you know, like we don't have to run the water from the driveway to the neighbors behind. So we lowered the garage floor and the whole building sunk down by one and a half feet.

OK, I'm looking to kind of bring it down a little bit more. Because the roof and the detail, I understand why you have the detail over the window, the third floor window. But there's so much roof. Your eye goes with the tall window above the door. And then the detail at the roof line makes it appear even taller than it probably is.

I mean, if it's only the question of reducing just that roof smaller, I don't think it's a big issue. We can, you know, I'm sure I'm not opposed to it. You know, we can live with that.

Okay. And maybe angle it a little bit more so that from the street, you see less. And I realized that with an elevation, it shows the true height of the roof.

You know, like my main, like one of the points, like you still want this... building to look sharp. I mean, you don't want to just fit something that is just going to be there like existing building.

Right. Because

I don't know who built existing building, but it definitely does not fit to the street escape. But if it's a matter just to shrink slightly this rule, but still have this like a French style, I'm fine.

I would keep the flare to the roof as you look at it, because it does pick up the adjacent to the north. But if you can pull that down a bit and then you've got 10 foot ceilings. What about nine? Well, it's rental.

Well, first of all, the third floor, probably I reside in Clayton with three kids that are going to school here. And at some point, I'm going to downsize. And I mean, I think 10 feet for these days, this is like a common size of ceiling height. I mean, nine feet is... I feel like I really want to make those units nice. And also, I want to make a point regarding... size of the units, there is not many three-bedroom units around Clayton for renting. When I was building my house on Davis Drive, I had to pay for two years tuition to Clayton School District because I simply couldn't find normal apartment. It was shortage, only like Clayton on the park, I think it was. I was on a wait list and I didn't get that unit. Maybe today is better. But like five years ago in 2019, it was no three bedroom, like good size units. So my vision for this building is just to create this building more for families with three kids. I mean, many families today have three kids, some of them four kids. So how you can fit them in apartments, two bedroom apartments? I mean, it's simply inconvenient. So the size of those units, it's important factor for me just to have a good enough unit so somebody can come and reside for two years, three years as needed. And also if I would, any project that I do, I like to treat as I would do it for myself. And that's maybe basically that when it comes, why do I do this 10-foot ceilings? I mean, that's our vision to do things.

Okay. You know it's pain to change light bulbs with a 10-foot

ceiling. My current house is 10-foot ceiling still. And regarding on the height, I live in 7739 Davis, and my neighbor's on the back is, I believe, is 657 Polo. And their roof line, at least probably 18, 20 feet above my roof line. And I mean, in reality, and my backyard also like not as, it's small, but you know, it does not bother us too much that we have like a neighbor. I mean, it's still nice building, well kept. And this is city. I mean, you don't like those tight buildings. You can go to, I don't know, West and where you have like one acre lots over there, so.

Okay. Now, I would appreciate anything, you know, lowering the parapet, lowering the roof, as you mentioned, that would help reduce that height.

Well, I can definitely address this. I mean, the whole roof, I can tell you, maybe like a foot and a half, two feet, we can shrink it down, but yeah. Two feet would work. I mean,

it's something that... Two feet doesn't sound like much, you know, that. But it will help it. If you take a piece of paper and just put it over the elevation.

You know, actually, I cannot play with the height point of the building. If you see the gutter line, it's like a black line. That line can be raised up. Like what?

Are there, I think you're, and it looks like maybe your architect has his hand up. So I don't know if you want to allow him to speak at all or her to speak.

Well, let me just finish. Yeah, no, I

just wanted to make sure you saw that their hand.

Okay. So the only thing we can raise up is the gutter line. Basically, if this foot now, the roof shows like eight feet tall, it can be reduced to six foot maybe. But maybe architect will make a comment.

Yeah. No, I realized that your top of plate, you still have the structure above that. And then you've got the finish for the roof deck and everything. But with a flat roof, you don't need a whole lot of parapet. You don't have a penthouse where someone's going out. Yeah.

but you still have 75 feet from front to back.

Right, so at a quarter of an inch, your slope probably can't change. You're probably at your maximum quarter of an inch per foot.

I think on the roofs, you definitely want to be more than quarter of the inch per

foot. The drawing, it was hard to see with the small sheets, but it's the minimum that you can do. sloped

roof. The architect will make a comment on that. So.

Sir, or is it? Is it? What's the name of the architect? Pavel? Pavel, Pavel, Pavo, you can speak if you would like to your hand is up.

It's what that's information around the roof. So the currently the front part is, can you can you

talk about I'm sorry, we can't hear you very well. Can you just talk a little bit louder?

Hello. So currently the front parapet is about four inches tall and then at quarter inch per foot it slopes back and then to make up the additional height of the structure kind of results where the height of the front is. Hello?

Yep, I hear you. Are you finished or continuing? Yep, I am. Helen, does that, I mean, I'm not, as you know, I am not trained as an architect.

No, the elevations show what you described, a parapet of about two feet.

The back elevation, not the front, yes.

And in the front, it shows, looking forward, it shows maybe a foot or so.

So as architect just comment, so at the front of the building, that parapet wall, it's only four inches tall. At the front of the door. Only four

inches tall.

It's only four inches compared to

the slope. Because of the slope, we have to make up that height from the back to the front, and then we add the height of the roof structure. So we end up basically about three feet from the ceiling height up to the...

Can I ask him something? I'm not following this quite. Can you maintain a 10-foot height on the third floor and drop the roof, the peak of the roof by two feet and maintain the aesthetics that appear to be attractive right now?

I think from the ceiling right now. You'll have to speak up. Okay. So I think from the ceilings we're about three and a half feet. You'll have speak up.

I don't know why it's like that.

I'm sorry, I guess I

have... We can hear you now.

Okay. Because of the thickness of the structure for the roof, which we assume to be 12 or 14 inches, it's not designed yet, but then we also have the slope of the roof. All of this brings up the front of the building up to where it is from the ceiling. And so the practical parapet at the front is really few inches. It's not two feet. Two,

two inches. Few inches. Because the depth of the trusses and then the slope.

So realistically, if I understand the architect, it would be extremely difficult to lower two feet.

Correct.

Okay. Okay.

And Helen, back to your comment, the reason why you need to have like a, you have slope, but plus even on the back of the building, we still need to have by the building code R49 insulation. So in order for me to keep that insulation and everything else, even at the back of the roof has to be at least like one feet tall.

Yeah.

And then it's basically goes up, up, up, and it's gaining another feet by the time it goes to the front.

Okay, then I would ask that you go to a nine foot ceiling or nine six to pick up something to lower that. It looms large.

Yeah, I mean, I will certainly echo what Helen is saying. I mean, I think it's important for everybody to understand that they're not just for anybody online or the audience. I appreciate that, you know, properties in the R5 are allowed to be three and a half stories tall. However, I really do think we need to appreciate the context of where this building is. You have single family structures that are right behind you consistently, and you have buildings that are on either side of you for basically the entire block that are two stories. So I think Helen's comments are very, I find them, you know, very, it's, I just think it's important to consider how we can reduce height as much as we can. I understand that you want to have three units that there, and again, I do find it to be an attractive building and certainly an improvement on what's there. But I think we have to look for ways to make it not feel so high compared to all the other properties along the street and behind it.

Can I ask a question? Firstly, 10 feet is not unreasonable. I mean, a lot of us live in homes with 10 feet or if not more. And should apartment dwellers have to have less just because they're apartment dwellers? I don't think so. But my point really is this. Let's say that we remove the height a foot and a half. Is that going to make that much difference? That's number one. My reaction is not much. Number two, as I look at the big picture, there's a reason we're starting to see a couple of newer buildings in this neighborhood. And that is the buildings that are there is from two previous generations, at least. And they're the kind that it'd be hard to rehab and make the numbers work. And so what you end up doing is you demolish it and you start putting up new buildings where to make the numbers work, you have to go up a little higher. Maybe you need more building space, more aesthetics of the building. And I think over a long period of time, we're going to see a little of this over time, hasn't really gone very far because the buildings are still usable. I think of like that Daman Hotel that has never been built yet. The building is so tired dysfunction and it just doesn't economically can carry itself well this site can't economically carry itself with a single story building so in 2024 how do you make that site viable I just don't think a foot and a half is going to change much aesthetically but you know You're the architect. I always defer to you and Steve a lot on those matters.

I think the foot and a half would, and if you can slope that front part of the roof so it goes away more visually, it will look lower.

You know, actually I'm, I'll review with the architects. If we can put ISO insulation instead, like regular insulation, if that's going to help, you know, like that, um, like commercial building installation, because that's like, it's give you our six per inch. Maybe that will help to reduce, um, But also regarding 10-foot ceilings in the apartment buildings, when you have ductwork, you have to build soffits. It's not like in my residential home I have 10-foot ceillings. You're going to drop down to accommodate ductwork and some other things. I mean, some places are going to be nine feet. Even with the 10-feet structure, some places is going to be still nine foot inside this unit. Now, if I'm going to go for nine foot, then I'm going to have eight feet. I mean, honestly, I mean... I own this property for five and a half years and I've been doing my homework and I was trying to first develop four family building. I'm short of 130 square feet of land to create four family. And in with that four family, it was two story building, but I have some neighbor from Tuscany park and they came over and say how, how bad this building is even for two family. So I don't think it will satisfy everybody around no matter what I do.

Right. You can never, you know,

like we just need to be in rubber. It's important point even today, financial side for this project. I mean in reality it's not compare what it's going to cost me to develop and how much the rent is going to bring. I mean if you in this business you're going to see it's not. I mean, it's not like a crazy deal. I mean, I do this. I have kids. Hopefully, maybe we'll go to Wash U. Maybe I'm going to live there. The kids are going to have some place to live. And I mean, I own for five and a half years, and that building is vacant. So I'm at the point, I mean... Either I do something nice for the city and I did a bunch of beautiful buildings on Parkdale 75. I don't want, I mean, I did enough in the city, created nice buildings and remodel new construction homes. And on my personal house too, on Davis Drive, I have a bunch of neighbors come to me and say, hey, you know, this is... But at the end of the day, I'm getting today a lot of comments when people walking by and say, hey, you know, this is nice, you know, nice home that you guys have. So

can I just throw one more thought in? And it's this and this is important to have three bedroom new construction. Is that easy to find? Except in the really expensive, expensive units.

Right. And there's an office too.

And I think that deserves consideration that that's a plus.

Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I would certainly agree with you, Bob. I think again, as part of our comprehensive plan, people in the community absolutely want to see, you know, more diverse housing stock. So, you know, I, I agree with you, sir. I think having three bedroom units that we, you know, some, projects that were approved in downtown Clayton, I think they changed the units a little bit to have more three-bedroom units. So I understand your point about that. I think, well, why don't we just, we'll continue. Helen, do you have any more comments? No, I am finished. Thank you.

So Helen, if it's come about even foot and a half and, you know, we can see if it's lower the building six extra inches at the driveway and maybe getting possibility one extra feet in that roof line, I would really do, I mean, I'll find a way how to lower foot and a half if it's deal breaker i mean i think foot and a half to gain it is i think it's doable

okay thank

you

amy No, no. I agree with a lot what Helen said. And it's great to hear all the care and thought you've put into this too as a developer. We don't always get that. So thank you for that. I do think that I really do like the architecture. I like the way that the building looks. I am concerned with the height because, I mean, you say yourself, you've owned this for five years. I don't think there's probably been a lot of teardowns on that street thus far. And so I think that, Bob, to your point, I don't think a lot of the buildings are going anywhere. And so when I see this just kind of all the way down the street, you know, I drove it. I mean, this was on the opposite side of the street, like along that other building that would make more sense to me. So my concern is just like the three-story. I mean, if it was two stories, it would just be crisp and perfect. And I get where you're coming from, from a financial standpoint. But that is just really a big concern of mine.

But, you know, when we are approving new buildings in Clayton Gardens and it's next to, you know, the range homes, you have the delta in height. And yes, they say, yeah, we extra feet and a driveway width. But in reality, when you look at those two buildings, I mean, you see, and I mean, that's the reality. You know, like we cannot, you know, win 2024. And you said one of the important comments is you don't see those buildings go nowhere. I think if the city will maybe ease off some guidelines, if you can replace unit per unit, because like, you know, in reality, any piece of property that you have on the street, if you're going to tear it down, you cannot replace with the four family building anymore, just because you have ratio 1500 square feet per land area per dwelling unit. So you have six family on Alamo and some of them, you know, I mean, some of them in bad shape, but, this homeowner will patch the building forever. They're not going to tear it down because they can replace with three family. You know, like it's...

No, I hear you. It's just being the first is always difficult, I think, when we see it in context.

Look, I built a single family home on 6350 Alamo and that probably on that street, it was first house maybe in like, I don't know, 70 years. you know, we have some comments. Yeah, it's not just too big, too tall, but I don't know if you saw it, but it's nice house on Alameda.

Jim?

So

I guess two weeks ago, sorry. I was at the awards for the first awards for sophisticated living magazine, which so I was there with a lot of architects and a lot of developers. And after a two hour cocktail hour, let's just say, I mean, people knew I was there. And there's plenty of people willing to come up to you and give you their opinion of the Clayton architectural review board. And I'll say the number one complaint that I got from people is they say you do not you're not consistent kind of with your decisions. And it's interesting that you bring up Clayton Gardens because just two weeks ago, we were sitting here for Clayton Gardens and we had a structure that at least in my opinion, made very little attempt as far as to step down the height, to do anything, to move away from this big blocky form that at least I personally didn't feel fit in the neighborhood where in this case, having lived in Daman for eight years myself, and I know this is not Daman specific, but it's obviously right next to Daman. I feel like this is the type of structure that you do see in the neighborhood. And specifically it calls out, you know, this is an area where we do want more density. So height and stuff like that, as long as we're within the limits, you know, we have set limits on, you know, where we want to see height. And this is within those limits. You know, I feel like maybe some of, Some of the residential houses that we've approved that have been like absolutely at the max height. I've had relatively similar drop off to the houses next door. We've seen and we've approved where I believe, at least in my opinion, the structure. makes a lot more attempts to fit into the neighborhood first architecturally. And then two, with this dormer how, like you mentioned, how it's set back to kind of visually reduce the height and not just present this giant block. I don't feel like they're trying to get every little inch out of it in this case. And I do think you have to look realistically at development as Bob was saying. it's obvious that this structure is going to come down at some point and something will replace it. And I think all of us would probably be shocked if that would be a two story structure. It's most likely going to be a three story structure. So I don't necessarily see, you know, I think if we're looking at reality and looking at, okay, a three story structure is going to be here. And there are plenty of three story structures in the neighborhood. I counted 10 when we were here. So it's not necessarily something that's completely out of the blue and I know also, obviously, like a lot of the concerns are from Tuscany Park and from the rear, that would be even lower. A lot of our concerns are kind of from the front where this will slope back towards the back. So given all of those, I would say I'm pretty good with it. And I think compared to especially what we've seen over the last month, two months or something like that, and what's been done to try and make it kind of fit in with the larger neighborhood at whole, I agree. I think greater attempts were made here than in some other cases.

Thanks, Jim. David?

As Jim said, much like the application we saw weeks ago, my feeling continues to be if it meets the code requirements, then I don't see why I would vote against it. And if our code requirements aren't what we want to see in these particular areas, then perhaps that's something we we should address because it seems like we keep getting in these conversations about character and that sort of thing. And if there's a mismatch between what the code allows and that prevailing community character or what the residents want to see, I think there's opportunities to have those discussions as we implement the comprehensive plan and take a hard look at our zoning. But you know, the, the, the height here is, is under that cap. As Jim said, it's not right at it. There's just a little bit of a buffer there. but it meets the code requirements. Those have been in place for quite some time. There are other buildings in the High Point neighborhood that are of a similar height, so I would struggle to vote against it based on that fact.

Okay, I think it looks like we have somebody whose hand is raised on Zoom. Is there anybody else in the audience that would like to make a comment about the architecture of the building? It looks like Stephanie.

Yes, I just had a question. And you said there's 10 buildings that are three stories in the area and that they're very common. The question that I have is what do those apartments or three story buildings butt up against? Are they butting up against other apartments or are they bordering actually a residential area? Yeah.

Um, I'm just looking at the diagram, but it looks like many of them do a butt, um, Concordia on the, that would be the South side. Um, and then it looks like there's one right across the street. That's three stories and one that's further down the street, um, to the East, um, that, uh, that is, um, a front, I guess, Alamo. So that's. But I mean, many of them are concentrated further north of you and they back up to Concordia.

Yeah. And that's my point. I think that it sounds like you all can say zoning laws, et cetera. But the fact that this is a residential area and we have Wash U, which is a different situation on one side of us than we have the apartments. I feel that this neighborhood and the people in this neighborhood's feelings about things are not being taken into account. And I understand financial viability. I get that. And yes, it's an eyesore. And yes, we need to fix what's behind us. And I'm all for that. But I feel that putting a three-story building is not fitting into the neighborhood. Also, you mentioned – I can't remember. I don't know which gentleman because I'm not there – But you stated more affordable housing. Well, what are these apartments going to run? And are we going to be looking at gentrification where we bring in all these more expensive buildings and this is going to continue? And is that the goal of what Clayton wants to do? Because a lot of people do live in those apartments and they do go to Clayton schools because they're affordable. And to the developer's point, is that really what we want to do with clayton and that that's my question because i doubt that these are going to be more affordable um and they i don't feel that they fit with the character of the apartments and other houses around

thank you thank you is there anybody else in the audience that would like to make any comments yes sir come on up to the microphone and just

The developer could address the subject of its viability if you made it a two-story instead of three-story. Okay,

I'd be happy. Sir, do you want to talk about making it two? I mean, it's up to you.

But I cannot fit three units in two stories. Well, I understand

that. Two units still be a viable project because it would be... in so much better with the

I cannot fit like for two family building you know but also there is like a building across the street like I don't know it's 50 feet from my building there is a three storey building that our building is not going to be taller than this building so if you're coming from big band towards my building, you look the street, you see the three-story building on the right, you're going to see the three-storey building on the left. Now, when you're the first or second building on Concordia on the left, it has a taller roof line, so it looks more like a two-and-a-half-story building to the left. So I understand that to the left, it's like a two-story building, but same thing, you walk in moorlands on oxford parkdale um all those streets i mean i redeveloped a bunch of those three-story buildings that built in like 1920s and when they're sitting against the building that built in 1950s 50s or 55s you it's two-story against the three-story and you have a lot of I mean, on every street you have multiple cases. It's not that it's uncommon. Same thing with the new development, new residential homes in Clayton Gardens or the other neighborhoods. When you're putting new structure, new house, and you want to have the three cell value in a structure, it looks much bigger than old buildings, old houses. So...

So I don't know if you're willing to kind of, you know, we can continue this only for two weeks and you can see if you can, there were some comments about reducing the height a little bit. It's up to you. It looks like we're missing a person tonight. I don't know anybody will be missing in two weeks, but I mean, I mean, I'm just, you know, you've got three people that seem to be, you know, okay with the height and the architecture and three people that are seeing if you can bring it down at all. So I'm just asking if... But

if it's a matter of one and a half feet, I don't know, current building height is 41.5, Ryan? The height of the building? It's 41.2, I believe, the current height. 41.2, if I would commit that the building not exceed 39.8 in height. Is that going to satisfy the

odds? I'm not going to try to predict what people's, you know, who will be here and who, I can't say that. What I'm asking is, you know, we can try to vote tonight or we can continue it for two weeks and you might be able to satisfy some people's concerns. That's what I'm asking. I mean, you've waited five years, so, you know, waiting a couple of weeks, but it's up to you. I'm just not sure that, you know, you may end up with a three to three decision. So that's why I'm asking. Okay. it fails and a three to three decision. So I don't, again, that I don't, I don't want, and I'm not, I don't know how people are going to vote, but that's why I'm asking if you would like to continue.

I mean, I can tell you if there is like counting is a possibility that I, you know, I can make this building like by foot and a half lower, we can lower it by foot and a know i will be happy with that so that we will drop the building one and a half feet i don't know if it's sagging the building down or we'll find a way

okay

how to do it

okay so um if there's no other objections um continue the matter for two weeks and um we can kind of represent see if there's been any you know architectural changes and um we'll go from there

okay

um I have a motion to that effect.

A motion to continue. I hereby make a motion to continue the architectural hearing until the next scheduled meeting or at some mutually agreeable time.

Second. All those in favor? Aye. Anyone opposed? So we'll see you at the next meeting if your plans are ready by then, I guess. If you're

going to vote and you're going to say no, so then like we don't have an option to resubmit this or where, what it comes?

If it ultimately gets voted down, then you have to wait a year to resubmit a substantially like identical project and on a con correct me on this, if you were to change the project, you could submit something, you know, if it was significantly different. Anna, is that correct?

Yes, that's correct. So you can change your project and resubmit or wait a year before you can submit the same project.

Okay. So that is the end of our new business. The last part of our meeting is a discussion session on Clayton tomorrow. Anna, are you going to be

Is that what we call the comprehensive plan?

Yeah.

Okay. Probably important if we get our residents to help us with the implementations for issues like this one, but... I just wanted to give the Planning Commission and Architecture Review Board a quick update of where we stand with implementation because some of our priorities are going to come before this board and you'll be involved in that. Just a reminder, I presented something very similar to the Board of Aldermen in September to discuss the outline of how we'll do priorities. Our objectives and key results within the comprehensive plan are put into three categories, short-term goals, mid-term, and long-term. And then within each of those, we have impact marks, what type of task it is, et cetera, that will help us with our annual planning. And so to catch up for this first year in September, the Board of Aldermen agreed to an outline of priorities that will be our task for this fiscal year. So our fiscal calendar runs October through September. So we've already kind of started. And you'll see here that moving forward, since we hadn't adopted our comprehensive plan yet in time for this Our annual strategic planning with the Board of Aldermen will happen in May or June. So around the same time that we adopted the comprehensive plan this year is when we would start meeting with the board to set up our tasks for the upcoming fiscal year. But right now, we have quite a few priorities. So I'm going to go through them really briefly to give you an idea of what those are. Some of the tasks for this fiscal year do involve the plan commission and other ones do not. So not everything that we do and work on within the plan will come before you, but a good number of them will when they impact our zoning code. So one of the first priorities is updating our planning and development. So the biggest part about this is realigning our public benefits and that structure. So we want to incorporate more of our priorities from the comprehensive plan And then also look to make some modifications to how we evaluate public benefit points in relationship to the projects that are being proposed. So this will include a text amendment because it will amend our zoning code with this structure. I did the first presentation on this item at the Board of Aldermen's meeting. discussion session last week gave them an update and an idea of how we're going to head and then we'll look to come to the plan commission for our discussion session in january and then in may we'll have some additional outreach and or sorry april some additional outreach and then may would hopefully be when we're processing the text amendment for that update The other main one right now is actually looking at our TOD overlay. So Ryan is managing this project. We also presented to the board last Friday on this one. The biggest item here with overlay districts is really looking at density and parking regulations as it related to our transit stops. Ryan did a great analysis. If you want more detail, he made a whole staff report that has a lot of background information on what he looked at. But the biggest element here was that we came to the conclusion that transit-oriented development overlay districts are probably not the most efficient way to increase mixed use and density within the city of Clayton because, again, most of the time with transit oriented development you are looking at within a quarter mile to a half mile radius of transit stops which covers our downtown and then some so instead ryan expanded his research to the rest of our downtown overlay districts and understanding our base zoning code and we started going into some of our other objectives which are to remove some of the overlaps or conflicts between base zoning and overlay districts So what came out of this recommendation is in conjunction with looking at our plan unit development would be to repeal the majority of our overlay districts on downtown, probably all of them and replace a more strict downtown specific zoning district for the base. The idea here being that we kind of right size our base zoning within downtown to really get what we want in terms of projects. So how do we support mixed use? How do we support density? What's the scale of development that's appropriate within different areas of downtown? And that would also raise the threshold of what projects would need to go through the planned unit development process. So part of when I was looking back through the projects that we've had within our PUD, there are many projects and examples in downtown of projects that had to go through the PUD process or other projects we hear inquiries about that would have to go through the because there's some outdated elements of our existing codes, they're required to be rezoned through that process instead of just meeting the base zoning requirements. So these two kind of merged as we did our initial research. So the big projects, big pieces that will come to you in January is we'll present recommendations on how we would modify the high-density commercial zoning district that currently covers downtown, pulling some of the relevant and successful elements from different overlay districts, and then also just better establishing the base for other areas of downtown. And then in conjunction with that, how we would elevate our play data development system to really get more public benefits that align with our goals. The next big one that I'm sure you won't be surprised to hear is a priority for the board this year is lot coverage. And how do we address that really particularly in our residential areas? So right now, we actually have an intern from WashU who's working with our sustainability team. sustainability advisory committee, Kate, and she has helped us get started on the research aspect of this. So she will be coming to you all probably in December to give a presentation on the research that she's gathered. So we gave her some research questions related to different mitigation strategies and single family residential, what kind of strategies work well on small single-family lots, how communities have successfully monitored or regulated those different elements for stormwater. And then we'll combine that with some of our research about just general lot coverage and recommend some text amendments that would change our lot coverage and stormwater mitigation requirements. And so this tracks, you'll hear from Kate, December, early January. We'll come back in February with some additional discussion items for stormwater this board, and then hopefully in April we'll go through a text amendment process for that project. Another one that's going to come quickly is updating the liquor license regulations. So there was a recommendation in the comprehensive plan to allow bars in downtown Clayton. We would discuss this with the Board of Aldermen, and they'll kind of be twofold. There would be a text amendment that would add bars as a use within our zoning code and we're recommending that they would those would be allowed with a conditional use permit so we would have some ability to kind of mitigate different instances for bars and then there would also be a separate ordinance that wouldn't be for this board to consider that would modify our liquor license requirements to address bars so there's kind of two pieces that would go for that one This is time to go a little bit faster because it's a pretty straightforward change. And so we'll probably be back to you in January with this text amendment. Then towards the end of the fiscal year, we're going to get into architectural guidelines. So this element, we're going do a lot of research on kind of the existing styles and character of areas. so that we can maybe better tailor some of our guidelines, depending on the context of those neighborhoods. As you all know, we have some neighborhoods that have pretty clear historic character or elements of materials or density or size. And then we have other neighborhoods that are much more a mix of styles. And so we're hoping that we can address some of those issues through guidelines. And then that also might help us with probably the first step of our next fiscal year, which would be additional zoning code updates to something like a minimum lot area or a building height, et cetera, for different zoning districts. So we'll be back to you in July with those. And then finally, the end of the year for commercial uses, we want to start working on identifying the target uses. Some of that is happening right now as we look at the base zoning district for downtown, but there's also other target uses that relate to some of our goals within the comprehensive plan for entertainment uses. as well as just increasing the diversity of revenue sources. So various sales tax uses versus how can we create different end users and make a more resilient economy. So that will start towards the end of the year and will help us update outside of the downtown district some of those uses and how we regulate them. So the yellow is just letting you know when we'll be back with the text amendments. The good news is that we meet twice a month, so we'll kind of monitor the agenda. But I can share this presentation with you guys so that you can kind of know on your calendars moving forward when we're going to likely try and target some meetings that will have some bigger text amendment items that we'll want you guys to weigh in on. So that is the update.

Thank you for the update on does anybody have any questions.

Anna who's doing the heavy lifting to do the drafting and conceptualize the incentives, for example, are.

Yeah, so we're doing all this in-house. There's going to be some elements that go outside. So with Lock Harbor and Stormwater, once we get done with the initial research part of it, then we'll consult with our various on-call companies to help with a really specific language for some of this. But a lot of it's in-house. So incentives, the business incentives, that's being led by Gary Carter, our Economic Development Director. So he'll kind of lead that process and help the board of aldermen through what their options are and what types of incentives might be the best options for various types of projects, all the way from tax abatement through just small business loans, discussing all those options. And then parallel to that, we'll see what elements of the zoning code we can use to also kind of incentivize different development types. But most of it's going to be done in-house. So Ryan will be... lifting a few of these and i'll be lifting some of it and then hobie will also be helping us with a lot of background research this

is so much work you guys will never leave the building in the next 12 months

yeah the the board has uh They're very optimistic here about what we can do. But I mean, you guys, you know firsthand the big issues and the types of projects that we're seeing. And I think that the top three items on the executive summary is already done. So that's on the website. But then the three after that. They're all projects that we see on a pretty regular basis would be impacted by those elements. And so the goal is to tackle those pretty quickly. What I talked about with the board, the hard part with zoning code is it's kind of like a spider web. So when you try and pull on one element of it to address a specific issue, you pretty quickly... impact other elements of the code. So that happened when we looked really targeted transit oriented development overlay districts and pretty quickly decided it's kind of hard to tackle that one overlay district without addressing some of the issues in the base zoning district that we have in downtown. So that one kind of evolved pretty quickly. things like that will happen. And the hope is with regular updates like this and with the board, we'll be pretty realistic if we're running into some issues and need to adjust schedules because we want to get it right. You don't want to rush through zoning code amendments, but we think that this is a schedule hopefully we can stick to.

Sounds good. Anything else?

Yeah, I was just curious with some of these like text amendments and stuff like that. And I'm sure obviously like they're not fully written and just sitting in a drawer. But is there the opportunity to maybe get some of that stuff out to us a little bit sooner? Only like I know like on stuff like this, I realize there's not too much we can do. But, you know, kind of like a Friday to Monday turnaround on something like that. Yeah. You know, for these things, like you said, that you want to get it right for these kind of like bigger issues where, you know, maybe we have, you know, would it be realistic to maybe get those to us like a week or two in advance, speaking from someone who likes to do a lot of deep research? Yes.

Yeah. So the goal here is to engage with you all in discussion sessions first, where we'd be able to provide kind of parts of of a text amendment and get your feedback on those elements. And then ideally, we like to publish drafts of text amendments a week to two weeks in advance for you all and for the public to really be able to digest things. That's kind of the schedule being running for the overlay districts for Big Bend and South 40 for WashU. So we'll keep a more advanced schedule. And also with the scheduling of public hearings and things You know, we need to know our dates a little bit more in advance. So you'll definitely get information from us further in advance of your typical packet delivery for these items.

Are you saying that there will be involved in discussion groups before the text comes out?

Right. So that's what we'll do when we come. So, for example, at the PUD and TOD, those two items, we want to come back to you in January. So by then we'll have met with the Board of Aldermen to discuss a few particular items. So we won't have a full complete draft when we come to you for that discussion, but we'll have certain elements that we think are important for you to understand, like the overall framework. some definitions might be important that sort of thing so you'll know the direction we're going in and then as we draft further elements you'll see those drafts moving forward

Are those early sessions? Are those open to the public or is that just among, okay.

Yes, they'll be open to the public and that's part of what, so Ryan and I are going back to the Board of Aldermen at their discussion session in December and what we're going to outline in that discussion session is how we plan on engaging the public because we have a ton of information in terms of the overall direction for this that we gathered during the comprehensive plan process and So we don't really need to start back over at square one and ask people what they want to see. But we obviously want the public to know when we're doing a text amendment that replaces the whole zoning code of downtown. So

what part of a regular scheduled planning meeting?

Yes. Yes. So the idea would be to utilize your regular portion of the regular agenda. Now, we'll go through that overall strategy with the board and see if there's a need for other workshops or how we're going to address those other issues. But our goal is to try to utilize regular meetings.

Great. Anything else? Great. I think we've come to the end of our agenda.

I will not be here for the next two meetings. I'll be out of the country.

All righty. Thanks, everybody.

Do we need to adjourn?

I move

to

adjourn the meeting. Second.

All those in favor? Aye.