 no problem okay thank you let's move to the approval of the minutes and the consistency statement again I believe we just have the minutes from our May 28th meeting in this packet is that correct that is correct okay before we move approval there may be other comments as well I did notice that the very first motion on the adjustments to the agenda there were no actual names listed for who made the motion and who made the second right we'll have to check on that I'm not sure we're gonna have to go back and look at the tape we're not sure that someone made a motion so we'll double check that mm-hmm okay yeah that was one of the things that the clerk of the the backup clerk Miss Elliott asked me to look into so we'll check that and correct it if we need to okay thank you any other any other comments or if not I'll take a motion to approve make such a motion to approve the minutes second move by commissioner Morgan seconded by commissioner low and we'll have a roll call vote for approval okay commissioner Williams yeah commissioner Johnson yeah commissioner Morgan yes Mr. Landfreed yes commissioner Durkin yes commissioner outer yes chair buzzbee yes commissioner amandala yes commissioner Miller is absent commissioner Cajun yes commissioner Santiago is absent commissioner Baker yes commissioner low yes okay the case and commissioner McIver yes and just chair buzzbee for the record we wanted to remind the commissioners that there is because this is virtual if someone drops from the meeting your vote is not counted as a yes you are your counted is out of the meeting and not voting so that we've approved the minutes and we'll go to adjustments to the agenda miss Smith so staff would like to offer one adjustment to the agenda and one item under new business or an additional item under new business after the work program we need to take care of the vacancy of the vice chair our rules of procedure state that in the vacancy of the chair before the chair's term is has expired the vice chair will step up and serve as chair automatically so we need to elect the vice chair this evening great thank you and that's it for adjustments and that's it for the adjustments I do want to state for the record that all advertisements and legal requirements have been carried out in courts of state and local law and all those affidavits are on file in the planning department great thank you could I get a motion to approve the agenda as amended some of it thank you I'll call just has to be updated I'm sorry the roll call is incorrect as listed on the agenda I think we correct we may have posted it online correct it may have been incorrect at one point but we fixed it online okay yeah so you may have one that was sent out prior to it being updated okay so so so we just need to make thank you commissioner Durkin so we we have a motion and a second to approve the amended agenda and we'll have a roll call vote was the first alter can second commissioner Morgan I believe so okay commissioner Williams yes commissioner Morgan yes commissioner Johnson commissioner lane freight yes commissioner Durkin yes commissioner Alchard yes and chair buzzbee yes commissioner amandola yes commissioner Miller is absent it's commissioner kinship yes commissioner Santiago is absent commissioner Baker yes commissioner low yes and commissioner McIver yes okay thank you passage unanimous thank you very much we're gonna move to our first case item on tonight's agenda this is Fox Place is case a 1 9 quadruple 0 4 and concurrent zoning case z 1 9 quadruple 0 5 and we will start with the staff report good evening Jamie Sonak with the planning department I will be presenting box place it's a consolidated land use item first slide please the applicant is Cliff cradle from cradle engineering the property is located at 8705 NC highway 751 the property is currently located within the county but there's a pending annexation application the property is about just under three acres in size it's located within the suburban tier there is a request to change the zoning to residential suburban multi-family with a development plan with up to 11 single family detached homes the in addition to the zoning map change there's also a proposed change for the future land use map designation from recreation open space to low to low residential low density residential so the typo on that slide next slide please the aerial map shows the property highlighted in red it's located on the east side of NC highway 751 properties undeveloped it contains a stream and upon feature next slide please the staff report has several area photos some of them are depicted here the property is bordered by the chancellor's rage development just each east of the site other residential developments nearby include Huntington Ridge Eagles point and Kensington residential development to the north it is also abided by state owned lands to the north west and south which are within the recreation open space future land use designations next slide please the site the site is located within the suburban development here and falls within the falls Jordan District B watershed protection overlay this slide shows the existing zoning on left with the property in rural residential and then the proposed residential suburban multi-family on the right in orange next slide this shows the future land use map designation again in properties currently within recreation and open space and the applicant is seeking a change to low density residential next slide here is the development plan that has been included in the staff report which highlights the access points the building and parking envelope riparian buffer and ten foot no build the tree coverage areas and the project boundary buffers next slide please in terms of a summary of text commitments which have been included on the cover sheet of the development plan there's a restriction in terms of single family residential units as being the permitted building type with a maximum number of 11 units there's a restriction of a right in right out at the site entrance on NC highway 751 as well as other graphic commitments included on the plan next slide please as noted the proposed zoning is not consistent with the existing future land use designation of the site and as a result the applicant is seeking a future land use map amendment which would then be consistent with the rezoning request the proposal is consistent with the other comprehensive plan policies included in this list on the screen and further detailed in the staff report next slide staff determines that these requests are consistent with the comprehensive plan and other applicable policies and ordinances and I will be happy to answer any questions that you have thank you miss Anyak appreciated we will move to open the public hearing and just so fellow commissioners know the advance number of folks who signed up to speak on this item at the moment is 19 and so there are two signed up in support the rest are signed up in opposition there are a couple who have not we didn't didn't tell us which way they were speaking on the issue but there there's a fair amount of people who have signed up to speak this evening normally what we we do and we allow each side 10 minutes under our normal rules of procedure I would recommend as we often do to extend that to make sure that we give everyone time to share their thoughts I might recommend two minutes per person that's often what we do but I'm open to thoughts from other commissioners and would entertain a motion for how we would go about the public hearing process tonight on this item commissioner out there yeah thanks Chair Busby I'll remember to use the raise hand function in the chat or that but I was thinking that I think it makes sense to do to give folks more than just 10 minutes on each side so I like two minutes each I wonder though for the applicant if we can give them a little bit more time maybe because it's just two people in favor so maybe a few more minutes to either respond to some of the feedback I think we've done we do that often give the those in favor some more time to respond so I don't know if we need a motion for that but I think maybe 10 minutes for the for those in favor and then two minutes each for others can we do that have we done that before I believe we have we can check with with miss Smith on staff but I would agree that the proponents may have put together 10 minutes worth of time and we will certainly then allow everyone then to share their thoughts miss Smith is that appropriate yes we can do 10 minutes allow the applicant 10 minutes to make their presentation in two minutes per speaker on the other side considering how many are signed up I mean we've done that in the past so commissioner out there if you want to put that in a motion we can we can vote for approval. Sure I move that we give the applicants a total of 10 minutes and those or and opponents two minutes each in the public hearing. We have a second. Thank you commissioner low. We'll have a roll call. The commissioner low. Second. Yes. Yes. Okay. All right. So commissioner McIver. Mission low. Yes. Mission or Baker. Yes. Commissioner Santiago is absent. Commissioner Kenshin. Yes. Commissioner Miller is absent. Commissioner Landfried. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Al-Turk. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Amondola. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. And Commissioner Williams. Yes. Passes unanimous two minutes for each speaker proponent and 10 minutes. I mean a opponent and 10 minutes for the proponent. Great. Thank you. Thank you. So we'll start with the two proponents. We have Mavis, James, and Trans Perry have signed up to speak in support of the proposal. Yes. This is Trans Perry. Can everyone hear me? Yes. Okay. Yes. I'm the I'm the property owner of 8705 NC Highway 51. My name is Trans Perry, T-R-A-N-S, last name Perry, P-S-N-P-O-E-R-Y. I'm born and raised in Durham just to give a little background about myself. I'm born and raised in Durham. Live there pretty much my whole life except when I went to college in New Orleans. I went to Hillside, local product of Hillside, played sports there. And at the college I worked for Walgreens and I came back home around 08 and started renovating and building houses. I started primarily in the downtown district around Cleveland Holloway, Morehead Hills. And I've renovated and built over 30 houses, probably close to about 35 houses here in the Durham area since 2000 started since 2009. I'm very excited about this project. I think it's very consistent with the neighborhood, I mean with the area as far as like, was proposed as far as like single family residential. I've had, I remember I had the neighborhood meeting a few months back and seems like, seems like it wasn't, you know, seems like, you know, some people were excited, you know, some people had questions, but like, like I expressed at the neighborhood meeting the, the, the proposed project, like I said, pretty consistent with Chancellor's Ridge, you know, and that's pretty much. Well, I guess to say about the homes, the homes that, the homes that I would build, I build custom homes. You know, I, I build houses built from, I guess you can say from like, like they were built in 1900, you know, hardwood floors, custom cases, masonry fireplaces, very custom homes, high quality. You go around downtown Durham and have my sign up at my houses. You know, I try to, try to build on quality like I would, like, like, like if I would move in. So I'm very excited about this project. And that's, that's about it. Thank you, Mr. Perry. Thank you. Thank you. And Mavis James. Chair, I do not see Mavis James, this is Chris Peterson from playing department. I do not see Mavis James on our list of attendees. If Mavis is joining, please use the raise hand function so we can properly identify. And again, that's star nine on the phone. Okay. Well, I'll propose that we move forward hearing from folks who have signed up to speak and if Mavis James joins us, we can hear, we can hear that later. So we're going to move to folks who signed up in advance as opponents of the project. We're just going to read your listed in the order that you signed up. So we're just going to run down this list. Again, two minutes per speaker and the staff will help let you know when you are near your, your time. What I would say is that two minutes goes really quickly. And so if it's time to wrap up your comments, we generally just have a rule that says you can finish your thought. So you don't have to stop in the middle of the sentence, but please complete your thought. And we'll move on from there. Michelle Alexander, Xander domain and Dan genders are our first three folks who have signed up to speak. So Ms Alexander. You might be on mute. Yes, see, I see Michelle Alexander is on here but is on mute. So if there's a way to come off of mute. This is Xander domain. Am I okay to go? Yeah. Yeah, please go ahead and we'll we'll work on getting Michelle Alexander off of mute. Thank you. Okay, great. My name is Xander domain. I live at 312 Marist Court in the Chancellor's Ridge neighborhood. My primary concern with this project is two fold with another small note. I'll say initially, my understanding is that this is a multi home dwelling. So the proponents claim about it being very consistent with Chancellor's Ridge is a little confusing to me because the Chancellor's Ridge neighborhood that the property is immediately adjacent to is primarily single family dwellings. And my understanding is that the proposal is for multi family dwelling. So it does not seem like it would be consistent with that neighborhood. But my primary concern that I signed up to talk about is for is kind of two fold related to two of the features on the property, one being the stream and pond. So the stream and pond that are features of that property. I know that every year that I've lived in Chancellor's Ridge, at least almost every year for the past four or five years. Stagecoach Road, which is across 751 from the property has flooded. My concern is whether the development would contribute to the flooding of Stagecoach Road, which causes closings of that road. The second issue, second concern that I have is due to traffic that intersection is is notoriously bad for traffic, even though there's a restriction for right in right out and concern that the additional traffic for 11 multi family units would be almost prohibitive to people going in and out of that inner going through that intersection. Especially if they're the stream and pond contribute to the flooding on Stagecoach Road. And then the second is purely environmental that is recreational use area that stream and pond or homes to lots of wildlife that contribute that help maintain a low population of rodents things like snakes and turtles contribute to reduced rodents and bugs in the area so my concern primarily around the actual features of that land and how they would contribute to traffic. And the environment of that area. Thank you. Thank you. Michelle Alexander, are you able to come off of mute and speak. We'll, we'll move to Dan gindes. Hey, can you guys hear me. Yes. All right, thank you. How are you my name is Dan gindes. I live at 142 college Avenue and the chancellor's Ridge development. My house backs up to the civil core of engineering land that is adjacent to this proposed property. So a few things really quickly I'm going to focus on ironically I don't know Xander was nice to hear from him but I don't know him but I have the same exact concerns primarily. But first off, I want to point out that slide show that we saw. Quite interestingly, there was a GIS pick in the beginning. That was pretty old. So this area does not look like that anymore. If you look at that GIS there have been developments dropped left and right. I bought this house in August of 14. I moved here from Indianapolis. I can't believe the development that occurs. It's a wonderful thing, but every wonderful thing has some setbacks and in this case with the, in my opinion over development of this area the setbacks are primarily true. The setbacks are primarily traffic and the effect on wildlife slash environment. So my biggest concerns are the traffic pattern. Somebody spent a lot of money and a lot of time and just rebuilt the intersection at 751 stage coach. They certainly didn't ask my opinion, but whatever they did was not a fix of the traffic problem. So a proposed project like this is only going to further worsen the traffic. If people are making a left out of that development, or more importantly, if someone coming south on 751 to turn left into that development, they're going to back that traffic, which I've seen backed up to the bone fish grill by root 40 a mile away. It's going to be just a horrendous scene. And at the end of the day, when you're trying to get home from work, it's not what you want to deal with. The stagecoach flooding is something that I also started to notice in the last five years. I worked at UNC hospital and would drive that route all the time. It's almost a delayed flooding, but it occurred frequently and now it seems to be happening a couple times a year. We're getting wildlife in our front yard, foxes, things getting driven out from all this other development. And I was under the impression I've talked to people who weren't here, who lived here 10 years ago. The stagecoach never flooded. And then they built the development just north of it. And then they built 751 south, just south of it. And then all of a sudden there's a water problem. It seems that these things were overlooked. I don't want to overlook these things again when it's in my backyard this time. Again. Yes. Thank you guys for your time and and and for considering. I think that this gentleman who owns the property should have every right to build what the property. Thank you. Appreciate it. We then have Jason Gonzalez, followed by Blake has a Brock and Richard Smith. Can you hear me? Yes. Hi there. So my name is Jason Gonzalez. I also coming from Chancellor's Ridge at 1134 scholastic circle. I first like the second and third, the points already made by Zander and Dan, in regards to traffic and certainly the environment. The, these were points that I had already hoped to make, but I won't hammer those in again to use up that time. But in regards to the traffic challenges, I've already been in a really horrendous car accident just trying to drive back into Chancellor's Ridge. So I just want to echo and really push that one, the importance of that and are already congested roads. And even more so, it pains me here to even consider the possibility that more of the greenery with the massive developments that have been going on around here are now going to be cleared away. Further congesting the area, especially at the time now with even our school districts are already congested. There are talks of requiring additional schools. No longer accepting some students at the ones that are existing that we we moved here with the intention of being a part of roads bogged down as we've already said. I mean, I recognize our population here in the South Durham area is growing as it is throughout the triangle. But there's got to be a more sensible way to address this growth and this land without stacking houses on top of one another up to 11 houses and less than three acres is hardly what I call value, high quality value for that area. While I have no doubt that Mr. Perry intends to build high quality houses and it certainly sounds like he tries to stay true to that. I have to believe the value of those homes as well as the home areas around this this proposed development will significantly be diminished without this greenery for not only aesthetic reasons but also as as Zander and Dan pointed out for environmental and safety reasons as well. Thank you. A Blake has a Brock. It looks like you're on mute. So you can if you're on the phone you can press star nine looks like you're good. There we go. Can everyone hear me. Yeah. Great. Thanks everyone for your time. My name is Blake has a Brock. I live at 212 graduate court in our homes along the northern border of this parcel in question. I'm a 31 year old father of two born and raised in the Carolinas my wife and I have invested in this community. We purchased and fully renovated our home about two years ago and we do aspire to spend the next 20 years here in Chancellor's Ridge. So when we purchased our home we did rely on the future land use map designation. As many other of the neighbors have to decide what the future looked like for our family. So the first point is that I would like to trust that that future land use map is reliable on one hand. But then on the other I feel we all need to consider how this affects not only us but the generations to come. So the parcel in question is very low and slopes into a gully or stream that flows beneath that 751 into the army core land on the opposite side. So because of this I oppose the proposal to change the future land use map from open space to low density residential. The staff says it's in the report that the open space designation for the property must have been a mistake. But they don't explain why they say that. So I don't think it was a mistake at all. And if you drive along the 751 you'll instantly see that the land contains a drainage feature directly reaching into the Jordan Lake watershed. So to me this is an unusual request to take land out of the open space recreation designation to accommodate the development. I've noticed in being here a long time the city's made minor boundary adjustments here and there but never anything this vast in my in my experience. So Jordan Lake is currently a drinking water source for several cities including Durham. And today we get our water from from other cities that use Jordan water. So we do plan the future to put our own straw in there. And then you may argue that 2.8 acres might not matter much. But I argue that 11 single family residences can't be so important that we should strip another parcel from the highest protections we can give the drinking water source. So once the parcels gone it's gone and then the decisions made and we can't correct that in the future. And so you know to look out for the environment and generations to come. That's that's my stance. And then on the other hand if we even argue. Is that time. It is yeah. Okay. Okay the other the other argument I would make would just be that the development plan wasn't thorough enough. So that's all I've got. Thank you so much for your time everyone. Thank you. Richard Smith. And Richard while you come off of mute, we'll have joy, sweetening Caleb white James. I'm just going to spell it because I'm going to do a terrible job with it. Those are the next few folks to speak. But Richard Smith you can come off of mute. And love to hear your public comments. And again star nine if you're on the phone to unmute yourself. While he's on muting. I'm joy, sweetening and I did not sign up to speak I'm sorry I'm just listening. Okay, so you do not look to speak this evening. No, thank you. Okay, thank you. Why don't we move to Caleb white. All right, Caleb I see your hand up you are free to speak. Hello, thank you I appreciate the opportunity to talk to everybody here. So first off, would like to give a lot of respect to everybody here I appreciate that we're all here and talking about this issue. But I do have a lot of concerns about this I am a member. I live in Chancellor's Ridge. I'm, and I'm really concerned about this development coming out because I just feel like it really is not in in line with what we have designated for the residential density and just generally speaking. Also, I was looking for a little bit more information on what was going to be happening with the water feature. Because by the looks of the plans it looks like they're going to just to somehow develop over like a giant water hole in the ground. So I just think that that there maybe should be some more discussion about how that even is going to happen. But generally speaking, I'm just, I'm really concerned with the traffic that's going to be coming into the community based on this development. Again, I don't think it's in in line with the actual the density of housing that's in this community. And I really am worried about that environmental impact based on that pond based on the watershed and also the flooding aspect actually was very interesting that people were bringing that one up because I think that's also a very interesting point. And it does seem like the flooding has gotten a little bit more poignant in the later years but anyways, I will I will cut myself off there and thank you for giving me the time to speak. Thank you. Richard Smith are you able to speak at this point. If not James P. I see you're muted as well but if you're available to speak, you can start nine and offer your testimony. So I just unmuted can you hear me. Yes. Okay. I can echo. And can you say your name and address and then you can. Yeah, I apologize. My name is James Seacoste I live at 108 college have, which is in Chantos Ridge, sort of directly off from where behind the area where this is going to be built. A couple points. I pretty much agree with all the people that are opposed this and things they've said. I was at the, at the neighborhood meeting that trans Perry held and I would say that the majority of the participants were against his proposal, and it was not a very positive atmosphere actually. I will echo that the aerial maps are way outdated. And the pictures as well as do not include any from the actual entrance which is walled off by steel barriers, which he had to have removed and you know make a very narrow right turn only access on 751. That whole area has been redone there's no aerial photos and proposal that showed that. It's not a similar development to Chantos Ridge are lots average about a quarter acre in size. If you take away the area that he can't develop on that property. He's looking at probably between point 1314 of an acre for each unit. And that doesn't even include the road and cul-de-sac is going to turn around. The access is going to be horrible. The traffic is already horrible hasn't gotten any better 71 South's going to make that even worse. And the Jordan Lake runoff is, is going to contribute to that as well. Happy to let him develop it as it is right now with the three or four homes that he put there. That's probably a nice valid use for that piece of property. But I will say that, you know, all the points that have been addressed are valid points and I'm kind of disappointed that really none of that was brought up in the staffs. You know rebuttal of his proposal it's almost kind of looks like it's over stamped, which kind of bothers me because I feel like that's what happened with 751 South. There's a list of everyone that attended that first meeting as well, which included two attorneys and a commercial appraiser and none of them were happy with that. So, and they do live in the neighborhood. Thank you, Mr. Seaco. Sure. Thanks. Richard Smith, I'm going to circle back. It looks like you might be available to speak. Apologies. There's no comments just supporting as a resident to the opposers. Okay, thank you. Ben Conkel, followed by Elizabeth Scalco and Jackie baby Smith. Hello, can you hear me. Yes. Okay. My name is Ben Conkel. I'm at 206 graduate court grew up in Durham, North Carolina been here for over 40 years. I've had this property for the past 11 years. Things are getting real crowded down here in this area. I agree with everything everything everybody has said thus far. The traffic has been an ongoing issue, the expansion and addition of turning lane at 751 South and stagecoach has not really alleviated any of the traffic issues, having 11 more homes in this property with the right in and right out. There's no way that's going to be helpful for anyone I would say the stagecoach flooding has definitely gotten worse in the past several years. The flooding. I mean it shuts things down for weeks at a time at various points in the past few years the 751 development. 751 South has definitely made that worse. I can't imagine adding 11 homes here in the sort of drainage area is going to help that at all. The wildlife impact I mean you're talking about directly paving over what is a very large pond right there. And that's going to cause a lot of wildlife to flee the area or turn up in other people's yards it's not going to help with rodent control, or the bugs and pests in the area. I don't have anything significant to contribute other than agreeing with all the points that have come before me but I don't understand how this would necessarily help the map seem wildly out of date. And I mean 11 homes on that small parcel of land is not going to be a particularly regardless of the quality of the homes like it's just not going to be a lot of very effective use of the land it's going to be very small areas for the development for the actual houses. Yeah, I've pretty much nothing else to contribute other than I would strongly oppose this measure. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Elizabeth Scalco. Hello, my name is Betsy Scalco, and I've lived in the Chancellor's Ridge neighborhood since the first year was built in 1999. Before South Point Mall and much of the development on highway 751 and Fayetteville Road. Over the past 21 years I have watched as lots of retail development, two apartment complexes, three hotels, three big churches and auto park and five large neighborhoods, including the 751 assemblage monstrosity have been built on 751 and Fayetteville. In 1999, Highway 751 had no street lights between Chancellor's Ridge and Highway 54. Now it is five. Stagecoach Road had a one lane bridge where you had to wait and take turns crossing. Now it's been raised and widened with street lights at both ends, and it was still closed multiple times last year for flooding. I've never spoken out. I'm not against development. I live in a neighborhood built just two decades ago. But all of this growth has affected the traffic on Highway 751 with no widening or significant improvements and the Jordan Lake watershed and flooding along Stagecoach Road. The landing question for rezoning has an existing pond that is often full. Where will that water go once you have all that impervious surface? Chancellor's Ridge had to build three water-retainment ponds when it was built, and they have never been full of water. Actually, they rarely have much water in them at all, but this pond does. The landing question has a difficult access of Highway 751 where it would currently be illegal, not to mention very unsafe, to turn if headed south or to turn north, to turn south if headed out of it. Allowing a right out and right in only addresses the turning traffic, but instead they will turn around in the Chancellor's Ridge neighborhood to go back north. Now, maybe you say it's a small piece of land less than three acres, what does it matter? And I would say that's exactly why it matters. It's a small piece of land. Let's leave it alone and not shoehorn so many homes onto this property. Thank you. Thank you. Jackie Bady Smith and then will be followed by Nicole Cruz and Donna Kaye. Jackie Bady Smith, are you with us and able to speak? I'm sorry. This is Mavis James. I'm late for joining the meeting, but I can speak after everyone has stated their concerns. Thank you. Yeah, that's a great plan. Appreciate you letting us know you're here. Jackie Bady Smith is not with us. We'll go to Nicole Cruz. All right. I don't see anyone raising their hand. We'll go to Donna Kaye. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay, thank you. I'm Donna Kaye. I live at 202 Alumni Avenue. And again, I'm not anti-development. I live in Chancellor's Ridge. I'm glad to. Like many people, mainly concerned about the flooding and the watershed. And I guess my question because I did not come out as opposed for is I do think that there needs to be a study. I understand that the actual site plan review or to do the calculation to see if flooding would occur is kind of a big deal. I know it's expensive, but I think that if this project needs to be considered, that has to happen. It's just not fair to anyone, including those future homeowners in that community, to go forward without that kind of plan. I guess I want to know is the city prepared to, if you do go through with this, are you prepared to request that kind of study to know what we're dealing with? But I think that's my main concern is moving forward without all the information. Great. Thank you. And it's the developer willing to invest the money for that. Last question. Also, I'm confused about it says it's multi-family homes, but then I heard 11 individual homes. So are these individual townhomes? Are they single-family homes? I wasn't sure about that either. Great. Thank you very much. And just so you know, during the public comment period, this is your opportunity to make your statement and raise questions. When we close the public comment period, the commissioners have time to ask the staff or the proponent or anyone else any questions and make comments. So it's helpful to hear your questions and commissioners may raise those on your behalf during the discussion phase of the hearing. Thank you. I want to be open-minded and hear what the data has to say. And I'm just not clear what is there. And I understand that it really, that work has not been done yet. It's not appropriate time to do it, but that I think it really needs to be done. Thank you. Thank you. Kristen Sherman-Cervati, I see your hand raised. You can speak if you're unmuted. I can't hear you. I don't know if others can hear you or not. We will circle back to you. There seems to be an audio issue on your side. We've got two more folks who are signed up to speak. We have Betsy Weatherhead and Ashley Gonzalez. So Betsy Weatherhead, if you want to speak. Or Ashley Gonzalez, are you with us? Okay. I don't see any of those folks. I do see a few hands raised. Kristen Sherman-Cervati, do you want to try again and speak? Yeah, I do. That's better. Speak up. It's still quiet. I see the pond that we've talked about that floods very frequently. I have been here for 16 years. And well before all the development that has happened that I know Betsy talked about. I don't know all my neighbors, but I do echo most of the concerns here. My major concern is that this land is designated for recreation open space on a future land use map. I remember when there was an actual resident in that very small house on that 2.5 acre parcel. And one of the reasons I moved here was because Army Corps of Engineering land backed up to my property. And I know that we all, it was Chancellor's Ridge has had considerations for the way that it was developed in light of and in compliance with the storm water planning for Jordan Lake. The flooding is a major issue. Flooding happens down behind my property just in Army Corps of Engineering land as it is. And so I'm really concerned about utilizing that small space and having a lot of impervious land or impervious space taken over on what is previous. Great. Thank you. Thank you for your comments and your persistence getting through to us. So we have finished I'm just going to read the names of names who are on here who didn't reply just to give you one more chance and then we'll go to Mavis James and any additional folks, but Michelle Alexander. Jackie Bady Smith and Nicole Cruz Betsy Weatherhead or Ashley Gonzalez or any of you with us this evening and wish to speak. Okay, I don't think you're here. We will go to Mavis James and then I see a few other hands raised who I assume are individuals would like to speak. If you've spoken already, you have one opportunity to speak during the public comment period but we will call on you if you have not spoken of Mavis James. Okay, so in regards I am for the development of the property myself being someone who has been around for a long time also knew the original owner of the property the Carlton's to live on that property. The property was in their family for a number of years prior to it being taken over by the Army court engineers as well as Mr Carlton allowing for when they develop Chancellor's Ridge to use some of his property for the development of Chancellor's Ridge itself. I'm also very familiar with Trans Perry the person who is looking to develop the land and it's also the owner of the land at this time and has spoken to him because I was actually the one who introduced him to the Carlton and has spoken to him about his plans for the development. They are single family homes and not necessarily saying it'll be 11 homes but it's up to 11 single family homes. Which myself of being interested in one of the homes itself as far as the pond and flooding. Mr Perry has looked into flooding of the pond and will continue working to make sure that the pond is not is one. He wants to preserve it for the property itself but to for to make sure that it's not something that's going to flood the community. I don't believe that anyone will build a home and put it at risk for flooding or having the pond flooded and just thinking about my current neighborhood now there's always a reservoir for the water to go into. No one who's going to develop a plan is going to go in knowing that these homes may potentially flood. So I think that's something that realistically we need to go ahead and look at the bigger picture. No one's going to build a home that's going to flood. Mr Perry actually has a very good reputation with the homes he's built around Durham. And I actually don't think that the homes would or the residents of the homes would actually cause any issues with traffic. You have 11 single family home as far as adding adding to the traffic. I don't see how that would change that would change the actual traffic pattern that we have right now on 751 I don't feel that those cars would act those people who live in that neighborhood would cause more traffic than what it is already on that road. Thank you for your comments. Thank you. Are going to move to the individuals who have raised their hands who have not spoken this evening and I'm just going to call you in order if you would like to speak. This will be your your two minute public common opportunity. Audra Slavin. Hey my name is Audra Slavin. I'm at 126 College Avenue and I'm an original owner here as well. Most of the comments have been said but when I did buy here with the future land use the Corps of Engineer property and no building behind it. I actually paid a premium for this lot. So if they you know I paid more to live here with the understanding that we would not be developing behind there. And so now what we're saying is we're going to develop behind there you're going to fill in that creek. It's not that long a walk down into Corps of Engineer to where you hit that creek and it does flood I've been in it my dog has gotten down in there before I've had to get her out. So everything else everybody saying is very true about the flooding. When we developed the farmland off of 751 onto stagecoach it never flooded before then as soon as you did that that's what created the flooding five years ago that we continually experience. So everything that Dan and Betsy and everyone has said is absolutely what we experienced and then the traffic has really grown. It's difficult to get in and out of the development. So I hope the commissioners will take all the comments seriously and why the reasons of being opposed. And I appreciate your time and I also want to thank Jamie for providing answers and advance some of my questions. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Cliff Cradle. Hey this is Cliff with Cradle Engineering. I am in Durham to a four East Markham Avenue. How are y'all doing this evening? Doing well. At least make your comments. All right. So I actually worked on this as a surveyor and engineer and understand what these concerns are in in looking at this parcel. We did look at the flooding that is adjacent to us. Actually the parcel was much larger originally and was acquired by the Army Corps of Engineers from the original owner. And that was in development of the Jordan Lake. And the Army Corps knew that this was going to flood. And that's why they purchased this land. And there's land to the northwest of us and to the south of us that is owned and still owned by the Army Corps of Engineers. So flooding was anticipated. It is in a flood plain. Does it does it flood? Yes. Is that going to stop? I don't see that stopping. Are we contributing to that? With this amount of homes? No. Matter of fact we're not allowed to by the city ordinance in moving forward on this site. And all of those have to go in before the first building permit is approved. So the little pond on the site which was obviously man made. Does it flood? It might get full. But the only contributing water to that is coming from Chancellors Ridge. And then it goes into a small creek that is right off the property that goes back into the Corps of Engineers property. So that was anticipated also. It is a nice little feature. We hope to save it. Not making any commitments on it at this point since I'm not the owner. But hope to save that. But that was a man made feature. There are some utilities that cross through this property that were done for the benefit of Chancellors Ridge. There's actually two sewer easements. One on the south side of the property and one on the west side of the property that go through this. And that was done for the benefit of Chancellors Ridge. And the majority of the people speaking. So I think that this previous landowner and the existing landowner have taken a lot of this into consideration. And I was not at the neighborhood meeting to address some of that. But I'm kind of disappointed that a lot of these folks didn't at least say that in the neighborhood meeting. But I understand timing. As for the traffic on 751. Does DOT need to increase that? Absolutely. Do we have power over that? Not at all. We have access to 751. And in accordance with DOT and the planning department and transportation department. We have agreed to the right in right out which makes the access as least impactful as possible. And actually DOT made several mistakes when putting up the guardrail and actually had to change some of that for us. And in addition to that, the Corps of Engineers actually cut off access to this property for a small time being in part of that. Just to show you how much the designation of this property has been all over the place. All right. Should it have been open space? No. Never should have been. It was always residential and it was taken as part of the building of this dam. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. And then finally we have John Paul Schick with his handrails. Yeah. Can you hear me? Yes. Great. Thanks, Mr. Chairman and commissioners. I appreciate your time here tonight listening to all of us. Again, my name is John Paul Schick. I live at 308 Alumni Avenue, which is in Chancellors Ridge. I've lived here since 2014 with my wife and my two boys. I've lived in Durham since 1997. By day I am a real estate attorney with the firm of Ortiz and Schick. I did attend the neighborhood meeting where the presentation was put on about this development and having practiced real estate and commercial real estate for many years. I can tell you that I was thoroughly unimpressed with the presentation, but specifically the reasons I oppose this application are the following. The number one reason is safety. This driveway on 751 so close to the traffic light at Stagecoach, so close to the entrance at Chancellors Ridge, even with a right in, right out, I think is going to be a safety problem. Not only the turning in and out at that driveway, but as somebody else mentioned, people that are going to want to make U-turns around whatever island is installed in front of that. 751, as you've heard other people mention, is an issue and I think that the safety of this entrance is huge, is paramount. 11 homes may not be a lot of cars, but all we need is one car to turn in or turn out wrongly. And then who knows what can happen. The other reason I oppose this is it's a bad idea. To the extent that we need new homes in the area, we've had over 100 units open north of this project at South Point Trails. And of course, whether it's 1,000 or 1,200 or how many ever it is coming at 751 South, these 11 homes are a drop in the bucket and I don't think we need that. The Army Corps of Engineer property, yes, it does flood. I too have been down there with my boys. I would like to address this idea that we at Chancellors Ridge are benefiting from easements. I can almost bet you don't us to a dollar that those easements were required by some of your predecessors from the city in building Chancellors Ridge. Although, yes, we benefit from these easements. I don't think Chancellors Ridge had a choice in that matter. And then finally, I've heard the hope that the pond will be saved and not paved. I've heard that hope and many, many, many other projects and the cost of paving over it, where you can put another house or two on it, usually loses out. So I think the downside to this project, the very, the many downsides are far outweigh the upside of this project. And with that, I'll thank you once again for your service to our community. Thank you. I'm not spoken yet tonight. I see Caleb White's hand is up. I believe you've spoken already, but if you have not spoken and you wish to speak during this public comment period, please raise your hand, and we will give you your opportunity. I don't see anyone else requesting to speak. So at this point, I will close the public hearing. I'm seeing hands of folks who've already spoken. So we're going to close the public hearing and we will move to comments by commissioners. And again, recognize the commissioners may ask questions of staff or proponents or even just folks who have spoken this evening commissioners if you can raise your hands if you would like to speak and I will call on you. Hello, I see your hand raised. Would you do you would you like to speak? Yes. Just one of the presenters, I think it was Miss Mavis James. I don't believe she gave her. It was her address. I didn't catch you. I did not either Mavis James I know she signed up a Mavis James if you can provide your address if you're able that will be appreciated. So currently I do not live on 751. I live at eight cast being court. Thank you. So I'm in the South Point area. That's great. Thank you very much. Commissioner low any additional comments at this point. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I see commissioner Johnson was that and you're muted if you. Yes, I'm back I'm back before is yours commissioner Johnson. Thank you. So, I guess from my end to start off on things I would like to ask that we are asked questions at this point right to Mr. trans Perry. So my first question is, is the tip when I usually ask and that can you provide us a sense of the price point for the residential units that are anticipate to be developed on this park. I haven't, I haven't pinpointed a price point but I've had to give a range I would say anywhere from 500 to $700,000. And while you're still there, I'm sure you'll likely be asked questions from others, but just to start off with addressing some of the concerns that have been raised from opposition to this request. Can you start off by just giving us a sense of how you came up with the up to 11 unit on this small parcel and any, any thoughts around like, how will the actual program of the site in regards to green space and etc anything that could be informative and how you will put up to 11 unit on this small parcel and it's still not just have a quality home but overall quality of life community that plugs into the surrounding community. Well, I was raised and I was raised in Southern Durham, and I've seen, you know, Southern Durham growth. I remember when there was no south point there and it's grown us. That's what where we live in, you know, things are growing, but I will say that I plan to keep the pond. I think I think there'll be a nice feature I have a little recreational area just to the, my boundaries right just to the south of the pond. Have a have a nice little recreational keep the pond. I just think the up to 11 homes answer your question, sir. That came from just working with Mr. cradle. As far as like what and actually believe we're working with the cradle like how many houses will be allowed, you know, as far as density. And I think it probably be closer to 10 this over lots would be a small but we still have to buy say we're very in we're in the early stages of this development so it might be 11 but it possibly could be 10, but I plan on keeping the pond. Thank you. And so just just to be breath just for the sake of brevity to start this conversation off with fellow commissioners. I will say that I am familiar with the South Point area and this particular site and the growth in this area here. And the concerns raised are if you ask me they are, they warrant attention. And the fact that this parcel is being asked to go from recreation and open space to basically request that, you know, is not just from a back of the envelope number then but it probably will look like from a visual standpoint is it doesn't align naturally with what's currently there in regard in the sense that you take 2.8 acres and 10 or 11 units you're talking about close to four units per acre. And so what does that mean with what what else you can do on this site and then the questions about the flooding and the traffic issues or whatnot. And so I do think that, you know, the concerns raised do warrant attention, not just from this commission, but beyond this here because, you know, there will be a quality of life. And yes, this is a small parcel, but this set precedent about what can be made of arguments for while we continue to do things certain ways. And so me looking at this application is like when there was there just doesn't seem to be enough certainty included like on on the development plan to provide a better sense of what the neighboring communities can expect this overall project to look like. And I have other questions that I'm pretty sure is on my fellow commissioners that you all be asking some of them. So I'll wait to let other questions that come down to this discussion. Thank you Commissioner Johnson. Before we move to the other commissioners. I, if is miss soniac available because I did want to just make sure that I understood the I believe I heard a commitment to preserve the pond but I don't see that on the development plan is am I understanding that correctly. Yes. Yes, that's that's correct. Currently, there is no text commitment to to preserve the pond, the building and parking envelope includes that area of the site. And, and while I'm speaking, I'll, I'll just also state for the record to that there is a text commitment relative to the unit type. The residential suburban multifamily does allow for a variety of different housing types. However, the applicant has committed to single family detached housing. So I just wanted to clarify that as well. I'm going to call the commissioners in the order you raised your hand so Commissioner out Turk is next. Thank you chair, and thanks to everyone for your feedback and being on this call. I think a lot of thoughtful comments I agree with a lot of them I agree with a lot of what Commissioner Johnson has already said. Let me ask if I could just ask staff. First a few questions. I wanted to my the first question is about the open space requirements for for a development like this. So this is in the RSM, or the proposal is for to change it to RSM is there. I mean, I'm looking at UDO section 6.3.1. And is that correct. Am I correct in seeing that there are no open space requirements for this zoning designation. And then how does that's well, I guess I'll let you answer that first and then. Yes, again, with the planning department I'm also looking at the same table I believe that you're referring to under 631 for the dimensional standards and there is not an open space percentage provided for the RSM. But in sheet C0200 and the development plan. I see in the development standards section here, open space. I don't know if you see that and then it says 18.0 minimum. So is that, I mean, is that a commitment to preserve or to have 18% I assume. Right, there's, I guess I should clarify there's no maximum, the minimum is 18%. Okay, so, so, so that is that minimum because the applicant has put that into the plan or is that somewhere else. On, I'll clarify again on the dimensional standard chart within the RSMs zoning district, there is a minimum standard for right, there is just not a max. Okay, I see so that's the minimum and that's what the applicant is is committing to I guess right. So, so the second question I had in that same section of the video 6.3.3. I see that there is a insect in section B of that 6.3.3 a density bonus for RSM. Do you think that that would apply because this is on a major roadway I would assume that would be designated designated a major road roadway. I would apply here and is, is that a site plan thing or is that would that have to be approved in a development plan. So, we have not done an analysis to see whether or not that density bonus has it's applicable here. However, if it is applicable, they do not have to identify that on their development plan and that is something that they can take advantage of at the time of site plan. Okay, I mean from what I can tell I mean I guess I haven't done the analysis either but Okay, so it seems like it might be possible. I could not answer that question I don't know if they have enough frontage, because there is a frontage requirement in terms of what they would need to maintain so I do not know whether or not something that they would be able to take advantage of. Okay, thank you. So another question back to the open space requirements or you know this is so this is currently the plum here is open space and wreck and wreck and wreck. We don't typically see a lot of cases where we changed it from that. From designation to low density or, you know, residential. It seems to me like I mean I guess we don't have any standards to say if we are going to take land out of this designation and make it residential. It needs to satisfy some requirements or some. I mean we have we have I assume as a county, you know, open space and tree, save goals, right but but we don't have anything to. I mean, how would that align with some of the goals that we've discussed kind of in recent cases about open space and tree preservation. Yes, you're correct. We don't often see these types of requests in. In fact, in many areas where we have the recreation open space designation and we as staff when we see the application indicate that no development or certain types of development can't occur within that area. When this application came in. There was a request to change the future land use designation and and staff reviewed that request. Typically we'll look at our GIS layers in terms of the environmental constraints on the site. And in this case, when we pulled up the, when we pulled up the data, there was not the FEMA floodplain area that would coincide with what we normally see as the recreation open space area. In addition, the properties privately held so staff came to the conclusion because the mapping in some cases with respect to the future land use designation is done at such a large scale level that this was considered a mapping error. With that said, the applicant, you know, the property is currently residentially zoned so they could develop for the property for residential purposes under the existing zoning. However, with the request that came in with the application seeking higher density than what's there right now. We reviewed the form and felt that that modification made sense. Okay. Yeah, because currently it's zoned as our so they could build up to three single family homes there. Correct. Right. I had a question for transportation as well. So transportation has requested in attachment eight a or the applicant to provide an offsite sidewalk. And then I guess the applicant has decided not to do that. Could you tell me exactly where you are requesting that is that I mean I see that it's a long 751, but it's I guess not. It is not fronting their site, their parcel or so can you clarify exactly where you're requesting that additional offsite sidewalk. So this request was for the frontage of parcels I believe just to the south to avoid a gap in the system. Okay, so just to the south. Okay, so kind of close where there's that no build line riparian buffer on the development plan. Exactly. So it would it would connect with the existing sidewalk to the panelists raised development. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Yes. Great. And then, could I, I also just have a couple of questions for the applicant. One of the one of the things that struck me about this is that it is owned RSM or you're proposing to change it to RSM, which is confusing because that's multifamily but you're also saying you only want to build 11 single family homes or you're committing to that. I think part of the reason for that. Mr Perry is that you want to, you don't want some of the requirements or some of the restrictions on lot with maybe and lot area is that is that the primary reason that you chose this designation because it seems to me like an RS 10 would make just as much sense here because it's a four units an acre. Could you explain why you're requesting an RSM zoning to the applicant. Mr Perry, if you are. Okay, yeah, I'm muted. I'm sorry. Yeah, I was, I was, you know, my first development, like I said, just the primary residential in the downtown area, a lot of infill up. And I was just going by the recommendation Mr cradle. Originally it was 16 down, but I have not done townhomes and I'm, I'm, I'm, I've only done a single family home. And that's why I changed it doing the, you know, doing this whole process that I committed to just single family homes because that's what I know. And I don't want to step outside my comfort zone if you will. Okay. And, and, and you've said that you want to commit or keep the pond with you. Are you willing to make that a commitment on the development plan. Yes, I believe. I was believed that it's on it on the it's on the plan, not the zoning plan. I believe I'm saying that right. I was talking to Mr cradle, the civil engineer that is on the is on one of the plans just now in the zone of them that I want to I want to keep the pond. I think that's a great feature to the property. I remember when Mr. Carlton toured when he was alive, he took me around the property and he remember going in the pond and things of that nature he told me to the tour me. So I plan on keeping the pond. Okay, can we confirm that with staff that that is? I think plant longest, I mean, I should be able to keep it. I mean, I don't see why I couldn't. Sorry about that. Yes, Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. We will accept the text commitment that will allow the applicant to offer, committing to the fact that the pond will not be removed or modified. So I guess we would need some more specific language in terms of what exactly they're committing to. Okay, thank you. I guess we can see if an applicant wants to come up with more specific language. I guess I can wrap up, I've spoken a lot. I initially didn't like the RSM zoning here, but I thought about it and one of the things that I don't like about RS 20 and RS 10 is that the requirements for big lots, some of the neighbors said that this would not be in line with the character of the area, but in my mind, smaller lots are good in the long run because they can help us increase housing density while potentially protecting and saving open space. So I don't have quite an issue with maybe the smaller lots or even the number of units. I'm not, I think 3.9 units an acre is not wildly out of character with the area. However, having said that, I'm still, I feel like if this was zoned and as an open space, piece of land, and I feel like there should be a little bit more environmental protection, something above and beyond what is just required from the UDO. And so I feel like if the applicant would potentially put in some more environmental protections, which I think is what a lot of folks have discussed tonight, I would be a little bit more prone to vote for it. Right now I'm still on the fence and I'm willing, I'm interested in hearing what others say, but I kind of wish that there were some more environmental protections here. And I would also love for the applicant to be able to build sidewalks offsite. I think that's especially when the transportation department is echoing what the Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Commission is asking for. And so I'll stop there. Thank you, Chair. Great, thank you, Commissioner Alturk. Commissioner Morgan, you had your hand raised earlier. Do you have comments? And you're muted at the moment. Yeah, I know. I'm just trying to find the right button. No, I think Commissioner Alturk asked some of the same questions I had in mind. So that's why I've lowered it. Great, thank you. Commissioner Durkin. Yeah, I just wanted to clarify. I'm confused about whether there is actually a proffer regarding the pond. Planning to do something is not quite the same as committing to it. So if Mr. Perry can confirm whether or not it was an actual proffer or if it's something that he needs to confer with his engineer about, then it's either something we're bringing to the table now or are not. We just wanted to make sure everyone was on the same page on that. Is that a question to Mr. Perry? It is, yes. If it's actually a proffer or if it's just an intention, but not a commitment. No, it is a commitment. I don't see, I mean, I think that'd be a better question for Mr. Cradle, but I've expressed him that I want to keep it. I'll let him answer if we can keep, I don't know, it might be some regulations with the city. I'm not sure, but I'm sure. I think Mr. Cradle's still there. Yeah, he's there, so if you could answer that question, Mr. Cradle. That's a good question and concern. We will have to look at the actual outlet to the pond since this was man-made. We have to make sure that the outlet is safe for this kind of development and it meets all of the state standards. Typically, these older ponds do not, so I don't want to commit to not modifying the pond, but Mr. Perry wants to keep the pond and we will commit to the pond. Also, part of the designation of this being RSEM was to keep these environmental features all over the site and give us the flexibility of the houses as opposed to the RS20 or RS10 designation because we do have tree coverage area on this site. We've got stream buffers on this site. We've got boundary buffers against both the core land and the open space that's associated with Chancellors Ridge and that kind of tucked everything into what would be smaller lot. The purpose of this was to build the houses so that we kept all the environmental features in addition to these two large sewer events that go through the lot. Thank you. Thank you for that clarification. So just we're not putting, there's not a proper on the table for tonight, which I think is the right move because it seems like a big commitment to make right now about really factoring into the feasibility of that. I did have a question for staff. Jamie. One of the concerns, well, many of the concerns were environmental related issues and one question that came up that I wanted to make sure was answered was what kind of environmental requirements or testing are required at the site plan stage? Since this is just the development plan, it doesn't lay out the actual footprints of the houses or anything with a whole lot of great details. So at that stage, what is required that the developer will have to undertake and pass with whatever requirements are. Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. In terms of the testing, I'm not sure what you mean. Are you referring to something specific? If there's an EIS or if there's what they can do with the pond and with the sewer easements and the concerns about flooding, if there are things that will be done at the site plan stage that would address some of those concerns. Okay. I believe if the commission doesn't mind, Mike Irwin and others from Stormwater may be on the call to better help answer questions related to stormwater at the site plan level. That would be really helpful. Okay. Good evening commission. My name is Michael Irwin. I'm an engineer with the stormwater development review section. In regards to this parcel, they are going to need some sort of a stormwater control measure. So I would recommend that this pond be available for retrofit without having any more engineering survey data from Mr. Cradle. I wouldn't know what the current situation of the pond is. There's also sections of the site that are down slope from this pond because there's a ridge in the middle of the property. So I don't know how they're gonna get the water from the south side of the, or from sorry, from the west side of the development back up to the pond. And we'll need some other sort of stormwater control measure on the site. But keeping the pond right now appears to be a viable alternative for stormwater treatment. Okay, just so it's clear for everybody, the attendees that there are stormwater abatement measures that have to be undertaken at sites that are not reflected on the development plan. Sorry? Yes, but most definitely, yes, they have to go with the site plan, stormwater impact analysis, where they talk about the peak flow runoff and the full assessment of saltless treatments or any other of our regulatory requirements. And it's usually a document that's greater than 60 days along all sorts of engineering details. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Durkin. Before I recognize Commissioner Kenchin, I did just wanna note that Commissioner Miller has joined the meeting. Good to have you with us. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And we are on the Fox Place agenda item and the commissioner question and comment section. Chris, your attention. Thank you, Chair. Most of my questions have been answered already. I did have a couple more for the owner, Mr. Perry. I'm curious like there's no other access points other than 751. Is that correct? That's the only access to the property, 751. And then also Mr. Crado in his letter to the city said the price point will be three to five per unit. But I think I heard you say 500 to 750, which is a pretty big difference from what we saw. And then lastly, why no sidewalks? I mean, you're asking a lot from us in terms of making concession to turn this space into something that works for you, but you said no to the sidewalks. I'm curious about what the rationale is for saying no to the sidewalks. Those are my three questions to Mr. Perry. Mr. Perry, your welcome to answer questions. What was the first, all right, the first, the style, the first question I was, I don't, there doesn't appear to be any access points other than 751, there's no way to connect to the other neighborhoods. So you've only got the one way to access the property, which is, which appears to be a really tough turn from my vantage point at least. So I was wondering about that, if that's correct. Am I reading that correctly? If I'm just- Yeah, that's correct. That's correct. I went into one, one, one, one, one entry. And the sidewalk is, you know, I, you know, I have, I think is, I don't have a map in front of me. I think it only have about 70, 60 or 70 feet of frontage. So, I mean, that's, I mean, I mean, I'll commit to a sidewalk. I mean, I guess it is feasible for the 60 or 70 feet, but I don't know if I feel like they want me to take it all with a chance of ridge just crossing over, you know, Army Corps, another property. So that's why, you know, we said, you know, that's why we, that's why I said, no, no, South Walk, all the way to the Army Corps, I mean, all the way to the Chancellor's Ridge, South Walk. Can I chime in on that one? Yes, please. All right, so the sidewalk, which is required across the frontage of our site, which is 60 feet, and then going to the south of us, which is hundreds of feet, also has a great difference of over 20 feet. So the sidewalk would actually be out of sight down in the bottom, which belongs to the Army Corps of Engineers, which is also in a stream buffer. So development of that would actually hinder and cause more environmental issues than it would resolve. A nicer sidewalk would be actually from the back of the site to the open space through Chancellor's Ridge. Thank you. And the only other question was about the price point. Again, I saw the letter from Alfredo indicating 505, but I think I heard you say somewhere between 500 and 750, which is far from, I mean, we need middle housing in Durham. 500 is far from that. 325 is not that much better, but it is better. So what is it gonna be? Is it a 325 in a letter or is it 500 and 750 that you indicated earlier? It'll be 500 and 750, it'll be 500 and 750. Commissioner Tension, any other commissioner? Commissioner Miller, I see your hand raised. I wanna give other commissioners just a final moment. That's fine. Any other commissioners? Raise your hand actually or virtually, if you'd like to speak. Commissioner Williams. Yes, so actually looking at this project and to what commissioner Tert was saying earlier in terms of we need density. The issue with this is we're creating density with 11 homes between 500 and $700,000. And I don't think that that's actually density that Durham needs. Not to mention the concerns that the people in this area have. Because they live there daily, I don't think anyone can necessarily say whether or not their property will or will not flood. And because these people aren't just five or six year residents, most of them that spoke are 15 to 20 to 30 year residents. I have concerns as I always have impervious surfaces always create way more runoff than grass surfaces do. My other concern is there seems to be a little bit of disconnect between the engineer and the owner. So I've got an engineer saying that he doesn't wanna commit to saving a pond. It's man-made, but I have a owner that wants to save the pond. So I think that there's a miscommunication there which may present further hurdles with this project going forward. I have issues as far as the runoff, how that will be contained, whether or not a watershed will actually be in it. Within our UDO, a retention pond is mandatory for new texture. And there's a concern of how the water will move uphill by nature without some type of mechanical unit. Water tends to flow down. So if there is any possibility that less properties could be developed on this same lot, I think it will be met with less resistance and there still could be an addition to the area. I definitely have a commissioner kitchens concerns with a letter stating $325,000 and then a price point of over half a million almost three quarters of a million dollars a major difference. But that didn't seem to be the concern of the residents was the price point, whether they were unaware or not, it was more so about the traffic, the safety and what that's going to look like on the impact of those that already live there. And if nothing else is shown up is that the community has a greater voice than the few. And there's a lot of resistance to this in the commentary or the resistance to this appears to be consistent in the flooding issue. Flooding has gotten a lot worse. The majority of Durham is built in a floodplain and some homes have managed to escape that. But over time with us building in consistent areas and adding on to infrastructures that cannot support certain structures or overbuilding, I think we're continuing to add to the issues of flooding. And 751 Jordan Lake, what happens when there's massive rains and the Army Corps of Engineers or different aspects have to release rates from Jordan Lake like what does that look like? I know specifically growing up in Southern Durham I know exactly what that's like. I've traveled 751 and it's not much different than traveling highway 54 heading into Chapel Hill on a busy, busy day. So even though 11 homes may not seem like a lot right now the continuous structure of what Mr. Perry traditionally builds are quite a few homes in a seemingly small area with short driveways. And I would assume that these people would entertain so traffic will definitely increase right in, right out. And just looking at the overall plan Mr. Perry does exceptional work but I do think that the concerns in this area are valid and I think that they go well beyond just looking at the number of lots and looking at density. I think that the concerns of during construction building construction equipment in this area during the course of building the entire subdivision I think those are all very valid concerns at least as far as I'm concerned. I definitely have issues when it comes to flooding them on off. That's my comments. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. Commissioner Miller, I don't see any other hands raised. The floor is yours. Thank you, Mr. Chair. This is Tom Miller speaking and I apologize to everyone for being late. This is my actually first time ever to be late to a planning commission meeting in the last six years. I have met with the neighbors here and I've studied the staff report and I've looked at the development plan and quite frankly, in all my time on the commission this is the only case that I can remember where we've been asked to pull a property entirely out of land designated open space and recreation on the future land use map to make it available for development. We have from time to time been asked to adjust borders here and there and in some of those cases for really good stated reasons I may have supported that but this is extraordinary to me and I will acknowledge that all around the Jordan Lake watershed, we have allowed development that wise planning says we should not have allowed. Some of it we have been compelled to do after resisting mightily and I was part of that resistance in one capacity or another. I am disinclined to even for 2.81 acres or for 11 single family homes, so small a change to vote in favor of reducing land designated as open space and recreation in the future land use map for a property that is so close to the reservoir which soon we will be drinking from and quite frankly, our ability to grow and develop as a community in other places more suited for growth and development is dependent upon our ability to keep Jordan Lake the best drinking water source we can. It has not been so long ago that the newspapers covered the ridiculous efforts by the McCrory administration to float devices in the lake to help remediate some of its dreadful problems with water quality. It sure it seems like this is just a little project of what difference can it make, but we are killing Jordan Lake using the death by 1,000 cuts. I will not wield the knife even for so small a cut. I'm going to vote against this. Even if we were to approve the future land use map change this is a development plan with so few commitments. I don't have a very clear vision of what this development's going to look like. And although I'm sure you have covered it in my absence why we're using multi-family designation to build 11 single-family homes. I'm deeply troubled by that as well. Thank you very much for the opportunity to speak Mr. Chairman. I'll be ready to vote when. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. This is a final chance if any commissioners would like to speak if you can virtually raise your hand. While we wait, I will just also echo the concerns raised by many of the commissioners. And I plan to vote no when there are motions made on this item. I don't see any additional hands at this point. So I would ask for entertain a motion. If I may then Mr. Chairman, Tom Miller speaking. In connection with case A1900004, I move that this item be sent forward to the city council of Durham with a favorable recommendation. Thank you. I've moved by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Al Turk and we'll have a roll call vote. I apologize for the glare. I'm trying to get out of the sun. Commissioner Williams. No. Commissioner Morgan. No. Commissioner Johnson. No. Commissioner Amandalia. No. Commissioner Durkin. No. Commissioner Al Turk. No. Chair Busby. No. Commissioner Landfrey. No. Commissioner Kenchin. No. Commissioner Baker. No. Commissioner Lowe. No. And Commissioner McIver. Okay, the motion fails 11-1. I'm sorry, 11-1. Mr. Chair, my name was not called in the roll call. Oh, sorry, because I forgot you showed up. That's why I got 111. It should be 112. Commissioner Miller. No, please. Okay. I knew my math wasn't adding it correctly. Thank you for calling me out on that. It failed 112. Thank you. She skipped me earlier this evening, Commissioner Miller, so you're gonna get it. I'm falling out on my job. I apologize. And I'll entertain a motion on the zoning cases. Well, please. Mr. Chair, in connection with cases E1900005, I move that we send this item forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Moved by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Al Turk. And we'll have the roll call vote, please. Yes. Commissioner McIver. I mean, Commissioner Lowe. No. Commissioner Baker. No. Commissioner Kenchin. Commissioner Miller. Yeah, I wasn't ready. No. All right. Commissioner Landfried. No. Chair Busby. No. Commissioner Al Turk. No. Commissioner Durkin. No. Commissioner Amondola. No. Commissioner Johnson. No. Commissioner Morgan. No. Commissioner Williams. No. Okay, motion fails. One to 12. Thank you. Ms. Smith, before we move to our next item, you had mentioned an interest given the length of tonight's meeting and the large crowd assembled a potential break at some point. Yes. This might be a good time to take a quick recess and start back up at 7.30 if everyone is okay with that. We don't need a vote. We just need a consensus. Yeah, I would agree. All right, we'll see you at 7.30. And commissioners and attendees, you can just go mute and go off video and come back in 10 minutes. All right, good job, everyone. 7.30, you are here. Let me just so I can make sure that the staff is here so we can keep a records for the minutes. We will move to the next item on our agenda. And next up is the Chin Page Road case. And this is case A19 quadruple 018 and concurrent case Z19 triple 050. And we will start with the staff report. Good evening again. It's Jamie Sonyak with the planning department. I will be presenting the consolidated land use item for Chin Page Road. First slide, please. The agent for the application is Bob Zoomwell from McAdams. The property is located. There's several properties on the north side of Chin Page Road generally located at 5203. The site is located within the city's jurisdiction. It is located within the suburban tier. The request for this application again is to change the future land use designation of the site to office and change the zoning of the site to office and institutional. There is a request for a straight zoning of the property. There's no development plan associated with this site. Just as a little background which has been included in the staff report, this property is a remnant track that remains after the adjacent property, which is about 37 acres in size was purchased. That 37 acre track is subject to a development plan, which is legacy case Z07-21. That requires the construction of Crown Parkway along the Eastern property line. That development plan was for the FedEx facility to accommodate that site. And my understanding is there was a land swap between ownership groups and this property resulted in that. Next slide, please. The property is highlighted in red. It's roughly eight acres in size. The next photos depict the context of the area and site to the north appearing to get to the site. Next slide, please. There is just to give a context of the area. There's the Republic Services Recycling Facility. A church and approved office park again for the FedEx, as I mentioned before, and an auto repair service facility to the west directly to the north and east is the Crete side at Bethpage Residential Development. Across Chimpage Road to the south are additional residential developments which extend to Page Road along to the west along Chimpage Road and Chronicle Drive is Bethpage office which includes a pending zoning map change from ILD to OI with no development plan. Next slide, please. The context map shows the property, the existing zoning on the left and the office and institutional zoning on the right. Next slide, please. Future land use designation, the property is currently industrial and the applicant is proposing change it to office to coincide with the zoning request. Next slide. In terms of the comprehensive plan policies, the proposed zoning is not consistent with the future land use designation of industrial but the applicant is seeking the modification to be consistent. Staff has reviewed the industrial land use study and determined that this property is not suitable for the industrial designation given its size and the proximity to the residentially zoned land as shown on the context map and then described in the staff report the current industrial future land use designation does not serve as an appropriate transition between the residentially zoned land to the north and east. Staff has determined that the office designation is more consistent and more compatible with the adjacent land uses and that the requested office will allow for more complimentary transitional uses to be developed on the subject site resulting in more compatibility with the surrounding properties and allowing for a more cohesive overall development with the Beth Page community. Staff did express concerns in the staff report that without a development plan however, there is no way to address any potential impacts or mitigating factors associated with being adjacent to an industrial or low median density future land use designation. And staff also wanted to note that on the site will have access through adjacent lots, therefore it does not meet the intent of policy 252E. Next slide please. Next slide please. The staff determines that the requests are consistent with the comprehensive plan and applicable policies except where I have been noted. I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you Ms. Sanyak. We're gonna open the public hearing. We have four people who signed up in advance. All are proponents. And so I'll just read their names off and then we'll provide, since they're all proponents they can have a total of 10 minutes unless we determined to change the rules and then we can see if there's anyone else who would like to speak on the item. Ms. Smith. I can keep time, I was just letting you know. I can split it into two and a half minutes each or just they can just talk and I can track it as they go, either way. Okay, that's great. Thank you. I'll just read off the names. They may have a plan on how they'd like to proceed. We have Patrick Becker, Rob Griffin, Kevin Walls and Bob Zoomwald. I'm present, Rob Griffin here. Patrick Becker here. I'll probably be the main speaker followed by Mr. Walls and then I think our team will be happy to answer any questions and hopefully take a lot less than 10 minutes. That's great. You may proceed, Mr. Becker. Good evening, Chairman Busby, members of the Planning Commission. I'm Patrick Becker with Morningstar Law Group. I live at 2614 Stewart Drive. I'm here tonight representing tribe properties for this agenda item. For those of you who have been on the Planning Commission for at least a year I'm pretty sure this item will be deja vu all over again. We had a practically identical case on your September 2019 agenda. Back then that case was for 23 acres whereas tonight's agenda item only covers about nine acres. By way of introduction, I'd like to give some historical background on the overall Bethpage project located here along Chimpage Road. It's been my privilege to work with tribe properties on the Bethpage development for the past 14 years. Back in 2006, tribe properties was our lead office and industrial developer for Bethpage. An assemblage that amounted to 450 acres located pretty close to RTP and RGU airport. Pursuant to what we designed and what was approved about 14 years ago, the residential section of Bethpage has been built out as an age restricted community called Creekside which represents a great neighborhood here in Durham. Unfortunately, the office and industrial section of Bethpage has languished for the most part since it was approved unanimously by the Durham County Board of Commissioner. Back then the Board of County commissioners consisted of Becky Herron, Helen Rekow, Lewis Cheek, Phil Cousin, and Michael Page. I recall Commissioner Becky Herron being very insistent that the Bethpage team create enough acreage zoned IL to accommodate around 1 million square feet of space and that is what we did. Back then before the great recession, we thought Durham needed a large swath of IL zone property to compete for a major corporate headquarter. Well, the world certainly has changed since then. Given that the IL zoning on the 8.8 acres we were talking about tonight allows for either office or industrial uses, we wish to rezone these 8.8 acres to allow for either office or multifamily. We think that is a better fit for the adjacent Creekside neighborhood and it allows tribe properties as the leading office developer in Durham to continue marketing this site for office use. Next, what I'd like to discuss briefly is our team's decision not to submit a development plan with the zoning map change to OI. Again, going back 14 years, our team undertook a massive TIA for Bethpage covering over 400 acres. The Bethpage TIA as part of that development plan runs with the land as part of the zoning. That TIA accounted for potentially high peak hour traffic generation from these 8.8 acres and any use allowed under the OI zoning district contemplated in tonight's agenda item would be equal to or more likely less than what we accounted for in the original TIA. In fact, the staff report states that the anticipated traffic generation will be reduced by about 2,600 trips per day. Also, since tribe properties does not have an end user at this time it's impossible to scope a traffic impact analysis. Keep in mind Durham city ordinance is including but not limited to the UDO place limits on this site in regards to noise, lighting, building height no more than 50 feet and pretty significant boundary buffers under UDO section 9.4 to give the neighbors comfort for this rezoning without a development plan. For all these reasons we respectfully request your recommendation of approval and now I'll turn it over to Mr. Kevin Walls. So I'm kind of representing a lot of the residents of Precited Bethpage. I've been a resident there now for just coming up onto five years one of the original residents. And we've been speaking positive to change all these incendiary parsnays around us from industrial to office industrial. We understand the uses. We've covered that several times and multifamily or even office fits into the design I was originally presented to us when we purchased here in 2015. So that's why I'm here to just speak positive to that. I'm on several committees and councils here within the subdivision and I think that the majority of the people here is who I'm speaking for. That'll be end of my statement. Mr. Walls, could you give us your mailing address please? I'm sorry about that. Kevin Walls 1027, Brandwell Drive Durham. Thank you. Any additional comments? Rob Griffin or Bob Zumwalt? Hi, Rob Griffin speaking. I'm a Raleigh resident 4901 Glen Forest Drive in Raleigh. Representing Trial Properties and the owner of the site. The site has some severe topo issues. The site were to connect both to the planned creek side, phase five, as well as Crown Parkway. It's approximately 30 plus feet of topo it had to deal with over a relatively short distance to connect the two. Going to an OI zoning gives the site a little more flexibility for a smaller footprint, more nimble building footprints. They could be anything from office building to townhomes to being keeping with creek side. And we just think it makes the overall site more marketable, provides a much greater transition for the residential between creek side and the IL zoning, both the Republic and the new FedEx facility going in. It's just really fits the transitional nature of uses. I think to Mr. Walz's point, far better than having the IL right up against the current residential zoning. Thank you. Bob Zumwalt, would you like to speak as well? I'm just here to answer questions. I appreciate it. I'll just mute myself. Thank you. Thank you. So those are the individuals who signed up. If you are attendance and you would like to speak during the public hearing, if you could just raise your hand virtually and we will provide you the opportunity to speak. I don't see anyone else raising their hand. I'll give it one more moment. No one else is stepping forward. So we will close the public hearing and commissioners. If you can raise your hands, I'll call on you. I'll start with commissioner Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I have a question for staff, if I may. And as district or district zone like this with office institutional against a PDR, what is the base requirement for the buffer in terms of width and opacity? And I realized that there would be alternatives under the interactive buffer model and also using a berm or a hedge. Mr. Miller, let me look that up for you while I don't have that number off the top of my head, but I'm pulling up the chart now. So if the property is in the OI district and is adjacent to a PDR in the suburban tier, it would either be a 0.4 or 0.6 opacity, which would require. If I may, what would the width be? That's what I was gonna get to just. Oh, I'm sorry. That's okay. It would either be a 20 foot or a 30 foot width. And if it's 20 feet, it would be a six? No, the 20 feet coincides with the 0.4. Okay, what if it's 30 feet? That would coincide with 0.6. Really? That's correct. In other words, the narrower it gets, the less opaque it has to be. Why would anybody have 30 feet? You can only do the less, the smaller limit if the adjoining property has already provided a buffer, which the previous best page zoning, I can check it, I think it's a 20 foot, but I can check that. Okay, I get it now. So if there's a buffer on the other side. That's right. Right, okay. But it, and so, but we're looking at a 0.4 opacity. And what's the height limit for buildings in a straight OI in this situation? I believe I put that in the staff report, but I will. I'm sorry, you probably did. I apologize. That's okay. Just bear with me and I'll pull it up again, 50 feet. So Mr. Chair and my colleagues on the commission, I intend to vote for this, but I would prefer to be voting for it with a development plan that had at least some commitments improving the transition quality of this property against the residential next door. I believe that the buffer requirements are really not adequate if we're operating on a property that could have buildings as tall as 50 feet. But since I see this as an incremental improvement over the industrial zoning that's on the property and because the neighbors actually favor this rezoning, I'll be voting for it. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. My dog seconds your motion apparently. Other commissioners who would like to speak, you may raise your hand. I don't see any others. I'll also just echo Commissioner Miller. I voted for something similar as Mr. Biker mentioned. I'd rather have the development plan as well, but I believe moving from the current zoning to the proposed zoning is a step in the right direction and hearing the neighbors are supportive gives me comfort to support this. Any final thoughts, commissioners? Commissioner Baker. I'll just say one thing real quick that, you know, I think both of these zoning districts by themselves are unsustainable sprawl. And so I don't see a major consequence in approving, you know, voting to recommend approval of a change in the zoning map, especially given the fact that some of the adjacent residents are in favor. Thank you. If there are no other comments from commissioners, I will entertain the first of two motions on this item. Mr. Chair, I move in connection with case A1900018, the property at Chin Page Road, that we send the future land use map amendment forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Moved by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Alturk, and we'll have a roll call bill please. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Amidalia. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Langbreed. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes, please. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. Yes. And Commissioner McIver. Yes. This passes 13 Dario unanimous. Thank you. And we'll take a motion on the zoning case as well. Mr. Chair, in connection with case Z1900050, the property at Chin Page Road, I move that we send this rezoning request forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation. Second. Moved by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Morgan and the roll call vote. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yes. Commissioner Amidalia. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alturk. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Landbreed. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Kenshin. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. Yes. Commissioner McIver. Passes unanimous 13 to zero. Thank you. We will move to our next two cases, our zoning map change proposals. The first is Carrington Woods 2 and this is case Z1900037. And we'll start with the staff report. Good evening, Jamie Sanyak again with the planning department. Cover sheet says Carrington Woods. Let's just make sure it's the correct PowerPoint. Do you want to go to the next slide please? I believe that's the right case. Okay. Great. Sorry about that. The applicant agent is Glenwood Homes LLC. The property is located at 833 Clayton Road. It is pending an annexation petition. The property is just under nine acres. It's located within the suburban tier. The applicant is seeking a rezoning request to residential suburban 10 with a development plan or up to 23 single family lots. There is no future land use map amendment associated with this development. Next slide. Property is highlighted in red. It is heavily wooded. There are a number of easements that are shown on the plan as well as an existing wetlands on the property. Next slide. The pictures depict the properties, the property and the area to the east and west contains mostly residential subdivisions, Twin Lakes and Woodland Park, specifically both rezoned at the RS 10 level. Most of those homes were constructed in the 1990s on 10,000 square foot lots. Additionally, you'll see on the area as well as the development plan, there are three street stubs from the subdivisions to which will be, which will require connections from those developments to the site. Southern high school is found just northeast of the property. Next slide please. Just, those are additional photos of the area. Next slide. This site is located within the suburban tier. It's also within the Falls Jordan Lake watershed protection overlay district. You'll see the existing zoning on the left and the proposed RS 10 zoning on the right. Next slide please. This slide depicts the existing future land use designation as low density residential, which is consistent with the application. Next slide. And this slide shows the development plan, which has been included in the staff report, which shows the access points, tree coverage areas and the project boundary buffers, as well as the density and the unit type. Next slide. In terms of key commitments, the applicant has committed to single family detached as the permitted building type restricted the number of units to be a max of 23. And then they've provided also a project boundary buffer along the property boundaries where one is not required under the UDO. Next slide. In addition, there are graphic commitments discussed on the development plan, including a variety of brief types, building materials and a requirement for covered front entries. Next slide. The proposed zoning is consistent with the future land use designation of low density residential, which is consistent with this request. The proposal is consistent with the other policies that have been included on this screen and further detailed in the staff report. Next slide. And staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and other applicable policies and ordinances. And I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you, we appreciate it. We'll open the public hearing. We had six individuals sign up in advance, two proponents and four opponents. If it makes sense to fellow commissioners that seems still fair to me to operate with 10 minutes per side, that would give each of the opponents more time than we actually gave the opponents in the earlier case, two and a half minutes per opponent. So I see heads nodding. So let's proceed. We have Penny, Sadat Sakalovsky and Garek Sevilla signed up to speak in support. Yes, good evening. This is Garek Sevilla. Penny and I are working together on this. I was planning to give a statement, maybe take five minutes, maybe less. And Penny can either correct me after I'm done or say some additional remarks if she wishes. Does that sound good to you, Penny? Yes, that's fine. Yeah, you may proceed. That sounds good. Okay, great. Like I said, I'm Garek Sevilla, I'm an attorney. I represent the applicant here at Glenwood Homes. About two years ago, the planning commission considered Glenwood Homes's request for a straight rezone of the same property from RS 20 to RS 10. There was no development plan submitted with that. And the commission did not recommend approval and the concerns that were expressed at that time fell into really three, three categories. One was the absence of a development plan that limited the number of units and showed the subdivision configuration with a little more clarity. The second bucket of concerns was really just to traffic impact along Clayton Road and through the adjacent subdivisions. And finally, there was some concern about disturbance of wetlands that are on the site. The case went to the city council in December of 2018 and it voted to deny the application. So Glenwood went back to the drawing board and we created a development plan to address many of the concerns that we could. And so now we're back before the city with requests to rezone again from RS 20 to RS 10. But we have a development plan this time. As Ms. Sunyak covered, the plan limits the maximum number of units. The 23 building type has been limited to single family detached residences. And we have an update on the price. We expect to sell these at about 250,000 per home. When we submitted the annexation petition in August of last year, we'd estimated 225, but prices have gone up. The plan also proposes three access points. There are stubs as Ms. Sunyak alluded to. One on Meadowcrest Drive to the east, Alpha Drive to the west, and Derry Road to the south. Last time there was an issue about whether there could be a separate entrance to the site from Clayton Road. The idea being that the new residents of this subdivision would not need to drive through the existing neighborhood. And I would just point out that it was the opinion of Mr. Bill Judge with the transportation group and also of Ms. Sikadla, our design engineer that NCDOT would not permit such an entrance. And so the only access options to this site really are the three existing roads that are stuck to this site. The plan also shows the precise location of the wetlands and the amount that can be disturbed. And the amount of disturbance, we minimized it to just fit the road that plan to connect to Derry Road to the south. And the area of disturbance is so small that we don't expect the state water resources division to require any wetland mitigation. So we've done our best to try to minimize the disturbance. And also I just wanna point out that Glenwood went beyond what was required of the development plan by including a boundary buffer along the perimeter of the property. It's 25 feet in places where we plan to include tree coverage. And then it's 10 feet in areas where there will be no tree coverage. And I just want to note that this boundary buffer was included after we had met with the residents in September of last year. After submitting the application, we notified all of the owners on the list that we received from Ms. Sunyak. I believe it's all owners within 600 feet. And 10 residents came to the meeting venue which was the East Regional Library near the site off of Lit Creek Road. And we shared with them the initial draft of this development plan that's on the screen. And we also shared a sketch subdivision plan which is just kind of our concept for how we plan to subdivide the site consistent with the development plan under consideration. The stuff that sketched is very similar to the one that Glenwood had shared with the residents about two years ago. It was mind-blowing at that meeting that the attendees were largely appreciative of the commitments made on the development plan specifically the limit on the number of bits and some more clarity around access and how wetland disturbance would, how that would unfold. There were still things about traffic, however, just to be completely candid. And as to that, all I can really say is, I'd ask the commission to align that under current zoning, 15 units can be built. We would still have the issue of interconnection to the three hubs that stub at the property. And so really the traffic impact I think needs to put on what the instrumental increase on traffic is going from 15 to 23 units. And I highlight that according to the staff report, the increase in units is projected to add just 87 vehicles per 24 hour period. Now just to put that in context, that's about a 1% increase in traffic volume that's in the report, which it looks from the footnote that it was measured in 2017. As for traffic that will go through the existing neighborhoods, as to that, I would just say that there were three different access points that will interconnect the three roads to site. And those will all share those 87 units daily trips. We're not dismissing the concerns about traffic. We're not saying that they're completely insignificant or won't be felt. It's just that our view is that the impact isn't substantial enough to deny the reason, particularly when it's consistent with the future designation and the surrounding neighborhoods are all zone RS 10. So in reaching a decision, I hope that the commission will recognize the efforts that Glenwood Homes has made at Transparency and communicating with the residents and efforts to exceed the minimum requirements in an effort to address the residents concerns. And so in some, we used to ask that the commission favorably recommend this proposed zoning map change to the city council. Thank you. And Penny, Cicadillo, do you have any additional comments? I think Eric covered it very well. I do wanna state as an engineer, it does seem logical to connect all the roads, connect all the utilities, all the sewer, all the water will now have our circulation pattern through this subdivision. It is designed to match what is in the surrounding area and appears to be a legitimate request for reason. Thank you. And as I said, we have four individuals who signed up and listed themselves as opponents. Joe Peck, Quincy Ratcliffe, Denise Reeves and Kenneth Wiggins. And so Joe, Mr. Peck, if you're with us, we'll let you start and each of you have up to two and a half minutes. Joe Peck, are you with us? You can raise your hand or you can star nine to unmute yourself. I see Quincy Ratcliffe. We'll move to Quincy Ratcliffe. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Okay. Thank you all for the opportunity to speak this evening. First and foremost, I would like to say to Mr. Cabila, thank you for the clarity in which you expressed this evening with the site plan that you have. We wish as the neighbors and the ones who live in these areas, we wish that was shared with us prior to this meeting. But he has done a good job with sharing the information that we have asked for since 2018. Now, I guess you need some background for me. Do you still want that? Or just go ahead and move in. We would love for you, if you can share your name and you've already given us your name, your address and please share your thoughts about the proposal over the next two minutes or so. Okay, my name is, again, my name is Quincy Ratcliffe. My address is 3219 Woodland Park Road. I live at the corner, which is direct, which is the main entrance to Derry, to the Carrington Woods entrance, which is Derry and Woodland Park Road. My mother built this home in 1991, which is that she has since passed away in 2017. So I have pretty much been with her since 91, although I moved away and came back. So I say that to say, the owners of the property, everyone who was speaking and have participated in these meetings, we have owned our properties since for 15 plus years. So we have a great deal of compassion. It refers to the upkeep and the growth of the community. So my concerns, along with my neighbors and some of them will share them as well as I will. Initially, they were about the, I'm sorry, traffic, the growth of this area. We have greatly outgrown the infrastructure for this area in which we live. So to add Carrington Woods and with all though they expressed, there are three entrances. One is at Woodland and the other two that will lead out to Meadowcrest and no wood. They're still, what they did not share is there is only one road that those streets will lead out to and that's Clayton Road. Clayton Road is greatly impacted by traffic when Southern High School is in session and when we are working during the rush hours. DOT has not addressed what the growth of this area as far as we can see at this time. There are other communities, along with Carrington Woods that has been developed for instance, Coakley Farms. Coakley Farms has more than 100 homes, single-family homes. And if you add two cars per 100 houses, that greatly exceeds the traffic in which we can handle here. We have had three fatalities that I know of. And we just want something to be addressed in reference to that. Thank you. And also, oh, I'm sorry. No, please finish your thought, but you're on time. Okay, and the last two concerns that I have is safety, of course it's safety and it's the infrastructure and the sidewalks. The city we have met with Ms. Soniac City, the planning committee, well, city planning. We have met with them. We've done everything that we're supposed to do. So there is a projected date to put in sidewalks along Clayton and Freeman Road. Those dates to start is as of August 2020. We don't know if that's still in place. However, there's just so many concerns that need to be addressed in reference to the traffic that has not been shared with us. But we've heard some things from Mr. Sovila and Glenmore Holmes tonight that we wish was shared prior to today. We are trying to work with them. The last meeting was September 29, 2019. I think there were enough time to meet again prior to this pandemic and quarantine so that we could all work together and making sure this takes this both as pleasantly for everyone. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Denise Reeves. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. All right. Thanks for giving us a chance to speak on this proposal. I'd like to echo everything that Quincy said. I'm also concerned with the traffic. 23 homes would equal greater than 46 cars, which is way too much traffic, even without rush hour. Again, as she spoke when Southern high school is in session, the traffic is atrocious. And to add those extra cars would be impossible. We live at 917 Glenrose Drive, which is adjacent to Clayton Road. So for us to be able to get out onto Clayton Road at any given time is just an absolute nightmare. It doesn't matter the time of the day. Also, I would like a little more elaboration on the wetlands. It's my understanding that any development near around or through wetlands is gonna destroy it, even if it's a very small percentage. So I would like a little elaboration as to what they're gonna do. And if they do develop into those wetlands, how it's going to disturb it and or destroy it. Thank you. Thank you. And finally, we have Kenneth Wiggins. And you can, can you start? Yeah. Can you hear me? Yes. Oh, okay. Thanks for the opportunity to speak this afternoon and listening to Quincy and I think Denise. Pretty much what I had here on the notes that I was writing down, she'd be pretty much covered it. And my concerns were pretty much the same thing as theirs, pretty much the traffic. Because like I said, when Southern High School is in session, you know, it's pretty rough. You know, I live on Meadowcrest, 14 Meadowcrest Drive, which the development they're gonna be doing is behind me. And when I come out to Clayton Road, sometimes it's like, you know, playing dodgeball to get out there because it's a tree line that kind of blocks my vision to the left. And I guess kind of take a chance a lot of times. And then when it gets really heavy and traffic, it's kind of rough. Coming out onto Clayton Road from Meadowcrest. And then when you're in schools and you've got kids walking and the kids aren't walking on sidewalks, they're crossing the street, which is to me is a safety, a safety problem there because you got all these kids that are getting out at around three o'clock, they're making their way home and then you got all this traffic and they're crossing the street and there's no sidewalks, a limited amount of sidewalks for them to walk on, to get home. So that's a safety concern of mine because that Southern high school is in a very deep curve. And unfortunately, a young lady lost her life there a few years back coming around that curve and she was a high school student. So it's a very dangerous curve. I have a cousin that lives in the curve and every time I go to her house, I gotta make sure I turn all the way around to come out. So just saying it's pretty safe, safety issue that we're concerned about when we add traffic to what's already here. And also, like I said, I've been living here for 20 plus years when the first house is on Meadowcrest, actually the first house on Meadowcrest. And like when I bought the property back then, the developer that we were buying from, he wanted to buy the property that they're now developing on. And he told me, he said, well, if you choose the lot you're on, you won't have to worry about ever having anybody behind you because there's a creek and wetlands back there and you can't develop on that. And I was like, okay, so I chose the lot that I have which is 14, so for that reason. And of course, fast forward, things change. I'm sure time changes, but in my mind I'm like, what has changed? The creek's still there, the wetlands are still there. I don't know, why is there now a capability to develop in that area? And so pretty much that's all the concerns I had, pretty much the safety, traffic and wetlands as covered before. So thank you for your time. Thank you. If there's anyone else who'd like to speak who has not yet spoken, please raise your hand and we'll call on you. I see Natalia Russell. Natalia, are you able to speak? I see your hand raised and we'll give you one more moment if you're interested in speaking that you may during the public hearing. Mr. Chair, is there any way that we can offer these people some suggestions or technical assistance that might make it easier for them to speak? I mean, I'm concerned about having two people who are here and who've indicated desire to speak but can't. Yeah, I mean, we told them numerous times, star nine if you're on by phone, if you're on Zoom, we've got staff who are helping make folks queued up to speak. So if Natalia Russell, if you are interested in speaking, please go ahead. I see Penny Sacadlo has her hand up as well, but she's already spoken during the public comment period. And Chris, if you can help me out, there's a 919-308-1389 number who has their hand raised as well. Hello, can you hear me? Yes. Hi, sorry. This is Natalia Russell. Thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. I actually say at 3301 Whitland Park Road, which is on the corner adjacent from Ms. Ratcliffe in Derry, Whitland and Derry. And I will say that my concerns mimic those that you've already heard. This is the third time that this rezoning has been proposed and the concerns remain pretty much the same. The traffic concerns and safety concerns are at the forefront. We really don't feel that DOP has properly assessed the area. There's also the impact to wildlife and conservation. We pretty much have wildlife in our front yards now. And there's very little trees in this neighborhood because it's just overly saturated and populated. And I would implore you to think about the fact that the DOT, I can't remember who spoke earlier, where they basically advised that a entrance and exit point was denied onto the main thoroughway of Clayton. And that is because this area is overly populated and saturated already. So the additional I think of 23 homes would definitely increase the amount of traffic. The safety concerns regarding the high school students, currently there are no sidewalks. They are walking on the side of the street to and from school. And to be quite honest with the COVID, you have families now walking around the neighborhood constantly with the traffic that we have right now. And it is very concerning because there's really nowhere for them to walk other than the street. Sheik Road, excuse me, Clayton Road continues to be a bottleneck to Sheik Road. If you are commuting anywhere, you are basically stuck. You are at the mercy of the traffic that we currently have with the existing neighborhood. And just because there is a patch of land that is between Twin Lakes and Clayton Crossing, it doesn't mean we should wedge in 23 or be quite transparent, even 14 homes because it's just too saturated. I mean, yes, we do understand that there's three exit points, but to Ms. Ratcliffe's point, two of them, there's only one way in and one way out. So what kind of relief are we really getting? So the main entrance would really be Woodland and Dairy. And Woodland is a very busy street as it is. It connects most of the main street vessels in Twin Lakes. It's just not a good idea. I just, I mean, this is my third time speaking on this issue. My concerns remain the same. We are concerned with the safety of the children in this neighborhood and the overly populated saturation of this quarter town. Thank you. Thank you very much. I don't see anyone else raising their hand. I'll give it one more moment and seeing no one else, we will close the public hearing and commissioners, this is your time. If you want to raise your hands, I'll start with Commissioner Miller who has his hand raised. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to make sure I understand by asking some questions, but I'll begin by saying when this came to us before, having met with the neighbors and understood their concerns and my biggest concern was the absence of a development plan. And I can remember that we pleaded with the developers to include a development plan to provide these neighbors with greater level of assurance about what was going to go in here. And the answer was it was too expensive to do a development plan for projects of small and that they wouldn't consider it. So I voted against it, at least in part for that reason. But I want to make sure I remember well from the other case. So I have a question for Ms. Cicaldo and also, I'm sorry, is it Cicadlo? Cicadlo, and maybe staff can answer this too. This development plan limits the development on this property to 23 single family detached houses. That comes out to about 2.7 units an acre. If that limitation were not present or if this was just a straight RS-10 rezoning, Ms. Cicadlo, you are an engineer. How many single family homes do you think under the RS-10 zoning you might put on this property? Given the limitation, certainly you have played with it and figured that out. I believe that the pure math says it would be 30, but I think that the 23 would be the most that would logically go on it. It looks like it may be less, but it is capped at 23. There is additional tree-save area buffers and the wetlands will all be in open space. So there will be a lot of area preserved. I'm no engineer or land use planner, but as I look at this property and imagine how your internal street system might work, I see the road coming in at Meadow Lane, perhaps turning north to a cul-de-sac or a bulb, and then proceeding kind of in an S-shape down to Alpha, and then another road that would run across the wetlands in that area where you say wetlands to be removed in order to access Jerry Road, and that lots would be organized on either side of these roads and that bulb that would go up towards the north. Is that kind of how you saw it happening? That is kind of how I saw it happening. There is not a lot of flexibility when you are connecting three roadways and trying to limit the crossing of the wetlands to as perpendicular as possible. And the reason you're removing those wetlands is to provide for that crossing. That is correct. So can you tell me what you anticipate, although it's not shown on the development plan and does not have to be, I'm assuming that there, some place on this plan, there will be a place for stormwater mitigation. Can you tell me, I'm sure you've thought about that, where that would go and what it would look like? Yes, it will be some sort of storm measure consisting of a drop-on or sand filter, probably adjacent to the wetlands in the southwest corner because that is where the property drains. So I'm looking at your development plan sheet three, sheet, well, it's S-1 of three. Correct. And there is a schematic of a tree that says proposed tree coverage area. Is that, in that vicinity, is that where we're talking about the stormwater mitigation? Yes, it would either be to the left of that tree or to the south of that tree on the other side of the wetlands. So we don't have Topo on your development plan, but I'm assuming that, and based upon my recollection, especially when you're over on the east side of the property in your in the backyards of the neighbors there, your property is considerably lower from them. And so the drainage essentially runs south towards the wetlands, but then when you get to the wetlands, it might rise only gently, a little bit on the southern side of the wetlands where Dairy Road connects. Is that correct? Is that my perception correct? That is correct. Yes, sir. Do you, will it be necessary to have some sort of stormwater control measure on the south side, separate from the one on the north side of the wetland property? It depends on how much area we use for, depends on which device we use. I anticipate it's gonna be closer to the tree shape, but I need to allow myself some flexibility on the other side of that wetlands because that's all gonna be open space anyway. What's all going to be open space? The area where you have the buffer on the southern border, that's open space. And then going north towards that tree shape is open space. All the wetlands are open space and going over towards Mr. Wiggins yard is open space because of the wetlands. Okay, and I mean, I can see where the wetlands to remain, and I know that will be open, but you envision that your site plan will include even more open space beyond those boundaries. Is that correct? Is that what I understood you to say? That is correct. So those are my questions primarily, excuse me. Thank you, Mr. Miller. Actually, I was gonna go ahead and just finish my comments. Okay. So I'm usually the neighborhood guy on the planning commission. And I think I still am. However, this time, we look at this property and I consider how it might be developed in the future. I note that it's entirely surrounded with RS-10, with single-family homes, RS-10 under optimal conditions is three to four units an acre around there. And this is gonna come in at 2.69 units an acre. We're going to have boundary buffers between separating single-family homes from single-family homes, something that the code does not require. I am very sympathetic to the whole Clayton Road problem, especially that curve that happens just as you're going from west to east on Clayton Road. That curve around there makes the site line tricky. And I get all of that. My problem is that ultimately, this is a piece of property that is going to be developed. And I do not see it at any point in the future, anybody coming along and proposing a development for this piece of property that has fewer units or a general scheme more consistent with the surrounding development than this one. I anticipate that some of my colleagues on the planning commission may have some pause that this piece of property is to be developed with so few units. I think the most important consideration in a situation like this is having a residential infill on a parcel like this that is consistent so that the new people have what the older residents have and that it is all relatively seamless. I would be very concerned if there was only one attachment to the existing neighborhood so that all the cars had to come and go from one place. But here there are three and are they all going to be used equally? Probably not. Probably not. But certainly there will be some division of uses. And I know that if you live in this area and you have to put up with Clayton Road one more trip per day, one more car on that road just seems excruciating. But the simple fact is this piece of property and other pieces of property along Clayton Road are gonna get developed. My own view and my own advice to the neighborhood which is unwanted is that I just don't see a proposal getting better for you than this. And for that reason, I'm inclined to vote for this. However, I can be convinced otherwise if my colleagues on the commission come up with reasons I have not thought of. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Another commissioner out there. Thank you, Chair. And thanks again to the neighbors for your comments. You brought up some concerns about safety and traffic that I think are warranted. I agree with commissioner Miller that when he was talking about the curve on Clayton Road, I mean, when I went out there, it was, I mean, it's something that is quite scary. So I can see the concern there. I was on the fence about this case about two years ago and I ultimately voted for it because I thought it was a reasonable infill project. Almost everything around this piece of property is rezoned RS 10. Some things are probably more, it's possible that some of these parcels are more dense than this will end up being. As commissioner Miller was alluding to and speaking about just now. One of the things that I think that I like about this project as well, and I appreciate what the developer and the applicant have done is that they have added buffers that are not required. They have preserved the wetlands or most of the wetlands. It seems like from what I can tell, the open space requirements, they have actually exceeded them, which we don't always see from a 15% requirement to 20% is what they are providing. 25% tree coverage, which is a little bit more than sometimes we see. And so I do appreciate a lot of those things. Again, I feel like it is quite reasonable and for some of the same reasons that commissioner Miller pointed to, which is that this is now zoned RS 20, which means someone can easily or probably develop 15 single-family homes that will not be considerably different from 23 single-family homes in terms of traffic and impact. So for those reasons, I'm also inclined to support this. I did have a just because the question of sidewalks came up, I want to ask staff just to clarify for us and for the neighbors, when this, if this is built, the developer would be required to build sidewalks along the frontage of their property on Clayton Road. Is it just on the side, on that side of, on their side of Clayton Road, or are there other sidewalk requirements? I just can't remember when I went out there, but. Perquina Thomas transportation. So they would be required to build sidewalks just on their side of Clayton Road, it's on the south side along the frontage. Yes. Okay, great. And while I have you here, the BPAC did recommend traffic calming devices. I guess your comment to them was that it wasn't a specific enough recommendation. I am curious though, because in a recent case, you did actually ask the applicant to provide traffic calming devices, I think because they were, it was a little bit more specific, you asked them to provide them, or I think you may have recommended that they provide them on roads that connect to other neighborhoods, right? So the applicant was proffering traffic calming devices that were more specific with a specific type of measure, which we could then enforce at the site plan stage. In this case, just saying you would provide them, it could just be a stop sign, which is not really getting to the point of what you're trying to achieve. Yeah, but if the applicant was to say, well, we could provide traffic calming devices along or right at Dairy Road, for example, for example, that would be something enforceable and in your mind, something desirable. Along with a specific type of measure, because every measure is not appropriate in every location, so we would want to evaluate that as well. Okay, and you wouldn't be able to do that tonight, so we couldn't, if I asked the applicant for something like that, it wouldn't be specific enough for you to be able to say, we're comfortable with that commitment, is that correct? Right, I would want to look at the specific layout of the area, just to make sure it was appropriate in that setting. Okay, thank you. So I guess for the applicant, I mean, I do have just to follow up on that, I do think that some of the concerns that have been raised are about traffic and about safety and about, and I do wonder if some traffic calming devices along some of the three access points would really go a long way, and I know you can do that at Site Plan, but I think it's always a good gesture to the neighbors to do something like that at this stage in the process, and I'm curious if you would be, I guess I'm not gonna ask you to do that tonight, but if you could try to do that or work with staff to do that before the vote at City Council, would you be willing to do that or have you considered that? Yes, this is Penny again. It is obvious that we have thought about it, we offered it. One of the dilemmas we have is, as your traffic engineer has stated, you have to pick something that's appropriate for a particular situation, and in two of these connections, we're one house away from an intersection, so you have to be, there's already gonna be a stop sign there, so we were thinking that traffic calming would be better suited in the middle of the project to slow things down in the middle of the project because each end has an intersection within one width of a house, and so that's the dilemma we got into, but the short answer is yes, we have thought about it, yes, we are willing to talk about it. I don't know if we can get as specific as we can without having our subdivision plan completely visible to everybody that needs to approve it. Yes, okay, thank you, that's very helpful. Thank you. Okay. Yeah, I guess I will wrap up and say that I think for some of the same reasons as Commissioner Miller, I'm inclined to vote in favor of this. I think it's a reasonable request, thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Alturk, Commissioner Baker. I have a lot of similar things to say. I had some of the same questions, so I won't ask those. This area really does lack sidewalks, and that's frustrating, and that's because of the past and the current priorities of the North Carolina Department of Transportation, and it's also because in the past, developers were not required to build sidewalks. That is in part because of the persistence of this body that developers are now required to build sidewalks on both sides of the street. And so the automobile traffic, I also think has incrementally become worse because we are designing virtually all communities to only realistically be accessible by automobile. We really very rarely see any other realistic option. So I think that the lack of sidewalks, in this particular case, in this particular area, really shows a very clear environmental and mobility justice issue. So I'm pleased to know that upon development of this site, there will be a sidewalk along at least their portion of Clayton Road, so that's positive. Similar to the things that Commissioner Miller and Commissioner Alturk said, this is an infill development. It's within walking distance, again, recognizing that there's a lack of the proper pedestrian infrastructure, but this is within walking distance of a school. And the fact of the matter is that we are a recommending body, the Planning Commission is a recommending body, and our recommendation will move forward to the Durham City Council. And Durham City Council has shown a very strong preference for high densities, for higher densities, even higher than is being proposed in this proposal. And so I think that the residents should have a say over what happens in their communities and frustrated by the things that we've heard today. But I also believe that there is a fair balance between increasing density in a neighborhood near a high school and also not causing additional heartburn and pain to the surrounding community. So while I'm not necessarily enthusiastic about the proposal before us, I do think that it may sort of represent and embody a fair balance, or as fair as we can expect it to be achieved. So I would just second to the applicant that I would ask that you work with Erlene and work with staff and try to incorporate traffic calming. And in particular, I would like to see traffic calming commitments. If possible, by the time this goes to council, and I will be putting that in my submitted comments to council. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Baker. Commissioner Kenshin? Yeah, first I wanna say, I really do appreciate the second time around. I mean, this came before us, I remember it well. And I think it's much improved from when it was presented a couple of years ago. I voted no for it, I'm gonna vote no for it again. To me, I mean, Clayton Road is a real problem. And not just that, but compounded by the fact that it's a high school that so many students walk to all the time. And it is a real problem. I just can't imagine a scenario where I will vote yes to something that might jeopardize student safety. And actually, in fact, I think from what I've heard, not been verified yet, but I think the middle school and elementary schools will be using Southern as opposed to high school students, they'll be online. Not been confirmed yet, but whether it's high schoolers or middle schoolers, it is a very dangerous road. I think it's a very good development plan, it's much improved. I really do appreciate the effort that's been into it. But until Clayton Road is fixed, we approved one similar to this on Freeman Road, but it was because they made some improvements to Freeman Road. They've gotta fix that road, it's just not, I can't imagine putting students in that position. I'll be voting no until Clayton Road is fixed. And I would urge my commissioners to think about student safety and let's put that above some other things as well. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Kenshin. Commissioner Johnson, I'm sorry, we'll start with Commissioner Williams. I'm sorry, I got you out of order. Thank you, Commissioner Johnson. Thank you, Chair Busby. I actually echo a lot of what Commissioner Kenshin said. Clayton Road is an extremely highly traveled area. So is Freeman Road, even with the improvements, you have a lot of blinds fighting. And even with the high schools returning for the fall, mainly online, you've got middle schools and elementary schools using the high school to see even more dangerous situations. There's an ongoing issue with Clayton Road that I don't see getting improved anytime soon unless something major is done or there's enough of a community impact in which these upgrades are being made. I also have an issue with developing in this area for numerous reasons. Outside of the day-to-day traffic with high schools getting out at four o'clock, you've got people traveling back in from Raleigh of Highway 98 that live in that quarter-derm and they cut over in a heavily traveled area. Excuse me, not to mention Southern football program, generating a lot of traffic on the street parking in that area. Southern's basketball program is generating a lot of traffic with people in that area parking on the streets. Some traffic measures would be helpful, but I don't see where many could do a lot. Even if there were traffic lights, there's gonna be other issues because you're gonna force cut rooms of neighborhoods and other areas to try to avoid certain traffic measures that are maybe put in place. None of this is at the control of the developer. This is just unforeseen circumstances that are hazard in this area. The lack of sidewalks in this area is major. I've driven in this area several times and the number of students that commute from school to home have no other choice or path but to walk in the street or to try to walk on not even what is a bike lane. It's literally just the yellow stripe on the side of the road and then dirt and any slight mistake even from a young driver and there's an automatic loss of light. So it's detrimental and it's something that we need to address and though voting yes for this will not stop someone else from developing in this area, perhaps the commentary in which we have a public record if reviewed will be enough to shake someone to say, hey, let's make some improvements. Let's do a little bit better. Let's have a little bit more consideration for this area. Let's put in sidewalks. Let's handle the traffic issues. Even if the Department of Transportation has no immediate plans for mediation for this particular area, a developer can come in and commit to building sidewalks and easing that foot traffic and doing a little bit more. And I absolutely applaud this developer for coming in, making the adjustments. I remember this case very well. I love the way that it's approached. I love the considerations that are put in but it still doesn't change the fact this is a heavily saturated area with a lot of traffic and no real way to control that traffic either on foot or by vehicle. Not to mention public transportation is not really a major force in this area that could help some like lessen some of the driver traffic if it was more efficient to this area. So those are my comments and I do plan to vote no. Thank you. Mr. Johnson. Thank you. Can you hear me? So I echo the sentiment of Commissioner Williams and Commissioner Kitchin and one I would like to state that I think that the second go round of what we're looking at now is very much improvement for what I voted against with the last vote. But I too remember this case because I spent time driving that area in that site multiple times at different times of the day and the safety issue with that area of that project site still like is the key factor that's driving like the quality of life reality of whatever comes to that place to the site in this area. And again, as Commissioner Williams stated, this sign necessarily the fault or the onset of the developer. This is just the context in which the developer is trying to develop this site. And I just, I'm not comfortable and I guess I'm prepared to vote no tonight even if this vote, the final vote is in favor. I want the city leadership to understand that this is not a clear clip vote that it's an improvement for what we started with. And so it's green patches ahead because I think there are some challenges in that area that has to be addressed because we're literally talking about human lives. When I first drove that site and saw how close it was to school, my first thing was there's no way if I was a parent I would be comfortable allowing my child to walk around that end to get to school. So it's like something has to be done because this won't be the last project that comes to this area. And this is the reality. This is a tough vote for me because I understand that development will happen. More cars will be placed on the road as a result. But at this point in time, I think that my vote will hopefully send some kind of signal to the final orbiters of what happens with this project that further consideration beyond this particular development is something that has to be developed because the city continues to grow. We're going to be, I think, confronted with similar situations in regards to infrastructure and the impact on human lives and the quality of life in these communities. So I just wanted to make sure I was on record with us. Thanks. Thank you, Commissioner Johnson. Commissioner Durkin. Yes, I have a question for Arlene. You can come back online. Yes. So if we don't approve this, this development does not occur and they're not accordance with this development plan that's in front of us and the applicant could develop just based on existing zoning and it would be eight fewer homes. But could they have an e-grass a street onto Clayton directly? At this point, I do not believe DOT was willing to grant a new access point to Clayton Road just because of the proximity to the other intersections and the site distance issue that's been mentioned with the curve but ultimately it would be in CDOT's decision. Okay, yeah, I don't remember on the last time we saw this, whether or not there had been a street an entrance onto Clayton. Right, there was not. Okay, okay. That's all right, Clayton. Okay. I'm inclined to vote yes for this one. It's not ideal. I do think this property will get developed and I appreciate the fact that there's a development plan and a lot has been done since the last time we saw this one. Significant time and effort has gone into this and this gives us a development plan that has a lot more commitments than we saw before which was really nothing. So I'm inclined to vote yes, it is not ideal. I do think that Clayton Road needs a lot of work but I don't think that this development is gonna be the one that fixes it if we vote no for it. Thank you, Commissioner Durkin. Commissioner Miller, I'm gonna hold off one sec and seeing if there are any commissioners who haven't spoken yet who would like to speak. Okay, I don't see anyone else. So back to you, Commissioner Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When I see that I might be voting against Mr. Kenshin and Ms. Williams, then I have to rethink my position and I'm not saying I'm gonna vote with them but I wanna explore a little bit and explain my position some. I've been in the neighborhood advocacy business for a very, very long time and I have seen cases where neighborhoods have to come down to City Hall over and over and over again on the same piece of property and eventually there's a calculus at work where you have to pull the trigger and take the best shot for fear that the next one may be much worse and that's kind of where I am with this but I don't live in the neighborhood and I don't speak for these people. I just, I have that feeling with the way we're going with density, taking such an important part of our policy thinking and what have you. I have just this feeling that the likelihood that we're going to get a better proposal for this in terms of compatibility is increasingly small but I do get the issue. I mean, I drove out there and to make a left-hand turn out of this neighborhood onto Clayton Road with that curve is scary and I can imagine doing it every single day to commute into the Sea of Durham, I would worry me. I would probably, I have not tried all three I've done two of the three entrances into this area and I'm sure that it might function. I may have one way out in the morning and another way in in the afternoon. I don't know. But here's what I'm going to ask my colleagues who are inclined to vote no to think about under the current RS20 zoning. I think it would be very easy to develop 15 maybe even 16 single family homes. The difference there between 16 and 23 is pretty small and that didn't going to come before. So it ain't going to come before anybody. The neighborhood's never going to be invited to see it. That's going to go straight to site plan review and then to building permits. No public comment, no chance to resist, no chance for input. And we are literally talking about a difference of, you know, 23 versus 15. So here's my question to you folks who are inclined to vote no. If this project was 20 units instead of 23 units and I know that the developer's not asking that but I'm asking it, would that change your thinking? Because the traffic impact, the incremental traffic impact caused by this development ultimately on De Clayton Road is a function of the number of units. And we know that right now the number of units, the traffic impact of 16 is there. It's on the books. That could happen. I don't think it will because I don't think a developer is actually going to develop it that way. I think the next request is going to be for, you know, 50 townhouses. But if it were 20 units instead of 23 units, would that change your thinking? And that's my question. And I wanted to put it in the context of my overall fear for the way this is going. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. I see Commissioner Williams has raised her hand. I recognize you. Thank you, Chair Busby. And no, even at 20 units, three unit difference would not change my voting. 12 or a half of that, yeah, maybe, but not at 20. And at the end of the day, knowing what I know about the situation, and I know that someone can and someone might come through and they may develop in that area. But I have to look at what's in front of me right now and what's in front of me right now as a proposal for 23 units. And at the end of the day, in good conscience, I have to live with myself and I'm not okay with it. No one else has to come before me and no public hearings and they can have the right way to build whatever they like once they get this on the permits and everything is approved or the building permits, excuse me, but I still have to live with myself and driving through that area with 50 townhomes. I won't be just as concerned, it's gonna be just as much as an issue. I just won't have a say, but today I have a say, so I'm using it. Great. Commissioner Kenshin. I would agree with Commissioner Williams who wouldn't change my vote either. I mean, the neighbors have spoken and they don't want it and they feel it's unsafe. I agree, I think it's very unsafe. I think no one can convince me that it's a safe place for students, so young people to be walking down the street. And let me add one more thing. I've got to say this, if this was Jordan High School, I don't think this would be, I don't think we would even consider it. I've been on the commission for a while. I've lived in Durham for 22 years. I don't think we'd have this kind of cause if it was Jordan High School, but it's not the Southern High School. Got to say it, I'm sorry for saying it, but you're talking about the safety of students, it's a real issue for me. And the community have said they don't want it. I agree with them, I concur. And I know someone can come and do the same thing, but not because I voted for it. They may come out and do 20 units or whatever, but not because I voted for it. So I can't stop that, but I can say no to this one. I don't think it's safe. I think it's wouldn't be right to go against community wishes. And our precedent has been opposite of what that would be. So I would say no. So Mr. Busby, those were my questions and I really appreciate the heartfelt responses. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Lowe and then Commissioner Landfried. Thank you, Chair Busby. Everday, obviously I wasn't part of this planning board meeting for the first team, but I do appreciate the backdrop information that has been presented here tonight. And for me, the major issue for me is the issue of safety. What I'm hearing tonight that it is a public safety should be almost in our minds. And as it's been forestated, some of the residents in that area has brought the opposition against this. So I'm inclined tonight to vote no. Thank you, Commissioner Lowe. Commissioner Landfried. Yeah, I have a question again for Ms. Thomas on the sidewalks issue. Yes. I think one of the members of the public mentioned that they had had some meetings with the city about sidewalks and that they had the impression that there was a plan to build sidewalks on Clayton Road. Can you update us on that? That might help us give a sense of whether there are other processes in place that might address some of these safety concerns, hopefully sooner rather than later. So the city does have a current sidewalk project that will build sidewalks on Clayton and Freeman Road, but they are near the high school. So there will still remain some gaps between this development and the sidewalk that's proposed to be constructed near the high school. And that sidewalk is planned for construction in August of this year. That's helpful, thank you. And I don't know if it'll be helpful, the limits of the sidewalk construction for the city's project is from Freeman Road down to Chandler Road along Clayton Road. It'll be from Freeman to Chandler. And then on Freeman Road, it will be from Clayton to Obsidian Way. That's great to hear, given everything we've heard. So thank you for that update. You're welcome. You're welcome. Thank you. Any additional questions, Commissioner Landfried? No, that's all, appreciate it. Great. I actually had a follow up from Ms. Thomas, so I'm sorry to make you jump back in the picture. Thank you. No problem. So the last question is my Commissioner Landfried were really important in my opinion. And so when the sidewalk gets built and you gave us everything and I'm trying to look at Google Maps to make sure I have it all correct. So this development is on the other side of the street. What's really interesting about this development and one of the things that excited me about it originally is that if you walked through Meadow Lane, which will now connect, you would come up briefly up Meadowcrest Drive to Clayton Road. If I were a student living in this neighborhood, I am less than a half a mile from Southern High School. If I'm living in the neighborhood, going to the high school in theory, that should be an easy pedestrian opportunity. In current practice, it is incredibly scary as my fellow commissioners have pointed out. Is there the opportunity, when these improvements are made, is there also gonna be some sort of crosswalk or a hawk signal or something that will allow students to get from the west side of Clayton across the street to the actual high school? Is that in the current improvement plan? I would need to look at the sidewalk plan, but more than likely those types of improvements, they are typically included when they are near schools, but I would need to confirm that by looking at the plans themselves. Okay. And you might be repeating then, coming out of Southern High School, going north on Clayton Road, how far will the current sidewalk improvements go, where does it end? So the project coming out of, sorry, where was your start point again? I'm basically thinking, if you're coming out of Southern High School and you're headed north on Clayton Road. Okay. Where will the new sidewalk end? So the city's project is not along that section of Clayton Road. Okay. So it starts at, for Clayton Road, it starts at Freeman and goes south to Chandler Road. And then along Freeman Road, it starts at Clayton and goes east to Obsidian Way, where there's existing sidewalk that's being constructed by nearby development. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate that. You're welcome. Before I recognize Commissioner Alturk, I'll just tell you where I stand, fellow commissioners. This has been really tough and still is. I wrote down a whole bunch of questions when I read this packet and every single one got checked off except sidewalks to the school. And I'm not comfortable voting on this one. I'm gonna vote no, but you could blow me over with a feather because I understand this is not under the control of these proponents, but I'm gonna stand with my fellow commissioners to hopefully send a message to our elected officials that we gotta do better. We gotta do better around Southern High School and we gotta make these investments to make it safe for the students. Commissioner Kenshin's point is well taken. Jordan High School, lots of sidewalks. So we gotta do better. But that said, I understand every commissioners thinking who are gonna plan to vote for it because I recognize all those points as well. And I have no idea what the right decision is. So, but I'm gonna vote. Commissioner Alturk. Thank you, Chair. I think if Ms. Ratcliffe is still on the line and I think she is, from her comments, I got a sense of, and maybe I was wrong, but that she was appreciative of the changes that have been made or the clarity that has been provided. And she would have just liked more time to think about it and to have had some more conversations with the developers. And I'm curious just if she wouldn't mind answering, based on our conversation tonight as well, in particular this point about, if we don't, if this is not rezoned, there will still likely be 15 to 16 single family homes. There will be increased traffic. It's possible that there would be fewer or less environmental protections. We can't control some of those things if it goes straight to site plan, it goes straight to the administrative body, the planning department. So I'm curious from Ms. Ratcliffe if she would, what would she like to see from this development planner from this or what she sees tonight would maybe make her more comfortable supporting this. Cause I got the sense that maybe she was on the fence. And so if she wouldn't mind answering that, that would be helpful to me. Ms. Ratcliffe, if you are still available to speak, you are welcome to answer Commissioner Outtork's question. Can you hear me? Yes. Okay. I'm not on the fence as from all the meetings we've had, I'm willing to work with them, just like my neighbors are willing to work with them, but all our concerns are, as long as our concerns are heard and met, because we are, we live here. We know what happens. We know the traffic zone, the issues that goes on in this area. Everyone that's speaking, they come and go, but we're here every day. So my concern is we would greatly work with them if they will try to accommodate what our requests are. That one meeting they had with us at the library in September, they never followed up as Ms. Bunyak and Ms. Thomas suggested to us when we met with them, it would be best for us to work as together. And that's what we have tried to do with them. So if they could clearly sit now and talk to us and give us the development plan, let us see what they had. Instead of waiting to present something to you all that they have one, they didn't show that to us. As I'm looking at my notes now, for what Penny explained, Ms. Penny explained, it seems like it's still the same plan that they share with us in September. So I'm not gonna say I'm necessarily on the fence. It's all my concerns are with the traffic and the safety of the children and the pedestrians who have to ride public transportation, our neighbors who walk and exercise. It's just, it's ridiculous. But I under, we know that this development, this land is going to be developed eventually. We do understand that. However, if somebody is willing to work with us and hear our demands and our concerns, we will work with them as well. That's all. Thank you, Ms. Crackliff. And thanks for clarifying your position and correcting me on that. I guess, I was in favor or inclined to vote for this. I will likely vote no on this now, but I will ask the applicant if they will. I mean, I don't know what else can be done. I mean, I do think I am still on the fence about this because I do think this is a decent proposal. And I think even the commissioners who are voting against this have acknowledged that this is a pretty good or not bad proposal. And so I don't know if it can be improved, but I'll just ask the applicant if they would consider a continuance to meet with the neighbors and maybe either present the development plan a little bit more, give them more time to think about it and to work with them, maybe get that number down a little bit down from 23 to something else that is a little bit more reasonable or suitable for the neighborhood. So I will just ask the applicant if they would like a continuance because I think I will be voting no. Mr. Sevilla or Ms. Cicadolo, you're welcome to answer Commissioner Alturk's question. This is Penny Cicadolo. And the answer is certainly we're always open to suggestions. I don't know that this developer is capable of solving Clayton Road's traffic issue. We did hear from Ms. Ratcliffe about wanting some more buffer behind her yard. That is on the development plan. We heard from Mr. Wiggins that he wanted some more space behind his lot. That's open space. We have addressed their conditions but I'm still open to finding out if there's something else short of redesigning Clayton Road. Commissioner Alturk, any additional questions or comments? No, I don't think I will ask for the continuance unless other commissioners feel like it is warranted. I mean, I agree I think with that general, that comment that I've heard a number of times already tonight which is that we can't solve the problem on Clayton Road. And so, but I don't know if other commissioners have other, if they think a continuance would be helpful, I'll entertain that option but I won't ask for it. Thank you. Commissioner Amandolia. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to briefly say I came in tonight expecting to vote yes for this. It seems to me an opportunity for info development and affordable units. I've been cited 250K homes, which to me seems like a step forward for ability, especially in this area. However, the words of commissioners Williams and Kynchon have moved me to reconsider that. I agree we cannot change the current patterns on Clayton Road with this vote, but I think it is important for us to stand together and show the city that we need to do better in the future. Thank you. Thank you. We're gonna pivot back to both Commissioner Baker and then Commissioner Miller. Yeah, I'll be quick. Our votes are not the final say, they're recommendations to city council and sometimes that means that we need to send a message and this isn't about punishing or rewarding developers, this is about making a logical judgment and a statement about planning issues, the planning issues that come before us. Second, I think that the density is appropriate, but I think maybe the timing is not appropriate and that is one thing that I heard several commissioners say and that's planning, that's logical planning. Third, I think our comments to council are as important and sometimes more important than our actual vote, the vote that we take and the vote count. I think that whenever council comes and takes a look at the comments that we have provided and when commissioners are unanimous or saying the same things consistently, council takes note of that and I think that if we all have similar things to say on this application that that will resonate with them. And then finally, I often approach a case with a strong opinion and I often approach a case wanting to persuade my fellow commissioners of my opinion and I want them to listen to what I'm saying and I want them to vote with me and I have been persuaded. So I will be voting no, this isn't about punishing a developer or rewarding a developer, this is about sending a message to council and I intend to put a lot of this discussion in my comments to council. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. So thank you very much and I wanted to say the same thing, I've had my hand up for a while all throughout this case, this time and last time I've had my neighborhood advocates head on. This time when I saw this plan, I thought, well, finally we've got the thing that we wanted last time. But I forgot why we wanted it. We wanted it because this is where these neighbors live. It's whose town is it? It's their town. I've turned in and out of this neighborhood a couple of times in the last two years. They do it a couple of times every day. Nobody knows this area better than they do. And so when we depart from what they see as problems or what their vision for the area is, I think we are on shaky ground and I'm grateful to my fellow commission members for reminding me of that. So I'm going to vote no if I must on this. I don't think it's fair to take a piece of property that's going to be developed somehow by somebody and say that whoever has this is responsible for fixing Clayton Road. But I do think we have to take into account no matter who proposes what, that Clayton Road is the way it is. And we can send a message to the city, but ultimately the city doesn't have a hell of a lot of control over Clayton Road. It's an NCDOT facility. I would love to have, and I also realized having done a lot of this work myself, that there are a lot of factors that go into this and that a solution where developers and neighbors come together is ever perfect for either side. I saw where Mr. Alturk was going with the possibility of giving them 60 days to really work it out and to put things on the table and to make adjustments that might be incrementally enough so that the neighbors balancing their risks and the impacts and the developers, their pocket, their interest in their pocketbook can perhaps come together. And so I like the idea of a 60 day continuance if the parties want it and really work together in good faith to see if there's middle ground. I just can't ever get it out of my head that you can build 16 houses on this piece of property right now. And while it's like with my approval, without my approval, the fact is, is with or without it, they can do it. And we're no closer to making things better there than we are if we approve or disapprove of this project. So I'm gonna make a motion, if I may, Mr. Chairman, that we continue this based upon what I've heard the neighbors through Ms. Ratcliffe and the developers through Ms. Cadlow say a motion to continue this for 60 days to see if these parties can work it out. I will say this, that if this motion is voted down, I'm gonna vote against this project and that may influence how the rest of you vote. So that's my motion. Mr. Chairman. There's a motion on the floor. Is there a second? The motion is for a two cycle, 60 day continuance. Second. Okay. So moved by Commissioner Miller, seconded by Commissioner Alturk. And again, this is a two cycle delay. Actually, I'm sorry, Ms. Smith, what's the proper term we should be using because we usually say two cycles and we're meeting every other week, it seems like. Two cycles is okay because that's our regular cycle, but the date is September 15th. Okay. And that's my motion, Mr. Chair. Okay. Let's have a roll call vote, please. Okay. This is the motion to continue. Commissioner Williams. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Before I vote, the question is, can we do this without having to get approval or this from the applicant themselves? Can we, can this be? You can continue it without their consent. That's up to the commission. I know a lot of times you do ask, but I think that they did ask earlier and they indicated they'd be willing to work with the neighbors. If unless. I'm filming that, but the context. Yes. Okay. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner, I'm in. Excuse me, I'm in Delia. Yes. Mr. Al Turk. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Landfrey. Yes. Commissioner Kynchon. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. Yes. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Okay. Passes 13-0 unanimous to be continued to September 15th. We'll put it on the agenda. Thank you. And thanks to all of you who spoke on that item. We look forward to hearing about the progress on September 15th. We're moving to our final zoning map change item this evening. This is the Cortez Drive residential proposal. In this case, Z1900038 and we will start with staff report. Good evening, Jamie Soniac again with the Durham Planning Department. I will be presenting the Cortez Drive residential zoning map change application. Next slide, please. The applicant is Bethesda Associates LLC. The property is located along Andrew Avenue and Cortez Drive. It is roughly 46 acres in size located in the suburban tier. The applicant is proposing to change the zoning to plan development residential 5.322. There is no change to the future land use designation which is low, medium density residential and the development plan indicates a development with up to 250 residential units. Next slide. On the aerial, the site is highlighted in red. It is generally undeveloped, heavily wooded. There are wetlands and streams that has frontage on Andrew Avenue and is separated by Cortez Drive. Next slide, please. The, this slide provides area pictures as well as the site and the surroundings. The property is situated among a number of existing residential homes including along Cortez Drive and Andrew Avenue to the south and north are additional single family homes including a rezoning request which was approved on June 10th, 2020 along Pleasant Drive and South Miami Boulevard for up to 170 apartment units. To the rear is undeveloped land and a commercial center which fronts on South Miami Boulevard. Next slide, please. This provides the context of the existing zoning on the left and the proposed zoning on the right. The property is also included within the falls short and like watershed protection overlay. As noted on the, on the right the property is proposed for a PDR 5.322. Next slide, please. This slide shows the future land use designation of the property being in the low, medium density residential which is four to eight dwelling units per acre which is consistent with this request. Next slide. As included in the staff report this is the development plan which highlights the access points, the building and parking envelope, riparian buffers, 10 foot no build areas, tree coverage areas. It also identifies the number of units and the density. Next slide, please. In terms of the key text commitments the development plan commits to single family detached and residential townhouse units as the permitted building type. It restricts the number of units to 250 units. There are a series of transportation related improvements associated with the TIA, the transportation impact analysis. There's a commitment to constructing sidewalk and several of the gap areas. There's also a commitment to provide additional asphalt along the front full footage of the site along the east side of Andrew Avenue for a bicycle lane. Next slide. This highlights some of the graphic and design commitments included on the development plan. Next slide. Subsequent to the writing of the staff report the applicant has offered a number of additional design commitments that have been reviewed and approved by staff that I would like to read into the record and I'll read them slowly because it's I believe it's two slides here. So in terms of the architectural style residential buildings within the proposed community the development will have compatible architectural elevations with respect to materials color and overall development elements. In terms of the distinct architectural features the townhome building front elevations shall have a minimum offset of 16 inches with two offsets per every building of four units to enhance architectural variation. A minimum of three colors shall be utilized per residential building. Decorative garage doors shall be used with the development within the development and shall include garage carriage house style hardware or windows. Residential buildings shall have a combination of a tipped table or shed roofs. In terms of the building materials residential building materials shall exclude vinyl siding. Residential building roofs shall have composite shingles or metal roof roofing. Additionally, in terms of the residential housing type side and sizes. The development shall include a variety of townhome units and single family dwelling sizes to reach a border market of family sizes, home transition and housing affordability. No less than 20% for no more than 45% of the townhouse units shall exceed 1,400 square feet. No less than 10% for no more than 25% of the single family unit shall exceed 1,700 square feet. No site plan for the new development on the subject property shall be approved without provision for at least 100 townhouse, townhome lots and at least 30 single family detached homes. The development shall include townhomes with a maximum width of 18 feet. Single family dwelling shall feature a maximum width of 30 feet. Next slide please. In terms of the comp plan policies the proposed zoning is consistent with the future land use designation of low median density residential which would be consistent with the rezoning request and the proposed application is consistent with the comprehensive plan policies including those listed on the screen and provided in further detail of the staff report. Staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and applicable policies and ordinances and I will be happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you. You're welcome, thank you. So we will open the public hearing. We have eight individuals who signed up as proponents and I may ask Mr. George and Mr. Ghosh if all eight are planning to speak or if they are doing it as a package and then we have one individual signed up in opposition. Hi, this is Neil Ghosh and I will say Mr. Steve George, Laura Holman, Ryan Akers from McAdams and Ronald Stevenson from Rainy Camp are all part of the team here and they're all available to answer questions but I was planning on doing the speaking. Sounds like there are some other folks who've signed up in support of this and I'm not aware of who they are. I may repeat some of the names, that's really helpful. Laura Holman, Audra Slavin who I think spoke on a previous item and Tammy Hayes. Yeah, so Laura Holman is with McAdams and she's on the team. Okay, I'll propose, why don't you go ahead Mr. Ghosh and if you wanna speak as the proponent on behalf of the team and I'll read it off any of the additional names. I think some of these folks signed up maybe for multiple hearings. I'm not sure they're still on the phone. Oh, I see, I understand. All right, well- Ms. Smith, hold on one second. I do believe there was a person signed up for the very first hearing that had put the wrong case number by their name. So that person may have left the meeting. I'm looking now, I don't see them in attendance still. So that might be where the math is a little weird. So you'll find out, I guess, when you get to them. Thank you. Sure, so should I begin? Please. Yeah, so good evening or rather good night, I guess. Chair Busby and members of the planning commission, my name is Neil Gauch. I'm an attorney at the Morningstar Law Group here in Durham at 112 West Main Street. I'm representing the applicant for this project as I mentioned, Mr. Steve George is with us on behalf of the applicant. So is Laura Holman and Ryan Akers from McAdams and Rinal Stevenson from Remy Kemp. Let me start first by thanking Jamie not only for her presentation just now but also for her guidance and diligent review of the additional proffers which she just presented for this development. Thank you very much for your work on that and working with us on that, Jamie. And I'll start by saying that this is a development that I am personally excited to be able to work on because I think it is a step in the right direction for new residential communities in Durham. As you can see from the commitments, the developer is proposing a community with a mix of housing types, including at least two different townhome options and two different single family options. In reality, we believe there will be more than just two options for each type of home but the proffers ensure at least two options for each type. There are various other commitments which speak to the quality of the building materials, variations in the front facades of townhome buildings, the width of the actual homes and the minimum mix of housing type. I hate to gloss over these but it's getting late and I know we have limited time but suffice it to say that these commitments speak to the thought and intentionality that the applicant has put into this community. Now, aside from those text commitments, there are other commitments which are worth mentioning. First of all, a traffic study was required for this development and there are several committed road improvements included on the D plan as a result of that study. In addition to the improvements that would be required to access the property, it is worth noting that the developer of this community would be required to build out the remainder and improve the existing portions of Cortez drive to city standards, which is more than a third of a mile of road construction. There also is a small gap in the sidewalk along Cortez which is offsite, which the applicant has committed to completing in addition to the sidewalk on the remainder of Cortez. The development plan also commits to installing traffic signals subject to NCDAT approval of course, but those traffic signals would be at the intersections of Angier and Pleasant and Angier and Glover. All told, the development plan commits to a significant level of new infrastructure. But wait, there's more. As you can see on the D plan, there is a wetland feature or stream beater on the property which essentially cuts the assemblage into three distinct areas. Of course, this presents challenges to how the property can be developed, but it is worth noting that the developer, in this case has committed to only one stream crossing. And I wanted to point that out because that commitment is quite subtle. It is a graphic commitment, but the UDO requires D plans to show all proposed stream crossings. As you can see only one is shown on this D plan because the developer has taken the time to consider carefully this community's impact on the environment. Likewise, in addition to saving the vegetation within the wetland area, the D plan graphically commits to saving over two acres of existing vegetation in the northeast corner of the property. While that land is developable, rather than trying to shoehorn in as many homes as possible, the developer has set that area aside intentionally to provide a meaningful buffer area for existing homes along Shiloh. Overall, the development plan commits preserving around 9.4 acres of existing tree coverage and vegetation. As I said, I am excited to be working on this community and as a Durham resident, I hope to see it succeed. This development has been well thought out at the planning stage and we'll put new home ownership opportunities on an infill basis in an area where bus transit already exists. The developer has made some strong commitments related to design and housing mix, which speak to the needs of the Durham community as a whole. Additionally, the D plan commits to a significant amount of public infrastructure which will be funded through private means. The project is consistent with the city's long range plans, but more importantly, it makes sense in the context of the area. So we hope to have your support for this development. We have our team available to answer any questions that you have and I'd like to reserve the remainder of our time for any rebuttal and thank you for your time. Great, thank you, Mr. Ghosh. We do have one other individual who signed up as a proponent and that is Tammy Hayes. Tammy, are you with us? Yes, sir, can you hear me? Yes. Okay. You're welcome to share your thoughts for a few minutes if you can give us your name, your address and you're listed as a proponent for this proposal. Tammy, are you with us? Can you hear me, sir? Yes, please, please share your thoughts. I'm sorry, it kept muting me. My name is Tammy Hayes and with my husband, Thomas Hayes and we're at 3601 Andrew Avenue. If you notice on the map, we're actually at the corner of Cortez and Andrew and everything goes around us in a sense. We're actually pretty excited about seeing this area developed. It's been a long time. We have lived at this home for about 24 years and it pretty much has looked the same except for maybe them paving Cortez. Other than that, there really hasn't been a lot done. I guess one of the, we have a few questions because when we met with them last year, Cortez wasn't, they were saying Cortez wasn't a factor. They were creating another entrance off of Andrew on the other side of us going into the development and now we've noticed that Cortez is now a factor. I like the idea of the turning lanes and the traffic lights and especially the sidewalks. There have been people that have been hit along Andrew. There's no space for people to walk or either ride bikes on Andrew. It's just road and grass ditch. So we're kind of concerned about how this will impact our property. Now with it being Cortez have now, I'm assuming it's gonna have to widen the road because if they're gonna create a turning lane and sidewalk and all this stuff, how does that impact us, our property? And then will this also mean that this area will then become city limits because as of now we're counting. So will that also mean that we will then become city limits based on all these things? And if this goes through, what kind of estimation data we looking at as far as construction and how long would it last? Those are just a few questions or concerns that we have right off the top of our head. Great, thank you very much. During the public comment period, it's a great opportunity to ask those questions. We can see Mr. Gosh reserve some time as part of their 10 minutes. So he might answer those in a comment period or we as commissioners may ask some of those questions as well. But thank you very much. Thank you. We had one other individual signed up to speak as an opponent and it's Aaron Hamakie. And Aaron, you may make your remarks if you're able to join us. Aaron, I see you're still attending the meeting so we'd love to hear your thoughts if you're able to speak. Mr. Chair, if you can remind her once again, and I think we're going to have to just get used to this about how the way she might connect with us and speak to us. Yeah, Aaron, if you're on by phone, you can hit star nine and that should allow you to speak. It looks like you should be able to speak. Hello? Yes. Okay, there we go. Thank you for bearing with me. So my name is Aaron Hamakie and I've lived at 613 Pleasant Drive for 12 years now on the property adjacent to the Cortez property. For those of you who aren't familiar with the neighborhood, we are a semi-rural community with a mix of residents from various backgrounds and income levels. Many of the residents value the privacy, green space and wildlife habitat that is supported by this area and the streams that run through it. Several residents have lived in the area for 20 years or more. I have concerns about the proposed rezoning of the property for several reasons. Density doesn't seem or seems incompatible with the surrounding area in my view. It also doesn't seem like a forward thinking development that considers a balance of housing needs with preservation of green space and pervious surfaces. And finally, I think Andrew Avenue simply can't handle the traffic that will be generated by the development and the current F rating for traffic in the neighborhood will go from very bad to even worse. I visited all of the households adjacent to the property on Shiloh Pleasant, Andrew and Cortez and out of 26 homes I was able to access 16 or two thirds of them were opposed to the rezoning requests and three households were undecided. 22 residents signed a non-binding petition to protest the rezoning. Two households were in favor of the development, mostly citing hopes for an increase in property values. And I appreciated hearing my neighbor, the Hayes' comments this evening as well. Just speaking for my household, we definitely understand that Durham is a rapidly growing city with a housing shortage and that unbuilt land like this will rise to the surface for proposed development. We aren't opposed to development of any kind. In fact, my partner is a builder, but we'd like to think that we can plan these new developments with a broader vision of what kind of city we want Durham to become. And we'd like to think that it's possible to achieve without compromising the character of a community that's been here for 100 years. We'd welcome developments at the current zoning or at a revised zoning that balances housing needs with open space that would truly add lasting value to the city and neighborhood. It's difficult to imagine traffic getting any worse than it is now, but that's what would happen with this added development. It was truly shocking to see and imagine the 18 minute wait time at the intersection of Pleasant and Andrew and 24 minutes at Andrew and Glover that is projected if the development plan is enacted and none of the DOT recommendations are implemented. It's also difficult to see how traffic flow on Andrew will be appreciably improved with any measure as the road tracks limit road widening and the neighboring train yard will continue to present an issue as trains frequently block traffic access at Ellis Road and cause backups onto Andrew Avenue. Finally, I don't feel that the six days that we had to review the development plan and text amendments prior to the meeting is an adequate amount of time. I know that several of my neighbors express confusion about what the plans were. Many of the residents in the area are older, do not have access to necessary technology, or they speak English as their second language and face significant barriers to actively participating in this process and tonight's meeting, which may explain why there aren't other opponents speaking tonight. Unless y'all are willing to vote against the request tonight on the basis of traffic information alone, I hope you'll consider postponing making a decision so that residents can have more time with the development plan or just speak with the developers. If the commission intends to move forward with recommendations, I hope you'll consider recommending development at a density less than proposed or with limited higher density, housing balance with substantial protection of trees and wildlife habitat. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you very much. I see two other attendees have raised their hands. I assume that means they may also be interested in speaking. I'll call on you one at a time and you can unmute yourself if you would like to speak. Paul Joffrian, and then we'll get to Mark Welker. Yes, thank you so much, all of you. The hours are growing late. I wanna thank my neighbor, Ms. Hammacky, neighbor Hayes for their comments. My name is Paul Joffrian, my wife Patricia Sykes and I have lived at 705 Pleasant Drive for 19 years in a home that borders the Cortez project area. This neighborhood is a richly diverse, economically, culturally, racially neighborhood of approximately three-quarter square miles north of the proposed project area. With some businesses, 200 or more homes, many, if not most of which constitute naturally occurring affordable housing. The development pressures on this naturally occurring affordable housing neighborhood are substantial. Once a week or more, we receive unsolicited offers to buy our home or part of our lot toward the southern end that abuts the Cortez project. In no way am I suggesting that the Cortez project is connected with that. I'm just identifying development pressures to sell upon neighborhood residents. With regard to traffic impact, the only way to get out of this neighborhood is by way of Anger Avenue or Highway 70. Bottle next day and night during commuting hours at intersections named by Miss Hamakie, Pleasant Drive at Anger, Glover Road at Anger, Lynn Road at 70, Pleasant Drive at 70 are formidable. Anger Avenue between Pleasant Drive and Cortez Drive is narrow, it's two lanes, 12-inch concrete border that empties onto sloping rutted shoulders in both directions. Speed limit is 35, but rarely observed. Pedestrians, neighbors walking their dogs or bicyclists heading up to the goboa. Quick stop at Anger and Glover must choose between risk of a twisted ankle on the rutted shoulder or facing oncoming traffic. There are no sidewalks, there are no curves. Anger Avenue cannot be widened without abutting the railway right of way or infringing upon the right of way in front yards of residents on the east side. Adding 200 to 400 additional vehicles to this scene on top of the 200 to 300 vehicles that will be added because of the approval gin tent of the Pleasant Drive rezoning request and the additional vehicles that will be added by the Brighton, I don't know the full name, the Brighton Manor approximately three quarters of a mile south of Glover and the Anger, off of Anger, is, forgive me for using a strong term, it is an assault on the traffic management capability of this corridor. The quality of life in this residence of this neighborhood, I think deserve consideration. I appreciate fully the developer's comments. It sounds like a wonderful construction. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate your comments. And when Ms. Smith comes on and gives a two minute warning, we ask that everyone can finish their thoughts as appropriate. We have Mark Welker as well. Hi, can you hear us? Yes. Hi, my name is Heather Cross. My husband, Mark Welker, share with me. We're at 713 Pleasant Drive. Our property is just down from the lady earlier. Sorry, I forgot her name already. We came on tonight, undecided. We were one of the ones that she had spoken to. And we currently are not really against the development. Traffic has gotten worse in the past couple of years with the construction on 70. When they shut down the access of East End Drive, all the traffic that used to take East End, we saw move over here onto Pleasant. And back when we first bought, it was right around the time we first bought this house, we were told a lot of people might re-change the routes when the bypass back to 147 opens back up, which is still in the process of being construction. And the construction on 70 finishes up. So some of that traffic, we're wondering what's gonna happen, what's gonna change as the construction projects end. The mentioning of the possibility of with this project going through that there would be the potential for lights at Pleasant and light at Glover are a huge bonus to me. Like, if that's something that really would go through, that would be huge. Cause those are places that cause really bad bottlenecks, particularly when trains come through, there's no light at Glover. Having that feature would be great. So to us, we see the need for housing in this area. It's huge, especially something like this that's mixed. It looks like it's gonna be more affordable housing than a lot of the other things being built in this area. I'm, I have to stand pretty much for it, particularly with some of the things they're doing, it looks really great. And I came on tonight, really not sure of where I'd stand, so. Thank you, appreciate that. Any additional comments from any members and anyone who has not spoken yet this evening? I don't see any other hands up. Mr. Ghosh, I believe you and your team had a few additional minutes reserved if you would like to make any additional comments or answer any questions. Yes, sure. That would be great. Thank you again. This is Neil Ghosh at the Morning Star Law Group speaking on behalf of the applicant just for the record. I did want to touch on a couple of things. So one, you know, as I mentioned, a traffic study was required for this development. And the developer here is taking the traffic, I mean, there are traffic commitments on the D plan and the developer does not dispute that there are traffic concerns in this area. Just to give you an idea, and I'm not suggesting that the price of any of these improvements is necessarily played into your decision, but each one of those traffic signals, two of which are committed, generally are gonna on the low end costs about a quarter of a million dollars to install. I have no idea why that is, but that's what it is. And there are two that are being considered or being committed as part of this development plan, whether they will be installed ultimately as with any traffic light is going to depend on whether it's warranted per NCDOT. But given the level of traffic in this area already, you know, you might expect that it would be and then other developments going on, you might expect that they will be warranted when the time comes to evaluate them. The other thing to be aware of is that one of the main pressures on traffic here is the existence of that rail corridor there and the rail yard. So the trains that come in in this area often will come in at a very slow rate because they essentially park there. And sometimes they park in the wrong place and block traffic. And there's no doubt about it. But there is a funded NCDOT project to grade separate, so to bring the track above the road at the intersection of Andrew and Glover. I'm sorry, but Ellis and Glover. And that is calculated not by us, by NCDOT on already funded project. It's project P5706. That is calculated to alleviate a lot of the traffic concerns that this area experience is already, essentially because it is getting those trains out of the flow of traffic of regular vehicular traffic. So in addition to that improvement, this project is committing to additional road improvements. As far as the points of access, because of the number of units that are being proposed with this development, the UDO requires at least two points of access. So on the development plan, you can see that there is a point of access proposed along Andrew Avenue and there also is a point of access on Cortez. Those are the two points of access that are being considered for this development to make it UDO compliant based on the number of units. Cortez right now is not at a city standard. And I think I mentioned before, the developer here is going to be improving Cortez to a city standard for his entire length. That right-of-way is already dedicated, but if you've been down to the site, then you know you can turn from Andrew onto Cortez and then you can turn left onto the rest of Cortez as it is today. That right-of-way actually continues all the way down as a paper right-of-way, it's not been improved. And that's the portion that developer will be improving across its frontage. The, you know what, it is getting late and I think I've addressed a lot of things that we have heard from the neighbors today. I'd be interested to hear any questions and comments from the planning commissioners. So again, thank you for your time. Thank you. I don't see any other hands from the general public raise to speak. I'll give it one more moment. Seeing none, we will close the public hearing and commissioners, I see a few hands up. I'll start with commissioner Durkin. Sure, so a question for the applicant. On price points, can you, for the record, state what you're expecting, the single family homes and the town homes to go for? Sure, and we thought a lot about this and if you'll give me a little latitude, I'd like to speak to it in depth if I can. So I want to make clear that we're not. Given the late hour. Late in the evening, we can make it brief. That would be appreciated. Well, sure. So I just want to make clear that we're not committing to any particular price point. No, no, no, just expected. Sure, yeah. The builder believes that the town homes will start at around the 204,000 mark and will sell at a top range near 229,000. And for the single family detached homes, the builder intends to start selling those at a price near 250,000 with the top end around 290,000. Okay. Thank you for that. That seems high to me for this area. I don't think that would qualify as additional naturally occurring affordable housing, as was mentioned by one of the participants that spoke. I agree that there is naturally occurring affordable housing in that area. I don't think it's new construction for sale at those price points. One other thing related to affordability that I wanted to raise was the additional design commitment. The first one that says the development shall include a variety of town home unit and single family dwelling sizes to reach a broader market, a family size home transition and housing affordability. I have no idea what that means and I have no idea how it will be implemented and how someone will confirm that it's the development is in compliance with that commitment. So my question is really more to staff. Was this vetted? How do you prove that this was in compliance? How would you monitor this at all? Jamie Sanyak with the planning department. Good evening, everybody. So yes, the design commitments have been vetted and we just received them recently. The intent as I understand it in terms of this particular proffer is to address some of the concerns that the planning commission have raised on other applications to provide a variety of different sizes. And obviously we don't have proffers or specifics in terms of the price points but we have heard concerns regarding providing a variety of housing sizes. So I believe that that's the intent that the applicant is trying to achieve. The design commitments are our commitments. And so we feel really meant to be a lead-in to the remaining four bullet points in the additional design commitments because it should be deleted. I think it's very confusing and just provides lip service to the planning commission as if they're giving us what we've been asking for. I don't think it gives us anything except for vague language that I'm not sure how you would enforce that. Okay, understood. And I can see how that might be inferred. Jamie, if it's appropriate, I mean, we can strike that one. I don't think that would cause any kind of delay. It's the first one, if I understand, you Erin, the first one. Listen, I mean, almost every development I ask you, have you used the affordable housing density bonus? Have you considered it? And everybody says no. And everybody knows that I would love to have enforceable affordable housing in Durham. However, I don't think this language gets us there and I think it's a very dangerous path to go down of pretending you're providing something that you're not and making the public and our elected officials and that they're providing something that's being requested and it's not getting anywhere near it. So as I mentioned, we can strike that. The staff has no problem with that is removed. Consider it stricken. For my fellow commissioners, I'm not going to be voting for this one based on the concerns I raise. Thank you, Commissioner Durkin. Commissioner Miller. So there's a lot in this that I like and look for. Mix of unit types and large project density level that is not high by Durham standards but might be a little high for the area but the area has been developed in a pattern that has some natural separations in it. A mix of unit sizes. The law doesn't let us commit to actual price points but it does allow us to commit to unit sizes and based upon the idea that smaller units are generally cheaper, they don't have to be but they generally are. That's one way to get at the affordability a relative affordability problem. And I appreciate that. More thoughtful commitments on design elements. Lots of open space reserve. Of course, much of it had to be reserved because of stream buffers. So a lot of good things here but the reason why I wanted to speak early on is Erin Hammacky, I think, I'm not sure I pronounced her name correctly if I had not apologized has pointed out that the ability of the neighbors to actually see the development plan is less than a week. This worries me. If we're serious about really engaging with the public with a development plan rezoning of this magnitude with so many issues, especially relating to traffic and what have you, I think we need to be better about getting that out there so that people can make thoughtful comments. I am concerned, as she was this evening, that more people in this area might have spoken had they had a chance to, a better chance to see, absorb and understand the development plan. The developer today has made a whole lot of profits that changed the development plan considerably. There was no way for these neighbors to see this. I actually shared the list just today with Ms. Hammacky to see if it changes her view of the project. I'm just uncomfortable proceeding with a 50 acre project with lots of potential impacts affecting these neighbors on the basis that they've had six days to figure it out. It's complicated enough with any amount of time, but six days just doesn't seem to be fair and I'm not blaming anybody. The developer certainly is not responsible for the shortness of notice. We're operating under some very strange rules and it's just hard and we have lots of meetings scheduled. And I even, I have to admit, I constantly lose track of where we are, so I get it. But ultimately these neighbors have one shot to understand what's going to go on around them. I went out to Pleasant Drive. It is one of the few streets in Durham that is actually aptly named. It is a beautiful place, accidentally one of the loveliest neighborhoods in town. And it reminded me that in our frenzy about density and affordability and all these other things, we have to reserve places in Durham County that are like Pleasant Drive. And I believe this property can be developed in a way that doesn't necessarily threaten Pleasant Drive, but it's just another issue. And I believe the people who live in the Pleasant Drive neighborhood have a right to understand and absorb and make thoughtful comments on a project like this so that we can be guided by what they say. As I said in connection with the last case, I'll say it with this case, the people who live there know it best, understand it best. And the information they give us about their area and what they want for it are extremely important. So Mr. Chairman, I'm gonna move that we continue this for 30 days, not so the developer and the neighbors can work something out or anything like that, just so that the neighbors can understand this project and come back to a continued public hearing and make sure that everybody who might care about this has had a chance to speak to us. Commissioner Miller, at the moment, I didn't hear you make the motion. I believe you were saying you would like to make the motion. No, I am making the motion. Okay. I know Commissioner Baker would like to speak as well, but it isn't a motion. And if there is a second, then we... I'll hold off my comments and I'll second Commissioner Miller. Thank you. So we have a motion for a one-cycle continuance with the second, we can, if someone wants to speak on the commission to the vote to the amendment. Commissioner Alturka, I see your hand up. I don't know if that was from before. No, that's on the motion, if you don't mind. Chair. The floor is yours. Thank you. Just like the last case, it is our, we can call for continuance or vote for continuance without the applicant's permission, but I do often like to ask the applicant what they will do and what they are thinking in terms of a two-cycle continuance, not because we need their permission, but I would like to hear from them if they would like this and what they would try to do in the next two months to bring along the neighbors in this case. So I'd like to ask that to Mr. Gosher. That's okay. Thank you, Commissioner. And for the record, I believe it was a one-cycle continuance that is the motion. Okay, thank you. Yeah, I was going to say that thing. And so thank you for bringing that up, Chair Busby and thank you for the question, Commissioner Alturka. So look, we know we added proffers at the last minute. Jamie worked diligently to get those on the PowerPoint and to vet them. We're really proud of them, but we also know the neighbors have not had an opportunity to look at them. We welcome a one-month delay and we'll be happy to come back in a month after the neighbors have had more of an opportunity to digest these new commitments in particular. And frankly, after the planning commissioners have had an opportunity to digest them, I know you got your packets kind of late to begin with and then you probably never even got the new conditions until tonight. So I think it's warranted and we welcome it. Commissioner Alturka. Thank you. I think Ms. Hammacky mentioned this in her comments and I may be misremembering, but I think she mentioned that there are likely a lot of people who want to speak on this case that even in a month or even in, if it is a one-cycle continuance, then that really means only a week or two of trying to reach out to those folks that live around this neighborhood. So I guess I would caution against a one-cycle, only a one-cycle continuance or I would also, and I would also urge the developer and applicant to really try to reach out to folks that to the neighborhood in a way that's relatively, in a way that's inclusive and that's, and so, and I'm happy to work with Ms. Hammacky. I think a number of us are happy to facilitate those meetings, but it's just, it's difficult, it's hard for me to see how that can be done in a way that I think is what we are hoping to do in the long run here in Durham, which is to involve neighbors early on to make the process more transparent. That's just a word of caution. I will vote for the continuance, but it's just, it's just a word of caution for the applicant and for the neighbors. Thank you, Commissioner Alturk. I don't see any other hands raised with the commissioners, and so we do have a motion on the floor for a 30-day one-cycle continuance, and we'll have a roll call vote, please. Yes, I wanted to point out that that would be, I wanted to make sure that we got the date of the meeting on the record, please. If that's okay, that's 11th. That's my motion. Okay. Commissioner Williams? Yes. Commissioner Morgan? Yes. Commissioner Johnson? Yeah. Commissioner Emondalea? Yes. Commissioner Durkin? Yes. Commissioner Alturk? Yes. Commissioner Busby? Chair Busby? Yes. Commissioner Lanebrede? Yes. Commissioner Miller? Yes. Commissioner Kanchin? Yes. Commissioner Santiago? Excuse the absence. Sorry, he's absent. I was late and I forgot. Commissioner Baker? Yes. Commissioner Lowe? Yes. Okay. And Commissioner McIver? Yes. Okay. It's unanimous 13-0 to continue to August 11th. Thank you. See you next month. Thank you very much. So we have two items under new business as we head into the home stretch and the first is the FY21 Planning Department Work Plan. And so we'll start with the staff report. Hello, everybody. I'm Sarah Young with the Planning Department and I'm coming to you tonight to hopefully talk quickly about the department's work program. As you know, we are required by the Interlocal Agreement that creates the City County Planning Department to submit to the governing bodies every year a proposal for the work that the department will do. As you also know, the vast majority of what's on the work program are things that are mandated by law or by city policy program or practice. And there is very little room for discretionary projects. Right now, we're in the middle of a very large discretionary project which is the new comprehensive plan that of course remains on the work program. There's still much work to do and we are kind of regrouping those efforts and hopefully you'll be getting an update soon on that project. But we are adding two other discretionary projects to the work program for next year in response to growing concerns about our environmentally related regulations and open space planning. So one of the projects is to strengthen the regulations in the unified development ordinance regarding natural heritage sites, Durham inventory sites and historic properties. There are several instances in the ordinance that just say very lightly to protect or preserve these types of assets but they give no regulations as to what that might look like, what the expectation is. And so often at the administrative site plan stage, it is very difficult to enforce for a developer to do anything to protect these resources. So one project will be to work on actually strengthening and putting teeth to those regulations. The other project is going to be an analysis of all of our adopted open space plans. There are many, many items from those plans that have not been implemented and we are gonna be looking at those trying to work with our partner departments in the Durham Parks and Rec department, Durham General Services and Durham County real estate, their open space acquisition program to see what items from those plans still need to be done and try and work within CIP and other mechanisms to get them funded and implemented. Although I like to Joe can say that we're the planning department, we're not the implementing department. I definitely think that we have a role to help make those plans a reality and deliver on the promises that were shared with the community and the development of those plans. So those are two projects that we will be adding to the work program for next year. So with that, I'm happy to take any questions that you all may have. Thank you very much. And congratulations on your role as the acting planning director. Thank you. Commissioners, any comments or questions for staff or just comments in general? And this is an item that we vote on, correct? This evening? Correct. We would need a recommendation. Thank you. Commissioner Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm really glad to see these additional projects. And I'm gonna throw out just one thing and it's consonant what I've always said when we get to this stage in the year. I think that we need to be intentional and create better programs for public engagement, lowering the barriers that the complexity of this process naturally create for people to become involved. And when I say people, I mean, people who are not engineers or land planners or attorneys or people who stand to make a lot of money from planning decisions. The folks whose interest in our planning new projects whose interest in our planning and zoning rules are the places where they live. And I would love to see us create more and better ways for them to get involved with adequate time and without fear. I know we have some programs that are on hold. We were beginning the business of having planners available so that people could ask questions in front of planning commission meetings. I'm not sure how that was going, but I applauded the effort. I've heard nothing but good things from the planning academies that were being done. But they're very small starts and what I think we ought to do. I would love to see the planning department have some ombudsman positions that where planners dedicated to the business of advising, not just answering questions, but actually advising what I will call ordinary people about how to protect their interests from their point of view. And I know that could be controversial, but at some point I think we've got to do that or we're never going to get better. My time on this commission is short. The chance to talk about as a commission member to talk about the work plan again may never come up. So I'm gonna throw it out there. I intend to vote in favor of this work plan. I will make the motion if that's required. But I do wanna say it out loud so that all my fellow commission members can hear it. This was my concern when I first came on planning commission many years ago and it will be my concern when I leave it a few months from now. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Miller. Other questions or comments? I would just echo Commissioner Miller in the big picture and I'm pleased to see what's in the work plan. I wish the planning department had more resources to tackle more items and that's been a continued theme as well, but I'll plan to vote for this and I'm happy to entertain a motion for approval. Well, I promised so. Mr. Chair, I move that we send fiscal year 2021 planning department work program forward to the elected bodies. That would be the city council and the board of county commissioners with a favorable recommendation. I'm gonna have an opportunity to come in it in writing, echo some of the things that I said to you folks. Do we have a second? Second. We'll give it to Commissioner Morgan on the second. I was moved by Commissioner Miller and we'll have the roll call vote please. Commissioner Williams. Yes. Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yeah. Commissioner Amondalia. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Alchart. Yes. Chair Busby. Yes. Commissioner Lanefried. Yes. Commissioner Kenchin. Yes. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. And Commissioner McIvern. Yes. Okay. You skipped over me again. What's that? I mean yes. I skipped you again. Oh, you know why I marked you out earlier. I'm so sorry. Commissioner Miller. Yes. It's late again. Woo. Thank you. It passed us 13-0. Thank you. Commissioner Miller, I believe she marked you out years ago. But yeah, don't think I don't know it and she isn't the first. Well, I tried not to mark you absent earlier but they were intent on invoting to excuse you and I was gonna wait to see if you showed up because I had this feeling you would and you did. Well, like a bad penny. That's right. We have one final item. The item we added to the agenda, the vice chair election and I will hand that over to the staff. So per the rules of procedure, Chair Busby moved up to replace Chair Hyman because the election is, we don't have an election until later in the year and so because she was term limited, he just would move up and replace her. So what we would need to have an election for tonight is just a vice chair to serve into our next regular election. So the floor is open and staff can take a nomination at this time. Ms. Smith, I'd like to nominate Commissioner Kenchin and I would note that I'm a city appointee so we do need to make sure that the vice chair is a county appointee. Yes, we typically try to have one of each from each jurisdiction as chair or vice chair. Do nominations need a second? Yes, please. Can I second that please? Sure. Are there any other nominations from the floor at this time? I think Mr. Baker has his hand up. I was just gonna say that I was also planning to nominate Commissioner Kenchin. Oh, okay. Thank you. Okay, so if there's no other nominations from the floor and no other discussion, ready to take a vote if the commission is ready. The commission has to accept that nomination. We don't care what he thinks. Yes, I guess he should do that. Mr. Kenchin, do you accept the nomination? I do, I do, thank you. Okay, okay, great. Thank you. Okay, I'm gonna go down the wrong call one more time and I'm not gonna forget Mr. Miller, Commissioner Williams. Yes. Okay, Commissioner Morgan. Yes. Commissioner Johnson. Yeah. Commissioner Amondola. Yes. Commissioner Durkin. Yes. Commissioner Al-Turk. Yes. Vice Chair Busby, excuse me, Chair Busby. Yes. Old Habits die hard. Commissioner Landfrey. Yes. Commissioner Miller. Yes. Commissioner Kenchin. Yes. You don't have to vote for yourself, but it's fine. That's really fair. Commissioner Baker. Yes. Commissioner Lowe. Commissioner Lowe. Let me think. Yes. Okay. Yes, yes. Thank you, sir. Commissioner McIver. Yes. Okay. The election to elect Mr. Kenchin, Vice Chair, 13-0. I have one last really quick announcement if you all will humor me, if that's okay. I sent out an email last week to our, I call them our frequent flyer applicants. It's our group of applicants that you see most of the time. We have a group of applicants that are our typical ones that we see and deal with. And I sent an email out explaining to them that based on recent comments and concerns that were expressed at city council meetings. And we haven't had the same concerns expressed at board of county commissioners, but we have not had the same set of circumstances either. So they may would feel the same, but definitely city council has expressed this concern a lot lately about development plans, zoning that have left the planning commission in between the time they leave planning commission and they are presented to city council, they have changed dramatically. And sometimes they change, and it's not sometimes all the time they change dramatically to be more stringent because on the development plan, you have to exceed the ordinance minimum requirements. You can't go backwards and do less. If you go backwards and do less, you automatically go back to the planning commission. But there's a section in the ordinance that allows the director to have some purview and some review of what is considered significant enough to send it back to the planning commission once it's already been to planning commission, but before it gets to council, if they change the commitments on the plan. And so we've taken a fairly conservative, aggressive approach in my opinion and we reserve the right to make adjustments as we go along, but we have informed out the applicants that going forward effective yesterday, any commitments that are made after planning commission with the exception of monetary text commitments, like if they want to make a monetary text commitment to the Durham Public Schools or the dedicated housing fund or something very, very simple, which would that pond earlier may have been an easy one because to retain a pond on the development plan is a fairly simple note that can be put on the development plan. But we do reserve the right to review those at planning commission, but if they make those changes after planning commission, we are going to send them back. They are not gonna be taken to the governing body with significant changes anymore going forward. There's a couple of cases that missed that missed our effective date of yesterday. So there might be a couple of cases that move forward at their own risk where they're changing the plans after planning commission to make them more restrictive or adding more text commitments and design commitments. We've cautioned them about that, but there was a recent case in city council that has been referred back to you. You will see it in a on a future agenda. It was for 1432 Ellis Road. And it was referred back because of the number of text commitments that were added after planning commission. And before it got to city council, the city council felt very strongly that the planning commission should see those commitments and have the ability to review those. So I just wanted to put that out there. Again, we reserve the right to modify as we go if we see necessary. We are more than happy to work with you on the spot and with applicants on the spot when it's reasonable. And when we can vet the commitments and we are comfortable with doing that the night of the planning commission meeting. Otherwise, we will ask for an automatic continuance to work those things out at the planning commission level before they get to the elected officials. So I hope that that makes sense. And we'll move forward in that direction and see how it works and certainly take your comments or concerns as we go. I mean, Mr. Chairman, I have a question about how this will work. Yeah, go ahead. So in article three of the UDO, we've got a 90-day clock on the business of the planning commission. And so if we have a situation where it comes to us, we don't like it. We make a lot of comments. The developer listens to our comments and becomes concerned because they got a, they did not get an enthusiastic vote from the planning commission. So they want to amend their proposal going forward to city council. My first concern is, is if we take a really, really strict view on changes and send everything back to the planning commission, we may have some developers dig in and just simply refuse to make changes. I don't know whether that will happen or not because if they did, we would probably just vote again. If it came back to us, it might be unenthusiastic or they'll just push ahead to the council without making changes. I mean, I like the fact that our influence causes developers to make changes, especially if it is in favor of, or bends towards what we have said. The second concern though is the 90-day rule. If it is, what happens to a project that where we've said no, they want to make changes before they go ahead to council, that means it's got to come back to us. The 90-day clock ticks all through that. Is it time then to go make a special change to the UDO that says that when something has to be re-referred to the planning commission that the 90 days is told? Or is that a statutory provision that we can't offer? So the first statement, my comment on that would be that that's why we're going to commit to be flexible and we may make some adjustment as we go in this process. Good, good. Because we started off more conservative and more aggressive because we really want these things worked out when they come to you. We want these things worked out during the review. We want the legwork done ahead of time and we want the things worked out with you. The planning commissioners, and that's why staff is willing to, if we have to ask for continuance while it's still in your 90-day period to work these things out before it ever gets to council, that's what we will do. We're going to probably become a little more diligent about that. Rather than, and it actually has not been an issue. We've just, of late, we've had some plans that have added a lot of text commitments after the fact. And adding one or two is one thing, but when you've got a list of 15 or 16 things that are added and the plan changes quite significantly after the planning commission sees it, that's what was the impetus to this. I see that the acting director has come on the screen, so I'm not sure if she wants to say something. I don't think we have to say acting. She's the director of my book. Yeah, exactly. I agree. I'm trying to be appropriate, so I'm going to let her speak. It's all just an act. The ordinance, Commissioner Miller, that is a great question. What the ordinance says is that we can refer something back due to significant changes for an additional hearing. So that additional hearing would start another 90-day cycle with the plan. Excellent. Answers my question. Thank you. If it's an act, it's a convincing performance. Thank you very much. I do my best work. I was actually pulling the section up to read that. And you're back every two weeks. Good question. There you go. But I hope that makes this the first part. It did. It did. And I'm very grateful. Great. Thank you. And I'll just add, from my perspective, I mean, Commissioner Miller, I appreciate your question about the timing issue because I hadn't thought about that. I think this is going to be very encouraging and a positive, especially because we often have votes where we all vote no and we write our comments and then a whole bunch of new things are added. And it is probably challenging for the governing body to know that we vote no because of what we had in front of us at the time or what we vote yes with all the new additions. It really does, I think, allow us to be playing the role we're supposed to play as an advisory board. So it would be very interesting to see how it plays out. But I appreciate the staff taking this step. And I look forward to seeing how that plays out for us as a commission. And Mr. Chair, if I may, I have another little bit of business. I wasn't here at the beginning of the meeting when we welcomed Ms. Landfried and Mr. Amondolia. And so, one, I want to add my welcome to the welcome I'm sure you gave them. I also want to make sure that I am pronouncing Austin's last name correctly. So I'm going to ask him to say it out loud for me to hear. Well, it's actually kind of contested in my family, but I pronounce it Amondolia. Very good. I'm going until your mother calls me. I'm going with you. She agrees with me, so that's all good. All right, so it's all good. The other thing I'd like to suggest, Mr. Busby, is we have two committees that are serving. One of those committees because Ms. Hyman has left us is a man down to use a lacrosse term. And I thought, since it is up to you to appoint people to committees, and it might be of interest to our two new members to join one, the other, or both of the committees if they want to. And that's consonant with your view of the committee's business. We have the last of three scheduled meetings with regard to the affordable housing slash trees committees this week. And then Mr. Baker's committee on the UDO is going to be scheduling meetings. But I wanted to make sure our two new members had an opportunity to join us in that work if that was their interest. Absolutely. Thank you for bringing it up. I will say the affordable housing group is finishing up its work this week, and that will be coming back to us. And so you're welcome to get in touch with Commissioner Miller, who has been helping shepherd that process. The long term effort is Commissioner Baker's committee that is working on UDO items. I believe that committee has met once, maybe twice, thus far twice. But that does have a longer shelf life. And you should also feel free to be in touch with either myself or with Commissioner Baker if that is of interest to you, if tonight hasn't scared you off already. We set up committees from time to time as issues arise. So there'll be other opportunities as well if you would rather wait for a new committee. They do rise up periodically. So just to clarify, Mr. Busby, am I to take it from your comments that if either Ms. Landfried or Mr. Amondolia were to join our committee at its meeting on Thursday that I would treat them as voting members of the committee? Feel free to reach out to me. I don't think that would be a problem as long as we don't trip having a quorum. No, I don't think it's not a quorum issue. It's an open meetings law issue, but I don't think the addition of even both of them would challenge that. Thank you very much. You bet. If there aren't any other items recognizing the late hour, we will adjourn and I will see all of you next Tuesday when we meet once again. So thank you all, appreciate it. Everyone, thank you. Congratulations, Armir. I hope it's what you wanted. You can cut out to it. You get it right.