 All right Welcome everybody. I'm going to call the Call to order the joint meeting of the Burlington Planning Commission with the City Council Ordinance Committee welcome to everybody who's here both in person and on the screen This is going to be recording in progress Okay, now we're recording good This is gonna be interesting to try and coordinate it between the people here and on the screen We're remote, but I'm sure it will all work out. So first item on our agenda is the agenda. Are there any changes to it? We do not have any changes Okay, seeing no changes. We have our agenda as presented item two is the public forum This is an opportunity for members of the public who'd like to speak to us on pretty much any item they would like to whether it's on the agenda or not and Charles do we have anybody who'd like to speak? We do we've got Sharon Buescher Sharon you should be all set Yes, thank you Charles. Hi. Good evening to everybody I'm want to speak on the presentation that you're going to get on the proposed amendments to inclusionary zoning and it's always catch 22 and you speak before the presentation because I Have been known to maybe misinterpret some of the information that's presented and there's clarity during the presentation and Discussion, but I did want to speak In support for some of the proposed amendments the one that allows for More than just the market rate number of bedrooms sometimes There are two or three bedrooms for multi-generational families and that's in the amendment That's nine point one point fourteen a and I felt that that amendments exception worked well to address That group of people that live in our community or want to come to our community and find housing Yet when I looked at the amendment that's nine point one point eleven point B I felt like that negated a And so it it felt like then if indeed you meet all the criteria and your and your gross Whatever floor area is greater than 15 percent then you you don't have to meet that criteria And it seemed that That you could you could make any number of size units So I I wasn't I didn't feel comfortable about how those two Worked together and stood alone So I just wanted to speak to that Especially when it's in form-based code where it's by right Where there's no conversation with anybody so I wasn't quite sure if a developer I know this is predominantly being driven by city place But But it would apply to anybody and if a developer I mean you're depending on The The good not good will but the integrity I guess of the developer to make sure that They really are looking at what the needs are and addressing those and I know some would say Well, that's driven by The banks and the financing someone's not going to build what isn't going to be rented or sold or whatever And yet I'm not comforted by that because I think with such a need for housing Units will be Purchased or rented but that doesn't mean Necessarily Meet The fact that we are actually Meeting the needs of the community. I don't feel I I don't feel that that guarantees that And so I would like the I'm hoping that as you look at this and hear the presentation you take into consideration what I am saying and And make sure that you are feeling that these these two proposed amendments do work Alone separately and really don't Counteract each other The other thing I wanted to say was that I am concerned about Our marketplace and the number of bedrooms and the fact that city place is going to be main mainly residential And so I am Andy going to say one thing about Your second item, which you may or may not get to which is the in ward five On pine street that that mixed use I continue to be concerned about the fact that Uh, my worry is when you look at at our goal or our mission, we are definitely addressing the housing crisis I can't fault anybody on that But I am concerned that we are not looking out for Our own personal Well-being as a community because I think we are not Guaranteeing a healthy mix of commercial retail And residential and I'm I'm fearful That when all is said and done, we will become the bedroom town for south burlington and williston and So I continue to be very Pessimistic about Some of the new proposed Development and the mix that is uh moving forward. So thank you so much for your time That looks like it is it for our public forum again. Sharon. Thank you Um, we'll move on to item three, which is the proposed CDO amendment za dash 23 dash o2 inclusionary zoning But before we get to the substance of this as I said at the beginning This is a joint meeting of the burlington planning commission and the city council ordinance committee And I probably should have done this at the beginning But I think it would be worth all of us introducing ourselves to each other because I don't know if Everyone on the ordinance committee knows the planning commissioners or the planning commissioner knows everyone on the ordinance committee So I will start. I'm andy montroll Chair of the planning commission I'm bruce baker vice chair of the planning commission Hi, michael gaughan member of the planning commission. I'm maya brant east district city councilor Ryan do you want to say hello? Director of the community and economic development office, thank you Everyone knows you guys, but If you want to introduce yourselves Sure charles iller office of city planning I'm megan tuttle. I'm the director for the office of city planning and just because it's far away. This is sarah morgan She's also a planner in our office We'll go to the folks online. I don't know if we want to continue ben. Would you like to go first? Uh, sure. Thanks, megan. Uh ben travers city council from board five and chair of the ordinance committee Thank you for organizing this and uh for hosting us this evening Hey, ben Maybe I could I could pass it to emily maybe Hi, i'm emily lee and i'm a member of the planning commission Eves, was that your dog? Yes, that was my dog. She's a panelist Her name is molly My name is eves bradley. I'm a member of the planning commission Alex friend planning commissioner Hi, i'm julia randall. I'm a member of the planning commission I didn't see you kim. Go ahead. Kim started it. Uh, I can see attorney and staff both Staff the ordinance committee, um, but also work with the planning commission Again greetings to everybody who's here and glad everyone can make it for our joint meeting So on this item who's going to kick it off for us All right, um, so charles is going to give us a presentation about the substance of the proposed amendment that is in the packet for tonight's meeting I'll just say a few very brief Opening kind of points This amendment is coming to us as the planning commission heard at their meeting last week at the request of the city The a joint kind of request by our office along with sido and the mayor's office to consider a few of these Kind of targeted tweaks to our current inclusionary zoning standards I won't go into a great amount of detail because I think a lot of you know this from other Forums, but the mayor shared with the planning commission last week that one of the kind of driving factors for the Timeliness of this question it has to do with city place um I think the mayor had shared that while progress has certainly been made on Moving forward with city place. There are Still some uncertainties that remain in terms of the actual mix of residential units that would ultimately become part of that project And the success of that project depend on a little bit of flexibility in terms of how our inclusionary zoning standards Work with regard to bedroom mix and unit size, which is why we're kind of narrowly focusing on these issues But as we talked about at the last meeting as well These issues were among many that were also considered and updated as part of a collaborative effort To comprehensively look at our inclusionary zoning ordinance back in 2018 2019 time period Um ultimately we did make some tweaks to the part of the ordinance that deals with bedroom size and that was um an issue that Garner debate all the way up until the last minute when the ordinance changes were adopted Um really kind of grappling with what was the best way to deal with the sort of parity between inclusionary and market rate units And while we had to a lesser degree Well, we had a little bit of discussion, but to a much lesser degree About the kind of bedroom mix as well but ultimately It's not surprising that these issues are coming up again because I think that we're seeing In the types of projects that are incorporating large numbers of inclusionary units and the changing Dynamics of our housing market We are seeing um at once the possibility that inclusionary units could be both larger And smaller than market rate units depending on the specific circumstances Of an individual project. So really we're trying to um Focus on just these two pieces in order to uh grapple with those issues So charles is going to walk through the proposal in terms of what the three changes are that we're recommending and some discussion about the rationale for those And um, I think feel free to jump in with questions. Um, within the presentation for each of these issues Thanks, megan. So yes, I will provide more detail to the summary that that megan just gave so there's Sort of two overarching changes proposed here The bedroom mix there's two bedroom mix and then one that deals with the unit size Um, so high-level summary here is that the first would allow projects where the inclusionary zoning units include more bedrooms than is currently required by um, the standard today which essentially requires the same ratio of bedroom mix in the Inclusionary component of a project as is in the market rate component Um, the issue here, um, I will get into in just a moment Let me first just just talk about these other two. So Also related to bedroom mix, um, you know megan just mentioned the the city place project But there are others that we can contemplate where Uh, the market rate components bedroom mix does not sort of translate to the demand of affordable housing in the city In the community And we'll get into more detail and provide some examples of how that might be and the third is the gross floor area of Or unit size rather And how the ordinance today regulates unit sizes and requires That inclusionary units be no less than 90 percent of the floor area of market rate units and again Um, we can relate this to city place, but also other other developments where there's not a sort of Uh, direct match in the demand for market rate units and affordable units So the the first issue with regard to larger inclusionary zoning units. So it's Typical margaret development that we're seeing in burlington and many communities is consisting of Studios one bedroom units But we can imagine that an affordable housing developer might have a waiting list for, you know, two bedroom units three bedroom units and in a development today Where, you know, 90 percent of units are Studios in one bedrooms. There's simply no pathway for the affordable housing To deliver those in demand sort of larger units. And so this proposal would allow The inclusionary units in a project to include units with a greater number of bedrooms than the market rate unit component of the project There is a shortage of family size units I would say in all types of development and and I think it's important That the ordinance establishes a framework for Family size affordable units Yeah, we have a question from from bruce Charles, I just want to I didn't see anything addressing When you have one bedroom units and market rate versus inclusionary the gap is fairly narrow as far as the rent is concerned But when you get to a four bedroom Progressively by bedroom count goes up. Are you addressing that at all in this? Because what i'm saying is we can wish for us by fiat to do something but May not get done in the marketplace. In fact, that's why we're here because city place is saying The marketplace for us dictates more bedrooms and the marketplace for inclusionary Non-profit developers dictate something else. That's right. I'd say they probably never will match up. That's right. I think we've heard From affordable housing developers that There's simply no wait lists for four bedroom affordable units and if city place is Is proposing four bedroom market rate units that obviously leads to an issue in the ordinance today This first issue is really though intended to allow greater flexibility I think one unintended consequence of the way that the ordinance has been written in the past is that Our presumption was always that people would want to build smaller inclusionary units than market rate units But this allows the flexibility if a project is primarily studios in one bedrooms that some of those Inclusionary could be two bedrooms for example where it would not have been allowed before If I could just say one more thing I think and this is beyond the scope of this The solution for us may be in another part of the ordinance at another time Which is far instead of drawing units per acre which tends to incentivize The marketplace to produce especially in the college markets larger units Even though they may not want to build the larger units It's an operational headache to manage more tenants in one unit than And I'm just saying that there may be a fix outside of this but we should put it on our to-do list This I was just going to add that the The experience over actually not just recent years, but really over quite a few years From affordable housing developers is that the There's the cost of development combined with the access to tax credit equity and other forms of Essentially subsidy that make these projects work that Sadly that the larger units don't usually pencil out for them And so they can take on a few of them and hope that they can fill them But their waiting list and their demand continues to be for the one and two bedroom units as much as We all would like to see more family-sized units. It doesn't necessarily It doesn't it doesn't directly correlate to or I'd say the You know the organizations that are providing most of the affordable housing are seeing Less and less demand household sizes continue to shrink That's not always true, but as a society. That's what we've seen in a significant way. So It's somewhat recognizing that reality And then the the last thing I'll just add Related to this point and then you do have a couple online comments andy Is that I just wanted to acknowledge the kind of questioner point that Sharon busher raised in public forum about this feeling like it conflicts with what's in The next recommendation and I think to some degree that may be true that this could be a moot point if we're allowing for Greater flexibility of the bedroom mix between market rate and inclusionary units But we felt it was important to make this change explicit that it would enable this So I can't see the people who are remote So if anyone wants to speak During this discussion, and I understand there might be a couple people Just speak out and we'll have to figure out how to make sure everyone takes their turn. But just speak out because I can't see Emily comment. Thank you, alex. Um, I guess I don't follow why What problem this is solving Because I I understand it gives more flexibility But I don't understand why a developer who is required To build a certain amount of units would ever choose to build a larger unit And with more bedrooms If their requirement is to build smaller units with smaller bedrooms With fewer bedrooms because that would be less costly. So why would a developer Want the flexibility to build bigger units? and incur more cost Am I missing something and I think brian and bruce may be able to elaborate You know, I think at a time when a market rate project is coming Let's say the affordable developer has a particular need or demand the waitlist is growing for let's say two bedroom units Uh, and they really want to bring those online I think that could be a scenario where this amendment would be helpful and I don't know A market rate developer would look at what they can garner for revenue per square foot Versus the cost to produce that square footage and if you look at a student rental, for example With four bedrooms in one bathroom in one kitchen That's going to be cheaper per square foot to produce and it's going to bear More revenue square foot So am I understanding that these larger units would Allowing the larger units as more profitable to a developer That a smaller unit because they garner more per square foot rental income I would say it could be for probably one exception is one bedroom luxury units per square foot they've gotten smaller and The developer you've seen them get on the market rate side get much smaller But rents have gone farther up and that's because of construction costs And rents per square foot have gone up because of demand Okay, I guess I'd be interested to see those like any data on those numbers about um Um What a Inclusionary unit goes for versus a regular unit I'm just I guess my concern is that the larger inclusionary zoning units would be You know filled with uh Like maybe students who don't make a lot of money and and qualify for Low-income housing as opposed to single Older people who can't live in group in group home like group living situations and it actually would take The low-income housing and make it more of If you want to live in low-income housing you have to have roommates and live with a bunch of people um Just address this this point. I think um Is an important one to discuss because when a household is applying to Rent a unit that is designated as inclusionary. They need to meet Income, you know be below a certain income level and what I thought I heard you saying is that That might allow for Recent college graduates perhaps to qualify. I think is what you're getting at or maybe even current college students Yeah, I mean I understand I I guess Low-income college students deserve as much Access to support as anyone having been a low-income college student myself But if all of the units if we end up building more four bedroom units in order to satisfy You know these inclusionary zoning requirements um there's More people who are low-income will have to live in sort of group living situations Um as opposed to having access to one bedroom unit I mean I'm I just I'm interested to understand how that fits in to this well, I could just if I could just give an example at Uh, we're this this provision, which is really just the the one that is um Starts with notwithstanding the foregoing correct. I think that's what we're focused on When I think of the development on north avenue at camry and rise the market development Featured really quite small units and was Paired with or in tandem with the affordable development, which had Larger units in that instance so in that instance you had the affordable developer developing Some ones some some studios some ones and some twos and really by and large the um the private development That occurred there was um quite small Um studios and ones and so this is just to acknowledge that there may be times when there's a bit of a A mismatch kind of in a direction that you might not otherwise think is likely to happen But it's really just to allow for that Greater flexibility, but as megan said as we go further through this process It may not be as critical that this be this change be included in what you finally adopted Yeah, and this to be clear this came up not because of the same kinds of requests that we were hearing or seeing from The considerations for the uniqueness of the city place project and how it's evolving This was actually something that that we had known was potentially a barrier in Other cases and so we figured if we were talking about These standards that we could address this on both ends both where it wants to be bigger and where it wants to be smaller Um, but yeah, it's very possible that we can rely Um just on the flexibility that we're offering for bedroom mix without needing to specify this As its own kind of I'll hang tight and Listen to the rest of the presentation then I do have one kind of related comment. Um, would you just to underscore the fact that the Affordable housing developers are the ones that are concerned largely about the unit mix because they Have investors they have market studies and they have a lot of concern about Anything more than two bedrooms basically because of the weightless dynamic that brian brian described So they're the ones that really feel like, you know, everyone's gonna be put at ease if they can meet the market as they as they see it and You know reduce the apprehension on the part of the Their investors be they tax credit or um, or loan providers Now, of course, vacancy is very low and um, you know, that's that's kind of an easy market So you're right in a lot of ways, but uh that just to make sure roles and um Concerns of the of the related parties are appropriately described Yeah I had a question. Yeah, alex. I think you wanted to speak julia I'm hearing you might have wanted to as well and ben Okay, why don't you guys go ahead So my question was basically like i'm in favor of giving more flexibility to people who want to develop You know affordable housing or inclusion it includes some Some affordable units The question is what are the unintended consequences of making this change? It had to have been there originally for a reason and is there are other experiences from other cities that are informative Charles megan you have any thoughts about that? So i'm sitting here with brian Pine who we also have started calling the city's historian in city hall But we are also fortunate that he has a long history with the inclusionary zoning ordinance as well But i'll just say um, I think alex as it relates to this specific point The intent of this standard originally was Most likely and brian can confirm this Because at the time our ordinance was written we were concerned that we may end up with really large Market rate units and very small inclusionary ones And so I don't think that our ordinance at the time contemplated A situation where the opposite might be true or even not at the extremes like even just Inclusionary units that might be slightly larger than market units um, and so I think the unintended consequence here is Enable enabling them to be larger. I think emily pointed out something that we hadn't really thought about before but I think we still have all the same requirements in terms of income limits and rent limits that would be applicable But I just think that this standard was written in a different era when our concerns were different Family sizes were larger I was just going to say that too and I think megan summed it up well But you're right the demographic shift had not really begun this member This was adopted in 1990 things were a bit different household formation rates Which sounds really nerdy But it really is when people get together and actually form households Started moving progressively later and whereas people in the previous generation were forming households in their 20s Sometimes early mid 20s. It was moving to late 20s early 30s and now it's moved firmly into the mid 30s So it really does affect household size and what people are looking for at that stage in their life Thank you um, I my comments been addressed so carry on Yeah, and same here Alex actually asked my question. So if there's a The president if there's still more presentation why don't we go back to that? Uh, moving along. I don't I think we've discussed this such that this example I think we've we've talked about this sort of example. So I'll go to the next item. So Bedroom mix so the ordinance requires the bedroom mix again to In the inclusionary component of a project to match that of the market rate component of a project So this proposal would say that in in lieu of meeting that compliant and Uh of that standard and alternative compliance method would be where The gross floor area of the of all of the inclusionary Affordable units is greater than the percent that is outlined in that table That's dictating the percentage of affordable units if that is higher Uh, if that gross floor area is higher than that percent then the bedroom mix can differ So for example, if an inclusionary zoning requirement is 15 percent And an affordable component is, you know 17 percent of the gross floor area Of all of the residential units then the bedroom mix can be altered And again, this would address projects where there's a An abundance of let's say very large units that are four bedrooms and there's simply no demand for those in the affordable Housing market it would allow for, you know, affordable housing development in those situations Co-housing is another that we've seen increasingly in other cities that may be coming to burlington where there's let's say Four or five even more bedrooms and folks are sharing a kitchen or even, you know, sharing some bathrooms Across units. This would provide a pathway for for iZ to achieve some affordability Um, so an example of a project here So today, um, if let's let's say there's a project with 100 units total and a 15 percent iZ requirement So today, um, if all if all let's say the developer wants to build a lot of four bedroom units So 85 of those 100 would be four bedrooms And 15 would be also four bedrooms, but again, there's no demand for that Champlain housing trust has has told us communicated to us that there's no wait list for for four units And they they couldn't see themselves contemplating developing four bedroom affordable units So the proposal would allow in in lieu of that. Let's say Where those 85 units? Um, are each let's say 1200 square feet for a total of just over 102,000 square feet gross floor area It would say if the iZ units can can achieve at least 15.5 percent of that floor area Of the residential units then the bedroom mix can differ. So let's Then say instead of the 15 four bedroom affordable units That developer could then develop, you know, 20 in-demand one bedroom units at 600 square feet And five two bedroom units at You know 762 square feet for a total of, you know, 15.5 percent of the residential component. So That would essentially get us more affordable units and most likely would be, you know, all sort of in-demand types So that is You know, that's that's the proposal. So how do piercities sort of regulate bedroom mix? Um South Burlington requires that the Sort of average and they they use mean number of bedrooms in the inclusionary units shall be no less than the average number of bedrooms in the market rate units New York City establishes minimum bedroom mix proportions. So they're looking for At least 50 to bedrooms plus 75 one bedroom plus But New York City notably does allow for multiple exemptions to these standards If you're interested, we can we can bring those to your next discussion, but they are they are many Boston requires Boston has a sort of nebulous inclusionary zoning program that uses Let me just get this out of my way Inclusionary units must be consistent in bedroom count and includes A following sort of requirement. So Boston will allow inclusionary units to be provided on site or off site And off site units must reflect or be preferable to the mix of market rate units Where preferable in boston essentially means a higher percentage of units with two plus bedrooms I take it. There's a particular need for those family size units in boston Okay, so that is that is it for the bedroom mix if there's any questions online or in here Any questions? This point that i'm going to share is really something that we've only encountered a few on a few occasions and it's where the developer makes their calculations and comes to our office and says here's what I think is going to be um Required of us and the problem with their calculations are that they when they're calculating the average unit rent or sale price They include what they have determined the inclusionary Prices will be in their calculation And even it doesn't say anywhere in the ordinance how to do that But I think we need to clarify that when you're doing that calculation It should be the average of the market rate units But it's nowhere is it spelled that that was a clear that was something we wanted to clear up And I don't think we did that in here. So unless you tell me So are you talking about how they calculate 15 percent of gfa? Because we we have so just for the commission The concern that brian just shared about calculating the rents for example is something that we know about and for Transparency we do plan to bring you another package of corrections to izzy at some point in the future So that issue that brian just mentioned about how The izzy rents factor into the the average rents for a project is something we'll talk to you about in the future But brian has flagged the same kind of question And I was just thinking the same thing when you were giving your example about whether the percentage of The gross floor area that has to be occupied by inclusionary units includes all of the units in the project or only The market rate units in a project and so the way this is written says that The inclusionary gross floor area has to be 15 percent of all the residential units in the project Not just of the market rate units So it is specific to that unless people feel it should be otherwise, but it is supposed to be 15 percent of all Why not clear it up now or is that's gonna take too long More things we tackle the harder Sorry, alex. You couldn't probably hear my sarcastic remark, which was not appropriate. I heard it. Okay The but I will say that We actually have a large number of technical corrections and other Clarifications that we want to make and we think that one is actually more of a clarification So we didn't feel that it we we have ways of dealing with it right now in terms of the administration of the ordinance But we think it's an important clarification to make as part of that package And Ben does have his hand up Andy. I think go ahead Ben Uh, thanks Megan and first of all, let me say that I'm so impressed already with the expertise demonstrated by you planning commissioners and your questions. So let me apologize in advance if I'm asking a question that's not quite up to The level that you all are operating on here But I guess just to sort of put it out there before you move into the gross floor area discussion of the presentation so When I was first looking at the proposed changes, I suppose one of the questions that came to my mind was well Why don't we just Get rid of the bedroom mix requirement altogether for all projects and not do this Square footage analysis if affordable housing developers are saying that They just in whatever project it may be they want to be able to develop the units. They're in demand Um, why don't we just go ahead and do that? My my guess though and I would appreciate your feedback on that is that the reason why we don't want to do that is because There's some concern that Then an affordable housing developer may simply meet their 15% unit demand By building all small efficiency apartments My question then is and I think this goes to Sharon busher's point public comment as well is as we move into the gross floor area discussion um, I understand that by allowing Units to be less than that 90 threshold and the example that you just Showed there It would for those developers that are Then meeting that square footage amount by by building smaller units Um, it may result in there being more units overall In that equation You know, again, we're talking about sort of smaller the example that you used was a 600 square foot type apartment and as I look at the regulations as as existed prior to this proposed amendment again, there Appears to have been some consideration here that Sort of as a public policy standpoint, we didn't want folks in affordable housing and it's to sort of be in those smaller Efficiency type apartments and I know that we say that They're in demand, but I'm assuming that you know, if you gave someone who's looking for a one-bedroom affordable housing unit the option of Do you want to be in the 600 square foot? One bedroom studio or do you want to be in the? 1000 square foot One bedroom studio Then the choice would be to be in the larger unit and that's again. I think from a policy standpoint probably why We have that 90% number so such that folks are not in much smaller units than similar bedroom market unit Area, so I guess that's just what I would like to focus on. I know we're talking about sort of in demand here But from a from a policy standpoint is there's some concern that By adding this second part on gross floor area That we are, you know, allowing affordable housing developers to really build Sort of much smaller efficiency units that yes, maybe in demand But may not be what folks are really looking for and what they're available to get now under the current ordinance Sorry, that's long-winded and rambling, but I hope it made sense You know the whole reason that this exists both in burlington and other places is because of this concept of like A poor door or like things that are very, you know, painful And so it is important to have some parity or equity there and And so I think that's just worth articulating and sort of like You know not completely throwing out the whole The whole bedroom mix matching that previously existed Andy so I'd like to talk about What I'm what I'm not hearing in this conversation is an understanding and or an analysis of costs and rents Because you know with with great respect the reason why units are getting smaller Is because it's harder and harder and harder for developers And I don't mean the public sector. I mean the private sector To make the numbers work, you know when it's costing at this point 235 $245 a square foot for a private developer to put up a building and build apartments You start doing the math and the the rents that you you need to charge go up And the size of the units has to go down because the only way to to to get to a level where the deal pencils Is to make the units smaller so you can get more So it has nothing to do with you know I mean, yes, you could say that there is a general market trend Towards people thinking that smaller is better But to ben's point if you have the opportunity of rent a thousand square feet versus 600 square feet anybody Is going to go for that thousand square feet most likely there'll be a few outliers, but But You know the reality is that and again, I'm I'm saying this from my perspective, but the demand For lots of bedrooms I think I'm not I think it was Megan who said that you know cht has said, you know, we have no waiting lists for units that size they just they're They're not in demand And they're not So I guess, you know, I do understand the idea that particularly among some of the new american families People with lots of kids There is a need for for more bedrooms than than what's being offered in the current mix But I guess what I would say is, you know, this all sounds wonderful, but the end of the day costs money And it has to make financial sense And I guess that that's what I'd like to bring us back to is Sure Can this make sense? Yes, but you know, maybe there's there's some sort of a bonus you could give people For building units that have lots of bedrooms, you know, it rather than demand it Incentivize it But you know, if you talk to any developer about what they're going to build, they're going to tell you I'm building one bedroom studios and maybe a few tubes. Why? Because when somebody leaves that apartment, the next person coming along is going to want it and they have to want it And that's what the market is asking for. They're not asking for three bedroom. They're not asking for four better They're not asking for five better Eve's I'd say the only exception to that and maybe emily referred to this a little bit in the college student area That's going to be the opposite dynamic the rest of the City Ones and twos are prevalent for that reason because of construction costs The other thing I think So I think you're right with one sliver of an exception there The other thing I would say that's important to recognize is how these get developed The larger developments like cambrian rise For a lot of reasons including that the inclusion the affordable housing developers are better at managing the developments Folks at cambrian rise would rather have cambria. It would rather have a separate building equally as nice but Built and managed and financed using their financing by cht or someone like cht Because so who's building the inclusionary units in those larger projects are nonprofits Who's build now remember this is triggered at four units after four you build it Who's building them in the smaller ones are folks that are not as savvy about all these things perhaps because they're not professional developers with finance people In their offices as much so there it's a different dynamic there Those are built probably by the developers and maybe brian you could speak to that Is that right or is that kind of right? You know every every development is just a little bit unique. So it's not it's not always It's not always the best idea for me to try and offer When you look at the one of the largest recent developments before cambria and it was the redevelopment on Patchen Road Grove Street Grove Street in burlington, of course sd. Ireland had owned the property So they had no cost basis in the land So they were able to make all of their inclusionary units were within their buildings and they handled all of them there um Eric's model which he actually pioneered At the bank north properties where it started honestly Heinz lofts happened and right next door is 88 king where there's 24 Apartments that shampoong housing trust developed and that met the inclusionary requirement of Heinz lofts. That was the first Significant development where that occurred so um I guess i'd say that the You're correct and i think michael was getting at this earlier that when you have developments where The developer is just meeting the 15 percent and is just that's usually an in-house Finance deal where they're they're including those units in their building They're just handling the fact that it does depress their income stream over time And they've built that into their business model But when a project is done like Where city places coming online with or will come online with the Affordable inclusionary component being built and financed By cht as a standalone entity. I mean, I think we're you know, that's that's I think that's probably the most likely Development scenario we're going to see for the foreseeable future is that approach Well, and and i'm sorry I would jump in brian because I agree with you. I think that if there's a building where that's the mix That makes a lot of sense But I have a challenge imagining a bunch of one bedrooms and studios With a four bedroom throat and the mix that's filled with college students. I mean or anybody in a four bedroom because You know realistically if you can all think back to to when you're in college or other times The more people you pack into an apartment The louder and the rowdy or and the whatever it's going to be I mean unless you're all uh in jesuit school It just it's the nature of the beast And so, you know, if if you have units in a building That are you know, if you build a building and say this is a family building. This is where families are going to live. This is where That makes a lot of sense But again, I think that you know what we're looking to do. I think what we're looking to do makes sense We just have to be very careful how we do it and not Do it in such a way Because this has the potential to help our housing issue But done incorrectly it can harm our housing issue Because what the what the market can't really bear right now Between the taxes the cost of material the unavailability of the availability of labor and now interest rates is another cost another layer of cost That makes it harder for for developments to pencil and and brian, you know that that's you know It's elemental at this point because at this point, you know, I'll be very honest with all of you It's extraordinarily skinny to make any of these deals work in terms of building housing in this market Because of the cost associated and you know, we've plateaued in terms of rents and we're charging boston rents You know, it's it's it's two thousand dollars a month for a 600 square foot studio. Never mind a one bedroom So julia, we do see your hand up if you want to go. Yeah, thank you. Um I just wanted to come back to the you know, original reason for hearing this now, which is the city place development and I don't know if it's, you know, fully been acknowledged in this conversation that you know the desire of that developers to have The larger bedroom mix, um, you know, additional bedrooms for the market rate units, um, which is not you know the The mix that they are going for for the Inclusionary units unless I'm completely misunderstanding that And also that this is a situation that sounds similar to the cambrian rise development in that the affordable units will be in a separate Structure managed by cht. I just want to confirm the understanding that right and then The other thing I wanted to raise is just a question about Minimum unit size requirements. And if that is another element to this conversation that, um, can support, you know the uh, the parity and dignity of Um, affordable units compared to market rate units That kind of pairs or pairs with this bedroom mix conversation, but obviously is not a substitute for it So does the city have any, um Uh current ordinances that cover minimum unit size um by bedroom and I'm sorry that I don't know that off the top of my head right now. You shouldn't know that off the top of your head That's totally fine. The one thing I want to say is this I was on the inclusionary committee A lot of debate a lot of really good debate And there was a unit size requirement But because our ordinance is so slow to react to the marketplace the unit size your mark requirement Was impossible for brian to administer because it was beyond what anything was produced in the market I think one bedroom had to be 11 hundred square feet or something silly that for many years was no longer in existence So I'd be reluctant at least in the zoning ordinance to put a requirement of a minimum size Because I think we'll be back in the same place, but it'll be too late by the time we react We've lost many many units because development developers just Whether affordable or not The sort of the market conditions are right for them and they do it or they don't move to another market and build it Yeah, so you can see here on the screen. These are the former minimum unit sizes that were required for iz before 2019 as bruce was just mentioning um You can also see an example that charles polled for other uh for new york city Not really that different from the standards we used to have but we did hear A lot of concern through that process about Eliminating these static minimum sizes and using something different You know the other thing that we did look at earlier today is just that outside of the zoning ordinance We do have minimum housing codes that have Minimum unit sizes from a habitability and safety perspective. So this is what you see here on the screen These are would be much smaller than the sizes we're talking about but these are the minimum life safety standards in our housing code 150 is really low Yeah, again, these are just yeah, I understand housing safety. Yeah. Yeah, I understand It's per occupant. I mean I did live in that my freshman year of college, but yeah Yeah, this is yeah per person so that'd be Since I mean to I would be reluctant to change The the unit mix parity under the 15 percent because of the reasons we just said because if you're going over 15 percent You really are in a situation where you have a have a affordable housing specialist involved, but Do you can since we're doing this, you know, and I don't want to go too out of scope, but Is it a possibility that you could have something where They want to build where we get in the same situation, but it's less than 15 percent You know what I mean So is it worth saying is it worthwhile? We're kind of just making small changes to say up to three bedroom Up to three bedrooms in terms of parity if it's less than 15 percent I mean, I don't know that that situation exists or that you have something in the pipeline, but Yeah You guys speaking to the microphones, sorry, sorry, Alex 15 percent is the minimum that anyone can do and understood. Okay, but so like We're saying if you go over 15 percent, sorry We're saying if you go over 15 percent You have this flexibility right on unit mix where so long as you're Providing the right gross score footage, but under 15 percent could we envision a scenario? In relatively short time where somebody there's obviously some sort of market for four bedroom, right? Like we're totally at capacity on student housing And so could you envision a scenario where if it's they're only building they're building 15 percent exactly And we run into a similar situation where they're saying well I can't have parity within the building of a four bedroom that just doesn't make any sense I don't know. I'm just I'm just wondering out loud if like while we're making these small changes I'm again hesitant to change the parity within the less than the within the 15 percent, but Should we make a change that says you know up to three bedrooms or something like that? I'm just wondering because we've had this because because we're now we've now we're now observing this change in the market, right? That like could come back in relatively short order Yeah, I mean, it's a good question that we could put a little more thought into I think I think I'm following the point that you're making Um, which is essentially right now the way that this proposal is structured is we're creating two tiers. You're either allocating at least 15 and a half percent of the gross floor area of all your residential units And allowed to have greater flexibility in the bedroom mix and size Or if you're under that percent of your gross floor area, you have to meet all of our existing requirements um In terms of you know, the bedroom mixes have to be the same and the unit sizes have to be at least 90 percent of the market Um, so you're saying like within that lower tier see if there's more flexibility to offer as well Only for really large units, right? Okay Okay, yeah, I mean that is a question that we kind of started with is like Is the problem really just at the largest end of the market rate units? Um Versus across the board. So yeah, we could put some more thought into that question One thing I think and this was from the mayor last time I think it's important as much as we can to stick to this And the reason I'm going to give you another reason which is there are things inside this inclusionary ordinance If you gave brian an afternoon, he would like fixed And or maybe a few afternoons for example, it it says that More than one project within a year by any applicant or Helper or something like that Totally, I don't know how he could what's the year mean? What's the applicant mean? What's the responsible party? I think the term is what's responsible party mean? There's no way he can administer that The same way I do do you agree with that? I mean brian? I mean it it's just there's things like that We should technically go in and try to Define terms or and fix them and you may be This may be on the list. No, I definitely hear you. I don't open the Pandora's box But it is directly related to unit size and so in unit mix and that's the only reason it comes to mind Yeah, bruce. I'll just say that's another thing that's on our radar I have a question Oh, go ahead Emily No, your hand set up for a while you go ahead. Okay. Um, I just similarly I don't want to open Pandora's box But it is related to um, you know unit configurations Um, I wonder how this ordinance treats, um, you know changes over time future conversions Particularly in response to the market in like a similar way that we're seeing right now Um Yeah, that's just a question and I know that you know, that's beyond the scope of this immediate change But it's also, you know, this has implications into the future related to you know, unit Um ratios as they change in the future so And so this new idea in architecture of flex walls to be able to have uh one A two bedroom that could become a one bedroom It seems like That might be something that builders could consider in order to to work with, you know changing You know Requirements and then the second thing as julia mentioned that the Um That the iz units are in a different building. Is that the case? Can somebody explain that to me? So do you want to talk about this or do you want me to talk? Sure It's It's at the option or the discretion of what the developer proposes and what the drb approves It is allowed that they be in separate buildings and michael spoke a little bit about the financing of affordable housing And if you are a private developer who? Acquires land holds the land does permitting does infrastructure and then makes available a Pad if you will a section of your property for the affordable housing you usually transact that you make that transaction in such a way that is Concessionary basically you lower the price enough to make it work for the affordable housing developer that developer needs to ensure to The tax credit investors that they're developing something that is a sort of a standalone They can't scatter the units about in market rate buildings and and hope that they work things out So that is ultimately what the financing structure requires or there are developers who've managed to put the inclusionary units Sprinkled about their building because they haven't chosen that other approach. It's usually smaller developments that developer keeps their inclusionary units in house and then the larger properties Will involve a third party that does the affordable units in a separate building Okay, and I I just was curious because of the word inclusionary and inclusionary zoning and sounds like it can be exclusionary as well depending on the developer I think the idea and it's a good point, but I think the idea is to have economically Diverse and integrated areas and neighborhoods not necessarily to say that every single building itself needs to meet that So it's the idea that you don't have exclusive neighborhoods not necessarily focused on what address you're at, but really what neighborhood I don't see any hands up currently Oh, sorry, Emily I just i'm looking for Information about what what does the low income housing? I I feel like I'm hearing conflicting things here. I'm hearing we need larger units And then we don't need larger units because there's no demand for it so and I see that the um It seems like some of the florid ratio ideas do result in more units being created So what are how we measuring our success like is it the number of people that are housed? Is it the type of units that are most needed? So, um, I guess Brian you just tell me like what is our community need right now so that we Can be sure that this is doing it because I don't I don't feel like I've seen that very clearly That's a it's a big question Emily. What does our community need in terms of housing? We do have um You know demographic shift that is Going to continue on for quite some time and that is the aging of our population So our housing needs are very much shifting and and the homes that are owned and occupied by Either one or two people who are elderly There's still a very significant number of starter homes in burlington that still are occupied By households who've been there 40 or 50 years and their kids are long gone and they don't have a lot of options And so there's a huge need for decent quality new rental housing for seniors to be able to move and create Open up those starter homes again for families to kind of do that Recycle of of hopefully bringing new families into neighborhoods into homes but um, you know the if you look at the If you look at the waiting lists as one way to see what your demand is The the demand continues to be for the ones and two bedroom units You could fill one bedroom units a market study will show you can fill one bedroom units All day long in this community you could do Two bedroom units at a pretty high level once you get above that it starts to Numbers just don't support a lot of new development unless you're narc marketing to a niche that is primarily the student niche And that's where larger Bedroom configurations do work And just how the race Oh, the only thing I was going to add Emily just for clarity when we've been referring When we've been talking about larger units in the context of the first change in particular We're not necessarily envisioning that this means for bedroom units. For example, we've really been thinking about even just situations where market rate might be studio in one bedrooms and Inclusionary could be one and twos. So we're not talking about really dramatically larger units Or I guess I'm always looking for the loophole here, you know, like that Uh developer is going to meet the floor area requirement of 15 percent by putting in four bedroom Units because then it's the fewest number of units to put in And it's the lowest cost when our community just doesn't need four bedroom units to be low income housing But when I look at the race when I look at the floor area ratio Uh Example that you gave earlier that showed that alternate path. It seems like it actually created more units So that seems like an obvious good thing if if the this one right here. Yeah, the one not one slide It seems like it creates more units. There are one and two bedroom units, which is I'm hearing What our community needs. So I guess I don't have any issue with this type of you know, this being allowed as an exemption Um, I am concerned about you know, the large units being used as a workaround to the to the Square foot. So I guess I'd like to hear more about how You know, maybe see Something like this that shows how it could be met in different ways If we allow the increase in bedrooms and larger units I think that um To your point about somebody building larger units to satisfy the requirement But potentially resulting in fewer units than they would have otherwise been required. Anyway, is that kind of what you're saying, right? Yeah, and then having and then having units built that aren't really that useful to our community, right? Yeah, I mean, I guess I'd say probably nobody really wants to build units that they can't fill if they can't fill them right, but I think um, what I've been hearing Bruce and Eves and maybe Brian to some degree saying is that The four bedroom units actually become harder to build especially when you think about building them at inclusionary rates that the Delta between what you can charge and what it actually cost to build those units is bigger than when the units are smaller. Is that right? Bruce is nodding his head at me. So I think I'm I'm struggling to see like where the incentive would be for someone to build just like A few four bedroom units that they are concerned. They might not fill The difference is pretty dramatic Brian I can't remember the numbers, but I don't have the inclusionary rents memorized But Bruce is correct that the the delta gets more significant It's actually quite small at the one bedroom and studio level. The difference is quite small It's when you get to the much bigger units and obviously Developers are in business and their financiers aren't interested in in developments that don't Kick off enough cash to make it a good investment. So there's probably not I don't think there's a whole lot of risk that Developers will be seeking to take a route a loophole route that gets lots of units that aren't really If there's no demand for I don't I don't think that's I don't think that's a very likely outcome At this stage do we feel like we need to talk about the last one? Maybe you could just say what the last one is I think it's yeah Right, so we've we've sort of talked about this issue, but The the third and final component of this is that it relates to a current requirement that The inclusionary units can be no smaller than 90 percent of the average gross floor area of market rate unit with the same bedroom number so A one bedroom is a unit can be no smaller than the average, you know of 90 percent of the market rate one bedrooms and so on and so forth as you go up So this proposal takes a similar approach to the previous one where the gross floor area of those inclusionary units is Greater than the percent of than the iz percent that's required for that project then the units can Be of a different size. It doesn't Doesn't prescribe what that size might be It just says that the size can be different. And so again using using a student housing example Where those units might be, you know, 1200 square feet You know, you get A whole host of potential options for or scenarios where the inclusionary units might be Significantly smaller half the size, but again, you're likely going to be ending up ultimately with more affordable units in that scenario Charles I have one question and maybe it's for brian too Isn't there also a phasing issue if we're here to solve the problem of multiple buildings on a lot and The if you think about in your building through four buildings on a site The inclusionary developer may not be in sync or or their funding source may not be in sync with When the market rate units can be produced and we're forcing them to build them all at the same time And it may not in an urban setting You may not be able to get enough big yellow trucks on the site to build them all at one time So do we still have a phasing issue for just like we have these two issues? We don't believe so We have worked through this issue with a number of folks including with our permitting and inspections department and I think a really helpful reference point for us again Just because cambrian rise has been such a different type of project for our community to to See come online under these ordinances has provided a helpful reference point in that The conditions of approval for that project did facilitate several phases of market rate development Before inclusionary units were originally planned to be created The conditions of approval though did acknowledge that those inclusionary units were going to come online within the first couple of years of construction And so that was something that the drb had deemed as you know appropriate for Allowing the different types of buildings and types of units that were going to be created across that project Ultimately that project's funding opportunities changed and the inclusion both inclusionary buildings ended up getting built before the other market rate built Any of the other market rate buildings I should say So it worked out slightly differently But particularly in situations where as we've talked before you have multiple development partners using different types of funding sources Uh, we think that that provides a good roadmap for how a phasing plan could be approved for future projects like it I can't find the provision now But are you saying that the drb has discussion under the current current wording of the to approve a phasing plan? Yep Ben did you want to chime in? Yeah, thanks, andy. So, um This is probably highly technical Um, but sort of doubling back to the first amendment, which is to allow for projects to always Build Inclusionary units that contain more bedrooms regardless of whether or not they meet this 15 threshold it theoretically would allow for The construction of a larger bedroom unit Without hitting that 15 threshold And that larger bedroom unit does not have a correlating unit within the building And so there's some confusion then to your point as to if there is no other apartment Or unit in the building to determine what that 90 percent number is Um, then there's some I think there may be some questions here as to sort of what is the threshold in that case where You don't hit that 15 square footage threshold But you have decided to build a larger bedroom unit, but you don't have that correlating unit within the project this Split in this table is just in a very inconvenient location. Sorry um Yeah, no, I think that that's a great point Ben. I think in that case You know the the 15 percent. Yeah, as you've acknowledged the gross floor area does not necessarily apply if someone is not seeking To essentially build units in the opposite direction, but I think the more we've talked through this I think we've acknowledged that probably the two the second two provisions allowing flexibility within those could satisfy um What we were trying to achieve with that first one as well. So may not be as applicable Going forward So I I think we as a staff we would be fine with taking that first change out And relying only on the other two First charles are you all set with your presentation? Was that? Yes Okay, then Where do we go from here? There's been a lot of feedback. Does the commission or the counselors Have any additional feedback you want to give on what we've heard so far? We were chiming in a lot during the whole presentation, but is there anyone In remote land that wants to speak out I just have a quick question about um, like parody and You know if there are Other changes that need to be made to the ordinance or these address like You know the ordinance The way it communicates a standard of parody between the affordable units and the market rate Units Are there other things to To be clarified regarding that standard or Is this sufficient or is that something that we will look at later down the line? You know when we're looking at things a broader scope related to this ordinance beyond just this bedroom mix issue Right, so today there is some required parody and I think you know Brian could probably speak More to this better to this than I can but the parody We feel that you know the the parody standards that are in the ordinance today are sufficient and I think if we did need to take a deeper look which I don't think we anticipate at this time You know we could do this at this later phase that we've we've talked about but yeah, you know the you know Unit finishes that sort of thing. You know Michael mentioned, you know the the poor door those the sorts of things Uh, typically aren't permitted Yeah, so I'm not sure if you can hear Brian, but um in the ordinance the proposed amendments that are in your packet the one directly Well, it would be letter e now in these proposed amendments speak towards You know the differences in the general appearance The exterior appearance as well as the performance of the systems of the units So those are standards that are already in the ordinance Thanks. Was there Julia did you still have No, thank you. Okay. Was there anybody else who wants to chime in on any of this? So just I think you know this may be more of a Megan did you? Yeah, but I just have one one really brief comment Which is and this may be more for our discussion that's going to be coming up in the future on the missing middle but just hearing the The lack of need for the larger units the three or four bedroom units Just raises all sorts of questions for me about the mix of our community Which is if if we want to be like a community that supports families and has strong schools The larger units are really not even large units But three four bedroom units is what most families with small kids or medium-sized kids one So as we get to the broader housing discussions, we're going to want to make sure that We keep that in mind and again I'm not sure that's really part of the discussion that we're having tonight on the inclusionary zoning But and it may be that we really need to look at our existing stock that Is already there to make sure that we Are able to preserve those as the three four plus bedrooms for the families But we want to make sure that those stay affordable those stay accessible those stay available to people who Want to be in burlington with families who go to the schools otherwise I think Sharon would be right that we just become like a bedroom community for Other areas around us. So not really part of the inclusionary zoning. I don't think maybe it is but Something to really keep in mind these were some Interesting statistics that we were hearing tonight I have I think you make an excellent point And I think that the three bedroom thing as someone who is looking for a three bedroom house for the young family like that was extremely hard and I pushed some housing developers and affordable housing developers in town on this point to say Is that true because you know the first thing you do when you do a market studies, you look at what already exists Right, like you don't look at what might exist. You look at what already exists and and they really Reiterated that in this market segment. That's where the demand is But I think you're right to say that we still need to be focused on as a community And I take brian's point about allowing people that would otherwise be starter homes to move to a new location to then Have you know some filtering of housing and to allow You know these smaller homes to open up for for families because I think I think it's I'm very happy you're focused on that One thing I'll say is um Executive committee authorized ordinance to start talking about some of these little tweaks that May have big impacts in the ordinance and charles and I have been trying to line up a A meeting and so we can share some thoughts on that So it may be bubbling up to you from ordinance planning commission ordinance Including a discussion of far instead of dwelling units per acre in certain zones Some of the demand is based on the zone around the university is different than the new north end and so I think and but we've taken A blanket approach of dwelling units per acre in all of our residential zones Which doesn't make a lot of sense from my perspective, but I think we should at least have that debate And you may be seeing a proposal from ordinance and staff on that Just the commission I believe took a huge step recently with the approval of the trinity be trinity zoning rezoning because We have lots of big Three and four bedrooms. They're just occupied by a different population that it'd be great to find purpose built Instead of to build purpose built student housing both on campus and off so that Folks will make room for the uses that were historically intended and the neighborhoods Are begging for more Diversity of household types and I think what it would also do is allow the market To demand for the producers of housing to produce what the market's demanding Not with the regulatory environment in some cases gets in the way of producing and in particularly with There are areas where there is a large demand for one bedrooms and they're not being produced and there are areas where there's A larger demand for three bedrooms and they're not being produced and there are some I think technical areas of the ordinance If it's demanded at a high rate It should be produced unless the regulatory environment stopping it and it's stopping it in some places Yeah, I think um Not to Belabor this point too much But I you know bruce is touching on something that has been a goal in our comprehensive plan for a while now Which is to think about a different standard than dwelling units per acre As the way we regulate building intensity essentially, it's something we're using as a proxy for how big or how bulky buildings are rather than necessarily about what happened what's happening inside of a building and so This is something that will definitely be a central point in the missing middle work I know it's come up in some of our other conversations as well Is what's a better way for us to achieve Um, you know what we want buildings to look and feel like but not so much micromanaging what they're doing on the inside so Yeah, so I don't know do you want to talk about do you want to bring it back to this amendment? Sorry, I didn't mean to I didn't mean to um sidetrack us on that but it's just something I think important for us to all keep our focus on As we're dealing with all different aspects of the housing issues, but um, Megan and charles if you want to just Um, if you have thoughts of Where we're moving from here on this it seems like there's some changes that we're talked about tonight So we'd need to see a new Version of this coming back to us and also just I mean, this is our first meeting with our joint meeting with the Ordinance committee and the commission and are you envisioning more of these because it might be helpful To continue with with at least the inclusionary zoning discussion that we're having Yeah, so we I think we've heard enough About revisions that both the ordinance committee and planning commission would like to see and so we can bring a revised amendment back to the planning commission At your meeting next week on the 24th I think we did anticipate having at least one more joint meeting of this these two bodies Um, I do know that the city council ordinance committee Will not be able to sort of accommodate that until after the first week of february So I think at the earliest it would be the week of february 6th The one we'd be able to have an ordinance committee meeting. I think saraya Is is traveling and won't be back until Early february doesn't Sorry just on that timeline Part of my ignorance because I just I think this is the first one I've attended That's a joint meeting. But um, is it something where we could move it at our next meeting? Yeah, rather than having to reassemble this joint committee. Yes. I mean you technically could warn a public hearing tonight for february 14th um, if you wanted to At the meeting next week on the 24th, I think if you were to warn a hearing you could still get it on the february 14th public hearing date Um, so we'd be happy to bring a revised amendment the planning commission. You all could Warn that public hearing for the 14th The ordinance the city council ordinance committee can have their discussions But ultimately if if at the public hearing you were to recommend that it go to the city council, then it would go Ultimately back to the council and probably the ordinance committee itself Are we are we close enough to warn it now because we can make changes during the day? Yeah, that's right. I mean public hearing I you know, it sounds like there are Because we're stripping out like one third of the Major changes that are being proposed. I do think it's often better to have a more finalized version that we warned for public hearing because That's what we want to put out to the public to have the comment on Like the version that's right now. We would have to say Warned something but we want you to change it before it gets put out to the public I just think it's a much much better practice to have something that's much closer to what we actually intend to present Hey Andy Yes, I don't mean to be contrary, but you know, this is a relatively big one and If we can get back together when ordinance committee the second week in february I think it would it would Realistically my fellow commissioners. I think if we get an ordinance committee buy it It might seem like our process is a little bit slower But I think the overall process would be more rapid So just putting that out there for thought that having everybody here Allows us to get to a relative consensus. I feel in a relatively quicker manner because We all understand each other's perspectives and are part of the dialogue So if it is something that we want to fast track Counter-intuitively it might be more efficient time wise to do it with the ordinance committee than without I'm I'm not hearing from tonight's discussion very much of a divergence between what the Ordinance committee and what the planning commission have been saying so I'm not really worried too worried at this stage about crossing paths on that one I just think that it would be a better practice whether we do it jointly with the ordinance committee at our next meeting or Just with the commission to have the version To warn for public hearing that we actually want to warn for public hearing And so when is our next meeting at this point? Are we still scheduled for next week or? Yeah, okay So we're still scheduled to have our meeting next week on tuesday Which is a lot of meetings that we've had in a fairly short time, but there's been a lot of important work that we've been doing So That would just be my suggestion to hold off on the warning at least until next week When we could see what the final version looks like and we could decide and we could hear I mean, I'd like to hear from the ordinance committee members who are here What your Desire would be on this one as well, but thank you andy. I am so new to this process That uh, this is my first time a Planning commission meeting So I I really appreciated the questions that were asked and If ben has questions He should ask them But I am also learning and an observer tonight, but thank you for making that time and space for me Yeah, thanks andy so Yeah, I mean obviously the proposed changes here are going to have broader effect into the future But I'm also mindful of the reasons why we got together jointly here Tonight and we've talked about it in the context of city place and You know, my understanding is that there is some time sensitivity around that so from my own perspective I would want the ordinance committee to accommodate Whatever process is going to be the most efficient towards our coming to resolution on this sooner rather than later And I sort of defer to you and to staff as to uh, what that would be but um, but we we do Want to accommodate that as soon as possible the only other thing that I would add is that Councillor hightower is the third member of the ordinance committee and is is not here this evening and my suggestions to staff would be If possible we could follow up with her between now and the next meeting to seek any additional feedback that She may have so one possible approach on this is We could have this back likely at our next meeting which is on tuesday it would be Ready if the commission would want to warn it for public hearing then and then the ordinance committee members You could certainly welcome to come during the public hearing portion of it and Way in on it at that point and if more changes need to be made we could certainly make changes and ultimately Once the commission is done with our work What we do is send it to the city council. So You're the ones who ultimately would be adopting it and well Consider doing the final consideration of it and adopting it. So You'll still have plenty of opportunities to take a look at it. So You know, it does sound like there's a lot of time sensitivity here. We want to get this moving We don't want to get it held up. So that might be a good approach to keep it moving give everybody who's you know at the table here an opportunity to weigh in and Have input on it while still continuing the process Megan I was just going to say logistically For the ordinance committee members the planning commission meets twice in february on the 14th and the 28th So after tonight's meeting we could follow up with you to see when would be best for your If you like the suggestion that andy just offered we could find which date would be best for your participation So we know when to set that hearing for And I agree with what andy said that We could even consider having that hearing as another joint meeting The planning commission is able to make changes to a zoning amendment after they hold that public hearing But before they refer it to the council that can happen the same night So that would give the ordinance committee members another opportunity to weigh in on any other Questions or changes you might want to see to this before it gets referred to the whole council But that could be a way for us to kind of do both at the same time keep this moving as well as keep your participation in the process For the process that We just laid out is there any concerns with that? And again for people who are remote I have a hard time seeing who all of you, you know, whether you want to speak out or not Feel free to just speak out I'm shaking my hand andy Which way? I'm saying I don't have any concerns, but the process was just laid out. Thank you. Good. Thank you. Get up. Get up. Okay Sounds good. Good. So I think we have an action plan on this one um, we'll see this back again at our next meeting and The commission will then decide what it wants to do with it at that meeting And from what i'm understanding and what my sense is we'll probably moving it forward to the public hearing What that's to be seen at that meeting good Anything else on this? All right, I don't think so. This has been really productive. Um, thanks again to the City councilors for joining us tonight. I think hearing Hearing your input on this is really helpful because it just Helps us know that we're heading in a direction that is likely to be supported by at least some members of the council so That's always good to know especially on something that's as time sensitive as And important as what this one is so good All right, we will close Unless there's anything further we'll close that and brian. Thank you also for being here. So we'll close this item um The next so we have to adjourn our joint meeting um But our next item was put on here in case there was time we're usually trying not to Continue on new items after around eight o'clock. So It's a possible to have this on our next agenda also on tuesday Um, is there a question? I may kindly make a just a request. Yes. I cannot make next tuesday's meeting I'm uh, feel very vested in this so I was wondering if you would just allow the time to explain the small change that staff had sure Made rather Joint meeting Yeah, so so let me formally if I hadn't said it we've formally adjourned our joint meeting And we're on then to item Five which is proposed cdo amendment z8-23-01 south end innovation district And again, I am mindful of the time on this where we've Try not to move into new items after around eight o'clock, but Okay, so yeah, why don't you there's a request to just go through what the changes are and then we'll pick up our discussion at the next meeting Sorry So I'll be very quick. So remember you you did Make the decision to adopt all of the revisions that we suggested So the final discussion was about the land use framework and and there were discussions about The ratio there were discussions about particular uses and so we've brought back is essentially We have made these three changes here on the left. So the first And biggest one is reducing that ratio between primary and secondary uses from one to one to one to two So the example projects here you can see You know To to essentially achieve 10,000 square feet of those secondary uses you would now need half of what you would have previously needed So 5,000 square foot of artist space would get you 10,000 square feet of a restaurant so on and so forth We have added health studio which encompasses things like yoga studios into the secondary permitted uses I think that was an oversight on our part and Bruce thank you We did move parking lot and parking garage over to the primary permitted category but also Included a footnote that forbids counting the square footage of those parking uses in that ratio to achieve those secondary uses So again, this is a sort of comparison of how the the previous version and the current draft line up So again, uh, if if a developer wants 10,000 square feet of restaurant space They would previously have needed to to to provide 10,000 square feet of primary space Let's say artist studio community garden now Just need that 5,000 square feet of artist studio We think this still achieves the intent of the southland innovation district, but it provides more flexibility In in achieving that and note that again Plan unit developments are permitted So the so in the event that any of these large sites do come in in a phased approach These uses can sort of creatively be laid out across sites Approaches that you talked about ask us to incorporate in the ordinance. So it's at the very end In a rough draft form Yeah, and and some of that involved, you know, we we decided ultimately not to sort of take a fine tooth comb to the use Categories and say well, let's move this use from secondary to primary Yeah, that that was basically it or just to remove the requirement altogether and create one sort of unified permitted use category Thank you. I mean, we were pretty close last time I don't know if it would be appropriate to move it, but Chair to consider given it's late What I mean, it's what would the commission like to do on this one? I mean, I I think it's worth having the final fuller discussion rather than pushing, you know rushing right now But it's really up to the commission over what you want to do Which is just a few days away. So one thing I will say is that I don't think city council has capacity to consider this as quickly as we would get it up to them Is my instinct right now because of what you said earlier tonight about march or something Well, I mean the election we have the march election coming up. I mean if Probably my guess is very little of what we're doing right now is going to be considered until after the new council takes Steps in which is in early april So we're not slowing anything down by debating in other words, right? I don't I don't think so But it's not being able to make next meeting because I You know wanted to make the motion but So we'll see it again, right after when it comes back, right? You already held your public hearing so Unless the council made changes to it at their level it shouldn't come back to you. Yeah, that's only if they make changes It's only if they make changes to it As Megan said we've warned it. We've asked for change We've had the public hearing over a couple different time periods. We've made changes So we're really on to the final consideration before it moves on to the city council And then they go through their process, which they generally have At least two readings of it. They send it to their committee I'm pretty sure there's going to be like, you know, good debate there as well. So You know, it's gonna They'll move at whatever speed they do it, but I don't think it's going to get that much consideration from them until A little bit later on but who knows I mean they might want to push it through quicker Yeah, at this point whether you took action tonight or next Tuesday It's not going to go to the council until their first meeting in february For their first reading and referral to ordinance committee I know ben who was here earlier is the chair of the ordinance committee and he's expressed that He's eager to take this up and work on it as an ordinance committee So I think they're definitely ready for it to be referred to them But at this point, it's not going to make it on monday night's council agenda regardless of whether you do anything with it tonight or not so Can I just ask What what do we this is something that we've already discussed at a public hearing And this is just another revision after the public hearing before it actually goes to the city council. Is that correct? This is like a mini a half boomerang That's right Sweet. Yeah, really really what we're doing is taking action on the public hearing Yeah, no further questions here. It's just finalizing our discussion and final actions on it Yeah, personally, I'm ready to go to approve this But I wasn't one of the people who had issues with it as it was written last time so Curious I mean, I would just say I think it would be healthy to have a you know, our final discussion on it because I know I've heard from various folks who have Said that they want to just have some final discussion some final input on it but I think we have plenty of time at our next meeting And as Megan said, it's not going to Really slow down or change the process at all. I just think it's A better discussion when we're all fresher Then I will I will reserve my sense of deja vu and You know exceed your your your point about doing things in a in a rational way is a good one Okay, good. Thank you. Then um We'll close that item out. We have our next meeting on Tuesday Do we have a Executive committee meeting before that one. So and that's a five o'clock Five thirty. So there'll be an executive committee meeting at five thirty next Tuesday as well And with that, I think we are on to adjournment item Six Do we have a motion to adjourn? Motion by michael seconded by Bruce who are the only ones I could really see I apologize for not being able to see the folks who were remote very well, but Next time I think if I if I come to um A hybrid like this, I'm going to bring my laptop so I could keep track of everybody. I think that might make it easier Well, do you think alex knows his head is like four and a half feet tall? At least All right, so we had a motion and second to adjourn all those in favor of the motion. Please say I raise your hand We stand adjourned. Thank you