 His mother was a long time ago. That was the longest funeral I've ever done. I was there too. Where the academics began to come and say, well, actually, no, no, no. I don't care whether what the last speaker said was true or not. You just let them say, I couldn't believe it. I was stuck. Some strange things do happen at services. We know these college professors. They're all about the credit. It's like, today it doesn't matter. That's it. Where are our folks? No one, only one person has asked for nil. We do the roll call before we do the excuses. You do it before and after. I do it after. Yeah. Did you guys get a lot of invoices this time? Yes. Creekside. I got a few today. I got two. Yeah, it was more today. I got two. I got four today. They did about four talk. I didn't get any. And then I came here. Okay. There was, I think I looked. Well, they went to you because you're the biggest. Well, they are writing to the one who's not going to respond back to them. So, I was tempted. Me, instead of the you. No, I had spoke with everybody. Yeah, I had. I spoke to them a couple of times and I wasn't there. Whoops. You know what? It's too early. Yeah, Tom. I had four or five today from folks and I thought they came to all of those. So, I got one from Mike. Mike Cutley. Yes, father. Yeah. One from yesterday. One from Mike Cutley. What's good for me? I got one out of the weekend. I got Mary. Mary Elizabeth Hanch. Victoria Creamer. Tim Fox. Dave Young. Yamachi. No. I just won. Just came in a few minutes ago. You know, we're not so great. They say I'm the same. I understand that word. I do. It's funny because I run an advocacy group that allows people to send those emails. And on this side, I'm like, they don't work. They don't work. Just stop. I understand. But I do prefer one people. It's in the room. I understand. But I do prefer one people. It's in the room. But, you know, it don't work, but it does work. It does. It does make sense. I mean, I tell you, because I mean, you can tell me the history of my circle on this one. So, I understand if there are problems. Hey. How are you? She'll be away when you need to. She'll be away when you need to. Oh, don't worry about it. Yeah, we do that too. Sorry. Sorry, Mr. Caller. Good afternoon and welcome to the Durham Planning Commission. The members of the Durham Planning Commission have been appointed by the city council and County Board of Commissioners as an advisory board to the elected officials. You should know that the elected officials have the final say on any issue before us tonight. If you wish to speak on an agenda item tonight, please go to the table to my left and sign up to speak. For those of you who wish to speak, please state your name and your address clearly when you come to the podium. Please speak clearly and into the microphone. Each side, those speaking in favor of an item and those speaking in opposition to an item will have 10 minutes to present for each side. The time will be divided among all wishing to speak. Finally, all motions are stated in the affirmative, so if a motion fails or ties, the recommendation is for a denial. Thank you and let's have the roll call. Mr. Alturk. Mr. Bryan. Mr. Busby. Ms. Freeman. Mr. Gouche. Mr. Gibbs. Mr. Harris. Mr. Hornbuckle. Ms. Hyman. Mr. Johnson. Mr. Kinchin. Mr. Miller. Mr. Vann. Mr. Whitley. Commissioner Freeman has arrived and I do have a request for an excused absence from Commissioner Neil Gouche. Second. I'm chairman, I move that we excuse Mr. Gouche from tonight's business. Second. Motion by Commissioner Miller and second by Commissioner Bryan that we excuse Commissioner Neil Gouche from the meeting. All in favor of this motion, let it be known by the usual sign of aye. All opposed. And let's see, I think we do have a quorum, so we're ready to proceed. Okay, our first item are there any adjustments to the agenda? Recognizing Commissioner Harris. Madam Chair, I would like to add under new business discussion on the training budget. Okay, any other adjustments to the agenda? Then we'll proceed by adding one item under new business the training budget. The next item we have is approval of minutes for October 11. Madam Chair, I move we approve the agenda as modified. Second. Commissioner Harris. Motion that we approve the agenda as modified. Second by Commissioner Busby. All in favor of this motion, let it be known by the usual sign of aye. All opposed. I think we're ready to open the first public hearing. Oh, I'm sorry. Madam Chairman, I have a question about the minutes. Okay, a question about the minutes. So Susan, are the, you and I had traded emails about the completeness of the comments section. The minutes we'll be voting on tonight will be those with the complete comments, even though they're not exactly like the ones that were mailed to us. Under those circumstances, I move that we approve the minutes. With the... Commissioner Brine. Mr. Commissioner Miller, could you modify your motion to include consistency statements? I was just doing the minutes, not the consistency statements. Okay. We could do two votes or one. Please. So I will be happy to modify the motion to include the consistency statements. Second. We have a motion by Commissioner Miller to modify the minutes, including the consistency statements. A second by Commissioner Brine. All in favor of this motion, let it be known by raising your right hand. All opposed? We've approved the minutes then. Thank you. Now we're ready to open the first public hearing. Case number Creekside Z1600001. We're ready for our staff report. Good evening, Kyle Taylor with the Planning Department. I can confirm, I can affirm that all legal notices, requirements have been executed in accordance with state and local law, and affidavits for such are on file in the Planning Department. For all cases being heard tonight. This is case Z1600001, Creekside Commons. The applicant is Stephen Freeman. The jurisdiction is in the city. The request is from residential suburban 20 to PDR 6.302, the acreage is 26.821 acres, and the proposal is for 169 townhomes. Just as a note, this was a case that was heard on 9-12-16, and is continued to this meeting. The site is comprised of three parcels located at 5300, 5308, and 5336, Ephesus Church Road. The project is located in suburban tier, and is located within the MTC I-40, and FJB Watershed Overlay Protection District. The site satisfies the criteria for the PDR Zoning District, as outlined in this slide and in the staff report. The site is currently heavily wooded and vacant with the exception of 5308, Ephesus Church Road, where an unoccupied home is currently located. This project meets the requirements for a development plan for the PDR Zoning District. The site's conditions page commits to five side access points, location of building and parking envelope, stream buffers, and general location of tree protection areas. Minimum commitments of the site are 169 residential units, five external side access points, impervious service maximum of 30%, or 8.05 acres, tree coverage 20% or 5.44 acres. The graphic commits to the location of tree preservation areas and stream buffers, location of access points and building and parking envelope. There's a number of commitments on this project, including road improvements, dedication of additional right-of-way and for a major transportation plan, providing sidewalk approval, subject to approval of the owner, crosswalks and other road improvements. They're outlined in this slide and also in the staff report. There are design commitments for the project. All buildings will have a maximum of three stories. Two-card garages will utilize elements as provided below. They're outlined in this slide and also in the staff report again. This request is consistent with a future land use map, which doesn't exist in this area as low-medium density residential. The staff has determined that the proposal is consistent with the comprehensive plan and policies as outlined in this slide. And as such, staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and ordinances. Thank you, and staff is available for any questions. I have two individuals who have signed up to speak for the project. The first individual is Ken Spaulding. Good afternoon, members of the Planning Commission, Madam Chair Lady and members of the Commission. My name is Ken Spaulding. I represent the applicant in this matter. The applicant reviewed available and buildable land in Durham for an opportunity for equality town-home residential development. There was a review of the city-county comprehensive land use plan for a recommended location for town-homes in Durham. This property and location were recommended by the land use plan of Durham, which had been approved by both the city and county governments, along with Durham residents and neighborhoods during years of preparation of Durham's comprehensive plan. Staff corroborated that four to eight units an acre is recommended for this location. The developer received this guidance from staff, and we are here tonight after many months of hard work, expenditures, and meetings with existing neighbors. Every ordinance, policy, and plan of the city of Durham has been adhered to by this developer. I want to point out that schools are under capacity as well as Ephesus Church Road. We are dedicating right-of-way for the much-needed southern, southwest, rather, Durham Parkway, which will assist in the lessening of traffic on Farrington Road. The town-homes will be significantly separated by this major proposed Parkway and city-enforced stream buffer protection from the nearest existing neighborhood. Basically, our project is bifarcated from the existing residents. Mr. Stanziel will provide for you for a more detailed presentation of our plan. Good evening. My name is George Stanziel with Stuart 115 Cofield Circle, Durham. After appearing here at our last meeting almost two months ago, we immediately met with the neighbors again. It was a very cordial and educational meeting where we presented a number of maps to try to give the neighbors a larger perspective on where this site sat within the comprehensive plan relative to transit planning, roadway planning, and the such. We wanted to give them a bigger understanding of where this site was located. I wanted to summarize just a few things that we feel are especially important in your decision this evening. Number one is density. Our proposed density is 6.302 units per acre, which falls directly in the middle of the densities required by the comprehensive plan at four to eight units per acre. A comp plan was developed, as Mr. Spaulding pointed out, in 2005 with significant community input, and we believe that a townhome community in this location is a perfect fit. Now, we can argue density, which we tend to do, and whether it's five, six, seven units per acre, we all have our feelings about that. But at the end of the day, the use remains a multi-family use. I am concerned when we argue solely about density because it's a number that is directly a direct relationship of the size of the site and therefore not always an indicator of the actual intensity of the site or the buildings. For example, if our site were two acres larger, which would be about 14 feet larger around our perimeter, with the same number of units, the density would be 5.8 units an acre rather than 6.3 units an acre. And the project would have the same unit type, building mass, design, and look, and would generate the same traffic and the same school children. The question here is use and the comp plan calls for a low to medium multi-family use. Our site is encumbered by a 200-foot buffer that you see there on your screen on the left. That is about 5.3 acres and about 200, it is 200 feet wide, it's a 200-foot buffer, screen buffer, which serves to separate our townhomes from the adjacent neighborhood. And the requirement, and we have the requirement to dedicate 110-foot right-of-way for the proposed parkway, which is about 1.8 acres, that bifurcates the site leaving a developable area of about 19.8 acres. And you can see the right-of-way there in gray, which extends to the east of our site and then will extend to the south of our site. A single-family development adjacent to a parkway without it being in a planned community such as Woodcroft, for instance, where you have the ability to provide adequate buffers adjacent to roadways is just simply not feasible in this marketplace and would create essentially a failed community or would suggest potentially a lower-cost housing type that would ultimately impact value of existing homes. The site is less than a mile in two directions. I'm going to see how this works here. I wanted to also point, let me just back up and point out, this is the land use map, and you see that our site is in the 4.8 units per acre area directly to the east 6 to 12 units per acre directly to the south of that 4 to 8 units per acre and then commercial and office directly to the east of that. So this is an area that is transitioning from single-family to multi-family to commercial and office. So the transit, this site is, as I said, within less than a mile within the transit, a couple of different transit stations. You'll see here about 0.86 miles from the Gateway Station and about 0.87 miles from the Lee Village Station to the south. Density is a major factor in ridership and in successive ridership for transit and also the ability to secure federal funding for transit. So six units per acre, as we're proposing, is not even considered reasonable density in a transit area. The second is housing typology. Mixing housing types and close proximity offers lifestyle choices. Durham has been stagnant in that regard, predominantly offering larger lots, single-family communities that are either not affordable nor necessarily fit today's lifestyle. Today we have either aging families who prefer to downsize and have a smaller unit with an HOA maintenance or young professionals who have other priorities in their lives than a home and a yard. Providing housing choice in residential areas is a positive and creates a more sustainable economic and social model. From a traffic standpoint, we can all agree that there are some short-term traffic issues in the area, predominantly morning and afternoon school drop-off and pickup. Town homes on this site will have little to no impact on that traffic. Roadway capacity is available on both roads, Farrington and Emphasis Church roads, and improvements are being planned and are approved on both these roads by other developers that will allow more efficient traffic flow. If we were to develop our site, for example, at four units per acre, which would be about 104 single-family units, as some have suggested, we would generate as much or slightly more traffic than our current proposal of 169 town homes and more school-aged children. I ask that you consider these as you make your decision tonight and would respectfully consider approving this case. We have a high-quality national home builder who will provide a very high-quality product for this area. Thank you very much. Thank you. I do have three individuals who have signed up to speak in this order. Number one will be Adam Jewelry. Adam Jewelry. Go ahead. Good evening. Thank you for having the community here. My name is Adam Jewelry. I live in Westendowns, which is directly adjacent to this Creekside Commons property. I would like to identify the members of the audience who are against this development in its current form. Could you please stand? Okay, thank you. So as he just mentioned, our primary concern with this development is the density in proximity with the lower density single-family homes around the development. So the rationale is that it would triple the density of the existing communities right adjacent to it, and that is actually not in accordance to the unified development ordinance or the overall Durham planning document. So we would propose a lower unit per acre of no more than five units. And this is, we believe a fair compromise is about 20% less units per acre. And although we understand that there will be traffic issues no matter which way do we go with a single-family development or a town-home development that's still 20% less traffic than already extremely crowded avenues that come north and south through Durham and also east and west in that area. We have some photos of the traffic of the daily commute that we'll go through in just a minute. Average time going through the stoplight on 54, where Farrington intersects 54, in the morning time is between 20 and 30 minutes with about a five-light cycle change. So it's a very long time to get through those lights in the morning time. Our second, well, as you can see here, we've seen the maps already, but this is the land in its current form. And you can see that all the developments around this area are single-family home, and Durham really promotes continuity of the surrounding communities and developments. And so putting a development of town-homes directly across from an elementary school in the middle of several single-family home communities would be directly opposing a lot of those Durham ordinances. So that was one of our main issues with this development. Would someone like to defer some additional time? Because I had basically allocated three minutes for each individual, 10 minutes all total. So how do we want to are all of you together? Thank you, Mr. Gallagher. I do have your name listed. And Mr. Jury, you can proceed. Okay. I'll speed up a little bit. Okay. So the second point was school overcrowding. So currently the creekside capacity is about 764 students, which is per the Lee Village 2012 study, which is available on the Durham website. And currently the enrollment is at 960 students, I think this year. And we have fourth and fifth graders in temporary trailers behind the school. And it's been that way already for about four years. If you look at the very bottom here, I think it's a very important point. Mobile classrooms cannot match the quality of educational environment that can be established in permanent buildings. I think that's very important because there is currently no plan to put any additional capacity into the elementary school system in Durham at this point in time. So adding additional students into creekside, which is exactly where all these kids will go at this point in time, will be very detrimental to their learning process. And in addition, policy 11.1.1B of the Durham plan recommends the denial of zoning map changes when capacity is over 110% in the school. Although I understand that that sometimes is also evaluated on a system-wide level, but this school is already far beyond capacity and putting another development right across the street would be very unwise. And I think also the community here would agree that nobody wants to overcrowd the schools more than it already is. And then Ted, would you like to come talk about traffic? Our next speaker is Mr. Ted Sezinski. Thank you. Ted Sezinski, 53-14, West End Downs Drive and West End Downs Subdivision. Traffic has been mentioned, and I kind of want to bring that to your attention and show you some of the problems we're currently having. The students from creekside seem to be coming mostly from the south, and their avenue of approach is up Farrington Road, making a left turn onto Ephesus Church and another left turn into the holding area for the school. So let me begin by showing you a picture of some of the northbound traffic on Farrington. This is an area map showing the position. It's a looking northbound. You can see it's backed up extensively. The same place, just a little farther south, and it's still backed up. So the backup goes a substantial distance on Farrington approaching Ephesus Church. Now, if we look in the other direction, a going home scenario, a similar situation. These are cars on... Yeah, okay, this is Farrington northbound, approaching Ephesus Church. Now we have Farrington southbound approaching 54, northbound. This is Farrington coming down towards 54. 54 is right in the foreground. A substantial amount of these cars are coming from the school after drop-offs. There's also people just trying to get to work, making a left turn on 54, getting over to the interstate. This is the Ephesus Church School, their driveway to the south. And the proposed subdivision entrance will be directly opposite their driveway. Here are cars backed up on Ephesus Church, waiting to get into Ephesus Church, and of course some of them leaving. And we'll look in the other direction. This is on Ephesus approaching the left turn to get into Creekside Elementary School. That's what I have. Thank you. Thank you. Are there any additional individuals who would like to speak? Mr. Galloway. So Mr. Gordon Galloway. Good evening to the council and the public, and thank you for welcoming to the meeting tonight. I am much less prepared. I come with my words only. Again, my name is Gordon Galloway, address 114 Baccalaureate Boulevard. I am one of those families coming from the south, heading towards Creekside. And first I'd like to say that I recognize the need for economic development, and I respect that by all means. I also have been convinced tonight in my first meeting here that the planned project has met the grand scheme proposals. I would simply like to question this site for this project being adjacent to Creekside Elementary. I have a seven-year-old daughter enrolled in first grade. I have a two-year-old son who'll be there in a few years. And I'm concerned about the strain that this project puts on the public resources with particular respect to traffic. As we just saw, I'm surprised you didn't get my car in one of those photos. Safety with the young children attending elementary school and an increase in what is already, for lack of a better word, some ridiculous traffic at particular hours of the day. And finally, the only time I found myself kind of laughing to myself was with this notion that this school is under capacity. Creekside is a fantastic school. We love our teachers. The kids are great. The programs are fantastic. But as we've heard tonight, we have students in trailers. We have very crowded hallways. We have, you know, a large number of students in small classrooms. I'm also a teacher with Durham Public Schools and I recognize the very important need for teacher-student ratio. Thank you for allowing me some time. Thank you. I have no other individuals who have signed up. Yes, okay. If you will. I'll need to have your signature on this sheet when you're... Hello, my name is Jay Goldstein, 304 Kinsale Drive in Chapel Hill. So I live adjacent in Blenheim Woods, which is kind of running down George King Road on the side of Creekside. So what I would add, I agree I'm not in support of the development. I think it's going to just add to the overcrowding. I feel like this is really just sort of development ahead of light rail or development, ahead of coming larger development. And I just... There have been a number of projects that have come through and then kind of make it past the Planning Commission on the City Council and get approved despite whatever you all recommend. I just feel like we're building to... We're adding to a problem to justify light rail or light rail ridership ahead of it actually being funded or really finally approved. It's also years in advance. I believe while the roads have been set to be developed and fix the Farrington 54 issue, that's years away as well. Even though it's in the plan, it's kind of deep in the things to get done. And we're sort of planning or building ahead, which is just adding or exacerbating the problem when the solution is years away and we're sort of building to create or add to a problem that will then be solved by light rail. So I just don't think that that makes sense. I would just contribute, I don't have pictures, but the spillover, the traffic is so bad to get into Creekside that many people currently are pulling into George King and parking on that road. So that's another issue that's only going to have to be resolved as George King gets developed because they already don't fit in terms of getting into the school. They're kind of creating their own solution, which is creating its own safety issues over time. So I would just contribute that's an additional issue related to the school. And then overall safety. So people are crossing the street from the community west end, but they're also coming from my neighborhood in Blenheim Woods. They're walking to and from school and the traffic is excessive. So I'm one of the lucky ones who leaves the house well before, but they actually switch the time when Creekside started to school and I got a little more exposure to it. And it stinks. So I actually, I would just say like while we're planning to solve a problem and that solution is years away and you're actually just exacerbating the issue where it's really going to become a deterrent in terms of people who want to live in the area. So that's it. Thank you, Mr. J. Goldstein. I do not have any other individuals who have signed up to speak. So I am going to close the public hearing and give our commissioners an opportunity to make comments and ask questions. Do I have commissioners who would like to speak? Okay. Sure. Okay. We'll start with Commissioner Alturg. Thank you, Chairwoman. I have a clarifying question for staff and then a comment. The question for staff is about school impacts. We heard that Creekside has over 900 students and in the staff report we get, you know, in table G5 we get numbers. But these are system-wide numbers. So we can't assess whether from these numbers whether the elementary school is above capacity from these numbers. Do you have numbers just for Creekside elementary or is that something we can get? Sarah Young with the Planning Department. It is our understanding and we've been advised by Durham Public Schools that we should only be using system-wide numbers because Durham Public Schools is a policy where they can reassign, districts can shift, there's magnet options. So not every child that necessarily is within a certain area will necessarily go to that school. For that reason we've been assigned advised to give you system numbers because there is no direct way to attribute specifically how many kids in that area will actually generate kids that go to that actual school. Okay, thank you. I guess, you know, my comment is that I'm generally not opposed to density or townhomes, even if they are close to single-family homes and I was inclined to vote for this because I do think in a growing city like Durham we do need density. At the same time I think that it seems to me like from the last, since the last meeting the neighbors have compromised or it seems like they have backed off. I think the initial suggestion was that only single-family homes were wanted and now the neighbors have suggested and given a recommendation of five acres per unit and I think that seems to me like a reasonable suggestion to the developer. I mean, if you look, I think to the point of the first speaker that spoke against the application, if you look at the surrounding neighborhoods, even if you exclude the RS designations, the PDR is the plan development, developments around this proposed site are all less than four acres per unit. Even, you know, to the northeast you have one close to four units per acre. Even to the southeast you have one at 4.5. And so I do think, I would be inclined to vote for this if the developer would go down on the density. I think this seems to me like this is the major sticking point and it would alleviate some of the traffic and school issues. It seems to me like six is maybe a little too high. So thanks. Thank you. Commissioner Bryan. Thank you. I also have concerns about the density. I think the 6.302 is too high. I think the neighborhood has made a very reasonable suggestion of five. I would even like to see it lower than that, but if they can live with five, then that would be fine with me. I don't really think, even though it's close to two transit stations, that this development does much to really support transit in your development plan. There's commitments to two-car garages. There's commitments to putting speed humps on your internal roads. This suggests to me that the major motor transportation in this development is going to be motor vehicle. That doesn't support transit. I'm concerned about the traffic problems. If you come down the density, you will reduce the traffic somewhat, but I'm very concerned about the traffic in front of the school. I'm afraid that people who might live in this development might choose to go out by way of Bakers Mill Road to the north, which will cause problems for them, for anybody who lives along Bakers Mill. I also wanted to note that the Southwest Durham Drive or Parkway is on the MTP plan for 2040. My understanding is that that means that hopefully we'll be built by 2040. That depends on acquiring right-of-way, getting funding, and so forth. The point I want to make is that if this development was approved, it would probably be built out maybe two decades before the Parkway came along to help relieve the traffic, and that's not good. And the final thing that concerns me, if I may finish my statement, is no bike lanes. That's really bothersome. If you look from Farrington Road to the western town's Parkway, you have the biggest frontage. And you have it in front of the school where there's a lot of congestion and traffic. I think that's one place where a bike rider would really welcome a bike lane. And if you're not going to put a bike lane in, then when other parcels get developed closer to Farrington, they will probably get away with outputting bike lanes in. And it defeats the whole purpose of having bike lanes along Ephesus Church Road. So I'd really like to see a bike lane. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Miller. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I actually would like to begin with a question for the developer if I may. Your development plan shows five external access points, one to Ephesus Road, one to Bakers Mill Road. And then there are three others that go to adjacent parcels. You don't currently have any arrangement with the owners of those parcels to build roads or anything. These would just be stubs. If somebody in the future may or may not connect to, depending upon what the rules might be at the time. That's correct. Thank you. And then I also have a question for the, I guess it's for Mr. Szynski, who showed us the photographs of the traffic, the school-related traffic. If you could come to the mics, sir, please. You showed us a bunch of photographs and you may have said so, but if you did, I missed it rustling my papers. The conditions that you showed us, was that some extraordinary day or school event, or is that every day? That was a typical school day. That's every day that school's in session. Yes, sir. And were those just in the morning, or in the afternoon, is it different? I believe most of them were in the morning. I didn't take all of the pictures. Do you know of them? All in the morning, sir. And so what's the, what are the traffic conditions like in the afternoon when it pick up time? But that's occurring sometime around between two and four, I suppose, and not five to seven. All right. Is it pretty much cleared out by five o'clock? No, it's still going. All right. Thank you. Those were my questions. If I may, Madam Chairman, I would like to make some comments on this property. The future land use map does designate this property as being four to eight units per acre. That doesn't, to me, to my mind, doesn't mean that anything between that is okay or that any density offered below eight is okay. I believe we have to take the future land use map and interpret what's appropriate for a particular parcel in terms of the written policies in the Comprehensive Plan. And policy 4.3.2A basically says that we're to encourage and promote compatible residential and non-residential infill on vacant or underutilized property within developed portions of the community to reinforce existing character. And so I am persuaded by what Mr. Al Turk said in looking at what the existing character is in this area to find a unit density between four and eight that's appropriate and promotes compatible residential infill for this project. And I believe, as Mr. Al Turk said, is the proposed six plus units per acre is too much given the pattern that's already established in the area. So I think the Comprehensive Plan requires us to look at this parcel, decide what number between four and eight is correct, six is too high, given that all the surrounding areas are developed at a substantially lower unit count. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Thank you. Mr. Gibbs, Commissioner Gibbs. Just a couple of comments. This is something that we go through with every development. Traffic, impact on schools, impact on infrastructure everywhere. I don't have... Well, I didn't have that much objection to six units density until I totaled up. That would be, what about... compared to the five that you're asking for. There would be, what, 28 more units. And how it's going to be fit on this property, I don't know, but I really don't have that much of an objection to the density. The impact on the school, there's nothing we can do about the traffic, number one. And we can't have a moratorium on all development everywhere until all the traffic and all the other concerns are worked out. This is in proximity to the Lehigh Village and the transit stop there. It will be on the path of the transit. And I agree with the last speaker. It seems to me that we're basing everything on what we hope to have, but let's face it, that's all we've got now. We've got to have some rhyme or reason to our development. And I don't think this development is to support transit. Transit is supposed to work with development. But as far as the school is concerned, and this is not going to help traffic going into school, but any students living in this development, it sort of goes with compact neighborhoods. It's walkable, they can walk across the street, which brings up some kind of dedicated crosswalk there for direct access to the school, even some traffic lights and maybe even some kind of traffic monitor. Maybe some sheriffs or police. I don't know which county it would come from. I would imagine from Durham County. But that could help the safety in crossing the street. And I know I'm going on about a lot of things, but there's just so many things that we have to consider. And right now, I think I would vote for this development. But let's hear what the owner and what you all can work out as far as coming to some terms. Those are just some ideas I have. Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, Commissioner Kitchin. Yes, my daughter is a fifth grader at Creekside, so I've been doing this for six years. And this morning, I don't know if anyone saw this morning, but there was a 40 was backed up. And so no cars could get off of Farrington onto 54, onto 40. And the traffic was backed up almost from 54 down to Ephesus Church Road. I mean, it was the worst I've ever seen. Just this morning. My point is I don't know that anything that we do tonight is going to fix that. You know, we've got some real problems with Farrington Road. I didn't know that 2040 was the time for the parkway. But we've got some real problems with Farrington Road with 54. I mean, it is an absolute disaster. I've done it. This is my sixth straight year doing it. And my daughter is in one of the trailers at Creekside as well. Having said that, I do think we need to, we need to face the fact that it's going to be developed. And if we can figure out a way to make less density project work on that site, it will not solve any of our problems with traffic with the trailers. But it will, I think, bring more cooperation with the neighborhood. So I would say that it's going to be developed and it's a good site. Farrington Road is a disaster. 54 is an absolute disaster. It's not going to get better or worse, depending on what happens here. But I would say that maybe if we could find a way to get to a less dense project, as I think Commissioner George said earlier, maybe five units per acre might be more plausible. Thank you. Commissioner Busby. Great. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to quickly weigh in as well as useful to hear the conversation and the questions. It's rare to have neighbors come with a very specific proposal when they oppose a proposal here at the Planning Commission. Normally folks say, I'd like less density. What I heard tonight is a very clear proposal, which I think is incredibly helpful. And the neighbors, you should all be commended for that. And as others up here have said, you could have asked for less. But I think it's a very reasonable request. I have a lot of concerns about the traffic, particularly around the school. The traffic study in our packet is useful, but doesn't tell us the story about the very acute issues. So I'm very concerned about the safety around the school as well. And I know that's true in a lot of schools, with drop-offs in the morning, with people walking. Even having a police officer out doing the crosswalk, it still is very dangerous. And when people are stressed and they're backed up, people make bad decisions. So I'm very concerned about that issue. And so I plan to vote against this proposal. I think it'd be very useful to have additional conversations to take a look at this notion of five units per acre. That strikes me as a good compromise. And I think it's something that I hope will continue as this moves forward to City Council. So thank you. Do I have other commissioners who would like to speak? Commissioner Johnson? Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. So I have one question for Mr. Stanzeal. So I'm reading comments that you provided. And you state that the neighborhood that we have illustrated to the neighborhood that lower density single family development adjacent to this parkway is simply not practical. I was wondering if you could provide more insight into the impractical reality that you state. I mean, it's very difficult from a... And this is coming purely from a developer's perspective, but it's very difficult to sell housing in general next to a parkway, a major parkway. Now, again, I know this is something that's very far in the future, but nonetheless, we're being asked to give up land. The city's not buying it. We have to give it up. We have to dedicate it, and it'll be there for the next 20 years or whatever that we talked about or that Mr. Brine brought up. But nonetheless, somebody is going to look when they go to buy a home, and they're going to see a dedicated right-of-way there, and they're going to wonder what's going to be there. And they're not going to care whether it's a year from now or 10 years from now or 20 years from now. They're going to be backing up to a parkway. So it has a major impact on the saleability of homes. Now, it has less impact on the sale of a town home versus a single-family home. We just know that statistically. So that was the point I was trying to make, is that when a parkway or a roadway or a dedicated, this is 110 feet. This is not a typical residential road is a 60-foot right-of-way. This is 110 feet. So it will have an impact on the sale of homes adjacent to it. Thank you. And so in just following up, so I pondered on this particular application for some days now. And so given the feedback that you just provided, it seems clear that finding a way if you're going to do town homes to make it work with the neighboring communities, it just makes sense as in the options are restricted in regards to the type of product you're going to build on the property. On the flip side, it seems like it's almost like it could be seen as a cash 22 in the sense that if you lower the density, and so I'm a real estate finance type person, so I understand the economics from the developer standpoint, you're probably talking different price points now. So that's a question of who will have access to the housing that will be developed on that property. And I did look at the numbers on the pricing of the houses. If it's anywhere in those ranges or above that, there's just a segment of dermites that's not going to be able to even consider that as an option. And so that's just something to consider. However, when I did look at the Futureland use map, I saw it was four to eight, you know, and I was like, you know, that's what they say. It can happen there, but that's not necessarily what should happen there when I'm looking at the surrounding communities and just the density of those communities. And so six, I wrestled with it, but six units per acre was just seeing the bit much. And I wrote that area two, three times just to get a feel for it. And so that brings me back to I'm not comfortable voting for the project and the plan as is, but it seems that if the townhomes seems to be the product that makes sense right now, then there should be some effort I would, you know, implore you to find a way to work with the communities, the surrounding communities to make this project viable as well as economically feasible for the developer. Thank you, Commissioner Johnson. Commissioner Hornbuckle. Thank you, Madam Chairman. This is always a difficult decision with us, especially on a density issue. I really don't think the density issue is going to affect with the impact on the schools. And I know I'm probably going to get criticized or ridiculed for this, but I'm retired law enforcement. In Bahama, there's traffic problems around Mangum School on Queer Roost Road. And I think a lot of the problem is is so many parents feel they're better off trying to drop their children off instead of utilizing the bus system, that creates quite a problem around many of the schools. And if more parents would utilize the bus system and transportation with the school system, that would cut down on the problems of, as you stated, the parking on George King or just trying to get in and around the schools. But it's virtually at any elementary school or schools in Durham, in general, that we have that problem. I think they have made some concessions on the density, and I'm in support of the project. Thank you, Madam. Thank you, Commissioner Friedman. Thank you. Just a few points. I first have to say that I wouldn't blame the parents in this situation. I think that there is a bigger issue in that we don't have a street grid to support the density that needs to be in this area or that could be in this area. And so I just want to make sure I do say that. I am similar to Commissioner Johnson and concerned about reducing the density, but I'm also more concerned about the traffic impact for the school. And I'm not sure that even at five that would help, but if that's where your neighbors or the residents in the community are, I would also strongly implore you to see if there was a way to come to some type of resolution around that. I mean, there are alternate... If there were five in certain areas or, you know, further back, there were more. There are different ways to do it. And I think that you might want to spend some time on that. I can't support it in the way that it is right now, but I really would like to. I think that you've done a lot in making those tax commitments. And it sounds like, you know, you're trying to get to a point where you can come to an agreement. So I think that it's just like a little bit more. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Freeman. Do I have other commissioners who would like to speak? If not, I'm ready for a motion. Madam Chairman. I do. Apparently, the applicant would like to speak. The public hearing is closed. Commissioner Freeman. I would like to hear what the developer might have to say about the comments I made. Like, I would like to respond to the question that the comments were made by DeGerana in regard to, I've talked with the developer, and I want to say this, we did meet with the neighborhood. As we said, we would do. It was very educational for us, for them. It was probably one of the most cordial meetings that I've had over 30 years of doing this work. And I think everybody was really trying to work together to get information and also to get us to understand how they felt and what they were going through with the neighborhood that they weren't aware that this was going to take place or was attempting to take place. So I thank you all very much for what you have been able to share with us and to help us as we move along. I also just talked with the developer and we would like to respectfully request one more continuance so that we could try to address some of the issues that you all have raised that you felt was important to you and also that you felt was important to the community. So I respectfully request that at this time. Thank you. Especially in regard to the density matter. Thank you. The chair is going to recognize Commissioner Bryan. I would be happy to move that we grant the applicant's request for a one cycle deferral which in this case will be a little bit more than 30 days since we're a week early this month. I'll second the motion. Madam Chairman, before we vote I would like to know if the neighborhood is how interested they are in an extra cycle on this. Let me recognize the staff. Just as a note, if it is a 30-day referral that's not going to give adequate enough time for them to submit anything to us to review it before it comes before you guys again. I think the problem we have is that they've already had two cycles so they only got one left. This is a bit irregular. I would just like to ask, as you asked us if we would be okay with deferring this until the next meeting, what the difference is in us deferring it as opposed to if it was voted on tonight and voted against versus being deferred for another month. What that changes in terms of how this issue would get voted on in the future. I apologize. My knowledge of such things is small but I do think it's just something that would be helpful to know when we choose. I have a staff response. Erin King with the Planning Commission. If you get a one month deferral then this case will come again for a potential vote before the Planning Commission next month. If not, if the Planning Commission decides to vote tonight, that recommendation will move on to City Council who would hear it at a public hearing for anybody to come speak before them to make their decision in about two months. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I have a motion on the floor. Okay, I'm ready to call for the vote. Mr. Outer. Sorry, what's the... Motion's 30-day. One cycle before. Yes. Before we vote on this, did we not just hear that 30 days would not be enough time for staff to do what they have to do? May I address that? She's going to address it. Sarah Young with the Planning Department. We just want to advise you that we may not have sufficient time to really delve into the details and provide you with any updated staff report. It may be on the fly at the next meeting. But you don't have any real other choice if you're going to continue it. Can I ask... But 90 days is the maximum you can continue a case, right? Correct. So they only have 30 days remaining... Right, that's why I said you don't have a lot of choice. Exactly. So you don't have any choice. Mr. Outer. Yes. Mr. Brun. Yes. Mr. Busby. Yes. Ms. Freeman. Yes. Mr. Gibbs. Yes. Mr. Harris. Yes. Mr. Hornbuckle. Yes. Ms. Hyman. Yes. Mr. Johnson. Yes. Mr. Kenshin. Yes. Mr. Miller. Yes. Motion carries unanimous, 11 to 0. Thank you. I'm going to give the individuals an opportunity to leave before we move to the next case. We're ready for the staff report on the next item, which is 108 Celeste Circle, item number Z160006. Good evening again. Kyle Taylor with the Planning Department. I'll be presenting Zoning Case Z160006, 108 Celeste Circle II. The applicant for this case is Dan A. Jewel from Culture James... Culture Jewel Tames. It's in the city's jurisdiction. The request is from RS-20 to Office Institution with the Development Plan. The acreage is 0.46 acres. And the proposal is for a service parking lot to serve the office use on the adjacent parcel. The site is located at 108 Celeste Circle, east side of Celeste Circle and north of NC-54 Highway in the compact neighborhood tier in the MTC I-40 and FJV Watershed and Replay Protection. The site satisfies the requirements for the UI district as highlighted on this slide and in your staff report. The parcel is wooded and developed within occupied single-family residential building in an accessory structure. The proposed project is located within one-half mile radius of the future Lee Village light rail transit station identified in the Triangle Transit Regional Rail Local Preferred Alternative or LPA. Staff plans to implement the transit-oriented compact neighborhood zoning district within which encourages a mix of uses and emphasize pedestrian-oriented design in this area in the future. The project meets the requirements for a development plan for the UI zoning district. The proposed conditions page commits to one access point, tree designate trees for preservations, the parking envelope, and size and location of project boundary buffers. The minimum commitments for this project is one external site access point which is to the office building to the south. The impervious surface maximum of 70% or 0.322 acres. Location of access points, parking envelope, and location of trees for preservation or all graphic commitments. There are a number of commitments associated with the project, including the fact that the phasing will be constructed in one phase. The driveway access to the property will be limited to the southern corner, the southeast corner of the site, as depicted on sheet DP2. The proposed use shall be a service parking lot. No building shall be constructed. Reservation of 10 feet of property frontage for potential future widening of Celeste Circle by GoTriangle. Storm Bonner runoff rate will be controlled up to 100-year storm events, and the parking lot entry will be gated to control unauthorized uses on nights and weekends. Two more additional comments. The text commitments is the 25 additional 36-inch tall evergreen, 36-foot, sorry, tall evergreen sheds beyond what is required by the UDO will be planted in the proposed project boundary buffer adjacent to Celeste Circle, specimen trees located between the right-of-way and parking envelope, and between the parcels to the north and the parking envelope to the south remain as shown on sheet DP2. The only design commitment associated with this project because of the fact that it is committed to a parking lot is that parking lot lighting will be with LED fixtures. This project is located in the design district and therefore is not consistent with the future land use plan. However, the requested OID zoning district is not consistent with the future land use map of the comprehensive plan, which designates the site as design district. However, the requested OID isn't allowable use in the zoning district in the compact neighborhood. Further, UDO section 4.1.1a. Furthermore, the applicant requested the zoning map change was submitted prior to the adoption of the Leesville Compact Neighborhood Tier in the future land use map designation of design district. Staff is supportive of the application because it is limited to parking lot and parking standards are by tier. The proposal will meet the standards of the UDO for parking lot in the compact neighborhood tier. A building at build out this project will comply with the same regulations that would apply if it were zoned compact design. Therefore, staff determines that the request is consistent with the intent of the comprehensive plan in previously adopted policies. On this slide, you can see that this plan is consistent with these plans with the exception of the design district, which I just mentioned previously. And as such, staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and the requirements. Thank you, and staff is available for any questions. Okay, I do have one individual who has signed up to speak, the applicant, Dan Jewel. Good evening, Madam Chair, fellow commissioners. My name is Dan Jewel. I'm president of Culture Jewel TEMS, Landscape Architect and Private Practice. We're Landscape Architects and Civil Engineers here in Durham about a block away. We've been asked by the partners to review tonight. I see all the looks on your faces. We're here this evening to present a proposal that you saw first about a year and a half ago in a different form by a different developer and a different design firm. And what you have for you today, although it is still a parking lot, it is a different use of the land in terms of how it impacts the neighborhood, and most importantly, it does not impact the neighborhood. This parking lot will now solely be for the use of central dermatology. The previous proposal was for by UNC Medical. They were creating a commercial parking lot for the entire complex over there. There is a demonstrated parking problem for central dermatology folks where the first medical use on that site, they've been there almost 20 years ago. Landlubbers, the old ECHO International when those vacated central dermatology has been there all that time. For the first many years there was not a parking issue out there. There weren't that many users and a great majority of the land remained developed only as a parking lot and then when they built that new UNC Medical Clinic building, and I think you all know is there now with a lot of different outpatient uses, that's when the parking issues began. Because central dermatology owns the adjacent property they are able to make specific design commitments and which we have done so with the neighbors that the previous application was not able to do. The folks at central dermatology started engaging in regular meetings with the neighborhood, park neighborhood which we all sometimes refer to as Celeste Circle about nine months ago after the first proposal by UNC Medical failed because even though that proposal did not get passed the parking needs are still there. Their patients have a difficult time finding parking spaces on their own property because it's hard to police where the patients at the other facilities come in and I've been told that folks sometimes have to circle the parking lot for 10 to 15 minutes to be able to find a parking space. So they started those conversations with the neighbors over various and sundry issues including parking that had been occurring at some point in the neighborhood that's been solved, the fact that trash was being picked up in the wee hours in the morning the neighbors didn't like that so they promised that that won't happen anymore. In June of this year we had a meeting with the neighbors to discuss this specific proposal we had submitted our application we showed the plans we discussed, we listened in many cases the neighbors were having discussions among themselves about what they wanted to see and what they did not want to see and at the end of the night we ended up with committed elements and a proposal that we think was much more palatable to the neighborhood I think you see by lack of an audience here tonight that I believe we've done a good job on that, we did send a follow-up letter to the neighborhood articulating our committed elements on this plans and so the proposal before you tonight includes things that were not included on the previous proposal which we do think makes it more palatable, more sensitive to the neighborhood and does not denigrate the neighborhood in any way in fact the fact that we are now going to have parking to serve the staff and the patients of central dermatology means that they will not be a burden on the neighborhood we're controlling stormwater runoff to a hundred year storm, that's unprecedented but those of you who are familiar with Eastwood Park know that they've had stormwater problems for a long time I think they've had stormwater problems from the day it was developed so a hundred year storm is unprecedented but that's a promise we made to the neighbors that we would control to that some concern that maybe a building commercial building would be constructed we have a committed element that no building will be constructed, it's simply a parking lot because central dermatology is adjacent we've committed that the driveway access will only be to the southeast corner of the site connecting to the existing central dermatology parking lot there will be no driveway onto Celeste Circle I'll stop for a second, I believe Aaron handed out our one simple little exhibit tonight it is the development plan with a little bit of color and I wanted to put that out there because I think it's a very graphic representation of how the proposed parking lot will now be tucked to the southeast preserving the buffers along the front and to the north the as Kyle mentioned, we're committing to 25 additional 36 inch tall evergreen shrubs along Celeste Circle above and beyond what the ordinance would require from a buffer standpoint that's a commitment and we've now committed to preserving some of the major trees along that Celeste Circle frontage as well and finally the neighbors also had some concerns that at night, what if somebody drove into the parking lot and they were doing something they shouldn't be doing we will gate the parking lot and the last person out with central dermatology every night will close and lock up that parking lot and they will open it up in the morning I received an email last night from Chris Selby I think many of you know who Mr. Selby is at least in the last published neighborhood list on the city website, he at that time was the agent for the Eastwood Park neighborhood association Dan received your letter about the current plan for 108 Celeste plan appears to accommodate the concerns of the neighbors especially regarding potential stormwater problems I thank you and your clients so there is a need for this parking so that we don't end up with additional parking problems in the neighborhood as existed several years ago central dermatology major it wasn't their staff and their clients but they cannot control what happens in the rest of the complex and again this parking will be solely for them and they will control it and they will continue those conversations with the neighbors so I appreciate your time I appreciate your attention to this and we hope you will agree that beyond the need for the parking this is a much better application than you saw a year and a half before and move this forward with a recommendation for approval to the city council thank you thank you I do not have other individuals to speak as such I'm going to close to public hearing and give the commissioners an opportunity to comment so I will start to my okay Mr Harris okay Ann Alturk why don't I start with you Mr Alturk since you raised your hand last I just have one question it was about the the bicycle and pedestrian advisory commission recommended that you add a text commitment to provide sidewalks and I was wondering if you had any comment yes sir we will certainly be installing a sidewalk along the frontage of the property along Celes Circle that's an ordinance requirement so that's why it's not a text amendment commitment but in terms of providing bike trails and sidewalks and that sort of thing through the neighborhood it's frankly the scope of this project to do that those of you who have been on the commission for a while know that that's a fairly standard comment that comes out of Mr McKeel and the bike ped folks so we will do what we need to do on the frontage of our site thank you thank you Commissioner Harris Dan as a soil and water supervisor I'm in favor I'm in favor of the project I just want to educate myself how do you plan to satisfy the storm water needs for the next 100 years is it with the buffering system you use so my client needs to close her eyes but close her ears but it will be with some expand so it will be a combination of of rain gardens but we will likely have to go to some underground water storage as well to make it work the fact that we've committed to that buffer along the front there's going to be some underground storage on this site to make it work yes sir thank you it's physically possible thank you Commissioner Busby stay right there Mr. Jewel thank you for your presentation thank you for going and spending the time with the neighbors and the neighborhood I think you've answered most of my questions just to help remind me and others on the commission the original plan that was brought a year and a half ago the entrance was that off of Celes Circle as opposed to through the yes sir it was off Celes Circle and in fact because they were coming off Celes Circle I believe they actually had to get a variance from the Board of Adjustment to intrude in the riparian stream buffer which you I believe is still shown on our plan but that impact has also been eliminated by coming in through the back great okay I just wanted to commend you as Commissioner Harris that as well on the the commitment to control storm water runoff up to a 100 year storm event I think that's fantastic and I hope that's an example that other proposals will take a look at and consider in the future the final thing and you answered this question about the gated property but just to be clear that was a specific request from the neighbors and the neighborhood yes sir they wanted to make sure there was a lot of conversation between lighting or not lighting the parking lot the parking lot will be lit but they wanted to make sure that people didn't come hang out at night and do whatever they might do use your imagination so they said a gate would be the best compromise for them so that's what we've committed to okay and personally I'd rather not see a gate there but if it's in response to the neighbors and what they're asking for I'm willing to live with it I think this is a fine proposal especially seeing that you've worked with the neighbors so carefully so I plan to support it thank you Commissioner Miller so when I saw this project in our agenda my reaction was oh no not again I will have to say that it has been very valuable to hear from you Mr. Joule tonight because I've changed my mind concerning the I note that in the handout that we received from Erin at the beginning of the meeting on the priority projects number four here is compact design district zoning for Lee Village it's something that matters to me a lot I will say with regard to Lee Village my primary concern has been the impact of the Woods Partners project which I do not like and I think is harmful to the to the compact neighborhood and design district proposed for the area but that's over I lost that one my second most serious concern about the Lee Village design district is how it will interface with the Celeste Circle neighborhood and I have to say of all the scenarios I crunched through my mind about how that might work this is actually the best I like the idea that this actually interacts with property that faces away from the neighborhood eliminating that Celeste Circle connection and committing to no building here is at least for this property which is part of that interface is the best result and I'll vote for this and urge my fellow commission members to join me and Commissioner Gibbs just a couple comments Dan tomorrow morning I'm going to go down this way and make a left hand turn on the Farrington Road I'm scheduled for a remiccate infusion that's a UNC medical center and whatever else medical stuff they've got all kinds of disciplines of medication from rheumatology you name it that's a lot of dense medical facility and they ain't got enough parking not nearly enough and I'm going to remember tomorrow when I go in there this is probably why I had no idea of all the hoops you would have to go through and the expense just to get a parking lot to serve a medical facility or any kind of facility for that matter and these things are not that impactful to the neighborhood to anywhere else it serves them it serves the owner and I guess you can tell I'm vending right now this kind of thing well I'll make a long story short I am supporting it it's needed anytime you have medical facilities and I'm sure this must be offers good service but it does need support and it serves all of us so we need to chip in and look the other way maybe but at any rate I am 100% for this and I've got to say this about bicycles I wouldn't even I don't even know how that came up if they have reviewed this and wondered if you would provide some bicycle lanes and I meant to mention this in a previous issue tonight if we're going to have a bicycle lane in a along a highway I think it should be a visible concrete barrier between bicycle lanes and traffic for their protection and mine because I'm the one that's going to be taking evasive action but anyway that's enough of my complaining I do support this and I appreciate the opportunity to vent a little bit thank you I think we're ready for this question Madam Chair if I may I'd like to make a motion that we send case can I just clarify that I think the BPAC recommendation was to add sidewalks and not bicycle lanes so that's not totally unreasonable that was a clarification so I think we're ready for this great I would move that we send case number 06 forward to the city council with a favorable recommendation second motion by Commissioner Busby that we move case number Z1600 06 forward with a favorable recommendation second by Commissioner Brian all in favor of this motion I'll let it be known by raising your right hand I'll oppose all right motion carries unanimously 11 to 0 thank you thank you let's move to our next item on the agenda thank you new business planning department work program and budget request for FY18 staff thank you again Aaron Cain with planning department I'll be very brief you have the cover meadow in front of you about this item I also handed out before the meeting started just for your perusal and for you to give us input what we as staff as identified as about 15 to 20 medium to high priority items that we'd like to work on next fiscal year believe it or not for the fiscal year 2018 we are already starting the budget process and as part of that the annual work program that you all usually see in the spring but we wanted to bring that to you here in the fall to get some input from you at this time and you can either do that tonight you can send me an email over the next couple of weeks however you want to do that on your thoughts on higher priority items for us to take forward either something on this list that you find to be of particular priority or something that's not on this list that you'd like us to consider going forward just a reminder we are getting input from you but we're also going to our other advisory boards that we staff such as the environmental affairs board Durham open space and trails the appearance commission and so forth you'll see this again once it's gone through joint city county planning committee either in January or February it'll come back to you in the spring again for a vote and recommendation to make a motion for some input madam chairman having just received this and not really having a chance to kind of think about it and weigh it out I was wondering whether or not we might hold our discussion of this until a place reserved on the agenda for it in our December meeting that's fine by us that's certainly not going to be too late for us to take your input and use it okay then we'll include that as an agenda item in December okay sounds good commissioner Brian I don't want to go against the wishes of the commission but I had one minor item that I would like to put forward sure I want to get back to the question of notification distances 600 feet for rezoning a thousand feet for plan amendments which might could be fit fit in under miscellaneous revisions to the UDO my reason for bringing it up I have recently been to two neighborhood meetings I got the invitation because I'm 900 feet away from the property so I'm within the plan amendment thing but I'm not inside the zoning thing at these me and both invitations were to discuss a rezoning and a plan amendment all the discussion has been on the rezonings I don't think a word was said about a plan amendment in either case but what we're doing is that we're getting you know people are beginning to believe that the distance is the same for each and I think that that's part of the problem we sometimes run into when we have a rezoning plan amendment but people come in and say well I didn't get to notice and they don't understand this difference between 600 and a thousand so I would ask that staff take a look at that thank you absolutely so that will be another item that we'll include thank you item I have is the training budget the people who's been on here a while a couple of years ago we submitted a resolution to the city and also the county commissioners about including the $2,000 in each one of their budgets to train the commissioners the school of school of government offers about three different classes that we can educate ourselves on what we're to do here and I think some of us have attended some of those classes but the keys I think some of them is $300 and some is $400 and they get to be quite expensive and that was the purpose for including that in the budget I know I spoke to both city and county managers last year to include it in the budget and they both appear to say that that's not a problem you know that's pennies in their budget whether they did it or not I don't know Miss Smith Sarah Young with the planning department just in case you forgot so although you requested $4,000 in total what we have in the budget for each commission is $1,000 so just to give you a sense right so we have multiple boards and commissions that we so Board of Adjustments is going to get $1,000 you all get $1,000 there was not any specific allocation made nor did we get additional funds so this is money that we are eating out of our own operational budget to fund your training to put it in perspective when we do commission-wide training we brought in folks from and we did that for several of our boards half a day training from them is $500 so if we continue this is just food for thought for you all to digest if we continue to do an annual commission-wide training that touches all of you that's half of your training money gone Erin I think sent you an email about some relatively inexpensive a book resource that would be another way relatively inexpensively to get additional training kind of self-directed training in your hands you could also look at prioritizing one or two members to take a school of government course that might be if you chose two that might be at the expense of doing some other things because again we do have a very limited budget so I just wanted to put that out there we're willing to work with you all but we do have kind of a tight constraint does the staff object if we ask to include in the planning department's budget extra money for training the planning commission and I have no disrespect for the other agencies some of which are also planning agencies I think the Board of Adjustment and probably the Historic Preservation Commission would benefit from the training too it would be different courses but I still think that they would benefit it seems to me that these agencies have a lot of public interaction and in that interaction is a major component of the public's impression and trust in their government we're kind of that bridge and I think it's a poor economy to starve these agencies that have this maximum public exposure from training that is is not I mean at least physically it's easy to get it's just a few miles away it is expensive but I think the money value is there I've taken the courses I think they're great I wish everybody could I would like to have us ask the administration to ask for agencies that have a high public interaction more funding especially when that funding can be applied towards such a valuable educational tool commissioner by the way thank you madam chair and Ms. Young thank you for the update it was helpful clarification I know from my personal perspective I found the half day event that we did together I thought it was very helpful I think it's something that would be useful to consider doing again especially since we have a lot of new commissioners who didn't have that opportunity so it does sound like we have additional funds what would be useful and it doesn't have to be answered tonight but I think I know some commissioners are interested in pursuing those training opportunities I believe one actually requested the support and was told it wasn't available so it would be good to get just information on how we as commissioners what's the right path to move forward to make sure that that a request if the resources are there provides that opportunity so here's what I would say two things one for the existing resources the bucket of money that we have available now what we would look for is you all's recommendation on how you would like to see that is your priority to send you know a couple of people to the course and call it good for the year and wait until next year would you rather do another you know commission wide training plus send one person it kind of what priority do you want to establish for the existing funds we have so we would look for that from you moving forward again like in years past you should make a budget request from the chair in writing to the department that we then pass on to the administration through our normal budget process thank you if I may madam chair so the courses that we've been talking about at least as they relate to the agency are in the fall and so for this budget cycle for the money that's currently in the basket it's not available for those and with regard to making a recommendation to staff for spending that I like the idea that their books available and we also may in there still plenty of time to bring someone over like Mr. Love Lady or Mr. Olin for another training session I found that to be very useful and I don't know how much money is in the basket it's a thousand dollars so if it's five hundred for the one and a few few bucks for the books that might be a useful way to to use the money up before the end of the fiscal year which is June 30 but the budget process heats up if I recall right about now you guys are putting together your request which then works its tortuous way up through administration and comes out something completely different and then goes to the city council and the board of county commissioners it seems to me if we want to be part of that maybe we need to think about how we because it seems to me if you ask for money you should also outline how you think you're going to spend it rather than just ask for more money I think that as useful as it is to have someone come over and spend a few hours with us from the school of government it's no substitute for the actual introduction to zoning introduction to planning zoning courses and the zoning course those two courses since it's so much of what we do I would like to I like the idea of in addition to whatever else we may do with a thousand dollars with books and having somebody come over and talk to us particularly is to raise enough money to send a couple of us to take the courses in the fall if they want to do that and I I don't want to formulate a proposal right now but maybe in December I will have a more specific proposal with some numbers on it that we can play with don't you yes commissioner Harris I see two things and in order for us to move forward I would move or recommend that we recommend to the staff to do the half day class and we do get books for everyone with the current budget and I'll move that I second the motion motion by commissioner Harris and second by commissioner Miller that we move forward with the training session for a half day and to order books for all of the commissioners adjustment I have another all in favor of this motion just raise your right hand all opposed okay I have a comment commissioner Harris second item I have with the budgetary cycle this time they have a new vehicle where they are trying to gather more input from the neighbors from the citizens and it's going to be a computer so when that's rolled out each of us need to get on there and advocate for ourselves advocate for the commissioners to receive training money along with the request coming from the chair but do you know about the new the new vehicle they're using this time no I actually haven't heard of that okay but they mention that uh okay well we'll find out but they they didn't introduce a new vehicle for a budget to involve more of the residents the chair recognizes commissioner El Turk can I just ask a clarifying question I think you said Sarah that each commission gets $1,000 is that for training or maybe I misheard you we have the planning department out of our own budget have set aside $1,000 for each board that we staff so is it possible that it just it's a bigger pool that all commissioners and all committee members just draw from rather than having a thousand for each commission and board or would that be just I mean I think following up on commission Miller's suggestion that you know maybe some commissions need it more than others but I'm being selfish here so I'm sorry I understand we also have the commissioner Miller mentioned the historic preservation commission and the Board of Adjustment which are quasi judicial boards and also need fairly regular training to keep up on procedure and acclimate new members as they come so we we tend to think of these three boards you all and those two is kind of on the same playing field in terms of training needs at least that's staff's perspective Madam Chair is down here I do have a question I'm just full of questions tonight aren't I as a as a schedule for these things we don't necessarily have to have this training every year for everybody I would think once you've had it you don't need to go back it maybe a cycle of two or three years for newer board members uh that's another another issue with that it might help in budgeting and maybe we can even let it accumulate anyway that's uh it was just a thought that I had what happened down there I said budgets are used to lose you believe somebody I know there was something else that I was going to mention but it evidently wasn't that important but anyway I just thought I would throw that in as a consideration I do like the idea of the in-house training too and a book this book that you you send out looks pretty dark on interesting and full of good useful information thanks thank you I think we have spent my call do we have other announcements next month I believe we have two cases the one continued from tonight another case and then the repeat item to discuss work program and further if you want to talk about budget as well what's the others what's the news outing case it's called the village hearth co-housing project it's a pdr 2.1 the community road project yes that's ready to come to you next month any other announcements motion to adjourn