 Oh, yeah, that's all right. I went hunting. Where'd y'all go again? Technical difficulty this morning. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope y'all bear with us a sec while we get rebooted. I think you can, you know, it's a little bright. Welcome everyone to the November 12th, 2019th City of Columbia Board of Zoning Appeals meeting. My name is Chuck Salling and my service chair of the board. And at this time I'd like to introduce to you the other board members. To my far left is John Gregory, followed by Josh Speed and Jean Dinkins. And then to my immediate right is George Shaffer. And next to George there is Marcellus Primus. I would like to introduce the staff as well that will be assisting today, Rachel Faley, the zoning administrator, Hope Hastie, the deputy zoning administrator, and Andrea Wolfe and Erica Hyynne. The board is charged with hearing applications for special exceptions, variances and administrative appeals. All testimony is recorded for the record and anyone wishing to speak will need to be sworn in and come to the podium to speak. No testimony may be taken from the floor. When you come to the podium, state your name and please speak clearly into the microphone because this meeting is being recorded. Applicants with cases before the board are allotted a presentation time of 10 minutes. This time also includes all persons presenting information on behalf of the applicant. This time limit does not include any questions asked by the board or staff regarding the case. Any member of the public may address the board in intervals of three minutes or five minutes if a spokesperson for a body of three or more. The applicant then has five minutes for rebuttal. The board reserves the right to amend these limits on a case by case basis. So if you plan to speak, you must be sworn. So if you plan to speak or an applicant at this time, please stand and raise your right hand. Do you affirm or attest that the testimony you will give today is the truth and nothing but the truth? This time I'd like to turn the meeting over to Mrs. Bailey. The board uses the consent agenda to approve non-controversial or routine matters by a single motion and vote. If a member of the board or the general public wants to discuss an item on the consent agenda, that item is removed and considered during the meeting. The board then approves the remaining items. The first item on the consent agenda today is the approval of the October 8th, 2019 minutes. And item number two on the agenda, Case 2019, 0070 for 1428 Oak Street, a special exception to expand a religious organization. That's all on the consent agenda today. Does anyone on the board or in the audience wish the item 1428 Oak Street to be removed from the consent agenda? I see no one. So we will go ahead and vote on the consent agenda if I'll accept a motion. I'd like to make a motion. We approve the consent agenda subject to staff comments. I second. We have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed? Motion carries. Item number three through seven were withdrawn prior to the legal add for this matter, but they were carry over. So I just wanted to make that known. The next item is case number eight, 2019, 0069 for Broad River Road and Lake Murray Boulevard. This is a special exception to establish a gasoline service station and convenience store. The items will be heard together, but this is another one that's going to need just two separate motions for the gasoline station and for the convenience store. And John Gregory has recused himself from this item. If the applicants present, they're welcome to come forward. My name is Marion Boyd, senior and I'm a resident of Broad River Road. Would you bring that microphone up just a tad? My name is Marion Boyd, senior and I'm a resident, lifelong resident of Lake Murray Boulevard and Broad River where you have the zoning sign saying that you want to build a service station and a fast food place. If any of you live out that area, you know you can't get out of the street in the morning anyway. And to add a facility like this, of this nature. Are you the applicant? Yes. You're applying for the application? No, sir. I don't want this application. I'm just telling you that I'm against what you're trying to do for that area. I appreciate that. I didn't understand what you were saying. What we, our rules of procedure is that the applicant comes to the podium first and explains it and then we take testimony from the floor after that. Who is the applicant? Is the applicant present? I'm not sure the applicant's here. Um, Rob Wayne. Just in time. That was good timing. Sorry, sir. We will take your testimony after that applicant presents his case. This is a, you need to state your name please. Sorry, Rob Wayne, Robert Wayne Jr. We'll let Broad River Road and Lake Murray Boulevard. We've got 3.77 plus or minus acres that we want to develop for convenient mart and fuel station with potential future development for some additional retail. If you look at the plan that I just issued out, you can kind of get a layout of what we're looking at. It's right where Broad River meets Lake Murray. It's directly across from the local fire station and also the police department there. We made contact with both departments and some of the other neighbors in the area and they seem to be excited about the potential of that area, of that development. If the real, the property of a line where it shows trees, that's where the, you see some hash marks and dash lines. That's just areas showing potential retail development in the future. Otherwise, it's eight eight eight island fuel stop. We kind of kind of highlighted some possible preliminary. Are you familiar with the criteria that we have to use to determine whether the special exception is approved or not? Yes. Can we get your application and kind of talk about each one of those individually so we can have a better understanding of how it's going to meet those or not meet them please? Do you have a copy of the application handy? So starting with number one. Yes, please. Special exception will be provided. We'll provide a desirable 5,000 square foot gasoline station and food store for neighbors, businesses and common vehicle traffic from Lake Murray Boulevard and Broad River Road. The owner will coordinate a national claim to detail acceptable specification interest. The owner will work closely to assure all methods of met to noise, glare, vibration, fumes, odors, obstruction of air and light and litter as have minimum adverse impact. The landscape design and detail should work well to support the reduction of positive shading. The proposed special exception will not have a substantial adverse impact on the neighboring communities. As contemporary design of the building will be subtly natural stucco, brick veneer, metal flashing and equal finishes. This proposal proposed project special exceptions will not impact public safety or create unusual conditions detrimental to the public interest or conditions likely to result in the increase of enforced response or have enforcement responses. The project will be designed according to the local municipality guidelines and assure adequate traffic flow into and from the site. Five establishment will enhance the immediate surroundings in a positive way and non detrimental to its development of any future developments. Establishment will be a set an asset to the neighbors, community and clean environment and as easy access to and from the site. The site is on C3, adequate for gasoline service station convenience stores and retail spaces for future lease. Designed to accommodate 5,000 block brick stucco, synthetic finishes or equal. Number seven, proposed special exception and issues are significant to the intermediate areas as it provides a service capital compatible to travel and many stops for daily needs. Number eight, proposed special exception will be provided daily, will provide daily merchandise and authorized nutritional nourishment used daily by the public. Did you have a traffic study done or do you plan to? We do plan to have traffic study done. But you haven't had that done yet. Any other questions? The application didn't really speak to criteria number five very well in my opinion. Where is the closest gas station or convenience store to this site? It's about five miles east of the intersection there. But where, how far away from this site would be the closest or the nearest other convenience store? There are two actually. We hear some thank you so much and we'll take some testimony from the audience at this time. Good morning again. My name is Marion Boyd Senior. I live on 101 Lake Murray Boulevard right where he's talking about. If he talked to any neighbors, he didn't talk to me. So this was a shock when I saw the sign across the street saying this is what they're going to produce in that area. Right now, if I go home, I can hardly get in my driveway and I can't get out of my driveway because of the traffic that's already there. If he did a study of the traffic, he didn't do a good job. So if you go out there five o'clock or eight o'clock in the morning, it's just like a standstill traffic. And if any of y'all live out there, y'all would know that it's hard to get in your driveway, hard to get out of your driveway. The noise level is so great because of the traffic, sirens and all. Now I have problems with the sirens but to add a service station and a convenience store would add undue traffic. And you know what gathers around service stations. People gathers around service stations and the next thing you know, you have a problem. We don't have problems out there right now because we don't have that kind of activity going on and I lack for it to stay like that. There's two service stations on Broad River. They just built a new one up there past this food line off of Broad River and there's another service station right there off of the Kindle Road. So it's not what he's saying five miles away. Why do we need three service stations in a small vicinity? And if you talk to the residents, there's river walk across the street from where Broad River is. If he talks to those people over there, I don't know. He certainly didn't talk to me and my neighbor and there's only two houses there on Broad River. We've been there all our lives and you have someone to come in and want to disrupt it with that type of facility. It's unreasonable. It's not acceptable by my family and by my neighbor. And if y'all go out there, y'all will see what I'm talking about. Anything happened on Interstate 20 coming into Columbia? All the traffic is detoured toward Broad River and Lake Murray Boulevard, which makes it that much worse. And to have a service station and a convenience store there will add more traffic. And children will walk to that service station like they do at most service stations. They stand out there all day and half the night. And that's not the kind of environment that I would like to see happen on Lake Murray Boulevard. So I want this to be withdrawn. I disagree with this. And I don't think he did a good job in his presentation. If he did a traffic study, he would know that that place is not suitable for that type of facility to be constructed there. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Mary. Yes, sir. Yes, my name is Dave... Oops, pardon me. Dave Grove from Harveston Community Association. We are aware that the property has been zoned commercial. We had no idea that what special exception was being asked for. But I can say that there's a part of us that obviously would like to see this parcel developed. Obviously, it's in Harveston Community Association. The more it's developed, it means assessment money to Harveston. At the same time, though, the applicant has never approached their DDRC committee. And I can assure you that based on what the diagram, not this one, but the other one that I just saw up there, our DDRC is going to have serious reservations about this applicant. We have setbacks. We have other issues that... So my specific request is that the board postpone any kind of special exception until the applicant comes to our design development committee. Let us try to work with the individual on the plans. We've not seen any plans. And then we could come back to the board and say we approve or disapprove with this type of agenda. I can also tell you right now that they're like this gentleman here who lives right across the street from where it's proposed. You're going to find serious opposition from Glenridge, Fox number one. All those people that live in that area are going to be opposed to this type of situation where you have traffic coming from both Lake Murray and also Broad River. It's already a very, very congested if you... Obviously, you're probably familiar with that environment. You've got traffic merging there. It's a dangerous situation. So as I said earlier, I think our design development committee is going to have serious reservations. The property is owned by Georgia Capital. It's appraised tax-wise about 251,000. It's 3.86 acres. We want to see it developed. But at the same time, we don't want to see a safety situation occur. And with the design that I just saw up there, you're going to have people coming from Broad River crossing the line of traffic. Again, those are things that our design development committee can help you with by working through this. And then we would come back and say, we approve or disapprove. Again, the opposition is going to be mounting because we just put it on our website. And I think if people had more notice of it, you'll probably see people from the neighborhoods come in here and say, we're opposed to a gas station and potential alcohol beverage type situation in that area. Again, my specific request of a don't mean to repeat myself, as I'd like to see the board postpone this decision, let the applicant come to our design development committee, the Harvesting Community Association. We and them would come back to you and say, we approve, disapprove, or whatever. I'm the executive director at the Harvesting Community. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for your testimony. Anybody else like to come forward? I'm speaking on behalf of Bertha Simons, my grandmother. This is what our children came up with. This is the email I was sent. I'd also like to speak on my behalf. Do I have to do that separate? Or does grandma need to come read this? No, no, you can speak for her and yourself at the same time. Perfect. Okay, so. You have three minutes. Okay, I'm going to go. Okay, so my name is Lonnie Mackenzie, Jr. That house that's up in the upper left-hand corner, that's grandma's house. I'm 34 years old. She's been there my whole life. We know that that's grandma's house. Next door is Marion. Marion is the guy that came up earlier. When I was born and raised, all of this wasn't here. There wasn't a hospital. There wasn't a fire department. There's just woods. There's been a lot of development done, but I wouldn't say it's for the benefit of the older people that's been there and living there. The danger, of course, has been increased. Being there, there's apartment complexes there. There wasn't any danger before they got there, obviously, because there was nobody there to do anything. Now you're talking about adding in the gas station across the street, literally, from Grandmother's house. I don't see that as being beneficial to the people that actually have been there for what I know 34 years or what she knows 60 years. Okay, so that's my part. Now I'm going to read the email that grandmother put together and sorry I'm mumbling, bear with me. I came there almost over 60 years ago with my husband. This is my home. It's been for all these years. Our proposed change is zoning. We'll destroy the peace that we have at our home. There's no way that you can deny this conservation store or gas station in front of our house destroys the ability to live secure and pleasant lifestyles for our property. We have paid taxes and contributed members of our neighborhood and family resided on the property prior to our marriage. The family is displaced when Fort Jackson was raided. They have moved, so they have relocated their home. This proposed zoning change is familiar effect in this area. This area is becoming more and more congested in the building of the store on the small strip of the property. We'll further exerberate the problem. The city has assisted in the effort to destroy the neighborhood feel of the area and agreeing to build in the larger apartment complex that's nearby. I am opposed to the change. It is a negative impact for the closest neighbors marrying the grandchildren included when it is no benefit to the neighborhood. There are numerous options within a very short drive. There are numerous options within a very short drive for consumers to obtain gasoline and other products that their heart desires. Please reject the proposed zoning change so that we can peacefully enjoy the property. Please do not affect the families around the area. Thank you very much. Thank you for your testimony. Appreciate that. Anyone else here to speak on this matter? Were you sworn in? Were you raised right in? Did you attest to tell the truth? Actually, Google maps to back check what he said about the nearest filling station. It's actually 1.2 miles away closest Exxon, right up Broad River. I have 8 a.m. classes Monday through Thursday. It is god-awful trying to get out of there in the morning. Actually easier sometimes to turn the opposite direction and then get on the highway down there at the Valentine entrance. It's terrible. The congestion is extensive. It's like the other gentleman said. Really like you to reject this proposal. It's not good for our community. Get close to the microphone. I don't believe this being the cause. It's not good for the communities around there. My families lived there for 20 years. They've seen the development themselves. They actually go to the church right over there. Riverland Hills Baptist Church. So some of it is not all bad. But gas stations are not all bad. It's not all bad. But gas stations right there be terrible for it. Terrible for environment. Terrible for the people living directly around it. I'm going to throw my opposition out there. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Is anyone else here? Let's speak about this. Will the applicant please come back to the podium? So I guess you've heard this testimony and I'd like to add that I have some real concerns about just without a good traffic study and a good decision on how the traffic would flow in and out of this property. It gives me a lot of reservation about this because we have to acknowledge that that area has a very high level of traffic and it's that convergence of two main arteries that serve that area. And I don't believe that we have enough information to determine whether this is really, you know, what impact it would have. I think I'd like to add, although the subject property is in a C3 zoning, it appears from the aerial photo to be a mostly residential neighborhood. And with that being the case, I think you would be wise to take the neighborhood association's recommendations and try to meet with these adjacent adjoining neighborhoods to discuss this in a little more detail. Yes, I do agree with that. And because of my schedule, I hadn't been able to reach out to them. I'm aware of who they are. And I just hadn't been able to reach out to them yet. But we would work diligently with the community design group to assure that, you know, in and out of low traffic would be acceptable. That would be good. Furthermore, while you're doing that, to me in reading through the Good Neighbor Plan, it seems a little lacking to me. You simply add a few things about complying with zoning regulations. I personally would like to see you beef up your Good Neighbor Plan to give us a little more comfort than if you would be a Good Neighbor. And I think that because this is in harvest and is subject to that, their design review committee, I really feel like we need to have that information also. Because I just, again, just have tremendous reservations just basically approving this without any more information than we have right now. So we got a couple of choices here. We can vote on it right now. Or we can vote, take a vote to see if the Board is willing to defer this to give you some time to do some more homework and get some more information. I think we've explained to you the kind of information that we're looking for. I'm not saying that the Board will vote to do that, but that's your, you can request that. I just wanted to make you aware of that so that we can either vote now or you can request for us to vote on it deferral. That's my decision. I'm representing the owner. I would suggest that maybe we could defer and let me do some more with the people that I need to meet with. I will say that I did meet with a couple of businesses. I did meet with the apartment complex and the church across the street as well as the fire and police department. And they were pretty excited about the possibility. I will reiterate my concern that a development of this type without an engineer who has provided a traffic study can determine that the egress and ingress will not impact, have an impact on the existing traffic or that they have made some changes to your design in order to minimize that traffic would be hard for me to move forward with this. So I'd like to make a motion to the Board to defer this matter. So we have a motion and a second for deferral. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed. No. The motion carries. All right. The next item on the agenda is item number nine. This is case 20190071 for 4624 and a portion of 4464 Divine Street. Special exception to establish a drive-thru automatic car wash. If the applicant is present, they're welcome to come forward. Mr. Chairman, members of the Board of Zoning Appeals, I'm Bob Fuller. I'm a lawyer here in Columbia and I'm here today in the half of the applicant who is proposing to establish an automatic car wash at the intersection of Garner's Fair Road, Croson Road and essentially Gills Creek. The property is at the far eastern end of the large Gamecock Biolo Shopping Center that faces Garner's Fair Road and Jackson Boulevard at that large intersection. I will quickly move through the items of criteria, I think, that we have addressed for your consideration this afternoon, this morning, and this and then I would hope to call on a couple of members of the development team to provide some additional information. Here with me today in that connection are Lisa Sherrod, who is an engineer in flood control and management specialist in that particular field. Gerald Lee from Chow Engineering Associates who have done site work in the planning on the site development. Jenkins Williamson, who is also a journal of the development company. First of all, to address the matter of what they're trying to do here is to combine two large lights at the eastern most end of the Biolo Shopping Center and adjacent to Gills Creek where it crosses under Garner's Fair Road. It is property that would probably be best known to you as the old TitleMax property. The building was destroyed in the 2015 flood and sat by the roadside for some time. The property was in the county has now been annexed to the city of Columbia and is that is the reason we are here in this body to seek approval for the special exception. The property is zoned for the use but with conditions that have to be reviewed by the board. The access to this property, I think particularly is important because it does not feed directly into Divine Street Garner's Fair Road. There is an entrance road signalized at the intersection of Croson and Garner's Fair that permits traffic in and out of the large property that constitutes the shopping center. There is no direct access onto the highway from this parcel. It is accessed from the shopping center road into the western side of the car wash proposed lot as it sits there. The access is at a very busy intersection but it is signalized and the site has been laid out in such a way that the stacking queue can accommodate well more than enough cars to satisfy the problem that would be caused if the stacking were to be offsite in any manner. There will be no offsite queuing at this location. It will not have any substantial impact on any other buildings or close proximity neighbors because there really are none. At the far end of the easternmost end of the shopping center there has been a restaurant in place, has been removed and will be replaced probably but this entrance road to the shopping center is the western boundary of the proposed wash property and Guilds Creek is the other extremity on the eastern side. It will not have any adverse effect on the aesthetics of the community. It will be a fairly handsome structure built specifically for the site, designed for the site to be accommodated on the site and will be developed in such a manner that it will be protected or it will minimize impacts if flooding should occur there again because it is designed to be a flow through rather than have it knocked down and end up in the flow patterns of the creek. It is very close to the plain floodway of Guilds Creek and that has been accommodated and studied and dealt with by the engineers. There is not going to be any nuisance or public safety impact. It would be a car wash that is automatically operated. The patrons would remain in their automobiles while the car is being serviced but the car wash itself will be a staffed facility with probably three or up to three people in employment on the property to monitor what conduct goes on on the site and in the operations. There is no proliferation of this kind of activity there as is considered by item number five. There are three car washes within two and a half to one and a quarter miles from where this facility would be but it is a heavy traffic impact area and it is simply one amenity that would be located in a location that is not proliferated with anything in particular by way of servicing of automobiles and certainly not by way of car washes per se. The underlying district is a commercial zoning district and while people might prefer that nothing be developed on a particular property because of problems they envision or have experienced in the past, this is a commercial zone property situated adjacent to commercially owned property and when it was annexed it was understood what the purposes were for continuation of commercial use at that location so we think that the attendance to the matters relative to the special exception are important but it is certainly an appropriate use for this particular location. There are no overlay districts that would prohibit this use. It is compatible with the permitted uses in the general area. There are gas stations, there are retail commercial establishments, there are restaurants, there are drive-in facilities for a food service. It is a commercial district and this is a commercial interest being placed conservatively and adequately in a part of it. It would be in every manner compatible with what else is around that general vicinity. I don't see that you could determine any adverse impact on public interest by virtue of putting a commercial establishment such as this well thought out, well engineered, well designed and well managed in a commercial district. If it's commercial it is commercial and that's what we would expect it to be operated as responsibly and adequately in every way. Because it is near to Guilds Creek I want to ask Lisa Sherrod to come forward and explain to the board the possibility to anticipate some manner of those concerns that might be considered by virtue of the fact of its proximity to the roadway and the creek. Good morning. My name is Lisa Schrad. Many may remember me as Lisa Jones. I'm the former state coordinator for the National Flood Insurance Program in South Carolina. Would you mind bringing that down a little bit? I have over 30 years experience in floodplain management, mapping, mitigation and compliance. I'm the former chair of the Association of State Floodplain Managers. I'm a certified floodplain manager as well as I have an associate national flood insurance. The floodplain environmental impacts have been a paramount concern and considered during this planning process. The applicant has devoted considerable resources to ensure the balance between floodplain management and environmental concerns have been taken into consideration. We've met with the Guilds Creek Association. Car wash is a suitable floodplain compatible development considering what could be there. This property is going to be developed in some way, shape or form. A car wash is a wet location building. Water flows in. If it gets wet, it's hosed down and it's back in operation. Car wash, in essence, operate with water. The building is suited so that the water would flow through the building. Should we ever indicate that the events of 2015 reoccur? The majority of the project is outside of the special flood hazard area. I'm going to turn to Gerald in just a minute to address the stormwater management processes and how that's going to be maintained. I also wish to correct the record. For the record, I've introduced me as an engineer, I'm not an engineer. I'm a consultant. Are there any questions? I'll have to take those at the end. Thank you. Good morning. I'm Gerald Lee. I'm an engineer with Child and Associates and it was my duty here to design the stormwater management system. We met with the Guilds Creek Organization a couple times and discussed this project. We've also met with the city staff and talked to them about this project and is our total intent to design this project not to be detrimental to the current conditions. In our due diligence we have determined that the main problem with Guilds Creek is dissolved oxygen levels which is a common problem with urban streams. You get hot runoff water from hot asphalt doesn't contain much oxygen discharges directly into the stream and it becomes an issue. To address those items the stormwater management system that we've designed does not include any kind of flumes that would just directly discharge the water let the water go directly into the stream. We're going to collect it subsurface underground it's able to cool a little more and it also directs it to a water quality unit a mechanical unit that will actually filter the runoff before it's discharged and then our ultimate discharge will be a cascading rip-rap outfall designed to aerate the water as it goes back into the stream. Now process water process water is not allowed to be discharged into the stream that's by ordinance. It's totally 100% recycled in this car wash and then any discharge has to go to the sanitary sewer. So it is our intent to not be detrimental with this design to Gil's Creek. Thank you. Yes sir. So I can't really see your design. I don't believe on this underground containment. Is there a tank or is that what these squares with the circles in? The square in the circle is a conceptual water quality unit like a crystal streams conceptual Well, we don't know which brand we're going to use. Crystal streams is one manufacturer that makes a mechanical filtering system. Gotcha. Now is that from the car wash itself? It is only from the pavement. There's no runoff off the car wash. No runoff off the car wash. All process water is recycled. That's those series of boxes just below that's the mechanical water recycling system. Is there a so I'm just trying to decide is there is there any kind of underground containment area? At this location being that close to the creek there is no need for stormwater detention. There's no detention but we're going to put it underground. It's not being detained but you may mention that it was going underground. We're going to pipe it underground. Okay. So it's going underground and then it's going out into a I guess like a culvert it looks like it then going out and then it goes from there out into a gravel thing into Gills Creek. The dash piping connecting the boxes takes it over to the right-hand side to our water quality unit which then mechanically filters That's the little square. That's the square on the circle Yes. There. And it's discharge, ultimate discharge will cascade over the riprap flume which is intended to aerate the water as it splashes down. Mr. Lee, certainly with respect to water quality, would your testimony be that the post-development state of this potential development would be an improved water quality situation that currently exists today? Yes, that is the intent of this design. And clearly we're not going to have any increase in stormwater here in a post-development situation we all know that but would there be a decrease in stormwater as well? I can't say we will decrease It can't be an increase I can't say there will not be an increase but being at this location next to our discharge point our peak discharge will enter the stream long before the peak discharge of coming down Gills Creek so we will meet the ordinance that there is no adverse impact. Timing situation to beat the peak, as you'll like to call it in the slang term but I think that's important that your testimony is that it's an improved water quality situation because I think a lot of the surrounding neighborhoods and some of the arguments may be with regards to water quality from a site like this so I think it's a good design. Like I said, we met with the Gills Creek organization and we listened to their concerns and we've taken that to heart in our design. Thank you. Thank you. Is there any testimony? Hi my name is Jenkins Williamson. I'm with Columbia Development I live here locally at 3700 Casino Road When we initially decided to pursue this site there were a couple of things that were of paramount importance to us. Number one we live here. I live just up the road all of the members of Columbia Development live here locally for the most part. We care what goes on that site. We care what the aesthetics are of the facility that goes there. I drive by there every day and we wanted to do something that was very nice for the community. So we chose a concept that aesthetically is very very pleasing. We have some images that I'll show you in a moment of what this facility is going to look like. It is not a standard car wash facility. It is an elevated architectural facility. It looks as nice as any high-end Chick-fil-A that you've ever seen. It's a very nice facility and we chose this particular concept for that reason. Number one. Number two we understood the environmental sensitivity of this site. We know the history of this site. We all live through the flood. So the first thing, we did a number of different things. The first thing we did with regard to the environmental challenges or the perception of the environmental challenges is we hired a 30-year veteran of the flood business in Lisa Charard. Lisa was with Deaner for 17 years on the other side making sure that developments were done in a proper manner. And we brought her on early to consult because we wanted to make sure to address all the flood concerns. Number two we hired Chao and Associates because Jimmy Chao had done so much work in that particular retail node post-flood helping people work through some of the issues. You may continue. Thank you. In addition to that we knew traffic was going to be a concern. It's always a concern. And if you'll look at this site plan, we have over 360 feet of internal stacking within the project. We can stack two Chick-fil-A's adequately based on the amount of stacking we have here. We know that stacking is important. We do not tie into that divine street in any way whatsoever. We tie into the shopping center. We have signalized access. We've met with the city in addition to all of these things three or four times. The city supports our design. Our design meets the ordinance in every way whatsoever. As a matter of fact, when we were annexed into the city, Mayor Benjamin asked have all of the flood issues been addressed here because it's important to him and Krista Hampton stood up before the mayor and said yes, Mayor Benjamin. They've met with us numerous times and what they're proposing to do meets the ordinance. Thank you. Thank you. Sir, anyone in the audience that would like to speak for or against this application? Good morning. My name is Eric Goff. I am the Executive Director of Guilds Creek Watershed Association. I represent 300 members that are individuals, families, homeowners associations that are in this area and located within close distance to this proposed property. I have a prepared statement that I would like to read on behalf of the association. Before I say that, on my own behalf, I would like to say as the person that is directly responsible for managing or monitoring water quality along Guilds Creek, dissolved oxygen as far from our biggest issue, one of our biggest issues is development and lack of proper stormwater management practices throughout. On behalf of Guilds Creek Watershed Association, while we appreciate the efforts that the developers of this proposed car wash have taken to communicate with us and to include environmentally friendly measures in their plans, Guilds Creek Watershed Association stands by its mission and wants to convey to the Board of Zoning exactly what we convey to the developers. We believe no development of any type should be allowed on this parcel. With extensive impervious surfaces in the area already, this currently vacant parcel should be converted to a natural buffer that will slow down and filter stormwater prior to entering the creek. We encourage the Board to remember the devastation of the 2015 flood. There is a reason that this is known as the old TitleMax property and why this actual area is both a local and national landmark of that event. Development of any type in this area will continue to strain and already stressed Guilds Creek. We would also like to note on a safety issue that the parcel proposed to be developed in this commercial is also included in the commercial node plan that was designated to be the trail head of the Guilds Creek Greenway. This plan was developed by the City of Columbia and is found within their development plans. The addition of a drive-through system that will increase traffic in an area, not particularly on Divine Street but in an area that's supposed to be designated for both bike and pedestrian travel is both unsafe and unwise. We recommend that the Board consult the City of Columbia commercial node plan and consider the safety of both the community and the environment in this area before approving this proposal. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone else? Good morning. Hi. My name is Allison Teratio and I have the distinct pleasure of serving Richland County District 5 on County Council. This is my first time that I've been on this side of the campus so I have a new appreciation for what people who come before us in zoning meetings feel like. Since before I was elected I was hearing from constituents about making Richland County and Columbia more bikeable and walkable and learning more and more about the Greenway projects proposed as part of the Richland County penny. On County Council we have voted to move forward with a Greenway plan which includes this portion of Gills Creek Greenway. I know that Greenways are an important part of making sure that we are a livable community that we can get people to places so we want people to be able to walk from neighborhoods down to some of those stores and restaurants. And also the developing these Greenways are a way that we ensure that we are able to advance the flooding that we had in 2015 again. I would just like to stand here and encourage the zoning committee to refer to the 2013 Divine Street and Fort Jackson commercial node plan which envisions an amenity so a Greenway amenity at that location and to deny the special exception to establish a drive-through car wash at 4464 and 4624 Divine Street. Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Anyone else? Good morning, how is everybody? My name is Will Brennan. I'm here today in front of you as a former resident of Timberlane Drive off the South Belt Line Corridor and a supporter of the Gills Creek Watershed Association I believe in their programming, their vision, and their energy. And I want to point out, and I want to talk about this 2013 master plan that really brings everything together along the Gills Creek Watershed from the Fort Jackson area all the way down to where I was flooded out on Timberlane Drive and further down to the Bluff Road area. It's a wonderful master plan that by the way the city spent money on that brings in recreation residential retail components. So here we are in the city of Columbia. We like to get away from our master plans that we invest in and we jump on the first thing that comes along. I view this as the first thing to come along to be developed on this property. I do believe that this property one day will be bolstered with a wonderful energy connecting Crosshill, the wonderful things that have been done at Crosshill all the way down to this by-low development. This is smart growth, and you folks are the baseline for smart growth. You make the decision. I hope that you think hard about this special exemption because accepting this is the first go for development here would be what I think the most Columbia thing Columbia could do. There's so much more potential for this property. Thank you so much. Thank you for your testimony. Is there anyone else in the audience like to speak? Yes, please come back to the podium. You're welcome to. I guess the master plan for the Greenway and where the Greenway is actually going to ultimately go has been in question. But to the extent the Greenway traverses through this property and the property in the rear that is owned by the shopping center, we have offered to Gills Creek and ultimately to whoever winds up in charge of the Greenway to provide them with an easement. And I'm on record here today to say we will provide an easement so long as the easement traverses down the side of our site following the creek and we have gotten the owner of the shopping center in the back to also agree to an easement for the Greenway. So that's there for the taking when and if the powers that we are willing to engage on that. And we did indicate that to Gills Creek in our meetings that we had with them. So I just want you to understand we care about the Greenway. I'd love to see the Greenway here and that's there if they would like it. Thank you. Thank you. Fuller do you have any other testimony or want to about anything? Everybody here has a pretty good idea of what the proposal here is. I simply have to say as a