 Okay. I hit the wrong button. I was trying to get some information, but I'm just starting the planning though. Where are you? Oh, all right. See you in a few minutes. Resolution and honor. Good afternoon. Welcome to 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 had a final say on any issue brought forth tonight. If you wish to speak on an agenda item, please go to the table to my left and sign up to speak. For those who wish to speak, please state your name, state your address clearly when you come to the podium. Please speak clearly into the microphone. Each side, those wishing to speak in favor of an item, and those wishing to speak in opposition to an item will have 10 minutes to present each side. The time will be divided amongst all persons wishing to speak. If you are here opposing and rezoning tonight, you should be aware of what's called a protest petition. A protest petition can be held to those residents who live in a rezoning area. Please consult the planning department staff. For any details on the protest petition, they would be happy to help you. You should also keep in constant touch with the planning department as to when your case will go before the elected officials for a final vote. Finally, all motions are stated in the affirmative, so a motion fails or ties. The recommendation is for denial. Thank you. Can we have a roll call? Commissioner Bealon, Commissioner Boyd, Commissioner Davis, Commissioner Gibbs, Vice Chair Harris, Chair Jones, Commissioner Huff, Commissioner Lam, Commissioner Padgett, Commissioner Smusky, Commissioner Walters, Commissioner Whitley, Commissioner Wonders. All right, thank you. I did receive an e-mail from Commissioner Padgett asking for an excuse absence tonight, and I granted that to him. Do we have any adjustments to the agenda? Thank you, Mr. Chair, members of the Commission, Pat Young with the Planning Department. I do have several requested adjustments, but first I can certify for the record that all public hearing items before you tonight have been advertised in accordance with the requirements of law, and there are affidavits to that in fact, on file with the Planning Department. The first requested adjustment is Item 5, Resolution and Honor of Commissioner Barbara Beechwood. Ms. Beechwood was unable to be here this evening, so we'll ask that that be deferred to the March 11th meeting. Also in Item 9A, the Downtown Open Space Plan, there were several recent edits based on some citizen input, and we are going to ask also that that item be deferred to March 11th. So those two items would come off this evening's agenda. Item 6A and Item 8A are essentially companion items. They're related subject matter, so we are going to also ask that Item 6A be moved to 8A, and that 8A become 8B so that it can be held concurrently or in succession, excuse me. And that's it. Any questions or concerns about those? No, thank you, sir. Great, thank you. Yes, sir. I just want to make a suggestion. It seems like there are a lot of community people for Item, I guess now, 8A and 8B. It would be probably best interest for them if I'm correct. If we move that to 6A and 6B, if we could do that. We can do that. Okay, thank you. Can we have approval of the minutes? Second. This was seconded by Commissioner Harris. All those in favor, let it be known by raising your right hand. Minutes are approved 12 to 0. All right, thank you. So we'll move down to 6A. Open to public hearing for 6A, which is the village at Rougemont. Good evening. I'm Laura Woods. I'll be presenting Case A130009 village of Rougemont. Laura, before you get started, I'm very sorry, Mr. Chair. I apologize. I know this is a bit irregular, but I promise staff, we have a staff member that's going to be presenting to you in the coming months and it has to leave this evening. And I wanted to very quickly turn it over to Aaron Cain to introduce her. It'll be very brief. I apologize. Members of the Planning Commission, my name is Aaron Cain. I'm with the Durham City Planning Department. I just wanted to introduce our newest staff member. Come on up. This is Karla Rosenberg. She just joined us back in December. Karla is a native of Durham, was born and raised here, went to Riverside High School as a graduate of UNC and their planning and social work programs. It also has a certificate in Historic Preservation from UNC Greensboro. She's primarily going to be working on plan amendments going forward, as well as Historic Preservation items. So, where you've seen Ms. Woods and Hannah Jacobson in the past, you'll be seeing Karla more going forward. So, I just wanted to introduce her. You'll see her in her first case next month and thank you very much. All right. Thank you. You may proceed. Okay. Case A-13-00-09, Village of Rougemont. The Village of Rougemont is located in northern Durham County and the proposal is for approximately 576 acres. The area is located within the rural tier. In this case, the applicant is the County of Durham and it's initiated in order to fulfill policies that are adopted in the Durham Conference Plan. The plan was adopted by County Commission in 2005. The Village of Rougemont was designated on the future land use map at that time. That was February 2005 and the plan amendment is based on the following comprehensive plan policies. One, rural service centers establish rural service centers in the rural tier to provide locations for small scale commercial uses and community services. Rural Village Plans. The planning department is charged with developing land use plans and design guidelines to promote the continued economic viability as well as protect the character of the rural villages of Bahama and Rougemont. In this case, we're considering Rougemont. Rural Village design guidelines backs up the previous policy. The department is charged with developing design guidelines to protect, again, the character of our rural villages, Bahama and Rougemont by encouraging appropriate and compatible infill and development. Historical rural villages. The planning department was asked to investigate the feasibility of establishment of a local or national register historic district in Bahama and Rougemont. Staff did a preliminary survey of Rougemont and determined that a historic district probably isn't feasible. What's more, once we got into the community outreach effort for this project and I'll talk about that more in a moment, we determined that there wasn't an enormous amount of support for trying to establish historic district in Rougemont. Okay, the timing of the plan amendment had a number of questions on this. You're probably aware that Durham County initiated a project to provide clean drinking water to some properties that have groundwater contamination in Rougemont. And because of that, the Joint City County Planning Committee added the Rougemont plan to our work program and asked us to kind of track our project with the water project. As far as I know, it is on course at this point. Now then, the proposal includes reconfiguring land that is designated commercial in Rougemont as you may see on the maps in the staff report. The commercial is a linear strip along Red Mountain Road. It probably doesn't provide viable commercial locations for commercial uses. After all, the area has been zoned for commercial along Red Mountain Road for many decades. As a matter of fact, I believe this zoning designation dates back to the 1950s when Durham County first adopted a zoning ordinance. So staff recommends a somewhat of a reconfiguration in support of that policy we talked about establishing a rural service center. Second, in order to provide for the rural, we've already discussed that, the proposal would gather the commercial in a sort of node in the vicinity of U.S. Highway 501 and Red Mountain Road. And land not designated commercial in Rougemont staff recommends that it be designated as very low density residential. This is consistent with the current development pattern within the village of Rougemont. And it's a pattern that has been there for many years and probably will pertain for our lifetimes. Well, some of the older among us. All right, I mentioned community involvement. Staff conducted some pretty robust community involvement. We had six community meetings from May 2012 to February 2013. And we asked residents or attendees at the meetings to provide feedback and share their concerns. At the initial meeting, one of the first things we asked was, well, what is Rougemont to you? And what are the issues that most concern you and you would like us to address? The meeting was quite well attended. We were able to divide the attendees into nine groups and they all got to sketch what they imagined was Rougemont. As you see from the rather large pink area, there was a great deal of variation. So what staff did was overlay each team's definition of Rougemont to identify the area of greatest overlap. As it happened, it very closely coincided with the existing village of Rougemont. And so we opted not to propose radical changes in the boundary as on the adopted future land use map. Now, attendees, after identifying a series of issues, were asked to vote on what they thought was most important. And each was given three votes, which they could allocate in any fashion. They wished. The most popular of the issues was provision of water. At that time, the discussion was a water line from Person County. That project has changed. But as you see, contaminated groundwater was the primary issue in Rougemont. Second, identify an appropriate location for a park and ride bus facility that would connect Rougemont to Durham and therefore to the region. Third most important, attract commercial development. Fourth, investigate the feasibility of a historic district. We did that probably in no go. Finally, reexamine future land use and zoning map designations. Now, you will note tonight that I'm only offering a plan amendment. It changes the future land use map. There is no associated zoning map change. We did not deem it prudent at this time to recommend zoning map changes. The future land use map to remind you primarily serves a function as a policy guide when a landowner approaches the county and applies to rezone their property. Staff, planning commission, the elected bodies, one of the criteria is that the zoning request be consistent with the future land use map. Otherwise, future land use map plays very little role in the lives of property owners. If you like your zoning now, then whatever that zoning allows will be allowed by right in the future as long as that zoning pertains. Okay, here's the village and it's approximately 576 acres. Once you subtract all the rights away, it's actually a bed under 500. And not all properties within this area have, we have not proposed changes to the future land use for all of the properties. Actually, it's a little over 53 percent. And of those, many are because the properties are actually split by different land use categories. And so our proposal is to make entire properties one future land use, not split them. The classic example, of course, is along Red Mountain Road where the future land use sometimes divides property with the part fronting Red Mountain Road being commercial and the back part of the lot being rural residential. Also, a few properties we are suggesting as adding to the village of Rougemont. And the reason, primary reason for that is that with the 2005 boundary, here shown in purple, as you see, there were many properties that were split by that boundary. So staff opted to push the boundary out just a little bit to incorporate the entire property. In two cases on the north side of the boundary, you'll note that there are two long streets with cul-de-sacs. And in those cases, some of the lots were included in the village in 2005. Some are outside. We opted to move the boundary outward to include all the properties on the streets. That accounts, in large measure, for any change to the Rougemont boundary that we are proposing. Okay, here is the commercial, the much discussed commercial future land use in Rougemont, as you see, along linear strip along Red Mountain Road. In order to provide for an opportunity for an actual rural service center, we suggest moving that to the vicinity of the intersection of Highway 501 and Red Mountain Road. Again, this does not propose changing anyone's zoning. If, for example, there are residences within that area in red, they can continue to be residential, and their zoning will not change. It is strictly up to the private land owner to decide whether they wish to utilize this or not. Government is not involved unless you apply to rezone your land. Now, for the rest of the properties within Rougemont, here is the O5 map as adopted by County Commission, and you'll see that most of the rest of the land is very low density residential with a bit of rural density residential scattered in. We suggest simply making all of the residential land within Rougemont very low density residential. And the text amendment associated with this apply, it has some pretty important applications to residential land, but we'll talk about that when we get to that case. Now then, what are the criteria for plan amendments? The four questions. Is the proposed land use consistent with adopted plans and policies? Is the proposed land use compatible with existing and or future land use patterns? Does the proposed land use create a substantial adverse impact? And is the site of adequate size and shape to accommodate the proposed land uses in each case? Staff has concluded that the proposed land use is consistent. It is compatible. It does not create adverse impacts and it is of adequate shape and size to accommodate the proposed uses. Therefore, staff recommends approval. That concludes my presentation. Thank you. We have two people signed up to speak. Does anyone else sign up with just the two? It's Don Mason and Joe Honing, V2 individuals, one for and one again. So each side would have 10 minutes each. So we have Mr. Don Mason. Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. I'm Don Mason and I reside and live at Rougemont. I live on the golf course Lake Wins, which I built in the 80s. And as time went on, I developed some sections because I built the golf course with priority. And I'm left with some parcels of land that need, the golf course needs badly to have homes in and around it. As you know, golf courses usually draws that situation. But here's a different one. If you look at page two on my sheet in front of you, you'll note that all the conservation lands to the south and all around the whole area, which will never be any building. And Lake Wins needs to be finished as per approved in the late 80s. And then there was stages and phases allocation for the utilities and all was limited to 15 lots in that timeframe. So then we had changes over time and I kept working two jobs doing everything on the course and doing that. So now we still are left with the need to get back to the original approved plan of one acre per the same as the Rougemont Village plan. And if you'll note, we bump right up to it. And this is my my plea is to ask you to consider the Planning Commission to allow this to be taken in to this one acre issue. The three acre UDO at presence has stopped us in their tracks and we cannot complete as it is because already in place the roads were cut earlier when I built the golf course to use the soils on the tees and the greens. Common sense. I was lucky to even get it done. It was a calling, a labor of love. But then the utilities are underneath the ground to get to the lake already everything infrastructure is in place. So the three acre if you look at page three you will notice the roads are pre cut on the one on the right. You can see the aerial. And in getting the perks you can't get a perk to change because the soil has been already cut out. So we are in jeopardy in every way the golf course needs the support of more members and it's a treasure in northern Durham County if you know that. And we want it to be successful. And it is a if you'll notice we are right up to the village and that that would include that section should be added to it and that way it would answer the future and it could be continued and finished out because I had to build it in stages. I'm a custodian not a developer. I live there and I have all these years and it's been continued. And you can see from the last pages that my request. Should be examined and it would be. Well. To have us included and another thing I have a vision as I did with the golf course is to have a park. On 501 on page two you'll notice the route. I'm proposing to give the. Land to the Rugemont Routin Club. On that parcel. That you see on the map. A great building site if included in this plan it would. The impervious surface all the requirements needed would be right for that parcel. And the park that would be involved. Would be perfectly fitting in with the road tracks when the future trails happen if the county ever requires the railroad track. So I would ask you to please consider. My needs and the community needs. And we would certainly. Hope of giving you enough of evidence it's not feasible under three acre you do. But it would be perfect fit with the Rugemont village plan. And I would consider. This being included. And amend the plan to include as per the map. On page one. And it's our twin are twenty zoning. And it would encompass the remaining track that is needs to be completed. And that's all I have to ask for at this time and if you would consider that. There's any questions I'll be glad to answer. All right thank you. We need to call you back up. Thank you very much. In. Okay we have a. How to pronounce your name answer. On yes okay. Mr Joe Han. My name is Joseph Han I'm four oh four Shetland road in Rougemont. I've been a resident there for twenty five years. Been kind of a leader in the community very active in the rural town club. And. Although I feel this plan has some real merits. I also feel it has some deficiencies. And so the reason I'm against it tonight is because I think we need a delay to talk about a few things a little bit longer. I'd like to give you just a little history. Originally the area up there developed around a mill called I believe it was Bowlings mill. Linda happens to live right close. Like within a stone's throw of where Bowlings mill existed. And the village grew up around Bowlings mill towards Moore's mill. That was all fine and good until the late eighteen hundreds. When they decided to put a railroad through there. At that time I don't. The town is going through the village of going through different names. But it eventually settled on the name Rouge Montt. Not because of the residents wanted it but. The super the railroad superintendent's wife was a French aficionado. And she figured well there's red mountain there so why not name the village Rouge Montt. So everything of course grew up along the railroad so the adopted future use plan that the existing one. Obviously reflects the fact that the commercial district grew up close to the railroad there were barbershops. There's a school there were. All kinds of various stores gas stations you name it. And so that kind of became the commercial district and that was all fine and good until. In the nineteen sixties when telephone came out to Rouge Montt. And later on when they widened 501 to four lanes. Made quite a bit of difference. In the traffic and in the twenty five years I've lived out there if any of you know. And that's one of the reasons why they're looking at a park and ride. Half of the vehicles coming down through Rouge Montt in the morning have Virginia license plates. They're heading to the park they're heading to Duke. They're heading for centers of employment which makes sense. So this plan makes more sense because it's developing it's changing the potential for commercial development. From a long. Red Mountain Road. Which is a. Residential Road basically. To a U. S. Highway. U. S. 501. The major problem with the. Commercial district as defined on your map here. Is most of those properties were. Planted and developed. Prior to any zoning in the county. And anybody that knows anything about the Rouge Montt area knows that there is a vast amount of property out there that does not perk. And I would venture to say that probably half. Of the property that's in this designated commercial district. I will not perk. So it's not suitable for commercial development. The way it exists. I mean you can. You can. Put lipstick on a pig but it's still pig. And- some part of my concern is that the commercial district. Is not big enough. And there's an an obvious area. That should be designated commercial that's not here. And that's the area. That goes south on the east side of five oh one. If you go down. That south side. You got a map that looks like this I believe in your packet. You down that south side right now the. Village ends here. But all of this property down through here. Except for one area is undeveloped. It's larger it has a larger areas- that can perk. It's more readily develop for commercial purposes. And makes more sense. And the terminating property is already re-zoned industrial. It's the only piece of property in the northern part of Durham in Mangum Township that I know of well excuse me outside of Trayburn. That is zoned industrial. So it may would make a lot more sense to designate this strip on the east side of five oh one. In the future land use plan as commercial. Part of it is self interest- as Don Mason already stated- Don is willing to- to donate to the Rougemont Ruritan club. A piece of property that we would like to develop- into- our club house. And also a community park. And that piece of property looks like it's this eastern part of that. Piece of property again there's your railroad tracks there's five oh one- it's all in that area that would be. Future commercial so it could fit in there without any trouble- have have a greater potential for some- some density- and we'd very much like to do that for those of you know the Rougemont Ruritan club was founded in nineteen fifty in nineteen fifty three they build a log cabin. Which is their. Meeting place. All hand-hewn logs all from the area none treated. Been there fifty some are sixty some years- at the places needs a lot of work. And we're on property that if it burns down we can't rebuild. Because of the density limitations we have two pieces of land and they total. A grand total I think of one point seven acres. And so we're looking at the possibility- of moving the Ruritan and this is our potential for doing that- those of you who know the Rougemont Ruritan know what they do for the community. If you drive up a Christmas time everybody sees the Christmas angels. They exist because of the Ruritan flags. Fly because of that. Wouldn't have the green box out there the Ruritan wouldn't have fought for it we wouldn't have the traffic light of the Ruritan wouldn't have fought for it we do a lot for the community we're community oriented. We raise money through fundraisers in every dime. We raise every year goes back into the community. Unlike most- civic groups. That have some sort of national project Ruritans are local. They serve only the community that are in. Our treasures here tonight and he can tell you that we spend every time. And- and so I would ask you to. To delay this so we can talk about it a little bit more and to make sure that accommodations could be made- for extending that commercial area- so that we can get some commercial out there with a reasonable possibility. That it can be cited someplace that'll perk. And and also so that we can develop the Ruritan and the community park. And I thank you for your time. All right thank you. We have anyone else here wishing to speak on this item. No. Okay we'll close the public hearing we'll bring it back for the commissioners to have anyone that. Has any questions. Reverend Whitley. Miss Woods. Was there any consideration about widening the commercial area to consider the property that he referred to? The vast majority of attendees at the meetings express no preference to enlarge the village of Richmond. Okay thank you. Mr. Lam. Yeah thank you I just a point of clarification- do I understand you correctly to be saying that the property that the Ruritan club. Seeks eventually to develop for commercial purposes is outside of the designated commercial district that the city's proposal. Recommends and is it. I. You come back up to the- yeah I could podium. Pardon me- may I correct one important. Miss statement. We're this is a county case. Not city okay. The county my apologies. It comes within two properties. Okay it's two properties away from. The proposed flume. Commercial district okay. And- was the routine club involved in the process of- designating or or- the the public process that the that the staff. Mentioned. We were not actively involved because we have been actively involved in the water situation. Okay we've been taking the point on the water situation. And- because of that we hope to have actually have the that resolved by January of two thousand sixteen. Thank you. Miss board then. Hello follow question for staff- you said that the people who did attend your public meetings were not interested in extending the borders to the south. But was there any opposition to doing so. I did not recall any specific opposition. Okay thank you. Well I attended all of the meetings I think maybe but- one. And- something that I'd like to say about the decision making process it's. It's very confusing to. Just to people who are who are not familiar with planning terms with future land use map was zoning. It's it it took a lot of Laura's- energy in fact to inform people of exactly what was happening. I think the reason that. Of the commercial that that no one pushed harder for commercial district along five oh one. Is that. I mean I certainly thought that there would be. There would be a presentation and people would say well look we're leaving this we're leaving this land out we're leaving we're this obvious area where in fact there's already a zoning for industrial. It's an obvious area for commercial development. And I think that I think that this hasn't been thought through carefully enough to be honest with you I and and I think that there's been an enormous effort. To. Think it through. But it's a complicated issue and and it's involves a community of people understanding exactly what's going on. So. You know it always. When I was on the planning commission before the kinds of cases that came before us that were the most. Distressing were ones in which people had had started a development. And the zoning changed unbeknownst to them and or. Or we were voting to zone out what they had been paying taxes on and we have a situation here where where development was started it was started and it's in phases and and I think we we have a responsibility as a community to think about. Whether or not that development can go forward there's been considerable effort put into it. So those are my comments. Mr chairman I address some of some of these concerns. Pat Young again with the planning department the. Club or lodge that was referred to by the speakers. Could be developed under the current zoning on the property in question that there would be a implementation of the future designation for the village would really have no impact on that. Either way there would still be a use permit required because it's a non residential use in a residential zoning district. But that could proceed independently now in terms of the broader issue about additional commercial uses. We certainly understand I think all I could say to that is there were there were. Six years ago. We had a lot of input and. We are where we are we certainly don't want to. I will say one last thing that comp plan as I think you all are aware. Requires us to be recommending and encouraging through the future land use map. No development meeting development centered on. Roadway intersections better access better infrastructure support. There does become a point if you extend this thing that becomes a part of the plan. And trying to get away from and that would have to be you know carefully evaluated there might be a need to take properties out of the northern side. I can't say that for sure until we look at it more closely but. I just want to. Put it on the table that it's it's not a real simple. Quick hit it would have to probably be pretty thoroughly evaluated. And those were just some comments I'm happy to answer. I think people would like to know how easy would be to change. The. Thing we have before us tonight I think that that's a concern. You know how set in stone. In order to make that sort of substantive change. It would probably be necessary to schedule additional community meetings. Go through another process. With this project so far. It would so considerable confusion. In the community. And. Perhaps suspicious. In some cases. I'm not saying. It's a bad thing I'm saying that. The change would be more complicated than you may. Imagine. I think we obviously always want to consider and contemplate any serious concerns and this is one. But it and you've heard this is a recurring theme over the last. Year especially. That at some point it becomes a resource allocation issue. We've got a very small number of staff. Laura being one that work on a large number of strategic planning projects for the community that are that are all priorities and. I think the time and effort we've spent out in Rougemont has been considerable and I think I'm certainly not authorized. To make any additional. Evaluation I my recommendation is that we. Certainly note this concern thoroughly. Vetted daylight it when it goes forward but. And then of course if we're directed by the elected officials the plan director off to make a determination there but. And you all can certainly make whatever recommendation you want but. We can't we can't commit to to additional. Input or evaluation. The board of county commissioners. When this goes to public hearing. Can instruct staff to change the map. Without the additional community meetings or that's their prerogative is elected officials. Walters. So we're going to finish everyone and if you have an additional question we'll come back to you as I. Yes. I wanted to ask about the two outlying. Commercial parcels shown in the proposed. Yes. Are you referring to the ones on the east. Okay. The north. And then the one is the split zone one. Yeah I forgot to mention that and I was going to mention those outliers because they're rather odd looking. The one on the north is an existing convenience store. It's been there for many years chances are it's going to be there for a while. And they have the zoning so we just left them alone. On the south side of. Red Mountain Road. To the east there's rather large almost square. That's an existing small shopping center. It's minimally occupied at the moment but it is the shopping center. And the large area east of that on the north side of Red Mountain Road is a large large animal veterinarian. They currently have the commercial zoning chances are they're going to remain there for the foreseeable future. So we just simply left that as the commercial. A bigger part. The property is split. That is one of the few cases on the map where we actually recommend that the back be designated as very low density residential. Now in point of fact although it's not zoned residential they are allowed to use that area in the back. That's where they keep the horses and allow them to roam free as it were. And the change in land use will not affect it at all. It's currently designated rural density residential. So. Commissioner Harris. Speaking about confusion. I attended a number of those meetings too and I know the first meetings that were held people were there thinking that they were going to get a water situation. And not the future land use map of Ruge amount. So I mean it was confusion even from the start of it as far as the real purpose of those meetings because people thought that you were working on the water situation you know. So. I would be in favor of at least consideration of you know maybe doing some misogynical changes to this. Thank you. Yes. Well I'm not sure that an answer is required but yeah since the confusion as well and worked very hard to separate the two projects the timing of the two projects was purely a matter of issues having nothing to do with planning concerning the timing of the water project and planning department directed to undertake this process at this time by our work program which was approved by the joint city county planning committee. We had very little wiggle room in terms of our timing for our project as opposed to the water project. Thank you. Next. I'm going to get Dr. Winder's and Mrs. Mosky then I'm going to come back to you two. I'd like to ask about the difference between the zoning and the plan. Pat I believe you said that the current zoning would allow the Ruritan project what about the development around the golf course the development around the golf course is not included in this proposal. It's not part of the that is correct it is to the southeast of the village of Rougemont. So that's a whole different issue. Precisely it is zoning is controlled by the zoning ordinance and the watershed overlay protection ordinance that applies to that particular watershed which by the way is Lake Mickey Little River protected area or B they call it. Lake Wins is not a part of our proposal Mr. Mason who spoke earlier would like it to be a part of the proposal. So we haven't considered Lake Wins because it isn't. I'm not really clear on where it is on the map that we have in our packet. Well this is easy to solve. The map. I remember seeing golf course. The map in the you may recall the map that I showed you at the beginning of my presentation the yeah I will walk over. Actually Lake Wins is the area precisely under the county wide map that indicates the general location of Rougemont. It's underneath that map. You can see a few of the lots just on the western boundary of the NSAT map. That's the and the golf course is in the green is on the map that we have in the packet. There's the recreation open space that's the golf course. That is correct. So and it's not you it was part of this project or it's relevant to this project but it just was not you decided or the community decided the planning department decided that it should not be included in the village of Rougemont. The village of Rougemont has defined in the 2005 comprehensive plan did not include Lake Wins. We did not include Lake Wins. Based upon the team exercise that I discussed where the different teams sketched Rougemont and we sort of overlaid them to get a best fit we opted not to in other words expand greatly the village of Rougemont boundary for the precise purpose of protecting a water supply watershed and keep in mind there is a text amendment coming up. There are aspects of that proposal that change what one can do within the village of Rougemont. Now the village of Rougemont is approximately 2% of the total protective watershed if you're doubling the size then you're doubling the impact of what we're proposing with the text amendment that you will be hearing shortly. Is it possible to rezone the area on the other side of the golf course? Mr. Mason or any landowner is free to apply for a plan amendment to change the land use policies of the county is also free to apply for a rezoning. That's true for any landowner in the region. Mr. Smosky. Thank you Mr. Chairman. If I remember correctly you said that this future land use map did not change the zoning. Is that correct? Correct. On this map going down Red Mountain Road are all those properties in red currently zone commercial? Future land use map is currently adopted. Simply reflects the existing zoning and all those properties are at least the front part of the properties are zone commercial. Therefore the owners of those properties would if they chose to do so if they wanted to start a commercial enterprise they have the zoning to allow that despite what the future land use map would say. And so they would have to apply for a rezoning if they wanted to put in a house a residential. Most of those if there's no house on it now most of those properties do have residences on them and they've been there for many years. So if we lay this out as a plan we've come under some criticism for having plans that we change but as pointed out there are some other properties that are not going to be incorporated into this plan but could logically in the future be seen to be compatible with commercial zoning? That would be correct it is possible. Okay, so we could see the zoning progress out from this current central Yes, but that's ultimately a privately an owner decision whether they wish to apply for a rezoning. And in some cases a plan amendment as well. And so for Mr. Mason's property and that project that is going on even though it's not included in this future land use map or the plan that could be considered at another time the County commissioners could consider that project for relief, right? There are multiple things could happen we're talking hypotheticals here yes when this particular proposal goes to Board of County commissioners they could instruct staff to change the map or they could consider another project at some later date which planning would undertake or the landowner could at any time if they consider it worthwhile apply for a rezoning and a plan amendment. I wasn't trying to discuss hypotheticals I was trying to find avenues and so I think we've found out that even if this plan moves forward from us that it can be changed by the elected officials in future considerations even if they adopted as such it could be changed by the inquiries of the individual landowners and specific projects that come up, right? It would be unusual to do so but the county could initiate a plan amendment on its own at some point they initiated this plan amendment okay but the landowners could initiate a request for a plan amendment and then there is the other like you said rare possibility that the county commissioners could proceed to provide relief for this but that would be rare if they were to choose for relief and future consideration of these properties that are in question potentially potentially that's what I wanted to discuss thank you sir and ma'am so we'll go back to commission of board and huff okay I think we're all kind of on the same page to figure out what motion we need to make to move this forward in my mind it appears that within the plan that you have is basically within the existing boundaries of Rougemont with some minor changes at the edges and mostly it's drawing the commercial center into the middle and to me that makes sense and it seems like a good thing we also have this citizen concern that the area further down 15501 also be changed so my question is from the planning department's point of view would it make more sense to incorporate that plan as part of this and we could consider that in our motion to suggest to the county that they can modify this or would it make more sense to initiate it as a separate change planning staff is in no position to change the proposal at this point as my understanding of planning commission of your role you can make what recommendation suits the planning commission well there's what suits us and what makes practical sense this is staff's proposal okay and assuming it goes forward it will go to this is the form it will take at board of county commissioners okay myself just explain what happens if it doesn't go forward so you all under the UDO the planning commission has the authority to defer item for up to three cycles or 90 days but after that it would go forward under any scenario I think your options are to recommend approval and recommend denial or recommend approval with modifications and as Laura alluded to right I think kind of the bottom line is we tried our best I think we did a pretty good job of having a community consensus with the six meetings and essentially any modifications that from staff's perspective you all certainly are free to make any recommendations you see fit certainly Mr. Hans presented tonight this is the very first time we're hearing of that Mr. Mason has been in contact with us for at least several weeks maybe longer but we essentially feel like we owe it to the stakeholders that were involved in the participation process not recommend any changes at this time but we certainly respect your authority to do so thank you any other questions Mr. Davis there's no more discussion I recommend approval we don't want to set a precedent for a handful of individuals to come and have a discrepancy on something that's been out for six to eight months if we start that the next plan amendment that we have proposal if myself miss six meetings and I come to this meeting and say hey wait I'm my owner and I wasn't included then we'll have to start a precedent so being that said I move approval of plan amendment A130009 the moon probably second by Reverend Whitley all those in favor let it be known by raising your right hand any opposition motion has passed 12 to 1 all right thank you we'll move down to item 6B which is the watershed protection overlay rural villages TC130003 Laura Woods planning department and this presentation will most likely be much briefer because the subject matter is actually quite simpler this is the regulatory component of the village of Rougemont planning project and we recommend some changes to the watershed regulations for the Lake Mickey little river protected area that would be M slash LR dash B and our recommendation per the community meetings that we had in Rougemont is that within the village of Rougemont the minimum lot size be allowed down to one acre now it's important to remember with this proposal that does not mean that every landowner will be able to plant their properties at one acre lots the overriding regulation for Durham County remains the septic system regulations in order to have a plat approved you have to have a septic system permit the soils in Rougemont are in many cases quite poor for septic systems therefore not every property could be developed at one acre lots however this does provide an opportunity for some small number an indeterminate number of landowners to subdivide multi acre parcels the genesis of this recommendation is that a number of persons pointed out that with the current three acre lot minimum in that protected area they are unable to subdivide their property to provide additional residential lots for their children the second recommendation concerning watershed rules is that within rural villages and specifically the rural villages within this protected watershed like Mickey Little River Overlight and there's only one, Rougemont the impervious surface limit be allowed to increase to 12% it is currently 6% which is pretty restrictive and what we found in looking at a map is that there are residential properties that are already maxed out on their or close to maxed out on the impervious surface allowed which means it's very difficult for a homeowner to improve their property by for instance adding an addition the 12% allows them a great deal more flexibility plus a 24% high density option as long as they incorporate approved engineered storm water runoff controls and chances are most residential most of the residential properties will not go the high density rounds other than that one other section 8.7 .3 exceptions for existing single family lots currently that regulation states that lots that were planted prior to January 1st 1994 the regulations that retain are the regulations that were in place at the time they planted their lot we suggest a small change that within rural villages has defined by the future land use map such lots can utilize the current standards in effect meaning the one acre and the impervious surface which previously discussed or whichever regulation is least restrictive to the landowner in other words it provides the landowner more flexibility than landowners currently have in this protected area and other than adding a definition to the UDO for rural village that in essence is the text amendment that concludes my presentation all right thank you I don't have anyone signed up for it is that the case Scott Pat okay so we'll close the public hearing on that and bring it back before the commission do we have anyone signed up or wishing any questions can we get a motion Mr. Chair I move approval of tax amendment TC 1300 second all right moved and properly second all those in favor let it be known chair before I give you the vote on that I do need to make a correction on a1300009 that motion did pass 11 to 1 okay Mr. Chair may I change my vote on that one and make it 12 to 0 I'm not sure hold that thought for a minute I don't think so I'm afraid not yes yeah maybe next time so we were in the middle we were in the middle of this vote and we said all in favor so any opposition no the vote has passed 12 to 0 all right thank you we'll move down to item 7a just Chapel Creek Z 130014 good evening Amy Wolfe with the planning department this is case Z130014 yeah Chapel Creek the applicant is Eden's Land Court it is in the city's it is being considered under the city's jurisdiction because it is has a pending annexation annexation and will be considered as a consolidated land use item when it goes before city council the request is from residential suburban 20 which is the current zoning designation and the proposal is for the plan development residential and the proposed use is for PDR 8.000 designation the 8.000 represents the proposed density of the site the site is 17.10 acres and the proposed use is for 105 residential acres again it will be considered a consolidated land use item along with annexation and a utility extension agreement when it goes to council and I would like to remind the planning commission that you did hear this item at the November planning commission at the time it did include a plan amendment this commission did recommend Nile of both the plan amendment and zoning map change at that time since that time the applicant amended this application from the a lower density of 3.919 units per acre which would allow 50 single family lots and the request before you again which is for 8 units an acre which would allow 105 residential units this request is in the suburban tier in the suburban transit area it is 28 parcels has frontage along George King Road and Crossland Drive it's in the northwest quadrant of the interstate 40 and NC54 intersection excuse me it is in the FJB watershed and the portion of the site the site to the east east of this dark line on the context map shown here is in the major transportation corridor overlay and it is also in the vicinity of Army Corps land which is used for flood control purposes which is located to the west and south of a portion of the site this request does satisfy the requirements of the residential district the site is 17.1 acres a little bit more than 13 of that is considered net acreage when you're considering developable area and the development plan reflects all the requirements what you see here are the existing conditions of the site George King Road is on the far left hand side of this graphic Crossland Drive enters from the south as ridgeway excuse me, ridgeway road again it's 28 locks there are streams through the site one in the northwest portion of the site as well as a longer segment running from the south to the north at an angle there's also a gas line even in the southwest corner of the site and right now the site is primarily tree covered the proposal is shown here it includes all the requirements of the development plan and I'll go over the commitments in a moment primarily what you see is very similar to the last plan this dash line represents the alignment or location of southwest Durham Drive which will be a continuation of Crossland Drive this plan also shows three phase areas which I saw back in November had two phase areas which is a requirement for any request in the suburban transit area the first phase is on the west side of the larger stream segment not to include the shaded area phase two is to the east of the stream segment and then this shaded area represents phase three excuse me the requirements of the zone are maximum of 105 residential lots that should say residential units proposed two stream crossings four side access points a maximum of 50% impervious surface and 20% tree preservation graphic commitments include the location of those access points location of the tree preservation area location of those phase areas as well as the location of the multifamily development which it could only be accommodated in phase three because phase three has a building and parking envelope which is a requirement on the development plan for the potential for multifamily also access points are committed to be public street rights away tax amendments excuse me tax commitments include that the use will be single and multifamily residential and accessory uses the minimum lot size for single family of 3,500 square feet the previous plan showed 4,000 square foot minimum lot size for single family construction of the public collector street through the site which is the extension of crossland drive but also the construction of crossland drive presently just off the site as well as construction of Ridgeway road as a public street this request is now consistent with the comprehensive plan and the future land use designated as medium high density residential of 8 to 20 units an acre which is the need the why the original plan amendment associated with this request has been administrative with drawn because the density was increased to meet the future land use map projection this request is consistent with all the policies of the comprehensive plan that apply to the site and staff determines that this request is consistent with the comprehensive plan and applicable policies and ordinances thank you we have two people signed up to speak for one against Jared Edens, Lynn Scott for and Chris Selby against good evening Jared Edens with Edens Landcorp here representing my client David weekly homes Amy gave a very thorough summary of the project and what we've revised with the new application I guess at first you don't succeed try to try again so we left the last meeting without enough density took your feedback took the feedback from staff my client did some work on finding different product options that would help increase the density on the site so what you have before you tonight is very similar plan wise to what we had before except we now we've more than double the density from the plan we had in November we are consistent with the comp plan and other than that I'd be glad to be happy to answer any questions you may have thank you Lynn Scott good evening I'm Lynn Scott and I live at 211 Celeste Circle which is in Wood Park it is the neighborhood that borders this development I'm happy with the plan they've presented as I was here at the earlier meeting and my concern is I'd love to see the neighborhood developed out residential as it was originally planned David weekly looks to be very good builders they do clean building eco-friendly building and I think that's a good statement for Durham thank you all right thank you I miss the Chris Selby thank you I'm Chris Selby I live at 138 Celeste Circle and also in Eastwood Park I've lived there since 1997 and by way of introduction I'd like to note that the NC54 I-40 corridor study recommends that the Celeste Circle neighborhood that's our neighborhood remain residential through the 2035 horizon the recommendation is consistent with the nodal development concept for the corridor and as far as after 2035 it our neighborhood could in future be oriented toward transit rather than NC54 while remaining residential so I'm very enthusiastic about the opportunity to live on the periphery of this Lee village I hope I live long enough to enjoy it and light rail transit and so I'm for transit friendly development this development is very new to me the developer kindly provided me with a sketch of the layout I think it was yesterday and I'd say I really haven't thought about it as much as I'd like so right now I could only offer modest support for the plan I do however have a serious caveat to that that's why I signed up against otherwise I'm modestly for this plan there actually is a serious caveat and a very not serious one they both popped up when I was reading the technical report I assume that you all have the technical report I noted on page 12 out of 14 there's an appendix F site conditions table F site context and then it says existing uses and this is the area around the plot and to the south where we are it says vacant single family residential there's not a vacant house in our neighborhood that borders so it seems to me like a mistake vacant means vacant unless there's some planning something or other that I'm not familiar with and relevant to that on page 9 before that there's table D4 project boundary buffers and we're on the boundary there and the boundary to the south where we are it says required opacity zero of zero and the proposed is not applicable I don't know what that means but I wonder if there would be a required opacity if we were not vacant so that it seems like something about this report that I doesn't seem right and I think should be addressed before this is approved can be approved the second so that's the minor point the major one they brought it up on page 4 first it says as far as area characteristics now the characteristics are it's developed a single family to the south that's us and on the first page under the summary says the site is comprised of parcels with frontage on George King Road and Crossland Drive and I got to looking at the map and I'm glad there's a picture one I'd like to use it is there a way to get the map back up there to oh there we go thank you here we go so here's Crossland Drive and also like to point out okay and what struck me is that it's gone through Corps of Engineers land the road if you see where my pointer is there's a stub out here at the intersection of Celeste here and Crossland here and the stub out is there and into the proposal is to connect from here up into the property to be developed and actually that's supposed to be southwest Durham Drive but what struck me about that is I've been living there a long time I went through the collector street plan meetings and there was a lot of support for here's George King Road over here there was a lot of support for connecting here using this as the collector street but we were told time and time again by the lead planner and other planners you cannot pave a road you cannot pave George King you cannot pave George King through Corps of Engineers land okay so now I'm wondering how are they going to pave a road through Corps of Engineers land and and I caught the I've been emailing back and forth with the lead planner on this and I was sent by them to another planner who has more expertise in roadway and they informed me of some interesting things in their last email second to last email about this how are they going to pave that say nor have I researched this issue extensively oh well you need to get it right away from the Corps of Engineers to do this and he says I've not researched this issue extensively regarding the right of way therefore I cannot verify that the right of way still exists today I previously verbally advise the applicants engineer of this issue by committing to make the connection as currently illustrated that is this crossland drive connection the applicant will be required to obtain right of way and or construction easements from the Corps as needed to make this roadway connection so they need to get right away from the Corps of Engineers to do this alternatively if they later determine this connection is no longer feasible a rezoning subject to determination subject to a determination by the planning director would be likely to be required to remove this requirement so my concern is this site has four access points two of them are at this north side one here and one here and two are on the south one is this road and that's going to happen no one can stop that that has to be done by the UDO but this one it's up in the air as I said and this one planning is already said it can't be paved so if they develop this so the possibility exists that they could develop this and make a wonderful development and then who knows next week there'll be another plan for this huge 40 acres here and beyond and it all comes into here and they can't get in and out here so where do they go all the traffic would go right on our Celeste serval so they may build all these houses and they go to the planning director and say well we can't get approval from Corps of Engineers to have a right away to build our road and so they go to the planning director and say we got this huge development we need to get the approval to to get a home occupancy permit they would have to get the permission from the planning director and what do you suppose the planning director is going to do with all these taxable places and he's going to very possibly approve it and all this traffic from everywhere is going to go right down our little this is the local street they're supposed to build a collector street here this is the local street and it's not supposed to so that's my one big caveat like I said I'm modestly for this development I wouldn't want it to stop I mean I'd like to see Lee Village develop but not going through my neighborhood obviously through so maybe if I'd like to respectfully suggest you know you could consider approving this development with a caveat that before it goes before the city council they have to get right away from the core of engineers to build this road this has to be this road has to be done in my opinion thank you for your attention thank you sir Amy did you have something you wanted to just making myself available to answer the questions you brought up okay thank you we don't have anyone else signed up to speak so we'll close the public hearing and bring it back before the commissioners of anyone wants to speak forward. All right I have two questions and Amy I was wondering if you could explain to I'm sorry I've forgotten your name if you could explain to him what the process is so that if this committed element cannot be met sure what point in the process would it block. Sure when if this were approved as is today prior to development it would have to go through a site plan process through that process prior to any I don't want to say dirt being turned over because there are other things that could happen but prior to development of according to the development plan a site plan would need to be approved and at that time the correct approvals through the army core land would all be researched and flaked out and if it was deemed that the right away was not buildable the zoning the development could not proceed it would have to go back through the zoning process to remove that access point all right thank you very much all right my next question is for Mr. Edens I received a call from a Durham resident earlier today who wanted me to inquire about your multifamily area over here in phase 3 and he was concerned about the rail line running behind this and he wanted to know what protection the people in those apartments townhouses whatever form they take what protection would they have from the ramp being having the rail line right in their backyards and how would they know that was coming one that probably wouldn't be determined until site plan because we haven't done very much detailed design at all I'm speaking for my client here to say that they're not in the business building product that they can't sell that people are not going to be happy with when they move in so the only assurance I can make is that we will make every possible effort at site plan to properly buffer between the rail and those units so that there won't be any issues in the future thank you can we get a motion move that we approve zoning case Z1300014 we're moving to probably second all those in favor let me know by raising your right hand any opposition motion has passed 12-0 all right thank you move down to public hearing 7B KL Creek Phase 2 initial which is Z1300034 A good evening I'm Scott Whiteman from the planning department this case call Creek Phase 2 is an initial zoning that's initiated by the city of Durham based on a voluntary annexation petition submitted by the representative of the owner of the property the proposal is to change the zoning is to establish a city zoning of RS20 on the subject lots currently they're zoned are rural residential in Durham County so the site is near the intersection of Herndon Road and Scott King Road the lots as they are currently platted are all smaller than would be permitted in the RR district so the staff is recommending as part of the annexation that the city council establish RS20 zoning so that all the lots would comply with the all the minimum lot size would comply with zoning there currently there's one house on the lots there's actually two separate segments one that consists of seven lots on DeLayer Drive another that consists of two lots on Herndon Road they're all part of the same annexation and zoning case and then the staff does recommend or does determine that this is consistent with the comprehensive plan and with the city policy for initial zoning of newly annexed land I'd be happy to answer any questions I have one person signed up to speak which is Gerard Edens for we'll close the public hearing and bring it back before the commissioners if we have anyone else wishing to speak can we get a motion Mr. Chair I move approval of Z1300034a second I've been moving to properly second all those in favor let it be known by raising your right hand any opposition motion has passed 12 to 0 alright thank you so we'll move down to 9B any announcements what do we have for next month Mr. Chair we have two zoning cases and the introduction of the downtown open space plan scheduled for next month any other announcements okay well all hearts and minds are clear we'll adjourn