Planning and Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

Let's get underway. I will call to order the regular monthly meeting of the Albany County Planning and Zoning Commission for July 8, 2026. Beginning through a call. Byron? Here. Correct. Here. Barb?

Here.

And Rob is supposed to be coming in online. I don't see her yet. And I'm here. Say approval of the agenda. Is there anyone who would like to make, move for any changes or additions to the agenda?

I'm happy to move approval of the agenda as distributed.

All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. That motion carries. We have a motion for approval of the minutes for June 10, 2026. I had a comment or two on those. Sure.

Go ahead. I think that's appropriate. I wasn't here, but I gave you the opportunity to listen to them. which is an interesting exercise. And I don't know who's under control, but the video that's posted has a little bit of lead in and a little bit of trail off that wasn't part of the meeting. So those of us who are picking it up later get to listen to some of this other conversation, which might not be entirely appropriate. So I guess maybe in addition to us, nobody was saying anything too scurrilous, but

HAB-Masyn Moyer- But anyway, just which is unusual.

HAB-Masyn Moyer- When I just dialed it, it was almost. Oh, I don't think everybody realizes they're still being they're still being HAB-Masyn Moyer- distributed. So anyway, just as a an FYI that I didn't have a great meeting. I agree with everything you guys did. HAB-Masyn Moyer- The analysis was spot on, as far as I could tell. HAB-Masyn Moyer- So the only question I had was whether we're all might want to elaborate on the business of questioning livestock in ranchettes. But if she's not here. Oh, there she is. Yeah, so I just thought I'd invite you, as I was listening to the video and then looked at the minutes, if someone were trying to see whether they were interested or not, it might have been useful to expand your comment a little bit that it was specifically about livestock management under ranchettes. So I just invite you to consider the way the minutes came out on a particular item. And if you wanted to augment it, that would be easy to do. That was the only thing that caught my ear.

I'm not sure what you would like me to add to my comments.

Oh, just the comment said that livestock regulations were discussed. And you were much more specific.

This was not my comment. I was relaying a comment made to the county commissioners at their meeting following ours where actually it was Chris Cleveland complained or commented that we never specifically discussed when we change the definitions of livestock.

Yes, I understood that from listening to it and just wondered if you wanted that specific thing in the minute. So that's a very fine point, but if it didn't bother you, then certainly not my role to lobby for it.

I don't see any need to expand on this.

Okay. And I love the discussion of new branches. I thought you guys nailed it on that and everybody was in union. So those are my only comments. Those aren't additions or corrections. Chair.

That's fine. In that case, may I have a motion to approve the minutes? So we have a motion to approve the minutes. Okay. Let me have about six seconds. All right. Very good. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Okay. That motion carries. Disclosures with conflicts of interest. Scrappy everything?

No.

Barb? No. Marv? No. Vern? Nothing here. Nor do I. So in that case, we'll proceed with the Range Acres Final Plan Submission Permit Application SD-202-26. David?

Yes, Mr. Chair, members of the Planning and Zoning Commission. This application was submitted for your review by Nathan Willis, who is the applicant and owner. The location of the property is at 83 Littleworth Lane. We've seen this preliminary plot, which was approved by the Board of County Commissioners at the April 21st meeting. This approval included a condition requiring the installation of signage on all subdivision roads, indicating that the roads are privately maintained and will not receive public maintenance. that they're proposing 11 lots on a property that's 131.2 acres approximately. The lots will range from 10 to 20 acres, most of them around the 10 acre size. So water and sewer for this subdivision is proposed to be either well or hauled water. The Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality required a note to be added to the plat stating water from wells completed in the chug water formation at this subdivision may contain elevated concentrations of total dissolved solids and sulfates. Homeowners may wish to install treatment for these constituents. No proposed centralized water system is, there's not a proposed centralized water system. Individual on-site wastewater systems, septic systems will be proposed for this. The roads to this, there's Little Worth Lane, which is an existing private road driveway, will be improved to county standards. A new road, Big Worth Lane, will be built heading north from where it intersects with Little Worth Lane. provide access to at least eight of the lots. This new road will end in a cul-de-sac and the roads will remain private. Access to the subdivision is from Little Worth Lane, which connects with Highway 287. Lots will either be accessed from Little Worth Lane or the proposed road, Big Worth Lane. Road maintenance will be The roads will be maintained by homeowners association established through the covenants. There's also an agreement, at least preliminary agreement between these folks and the subdivision to the west. Fire protection will be done through the Albany County Fire District number one. They're currently working with The applicant is currently working with them to be part of their hauled water program, which is what has typically been done in the last, I don't even know how many years, five, six, eight years, where they pay into this and the fire district uses that money to buy fire equipment, to haul water and such. Water rights associated with the well, they're in the process of being a portion of the water rights assigned to lot 11. So that's, their request has been submitted and received by the state engineer's office to get that taken care of. There's a well on the property that's used for irrigation that they're just trying to limit it to that one lot, lot 11. Financial assurance will need to be provided prior to final approval. That's something that's being worked on at this time. And then fencing and print work fencing currently exists. There were a number of folks that reviewed the application. This Laramie Rivers Conservation District that commented on soil degradation, erosion, land disturbance of Asia weeds and reclamation, which recommends minimizing land disturbance and reclaiming disturbed areas with native grasses and shrub species. They will provide information on native grass seeds Upon request in Welsh, they know the Welsh should be tested every three to five years. The Wyoming Department of Transportation reviewed this. Taylor McCourt, District Traffic Engineer, requests traffic generation estimate for this site to evaluate it if more detailed traffic evaluation is needed. If changes are proposed to be made to Lilworth Lane, access from Highway 287 permit will be required from YDOT. Game and Fish reviewed this, only recommended avoiding new fencing and wildlife friendly fencing, explaining in covenants the presence of wildlife and impacts that they may have on landscaping and the restraints of pets from roaming at large to protect wildlife. I mean, Department of Environmental Quality reviewed this in their chapter 23 report, provided a non-adverse recommendation And then, so the applicant has provided a complete final plan application with the exception of the required financial assurance and fire suppression plan. The applicant is in the process of securing financial assurance. The applicant has been in contact with Albany County Fire District number one to address the fire safety requirements, financial assurance and approval of the fire safety plan. or facility by Albany County Fire District number one must be provided prior to approval of the Board of County Commissioners. Yeah, so staff's recommending approval of the application, adopting and incorporating the staff analysis, findings of fact and conclusions of laws, each are stated in the staff report. With the following conditions, financial insurance and the amount of 125% of the cost to construct improvements is provided to the planning department for final approval and written approval from the Albany County Fire District number one, confirming an alternative water resource will be adequate for the subdivision that provided to the planning department before. And we'll, yeah, so they'll provide that, to our planning department before final approval. Yes, and I'm happy to answer any questions.

David, I'd like to start with one thing just to clarify what was written in the staff report with regards to the comments by Damon Fish. Okay. Damon Fish made a recommendation to avoid new fencing inside the subdivision. But if fencing is required to use wildlife-friendly fencing, I'm sure that's what you intended, but I just want to make sure. The way it's written, it says just avoid new fencing, period, or wildlife-friendly fencing. It could be interpreted to mean they recommended to avoid wildlife-friendly fencing, and that's not what they did.

I just want to point that out. Okay. The way it's written. Sure, I can change that if I probably missed that. Yeah, that's fine. Yeah.

So with that, questions for David? We get a bar. You have anything?

No questions. Ralph?

Yeah, a few questions. Somewhere there it said that the county commissioners approved this on April 21st, conditional on signage. David, can you give a little better explanation of what that was? And was it done? Yes.

Okay. So what happened was, so, When it came to you guys previously, the preliminary plat, there was the issue of the private roads. At the time, well, yeah, when the preliminary plat was filed, the regulations basically said that the roads have to be public. They have to be dedicated to public or have a public easement. But when the new regulations went into play, which was after this was kind of going through their approval process, we had changed that to allow for, you can have private roads as long as it states that specifically on the plat or in another document, or you can have public access roads. And so the final plat actually follows what's in the regulations now. It's allowing those private roads to be what they're wanting to do. And they can do this now. But at the time, again, it wasn't specified that they could do that, the preliminary plat. The Board of County Commissioners, they made a motion to at a condition because of that discussion to basically say they needed to notify the public that these are private roads and not maintained by the county and put those signs up. That was the condition that they put on it. So it had to do with the road ownership or whatever you want to call it, discussion. And that was kind of their solution is like, okay, well, we're going to allow them to have a variance for this and with this condition that they have, that they're notifying the public that these are private roads not publicly maintained.

Another question I have, so my understanding that we don't have the response from the fire department and In between when we discuss and decide on this and the commissioners, that documentation will be provided. Am I understanding the timeline correctly?

That is correct. They'll need to provide it before the Board of County Commissioners makes their decision.

I see. So we are going to recommend approval and maybe they will or will not get the letter in time. or they'll just wait until they have the letter to go forward to the county commissioners.

So what is being proposed is that you recommend approval with the condition that that information is received prior to the Board of County Commissioners. So if they do not meet that condition and they want to go forward without meeting that condition, then it's basically the recommendation is a denial because they haven't met that condition. If that makes sense.

Okay, that makes more sense. Okay. Um, I think that's all I have for now. If someone else.

Craig, do you have anything?

No, I'm good.

Mark? Yeah, a few questions. First of all, let me follow up on Rob's comments, because this is a point of contention. So are these public can the public travel these roads despite them being privately maintained? And no, we have subdivisions, that's the case.

It's contentious.

No.

These will be private roads, completely private. They can lock the gate and just give the key to people in the subdivision.

That seems fair. We have some subdivisions where it's privately maintained, but it's a dedicated public road. There were four areas in the report that were kind of conditions two of which you picked up in your recommendation, the fire safety and the financial assurance. But why don't we just wait until it's all done? Why are we doing conditional approvals?

Well, for one thing, specifically with the financial assurance, once somebody gets that financial assurance, now they're paying for it. There's usually interest or fees that are incurred. To me, it almost makes sense to just make sure that planning and zoning is okay with what it is and providing that prior to the Board of County Commissioners. Just for the fact that they don't, I mean, nothing's for certain until the decision is made by the Board of County Commissioners, but there's more certainty after you go through your board, this board here, and there's a decision made. So that is my reasoning for that. This is not the first time that this has happened. Financial assurance often isn't provided until right before the Board of County Commissioners meet. Now, the fire suppression thing, I mean, it's like they either do it or they don't. If they don't, then they can't have their subdivision You're given the right to put a condition on it. To me, it's one of those things that's important, but they're in the process, and they showed me the emails. They've confirmed to me that they're working on it, and they're just waiting on the fire district to figure things out, honestly, right now. I feel like they've done their due diligence, so I feel comfortable with them going forward. Again, it can't be a your recommendation will not be an approval if they don't meet that condition. It's basically recommended denial because they can't meet that, so. Sure, but that's true of all of the stuff.

You can say approval condition on 30 different things. As I was just wondering, I'd like your answer on the financial assurance. There's no point in costing that more money because it works its way through our system. So the policy would be if it's something that either costs them and they're clearly working on and they're clearly able to provide, then you think correct yes the other the other two were the the covenants and again maybe this opportunity for a little education okay they have to have covenants yes but we have no we're not approving them we have no control over them or direction of what's in them am i understanding that it seems like we just checked yeah there's a little box that says covenants at the top is that is that right

Yeah, you're right. We're not really approving them. They're providing what they're going to turn in. They have to meet, like, I think there's two standards in the statutes that it talks about. I mean, I guess technically that they're going with the application. So what's approved with this should be what goes forward. So if they filed something and they're lacking those requirements, the statutes, and they are, I think the two things that are in the statute are they have to have something that covers road maintenance or maintenance of other public stuff. And the other standard is they have to have some kind of continued continuation of the entity. Like it has to spell out how this is, that this will continue on or whatever. So those are the two standards and we're mostly, we're usually just like, okay, do you got your maintenance stuff in here? How are you taking care of the roads? That's what we look at. So I guess I feel like if this is approved by you guys and the Board of County Commissioners and they totally change it and they're not meeting standards anymore and they're not going to maintain roads and we find out about that, then we could probably do something about it. Say, hey, these are not correct. You need to correct them or we're going to pull your permit or something like that. But yes, I mean, I think we're not specifically saying these are the ones for sure, you know?

Right. So a much cleaner regulation would be that we would require them to have a road maintenance agreement and an entity and just leave it at that. What caught my eye reading through them is that, and I want your assurance, that there's no sense at all that we are endorsing or approving their covenants because they've got their own things that giving people permission to add different buildings or do different things that we don't have any control over. So it might be clear that us approving their covenants, maybe that's not the right word, acknowledging their covenants, there's no implication that we agree with anything in there.

Is that fair? No, absolutely fair. Yeah. And, and I can, we can do that. We can change that in the future that, I mean, I see what you're saying. We could just say that they're meeting these two standards. for the covenants they've turned in. I think that would be a much cleaner thing to do. Yeah, no, that makes sense to me.

We always get into this, oh, well, the covenants cover it. And then we say, we don't care what the covenants do.

Yeah, really, we don't care what any, everything but the maintenance of the road and the continuation of the entity that's- We have no enforcement authority or anything.

Okay, that's just that clarification. But yeah, if that's appropriate to just change our regs to do what we say we're going to do instead of just this global, you need covenants. John Gerstle, Right, so the other one was the game of fish now, maybe I didn't read it quite the same as Michael. John Gerstle, They are required under state law to have perimeter fencing that correct. John Gerstle, Yes, so the so I read the game of fish comments to say they'd like to have it.

John Gerstle, All right, let's say that they were not. They would prefer not have fencing inside the subdivision.

Avoiding construction of new fences in the proposed subdivision. I read not in as within, but in as associated with.

Yeah, but they were required to have exterior fences.

But that's what I was going to clarify. So we could change that if we wanted to.

Correct. I guess the game of fish doesn't like that standard in the statutes.

Well, like on the barbless, I think it's great. It isn't fenced. I mean, there's just a whole lot of free-roaming wildlife. Right. So you didn't recommend doing anything with that condition, even as an internal fencing. Is that correct? You just think that's just not our role at all? Or what happened to the game and fish recommendation?

Yeah, I didn't put anything, recommend anything based on that, no. Could we require that if we wanted to? I believe so, because we've got that section in the, in the regulations now that it talks about other agency reviews. I have to see what it says, but I think you can. I think you can apply something.

You're saying that you think we could tell a private lender they could not put up fencing on the property? I don't think that'd be correct. I think that would take people off severely.

I'm not promoting it. I was just wondering what are the jurisdictions.

And normally, Antelope Ridge, that's covered in your HOA agreement. There's an architectural committee. You can put up this fence. You can't put up some god awful ugly thing with billboards and all that stuff. It has to be approved by the HOA committee.

And could we make a condition of our approval that internal fencing is also wildlife friendly? That would be responsive to our own regulations as well as Game and Fish's comment. And is there any sympathy for doing that? I'm just exploring the fencing issue.

Can I interrupt for a minute?

Go ahead.

The problem with internal fencing is that the Game and Fish would like the residents to control roaming dogs. And there are ways to control dogs with GPS-activated fencing, and we have new technology to deal with that. But if the wildlife ends up on your property within the area that your dog can roam, you are going to have conflict. So there is a big issue there with how the Game and Fish is trying to reduce the conflicts between, you know, wild and, you know, ungulates eating shrubbery, your own shrubbery, and homeowner dogs attacking wildlife. So there is a big disconnect here between what Game and Fish is asking, in my opinion.

So again, I guess I'd ask my fellow commissioners, is there any sympathy for or having a condition of the subdivision wildlife friendly fencing? Not for me.

Okay.

Just leave that up to the individuals.

Yeah, I'm entirely fine with leaving it up to the individuals.

Okay. Okay. And just in the, what chapter is this? Sorry, in chapter four, we do have a section on agency review and recommendation, and it does says recommendations received from agencies whether the review is required by this resolution or requested by the planning department may be conditionally required by the board or the planning zoning commission as part of their review of the subdivision proposal. So I think we can take their, this was a new thing, I think, because of discussions we had here, but you can conditionally approve Vegas with that. And so like, if something like this, not that we're going to go forward with it, if we wanted this, we could require a note on the plat that says that All fencing within the subdivision has to be wildlife friendly fencing and maybe even refer to our regulations for that or something. I'm not suggesting that. I'm just saying that that would be the way to probably handle this. Either that or, I mean, we're not telling people what to do in their covenants, but we could have them put that in their covenants. We've asked that. the past. I don't know. It might be more appropriate just to be on the platform.

Yeah, I mean, having them put it in a covenants, I don't think it's meaningful. And then they can change it, yeah. Change it tomorrow. So, yeah, I don't think covenants would be a good list. All right. I was just anxious that we'd be respectful of game and features comments. They take trouble to go through that. And that will, of course, be passed on to developers. So, yeah, hearing no great sympathy and I don't know that I have to side on it, I'll

I'll stand down on that issue. Let me ask Barb. Barb, do you have anything to add about that perhaps or not?

The only thing I would say as far as the covenants go, the peripheral fencing I can see us requiring, but I think it should be up to the HOA to decide on internal fencing. All right.

I have no clue. Okay. I do. Yeah. And so like, I don't, yeah, I don't know.

And you know,

Some of the notes that are put on the plats, they're actually supposed to be put on all the advertising materials and those types of things. Like no centralized water system, that's supposed to be put on all their advertising documents and all that. No proposed centralized wastewater system, that is supposed to be put. So it's not just on the plat that these things are supposed to be put.

And what do you mean by

That's the state. Yeah, a lot of those are dictated in the state that they should be on all. Plats, solicitations, maps, blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm reassured by that. We go to the trouble to do those carefully.

Then final question, if I may. Sure. What became of our response on the Did you get any feedback at all from them, or did we just see it in the letter from DQ? So did you read the letter from DQ?

Because he had, like, a paragraph at the end, and I don't know if that was trying to, like, address that or not.

I think it was. So my question is, was there any other communication?

No, there wasn't anything else other than the letter.

OK, that's the only question that for staff. Thank you.

All right, Miss Rose, you're here. Would you like to stand for questions? Will you say for questions?

Can I make one small comment? There is a type of comment or even a larger one. Before we go with questions to the applicant, there is a typo on. Just before the staff analysis. The last bullet before staff analysis, I can't see which page it is. Three, page three. The word Wyoming is misspelled, so please correct me.

Yeah, I'll get that taken care of. Thanks, Bob.

Okay.

Very good, thank you. That was a small comment. All right, Greg, do you have any questions for that?

No, there isn't.

So people are going to have to put in their own wells in their own...

Yes.

And that'll be understood when they...

Yes. Okay. Yep. And in accordance with what the DEQ sent back on what we need to do for their septic systems and everything too as well. But yes, that'll be understood.

And are you going to do overhead power or underground power?

It'll be underground.

Okay. All underground. All right. Seeing that Ms. Roberts is on here, maybe you can answer. The engineering report was a May revision. I just wondered what had been revised in that report. I didn't compare them, but is there any? On what, which one? The engineering design report, it just, it was titled May revision. And I just wondered what was the revision, if anything? May revision. Yeah, so Mr. Chair, but,

The main revision, like, when we receive an application and the report, Jake looks through that. I look through that. And we just send it back, like, hey, you know, fix these things or whatever. And it was probably revisions after comments from the county engineer, Jake Schneider, or myself. Okay. So, yeah, we go through a few iterations sometimes on these things.

And then we usually see it as all of the kind of engineers concerns were addressed. Yes. And that would be correct.

Okay.

Well, that was the only thing just kind of. We're off. You have any questions?

No, I don't. Thank you.

Well, we can't hear you. I'll mute yourself.

No. All right.

And I just have one question. How many times did you meet with staff? Um, going through this whole process? A few times.

It's mostly been emails, lots and lots of emails.

And do you have any feedback for us? I mean, has it been a good experience?

The main thing is that I have never done honestly for these guys. The main thing has been through the whole deal has been that I've never done anything like this. It's not what I do. So it's mostly been a learning experience for me. And I was just telling him that too. It's been really pretty fun learning about all this and, I learned something every time we come to a meeting, and now I don't have any recommendations for you guys this time. Okay, then. All right, well, thank you. Yeah, thank you, guys. Thank you for your time.

Are there any members of the public who would like to comment on this application? Would you like to make any comments? I'm going to guess that Christy Roberts is the one making comments. So in that case, hearing and seeing no members of the public wish to make comments, may I have a motion to close the public hearing? I move that we close public hearing. So second. Second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Motion carries. So any discussion on this application? Or can we move to a motion?

I would just register that I appreciated the support in our attempts to bring a little better science to this thing. The DEQ response was utterly unresponsive. And I understand I'm being recorded here. It was a shame. Those guys didn't get it. Now maybe that was, it takes two to communicate. Maybe the failing was on our, my end, but no, they tinkered with their numbers a little bit in a completely irrelevant way. So that would just report my disappointment that we attempted to help DEQ out with the review and they were not interested. So it was a small point. It wouldn't begin to rise to the level of compromising our approval. pursue my scientific concerns through my professional relationships and conferences and so forth. But it was a shame. So if you read the DEQ letter, don't think that they responded because they did not. Anyway, that's the only point I would register here. And then I'm ready to proceed with the motion to approve. Well, all right then. Okay, somebody's got the language at their fingertips, perhaps.

I do.

Would you like to go ahead then, Ralph?

Yes. And I assume we are approving with conditions, right?

I believe that is consensus here.

Okay. So I recommend, I move that we approve, recommend to the Board of County Commissioners to approve range acre subdivision application SD-0226, adopting and incorporating the staff analysis, finding facts and conclusions of law, each are stated in the staff report with the following conditions. that the fire department response is submitted before submission to the county commissioners.

And also financial insurance will be provided. Yes. Okay. So we're clear on that. Yes. Very good. Is there a second? A second. All right. A second. Any further discussion? I'm going to receive the roll call vote. Barb, how do you vote? Yes. Rob? Yes. Greg? Yes. Vern? Yes. And I vote yes also, as that motion was carried, since unanimous. Thank you. Nathan, good luck. Thank you guys very much. Appreciate it. It is time for citizen comments. We have two citizens. Are y'all here to make a comment? All right. Step forward.

Please go forward. Can I ask a question? Sure.

You were talking about the analysis and that they didn't seem to move it very far along.

What are your concerns with the site that, is it just the analysis wasn't very good, or is there a problem with the site that concerns you?

I'm not sure what you're asking about.

Okay, burn.

Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay, well, why don't you, I mean, I can speak. Okay. But the problem is, is that, you know, for these kind of applications, there has to be a DEQ study. Right. And it's not, I'm not going to say it's not always, but there are typically problems with it. And we have a number of times now, and I say we, but really Berners-Levitt all along, tried to help this process along by making comments and sending letters and trying to upgrade what we're getting back from them. And so far, it just hasn't resulted much in changes. And Berners-Levitt tried to add anything to that.

No, but I think to be responsive to concern, and I tried to qualify that, I'm not concerned for the integrity of the subdivision. 10-acre lots are quite robust in their ability to absorb subsistence effluent. My objections were in the way they did that analysis I think was flawed and in other situations would make a substantive difference. In this case, I was trying to bring better science to the analysis, not expecting the final result to be a great deal different. And it may be that they just figured, oh, well, it's going to be fine anyway. Don't worry about it. But I find that kind of philosophically, scientifically so optimal. We ought to do the analysis correctly regardless of how the answer's coming out. So no, I don't mean to convey that I'm worried about that subdivision being a health hazard.

But this is kind of a pattern that occurs in the county, like in other areas as well. I mean, I look at things along the floodplain, and you kind of wonder, how is it assessed?

As a professional, I'm a I'm a geologist by profession. This is what I've been doing for 40 years.

Well, I have a background in hydrology. I don't deal with groundwater.

I'm not prepared to speculate on DEQ's response to the media and other things that they look at all the time. And perhaps I'm a bit like the blind man and the elephant. I'm a tail guy. I'm worried about the tail. Like the truck. With those caveats, again, I just go away. science on these small subdivisions that don't matter in the larger scheme of things. I mean, they're fighting hazardous waste sites and Superfund sites. You know, to the individuals involved, it's the world. So, yeah, that's kind of my philosophical digression. Thank you for indulging. And I can talk afterwards about the particulars, but no, I don't mean to raise any red flags about this subdivision.

Okay. I mean, we're just across the fence. So that's my insight. Is there something else happening here?

We are absolutely not recommending approval of things we know where there's a bad problem. That has not happened. At least it hasn't happened in the time I've been in law, and not at the time I've been in law either. That's fair. So anything else?

Nope. That was just my question.

David, are you? Is there something you want to say? I'm good. OK. Very good. OK. Thank you. Thanks for the question. current planning projects. David?

Did we close the public hearing?

Yes, we should close the public hearing. It's our motion to close the public hearing. Thank you.

It wasn't the public hearing. That was public comments.

No, you're correct. Forget that. Scratch that. We're fine. We're moving on to the next thing. There are no more citizen comments here.

I need all the help I can get. We don't have any current projects. Or what was it? Current planning? Yeah, there's no current planning projects right now.

Like on the agenda. Yeah. And then staff updates.

Okay. So at the last Board of County Commissioners meeting yesterday, very recent, the conditional use for the Wild Horse Ranch Property Owners Association Community Center or Community, whatever they called it. I can't remember. Community building was approved. And then the Union Tower that'll be west of Laramie was also approved. As for other projects, we haven't really gotten very far. We're going to have another person hopefully start in a couple of weeks. So then we can start well, we'll do some training and things, but hopefully then we'll be able to move forward with some of the other things that we've talked about, like short-term rentals, lighting, or not, is it lighting? Yeah, no? Did we do anything with lighting? I think we talked about lighting. Yeah, lighting. Yeah, some of those other things. I can't remember all the things, but everything's on our list. But it's just sitting on the list right now, so. I took some time off this last month, so I was gone for quite a bit. So if I was able to get ahead, I lost it by doing that.

So you've got an accepted offer now?

Accepted, yes, yes. And, yeah, hopefully they'll be here in not this next Monday, but the following Monday. July 20th.

Any questions for David, any of y'all? No. Yeah. One of those kind of perking along in the background, like terminal cell data centers. I mean, I can't pick up a paper without reading about data centers. Where's, where's Albany County and data centers just standing by and watching what happens or talk to me about data centers.

Yeah. We're just going to see what happens, you know? No. So we are, that's another thing, man, I have been working on, you know, is a potential, I guess the way that, yeah, we want to address it through like a zoning district or whatever in order to, so right now the way the statutes, did we go over all this? The statutes are written for industrial siting council, The way it's written is like they basically preempt us according to the county's interpretation. And the only way for us to do that is there's an exception or exemption that will allow us to do it if we have a method of designating an industrial park. So we're kind of looking, going that route to look into industrial parks, what that looks like. That may be in the industrial park zone and then we put certain things in that zone and data centers would be one of them. Really in the preliminary kind of discussions stage with that. But we are looking into that. I guess on a more community oriented note, there will be a joint work session with the Board of County Commissioners and the City Council to discuss the topic of data centers. I'm just tasked with providing some information about what it means right now, and what I'll probably do is put together a short spiel on, with probably the help of Matt, like industrial siting and how that all works and what we can regulate, what we can't, and then what's in our regulations now, because we do have a data center land use, or I don't think we call it data center. I think it's information technology facility or whatever, because that's what we were kind of looking at before and what that all entails. So yeah, I'm more interested in being there to hear the rest of the discussion and what we're doing, because we don't have a whole lot right now. And our comp plan, I don't think, mentions the word data center, which there's a lot of things in the comp plan that or a lot of things that are missing from the comp plan that would be nice to have in there. When will that meeting be? What's that? When will that meeting be? August.

And that will include the county commissioners?

Yes. Okay. I'm not sure what date. I think it's probably like the third or not third, probably like the second. I think it's like the second Tuesday or something like that. Because I think council meets first and third for regular meeting and then a work session in the middle. the different, the second and fourth maybe. So before our next meeting, it sounds like.

Yeah, next meeting.

Yeah, I think so. I think so. You might just drop us a note as that matures. And I wasn't meaning to be facetious when I said, are we just sitting back and watching it develop? I mean, seriously, there's a lot of jurisdictions that are spending a lot of time on this and there's a lot of model legislation coming out of every state. So yeah, I think it would be... perfectly efficient of us to let, to remind that for good ideas. Yeah, sure, absolutely. We need to be out of the forefront. Yeah. And then currently there are no proposals in Albany County, is that? That is correct. Okay, thank you.

Go ahead. Can I add a bit to the conversation? Please go ahead, Rob. I think we need to keep an eye on Laramie County and what's going on there. because they just closed a Microsoft facility data center, which has been operating there for quite a while because of contamination issues. I think we should keep an eye on what's going on, where we already have some sort of development of that sort, just to get a little more understanding of the challenges.

I think that's a good idea. Absolutely. I think we should keep an eye on any of that news. I think it's a good suggestion. Thank you.

Rob, just to compare with what I saw, you said something was closed. I thought that maybe the city of Shanahan was stopping, was stopping, stopped accepting wastewater from the facility, but the facility was still operating. Yes. Is that what you're referring to anyway?

Yes, that's what I'm referring to.

Yeah. Just want to make sure. Yeah.

I mean, we are concerned about, you know, water quality, not just quantity. And so, you know, we've done a lot of work to protect the water in the county. So things like that, you know, we should be aware of and what can happen even to wastewater.

I was, I don't know, maybe somebody was reading the boomerang, but there was a there was an article about a community in Wyoming. I wanted to say Riverton, but Riverton doesn't have zoning, I don't think. But they're looking at doing a zoning, or I think there was a zoning change application to create an industrial park. And I saw that and immediately like, are they changing it so that now that they can permit or is it, is the applicant wanting to change it so they can permit data centers? I don't know for sure, but like, I don't know. That's, I need to, I need to figure out where that is and kind of follow that along to see what happens, I guess, in the future. Cause I'm, it's kind of interesting. I don't know because that having an industrial park now allows them to do data centers and they don't have to go through the state and these, at least the, with the conversations that I've had with, others that are contemplating these types of ideas, they don't want to go through the state industrial siting council because of the time, probably because of all the reports and the things that they require. But I don't know. I've limited to like, yeah, I haven't had a whole lot of conversations, but. That was the one Barbara said.

That's what they want to do. David, have you? Sorry, Barbara, go ahead.

I'll go after. David, I saw that article too. I'll see if I can find it. If I find it, I'll send it to you. But just to comment, there is a lot of conversation in the community about data centers. There's a movement to have petition for moratorium on having any data centers here, which I think is kind of crazy. I think our concerns have to be on the environment and how they affect the environment here because they're going to happen. So it's just a matter of time.

I think there's a lot of misinformation out there too. And not just on one side, I think there's just, you know, both sides are trying to make their point. And I just think it's interesting that Cheyenne forever has had, they had the big data center for the, I mean, the weather thing, the big, whatever weather computer, what was that? That was probably a data center and the Microsoft thing. And then now it's like across the country, it's a big deal. Now it's a big deal in Cheyenne too. Like, I don't know.

I don't know what's really changed, but... Let me just put things in perspective. What we currently have in Cheyenne is not what people are talking about in terms of data centers. These are just computing facilities. They're not even very large. So what people are concerned about and what is... people are opposing nationwide or internationally much bigger operations with potentially huge implications for the environment. And I agree with Barbara, we have to make sure that it's not just the environment, it's also human health and it's part of our responsibility and we should be educated about what are the impacts of different sizes of data centers, different water requirements. There are new technologies coming out all the time. So I think we should keep up with what's happening so we can make right decisions.

The company, the company Navidia, I think is the name. They've got a system that they say does not affect the environment as much as some of the others. So it's kind of interesting to take a look at their technology and what they're proposing. Yeah, cool.

And I will just add that we have been talking about thinking about what is called community benefits agreements. Sorry, guys, we're just getting a tornado, a tornado warning in the county. So that was this alert on my phone. So I'll just say briefly, and then I don't know if we need to end the meeting or not, that the community benefits agreements are agreements between the developer and the community for things beyond just protecting the environment. For example, the agreements with developers that the developer doesn't only build their own electricity supply, but also takes care of the whole community's needs. There are a lot of different things people do. including social systems, I may have to go to my basement. So if I disappear in the middle, it's only because of the tornado. But anyway, so that's another thing that we should keep an eye on and see what other communities have gotten out of working with developers and make sure we don't give our resources for free.

Anything else? Well, I'll make a fearless prediction. And the chief role of predictions to make is making the bridge together look foolish. I don't think we're going to see a data center here in time soon. We'll see. Anyway, all right. Well, we have gotten through our business. So our next regular meeting will be August 12th here at 5 o'clock. And with that, I call this meeting adjourned. Thank you.