Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the Tuesday, March 17th regular meeting of the Ann Arbor Planning Commission. My name is Donell Wich and I will be chairing tonight's meeting. For detailed information on meeting procedures, please review the full printed meeting agenda provided. There's a copy at each end of the deis and you can get up at any time to get one if you need. Mr. Leonard, would you please call the role? Commissioner Wch here. Commissioner Abrams. Commissioner Hammershitt here. Commissioner Lee here. Commissioner Dish here. Commissioner Mills here. Commissioner Weatherbe here.

Commissioner Adams here. And I think Commissioner Norton is here as well. Is here. Yep.

We have a Thank you, Mr. Leonard. May I have a motion to approve the agenda? Moved by Commissioner Mill, seconded by Commissioner Lee. All those in favor of the motion, please say I. I. Any oppose? The motion carries. May I have a motion to approve the minutes of the March 3rd, 2026 meeting? Moved by Commissioner Weatherbe, seconded by Commissioner Mills. Is there any discussion of the minutes? All those in favor of the motion, please say I.

I. Any oppose? The motion carries. Next up are the reports to the planning commission and written communications. We will start with Commissioner uh Dish or Council Member Dish if she is ready. Thank you. Um it wasn't a very busy night last night on council. Um we approved a a 3 acre annexation which I think is also on the agenda. 615 Riverview. Okay. But it's bigger. The one that's on the agenda is [clears throat] bigger. It's magic.

Okay. Bizarre. It grew overnight. And then we had a really long discussion. Oh yeah, right. And I think we approved the the comprehensive land use plan. So [laughter] congratulations. It was unanimous. It was joyful. It was filled with gratitude for all [snorts] of your work and staff's work. And uh [laughter] now the work begins. So thanks. Thank you, Council Member Dish. Mr. Leonard, do you have a report for us tonight?

Uh just two items. Um I I [snorts] we are planning on an April 14th work session to talk about next steps for the comprehensive plan. We can address any more questions at that once I think we get to an appropriate item on this evening's agenda. I would say just one of the things I would ask commissioners to think about if there's any information that would be helpful for you to be determining uh those steps. And then uh also in your packet is a memo on pending legislation, a series of housing bills that have been introduced in the state. This came up in a meeting that I wasn't at. Uh the short of it is the city has uh um submitted a card which I think is a convention of legislative committee action. Um but it's not provided any written uh or oral testimony on any of those bills yet. I provided a summary of those um um because I just went down the rabbit hole about how they would or wouldn't impact any of our current regul regulations. Happy to follow up with any additional questions that the commission has. That's all.

Do you want to take those questions now? Uh happy to.

Do we have any questions? I have one, but do we have any questions about the memo? Okay. Uh, with the table's consent, can I ask my question? Great. Thank you. So, Mr. Learner, as I was reading through your memo, and thank you for preparing it. You weren't here. I was the one who asked about it. Um, manager Kelly u got back to you and then you got back to us. So, we appreciate it. So, please do take a moment to look at that. It's in our packet and you can get to our packet in Legar. It's a2gov.legisar.com and then go over to the calendar and then go over to city planning commission and then go down to today's meeting agenda and it is linked there. Um, one thing of note was you when you talked about uh the state proposed bill for action in 60 days, you said that that would result in more denials. And I wonder um if you are prepared tonight to give us a reason for why. Um I have my own answer based on your staff report which I think actually planner Burgerer put together as a part of their work. Did you did they do that memo? Who did the memo? No, not the memo, but the um 2024 um staff report the full

Oh, the annual burger. Yes. Yes, it was. It was planner burger. All right, you all are making me think I'm losing my mind. Okay. So, uh in there it showed uh over the last 8 years that our average time from submittal to the next action which could be approval or denying dependent on wet body is about 195 days. Currently, we're at about 260 days. And so, I made the assumption that if you had a 60-day requirement, part of that would, you know, create some denials because you wouldn't be able to meet that threshold. But could you help us? understand why you shared that.

Yeah, I think the potential would be there for more denials or conditional approvals. Just for as you said, um our experience typically is with our current requirements, we have not we not we don't often get projects to compliance within that 60-day time frame. So, if there was sort of a hard deadline that we had to make a determination one way or another, I would say that the potential um while conditional approval is always a possibility, if there are items that were um of a significance enough where we couldn't we weren't comfortable moving forward, that that type of clock might put us to push more of those into a denial column. So, that was the basis for it.

Thank you so much. That was my assumption. Uh but I did uh want to hear a little bit more. Uh any other questions about the memo with the proposed uh legislation that is before the Michigan um legislative bodies? All right. Thank you, Mr. Leonard. Do we have any other commissioner officers and committee leaison who have anything to report? Commissioner Norton,

I do. I do. You all may recall I volunteered to serve on the SWAG, the storm water advisory group. The city staff isn't Oh, thank you. The city's [clears throat] staff is in the process of updating its its planning for better managing storm water. I've been attending um about quarter quarterly meetings along with planner Bennett who's attended most of those as well. Um a lot of their work is trying to figure out how to conceptualize the storm water that's coming and how to think about sizing infrastructure to deal with the storms. Um but here's what I want to convey. Climate change is happening. It's real. um we're going to start experiencing more severe storms um heavier rainfalls um coming down quickly. Um we rely right now largely on FEMA maps. They're just the baseline and they're getting outdated every day because they're not updated regularly and because climate change is real and it's getting worse. And it's quite clear from the analyses they've been showing in our meetings um that there will be other areas that are subject to flooding that we're that aren't going to be captured by the FEMA flood plane maps that we ought to be worried about and thinking about. Um particularly in terms of not putting new development in harm's way, especially recognizing the historic pattern of putting the least welloff or the least advantaged in the worst places because that's what always happens. And I'm a little bit concerned that in our um uh concern about moving quickly to allow more housing that we end up doing exactly that. So that's a bit of a concern. And then the other thing we should be worrying about is not creating a lot of new impervious surfaces and developments in places that will make um storm water runoff a huge infrastructure problem with a huge liability and money expenditures that we're going to be facing. So, um, all of this is to say I'm totally on board with what we'll be talking about later and moving pretty

quickly, but I also want to make sure that we're also working quickly with this, uh, water system staff to see if we can do a better job of doing some Ann Arbor specific analysis to identify the places that we really should be worried about and kind of tailoring um, our design standards so that we don't create problems that we're going to later regret because we didn't think ahead. I think we can do both of those simultaneously. I'm not really sure how, but I wanted to get this on the table and then look to Brett and say I want to follow up somehow to figure out the best way to do that. [clears throat] Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Norton. Um, do any other committee lison have anything to report at this time? Yes, go ahead. Uh, Commissioner Lee. Yeah, we we have a transportation commission meeting tomorrow, but just wanted to give you all a heads up on a few things that we're looking at. Um [clears throat] there is uh the North Main Street project planned for 2030. So just wanted to give you all a heads up that uh there's engagement that's occurring. That's the 23 exit coming off of North Main. So corridor is considered a city priority safety location tier 2 given the number of severity of crashes. So um they are looking to do a a kind of a larger project. So there was a um discovery chet and openhouse that occurred actually March 10th through the 13th. So um it just occurred but um keep your eyes on that as that's continued to be an area of focus. There's also an annual survey going on as a part of the vision zero plan goals and so again this is about zero fatalities on our roads. Um I think the survey was now published. I'll make sure to circulate that link for everybody. So um a few other [clears throat] sidewalk gap projects happening. I'll also circulate a link as well um for for the planning commission but this is on Hon River Drive Gettys Road from here on parkway to Ellsworth Duvar road from Pontiac to Lasad and Sunset and Wel from Newport to Summit. So I'll continue to keep you all apprised on that. [clears throat] Um aside from that uh I think Spin Scooters I think their contracts coming up in June. So um other than that I think that's about it. Thank you.

Thank you Commissioner Lee. Do any other commissioner officers or committee leazison have anything else to report? [snorts] Written communications are included in today's packet and again you access our packet at a2gov.lear.com. When you arrive on that website you click the calendar tab. Then you go over to this year 2026 and then select city planning commission from the drop- down list and it is in reverse chronological order. So March is near the bottom and then you find today's meeting and you can click on the agenda and then go to 5C which has a list of all of the written communications. This brings us to item number six uh public comment. And before I read the whole blurb for public comment, there is a dedicated public hearing for agenda item 10 C. I think it is 10 C. Yes. Which is regular business Commissioner Adams um um memo that is attached. So if you are interested in speaking on that, could you please wait until that public hearing uh later? So, if you get started and I realize you're talking about the memo, I'm going to interrupt you and ask that you suspend and then you can uh speak about it later. Okay. But I try not to do that cuz it's embarrassing for me and for you, Mr. Leonard.

Uh the same applies for public hearing scheduled for items 10A and 10B. Yes, but I was just getting ahead of the fact that people might not have expected that there was a dedicated public hearing for a memo. No, nobody come back. Technically, it's a public comment.

Woohoo. [laughter] All right. Now, on to public comment. This is an opportunity for individuals to speak up to three minutes on any issue not listed as a public hearing or, as Mr. Leonard just corrected me, a dedicated public comment period. We will first hear from those of you who are present here in chambers. Then we will turn to remote participants. To speak remotely, please press star 9 if on your phone or use the raise hand feature if you're using Zoom. For phone access, please dial 877853-5247 and enter meeting ID 977-66341226. City staff will identify callers by the last three digits of their phone number or by name if on Zoom. You'll hear an announcement when it's your turn to speak. Please move to a quiet area and mute any background noise. For all participants, whether in chambers or remote, could you please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments? Is there anyone present in chambers who'd like to address us at this time? Good evening.

Good evening, Adam. 14:30 Las Vegas Drive. Um, I was going to ask about whether there was a dedicated public hearing for Tennessee. Um, but, um, just a couple of other things. Um, I would just like to echo council member Commissioner Dish's comments, thanking staff, thanking the planning commission. Um, with all of the work that you did on the comprehensive land use plan. Um I was glad to see that um passed last night and um it's a big deal. So, you know, let's move forward. Um the other thing I want to talk about a little bit is just those Michigan housing bills. Um if people want to look up abundant housing Michigan, that has a list of what all of those bills are and what they do. Um and please support those. Thank you.

Thank you. There are a lot of you here. You must be here for a different purpose, maybe a class. And if so, we're glad that you're here to fill the space. You are welcome. Mr. Garber, do you have a comment for us now? Okay. Mr. [snorts] Leonard, do we have any remote participants? We have participants, but no hands raised.

Great. I shall close the public hearing or comment period and move on to agenda item number seven. Commission uh excuse me, communications from commissioners. Are there any? That takes us to agenda item number eight, public hearing scheduled for the next regular meeting. Mr. Leonard, what's on our agenda?

For the next regular business meeting, we have three new public hearings and one new public comment item. Uh the public hearings are as follows. Uh 414 South Main Street. This is a petition to amend the supplemental regulations of the Ashley Muse plan unit development. Proposed changes would allow all permitted uses in the D1 downtown core district and the high-rise portion of the site. No changes are proposed to the site plan or to the low-rise town homes on permitted uses. The PUD and site plan were originally approved in 1999. The second public hearing is for 805 Oxford Road. This is a proposal to construct a three-story approximately 23,500 foot sorority house with 47 beds and a surface parking lot with 16 spaces. The parcel is zoned R2B to family dwelling and student housing district. The petition includes a special exception use application which is required for sororities in the R2B district. The third is 2700 Fuller Road resoning for city council approval. This is a proposed annexation and reszoning of a 6,534t vacant lot from Ann Arbor Charter Township to the city of Ann Arbor for P in the PL zoning district. There's no proposed development. And then an public comment item uh 161 South State Street, uh formerly known as Southtown. This is a proposed site plan for a 215,500 ft 8-story residential building with approximately 290 apartments in a 39 space parking garage. Building design includes a one-story podium and a C-shaped tower open to the west. Approval of the site plan will replace a previously approved site plan with a com for a comparable development mass but different design. The site is 1.7 acres and it is zoned C1 AR with conditions.

Thank you, Mr. Leonard. Uh that takes us to agenda item number nine, unfinished business. There is none. Bringing us to agenda item 10A, regular business 525 South Stage Street vacation for city council approval SV25-00002, a proposal to vacate the northern 26 1/2 ft of the South University rightway between South State Street and East University Avenue. All properties abuing this rightaway are owned by the University of Michigan and it is in ward 1. There isn't a petitioner presentation. So we will turn to our staff presentation with planner burger. Um all right I will share screen. This is all in the staff report but I'm putting it up here so we can all see together. There we go. Um, all right. So, this is a petition to vacate a portion of South University running from South State Street to East University. Um, the owner of the um, street vacation or the people requesting the street vacation is University of Michigan and staff are recommending approval. This is just the portion of the area that it um, is included within. It's on the bottom part of this green square here. [gasps] Um there's an aerial image and closer up. So it is um 7 acres in total and it is a 26 1/2 ft wide portion along South University. Um digging into the plat records, this was originally University of Michigan land that was then um a portion to the um to be part of the ride of way. Um and so it is now being requested to be returned

back to the University of Michigan and it is already being used as part of the diag. So this will just kind of um correct the use and um designation of the land. Um this discrepancy came to the University of Michigan's attention during the street work that was done on South University Avenue in 2020. Um and so here it is today. Um yeah, that's all I have. Thank you. We will now have a public hearing. This is an opportunity for individuals to speak up to three minutes on this item. We'll first hear from those of you who are present in chambers. Then we will turn to remote participants. To speak remotely, press star 9 if on phone or use the raise hand feature if on Zoom. For phone access, dial 877853-5247 and enter meeting ID 977-66341226. City staff will identify callers by the last three digits of their phone number or by name if on Zoom. You will hear an announcement when it's your turn to speak. Please ensure you're in a quiet area and mute any background noise. For all participants, whether in chambers or online, would you please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments? Is there anyone present in chambers who would like to address us on this item?

Good evening. My name is Mike, director of community relations in the office of government relations at U of M. Um, not much to add to Miss Berger's comments or what's in the report. This is just something that was originally platted in 1844 and um was discovered recently when we uh reconstructed in a joint project with the city south university. For those of you are familiar, those are some of the oldest buildings on campus. Um there are no plans to use any of this other than what is now there, which is lawn area and landscaped area and front yards. for the president's house and the Bentley Library and the rest of the building. So, um it's just really kind of trying to clean up something that's been out there for a while. So, if you have any questions, I'll be glad to answer them.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Chair W. Ken Garber, 28 Haven Hill Court. Just a couple of questions and I won't annoy you with a well-worn joke about not opposing vacations. Um but uh the questions are why now? I mean this was uh discovered 6 years ago. Uh why is it bring up on your agenda today? Um two, if it's not causing a problem, why not just leave it be? And I guess lastly, um any consideration to doing a swap with a University of Michigan right away somewhere maybe to um allow for protected bike lanes like along my preferred route, the north side of Plymouth Road heading west. Um [clears throat] so again, not opposed to this. Seems like um just a cleanup item, but thought I'd raise those questions. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Garber. Is there anyone else in chambers who'd like to address us on this item? Mr. Leonard, do we have remote participants who'd like to address us on this item?

No. I will close the public hearing and read the motion. The public hearing is closed. The Ann Arbor City Planning Commission hereby recommends that the mayor and city council approve the 525 South State Street rightway release/vacation as proposed. Moved by Commissioner Mill, seconded by uh Council, excuse me, um Commissioner Lee. Uh we are in discussion. Would anyone like to pose Mr. Garber's questions uh to the petitioner? We'll start with you, Commissioner Mills. I'll have to do it. But if someone wanted to bring those up. Okay. Thank you. Otherwise, I will

I will ask secondly about why now. But actually, your second question about the idea of a swap is similar to the question that I had the last meeting when there was a vacation proposed. Um, and because not everybody in this room was at that meeting, I learned something new that time about how rights of way came to be associated with plats. And so I'm cur and the question that I posed last time is if we bought it once upon a time, why are we just giving it away? Um, and we didn't buy it once upon a time. That's one of the things that I learned. And so maybe you can um if you can refresh my memory and everyone else's memory about vacations and rights of way and how this works that'd be helpful. Yes. So um Alexexas also taught me many things between that meeting and this meeting. Um but yeah, just to summarize and jump in if I'm saying something wrong, but the when there were plats um back in the 1800s when land was platted out, they dedicated portions between the plats to be rideway portions um and then within the ride ofways there were streets. And so um when street vacations are requested, the request pertains directly to plats. And so whoever owned that original piece that's being requested to be vacated will go back to that owner. So there was no purchase. It was a simple dedication. Um and with this one it's kind of interesting. The plat or the um ride ofway was designated at 100 ft wide which is pretty wide. And the street when it was built was not actually centered on the ride ofway. So that's part of the reason why that 26 1/2 ft wedge is um kind of shifted onto University of Michigan's land and it's not actually used for street purposes. Um and so that's kind of why I think the discrepancy was missing for so many

years and now it's come to light. So

great. Thank you. Um I then am curious either for staff or for the petitioner about if this came up in 2020. It's 2026. Uh well, I I don't profess to have that answer, but I will tell you a lot of times through uh street improvements, we are doing title work and the like. Um in something like this where there was an easement and we weren't utilizing it. I don't want to speak for whoever the project manager orders were at the time, but there might have been an indication to get to it when we get to it. It wasn't like a pressing need. Um but I don't know if uh U of M has any more specific time timeline other than that. No, Brett, that's that's pretty much it wasn't like we discovered it right away. It was just during the course of the work and and uh for those of you who know the university, we move very slowly and deliberately too slowly. Lisa and Richard know that all too well. But um it's just a matter of the timing was right. And um you know we did as far as the gentleman's um uh in terms of swapping land um we did the original rightway extended through McDevit White Plaza and one of the things we did work with the city and [snorts] the DDA on is opening that plaza up for temporary artwork which um we haven't the DDA has a new art citywide art program. We haven't been asked to do it yet, but that's uh that agreement's been worked out. So, that was a result of this conversation. So,

uh, for those of us who might need help, uh, if you can stay up for those of us who might need help of the plaza that you are referring to, uh, can we put the map back up near and so if you can locate it on the aerial map, uh, so that we would understand and if you could, um, maybe say a sentence or two more around the what it means to work with the DDA to make that space available for public art. Just for those of us who are just hearing this for the first time,

at that scale, it's going to be difficult to see, but if you looked, you were looked to the far right um where East University butts into um South University. There is a a small brick plaza there near the um pizza. I'm trying to remember. Joe's Pizza. Thank you.

Um it's in there. Um and um we've uh we're working with the DDA on some other areas too, but this came up. We decided if they have these temporary art fixtures, we didn't want anything permanent cuz we've never put anything permanent there either. So the temporary art struct uh facility structure at some point it works. That's where it's going to be. And it's a prominent location. There's a lot of pedestrian activity if you've ever been down there. Even when the students are gone, it's just kind of a heavily used area. So, it made sense to us. It sounds like a win-win. Great. And then, were you done? Did anyone want to ask Mr. Garber's last question,

which is why not just leave it since it hasn't caused any issues since 1844? I'm sorry, I didn't hear the question. Mr. Garber asked he had a series of questions and I think his last question is since it hasn't caused any problems. Why why not just leave it in place the way that it is now? Well, it it it was really um a conversation between the university and the city to kind of clean up the records. I mean this so it was a joint agreement between it was platted in 1844. Okay. Um so again the university is very slow about doing things but sure

um but it's really just a matter of cleaning up and you know we we've taken ownership of it. There's the landscaping in the lawn areas and things like that. So it's just a matter of making it like every other block where the rightways are consistent but back of the sidewalk.

Thank you Mr. Leonard. Yeah, I was just going to add um you know part of part of your recommendation for the council is whether you advise to vacate this and in this case staff is recommending that it's not necessary for the functionality of that road in the public right of way. Um to state the obvious having an easement or that right away there does impact the University of Michigan's ability to maintain make decisions about that property as they have been doing for a long period of time. So, I would just take that sort of cleaning up the the ownership boundaries to in a functional way, it does have some real ramifications for their ability to um plan for that long term and and we are here presenting to you that we don't feel it's necessary for a public right away.

Great. Any other commissioners? Uh uh Commissioner Norton, he's unconvinced.

I appreciate Mr. Garber's creativity, but and I am an employee of the University of Michigan, and I'm not saying this because I'm an employee of the University of Michigan. I'm sorry I have to keep talking to this. Um, it makes total sense to me to clear the title to get the title confusion cleared up. And it actually would trouble me a little bit if the city were to take the stance, well, we have something holding over you and we're going to get something out of you for it. I think that's a really bad precedent to go down. This this was dedicated way back when to be used as a road. It's not being used as a road. There's no purpose to keep it. It would be a little bit abusive for us to try and get something out of it. um when we should just clear the title and give the land back to the university what it was. So that's the position I would take on this.

Thank you, Commissioner Norton. Any other commissioners? Thank you, Mr. Allen. Are we ready to vote? Mr. Leonard, would you please call the role? Yes. Commissioner Hammershmitt, yes. Commissioner Lee, yes. Commissioner Dish, yes. Commissioner Mills, yes. Commissioner Weatherbe, yes. Commissioner Adams, yes. Commissioner Norton, yes. Commissioner W. Yes. Uh, it's recommended for vacation to the city council.

Thank you so much. That takes us on to 10. Thank you, Mr. Allen. That takes us on to item 10B, regular business. 615 Riverview Drive, reszoning for city council approval. A I think this is an O. [snorts] uh 125002 uh a proposed reszoning of a single family lot from the township district to or R1B zoning district. There is no proposed development. The lot is 14,375 ft and it is in ward 2. We will start with a staff presentation by planner burger.

Thank you. You're welcome.

I will share screen again. Oops. All right. Yes, this is a requested annexation and resoning for 615 Riverview Drive. Um the annexation was actually um approved by council last night. So that step is being processed simultaneous to this resoning. Um but staff are ultimately recommending approval. um into the city to be zoned R1B and it is around.3 acres of a parcel. Um so the surrounding zoning is largely R1B. Um there's a few R1A parcels mixed in there and then as well as Ann Arbor Township um island parcels. Um this is an overview view of the parcel, a zoomedin version. There is an existing single family structure that is not proposed to be demolished and there's no other development proposed on the lot. Um and then this is just nerding out, but the um the home on 615 Riverview Drive is one of the oldest in the neighborhood. This is an aerial image from 1947, which is as far back as our records go. Um and that original um structure is still there, so it has been there for a while. Um staff comments included um a storm water improvement charge will be um uh charged upon annexation and then engineering um has said that the zoning is appropriate for the existing utility infrastructure. So those are staff comments and that is all I have. Thank you for your presentation. We will now have a public hearing on this item. This is an opportunity for individuals to speak up for up to three minutes on this item. We'll first hear from those of you

who are present in chambers. Then we will turn to remote participants. To speak remotely, press star 9 if on phone or use the raise hand feature if on Zoom. For phone access, dial 877853-5247 and enter meeting ID 977-66341226. City staff will identify callers by the last three digits of their phone number or by name if on Zoom. You will hear [snorts] an announcement when it's your turn to speak. Please move to a quiet area and mute any background noise. For all participants, whether in chambers or remote, please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments. Is there anyone in chambers who'd like to address us on this item? Mr. Leonard, do we have remote participants who would like to address us on this item?

No hands are raised. With that, I shall close the public hearing and read the motion. The Ann Arbor City Planning Commission hereby recommends that the mayor and city council approve the R1B single family dwelling district zoning of 615 Riverview Drive, which is in the process of being annexed into the city. Moved by Commissioner Mills, seconded by Council Member Dish. We are in discussion. Who would like to kick us off? Not a one of you, Mr. Leonard. Uh, I think we are ready to vote. Would you please call the role? Commissioner Hammer Schmidt, yes. Commissioner Lee,

yes. Commissioner Dish, yes. Commissioner Mills, yes. Commissioner Weatherbe, yes. Commissioner Adams, yes. Commissioner Norton, yes. Commissioner W, yes. It is recommended for approval.

Thank you, Planner Burgerer, for your presentations tonight and bringing these items to our agenda. Well done. We will now move on to 10 C. A I don't know how we do this one. Okay, this is a proposed memo from a planning commissioner, Commissioner Adams. It is titled comprehensive land use plan zoning reform execution proposal. Uh we I have asked uh Commissioner Adams to give a short presentation. There is not a staff presentation. Once he concludes his presentation, we will have a dedicated public comment where anyone can comment uh on this item. And then concluding that comment period, we will enter into a discussion and hopefully Commissioner Adams will have a motion for us to consider and approve. With that, Commissioner Adams.

So unlike our fine planning staff, I did not come prepared with slides. Um so I apologize for that. Um, so kind of walking through what this is. Um, I wanted to try to organize my thoughts around and we've been talking as a group from at points about how we felt like the plan would most logically be implemented and folks have made comments from time to time on that. I wanted to start working on that and as I tend to do, I started writing it down and all of a sudden I had a memo. Um the memo makes what I would call three different clusters of recommendations for the first phase of plan implementation for your consideration. The first recommendation relates to category prioritization and timing. The second relates to how the first plan category we do should be executed. And then the third and final group of recommendations relates to process. Um the first group of recommendations I think is the main and most important recommendation in the memo. It's the one I feel most confident we may be able to vote on tonight. Um it's prioritizing the reasoning of the hub category and some limited what I call halo transition areas over the other plan use land use categories and doing so um this year before before the end of 2026. um in terms of ordering your thoughts and pardon the metaphor here. Um that's sort of the main course. Um everything else is like an add-on like an alle cart option. Um so there are lots of other recommendations in there but to me the main recommendation in there is is those two things hub and halo transition first and uh by the end of the year. Um, so starting with that first recommendation, I think personally that feels like the logical choice. Uh, building outward, starting where we already have a lot of density, adding new districts as we go. If I had the pen, that's how from a as a drafting

project, that feels like a logical way to start. Um, I also don't like the idea of proceeding in peacemail fashion, i.e. taking a category and like identifying certain pockets of it to do and then moving on to other pockets. I think there's problems associated with that. That's an easier drafting exercise only in the limited sense of it being done, but as you start moving outward, um, you know, you're going to get fights about which districts go first. You're going to have lots of pressure to create special rules for certain areas where they wouldn't be normally justified or might be inappropriate. Um, all that aside, those are my views. I also think the need to do hub and halo transition first and to do it this year flows from the policies in the plan that city council just approved. So the plan identifies hub as the category with the highest density and the highest impact potential impact to housing stock. It also notes that resoning um for hub and adding density to hub enjoys the strongest levels of community support. Um so resoning for hub first is both the highest impact. It's also the least sensitive for residents. Um I think that transition in residential based on the public feedback that we've received to date will probably involve more complicated and difficult resoning work um than hub. Um that leads to the second point. The plan commits us to a 1 to threeyear timeline for resoning reform. And I think the first decision we make as a body on implementation has to set us up to complete that work on time on schedule um and to treat it with appropriate urgency. Tackling hub first and doing it in a year I think does that. Um not only does that I think put us on schedule but it reserves the balance of our time more time for transition and residential. I think again given the execution challenges that those categories may create um the

fact that the bulk of the public commentary we've heard to date uh I think related to those two categories more than hub. Um we also know that uh council is sensitive to changes to residential. They may want to move slower there. They may want more public engagement there. And that all is something that we should anticipate and build our timeline around. Um, so again, that's that's statements in the plan to me that that push us towards both hub first and on that timing. Um, if we can't do that, if we can't complete the least complex, least contentious part of the work, I worry that we immediately put our timeline at risk. And um, I think we just really got to be upfront with ourselves and with the city council about that fact. like if we can't say hub first and done this year, then I think we need we probably need to start talking about a new timeline. Um that I mean I candidly I just I thinking about how difficult it's going to be for transition and residential I I just really think that this has to be prioritized and and and done as soon as possible. Um I also worry about the signal that would send to the community um regarding how we're treating our housing crisis. Like we have to try to push the pace and get this done. um regarding halo transition. So halo transition because of the tapering mechanism in hub because as it approaches in our zone it tapers down to mid-rise. Um, if you have h if you have hub that is on our future land use map near transition and if that transition is currently in our zone, then if you do what the plan says and you have a tapering mechanism that hits as you approach those legacy R zones, you're going to be downzoning there in a way you probably didn't intend, the way we didn't intend when we passed the plan. So the halo transition issue is one that isn't really the focus of what I'm

proposing. It's just something that feels necessary to consider and tackle somehow as we do hub there. It doesn't seem to be any way around it. And there's a few different approaches we could use to that and we should be flexible about it, but it's something that I think we we probably have to account for. Um this sort of leads into the alakart recommendations. So the member recommends using the documents that were submitted, the presentation that we got along with the very detailed um you know remarkably elaborate recommendations that professors Jonathan Lavine, Noah Caseasis and along with resident Will Leaf submitted in late 2025 and early 2026 that make recommendations on how to how to do this. Um they, you know, they again I I think these are really careful and remarkably detailed pieces of work product. Um they include suggestions on how to address the halo transition problem. Um and that's by making a single mixeduse zone for hub that as it gets closer to our zones tapers in the way transition tapers. So you can you potentially can do it as as one district. You may have to do it as two. they provide recommendations for for both that include actual maps of how the how the zoning might work. To me, that feels like um an asset that we should be picking up and using as much as we can to to assist in the efficient execution of of what this is. It doesn't mean we have to use all of it and I think there will be adjustments and changes we have to make to it, but um it's sitting right there for us to pick up and use. um planning staff obviously you're the subject matter experts on the UDC and on the land use map and you're going to have changes that you want to make to those recommendations as well but it again it felt like something we shouldn't um we should take advantage of if it's if it's sitting there for use um one adjustment that I'm proposing in this amendment of those recommendations

is a height cap for hub um they don't propose one um my experience from the last year is that uncapped height is a sensitive issue politically and it the juice isn't worth the squeeze. We know that heights will limit somehow. Um we should be thinking about where we think that line is and if we don't propose it, I think there will be a reaction to our consideration of an uncapped height limitation downtown that will result in, you know, a course correction that will be destructive to our process and our deliberation. And I just again don't think that that's worth taking on. Um, last and not least, well actually least too. Last and least, the uh member makes a series. This is the third group of recommendations. These are just nuts and bolts procedural recommendations about modifications to our work our work plan deprioritization of certain work that if we were inclined to pursue it, you know, council's office may have a position on depp prioritizing resoning applications. But if we can do it legally and we have zoning we have resoning applications that relate to the work that we're doing, it feels appropriate to say we're not we're not denying them, but we are it's it's dep prioritized, right? We're not we're not going to put that at the front of the burner while we're actively discussing changes to those zones in line with the plan's recommendations. Other things include skipping over OC review, which is limited attendance, having all of us see this stuff as it's being made in the interest of time. Um, and then reviewing the district as it's being built as instead of kind of at the end. So when uh permitted uses are ready for review, we look at those. When other aspects, dimensional standards are ready, we look at those. And by chunking it out, that provides staff more ongoing feedback instead of just a big blast of feedback at the end that I feel like is less efficient and less productive. So

that's that's the memo.

Thank you, Commissioner Adams, for your presentation. Um, now we will move to a public comment, a dedicated public comment period. This is an opportunity for individuals to speak up to three minutes on this item. We'll first hear from those of you who are present in chambers. Then we will turn to remote participants. To speak remotely, press star 9 if on phone or use the raise hand feature if on Zoom. For phone access, dial 877853-5247 and e enter meeting ID 977-66341226. City staff will identify callers by the last three digits of your phone number or by Zoom if uh by name if on Zoom. You are hearing an announcement. When it's your turn to speak, please move to a quiet area and mute any background noise. For all participants, whether in chambers or online, please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments. Is there anyone in chambers who would like to address us at this time? You can come on up. Mr. Rhodess.

Hi, Tim Rhodess, 448 South First Street in Ann Arbor. Um I I've been told many times during this process that uh the CLUP doesn't do any zoning. That there's going to be a process, a deliberative process that's going to involve the public. There will be engagement once we get to zoning. And that will be involving the neighborhoods, which really weren't addressed neighborhood by neighborhood during the first time around. This is uh really critical that you keep your promise. This is it was supposed to even be granular parcel by parcel. Uh this memo doesn't propose anything like that. Uh I understand the urgency on the part of a lot of people and the advocacy for a lot of people to do this, but a lot of people like me have felt shut out. Uh the old west side has not really had a voice. Um I don't understand. Also, uh, Commissioner Adams, you the reference materials, there's not enough resolution. I can't tell. Am I in the halo? Am I not in the halo? Uh, what are the height limits that are being proposed? Are you really talking about 95 ft in the old west side? That's ridiculous. So, I don't understand what it is you're advocating as the fast starting point. Uh, there isn't enough resolution on on the documents that are in the record. I went back to the old meetings to find their original submitts. Um there's not much clarity about this and it just simply blows past the engagement that we really need to have that was missing the first time around and to the transportation meeting that you mentioned uh Commissioner Lee before. They're doing some seriously good engagement. I have no idea how Main Street's going to turn out, but what the DDA did at their office was legitimate engagement and we

need that engagement now to maintain those promises that you all have made that we would have real engagement once it came time to the zoning. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Mr. Rhodess. Is there anyone else in chambers? Hi, Adam Duskovich, 14:30 Las Vegas Drive. Um, I'm not going to read out my whole read my whole email into the public record on this. Um, but I just want to um read through one paragraph here. It's a pragmatic approach that will allow us to execute on the most well-defined ideas in the I'm not going to pronounce what, as Tracy Sam put it as an ungainainely acronym, comprehensive land use plan. quickly unlock the significant potential for new housing in Ann Arbor and take up the more contentious, detailed, and thus time-consuming discussions around the residential category and [snorts] less well- definfined transition areas on a less urgent timeline. I'm looking forward to your discussion tonight and to what I know will be a robust public engagement process. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Jeff. Hello, I'm Peter Hal and I'm at 2025 Yman Court. Um, thanks for all your work on the plan. Uh, and congratulations on getting it passed. Um, and thank you for putting together a um a a plan for getting it implemented quickly and for making real progress that um on the places where we can make progress. Um the urgency for me is that uh I have family members like my kids who are going to be making their own lives for themselves and um I want them to have the choice of living here. If they have to if they go somewhere else, I want it to be their choice. I want them to be able to stay here if they want to. Um, the urgency for me also to to uh get more housing and to to fix the crisis that we have is I'm seeing real time what it's like for people like my parents who uh are a single family home is no longer the right solution for them and they they [snorts] don't have a lot of they don't have a lot of options in their community and that has been so difficult to watch. And I don't want to have to go through that with my elderly in-laws who are in Ann Arbor. I don't want them to be faced with these same difficulties. And looking at how long it's taken to get into the situation that we're in and how long it's likely before we're out of it. I don't want to have to be making those same difficult choices and be faced with those really unpleasant options for myself either as I age. So, I just thank

you for understanding the urgency and acting on it as soon as we can. Thank you. Thank you.

Good evening, Commissioner. Kirk Westfall, 3505 Charter Place. Uh I live in a a trickle down house in a not in a historic district. Um so, first congrats on the plan. Um, I hope you can take a breath uh and and appreciate uh what has happened. Um, so thanks for all your hard work on that and staff as well. Um, [snorts] I want to support the memo in front of you regarding hub and transition. Uh, I would just like to offer two possible uh amendments or things to think about uh between now and whenever the process begins. Uh, one is to change the timing to 3 months instead of nine. Um, part of the reason the comp planning process uh sort of became extended uh more than anticipated was because I think you invested time in getting your arms around things like building heights um map outlines and uh you know additional public input and I think now is the time to avail yourselves of that investment and get the zoning done quickly. Um I guess other than deciding whether to make pub and transition one zone or two um the lines are on the map and to my mind the rest is kind of plugandplay with building heights and uh radi for protecting residential. Um the other related amendment I'd like to ask you to consider is a moratorum uh to cons coincide with the zoning implementation. I don't think the city has ever enacted one. Um, but it's very common tool elsewhere, especially when a new plan is in place and zoning is being debated. Uh, so a community doesn't continue to get the development that's not in line with its updated vision. Um, again, very common and defensible legally to do this for 3 months and usually extended to 6 months or longer if needed. uh which should be more than enough time to to implement what uh the limited scope that you guys are talking

about. Um and I'd argue that you know looking at the TC1 roll out that a mortoriium should have been put in place uh for that um when we saw you know U of M credit union and a certain fast food restaurant come in under the wire. I think those were big errors. Um, and those parcels will be crowding out housing and more fiscally appropriate uses for, you know, 50 years or more likely. Uh, I'm guessing you've seen proposals coming in for Research Park Drive, Pontiac Trail. Um, and I guess I would just pose the question if you think those meet your vision for what you'd like to see, uh, you know, 20 or the kind of development you'd like to see 10 or 20 years from now. Um, and if not, I would say all the more reason to prevent more of that. Um, while zoning is being debated, um, a topic like this will create resistance. Um, based on previous experience, uh, involves something the city hasn't done and extra work by the attorney's office. Um, but I think given the cost of the community, um, it's worth looking into. Thanks.

Thank you, Mr. Westfall. Uh, M. Uh, Commissioner Adams, was that like about Taco Bell? Was that what? Um, really? It was It wasn't Taco Bell. I thought it was the Taco Bell. Chick-fil-A. Oh, see, I I I just wanted to make sure cuz, you know, those are shots fired about the Taco Bell. All right. Uh, [laughter] is there

Oh, golf. Yes, we've heard a lot about golf. Uh, Commissioner Dish. Um, is there anyone else in chambers who would like to address us on this item at this time? Thank you, Chair Wes. Ken Garber again. Um, interesting ideas. Um, 3 months instead of nine and a moratorum on um, development until the resoning can take place. I'll have to give that more thought. I want to thank Commissioner Adams for his thoughtful memo. Um he mentioned that he favors setting height limits basically to avoid political blowback uh of unlimited height. There's another reason. Um we have um an incentive in place in the UDC to u for sustainability and affordability. Developers go above a certain height. They have to provide certain um benefits to the community. Um actually this section of the UDC uh 5184D is kind of dysfunctional and hopefully we'll be addressing that soon at a meeting. Um so um but it raises a broader uh and there was some push back against um the height exception at the last OC meeting which raises for me a philosophical question. Should we be using UDC incentives at all to achieve the community goals of sustainability and affordability or should we leave these entirely to the market? Because I don't think the market is going to give us either. And if we don't write such incentives into the UDC and in an intelligent way, we're losing a precious opportunity as we resone. And by the way, I have no problem with upfirst. Um but as we do that um there's an opportunity. Last year Commissioner Lee calculated using opex ratio NOI cap rate

estimates um that for a single building 625 church an extra four stories boosted its value by 34 to $40 million and that's just one building. Large scale resoning is a tremendous transfer of wealth to the property owners. here. It would be billions of dollars in added value that we're handing over at the stroke of a pen. That would be fine if the interests of the property owners and their developer partners uh were perfectly aligned with the public interest, but they're only partly aligned. We all want more housing and more density. But the public sees affordability and sustainability as additional goals, while property owners and developers seek to maximize return as they should. That's our system for better or worse. And of course, we depend on private developers to build most of our housing stock. But if we're going to grant this huge windfall through large-scale resoning, let's also try to achieve some of our broader community goals by building in effective incentives for developers to incorporate affordability and real sustainability into their projects. So, I would hope any proposal for execution of comp plan resoning uh maybe tonight, I don't know. I don't know what the motion's going to be, um should mention the goal of carefully crafted incentives to maximize affordability and sustainability in market rate developments.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Garber. Is there anyone else in house who'd like to address us at this time? Mr. Leonard, do we have remote participants who'd like to address us? We do. Thank you. Your current, you can address the planning commission for up to 3 minutes.

I'm sorry. Can Can you hear me now? We can. Go ahead.

Good evening. This is Jerk Hades calling from the first ward. Uh I just wanted to say uh thank you for the years of tireless work and incredible dedication and congratulations on the camp comp plan getting adopted. I look forward to seeing meaningful fixes to our broken zoning laws being passed this year. I strongly support the direction of Commissioner Adams's memo perhaps with the exception of the bullet point regarding height limits in hub. Political expediency aside, I have yet to hear a coherent rationale for why it would be in the public interest to continue imposing artificial height limits in the most dense parts of our city. [snorts] It's plainly obvious that 20 stories are no more no more acceptable than 40 stories to the small group of individuals who appear to suffer from an acute phobia of anything taller than two or three stories. Please think big and provide ample opportunity for our council members to live up to their campaign promises, not just in hub, but everywhere throughout the city. As I mentioned to council yesterday, it would be a real embarrassment to our city's progressive bonafides to see Lancing move faster and force our hand when in fact we should be the ones leading the way. Thank you again for your leadership and service.

Thank you. [snorts] Adam Goodman, you have three minutes to address the planning commission.

Good evening, Adam Goodman, 400 Virginia Avenue. Um, I will also say uh congratulations on on the final passage of the comprehensive plan. That's a huge moment for our city and a huge testament to I I can't even imagine how much work all of you put into that. Um, I was exhausted just watching it. So, as almost every council member, I think said last night, maybe every single one, we have a severe housing shortage and we need to have a sense of urgency about it. And so, you know, I did have a few disappointments about the content of the comprehensive the final comprehensive plan, but my strongest disappointment was that it took three years. Um it it started with a a uh timeline propo proposed timeline of two years and that was already too long. If you look at um one of our peer cities, Charlottesville, Virginia, they did theirs in 18 months. Um, and and so, you know, as as we go into looking to implement the comprehensive plan, I'm I'm I guess I'm happy that the implementation matrix suggests we should get this done in 3 years. Charlottville also got their zoning rewrite done in about 3 years. Um, but you know, we already saw we saw the comp plan slip by 50%. So, I'm not currently today very confident in that three-year target. And, you know, it could actually be much worse. I think Chair W has alluded to this a few times in the past. It actually took us a full 15 years to implement some of the recommendations from our 2009 land use plan, particularly the ones around transit corridor zoning. Um, so we simply cannot allow this land use plan to fall victim to the same fate as our last land use plan. I don't know. I don't claim to know the best way to solve this. A year ago, I

thought that we should hire a consultant and do a complete oneshot rewrite of the entire UDC. Um, people smarter than me like Professors Lavine and Kazus have convinced me that an incremental approach is a lot less risky. So, the ideas in Commissioner Adams memo is unreasonable to me. But mostly, I just want to say thank you, Commissioner Adams, for getting this conversation started immediately and and kind of showing the the sense of urgency that is needed to address the most important problems in our city. And I hope that I will I hope that we will see, you know, a similar attitude from everybody on the planning commission. Even if you have different ideas, we just need to make progress as rapidly as we reasonably can. So again, thank you for all your work. That's all I've got. Thank you.

Alex Low, you have three minutes to address the planning commission.

This is Alex Low, 2532 Pittsville Boulevard. Um, I want to agree with what uh uh Mr. Westfall said about um uh reducing the 9-month time span uh to three. Got to remember that we are already a year late on the comprehensive plan to begin with. So we uh we shouldn't be going still uh still later on uh on everything else. Um likewise with uh I want to u agree with M uh Mr. Goodman that we uh uh that we should be uh working on a shorter timeline than 3 years because if we're going to be if if we're going to keep uh getting later and later like uh uh like like this how long would uh will we uh be pausing this? Um, finally, I believe on uh on item uh or section B um what I guess 2B, uh the second bullet point to uh say CPC and planning staff should consider an upper height limit recommendation. Um I believe that's uh a typo given uh that I am a uh a resident who is very sensitive to uh concerns regarding uh building uh height. I believe that is supposed to say uh CPC and planning staff should consider a lower height limit. Thank you.

Thank you.

No other speakers. I shall close the public dedicated excuse me the dedicated public comment period and open us up for discussion. Um just as a little bit of framing um uh Commissioner Adams and I uh spoke briefly before the start of the meeting. We're going to listen to the discussion to figure out what the motion is going to be based on the discussion and then he will uh craft one present it for our consideration and then we will vote on that. uh if that's okay with the table. If it's not, I am open to hearing another way forward. And it's okay if you just want to take a minute because you're just hearing it right now. And you may need a moment to feel yourself. Put your feet on the floor, uncross your legs, open your hands, take a deep breath. I know. All right. Go ahead. Uh Commissioner Nord,

can I just put this staff on the spot for a little bit? And I'm just curious what your thoughts are on um the Lavine Kzis leaf proposal and is that a good workable starting point or how would you pick up and work on that if you Actually, if I can pause there cuz I think I I will let that uh happen during discussion if that's okay, Commissioner Norton, cuz I first I want to just see if we all agree for how we should open the discussion and I feel like that question a process for what we're doing to get to the discussion. Yes. Yeah. Okay. I'm sorry. Um, that process is fine. I would like to try and figure out what are we moving or what the mo motion would be ultimately.

Yeah. And I think that was what we wanted to create space for at the table because the plan just finished. It just just got passed and now we're trying to figure out how we might go forward with that. So I I want to permit you to ask that question but just in a moment. Is that okay? Okay. That'll give him time to think too. Sure. That's fine. All right. [laughter] So, just from a process standpoint, are we okay with the discussion before the motion or would you prefer for Commissioner Adams to craft a motion now, which he can, and then we start with the motion and then go to the discussion? That's all I'm asking. Oh, I see. I prefer a discussion first.

Okay. Yeah. I thought you might prefer the discussion before we got to the motion. All right. I'm seeing head nods. I'm not seeing any objections. Am I reading the table correctly? Okay. Great. So with that, we're now going to have a discussion. Commissioner Norton has already uh given us our first question to staff about their opinions on um the submitted um uh work product.

Yeah. In short, uh we've gotten several opinions about how we should move forward, how we shouldn't move forward. So I don't sit here with any more of an analysis of that memo than any others that we have. Um, I think that, um, I'm grateful for, um, folks like, uh, commissioners like Commissioner Adams who are obviously, um, really thoughtful and thinking about this. That's kind of my intention of dedicating a work session to um, unpack some of the things and the questions that you have. Um, some of you as commissioners might have alternative ideas. I, for example, have an I have a different approach that, um, if I were pen to paper, I would an order of operations that I would do. Um but I think giving the commissioners the space to sort of um process not only this approach um we can provide um in advance that work session some thoughts that we have and again like I put in my manager report I stand ready as staff to see if there are questions that you have or information that you think would be helpful for you to form your own basis of opinion about how you want to approach implementation. Um just from just from a you know this this conversation for example about 9 months versus 3 months just practically speaking just as a reminder if you were to move a motion now to approve a new zoning district we are about 2 months forward to get anything adopted by the city council. So um so I'm happy to bring whatever questions I think you know I I do hear an urgency of this commission. I've heard it all along through the comprehensive plan process. Um, so in short, I don't I'm not going to sit here and think that I think that it's uh I certainly am not in a position to say that I think that it is definitely the approach we should make. It is a perspective and honestly, I think you as the commission that is your role here to figure out what you think, what are the questions that you have in

order for you to put together your order of operations as we move forward. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Ler. And I do want to uh let the table know that Mr. Leonard and I had a small email exchange about the memo. At that time, Mr. Leonard made me aware that he had already for our work schedule added the um April 17th work session to talk about the implementation plan. and he asked whether or not we should defer um Commissioner Adams memo [clears throat] to be uh subsumed inside that work session or if it should come to the agenda tonight. I asked he agreed with my request to bring it forward tonight because if we have this discussion now it can inform that work session and we're not um playing catchup in a sense. So I think if and Mr. Leonard, please correct me if you have a different opinion. I think we're all on the same side trying to figure out what this next step is going to look like and we seem to be working um in concert as opposed to uh with cross purposes. Does that is that fair? Okay, great. Uh Commissioner Mills.

Yeah, I want to thank you, Commissioner. Um for some reason, I can't remember your name right now. Adams. Gosh, it's Guys, it's been a long day. Sorry. [laughter] Thank you, Commissioner Adams for this. Um, I also I I think it's important for the public that we know what next steps are. And so, I'm glad that we're talking about this here and that it was named on the agenda. I think that that's really valuable. Um, I think that we I don't know, maybe this is just me, I work to a deadline. And so I think giving ourselves a deadline is really, really valuable. And also, I thought it worked quite well with the comp plan to actually put here are the meetings where we're going to be discussing, here are our goals, this is our goal to get through. I think that as we're tackling the um ordinance revisions that that's going to be really, really helpful. I also think it's going to be helpful to not tackle the whole thing at once. And so it also makes sense for me. I I like the idea of starting with hub. I'm cur I'm I'd actually really like um to hear uh counterarguments to why not start at hub. Like that helps me make sure that I like I don't know what I don't know, but that feels right to me. And I would say I opened the comp plan like within hub we have areas that are marked that are currently R1B R2B like it at first when I was thinking about it this is like reconciling D1 D2 and TC1 and that's not true like we have multiple hub areas and the character is quite different in those areas the underlying zoning and we're also talking about not just kind of fringe currently in the hub itself elf. And so I think that

actually how we would draw the boundaries around Halo is something that is really vague to me. Um because it all that transition does flow [laughter] or like that the transition goes from adjacent to hub and out. And so I'm I that feels a little arbitrary even just tackling hub. And if we can do that first and do it well, I think that's um important. So I I kind of am on I'm I'm bored with that and I think giving ourselves a timeline um really really helpful. I also want to address the feedback about notice and engagement and I'll just tell you what is in my mind is that if we are if we're tackling this kind of hub first I do not have the purse strings associated with this but it feels like if we have a plan of when we're going to talk about it I would I know it is not required by state law to send notice postcard notice this and I think we should do it. I really really think that we should let people know what we are doing and I I am on team send everybody a postcard in that in that it that are in that area because I think if you know what the schedule is um when we're going to be discussing it, what topics we're going to be discussing and this is about your place. I think that that is may address some of what we some of the feedback that we heard about lack of of notice about engagement earlier on. So, um that's not in this memo, but I since we're talking about how we would start this, that's something that I think I would do. Um I really like the idea this shouldn't just be an OC. ORC only meets once a month. That's actually not month enough. And so I think having it be it's not only the that it's a

subset, it's that the frequency. I think to move these forward, we're going to need to talk about this more regularly. Um, and we should, I think, then not abandon OC, but think about getting more. Like, if we really want to move things on, I think that we're going to have to maybe spend the fourth Tuesday of the month, too, potentially. Whoa, there.

I know. I know. I love the OC. And um yeah. Um, so I I actually think the idea of a a moratoria is really interesting. Um, in part to focus staff like to allow staff to focus on this. I don't know what that means. Um, for other things like if again I can see unintended consequences associated with that. So I would love counter opinions on that as well. Um, but that's I appreciate Commissioner Adams you putting it in. And also, did you print this off or did staff print this off? Oh, thank you. Like, what are the specific points so that we can say which one's yes and which one's no? I think that I mean, I don't know if that's where you're going, but that's really helpful. Okay. Okay. Um, just for the public, you have the full memo. Um, and for the viewing public, uh, you have access, uh, to the memo via Legisar. We just, I just took the memo and, um, made it into 13 paragraphs, uh, with everything that Commissioner Adams was asking because it can be hard when we're in our discussion to find the thing and then be able to reference it. So, um, Mr. Leonard, if it uh works for staff and you are and legal and everybody's okay, you could just include this in the packet so that people would see what we have. It it has no commentary whatsoever. It is just um a summary of what Commissioner Adams has said, but we're happy uh to put this into legisar so that you can see it. And so we did I did it at the last minute today. So that's part of why we weren't able to include it in your packet. and Commissioner Mills just referenced it. So, I'm just telling you what it is. And if any of you want to come up and take a photo of it, you can. Just not mine cuz

I have written all over it and I don't want you to have my work product. Okay. [laughter] All right. Um, who's next? Oh. Oh, yep. Yes. Yes. Commissioner uh Dish, we will go in order. [laughter] I know. To com Commissioner Hammer Schmidt.

Thank you. Um, thank you, Commissioner Adams, for this amazing start to all of this. Um, so I I'm glad I'm next because I sort of wanted to Yes. And Commissioner Mills. Um, I like the idea of sending postcards, too. And I almost think And I don't know how much this costs staff. So, sorry, but maybe it's we figure out a schedule and it's just to everyone in the whole city like this is like here's the website and here's the here's what the schedule's going to be. I don't know. Um, OC I was I had the same thoughts. I do think that this this like our typical process is we go to it goes to OC first and it comes to full commission. I think for this it should go to full commission and if we have to use those fourth Tuesdays or every other cuz OC has been every other and just sort of depending on how this goes like sorry people not on OC but I mean if we if we're serious about this like we should take advantage of those Tuesdays. Um, [snorts] I would also like to hear I've heard Mr. Westfell talk about moratoriums before. Um, I I would like to hear staff's thoughts on that and legality, etc. I also have mixed feelings like I don't want to development is really hard right now. I don't want to stop development that we're going to need. Um, but I also appreciate the reasoning why. Um, [clears throat] I don't like that credit union either. Um, and then this is this is more I guess I don't I don't know that I need I was just thinking about this as Commissioner Adams was presenting [snorts] um or talking about the memo about not peacemealing TC1. We peacemealed and it took a really long time. A really long time. And I I guess I'm curious and we don't have to answer this right this second. I think we should probably just keep going down the road. But how would how did like staff how do you Mr. How do you think this would look different from the TC1

process in terms of staff commitment? Um [snorts] cuz we're talking about if we're talking about hub which is all over the city. It's it's a lot different than three corridors that are that were much more defined.

Um hard hard to predict. Um I think it might be comparable. You're looking at more geographies. uh you are probably taking lessons from more zoning districts in this case perhaps TC1 D1 and D2 whereas before you were really um we spent the time upfront doing TC1 as you know we had a lot of modific we've had a lot of modifications to TC1 subsequent to that as well so um my intention is to put more staff resources into this so uh we're I'm still in that process but I want to dedicate some full-time that is going to have an adverse impact on the development view side of things. Um, so I you know I I as as you know I think that's a good example. Our intentions often don't end up we learn we hear from people. We have to adapt. And so I I just want to be honest I can't sit here and promise you that I think that this would absolutely be shorter. Um I think TC1's a great example. we've we encountered new questions as we approached different areas and we've made modifications since then and I you know I guess I'll leave it to you as to your assessment of where we stand with that today. So I you know for example with that I think we might be revisiting TC1 as part of this. So I I think

thank you Mr. L. Can I just one more thing? Uhhuh. Um I mean I absolutely think we'll be re revisiting TC1 as part of this but it's also like a good starting point I think at the same time. So this might be a big question but I mean because of the geography of hub I don't even know like I'm just remembering back to the TC1 process and the and the peacemailing of it. How how does this even work? like we're doing the whole city and we have public hearings for like the whole city for hub resoning in like all these different areas with TC1 we created the district and then we started geography by geography we did

do I think both Plymouth and simultaneously but we did dedicated engagement sessions with those so that's part of the that's part of the project approach that you are going to have to decide you could do either you could we could hold a public hearing for any property that is going to be proposed to be a new zone across the city. Or you could choose that you want to do a more focused engagement with some subset of that. That's part of the decision-m process that you're going to have to figure out. Thanks. I'm let you go, Commissioner Dish.

Thank you, Chair W, and thank you, Commissioner Adams, for this memo. Um, okay. I I like the argument that Commissioner Mills has made about counterarguments. Um I would Yes. And that um that

Oh, sorry. It's on, but I don't want to talk into it. Um okay, let's do that correctly. All right. Um, I guess in addition to counterarguments, I I think that I would appreciate analysis of the hub category. It's a big category. Um, and as has already come out of this conversation, it isn't just composed of corridors like we had with TC1. So I would love to see analysis and I would like to know how much how much do we need to know about constrained infrastructure capacity at this stage of the game if we're going to start um reszoning hub? What are the implications of going ahead with a resoning in a part of hub that is capacity constrained? Um I would like to hear more from our lawyers about whether we need a moratorum which sends a signal that I don't think we want to send. I think it's a signal that might be contrary to the plan which is we're saying we want development. So, um, and and I don't know, I mean, I I get that we don't want spaces getting filled up with things that are not what we envision for the future. We don't want that to happen. So, I do understand that. Um, I'm hearing it said that development proposals will probably review of those proposals will slow down because we're going to emphasize this. I heard the words deprioritized from Commissioner Adams. I I guess I just want to you know we [sighs and gasps]

I want to understand how all the pieces of the things that the planning department does will fit together in this process which is a process that I have never seen before because we are actually this is this is a plan that reson zones the whole city. So I would like to understand how people do that and I know that we are not going to reszone the whole city at once but I would like to understand how we continue with development review and we continue with things like uh there's a lot of need to think about use that is also embedded in this process of the and I'm not trying to say these are all barriers and things that should slow us down at all. That is not my intent. I'm asking for an analysis of h how this goes forward. So, um, and by the way, yeah, I really do like the idea of starting with hub. I think it's the best place we can start. Um, but I understand that I think of hub as all the orange, but what hub is is a lot of parcels that are underneath the orange and they may be, you know, there may be some sections of hub that are going to be easier. So I want under I would like to ha have an analysis of hub in a way that helps me think about where we can map it where we can put new density on the map and I would like as much new density on the map as fast as we can possibly get it. Um I want to know if halo is necessary. I understand the points that Commissioner Adams is making. So I I definitely do not want us to design a hub that imagines that it's a budding R4C when there is transition there. But I do not know I'm not I'm just sort of I did we use the word halo in the No. Okay. So

I don't really know what that means. Right. I so I think I'm echoing Commissioner Mills. And then um I do want an analysis. This is something I encountered a lot in reading the literature when we were working on the plan. I want an analysis of what those height incentives should be because I do want to use them. I do agree with Mr. Garber that the market is not going to give us affordability and sustainability. Um but I so I want them as incentives though I do not want us to go back on the discussion that we had when we did TC1 because we talked about we could write it into the zone. We could say you have to do X that is sustainable or X that is affordable and we chose not to do that because we felt that it would dampen development. So I want to understand what an incentive would be a meaningful thing for a developer that they would say, "Yeah, if you give me some extra height on top of whatever the base is, but I also don't want to go back to the downtown premium." So I mean, we've done this, you know, we've learned from errors in this area um before about cons, you know, having an available height and then constraining like not letting someone reach that availability. That's not what I'm looking for. But this is something that I would like to be part of the zoning of hub unless I am told that hub shouldn't ask for both of those features. Maybe one or the other. I don't know. But these are questions that I do think that I do not think they need to slow us down for 6 weeks thinking about them. But I do think that we need to deliberately put them in because once we've created this district, we can't go back and say, "Oh, now we want to attach a height

exception or an incentive for sustainability and affordability." So, um, yes. So, I guess I'm saying I want a lot of things as quickly as possible. Cake and eating it also would be my preference. Thank you, Council Member Dish. Commissioner Lee. Hi. Hi. [clears throat]

Hello. Um, yeah, I I think this is a really good uh prompt for us to discuss tonight as I think I I also agree on the comment regarding I work better to schedule. So, it's it's definitely better to say, hey, let's just make sure to try to hit some of these targets. Um, and let's be aggressive and ambitious about those things. Um, so I also think what might be helpful is talking to cities that went through this process. So I'm looking at like Minneapolis 20 240, right? They did something similar to this. They took a text first basis. One of the things I'll actually challenge I think uh Commissioner Mills you wanted to hear, hey let's is there a counterargument right to hub? While I actually like initially my thought process is actually hub, the other like the counterargument might be what is most effective in terms of like the smallest amount of change within the text that delivers the largest kind of like like widespread change. So like for example, does the I mean we we talked about duplexes and triplexes, right? does specific text amendments in the resi zones R1 through R4 specific to triplexes does that like and and almost kind of like an analysis relative to what delivers kind of like the most widespread I guess kind of impact. Um and so and then also just thinking about um that we should be measured about this. I think time setting timetables and setting clear guidelines as to when these things will be discussed uh a very thorough datadriven analysis with really references on base uh like best case studies as it relates to implementation because we're not the first city in the world to have done you know comprehensive land use plans. So, uh, what is what have other planners like I I would really actually urge that we call like Minneapolis or Boulder, Colorado and talk to those planners and say, "Hey, what did you do that worked well? What have you done that you know you wish you could do again?" So, I'd

love to just kind of learn from other cities about the implementation process and kind of also make sure that we're communicating that actually to the public about what we saw. Um and so I think uh and I also echo the concept that we do need good analysis as as it relates to um feasibility. And what I mean by that is like how many like just even statistical analysis as it relates to uh how many properties impacted by hub. I think we actually had some of those numbers uh previously. But to really kind of say like all right what do like how many are we talking about here? Like how many properties does this touch, right? I'm not in favor of like waiting for like I think the text amendment first then map second approach makes sense to me and so to really think about okay what kind of text actually needs to be amended and my thought is uh and and hub may be a great category to start like that's where my gut kind of tells me but I also want to urge some critical thinking about if there's more effective smaller tax changes that deliver stronger impact um and whether that is a something that could be phased but but more importantly I do think it's very important for us to talk to um other planning departments that have gone through this process um and that that should be that kind of outreach should be intentional I I really think that's an important step um [clears throat] last thought would be um I'm not yeah I'm not quite in favor of like allowing property owners to petition us kind of similar to we had this debate regarding like TC1, right? Like, hey, do we um do we do MA like larger reszonings? Uh that being uh spot zoning is can definitely be an issue. So, I feel like if we

waited and said, "Hey, we've made text amendments and then like, hey, please come to us and change them." I think that could be kind of problematic. Uh because then we'd have like we we're trying to simplify the zones and now we've ended up in this kind of like quasimoto or like half transitioned and half non-transitioned and not no pun intended relative to the zone but like one that's under the new you know next text amendments and not and so uh all that to say I believe in talking with folks that have gone through the implementation process what has worked well learn from their um learn from their process do basically a code audit slash uh analysis of what it means for us to make these changes. So similar to how we looked at different tables kind of like okay well we we believe R1 R2 still fits in within like resi zones or D1 D2 being in hub. Um and just making sure that we have actual number of parcels and like what level of impact um and outreach is required there. Uh and then by setting I think tight and clear timetables that helps for additional um or or clear engagement within the process. So I agree with sending out postcards. I do think that we this has to be a very measured and deliberate conversation around this. So um I I believe that this this is the really important step that we need to take. But uh yeah, text first, map second. Um as it relates to this particular memo, um like my my gut tells me that hub is kind of like the kind of like does it drive the most amount of impact and and will we actually learn during this process? Yes, I also want to talk to other planners about who took a more tactical route as it relates to resi um in Minneapolis specifically as it relates to oh triplex

by right like did that make the most impact uh in terms of uh limiting the types of like large McMansion construction and single family zones. So I think that that's kind of where I'm at right now. But I'm I am glad and thankful that this discussion is kind of in front of us very quickly, literally within a day. So, all right. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Lee. Commissioner Weatherbe.

Okay. So, uh thank you to everyone for your comments because my brain's going back and forth and back and forth. Um [laughter and clears throat] and and thank you to Commissioner Adams for bringing this memo forward. I kind of hate it, but thank you for bringing it forward. Um, I personally don't think, well, I know that I am not ready to commit to any of these statements tonight. Um, and and some I like better than others, but I don't think we have anywhere nearly enough information or to to say yes, I want to do this or not tonight. Um, I I really would like to hear from staff because the biggest thing is staff is going to have the biggest um it's going to impact staff and how this is implemented and if this is implemented and what the options are and what the possibilities are. And I think Commissioner Lee had a really good point of yes, it hub feels big, but like is it really big? because maybe we could do other things that would would make more of an impact more quickly. And to hear Mr. Leonard say uh that this might not be the way he would choose, I really would like to hear more on that. Um, I think I think using an existing memo that really knowledgeable people in the community wrote is is great and we shouldn't uh we shouldn't just say, "Oh, we don't need that information because I think that's super valuable." But I also think those are people who are not elected, not appointed, not paid by the city, and have no responsibility if things don't go well. Um, and so I think

we need to take that into consideration that it's really easy to tell other people what they should do. Um, it's a lot harder to say, you know, this is what we have to do to be responsible. We need to send out postcards. We need to be responsible to people who we've talked to over the last 3 years. Um that you know just like introducing a new terminology like the halo idea is just like whoa hang on like um you know moratorum that's maybe that is a tool maybe that's a a really useful tool but I think you know it it has not yet been 24 hours since the the plan was passed and yes we've been working on it for a long time so that's not really an excuse. I do think we need to move forward and move forward expeditiously. Um it's easy to fall into the trap of, oh well, we'll get to it when we get to it. Um, but I also think that it's going to take us a little while to kind of get this going in a rational way and hopefully it will speed up each time that we're not that the lessons we learn in the first iteration will, you know, hopefully not just stay there and will help to speed up all the subsequent um, changes that we make. But I I've worked on a lot of projects where people come in all gung-ho and we're going to change this thing and do this and you know things maybe don't work out quite as well because we haven't looked at the possibilities of X or Y or the unintended consequences and there's a danger in both of also we need to have some comprehensive plan say for [laughter] for looking at this um these changes and

I just I you know I had sort of a knee-jerk reaction to this uh memo that that made me want to slow things down and I don't think that's where we want to be. I think we want to really go full speed ahead. Let me see how many apherisms I can use in one. Um but but uh but we need to be thoughtful and we need to talk to PL the city staff. we need to talk to city legal staff um because it's going to fall mostly on them and and it needs to be something that can be can be done you know like we can give a lot of like hey let's just start with hub and get going and do this but that that just may not be at all reasonable and I I just so I want to I guess that's uh those are my thoughts thoughts. They're not actionable and I know that we want actionable, but but I do think we need to have some I really would like to hear what city staff has to say and and we we haven't heard that and that's where I would like to start.

Thank you, Commissioner Weatherbe. Commissioner Nordon, [clears throat]

thank you for coming back to me. Um, I want to start off by making a couple comments. So, thank you to Commissioner Adams for getting this discussion going um so promptly. Um I have some reservations about it as well. Um I totally get not wanting to doawle or study things to death because that becomes a way to kill things. I'm mindful of of that concern. I'm quite mindful of um giving neighbors the ability to veto anything that happens within their neighborhood because I'm pretty sure if we do that, nothing will change. Um, at the same time, we made promises to folks that we were going to make meaningful public engagement when we got to the difficult task of engaging in zoning. Um, we made promises that we were going to think carefully and study carefully things like infrastructure impacts and such. Um, we need to take that seriously and I really we need to make sure that we do a good faith effort to do that. Um, so I'm a little bit nervous about um, jumping in. I'm quite nervous about setting arbitrarily a deadline of three months that's not based on anything except somebody thinking we could do it in three months. I think we need to be more carefully lay out what are the tasks we need to do and structure a schedule that's based on realistic estimates of what those tasks involve. Um I do think I agree with um Commissioner Adams that hub is probably the place to start. It was the seemed to be the place that was the least controversial but it's not going to be easy. Um, and we need to take that with some care. I also think um, so I want us to move with urgency, but I want us to move with deliberate urgency and not end up making big mistakes because of our rush to try and push this through. And I would point out, maybe this is sounds a little bit flipped, but it took us 80 years to get here. Um, I'd rather take a little bit of time and do it right as we shift and not jump in and do some radical things and then in three years realize, oh my gosh, we made a huge mistake and we put

people in places where they shouldn't be um for those reasons. So, I think a little bit of deliberation right now to get a schedule going and tasks set out will save us a whole lot of heartache in the end and then we'll be able to move more effectively. And the kinds of things I want us to be doing is coming up with a realistic public engagement plan. How are we going to engage the community now in these steps? I definitely want to make sure that we're reaching out to the folks who are in the areas that are going to be affected. But I absolutely want to make sure that it's open to everybody um so that we're not just doing a placebyplace study and and letting neighborhoods veto anything that's going to happen in their neighborhood. I think that would be counterproductive. So, we need to have some kind of public engagement plan how we're going to do this moving forward. I remember having discussions about particularly when we get to thinking about residential neighborhoods, maybe we could have form-based designs that we could use to facilitate quicker review. You know, if we can come up with pattern designs that would be workable in the neighborhoods, then you could get a permission quicker. Why don't we get started on thinking through that while we're doing some of these other tasks? And then I absolutely I'll come back to where I started this evening. We need to be thinking seriously about storm water and um doing some analyses. The GIS technology is now sufficient enough. We shouldn't I know I'm saying this for the staff and maybe Jennifer will be rolling over when she hears that I said this, but I think we could be doing some meaningful analysis would give us a much better sense of what we're facing as we do resonings. And it would we be way be way better way is is that a right word? It would be much better to do that now and avoid creating problems because we've done some good analysis up front instead of getting halfway down the road and realize, oh my gosh, we've had a huge mistake. Um, and storm water is going to be an issue that we're going to have to deal with because because climate is changing and we're going to be getting more severe storms and we

need to be thinking ahead for that. So, I'm not ready to to vote on these actions and saying yes, we're going to do this in three months and we're going to start with hub because I don't think we're there yet. But I appreciate the urgency of let's get started on this and do it in a deliberate way. But I wanted I guess I kind of want to hear too from staff thoughts on where you're thinking how we would proceed. Um but I want to have some things planned out first and kind of a a road map and get on a schedule and then start moving down that road before just announcing we're going to jump into it with both feet. That's my take. Thank you.

Thank you. with the chair uh with the tables uh permission. I'd like to weigh in. Everybody okay with that? Great. So, um you know, I've come to this conversation much like all of you. I've read uh Commissioner Adams memo. I read it again. I made a summary of it which [laughter] uh Mr. Leonard has put into Legisar now. So, if you go to a2gov.lear.com legisar.com and you go to today's meeting. You go down to the agenda item 10C, you can see the summary there. It's just a PDF of what we're looking at. So, um, and I appreciate everyone's, uh, comments. One of the things I wanted to reflect back is something that I've heard at the table for the six years that I have had the privilege of serving as a volunteer planning commissioner, which is the planning commission sets its own agenda. And um, it is us. It is the nine of us minus uh commission uh commissioner Abrams who is here who sets our work agenda. Um staff make recommendations of what should go on the agenda but often Mr. Leonard would say if you want to work on this tell us if you want to work on that tell us. And so in that vein, um that's what I see this memo as doing is saying uh the comp plan which we have worked on. I mean I've if and correct me again Mr. Learner if I'm incorrect but I feel like the steering committee for the comp plan started in August of 22 according to my email. So that puts us about 40 months uh in this conversation. So a little more than 3 years. It's been about 3 and 1/2 years that we have uh been doing this. And along the way with my colleagues, I've been reading what's been going on. Um a caller called in and talked about um Charlottesville. I've read their plan. Uh someone has through the many thousand of comments we heard talked about Gainesville. I read their

plan. Uh I have been watching uh other municipalities in Michigan as they have gone through their plan whether that was Royal Oak, Ferndale or Traverse City and trying to understand how these processes um unfold and how they come into being. So, uh, for me, for my part, I'm I, um, appreciate, uh, the memo that we have, uh, for the simple purpose that it helps prioritize what we should do next. It doesn't say what the outcome of that prioritization is. What it says is this is what we're going to prioritize. And, um, I agree that we should prioritize hub. It sounded um universal at the table that hub felt like the priority whether or not we take it up with a 3month agenda or a 9-month whether we take Mr. Westfall's uh recommendation to recommend staff a moratorum. Um and then the other thing that I just want to note is now that the comp plan has passed any property owner again correct me if I'm wrong Mr. Leonard can begin to petition to be reszoned and that is just going to happen. Period. People will say this is where this is going. I have a property in this uh place and I want it reszoned and that's going to come to this table. Um and so I would love for us to have a plan in place so that we know how we are going to address that. And I think having a prioritized work plan uh where we are prioritizing hub um as that sort of top uh list is something that helps us at our work session in April. We will talk about the entire implementation

plan. I think that's going to be a great place to say hey here are the kind of analysis that I want to see. Here are some of the feedback from staff that I would like to see. And I would ask my fellow commissioners if you could between now and April maybe identify just two things that you'd like to see in order to get that implementation moving. I think that would be helpful and recognize that would be 19 or excuse me 18 items if we all did it that we would be recommending to staff. And then staff's task as uh Mr. Leonard has helped us and helped me to understand is to listen to what we are saying to organize it and then to come back to us and say here's what I heard you say here's the staff allocation that we have and here's what I think we can do going forward but ultimately it is us the nine or eight of us who will vote on what we will do and uh for my part I think um prioritizing hub club. I have some questions about Halo 2 for everybody who [laughter] and I was going to ask someone to define Halo uh so that I wasn't the one defining it for you, but uh I I I understand what that means is just making sure that we don't have a unintended consequence of moving something to hub and then it abuts something else and we didn't think to put it in transition instead of letting it sit right across from it. But um for what we have in front of us, I think uh for my part uh it would be great if we could signal to staff in advance of our implementation meeting that we'd like to start with hub as a priority. I think that uh would be helpful in

terms of direction that we can give to staff and then we can work from that direction and we can add other priorities. So we don't have to it's not a all it's not a zero sum um conversation. It's a it's a more inclusive conversation from my part. So um those are my uh thoughts uh with regard to this. I have some like specific things like I in paragraph 8 um uh Commissioner Adams proposes upper height limit and you all if any of you have sat at this table with me for the last 6 years you know that the first question I ask every practitioner is why haven't you made it taller so um Mr. Leonard and Miss Dio who are some of the uh well Alexis is one of the older not older in terms of age but time spent working in the city couldn't answer for me why we have some of the height limits that we have in place. So I was going to just throw that one out uh for kicks and giggles uh to Commissioner Adams, but uh he's more in tune with the politics of all of this. I'm just trying to get as much housing for people as I possibly can. Um, yeah. So, are you ready for your feedback, uh, Commissioner Adams? All right. Thank you.

I don't think that I have more I don't think I've got more than three to four votes for any part of this tonight. I'm just sort of like looking at my notes, so I'm not inclined to make a motion to approve anything. I think we just got to kick it. Um, yeah, I mean, I hear all of it. Um, all of it is feedback is a gift. Um the you know the only two things I wanted to say and this is mostly just to kind of put my cards on the table uh on two issues. Um I I alluded to this in my comments when we voted to approve the plan and send it to council. I think that engaging in a three-year public engagement and planning process entitles a public body to take the position that they've engaged in. robot robust is not even I think it's an understatement um that they've engaged in robust public engagement with respect to how the public views what they're doing. What I mean by that is not that we are not going to conduct future public engagement. What I mean by that is I I expect that on some issues we can look to the plan itself and the public engagement that we did in connection with that and rely on that and move forward and other communities and this is in the cases memo other communities like Kalamazoo and Minneapolis when they finished with their planning process they proceeded immediately to resoning they didn't wait they didn't conduct additional public engagement beyond the hearings and meetings that might be required by law they said on these issues, we're ready to go. That's what a plan is for. So, there are, I think, questions that I think we have more than sufficient public feedback to proceed to the resoning stage. That's part of the reason why I felt like hub made sense to go first because it felt like for me I have far there's certainly complexities and many of you have pointed them out like it's not I'm not saying it's an easy exercise. Um, but I again I suspect that when we get to transition and

residential, we along with members of council are going to want neighborhood meetings. They're going to want postcards. There's other things that may pop up at that point that are going to take a lot of time. So, what I didn't want to do looking at that, it was sort of an exercise in we have a three-year timing that we that's self-imposed, right? It's in our document. It's in the document that the council approved. I want to respect that and move in an orderly fashion towards doing it. And that meant, you know, um where do I want to spend my calories? Where's where can we spend the time most productively? It felt like residential and transition later on. So that's that's point one. And the other point that I wanted to make, um I worry that we and I think everybody's been candid in their thoughts. I'll be candid in mine. I don't want to subject the task of zoning reform to a level of scrutiny and evidentiary rigor that we didn't apply to the act of creating the dysfunctional, overly complicated patchwork of zoning that has made huge sections of the city non-conforming. That feels inappropriate to me. Like this this is normal legislative work. State law requires that we create this plan in advance of that legislative work. And it's good that we did it, but This is normal legislation as just speaking as like a practicing attorney like this just feels like normal legislative work. So it's not any different from any sort of federal, state, or local legislation. Um, and we we made a bunch of zones that we think aren't doing good things for us. And I I think we ought to be careful with how we change those zones. But I I don't want to be a hundred times more plotting about the act of doing what we're about to do than we were in creating these original zones which are not good. That's that's all I just don't want to have two different standards for

this. That's a one-way I think of that as a one-way ratchet, right? Like that's a status quo bias baked into our work and I just I don't want to do that. Care careful is good but one way sticky like sticky status quo bias is not good. So, Commissioner Adams, if I could, um, I heard you say you were whipping votes and you thought there were four, uh, you couldn't get more than four in any direction. Would you like to make a simple motion around the prioritization of hub to see where the table is to validate those counts?

Sure. I I don't if that's something we can procedurally do just to guess where people are at. I I I'm not even sure I've got four to be honest with you. I I mean, you and I are counting. It's just whether or not our counts are right. Okay. Um so, yeah. Um I'll I'm a little bit awkward at this, but I'll straw. Is this a straw pole or is this an actual

I don't know. What's the tenor of the table? Do we want to do a straw pull? Do we want to do an actual motion? And we're not taking up anything right now, but at most what we would be doing, Mr. Leonard, is giving direction to staff of our work plan. So that wouldn't actually require a v a roll call vote. Correct.

I mean, can I could I suggest that I'm hearing some questions and some diversity of opinion? One of the things that I could commit to you as planning staff is when we come to that work session, we could come with ideas about how we could prioritize hub as part of the implementation of this plan. I mean, if [clears throat] if that's the kind of motion you're you're getting at, I don't I think what we're hearing is that there's a specificity in this memo. I don't know that there's a unanimous um committee that everybody's hit is ready to say yes, hub should happen first. I'm hearing enough of that. I'm happy just to take this conversation and my intention is sort of like Commissioner Mills is talking about I my intention is to sort of lay out a couple of approaches or some questions about approaches and one of from this dialogue one of the things I can commit to you is let me come to you and the commission with how how can we elevate hub early in the process what was the most viable way that that looks like I I can do that without any straw poll or motion um again I want to be honest I'm I'd also like to just provide other alternatives as well, but I think as as indicated, I think where wherever you land, that'll hopefully give a little bit more assurityity that the the prioritization that that you've taken is feels like the right one.

Yeah. And and just for the table, I'm just looking to give direction, not resolve all of the questions that we delighted. I think those questions still remain like what is what does the public engagement look like? I imagine once we put to together a a schedule there will be a notice whether that notice goes out on engage or whether it goes out on the agendas and they'll always either have dedicated public comments or they'll have public hearings depending on what it is we're discussing. So we're not precluding anything. It's just where are we going is where I was looking uh to get some direction and we could do that through a motion, a straw poll or Mr. Leonard has weighed in and said I've listened to the conversation and I've heard you say that hub is something you would like us to consider and so we'll do that. So there are three of you and I'm going to start with Mills, Norton and then Weatherbe, but if you're good Mills you can push to uh Nordon. It it was a comment that I was going to say before about hub and actually it's what Commissioner Lee was saying that stuck with me. I've written down like and this was actually from either the last meeting or the time before when we had that re uh reszoning that went from an R1D to an R2A.

And I've just done some comparison like in terms of like simplicity like that's pretty darn simple. It actually doesn't change the setbacks in most places. It just makes it real clear like duplexes are allowed. Anyway, I'm I wonder we already have most of our density is in is either already downtown where there is a hub or it's already zoned in TC1 to allow for a whole bunch more. And yes, this is expanding it, but it's actually only expanding on the margins. I don't actually know if that's her biggest bang for the buck. [laughter] Um, [clears throat] and if there's something a little bit simple like and I understand controversy controversy wise why it's an easy thing to check off the list but I that's where I would just before I would want to commit to like yes we're going to spend the time on this. That's the thing that I want to what you said Commissioner Lee is sticking in my brain. So thanks

Commissioner Norton then Commissioner Weatherbe. I was going to suggest that I'm I'm quite sure Steph's been taking really good notes about all these comments. And so we've all asked for a number of things that we think need to happen at the same time as we're thinking about starting the resoning process. So I think that means kind of a work plan of how we're going to organize all of this and pull it together. That's what I would ask staff to do is how to organize everything we've talked about into a coherent work plan. And maybe it might be helpful to think about in the context of focusing on hub first just to make it more of a concrete exercise. So that might be a fruitful thing way to approach it but in the process might realize no actually that's not the right place to start. So I don't I guess I would suggest I don't know that we need a motion other than just kind of confirming what Mr. Leonard just told us that he can kind of pull all of this together and come up with a coherent work plan for us to start to jump into this in earnest.

Thank you, Commissioner Norton. Commissioner Weatherbe. Yeah, I just like to agree with Commissioner Mills is um I I just don't know that hub is our our best bet. I think it might be the e we might think it's the easiest right now, but maybe we want to do something different. And so that's why I am a little bit hesitant to just say, "Hey, let's focus on hub because I I don't know if that's really where we want to focus."

Commissioner Lee, [clears throat] for for me, I think about what organizational conditions are needed for staff. So I really am kind of more thinking about establishing what resources are needed for staff to go through this. So I would love to see an effective process roadmap. I think we've all kind of asked what that does that need to look like uh a schedule that we can adhere to um based on that road map. Um the the normative public engagement that would be um sufficient for uh this kind of a process again and case studies. Um, not that I'm asking for like the commissioning of like a formal reasonzoning study, although that is something that it looks like Minneapolis undertook during um, what they did. Um, but more so I'm really thinking about from their bandwidth and resources. Do you have what you need and do we need to ask for something from council? Um, similar to how we had uh, engaged with gosh, I'm already forgetting the contractor. Who's contractor? interface studios. Yeah, thank you. Um

and so yeah, I'm just thinking about what organizational conditions are needed. So coordination, motivation, and um competence like do we do we have uh is there like a specific area that we need to focus on? Um and then yeah just just establishing the the road map of things and I and Commissioner Mills you my thinking is like if you could change something really simple that delivers a ton like that's kind of what I because there's 288 pages there's a lot of references like this is this is a I understand this is a legislative process but it seem it it's pretty complex because think about how many times we're actually amending things to just make things consistent again right so I I do want to make sure that like we have a good consideration of uh what does that process look like? Do we does staff have the resources they need to execute this? And that's kind of where my head is at right now. So, I think going through to the work session, um I'm I'm not sure yet that I'm like prepared to say like my my gut tells me hub is impactful, but I'm wondering if there's even more simplistic simpler changes that may be even more effective and I just I don't have enough information yet to make that kind of a determination. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Commissioner Dish. So, I think I did ask some questions which I think you wrote down. So, I'm not feeling like I need to repeat those, but I did want to also add that um I would like to hear about engagement options and I think that we are talking about engagement that is meaningful. I I'm just I think underscoring what Commissioner Norton said, but that recognizes that we did just go through an extensive planning process. And so we are not starting from scratch, but uh um but we do learn we did learn when we were doing TC1. We learned from those engagement sessions and I think we

should learn in the same way. Um and then I would like to um hear a strategy about the fourth Tuesdays. I'm some of them I'm not here, but I will give all of my Tuesdays for the rest of my life to get this done. [laughter] Little do you know, my life is shorter than No, I'm just kidding. Um, but you keep mentioning that, Council Member Ditch, [laughter] um, I'm I'm starting to get concerned.

I I'm [laughter] sorry. I shouldn't have thrown that in. Um, but what I mean to say is I think that if as we did with the club when we were finishing it, we identified that those were meetings that we could cannibalize and we cannibalized our work sessions too so that they could be voting meetings and um I would you know obviously we did that a little bit later so there was momentum and it wasn't like giving ourselves a bunch of meetings where there was no progress made in between and that's a waste. So, I think staff needs to think about pace and cadence, but I would like to see us ma making a plan ahead if we're going to start using those and how we can use those because I uh we don't want to slow things down waiting for this thing that only happens once every other month. That would take a long time.

Commissioner Hammermith, thank you. Um, well, I guess I will just chime in to say I I liked what Mr. Leonard proposed. I also don't think I would have been ready to vote yes for sure hub. Kind of like Commissioner Lee. I think my gut says that, but then hearing like what Commissioner Mills just said, like maybe maybe not. Um, so hearing something at the work session, I think as you had outlined with a couple of different options, I think would be really helpful. Thanks, Commissioner Adams. Are you okay with uh what you've heard at the table? Are you okay with Mr. Leonard taking the feedback he's received, incorporating that, and then presenting that back to us at our work session.

All right. So, with that, uh, we will conclude this, uh, agenda item. Oh, I'm sorry. Yes, Mr. Leonard. If if I could just reiterate, I think you brought this up. I brought it up at the manager report. Who is we you? Commissioner White. Okay. I'm sorry. I just want to make sure.

Uh, I'll get to it. You brought up if every commissioner could identify a couple areas. I I just want to as a reminder between now and then if there is a piece of information a question you have um please uh keep in mind if you say please provide the list of all the current properties that are in a proposed hub district and their date of construction. I don't know how quickly I can put that together but don't let that stop the question. If there are questions or information that you think would be helpful for that discussion please send me a note. We will do our best to make sure that we're putting that together so that by the time not only are you considering options I have done all I can to eliminate any barriers from you saying all right this is the direction I want to see this on our next agenda and let's get started on it. So just a reminder if you have questions if there's information if there's data that you think would be helpful for that discussion please don't hesitate to ask.

Thank you Mr. Leonard. All right we will move on to item 11A other business. There is none. Wait, wait. Make sure I didn't skip anything. Okay. Uh 11A. Other business. There is none. Which brings us to item number 12. Public comment on any issue. This is the second opportunity for anyone to speak to us for up to 3 minutes on any issue. We'll first hear from those of you who are present in chambers. Then we'll turn to remote participants. To speak remotely, press star 9 if on phone or the raise hand feature if on Zoom. For phone access, dial 877-853-5247 and enter meeting ID 977-6613 226. City staff will identify callers by the last three digits of their phone number or by name if on Zoom. You will hear an announcement when it's your turn to speak. Please ensure you're in a quiet area and mute any background noise. For all participants, whether in chambers or online, please state your name and address at the beginning of your comments. Is there anyone in chambers who'd like to address us at this time? Mr. Rhodess, come on up. Tim Rhodess, 448 South First Street. Um, I've heard many a few people talk about elders not being able to downsize and of course Headley is one of the problems with that and I would suggest that uh although a lot of people think Headley has created problems with tax revenue and so on, I would suggest looking at it the other way. That the way to look at it that would probably require constitutional amendment but we has to start someplace. What if you could take your Headley reduction, your percentage reduction, and move it to a new place if you're downsizing?

So, yes, I would uh there would be a savings at that new place, but for the city, somebody's going to buy my home and they're going to be reset. And so, the city's going to get, let's say, six or $8,000 more in taxes for my residents. I get a smaller place, I get deported. And you could start to get a churn. We could start to get movement where the uh elderly can rightsize, can get into a better home. And even though on its face it looks like you're giving people this tax break, giving boomers like me a tax break, but it's to downsize and to make more housing available. and it won't cost the city anything if I save some money on the new place, but it's more than made up for on the purchase of my current house. Just a thought. I think it's I think it's something that could really work if we just kind of think outside the box. Thank you.

Thank you so much.

Good evening again, Kirk Westfall, 3505 Charter Place. Um, I thought this was a great discussion. I I enjoyed the uh ideas that were bounced around. Um, I think there's it's a good point that a lot of the hub, especially downtown hub that's already been mapped out, uh, petitioners are going to be coming and getting those resonings. Um, and I think it's been the point's been made before. It's why the, uh, kind of downtown hub adjacent transition is so important, I think. um to do quickly. Um I'm not against concurrently, you know, changing the unit counts [snorts] and heights in uh all the R districts, you know, all at once. That's that'd be great. And I can just flip that switch. Um but uh I I I would encourage you for you know since this discussion is being uh pushed to next month um that perhaps there's uh an ability to move make some decisions at the table to a schedule and to avenues that you would like to push forward and hopefully there can be some communication in the meantime stuff put in legisar some uh proposals for that but um because already if if this is a discussion that is going to start at the next month's meeting then when is the decision time to set a timetable and so on so I hope some of these things can go concurrently thanks

thank you Mr. Westful. Is there anyone else in chambers? You all have been here the whole night. Would you like to say anything? Do you get extra credit if you speak? No, you don't get extra credit if you speak. I'm so sorry. I would give you extra credit. [laughter] Wait, is your professor here? Dick, come on. [laughter] Credit I I would just give them a point or two. So it it may not help [laughter] conversation in class.

I bet you will. [gasps] Don't let him uh you know let him off the hook uh easily when you do talk to him tomorrow. Grill them. Mr. Leonard, do we have online participants? We do.

Do they like would they like to speak? Caller with the phone number ending with 367. You can press star six to unmute and address the planning commission for up to three minutes. Caller with ending with 367. Press star six. There you go. Go ahead. Caller. Uh, you've reached planning commission radio.

Caller ending with the phone number with 367. You can address the commission. This is Brian Chambers. Can you hear me now? Yes, we can hear you, Mr. Chambers. Go ahead.

Thank you. Sorry about that. Uh, so first of all, uh, thank you for all of your time and dedication. Congrats for getting the comprehensive plan um, together uh, completed and then passed uh, by city council. I even thanked city council and since we're talking about whether or not a class is ongoing in there, I said that they were actually a senior master's class in urban planning. I don't know if that was too much too far. You guys all have urban planning backgrounds to some degree or not, but my hats off to council because they also um dove in and put their arms around this. Um my one comment in terms of um what to move on first uh you know it's a trade-off, right? you know, what is the easiest to process? Um, where is the most political resistance? I get it. Um, but the other thing I want to emphasize is equity. What would have the greatest equity impact in order to allow for more housing development? And I'm going to suggest that it's um the general density, the missing middle. Um making that available now sooner rather than later would allow, for example, the land trust to continue to proceed on a buy basis for duplexes and triplexes. Otherwise, we're going to come back and ask for a special ordinance just for land trust. And then we'll hear, oh no, we you know, the city doesn't know how to manage land trust properties and we went through that, right? I on for the text amendment on ADUs. Um but we desperately need to have equalsized duplexes being available for the land trust as well as triplexes. And um you know I think the equity effect across all of uh the uh residential areas is going to be huge once um all of the ordinance language is developed and passed. So I'm just asking you to take

an equity lens as well as a political feasibility and timing execution lens to your question on where to start. Um because you know that's what this is all about, right? Equity to a very high degree. So not that you weren't thinking that while you were holding all of your discussions earlier, but I'm I'm not sure it was necessarily at the forefront. I heard other issues come forward. So that's my suggestion. Um the the land trust will be coming back with an ordinance change request if you defer um on the um residential duplexes and triplexes because we can't wait. And please don't do a moratorum on those developments. Um you know I I don't necessarily feel it's appropriate in terms of the nonprofit and the um uh land trust but there is the aspect of deal flow. you know, we maintain our continuity and going business concern even though we're a nonprofit by continuing to do development

and please don't stop that process. I mean that that that'll grind us to a halt and we'll have to likely disband and then pick up again. Don't do that. Please, if you understand my there. Uh so, thank you very much. Congrats. I really appreciate the the desire and u the interest in moving this forward. And also um if you haven't heard I'm gonna be speaking on the land use plan. Thank you Dr. Chambers. Thank you so much and maybe you'll join us. Oh I thought you had stopped.

Are you hedging? I think I pushed the wrong button. Oh [laughter] good man. You have three minutes to address the planning question. I hope.

Hi. Yeah, Adam Goodman, uh, 400 Virginia Avenue again. Um, so interesting discussion. Um, two two things kind of stood out to me. I was also kind of intrigued by Commissioner Lee. um kind of you know if I heard right posing the question of like what if we just you know immediately amended the the use table to allow triplexes in all residential zones. I mean that that is something that the comprehensive plan makes a completely unambiguous statement amount about and I think that you know writing that ordinance amendment should be relatively straightforward. My one concern of course is that um changing the use table without also you know a a broader revision to our area height and placement standards could mean uh that we are legalizing housing in theory but not in practice. Um, however, I think, you know, doing these things, doing one of these, doing one of these things is fine as long as we have a commitment to get around doing the other um before too long. Um, so it's definitely, you know, I I kind of like that idea and, you know, as Mr. Chambers said, it it could be helpful to some folks who are trying to do this work right now. The other thing that stood out to me was a little bit of discussion about um height incentives for sustainability and affordability. I just want to point out that we have a height incentive for uh sust sustainability that is working right now. Um, we've gotten several all electric buildings proposed and I think some of them are under construction now along the southeast corridor um because of the 30% bonus and you know this the the language in the UDC on that's a

little bit muddy but the as I understand it even though it's got some wiggle room it seems to have some wiggle room that bonus actually does require buildings to be all electric unless DTE says they cannot service the building, right? Um, so, you know, I know this is a topic that came up at OC. Um, you know, kind of as a like, oh, we need to fix these these uh height bonuses. I'm I'm not sure there's on the sustainability one at least, I'm not sure there's anything to be fixed. It seems to be working perfectly. We're actually getting what we want out of this. Um,

30 more. you know, just I I'd encourage I'd encourage you not to mess with something that's working. Um, and instead, you know, just just see how it might be made to work um outside of like a, you know, single twob block area in in downtown. Um, it's all for now. Um, again, I urge you to, you know, get get moving in some direction as quickly as you reasonably can. Um, even if that's not tonight, as soon as you reasonably can. Thank you.

Thank you. I just want to give one minute in case I flubbed any buttons for any additional speakers that would like to raise their hand. A minute's a long time, Mr. Hunter. All right. 10 seconds. Okay. Ah,

Alex Low, you have up to three minutes to address the planning commission.

Hi, this is Alex Low. Um, just want to say thank you to uh Mr. Leonard for uh for attempting to unmute uh to unmute me before I had my hand raised there. Uh shows great confidence in in my persistence. Um, I do agree with uh with Commissioner Lee that the uh triplexes are uh uh allowing triplexes everywhere is very clearly stated in the comprehensive plan that was passed by city council last night. So, um let's let's do that at the next meeting. Should be a pretty simple UDC change. Thank you. Thank you. No other hands raised. Thank you, Mr. Leonard. I will close the public comment and move us to agenda item 13. Commissioner proposed business. Is there any? Seeing none, I'll entertain a motion. Oh, wait. Commissioner proposed business. Commissioner Lee, or were you trying to adjurnn?

No, no. I was actually Yes. Commissioner proposed business. Okay. [laughter] I just want to say thank you to everybody here, everyone that attended. Um, this has been a long three-ish years. So, just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart. Lot lot of hard work. Thank you. Any other commissioner proposed business? I'll entertain a motion to adjurnn. Commissioner Mills and Commissioner Adams moved and seconded. Making sure Mr. learner has enough time to write that down. All those in favor say I. I. Any oppose? We are ajourned. [laughter]