Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Planning Commission meeting to order. The first item of business is the approval of the agenda. Any changes from staff?

Madam Chair, we have no changes for you tonight at this time.

Thank you. Any changes from the commissioners?

Move approval.

Second.

Move by approval was by Commissioner Schindler, seconded by Commissioner Scanlon. Any discussion? If not, all in favor say aye. Aye. Oppose? Nay. Motion carries. The next item of business is the approval of the consent agenda. Consent agenda items are considered routine and will be enacted with a single motion without discussion unless a commissioner or citizen requests to have any item separately considered. It will then be moved to the regular agenda for consideration. Can I get a motion of approval?

So moved. Second.

Commissioner Scanlon moved that, and Commissioner Hala seconded. Any discussion? If not, all in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Motion carries. We do not have any public hearings tonight, so that brings us to our land use action items, which is 5A, the sketch plan for Village Pointe Plaza, lot two, block one. Hello, Sydney.

Good evening, Chair Kurtz and Commissioners. Tonight, I'll be presenting to you a sketch plan for Village Pointe Plaza, Lot 2, Block 1. Specifically, you're going to review and consider a sketch plan of an 80-unit continuum of care facility and commercial building on the subject property. The site is located within Central Village. It's just west of Galaxy Avenue and just east of the existing Zavago Senior Housing Cooperative. The property is within PD 739 Zone 4. This plan development encompasses the Central Village neighborhood. Subzone 4 includes uses primarily for retail uses and then limited office uses. A continuum of care facility is currently not a permitted use. So if this project were to move forward, that would need to include some sort of amendment to that subzone or rezoning to a different zone within PD 739. This plan development is subject to the Central Village Plan guidelines, the requirements within PD 739, and then also just general zoning requirements in Chapter 155. To give some background, the original approval of this plat was approved in 2018. The approvals also included the site plan building permit authorization for the Zabago site, which is located on lot one. And then lot two included assumed future uses for retail, restaurant, and office uses throughout a couple of commercial buildings. At the time of approvals, it also included an amendment to the plan development. These two properties were in different subzones. They were rezoned, and part of those amendments also included changes. So originally, it would need to be vertical mixed use. Those amendments changed that to horizontal mixed use across a planned area rather than the vertical mixed use on two separate lots. So that's how it allowed for the residential use on lot one and then the assumed future commercial uses on lot two. The site plan that we have submitted and for your review today includes a 67,000 square foot continuum of care facility, which includes 45 assisted living units and then 35 memory care units. The site plan also shows a small 2,000 square foot retail building. I do not believe that there is an intended user at this time, so it would be built on a speculative basis. It also includes access from the existing access points off of 153rd Street West and then Founders Lane. There would be no new accesses as part of this project. The primary concerns and comments that staff have for the site plan at this time, number one being the retail building. The retail building isn't necessarily any sort of requirement within the plan development as a separate freestanding building. Staff does have concerns on the feasibility of a freestanding retail use at this time. There has been no users that have gone into this vacant site for years, so there are concerns that that might not be filled out right away. If the applicant were to move forward with the retail use, staff would suggest seeing that as either an end cap to the existing building or incorporate it on the first floor of the continuum of care facility. The next comment would be a pedestrian connection throughout the site. Central Village is a highly pedestrian-oriented neighborhood, so staff would like to see a connection from 153rd Street West down to Founders Lane South. That incorporates wayfinding as well for a mid-block pedestrian connection. And then lastly, for parking, there is no minimum parking requirement for this specific use within our city code. So we would want to see some sort of parking analysis or parking study that goes over the amount of stalls that would be needed for this use, and then staff would analyze that. The renderings that were submitted show primarily architecture on the interior of the site. The narrative submitted indicated that the materials would be fiber cement board, e-fist, stone veneer, and brick veneer, and then also wood siding. Staff would like to see renderings and elevations of the elevations along Galaxy Avenue and then Founders Lane within the central village plan and the guidelines within the PD. Architectural features need to be consistent across all sides of the building. Additionally, prominent features need to be focused along Galaxy Avenue and other public right-of-way, so we would like to see that to ensure that there are the more prominent features located on those roadways. I went over quite a few of these staff comments in previous slides, but just to go over the main question that we have for tonight that we'd like the Planning Commission to comment on and provide feedback to the applicant is the continuum of care use. So it's currently not permitted. Again, if this project were to move forward, there would need to be some sort of amendment or rezoning to allow that. So what staff and the applicant would like to know is any sort of questions or concerns you have for that proposed use. Again, went over most of these in the previous slides. Then lastly, this is not a full review of this proposed project, so there would be significant additional submittals that we would need to review. This would also, if this were to move forward, this would include a public hearing, so there would be a public comment period in the future, again, if this were to move forward. So to reiterate for tonight, this is just received feedback for the applicant and it's not for formal consideration. The Planning Commission is asked to identify any specific zoning questions or issues you might have with the project. Staff would not recommend saying whether you would approve or deny the project, just simply provide questions and comments on the proposed use and project. and with that we do have the applicant here tonight um they have prepared a presentation so i can either take questions now or we can wait until after their presentation as well maybe we'll wait till after his presentation questions okay thank you thanks sydney applicant

Thank you, Chair and the Commission.

Is your title, is it Planning Director? No, we've been a couple years. Oh, yeah, yeah.

That's it. Not yet. Yeah. Pretty soon, I think. I'm Ben Krizak. I'm with Hempel Real Estate. We've been involved in Apple Valley Real Estate for over 10 years. We've developed four different properties in the city, including several retail properties. And this is my business partner on the project, because you can...

Yeah, I'm Lucas Larson. I own Galahad Development and Coretta Senior Living. I've been developing senior living for going on 12 years. I used to work for a large national building, probably recognized them in town. And started Galahad and Coretta in 2020, since 2 of which have been with Hempel, Ben and his brother, Josh. We've developed 5 since then we have 4 buildings open and 1 under construction outside of Milwaukee in the Brookfield area. Our kind of core operating tenant is to serve our neighbors as ourselves. And so we operate under the. Um, under the mindset of trying to dovetail, um, the city's perspective, um, and, and the residents perspectives with. Our perspectives and our residents perspectives, um, so, um, thanks for the opportunity for having us tonight. I mean, I'm, I'm definitely curious to get get feedback on this. I appreciate the opportunity to do it. So early. Um, we don't have that at a lot of at a lot of cities and, uh, it's very helpful. So. If you have any initial comments or concerns or feedback, I'd love to jot those down and perhaps even answer some questions off the cuff here if you have them.

But first, I've got about 45 minutes of slides to go through, so we'll get through those quick. But we just wanted to kind of... explain how we got to senior housing on the site and how we think it fits in the community and wanted to get, you know, obviously maybe a vibe check on what works here. But like I said, we've been doing retail in the city, built four strip centers in the last 10 years, all been really successful and well received. Those two locations have been on Cedar and on Pilot Knob. Those we find are kind of more of the main traffic fairs in addition to County Road 42. And on this section of Galaxy, as you continue down south, it does tee. I think it's at 160th. But it tees, and that really decreases the traffic on that road. Well, it's closer to 15,000 cars per day up by Culver's. It drops down to about 6,000 cars towards the end of that street, towards us. And compared to Cedar, which is 50,000 cars a day, Pilot Knob, which is over 30,000 cars per day, 42, I think is around 40,000, 50,000. So it's much higher, triple to more than that traffic. And so that's why we think retail has had a tough time taking off at this particular intersection. So we wanted to walk through some neighboring property uses and talk and compare and contrast kind of some similarities of our proposed project to those. So obviously here's the site located right off the Galaxy. So we zoom in. So you have a variety of different types of uses in this area. We got a hotel, we got a Culver's, the super cool new Pickle Hall thing that's opening soon. There's several apartment buildings, there's Park, there's the mixed-use office retail building. So as we look at each different quadrant of this intersection, to the east we have the two-story office retail building. It was built about 20 years ago. We have a few vacancies, but it's there. Yeah, it's nice looking. And then we have a residential to the northeast purely apartment building called Galante. To the north, there's really a traditional strip mall, which is a one-story building with actually the parking in the front. Residential to the southeast, this is a three-story building, somewhat similar to what we're thinking. And to the south and southwest, there's some townhomes, and then there's also an apartment building called Weiser. And then directly to the west, which we think is a great fit, is a senior co-op that is adjacent to the property and does share a parking. There's some shared parking between the two properties. It's a couple of buildings that we built. I don't know why I put these in here, but we do nice. We like to really go above and beyond on the architecture component, additional landscaping, try to more than meet the code. We like to exceed it. another one we built on cedar also a successful project and so then we get to you know our proposed plan um the back side will which is really we we also view as the front side facing galaxy we'll have similar architecture um agree that we we could move some of these towers to on that side to make that more prominent feature also with that retail building there you know we're not married to that plan certainly don't need a curb cut there and if we didn't build that building we probably would just add additional green space we do have more than adequate parking for this facility typical facility is about 30 employees although they don't all work at the same time there's some visitors almost none of the residents drive particularly the memory care, but even assisted living. If you're in this facility, you're taking the shuttle bus that's provided for free?

Yeah, if you don't mind. Our average resident or our typical profile is an 85-year-old widow. And she has at least two, we call them ADLs, needs for help with activities of daily living, so things like eating and dressing. Yeah. generally speaking everybody moving into our building requires some level of care um just some residents require more than others so we get a few folks bringing cars in a building like this you might have 10 or 15 cars that residents bring but they never drive them it's more of a something to kind of keep their spirits up and make them feel like they still have some freedom and some dignity Um, and beyond that, we have, as Ben said, 25 to 30 FTEs over 3 shifts. Our busiest shift usually has around 15. That would be a shift and the balance of our traffic is simply visitors in and out during the day and it's never super intense. So. From a, from a city's perspective, it's kind of nice because we bring in. strong tax base and jobs but we don't bring in the intensity of like a retail building or like a market rate multifamily building so you kind of in a way get high care system like what we

And I'd also like to comment on the two-story component. We think this brings in and really mirrors across the street to the east. But also, this is a requirement of the state building code. Is that correct?

What is that? I'm sorry.

The two-story component.

Yeah, yeah. So a couple of years ago, the state limited stick frame assisted living, the two stories. and memory care actually to one story. And so we can only have memory care on the first story here now, and then the rest of the building would be assisted. And so we are limited by state building. And there's sort of a, they dovetail together, but state building licensing requirements now limit us to a two-story building.

That's to ensure that everyone can get out in any sort of emergency.

Yeah, that's the thought process.

Yeah, additional green space we think would be great. So if we could eliminate the retail building and do green space, I think that would be great.

That would be advantageous. Yeah, I think we I think we originally proposed the retail just given the, you know, reading through the existing code and trying to really bridge the gap between, you know, what I offer and then what, you know, the existing code sort of wanted to see here. But I know my residents would love to have a little bit more green space here. And just given the challenges that retail has seen on this particular site, you know, I think it probably would be better not to have it, but if the city sort of deems that as necessary, then we can explore that further.

This is the site plan, I think, which we already touched on. Because plenty of parking really won't impact the adjacent properties to the west. There's not going to be a lot of traffic. There's not loud music at night. There's not much going on.

There's no cameras at my building. Yeah. So the logic here is, so first off, we don't build underground parking garages. They're extremely expensive. And because our residents don't drive their cars, we don't get to see them. Add to our residents is typically what happened if you build an underground parking garage, it's a nice amenity, but the cost is always baked into the rent somehow. And we're trying to be, we're trying to deliver excellent care and amenities at. Somewhat affordable price, I mean, these buildings just. Care just gets so expensive as it is so. We typically park, and if we were to continue on through this process, we'd love to explore. We could explore this further with staff, but we typically park between, like, 35 and 50 stalls. Our logic here was just given on the existing. Retail and then the neighbor used to just fit our building on the site and in a way that we think would would be. Advantageous and then and then fill out the rest of the site with parking. So we ended up with around 62 stalls here. Um. from my perspective, I, that would be more than adequate for our operation, but as I said, we can work through that further.

So this is Lucas's portion where his break book of just some, you know, some of the interior design. So it's meant to look, um, high end homey, certainly not, you know, yeah. They look like a nursing home. Yeah. Very resident, very resident. It's a senior care facility.

I was, we, we spent a lot of time ensuring that this feels like for residents and it becomes like a place of community and it's not just a place to go to, like. For hospice and so we really try to, um. We build an efficient building from an overall square footage standpoint, but that allows us to make it feel really nice and comfortable. And these would be our buildings that we built with Happel. One is down in La Crosse. This one is actually up in the Green Bay area. The interior aesthetic would definitely carry over.

This is one of the units. This shows there's actually some two-bedroom units. There's some single units as well.

Yeah, we have a mix. Well, the way that we do it, just for your edification, is our high-acuity assisted living and memory care units are all studios. And then our assisted living units are a mix of 1 bed 1 bed down and 2 bed units. We're all pretty efficient units. Most of the people who are who are moving into the 2 bed units are actually single on the 2nd bedroom or even the Dan is just like an activity room or for family when they're visiting. We have, I think our, our 2nd person, right? Is our incidents is around. 10 or 15%, so we don't have a ton of 2nd person.

So, um, just to talk through some of the staff comments and. Kind of our thoughts on each 1 of them, um, you know, we think it fits well in that neighborhood. I think it, um, there's a lot of different types of housing in the neighborhood already. Um, and we think this fits kind of.

Right in the sweet spot for what it's worth. I think this is a perfect adjacency to a 55 co op. Those people are eventually as their age they're going to want to stay in the neighborhood and to be able to move right next door if and when they need care I think is a huge advantage for those people.

Talk about the retail building already we're okay eliminating making that additional green space. This comes to the pedestrian connection certainly this is sketch plan so we'll refine the plans and that will certainly be included. parking and access we don't need any additional access points and what already exists off of founder circle if if we'd like to look at trimming back the parking because you said we're open to that architectural features will meet all the design requirements that are required for this district which are more stringent I think than the rest of the city in general And then stormwater, I know there's offsite ponding for storage, but treatment can also be done on site. We should have more than enough space for that. So I just threw some stats in here. the types of employees that it's really like, it's a care facility. So that's looks similar to like a dental office, you know, receptionist, medical director, or doctor, sometimes marketing, nursing, chefs, cooks, janitorial, and they even have a hair salon. So stylist on on staff are contracted. Um, I think this will shake out around 80 units. And the tax base creation is over 10 million. Probably a little higher.

Yeah, it would be higher than that.

Yeah, but good starting point. So yeah, this is a sketch plan. So obviously, we want to hear feedback and comments and concerns and questions.

I want to preface, too. I want to preface the renderings. It will definitely change. They'll change some once we start to align windows with units, really start to develop the exterior. This is super early on. I think Ben maybe even just used AI to try to give you an idea of what a quality building would look like here. So I wouldn't expect it to look perfect, exactly like this, but we'll definitely meet the code and the intent of our discussions here with respect to quality. So that won't be an issue at all.

I got Lucas's name and I apologize. I'm Ben. Sorry. Very nice presentation. Thank you. Kind of hits home for me right now because my mom's going to be 83 and a widower and definitely needs memory care. So I'm grateful that you guys have these wonderful places for our parents and grandparents to go into. I have a few questions. Maybe next time around or if we proceed with this, I would like a front view. Did I miss a front view from Galaxy? I saw all the side views, but I didn't see a front view.

We'll provide that.

Okay. And then I might have missed this because I was writing when you were probably talking about it, but what was that middle building that's in the parking lot?

Oh, that was a retail building? So is that what you were talking about? Yeah, that can be a limit. It's like a 2,000 square foot.

I figured you did, but I wanted to make sure. It'd be kind of cool if you had something there that would... Yeah, bring the people over and stuff like that. Um, I'll ask some questions for Sydney. Um, what else did I want to ask you? So, even in the assisted living, there is no driving. I'm going to assume they don't drive mostly in the assisted living, but there's no reason for cars for the assisted living. Very limited, very limited.

They will, they will bring some, they will generally generally use them. We have, we have, like, a little bus that we provide scheduled transportation several times a week.

Okay.

Probably be Waymo pretty soon.

Do you have safety? I'm guessing it's a busy street there for wandering. I mean, I know with dementia and Alzheimer's, there's a lot of wanderers. I imagine you have them with... Memory care is controlled access. Right, with a bracelet on or whatever. Although my grandmother did get through.

Everything's very, very...

um okay i'll let somebody else go commissioner schindler sure um you somewhat answered my question a little bit when you said that the rendering might not be exactly how it's going to be i noticed they have really large windows all over the place these are all people's homes right yeah yeah once we once our architect places each room um within the inside we haven't designed inside

Because I'm imagining all the shades would be drawn. Yeah, the windows are not going to be this large. They're going to be much more residential in nature. This feels to me, at least this interior portion, feels to me much more commercial or even.

Yeah, that's the feeling I got because that huge entrance area, is that the main entrance?

Yeah, so we do typically have some retail store front glass at our entrance and an automatic door and stuff. It's not this grand. It feels much more residential in nature. And then above it, we would have units rather than

My biggest concern is the fact that I've been here through this whole process and it's like everything was going to be retail with maybe some shops, some office or residential above it. Well, that clearly wasn't a market that was able to grow. But it just seems like every property moves from retail to housing. housing next to you, housing across the street from you, and it's like, is it really gonna be what this area of town was, what we thought it was going to be? I mean, you're putting in a building with virtually no one that's gonna be shopping in the local places. They're not going to be walking around the shops are.

So, our target market, when we market these buildings is the adult child. And what we want is we want the adult children. Like, I love this area. Because I want the adult children to come shop and go to coffee and go to lunch and I want them to come pick up their their mom. And so we will actually traffic, uh, you know, all the retail and everything in the area and it'll just be indirectly through the adult child. I mean, our residents will, I guess when they go on, when they go on outings with their family.

Right.

Um, but yeah, and then the staff too, and the staff absolutely. Yeah. The staff will definitely utilize, um, the, the retail around.

But, I mean, I, I, I, I mean, I, I think it's. I mean, I'm sure it's going to be a nice building. And, you know, like you said, there's all the levels of living right around there from just regular for rent to 55 plus to co-op and now adding a memory.

Is there any other memory care around there?

I'm trying to think. Just over on Pilot Knob, right?

That's the only one. You'd have to get over to Pilot. I can't remember if any.

Tim, do you know?

I'm trying to think of the name of it over by the tavern.

Oh. Yeah, there's a pillars building kind of to the east.

I believe that's senior care over there.

you know a lot of things are driven by market we've i've learned that sitting on this commission as long as i have um you can have all kinds of wild dreams of what you want but at the end of the day someone wants has to want to build it and has to be able to sell it um so i mean it's i'm just a little disappointed that this area didn't turn out how i kind of was hoping it would but i don't have any problem with this project i think it i think it looks nice i I don't like the idea of the Galaxy Avenue. If it's going to just be small apartment windows with shades drawn, it's not going to really be that exciting. And you're basically not, the shopping kind of ends. Yeah.

There'll be some open areas like a dining room. We'll have a salon.

We'll have a manage on that side of the building.

Yeah. We try to put that on the corner or something.

Yeah. We'll have, I mean, we'll have dining. we still need a program a little bit further, but like the kind of that like main entry area. And then it would be, well, there's actually two main amenity areas. One is dedicated to memory care and then one would be dedicated to assisted living memory care because it's secure. The memory care that we're proposing, do you have the overall site plan? Could you pull that up? Because I could just walk through kind of. At least conceptually what we can show you right here. Yeah. So, like, your memory care, many spaces would be along galaxy on the 1st floor. Um, right at the corner of the building side in the corner and then, um. Where that where it says commons there, and it's all kind of gray or like. yeah like right that's all going to be like dining room and club room and vibrant a lot of that stuff's going to be facing galaxy and it's it will have large like expansive glass for sure i do like that because i last thing i'd want is it just to be like a darkened row you know but um yeah all right thank you

i completely agree with you that what our dream was to have that there and everything but when no one bites at it right now and i the more that i drive well i drive in that area quite a bit anyway i don't know that retail would have been really good there anyway because of the traffic increase and stuff at least here i feel like there isn't going to be additional traffic to it and stuff so commissioner scanlon

Adam chair. Welcome back. Thank you. Yeah. We work together on multiple projects and a couple of questions. I'm not opposed to the idea of doing something with the retail, but what, what have you done any projects like this where you've had a separate retail plot such as this or

We've done a lot of projects with multiple buildings on the site. Sometimes it's medical, sometimes it's retail next to medical, but nothing carbon copy of this, no.

Okay, all right. But I would go along with the city's comment on that, that I'd be concerned with just doing that retail space on its own and what that might be able to bring or not bring, especially with not being directly on Galaxy with... which I'm sure any retailer would want in terms of traffic and visibility and so forth and that kind of goes back to the the comments in the report in terms of you know maybe moving that over to retail or over to the Galaxy area if that's something you choose to do as you move forward with the project and what considering variations you have If you don't go forward with that, and you talked about green space, I think it would be kind of nice to see more back, you know, moving over to the entrance area and, you know, bringing that green space over there. Like you talked, you know, you talk about where the, you know, you come over to see mom and dad or something, you want to go out and sit outside or something that, you know, you develop the space for them to have that versus just being right up on the parking lot.

100% I mean, I would definitely for that. Yeah.

So that's something I would ask you to consider with when you if you're going to move forward with the project. Um, I was interesting when I, when I got this and saw it that you were both doing memory care and, um. Assistant assistant looking Thank you. Um, because the 1 of the other. Keep an eye on me that are one of our other big providers of senior housing have when they did their expansion that was one question I had because that was part of their original concept and they just went with just Straight senior living and that they said, when the current marketplace with Medicare and so forth, and that it just wasn't financially viable. So I'd like to get. Your comment on that that component of it.

Yeah, I mean, we're, we're. basically 100% private pay. We generally only take Medicare if somebody, we'll qualify everybody before they qualify their assets before they come into our building. We try to ensure that They can pay private for their state. If they do run out of money, then we would flip for a short period over to Medicare, Medicaid to keep them in the building. So they don't have a last minute, but it's not like a primary source of our. our revenue again that's more of like a dignity thing it's like really traumatic for an old person to move in the first place but especially when they're on hospice or something the last thing you want to do is move them so yes yes um our financing does not rely on government subsidy or government help so that wouldn't affect

With this building design, where would you foresee deliveries and so forth take place?

Yeah, that's a great question. So it happened on the front side of the building kind of right in that primary commons area. So a truck would come through and we don't have, we have like box trucks, we don't have like huge delivery trailers, and they'll come through two, three times a week maybe, and then garbage. But everything would happen kind of in that internal courtyard.

Okay, yeah, if you could, that'd be something that'd be nice to have a better clear understanding and how that would work for things. We've kind of gone through the parking, you know, that's something that Sydney is going to work with you on and in terms of what that means. You said you're going to probably have maybe about at max 15 staff members there at one time, and they could maybe be encouraged to park in one area versus another for walking and so forth. I had a couple questions, a question for Sydney. I'm done.

Thank you. Commissioner Sandahl. Thank you. Yeah, I actually kind of really like the idea of the retail. And I think it's because I like the picture of it, because it makes me think of like, yeah, bringing my parents down there for coffee or whatever. But I also understand that if it's the market's not there, it's not there. So and I like the idea of the green grass, too. So I think my other thing was mainly for Sydney, just would like, I haven't been on the commission as long as some of these others, and so just understanding the history of what the reasoning behind wanting the retail rather than an assisted living memory care facility, I think would be helpful. We'll have Sydney explain that. Yeah.

Thank you. Just a little background on myself. My father is 88 years old. He's not in memory care, but there is a memory care attached. He's in independent living. And that side of the building has got an entryway where they have, well, they've got some clear glass windows. arch where people go out and they they've got some metal benches and some green space out there and it's used quite a bit if that's something that you might think of um i'm not in the architecture business bill uh towards your entrance that's a nice place for the family to meet and and come out there yes yeah so so this point on here this little green because that green here ben and i went back and forth on how we're going to lay that lay out this building and

When we originally laid it out, it was like, we really need to do retail. We really need to do retail. How do we accommodate it on the site? And there was this tension here because I'm like, Ben, I need green space for my memory care people. And so the way that we laid this out, you see the light green area on the south of the plan. So that's right off the memory care common area and dining room. And so you would enter the memory care area and have seating and gathering space and then have that space.

And that's a secure area as well.

Yeah, also a secure area.

Good, good. One other question. We talked about a walkthrough.

Is that? I think that's intended to come through, kind of through here somehow. Tie into a trail somewhere in here. So we'll get that to work.

between it's between the two buildings yeah yeah walk through between the parking lot okay okay i'm not opposed to what you have going and i think that there's a need for that i see seeing my father quite often there's a lot of visitors that come in to that building and having the space to go outside it would be very handy and very nice

Okay, good comments, everyone. Thank you. I think we'll have Sydney come back up here. Okay, Sydney, now we're going to get you. My concern is still the traffic. I hear a lot of grumbling, a lot of concerns, which is legit around the roundabout, okay? And then with the pickleball building coming in and everything, very concerned with that traffic in that area. The other thing I'm concerned with with traffic is the exit, and maybe we can have the Zavago residents talk here in a minute or two, but when you come out of the exit... Are they able to see traffic coming pretty well, you know what the building right there, so my concern is because that's the exit right on founder lane inward is 153rd exit is founders.

Right, you can for 153rd street, you could only turn left right then going you're right the other way.

You can only so do you follow my question is when they're exiting that area there. Is it is the view legit? Is it okay? Is it safe when they're coming?

That's not something we reviewed at this point, but that is something we will review. And I can write that down as a concern. We do have site visibility requirements. And I do see how that hard corner could create some sort of visibility issue if we don't address it right away. So that will be reviewed to ensure that there is visibility. Coming from Zavago, that is set further back. I don't believe People would have an issue seeing that way going more south Towards galaxy, right?

I'm just concerned with the traffic. Do you have anything to add? Madam chair.

Thank you for the question as Sydney mentioned we really haven't had a chance and engineering to look closer at this So we don't have I don't have an answer on your earlier comments on the pickle haul traffic and how it would interface with this. As far as the sight lines go, in place today, we're comfortable with how the sight lines operate. There, obviously, we fielded concerns on speed on Founders Lane recently. We've collected data for that and we'll be bringing that forward to our traffic safety advisory committee and we that probably be a good update if and when this project comes back that we could get you more backstory and a comprehensive review of what we looked at.

I'd appreciate that and, like I said about the pickleball. You know that's going to be quite a few people come in there to how much is that going to add to that area. And the four-way stop sign by the post office, it's getting backed up quite a bit. And like I said, I hear a lot of complaints about that particular area right there. Thank you. Anybody else want to ask any questions?

Commissioner Scanlon I guess one question I have for you if this comes forward to how this fits into the 2040 plan and look at in terms of these kind of housing whether it's memory care or assisted living or just senior living where we're sitting with numbers in that area I mean in I don't recall if we had specific projections that we're looking for to expand on that so it'd be interesting to see how that this fits into that so you could pull some things together there

Yep, Commissioner Scanlon, I can look into the 2040 plan. Overall goal as part of the comp plan is that we do provide a range of housing for all generations. So that would be included for this. A lot of the more senior facilities that we have in town do include more of the independent living. And then they do include some units for assisted living and memory care. Whereas this facility is different that it only provides the assisted living and memory care. So that might be filling a gap that we don't currently have in the city.

yeah so that would be appreciated so thank you mr sandal did you have a question not to put you on the spot but did you have a question yeah i just would be curious to hear more of the history i don't know if you would have that right now or in future meetings but just to understand what we were hoping for i think it's a similar question to what was just asked about the comp plan about what we were envisioning for this space and

Yeah, I can go into a little bit right now and then also maybe provide some more background material and include that in any future reports if this is to move forward. But Central Village in general was originally encompassed as two zones. Right now, I think we're up to four zones. So it was just more residential zones and then mixed use zones, commercial zones. This specific block was more of a commercial area. If any residential was to be incorporated, it would be more of a secondary use and on an upper level. And then when Zavago came through, again, that amendment split those two zones for a horizontal planned area. So that housing was allowed on just one property and then commercial in the future In general there have been quite a few changes to Central Village To those more housing focused uses, you know, we have riser now We have the Parkside neighborhood which includes three very large residential multifamily properties so there are actually residential caps within Central Village, so we would have to analyze that. Again, this is more of a quasi-commercial use, so it's a little more of a gray area, but we would review that residential cap to ensure that we're not exceeding that. And if it were getting close, that might need to be amended as well as part of the plan development. But I can also provide more background if this were to come forward. Thanks. Thank you, Sydney.

Anybody else? If not, this is not a public hearing. But I do see some sweet elderly people out there. If you would like to come up and speak, I would gladly listen to you if you're from Zabago. I'm just gonna assume that you are for this, correct? No talking? No worries, no pressure. I just wanted to give you the respect and the opportunity to do so. Okay, that's it. So we will close on land use. Thank you. That brings us to other business and that is Tim Benetti.

Thank you, Madam Chair. In a few seconds here, I'm going to have our city planner, Terry Dill, approach you. And she's got some news about the comp plan and also a special request coming forward.

madam chair commissioners i just wanted to give an update under the meetings that we have our comp plan coming up on the project all cities in the metro area are required to update their comp plans every 10 years that's based on state law in february of 2025 the met council adopted their policies in the regional framework for the metro area and then last september they issued the system statement for each city that is the requirements of what we need to include in our comp plan. So we've started that process, we've been planning, and now we're just kicking it off. We did hire a planning consultant. Transportation Collaborative and Consultants is their full name, but they go by TC2. So that is who is going to be providing professional services for us to get this through the process. The comp plans are due December of 2028, but we hope to have ours in way before that. So tonight I just wanted to bring to your attention that we will be having a joint meeting with the Planning Commission and City Council to kick off our project. And we're looking at possibly the first meeting or second meeting in September. It would either be September 2nd or the 16th. And we're hoping that we'll have an informal joint meeting before, possibly at 5 30. And then, if we have any regular agenda items on our planning commission for that night, then we would convene for a regular meeting at 7 pm. So, it's tentative. I just wanted to give you a heads up on that. Once the date is finalized, we'll make sure to let you know right away. You said first and second meeting.

How many meetings do we generally?

So I was referring to either the first Planning Commission or second Planning Commission meeting in September. We don't want to add another meeting to your calendar. So we would have just the informal work session before the regular meeting. We're working on finalizing the project schedule at the moment. So we'll have that done and we will also have, we're going through the draft public engagement plan. of how we're going to gather community input for our comp plan. So we'll have all that ready. And we will be presenting that to you at this first kickoff meeting. So that's good. I don't know if anyone has any questions on the process. I know some have been here through a comp plan update before. So it's it's quite the undertaking. We can do it.

Yeah.

Thank you, Terry.

Okay, thank you.

Now, Mr. Benetti.

Madam Chair, just a reminder, your next meeting is Wednesday, August 5th, also followed by our council, or excuse me, August 19th. Our council meetings are July 23rd and August 13th. We do believe we have another application coming forward i believe cassia has officially applied for something so we might be seeing that in the next few weeks or next month so beyond that i will yield the floor to our madam chair for a very special announcement if you if you wish to make it public but i think you almost did yesterday

It did yesterday, or Monday, Monday. Thank you. Just for those of you who don't know, I have filed for city council, and look forward to the next few months, seeing where that goes. And we'll see if I'm still here or not. So but appreciate. Thank you. But appreciate your support. Thank you, Tim. Okay that brings us to adjournment can I get a motion So moved Second Motion made by Commissioner Scanlon seconded by Commissioner Halas all in favor say aye Aye