Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening everyone. This is the planning commission meeting of April 9th, 2025. I will call this meeting to order at 6:00 p.m. Uh we also have a new uh staff member here with us tonight, our new deputy city manager for the city of Bowmont. if you'd like to introduce yourself, sir. Sure. Thank you, Chair. Uh Gus Romo. I've been here now a month. I can't believe this time has gone by so quick. Uh it's been a pleasure to uh work with your staff. Uh Carol has been wonderful and uh helping me transition through this. Uh so I'm going to be serving as your acting community development director in the meantime uh while we get that um position filled. Uh so happy to be here. Thank you. Perfect. Well, welcome. Glad to have you. Uh, can we get a roll call, please? Yes. Commissioner Kulie here. Commissioner Cooblin, present. Commissioner Qua, present. Vice Chair Smith, here. And Chairman Suther, here. Okay. Uh, looks like we are all here. Uh, we'll go ahead and do the pledge of allegiance. If you all stand please of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands nation indivisible. Right. Do we have any adjustments to the agenda tonight? No adjustments. Okay. Noble uh specific plan termination. We we will be opening the public hearing and requesting a continuence on that item. Perfect. Thank you. Uh any conflicts of interest disclosure? Seeing none, we'll move on to item B. Uh

public comment period. This is for items not on the agenda. This meeting will be open to the public and conducted in a virtual format to be inclusive of all participation preferences. Public comment participation is encouraged by emailing any comments to the city clerk's office or by calling in using the phone number provided on the front of the agenda. Do we have any public comments on items not on the agenda? I have no written requests. Mia, do we have any callers on the line? No callers. Perfect. Uh thank you. We'll go ahead and move on to item C that is action items, public hearings and requests. Item C1 is approval of the minutes. Can I uh get a motion for approval of our minutes? So moved, second a motion in a second. Can we get a roll call, please? I'm sorry. I do have a um correction to make for the record. Um the minutes had the date swapped out, so it was the beginning of a previous minute. um with the action of the last meeting. So, I have it all sorted out. Um I will email out the corrected minutes and then we will record the the correct ones. So, if we can get a motion to approve with corrections. Can I get a mo motion to approve with corrections, please? Motion to approve with corrections. Second. I have a motion to second. Uh roll call, please. Commissioner Kulie, yes. Commissioner Copeland, yes. Commissioner Qua, yay. Vice Chair Smith, yes. Chairman Suther, yes. All right. Thank you. That takes us to item C2. This is plan 2025-0164, Bumont Municipal Code, amendment to chapter 17.11.110, home occupations. Can we have a staff report, please? Good evening, chairman and commissioners. Jillian Fountain, planning staff. Tonight I will go over the proposed updates to the city's home

occupation ordinance. These updates are to aimed to ensure that the regulations are clear, enforceable, and aligned with current trends in the home business uh business homebased businesses. The city's current home occupation ordinance allows residents to operate certain types of businesses from their homes through the insure issuance of a home occupation permit. The goal of these regulations is to balance business activity with within residential uses and prevent nuisances such as excessive traffic and noise. In recent years, we've received feedback and complaints about how the ordinance is being interpreted and enforced, particularly with the rise of online businesses and remote work. During the city council meeting on December 3rd, 2024, conditions 8 through 10 and 13 through 15 of the ordinance conditions were identified as needing review and potential revisions. During the city council meeting on March 4th, 2025, council asked staff to bring these updates forward for public hearing. These items include pedestrian and vehicle traffic, commercial vehicles, stored materials, residential impacts, and the use of outdoor areas for storage. Before I continue, um, can we have the red lines put up just so you guys can follow along with, uh, the changes that we're making. After reviewing the ordinance and consulting with the legal team, we propose the following updates to clarify language and improve enforcibility. These changes will also align better with modern business practices. So, we'll start with removal of condition two, the restrictions on material equipment use. The old rule materials or equipment must be typical for a home. We propose removing the this restriction to allow a broader range of materials and equipment as long as it remains compatible with the residential character of the area. We are putting at

home businesses on par with other businesses in the city. We have a revision to condition six which is flexibility in room use. The old rule the old rule only one room in the house could be used for the entirety of the business. We are proposing the change to add the requirement that no more than 20% of the home could be dedicated to the business including [Applause] storage. The removal of condition 8 and nine traffic generation and delivery restrictions. The old rule home business homebased businesses cannot get generate more traffic than is typical for the neighborhood. Additionally, businesses could not use commercial vehicles for deliveries. We proposed to remove these restrictions to allow the ne for the necessity the necessary delivery of goods, particularly for e-commerce or other homebased businesses that rely on deliveries. The city is still able to enforce the nuisance provisions in the code should any issues arise. Revision to condition number 10, storage of materials. Old rule materials must be stored indoors and out of sight from the public. Proposed change for the businesses can store materials or supplies indoors, outdoors, or in accessory structures as long as they are not visible from the street or public areas. This change provides more flexibility while still protecting the residential character of the neighborhood. Do you want me to interrupt if we have questions as we're going through or wait until the end? Probably the end. Okay. Uh revision to condition 11, signage and advertising. Um the old rule home businesses were heavily restricted restricted in terms of signage and advertising. The proposed change that that businesses can now have a one unlit sign up to two square feet for temporary

produce displays. Advertising for produce was not was part of the old rule which we are not changing. We are also proposing allowing advertising on commercial vehicles as long as they comply with city's parking regulations. This again puts at home businesses on par with businesses type business types in the city. The revision to condition 15 uh use of accessory buildings. The old rule accessory buildings like sheds or garages couldn't be used for business business purposes except for growing produce. Uh we are revising this to allow the use of accessory buildings for storage of materials and supplies associated with the business as long as it follows the new 20% requirement and other relevant codes. We also are including in provisions related to microenterprise home kitchen operations for consistency with the proposed updates in the zoning code. At this time, staff recommends planning commission hold the public hearing and forward a recommendation of approval to the city council to amend chapter 17.11 general development standards section 17.11.110 home occupations of the Bowmont Municipal Code. That concludes my presentation and we will be happy to answer any questions that you may have. Perfect. Thank you for that report. Uh do we have any discussion from the commission? Vice Chair Smith. Thank you there. Um, on condition 10 for the material storage, the requirement is be it or it's allowed to be stored outdoors so long as it's not visible for the public or the public street. Uh, what about for neighbors? If they're just storing things on pallets in their rear yard, is it prohibiting or requiring those u views to be blocked? Not from neighbors. No. So, if it is in their rear yard, um, as long as it cannot be seen from the street or any public space, if they're backed up to a park, that would be an issue. But from

neighboring yards, because sometimes with, um, elevations, you know, you can see into everyone's backyard, but that would not be a requirement for neighbors. Okay. Um, and then, you know, I I don't know the answer to this question. Um, cannabis would still be not allowed by city ordinance. Correct. That is correct. Okay. Commissioner Smith, you bring up a very good point though with regards to looking at a neighbor's yard. If your neighbor is piling things up even though they can't be seen from the street, but you can see that. Is that going to be a problem for other neighbors as well? And I was I was when we get to discussion with uh, you know, with the with the commission, that's where I was going to go to. Um, one one last question. Any rules that are in place from an HOA would still, if they're more restrictive, would still be enforceable within that HOA. Yes. So, if an HOA prohibits it, there this would still not be printed within the HOA. Yes. Um, and we also to touch on, you know, building up the materials in the backyard. So, we do still have the requirement for the 20% storage. So, you know, to guide them not to go more than that, which is sorry, not just uh storage for the 20%, that's the whole property cannot be more than the 20%. Um, but we also do have our nuisance requirements in the code that we would be able to utilize if there's any issues with neighbors. Okay. Um, I was I was just going to add for commission there. My my concern is that, you know, obviously if we don't have a screening requirement for outdoor that's visible to the neighbors, it does become a code issue. Now you're bringing in a code enforcement department. You're relying on, you know, other items on there where, you know, it might be more suitable to have a screening requirement, you know, so we we can look to try to avoid some of those issues, I

would think. And this is probably something that we'll want to talk with the city attorney about. So, I know that code has been um working on some cases with particular issues with um views from a neighbor's yard and so I know that we've been asked to kind of pull back on some things so that if that's something we can discuss further with the city attorney on that. Okay. Any other questions from the commission? Yes. Um, number 11. Homebased business shall not involve the display of signs or advertising devices on the premise except on the when light one unlighted sign not more than two square feet may be posted. But then we go down and allow them to um or that this code allows them to have advertising on vehicles. Um, and the vehicle has a a weight, but it doesn't have any restriction on the size of the sign. So, what I'm seeing is somebody pulls up their pickup truck with a camper on it or whatever with a huge sign and parks it there. Uh, I see a potential conflict there. So, the um the unlit sign is only for temporary produce displays. um that's not for their actual business for the home occupation. Um but the commercial vehicles or any displays on their vehicles um that is just aligning with other neighbors. So for example um our thought in our discussions with legal um say they work at the water district, they can park their vehicle at home with a logo on it. But if you have a home occupation in the current code, you cannot. So just trying to align it to be equal across the board.

And I think uh maybe it would be some clarification because sometimes you have vehicles that have wraps, but I I think Commissioner Kulie, if I'm understanding you correctly, it's not adding additional signage to the vehicle that would protrude or Well, what I'm what I'm seeing quite frankly is that uh um if the guy has a vehicle that they use for their home business and it conceivably could have a huge sign and parked in his driveway, whatever the business is. And I don't see where where that is addressed. The comment was made if he works for some business, park the driveway at home when he's he's at home. But I don't see anything that stops him from just pulling in on one and parking a vehicle there in his driveway. But that has a sign that could conceivably be 10 ft by 15 ft. Well, it would have to be on the on the vehicle. So, I'm thinking I mean, we've got cars that are wrapped. you have cars that are completely wrapped, but I I guess where I'm going with this is are are we looking at uh with the wraps that would be okay, but not adding additional signage to the vehicle. This Well, I I think, you know, kind of following I think it's the kind of the the billboard type displays you have in the back of a pickup truck or something like that. you know, it's, you know, we don't want, you know, Bob's burger on, you know, this great thing for his home business or a small box truck with a with a sign that he just leaves in his driveway. Right. Right. Cuz I know during campaign season, I I saw pickup trucks that had big signs that were propped up in the back and then also big box trucks that had signage. So, I I mean that that's something that we can can look at getting clarification from and working with the city attorney. We can also double check the other parking um codes that we have for commercial vehicles to make sure that if that that is showing that that's not allowed, then

that's what we would follow for the home businesses as well. So, we can just double check the parking. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm thinking maybe it's just a clarification in the language of just making sure that that's confined to the vehicle itself and there's no additional added signage or I'm sure there's some clarific clarification language they put in there to just make that a little bit more clear. Yeah, there's a painting company in Calama and they've got like a like 1940s pickup or something and they have it just painted on the side. Looks pretty cool, but it's on the actual truck itself, you know. So, you know, I think something like that I don't think I don't have a problem with that per se, but you know, someone's putting the billboard in the back of the, you know, I think that's a different case. So, yeah, I believe our intent is only going to be to the vehicle. So, if we need extra language in there, we can Yeah. What what my concern more is is you have the big huge handlettered sign says uh gardening services, blah blah blah blah, and the truck doesn't run. They just park it in the driveway, leave it all the time, and now they've got a sign that looks horrendous. Chair and Commission, I would recommend this is a time for questions, but we should open up the public hearing. Once we get comments, then at that point, we can deliberate and you could u ask us about those particular changes that you'd like to see. Um I I see what you're saying in terms of maybe adding additional language to elaborate some of these comments. Um, but right now is a time just for questions. I I understand and I just want clarification on something. An HOA can be more restrictive than city ordinance. Yes. So we say someone works, let's just say hypothetically for a blood bank and they drive a blood bank vehicle that has blood bank on the side of the car as a a stick on u the HOA could say you can't park that on your property and that's okay and that may also align with our regulations because we do have size

requirements for parking for commercial vehicles and residential. though depending on the size of that vehicle. In this case, it's not a commercial vehicle. I think you know but but the answer is you answer my question. The HOA can be more restrictive than the city. Okay. Yes. Thank you. I think our HOA we looked at if the vehicle is a commercial vehicle if it's advertising a service or a business or something else on it doesn't you know it's not necessarily classed DMV as commercial but you know four-door sedan that's got a emblem on it is a commercial vehicle. Any other questions from commissioners? Well, I'm just holding mine till after we open for comment. Oh, okay. Fair enough. Uh, then I'll go ahead and I will open the public hearing at 6:18 p.m. Are there any requests to speak on this item? I have no written requests. Mia, do we have any callers on the line? No callers. Okay, hearing none, I'll go ahead and close the public hearing at 6:18 p.m. and bring them back to the commission for discussion. So, my question would be on page 414, uh, item number 13, uh, when it talks about cottage food operation. My question is um the way I'm understanding that they would prepare the meal, someone would drive up and they would bring it out or they would go knock on the door. Do we restrict the time? Because the way that I'm looking at this, they could drive up anytime. So, we follow the Riverside County requirements for cottage food and microenterprises. Um we do not have any differing standards. um I can get uh in their code if there's any time

restrictions um back to you. Absolutely. Okay, that's mine. Thank you. It was a good point. Any other comments from commissioners? Hearing none. Do we have a um anyone want to make a motion? So at at this time if we have some questions on here, are you looking for us to make a recommendation to council with our clarifications or is this something that you'd like to bring back to us? I think clarification if we go ahead and um identify these are some of the changes that we'd like to this code, you could make that recommendation to the council and have that move forward. Mhm. So I'd say in general I like the idea of updating this, bringing it in line with current um kind of current practices and current standards. So um I would make a motion that based on our discussion and recommendations that those be brought to council for consideration when they look uh at this item. I'll second commissioner. Just to clarify um when you say to be brought to council with the items that you had discussed earlier or any changes to that? Yeah, with the items we discussed earlier. Okay, perfect. So, elaboration on uh some of these things, some of these uh changes on there. Okay, thank you. Right, we have a motion in a second. We get a roll call vote, please. Commissioner Kulie, yes. Commissioner Copeland, yes. Commissioner Qua, yes. Vice Chair Smith, yes. Chairman Se. Yes. Go ahead and move on to item C3 that is suspension and revision of BMC

17.11.050 offsite improvements. Can we have a staff report please? Good evening chairman and council or commissioners. My name is Darren Usher and I'll be presenting this item um in regards to chapter 17 section 11 for off-site improvements. So the current problem as um it is faced is as the current code is currently written, residents wanting to build or construct new patios or garages within their residence will have to make off-site improvements which is usually underground utility improvements which usually extend beyond their immediate property and the construction area. And this can increase the costs of their project substantially, usually double or triple the amount of the original estimate. the proposed solution. So this was taken to council as a discussion item back in March and the direction was a suspension of that section. So chapter 11 section 11050. So the enforcement of that section and this suspension would not affect any other the provisions in chapter 17 and this would just apply to non-resident residential developments or larger structures exceeding the specific size limitations. And then the red lines here. So what staff is recommending is to incorporate an exemption. So the exemption would be for single family residential parcels within existing primary dwelling units that shall be exempt from section A. And this would also be included after the suspension and the comprehensive zoning code update if there are any additional changes that need to be completed. And that's the end of my presentation. Uh I'm available as well as staff for any questions. Perfect.

Thank you for that report. Uh do we have any questions from the commission? So this would so single family additions of single family homes, new single family homes, if it's a minor frontage on there, there's no significant impact to public infrastructure that they would not be then required to make uh curb gutter type improvements. Is that if I understand this correctly? Yes. So that what so it's usually the cases that we've had brought forward are single family homeowners that are trying to make you know covered patio or garage and because they as the current code stands they would have to make those off-site improvements and so what staff is recommending is that exemption for single family. So any multif family, duplex, quadplex or apartments would still have to comply with that code. Okay. So would a new single family home still be required to make the curb improvements is only for the addition of accessory structures um so on and so forth or all single family homes on in I'm assuming on infill lots at this point not subdivisions um so how we how we wrote it is existing structure okay so new family would have to perfect okay thank you questions you know I take it back um go ahead why 6 months not to exceed six months that we were going to do this. Why not indefinitely? Well, I have it as six months just because that should be the estimated completion of the comprehensive zoning code update. Okay. So, I would have it tied to that. So, because we would address it in that zone coding update. So, I don't want to have it indefinite and I would like to have that addressed before then. I understand. Thank you. I I have a question. Single family home builds an ADU on the property. They're no longer single family. They're exempt now. They're no longer exempt. Correct.

[Music] Um so ADUs are not um included in these. These are already exempt from any type of um infrastructure upgrades. So ADUs per California do not have to do those. Well, I I think what I'm thinking is that single family home, my house, I build an ADU. Now I have two dwellings on the property. Yes. So that would mean as such my house is no longer a single family. A single dwelling on the property. I'm no longer exempt. You would still be a single family. It's still considered single family. Yes. We understand what you're saying because at the end of the day as planners had that issue. There's a fun handbook if you would like it on ADUs that we reference daily. I think I I think I have one, but thank you very much. Any other questions from commission? Hearing none, I'll go ahead and open the public hearing at 6:26 p.m. Do we have any requests to speak on this item? I have no written requests. Mia, do we have any callers on the line? No callers. Okay, hearing none, I'll go ahead and close the public hearing at 6:26 p.m. and we'll bring them back to the commission here for a motion. So, I will um move to forward the recommendation to approve the ordinance uh to city council uh to suspend this section of the zoning code for 6 months. I'll second. Right, we have a motion to second. Can we have a roll call vote, please? Commissioner Culie, yes. Commissioner Copeland, yes. Commissioner Qua, yay. Vice Chair Smith, yes. Chairman Sard, yes. All right, that motion or that item passes unanimously. We'll go ahead and move on to item C4. This is plan

2025-0204, public hearing to consider a resolution repealing the Noble Creek Vistas specific plan. Can we have a staff report, please? Good evening, chairman and commissioners. As mentioned previously, this item has been advertised. However, we are going to recommend that you open the public hearing uh take any testimony and then continue this item off calendar. Would you still like a staff report or would you like to wait until um we can bring this back and discuss it? Is commission okay with any questions? I think at this point um I had um discussed this with our planning manager earlier and that's what we discussed but after thinking it over I think we have enough time to continue to the next hearing. Okay. So I think we'd be okay with that or recommend it. So looking for a motion to continue the item to the next meeting. I was thinking we didn't have enough time but we since we have to do a 20-day review but it looks like we do have some time to clarification May 14th. Okay. to the next SK regularly scheduled meeting, not a the optional. Okay. Okay. I move. Do we Well, do we still need to open the public hearing at that point or we just Yes, we still because it was advertised. So, we still we need to open the public hearing. Perfect. Then I'll go ahead and uh open the public hearing at 6:28 p.m. Are there any requests to speak on this item? I have no written requests. Mia, do we have any callers on the line? No callers. Okay, hearing none. We'll go ahead and close the public hearing at We're going to leave the public hearing. I'm sorry. We're going to continue the public hearing to the next meeting. Got it. Uh and do we have a motion to continue? I move to continue the planning or plan 2022-024 to the next public meeting. I'll second it. We have a motion and second. Can we have a roll call vote, please? Commissioner Culie, yes. Commissioner Cooblin, yes. Commissioner

Qua, yay. Vice Chair Smith, yes. Chairman Suther, yes. All right, that takes us to item D, planning manager comments. I have no comments tonight. I don't know if the deputy city manager has any uh comments that he would like to share with the planning commission, but I I don't have any comments tonight. The only comment I have is I'm so happy that um the city budgets conferences for our staff. that is uh just wonderful to see all the training that takes place. So that's it. Thank you. Excellent. Thank you for those comments. To end with that, we'll go ahead and adjourn the meeting here at 6:30 him. [Music]

Heat. Heat. [Music]