Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Greetings. Now is the time and place for a meeting of the Beaverton Planning Commission. For the record, I will do a roll call to verify which commission members are participating this evening. Commissioner Holmes.

Present.

Commissioner McEvoy. Present. Commissioner McCann.

Present.

Commissioner Mettler. Commissioner Winter. And the chair. Let the record show that commissioners Speck and Metler are excused in absence from the meeting tonight. We are now at commission communications. Commission, any communications? Looks like no communications. We are now at staff communications. Staff, any communications?

Good evening, Chair. Ana Slotinski, planning manager, planning division manager. I do not have any staff communications tonight.

Perfect, thank you. The first item on the agenda is a public hearing on the application for LU 32026-00547, 3rd and Washington Public Parking case file number CUN 32026-00546. Before we move to the substance of the hearing, I will ask the city attorney to cover the pre-hearing matters.

Thank you, Chair. The applicant has the burden of proving that the applications are consistent with the Beaverton Development Code comprehensive plan and any applicable Beaverton Code provision. The criteria that must be addressed in the hearing are Development Code Sections 40.03.1 40.15.15.5c, new conditional use. Testimony arguments and evidence must be directed toward these approval criteria or other criteria in the comprehensive plan or development code that the speaker believes apply to the application. Failure to raise an issue accompanied by statements or evidence sufficient to allow the Planning Commission and other interested parties an opportunity to respond may preclude an appeal to the Land Use Board of Appeals based on that issue. Anyone who submits written comments or gives oral testimony has standing to appeal this decision. failure of the applicant to raise constitutional or other issues related to proposed conditions of approval with sufficient specificity or to allow the city to respond may preclude an action for damages in circuit court State and local law require commissioners to make certain disclosures. To these ends, the following questions will be asked. Does any commissioner have a potential or actual conflict of interest, ex parte contacts, or site visits to declare? Chair Adams.

No to all three.

Commissioner Holmes.

No to all three.

Commissioner McCann. No to all three. Commissioner McEvoy.

No to all three.

Commissioner Winter.

No to all three.

Does any member of the audience wish to question a commissioner about ex parte contacts or site visits or challenge the right of any commissioner to participate in this hearing? Nobody online? Okay, let the record show no response. The order of the public hearing tonight will be as follows. First city staff will give a presentation followed by commissioners questions of staff. Second the applicant will be given 20 minutes for its presentation followed by commissioners questions of the applicant. Third members of the public in support of the application may speak for up to five minutes each. Fourth members of the public oppose the application may speak for up to five minutes each. Five, members of the public who are neither in support nor opposed will then have five minutes to speak. Six, the applicant will then have five minutes for rebuttal. And finally, the Planning Commission will then hear any final comments from staff. Chair, that concludes the pre-hearing statement. You can proceed with the hearing.

Thank you. We will now begin with the staff presentation.

All right. Thank you very much. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Steve Regner, senior planner with the City Beaverton. And let me modify that so you guys can see. there we go good side excellent uh my name is steve regner a senior planner with the city of beaverton's planning division and the application before you tonight is lu3 2026 zero zero five four seven third and washington public parking uh cu uh three twenty twenty six zero zero five four six i will draw attention to the um Supplemental memo dated today, September 2nd, providing additional public testimony received by staff after the publication of the staff report. The project before you tonight is a new conditional use request for an existing parking lot. And the purpose is to take this existing parking lot that has currently been serving the library and turn it into a standalone public parking lot serving all of Old Town. There are no physical changes proposed with this development. The property is in the regional center old town zone, which is one of our downtown zones. To the north, properties are developed with commercial development. To the south is city park. To the east is the city library. And to the west are institutional uses. This site was originally developed to satisfy the minimum parking requirements set forth in the development code for the city library itself.

Thank you.

And up until 2023, it served, actually up until today, it has been serving as an accessory use purely for the library itself. In 2023, in response to the statewide climate friendly and equitable communities rule changes, The city updated their development code to eliminate parking minimums across the city, which meant that the library no longer had any minimum parking requirements. However, the parking lot still was serving as an accessory use to the library, even though the development code didn't necessarily require that anymore. So what the action tonight is doing is recategorizing this existing parking lot now as parking as a principal use, a standalone use, and that is a conditionally permitted use in this zone, thus the public hearing for the new conditional permit request. For a new conditional use approval, there are several approval criteria. The three big ones I've got on the screen here. First are the application needs to demonstrate compliance with comprehensive plan goals. And staff really identified kind of three major ones. One is promoting a vibrant downtown, creating an efficient transportation system, and developing downtown as an employment and urban lifestyle center. And really what's going to allow, The way that this proposal is gonna further those goals is taking existing parking as a city asset and opening it up to more users. So we'll be able to have more of the park once and walk features. We won't have as many vehicles circling looking for parking. So we'll reduce congestion, leading to that more efficient transportation system. And really just again, levering this existing asset of a parking lot to more users of Old Town is gonna allow more people to come into Old Town. and spend their time here. The final two approval criteria are really demonstrating that this use works in the area. One is demonstrating that the site size and configuration can reasonably accommodate the use. and that the location size and functional characteristics are reasonably compatible with the neighborhood. The good news here is that we've got 25 years of data and observations to show that this parking lot has functioned well, has served the neighborhood well, has been safe EFFICIENT, AND HAS REALLY SERVED AS A GOOD PARKING LOT FOR THE LIBRARY, BUT WILL CONTINUE TO DO SO MOVING FORWARD WITH THIS WIDER USER BASE. SO BECAUSE OF THIS, STAFF HAS FOUND THAT ALL OF THE APPROVAL CRITERIA HAVE BEEN MET. WITH THAT BEING SAID, STAFF IS RECOMMENDING APPROVAL OF LU3-2026-00547, THIRD AND WASHINGTON PUBLIC PARKING, AND STAFF IS HAPPY TO ANSWER ANY QUESTIONS THE COMMISSION MAY HAVE.

Thank you. Are there any questions of staff with regard to the proposed application? Commissioner Holmes.

I just want to clarify that transferring it from the library parking to a public parking doesn't really change anything except it allows people to not, people can park there that are not going to the library.

That's exactly right. The ownership will remain the same. I think the only physical change we'll see is some signage saying instead of library parking, public parking. But the day-to-day operations, it just opens up to a larger user base on a regular basis.

And is the intent for it to stay free at this time?

That's a question I will defer to the applicant. I'm not sure what the policy is on that.

Okay, and then I know there's been question about the market do we know what? What kind of agreement has been made with the farmers market that this wouldn't change?

Anything related to that nothing nothing in the action tonight would have any impact on the farmers market Any other questions Commissioner McCann yeah, I was just curious about the there is another parking lot on the east side of the library Is that a library only parking lot and is that remaining?

I believe that one is library only and this action is not affecting that in any way.

Thank you.

Any other questions? Commissioner McEvoy.

In your comments I saw that there's no longer a minimum requirement, parking requirement for the library. Does that prohibit

uh designation of specific parking lots or parking spaces for use so i understand you don't have to have minimum requirements anymore but could the city impose a requirement or not a requirement but set aside certain particular sure the the city as the as the owner and property manager of the parking lot could make the decision to set aside a certain number of parking spaces for library use during library hours but that is not something that we would

See necessary for the application to meet the approval criteria Thank you Any other questions All right, no further questions The applicant will now have 20 minutes to present please begin by introducing yourselves and sending your names and addresses for the record I

Good evening Planning Commission. My name is Molly Rabinovitz and I am the parking manager for the City of Beaverton. I'm here tonight to discuss the requested land use designation change for the 3rd and Washington public parking lot. As you know, this parking lot is located at 3rd and Washington. It is one of three parking lots that is currently designated for the library. The library has approximately 190 spaces in the east library lot, which is not part of this application and would remain as is. It has a small staff parking lot in the back of the library that serves approximately 22 or 23. spaces and then this parking lot that has somewhere between 119 and 121 parking spaces and is sort of the secondary parking lot for the library if you look at the 25 years of data that this staff just mentioned it is definitely the east library lot is definitely kind of has much higher usage. So this parking lot has an average usage of approximately 25%. So 25% on any given day. Obviously there's no parking allowed during the farmer's market. THAT OPERATION IS NOT INTENDED TO CHANGE AT ANY TIME. IT WILL STILL REMAIN THE FARMER'S MARKET LOCATION UNLESS THE FARMER'S MARKET WORKS ON A NEW POLICY AND THAT IS AT THEIR DISCRETION, BUT NOT PART OF THIS APPLICATION. ALSO, THE CITY COUNCIL ADOPTED THE DOWNTOWN PARKING PLAN IN JUNE OF THIS YEAR. And strategy seven is to optimize our existing assets, to really take advantage of what we have and try to better utilize the existing parking instead of looking for more or building more. And one of those actions within that strategy is to consider removing the library-only designation for just the West Library lot, so not the East one. as well as just increase underutilized opportunities. And 25% of 120 spaces is definitely an underutilized opportunity within this larger context of downtown and the parking demand that we see, even within like two blocks on street. So the proposal is to change the land use designation from the existing library use only to parking as a principal use, which is a type three conditional use. What would change? The designation from library parking to public parking and some signage to go along with that to let folks know that this lot is now public. It's used by non-library members, those coming to City Park, those coming to Restaurant Row. We'd like to make that official. and be able to advertise it as such. What doesn't change? It's a parking lot. It remains a parking lot. We don't have any proposals to make any site adjustments. It remains a city property. It would continue to be maintained as a city property. Farmer's market would run as scheduled. And the EV stations, there are currently three stations that are two plugs each, so serving six spots. Those remain as part of the city's larger EV initiative and no modifications except for maybe upgrades to the machines on occasion. So next steps for us if this application is approved is to move through tonight and get our final land use approval make some signage changes and finally advertise it officially as public parking. we do know that there were some conditional uses requested through public testimony and we believe that our application meets the criteria without those conditions and so we hope that we can move forward without those conditions and thank you so much and I'm happy to answer any questions thank you questions of the applicant with regard to the proposed application

Looks like no questions. We are now at public testimony portion of this agenda item. We will call for testimony in groups, starting with those in favor of the application, then those in opposition to the application, then those neither in favor nor in opposition. We'll take testimony from state and We'll take testimony from those attending in person first, followed by those attending via Zoom webinar. As a reminder, testimony is limited to the criteria that apply to the application. Now is the time for testimony in favor of the application. Do we have any yellow cards? No. All right. We have no one testifying in person. We'll move to the Zoom webinar. Via Zoom webinar, for those viewing via Zoom webinar, please communicate by using the raise hand feature in your Zoom menu bar. And if calling in, press star nine to alert the chair that you would like to speak. Is there any virtual testimony? None, all right, thank you. Staff has stated that we do not have any public testimony in favor via the web. We're gonna move on to opposition. Now is the time for testimony in opposition to the application. Any yellow cards in opposition? None. We have no one testifying in person. We'll move to the Zoom webinar. Via Zoom webinar. For those viewing via Zoom webinar, please communicate by using the raise hand feature. And we already did that, correct? Okay, still none, okay. Staff has indicated that we do not have any public testimony in opposition via the web. Now is the time for testimony neither in favor nor opposed to the application. Are there any yellow cards in favor or opposed to the application? None, all right. We have no one testifying in person. We'll move to the Zoom webinar. Via Zoom webinar, for those viewing via Zoom webinar, please communicate by using the raise hand feature in your Zoom menu bar. If calling in, press star nine to alert the chair that you would like to speak. Are there any? No? All right. Staff has stated that we do not have any public testimony neither in favor nor opposed via the web. So... Now is the time for the applicant's rebuttal, which there wouldn't be one, so we will move on from there. Does staff have any final comments?

Staff has no additional comments, thank you.

Thank you. With final comments completed, I will close the public hearing. Now is the time for deliberation. Do any commissioners have further discussion on the proposal? Okay. Is there a motion?

Chair, based on the record and findings and conclusions in the staff report and the supplemental memos from today, September 2nd, I move to approve the application for LU 32026-00547, 3rd and Washington Public Parking, case file CUN 32026-00546, subject to the conditions as presented.

Great. Is there a second?

I'll second.

Is there any discussion on the motion? looks like no discussion on the motion a vote will be taken by roll call when your name is called please say a if in favor of the or nay if opposed commissioner holmes aye commissioner mccann aye commissioner mcavoy aye and commissioner winter aye and chairs aye as well the motion passes The Planning Commission's decision will be memorialized in land use orders provided by all parties who testified. Appeals must be filed in accordance with the Beaverton Development Code and LUBA rules. We are now adjourned at 6.51. Thank you.