City Council - Regular Meeting

July 6th, Blue Springs City Council meeting. Gonna start the meeting a little different this time and had some announcements at the top here. We had some sad news from a couple of former employees we found out this week, and so wanted to share that with the community. First of all, we found out that former police captain Jim Snyder passed away this week. He was an employee for nearly 43 years, from 1976 until he retired in 2019 as a police captain. And then Councilmember Erickson's gonna share another one we found out about this morning.

Yeah, I'd just like to sadly announce the passing of my dear friend, and I call it my brother, and I probably can't do this. Fred Sims passed this morning. Fred was our first city administrator, I believe, in the summer of 1978. He served as administrator with my wife when she was on the city council. If you drive down Adams-Durie Parkway, Fred was instrumental with Great Grounds in getting that done, Adams Point Golf Course and Hidden Valley Sports Complex, and I actually give him credit for starting the Public Works Department. Fred was a great guy. Anyway, I just wanted to say that to everybody, and I'll miss him dearly. Thank you, sir, for that.

Thank you, Council Member Erickson. We definitely wanted to say our gratitude to those employees and that our thoughts are with their families as they work through this. We'll share with council members and staff that are interested once we find out services for both. I think I've seen some information on both of them, but I don't think we have all the details just yet. Not to make light of that, but on a more lighter note, there is an important game on tonight. We're trying to reduce spoilers, so if you're watching in the audience, maybe don't stand up and say goal real loud if you see somebody score. So for the council, you know, some people got it recorded for later, so we'll keep that in mind. But with that, if you will stand with me, we'll do the Pledge of Allegiance. We'll call it in the Lord.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you. You can be seated. I will now call the meeting to order. First item on the agenda is confirmation of accord.

Council Member Kaler.

Present.

Boland. Present. Rommel. Present. Erickson.

Here.

Markworth.

Present.

Rowan.

Present.

Mayor Levesay.

Here.

We have a quorum.

Next item is the consent agenda. Do I have a motion to approve?

So moved.

Is there a second?

Second. Any discussion? Just a clerical thing on there. Lyle Shaver's appointment, while I think it's great, it's not to Downtown Alive anymore. It's Downtown Blue Springs. It's just a matter of point of view. Yeah, that's for the CDBG board. No, I believe it was, you have him on one of them. I think it was representing for CDBG from downtown. Okay, we'll make that correction.

All right, any other discussion? Okay, then roll call.

Council Member Kaler.

Aye.

Tholan. Aye. Brummel. Aye. Erickson.

Aye.

Markworth.

Aye.

Rowan.

Aye.

Mayor Levesay.

Aye.

Motion carries.

All right, we're gonna start off the evening with a series of public hearings tonight. First, we have the Midnight Inc. Conditional Use Permit. The city clerk will read some items, exhibits for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated June 23rd, 2026 with the following attachments. Staff report with attachments, site location map, site location zoning map, an applicant narrative, affidavit of publication, 185 foot map, owner's list, resident letter, and bill approving the conditional use permit. This is all we have to enter for the record.

Okay, we're going to try to do each of these all at once and see if it works. So if you're going to speak on the Midnight Inc. public hearing, if you know you're going to, if you could stand, I'm going to swear you all in now. I know staff will. Is there an applicant in the audience?

No, my applicant is not here.

Okay, well then we'll just go with staff and see if the applicant shows up later. If you can raise your right hand then. Do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God?

I do.

Okay, please state your name and address for the record.

Chantelle Frey, Planner 3903, West Main Street, Blue Springs, 64015. Good evening, Mayor and members of the council. Before you this evening is a request of a conditional use permit with an alternative development standard by Caitlin Ferris on behalf of Midnight Inc. to allow a body art service establishment within an existing commercial tenant space located at 2307 Northwest South Outer Road. The subject property is zone general business, which is intended to accommodate a variety of commercial and service-oriented uses along the major transportation corridors outside of the city's central and neighborhood business districts. The proposed tattoo studio will occupy an existing tenant space and no exterior modifications or site improvements are proposed at this time of this request. Under the unified development code, body art services are permitted only through a conditional use permit. In addition, the applicant is requesting approval and alternative development standard to waive the required 500 foot separation from residential uses. Staff's review determined that the residentially zoned property and residential uses are located within the separation distance of the subject property. Therefore, approval of the waiver would be necessary for the proposed use to operate. The city approved a text amendment modifying the allowable number of body art establishments within the city of Blue Springs. The amendment increases the allowance from one establishment per 15,000 to one establishment per 6,000. And based on the current population and code requirements, approval of this request would result in a total of eight body art establishments citywide, which still remains below the maximum allowable threshold of 10. Staff also notes that tattooing and body art services are regulated by the state of Missouri and all practitioners and establishments must maintain the appropriate state licensing through the Missouri Division of Professional Registration. Staff has reviewed the request against the conditional use permit criteria and has found that the proposed use is consistent with the intent of the General Business Zoning District and is compatible with other commercial uses in the area. The establishment will operate within an existing commercial building and does not require any additional site improvements. And aside from the request of the 500 foot separation requirement, the proposal complies with all applicable zoning and operational standards. No impacts to drainage, utilities, streets, sidewalks, parking, or public facilities are anticipated, and the use is not expected to generate significant traffic, noise, or other impacts beyond those typical associated with the personal service uses in a commercial area. The request will not impede the future development use, our use of the neighboring properties and is consistent with the long range development pattern of this area. Based on the findings contained within the staff report, staff recommends approval of conditional use permit with alternative development standards with the two conditions listed in the staff report and I am happy to answer any questions and the applicant is not present.

Are there any questions for staff and the council? Council Member Taylor.

Okay, a couple of things. Why for the CUP again, one more time? What's the reason for the CUP?

It's required for tattoo businesses.

Okay, and then the 500 feet, waive the 500 feet from?

Residential uses.

Is there a residential?

Yeah, this two family down here, the gold color.

So that's within the 500 feet?

Yes, it's like 479 feet. By the crow fly? Yes. Okay.

Council member Erickson. The goats will be there soon, by the way. When you said the criteria, did you say establishment license?

Yes.

You did say that.

Yes. And Midnight Inc. currently does have a state license that they provided to us.

Could you tell me where that is? Because I was unable to find that.

Well, they emailed it over to us. We were able to get it now.

What is the location?

2307 Northwest South Outer Road.

So they have a license without our approval?

Well, yes. Which is why I'm here.

I understand that. It's difficult, though, because as I understand the state rule, they have to have approval from us before they can have the license. So it's one of those which comes first, the chicken or the egg. But they do have a license.

Through the state.

And it came today.

Yes.

Okay. I was not aware of that. Thank you. Oh, I might say, Councilmember Kaler, the 500 feet doesn't bother me very much. Typically it would, but we've got the outer road and we have a lot of things in the way for that.

Any other questions for staff from the council? Okay, you said the applicant is not present. Then I will just go to the audience. Anyone in the audience like to speak in support of? In support of? Anyone like to speak in opposition to? Any other comments from the council before I close the public hearing? We'll close the public hearing. Next item is Item 5, Introduction and Reading of Bill 5408, Approving Midnight Ink Conditional Use Permit.

I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First, Reading Bill 5408, an ordinance approving a conditional use permit with alternative development standards allowing body art services within 500 feet of residential use and a church at 2307 Northwest South Outer Road, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri for Midnight Ink.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Okay, all in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Second reading.

Second reading, Bill 5408, an ordinance approving a conditional use permit with our alternative development standards allowing body art services within 500 feet of residential use and a church at 2307 Northwest South Outer Road, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri for midnight ink.

The honor I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion?

Roll call.

Councilmember Tholen. Aye. Rommel.

Aye.

Erickson.

Aye.

Markworth.

Aye.

Rowan.

Aye.

Kaler.

Aye.

Mayor Levesay.

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5504.

Next item is a public hearing for a universal beauty school conditioner use permit. City clerk has some exhibits to read for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated June 23, 2026 with the following attachments. Staff report with attachments, site location map, site location zoning map, applicant narrative, affidavit of publication, 185-foot map, owner's list, resident letter, and bill approving the conditional use permit. This is all we have to enter for the record.

Okay, we're going to try this again for this public hearing. If you know you're going to speak on this public hearing for the conditional use permit, will you please stand, raise your right hand. Go ahead and stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case be the truth, so help you God? Okay, when you come up, you'll have to give your name and address for the record, but we will start with staff.

I meant to say I do, sorry.

I heard you. I caught it. Please continue with your presentation.

Chantelle Fry, Planner 3903, West Main Street, Blue Springs, 64015. Good evening, mayor and council members. Before you this evening is a request of a conditional use permit with an alternative development standards by Tyrone Jackson on behalf of Universal Beauty Studios for approval to allow a body art services education training facility specializing in permanent makeup and related body art services at 1405 Southwest Smith Street. The subject property is located within the downtown T4 general urban district. The T4 district is intended to support a mix of residential and commercial uses while promoting walkability and traditional neighborhood development patterns. As part of the request, the applicant is seeking approval of the conditional use permit because body art services are permitted only through the conditional use permit process. In addition, the applicant is also requesting the approval of the alternative development standards to waive the required 500 foot separation from residential uses and a church. Staff analysis confirmed that the residential properties and the church are located within the required separation distance. The proposed operation will occupy approximately 442 square feet within the existing tenant space. No exterior modification, building additions, site improvements or changes to parking are proposed. Existing pedestrian access, utilities, drainage and public infrastructure will remain unchanged and the traffic impact study was not required for this request. The city approved the text amendment increasing the allowable number of body art establishments from one established per 15,000 residents to one per 6,000, and based on the current population and code requirements with the last approval. And if this is to be approved, this would be number nine, which remains below the maximum threshold of 10 establishments. Staff reviewed the request against the conditional use permit criteria and found that the proposed use furthers the intent of the downtown T4 district by providing a compatible commercial service within the existing downtown building. The use complies with the UDC code except for the 500 foot separation requirement, No additional site-specific conditions are necessary beyond compliance with the conditional use permit and the applicable code. The proposal will not negatively impact the public realm, streetscape, utilities, drainage systems, or surrounding properties. And it's also compatible with the area in terms of scale, character, traffic generation, and operational impacts. The establishment will primarily serve students who are already enrolled through the House of Heavilon and is not expected to create significant additional traffic, parking demand, or pedestrian activity. Additionally, state law requires that body art practitioners and establishments are to maintain licensing through the Missouri Division of Professional Registration and staff recommends verification of all required state licenses prior to the issuance of a business license. Based upon the findings contained within the staff report, staff recommends approval of conditional use permit with the alternative development standard request with the two conditions listed. And staff, I'm here for any questions, and the applicant is also present for any questions.

Any questions for staff and the council? Council Member Kaler.

You said this wouldn't change any parking?

No, because they're currently using students who are already enrolled. They're not adding additional students.

Okay, so the same students are getting taught on one thing or are... Are going to get taught on this now, too. Okay, so in other words, they're going to go math and after they study history, so to speak. Okay, and I would like to point out, just for the record, this is not 500 feet how the crow flies. This is straight across the street within 500 feet. Okay.

No questions.

Council Member Harris. I have another technical question maybe. You call this a training facility in our business license procedure and in our code it will be a tattoo, body art establishment. The training facility is basically descriptive, is that correct? We're not creating a new category.

No, no, it will still be underneath tattoo and body art services.

And I will have a question for the applicant when it comes up.

Any other questions for staff and council? Okay, if the applicant would like to come up and answer questions, give a presentation. If you will give us your name and address for the record.

All right, my name is Tyrone Jackson. I'm here with my wife, Tiara Jackson. Address 4921 South Aaron Avenue, Springfield, Missouri. And I'm open to any questions.

Council Member Erickson.

Could you, part of the new licensure with the tattoo establishments from the state has been to try to make things more medically correct and cleaner and more sanitation and separation, this, that, and the other. Yes, sir. On the literature that I saw, it looked like there are little booths. I don't see the separation. Could you assure me that this isn't like a tattoo here, a tattoo here, and something else going on? That it's a one of a kind thing?

Absolutely. So we are the only sole proprietor state school in the state of Missouri. The other tattoo establishes are apprenticeships, and they don't have a set standard. We only focus on permanent cosmetics. Unfortunately, permanent cosmetics fall under the same umbrella as tattooing, but it's a complete different practice. The needle depth that you have to use when doing tattooing is completely different from permanent cosmetics. It requires a certain set of skills. Someone that wants permanent cosmetics will need to talk to a tattoo artist that does that skill set, not traditional tattooing. The only way we can reassure you that that will be the focus practice is by being partnered with House of Heavenly Beauty. What we're doing is under the beauty category, so this is to enhance someone's already appearance.

So all the beauty part of the thing will be totally separated from your establishment, correct? That's correct. Okay, thank you. Appreciate that.

Other questions for the applicant? Okay, you did a good job. Thanks for your time. Thank you. And we will go to the audience. Anyone in the audience like to speak in support of? In support of? Anyone speak in opposition to? Opposition to? Any other comments from the council before I close the public hearing? I will close the public hearing. Next item is Item 7, Introduction to Arena Bill 5409, Approving a Universal Beauty School Condition Use Permit.

I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First reading of Bill 5409, an ordinance approving a conditional use permit with alternative development standards allowing a vocational and technical education for body art microblading services in downtown zoning district T4 within 500 feet of residential use and a church at 1405 Southwest Smith Street, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri for Universal Beauty Studio Academy.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Second reading.

Second reading, Bill 5409, an ordinance approving a conditional use permit with alternative development standards allowing a vocational and technical education for body art microblading services in downtown zoning district T4 within 500 feet of residential use and a church at 1405 Southwest Smith Street, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri for Universal Beauty Studio Academy.

Your Honor, I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number.

Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion? Roll call.

Councilmember Brummell?

Aye.

Erickson? Aye. Markworth? Aye. Rowan?

Aye.

Kaler?

Aye.

Tholan? Aye. Mayor Levesay?

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5505.

Okay, this next starts a series of three public hearings, all on the same issue. We're going to do the three public hearings first, and then we will consider the items that are attached to them. First, we're going to have a public hearing on the rezoning for Iconic. And let's try to do this again. If you're going to speak on the rezoning, if you can stand, I will swear you in all at once. You'll raise your right hand. You swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God.

I do.

Okay. When you come up, you'll have to give us your name and address for the record. I have not let the city clerk read her exhibits for the record yet.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated June 25, 2026 with the following attachments. Staff report with attachments, application with attachments, affidavit of publication in the examiner on April 25, 2026, 185-foot notification map, names, addresses of the property owners within 185 feet of the site, copy of letters sent to said property owners, and bill approving the rezoning and planned development concept plan. This is all we have to enter for the record.

All right, staff, we'll start with you. If you can give your name and address for the record and continue with your presentation.

Logan Day, 903 West Main Street, Blue Springs, Missouri, 64154. Good evening, mayor and council members. Before you this evening is a request to rezone the property located east of the intersection of Adams Dairy Parkway and Northeast Napoleon Drive from ag and agriculture and residential estate to PDMU or planned development mixed use. The applicant is also requesting approval of a planned development concept plan to allow for the development of a large mixed-use project on roughly 23.02 plus or minus acres consisting of a 252-unit apartment complex across four apartment buildings along with a central clubhouse in addition to development that also includes four retail lots along the frontage of Adams-Derry Parkway. According to the 2014 Comprehensive Plans, Future Land Use Policy Map designates the subject property as distinct destination, which is defined as a mix of larger scale and regionally significant land uses that are different from other places in Blue Springs and the region. these areas may include a mix of retail service and entertainment office institutional and civic or light industrial land uses with a unique land use policy emphasizing different uses patterns and characteristics that make each destination distinct however the subject property is also located within the c2 area specific plan adopted in 2017 which designates the site as small scale multifamily The specific area plans are detailed area-specific perspectives on development patterns and the coordination of the built and natural environment and how these details contribute to unique places in Blue Springs. This designation is intended to accommodate multifamily residential development that is compatible in scale and design with surrounding neighborhoods and adjacent uses while supporting walkable mixed use environments when integrated with complimentary retail or service uses. The proposed development, which includes a mix of multi family, residential and retail uses is consistent with the broader vision of the distinct destination designation by introducing a higher intensity mixed use environment that can serve as a focal point for activity and investment within the corridor. While the scale of the proposed residential component exceeds what is typically anticipated. Under the small scale, multifamily designation, the development advances key comprehensive plan objectives by promoting a coordinated mix of uses, supporting pedestrian activity and contributing to the creation of defined destination within the area. The proposed zoning district of PDMU supports the applicant's mixed-use development concept by integrating high-density residential and commercial uses in a manner intended to enhance walkability, access to services, and overall site functionality. Approval of the rezoning application would establish a precedent for high-quality mixed-use development and is consistent with the intent of the PDMU zoning district. The proposed project will also have multiple land use designations with the apartment complex having a multi-family housing designation for the four apartment buildings for a total of 252 units along with a clubhouse, amenity areas, garages, and internal sidewalks. The proposed development features a contemporary architectural design with a cohesive mix of stone veneer, fiber cement panels, siding, and contrasting exterior colors. The clubhouse and apartment buildings include various roof lines, recessed entries, balconies and changes in building planes to add architectural interest and reduce the appearance of massing. The four-story apartment buildings incorporate integrated garage units at the lower level while the detached garage structures are designed to complement the primary buildings through consistent materials and colors. Overall, the elevations provide a modern residential character with enhanced visual articulation throughout the development. The development will also include four retail lots along Adams Parkway designated for small retail and midsize retail land uses. The proposed retail buildings will range in size from approximately 1,000 square feet to 10,000 square feet and are designed to complement the overall architectural character of the development. through the use of similar exterior materials, neutral color palettes, varied leaf lines, and modern architectural elements. The retail portion is intended to provide a cohesive streetscape appearance while supporting a mix of neighborhood scale commercial uses. The development will also include three access points along Adams-Derry Parkway, a southern right-in, right-out access that will serve as fire access, a primary signalized full access point at Adams-Derry Parkway and Napoleon Drive, and a northern left-in access with associated median modifications To support safe turning movements. The site will connect to the existing sidewalk network along Adams, very Parkway and provide an internal pedestrian system throughout the development. Sidewalks will range from 5 feet to 8 feet wide and be 88 standards. Sidewalks adjacent to tracks will be installed prior to final plat approval, and sidewalks along lot frontages will be required prior to certificates of occupancy. Traffic improvements include a southbound left turn lane at the northern axis with median adjustments for visibility, a northbound right turn lane at Adams Dairy Parkway and Napoleon Drive, Southern Drive, and an installation of a new signal pole on the west side of that intersection. A final stormwater management plan prepared by a Missouri licensed engineer will be required meeting APWA 5600 and MARC BMP standards. All detention and overflow land will be contained within easements, and significant design changes may require additional review. Sanitary sewer is available across Adams-Zerry Parkway. While capacity exists, the developer will extend infrastructure within the site with final invert elevations verified to confirm connection feasibility. The applicant has submitted a conceptual landscape plan. All landscaping, including required plant units, will be reviewed with the PD final plan. The required 15% open space equates to 3.45 acres, which is meant for this development. This development is proposed to be a five-phase project with construction anticipated to begin fall of 2025 and reach completion by fall of 2026. staff recommends approval of the rezoning and plan development concept plan with the conditions listed at the end of your staff report and i'll be happy to answer any questions and the applicant is here to answer any questions as well other questions for staff and the council councilmember kaylor thank you your honor are there already cutouts on adp for this Correct. So where this new intersection, or there's a cutout, an existing cutout for this intersection, they'd be required to add a signal on the other side?

Correct. So the north and the south both already have cutouts on ADP?

No, those would be new cutouts. Okay.

Fresh my memory, if you can, and they're a certain distance that... Correct. That was reviewed. We're not having the cutouts?

Yeah. That was reviewed by our city engineer.

So that falls into the category of the distance. There is no issue then having those? Correct. Okay.

Any questions for the applicant? Council Member Erickson.

The sidewalk that's already in place, pardon my ignorance on this, but does it meet ADA standards? It's 25 years old. So the trail on ADP? The trails on the other side?

Yeah, so the sidewalk, they would be required, so it does meet ADA. Currently it does? Yeah, so they would be required to connect to that sidewalk, essentially.

Other questions for staff from the council? Okay, then if the applicant is present, want to come give a presentation? We need your name and address for the record, assuming you've been sworn in.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Matt Tapp with Griffin Riley Property Group. 21 SE 29th Terrace, Lee's Summit, Missouri 64082. I know Team USA has a pretty important match tonight, so I'll do my best to keep this moving and get everyone home to watch the big game. Tonight, we're presenting the mixed-use development proposal for approximately 23 acres at Adams-Derry Parkway and Napoleon Drive. This project represents an opportunity to create the type of destination environment the city envisioned for this corridor, bringing together high quality housing, community serving retail, restaurants, and gathering spaces within a coordinated mixed use development. As we'll discuss tonight, the plan is the result of multiple years of collaboration between city, staff, and our team, and reflects the vision established through the city's RFP process for this important property. We appreciate the opportunity to work with the city and staff throughout that process. Before discussing the project itself, I think it's important to briefly review the process that brought us to tonight. The city began evaluating opportunities for this property several years ago, and ultimately initiated a competitive RFP process to identify the right development partner. Griffin Riley was selected through that process in 2025, and since then, we've worked closely with the city staff to refine a plan that is consistent with the goals established by the city. What you're seeing tonight is the outcome of that process and collaboration. At a high level, this project does five important things for Blue Springs. Number one, it delivers the destination-oriented mixed-use environment outlined in the city's RFP. Two, it activates 23 acres of city-owned property. Three, it supports balanced growth and housing diversity. Four, creates new economic activity. And five, is structured to develop in phases that align with real demand. Just as important as what the project is, is how it actually works. This is designed to succeed because it's phased based on real demand, not speculative build out. The residential creates immediate activity, the location benefits from existing infrastructure, and the plan has already gone through a detailed review by city staff. This isn't simply a development concept, it's a development strategy that is intentionally structured around market realities. I'll keep this brief. This just reinforces that our team has experience delivering projects like this. We've developed across multiple asset classes, including mixed-use environments similar in scale and approach. These are simply examples of comparable projects that demonstrate the level of quality and execution we bring to our developments. We've also assembled an experienced local team, architecture, civil, and traffic, who are here to answer any questions, all familiar with Blue Springs standards and expectations. The location, the site is about 23 acres along Adams-Derry Parkway, just south of I-70. This is one of the city's key growth corridors with strong visibility and existing infrastructure already in place. Few undeveloped properties remain in this corridor that have the size, visibility, and flexibility to support a project of this scale. The requested zoning simply provides the framework necessary to execute the mixed use vision that's already been established for the property. And this zoning framework was reviewed and recommended for approval by city staff. Rather than reading through the comp plan, I'll simply summarize the takeaway. This project advances the city's goals for destination development, housing diversity, and walkable mixed use environments. In our view, that's exactly what this site was intended to become. We held the required neighborhood meeting, one neighboring property owner attended, no questions were raised, no concerns were raised, no opposition was expressed. Since that meeting, we have not received any opposition to the project. In terms of the development plan itself, I will not go into the nitty gritty of it, as staff did an excellent job of introducing our request, but the site is organized around a live, work, play concept. Retail and restaurants are positioned along Adams Dairy for visibility, and departments provide a built-in customer base that supports those uses. Stormwater has also been coordinated with the city to improve downstream conditions. In terms of the phasing, this is one of the most important aspects of the project. This is not a build everything and hope it fills approach. We start with residential to establish activity, create a customer base, and bring daily energy to the site. From there, commercial development is delivered incrementally based on actual tenant demand and market conditions. It also allows commercial development to respond to real demand rather than forcing space into the market before it's needed. That reduces vacancy risk and supports long-term project performance. This phasing strategy has been discussed with staff throughout the review process and is one of the reasons we believe the project is positioned to perform well over time. I'm a visual learner, so let's talk about the pretty pictures. These renderings illustrate the overall design intent for the residential component of the project. The buildings have been designed with articulated facades, varied roof lines, quality exterior materials, and strong pedestrian scale to create visual interest and avoid a repetitive apartment appearance. Our goal is to develop a community that complements surrounding investment in the area while establishing a high quality environment for future residents. The result is a product that supports the overall mixed-use vision while creating a destination development that Blue Springs can be very proud of. The key takeaway is that quality matters, and we intend for this project to reflect the level of investment occurring throughout the Adams-Derry corridor. The clubhouse anchors the internal pedestrian network and functions as a true community gathering space for residents. Meanwhile, open space and amenities are intentionally distributed throughout the site rather than concentrated in leftover areas. In terms of the Adams Dairy frontage, the commercial conceptual idea, this component is intended to serve both project residents and the Boderick Blue Springs community. The buildings are positioned along Adams Dairy Parkway to maximize visibility, accessibility, and long-term viability for future tenants. The intent is to attract a mix of neighborhoods serving retail, restaurant, and service users that complement nearby development and create additional amenities for the community. The commercial lots are intentionally phased so they can be delivered in response to market demand, allowing us to pursue quality tenants and avoid speculative construction. Together with the residential component, this creates the type of integrated live, work, and play environment envisioned through the city's RFP process. Fingers crossed technology works, but as I said, I'm a visual learner, and this is often the easiest way to understand how the site comes together as a complete environment. If you'll bear with us, we'd like to show a short, short video.

you

Mayor and council, this site has been the subject of discussion, planning, and evaluation for several years. Through that process, the city established a clear vision for what this property could become and ultimately conducted a competitive RFP process to identify the right development partner. We believe this plan fulfills that vision. It creates a destination-oriented mixed-use environment, expands housing options, activates a strategically located piece of city-owned property, and does so in a phased and market-responsive manner. The project has been thoroughly reviewed by staff, neighborhood outreach has been completed, and no opposition has been expressed. We appreciate the opportunity to work alongside the city throughout this process and respectfully request your approval. Thank you for your time and consideration. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Any questions for the applicant from the council? Council Member Brummel.

Of the 252 units, what's the breakdown between studio, one bedroom, two, three?

I assumed that question was going to be asked. So we talked with our architect and identified a potential unit mix that's likely the best situation and application for Blue Springs. So do you want to do percentage-wise, Councilmember? Does that make the most sense? Whatever is easiest for you. OK, sure. Let's do percentages, though. That's a key figure. So within studios, we have around 14% of units as studios. For one bedroom, that would be 42%. For two-bedroom, it would be 35%, and then two-bedroom plus den would be 9%. Thank you.

Do you have more questions?

No?

Council Member Erickson.

Two questions. The first one is, this is a facsimile of the Blackwell, is that correct?

That is correct, Council Member.

So the same type of architecture, garages, et cetera, that you have out there is what we would expect?

Yes and no. I would say we evaluated the market area and we feel as if the architecture that we're presenting presents that air of luxury and high quality. So if you drive by Blackwell, by all means, please do and swing in and visit. We'd love to give a tour. But it is very similar in overall design. But the skin of it, we wanted to update a little bit and refresh it a little bit.

Okay. And then how many square feet of... Commercial space when it's all done.

I don't have that figure from a council member, but Yeah, like 26,000 across the the four lots that's good.

Thank you the questions for the applicant from the council

Well, I'm going to ask, and I know you can't tell me exactly what's expected for the commercial space, but can you maybe give examples of what spaces of that size, what types of uses we can expect as it builds out?

Yes, Mayor, definitely, great question. We've already had preliminary conversations with a bunch of different brokers that have representation of fantastic users. We're still working through that process. We're a little early in the game, so that's why we didn't really want to announce anything just yet, but based on my slides and what we've presented to this point is retail, restaurants, We wanna try and attract as many entertainment users as possible. We feel that Blue Springs lacks entertainment options, so we would love to push that pretty hard. But we'll do our very best to attract the actually top tenants for Blue Springs.

So do you expect, for example, the 10,000 square foot, that that's gonna be a single user or multiple users?

The conceptual plan that we've laid out, we just wanted to show you all what could happen in those lots. Let's say, I don't wanna throw a name out, but let's say it's an entertainment barbecue concept. They would perhaps merge lots two and three and make a much bigger lot, because they need 50, 60, 70,000 square foot lot. So that's why we need to have those conversations now, so that we can revise our plans as we need to. But the concept plan before you this evening is meant to show you what could happen. So we want to show you our multi-tenant commercial buildings throughout those lots, and then we also have a smaller coffee type of user on that very south end. So to answer your question, yes. We very much want to attract a single tenant user, but we also want to allow for multi-tenant as well.

and i think i heard you say the build out of the retail space is kind of dependent on resident demand do you have a timeline of what that might look like or full completion or something along those lines great question so unfortunately our apartment construction these days is running 18 to 24 months more on the 24 month end of it mr mayor so

we will start the apartments with the clubhouse, obviously, and amenities, and then also the buildings nearby so that we can be as soon to market as possible. In doing so, we'll actively market the commercial lots and work our tails off to attract users. So if someone comes and says, hey, we wanna do lots two and three, then they can happen right away, basically, because thanks to the city's vision and application, Adams-Derry Parkway, for the most part, is ready to go. the retail can happen as swiftly as quickly as the market tells us so it doesn't actually have to wait till the end of the 24 months they can be concurrently as well no no but i also wanted to lay that expectation of i always say this harks back to my economic development days but retail follows rooftops not the other way around ever okay looks like that's all the questions appreciate your presentation thank you mayor council

that i will go to the audience anyone in the audience like to speak in support of in support of okay i do have an opposition to for the rezoning from find the name here abbas haldari you here okay if you can come on up i need to swear you in so if you will raise your right hand You swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God.

I do.

If you'll give us your name and address for the record.

Abbas, Henry, 14462 Chadwick Street, Leawood, Kansas, 66224.

Okay, you've got three minutes to tell us what your comments are.

Thank you so much. Hello and good evening, respected mayor and city council members and staff. I'm Abbas Hedry. I'm an architect and an urban planner, and I'm here on behalf of Mr. Zahid Muhammad, who is the owner of the Phillips 66 Speedway convenience store at 501 Napoleon or Northeast Napoleon in Blue Springs. The owner had attended the meeting on April 22nd, and I believe, so that was the only opposition, and he had noted his concerns contrary to what was stated by the applicant. And thereafter, I had called Mr. Tapp, the applicant, and left a message. However, he never returned my call to discuss. So please have that be noted. I therefore wanted to discuss the proposed development as it directly impacts the owner's business. He is not necessarily opposed to the development in general, however he has significant concerns about the tenant mix and the activities that might come in the retail development. As a gas station with a convenient store, his livelihood depends on providing fuel as well as be a neighborhood store that supplies our neighbors' needs. This includes beverages and coffee, food options including quick serve foods, grocery needs, as well as liquor. We are also designed to be able to provide electric charging stations for electric vehicles. We therefore want to make sure that this development does not have any businesses that compete with us as this would cannibalize our livelihood and ability to survive. As you can see, we have enhanced the node by designing and building a really exquisite facility, the likes of which are generally not seen in terms of material quality and articulation for convenience stores. Most people that visit our store compliment us on our facility and cleanliness as well as services. We have also invested heavily in the public infrastructure as we paid for the design and installation of the traffic signal that serves this intersection. This development will get to enjoy the fruits of that signal. We do request that this development share the cost of that infrastructure as they will profit from our investment. We are happy to furnish our receipts for that purpose. Thank you so much for your consideration. Thank you for your comments. Appreciate that.

Is there anyone else in the audience like to speak in opposition to, in opposition to? Any other comments from the council before I close the public hearing? Okay, I will close the public hearing. We have another public hearing on the same topic, this time for the CID that's proposed for Exxon Blue Springs. The city clerk will have some exhibits to read for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City council information form dated July 1st, 2026 with the following attachments, Polsinelli presentation, but for analysis presentation, city clerk verification of petition for community improvement district, an ordinance to approve petition and establish district with community improvement district petition attached as exhibit A. This is all we have to enter for the record.

Okay, let's try this again. If you know you're gonna be speaking on this item, public hearing for the CID, if you will stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God?

I do.

Okay, when you come up, you'll give your name and address for the record. I believe from presentations we have Kurt from Pozzanelli's, our first one up. Good evening, Mayor.

Please continue. Thank you, Council Mayor. Kurt Peterson here on behalf of Griffin Riley. My address is 900 West, 48th Place, Kansas City, Missouri. With all the experience and reputation that Griffin Riley has, and Mr. Tapp went over that a bit, they are thrilled at the idea of bringing 23 acres of unused, dead land to life and doing something great within the city of Blue Springs. The specific proposal, I'll say, because I guess I was looking at all of you very recently, so this is just for context, not to overly compare, but the idea behind Major Locks with a CID, a chapter 100 the structure itself is identical so just to get your mindset for those that haven't dug in deeply the same exact structure so going over that with a little bit of detail the first with the CID is a community improvement district sales tax of 1% which says anybody that purchases something that's subject to Missouri sales tax within this project only will pay an extra penny per dollar and those funds are then used to help with public infrastructure reimbursement The second piece is Chapter 100, and Chapter 100 has two benefits. One is it provides sales tax exemption for the purchase of construction materials for everything that happens in the development that Mr. Tapp was describing. And lastly within Chapter 100 is fixed pilots, or payments in lieu of tax. So the bond structure we do have a deed lease back with the city, just like Major Lux, allows there to be sort of a clean slate. And then there's payments in lieu of tax that are paid, and then those increase over a period of 25 years. in as brief, but hopefully still sufficient for initial discussion. That is the proposal that's before you. The reason for these are the benefits to this development, the reason that makes it happen. One is there's a significant, it's funny, I heard the description accurately of public infrastructure and you think, oh, there's a turn lane here and a signal here, but we're talking millions of dollars of public infrastructure that this project has as part of its budget. what i just described as the request is what makes it happen it makes us get uh be able to pencil with the public infrastructure load that's there and then secondly just overall actually i almost left this out but it takes about a few words to say it the uncertainty we faced in the development community with major tens of millions of dollars and cost projects like this of tax uncertainty in jackson county You've heard it, you've seen it, you've read it. It's really, really hard for lenders, for equity. So this sort of fixed structure of a payment in lieu of tax solves that problem. Lastly, and this is really the job I won't step on their toes, of your financial advisor, Baker Tilly, doesn't gets into all our books and records and costs and projections and looks for you and makes a recommendation on whether this is indeed a proposal that is just enough needed not too much uh to make this project a reality so i won't speak into that if you have questions i'm sure you'll ask them but i will tell you from the very beginning we designed this proposal for you tonight both and i should say this public hearing the cid and then i won't bother you again in a minute um and then the chapter 100 which is the next public hearing it's exactly what makes griffin riley bring this project to life that's as brief but substantive as i can be and i'd love to answer your questions now or later on either one of those pieces do you want questions on both the cid and chapter 100 now as long as council's okay with that i'm okay with that but i'll defer to uh sarah if she's here somewhere Sarah says yes, so yes mayor.

I'm happy to answer your questions. Sarah says yes and that's the truth. Okay, well is there any questions for our presenter from the council on either issue?

No.

Councilman Markman.

Maybe I should ask this. We're going through the last presentation. I read a lot about local developer, local design firm, civil and architectural. I don't see anything here about the construction side. I expect this to have over 100,000 man hours. which would be just doing quick math on how many guys on site, and I hear 18 to 24 months, that's a lot of work. Do you guys have, who, and maybe I don't need to, is it a local construction management firm that you guys use? Do you try and keep your workforce closer to home rather than just finding the cheapest that's out of town? I know that when those individuals are paid and that money's going back home, that money could be used to kind of invest in this local economy as well, right? So when we talk about all local I like to hear that it's also local workers, too. That's kind of near and dear to my heart. So do we have a CM on the Blackwell? Or how do you guys do it?

I know Jake Loveless, Vice President, I was going to say, if you're starting to get up. Sure.

Jake, I think you were sworn in, but go ahead and give us your name and address for the record.

Jake Loveless, Griffin-Reilly Property Group, 21 Southeast, 29th Terrace, Lee Summit, 64082. So actually really good question. Um, I think in all of these that I've done, I believe I've only been asked that 1 time. Um, but it is a great question and thinking through, you know, the. Last 5 or 6 of these projects that I've been a part of, um, every 1 of them, we've had a local construction management group. We actually carry, it's a unique thing about us is that we carry our construction management licenses. We don't generally perform the construction management services. We just try to oversee a project really well that's done by a local construction management company. So while I can't speak exactly to where every one of the workers come from in the projects, what I would tell you is that the vast majority of the workers that we see here are local to Kansas City. Very rarely does it make sense for somebody to come from out of market to try to perform any significant work.

Thank you. Any other questions for Mr. Peterson before we move on to our next speaker? Okay, thank you, appreciate it. Also then have somebody from Baker Tilly gonna give us a but for analysis. Colby, I believe. If you were sworn in, then give us your name and address for the record.

Can do. I'm Colby Krasinowski with Baker Tilly, 7285 West 132nd Street, Overland Park, Kansas, 66213. And I'm here to present on the but-for analysis for the Adams Dairy Parkway development project. we'd like to start with the end a little bit we have uh reviewed as mr peterson said a vast variety of details surrounding this project over the time that has been in circulation in the city's process and we evaluated above all else what we consider sort of the the the the marquee data point on the return analysis which underpins the but for and answers the question would this project proceed in the current market but for the incentive being requested and well you'll see on the scrapped here we'll get to it throughout the course of the presentation is without the incentive the project is about 3.54 percent unlevered internal rate of return The lower boundary that we would expect investors to seek in the current market is 6% and the upper boundary is 9.5 for this type of project. And with incentive, they are lying almost on that lower boundary at 5.92% according to our analysis. Some of these figures may differ slightly as some of our assumptions in our analysis may be very slightly different than what the developer, the development group presents, but we do sensitize and evaluate all of those assumptions in the course of our work. So there's a lot of details related to the project, but I think the project team has largely gone over those. So we do have some information articulating the project that we evaluated. We do try to keep this up to date with all the updates, any particular changes or any new information that comes from the development group. But I won't linger here too long. One of the most important slides, at least in my opinion, is us describing what we do in the evaluation of these projects. Firstly, the purpose is for us to assess whether the public participation supports the project feasibility based on the forecasted return. We do use an internal rate of return. That's the language that investors speak broadly across the country in terms of real estate investment. The scope of our review is to review the applicant's pro forma, evaluate the cost, revenues, expenses, financing, and the underlying assumptions that the applicant uses to develop each of those items. We also estimate the return with and without the request and incentive basically to say what does it look like If it gets incentive, what does it look like without? How does that align with the market, which is what we saw on the first slide? And then we compare our returns to market ranges or proxy references. We say proxy references because there's a broad amount of information for the development you see in the market and commonplace. We also like to look to a lot of different sources as the development grows more and more specific. Luckily in this instance, this type of development is something that we see a lot of. um what is not in our scope we do not do market feasibility we do financial feasibility so there is no larger economic review done of this project we obviously can't guarantee any project rents expenses financing terms we are using the best information available to us from the many data sources we have and evaluating the information provided by the applicant so we don't have a crystal ball if we did we'd probably be doing something different It is not an independent appraisal or construction estimate that we do put a lot of work into evaluating the applicant's assumptions around final valuation and several other metrics associated with their project. We are not appraisers that we do try to emulate the techniques used by appraisal professionals as closely as possible and oftentimes lean on them as well to understand the project in a deeper way. One important term in our purpose and scope is that we have no financial interest in the project. We are the financial advisor to the city and we serve in service of the city and its residents and taxpayers. Our analytical approach is also important because the rigor with which we evaluate each project is important for us being able to underpin the results of our analysis. We evaluate the project costs as in every cost that goes into the project. We try to find a resource benchmark estimator peer project or peer cost that we can associate it with and compare it to in the current market. We evaluate the operating assumptions. There is a wealth of data on the operations of projects like this and with this kind of industrial mix. So we like to turn to that and say, what do other projects in the market do? And that's the same thing a real estate investor would do as well when they're looking at a project to invest in. We evaluate the sale assumptions. Ultimately, these projects do get sold. They do get turned over. Investors look at it in a fairly standardized way. In our business, even if our developers intend on holding the project for its useful life all the way 20, 30, 40 years, we benchmark it against what we would see in the market, which is, in many cases, a 10-year sale at the end of the period of the project. So we do that to understand the hypothetical aspects circumstances surrounding that and get its final value because that helps us understand the final return. We use all of these things to calculate a return. We use an unlevered return because it removes us from the place and time we are in the current market and the current interest rate environment, and we evaluate the project return against a variety of projects across history. I do wanna note here, the interest rate environment is very volatile right now among other things, so it's not that we entirely ignore the concepts of interest rate and financing, but we do like to benchmark it against projects, both current and historical. We also compare to market expectations. We use the PricewaterhouseCooper National Survey for real estate investment. We also have other tools we benchmark to as well. That's sort of our primary weather vein of understanding what investor expectations are and how we determine the results of our analysis. A little bit on the requested incentive package. As the previous presenters have gotten to, the request for incentive involves a sales tax exemption on construction materials, property tax abatement, and CID sales tax. The cumulative gross value of those incentives over the life of the entire project is 20 million, but present valuing that benefit to the current day puts it about 9.7 million. The sources and uses are very much in line with what we expect in the current market. As interest rates rise, we expect equity contributions for real estate projects to rise with them, and this meets the pattern that we're seeing in the current market. For uses, we found the assumptions behind uses, and we'll get to this a little bit more, very much aligned with what we'd expect in the current market. And as for the incentive structure, we have some articulation here, but the pilot schedule that has been proposed and negotiated for this project is a, five-year escalating pilot schedule on a per-door basis. This is a term negotiated between the developer and the city. And in Baker Tilly's review of the calculations here, it is not meaningfully markedly different from a percentage-based pilot. So we calculate it correctly, but we kind of treat it as what it is. For the sales tax exemption on construction materials, this is fairly standard component of the chapter 100 industrial revenue bond structure and the 27 year CID sales tax on a portion of the development is We evaluated that review and the data presented by the developer as well. So for the project cost overview, we reviewed the applicant's assumptions related to the construction costs and compared it to the data that we see in the market. We found that it was largely in line with what we would expect. For the retail construction component, there is There is some variation on what we would expect there, but this is where we try to sensitize to the fact that all projects are fairly unique. There are other considerations to make. And also, what is the sensitivity? The retail component of this project is not the major contributor to the square footage. And even if we sensitize this to completely normal construction costs, there was still a notable and pronounced gap in the project financing. While there was some variation in our assumptions versus those put forward by the developer, we found in our review of sensitivity and our evaluation of the underlying assumptions that that really didn't present a material issue with the findings of the report. So for operating assumptions, we evaluated rents, vacancies and retail revenue and all three of these metrics very much largely aligned with what we would expect in the current market. The multifamily rents we looked at for the greater regional area and then benchmarked against some peer city groups and even within the city of Blue Springs as well and found that it was very much in line with the four and five star market locally. For the vacancy and lease-up rate, we found that vacancies were even somewhat more conservative, and the retail revenue rate was proposed slightly higher, but we would expect that from a development that is seeking to be a market-leading new-build retail development. We're back to our internal rate of return graphic. So what we evaluated is in part of our sensitivity that even if project costs were reduced significantly, the incentive scenario would still return what we would expect to be within a normal range with the incentive between that six and 9.5, and then without incentive it still is in the same range below the expected investor incentive range. The primary constraints of this project are elevated cost of construction and cost of capital. This is something we are going to see in the current real estate environment. For this to be a result of the analysis is largely in line with what we'd expect, and it's something we're going to see consistently both in our market and markets around the country. The greater Jackson County area also has some softening in the apartment market. This is not just Jackson County, but we are seeing patterns like this throughout the country, and it is a feature of the current economy and likely will normalize, but that softening of the apartment market is going to be a contributor to the lower return here. And then the valuation, we did review several scenarios related to the cap rate, which is commonly a highly sensitive assumption. And we found that within the realm of reason, if we sensitize for those cap rates, we also found a project that still justified the need for the incentive as it was currently requested. So we did conclude the incentive appears necessary to support the project as proposed under the current marketing conditions, even under the most ideal conditions, the project would likely not be feasible without the requested incentive. And in respect for everyone's desire to see the game, I did try to move quickly, but I am available for questions as necessary.

Well, I do want to note, I appreciate you noting, Mr. Peterson is the attorney for the developer sharing their incentive request. You and Sarah from Gilmore Bell are attorneys on behalf of the city. You're evaluating it to protect the city from an outrageous incentive request. And so your but-for analysis on behalf of us is that it's a reasonable request for the size of project is kind of the summary of what you concluded.

That is a correct statement.

Council, do you have any questions for our attorney on this? Okay, appreciate your time. We up next then have Sarah with Gilmore and Bell also are turning to present as well. And I still need your name and address for the record.

Good evening, Sarah Granath with Gilmore and Bell. Our address is 2405 Grand Boulevard, 1100 Kansas City, Missouri. And I do not have a specific presentation on the CID portion. I'm happy to answer any questions you might have on that incentive. I will be, I'll come back up and kind of wrap up on the Chapter 100 portion, but happy to answer any questions here.

Any questions for Sarah? Okay, thank you. We'll see you again here in just a minute. With that, then, I will go to the audience. Does anyone in the audience like to speak in support of, in support of? Anyone speak in opposition to? Any final comments from the council before I close the public hearing? We'll close the public hearing. Only to start another public hearing, this one for the Chapter 100 bond request, and the city clerk will have some exhibits to read for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated July 1st, 2026 with the following attachments. Trust indenture, lease agreement, bond purchase agreement, ordinance to approve plan, issuance of bonds and approve bond documents with plan and CBA as mailed attached as exhibit A. This is all we have to enter for the record.

Okay, I think Ms. Granath is the only one coming up to speak on this one. Is that not right? Okay, I do have to swear you're in, though. If you will stand and raise your right hand, do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case be the truth, so help you God? I do. All right, if you will give your name and address for the record.

Sarah Granath, 2405 Grand Boulevard, Suite 1100, Kansas City, Missouri. All right, good evening again, Mayor and Council. So as has been mentioned before, and so instead of kind of reiterating the whole process, we're just gonna enter on to the record and incorporate the comments from the prior two public hearings. into this taxing district hearing. Slight difference there, so as you all are aware with the previous incentive that was mentioned, that Kurt mentioned on Major Lux, this is kind of the same scenario where we have the CID and the Chapter 100. The CID for this project is actually only on the retail portion. kind of carved that out in the legal descriptions. So now that we're talking about the Chapter 100, that similarly is only on the residential portion. I did want to highlight that that means the retail portion of the development will be on the tax rolls as far as real and personal property tax goes. The Chapter 100 request um for the multi-family portion would be for real property tax abatement for 25 years it's the maximum length that you can go under this this portion of the missouri constitution and statutes for multi-family development and so what that means is during construction the developer would pay a payment in lieu of tax equal to 100% of the taxes that would otherwise be due. So whether that construction period is the 18 months or the 24 months, they would pay that full amount. And then once we hit the year following that full construction, and they're ready to activate the abatement, that's when we would have our schedule that's kind of put up here on the screen. I think this is Curt's slide, but I'll go ahead and use it because I did not prepare a slide specifically. So as you can see, we kind of stepped on each year in increments, five and then five years, 10 years and five years. The actual documents and plan are set up on a dollars per door basis. It comes out to roughly these percentages, but it is calculated on dollars per door. So it will be that dollar amount per whatever is actually constructed. That's how we help kind of right size the incentive, right? And as with all incentives that are covered in the area that Central Jackson County Fire District covers, this project will pay a payment in lieu of tax equal to 75% of the taxes otherwise due to the district, as is their statutory right to set their reimbursement rate. Sales tax exemption on construction materials, again, has been discussed that historically will have, shows to have very little impact on the city. Without a use tax, there's not a lot of construction materials that can or ultimately would be purchased within the city. The ordinance that you will have tonight on this issue will approve both the plan and the bond documents. That's the implementing instrument. That's kind of the less exciting part, but I am happy to go into any of those details that you would like on those documents as we would move towards implementing that if this is approved tonight. the last item that i will mention is because this is under the chapter 100 statutes there's a taxing district hearing required and so i would just ask that we give an opportunity um not only for the public if we'd like but specifically those taxing district representatives that may or may not be in attendance tonight i'm happy to answer any questions any questions for sarah councilman two questions number one would be on the retail so that means they're paying full property tax right Full property tax, yes, and full sales taxes will be collected, plus that additional 1%.

And then the 27 years of that, does that start from when they close in the land or until after they build it up?

On the community improvement district?

Yes.

Yes, so that is actually by statute as of, I believe it was 2021 when it went into effect. It's 27 years from the date the ordinance is approved.

Okay, so that also is an incentive for them to get that district done.

Correct, yep. The clock starts ticking tonight if it gets approved.

Yeah. Just to piggyback on that question then, I'm guessing you didn't do, do you have numbers on what the retail portion property tax is annually?

I do not have those estimates. That's kind of outside of our scope. I don't know if Colby was at anything.

We didn't ask you to review that, so I wouldn't expect you to. I just wondered if you did.

Yeah, it sounds like Colby may have some numbers on that that he would be able to present to you.

Okay. Other questions for share from the council? Okay. Thank you for your presentation. Thank you. Then we'll go to the audience again. Anyone, I just like to speak in support of, in support of. Anyone speak in opposition to, in opposition to? Any comments? Oh, come on up, sir. I believe we had your name and address, but I do have to swear you in again. If you'll raise your right hand, you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so I hope you've got it.

I do.

Okay, give us your name and address again for the record on this public hearing, and then continue.

Bas Hedry, 14462 Chadwick Street, Leawood, Kansas 662-4, on behalf of Mr. Zahid Mohammed from 501 Northeast Napoleon, the Speedway gas station. I just wanted to highlight again that I hope there's discussion on the retail portion. and the concerns that we had because that would directly impact my client and what he does. And I don't think we want to see a closed down gas station right in front of such a nice facility that we're trying to build. Thank you.

Okay, thank you so much. Anyone else in the audience like to speak in? Opposition two and opposition two. Any comments from the council before I close the public hearing? Okay, I will close the public hearing. Next item then, let me catch up here. Looks like item 11, introduction and reading of Bill 5410, approving the Adams-Gerry-Parkway rezoning and planned development concept plan for Iconic Blue Springs.

I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First, reading Bill 5410, an ordinance rezoning property from AGRE, Agricultural Residential Estate, to PDMU, planned development mixed use, and approving a planned development concept plan for Iconic Blue Springs. Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Is there any discussion? Okay, I'm gonna add some comments while council's thinking about whether they have discussion for this item, because we had a similar proposal to this a couple of meetings ago, and I said we would have more of these and that I wanted to make sure we were transparent to the community. I do still see in the community sometimes that the council is giving money away to developers, and so I wanna make sure that everyone recognizes that is not what's happening. That is either misinformation or something else, but the council is not giving money to any private developers, whether this project or any project like it. What we are considering doing tonight is temporarily abating property taxes for the use of producing a project like this. The city has owned this property for more than 15 years. So for 15 years, all taxing entities received $0 in property taxes for this property as was mentioned by the applicant we did two requests for proposals on this property one of them specifically for jobs and office and light industrial get zero proposals for that but this developer was selected by the council with the rfp to look for a mixed use development just like this and as was pointed out has had multiple years So even if we were considering a project which was 100% abatement, the taxing entities would be exactly where they are now, receiving $0 in future taxes on this property. However, that's not what's being considered tonight, as is the three lawyers that we just talked to in the last two public hearings, is there are payments in lieu of taxes. And so those pilot payments do go to the taxing entities As a result of this project so the school district is going to receive some money annually From this developer if we approve this project now, it's over the course of 25 years, so it starts out smaller You look you saw the schedule Maybe they're getting twenty five thousand a year for the first five years and then it goes up to almost fifty thousand a year and then it goes up to a hundred thousand a year for the next ten years and But over the course of the 25 years, the developer is paying, instead of the property taxes, is paying $2.6 million to the school district. They're paying $2.4 million to the fire district. The city doesn't get very much in property taxes, so we're maybe getting a couple hundred thousand dollars in that time frame. but there is money going to the taxing entities to support the services that this development could potentially increase so the fire district is getting 2.4 million dollars over this time frame to help fight fires or to provide services to this community the school district if there are kids that are students that are developed out of this there may be 25 30 students when you have a only what, 35% two bedroom. So we're looking largely to be young professionals, maybe some people retiring, looking to a high quality development that may also allow for some more properties, some more houses to be free in the community. And so those are still getting, those tax entities are still getting some money here. And what the city gets, in addition to a $66 million private investment, we also get new residents that will do sales taxes. Let's assume there's 300 new residents out of this, which is probably a conservative estimate. That would be based on just normal average amounts. They may spend about $3 million in taxable sales to restaurants and retail in Blue Springs, in the community that isn't currently getting spent now. Could be more, could be four or five million, but $3 million. is a conservative estimate. And then the city does get the additional sales tax dollars out of that. We get an additional $100,000 a year in sales taxes, or we get additional money from water revenue or sewer revenue. And so the city gets, in addition to just new residents, we get an injection economic development into the community that doesn't currently exist, and a vacant property that sat there for 15 years. And so if you hear somebody saying we're giving money away to a developer, that's not happening. We are agreeing potentially, if the council agrees, to abate taxes temporarily so we can produce a project that gives the city some additional resources, public infrastructure, all of those things. And so that's what's on the table now, not giving money to developers, just making sure that we have a project that works for everybody. With those comments, make sure there's any council that has thought about it and decided they do have comments. For the record, Council Member Brummel.

Yeah, the only thing I was going to add to that is all the retail is going to be 100% property tax. So we're getting more tax revenue going to the schools and everything else right there. And then on top of that, the sales tax that we will be receiving from that much retail is going to be a pretty good amount.

Yeah, we get 26,000 square feet-ish, depending on the makeup of new retail, new restaurants that we don't currently have. And that's why we look for projects like this. That's why we even entertain projects like this, is because it does have a benefit to the community, or at least that's a judgment that the council is looking for, is whether or not we feel like this benefits the community and to the level that the incentive request matches. With that, then, I have a motion and a second. All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Second reading.

Second reading of Bill 5410, an ordinance rezoning property from AGRE Agricultural Residential Estate to PDMU planned development mixed use and approving a planned development concept plan for Iconic Blue Springs.

Your Honor, I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number.

Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion? I do just want to, because we had our speaker here in opposition, I guess just to address those things specifically. I guess from my standpoint, I feel like a development such as this would benefit a gas station and convenience store that's right across the street. So I don't quite understand the concern. It doesn't seem to me like it would be something that would be negative. I guess if another gas station was across the street, you could argue that has some cannibalism. But even so, I think the additional residents would actually probably benefit a business such as that. The public infrastructure will be developed on their side as well, similar to what you had to do. So I think that's consistent with what the expectations were for a similar development. So I don't share the concern that was expressed, but I did want to at least address it specifically since you brought it up. Any other comments from the council before we vote? All right, then roll call.

Councilmember Erickson.

Aye.

Markworth.

Aye.

Rowan.

Aye.

Kaler.

Aye.

Tholen. Aye. Rommel.

Aye.

Mayor Lovesay.

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5506.

Next is introduction reading of bill 5411 establishing a CID for Iconic Blue Springs. I'll introduce it, your honor.

First reading of bill 5411, an ordinance approving the petition for establishment of the Adamsterry Parkway Community Improvement District and establishing the district for Iconic Blue Springs.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Second reading.

Second reading of Bill 5411, an ordinance approving the petition for establishment of the Adams-Derry Parkway Community Improvement District and establishing the district for Iconic Blue Springs.

Your Honor, I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion?

Roll call.

Council Member Markworth?

Aye.

Rowan?

Aye.

Kaler?

Aye.

Boland? Aye. Brummel?

Aye.

Erickson?

Aye.

Mayor Levesay?

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5507.

Next is introduction to reading of bill 5412, approving the chapter 100 bonds for Iconic Blisterings. I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First reading of Bill 5412, an ordinance approving a plan for an industrial development project authorizing the issuance of taxable industrial development revenue bonds in a maximum aggregate principal amount of not to exceed $66.5 million and authorizing certain documents and actions in connection therewith for Iconic Blue Springs.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries, second meeting.

Second reading of Bill 5412, an ordinance approving a plan for an industrial development project authorizing the issuance of taxable industrial development revenue bonds in a maximum aggregate principal amount of not to exceed $66.5 million and authorizing certain documents and actions in connection therewith for iconic blue springs.

The honor I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion?

Roll call.

Councilmember Rowan. Aye. Kaler.

Aye.

Tholen. Aye. Rommel. Aye. Erickson.

Aye.

Markworth.

Aye.

Mayor Levesay.

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5508.

Next we have a public hearing on the Colburn Road annexation. I think just staff will make the first presentation so the city clerk will have some exhibits to read for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated June 23, 2026 with the following attachments. Site location maps, petition of voluntary annexation with attachments, affidavit of publication the examiner on June 13, 2026, 185-foot notification map, names, addresses of property owners within 185 feet of the site, copy of letters sent to said property owners, and bill approving annexation. This is all we have to enter for the record.

All right, staff, if you can raise your right hand. You swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so I hope you got it. I do. If you can give us your name and address for the record.

So Chantelle Fry, 903 West Main Street, Blue Springs, Missouri, 64015. Good evening, Mayor and members of the council. Before you this evening is a request to approve an annexation of approximately 2.43 acres into the city of Blue Springs. The property is currently owned by the applicant, City of Blue Springs. This property is located at Southwest Colburn Road right of way east of Southwest 7 Highway. annexation into the city is required to prior to development in order to access and utilize public utility services these two properties are actually remnants from when we annexation into the city limits so this is a matter of cleaning up our city limits and getting those pockets along colburn road This request is for the public hearing and the first reading of the bill for the annexation. The second reading for this annexation and the annexation agreement is scheduled for July 20th, 2026 City Council Agenda. The annexation petition was received June 1 of 2026 and the initial public hearing is occurring within the state statutes required of 60 days. Staff believes that the proposed annexation meets the general criteria for annexations as outlined in Missouri Revised Statute 71.012, and that the property is contiguous and compact to the existing corporate limits of the city, and that the annexation is reasonable and necessary to the proper development of the city, and that the city is able to furnish normal municipal services to said area with reasonable time after annexation. And again, this is just simply the two areas are just right of way. And so staff recommends approval of this annexation, and I would be happy to answer any questions.

Any questions for staff from the council? All right, no questions. And I'm guessing we're the applicant, so we don't have any presentation from the applicant, so we'll just go to the audience. Anyone in the audience like to speak in support of, in support of? In opposition to? Opposition to? Yeah, come on up, sir. I'm going to have to swear you in. If you can raise your right hand if you swear a testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God. I do. Give us your name and address for the record, please.

Michael Bennett, 2705 East Colburn, Blue Springs, Missouri, 64086. And it's simply just a question, so I better understand. This is merely a technicality of the annexation that took place for Cary Jokes? Yes. Is that true?

That is true.

Okay, so it's not like there's an agenda in place for widening a street or something like that?

No, it's strictly cleaning up from carriage oaks.

Okay, for municipality and whatever else happens in that easement along Colburn Road. Is that correct? Mm-hmm. Okay, that was just simply a question. Thank you.

Appreciate your comments. Anyone else like to speak in opposition to, in opposition to?

All right, any comments from the council before I close the public hearing?

Close the public hearing. Next, we have introduction and first reading only of Bill 5413, approving the Colburn Road annexation.

Your Honor, I'll introduce it.

First reading of Bill 5413, an ordinance annexing 2.43 plus or minus acres of unincorporated property consisting entirely of Southwest Colburn Road right of way east of Southwest 7 Highway into the city of Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and assign.

Just first reading, right? Okay, first reading. All right, is there a second? There is. Is there any discussion? Okay, this is voice vote only on first reading. All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Now we're on our, nope, it's not our final public hearing. We still got two more. On another public hearing, this one for the 12th Street Vacation, and the city clerk has some zips to read for the record.

Mayor, the city has one exhibit to enter into the record. City Council information form dated June 23, 2026, with the following attachments. Staff report with attachments, application with attachments, affidavit of publication in the examiner on June 6, 2026, 185-foot notification map, names, addresses of the property owners within 185 feet of the site, copy of letters sent to said property owners, and bill approving the vacation. This is all we have to enter for the record.

All right, staff, if you'll raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you've got to give in this case be the truth, so help you God? I do. All right, state your name and address for the record.

Logan Day, 903 West Main Street, Blue Springs, Missouri, 64154. Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. The item before you tonight is a request by the City of Blue Springs to vacate a portion of the existing right-of-way associated with the proposed 12th Street extension project. The request would convert the existing right-of-way into a permanent construction easement. to allow for the installation of stormwater infrastructure, utilities, and roadway improvements associated with the extension of the Southwest 12th Street from South Crest Drive to Wyatt Road. The extension is intended to improve connectivity within the area and provide access to future development, including the proposed Southwest Park development located west of the roadway. Staff reviewed the request against the vacation criteria contained within the unified development code and found the request to be consistent with the comprehensive plan compliant with the development code and supportive of future infrastructure improvements with development and development within the area. stuff also finds the proposed vacation will not negatively impact access utility services transportation connectivity or the rights of adjacent property owners the right-of-way proposed for vacation no longer serves its intended purpose for public Intended public purpose and its conversion to a permanent construction easement will better facilitate the public improvements necessary for the project Based on this contained within the staff report staff recommends approval of the vacation With the conditions listed at the end of your staff report and I'm here to answer any questions any questions for staff from the council Okay, also where the applicant against will go to the audience anyone that I just like to speak in support of in support of

Anyone speak in opposition to? Opposition to? Any comments from council before I close the public hearing? Close the public hearing. Next item is item 17, Introduction to Reading Bill 5414, Approving the 12th Street Vacation Right-of-Way. I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First, Reading Bill 5414, an ordinance approving the vacation of a portion of right-of-way into conversion of a permanent construction easement located generally at 8131 Southwest 12th Street, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? Okay, all in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries, second reading.

Second reading of Bill 5414, an ordinance approving the vacation of a portion of right-of-way into conversion of a permanent construction easement located generally at 8131 Southwest 12th Street, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri.

Governor, I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion? Roll call.

Council Member Kaler.

Aye.

Tholan. Aye. Brummel.

Aye.

Erickson.

Aye.

Markworth.

Aye.

Rowan.

Aye.

Mayor Levesay.

Aye.

Motion carries and given ordinance number 5509.

Okay, now our final public hearing of the night, Windwater General Development Plan. City Clerk will have some exhibits to read for the record.

Here the city has to exhibit center into the record City Council formation form dated June 23rd 2026 with the following attachments staff report with attachments application with attachments affidavit of publication the examiner on April 25th 2026 185 foot notification map names addresses of the property owners within 185 feet of the site copy of letter sent to said property owners updated plans and developer email and bill approving the conditional use permit in general development plan exhibit to his emails and photos received after the agenda was published this is all we have to enter for the record.

All right, staff, if you will raise your right hand. Actually, anyone that knows they're going to speak on this public hearing, you will stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God?

I do.

Okay. When you do speak, just give your name and address for the record. Staff will start with you. Continue with your presentation.

Do I repeat my name? You've got to do it every time. 903 West Main Street, Blue Springs, Missouri, 64154. I'm jumbled sorry Good evening mayor and council members before you this evening is a request for approval of a conditional use permit and general development plan for the property located at two six zero one Northwest Jefferson Street It is currently zoned RC or regional commercial and the applicant is proposing approximately twenty eight thousand five hundred square feet of building area on a five acre site The development includes a 10,320 square foot facility for Windwater Blue Springs, which will contain office space and associated outdoor storage for the utility materials located to the rear of the building. The outdoor storage area will be screened from the public view with a six-foot wall and additional landscape buffers. The second building consists of approximately 18,180 square feet of flex commercial space intended to accommodate a mix of uses permitted within the RC zoning district. including residential storage uses subject to the approval of the conditional use permit. Overall, staff finds the development represents a low intensity commercial use that is compatible with the surrounding area. In regards to the conditional use permit request, staff finds the proposed use is consistent with the intent of the regional commercial zoning district and compatible with the surrounding and adjacent properties. The proposed development is required to comply with all applicable provisions of the development code. As part of staff's review, one additional site-specific condition is recommended to ensure continued compliance with the intent of the code. The condition clarifies that parking spaces shall not be used for outdoor storage of equipment, boats, trailers, household goods, or other properties. Trailers may occupy parking spaces, but only when associated with a business on the property and being actively used for loading and unloading. Staff does not anticipate the proposed residential storage use to create significant adverse impacts related to traffic, noise, or operations, and finds the scale, site, layout, and building design to be generally compatible with the character of the surrounding area. Staff also finds the request is consistent with the long-range planning goals for this corridor and will negatively impact the future development or uses on the surrounding properties. Regarding the general development plan, the site is proposed with two access points, including a primary access from Northwest Jefferson Street and a secondary access onto Northwest Saunders Road. Since the planning commission, the applicant has revised the site to direct truck traffic exiting the site south onto Northwest Saunders Road toward Northwest Jefferson Street. This revision eliminates truck traffic traveling north towards the adjacent residential neighborhood. It was made in response to comments received from nearby residents. Additionally, there is no request for gravel access or gravel driveway as part of this application, and all access drives and parking areas associated with the development will be constructed in accordance with city standards. The development also includes sidewalk improvements along Northwest Jefferson Street, connecting the existing sidewalks located on either side of the property. Sidewalks improvements were not required along Northwest Saunders Road due to the lack of continuous pedestrian connection in that area. However, the applicant is proposing half street improvements along the site frontage on Northwest Saunders Road, along with additional landscaping and screening enhancements. In response to concerns expressed by nearby residents regarding the width of Northwest standard road, the applicant has indicated they are willing to work closely with city engineering staff to develop a interim solution that addresses existing roadway with concerns until future development occurs on the West side of Saunders road. The final design may consist of a concrete shoulder designed for future asphalt overlay or another mutually acceptable improvement as determined during the engineering review process. To minimize impacts to the adjacent single-family properties to the north, the applicant is proposing a six-foot solid privacy fence consisting of masonry, wood, composite, or vinyl materials, in addition to a 25-foot landscape buffer along the rear property line to further screen the development and outdoor storage areas. A preliminary stormwater management plan has been submitted, which includes detention basins and best management practices to address runoff and water quality requirements. A final stormwater management plan will be reviewed during the engineering approval process. Lastly, the development is proposed as a single phase project. And based on this analysis provided in the staff report, staff recommends approval of the conditional use permit and general development plan with conditions listed at the end of the staff report. And I am here to answer any questions, and the applicant is here to answer any as well.

Questions for staff from the council. Council Member Erickson.

You mentioned the sidewalk to nowhere aspect that would come from Jefferson Street because it doesn't connect to another sidewalk. We don't require that. However, as long as I've been on the council in new development, there have been a couple cases where people wanted to do a few things we decided not to do that but I cannot think of another example of where we have said oh because it doesn't go anywhere you're not required to do a sidewalk I find that inconsistent with our policy and the other the other statement to that is this is Saunders Road will be a commercial Well, I call it an industrial road, but a commercial road, and I think we would require that. Can we not just say you got to have it? Toby, could you answer that for me? From our rules, I don't see why we would even say that we shouldn't have that sidewalk.

I can add something to that, Councilmember.

We did evaluate it, and without the connectivity, it was deemed not to be somewhere to send the pedestrians down that road, but I do agree in the past we have done most projects.

I would respectfully interrupt and disagree with you on that. There are a number of pedestrians that go up and down that road at this point in time, and the evaluation that there are not residents going up and down, it's partially because there's not sidewalks. I just find it totally inconsistent with what we've done. in the past and what we should do in the future for sidewalks. If there is a widening of Saunders Road, somebody's gonna have to pay for that or else we'll come back and say, oh, it's not necessary. I don't think that's what we're thinking about in our new plans and this, that, and the other. So everybody, I would just like for you to take that into consideration. And I do have another comment or question. There's a paper, that looks like it was submitted by PAL Architects, Engineering, et cetera, et cetera. And on page two, are we bound by this? No. Okay. So that is an outdated, so what you're referring to is an outdated written narrative, I'm assuming, that talks about the gravel and... Well, that's not what I'm talking about, but if I have outdated papers in my hand that I printed off the agenda today, that would be unusual that it would get updated that quickly. But what I was referring to Was their statement on page two, the third one from the bottom where it says proposed uses will be permanent? Should wind water relocate, additional flex use buildings may be constructed on site in the future, but the proposed uses will not change? That's not our policy, is it? Isn't our policy of conditional use is based upon the use of the people that are there?

Correct. So the conditional use is essentially allowing all the uses that are allowed in regional commercial with the exception of the residential storage. So if when water was to move on and leave this site, the conditional use permit would still be in effect and that would continue to permit uses that are allowed in regional commercial and the addition of the the residential storage with the With if you approve the conditional use of flex spaces then are considered non conditional use permit No, no, they are so then they would have to expand those and would they not have to do a conditional use permit for that?

That's what the conditional use permit is for. Okay. I just, yeah. Yeah.

So the, the conditional use is for the, for the flex.

I apologize, but I didn't get the updated stuff. No, no, you're fine. It's not there.

There are other questions from the council for staff.

I did have a clarifying question as well. I saw in the materials a masonry wall, but then I thought I heard you say a fence. What is the screening?

So they would be required along that rear property line to install some sort of six-foot wall that'd be privacy fence. So with our buffer types, that ranges in a... range of materials that i listed and then that would be reviewed during our site plan design review that would come after this so we would nail down but for the most part there are masonry retaining walls throughout the site so but i can have the applicant speak to that as well so based on the proposal we're considering tonight they could theoretically put up a six foot wood privacy fence and that would be consistent or they could put up a stone wall correct and they would both be consistent okay

all right other questions for staff from the council okay then we'll go to the applicant it looks like you're up there yeah oh sorry sorry i'll be quick um i'm seeing a subgrade um detention is that what i'm seeing here it's yes underground detention yeah that's correct um i'm assuming this is still just preliminary the storm water is going to have one single outlet and that one stream behind the property, correct?

Yeah, it's basically one inlet, one outlet with an underground attention, so it'll be concentrated flow. There is a creek there with also concentrated flow that's going through it, so it would potentially go to that.

Any other questions for staff?

One more time. Pardon me for this one, too, but on the Plans, I can't see a picture that shows me sidewalks. I see the narrative that says it's there. Is that what that is, that little line?

Yeah, so it's this dark and gray line along Jefferson, and then those also continue into the entrances of the buildings. So it goes along the whole frontage. Your Honor.

So there's nothing on Saunders?

Correct. The next sidewalk along Saunders would be Northwest Jefferson Street. Duncan. Is it Duncan? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry.

Okay. All right, now we'll go to the applicant.

Assuming you've been sworn in, if you'll give us your name and address for the record. Sean Stewart, 3445 Road D in Allen, Kansas. I'm an attorney on behalf of the owner and applicant, and thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. Also in attendance tonight is Jeremy Powell with Powell CWM, Bart Fisher, and Casey Williams with the construction management firm of Epic Concrete and Construction, Inc. and then the president of Blue Springs Wind Water, Troy King. Thank you for allowing me to speak tonight. I have gone old school and I have my presentation in paper format that I would like to, I was recently retained on this case and did not have the opportunity to prepare a slideshow, but I have my packet, if I can just distribute this.

We can take those for now and then can we make those a part of the record for, okay.

On, I'm gonna refer to Logan's staff report pretty extensively, but on page two, and I wanna walk through the history of the approval of the rezoning back in 2007. I have the minutes and agenda of the council at that time. I think it's very pertinent and relevant to talk about where the rezoning came from and how we got to the point where we are tonight. But on page two of Logan's staff report indicates that the previous, and in my presentation I've enumerated the packets at the bottom right, one through 41, but on page two, The previous actions are identified on March 19th of 2007 the Planning Commission recommended approval of the annexation of the real estate into the city of Blue Springs And then on April 2nd the council approved that annexation shortly thereafter on June 11th the Planning Commission recommended approval of the rezoning of the property from high industrial in Jackson County, unincorporated Jackson County at the time, to RC Regional Commercial. On June 18th, the council then approved that rezoning of the property and then on December 10th of 2007, the Planning Commission indicates it denied a preliminary plat but it actually recommended approval of that preliminary plat unanimously and then it lapsed. There was not a final plat that was submitted. But I'd like for you to turn to then page 20 of my report that shows the agenda for on March 19 of 2007, and just talks about the background, the explanation, and then the justification. At that time that was submitted, the subject property consists of five acres, this is a five-acre tract, and it's located on the north side of Northwest Jefferson Street, east of Saunders Road. The petitioner is requesting to voluntarily annex the property into the city in order to gain access to city services. For a proposed commercial development, possible equipment, rental business, and to allow guy offense to expand its operations on the eastern portion of the property. The property is fully surrounded by the city of blue Springs municipal boundaries. and annexation of this parcel will remove yet one more island of unincorporated Jackson County currently surrounded by city boundaries. The applicant agrees to enter into the prerequisite pre-annexation agreement attached to this report for your reference. This is the recommendation of approval by the City Planning Commission. If you flip to page 22, Council minutes that the council approved the annexation. Again, this project for the most part has been on the radar in the city of Blue Springs since 2007 is what the point of this is. Staff report indicates on page 22 of the presentation packet Mr. Allen, director of community development, stated the property consists of five acres and is petitioning the city to annex the property in the city in order to gain access to city services for proposed commercial development. Same language. So that was the justification at the time for the annexation. Page 23, then same thing. Page 23, actually, though, is the rezoning request that was submitted by the applicant and the owner at that time to the city. This is the agenda on page 23. It talks about the background, the explanation that the property was annexed from Jackson County into Blue Springs. At the time, it was heavy industrial. pretty much a down zone to regional commercial RC. The justification at the time was the proposed zoning change meets the criteria defined in section 403.030G of the Unified Development Code and is consistent with the city's comprehensive plan. That comprehensive plan was in effect from 2003, that's on page 24. So the project at that time was consistent with the Comprehensive Plan of 2003. We'll see that it's also consistent as staff has recommended and stated throughout the report that it's consistent with the current Comprehensive Plan. So we have an existing zoning district of regional commercial that was approved, recommended for approval, was approved unanimously. Everything's been approved and recommended unanimously. Planning Commission in 2007 recommended the approval, that was unanimous. The Council approved the rezoning in 2007, that was unanimous. And then in December of 2007, a preliminary plat application was submitted to the Planning Commission, which was also recommended for approval unanimously, but there was not a final plat that was submitted, so therefore it was lapsed, and Logan indicated that It was denied, but it wasn't denied. It was approved. It just wasn't followed through. So for 20 years, nothing has happened on the property. As you'll see in the staff report, the staff is indicating that they're hopeful that with this development will snowball additional development along Jefferson Frontage Road. And we anticipate that that would happen. I want to go back to the staff report page just walk through what, essentially, I'm an attorney, I present cases, and so I'm looking at the criteria. This is what the council has to look at, is the criteria. And the review criteria for a general development plan is listed by Logan on page eight. As we'll see every single one of the review criteria Logan and staff professional staff for the city is indicating that That that criteria is fully complied with the first and this is Taking a look at The The first, proposed general development plan is consistent with the comprehensive plan and all requirements of the UDC. Staff indicates the proposed general development plan is consistent with the comprehensive plan and all requirements of the UDC. The applicant has not requested any deviations or modifications to the UDC. Number two, and this is all from the code, the proposed general development plan is consistent with the current zoning on the property or conditional on the approval of an existing application for a zoning map amendment. And the response by staff is the proposed general development plan is consistent with the current zoning on the property and the proposed use is allowed by right in the regional commercial zoning district. Number three is the general development plan is in compliance with all applicable use, development, and design standards set forth in the code unless alternative design standards have been approved by the development. Staff's response is the general development plan complies with all applicable use, development, and design standards set forth in this code. Number four is adequate facilities and services exist or are planned by the project to serve the development at the time of construction. Staff's response is there are existing planned facilities and services in place or proposed to serve the development. Five, the general development plan is sensitive to the existing land uses and is compatible with the existing adjacent land use designations. Compatibility with surrounding areas demonstrated by proposed improvements including screening and buffering that has been provided to minimize impacts to adjacent uses. Staff's response is the general development plan is sensitive to the existing land uses and is compatible with the existing adjacent land use designations. There are four, of course, on any rectangular piece of property, there'll be four sides, four adjacent uses to that site. And in this case, everything except for the property to the north is commercial, consistent with a regional commercial zoning district. We have Geyer, we'll look at the pictures, Geyer Fence is to the east. The layout, the operations, everything is almost identical to what we're proposing. Further on down to the east on Jefferson, same situation with Meyer Laboratory. The property to the north was developed in 1985. Since 1985, that single family development, since that was approved and developed, in 2003, the city passed and adopted the comprehensive plan that recommended regional commercial right on this property. In 2007, the city approved the rezoning for this property. In 2014, the city approved an amended comprehensive plan that also recommended regional commercial for this property. And why wouldn't it? It's adjacent to the Interstate 70. So there is certainly compatibility with the surrounding area. And then number six is the general development plan will provide for orderly physical growth of the city and foster safe, convenient, and walkable neighborhoods and shopping districts. And the response by the city staff is the general development plan will provide for orderly physical growth of the city. Likewise with the conditional use permit, which simply is to allow for residential storage within the flex use. Flex use does not require a conditional use permit. The outdoor storage for Blue Springs Windwater does not require a conditional use permit. That's simply to allow for the uses that are within the zoning RC. But a condition use permit is part of the application and it shall be reviewed according to the following criteria. Again, this is pursuant to the code. And all items of the code that this council is to review and consider for the criteria have been met and established as determined not only by the applicant and the owner, but by staff, professional staff. The application furthers the intent of the proposed zoning district and supports that of any abutting district. It certainly does, as I've mentioned, regarding the three surrounding adjacent properties that are consistent with regional commercial district. Staff indicates that they find the proposed conditional use is consistent with the intent of the regional commercial district and as conditioned remains compatible with surrounding and abutting zoning districts. Compliance of any proposed development requirements of the development code those have all been satisfied and can read those It's it's pertinent to know what the criteria is if you have to vote on it, but the criteria is set forth in items 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 and each and every one of those has been found to have been established the There will probably be some neighbors to the north here tonight to testify in opposition. I want to show you some pictures. And again, page 29 sets forth, page 30 sets forth the specific criteria from that general development plan from the from Blue Springs Development Code. And then page 31 sets forth a review criteria for the condition of these permits. But if you turn to then page 32, this gives an aerial view of the site. To the north is the residential neighborhood and then immediately to adjacent on the east is guyer fence as you can see significant parking area and on that parking area is significant amounts of storage there's storage for their goods and to and this is no denigration to to guyer fencing it's just simply to establish that this proposed use is compatible and consistent with the property right next to it You can see the size of that parking, you can see the buildings. If you turn the page, page 33 shows a closer shot, aerial shot that is showing all of the storage that's going to take place on that property, similar to the storage that will take place in connection with Blue Springs Wind Water. Turn to page 34, it shows the open walled warehousing of the goods for Geyer Fence. Again, a great company, very reputable company. It's simply to show that their use is consistent with ours. Just down, just next to, down the road on Jefferson is the Meyer Laboratory. Again, no denigration to Meyer Laboratory. We think that all of these businesses are doing spectacular things for Blue Springs, just like we believe we will. But it shows semi-trucks. There are numerous loading docks that are on the east side of Meyer Laboratory. You can see some pictures maybe already in the staff report that were submitted by the neighborhood opposition, but that part of that site's not there. None of the portions of these sites, Guyer Fence, Meyer Laboratory, Blue Springs Siding and Windows, do their pictures show all of the storage. Turn the page to page 36, that's Blue Springs Siding and Windows, that's further on down on Jefferson, east of the site. There's storage trailers right immediately adjacent to the rear yard of residential. And again, these are not, it's no denigration, but these were consistent with the comprehensive plan, they're consistent with the zoning district, and so will ours be. If you turn the page to 37, it's an aerial showing this entire corridor from the east back to the west to the site that shows Blue Springs Siding and Windows, then it shows Meyer Laboratories, shows Geyer Fencing, all right up against the neighborhood to the north. And it's very compatible, very consistent. I'd like to read two letters that, if they haven't been entered into the record, they will be now. On page 38 this is from Bart Fisher, which with epic concrete construction Indicating that in advance of the City Council meeting on July 6 the development team for the wind water and flex use project at 2601 Northwest Jefferson Street would like to provide the filing summary of plan updates and commitments regarding Saunders Road and The updated site and utility plans reflect the following. Sanitary sewer main extension has been located within the existing drainage and utility easement to the north, so no new easements are required. That was an issue that had come up in the review, and there is a significant drainage easement located adjacent to our property that we will be able to, it's a public utility easement that we'll be able to utilize. And to further address remaining comments from area residents regarding the width of Saunders Road, development team is voluntarily offering to construct an additional three foot wide improvement on the west side of saunders road for the full north south length of the development property this improvement will be designed in close coordination with city public works and engineering to provide a cost-effective interim solution that addresses current width concerns until the adjacent property to the west is developed and completes its portion of the roadway improvements The final design may include a concrete shoulder set down for a future asphalt overlay or other methods as mutually agreed upon with the remainder of any needed improvements to be addressed by future development. This additional west side improvement is being offered in addition to the standard half street improvements along the east side of Saunders Road as shown on the current plans. It will take the current paved road from 20 feet to 28 feet. We believe this commitment together with the other plan revisions will help address the remaining concerns while allowing the project to deliver long-term tax base and economic benefits to the city of Blue Springs. We appreciate the city's consideration of this project and look forward to the opportunity to move forward following the council meeting. That's page 38. And then page 40 is an email from Troy King, president of Blue Springs Wind Water. On behalf, and he's sent this to each of you, should have received it, but I'll just read it again for the record. On behalf of Blue Springs Windwater, I would like to express our appreciation for the opportunity to be part of the Blue Springs business community for the past 26 years. Since establishing our business here, we have been committed to serving our customers, creating quality jobs, and investing in the long-term success of our community. We are proud to call Blue Springs home and we are committed to remaining here for many years to come. Over the past five years, our company has experienced significant growth. We have doubled our workforce from eight employees to 16 employees, providing more than two million in wages during 2025 alone. Our continued investment in our employees reflects our commitment to creating stable, well-paying jobs within the city of Blue Springs. Our business has also experienced substantial revenue growth in 2024, Blue Springs wind water generated approximately 29 million in sales. In 2025, that number increased to approximately 34.5 million, and we are currently on pace to reach approximately 44 million in sales during 2026. Those are incredible numbers. This growth has translated into meaningful economic benefits for the city, including approximately 250,000 in taxes paid to the city of Blue Springs in 2025. While we are extremely proud of what we have accomplished, our success has created a new challenge. We have simply outgrown our current facility. To continue serving our customers, efficiently supporting our employees and sustaining our growth, we must expand into a larger location. For these reasons, we are seeking to relocate our operations to 2601 Northwest Jefferson Street, this site. This move is not about leaving Blue Springs, it is about ensuring that we can continue growing within Blue Springs. The Jefferson Street location will provide the space necessary to support our expanding operations, accommodate future employees, improve service to our customers, and continue contributing to the city's economic development. Our vision is to build a long-term home for Blue Springs Windwater that will allow us to continue investing in this community, For decades to come, we believe our growth benefits not only our company, but also the residents, businesses, and the City of Blue Springs through additional employment opportunities, increased tax revenue, and continued local investment. We respectfully ask for your support as we pursue this opportunity. We are excited about the future of Blue Springs Windwater and look forward to continuing our partnership with the City of Blue Springs as we grow together. Thank you for your time, your consideration, and your continued service to our community. Sincerely, Troy King, president owner of Blue Springs Wind Water. And Blue Springs Wind Water will be the anchor tenant of the site that will have a 10,000 two-story building for office space to house essentially their corporate headquarters that will allow them to relocate from their existing location and stay in the city of Blue Springs. Without the approval of these two applications, that will not happen, of course. The office building will also allow for some storage for some of their goods, interior storage for goods that can't remain outside. The entire northern storage area will be dedicated exclusively for wind water alone, not for any use associated with the flex use space. It will be fenced, it will be a paved surface, and we have redesigned the the entrance onto Saunders so that the truck traffic will essentially turn south. And that makes sense. The truck traffic will come from I-70 and will traverse onto Jefferson and go into the site. It's not gonna go north. It's not gonna go to the neighborhood. And then the flex use, which will allow It's nine units. I can't speak to any other flex use uses or properties within the city of Blue Springs, but they're not ours and they're not developed by us and they're not owned by us. And we obviously with the significant amount of investment that will go into the construction of Windwater's corporate headquarters along with the nine units, we will guarantee that it will not receive, or do everything we can that it will not receive the complaints that you're receiving regarding these flex use spaces. There will be no outdoor storage related to the flex use. The only outdoor storage is, and again, permitted by right, under a regional commercial, is for wind waters, water and utility piping. So there's a lot of details regarding aesthetics and elevation renderings, the site layout. I haven't dove into those details, but I certainly can and will field any questions that you have regarding those. The staff report explains and presents the elevation renderings and has a site plan layout. So I've simply captured what the criteria is for the approval, which we've met, we've established. we are seeking your of course approval of both applications subject to the conditions that staff has recommended would ask that you grant that approval tonight if you have any questions for myself or mr powell or mr king Mr. Fisher or Mr. Williams, we're happy to entertain those at this time. Thank you.

Any questions for the applicant? Council Member Tolle.

So from the time of planning till now, we are now agreeing to do not just half road improvement, we're doing the full road improvement on the

from the boundaries of the property i don't know what you mean i just want to clarify what full road improvement means but um but from from the property boundary on the uh as it jefferson connects to and intersects with saunders north all the way to our property line will be essentially we will construct so that you'll have will be a 28 foot 28 foot regulation right roadway with curbing on one side and probably just run off on the other side right although there was a comment regarding maybe it's possible if there could be i don't know how you call it temporary curbing but it seemed like that was mentioned right art but uh but yeah but that is a change from the last from planning until now

additional three feet correct and then the additional I know in planning they were talking about just signage for Left turn only with this new design It is a left turn only designed by where they can't physically the the semi physically cannot turn onto the right from the exit onto Saunders and

Well, I think if they jumped a curb and...

Right, which is going to not be in their best interest. No, no. It's their property.

As you can see, it's going to... The most reasonable, rational turn is to the left. And again, only somebody that didn't have their phone with them or got really confused is going to take a right. okay so i'm just just reiterating that these are the changes based on what was done in planning that they are coming forth to city that's different right there was a plan commission um for whatever reason it was five four vote i i've been doing this for 30 years and i frankly i'm surprised that i i even received a phone call to represent my client tonight um i mean this would can't be on a consent agenda because it's a public hearing but i think it's probably about as close to it as it gets so that's my take on it thank you other questions for the applicant councilman real quick um i heard you speak towards a uh easement on the north end um you said that there is a private agent in place uh public yeah it's a public dream so it was in connection with the plat on that 1985 residential development pretty large square, I'd say it's probably 50 by 50. I'm just estimating. It's big.

Where is that closest invert at?

Well, if you see that line, that would be the... So it's up into lot four? That entire... Yeah, there it is. That square. Okay. So it's essentially I see I see it now. Okay. It was very shaded. Yeah. Thank you And that again that was established in connection with that plat.

All right. Thank you other questions for the applicant from the council I have a couple it's a little unfair because you had zero zero time to prepare for this but you heard some questions about the sidewalk along saunders um if we were to require a sidewalk on saunders or escrow for a future sidewalk um do you have any feedback on how you would respond to a requirement like that If you're going to make a comment, go ahead and let Swayre in. Give us your name and address for the record. I think he's trying to relay it to me. Yeah, yeah, I understand. This is easier for us. Have you been sworn in? Did you know? Okay, do you swear a testament about to give him this case and be the truest hope you got? I do. Okay, and give us your name and address for the record, please.

Bart Fisher. I live in Odessa, Missouri, 7687 Cox School Road. Odessa, Missouri, 64076.

Okay, please continue.

But yeah, I would imagine with the West development right now, it's a vacant lot. So eventually that's going to be developed by somebody. So... for me i would probably put the sidewalks on the west development anyways if we put it in now there's a chance that it may be disturbed damaged i believe there's trees also along the west side on the east side we have a creek there we don't really want to put sidewalks down the creek but i would imagine that the best place to play sidewalk would be on the west side but i would imagine that would be part of a future development to the west okay

I also was just going to ask, I heard a fence and I heard a masonry wall. If the residents that are here, if screening is kind of the concern, is a wall something, if we were to require a wall, not just a fence, is that something that's likely or what's planned or what's the aim?

Well, we will have a retaining wall along majority of the north property line and they'll extend down to the west um property line because of an elevation change um on top of the retaining wall we are wanting to put a fence there um if we're me i would put in a chain link fence with slats or something like that um that's a little bit more protective because it'll be on a retaining wall um but just to help put some more force on pushing it out versus like a wood fence or a vinyl fence um you know i We do not want to put a concrete retaining wall or a wall on top of a concrete retaining wall. You know, that doesn't make sense for, you know, as far as expenses go, that should be something that's already kind of put in place with the retaining wall because there is going to be up to 20 foot on that northwest corner that will be a wall that's kind of also shielding the project site.

So the topography kind of naturally requires a retaining wall for it. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Appreciate that. You're welcome. Other questions for the applicant?

I guess my question would go back to the sidewalk. I mean, we kind of danced around it. Would you guys be interested in putting that sidewalk on Sanders if we wanted it on the east side of that road?

If that is a stopping point, yes, we would.

Can I ask a question real quick? You've asked a question about retaining walls and fences and this and the other, and I've said this a thousand times, but this perspective, this overall site view that's up right now, there's a thing back in the back that looks like a concrete wall and a bunch of, a bunch of trees, what is that supposed to do? Is that supposed to make us think that it's gonna be something besides chain link fence, or is that a perspective of a concrete wall? I don't understand that.

Well, I would say that the wall is for the detention, an earth detention wall.

I guess what I'm saying is this little green thing up there at the top, it doesn't show any of the storage that's gonna be there. It's a nice way to represent something that's not real, in my opinion. It's not current, of course. It doesn't have the left-hand turn on Saunders. It doesn't show the sidewalk. And I don't know why it's there. And then you talk about the fence that might be chain link. I'm pointing at the screen. I guess I should go up there. It's deceptive, I guess, to me, anyway. Maybe that's not a right term. It just doesn't look like what I would like for it to look like. or maybe it looks like what I'd want, but you say it's not gonna be there.

All right, I've been sworn in. You have been sworn in. Go ahead and give us your name and address if you're ready. Jeremy Powell, Powell-Sudowian, 3200 South State Route 291, Independence, Missouri. this does have a retaining wall and as you can see in this landscaping plan that we've got brought up here there's substantial buffering with landscaping along with the privacy fence on the residential property plus this landscaping plus our retaining wall plus the fence that we're putting this is going to be well screened from the residential homes So I'm not sure what the rendering, the rendering is a 3D rendering, so it wasn't here to deceive anyone. You got another question, go ahead.

I'm not sure it's a question of you or maybe of the staff, but the diagrams like the one that's up right now, that's not consistent with the changes. It bothers me to vote on something that's going to change. And the left-hand turn out is not there?

Well, that's on the landscape plan. It is on the site plan.

I would like for it to be consistent, that's all.

Well, these were all changes made to appease the council and the community. Not all plans were updated to reflect those. But the site plan does show the new drive, how it has been oriented to force when we go south. The landscape plan was not updated, not really seeing why that was necessary to demonstrate what we're trying to do here with the turn. client here has gone ahead and it's the city cannot make you improve the other side of the road they have volunteered to do that this this road is on the 2027 overlay plan so they will be overlaying that next year other questions for the applicant from the council okay thank you for your time i appreciate it

I guess we will go to the audience next. Anyone in the audience want to speak in support of? All right, I do have one speaker appearance for him in opposition to, so we'll start with him. Looks like Larry Anderson. Larry, are you in the audience? That's all right. We'll get to you. I just, Larry's the first one, so I'm just gonna. Okay, if he wants to be second, then we can do that too. Go ahead and be. Have you been sworn in? I have. Okay, then if you'll just give us your name and address for the record. The form's appreciated, but. Give us your name and address for the record. You'll have three minutes to tell us your comments.

Thank you. My name is Tim Dew. My address is 2612 Northwest Stonecrest Court. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of the Commission. My name's Tim Dew, I got that. I'm speaking tonight on behalf of myself, my fellow neighbors, and a strong unified opposition to the proposed plumbing supply facility and outdoor storage yard and storage units at the end of Saunders Street. We fully support responsible economic growth within Blue Springs. This specific development presents immediate, unmitigatable threats to public safety and municipal infrastructure. Our primary objection centers around the incompatibility of the surrounding roadway with commercial freight transit. As the commission is aware, Saunders Street is significantly narrower than the standard municipal streets. As we know, we've talked about it, they're gonna add a portion of a lane, but there's no guaranteeing everybody's gonna turn south. You're not gonna jump a curb. If another truck is coming in, they're gonna turn north. It's just gonna happen. And then we're in trouble in our neighborhood if we're trying to get out. More critically, this layout creates an immediate public safety hazard If a large commercial truck becomes wedged, struggles to turn, or is forced to turn back down this narrow corridor, it will completely obstruct access for emergency vehicles, a fire engine, or ambulance. Trying to reach our families during a crisis would be entirely blocked. Second, we must address the long-term financial burden. This product shifts into Blue Springs taxpayers. This roadway was engineered and structured exclusively for light residential passenger vehicles. It does not possess the structural sub-based design required to withstand the severe repetitive, dynamic axle loads of heavy commercial vehicles loaded with industrial piping. Allowing this facility to operate here will cause rapid pavement failure, severe deep running, and pothole acceleration, forcing the city to prematurely fund costly road resurfacing out of the public budget. Finally, the proposed open storage yard directly abuts several residential backyards. If this commission considers moving this forward, we demand strict uncompromising enforcement of the Blue Springs Unified Development Code Section 407.01 regarding buffering and screening standards. A six-foot wall or fence is entirely insufficient to protect our property values, privacy, and visual landscape from an industrial eyesore. I think that we were talking about the wall that they have that is purely to hold dirt back. It ends when the dirt ends. So we need something to cover above that, definitely, not a chain link fence. We respectfully urge the Planning Commission to protect the safety of our neighborhood, preserve our city's infrastructure, and vote to deny this application. Thank you for your time and your continued service to our community.

Thank you for your comments, sir. Mr. Anderson, are you prepared to speak now? I can go to more opposition. All right. Go ahead and give us your name and address for the record, if you've been sworn in.

Yes, my name's Larry Anderson. I live at 2613 Stonecrest Court.

All right, you'll have three minutes to give us your comments.

Thank you. Stonecrest is a subdivision of 38 single family homes just to the north of the proposed location. My family's lived there for 41 years. We've enjoyed the look and the feel of the north end of Blue Springs. Our neighborhood is not against a business that fits into this area, but we don't think a pipe trucking distribution center is appropriate. And just over two weeks ago, nearly half of our Blue Springs Planning Commission voted four to five to say this isn't appropriate. There's three other windwaters in the Kansas City area. There's no single family homes near any of them. Not one single family home. And now we got five in this proposal. It just doesn't seem to be a good fit for a neighborhood of single family homes. And even if approved, does Windwater really need to run truckloads of pipes up and down Saunders Road? We don't think so. The other businesses along The other businesses along Jefferson all have a single entrance exit for their trucks. Why mess with Saunders is our question. Now, page one on my little handout there, our Stonecrest neighbors have watched for seven weeks as construction progressed to the point where it appears Windwater could start building tomorrow with all the elevations in place. My neighbors are puzzled as to how all this is happening, and you haven't voted yet. We don't get that. Likewise, the agenda for this meeting, it says construction is to begin on July 7th, that's tomorrow, when it actually began on May 20th. We're puzzled by this as well. I get to my photo on page three. This is from Sunnyside School Road location a few days ago. I took that photo. Are you going to allow this to be our view from Saunders Road for the next 20 years? It looked like an entrance to a prison almost. And it's only a few feet from our Stonecrest properties. You could put a six foot retaining wall there all along Saunders and we wouldn't have to look at what you see on page three. not a chain link gate with a log chain and a lock on it that that's that's that's just not good so i'd say please tweak the plan keep the trucks on jefferson leave saunders as it is you don't have to do anything to saunders except put that put your six foot retaining wall all along there and everybody will be happy thanks for your time that's your time i appreciate it

Anyone else in the audience like to speak in opposition to, in opposition to? Come on up. Have you been sworn in?

No, I have not.

Okay. Then if you will raise your right hand when you get there. Do you swear the testimony you're about to give in this case to be the truth, so help you God? Yes, sir. Okay, please state your name and address for the record, and then you'll have three minutes to tell.

My name is Jack Rudney, R-U-D-N-A-Y, 7219 Whippoorwill Road, All right, Jack, you've got three minutes. I have sent an email July 5th to four people, the mayor, are two councilmen in our district and Ms. Ford, the clerk. If anybody else would like copies of that, I have it, but I didn't know if I should provide it for all of you, but I will read it as follows. I, Woods Chapel and I-70 properties, the managing partners, myself and Bob Stein, the other members are my daughters, owned 12 acres of land on the north side of Jefferson Street, west of Saunders Road. We have owned this property as part of a beginning 47-acre parcel since 1971. It is directly across Saunders from the proposed windwater development. We wish to express our concerns for that development proposal and thank you for considering them. Item one, we object to the proposed wind water flex use project and urge the council to reject it. Item two, we believe the proposal is inconsistent with and potentially prohibitive to the types of development Blue Springs has encouraged and pushed for our land for decades. We've been there 55 years and cooperated with the city's wishes. We cooperated with the city direction at the cost of hundreds of thousands of dollars of improvements and road design that was extremely limiting to our use and find the wind water proposal at odds with the upscale development, which the city, our residential neighbors, and we expect. We are concerned with the safety impact and overall image of potential commercial pipe storage or similar uses. Item three, the wind water proposal is inconsistent with the office park use urged upon us by the city per our West Gateway Plaza Office Park Entry Monument and potential upscale apartment or commercial complex usage. Item four, a registered Marriott builder recently decided not to build a Marriott on our property, largely due to the negative effects of the flex-use buildings approximately a half mile west of Saunders on Jefferson. The Windwater proposal, including, I'd like to maybe restate that. We were turned down as a Marriott site because of the flex use buildings to the west of us.

Mr. Redney, that's your time.

The Windwater proposal, including.

Jack, that's your time. I'll let you finish item four because you were in mid-sentence there. Why don't you finish that and then it'll be your time.

Oh, sorry. Thank you. The proposal, including potential storage materials and sales are accompanying heavy truck traffic would play similar loose use directly across Saunders from our property, even more damaging and counterproductive to the long expected tax base increases. I'm sorry. I went over and I've heard a lot of talk and I, I've heard comparisons to Meijer Labs. You all see it. This property is the face of your city, highly visible from I-70. You can't talk and make those buildings look like Meijer Labs. The aesthetics are difficult for your city and our neighbors.

We'll make sure your letter is part of the record that you sent. Anyone else in the audience like to speak in opposition to, in opposition to? Okay, any other comments from the council before we close the public hearing? I do have a couple questions for staff while we're still in public hearing. To Councilmember Erickson's point on the sidewalk, usually the sidewalk improvements are required for a project like this. Is it only because there's an entrance on Saunders that we would require, or if there was an entrance on Saunders, would we still have sidewalks? Does anybody know what that generally would look like?

No, we had it originally in there as a comment, and then staff kind of huddled together and thought about, you know, as we go north on Saunders, the grade falls off really steep to the residents, so it would be difficult to continue that sidewalk to the north. There wasn't a sidewalk. So all of these things were considered. And in the future, it seemed to be potentially better on the west because you have less grade fall off and it's flatter. So we did consider it. It was in the original comments. And then we kind of all decided as a group that it just didn't seem to be feasible from a constructability standpoint and extension to the north.

So the topography, I heard mention of a creek, the topography makes that difficult or impossible? In the future to extend, yes. Okay, so you're just saying along this property it might be okay, but to continue it all the way to Duncan, that's what would be potentially problematic.

Correct, and if you look at Street View, it does drop off very steep to those residents' backyards that back up to Saunders to the north of this property.

Then I did want to hear from staff. I heard the applicants a suggestion of what the wall might look like I guess I the terminology we use in our packet is wall, but then we kind of clarify that could be a fence So what does staff envision this screening looking like based on what we would approve as it currently stands? Would it be there on top of a retaining wall? So from the resident standpoint it would just be the fence they would see or What would this look like from a resident standpoint as it currently is proposed? I?

Mayor, in order to meet code requirements, they would be required to have at least a six foot wall that would serve as screening, but also for safety. Just due to the elevation, anything over the four feet for retaining walls would require some type of fencing. In terms of the material, due to the nature of the product, they would be unsuitable for a chain link with some type of screening applied to that chain link fence.

so is the requirement that we have currently the retaining wall is is what's required and a fence would be on top of that or is the fence required for screening purposes the retaining wall is required due to the topography the fence is required due to the retaining wall and also to meet the buffer requirements of the code so part of our requirement is the fence for screening as well on top of the wall okay then i uh final question is just so i again just to clarify councilman erickson's question um the cup is required because of the flex space so uh is the cup currently acquired the flex spaces that exist currently down jefferson or is it because what they're going to use this flex space for correct so it'd be the uses so essentially um how we've

like regulated them in the past, for example, the flex spaces down the road, we lumped in that residential storage. They ended up going and rezoning to a light industrial, so that was allowed. Whereas this is in a regional commercial, so the CUP was required to loop in that residential warehouse to kind of encompass all those uses that would be potentially within those units.

So I guess that then I guess gets to my other question. So as we heard talked about regional commercial, if they were only proposing to build the wind water headquarters with the storage, we wouldn't even be here. They'd have a general development plan. We'd have a lot of discretion. It would be generally administrative.

Correct.

So really only the big discretion we have tonight is the flex spaces. and whether or not we wanted to allow flex spaces with the cup because it's regional commercial not light industrial is that what i'm hearing you say correct okay so um so we could add some additional requirements for a project like this for the sidewalk or screening but generally speaking they can build this by right

regardless of that is that correct so the wind water would be under a building and contractor uh consultant so that allows that outdoor storage and that definition kind of goes into heavy construction and utilities so they fall under that umbrella of what would be allowed and that's allowed by right within the regional commercial

Okay. Your Honor. Yeah, Council Member Erickson. Two things. You brought the sidewalks back up again. I would like the council to remember that the city four years ago, I believe, started a million dollar plus sidewalk infill project to do exactly what we're talking about on Saunders. One of the places we did not infill is in front of this, which if this passes, we will get that, but We spent millions of dollars literally on sidewalk infills for things like this that we did not do in the past. And then to the wall and the screening, a few years ago, I don't recall, three or four years ago, there were two projects on South 7 Highway by Lead Bank, one of them. And on the east side, we spent quite a bit of time at this council talking about wall protection and visual blockage for the homeowners that are now being built, for the homes that are now being built on 7th Highway. There's a, Council Member Brummel, you probably know what the term is, but there is a masonry wall and there are nice, very, very nice trees in front of it. I personally am proud of the council for doing that. I don't know exactly what the subdivisions are called, but there's at least a half a mile of that. And I think it looks really good. If that were my backyard, I'd be happy with that as opposed to a chain link fence. But those are just comments for the record, I guess, since we're still in public hearing.

Any other comments or questions from the council before we close the public hearing? Council Member Brummel?

Yeah, isn't there screenage on the west side too? Because I know that was a concern. So there is landscape screenage along that west side to cover up that fence.

Correct. So under our code, there's not a required... screening for that due to it being a local under our designation but after talking with the applicant they volunteered to add that additional screening along Saunders as well.

So there's a 25 foot landscape screenage on both the west and the north side if I'm correct is that right?

There's one on the north but the setback from Saunders would be 25 feet and they've just added additional landscaping within that setback.

Any other questions from the council? One more. Do you mind pulling back up that proposed landscape plan?

Mm-hmm.

That's it. Are the darkened trees, are those trees that are going to be added?

So all the trees that are on the plan would be trees that would be added. And then this would be, yeah, yeah. So this would also be reviewed under, during the site plan design review to ensure compliance with our UDC.

Okay.

Okay, thank you. Other questions for staff from the council?

Or any comments of public hearing? All right, then I'm going to close the public hearing. We have introduction and reading of Bill 5415, approving wind, water, general development plan, and conditional use permit.

I'll introduce it, Your Honor.

First reading of Bill 5415, an ordinance approving the conditional use permit to allow storage residential warehouse in RC Regional Commercial and approving the general development plan for wind, water, and flex use at 2601 Northwest Jefferson Street, Blue Springs, Jackson County, Missouri.

Your Honor, I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Is there a discussion? I heard staff say a lot about things that the applicant is voluntarily doing. Is it worth putting some of those things in conditions or can we put those as conditions for approval such as adding screening on the west side or the 28 foot improvements so that it's in our documentation and not just that they have expressed an interest to do that?

The screening has already been incorporated, but the 28-foot, that could be incorporated as a condition. As a condition.

Okay. I've heard a lot of discussion from council on questions. Is there any further discussion tonight?

I have 40-some pages that I was given of history tonight and a lot of comments and comments Whether I support it or don't support it, I can't make decisions based upon stuff that I can't see written down, like the wall and landscaping and sidewalk. I want to see that on paper before we do it. So unless somebody wants to move to, what's the right term, to table it to the next meeting?

Continue to be a next meeting.

Then I'm totally opposed to it. But I would do that. I don't know if that's the proper time. Now is the proper time to do that. If you're wanting to make a motion, now's the time. Do we need to vote on this one first?

No, we're on approval of the plan, so this is where we are.

Well, then, Your Honor, I would move that we table this until the next City Council meeting. I believe it's July 20th.

Not the public hearing. Just clarifying, that is an appropriate motion. Okay, I have a motion to continue. Do I have a second? Second. A motion to second. So now we can discuss a motion to continue. Anybody have any discussion on the motion?

Yeah.

Council Member Kaley.

I think it's a great idea. There's just too much information not there. that they talk about, but as Councilmember Erickson said, you can't see it, and my thoughts is that it drops down on the north side, and where this retaining wall and stuff, I'd like to see something down how this is gonna be, because coulda, woulda, shoulda is not gonna work. We need a NOAA.

I will second that. I know that we've approved some things in council that was verbally said, but when we go back, we don't have any way of holding them to that because it was not in the plan. So, I mean, I do appreciate that you've listened to planning and you've came to that, but I really do think that it needs to be on something that we are approving.

Okay. Any other discussion on the motion to continue? All right, does this need to be a voiceover or real? Okay. Seeing no other discussion, all in favor, aye? Aye. Any opposed, no? That motion carries. We will continue this to the next council meeting. Next is item, I don't have any public comment on the ordinances on the agenda, so we'll go to item 21, which is bill 5416, accepting permanent easements for 12th Street.

Do I have an introduction? Yes, sir. I'll introduce it, sir.

First reading in Bill 5416, an ordinance accepting permanent utility, permanent right-of-way, and permanent construction easements from property owners for the construction of 12th Street from Southwest Southcrest Drive to Wyatt Road, Project ST 55 Bonds.

Do I have a motion?

Oh, sorry. I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Yes, there is. Second. Is there any discussion? All in favor, aye. Aye. Any opposed, no. Motion carries. Second reading.

Second reading, Bill 5416, an ordinance accepting permanent utility, permanent right-of-way, and permanent construction easements from property owners for the construction of 12th Street from Southwest Southcrest Drive to Wyatt Road, Project ST55 Bonds.

My turn now. Your Honor, I move we approve on the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number.

Is there a second? Second. Is there any further discussion? Roll call.

Councilmember Tholen. Aye. Brummel.

Aye.

Erickson. Aye. Markworth.

Aye.

Rowan.

Aye.

Kaler.

Aye.

Mayor Levesay. Aye. Motion carries and given ordinance number 5510.

Next, we have Item 22, Introduction to Arena Bill 5417, Contracting with Mid-America Regional Council for Meals and Transportation.

I'll introduce it.

First reading of Bill 5417, an ordinance approving a contract between the City of Blue Springs and Mid-America Regional Council, MARC, for congregate and homebound meal preparation, site transportation via OATS, Inc., and the administration of Vesper Hall.

I move to approve on the first reading and proceed to the second.

Is there a second? Second. Is there any discussion?

Your Honor.

Yes, Council Member Kaley.

This is the meals that are prepared. at Busper Hall and the transportation with the Oats Bus, correct?

This is what we call the Meals on Wheels program. I was going to ask, too, since you brought it up, whether there's been any changes since last year in the... Is that what you were going to ask? Go ahead, Your Honor. In the reimbursement amount from Mid-America Regional Council, which staff person would be best to answer that? Justin. Come on up, Mr. Parks Director. You've been getting too comfortable back there in the back row. We're going to make you talk. Can you tell us what the reimbursement change was from America Regional Council?

Very minimal. Most of the reimbursement rates are the same as what we received last year. One thing that changed, there was a decline in the... I'm having a hard time coming up with the word for it. like the aging mastery program that we did they brought that back it was a max of 10 000 now it's a max of 5 000 but we haven't hit up to that 10 000 max for the last couple years so that shouldn't affect anything the other rates were all very similar to what they were last year very minimal changes okay thank you all right any other discussion all in favor aye aye any opposed no motion carries second

Second reading of Bill 5417, an ordinance approving a contract between the City of Blue Springs and Mid-America Regional Council, MARC, for congregate and homebound meal preparation site transportation via OATS, Inc. and the administration of Esper Hall.

Your Honor, I move to approve the second reading and assign the appropriate ordinance number. Is there a second? Second. Any further discussion?

Roll call.

Council Member Brummell?

Aye.

Erickson? Aye. Markworth?

Aye.

Rowan? Aye. Kaler?

Aye.

Tholen? Aye. Mayor Levesay?

Aye.

Motion carries and given. Ordinance number 5511.

Next we have the visitor section. I have a speaker from Mr. Porter that you were here in the audience. I just want to commend you. Come on up. I want to commend you for sitting through this very long meeting. I appreciate you sticking with it.

This is my first council meeting.

You got a full civics lesson tonight on everything because we went through the game. This is Brandon Porter. You want to speak on flock cameras. We'll get three minutes to tell us your comments. Please continue when you're ready.

Thank you. Good evening, my name is Brandon Porter. I'm a Blue Springs resident voter and a father of two. I'm here tonight to speak out against the flock surveillance systems. I know that other members of this community have come forward to speak on this issue, but most of them have taken a position of compromise, either asking for a little bit more transparency or adding some sort of limitations. And I understand where they're coming from. They're trying to meet in the middle ground. But I'm here to speak out absolutely against these cameras. Flock has a proven track record of not disclosing violations or taking accountability with their flawed systems and misuses. All of the incidents that have come out from across the country have come either from criminal investigations, subpoenas, FOIA requests, or citizens having to look at their own data. The incident that happened in Dunwoody, Georgia, where Flock employees were watching and recording young girls, in pool and gymnastics classes only came to light out of a FOIA request by a citizen. They have been repeatedly revealed to have retained private data that they weren't supposed to have access to or keep data longer than what city contracts were allowed to keep. Like other big tech companies, they care little about violating the law They care as long as they can make a profit. An expensive legal battle or a fine is just the cost of doing business for them. Just today, another news story came out of a woman being stalked using a mass surveillance system. In Florida, a police officer who worked as event security met a woman who was working as an actress on a show. After meeting her, Kat calling her, harassing her for her full name, the cop illegally looked up her vehicle information on the Florida DMV database. He then put her license plate and her surveillance system hot list Court records associated with this case show that how he met, harassed, and stalked the woman, who was not suspected of committing any crime, had nothing to do with him, and had no idea she was being tracked using a series of police surveillance software, hardware, and government databases. When these incidents happen, they leave our city open to liability. If someone sues the city, we know that Flock is not going to cover the bill. and so we, the taxpayers, will have to pay for that on top of the obscene $4.6 million that we're paying for this contract. This company tracks and sells our info, including of our children. You can look at just their patent to show that these are not just license plate readers, they are for tracking everything about us. From the US patent that was issued to Flock Group Incorporated, Just an excerpt from it shows, the object class I have identified is that of a human being, then the object detection module may further analyze the image using neural network module configured to identify different classes of people.

Mr. Porter, that's your time. Thank you for your comments tonight. Thank you. That's the only speaker appearance form I have for the visitor section, so we'll go to council member comments. Any council members have anything to add? I know it's been a long meeting. Appreciate everybody sticking with us. Council member Brummel?

I got two. I want to commend our parks department for last week, from planting the Liberty Tree to Red, White, and Blue Springs, and then the staff for being open on the 4th of July at the Carson Ross Community Recreation Center. I mean, our staff is amazing on that. And then also, I wanna thank the police department for their work at Red, White, and Blue Springs for it to be a safe and successful event and getting everybody in and out of there in a timely manner. So thank you both.

Okay, Council Member Kaler. I will ditto on that part, but we need to add one organization that you left out, and that was the VIPS, the Volunteers in Police Service, how they came out. But what a job the police department, the VIPS, Parks and Rec, just super, super good job. It was hot.

I did this last year. I wasn't going to do it. It's been a long meeting, but you said it. We have nine visitors from California in this week. They're still here. Five of those visitors, including the adults in their early 40s, have never, ever shot a firework. And the VIPS, we bought a lot of fireworks from VIPS, and we enjoyed, we unfortunately couldn't go red, white, blue. We listened to Lake Tapawingo, but it was amazing, and the spirit, and they'll be back next year, and VIPS will get some more of our money. So thanks, VIPS. Any other comments from the council?

Well, I will just echo all of those comments to say it was a great week celebrating our, I promise this is the last time I'll say this, our semi-quincentennial. I made a point of spreading that around for my last time. But it was a great week. We had a lot of events throughout the whole week. Heritage Philharmonic, Liberty Tree, which is now out there in front of City Hall. Great events for the kids, and of course, Red, White, and Blue Springs are nothing but great comments. The drones were a hit, as we expected, and so a great way to celebrate last time, semi-quincentennial. The only thing to add is just upcoming events. July 10th, we have our dive-in movies at the Carson Ross Community Recreation Center, Blue Surf Bay. This is a 21 and over event. The movie will be Jaws. So, you know, make sure you still sleep that night, Council Member Brumwell, if you watch Jaws at the pool. And then, of course, July 12th and 19th, before our next council meeting, our concert in the park at Rotary Park. So be sure to visit those. With that, I will accept a motion to adjourn. So moved. Is there a second?

Second.

uh all in favor aye aye any opposed no no motion carries we are adjourned i heard one no but you don't have to mark it it was a voice vote