Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the Birmingham Planning Commission for May 19th, 2025. At this time, could I ask for a roll call?

Chair Wofford, or sorry, Vice Chair Tift, we have a quorum just noting Chair Wofford has an excused absence for tonight's meeting. Thank you.

OK, thank you. Next, I'd like to ask for approval of the agenda as presented for tonight's meeting. OK, hearing and seeing no objections. we will consider the agenda approved by general consensus. Okay, moving on. Approval of minutes for the April 21st, 2025 meeting. So do I have a motion to approve the minutes of April 21st as presented?

Commissioner Browning, I approve the motion to approve the minutes of last meeting.

Okay, do we have a second?

Commissioner Miller, second.

All right, thank you very much. Can you call for the question?

We have a motion to approve the meeting minutes from the April 21st, 2025 meeting as presented. The motion was made by Commissioner Browning and seconded by Commissioner Miller. All in favor?

Aye.

Motion carries with six ayes, thank you.

Okay, this time we'll move forward into the public comments portion of our meeting. And so at this time, I'll open the floor to any member of the public that would like to make comment on items on tonight's meeting that are not on the regular agenda for tonight's meeting. And if you'd like to make comment, please approach the podium, state your name and address, and you will have three minutes to address the Planning Commission.

Jose Camacho, Friends of Smith Cove. I'm also speaking for Rock the Block. There's never enough time with these three minutes. I have complained and objected on this idea of a realtor developer cartel taking over municipal processes including the warping, subverting, and concealment of law, specifically environmental law and the Shoreline Management Act law, which is incorporated into the Growth Management Act. I used to be leery of using that term because it meant I would have to research and find out the technicalities, but I actually tried to avoid it. But now we have a member of Sound West Group and a member of Rice-Fergus Miller on the Planning Commission. It's actually law about how a commission should be able to listen to the weak voice as well as the strong voice. And right now, it's incapable. It is the strong voice out here and the strong voice on the commission. I went back, had to go back all the way to 2016 to find the names of the 4th Street Action Group. They call themselves a grassroots coalition. It's developers and DCD. I have the names here. Wesley Larson, all the guys from Rice-Fergus, Dean Kelly of Rice-Fergus, DCD is on it. This is a merger of government and private business. And there's a reason why this has always been frowned upon, because it leads to what has happened in this city. 4th Street Action Group in conjunction with DCD, eventually hijacked funds for the needy, HUD, CDBG funds, to finance the Quincy Square project. At that time, everyone's talking about affordable housing. At this time, Wesley Larson is talking about the resurgence of cultural whatever. He's now an impresario. World Theater Foundation. It's going to be a creative hub, an arts district. No one's talking about affordable housing in Quincy Square anymore, and they can't. It's not going to be for the homeless. It's not going to be for regular people. It's decoration for Wesley Larson's development there. So the same names in the 4th Street Action Group including some current council members, are now here in the Planning Commission. Now they're making decisions to further fund their private development projects. It shouldn't be the business of DCD or the city.

Thank you very much.

Are there other members of the public that would like to make comment on items not on tonight's agenda? Please come forward, state your name and address, and you'll have three minutes to address the commission.

I'm Robin Weldon. I am in District 3, the Evergreen Park community. And actually, I live in a 122-year-old house that's in a very historical district. And on Sound West's SEPA checklist for Evergreen Point, they said, no, there weren't any houses that were over 45 years old. there are and we fix them up and and I am seeing our community be harmed by developer favoritism and city corruption that we have a DCD that favors only developers they do not act impartially and the 44 comp plan is invalid because it does not serve the members of our community who are working class, lower income, the kind you like to call essential workers during the pandemic. It also, the DCD, during 2019 to 2021, rigged the Shoreline Master Program for one developer, Wesley Arthur Larson III of SoundWest Group. They isolated his two packaged parcels, and I say packaged because they cannot be segmented. They isolated them from the Smith Cove estuary, but with using a flat shoreline road. And that flat shoreline road, you know, also went across the park and right down to the Smith Cove. And the thing about it is, this invalid... 2004-04 comp plan is based on that rig because it sets a precedent for any old flat road. Any old flat shoreline road will help develop, will mean developers do not have to operate under Shoreline Management Act law and that the people behind those buildings are not protected because Shoreline Management Act law protects us and the shoreline. It is invalid. It should not be adopted. It does not serve the people. In fact, developer favoritism has harmed our community. And that is what I've seen through every action you've taken. You've harmed our community. It doesn't, you should not be trusted. None of you.

Thank you so much. Your three minutes is up. Thank you.

Thank you.

Are there other comments, public comments? Are there any comments online? Okay. Hearing none and seeing none, I will close the public portion of our meeting and open our workshop this evening, our public hearing this evening. And Mr. Garrett Jackson will be presenting.

Okay, thank you. We are here for a public hearing this evening to discuss some potential development regulations aimed at implementing the 2024 comprehensive plan. Staff's recommendation is for the planning commission to hold a public hearing on the proposed development regulations, consider public testimony, deliberate and forward a recommendation to the city council for adoption. There are several code sections that we'll be looking at today, most of them in Title 20, also known as the zoning code, and then several other subarea plans, the Puget Sound Industrial Center subarea plan, Harrison Heights, Bay Vista, and East Park. The majority of tonight's conversation revolves around market-based parking. which essentially means that the market would decide how many parking spaces new development would require rather than a government regulation. So the proposal as it appears in the packet would be to implement that market-based parking, no minimum parking, citywide. There would be an exception to that for single-family homes in the low-density residential zone, but that also would need to conform with the recently passed Senate Bill 5184, which I believe the governor signed into law in May. Now, at the end of the presentation, we'll provide the Planning Commission with two separate motions. One motion that has market-driven parking with the LDR exception as it appears in the packet, and then a separate motion with market-driven parking citywide without that LDR exception. So it will be for the Planning Commission to consider at the end of the presentation. First off is the Bremerton Municipal Code, Title 20 Zoning Code, which has all kinds of requirements for minimum parking throughout. Like I had mentioned, the governor recently signed into a law, SB 5184, and that limits all cities in the state of Washington from requiring more than 0.5 parking spaces per multifamily unit no more than one parking space per single family home, and no more than one parking space per 500 square feet of non-residential square footage, with some additional exemptions that we'll get into. So as I had said previously, the current proposed code that's in the packet still requires minimum parking for single family residential in the low density residential zone. And that currently written is one parking space per single family home with the exceptions that are carved out in SB 5184. Meaning that even if it's a single family home in the low density residential zone, if it's under 1200 square feet, there's no parking requirement. If it meets the definition of affordable housing, also no parking requirement. And if it meets the definition of senior housing, also there would be no parking requirement, even if it's a single family home in the low density residential zone. There's some added requirements also from SB 6015, and that if there is existing gravel parking that is legally established, not that you threw out some gravel into your yard one day and decided that you could park there. But if it was approved by the city at some point, then you can retain that existing gravel parking for new residential projects. And that also that grass pavers be allowed as a surface for residential projects to park on There is like I said previously a slew of code sections that had minimum parking requirements They're all listed up here. I won't go through each of them, but these are detailed in the packet All of these minimum parking requirements from each one of these sections removed per Planning Commission guidance and Also, minimum parking requirements in the Harrison Heights subarea plan, here shown in legislative markup for those changes. The Puget Sound Industrial Center, once again, implementing that market-based parking. Bay Vista subarea plan. and East Park sub area plan. So all of these are shown in your packet with legislative markup showing how those minimum parking requirements are being removed from the zoning code and those sub area plans. Other proposed amendments so outside of that large lift of off street parking requirements, we have a few other proposed development regulations. One related to boundary line adjustment we've spoken with the planning Commission before that we've been working with the local survey or on fine tuning these be la standards. A boundary line adjustment is when you need to shift the property line from its current location to an alternative location. And the amended code would allow for minor deviations in dimensional standards of the zone. So say you have a 30 foot wide lot minimum, but your fence would leave your lot at like 29 and a half feet. This adds a code provision allowing for that minor deviation from existing standards. that we have additional options for final submitted documents. Right now we have one final document for a boundary line adjustment that combines survey of record, notice of boundary line adjustment, and deed of conveyance. And we've gotten feedback that those should really be separated out. A deed of conveyance, if you have common property owners, isn't even required. So separating those documents out adds a little more flexibility to the process. And clarification revised, there's revised clarity throughout. I know that our, our surveying partner was didn't like some information limiting a to a maximum of 6 lot lines. So that was too restrictive. And we propose to remove that for an additional flexibility. So family daycare provider, this is required by the state of Washington with the RCW up on the screen now. And that the business, excuse me, the city is mandated to allow for daycares of 12 or less children in any residential and mixed use zone. that there must be loading facilities that conform to state standards, so when you're unloading and loading children, that it's safe, and that you provide notification to adjoining property owners that your business is in place. Co-living housing, once again, a state requirement. And this means that it's a residential use where people can rent out individual rooms, but they share a kitchen facility with the remainder of their roommates, essentially, in the building. that there is a minimum lot size, meaning that you can have this co-living housing, however, that the lot that you would be sited on is large enough for six multi-family residential units. That's straight from the state code. And that there is a correction here. It's underlined as minimum in previous editions of the code and it said maximum and that it should be minimum. So that was corrected and sent out in an updated packet and that density these once again straight from the straight the state code that sleeping units, meaning individual bedrooms, would count as one quarter of a dwelling unit for density. I believe that once you get to that minimum lot size, the state is trying to. encourage these types of living situations and so that density shouldn't be so much of a precursor for allowing these housing types. Neighborhood scale commercial. So the intent of allowing small businesses in otherwise residential zones is to promote walking and bicycling and enhance neighborhoods with additional uses. So uses that would be allowed per this code would be small restaurants or a drinking place, small grocery stores, and personal services like a cobbler, a barber, stuff like that. and that they have public street frontage so that you don't have a scenario where you have a long private driveway that's potentially shared by a few property owners and at the end you have more foot traffic or vehicular traffic than you would have guessed. So it's a requirement that there be public street frontage in order to have that business. and that the business be limited to 1200 square feet of new construction or that 2500 square feet of existing buildings once again keeping the scale of those commercial uses small and in concert with residential uses but that you would be exempt from that size requirement in the r40 zone so the r40 zone allows for a 65 foot height limit uh and higher density so it's it's uh it makes more sense not to have that smaller-sized commercial requirement in the R40 zone. New housing and non-conforming buildings. So once again, another state requirement, and that allows for the conversion of existing commercial buildings to multifamily uses, and that they would have to have an occupancy permit within the last three years. We do have a public comment From someone supporting the overall code changes, but objecting to that 3 year requirement. I did further explain to this gentleman that what's intended with this code is not that. If you had a building built in 1980, and you haven't had an occupancy permit within the last 3 years that you would be limited. The code is intended instead that if you have new construction that you would have to wait, excuse me, have new construction, receive an occupancy permit, then you would have to wait for three years before adding multifamily units to your development that takes advantage of this 50% density increase. So this isn't supposed to be a loophole for getting additional density. That's why there's that three-year requirement. Once that was explained to the commenter, they retracted that objection to the three-year mark. Existing nonconformity. So this lays out that the city cannot deny a permit based off of an existing nonconforming height setback modulation or other feature. So that if you have an existing building that doesn't quite meet the zoning code, then you can still transition that to multifamily units, even though it has that existing nonconformity. And getting to the density bonus. So there's a state required 50% density bonus for any commercial building applying to convert to residential. That doesn't apply when life safety standards can't be met or when the structure is located in a critical area or their buffer. Residential cluster development. So the Planning Commission has talked about this item a couple of times. A residential cluster development is a specialty subdivision where you can have additional code flexibility if you set aside some open space. So the Planning Commission had directed staff previously to make that open space requirement consistent with Kitsap County at 15%. So there's that change once again, removing minimum parking standards and removing lot size requirements. So there was previously in low density residential and medium density residential zones, minimum and maximum lot sizes. We've run that through the planning commission that that should be removed because those zones are no longer based on single family housing sizes. So now that there is more. types of housing allowed, those minimum lot sizes should go away. So that's what's proposed here for residential cluster development also. Once again, the staff recommendation that the planning commission conduct a public hearing on the proposed development regulations, consider public testimony, deliberate and forward to the city council for adoption. And once again, we have those motions. We have a market driven parking exception motion. And we have a separate motion where it's market driven parking citywide removing that provision for low density residential. I should also say before I sit down that we did also receive an additional comment from requesting that Market driven parking be city wide, the commenter provided an article that they wrote, and that's also included in the planning commission packet. So happy to take any questions.

Okay, thank you, Mr. Jackson. At this time, I will open the floor to public comment on the topics that we've just heard. So again, if you'd like to make a public comment, please approach the podium, state your name and address, and you'll have three minutes to address the commission.

Vice Chair Tift, can you please note that you're opening the public hearing?

Oh, I'm sorry, yes, we're opening a public hearing.

Yeah, Christine. I'm Jose Camacho, friend of Smith's Cove. I live in the Evergreen Park neighborhood. block away from Evergreen Park and Smith Cove. And it's where I and my neighbors discovered Commissioner Pau's Evergreen Point project was rigged. There was a connection between that project and other Southwest Blue projects. and this elimination of parking standards. Essentially, DCD and other units of the city want to give developers whatever they want. And the problem with that, including with parking, is there is a component of analysis missing from DCD because it's very inconvenient. RCW 90.58.020. It's the heart of the Shoreline Management Act. And that has to be factored in to all issues of development because the criteria for that are very distinct and independent from those of municipal zoning, municipal whatever. This derives from the Constitution. and the determination of the state to embrace the public trust doctrine. The manifestation of both those things is the Shoreline Management Act. That's been erased for years, actually since Andrew Spencer took over the DCD. If you're going to basically have a free-for-all for parking and a free-for-all for height, without taking the Shoreline Management Act into consideration. That means the analysis and safeguards of that half century year old law is gone. So you have a big gaping hole in the comprehensive plan. The comp plan comes from the GMA, Gross Management Act. It has a statute, which I cited over a year ago, June of last year. And that statute says you must consider this section, the heart of the Shoreline Management Act. That section says a clear and urgent demand for a planned, rational, and concerted effort, ellipses, to prevent the inherent harm in an uncoordinated and piecemeal development of the state's shoreline. If you take this out of analysis, the SMA, while you are going to have a free-for-all, and it happens to be illegal, and this free-for-all is being enabled by misrepresentations from DCD to the public in order to do a special favor for Commissioner Paul, his partners at Sound West Group, Rice-Fergus, the development cartel.

Thank you so much. Your three minutes is up.

Okay. Thank you very much. Are there other public members of the public that would like to make some public testimony?

Good evening, commissioners, city staff. I'm a resident of District 3 here. I am very delighted to see this option come in front of the commissioners to remove parking requirements. The state bill that was referenced, SB 5184, kind of showcases that through research and analysis, we've seen that having Arbitrary parking requirements lead to situations where people are unable to accommodate. Homes residences in lots that may not meet those requirements. I am in support of the option B, which eliminates this requirement. across the city various other cities in washington spokane being an example and i believe port townsend has also eliminated those requirements and and that seems to be that trend i think there is also research coming out that shows that it doesn't actually removing these requirements doesn't actually causes any additional traffic issues i think right now it seems like the parking requirements are oversubscribed These are probably not in line with what people are actually using. I believe about 50% of Bremerton is renters and of that more than 25% have one car or less per household. And that seems to also indicate that our current minimum requirements are oversubscribed. By removing these requirements, we can give the power back in the hand of people. People can choose to decide whether they want one parking spot in their house, two, three, four. And that is really, I think, the ethos that we should pursue, like give people a choice in deciding what they need rather than enforcing specific requirements on them. That's all I have to say. I encourage the commissioners to go for the option B. Thank you.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Greetings, everybody.

Travis Merrigan from Bremerton. I also encourage everyone to vote in favor of the citywide elimination of parking minimums towards market-based parking. One of the largest problems that's facing the state of Washington, Kitsap County, and indeed the city is the lack of housing, especially lack of affordable housing. for our residents and people moving in. You've seen the projections for growth in this county. You've seen the projections for growth at the shipyard. We need more houses in every possible way. What existing rules on parking, two per unit, what those do is they create added cost to every new housing structure you're going to build. And it's a mandate that comes from on high. It's going away due to the wisdom of the state. I urge the city to go even further. In particular not to exclude low-density residential Low-density residential represents 80% of the land Currently zoned for housing if you're gonna eliminate 80% of the land you're gonna gut your parking reform It's simply not going to be as effective as it could be One example right by my kids school at Naval Elementary. There's a small parcel for sale reasonable normal sized housing parcel and It might be a one-bedroom house, but it could easily fit four houses. It could easily fit a four-plex or a three-plex or a two-plex, but if you're going to require eight parking spots or six parking spots or four parking spots, it's just not going to work. We could build low-cost housing relatively quickly. I think that would be very attractive to developers to do so, but those parking minimums stand in the way. Please do not exclude low-density housing from this very, very important reform. Let's get the... Let's get the city building so that the folks who are in the police department are in the schools are in the preschools that we hope to build. And certainly the folks who work at the shipyard can live close to where they work. That will help reduce traffic. It will help reduce sprawl out into the hinterlands and chopping down trees. Every time we put one of those big developments either outside of the city or within the city out in the forest, that adds a ton of extra miles of roads, of sewers, of bus routes that need to be serviced, adds a lot of cost to the city. Whereas if you can build infill housing right in the city, In addition, whatever's going to be built out in the forests, that infill housing doesn't have any of those costs. Because the roads are already there. The school bus already goes by. The police force is already serving it. It doesn't expand the city. It increases tax revenues. It helps build low-income housing. And it makes for a more walkable and excellent city. So thank you. Please vote in favor of eliminating all parking requirements citywide.

OK. Thank you very much. Anyone on Zoom? Okay. Seeing no members of the public who wish to comment, I'll close that portion of our public hearing and open it to the commissioners. Comments?

Commissioner Miller, I would like clarification, Garrett, on option, the two options for the low density residential zone one more time.

Sure, let me just put that up on the screen just so everyone can see the wording. But just for clarification, oh, nope, sorry. Just for clarification, it would only be single family homes that are exempt, so in the low density residential zone. So if you are proposing duplex, other middle housing, that would not be required, would not have required parking. Thanks for your patience.

Make sure you start at the beginning. I think it's fine that that clarified what I wanted to understand. Thank you.

So, yeah, once again, only for single family homes, not any other type of housing type, whether it's middle housing, multifamily, et cetera.

Okay, can we shoot Peterson? Hi, this is Commissioner Peterson.

In our last meeting, Commissioner Wofford had a good question. And he wanted clarification that the setbacks in this zone that we're talking about. So we're talking about one specific use in one specific zone. single family housing in the low density zone i think i remember correctly that staff confirmed that the setback requirement in that zone is 15 feet and i think we were all discussing the idea that that would pretty much Mostly guarantee every every one of these houses still does is almost virtually guaranteed a single parking spot and We talked about that a little bit. That's kind of in my memory. That's our discussion kind of ended so I just wanted to pick up kind of at that point and ask again, am I remembering that correctly? All of these houses, because of that setback, could almost certainly have a parking spot, especially with your point about pavers and grass being able to count, or they will be allowed. So once you allow grass pavers and have that setback, we're really... arguing over whether second and third parking spots are going to have to be required. Am I correct with that?

Yeah, this is Commissioner Browning. Just to go off of Eric's thought here, if you go to BMC 20.60.060, it lists the development standards for LDR, and that is correct. There is a 15-foot setback. And also, if you scroll farther down to Section 5, the maximum development coverage is 60% of the lot. So there is room to establish a parking or additional parking for any single family residents in an LDR zone.

okay um it's commissioner tiff vice chair tift that is true however parking in the setback is not allowed so you end up with enforcement issues for on behalf of the city because it's not a designated parking place it's a setback and that's one of my concerns is the setback will become a parking location, which then presents an enforcement and compliance issue for the city. I also would like to remind us that we have already made a lot of provisions for some of the items that have been brought up tonight. There's an exclusion for homes 1,200 feet or less. There's an exclusion for affordable housing. There's an exclusion for senior family living. A garage now counts as a parking place. ADUs are not impacted. Formerly, one ADU did not require an additional parking place. A second ADU did. We've removed that requirement. So we have, I believe, gone forward quite a bit to promote infill, to promote affordable housing, to promote some of the things that we've heard from the public tonight as far as making parking not necessarily an inhibitor to some of the direction and some of the things that the city wants to do. My concern is the neighborhoods. I agree that market-based decisions sound great, but in the event that those market-based decisions are made and homes are built without parking, is there a burden on the neighborhood if that doesn't work out? And certainly the developer will maybe only make that mistake once. but once is enough to impact the residents that may have purchased homes in that region. And we'll certainly live in those homes and be difficult for them to sell them and move on after that. So at any rate, back to, I see several lights on, so let's go back to the commission. Commissioner Miller.

yeah this is uh mike miller and i also i agree with commissioner tiff on many of these items i too am concerned about neighborhoods and in bremerton we have many neighborhoods without sidewalks and curbs and parking becomes a little bit haphazard in a lot of cases in many neighborhoods we where we don't well even where we do have parking aprons and driveways people are still parking in their front yard setback on their grass alongside their house they're parking a trailer there and it detracts from the overall benefit of the neighborhood itself um i believe that with the exception of less than 1200 square feet the um there should be a requirement for parking for single family residential in those single family residential neighborhoods to eliminate or to dissuade people from parking in their setback or otherwise in other parts of the neighborhood and kind of destroying the aesthetic nature of the neighborhood.

hi this is commissioner yeah no that's fine um we were to the point where i think staff was about to say something one way or the other can we circle back to i remember that garrett was nodding his head like he had some confirmation about something

It's kind of like jump rope when you're trying to figure out when to get in. Um, but right now there was some comments about 20 feet or the 15 feet. Um, so it is a 20 foot setback from a garage. If you want to count it as a parking space, it needs to be 18 feet in dimension on private property. So those are, uh, and there is a 15 foot setback in the low density residential zone. So, can you park. in that front yard setback. You can if it's in an approved driveway. So if you do see people parking on grass or in other unapproved parking situations, that would become city code enforcement. So let me know if I have or have not answered your questions.

Hi, this is Commissioner Doring speaking. Um, just to clarify i do agree with them with the concern what it would be like when developers continue developing in the city and the issues that i will create potentially it's hard to dictate that so i do appreciate you clearing that up as well okay commissioner peterson

Hi. So to drill down on what Mr. Jackson was saying, a parking area in a front yard setback has to be approved. So we were just talking about grass pavers being acceptable. What can one get one approved easily? Can one almost always get one approved? Can sometimes a developer not get one approved? Can almost any new development get one approved?

Yes, and that's typically the case with new development. Not only does the zoning code weigh in on how that interfaces with the public street, but also Public Works has their own review of what those individual driveway access points are required to have. So there's a Public Works permit and then land use review of potential parking areas. Does that answer your question?

it seems like they would rarely not be approved.

If you meet the dimensional requirements, it's really a case by case basis and proposal by proposal. So I'd hate to say carte blanche, you know, even down to a lot coverage. You know, if you have impervious surface coverage, does that trigger stormwater conformance? What about the green grass paper? Sure. And that would be certainly considered by our stormwater reviewers.

okay so so at this point we're we're quite worried about people's second and third cars in this zone um for virtually for the most part just i just want to circle back on that we i would argue we are choosing to make housing a little less plentiful and a little more expensive for people's second and third cars for the most part. It seems like most of these developments would qualify to have a front yard driveway. So that's just... what this probably would look like if if in these corner cases a developer comes in and um there's just bound to be lots in the city that that could fit fit a house that might otherwise not with these requirements It seems like most of them would qualify to have a driveway. So so it seems like we're choosing to make housing a little less plentiful, a little more expensive for people's second, third cars. Thank you. That's that's.

As Commissioner Tift. Are you saying, Mr. Jackson, that the setback in the driveway count twice, a driveway counts as a setback. You can park in the setback because it doubles as a driveway.

You can park in the setback when in an approved driveway. So I'm not sure I'm following the conversation. If I have a shortcoming, my apologies on additional parking spaces or on double counting of setbacks. But you have a setback from your home, 15 feet in the low density residential zone. And if it's in an approved driveway that meets the other dimensional requirements, then you can park in your setback.

Okay, so when you said that was 18 feet, so essentially it's an SP an 18 foot setback.

Correct.

If you're looking to state it another way. Okay. All right. Okay, no problem. Are there other comments from the commissioners?

I have one. Commissioner Powell, does the existence of a sidewalk or no sidewalks play into this at all? where we have neighborhoods with no sidewalks and we're adding densification, i.e. more cars parking on the street bumper to bumper and no sidewalk, which forces people out into the street, pedestrians. Is that a consideration in this?

Can you answer that, Mr. Jackson?

Sure. The Public Works Department, with each new development, sees... does an analysis to see if sidewalks are required. This land use code section does not have any provision for sidewalk v. no sidewalk. That's reviewed by the Public Works Department with individual developments.

But I'm not sure that got to the crux of your question. I think what you're asking is if there's sidewalks, there would be parking required, or if there's no sidewalks, there would be parking. I just want to make sure we're answering the question that you have.

Yeah, the question was more if there are no sidewalks, does this parking requirement, you know, does it affect the neighborhood differently than when it does have sidewalks?

And the land use regulations are agnostic if there are sidewalks or no sidewalks.

However, in the event, Commissioner Tift, in the event of a sidewalk, the setback or the driveway is 18 feet to the edge of the sidewalk. It's not 18 feet plus the width of the sidewalk. It doesn't count. You've got to be inside the plane of the sidewalk.

And I can confirm, correct, that you have to have the full length of a parking spot behind the sidewalk so you don't have a situation where you've got the bumpers of cars or tailgates of trucks or whatever hanging over the sidewalk. That's just what we don't want to happen.

OK. Other comments?

This is Commissioner Peterson. Can people hear me?

Okay, cool. I'll try to make this one quick. I know I've gone on. So I've had the pleasure and privilege of living in a single-family neighborhood for most of my life. But I've also lived in Seattle in one of these quite dense neighborhoods near Capitol Hill where there's virtually no parking for most houses and it's still single-family homes but it's just been packed so um i lived there for several years and i think this is like the the zero parking hellscape that most people are like imagining when they when they think of what's going to happen and um Most of those neighborhoods wanted to ramp up neighborhood zone parking. Oh gosh, what am I trying to say? There's like a permit system for on-street parking that neighborhoods can adopt if... Like, say we totally ax all parking requirements citywide, and we get that density that we're looking for. Holy moly, we're getting it. Our neighborhoods are filling in. We're building a lot of more cheap housing. Great. But parking, gosh, parking is, there's no on-street parking anymore. Other communities have adopted a system where there's zoned parking systems with with increased enforcement to manage that on street parking in ways that work for those residents. So I lived in a situation like that for several years and it. um it was it was not that bad i would argue it is a different flavor than our very very very low density neighborhoods in the city but those those neighborhoods are you know not affordable um where we have a housing crisis and i would argue that that if we totally axed all our requirements um and got some density, that would be a really good thing. And in this scenario we're imagining, it has existed in other communities, and it wasn't that bad compared to the very real housing crisis issues that were facing so we it seems like we have a bit of a zero-sum situation where we have a choice we can we can lower housing prices a little bit and there would be a little bit of less on street parking available but there there is there are management systems that some communities adopt to help with that all right thank you very much

um the only comment i would make on that that those management systems often involve more city staff enforcement so in uh we we have a housing crisis and people are sleeping in the streets and uh i i think it's worth trying hard to lessen that All right. Okay, so I guess are we done with debate here? We have two motions. So motion a So which, help me out here, one in front of us now. Move to recommend the City Council adopt development regs shown in Detachment A, the staff.

Thank you. So on the screen now is motion option A, which retains that language for requiring single family homes in the low density residential zone to provide that one parking space or motion option B market driven parking citywide, which would not have the provision for single family homes having one parking space in low density residential.

Okay.

And please understand that though we're calling it market-driven parking citywide, market-driven parking, except for low density with the low density residential exception, it also incorporates all the other things that we talked about, the BLA ordinance. So just be clear, it just was convenient to discern these two, but we're still talking about the adoption of all the other great things that Garrett gave an overview of.

Does anybody have any comments on any of the other stuff? Do we want to separate these two things, perhaps? Or do we want to, sorry, I'm not trying to step on your toes, Commissioner Tiff.

Well, we should make sure that no one else had other comments on the other elements of this particular presentation that we heard tonight.

I have comments. So when we say with the LDR exception, we're accepting 80% of the surface area of the city that pertains only to single family homes inside the LDR. Correct. So all the other ones, it's only single-family homes in the low-density? No.

So every other zoning district, it's no parking standards. So the only place there would be parking standards is for single-family residential use in the low-density residential zone. So just one particular use in one of the zoning districts. All the rest of the zoning districts, they go away.

Okay, Commissioner Miller.

So just so I understand, if we vote for either one of these, we are also voting for the other items we talked about, like businesses and residential zones, is that correct?

Correct, yes. And we can parse out the question if you find that, if you would like to do that, although the motions, it'll be, I'm looking at Sharon, it'll be a little rough on her, but we'll get through it.

okay so i have i have a couple of questions and i'd like to ask regarding the businesses and residential zones particularly restaurants and establishments for drinking or however it was phrased my concern is noise and we all know about the issues with something up on kitsap way where there's a bar that has live music and people live down below that bar and they hear live music. So I'm wondering whether or not there is any restriction on noise getting past the property line of a business in a single family zone, for instance, or how would that be handled?

So that would be guided by our city noise ordinance. And the most restrictive element of the noise ordinance is a residential zone receiving noise from another residential zone. And that decibel level goes down essentially at night. that's what the current consideration would be if this code were implemented today would be the city noise ordinance would handle those situations okay so just play this out for a minute somebody decides to put a bar next to my house and

I'm having a peaceful afternoon and there's people out on the deck playing loud music or something like that. How would that be handled? I mean, so I guess I'm concerned about it.

So that's police enforcement. So the person in distress would call 911 and make a report of a noise ordinance violation.

And I like to point out, too, that these are very small cottage businesses. So why I had Garrett roll to this slide is that it's basically you're supposed to reuse an existing house. So we're imagining the state legislature was actually really close to passing this kind of code for us to tell us you have to do this anyway. it's where a lot of this model came from so likely it's a it's a house if anybody is spending time at moss back in Kingston it's a retrofit of a house to a restaurant it's a house to a yarn shop fiber store it's it's smaller scale things that isn't a large restaurant that you're gonna have big collective bands in because a the square footage of these facilities is very small so I think there's the scope and scale is much different than what you see up in some of our commercial districts which are much larger facilities that can host those kind of activities too okay thank you go ahead this is Commissioner Doering and there's no size square footage restriction on those businesses and the low residential down here it says size you can only build 1200 square feet of new construction and the cap is 2500 square feet of existing buildings thank you mr miller do you still have the floor commissioner peter commissioner peterson hi this is commissioner peterson um

Let's see if I can stretch this cord a little bit. I'm going to get close to you, Commissioner Miller. So that neighborhood scale commercial, it seemed like a...

I can hear what he's saying.

A deceptively, not intentionally deceptively, whoa. It seemed like a bit of a deceptively big change to me on a second glance. I, during my time on commission, have made an effort to bend over backwards for, you know, we are in a housing crisis. What are all the different ways we can make more housing in our our communities i think that's a great goal but i i did take a step back reading this thinking about um and this is this is for any residential lot not currently zoned commercial lots right you can take a house and turn it into a business anywhere you want That does give me a little bit of pause after I thought about it for a while. That seems like it might be a quite big change. I don't want I don't know if I would like to live next to a bar, even if it's a small bar. I do think that I like the the goal of having neighborhoods be walkable and you be able to go to shops that are within walking distance of your house, but any neighbor anywhere being able to change their lot into anything seems like maybe a bigger change than than we realize at first. And maybe it's because we haven't seen a lot of examples. So I might want to see some examples of how this type of thing has worked in other communities before I'm feeling comfortable moving forward with it. That's just me. I don't know if anybody else feels that way.

So we can respond that cities across the state are starting to implement this because it was close to adoption at the state level and the notion was just as you pointed out is that this you keep people in their own neighborhoods and they don't have to drive anywhere and if they don't have those vehicles because there's no parking required in any residential units they can walk to their neighborhood coffee shop and meet with their friends etc so it's this notion of third places in people's neighborhoods so being able to get to them so that's and our code was modeled after some of the other jurisdictions that had implemented it there's not going to be a lot of examples to point to because it's a new concept and so we've got and we have it go ahead and add

Just that it's a type two permit, meaning that there's public notification and public feedback for this type of permit. So just adding that on that if there are concerns in the neighborhood about a specific use, then the public would be able to weigh in on that, provide feedback to the planning department.

This is Commissioner during that was going to be my question with the restriction on businesses that are allowed to be open. So there is no restrictions.

Correct. It is any residential lot.

Thank you.

i think i'd like to make a comment um just going off of uh commissioner peterson's comments i um i think we do have some examples they might be bad examples but i think one of the examples that just kind of pops into my mind is like the reopening of the midtown market right on sixth street and i've heard a lot of positive feedback from neighbors of that area that it's nice to be able to walk into a store and buy things for dinner or you know whatever lunch that you don't have to get in your car to drive to safeway or fred meyer it's one of those stores you just kind of get in and oh i forgot some pepper or some salt or whatever and you go in and you grab it and just kind of walk back to your neighborhood i think those kind of stores and there's some clothing stores and places like that along that sixth street area um that i think the neighbors do enjoy and i think it is kind of a boom to the neighborhood a positive thing to the neighborhood so it's a comment

Commissioner Miller?

Thank you. This is Commissioner Miller. I have a separate question, more of a comment, I guess, than anything else. But it's my own personal opinion that as we move to either drastically decrease the required parking or eliminate it entirely, that we look at other benefits that the city and the city population may receive in lieu of doing that. And specifically, I'm thinking about more robust landscaping requirements around parking and on city streets and also thinking about how lighting is handled in parking areas. So as we diminish the amount of parking that's required which should theoretically save money on the development side i think we should also look at strengthening our landscape requirements and the survivability of our landscape requirements for new developments that's just my comment okay thank you

Okay, with regard to the so help me understand, do we want to exclude neighborhood scale commercial from this motion and readdress it at another time? Once we have a chance to, you know, identify potential concerns. One, I don't know of anything in the city of Bremerton, but I do know a small engine repair guy that fixed my lawnmower worked out of his home. and had lawnmowers all over this front yard. So I in small engine repair right now is a very highly in demand business, essentially. So there are things that we don't know of and haven't thought of that might crop up in our neighborhood. So it's just one example. Now, Andrea turned her light on. So did you have a response?

I'm like, well, small engine repair is not something that's permitted in the low density residential. So perhaps we should talk about that.

OK, then scratch that.

Yes. And so do we want to go through one by one? So this seems like it's a harder topic. Parking is a harder topic. How about boundary line adjustments? Do we all agree? I'm just going to go down the list. Any questions about BLA? There's consensus. So BLA is in. How about the family daycare providers? This is just provisions right out of the state law. Family daycare, OK. And co-living housing. OK, we have co-living housing. New housing in non-conforming buildings. Thumbs up. and the rcd the residential cluster development okay so here is what i would suggest so we can get those off the table that you would make an ordinance you would make a motion to forward to the city council the boundary line adjustment the family daycare the co-living housing the new housing and non-conforming buildings and the residential residential cluster development. And if somebody wants to say so moved in a second, then we can get that one on the floor.

Okay.

Okay.

So I'm going to say that use Commissioner Peterson. Oh, Mr Miller's Mr Miller. So moved.

Okay. So we have Miller that's made the motion. And is there a second Commissioner Browning?

I second the motion. Okay.

Is there any discussion? No. Okay. So I'll say it. You can call the roll. How about that? Okay. So we have a motion on the floor from the Planning Commission to forward to the City Council the changes that are shown in Attachment A related to the boundary line adjustments, family daycare, co-living housing, new housing for non-conforming buildings, and residential cluster development. That motion was made by Commissioner Miller and seconded by Commissioner Browning.

Call for the vote. Commissioner Browning?

I say aye. Aye.

Commissioner Doering? Aye. Commissioner Miller?

Aye.

Commissioner Powell?

Aye.

Commissioner Peterson?

Aye.

Vice Chair Tift? Aye. Motion carries with six ayes. Thank you.

So the items that are left are market driven parking and new, sorry, neighborhood scale commercial. And I don't know which one you want to tackle first.

OK, well, neighborhood scale commercial, I'm not sure what there is to tackle here. Whether it's a, I mean, we're going to start adjusting it, or are we going to, continue it.

So you can either make a motion to forward it right now as it's been drafted or you can direct us to do more work in regards to the neighborhood scale commercial which is what I would recommend you do based on unless you feel differently as a result of the deliberation.

Okay do we need a motion for that or can we do you can just take that from The consensus of the commission.

So I don't know if you feel like you want to move it forward. It seemed like some were feeling positively that way, so I didn't want to.

Okay, so you were proposing to move it forward, Commissioner Browning? I am. Okay, Commissioner Powell? Continue it or move it forward?

I think we, Commissioner Powell, I... I would like to see it continued, and I'm afraid of the law of unintended consequences, and we haven't really delved into that yet.

I'm with him on that. I agree to continue it. More discussion, thank you.

Commissioner Miller? Commissioner Miller, I agree with continuation. Commissioner Peterson?

I'd like to talk about that more.

I, too, would like to continue it.

OK. Just because it's a. Take no action on commercial, but it's still on the work program. Keep in mind, it won't come back for a bit of time because we have other items that are coming to you next month already. So you'll see it. It just will take a couple months before it'll come back.

OK, that leaves us with the final item for this evening, and that is two motions on parking moving forward. So motion A, is anyone willing to make this particular motion in front of us, which would basically move forward parking, market driven parking with the exception of low density residential.

This is Commissioner Miller. I move to recommend that the city council adopt development regulations as shown in attachment A of the staff report based on the findings and conclusions presented in attachment B. Do I have a second?

Sorry. OK.

So because the motion was made, there was no second, so it doesn't move forward.

OK. Except I can make a second.

Normally, the chair doesn't do that. OK. But if you want to have more deliberation, but given that you don't have a second from the rest of the group, then I would suggest going to option B. OK.

Then let's go to option B. Do I have a motion?

Yes, this is Commissioner Peterson. I would love to move to recommend that the City Council adopt development regulations as shown in attachment A of the staff report with the exception that parking requirements are removed from low density residential based on the, wait a minute, based on the findings and conclusions presented in attachment B.

Did I say that right?

It's A has been drafted, except for you're just making it citywide and there is no carve out for this low density residential single family residence. So we have a motion on the floor. Do we have a second?

Is there a second? Commissioner Browning, I second the motion.

OK, call for the question.

We have a motion to recommend that the City Council adopt development regulations as shown in Attachment A of the staff report with the exception that parking requirements are removed from low density residential based on the findings and conclusions presented in Attachment B. The motion was made by Commissioner Peterson and seconded by Commissioner Browning. I will now do a roll call vote. Commissioner Browning?

Aye.

Doering? Aye. Miller?

Aye.

Powell?

Aye.

Peterson? Aye. Vice Chair Tift? Aye. Motion carries with six ayes. Thank you.

Okay, that closes the public hearing for this evening. And let's go to the chair report. And I have nothing to report this evening except thanks for everyone's deliberation tonight. Director report.

I'm happy to report the City Council started their deliberation on the comprehensive plan update. So we've been tweaking the language a little bit. We had a study session last week. We will go back to study session on the 28th of May and hopefully the last public hearing at the Council will be on June 4. We'll have an adopted comprehensive plan and the hope is that we will take everything that you've made recommendation on which includes the work tonight we will be bringing that to council on june 4. so hopefully next time you see us we can tell you we have an adopted comp plan and we have two new sections of the zoning code updates done as well so exciting news if you are interested tune into that june 4 public hearing at the city council thank you okay is there any old business for tonight

Any hearing none. Any new business for tonight?

And our only new business item would be that the next months we'd be seen transitional permanent supportive indoor emergency shelter and indoor emergency housing come to the planning commission. We needed to find some language on that. It's more in depth topic. So we thought the planning commission might use some additional time on that.

Okay, thank you very much. Now do we have our timetable included here tonight? What's upcoming? I'm sorry, I meant that that is what it's upcoming.

Okay, that new business item for the June meeting.

Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Hearing nothing else for this evening. We are adjourned. Thank you very much.