Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Only 15 minutes down the drain. So I'm going to open the meeting now.

Microsoft Teams is, yeah, it can be annoying.

Yeah. Good evening and welcome to the Tuesday, September 15, 2026 meeting of the Chapel Hole Planning Commission. For those who aren't familiar with us, we're a citizen advisory board volunteer that advise the town council on growth and development decisions, but do not, are not empowered to make decisions ourselves in general. Our agenda today is pretty short, really just one item. I don't see any minutes for us to approve. Actually, one and a half items, and I'll get there in a second. Let me take roll call. So, Jeff Green. Present. Liz Losses is not able to make it. She's out of town. Chuck Mills.

Here.

Libby Thomas.

Here.

And Mike. Mike, how do you pronounce your last name? Zibay? Zibay. Zibay. Yeah, I'm here. Okay. And I'm John Mitchell, the chair, so we have five out of six. So back to the agenda. The first item on the agenda is... And you MLUP, I forget what the acronym stands for, but I had wanted to remove this from the agenda because. It's kind of a weird procedural thing where whatever we. Say it cannot legally be conveyed to the Council who in our purpose really in general is to advise the Council so. this glitch is being fixed in the next version of the LUMO, but it hasn't been fixed yet. And staff asked me if I could put it to a vote rather than unilaterally taking it off at this juncture. So I'm happy to do. Jeff, do you want to provide a better explanation of what's going on before we before I put that to a vote, taking it off the agenda?

Sure. So some of you may know that There are also procedures called special use permits. You know, there are certain uses that are only allowed if you get a special use permit. And previously, the Planning Commission used to review those and give a recommendation to the town council, and the town council would make a decision. Same with these MLUPs, master land use plans. The Planning Commission would make a recommendation and it would go up to council. In 2019, when the state land use laws were updated, they were updated to clarify the procedure for things such as special use permits and master land use plans, and they are what are called quasi-judicial. And so the town council is the decision-making body, and the only evidence that they can consider when making the decision for a quasi-judicial matter is competent evidence by people who are entitled to testify. The Planning Commission is an advisory body and we are not acting in a quasi-judicial role and anything we say is essentially hearsay and it's not something that town council can consider. So when the new state law was adopted, the town changed the procedures for special use permits to take Planning Commission out of the loop. Because again, anything we say, they can't actually listen to. Um, for whatever reason, um, it was not done for the master land use plan. And the LUMO currently says that, um, the, you know, we're supposed to be given an opportunity to look at it, but since our, A, this is a, honestly, a trivial change and B, um, I don't see any sense in which we could give input to the applicant that would be helpful in any way. And since the town council can't hear it, um, it seems like this is not something we need to waste time on. So if you're open for a motion, if you're open for a motion, John, I'd like to move that we amend the agenda to remove the Meadowmont Master Land Use Plan modification from new business.

Okay, so let me just, are there any questions on that before we vote? I have to scroll through different screens to see because there's so many panelists here that the actual planning commissioners are spread out across three screens. Let's do a roll call vote. Jeff? Do we need a second? Second. I second the motion. Arguably for an agenda. Okay. Jeff?

Yes.

Mike? Yes. Libby? Yes. Yes. Chuck. Yes. And I'm a yes. So that agenda item is stricken and I apologize if the applicant is here. I tried to prevent that from happening and maybe the applicant is not here. I hope not. But if you are, I really apologize, but I tried. So let's move forward to. I forgot to ask for announcements or petitions. Are there any? before we go to our main order item of business here. Libby.

Well, I know you're not supposed to, we're not supposed to be talking about the LUMO tonight, but I just have a quick question. I'm trying to catch up to the prior discussion and I know Taz discussed next steps and the workflow at the last meeting. And I'm sorry if I should know this and I don't, but will the zoning map be updated prior to the LUMO when it is adopted, actually going into effect?

The zoning map is going to be a separate project after the LUMO update. So it will be presumably sometime in 2027. Okay.

So the LUMO will be implemented to some degree but the zoning map will be changed later.

Okay. That's right.

Okay. Thank you.

Okay. So let me turn it over to either staff or the applicant for 101 Weaver Dairy Road Extension to give any presentations that you'd like. And then after those presentations, we'll take any public comment. AND THEN WE'LL BRING IT BACK TO THE PLANNING COMMISSION FOR DISCUSSION.

THANK YOU. AND I HEARD PLANNING COMMISSION MEMBER GREEN ASK FOR THE RESOLUTION OF REASONABLENESS AND CONSISTENCY. REGRET THAT OVERSIGHT IN YOUR PACKET. SO WHAT I HAVE IS THE DOCUMENT PULLED UP ON MY SCREEN. I'M NOT SURE WHAT OTHER WAY JOHN you would like to share that information for the commission to consider. But I'm open to your ideas for making sure that you're all able to consider that information with this item.

Would you like to email it? Jeff, what do you think?

Can you put it up somewhere and place a link in the chat? Or you might be able to just share the file. I think you could just share the file in the chat if you had. maybe? I don't know. No, it looks like you can't.

Like the file itself into the meeting. We've been asked not to use the chat as like a place for sharing anything more than technical issues, just for records maintenance. So I'm happy to share it with John, if that would be appropriate. And then John, you may share with the rest of the commission.

Happy to, yeah.

Okay.

Yep.

What I might do is actually send this to Sneha so that she might manage that while I'm doing the presentation. Yeah, sure. And then make sure you have the materials that you need. Thank you for your patience.

Great. Thank you. Yeah.

So, Sneha, would you please share that document with the chair? presentation. So I will first introduce the application, share our recommendation, and then we also have staff from the fire department and the housing department, as well as some of our consultants who have been supporting this project to answer any questions that you all might have.

Share my screen.

Can you all see my screen?

Yes.

Yes. Okay. So, hi, everyone.

I'm Catherine Shore with the Planning Department here to deliver SAS recommendation for 101 Weber Dairy Road Extension or RCPCCD. The site is located at the corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard and Weber Dairy Road Extension. It's highlighted in yellow on this image. We recommend that council adopt the ordinance and approve the project subject to the conditions in that ordinance. We believe that the project is aligned with complete community goals and the comprehensive plan and that their proposed modifications to regulations would serve the public purpose to an equal or greater degree. Their request is to rezone from office institutional two to residential community priority. So that zoning designation requires at least 25% of the unions to be affordable for households that earn at or below 60% of the area median income. And I should be clear, this is a proposal for a 100% affordable housing development and redevelopment of the existing fire facilities. So this would replace the existing fire department structures with 50 to 105 dwelling units and a new fire station. and that would be in up to 216,647 square feet of floor area. Procedurally, you all should be familiar with this by now, but for folks who are tuning in, conditional zoning requires council's approval. Any change in zoning district, like the one that's proposed tonight, needs to accommodate the land uses and the proposed scale. The development scale is proposed, which we believe it does. Financial zoning also allows for site-specific standards and the applicant can request modifications to LUMO standards. So reminder, these are the complete community goals that are guiding our review of this application. We're planning for the future strategically, expanding greenways, being green and sustainable, and excellence in the public realm. Here are the ways that we think that this application aligns with complete community. It's allowing up to 105 units of income restricted affordable housing near planned high frequency transit and greenways. We believe it's consistent with the future land use map. It provides infill transit oriented redevelopment. It places residential uses adjacent to each other and makes meaningful use of a constrained site. It also activates the streetscape on Weaver, excuse me, on Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard and Weaver Dairy by reducing the buffer widths and Interacting with the bus rapid transit station there. There will be minimal influence on natural features and it would be a redevelopment in an amenity rich area. So our recommended procedures for you this evening is to consider the resolution of reasonableness and consistency with the comprehensive plan. Consider the ordinance approving the conditional zoning and provide a recommendation to Council. And I will stop sharing my screen and. CHECK WITH THE OTHER STAFF WHO ARE HERE TO SEE IF THEY HAVE ANY ADDITIONAL COMMENTS THEY'D LIKE TO MAKE OR SEE IF THE COMMISSION MEMBERS HAVE ANY QUESTIONS THEY'D LIKE TO POST.

I'LL JUMP IN, CATHY, AND THANK YOU. PLANNING COMMISSION, GOOD EVENING. MY NAME IS JAY MEBBAN. I HAVE THE PLEASURE OF SERVING AS A FIRE CHIEF WITH THE TOWN OF CHAPEL HILL FIRE RESCUE DEPARTMENT. WE'RE EXCITED TO BRING THIS PROJECT BEFORE YOU. It's been years in the discussion and it's finally come to fruition. So any questions that you have for us tonight, we'll be happy to answer. Thank you for hearing us out.

Thank you. I'll also introduce myself. I'm Maggie Simon. I'm with the Department of Housing and Community Development. We're pleased to be partnering with the fire department in introducing this project to you all. We think this project presents a really exciting opportunity to address some key community needs at an important kind of gateway intersection in the town. We'll be available to answer questions as needed. But with that, I think I'll turn it over to McAdams.

All right. Thank you, Maddie. All right. Let me share my screen here. I do have a short presentation for you. Yeah, so as everyone mentioned, this is for the Chapel Hill Fire Station Board and Affordable Housing Project. I have a short agenda for the meeting today. We'll go through the existing conditions that Catherine has already mentioned. We'll go speak to the zoning plan, the concept site plan, and then the complete communities, and then we'll open the floor for any questions. So as Katherine has already noted, this project is at the corner of Weaver Dairy Road and MLK Jr. Parkway. The site is already developed as Fire Station 4 and a training facility for the fire department. And then just south of this project is the 1701 North Apartments. The project is about 4.11 acres and it is zoned 012 and we are requesting to change that to RCP CZD. This is compliant with a future land use map. The site sits in the north MLK focus area sub area D. This calls for the following primary and secondary use. So for primary uses, this is multifamily, shops, offices, commercial, parks, and green space. And the secondary uses is townhouses and civic. So this is our district specific plan or our bubble plan. This does get approved with the rezoning. Um, this allows for us some flexibility as we move through the project, uh, into construction drawings. And so I'll highlight each of these elements, uh, to better explain what we're proposing with this project. Uh, so there's two primary blocks, uh, block one, or is this reddish area here? This is reserved for the fire station development. And then block two is this yellowish area that is reserved for the multifamily affordable housing. We have three primary points of access, two from Weaver Dairy Road, and a third using an existing joint access agreement from 1701 North Apartments. Additionally, we have one emergency exit, primarily for a fire apparatus onto Weaver Dairy Road. It's already mentioned there is a BRT stop as part of this project on Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard. And on the bottom here or on the west side of the site, we do have area reserved for our stormwater control measure. Even though we are just having a bubble plan rezoned, we do have a pretty good idea about how this site will lay out. We do have the multifamily element that is pulled close to the road here on Weaver Dairy Road and Martin Luther King Drive, and then also the fire station element that is in the middle of the site. And the stormwater control measure has been roughed in here just to make sure we have enough space for that component. Three driveways here are shown, and then that joint access agreement, access here to the south. And as I conclude the slides, we also wanted to highlight the complete communities and how this project meets these goals. So planning for the future needs and meeting housing needs. This project aligns with the future land use map It does provide additional housing close to the BRT route, and it upgrades the town facilities and services for the community. On the greenway and travel options, as already mentioned, this does have a BRT stop. It's close to existing transit route and existing bike routes. For the green strategies, this is close to the walkability and transit, cutting down on the number of vehicular uses that this project would generate. It is redeveloping a disturbed site. So this is not a green site that we're redeveloping. We're making the best use of an already developed site. And we're using constructed wetlands for our stormwater managers as opposed to other less green stormwater management control measures. And then finally, for the placemaking and public realm, we're providing street trees along the frontages. Our multifamily is facing the street and we're working to keep our parking interior to the site. And finally, we are providing a new fire station with the project, and there is a community room proposed in the multifamily building. So that concludes my presentation. I'm hoping for any additional questions.

Okay. So what I propose to do now, thanks for that presentation, is give members of the public a chance to comment if they'd like, and then we'll bring it back to the Planning Commission for discussion, which can include questions and comments. How do I tell or maybe somebody can tell me if somebody's raising their hand?

Yeah, if members of the public can raise their hand and bring you over.

You see anybody say huh?

No.

Okay. So let's bring it back to Planning Commission for discussion. Now, actually, one more thing. CONDITIONAL REZONING IS ONE OF OUR COMMON PRACTICES OF THE PLANNING COMMISSION IS TO FILL OUT A COMPLETE COMMUNITY MATRIX AND DO OUR ANALYSIS SORT OF SYSTEMATICALLY THAT WAY I DID PRE-POPULATE ONE EARLIER TODAY IT'S NOT VERY LONG I THINK THIS IS RELATIVELY STRAIGHTFORWARD BUT I'M PROPOSING TO THE OTHER COMMISSIONERS I JUST BRING IT UP ON THE SCREEN AND WE KIND OF MARCH THROUGH ITEMS ONE THROUGH NINE their standard matrix and just take them off that way. And so they were sort of organized and systematic about this. Is everybody okay with that? Louie? Makes sense. You're muted, Louie.

Sorry. Yes, I'll wait.

Okay. So I'm going to share my screen now.

Hey, John, I've got my hand up too.

Oh, Jeff, sorry. I didn't see you. Yeah.

That's okay. Um, I can, we, I had a question for staff or the developer or something.

Yeah, go ahead, please. Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah. Um, I'm just curious the, uh, neat project. I'll talk more about that later, but I'm just curious about the configuration of the site and the thought about. pushing the multifamily development as close to, you know, if you look at the site as a whole, you know, there's a segment along Weaver Dairy, there's a segment along MLK, and the multifamily building and, you know, half of the residents have been placed as close to the highest volume part of the site as possible. And all of the traffic noise and air quality impacts that being immediately adjacent to the road is going to have. And I just bring this up, there's going to be, obviously with the bus rapid transit, there's going to be more buses there. And I'm generally in favor of the placemaking of bringing buildings up to the street. But in this instance, I mean, it's not a huge site, but there are a variety of options. for how it can be configured. And I'm just curious why the decision was made to place the residents in the probably least attractive part of the site overall.

Sure, I'd be happy to speak to that. I apologize, I failed to introduce myself. I'm Jason Galloway, project manager at McAdams. I'm also joined by several other members of our project team today, so others may want to chime in. But when we were working through this project layout and how this was going to function with the site, knowing that our charge was to provide, one, a fire station and, two, the affordable housing and how that would all function on this four-acre site, we started to understand how the site would function. And one of the primary goals that we had to meet was to provide proper access for fire apparatus leaving the site. One of the challenges they have now with the location of the fire station being so close to that intersection is that it sometimes allows for some of that intersection to block the exit of the fire station. So we needed to move that exit as far away from the intersection as we could. And then the stormwater control measure was located at the lowest part of the site, which left the remaining area closer to the intersection available for the affordable housing.

was uh we did work through our priorities and um that was ultimately where we landed with the site layout jeff any other questions you want to ask or yeah i mean that i get that with the fire station and of course the stormwater um but there's a lot of parking um and so i i don't I think you could take the same shape of a building and reconfigure it. I know we don't, you know, in an ideal world, we don't have parking between a building and a street, but MLK is a very wide road. I believe this is a segment that's going to be even wider with additional lanes for the BRT. I may be wrong. Town staff can correct me. It's just, it's going to be, it is not the type of urban environment where it's a benefit to have the building right up against the street.

Just point of clarification, Jason, were you saying that the concern about the fire trucks being unable to get out because of your queuing at the light or at the intersection, that's about Weaver Dare extension. It's not about MLK.

That's correct. Yes, it's the Weaver Dare extension.

Does that make sense, Jeff?

No, I understand that.

Is that how you understood it? Okay.

Yeah, no, I, yeah, I totally understand that. Chief Medman has his hand raised.

Do you see the people thing? Yeah, I do now. Yeah, yeah.

Go ahead, Chief. Yes, thank you. Mr. Green, to further add on to what Jason just described, we want to build a fire station while remaining in the current fire station as well. That was an exorbitant cost for us to relocate. to tear down the training center, then to build a new station, then to move back in. So to save on calls to the community members, we decided to stay in the station, tear down the existing training center, rebuild that station, and then move out of the old into the new, and then start the demo process of the old fire station for the affordable housing development. That is why it is where it is. Thank you.

Libby.

Since Jeff raised these issues, I was thinking along the same lines and that what the chief just said. seems to offer a lot of constraints. But I was just wondering, for the purposes of the calls that the fire station makes, do they more often go north and south on MLK or go east and west on Weaver Dairy? And I understand right now it's planned for the BRT stop to go right out front, but with these, Anyway, I agree with Jeff's comments about putting people close to that. It's already seven lanes. I think it'll be nine lanes after the BRT. So it's not becoming a more pedestrian-friendly environment. It's adding transit, but there's still going to be a lot of lanes, a lot of pavement, a lot of heat and pollution. out there so again I don't see a great advantage of and there's not going to be any commercial uses here so just bringing people and dwelling units right up next to this big road Yeah, I just wonder if all options have been explored to provide more buffers and move the people away from one of the busiest roads in town. Anyway, the other comment, so I'll leave that if you have any more to add about that.

OK, Chief or Jason, feel free to respond to that now. We could also save it up, but why don't you respond now? If you'd like.

Thank you, Mr. Libby. We traditionally travel north to south more than we do west to east or east to west. We looked at the fire station remaining in the same site. However, there are some challenges with ingress and egress from the site for the fire service that we're currently working through with NCDOT. So one access point we had to eliminate already because of the BRT transit system. So we have evaluated those options and this appears to be the best at this time.

Okay.

Thank you.

All right. Yeah. It's a tough, tough scenario. So my other question was, does access point two on your plan apply to the housing block or is that Does that apply to the fire station access as well?

Yes, ma'am. So the access point two is primarily for the housing block, but all access points can be used by both the fire station and the affordable housing.

Oh, that's interesting. So you might have people driving across the fire station

access area that would not be ideal that's why we have that access point too to try to keep the residents from separated from the apparatus traffic but the whole all of the parking areas will be connected for connectivity purposes okay mike

Yeah, John, I think this probably is for Jason. I think, you know, with the significant amount of new buildings going onto this four acre, there's certain, you know, everybody knows stormwater is an issue. It's going to be a reduction in canopies as well, definitely as part of the project. I heard the wetland on the slide that you had with the four section that the wetland is supposed to address that. I was just wondering if there was a study that was done to say, hey, yeah, that's the case. This wetland is, based on this engineering study, is going to handle the additional stormwater that's going to be flowing.

Yes, we have done some preliminary studies on this. They are very much preliminaries as we haven't really gotten into the details of all of the design. We're still very much at a conceptual level. But at that level, the Area Reserve does work for the constructed wetlands. The constructed wetlands do provide a high level of water quality as well as some detention. So we feel like that's the best solution for this site.

Thank you. Let me go ahead.

Thank you. I'm sorry, before we move on, I'm just curious how, a little background on how is a project on town-owned land initiated? Can you give us a little background on that? In other words, do you just put out a call for proposals? That's exactly what the town did.

Yeah, put out a request for bids. Okay, gotcha. OK, I'm going to put out on up on the screen this matrix and let's just take through it. You see it now.

Yep.

OK. Number one land use efficiency, so it's 50 to 105 units in that range on. I think the footprint of the multifamily is less than two acres. Just eyeballing it. That's not counting the fire station or the stormwater control measure. So that's at least 25 units an acre, which is fairly high. That's like around oral level, actually. I think it's like a five story building we're talking about, so it could be, you know, pretty dense. Does that make sense just factually? So I didn't think we would have any sort of recommendations here unless we do. Any comments on this from the commissioners? OK. number two mix of housing unit sizes configurations that address affordability goals well this is a 100 affordable development um at the highest is going to be 80 am i and the the base zoning um requires at least 25 of the units be 60 ami or lower as i understand it so libby you're muted

Sorry, I had a question about that because the ordinance itself only mentions the 80%. So I'm confused what is meant by the base zoning. Is that for this district?

Maybe I got it wrong.

No, no, you're right. I mean, I read that too.

Catherine can clarify for us. Yeah. Does the 25% at 60, is that overridden essentially by the 100% at 80%?

So that's a good question. The RCP zoning district like you have that you have to have 25% of the units at 60% AMI or below. That's like to qualify for the zoning because this proposed this housing development would provide household would allow households at 80% AMI or below like that 60% is within that. So. There's also, I think, my housing colleagues could speak to the way that affordable housing developer would approach the income mix. But for the zoning purposes, we're going to be monitoring it differently. So just for zoning, it would be appropriate to keep it at 80% for all the units.

Does that answer your question?

I still don't understand that.

Well, let's go to Maggie and then we can clarify from there. We'll go to Jeff after. Maggie, please go ahead.

Yeah, so this is expected to be a tax credit project. And so we are expecting that 60% AMI is sort of what we're are sort of our goal for this, but the point of being able to go up to 80% AMI is to leave a little bit of flexibility in case there are some units that would be above 60% AMI. And the point of this is to maintain a little bit of flexibility to ensure that when we have a development partner on board, that they would have some leeway to make the project feasible. And so, That's why you'll see a little bit, maybe fewer details that you might at another development proposal that has very, very specific items. That's also why we have a bigger unit range, just because we know that within that unit range is where we expect the final numbers to fall. So is that helpful?

Yes, but would it make sense to have some small amount at least at 60% mentioned in the ordinance?

For our purposes, I don't, it may be, but I think that would be provided regardless based off of the goals of this type of development. So like from the planning department's perspective and administering the ordinance, whether it's there or not, would it impact the ultimate outcome? Do you see where I'm coming from?

You mean assuming it's a LIHTC project?

Exactly.

Yeah, because those are generally 60 or below. Jeff? You're muted, Jeff.

Yeah, thanks for the explanation. I JUST, YOU KNOW, I'M READING THROUGH THE MATERIALS AND ONE OF THE REZONING NARRATIVE THAT WAS PROVIDED BY THE APPLICANT AND ONE OF THEM, YOU KNOW, COMPLETE COMMUNITY GOALS UNDER COMPLETE COMMUNITY GOAL ONE AFFORDABLE HOUSING PROPOSAL DESCRIBE HOW THE PROPOSAL INCORPORATES THE COMMUNITY BENEFIT. A MINIMUM OF 25% UNITS WILL BE RENTED AT OR BELOW 60% OF THE AMI PER THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE DISTRICT. But based on what we've been said and also my read of Ordinance A approving the conditional zoning application, that's not the case. That it's actually, there's a requirement that it be at least below 80%, but that the zoning requirement for this district, which has a 25% minimum under 60% AMI, is being overridden. And it's because, you know, as some of the other standards in the LUMO are overwritten. So I would recommend, I mean, I don't have a problem with it given that, you know, the overall scope of the project, but I would recommend that in the ordinance and the modification to regulations that you make very clear that the 25% at 60% requirement will not apply to this particular conditional zoning application. If that if it doesn't.

Yeah, I think that makes sense. Okay.

My recommendation here would be to make clear, you know, add a Section in the modifications to regulations clarifying that these. The 25% at 60 rule for the district does not apply because it's it's a little bit of mixed messages. Honestly. You know the the presentation states zoning requires at least 25% of units affordable for households that earn at or below 60% area median income. Which is true about the zoning district, but is not generally, but is not true about this particular conditional zoning application.

If I just added that to recommendations, maybe make sense. OK, so let's go to the next. Row not see any hands with walkability, bike ability to daily needs such as housing, jobs, schools, recreation. I mean, Yes, yes, is my answer here. Close to two major strip malls. You got Timberline and Chapel North just up the street. BRT is going to bring a multi-use path on the east side of MLK up and down this corridor. Continuous sidewalk on the west side of MLK corridor. Homestead Park is not far away. So folks will be able to take the Greenway or also I think there's a planned route or existing route through the Parkside neighborhood to get down there. So this is nearly as centrally located to amenities or shopping and whatnot as you can get in this town. Putting aside, you know, downtown. Anything folks want to add to that? Okay. Number four, access to transit directly on BRT corridor. I think Jason may have mentioned there's a stop right there. Is there a stop right at Weaver Dairy? A future BRT stop? Yes, that's correct. Okay. Probably not much else to say about that. Libby, go ahead. I stand corrected. You're muted, Libby.

So I know BRT is working toward 90% design at this point, but never mind. I'm sure it's... You want to know the timing?

The timing is... SAF is hoping to get $190 million at the end of the month is the answer. We'll see whether it happens.

But if there could be some shifting of that and allow the fire trucks to come out on MLK, you could coordinate the signal with your fire truck.

Good luck with that. Good luck with that. That's been negotiated for 10 years.

All right. Oh, shut up.

So for parking, oftentimes we'll ask, so as I understand it, The town and actually the entire state of North Carolina does not have parking minimus anymore, which is great. The town does have parking maximums. They're not very restrictive. When we brought this up a couple years ago with respect to J Street affordable housing, I recall the response we got was, look, this is a LIHTC project. In order to get the funding, the tax credits, we're going to have to satisfy North Carolina Housing Agency and are there program requirements regarding parking? So it's not like the developer has free reign to include whatever amount of parking they want. It's sort of optimizing for the program requirements. Is that fair to say?

Maggie, do you have any feedback on that?

So I would say that generally, yes, the regulations of the LIHTC program are going to provide guidelines for parking ratios and whatnot. But from my understanding, there are waivers that can be requested, especially in a case like this, where there's going to be a BRT stop right outside their door. And so there may be an opportunity to provide you know, a lower ratio of parking, but we would expect some parking to still be needed and included.

Right, of course. But the exact amount is probably TBD at this point. I don't, because the site plan isn't fully evolved yet, right? It's a little premature for that.

Because it will depend on our final unit count. It's, like everything, it's a little bit of a range.

I see. We don't even have the final unit count yet. So question to the Planning Commission, what if we just put a recommendation that the eventual parking ratio consider the transit-oriented sort of location of it and just sort of leave it at that?

You could mention the possibility for a waiver that she just discussed. Okay. Include that.

Something like that. Okay, so let's go on to row six, quality design, placemaking, prioritization of the pedestrian realm. So we heard that the parking is going to be behind the multifamily building and not right on the road, which is good for the pedestrian realm. I also saw in the materials that there will be street trees Seems relevant here, but I don't think there's a requirement to have a detailed site plan. We don't even know whether it's 55 or 105 units at this point, so I think we're not really in a position to evaluate the quality of the design. I also know that the town's urban designer, Brian, commented on the concept plan, which is great, but I don't think there's anything further to say about this. Others? Now, Jeff.

Yeah, I think this is as good a place of any. I would like to suggest that we recommend that the during the development of the site that they consider ways to prove to pull the building back as much as as much as is feasible from the nine lane and five lane roads that it is that the site borders.

I support that and adding more trees, as many trees as possible.

I think, Libby, respectfully, my issue is that if it's a multi-story building and you're on the fourth floor and you're facing the road, you can have 3,000 trees and it's not going to make a difference.

We'll shelter the people who are outside.

Yeah, but not the people who are living there.

No. Well, when they're accessing whatever, the street or their cars.

Well, I think the trees tend to be like standardized distances from each other.

Yeah.

It's been my observation. Okay, other comments on number six? All right, let's go to seven. Respect for surrounding neighborhoods. So this is something that comes up when a big building is proposed to go next to existing single family neighborhood and their issues are on transitions. I didn't notice any issues of that sort here, just looking at what's around it. It's well insulated from existing There's an existing single family neighborhood to the south, sort of below where the fire station, proposed fire station will be, but it's not close. I mean, there's a lot of woods between the two sites. They're not even contiguous sites, actually. There's something in the middle. The multifamily portion of the site is actually, as Jeff said, on two arterials. So the arterials are not going to complain about the housing being there. There is a single house on the northwest corner of that intersection um but it's all the way across weaver extension so i'm not so worried about compatibility there plus it's on two arterials already um and the project in terms of height and type of development is consistent with the flume as far as i understand so um i just don't think this is a salient issue here does that make sense everybody Okay. Jeff.

I just wanted to comment that I think it's great that it has that access to the 1701 North or whatever that development is to the South. I appreciate that.

I didn't see the access. Should I describe it here? You mean like a walking, like a pedestrian?

No, the access through that other building. I don't think we need to mention it. I just wanted to comment on that.

Vehicular access? That's access point number three on the plan. Oh, okay. I didn't see that.

I'm curious whether there were any comments from that community to staff about that.

Well, it helps them too if they want to go south on Weaver Extension or if they have a fire.

I have not received any feedback FROM THIS APPLICATION. I DON'T KNOW IF ANYONE ELSE IN THE PROJECT TEAM HAS RECEIVED FEEDBACK FROM THE 1701 NORTH RESIDENTS OR PROPERTY OWNER ABOUT THE PROPOSAL.

OKAY. SOUNDS LIKE NO. JUST TWO LEFT HERE. NUMBER EIGHT IS MAINTAIN NATURAL LANDSCAPES, TREE CANOPY, GREEN SPACE, including protected natural areas. I saw in the materials that there's a request for a variance here, reduction of required tree canopy to 6%. I don't know what the starting requirement is. Is it 20%?

I think it was 30 to 11%, but wasn't it 11%, not 6%? Oh, I saw six somewhere. I saw 11 somewhere.

Catherine, what are we getting this right? There is a variance related to tree canopy.

Yes, there is a request for a modification. It is 11% and we can make sure that that is revised for the final version.

Down from what?

30 30 OK. And will any of that be by preservation of existing trees?

I'll ask McAdams maybe to reply to that question.

Absolutely, yeah. As much as feasible, given the grading and site development proposed.

So I'm, oh Libby, you're on mute. Go ahead. You're still on mute, Libby.

Does the 11% include that little triangle across Weaver Dairy Road? Or is it all on the same side?

It includes the triangle on the other side of Weber Dairy. Okay. Which you're not going to build on.

That's a little disingenuous. Yeah. So maybe it is more like 6% or 5% on the same side of the road.

Let's see how it's disingenuous. It's all part of the same plot. They're keeping the trees over there.

I don't think, yeah.

I'll say just two things. First of all, the requested modification to regulation states that the minimum tree canopy requirement is 40%. I'm not sure if that's wrong. But I think we need to think of this in context of what it's providing. And it notes somewhere in the narrative that it's adjacent to town-owned land that has additional trees in it. Um, so, you know, the goal of these minimum tree canopy requirements is to obviously preserve the tree canopy in the town. You know, the town could include as part of this project, some other piece of land that include that they don't plan on developing includes trees, but that's, you know, it's, it wouldn't make a meaningful difference. So, um, I think including that little triangle across the street is a little cheeky, but I'm fine with it.

yeah i think it's just confusing and so um catherine i'm wondering if you could um help us understand and maybe i'm not asking the right party maybe i should ask the developer help us understand the rationale for this variance i mean i can use common sense here that uh the trees don't fit if you're going to do this scale of affordable housing next to a fire station which inherently involves a lot of impervious you have to literally turn around fire trucks all day long it just doesn't and then there's the storm water you can't leave mature trees above a storm water facility of any sort um

there's just not room to fit them so you got to make your trade-offs you could either have the trees or you could have the affordable housing like kind of it right yeah i'll answer one part and then i'll ask the project team to weigh into to your point about like that sliver on the other side of weaver dairy road extension it's actually part of the same parcel that is left over from the um right of way like expansion from when the road was extended and so it needed to be rezoned anyway as a part of this approval. So I understand your your point about like maybe not feeling like the full tree canopy, but it is counted and we did want to make sure it was included in the rezoning. And then I'll ask Maggie and maybe Chief Mevin to weigh in and the the trade offs of that modification.

Yeah, I think Chief Mebbing can probably speak to the needs for the fire department in terms of sight lines and things like that. I would just say on the housing side that we acknowledge that we're trying to do something with this site that it's not being currently used for. We're adding something extra that wasn't a part of it before. And I think this is one of the trade-offs of that. And my understanding is that it's correct that if we have some kind of a stormwater measure that We wouldn't be able to have mature trees there necessarily. And so this is something, it is a consideration.

I'll jump in on the next one. Excuse me. I thought Chief Graves would take that. The trees around this station are definitely needed, so I support everything they're saying. I do want to present a little bit from the fire department operational standpoint. My apologies. There's a ladder truck that operates out of that station. The length of that truck is nearly about 60 feet long with a 100-foot ladder on top. So being able to get that truck out, to be able to get its service, to extend the ladder, to lower it to the ground, the sight lines that are needed to make sure that the clear obstructions are not there. We need the buffer around this station, around that area to be able to maintain and service our equipment. In addition to pulling out of this station, the front depth of the station for us to be able to pull out on, the length of the truck obviously is a problem there as well. So we need to be able to get out to where we can have a clear sight line east and west to be able to see. So removing trees in that sight line area is also needed. Chief Gray, do you have anything to add to that, sir?

Yeah, sorry. I was a little slow on the uptake there, Chief. The only thing I would add to that is one of the reasons, and John hit on this a while ago. Sorry, I forgot your last name, sir. We do have, we require greater turnaround area. We need space to check our equipment and those kinds of things. And with apparatus that big, it just, requires a little bit more impervious surface and a little bit more space where trees aren't an option. That makes sense. And you can call me John.

Chief Mevin. Just like to add one more thing, Mr. Mitchell.

Chief Gray's mentioned on it, but I just wanted to be clear about it. Most of our stations that, yes, all of our stations actually that we have in town today requires to back in 25% of vehicle accidents involving emergency service vehicle comes from backing. So having the ability to drive around this station in the rear to pull forward was also necessary. So that is causing some of the reduction in trees as well. Okay. Thank you for that.

All right, Jason.

Yeah, I'll just add one more thing. Um, part of our, just recommendation to move forward with a stormwater wetland on the site was recognizing that we are reducing the canopy coverage here. So we didn't want to come back with a stormwater control measure that didn't provide any sort of environmental benefits. So a lot of what would have been tree canopy coverage area is being used as the wetland and it is providing some environmental benefits to the site and the town as a whole.

Okay.

But it was very much a balancing act between all of the

desired uses for the site. Right. And this sort of leads us into number nine, the last row. As I understand it, the project is required to comply and is complying with the 100-year storm standard. Is that about the level of that detention-retention facility, or are you suggesting you're going sort of beyond that?

So that is the design level is for the 100-year.

Okay. um so commissioners on uh planning commissioners on eight and nine are there any uh recommendations that you would want to make um i'm okay with the the trade-off uh with the trees understanding that uh clearance sightlines needs of the fire station and also the um kind of brutal trade-off between having using the house for then the site for dense affordable housing versus having trees there it's It's a tough trade off, but I'm not. I don't think it's unreasonable personally, but others may have different thoughts. Libby.

No, I'm just I know you don't have the site fully. All of these issues worked out about the wetland and the ephemeral stream, but I'm just hoping that they will interact a little bit on the site somehow that natural flows that are coming both onto and off the property will be considered as you go forward. That's all. I guess that's more of a comment than a question because unless you've worked out more of those details at this point, I don't know.

No, not at this point, but we will certainly keep that in mind.

Catherine?

Thank you. I just wanted to offer a point of clarification and thank Commissioner Green for pointing out the discrepancy in the tree canopy. I did confirm it is from 40%. So apologies for the mistake.

Next. Thank you. So bringing it back to the Commission, I tried to keep up with the discussion and the notes here. Is there anything that folks want to discuss that we haven't touched upon or you want to circle back to? And if not, maybe we could move toward a motion. Now, there are two things that we have to consider. One is consistency with the comprehensive plan, and the other is the ordinance, ordinance A. And sometimes what we do is combine it all together in one motion. You don't have to, where you could propose, you know, yes, we feel it's consistent with the comprehensive plan at the same time we want to vote up or down to recommend to the council the project. I don't think we have conditions right now. We have a couple of recommendations so that we could convey that along with this matrix, which contains the recommendations. That's just one possible thing.

Could I ask one more question? Yeah. About the buffer, the five foot buffers along. I think there's no buffer along MLK. Is that right? And a five foot buffer on Weaver Dairy. Am I remembering that right?

That's correct.

Would you put anything other than grass in a five foot buffer? Or is that where the street trees will go? Or help me out.

Yes, that would be where the street trees would go, that buffer area.

Thank you. So I don't know the best way to proceed, John. What you outlined sounds reasonable We have I don't I don't know what Jeff thinks about the. The model that item two.

Yeah, no, I think that's. I'm fine with that.

Just leave it as a recommendation.

Yeah, I mean we can't make anybody do anything so everything is a recommendation.

Sure.

Well, it seems like Catherine is probably receptive to it. It's sort of a technical informity point.

I just don't, you know, I don't want a council member to say, well, you said it was 25% under 60. And, um, but the, this as, and it, it just, it was unclear to me. So I have no issues with, with limiting the requirement to under 80%. I just, yeah.

Well, now it's in here, so if they read our work product, which is an if, then they won't be misled.

John, on that point, did Megan agree to the clarification? as well i know jeff i i thought it was great point there you caught you caught this correctly but did the staff or or megan agree that that was the case that that the 25 of 60 really is being overwritten i think that's a question for catherine before she answers i just want to comment it was libya that figured it out not me

Can you please restate your question, Mike?

Well, we have under recommendation now that that 25% of the 60% MII has been overwritten. Okay. So, um, Is that true? Is that true? Is that your question? Is this true?

Um, I think that is how it's written in the ordinance. So if you all would like to make a recommendation for that to be different, then I encourage you to do that. There's not currently a modification to the regulations right now to change the requirement for the RCP.

Oh, I thought that there are mixed messages here.

Yeah, I mean, Condition five states that 100% of the affordable units will be reserved for those households earning 80% or less of the AMI. And there's no indication of the fact that there's that 60% under, 25% under 60. So I just think that needs to be more clear. If the intention is that 100% will be under 80% and 25% will be under 60%, that should be said. But I thought the discussion, I thought the conclusion of the discussion was there might need to be some flexibility. And so the town didn't want to commit to hitting that 60% AMI mark.

And if so, we could just put in the, or the staff could just put in the modifications that you don't have to hit the 60% mark. The planning commissioner would be fine with that. We just wanted to remove the ambiguity.

I understand. Yeah. I think you all should, I can see where the ambiguity is coming in. And if you all would like to make a recommendation to kind of address that ambiguity, I think that's under like appropriate. And we as staff can figure out how to best do that either through the ordinance condition or a modification to the regulations. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I think so. Maggie and then Jeff.

Yeah, I just want to confirm that housing staff are comfortable kind of clarifying this condition to say that we're going to be meeting that district AMI, the 25% and 60% requirement. Oh, OK.

Okay. You are going to be meeting, and that's good. Okay.

So you're comfortable with leaving that in, that you'll meet at least 25%. Okay.

I think my only point, and I'm happy. I personally am satisfied either way. But if the 25% at 60% is... is going to continue to be a condition that the development will meet. I just think that should be clearly stated in the ordinance because as written, it's ambiguous. So, John, that change you made, I would change the weather to that because we're hearing from town staff that, no, no, the change clarifying the ordinance, that, yeah. Because we're hearing from staff that they do intend to have that condition in the conditional zoning district.

Yeah. Okay. Hey, y'all, I just want to note that this is a condition of LUMO. So they're meeting LUMO, which is why we don't highlight it. We're happy to clarify it for sure, but that is why it's not there.

Yeah, right now it sounds like an exception, even though it's not clearly stated. I think that's Jeff's point. It seemed because they're asking for a lot of exceptions and so it could come across that that is an exception.

Right, I think that was, yeah, that was the part, but it sounds like we've cleared this up. OK, anything else we need to sort out and if not, Maybe somebody could make a motion.

And let me know if you want me to scroll. I had just a question. I didn't understand something. Libby asked about the five foot clearance, I think, on Martin Luther King. And then I understood that the green is going to go into that five, you know, uh, five foot, uh, clearance, I think. Or trees that are going to go there. Right. So what I just didn't, I can't see the map, but is, is that, where is the, the, the sidewalk in that picture where the pedestrians are walking? But we have the canopies, but that five foot, if it's going to be where the trees are going, then where is the sidewalk?

We have not quite designed that far out, but generally speaking, the sidewalk is in the right way, not on the property. So that buffer would be on the private side of that property. The inside, not the street side.

The inside. Yes. Okay. Okay. Thank you.

And Mike, there is no buffer shown on the map on the site plan on MLK, but only on Weaver.

Oh, okay. Gotcha.

But there will hopefully be a buffer between, I think they're designing buffers between the greenway and the street. That's in being planned now.

Are you talking about MLK?

Yes.

Okay. But the greenway is on the opposite side of the street.

Oh, it's on the opposite side here.

The multi-use path is on the east side, and the sidewalk is on the west side of it.

Okay, so there should be some green, a green sward, a small green sward between the sidewalk and the street. But that's public right of way, not on the property.

Right, like the grass strip or whatever. Thank you.

It is confusing.

Jeff, you want to make a motion?

Yeah, I just want to. I don't know if I should share. I don't know if everybody has had a chance to see the. Resolution of consistency with the comprehensive plan that was emailed to us. I could share my screen and throw it up or.

Do you have any concerns about it?

No, but I you know if people like to see what they're voting on.

That's in your emails as an attachment. Sure, I can stop sharing if you want to throw it up there.

I mean, it's what we expect. But I thought it would be good to show it. So I would move that the Planning Commission recommend that the Town Council adopt Resolution A, resolution of reasonableness and consistency for the proposed conditional zoning map amendment at 101 Weaver Dairy Road extension?

Okay, we'll start with that. Jeff, please vote. I think we need a second. Oh, we haven't had a second yet. I'm sorry. Is there a second?

Second.

I said. Okay, that's Chuck. You got him first. So just to be clear, Jeff motioned for us to opine that this proposal is indeed consistent with the comprehensive plan. Chuck seconded. So Jeff. Yes. Chuck.

Yes.

Libby.

Yes.

Mike. Yes. And I'm a yes. So that's five out of five. Okay. Now for ordinance A. which is what the council would vote on to pass the project or not.

I will move that the Planning Commission recommend that the Town Council approve Ordinance A, approving the conditional zoning application. subject to the recommendations included in the complete community matrix that we will attach to the recommendation i second that okay mike seconds so let's do a vote jeff yes um chuck yes libby yes mike yes

And I'm a yes, so that's five out of five again. And that is it. So thank you to Catherine, Maggie, and also thank you to the development team and to the fire department team that was here with us tonight. We appreciate your time. Sorry about the technical glitch for the first 15 minutes, but good luck with the project. Very exciting.

Thank you all. It's greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much.

Great project.

Okay. Now, um, just to give a preview of what's going to happen, uh, next month. So this was our last September meeting, but we had a meeting October 6th, I think, and then one October 20th is optional. I can count 14, 6, 14, 20. Yeah. So, and the council is going to start to meet on, I think they're starting to meet on Lumo, like within the legislative session being open on the 21st of October. So we had two meetings. that some of us were able to attend the first of this month, and then there was one in August. And when we take up the LUMO again on October 6th, the idea is for us to not just get information from TAS and have it be sort of informational, but actually move toward a set of recommendations or advice to the town council at that point. And we can use one or two meetings jeff and i discussed this earlier today and we propose to use the october 6 meeting to among the six of us um come up with a conceptual agreement about um the points that we would like to make to the council assuming we don't just want to up or down vote it, which I think we probably don't want to just do that. It's way too complex to reduce it to an up or down. We're going to have some comments, so maybe it's two comments, maybe it's four or five comments, however many it is. We could use October 6th to have an open discussion. I don't think there would be a presentation from Taz unless he wants to present to us. It would just be sort of a a working session, really, for us to decide what we can agree on in terms of comments to forward to the council. And then between and we wouldn't vote on it, then this is the proposal from Jeff and me. Instead, we would vote on it at the October 20th meeting. We would use the 14 days in between to for assigned people to actually write up what we thought we agreed on. And then we can tweak the language, having something to look at, you know, on the screen on the 20th. So that's a proposal.

John, just a question. Has the feedback from the last few meetings, I know these were conversations, has those feedbacks been folded into the LUMO by TAS already? So we have a sort of finding more updated copy that we can look at?

I'm reasonably confident that nothing has changed. but I don't know for sure.

Jeff? Yeah, I think it would be helpful if, I don't know if town staff know about the plans for the public hearing. I assume there will be some sort of presentation because they will be, you know, giving a presentation to the town council because this is a pretty big legislative undertaking. But I don't know what the plans are or if we will be getting an updated version. of the LUMO. I mean, at least I know there's a few typos in there which are inevitable, so I don't know if they're going to try to fix those and how much time we'll have to review before the meeting. I don't know if either of the town staff who are here know or if you can, you know, we'll be able to get us some information in the next, you know, week or two.

Yeah, so that's the question. It would be good to know if anything has changed since the version that we were looking at as of a couple weeks ago. I don't think anything has changed, but if something has, it would be good to get a heads up on that.

Yeah, and I'll say Taz will be at the meeting. He will be able to share that information. We'll let him know that that's in the interest of the Planning Commission, and we'll let him follow up with you all.

Yeah. Okay. But yeah, Jeff, good point. I think now Ted probably is going to want to make, now that you mentioned that a presentation, um, on the sixth. And also I think we are obligated to take public comment for now a third time on the Lumo, which is fine. Um, which could consume, you know, a bunch of time, depending on how many people want to want to show up to that one. Um, Doesn't matter, just setting expectations.

Well, that seems like a good plan to me, John, to have that meeting for a discussion and kind of seeing if we can identify where we're going and then make assignments, writing assignments or whatever, circulate that in the intervening two weeks. And then hopefully, yeah, we'll see where we can get it.

So I'll have, I'll come prepared with a couple ideas of my own in terms of what we might, things that we might want to, um, advise or recommend to the council. Uh, and, uh, I anticipate Liz will probably have a thing or two and Jeff may have some things. He may have a large, longer list of technical things, uh, for all I know, because he does this for a living. Um, I don't, Liz doesn't. And Libby, Mike, Chuck, if you have things that are important to you that you've sort of noticed over the last couple of hearings or otherwise, just come with them because I'm sure that the rest of us would love to hear what they are and figure out if we want to include them in our overall PC feedback.

John, October 6th will be The only time I'm going to miss the session because it's my vacation. I'm taking, you know, it's planned vacation time. But so just procedurally, how do we do this if we have feedback? Number one, I would love to see if there is an update, what that update looks like. So I'm not going back looking at things that we already, you know, provided feedback. But number two is, do we use email to send you things with everybody copied on it? Is that the appropriate way of doing it?

No, don't do that. If given that you're not, I don't need folks to send me things in advance, but if you're not going to be at the meeting, then just send me and only me what you want to introduce and I can be your mouthpiece.

Okay, good. Okay.

Thank you. I wouldn't trust him.

I may distort and twist your words, but that's a risky take.

I'm used to it. This is on public record. I'm used to it. Thank you for that.

Okay. So it sounds like we have a plan. And I guess that's it. Josh, anything else that... Are there going to be other agenda items besides LUMO on the 6th? not that i know of okay no i think we've preserved that okay so tentatively we're going to plan on having the optional meeting on the 20th which is the day before the council starts meeting just for the purpose of wordsmithing and doing a sort of final formality type of vote on the stuff that we're really going to be working through on the 6th this is good Is there just a random thought that popped into my head? Is there any procedural avenue for us to have a work session on the 6th as opposed to a business meeting where we need to take public comment?

I'll check. I am not sure. I will say the agenda item we're likely to bring to you is to open a public hearing. So when we bring a public hearing to y'all, we do need public comments.

But could we do that on, oh yeah, I guess we can if you're going to open it that day.

Yes, the 20th we may have options, the 6th may not have as many options there.

Alright, I mean, you see what I'm going for here. Maybe there's not a way to do it. But if you can see a way, let me know because that would kind of streamline things for us.

I mean, we can always have the public hearing and then close it. We're required to have a public hearing, but we're not required to, you know, who knows how many people will come. There have been a number of emails about some of the, to town council about some of the changes in the draft update in LUMO. These people may want to only come speak to council. They may decide to come to us, who knows. But I think after they, after the public hearing, we can close the public hearing if we choose to or continue it and then have whatever discussion we want to have.

Right. But, you know, when we open the public hearing, I think we have to take public comment probably. Yeah. And then even if we keep the hearing open, we don't have to take more comment.

Yeah, right. And so we can have, I think we'll be able to have that kind of discussion at the meeting.

Okay.

Even if there's a public hearing.

My thought. Yeah, I think probably we'll just do it the way we originally planned. Open the public hearing, take the comment after Taz's presentation, assuming he makes one, and then we'll just have our own discussion. I don't want to prevent people from the public from speaking to us at the first public hearing, given that the last two meetings we had weren't officially a public hearing. So I don't want to do that. So maybe I should just um not make this suggestion okay good so i think that's it uh meeting adjourned and see you all in um a few weeks okay thank you thank you good night everyone