Zoning Committee Work Session - Regular Meeting

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to the March 3rd, 2026 zoning committee work session. My name is Douglas A. Welton. I'm the chairman of the zoning committee. This meeting is being streamed online via YouTube in accordance with all applicable meeting statutes. Requirements for notice access and minutes have been met by electronic means. Few um orders of business before we get started. For those of you who are uh uh behind a microphone, please keep your mic muted and when you are not speaking and when you're going to make a second or uh make a motion, please state your name so that those who are listening at home can tell who you are. Uh the public hearing for the zoning petitions that we are hearing tonight have been held at a previous date in front of Charlotte City Council and the zoning committee. This meeting is not a continuation of those hearings. So there will be no public input unless the committee has a specific question in which case the committee will suspend the session and ask the petitioner directly. Uh we'll begin with introductions uh of the zoning committee and I will begin all the way to my left with commissioner Milan. Errol Milan, Planning Commission.

Michael Caprielli, Planning Commission. Melissa Gaston, Planning Commission. Theresa McDonald, Planning Commission. Aaron Shaw, Planning Commission. Um, we will also introduce staff and we will begin to my left with Mr. Patton, Dave Pettton, planning. Holly Kramer, planning. Uh, Michael Russell, planning. Max Oliver, planning. Emma, Emma Canaras planning.

Thanks. Uh, for those of you who are listening at home like a baseball game from 1965, Emma is out in left field all by herself tonight. So, uh, there's no one sitting next to her and that that has added a flavor to our meeting that we did not know we were going to get at 5:29. Uh there are folks online and if the folks online would introduce themselves, we would would love to hear who's there. Hi, I'm Natalie King, C dot. Brent Hut, C dot. Chris Mano, C dot. Isaiah Washington, C dot.

Travis Miller, C dot. Jitter, C dot. Is that everybody? I think so. Um, before we get started on our meeting, we will ask Miss Kramer if she will give us uh word of any deferrals uh or withdrawals from the from our agenda tonight.

Yes. A couple to review. We have one withdrawal that's petition 202585 by HK Cedarbell. In terms of deferrals, we have 205036 by RangeWorks deferring to the April zoning committee work session and 202586 by Pence Road Development LLC deferring to the April zoning committee work session as well as petition 2025127 by 4749 West Boulevard LLC also deferring to the April zoning committee work session. That's all. Okay, that first one was uh item number four, the cedar bail. Is that what you said? Right. 2025. That's withdrawn. You said

that is withdrawn. And the other three that I mentioned are deferring to the next meeting. Do I have a motion to accept these withdrawals, this withdrawal and these deferrals? Do I have a motion for the disposition on those? Gaston, I uh move that we accept these withdrawals and deferrals. Second. Wow. steel cage death match already on the second and I'm going to give that one to Shaw. This has been moved by Commissioner Gaston and seconded by Commissioner Shaw. All those in favor, please say I. I.

Any opposed? All right, those have been taken off our agenda tonight. And for those of you who are keeping score at home, that means our agenda is going to be a little bit lighter. We will begin with uh item number three on our agenda which is resoning petition 2025-118 by Charlotte design plan Charlotte Charlotte planning design and development department. This is a text amendment and um I I have a sense that Kevin is not here but he looks a lot like Dave. Yeah. There's a couple of references that Dave's not here there. So anyway, yeah. Okay. Thanks. Thanks, Kevin.

We're good. Kevin is not with us tonight, but we do have Faith with us. And of course, we have Ellen from Solid Waste. No, I'll be No, Dave is still gonna do it. Yeah. She's just supervising. Yeah. Okay. She's keeping me in line. Keep it in the road, Dave. Okay.

Uh so, as we presented back uh at the hearing a couple weeks ago, uh this text amendment was originally filed back in October. did some updates to it uh in both December and January just to clean some things up and add a couple of things last uh last minute. We are addressing multiple items identified by both external stakeholders and our internal staff. Uh we did engagement in October and November with the UDO advisory committee. Uh provided an update to the transportation planning and development committee on January 5th. Had our engagement that same week on January 6th and 8th. and then of course had our public hearing uh just a few weeks ago uh back on February 16th. Just some highlights of what's in this current text amendment. Uh we talked a little bit about this in a couple of different settings. Uh we are updating our ADU standards to increase the overall allowed size uh for some of those. So essentially it's now reading that the heated floor area shall not exceed 600 square ft or 70% uh of the total floor area, whichever is greater. Uh however, there's still the thousand uh square foot cap uh that we've got for ADUs in the in the ordinance. Uh also expanding where allowed outdoor markets can be uh established in the ML1 and two districts and IC1 and IC2 districts as well as our office district. Uh this is um intended to try to improve food access in areas uh where folks do have some struggles with fresh healthy foods. This is also something we uh were made aware of by the Carolina Farm Trust who we uh work a lot with on projects like this and they were looking to uh expand some of their options and ran into some of these challenges. So uh certainly wanted to open that up uh for more availability. Uh we do uh have solid waste changes uh within the ordinance as well. Uh this kind of highlights what those changes are. So for projects that have 1 to 11 dwelling units, uh they'd be eligible for city provided rollout services. Uh

they would not be required to construct on-site solid waste space for dumpsters uh or recycling uh containers if they have 12 or more dwelling units. This is for all development types. They are eligible for city provided dumpster services. uh they would be required to construct those on-site solid waste services or on-site solid waste spaces, excuse me, except for duplexes, triplexes, and quads. Uh they would not be required to construct that on-site solid waste space when they meet the criteria of having buildings located on individual lots and those buildings are fronting a public street. Uh so in instances where you've got 12 to 49 dwelling units uh for duplex, triplex, and quads, uh they're eligible for the city provided dumpster service and again required to construct that on-site solid waste space in with the exception of those two criteria that we just mentioned and are listed there. Again, buildings on individual lots and fronting on a public street. Uh we do have some changes uh as a result of House Bill 926 that was passed back in September of 2025 went into effect in October. Uh the biggest change for us is the effective denial language. Uh the state essentially said no jurisdiction in North Carolina can uh provide any waiting period in their ordinances for development related permits. So things like resonings, appeals, uh through zoning board and other uh other types of requests that have a denial process, you can't have a wait period to say when you can reapply. Uh we did have that as part of our resoning process. There was a two-year wait period with some caveats. That no longer is the case. So a denial, somebody could come in the next day uh and start the process over again immediately. do have some changes to some zoning and development standards just in in general in the ordinance. Uh we did provide some flexibility on transparency for modular buildings. You can see those are typical of what we see at some of the school

sites. Don't have a lot of windows, don't have a lot of u transparency options. So, uh we did run into some challenges with CMS. Wanted to partner with them to create a little bit more flexibility when locating those units on their school sites. also flexibility for design standards for large health care institutions mainly for prominent uh entryways uh and some other things where you have ground floor requirements where you might need more privacy or more security for a hospital or healthcare institution. They can't always meet all of those. So we did want to provide some flexibility in those instances. Also setbacks for new wireless telecommunication infrastructure. Uh that's something that we didn't necessarily have uh where a new tower didn't really have any setback requirements from existing residential structures. Uh so any new towers would have to have uh meet the fall zone requirements if they're located near existing residential. Uh we do have some uh flexibility for driveway conflicts between city and NC DOT. uh really just provided some language where both organizations can work together uh to resolve some of those conflicts where somebody may need a larger size than the ordinance uh typically would would require. NC DOT can work with CDOT and resolve those administratively uh and also updated notice requirements for our flood plane regulations. did make some changes after that February 16th uh public hearing. Updates to uh the use table, which is 151, uh to allow indoor amusement facilities in the ML2 district. That again came up from uh projects in land development that were running into some challenges. So, we wanted to create some flexibility uh for those as well as commercial fitness centers, allowing those in ML2. We do see a lot of old industrial buildings reused for uh gyms and other fitness centers wasn't allowed in ML2. Uh so that is something we we opened up uh after the public hearing and talking to land development uh on some of that as well. We did update the effective date

for uh the setback requirements for newly constructed wireless telecommunications tower. It did read originally uh February. That was our initial approval date. Uh but after getting bumped a month, uh it's now up to March 23rd. So once that uh goes into effect, anything constructed for a wireless telecommunication tower after March 23rd would have to meet those requirements. Anything before is considered uh as meeting the requirements that they had in place once they were constructed. Uh we did restore a clarifying term for detached uh for specifying development of a single family dwelling on a non-conforming lot abuing a street. Very technical stuff, but I can assure you that was needed. And then we did update uh some language for our bonafide farms. Uh our definition, as you may be aware, Meckllinmberg County did establish a voluntary and enhanced voluntary a district uh last year. Uh and we really only had a definition for bonafide farms that applied to ETJ. Uh but we are you can have a bonafide farm within city limits. They don't have all the exemptions that they would if they were in the ETJ. Uh but it it wasn't very clear that you could still have them in city limits. So, we removed uh some of the language that just said ETJ only uh and clarified that they can be in both uh but the exemption for zoning standards and other standards that really only apply to uh the ETJ uh bonafide farms versus the ones that may be within city limits. And again, that's to support Meckllinmberg County's program. Overall, uh we do support and and recommend approval. It is consistent with the comp plan and the goals. Uh we do provide these updates frequently for the uh UDO. We'll have another text amendment later this year. Uh we may have some other standalone ones to address some topic specific things in between now and then, but overall this is what's in uh the current one and we do recommend approval and we'll take any questions you have.

Thank you very much Dave. Does anybody have any questions, comments? Commissioner uh McDonald McDonald you're very I think it was close to the beginning the ADU heated floor from your our very literal friend over here. Are we talking about heated floor or the heated living area?

It would be essentially the space within the ADU that does have heated square footage. So if you have a storage area off of it that's not heated, that doesn't count towards the total square footage. So if you have, you know, just a another room in there that's not heated, not cooled, that's not considered part of the total square footage, that is considered that heated. So it's really just the space that's habitable uh with heating and cooling to 600 square feet. We're expanding it to 600 feet. It was It was originally 400. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, then

Well, no, it wasn't originally 400. So, let me let me back up. So, we It was originally 50%. which in some cases, you know, would result in a very small unit. What where I came that 400 popped in my head, we had some instances where we were working with uh housing and neighborhood services and our urban design center for uh their efforts to get some pre-approved or pre-reviewed ADUs uh available to the public and and they're currently under review by Meckllinmberg County Building Codes. Uh some of those units were on the smaller side uh and some were on, you know, ranging anywhere from about 500 to 6 700 square f feet. What we heard through some of those conversations were, you know, we do have neighborhoods that have small houses, you know, Elizabeth, Nota, other places where you might only have a 900 foot home total. Uh so that 50% really limited you to a 400 450 foot or 450 square foot uh ADU which if you wanted to use one of those pre-approved templates that we're working on, you wouldn't have access to them. Uh so that did kind of trigger a thought in our head of let's put it at a base level of 600. So, if you do the math and you're limited, let's say you have a 900 foot home and you the math only gets you to 450, you would still be able to do 600. We also increase it to 70% uh as well. So, that should offer enough flexibility for folks to uh be able to use some of those pre-approved designs that uh we're working on and hopefully we'll have approved and and ready to go uh in the coming months. Uh but under the current ordinance, some of those would not be available to folks in some of our older neighborhoods that have some of those just smaller uh cottage style homes. So,

Gotcha. Thank you very much. Yep. Anyone else? Dave, I would like to ask a question on the um solid waste. Yep.

Dutabob, there were 8 million conditions in there. Which one? What's an example of something that falls through any of those conditions? Because like it's 12 units or more, all development types except duplexes, triplexes, and quads. What would that be? What would the what would be except those things? So the the exception for when you've got the 12 to anything less than that one or one through 11, you're eligible for the rollout service for those uh those development types. For the duplex, triplex and quads when you're within that 12 to 49, you've got the city eligible for city provided dumpster service. So you'd have to provide that and construct the pad to be able to put that out there if you want that city service. If the only exception to that is if you're on those public streets and you're on individual lots, you you wouldn't have to build that on-site solid waste container uh for that project. So, anything that goes beyond then that that threshold is how we treat them today, which would be, you know, you still have the private hauler service, you still have private dumpster service, but this gets into a little bit more clarity on when you can be eligible for the city provided uh dumpster service and when you have to actually build those uh dumpster pads for those types of services.

Okay. In my mind, I'm goofballing and I'm saying I'm building a cottage court and I'm trying to get 20 units on on an acre. So, the they're really close together, but they're all detached. Which one of those do I fall in? I'll look over to technical experts. Those would all be considered um the people. Okay. uh Ellen Price with Solidway Services. Um I think in the example that you're using, those would all be single family, I guess detached, I don't know, um homes. So, they would be eligible for uh the curbside services.

Yeah. But maybe there if they're a cottage court, there might not be a curbside to curb with. They would have to design a place to curb with. Okay. All right. I'm I'm just asking odd questions because you know that's how I roll sometimes. Thank you. Aren't you glad you came to our meeting now? I'm glad that you um anybody else got any questions, comments? If not, uh do I hear a motion for the disposition of item three on our agenda? Reszoning petition number something here.

2025118 I'll get to the There we go. Yeah. 25 2025-118 McDonald motion to approve. Ah, having reviewed the petition and considered the consistency statement prepared by staff to approve this petition, I move that we recommend approval of petition number 2025-118 as it appears before us and the adoption of the consistency statement as it appears before us. Milan second.

It's been moved by Commissioner McDonald, seconded by Commissioner Milan. All those in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. We're on to item number five on our agenda. Reszoning petition 2025-114 by the Charlotte Meckllinburgg Hospital Authority. And Max, uh, you get to take us through this one.

All right. Good evening. Um, petition 2025114 is a.56 acre parcel on Lombardi Circle near the intersection East Boulevard. plan proposes a private outdoor recreation facility associated with the adjacent healthc care institution on a site that is currently undeveloped. Site's currently zoned into B neighborhood 2. Proposed zoning is OGCD, general office conditional plan is consistent with the goals and policies of the south inner community area plan and is consistent with the 2040 policy map recommendation for the campus place type. The resoning proposal calls for the development of a therapy park, an open space associated with the adjacent healthcare institution following the prescribed conditions of article 15.4 of the UDO will include um elements like pedestrian features, seating, shade elements, raised garden beds, landscaping, fences or walls, lighting and art installations. No buildings are permitted on the site. A minimum 25 foot wide class B landscape yard will be installed along the southern and northern property boundaries adjacent to residential. Um, one minor change since public hearing is uh the therapy structures and equipment proposed for the sites have been removed from the plan and staff recommends approval of this petition as it aligns with the south inner area plan and campus place type, incorporate incorporates the landscaping buffers for adjacent residences and introduces a minuteized open space along the Little Sugar Creek Greenway um that may advance um the 2040 policy goal of integrated in natural and built environments. I'm happy to take any questions.

Thanks very much, Max. Uh, does anybody have any questions, comments? Was there a reason why the therapy structures were removed? I'm not aware. Um, okay. If if there was

Okay. All right. Um, if nobody has any comments, do I hear a motion for the disposition of item number five on our agenda 2025-114? Caprioli. Motion to approve. Having reviewed the petition and considered the consistency statement prepared by the staff to approve this petition, I move that we recommend approval of petition number 2025, TAC 114 as it appears before us and the adoption of the consistency statement as it appears before us. McDonald second.

It's been moved by Commissioner Caprioli and seconded by Commissioner McDonald. All those in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. We're on item number six on our agenda. Reszoning petition 2025-121 by the Huntington National Bank. Emma, will you talk take us through this one, please? Ma'am,

petition 2025-121 is approximately 3.67 acres located north of Ballentine Commons Parkway, south of Conland Circle and west of Huffins Lane. The site is currently occupied. The current zoning is neighborhood services and the proposed zoning is neighborhood services site plan amendment. The 2040 policy map recommends the regional activity center place type for this site. The proposal is to increase the maximum allowed squared footage from 30,500 ft to 35,100 ft. All other conditions of the plane plan remain as is. The petition is consistent with the goals and policies of the south outer community area plan. The petition is in alignment with the Charlotte future 2040 policy map recommendation for the regional activity center place type. The south outer community area plan um goal that is checked off for this would be goal one, the 10-minute neighborhood. The petition is consistent with the goals and staff does recommend approval of this petition. I will take any questions you may have.

Thank you very much, Emma. Does anybody have any questions or comments about this petition? If not, do I hear a motion for the disposition of item number six on our agenda, reszoning petition 2025-121.

Caprioli, motion to approve. Having reviewed the petition and considered the consistency statement prepared by the staff to approve this petition, I move that we recommend approval of petition number 2025 TAC 121 as it appears before us and the adoption of the consistency statement as it appears before us. One second. It's been motioned by Commissioner Caprioli and seconded by Commissioner Milan. All those in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. We're on to item number is item number seven um deferred? No. Nope. Eight is deferred. Oh, okay. Sorry. You can't mark on this

that thing. Item number seven on our agenda. Reszoning petition 2021-122 by Union Church. The people are leaving the room because they their petitions have been heard. CJ. Uh, Michael. Yes. We haven't heard from you tonight. You got anything to say? Sure. Okay. Go ahead. Give it to us.

Uh, approximately 14.9 acres located south of East WT Harris Boulevard, east of Old Concord Road and west of University East Drive in the University Business Park area. As you can see, this is an existing uh office building. uh and it's currently zoned uh business park conditional. The proposed zoning is uh office flex campus. Uh the policy 20 40 policy map recommends the manufacturing and logistics place type here. Um the petition is inconsistent with the policy map recommendation for manufacturing and logistics place type. Uh so you know even though it's inconsistent with the recommended uh policy map for manufacturing logistics the site and surrounding properties are developed uh really as office and campus uses. So the uh proposed uh office flex campus zoning district is compatible with uh many of the existing uses in in the business park. Um and in in accordance with the uh UDO the conventional um business park zoning district was translated to the office flex campus district. However, this property is currently zoned uh BPCD, which is a conditional district uh and therefore it did not automatically translate under the UDO. Um so in the OFC it prevents a variety of uses that are in line with keeping the character of the area which is primarily developed with office, medical clinics and supportive uses. Um and the petition proposes changing the site of the campus place type which is generally considered more appropriate transition to the adjacent neighborhood place types than the manufacturing and

logistics which is uh incompatible with the residential uses. Um so with that staff does recommend approval of this petition. Thank you very much Michael. Does anybody have any questions or comments about this particular petition? If not, do I hear a motion for the disposition of uh reszoning petition 2025-122? Gaston. Having reviewed the petition and consider the consistency statement prepared by staff to approve this petition, I move that we recommend approval of petition number 2025-122 as it appears before us and the adoption of the consist consistency statement as it appears before us.

Shaw second. It's been moved by Gaston and seconded by Shaw. All those in favor, please say I. I. Any opposed? That motion passes unanimously. We're on to uh item number nine on our agenda. Reszoning petition 2025-129 by True Homes. And Max, would you uh give us the good word?

Yes, I'd be happy to. Um petition 2025129 is an undeveloped portion of a track containing a church. It's approximately 4.94 acres in size and it's located on the southeast corner of West Sher Creek Road at West WT Harris Boulevard. Site's currently zoned institutional CD. The proposed zoning is N2B CD. 2040 policy map recommends the campus place type of the site. The N2B district is inconsistent with campus place type and approval revise the policy map. The reasoning proposal calls for the development of up to 65 multif family patch town home dwelling units, including potential live work units. All residential units will be offered for sale or lease to households earning 80% of area median income or less. An 80 uh an 8ft sidewalk and 8ft planning strip will be provided along the site's frontages with Brookstone Drive and a 12oot multi-use path 8ft planning strip along the site's frontage with West Sugar Creek Road. A minimum of 9,750 ft of enhanced open space will be provided um with a minimum de minimum dimension of 50 ft. Buildings along public streets will be limited to five units maximum and up to two six-unit buildings will be permitted on site. Units will have prominent front porches and stoops. Front porches will be covered and at least four to six feet in depth. Um a note was added since public hearing where um the petitioner is working with C dot and NC do to provide pedestrian facilities. Um and staff recommends approval of this petition as the proposed development supports the institution's mission by providing affordable housing for households earning below 80% AMI. introduces live work units, enhances open space beyond ordinance requirements, and reszones site to

neighborhood place type adjacent to commercial amenities, providing housing diversity, access to daily needs. I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you very much, Max. Where are those uh you just mentioned um pedestrian facilities? Is that within the site or is that to a connecting uh it would be crossing West Wtier's Boulevard potentially? Okay. So that there's no guarantee of that, but Oh, but so I I

I wasn't going to mention it initially since there's no um guarantee. They've committed to exploring options with C dot in incot to potentially install an an a signalized crossing but okay but C dot has asked for further revisions to those notes and the um area engineer may be better able to explain exactly okay what's required but I don't want to that but that is that is an addition that if that were not there your recommendation would not change change no It won't change our recommendation. We were in favor of the project. Um, yeah, I just

either way, but I I think it's a valuable contribution to the project. Okay. All right. That's fine. I just it struck me as though I've driven on WT Harris Boulevard, so you know, it was like I just wanted to make sure where where it was and if they were adding pedestrian facilities within the No. NC DOT considers it a controlled access highway in this location. I Yeah. Okay. Um, Commissioner Shaw. Um, thank you, Max. Um, just one quick question. Is how long are the, um, AMI restrictions in place? Is that is do they expire?

Um, let me double check that. They are. Sorry, I should know this. Uh, I'll check the site plan. Excuse me.

Okay. Now I know where you're talking. Okay. I was confused by the one that was closer to you. Yeah. Okay.

But it it the road does that little thing like that right there big island there. um they do not include a time frame but do note that they're you know provided as outlined in the UDO administration manual. Um it it depends typ you know this is sometimes will be between 15 years 30 years sometimes in perpetuity given that the church at this time does not plan on subdividing the site. It will remain on their property. Um that may or may not affect the the length of time. So, safe to say 15 plus years, I would imagine. So, thank you.

Um, Teresa, did you have a question or not? No. Anyone else have a question? If not, do I hear a motion for the disposition of uh reszoning petition 2025-129? Shaw. Motion to approve. I'm sorry. Move to approve petition number 2025-129. Um, having reviewed the petition and consider the consistency statement prepared by staff to approve this petition, I move that we recommend approval of petition number 2025-129 as it appears before us and the adoption of the consistency statement as it appears before us. Milan second.

I'm gonna give that one I'm gonna give that one to Milan. Um, I see convicting aside. That that has been motioned by Commissioner Shaw and seconded by Commissioner Milan. All those in favor, please say I. Any opposed? That motion passes unanimously. That is the end of our agenda, folks. Uh, do a motion for us to adjourn. Motion to adjourn. All right. Thank you very All right. We're out of here, folks. I'm not about the meeting. I was bus.