Planning and Zoning Board - Regular Meeting

All right. I'm calling to order the meeting of the 11/12/2025 Planning and Zoning Board meeting. Clerk, will you call the roll, please?

Ms. Corinne LeJoy? Present. Ms. Nancy Fry? Here. Vice Chair Colleen LePlante. Present. Chair Jeffrey Light.

Here.

Deputy City Attorney Kathy Mahaffy. Here. Assistant Director of Sustainable Development Lizette Aguilar. Here. And Planning Manager DeAndra Moyes. Here.

This meeting is being conducted live with the quorum physically present. The material for today's meeting is available online at www.coconutcreek.net. Anyone wishing to appeal any decision made will need a record of the proceedings, and for such purpose may need to ensure that a verbatim recording of the proceedings is made, including the testimony and evidence upon which the appeal is to be based. The archive of this meeting may be requested from the city clerk or may be heard online at www.coconutcreek.net. If you haven't already, please silence your cell phones. If you must take a phone call, please excuse yourself and step outside. Thank you.

Are there any corrections or revisions to the minutes from the 08/13/2025 meeting? Seeing that there are none, is there a motion and a second to approve the minutes as presented?

I will make a motion to approve the minutes as presented.

I'll second. Roll call,

please. Ms. LeJoy? Yes. Ms. Frey? Yes. Vice Chair LePlante? Yes. And Chair Light?

Yes. We will now hear agenda item number four, an amendment to the land development code to align with state law regarding procedures for handling and processing requests for accommodation. Ms. Aguirre, staff will now make the presentation.

Thank you, Mr. Light. Good evening, board members and staff. Liz Aguirre, Assistant Director of sustainable development. With me this evening is Deandrea Moyes, planning manager.

Got it right?

Yay. Agenda item number four is the land development code amendment, an ordinance amending the city's code of ordinances by amending chapter 13, land development code, section 13 dash four one, request for accommodation, to update the city's code in order to align with recent changes to state law regarding procedures for handling and processing requests for accommodation under the city's land development code. Senate bill nine five four of 2025 recently passed and requires local governments to implement certain procedures for handling and processing reasonable accommodation requests by 01/01/2026. The city of Coconut Creek city code of ordinances provides procedures for handling and processing these requests for accommodations in section 13 dash 41, request for accommodation. This is a pretty easy application.

As I mentioned, section 13 dash 41 establishes the city's formal process for handling requests for reasonable accommodation. That section ensures that individuals with disabilities can request to the city exceptions from the land development code when needed. These requests are generally made to the Sustainable Development Department and in cooperation with the city attorney's office. They can be made in writing, orally to the department, and as currently written, staff reviews these requests and provides and issues written decisions within forty five days. There are additional changes, minor changes, that I'll certainly let our city attorney's office answer any questions that the board may have.

But in summary, this is a state mandated statutory change that the city is obligated to do, And so, of course, we're here to do this, I guess, a housekeeping measure to make sure that our code is compliant with state statutes. And therefore, we, of course, support the approval of this request. Dia, if you have something you'd like to add?

Nothing at this time.

Thank you very much. Staff's agenda item report is further summarized for your guidance. And I'll just kind of pass it over to the city's attorney's office if they have any other questions. I'm happy to answer any questions as I may. Thank you.

Does the members of the board have any questions for staff?

None. No, it's pretty straightforward.

I have some questions. The statute and the ordinance seem to be talking about two different things. The statute talks about sort of oddly written.

You're talking about how it specifically references recovery residences? I'm sorry? Are you talking about how the statute specifically talks about recovery residences?

Yeah, I'm getting to that. Yeah. The statute seems to require this if there's a regulation that pro it's very strangely written. If there's a statute, a regulation that prohibits the establishment of a certified recovery residence, then you have to include this accommodation language. I didn't understand the statute to begin with. And the ordinance seems to address general request for accommodation from the land development code. So I didn't see how the two fit together.

The reasonable accommodation request is what we use. Generally, it really comes into it can be used for broader applications, to be sure. But it is almost, I think the only places I've ever seen it used in the city of Coconut Creek is for recovery residences in that situation. We were actually ahead of the game because we do have a ordinance which addressed most of what was required under the statute already in place because our city attorney is an expert in this area. So we like I said, we had we have our base regulations already in place.

This just adds the required mandated state timeframes, which tightens them up a little So

our ordinance generally applies? Yes. It's broader than the state statute. Are these recovery facilities, is this like a rehab facility? Is this drug rehab? Or what are we talking It

would be any kind of recovery residence as licensed by the state. Well, I know. Like, give me

a for instance, what's a recovery facility? Recovery from what?

It could be from drug and alcohol. It it could be anything like that. Okay. Alright. Thank you. Unfortunately, to a large extent, we are preempted by state law in some of those areas.

I'll now open the public hearing. I'll turn this on. And now I'll open the public hearing. Are there any members of the public that would like to speak on agenda item number four? Okay, seeing none, then the public of the public hearing is now closed. Are there any additional comments or questions from the board?

No, thank you.

Thank you. None, I'll take a motion on agenda item number four, an amendment to the land development code regarding procedures for handling and processing requests So for moved.

Second. Ms.

LeJoy? Yes.

Ms. Fry? Yes. Vice Chair LePlante? Yes. Chair Light?

Yes. Okay. Does the board or staff have any correspondence or reports to share for the go to the board?

I would like to share something with the board. Let's see. You may have noticed that the format in which the agenda item was presented to you this evening, the agenda item report, is different than what you typically see when staff brings before you a site plan or a rezoning application, etcetera. This format that you see here, this agenda item report, is the standard format that all departments within the city use to upload information into the commission agenda. So moving forward, and in the effort of creating just process improvement, etcetera, we wanted, we planning staff wanted to move forward and use the same format that you see here, to make it much more transparent, and certainly not duplicating efforts and creating one style of memo for this board, and then a different style of memo for the commission.

So, I would be happy to entertain some thoughts on your opinion, but moving forward, we will be using the same format that you see here. Obviously, the pertinent information that you need to review some of your applications like zonings and land use and those legal descriptions would be worked into the memo. It's just a format substance change. You would still get all of the criteria for rezonings with staff analysis, all of that would remain the same, it's just a formatting change that we would like to move forward with.

If it saves staff time, sure.

Yeah. We just create one memo, and we can use it for both public hearings.

So there won't be an actual backup won't be an actual staff report? Is that what you're saying? Okay.

Sound It will like continue to be a staff report. It's just the cover will be much more consolidated, but the staff report and the analysis will still all be provided.

Okay. It'll have all the same information. It will just be organized a little bit more streamlined with our kind of following these headings. Well, the goal is that it provides all of the information that you need in this succinct, very straightforward order.

Sounds like a good idea.

Well, thank you. Good. I'm glad you approve. Nothing further, Todd.

Anything else? Else, No,

that's it. Nothing further, Todd.

Thank you.

All right.

There's no other business, I'll ask for a motion and second to adjourn the meeting. Ms.

Motion to adjourn.

Ms. Second. Thank you. Ms. All right. We're adjourned.