City Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Include multiple addresses when you sign up, such as your home, work and school. Download the ReachWell app to receive emergency alerts in more than 130 languages. Visit peakalerts.org to learn more.

You ready? Feeling ready? Chris, I'm all set. Let's go. Hello, I'm Fire Marshal Chris Cooper. And hi, I'm Mayor Yenny. When it comes to preparing for wildfire, ready means sign up for emergency alerts and get your family's go bag ready. Set means there's an extreme threat. It's time to load the car. Go means evacuate now. Ready, set, go.

I'm Amber Glenn. This is Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Olympic City, USA.

Set. Go.

When it comes to preparing for wildfire, remember, ready means prepare early. Pack a go kit and sign up for emergency alerts. Set means there's an extreme threat. Monitor fire conditions and load essentials into your car. Go means evacuate now. Listen to first responders and don't return until officials say it's safe. Visit ColoradoSprings.gov for more. Ready. Set. Go. Near a city map, you'll find Matt. He uses geographic information systems, or GIS, to track local properties required to pay the city's stormwater fee. That money goes toward critical infrastructure projects that keep residents and property safe when it rains.

I'm Ellie Kam.

And I'm Danny O'Shea.

And you're watching Springs TV in Olympic City, USA. In Colorado Springs, we shoot for the moon.

We train the defenders of air and space. We secure American freedom. We compete on the world stage. We launch balloons, rockets, careers. We conquer America's mountain and spend time in a garden fit for the gods. We power the future and protect the past. There is greatness within each of us and all around us. We are Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

You ever want to know a little bit more about Colorado Springs, listen to the podcast Behind the Springs. You'll know all about the fun, cool stuff going on in Colorado Springs. Enjoy.

Mary Emi here, and thank you for tuning in to Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA. Stay connected with us on social media or visit coloradosprings.gov for the latest city news and events. Together, we are Colorado Springs.

Inside Surtage Ice Center, you'll find Greg. He manages programs and schedules at the rink, like the Learn to Skate sessions. Around 250,000 people hit the ice at Surtage each year during programs, events, and just for fun.

We're ready, we're ready, we're ready.

I'm Apollo Ono and you're watching Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

Always near technology, you'll find Candy. She's part of the city's Innovation and Technology, or IT department, which handles more than 28,000 requests each year, allowing the city's 3,000 employees to work smoothly and efficiently.

There's an emergency happening in your neighborhood? How would you know? Sign up to receive emergency alerts such as fire evacuation notices and police activity. You can receive alerts via text, phone call, or email by going to peakalerts.org. Include multiple addresses when you sign up, such as your home, work, and school. Download the ReachWell app to receive emergency alerts in more than 130 languages. Visit peakalerts.org to learn more.

You ready? Feeling ready? Chris, I'm all set. Let's go. Hello, I'm Fire Marshal Chris Cooper. And hi, I'm Mayor Yenny. When it comes to preparing for wildfire, ready means sign up for emergency alerts and get your family's go bag ready. Set means there's an extreme threat. It's time to load the car. Go means evacuate now. Ready, set, go.

I'm Amber Glenn. This is Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Olympic City, USA.

Set. Go.

When it comes to preparing for wildfire, remember, ready means prepare early. Pack a go kit and sign up for emergency alerts. Set means there's an extreme threat. Monitor fire conditions and load essentials into your car. Go means evacuate now. Listen to first responders and don't return until officials say it's safe. Visit ColoradoSprings.gov for more. Ready. Set. Go. Near a city map, you'll find Matt. He uses geographic information systems, or GIS, to track local properties required to pay the city's stormwater fee. That money goes toward critical infrastructure projects that keep residents and property safe when it rains.

I'm Ellie Kam.

And I'm Danny O'Shea. And you're watching Springs TV in Olympic City, USA.

In Colorado Springs, we shoot for the moon.

We train the defenders of air and space. We secure American freedom. We compete on the world stage. We launch balloons, rockets, careers. We conquer America's mountain and spend time in a garden fit for the gods. We power the future and protect the past. There is greatness within each of us and all around us. We are Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

If you ever want to know a little bit more about Colorado Springs, listen to the podcast Behind the Springs. You'll know all about the fun, cool stuff going on in Colorado Springs. Enjoy.

Mayor Yemi here, and thank you for tuning in to Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA. Stay connected with us on social media or visit coloradosprings.gov for the latest city news and events. Together, we are Colorado Springs.

Inside Surdage Ice Center, you'll find Greg. He manages programs and schedules at the rink, like the Learn to Skate Sessions. Around 250,000 people hit the ice at Surdage each year during programs, events, and just for fun.

very difficult access.

We're ready. We're ready. We're ready.

I'm Apollo Ono and you're watching Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

Near technology, you'll find Candy. She's part of the city's innovation and technology or IT department, which handles more than 28,000 requests each year, allowing the city's 3,000 employees to work smoothly and efficiently.

There's an emergency happening in your neighborhood? How would you know? Sign up to receive emergency alerts such as fire evacuation notices and police activity. You can receive alerts via text, phone call, or email by going to peakalerts.org. Include multiple addresses when you sign up, such as your home, work, and school. Download the ReachWell app to receive emergency alerts in more than 130 languages. Visit peakalerts.org to learn more.

You ready? Feeling ready? Chris, I'm all set. Let's go. Hello, I'm Fire Marshal Chris Cooper. And hi, I'm Mayor Yemi. When it comes to preparing for wildfire, ready means sign up for emergency alerts and get your family's go bag ready. Set means there's an extreme threat. It's time to load the car. Go means evacuate now. Ready, set, go.

I'm Amber Glenn. This is Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Olympic City, USA.

Set. Go.

When it comes to preparing for wildfire, remember, ready means prepare early. Pack a go kit and sign up for emergency alerts. Set means there's an extreme threat. Monitor fire conditions and load essentials into your car. Go means evacuate now. Listen to first responders and don't return until officials say it's safe. Visit ColoradoSprings.gov for more. Ready. Set. Go. Near a city map, you'll find Matt. He uses geographic information systems, or GIS, to track local properties required to pay the city's stormwater fee. That money goes toward critical infrastructure projects that keep residents and property safe when it rains.

I'm Ellie Kim.

And I'm Danny O'Shea.

And you're watching Springs TV in Olympic City, USA. In Colorado Springs, we shoot for the moon.

We train the defenders of air and space. We secure American freedom. We compete on the world stage. We launch balloons, rockets, careers. We conquer America's mountain and spend time in a garden fit for the gods. We power the future and protect the past. There is greatness within each of us and all around us. We are Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

You ever want to know a little bit more about Colorado Springs, listen to the podcast Behind the Springs. You'll know all about the fun, cool stuff going on in Colorado Springs.

Enjoy.

Mary Emi here, and thank you for tuning in to Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA. Stay connected with us on social media or visit coloradosprings.gov for the latest city news and events. Together, we are Colorado Springs.

At Surdage Ice Center, you'll find Greg. He manages programs and schedules at the rink, like the Learn to Skate Sessions. Around 250,000 people hit the ice at Surdage each year during programs, events, and just for fun. very difficult access we're ready we're ready we're ready i'm apollo ono and you're watching springs tv in colorado springs olympic city usa is near technology you'll find candy she's part of the city's innovation and technology or i.t department which handles more than 28 000 requests each year allowing the city's 3 000 employees to work smoothly and efficiently

There's an emergency happening in your neighborhood? How would you know? Sign up to receive emergency alerts, such as fire evacuation notices and police activity. You can receive alerts via text, phone call, or email by going to peakalerts.org. Include multiple addresses when you sign up, such as your home, work, and school. Download the ReachWell app to receive emergency alerts in more than 130 languages. Visit peakalerts.org to learn more.

You ready? Feeling ready? Chris, I'm all set. Let's go. Hello, I'm Fire Marshal Chris Cooper. And hi, I'm Mayor Yenny. When it comes to preparing for wildfire, ready means sign up for emergency alerts and get your family's go bag ready. Set means there's an extreme threat. It's time to load the car. Go means evacuate now. Ready, set, go.

I'm Amber Glenn. This is Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Olympic City, USA.

Set. Go.

When it comes to preparing for wildfire, remember, ready means prepare early. Pack a go kit and sign up for emergency alerts. Set means there's an extreme threat. Monitor fire conditions and load essentials into your car. Go means evacuate now. Listen to first responders and don't return until officials say it's safe. Visit ColoradoSprings.gov for more. Ready. Set. Go. Near a city map, you'll find Matt. He uses geographic information systems, or GIS, to track local properties required to pay the city's stormwater fee. That money goes toward critical infrastructure projects that keep residents and property safe when it rains.

I'm Ellie Kam.

And I'm Danny O'Shea.

And you're watching Springs TV in Olympic City, USA. In Colorado Springs, we shoot for the moon.

We train the defenders of air and space. We secure American freedom. We compete on the world stage. We launch balloons, rockets, careers. We conquer America's mountain and spend time in a garden fit for the gods. We power the future and protect the past. There is greatness within each of us and all around us. We are Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

You ever want to know a little bit more about Colorado Springs, listen to the podcast Behind the Springs. You'll know all about the fun, cool stuff going on in Colorado Springs.

Enjoy.

I'm Ariyemi here, and thank you for tuning in to Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA. Stay connected with us on social media or visit ColoradoSprings.gov for the latest city news and events. Together, we are Colorado Springs.

At Surdage Ice Center, you'll find Greg. He manages programs and schedules at the rink, like the Learn to Skate Sessions. Around 250,000 people hit the ice at Surdage each year during programs, events, and just for fun.

We're ready.

We're ready. We're ready.

I'm Apollo Ono and you're watching Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

Always near technology, you'll find Candy. She's part of the city's Innovation and Technology, or IT department, which handles more than 28,000 requests each year, allowing the city's 3,000 employees to work smoothly and efficiently.

There's an emergency happening in your neighborhood? How would you know? Sign up to receive emergency alerts, such as fire evacuation notices and police activity. You can receive alerts via text, phone call, or email by going to peakalerts.org. Include multiple addresses when you sign up, such as your home, work, and school. Download the ReachWell app to receive emergency alerts in more than 130 languages. Visit peakalerts.org to learn more.

You ready? Feeling ready? Chris, I'm all set. Let's go. Hello, I'm Fire Marshal Chris Cooper. And hi, I'm Mayor Yenny. When it comes to preparing for wildfire, ready means sign up for emergency alerts and get your family's go bag ready. Set means there's an extreme threat. It's time to load the car. Go means evacuate now. Ready, set, go.

I'm Amber Glenn. This is Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado, Olympic City, USA.

Set. Go.

When it comes to preparing for wildfire, remember, ready means prepare early. Pack a go kit and sign up for emergency alerts. Set means there's an extreme threat. Monitor fire conditions and load essentials into your car. Go means evacuate now. Listen to first responders and don't return until officials say it's safe. Visit ColoradoSprings.gov for more. Ready. Set. Go. Near a city map, you'll find Matt. He uses geographic information systems, or GIS, to track local properties required to pay the city's stormwater fee. That money goes toward critical infrastructure projects that keep residents and property safe when it rains. I'm Ellie Kam.

And I'm Danny O'Shea.

And you're watching Springs TV in Olympic City, USA. Colorado Springs, we shoot for the moon.

We train the defenders of air and space. We secure American freedom. We compete on the world stage. We launch balloons, rockets, careers. We conquer America's mountain and spend time in a garden fit for the gods. We power the future and protect the past. There is greatness within each of us and all around us. We are Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA.

If you ever want to know a little bit more about Colorado Springs, listen to the podcast Behind the Springs. You'll know all about the fun, cool stuff going on in Colorado Springs.

Enjoy.

Mayor Yemi here, and thank you for tuning in to Springs TV in Colorado Springs, Olympic City, USA. Stay connected with us on social media or visit coloradosprings.gov for the latest city news and events. Together, we are Colorado Springs.

At Surdage Ice Center, you'll find Greg. He manages programs and schedules at the rink, like the Learn to Skate Sessions. Around 250,000 people hit the ice at Surdage each year during programs, events, and just for fun.

We're ready. We're ready.

Good morning. I know that we don't have a huge crowd, but we're going to delay our start by just a couple of minutes. It seems like there's some traffic out there and we may have some folks that are late, both audience and dais. So we're going to just start a little bit later.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right, we're going to go ahead and get started.

Good morning, everyone. The Colorado Springs City Planning Commission public meeting for June 10th, 2026 is now called to order. The Planning Commission is comprised of nine members appointed by City Council to review various development applications and proposals. Planning Commissioners are community volunteers with expertise across a wide variety of areas. Each Commissioner acts independently and carefully assesses all the information and evidence presented to make their decision. The city planning staff facilitate the process for applications. This commission reviews those applications and proposals governed by city code. Some applications require the planning commission to be the final decision authority, and for others, the planning commission is a recommendation body to the city council. Throughout the hearing, we will require that everyone conduct themselves respectfully, understanding others may have different views from your own, and disrespectful words or actions speaking out of order or when not recognized will not be tolerated. For items presented on today's agenda, the city planning staff will give a presentation on the application, followed by the applicant, who will have 30 minutes to present the details of their application. Public comment will be taken after the presentation, starting with comments in support of the application, followed by public comments in opposition. Each citizen will have three minutes to speak. Please keep your comments brief and focused on the issues at hand, and please respect other attendees' rights to both listen and to be heard. Once public comment is complete, the applicant will have a rebuttal period of 10 minutes to respond and address any comments. And at the conclusion of the applicant's rebuttal, the discussion will move back to the dais for commissioner consideration. So Solange, can you do our roll call, please?

Chair Hensler? Here. Commissioner Cecil? Here. Vice Chair Slattery? Commissioner Robbins?

Here.

Commissioner Clements?

Here.

Commissioner Gidiano? Here. Commissioner Willoughby? Commissioner Case? Commissioner Ingle?

Here.

Thank you. We have six members present.

Great. Thank you. Are there any changes to our agenda or any postponements looking at staff and commissioners? None here. None. Good. All right. As for communications... I think the two items, hold on, let me pull up my notes, that I wanted to mention is actually three. Again, just reiterate to fellow commissioners to make sure we state our names before we make comments to better be reflected in the minutes. I also wanted to make note that we recently completed commissioner interviews a couple weeks ago, and offers have been extended to both voting members and alternate members for this body. Those are slated to be appointed by city council, I believe, in their July.

They were appointed yesterday.

They were appointed yesterday. Oh.

But their term doesn't start until end of July. Okay.

Maybe you'll make more comment about that.

Maybe not.

OK, perfect. So they will be slated to be with us starting in August. And the last thing I wanted to say is since we won't meet until after the Fourth of July holiday, just to wish everyone a safe and happy Fourth of July. It's also the I was trying to pronounce this sesquicentennial. So America's 250th and Colorado's 150th, which I think is monumental. So anyways, just wanted to wish everyone a safe and happy Independence Day. And Melissa.

For anybody that's just joining us and you're here to speak or comment on an item, please make sure that you sign in. If you're here just to observe, you do not need to sign in. We have a sign-in sheet located at the table over here. Thank you.

Awesome. I think that's all I have for communications. Kevin?

Kevin Walker, planning director. I only had, I appreciate you taking on this, the pronunciation of that celebration that we have on the 4th of July. So thank you for that. I wasn't going to even try. So thank you. We do have, the only thing I was gonna comment on was the appointment of the three new members. One is a voting member, that would be Aaron Egbert. Aaron's a longtime resident of Colorado Springs, been involved as a city employee, as an engineer here in town. BEEN ON THE DRAINAGE BOARD AND A VARIETY OF OTHER, BEEN INVOLVED IN A VARIETY OF OTHER PLACES AND HE WILL JOIN US IN AUGUST. THE OTHER TWO WERE ALTERNATE MEMBERS. done a lot of work for schools and so brings that perspective work for district 20 and for district 49 as well as private architects and the third member non-voting member was Mr. Daniel Way he joined us here today rode his bike over so welcome he's a member of the Shook's Run Middle Shooks Run Neighborhood Association, I think, president and as retired, maybe not retired, but a pilot of some sort. And we'll be, again, joining us as an alternate member, 1st of August.

Awesome. Thank you. And I wasn't sure I didn't write down everyone's names or state them because I wasn't sure if they had been. I guess I should watch city council meetings. Awesome. Well, again, and welcome, Daniel. All right. Moving on to the approval of the minutes. We have several minutes, two minutes in our in our work session. Three. Yes. Yes. So Solange, if you'll go ahead and read those into the record. And we have to vote individually on each, yes. Yes. No? OK. Well then, we'll look for a motion.

That's fine.

There you go. Go ahead.

Commissioner Engel, I will abstain from the April minutes as I was not on the dais at that time.

Thank you.

This is Commissioner Cecil. I was also unable to attend the April meeting and will be abstaining from voting on the minutes for April.

Would someone who attended the April meeting please make a motion?

This is Commissioner Robbins. I make a motion that we accept the minutes for the meeting for, I believe that is April 8th. Is that not correct?

Commissioner Clemmons, I second it.

Thank you, the motion passes.

Thank you. Melissa Watson, Senior Analyst. For this next set of minutes, as you may know that we started taking minutes and posting the video for our work session meetings. So this next set of minutes will kick off our first work session meeting minutes to approve. Thank you.

Thanks for stating that. I was going to do something similar, so yes. So can I have a motion for the work session minutes for May 7th, please?

shoot you're on a roll i don't know about that commissioner robbins um i um make a motion that we approve the uh work session minutes from the i believe that was in was that in may yeah from 7 may thank you commissioner clements i second it

Thank you. The motion passes unanimously.

Great. And finally, our minutes for the May 13th Commission meeting.

This is Commissioner Robbins again, and I move that we accept the, I make a motion that we accept the minutes for the May 13th meeting.

Commissioner Clements, I second it.

Thank you, the motion passes unanimously.

Okay, moving on. Next would be our consent calendar or unfinished business of which we have none. So we'll move into new business. Ms. Solange, I'll ask you to read our first item into.

Item 8 a D V S a dash to 6 dash 0, 0, 0, 1, a development standards adjustments to city code section 7.4 point 1, 0, 0, 3 to provide 11 off street parking spaces where a teen parking spaces are required located at 7, 45 East street and 4, 0, 4, and 4, 10 South prospect street. Item 8B, DEPN-25-0164. The Cottage Court on Costilla Development Plan establishing a 14-lot single-family attached housing development consisting of 22,230 square feet located at 745 East Costilla Street and 404 and 410 South Prospect Street. Our presenter is Bill Gray.

John Potter, All right, good morning planning Commission bill Gray city planning department and its application is titled cottage court on christina. So this application is located at the intersection of East Costilla Street and South Prospect Street. We're on the southeast corner. The highlighted yellow rectangle is the site that we are considering today. The property is zoned MXL. And you can see the half block and a third of the other half, or two-thirds of the other half of the block are all zoned MXL. As we go west down Questia Street, we retain some MXM zoning. And then as we get along the creek and toward downtown, the zoning switches to Business Park, LI, and GI. You can see that majority of this area though is zoned R2. There are small pockets of the hillside area that are R5, R4, but the zoning in this area does allow for a broad mix of uses, everything from single families Homes to general industrial general industrial uses. The size of this property is approximately a half acre and the proposed land used for this application is single family attached. Or if you want to think about it townhomes, I think it's. Um, so to put, um, the zoning, um, into context to see what is, um, actually on the ground and in use on these properties. Um, you can see that, um, the R2 zone that was primarily to the north, south and east of this site is made up of. single-family homes. Costilla Street is a mix of uses. As you go east-west on the corridor toward Memorial Park, it remains single-family residential. As you move toward downtown, the uses change from residential to commercial and industrial. So, um, a little closer look, um, at the, uh, at the property. So you can see on this, um, slide that this property was formerly developed, um, on the northeast corner. Of the of the property, there was a convenience store Elmer's place, and just to the south were 2 single family homes. Those homes have been those buildings have been removed from, um. From the site, um, and so the property is vacant at this point in time, uh, street, um, is an, uh, East West corridor main corridor of, um, uh, street in the, the city. Um, you can see that, uh, it does include travel lanes for, uh, vehicles. It includes on street, uh, parking. It also includes. Um, bike lanes, um, and, uh, prospect street, you can see that, um, to the West East side of the site. That is a much narrower. Uh, right away, 60 feet, um, in width, uh, it's approximately 30 feet from edge of curved or from curb to curb on the property. Prospect Street is also a street that allows for on-street parking in this area. The illustration to the right shows the street cross-section in a little more detail. And we've also placed some cars on the street so you can kind of see that Prospect Street is narrow when that use is both travel for vehicles and for parking cars. I would also note that this property is also on a transit route or a bus route. That bus route operates on a 15-minute frequency during the weekdays. I believe it goes to 30 minutes on the weekends. So, a little more specifics about this project. So this is a, a 14 single family attached residents residential development in the zone district. Each of these homes will be on their own lot. You can see each of the proposed lots on the illustration to the right. of the screen the lot sizes range anywhere from uh about 950 square feet to just over a thousand square feet single family attached is a permitted use in the mxl zone district the development standards adjustment that this application that this project has relates to uh parking so the applicant has asked us to consider applying the multi-family standards to this application and either the rationale is that kind of this this this project shares uh traits of both kind of a single family project and also a multi-family project there is more detail explanation in the staff report agreeing with that, the rationale that the applicant had provided. Their development standards adjustment asks us to reduce the parking from 18 spaces down to 11. This project qualifies for on-street credit because on-street parking is allowed and it does have adjacent street frontage. And they also qualify for reductions because of their proximity to bicycle routes and also bus routes. And lastly, just to give a little background on this project, the idea of this project, Cottage Court on Costilla, is to fit the notion of what has been called missing middle housing. So it's all about diversifying housing options at a scale that fits into existing neighborhoods. So it's either compatible or complements what's there, but there is, along with that, a little bit of additional density. But that is to support walkability, biking, transit, maybe commercial services that serve those neighborhoods, and also affordability.

So here on this slide, just a little more, or a little additional information.

One, to give you an idea of what the development would look like once it was constructed. And then also to give you a little taste of the character of each of the streets. But this is a redevelopment of a vacant property. It is infill development. It does add housing choices to the neighborhood. The buildings that are proposed are small, one-story and two-story homes. This location does have multiple options for transportation. It is served by adequate infrastructure. the streets that are adjacent do again do allow for on street parking i think the difference that we see in this application versus what we see i guess more traditionally is that this project there will be a reliance on that on the use of the public right away to meet some of their parking needs um So there will be an increase of activity on the street as a result of this application. And I think lastly, we do believe that this application does fill a community need supported and documented by the housing needs assessment done by the City of Colorado Springs. This application was submitted to us in November of 2025. It was ready for Planning Commission, the agenda on April 15th. We did have stakeholder involvement in this application. We did not do a neighborhood meeting. We just did standard notification. So there were two notices once for the initial application and then for the planning commission. We did send out postcards on each of those occurrences and post the property. There were about 315 postcards sent to surrounding property owners. um during the initial review um and when the staff report was written i think we only had received about eight to ten written comments but recently um in the last several days that has doubled so there was a revised public comment packet that went out to planning commission so we received comments both in support and opposing the application The, um, the bullet points below, um, address, uh, I think some of the main themes that. We received during the, uh, public input. And those related to parking the narrow width of, uh, prospect street, uh, increased traffic, um, in the alleyway, uh, too many units on a half acre, uh, property. So those are some of the flavor of those opposed. Those that supported the project felt that it did meet community goals and needs, such as infill development, housing diversity, missing middle, and then proximity to multiple transportation options. And some even felt that this was thoughtful density. This was reviewed by, um, uh, city agencies, um, and, uh, departments, um, um, traffic, um, engineering, um, uh, their, their comment, uh, Mainly was just about parking, but the developed plan initially showed that the parking was striped to indicate that those spaces may belong to somebody. But in this neighborhood, parking is not striped. It's available. And so the development plan has been amended to reflect that that's just a lane or an aisle that's available for parking. On street parking, as it relates to SWENT, there is a requirement that the final drainage letter is approved. In their comments and also in public comments we received, there was some indication of some drainage problems in that. That is being accounted for. in the final drainage letter. Operations and maintenance for Swent did indicate that the issue may have most likely stemmed from a clogged drain in that area. From a public improvement standpoint, all curbs, gutters, driveway aprons that are in non-standard or poor condition will have to be replaced. Colorado Springs found that the development plan met all of their standards that were necessary for water, wastewater and electric from a preliminary utility plan. This project is subject to school and parkland dedication requirements. The fire comments related to. A fire code access requirements of hose length, a fire access apparatus road, which is 1 of the main reasons you see that the alley is being improved for a portion of its length adjacent to the site. As this project relates to plan, I think there are several. Key areas where this project does comply with the general plan for the city. It does reflect the neighborhood identity where this is located. This is kind of supposed to be workforce housing. This neighborhood has historically kind of met that need. The Plan COS encourages redevelopment of vacant properties. It asks for targeted infill, particularly in inner city or established neighborhoods. identifies the need for having a more housing, a diversity of housing options, and then locating housing in areas where they are connected to transportation, activities, outdoor recreation, and those kinds of things. The next couple slides are Pretty boring, but they're the development plan criteria and the development standards adjustment criteria, but they are important. These are what you will judge this application on. I'm not going to read them because I know that the Planning Commission knows them as well as anyone, but there are 12 of those. In staff's review of this development plan, we did find that it would meet the criteria for approval. And then the development standards adjustment criteria are listed on this screen. I think maybe the most important thing to consider as it relates to development standards adjustment is that the design that they're asking to be altered should be equal to or better than, and you need to agree that they're compensating benefit Um, is appropriate for the reduction or the adjustment that they're asking for in staff's review of this. We have found that cottage court on meets that criteria. Um, so the 2, the following slides are the 1st, 1 here is the optional motions for approval and denial of the application for the development standards adjustment. And the second are the motions for the development plan and that concludes staffs presentation on this application Thank You Bill Next we'll move to the applicant you'll have 30 minutes

I'm going to try not to take 30 minutes, Ryan. My name is John Olson. I'm with Urban Landscapes, and I have with me today Lee and Alex, and they'll come up and introduce themselves here in a minute. They are the owners of the property and developers of this. So, first of all, I'd like to thank you all for your service to the Planning Commission. Having served on the Downtown Review Board in the past and several years on the Urban Renewal Authority, I know that it's a lot. And I would argue that you guys have a bigger role and task and time commitment than than those boards do. So just having seen planning commission and witnessed it over the years, you guys do a lot. So I really appreciate your passion for the city and your service. Our team is comprised of, as I mentioned, Lee and Alex as the developers and owners. Lee and Alex have a company called Stream Home Construction here in town. And then we're local here as well, fairly close to the site. Our office just moved, actually, from Old Carter City to Los Animas in Nevada, so near the police station. And that was within the last week here. So it's been fun to be in the downtown space again and kind of contributing to the city. And actually, I rode my bike. Where'd Bill go? I was going to tell Bill. I rode my bike to the office just yesterday, so I knew he'd appreciate that. Okay, so here's the site for the Cottage Court on Castilla, and I'll get into a little bit more on Cottage Court and what that means and some examples for you all. You can see we're very centrally located between Memorial Park and downtown, so in a very vibrant area, in an area that's probably going to see some change over the next few years because of its proximity and great location. Just giving you kind of a reference quarter mile walk from the site gets you right to Shook's Run and gets you close to Memorial Park and a half mile gets you into downtown or Memorial Park. So it's pretty close. There's a blue line on here and that represents there's a bus line. It's bus route number one. It's one of our higher frequency routes here in town. It's a 15 minute service. So that is running right into downtown from the site with the bus stop right there on Castilla. And that'll take you out to, I believe this one takes you out to the Citadel Mall to the east. Our location includes three lots. There were two single-family homes, and of course the beloved Elmer's Place was here on this site. We'll go through some site photos here in a minute with Lee and Alex of what they endured with this. But while I have this slide up, I want to make a couple of notes on here. The site had a few curb cuts. previously. And we have not added any curb cuts on this. So we're actually with this development is going to open up a decent amount of on street parking for the site. And then we'll talk about that a little bit as well. Castillo on this slide is just to the north running east west and prospect to the east. As Bill mentioned, Castilla has on-street parking on it as well as Prospect, and that's on both sides. Prospect Street functions as much more of a local street and kind of more planning jargon uh traffic wise it's a queuing street right so traffic naturally goes slower we've developed a few of these in gold hill mesa as well on the newer side of things with these type of streets although not as as frequent in colorado springs as other cities these more narrow local streets are common and they provide a really slow street for people to uh hopefully not have cars flying down I'm super fast on that I'm gonna hand it over and step back for a minute and then I'll come back up here in a minute introduce Lee and Alex with stream home construction any staff and community members Alex Coasley

Yeah, can you get just a little closer? I know you're a tall guy.

Actually, can you turn your mic on and then reintroduce yourself, please? Is it not on? It's not.

Okay. There you go. Now we can hear you better. Okay.

All right. Good morning, planning staff, planning commissioners, community members. Thank you for your time and attention this morning. My name is Alex Cozley. I'm a co-founder of Stream Home Construction. We're a local design-build general contractor specializing in infill residential development projects. I'm also a third generation Colorado Springs native and live within 10 minutes of the project site. Why this project matters, per Peck's Peak Housing Network data, about 41% of Colorado Springs residents cannot afford to purchase a home that costs more than $300,000. However, there are no homes being constructed right now under $300,000 new construction in the city. So we wanna do something to provide as many of these people as we can with an opportunity to own a home and we're targeting to have our one bedroom units for sale below the 300,000 mark for this project. And, you know, I want to address, you know, we can't solve problems doing things kind of the old way. You know, we've been, what we've been doing is creating houses, most of them above 400,000, like 91% actually above 400,000. And, you know, we've got codes requiring, you know, two parking spaces per single family home. You know, we're asking to, for you to consider looking at this in multifamily and I think just in general parking standards, John's gonna address a little bit more. I think we can make some accommodation for projects like this that are sensible. So yeah, why are homes, why is nobody building a home for less than $300,000? Well, basically everything just costs more than it ever did. Construction materials cost more, construction labor costs more, land costs a lot more than it ever did in Colorado Springs. So, it's really hard, very hard to build a home and sell it for less than $300 and still make money in this economy. Just what it is. So, we have to do things differently to get a different outcome. In the case of this project, that means something a little bit denser than what we're used to. Some parking and trapping impact will be expected and some variations from the code as it currently sits. Just some adjustments to bring this bring this dream to reality and make home ownership possible for a larger portion of our community. 1 thing I want to touch on just briefly affordable housing when it's discussed in these in these contexts generally is talking about. government subsidized rental projects and i just want to make clear that that's not what we're talking about in this project although you know we really have a heart for affordable housing uh john olsen's trained us to say lowercase a affordable housing to make clear what we're talking about here And I do think I would hope that the city in our community can really see the value of, you know, providing affordable homeownership opportunities, not just subsidized rental opportunities. And really, because homeownership is historically kind of the cornerstone of building financial stability and wealth for households in the United States. So. Really, you know, approving this project will set a precedent. It'll help us look into the future. Other ways that we can partner with the city, us as a developer and other contractors and people working with urban landscapes and looking at new projects and new ways to do housing. We've got to break the old mold because we're having a crisis that's getting worse and worse. We have to start doing things differently if we want to see changes and see some solutions coming into the forefront. Um, just 1 thing on the parking issue specifically, I wanted to address. I pulled up all the Google street view images for this address. If you scroll through, you can go to the corner of prospect and invite you to do this scroll through every single photo in that history. You can look at the history of from 2007, 2007, all the way through 2024. There's in those, there's like 9 images. 1 car is parked. on either prospect street or coastia street in all of those nine images only one car is parked on those streets either even on the opposite side the east side of prospect street so essentially my What I'm asserting here is we're not taking anybody's parking here. As John mentioned, we're going to close off a couple of existing driveway aprons that are cut. Those could never be parked in as it sits anyway. I think if you looked at just those curb cuts, we're probably adding back in basically about five spaces that couldn't be parked in anyway. But again, if you look at those images, you'll see there's really no demand. There's no demand for parking in this area that we're taking by doing this project. I would agree with some of the commenters in the hillside neighborhood. There are some overflow and some, um, some traffic issues in some areas, but not in this area. And you can go and look and go to the site and observe that. And you see that. So. Really, I just want to conclude and say, we're not here as greedy fat cat developers. Some of the commenters have suggested in the public comments here. We're local, Colorado Springs, and really have a heart for this community. We... We're really doing everything to ensure this project thoughtfully adds housing to our community in a way that's as minimally impactful and in alignment with the neighborhood and the goals of the city and planning in general. So we've been working as a community for around 30 years to develop a walkable, bicycle-friendly downtown area. And I think now is the time to really align our codes with all that work we've been doing in the downtown area and allow this project. So respectfully asking you to approve the parking adjustment, DVSA 260001, to give 14 families a real shot at owning a home here in Colorado Springs. So thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you this morning. My name's Lee Chapin. Alex and I are business partners, both in stream home construction and this development. We joined together as we had a shared vision for housing. I'm an architect and general contractor with over 45 years of experience in construction. We moved to Colorado from Ohio in 2005 when I was offered a position with a high-end production home builder who paid to move my family out here. What a beautiful place to live, but that beauty has a cost. My wife and I have a blended family of seven kids and five grandkids spread across six states, so we understand the challenges facing young singles and couples as they are starting out. This is especially true in Colorado, where it was recently reported that we were in the top five in the nation of most expensive states to live in. Over my career, I've worked with three Habitat for Humanity affiliates, with roles as board president, executive director, construction coordinator, and architect, along with helping to start a habitat restore. I work for custom and production home builders and have nothing against them. But my passion has always been finding ways to put a roof over someone's head who couldn't otherwise get there. Something I learned from my time with Habitat were two models that have stuck with me. Simple, decent, affordable housing, and a hand up, not a hand out. I'm telling you that to help you understand what's behind this project. Alex referenced the Pikes Peak Housing Network where some of the stats were 91% of the homes being built in this region are over $400,000. 55% of the population can't afford those. For a single income family, a teacher, a firefighter, a veteran, or a young couple just starting out, that's not a high price, that's a closed door. They're renting, building no equity, with no path to the stability that ownership provides. What we're proposing is 14 paired houses on a half acre site. each one individually owned, not rentals, not investment units, homes, deeded, with a yard, with a neighbor, with a stake in this community, designed specifically to hit a price point that's actually attainable for the people this city depends upon. I would like to answer a couple questions and dispel a few misconceptions. Alex mentioned the greedy developers that we've been called. As to the greedy part, my wife and I, we personally have a first mortgage, a maxed out second mortgage, and most of her retirement account tied up into this project. I'm in an age where we could have chosen to work a little longer and just paid off our mortgage and travel, but we decided instead to invest in this critical mission and would like to help others find affordable home ownership and hopefully continue to do so. Again, there's nothing wrong with the statement. These are not apartments. They're not luxury townhomes, rentals, or investment properties. Those are all needed items within the community. However, that's not what we are and not what we're doing. Two other questions that come up. that are related, is this a nonprofit project? Well, we hope not. That's not our intent. However, in all seriousness, it is a private development. I referenced Habitat because it shaped how I think about housing. Affordability isn't charity, it's design and execution discipline. The same principles apply here. Are any of these units designated affordable under HUD guidelines? These are market rate homes priced below market. They aren't subsidized units. They're designed and built efficiently enough to hit a price point that works without a subsidy program. The last 45 years have spent learning how to build things right and attempt to make them affordable. This project is the most direct application of the knowledge gained. We're asking for your support, not for a greedy developer's return, not for an investment corporation, but for the chance to give 14 families in Colorado Springs a front door of their own. Thank you for your time, for your service to this community.

Thank you, sir. Appreciate it.

They're going to come back up here in a minute and talk through some of these slides, but I do want to go and make a point on one of Lee's comments there. This has been a kind of a point of caution. We did not want to go and tie these in and ask for parking reductions for affordable housing because that would be a deed restriction that would be required to this. I love their passion and I love what they want to go and do. Personally, as a citizen of Colorado Springs, we need more lowercase affordable housing. We need an uppercase affordable housing. We need more housing in general. my caution to them, and I want them to be able to make a profit so they can keep doing this and keep adding to that. So his comment about we're not a nonprofit, and you heard me chuckle maybe a little bit, that's my concern. I want to make sure that they can do this and do it in a way that they can keep doing it and keep adding more to this community. So if you guys want to jump back up and talk about some of your images that are on here before we go into the parking.

Sure, yeah. Yeah, so this is Elmer's Place.

If you'll just state your name one more time.

Yeah, this is Alex Cozley again. And Lee Chapin. Yeah, so this is the Elmer's Place building. Many of you may recognize and know and have maybe shopped there before. We used to be able to get gasoline back there maybe 100 years ago.

and there yeah that was the one commercial building as john mentioned there's three total buildings on the site um you may not i'm sorry one thing to mention with that again this is lee chapin uh we tried very hard to keep elmer's place um that's why we named the development originally elmer's place we wanted to keep the historic feel of it and all that but as you'll see in the upcoming slides there's a reason why we couldn't do that

So I mentioned there's three total buildings. You can see one there. There's actually two buildings. You may not be able to tell. You can see maybe a little piece of wood, hint of wood in there. But when we took over this property and purchased it, it was basically like a jungle. I don't know if any of you were familiar with it or had driven by. There was literally 30 tires at least. There was four or five motors and transmissions, just completely overgrown. You couldn't see more than 10 feet in any direction. There was drug activity. It was a dangerous and unkempt place. And this is just right at the beginning of demo, just kind of showing the variety of trash that was, you know, kind of piled up and pulled out of different places. This is inside Elmer's place. You can see there's actually was a fire, you know, there you can see the burn mark there in the middle of the floor. So, you know, fire was in here. it's very dirty there was a you know a dead raccoon just in the pile of trash in there in this um and this was really kind of this these pictures are elmer's place building but the homes on the property were relatively equivalent you see tires refrigerators old bathtubs rv shells like it was just a total total disaster now the property's been totally scraped and clean you know just dirt right now um and we're looking forward to getting it developed to look like the renderings we showed Anything you'd like to add? No, I think that's pretty much it.

Thank you both. Okay, so John Olson again, Urban Landscapes. What are the cottage court? So as some of the people in the room here know, I'm kind of a planning nerd and I like to nerd out a lot. And in probably post 2020 in particular, I really started to kind of dive into cottage courts and on a national level of things. So while we did a couple peripheral ones for nonprofit, for We Fortify, with Working Fusion and Prospect Village, which you've all seen come here to Planning Commission, and another one with Wendy's Village for Teacher Village, the cottage court for ownership piece hasn't really been touched here in Colorado Springs. And so before I met Lee and Alex, we had started to take a deep dive into these and helped organize, as a part of the Congress for the New Urbanism, something they call the Magical Mystery Tour, which has been ongoing for about 20 years. And this particular slide is one in Rhode Island, where our office went out with about 20 others, 22 others. And we toured this site. Actually toured a couple of them. And then Jill Gabler was there with us as well, and some other people from Colorado Springs. So this one is in East Greenwich, Rhode Island, and it's called the Cottages on Green. And this cottage court in particular won several awards through the CNU, through the APA, et cetera. But they're kind of touching on the similar theme that we wanted to go for here. A cottage court, and I'll kind of go through some of the slides here, what it does is it provides homeownership opportunity, but yet still in a level of density that can go and meet some of the goals of cities and make really good, efficient use of the land. A lot of these are flirting somewhere between 20 to 30 units per acre. If you think about that, that's a typical garden-style apartment project is around, typically here in Colorado Springs, around 25, 28 units per acre. That's actually what we're achieving with this one in this drawing, these drawings that you're seeing. This is an image in Seaside. So Seaside, Florida was actually one of the earlier ones before they started to call them cottage courts. But you can kind of see that emphasis on community space and less on cars. This one is in Alabama. So this is one I toured during COVID. So I've gone on lots of these tours and just kind of played around with these things. And because as I said, I'm a planning nerd and I enjoy it. We have some of these in the Denver area that are similar to this. Boulder has some as well. And then this one's lastly one that we recently saw, I think three years ago in Virginia, near the Virginia Beach area. Okay, onto the site. The zoning on this property is MXL, as we've kind of gone through before. Some of the things you can and cannot do in the MXL, you can do multifamily, you can do apartments, you can do single family attached, which is what we're providing, but you cannot do single family detached unless it comes to you all as a conditional use. Our initial application, bless you, our initial application was actually single family detached on this property. we were coming in as a conditional use part of the homes were attached some of them were detached which would require us to come here there is no density cap in this so if you can park it and meet the standards then then you can do it right administratively there are no minimum setbacks on this property as well however we have imposed some as you can see in the development plan There's also a maximum building height. There might as well not be one, but there is a maximum building height of 65 feet because this is in the MXL area. So with this, and I'm sure Bill cringed when I put this slide on here, but this is something that you could do on this property. You could do a five-story multifamily as long as you park it. And you may ask, well, how do you park it? On this one, which I thought it through, we can pull it in off of Castilla and park underneath this. So we could park this up to about 60 units, which is a lot for the property. I wouldn't necessarily suggest that they do that. It doesn't necessarily fit with the neighborhood, but this is something that we could have gone through on the administrative side of things. The proposal, and I'm going to go back and forth with you on this, is much less intense. This is the 14 units, and what we're looking at is single-story and two-story homes. Each one of those buildings is two units, so they're all paired homes. The one-story ones are kind of unique, and this is really because the client is an architect and he thinks like this and he actually flipped these so it's a mirror image kind of a flipped home so the home may look like it's one home on one side but in reality it's two you're just looking at the back of the house on one and the front on the other i thought that was clever Next slide. And again, we're showing the striping on here just so that you can kind of see where the on-street parking is. Engineering did not want that shown, and I understand that. We did not have that on the development plan, but we wanted to keep it illustrated here for you all. You're seeing this looking from the northeast, looking southwest. So again, you've got the 14 units on street parking on both sides, and then you've got a mail kiosk, and then I guess I didn't point it out on the last slide, we do have shared waste receptacle area, and those are the 11 parking spaces off of the alley, which is on your left-hand side of this slide. We've got two bike racks. We really toyed with bicycle storage. One of our submittal applications on this showed a separate bike shed. Some of the conversations that Lee and Alex had had actually were with a former police officer who really cautioned them on that. Didn't want to make this a target for these residents to have their bikes stolen, even though it may look like and be a secured bicycle storage area. he was very very cautious about that so instead we were we're looking at and they are still looking at how to go and provide an outdoor storage that's still secure for for bikes on these homes and the rears of the homes but we have the the two spaces that are for guests Plan view, same thing, just kind of shows a little bit more. You can see we've got a, I know you're looking at it, it looks east-west, but that's truly north-south, the north-south kind of greenway. And that'll be commonly maintained by an HOA. a limited HOA really just for landscape on this site. But that kind of common space, and it's the active green space, is really gonna be the only high water use turf area on this for the water conservation side, which as a landscape architect I'm very sensitive to. And then we'll have xeric plantings along the parkway. And then we're going to try to work with CSU on the Castilla side to get some of the lower water use seed mixes. We're looking at a blue grandma buffalo. Sorry, I don't want to nerd out on this too much because I told Ryan 1030. I'm going to stick to it, Ryan. Here's the slides that probably gave, told McGraw and I was gonna go long. These are all from the 2020 census reports. These are Colorado Springs generated these documents and these images. We put the star on it for you all to be able to see. So you can kind of see the dynamics. So this site saw a zero to 10% or really not much, but it did have a slight decrease of population between 2010 and 2020. The median age in this area is 35 to 40 years old. The median household income is $40,000 to $60,000 per year. So as Lee and Alex had mentioned, they wanna go and be able to help serve this neighborhood and provide opportunities for housing and home ownership in particular. In this area, we're right around, it says 40 to 60%, so right around 50% of the homes are actually owned and occupied by their owners of the homes. So the other 50% or 40 to 60%, however you want to look at it, is rent or occupied. This is an important one when we're talking about parking in particular. This area, and first of all, this map is sad. This map is really sad for Colorado Springs because the lowest bar on here says less than 70% of people drive alone to work. That's sad. We fall into that category, fortunately, on this one in terms of how the parking works, but you can kind of see where the areas are that have less and more. the next image was one that downtown review board member Harrison Sokol actually sent to me which was vehicles per household in this area so it's a it's a fun GIS there's there's great information out there but this area you can see has a one vehicle one vehicle average per household. And I think I'd like to also kind of point out, let me see if I can pull it up here. I really appreciated all the letters that we received, whether they're in opposition or against, because what that tells me is that this is an engaged community and that people really care. And that's great for the success of this. Lee and Alex want a property that is gonna have people that really care. about their their area one of those letters in particular had an interesting quote in it that really kind of ties to a lot of what we thought was the case but you couldn't really prove it right which was they said most of us don't have garages in this neighborhood we must park on the street in front of our houses That's something that we had assumed was the case, but how do you really know? So it's interesting that that was a comment from, it was actually from an opposition letter to this, but it helped us understand it a little bit more. There's a lot of bikeability in this area. So you're seeing on this on-street bike lanes, paved trails, et cetera. You've got Shooks Run nearby. You've got Memorial Park nearby. You've got lots of bike routes. And it is very easily bikeable. I know that I personally, and I live on the west side, but I bike this street, Castilla, through downtown out to Memorial Park because it's kind of a great passageway into Memorial Park. Just a zoomed in version. You're seeing the transit. Is it 1030? Oh, is that my timer? Wow.

Okay.

All right. Parking.

I'll let you. Oh, I'll give you a couple more minutes.

You probably want these slides, right? We do.

Thank you for the census data, but I think we want to hear about parking.

I know. I'm sorry. I'll give you a few extra minutes. 11 off-street parking spaces along the alley. We've got seven on Prospect and five on Castilla. As mentioned before, and you saw some graphics from Bill, Castilla has a pretty wide right-of-way. It's a pretty wide street. we're opening up some of those parking spaces that weren't there from driveways before. So now there's five on street parking spaces and then seven on Prospect. Prospect, as noted, is more of a queuing lane street or queuing lane. And with that, there is parking on both sides, but cars are going to naturally have to go and kind of slow down. I think there's a lot of streets in town. The one that I always come to think about most often is Columbia Street. up in the Patty Jewett neighborhood. If you've ever driven Columbia Street, you'll notice that. And you'll, courtesy, likely, hopefully, you'll stop. And if you see a car coming, you'll stop kind of where you can and let somebody come through. We also have that and see it frequently in the Gold Hill Mason neighborhood where I serve as a planner and as a resident and an unfortunate HOA member. We can go back to these. I put these on here for your information. It's a lot of data. I don't want to dive too much into it, but I'm happy to refer back to it during the Q&A. But this is with a comparison of the apartment sizes to what we're providing. Your typical average one-bedroom apartment in Colorado Springs is 670 square feet. We're providing one-bedroom homes at 510 square feet on here. So we're actually providing smaller than an apartment. Two-bedroom homes we're providing at $960. The average two-bedroom is $980. So again, smaller, very comparable. So that's why we were looking at the multifamily piece of it in terms of parking. We don't want to over-park this because we need the homes, right? The more homes, the more affordable that they can become. going to more math. This one I put on here really just to refer back to. If you'd like me to go through it, I'm happy to do that, but Bill did this pretty well in his presentation. And with that, I'm going to leave you on this slide for questions and answers.

Sounds good. Thank you, John. Okay. Um, I think we will turn, are there any immediate questions for our applicant or city staff? Otherwise I think we'll turn to public comment and we can bring it back up to the dais. So, okay. Okay. Well with that, um, let's open up to comments in support of this application.

Our first speaker in support is Sam Prisma. You'll have two minutes after you introduce yourself.

Good morning.

Do you have the mic on?

Hello, hello. Good morning. Thank you, Chair Hensler and Commissioners. My name is Sam Frisema. I've lived on the 300 block of South El Paso for 10 years. This is the block immediately adjacent to the north of the proposed project. I serve on the city's Urban Renewal Board and the Downtown Review Board, and I've also served previously on the Hillside Neighborhood Association Board. In those roles, I often encourage proposed projects to increase density and reduce parking as much as possible and to allocate resources and energy towards pedestrian infrastructure. I felt it was important to come here today to show that I support this kind of project in my own backyard, just as I do in other parts of the city. It's been referenced, but Plan COS and other visionary city documents envision a future city with a diverse multimodal transportation infrastructure and a higher emphasis on pedestrian realm improvements that increase walkability and bikeability. We really need projects like this to begin showcasing those types of projects and development and housing models that will start to move that needle in Colorado Springs towards meeting those goals. Hillside is the perfect neighborhood for this type of project. It's been mentioned, but our proximity to downtown, bike paths, bus routes, really allow Hillside residents to get to a lot of your daily needs on foot or bike or on bus. This means that the average Hillside resident can reduce the amount of weekly trips by car and households can reduce the number of vehicles owned. Um, I parked on the street as do many of my neighbors. Our neighborhood has ample on street parking, much of which sits unused. Um, so the question before us today is a matter of 7 on street parking spaces and whether that will be a burden to the neighborhood, which to me is a clear no. As Colorado Springs continues to evolve its walkability and transit options, we really need to be willing to align our parking requirements with how people actually live in neighborhoods like Hillside. So I'm excited for this project, and I'm excited to welcome 14 new neighbors to my neighborhood. Thank you.

Awesome. Thank you, Sam. Our next speaker is Amanda DeMarco.

Good morning, Commissioners. My name is Amanda DeMarco, and I'm here on behalf of the Apartment Association of Southern Colorado. Our organization represents rental housing providers and those who support rental housing operations. This project is not rental housing, and we understand that. But our support reflects something our members see every day. Rental and ownership opportunities and options are connected parts of the same housing continuum. Our members work with people at many different stages of life and housing need. Young workers renting their first apartment, families saving for ownership, seniors looking to downsize, workers relocating to Colorado Springs, and households that need flexibility because they are not ready or able to buy. From that perspective, we see clearly that people need more than one kind of housing option. Smaller ownership opportunities, cottage courts, townhomes, and other modest housing types are important parts of a functioning housing market. When those options are missing, the pressure doesn't disappear. It shows up in competition for the same homes, longer stays, fewer move-out options, household crowding, and residents who may be ready for the next step but cannot find one that is realistic or attainable. That is why we support Cottage Court on Costilla. We understand that neighbors have questions about how new housing fits into existing neighborhoods. Those questions are part of the public process and we respect that. From our perspective, this proposal represents a modest and reasonable housing option for this site. When smaller ownership options exist, they help create movement across the entire housing continuum. It gives people more choices at different stages of life. We do not view attainable for sale housing and rental housing as competing goals. A healthy city needs both because they serve different needs within the same housing continuum. Rental housing provides flexibility and access for many residents, while smaller ownership opportunities provide another step for households who are ready for that path. That continuum is especially important for our local workforce. Our members house workers across Colorado Springs every day, and we see how important it is for people to have housing near jobs, services, transit and established neighborhoods. Smaller homes near downtown support that broader workforce housing ecosystem. Whether a home is attached, detached, rented, or owned, the people living there are still neighbors. They are workers, families, seniors, pet owners, volunteers, customers, and community members. The form of housing may look different, but the people are part of the same community. Colorado Springs needs more housing choices and more points along the continuum. This project is one more way to add needed housing choice in a location where people can live near jobs, services, transportation, and established neighborhoods. For those reasons, we support Cottage Court on Castilla, and we respectfully ask for your approval. Thank you.

Thanks Mr. Markham. Our last speaker in support is Jill Gabler.

Good morning, Madam Chair and Planning Commissioners. I have one more letter that came in really late last night in support of the project and just wanted to ensure that you saw it. My name is Jill Gabler and I am the Executive Director of Pikes Peak Housing Network. I am here today to speak in support of this fabulous cottage court development as this unique and underutilized housing type is exactly the type of housing our city needs if it wants to ensure we have for sale homes that our younger and senior residents can afford. Over the past 10 years, the cost of homeownership has risen three times the pace of local incomes, making it difficult for our younger families to purchase a home. This disparity has forced many families to remain in rental housing when they want nothing more than to purchase their first home in a neighborhood where they can meet other families, raise their kids, and walk their kids to school. This proposed development is a unique and creative housing design that creates shared outdoor spaces, shared parking that keeps overall costs lower, making these homes more affordable for these young families and first time homebuyers. The parking plan for this project is reasonable considering the home sizes, proximity to downtown and bus lines and the proximity to safe bike routes, which is my favorite part. these same attributes also align closely with the city's comprehensive plan plan cos especially in regard to helping to establish vibrant neighborhoods and promoting strong connections that will allow residents to avail themselves of alternate modes of transportation the housing design also promotes the building of community and support systems that are so desperately needed right now as an ever increasing number of our community members are experiencing loneliness and depression Housing that is built to promote accidental conversations that lead to neighborly support or even friendship are becoming more critical in housing development everywhere. This is one reason why cottage courts are being developed all over the country, as John noted, as more cities are realizing the benefits of building smaller and more affordable homes alongside shared community spaces that bring families together. To be clear, under the current zoning, this vacant land could be used to build a much larger apartment property, which is also very much needed here in Colorado Springs. But I applaud this small developer for taking the risk to build this type of housing for our city. Housing that allows lower income families to buy their homes in an existing neighborhood and become part of the community fabric that keeps neighborhoods safe and families connected. Thank you so much. And I. Good luck with your decision.

Thank you, Ms. Gabler. Okay, do we have anyone else that is, do we have anyone else in the room that's here to speak in support of this project? And maybe we can check online as well.

If there's anybody online that would like to speak in support of this item, please unmute yourselves, pressing star six. There's nobody online.

Okay. Switching gears to those who may be here to speak in opposition to this project, do we have anyone in the room or who signed up?

Yes, sir.

We have Ray Golden. Okay. If you'll just wait, sir, we'll take the gentleman who has signed up. Did you sign in, sir? Did you sign in? You don't have to at this moment. I just didn't know if you had.

Please introduce yourself and you will have three minutes to speak. Hello sir, good morning.

Can you make sure that's turned on?

Is it turned on?

Yep, you're good. Okay, your name and you'll have three minutes.

Good morning. I'm Ray Golden. I'm a Colorado author and a local history researcher. I live in Hillside neighborhood. I have since 1982. While I'm grateful for Lee and Alex to improve the neighborhood, I'm very concerned about the historical implications of what this project might. The homes in that neighborhood, many of which were moved from downtown. 1907 and 1911, 300 of which belong to pioneers of Colorado Springs were moved to that neighborhood. They exist there now. Further proof, you can look at the El Paso County building inspector's stub book for moving permits, and you'll see that that's true. What I'm concerned about is not that this project will harm the historical aspect of the neighborhood. What comes next? Are they gonna tear down the historical homes? Reed, is that what happens next? While I may not be here, the kids will be. It's good that you get homes for young people they can afford, but why are the other empty lots not used in that neighborhood to increase the amount of these homes? You gotta put 14 right there. There's empty lots in the other parts of the neighborhood. So I want improvement. That's great these guys are doing that, but can we do it reasonably? And with forethought about what door you're opening, are you allowing this development that's gonna cause many more like that and our neighborhood will be gone? Melvin Sitton started that neighborhood in 1887. He had 82 cows on that neighborhood. You can still find milk bottles in the backyards. I bought a home that belonged to Tom Brigham, whose house was at the corner of Bijou and Nevada, 1872. I have pictures of that house, and I know the people who are his descendants. Christiana Fitzsimons bought a home there. Her husband was the foreman for the streetcar division who came up Cimarron Street. There is so much history there that it's gonna be eliminated because you are opening Pandora's box. Can we be reasonable about limits in the future? I know that you're likely to approve this. Fine, but can you please

put a limit on the future developments to preserve our history please mr golden thank you for your time and the history lesson our next speaker is ron thank you for your patience come on up please introduce yourself and you will have three minutes i uh been in the neighborhood for over 40 years can you state your first and last name sir

Excuse me?

Can you state your first and last name?

Ron Wilkinson.

Thank you, sir.

Also Front Range Foundations Inc. is our property. And I appreciate the need to redevelop this area. At the same time, Prospect is very narrow I'm concerned that we're putting vehicles on the road that are going to make those of us that have been there an extended period of time hard to get around. I appreciate that there's a bike path close when it's 40 below zero and two foot of snow. That bike path isn't much good to get around on. that I'm concerned about the parking. Like I said, I understand it needs to be redeveloped. I knew Elmer. I don't know that I was there when Elmer was running things. But they need to do something about reducing the amount of on the street parking. The prospect there is very narrow. They get cars on both sides now and you can barely get, I drive a 3500 pickup and it's tight getting it down there. And we're gonna put how many more cars on it? Well, where are the cars that are parked there now gonna go? I just, like I said, it's, and Castilla is steep, so we're going to put people down. I'm going to call it transit mix. I don't know who owns the concrete plant down there now, but that's a steep hill, and they're going to walk up and down that in the snow? That's my concern, is the... the parking and how we're gonna get around on the street when we've got all of these additional vehicles working on the street. If they could get them off the street, it sounds good to me. I don't have a problem with that. There's been a lot of money and a lot of labor invested in hillside here in the last periods and Why should we have to all of a sudden well, you can't use prospect because there's too many cars on it now You know, you can't get two ways down the street because you can only get one direction of traffic and that's what my concern is is the off or on street parking, if they would move it off street. It sounds good to me, but they're not the ones that are gonna have to deal with the parking. They're gonna build it, they're gonna take the money and they're gonna run.

Thank you for your comments, sir. Your time is up, but we appreciate you being here, Mr. Wilkinson. Is there anyone else that signed up in person to speak? Okay, can we check online as well?

Yes, this is Steven Swift. I'm wondering if I can speak.

Please go ahead and introduce yourself again, please. And you will have three minutes.

Yeah, my name. My name is Steven Swift. I'm the attorney at my office is at 733 East Castillo Street. I have been at this location since October of 1990. I also own the property next door to well, it's one door down from the at 737 East Custia Street. So we've got two properties that are right adjacent to the property to be developed. First, I want to bring to the Commission's attention that there are notice defects. The sign's been torn down twice and before the end of the notice period. So I question whether or not the notice was not defective because of the sign being torn down. Second time they affixed it to some OSB board, but someone has pulled it away from the, and so it's not legible, and it's been torn down for several days. Nor did it reference the hearing information, and so my concern is that people who didn't receive the mailer, I recently served, as the Finance Secretary for the Congress for the Commission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And we frequently had checks get lost in the mail. And so, you know, the postal delivery services, if it didn't deliver the notices, there may be a number of people who didn't get proper notice of the hearing. My concern is that there's already a lot of, you know, as the gentleman that spoke before me said, that prospect is very narrow. And we've already got a full capacity parking in front of my office. There's basically a gym right next to my office. And when he has customers, the spaces in front of my office are already taken up and there's no room to park. And so if we add a bunch of parking along Prospect, which is, as the gentleman said, is already very narrow, I think it's going to create a real problem. I think the proposed development is out of character with the neighborhood. There is within the area, maybe a couple duplexes that have been built about a block away, but there's nothing larger than that. And so you would completely change the character of the neighborhood. I dispute the notion that it fills a housing need. As I am going home, especially when it's late at night, I can see that there's a lot of vacancy downtown already. They have built a lot of structures, apartment structures. I think, you know, because of its location close to the city, this area will attract a lot of young professionals who are working downtown. And so it's not going to meet the needs of the demographic that they are targeting. I think it's going to be more... appealing to the people that already work in the area close at hand.

Thank you, Mr.

Swift.

I know you probably can't hear it, but your three minutes has elapsed very quickly, I realize.

Thank you. In summary, I don't think this area can accommodate the parking, and I think it would detract from the property values in the neighborhood, and the city tax collections, I think, would fall because of the declining property values as a result of putting this kind of housing right adjacent to what is primarily single-family homes and homes that have been built within the last 100 years. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Thank you very much for your comments. Do we have anyone else online that would like to speak in opposition? Or I'll call for anyone who would like to speak either for or against this item.

If there's anybody online that would like to speak in support or opposition of this item, please unmute yourselves now. There's nobody online. Okay, great.

Okay. Okay. All right. Well, then we will ask our applicant to come back up for 10 minutes of rebuttal to the comments we've heard today.

Yes, thank you.

Uh, John Wilson, urban landscapes. Um, 1st of all, I'd like to go and make a comment on and I appreciate everybody coming up here and speaking whether you're in favor or opposed again. That's a great, um, attribute of this of this neighborhood. So really appreciate that. Uh. Ray golden's comments I, I really. Really appreciated both his letter and this. I know I personally learned a lot about the neighborhood. So thank you specifically for that. Excuse me, I know a lot of the comments are regarding the parking. So, 1 of my rebuttal to that really is, I just want to go and I know you're already familiar with this process that it goes to city planning city engineering city fire comments have been given. We've responded, we revised, et cetera. So there hasn't been a concern regarding traffic engineering of the parking aside from taking out stripes. um regarding the sign yes uh we have noted that and i believe bill and you can correct me if i'm wrong on this but um the initial submittal on this project went in quite some time ago and they had two signs on the initial application this is our fourth so this was like 8 months ago, the initial application, so there were signs that went up at that time. Those 2 signs were not torn down. So they stayed up. Um, we did not receive any comments for or against with that public notice at that time. So that went through the entire review period. Um, the, uh, we did note that 1 of the signs we post 2 signs each time 1 of the signs was torn down on the. I think it was for the design standards adjustment that went in. That's when the postcards came out and we got comments back. We did have one sign torn down that was noted. We had emailed planning staff and I don't think there was a huge concern because the other sign was still up. um this next time around when we posted again for planning commission uh it was noted again that one sign was torn down so i don't know if it was torn or wind blown but we really secured this last one really heavily with a lot of staples so um i i feel like somebody tore it down and i don't know what yesterday and both of them were there by the way okay thank you um they might have been standing but one was torn down i think it's on prospect street maybe it was castillo maybe so but i did see it though But, um, yeah, so the wind didn't blow them down, but it happens, especially in older neighborhoods. You know, this is a common element that happens with with postings. That's why it's posted multiple times and different right away. And it's, uh. And it's sent by by mail. Um. And then the last one, the last comment I think to rebut on is housing demand. I don't know that I really need to rebut that. It's highly publicized that there's a major demand for housing. There's a major issue with economics. I can personally tell you that right before this meeting, my wife texted me a $400 increase in our escrow on our mortgage. So that's fun. So that's a fun element that I think everybody's gonna experience. And it's unfortunate. So we need more housing so the housing can be less, and we don't run into so many of these issues. So with that, I know you all didn't get a chance to ask questions before, so I'll remain up here if you have questions.

Okay. Yeah, if you don't have any other rebuttal items, we'll just, yeah, we'll switch up to questions then. Thank you, John.

It's 1030. Okay.

All right. We're going to just move into questions then. So I'll open it up. If you guys could one use your tablet to indicate, uh, request to speak and which I never remember state your name for the record. So commissioner angle, go for it.

Commissioner angle and I have, uh, let's play some questions for, uh, Mr gray. If I may start with start there. I looked at the parking space requirements by use section 7.4.1003. And I thought your analysis of how you went through that from the point of view the original two unit two parking places per development unit and then eventually that was changed because they requested consideration as a multi-family and that gave us a total of 18 considering there are eight houses that were in the 1.5 category per dwelling unit and six that were one for one and they propose 11. If you look at the original requirement, it was really two per dwelling unit, which would be on the order of 28, and going down to 11 is a big drop from 28. Nonetheless, I thought your analysis of that was excellent. So the question then is, should we really grant them this multifamily consideration to reduce the parking requirement? And also doing the review, and this was kind of intriguing to me, I found in Section 7.5.515D, the review criteria for the development plan, they actually, vectored you to three other places in the UDC. Section 7.4.409, which is general criteria, then Section 7.4.10X, which is really the parking one, which is so relevant to this discussion. And finally, Section 7.3.3, the proposed use. In looking at the proposed use category, there was a description of something called the tiny house community. And that intrigued me because it sounded much like what we were dealing with today. The minimum project size is 20,000 square feet, and this one's 22,000 square feet, so it meets the criteria. So my question for you is, was there any consideration of developing this with the tiny house community criteria? Simple no.

Yeah, there was not because the homes are larger than a tiny house.

They're larger than a tiny house.

Than the definition of a tiny house in the development code.

Okay. Another question just from a background point of view is how much does a $300,000 house cost in terms of its mortgage with escrow and everything associated with it? Anyone have any idea? I really don't know. google it on uh mortgage but um yeah i don't know yeah i i would prefer that staff not answer a question like that okay thanks uh the last my last observation deals with the developmental standard adjustment uh section 7.5.525 uh and this is what i think brings the biggest challenge to the proposal that uh Paragraph E, which lays out the criteria for approval, says the Planning Commission may approve or disapprove conditions of development standards adjustment if the Planning Commission determines the proposed alternative design meets the following criteria. And I would defer to a judgment from the attorney, but I think that means all the criteria that follows that paragraph. The first three, there's a phrase in each of them that says that the standards that are being changed must be the same or better than would otherwise take place. And I will tell you, I struggle to find that moving from 28 to 18 to 11 really constitutes better, even if one considers the parking on the streets better. particularly the parking on the smaller feeding street, is problematic in my judgment. Those are my comments.

Thank you, sir.

Jen? Since we've still got Bill up here, this is Commissioner Cecil. I did want to start asking a couple of questions around the first point that Commissioner Engel brought up. Specifically, table 7.4.10 , the parking table, specifically lists dwelling single family attached with a requirement of two spaces per dwelling unit. Since the application is described as a 14 lot, single family attached development, what provision of the authorizes the city to calculate parking using the multi family parking category instead of the single family attached category.

In my opinion, it's the development standards adjustment application.

So does the development standards adjustment authorize reducing the required number of spaces or does it authorize replacing the parking requirement for one listed use with the parking requirement for a different listed use?

I think it's got the latitude to do that and the decision rests with the Planning Commission to decide whether you would agree with that or not.

and that's in spite of the fact that seven point four point one well one thousand three one zero zero three b three says that it only applies to uses specifically not listed in table seven point four point ten a Can you restate that one more time? The idea that there is latitude. The section of code that I'm looking at is... I just scrolled past it. That I've perceived as creating the latitude was 7.4.1003... Wait, no, I'm looking at the wrong one. I was at the right one, I'm so sorry. 7.4.1005, adjustments. For single family, sorry, I was doing a bunch of reading.

If I could help clarify real quick, John, urban landscapes. So, the request that we had in the development standards adjustment, which is separate application was to apply the multi family parking as mentioned. And as referenced due to the sizes of the homes that we're trying to do, and we're trying to fulfill a home ownership need. Um, in the, in the neighborhood, um. That was the request, right? So the request would go to those standards from there. And I don't know the 7.9 or information, but, um. The the you're allowed up to 40% reductions from there. Right so the 40% reductions included. Adjacent transit adjacent bike lanes. Uh, and the on street parking. So those reductions can get you to the 40% reduction from the multifamily standard.

And the, and I'm being, like, bizarrely technical, because I couldn't be more enthused about your project and I want to get to yes, but I want to get to yes in a way that doesn't get knocked down again later. I appreciate the number of. Off street parking spaces to be provided for attached and detached single family and 2 family dwellings may not be adjusted. Pursuant to the section you just referenced that it's right underneath the 40% reduction.

With without the development standards adjustment, so the development standards adjustment was an extra application. Sorry bill if you wanted to add more planning nerd out man. So that's what the extra application was was about was to go and apply those. We could have very easily said, you know, and we have and before the, the. Frankly, I think the code got broken with the update in terms of parking. We had several applications before this before the that allowed on street parking and there was no cap to it. And and so. With the, I'm guessing unintentionally. Uh, city planning kind of got their hands strapped behind their back a little bit in terms of how parking can go and be counted. And so we could have said all on street parking counts, and then we would have met the goals and we would have met the parking requirements instead. We were looking at things more holistically so that you all could look at this in the future for, and hopefully updates code. When we want to have some missing middle product that can help fill some of these needs for the city to apply a multi family standards when the homes themselves are going to be small multi family sized. So that was our goal and intention for some of the background of why we did a development standards adjustment. Or the multi family parking so in.

For the record, I, this is commissioner Cecil still, um, I'd like to say that in order to get my head around this and be comfortable with it, I have to be able to state how this works as a development standards adjustment because you get an adventure. I did an additional. Economic benefit from being able to subdivide the lots and then resell them that you wouldn't get from an actual multi family dwelling. Um, so for the record in my head, I'm looking at parking being based on. Occupancy characteristics rather than the technical ownership structure in order to be able to get to a. The development standards adjustment, so these in my head for parking purposes, due to the configuration of the lot and or the lots and, um, the way that it's going to be built, they would not be. And when I'm looking at parking, something I consider a single family, but I do understand that they function that way from a real estate perspective to that end. I was wondering if you could clarify a couple of things about the intent to sell, including how parking spaces are related to the lots that people will purchase.

So that's probably a question for Lee and Alex, but my understanding is that they were not going to assign parking spaces. If that's the question, would they be open to the public generally? Well, all on street parking is open to the public, right? So the 11 parking spaces that are off street are technically on private property. That'll be owned by the of these 14 homeowners.

So, would they be open to the public the 11 spaces? Yes.

I'm guessing no, because those are would they be associated with specific units? They'd be associated with the ownership of that. So, all 14 units would have equal right to use those.

That does sound like 1 of those bothersome that really could turn into a sort of messy internal political consideration because maybe I can clarify that or ask a clarifying question.

Please do. It sounds like that's the same as a multi family parking lot. Where 1st, come 1st served so if somebody's parking there. It's not an assigned space, but if it's open and somebody lives there, they can use that space. Much much the same as a multi family parking.

Situation to that end, I'm. Concerned about whether it can be used for, say, guest parking or anything like that and how that would be governed in terms of that.

I think that if it's if it's open, just like an apartment complex. That would be used by the residents of that apartment complex and their guests. I know my daughter lives in apartment complex and I, I park in their lot. Right so I don't have a special permit or anything for it. And I guess I do run the risk of somebody. I think it told, but I'm never there for more than an hour.

Um, also, is it covered within the, I noticed that there's no 1 unified trash receptacle and not a not space necessarily on each lot for trash is that contracted through or plan to be contracted through the.

That would need to be through the way. Yeah. So the would need to have that that trash service piece of it from there because the trucks couldn't go in and serve it. And I don't think you would. I don't think the desire would be to have a dumpster or a trash and a trash. Roll off at each home in the backyard. That's why we had an enclosure.

And I noticed there's also a mail kiosk, which also helped me get to the multifamily conclusion. But I'm wondering, it looks like it's in the right of way. Is there an easement you have to get for that? How does that work? end up working when it's a single family property. I think Mr. Chapin's coming out.

Okay. Yeah. USPS, whether it's a multifamily or, or a single family, they require those kiosks or now you can't have your own individual mailboxes. It's kind of sad, but that's, that's become the reality.

Oh my God.

This is to piggyback on what John was just saying. Yeah, we're working with the in that and yes, it is a community mailbox required there. And so they need once we get through this process, we have to have numerations assigned addresses to each of the lots, which would then correspond with the mailboxes. As far as the, we're working with an attorney right now to work out all the details, but yes, in general, snow removal, traction removal, and then the general shared common landscape would all be maintained through that.

Um. As a result of this development, is there a plan to investigate the drainage issues and remedy them in that area again?

We had a survey done of the alley immediately behind us on the South side that runs from prospect West. We, through the whole process, we're having to develop to 20 feet wide for fire and other reasons. The entire width of our property. I noticed there were some pictures may have been Ray. I'm not positive with that of some drainage issues. That was actually on the other side of the street and the other alley. So it didn't really affect us. But again, we had a survey down to the rest of the alley to find out through any low spots, anything like that. But the historical data of what we are adding to that runoff is very minimal, but we are willing to.

And I can add to that. I spoke with our civil engineer last night on this because I thought the question might come up and I wanted to know where exactly we were with in that process. And his understanding is that he has a meeting set with Sarah Rivera of stormwater and to just dial in these last little technical things. Um, for the most part, everything has not the most part everything has been resolved in terms of drainage. They're just nice and cross and tease to get the trainers letter approved. So it has gone through all that process and review.

And, um, I'm going to just make this as a statement, not a formal recommendation and commissioner Cecil will be done speaking then, um, the 1 consideration you may. Want to noodle on is that sometimes you can buy. Uh, some positive sentiment from a neighborhood by improving the entirety of the alley that you're impacting, because sometimes your folks will be traveling up and down it and it sounds like there is already, um, you know. A little bit of a, um. poor condition to it and that perhaps maybe things like that that might constitute a win-win should be kept in mind, although I understand paving and reconstituting an alley is very expensive. So that was my last comment right now.

Okay.

Thanks, Jen.

Before we move to Commissioner Robbins, this is Chair Hensler. I have a couple questions I think that are maybe just piggybacking off of Commissioner Cecil or Engel even. Again, I'm enthusiastic about what you're trying to do here and I think it's a great project and I think it's a great location for it. I don't necessarily have any issue with the parking reduction given the way that the code and the adjustments are allowed. My question for you is more so on your pro forma and your business plan because I think my concern is greater that you may not sell units as well if people are concerned about parking. So have you given consideration to that? And can you speak to how you see the viability of the project with parking for residents in? Yeah.

Uh, yeah, thank you for the question. This is Alex. Yeah, it's definitely a conversation. Um, something that's come up in in the planning of this project is, you know, how do potential home buyers, you know, look at this and look at the parking and do we want to have assigned parking spaces? And that's, you know, that's not even really potential, you know, not really even on the table as a possibility in this project with the density and layout or really max on space. So. Um, we're yeah, I mean, we're relying on, you know, some of this data, knowing that this community in general is like a 1 car, sometimes less some, um, you know, is going to be more bicycle and pedestrian oriented than a general development in Colorado Springs. And that, you know, there will be sufficient parking, you know, even if it's not the ideal, like, assigned spot right in front of your place. I, you know, I'm confident there's sufficient parking with the off street parking. And that again is not used currently at all. And some of it not even available due to the existing curb cuts. So, yeah, it's definitely something that we've considered, but we're, you know, we're really just banking on that. This there's just reduced vehicle usage in this neighborhood. Um, and that. That the right, you know, we're going to find buyers who are aligned kind of with the vision that that really fits this project as a whole.

Thanks this week chicken again. Um. To piggyback a little bit on what Alex is saying, we've asked multiple people who have done developments, things like that for their opinions thoughts, you know, help us refine this. Um, yes, I think to a certain degree. For my years of design work in construction, there's always concessions and it's what's the worst or best. Outcome and so the back and forth, I mean, we've wrestled and wrestled and wrestled with how do we make this work and what's the best density and I mean, we've looked everything from keeping the last as they were originally. And just trying to do that. The numbers don't work. Um, they just don't work. And then I've heard some things about other people saying, you know, there's others lots available. Well, this is the 1 that we. Shows, and we're trying to maximize whatever we can with it for the greater good of everyone. And so we have factored that in to a certain degree, and even looked at when you say the pro forma, what does it mean if we have a couple houses sit or whatever? What was that? What's worst case scenario? What's plan B? What's plan C? So we've tried to go down the list of. What could this impact and again, looking at. We have to concede, you know, certain things and we thought this was the best. Overall plan to to bring that together.

Yeah, I think I would just add 1 more things Alex again. Really? Yeah, as we mentioned, we were just looking at the. Best overall product here and mix of parking and we thought, well, we could add garages under everything, but then it becomes like an infeasible project. We're looking at our price point. We're looking at comps. And so 1 of the biggest challenges is there really aren't comps because there aren't products like this being built and sold in Colorado Springs. You know, as I mentioned earlier, like. Rental multifamily type projects are way easier to get approved. There's provisions form. There aren't really provisions for this. And that's why there aren't products like this that I can go and say, hey, what happened? What do you what does it look like when you sell a single family with a 1.5 parking spaces or 0.75 compared to tubes? Like, there's no data on that. Um, so that's 1 of the biggest challenges is we're just operating in an area that hopefully in the future, there will be more data in place that we can make more database judgments. But for now, yeah, we're definitely going out kind of on a limb because there's this doesn't exist and and just. You know, hoping that we've come up with the best plan that way balances everybody's needs and this is again just real quickly.

John geeks out on landscaping and all that I geek out on small spaces and making them as efficient as possible. So we're, we've gone over and over the floor plans and having storage underneath and, you know. Sheds and just all the different things again, to try to think about not just creating a house, but how are people going to live in it? So we've tried to think that through as well.

Great. One final question on the parking piece, and maybe this is for Bill as much as it is for you all. There are certain neighborhoods, I think maybe around Colorado College, they're definitely in Denver, right, where it's permit parking after, say, 5 p.m., right? Is that a consideration or a discussion, or is that something that happens here much? And maybe, John, maybe you know that. Just that might be peace of mind for residents sometimes, right? That they know that they're going to have not that I mean, not that I drive that street all the time, but whenever I have in this week and looking at the thing, I get that. There's not a ton of parking, but is that ever a consideration for, like, permit for residents after a certain period?

I think that's usually something that gets brought up when there's a parking problem or a proper parking issue and we don't see that in this area. Uh, as you all know, the, we, I think, uh. Our nonprofit we fortify, um, who I represent as well. They, um. Had requested parking permits in the mill street neighborhood, uh, at the time with working fusion and because there is a parking, there is a parking issue that. That does occur there. So, even though on that 1, we actually added angled parking, which is an opportunity in a lot of places in the city with our very wide streets, but not in this particular space. Otherwise I would have proposed it to just make planning staff, uh, pull their hair out. Yeah.

No, thank you for that. And I appreciate the context because I do, you know, you do see that occasionally, but you're right. It's when parking becomes an issue like other neighborhoods. Commissioner Robbins, sorry, you've been waiting patiently.

There we go. Commissioner Robbins here. Yes, a lot of questions have been answered. The thing that I wanted to bring to point was that in this neighborhood, and I used to patrol this a lot in my previous occupation, there's a lot of off-street parking by all the residents, 50% perhaps. They're lucky to have a one-car garage, and if somebody has enough room, they can build a two-car, and they've been able to do that, but For the most part, there's a lot of off-street parking. And Mr. Gray, I think you did a great job trying to come up with a situation here. Something else that adds to this scenario is I've also worked with a lot of people buying properties multi-generational. The reason they do that is there's no other place for them to have mom and dad or whatever. So they will add them to their own home or try to buy a house that's even bigger so they can accommodate them. This allows that older generation, maybe myself, I don't know, anyway, to be able to have something of our own. And I find too that in this context, there are a lot of those people that don't have a vehicle Nor do they want one because of the cost, the expense, the insurance that continues to go up. I don't know about you guys, but auto insurance keeps going up. So why have it? And so this gives that alternative basis for a lot of people that say, you know what, there's a bus right up there. I'm going to go grab it. or if they've got the bicycle, and that brings up another issue, but those are things to really think of, and I really appreciate what you guys are doing. And as far as the bicycle scenario is, having some place to be able to store the bicycle when it's not being used, so it's not getting stolen in the middle of the night if it's an outside storage area, if there's some way to accommodate that, I think that would be something to consider. The other thought was that I really appreciate the fact that you have taken a lot that is full of garbage, trashed out and destroyed and looks like heck into something that's going to be nice and usable for a lot of people. And I do appreciate the fact that you are looking at ways to make it affordable. I hate using that name all the time, but affordable housing. I think it's really, really important. you've already answered the question about the hoa maintaining the grounds is going to be really important because we don't want something in the future where people are throwing their water heaters or anything out there in the front it's got to be controlled and if as far as the parking goes when somebody is coming to buy a property just let them know this is the way it is and if you can find a place to park there great if not it's on the street and that's the way it's going to be there's no assignment If they know that up front, maybe put it in your in document in your paperwork. That's the way it is. It solves a problem. And I think that solves a lot of problems, quite frankly. What else? I had all kinds of the height buildings. You've answered that already. Investors. I think something along this line would require, I would make a recommendation that investors are not to be buying these properties. It is for the folks that want to spend in the lower level so they can afford life and go to get a loaf of bread. I think that's really important. And there was another one. Oh, as far as the ingress and egress on this, because that Castilla Street is narrow, The idea of going one way like we had on Tejon for such a long time is what if you talk to the traffic and set up where it's one way. I don't care if you're going from south to north or north to south.

I think that might be out of our purview to recommend. I think it might be out of our purview to recommend street direction improvements to the developer.

I think that's a great idea. So anyway, that's something that's really important because when you have fire emergency equipment coming in and you've got Vehicles on both sides, traffic, it could be quite an issue. And if it's going to save a life, I think it needs to be something to be considered. So I've talked enough, and it's someone else's turn. So thank you.

Thank you, sir. Amanda, sorry, Commissioner Dugiano, do you have comments or questions?

Mr. Giano, um, most of my concerns have been addressed at this point.

Commissioner comments, comments.

Most of my questions, Mr Clemens, most of my questions, nobody been answered. So what about Mr. Robert? No, I'm good right now. I'll make a statement later on.

Okay. Do we have any other questions or do you want to move to comments? Okay. Seeing none, Commissioner Clements, do you want to start us off with a comment, then, since you said you had one?

Sure. I am Commissioner Clements. When I moved here from Florida about 20 years ago, I experienced severe sticker shots with holes. And I know we have really affordable housing here in Colorado Springs. I was checking out the average salary for average mortgage right now is around $110,000 a year for salary. I don't know anybody who makes that. But we need something affordable housing like this. And except for the help, the parking, I will be voting for it. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Anybody else, comments? Robbins, I think you were quick on the draw there.

Commissioner Robbins here. Yes, I think this project is a great idea and I'd like to see more of that around the town. And I am in support of this. And obviously trying to blend it in with the atmosphere of the neighborhood is really important wherever you go, wherever you build these things. And I think I don't have anything else other than I think this is a great idea and I'd like to see a lot more of it.

Thank you, sir. Commissioner Cecil.

Um, as it pertains to the development standards adjustment review, I previously stated that I'm looking at the parking as a parking that applies to the multi family. Classification as opposed to the individual single family classifications because of the actual practical use of the property and therefore I do find that the, um. Development standards adjustment does, when considered together with the compensating benefits and goals of the policies of the, it does fit to a better degree than the standard for which the waiver was requested. And that the alternative design imposes no substantially greater impacts through compliant than it would with the. Original provision of the, I think that it does provide compensating benefits in, especially in so far as there is such a need for affordable housing and benefits to the general public. And even if this just ends up being attainable, I want. To see more missing middle come online in Colorado Springs, because I only moved here 6 years ago, commissioner Clements, and I will too was completely stunned by how expensive things were as it come as it pertains to the development plan review criteria. I find that this plan and the site design and the youth specific standards proposed have the opportunity to be harmonious to the surrounding neighborhood. I do hope that some of the input around the historic homes that was shared by Mr. Goldman have the opportunity to inspire some of the design and the final finished product when you're 100% at construction drawings. I think the development plan substantially complies with our adopted plans, namely Plan COS and the need for affordable housing here. Everything that I see here as I look through the conditions and the criteria, it does seem to Abide with our drainage and storm water protections and other standards and therefore I will be voting to support both the development standards adjustment and the development plan.

Thank you commissioner angle.

Commissioner Engel, I did not precede my comments and concerns about the parking with a general comment about the aspirational goal of this. I think it's terrific. I am a little hesitant sometimes to endorse apartment solutions while they are low-cost housing. They aren't really building wealth in the people who are in there. And you've put together a solution that provides property ownership, equity in the house and eventually as some form of increase in value over time, the individuals gather wealth and they reduce their debt. So I think that is a terrific program and quite frankly a better solution to inequality than apartment solutions. So I wanted to make a real strong statement in favor of your vision there.

Thank you, sir. Commissioner Gigiano.

Okay. Commissioner Gigiano, for the record, I feel like a lot has been stated. I think I'm also okay with the parking adjustment with all things considered, and I will be in support of this project.

I was still on.

Thank you very much.

All right. Well, I think we're close to a motion. I'll just say, I mean, I think a lot has been said about the benefits of this project. And so I will concur with all of those. I think that it's a great use in a zoning of MXL. There could be far different uses there that would be less compatible with the neighborhood. And I think you all have done a great job of being consistent with that. with the neighborhood to the degree that you can while bringing new product that is sorely needed. And I think the parking will take care of itself in that neighborhood. So I am in favor of your application and excited to move us to a motion. So if anyone would like to take that on.

Okay. Commissioner Robins, I'll make a motion that we approve the development standards of this city adjustment to the city code number 7.4. to provide 11 off-street parking spaces where 18 spaces are required, based upon the findings that the request complies with the criteria for a development standards adjustment set forth in City Code 7.5.601.C.2. Commissioner Clemmons, I second it.

Thank you, the motion passes unanimously.

Commissioner Robins here, I'd like to make another motion to approve the Cottage Court on Costilla Development Plan based upon the findings that the request complies with the criteria for a development plan set forth in City Code Section 7.5.515 with the following condition, an approval and approved final drainage letter for the project. Thank you.

Commissioner Clemmons, I second it.

The motion passes unanimously. Congratulations, gentlemen.

This item is appealable to city council. So I am going to read the appeal instructions. Um, if those are of interest to anyone in accordance with the requirements of section 7.5.415 of city unified development code and affected party may appeal to the city council, any action of the city planning commission in relation to the zoning code where the action was was adverse to that party. Within 10 days from the final action on the item being appealed, which is Monday, June 22nd, 2026, the appellant must file notice of appeal and pay the $176 fee with the city clerk. The appeal notice should address specific zoning code requirements that were not adequately addressed by the city planning commission. City council may elect to limit discussion at the time of the appeal hearing to the specific matter set forth in the appeal notice. And with that, we do not have any presentations.