Board of Zoning Appeals - Regular Meeting

Okay, it is uh 700 p.m. Uh we'll call the uh November meeting November 3rd meeting of the of the Columbia City Plan Commission to order and have roll call please. Chip Hill here. John Kissinger here. Don Lingalo here. Leslie Robinson here. Nikki Venibal here. Dennis Warick here. Dan Wiggle here. Larry We here. Patrick Cigar here. uh previous meeting minutes.

Before we do that, I want to introduce our newest member, Leslie Robinson, who's the city clerk treasurer. So, she fills in for Jennifer Romano's seat. Uh Jen had to resign for family and personal uh obligations. couldn't. She had to make some hard choices, so this was something that she had to step aside from. So, uh Leslie steps into this seat. Um it's one of the three uh elected or appointed or city employee uh positions. So, being cler treasure, she falls by as elected.

Welcome. Thank you. Welcome. Okay. previous minutes not ready yet. Okay, next time for sure. All right. So, oath to witnesses. So, any of you who wish to speak tonight, ask a question um or anything else you need to to stand and our attorney will we'll swear you in, it's real simple. You just stand up, raise your right hand, and you have two words to say at the end. So, and it's free. Okay. Do you swear or affirm under the penalties of perjury the testimony we're about to offer will be the truth? If so, answer. I do. You may be seated. Put your hands down. Thank you, sir. Sir,

okay. Old business. Nothing. A new business 25- C-RE-1 JBW Properties LLC R2R3 at 940 West Business 30 in Columbia City. Nathan,

thank you, Mr. President. So bringing up these slides, uh 25 CRZ RZ1 is a request for zoning from R2 to R3. Uh it is a one lot. It is one lot in the Tangle Wood subdivision with an address of 940 West Business 30, currently zoned R2, two family. Uh overall lot size is just over half an acre. Uh, as I mentioned, the request is to reszone to R3 multif family. Uh, the current proposal is to construct a 4-unit town home. Uh, the petitioner has submitted a couple different uh, tenative floor plans. Uh, which I'll show here in a second. Uh, but again, this is resoning. This is not necessarily exactly what he's uh, what he could wind up doing. uh the surrounding land uses and zoning are shown there on that table and in the written staff report. Uh importantly, we've got R1 to the north with single family detached residences. To the east, we have R2, which is the continuation of this portion of Tangle Wood. Uh and then R1. To the south, we've got business 30 and then many acres of R3. uh some of which is developed already, much of which is not. And then to the west, we have a similar uh situation of R2 and then R1. Uh of the R2 lots in Tangle Wood, the only one currently developed with a two family dwelling is the one immediately to the west of this. So, as as I mentioned, uh, petitioner submitted a couple of, uh, renderings

for the intended use. Um, believe this one's a little bit more representative in terms of size, but they are still conceptual with details subject to change. Uh, why we're here, the proposed structure is defined by the zoning code as multifamily. Multif family uh is anytime you have more than two units not on individual lots. If these were on individual lots, they would be considered single family attached uh and permissible under the existing R2. Uh that could be done, but there's quite a few different pieces to that puzzle. Uh dealing with lot uh lot size, lot area, and so on. Uh depending on the construction, however, uh the building code likely will consider this single family attached uh because it's my understanding that the petitioner is looking at doing this as uh individual units separated by firewalls. So by doing that by the building code, it's single family attached. Zoning code treats anything uh uses the lot definition more uh rather than the actual structure definition. Uh I also toss on here the concept of missing middle dwellings which we've talked uh some about before and those of you on council and and uh perhaps you've attended other seminars various times. Missing middle is a very uh popular discussion point. Uh that is the type housing types that are between single family detached at the far left and then towards the right you have uh essentially apartment complexes and low to mid-rise apartments which probably

aren't ever going to happen to us but lowrise uh those are our Quail Ridge Simon states and so on. But in between that, you have uh all of these different uh types of residences that just aren't seen very much, including in Columbia City. You've got, in this case, the townhouse, uh duplex, two family, triplex, forplex, and so on. This is kind of between forplex and townhouse depending on how you want to look at it. Uh and then I'm not sure about heritage conserving infill. that would be uh when you have your conversions of historic homes to more units uh which we do have. Um so I put that in here uh just as a reflection of um again current planning trends and and food for thought more than anything. Going to the more standard reference slides here. Aerial view highlighted in blue is the subject site. Um, we have the I don't remember the name of the manufactured homeark to the southeast.

Country Squire maybe.

Country Squire. Thank you. Yes. Uh, a couple different homes to the south and then again single family residences and a church uh there on the north side of business 30. Closer view. Uh as I mentioned this is a two family dwelling uh or single family attached since they are on separate lots oblique view. Uh this is the overall zoning for the area. The orange is R3. The darker yellow is R2. The lighter creamer uh colored yellow is R1. And then the red is GB commercial. Closer view here. You can see again how this uh borders three different zoning districts. Future land use map for everyone's reference. Uh this is from the 2015 Z uh conference plan, but it's still in effect. Um closer view here. Uh the yellow is or is designated as low density residential. Uh there is no definition as to what low density quote unquote is in the comprehensive plan. Uh the orange color is medium density residential. Again, no definition as to what that is. And as we've discussed before, the current comprehensive plan when in doubt, it tended to use the existing zoning districts uh and just applied the existing zoning districts to what it expected for future land use. There are some places where there are deviations consciously made, but if there weren't uh specific reasons for changing it, it was kept. And that's reflected here. the

R3 zoning south of business 30, the R1, R2 north of it. Uh I go into discussion in the staff in the written staff report about densities, uh the number of units uh for this overall area. uh if this was developed as single family versus two family versus the four proposed and uh all of which are relatively close together in terms of units per acre but again I won't go into exactly those calculations unless you want me to. Uh the Tanglewood plat uh this is an excerpt showing the subject site. Uh this was report uh platted in 1998. The cabinets were revised in 1999, which I'll show you in a second. Uh, lot two is right here. Uh, these were oversized even at the time for the R1 standards uh, under which they were platted. I believe they were made deeper uh, in order to basically fit uh, the existing um, area left between Dogwood Lane and business area. They basically split the area in half, but that's just my supposition. Not really sure exactly. Um, but it is fairly clear that the 100 foot lot width comes from the minimum lot width for R1. Uh, aerial view with the plat and setbacks. This is something that I do draw your attention to uh because this is somewhat of a unique deviation and it's kind of important if we look at the uh impacts to this immediately surrounding properties. Uh the red line there is the asplatted building lines.

As platted, these are platted with 35 ft building lines. Uh you'll note that the duplex or the two family dwelling there on lot one follows the front setback pretty closely. It doesn't get uh too close to business 30, but I believe it just runs out of room because of the wedge shape of that lot. Uh but lots 3, four, five, all of those homes were set back pretty significantly from that 35 foot building line. Uh they're actually close to about 60 feet from the property line. Uh, I'm not sure exactly why other than uh the desire to place the house pretty much in the center of the lot, making your front yard as big as your backyard. Um,

thank you.

In any case, uh, lot two being an infill lot, uh, anything, whether it be a single family residence or the proposed, uh, four unit residence, if it were up at that 35- ft building line, it would be 30 ft closer than the home on lot three. uh good potential that that existing homeowner would actually be seeing the backside of or somewhat the backside of whatever goes in lot too. So I'm kind of thinking while it's not necessarily on the plat, it may be good uh to consider that as we look at the implications again on the surrounding propert on the existing uh situation. Uh I do have illustration here of that. So again, this is the approximate footprint of what would be a 4-unit townhouse based upon the the concept floor plans that were submitted outlined in green. Uh if it were placed up against that existing 35- ft building line. uh than in purple if it were uh at the approximately 60 ft building line. Uh so you can kind of see what that difference does make and the depth is still variable. Again, I just made it at approximately uh 40 ft or so. So, but it could be um slightly different between each one. I've kind of mentioned a few things about the different zoning districts. Uh R1 I don't have on this table, but R1 has a minimum lot area of 10,000 square ft and lot width of 100 ft uh with a lot

frontage minimum of 50 ft uh and front yard set back of 35 ft. uh all of which line up pretty much with what the subject lot is except for the lot being essentially twice as large as the minimum. the existing R2 those lot standards are there 8,500 square feet area per unit if you have more than one unit is half that 4250 per unit uh minimum lot width of 60 ft frontage of 50 ft front yard at 30 and so on. Um floor area for multi-units uh is 750 square ft that includes each component of a two family lot. The proposed R3 uh standards, zoning standards, drop that down to 7,000 square feet, 3500 per unit, uh 50 foot wide, and uh let's see, sideyards go down to seven, and the minimum floor area is still the same. Uh, I mentioned in the staff report the idea of under the existing R2 zoning, you could do two two family dwellings and still get four units on this because the uh lot area and the amount of area per unit still comes in under 2200 square ft. However, the minimum lot width comes into play. uh you would need to have 110 foot wide lot in order to split that under the existing R2 zoning into something that you could do two and two. Uh you could seek a variance in order to accommodate that. Um there are other things that could be done. uh the petitioner and I did talk that over wound up considering the R3 to be a more

straightforward and uh manner of it of seeking this uh design. Petitioner also uh can give you more details why he selected a fourunit building over two two family dwellings. Uh going to R3, however, uh you could because the lot width is only 50 feet, you could split this existing lot 5050, literally 50 ft and 50 ft uh and still have that two two family dwellings uh as an option. So you can still do four units without variances um like you would under without reasoning. Uh however, that isn't what's being proposed. Again, it's four units in one structure and as a town home style. Uh so I mentioned the covenants. Um covenants aren't something that the plank commission typically uh enforces directly. However, I do know that it's something that will come into discussion. So I just including it here for everyone's benefit. Uh in 1999, the developer uh modified the Tanglewood Covenants uh in order to accommodate lots 1 through 10 uh and uh it's resoning to R2 standards. The rest of Tanglewood lots 11 through 16 remained R1. So the difference is previously it was for single family residential purposes only. uh with the modification it was that single family component was stripped out and it now just says residential purposes only. I will say it does feel like it implies and definitely could be argued that the intent was for two family dwellings. Uh but as you read it there it is

ambiguous. So that's something for the petitioner uh to take up if he wants to. But I wanted to make sure that you guys on the plan commission knew that this was out there. Again, this was modified a year after the approval by the plan commission of the plant. So, it wasn't anything that even went through uh the commission at the time. Uh, also point number two is the minimum square footage and the petitioner can give you more details about how that uh would or would not be met um and what his plans are with that. Uh going to the resoning criteria. I talk a lot in the staff report about this. Um so I'm not going to rehash everything. Comprehensive plan. Uh you can see there on the map it was uh indicated for low density residential. However, what exactly is low density? You're also directly across from an area of of moderate density. So is this how does this fit into the overall uh plan is is an important piece of the picture. The current uh conditions of structures and uses in each district as I mentioned the impact on the existing uses uh immediate uses is important to consider. Uh the most desirable use uh for the land. Um that starts to getting into uh is this land is this lot in particular better suited uh for additional units? Is it uh better suited to have more units, more housing units in the city overall? Uh so what's more desirable? Um it's not necessarily uh that that starts to step away from the existing

surrounding uses and looks more at a higher level picture. Uh unless there's again if it was a corner lot or something else very very specific to this property conservation of property values throughout the jurisdiction not and you've seen this before. We've talked about it before but it's property values throughout the jurisdiction not just the immediate vicinity. So uh it's that is part of it but again the criteria criterion talks about it throughout the jurisdiction. Finally responsible growth and development um that's kind of a catchall of different things. Uh as I mentioned this could be developed as four units uh with a variance uh in the form of two two family dwellings uh which is not what's being proposed but still four units. Uh so you start weighing that out. Um couple different issues that are more practical issues that are are important pieces why we start to uh view multif family a little differently than single family. The traffic generation um and the number of uh families, number of units uh on the actual lot itself to make sure it's not getting too congested. the amount of traffic being generated being compatible or at least not disruptive to the surrounding area. Uh I do mention in the staff report that there is some merit to the thought of dispersing density throughout a area uh as opposed to uh concentrating it as we've seen with apartment complexes. So that is a concept that's age-old. Uh kind of went away when we started having singleuse districts. Uh but is a recurrent planning trend um coming back around

because again if you disperse uh more intense uses uh it starts to dilute the effects overall. But the effect there are still additional effects because it is a slightly more intense use. Um, one more slide. I do recommend a couple different zoning commitments. Uh, if you send this as you send this on to the council, uh, a commitment that no more than four dwelling units would be permitted. So, uh, so we wouldn't have uh, anything more than that. um a practical matter of no more than two drive cuts onto business 30. Again, addressing the issue of uh traffic generation. And then I recommend uh you guys discussing uh the front setback situation, whether it be that 35 foot or 60 foot uh to line up with existing homes and then the driveway width in order to make sure that we've got the minimum number of parking spaces accommodated. And we've talked about that before with Timber's Edge, Ravenwood, uh, and couple other places. Making sure those driveways are both long enough and wide enough to accommodate the minimum number of vehicles. Okay, that was a long summary of a staff report, but I am done. Any questions for me? I have a question on uh from 98 to 99. Why did they opt to make this a R2 section along there when the rest of the tangle wood in the backs all R1 already? Do we have a anything from hysterical uh record or anything?

I don't um I don't see the developer here. Uh, so I don't I didn't pull those minutes. Uh, the reasonzoning to R2 would have been there. I didn't pull that part. The other question I have is on sideyard. Um, where R3 is 7 foot, R2 is 8 foot. Uh, is there adequacy there for if the R3 is approved? I'll let I'll let the petitioner give you more details on his construction. All right. I I have to assume so. Yes.

Other questions for Nathan?

Okay. Thank you, Nathan. We'll now hear from the petitioner or his representative. Come to the podium. State your name and address, please. Hello, my name is Josh Bsley, owner of JBW Properties and citizen of Willy County. Uh, I'm proposing to reszone 940 West US Business 30, lot 2 in Tangle Wood to R3 in order to build four town houses. I believe this is a should be approved because town houses do not lower property values. They're well-built town houses, attractive, moderate, and increased neighborhood appeal. They provide affordable housing options without lowering surrounding property values. This helps address Columbia City's housing shortage. There's a clear housing shortage in Columbia City. These town houses would add quality housing that meets local demand and fits with existing infrastructure. It fits the character of the neighborhood. They're proposed to build. The proposed building will fit with the existing lot boundaries without requiring any variance changes and will blend in with the surrounding homes. The area has already got mixed uses like we talked about. Uh it's got a barnaminium, bullb barn, church, and trailer park across the road. This shows that it already uh supports mixed uses in housing. As a landlord, I do thorough background checks, screen all my tenants, and also try to keep my properties very well maintained. So, I believe this reszoning and townhouse project will be a good fit for the neighborhood and a positive contribution to Columbia City's growth. It supports affordable housing goals, uses land efficiently, and maintains property values in the neighborhood. So, like he showed, I wanted to build four town houses. It's just one unit. um

twostory threebedroom one and a half bath around 1,200 square foot is what I'm looking at right now. It's 80 foot wide 40t deep. Um so and the variance off the side of the road I was going to go 60 from the property line but I think there's a question because you're talking the other homeowners are 100 the way I look at it. They got a 100 foot driveway off of it and I didn't want a 100 foot driveway. I was going to come out with two driveways. So, as you can see on the picture, it would be like um two units would share a driveway and uh it would be 60 foot long. So, that would get three parking spots per unit. I didn't want to go 100 because I didn't want that's a lot to plow snow for the tenants to have to plow snow and I didn't feel like they needed five parking spots. I thought it was overkill and that's where that's where I came up with the setbacks on there. So that's all I've got.

So you're saying that you're your front would not be at the set back line that the other three homes are at today? Just because I didn't want a driveway 100 foot long because the way I see it, they're 100 foot back from the property line. I didn't want every tent to have a 100 foot driveway. Nathan, could you pull up the on the uh covenants the square footage that each unit is supposed to have?

So, we're talking between 12 and 1400,600. What What did you say yours were going to be? So the whole thing would be pushing 4,800. Um each unit will be 1164 is what I'm looking at right now. Excuse me. Uh, I walked that area today and it seems like one area is kind of deep and it's surrounded by I don't know what it was or where it is. We don't have any prints here to check it out. It's in it's in behind there, isn't it?

Where that where the green line is. It's kind of in the back of that. It kind of goes downhill it looks. Yes. So, I propose to leave all those trees in the back and not disturb any of that back deep area. And then when you meet the people that have their homes that are there now and you back up to them, it's going to be off a few feet. Several feet. Several feet.

Yeah. Well, I don't know who's going to clean it. That's the whole problem later. And every other thing out there is pretty left clean. And if two people don't get along and one over here two years back, they getting along with their friends. So he painted this purple. The other guy went back and got some other goofy people. Just don't get along. But that's in the city. So yeah. Then they look at little things that back to back.

Other questions for the petitioner. Now, these these properties will be owned by the individuals that buy them, right? They're not rental units. No, these are rental units. They are rental units. Okay. Is there wanting to rent out each of these units? Okay.

I know you said that the parking situation, you don't want them to have a 100 foot parking, correct? Driveway. In your estimation, is it enough space to have three to four vehicles in a driveway? Because you're you were saying on some of these I was looking on the plans it's stated that it could be up to three bedrooms. Correct. Okay. So, how many vehicles are you kind of looking at to be able to be in what was it? A 60 foot.

Correct. So, 20 foot wide. Each unit would have 10 foot by 60. So, 10 by 60 should get three vehicles in there. So to answer your question, three vehicles per unit with the two drives. So they would be front to back, correct? Not side to side. Not side to side because So if you have three and I live next door to you and I have three. How's vehicle one and two going to get out? You have to have a whole kind of a chain link. Yeah, that's the deal with our on to US30

to get out and then for them to pull back in. That's why I That's why I'm asking them.

Yeah, single car drives, you just kind of got to jockey vehicles around. I mean, there's a lot of single car drives that uh are three deep and it's it's not ideal, but with only coming out with two um drives, then I mean that's I mean, if you went deeper, you'd have just as much of a problem of uh moving cars around. And I really didn't want to put a parking lot in front of it. One thing, I didn't think it would look as nice. me coming with one drive through a parking lot. I didn't feel like it would look as nice and then then the tenant wouldn't be I would have to plow all the snow and I was trying to leave each tenant to be able to plow their own snow on their own drive.

I'm just looking at the safety on US30. When you have the other homes, they have the sub session section where there's movement where they're not all backing out onto US30. That's why I was asking that. I guess from my perspective it does concern me a little bit. Um because you know I think it the speed limits what 45 through there because you're coming from 30 to 45.

Um you know if we could only fit three vehicles in a driveway you know if you have three bedrooms you could easily have five or six individuals driving. I wouldn't want them to be parked alongside the road. That's one of my big concerns. Um because that road's crazy enough as is. Um I personally feel that I would be more comfortable with that 100 foot driveway. If somebody can't plow that driveway, then maybe they not be a tenant. But I look out for the safety of the folks that are coming down business 30

because 100 foot gives you more parking. I mean, you still have the option of pulling out, but because the 100 foot gives you say five spots at 20 foot a piece. It's going to give you Yeah. The other thing also on business 30 West there, there is no parking permitted. Exactly.

I know when the guy built the uh barnaminium, you call it. Uh, I think the police were out there at least five times and he was pulling off and unloading hardware and just leaving his truck sit there, no hazard, no coms, no nothing. And it sit there all day long and uh uh they they made the point clear to him that, you know, there is no parking on business there. So there wouldn't be any any type of turnaround in your drives. I mean like no kick kick out where they they can back up and turn around so they pull out on the 30.

I haven't really looked at like coming in angle drives. I mean just because your your unit's 80 foot wide and you got two driveways already going up into there. So I I mean I was trying not to leave the whole front of it concrete or stone or whatever the uh surface may be just to try to keep it standard looking with the two drives. So that each tenant will be responsible for snow removal of their driveway. Correct. What about lawn care? Uh

the landlord's responsible for lawn care. Okay. Other questions for petitioner? Okay. Thank you. Where where are we? Since we've been talking about the last few months so much, where are we at as far as requiring sidewalks? Uh, so what are you

there's no there's no other sidewalks out there. But the last few weeks, the last few times we've met, we've had discussions on whether to have sidewalks. I just want to know if this if this is going to be a test case if we had to have sidewalks out there. So eventually it would all have sidewalks. So that is more of a platting and building issue than a zoning issue. However, we have started to require sidewalks on new houses being built. Um it's a question Matt and I actually talked over last week for an older subdivision uh and whether a sidewalk should be put in. So the the quick answer is we're looking for them. However, if the subdivision is older, which this one is, it's still going to be a case by case basis to try and figure out whether it was originally required. This was a replat, then uh that would reset everything back to what we were doing. So, it's kind of a roundabout answer to say it depends.

Have we gotten any information from our departments on everything that is involved, which we don't have any trees and all this other stuff we look after? Have we gotten anything from We Amanda did we send out for review? We typing. Yeah, we typically don't seek comment from the utilities for reasonzoning actions. I believe did inquire about some

and Chip Chip's giving a thumbs up down there that those discussions have occurred. Yes. If something goes wrong to their department or anything, we're not

What? What was that? Are we with them with We've never seen We got some intellisense here. I can go over that and we want to make sure was a the way his ground is laid out. It's kind of questionable on how it's going. Strange board talking about well if you got to get where he puts this stuff going goat will have Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. That would apply whether this was one home or the proposed four, two, whether it was commercial somehow, whatever. Individual site development is reviewed uh through the building permit stage. So the departments get involved, we get involved from zoning, uh soil and water conservation, so on. So there's still checks beyond this. Okay.

Okay. Okay, at this time we'll hear from you folks. So, whoever wants to go first, hopefully we'll save you from hearing from everybody. I don't think I made enough copies of this. You probably share some seen part of it already. Um, Brooks Lango, 818 North Newport Run. Uh, guess I'm here because Mitch kind of talked me into it. He called me up when he had a question when he got the notice on this and uh, he called me concerned about it and uh, that the zoning could be changed in the subdivision to allow for multifamily dwellings. And I was kind of a bit shocked uh this could even be proposed in a newer I'm going to call it a newer subdivision uh that's nearly totally developed. My concern with this as a realtor and developer is a disregard with respect to that subdivision's covenants and restrictions which both ironically must be approved by the board and planning commission. uh andor again think the board actually approves the restrictions but it does go through the planning commission. I understand the planning commission does not enforce the covenants and restrictions but they should certainly be considered before making a reasonzoning change in a subdivision within all covenants and restrictions. I've seen uh language that's similar to Tanglewood

and that's the first part I highlighted there. Uh all the lots in the addition shall be subject to and impressed with the easements, restrictive covenants, restrictions and limitations herein set forth which shall be considered a part of every conveyance of any lot or portion thereof. In the addition without being written therein, the provisions herein contained are for the mutual benefit and protection of the owners and occupiers, present and future of any and all lots in the in the addition. And they shall run with and bind the land and shall ensure to the benefit of and be enforcable by the owners and occupiers of any lot or lots. in the addition and the representative of legal representatives, heirs, successors, grantees or assignees. The owners and occupiers present and future of any lot or lots in the addition shall be entitled to injunctive relief against any violation or attempted violation of the provisions herein and also to damages for any injury resulting from any violation thereof. that there shall be no right of reversion, re-entry or forfeite of title resulting from any violation. We have building zoning standards set by the state, city, by the state, county, city, each possibly being more restrictive than the former, but never less restrictive. The final progression of these standards are the covenants and restrictions of the subdivision, which is its own

little island governed by those restrictions. If restrictions don't matter, then why are they required? I've spoke with Nathan Nathan several times about improving the permitting process to protect all involved, and it seems to fit right into this conversation. Again, I know the department does not enforce restrictions, but they need to consider them in decision-m. I'm not suggesting another layer for the planning commission to deal with, but a simple notice to the petitioner when they fill out a request for reasonzoning or permit. I'm on the HOA board for Chesapeake and Cambridge crossing, and you'd be surprised at how many people don't know about the Cullinsson restrictions. We have had to approve many items after they've already been installed, pretty much fences. Uh, and the arguments have always been, well, the planning commission approved it, so why do I have to get approval from the HOA? Um, again, it's it's putting people on notice that there's another layer there you have to go through. Luckily, at this point, again, they've pretty much been fences. There hasn't been anything major, but in the future something major is going to go in and then there's going to be a lawsuit and it's just a headache for everybody at that point. Um, I'm suggesting four simple questions on applications for reasonzoning and permits to put the petitioner on notice. First, is the property in a subdivision? Yes or no? If yes, does the request comply with the restricted covenants and restrictions? Does the request need approval? Do you have approval? At least that puts everybody on notice that there's another layer of restrictions that have to be looked at. I'm not, again, I'm not

suggesting the planning commission, police or enforce this, but it may save everybody involved time and money and headaches. with regards to to tonight's resoning. If approved, the petitioner will believe he can move forward with the four-unit family structure, which really is not the case because it will be in violation of the restrictive covenants opening up a potential lawsuit. He has protect him, protect you, protect these people out here from having to hire an attorney. Um, what he will be in violation of is I handed out uses under B. Lots one through 10 shall be used for residential purposes. There may be two there may be two family dwellings. Again, kind of an interpretation on what's what that actually means. But then you go to number three, garages, driveways, and sidewalks. Each single family dwelling shall have a garage of a minimum size of 576 square ft 24x 24 and shall be attached to the dwelling either by a breezeway or porch or directly. Each driveway for the street to the garage shall be paved with concrete or asphalt and not be less than 18 ft wide. So it sounds like that would be another violation. Um as provided in the covenants and restrictions, the uses can change under 26D the duration which these easements under section B. These easements, restrictive covenants, restrictions and limitations may be changed or abolished in whole or in part

at any time as follows. The introductory provisions of these covenants and provisions of the of paragraphs one which is the one we talk about uses 2 21 22 24 and 26 may be changed by written agreement of all the property owners of all the lots in the addition and the other ones 75%. So there there is an avenue to change to allow this to happen. I'm not against the idea. I think it's a good idea. I just I don't think this is placed for um again this should be taken care of getting the restrictions changed before any reasoning should be considered to save again everybody time and money and headaches. Um, again to save time, I mean, I think everybody got a copy of the petition, didn't they?

Yes, please.

Yeah. With 28 signatures uh of of residents against the resoning. Um, and I'd like to ask anybody here again to save time, anybody that is against the resoning to go ahead and stand up. uh if you don't want to come up and say anything or have anything different to say. Um again, I think it's I I like the idea. I just don't think this is placed for it. I don't necessarily agree that it's not going to affect property values. Um I wouldn't want to be trying to sell the house right next to it. I think you're really going to cut down the availability of buyers if you're right next to a forplex and everything else is is basically single family in there. So that's all I have.

Any questions for Brooks?

Yeah. Yeah. And I I do think that to me this is spot zoning. It's in a in a subdivision that was approved at these uh R1 zoning and then they later changed it to R2. But it is I mean it a subdivision is an island to itself. And I think you have to look at at the island you're on, not outside of that island. And you know, I think it's going to set a bad precedent if we do this. you know, there's two other vacant lots in there. That could happen. A house burns down. The next guy that comes in and says, "This is what I want to do." He did it here. So, you could eventually have that whole thing turned into multif family lots 10 through 16. So, thank you.

Thank you, B. Anyone else wish to speak? you please raise your right hand. Did you swear or affirm under the penalties of perjury the testimony you are about to offer will be the truth? If so, answer I do. Put your hand down. Please identify yourself.

I'm Anna Wells. I live at 977 West Dogwood Drive. I am and my neighbor are the only two in that area with a duplex. Everything else in that area is a single family home. I'm not sure I understand why we're going to have somebody rent property, let alone maybe take care of it. And I back right up to that property. How wild are they going to be? This is a a family edition. I mean, we don't have nobody has big parties. Nobody does anything. But what's it gonna be with four families in that area next to my backyard? Uh my property, Rhonda's and my property are about the same size as what he's putting on there. And I can't imagine putting two more uh pieces of property on that, let alone to get out. We get out on Dogwood. Nobody in that area gets out on 40 highway. I know that me turning in off of 40 highway sometimes because I slowed down and the traffic behind me is still doing 45. So again, that concerns me with the traffic on 40 highway and four families trying to get in and out of that property.

So that's all I have to say. I have a question. Yes. Uh in this duplex property, you and her each own your individual unit, correct? Okay. And that was my concern that we were these people were going to be renting. There's no one in our neighborhood that rents. So again, do we know what we're going to get in there? And if so, how long are they going to be there? Are they going to be moving in and moving out? Um, I'm just concerned for our neighborhood. Thank you. Thank you.

Anyone else? Ma'am, would you please raise your right hand? Do you swear or affirm under the penalties of perjury the testimony you are about to offer will be the truth? So, answer I do. I do. May you put your hand down. Please identify yourself.

My name is Rhonda Jvenville. I live at 979 West Dogwood Drive. When I bought when I I don't know if it's a townhouse, a condo, or what? When I bought my place, I loved the environment. It was a quiet community. I knew it had older families in it and there wasn't much traffic or anything. I love the fact that in winter time I had deer in my yard. I saw wildlife. One mile from the courthouse, I saw wildlife. It made me feel good. And knowing that my neighbors in that tangle wood were older people, quiet, nothing going on, no parties or nothing. I raised my daughter there. She likes it there, too. But I can't see a dwelling like my neighbor Anna says behind me. That end dwelling. Five of my windows would be facing that duplex. I don't want to have to put a fence up to keep the wildlife out and everything. I love it the way it is. That's all I got to say.

Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Okay, we'll close the public comment portion at this time or discussion. Yes. Before we go any further, I I just wondering has Leslie been sworn in yet as an official member of our commission. I'm sorry to interrupt that, but I just got in. Well, was it at the mayor's office? Did you sign a piece of paper? Usually we do signed ones. Ashley didn't give me anything. Like I said, please raise your right hand. I just want to make sure we got it covered.

Do you have me to stand? Um, you may if you wish. Yes, please. Do you swear that you will faithfully discharge the duties of a member of the Columbia City Plan Commission and follow applicable rules and obligations there into appertaining? If so, say I do. I do. Thank you. I just want to make sure everything is official before we show anything. All right. Thank you. All right. Board discussion about this petition. Nathan, would you cover our options, please?

So, you're with a resoning, you've got four options. You've got the option to continue if you so desire. Uh, and then your three main ones to take action on would be to forward a favorable recommendation to the city council, an unfavorable recommendation, or to forward no recommendation. With any of those except for continue, you can attach uh required conditions and commitments. As I suggested, there are a couple different uh conditions that I recommend as commitments. Uh and that can be attached with any of those three options. Uh because then the the city council would figure out what they want to do, whether they approve it. if they approve it, uh they can still then carry forward those commitments. So don't think that an unfavorable recommendation you can send without commitments. I still recommend discussing those no matter which way you want to recommend.

Okay, Mr. Chairman. Wait, he's got a question. Yes.

I I just say I respect the petitioner. I have always supported uh future housing and development in our city. With that being said, um I also respect the people that live out there. I I don't live out there. Um, but I I've been made numerous trips out there and I I I just believe that after seeing the and I did check the uh remmonstrance addresses to make sure people were actually living there. I had remmonstrance before and people were resigning it from Lord knows where. Um, but I did double check, you know, the the responses and I I have to respect the people that live out there. There's a number of issues I agree with you on and there's a number of issues I have a different opinion on. Um so uh at this point in time it's very difficult for me personally to support this uh development. I don't I I would agree with the setback for one. I I think that building would be set out in front uh of those other homes that are out there. And I personally think that um it should be another house if it goes in um instead of a fourunit development. I I I think the building looks great. Honestly, I just don't think it's a good fit for out there. That's just my opinion. Nathan, can you clarify just so that I make sure that I'm understanding correctly? Because it's an R2, essentially he could have two separate homes that are multifamily on that one lot.

Uh R2 allows for single family, which is one dwelling unit per building, and two family, which is two dwelling units per building. So what you're getting at is having theoretically two two family dwellings. The lot size, you could do that under the existing zoning. However, the lot width would have to be uh variance would have to be obtained for the lot width. Under R3, you could still do that same concept to two family dwellings without variance because the the lot width is narrower. Okay.

Thank you. Anyone else?

Mr. Chairman, make the motion for an unfavorable recommendation on the following item of 25- CRE Z-2 or one, excuse me, JBW properties from R2 to R3. My reasons and concerns are this is evident of spot zoning and restrictions are not conforming. Second have a motion on floor to pass along an unfavorable recommendation to the city council uh by Larry Wi, second by Dennis Warick. Any further discussion? If not, uh, Amanda will have a roll call vote, please.

Chappelle, yes. Mickey, yes. Dan Wiggle, yes. Robinson, yes. Yes. We

Yes. Other business,

Amanda, did we have any other business? We talked about we talked about 2026 meeting dates last meeting, correct? Okay. So, um, just just a a discussion that Manda and I had when I stopped up today that you're thinking about switching how our minutes are going to come to us using a different

Oh, yeah. Um, we've been trying out both the Google Drive and SharePoint. Uh, you guys have been using Google Drive. SharePoint has been for the county. There are pros and cons to both ways of doing it. Um, but SharePoint offers more um, drive space and it's a little bit better integrated on our side. So, come the beginning of the year, we'll switch you guys over to SharePoint as well. Um, is it more user friendly? Depends on the user.

That's discrimination. I I could not I had to come and see Amanda to get this, but I was able to print this. Right. Share SharePoint seems to be a little bit better in terms of that. We haven't had those issues with the county members. However, we have had issues with SharePoint not interacting well with mobile devices. So, if you're trying to look on your phone, there's some workarounds. Google Drive is better integrated on a phone. So really old computers that don't like old Yeah,

we uh we don't I don't know what to do for you. Well, Miss Mr. Warick used to be on the library board. The library tends to get their computers upgraded about every three years. So I was think that more than a couple. Yes. Yes. As far as I know, nothing else. Second