Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

monthly meeting of the Dixon County Planning Commission. Before we go any further tonight's meeting, Brother Ramey, would you direct our minds, please?

Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for this day. We thank you for this opportunity to serve you and serve the people of Dixon County. And we ask that you lead us and guide us in every decision that we make. We hope that you do be pleased in your sight. We thank you and we honor you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

Amen. Mr. Hayes, would you call the roll, please?

Todd Berry. Tina Farris. Here. Darren Green. Here. Todd Lindsey. Here. Robert Qualls. Here. Tommy Brown. Jeff Chase. Here. Randy Ramey. Here. Paul Organ. Amanda Berry. Here. Patrick Reagan. Here. Mitchell Hardin. Present.

Mr. Chairman, we have a quorum. Thank you, sir. The first item on tonight's revised agenda here is the approval of the minutes of the last meeting, which was on May 14th. Is there any discussion with regard to those minutes? Any corrections, amendations, anything? I will say that under item one, Jocelyn Branch Road, that's not the way that we spell it out there in the country. It's just L-I-N. But other than that, I find nothing wrong with those minutes. I find them to be a fair representation of what happened at that meeting. And the chair would entertain a motion to approve the minutes as presented with that one very minor change.

I'll make a motion to approve.

Mr. Reagan so moves. Is there a second? Okay, Commissioner Amanda Berry seconds. Been properly moved, properly seconded for approval of the minutes. Those in favor state aye.

Aye.

Those opposed state nay. The opinion of the chair of the ayes have it. The minutes are approved. The next thing we need to do is recognize our visitors. I see we have several and that's good. We thank you for attending and if you want to speak again, speak now because once it's the once the meetings open, you're certainly free to stay here and enjoy all the excitement. But this is your chance to speak and I see I will recognize these people in the order they signed in for a maximum time of three minutes. to say whatever is pertinent to us on the Commission that's on your mind, but particularly if you want to discuss the items on tonight's agenda, that's what we really want to hear. So, Mr. Crookberg, Mr. Crookberg, is it Crookberg, sir? Crookberg. Crookberg, okay. Well, I like it when people get my name right, so I try to get other people's names right. Well, sir, would you like to come up here to the podium and address the Commissioners? All right.

I believe our item would be item number one on the agenda. It's a subdivision that we're trying to parcel out 20 acres on Sladen Wood Road. And we are trying to do approximately 10 lots there, one and a half to two and a half acre lots. And any questions on the plat that we've submitted, I'd be happy to answer them.

So this is for public comment. It's not a back and forth when your agenda item comes up. You may be asked to come back up.

Yeah. Okay, great. That's right. You don't have to contend with us on that right now. Thank you so much. Okay. Thank you, sir. All right. The next agenda item is the next person, and that is Sidney Goodwin.

That's me, but I won't let you go in front.

Is it okay if I go first? As long as just one person that signed up for the time gets it, we'll do that. Go ahead, sir.

I'm Mark Garten. I'm signed up right after him. Yeah, I see that. We'll just switch orders.

Is that okay? Yeah, I'll permit it if you all are willing to do that.

All right. So hi everybody. I'm Mark Garten. I talked last meeting as well, but I just wanted to, for anybody that wasn't there or just to refresh your memory about what we're trying to do, we're undoing the Lewis road. One, I guess that's number two on the, on the agenda. So basically we've owned the property or my parents have owned the property since 1990 and my sister and I want to move out onto the farm now too. So we'd like to, divide the property up into five tracks. We're going to take two of those. My parents will have one. We'll have two additional tracks. So we'd like to extend Lewis Road by 75 to 100 feet so that we can get road frontage to have those additional tracks on the 100 acres. I think that part's OK, extending the road, but we have to extend it to the road, the current road standard, which is pretty aggressive given the state of the current road. And so since we're only going about 100 feet, it's 2% of the current road. It's at the end of this road that I believe will never be brought up to the county road standard. It's a road that's not not a big travel at dead ends into our property. So anyway, to me, it feels like a perfect example of having an exception to where we can just make our extension of this 100 feet just to the existing road condition. Whatever the current road is, we'll just extend it that far to the existing construction, not to the new standard. So that's kind of what we're trying to do. And I think I think that's it, OK? Thank you.

That's Mr Garten's comments. Mr Goodwin have something to add if you would, Sir.

Yes Sir, I'm Sid Goodwin. I live right next door. There's a people here. Yes Sir, and when I found out about the. Development, I was a little bit concerned. But anyway, when I went over and talked to them, found out what they was wanting to do, I have no problem with it. I own 65 acres right next door to them. The road does need stuff done, I'll tell you that. In fact, I've got flags on the front of my property right now where the water people come down. And they were supposed to have done some work on that back glass. And the weather got to you, I think. So, I mean, that was, I was told. But anyway, all I want to say is to break 100 acres into five tracks is not much. That's not going to add a lot of traffic to the road. And I do support what they're trying to do. If it had been otherwise, I would not have supported that. And I told them that. That's really all I've got to say, except I support what they're trying to do. They're trying to get all their family back together, and I think that's a good thing. And it will limit the number of people that we will have on that road forever, you know. That's all I have to say. Thank you, sir.

I think you articulated that well, sir, and I appreciate your participation. That is the end of the public comment session. portion of tonight's meeting and we're going to get into the agenda at this point. And the first item is the, I'm probably going to get it wrong again, Crookerburg? Thank you. LLC subdivision, which is found on tax map 17, parcel 019.02, Sladenwood Road, Cumberland Furnace, Tennessee, 37501, A1 Agriculture, 10th District. And I think all of you all had in your packet a map of this proposed development.

so does anyone have any comments about this i have a question for 3b what it's only 0.66 acres what is the purpose of this it's combined with the other the uh 3A?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay, just the road goes between them?

Yeah, it's just to make it a Y as opposed to a straight right angle turn. At that size, there's nothing that can really be done with it as far as development. I hope you're planning on keeping it mowed off, but.

3A and 3B are considered one.

So the owner of 3A will have the right to do that, and I hope I would. I sure hope they will.

It's really all locked, right?

Yeah.

That staple line there, the zigzag indicates it's all one lock. Just have to goad over it. Yeah. It can only be one dwelling.

But that is still gonna be a public right of way. Okay, as long as we've established that, are there any other questions about this proposed development? Yes, sir, go ahead. Mr. Chairman, I have some concerns about the entrance, driveway entrance.

on lot 3a on lot 3a okay mr lindsey bear with me at the intersection for the stop signs at okay all right see there's two utility poles to the right are we creating a a hazard with a drive that close to an intersection i i think i understand your point there If you've been out there and looked at the lay of the land, it's just about impossible to put a drive anywhere else other than that location. I'm sure that's why it's there.

More or less, that's the only place that it would work. Okay.

Let me ask... If we need to, we can have the highway department go out and look at it.

before the final plat. Would that be Mr. Phillip or Mr. Jackie?

Yeah.

Okay.

I think Mr. Phillip.

Mr. Phillip would go out and look at it.

I like that recommendation. What is the typical speed? Does anybody in the highway department know perhaps? How fast people usually go on Boaz Branch Road? Before they get to this Y.

Right now the speed limit is set at 45 mile an hour, but however it's on the county commission coming up pretty soon, they're studying it, probably going to drop it to 35.

Okay, so people hit this road pretty hard is what you're saying, and it's probably harder than it should be. So it sounds like it really would be a good idea to make sure that this is something that won't create a sight distance hazard. You know, I hope the county commission will do something. what they've done well in other places in this county and take that into consideration. But that's really we can only concern ourselves about what is and what we've got to deal with right now. Are there any other concerns about this plat? Any potential problems that seem to be need to be addressed before we take a vote on it? If there's not, the chair would entertain a motion to approve item number one with the stipulation that the highway department will visit out there and make sure this is a feasible location for the driveway on lot 3A before final approval. Jeff? Jeff will make that motion. Mr. Jeff Chase, someone second that motion. Great with the same stipulation reoccur, I'll say so it's been moved and seconded that the lot item number one tax map 17 parcel 0.1 9 0 to Slade and Wood Road Cumberland furnace be approved with the stipulation that the county Highway Department will visit the site and make sure that the placement of the drive and what 3 a has proposed is appropriate. Is that a fair summary of your motion?

Mr. Chairman, there was a note from Miss Harrington about wanting a note on the plat that 3B is not a buildable independent lot of record. Can we add that in?

I would like if you if we all think it belongs on the slide and I think perhaps it does, then let's let's add that stipulation that that it be noted here on the final drawing that lot 3b is not and should not be construed as a buildable lot residential lot yeah yeah because but if you want to build an outbuilding yeah yeah that's permissible that could that could very well with the proper setback that could be no problem sure okay all right so everyone agree to amend the motion to that okay are there any more comments questions or additions all right i'm gonna say those in favor of accepting item one with the stipulations previously included state aye. Aye. Those opposed state no. Opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The motion is agreed to. That's item number one. Item number two is the Lewis Road extension previously discussed in the public comments. Who has something to say about that?

Mr. Chairman, I'd like to speak. First of all, I'd like to apologize for being absent at our last meeting and also to say thank you to this body for the discussion. I did watch the video. I've done a lot of research on this since last month. And again, I appreciate all of us having the opportunity to think about it a little bit more and take a look at it. I went out and drove to both locations at Beaver Court as well as the Lewis Road extension, looked at both of those and tried to put myself into the understanding of the landowner and what they're trying to accomplish here. And I can see that and understand that. I can see their vision and what you're trying to accomplish here as well. And then I also looked at our guidelines and our guidelines specifically on variances, which is what you're asking for on the subdivision. And one thing on subdivision, too, in watching that video from last month, I want to make clear that subdivision is not like a thought that you're suddenly going to build a ton of houses out there. You're taking 100 acres and you are dividing that into separate lots. That is a subdivision. There's a division, right? So it's under that. it's not a thought that you're suddenly going to build 100 homes out there or anything else, right? And when we say subdivision regulation in streets, it is subdivision for that specific definition. It's not, again, a bundle of homes, right? So to that, I read through the understandings of what we could see for a variance, what may be acceptable and what those guidelines are. And I can't find anything here that would allow us to agree to the variance that they're requesting for the roads to be anything but what should be followed in the current guidelines as they are.

Well, I understand your point, Commissioner, and I appreciate you going back and looking at what we did, and I'm sorry you weren't able to join us last month, but, well, are you getting, is anyone in your district besides the folks here that are obviously very concerned and very involved, are you getting input from any of your constituents in that district? I am not. Okay, that's fair enough. Well, does anyone else have something to add to this?

few things to highlight from the last meeting. This is a preliminary plan, so we would have to come back as a final to keep that in mind. We talked about two main things, and Mr. Hardin just mentioned one of them. Because of the number of bots involved and to have road funnage, they are having to extend Lewis Road into the property, right? And so the question is, what they've effectively asked for is a variance of county standards as to what that road needs to look like. They have to extend it. That's bedrock. But what does that road look like? So this body has the option, if you just approve it as is, you were saying go for the county standards. Or this body could vote to lower those standards. So that's one item we discussed last month, and that's what's before you now. You heard from Highway Director Jack Hodges, you know, opening the door to these things could put the county in jeopardy going forward. The second item, I just want to make clear, this will need to be noted on the final plat. It's not for the preliminary plat. But those back two lots are not connecting to this road. They are connecting to, forgive me, Beaver Court. Okay. That is a platted subdivision. Yes, it is. There is an area coming east to west of Beaver Court that connects to this property. it's just vacant land right now but it is intended to be dedicated over to the county so if this body approves this five lot subdivision this just from their property line not into their property from their property line To be report, they will have to connect and it will have to be the county standards. It's outside that property. It's how we're going to connect the backside bonded process all of that. So I just want to point out that we noted on the final flat that we are accepting that area. for dedication contingent upon it being built to county road standards, and that'll eventually make its way up to the county commission to fully accept it. But that's starting a process on the back side. Without that, they're not connected. Two lots that don't, really one lot that does not connect to a public right-of-way. Because it's just intended to be a public right-of-way right now. Beaver Court's just north-south. There's a stub out that connects to this property. That area's going to have to be built to County Road's standards. And I'm just pointing that out for everyone in the room and the applicant. And if this goes forward, that will have to improve. Nothing to vote on tonight.

Regardless of what other action we take, that has to happen. And there's no question about it being built two counties. That's not something we could waive if we wanted to in that instance.

Well, it wouldn't be appropriate because the area involved is not on their property. It's on the area. So that'll be for the final plan. The big part about that is in order for them to be able to be allowed to work in that area, this body has to agree to cart before the horse, but that's typical when you have an old subdivision and something new coming along later.

Alright, I think I understood that. I hope you all did. Are there any more concerns? I think the concerns expressed by the County Highway Department last month were very well re-highlighted then and now. Everyone understands that Anybody can come along after this and say, well, you did it for them. You've got to do it for us. That's the problem here. That's really what we're going to be voting on in a way. That's the thing. Because I don't think people are going to do anything but what they say they're going to do. And for the next... 20, 30, 40 years, I'm sure that's their intention. I'm pretty sure those intentions will be met. This is, what, about 60 years from now. And I've seen stuff that old come back around to this body. So I've seen stuff that's really surprised me.

I think we'll be able to look at what we've done in the past also.

Yeah, because we haven't done this for other people who've asked us. No, we haven't. We've kind of said, well, our guidelines mean what they say and they say what they mean. Okay, if nothing else, the chair will entertain a motion with regard to item number two on the agenda.

I'll make a motion to approve the preliminary plat with disapproval for the exception request, if that's the word.

Is that?

The variance request. The variance, yes.

Okay, that is a proper motion properly made. Does everyone understand the motion? The motion is to approve the extension of Lewis Road, but without the variance granted to the composition of that road. In other words, the road would have to still be built to Dixon County Highway Department standards. Is there a second for that motion? I'll second. Mr. Reagan seconds. It's been moved and seconded that the extension of Lewis Road be approved provided that it be built to the standards of the Dixie County Highway Department. Is that is that a proper summation of the motion? Okay. And it's a proper motion properly made. So the question is, do you approve of the extension of Lewis Road to Dixon County Highway Standards only as displayed on tax map 114, parcel 0.01.00 at 1180 Lewis Road, address Burns, Tennessee. Do you approve that or not? So those in favor, I'll tell you what, let's take this to a roll call, Mr. Councilor. Would that be appropriate? It's your call, Mr. Chair. Well, I think it's appropriate. How about that? All right. Ms. Trays, do... If you would call the roll, we'll do it that way. Tina Ferris.

With a heavy heart, I approve.

That's an aye? That's an aye. That's one aye. Okay, go ahead. Aaron Green. Aye. Todd Lindsey.

No.

Robert Qualls. No. Jeff Chase.

No.

randy ramey wait can we stop we need to stop because i'm i thought we were i i'm not then i'm confused with what with our responses let's let's let's don't vote on premises we don't all understand okay all right

What part of this, I'm not trying to be smart with you, but what part of this do you not get?

I thought I was approving the plat with disapprovement of the variance. And I was approving, and then the people that were saying we shouldn't do it were saying no. So now I'm confused.

I agree. Okay. Restate the motion. It's going to read years from now. You were saying yes to this preliminary plat, no to the variance, meaning the road has to be built to Dixon County Stadium. Correct. So if you vote yes, that is what you were doing. If you vote to deny a preliminary plat, I need a reason you're denying the preliminary plat itself. Because they're compliant with all other aspects of the road.

That's where the motion stands. Right now, it's a motion to approve of the extension to Lewis Road, but to disapprove any variance to Dixon County Highway standards. The chair accepts that. Council, we can do that, can't we? Let's do it that way then. Okay, does everybody get to vote now? If you vote yes, you're saying it's fine for Lewis Road to be extended. It has to be extended according to the standards of the Dixon County Highway Department. And I'll even... at the applicant's own cost. And I think they want this on the record, so I'll bring it up. Even though Lewis Road, as it currently exists, does not meet Dixon County standards and was accepted as a county road before there were standards, basically, or certainly not the current ones.

If you vote yes, you're saying it's a normal preliminary plan with all the requirements.

And it is that.

no okay all right I hate to do this to you mr. Hayes but would you start the roll call again Tina Farris yes Darren green yes Todd Lindsey yes Robert qualls yes Jeff chase Randy Ramey yes Amanda berry yes Patrick Reagan yes Mitchell Harden yes it's unanimous mr. chairman thank you sir

Well, that's the end of item number two for this meeting. And the next thing we're gonna look at, and this is a change, we're not gonna talk about the rural commercial building standards tonight. So we need to talk about the amendments to the zoning resolution, and there's some proposed amendments to the zoning resolution that were in your packet. And... I think I'm just, I don't think we need a motion on them because I think we just need to open discussion. Yeah, please do that. Would you like to summarize both for us then, Counselor? Yeah. Thank you.

So I'll point those out. But amendment number one is in compliance with the changes to state law. It's adding a definition for substantial compliance. So for 12 years, when someone submitted a site plan or a plan, it was not vested. We've talked about vesting before. We'll talk about it again. But it was not vested until this body approved it. State law changed to say it's vested when they submit. Well, that's dangerous because what if someone submits an active? Is that vested? So this definition says you have to have submitted everything necessary for a yes or no vote. No missing documents, fully formed. This is a common definition we're seeing by jurisdictions across the state to say, and it tries to move that vesting date as Technically, technically it was vested the day they submitted it. This is just confirmation of that. So we have to have a definition. This protects the county. So we're adding this definition in furtherance of state law.

In other words, we're not saying substantial compliance is a commonly used term of art and everybody knows what it means. Here's what it means. Correct.

Because the statute said substantial compliance. It didn't say what it meant.

Every jurisdiction gets to define it. Well, we just defined it. Okay. And since it is a state law, I would strongly encourage you to adopt this.

okay do you have discussion for what the traffic impact study guidelines mean please do so for amendment number two this is actually what started the subcommittee meeting was these developments that come in under the current trigger for traffic impact studies that was a concern to several planning commissioners so right now the big triggers are 25 000 square feet of forest place or 50 lots. There's some other triggers, but those are your two big triggers. This looks to substantially reduce when a trigger is hit. So subsection A there, any commercial or industrial development Because you could have a very small driver that has a ton of traffic implications. A Starbucks or just a coffee shop is 1,500 square feet sometimes. So it's designed to catch these small but impactful commercial or industrial developments. So it's just any of them have to do with traffic impacts. Planned unit development that was already in our regs, that's keeping it. The subcommittee wanted your input on it. So again, right now, 50 lots is the trigger. What's in here is a major subdivision. A major subdivision is five lots or more. The discussion at the last subcommittee meeting was, that's what we want, but it may be a little harsh. may be a little harsh because a subdivision that comes to the five lots needs to do a traffic impact study is that appropriate um so i think the discussion and we'll get to it uh i want to hear from y'all uh is 50 was too much better lower number what's written right now is five so it's on you to decide should it be a higher number And then the other thing we wanted to make sure to add in is from time to time, especially for bigger, more complex developments, we haven't had any recently, but the county may want to have a third party engineer review their traffic impact study. That can get rather pricey, and it's common to have, it's either the planning director Or this body can say, hey, we're going to defer this, and we want our own engineer to review this, so they can explain it to us. Sometimes traffic studies are a little Greek, right? What does this mean? So it requires the cost of that review to be borne by the applicant. And again, that's only if the county decides to have a third-party engineer review the traffic impact study that was submitted. So that's amendment number two. Amendment number three is kind of long in the running. I think you all remember Nubbin Ridge Road started this discussion. In the C1 zoning district, there's agriculturally oriented uses, and one of them is light industrial uses. The subcommittee met and discussed deleting that. It's actually been also a request from a county commissioner.

So it is before you to delete that aspect from the C1 zoning district. I will point out that there will be no even light

agriculturally oriented uses in the entire rural area if you take this out because you would have to go c2 or one of the light industrial districts and those are not allowed in the rural area fine i'm just pointing out you're closing that door you're still allowing several commercial uses as defined in c1 you're tightening it down by removing light industrial uses The last one is to kind of create some consistency and applicability throughout the zoning resolution. In R2 and R3, there are certain access management standards. In fact, let me pull them up briefly. you have to have at least two access points in every major subdivision. That's five lots or more. That's pretty small to have to have two access points. And then in R3, it's 25 lots to trigger a second access point. And these access points are designed not only for flow and traffic, but we're talking emergency services. What if there's a wreck at an entrance and then someone in the back has a heart attack? I know that's like .0001% of what's happening, but a second entrance can solve that problem. So having minimum standards for a second access point is good. So what we have proposed here, what the subcommittee talked about was let's have uniform standards across the zoning resolution. So one to 30 lots, one access is okay. Once you hit 31 lots, two, and we'll probably never see it, but if you hit 150, you have to have a third access point. For non-residential developments, that's commercial, industrial, anything, it goes by parking spaces. So once you hit 30 parking spaces, you have to have that second access point. That's way more geared towards safety and emergency access. Finally, subsection D there talks about connectivity, which this was independently arrived at, but it actually relates to Lewis Road. All subdivisions have planned on being connected to in the future. So they, even if you have a cul-de-sac, you need an area on your plat, again, just like off of the report, that's 50 feet wide and connects to the backside of your property. So if anyone ever comes along, they can connect and go down the road and continue that on. So it's a... connectivity is a desired policy of the county so when you come in with your subdivision plot if you do a cul-de-sac you have an end road somewhere you have to act like of legal description it's a full 50 foot wide road all the way out even though you didn't fully connect it the next development So again, that's just a little bit of a shift. We have other provisions in the zoning resolution that speak to that, but this was very direct. So Mr. Chairman, those are the four amendments. I'll be happy to entertain any questions for me, Director Hayes, or Ms. Harrington. If you all have questions about any of this, I think, again, the subcommittee was really looking for some guidance on the trigger for a traffic impact study for major subdivisions or maybe something more, but something less than two.

Just by way of background on this, I think this was probably even before you were regularly at the meetings. This was several years back. There may be two or three of y'all that remember this besides me. We talked about circumstances that we'd seen other places, and I was one of the average bringers up of this because I could tell you the town exactly. But just suffice it to say, There's a town that's also along Highway 70 in this state that every farm along there became a subdivision and every one of them they built one residential street dead end right down the middle of that farm and sold lots off both sides and if there's a fire that spreads from one of those houses back across the yard to the other one's backyard the only way to get the fire engine around is go all the way back out the highway back down that other street and it's to say it's suboptimal is an understatement You don't want that. You want everything that's building out to have the potentiality for connectivity. And that's the purpose of this amendment. And I certainly agree with that. And I'd like to hear anybody that has discussion for any of these amendments and why they may or may not be right.

Okay, I have something. And I was part of the subcommittee. I really put a lot more thought into it. If we stick with the five, that means every time. Every time a plaque comes to us, we're going to be requiring a traffic study. And I think that could be excessive. I think White Bluff does this. They're at five, and that's why we originally thought of that. But I think we should up it to like half of 50 and be 25.

I've got to say I was thinking more in terms of 10. I would say this. you have to look at when you're going to make people pay for a traffic study you've got to look at what are they realistically going to make off doing this development and are we going to be giving them such a big overhead they'll just assume not do it and i don't want to do that but i don't want to burden infrastructure that in so many places and not just in white bluff but it's a good example where infrastructure is already strained We need a traffic impact study. And again, we've talked about how that's a term of art. There's levels of intensity it has to meet to qualify as a traffic impact study as opposed to assessment or something else. I think it's all right to get it away from five because, again, there's... You start putting that on a five lot subdivision and there's not much money to be made in building one and we don't want to make it impossible to do something like that or I have no interest in. Again, I we're not the development prevention department. But I think we should be pretty strict on this. Again, 10 is just my idea.

Mr. Chairman, if I may, just by background.

Yes.

I just had to go through this. What is a traffic study? We have a PCA hearing in White Bluff. A traffic impact study isn't just about traffic.

No.

and flow, and the number is, candidly, 10, 20, 30, it's gonna say it has no traffic impact. It's just not. We've seen it before. It's gotta get big before it truly has a traffic impact, but there are other elements to a traffic impact that are important. It can tell you the conditions of the roads, whether there is a problem at an intersection. There's so many layers, and maybe if you have more to add, but that's, it's not just how many cars are on the road at any one time. There's a lot more to it.

Well, again, just to go back. It's recently as this past winter, the traffic impact study for the former drive in. between Dixon and White Bluff showed that it wasn't gonna have any appreciable impact on traffic. That was their conclusion. None of us really believed that because, partly because as councilor said, you can disclose there's a lot of problem with that intersection at Rockchurch Road and 70 right now. But yeah, it's very important for the reasons you just said and I don't wanna skip over it lightly, but I don't think a five or six unit subdivision should trigger it. I agree with that.

The last thing I'll add is they're not inexpensive.

That's a nice way of putting it, too. Yes, ma'am.

Go ahead, Ms. Perry. Is this Mr. Hodges? Do you have an opinion on this? I mean, you've been in this way longer than I have.

Well, the price of the traffic studies can get to be, you know, a good one. And as he said, you've got to kind of take into consideration somebody with five lots. you know, are they really going to want to try to put that much more money in? And if they do, it's just driving up the price of the house. At the end of the day, you know, if they're trying to build spade houses for starter homes, it's just going to add more money to the price of the house.

And we may not love it, but it's hard to say we don't need those. Right.

Now, there are situations where they're definitely needed just for the reasons that the council just spoke of, and they're there for a good reason. looking at the amount of traffic it's going to add to a road. There's development coming in out of Burns that it's great. It actually gave us a study for a red light. We've been able to take that study and move forward with it, hopefully obtaining some funding to get a red light put in out there at White Wolf Road 96. Those are the things that come out that make it good. Now, it's something you just have to weigh out. Do you want to put that extra cost on those spec houses?

is it worth it at the end of the day a lot of things that you guys got a way out that's i'm glad y'all are in that seat mr chase if you and counselor correct me if i'm wrong this stemmed originally because we were not at five we were with we white bluff went to five if i'm not mistaken because you do five here ten years and then all of a sudden somebody wants to come in and do five lots but you already got 75 lots in there and nobody's done a traffic study so at some point you gotta say you gotta You gotta nip it in the bud, I believe, and say five is really tough, but by the same token, if we don't keep it real low, that's what's going to happen with the way that things are being developed. That somebody's gonna get stuck after they put 75 lots in, and well, now the limit's 75, I gotta do a traffic study.

So at any rate, I'm... No, I mean, the current trigger's 50. The different jurisdictions handle it differently on what the trigger should be. y'all are trying to decide when should the county see one that's appropriate i'll speak for commissioner todd berry i think he was the one who first brought this up because there were a series of sub 50 subdivisions before this body yes earlier this year okay i know it wasn't real long ago so one came in at 25 one came in at 40 none of them triggered a traffic study at some point You have to ask yourself, well, should we have seen one? And I think that's what this was designed to try to get to, just to find this one.

So I think, you know, with White Bluff, so in this whole thing, we have to look at density. So in White Bluff, it's very dense, right? So this population, small area, a footprint of five homes makes a big difference versus... the plot we just looked at. Would we consider that these folks need to do a traffic study for this? But what if a railroad was running through the middle of the property? Okay, and then how do you get to homes, right? So there's these other things that kind of stand out. I think five is for the county. I think it is a little aggressive. It is. What I do like about it though is it does keep stuff in check. So what's to keep someone from saying, well, I've got a five here, five here, five here, but then like you're saying –

put that all together and all of a sudden we got 30 to 50. My first phase is 5 and then phase 2 is 7 and then phase 3 is 8 and pretty soon you've built a whole subdivision out and nobody ever looked at the traffic flow. So

Well, if they had a preliminary plan that had faces like that, we would have to do it on the whole. I think what we're talking about is someone comes in with a final plan.

Individual subdivision here. Another final plan.

I also want y'all to be thinking about who's going to be looking at this next is the county commission. I think it's a sincere desire of at least the subcommittee. to have it be lowered from 50, but if you go too low, it may not pass the county commission. I don't know, but I will speak for them. I just don't want you to keep that in mind. If it has to pass this body, it has to pass another body, and I think that's a balance you need to take into account.

Are there any realistic exceptions that we can put there? I know that we talked about a waiver.

We did talk about a waiver. I didn't draft one. This body could decide to amend this tonight if you wanted to. We talked about the Planning Commission could choose to waive a traffic setting. That was required, so say we kept it at Major Center Division. The plaque tonight came in and you looked at it and said, you know, we don't need that. That being said, it's technically not supposed to get to you unless they've done a traffic setting. So we do have, so the way it would probably work is you look at it and make a decision and then they have to go get a traffic study. The logistics of that can be difficult, especially since state law says once you have considered a plat, you have 60 days to act or it's automatically approved. That's one of the big dangers we have once a plat comes before you. So I think it would have to be at staff level to waive it, but also I'll speak for them. I don't think they want that responsibility. I think that is something that should be objective. Something this body and the county commission says, here's when you do it, here's when you don't. Because once you get into that area, we get into, you granted a waiver for him and he was nine lots and I'm eight. Why don't you give me a waiver? So we're trying to get into that game and kind of worry about the waiver process a little bit. Mr. Hayes, must you really want to be waiving traffic studies before they come up?

No, not really. We can't force this off. I think we need to settle on a number and approve that number to when we have to have a traffic study.

When you say staff, are you saying those three?

You see any more planning staff around here?

Mr. Hodge wouldn't be involved in it. Uh, no, I mean, he'll be involved in the road part, uh, and he gets, you know, he gets advised that he's insulted enough.

He'll be a part of the scope meeting.

Yeah. So, does the county highway department now, do they got a traffic study on any of the roads right now? Is that why we set it at 50 because they had the traffic study up to that point?

Say that another way for me.

So anything over 50, we haven't had to track the study. That's where we are right now. So the county has done a traffic study up to that point. That's why it's good to 50, right?

No, we were doing, correct me if I'm wrong, we were doing a speed study?

Mm-hmm.

Yes, that's only studies we've done so far.

Yeah, that's just determining what the speed limit should be. That's not getting into the development of traffic.

Yeah, the traffic study, all it's going to do is just give us an idea of whether or not, how that extra traffic is going to affect the roads.

How many new trips a day are going to be generated by this development?

If there's some kind of new safety measures that would kick in and have to be put in, whether it be turning lanes, a red light, anything to that factor. That way it's been studied. The traffic count is projected to be there. Everybody knows what's involved out of the gate.

So really what we're discussing here is how we define a major subdivision.

For this, for this, for this.

And that was the trigger.

But now we could, this is, this is one of those easy fixes. We can say B and say a major subdivision of blank units, five units, 10 units, 12 units, 15.

Or you can do what we have right now. It just says 50 lots. Yeah.

Yeah, but but we even even by still using the term major subdivision, we could break it down the same major subdivision of 10 or more units. And we don't have to rewrite anything to the end. But yeah, I think that's good. Now, Do we, let me, I guess I'm depending on you for a parliamentary question, I should know, but we need to vote on each one of these as an amendment necessarily?

I'm actually asking this body to take them all at once.

Okay, well that's kind of what we've done.

yeah let's move past uh one or two or three um but if this body wants to change anything before the vote the emotion to for example i move we change any major subdivision to block there'll be a vote on that to change what's before you tonight and we'll get towards some final plan okay i okay that i appreciate the recommendation counselor

So do we need to dig into this any deeper? I have a question for Mr. Neal. No, please. This is a great time.

Five is aggressive. But you do have the people who keep doing it in segments. So is there a way to put in there like it's 10 or more or whatever number we decide on and taking into account what's been built there within a...

Certain time frame? Boy. That's great, isn't it?

I mean, it is, but that's what makes a difference.

Here's the problem. And if Mr. Hayes or Ms. Harrington have any thoughts, traffic studies are by individual developments. Yeah. Right? So we're looking at that. Now, you do a traffic study, and an engineer can explain this better. They are required to look at everything in the area. It's not like it's blank right there. If there's been five developments up the road and then the sixth development comes in, they will have to take into account all five of those developments when they do a traffic sign. So it's not going to be ignored, but I don't think there's a mechanism to say, we're going to look at this area and see how much it's going to be recently. I don't see that being viable. I thought about it. I know we talked about it. But you have to go by development for a traffic impact study requirement. I don't know, Amanda, if you have.

I think that's right. And with traffic studies, you'll have what's called a scope and meaning. and where the you know highway department would probably be involved involved anybody else in planning staff would be involved and we would take a look at the project and determine what would be appropriate whether to go a half mile out a mile a mile and a half whatever's prescribed to catch those type of developments but i think I think perhaps what you might be getting at is to get those developments that are segmented, to get those that are phased. If you know that it's going to be part of a, like Andrew was saying, You'll get a plan in and hopefully they will indicate that the project is going to be fixed. And we would see that and we would do a traffic study on the entire project. What's sneaking up on us are the ones that aren't showing that. ones that come in straight with a final plant, and then a couple months later they come in with another one that is like 15 or whatever or something. I think what you're asking is, is there a way to capture those segments of those top plants?

Yeah, I want to get away with them getting away with that.

Well, the thing about it is you may have one developer come in and do five lots or ten lots, then you got a different one come in. If you try to make that one do a traffic study, you're pointing the finger at this one because the first one didn't do it. They're doing the same amount of lots, but now you're wanting him to do a traffic study on the same amount of lots that this guy just done. So you're pointing the finger at... That's one thing we gotta watch is, you know, if it's the same developer doing it, that's a different thing, but it's not always that case.

I think that goes to Andrew's point, Mr. Mills' point of it being developer specific, development specific, and that's why the lower the threshold, the more likely you are to catch those things.

Yeah, I see that. I think we've kind of got a problem here of just the way things work. As it's been stated, a traffic study is going to study regional traffic all around there with all the other subdivisions or whatever have been built, shopping centers. They're going to take all that consideration. We don't have that before us. What's there is there. And we've got to do this in isolation on our end, even though in the real world, it's nothing isolated about it. But we've got to have an objective standard or you're going to get, hey, that guy did 12 lots there just a year ago and you're asking me to do a traffic study because I want to do 11? No, I'm not going to do... And you're setting yourself up and what you have to do is, okay, picture that in chance record. and then picture the chancellor telling us that we lost, because that's what's going to happen if we do that. And I don't, anytime we can prevent litigation before it starts, that's what I want to do. Now having said that, if we got some more input on this, because I'm not trying to cut anybody short, but I'm kind of wanting to bring this to a head and bring it to a vote if we can.

I'd like to see it at anything more than 10.

Well, I'm... Was there a motion to change that to 10 blocks?

Yes, more than 10.

Okay, let me... 15. Okay, well... Well, I think Well, I think it Yeah, that's that's what I was about to say. I don't know. I think you said I just just for purposes discussion, the chair is going to move that we accept amendments one through four with the stipulation that under amendment to traffic impact study that sub point B, say any major subdivision of 10 units more ten units or more it's got to be done by lots okay okay well well okay now does that for a subdivision yes that'll work if we're gonna say industrial development we do it by parking spaces but for this one we're talking about a residential subdivision of ten lots or more Okay, all right. I think that's my motion. Does anyone have a second for that? Okay, Mr. Chase seconds the chair's motion to include the words under B of any major subdivision of 10 lots or more. Okay. Does anybody have more discussion on that before we vote?

yes i i do for amendment three for the because we're deleting that light industrial uses i think everybody's good with that i sure know i am okay so that would be like a dog groomers or anything like that that's light industrial right not industrial that's commercial uh that's we talked about yeah so those are allowed in the industrial district they're also allowed in other in other sections of the books okay i just wanted to make sure yeah i sure can yeah okay all right just wanted to make sure thank you all right

So the motion as made and seconded is this. We approve all four amendments with the stipulation that under subsection B of amendment two, that the words any major subdivision be amended to say any major subdivision of 10 lots or more. All right, that's the motion I'm going to call for the vote unless somebody got another reason not to. All right. Those in favor of accepting all four amendments with that one stipulation signify by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed say no. No. Okay. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. Counselor, do you think we should go for a roll call vote on this? I mean, well, I think it's pretty obvious. I mean, I got a question. Go ahead and ask it.

10 or more. No, 11, 13, 29, 10 or more. It's 10 to whatever.

Any number greater. we're not gonna say if it's an even number yes and if it's odd number no or something like that yeah that's it can I ask why Commissioner for District 12 said no are we allowed to ask that he doesn't have to answer but you're allowed to ask I understand

So I've been here for a little over a year, and I'm trying to think of how many flats have come to us of five lots or more. Okay, well, we've had to take a look at this. And honestly, I think it's a very manageable amount. I know what you're saying. Because to the points we're making here, it helps to keep things in check. It does make it, I'm not saying difficult, but it... it makes sure that the development is qualified right so this is going to happen the way it needs to happen with the body and i understand it also opens up a little bit of a can of worms to say look we'll you know we'll give you a pass on right if it's five if they if they do this application they continue you can't apply for um to say you don't have requirement. I'm just scared that something that they can get around, I'm scared that they can get around it already even just a five and it'd be an even easier attempt for more. That's .

Our number now is 50 for an impact study. Our number now is 50 for an impact study, so we're lowering. Yeah, we just lowered it from 50 to 10.

Yeah, we're wording the amendment in such a way that instead of being 50, it'll now be a 10. And again, I want to throw out something that was mentioned earlier.

the county commission still has to prove on this and if we ride on it too hard they're not going to approve it but anyway well based on those facts well it's it's okay it was a voice vote so it's it's already approved now that's right that's it for that That's it for that. Now I want to throw something out that's not on the agenda, and partly I guess I need to refresh my own memory. You know, we adopted these subdivision regulations a long time ago. Was anybody in this part of the world discussing data centers at that time? At that time? At that time. I don't even think that, I don't even know if that term was used. Because it's been a while since we adopted this current set of subdivision regulations.

Well, it's starting to be a discussion.

I think this is a good time to get proactive. And I'm not a totally unbiased arbiter of this in that I worked for several months at a data center a few years ago in Nashville. And now this is my opinion of data center as far as, is it something, if you're a commercial development, you want it? Oh yeah, because you want that high, power capability coming to the edge of your commercial development. It's zero emissions on that site. Now I can't say that about the steam plant over in Cumberland City that's powering it ultimately is a long way from zero emissions, but it's clean in your immediate area and it's very quiet and it has lots of security usually which is a benefit to the other tenants. So it's a real nice thing in a lot of ways. Now If anybody's paid attention to all the news around Nashville last couple weeks, there's obvious downsides. And like I said, I worked at one and all that's true too. But do we need to start proactively?

The subcommittee has already discussed it. It's going to go on the chopping block for discussion at the subcommittee level. That's why I think this body will see it.

Well, I'm looking forward to that. And that's really being proactive. I'm glad you already brought it up.

Thank you.

Well, they're probably pretty astute. Does anybody have anything else? I'd like to kind of go to the house and watch ice hockey or the World Cup or something. It's not this. And there's not the war, too. I'd like to not watch the war. All right. If there's nothing else, the chair would entertain a motion that the planning commission adjourn. I'll make the motion. Commissioner Berry moves. Is there a second?

I second.

Commissioner Reagan seconds. Those in favor say aye. Aye. Meeting's adjourned.