Boc Joint Planning & Zoning - Special Meeting

in district 4 and vice chairman Mark Alcarez. I believe you're on line with us. Yes, ma'am. I can hear you now. Okay, we have a quorum and we are present and accounted for. So, thank you. We do have a quorum. Okay. Thank you so much. Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, also present, we have members of the planning and zoning board. If you would confirm your presence when I call your name. Uh, Oric Curry, District Two, present. Brandon Penman, District One, present. Frank Payne, our atlarge member, present. And Dr. Chris Small, our Douglas County School System representative, present.

Uh, Melissa Pul is excused tonight and so is Rob Thomas, our vice chair. And before we go on, uh, I would like to take a moment to thank Rob Thomas. This will be his last meeting with the Planning and Zoning Board. He's uh really been committed with us for the last few years and we will miss Rob going forward. But we do have a quorum. Uh Allison Duncan, our planning and zoning manager, will now introduce the county staff planning and zoning staff president in the meeting. Miss Duncan.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh tonight we have with us our chief of staff, Tiffany Stewart Stanley. Uh we have our uh legal department, uh Thomas Mitchell. We have our managing director of transportation, Sullean Rana. We have our managing director of development services, James Worthington. We have our deputy director of development services, Travis McDonald. We have our zoning administrator, Austin Cronin. We have our planner, Melody Glenn. And we have the clerk of the planning and zoning board, Johanna Wac. And we appreciate our sheriff's deputies and our communications team for assisting us tonight as well. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Uh there is a reversionary clause that applies to each reszoning and that is the applicant, the agent or the property owner has 24 months to vest the zoning change after the board of commissioners have granted an approval. As far as tonight's procedure goes, I will conduct the public hearings. Planning and zoning staff will introduce each item followed by a presentation on that item. The applicant or applicant's representative and members of the public in favor may present their information. They will have two minutes per person for a total allocated time of 15 minutes to speak on behalf of an application. Members of the public in opposition will also be able to present their information. They too will have two minutes per person for a total allocated time of 15 minutes. After the opposition completes their input or the time is elapsed, the public hearing will be officially closed. At that point, the staff will clarify any points of the cases. The staff is unable to satisfy the board's questions. The board will then ask for points of clarification. Planning and zoning board will then entertain a motion. Uh first agenda item tonight, Miss Duncan. Let's move forward.

All right. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um we are doing things a little bit differently tonight. So this special called meeting is to focus specifically on text amendments. Um there are some substantive policy changes that we've been working on for several months and we appreciate everybody coming together tonight to go through those. We're going to start with our presentations up front. Um so this will be a little bit like a work session where you have the opportunity to ask us questions and answer specifically about what we're proposing and then once we get through all of our presentations um and answer all of your questions, we will then roll into the public hearings. So we have a variety of text amendments. You can see those outlined there on your screen um to the unified development co code. These are all listed on your agenda and they have been advertised. Um we have two comprehensive plan amendments um to support the text amendments should the board decide to move in that direction. And finally, we have a zoning map amendment. Again, all of this information is in the packet that was uh presented to you and is available to the public on the website. So, we're going to present tonight and then we'll take each of the amendments one by one and have the public hearing at that time. Um does that make sense? some questions about that because what we're going to do is jump right into kind of the the first area that we wanted to share with you tonight. So, these are revisions to the zoning in the area of Cedar Mountain overlay, the uh Central West workplace campus overlay, and the estate density overlay. And I'm going to just run for you a few, excuse me, I'm just going to run you through a few slides to tell you, you know, kind of what we've been looking at and what we've been working on in this area. So, this is primarily concentrated in the northwest corner of Douglas County. Um, what you see there before you on the map in the light blue, that was our workplace campus. Um, that was a placeholder for an area that we thought made sense for economic development expansion. Um, one of the things that we had put in the comprehensive plan is that we wanted to see that come in under a master plan um, development. Adjacent to that, that dark purple color on the map, that's our character area for the community of Winston. Um, as many of you know,

Winston at one time, um, had a sense of identity, a post office, you know, kind of a little downtown organized there on the railroad. I don't know that it was ever an incorporated place, but it still is very much a place that people know and understand and feel a sense of attachment to. So, we carved out an area that we wanted to say, let's do a little a little more planning around this community center for Winston. And then finally, the green boundary there. That's our rural reserve. So these are kind of areas of unincorporated Douglas County outside of any of the cities or outside of any of the areas that have that community identity like Winston. And we're going to be focusing on several zoning changes that would broadly apply to this area. So uh the the key driver of this is that sewer is being constructed to serve two new data center projects in this area. Most of the area is zoned for residential development at this time. Uh and as I said previously, the master plan uh excuse me, the master plan development zoning did not precede the construction of the sewer line. So projects that are proposed to develop under the base zoning may introduce higher density development and we're concerned that they may erode the vision that we have, you know, for this area is developing as kind of three stink three distinct areas, right? So that unincorporated rural area, you know, focusing on that town center uh area of Winston and then finally the workplace campus that we had identified. So, we've also um been made aware of environmentally sensitive areas in proximity to Cedar Mountain, and we're going to tell you a little bit about that tonight. Um and then the comprehensive plan did contemplate previously that environmentally sensitive areas would have been identified as an overall master plan in this area. Um the staff's concern is we've gotten a little out ahead of that, you know, with the expansion of the sewer into this area without fully having the vision in place. And so, what we're doing tonight is proposing a series of overlays. I want to make it clear that this buys us time, right? This is not the end um of what I think needs to probably happen in this area to bring the vision to fruition. Um but we have the opportunity to buy some time around several of these areas. And so that's what we would like to share with you right now. The first thing we're going to talk about is the Cedar

Mountain overlay. Um this is roughly bounded by Cedar Mountain Road on the north, Man Road on the west, South Flat Rock Road in the east, and then the south is the utility line. And that's kind of what I have overlaid there in the hashed um uh the hashed area in front of you. Um we also have received some feedback that we may need to adjust our boundary a little bit north of Cedar Mountain Road. This came in after the packet was published, but I wanted to kind of put this information in front of you because I think some folks who are here to speak in regard to this may reference some of this information. Um Cedar Mountain has been an area going back to at least 1968 in our long-range planning maps. Um so we had identified it in the comprehensive plan in ' 68 and then there was a fair amount of documentation done in 1978 um in terms of being a natural area in Douglas County by the department of natural resources. We see it again in 2000 when Douglas County put in their application for the Georgia green space program grant. Um but I can't tell you exactly what happened after 2000. Right? So we kind of stopped talking about Cedar Mountain um as a place. I think perhaps catalyzed by some of the development moving into that area with the data centers and the sewer line. Um we have been made aware of some additional um environmentally sensitive areas that are probably worth giving consideration to. So in just a minute I'm going to turn it over to some folks who are far more qualified to speak to that than I am. But just wanted to let you know where we're headed with this overlay. Um is looking at something that would have a pre-application meeting requirement. um requirements for botanical, geological, archaeological, and cultural resources as well as looking specifically at wildlife habitat. Um we would ask that this is done by a credentialed individual using publicly available resources. Um and then they would have to return a report of whether there would be a lower high probability of impact from any new development in the area. So again, keep in mind that boundary that I'm talking about, that's just the area that we're talking about here. There is an administrative approval that is contemplated under this

text amendment for anything um that is found to have no uh negative finding or no negative impact. However, if uh it was returned that there was a potential impact to the area, we would then have to send that on to the board of commissioners for a special use permit to be approved. Um I'm going to pause right there and ask any questions about anything that I have put forward so far before I turn it over to our guest to share some more detailed information. No, nothing so far. All right, then I'm going to ask Austin to assist me in [clears throat] Madam Chair, I like to ask question.

Okay. U Commissioner Alarez. So in regards to a lot of this information from brought before me, I mean there's a lot of sensitive information in regards to like DNR and special exotic plants in regards to that area that that we really need to take into consideration and also with the workplace campus. I mean because that was not known to us before then but now it's been brought to our attention and so I would like for us to you know make sure that we look at this I mean cuz this is on the Georgia DNR u consideration in regards to like a reserve or an natural area. So I would like for us to just make sure we take this in consideration going forward because we did not know this and it was brought for us and then now my predecessor did not did did not know this but it was brought for me. So I would like to make sure that we look at this going forward and re-evaluate that BF in regards to the workplace campus.

All right. So, if it's okay with you, Madam Chair, I'll turn it over to our um stakeholders. Thank you, uh, Commissioner, Vice Chair Alcarez, for sharing that with us. We, um, have largely been doing this work, you know, based on the information that was presented, like I said, in light of the approvals, um, of some of the developments for the workplace campus. And I'm going to bring up their slides here, and I'm going to introduce this Lee. I'm gonna introduce Lee. I'm going to introduce to Whit Roer who is going to speak initially um to the uh information in this area. So as you come up if you please just state your name and address for the record and then share whatever you have to share. Thank you. Dit Roer, 6826 Cedar Mountain Road, Douglasville.

Thank you.

For years I've tried to get elected representatives from Douglas County to help save the jewel of Douglas County, Cedar Mountain, but with no results or any interest at all. Cedar Mountain is not only rare, special, and unique to the county and the state, but the entire US. There's no other place like it in the United States, [clears throat] but and the entire world. Is that right? It's unique. It's unique to the entire world. But last year, I was introduced to Allison Duncan and her exceptional staff, Alison and Melody. Along with myself, Allison and her staff, two very professional botnists and two professors of ecology. We started having regular meeting to see how we could try to save this special place. Tom Patrick was called Georgia's botnist. He was he worked for the DNR. He called Cedar Mountain a botanical treasure that should be preserved at all cost. Tonight's meeting is a culmination of all our efforts so far. So far. I hope after our presentation of facts, empirical evidence, and DNR reports, everyone here will appreciate and see Cedar Mountain as we do. [clears throat] Uh, it's a botanical, ecological, and irreplaceable treasure. The DNR and Douglas County have known about Cedar Mountain for decades going back to the 60s. If you will turn to page two of the handout that I think I gave everyone,

yeah, I I didn't have enough for y'all. U, the commissioners do, but we'll get we'll make sure we get y'all some. Uh you see this is Douglas Countyy's comprehensive plan prepared by Douglas County in 1968. They actually knew about Cedar Mountain through the DNR in 1968. Uh you can see it's a major drainage divide. Most every creek north goes into Gothur's Creek, Sweet Water Creek Basin, and then into the East Point Reservoir. Can you speak to the I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Can y'all hear me? Yes, we can now. Okay. What page are you on? Page two. Two.

You'll see it's a 1968 report from the DNR. The it shows the the drainage areas and all.

If you'll turn to page three, it says Cedar Mountain history. And this goes back to the 60s and and the 70s. Douglas County natural areas by the Department of Natural Resources. You can see there all the creeks and the drainage areas, but you see Cedar Mountain at the right, which has a star behind beside it, which it should. Page four, if you'll turn there, this is pretty critical. And y'all have this uh it's a [clears throat] Cedar Mountain history, Douglas County Natural Areas by Department of Natural Resources, 1978. It's a name Cedar Mountain Winston area. And this is this is what's critical and what should have been known because Allison found all this for us. Every administration since 1978 has had this but they just didn't take the time to look it up. Says size minimum 320 acres critical buffer of a thousand acres. That's what they wanted for Cedar Mountain area back then. Says description and significance. Cedar Mountain is Douglas Countyy's most significant rock outcrop in Fibilite and it's its highest elevation. a rockt type vegetation habitat with rare and unusual plants. It has very good scenic value and should be conserved as a county natural landmark for present and future generations. The upper elevations above the power line crossing toward the south contain relatively undisturbed geological, botanical and zoological and extinct features. Second section which should be included is the northwest core which has good plant and animal life. A third area for consideration is the portion of Gothur's Creek flood plane and swamps out the mountain road. The natural qualities that result from the diversity of the geology, botney and scenery are very good. Careful stewardship should be needed to contain them. They may may best be conserved and managed as part of a larger natural park which [snorts] buffers the additional areas. environmental

quality maintenance of potential natural preserves class 4 to conserve significant rare plants and natural scenery and for carefully designed and manage low inensity nature recreation activities and outdoor education and that's what we had always envisioned for Cedar Mountain but uh if you'll turn to page five [clears throat] one of the very most important it's very poor for development due to rockout crops and shallow depth of bedrock and water quality limitations limitations No known commercial minerals. Potential value. A good example of rock type, plant and animal habitat and scenery for the county's natural history, environmental quality, maintenance, rare plants, outdoor education, scientific research, and natural recreation activities. recommended uses for and management based on natural resources characteristics as a Douglas County natural area for natural history, outdoor education, preservation of unusual and possibly endangered endangered species of plants include the Northwest Ravine and protect Gothther's Creek flood plains wetlands cleanup. And that's me. That's my driveway. I've already cleaned that up. Uh [snorts] but also under article nine of your development code, it lists several things that should be uh protected. Uh it talks about wetlands, recharge areas, river basin, streams, and drainage areas. And Cedar Mountain area has all that. It's all it's all that. But we all also have several plants and uh birds. We have eagles over there. I've got the pictures. Be glad to show them. I have videos and pictures of the eagles. U but that's about all I have. I'm gonna turn it over to some professionals that have a lot more information that I do. Thank you for your time.

Okay. Thank you. Madam Chair. Uhhuh. Yes, vice chair. I hear you. May I have a moment to speak? Absolutely. You have the floor.

All right. So I I've also been working with DNR in regards to making this a you know a conservation area and so uh I've been working with the top at the state on this. So you know just letting you know that that I mean we are working on this at a high level and they are seeing this and they understand this and they understand the exotic plants everything that Mr. Det has proposed. um they know that. But we just as we work forward going forward, we need to look at, you know, in regards to what our proposed outlook is in regards to that area. We did not know this. We did not until Mr. D brought it to our attention. And so now going forward looking at all this information that we need to possibly look at this as a good conservation area for no county which is great which would we create a good you know walking area a park or whatever but I just want to know that this has already been brought to by myself to them so that they can look at this in regards to making this in the natural preserve area.

Okay. Thank you. You yield back, vice chair, did you? Yes, ma'am. I'm sorry. No problem. I yield back, Madam Chair. Thank you. You have the floor. Any other questions or remarks, board? Okay, you have the floor. If you just state your name. Good evening. My name is Lee Eckles and uh my address is uh 3012 Winfield Circle, Tucker, Georgia 300084. And Steve Bowling is going to be presenting with me. I'll let him get on the record. Okay. Thank you. It's Steve Bowling. Um Alandale Estates at 35 Sutton Place Aendale Estates 30002. Okay. Thank you.

All right. So the um title of this uh brief talk is Cedar Mountain Biodiversity, a first pass. And I called it a first pass um because despite the u impressive uh list of rare species and rare natural communities, unique geology that we've um been able to um assemble and summarize. Uh we still know so little about the mountain and there are many unique features waiting to be uh discovered out there. And um so again uh my name is Lee Eckles and I've been working as an ecologist and a botonist for over 20 years now in Georgia and the surrounding states uh predominantly in uh in private land conservation uh conservation easements. And Steve, you wanna

Oh, well, I've made my living. I'm retired now, but uh I've made my living doing ecological work, endangered species work, and wetland delineation for the most part. And y'all are going to have to forgive me because I absolutely demolished my glasses before I came here. So, I'm going to be squinning at the at the at the laptop. So, bear with me. [clears throat]

So, what makes uh Cedar Mountain so special? It has a unique geology and it has rare and/or undescribed natural communities. And we'll just explain what that what they are in a minute. And rare and/or undescribed plant species and rare animal species. [clears throat] So, Cedar Mountain has a long history of recognized importance. Um, we've already covered that DNR has singled out Cedar Mountain going back to at least the mid70s and possibly earlier as a significant uh habitat within Douglas County to protect. And um, every every ecologist, botonist, naturalist that has had anything to do with Cedar Mountain has walked away saying that this place absolutely needs to be protected. So I want to start out u going to kind of work from the ground up and start with the geology and why uh the geology is unique out there. So um the geology is uh mainly dominated by ropes creek metabol [clears throat] and um so this is a type of uh amphibolite. It's a dark, heavy, dense rock that is uh that contains high amounts of iron and magnesium and also in this case uh calcium. And you can find this rock type uh at Kennesaw Mountain and in the vicinity of Stone Mountain. And both of those areas are superlative for their uh for their rare species and natural communities um as well. [cough] and [clears throat] uh mafic rockout types uh rockout crops and mafic a mafic rock is basically a uh dark colored rock that contains high amounts of iron and magnesium and in Georgia typically calcium um are highly uh correlated with the occurrence of rare plant species um because of the uh

prepoundonderance of calcium loving rare plant species. It's a limiting factor um for many rare plant species. So when you have a lot of calcium, you get these rare goodies that we as botonists love to find. You want to say anything about the geology? I think you could.

Okay. All right. and [clears throat] working with Steve, who's my botanical sensei, he's he has he's conducted a um a thorough list of all rare species um that the state of Georgia tracks and a large proportion of them are are in fact associated with this mafic rockout type or mafic rock in general, amphibolite. Here [clears throat] we just have uh a closeup of um of garnets, you know, the semi-precious stone that most of y'all are probably familiar with that are embedded within this dark rock outcrop. When you start getting out there and looking at the rock, it's uh it's pretty fascinating. Um just from a purely geologic perspective. And here we have uh light colored striations of feldspar within the darker matrix that creates these really interesting patterns. [snorts] [clears throat] And uh so I wanted to move on to Cedar Mountain natural communities. So in a broad sense, natural communities are uh assemblages of plants, animals that occur um in similar environmental conditions and are basically repeatable over space and time. [clears throat] And um a lot of my work over the years uh has focused on identifying these natural communities and vegetation classification to try to figure out if a land if a particular landscape that I'm looking at is in fact important and how is it ranked? Is it rare? Is it you know is it threatened by development? How many how many um how many of them are out there? And um so [clears throat] the the main forest type, the matrix forest type surrounding the rockout crops that we're going to talk about is uh known as

Piedmont uh dry mafic oickory forest and uh it is considered G2 which is which means it's glo it's globally imperiled um and it it's it's rare and uh subject to threats such as habitat conversion development and Um the the forest that occurs out there is superlative uh because of its age, its undisturbed nature. It has a very low incidence of of um invasive species. [snorts] It's in really good shape. And that's just the surrounding forest. [clears throat] Um and so the rockout crops which are really the crown jewel um

we believe are an undescribed new to science ecological association that's [clears throat] not known anywhere else in the world too many need to break that model I'm sorry vice chair turn your mic off put it on mute these. Mhm.

And uh there are similarities um to other to other mafic uh outcrops. Um with Steve's research, Thank you. Um with Steve research, he he determined that the closest analog to what we have at Cedar Mountain is found uh hundreds of miles north in Virginia, and only 11 acres of it is known up there. But it's a different it's a different geology type. It's it's significantly different from what we have down here. So we believe strongly that this is a new to uh a new to science ecological association that's highly significant. You want to add anything or [clears throat]

you want to hear from I know [laughter] I taught him well. He doesn't. He's got 10 times the knowledge that I that I do. So, okay. All right. I better hurry. All right. So, this is an aerial photo that kind of shows you um in the center you have the these undescribed rockout crops and then surrounding you've got the oickory forest and you see a lot of cedars uh dotting the landscape there. [clears throat]

Um so the Cedar Mountain outcrops are similar in some regards to your stone mountain your granite outcrops. They have uh some floristic similarities like the stone mountain daisy and the elf orpine the little red plant in the in the bottom there. But they also differ from because of the underlying geology is mafic and there are many calcilic species calcium loving species that occur here. [clears throat] And so this blending of granite outcrop and and mafic amphibilite outcrop uh species is one of the things that makes this habitat type unique. And just wanted to talk a little bit about some of the weird and unique things out here. We there's three different species of cactus. One of them is is really only known from northwest Georgia. One of them is known from the coastal plane and the other one is uh widespread. And this is actually a hybrid of two of those species. And here we have another another example of the cacti out there. This is opontia cesptosa and it just kind of lies in a pile out there. It's a really wild environment. It looks kind of alien. It's kind of thing you wouldn't think that you'd find [clears throat] out in the woods in in Douglas County. And here we have two examples of the um rockout crops that um this is something that we have haven't even scratched the surface on. Uh the the lykan and moss communities out there are fantastic. Um we we have we just have no idea what's there. And they're also in excellent shape because there has been no no foot traffic. These places haven't been loved to death like some of the other rockout crop uh uh parks in the greater Atlanta metro area. And so we have found um andor collected data um and we we believe that there are at least five different rare plant species out there. And this number is

again it's a first pass. There's every every time someone train goes out there, they find something new and significant pretty much. Um there's a lot more work to be done on the mountain. And [clears throat] so Steve, I'm going to insist that you take over on this. Uh, one of the most incredible things about Cedar Mountain is that in the 70s, uh, Steve Bowling found a a new to science undescribed species, a shrub that we're calling dwarf Ohio buckeye. And you want to talk a little bit about it?

Well, basically Ohio buckeye, as you might guess, is mostly up in the Midwest, like in Ohio. and it gets to be a large tree. And this is very similar except it never gets more than three or four feet tall.

Um, I first encountered it in 1978 when I was working with DNR that had been requested by Georgia DOT to look at all the metro counties. uh they presumably wanted to know where the good places were so they wouldn't put roads over them, but that didn't necessarily stop [laughter] them. But anyway, uh it's uh it's only known from three locations in the world and three locations in the metro Atlanta area and one of those we think it may be gone from already. So yeah, this is about as rare as it gets in terms of rare plant species. And this is just another picture of it um showing its shrubby habit. So uh we'll speak briefly about the animal species. Since we're botnist, we really don't know what's out there. Um and and it's really wide open. Uh there are most certainly a number of rare animal species waiting to be documented out there. We've documented Lykan grasshopper which is a species of greatest conservation need. Um as recognized by the Georgia DNR um it's globally vulnerable and uh it's known the populations are typically small and fragmented with little gene flow. That means that they're not coming into contact with each other very often. And um so the genetic diversity is potentially high between the populations. Um it's really cryptic. You don't you you won't see them until they start jumping because they blend in with the lychans so well. And as uh Mr. Roer uh indicated, there have been numerous bald eagle sightings um on and around uh Cedar Mountain. This photo is actually from Duet. And again um we've we haven't even

scratched the surface in terms of animals. We'd we'd love to get some qualified specialists out there because we're we're just plant geeks. [clears throat] So, uh to wrap it up, um you as you all probably know, Metro Atlanta is slated to increase its population by approximately 30% by 2050. We're going adding close to 3 million people. And the requisite infrastructure that's going to be required to get that make that happen is is staggering. um our natural landscapes are going to be train changing dramatically in the next few decades and and they already are right now. And we believe that um right now is an outstanding opportunity to uh think about protecting the amazing mosaic of rare plants, rare natural communities and rare animals that occur at Cedar Mountain. And um you want to add anything? Well, I would just simply say the OB say the obvious, which is that uh you may think of preserving natural areas as taking it out of productivity, but it's an amenity that actually makes all of the communities and the land around it more valuable.

Okay. So, any questions right now for any of our subject matter experts in this area? Some of some of our board has questions. Okay. you go first. Okay. Go ahead. Planning is zoning board and then we'll switch it over to commissioners. Okay. This is Brandon Penman. Um so I wanted to first just for uh clarity sake um the the dwarf Ohio Buckeye was that picture that we act that they shown was that like it in plant form before it becomes the actual dwarf tree or am I not understanding what it is? Just want more information on it. Never speaking to my it it never becomes a tree. It it uh the tallest it ever gets is three or four feet.

Is that what we're looking at right there? That's not the That's not Yes, that is it. Yes. Yeah. Here's here's the shrub that's fully grown. Okay. Steve, how many how many different types of Buckeyes are out there?

There are three three different uh species of Buckeyes. Buckeyes have a habit of freely hybridizing with each other. So, uh you have many different hybrids of the three and then you have each of them individually but but this one as I said is only known from three locations in the world and one of those locations it may already have been removed from. Got it. Then my last question is um I heard you kept keep mentioning something called rock outcrops. Is that where plants are growing out of the rocks or can you just describe what the rockout crops are again for clarity in the most layman terms that you can say it?

Well, it really just simply means rock uh bare rock uh any bare rock, you know, rock that does not have an overlay of soil. Uh well, I mean it has thin layers, but uh it's mostly rock. is any of the I know you said there's not many footsteps which is what makes it rare but how would the people of Douglasville or Douglas County know about this there is or or be able to enjoy it or well there are there are ways of like at u at Panola Mountain which is state park uh there are ways of you know you you limit you put trails you in order to get the public in yes you have to make some compromises is, but you manage, you know, where people go and at what times and whether or not they're guided. But, uh, there's no reason you couldn't put a trail the length of the mountain for the public to use.

Polola is serves as a really good, um, example of of the you the successful use of boardwalks where you can enjoy these you can enjoy these really sensitive natural communities from a distance. Yeah. And the reason Cedar Mountain is as preserved as it is because I've tried to make sure nobody knew about Cedar Mountain. We didn't want them over there walking [laughter] it. We didn't want them walk over there walking around it and all that. You know, my driveway leads up to the top of Cedar Mountain. You did a good job.

But uh but but also when they when they put the old landfill in, if you look in the presentation they give you, they talked about taking the old landfill and turning it into a passive recreation. not what they're doing over there now. It was supposed to be passive recreation. That's where they pitched it us once they closed the landfill. It was going to open it up to walking trails and riding trails. That would be incorporated to what we're trying to do now. They still have that space over there. So, it make this space bigger. But, you know, DNR requested a 320 acre critical area with a thousand acre buffer around it. And we're running out of any way to keep that anywhere near what they talked about in the 70s. Okay. So that is that a requirement. The DNR talking about that requirement.

Sorry, let me just jump in here. Sorry, gentlemen. Excuse me. Uh, so if we can kind of maybe keep this part of the Q&A focused on just the sort of subject matter expert kind of stuff. Anything that would require me to say Ropes Creek Metabol, which I'm not very good at, right? Um, but then beyond that, we can talk specifically about how the overlay is going to work when they're done with sort of their presentations about the technical aspect. Does that work? because I I think I can give a more wholesome answer to some of your questions. But if pleases the board at this point, I would say if there's any other questions for our subject matter experts about botney and ecology and that kind of stuff, let's maybe kind of get through that. Thank you. Any other questions planning on madam chair? Okay, we have no questions board.

Okay, no question. Thank you. Okay, you're welcome. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Yes, madam chair. Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. Uh, vice chair, you have the floor. I'm sorry.

Yes. Yes, ma'am. So, I mean, I recently, you know, declined a roof that was going to come there and want to do a rock corey for that whole area. [clears throat] And so anyway, we are working at our best our best to make sure that this is done in regards to what the citizens want or my constituents want in regards to [clears throat] making that an actual reserve area. So we are working hard, but please understand, I mean, every developer is coming to district 4 and ask for every bit of property that we have. And so I I'm sorry I was just taken back a little bit in regards to some of the comments, you know, but either way, we are still and I am still working for and denying people who are willing to make a rock quarry out of district 4 right across from in Cedar Mountain right across from Cedar Mountain Park wanting to buy our property for $2 million. So we are working hard. So, I just want the citizens to know that we are still working hard for them to make sure that that is maintained at what they are asking for. I mean, I know they don't know a lot of this, but [clears throat] I want to put put this out there. So, I'm sorry, Madam Chair, but it just kind of got to me. But anyway, I just want to make sure that was known and I yield back.

Okay. Thank you [clears throat] so much, Vice Chair. I just had one question. You said there are three places in the world that have that particular plant. I believe it was the Buckeye. Yes. It seems like two places here in [clears throat] Georgia. Where's the other place if that's Oh, all three of them are in the metro Atlanta area. So, one in Gwynette, one in Cobb, and one in Douglas County. Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

All right. So, I am going to pick it up where I left off if you will indulge me. Sorry. Just a moment. Um, I appreciate our subject matter experts coming tonight and sharing some of the background that they have been sharing with us. Um, because again, this is a this is not where our team has a lot of depth in terms of understanding the specific ecological um conditions. And so we are proposing an overlay for Cedar Mountain, but I want to share with you how it works with a couple of other areas in this northwest corner. Um, so again, I'm going to forward to um the workforce

workplace campus. I keep calling it workforce campus. It is the workplace campus. I even have it wrong on my slide. Um, we are trying to sort of move uh some of our character areas to be more placeoriented, right? And so speaking less about specific uses such as a workplace campus or a data district or something like that and moving more um into something that describes the overall character. Um so that's what we're proposing with this central west overlay is what we're calling it. It is our workplace campus. It still focuses on the area of the comprehensive plan that identified that it should be master planned. I think what makes me a little nervous is we had a couple of planning light ideas out there. These were things that were shared with us by the development authority. Um my understanding from the Beltman Authority is that both of these were very conceptual. These didn't really reflect anything um that I think would reflect adopted policy or anything that their board or our board, you know, had looked at and had voted on, right? And so when it comes to the overall master planning of this area, this was kind of the only thing that we had to go on. So, as I said previously with the Cedar Mountain overlay, what we are proposing to do is by time with our workplace campus overlay and our Cedar Mountain overlay um and to give a little bit more opportunity to make sure that as things come in, we are taking them on a case- by case basis until such a time as we can develop a more wholesome overlay. So, we have looked at several um comparable areas in Alabama and in Georgia. Um and what we are proposing for this workplace campus overlay um is that there will be a requirement for a regulating plan and infrastructure improvements. Um but the use is going to still be regulated by the base zoning. Um except we'll be looking for specific architectural standards similar to what we have in the quality growth overlay. We'll be looking for specific landscape standards typical to the quality growth overlay, but we're adding some specific performance standards as well. So that's going to look at uses that may have um impacts on air and water pollution, odor, noise, vibration, um things of that nature. We are also proposing that

anything coming into this area would have to submit a statement of jobs created. Um because I think that's something else that we realized. We didn't fully understand, you know, the vision between the board of commissioners and the development authority at the time. um as a workplace campus, our comprehensive plan had identified that this should be an area that could potentially, you know, create a industrial mega site along the lines with the state economic development efforts. Um but I also understood that there is some challenges with, you know, bringing that type of development to Douglas County in terms of having a workforce to be able to supply that. So again, it goes back to the idea that we still don't really have this fully fleshed out. Um, but the concern is that we're going to have sewer here sooner rather than later to serve a couple of the additional projects that have been already approved and that you may lose the opportunity for the overall vision if we don't put a few things in place um at this time. So, the final piece of that is the estate density overlay. If you see the little inset in the bottom um corner of the slide there, we are already using the estate density overlay um in areas around the um reservoir. And so this would kind of expand it out to be that northwestern um corner of the county. Right? So again with the introduction of sewer coming into this area, we are suggesting that the estate density overlay be applied broadly to that rural reserve. You know, so that what you would do is have something that would limit development to a 3acre density um and put some other restrictions on it to allow for growth to happen at a slower pace than maybe what will happen when the sewer comes into place there. Um, so I want to make it clear that, you know, to manage expectations with everything that we're trying to do in this area, we are essentially just buying time, right? So the Cedar Mountain overlay does not stop development. It doesn't say you can't develop in this area. It just says you have to do research reporting and show us your findings before you can move forward. Um, the uh challenge that I have put out to our subject matter experts is okay, now you've got to go out and you've got to produce the

documentation that there's a there there, right? So, they've told me about all sorts of interesting plant and animal species and unique habitat and one-of-a-kind rock formations. So, I'm going to put the burden on folks who understand this better than I do to to put that together so we have a record of that. And that way, when people come and ask for development permits, we will review that in advance. And if there is a concern about the potential impact, it comes back to this board for decision-making. In addition to that with the workplace campus, um trying to get something that doesn't govern use, we have been working with our friends at Elevate Douglas. Unfortunately, they were not able to attend tonight to to speak in regard to that. Um but again, we're trying to better understand the types of uses that they're marketing in that area. Um and what we kind of landed on is right now they only have a very, you know, kind of broad vision of what that could be. So, we want to make sure we give time to have that more fully fleshed out. And then finally with the sewer coming in, we want to make sure that we kind of protect that other area of the rural reserve, you know, for just something coming in under base zoning that wasn't fully anticipated. So I'm going to pause right there and see if you have any other questions or comments before we move on.

I have a question, Alison. So what is the lititness test to say that hey that this particular development is something that the board need to look at before we approve? It sound like it's going to be a casebyase situation. So it will be case by case situation, right? So anything that's coming in in that Cedar Mountain overlay um that's asking for a reasonzoning or is a major subdivision would have to go and do the um review and reporting. That report goes to the director. Um and the director has the ability to require it to come to the board of commissioners for a special use permit if there is a potential negative impact. Director as in you or Oh, the director is uh James Worthington.

Worthington. Okay. He would deter make the determination. Correct. He would review the report. Um, and again, as director Worthington has done many times, you know, you've seen us use this before. Um, he is very knowledgeable, but it is not because we think he can know everything that he needs to know in this space, but it really just identifies a person, right? So, when that person makes the decision, you know, it either is approved administratively or it goes to the board of commissioners. So, that's why we set it up to have one person, you know, who has the ability to make the say. Typically in situations like this, whether it's a impact for line of sight or it's an architectural requirement or something like that, he can bring in people from other departments, you know, and then outside of Douglas County to to weigh in. Um, this is what in fact happened with the stream application. Um, because again once the the stream data center was approved and they started doing the the rough grading work and Travis and James can probably speak better to this than I can, there were questions and concern raised about the environmental impact and so they were able to work, you know, with our peers in Douglas County and outside agencies to fully understand what that impact was potentially. Um, so that is the mechanism we're setting up. We're not saying it can't develop. If you're familiar with the area around Soapes Creek and Dicab County, we looked at that precedent and I think everybody knows that um that Soapes Creek has developed quite fully as well as the areas around Arabia Mountain um that our colleagues had mentioned earlier. So, it's really just making sure that we're reviewing and documenting in advance to do our best to avoid any kind of unanticipated consequence. Um, and then if there is some larger effort through DNR or the state to try to do something different in this area, um, it would not necessarily preclude that, but it's not specifically set up to create that outcome.

Quick question for you. Um, yes, so I the gentleman mentioned like there needing to be a a thousand acre buffer. Um, is that something that we will have to consider to be able to preserve this land that the unique land that they're referring to? That thousand acre buffer is not uh is not considered in I don't actually recall I'm saying that so maybe I'm speaking out of turn. Um, but we are not considering anything that's a thousand acre buffer. We are considering specifically that I'm going the wrong way and that this would just apply um to this area that is outlined. Okay. here

cuz if I was hearing correctly, I just want to make sure I'm hearing this. Sound like they were saying that the concern was that we're not going to be able to meet the buffer to be able to preserve the land. Is that correct? Or can you explain that to me again, please? I'll try to get y'all what the commissioners have. This what the DNR asked back in the 70s to preserve this area. A 320 acre critical area and a thousand acre buffer was what they thought was needed to protect Cedar Mountain because of its rarity. Okay, guys. And it's also part of the Douglas Countyy's comprehension plan was, you know, part of the DNR report that they did, but that's what they were saying. They need a 320 acre critical area to preserve Cedar Mountain and a thousand acre buffer.

Okay, perfect. All right. Can I get Allison? Okay, Allison. So consider considering that are we looking to put a plan in place or is that something we would have to vote on to put a plan in place to preserve the area or to put a certain buffer in to be able to just preserve this area? I know you I remember you saying like this is not me saying that the area is undevelopable undevelopable but are we looking to put a plan in place to make that the case or

Sure. So I think what I can say right now that we're trying to do as I said previously is we are trying to buy time. Um I think as vice chair Elkare had also indicated I think a lot of this is coming to us now because there is interest in developing you know particularly with the two data centers going in. One was approved in the city of Douglasville the other is the stream campus. Um and I think that that is where this is getting greater attention. Now at this time I do not have enough information to suggest whether a thousand acre buffer is going to accomplish anything or not. Um, in working with our subject matter experts, we had shared this proposed boundary that you have in front of you. Um, we received something back from them that suggested maybe it needs to go a little bit higher north of Cedar Mountain Road. If it's the will of the board to do that, we can certainly do that. Um, we have not studied that at this time, but the only thing that we are potentially asking you is to put an environmental overlay just on what you see in front of you here. Um I I have also put the challenge out to these folks that if this is the last time we ever see or hear from you, that's the answer. This area is probably going to develop, right? So it really puts the burden back on people who know about this to say what is the next step into continuing to work to see what a final outcome would be. It is not necessarily the intent of the planning department at this time to say that anything different should happen other than making sure that before we go and make additional decisions that we are not inadvertently doing something that cannot be undone. And again, I cannot explain why this sort of falls off the radar um around 2000. But that's where we had sort of started this presentation is to say that we were able to find in the planning documents up until about 2000 this area around Cedar Mountain has been um studied previously and there is you know something that's worth considering now whether that you know continues to be the case or stands the test of time. I cannot speak to it. I'm just putting forward an idea to say let's not maybe ruin it until we know if there's something there that could be irrevocably ruined.

And this environmental overlay gives us some form of protection. it it would give us a step-by-step research, you know, and review. So, yes, it is some form of protection if there's any greater outcomes through DNR or the state or anything else. That is not necessarily contemplated at this time, but we're not taking it off the table either. We just need to understand if there is, you know, more substance um there than what we're aware of. Madam Chair, may I vice chair? Yes, you have the floor if I finish. Vice chair, you have the floor.

Okay. So yes, I'm not preventing us to go forward anything [clears throat] in regards to development until we understand what is done in regards to the development about you know from DNR until that is discovered what is going to be proposed from the state of Georgia in regards to the all these exotic plants that's been you know brought to our attention. We're not moving forward this in regards to our plan and development. You know, I know that that's with the business plan in regards to development act, but I will push back on that until we come up from a resolution from DNR.

Now, you floor, Madam Chair. Okay. Thank you so much, Vice Chair. Any other remarks? Board, Commissioner Kenner Jones, you have it for me, your name. I'm struggling. I know. I'm like, what is why I call everybody? Commissioner Kenner Jones, you have the floor.

Um, just a very brief comment first. Mr. Roer, thank you for bringing this to our attention. You said that we would be blown away if we heard from the botist and the ecologist, and you were not wrong. I'm very impressed. But I just want to say um to the gentleman's comment about preservation, when you are looking at land usage, what we are required to do is consider what is the best and highest use for each property when you're making a decision about it. And sometimes the best and highest use is preservation. It's maintaining the natural beauty. Um, and so I just appreciate you for for making that comment and giving us something to consider because Douglas County does it deserves to have a beautifully preserved space that you can't find anywhere else in Georgia and that you can't find anywhere else in the US. So I just I appreciate the presentation. Very well done. Thank you.

All right. Any other remarks? Commissioner Raxton, I got you right. All right. Appreciate your name. So quick question I guess for Allison in regards to the overlay. Is there any time requirements or restrictions that we need to consider? I'm just just asking the question. I don't think there is. I just want to confirm.

So again, part of the reason we we asked for this special called meeting to put this in front of you is because if you put this on the books, it's on the books. It doesn't expire. It doesn't revert. Like this is here from now until somebody else says, "Hey, we need to repeal this or we need to move in a different direction." Okay. Um, so [clears throat] it does have a it does have a sizable impact to a significant portion of the county. Um, and again, but I I want to make sure that we're kind of taking it into consideration also with, you know, this this workplace campus. I think that there's some placemaking work that we look forward to speaking further with the board about, you know, in terms of how we talk about ourselves, how we describe ourselves. We've had that conversation about we don't always tell our story as well as we could. And so the planning department has really heard that and we take that to heart. But then in addition to that, you know, I'm going to jump back here and say I think we need to really start working more closely with our colleagues at the, you know, uh, development authority to make sure that we're all kind of moving together handin glove about what the, you know, um, future will be for economic development initiatives in the county. This was, you know, this was an idea that we created in 2023 with our comprehensive plan amendment. certain things have come to pass that didn't necessarily go in step and in sequence with where we think it should have happened from a planning perspective. So that kind of got our attention to say we probably need to do a little bit more in this area, but we want to make sure we're doing it in partnership with the stakeholders who have a say here. And then again, finally using tools that we already have like this estate density overlay to make sure that we don't get too far ahead of ourselves and start introducing higher intensity development and lose the opportunity for the vision that we put out there. So everything we're doing tonight can be undone, but until such a time as it is, this is going to be, you know, the impact to the land use in this area.

All right. All right. Thank you. And again, uh, I echo Commissioner Karen Jones's great presentation. Mr. Dit, thank you for meeting with us, bringing this to our, you know, even further attention and closer attention to the board. Greatly appreciate that. Madam Chair, I yield the floor back to you. Thank you so much. [clears throat] Okay. I'd like I would like the floor. You have a floor, vice chair.

Okay. So that workplace campus in regards to the economic development, they had a road running through straight through man road which would take a lot of citizens out of their homes. They want to build a bridge over there which I mean these are lifelong citizens of my district 4 which would take them out of their homes to build a bridge and they go down through you know Cedar Mountain road or and then down to uh I'm sorry man road down to mountain road and then now through a straight road through our new burn building for our fire department.

I mean that is not that's not acceptable. I mean, we just we just paid millions for that new burn building and then also in [snorts] regards to Cedar Mountain Park. I mean, that's not acceptable running all that down through there and what they're willing to build, especially in that these new findings. So, I appreciate Commander Commissioner Kenner [clears throat] Jones in regards to supporting me in this, but this does not make sense. We've got to look back on this new planned vision in regards to that area, which I don't support a workplace campus. There's no way. There's no way. It it it needs to be preserved for my citizens over there. And there's too much rock. I mean, there it had to be a lot of work. But I'm just going to put that out there, you know, for my constituents and also for you, Madam Chair, and Commissioner Kenn. Thank you for saying that. But if you guys I don't know if you did see the overlay, but it would put a road right through my citizens homes and taken away their houses and then put it right through our brand new milliondoll burn building for the fire department. So, I just wanted to put that out there so that everybody knows what they're looking at in regards to going forward.

Okay. Thank you so much, Vice Chair. Did you have something to add?

Yeah, I will just add I think that um Vice Chair Alarez is referring to that image sort of to my right there, you know, on the screen and it may be hard to see at this level of detail. Director Ronic can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this was just conceptual. I don't know that there is a specific plan for the road yet. Um but again the the question is how do we open this area [clears throat] up if we do open this area up for development and what does that look like and then again the picture also on the left there again just conceptual something that the development authority did. I have no idea if this has been presented to the board of commissioners or not. Um but just want to just underscore that that is where our concern from the planning department and asking you to give up you know these few hours this evening to talk about this comes in because there is a bit of a disconnect about where we're running infrastructure and where we're not running infrastructure. So all these overlays do is by time and may ultimately get revealed once we get further down the road with our planning. But I just wanted to share that there's any other questions.

Madam chair. Madam chair. You have the floor vice chair. Okay. So I've had two meetings with huge company and also the development authority. They were planning on running that road straight up through our new road. I mean I mean they brought two plants and I told them no. So just let you know. Yeah. I mean, this has been I mean, it's been drawn out multiple times by the, you know, LA Douglas, but either way, I told them no. I yel back.

Okay. Thank you so much, vice chair. Certainly. Um it appears that this area uh in my opinion is we would consider endangered species are there in terms of plants and um certainly I believe a buffer or something should be there to protect that partic particular area similar to the dog river river basin something that we've certainly made sure nothing touched that area. I don't know what the boundaries would look like. I'm certainly not sure which direction but I agree with Commissioner Kenner Jones. I got it right that time and you know certainly want to just see what we can do to preserve and protect. It sounds like we have uh an opportunity to seize the moment on number one in the world not the world world global that we have a plant or some several plants here that are considered uh in a class all by themselves. would love to see what we can do to protect that area. Similar to do you have any anything that you could certainly consider uh similar to the dog river basin? It may not be as you know as elaborate but is it something planning and zoning manager that we could consider?

Certainly. So again, the estate density overlay does mirror the density um in the Dog River Basin and that we are proposing would apply to the whole area of the uh workplace campus as well as that whole rural reserve area up there. So if you see that kind of hashed outline of the northwest corner, um it doesn't impact any of the cities and it doesn't impact that area that we've carved out for Winston, right? So kind of trying to do a little bit more placemaking in what I would call downtown Winston or the town center that is Winston. um it doesn't necessarily cover that area, but it does kind of include the area around it. Um again, to just sort of buy us time, the area where we already have this is around the Bear Creek Reservoir. So, not Dog River because that's protected by policy for the water quality and quantity. Bear Creek still acts as a backup. Um it doesn't fall under the same restrictions as the Dog River reservoir, but it still acts as a backup in times of drought. And so that's where this estate density overlay was put in place by the county to help sort of protect the character in that area. Again, because there was a sewer line that was run into this area largely to serve the uh Bear Creek Estates and the golf course, if you're familiar with where that is. So, we just kind of borrowed a playbook from our uh colleagues 30 years ago um and are suggesting that again as a placeholder, we kind of apply it in this northwest corner of the county as a placeholder to to give us more time to figure out what the ultimate solution is. Okay. Any other remarks for it? The ultimate solution may be if it's not broke, don't fix it right now. You know, that's the only thing I can think of at this time. And certainly, I'm just speaking for myself, not for the board. Um, that area is considered very precious. Um, and the mountain is it's natural. It's part of life. I'm just not sure if you can if there's an opportunity to just kind of move away from it. Any any thoughts, Alison?

Well, so again, I I would admit that the area there is going to be hard to develop and I would defer to my colleagues in engineering to speak further to this, but all of the the the granite and the rock and all of the topography change in that area. It will be challenging to develop, but what we've seen with the introduction of the data centers is you have an end user that has the resources, you know, to develop it. Um so that's where I think that um for many years much of what I think has preserved this area has been the lack of infrastructure and the difficulty you know for dealing with the large granite outcrops in that area. Um but that is changing and so I think it does raise the question about what is the what is the future vision in that area and puts a little bit more pressure on us to address [snorts] that. So

developed there by right managing director Worthington, could you come up and just help us out a little bit? I certainly would love to hear from you. Is that a question for J? Yes. You know, and Travis, if you would come too. Just Good evening. Good evening. So is there a specific question or you just want me to weigh in? Commissioner Ker Jones has the floor. She had a question.

Understanding um Miss Duncan uh correctly the purpose of trying to do the particular overlays on each one of these three character areas is to limit what can be done without someone having to actually bring a application and a proposal before the board that we would then be able to say yay or nay to. So it's if like for instance back to the workplace um campus that's just an overlay. That's not to say we would be approving the drawings and the proposal from the um from Elevate Douglas but it would also kind of prohibit just a random development from coming there. We it would have to meet a certain criteria. They would have to come get various different approvals. Am I understanding that correctly?

Yes. So when when you look at these, these would just be kind of like a first line of defense, if you will. So this will be our first step.

We can look things over. We can see we're, you know, obviously we're trying to follow the will of the boards and and to follow y'all's leadership. Um so you know, for example, I know Stream was mentioned on their sewer outlay. We had had these same concerns because this was all kind of starting to evolve around that time. And [snorts] we had had them reach out. They had a study done by US Fish and Wildlife. They provided me with that. I am um somewhat in tune with those things, but by no means the expert on all things ecological and botanical, but um so I was able to review that and they had kind of pointed out that there was nothing in that area that was currently listed. And this is not to um discount what what these folks are saying at all, but um currently there's nothing listed on the US Fish and Wildlife's um endangered species habitat areas. So that I believe that was also alluded that these some of these things need to be added to that list so that when we get these things in the future, we know, hey, these are called out and so we want to limit that to preserve that area. So that'll be a decision of the board if if we want to continue down that road. But um the way we would handle those, we'll get those reports from those experts or the federal agencies if there won't exist and then I'll review those and if there is problems with them, they'll still have to come back to the board.

You know, if it's kind of given the all clear from all the experts, we'll continue through the rest of the normal process. Does that make sense? Yep. And then it what can be developed in that area at this time by right? Well, that's going to depend on the zoning. So, it's not one zoning across the whole thing. So, um there are multiple zonings out there. I don't know what all the bulk of it is. Mostly residential. Yeah, mostly residential still, but it could get, you know, higher density 50,000 foot box. And this would give us some form of defense against a high density residential development in that area. Correct. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm sorry I had to yield back.

That's great. Uh, Commissioner Mitchell. Yeah. And I think Commissioner Ker Jones is going in the right direction. I think we got to make sure we understand what we're doing here. Sure. Because doing nothing Well, it could be an option, but you may not like it. [laughter] So, and I I think what staff is trying to do is okay, what is that that So, let me make a point that may help you with this. So, okay, um, historically, if you have a big rock, that's not an ideal place to develop, right? That's not your lowhanging fruit as a realtor when you're looking for a good piece of property to develop.

That is aside from the specialty ecological stuff and the botanical issues. Um but in general big rock particularly mountain top not ideal right so I think economics as a whole has kind of prevented development in that area long term now we've got some large facilities coming in some data centers there's going to be some sewer ran up through there that will change the viability of that property we want to know you know what we're trying to do here is is to get a feel do do we want to be able to prohibit this now or do you want it to just I don't want to say go wild but develop freely right

you know at at the will of each developer as they come or do you want these overlays to kind of you know smooth that pace out and let you you folks decide how we want to go with this

but let's be clear that that doesn't stop anyone wanting to or looking at or see something different like someone mentioned I think a rock quarry that might eyeball that because of what they're trying to I don't think like you said a big rock that's very doubtful. Um but when you start running so when you start running power when you start running water when you start doing that I caution us to make sure that we know what the overlay looks like or what our vision is. Sure. what it looks like because the highest and best use will be to that developer

whom see something that may not we haven't even thought about. So I I know it's a tough call. It's a tough do you let the rock stay? Not you can't take the rock but you know leave it the way it is and and let's see what what happens. Then you may be subject to something that you really didn't want. But with an overlay, as Commissioner Kenner Jones and and others have stated, it might slow it down, even stop it or defer it from wanting to come because of the hoops that may come along with that. Am I right in that thought process or

I think you're right. And then there's an opportunity to kind of steer in a direction that the board's looking for. You know, that's because the sewer line will steer him in a different direction or in the direction of Yeah, I got sewer. I got water. got a potential there. Not that we want it there. I mean, I think we the Buckeye plant I think we all want to see those types of nature continue to exist. Sure. Um but if we're not careful,

somebody may find a way to say we'll move the the Buckeye plant over to the left or go around this development to kind of do what we want to do and then we'll get the foot traffic. then we'll get the other stuff that we don't want that, you know. I don't know. So, I I I get it. This is a I get what what staff is trying to do is trying to give us keep us in a safety zone to know what we might end up getting. Can't guarantee it because you just don't know what a developer mayor their vision is totally different than what our vision is. But if our vision is to slow it down, this might not be a bad idea. Not that I'm for this whole um for that the the workforce campus type

workplace campus. Yeah. Um but I know I'm not for something else. So, right.

Okay. I It's kind of tough, man. This is This is interesting though. But but Allison, I appreciate and the experts, it's good to know what we got, you know, cuz it's we got some some some precious jewelry here that I think is is precious, but we got to be careful as to preserving it or trying not to, you know, let anybody do anything around it and leaving it just open open field for everybody to just, well, let me try this. and and Allison I can I think they'll just keep you busy with try this with try that and you know so but okay I I yield I'm I'm babbling now thank you I back

okay thank you so much commissioner Mitchell any other remarks right you I yield the floor back to you all so the again this is a little bit of a unique meeting with me if you hate this format let me know after the meeting but we're going to totally switch gears right we're going to kind of get through all these presentations up front and give you the opportunity to ask your questions Right, because we're going to totally talk about something different. We're going to jump over to the other side of the county and talk about West Fork and Thornton South. Again, this may mute your mics, please. Please mute your [clears throat] madam chair. M chair, may I chime in just for one second? Yes, absolutely. [clears throat] Uhhuh. Okay. So

you have, you know, everything that heard from all my fellow commissioners

and I really appreciate that and I agree with that 100%. We need to slow this down 100%. And so as we go forward talking with David, which I've already been talking with in regards to how can we slow down this growth just a little bit, just a little bit because it is overwhelming our county. So as we go forward, you know, let's just look at this. We need to take a hard stance on this because we are 25 years behind in infrastructure. So I just asked them to, you know, go for me on this. Look at the workplace campus. Agree me on the workplace campus. Slow it down. Not do that. And let's look at the conf cons conversation area to where it can be, you know, preserved for that, you know, for Cedar Mountain.

Okay. Are you finished? I yield back, Madam Chair. Okay. Thank you. All right. Uh certainly duly noted. Thank you so much. We're going to yield the floor back to you, Allison. All right. Thank you. So again, I'm going to do some other presentations, maybe as long as that one took, maybe briefer, but these are some additional text minutes, text amendments. Again, there's a a certain amount of interconnectedness to a lot of what we're doing when it comes to the code amendment. So, we're putting all the information out first. Um, and then we'll go through and do the public hearing on each line by line. So, I'm going to ask Austin to come and talk about our West Fork and Thornton South amendment. Good evening, boards, madam chair, vice chair.

Good evening. So, as an overview, the Westport PUD, we've taken it, and this is the primary vision, and we'll go into greater detail, but the issue with the Westport PUD was originally approved in 197. Can we have a point of um just hold one second

privilege for a moment? Um I was just speaking with my colleague, Commissioner Mitchell here. Um, if we could do this slightly out of order and maybe amend um the agenda before the next presentation, can we go ahead and get the um udc amendments out update really quick and get that out of the way and then go through the presentation. So, I think the only challenge is with the UDC amendments, this is part of the UDC amendment. Does that does that make sense? When I talk about all of those different sections, if we're amending article 2, section 208, it's for all of these different overlays, including West Fork. Does that make sense? Okay. Sorry. [laughter]

I know, but I'm I mean, I'm If we wanted to only I don't know how exactly we would only act on just the section of the code um for these amendments. I could we could do a that would be difficult. Sorry. Okay. Does that Okay. If unless you have as many questions about West Fork, it may not run as long as the other one. You Yeah, we just Okay, you have the floor. Yes, ma'am. Austin.

So, as amended a few times, 1988, 1995, 2002. Other PEDs were approved in close proximity. The market has changed significantly since 1973. So, we feel like it deserves an update. The 2023 comprehensive plan anticipated an overlay district that focused on business incubation in kind of a two-tiered two or three tiered system. The West Fork original boundary, it made space for residential, commercial, and industrial areas. And it had a regulating plan that really just limited activities to indoors and those activities that wouldn't generate off-site impacts. Um and so staff has taken that direction and the 2023 comprehensive plan and has put together these sub areas that define the current areas based on current development and uses. So we took those into account clarifies what uses are appropriate and which areas to modernize administration of the PUD that makes it more clear for developers as to what is permitted, what's not permitted. We also introduce redevelopment standards as well and extends the PUD or the overlay district from Veterans Memorial Highway to I20. And so we feel like this will allow for streamline administration and opportunity for future development along clear lines. It'll impact article 2, article 4, article 15, and the zoning map as well. So that's why we ask you to take these in hand with the other amendments as well. But I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have.

Okay. Any questions forward? Very good. Any questions? Madam Chair. Okay. No, we don't have any questions on our end. So, one thing I would say is that now that we've gotten through the overlays, if you would like to speak, if you'd like to address specifically those overlays, we can um I guess would ask county attorney to weigh in on how we would need to amend the agenda. But if you would like to amend the agenda to do just specific text amendments that would appi apply to the overlays, we could just basically address article 2, section 208, article 4. Um, and then that would uh get those out of the way if that is what the board would like to do.

Is that and I don't know Thomas if you want to advise on the steps we would need to take to do that. facilitate this. Okay. Thank you so much. Attorney, you want to just leave? Madam Chair, I'd make an um motion to amend the agenda to um permit I guess voting on article 2, article, and article 4 as pertains to the overlays.

Sure. So, let me I'm sorry. Let me kind of jump down here. I apologize. What we would be asking you to uh address would be article 2 section 208. Um we would be asking you to address article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlays. Um and so we have three of those. One would be creating a new uh Cedar Mountain Overlay district. One would be creating a new West Fork overlay district. One would be creating a new section for the workplace campus overlay. And then one would be creating uh an extension of the estate density overlay. And if you were to just approve those in addition to article 15 with the definitions, that would cover all of the work for the overlays. I don't know if we need to do all of those at once or if we can

have to do them one at a time. Right. We would have the public hearing, but could we just take all of those amendments together or do we need to do them one at a time for each section? I think I think the way they're outlined on the agenda. Okay. They're out on the public hearing and vote on them separately individually. Okay. Thank you. Yes.

So if I understand there would be a if we want to start with the planning and zoning board if we wanted to amend the agenda motion to amend the agenda to address um just those specific text amendments that staff has enumerated and then we can go through each one you know for the public hearing. And just for clarification, the reason that we're having this discussion is because there are people that are here for those specific items and if we could have their public hearing if they have anything else to weigh on in on so that we can let those folks go so that they're not here hostage here. So we hostage understood. I appreciate that. So

all right. So just quick question Al. So, do we have to get a motion from the planning and zoning board first cuz there's a motion right now that's on the floor that I I would suggest we maybe start with the planning and zoning board and then follow a normal procedure in that and I apologize for making this complicated. Okay, this is our first rodeo. You're probably going to tell me you don't like this new format, I guess. No, this is our first rodeo. So, zoning board, do I have a motion to amend the agenda? Tell me I'm doing this properly. I'll make a motion to amend the agenda as Commissioner Whitney Jones requested. [laughter] Whitney Whitney Kinder Jones requested. I

I believe I understand the direction on that. Yes. Yeah. Then we'll go back. Oh, yes. Second. Any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of the motion, please signify by raising your hand. All opposed. So unanimous. Madam chairman, the amended agenda comes to you with a unanimous recommendation for approval. Okay. Do we have a motion? Commissioner Kenn. Yeah. Madam Chair, I make a motion to amend the agenda to allow the um public hearing um as to the overlays uh to to go out of order. Second.

Have a motion and a second. Any questions forward? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Okay, we have a four unanimous vote in the motion. Well, vice chair, did you raise your hand on the vice chair? We have a four unanimous voting. The motion carries with no opposition. I yield the floor back to you.

All right. So, the first thing that we're being asked to vote on would be article two, use of land and structures, section 208, overlay districts generally and purposes of each. This is the section of article two that would just outline the specific um uh overlay districts. Uh this all is presented and outlined in your packet. Um and uh we will need to have a public hearing on each of these items. So on just on article two section 208 overlay. Yes sir.

Okay. Uh we'll open the public hearing now. Anybody wishing to speak in favor of article two use of land structures section 208 overlay districts and generally for purpose of each please approach the podium seeing no one moving I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition again seeing no one moving we'll close the public hearing now do we need a motion to approve board planning and zoning board.

I need a motion to approve that article 2. It's Brand of Hen. I make a motion to approve um article 2 uh section 208. First item. The first item. Second. I have a motion and a second. Do I have any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor of approving article two, use of land structures as section 208 overlay districts. Please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous. Madam chairman, the article two use of land and structures comes to you with a unanimous recommendation for approval.

Okay. Thank you so much, Chairman Simmons. Uh board of commissioners, do we have a motion to approve article 2 use of land and structure? Madam chair, I make a motion to approve article 2 use of land use um land and structures section 208 overlay districts generally and um purpose of each. Second. We have a motion and a second in discussion board. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. We have a full unanimous vote and the motion carries. I'm just checking to see if you're there, vice chair. Okay, we have a full vote, unanimous vote and motion carries. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Now, all right. Article four a lot. Yes, sir. So, the next one. Okay, so we have a

He came in a little late. So, we have a five over as well. Okay. Thank you. All right. And the next item is going to be article four lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the Cedar Mountain Overlay district. Okay. At this point in time, I'll open the public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak in favor of the article 4 lot and building standards for the Cedar Mountain Overlay.

All right, sir. Name and address and in two minutes. Yeah. Uh if you'll look at the handouts that I gave the commissioners, uh Douglas County comprehensive plan said the Cedar Mountain area, it talks about it's unfit for development. You've got the railroad tracks in Mount Anay behind and the mountain behind Anahei. You got Cedar Mountain. They converge as the headwaters of Sweetwater Creek Basin, Goth Creek Basin. So, you know, just keep that in mind how important that the recharge area is and the headwaters of those streams are. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, sir. Anyone else wishing to speak in favor?

Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing favor and open the public hearing in opposition. You have to be ready to get Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing. Planning and zoning board. I have a motion on that article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the Cedar Mountain Overlay. This Rob Thomas. [clears throat] I'll make a motion to approve article 4 land and building standards division 4 overlay district to create a new section for the Cedar Mountain Overlay District. Second. No motion and a second. Do we have any discussion?

Hearing no discussion. All in favor of approving article 4 lot and building standards etc. Please signify by raising your hand. You get it again. I didn't get it that much. That's unanimous. Madam chair, article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the Cedar Mountain Overlay district comes to you with a unanimous recommendation. You hit the point for Thank you so much, Chairman Simmons. Do we have a motion, Board of Commissioners, for article 4? Madam Chair, I make a motion to approve article 4, lot and building standards division for overlay districts to create a new section for Cedar Mountain Overlay District.

We have a motion and a second. Any questions? Okay, we have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising right hand. We h we have a vice chair What's your response second? Okay, we have a you second but we've already voted. What's your vote? Okay, thank you. We have a 50 unanimous vote in the motion carries. I yield the floor back to you chairman.

Thank you, Madam Chairman. Now we go take up article 15 definitions. So actually probably probably we need to go ahead and do article four lot and building standards division four overlay districts to create the new uh section for the workforce campus overlay [snorts] or actually is it West Fork that comes next? I'm sorry. The West Fork overlay district comes next. We're going to work force. I think on here if legal has advised we need to go in order of the agenda. It would be the West Fork overlay district. Again, I apologize. I um we're a little off script here. So if we could just take them in the order we've listed them on the agenda. The article four. Okay. Yep. So, this would be for West Fork. Okay. We need to have public hearing on that one. Yes, sir.

Okay. Uh, I'll open the public hearing on the article 4 building lot standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the West Fork Olay. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? Seeing no one moving. Anyone? I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition? Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Uh you've heard the discussion. Do I have a motion on article 4 lot and building standards for West Fork Overlay District?

Brand make a motion to approve article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay district to create a new section for the West Fork Overlay District. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Or Curry. Second.

I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving article 4 uh West Fork Olay information, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts create a new section of the West Fork Olay District comes to you with a unanimous recommendation for approval. Thank Thank [clears throat] you so much, Chairman Simmons. Board of Commissioners, you've heard the discussion regarding article 4 lot and building standards um and the overlay for the West Fork uh district. Do we have a motion?

Yes, madam chair. I make a motion to approve article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the West Fork Overlay District. Second. Okay, we have a motion in the second. Any discussion board? We have a motion in the second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Uh, vice chair, where are you? Are you in favor? Okay, so we [clears throat] have a 50 unanimous vote in the motion carries. And I yield the floor back to you. Thank you very much, Simmons, Miss Duncan. What's next? Apologies. Uh, did we go back up to article two? So, article four, lot building standards division 4 overlay districts to create the section for the workplace campus. Overlay district workforce.

I know it says workforce. It really is workplace. Sorry, I cannot keep this straight in my head. It's workplace. It should be workplace campus and Austin and Melody are laughing at me and they should be kind of like me. Okay. Well, we'll open the public hearing on article 4 and lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the workplace campus overlay district.

Anyone wishing to speak in favor? Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Again, no one moving. I will close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Do I have a motion or discussion? A discussion or a motion on article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create a new section for the workplace campus overlay district. I I have a I have a question about this one. Wasn't this the one they were talking about? Allison, was this where they was had some discrepancy on it being in that location? Could you [snorts] go back?

Sure. All right. So, we are back in that area. Can you clarify your question, please? Yes. I know they was talking about where it was, how it was designed. Would it be effective to be put out there? Was Did I miss something on that? No. Okay. Not not saying you missed anything. I think what we're asking for Central West workplace campus overlay, right? We're trying to rebrand it a little bit differently, but it still is targeted at that workplace campus overlay because y'all may hate the name Central West. Um, okay.

But beyond that, this this does overlay Cedar Mountain. This does overlay workplace campus. This is overlay reserve. What we're trying to do is put in three layers of overlay protection so that in the near term we can sort out exactly what the vision is for this area without anything getting too far ahead of us. So this is specifically to apply to anything wanting to come in under current zoning, right? Because if you see there, we have that whole area in blue that was technically for the stream campus, right? But if anything wants to change or if anything else wants to come in for resoning in that boundary, um it seems like there's perhaps been a change of sentiment from the 2023 comprehensive plan to where we are today. And my concern is that the infrastructure is going to get ahead of the vision, right? So we need to fall back and sort out the vision

before we move forward. Yes. Any other discussion? Do I have a motion? This is Frank Bane. U recommend approval of uh article 4 lot and building standards division 4 overlay district to create a new section for the workplace campus overlay district. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second. Second. A motion in a second. Any discussion?

Hearing none. All in favor of approving uh article 4 light and building standards division 4 overlay districts to create the new section for workplace campus overlay district. Please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous. Madam chairman, article four lot and building standards division four overlay districts to create a new section for the workplace campus overlay district comes to you with unanimous recommendation for approval. Thank you so much Chairman Simmons. uh board of commissioners, you've heard the discussion regarding article 4 build building standards division uh overlay districts and also regarding the uh ceda mountain overlay. Do we have a motion? Madam

second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? Okay. And it sounds as if I had one just comment. Uh three measures of overlay. So we're insulated three times, right? You said three overlay measures, Cedar Mountain and then workplace campus. And then the last one we're going to take up is the estate density and that rural reserve boundary. Okay. Thank you so much. Any other discussion? We have a motion and a second on the floor. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Um, vice chair, where are you? Okay, so we have a 50 unanimous vote and the motion carries. Thank you. I yield the floor back to you, Chairman Simmons. Madam Chairman, now are we moving to the uh building standards?

Article four, law and building standards, division 4 overlay districts. Uh and this is going to be to extend the estate density overlay uh to the protection [clears throat] of the rural reserve. This is going to include the Cedar Mountain overlay, the workplace campus, and then that larger rural reserve boundary. So we are looking uh for an amendment to article 4, division 4 overlay districts to extend the estate density overlay. Okay. Thank you very much. At this point in time, I'll open the public hearing on article 4, building standards for the Cedar Mountain Overlay Protection Area. Anyone wishing to Okay. Extend the estate density overlay. Sorry. Extend the estate density overlay. Yeah. Sorry. Okay. [laughter]

I'll go back to the picture. Go back to the article 4. Well, I knew this was going to be confusing and I did not try to do this at the end of a long meeting. otherwise. So, uh, let's see. State density over that picture. We already are using this area around the Bear Creek Reservoir. We're extending it to this whole northwestern corner um of the county. So, that's what you're being asked to vote on. Okay. Do I need to restate that? I think we I I think we understand. Okay. Let's let's have the public hearing. Yes. [laughter]

Anybody wishing to speak in favor? Seeing no one moving again, I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. No one moving. I will close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Do I have any discussion or do I have a motion on the estate density overlay to extend a protection to Cedar Mountain overlay?

Oh yeah. spreading the pend make a motion to approve article four this article four lot and building standard division 4 overlay district in section 2 4.27 27 estate density overlay to extend the protection in the area of the Cedar Mountain Overlay. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Or Curry. Second. Motion in a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving, please signify by raising your hand.

Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Article four, lot and building standards division 4 overlay district section 4.27, 27 estate density overlay to extend the protection in the area of the Cedar Mountain Overlay comes to you with a recommendation for approval. Thank you so much, Chairman Simmons, Board of Commissioners. You've heard the discussion. Do we have a motion? Second. [clears throat and cough] Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? We have a motion in the second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Um, vice chair. Uh, I approve.

Okay, we have a 50 unanimous unanimous vote and the motion carries. I yield the floor back to you, chairman, please. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Now, where are we going next? Back up to article two, use of land. No, sir. I think this one is just going to be article 15 definitions. I'm looking at Austin right now and he's shaking his head. I think we just need to get the definitions to cover some work for the worst work West Fork uh and South Orton um plan. But once we do article 15, then we'll be done with this section and that should cover all of the text amendments for this. So, thank you for your patience. [clears throat] Okay. Article 15 definitions.

I was going to say is is Austin. Are you going to elaborate or is this or have I missed it? [laughter] So the definitions for the mostly for the Westport overlay, they introduce the sub areas and that's what's added to the definitions under the unified development code. So the different the uh Oh Lord, this is a long presentation. Bear with me just one second. The different sub areas here, the eight or so categories there are what's added to the article 15 to define them.

Okay. Well, let's let's have a public hearing on article 15 definitions. Anyone wishing to speak in favor, please approach the podium.

One minute. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition. No one moving. I will close the public hearing on this matter. Uh planning and zoning board. Do I have a recommendation on article 15 definitions? This is Chris. Make a motion to approve article 15 definitions. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second.

I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion hearing? None. All in favor of approving article 15 definitions, please signify by raising your hand. Madam Chairman, article 15 definitions comes to you as a recommendation for approval. All right. Thank you so much, Chairman Simmons, Board of Commissioners. Do we have a motion to approve article 15 with the definitions? Do we have a motion? Madam Chair, I'd like to make a motion that we approve article 15 definitions. Okay. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Vice chair, where are you? Vice.

Okay. So, we have a 50 unanimous vote in the motion carries. I yield the floor back to you, Chairman Simmons. Okay. Where are we? All right. So, if we uh I think we have a few other things that we want to cover tonight. I may be brief, may not be brief, but would you like to take a quick break or shall we just keep going? Keep going. Let us go. Keep going. Keep going. Okay. I hear keep going. All right. You take a break. All right. Okay. So, let me Oh, that's okay. I just need one. Thank you.

Uh, so we're going to hit two more presentations real quick. Um, the first one is in regard to subdivision review. There's two things that we wanted to speak to in regard to subdivision review. One of the things that we're going to ask is if it's the will of the board to remove the cluster conservation subdivision provision from the code. The other thing we're going to ask is does the board still wish to have um approval of preliminary plats. Um so the conservation subdivision uh basically Douglas County has two options for conservation subdivision. There is a cluster conservation subdivision that allows for lots to be developed at a density of the base zoning and then the minimum lot size of the next highest zoning district. So this is very much an area. Can we uh can we hold the conversation in the back down, please?

I'm sorry, Miss Dunkey. Go ahead.

Sure, no problem. Um, so this is uh kind of the concern that staff has expressed previously. Um, a couple of the plats that you see here before you are examples of areas where you have sewer um already in place and a project can come in and get preliminary plat approval under its base density. So there has been some concern expressed to us by the board that this may otherwise be introducing a level um of development and intensity um that is is otherwise undesirable. The conservation subdivision, the cluster conservation subdivision has been um on the books since the 2004 update to the code. To my knowledge, these are the only two projects that ever came in. Um one is Somerset and Anowaki, the other is Chattahuchi Meadows. And neither of these ever developed. Um, and so we have an opportunity now if we want to reconsider whether or not we want to keep this as an option to allow for this higher intensity of development in areas where it would come in under base zoning with access to sewer. Um, any questions or comments on this one before I move forward? All right. If not, the second provision is related to articles 5 and 12. This is a revision to the major subdivision process. So this is going to remove the board of commissioners approval on preliminary plats. This would only be uh an administrative approval by various departments including planning and zoning, engineering, fire, water reser authority and DOT um and those in those departments. So this would as you know we tend to bring projects to you. Here's some examples of projects that have come recently. Um there's some concern from legal and I can defer to Thomas Mitchell to speak further about that that these approvals really should be administrative um and not brought to the board you know for your discretion and approving. Um so we are putting that text amendment here before you um and we're happy to have conversation or discussion on any of this if there are questions at this time. So but those are the two main provisions under article 5 and 12 in regard to subdivision process. So

yes sir. Okay. So, thank you. And I know we had talked earlier about the preliminary plat. I know for me what I've been seeing is that we've had plats that have been approved years ago and then they'll come back and the economy has changed, community has changed, etc., but they weren't reverted. So, for me, I like to have that opportunity to ask those types of questions to see, have they met all the requirements before the 24-month reversion kicks in. Now, is that something administratively that would get caught where that would be, you know, taken care of and not have to come forth to the BLC for us to have those conversations or what's the thought there? Do you want to speak to this or I can I can address the reversion or

question is about the reversion that I'll speak to.

Okay. Okay. Uh so in regard to the reversions again I think I've shared with these boards before to my knowledge I have not seen a systematic effort to bring projects back to the board of commissioners to revert zoning um in the past. So again because of all of the requirements under the zoning procedures law there isn't just an automatic if you don't vest it automatically reverts. has to come back and go through that zoning procedures. So, we've done a handful of those reversions. Again, trying to figure out how to put it in front of you. Um, and we learned a lot of lessons with that first round of reversions that we brought forward. So, now we're currently working our way through a next round of reversion. I just want to underscore the amount of time it takes administratively is not insignificant. Um, so with current staffing and resources, and let me be clear, I'm not asking for additional staffing or resources, but just saying with current staffing and resources, we have about 240 parcels that we have to go through case by case and do the research and see, you know, what was the decision at the time, was it ever vested, you know, and things of that nature. So, it really is just an issue of how much time it takes to do that. We're actively working on it and we think we can bring you kind of the next round of amendment sometime within the next 3 months if it's the priority of these boards to see that happen. Um but so two issues, right? So that's the reversion. If nothing ever vested, we can present it back to you like we did historically and say, "Hey, they asked for zoning approval and then they never came and they never submitted for a land disturbance permit or a preliminary plat. We think this should be reverted." And that would be the um discretion of the board. The other question about the preliminary plat, I'm going to defer to Thomas Mitchell to explain some of the the legal considerations with that. That answers your question. [clears throat] Good evening. One of the reasons to um and a lot of historically smaller jurisdictions would have had the elected body approved preliminary plats because they were trying to control growth uh as they began to grow. But in the larger jurisdictions that has there's the the trend is to make those administrative

and there's a reason for that. It's one of the are if you still continue to do preliminary plat approvals, it's one of the areas where you're not really acting and I'm speaking to this side of the room, you're not acting in an legislative function in that. It's purely administrative, which is really not your role. Um, and you can get into, and I can speak from personal uh, experience, in my case it was a city, uh, you can get in trouble if you try to impose conditions or do anything other than what the objective requirement of that proposal is. And if you if you do anything and step outside and and try to act in a legislative way, you can get sued. And there's at least one case that again I was involved in where the court awarded attorney's fees for bad faith. So there's those are kind of the legal considerations. It's it's to protect you all understanding what you're saying and I think that the way that you handle that is the way staff's doing it with these u reversions on the on these on the zonings that never passed.

Okay. So staff has the opportunity to do that because I know we've had cases I know there was two but I had to say hey what happened why did we not revert? One was the OC MSI Oak that was approved back in 2006 and we're in 26. You talking about 20 years that you that's hard peel to stomach to be just honest. So, and I just want to make sure that does not happen again.

So, again, the best answer that I can give you is we can make it a priority if it's the will of the board to kind of step up, you know, um the reversions right now when we look at that traditional neighborhoods character area, you know, that's what we're working on right now. And that's come up to what 240 am right about that about 240 parcels that we just have to go through case by case um and do that. If y'all read our monthly reports, um you see how many phone calls we get, you see how many permits we process, you see how many applications we process. So, um we do have a lot of things that kind of pull on our time. And I'm not saying that again to ask for more staff or more resources or anything like that. I just want to manage expectations. So, [laughter] you know, um so again, I will also say that we have been slowing a little bit in terms of the application pipeline. Not sure if it has something to do with what's going on in the economy right now and kind of the overall slowing that we're seeing a little bit. Um, but it does uh give us a little bit more bandwidth to take on some of those stretch projects. Um, but we'll do our best to get it in front of you, but we can only move as as as quickly as we can actually do the research. Um, because we again want to be thorough as y'all have seen when we put information in front of you um for consideration.

Any other attorney Mitchell, I had a question for you. When you mentioned the larger jurisdictions, you know, you said, of course, it's a little different than the smaller jurisdiction. Are you looking at population? Is what is the the uh common denominator? Is it uh population or is it square footage? What are they using at part of the calculation to determine? Yeah, I was when I was talking what I what I meant by that was was less dense, less populated.

I meant to say square miles because Douglas County is relatively small in terms of square miles. I was talking about more in terms of much more rural, less developed jurisdictions where you've you may have one development per year or a couple developments per [clears throat] year and and then you can have a major development that really will change the the [cough and clears throat] complexion of that in uh jurisdiction uh in terms of the the amount of density or the amount of homes or the amount of square footage and uh I can see a legislative body wanting to have more control in that regard. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Attorney Mitchell. Thank you.

Any other Okay, Miss Duncan, which which item are we working on now? The article five subsection.

Sure. And if we want to, we can kind of jump forward with the rest of the presentation and then just do the rest of the text amendments if it's a little board. Does that work for everybody? Okay. All right. And so um in regard to the last amendment, again, this is really in the weeds and I apologize, but that's the reason we wanted to do this as special called meeting. So when I talk about the North American industrial classification system, um this is how we determine use, right? When we stand at this podium and we tell you it's a use that's allowed, a use not allowed or a use by special use permit. We're using those North American industrial classification system because I know all of you went and read your briefing book part one that we put out. You've seen this chart, right? So this is an example of this is how we use these North American industrial classifications. So all of the uh federal statistical agencies such as the US Census Bureau that collect and analyze economic data, they're using these classifications, right? So that's just a little background in what this was. Um near as I can tell, the last time we did a thorough overview of the NAKES codes was in 2002. So we're up to I think what 2017 now is that our most current or 2022. 2022 is the most current, you know, standard of North American industrial classification system that you're using. So essentially, um, we're talking about this table, right? So when you look in our code, and again, I know all of you sit and read the code for fun, right? But when you get to article 2, section 210, table 2.2 and 2.3, this is what we're talking about. All of those codes on the left hand side of our use table, that's what we're talking about updating. Um, if you looked in your packet, you saw this is about 53 pages of updates. So, I want to give a shout out to Austin and Melody. They did an amazing job of just slogging through and getting this up to date. Um, I am once again going to stand here and say I will present you as much information as you want on this. But the bottom line is this is really taking something from 2002, updating it to 2022 to use the most current nomenclature and classification. Um and then we did a little bit of tweaking around the edges, you know, for certain changes to

existing allowances. A lot of that was particularly in regard to manufacturing. Um so we have a whole slide where we can talk about some of the manufacturing uses that we sort of transitioned away from or made those special use permit because what we see is that our economy and our land use in our area is transitioning far more um to what I would call knowledgebased creative industry, those type of you know workforce developments. So that's essentially what this is and I'm going to pause right there and ask the boards for any questions or comments in terms of how much detail you would like for me to get into this. I have a question on that cuz you know I use this use this all the time so I need absolutely I need to know this. Um how many did you say you're going to add to it? How many different nexus codes?

Well, so I don't know that we're adding as much as we're taking the current 2022 codes and we're aligning our ordinance with the most current codes. But are you going to possibly add some more usage then? I mean, it's quite a bit that you're going to add. So, it took the handbook, the 2022 handbook, and just went line by line for each industry and put it on the table itself and uh designated which districts would be permitted. Mostly it was a expansion of what was there previously. Whereas in this table, you'll well, it's kind of hard to see, but the first under agriculture, it reads 111. Uh there are multiple things after 111 because it precedes like a five-digit code.

So, it was kind of expanding on those uses, making them more distinct so people that come into the county can have a better idea of what they can and can't do. Okay. I guess my question really is I'm I'm asking are you adding more usage uses or um elaborating on the on the current ones? Yes, it's I'd say it's both. So by virtue of being more thorough by aligning more with the handbook, more uses are added. So we are adding uses. Okay. Well, that's good that we need to. I think we need to. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? [clears throat]

We need to open the public hearing. Oh, do y'all have any questions? Madam Chair, questions. No questions. [clears throat]

Uh so again we have a couple of comprehensive plan amendments um that we were going to present on. These are very straightforward. So this is just aligning our character areas and making some updates in our comprehensive plan. Um so again data district is becoming Thornton South workplace campus is becoming central west workplace campus. Um we are clarifying all of that in our use charts. We are also making some revisions to what previously had been data district to more sensitively account for the fact that there is residential development in that area. So previously we had indicated that the residential development did not need to be expanded or encouraged. Um and we've received some feedback that we probably need to make that a little bit more um sensitive to recognize the current neighborhoods that are there. Um and it's the same thing as we've already talked a lot about the workplace campus. You know rebranding kind of central west giving it more of a sense of place. um and then getting some specific criteria that start to kind of build out what the vision is for the board in that area. And so um as we submitted in your packet, we have just highlighted a few areas. We when we got through all of the text amendments and we looked at the comprehensive plan, most of it was generally aligned with where we were going. Um but we do need to just make some some uh minor amendments to the comprehensive plan. And then the final thing that we want to make sure that we're putting in front of you tonight is adopting the new um Douglas County zoning map. Right? So this illustration here is just to identify those uh overlay districts that we've specifically talked about, but that's overlaid kind of on the the existing zoning map. It includes all of our first round of reversions, right? So um but we are putting the new map in front of you to activate all of those text amendments that you have previously approved. So questions about any of this? Yes, sir. How long would that be updated take it to get updated on to the GIS this new

uh well so as soon as the board uh votes to approve or amend or however you want to do that we will make those changes and we will transition it over to our GIS department um planning and zoning doesn't maintain those so I can't say specifically for how long it would take to amend but once it's approved that is the the active map questions Any questions?

So, so then just by way of overview, I think we're back to um the agenda, right? So, approving some of our amendments, we would need to go back and we would need to tackle specifically section 210, tables 2.2 and 2.3. That's the second bullet there. We would need to do article five in regard to subdivisions. uh and we would need to do article five in regard to the uh process for subdividing land. Right? So that's removing the board of commissioners um from having to sign off on plats. And then article 12 just mirrors those same subdivision um provisions and then we would need map amendments for the comprehensive plan and the zoning map amendment. Then we'd be done. Okay. So

all right, let's take up article two, use of land structures section 210 allowed uses in each zoning district table 2.2 2.3. Do we open the public hearing? Yes, please. Do you have something to say? No. Public hearing.

Okay, we'll open the public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? I don't think there's anybody in here but us. No one uh speak in favor. I'll close the public hearing. Open the public hearing in opposition. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition. [clears throat] I'll close the public hearing in opposition. Planning and zoning board. Do I have a motion on article two use of land and structures section 210 uses allowed in each zoning district table 2.2 2.3

or Curry. I make a motion that we approve article 2 use of use of land and structure section 210 use allowed in each zoning district table 2.2 and 2.3 Rob Thomas I second

I have a motion and a second do we have any discussion hearing none all in favor of approving article two use of land and structures section 210 uses allowed in each zoning district table 2.2 2 2.3 signify by raising your hand. Thank you. All oppose madam chairman article two use of land and structure section 210 uses allowed in each zoning district table 2.2 2.3 comes to you with a recommendation for approval.

All right. Thank you so much chairman Simmons. Board of commissioners. You've heard the discussion regarding article 2 use of land and structures uh section 210 uses allowed in each zoning uh district table 2.2 and 2.3. Do we have a motion to approve? So move. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Approved. Okay. We have a five unanimous vote and the motion carries. I yield the floor back to you. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Okay. Article five, subdivision. Article five, subdivisions and plan developments, section 511, conservation subdivisions. Yes. I'm sorry. Yes. That would be the next item for consideration. Open the public hearing.

Thank you. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? No one moving. I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition? No one moving. Uh we'll close the public hearing. Planning and zoning board. Do I have a uh discussion or a motion on article 5 subdivision and plan development section 511 conservation subdivisions? So [snorts] move approve. A motion to approve. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second. Second.

I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving article 5 subdivision and plan development section 511 conservation subdivisions please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous madam chair. Article 5 subdivision plan developments section 511 conservation subdivisions comes to you with a recommendation for approval. Thank you so much chairman Simmons board of commissioners. You've heard all the questions and answers and discussions. Do we have a motion to approve article 5 subdivision and plan developments section 511 conservation and subdivisions? Do we have a motion?

Madam Chair, I'd like to move that we approve article 5 subdivision and plan development section 511 conservation subdivisions. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion, board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Great. Okay, we have a 50 unanimous vote and the motion carries. Thank you. Thank you and I yield the floor back to you, Chairman S. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Next one's article five, subdivisions and plan developments, various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land. Is that correct? Yes, sir.

Okay. We'll open the public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak in favor of this article five, please signify by approaching the podium. No one moving. I'll close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. We'll close the public hearing in opposition since no one is approaching the podium. Uh planning and zoning board, do I have a motion on article five subdivisions and plan developments various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land? This is Chris make a motion to approve article five subdivisions and plan developments. various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land.

Frank Payne second. I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving article 5 subdivisions and plan developments various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land. Signify by raising your hand. All in favor? All thank you very much. Article five, subdivision and plan developments, various amendments related to the process for subdivision of land comes to you with a unanimous recommendation for approval.

Thank you so much for commissioners. You've heard all of the discussions. Do we have a motion to approve article 5 subdivisions and plan developments various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land? Do we have a motion? Madam chair, I'd like to make a motion we approve article 5 subdivision plan developments, various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land. [clears throat] Second.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Board. We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Vice chair. Okay, vice chair. Okay, we have a 40 unanimous vote and the motion carries and maybe he dropped on.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Okay, now we've got article 12, procedures and permits, various amendments related to the process of the subdivision of land. Uh, I'll open the public hearing on that matter. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? Seeing no one moving, I'll close the public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition? No one again moving close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Do we have any discussion or do I have a uh motion on article 12 procedures and permits various amendments related to the process for the subdivision of land please?

This Rob Thomas. I'd like to make a motion to approve article 12 procedures and permits various amendments related to the process of the sub of the subdivision of land. I have a motion. Do I have a second? Chris Small second. Thank you very much. I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving article 12 procedures and permits various amendments related to the process of subdivision of land signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous madam chair. Article 12 procedures and permits various amendments related to the process with the subdivision of land comes to you with a recommendation for approval.

Thank you so much chairman. Uh board of commissioners you prepared to discussion regarding article 12. Do we have a motion? So moved. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. We have a uh vice chair. Okay. We have a full unanimous vote in the uh motion carries. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I believe that wraps it up. Not quite.

Not quite. Two comprehensive plan amendments and then the zoning map amendment. So, just three more. And again, thank you. I appreciate your patience um in this. So, Would you like me to read the comprehensive plan amendment map amendment to the character area map and future land use map for the workplace campus and for rural places would be the first item that we would need the public hearing

we'll have public hearing on that anyone wishing to speak in favor of the map amendment to the character area map future land use map for workplace campus and rural places approach the podium seeing no one moving I'll Close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Now one moving, I'll close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Do I have a motion on the map amendment to the character area map and future land use map for workplace campus and rural places?

Or I make a motion to approve map amendment to the character area map and future land use map for workplace campus and rural places. I have a motion to have a second. Second, Frank Payne. Motion in a second. Do we have any discussion? All in favor of approving the map amendment to the character area map and future land use map for workplace, campus, and rural places. Please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous. Madam Chairman, map amendment to the character area map and future land use map for workplace, campus, and rural places comes to you with a recommendation for approval. Thank you so much uh chairman. Do we have a motion?

Madam chair, I make a motion that we approve the map amendments to the carrier area map and future land use map for workplace campus in rural places. Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Vice chair. Okay. We have oral unanimous vote and the motion carries. Okay.

Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Next one is the Texas amendment to revise the description of workplace campus and data district. I open the public hearing. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? No one moving. Close the public hearing in favor and open the public hearing in opposition. Again, no one moving. Close the public hearing on this matter. Planning and zoning board. Do I have a motion on text amendment to revise the description of workplace campus, excuse me, a data district? I make a motion to approve the text amendments and to revive this revise the description of the workplace campus and data district.

I have a motion. Do I have a second? Second. I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none, I'll call for the vote. All in favor of approving text amendment to revise the description of workplace, campus, and data district, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. That's unanimous, madam chairman. Text amendment to revise the description of workplace, campus, and data district comes to you with a recommendation for approval. Thank you so much, chairman. Board of Commissioners, you've heard all the questions and answers and discussions. Do we have a motion? So moved. Second. [laughter] We have a motion. Any discussion? No.

Okay. We have a motion in a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Uh, vice chair, we have a 40 unanimous vote. And the motion carries. Okay. I yield the floor back to you. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. Okay. The next thing we have

So, sorry. May I add for one quick agenda amendment on the zoning map amendment? It is to approve the boundaries of the Cedar Mountain Overlay district, the Westport overlay district, and the workplace campus overlay district. I should have also included to extend the estate density overlay. So, if I jump back up to the map again, that's that northwestern corner there that's all cross-hatched. So, I think um uh legal is advising me that the first thing we need is an agenda amendment to clarify um that we are adding the estate density overlay. So, if we could have a motion to amend the agenda, and we [clears throat] don't have to have a public hearing on

a zoning board. Do I have a motion to amend the agenda to add the estate district overlay to the uh zoning map amendment? Make a motion to amend the agenda to add the estate density overlay to the map amendment. Do I have a second? Second.

I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none. All in favor of approving the uh agenda amendment, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. All opposed. Okay, madam chairman. Uh amendment to the agenda comes to you with a recommendation for approval to add the state district overlay to the uh zoning map amendment. Thank you so much, chairman. Uh, board of commissioners, do we have a motion to amend the agenda to add the district overlay to uh the map? Yeah, let Rob do it. Uh, uh, did I say that? So, moved to extend the estate density overlay. Okay.

Second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion board? We have a motion and a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising right hand. We have vice chair. We have a 40 unanimous vote and the motion carries. Thank you, Madam Chairman. And then this one would actually be on the map amendment and we would need a public hearing and I apologize for uh not putting that on the agenda. So we need to have the public appearing to approve the boundaries of the Cedar Mountain Overlay District, West Fork Overlay District, Workplace Campus Overlay District, and the State District Overlay. Correct. Anyone wish

anyone wishing to speak in favor, please approach the podium. Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing. Uh, anyone wishing to speak in opposition? Having no one moving, I'll close the public hearing on this matter. Uh, planning and zoning board. Do I have a motion to approve the boundaries of the Cedar Mountain Overlay District, West Fork Overlay District, and Work Workplace Campus Overlay District, and the Estate District Overlay. Chairman, this is Rob Thomas. Thomas

and I'm going to recommend the approval of the boundaries of Cedar Mountain Overlay District, West Fork Overlay District and Workplace Campus Overlay District. I have a motion. Do I have a second and and to extend the estate density and the estate density overlay district? Thank you. All right. Do I have a second? Second.

I have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Hearing none, I'll ask for approval. All in favor of approving the overlay boundaries as discussed, please signify by raising your hand. Thank you very much. Now, Madame Chairman, uh, you have a recommendation to approve the boundaries of the Cedar Mountain Overlay District, Westfork Overlay District, Workplace Campus Overlay District, and a state district overlay. Uh, unanimous recommendation to approve. Extend the state. Okay.

Board of commissioners, you've heard all the discussions. Do we have a motion to approve the boundaries of the Cedar Mountain Overlay District, West Fork Overlay District, and the workplace campus overlay district, including the S estate district as well? Yes, move. Okay. Second. We have a motion and a second. Uh we Any discussion? We have a motion in a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. Commissioner um Alcarez. Okay, we have a full unanimous vote and the motion carries. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Now, now we're done. And again, just want to thank everybody for your um attention and your patience tonight and I welcome any feedback that you may have on our new process.

And uh since our vice chairman, Rob Thomas, was not here earlier. Uh I wish to again express our thanks to him for his years of service on this board and wish you the best in the future. Thank you very much. Thank you. [applause] Having nothing else to come for the planning and zoning board, I declare this meeting adjourned. Madam Chair, Board of Commissioners, do we have a motion to adjourn? So move. Second. We have a motion in a second. Any discussion? We have a motion in a second. All in favor, please indicate by raising your right hand. All right. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you and have a great night.