Planning Commission Work Session - Regular Meeting

All right, let's bring this, the Planning Commissioner regular meeting dated July 6th, 2026 to order. We all stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you all. Can we have the roll call, please?

Commissioner Ed Coopley. Commissioner Jim Smallwood.

Present.

Commissioner Mark Hampton.

Here.

Commissioner Mark Reier.

Here.

Commissioner Mark Wachowicz. Commissioner Mike McKesson.

Here.

Commissioner Calvin Downs. Commissioner Linda Russo.

Here.

All right. With the roll, we have a quorum, so we may proceed. Can we have the attorney certify the agenda, please? Yes.

Good evening, Commissioners. Chris Pratt with the County Attorney's Office. The single hearing item on your agenda this evening, the Adragna Minor Development Final Plat Project File SB 2024-030. This item was published on June 11th and posted notice was accomplished on June 16th. This item has been properly noticed and you have jurisdiction to hear it this evening.

Wonderful. Are there any disclosures or conflicts from any of the Commissioners tonight? Seeing none, we'll move on. May I have a motion to second and approve the meeting minutes?

This is Commissioner McKesson. I move to approve the meeting minutes as drafted.

Commissioner Smallwood seconds.

Wonderful. Okay, the first item on our agenda, is the land use hearing action.

I'm sorry, Mr. Chair, do you wanna have a voice vote on that? We had a motion and a, just for the record.

Let's have her voice vote. It didn't say that here. Let's have her vote.

All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? See none.

Okay, the next item on the agenda is the land use hearing. for the minor development final plat project file SB2024-030, subject to the conditions and recommendation by staff. And for staff, we have Caroline.

Good evening, commissioners. Caroline Washie-Freeland representing Community Development. The item before you today is the Adrania minor development final plat. The project number is SB 2024-030. Casey Adronia is here on behalf of the applicants. The applicants are requesting approval of a minor development final plat to establish two single family residential lots on a 4.62 acre site. The intent of the minor development process is to provide a streamlined review process for the creation of 10 or fewer single family lots. The minor development process begins with the submittal of an application. Following staff comments, the request is forwarded to referral agencies. At the beginning of the referral period, courtesy notifications of an application and process are sent to abiding property owners. Staff further analyzes the request, and the applicant is provided the opportunity to address any issues identified through the referral period. Public notice is provided, and the request is heard by the Planning Commission prior to consideration by the Board of County Commissioners. Referral comments were standard in nature and have been addressed through various revisions of the exhibit. During the process, no public comments were received. The applicants provided a written response to all referral agency comments. The project area shown here by the red stars in the central portion of the county, generally located on Evelina Road, approximately 1 1⁄2 mile east of I-25 near North Allen Street and Founders Parkway. The property is located within the Castle Rock Municipal Planning Area of the Douglas County 2040 Comprehensive Master Plan. The project area outlined in red is the Zone Suburban Residential. This is a bird's eye view of the property. The lots will have central and water services provided by the Silver Heights Water and Sanitation District. To provide some context and history of the site, the parcel was originally zoned Agricultural 1 in 1955. In 1983, it was rezoned to Suburban Residential. The existing home in the site was constructed in 1995. And in 1998, the applicants purchased the property and built an outbuilding in 2026. I'm sorry, 2005. Here is the minor development final plat exhibit. Both lots will be accessed by two separate private driveways connecting to Evelina Road. A portion of lot one is located within a rockfall hazard zone shown here in red. a falling rock hazard on the lot, a no-build zone was established. No structures will be permitted to be constructed within the no-build zone area. There are two existing non-habitable sheds present on the site within the rockfall hazard zone. These structures cannot be replaced, modified, or expanded. Building envelopes have been delineated on the lots outside of the rockfall hazard zone, shown here in brown. General purpose utility easements will be dedicated to the county via the plat. This is a site view looking to the north. In this view, a portion of the existing home is shown on the left side of the photo. The topography of the site has slopes that range between 15% to 25%. Vegetation consists of native grasses, small shrubs, and trees. The existing sheds are in the rockfall hazard area on the proposed lot one and can be viewed and can be seen in this view. This is a site view looking to the southeast. The surrounding area consists of rolling hills and natural terrain. Springer Park is located south of the proposed subdivision. This view is looking to the east from the proposed lots. The lots are situated south of a mesa which slopes downward towards Evelina Road. This view is looking to the west on Evelina Road. I-25 is located one half mile from the proposed subdivision. The approval standards for a minor development request are set forth in section 603 of the subdivision resolution and listed on this slide. Staff's assessment of the approval standards are discussed in detail within the staff report. Staff has evaluated the minor development in accordance with Article 6 of the subdivision resolution. Should the planning commission find that the approval standards for the minor development are met, the following proposed conditions shall be considered for inclusion in the motion. Condition number one, prior to recordation of the minor development final plat, the applicant shall pay $500 to Douglas County School District for cash in lieu of school land dedication. Condition number two, prior to recordation of the minor development final plat, the applicant shall pay $250 to Douglas County for cash in lieu of park land dedication. Condition number three, prior to recordation of the minor development plat, technical corrections to the plat exhibit shall be made to the satisfaction of Douglas County. Section 604.06 of the subdivision resolution sets forth parameters of the Planning Commission's recommendation of a minor development request. This concludes staff's presentation. I'm available to take questions on the staff report. Casey Adrania is here representing the applicants and to answer any questions about the request.

Thank you. Commissioners, are there any questions for staff at this time? No? Does the applicant have a presentation this evening? Okay, thank you. Commissioners, any questions for the applicant? There is no presentation. Lynn?

Yes, Commissioner Bruzo. Just a quick question on a concern I have. I just wanted to make sure it's being addressed. So I noted that the Colorado Geological Survey, they reviewed and assessed and sent out a report with no objection with the mitigation proposed. But the one I wanted to ask about is the one by the Geotechnical Evaluation Report They said that there was no imminent hazard at the site, but there was a potential for rock fall and related damage is significant due to the location being 100 to 150 feet from the no-build boundary. And they sent a recommendation along with that. So my question is, are you going by that recommendation or something else to mitigate it?

We had a lot of back and forth between our civil engineer, our geotechnical engineer, and the Colorado Geological Survey that a lot of mitigation options were looked at, but it was determined that actual mitigation, so this would be like some sort of structural fence on the north property line, any sort of structural mitigation is not really feasible for our site. So that's where our geological engineer met with the Colorado Geological Survey and discussed that, came to the determination that a physical site walk with our geological engineer to physically look at all of the the potential rocks that could fall around the north air end of the site as well as the existing topography and He literally staked out, you know, basically the no-build zone based on all of the information given to us so It was determined that and reviewed by all parties, the Colorado Geological Survey, that the no-build zone that was established is the best path forward and the safest path forward.

Okay, yes, and I think I read that when you were mentioning fencing along with a couple other options, that was not feasible because it's super expensive, I think I read.

Yeah, very expensive and honestly not even feasible because a lot of those mitigations measures would have to actually take place off of the property, which would certainly not be an option. So that's where that path was ruled out pretty early on as a potential.

Okay, thank you very much.

You're welcome. Sir, can I have you state your first, last name, spell your last name, and where you live in relationship to Douglas County? Sorry, needed to get that in there.

Yeah, no problem. Name is Casey Adrania with Adrania Architecture and Development. You spell that A-D-R-A-G-N-A. And my address is 12135 South Meander Way in Parker, Colorado, 80138.

All right, thank you very much.

Yep.

Any other questions, commissioners?

Mr. Chair, I'll have a couple questions, but I'll reserve them for after public comment.

Okay. Thank you. Thank you. At this point, is there any public comment? Sir, come on up. State your first, last name, spell your last name, and where you live in relationship to Douglas County.

Yes, sir. David Shohet, S-H-O-H-E-T. My residence is 3990 Home Street, Castle Rock, Colorado, 80108. In relation to the subdivision, my wife and I own the property on the north side of the subdivision as well as on the east side of this division so the the property that's that's going in or to be subdivided is essentially what I'd call a flagpole lot so that the pole portion is right along our Eastern boundary property line and I understand that the driveway for access along with probably utilities are going within the pole I'll be fairly blunt on the west side of us is the Bridgewater project and it's been a nightmare, frankly, with dust, weed, noxious weeds, sediment, and everything else coming off that property for the last five years. I recognize this subdivision, and I'm not here to fight it. I'm not here to dispute it. I'm fine with it going through. I just would like to have the sediment, noxious weeds, as well as dust control during construction, and while they make improvements, because it's been bad on our west side here. And one of, I think, the concerns is the development reports, Article 6 does require grading plans as well as other reports that were not provided. And then there's some other staff comments that I thought were a little bit bizarre in that the SIA, which was approved in June, it's not part of the public packet, but apparently it was approved based on construction plans that have never been seen. I'm just here primarily to see if there's a condition or something that we can work on that prior to construction we have some ability to look at what's going to happen with stormwater runoff and drainage and grading to ensure that grading isn't changed so that stormwater is increased beyond its historical levels upon particularly our east property to this subdivision. That's really our primary concern with this development.

Thank you, sir. Thank you. Are there any other public comments at this point? Seeing none, we'll close public comment. So really, you have questions that kind of focus around dust control, noxious weeds, and things of that nature. Was any of that addressed inside the packet? I don't recall seeing it, but it might have been in there.

Carolyn Freeland for staff. The applicants completed a weed management study that was weed management plan that was approved by the Douglas County weed management department. So they do have, and that was included in the packet that you received. The engineering did not require Construction plans or grading plans because of the size of the subdivision. It's just adding an extra lot and based on the geotechnical report one of the recommendations was to basically have as Grading should be minimalized and should be basically just located around the building envelope that was established. So all of that will be addressed during building permit, the building permit process. Engineering will require some type of either a desk or a desk plan at that time in addition to the specific construction documents that would be associated with a request, a development request. The applicants did work with the Silver Heights Water District who required, along with Douglas County Engineering, that the applicant bring in infrastructure basically to the Evelina Road water stubs, which are already in place. The existing home on the site has central water and sewer services from Silver Heights. So the infrastructure is already there, basically in the street. So for this second lot, the applicants will be basically putting in the construction for that, to tie into that.

And when we get those construction plans, that's when we'll have the drainage and everything else at that time, correct? Correct.

That's correct.

Yeah. Generally with large lots, Curt White can offer staff just to build on what Carolyn said. Generally with these larger acre plus lots, that'll be with site specific when they actually come in with a house plan and they can see where the grading is within the envelope. That's when all the GESC and DESC or DESC plans will be finalized and submitted in, as well as any grading and erosion control. That's why it's part of the GESC AS.

Great. Does the applicant have any? comments that they would like to address at this point?

I mean, just specific to that, we worked extensively with our civil engineer to already start thinking about building footprint, which is limited in this case. It'll most likely be on the western half of the lot. which would be kind of opposite of our flagpole driveway, which comes up the east side of the property line. The house will be likely on the west side of the property. But again, you know, The main purpose of the applicants looking to take over this lot and develop this new house, absolutely wanna be a good neighbor and make sure to not put any extra issues on the neighboring property. It sounds like there's existing issues on the other side of their property, so I know that we would not want to add more issues to that situation.

All right, thank you. Do you accept all the conditions as presented by the staff?

Yes.

Okay, you may have a seat. Commissioners, any other discussions on this item at this time?

Mr. Chair, this is Commissioner McKesson. I have a couple of questions here, and if the applicant wouldn't mind, I'll have you come up now just because some of them pertain to just that. One of my questions early on was your neighborhood outreach, and it sounds like I appreciate the Showett family here this evening giving you some context from their perspective, and I appreciate hearing you testify tonight that you want to work with them on your neighboring land use. Did you have any outreach with any of the neighbors prior to or just the posting? Did you?

Just the posting, to be honest. We worked with the Colorado Geological Survey for around two years. So I would just say that the majority of our efforts were put towards that to just to even see if it's a feasible project. So that was the extent of kind of our, so there was not any additional outreach beyond what was required.

Okay, I appreciate that, and I guess I can say now after hearing the testimony, both the lack thereof in the written file and the verbal, that I generally favor your project, but I too, and I think we too, want to make sure it's favorable for your existing neighbors and future neighbors and that sort of thing. So in that context, I'd like to know if, Carolyn, if you could bring up slide nine on the presentation, I think it's page nine, because I'm not aware of seeing that detail in our staff purport. Was that in our report? I couldn't find the no build zone in our staff report anywhere, and maybe I was remiss, but I didn't see that.

It's the last page of your packet. It's basically the final exhibit, the minor development plat exhibit, and then it also has the supplemental exhibit that kind of gives more detail of the slopes and things like that.

I will look for that in our, of the 114 pages, so it could be there. And I guess while we're here, though, this is what I call a flag lot, meaning you have a private drive, your access, which I'm gonna call the northeast, well, the east side of the lot that goes up. That's a private access drive to this new lot one, right? Correct. And is that the one, if I read the report correctly, Engineering wants this access to be designed within current standards.

That's correct. The lot, the proposed lot two or the existing home currently has sort of two access drives that kind of kind of like a half circle. And so they're already existing. The one to the west that will be for the designated for lot two, that one is already paved. And it's already a designated access point. The second for this lot one, the new proposed access will be a private access drive for that particular lot. and that one will be constructed to Douglas County roadway standards, driveway standards.

Thank you for that. I see in our staff report you've got an aerial that does show the paved drive to the west, and then this is existing, but I thought I saw a picture in your presentation here of a culvert with dirt over it, and that's this drive that gets improved?

Yes. Is that right? Let me see if I can go back here. Is this what you're thinking?

Is that, that's the new one? This is the one that will be new.

Yeah, this is the location of the new driveway on the east side.

And the culvert was not shown in this picture. There was another picture. So this is the one engineering wants built to the standard, our standard.

Correct, and this is where the infrastructure will go in through this particular drive. This is just basically a dirt drive.

Right.

So sort of, it's not really a formal driveway.

But it'll become one is what I understand. It'll become one. And this is where I could appreciate the concern about erosion control and debris and whatnot because this isn't built to Douglas County standards. So that will be improved. And then how is it proposed, and this is maybe to the applicant, that you're going to do a joint access agreement here or no?

No, the property line, the property will, is the same shape of the drive. So the property will take on this eastern drive. So there will not be a shared access here.

So they're in any REA reciprocal access?

No, so the new lot two, which is where the current residence is, its access will remain the same, but they will not have a secondary access. Okay.

Good, so this access would be the responsibility of the new lot.

Yeah, correct.

And this is something you're going to sell off or somehow or another develop, I guess, is the plan, right? And so that property owner would be responsible for this access and maintaining it.

Yeah, completely isolated, so there's no shared access between the two lots. Excellent.

And I appreciate the comment that staff has relative to the grading, erosion, and sediment control happening at permit, which is more typical, because it depends on how much earth you plan on moving, as you may know, whether or not you're gonna be subject to many more of those requirements for the erosion control comment that Mr. Showett had. So thank you for that. That's all the questions I have.

Okay.

Okay, seeing no further discussion, I'd entertain a motion.

Mr. Chair, Commissioner Smallwood. Turn that on. Commissioner Smallwood makes a motion to recommend approval of the Adragna Minor Development Final Plan Project File SB 2024-30 subject to the three conditions recommended by staff.

And Commissioner Brews will second that motion.

Thank you.

Motion to recommend approval of the Adragna Minor Development Final Plat Project File SB 2024-030, subject to the three conditions recommended by staff. Commissioner Jim Smallwood?

Yes.

Commissioner Mark Hampton?

Yes.

Commissioner Mark Reier?

Yes.

Commissioner Linda Brusso?

Yes.

Commissioner Mike McKesson?

Yes. And with that, the motion passes unanimously.

I lost my place.

This concludes all the items on the agenda. Since there are no other agendas at this point, we will adjourn. Thank you for your attendance.