Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

I'm going to start over again. I apologize. I forgot to unmute the room for the recording. Good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us for the Planning Commission meeting July 13, 2026. We're going to be running the meeting as staff today. We have two members present in chambers and two members present online. We just did the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you all. Now call the roll. Joanne Overfield has an excused absence. Andrew Hardesty Present. Nick Francavitch. Present. Layla Church.

Here.

And Carly Lenoir.

Here.

Thank you. That concludes roll. We have quorum. So tonight, first on our agenda is a set of public hearings.

Tonight we are conducting the following public hearings. Concurrency code updates, multifamily tax exemptions, and a shorter comprehensive plan and zoning map amendment. A public hearing is a one-way communication that allows the citizens to present testimony on a specific topic for the Planning Commission to consider. in their decision-making process. Please frame your testimony as a statement of your fact or opinion, whether it's a question. When it is your turn to speak, those attending in person shall approach the podium, while virtual attendees should use the raise hand option in Zoom. I will call on you when it's your turn. Please clearly state your name for the record. You will have then five minutes to speak.

All right. Thank you for the introduction there. So the first hearing tonight is for concurrency code updates. We will call that hearing to order at 6.04 p.m. This is an item that has been under discussion with the Planning Commission for the last few months. We are proposing a modification to Chapter 18.105 of the Edgewood Municipal Code That will adjust the trip threshold for concurrency applicability from 10 trips to 20 trips. It will also clarify that the level of service is based on vehicular trips as opposed to the broader term of road facilities. and also will allow for flexibility in our annual reporting so that rather than being required annually, that we would have the option to do it as infrequently as every two years. So with that, we'll open the floor for any comments. If anybody would like to speak about the concurrency code updates, feel free to approach the podium or raise your hand with the raise hand feature online. Seeing no one approaching the podium and no hands being raised online, we will go ahead and close the hearing for concurrency code updates at 6.05 p.m. Our second hearing this evening is for multifamily tax exemptions. This is another item that's been under discussion with the Planning Commission for a few months at the direction of the Council. The Planning Commission has been reviewing and considering standards to adopt if a multifamily tax exemption program were to go in effect. We are proposing a limited target area of our densest zones being the town center zoning district, properties in the multi mixed use residential zoning district within 750 feet of Meridian and properties in the commercial zoning district within 300 feet of Meridian. of the three tax exemptions allowed by statute. We're proposing the eight-year and 12-year exemption terms with the following restrictions. The project to be eligible would have to have 10 units, would have to provide at least 50% permanent residential occupancy, would have to improve crosswalks when transit stops are within 100 feet of the project site, and existing overhead utilities would have to be relocated underground with the exception of high voltage transmission lines. The attached draft in the packet material and a couple of minor changes where prior draft unintentionally restricted eight-year exemptions to just the mixed-use residential zoning district. The tenant displacement provisions have been expanded and clarified to be consistent with other city examples. to ensure a regionally consistent process. And for conditional certificate extension appeal, we're proposing the mayoral appeal process as opposed to the hearing exam appeal process. And there are a couple of items listed here for further discussion with the Planning Commission prior to potential recommendation based on conversation with the Department of Commerce. regarding the definition for high-cost area and trying to be clear on the threshold for what would be considered an affordable unit. Also, wanting clarity on how many units to be eligible for a multifamily tax exemption, the percentage permanent residential occupancy, and whether or not some additional provisions are desired by the Planning Commission. With that, I will conclude my presentation and technically open the hearing at 6.06 p.m. I did my presentation. So with that, if anybody would like to speak regarding multifamily tax exemptions, feel free to approach the podium or use the raise hand feature and Zoom online. We have one hand raised in the online audience. Would you like to speak?

Yes. Can you hear me?

Yes.

Good evening. I have actually spoke about this previously as well during the work session. So my name is Nusha Tashikor. I'm a real estate developer with Intercorp Homes and currently working on you know, multiple projects in the region, including a project in City of Edgewood. I do want to express my support for the proposed multifamily tax exemption program. You know, Edgewood, like many other communities across the region, faces a housing shortage, which is used and needed for young families, teachers, healthcare workers, first responders, service employees, and, you know, seniors. who all desire to stay in the community. The challenge is the cost of developing new housing just continues to rise due to multiple factors such as construction costs, financing, infrastructure, regulatory expenses. The MFTE program is one of the most effective tool that's available to both cities and the private sector because it creates a partnership between the groups. resulting in more affordable units created without requiring direct public subsidies from the city's budget. Importantly, you know, MFTE program doesn't just create affordable housing. More often than not, that is the main reason that a project financially becomes feasible that otherwise would just not be built. When a project moves forward, obviously the community benefits from new housing. increased economic activities, construction jobs, long-term investment in the city. So I do really believe that this program will help Edgewood attract responsible development, increase housing choices for residents and support the city's long-term goal while maintaining local control over how growth occurs. Speaking from direct experience, as I mentioned, programs like this can truly be the difference between a project moving forward or remaining on the drawing board. Thanks for your time.

Thank you for your comment. If you'd like to speak on this matter, please approach the podium. Thank you.

This is just a quick rebuttal to the comments from the previous speaker. My name is Zachary Melton. I live in Sumner Heights area. The last election cycle, we were requested to vote on a levy lift lid to increase our property taxes because of the shortfalls of the current city government. And now we're looking at corporate real estate developers who can clearly afford these extra taxes and aren't working people that live in the area and they are asking for tax exemptions. That seems a little backwards and counterintuitive to supporting your current citizenry. That's all I have on it.

Thank you.

Hi. I'm Gloria Fletcher, and I didn't plan on speaking to this today, but I just heard it, and I'm a commercial real estate broker, and the hardest thing to lease is commercial space that's on the first floor of a multifamily project, specifically ones that are part of the MFPTE program. program because the developers don't think about it. So I'm just hoping that within the standards, you've got something in there that makes that commercial space designed so that it's usable. That's it. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. All right, not seeing any other hands raised. We're going to close the public hearing for multifamily tax exemptions at 6.13 p.m. Last but not least, we have a level hearing for the Schober comprehensive plan and zoning map amendment file number 25-002-comp plan. I'm going to switch screens here and open this hearing at 6.14.

Just a moment here.

Okay. Josh, would you please introduce this subject?

Yes. um tonight we're having the public uh keeping the purpose of this public hearing is to discuss the shoulder map uh schober map amendment and rezone the permit numbers 25-002-com plan uh there's a lot of new faces out here in the audience so let me just kind of go through the overall whole process so you kind of understand it from the beginning um The GMA allows the city to update its comprehensive plan once per year and only once per year. This is called the docket process. And the application is received by anyone from any public or city staff to request any amendments to the comprehensive plan. Those are due by December and they go on a preliminary docket for the director to review. the community development director reviews and provides a recommendation of planning commission on the preliminary docket, which they review and have a public hearing, which was held earlier this year, I believe it was February. then they make a recommendation to council to make it official docket a final docket that docket does not approve any comprehensive plan amendment it doesn't guarantee any approval or denials all it does is saying that it is now on the docket to be reviewed so we had started the review resolutions numbers 26-0788 that's when city council took the final docket action So the first step is for staff to review the preliminary document materials submitted by the applicant and complete the State Environmental Protection Act review. From there, the Planning Commission holds a public hearing, which is what we're having tonight. They will discuss the amendment at this meeting and the next meeting, and then make a final recommendation to City Council. City Council reviews the Planning Commission recommendation, staff report, SEBA decision, all the public comments, and they can decide to hold a second public hearing if they so choose. City Council then makes a final action on the entire docket. This is just one item on the docket. The timeline is right now the anticipation of, well, it has to be adopted or a decision has to be made by December 2026, the end of the year, either approval or denial. Right now we're conducting the review and analysis, and we expect that to go to either October or November. Okay. So on the screen you have is a vicinity map of the Schrover properties. It's at the south east corner of the city near Sumner and State Route 167 along Sumner Heights Drive and near Edgewood Drive East. what is being proposed the applicant has proposed changing the comprehensive plan future land use designation and zoning of the two tax parcels from mixed residential one to industrial after reviewing all the applicant materials all the notice of application comments from the public staff has put together a second alternative alternative two That is the same as Alternative 1, so it would be rezoning from MR1 to industrial, but with a new limited industrial overlay to address the public comments. On the top right of the screen is the applicant's proposal, and then the bottom right is the city alternative. So this alternative limited industrial overlay would be a completely new overlay that goes over in the industrial zoning and provides additional restrictions and allowances that would restrict industrial uses on the property. So as proposed in the hearing documents, for permitted use parking lots, commercial parking areas would be a permitted use, which is not right now an industrial permitted use. Conditionally, we would change light manufacturing. For this purpose of our code, it's construction companies, contractor yards, apparel manufacturing, furniture, making those type of uses as a conditional use, which would require a hearing examiner when a project is specified. Also moving to conditional use would be warehousing storage all up to 50,000 square feet. The 50,000 square feet is just what we have in code currently is the easiest way to include it with any updates. The properties have to be able to meet all of the other requirements of the city in order to be allowed. So the 50,000 square feet is likely not one for this property. But since it's in the land use code written that way, it's easiest for staff to keep it all the same size. In addition, there's a A variety of limited or prohibited uses being proposed that is normally allowed in the industrial zoning district. That includes gas stations, heavy manufacturing, warehousing and storage above 50,000 square feet, waste management services, and asexual oriented entertainment or services. what what i'm trying to get at here is that this is uses uh permitted outright in the industrial zone with the new overlay these would not be allowed so this is in a sense limiting industrial uses on the um those properties with the overlay applied to them So during the notice of application public comments, key concerns, we did receive a lot of comments, 32. I have to briefly summarize these here, but they were provided in full to the Planning Commission and they will be provided in full to City Council. Some of the concerns though dealt with incompatibility with surrounding neighborhood, reduction in property values, concern regarding traffic, noise, lighting, and air, and quality impacts. Our staff response to this is to propose an alternative, which would limit the type of industrial uses, conduct SEPA review on both alternatives, and determine if mitigation measures are required. SEPA determination has been made and mitigation measures, and I'll go over those shortly here in a second, are provided in Test Image H, and then conduct a full code compliance review when any applications are done. So an MD&S, which is a SEPA determination mitigation, It was issued on June 28th, 2026, and had the following mitigation measures. Access limit to only the existing access easement, all other access points to removed, or one could be approved for emergency exit only. And the image on your right is kind of the, just highlighting what that means. Future developer development requires project specific noise study and share compliance with code. So, whoever proposes a. Industrial use would be required to provide a noise study. That would determine if noise walls are needed and how that would impact. We have specific noise requirements in the city. Based on the levels of use and residential has the highest. threshold of noise. So it has the lowest noise levels. So that means it's harder to projects to meet without doing more mitigation, for example, noise walls. The mitigation measure includes a 50-foot landscape buffer with solid screening required along Sumner Heights Drive. The images provided here were something the applicant has put together as part of their materials. So the staff can't confirm it would look exactly like this if something was built, but it gives you an idea of that landscaping and screening that they would have to build for any project on this property as part of the reason. Potential Sumner Heights Drive East improvements from the site access to City of Edgewood boundary, City boundary, primarily because the road is not sure if it can meet commercial standards. So it would need to be updated to meet those. So the applicant would be required to show proof that the road can sustain in that portion commercial traffic. This is still anything past it when commercial traffic would not be allowed. And lastly, design review would be required for any commercial industrial to ensure compliance with aesthetics, critical areas, site layout, landscaping, all the requirements of the SEPA mitigation measures, and if the overlay is the final decision, reviewing it against the overlay. So comprehensive plan amendments have certain criteria to be reviewed against. So whether the proposed amendment conforms to the GMA, The city has reviewed the GMA and the housing impacts. The property is only going to reduce our housing by four or five units. And we are well above our growth targets because the ADUs and middle housing wasn't incorporated with or thought of when we were doing our comprehensive plan update because there were state requirements later. So we are well above our housing requirements. for future growth. Consistent with the 2024 Comprehensive Plan, on the image here on your right is a figure on the Comprehensive Plan. On the Future Land Use Map, The comprehensive plan, which is also approved by city council, identified properties for a special land use study overlay. Those are hashed areas. It's a little harder to see on the map, but these properties, including the industrial, existing industrial, were identified as special land use overlay for future study of potential rezone. So those are already considered to be looked at in the future. So it's consistent with the 2024 Comprehensive Plan. The next two circumstances in the area has substantially changed or the assumptions are no longer valid. Do not really apply to this amendment because it was identified as to be looked at later by the comprehensive plan. proposed amendments reflect widely held values of the residents of the city the full explanation of the land use goals and policies that this amendment meets is provided in the staff report primary dealing with improving employment and compatible uses with adjacent uses Um, key term here is being adjacent with industrial being the media adjacent. Here to the South and somewhere heights being a physical barrier to the. Around the rest of the property additionally site specific proposals have additional criteria. Does not adversely affect public service transportation level of service. Applicant did provide a traffic report, and we will require project-specific traffic reports when they are applied for, and there are no adverse impacts to the transportation level of service. Does not adversely impact transportation network, capital facilities, utility parks. That can't be mitigated. The property is physically suitable for requested designation, including access, utilities, and compatibility with surrounding land uses. Uh, that for this 1, particularly staffs for, uh, recommending the alternative to as the best option to meet this criteria. The site, uh, specific amendments will not create pressures to change the landing station designation of other properties. That does not believe that this will happen because of the road barrier and, um. The pressure already existing on the property from the industrial to the South. Um, that's adjacent to it and makes it seem really a part of that area. Does not materially affect population growth projections or availability of urban services. then consistent with county-wide policies and other inter-local agreement laws there's one little uh note i would like to make on regarding county-wide policies the camera policies does want us to limit industrial uses that are prohibit industrial uses on septic on septic however that was primary for uh things in the uh uga which we are However, we have a plan for sewer in this area. So in a sense, we are compliant with that. And the limited overlay was designed also to ensure that no real big impact into the utilities and need for septic. So staff is recommending to move approval of alternative two of the Schrover Comprehensive Plan Amendment and Rezone. What I recommend is what staff is really meaning is that this is the option we think is the best aligned with the Comprehensive Plan. For just note to the public here and Planning Commission, the alternative three is in a sense, voting against the Comprehensive Plan Amendment, which can be a recommendation from Planning Council. And then the City Council though can take a whole other decision if they choose to. They don't have to follow the Planning Commission or staff if they choose not to. Now we'll go ahead and open for public comment. As a reminder, there's gonna be five minutes, you have for five minutes for public comment. We'll take all the public comments. We have to stay here. We'll stay here as long as we need to to make sure the Planning Commission gets all the public comments. You can also provide written comments if you'd like. And Jeremy, do you have anything to add?

I just want to briefly reiterate again, this is a one-way Testimony. So please frame your testimony as a statement of fact or opinion rather than a question, if at all possible. When it is your turn to speak, just approach the podium. We'll... keep an eye on our online audience to see if anybody wants to make comment virtually and we may cut in between to allow the virtual attendees to speak as well. I would ask that since we did not have a sign-in sheet, we have a full house tonight that if you would please in an orderly fashion approach the podium and just start a line and please wait until we give you the okay to go ahead so I have time to reset the timer between speakers. Thank you in advance for your patience this evening. We really appreciate all of your time tonight, and we'll do our best to get through this in a nice and orderly fashion.

I know not everybody's going to talk. We've got to raise a hand if he's here again.

Thanks.

My name is Karen Coates, and my dad's Diane. So I'm in opposition. While I do appreciate that the city council took into account our comments, I think the amendments are insufficient. So first of all, in the pictorial, the yellow circle, you can see the rezone area if you're familiar with it. The yellow circle is Evan and Mariah who live across the street. So in the last two years, they've repeatedly made cases, and there is a case number against this company for illegally using the land. They see what they're doing. They are dropping off industrial equipment to store there as a waypoint from eastern Washington. When they see it, their house vibrates. They have noise waking them up. Two years they've been fighting this. So we have in the last two years noticed new noises that wake us up at night that actually shake the bed hard enough to wake people up in the middle of the night. I have seen nothing in this amendment that does anything to prevent the vibration. And this company, again, they don't follow code. They have a case against them. So no matter what codes you put in place, they don't follow the code. So in the red circle, while this has happened, the last two years, our landslide problem has increased. So we'll show you. This picture is a parcel in the red circle. That's a landslide that's left off halfway down the hill in January, down to the bottom in April. Two truckloads taken away. Those are not the only truckloads that are taken away in the last two years. Vibrations significantly exacerbate the erosion problem. Next one, even more concerning, is 27 and a half feet from our door. And that's from this year. So that's very concerning. And what does the applicant say? So in regards to unstable soil, none known. And they say it in regards to the use of the land causing erosion, not applicable to the comp plan amendment and rezone, none known. If this issue is not applicable to the comp plan amendment and rezone, it certainly should be. Erosion issues on the hill are well known. You just drive around, you see them. I don't see that this applicant, if they really cared for the community and the residents, they didn't have to dig deep to find out there's an erosion problem. So next of all, they state that the existing topographic elevations substantially create physical separation. They don't. They reduce our separation. In my view, the rezone is a dramatic change as it steps over a significant boundary area that is currently a buffer to the Valley Avenue. As far as noise, they state not applicable, must comply with city code. Again, they haven't complied with city code to date. Why should we believe they will in the future? Furthermore, the mitigation plans involve an eight-foot soundbar wall, which won't when the site is in the valley and the residents are on the hill. So from... Washington State DOT site, quote, noise barriers do very little good for homes on a hillside or for buildings that rise above the barrier, unquote. The barriers built right next to the industrial site source, the valley of the floor, sound waves will easily clear the top of the barrier and travel in a straight line direction to the hillside homes. Because the direct line of sight is not broken, the barrier provides little to no noise protection for the homes. So I see nothing in this that will protect us from the noise that's already... Causes issue as far as character. There is a picture of one of their rigs. It's an industrial rig hauling another industrial rig. We don't think as they say in their proposal, the member proposal will sustain the city small town character ambiance and charm. We don't think that's charming. Next, traffic. That is a choke point at the bottom of the hill. When I commuted, I could be a mile from my home, and it would take me 20, 30 more minutes to get home. In addition, we've had to call, unfortunately, 911 several times the last couple of years. They come from Sumner. So we don't like more congestion in that choke point. And these vehicles, who wants to be behind that when the green light goes? They'll probably take up the whole time. It's going to slow things down significantly. So finally, we're concerned about lower property values. Nothing in the mitigation addresses that. They will go down. We're concerned about the negative impact on health and well-being. So the applicant, again, has already had a negative impact. Reference case number CE-24-0033. There have been numerous noise complaints. It's interrupting resident sleep. The noise is disturbing telecommuters during working hours. It's exacerbating erosion issues and causing people to spend time combating the issues. It's not a right to have the rezone. Right to request it, not a right to get it. Thank you.

Thank you for your comment. We have Phil Harris online. I'm going to promote him to allow him to speak. Phil, you have five minutes.

Thank you. I appreciate it. First of all, thank you, Commission. I appreciate y'all for spending your lovely hot summer day here with us. Thank you very much. Um, I've been in education for 21 years. I've been a community member here for 10. Uh, my home was built in 1924. Uh, I live just a road above this proposed, uh, commercial site. I have three children. My neighbors have children. My neighbors have children. Uh, As I understand it, this commission is built upon experts in architecture and community involvement and urban planning, which has a responsibility to protect existing neighborhoods and preserve the environments within those neighborhoods and uphold the integrity of our city's comprehensive plan, which we've talked about. I'm not an expert. I've been a teacher. I've been an administrator. I've worked at Central District in this community. I serve my community. I think, well, I uphold the integrity of our community, but I'm not an expert. I can read though. I have a master's degree in literacy and another one in educational administration and leadership. According to the comprehensive plan one, there's a duty to preserve and strengthen residential neighborhoods. We have one, it's strong. Two, you have an obligation to protect the community's character and natural environment. We have one, and it's thriving. Just yesterday, I saw a beautiful eagle circling right above the property that they're proposing. We have two bald eagles, though according to that plan, they don't exist. We have a crane. According to that plan, it doesn't exist either. However, they do. And They rely on us to ensure their safety and their well-being. Three, this comprehensive plan has an obligation to direct intensive, and I quote, direct intensive commercial mixed-use development into designated areas specific to the town center and the Meridian Corridor. That's not where we're at. We're just simply not. I think the biggest problem I have here outside of the fact that it's unsafe for my children, we don't have, we don't have sidewalks yet. My kids still find their way down to this city center in Sumner or find their way up because they like to run the Hills. We don't have those. I think, I think the, the, the, If I'm just being honest, I think the biggest problem I have here is the ambiguity in the language with their proposal. Those attorneys were smart in their ambiguity. Is there going to be noise pollution? Well, not yet. Not yet. Not based on what we're trying to. Okay. Is there going to be air pollution? Well, maybe, but not yet. Are we going to have an impact on environmental erosion? Well, no, not necessarily, not yet. My house was built in 1924. It was a logging community 102 years ago. It has not been a commercial community since. This commission in this city has an obligation to maintain the integrity of status quo. 100 years worth of status quo. Are you going to be the one that does that? Are you going to be the one that decides, hey, status quo no longer is applicable here because we want to financially gain? If I wanted to make a million dollars, I certainly wouldn't do it in the heart of a community that's 100 years old. That makes no sense to me. And one thing I will say, the last thing I'll say, there was a quote earlier by a gentleman, I apologize, and please forgive me, I forget your name. But you literally said, quote, this is four or five houses worth of land. What if we put a rehabilitation center for violent criminals in that four or five houses? What if we put a rehabilitation center for sexual offenders in that four or five houses? What if we decided to dump toxic waste in that four or five? It's just four or five houses. We need to be smart here. We need to be smart here and you may not live here, but you are a part of our community. You're a volunteer that our mayor has entrusted to make really, really good decisions on behalf of us who are not able to make the decisions for our own community. Make the right decision. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Harris.

Get the clock restarted here. All right. Go ahead.

Thank you. Can you hear me okay?

Yes.

Oh, perfect. Okay. Hello. My name is Mariah. My partner and I live across the street from the proposed rezone. We have called this neighborhood our home for many years. We have built our lives here because of its residential character, sense of community, and peace that comes with living in Edgewood. I'm deeply invested in this proposal, so invested that I came on April 13 to speak at the planning and commissioning meeting while our five-year-old dog was fighting for her life. I spent countless hours dedicated to understanding this proposal, reviewing documents, going door to door, and gathering community input. This meant time taken away from work, my family, and the life I normally enjoy. Some of the concerns I still have are the equity of the land use. Who bears the burden and who benefits? Are the impacts of the development being disproportionately placed on the homes nearest? Our home is also located next to a freeway. Has a cumulative impact been determined? Transparency. For example, the SEPA checklist, the applicant indicates NA to the comprehensive plan or to be determined at the time of development permit application. Due to such a radical land, due to such a change in the land use, transparency is essential for residents to evaluate the information that is being presented. The comprehensive plan talks about preserving small town charm, ambience, and character. From my perspective, those qualities are determined by quiet streets and a sense of safety and calm. It is difficult to see how increased industrial activity, truck traffic, noise, and emissions are compatible with the comprehensive plan. Access. I also want you to consider transportation and public safety. Sumner Heights is an evacuation route in the event of a natural disaster. Any increased truck traffic should be carefully evaluated to ensure it does not compromise emergency response or residents' ability to safely enter or exit. Mitigation. I was interested to know what supported the mitigation and if it was supported by evidence. An eight-fold wall was proposed. However, due to the topography of the land, it would only mitigate noise at the line of sight. Vegetation was also added. However, what do we do in the winter months? And there's already mature vegetation already existed that did not mitigate sounds from previous violations. Our neighborhoods include families, older homes with decades of history, people who work from home and vulnerable residents. We deserve thoughtful planning that protects our health, safety and quality of life. For all these reasons, I respectfully ask that you deny this request. I believe that the proposal is incompatible with surrounding residential neighborhoods and does not adequately protect the health, safety, welfare and quality of life of the residents who already call this place home. Thank you.

Hello, everyone. My name is Karen Diego. My husband, Sheldon Bowen, and I live on a property at 1312256 Street East in Edgewood, and our property also borders Sumner Heights. We are totally against the rezone from residential to industrial on the property listed above. The new owner, Mark Schober of M2 Industrial, Ellensburg, Washington, bought and started using the property commercially about two years ago, moving in equipment and vehicles. The property is zoned residential. M2 Industrial... works large projects over most of Washington State. On purchase, they had semis and large flatbed trucks entering the property, dropping off and loading metal products, creating a very, very loud noise level. This would happen between 10 p.m. and 1 a.m. the majority of the week, Monday through Sunday. Our home is directly across the street on Sumner Heights. We looked down on the entire property and they built a new gate on the northeast side next to Mariah's house on that sharp curve on Sumner Heights. The commercial property adjacent to these parcels, Evergreen Septic and Concrete in business from 1987 located in Sumner are good neighbors starting at 7 a.m. and closing at 5 Monday through Friday. They make a lot of noise sometimes, but keep the trees between the business and homes in Sumner Heights. place to cut the noise from their business. Those large, well-established trees extend around the proposed industrial rezone area. If any are removed, it would cause destabilization of the steep slope that they're growing on, adding undue pressure to the steep slopes at Sumner Heights, 56th Street East, 56th Street Court East, 134th Street Avenue East, and the 55th Street East Homes. are on. Sumner Heights just incurred two landslides recently, one on our property and the other west of our property. This added to the lack of proper storm water management in the entire area as acknowledged years ago by Jeremy Metzler would not make a safe environment. Our entire Edgewood neighborhood is residential, not located in Sumner on West Valley Parkway as Evergreen is, allowing its industrial status. The intersection of Sumner Heights and Edgewood Drive and Evergreen East exit is an extremely busy area all day, every day with commute time especially backed up on Edgewood Drive and lower Sumner Heights. On a regular basis, semi trucks missing the no semis Sumner signage do not make a left turn and drive into Edgewood. Our local property values would plummet if for just one person's request for a rezone in a total residential wooded area taking away our lifestyle, home values, long established wildlife and bird habitat for the entire area. How would they handle the noise, dust, traffic, our views generated by their business? They already showed their colors by running a commercial business in a residential zone at the hours of 10 a.m. to 1 a.m. No to the rezone. I also want to make this comment about when they finished the current job, that they have because they will move on. Who the heck is going to purchase that place and what new industrial complex company is going to request all these other new things if they sell the property? Thank you.

Good evening.

My name is Eric Page. I live in Edgewood and have lived here for a while. In fact, I was on the first city council in 1995. And it's comforting to see at these hearings some things never change. In fact, one of the fun things that I saw in the presentation earlier was an argument that one of the reasons that this would be an acceptable compromise is that things have changed in the city. I can tell you, coming back from the 1900s, a few things have not changed. One is some of the bad arguments that get brought forward to bring something like this and see if we can get it approved. One of those is the shifting of the burden of proof. And I noticed that when I was on the council. I notice it here today as well. The people who purchased this property absolutely have the right to the enjoyment of their property as they purchased it. But so do these people here. The people who purchased the property are making it look like we have to prove why they shouldn't change the zoning, why we have to prove how what they purchased has to be something different than they purchased originally. That's not how it should be. The burden of proof should lie on them. The other argument that I'm hearing that's really, really common is the old camel's nose in the tent argument. We're going to just make a few changes. We're going to have this mitigated approach. But the reality is that we've already seen this particular applicant has not done a good job of observing code enforcement. And it has been a problem for the neighbors already. To put forward this modified proposal really doesn't address the concerns of the neighbors. The other thing that's truly a constant is keeping our city as a good city requires vigilance. It requires vigilance on the part of the people of the city, as well as the good people serving on the planning commission. Thank you for your service and the staff as well. These people here all could be doing something different today. They would all prefer to be doing something different today. And they're here, why? Because they care about this community. They care about handing on a good community to the people who follow us. When we formed this city in 1995, there were many people who came to us and said, you have an obligation as a council to keep this community as the kind of community that people want to live in. I know when we talk about land use frequently, people will say, we need to have the highest and best use of the property. Well, we need to have the highest and best use the city as a whole. The evaluation of this decision, it shouldn't just be based on this parcel alone. It should be based on the needs of the community as a whole. And it's extremely difficult to find a good place to live. It's very difficult to find a community that cares about its community as this one does. Planning Commission, you have an obligation to help keep the character of this community. It's something special. It's something we want to hand on to future generations. We're going to consistently have proposals like this, proposals from people that I'm sure would really like to see it happen, but it will do serious damage to the good of the community. All of us here want the same thing. We want the best thing for the city. Now, the applicant, I don't know, is the applicant in the room? All of us here want the best thing for the city. We ask that you please deny this request, maintain the comprehensive plan as it is, and we all appreciate it. Oh, and just one note. I noticed that in this proposal, there was a statement that it's consistent with the wishes of the community. Just a quick show of hands. Is this proposal consistent with the wishes of the community? No. Thank you so much for your work.

Good evening. I've got a few notes, no speech prepared. We've been out of town for a while, and I apologize. I've just got random notes. I want to follow in the back of those last comments with something that really uh caught my attention and that was the adjacent to the other industrial property um and i don't really understand that being in sumner and then you know we're a different city across the street but take it it leads to to my concern that Edgewood's so close to Sumner, so close to Puyallup. Like, has there been a comprehensive plan with the three cities possibly? The, you know, we're so close, the proximity to the Sounder station, walking, you know, I would consider my home, I own two properties across the street from this proposal, and I can walk to the Sounder in 10 minutes. Like, that's great. Why would we approve, I guess, light industrial if you're going to gain tax base? And I'm trying to put myself in all three positions here, the city, the residents, and the investor or the industrial company. And I get it. I served in the military 25 years, and I appreciate your guys' service. Uh, and I wanted, I've retired and I don't want to do this, but here I am. You guys have motivated me to defend my neighborhood. Um, so with that said. Uh, I'm the road association president for our 56 street court. I'm not speaking for them, but I believe there are 16 properties adjacent to this and, uh. Again, I've been overseas with my wife and her family. And I think there's like a second meeting option that I read about. And this is such a big decision. I ask you on our behalf to gather as possibly a 13 building community. I think there's 16 lots. I don't even know. We own two. Again, my family's been in this neighborhood for over 50 years. And, you know, I just can't tell you the peace I find driving into Edgewood. And that doesn't go just for Sumner and Edgewood Heights. That's everything south of Meridian. You know, Milwaukee, Jovita, you know, you cross into Edgewood and you leave the war behind, is how I feel personally. It's a breath of fresh air. And... For whatever it's worth, putting myself in the business person's shoes or the light industrial proposed property owners, we own investment properties, nearly two dozen, from vacant lots to single family to multifamily to commercial to... You know, this isn't something I talk about. I'm very humble. But I want to put myself in their shoes and get, you know, I understand. You up zone, you make money. You know, I benefited from that personally. And I get it. But I'd like you to do the math. this tax base that you're going to gain from light industrial compared to however many residential properties that are losing value. Like, I don't know if that's something you guys have penciled or not, but... It just doesn't make sense. Sticking a light industrial in a residential community adjacent to check out Sumner's comprehensive plan. It just doesn't make sense to me why we would have light industrial in the middle of residential and downtown. I would suggest doing something more like disregard that. All right. Access to the hill is what I was going to say. Sidewalks and lights and things like that. So we could sell this as proximity to the sounder. So with that said, I had to do a double check. It sounds like this... decisions already been made. Uh, and that's really strange to me without hearing public comment that, you know, I kind of did a double take, like you're going to, you're going to recommend this way forward for the city or whatever. Uh, so there you have it. Um, Thank you for listening. Hey, I'm not a, not in my backyard type of guy. Okay. But you know, if Schubert wanted light industrial, they should have bought light industrial in my opinion.

Hi, my name's Jay Camelton. I do live in the area, but I also, I do have some sympathy for the applicant and planning because I do this for a living. I'm a little embarrassed to say, but I'm usually on the other side. I represent commercial clients doing this for a living, conditional use permits, rezones, you name it, pretty much any of that. And so I understand where they're coming from. I see what planning is doing by trying to come up with an overlay zone that addresses the concerns of the neighborhood and also addresses the applicant's concerns and tries to reach a middle ground. But in American law, property law specifically, to do a rezone is a very dramatic tool that's usually saved for the most extreme cases. So generally, if I'm going to acquire a rezone, the property has to be a checkerboard property. You have an industrial, you have maybe a residential, maybe a commercial, and then You want to combine them all or that that specific commercial property can be industrial because it's surrounded in that. You just don't have that in this situation. You have literally 100 years of topography, geography and use. This determined where residential is at. and where commercial is at that's the other surprise is that they went directly from a rezone to residential to industrial in my industry that's unheard of i'm impressed with the applicant that they were able to get planning to recommend approval a little disappointed in planning but i'm also impressed that they were able to do that because that is a dramatic tool that's not something that's done lately and you can also look at this overhead and i can understand how you can review the comprehensive plan And you can see an overhead shot. But when you're actually on the property, which I go past literally 10 times a day, there's a clear delineation between the residential and the traditional industrial use. And it does not include this property. So on the overhead map, you can kind of see how you could just adjust the industrial. But in practice, that just doesn't make sense. And going this way 10 times a day, I can... I can agree with a lot of the other people that are anti the property because this is an extreme choke point. That Sumner Heights Drive, West Valley Highway, Old Canary Road with UPRR that blocks it. I have three kids and probably a hundred tardies because of that. Just go away as it is now. And I don't know if that was necessarily taken into consideration when they did the traffic plan. I think they said that it was three additional trips, commercial trips a day. and anything over 10 targets extra study, A, I just don't know how that is possible, and I don't know what tools you have to confirm that it's true. The other issue I would have, because I do noise studies for a living for clients, We do air conditioners, generators. Truck noise is real difficult. So when you're doing a noise study, what you want to study is the worst case scenario. You want to know when that traffic is going to be at its highest noise level. And then you record that or you try to. It's all theoretical. But trying to capture this and heavy trucks and backing up and noise like this, I just don't know how they possibly could have accounted for that noise. I know it seems like there's probably a lot of nimbyism going on. I deal with it all the time. I'm always up here getting yelled at too. So I get it. And I know what planning is trying to do. But this is not that situation. It really is a pretty odd request, to be honest with you. If a client came to me with this proposal, So look, I bought it already. It's residential, but I want to rezone it industrial, and we're already performing industrial use. I would probably tell them that it's a bad case. So like I said, I'm impressed that they're able to get it to this point and have a recommendation of approval. I thought that was a really good point, how the burden of proof had switched now to the community. That's, it's really, it's kind of an odd situation. I built a house in Edgewood and I do cellular for on the other side. And building a house was, let me just say it was a nightmare in Edgewood. The way that the rules were applied, my neighbor applied for a five foot variance on the setback, shot down. Which, hey, that's what it is. You bought the property, you knew the rules when you bought the property. That's what Edgewood told my neighbor, and I tend to agree with that. When you purchase a property, it's residential. I understand what they're doing, but to set a precedent where you're going to allow somebody to reward that behavior, that's just unheard of in planning. It really is. That's not something that's allowed ever. So I would be really surprised if this was approved. I really think that you should... do what's right here and deny the project. I know that seems extreme, but it's really not. It seems quite common sense here. Thanks.

Good evening. I'm Gloria Fletcher. I live on 56th Street. I'm really just seconding what the last two gentlemen said. I don't know if you all have actually walked down there and around it because I agree when you look over it, it's like, oh yeah, that makes sense. But I do love to walk to Sumner. That's the coolest thing about where I live. My house was built in 1929. Sometimes I get sad for what it probably looked like in 1929 because, yeah, I have to look at the freeway. I have to go under the freeway. But I don't have to walk past a semi-unloading area. And I don't have to worry about actually, I do worry about the route of travel down there to this station because it's it's not safe. But you're going to put a wall there. Like, how is that even going to work? It just makes more sense to me. Think about how we get people down the hill to use our public transportation infrastructure. And also just thinking about. What the category is going to be maybe in the next 20, 30 years, that's light commercial or commercial mixed use. It's not going to be industrial. So keeping us just coming down the hill just makes sense to me and putting industrial back makes no sense. So that's all.

My name is Joel didn't live across the street in this place. I am a truck. And that's what they should be heavy hauler it's not like industrial. I live next door to a gravel yard for a bunch of years we build a ball, they build a wall. I lived on the second part or a part of the country. And I got all the dust in my house. And all the noise of all didn't do nothing. The trees are more effective than the walls are. You know, I'm old. I don't want to listen to that. I'm my old age. I don't want to listen to all that. I don't want dust. I don't want to hear it. I want to hear the freeway, the railroad, the airplanes. I don't need more trucks. You know? It doesn't say necessary. I say net. Thank you.

Hello. I promise to be one of your very brief speaker. Can you hear me? Can you hear me? All right. Hello, my name is Jacinda Barnes, J-A capital C-I-N-D-A-B-A-R-N-E-S. And I am a resident of King County. Nevertheless, I am here to support my friend, Mariah Goganachea. You might even say I represent people who are indirectly affected by this change because of the direct impact on our friends and loved ones. On more than one occasion, I received a late night message from Mariah saying the trucks are outside. Again, I can't sleep. They're out there. It's really late at night and it's disturbing her. And she has to get rest because she has to spend time working the next day and the day after that. I will get the message midday with the same thing. The trucks are outside if she's working at home. I'm still getting this information. So I'm here as a friend of hers to just express what we see and how this impacts people who are directly impacted by this rezoning attempt. This has been a consistent problem for the last two years. This has been a consistent problem with the short period of time of some peace but this will only make it worse i can see the impact that it has on her because it is something that she is thinking about a lot instead of just going about your regular day you have to and the residents here who've all spoken and provided evidence have to deal with how this will change their livelihoods, how this will change the topography, how this will change their homes, how this will change their property values. I, again, I don't really... I don't live here. I have not been to Mariah's house yet. But I have concerns about how this impacts her. I have a deep concern about how any rezoning or approval of this process will continue to impact her. As the previous speaker said, the wall doesn't do anything. And if she's right there, that wall will not do anything. But if at the most the sound of the trucks coming in at 1am will reverberate and hit her house. So it's not going to help her to have that wall there. I as a King County resident humbly ask you to reject this proposal. Thank you.

Okay, I just have a couple notes, and this will probably be really quick, but I am Lisa Steudle, and I live on 56th Street also, and I agree with everything that's been said, but I also just want to reiterate that if they wanted light industrial, maybe they should have bought light industrial, and maybe I'm just a rule follower, but if they've been non-compliant, and I just feel like Somebody who's non-compliant shouldn't be applying for a rezone. That's just a comment I just wanted to make.

Hello, I am Andrea Preston. We live on 56th Street East, Mariah's house. our house sits on the hill. There's a 100-foot drop from the top of our less than a half-acre property to Edgewood Drive. And then Mariah's house sits on the other side of Edgewood Drive from this property. The hill comes in almost like an amphitheater at the base of Edgewood Drive there from our house around Mariah's house. So the sound definitely carries up the hill. I can speak to the truck noise has increased. I didn't realize that this property was part of that until recently because I can't see it. We hear truck noise, but the truck noise has increased in the last two years and things like the clunkity clunk clunk clunk that comes out of nowhere. And, um, we hear that. Um, My major concern is that this is a very fragile traffic corridor, that it is the only egress off the hill on the east side of the hill. You have to go several miles if you want to go off the hill to the west. There is coming down the side into Fife and directly into Puyallup, and there is one road that goes through a new development, kind of off of Freeman, I believe. And other than that, this is it. The next route off the hill is Jovita, several miles to the north. Then you have the confluence of Edgewood Drive, Sumner Heights, and West Valley Highway, which is very significant. If anything happens on 167, traffic gets diverted to West Valley Highway. And that traffic backs up easily, yeah, a mile. And you'll see it at Jovita backed up as well. And we see it from our home directly backing up the hill past 56th Street East. When the train comes through, when the train tracks are blocked for some reason or another, when, for instance, if the train comes through Sumner, it stops the lights that cross into Sumner downtown, which backs up past Field Cannery and backs up then across Summer Heights that goes over the train tracks and then backs up on West Valley on an actual drive. So there are, it's a very fragile network and those lights are not, set to be responsive to the traffic that is sitting there they are timed they don't change so if there's one car coming from each direction you still sit there for three minutes now cars are not supposed to turn over and get stuck on the tracks but it happens regularly people that don't know the area and the danger people that are sick of waiting there are also um That is a two-lane drive coming up and down Edgewood Drive. There are no curbs. Our side of the road has a very significant drainage culvert, which is all of the water runoff. down Edgewood Drive, and there may not be a visible stream, but that water runoff goes then under Edgewood Drive and toward the river. So that water is right there next to this property. So This Edgewood Drive can be threatened by water runoff, which can be very significant. It's threatened by, I mean, the large trucks that they are already using. You have one jackknife truck at that curve, which is also under a freeway. And you can have a very, very significant problem, not to mention ability of emergency services to respond to people on that portion of the hill, anybody from Sumner in the valley that needs to evacuate for any reason, or for any reason people need to evacuate off of Edgewood Drive. This is inappropriate. And also I'd like to say, They bought residential land. If they wanted light industrial land, they have so many options in the area. This is not a crucial piece of property to their business.

Hey, so my name's Evan Wall. I live at 5629 with Mariah Corniger. And I do want to say thanks to everybody else for speaking. So it seems to me that it's just kind of a dirty secret about this property. It's been brought to my attention that the language has changed. A year and a half ago, the city was behind what we're behind, and nothing was going to get passed through. Now I've actually been approached by a few different investigative journalists asking, is this company bigger? Is it too big to fail? And I just wonder what you guys thought about that.

Thank you.

All right. Thank you, everybody, for your testimony this evening. Not seeing any more folks coming up to the podium. No more hands on the line. I'd like to give Josh an opportunity to make any final staff comments.

Yes, thank you. Just two comments for clarification purposes. A decision has not been made. Staff has made a recommendation, planning commission recommendation, Here's that recommendation and we'll review it against the criteria. Then they make a recommendation to city council. City council is the one that makes the actual decision. So at this time, there's no decisions made other than staff has reviewed it against the mitigation measures proposed and provide their thoughts. The other item to want to note on was the code enforcement case. Yes, there's an active code enforcement case on the property that has a voluntary correction agreement in place right now. Code enforcement is not one of the criteria provided in the comprehensive plan update process. So we just look at it from a land use perspective only and not a code enforcement perspective. Those are all my comments for now.

All right. Thank you, Josh. With that, I will close the public hearing at 717 PM. I want to thank everyone for attending this evening and. I'll take that in just a moment, but I wanted to let everybody know that there will be discussion on this item later on the agenda this evening. There will not be any further public comment opportunity this evening. but I'd like to take a five-minute recess so we can just have a chance to touch bases with the audience, and we'll come back at 7.22.

Thank you. Thank you.

On the property. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. uh um I don't know. All right. All right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I mean, you know what?

I've been down since I was four years old. What's the next one? I don't know. I don't know. Carol Merrill. And so. yeah so we don't we don't get them All right.

Thank you, everybody. I'd like to call the meeting back to order at 722 p.m. Thank you for your patience this evening as we got through our public hearings next on our agenda is our open citizen comment period. So, this is an opportunity for people to speak to any thing else. They'd like to speak to tonight similar to the public hearings. You have 5 minutes to speak if you so choose. It can be item. that hasn't already been spoken to this evening on the agenda or any other topic. So if you'd like to make any further public comment, the podium is open. Please start with saying your name and we'll give you five minutes. Going once.

All right. Please do. Again, I don't want to be in this position. I'm Eric and I'm curious if there's any plan to provide street maintenance on the private streets. This has created a lot of drama in my neighborhood. I can't believe it. I'm surrounded by million dollar homes and 20 bucks a month is just too much for the majority of our 13 homes on our street court. It's created friction amongst neighbors, property rights issues, and just a financial burden. We pay the same taxes as the rest of the city. I think I read in the Edgewood Magazine recently, not recently, many years ago, I'm sorry, that they repaved our streets and we're on to burying utility lines now. And I just thought, what happened to 56th Street Court? What's that? Nobody sees us and we like it that way. We're in the corner of South Edgewood with all the benefits of downtown Sumner and we're off the grid. I don't want to highlight just the views and just how precious this property is to us. It's a forever home for my wife and I. And we're third generation. And, you know, I just would like to see possibly the council to maybe explore the idea of all the private roads in Edgewood. Not necessarily starting with ours, but maybe a long-term fix, you know, for all these poor people who would be living with dirt roads and potholes if it weren't for the local citizens putting in the association work and paying dues and piecemealing. sections of road you know it's crazy to me that that somehow there's some grandfather clause or something when we incorporated that we don't get streets uh so that's all i've got thank you again for your time everybody all right thank you for your comment i would encourage you i'd be happy to give you some more information give you my card after the meeting um anybody else please

Thank you.

I'm only doing this because I'm here, but it actually has been on my list for a long time to reach out to someone because I would like to see a historical commission back in Edgewood. I think we used to have one. Now we don't. And most of the people that are here live in older homes that I think have a lot of significance to Edgewood. And I'd like to see some way to see them preserved or talked about or acknowledged in a way that would be fun and respectful of economic issues too so that's it let me know who i need to talk to all right seeing no other

hands or interest at the podium. We'll go ahead and close the public comment period this evening and move on.

I can get my remote to cooperate. Come on.

There we go. So now we will move on to our consent agenda. Share the screen again here. That is our minutes from our last planning commission meeting. Bringing that up on the screen for the commissioners. So I would entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented in the packet.

Commissioner Church moves to approve the consent agenda as presented. seen in the packet.

And do I have a second?

Second, Commissioner Lenoir. All right.

It's been moved by Commissioner Church and seconded by Commissioner Lenoir to approve the consent agenda. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Aye. Any opposed, say nay. Motion passes. Thank you. Now we are on to our one and only action item for the evening. Josh, would you like to introduce this item?

Yes, this is the electric alarm systems fencing and retaining wall code amendments that we had a public hearing on it two months ago. And so we're bringing it forward for action. Now, there was a change that we were recommending that if you go down to the next page, please. There was a question since the public hearing if trellises and those type of features can be aesthetically added to a fence and be considered instead of being limited to just six feet. So staff looked at some other city options and found that some cities do allow a taller fence and then some have a specific allowance for architecture features like trellises or Trusses over gates, for example, or a little aesthetic stuff on top of the fence. You want to scroll down to the images and provide some just general images. These are not from Edgewood of what these. To be proposed could be, um. The requirements would still require that the, um. It'd be 50% transparent, so you'd still be able to see through it, but it would add some aesthetic appeal on top. Uh, staff, uh, as an opinion that, yeah, we don't, we really don't have an opinion on this, but you do feel like there's architecture feature. A lot of people do like to patrol us is above their gates, but right now would not be allowed to based on height restrictions. We talked to our building code official, and he would also have no, um, comment on this, uh. At all is as well. So, um, in the proposed amendments provided to plan commission tonight is a, um, change to include that little trellis discussion. Outside of that, the draft amendments have not changed since the Planning Commission hearing. And on your screen is the analysis that staff did with the requirements of 18-60-020. and recommend passage. Next one, last one. So following further discussions on the matter, Planning Commission is invited to make formal recommendations to the City Council on adoption of the proposed draft amendments to Title 18 regarding electrical alarm systems, fencing, and retaining walls. The draft recommendation has been prepared and attached for consideration.

All right. Thank you, Josh. Commissioners, do you have any questions for Josh on this item?

This is Commissioner Church. I know we've talked a lot about this in the past already. I don't have any concerns with the addition of the trellises unless it's considered some kind of barrier for sight for people on the roads. If the house is on the corner street, does that actually... you know, create a block in the site of the driver?

So city standards require a clear site distance. So that will always be a standard. So we'll always look at that. And we do have code enforcement cases that come up that have us changing those fence heights to make sure there are clear site distances at driveway entrances. So this wouldn't be any specific change that those standards are in place. And we would always check that. If there's code enforcement on it, we address it. for the most part, we just see this on the interior and rear yards. And so that's, and then the 50% transparency is also the kind of guiding principle of allowing people to look through it still.

Okay. Thank you. I don't have any questions.

All right. Anybody else going once? comment if you don't mind um i just want to say that i also am supportive of that and i actually think it adds a nice character to um neighborhoods so that's my two cents all right so on your screen you'll see our the draft recommendation to recommend that the city council adopt the proposed draft amendments to emc title 18 regarding the electric alarm systems, fencing, and retaining wall regulations as attached to the packet materials. I would entertain a motion to move forward with this recommendation of the City Council.

Commissioner Church moves to move this item forward to City Council approval.

And do I have a second? I second.

I second.

Okay.

All right, we got a motion by Commissioner Church with a second by Commissioner Francavitch. Commissioner Church, you have the floor. If you have anything further you'd like to speak on the matter.

On this item? On this item? No.

All right. All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye. Any opposed? Motion passes.

I just want to make one little note here that doesn't really impact what you just voted on. The City Council will be required to have a public hearing on this one. That's just a state requirement based on electrical fence, electrical alarm systems code. So there'll be another public hearing with the City Council. Thank you, Josh.

All right. Now we're on to the discussion items for the evening. And first, we've lined it out. So we have our discussion on the Sjoberg Comprehensive Plan and Zoning Map Amendment first, recognizing the level of community interest. We did not want to put this off any further for you this evening.

Yeah, so we obviously had a robust public comments. We got robust comments during the notice of application and those are presented to you. The schedule for this is that we had the hearing tonight and we'll have discussion tonight. We'll have discussion in August and then planning commission recommendation in September. So as mentioned before in our last meeting, staff looked at potential alternatives to go along with this and have proposed that alternative to, I'm going to scroll down to the next page, that was presented at the public hearing tonight as a potential way to consider if you wanted to move forward as requested from the last month's meeting. So that has been presented. We have provided a staff report full of the review of the criteria And those are based on staff's review of that, of the alternative two, have recommended approval. You've heard public comments tonight. You have basically another two meetings to discuss and think about it further. You can also ask staff to provide you additional analysis or review of any items that you'd like to be considered as you're thinking through this decision. And again, you're not making the final decision. It'll be just a recommendation to city council. um which can be alternative one alternative two or denial plain denial and i was gonna um add uh yes there's a code enforcement case on the property um as we are aware from staff every time we get a complaint we have talked to the property owner and they have addressed that immediate issue if there's other issues that are happening we haven't heard it since maybe february So just wanted to give you that context of what staff has heard and tries to address. Some additional kind of other ideas, but things to consider. The industrial overlay has to be a wide net because the developer and can sell the property and it can be developed in any way that that land use is approvable so when staff reviews it we're not looking at a specific project we're looking at it against all those industrial uses and so we require things that have to be done in order to ensure code compliance so for example the noise wall the noise wall would require a noise study and that would determine if what size the wall height would need to be in order to accurately reduce the noise impact to the neighbors because there is a strict threshold that they have to meet right now with single families there are no threat like if it's just a single family use someone can throw a party and there's nothing that city has for that ordinance other than loud noises are just large parties. But if the use is industrial, we actually have avenues to enforce noise impacts greater. So we can actually do noise walls, we can require it. Their noise study might come back and say, there is nothing we have here feasible. And then we would have to tell them then you can't meet the SEPA mitigation measures and the project cannot move forward. So at this time, we can't because they might have a specific idea of what they want to do on the project. But we have to look at against all those industrial uses. And that's why we propose a limited industrial as a way to look at those uses that maybe have lesser impact, but then can be mitigated for with these items to be looked at. So is there anything that you would like us to bring to you at next month meeting or any other things that you have questions for us to help you with this decision?

This is Church. I have a few safety concerns and environmental concerns that have been touched on by community members tonight, which I want to thank you for your time and your presence here. It's very helpful for us to hear your voice. I know that in some of the reports in staff findings that it contains potential landslide hazard areas and that there is a no net loss of ecological function, but the packet doesn't specify, let's say, what geotechnical review will actually happen at the project permit stage. So I know that this is asserted as like a future compliance step, but nothing, it seems like nothing has been analyzed currently. Is that correct?

So, yes. So, any project in the area, regardless if it's residential, industrial, would require a geotech based on the steep slopes of that area and identified as landslides. That geotech will have to review it against the code, the whole property, and ensure and do the actual soil boring, soil test to determine if there's any issues with the proposal that they can't impact their property, property uphill, downhill, to ensure that compliance.

Thank you. So when does that step happen? Are you essentially saying that it first needs to be rezoned and then when they propose to do a development, that's when you have that review step in there?

Based on the critical area mapping that we have, any project on those properties would need that review under the critical area code. So it's not specific to the industrial rezone. If it was a single family, we would require the same thing because of the potential impacts. Now the... The geotech level report will be significantly more looked into for industrial uses because they'll have to go further down in soil borrowings to make sure it can support the weight that's being proposed versus a single family. And when we get those reports, the city engineer reviews them and determines if they need to go out for a third party review and approval.

So just to piggyback on what Josh was saying, and he mentioned earlier code enforcement and voluntary correction agreement, there is a sequence to do the level of studies based on whether or not they are successful in their application for a rezone. So that's why we don't have the full level of detail at this stage because we It makes sense to see whether or not the city is going to grant a rezone request first before efforting that level of...

Data counter and the level changes based on the use, so it and they even from industrial uses from just a contractor yard type of use to a more of a warehouse having a full bit builders building. And materials will require a whole different review and so that's a project review item that we have to do.

Okay. Thank you. I have a few other things, but one is the access points, too. While I see that maybe being limited to a single, I think, southernmost driveway might be reduce traffic conflict or exposure near homes. But at the same time, I feel like that is an evacuation hazard too. I'm just wondering how we have considered this area and the potential rezone and the proposed access points against our hazard mitigation plan that we're actively building.

So the applicant did provide the traffic report that showed three net increases of daily traffic, which is in a threshold that requires a lot of significant improvements to the corridor. And that, again, is just a very loose level right now. And when they come over project specific, we require a lot more detailed about that exactly like that access point. The access point, based on its location, would limit it to just basically, they couldn't turn left onto Sumner Heights. They would basically have to go straight off into Sumner. From that point of view, staff doesn't believe that it'll have a significant impact to evacuation of Sumner coming up north. So it'd be, because there's no traffic from the trucks, they can't head north still. They would have to go down to Sumner. And similarly, if it's based on three or a level that the traffic engineer reviews and approves, they believe it's not going to be impacting the significant level of community traffic flow. So we have a little bit of information now that shows about three trucks total. That's peak hour trips. That is below our threshold. And we don't believe they'll have a significant impact on Edgewood or Sumner's evacuation routes based on those levels. Now, if they come with a report that shows more, there could be more that happens that city requires. And it might be a point where we still say you, You have to do this improvement, but there's no way to do that improvement. I don't want to even say roundabout, but let's say if it was so bad that you had to do a roundabout and they just don't have the room to do it, we would force them to say, unfortunately, the project can't be built.

Okay. Sorry. I think I'm just going to get through all of mine. Okay. Thanks. I know the SEPA mitigation report includes noise, dust, buffer screening conditions, but there doesn't seem to be an explicit stormwater management or tree retention standard spelled out beyond the standard design review process. So I'm concerned about that because I do believe These access points and the canopy that we have there, they're just a natural deterrent to a lot of climate impacts that our neighboring cities experience that we luckily don't. Our trees protect us from overheating, wind, rain issues, runoff problems. And so, yeah, I'm just wondering about how... We're going to be more specific to this area.

So the, our city code has a tree preservation requirement again. This is a project specific item. There would be a change from the retention requirement of interior trees from a mixed residential. which I believe is 50% to industrial would allow 10%. So there'll be about 40% reduction of retention requirements. So they can retain less trees. However, any perimeter trees is not part of that conversation. They have to retain those trees. So those perimeter trees along Sumner Heights have to be kept or they have to be replaced at a higher ratio. And based on what's being proposed as part of the mitigation measures on the landscape buffer requirement, that is greater than our current frontage requirement. So it provides a greater benefit than most industrial uses, commercial uses, or even residential. Those aren't requirements typically of that intense. I think I missed the other, oh, stormwater. We have the stormwater matter. We follow the Pierce County 2021 stormwater matter. So they're required to meet those requirements. That includes erosion control. So a lot of comments on the erosion control will be addressed through an eventual stormwater measure. And because they can't have any erosion. So basically, the report that they later do with a project specific will ensure that there's no project erosion, meaning specifically erosion from that property leaving, going somewhere else. So stormwater management manual is another project specific item. That's like that site development permit.

and then the tree retention would be at design review and i'll also just add in there because of the code enforcement they are not getting any credit for work that was done without permits they will have to make sure that the entire site is brought up to current stormwater regulations when they submit for that site development permit um sorry i'm just taking some notes um

There's just a lot in the packet about this, which I appreciate staff's detailed work here in the update to us. I guess I'm also concerned about the noise that we continue to hear. um voiced by our community members and um after hearing some of the comments tonight i'm wondering what staff's recommendation is to maybe assess that more for them or is there anything else that we we need to assess the only thing that we could do currently is do a noise assessment of the current conditions that

Um, anything and that would be a lot of work too. That'd be a lot of specific work. Um. Instead of putting that basically, that would be a cost on the city and the current residents to do that study to determine that at this level at this time. However, since it's a steep of mitigation measure. The project proponent will always have to pay that cost. So that's when the study would be required and looked at, and they would have a consultant work on it, and they would have to determine, show that they are meeting the noise levels. Now the caveat to that is that there's an existing noise level right now. They don't need to mitigate for that. So whatever the current noise of the neighborhood is, They won't need to mitigate that. It's any additional noise that they do that exceeds the noise thresholds. And it's actually a pretty detailed report looking at each individual property and where the building is and what the noise will be at that point based on topography, vegetation and walls. So that's why it's a little difficult to say without anyone having a noise report done to say what the exact impact is until it's there. And that's why it was a mitigation measure. And it's a common one for these industrial projects that they do a noise study.

Okay. I think I'll close my comments there. But thank you. I'll pass it on to my fellow commissioners.

Hey, Commissioner. I have a question about the traffic study. They said 10 or 20 new trips. What happens if they permit it and it becomes 100 trips each day? What are the steps on the city side to, is there anything that can be done? Because it's easy to say this can be 10 or more or 20. and you base the traffic and the lane improvement or runabout or stoplights based on those numbers, what if the actual traffic is much, much higher than what they say it's going to be? It's a great question.

So first, they have the noise study that will be sent to our third-party reviewer to look at and Traffic, sorry, traffic study looked at their third party reviewer who would look at it and see if it is reasonable because there are sometimes or they might disagree on the exact what they call ITE numbers of the traffic being reposed. And they might say, no, you're using the wrong number. It should be this and higher. So that's the first level. The second would be it becomes a code enforcement just like any other application. Issue with the city with the commercial residential, the number of trips are exceeding. Then we would, um, it can become a code enforcement item where it then needs to be re, about it to those higher, um. Traffic counts, so we require a whole new study and maybe even an active 1 where they go out and lay strips down and determine how many trips are actually making during the day. Um. And then we would address it from there. And it could be a case where if it's too much, then they might even have to close down the business until they address the issue.

Thank you.

Okay. Is it okay if I do my part now?

Jump in, Carly. Go ahead.

Okay, thank you. And first and foremost, I don't know if there's anyone in the audience still, but I do want to reiterate how important it is for us to hear public comment and how much I appreciate everyone coming in and a few of you coming in again. I think it's the most important thing we can do as community members to voice our opinions and speak on these issues and follow along through this drawn out process that can sometimes take months. for very important issues to you as a homeowner. So I want to acknowledge that and thank you for your time. I also want to thank you because of those comments, how much that has affected my own opinion on this situation. Initially, I came at it from a city business standpoint of as a property owner and thinking I'm all for people having the right to do what they want to do with their property. However, I think the most important thing I heard tonight and it kind of has swayed my opinion on this is that this business or my industrial business, they purchased it as a residential property with the intent of changing it. They did not go through this process ahead of time. And I think that would have been the most politically correct approach to this. And I think I think that's just important. They're not community members. They're not people who are, you know, being represented and coming to the meetings. This is clearly a business, you know, using an opportunity on some property and willing to spend the money to do the work, which I have looked into rezoning before. It is not an easy thing. And to do this would cost a lot of money. So this doesn't sound like a small thing. you know, process for, like, they've got, they're willing to invest in this. And that's not going to be a small business, in my mind. so i think just as a matter of like a community member as a volunteer on this commission i think it's important that we really do take these citizens comments into consideration and really listen to their concerns it's it's very important to them obviously and i think they made really great points and you know, in consideration also that the city is short on inventory for light industrial opportunities and, you know, income for the city. I do see that it's a benefit to the city. However, it's the community members that make the city. And if we don't respect those opinions, this whole process is kind of pointless. So I just want to state that and hopefully, you know, I don't know. Hopefully there's people in the audience that can hear that. But that is my comments. And I definitely at this moment, I'm standing at a place where I would I would say dismiss this and say no.

Thank you, Carly. I just wanted to tag on to that as well, you know, with the voluntary correction agreement and provide some context. This is not trying to sway anybody's opinion. I just want to provide context. You know, there's a code enforcement case that started in 2024. It took several months to get coordination done. with the property owner, property owner's legal counsel, and back and forth to get to a voluntary correction agreement in August of 2025. And part of that voluntary correction agreement was requiring permits to be submitted for work on the structure. and to if they wanted to pursue some use that wasn't allowed in the residential zone to apply for a rezone that's what they've done that's the process we're following i want to make it clear that it is city staff does not have any predetermined decision made When we say recommendation to the Planning Commission, we are focusing on what a potential path forward is based on the applicant's information. And so we are hearing everything that is being said tonight, taking it all under very due consideration. And I also want to express my thanks for your engagement this evening. Thank you.

Any other questions from the Planning Commission?

I don't have any other questions, but yeah, I don't know how many more times we can piggyback on how much we appreciate having everybody there for their comments. I think that you've definitely given me a ton of food for thought about this specific topic. Obviously, we'd all love to see a lot of growth in positive ways in the city of Edgewood for many, many, many things. I heard multiple different people talking about sidewalks and things like that. That's one of my biggest pet peeves probably. But that being said, like I said, the conversations and the passion that I saw out of the residents today was great to see. I'd love to see it for a lot of other topics, not one such as this. It would be really great to see some of that and have some of that other involvement. I mean, I know there's a couple open positions on the planning commission that there was some very, very well-spoken people in that crowd today that I'm sure in everybody's spare time would be great to have apply for those things to really get some of their viewpoints. But, you know, again, just want to appreciate the fact that people were there. I'm sad that I wasn't there in person today. I haven't ever seen a full house. So that was great to to see from from the the digital world here. So but again, really, really gave me a lot of a lot of things to think about. And I look forward to the ongoing discussions with the Planning Commission and

and staff as well as our you know future recommendation to um to a city council look forward to seeing what that looks like thank you andrew i just want to add is there any requests so from planning commission that they would like to see staff work on for the next month's meeting if not staff isn't probably going to move forward with any additional studies other than what has already been done so you can spend the time necessary to review it all is there any specific requests or information you would like from us.

Not at this time.

Okay. Thank you. So just a quick recap then. We're going to be bringing this back for follow-up discussion next month if there's anything that comes up in between now and then with the Planning Commission. We are not scheduled to consider this for any recommendation to the Council until September's meeting. and then would bring it forward to the city council for their initial consideration at a study session if they agree with the planning commission's recommendation whatever that may be then they have the option to act on the recommendation at their following regular meetings so there could be a decision as soon as the end of september on on the comprehensive plan amendment docket which includes this item If the council does not agree with the Planning Commission's recommendation, then they could schedule another public hearing and we'd have another opportunity for public input on this item directly. Now, that does not preclude anyone from providing public input at open public comment at the City Council's regular meeting. before they make their final action on it. But this is just a suggestion. You have the right to make comment at every meeting between now and then, but I would suggest you wait until closer to when it's actually coming before them so that it is fresh in their minds at that time. In the meantime, staff is always available here for any questions, concerns about the process. We have our cards available at the front counter. And again, thank you very much for your engagement. Much appreciated. With that, we'll move on to the next item. We'll move on to the next item on the agenda, which is the other item on the comprehensive plan amendment docket. Just wanted to have a quick touch point on the West Valley Highway comprehensive plan and zoning map amendment. Josh?

Yeah, so we'll be having a public hearing on this item next month. And, um, the individuals in the, uh, audience, uh, last year's city looked at potentially resigning West Valley from residential to industrial and had a lot of new study completed. um after receiving some comments from the agencies we actually didn't get really much any public comment we got a lot of agency comments we withdraw that application to further review it then this year we got a new application we got an actual application from i believe eight property owners requesting the rezone and so uh we've been looking at that as provided by the docket as part of this we um we're also looking at doing the industrial limited industrial overlay so basically the both comprehensive plan amendments would have potentially the same overlay on on them to limit the type of industrial uses So any discussions that you may would like to have regarding the industrial overlay, this is also another point that we can discuss. But we'll be having a public hearing next month, and those notices will be going out next week or two. and on this screen is the proposed west valley overlay area the only part that wouldn't be part of the rezone if as proposed would be the public zone properties those are city-owned properties by policy we keep those as public zone properties Based on the applicant's request, the rest of it would become industrial. So he's doing a again proposing the alternative. Which would be a limited industrial overlay. As a potential path forward for that 1 as well, similar to. Comprehensive plan, not a full recommendation from city other than if there's a path forward, we believe alternative to does the best option, which just provide that overlay. Um, those, uh, we did receive some public comments on that and the notice of application that was included with the packet. And, um, yeah, if you have any questions on this item right now, but, uh, feeling will be a bigger discussion discussion once we have. Um, public comment seat bill will also be issued when we do the notice of application or notice of public hearing. Um, and they're going to have similar mitigation measures as well. The difference here is that we are, we're going to be requiring 100 foot vegetated buffer from the, um, top of the Western slope. Um, to provide that natural buffer that kind of currently exists with trees. Um, and vegetation with, um, habitat.

Trying to maintain an open space habitat corridor between the existing residential properties on top of the hill and any potential development of the properties abutting West Valley Highway.

In this case, we did have that land use study done and they show you the detail, the buildable area and the impacts from steep slopes and critical areas. Those will all be project specific. Again, when the project wants to develop on a specific property, they have to meet all the critical area code requirements, transportation requirements, etc. Just like any other project.

And I just wanted to highlight to get on the record that this is only those areas of West Valley Highway from 32nd Street to the north does not include any West Valley Highway abutting properties south of where Sumner essentially comes onto the hill. So you may be familiar with the warehouse that was built in the last decade there. So it'd only be from that site to the north.

And for the audience purposes, this is basically the, the Western edge is the top of the slope and the rest of it's sloping down to West Valley. Any questions or comments from planning commission on this item?

Yes, this is commissioner church. I, I have similar. Concerns because it's a similar request from the applicant or applicants to rezone. And, um. I'm just wondering, I'm most concerned about the flood risk and the stormwater capacity and the size of the rezone. And I'm just wondering, like, is there a way to do more of a cumulative stormwater runoff impact analysis of that whole area?

So Jeremy can add to this because he has more experience with this. By the Pierce County Manual, they have to handle it all on site. So they can't have stormwater leaving their site that doesn't match current conditions.

Okay.

So the current Pierce County manual requires, from our standpoint, that all the stormwater is handled there. So they shouldn't be pushing any additional water faster onto any other properties. In this case, it would be some other side of West Valley. Yeah. But they would not fill up.

Yep. The short answer is every project would be required to meet the standard that models each project as if it were completely forested and would not allow any water up until the hundred year event to leave the site any faster than it would. as if it were forested.

One thing to really kind of add in from, I know what your experience is on this item, is that there's not really a lot of flood area there. There's a lot of critical areas and wetlands and streams, but there is a lahar. So Lahar does run up to a lot of the slope side and a little bit up Jovita. That's part of it where we're thinking residential may not be the best place for that then. That industrial uses with less people living in susceptible to a Lahar lava flow makes a lot of sense in this case.

But it also then depends on what they do with the land. And if it becomes more impervious land area, then there is a greater chance of runoff.

Again, any runoff from those impervious areas would have to be collected, treated, and detained so that it's not released any faster than it would have been if it were forested.

It is one of the largest, probably the second largest outside of sewers that limits development in Edgewood. It was our stormwater compliance requirements. Any others?

No questions. Okay.

We'll be having a public hearing on it next month. Thank you.

All right. Thank you, Josh. Thank you, commissioners. Moving on to our next discussion item. Get this all loaded up here. All right, so next on the list is the concurrency code updates. We had a hearing on this item as well this evening, but did not receive any public comments. Happy to take any questions commissioners might have on this. We talked about it last couple of months, and if we're ready to move forward, we'll have a recommendation ready for planning commission's consideration at next month's meeting.

I was wondering if you could, for the community that's here, introduce the topic again of concurrency.

Yes, thank you. Sorry, it's one of those things where I deal with it all the time, so I appreciate the reminder. Concurrency is the... when we have an evaluation done of the capacity of a particular element of our infrastructure. In Edgewood, we have regulations around transportation concurrency. So we have our consultant maintains a model to look at what the capacity of all of our roads and intersections are. And if a project is proposing currently any more than 10 new peak hour trips, then they have to go through that analysis. After looking at our available capacity and And some other factors, our consultant has recommended that we change that threshold from 10 peak hour trips to 20 peak hour trips because we're not seeing those projects that generate between 10 and 20 peak hour trips actually triggering any need for those improvements. so that's that's the primary item about this the other item is the annual report where our code currently requires that annual summary and looking at where we may have deficiencies and trying to update our transportation improvement plan to address those deficiencies but with the level of development and applications that we've been seeing there have not been um there has not been a change in that uh reports results over the course of the last several years so they're recommending a reduced frequency of that which will save the city somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 to 15 000 a year um if we go down every other year basis so that those are the two primary points of this thank you update uh this is commissioner church again um

I can understand that. moving the review to every other year. However, since we are working on our climate action planning, which I encourage all of you to go to our website and read about, and we will be having community feedback events in the upcoming months. So I hope to see you there too. But as a climate action team member, I'm concerned that if we narrow it to vehicle planning, only that we are kind of being counterproductive there because it's kind of cutting against our multimodal resilience planning that we're trying to do. And we might be encouraging more car dependent infrastructure if we limit it to just vehicle LOS.

Thank you for that comment. Right now, we do have multimodal level of service identified in our comprehensive plan. However, it is not great through most of the city, as you all may know. We don't have a well-built-out network of pedestrian paths. We have Quite a few more than when I started working here 10 years ago, but still have a long ways to go. The city council actually has asked that staff look into implementing a fee in lieu program for sidewalks that would potentially fund our ability to expand the pedestrian network from the core out in a very meaningful way instead of having what we have called in the past sidewalks to nowhere being thrown here and there. So we are trying to get to that as time and resources allow. Our concern with implementing a multimodal concurrency evaluation at this time is it could have the effect of halting any and all development outside of our Meridian core to include short subdivisions, you know, two or three lot subdivisions of residential properties that families are trying to build homes for their other family members and that sort of thing. So that's why we're suggesting the focus on the vehicular level of service with this particular code update. But I don't want to Sounds like a lot of words. I'm trying not to make it sound like smoke and mirrors, but we are actively trying to implement a better sidewalk and non-motorized network improvement plan that would be complementary to concurrency, but in the short term would still allow for those projects to proceed outside of our core.

And I understand I wouldn't want, I mean, I understand the concern about accidental freezing of development and we wouldn't want that. But I'm wondering like, would it be possible to keep, instead of removing multimodal level of service, is it possible then to keep it as a mitigation trigger rather than a hard denial trigger? Is there any possibility of that?

As far as the concurrency regulations go, I'm not aware of one, but as it is in our comprehensive plan, we evaluate everything through SEPA against our comprehensive plan and continue to work towards those improvements.

I would just add, if there is an identified trail, Shown in the comprehensive plan and from a project that's being developed, it is usually a requirement to have that item built. And the problem is, as I mentioned, sometimes it's just a hundred foot length of a trail that just ends on both sides. So that's what we have currently for the lodge policies as mentioned, but we are trying to work on actual real connections that provide the better mobility overall.

Commissioner Rancevich, I may be excused due to a family event. If that's okay.

We do still have quorum if you need to leave.

Thank you so much. Have a good night.

Just Carly, if you could confirm you are still present.

I'm here driving and still listening and still present.

Thank you. So Commissioner Frenchovich is now excused at 8.15.

All right. Carly, Andrew, do you have any other questions on concurrency?

None from me.

Then we will move forward with crafting a recommendation for next month's meeting consideration. Thank you. Moving on to multifamily tax exemptions. Bring this up on the screen. Again, this one is one that we have been talking about for a few months. Just for reminding those who haven't been part of the conversation, this is a tool that has been in place in Washington State for several years. There's recent case law that is moving towards requiring Growth Management Act cities, which Edgewood is one, to actively provide affordable housing. Uh, we have a longstanding incentive in our code that has never been utilized, uh, for, uh, density bonus if you provide affordable housing. So we are looking at multifamily tax exemptions as, uh, replacement for that. It's something that has been utilized in many cities throughout our area and the state. Both Puyallup and Sumner have had recent action on multi-family tax exemptions. I think Fife also has a program in place. The goal that staff has been focused on is not only to provide the affordable housing, but to activate and encourage the mixed-use developments in commercial development. We have had a lot of recent conversation around our design standards and How much commercial or or non residential space is required along our meridian frontages and the city council with the planning Commission's input. Past that ordinance earlier this year to update those rules so I'm So it's just kind of a confluence of a few things that have brought this to staff's attention and why Council has asked the Planning Commission to look at this. Staff did have a chance to have a conversation with the Department of Commerce staff last week about the draft materials that are in the packet. They were generally in support of what's being proposed. They really recommended... sticking to the model ordinance, but if you've got other things that you want to add as far as making a project eligible, i.e., there's a baseline standard that the model ordinance has, but we can add layers to that, basically. We don't have to allow a developer to come in here and get a certificate for a tax exemption by just following the baseline bottom line of what the statutes say we can say you need to also do this this and or this so we tried to craft it in that way uh to to have a couple of extra things there but there's some bullets on the screen here that wanted to dive into further with the planning commission get some feedback on before we polish this up for a potential recommendation at next month's meeting And so I'll just start with the first one, the high-cost area definition. We took that from the city of Sumner's example, and it basically allowed for a higher AMI

Yeah, so the higher AMI from 80% would allow them to be 100% AMI, meaning average medium income. for high cost areas as determined by percentage above Pierce County's 80% AMI. So we looked into it and we are an area that would be considered high cost. So we followed the code as written. It would mean that projects, instead of being 80% affordable, can be fully market rate because we're considered a high cost area based on how the current code is written or proposed right now.

so what we're proposing is striking the high cost area provisions and sticking to the 80 ami for eligibility uh consistent with commerce's recommendations also helps us achieve those 80 ami growth targets that we have in our comprehensive plan um by by following that mode so uh do the commissioners have any Sponsor input on staff's recommendation to strike the high-cost area provisions.

No, that makes sense to me.

All right, seeing head nods from Andrew. Thank you. Moving on to Sumner's definition for multifamily housing. Our example code has 10 or more dwelling units, but Commerce's model code and our own code's definition for multifamily uses four or more dwelling units. We had some conversation with the Commerce staff about this, and they said it's really up to us from a policy standpoint what we want to set that number at. So the thought would be maybe it makes sense to just make it four so we don't have confusion in our own code.

And Commerce did mention that they are seeing like four plexes being utilizing this as a way to encourage that development also. So they are seeing a fourplex type of MFT being utilized in others. However, again, as Jeremy mentioned, it's totally up to us. Ten is a very common number, but it would be higher than what our multifamily definition is, which is four or more.

So back to the earlier point, we can have a bar that's higher than the base bar. Four is as low as you can go, essentially, but we can go to a higher number. and thinking about where we're proposing to target these mfd areas being along our resident our meridian corridor higher density zones i don't anticipate any development would propose a single four-plex let alone actually be able to so we feel 10 is appropriate but we wanted to get the commissioners feedback on that before locking in i think 10 is appropriate Thank you.

I agree. The head nods don't always suffice, but I agree.

Thank you, Andrew. Appreciate it. Third bullet is for the residential occupancy requirement. The statute requires a 50% minimum, but we have the ability locally to increase that to 100%. The concern with as it's written is that you could have short-term rentals of units, particularly if they're units for sale as opposed to units for rent. And I don't think we want... to have affordable housing units be rented out as BRBOs or RNPBs. So would the commissioners be in support of increasing that ratio from 50% to something else?

Yes.

And what would you like that to be?

That's a good question. I think I've been, well, that can't, Back home on Maui, where I'm originally from, there's always a housing crisis there. And I remember considering buying in a new development that had a certain amount of affordable housing in it too. And they had different requirements of making sure that people were at least residents a certain percentage of time. And this happened to be years. So you had to be a resident there for four or five years before you could even rent it out long-term. So I'm wondering like what staff recommends in providing flexibility around that. But I definitely wouldn't want to see a high percentage of, Airbnbs or VRBOs in our city. I think we want residents that are invested in the community. I don't know if 75% is more reasonable, but even the remaining part, I would consider a required amount of actual residence use before even long-term rental.

This would only, just for clarification, it might fit with the temporary, but it might not be too, it might be too long. This would only apply during the tax exemption year, so either the 8th or 12th. So after that, they basically can do what they want again. So, yeah, so I don't know if that's, do you consider that temporary enough for what you're thinking? Or do you think that a shorter period might make more sense?

Is that another way if somebody were to apply and get a certificate for a 12-year tax exemption, this provision is only applicable during that 12 years? So, for instance, if you went 100%, that's basically saying, no, you can't have temporary rentals as long as you've got the tax exemptions. If you go a lesser percentage, then... Theoretically, that remaining percentage could be short-term rentals during the tax exemption period.

Go ahead, please.

Okay, I think the only thing I'd like to add to this is I think I understand where you're coming from and my suggestion would be 60% if we have to pick a percentage. But also I'd like to say that in these mixed use buildings, we're looking at some retail below and some residential above. I don't have a huge issue with the short-term rentals in that scenario. I also think that's another opportunity for some people from other areas staying in our community and enjoying and patronizing our businesses and that kind of thing. So it's something just to consider because we are looking at this with retail downstairs. So just my opinion.

Thank you. Did you have anything further, Layla?

Andrew, did you have anything?

I was going to say, I mean, I would be totally fine for that 8 to 12 year period to not have any short-term rentals. In that regard, I think that, you know, I mean, I would love to know actually what the commerce had to say about that. Did they have any examples of any other issues that people have run into in any of the other municipalities that have ran into something like this? I mean,

Yeah, we actually didn't get into detail on this particular item. They just stated, you know, the 50% is the minimum. They acknowledged the concern. But, yeah, we didn't get into anything further than that. But we can certainly circle back with them on that and come back.

Yeah, I'd love to see if they had any kind of examples on that. It would be nice to know. I mean, it's not something that I've necessarily heard of, but I could, I mean, just about any time, I mean, somebody... Airbnb, VRBO, the short-term rentals, I mean, they'll rent out a shed in the backyard if you let them. So it's something that I would love to know if it's more common, I guess you could say.

Great. Well, we can get that information and come back. Perfect.

Thank you.

Okay. And then last but not least, just wanted to see if you have any thoughts or feedback on these last few items. Sure. You know, for a 12 year exemption, if you wanted to add more. Boxes for them to check to be eligible and the 3 that staff have put forward are. Structured parking under beneath those occupiable building spaces thought there would be by. forcing that in a sense. You're trying to get there to be more vertical development, which would try to get to those higher densities that we're trying to achieve. Right now, we have yet to see any project go above 24 units an acre, and we allow up to 48 units an acre in the town center. So by doing something like this, where if you provide structured parking, you'd be eligible for a 12-year tax exemption on that residential component, then that might incentivize a developer to go forward. along with that structured parking, maybe allowing for bonus building height to then achieve that maximum density of 48 units per acre. Because just from a site layout geometry standpoint, it's a little hard to do with, I think it would be allowed to five stories right now. So depending on where the road is in relationship to the site, you've got parking at the same elevation as a road well now you've only got four floors to work with to put units in versus if you can get parking underneath the road it gets a little more complex but the idea being allowing for additional height to accomplish that density on a potentially a case-by-case basis particularly in the town center and then the last item would be the possibly allowing, requiring more than the minimum allowable density. So right now, if it's a single use project, like just residential, um, they could just do 10 units in a, uh, But I don't know that we want a low density project to be eligible for a tax exemption. So maybe we say, well, no, if you're not providing any more than 20, you know, if you're not providing at least 16 or 24 units an acre, you're not going to be eligible, you know, that sort of thing. So a little bit of rambling, sorry, it's getting a little bit past my bedtime, but Any other feedback you might have? Appreciate that.

I don't know that I would consider unlimited height. I don't know that we want to be that type of community. So I would really consider like what ideally we would want to cap our height at and in what areas of our community. That's the only comment I have on that. Okay.

Andrew?

That's more of a question. I mean, has there been any kind of public comment from any of the developers on what is limiting them from achieving the our maximum, you know, 48 units per acre? I mean, obviously, we know kind of where they're capping things are at now based on, you know, heights and things of that nature. But have they referenced parking as being the reason why? Or is it just kind of one of our general assumptions?

There's basically two main items here that we've run into. One is parking. So the state requires even smaller. They allow eight feet wide parking spaces, which won't fit a lot of vehicles anymore. And none of them want to do that because they like who wants to park there. They actually want to be providing parking. So that's kind of the, the item. A lot of them are meeting the, uh, exceeding our minimums. And aren't taking advantage of our advantage of our transit reductions either because they want to provide those parking. So there's that the 2nd item is. Cost of construction above three stories, particularly when elevators start being part of it, the cost of that has been significant for them, a big jump in difference. So that's why you see a lot of our apartments are maxed at three is kind of that level.

And that makes sense. The other thing along the cost of construction too is the type of construction. So the structured parking piece, concrete and steel is very expensive um so we're seeing a lot of stick built wood construction for the three-story stuff so in combination with the elevator requirement if you're going to do parking underneath you typically go with concrete and steel because of your fire separation requirements and everything else right yeah that makes sense that makes sense thank you So I'm hearing general support for exploring these a little bit further. We can certainly reach out to developers that have been contacting us about projects in the pipeline and see if they might have some additional feedback. But we'll work with this and come up with a final draft to propose for next month and potential recommendation. Thank you. All right, last, but not least, we've made it almost to the end of the agenda. Um, we want to introduce tonight landscaping standards review and updates. This is something that we have been. Accumulating notes on over the years as staff about. how our landscaping standards are in multiple places in the code, and it's got conflicting provisions as a result. This is just part of life when you've got a living document you're trying to keep up to date over the course of many years. But we think it's a good opportunity for us to dive in, consolidate standards into a single section or chapter to try to remove redundancy, improve clarity, get rid of those conflicts. Listed a few things in the bullets here. Part of what's prompting this is a recent adoption of the public works standards and wanting to remove any public works and or non landscaping elements from our landscaping code. I know it was originally constructed 10, 15 years ago because we didn't have a public works presence here. It was all planning code. So now we're just trying to put things where they belong. belong for lack of a better term. Um, and then just a couple of other little notes there, but rather than dive in too deep, I just want to open up, see if anybody had any initial thoughts, feedback or questions, and then we'll get a draft put together between now and the next meeting.

I was really excited to see, um, the item of, um, wildfire preparedness so i would like to request that those standards be incorporated into the rewrite thank you thank you

Just touching on, we've listed several examples from other local cities. Feel free to dive in if you've got questions or suggestions. Come prepared next month or feel free to email staff in the meantime if you've got a real doozy you'd like us to try to work in. tenant schedule and come back for discussion next month and planning on having another discussion in the following month before we go out to see if a noticing and prepare for a public hearing. We want to make sure we're not rushing this item.

Yeah, I think if we can definitely revisit this when we have more people present, I think that would be beneficial.

Agreed 100%. And that, I think, is a great segue into staff updates and commissioner comments. So just really quick, wanted to let you guys know that we are expecting the council to appoint two new members for you tomorrow night's meeting. So we should have a full complement at next month's planning commission meeting.

With that line, just as a reminder, we'll be also voting for chair and vice chair. So please provide your, at the meeting, planning commissioners can nominate anyone for chair and vice chair, and then there'll be a vote at that time. For other staff updates, I would like to actually reach out to Layla Church, Commissioner Church, if you want to provide an update from the last planning action, our climate action team meetings.

Sure, happy to. So we meet the last Tuesday of every month now, and we are working with a consultant called Measurement. Like I mentioned, there's a lot of information on our website that you can read and see about what we've done so far. Is the online survey still live? Okay. There's also an online survey. We want to capture your feedback on our risk assessment that we're doing. So really, how do you experience climate change? What kind of climate threats are you concerned about? How this affects our community? It will only take you five minutes, but we'd love to hear your feedback. And we are planning to... have, as we continue to go through these assessments as a team, I think we're wrapping that up this month, right? And then we're moving forward with looking at our adaptive capacity, I believe. But we are planning to do these fall community events. We call them fall charrettes. And we're trying to figure out the schedule, too, of when it would work for Um, community members to participate, we're looking at a November date, I think, for that. Um, and again, the design. Focuses around greenhouse gas reduction, resilience, um, inland flooding risk. To populations, uh, at risk populations and and so on. Um. So, yeah, we're continuing to work through that. And after the assessment is done, I believe the consultant is putting together a report on their recommendations, right?

Yes, and Chad on the server. Yes, the service live and go to our website, the climate planning website on the city web page. We also have flyers at the parks that you can do your phone. It'll take you straight to it. We also have 1 out here. On the lobby, you have a chance to win a hazard or, um. emergency preparedness kit for two people. It's a little backpack. That measurement has put together as part of their outreach. So there is a potential prize for an individual that takes the survey. Thanks, Josh.

Sorry, I wanted to add, I think we have another engagement opportunity July 18th, right? The Summerfest Edgewood Community Park.

There's just going to be flyers and postcards provided at Summerfest for just more information. So it'd be another way to pick up the flyer and find the way to the website and other materials.

Anything further? Commissioners, you good? All right. There being no further business to discuss this evening, meeting is now adjourned at 8.41 p.m. Thank you all.

Thank you.