Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Crystal. Uh, good evening and welcome to the December 16th, 2025 planning commission meeting. I'd like to call this meeting to order. My name is Jason Leer and I'm chair of the Eugene Planning Commission. To begin this evening, I'd like to call on Commissioner Remy for the city's land acknowledgement statement. Commissioner Remy, are you uh able to provide that? Yes, I am. Chairman Leer, thank you.

Since time immemorial, the Calapouya people have been indigenous stewards of our region, building dynamic communities, maintaining balance with wildlife, and enacting sustainable land practices. This land acknowledgement is a way of resisting the eraser of indigenous histories and to honor native communities by inviting truth and reconciliation. Following treaties between 1851 and 1855, Calapouya people were dispossessed from their indigenous homeland by the United States government and forcibly removed to the coast reservations in western Oregon. As we consider the impacts of colonization, we also acknowledge the strength and resiliency of displaced indigenous peoples. The city of Eugene is built within the traditional homelands known as Cal Calapoya Ilhi. Calapoya descendants are citizens of the Confederate tribes of the Grand Ron community of Oregon and the Confederate tribes of the Selets of Oregon. They continue to make contributions to our communities here and across the lands. We express our respect for the inherent political sovereignty of all federally recognized tribal nations and indigenous people who live in the state of Oregon and across the nation. Therefore, the planning commission recognizes that what we do today will affect the many generations who come after us. Thank you so much, Commissioner Remy. And uh thanks to everyone for joining us in this virtual meeting format tonight. We have two items on the agenda. The first item is a public hearing and possible action on a set of concurrent applications. A sight specific refinement plan amendment and zone change for three adjacent properties on Cobberg Road and south of Kenny Loop. City file numbers RA2403 and Z2409. The second item on our agenda is the deliberations for the public health standards code amendment application city file number CA2503. Anyone wishing to participate and access

in the public hearing tonight can do so by following the access instructions listed on the agenda for this meeting. Planning commission meetings can also be viewed by watching the live stream available on our website or the broadcast on Comcast channel 21. As I mentioned, our first agenda item is a public hearing. If you wish to speak and provide testimony tonight, please know that we will begin the testimony portion after a brief presentation from staff. When we reach that point, staff will provide instructions about the virtual hearing format and how to participate. Before we start, I want to let you know a little bit about the planning commission and our role in the process. Uh, first, we are unpaid volunteers appointed by Eugene City Council who all live and work in Eugene like many of you. For this set of applications, we are not the decision makers. Rather, we'll review the proposal, testimony, and other relevant materials and make a recommendation to the city council. The city council will hold their own public hearing before making the final decision on the proposal. We're at large members, which means we have to consider the needs of the community as a whole, as well as the needs of all groups and neighborhoods. We're also human beings, which means each one of us has personal views that make us who we are. But as planning commissioners, we're committed to balancing all of our needs as a community and to making the best recommendations we possibly can based on our policies and our laws for us and future generations. That can be pretty tough to do and we know not everyone will agree with every recommendation we make. So, as we proceed this evening, we want you to know upfront that we are listening, that we care deeply about you and about our community. We recognize how important these changes are and encourage everyone speaking tonight to do so in a respectful and productive way. That said, given the topic of tonight's hearing, some of the items we have to uh use are legalistic or some of the terms we have to use. So I'll try to explain the requirements in plain language of plain language the best I can. Since this is a hearing for a sightsp specific refinement plan amendment and zone change, there are

unique procedures which we are legally required to follow. The decision-making process for this application is considered quasi judicial. So we'll use a quasi judicial format for the public hearing. Before we begin, the Eugene code also requires that planning commissioners disclose any conflicts of interest, exparty contacts, biases, or abstensions. In a quasi judicial proceeding, the parties are entitled to an impartial or neutral decision maker. To ensure this fair consideration, the Eugene Code and the Planning Commission's rules attempt to limit exparte contacts or communications between a party and the decision maker outside of the public hearing process. Each planning commissioner must disclose and describe the substance of any communication they have had about this application outside the public process. Uh the planning commissioners must also disclose any conflicts of interest that is whether the decision they are about to make could or would result in a personal financial gain or loss for themselves, their relatives or a business with which the commissioner or the commissioner's relative is associated. Finally, a planning commissioner cannot participate if they are biased. that is for whatever reason they are incapable of making an objective decision on these applications. Do any commissioners have anything to disclose? Commissioner Isacson?

Yes. Believe it or not, I just want to make sure full disclosure the the property that we're going to be discussing is literally my backyard. I'm staring at it right now. I don't think it's going to affect my judgment. I could be unbiased. It does decision would theoretically impact my neighborhood and my direct being, but I I can't imagine it would be an issue, but I want to make sure that's on the public record. Gotcha. Uh, does that surface any concerns, Lauren or Alosa? Assuming not.

Uh, no. I just want to take an opportunity to reiterate what I think I heard from Commissioner Isacson, and you can nod your head or shake your head if I'm getting it right or wrong. So, um, what I think I heard you say was that you, well, I'm assuming you don't have any specific exarty context to declare that you can, I think I heard you say you can make an unbiased decision on the application based on the applicable approval criteria and the evidence and argument in the record. So, not taking into account any outside information that you may have based on the fact that you live near the property. And third, um, I'll rephrase a little bit, but I think what I heard you say is you're declaring a potential conflict of interest because there's a small possibility that this Bzone and potential subsequent development could um have a financial impact on the neighborhood slash your property, but that's very remote. So, in an abundance of caution, um you're declaring this potential conflict, but a potential conflict once declared still allows you to participate in the discussion and to vote on the item.

Is that all accurate? Yes. Great. Perfect. Thank you very much. Um, give me just a second. Does anyone in the audience or member of the commission wish to challenge the impartiality of any of the planning commissioners? We'll give a moment to if Crystal has any hands that come up from the audience. Nope, not yet. But looks like we're good. Okay. So, I'd like to invite our moderator, Crystal, to provide some information for tonight's hearing. Crystal.

Uh, thank you so much, Chairle. Um, hello everyone. I am Crystal Fischer and I will be the moderator for tonight's meeting. I am going to cover a few items before we begin with regular proceedings. Uh so first I want to thank everyone for joining us in this virtual hearing and note that tonight's uh hearing is being recorded. Uh and since we're meeting virtually and this is a quasi judicial hearing, I will provide specific instructions on how to requested to speak before we begin the public testimony section after the staff's brief presentation on tonight's topic. Uh with that it's great to have everyone here and I will hand it back to you chair. Thank you Crystal. So as she noted we'll begin with a brief presentation from Jeff Keer and then move on and open the public hearing. hand it over to you, Jeff.

Thank you so much, Chair Leier. I'm going to do the traditional share screen. Um, uh, just for everybody's benefit, my name is Jeff Ger. I'm principal planner with our land use planning team here, uh, for the city of Eugene. Um, at this point, can I get a thumbs up that you guys are seeing the presentation? Great. Thank you so much. Uh, we're here to talk about, uh, a refinement plan amendment and zone change located just south of Kenny Loop. um right off of Cobberg Road. Those are files RA243 and Z249. Um and just for context, I'm going to cover a lot tonight. You know, uh I know Chair Leer started by saying this is a brief presentation. I'm going to try to keep it as brief as possible, but everybody loves knows that I love to talk. Um so we are talking about three properties uh as I mentioned that are just south of Kenny Loop and on the east side of Cobberg Road. Um, and what is being requested is a zone change to change the base zoning to C2 community commercial. Uh, I'll note that on the property is still this overlay zone uh called Nodal Development. I'm actually going to talk a little bit about that more in more detail in just a little bit here. Um, and then also we uh the applicant is requesting a text amendment to clarify uh and designate the three lots for community commercial. And again, that's a pretty nuanced thing. I'm going to go into a little more detail. Um, but before I do that, uh, let's look at just really ground ourselves in where the property is. Um, like I said, we are located right off of Cobberg Road, just north of, uh, for anybody who who's in the area. Um, it's just north of the Windco. Uh, the Costco is a little bit south of that, the Eugene uh, tennis and swim center kind of caddy corner across the road. Um, and you can see on the

zoning map that the properties are currently zoned C1 with that nodal development overlay zone. Again, that nodal development overlay zone isn't going to change. Um, and so it's just changing that base zone from C1 to C2 community commercial. Um, now that's what's before us tonight. I also would like to say that uh tonight may be one of those times, one of those rare times where uh it may be helpful for planning commissioners to ask questions as the presentation moves forward while I'm talking about some of theseformational pieces. Um so if you're looking for clarity on any of the pieces that I'm talking about tonight, I'm happy to provide that uh while we're moving forward um following the presentation once we get into public testimony. uh we don't operate that way but it might be helpful just for now. Um so before I get into the actual uh topic for tonight I wanted to talk a little bit about zoning overall and just talk about why the applicant is requesting a refinement plan amendment just to change their zoning because normally zone changes are handled by the hearings official. Um, and so if we think about the way that zoning zoning typically works, you know, we have these overarching kind of longterm policy documents that provide guidance for how zoning is supposed to operate. And so, you know, the main one of those for us is the metro plan that provides us our land use designation map um that kind of dictates what zones typically would apply where. um what special situations might exist like nodal development that we have in this property. But the metrop plan is a very high level document. It talks very broadly about policies across as the city as a whole. Um and provides us with designations for properties generally. Uh the refinement plan uh in this case it's the Will Kenzie

area plan. Um those are intended to narrow down into specific portions of town or related to specific topics and provide additional details, policies uh and refined designation maps to help us really narrow in when somebody's requesting a zone change um to help us determine the zoning. So it's really it kind of operates at that level. You start with the big designation map. You move into the refinement plans and that kind of helps us understand what zoning should be applied to a property. And then that kind of works us over to that's what the base zones are. The base zones are that's where the the the actual implementation of all this policy work comes in. It limits what uses can happen. It applies different standards based on the zones. And then in addition to base zones, we have these things called overlay zones. So that can be anything from like riparian protections to uh triggers for additional review. Um in this case the overlay zone is providing uh context for something called nodal development that I'll talk about in a minute. And you'll see something hanging out there in the corner called the transportation planning rule. And I'll talk about that in a little more detail uh because there were a lot of findings related to it in in the staff report that went out and I don't want people to get lost with that one. Um so thinking about how zoning works here in the case of this property we have the metro plan and the metro plan actually designates this property just generally as commercial uh and under that commercial designation you know there's multiple things that can apply like C1 C2C3 or go um all those are okay but you also see that it's designated within a nodal development area and so that's why we have that ND nodal development overlays zone which is really trying to get at uh more transitoriented, pedestrian and bicycle friendly oriented things. So it it prohibits a number of uses. I'll talk

about that a little bit later. Um the refinement plan here, we believe that it likely designates this property as a as for the general office zoning. Um, I say that with the word potentially because uh the the policy is potentially a little bit unclear as is the map. Um, and so, you know, if that were the case that it really clearly depicted as go, then this appropriate zoning here would be general office. It's this lack of clarity, which is why the applicant has applied for the refinement plan tonight to provide that clarity for what these properties should be. the applicant is seeking C2 and retaining that ND overlay. So, um, just before I move on to the transportation planning rules, I don't see any hands raised, so I'm going to assume there's no questions. Just take a little break for that in case. All right, seeing none. the transportation planning rule. This is a state law that applies in several different um instances, but the number one time we deal with it is zone changes. Um and then we are also dealing with it in this case because of the refinement plan amendment. Now, we are applying an Oregon administrative rule that's 660120060. Y'all don't need to know that number, but we do. Um what this is intended to do it's basically uh this lives within kind of the realm of what you would call goal statewide planning goal 12. Um and the whole intent there is to have consistency among our long range transportation planning documents and our land use system. Right? So, uh, what that's really doing is saying, hey, cities, you need to plan, you know, x amount of years into the future to think about what potential impacts might be coming

down the pike for the transportation system as a whole. And that's part of our transportation system plan that we have adopted at the city. Now, that whole transportation system plan is based on the metro plan. And so if we change anything to the metro plan or to any refinement plans of the metro plan, we might be creating inconsistencies between those long-term policy documents and our transportation system plan. And for that reason, whenever somebody's changing something like a refinement plan or the zoning, they have to prove that they're not going to cause what we call a significant effect on the transportation system. And so you may wonder how do they do that? They do that by looking at the maximum buildout scenario under the current existing regulations or current existing assumptions and then under hey based on what they're going to change how does that maximum buildout scenario alter at that point. So this is not about specific development. This is about very theoretical kind of 10,000 foot view of how planning works. And so the transportation planning rule is really trying to get at whatever they're trying to change within this refinement plan or within the zoning. Is that going to have an an overarching uh effect on the transportation like network that we didn't anticipate? Um and if so then they have to kind of mitigate that in some way. In this case it's a really interesting one because just the zone change actually doesn't cause any inconsistencies. The metrop plan assumes commercial. They're going to C2 commercial. There's no problem there. It's the refinement plan amendment that is actually triggering them uh proving up on the transportation planning rule. And you know based on the

analysis that that staff uh did, we concurred with them that actually their proposed change does not create any significant effect. meaning that if you compare what it is today and what it's designated today with the changes in the refinement plan that they're proposing, no significant effect was found to occur on the transportation system. So happy to answer any other questions on that. Um but generally speaking, this is uh very separate from traffic impact analysis which is something that you may hear about a lot more. That's something that happens at the time of development. So if somebody comes in and they want to develop a uh you know a fast food restaurant or something that's going to generate a ton of trips if it's over 100 trips then we actually do a traffic impact analysis based on that specific development. So this first one is just that 10,000 square 10,000 foot view for the transportation planning rule the TIA and the traffic impact analysis that would happen later at the time of development. That's not what we're talking about today. Um, all right. So, all of that context provided around kind of what we're talking about here. They've requested a uh a zone change from C1 to C2. That's a pretty cut and dry request. where that, as I mentioned, where that doesn't get cut and dry is because there's a policy within the Willy Kenzie area plan that would indicate that this property might was intended to be general office and not C2. And so that would mean that we would have denied potentially denied an application for a zone change unless they changed the refinement plan. And so for that reason, the applicant has applied for this refinement plan amendment. Thus why the planning comm and refinement plans are considered by refinement plan amendments are considered by the planning commission

and the city council ultimately. And so that's why you're here talk listening to me talk about a refinement plan amendment and a zone change tonight. Um so what are they when I talk about this potential this kind of issue within the Will Kenzie area plan? This is what I'm talking about. There's a map within the Willilakenzi area plan that shows these three properties and it indicates them as commercial and it it is associated with this policy. Policy six. It says the city shall recognize that the area adjacent to the north side of Crescent Avenue designated as commercial on the Willenzi uh land diagram shall be zoned general office. Now, these properties are north of Crescent Avenue, and the question of whether they are adjacent to the north side of of Crescent Avenue, that's kind of the question at hand. And that lack of clarity was enough to say, "Hey, if you want to change these three parcels to be uh C2 instead of general office, actually when they came to staff, we said we recommend doing a refinement plan change to change that policy to make it more clear because if you look at this map, this is the actual like zoomed in map within the Willy Kenzie area plan called inset map D. You'll see that this area to the north, it does say general office and kind of fuzzy letters that you see there. And you'll see this thick black boundary. And that thick black boundary talks about the crescent village boundary. And these three properties are outside of it. And it's like between the lack of clarity in that policy and this map. We might could interpret it maybe different ways. You know, we said, "Hey, we recommend clarifying this policy uh in order to get your zone change approved." And so with that, they've proposed this text amendment to policy 6. And the important

thing is is that they've maintained that the rest of the area should still be zoned general office. But then they've carved out a specific thing that says that the properties shown outside of the Crescent area village area, it's only these three properties. Those are the only three impacted here. and it says they shall be zoned community commercial. If this refinement plan text amendment is approved, then the zone change likely can move forward. And so the zone change is really hinging upon uh this policy being amended um which requires uh planning commission recommendation and ultimately city council approval. So we did receive some public testimony that came in from the neighborhood organization. um we we tried to directly address those uh within an attachment to the AIS. Um but some considerations that we just wanted to flag for everyone just so that we we talk about a little bit was um these three topics which kind of what would this change do and that's really you know allowing a broader range of uses. Um the ND overlay zone is proposed to remain which does have some limitations to it and it would building height would be a big change. Um, so first talking about allowed uses, uh, right now they have the C1 zoning and that has a very limited set of commercial uses allowed because it's intended to kind of nestle within, um, a residential area. Uh the go zone um which is what the plan policy would kind of intend this to be potentially uh has a wider range of of uses than C1, but it's still limited in kind of height and scale. And the uses don't include some of the maybe um more intensive uses that you might see just

allowed outright in C2. And then the C2 zone has one of the broadest spectrum of allowed uses for commercial uh with the exception of maybe C3. But um you know some of those things that are add you know if they were to go to uh C2 they could have uh residential you know like a multifamily apartment building uh allowed outright that would also be allowed outright in go but uh with limit more limits on height. Um C2 would allow you know larger uh general merchandise stores things of that nature that wouldn't otherwise be allowed in the GO or C1. And so we provided you a table in attachment D to try to illustrate what some of those uh changes would be. And then the one thing that I wanted to call attention to is that the nodal development overlay zone is still applicable on the property. And that limits um mostly autooriented development types. And so that can be anything like a gas station. It can be something that's a driveth through facility um or auto sales. So, you're not going to see some you're not going to see a gas station pop up here. You're not going to see, you know, an auto mall or anything like that. It's going to be one of those other commercial uses that are allowed here. The other topic was building height. So, um within the R1 zone, which is kind of adjacent to this property to the northwest or northeast, I'm sorry. Uh you can see that on the just on the right hand side of the property there. Um the limitation there is 30 feet within the residential zone R1 zone. And so any commercial development that occurs on any of these tax lots is going to have a height limitation

imposed on it. And that means within 50 ft of that residentially zoned parcel, no building can be higher than what's allowed in residential. So that will be limited to 30 feet within that 50ft buffer. Now, as indicated on this uh kind of diagram, there's approximately 53 feet of available space, which kind of gets larger towards the south of the property that would allow higher height limits. Uh in C2, the height limit is 120 ft. And so that would be allowed there. Um whether that's likely or not is another thing to consider, but um and then if this were to go to GO as opposed to C2, that building height would be 50 ft. uh within that area outside of the residential kind of buffer zone. And so I'll just note that like these types of residential buffers that are built into the commercial standards, um those are some of the things that the Will Kenzie area plan didn't really consider when it was drafted. We didn't when it was created in 1992. It didn't have we didn't the city didn't have as robust commercial uh development standards or multifamily standards for that matter. And so it oftent times was trying to mitigate some of those by imposing some of the uh uh things like site review or limitations on the type of zoning. So uh all that said, you know what this comes down to brass tax.

I've got a question for you. I don't want to stop your flow, but maybe no please to ask it. So I just want to see if I'm understanding this correctly and hopefully if I'm not you can point me in the right direction. So that question of whether or not it's in a general office designated base zone according to the Will Kenzie plan, does that rest on whether or not the word adjacent is taken to refer to these properties in relation to Crescent or

that the conservative reading of it and that's where it's like the conservative reading of that policy and and let me go back to that policy just so that we're all looking at it. So it says the city shall recognize that area adjacent to the north side of Crescent Avenue designated as commercial on the plan shall be zoned go. So it's all about that adjacent to the north side of Crescent Avenue. A conservative reading of that would say it's anything north of Crescent Avenue. And so in an abundance of caution, staff was like, "Hey, we think that you could go to a hearings official and you could potentially have your zone change denied based on that phrase." And so if you want, you know, it's like a liberal reading of it could say, well, are those really what's the difference of adjacent versus a budding, right? And so, you know, it's like, oh, well, those properties aren't abudding, but are they adjacent? And what's that kind of limitation there? And that, you know, risk analysis is is something that the applicant went through to determine whether or not they wanted to apply for this uh kind of clarification. Does that help answer the question?

Yeah, absolutely. Is there any like definition of adjacent in this code? Not within Eugene's code. So then we defer just to the you know basic definition of it which doesn't necessarily provide clarity in these instances every time. Thank you.

Which is exactly why they you know in a risk averse situation you just go for the full clarification. Um, so that said, um, uh, this all really comes down to the zone change approval criteria. So that means are we consistent with the metro plan? Um, are we consistent with the remaining, you know, policies and designations within the Will Kenzie area plan, the base zones? There's a very long set of findings that you'll find in your staff report that indicate that we do find that this is consistent with uh the metro plan. It's not just by changing the zone, it's not going to create any inconsistencies with the Willy Kenzie area plan. The transportation planning rule as I mentioned is satisfied. Um key urban services is, you know, on Cobber Road. Those are all available. And for sighting requirements, there are no sighting requirements for C2 zone. So it's allowed to go wherever it's designated as such. Um the refinement plan evaluation has much more a much longer set of findings uh because you have to demonstrate compliance with every single one of the statewide planning goals um as well as any policies of the comprehensive plan and it has to be consistent with the remainder of the refinement plan due to the sight specific nature of this change within the willy area plan. it doesn't necessarily create any inconsistent or perce it potentially doesn't create any cons inconsistencies within the remainder of the refinement plan um because it's really talking about this one area and it's not changing any general policy uh that would affect you know how the plan looks at commercial zoning. And then the other thing that it has to do is it an amendment to a refinement plan has to be um kind of it has to be addressing something. So whether that's like an error in a refinement plan, uh new changes in state

or federal law, or in this case, um they the applicant is predicating it under a change to kind of circumstances that the plan didn't anticipate and the applicant went into kind of detail about the fact that the plan didn't anticipate the way that this area was going to develop or the fact that all the geo area to the south of this was going to be multifamily residential. Um, and I put that C2 zoning was going to be uh desired in this location. So, that's where they went to demonstrate compliance with this. Um, some potential deliberation points. We can go back to this a little bit later, but it's really just looking at that refinement plan amendment, the change to the policy, the zone change, and if there's any questions about the transportation planning analysis, happy to talk about that. Um just a reminder that planning commission is making is just making a recommendation and so uh there is another public hearing held by the city council followed by their action. Um any questions or or if you'd like to submit testimony to be reviewed by the city council if the planning commission closes the record. You can contact Nick Jello for that. And so yeah, with that I'll end my presentation. Thank you all. It's very long. I appreciate you all for sitting through that. Thanks. Thank you, Jeff. Good presentation there. Um, before we open the public hearing, I have a few more details to share regarding our order of operations. We will begin the public hearing with testimony from the applicant. Then testimony will be received in the order that people have requested to speak. Following public testimony, city staff will have the opportunity to respond to the testimony provided and answer any questions that might come up. Finally, the applicant will be given the opportunity for a final rebuttal. If commissioners have questions about someone's testimony, you should ask those questions following the individual's testimony. Following the conclusion of public testimony, staff will have the chance to respond to the public testimony presented, and

commissioners will have the opportunity to ask additional questions of staff. I remind everyone that the failure to raise an issue with sufficient specificity to allow the planning commission and parties to respond will preclude future appeals on that issue. In other words, please raise issues as clearly as you can so the city and other parties can address them. Just as a reminder, the planning commission will not make a final decision on this application. We'll make a recommendation to the city council who will hold their own public hearing before making a final decision. Before we open the public hearing, Crystal has some additional instructions for us for providing testimony. Crystal.

Thank you so much, Chair Leer, and hello again, everyone. Uh so again, I'm Crystal Fischer, u moderating for tonight. Um, it is now time to sign up to speak. If you wish to provide testimony uh tonight, you can get in the queue by raising your virtual hand. Uh, to do so, please click the raise hand button in the menu if you're joining us on a computer or smart device. Traditionally, for these proceedings, once the public hearing is opened, speakers were called in the following order. First, those in support with the applicant speaking first. Second, those with a neutral position, and third, those opposed. However, due to limitations of the virtual hearing platform, we have had to make some adjustments. So, at the start of your testimony, please uh start by clearly stating your name, your address, and whether you're in support, in opposition, or neutral to the proposal. Consistent with the planning commission standard practice, the applicant is granted additional time for their testimony. Uh for tonight's hearing, the applicant has requested up to 25 minutes for their time of time for their testimony, excuse me. I will announce whose turn it is to provide public testimony as well as announcing who is up next. Uh when you are called to provide testimony, you'll be promoted to a Zoom panelist which will allow you to unmute and turn on your video if you so choose. Please do not unmute or turn on your video until it is your turn for public testimony. When your testimony is concluded, you will be returned to the Zoom attendee status. Um, regular practice of the planning commission limits testimony to two to three minutes depending on the number of speakers in the queue and I will notify you when you have 30 seconds remaining in your allotted time and when your public testimony is concluded you will be muted. So please be mindful of your time. If there are technical difficulties and um we will move on to the next person in the queue and try again after that. Um all that said I will hand it back to the chair for now.

Thank you Crystal. Now I will open the public hearing. The purpose of the hearing is to receive relevant testimony on the applications before us. I want to remind everyone that your testimony should be directed toward the approval criteria that you believe apply to these applications. We ask you to frame your testimony in terms of the applicable approval criteria because the Eugene code requires that our recommendation be based on these criteria. The applicable approval criteria for the proposed refinement plan amendment and zone change are from Eugene code sections 9.8424. 8424 and 9.8865. These criteria are listed and addressed in the planning commission packet for this evening. Uh Crystal, how many speakers are currently in queue?

We have one. Um and it's the applicant's representative. Okay. Um so if anybody else joins in, uh based on the number of speakers in the queue, they'll have three minutes to speak since we've got uh plenty of time for everybody. And thank you. We encourage people to submit any written testimony as well. Written testimony may be submitted via email, by mail, or in person. More detailed instructions on how to submit written testimony are included in the materials for this meeting and are available on the application notices. We'll now begin the public testimony, beginning with the applicant. Crystal, I'll hand it back to you again to begin.

Thank you so much. Um, all right. So, it looks like we have uh Brandt Melik. I'm going to promote you to a panelist now. Um, and as Brandt is joining us, I'm just going to remind everyone else if they would like to um provide testimony tonight, please raise your hand. Um, perfect. And Brandt, if you can just start by stating your name um and your address, that would be great.

Sure. Um, thank you. Um, Chair Lear and members of the commission. Uh, my name is Brandt Melik. I'm a senior planner with Metro Planning at 846 A Street, Springfield, Oregon, 97477. And I'm representing the applicant for the city files AR24-03 and Z24-9. And I am in support. Um, personal planner Jeff Gert did an excellent job uh summarizing the issues and I have very little to add. Um, as a result, uh, I'll save you some time with my comments and comment when needed at the end. There's no need for me to take speak 20 minutes right now, so I won't get. So, uh, with that, I'll I'll let the other people speak and then come back as needed. So, thank you,

Crystal. Is anybody else signed up for the queue? We have not had any additional speakers request.

Gotcha. Well, thank you very much, Brent, uh, for taking time out of your evening to share your thoughts with us. Um, I'm assuming there's not going to be any staff response at this point. Do any commissioners have any questions? And there will be opportunity to ask questions of staff later following the close of the hearing later tonight for any items that may be needed for followup during deliberations. Any questions from commissioners? Looks like not. Um, we would now be moving on to the opportunity for the applicant to present any final statements. So, I don't know if you have anything else to add, Brandt.

Uh, no, thank you. At this point, I do not. So, thank you.

Perfect. Um, give it a minute. I don't imagine we're going to have any requests to hold the record open at this point, but want to make sure that no commissioners want to do that. not seeing any desire to do so. So, with that, the planning commission public hearing and record are now closed. We'll now begin deliberations for the Cobberg um Kenny Loop proposal here for the next Oh, I guess uh we're into deliberations now. So, let's see. I think we have this is is this is just is this just purely discussion or or are we potentially voting Uh I I have a you know so staff did recommend approval for this application. Um so we do have a draft motion uh reflecting that suggestion. Um however uh we would like you know to provide planning commission the chance to deliberate, ask questions, etc. Happy to walk through it.

And I'm assuming we can ask questions and deliberate at this time or we can put that motion on the table if somebody wants to do so and second it and then we can also debate it before voting on it. So, I'll defer to the commissioners if anybody has any questions or Lauren, am I getting that right? Okay. Commissioner Yang,

good evening. I just have a couple very quick questions. Uh, thanks for the education at the beginning of the presentation, by the way, was very helpful. Um my question is that the size of this parcel seem pretty small uh for a C2 um community commercial and in the presentation the applicant uh you know state that the rationale for making the applications because that uh with the go with the C1 zoning they have not been able to generate development interest given the small parts of plan and the um uh very kind of very vague um statement about unable to generate interest, but it did not really talk about what's the interest uh once we change it. So, it just felt like it's part of a maybe bigger future plan um to me and that may not be the scope of our discussion tonight, but I was just curious and I want to bring it up.

Thank you, Commissioner Yang. That's a great question. Um and and you you spot on uh with your fact that we're not talking about specific development tonight. We're talking about a change in zone and that brings you know any possible use that could come with that zone and so we aren't contemplating any specific development. But uh you're right that the applicant didn't you know didn't provide any direct evidence of their inability to to get development at that site. However, the fact that it's remained undeveloped, even though they did recently change to C1's own zoning, may be indicative of that. Um, beyond that, there's no evidence in the record that I'm aware of that directly points to uh uh an inability to develop the property.

Anything else, Commissioner Yang? That's all. Thank you, Commissioner Isacson.

Yeah, a couple things. to to go off of what Commissioner Yang just said. I mean, I think part of the problem is that one of the parcels has a house on it. So, it's it's difficult to develop the entire number of lots into one when one of them is is occupied by a home. You'd have to acquire all those lots assuming that you wanted a footprint big enough for say like the OEA building which is on the other side of of Kenny Loop. Um, and that's what I'm looking at when I look at the map as to what, you know, what it would look like in post-development world. Um, and so that's that that's that's a factor. So I I I am still hung up on on the adjacent language for me. I I I feel like for one, just kind of going forward, we should have a definition in the code as as to what adjacent means as opposed to the other so that just we get past this in the future. But I feel like we're doing two things which make me uneasy. one, we're going in and making a very sightsp specific change, which again to the um to the northeast neighbors um argument, what's to stop this from present setting from from the future? Are we going to just do this repeatedly? Um and and two, if we're mis we don't like the adjacent argument, but we're going to kind of kind of squint our eyes and turn our heads and make it make it kind of work. If we're doing this in tandem, I could see that being a problem in the future. So, I I feel like we need to get that buttoned up. I don't know what that process is in the future, but I want to make sure we voice it. I think that having a set definition that we're all agreeing on that we can that not only us, but the public can use for its own um edification is is probably a good idea. Um, but I am still hung up on on the the language as well.

Thanks, Commissioner Isacson. I'll uh insert myself here for a second. Um, it's it was a interesting read through on this one. Definitely a lot of information. Uh ultimately it doesn't seem like it's that complex a question. I guess in plain reading adjacent even though we're getting pretty legalistic that means next to for me. So I think it seemed like a good opportunity to clarify some um some items here that were not totally clear in the plan. But I think, you know, I'd like to hear any other deliberation from the other planning commissioners that um leaning toward the idea that it seems to meet all the requirements and that I think the staff has done a good job of articulating why that's the case and this is seems like it should be appropriate under Eugene city code. Um I'm also curious about what's going to sprout up there, but I don't think that's really within our purview too much tonight and evaluating whether or not this is a appropriate zone change. Jeff,

I'll just uh I just want to quickly flag that um staff did talk about this a little bit in the response to the Northeast Neighbors testimony. Um but we we don't believe that this would set any sort of precedent. Um especially related to the word adjacent uh because the applicant has proposed just clarifying it. Um it really doesn't then flush out the question of what does adjacent mean? And while I don't disagree that there's a need for the definition of adjacent across the city, um a change within our code wouldn't wouldn't facilitate that. Um it would have to be a change to the specific plan and it gets really complicated when you start digging into it further, which is kind of why we've never tackled that issue. So um just wanted to say I appreciate that comment for sure. Are there any other questions or deliberations? Commissioner Remy,

I don't I don't uh have a question, just a couple of observations. First, I'm I'm really grateful for the neighborhood to have raised the questions they did because it made me think about, you know, what what we're doing here. And I'm also equally grateful for the staff replying to them in the way that you laid it out in the report. That's very helpful. I I found comfort with the way the staff had replied to the issues that were raised and I am I'm uh you know in favor of pushing this recommending that this move forward to the city council. Thanks Commissioner Remy. Commissioner Edwards.

Thanks Chair Lair. I'm I want to echo um Commissioner Rey's comments and if if if someone would like to provide language for a motion, I'm happy to put one on the table and unless folks have additional questions, but happy to continue to move us along. Can we put the language on the screen, Jeff? All right. Uh, I will move to recommend that the city council approve the requested refinement plan amended and zone ch amendment and zone change and adopt the proposed text amendment to the refinement plan as included in attachments B and C to the December 16th, 2025 agenda item summary.

I'll second.

Thanks, Commissioner Ramy. So, at this point, uh, we have the opportunity to continue deliberations and to debate on this and just want to make sure that all the planning commissioners present. If you have any other questions or anything else that you'd like to say, I have an opportunity to do so. If not, we'll move on to a vote, I think. Not seeing anything else at this point. So, all of those in favor uh of the proposed motion, please raise your hands. And all those opposed. Okay. Okay, we have an abstent uh an opposition from Commissioner Isacson and the rest in support. So, we'll now move on to the next agenda item. For the next agenda item, I'd like to turn it over to Reed Verer for a brief introduction before getting into deliberations.

Thank you, Chair Leer. Share my screen. Good evening. My name is Reed Burner and I'm the land use supervisor with building and permit services. I'm here to discuss the public health standards land use code amendments. I'm going to start with some background information for the project uh focusing on the direction that the city council provided back in June. I'll then review the proposed land use code amendments and I'll close with an outline of next steps and we'll be available to answer any questions. At the June 20 2025 work session, the city council passed two motions. The first was to move forward with the land use code amendments related to improving coordination with our public health regulatory partners. These code amendments are the first step in the public health standard code amendments and are the topic of tonight's deliberations. The second motion passed by the council directed staff that upon completion of a Eugene specific hazard and risk analysis to use those results to inform potential future changes to the land use code. These proposed code amendments were developed based on city council direction and the feedback we received regarding the language and workability of the previous versions of the proposed code amendments. As proposed, version three would require an applicant to either provide documentation attesting to and identifying all air, land, and water permits required by the Environmental Protection Agency, Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, andor Lane Regional Air Protection Agency, or provide documentation that permits are not required for the proposed development. If version three is adopted, the city would develop a form that applicants could use to streamline the process. The form would identify the three regulatory agencies and would provide contact information for their permitting offices. Therefore, version three would provide the framework that applicants could use to consult with the other

agencies and confirm that they are aware of all required permits, helping reduce uncertainty for new industrial businesses. In addition, version three includes a noticing requirement for the city. Following submission of a development permit, the city would be required to send notice to the subject regulatory agencies to inform them of the proposed development and what permits the applicant attests are required, if any. The city's noticing requirements would close the feedback loop by informing regulatory agencies of what permits the applications attest to needing. El Rapid testimony pointed out that the notice would allow their staff to quickly assess the proposed use and determine if their regulations were correctly identified, enabling timely intervention before a facility begins operation without the necessary air quality controls. So now we're moving on to next steps. So following these deliberations, the planning commission will provide a recommendation to the city council. The options provided in the code include recommending approval, approval with modifications, or denial of the application. In accordance with the code, the recommendation shall be based on the applicable approval criteria in the land use code that were covered in the draft findings submitted as attachment B to the AIS. Staff is recommending that the planning commission recommend that the city council adopt version three of the code amendments. And a draft of that motion was provided in the AIS. And I also have a slide with the motion language. Following these deliberations and the planning commission recommendation, the city council will hold a public hearing on the proposed code amendments tenatively scheduled for February 17, 2026. So now I'll turn it back over to chair.

Thank you Reed for that information. Uh we'll now open for deliberations on this topic. We can begin with any questions commissioners have for staff. Also staff provided a recommended motion in tonight's AIS. If anyone wants to put that on the table, uh, feel free to do so and we can continue to deliberate and debate based on the motion or we can discuss first and ask questions. Commissioner Edwards.

Thanks, Cherry Lair. I I first I just really want to thank all the work that Reed and the planning staff has done on this. I know it's been many, many months in the works and I um I just appreciate all the time. I know that I've personally sat in rooms and meetings with you and some of the business members of the business community and um you've always been very very gracious to hear folks out. Um I am I'm just want to put it out there. I'm I'm not in support of uh action on this tonight and I I kind of wanted to just try to explain um from my perspective and I'm going to read from both the language in version three as well as I have pulled up the table for the employment and industrial zone um land use permit requirements just looking at the allowable uses because um my my main issue that I have with this is that version three and I'm reading from the language would require an applicant proposing new development in E2, I2 or I3 zones to quote provide documentation attesting to and identifying all air, land and water permits required by the Environmental Protection Agency, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality, andor the Lane Regional Air Protection Agency, which is LRAPA, or provide documentation and testing that permits are not required for the proposed those developments. None of those agencies answer to the city. None of those agencies there there's no enforcement mechanism. And as I look at the code and look at the allowable uses in these zones, if I'm a bar, a tavern, a deli, restaurant, caterer, art studio, gymnastic school, ice cream store, library, computer store, bookstore, museum, bowling alley, mini golf,

theater, bank, hotel, the list goes on. I'm going to be required to procure documentation from all of those agencies that says that I don't need a permit. And that inherently creates a huge problem because now you have a situation where if they can't get that documentation now we're at a standstill and that is the unintended consequence that a lot of my businesses who are regulated have said this is the problem that that it's creating. And I'll just state this again and I know I've said it in previous meetings. I don't believe that city council has clearly articulated the problem they're trying to solve with this. And I think everyone kind of points to the JH Baxter situation. I don't condone that in any way, shape or form, but that is, you know, literally people operating illegally and conducting illegal behavior and this just simply doesn't stop that. But what could result as a consequence, I believe is is a is a huge problem. And I just think that I'm I'm cautioning my colleagues to just think twice about this. And my recommendation would be for council to actually wait for that um risk and hazards assessment and actually see what the problem is that they're looking to fix and solve for. And then as we all know, code changes are not something we just willy-nilly do easily. It takes months and months and months. This process has taken months as as it is. And I just I would just uh encourage council to just hold off until they have more information. So I appreciate you all letting me speak and I will go on mute now. So thank you

Commissioner Bon.

Thanks. Um, I've been thinking about this quite I I also want to start out and thank Reed and any other staff that's been involved with this over the last number of months. Um, we've had a number of meetings on this. We've been through several versions and thank you Reed for uh getting all this together. I I've appreciated the written material all the way through. uh and I found it helpful. Um I will say I came away at the last meeting uh the last meeting which I now I'm I'm remembering the date is November 18th. I think I have that right. But but that's when version three was proposed to us and I was pretty uncomfortable with the idea of going forward with it that night without additional public comment. So we went through that and we've received some additional comment. Um, but at this point I think I'm ready to uh take this uh recommend that this go forward to the city council. Uh, and I would uh I guess I'm uh ready to actually put a motion out there uh to do that. Um, I think that it's been represented to us all the way through this. The the the purpose of this has been to kind of provide transparency or also to improve coordination uh between the city uh and the various public health regulatory agencies that um can that would have regulatory authority over some or permitting process for industrial development where this kind of thing might be applicable. And uh I think we've come to a point

after three versions of this where the way that it's worded now and the approach we're taking does that and uh I'm I'm in support of taking it forward to the council. Um the what we're what we're doing the way I read it, we're uh we be um requiring that an applicant for a building permit for industrial development with uh applicable processes would provide some documentation that um we use the word attesting to or attest testing to and identifying air, land, water permits that are required. I I don't think there's a problem. I don't think there should be a problem that if someone is is proposing a new development with such processes that they would have some understanding of what kind of permits would be required. So I'm I'm just I'm having trouble understanding why this should if with that kind of a development why this would be ownorous. Uh and I uh I think the way that we've got it in version three uh my understand when we went through the other two versions there was uh as Reed was and we were reviewing it uh with the uh with the uh agencies that are involved and also reviewing it out there with the development community. Uh there were some issues about how we might implement it and I think we've tried to address those. So, um I guess I'm uh I I'm would want to just put that out there as a statement. I think what I'd like to do is go ahead and make a motion.

Uh and uh I've kind of spoken in support of it in advance, but um I'd like to go ahead and put the motion on the floor. And if there's a second, I guess we'd continue discussion. Do you have it available, Commissioner Beer? Can we put it on screen? I do. Okay. Well, I have what I have available is the is the recommended motion that was included in Reed's AIS. Perfect. And he's put it on the screen as well for everybody.

Oh, okay. Let me go let me go back to that. Um, yeah. So, I I would move to recommend uh that the Eugene City Council adopt version three of the proposed public health standards land use code amendments included as attachment A to the agenda item item summary. Um I want to add to that if it's all right dated December 16th, 2025. Thank you, Commissioner Bon making a very precise motion. Do we have a second? I second.

Seconded by Commissioner Bailing. So, we'll now continue our deliberations. Uh, Commissioner Isacson.

Yeah. I I also wanted to to thank um staff for this. I I I think that part of um the office of planning really should be the office of needle threading because he always does such a great job of of presenting the the case in such a way that is really informative for for people that they don't feel like we're you're pushing one versus the other. You you actually do provide a lot of information out there. I I want to echo what Commissioner Edward said, not to make this super anecdotal, but I operate a business that is one of the most regulated in our state without any question of a doubt. Luckily, I don't have to deal with the federal government, which would um be entertained here. But if you're a large operation and you have um a fairly large amount of cash um available to you, there are an endless number of consultants that you can go to to make sure that all of your ducks are lined up, that you have everything all ready to go and everything will work fine and seamlessly for you. And it's just really a matter of time. Find a property that works, get your consultants ready to go, have them put everything together, they'll give you a timeline, and at some point in the future, you'll have your ribbon cutting ceremony. You open your doors. That's not most businesses in Oregon. Most businesses in Oregon are small business owners. People who are trying to make payroll, who wake up in the middle of the night, don't know how they're going to do it, who wake up um after four hours of sleep or two hours of sleep because they had to go in and work when their employees were sick or whatever it was it was. They don't have those money for those consultants. The number of times I can tell you that I have been told by state agencies, you are set and ready to go. Here's your list of things to do. You do it and it turns out something got it wrong. There's something additional. Now you have to go back to the drawing board. And all of that takes time and money. All that takes effort and time. And at some point some people just say, "I can't do this. I'm going to have to go someplace else or not do anything at all." I I don't believe our purpose is to call balls and strikes in the way that we're doing right now with this. Just as the previous action we did

tonight, we can't think about what possibly could go on for development here. I mean, it is the the 800 lb gorilla in the room is this is about Amazon. This is what it is, right? We and I get that. I I'm not a fan of them either, but that isn't our job. Our job isn't to wonder what could potentially be there. Our job is to create a blind policy, a blind uh infrastructure that allows anybody to come into our space as long as they follow the rules. And I want to make it fair for the small mom and pop as well as, you know, whoever else wants to come in here. And it concerns me that we are we are creating a policy that will shut out the majority of people who are looking to start a small business, which is the largest employer in our country. And that that really bothers me. Um, again, anecdotal, I have a warehouse. We applied for a simple ODA permit that would require that that simply added us that we had to have a bathroom. That's all we had to do. But because that bathroom door adjacent to the kitchen, even though the that because that door existed, four different agencies said two said yes, two said no, we had to hire a separate consulting firm to come in there. It was an incredibly expensive process to tell us which one was the right one. Even though the agencies were telling us one story and versus another. There are a lot of a lot of people who just say, you know what, I just can't do that part of it. And how much business are we losing for a community? How many employees are we not hiring? All because we are afraid of another potential backster situation or potential Amazon to come in, which again isn't our job. And as much as I don't like those people, much like Commissioner Evans was saying, we have to be looking at the the whole board and instead of afraid of the boogeyman, which has affected us in the past, but we have to be mindful of the entire community as a whole. And it really it really bothers me that that that is is

what this seems to focus on. Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Isacson. And I'll get to you in one sec, Commissioner Baileing. I was going to insert myself in there next. I was recently reading this anecdote about New York City and how uh there was a couple of well publicized construction accidents in the 80s and so they passed all of these rules and now whenever you walk in New York City the entire thing is all of these structures built everywhere. I mean it looks awful you and it's the biggest city in the world. Uh, but everything is built up because of an incident or two that happened 40 years ago that doesn't seem to have much effect today. And I guess I wanted to say that because I I agree with Commissioner Isacson in that sense that I do think this is one of those situations where it's kind of the rule in search of a boogeyman. And when we talked about it, there was one example of what sounded like a small business that I think it was a vape company or something like that. Um, but I don't think that this responds to the argument that's made over and over again about Baxter and about other threats to folks health. I do know that we talk over and over again and so does the city council and state legislature about housing and jobs, housing and jobs, housing and jobs. But two of the things that make it more difficult to build housing and to bring jobs are adding additional regulations. And we are in I think lucky to live in one of the more regulated and most planned communities probably in the country. And we get to live in a beautiful place that has you know clean water um and great nature and it's just well thought out. But at some point and this is where I'll disagree a little bit with Commissioner Bon. I think every little well-meaning rule adds up and cumulatively it's all of these rules and continuing to add to them that make it more difficult for businesses to flourish sometimes make it more difficult for houses to be built. And while every one of the rules, you know, that was used to prevent the

construction of housing over the last 40 years was well-meaning and many of them served a really legitimate purpose in protecting the character of the community and protecting our environment. it I I don't think it was forward-looking because I think the cumulative effect was to make it so we're now in a housing crisis and living in Eugene where I think there's this huge stratification between folks that make a lot of money and a huge population that works in the service industry that is struggling to get by is because it's difficult to attract bigger medium-term uh you know employers uh manufacturing and things that kind of power a more robust middle class. And though this is just one kind of smaller rule, I I don't think it's necessary. I don't think it really solves the problem that it's intending to solve. And I do think that there are going to be potentially negative results from it. And so that's why I think I will also be opposing it tonight. And I wanted to articulate my reasoning as well. And I'll pass it off to Commissioner Bailing.

Thank you. I um find these anecdotal situations very interesting, but on a practical level, I don't think any of them apply. I don't think anyone was looking at the boogeyman when they talk about trying to improve coordination between the city and the regulatory agencies. I see it as a simplification that's so basic that if I want to build a house, I could go to the city and they would give me a form, if I understood correctly, with the contact information for the three agencies I need to check with to find out if I need any permits from any of those three agencies. I can then go back to the city with my form. they will notify the agencies appropriately and I can get my building permit. It it I don't need to be a big corporation. I don't need to have a ton of consultants as long as I know how to read English and perhaps we have translators for people who don't. Um, but it seems to me with this version three, it accomplishes what the city council is intending for us to do. Simplify and coordinate better with the regulatory agencies that are beyond the control of the city. The city does not control all those things. And if we don't find a way to have the different pieces working together, it's going to be as arduous as it always has been, if not worse. There should not be four different agencies interacting about the

bathroom if there's only three agencies involved. So, I don't know what else you were dealing with, Commissioner Isacson, but you know, I've seen complications in California when we had to pay attention to ADA. If you wanted to add a bathroom, you would have to create a whole path of travel from the door that was compliant with all the ADA requirements. Now, there's a nightmare. you know, there's lots of ways for it to get very complex. Um, and and I see the side of this that represents a simplification that would serve the process. Now, maybe we're mistaken, but I think that's what the city council had in mind, and I agree with it.

Thank you, Commissioner Baileing. Commissioner Edwards,

I just had a question, so I appreciate it. Um, I it's a question for Reed because I'm I'm just looking at the language. So, the EPA, that's federal that's a federal agency. So, we don't currently have, you know, require the city doesn't have any kind of oversight um with the federal agencies, nor do they have with the Oregon DEEQ, which is the state agency. I'm wondering in your research and in talking to those folks, what mechanism they shared would um trigger them providing documentation to a business that says they don't need a permit. They don't need an air or water or other type of air, land or water permit. So, if I'm a I'm looking here, a martial arts studio that I'm permitted to be an E2 and I have to reach out to the EPA, the DEEQ, and LRAPA. What mechanism tells the EPA, a federal agency, that they must provide that documentation?

Thank you for the question. I' happy to clear this up. So, what the requirement does is it requires the applicant to provide a document attesting that they understand what permits are required by those agencies. So if they know if they're a martial arts studio and they know nothing in the EPA, nothing in the DEEQ, nothing else in LRAPA is triggered or permitting requirements are triggered by what my proposed use is, they would check on the form. No permits required. We would then take the form. We would send the email to those contact people and say this is a new use in E2, I2 or I3 and they say they don't need any permits. That would be the end of the story. So on another hand perhap the the example that I brought up last time with that nicotine vaping business if they had come in and they had done the same thing and said we're starting a nicotine vaping business in I2 and we don't think we need any permits we would as a city we would say okay we would send that same notice to those three agencies and in that case the DEQ would say well hey you actually are doing a use here that requires storing of hazardous materials so you do need a permit and they would be able to capture that at the initial permitting stage. rather than down the line when somebody might complain because somebody didn't get their required permits and they started operations anyway. So it's not a requirement for those agencies to provide documentation. It's a requirement for the applicant itself to attest that they understand what permits are required and then that notice that the city sends provides that information to those agencies that this is what the applicant is saying that they need or don't need and it gives them a chance to capture that at the initial stages rather than waiting for a complaint to start enforcement. Okay. So, just a really quick followup. So, then that's assuming if you're a, you know, if you're a a mineral resource mining uh that needs a site review for I1 or or I2 or three, you would probably expect that you have some sort of permitting requirement. But for so many of these that I listed off, they

wouldn't they've never dealt with any of these regulatory agencies. So, they would have no idea. So, you're asking them to affirm by checking a box. You're you're either asking them to just check a box assuming or you're asking them to proactively reach out to all of these agencies to confirm that they in fact do not need a permit to operate an ice cream shop because otherwise they're checking a box based on what they're thinking. So, they're either checking a box because, oh well, I've never needed a permit before so why would I need one now? Check. or you're requiring that they do proactive outreach to all of these agencies that they've never dealt with before, wouldn't know why they would ever have to deal with them, and get that information that then allows them to check the box authentically. And so, I guess that's what I'm saying. As a business, you're trying to do the right thing. So, you're going to do you're going to call EPA and DEEQ and LRAPA whether you have ever talked to anyone before at or at all if you're a ballet studio, but you you you know because you don't want to check a box and say that you don't need something if you haven't heard from the agency, no, you don't need anything from us. And so, that's the concern. And so the businesses are concerned, the ones that that you know that don't need to be permitted and they they don't know what to do because they have no relationship with the DEEQ or EPA. So this is all I'm trying to explain to you all is that this is what businesses talk about when they say that these regulations are really cumbersome and burdensome. They wait, like Commissioner Isacson mentioned, most of these types of businesses that have to be regulated, they have to hire people to navigate all of that. Same with the land use process. We we deal with a lot of those land use people all the time in these meetings. And so we know who the who the regulars are. I just think that I just want to

caution folks that this is what you're asking them to do is to is to pile on at least three regulatory bodies and communicate with them just to be able to check a box to attest that they don't need a permit from those agencies. Okay, I'm done. Commissioner Isacson.

Yeah, and I'll I'll limit my my comment. I I I don't want to have this become like a back and forth. I mean, we're we're kind of getting to the corrects of everyone's arguments, but what I will say is the business owners that I uh talk with on a regular basis that are in my particular field. Um, we have something called the rule of three. Um, we we joke about it all the time, but it is an absolute fact that we follow all the time. We if there is a question that we have whether or not something is allowed, we will have three different people email the governing agency the same question and then we will compare whether or not what the results from the the feedback that we get. And if they're all the same, then we have a more a probability that it's probably correct. The number of times that we have done this and gotten completely contradictory answers. One person at the state says yes, one person at the state says no. So I can see a scenario very easily where someone who doesn't have these type of uh abilities to hire consultants bases an entire they go down the line to create this business plan and break ground and we we got the approval. We checked the box and we got we got a letter that said we were totally fine. And then someone challenges it and a different person at the state or a different person at the EPA says no no I read this differently. you do need this and now we have to go back to the drawing board and that kills that's exactly what we're talking about. And so for me it it's it is about the ambiguity that's that is kind of at stake here. And it it is troublesome to again be trying to create a policy around a potential bad thing to happen when there are other ways of of of getting there without punishing um a lot of people in in the mix. So, I hope that that clarifies my position and I'm ready to

move forward with a vote as soon as Commission Commissioner Bailey is done. Commissioner Bailey.

Um, well, this is interesting and I had several questions that come out of it. Um, but my first question is, well, what happens now? How is it going on now? It seems like whatever is happening now has been pretty inefficient because there's a lot of complaints and problems with it. The other question I have is um I not so much a question but to remind Commissioner Edwards that we're not talking about occupancy permits. We're talking about building permits if I understand correctly. And unless you've got a, you know, a ballet school that's building a new building, I I don't think it's necessarily an issue if they're going into rent a space in an existing facility that someone else has developed. So, I I think there's a line there, unless I misunderstood. Um, and Reed could clarify, but how is the process happening now? And what else could we do about it? Commissioner Isacson, you said there are other ways to go about it. What are the ways could we go about it? And those agencies are not in our city regula regulation. It's not under the city to u monitor them. So, but they're the ones that have to issue the permit. So, there has to be some coordination. There has to be some communication. If you have a better idea, I'd really like to hear it.

And before Commissioner Ramy, give Reed a chance to respond there.

Thank you, um, Chair Leer and Commissioner Bailing for the question. So, um, the the way that the code is or the proposed amendments are drafted, it does apply to development permits. So, if a use was applying for in the zones E2, um, excuse me, E2, yeah, E2, I2, or I3 and they needed any kind of permit, they would have to attest to either needing or not needing these permits. So, um, however, with a use like a ballet studio, which keeps coming up, I mean, that's a pretty obvious one. it doesn't trigger those requirements, but there are some other uses like coffee plant roasters. There's another number of other um food manufacturing uses and things like that that people might not understand would need these requirements. So, the idea behind this code is that they do those checks initially and find out if they do need the permits. And if they they need them, then they'll fill out that form. All we do is we need that form and then we send the notice. If if they're wrong with what they said or attested to, we're not going to hold up our building permits. We're not going to hold up occupancy. It would be then a heads up to those other regulatory agencies that these are the permits that the applicant attests to needing and then if they have any sort of other thoughts or they think that that that's not correct, then they could have follow-ups with those specific applicants. But the city once we get that form and we send our notice, we're done with our obligations under this. There's not going to be any sort of hold up of occupancy or or hold up of our building permits or or anything that the city does after sending that notice to their agencies. Hopefully hopefully that clarifies.

Thanks, Reed. Commissioner Remy.

Thank you, Chair Leair, and to the commission and staff and others who have been working on this issue for seems like six months now since since the council started. I as you as you know, I did not attend the hearing uh and I did not attend the previous deliberation on this issue. I did however uh watch the hearing and watch the deliberations and I have read the materials many volumes of them um and it's a pretty interesting issue and and the one there are two things that I'm struck by one is the how how good the commission works I mean how the system works that you start with this sort of interesting well-meant well-meaning motion from the council that is frankly not workable. There isn't you can't create a land use code that makes sense out of out of what they sent to us. So now the commission saddled with trying to figure out okay how do we make you know something some lemonade out of this and what what are the issues that are that we're talking about. So someone has reclassified it as a coordination between regulatory agencies and I think that's exactly what we're doing and and the best way to do that is what we're trying to get at. You know what level what what level of coordination do we provide that is not so burdensome to businesses that they can't that they go to Springfield or god knows where or somewhere else but here because we want to keep them here. And on the other hand, we don't want we don't want businesses that aren't following those rules. So, I'm just not sure how you set that filter at the right level. But what I like about this proposal so far is that it has a feedback loop. So, what we're really doing is we're raising our hands as a community and saying, "Hey, these people ask us for a permit." And we send that to these other agencies

that we don't control, federal, state, and local. We had no control over them. Frankly, don't even know what the regulations are. But each of them has the ability to issue permits and to penalize people who don't follow permits. So, what we're saying to them is we're saying, "Hey, we're doing this development in our community that probably maybe, we don't know, needs your oversight. We're not going to get involved with that oversight." And as Commissioner Isacson says, we don't want to. Those are messy places, right? But as as citizens, we want to be sure that our development is following the rules that have been established there. So I think it's important that we separate those two things. And I what I was struck by the by the um doc, you know, the documentation that came with this in the testimony that this was an honorous and would provide it would it would prevent it would it would make things so difficult that people would would immediately run somewhere else. And and and that and I I must have read that 20 times in different emails, but none of them actually provided any information for why that was. And what I've heard tonight is that well, you have to contact three agencies and get an opinion from them if you need a permit or not. Then you write then you check the box. I talk to them. I don't need a permit or I do need a permit. Then we as a city raise our hand say, "Hey, these people came for a permit. So here's our here's our back check." So now those those agencies know what's going on. I I'm so I don't just I don't get it. You got to contact three agencies and find out whether you need a permit or not. You're not asking them to give you a permit. You're not even asking for an opinion if if they can say whether you need a permit or not. But again, it's not up to us. So all our process is saying is check it out and then we're going to raise our hands and go back to those agencies and say, "Look, these people came to us. They

wanted a permit from us. They may need a permit from you. We don't know. But we're just letting you know that's what they told us. So now you can do your work as the de, you know, Department of Environmental Quality, as LRAPA, and as whatever the third one is, and be sure that we've all followed the right rules. And I think it's it's maybe a little too ownorous at this point to ask the the local barber shop to to write to de EQ and find out if they need but if they've been in business and they know or they don't know they it's probably not going to be that big of a deal. So I think I would like to push it forward to the to the the um what are they the city council um and let them sort it out. I mean I'm I I I I understand we have raised the issue on both sides and I think that that it's a good thing for them to work out and we would send them our our recommendation uh with information that we have discovered along the way. So I would be in favor of pushing it forward but but being absolutely clear that that we know what what we're doing here uh or that that we tell them what we've discovered on the way that what what the pitfalls might be. So that's where I am. Thank you, Commissioner Remy. Commissioner Edwards,

I had another question for Reed because as you were talking, it thought got me to thinking, you were explaining that um inherently these types of businesses don't wouldn't need to seek a permit or this process. But often times you see in especially in new construction where somebody will will construct a building that in intended to be leased by multiple tenants and they're going to build it out and you might have a martial arts studio and you might have a coffee shop or you might have a bunch of different uses and and it could be in an like an E2. Who is then responsible? Is it the building owner who doesn't yet know what's going in the building or is it the individual um leases that plan on it go who who is the person that needs to provide the to to provide the documentation check the boxes whatever else and at what point in time would that have to happen because I'm I'm actually quite confused based on what

so the way that the yeah the way thank you for the question the way that the um language is written, it's based on a development permit which is defined in the code. It includes includes a new building permit. It also includes change of use or or tenant infill. So there would be whenever the original developer was putting together the the shell permit basically where they're just building out the industrial spaces, they wouldn't know what those uses are going to be. So they would give us information about what the overarching um proposal is. I I I found out recently that parking areas of a certain size actually do trigger LRAPA permitting requirements. So they would attest to assuming they they met that um the trigger. They would say yes, we're building a big enough of parking that Elraa says we need a a permit for how big our parking area is. Then that would be all that would be required at that point because we wouldn't have any information about what the specific uses are. Then once any specific business is going to move into each of the tenant space, they would have to be clear about what their proposed use is and what their operational characteristics are. They would have to check in and see whether any of um those agencies required permits for that use and then they would attest to whether they did or didn't need permits at that point.

Okay. So that contradicts what you had just said and I had said that that could be the situ the scenario but you seemed to cl you you provided some sort of feedback that that wasn't the case but that could very well be the case that six different businesses operating in an E2 with or without an need for actual permits would still need to seek and document one way or another. And so you could have so that would still have to happen before they can occupy the space

any well that they would have to attest to that as they submitted a building permit to occupy the space. If they are wrong with what they attest to we're not going to be holding up their occupancy. That's that's the point I'm saying is that all they have to do is as a part of their development permit they will say we've looked into it or we know these are the permits we need or we don't need any permits and then they would meet their obligation with the city. So we wouldn't be holding up occupancy. We wouldn't be stopping them from moving in or starting their business. What we'd be doing is giving a heads up to those other agencies that they said they do or don't need a permit for that specific use. And so there's no there's no um there's no oversight then or there's no penalty. There's no nothing that the city would have.

No. That is another reason for my apprehension about this. There's no enforcement at all. So we're doing something and adding this but yet we don't have any way to enforce it. And so you know someone could just say I'm not going to follow this. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we wouldn't want to enforce other agencies regulations. That would be problematic. So, what what the whole noticing does is it give them a heads up that this is what that applicant says they need or don't need for permits. And it would give them the opportunity to follow up and enforce at an early stage rather than waiting for somebody to complain if there's problems down the line.

Okay. And then what would stop the city from just doing that now without the without the putting the burden on the building on the business? What would stop the city from coordinating on their own? So, you're saying the city without a code authority would take the responsibility and start sending notice to these agencies about development. Um, I mean, typically we try to follow what's in the code when we're reviewing um new applications. Um, so without there being a codebased requirement, I'm not sure um where we would be um coming up with that um pathway. So, so that's what that's what this is trying to do is to close that loophole and that's why um we're moving forward with the code amendment.

I'm not sure that Okay. I that didn't quite answer what I was asking, but I was just asking like what what would Commissioner Bailey had asked what other solutions could potentially be out there? I'm suggesting that maybe the city could just do the coordination. I mean, if there's if they if they could be the one to proactively reach out to the different agencies instead of putting that on the business because you know the agencies, you have the relationship. If anytime someone is applying for a permit and saying, "Okay, I'm City of Eugene. We're going to go out and we're going to check with all of the regulatory agencies to make sure that they're doing that that they don't need or they do need their permits." What would stop the city from doing that? Reed, if I can take that one really quick. Um, there's nothing that technically would stop us from from sending that, you know, coordination email out of the out to these other agencies. Um, however, we typically await direction or clarification through a code amendment or something like that from the policy makers to to make a a change like that. there. I don't think there's necessarily anything that may prohibit us from doing so, but like without direction to do so, why would staff engage in that? Lauren, you can correct me if I'm wrong on that.

No, I think that's right, Jeff. But I think maybe what Commissioner Edwards is really asking is is there another version of these code amendments where the applicant isn't required to do anything, but there's a new requirement in the code that requires staff to notify these agencies anytime someone requests a building permit in any of these zones. So, instead of it being a two-step process where the applicant identifies the permits that they think they need or that they don't need any permits and then city staff notifies the three agencies, it's just a one-step process where city staff knows that a building permit application has been come in for has come in for a property zoned E2, I 2 or I3 and notifies the agencies and the code authority creates that notification. ation requirement, but there's no new requirement on the applicant. Is that correct, Commissioner Edwards? Is that what

I would say that's exactly correct? Is that you know, because for one, at least that I mean there's an existing relationship. So, it would be city staff working with the same agencies. So, there's efficiency there instead of these hundreds potentially of businesses who have no existing relationships. It's, you know, it's at least a savings of at least a step. And so I'm just I'm I mean I'm just suggesting that if if if there's a need for coordination, why couldn't the coordination happen within the city? You all are the you all all are the ones who control all of the permit process and everything else. And also, let's be honest, if we want to ensure that it's done correctly, relying on a thousand businesses to do the do it right and check the right box and make sure they get all the peri permissions that they need to doesn't doesn't seem as efficient as the city doing something. and and the um the fact that you know there would be inherent trust in the process that wouldn't exist if I mean if if the if the whole reason we're doing this is because there's mistrust in businesses that aren't following the rules then why would we think that we are going to just trust businesses to get all the right you know sign offs and check boxes I'm not say trust me I'm not the one saying that businesses would not do No business wants to be put out of business because they forgot to do something correctly. They want to follow the rules. But for the folks who have concerns about this, I would say then have the city do the the the added step in ma ensuring that the coordination is happening. And so yes, Lauren, you're correct. That would be my suggestion.

Commissioner Yang.

Oh, hi. Um I'm not a person who's in the field working with businesses uh experiencing you know workflow issues and and whatnot but from my standpoint I felt that the city council had a very narrow ask and I intend to view the version three with that in mind. So, and I felt that it kind of served that purpose. Um, from what Re has explained and discussed, it did not sound like it's a hard stop, right? That's why I call, you know, it's not like stopping everything, you know, it's not it's a not a hard stop. Uh, and the city is not trying to enforce that. It's not really an honor system. It it do expect that the applicants to put in effort to seek out, you know, the three agencies to find out. But it's not a hard stop. It's not like they're going to, you know, um, you know, um, make you run away. I I don't feel that way. And I do think that it would be difficult for the city to take on that task as the coordinator navigator role because well you can share the contact that you know does the city have with the three agencies but then to have staff to take on responses from three different agencies and coordinate them I think would be a a a very taxing on the um manpower and city resources for the staff. I do think that the applicants um shall have more sense of ownership about whatever they're applying the application. So I think that they should be able to if offer the contact of the three agencies a contact person that they can reach out to do that as the discussion earlier about you know the rule of three you know you you because

of confusion and sometimes inconsistent answer to different agencies you have three people ask the same people and to see if the answer come back correctly that's not the problem of this proposal it's a problem of the agency ies that they lack a single source of truth or references that people can consistently go back to. So there's definitely things that we can work on, but that's not the problem of this this version is what I'm trying to say. Um, and you know, like I said back to like it's very narrow ass and narrow um this things just to respond to that with that focus. It's not intend to stop all bad actors big and small, you know, big and small, you know, it's it's apply to the general applicants in in the in the field. So anyway, that's just my two cents. I I I of the versions that I multiple versions I've heard, I thought version three seemed reasonable, but I'm interpreting with a very narrow um focus. What's the ask? And did this one address? And I felt that it did. Anyway, that's my two cents. Commissioner Isacson.

Yeah. Um, okay. So, what obligation does the EPA have to answer any email that we send them? So, to Commissioner Edwards example, we have a business owner who opens up a strip mall. It's got 12 spots available. Somebody wants to open a martial arts studio. Somebody wants to open an ice cream parlor. All 12 of those people send off messages to the EPA. Where where are we sending this? Okay, I'm I'm on the EPA's website right now, epa.gov. I go to contact EPA. This is the options they give me. Connect us on social media, report a problem, comment on regulations, locate an EP officer lab, find a mailing address, subscribe to news releases, access our library, submit a foyer request, can find the information for, try these resources. There is not a phone number anywhere on that website including for a regional office which covers four states. So you're asking it is it is a little weird to me that we're saying that the city which does this for a living literally are paid to help with these regulations can't it? It's too burdensome for them. But small mom and pop who wants to open up a martial arts studio is suddenly going to navigate an a federal agency that has no obligation to return your telephone call or email for which you don't have a phone call and or phone number or an email address to send your question to and you're going to navigate this yourself. They're the ones who are going to be able to figure this out, not the people who are paid to do it. That that is wild to me. I did want to add something on to what Commissioner Isacson said, which has kind of brought my mind to the recent government shutdown. And we're kind of in the age of government shutdowns now. And to me, it's a pretty concrete

example of if somebody puts this request in to, you know, an ambiguous email address at the EPA 3 weeks before the shutdown, does that mean that their project can't even budge for 3 months because there's no one to respond to them? Um, I think it I think it adds a lot of uncertainty. And while a lot of folks mention that this is just one thing and it's not that hard to do, you know, there's the expression about the straw that broke the camel's back. Not saying this is the one, but it's not one thing in isolation. It's a thousand well-meaning requirements that all kind of cumulatively make it more difficult to run a small business. And as somebody who's been in and run small businesses for my whole life, you know, I'm super empathetic with the other folks on the planning commission that have done a lot of work in small business because it's really, really hard. It's really, really hard to keep the doors open on a business. And I think in Oregon, there's a feeling that it's twice as hard as it is in, you know, nearby states or places across the country because the volume of rules is just so great. uh and the fear of making a small mistake is so great that it can really be difficult to proceed and to do so without fearing that you're you're breaking the rules, you're breaking the laws. I I I think Commissioner Edwards put forward a really interesting point and I was thinking the same as the discussion was moving in that direction that if the point is just coordination, an email could be fired off from the city saying these people are applying for permits. contact them if you have any questions or concerns about what they're going to do with those permits thereafter. That to me would check the box of coordination without adding a pretty what could be a pretty significant burden to a lot of businesses that are not necessarily capable of navigating it. But I'll pass it off to Commissioner Ramy.

Thank you. Um I have a question first for the staff. I is it possible to create um a process box where planners actually do just what we're talking about? Send emails out or does it have to be in the code? Let me let um our city attorney Lauren speak to that one. Thanks for the promotion, Reed. Um but assistant city assistant city

uh it would be something that we would want code authority for in the same way that the code directs staff to provide other notices to other entities. So there are other application types where we are directed to provide notice for other things. Yeah.

Right. Just looking for a win there because I know in some organizations you can have a policy that says it is our policy to do X. It's not buried in the land use code. It's just part of the practice. It's what we do. So then moving forward, Commissioner Edwards and others had had the idea of maybe I think it's a 3A and I I wanted to to really um respect the time that you all have put into this and not just sort of come in here and say, "Wow, this is what you should do." But that is that is something that occurred to me. You could change version three so that it's just the coordination part. So, it's just a part where the city says, "Okay, these people came, they're in this kind of zone and they said they're going to do this and and you say, "We have coordinated." And then it's up to those agencies to pick up the ball and run with it. As I said before, I I think it's important to move this to the council to let them decide what what level of of of review they want to put on it. And I I would I would be interested in saying look you can do A or you can do B. You know one of these requires businesses to do a lot do some extra work. One doesn't. These are your two choices. We think they they but both get us to notification and coordination. So that's that's right.

I just want to ask a clarifying process question then we'll move on to Commissioner Bailing. Um, if the commission wants to put forward an alternative wording or something like that, is that possible in this session or would it have to come back?

Thanks, Commissioner Leer. So, right now you have a motion on the table that's been seconded. You'll need to vote on that motion. depending on the outcome of that vote. Um, if the commission is interested in Commissioner Edwards proposal, the sort of only city coordination option, um, I think the most efficient use of everyone's time would be to give staff direction to bring that back to you um, for action at a subsequent planning commission meeting. I believe the next meeting is in January. Um, but hopefully it would be a quick round. I mean, you know, pretty much what it's going to look like, but I just want to make sure that staff and I have enough time to make sure that the proposed language is accurate and, you know, we cross all our tees and dot all our eyes. Um, and I I don't want to try to do that during the meeting for you. Um, and then at that meeting to speak to Commissioner Ramy's point, your recommendation, you know, as always, you have options with your recommendation. So, your recommendation could be solely that council adopt version, you know, the the newest version. It could be that council adopt the newest version, but also that you considered previous versions and here are sort of the pluses and minuses of those. It could be uh it could be a lot of things. You can um have you could delegate authority to specific commissioners to come and speak at the council public hearing to talk about what the commission thought about. You can write a letter. You could, you know, there's a lot that you can do. So um yeah, depending on the will of the

commission and how you all are feeling about the various options, um you you could do various different things. But if a new version, whether we call it version 3A or version 4, is of interest to the commission, then um that's something that staff would want to bring back to you.

Commissioner Bailing. Thank you. As I recall, Reed said the form the city would create would include all of the contact information. So that would address Commissioner Isacson's concern about how to contact the agencies, whether it's emails, phone numbers, or whatever. I trust that Reed's intention was the city form would include all the appropriate contact information for the various agencies. I think that's a no-brainer. The issue, one of the issues I see with having the city take on coordination is the absence therefore of education of the applicant and the absence of any development or encouragement or um uh enhancement of the applicants relationship with the appropriate agencies. I mean, it's one thing if there are no permits required at all, that's fine. But I think it's important to educate people applying for a permit for a development or building permit that there are requirements and we can't just take that away and assume that it's all going to be fine. They're just going to go do whatever they want to do and we'll catch up with it later. I I think that's a black hole. I don't want to see us go down.

Commissioner Bon.

Yeah, I I continue to want to um move this forward to the council. They uh asked for this some time ago. I think all the work that's been done on it and where it's arrived at with version three has been responsive to what they're asking for. I think we ought to move it to that forum and they'll have a public hearing and they'll have their own deliberation about it. Um I you know I I I think that's an important part of this that they did ask for this. I I also want to um for me it's important that after these months of work we have a staff recommendation to do this and the staff has worked on this thought about it. Uh they've been part of multiple discussions and so I that has some meaning for me. Um I'm not exactly sure how the vote will turn out. I guess the only other thing I would add is um one of the things we've done before, I think it's been kind of alluded to a couple of times here, maybe I'm kind of making this up, but if assuming it's a very close vote, I think we've in the past uh sent forward our recommendation and attached a letter or attached a minority report or, you know, and provide some kind of um information to the council that this was assuming they unless they come back and watch all this uh that we've had quite a bit of discussion on it and I and kind of my last quick observation. I I I really think this is exactly what the planning commission should be doing. I find this is kind of really good work on our part. You you have something like this where there's some pretty uh I think strong opinions going either way and we've had a lot of good discussion about it. And I

think all of this kind of going forward to the council should be helpful to kind of inform them as they deliberate on it. So I'd like to move it forward to a vote. Thank you, Commissioner Bon and uh Commissioner Edwards.

Thanks, Chair Lair. I just wanted to I I'm I'm going to respectfully disagree with you, Commissioner Bon, because I don't believe that that is our job as planning commission. There's a reason why we spent months working on this policy. We've had multiple public hearings. We've had multiple versions. And I don't think council expects us to just um hand something over that's not ready for prime time and and say you guys deal with it. They actually are looking to us to be thoughtful about what we want to recommend. And if there is a majority that wants to move this forward, I you know, I won't I will not be supporting it, but I I will not stop that. I'm just saying that that is actually our job. So, I would encourage any of you who who might be on the fence for good reason that that's what specifically what council needs to hear is that this wasn't the right tool to apply to a problem that you weren't really clear on what you were trying to solve in the first place. Like that is our job. And so I do I do think that it's important that we we if if people have questions, if they aren't feeling it, if this doesn't seem like the right, you know, the right tool to be applying to whatever it is we're trying to do here, then that is actually expected for us to speak up in that way. And that's why that's why we spend all this time on it because council's dealing with other things. So they don't want to have to completely start over in this process. And I just say that because I I talk with counselors most days of my job. And so I I I have a very thorough understanding of what they're expecting from us. And so I do think that we're expected to be thoughtful. And the recommendation that goes forward is the recommendation that we this body the majority of this body would be saying, "Yep, we think they got it right." And so if you whoever's comfortable with that, that is what this vote would mean.

Wanted to maybe make a comment as well. Um really to just thank the planning commission and staff for a really interesting discussion and uh really makes me enjoy being part of planning commission to hear so many good ideas and so many different perspectives and counter perspectives. I guess I would just say too that I don't think we're facing a public health emergency per se. That's one of the reasons I asked a lot of times for examples of harm that was caused by say not having this rule in place. And I still don't think that I've seen any example of harm to the community that's come by not having this rule in place. There was an example of a violation by a sounds like a small vape company, but there was no finding that I've heard that that company poisoned the community as a result of not having that coordination in place. And so I, you know, I do think that it can be a little frustrating to continue to debate something that we're already, you know, debated two or three times. But I I I am kind of moved by the idea that I don't know that it serves us or the function that we have to say, okay, we've got it 80% there. There are still some legitimate concerns that could potentially be fixed, but let's just kind of cut it out because we've been talking about it for too long and move on something that we don't feel is there or right or, you know, perfected to to meet the need that it proposes to meet. Um, pass it to you, Commissioner Bon.

Yeah, thank you. Um, I I want to respond to Commissioner Edwards, and I guess it after your comments, I'll respond to you, too. I I am not at all suggesting that we move something forward that's halfbaked or 80% done or partially finished or whatever the descriptors were. Uh I I think that this is responsive to what they asked for. I think it's uh and I mentioned a couple of reasons why I think we should move it forward, but um I want to make sure that's clear. I'm not not suggesting that we move something forward that's not uh sufficiently finished. I um and I and I also one other thing I said early on I still think it's fine it's okay for people who are developing some kind of a of a business or something to have some understanding of the permits that are required and to be a participant in that process. And um so I I just I appreciate Commissioner Edward's explanation of how she's viewing it, but um I I'm again I'm ready ready for a vote. I think however the vote goes, it'll be an expression of this commission, which is kind of the point and the point of having seven members. Thanks.

Thank you, Commissioner Bon. It seems like we've gotten to these arguments pretty effectively at this point. So, I think everybody's had a good opportunity to speak on it. We're just before 7:30. So, I think at this point, unless anyone really feels strongly about making any additional comment, and I don't want to prevent that from happening, that it's appropriate to move forward with a vote. Uh, all of those in favor of Oh, Commissioner Ramy.

Sorry. I just want to be clear. I I'll be voting against this motion, but that's only because I think we can do better. And again, apologies to everyone for joining late and coming in at the 25th hour. Uh I did spend a lot of time thinking about this and listening this evening. And I I think if if we're uh the assistant Warren, what was your title again? If she's right, if we can get back together quickly, I think very quickly we could come up with a proposal that that we can vote on to move forward. I think right now we don't have that proposal in front of us. It's a little hard to know. So, I'll be voting against this with the intention that we'll come back with a with a 3.5 or whatever that is. Thank you.

Commissioner Isacson, do you want to add something on too? Just very quick. I I I want to echo that I'm really thankful that we This is probably in my five years of being on the on the commission, the most spiritic debate we've ever had. Um, and I can see it going sideways quickly and there's a lot of passion here, but I I I have a lot of respect for everyone on this on on this commission, including the staff who worked very hard to get us here. And um, I'm very thankful to be a part of this group and I'm I'm I'm looking forward to every other future conversation that we have. And in that with that case, I will call the question.

Perfect. So, um, can we put that motion back on the screen just since it's been a little while? I'm not sure who's sharing there. If that's not possible, we could read it again. Looks like Reed's got it up. Thank you, Reed. So, we've got this motion to recommend version three. Um, I don't feel the need to read it again since it's already been read and is on the screen there. All those in favor of the motion, please raise your hands. Sure. I got everybody in the gallery here. Uh and then all those opposed.

Uh so in this case the motion does not carry and I'll pass it back to the staff to discuss next steps. Sher Lear, um because of the the Zoom the way that the Zoom screen works, can you um state who voted for or against because I think folks watching at home probably couldn't see everybody's hands. Yeah, it's a little tricky. So, I got it as three in favor uh with Commissioner Bailing, uh Commissioner Bon, and Commissioner Yang. Did I get that right, everyone? Okay. And then everybody else voting in opposition. So there were no abstensions recorded.

Great. Thank you. Um and so then if I may, so that that motion fails, but the commission does still need to make a recommendation to the city council on this these code amendments, this application based on the direction from city council. So, um, we'll need to come back to you in some capacity to do something. Uh it sounded like there was some interest in a version 3A, version 4 that um would be a kind of a modified version three where an applicant doesn't have to do anything extra, but the city staff would still notify the three agencies of building permit applications for properties within the identifying zones. Uh if that is of interest to the commission, then it would be helpful for um you to make a quick motion before we end this meeting to direct staff to bring that back for future consideration.

Commissioner Edwards, you have your hands hand up. I'll make that motion. Second. Uh so this is a motion to uh direct staff to continue work on and to bring back the proposal. Lauren, is that correct? At a future session. Okay. All those Is there a We got a second. All those in favor, please raise your hands. And it looks like that one is unanimous. So we'll ask for those in opposition. I don't think Commissioner Bailing uh Oh, I'm so sorry about that, Commissioner Bailey. All those opposed, please raise your hands. And I I'll abstain from that.

Okay. And then I was going to call for abstensions. So we have six in favor, zero opposed, and Commissioner Bailing in abstension. Um well, perfect. I think that brings us to the end of tonight's meeting. That was quite a meeting. Uh are there any other info from uh commissioners to share first before I call over to staff? Not seeing anything and anything from staff.

I don't have anything other than we will see you uh January 13th, it sounds like. Um I do want to thank you for your robust and thoughtful discussion and debate. I mean that was a true deliberations in my mind and I I'd have to agree with um I think it was Isacson who said that was I don't think I I haven't seen one like this in a while. So, it was honestly it was uh it was actually really fun to watch you all work together towards something that you could find agreement on and so and thinking of the community and you know and the direction from council. So, really appreciate your work on this and we will be bringing you back something next year. In the meantime, wishing you a happy holidays and a happy new year. That's a nice message of harmony to go out on and definitely agree and happy holidays to all who celebrate. Um hope you get some time and rest and and peace over the next month here. See you all in the new year. Thanks. And this meeting of the planning commission is now ajourned.