Planning and Zoning Meeting - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the City of Farmers Branch Planning and Zoning Commission meeting. It is presently 7 p.m. Monday, July 13th, 2026. I'd like to begin by thanking the commissioners for their service. And first on our agenda is item A, citizen comments. And this agenda item provides an opportunity for citizens to address the planning and zoning commission on any matter that is not posted on the agenda. Anyone wishing to address the commission should complete a citizen's comments registration form and submit to the chair prior to the start of the meeting. There is a three-minute time limit for each citizen to speak within a reasonable limitation on speakers on any one topic or item within a maximum of 15 total minutes on the same topic or item. Anyone wishing to speak shall be courteous and cordial. The Planning and Zoning Commission is not permitted to take action on any subject raised by a speaker during citizen comments, and when called, please approach the podium and state your name and address prior to the beginning. I will also note that I know a number of people in attendance. We do have a public hearing, but I will also need those citizen comments forms for the public hearing. So if you wouldn't mind to complete those and bring them to the dais prior to speaking. So if you do wish to speak during the public hearing, please make sure that our staff receive those citizen comments forms. You can talk to staff. So with the regular agenda items up first, item B1, consider approval of the June 26th, unless you had something not on the agenda, sir. Okay. Item B1, consider approval of the June 22nd, 2026 Planning and Zoning Commission meeting minutes and take appropriate action. Commissioners?

I didn't see anything. Actually, I thought staff did a good job of capturing some complex discussions in that meeting.

Thank you.

Yeah, I would move that we approve the minutes as presented. Thank you. I'll second.

All right. Any further discussion on the item? Seeing none, we'll move to a vote. All those in favor of approval? All right. Thank you all. And with that, we will move to item C1. We will conduct a public hearing. Consider the request for a zoning amendment for a multifamily development on approximately 3.286 acres located at 14330 Midway Road within a light industrial zoning district and take appropriate action. Thank you, Brett.

Thank you chair. Uh, good evening members of the zoning commission. My name is Brett Mangum. I'm with the planning division here at the city of farmers branch. Uh, thank you for the opportunity to present this case to you this evening. Uh, 1st case is 25 dash 10. The address is 14, 330 midway road. As you see on the screen, the subject site is indicated in the green crosshatch. We're looking at the northeast corner of Midway Road and Proton in Council District 4. Subject site is approximately 3.286 acres altogether. The current zoning on this is light industrial. And there are, as you can see, there are two one-story office buildings on the site currently. Tonight's request is a zoning amendment to create PD in this location. So changing the zoning from light industrial to a new plan development PD that would accommodate a proposed multifamily development on this site. Alongside with this amendment, the applicant has provided a concept site plan as well as conceptual landscaping and elevations for this development to give you an idea of what type of development they're proposing for this particular tract. These two drawings, the first on the top is the concept landscape plan. This is to give you an idea of the building foundation and massing. We do have the general layout of this building is that the midway and proton faces. We have a 24-foot fire lane that goes around the perimeter of the building, providing a loop access on all four sides of the building. The bottom is just the concept elevations. That is the one facing Midway Road. The other elevations were included in your packet that show both the interior of the courtyards as well as all four elevations of the building. So what we're looking at is what is called a podium-style development. What that means is you have a ground floor parking garage parking structure and the building is set on top of that parking garage. So you have first floor is a gated parking garage and then four floors of multifamily apartments on top of that total unit count. being proposed is 242 units on this site. This equals a density of approximately 74 units an acre. It's just shy of that at 73.78. Approximately 90% of that 242 unit count will be one bedroom apartments. The remainder 10% or 24 units would be two bedroom apartments. The average unit size is 788 square foot. If you look at the parking ratio, there are 291 spaces provided on site. That works out to a ratio of approximately 1.2 spaces per unit. The landscape plan also gives you an idea of how much of the site is dedicated to open space and landscaping. So between both the midway frontage where the building is set back further and then the proton road frontage, in addition to the landscape pool courtyard and other ancillary spaces, you're looking at about 28% of the total site being landscaped green space. As we do with any multifamily proposed developments in the city of farmers branch we analyze the application against our city's adopted multifamily development policy which was adopted back in November of 2021. When going through this we. take the application in its original form and work it through our internal processes, which includes development review committee that has stakeholders from all the relevant departments that pertain to a development. So fire has weighed in on this, stormwater engineering has weighed in on this, planning has weighed in on this, and all the other different city departments. So we've refined this design and worked with the applicant to address all the concerns that the city has. And now that we have worked through all those is when we ANALYZE IT AGAINST THE MFD. SO WHAT OUR FINDINGS WERE FROM THAT ANALYSIS WAS FOR THE MOST PART THIS PROPOSAL WOULD MEET THE MFD GOALS AND POLICIES. THERE ARE TWO EXCEPTIONS TO THIS, ONE OF WHICH IS THE MIXED USE COMPONENT, WHICH REQUIRES A mix of uses on the site. So typically we see either vertical or horizontal mixed use product where you have apartments and then ground floor shop or retail. And then related to that is the ground floor parking. We only have the one use on the ground floor, which is just accommodating the cars. There are no proposed retail spaces or shops, which is what the policy would like to promote and would like to see. This is just the second floor layout of the building. As I said, the parking garage will be on the first floor and then a majority of the parking is contained in that garage. About 20% of it is surface parking around the perimeter of the site. But this will give you an idea of how the corridors will be laid out as well as the elevators. And then looking At the comprehensive plan, this was adopted back in 2023. This is the Farmers Branch 2045 comprehensive plan. We utilize this as a roadmap in all of our zoning cases to help kind of guide the decisions for the recommendation that you will make on this request. Yeah, I've circled the site in the blue oval, so you can see that indicates orange. What that means is its future designation is mixed use. So you can look at that from, you can think of this as more of the 30,000 foot view zoning is parcel specific, whereas the comprehensive plan looks at things on a more regional basis or a larger view. So in our analysis of this, we did find that this would meet the comprehensive plan principles. because it does list medium to high density residential uses in that particular subset of the plan. As far as our public notice goes, we followed all the required protocols that we have to do with any zoning case. We published notice in the Dallas Morning News for the hearings. We've sent out 15 letters, that includes two, to the DISD as well as Carrollton Farmers Branch ISD. Those 13 letters were sent out on July 2nd. That was the same day that we posted the sign on the site notifying the public of this request. This particular request would fall under the threshold which is recently changed by state's law, HB 24, which requires that any protest votes for any residential upzoning such as this, creating more residential entitlement where none exists now. The threshold that we're accustomed to is 20%. The state legislature has increased that to 60% threshold. And so that would apply in this particular instance, I do want to point out the sixty percent typically what we're used to is the twenty percent and this would require a super majority vote at city council level, which would be four out of five votes. The state law does specifically say for residential up zonings that is no longer in effect and it only even if you get the sixty percent requirement, it is still just a majority vote. So. That's a distinction that I'd like to point out because it only applies to these residential zoning cases. It does not apply to a majority of the cases of Joel here in the future, which will be non residential. So that'll conclude staff presentation. We do have the applicant here with Calterra Group. We have Clint Nolan as the representative, and he's available to answer any questions that you may have. I'm, of course, available if you have any questions regarding city policy or zoning regulations.

Thanks so much, Brett. Commissioners, any questions first for staff? Questions for staff? Go ahead, Pat.

Correct me if I'm wrong, the CZO specifies a parking requirement of something on the order of 2 1⁄2 spaces per unit, and this is coming in at 1.2, roughly half of that. And there's a total of 218 one-bedroom, 24... two bedroom or a total of let's call it 266 bedrooms. And there's only 291 parking spaces. That's like one per bedroom. It seems like a real shortage of parking. And there's no place anywhere around there for overflow parking to go, right? So I'm really baffled at the inadequacy of parking for this facility.

Yeah, thank you for bringing that topic up. It's always a concern of staff to make sure that any new development in the city, including this one, has adequate parking. If you do look in our comprehensive zoning, the reference you provided was accurate. It's 2.25 parking spaces per unit. So that's the baseline that we measure everything off of that would apply to any standard district or multifamily district. We have, I think, 4 different MF zones. This, of course, is a PD, which is a little bit different of an animal. It's a sense of you can. tailor a PD to meet the regulations to fit the development. So this is what they are proposing. There is room to either conditionally change the parking or modify those standards if you think that it is insufficient. This is just what the applicant is bringing forth as part of their proposal. So a few things I did kind of point out in the staff report. Again, the bedroom count is skewed heavily in favor of the one bedrooms. So that was something that helped kind of make a case for less parking. The other consideration is there is a bus stop on this midway corridor, so it does serve two DART bus routes, which also helps to bolster the case for less parking than you would find typically at that 2.25 ratio. So that's the regulations we have on the books. The applicant may have more to add as far as how they arrived at that figure. I know when we started the process, the unit count was upward of 300. It was a five-story on top of a one-story parking garage. So they have moved in the direction of Fixing that ratio of units to parking it was a it was concerning to us. So it's it's moving in the right direction But we'll leave it up to you as a recommending body if that has arrived at a sufficient figure or not Further further questions for staff Yeah, just is there do you know is there a reason specific reason why this is a podium parking as opposed to a wrapped parking garage I I'll defer that question to the applicant. They can provide better detail.

Thank you. Anything additional for staff? All right. Thanks again. And I guess we will love to hear from the applicant. It appears we do have some questions there, and it looks like you have a presentation. So if you wouldn't mind walking us through that, and then we'll proceed with some questions. And just please introduce yourself at the podium. Name and address.

Good evening. Clint Nolan, Calterra Capital Partners, 1845 Woodall Rogers Freeway, Suite 1160, Dallas 75201. Appreciate you having us here tonight. I am the sponsor and the applicant and obviously here to answer any questions. I also have a member from our architectural design team in case you have any questions for them. We've been working with the city for approximately nine months on this case. That's how we go about doing this. I've sat on both sides of the table for approximately 20 years in your seat and also on this side. One of the things that I realize is start with the city and start with the surrounding community as opposed to the alternative. We spent a lot of time with the city. We've come a long way. I did prepare a presentation. Quite honestly, it's a lot of the same thing that you just heard from Brett. I think he did an excellent job presenting. So if it's okay, I'd like to go ahead and jump right into questions. And I'll start with the parking question and then field any additional questions. So as far as the parking ratio, you made a very good point. Typical suburban multifamily, which we have developed a lot of, does have a higher parking ratio. Most often you'll see north of two. Quite frankly, we've built thousands of units. We've never developed anything with a parking ratio of greater than a 1.5. 1.5 very comfortably parks all of our products. On more urban style projects, it is typically a little bit lower. The city of Dallas is currently one to one. We developed a mixed use property in Grand Prairie called Midtown GP that had a multifamily component. That PD was approved at a 1.1 ratio. After our design we actually intentionally made it a 1.3 for various factors But we've got sufficient parking and we on that project. We've not even had to do a sign parking on this project we've got a 1.2 parking ratio and As Mr. Mangum pointed out, we're a majority one-bedroom units. On a per-bedroom ratio, we're about 1.1. And we did implement both the bus stop as well as the structured, you know, the covered bus stop areas. We feel very comfortable with the 1.2 and the 1.1 as far as bedroom ratio. We would intend to assign parking spaces like we do on a lot of our properties. We do have towing enforcement for residents who don't live there so that that's regulated, and we've been able to handle that very well.

Thank you. And I think we had another question over here, if you want to make a decision to do podium parking as opposed to a wrapped.

Yes. So we did start out investigating a wrap. We actually started there. We simply can't make a wrap. We started there because it's actually more cost effective to build a wrap than it is a podium style project. We simply can't make the economics work more because of a density. issue on the site. We would love to acquire adjacent site and do something different. We've got Eagle Gun Range and power lines to our north, and then you guys are aware what we have on our east and our south. So we wanted to bring this product type to Farmer's Branch. We believe that it needs it, it deserves it, and I could talk more about why that is, and this is how we could make it work on the 3.3 acres that we have.

Additional questions for our applicant? Go ahead.

Thanks for your comments. Just following up on the parking, you said there would be assigned parking. Will it just be one unit, one parking per unit, irrespective of bedrooms?

No, no. I mean, again, we have about 1.1 per bedroom. So for every bedroom, there's at least one parking space.

So that would leave 25 general use parking for guests, delivery, and that sort of thing.

And that's adequate in your experience?

Yes. Yes, sir.

Okay, in this particular area, I mean, all of us are somewhat familiar with how that area works, but all you need is one or two parties and they're full and you're spilling onto other streets. I just don't, I can't imagine that working.

We do. I mean, for what it's worth, the The majority of the parking is underneath the structure, and it is gated, right? So it is gated entry. And so the overflow parking or additional parking we do have, and we try to keep it off of Midway and off of Proton, but we do have some service parking on the north side or on the east side of the building. And you are right. I mean, someone could easily come off the street and fill those spaces, and that's why we typically have... It's managed and towing enforced very intentionally.

Additional questions for our applicant? All right. Seeing none, a reminder, this is a public hearing. I don't believe I have anyone signed up to speak on this item. No, and no one is coming forward with their sign-up sheet, so...

So I would make a motion that we close the public hearing.

Thank you for that.

Second.

All right. Any further discussion on the item? All right. All those in favor to close the public hearing? Thank you.

Thank you.

All right. And with that, we'll entertain motion on the item.

I make a recommendation to approve this as presented.

Recommendation for approval?

I second that.

Okay, seconded. Any further discussion on the item? Seeing none, all those in favor to recommend approval of the Ordinance 4008 as presented? All right. Thank you all. That carries. And this will go to City Council.

August 10th.

August 10th. Thank you so much.

Thank you.

All right. Up next on our agenda, we will hear item C2. We will conduct a public hearing and consider a specific use permit request to allow guest quarters within an attached accessory structure on approximately 1.0 acre property located at 3125 Brook Hollow Drive, and located within the One Family Residence District, R1 Zoning District, and take appropriate action. Thank you, Brian. Thank you.

Okay. I'm using your space.

All right, well, thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Commissioners. Good evening, it's always a privilege and a pleasure to be presenting before you. I'm Brian Campbell, planner with the Planning Division, here to present to you tonight on the specific use permit for 3125 Brook Hollow Drive. And so this is the subject property. It is zoned One Family Residence District-1, which is governed by our comprehensive zoning ordinance. As I said, this is an SUP request, this time for guest quarters. And so I'll just preface my presentation by stating that currently guest quarters are only permitted within the R-1 and the R-2 zoning districts with approval of an SUP. And so the applicant is Nick Patel, the developer who filed the application on behalf of John and Jennifer Huffman, who are the homeowners. They are requesting approval of an SUP for guest quarters in the form of an attached addition to their existing single family home, which does measure 6,542 square feet. The proposed 2,123 square foot addition will include a two-car garage, kitchen, living and dining area, a bathroom, bedroom, and covered patio. The proposed addition does meet all the applicable requirements for the CZO, section 2.9 for accessory uses and structures. On this slide, I blew up the floor plan just so you can get a better sense of how they propose to lay out this guest quarters. And I'll just quickly point out, so internal egress and egress to the structure will occur from the garage of the existing home here. And then as far as external egress and egress, we have two points of entry, one from the two-car garage and one from the area where the covered patio will be. And then on this slide I just wanted to briefly go over our lot coverage requirements. So currently the R-1 zoning district allows for maximum lot coverage of 25%. And so taking into account the proposed addition, the lot coverage for this particular lot stands at 18.47%. And then on this slide are some pictures I took of the home just to provide a visual aid of what it looks like if you're looking at it from the driveway. Yeah, just to provide some additional visual aids there. And so now turning to the recommendations of the Farmers Branch 2045 plan. So the Farmers Branch 2045 plan does designate the subject property and the surrounding area as moderate density residential. With this particular designation, the plan does recommend maintaining the existing single family homes located in the area, as well as providing opportunities for additional residential focused developments and some compatible uses. So with that, the recommended land uses are single family homes, duplexes, town homes, churches, schools, and institutional uses. In addition to that, the plan does recommend and encourage housing diversity, of which guest quarters would fall into that. And so given all that, the proposal is consistent with the Farmers Branch 2045 plan. And so, now across these next two slides, I wanted to discuss the public response to this case and our requirements there, because as you've seen with the materials I have provided you, we have received quite a bit of correspondence regarding this case. So firstly, on July 2nd, we did mail 23 notification letters to all property owners within 300 feet of the subject property, as we now require, in addition to both the Carrollton Farmers Branch and Dallas ISDs. A zoning notification sign was placed on the property that same day. As of this evening, we have received 25 letters and emails in opposition to this request. of these 13 were from property owners within the 200 feet, which is the protest area. And with that, we did receive some duplicate correspondence from the same addresses. This included a petition with signatures, and so in analyzing where the public response stands, which I'll discuss here in a moment, in that petition, all of the addresses that weren't captured in the individual emails and letters were accounted for here. And so, just to quickly summarize Texas state law, House Bill number 24, so for any residential zoning amendments and upzonings, which does include specific use permit requests, that threshold, for a supermajority vote by city council is now 60% versus the 20% we're accustomed to. And this is based on land area. And so given that, the total land area within the 200-foot boundary is 327,371.80 square feet. Taking into account all of the opposition we have received, that land area totaled 211,000 460.62 square feet, and so given that, the current opposition for this case stands at 64.59%, which does trigger that supermajority vote by city council for approval of the request. And so I just wanted to provide all this information and the materials in front of you just to be transparent, and hopefully that gives you some insight into how public response works when we have situations like this. And with that, that does conclude my presentation. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to take those. We do have the applicant, Nick Patel, with us as well, should you have any questions for them. Otherwise, as always, I thank you for your time this evening. Thank you all very much.

Thank you, Brian.

Oh, and in anticipation of your other question, this will go to City Council on August 10th as well.

Thank you. Great anticipatory question. Commissioner's question.

I'm sorry, 17th. 17th, all right.

Thanks for that correction. Of course. And with that, I'll see if any of our commissioners have questions for staff. Go ahead, Pat.

It designated this as an attached unit. If I'm reading the schematics right, the only point of attachment is a garage wall. Is that correct? Yes, that's how they're proposing to attach it. Okay. A small segment of the garage wall. Okay.

Mm-hmm.

Um, do you know, is this the first time anybody's built an auxiliary dwelling unit of any type in that neighborhood or are there others in the area?

So I did do a little bit of research on prior to our meeting tonight. And so the only other guest quarters we have approved right now is on 2973 Sunbeck circle.

Okay. Cause I was, I was looking at the DCAD maps and it appeared that there were other types of dwellings in some of the homes in the area, but those don't qualify as ADUs, they're maybe storage sheds or something like that? Potentially, yes, sir. Looking at the satellite, all you see is trees, and of course we can't go scoping around people's yards. Sure. Okay, well, thank you. Of course.

Further questions for staff?

I had a couple of questions about the CZO. True points shall not be used for rental purposes or barter exchange and may only be occupied by immediate family members. How do we enforce that?

So that would be through our code enforcement department. Generally, it is complaint-driven, but the applicant is aware of that.

I saw some concerns about drainage issues. Is there a drainage study as part of this? Would there be one required at any point in this process?

So I did actually have a conversation with a member of our Public Works Department tonight, and so currently there is a drainage easement running through where they're proposing to put that accessory structure. So I don't know that we can require a drainage study, but there may be additional requirements through our Public Works Department, additional improvements that they'll have to install prior to completing this structure, if it were to be approved. Okay.

Just one point just clarifying that part of it would occur when they're requesting a building permit. Is that correct? Yes, ma'am.

Okay. I think that's where I was going with that. It looks like this lot has there's been some attempt to subdivide this lot in the past. Is that accurate?

Yes, that's correct. We did have an application filed a couple of years ago to subdivide this lot into two. However, that application was avoided by staff as it was found that the two resulting lots would not be able to meet the setbacks and other development standards required by the zoning district.

Okay, so let's say that an attempt was made post-construction here. It would go under the same review and... If the new lot did not meet those same R1 requirements, presumably it would meet the same fate? Correct. Okay. And then I think I saw in some of the letters deed restrictions. Do we have any knowledge of the deed restrictions that are in place, or would we have any involvement in that?

So the planning department doesn't directly have any involvement with that. However, if you are looking for additional information, I can see what I can bring back to you. Okay. Thank you.

Sure. Additional questions?

So in the 2,100 approximately square feet, the garage is not included in that calculation, correct? Correct.

Not the garage for the existing single-family home, but the one that will be part of the ADU, yes.

So that is included in the 2,100 square feet?

Correct.

This one is, but not this one. Right. Correct. But I was just noticing that 2,100 square foot with one bedroom is... But if it does include the garage, then that helps to explain that. Thank you.

Of course. Further questions for staff?

Go ahead. You mentioned setback. The current house, looking at the plants, is 31 feet from the side fence, and it looks like this one's going to be half that distance at 15 feet. Does that meet setback requirements for the neighborhood?

Well, given that, yes, it does, because given that it is attached, it's going to have the same setbacks as the main house. No, it's closer to the fence than the, yeah, by quite a bit.

Yeah. unless I completely misread the larger schematics.

I think you were right on that point. We did check on the setbacks and they are in compliance with the zoning district.

Thanks. Thank you. It is a one story house, right? Correct.

Any other questions for staff? Thank you.

What makes this classified as a, in the way that it is and not just an addition?

Yes, so the CCO currently defines guest quarters as any addition to the home that's... I'm just making sure I phrase this carefully. I believe it has to do with the way it's attached to the home. It's because it's only being attached by the one wall coming off of the garage and instead of, you know, You know what, I may need to do some, I may need to do some, maybe I'll let our city attorney help me out here.

Rebecca, throw my two cents in. We really don't have much of a definition for accessory structure in our code. It just simply says a building or structure attached or detached and on the same level as the main structure. I think you kind of have to use some common sense in applying the zoning regulations because this is a separate unit i mean if this were a part of the main structure and not just connected to an external garage it might be different it would just be in addition to an existing home but because it appears to be a a self-contained living unit attached to a garage and that's the house itself and the word accessory is defined and you have to refer to like miriam webster's to figure out what an accessory structure is because our ordinances Very few city ordinances go into any detail. So I think as a common sense application in the context of our code, it's appropriately an accessory structure.

Thank you.

Any further questions for staff? Thanks again, Brian. You're welcome.

Oh, go ahead. Brian, so that... The zoning and that is just single family homes are allowed.

Correct.

Thank you.

Of course.

All right. Well, thank you again. With that, I believe we will have some questions for the applicant. So if you wouldn't mind, the applicant, you can step forward. Please state your name and address for the record.

Good evening, my name's Nick Patel, 3607 Vineyard Way, Farmer's Branch. I live out here in the courtyards. And I represent John and Jennifer Huffman. I'll be the builder on it. So I'm glad all the questions you guys brought are exactly what I wanted to talk about. Primarily the zoning and the process that we're going through right now, the special use permit. We've gone back and forth on this, I would say about four or five months. And now we're at this stage, the reason being was even staff was confused as how to designate this and what route we have to take. So the intent of the homeowners is they're single, their kids are off to college and it's just the two of them. The house, I'd like to point out some clarifications. It's 6,000 square feet, the main structure under roof. It's a three car garage, oversized three car garage. of a back patio, front entrance. The actual living space is about 4,800 square feet, if I remember off the top of my memory. The intent of this structure is primarily for a caretaker down the future and close family. They have kids that come and stay over. The main structure is only a three bedroom house with a gym and an office. That takes up majority of it. Now, we wouldn't have to use this special use permit route. The reason we have to is exactly the question you guys asked Brian is, why is this designated that? And it's my understanding, and it appears we're still unclear about it, is we wanted to do, in addition to this house, to have that extra room that has its own private entrance for either a caretaker or guests or family that come over. But the reason that got declined was the access is not through the main living portion of the house, a living room or a hallway. The reason being, as you can see this house, it has a notch. I don't know if I can use a pointer.

Well, we can't see what you're pointing at. Oh, you can if he uses the mouse.

Yeah, that's what I'm trying to point at.

If he uses the mouse, we can.

Yeah, there it is. So this house, when it was designed last year, was... Designed based on this huge oak tree in the middle. It's about a 42 inch wide oak So it's in the middle of the living room the kitchen and the office and There's bedrooms here The kitchens here and these are the three-car garage and this is the motor code with the driveway coming through so we can't attach this additional unit we want is anywhere else. So we had to come up with a creative way to attach it to the house. But because it doesn't comply with the requirements of it has to be through a main living space, we're having to go through this special use permit. So that's like the big picture. I just want to make sure everybody was on the same page. And this is not just something thrown out there. We've really thought about this. And this is probably our third or fourth attempt at a design that we've provided to the city staff to review, and this is what we kind of stuck on. As far as, I'll address some of the concerns that the neighbors had that I just heard, I don't know the full list, the drainage. So when we applied for the main building, the rear of the lot, I believe it's either 10 or 15 feet right here, And on the opposite adjacent neighbor, it's a drainage easement. So all the water from all the neighbors right now drains either east or west. I'm not sure which way slopes, but that is part of the drainage easement. So we're not, you know, we're not violating anything. And that's what the building. building team, inspection team have approved plans for. So if we were to do this additional unit, it would follow the same rules. We are allowed to drain on the back of the lot and the front of the lot. So we're not going on anyone's lot. That's not allowed and they wouldn't approve our permit. Second question that was answered was a setback. On the east side, or the west side, I'm sorry, we have a 20-foot built line. And as you see here, this 20-foot built line, we're complying with that. So it's still... All the requirements are the same as the main structure. We're just trying to add on to it and comply with everything as if it was a new construction. Was there any other questions that I missed that were concerns that I could address?

Commissioners, what questions do we have for our applicants?

When was the main house built?

I would say about a year, year and a half ago.

Okay. And so you really... You're saying that ideally this would just be an addition to the house. So in that year, something changed. I mean, what do you know why it wasn't just built in the first place at the size that they wanted it to be built?

That's a great question. And also to address the prior attempt to subdivide the lot. Somebody had mentioned this was well before. Um, you know, so the homeowner, like I mentioned, it's just the two of them. They're like, we don't need an acre lot. Uh, they were going to plan on subdividing one and, you know, building the other one. Uh, but with the opposition that there was and with the zoning requirements that was scrapped, we didn't even apply for it once we kind of got with the city staff and, you know, we heard what the neighbors had to say on it. So, um, Right now, he built it that way to have at some point, you know, additional space for their grandkids or anything like, you know, a large yard possibly. And once they moved in, they figured that they would need additional space for at some point because this is their retirement home.

Further questions?

Go ahead. I've got one question. This house was built how long ago?

About a year.

So they haven't had any experience yet with torrential rain that might hit? Where's that water going to go?

Well, we had rains about three to four months ago. I mean, sorry, a couple weeks ago that were, I would say, monumental. And we didn't see any flooding back or forward because I would get called. I'm the builder on it.

All right. Further questions for our applicants? Go ahead.

So because of the, there's just no other way you can do this?

No, exactly, unless, there physically is no hallway at some point without cutting off access to the garages, because the garages are at the back of the house, right up here. So to attach something here, you would essentially cut off the driveway. And that's the biggest challenge we've had. And this house, I'm sorry, go ahead.

I was going to say, so just going back to the drainage, just so that just to the specifics of what has been brought up, which is that there was a requirement for you to drain the property to the culvert to the southeast corner versus toward the Cornwell's property at 3140 Spur Trail on the southwest corner. And in doing so, block the Cornwell's natural drainage to the culvert. with improper site grading. That's a very specific challenge. So can you answer that specific challenge or that specific point?

No. So when we apply for the building permit, we are required to drain. And we submit a drainage plan to answer your question. Majority of the lot was draining to the front, and some of it to the back, depending on where the downspouts were and the surface draining was. we are required to drain to the front and maintain the existing slope. So we are not allowed to tweak, let's say this was draining east to west, I have to keep that slope. And that's what we comply, and that's what our building officials, when they come out and inspect final CO, they do a final grade survey. We have about, I don't know, about eight inspections towards the end where the city actually comes out, and it's all been approved. So we haven't altered the drainage by any means. What's happened, and I will point this out, and this is not just here, it's all these older subdivisions with roads that have been there for a while and soil movement. We have highly expansive soil here too, and that causes uneven grade in some areas to where water can pond, but that's not because we've altered it, it's just... over the years, you know, there's some shift in soils and roads that create dips and humps and might have caused that. But that particular example I can't comment on, but we've complied with everything on the building side and have gotten approved.

I have one more question, and this may be for Council. This is with regards to the ADU guest quarters. If it complies with all of the other building codes, square footage, et cetera, is there a requirement that it be attached?

Well, yeah, go ahead.

To answer that question, so guest quarters can be attached or detached. There's not a requirement one way or the other.

So I guess my question, and this might be a little blunt, is why is this backed up to the back of the lot and not built in this big empty space on the other side of the driveway that you have? And the reason I ask that is it's just it is a bit unusual. And I think when people see something like this that is unusual, they tend to look at it suspiciously. Right.

So we try to match up the garages at the back. We didn't want to have a garage at the front of the house. I don't know if you guys are familiar with this property. They've done a really good job cleaning it with hollies. You know, they purchased, I think, over 200 hollies just to make it nice and, you know, aesthetic. And also the house is not too tall. You can barely see the roof from the street. And so the idea is we didn't want to put a garage smack in the front of the 50-foot built line. That would kind of throw off the whole aesthetic and the architecture of what's existing. But also, to your point, we still don't know what the rules are of what can we do and what we can't do. This is what we've come to is a special use permit's what we need because, unfortunately, there's no clear guidelines on the ordinance. It's all based on what the interpretation is. And we've interpreted it differently, staff has differently, and this is what we've come up upon.

Go ahead. So can staff, can Brian, can you just say definitively that the city does not have an issue with the drainage currently on this property?

So I can't say that definitively. That would be more of a question for a public works department. I don't want to speak for them. If we need to bring this information back to you all, I certainly can do that.

It's just one of the main topics that's brought up. So it'd be nice to hear from the city that no, in fact, we say there is no drainage issue.

I can't definitively state that at this time.

Further questions? Pardon, we have a public speaking time, thank you. Further questions for our applicant or staff at this juncture? Okay, thank you. And thank you. So a reminder, it is a public hearing and we do have some folks signed up to speak. Thank you so much, Brian, for procuring those for us. So I'll just read these in the order I've received them. So up first will be David Coletti. And please just introduce yourself with your name and address at the podium prior to your three minutes.

Thank you, Madam Chairman, council members. David Coletti, 3166 Brocala Drive, Farmer's Branch. So I live a little bit to the east and south as Brocala Drive curves around from Webb Chapel up to Valley View. If you know this neighborhood, I think if you went back a couple of slides, it talks about medium density. That's not how this neighborhood is built, right? You wouldn't be building churches or duplexes or multifamily. This is one family residential large lots I think the most concerning thing here is not only the drainage that's impacting our neighbors, but The builders didn't get a permission to subdivide it, yet they then proactively still built the same building on half the lot, which has created these same problems now for why they can't build a proper attached mother-in-law suite, whatever they may need. So really we have not a situation. The hollies in the front do not do a good job of shielding this. It's really kind of an eyesore in the neighborhood because it's half a lot with a side... There's no backyard. And this is going to create all the building, when you add more concrete, take away the yard, it's going to create more drainage problems. It's also going to create pulling across probably three to four properties across the backyard. But it's, I think, wholly unnecessary, except for the fact that they built really hoping to subdivide and didn't adapt their plans then. So they've kind of created their own problems. And now trying to satisfy that with an odd interpretation of the accessory dwelling unit and create a guest quarters with additional garage. You know, the lots in this neighborhood, the houses are all a little larger houses, little larger lots. They could have built something here that would have had a proper mother in law suite for caretaker purposes for kids. But now they really can't because they've only used half a lot. They've created this big problem with the driveway down the middle. It just it doesn't seem like the appropriate use of a special use permit to within I think they moved in three, four months ago. So that you already need to adapt your home when you just built it. It says we didn't follow the process properly to begin with or stuck to the original plan instead of saying, OK, we couldn't subdivide a lot. We couldn't take advantage of one avenue to shrink what are all one acre plus lots, which is also part of why the deed restrictions out there amongst all the homeowners. And now trying to find other ways to kind of get around a building problem in the beginning. So it creates a problem for the neighborhood, a problem for the drainage. Really, you know, there should be unique neighborhoods within Farmer's Branch. We moved here in 2021. And the thing we've loved about this neighborhood is it's not like some of the other neighborhoods in Farmer's Branch. And the people who will move into this neighborhood, people who have, you know, having these unique neighborhoods within Farmer's Branch different than more master plan development communities is, I would support denying this.

Thank you. Next, if we could have John Brownlee, if you wouldn't mind, step forward, state your name and address.

Hey, good evening. John Brownlee, 3116 Recall Drive. I've been a Residents since 2011, about 15 years. And, you know, David made a lot of the points that we all feel. And, you know, I guess one comment, we can't protect them from a bad plan. They just finished this house. It certainly feels like their whole plan has been to jam this one lot to one side, come back and try to rezone. Now they put another odd structure on the property.

And just the results of the bad plan, usually some of those are core levels.

that it's having on them, it's not good. It's obviously not good for their yard, mosquitoes, structure, et cetera. That's one just tangible result of this really ill-conceived plan, because they easily could have designed this house to add a guest quarters or add more space to it. They should have centered the lot or centered the home on the lot, not stuck it up to one side, jam it up right to the side yard setback. There's just a lot of things that have been done that have created a lot of distrust that it's hard to get a whole neighborhood mobilized when you send a notice out over July 4th weekend. Everyone's doing their things, and we get this. We don't find out anything until the sign goes up. Does Nick Patel, I don't know, where's the homeowner? Why didn't he ever show up at this? We tried to reach out to him. He rejected. He didn't reach out to us. So just a lot of things about this have been very disturbing. You can read, you know, just you can see the aerial in terms of how he's placed this. It gives a little more context than how it's shown on that site plan. And even the drainage study, the comments from the city planner back originally saying you've got to set this up to drain to the culvert on Brook Hollow, and they didn't do that. So there's just not a lot of confidence in faith. They'll do what they're supposed to do. Is there anything else that's new? That's it. I just respectfully request that you reject this permit.

Thank you. Thank you. Up next, Kevin Kirksey. Again, just state your name and address for the record.

My name is Kevin Kirksey. I live at 3132 Spur Trail. Been here for about 14, 15 years. We built our home, our life home here. Invested heavily, not only in the home, but the beauty of the home. One of the things that was brought up, I don't know if you all have time, but I would encourage you to go by and physically see the lot in question. Somebody talked about the aesthetic beauty of it. You can't see it. There's no beauty. And then come by and look at my house and see what looks beautiful and what doesn't. But I came here to appeal to you as persons doing your job for the City of Farmers Branch, as citizens of Farmers Branch, and frankly, as neighbors of mine. So that's where I'm coming from. I don't have a whole lot of technical things to talk about, but I do have some observations. So for me, this all started out with rumors that the lot owner at 3125 Brook Hollow was wanting to build two houses on that lot. That started out as a rumor. I didn't have any firsthand knowledge of this is what I heard, which is something that none of our neighbors want. And at the time I began hearing those rumors, I also believe that the city that I live in works very hard to vote in favor of what the majority of its citizens want versus oppose. So if I fast forward and based upon where this house was built, and you've seen the diagrams and you've seen the pictures, these rumors are no longer rumors. It was proven by what's built there, what the intention was to have happen. And so when I heard about attempts to subdivide that lot failed, and even though the lot owner would never communicate with us as neighbors, we reached out several times to meet with them just to see what's going on, to be friendly, not a single reaction. I still, although I was still enthusiastic about having a new neighbor with a nice house on the lot and to welcome them, etc., So my enthusiasm and trust vanished when the house was jammed up to the west side of the lot. And I personally, I personally witnessed my lot backs up to the corner of theirs. I was out there and personally watched them regrade the lot and move large amounts of dirt to the end of the lot. I don't know if they were trying to block up water or redirect water, but it was very obvious. I don't have them today, but I still have photos of that. I call the city because I know that is a no-no, but I saw that happen. I now know the effect of that from whatever other neighbors that you're going to hear from. So when I thought this was, you know, it was all over, I heard about the continued attempts to bypass R1 zoning. and to achieve two houses on that by this process of calling it a guest house, a rather large guest house, I think average guest houses are probably 600, 800 square feet, not over 2,100 square feet. So something is really odd about this in my personal view. So here I am, untrusting of my new neighbor, which I hate, with good cause though, and wanting to trust my city officials to do the right thing, which is now getting more fragile, given the lack of time and notice of this hearing. I was in Las Vegas. I got to go?

Yeah, I'm so sorry, but your time has expired.

I'm just going to ask you to do the right thing and stick with our one zoning promise and what we execute and filed with Dallas County that's in place right now. Thank you.

Thank you. And with that, Brian, I have two duplicates of Mr. Kevin Kirksey, so I don't have any other sheets. Is anyone else signed up? Do you have a sheet? Yeah, if you wouldn't mind just bringing that forward. Thank you. And for future reference, try to get to me ahead of time. Oh, okay. Great. And just state your name and address for the record.

Beth Wood, 3184 Brook Hollow Drive. Can you hear me? My family's been here since the 60s. We still reside at the same place. They were in the original Marsh home, tore it down, rebuilt. We followed all the guidelines. and stayed within the aesthetic of the neighborhood. I do have some questions. One, I'm not within the 200 square feet, but DISD and Carrollton Farmers Branch got letters, yet we are more impacted by it, and we didn't get a letter. I also question the garage up there. How do they access the garage on that diagram? Because it looks like it's behind. As well as it says bathroom, But I counted a bathroom, at least two bathrooms or a bathroom and a half. I also feel like that it would be easily to add on to the house or the guest quarters and make it almost another house or a larger house. And so that does give me a concern about the future. What are they going to do? Are they going to try to get in? As Kevin Kirksey said, you know, I hate to not trust them, but that's where it's led to. We've already spoke about the location, drainage issues, the berm and the fence for another neighbor. And then the deed restrictions. There are deed restrictions. They should be somewhere in that neighborhood. And I questioned the CZO, I think that's right, with the townhomes, the duplexes and what have you. I'm not sure where that came from. And that concerns me that somebody would come along and try to do that. And then lastly, I do, not being in the 200 square feet, but I do oppose this up here. Thank you.

Thank you. And do we have anyone else? Please, if you wouldn't mind. If you can turn that in for me. Yeah. And again, in the future, better to have it ahead of time. Oh, sorry about that. Okay, and just state your name and address for the record.

Sure. Gary Weinstein, 3116 Spur Trail. I moved into this neighborhood in 2017 because of this neighborhood. The house that I bought, I was convinced that that was going to be my forever home by walking in the backyard and seeing the beautiful large lots. And that's how all the homes in our neighborhood are. that brings the value, the uniqueness to this neighborhood, and that's what we all love and enjoy. That's why we rallied forces In the last six months, this was turned in September of 2025, so I guess nine months ago, we re-initiated deed restrictions that had expired for our lot and filed those with the City of Dallas and informed the City of Farmers Branch and followed all the rules to keep things like this from happening. This is not what any of the neighborhood Once the majority of the neighborhood does not want to change the look and feel of our neighborhood the house that is currently there As was just stated you can't see it. It's completely shrouded by trees It's when it was built before the trees were up. It's Shoved way over on half the lot divided by a long driveway It's clear what his intentions were from the get-go. It was the replanting was denied by the city and Then he built a lot on a house on half the lot intentionally. And now he's trying to skirt the rules and fit within the regs, but still accomplish what he wanted to accomplish in the first place. He's been unapproachable, unfriendly, not trustworthy, not what we would want as a good neighbor. So I'm strongly opposed, and again, as already was stated, the reason they're having to fool around with this and try and make it fit is because of the way they built the first house. They created their own chaos, and now they're trying to get around, skirt the rules, and accomplish their original goal. So again, strongly opposed to this proposal. And I don't know if you'd want these. Just the deed restrictions that follow.

Thank you. All right, thank you. And I believe we have no one else signed up to speak. Brett, you have a comment?

I just want to take an opportunity to make a point of clarification on this case. There was some confusion about the dates for city council hearing on this and the previous case. We were actually looking at the P&Z calendar. So it is August 18th. So as you continue your debate and wrap up the discussion, just an FYI, more than anything, it's August 18th. So we gave you the 10th earlier, but it's actually the 18th.

Thanks.

That's all.

Thanks so much, Brett, for that clarification. All right. Brett, your time is up. All right. With that, we've heard. Do we have any further discussion? Would we like to? It is a public hearing. Are we ready to close that?

I'll make a motion to close the public hearing.

Thank you.

Second.

All right. Any further discussion on the item? All right, seeing none, we'll move to vote. All those in favor to close the public hearing. All right, and with that, I'll hear action on the item. Unless there's any further discussion to be had amongst commissioners.

Do we have any mechanism by which to require a drainage study or drainage remediation if it is out of compliance?

That's our counsel. I will defer that to you, City Attorney.

Not really. Well, it's an SUP. I mean, this is an applied application or development agreement, so really there isn't a true mechanism for doing that as a condition. But, you know, because it's an SUP, I mean, it would be really, really difficult to impose a drainage study as a condition of granting an SUP because you would know what the study said when you would grant it this evening. So there really isn't a way to go about doing that, at least not at this stage.

And I will add on something that I should have mentioned early in response to that question. So if this were to be approved by city council during the building permit phase, public works will review this and could potentially require some sort of a study or something to that effect at that time.

You could always make that part of your recommendation if you wanted to have council consider.

Say, I know I'm not supposed to recommend with conditions.

Good point. Don't make that recommendation.

All right. Any further comments, questions, discussion amongst commission? All right. Then with that, I will hear action on the item.

I'm going to make a motion to recommend denial.

Okay.

I'll second that.

Seconded, okay. All those who would like to vote in favor of recommending denial of Ordinance 4007. All right, all those opposed to recommending denial. All right, and with that, it does carry. So as you said, thank you, Brett. This will go to City Council on August 18th. Yes. Thank you so much. And that, I believe, takes us, that's our last piece for the evening. So with that, we will adjourn at 8.08 p.m. Thank you all.