Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

This is Zach.

This is Zach. Can you hear me? Uh, yeah, we can hear you, Zach. Hey guys, this is Bill. I'm here, too. All right, you guys. Thank you for joining us. Yep.

Thank you everybody else for joining us uh here in in person. I'll cord call to order at uh 6:30 or 5:35 uh our February 17th meeting of the Hood River Planning Commission. My name is Bon Fasio Romero and I am presiding as the planning commission chair. Let me begin with a description of tonight's process and a few disclosures. First, the function of the planning commission is to review the record for this application, take testimony, and determine whether the application meets or does not meet the approval criteria in the Hood River Development Code. Second, we are required to render an impartial decision on each application. This means that we cannot have a personal financial stake or bias that would prevent us from making an impartial decision. Before we begin, I will call for the disclosure of bias, exparte contact, and conflict of interest from each commissioner. Anyone in the audience will then have the opportunity to question any of us about those disclosures. Uh, do we have any today?

No bias. No bias. No bias, exparte, or conflict of interest.

And I have none as well. I also have none. Um, our decision on the planned unit development will be uh final unless appealed to the city council. To appeal our decision, you must participate either orally or in writing before the record closes on the item you are interested in and raise any issues you would like to uh preserve for appeal. Once we close the record for an item, that will end your ability to raise new issues or present evidence. Uh so I'll describe the order of events for the hearing on tonight's agenda. Uh first we'll hear the staff report. Uh next we'll hear from the applicant. Then we'll take public testimony. Finally we will hear from uh the applicant's final rebuttal and remarks. After everyone has had a chance to testify, we will close the record, deliberate, and may render the decision tonight. Our decision, however, is not final until it is reduced to writing and officially issued uh except for the zone change request, which will require city council approval. Uh planning commission decisions are final unless appealed to city council. Uh here are some of the basic rules for presenting testimony in tonight's hearing. Only present testimony when called upon. Uh do so only at the podium. uh begin with your name and mailing address. Please limit your testimony to the applicable approval criteria. If you believe that other or different criteria apply, please identify those and explain why you think they apply. Uh that is by way of a procedural introduction for tonight's hearing. Um if anyone has any questions about the process as we go forward, feel free to ask them during the public testimony portion of the hearing. Uh, does anybody have any questions about the hearing pro procedures?

Okay. No one online. No. All right. Well, we will now consider file number 2025-32, an application by Ben Dao requesting approval of a conditional use request for a planned unit development uh consisting of 11 dwelling units and an 11 lot subdivision in association with a request for a zone change from the industrial to general commercial zone. Uh, a quorum of the planning commission is present and I will now ask all commissioners to disclose. Oh, we already did that part. Um Um, okay. So, there was none.

We are ready. We're ready to give the staff report. So, the staff for their report. Thank you.

Thank you, chair. Before you tonight is file number 202532, the Wasco Street Town Homes Project. The applicant, Ben Dao, is requesting a zone change from the industrial to general commercial zone in association with a planned unit development consisting of 11 town houses on an 11 lot subdivision. The property is located at 1225 Wasco Street totaling approximately 34 acres and is currently developed with an industrial building. Surrounding uses include industrial to the north and east and residential zoning and single family homes to the south and west. Under the Hood River Municipal Code, residential development is allowed in the C2 zone through planned unit development process through a conditional use process provided minimum density standards are met. In this case, the minimum density requirement is approximately four units and what they are proposing is 11 which exceeds that criteria that criteria. proposal includes 11 townhouse units, private internal access uh with a shared driveway off of Wasco Street uh beneath a shared common deck. Two internal and enclosed garage spaces are provided for each unit for a total of 22 spaces. Uh and frontage improvements along both Wasco Street and 13th Street are um shown along with new sidewalks, landscaping, ADA improvements, and utility infrastructure. A traffic assessment letter was submitted and reviewed by city engineering and ODOT. The analysis shows a net decrease in peak hour trips compared to the existing use. All agency comments have been addressed through recommended conditions of approval in the staff report. The proposed buildings range from approximately 22 to 30 ft in height which is compliant with propo with the 35 ft height requirement limit uh for residential development in the C2 zone. Required setbacks are met including increased setbacks adjacent to the residential zoning to the south. Public notice was provided to property owners within 250 ft and comments were received last week after the publication that had been forwarded to you all prior to this meeting. These primarily discuss the potential impact of the development on

available street parking, neighborhood compatibility, scale of the development, impacted use, traffic safety concerns along Wasco and 13th Street. Staff finds the proposal is consistent with the city's comprehensive plan along with the housing needs analysis which identifies a need for higher density housing and attached housing types including residential development in commercial zones. There are findings within the staff report that address the Hood River economic opportunities analysis related to goal nine uh which is economic development which define which finds the proposed zone change from industrial to commercial for residential use would not adversely affect the city's ability to meet the industrial land requirements and is consist consistent with statewide planning goals and the local comprehensive plan. These findings can be found on page 40 of your staff report. Staff analysis finds the application meets applicable criteria and as such we are recommending approval of the zone change in planned unit development subject to the conditions of approval outlined on page 96 of your packet. Thank you.

All right. Thank you. You have if you had any questions right now we take any quick questions. Uh next up would be the applicant. There'll be another opportunity once you hear their presentation to ask more questions prior to your deliberation. You guys have any questions regarding the staff at work? We have anyone online with their hand up? Perfect.

Bill and Zach, you guys are good over there. it. Well, one one thing that I was wanted to understand, it wasn't clear if maybe I can get addressed was the requirement for public for I think it was the open space or outdoor area and there was a number specified per unit and I couldn't tell from the diagrams if that was planned to be in the driving lanes or if it was elevated above it. So, I guess the the applicant could address that one. Oh, okay. or or or staff, but that that was one of the questions that I wanted to glean. Okay, we'll wait for the applicant on that one. Okay, thank you, Bill.

Okay, thank you guys. So, yeah, we'll go ahead with the applicant.

Good afternoon, commission. I am Hayden Wooten with Mario Design. I am the senior land use planner on the team. Uh I am representing the applicant tonight. Uh to start, I would like to thank staff for all of their help throughout the course of this application. We've been bouncing questions off them for the last handful of months. They've been incredibly responsive and helpful as we kind of work through some of the more complicated elements of this project. Uh we've had a chance to look through both the staff report and the conditions of approval. Uh we have no issues with the findings as presented in the report and are willing to proceed under the conditions of approval as written. Um the staff report was pretty thorough and covered just about everything I was intending on presenting tonight. Uh so I'll keep this limited to a few key points I'd like to reiterate uh and then kind of open a few things up for questions. Uh to start with the zone change. Presently, there is not an identified need for industrial sites of this size. And so, as the applicant, we went to look for a more appropriate use that is more in line with the statewide planning goals and the planning goals of Hood River. And we found that to be a residential use and proposal. Uh and then under that kind of review of those documents, the economic opportunities analysis, the housing needs analysis, we found that the C2 zone was pretty advantage for us or advantageous for us primarily because uh Hood River has already accounted for certain residential zones uh that are available, but there was an identified need for commercial land with the intention that it be developed as residential to help meet the housing needs. And so we looked at that route through our housing needs analysis as a reasonable way to get

residential units on this property. Additionally, the benefit of a commercial zone in this location is to provide a smooth transition from nearby industrial properties to residential properties which are not always considered compatible. And so the benefit of having kind of that commercial zone on this corner property uh is to provide a little bit more of a transition. And so we go from what is considered a more intense use in industrial to a slightly less intense use, higher density residential and then moving to lower density residential as we move north to south there. And so we found that that was an appropriate zone change. It's also typically when we look at some of these things a little bit more of an easier ask that sometimes an industrial use to a residential zone can be a big ask for certain jurisdictions. And so providing that smooth transition uh is frequently something that we have learned cities like to see that when you start accounting for what could happen in the future when you just simply look at that map that transition is held intact. And so that was kind of some of our reasoning behind the zone change there. Uh moving to the subdivision, the development itself, uh Jacob covered it pretty thoroughly. It's 11 units on 11 lots. Vehicle access will be provided via a private drive to Wasco. Uh pedestrian access, and I hope this might answer one of those questions, uh is actually going to be provided from 13th Street. there's a fair bit of elevation change between those two streets. And so a creative way we found to kind of accommodate that within the design is to orient the pedestrian access, the pedestrian uses

towards the lower classification street and 13th and then vehicles from the more traffic street. Now that might sound counterintuitive, but ultimately what that provides us is better spacing from the intersection for that driveway. So we provide safer sight distances. So what's going to end up occurring is all of these vehicles will access on the ground. They'll have ground level garages and then there's a boardwalk and that's that shared pedestrian space. The shared open space is going to be in a form of a communal boardwalk that provides access to the uh living quarters to kind of the uh more trafficked uh rooms in these homes. and then that will route out to 13th. And so that was kind of some of the theory then behind uh our strategy and approaching some of that elevation change we found within the streets already. And then just to reiterate uh we are going to be improving both street frontages. And so our hope is that that will help provide some safer on street parking and safer pedestrian amenities there on the frontage. Uh, and so with that, I open up to any questions.

Uh, yes. Did you look at R3 for that zone change? And if you did or didn't, why?

So, we considered R3, but it was one of those that kind of got eliminated as we started getting into the weeds of this project and started looking at what suited the development best and what suited the area best. Uh ultimately we I looking through the housing needs analysis saw that good river had already accounted for development of that zone and the amount of land they already had zoned in R3. And so the housing needs analysis kind of guided us away from that zone and pointed us more towards the commercial zone which was intended to serve a variety of uses and a variety of development patterns. And so ultimately we found that when we start looking at what our decision criteria are and how we justify that and going back to those kind of goal nine and goal 10 uh reviews, C2 was a lot easier justification in code than R3.

I'm not sure what you mean by that, but could you do you know if you would have as be able to put as many dwellings on an R3 as you could as as you could on seed one commercial? It would be a different number of dwellings. Do you know the numbers by any chance? Uh, I'll lean over to another one of my team members here. Eight. So, you'd lose three dwellings in our three. You would lose three dwellings, which would decrease our ability to comply with goal 10.

Yeah, I understand that. Uh now every in the housing needs analysis I actually am a developer and I tried to get that land and the land across the street from it zoned from industrial to to uh to R3 years ago and the city said we don't do that. We want to we want to keep our industrial land. They've changed since then. I realize that. I read that since 2015 they changed that and I think this is a good transition point to be able to do it. My concern is the housing need analysis and every housing strategy comment encourages high density in a spot like this, but it's all in the context of affordable housing. That's what they're trying that's why they want that high density and they that's why they want those zone zone changes. So my concern is that are you trying to make this affordable housing or are you trying to make it like a hotel because it's commercial? What do you have any is it for sale? Are they for rent? What what's the ultimate goal here? Is that even any my business? I don't know.

Uh the applicant's intention is to sell these units as individual units. Uh to my knowledge, there's no intention to rent them, to cond them, anything along those lines. Uh now, we lose obviously control of what happens after that sale. And so then we start getting into realms and questions I can't answer as the applicant. Yeah. Okay. Well, that's just a concern of all is what you know what the end what the end use. and they're probably not going to be affordable that I mean that's to me it's a you know it's a proper use of the of that lot.

I I don't see the taking down a commercial building that's already there and they probably got 20 or 24 employees in it already. So it just seems a little odd but it's not my project and and we can understand that concern. Uh and speaking from the applicant side, we while we do have some control over cost, that's ultimately not something we can really get into the weeds of uh in this forum. And so at this point, our view is that for sale lots and units and just increasing supply, trying to provide those higher densities, those smaller units are another way of kind of reaching that ultimate goal.

So the these are for sale. That's what you're Okay. And that's nobody can hold you to that. I mean, you could somebody could turn those into a 11 unit rental development if they wanted to because of the zoning, but that's your intention is for is to sell them and sell them at a as reasonable price as you can. Yes. And that's then ultimately after that exchange happens, we're no longer involved and that becomes a different conversation.

Okay. I think just a like as it relates to the housing needs analysis, you know, leveraging commercial zoning for housing. I believe that was in the context of existing commercial zone um really as a way to augment the stock of our zoned uh you know, land that we had. So, I'm not I'm not quite sure that I buy the argument of we're going to reszone this to C2 in order to in order to get what the housing needs analysis said that we needed. It was really more use your existing, you know, C2 stock to augment um the housing needs analysis also indicated that we do have enough R2 and R3 zone um for you know needed housing as far as I read it unless that's changed in current years or that calculation has changed. Um, so it it does indicate that we or did indicate that we do have enough R2, R3 and commercially zoned property for housing. So they just wanted to put that statement out there because I think it is relevant. Um, I do I I mean if you look at this on a on the zoning map, um, it's 700,000 ft away from the closest commercial zone lot. So I just I how do we consider that from a keeping a clean and consistent uh zoning framework? Maybe that's a question for staff I think more than or for my fellow commissioners more than anyone. Um is this something that we we do? Is this something we want to do? Do we want to have a practice of um is this the first of potentially many uh you know reszones on that kind of fringe of um industrial to you know residential or is this going to be an island? Well, I think um you know to your to your point, the the housing needs analysis of 2015 uh

indicates a a deficiency in R3 and basically says you will need to rely on on your C2 zoning to satisfy a multifamily need. Um so that's that's really the context. The other um big I would consider kind of hallmark that we look at is uh the industrial needs analysis or the economic uh opportunities analysis which is our goal 9 analysis which showed you know in this instance industrial sites of this size we have a surplus of. So what you know what we do as staff and ultimately what city council and um does is and and you all is a balancing test. if we have a surplus of um of property, are we justified to zone change or change that zone from um to something else which is a need. So I I don't think it's necessarily just because it wasn't in a C2 inventory before does not make it all of a sudden excluded from the calculus here. Um so I think that that provides an opportunity to say well you know we can we can move the needle on goal 10. um from well this is a stat we can move the needle on goal 10 for something uh that provides a housing needed or a needed housing uh so long as it doesn't create a deficiency or impact adversely impact goal 9. So those are kind of our balancing. Um you know the world moves at time you know the snapshot in 2015 is is there I don't think it necessarily means any changes after all of a sudden off limit. So um in terms of changes in the spot I think you know there's um we're going to look at each individually. Um this a collector street um is it an interface between where the zone changes? It may it may allow some sort of transition there that may not be widely spread. Um you know when you look

at pieces like this I think it per there's not a whole lot of places where industrial all of a sudden is adjacent right to residential. We usually see a step down. So in terms of progressive down zoning I don't think it necessarily shows as some anomaly. Um the industrial pieces that are next door to this are actually um uh already I would call them the backyard of a res of a residential property uh owned by uh a certain house that is under construction right now. So the likelihood of that being um all of a sudden an industrial piece of property is it's it's unlikely that the people building that house are going to convert their rear yard into any industrial use. So that's some commentary and response for

Hey Dustin, it's Bill. Could you walk us through both the HNA and economic opportunities analysis and the deficit or surplus for each of our zones from the from that analysis? I I don't have the numbers right off the top.

I I don't need you can just tell me whether there was a deficit or surplus of each zone. uh R3 there's a multifamily deficit. So it's not necessarily deficit of R3 zoned property. It's really because R3 you have a it's a multifamily issue. It's not a zone issue. So the HNA says you will need to use some of your C3 or excuse me C2 zone to satisfy your multif family need. It doesn't say you'll need a C2 to satisfy your R3 need. It it's the use. It's not the underlying zone. Right? So that's the that's the tension there. Um, and this is not this is not a multif family use that's being proposed. Correct.

It's 11 units in one building divided into town houses. So, arguably it's an all single family attached. I saw

Yeah. Uh, individual lots technically on fe simple lots. It's it's not five units in one building. It's 11 units in two somewhat combined buildings. So technically it's a townhouse. If you look at the the image itself, I think it it pretty much represents a multifamily building by configuration. Maybe not by definition the way the city defines it. If I may, uh I believe that intention, that idea that we are reaching for higher densities, for higher unit counts helps justify our proposal for C2 because that zone is ultimately what allows us to achieve those unit counts and the desired while not traditionally defined as multif family, but more that level of density in a package that is still found nearby on Wasco. several other townhouse developments nearby. So, we're still achieving higher densities as directed by those plans while maintaining a development style that is compatible with other recent developments in the area.

So, c continue on my request. Dustin, my understanding of the economic opportunity analysis was that we had a shortage of li and we had a surplus of I. Is that correct? Now I think uh it's for industrial sites of less than one acre there's uh in 2019 even under the highest scenario industrial growth there was a surplus of sites of this size and was that industrial and light industrial combined or was that just industrial go to the the page and I believe it is on page are you looking for the packet or what's in the economic opportunities analysis

in the EOA Oh, in the pack are discussed on page 39 and then again on 40 and 42. And in summary, it's is industrial. Yeah, it's industrial. Industrial combined, Bill. They're both industrial and industrial. And they just did it by sight size.

Yeah, it's sight size. That is that's the big metric that we looked at. It's not industrial at large. It's industrial on side uh on sites uh less than an acre. There's a surplus.

Okay. Thanks. I think I think based on that and based on on on the location of this along kind of the fringe of the industrial and you know surrounded by R2 and R3 it does make sense to me that this should be housing. I have no um I'm beyond that question personally. It it that seems to make sense. I think my question is uh should it be R3 or should it be C2 or should it be C2 I guess is the question at hand. Um

it is let me let me uh along this line I guess let me ask a question. Um is there anything that would assure us that this is going to be developed as housing if we change this zone? So we change we agree to change the zone. Um the developer never does the project. Property gets sold and next thing you know we have a car wash. Yeah, I think um we had discussed in uh in other applications a condition of approval um mandating that a certain amount of housing pre-produced and that be left on the zone. Uh therefore not allowing uh reszone to occur leaving a C2 that didn't produce. Um I think uh that would be something you would want to produce or discuss with the applicant in terms of you know conditioning that um although zoned to C2 you would and any subsequent developer if they walked away would be required to produce a certain number of units that that's not unprecedented territory for a planning commission. Is there anything that is going to currently as defined in the findings that would preclude these from just being short-term rentals?

No, that's not a condition that we could. Thank you. Yeah.

Yeah. I I share Bill's concerns, too. That's what I wrote down where the my concerns were, is somebody going to turn turn it into a 7-Eleven someday? I mean, literally, that's I mean, that's a farfetched possibility, but that's why I have a problem with C2. And um yeah, you you you said that if even if they if someone else comes in and develops that you can put something in the the uh the approval process that says it can't it has to be some type of housing and it can't be more than 11, but they they really jammed it in there, but which is fine. I've done that, too.

Should we like I guess we've we've asked some questions. I think at this point I don't know we have anything outstanding. We should maybe continue with the process if there's any people who want to any further question if there if there's anybody here at the hearing. Does that make sense at this point? Yeah. Yeah. Commissioner, we uh I parked a couple of your discussions. We'll help cue those up for your deliberation later. Okay. Uh thank you. Thank you. All right. All right, we will now take testimony from the public. And we have a list here. Um, looks like uh Deborah Hendrickson.

Go ahead and state your name and address and the mic's hot.

Mike's hot. Uh, my name is Ron Hendrickson. I live at 1305 Wasco Street. I am 200 feet uh 200 feet west of the proposed project. Uh I purchased my home in 2012. Uh realizing it is was zoned R3. Uh everything to the east was uh pretty much zoned R2 or industrial and uh knew that I lived on a truck route. So those were the uh uh parameters that I knew I was buying into at this point. Uh to me, if we allow uh an industrial site to change to a C2, which allows for very high density, um I'm concerned that my uh neighbor across the street, which is 1302 Wasco, Kitty Corner to this project, would ask for the same thing, which I think uh you know would number one, the 2015 housing uh more what You guys, what do you

housing needs analysis? Excuse me, I don't know the correct term, but uh decrease the value of my property. I no longer could be a short-term rental. Uh if this project goes from industrial to C2, again, that will decrease the value of my property with the highdensity uh residential close by. And I would worry again that it would happen that it would go across the street from me at 1302 Wasco. I don't know if you guys have studied the drawings very well. Uh I've tried. All we have is exterior elevations and uh a site plan, but there are no cross-sections through the building looking north or south through the project looking north or south or through the project looking east and west. Okay. And to me, just trying to figure it out, there's only three access points to get up to the so-called boardwalks, which basically to me are catwalks. So, you're going to either come in from uh 13th on the stairs or you're going to come in from uh Wasco on a set of stairs to walk up to this uh circular catwalk that walks around the whole thing. So, all these people are going to walk in front of all their neighbors to get to their uh to get to their doors if I'm correct. And I don't know because we we haven't we haven't seen it. But to me, looking at the density going from uh an R2 or an R3 to basically 11 units, I think is excessive. And I would I would ask that we would be looking at R2 or R3 would be a reasonable zone change from industrial. Um that was it. Thank you.

Thank you. Y that was Ron Hendrickson. Deborah, you said he was speaking for you. Okay, perfect. All right, so we got Jody McFarland since I didn't get signed up. Uh yeah, here come and sign up. You can just say state your name.

Linda Bailey. I'm an owner of Crush Stad Cafe. I also own a house on Wasco that's in R3, four spaces down from 13th going west. And um I am concerned for two things. One, 22 cars in a space on Wasco Street where it is considered a truck route. And um the other thing is the amount of in and out and everything because 13th Street is not very traffic induced. It's not a good street for a lot of traffic. Um there's no sidewalks. Um it's steep. It's icy. And but my main concern is just because you have the parking on the lots for for two cars, they're going to have all their wind surfing boards, all their bicycles, they're going to be parking on the street. So that's my main concern. Okay. And I do think I have an R3 lot and that I live on and um I think that's how it should keep it.

Thank you. Oh, I see. So, there was Jod and David. Does David? No. No. Okay. Uh, Steve Lambert.

Thank you for your time. Steve Lambert. I live at 128 Lincoln Street, which is lot uh tax lot 3100. So, it's right adjacent to these units up above. on Lincoln Street. Um, also next to the big house that you all know about on Lincoln Street, which has been pretty disruptive for our neighborhood. Um, and it's going to be right up against the new property that they're building too, by the way, the park that they're building below. So, it's going to be interesting for that. Um, I mean, I first of all, I don't fault the owners for trying to make as much as they money as they can on that lot because obviously the more units on there, the more money they can make. Uh, they do look like they're going to have rooftop decks. So, as far as affordable housing, I'm not sure about that, but they are going to be nice units looking from I see. Um, but I do think it's incompatible land use. They're trying to put as many units as they can in that small space in my my my opinion. So, you're turning into like spot zoning, which you mentioned is it spot zoning where there's R3 all around it, crosses industrial, so it's there's no C2 anywhere that I could see on that. And to to Bill's point earlier, um it could be turned into a 45 foot building, which obviously I have a lot of vested interest right out above it. I have a nice view right now, but I mean I know that's not part of the equation. Um and but I think that uh you know there's some some some thought down the road. Um I do think you know it doesn't really fit into the the urban renewal that we're looking at doing to Hood River. I know there's a lot of studies going on about urban renewal. Um I think it's also going to be some adverse impact to our adjacent neighborhoods. I Sam mentioned it. Um there's going to be a lot of noise associated with it. There'll be safety on that 13th in Wasco, which is I think a very dist dangerous street and obviously a lot of obstructed views from the property above it from multiple units on this street on Lincoln Street that obviously will

affect all of our um our value of our houses. So, it doesn't really seem consistent with our overall plan. And I do think it's disproportionate mass scale of what they're putting onto that same location. um you know just 11 units if you if you have a chance I don't know if you've had a chance to look at that actual property if you walk down the street if you walk down Wasco there's a lot of R3 a lot of three units it's all kind of uh cohesive but then you see 11 units right there then there's going to be that big part big unit which has that big field below it I guess it's going to be a very nice landscaping I'm sure um so I I just am concerned about parking I'm concerned about the lights from that unit that's going to be 11 units going to throw a lot of lights and of course the traffic. It seems like there's going to be a lot more traffic there too. So I also think that you know instead of C2 that they should look at R3 and have proper setbacks and just do it right. I know you want to have more housing but they should just take a look at it and make sure they do it the right way. So that's it. Thank you.

Thank you. All right. Do we have uh Steve Carlson?

My name is Steve Carlson. I live at uh 1524 Lincoln Street, which is half a block um west of the property. I've lived on Cascade Columbia Lincoln. I've been in the neighborhood since the late 90s. And um anyway, I a question I have about this. I don't have very many questions about product specifically but um a question for planning is is and per your question Mr. Pope and Mike Mr. Kits you referenced your desire to reszone those parcels historically as well right anyway is is this zone change president setting have we ever done such a thing before changed industrial into how many zone changes have we done historically many We'll let them talk about as that.

Have we done many zone chases? I don't have that information. Uh you need to ask planning for that. I think for the sake of this hearing factf finding there's been a question raised that uh regarding the precedent setting aspect of it. Yeah. And I think we we pause it there. Okay. And allow Steve his time

and that's fine. And regarding that precedent setting, were we to make this decision as a community, do we foresee such more of such actions in the future? Are we likely to be converting other lands that historically have been forbidden from such development into something that will open that up? Is that I don't know if anybody has any I mean that's more opinion than than u you know. Well, that's that's in the housing needs analysis. There actually they spell that out that there's a need for that in several different spots. I've got them here printed out actually. Yeah, they they they they request that and they encourage it. But again, they encourage it under the opices of hope hopefully it would be affordable housing

in util. Didn't somebody say in the utilization of like existing commercial for housing? No. Changing they they say that there's an abundance there's an overabundance of small industrial lots. Okay. Okay. That I'm unaware of this. Great. Yeah. That that that's that's from 2015 and and it's even recent. I mean, I just checked on that recently and there is this is a this is a a good spot to to do that. I mean, initiative, but but I don't know I don't know if there's if it's ever been done before. I can't answer the question. So, that's a good question. Probably for your making decisions you guys did regarding choices development.

Um, uh, Mr. Irving and Mr. kits both alluded to the concern about uh commercial zoning and the possibility for something such as car washer or 7-Eleven, which are both extreme examples. Um but yes, if that zone land to be reszoned and that development will not proceed, that land would now have a different nature to it and have the potential for some things that we don't foresee currently. And but my greatest concern as somebody who's been living in this neighborhood for a long time is uh that it's my understanding, correct me if I'm wrong, but commercially zoned properties with residences on them have unlimited short-term rental potential. Is that not the case?

We we'll we'll keep it we'll keep it to um to testimony and bringing up questions. Um but this is it's not this isn't the forum for back and forth. I'm just it's not a form for questions. just we'll okay we'll take your testimony and deliberate the concern I have is the potential for there to be unlimited short-term rentals and in there was a period I haven't counted lately but in my rather long block it's longer than usual there were 22 short-term rentals on my block and um you know right nearby so there's a been a lot of that around so one of the concerns I have is that specifically so anyway so any questions I have about the development itself are not appropriate at this time. Is that correct?

Uh yeah, you raise the question and then the applicant will have this their opportunity to to give us a rebuttal and then we'll we'll do a deliberation. This is question developer folks involved in design. I don't really understand what you guys mean by the elevated common area. Uh and and again, yeah, go ahead and raise the question and then they'll have their their time to that if such a thing were to exist, it needs to fit a sprinter van because this neighbor full of Sprinter vans. And to your point, um okay, it got 22 parking space for 11 units. Um yeah, let's so yeah. So, okay, again, raise a question. We'll have a rebuttal. Um but yeah,

so I say okay, thank you very much. Just we have one person online with their hand raised too. All righty. And anybody else in person before we go to the online? Okay. Go. Okay. Yeah. Go ahead. And then we'll get to the to the online. State your name and address, please. Yeah. From Jordan, 1310 Wasco. Thank you.

Okay. So, I must live right outside of the mail zone of 250 ft at 1310. But my principal concern is also about the amount of cars that 11 units will produce that will end up mostly in the street because as we all know in Wood River garages are used for toys and not for cars. Okay. And uh I see this I've lived at that address for 20 years. I see this on my street in the summertime just loaded with these Sprinter vans etc and extra cars everywhere nothing in a garage and now you're going to dump 11 units on this. So that is one question I have. How are they going to solve that? How do you fit in and we don't see any plans here. How do you fit two cars underneath 11 units in that manual space.34 acres you say? Right. So, um I think that would be good to see the plans, maybe a little model on a table. Um and then the other question I have is a more general question. Who actually represents the quality of life of our neighborhood here? It's a big question because I mean that's really going to impact our Thank you.

Thank you. And looks like we have Patrick Jones online. Patrick, if you can hear us. Looks like you're still muted. Hi. Can you hear me now? Little better. Perfect. Go ahead. Thank you, Patrick.

Okay, great. Um, now I can't get rid of the uh all the words, so I can't see you guys too well. Anyway, uh yeah, I'm Patrick Jones. I live at 1301 Wasco Street, the single family home next door. And um I'm all for uh a generous zone change uh but along the line of uh like I have, which is R2, R3, R2, I guess, to the east, R3 to the west. And I pretty much agree with uh what everyone else has has contributed, but I do know that uh that intersection, that four-way stops, uh we're about due for traffic lights in that intersection. I I mean, it's we routinely uh watch people go through there at at 20 30 miles an hour. Uh and and as far as that 13th Street, this is the first year I've known to not have uh snow and ice on there for quite a while. And at that point, it it's sort of a a neighborhood family-friendly tobogen run. Basically, you can't get up and down it with cars. So, if that's the egress, uh you know, of cars coming in off of 13th, uh I think you got some problems there. But but mainly with the it just seems like R11 is just very excessive. I mean uh 11 uh units. It's very excessive. I uh I wrote down a lot and submitted it, but it's u I got caught being out of town for uh and I can't I can't I'm just shooting from the cuff here. But, uh, I just I'd just like to see, uh, in keeping with everything else that, uh, the president said been set, uh, I don't think we need higher density there. If

you need housing, uh, there's some huge projects going west of town out there at Cascade. And, uh, there's some really big projects being put in and been been approved. I don't think we need any more than the R3s we have in this neighborhood. Uh, and as far as like the parking I think that's been mentioned, u, yeah, just because you got two little tight spots per unit. Uh, you have you, you know, you got friends and convenience and I never even thought about the height uh, requirements for when you're carrying bicycles on top and everything. And uh I don't know. It just seems seems quite quite a endeavor. Uh huge project. And plus I'm the little house that could there in between. So I'll be uh I already don't see my west son. I won't see the east after this. So but that's my problem. I understand. But it's just uh you know it's just a bit getting a bit overbuilt right there and and too little odds. I don't know why we can't see six units at most. That's what I put my throw my head into that like take that in consideration. Thank you. Thank you, Patrick. And do we have one other raised hand online? LK, uh, if you can hear us, go ahead.

My name is Can you hear me? Yes.

Thank you. My name is Laura K. L and I live at 1211 Lincoln and my question is for the developers representative. I'm sorry I missed your name. You used words where you said that uh this development would be a compatible development style with existing and surrounding town houses. And since there aren't any town houses that have develop been developed in C2, you're can I assume that you're likening these to R3 town houses? So that's my question. And then my comment is the commercial zone makes me extremely uneasy because as soon as we make that zone change away from residential, we could have 11 little MPA units selling um who knows what. And I think that what's left of our neighborhood needs to stay R3, please. Um, and that's what I have. Thank you.

Thank you. Um, and if there's no further testimony, um, we can move to Well, did you did we get everyone online?

All right. So, we will move to, um, the applicant's uh, final rebuttal. Thank you. Uh I'll address a few of the basics off the bat. Uh to reiterate, we have done everything we can to meet the decision criteria. And with that, uh we have come to a set of condition of conditions of approval along with our own findings and designs that can meet all of those decision criteria which would lead us to an approval tonight. Uh, I do understand there is some concern potentially about the future use of these town homes. Uh, I do feel the need to say again that ultimately that's outside of our control as an applicant. That comes down to the owner of these future units. Uh, that it then is up to them to comply with the appropriate zoning code, development code. um any future use is somehow going to need to be worked out amongst all these different owners. Uh and so we are starting to get a little bit outside of the realm of which I can answer questions and uh promise or deliver on certain items. Uh I can tell you that setbacks are met, that streets will be improved. Uh and so we'll start to see sidewalks, additional road width, uh some of those kind of basic amenities. Uh and then to answer some of the questions regarding the building design, I do have the architect with me tonight, Tim. Uh and so as we start to get into some of the conversation around the buildings, uh I'll let the expert start to speak on that.

Expert is a strong word.

Yeah, my name is Tim Fouch. So, I'm the uh design architect on the project. Um, I do hear a lot of the concerns about the building and I just want to say to frame where we are in the project, we're just looking at the idea of a zone change. So, we haven't gone too far down the road architecturally other than to reasonably reasonably assure ourselves as a team that these units would work, that they'd be beautiful, that they'd be compatible with the neighborhood and things like that. But yes, we did not issue highly dimensioned drawings of the garage sizes, but I I will address that one. So, I have a few notes here. I'll jump around a bit. They are tall garages because that is we know Hood River well. Um actually was on the design team for the industrial building across the street and I've done some other town home projects in the city here um that I think have been wellreceived. But tall garages are a big thing. We know that a lot of the garages we've seen in our other units become snowboard waxing studios and things like that. So, we know big garages. We overdid it on parking. We actually could fit an additional unit on this lot if we used the C2 zoning. C2, right? A lot of C's and Rs are going around. But we decided to take to scale back because if we did that, we were going to need exceptions to maintain parking numbers and things. And we actually felt like it's of high value to the neighborhood to make sure anybody who's living on this lot or on these lots has dual parking spaces. These these garages are also extra deep, so they have extra room for all toys and all those things. That doesn't mean no one's ever going to park on the street, but we are doing our level best to make sure these are actually very good river compatible. Um, and so a little clarification, the boardwalk, it's almost, you can think of it as a little bit of an elevated courtyard. So we thought it was

important to not stick all our cars out in a parking lot. So the neighbors are all just looking at cars to coming and going all the time, people unloading and loading and then all the mess that goes with that. All the all the cars go under the units. It's covered then by this boardwalk which is where all the social spaces for the units are and that is elevated up to a pedestrian access from uh 13. Thank you. Your vehicles go down off of which is the motor vehicle oriented street. But the idea there again is that all the the front doors of those units all address the courtyard. So you're not going to be dealing with people like on a catwalk around a building. Sorry, I don't know who I should be addressing here. uh just just the microphone is what is gonna pick up your voice. So just Yeah.

So yeah, so the a lot of the foot traffic is really going to be in an internal courtyard type of experience rather than kind of casting out into the neighborhood. Um the other thing is we are really doing as much as we can to keep the height as low as possible. Obviously views in the gorge are so important to everybody. We're here for a reason. So, we're trying to keep that as low as possible, which is why we didn't we have a roof deck, but it's unsheltered. It's really just a place for people to go sit on a chair and enjoy the view or Fourth of July, that kind of thing. Um, and then the the building, if we did an R3, you can do an apartment building or something more dense, but you're going to see something with higher massing. So, we'd almost be working against ourselves. We're trying to do something that is town homes. They have brakes in them so you get slot views through them so they feel more residentially scaled rather than a big uh multifamily project. So we want something that kind of bridges the gap architecturally between multifamily and the residential around us. So we're going for that density. The additional density we get to with C2 allows us to do these more more units which means we can shrink the units down a bit and then make them more affordable. So they may not qualify for affordability from the definition in some of the housing plans, but more units means more affordable because they're going to be smaller units. So we're going to have an offering of two and threebedroom units which is kind of single family size scaled appropriately. That's really a tough spot for a lot of home buyers right now. So we're trying to get something I know there's a huge house going on next door. We don't want that type of thing. We're trying to get the opposite of that people something that people can comfortably move into. A little bit about my history as an architect. So I've done a series of projects in Hood River. Um

I do really good thoughtful work. I am not going to do anything bad in this neighborhood. This is really important to us. I've done work on bridges and Forest Park in Portland where everybody loves Forest Park. One national award for that. Um, I've won a mayor's award for residential work I've done in Portland. It's It's going to be a good project. I know it takes a extension of trust, but I hope that we'll get that and we can do something that'll make everybody proud. And can we see something? Uh, I think

uh, hey, excuse me guys. Sorry. This is unfortunately this is not the the format for for back and forth but but I will say generally in a process like this once we have some confidence that this is a feasible project that with the zoning we're looking at we would immediately be moving into further architectural development. Okay. Uh thank you to the applicant and now we will move to the portion of the hearing uh where the planning commission uh will deliberate and if you guys have any questions for the applicant or the staff uh now is the time for us to do that.

Have one question um maybe for the applicant maybe for staff. Um what is the current what's the height of the current building? I think it's required in the PE application. I didn't see it. Maybe I missed it. But that was also a question that came up during the public hearing you guys had or the meeting. Yeah. The height of the current building is about 26 27 feet. Okay. Gotcha. I think that's helpful for the year. Well, I have a related question in C2. How high what's the highest it can go? C2. Yeah. Current currently uh industrial is 45 ft. change C2. If it's changed C2, it's no different. So, it would be 42,

right? The proposal as measured here is between 20 if you look at the can that be ever be changed. I mean, there's they came with a plan that was 44 feet. Would that 42 feet would that could that fall? I mean, can they build another Yeah. Yeah. They can go with any height they want. Even though right now the plan say it's 35 ft for residential and C2. So, C2 zoning and residential are different. So if you if they went mixed use in a C2 at a coffee shop, it could then be 45, which they could do in C2,

right? The proposal you see before you is between 22 and 33 feet tall. It's a PUD. It's it sets the groundwork and binds the ultimate development. So conditional use in a C2, all residential product requires a planned unit development. The planned unit development as laid out in his before you page 102 in your packet includes elevations, plans, parking. Those are really the parameters that we work around.

And if I can just add one thing to Dustin's comments, ultimately we do have to be within substantial conformance of the conceptual drawings that got submitted in our packet. And so if we started changing uses around building height significantly, uh, anything that would be really concerning, we would be shown up here again to have that conversation. Yeah. Well, we've seen that not too long ago, so it's just curious that that tracks for you, Dustin.

Yeah. Uh, the PUD really sets the the the boundaries. Any any construction drawings that come out of it has to be consistent with the PUD and these findings. any modifications from a PUD would then uh if it were to hide their number of units or anything that's considered a major modification uh which is a term of art in your code they would return here and say this is our PUD uh you've heard it here's our modifications it would be evaluated for the PC

uh okay parking is was my main concern and it seems to be a concern of a lot of a lot of people uh that wrote and and also testified. I've done a dozen 12 PUDs in this town over the course of my career and I uh had varying luck with the parking and I found that garages people don't use them. They just don't use them. even a two-car garage, especially if there's there's going to be two cars for every dwelling. There's I I actually took your plans and tried to redo them to look if there was some way to do some uh cluster parking on site, but there just no way and get that many units there. It's impossible. And you've probably seen that, too. Uh you're going to have a dozen cars on the street all the time for people living in those dwellings. And I don't think there's anything to be done about it. I don't know if that's a deal breaker. I don't think that's anything to do with us. It's just the way it is. And and plus, I don't think there's any way you can pull into those garages properly. There's not enough room trying to be like a two or three point turn to try to get into a garage with the with that alley you've got. I mean, I've done it a lot and I can see that it's just not going to work. It's too bad you can't find a way to have at least 10 parking spots where people can park and walk into their units from there if they're going to be on the street. And I I'm I we can't say you can't do that because, you know, everything's allowed. That's just a tough one. I don't know. I'm just bringing that up. I don't have a solution to it or anything. Just it's they're all everyone that's concerned about parking is right. They should be concerned.

Thank you. Uh ultimately it is something that is a little bit out of our control. As the applicant, we meet the standard. Uh we provide the required parking. We look to improve the width of the street to ease some of that conflict. Uh I have heard across jurisdictions that how people use the garage is becoming more more of a problem but ultimately we haven't quite have we don't have the code uh that really provides us a good way of controlling that uh especially given that's something that how that gets used is up to the owner of that unit. And so we hear the concerns. We understand the concerns. We've done what we can to alleviate that. Uh but ultimately there's only so much we can do at this time.

Yeah. I'm not asking you to change it. I'm just I'm just bringing it up and and just kind of uh verifying everyone's concerns and and acknowledging them. And I don't have there's yeah I just like way to have some some cluster parking inside the unit the the development and I think you haven't got enough room to make those garages work that well acting out everything is going to be it's going to be an issue but again you've you've dotted all your eyes and crossed all your tees with this. I I see that. So we have I got other

I got a staff question. Uh, I was going to help out and Bill, I'll take it in one second. Mike, just and for the audience, for the record, on page 116, they have the site plan included, which has the internal drive width, it's just short of 20 ft in width for the drive, which is uh as wide as our alley standard. So, although it's tight, it's tucked between two buildings, there is a it it does match up with the the dimensions that we would have for a public alley. So, tight. Um, it's an urbanized site, but I wouldn't consider it an unreasonable dimension when it matches up with an alley with uh, and then per parking uh, required by code shown in the PUD, two units per each of these dwelling units off street is provided.

U, Bill, did you have some?

Yeah, I got I got two questions. Hey, Dustin or Jacob, could you walk us through the density calculation for this property? the unit number units if it were zoned R3 and apply the 30% bonus density. Um essentially R3 it's flat density is eight at this site. Um 5,000 for the first two units 1500 thereafter. U for current proposal it's shown at 11. Um with no bonus prevent uh density allowed allowed for 16 units or affordability. it. So the question I'm asking is if we zone like for me I think this is a great project. I like it. It's in the right spot. It's the right size. I am have a problem with the zone change and I don't think the findings are accurate. I think we're they're being they're not I don't think the findings are accurate. So what the the question I'm trying to ask there's two questions is one if the applicant were to if we were to change this to R3 and the applicant wanted to keep a very similar type of project can he get a 30% bonus density with architectural features and what would that and what would the number of units be?

Uh I don't have that top of my head and it's not proposed in the application packet. Uh is there ability to adjust the base density under uh under Senate Bill 1537? Uh I don't believe there's a base density provision for 1537. Uh there's some measurable standards especially in C2. Measurable standards in C2. I'm not quite sure what height height setback 10% open space there. There's some of those standards. Um 1537.

Yep. But that is also not a part of this application. They have not sought a variance or adjustment. Yep. Um, I'm trying to figure out how we approve this project, but not switch it to C2 because I think it's one not justified based upon the data from the economic opportunities analysis or the housing needs analysis. It's not a multifamily project. It's a single family residential project. And um I'm it's a slippery slope. We we changed this to R2. Then we're going to change another lot to R2 to justify it under the housing uh need. And I think we should get there some other way. I like the project.

Bill, you said R2. Did you mean C2? I mean R3. Okay. Thank you.

Yeah. I'm just the fact that it could be we change this to C2 and then two years down the road it's a car wash. even if we tried to impose some density calculation and if we're going to be using this as the needed housing as a justification. Um the fact that these could easily be all short-term rentals. Um it it it's concerning because then it will not be provided needed housing. Yeah, I I too share that concern with the C2 zoning that even if we do get the those uh dwelling units that they inevitably become their highest and best use financially, which would be short-term rental. And um if we're able to get to this through an R type zoning, then that that I think that that would be the ideal situation. and it makes everybody's we don't have to worry about conditions that likely we can apply um in terms of protection from short-term um rentals. Um yeah, Commissioner Lidle, do you have anything?

Yeah. Um, so I've got a poor connection, but I I agree with you guys that um going into C zoning is a slippery slope, and I'm a little uncomfortable with it. I'd feel a lot better if this was an R3. I'll just leave it at that. Okay. Yeah, I would I mean, I think I've I've said this prior, but I I agree with that. I think this this should should and can be reszoned, but I don't think C2 is the right classification for it. I'd rather see an R3.

So to the just for point of clarification to ask uh the commission um in this application, you are the decision body on the PUD itself. Uh the zone change comes before uh city council. So we're looking for decision on the PUD. Any of that is pending a zone change. uh we'd be asking planning commission to make a recommendation to city council when they contemplate that their zone change. So in terms of your role, you you have a conditional use approval standard and a recommendation role by way of zone change. So on the PUB, we're assessing this as if it were a C2.

That's correct. Zone already. Yeah. Okay. Okay, you just just so you know, you can you cannot you cannot approve a zone change. You're only recommending

we would give recommendation to city council on the zone change. Today we are here to deliberate the file um for the PUD. Um so not the zone change we we give recommendation to city council. So with that framing, you know, I think the PUD does meet all the standards that we would require for a PUD as if it was a C2. Um, however, for me, the recommendation would be to not do the zone change to C2. Um and since we are to make a decision based on the standards set before us, not and it should be an unbiased um decision. Um yeah, I mean that that that's the way that I would frame my my vote. Um, and so just with that being said, if there's any more comment around this, um, or if there's a motion, um, if there is no more comments, um, yeah, I welcome that from the commission.

Commissioner, we had one hand up raised from the public. Uh, we're really only taking procedural questions and the time for testimony is over. So, I just want to make sure we have a procedural question out there that we have it addressed. Yeah. Can we see what the hand raise was? Is that from Patrick Jones? And is that just I think he was having a hard time. Uh yes. I'm I'm not sure. I uh I understand with this procedural business. Uh so you've you've you've heard all the testimony times been used, right?

Correct. Yeah. Unless unless there was a procedural error where we we had the testimony time. I gotcha. Um, no, I guess I think I'm good. I I just uh just was amazed at the difference of how the study uh did have exact figures on like elevation. First it was 23 24 feet, but it could go to 45. Uh that's very confusing.

Gotcha. Okay. Yeah. Thank you, Patrick. I think uh at this moment in time and where we're at with the proceeding, we'll um we'll move forward with the planning commission deliberation and if there is a motion that anybody would like to bring forth. Did you have a procedural? Sure.

Oh. And then there's a button there to to press. Yeah. Perfect. Steve Lambert. Okay. So, the procedural question is you folks are voting on if a C2 reszoning, correct? And then you're going to prove it to the No, we we will be you're voting on we're voting on the PUD and then we will also give a recommendation. So, if we were to approve the PUD, we would also give a recommendation for the zoning change. So, it's it's two things together. Yeah, you will vote on a recommendation. But you will not approve that recommendation. Right. That that that's to city council.

The recommendation would be to potentially change the zoning to city c to Yeah. So city council holds that power and we would just only give a recommendation and then we could appeal to the city council as well. Correct. And there'd be a hearing. All right. Thank you. Yeah. But I don't think we're I mean we're not going to make any recommendation around an R3 zoning. Just I'm talking we're going to make a recommendation around the zoning the reszone request that's been made. That's it.

Right. We know corre correct. You your recommendation is based on the proposal. Any additional commentary however is is welcome and you know in terms of findings you want to produce that um for them for them to hear.

I do just have a a staff report uh question um comment detail that I wanted to bring up. Um, I don't think it it doesn't change the nature of this application and I'm not really sure where to put this, but I just want to put it out there mostly for the commission and maybe for staff is to kind of gain alignment on it. Um, and it's our our friend surrounding area as it relates to compatibility. So I if looking at page 11 of the staff report um if commissioners can head there if possible. There's just some language in here that staff wrote. Um I guess my first question is for staff. Jacob, if you wrote this, what where is this boilerplate language? Did this around the surrounding area definition um or where does this come from? Yeah, this is pretty typical. Um I think some of the key terms that are in here, uh it talks about a minimum. The notice doesn't drop below the um the noticing area 250 ft. However, there are certain adjustments based on you know, let me summarize time, placement or circumstances that may allow that to be adjusted.

Okay. Um that's that is where does that come from? That's a typ that's what we use. Correct. That's that's our typical convention or standard you guys apply.

Correct. Okay. It's um I would consider it more flexible allowing some change based on circumstance and uh I think we continue and will continue to use that. It's also backed by um some court law and case law um Wilbur I think it's Wilbur v. Douglas County that's my shortened version of it. uh that basically says you cannot just rest on notice area as the static or something arbitrary. Um that really supports our if something else changes this bigger project we would want to expand that and we it definitely gives us notice and we could incorporate this that we can't just use the notice area as our as our baseline.

Just because it's a notice area doesn't mean it's the surrounding area that the court would would resist that. Yeah. I I I think it just um creates a really unclear target and so I'm not I'm not really a fan of of this definition and that it's really not it says in some cases we can use a large portion of the city and in our prior judgment we decided we weren't going to use a large portion of the city and so I think I think we need to just get alignment on this be and I'm not sure if commission can ask for different language to be in staff reports or if this is purely a staff this is decision.

Yeah, I think this is a the staff's report to you. Um every time you see this if you want to you know we may come with something specific saying this is what we think it is. Um but certainly you have uh I would suggest in whatever circumstance comes before you'd say you know we think this is the right area because yeah and so you have the opportunity to to either affirm it or modify it when when it comes to your hands saying this is this is the general area that we we should be contemplating. So I think it's so

this is accurate that in this case it did consider the the surrounding area to be the 250 ft of the subject site. I would then don't explain what we're not using. Just omit that and just say this is what we are applying. That would be my preference just so that we don't add um questions about why some other distance wasn't applied. So that that's my only comment on that and just kind of going forward. But I'm not sure if it matters in this case. But yeah, sorry to have to talk about surrounding area again. Yeah, I get my my comment on is the surrounding area is 250 is too small generally in all cases. So I don't necessarily agree.

Great. This has been uh likely. So, how about Go ahead,

Joe. Why don't Why don't I make a We got two things to vote on here. Um why don't I make a motion that we Well, the the issue is I I I'm not in agreement with certain findings in the staff report. Um and those findings are related to the zone change. So, uh, I guess staff, how do you recommend we move forward? Can we ex can we agree to can we make a motion or vote on the staff report and the associated findings except for the zone change?

Yeah, you have actually two actions here. One of them is a vote on the the the PUD and the conditional use approval. second is the vote on the you can absolutely break them into two. uh if you have alternative findings that you suggest for the C2 aspect um we'd throw them in there but I think taking two votes is good and and that's as well

can so uh one more question so assuming we approve the PUB with the associated findings um and then city council goes and approves the zone change Um, there's not really I guess there could be conditions associated with the zone change specifically. I guess that's a question. That's correct. Or are we going to have to get all the conditions we want into this right now?

No. You um importing importing conditions is okay, but um if they're insufficient conditions or terms, city council could have their own installed. So, you don't have to have them all in now. They're only recommendations. Yeah. So, so, okay. Recommendations on the zoning change again would only be a recommendation to the city council. Bill, can you provide some just maybe one example of what you're talking about?

Well, uh, I need to get to the page. Um, it's it's related to justification. So, I was on the economic opportunities analysis committee. I was on the housing needs analysis committee. And very specifically, it was there was no discussion that we were going to take industrial lands and reszone them to C2 to justify to provide additional housing. What we determined was that we had an excess of C2 lands and we had a shortage of R3 lands and that we should be doing R3 in our um in our we should be doing multif family projects in our C2 zone. that that's that's what was just that's that's the summary of those documents and that's not what is that's not what these documents are saying. Does that make sense?

Yeah. But what section are you are you I mean I think that the document is saying we don't need this as industrial. I'm not sure. Well, the the justificate let me get to the page. Um, if we get to um, Bill, go to page 40.

Is it 40? Yeah. Yeah, I guess there. Uh, yeah. I mean, it's basically page Dustin's got it. under goal 10 um it's housing needs analysis without residential development C2 zone we'd have a deficit of land for multif family development like I agree with that statement because that is accurate but that doesn't in my mind just this is not a multif family project it's a single it's attached single family which there's a there's a very specific difference in our zoning ordinance with related related to that so I don't feel like this is an appropriate justification for both 10. So I don't I don't think these findings support the re the justification for a reason.

Yeah, I would I mean I would agree with that. I think I kind of made this statement earlier that I think the housing needs analysis was talking about um land already zoned as C2. So I think

that's cor that's exactly what it was considering because we did an inventory of it and we had economic opportunities analysis we had a surplus of C2 land and we had a shortage of R3. So the justification was hey you can make up for and in and R3 and it was and as as Justin said earlier it wasn't it wasn't just housing it was multifamily housing specifically that we were supposed to be doing in R3 in C2 and this is not multifamily and it and it's and it's a reszone not existing C2. So that's that's the rub where I don't agree with the findings. I I think we could add that with the zone, you know, recommendation as a as a detail.

Yeah, I think I guess what we should do is vote on the PUD. I mean, that seems like that would be one thing to do. So, I could make a motion that we approve the planned unit development file number 20 2532 um with the staff report as submitted except for uh the zone change component of it. Okay. Do we have a second? I'll second that. All in favor?

Yes. Uh, Zach. Oh, yes. I'm in favor. And I am also in favor. So, that motion passes um unanimously. And our second action here is uh for a recommendation to the city council. Um, I would entertain a motion for that.

I I think we really need to get some real clear communication to council for them to consider. So, I think we should maybe kind of outline what those points are and maybe we could look to staff to take record of this. Mhm. Um and then once we have some agreement upon what the components of our recommendation and this information we want to communicate to council once we get an agreement on what that is, then maybe we can make a motion.

Yeah, I'm okay with that. Do we have anything that uh you guys want to parse out here? Something that you'd like to call out um in our recommendation to city council?

The the first thing for Well, I got I got a few things. Um, one is that I think this is a precedent setting activity. Um, what's to say we don't take some other random spot and reszone it to C2 under the justification of housing only to have that housing never get built? And so that's I guess one bullet point I would like to communicate to council. Yeah. Does everybody agree with that one?

Yeah, I agree with that, Bill. Um I think I think the idea behind the zone change in an ideal situation, correct? you know, we do want as much housing, but I don't think the C2 appropriately protects from kind of one of the downfalls um that we've been trying to protect from, which is the short-term housing um yeah, taking over, you know, more of a long-term housing situation. So, yeah, I I agree with that. Any other commissioners? And I think also other future commercial use. I think I would add that on too.

I agree. Yeah. If you're if I get four of you to say you're on board with that, I can kind of Yeah. log these and inventory them. I don't I don't want to go through them and then have them drop off. So was my concern from the be the get-go was uh improper use or legal use but not exactly what the what the spirit of the housing needs analysis was. Okay. So precedent setting short-term rental and concern about allowing um kind of those unforeseen the unforeseen permitted uses.

Yeah. I think I think also just clearly inconsistent with surrounding zoning. I mean it creates a it creates an island um of C2 not near any other C2. And so I I think if we we buy this you know interface um point that there should be this interface of higher density between R and I then we that should be a strategy. we should articulate that strategy and we should then implement that strategy. I don't think we should implement that strategy with one development. Um I think we need to buy into that as a city if we're going to yeah do it.

I don't I don't necessarily take issue with the interface idea of it. However, um I think based on our our needs, I think we were looking more for long-term dwelling units, not potential short-term rental units.

Yeah, I think uh the zoning between the different areas, this was a little uh a little less harsh. It's more of a a gentle transition from residential to instead of right to C2. I agree. But I'm also as a developer can tell you losing three houses is a huge hit. And what they would say and what I would say if I were with them would look like well that means all the houses are going to cost another $150,000 a piece or 200,000 a piece more. It makes one one house losing one house makes a big difference. Losing three is significant. Right. But I'm in agreement with everything we're saying. I'm just giving them a bone basically.

No. Yeah. I Yeah. And I think we're considering and I I agree with you Mike, you know, with my real estate back background as well, you know, you see what that does as a developer to the cost per unit. So yeah, Zach, did you have any input on this? No, I don't have anything on that. Okay. Well, I mean,

so we have we have one let's I'd like to staff to go through if we're going to be communicating stuff at council. We've got we've got the we've got the precedent setting concern that we're just going to basically go around and spot zone C2 under the justification of housing. Correct. Yeah. I have I have your precedent, concern, the fact that if this is left vacant, it can leave the opportunity for unforeseen uses or commercial uses that aren't residential and the concern of the STR proliferation.

Would that be exclusively from industrial or from this this going to be like we're going to go into any kind of zoning change? It could be a slippery slope. Is this specifically industrial to C2? I think it's specifically this proposal.

Yeah. Okay. I I guess the um the place in the event um I think the findings are just an error like I think I think I think you could if you look if you look at the zone change. Did we lose you, Bill? Sorry. Yep. Um so I the the the I want to go come back to the findings error because I think we I think we should figure that out and correct it. Um the if I go under the um approval criteria I'm on page uh 42. Um, number two is there's a public need for the change and this is identifi and this identified need will be served by changing the zone or plans designation for the subject properties. Like that's an easy thing to do. We've we've we've got the housing needs analysis. We can justify that, you know, basically all types of houses are needed housing in the state of Oregon. And I think like that that criteria there is really easily met. Number two, um I think we really muddy the water when we start pulling in the justification of multifamily in the C2 zone like that that crit. So, I I I think I'm looking at um I'm I'm I don't I don't really know that I feel like pages 42, 43, 44

um and 45 like that's the section of the findings where I'm just kind of like uh I think we need to be very careful there and concise and precise that We're really using only needed housing and we're not using the multif family and C2 justification. Does that make sense? Yeah, that makes sense to me. I mean, I think I think if you were to look at this from a I to R3, you would use the same justification. Yes.

Right.

Yep. Yep. And then I I guess I guess if we're going to be communicating stuff to council, um and and I guess this is to the applicant, uh I think there are possibly other mechanisms under the city code and the state code where they could get to the density that they want under R3. It would be a different process. I mean, I think they could do I'm not I haven't gone through the analysis, but it seems like under 1537, you can get a bonus density of 20%. Um, under the PD ordinance, you can get a bonus density of 30%. So, I think we could have a very similar project in the R3 zone. And I think I mean, I'll just communicate that to I guess council and it it's it's it's not a founded opinion because I haven't gone through it, but I think I think we could communicate that to the applicant and to council. staff. Does that track uh

um bills are

Oh, microphone. Sorry. Uh yeah. Uh I'm hearing it. However, that's not the application that we're looking to justify. So right we we we can still communicate it though just yeah just to inform our recommendation. So I think in summary without getting into all the numbers the is it planning commission at large thinks they could get there with the residential zone. Well Bill does Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And and I mean I think to Bill's point and what Dustin is I think what he's trying to say is that we are here to to talk about the application as it's set forth to us.

Yes. So then and so then the recommendation if if I'm trying to kind of distill it down here would be that uh we don't think that the C2 is justified uh because of potential uses um in the future and additionally to help the applicant because we do want applicants to develop in the city of Hood River. Uh, I think what we're asking is if an R3 zoning could could come out with a very similar project. Does that sound accurate to your recommendations, Bill? Yes.

Yeah. I think that I think point being um it doesn't justify uh sorry, the housing needs analysis does not justify this resumption of a C2. I think that in my mind seems clear. The housing needs analysis u does justify this plan being used for housing. I would agree.

Yeah. So with that being said, um it seems like we are coming to a pretty good agreement here on what recommendation we want to make to city council. Um, so would we do a motion for this or is this just something that Dustin, you guys would distill or uh put into writing for us? I'll we'll put it in writing, but I can get the general points um being back to precedent setting concern about vacancy and the opportunity for unforeseen uses in the C2 zone, those commercial that wouldn't move the needle on uh your HNA proliferation of short-term rentals concern that uh the justification is not there for a C2s on under the HNA and that the applicant could get there with an R3 designation get there meaning get to an approved development of equal density.

I mean that's not I I think we're not uh voting I mean that's not the application. So I think I would be concerned commentary is commentary in your findings of your nonC2 recommendation. Okay. Yeah. So, we would want a motion to set this. I as chair, I'm not allowed to motion. Correct. Uh, do do we have a motion to recommend? Yeah. So, I can I can have a go at it.

Thank I guess I would so I would recommend that we um sorry I'll make a motion to re to recommend to council uh to not approve the C2 reszone um uh with the following uh justification for our for our recommendation included uh that it's not consistent um with the surrounding area that we have um that the housing needs analysis does not justify this being reszoned to C2. Um that the Dustin is going to remind me of the other ones. precedent setting. Uh that this could be precedent setting and we don't want that uh to be the case and unforeseen uses uh both uh straightforward commercial and also potentially short-term rental of the proliferation of STRs. Do we have a second?

Yeah, I'll second. All in favor, unless there's no more discussion, take hold on a sec. Let's have a discussion on the motion. Let's let's let's amend the motion or I I would suggest it. Can we we can amend a motion. Um that I guess the only thing that I would the only thing that I would add is in the event that council is going to consider approving this that they should impose additional conditions to satisfy our concerns. That would be a part of our recommendation.

I think if the motion's been made and seconded, we have to vote and then make a new motion. Is that correct? That's my question. uh in order to amend the motion uh we would have to have both the the one who motioned and the second allow for reconsideration. Okay. So we it's not super formal but if if you both agree you can back out and then have that amendment. Okay. Bill, can you can you say that one more time?

Yeah. I I guess I mean we stated our our case pretty clearly or our thinking. Um my concern is that council here's what we had to say and they're like, "Oh, we're just let's just approve this." Um in the event that they approve it, I would like to really make sure that they I this is my goes back to my question of Dustin earlier, they do have the ability to insert additional findings at that point. So, I think we should highlight for council if they're going to approve it that they have the ability to add additional findings um that could address a variety of different concerns. And I guess that specifically could be related to, you know, the precluded from doing short-term rentals on the site that they were guaranteed to do a minimum number of housing units under any development scenario.

Those sounded like conditions, not findings. Uh you that they could apply conditions, not findings. Yes. Yeah. Correct. Yep. Yeah. So, I like your motion. I would just suggest we amend it if we choose not to. I'm okay amending it with um we would we would make the recommendation to council to include conditions that would mitigate any of these uh concerns that we have it in the event they're going to approve it. Yes. Okay. Okay. So, we're recommending that they don't approve it, but in the event that they do approve it, we're suggesting that they at least should heavily condition it.

Okay. Uh, so I'm hearing that you guys are both okay with backing out of the initial motion. So let's clean it up with one final motion and then we'll look for a second. Does that sound okay? I think we can amend if as long as the second Who seconded you seconded. Are you okay with the amended motion? Long long as you agree to the amendment, we can move forward with All right. Okay. We have a second. So it is seconded. All in favor? Yes. I Yes. Yes. Yes. And I uh so this uh recommendation passes unanimously as well.

That motion is approved. You have a decision on the PUD and a uh a recommendation on the the zone request that will go to go before council at a sub hearing. Uh we'll advertise that um time and date certain. Um and then we will render this uh decision in writing. We'll ask you to sign it. Um that will start that process. So uh okay. So if nothing else uh I will

yeah one one more thing uh outside the hearing may we will be back with a code update. Um so um just to keep your eyes and ears open the consolidated code update will be back to you board commission. That's all. All right. This has been great. Uh I will adjourn today's meeting at 7:18. Thank you everyone.