Planning & Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

[snorts] over. Let's call this meeting to order. It is 1:38 on January 15th and we'll do the roll call and Commissioners Bateson, Foster, Harwood, Slater, Summer, and Bulls are present. Commissioner James is absent. Are there any changes to the agenda? Okay, seeing none, agenda is approved and uh any changes to the December 4th, 2025 minutes. So, entertain a motion. Motion of approval. Okay,

I'll second it. Um, all those in favor of approving the minutes say I. I. Anybody for nay? Okay. Thank you. All right. Next time is new business. We need to elect a chair and co-chair. So, who would like to be the first victim? I would like to nominate I'm sorry. No, go ahead. Um, Tammy as co as chair. I second that. Okay. All right, I accept. And uh all those in favor? I. Any opposed?

Well, thank you, I guess. [laughter] Yeah, just more work. That's okay. It's all good. And then uh we need a co-chair. You up for that? I am. I nominate Victoria. Okay. And a second. Okay. All those in favor for Victoria to be co-chair. I I Any opposed? All right. Very good. I'm glad you guys can hear. You know, I'm having a terrible time here. Okay. You want me to speak up a little bit? No, that's okay. I'm doing the best I can. I got these things cranked up as high as I can crank them. My hearing is in the last few months just went. Well, there's a lot of ambient noise, too.

Yeah, I can hear something running in the background. Okay. I'm sorry. Just let you know. Okay. And these girls have to speak up all the time for me, too. I can't hear where those

um so we also have uh community development staff in attendance. We have community development director David Callahan for the next two weeks. Planning manager Ben Tarbutton. Did I say that right? Tarbutton. Tar. Okay. Administrative secretary Joselyn Henning and administrative manager Reeba Greatness. And attorney Pat. Thank you. So, moving on, we're to the workshop discussion. I will turn this over to David to give us a background, maybe help our new members have a better understanding of what we're looking at here. The starting point for those of you that are new is that [snorts] the ordinance you will have in hearing and that's in front of you now um is already in the code but as an interim ordinance. So it it has to by law come back around on this this review process to make it a permanent part of the code. And so I guess one way to look at it is everything you're about to consider in the public hearing is tried and true and working well. So arguably there's no no debate about that. But there is one little twist in the U that Pat can speak to. It's a little different from current code and that's because the setbacks for um trams are now different than what they used to be in the so there are some new areas that reflect that they just make it clear that trams don't have to meet setbacks anymore.

Well, it's still a five foot setback for sign. I missed that. Okay. I thought yeah I think that was something that we wanted to maybe just vet out through the workshop. Okay.

But I think that is one thing that we wanted to talk about and we have talked about as staff is that we oftentimes have got situations where a tram is next to a property line or they want to share a tram between two properties because you know the infrastructure can be expensive. Um but because we have currently a a a setback requirement for those stairways, walkways and trams, it just has proven to be complicated. Uh especially when there's landings, you know, there's landings of course at the top and the bottom for trams that you know those that infrastructure also would need to be set back from the side property lines. And so we've had some contractors express some interest saying if we get both property owners on board and we have some kind of easement for use, we don't see any reason for there to be a setback requirement from that interior property line. And so I think staff's supportive of uh of changing that from what it was a five feet to um do something as a a zero foot setback. As long as of course you know if there is no sharing between two properties as long as all of the infrastructure including the cart uh is fully within the property line. So there's no overhanging. Oh, they're splitting a cart or something, you know,

unless they have a joint. Yeah, unless unless there's an actual use easement for that splitting a baby or something. Okay. But we would we would be supportive of looking at a a sideyard setback of zero. And that's something we could, you know, tweak with the uh ordinance uh that will be at your review. And would you consider exception in the ordinance? In other words, if you had if they weren't going to share, then you'd have a setback. But if they are going to share, you'd be zero. Is that how you're going to do it? Or what do you

uh I guess what we would propose to do is just be a zero foot sorry zero foot sideyard setback. Um and then if they are going to share, it's possible that you could perhaps have some kind of encroachment over the property line. Um but again, open to ideas. If you take out any setback at all, u do you foresee any problems with neighbors not not wanting, you know, to have the thing that close to their property line or something like that. I mean, it's easier for you guys to write something that says just zero, but then you've got, you know, I can understand if you got two property owners want to share the same, you know, thing or whatever. That's great.

I think what it comes down to is unlike a retaining wall or a fence, these trans are not obstructionists. Okay? They don't create walls that separate neighbors. They created a little area where the tram goes up and down. And the only thing you really have to be careful about is that the tram is all either within a a joint easement or all on one property. So with your joint easement, what happens if one property owner sells the other one and the new property? It has to be joint and has to run with the land.

Yeah. The easement would stay with the land. And so they if you're buying the property, you're going to have a title report done and part of the incumbrances on that property are going to show and that would be one of them. Yeah. And a title shirt search that would show that would that's the sort of thing we would establish as part of our review if they're running it down the middle right on the property line. We say, "Okay, where's your easement?" Yeah. And then once that's recorded, then it's a because my thinking is everybody's different when they buy buy a piece of property, right? And you got so many different new people coming into the area that aren't familiar or haven't had that in the past, you know, have to share something, you know, right?

So that's my only concern. It's the classic buyer beware part of property, but that should show up when they when they purchase a property and the title show Absolutely. In all that process, you know. Well, it's also what the owner should be disclosing. Yes. Yeah. Right. Right. Oh, well, yeah. The realer should disclose. Sometimes that happen. [laughter] Should should.

And if I could just interject, this exact scenario is based on what you were just talking about. We had one single property owner that owned two parcels. Tram was on one parcel, sold both of our family [snorts] properties. And what happened was the result of a civil case. The one they were sharing a tram. The one didn't want to upgrade to the level and so one entered into a civil litigation with the other property owner because they wanted to pay for a new tram because they didn't want to upgrade the other one. Long story short, no matter what happens, there's going to be a setback because because the tram span where it attaches to the ground to prevent trespass of the cart, there's going to be some kind of a physical setback. But the zero as long as the cart doesn't trespass without, like Ben said, an easement,

right? Okay. The effect is the same as desired. Thank you. And I think why it is helpful too to allow for some flexibility is, you know, the slopes are not uniform. And so there are different outcroppings and boulders and things that they kind of need to maybe have more of a diagonal type of an arrangement arrangement. And so we should try and I think in my opinion and I think staff agrees that we should try and work with property owners um if they're on board with sharing a tram that we can give them some flexibility there. Okay. [snorts]

So, back to the ordinance itself. Um, we can go through item by item, but again, this really just replaces what's already in the code today, but on a permanent basis.

I read the thing again. It's what we talked about. Yeah, it's what we I studied it when it was sent to me the other day. So, I think it's a very reasonable thing to do. Yeah. I think that's the only con, you know, problem that I had with it. So, we'll just we'll schedule a hearing. Yeah. Yeah. It's scheduled month next month. Uh February 12th is when this is scheduled with the zero set back then, right? Right. Okay. Unless Yeah. Unless the commission feels otherwise. But yeah. Okay. So, February 12th will be the public hearing. [snorts] Yep. Yep. It is scheduled for that already. Mhm.

All right. Anything else on marine service? No. All right. Unless you have questions. All right. Next one is the minimum lot size in the rural zone. And this is a repeat of what I just said. We've already talked about this. It's a inter in interim going permanent. There is nothing new unlike the last ordinance which had at least a new piece. This this one's exactly the same as before. So I don't know anything else to add to that less. Well, we might explain to our new folks what this is about.

Yeah. Because I mean this was hard for me. I mean, we have a five five acre rule basically in Coutney County. And most of the reason for that was to protect the aquifer, you know, from, you know, a lot size of 7,000 square feet and a zillion septic tanks on top of the aquafer, you know, but but of course, Coney County includes part of the aine reservation and the tribe didn't want properties of smaller than 10 acres down there. So that that was a consideration that we paid when this was all done. So

So in other words, everywhere else in Coupney County, the minimum lot size is five, but down in the res, it's 10. Yeah. Well, it's a little bit more complicated than that. Well, let me let me back up and give you a bigger picture for a moment. Um, and the [clears throat] minimum lot size in the county is actually 8,250. Wow. Depending on which zoning district. Yeah, there's but to your that's why I wanted to jump in. To your point, most of the counties zoned rural. The minimum lot size in that zoning district is five acres,

but there are other districts where you can go much smaller. It's just that they tend to be right next to the lake or in other places where they probably shouldn't be that dense. And part of Pat Braden, civil deputy prosecutor for the record, part of the reason for the 10 acre u minimum is because the tribe wanted to do a water study to to see um you know where there might be water that's scarce within the reservation. and uh and originally the the board the commissioners adopted a 5 acre or I mean a 10acre minimum but only in the rural zone. That ordinance sunsets on June 30th, 2027. And so this would make it consistent across both the A and rural zones with a sunset date of June 30th, 2027 to match the uh the uh increased minimum parcel size in the rural zone within the reservation. So, one other thing I can add to that for the new folks is that the tribe had originally asked us to conduct a reszoning for all the tribal lands. And the concern was that, especially then when they first asked for it, was that we were still getting a great number of minor subdivisions, as the highway district engineers like to say, masquerading. They were really major subdivisions masquerading as minor subdivisions because we'd get 12 minor subdivisions lined right up to each other with four lots each. Yeah,

you do the math. It it should have been a major subdivision, but the law then and now still allows it to be a minor subdivision. So, that's another thing you'll the newbies will have to confront here at some time in the future is we that issue is still out there, hadn't been resolved. The only thing that helps a lot right now is the market has trended off. So, we're just not getting so many minor subdivisions in the door these days and especially the so-called serial ones where they're back to back. But that that's kind of digressing into different weeds. The weeds I want to bring you back to are the tribe asked for a reszoning. We that took a year and a half. We got them through the resoning, but the commissioners gave the tribe about half of what they asked for. You know, tribe wanted no, if I remember right, no minor subdivisions.

They wanted it zoned all agricultural and all act. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I forgot about that.

And so the commissioners kind of split that baby and said, "We're still going to allow subdivision, but the minimum lot size in the tribal area is now going to be 10 acres instead of five acres." But then that got complicated with another ordinance that came along after that called the family exemption where a person anywhere in the county whether in the tribe or not that owns a large track of line land can parcel that out without having to go through a minor subdivisions. There's rules to it. you know, you have to meet certain minimum criteria, but that then compounded the issue in the tribal area where the family exemption wouldn't ordinarily allow you to do five acre lots, but the, you know, the commissioners had just changed it to 10. So, part of the reconciliation of that is before you in here, if I remember right. Is that right,

Pat? Okay. Making a 10. Yeah. keeping a temp.

Yeah. Let me give you a little color of that too on the so let's talk about the water the water issue when within the tribal boundaries um and I'll pick a place. It's called Lake Creek. It runs on the side of the of the reservation. They're monitoring the flows to Lake Creek and and and the tribe has literally they've literally told me that if the flows get down to a certain point that will trigger action by them to shut off water to uh people who live in that area. Full disclosure, I live in that area. Hence, that's why I know. But they will literally tell people to stop pumping. And that's, you know, your only water source out there is a well. There's no public water source, at least where I'm at. And so the reality is if we don't work with the tribe, the county doesn't work with a tribe, there's going to be conflict and there's going to be real problems where people won't be able to live out there because they'll have a house without water, you know, and so that's, you know, in balancing the the the rights and and the property rights, it's a balance. It's not just, you know, a cry for, you know, property rights because once the property rights start to infringe on the tribe, they're going to take action. Um, and I think the compromise worked out. I I mean, I was worried we're going to have litigation. I haven't seen anything like that or heard anything like that. um in the litigation and and we've talked a lot about this before is based on basically the Montana case. So the concept that once the fundamental certain fundamental like um you know water, you know, uh open space, you know, certain fundamental rights the tribe has within the reservation that will trump what the county can do. And in my view, I just I'm transparent, my position is always to try to avoid the conflict and reach compromise with the tribe so that we don't get into litigation because that's a nightmare

and and the tribe is, you know, potentially a very strong position. The the other thing I I just want to talk about is these minor major subdivisions. It's kind of a one of my pet projects here is to fix that because because it's abused. um and when it was first passed, you know, so my colleagues voiced a concern that said, "Wait a minute. We understand the spirit of what you're trying to do." But, you know, developers, it's just a, you know, developers are going to go in the direction. They're not bad people. They're just going in the direction what makes the most money, right? They're going to they're out to make a profit. So, they're going to do these minor subdivisions and amalgamate them. And again, what we have is a conflict of property rights because while you can you can do that and and make more money and and skirt the sub there's a lot of things get skirted. One is the notice provision that people and I and out my way this has been an uproar ever since co because a lot of the developers have moved south um of town and and so the flavor of this is you you've got a a lot of pressure to develop south of town now because north has pretty much been done and and you know with the minor subdivisions they were putting in they weren't giving the notice that would be required by a major subdivision and a lot of the people that that live in you know it's a rural area. They enjoy it that way. They don't want it to be built up so much. They and and for good reason because we have, you know, um difficulty particularly south of town with a clay soil. The um it doesn't percolate. So you have to have these special, you know, cy dome systems for the sewage and everything and it tends to run off and it'll run literally down into the lake. You know, there are times you can smell it when you drive by people's places because it's running off. Um and and and there's other problems with with the land down there that that that make it not as conducive as say up north where it generally is, you know, better for development. Plus, you have a tribe issue. The tribe is doesn't want a bunch

of subdivisions. So, you know, we ran into this problem of of of these, you know, major subdivisions being put in masquerading as, you know, minor subdivisions and and it and it goes even further because you start the problem is compounded because for a major subdivision, you not only have to give notice, have hearings and everything, and I know it's a hassle, but it's there for a reason. And and then you have to put in proper roads with proper widths and everything for the firet trucks and all that. And and and the problem is you get these subdivisions that don't have the proper access, you know, ingress and egress. And you know, the fire chiefs are upset about that because they can't get their trucks in or when they get them in there's problems and you know, people can get hurt and die and stuff burns down and it it's a real real safety hazard. So yeah, I mean I I hope we do tackle that because the main reminder subdivision is a real problem and it needs to be addressed and it's not about and I always want to stress it's not about, you know, we're cutting people's property rights. we're trying to do is balance them so that so that one person's property right doesn't infringe upon the other. I mean, if a developer comes in, makes lots of money, does a lot of minor subdivisions, and leaves it without the proper infrastructure, roads, sewer, whatever, it's a problem for everybody when they leave and we're all stuck with it. Now we got to now we got to deal with it and it's a mess. And that's that's what I see as the problem. And if I spit on

No, I was spot on. I think one of the [laughter] messes it creates is an imbalance of funding for services. Right. Right. There's a myth been around in this country for 50 years that the taxes paid on residential homes cover government services. That has never been true. No. Ever. Yeah. If you want a vision on that, just go to the the the dumpsters down my way. Um because everybody who goes to lake down there it's on on s road I mean you know you got all the people from from out of state that come from Washington. I don't want to pick on Washingtonians but they do come and dump their dump you know stuff there because so convenient

and then you have you know the the growing population and and there's there's stuff plastics and everything across the fields. Even my field, I own about 100 acres down there that I farm and I'm forever pick picking crud off my property because it's blowing out from the the dumpsters because they're overflowing constantly. Um, and so I mean that's just a visual. It's a pet peeve of mine.

I just like to, you know, support what he said. I worked with the tribe for 20 years in my before I retired this last time. And it's better to work these things out than to take them all the way to the to the bitter end. And like he says, I think if we can work with the tribe rather than con confront them because they they they they're they're very they're not they're very sophisticated in what they do and so so they again, you know, they want to exercise their rights. They want sovereignty and all that kind of stuff. So it's best that we work together with them on stuff rather than have some kind of a confrontation. Based based on that, David, can you cover for our newbies the u the authority of the county versus the tribe and how

sure how we you know stay friendly. I'll start and then the attorneys in the room can actually fill the gaps. But I I think the attorneys will agree that land use law is complicated as it is. Throw in Indian law and all bets are off. I think the most complicated law there is is Indian law.

And so with that, you know, remember that you're dealing with a sovereign nation. When you talk about the tribe, that means our zoning doesn't affect them at all. But we zone areas of the tribe anyway for multiple reasons. one is that if it comes out from underneath the tribal ownership, we don't want to be naked, so to speak, where a a new buyer could build anything because it's unzoneed. Um, and it's this that's just a standard practice that communities, city and county, have used all around the nation anytime there's tribes and other government entities. You'll often see federal government land zoned something for the same exact reason even though it's completely exempt. So what I'm trying to help you formulate in your mind is that the sovereign nation of the tribe can do whatever they want on land they own and on land that u direct descendants of you tribal members own. But then there's also a whole I think there's four other ways that the the tribe can actually own land in trust and in other ways that I I've never mastered. Pat knows more about,

but where I'm going with this is that those different kinds of ownership, it's fair to say I think all still give the tribe pure exemption from our zoning regulations. It gets a little weird after that because zoning's different from subdivision and different from other regulations. And so sometimes you start to see and that's why I opened up with the law under these circumstances is complex because sometimes it interweavves. EPA would be an example. You could talk about that.

I can talk about the EPA. Dave, does the tribe have their own permitting process for their land or people who own property on the land? I mean, is that I don't It depends on the tribe. Well, I know tribes are different because we had a ranch in Montana, right? We couldn't even hunt on our own land on the because it was on the reservation. The only time we could hunt on our own land was if a tribal member was with us. Wow. I mean, and so it's varies from tribe to tribe. Yeah.

Add a little bit of color to that. Um, the Supreme Court of the United States hasn't decided what a tribe is still in terms [snorts] of of of sovereignty. I it's gone all over the map. It's it's called them a separate nation, a sovereign nation, which because you only have treaties with a nation, right? The United States only has a treaty with, you know, hopefully with Greenland, but you know, [laughter]

good timing. nations, right? Yeah. Um and and and so the the United States entered into treaties with these sovereign nations. So that kind of is on one end of the spectrum. But on the other hand other hand you have these cases where you know it's been battled out between the state and the tribe you know the taxing cases where they tax gas and and and you saw how the you know the the uh the lake case came out you know the the court lake case came out the tribe won you know that under the treaty they had a right to the to the lake sold half the lake but the best I and and Pat probably could say more but the best I see in it is that a tribe is generally looked that is kind of on a par with a state.

So they're kind of like a state. So when you get into conflict between them and the county, the county generally is going to be a more disadvantage probably just generally speaking. Um the the re in terms of the the the the trib's ability to regulate non-Indians within the reservation. Again, it's a complicated area because there are certain activities or things that can be rated, but generally speaking, the tribes not able to to dictate, you know, what I do on my land. Okay? They they I'm a non-Indian, so they don't have the right to it's not Indian land. So they so you know we had one of those patchwork reservations that was opened up for because the we used to be on the reservation here and then this the United States decided they had too much land so they shrunk it down to what they have and then they decided well they weren't using it all so we're going to open it up for homesteading so you have all this non-Indian land it's a patchwork in there

and that's why you get this part and so so you have this non-Indian land and basically the the general rules on non-Indian land Indians are not going to be regulated by the tribe. There's a trump card with that that I was alluding to before to sort of fill in the gap. The Montana case or the Montana line of cases that says if you're affecting some of the fundamental rights of the tribe, there's certain numerated ones like water. Now, they can come in and they have a trump card, they come in and regulate you. So Pat, you take it from there, but that's kind of what what I'm seeing.

Well, actually, I think Lee Lee said everything I would have said. So I think Lee and David and myself, I think we've kind of just got a real thumbnail sketch of Indian, you know, Indian law, the relation between the tribe and the in the county. In fact, uh, you know, as far as the like treatment as as a state, that's actually a a status that's allowed in federal in certain federal laws. even that where a tribe can be treated in the same manner as a state in terms of regulation pollution like air water that kind of thing and further record Craig Davis we do have provision in our code also that if it's a tribal member within the tribal jurisdictional boundary not necessarily the reservation that they can opt out of our building permit process

and enter into the tribal permitting process and that's based on a ninth circuit case that's out of Washington but is binding at Idaho also because but the point you were making about Lake Creek because I worked with them for so many years you know they're trying to reestablish the whole ecosystem in Lake Creek and and that's why this water issue is is you know a big deal you know and that's the cutthroat trout and yeah reestablish an ecosystem for cutthroat trout spawning in Lake Creek which is a major tributary cordling lake so and it's on the reservation so

it used to cutthroat everywhere. He talked to the tribe. They're pretty upset about this because the introduction of northern pike just wiped out the I can just tell you a quick funny. So I had a buddy of mine and and he he's fast driver and he said, "You know, I love going through that trial area. I can go 80 miles an hour. They pull me over and it's just like Mexico. I slip on my 20 and they and they let me go. They don't, you know, they they give they tear up the ticket in front of me. It's it's great." This is some years ago. I said, "Oh god, how much you paid him?" Probably a few hundred bucks. and and he really watches his money. And I said, "Well, you realize you're not Indian. They have no jurisdiction over you. They give you a ticket. It means meaningless." That's back when they weren't crossed. Oh, he went white. [laughter]

Gave them all that money. Now they're cross. Tickets. The tickets stick. But well enough said but I think it's important that we do and and the reason of course I worked with him for so many years but Jack Bule is a personal friend of mine and Jack had a terrible time with the with the lake and all that you know they got into all kinds of freakus down there and finally I'd have my meetings I put Jack at this end of the table and I put the tribal representative at the other end so they couldn't reach each other because they almost got in a fist fight once in Post Falls. So anyway, it's but it's it it works and we just need to make it work. So, well, my experience with them is they're generally very good to work with

and they're open and they're, you know, they're they're pretty communicative. Um, they have a good communicator. I can't remember his name. He's very good. Yeah, he does a good job. Yeah, Tyrell. But yeah, I think, you know, it there shouldn't be conflict and I think they're pretty pretty good to deal with general. I thought the commissioners were great. They they compromised. They reached a compromise. That was a big issue. Remember we had all the Yeah, I do. [laughter] They lined up. I do remember. Can you talk about the opt out? You mentioned it a little bit. Can you go that into a little more detail? Right. So if they're

if they're going to build a structure that requires a permit under our code, if they're a tribal member and they're a bonafide tribal member, registered with the tribe, they can opt out. We cannot make them submit for a building permit for Kumi County Community Development. They can use the tribal system and engage in the permitting process there and build their structure. Is it less ownorous? Is that why they might choose to do that? Most likely. Um, and there's some benefits to the being a tribal member to be able to do that. Were people also able to opt out when this was originally put in as an interimm ordinance? So, land owners a whole issue that was 20 what 1819 David

2018 that's completely unrelated to the tribe.

Okay. Um then [clears throat] commissioners Everline and Bingham proposed and and it was a two to one vote to strip the building code of the mandatory part of a residential building permit. you could choose to have um no permit at all and in which case there was no plan review, no inspections and we sent I think we approved 400 something of those because the total total opt out permits of everything every kind including windows and decks and stairwells was,800 I think something like that. So, we had a lot of use, a lot of horror stories. Um, people lost entire homes because the builder was just awful and they went to court and they got their money back in a way. But that was after two years of arguing in court. And he, one man I know in particular, spent a half million dollars

and lost it all and then finally got it back through the court process because the opt out program let people build anything without inspections, without plan review. This particular house would ultimately have fallen on its own.

It was that bad. Well, one of the problems with this is, and I was, you know, I worked in this up in the Silver Valley for 20 years, too. And the the fire insurance companies, if if you don't have any kind of a controlled building program, they're going to get to the point where they won't insure. They quit insuring. Three or four of the major companies quit insuring in in Kellogg and Wallace because they had one wildfire up there and they just dropped everybody. Yeah.

And people were hunting all over for fire insurance. And so I mean the insurance companies, you know, they man I don't know what their actuaries are like in California right now, but I mean I mean they're paying zillions of dollars. And so if you don't have any kind of a a building program, you're you've run the risk of people not being able to get any insurance. Okay. So this minimum lot size um do we need to do anything uh or is it just discussion today? Just discussion today. So it can move. So you're going to have a hearing for this one too, right? Yes. The same day. So February 12th is scheduled also.

Oh, is it February 12th? Well, we see that tribe the tribe behind us. I don't think I don't know if there's going to be anybody coming. I mean, this is just again making what is already in place permanent. We should probably reach out farmers come some of the farmers on land down there pretty we should reach out to try to let them know this is going through. Yeah. Um especially because I can't predict that there's two county commissioners that will approve this one,

which is one big reason, probably biggest reason they separated these two out. originally consolidated. So there's a chance this might not go through the board. And I know marine service businesses that's that's no one to argue that right if there is a sunset on the rural zone already which is right I it would be hard to imagine the board not being supportive of the a zone also going to the same the same standard at the same sunset. I mean, if the rural zone already has one, right,

it's going to have to be addressed unless unless they direct us to to prepare a repeal of that one. Yeah, which is possible, but [clears throat and cough] certainly. So, if it's got a sunset on it, then we're going to have to redo this and after the end of that after the end of the sunset if there's a desire to make it per permanent permanent and it's per it would be permanent for a year and a half because the But uh for both the rural and egg zones, you know, to extend it past June 30th, 27th, yeah, there would have to be another action taken and that sort of gives the tribe time to do their water test. Is that what's the thought?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, so just on that for just for a moment and um Pat maybe help. with some clarification. So, right now there are two ordinances. Mhm. So, there there will be two ordinances and you'll make a decision on each ordinance.

Um whereas, you know, again, staff consolidated them what we thought is for con convenience, but you know, Pat made some good good um [snorts] case or good reasons for for separate them out. And so again, those will be coming to you in two different ordinances so that you guys can make decisions on each one individually. So for the more politically minded here, um, is there anything other if you could just say a word about because I'd like to know myself how we interact with the commissioners and can influence them from a political standpoint because you're talking about politics here on what people think is the right thing to do and what their platform is or their [snorts] ideology. How does our group interact with that? [laughter] How or do we have influence at all on the commissioners?

Well, you do. And because this is a legislative matter and not a quai judicial one, you can talk about it with the commissioners directly and try to influence them. I tried that during my interview and I thought for sure they would not hire me again. Counting on that. And there you go. [laughter] one in particular you probably I mean because because there's all like this this minor subdivision and tribe issue two big issues but they're they're really connected with the one fundamental issue in my mind politically.

Yeah. and and that is you know you have this notion of you know personal property rights should be expanded you know as much as possible and my position is it should only be expanded as much as possible to the extent it doesn't infringe upon others rights you know because you got to balance the rights it's a balancing act because otherwise it's chaos and and that's again the problem potential train wreck with the tribe is if if if they don't continue to work with them and try to you know if the tribe wants 10 parcels and that's not done, but you're headed towards potential. Particularly when you start to see developments, that's when you're going to see it, I think. Yeah, I think so, too.

You know, I still have a question, too, of we work together and we spend a lot of time on some of this stuff, you know, right? And then we decide on something and then it's presented to the county commissioners and then they have a hearing and uh I almost think I need to come they're hearing about what we did. I don't know. See, I don't know how much. You see what I'm saying?

You know, I mean, if we spend a lot of time on an issue and I would hope that they would they would have some credence as to what we've done for them. And but I don't know if that's the case because if they have an open hearing and 10 people show up and complain about something we've done, they'll just vote whatever we did down the tubes. That's I guess that's the question I've got. And I don't know if they do that very often, but I mean I just I don't know what the process is. I mean, and we may get into that with some of this stuff, you know. I don't know. Well, let's talk process for a minute.

These sorts of legislative things, you have a lot Well, you have the ability to talk to any commissioner any time. It's that simple because you're not restrained by due procedural due process. Procedural due process is a term attorneys have come up with to mean in land use law. It applies to quai judicial hearings which you don't get but our hearing examiners do. So if we had a reszoning for example or a variance or a major subdivision or a minor subdivision that got appealed, those are all things that have absolute criteria in the land use and development code. You have to meet those criteria. You don't get a building permit from us or a land use permit. And those kinds of things have built-in public review process like a major subdivision goes to the county commissioners in the preliminary level. They approve or deny on the preliminary level. And part of that approval includes public outcry and you will on occasion see commissioners turn something down just on the level of public outcry. And I having been in that seat myself for four years in Colorado, I can tell you it's hard not to when there's a whole room of 160 people that you know voted for you or not and you've got to make a decision that reflects their interest. It's hard not to take into account what you're seeing right in front of you. And I I for one think you should. But the to me the hardest part of it is balancing that against what your own belief system is and what you believe you know about the rest of the community

and what's been staffed out too. Yeah.

Yeah. Because I you know it's just it puts our board in regular conflict because they've got to weigh what all they know about the entire community against what they're hearing and hear right now. It wax just a little bit philosophical when I have my interview. it came up this issue that on on a certain issue personally I was on one side but I voted the opposite in this group and I was asked how can that be and I explained because personally for my kids and me and my family selfishly this is better for me right but when I'm sitting here in this capacity my duty is to look at what's best for the county and if that runs counter to my personal views so be it because that's my job I I was hoping that we get them not to hire me back today. Um but anyway, the the I want to say on the um uh oh in the process I I had that experience um down our way. There was a an area where they asked for I'm not going to remember the name. You know that that that place where they're going to create a a trailer park and they wanted

wasn't a variance. It was more than variance. is a they didn't want CU was Yeah. They didn't want any of the rules to apply, right? And they wanted to be able to do whatever they wanted, but they didn't really want to tell the commissioners what they were going to do. They wanted they wanted to be exempt. That was a CUP. Yeah. A what now? A conditional use permit.

Yeah. Conditional use permit. They wanted a conditional use permit, but they didn't say what they were going to use it for. And they kept commissioners actually kept asking. They wouldn't say what they're going to use it for. And and I I went to that hearing. I had really good advice from my attorney right here because I asked him first, can I go and say anything because this is affecting my property rights. So I went down there and and I all my kids got up very proud of them. They each stated their point of view and gave descriptions and argument. I gave up gave my presentation. We lost but but we but we were heard and and so I think you can go like like they saying you can go to the to to the hearings and you can speak out just like any other um any other uh But when you do I I think I think our attorney will share this thought that I made a point of saying here in my individual capacity I'm on behalf of myself my family only so you don't get this blurred line between your position here.

But back to your something you raised earlier Terry in the staff reports like you see here in front of you today. Um we try and give the commissioners a sense for what you all think when I'm doing them. not try to do that. A blurred right up front. It just says we had this hearing. Here was the general discussion. Here's the vote and and Mallaloy voted against it. Here's why. Just so they have a flavor of what's going Yeah, I understand that. I appreciate that. That's that's good staff work. But I mean, yeah, but that's just

But again, you know, you guys know the commissioners and you can pull them aside on these kinds of things and I would suggest you you do whenever you have strong feelings about it. So for the newbies, I'll share a comment by one of our judges I was in front of the other day. I believe he was in past position years ago and it came up randomly that I was on this board and he says, "Oh, you have that thankless position. You don't get paid and you get yelled at because in our hearings, you know, people come, right? Sometimes, was that Scott? It's a pretty good description. Yeah. [laughter] Was that Scott Forman? Scott. No, it wasn't Weman.

No, no, Caerty. Caffy. Okay. Yeah. He was He's great. I was just gonna say I could see him saying something. Well, he knows. It reminds me of a there's a great essay that Tom Wolf wrote called the flack catcher where you're in a position where you catch flack and and that's important in society because you have to we have the data uh issue that data building. Yeah. Data center issue that I was shocked at how many people came. They were outraged that would think about having a data center in this county. Yeah. I didn't thought about it that Well, and you only saw onethird of them. It turns out we had twothirds more show up for the county commissioners.

Well, that covers what I wanted to go over unless you have questions. I appreciate the discussion. I mean, it's good to have it. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. Thank you. Okay. Um, can I request for our next meeting that um, similar to what we did last year is we have a list of things that we worked on for maybe the past two years and those things that are still hanging out there, where they're at, what we need to do. Can we do that at our next meeting? Yeah, I think this would be a really great time to do that with the upcoming change of directors, too. Do we know who are new?

The board did make a decision today to make an offer. It hasn't been formalized as of this status. So the notification we can't it was exactly this session. So we can't tell you there is a good local. Okay. I can tell you that. I shouldn't say. Let's wait till the board actually makes a decision. It's going to be what it's going to be. Well, I don't want to board's going to make the decision. I don't want to be the one to break executive session. It is after all executives, right? What is the change here?

End of the month. I I'm done the end of this month. I don't know when a new guy What are you gonna do? I'm moving to Pennsylvania. I'm going to start ballroom dancing in Pennsylvania. By the way, just to curiosity, I got an email this morning from Washington DC and some outfit is wants to set up a new AI facility and they need the electricity from 10 nuclear plants to run it. 10

10 nuclear plants to run it. This AI thing is it I mean it's all over. you know, I'm a engineer, so I get all this stuff and then I'm still members of senior executive service and the federal government, all that stuff. It it's just one thing. It It's amazing, guys, what's what's what's going on. Amazing treing. I'll tell you, just as an anecdote, I had a client of mine who ran a Google search on a very confidential case and AI came back with all this confidential stuff that and ultimately I drilled down and drilled down and drilled down. What I discovered is it came from her own computer because AI minds your your own computer.

If you don't disconnect it, it mines stuff out of your own computer. Very hard to disconnect. I mean, I This is weird. It's It's really Sorry to digress, but just so you know, I'm actually gonna have my computer people figure out how to disconnect. Yeah, because that could potentially go worldwide. It could go anywhere. And it takes everything out of your accesses everything in your computer. It's getting so bad. He just trademarked his own.

Wow. Way to protect himself. Oh, because he could be regenerated and made he could be [snorts] made to say anything. Well, yeah, he can already do that, but at least he's protected against

So, I I um I have a I wanted to talk about a few things not in this meeting but like to put them on our agenda um as long as they're under our perview and I'm not sure if they are. So um they are things like um the complication of building codes getting those narrowed down and simplified would that be something that is under our purview and you know I know it's a can of worms but that's at the state that's the state level okay so that isn't something we would

but I you know the thing there is to get involved at the state level because the legislatures are of a mind that it's better for the state overall to have the same code and they've been of that mindset for 20 plus years. There are other states that have flipped that around on its head and have decided that it's better for each municipality to have its own code. Texas is one of those. And the advantage to that is each municipality can fine-tune its code in a way that could still be very safe but be very different suits

from a Boisey or right okay so that's state level right okay then um through the comp plan protecting our aquafer by zoning certain areas to keep them from um you know dangerous chemicals. That's a policy issue the comp plan could take up and in fact the consultant has that direction from us right now. Okay. We're working with the aquifer protection district to include those areas on the new map. Great. And then um open spaces would that be under our purview?

Yes. And same thing, um, just so you know, the comp plan updates, including a park master plan, first time ever, right? And that will address open space as an issue. Okay. And so when do we um when's the next comp? I mean, what's the next step with a comp plan? The consultant's working out scheduling right now. So I I don't have any dates for you, but he'll be sending that through Craig and Ben once we're at that. Yeah. for our new folks is we're in the process of redoing the comp plan. So yeah, guys open a consultant work growing issue [clears throat] because

I mean we've heard it more and more here people coming in people who I think probably 10 years ago it would have been property right advocates coming in saying hey wait a minute you know this is in my backyard data center or whatever it is and we're losing opening space. I'm hearing a lot more of that. anecdotal admittedly, but I I do think that's going to be a big issue of of how we deal with open spaces. Well, I think that was one of the pushes David introduced early on with master parks plan with Nick to get that going for that specific purpose. We This is the first time county has ever had one or even progress as far even even tried to have one.

You don't have a code, right? You don't even have a code for open space. Yeah, you don't normally have a code, but you normally do have a master plan to plan for open space or arts, which we've never had, but we are incorporating that now. Yes. Yeah. That's onethird of the budget for the comp plan update.

You did when we were talking open space before you talked about open space that they had was buying it and leasing it out to farmers etc. Yes sir. Under that one is that will something like that be written into this? That's a possibility.

Other possibilities like that could be written in. The state of Idaho doesn't allow the same tax structure as the state of Colorado. So in Colorado it was possible to do few pennies on every grocery store that went to open space. Can't do that here. Um and that's how a lot of the land was bought up in Colorado. But but the comp plan could come up with any myriad of ideas of how to approach balanced growth. And the only reason I'm asking is because we've got all these open spaces and everything goes to park and wreck type thing when they do that. But in reality, the way I see it, you when you do that, you're just putting more people into that specific area of the 50 acres or whatever it is instead of getting rural people, you know, a chance to do agriculture on it. Well, that's really why it needs to be a policy discussion

because if you get community buy in for that, it's easy to once that's part of the comp plan to implement it in code or part of hopefully the county someday will have a capital improvements program. That's my view. I I always thought it was useful for a municipality to be able to plan ahead for structures. Yeah. Whether you plan fees based on that not

right well there's all kinds of things going on I just went through a process I you know I manage public drinking water system aer Idaho in in response to the EPA you know they the EPA has all the federal rules for drinking water and clean water and all that and then they give the states the authority to manage those and they supposedly fund them But the state of Idol came to me and said, "You don't have a proper uh policy uh document to manage potential cross connections on your drinking water system. You have to have backflow preventers like on sprinkler system and we want you to write the policy." So I so I rewrite your policy. So I rewrote the policy submitted to the state of Idaho. Oh, it's not good enough. I said, "Well, why is it not good enough?" you have to go out and personally inspect every single property in your subdivision once a year to make sure they're in compliance. So, what's happening is is the states asking a private person to enforce state law. Well, and I don't know where we're going to head, but they're they're reacting to the EPA's new requirements for all the drinking water stuff under the Safe Drinking Water Act. So, it's a what am I going to do? you know, take a bunch of vigilantes out with me or something. You know, this is going to be a hairy situation.

Yeah. Go packing. Huh? Go packing. Well, no, I'll just resign. But I mean, I I don't know where this is all going to hit. Some of this kind of stuff, but boy, that was I mean, and my policy was that much before. Now it's seven pages. Wow. to get it past the state of Idaho approval process. Fun stuff, huh? Fun stuff.

All right. Anything else on the rural zone? Everybody good? Any announcements? So, we have the hearing to cover both of these ordinances on February 12th. And then, do we have any of the AOIS? Is that coming back to us? Do we have a time frame on some of those? Presumably, all the ones that will result in text amendments

uh would come to you because text amendments do come to you, but we don't actually have any that have applied for it yet. So, I can't tell you what the time frame will be. They I can tell you all of the cities know that if they want a text amendment, they have to start giving us what they want. Yeah, I was wondering about that.

I I sent that out. Copy Ben and Pat and Craig to all the mayors and people co my cohorts and their legal counsel. So I it's balls in their court. I think the the four cities that jumped on it immediately, you saw in the paper, you know, they at least have maps so they can keep their annexations going and they're okay. And at the moment, they don't mind that they don't have any ability to tell us what they think about our plans. That's where the text amendment. Of course, there's still that state law that requires this to be done, though. Yeah.

Yeah. That's one of the many things about state law. That's not very clear. Well, it never really Yeah. So, at this point, David, we're kind of reaching out to the cities to see who may be interested in a workshop. Yeah. Um if they have different texts that they'd like to see within our code. Exactly. Um so, I think we're going to plan on doing that at least. There's there's two ways we can handle it. If a city doesn't want any special treatment, they're willing to live with county regulations and a map that's only 1/8 of a mile

in a area of impact beyond their corporate limits, we can take that, schedule it, and go to a hearing. On the other hand, as Ben says, is they want to add try and ask for things that a city would typically ask for like they'd like curb and gutter as part of the street system, that sort of thing. Then they've got to work up their own text schedule with us at a workshop because we have two commissioners willing the workshop now and see if they can convince two of the commissioners that that's the right thing to do. I will be surprised but it's conceivable.

All right. Well then um I will entertain a motion for adjournment. So moved. Seconded. Okay, thank you. Welcome, guys. Hope that wasn't too painful for you.