Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

City Planning Commission of order. Call the roll, please.

Pacino, Bull, Isler-White, Moody, O'Toole, Schneider is absent, and Matamor. Six present, one absent. Can you turn your mic on, too? Can you turn your mic on?

I'm out of practice. It's been a month since we've been here. All right. Next item of business is approval of the agenda. Does staff have any changes or additions? No. I'll entertain a motion.

The agenda is presented.

Second. All those in favor? Aye. Agenda is approved. Approval of planning commission meeting minutes. from 5-11-2026. I entertain a motion.

I'll move that the minutes from the May 11th meeting be approved.

Thank you. All those in favor?

Aye.

Minutes approved. Next item of business is citizen comments on non-agenda related items. Does anyone care to speak on a non-agenda item? Clerk, do you have anyone online? All right. Seeing nobody wants to talk, we'll go to planning commission and staff reports and comments. Philip, you're up.

Dear members of the commission, I wanted to make an announcement this evening about an award we recently won. And we, I say that as in a group of students that we worked with, that you guys, this body, worked with as well in crafting the West Side Vision study. Last year, I believe it concluded, And I just wanted to speak a little bit. This is a national award. It was the 2026 James Seghetti Honor Award from the American Planning Association Small Town and Rural Planning Division. And the acronym for that is STAR. So they got lucky there, right? But this is a meaningful national recognition, this plaque here. And we were very grateful to be awarded this at the April National APA Conference, the American Planning Association Conference. So very happy to have this. It'll be in display in our building now, back in my office, because nobody comes back there now. But when we go to the annex, it'll be prominently displayed with our other awards. But the West Side Vision study was recognized as the student project of the year. The two students were at CU Denver, and this award reflects the quality the planning work community engagement and thoughtful attention given to the west side if you remember these students these were masters students that were putting on public engagement events over there at the lincoln community center and we were all thoroughly impressed as more importantly were the people that lived there were very very impressed with aslan and avery um it's also a reminder of the challenges and opportunities in Westside and that I think this body and us as the planning division continue to work on. So I just wanted to make that announcement. I thank you guys' work in that and reviewing those documents, being part of those work sessions. And yeah, we are national award winners. So that is my announcement.

Donald? Was there a check?

I mean, an award.

You want a really big check.

No, it wouldn't come to me. It would come to you guys. But, you know, just by definition at the University of Wyoming, it has meaning if there's money. Money equals meaning.

Let it be known to the record that I'm only holding up the plaque and not a check. National recognition, they do, I mean, they put it up on their website, on the national website. So as a person seeking jobs, you can see who's winning the awards, who's doing progressive planning, right? It can attract in that way, but no financial contribution to the planning division or the city.

Just one question I have. Have you had a chance to get the two students in to take a photograph of them with their award?

Well, they were not able to attend the national conference either. I spoke with both of them on the phone and informed them of us nominating them and then winning it. Eventually one of their professors went, was going to Detroit anyway, where the conference was and picked it up on their behalf. So,

That would be nice, a resume builder for them.

Oh, absolutely.

Seriously, congratulations.

Well done. I'll pass it on to them. Thank you.

Next time, the business disclosures, ex parte communications, and potential conflicts of interest. Anybody got one? Seeing none, we'll carry on. We'll go to current planning projects. Item 6Bi, little i, rezone 26-0001. Take it away, Phillip.

Thank you, Chair, members of the Commission. So this rezoning request is to rezone the properties at 1270 North 9th Street and 715 Shield Street from R2, our limited multifamily district, to R3. multifamily zoning district. The properties are currently occupied by Trinity Baptist Church and the developmental preschool and they are the applicants as well working together in this application. So Planning staff generally finds that the applicant's request is supportable based on the existing land uses and surrounding context. However, the request raises a broader planning question about whether the zoning pattern around Labonte Park which has r3 b2 and r2 all and kind of similar ratios around there or percentages around that park whether those should be evaluated more comprehensively particularly since we have the different zoning districts but the land uses are very very variable as well including residential civic and some even would say industrial and industrial slash utility related uses are present there so we are recommending a postponement to August 24th which would allow staff to prepare updated mapping coordinate with our Parks and Rec Department and other affected departments as well as a broader rezoning request, we would need to provide additional public notice as well. So we have conferred this to the applicant. They are in agreement that that two-month delay, postponement, to look at a broader rezoning in that area is okay with them. I don't believe they've indicated they're not working on anything on the site until 2027 anyway. I'll let the applicant, if they wish to speak more about that. Regarding the rezoning request itself, I feel like it's important to look at it broader rather than creating even the optics of a island of R3 within R2. And we just want to look at it in a broader context. They're okay with it. So that's our recommended motion. And as I mentioned, we have some

representatives from i know holy trinity at least on a developmental preschool as well here to answer any questions and i can answer any as well anybody i've got one uh changing this would that r3 designation include the pacific court uh property there what would happen with that would that zone them out of out of the land or

Chair, it's not included in this rezoning request, but it's certainly something we would consider given that kind of heavier use on that property. But it wouldn't, we have still the grandfathering and the pre-existing non-conforming status of that site would prevail no matter what the zoning is. So they could continue there until they want to expand or change something. Then they would need to look at whether it's appropriate in the overlying zoning, whatever it is.

So comprehensively, would you be looking as far as 4th Street or 3rd Street?

Well, 4th Street is, Chair, 4th Street is already zoned for our intense business use B2. And there is a portion of Labonte or that Labonte Park block That is B2 as well, which includes some of the North 4th Street property. And then R3 as well is already present there. On that side, and then if you look at the zoning map, there's R2 pretty much east of 9th Street. Probably wouldn't look at that as much as we would north and south of Labonte because 9th is a collector going through there and a pretty good dividing main thoroughfare. Yeah. Mostly single-family residential there, but around the park itself, you have a lot of multifamily on the southern portion. You have interfaith there.

Yeah, I could see why it's going to take you a while to figure it out. Yeah.

Kind of an add-on question to that. So I am a little confused procedurally because you brought this to us, but call it a postponement. But it doesn't sound like we're postponing. We're actually going to go in a different direction. It's not ultimately going to be a variant. So instead, maybe this is a recommendation for city planning to take a different approach in response to an action from an applicant. So it's sort of a rejection effectively for a different approach. I guess I'm just a little confused why we're sitting here and all we're going to do is agree that you want to postpone it when you're not even going to postpone. You're going to take a different approach.

Chair, through you, I would say in the motion provided, we did write and direct staff. We recommended the postponement and then direct staff to evaluate whether a broader R3 zoning map amendment is appropriate. So that's when a rezoning request comes in. I mean, this body has the ability to tell us, well, we need a broader area rezoned. And that would inevitably result in a postponement because we would need to notify people. So this is kind of the start of the process to get things going, because this isn't something that planning division would do on its own volition really it comes from the applicant desire to rezone their own property so we're there is certainly the option to approve in the staff report it gives you that option to approve the applicant's request as it stands just for those two properties but they're in agreement with us that a broader look at it needed so not just those two properties but just using that as a vehicle to have a broader rezoning.

And can you just flag just the key differences between R3 and R2? Because one thing, it clearly is going to trigger more interest, right? Because if more properties are affected by I don't know whether you call it an upzoning or town zoning, but it's going to allow more uses, right? And so what are, can you just highlight some examples of the difference, what might come into that area? And are you planning any public outreach as part of that or simply as part of the consideration that we would then have about the rezoning in August, at the end of August? Because that would be a public meeting that there would be public comment at.

Chair, through you, I'll answer the question about the notification first. Like, right now, the people that were notified were only 300 feet within those two properties, that were within those two properties. We received two phone calls in support of, that's in the staff report, is, well, one verbal approval of the project, and then somebody else called today with... were notified across the street from 9th and they're in support of a higher density residential there as well when we go to present a rezoning of a broader area then that would expand significantly and we would contact anyone within 300 feet with the information the link to the staff or the link to the information so to speak so that's how they would be notified and and um Then to the key differences between R2 and R3. So R3, I think, so the uses themselves, the residential uses are quite different there. So just pulling it up here, but in R3, multifamily, So we've recently revised these to kind of allow more things in each zoning district. So it's actually not that different anymore when you go from R2 to R3. There's still traditional apartments through multifamily. There's two-family, townhouse, live-work, dwelling. I would say the biggest difference is in density, which is also not that different. In R2, let's say you have a 10,000-square-foot lot. You would be able to build four units because there's a 2,500-minimum lot size per um i'm sorry 2500 minimum lot size to subdivide to make it um in this reference all right so follow up because i was looking i was the reference in their cover letter it says citing

the municipal code, the purpose of our three zoning district is to, quote, provide for commercial uses that may complement the neighborhood. But those are going to be minimal commercial uses, not industrial type things, right?

Yeah, I was going to say, just to continue a little bit on the residential uses, but then to get to the commercial. But in residential, it's not that much different density-wise. I mean, you have 1,250 square feet per unit in R2, and then 1,000 square feet per unit in R3. So it's really not that different, I would say. To Commissioner Buccino's point, the uses, there are a few other like lower impact commercial uses such as bakeries, barbershops, stuff like that, that's permitted in R3 and not in R2. There are some conditional uses that are different too, like what's permitted by right in R3 is only conditional use in R2. So, yes.

Just if you could refresh my memory. I'm going back a while. What did we zone the city yards? I know we changed the zoning on the city yards. What is the old city yards zoned at right now?

Chair, are you speaking to the 4G property? Yeah. So that's R3 now.

Okay. I thought we'd change that to R3.

That was from industrial to R3. Yeah.

All right. Thank you. Anyone else?

Streets.

Oh, so not the 4G, the North 4th Street. I'm sorry. So that, it is zoned R3 as well, a combination of R3 and B2. And previously, it was all B2?

It's all B2 right now.

So the whole yards, as you say, I'm sorry, I wasn't familiar with that, but is zoned general business now.

So we haven't changed that zoning yet. That would be included as part of this plan?

Nope. Well, I mean... I don't think so. I don't think we would be going that far west because that is around 4th Street. It makes sense that 4th Street's a major commercial corridor. So I wouldn't anticipate going that far over and considering rezoning there. It's more north and south of Labonte Park where... some higher density residential zoning could more accurately reflect the land use going on there. There's a lot of multifamily already going on in R2, which is would essentially become the land use would match the zoning essentially.

All right. Thank you.

So Philip, you'd be the staff, the planning staff would sort of figure out what area to expand to, let's say, maybe like south of Reynolds, whatever the Reynolds is, the north boundary, and then send your 300 feet beyond that defined area that you guys, would there be any sort of, what kind of discussion would be about defining that area within the staff? Maybe some of the criteria for whether to go Just, you know, like south of Reynolds, west of 9th, or some north of Reynolds. Do you have a deal what sideboards might be?

Yeah, I mean, Chair, through you, I think there's a lot to consider, right? And I think we need to acknowledge that Labonte Park itself is zoned R2, which we would probably consider rezoning to R3. Of course, the city's not planning on developing Labonte, but it would just fit in better with what's surrounding. But I also think you use a major street plan. What are the major, you know, the fact that 9th Street is a major thoroughfare collector street. Let's say existing land use plays a big role in it, which current zoning doesn't really accurately reflect the current land use there. And potential as well. I think you look at lot sizes, you look at development potential, you look at surrounding land uses as well, which is, there is a lot of single family residential surrounding this area that needs to be considered. So that's kind of a couple things I say that right off the bat we would need to look at.

Well, you picked a long road to hoe. Are you going to be able to do it by August?

I mean, I think the park itself is going to be a big one to rezone. And I think that's going to give us a lot of room to justify rezoning properties directly adjacent to the park. I'm not anticipating going even further. know full block north of shield street or south of canby street so it's mostly bringing the park within that zoning district and then matching existing land uses to a zoning district that's appropriate so you know it seems like a heavy lift but i'm pretty sure we can get it done by august all right thank you

Anyone else?

And the applicant I just want to mention again is also the applicants are here to speak and answer questions as well if needed.

Thank you much. The applicant, care to speak? Applicants?

Thank you, Chair and Commission, for letting us come. And thank you for reviewing this and potentially approving it. I have Pastor Mattingly, John Mattingly, and we at the church have seen some good growth, and the church has been there for well over 70 years. It's been a good neighbor, and the people around us, we all get along really well, and they're excited about some of the improvements that we look at. The building is actually looking like it's 70 years old, and we just want that whole corner, that whole block of ours, which covers a lot of bigger part of the block there. Just to improve it, make it look good, it's adjacent to the park. We'd like to see this approved as quickly as possible. We did agree with the potential of attaching this through with the other. I have no idea. It's way beyond. I'm sitting over there swimming in my brain right now hearing all this stuff, you know. So I have no idea what the logo, the whole lingo is. But all I know is that we got a good thing going over there. And the church is going to look really nice. And we do need some more space. A little more space as time goes on. We want to renovate and make it ready for the times. Like I said, we've seen the church expand almost three times its size in six years. So if we don't move, there is no intention of that being anything other than a church that has been there where everybody's moved and come and go for decades. And it is my hope that and request from our church that you would approve this rezoning so that we can move forward in a more timely, fashionable time. So thank you very much. Can I answer any questions?

Anybody have any? I've got one. Yes, sir. Well, go ahead.

I'm just curious what expansions or things you plan on doing that are accommodated in R3.

The R2 is... Well, yeah, Chris, that's a good question. Working with Laramie City, they come with different rules than some of the Illinois places I've worked with commissions, so they're different. My understanding, it is... And again, we have Christy here that can help us out with that, and Philip can probably give... And thank you, Philip, for your staff and the staff helping us understand it. But it looks a bit about space to me. It sounds like our expansion immediately is all remodeling. We have a welcome center to put on the front end. And there's some square footage, I believe, that we have to accommodate to get the additional forms and to be able to do that. And it just is a little timely, I think, to be able to go through the community around us, which are all for it, ready to go with it. And R3, I believe, will kind of expedite a little bit of that. Not that we want special preferences or anything. It's just we still have to work through all the planning and approvals of all the building that we're going to be doing. But I believe, Chris, it's probably the space. Am I correct on that, R2, R3 for us particularly? Yes.

Chair, I would defer to the applicant and their representative as to why they want to rezone.

Well, I have one more question. Have you got anything scheduled that this postponement will interfere with?

Chair, we are right now having new building plans, and we're hoping to have those done in the fall.

So this isn't going to slow you down at all. All right. Yeah. Thank you.

Good evening, Honorable Chair and Commissioners. Christy Roberts with Dwell. I represent the applicants this evening. The rezoning to R3, the place of worship use is a use by right in the R3. And so it's a more appropriate zoning for the use that has been there kind of for a long, for seven years, apparently. And similarly with the developmental daycare, in the past that property was zoned like a neighborhood business, something that doesn't exist anymore. When it was, I don't know if anyone remembers the grocery store. And so the zoning has kind of been changed around these uses that have been there. And so this zoning request brings the zoning into compliance with the uses that are already there. Okay. Any other questions for me?

Anyone? Thank you. What's the... Oh, yes.

Sorry, Honorable Chair, Commission. I'm Jamie Stein with Developmental Preschool and Daycare Center and... Just to kind of tag along with the church and what Christy had mentioned is just rezoning to the R3 makes more sense for our program. We don't have anything planned in the near future, but the land use not matching the zone could be a problem for us in the future. And so just kind of presented with the opportunity to take a look at it and figure out if there's a better way for our property to be zoned. So if we do have any future plans, then hopefully it will make things a little bit easier to go through the planning process and approval for that. So I do ask for your eventual approval of the zoning change. But again, I don't have anything going. So a postponement until August doesn't affect me one way or another. But I would certainly be willing to answer any questions.

Any questions? Just thank you for the good work you do.

Thank you very much.

Well, one question.

Are there any facets of the design or what you're proposing in terms of, I think it's more actually for the church, but, you know, in terms of structure, facade, expansion, parking, any of those things are not compliant in R2 that are compliant in R3? So again, even phasing and thinking forward, if you're starting to design things, certainly you don't want to go down one road if then that can't happen in the other. So I guess just trying to understand, number one, any wasted time and effort, I guess, on your part. And then, of course, milestones associated with your needs.

Well, the usage part of it is, I think, more appropriate, at least for my being educated on all the usage for every zone. Um, it appears that, uh, we will be putting in new parking, you know, um, that'll be a part of it. Um, eventually down the road, potentially a new building that would, with the church increasing in size, we have plenty of space, ample space, um, to do that. Um, I think to your asking question, that is not immediate. Obviously, there's a lot of planning involved with the new building. Right now, we're trying to get our building just updated and the usage of the building a little more efficient for the people to come as we use it. So I think the R3, from what I've understood, is the best route for us to go.

Thank you.

Yes, sir. I'm with Trinity Baptist Church as well. I've been there since 92.

I'm afraid you did state your name for the record.

I'm Lonnie Schultz and been involved with the church a long time and actually didn't hear anybody comment on the fact other than we're updating our drawings, but we had drawings ready to go 15 years ago and we've worked with the city on several internal remodels on the inside of the building and and improvements on insulation. You know, it was just a cinder block building, and we furred it out and insulated better all the way around. New windows throughout the entire facility, on and on and on, new carpet, and of course, things that wear out and maintenance that goes, but It is. We'd like to improve the change, the looks of it. It's a cinder block building that's been here a long time. And we've talked to some people in town that do stucco work. And we have people that it was originally built by volunteers. It was an idea. The floor plan that I found, the actual drawings that I saw were a nearly identical church in Cheyenne. We had the drawings that came to here and built the same, almost identical building in the 50s. And I just, if anybody would ever like to come by and see what we've done on the inside, the drawings that we had done 15 years ago included a lot of changes and changes in the walls and better use of the facility internally. Externally, we didn't get that far. And this welcome center we'd like to do that would be in kind of the inside of the L facing 9th Street where you got the corner there would give us some more room as a welcome center. And then some modifications, just mostly architectural changes to rooflines and little porch covers on the entry areas. But the main reason for the drawings to be done is that the codes changed here in Laramie. So we need to update our codes as well at the same time. So that pretty much sums up what I've got. We've been good neighbors, as Pastor said, good citizens, I think, in the community. And we still continue to hope to be able to change. But what we ran into on the internal drawings is we'd like to do some new bathrooms and we don't have really space to do that and enlarge the kitchen. So until we get a welcome center to put new bathrooms, updated bathrooms that are handicap compliant, ADA compliant, we really can't take the old bathrooms down. So it kind of is one before the other. Again, it's the last remaining things that need to be done on the interior of the building, but the primary drawings on the outside are, to stucco it and doll it up, I'll say, and modernize it on the outside as well. Any questions?

No.

Thank you.

Are there any citizen comments? Anybody from the public wish to address this? Do you have anybody online? All right. Carry on. What's the will of the commission?

Well, I'd like to make a motion. Because I strongly support the effort to look at the area together. I think that's consistent with how we've approached planning in general, rather than on a piecemeal basis. And I very much appreciate the flexibility of the applicant to provide that time to do that. So I would move to postpone consideration of RZNE-26-0001 and direct staff to evaluate whether a broader R3 zoning map amendment is appropriate for the area surrounding LaPonte Park, including the subject properties, LaPonte Park and other immediately related properties.

Is there a seconder?

Second.

Very good. All those in favor? Oh, yeah.

I have one quick procedural question. So we'll postpone. This will come up on the agenda in August.

I did put that date in, which is what you want.

So it will be on the agenda in the meeting to approve potentially along with staff's recommendation for the broader geographic area? Or how are we going to all see this again in both your recommendations and then the applicants?

Sure. they're going to bring us one big change or changes on individual properties.

Is that what you're going to see? Will this come up as a variance again, or will that go away and you'll just bring, or again, I just, what are we going to see when, and on what date?

So chair through you, um, So it will be a rezoning request that will come back on the 24th of August. And in that, we'll add to this staff report as to any additional properties that we, as staff, felt should be R3 as well. Essentially, that's what's going to happen at the end of the day. we'll have already notified those folks that are required for that additional rezoning so that this body can recommend the approval of that zoning to city council and you could also recommend make a motion to recommend approval of just these two parcels as well. I mean, the public hearing for that has been held. That was tonight. So there will be the options. You always have a menu of motions or actions at the end of the staff report. One of them will be to recommend approval of the rezoning presented by staff in the new staff report. Or recommendation of approval of the original request or changing something which we would require another postponement if additional notice is required so does that answer your question i think so so there'll be an agenda item dedicated to reasoning it'll be just like also be this variance so we can do we can approve both we can approve one we can whichever we so desire

And you'll have a recommendation for theirs as well because it won't be postponed. It'll be to approve or reject.

Shared through you. So just to be clear, there's no additional item other than the rezoning request. There's no variance request being made.

But we have the option. We have the option of breaking it up if we feel we need to. So we can approve a bigger zoning change. Or if we want to, we can postpone that bigger zoning change and just at that meeting approve the two properties here, Shields Row. I think it's one property just with two addresses. So we have the option of doing that.

Chair, it's not just quickly, it's not unprecedented. If you remember from the 4G property over in Westside on Garfield, the 70-acre parcel that was ultimately rezoned to R3, there was a sliver of land adjacent to Garfield that was actually separating the parcel from Garfield Street. That was not in the original application, but staff added that in because that would make sense and continuity. And so it's not because rezoning requests are generally it's just an applicant wanting their own property to be rezoned. But we need to look at it holistically. So there's not islands of. different zoning types. So it's not unheard of to, you know, make a broader recommendation like this to look at it, but hopefully that helps clear it up as well.

Thank you. So, Clark, would you like me to reread the whole, my motion again, or what I should add in, move to postpone consideration until August 24th. That's what was missing, right? Is that sufficient? So that would be my motion.

Yeah. And then if the second is okay with that.

Second okay with that. Yeah. Okay. Okay, we have a motion and a second. I believe this calls for a roll call vote.

Okay.

Pacino?

Aye.

Bull?

Aye.

Kaiser White? Moody? Aye. O'Toole? Aye. Schneider is absent. Matamor?

Aye.

That is six yeses, zero nos, and one absent.

There being no other business before this commission, the chair will entertain a motion. All those in favor, stand up and leave.