Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

4.30, call this meeting of the Laramie Planning Commission to call the roll, please.

Pacino, absent. Bull is absent. Iserwhite is absent. Moody?

Here.

O'Toole?

Here.

Schneider? Here. And Matamor?

Here.

That's four present, three absent.

Next up will be approval of the agenda in minutes. Staff, any changes to the agenda? Take a motion.

And move to approve the minutes.

And the agenda. All those in favor? Aye. Motion carries. Okay. We will go to Citizen comments on non-agenda related topics. Does anybody care to address an off-topic issue tonight? Feel free. You got anybody online? Seeing none, we'll carry on. Planning Commission staff reports and comments.

Chair Commission, last week we had our last steering committee meeting for the Forge Laramie plan, the comprehensive plan update. And so coming up here on the 22nd-ish, we're hoping to launch the public review of that final draft so that the public can go through and make their comments and address any concerns that they may have in there. So I guess... Most importantly, it will be open for public consumption. You all will have an opportunity to go over it as well, and it does have to be approved by you all before it goes on to city council. So this is not your guys' only opportunity, but for the public at large, this one is going to be one of the last opportunities to say your piece.

Joe, are you going to have any kind of a presentation at Farmers Market?

I do think we have some times at the farmer's market this year scheduled. Off the top of my head, I don't remember them, but that will be just one of the things that will be going over there probably.

Whatever venues are you looking to?

I think primarily it will be online for review, so on our Zen City page.

Are you going to let people know on Facebook or social media or something that it's there? Certainly that as well, yeah.

Okay, all right.

Advertise it. I think we, I don't want to say it because I'm a little bit, but we may be trying to send out mailers again. Okay. It's usually a fairly significant investment, but it seemed to be worthwhile in that first round.

I'd be better off going to the radio stations and announcing it there than mailers. People don't read mailers. Yeah. They'd chuck them in the garbage. I think it's a waste of money. Especially this time of year. I haven't been convinced of that yet. Yeah. This year, the natural instinct is to throw flyers in the garbage. Exactly. I'm sure Eric Henderson would say something. I know the other radio station by the liquor store would probably broadcast something on it. That would be better than a newspaper. Although I think you're required to put in a newspaper, aren't you? That it's open.

Well, when it's on planning commission or a city council agenda, certainly those. But hopefully before that as well.

Good luck. I've read it. I don't think anybody else does.

Right. We appreciate that.

All right.

What do you think, Joe? Tom?

Well, I'll talk about that another time. There are parts that I like, parts I don't. Okay. All right. No other staff reports or comments. Any ex parte communications, contextual conflicts of interest? Hearing none, we will go to new business, being no old business, and that will be Conditional Use Permit 26-0002, 2552 North 15th Street, Expansion of Church. Derek, take it away.

chair and commission good evening um first off i just want to double check so we did i did send an email out today just with some uh a letter from the applicants engineer and representative just on two items related to this application did you guys get that and if not i have a copy up here and i can just bring them on up when did you send it uh this morning I didn't see it.

I didn't see it.

That's why I made copies just in case because it was today. So let me grab those.

I was otherwise engaged. Uno mas.

No, go ahead.

Oh, you got it?

Yeah, sorry. Do you want one? I thought you had it up on your computer is what you were indicating. So... Chair, Commission... What we're going to be presenting on is a conditional use permit for a building that's located at 2552 North 15th Street. It's the E Free Church. That's kind of the north end of 15th Street. The request is part of a expansion of the existing church that's located there, which is located in R2 zoning district and thus is required to go through the conditional use permit for expansion and changes to the site. To kind of provide just some general context to the project, once again, staff is recommending approval of this conditional use permit. It is conditioned upon the conditions that are found at the end of the staff report. As I mentioned, this is a request for expansion of an existing church, so the church is already located at this site, and it's an expansion of approximately 7,000 square feet of space that's kind of on the west side of the existing church building. Generally, the expansion is planned to provide for additional recreation, classroom, multi-use space, for the existing congregation. So one thing I think that's important to point out is this isn't expanding any of the worship space or the actual area in which worship service is occurring, which is typically on a Sunday and typically the highest use of the building for most churches. A few other background items. This item has been before you before. Back in 2012, when the church did their first expansion, I went through the conditional use permit process to, one, recognize it as a conditional use since that time codes had changed, and then Also, in 2024, when a similar expansion was provided, but the permit expired. And so you have the application that is before you today. As I mentioned, the site is located in an R2 zoning district. It's primarily access off to 15th Street, which this church sits on the west side of 15th Street. Generally speaking, like I said, this is not really modifying the site too much. There's space kind of behind the existing church where the parking lot is off to the west where they're putting this expansion. All the way back in 2012, expansion of this building was contemplated to the west. And even the 2012 conditional use permit, information about the site and things like that were kind of planning essentially for this general thing to occur.

Sorry, hold on.

A question there. Yeah. So in 2024, there was a CUP and it was approved.

Correct, yes.

It has since expired. Yes. And we haven't had, was there a meeting since then on this?

Chair, no. So since then, this application that's before you today is now to reconsider the conditional use permit so that they can essentially reactivate or go forward through with the process of potential expansion.

Page 2 of the Planning Commission approved that 2024 sees the request on September 9, 2024. Is that a typo?

No, that is correct. So in 2024, this commission approved it. But since that time, there were stipulations in there that the site plan and building permits had to be established through the process. And so it wasn't done in time. So now they're back before you to kind of essentially go through the process and get the conditional use approved again. Yeah, sorry. As I noted, this area and kind of the surrounding area are essentially all R2 zoning district. There is some property to the east, which is O zone or open zone. And to the, aside from that, all of it is R2. So you're kind of within a residential R2 zoned neighborhood. I will point out, we do review this from all departments. All departments have reviewed this and any associated conditions might be a result of that review. So what I'm going to do is kind of go through just some of the general conditions and requirements of the conditional use permit and outline a few things that are specifically related to this project. As I mentioned, ingress and egress to the property is off of 15th Street. What we will note though is that there is secondary access that is located on a gravel driveway or an alleyway that's on the south side of the property. Per municipal code, that alleyway is required to be paved. You'll see in the correspondence that I handed out or that's sent by email this morning that that is one of the items that the applicant is requesting that you differ from city staff's recommendation. So city staff is recommending that the alleyway be paved and the applicant is requesting that the alleyway remain unpaved. What I think is important to point out is during the 2012 process with the conditional use, the city staff recommended that the alleyway be paved at that time. And ultimately, the planning commission decided and allowed for the alleyway to remain unpaved. So it remained gravel. What's interesting is during that time, there were members of the neighborhood who came to that meeting requesting that the alleyway not be paved. And so at the time in 2012, that was the request of the applicant and the Planning Commission was fine with that. In subsequent filings, staff has continued to recommend that the alleyway be paved per municipal code. And in past approvals, the Planning Commission has allowed for the alleyway to remain gravel. One thing that we would point out is this is kind of their access point that comes out of the parking lot to the south and then allows them access to 15th Street off to the west or it's 13th Street, I believe. Yeah, 13th Street to the east or to the west. Sorry, I had those flipped. um you'll see within the within the information um you know we're simply recommending and following code and the requirement to pave the alleyway and as i mentioned the applicant is requesting that it remain as been approved by the planning commission in the past the one thing staff will point out too that i think is worthwhile to point out is um you know not paving the alleyway is a direct deviation from code and one of the things that we are bringing up in this process is is that something that really the Board of Adjustment should be considering versus the Planning Commission I will leave that for your discussion purposes but I think that you know in past approvals the Planning Commission has allowed for Valley Way to remain unpaved so in terms of consistency and just kind of what you all have done in the past that has been your recommendation in the past filings so

Okay. Why did the neighbors want it to remain unpaid for the utilities and stuff, or just because it's only a good town?

Chair, Commission, so here's what I would, the general sense was, was that It was preferred just to remain as is, right? I don't think it was necessarily, that just was their preference. And by paving it would maybe encourage more traffic and things like that. And that was just a neighborhood alleyway. That was my recollection of the whole, like kind of the broad summary of the conversation at the time. It's pretty narrow. It's pretty standard in those areas. We have alleyways that range anywhere from 16 to 30 feet wide, just depending upon where you're at. But it's on the narrower side, I guess, of all the alleyways.

That open space to the, let me think, east, how is that zoned?

The open space is actually to the east there, and that's the O zoning, and that's part of the city's trail network, the Sierra Sky network that's up there. Is it going to remain?

Because I think I saw a sign there for sale. So on that land, right?

So, yeah. Chair, through you again, so the There's two pieces of property that are all zoned out. There's one part that's the Sears Sky Trail. There's another piece, a parcel that's directly across the street from there that is owned by the school district. The future land use plan does not have that being like parks or open space. Remember the O zone is simply a holding zone for future rezoning at some point. And so I think that that's maybe what you're recalling. There is a sign there for sale, I think by the school district for sale of that property. Kind of continuing on, aside from that, That is pretty much what we would for access. Off street parking and loading areas. Churches are kind of a unique animal. Typically with most churches, we're trying to build parking lots based upon the congregation size and the worship services that they have. That is almost always their largest impact and user. The applicants provided us information that basically shows that even with the expanded space, these are office spaces that are going to be used kind of in off times. This has been pretty consistent with what we've done with most churches within the community that we've done. You'll see within the staff report, we believe that the parking that's being provided is adequate, as well as there's on-street parking along 15th Street that also provides some additional parking spaces when the church is in use, usually during a worship service on Sunday. We had no real concerns about ecotourism. the economic noise, glare, odor, and effects of this church. We did not have any changes to the refuse area. There's an existing refuse enclosure that's screened with fencing, and so we've not recommended any changes there. We believe that this church is located and is properly being served by utilities and recommend no changes there. We believe that this building is properly screened and buffered. The use doesn't really need to be screened and buffered, but it is okay. Signs and lighting. No new signs are being proposed at the site. There is an existing sign on site that is located over on 15th Street. New lighting is being proposed by the applicant and final photo metrics will be provided as part of the site plan type 3 process just being required to meet all requirements of municipal code for lighting. We believe that the use is appropriate for intensity and bulk in the neighborhood. As noted, this church has existed in this location for many years now and is been there without consequence, really, for our purposes, at least. The expansion really isn't changing much on the site. It's kind of in an area that's logical for expansion. And so we believe it meets those requirements as well. We believe that this will not pose any issue to health, public safety, or welfare. This meets all requirements for setbacks and other uses required in an R2 zoning district. There are no walls proposed. Landscaping is an item that also I want to address. This is also addressed in the applicant's letter that was provided to you by email and this evening. Generally, here's how I would summarize this. As the In 2012, the Laramie Planning Commission approved a landscaping plan for the site with the long-term intent of expansion of this church. Since that time, the landscaping hasn't been fully maintained, and so the landscaping per the 2012 approval hasn't been remained in compliance. That being said, the applicant has submitted a landscaping plan that meets our requirements today. which are lesser than what was approved in 2012 and so really the question for the Planning Commission today is do you uphold your 2012 recommendation which is the original recommendation of the Planning Commission or do you allow for the applicant to submit the new landscaping plan which meets the requirements of today under your new approval either an option for this planning commission to consider. However, staff provided the recommendation, which is planning commission has made a decision once before that the landscaping of the 2012 be approved. And it's your ability to change that if you so wish, not staff's. And so that is an item that you'll see within the letter that the applicant is requesting that you accept the current today's standards versus what was approved in 2012. And so either options will work and will allow for the site to move forward through the site plan process. Aside from that, I'll note the site does and is required to have notification. We did mailings. It's published in the newspaper and there is a development sign that's located at the site. As of today, we've only received two just general inquiries about what was going to be going on on the site. And aside from that, no other public comments have been received. So finally, I'll just note, once again, staff is recommending approval of this based upon the conditions. As I noted, the applicant's two items that are associated with the conditions which they're requesting, which are different. But aside from that, I'd be happy to take any questions. I will note the applicant is here and the applicant's representatives. And so I think that they will probably request to speak at some point as well. So thank you.

I have a question. Derek, on the alley paving or the concreting surfacing, is that the proposal or the requirement for that the entirety of the lot or just the section on the farthest east side where the parking lot kind of encroaches on the alley or accesses the alley? Chair, Commission, do you remember?

I'm going to have William Winkler, he's with the City Engineering Department, answer that if you don't mind. Okay, thanks.

Chair, through you, the requirement for the alley paving would be because access is provided from both ends, from the 15th and 13th to that same access point to the parking lot, that it would be the entirety of the property there. Okay.

Go ahead, Chris.

Was it the south side of the property?

Yeah, but I'm talking from the far east to the far west of it, the south side of their property, yes.

Are the utilities in that alley currently?

Chair, the utilities in that street are actually in the roadway in front of the properties in Grafton.

Yeah, that answers my question. I'm not a fan of paving that entire thing. I live right up close to there in the water. That steep grade from east to west is pretty significant. Water comes ripping off of that hill pretty decently. And I don't know that... There's a detention pond right below there. But, I mean, I think I would be at least in favor of saying maybe they paved that section of the farthest east side of that parking lot just to kind of minimize dust and some track. But I think the entirety of that would cause quite a bit of stormwater erosion, which would probably need a little bit of engineering analysis.

The detention pond's down 10th Street, isn't it?

Yeah, it's a ways down there.

It's a ways down there.

we approve this do we have to as planning wants do we have to amend the text to depending on what we decide in terms of paving and landscaping chair commission so the current conditions would be are to pave and to landscape as approved in 2012.

And so if you would like to be different than those, you just would need to amend those two items in the conditions, and that would allow you for the option of whatever you so choose. If you look in the letter that was provided by Dwell, there was some information in there about changing the conditions, and she provides some guidance there, too, if that's what you would like to do.

All right. I have a question. As a general rule, if it's a grandfathered property and you change something, you go to the current code. That's pretty much as a general rule. So despite the fact that they didn't maintain the 2012 landscaping, and if we required them to put it in, what makes you think they're going to maintain it this time? I mean, I'd say give them a smaller parcel to water and it might do better. That's just my question. But that's a general rule. They would have to comply with current code.

So a pre-existing site can follow the current code. The difference here is the planning commission made that decision. So it's an actual approval by a body. So that's why you all have to make decisions. decision this site couldn't just do it voluntarily it would have to come before you to have that decision so it's whatever it's whatever you guys as a Planning Commission choose to do will allow for whatever standard of landscaping I mean you can the Planning Commission can require double the landscaping or half as much it's it's totally up to the Planning Commission based upon the use and what's being requested and, you know, what your decision making is in terms of why you would choose to do whatever the proposal says, you know, or whatever you choose to do. So should always be based upon a reason, but that's what, so that's all it needs to be done is you just need to make that decision.

So through the chair, we can do that today. I don't want to be messing these folks around. So we can make that decision today, correct? It doesn't have to come back.

Yes, it can be done today. Yeah.

So with respect to the paving, as I understand what you're, what you said was that the staff has always been recommending that the alley be paved. And it's been the planning commission in basically two, two meetings had said, no, we're okay with being unpaved.

Chair, correct, yes.

So the staff reporting in 2024 on this ingress and egress item, it says during the consideration of the CUP in 2012, extensive discussion about the alleyway was had, including a desire by neighbors to not have the alley paved and ultimately it was decided and approved by the Planning Commission to remain an unpaved alleyway. It says, staff believe that this determination can remain as no major changes to the access or number of users will change, thus not requiring this alleyway to be paved would be consistent with past decisions. So it seems to me like that sentence says that the staff had sort of come into quasi-agreement or said that what the planning commission was deciding was kind of okay as long as there weren't more people or more use being put out there?

Chair and Commission, I think what we're trying to express is making sure that this Planning Commission knows what you all have decided upon, upon the alleyway and past approvals. And that's the reason why, is that is very consistent with what's been approved in the past. And I think that that's what we were trying to point out, is that Code still says that the alleyway is supposed to be paved. But staff is recognizing that past approvals have stated that it's been allowed to remain unpaved, and that's consistent with what's been happening in the past. And so I think what I'm trying to say is that is the case, right? We're just trying to make sure that you understand where the consistency has been in terms of what the planning commission has decided upon each meeting.

So, and, and, and there hasn't, there isn't, um, any changes, major changes to the access or the number of users in this new application.

No, no, it's not a substance. Like all the access points that come onto the alleyway are still the same as prior approvals. And so, but that's for, you know, planning commission to consider in terms of the requirements of code.

And yeah, thank you. Anybody else? Thank you, Derek. I believe the applicant, the speaker, if they so wish,

Good afternoon. Yes, it's been maybe a month. Has it been a month or just two weeks? I'm Christy Roberts with Dwell. I represent the applicant here this evening. I mainly would just like to speak to the letter, just clarification. I think Derek pointed out pretty clearly what we're requesting. First is that condition three just be changed to the landscaping plan she'll comply with. Laramie Municipal Code 1514050 as currently adopted. And that either condition 9B be removed or clearly stated that the alley can remain unpaved. I was involved in the conditional use permit in the... earlier phase and the neighborhood was concerned about additional traffic, particularly from like motorcycles and dirt bikes, because I think of the open space in the area. That was the main concern at that time. So we think that the alley meets the needs of the church parking lots and is adequate and There are utilities in that alley, though not city utilities. It's a, you know, franchise utilities, electric, cable, phone. And so do you have any questions about our proposed modifications to the conditions? That was a little wordy.

My question is, will you maintain the landscaping this time around?

Well, it's not like we don't have any landscaping. So, yes, we do have landscaping there, and it is to the level that meets current code. In my opinion, one of the downfalls of the previous landscaping code that was changed in 2016 is that Frankly, Laramie doesn't have the climate to support the number of plantings that were required, and so they kind of die off, right? So I think our landscaping is appropriate for our site, and we do maintain it. We have an existing irrigation system. We've accommodated that irrigation system in the addition. There'll be another access point for that. So yes, we'll maintain our landscaping.

Just as a personal opinion, I think the current landscape in code is still too restrictive. And I've always said that. We'll see if we can work this out. Anybody else?

Yes. Unless we have more questions.

Are there any? Yeah, go ahead. You can. If you could state your name for the record, please.

Good evening. My name is Mark. I'm the pastor at Snowy Range and I thank you for your consideration today. I can speak to the landscape a little bit. We do have irrigation. The areas where we struggle is on the far west side where that's just prairie. And so the trees really take a beating there. It's hard to keep them alive. The rest of our landscape seems to be doing pretty well. I do want to make a comment about the alley. Before we built our last addition, we had a series of meetings with the neighborhood, and the homeowners were adamant that they did not want that alleyway paved for reasons that were mentioned already, the water. And then they wanted to mitigate traffic during the week, not on Sunday mornings. Our traffic is very slow and safe as people come in and out. It's the dirt bikes and the four wheelers and trucks that were racing down there. So they didn't even want it leveled out. They liked the potholes in there to slow the traffic down. But that's just a comment there. We try to be a good neighbor. In our community, we have provided a playground there that's used every day of the week during nice weather. The kids get to use our facilities, our bathroom facilities, as necessary. So we open that up to them. People use that property to walk, ride their bikes, get off the streets. We provide trash cleanup, not just on our property, but across the street and in the alleyway. We try and do our part to be good. When Grafton Street was being, when there was road construction, remember that a few years ago, we went door to door to all those residents and said, we know this is going to create some hardship for you. Why don't you park in our parking lot? in the evenings to lessen your walk home. I think we have good relationships with them, and this time when we applied, there have been no complaints. We've had general questions, as has been mentioned, and we just explain what we're trying to do. What we decided was to build an addition that has a multi-purpose area, a lobby, some classrooms for Sunday school to accommodate the congregation that is already there on Sunday. We did that intentionally. Our other option was to try and build a bigger sanctuary to accommodate larger crowds, and we didn't want to do that at the time. What we did was we added additional services as necessary to keep the traffic flow down, to accommodate them with our parking lot so that it wouldn't be that big of an issue. And then I just want to mention, too, that if you decide to have us pave the parking lot, half of that approximately isn't even next to our property. Most of the people that come into our church come in off of 15th Street. Very few come in off of 13th. And so if we pave that, we are also then supporting the commercial property next door to us with the apartment buildings and so on. And I don't know what to think about that. You're the experts. but something should be thought about there. We want to do our part, but we believe that since you approved the project in 2024 with no conditions at all, and it's the very same project this time, we're just simply asking you to approve it again so that we can move forward. And I'd be happy to answer any questions. Otherwise, I thank you for your time. Any questions?

Thank you, sir. Thank you. Any citizen comments? You have any online? Hearing none, what's the will of the commission here? Should we discuss this? Go ahead, Donald.

I have not realized, I'm revealing my ignorance, that the current city plan not mandates, but encourages paving of back alleys. And just to comment, and I'm biased, because I have a dirt alley behind my house, and we've got a lot of construction going on along Russell, and they're able to get a lot of stuff done fairly cheaply because they're dirt alleys in terms of putting in some of the pipes at the moment. But one of the charms of Laramie is having dirt alleys. And that's a part of town where there are, I used to live in that part of town, where there was, there's a lot of folks out on what used to be warren livestock land that used to amuse me what folks would do with their trucks and their quads and their dirt bikes. And anything that can be done to kind of minimize them, annoying the neighborhood, I think is not a bad idea. And if that involves a dirt alley, I lean in that direction.

Chris? I think we should respect the previous two decisions by Planning Commission to leave it unpaved and for the reasons that Donald mentioned. So I support leaving it unpaved. And to your point, Tom, about the landscaping to use current landscaping standards would be my opinion.

You got anything? I don't have anything to add. I'm in agreement with that. I live in that area too. Walk my dogs there quite often. Spent a lot of time in Breezelsfield and it's bad enough the way people drive through there. If we gave them a pavement, they'd be shooting up there into the, up that hill. They're already climbing up that hill in four wheelers. And we've had significant erosion on the east side of the church property.

It was a major source of entertainment for me when folks with their trucks would miscalculate it and get stuck. And I always felt a strong inclination not to help them.

I second that. Except for the fact that they're doing it oftentimes when I'm up there with my wife and my dogs. So, and They even forced Brad Enzi to fence in most of that land up there. Although Brad lets people walk in it. Would somebody care to? I'll make a motion. Okay.

Okay, so I move to approve a conditional use permit for an amendment to CUP-12-11, allowing for expansion of a church at 2552 15th Street and zoned R2, limited multifamily district, based on findings of fact and conclusions of law and subject to all of staff's recommendations below, with the modification of number 9. Item two being that the landscaping shall meet current landscaping code.

Excuse me. I think the way we need to do it, you need to make the motion as written on the recommended motion, get a second, and then we can amend it. Okay.

Okay.

Is that correct? Yeah.

So then strike the last item from being from item nine modification. So the current move to approve the conditional use permit for an amendment to CUP-12-11, allowing for expansion of a church at 2552 15th Street and zoned R2 limited multifamily district based on findings of fact and conclusions of law and subject to all staff's recommended conditions one through nine.

Is there a second?

Second.

All right. Would somebody care to write an amendment? Should we just strike those two conditions?

I don't think we want to strike them. I'll make a motion. Okay. So I move to amend item number 9-2, where it says the landscaping shall meet LMC 1514055. or the approved DR1308 to amend that to just say the landscaping shall meet the LMC14050 and strike or of the approved DR1308. All right. And the second part of that is item V or 5 to strike all of that requiring no paving on the alleyway.

Do we have a second to that amendment?

Second. So is it clear that item 5V is gone? And so the previous decisions of council stand of it being unpaid?

That's the intent. I think that's how. my word in it.

Chair, I'm comfortable with that motion. I think it's very clear what you guys want to do. So we'll, regardless, that's what we'll have happen in the site plan, yeah.

All right, there's an amendment and a second. So we vote on this motion as amended. And do we need a roll call vote Or a voice vote? Have you got the amendments?

Do we vote on the amendment?

Yeah, we vote on the amendment first. All right. All those in favor of the amendment, say aye. Aye. Aye. Ayes have it. The amendment carries. Next, we'll approve the CUP. And I think we need a roll call vote for the CUP. Do we? No.

Only for variances in comprehensive plan amendments.

OK. So all those in favor of approving Brian's motion, say aye. Aye. So it's proved as amended. Let's see. I believe there is no other business before us this evening. And the chair will entertain a motion.

Move to adjourn.

Second. All those in favor, get out of here.