Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

We'll be right back.

It's true.

So we're having some issues with the, uh, audio system here, which also, uh, coordinates with the voting. So we may have to do thumbs up, thumb to the home on the voting. Uh, my planning commission available up here is two 24, 2021, which is not today's date. So with that said, I will open this meeting of the planning commission on November 10th, 2025 at 6 32 PM. And clerk, could you please call the roll?

Chair Reynolds?

Here.

Vice Chair Almond? Here. Commissioner Coronado?

Here.

Commissioner Neely?

Here.

Commissioner Roethlisberger? Here. Commissioner Radulovich?

Present.

Commissioner Santana? Commissioner Goodman? We have quorum.

Thank you. At this point, we'll... Please stand if you're able and join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Seeing no changes to the agenda of the agenda is approved as published. We do have one set of minutes to approve certification of the September 22nd, 2025 regular meeting minutes. I'll call for a motion and second.

I moved to approve based on the clerk certification. Is this right? October 27th. No. Yeah, I guess so. 27-2025, regular meeting of the Littleton Planning Commission.

Second. Motion by Commissioner Allman, seconded by Roethlisberger. And I will note that the minutes are for Monday... October 27th, 2025 and not September 22nd, as I mentioned in the intro. So thank you for correcting me with that. I'll call for a vote on the certification of the minutes of October 27th, 2025. Please signify yes by thumbs up.

The vote is six in favor. The motion carries.

All right. Thank you. This is the portion of the agenda for public comment that is not related to a publicly noticed item on the agenda tonight or other general business. And this is, as I mentioned, for items that are not part of the public hearings on tonight's agenda. And comments will be limited to three minutes. Please be civil and we will not tolerate disrespectful or disruptive behavior. And the sign-in sheet is approaching the dais. And we have one person signed up, Pam Chadbourne.

Hi, Planning Commission. My name is Pam Chapman. I live a block or two from here. First off, I want to acknowledge that 3A passed. It is poor legislation for our city. It puts the zoning of single-family zone districts into the city charter and not our zoning code where it belongs. It was a response by A group of people with a certain kind of motivation to the city's proposed legislation for duplex, triplex, quadplex housing replacing single-family homes. That was not well designed, and the process to push that through was a failed process. It is one that the city has used many times. But it is a bad process. And so I want to point out to Planning Commission that I hope that you as individuals and members of this committee ask for improved process in the future because that was one of the flaws that led to, in the city's actions, that led to this 3A poor imposition. I also want to ask for Planning Commission to think about how do we fix this long term? I think there are some requirements in law for how long it can be before it can be changed, but let's get that in our process in our plan now. And I would like planning commission and staff to figure out what the code really should say to protect diversity and variety of housing. I believe in single family homes in Littleton. They should be part of the mix. So let's protect them, but integrate them into a larger plan for how this is going to provide housing for everybody. I want to talk about the public hearing item for electrical vehicle chargers and related fuel station legislation. It's for high-quality governance, and I'm going to point out if it is, then I want to see it taken through Environmental Stewardship Board and Transportation Mobility Board, too, before it comes to you for approval or recommendation to City Council. Why is this not happening? I've been watching this for years and our staff continues to say what is the minimum we need to do to push something through rather than what is the way to get the best legislation for the city and use all of our boards and commissions and motivated folks to do that. I want the stove piping to stop and so that is a flaw in this and I want to see the integration of EFSB and TMB and put in this. Finally, Littleton Boulevard subarea plan. We please pick someone with a commitment to a professional design process which includes consideration of alternative scenarios and pros and cons, and not someone who wants to push forward just their one opinion. There are many flaws in our management of process and products. It's been true for years The stakeholder working group process is wrong and it's anti-civic and anti-public Anti-professional public design that is time and so on. Oh, yeah, there's no time on this thing So anyway, please pick someone who will do the right design process. Thank you

Thank you. That's all we had signed up for public comment this evening. Is there anyone else in the room who would like to speak regarding items not on the agenda? Seeing no one in the room, we'll move on to the next item, which is general business, seeking volunteer representative and alternate for the Littleton Boulevard Subarea Plan Stakeholder Working Group. And I believe we do have an introduction from staff for this item.

Yes, thank you very much. Before you this evening, we have a discussion, and hopefully that will result in a nomination to this working group. I just want to introduce Zerreen Tasneem, Senior Planner, and one of the project managers for the Littleton Boulevard Subarea Plan.

Hello, Planning Commission. You might remember me from a couple of weeks ago giving an informal introduction to this topic, so bringing it back to you for the formal selection. So as a background for those that weren't at that meeting, the Littleton Boulevard sub-area plan has been approved by a city council with a consultant selected to help us in doing that planning services work. Specifically, the subarea plan will be looking at the Littleton Boulevard corridor from a multi-faceted, comprehensive perspective and thinking... Sorry, I'm realizing the... Presentation is not up there. Is it in front of you? Oh Okay Well, we'll just do this blind So we'll be looking at it from a multi-faceted Perspective we have six fillers that we have identified for this process for this project looking at land use historic preservation and economic development housing transportation and mobility and streetscape and green infrastructure as part of this comprehensive planning process in order to answer the broader question of if you think about the Littleton Boulevard corridor and this area around it in 30 years what we want that area to be known for and that's the major goal of the project So what is a sub-area plan anyway? It's a, like I said, it's a comprehensive plan, but on a smaller geographic scale, looking at a particular area of the city from a multifaceted lens. It provides that same level concept detail that you might see in a comprehensive plan. So in terms of planning commission, we talk about Envision Littleton. That's our comprehensive plan for the city. So same level of concept level there. making recommendations that would then be explored in greater detail and different types of plan. For example, an infrastructure plan such as Project Downtown or a really honed in corridor study like the Broadway Corridor Study. So this is how this plan differs from some of these other planning process that the city has undertaken in the most recent years. And we say that to just have Planning Commission's understanding of just like the level of detail and some of the things that the representative might be working on. Through this plan, we have outlined multiple project engagement opportunities, two of which include the stakeholder working group, which we anticipate to be a representative working group of members of various boards and commissions on the city, including planning commission, historic preservation commission, transportation mobility board, so it won't be just Commission that takes part of it as the board representative and numerous others will also be looking to have business Business center representatives or businesses along Littleton Boulevard as well as resident Representatives as part of the stakeholder working group to give you all an idea of the other members. We're seeking for this The stakeholder working group will also have the opportunity to participate in a urban design charrette as part of their commitment and So that should be an exercise that takes part during the process and thinking about the visioning for the quarter and what might be possible in it. So in talking about time commitment, the outline, the life of the project is expected to be about 18 to 24 months. We've begun work on the project this fall. We're doing some existing conditions analysis, doing some data collection that's going to start this month. and then hoping to wrap up by October or fall of 2027 at the latest. The stakeholder working group is expected to meet every few months throughout the process at key milestone touch points and engagement opportunities to provide feedback and advice on the project to inform the consultant team and staff on key questions we might have along the way. Particularly for planning commission, the representative and the alternative if the representative cannot attend a meeting. will act as a liaison between the project and Planning Commission to provide updates during meetings periodically. And the first meeting is expected to take part either in January or February of next year, so 2026, most likely February of next year. We're currently seeking representatives from the various boards and commissions and from the larger community to build out the stakeholder group. So that's what staff has been focusing on and then hopefully moving on to actually having a meeting next year. That's my very brief presentation that did not show up in front of anyone, but happy to take any questions and hear your discussions on this. So just as a reminder, we're looking for the primary representative on the stakeholder working group and then an alternate if that representative cannot attend the meetings. Obviously we'll figure out the meeting time, so most likely maybe, like I said, once every couple of months, maybe at the evening time or somewhere maybe later in the day if you're thinking about your schedules.

Thank you. Are there any questions for staff about the corridor study? So our task this evening is to nominate a primary member of the planning commission to serve on the advisory group and a backup. So what I would do is we'll conduct this similar to, you know, the chair and vice chair nominations. So I'll take any nominations for people.

I would like to nominate myself for this, please.

And I would like to nominate myself, too. I'm very interested in this project.

Any additional nominations? All right, so.

Do both of you accept your nomination? Yes.

THEN IS THERE ANYBODY IN PARTICULAR WHO WOULD WANT TO BE THE ALTERNATE OR SHALL WE HAVE SPEECHES?

WE'LL GO AHEAD AND DO A SPEECH AND THEN WE'LL HAVE YOU VOTE.

JUST A QUICK SORRY, I SHOULD HAVE ADDED THIS BEFORE. SO WE DO HAVE IN THE PROJECT SCHEDULE TO MAKE PERIODIC STUDY SESSION PRESENTATIONS TO PLANNING COMMISSION. It won't be just the representative making some updates to you once in a while. The whole planning commission will see project staff and consultant staff once in a while to make those study sessions just as an addition.

Okay, so yeah, I'd be interested in doing this because we are starting to see a fair amount of development, and we've seen some good development down on Littleton Boulevard there with some of the new restaurants, the brewery, the revitalization, I think, in that shopping center across the way. We also have obviously hit some... speed bumps there in terms of how some of those designs were implemented and I think that some of that can be resolved in terms of how we use the space we have to resolve some of those issues that have come up in the past. I'd like to take a look at or be involved in this to also understand how some of these some of these designs or some of these wishes from the stakeholder group and in community feedback would feedback possibly into a additional kind of corridor. Like we've got a downtown zoning, um, standards and how we would look to implement some of those, uh, Littleton Boulevard standards, both in the code, um, as well as how it fits with our existing uh, zones and standards, um, throughout this, uh, throughout this process. I have a few ideas, but certainly would like to hear more from a stakeholder group. Every now and then I think that I feel like I've got everything, I've got a ton of ideas and somebody brings in a new idea and I'm like, that's brilliant, let's shift some of these other things around. So in terms of kind of accommodating and combining the views from the various members of the stakeholders, Um, plus some of the things that I was able to learn and observe at the planning conference in the spring, there was a whole presentation and study session from one of the, uh, um, you know, and during one of the sessions about transit corridors to grand boulevards and basically revitalizing and reinvigorating some of those community spaces along boulevards that have been just kind of heavily trafficked and are used as kind of more of a cut through, um, In terms of what we see, I think we see a lot of that in terms of Littleton Boulevard, and we can make that a better community and commercial space for the residents and the businesses of Littleton. So that's my motivation.

Thank you. Okay, yeah, and as most of you know, I've just recently retired from a 40-year career in planning and urban design and landscape architecture and So I have time and flexibility to participate. And I'm really interested in getting more involved in Littleton issues. And this is a big one. It's a very important one. I don't really have an agenda or any strong ideas for the Littleton Boulevard corridor. But I know some of the issues, having sat on this planning commission for a long time. And I see opportunities and potential there is really intriguing, especially with the application of the ULUC which has changed the land use zoning along that area. And right now there is an interesting mixed use happening there, but it's segmented and broken up. how could it become more integrated and embrace the attributes that it has now, such as the historic aspects, the economic aspects, the residential aspects as well. I just see a lot of potential, and I'm interested in being a stakeholder, being a representative of the city and the planning commission in this process that we're just starting. It's a long process. I've been involved in a lot of these types of projects throughout the country, um, in working as a landscape architect. And, um, so I kind of know what to expect in, in the public engagement piece and, um, willing to listen and hear and, and applies what we hear, um, uh, to the, to, um, to this quarter study. So I'm very interested in, uh, participating in that.

Okay, I will need a motion and a second on nominating Roethlisberger.

Okay, I would like to motion to approve myself for the Transit Corridor Representative, sorry, sorry, still stuck on my thoughts process. Yes, all right, so I would like to make a motion myself as the representative for the Littleton sub Littleton Boulevard sub area plan Motion by Roethlisberger.

Do we have a second? Seconded by Neely any discussion And it does appear that I am The voting might work but I'm only showing four participants authorized to vote here. Don't know if the software is cooperating.

No.

Open.

Okay, thumbs up is great. Okay. So this is for Roethlisberger to be the representative and the vote is? Oh, we had something.

Clerk, have you seen the votes or trying to get that programmed in?

Okay, that was great. Okay. Four in favor. Four in favor, Rothlisberger is nominated or approved.

All right.

All right, thank you. And so now I need a... NOMINATION FOR, OH.

A MOTION.

I NEED A NOMINATION FOR THE ALTERNATE.

ALL RIGHT. I WOULD MOVE TO APPOINT COMMISSIONER CORONADO AS THE ALTERNATE AND CALL FOR A SECOND IF THERE IS ONE. ALL RIGHT. MOTION MADE BY CHAIR REYNOLDS, SECONDED BY CORONADO. AND WITH THAT, A VOTE. THUMBS UP FOR YAY, THUMBS DOWN FOR NO.

SIX IN FAVOR. THE MOTION CARRIES.

All right. Thank you. I'm really excited for this project. It's going to be just, I think, there's a lot of tremendous potential along that corridor and living so close to it and experiencing it on a daily basis, including on my way down here tonight. Certainly worthy of the attention that the city is placing on it. So we do have one noticed public hearing item PC resolution 12 dash 20, 25 recommending approval to city council of a code text amendment to title 10, the unified land use code related to electronic vehicle charging.

Thank you very much chair. So before you this evening is an item that we've been working on For a few months now. So this is actually a response to some state legislation I know you're probably saying hey, we tackled a lot of state legislation earlier and made a number of changes to the code however, this item is was delayed because the state was finalizing the model ordinance that they've put together. And so initially, there was a timetable on it that was the end of the year. So we were really trying to move this forward, right, and get this in during compliance. The state's given us some breathing room. I think a part of that is because of when when their document came out, which I think was probably a little later than they anticipated too. They have also, the state has also hired a consultant to review code language. So we are going back and forth with them a little bit on any changes that we are proposing so that they can review it to make sure that it's in compliance with that model ordinance. So we're still in that process. So those are... having that little bit more breathing room so that we can engage with other departments and bring you hopefully what is a much better product, much more thought through and collaborative effort is our goal in asking for this to be continued. As you may also be aware, City Council has been talking about some ULUC changes to retail fuel stations, so basically gas stations, our code calls them, something different slightly. So our thought was also to bring those two items to you at least at the same study session, because they do have some similarities. So the extension of the moratorium is up on the agenda for next week for City Council, which would give us six more months. So yeah, we may engage with the Planning Commission on those two items in a similar timeframe as our goal. We had put on our recommendation a date certain of January 26. However, you may also, if you choose to move forward in that manner, that's perfectly fine. But you could also move to January 26 to continue it indefinitely, which would kill the current item. But then we would just repost when we are ready, giving us a little bit more flexibility to have some study sessions, et cetera. So either option would be adequate. So thank you.

All right, thank you. For the introduction, are there any discussion on continuing to a date certain versus just, you said, motion to postpone indefinitely? I guess I'll throw an opinion out there, which is January 26, 2026 is far enough away that it seems like it would be best to re-notice anyway. So I might lean towards just, you know, continuing indefinitely, which would allow that re-notice, but I wouldn't be upset if it goes the other way.

A question, I may have missed it. Did you say we want to do a study session before we do the resolution, vote on the resolution?

That is my intent, yes.

Okay, so I think that supports that idea.

Postponing it indefinitely would definitely give us a little more flexibility. We do not have anything on the December agenda, but we're planning on a stay session in the first meeting of January. We still have that as the target date, but as most of you are probably aware, then that means that a lot of that packet creation and generation is kind of being finalized during the holidays. So that, just as I mentioned, it's still our target, but it would give us a little more leeway.

I have a kind of a silly question, I think. Is it electronic vehicle charging, or is it electric vehicle charging?

Is there a difference? I'll have to check the model ordinance. I apologize. I normally refer to it as EV charging.

I believe it's electric.

One other note, Jared and I have been talking offline and one of the things that we would like to do is loop in, as you mentioned, other departments. Laura Rose's mom is our sustainability coordinator and so we'd like to, she's actually been working with, she's been working on a lot of EV type of projects with the city that have yet to come forth and also grants and so we'd like to also bring her into the loop. Postponing indefinitely, I don't know her schedule. I don't know what resources she has right now. But we'd really like for her to get a set of eyes on this as well.

We certainly plan to coordinate with Laura and other staff to see their thoughts, but definitely not opposed on having the conversation with more groups in the city. Yeah, I think environmental sustainability would be a really good one. Transportation, the charging stations are a little bit more of a land use item than a true transportation. But I'll chat with the transportation division and see what their thoughts are.

Given that the state wants to have these things done in a timely manner, when did they push that out to?

That's a wonderful question. So they have given us some more flexibility. We have to do some reporting at the end of the year to say that we're working on it, and in working with their consultants, that's easily achievable. Then we have to do a little bit more reporting in March. I think their preference would be that we were complete in March, but we might be a little bit behind that. And so we'll continue to have that conversation with them, though.

And I definitely would support talking to other groups about this. Now, this is one of those things where the state is kind of telling you what they would want the code to look like. So I don't know how much wiggle room there actually is, but it's always a good discussion to have with them. It's just a matter of the state wants this to look like this, so this is how this is going to look.

kind of regardless of our input at times it feels like we, if I may, we certainly would be able to go further than the code if we so chose. But yeah, there's kind of a minimum threshold there. Yeah.

And the other note to make, um, which is kind of interesting with this model code is that there are a lot, there's a lot of flexibility that are, that has given to the municipalities in terms of how we want to, um, I guess structure it so most codes kind of outline exactly what the jurisdiction is supposed to do and this one is a little surprising to me how it is written that we can discuss internally and they gave us three different options in terms of how we want as far as paths forward and so there is a little bit more flexibility than other statutory requirements.

Given that information. I definitely would like to have the opinion of those other two boards as far as What they have to say about it, so I would probably support Doing this indefinitely just to make sure that we've got time to do that because Holidays and everything else is probably going to get in the way Any other questions for staff comments

I'll go ahead and move to continue indefinitely PC resolution 12 dash 2025 recommending city council approval of code text amendment title 10 regarding electric vehicle charging motion by Coronado.

Do we have a second seconded by almond? Um, I believe we've discussed this, but if anyone has anything else to say, uh, Seeing none, I will call for a vote. Thumbs up is approval of a motion to continue this item indefinitely.

The vote is six in favor. The motion carries.

Thank you. So on to the comments and reports portion of the agenda. Community Development Director and staff.

Yeah, thank you very much. As I mentioned, We are not planning on a December meeting. And so we plan on taking up quite a bit of work in the spring of next year. We do have a number of quasi-judicial items on the way. I think I said that at our last work planning, and not all of them have transpired. But some of them are just taking a little longer than I anticipated. So yes, there are a number of items. And that kind of brings me to the next point. We have not talked work plan. And so I'm proposing to have that discussion with you in January and talk about more of a year plan rather than six months. So with that, because it's not on the agenda, I can't really have the conversation, but what I can do is I could tell you some of the items that we are contemplating and then ask that you email or correspond directly with me if you have other things that you think would be of value to take up. I will admit that we don't have resources to do absolutely everything at once, but we're happy to analyze things further and have that conversation in January. Some of the things, though, as I mentioned, that we have looked into Of course, the EV and the gas station, so those two items will be earlier in the year, but then we do plan on working on a little bit more of a larger update as well to the ULUC. We're currently still talking about some landscaping items, and we have a little bit of staff changes there that have kind of elongated that process, but we're We're working with that new staff to identify any other items. Some coordination with building division in regards to building codes. So we have a couple items there that the UOUC calls out one thing, the building code calls out another. Sometimes there's rationale for why those are different. Sometimes the UOUC is stricter. Other times I think we could probably get in more alignment. So that's another item. potentially an update to temporary uses. And then I know we had a state session last year about lighting, and that unfortunately hasn't come back to the level of necessity to bring back. So I want to make sure that you all know that we haven't had that drop off our radar. We'd like to bring that back as well at some point in time here, probably later in 26 for that larger update.

Thank you. So I'm planning on a discussion at a January meeting then for the work plan. And I'll be looking at the attorney while I make this statement. But members of the Planning Commission are free to email a member of the staff and not CC other members of the Planning Commission. If you have ideas for the work plan so An email with any more any of the Planning Commission members CC down it starts to look an awful lot like a meeting and that's a bad thing So you but you may email staff directly if you have ideas for the work plan for discussion in January Good Thank you Any reports from city attorney city clerk I

Jared and I spoke real briefly before the meeting. I know that 3A has kind of been on everyone's mind. I know that the city attorney is working furiously, too. He's back and forth with city council, and I suspect that there will be an update. I don't have an update personally for you, and that any type of update will come from either the city attorney or myself after a little bit more discussion.

And this is our last meeting for the year, so happy holidays to all of you.

So yes, the January meeting is right around the corner as discussed earlier And he updates from Commission members And No, no specific Littleton related updates from I The chair, though, I will recognize that it is the 50th anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, so please listen to that Gordon Lightfoot song this evening. And with that, I'll adjourn the meeting at 7.10 p.m.

Thank you.