Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Thank you, Vice Chair Gregory. We have you in attendance. We have Anna Rahumlo, we have Christopher Arnston, and we have Mark Berger, and we do have a quorum.

Come on. There you go. Sorry. Chair Hempstead provided advance notice of his absence. Is there a motion to excuse the absence?

I move to excuse the absence. Second.

Okay. It has been moved by Commissioner Arneson and seconded by Commissioner Barger to excuse the absence of Chair Hempstead. The floor is open for discussion. So, being as there is no discussion, it has been properly moved and seconded to excuse the absence of Chair Hempstead. Will the clerk please start the vote?

Commissioner Barger?

Present.

Do you approve?

I am so sorry, yes.

Thank you. Commissioner Arntzen?

Yes.

Vice Chair Gregory?

Yes.

And then Commissioner Hamlin? No.

yes thank you okay it was voted 4-0 that we approve that now the next item is approval of the agenda if the commissioner wants an item removed from the consent agenda agenda please be recognized by the chair and state the item you want to remove for further discussion the item will be considered separately no motion is required i'll entertain a motion to approve the agenda.

I would like to make a motion to approve the agenda.

Second.

It has been moved by Commissioner Barger and seconded by Commissioner Arsten to approve the agenda as presented. The floor is open for discussion. Being how there is no discussion, it has been properly moved and seconded to approve the agenda as presented. Will the clerk please start the vote?

Commissioner Wahimlo? Yes. Vice Chair Gregory? Yes. Mr. Arntzen?

Yes.

Commissioner Barker?

Yes.

It has been approved 4-0. The next item is the approval of the consent agenda. All matters listed within the consent agenda have been distributed to each member of the Kennewick Planning Commission for the reading and study and are considered to be routine, and it will be enacted by one motion of the Planning Commission with no separate discussion. I'll entertain a motion.

Second.

I'm sorry, Commissioner Gregory. Could you repeat that, please?

I'll entertain a motion for the consent agenda.

I would like to make a motion for the consent agenda approval.

And you're my second? Second. Okay. It has been moved by Commissioner Barger and seconded by Commissioner Rahim Loo. to approve the consent agenda. Will the clerk please take a vote, start a vote?

Commissioner Barger?

Yes.

Commissioner Arnson?

Yes.

Vice Chair Gregory? Yes. And then Raheem Liu?

Yes.

If I'm saying that correctly.

You said it beautiful. Okay. I need to practice. Okay, the outcome of the vote is four to zero. In favor? And we didn't have anything pulled, so next we will have two public hearings. The first hearing for Pringle Heights II ReZone C0Z2026-0004 is considered a quasi-judicial act by the Planning Commission rather than legislative. Quasi-judicial matters require that the Planning Commission meet the appearance of fairness doctrine. I ask that the Planning Commission listen carefully to the following questions. If your answer is yes to any questions, please ask to be recognized. I will call on you once all questions have been raised. One, do you have any interest in the property or application, or do you own within 300 feet of the subject property? Two, will you stand to gain or lose any financial benefits as a result of the outcome of the proceeding? Three, are you unable to consider the application in a fair and objective manner? Four, have you engaged in any ex parte communications with either proponents or opponents? So, it seems like nobody answered yes to any of these. It is established the Kennewick Planning Commissioner can consider this matter fairly. After each staff report, the Planning Commission will have an opportunity to ask questions or to request clarification information. Following questions, persons interested in testifying for or against each matter will be invited to speak. General discussion and debate by the Planning Commission must wait until after a motion has been made. The clerk has informed me there are no online... No online visitors signed up to testify for each public hearing. When testifying, please remember, the testimony period is your opportunity to speak for or against this matter. The Planning Commission will not directly respond to comments, questions, or concerns. When it's your turn, please come to the podium and state your full name and the city of residence for the record before beginning your remarks. Each speaker will have three minutes. A timer will be displayed on the screen. Everyone will only be allowed to speak once. Mr. Laras, may we have a staff report, please?

Sure, no problem. Before I start, I will make a note that we did receive some additional public comments last minute. We didn't get a chance to put them into the staff report, obviously, so I did put a bundle of them in front of your desks in case you haven't noticed already. Okay. So starting this presentation, this is a change of zone 2026-0004. Just a quick summary, the applicant is Peter Harpster of Harpster Land Development. The owner was listed as John C. Pringle. And the proposal is to rezone 48.94 acres from residential suburban to residential low density. The current comprehensive plan has it designated as low-density residential with the location of the proposal 5155 South Olympia Street and 5400 South Garfield Street. And so here's the vicinity map of the site. You can see the two properties right here that are outlined in red that are subject, or outlined in black, I mean, that are subject to this proposed rezone. And the zoning map right here, same thing, outlined in black, the two properties that are subject to this proposal. The light yellow is RS zone. and the surrounding dark yellow right here is RL Zone. Just a brief history of the property. The city annexed the site in 2007 through Ordinance 5183, and the properties were zoned agricultural. The site was rezoned to residential suburban on November 20th, 2018 through Ordinance 5761. So when it comes to RL and the permitted uses, RS and RL, they do both allow for single-family and middle-housing homes, but RL does allow for smaller lots. So the current zoning, RS, has an 8,000-square-foot minimum lot size, but RL has a smaller 5,500-square-foot minimum, and that's for single-family and middle-housing, but both zones do allow for townhome lots with an 1,800-square-foot minimum lot size. And so when it comes to a change of zone, there are certain findings that have to be made for approval. The first one is a proposed amendment conforms with a comprehensive plan, promotes a public necessity, convenience, and general welfare. The amendment does not impose a burden upon public facilities beyond their capacity to serve or reduce such services to lands which are deemed unacceptable by the city. The proposed amendment will be consistent with all applicable provisions of the Kennewick Municipal Code, including those adopted by reference from the comprehensive plan. And for residential properties specifically, the property is adjacent and contiguous to property of the same proposed zoning classification or higher. And with that being said, recommendation is that staff has reviewed the application and finds that it meets the change of zone findings in KMC 18.51.070, Section 2, and recommends that the Planning Commission concur with the findings and conclusions contained in staff report, change of zone 2026.0004, and recommend approval to City Council. And from there, I'll be happy to take any questions.

Commissioner Barger here. I know that, Anthony, we were just talking about this, but even on the map, it looks like the exact same property that we did a few months back that changed to low density. Is it like an addition to that property? Because it literally looks the exact same as before, unless I'm mistaken.

Yeah, so the top left-hand corner, yeah, that property was rezoned from RS to RL by the same applicant and also the same property owner, I believe. Basically, they have already applied for a preliminary plat for that property. It's working its way through the process right now. And so, yeah, by the sounds of it, this proposed rezone would be in addition to that. But as of right now, they're just doing the change of zone. They haven't submitted any preliminary plat map whatsoever for these two properties. Okay, I see. Thank you.

Commissioner Gregory here. One question I have for our helper, Randy. We don't have like a cheat sheet of how they are going to read out when they make a motion. And so that might get a little hard up here just to prepare you. And... For me, with all the new legislative stuff coming our way, whether we change this now or if we say no today, what... With our new laws, are they going to be able to do it anyway?

I can speak to that, Vice Chair. So... Obviously, it's dependent on what the proposed development is going to look like. Is there potential that it could end up the same? There is some potential there. Just based on the state's laws on middle housing, the requirement that we allow townhomes in every zone, and then their ability to utilize a unit lot subdivision in order to create lots that are actually smaller than what's allowed under the existing code, or at least segregate units off of a lot and have those unit lots be smaller than existing code. It is possible that they may be able to achieve the same thing without going through a rezone, but it's all dependent on what they're proposing to develop.

Okay, thank you.

Commissioner Barger again. I know it's probably too early to tell, and this is obviously in the beginning stage, but is there an idea that they might change from what they originally planned a few months back as far as this engineering goes?

Can you say that last part again?

Well, before when they submitted their plans the first time, is there any indication that it might change?

The applicant has not stated anything so far regarding their subdivision plans for these two properties.

Maybe just to clarify, Commissioner Barger, again, if you look on the screen up here where I've got the pointer, That's the property that was rezoned and that's the property where development plans have been submitted. For this rezone, we haven't seen a lot lay out. They've just indicated a desire to rezone the property and then develop it in accordance with the residential loan provisions. Thank you, Ms. Malloy.

Are there any more questions from commissioners? Okay. The public hearing is now open. If someone in the audience wishes to speak, please raise your hand or come on up to the podium. Do you want to direct them?

And then we do have one person that's online. I'm not sure which item they're wanting to speak to. Okay.

Okay.

T. Carson, if you're there, would you like to speak towards this item? Are you wanting to speak towards the next item, or are you not wanting to speak at all? I think she's a watcher. No response, so we're going to assume that you're not wanting to speak. Okay, and then we'll move on to the people that are in person here. We have the first one. We have Rex T. McKay. And if you'll give me one moment, I will turn on the timer here.

I'm concerned about this change and for several different reasons.

Garfield Street is very narrow. It's poorly constructed. It has no sidewalks. In fact, it has no shoulders. And so unless there is significant improvement to that street, it cannot handle this kind of traffic. It would be dangerous. And in the case of an emergency, like the fire that we just had, it would have been a bottleneck. That fire could have been a lot worse. If the wind hadn't pushed it to the east instead of to the north, we may have seen another Spokane. Because I'm not sure they would have stopped it before it got to my house. But the second is Kennewick Irrigation District has had, for whatever reason, lots of difficulty in that area of their service area. And so it needs to be upgraded in some way. or it won't be able to handle the additional housing. Under the old zone, it would have had difficulty. In a denser zone, it will have even more difficulty, causing difficulty to those residents that live there. Kennewick School District, if you've been to Cascade School, you'll notice the number of portables that they have there currently. I don't know of any additional schools going into that area of the city. This would put an additional strain on our educational system and on the transportation and the travel to get to the school. There is not nearby city fire and ambulance service. The closest I believe is down on 27th, close to US 395. I don't consider as a resident the volunteer station as being adequate for an increased population. I would request that before any approval is given, that someone, whether it be the city planning department or some other agency, detail the cost estimates of improving the street, improving the access, improving the other infrastructure items that are needed in that area. And so I would request that we not approve that until such estimates of what the cost to the city would be against the increased density.

Vice Chair Gregory, that is the three minutes.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Is there anyone else that would like to? We have two more that I have forms for. I'm not sure if anybody else in the audience wanted to speak towards this item, but we have Heath Geyer. I'm not sure if I said that right or not.

Thank you for the opportunity to say a few things. My name's Heath Guyer. We have lived and owned a home up there for 48 years. It's quite a long time. It's my mom's place, so I'm kind of speaking for the both of us. And ditto to everything Tom said. I've known Tom since I was a kid, living in that neighborhood. All kinds of concerns, especially with Garfield. We're talking about in that area, I've done the numbers through statistically how many homes that these all sell. It's going to be roughly 350 to 400 children in that area. It's a lot of kids, a lot of foot traffic. They're going to have to make their way over to, what is it, Cascade Elementary. There's strain on the schools, that's for sure. So I'm hoping that if you're going to go ahead and rezone this and allow the smaller lots and the more homes, that you do some serious improvements to the infrastructure up there to help with that traffic. I'd also like to point out that this is an opportunity for Kennewick. who has not the greatest track record of access to parks. I think 56% of our citizens in Kennewick are within 10 minutes of walking distance to a park, whereas Richland is 80%. Pasco's even better. And so I know that the builder would have an opportunity to pay the park impact fee. But if they were to waive that for common space, that might cut down, or a park in that area, that might cut down the amount of homes. At that point, they could have whatever size lots they want. They would have less homes or something for the kids to do. So once the thing goes in and once people build these homes, that's an awful lot of homes. I mean, we're all for developing up there and lived up there a long time. I've looked at alfalfa fields, fields, trees, orchards. So it'd be nice to see some of the weeds go away and some improvements made. But you only get one shot. Once they start developing, that's it. So I'd like to encourage you guys to try to work with the builder or the developer to make sure there's good common ground, park, things of that nature. Any other points that I might be missing? I think Tom covered everything else. But I thank you for the opportunity to voice my opinion.

And the next one that I have a form for is I believe it says Blaine Broenberg. Give me just one second to get your timer going. Okay, there you go.

Hi, everyone. My name is Blaine Broberg. I'm with Harpster Land Development, the applicant on behalf of the property owner, regarding the change of zone, COZ 20260004. Kennewick Municipal Code requires City Council find five criteria to meet in order to approve a change of zone. Staff has addressed all five criteria in their staff report, and we're in agreement with their findings. Parcels in the change of zone are directly adjacent to and surrounded by parcels that are zoned RL to the north and east. This rezone simply brings those subject parcels in conformance with the surrounding zoning. This change of zone is a non-project action. No plat has been submitted, no builder's been selected, no product type has been determined yet. Comments regarding future lot sizes, housing density. I believe we saw one about crime in the public comments in staff report. In traffic, presuppose future development decisions that have not been made and are not before you guys tonight. Any existing concerns with the existing neighborhood can't really be attributed to this rezone application. All the notified agencies, including Bonneville Power, Benton Pewdie, Columbia, and Kennewick Irrigation Districts, Benton Clean Air, et cetera, they didn't have any objections, and we received a determination of non-significance with no comments from the City of Kennewick. Should a future application be submitted, these same agencies and the public will have an opportunity to comment then, and staff will have the full authority to require mitigation That's appropriate at that time. Respectfully, I request that the Planning Commission concur with staff's recommendation and forward the approval of this change zone to City Council. And I'm here to answer any questions if you guys have any. Thank you.

Is there anyone additional in the audience that wanted to speak towards this item?

Okay, if there are no more speakers, then the public hearing is now closed. I will entertain a motion.

I move to concur with the staff findings and approve change of zone 2026-0004.

I'll second that. And also I'd like to say something about it.

There will be a time for discussion. Okay. Never mind.

I second.

I'm trying to follow the script, so. Okay. It has been moved by Chairman Arneson and seconded by Chairman Barger that the Planning Commission concur with the finding and conclusions in Staff Report C0Z-2026-0004 and recommend to the City Council for approval of the request. The floor is open for discussion.

You know, the only thing I really wanted to say about it is, and all these concerns are valid concerns, and we had also dealt with this, as we'd seen before, same owners, different parcel, and it all meets the criteria, and I think that the concerns will be better addressed at the time where there's actually a plan coming into place for the public, if I'm not mistaken, but that's That's the way I see it, and that's why I would agree with this. It does meet the staff requirements, and that's all.

Okay, Commissioner Gregory here. I have a couple questions. Will there be a fire impact cost on the developer like there is in a lot of other areas?

Yes, there will be.

Like enough to actually help with the fire station?

So currently the fire impact fees are only assessed in the Southridge area. Okay. There's consideration to look at the rest of the city and to institute a fire impact fee, but there's not one in this area this time.

Okay, and another question is, as working with developers in many places in the city, there are requirements for common areas, and there aren't any requirements for actual parks. And so can you tell us what those requirements are to let the homeowners nearby understand?

Right off the top of my head, I believe that they're generally not any requirements when it comes like specifically providing parks. I know there are requirements for like such as providing sidewalks for every residential streets also long arterials, for example. Also, landscaping requirements, they're required to place street trees for every residential property. Also, as a part of a landscaping buffer along arterials, I don't believe that the street, what is the street called to the east of this development? I don't believe it qualifies as an arterial, but generally speaking, you do have to provide some street trees along streets.

And that's considered a common area for the homeowners that move in there?

No. So generally, like I said, it's not a requirement in our residential design standards, I believe, to provide common areas for single-family developments.

But it will be a green belt that they'll have to maintain.

I'll elaborate on that. I'll just elaborate on that, Vice Commissioner, or Vice Chair. It all depends on how, yes, it will have to be maintained. How it's maintained is dependent on how the development is set up. So as Mr. Lars was saying, stating, there are arterial street landscaping requirements. There are residential street landscaping requirements as well. And oftentimes those landscaping tracks are placed in areas Those landscaping areas are placed in tracts, which are generally referred to as common spaces because they have common ownership. They're typically owned by a homeowners association. And the homeowners association is responsible for maintaining those. There's not a requirement that a homeowners association be present. And so when... It is possible to establish those landscaping tracts and have them be a portion of the property owner's property, and then they have responsibility to maintain their portion of the tract, or their portion of that open area. That doesn't happen very often, but it does happen occasionally. But for ease of maintenance, it's not very efficient. And so that's, in most cases, it doesn't happen that way. There are other instances like stormwater retention areas that sometimes, depending on what's needed for the area, those can sometimes double as a recreation space. Not typically, but we have seen instances where those double as recreation space as well. And so there is a requirement for the landscaping. There's a requirement for retention areas, but there's not a specific requirement that they include like recreation space within a subdivision.

Okay, I'm going to agonize you a little bit more. So along with that, is there walking paths that have to be in? Because most of the developments I work in, the city forces us to have walking paths. Is that part of the ordinance, or is that just a developer that tries to put those in?

So that is part of the ordinance, depending on how the developer chooses to develop their property. And so what we're looking for with those development standards is connectivity within the development and providing a walkable area and a way to easily traverse through the neighborhood to get in or to get out of it. And so part of that is restricting the block width or length. And so there is a limit on the length of the block. If you exceed that limit, then you're required to install a pedestrian connection, mid-block connection. And so they're having to be installed because the developer's choosing to exceed the limit.

Okay, I got one more. So this is going to reduce the lot size down to 5000 square feet. And it right now stands at 8000. Is that correct?

Yes.

So along with that, rural suburban, the way I understand it is you can have larger farm animals. Is that correct?

Correct. It's the only zone that allows for farm animals, but you have to have, I believe, at least 30,000 square feet of land to have them in the first place, like horses and cows and such.

So if somebody wanted it to be rural suburban and stay that way, they'd have to purchase a few of these lots in order to keep that rural suburban type of theme there.

That would be correct, yeah, if they want to have farm animals and keep it as such.

So the difference between rural suburban and the ARC? that we're trying to change it to right now is just 3,000 square foot in a lot.

For the single-family lots, yeah, the minimum lot size, yeah, they go down.

Okay, thank you.

Commissioner Barger, I have a question. I know this is kind of like cart before the horse also, but I was thinking about Garfield Street, and I remember when they built all those houses back, I mean, as you can see on the map, And I remember going down Garfield thinking the street was too small to even accommodate all of the housing back in there. Is there a requirement that, you know, maybe to answer these folks' question, to widen the road, sidewalks? Because this would essentially at least double the traffic on that road. Is there something that the city requires the builder to do? Is it something the city does itself based off of traffic control? Or how does that work?

So from what I've seen personally in past projects that I've handled, whenever a project like a subdivision gets to the civil infrastructure permits, usually what I've seen is at the very least half street improvements. So basically on one half of the street, they would be required to add a curb gutter and sidewalk. So, I mean, that would be more of a traffic department question to get the specifics on their requirements. But yeah, from what I've seen in past subdivisions, that's usually the bare, the minimum that's been required.

But it would be something that was addressed, right? Correct.

Yeah, they would have to have it done before final plot approval.

Commissioner Gregory here. He's stirring the bear. So that is only on the property that is right there next to Garfield. That's not anything before or anything after. That's just where they're trying to change it, which would be both of these parcels eventually.

Correct.

Okay. Any more questions? Oh, we can't. I'm sorry, the hearing's already been closed. I would love to, but I can't, so. It has been properly moved and seconded that the Planning Commissioner concur with the findings and conclusions in Staff Report C0Z-2026-0004 and recommend to the City Council for approval of the request. Will the Clerk please start the vote?

Commissioner Parker?

Yes.

Mr. Arntzen?

Yes.

Vice Chair Gregory?

I just don't like where our city is going, so I'm saying no. And then Commissioner Rahim?

Yes.

The outcome of the vote was 3-1. Next is a public hearing for the 2026 comprehensive plan update. Mr. Maui, may we have a staff report, please?

Thank you, Vice Chair Gregory. Tonight we have before you the Comprehensive Plan Periodic Update and Associated Public Hearing. We have with us tonight Scott Bonjoukian of MAKERS Architecture and Design, who was our primary consultant on this periodic update. He's here in person with us. additionally we have members of his team and some consultants who are attending online and are available for questions should they should they come up so this time I'll I'll turn it over to Scott and I'll allow him to walk through the presentation

There we go. Again, for the record, Scott Bonjoukian with Meagher's Architecture and Urban Design. Here tonight to give an overview of a package of documents being considered for planning commission recommendation, city council, the comprehensive plan itself, a housing action plan, and an update to the critical areas ordinance. It'd be very similar to the briefing a couple weeks ago, but for the sake of the record and some new folks in the public attending tonight, we'll go over the updates on what's before you. So I'll try to go through the next slides here. Let's see, where should I point? Might have to be a manual situation. Let's do the next slide. All right. Okay, thank you. So I gave an overview here. I mentioned the project team. You can't see them on the screen, but we have some other consultant members on the team online with us to answer questions today. Jonathan, Ben, Katherine, Andrea, and Claire, and Laurel. If I can answer a question, they will be able to, and any technical components of the plan. And if we can't answer it tonight, we'll endeavor to get you an answer as soon as possible. So we're towards the end of a two-year planning process. We started in early 2025 with a series of early public engagement that gets folks' general input on preferences and priorities for the plan. These plans are updated every eight to 10 years, every 10 years now. And so things change over time with the population, the economy, technology, people's preferences, and also elected leaders and other people turn over. So it's important to update the plan every once in a while. And once through that public inputs, we put together the first early drafts and those were available for public comments and review earlier this year. And we're now at the point where we have a pretty well-baked set of documents and there's still at the end of the road and we're still interested in getting public comments and making sure this is the best plan and other documents that we can have. I mentioned every 10 years, most jurisdictions in Washington states need to update their comprehensive plans. Can you go to the next slide, please? There we go. As many of you know, the state legislature has been amending the Growth Management Act, which is what governs the planning framework for Washington cities and towns and counties. And so there's a lot of updates, especially on an emphasis on housing supply and community resiliency lately. And from a practical standpoint, jurisdictions need to plan for certain population targets that are developed by the state's Office of Financial Management. Those population numbers are distributed and assigned to all the counties, and the counties work with their cities within those counties to determine what the most realistic or appropriate sets of population projections are. And so those are very helpful for planning for housing growth, but also practical things like how much infrastructure you need, what type of infrastructure, and other long-term decisions. So these are the specific Kennewick growth projections that we're working with. Kennewick is expected to continue to see healthy growth in residents and jobs over the next 20 years. The numbers show an approximate 2046 projection of 108,000 residents, which is over 25,000 increase from today. which in those residents need to be accommodated with at least 12,000 new housing units and projected to see a job population of 59,000, which is another 12,000, nearly 13,000 increase in jobs as well. So these are bigger numbers, but it all can be accommodated for when planned for properly. So I mentioned public engagement. We've done a variety of activities with the people of Kennewick being guided by city staff. It was important to hear from the community members from the beginning. We've done a pretty good job in getting the word out and getting feedback from both the general public, but also specific stakeholders and special interests such as public agencies and key local business representatives. Our last major event was in May when we hosted an open house to give an overview of the first draft plan. In this slide, which I won't go into detail, just gives you a breakdown of the key activities we did with a couple of different surveys, stakeholder interviews. We had three meetings with a specific housing work group focusing on updates to the housing element and the housing action plan. We had that draft open house back in May. And of course, along the way, we've updated planning commission and city council at various meetings. So the nuts and bolts of the plan, the actual plan elements or chapters is not new to this group, but just a reminder of the constellation elements being worked with. Land use and housing probably have had the most changes from the old plan and given the amount of updated requirements at the state level. The climate element is brand new and I'll have a slide or two for each of these elements to help you get oriented. The plan document itself has been split up compared to the old plan. There's two documents in your packet. There's a volume one, which is the main elements that contain the goals and policies, a little bit of background information for each element, and most of the primary maps. There's also a separate introduction and vision statement chapter that gives a little bit of history of Kennewick. and kind of explains the comprehensive planning framework and how the plan is used for decision making and budgeting and staffing and things like that as the city grows over the long term. Volume two with the appendices, as you can see, is much longer and that has a lot of the backup information that was developed in support of the plan. It has a lot of technical reports, detailed land and infrastructure inventories, and a variety of other reports and analyses. Some are required by the state, others are just good practice that makes sure the plan is as well informed as it can be. So the first element, land use, is considered a core part of the plan because it affects how Kennewick is physically shaped and it directly relates to the work of many city departments and other public agencies that have decisions and programs to administer every day. It focuses on supplying adequate land for housing and jobs, including industry. The various goals and policies supports a variety of housing types depending on different neighborhoods and to provide considering people's different income levels. There's also policies focused on commercial districts and industrial areas and promoting those and retaining those and strengthening them to make sure they're viable employment centers for the long term. There's a goal in several policies related to environmental protection and other kind of a grab bag of other items related to parks and recreation, since you don't have a separate parks element and open space access. And also there's a separate policy on efficient governance, annexation, administration of the Growth Management Act and things of that nature. A key tool in the land use element is the future land use map. So this is a illustration of your existing map showing the color coding with the broad categories of human activities and commerce that can occur on each lot over the next 20 years. In many cases, the future land use map is just a reflection of what's existing on the ground today because once things are built, they're often there for a long time. But this relates to the zoning map because the zoning map will have more specific categories of land use and activities that can occur. But this is kind of the guiding higher level version of that. The next slide shows the draft proposed map, and I'll jump back and forth just between them briefly. A couple of things to point out is that the legend's a little bit small in the room here, but one proposal was combining the medium and high density residential areas on the map, because for the most part, they allow very similar types of developments and intensities of use. So those were proposed to be combined to simplify things. Then a couple other practical things. Mixed use was changed from purple to orange, and industrial was changed from gray to purple compared to the old map. And then if you want to dive into the details, this version highlights in the various colors the specific areas that are proposed for change, and they're all numbered. So if they need to be discussed, they can be talked about individually in that way. Throughout most, just the overview of what changed for the most part, there's a lot of administrative things. There were schools, cemeteries, parks, public works facilities and things like that that we suggested designated as public facilities or open space, just to make it more clear on where those facilities are located and to reflect them more appropriately administratively. And then scattered throughout the neighborhoods, we identified some specific areas that could be suitable for changing from low density residential to the new medium to high designation, typically because they were near a commercial district or schools or parks or transit service and should have the infrastructure to support that additional development and to help meet the city's housing targets. The plan has a special section on the South Ridge area because it's just the kind of the last area standing with a lot of vacant land. But it is slowly filling in as we've seen with new subdivisions and other developments coming in. But in some areas we suggested or we noticed during the process and hearing from the community that there's a little bit of a lack of commercial amenities in parts of South Ridge. And there's a lot of kind of a blank slate to work with. So there's a couple of policies suggesting a new neighborhood center centered on Bob Wilson Parkway that could potentially have a grocery store, parks, or some other community centers. The plan won't directly dictate or require those features, but through policies that will influence zoning in the future and future decisions on subdivisions and maybe public investments could help potentially shape that over the long term. Supporting all this in the background is an early document that we did with the land capacity analysis. The analysis looks at the existing zoning in comparison to those population and job targets that I mentioned earlier. Overall, the key finding is that there is sufficient land capacity in Kennewick City limits and the small areas of unincorporated urban growth area to accommodate that growth for the next 20 years, meaning overall housing capacity is also adequate. But under new state guidance, we had to do a second level analysis and look at available housing capacity by income level. So folks earning different spectrums of income depending on what type of jobs or other type of income or whatever their economic situation is. And there was a notable gap in folks who are earning 80% or less of the area median income, which generally means folks who are retired or on social security, but also includes a lot of kind of blue collar and service workers as well. And so there are, to address that gap, we proposed several code updates and also specifically that expand multifamily and middle housing capacity that are projected to serve those lower income levels. And it comes from expanded zoning, higher densities, and promoting accessory dwelling units. And with that change, the analysis shows a surplus of approximately 1,400 billable acres after accounting for constraints like critical areas and steep slopes and whatnot. So the next slide here shows the details of that. This is the first analysis, and you can see in the kind of the second to last column on the bottom, overall, the city had a surplus of 12,916 housing units over the next 20 years, given the current conditions on the ground and the current regulations. But when you zoomed into those different income levels, you can see the zero to 80% level had a deficit of about 2,400 units. So where can that extra capacity happen, given how much Kennewick is built out? Just some of this is reflecting the plan so much as this is just some kind of notes on what happens in practicality. There's a lot of vacant land still left in Kennewick, rural sized lots kind of in the center of the city and some underutilized commercial parcels that could potentially turn over over time. Kennewick's recent middle housing update increases choices and capacity as well, but you're not likely to see a lot of middle housing built and established in older single-family neighborhoods for the next 20 years. And as far as some of these new units are going to be affordable to those lower income levels, in theory, a lot of those new units have to have subsidies or income restrictions that the property owner offers units at a below market rate. But that doesn't happen automatically. And Kennewick may need to either with itself or in partnership with other state and local agencies, find programs and funding to meet those lower income housing needs over the long term. So some of the regulations that are proposed to be adopted concurrent with a comprehensive plan are there's quite a few and there's city staff will have a separate document available on this, but just the highlight of the high points allowing multifamily use in the commercial auto row and business park zones, which make up a relatively smaller part of the city. commercial auto roads kind of in the bridge to bridge area along Columbia Drive, and your business park zone is mostly west of the convention center area. That's partly driven by this work, but there's also a new state law that was passed earlier this year that is driving that requirement as well. But this is an opportunity to shape that to make sure it works locally. Kennewick currently requires a lot of most new development in commercial zones to have mixed use. But there's another, that same state law also provides some guardrails on how that can be required. So they're suggesting to kind of minimize that barrier in some of the zones. It doesn't fully apply to Kennewick because Kennewick has unlimited height limits in several zones, which is beneficial for development already. Removing maximum density limits in the medium and high density residential zones and basically let the market control for how much housing is built and rely on your other pre-existing zoning tools such as building heights, setbacks, landscaping requirements, providing parking. All that will already kind of naturally limit density anyway, but it just removes one hoop and allows a little bit more flexibility. Reducing or removing parking requirements under a new state law as well. The city can still require a little bit of parking, and for the most part, based on what I've observed around the states, private developers will still provide parking regardless of how much the city requires. But in theory, that will reduce some of the pressure and potentially allow housing developments to maybe fit in more units than they would otherwise. And then lastly, some key changes on reducing code barriers for a special subset of housing that's targeted to folks transitioning out of homelessness and needing extra social services, known as emergency, transitional, and permanent supportive housing. Things like adding definitions and adding them to the list of permitted land uses and things like that to provide some clarity for those developers to provide those types of housing is recommended to be updated in the zoning code. So of all that and the other smaller minor changes that happened, we reran the analysis and found that that deficit of about 2,400 lower income housing units turned into a surplus of about 79 units. So that's just kind of barely meeting the balance there and over the long term. So technically kind of what can meet its capacity obligations through those zoning changes that are proposed. And I will note that this table does not reflect changes to the zoning map or the future land use map that I mentioned earlier, but that would, in theory, provide additional surplus capacity. The Housing Action Plan proposes some more detailed strategies to address housing affordability concerns in Kennewick. We heard from the community that relative to Washington State, Kennewick and the Tri-Cities have a high quality of life and are an affordable place to live, but things are changing slowly and housing prices are going up like everywhere else. And so we worked with city staff in our housing task force to come up with a set of ideas for how that could be addressed. And we treat it basically as a menu of options. The city is not expected or obligated to take action on every single option in idea in the housing action plan, but they kind of provide a universe of ideas that can be implemented as feasible or as the city has capacity to do over time. A few things to highlight on the slide here would be things like height bonuses in multifamily zones to allow additional units to be built, perhaps in exchange for and attracting developers to do that by offering a temporary tax break on property taxes to help make those kind of larger, more complex projects more financially feasible. Reducing the amount of environmental review and paperwork that has to go into reviewing individual developments. So allowing some larger projects to basically skip the secret process when they meet certain requirements. Considering tenant protections such as longer notice for rent times, and then a litany of other things related to the staff capacity to help implement the housing action plan, work with the Kennebec Housing Authority, find new grants and other funding. Impact fee waivers could be considered for qualifying developments that have a certain number of affordable units. Impact fees could be adjusted. And there are potential a variety of tax options at the state level as well that city governments are allowed to consider. So as you can see on the right, that's a that's a kind of a table of contents for the plan on that table on the right side. And there's a lot more detail in there as well. The Housing Action Plan complements the housing elements in the Comprehensive Plan, and it has a lot of more higher level policies on housing supply, diversity, and affordability, policies for minimizing regulatory barriers, which I just touched on, and promotes access to housing, including for special populations such as seniors, people with disabilities, and others who might not always be met directly by the private market. Moving on to the other parts of the plan that have not been updated as much, but we did give a good polish on the economic development element. focuses on the commercial side of development and the city's long-term strategy to continue to improve economic well-being in the general business environment. And it seeks to attract residents and jobs through making sure Kennewick has the services and amenities that are needed for a good quality of life, whether that's access to certain products and retail services, entertainment, healthcare, childcare, the full spectrum of services that make a complete community. So there's a variety of policies in there related to those pieces. The new climate elements, I should say, Kennewick prepared its climate elements at a regional level in cooperation with other counties and cities over the last few years. And then Kennewick basically borrowed that and tailored a version for Kennewick that is very similar to the regional level but has some tailored policies and data in there specific to Kennewick. because the region shares a lot of the same issues. So generally, the element prepares Kennewick for current climate hazards, such as extreme heat, drought, and wildfire, seeks to reduce those hazards, protecting people in the ecosystems from hazards, and providing a lot of data and information on climate resilience and greenhouse gas emissions, which are baked into two different sub-elements or sub-chapters of the plan. The transportation elements focuses on improvements in policies and programs that guide the transportation system. It assists the city along with working with partners such as Richland, Pasco, Waukesha, and the county in coordinating on network-wide investments and planning, especially thinking about the long-term traffic projections, but also has policies for how to handle and guide individual development proposals that come along. And some of the key policies relate to making sure the system remains integrated and has multimodal options for people who will get around in different ways, maintaining service levels so traffic congestion is manageable, and minimizing the environmental impacts of transportation. The capital facilities elements addresses utilities owned by the city of Kennewick, which include water, some irrigation, sewer, and stone water, and also parks and recreation, police, fire, and also has information for schools, although that is administered by a separate agency. The capital facilities elements aims to coordinate land use planning with infrastructure planning so that as growth occurs and individual projects are proposed, the services and public facilities are confirmed to be in place or are required to be in place down the road as that growth occurs. The utilities element is related and it addresses other utilities owned and operated by other public agencies, including electricity, telecommunications, and natural gas. And very similar to capital facilities, it has policies and guidance for coordinating land use planning and utility planning, especially from a cost efficiency standpoint and to some degree aesthetics of utility infrastructure. And there's also a series of goals and policies on solid waste reduction. So that's the comprehensive plan. Separately, and the third piece here is the critical areas ordinance, which is part of your city code. This is already in place, and the purpose that's been in place for a long time is to use the critical areas ordinance to protect people and property from natural hazards, enhance the environment, and preserve areas that are valuable to the public and provide some low ecological function. There are various Growth Management Act guidelines on how critical areas ordinances should be written and what topics they should cover and what type of regulations they should have. Key to it is integrating the best available science for dealing with natural areas because the science is constantly evolving. Critical areas, to speak a little bit more plainly, the actual areas that they are in the city is natural areas, including wetlands, whether they are permanent or seasonal. Aquifer recharge areas, meaning areas of soil where rainwater and other water drains down into the aquifer and provides groundwater for human use. Fish and wildlife habitat conservation areas, which includes the shrub-stepped landscape around the Tri-Cities, frequently flooded areas, and geologically hazardous areas, which are mostly in this area's deep slopes. So addressing all those, overall, the critical areas ordinance, you'll see in the version in your packets, the changes are relatively minor, again, to incorporate best available science. There are some clarifications and updated definitions added. There are some new helpful guidance for both on the administrative side of staff and also developers to help understand the mitigation sequencing process for the kind of what the preferred mitigation is and working down through the different options in case something doesn't prove feasible. There's also incorporated rating systems for stream and wetland buffers based on the latest guidance from the Washington Department of Ecology. The critical areas ordinance has some draft maps just to show a little bit what these areas we're talking about. So just on the left is an example from your fish and wildlife habitat conservation areas. And on the right is a map of wetlands and critical aquifer recharge areas. So you can see they tend to be oriented on the south edge of the city, which has been less developed until recently. And notably, the critical aquifer recharge area is quite large and kind of aligns roughly with Highway 395. And some of the practical effects of the aquifer recharge area is it limits some types of polluting uses and industrial activities that could have the potential risk of contaminating groundwater. So those are just some of the practical effects of those. So with that... After today's meeting, City Council is scheduled to review in September at a couple meetings and hopefully adopt by the end of September. You technically need to adopt by the end of the year, but we are on schedule to do that a little bit earlier. So with that, I think we're happy to take questions.

Commissioner Gregory here. Scott, you are so thorough. It's like you have everything memorized, and I thank you for all your hard work that you've put into this. I know it's a lot.

It's been a good, fun project, so thanks for having us work on it.

I see your passion in it, and I appreciate that. I'm going to come back on the same thing that I keep asking. I would like to see some of the peer reviews that are in this climate issues because I do a lot of study on greenhouse gases and... We've been served a lot of lies over the last 10 years. And then when it comes to parking and all that, I know our state on the west side is trying to take away our vehicles and anything to do with gas. And so I'm not on board with this kind of issue. I'd like to see the science, the real science behind that. And I still haven't seen that, so... your work is amazing and i know our state legislators have pushed this upon us and that's why it's important for us to vote which we only had 30 percent turnout again this election and i know that for us to as a planning commission we need to back this kind of thing because our managers in our city are amazing but i still would like to know some kind of real science behind that. Can you give me any data on where they're coming up with this?

Yeah, I don't have it at my fingertips, and I'll let a couple of my colleagues could chime in, but the climate elements in volume one and volume two, I believe, does have references to a lot of peer-reviewed studies that back up why things are suggested and written the way they are.

Is that in our packet? Because I tried looking for those.

The actual reports might not be in your packet, but if you have the name of them or a web link, hopefully you'll be able to, you can find those online for the most part, I believe.

So how will I get those?

Commissioner Gregory, I think that, so Volume 1 and Volume 2, they contain the climate element information. There are citations within those, and so the actual reports themselves are not. going to be part of the comprehensive plan. But you should be able to look at those citations and then find the documents that are referenced in there. I don't know if you've seen those.

I didn't see citations, okay.

There should be citations within the, especially within volume two, which is where most of the technical data is located.

Andrea, did you want to speak? I saw you unmuted.

Sure, yeah. Thank you so much for your question. Our team supported the climate element, and I can speak to the greenhouse gas emissions piece and say that the greenhouse gas emissions analysis was based on standard, industry standard protocols for quantifying greenhouse gas emissions from, specifically from communities. And as was mentioned, this was part of a regional effort, and we drew from the analysis that was done by or commissioned by Department of Commerce for the counties that are required to provide a greenhouse gas emission reduction sub-element. which is why it's included in your comprehensive plan. And the key emission sources, I can provide a little bit more information about where that information came from. The transportation is a key source of emissions according to your greenhouse gas emissions inventory. The majority of that is from on-road vehicles, specifically passenger vehicles and that data. was from the BFCOG travel demand model, is where we got the BMT numbers that drove that emissions estimate. And then the other largest sector or source of emissions for the Kennewick community was from electricity and natural gas consumption in buildings, specifically natural gas. And that data came directly from the natural gas utility who provided natural gas consumption data within the commercial, residential, and industrial sectors.

Are there any more questions with commissioners? Okay, the public hearing is open. If someone in the audience wishes to speak, please raise your hand.

If you'll hold on just one second so I can get your timer. Okay.

Okay.

My name is Jean Mackey and I live in Kennewick.

And I was curious with the planning commission where they could say you can reduce the parking element. I noticed in our neighborhood when you reduce parking, we just have tons of cars on the street and things. So I've noticed some of the apartment buildings and stuff too have a lot of parking areas problems. And so I was wondering how that would really be good for our cities to be able to be in reducing the availability of parking. I was just kind of curious about that. So just a question on that. So thank you.

I mean, I could add some discussion to that. We'll wait until the... We can do that after.

We have a couple more people. And so I know that we do have Marty. I'm sorry, I'm not sure what the last name is. Greg. Greg, thank you.

Could I ask a question first? Could you put the map up there, the 46 map?

If you'll give me just one second, I do a speaker and then I can get the map back up.

I think slide 13 is probably it.

Is that the correct map you're speaking to?

No, that's the current map, isn't it? The next one? The 40? The one that goes to 46? Is that it?

Okay.

Oh, okay. You had one with numbers on it so you could blow up a certain area. Next one.

Next one.

It's the one in the right-hand corner, the bottom right-hand corner where there's, I don't know what that number is. I can't read it there. Oh, so they got two numbers on it. What is that? 1112.

Just a little more. 11 and 12. Yep, 11 and 12. Cascade Elementary.

Yep, that's where I want to. That'll work. That's fine.

Okay, let me start your time. One second.

Commissioners, I'd ask you to review this and to eliminate item 12, which is a zoning for commercial areas. They've added that whole area out there is residential. All of it is large lot residential. Section 11, or Area 11 there, most of that is owned by two people. And so those two people, you know, have eight acres and five acres right there. But the commercial is a real problem for me. I live across the street from the school, so I watch school activity day in and day out. I'm retired. And there is no way you can have commercial activity going on and it be safe for all those kids that are coming in and out of that school all day in the morning and at night. Hundreds of parents show up there with their cars, there's buses, all of that goes on in the morning and night. There are no sidewalks, there are no areas to walk off the street. It's kind of really a bad area as it exists. So then... you open it to commercial and the next thing that happens is John buys the four acres down the street from the school and puts in a motor pool for his asphalt business and has heavy equipment running in and out of there all day long. So I'd ask you to reconsider the commercial areas specifically for safety for all those young people that go to that school. And like the other said, that school will be, We'll be expanding with your other activity that you're planning. They walk across. When you do the Pringle Heights, they will walk right across 45th and right on Cascade Street. There's a walking path there that goes over the irrigation ditch, and that's how they all access that school. And so that's all safe. because there's no way for them to get hit. But Highland Drive is not a particularly developed area and it is not a particularly safe area for those children to be on. And they walk up and down there every day when school's in. And I don't know why you feel the need to have commercial property out there in the middle of a, well, right now, there's eight acres of sheep on that property. And so, you know, I mean, that whole area out there is kind of, is always been residential with animals, of course. So, thank you.

Were there any additional members that wanted to speak tonight towards this? If you would like to come up, sir. And please state your name and your address for the record. Or just the city is fine. You don't have to have your exact address.

It's Damian Padilla, and I actually am resident in Pasco, but I have multiple businesses here in Kennewick. I guess I only had a question just in regards to if the planning goes through and it's adopted, what is that timeline? You said you wanted to get it in by the first of the year. That would be a plan. But what is the actual timeline? What are you guys working on right now? It just holds up projects that we're looking at and are thinking about doing. And we've been advocates of improving downtown Kennewick and other parts of Kennewick. That was my only question. Thank you.

I think we have one more out there.

And then, sir, did you still want to speak?

I'm Darla Vance, and I live on 48th Street. I've been out there 48 years, and when we lived out there, we were the counties. We were the county for years and years, and all of a sudden the city came in and says, we're buying up this land. You're now in the city. All these years that I've been there, never, ever seen a sidewalk come around our home. Garfield Street, as we've mentioned, is still very, very narrow with ditches on each side. And you see the kids get out of school right now. They cross 45th. And now you're going to have 300 or 400 kids walking across 45th Street. And it's just very scary to me that you're putting the lives of these young children. And it's not so much having the homes, but now you're going to condense it to where you're going to have smaller homes and even more children. And like my son said, with the parks and giving consideration for sidewalks and that, because I've never seen a sidewalk yet. So to me, the city has done nothing, and I'm kind of afraid that's what's going to happen here, that the city's not going to come forward, step forward, and make sure that this is developed in a nice neighborhood. Thank you.

Did anyone else wish to speak? Yeah, come on up, sir.

Thank you. Heath Geyer, 48th Street. I just made some comments.

You give me just one second to start. You bet. Thank you.

Like I said, Heath Guyer, 48th Street. I made some comments earlier about the Pringle Heights. And through the process of seeing the maps and seeing the planning and watching the procedures here tonight, I've had some questions about parks in the city. and the impact fees. I know as of this year, March, the City of Kennewick pulled in $3.5 million in impact fees for parks. I think last year you had a year where you pulled in $7 million or something of impact fees. I'm just curious where these go. And we're lagging so far behind Richland, who doesn't take impact fees for parks, but yet has a heck of a lot more land and park access. So I really would like to encourage... the the commission and the city planners to encourage the builder out there to use his uh impact park impact fee um credits i don't know the right word for it but i guess it's a thousand something a lot that he's he can write off right on his impact fees is that correct Anyway, I just would like to encourage more parks in that area to help with the congestion and the traffic. That's all.

Are there any other speakers?

And there was no online. Okay. If there are no more speakers, then the comments are complete. The public hearing is now closed. I'll entertain a motion. And I don't know that we have that cheat sheet.

And we are moving to, what is the motion for exactly? Is it to approve the updates and comments? I thought this was kind of more of just a review of the comp plan.

Madam Chair, Commissioners, this evening you're reviewing the comprehensive plan, the draft comprehensive plan, the updates to the critical areas ordinance, the development code updates that were included in your packet, along with the housing action plan. So the motion would be to forward all of those to City Council with a recommendation.

Gotcha, okay. So this is the Planning Commission's official approval or recommendation?

Recommendation to Council, yes.

Gotcha, okay. Thank you.

Do you have a cheat sheet of words of how to read that?

Madam Chair, there is a proposed motion in your staff report.

Oh, so I should do it?

If you choose to go that route, yes.

Thank you.

All right, thank you. Well, I move to concur with the findings and conclusion contained within the staff report and forward a recommendation of approval of the 2026 Comprehensive Plan, Housing Action Plan, Critical Areas, Regulations, and Associated Development Code amendments to City Council.

I'll second that.

okay it has been moved by commissioner arnoldson and second by commissioner barger to concur with the findings and conclusions contained within the staff report and forward a recommendation of approval of the 2026 comprehensive plan housing action plan critical areas regulations and associated development code amendments to the city council the floor is open for discussion

Just some discussion on some of the previous topics. Parking, for example, was one of them that was brought up. From what Scott had mentioned, it sounds like the parking requirements, there's no longer as much required parking, and that's a state ordinance. And so those just automatically have to go into our comprehensive plan, not a lot of choice there. so I mean I've lived in apartment complexes that had too little of parking and it's not not a fun situation so we can hope that builders include adequate parking but unfortunately like Tina was saying earlier this it's really important to vote particularly at the state level because you know ordinances come down legislation comes down and by the time it reaches city of Kennewick there's not a lot we can do about it so

Commissioner Gregory here, and I just wanted to go ahead and address item 12 that the gentleman was talking about with commercial limits. And I wondered if the staff can kind of assure him that like a construction company can't move in because there's certain codes already in effect with what kind of stuff could go into a commercial area with size and all that stuff. Is there any way you can give us a little bit of detail on that?

sure i can do that uh vice chair um with it yeah so construction uh yards construction lay down yards are not permitted in our commercial zones um they're permitted in our industrial zones um so if that were to change to commercial uh that wouldn't be an option um So I guess I can just say that. It's not a permitted use. And so somebody would have to come in, propose, submit an application for a site plan review, detail their proposal. We would let them know at the counter that it's not a permitted use so that they don't spend the money to apply for something that will get denied. and there's also a pre-application meeting they can go through where we explain all of that.

But for our community, I think our community doesn't understand a lot of things. And I think that it's amazing that we have so many people here tonight. And I would like this opportunity for you to educate them that even if it was eight acres, if that person sold that eight acres, that is a big chunk. But there are certain guidelines that would be in the middle of a residential. It would be like a grocery store. There's certain guidelines.

Correct. Depending on the zone, there are multiple commercial zones, although we'll be coming back at a later date to propose consolidating some of them. Depending on the zone, every commercial zone that's there has allowed uses within that zone. And so you can't just put anything that's non-residential in a commercial zone. It's got to be something that's allowed per that zone. And when zone changes are requested, we're making recommendations on whether or not we think it's an appropriate zone. So in the case of commercial, if there are multiple commercial zones, it's not uncommon for someone to come in and want to do the most intensive commercial zone, and we recommend that they not do that. And typically, we'll recommend that to the Planning Commission that they not approve that and consider approving something lesser intense instead. At the end of the day, the city council are the ones who make the decision on the rezones. And so it's not staff and it's not the planning commission, but we do provide those recommendations and supporting documentation and analysis to support the recommendation. So there is, I mean, that's generally the process that we go through for that. Yeah, so.

Could I add just a bit to that? I think I remember from earlier discussion on the planning commission, some of the public comments and analysis that some by Scott and some of his partners, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but I think that there were certain areas of Kennewick that didn't have access to services. So for example, grocery stores, coffee shops, nail salons, business offices, things of that nature. There's large swaths of all residential where people who maybe are just walking or biking don't have access to, you know, food or other services that they might need. So from what I understand, I remember there being a report where we were looking at areas specifically where there needed to be at least small pockets of commercial space just so that everyone had access to services. And I think that may have been one of the ones that came up kind of in that quadrant there. Does that ring a bell? That does.

So there are instances where we've proposed retaining commercial zoning in areas where it's been proposed to be removed because we know that as areas develop out, they're going to need those services. I think looking at this area on South Highlands and the area around the school, and as you continue to move, there's not much for commercial services in that area. This particular site was looked at more as like a neighborhood commercial type center that would provide... I don't know that it would provide a grocery store necessarily, but local... you know, smaller intensity commercial options, they could potentially provide a grocery store because there's not really anything like that in that area with the exception of yolks. But your bakeries, your dry cleaners, your other small services, offices, salons, things like that. Ultimately, I know we heard one request to not to not change that and that's you know the commission's discretion on whether or not they want to pull that out or not but really just looking at a way to create a little bit more neighborhood centers especially when we're being tasked by the state to try to reduce vehicle trips they're not telling us to reduce vehicle trips but they're telling us to reduce greenhouse gas emissions which essentially as vehicle trips in this area because that's the primary source. Looking at ways to try to comply with some of those measures because we not only are tasked with evaluating that now, we're tasked with reporting on that five years from now and every five years after, whether we like that or not.

Thank you for helping out in that. And just for public, like a storage facility or something like that can't just move in right there. There are pretty strict guidelines with those commercials. So I thank you for clarifying that.

I just wanted to comment. It seems to me that most people's concern is like current infrastructure being not enough as the city grows. Is there a section that I have missed where that is taken into account and if not what will be the best place for the community to voice their opinion and suggestions. We have, Garfield Street has come several times to the meetings as a place that needs improvements. I was just recently working with a project where ADA requirements were put in place for new development, but I will wonder, so how's that working for the rest of the city where it's non-existent? and all the lack of infrastructure for what's already in place and we talk about downtown canaway being a point of concern so is that at some point coming into the plan or that's handled and managed totally separate from it so infrastructure needs are handled they're generally addressed within the comprehensive plan but

For the most part, they're addressed more specifically through our capital improvement plan, through our CIP. And new development is always responsible for upgrading infrastructure adjacent to their property and where their development is. And so they will have to upgrade those areas. We can't require them. to do is upgrade areas beyond that that are already in need. And so from a legal standpoint, we're not able to do that that's been through the supreme court a number of times and so these landmark cases that state you have to have a tie and you have to have it has to be proportionate to the impact they're creating and so existing conditions that are inadequate are not something that we can force others to pay for and take care of but we can and we do require them to mitigate the increase to the impact. So the impact that they create, so anything that's taking it beyond what it's at now, we require them to mitigate that impact. And that's very common with new development. And so when... know the previous item where we were talking about the rezone and you know what are we going to do with the streets and you know garfield street well the developer will have to build a curb gutter sidewalk and improve their half of garfield street along the frontage of their property um the remainder of you know the 45th and the portions of garfield that are not um that are not part of that project would have to be project um scheduled in on a be done as a city project so the city would have to balance out where the priorities are throughout the entire city in order to disperse those funds in a way that's We have a limited amount of funds, and so wherever we can spend them that's in need of repair or need of upgrade is how they prioritize that. And so it just gets put in this big list, and then it gets prioritized. And the areas that are the highest priority based on condition and traffic are the ones that typically get moved to the top of the list and get updated. There is an opportunity for residents to enter into an LID and have that done themselves. They pay for that themselves over time. So that option is available as well. We're constantly looking for options to fund infrastructure, but the funds that the state used to provide through the transportation fund is just not there anymore. They're not funding it anymore despite cities continually telling them it's a priority. And then we're having to just prioritize everything throughout the city and spend those dollars to the best, where they make the biggest impact. Occasionally we can find grants, but if they're specific to certain areas, like we can find grants for downtown, but those are Main Street grants that have to be spent and can only be spent in that area. Otherwise we're looking at state appropriations and in some cases federal appropriations to try to supplement what we're able to set aside.

Quick clarifying question on that. Is there a way, just so everyone here could be aware, we've heard similar concerns kind of in this, let's say, southeast area of Kennewick, and the same street names kind of keep coming up, even at previous meetings. about inadequate sidewalks and stuff like that. Is there a way for residents to participate in that prioritization process of projects? Can they submit proposals? Can they write letters? Who would that be to? Just so that there's some sense of agency if it really is more of a concern maybe than the administrators realize.

The best place to start would be one, with the council, and two, if the council sets the priority. And so it'd be best to start probably, you can talk about it with them, but also I think it probably would be better to start with our public works department. That way you kind of understand where the priorities are at. Or how they're prioritizing things and then you can you get a sense of one what it costs to do those projects and into the reasons why they're being prioritized the way they're being prioritized and then of course you're always able to talk to the Council as well.

Great Thank you.

I don't know. I'm on a roll tonight. I'm going to really aggravate you guys.

Keep rolling.

The gentleman brought it up. It's a good discussion of $10.5 million for parks, the impact fees. And I don't see any parks that have been built. But I do know they cost a lot of money to maintain what we already have. And so with that, it's tough as a taxpayer to keep paying, paying, paying, and our taxes keep going up, and we don't see any improvements, and we trust you guys, you do amazing jobs. But on top of that, our legislators are our problem, and we need to get out and vote as our city. And when we come with these projects that get to be fixed, when you see sidewalk, curb, and gutter that were replaced four years ago, with the nice handicap and all that and then all of a sudden the street gets redone so our legislators have made laws that we have to upgrade those curbs again those corners and i've watched over the last 10 years corners that were beautiful get tore out and replaced with new ones because it's not our city it's our legislators And that's wasteful spending. We could have been curbing and guttering and sidewalking Garfield years ago if we weren't forced to spend wastefully. And so I just admire you guys for what you do. And I know your hands are tied in a lot of ways. And our community needs to be more educated. We need to get people involved more. And like she was saying, how can we do that? You guys have tried. You send out surveys. You do all of this stuff, and you try. But it's a lack of people caring about it until it affects them in their own neighborhood. And my goal for the last 10 years is we need to stand up, show up, and speak up in every issue there is. And when it comes to this comprehensive plan, all of this, I'm not okay with it. And it's not anything to do with you, because I love you guys. You do amazing jobs. But I'm not okay with Seattle, who has nothing like our city. We have lost our independence to be our own city. And we like our cars. We all enjoy driving around. We don't have subways and all of these different things that the big cities do, and we don't want that. That's why we're over here. And so it's really important that our communities start getting involved to fight back on these issues so it's not on their backs and we're not complaining at them all the time. And so there's my two cents.

I would like to second what Tina said. I don't know if I can make a motion or not. No. And I would like to say from the very beginning, the reason why I got involved was so that I would know what was going on at the city level and seeing how hard staff works and educating us and then seeing how our hands are tied by the state. This comp plan wouldn't be what it is if it wasn't because of the state. And the climate, which is, of course, there's going to be climate change. I follow the weather. I'm in agriculture. I follow the weather every single week. And you can tax the hell out of us at the gas pump, but you're not going to do anything to fix any of this. And in monitoring climate or greenhouse gases, I have two fireplaces in my house, and every winter I've got three cords of wood and I'm burning everything. Every time it gets cold, I got an 05 Dodge. And yeah, it blows some black smoke. And I like my cars too. So I don't really know how... And then to take it one step further, if the state really did care about climate, then they wouldn't have pulled 60% of Benton Clean Air's funding. So it's not a... a budget problem or a money problem. It's a spending problem and we're dealing with it here as well. So anyway, that's all I have to say. That we should get, we should all be involved for sure.

Thanks, Chair. If I could address a couple things that you mentioned just to provide some clarity. Because you mentioned it and Mr. Geyer mentioned it as far as park impact fees. So we do collect park impact fees on new development The city is broken into two zones, an east and a west zone, and so the fees that are collected can only be spent in the zone that they're collected in. I think the bulk of our fees are being collected in the west zone currently, which is west of 395. But there are fees that are being collected east of 395. Those fees can only be spent on... New infrastructure, so it could be spent on buying land for a park, it could be spent on developing a new park. It cannot be spent on maintenance. So impact fees cannot be spent on maintenance. because their intent is to mitigate the impact. So with new residents, you have need for new amenities. And so replacing or repairing old amenities is, my understanding that's not allowed and maintenance is not allowed. So paying workers to maintain that is not allowed. It's only for new infrastructure.

Anthony, that just opened more questions. Sorry. So where is that money going? I don't see any new parks. I mean, I created one at Apple Valley on a holding pond just to try to help the neighborhood. But where are they? Do we have that money then to purchase land still?

There is money there. I don't know. Mr. Geyer knew more than I do about how many there were. But our parks department is in charge of... developing, identifying and developing those parks.

I was just going to ask, a few minutes back when we had that gal here that was talking about the water pool, whatever that is just down the road, is that part of that money? I know you were saying something about the infrastructure maintenance, but increasing or making some better of the skate park?

Okay. Sorry, I had to think. When Kylie was here, gave us a presentation on community block grant funds. So yeah, so yes, kind of. So the projects that that she works on her projects that are federally funded with HUD dollars from a grant called the Community Development Block Grant. Parks does utilize those. They apply for those funds and do utilize them for infrastructure. They did the splash pad across the street. They utilized CDBG funds for that. And they can... I don't know the specifics on that particular one, but they can't, you can only spend the funds in certain areas of the city that HUD identifies. And so I do know the Southeast area of the city is not one of those areas that you can spend. You can only spend in some of the more depressed areas of the city or where the median income within the area is below 80% of the area median income. But you can couple park impact fees with CDBG funds and do a project. Unfortunately, that doesn't help what was brought up tonight because there are a lot more parks in some of the older areas of town where we're able to spend CDBG funds. But she came to talk about that, so there's a tie there. The one other thing that came up was parking, and I do want to mention that. We are somewhat concerned about parking as well. There have been a few instances where we're monitoring a few areas. The state is requiring us, like the requirements that the state have for us to minimize how much parking we can provide. They set the limit on what we can provide or what we can require, I should say. That doesn't mean that the developers can't. put in more they can put more in if they choose to but we can't require up to a certain level there is a provision within that bill and that's proposed in the code that is being proposed tonight as well that allows us to perform an empirical study on areas of town where we think that there's not going to be enough parking and once that's reviewed if it's approved we're able to require more parking And so we're monitoring a couple areas right now. I think there's possibility that we may need to do one of those in one of our neighborhoods here. But we're kind of waiting to see. I think there's still infill opportunity within that neighborhood, and if additional infill occurs, especially on a specific street, there may be a need. So that provision is there as well to help alleviate instances where there may not be enough. Unfortunately, I don't think we can do that until we start to see a problem. It'd be nice to do it ahead of time, but that's the way the state wrote the bill.

That was a lot of discussion. Sorry, Anthony.

Maybe I'll plug in one more because I did star one other comment that was made. Nobody brought this up, but since we've addressed all the other ones that have come up, I'll plug this one. That was a question on the timeline, and that is we're expecting adoption to take place in September. So that was, I think, our second-to-last slide, but I think the 18th. I believe it was 8th and the 15th. 8th and the 15th. You're right. And then the follow-up rezones will happen before the end of the year. At least that's the schedule for that.

And those are the rezones that are proposed as part of the comp plan, and they will come individually back through planning commission and up to city council?

Yeah, what we're looking at is an area-wide rezone that will come back, and it will rezone all of the properties consistent with the plan or what gets adopted as part of the plan. So whether it's what we saw tonight or if there are modifications made to it by... Well, council would make the modifications, but yeah. So we're not intending on modifying them. I mean, at this point, we can't modify the staff, can't make any further recommendations on the plan. It'd be up to the commission to make recommendations on the land use changes on the map. And then council would either approve all the changes, approve some of the changes, approve none of the changes. It's going to be up to them at that point.

Now, back to 11 and 12, 12 being the sheep farmers. What if they don't want it zoned commercial? What if they want to keep it the same? I mean, it is their property, right?

It is their property. And if that becomes the case, I mean, the council does not have to adopt that. So...

I think to help there, they don't have to go ahead and be commercial just because it's zoned commercial. But will they be living there in noncompliance like we had problems in other places, I think is what he's asking.

So they would be considered, if it were to get rezoned, if the council were to rezone that, they'd be what's called legal nonconforming or grandfathered. They'd be able to continue what they're doing there for as long as they want.

Unless they sold.

If they sold, the next person can continue doing the same thing.

But tax assessment will change?

Potentially. Whether or not they are taxing it based on use or potential use, I think normally they assess based on the use existing. I don't know that it would change unless they added a commercial use to it. And I'm also not the assessor, so.

Good thing.

Okay, any more discussion? It has been properly moved and seconded to concur with the findings and conclusions contained within the staff report. and forward a recommendation of approval of the 2026 Comprehensive Plan, Housing Action Plan, Critical Areas Regulation, and Associated Development Code amendments to City Council. Will the clerk please start the vote?

Commissioner Rahimlu? Yes. Vice Chair Gregory? No. Commissioner Arntzen?

Yes.

And then Commissioner Barger?

Yes.

The outcome of the vote was three to one. Next on the agenda, is this new? It's visitors. I love this. Visitors are welcome to state their opinion on any topic except for quasi-judicial matters and items under a pending or previous public hearing. The clerk has informed me, is there any online? That there aren't any online. And if someone in the audience wishes to speak, please raise your hand. okay it's an opportunity for the mutual conversation with planning commissioners or posing questions with the expectation you don't get an immediate answer we would listen and you could direct them but it doesn't look like anybody's going to so oh i would love to have you so let me finish then uh you each person is permitted to speak one time for a maximum of three minutes And our beautiful gal over here will start the timer.

Hi.

My name's Jason Huffman. I live in Kennewick.

The thing that just baffled me about the situation that just happened was there was, I believe, a lack of knowledge of what the impact of changing specific areas to commercial were and still voting it through or voting it, not necessarily you guys voting it through, but voting it through for the city council to make that decision. I feel knowing exactly what's going to happen in this situation is your guys' responsibility and having that total knowledge of what's going to happen in every situation is what got you guys to this situation or the promise to do so. I feel like the lack of whoever you guys acknowledge to in what would happen in that situation if that was rezone commercial and who would be paying what tax on it. Like if a resident would be paying commercial rate there if that would increase that because obviously commercial value is going to be higher than residential value for a piece of land so i just think making sure we have the that knowledge of what we're voting on and the full impact of what's going to happen to those people who live in those residences is super important so thanks for your time

okay the comment period is closed is there any new business i don't think so and unfinished business are there any city council action updates there are no updates i don't think we've had an item go to council for

on the last one.

Okay. Commissioner's comments and discussions. Are there any reports, comments, or discussions of commissioners and staff?

I would like to make a comment, if I could, to address the gentleman's comment and concern. That's why we have the public. That's why people should get involved because, you know, we... We've gone through this comp plan probably three different meetings and not knowing what everybody else sees or who lives in that area or I used to live on 41st which is at the end of Highland Drive and that was the first house I bought. So I know exactly the location and seeing that proposed, it reminded me of when they proposed off of Union by the library. which makes the same amount of sense, you know, putting something in there like what they call in the New England states a bodega or, you know, something to increase it. But yeah, again, this is why the public getting involved is great because we only know so much and we hear it and it gives us more questions to hear your guys' questions and then to get answers and then we can start digging and get farther along. But from us, it goes to council and there you go. So thank you for your comment, though. I appreciate it very much.

Okay, if there is no more further business on tonight's agenda, it is now 826, and the meeting is concluded.