Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Yeah. Did you join on your laptop? No. Okay. All right. Um, we are on and uh got one more minute to go, but is that fine to wait for it to start now? Yeah, that's fine. [clears throat] We will call to order and do a roll call for planning commission. It is now 6:30 on Wednesday, December 3rd 5. Um, Commissioner Matlock is joining us. Uh, is it Teams or Zoom or online? Teams. Yes, Teams. Perfect. And then Commissioner White present. Commissioner Pereira

present. Commissioner Fry. Okay. Thank you. Commissioner Bover present. And then Commissioner T. Uh now we'll move on to item number two. Uh we're opportunity for public comment on the items. [clears throat] There is no one here in person. Uh is there anyone online for anything that is for public comment for item two? I believe it's just Brian that is the only other person other than Stephen. Oh, is Brian on too? Yeah. Can you hear me? Yeah. Okay. Commissioner Pitg I'll eventually joined by teams. It's just not working for me. But uh I am present.

Okay, perfect. Thanks, Brian. Sorry, I didn't mean to miss you. Uh okay, so we will I guess we will open and close the public comment period at 9 or sorry at 6:31 [clears throat] and move on to number three, the approval from November 5th, 2025. [clears throat] Are there comments, questions, or we're looking for a motion? Motion to approve. Second. And all in favor? I and none opposed. Amanda second.

We will move on to item number four, the sign regulations, including non-conforming signs, maintenance, and removal of signs, administrative enforcement, review processes, and civil infractions. and then we'll turn it to staff to uh to present.

Uh good evening commissioners. In your packet tonight, I have included a memo summarizing the changes that are proposed to a couple sections of code along with identifying two [clears throat] sections of code that detail non-conforming signs and maintenance and removal of signs. Um, the memo describes the purpose and intention of some of the changes that are proposed to the overall title. Um, and tonight I'm just looking for feedback, answering questions. Um, seeing if there's any changes you would like to be made to these sections. Um, I anticipate sending this to legal by the end of the week with any comments that you have incorporated into it. Um, and then I'll be starting to work on residential sign standards. Um, additionally, I just wanted to provide a brief update on the sign code survey. Uh, we recently re-released the survey um on November 19th and it will run through December 17th. And as of today, I'm happy to report we've already doubled our responses on that. So, I'm really looking forward to hopefully getting some additional responses and being able to relay that feedback to you when sweetie start talking about commercial science standards.

Does doubling mean it went from one to two? Went 17 to like uh 36 I think. Good. Yeah. Um we've also done a inerson campaign dropping off flyers and talking to local businesses which has been really appreciated so far. We've had a lot of positive interactions doing that. Great. Thank you. So, this there's no public hearing with this, so I think we can talk amongst the commission. Um, any thoughts or comments on this for staff?

Oh, sure. Uh, if I don't mind, I'll just go. Is it cool if I just go through my comments and then um um All right. [clears throat] I guess we'll start on uh page seven, very top. the the term building official is used a few times and capitalization seems to be inconsistent. Some points building official was capitalized, others it wasn't. I'm not sure what the appropriate you have capitalization is there. Um um someone okay um also on page seven section A2 it says the city has a right to enter private property for purpose of inspection. the this section is specifically commercial property, right? I mean, it doesn't need to be specified that it's commercial property. I mean, just reading that sentence sounds

it could be non-commercial property as well. So, that's for the purpose of inspection. So, [clears throat] somebody has an active permit and part of review of that permit would be inspection. Okay. Horizons and of course it's a you know it's not just we somebody barge in right um page nine uh or a um uh it says if a sign is illegally displayed a second time a fee per sign will need to be paid and I was wondering if it's appropriate to list what that fine might be and or site where the fine is established in some other section of code.

Yeah. So that would be established in the fee schedule which right now I don't believe that we necessarily have an explicit fee called out. That is something that we would like to tack on to the next iteration of the schedule update. Um I think we did two or three updates this year already. So it'll probably be something we work on maybe springtime. Okay. Do you want to have a line there saying it's referencing to a fee schedule? That's a good idea. Yeah, thanks. Yeah, that's absolutely what you can add.

I had went on the same section, the E4 in 1820. Was just curious if we want to mention it says signs may be relocated and they'll have up to two weeks to get a hold of them. Um, is it worth putting where they're going to be located at? Yeah, we could say it's city hall. Yeah, I think that'd be a great idea. I don't think some of my signs disappeared and I'm trying to figure out where to go get it in that twoe period. [snorts]

page 10 [clears throat] section D4 um talk about sign sign abandonment and I'm [clears throat] just wondering I mean who pays for the removal of that sign if the business is no longer there and what if it's a sign that is embedded in concrete or mounted the side of building could be expensive removal Is the city going to have to incur the expense to remove that or do you have a way to track the previous owners to So abandonment just means abandonment for the purpose of the regulations. It doesn't actually physically removed. Okay.

It just means that if it's been left vacant, you lose that um potential grandfathering status that allows you to continue to maintain a non-conforming sign. Cool. Thanks. Page 11 would be section A4. Um, excuse [clears throat] me. I was wondering if the city already has rules governing graffiti removal and time frame. And if not, [clears throat] I think I think there should be a graffiti removal uh uh somewhere in the municipal code. And I think I would prefer it to be less than 60 days. I feel like uh two months of allowing a business or even a private residence to have graffiti displayed is not great.

What if it's really artistic graffiti? [laughter] Thanks. Yeah. Yeah. Um what would you want to see it reduced to? I mean I would I would shoot for 10 days. I don't know. For some reason that arbitrary 10 days seems reasonable to me. That's two business two business weeks. Is there a reference to graffiti and the sign regulations or No, this is a new addition regarding the maintenance signs. Um, this also includes damage. Two weeks might be a little tight for a damage sign to get fixed.

Right. Yeah. So I yeah focusing [clears throat] mostly on the graffiti suggesting either does it already does graffiti remove already exist in other code that I don't know about and then yeah to your point it should be I would like to see it on a separate item. Mhm. Sorry, what section is it? 11, but

question with it would be if they are doing it themselves or if they're hiring somebody to do that and how long how long does it take a professional to come remove that? That would be my only question. I agree with you. 60 days is a long time, but that's my thought with it. Yeah, I mean there's certainly an element of that, but I mean I feel like put the burden on the business owner and at a minimum they can at least provide the city with you know documentation says, "Oh yes, we have someone scheduled to come out. This is the at least we get someone to come out. I don't think city needs to be heavy-handed, right?

So we do have graffiti regulations separate [clears throat] title of the code entirely. So 8.40 is graffiti. Uh they have 48 hours to remove it. very [laughter] so let's reduce let's separate out vandalism and graffiti in this section so graffiti should be removed in 48 hours or just maybe reference to the graffiti chapter yeah [clears throat] damage could also be different than vandalize like somebody could hit it with a car or something

yeah so do we want to keep just general vandalization 60 days just because it takes time to schedule someone to come And then we will just amend the section to reference the graffiti section with regard to graffiti removal. Um although if it's toilet paper that could probably be cleaned up in 40 hours.

Probably define graffiti. Just curious. I don't know if I can read it in this that's provided because I'm just curious like [clears throat] at what point what if someone's doing to their own sign like we have I forget the organization here but over by ACE they painted the whole side of their building. Yeah. So the def definition of graffiti gets to that means unauthorized inscription figure meaning rather defacement unauthorized by the owner. Yeah. So if the owner is doing it themselves, they could do whatever they want and there's no and so for them if someone else did it but they don't want to clean it within 48 hours, they'll just say we're happy with this. [laughter]

Okay. Yeah. It's tricky. Yeah. [clears throat] Uh going to page 12. Um 3 A three. I think uh signs that advertising Canada passed. I think it should be P A S T instead of P A S D. I'm sorry. Which section is that? Yeah. Um page 12. It's 3 A3 is P.

Oh, should we fix that?

Um, next is page 13, section B. In that sentence, uh, demolition permit shall be required prior to the removal of any ground mounted sign exceeding 6 feet in height. I was just Is this height requirement based off of anything? Because like for example, like no parking signs that are mounted on parkways and stuff like that, those are ground mounted and they're higher than six feet. So when the city has to do work and remove those signs, does that mean they have to get a permit to take out no parking signs? And do you see where I'm going with this a little bit? It's a building code related thing. I I think we could probably get more clarification from Colin Mercer, our building official, because I agree it's not going to be for a stop sign that's over six feet. It's it's more structure.

Yeah. Um so that's all I had to say about that. Yeah. I think the intention here is just public safety with regard to removing like monument signs that tend to be very tall, have a heavy weighted sign at the top. Um I think that's really the only intention behind that. Not a stop sign. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, but you know, the requirement of getting a permit adds cost and you know, you know, bureaucratic red tape for a property owner to, you know, like if it is just a no parking sign, similar something like that, which

most people could just do, you know, four screws and take the sign out of the concrete and be done with it to to require them to get permit and go city hall and all that processing is excessive. So maybe there could be more specific

Yeah. information. Next page 14 um in the paragraph at the very top all the items below uh has this ver verifiable standard scale and I mean I'm not this is not teased by any means so I don't know what this is but 1 in equals 20 ft or 116th in equals 1 foot. So if you have 1616 That's equivalent to 16 feet. So 1616 is an inch. So the first one says 1 in equ= 20 ft. And the second one if you do the math it's 1 in equals 16 ft. So I'm not sure what the scale I'm not sure what the scale thing is supposed to say here because one inch equals two different things. [clears throat]

Is it a range? Maybe maybe I don't understand either, but I took it as it being arranged like you could scale it either way or something in between. Yeah, I was hoping for I'm just trying to catch up where you're at. Oh, sure. Yes. Sorry. Very top of page 14 at the the end of the first paragraph. Yeah. Application will not be considered complete. Oh, okay. Thanks. One just say or So it's not like between, right? But no less than.

I think we could just get rid of the second part because that's adds confusion. So no less than 1 in equals 20 ft. Okay. That seems like a large scale though if you're trying to do something smaller than that. Most aren't 20 ft. Yeah. So you need you do need a different scale, but less than and an ore is weird. Mhm. or maybe just have a second part.

It's likely because some sign plans include a supplementary sign package that covers kinds of site signs. So like parking signs or like guiding signs that tend to be smaller and plan designers don't necessarily want to take up an entire page to show some of those smaller supplementary signs that are shown throughout the site. So think of like a like a fast food restaurant. You have a tiny little drive-thru sign. You have, you know, maybe other supplementary like vehicle directional signage around the site. It's probably all shown on one sheet, which is probably why the scale seems very very small. Um, that's my best guess, but we can double check with the building official um on minimum scale size.

There's there's got to be a standard that people have used. And honestly, it's probably not an issue these days. This was back when submitts were on paper and you wanted to make sure you could actually read it. Now that it's all electronic,

right on page 16 and B, um, there's this maximum daily penalty of $1,000. And unfortunately, I'm not a fan of hard-coded numbers um because then if we ever want to update it, then you have to always go back in and review these things. Um, but additionally, I mean, when you hardcode a number like this, the penalty ends up being potentially regressive for small businesses who $1,000 potentially big has a bigger impact on their bottom line versus like the mall where Nike is where, you know, it's going to have far smaller impact. So,

no, it is a sliding scale just maximum. Yeah, there's a lot of discretion on this section for the building official to make with regard to what the daily penalty will be. Um, there's [snorts] not necessarily a hard number that we are anticipating to propose based on [clears throat] what the issue is. It's more I I think Colin's perspective of this is that it's more akin to the level of not addressing the issue and the frequency of the issue happening. So for instance, if there's a business and we give them three code citations separately for the same thing, but they keep doing it, then that's the situation where we would want to consider a more harsh penalty to discourage people from doing the same thing over and over again. Um, but again, it's more discretionary.

Well, in that in that case is a maximum of a thousand enough. I know [laughter] you know that's why we added daily to this paragraph. Yeah, I did I did read about it. Yeah. Okay. I just uh wanted to open some discussion about Yeah, understandable. And that's it for all my comments. Thanks for patience. And all right, who's next? [laughter] I had one more.

Yeah, I think it's Let me just confirm the age. I think it's 11th. was 10 and D4. Uh, if signs being determined as abandoned, is it should we have anything in here where there's a reasonable effort made to contact the property owner?

Uh, I would suggest no because then it becomes a burden for staff to track somebody else's project. So, it's just for the purpose of non-conforming status. So, it's not a problem if it's a conforming sign, but if it's some sign that no longer meets our sign regulations, they have a year to address it um or maintain it. And if that doesn't happen, then they lose that status. Okay. And then as a business owner, I would not be aware that that's being tracked by the city other than just this having awareness that a sign being blank for a year. Like there's no notification from the city from that. They just suddenly may not have a sign anymore out there.

Yeah. We we just don't have the staffing to be able to track other people's projects and signs, you know. But even with business licensing, isn't sign review? [clears throat] So it's like let's see if they have a business license, they should have some type of other sign, right? Well, [clears throat] the business license can be approved separate from the sign permit, but uh if they're doing something to change the sign structurally, it would have to come for a sign, right? And that's not addressed in the application for business license. I think that

No. And if a business is moving into a new building, they're likely going to have a building permit with us for interior work. Um, even if it's very minor work and likely need sign permit to do any work on the sign for the most part in in most cases. Um, there's like somewhere in city they're tracking when this sign started blank. Yes. So that's at the point in which and I think it's in the language here about the business license expires. So once that [snorts] happens then a year from then the sign might be considered abandoned if it's

Yeah. Okay. Well and I do see the expired piece. I think it was more concerned on the first sentence is just determine a ban will blink for more than a year. And I'm not that worried about I'm just curious. Do you have other questions? Okay. Any more or any online? Not that we can see you, but yes, Steve or Brian, do you have I'm good. Um, Commissioner White mentioned some stuff that I was going to bring up, so I thank him for his diligence and move on. Okay. So, I have a couple questions. Unless Brian, you were about to talk. I think

we're safe to move on. Yep. Okay. Okay. Let me crack here. I had a couple questions.

Okay. So, on page 10, uh, under non-conforming science, I was just wondering I have to remember why I wrote this. Hang on. So, it's under a maybe a two non-confirming or no permit issued. So, let's see. Or do not meet today's sign code standards. Sorry, I'm I read this a while ago, so I'm trying to remember my thought process. Um, A2 you mentioned.

Yeah, so add in an A2. Oh, okay. To add. Okay. So, currently signs [clears throat] legally in existence as of the effective date of this ordinance that do not comply with the standards here and are deemed legally non-conforming and may continue to exist for this section. Okay. So, one legal non-conforming sign designation does not apply to signs that have received a notice of infraction or code enforcement violation prior to the effective case or ordinance. Um, and then I was wondering if it would be appropriate to add a or no permit issued.

Would suggest no because there's a lot of signs that there was no permit issued happened before permits were required or before it came into the city limits or

or it does not meet today's sign code standards. So, if there's one that is Sorry, I don't remember exactly why I wrote that. I had a purpose, but I don't remember what it is. So, let me go on to my other question. See if I if that jogs my memory. [clears throat] Um, on page 12, I was going to ask regarding temporary sign time limit. So, when I looked up the definition of our temporary sign, it didn't appear that there was within that definition a time limit for temporary signs. So, I'm wondering if, you know, that might clear up some of this. Um, I think that it's definitely helpful to check with legal about the content neutrality. That's perfect, but I'm wondering if specifying a time limit in the definition of the temporary signs would help enforce some of like without getting into the content. So if a temporary sign is allowed for a certain amount of time or you know if it's a political sign within

yeah we may not have gotten into that section yet but isn't there a whole section on temporary signs? There is currently a whole section on temporary signs. It will be something that we do take a look at more closely in the new year. Okay. Um I may want to leave some of it discretionary because I think it would probably be more related to the subject application that's being requested. So, a temporary sign could mean a weekend or it can mean 30 days or longer potentially. So, I guess I would want to revisit that. Yeah.

Well, if we're going to cover that later, then perfect. We can look at it at that time. But also within within while I'm thinking about temporary signs on page 13, I'm wondering if we want to include temporary signs as something that does not require a building permit. I think you want a building permit for a temporary sign. Or maybe you do. We wait. [laughter] [clears throat] I would prefer no, but there may be some signs that need a building permit for the sake of building code. Okay. Depending on the size and installation. I can see like, you know, construction projects or that kind of temporary sign.

But as of right now, it's not listed as something that would not. Maybe we could place some sort of criteria for temporary signs that don't require a building permit and specify not triggering a building permit review or I support that because a lot of temporary signs are not all but some of them will be associated with like a special And then it would be attributed to like a special event permit more ideally more than a building [clears throat] permit. Um yeah, we can add a section there about temporary signs being exempt. I think that was it for me. Any last thoughts from commissioners? Okay. And looks like Thank you, Caitlyn. And we will move on to item five, the review and recommendation on the 2026 docket list.

All right. Yeah. So, we had two dockets that we received this year. Um, the first one we get to that page 17. Yeah. Yeah. So, um got a docket from a property owner, Debbie Lucas Mhler. She owns the Chevron station as well as think another gas station in town. Um the Shell station downtown here and her interest specifically is to provide housing for employees. Um so she might have given [clears throat] up on this proposal at this point, but I think the docket um should still move forward. her it's her docket request. Um her request more specifically is to allow upper floor dwelling units in the interchange commercial zone. So right now that's only allowed north of Bendica Boulevard in Alabama. But I believe it it does make sense. It's consistent with policy to increase uh af more affordable housing options and to provide um residences above businesses is an excellent way to do that especially if you got somebody interested and willing to do that to actually construct it. Um so the staff recommendation is to approve that docket and that's then something that we take up as amendments in the next year in 2026. Do you mind? I'm still learning all the zones in town here. I know north of Bingo, you mentioned the out walls. I can see it on map here.

Is it all of north of Bendingo? Yeah. Allows that. So, even on the other side of the train tracks. No. No. Um I'm sorry, we don't have a zoning map. We need we have [clears throat] construction zone that would be impacted by that would be here where the Safeway. Well, that's that wouldn't be what's impacted by that. That's what currently allows for it, I think. Right. No, it's up here that currently allows it. So, this would be the subject the primary subject of the docket request. Um, but it would apply to I think this for all interchange.

Chevron's own not that way, right? Chevron's further north. Chevron's right here. Oh, Chevron dealership. Yeah, me too. I thought the same. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's the gas station. Oh, sh. Oh, yeah. So, she's planning to do a major removal of the gas station. Is there anything for like restricting a similar thing on Northbend Way in downtown like the historic district? Do we limit that from being expanded vertically? No. So, could people could build higher there?

Um, there is a 35 foot limit or a 45 foot limit depending on where you're at in the downtown commercial zone. So, our historic district is under 35 ft and outside of that uh to the south is all 45 and certain areas to the north at 45. Yeah. In my mind, the only thing worth restricting would be like that. Oh, thank you. I see. Yeah, the red just so you can see the mountain in your downtown historic area. It's not part of this dark at all. Yeah, I see is the purple section later. All right. She will continue with the the the store on the the first floor and then she wants just to have like a a second floor for apartment.

Yeah, probably three stories. Three stories. Okay. First floor is the convenience store. The second floor would be their office and the next floor. Okay. Yeah, I say it seems like the zone works great for it right by the interchange. It's seems great. Yeah. So, staff support it. Uh we'll we look for planning commission recommendation on that as well. Are there concerns from commissioners? I'm I'm just wondering, do you know the history behind why this type of uh building is allowed north of Bendigo, but it doesn't it didn't spread across?

So, that itself was an amendment last year during the 2024 docket um comp plan process. We were specifically looking to we were thinking about the Alam Mall and opportunities to redevelop it. So adding residential above commercial in a mixeduse scenario was a great thing for the outlet mall. Um it was specifically thing in the outlet mall but it makes sense to apply it. Yeah. [clears throat] Okay. Thanks. Any thoughts online?

I love it. Yeah, I think consistency is key. So um yeah, my vote to approve when it's the right time. Is there any thought to expanding that too? Because actually purple is also on the truck town side, but the interchange mixed fuse. Does that already allow for that? That already allows for residential. Yeah, that makes more sense. Hey, we heard [laughter] from [clears throat] person. Any other thoughts? And Commissioner Fitzgibbons. Um, Commissioner Matlock, did you have anything on this? No, no, I read [clears throat] through it. I'm interested to see what the next year is going to bring.

Water work. [laughter] Uh I think my only concern is you know what potentially could happen uh over the next 40 or 50 years or something like that if uh let's say for the Safeway is they added a bunch of apartments above that. I mean, traffic already in that area, you know, especially on weekends when travelers are coming in, uh, that intersection is always super busy. Roundabout is going in there at some point. Is that correct? 27, 20, 28 is what we have last heard.

So, I potentially would just be concerned long-term what if if other businesses took advantage of being [clears throat] able to build up like this and have an influx of additional residents. Um, every project that comes through has to go through a concurrency review that includes traffic analysis and if they are going to trip um create levels of service standards that fall below thresholds then they have to mitigate for that or we can't the project. So that's kind of the the restriction that keeps things from getting out of hand. And so it let's say there's no mitigation procedure then they can't go forward,

right? Like if there's something that fits not they cannot bring that level of service up some improvement then we can't improve the project. Thanks. Okay. Um so the easy one, right? Yeah. So the next one is a lot more complex. You guys have the full list. Um this is a docket submitted by the Snowqualami tribe and they had comments throughout our comprehensive plan. So in multiple elements, uh we just do not have the staff time to address all that and to open the whole comp plan again this year. That's a major process that we do once every 10 years.

Um however, we do feel like there is opportunity for three elements in particular to open in 2026 because there's other purposes also um that we'd need to open those for. And so when you batch things together, it makes sense to open um first the economic development element because the economic development commission um James and Caitlyn are working on a innovation um what's the name of it? It's a creative economy plan. Okay.

Yep. So we will be partnering with the city of Snowqualami to assess the local creatives and makers in both of our communities. identify what our strengths are, where our focus points should be, what challenges and barriers they've had to operating for businesses and how we can elevate them. So those are that that report will ultimately include engagement with them along with policy recommendations which is something we would want to integrate into the economic development element. So with opening that element, it makes sense to address the tribe comments um appropriate to be addressed in the economic development element at the same time. So the same thing goes for two other elements. The parks element uh we need to address a actually an urban forestry inventory requirement from the state that's supposed to be in your parks element. So as we address that, it makes sense to address um some of the snowcoming tribes comments in that at the same time. And then third, um the what was the third one? Capital facilities element. So um we have the new police service contract with King County Sheriff's Office. And so we really do need to change our capital facilities element to reflect that. Um that's a pretty significant change. Uh and then also with that we want to provide some things in the capital facilities plan about um making improvements to the old CED annex building to serve as one of their offices and to be able to provide any kind of impact fee funds or other funds to that it has to be in the capital facilities plan. So we need to open that. So likewise we'll address some of the Swami tribes comments on those things. Um, as you'll see in the staff recommendations in the staff response to each of the trib's comments, some of them we do not feel are appropriate to address, uh, a lot of times it's because

it's the policy suggestion is just getting too wordy. We always want to keep a policy focused on its intended subject. And if a policy is trying to address subject A and you're trying to add BCD and E to that, suddenly it's watered down and it doesn't have the the intended purpose. So there's a lot of suggestions that the tri suggested on certain policies that we said no that's getting too complicated or too off topic. We we can create other policies to address those situations but not just add on. Do

you know why the tribe came forward now? because they were part of the comprehensive plan update just barely and we addressed a lot of their update as well. So I think that they've hired a new staff person to do a lot of policy review and so I think it's something [laughter] that [clears throat and cough]

so with the staff recommendation there is to address selected comments from the tribe in their docket in the capital facilities element parks element and economic development element. And just to clarify, when you say to open, you know, this up, you're saying that's too labor and time intensive because it will require bringing it to planning commission and then approval that then going to city council and having to track all that, right? That's why that's what I mean by open it up because some of these are just adding a sentence which it's like yeah have sentence but if you added that sentence you would have to go through the whole process of opening that chapter.

Yeah that's that's what I thought public notification and and a lot of process and a lot of those other chapters that they had provided comment on we're also bound to open those in our midcycle review. So we have our shoreline regulations that we will have to open in 2028 to make some amended amendments required by the state. We'll also have to develop our climate element which will be next year's work plan. So a lot of their climate related comments will be addressing that plan. It seems very reasonable in [clears throat] my personal opinion [laughter] because we it's not like when when we just did the update. So [clears throat] I think your plan sounds great. Yeah.

But other thoughts? How how much are they engaged when we did it just recently? Very. [clears throat] Yeah. Very. Interesting. So now these are just new comments that they're making. Yeah. Uh I did have a couple of questions. Um the guns, but okay. Uh I noticed the land use amendment. This was one of our default responses. the suggested amendment may be considered during the city's next update to the land use element. Uh is it possible to get an estimated date on that? Just so like 2020 probably 29 we'll probably be opening it as a part of our midcycle review 2028.

Okay. Yeah, I think it would be great just as a reference on this as I'm through just so I know like have a point in time like the next time we look at this for data is in three years.

I was interested in a lot I'm not an apologist. Um, we did a lot of these blanket and I know you guys did a lot of look into these. They're not just default answers. Um, water conservation concerns that they had. Uh, the next updated review I believe stated here is 2029. And I was just curious, there's a lot that will change between now and 2029. Namely, and ballparking numbers I was looking up like we're expected at the current rate of growth to increase by 50 million gallons of water consumption a year. Is it necessary or worthwhile just to really look into these to ensure that they're not things that should be addressed? Like they won't be problems that are massively exacerbated waiting for three more years.

No, our water system plan is a 20-year plan. So we had the capacity and let's see I think I had another one kind of an odd comment. I was just looking more into it. We had BAS which is the best available science and there was a comparison with indigenous knowledge. [clears throat] I think I apologize I read this a few days ago. we were saying rely on BAS and as a result we're not leveraging indigenous knowledge.

No, I think the comparison there is best available science has kind of standards and expectations about what that can include. Traditional knowledge does not necessarily and so however it could be considered under best available science criteria. So if the state recognizes certain aspects of traditional knowledge as best available science, there's structure to it and there's something that we can hang our hat on to say, "Yes, we're going to rely on this to create our our regulations." Without that, it it's possible that traditional knowledge could just be an individual determination

which it would not be appropriate for making policy and regulatory changes based on. And I think that was where my question was. I think just in my loose research was that the state does recognize indigenous knowledge as almost a partnership with PAS in certain level. So it sounds like if the state recognizes it then we have city those were all were there I I don't know if it was a sneeze or if it was somebody online that was wanting to chime in on this. Uh, Commissioner Matlock or Commissioner Fitzgiven, did you have anything on this?

No. Yeah. I I just think it's very reasonable to um only tackle the three um table the other ones for um a while until we get to those um later down the the line. So, I'm in favor of what staff has recommended. Perfect. Thank you. And any other thoughts from commissioners in person?

Where can we I'd love to learn more about the water consumption. You know, I know it was repeated multiple times in this was historic lows the last year or two on Snowqualami River. Um, and we've got a 20-year plan, it sounds like. I'm just I would love to learn more about it. Like we have apparently sometimes I'm hearing we have a ton of water. Everyone else seems to think there's a dirt of water. Just love to be more knowledgeable. Yeah, it's incredibly complicated. So, a lot of the water comments that the tribe is concerned about is related to river flow. Um, so that's monitored by the Department of Ecology. uh our commitment to that is to make sure that there is a minimum river flow and when the river drops below a certain point we're required to mitigate um by bringing additional flow from Seattle watershed which we pipe in

uh to supplement the flows to make sure that our draw down um based on our aquifer creating a problem for the the flows. Uh Tom Moore our public works director would have a lot more information for you on that. he manages our water system plan and yeah I'll chat with him always curious and then the Seattle reservoir has that been impacted like the other reservoirs in the area like I know that catchless and kis which obviously feeling agriculture have been all-time lows as well is that not affecting the Chester Morris reservoir uh there's no agriculture drawing from Chester Morris probably a little bit different yeah [snorts] I'm not an expert

this is probably not the floor I'm part I'm very curious Maybe I'll set up a meeting. [clears throat] One question I did not ask about the previous docket was just is it a code change for the MER docket. Is it code change or comp change? Comp just a code change. Okay. So that's literally just uh opening that 181030 to say second floor residential permitted it period without a footnote. I was confused just because the the application says comp plan and development. So I just wanted to verify that it was just

just good. So that's I think we've got the recommendation together. So the rest of it is the planning commission work plan. So we took those dockets and then we also thought about what else do we need to do for the rest of the year based on other priorities state obligations etc. And so that is 57

57. Thank you. So, we'll run through those and discuss those a little bit. We've organized that into four kind of primary focus goals that we want to um think about in the year ahead and and the council is going to see these as well with a lot of their kind of visioning and uh various exercises. So, the first one is housing. So housing, we're in a crisis for housing statewide and the state legislature is continuing to provide additional legislation trying to make housing more affordable and easier to produce. So we've got a number of things that we want to do uh in that direction um beyond just what's required by the state but um thinking about how can we make housing easier in North Bend. Second one is streamlining development review and increasing efficiency. So we are very restrict restricted um with staff time. We only have really three of us in the department that have the opportunity to make these changes to staff the planning commission, the parks commission, economic development [clears throat] commission and with the amount of development review occurring and the amount of stuff that we do for the state, it's beyond our staff capacity. So we're trying to figure out how can we do more with less. So uh we want to bring those in as criteria for review when we're bringing code amendments is does this help us to increase our efficiency in bringing through development and uh making decisions. Um the next one is promoting economic development. So long-term we want to make sure that the city is in a financial position to be self-sufficient. We don't want to create a situation where development um or decisions put us into a situation of debt. So that often happens with cities and we want to make sure that we're creating a

framework for development that supports our long-term picture. So that's by by way of looking at zoning, by way of um our impact fees, things that either attract or chase away the right kinds of development. Um and then finally just addressing the state requirements, making sure that we're consistent with that um in amendments that we need to do. So then diving further into what we're actually looking at, um one [clears throat] of the first things is a joint visioning workshop. So sometime probably in early 2026 the council will have their own uh council uh retreat believe in February and so probably March, April or May um at their direction we would look to set up a meeting with the planning commission and council to talk about some broad visioning uh topics. So probably focused on those four goals. Um but that's really going to be at the direction of the council. the comp plan amendments we've talked about um capital facilities, the parks and economic development elements. Um the fourth one there is it's on there. We may be able to get started with you guys, but it's going to depend on um when we get a grant. So, we do need to begin our climate element that's due to the state in 2029. And uh I just found out the state's going to be opening up a grant cycle in January. So I need to figure out if we can put together an application by then. If not, it would be probably a grant cycle later in the year. And so just depending on when we get started on that, you may see that in 27 and or it may be in 20 or 26 or it may be in 27, right? Um

so evaluating fiscal impact and efficiency. So in pursuit of that goal, we actually want to make that a review criteria. So whenever we bring a staff report to the planning commission, we're evaluating certain things like how does this impact the neighbors? How does this impact the environment? We want to make other criteria about how does this impact our city's bottom line long term? And then how does this also impact our ability to quickly process applications? Um signed regulations, it's ongoing and hopefully [clears throat] wrap that up here um early 2025 or 26 [laughter] unit subdivision regulations. Those are one of those state mandates that is trying to make creating housing easier. And so that's a simplified version of a short plat um that allows you to do multiple lots together in one review. So it's kind of like a condo but um intended for things like cottages and uh town homes and so forth. Lot splitting. That's another one that's a a new requirement by the state. We want to create a new chapter for that. And that's where you've got your existing single family lot and it's this much simpler way to just divide that in half um than the the short plot process.

Does that include flag lots?

Yeah, um binding site plan regulations. There are some new state requirements. This is a pretty simple one. Um that you can now use the binding site plan process for condos. So, previously the buying side plans could only be used when it's in a commercial zone. So, now the state say it doesn't matter what zone it's in. You can use that for residential as well. Um, okay. Six is to address that docket about the upper floor residential and interchange commercial zone. Uh, seven is transportation and park impact fees. So, you recall last year we did that for residential. We structured it to scale the impact fee to building size based on state requirements to try to make it more affordable for smaller units. Um, this is a second part to that. Doesn't have to do with residential, but now we're looking at commercial impact fees. So, we have to make our impact fees in alignment with our capital facilities plan. So in particular for transportation, making sure that aligns which is required for state law. Uh but while we're doing that, we also want to look at how can we incentivize the right types of businesses. Um so businesses that are going to bring in jobs and revenue uh tax revenue to the city. Uh considering ways that we can lower the impact fees for those to make it more attractive for those to come. um parking regulations. We have a number of state requirements that we are doing. One of those is to eliminate parking requirements for affordable housing projects. So, uh that's a a new state mandate. Uh while we're in there, we also just want to um have there's a number of other things that we want to consider such as bicycle parking.

Currently, our code doesn't require bicycle parking. We feel like that's a good thing to start promoting people's uh biking, making it easier to do. Um multif family tax exemption is MFTTE. Um so we have a multif family tax exemption uh provision right now just for the riverrun apartments. It was kind of set up as a demonstration project and that's um the multif family tax exemption program is a state program that you can get tax credits for developing affordable housing, affordable multif family housing that meets certain criteria. So we want to now expand that program to apply throughout the city. So if you meet those criteria for affordable housing, you should be able to use this state program no matter where you are. uh residential design standards. So, um planning commission looked at those last year. When we brought that to council, the council said at this point, we're only ready to address what was required required specifically by the state. uh we want to come back and there's additional things that we want to do in there uh that go beyond what's just required by the state but we felt like were good uh things to do for streamlining and for uh clarifying the intent of regulations also um some specific clarifications uh town homes right now are considered a single family typology under parts of our code but multif family and others so we need to clear that clarify that especially in our design standards to make it um a little more clear for developers. Um frontage improvements. So this is again about um economic development. Right now frontage improvements are required when you exceed a threshold of

50% of the value of a structure. Um that can be a little bit steep especially when you're considering a low value structure. Uh the food bank is an example. So, um, well, actually that's an example that fell under the threshold,

but often times when there's a building that's a low value because it's an old building or it's not, um, you know, it's more of a warehouse type building that then and any kind of improvements can get you over that threshold quickly, which maybe isn't fair for all circumstances. So we want to add a little bit more refinement to those criteria uh in the consideration of when frontage improvements are appropriate. Um the rest of these are a little further out. We want to get to them, but it's possible just given the sake of time. These might bump into 2027, but tree regulations. Um, so Kaitlin is interested to lead that one and that's going to be a pretty significant overhaul of our tree regulations. We want to do two things with it. We want to um provide better criteria for when trees should be preserved. Um, I think you've seen probably the Joe subdivision, the clearing for that. We've got a lot of comments from the community out of concern about that.

Yeah. [laughter] Um, that met our criteria. It's a lot. Um but at the same time we also want to simplify the regulations because they're very complicated to review right now. They are also very specific to brand new site development like Ichi Joe and not so specific of instances where a developer is redoing an existing parking lot or there is u residential tree removal. It's not very specific to that those kinds of situations smaller situations. Not to get too off topic, but they're obviously clearing right now for that subdivision.

When do they start doing curb and gutter kind of stuff or is that [clears throat] way down on the line? Um, it it could be fairly soon. So, they have the clearing grade and permit issued now. So, it's just a matter of how long it takes to install the underground ily estates. So it's just east of Wood River. It's right by Twitter Falls. Yeah, they start they removed all the trees there. It's starting to Yeah, they removed more trees than what you would normally see in that area specifically because they preserved a whole lot more trees toward the river than what they otherwise would have done. Yeah.

So it's a little bit of a trade-off. So you see a lot of clearing by the road, but further into the site, there's a lot of protected area that they could have developed. How many houses are they planning to build that? 40, I think it's 46. 46. Okay. And they're bigger lots, right? Yeah. Yeah. Similar to Wood River, I think. So Mhm. And that impacts that property on the point there is like $20 million. Which one? It is super cool to look at this guy. Yeah. Or a little further. It's just after House Rocks on the river because I kayak and I look back at it. It looks like Hogwarts up there in the lyrics. Really?

But I wonder if that'll negatively impact their [snorts] value. I'm sure they don't like it. There is no clear in this area. So the clearing is maybe just this. Oh, it ends. Okay. So that's part of it is they preserved everything in this area even outside of the critical area buffers. Yeah. Just go ahead. Yeah. Sorry to digress. Okay. Is [snorts] the I'm sorry. I know we're tangents. Did the National Guard actually purchase land here in Trucktown as well?

Yes, they have. So they they haven't yet acted on that. We had a public hearing on that two weeks ago. Um, so the developer is developing the property on behalf of the guard. Um, whether or not the the guard actually goes there depends on a number of other scenarios. Uh, so there's two options. It's either going to be the National Guard or it would be a commercial uh and light industrial. Where is that? It's this. Oh, it's the one that the guy came and present a master plan for us. Yes. So he sold to the to the National Guard. The National Guard is the property owner but not the developer. Yeah, I thought the guard option was gone but Yeah, me too. Okay.

Yeah, I was a little surprised. So, see Colon is the developer, right? Yes. Okay. Okay. Sorry, I distract everybody. I was curious if it was going to be an armory or service training center or something. Possibility exists. It's a readiness center. Um, related to this, do you know when does the hearing examiner issue a decision? I mean, I went to that hearing. Do you not? Probably another couple weeks. Oh, okay. It's like a long Okay. Hearing examiners towards the end of the year get very very busy with a lot of people trying to get their hearing in before the end of the year. So, the

response time for official decision is a little bit longer than usual right now. Okay. This is my first experience with the hearing examiner. [laughter] Okay, cool. When do we hear about this? So, and will it be noticed when his decision is issued like or do you like will it be public notice or will it just go to you guys and be like, "Okay, we issue a notice." Okay. Thanks. And sorry, is the hearing exam in Isiqua or is it I'm getting to know local government in Washington. So it's not through North Bend, it's through the state independent air examiner. Okay. Um he consults with a number of jurisdictions and provides hearing services.

Okay. So is he assigned through the state or he's not assigned as a contract with the city? Okay. Got it. Okay. Because we don't we're a small enough city that we wouldn't have our own way. Okay. Thanks. Okay. Um the last is that the last one number 13.

So that's our medium density density residential zone. And really that's just a rename of what was the cottage residential zone. We want to now make amendments to bring greater flexibility to the types of units that we you can do because it's largely still just cottages and there's some allowance for standard single family. Um, but we'd like to expand that to be uh more of your true missing middle typologies. So, your um uh not just cottages, but uh kind of forplex in a manner home typology. Looks like a standard single family home, but can have up to four units in it. Um, duplexes, triplexes, etc.

Um, I've been doing this too long. What's that? I've been doing this too long. I've only Yeah, you were on the planning commission when that was reviewed previously. Trees aren't [laughter] the third time I've ever beat. Yeah. So, has your per your perception changed? [laughter] All right. Number 14 is a similar story to the design standards. So, this is amendments that we you guys have reviewed that we'd like to come back make [clears throat] additional refinements. Uh when this went to council, they said the same thing. They said only address what you need to do for the state for this at this point,

but we'd like to come back and consider some things like the height um um residential height on the ground floor away from North Fenway. We want to consider uh ground floor multif family in the DC zone. Um and then just some additional refinements uh non-conforming regulation amendments. So right now non-conforming uses um can continue and that often what that means is sometimes when you have a new use that comes in they can continue to um utilize those non-conforming uh situations of a property and more specifically we're thinking about like gravel parking lots. So an example was we had an application that came in that could have created water quality impacts because of the nature of the use of parking vehicles that could leak on a gravel park lot. Um so we want to think about what criteria could we apply to provide uh clear regulation for water quality and certain other parameters uh that should not just fall under the non-conforming allowance. Uh 16 long-term interim use regulations. So this is where uh it's again in the idea of promoting economic development allowing people to better utilize their properties. Uh right now we have these um short-term use regulations that allow you to use a property for up to 45 days for you know limited number of things as a temporary use. And that's really intended more for I want to, you know, park my RV and sell strawberries out of it for kind of thing. Um, this is beyond that. There's a lot of circumstances where

somebody needs to start generating revenue to their property in order to be able to then put together an application to do something bigger. Um, so instead of requiring the full gamut of site improvements, so sidewalks, gutters, planter strips, landscaping, storm water, etc., we want to have an interim [clears throat] regulation that allows them use of the property meeting certain minimum criteria, but not the full development that would be required for a permanent use. All right, a lot ahead. And then development agreements. So the honing property is a very large property right here.

Oh yeah. That one is most likely to come in seeking a development agreement in this next year. So development agreement would come before the planning commission. Right now that is um zoned. It's not neighborhood business. Yeah, it is neighborhood business or uh neighborhood mixed use. and their interest to do more residential than what that allows right now. Um, so that would come before the planning commission for considering what are the parameters, what are the public benefits received to the city for tradeoffs for what they're looking to do with their application. Who owns it? Uh, the Honing family.

They're local. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, Cherry Cooper, I believe, is on the call. Yeah. So Terry Cooper is the um representative um of the owners. Interesting. I see it police all the time. I kept hoping they turn it into a dog park. [laughter] I guess we'll see the development increment when it comes. But are they thinking multif family or single family? Multi family. I was just taking a deep breath whenever I see development agreement because I don't love development agreements, but they're a lot of work, but they can be less work than the the broader master plan process. So,

yep, it's true. No, my my concern with them is the potential for spot zoning. That's that's my worry with the improvements. It's not Well, this is a very large property, so true. Absolutely. Something that kind of the master plan is the intent there that you're thinking of impacts to adjacencies, you're thinking of circulation patterns, uh a lot of things together. Yeah, it's good.

Yeah. So, it is very ambitious and we're not going to get through all that, but we get through as much of it as we can and uh look for the planning commission's recommendation on that together with the dockets. Yeah, it looks like a good plan. Uh thoughts, questions, comments? Anybody online? Yeah, it does look like a good plan and like you said, it it's an ambitious plan, but I'm looking forward to seeing how much you accomplish.

I'm not seeing any off months for us. No. [laughter] add in some realistic breaks. [laughter] All right. Well, I guess unless Steph has more comments on item five, we will move on to item six. Well, it would be nice to have a recommendation approval. Okay. I I think as a whole I think the planning commission is supportive of your docket list and planning commission work plan. Are there any concerns? Well, I think I think we're all in favor. [clears throat]

Would somebody be willing to make a motion on that? Motion to Okay, sorry. Motion to approve the 2026 docket. Seconded. All in favor? I I and none opposed. Right, Commissioner Pence given. Correct. Yes. [laughter]

All right. I apologize. I was used to just chatting with the sign regulations. I forgot that we had to do a motion for that one. Um because we had no public hearing on any of this tonight. So, uh, we are on to item number six, the request for planning commission chair to present 2025 planning commission accomplishments and 2026 work plan to city council.

Yeah. So, I sent Hannah an email today um shortly before the meeting. Uh, but the idea is it would be fantastic to have a little bit of facetime before the council for them to be able to recognize the huge amount of work that you guys do in providing recommendations to them. And so as a part of presenting this because ultimately the planning the council needs to approve of the planning commission's work plan for the year. Um so as a part of that it'd be nice to also celebrate the accomplishments that you did in 2025. So um I think it'd be nice for the chair to present and anybody else would be welcome to come. Um and that would be at the January 6th council 6th yeah January 2nd council meeting. um where you you could provide just some of the highlights of some of the things that we've [clears throat] passed that plan commission recommended for council passage in 2025 and then I can take it from there to talk about the work plan ahead unless there's anything out of that that you're interested to speak.

Friday, right? No, Tuesday. Yeah. Is it the second or the sixth because whatever that Oh, so Tuesday of Oh, so it's the sixth. The sixth. Okay. Okay. And then um previously Rebecca had created a slideshow. I don't care if you do a slideshow or not. Do you want me to just talk to the city council or is that something that I should follow that you're together? I'm not a lot of visuals along with that. So, okay. I think just a verbal presentation would be fantastic. Okay. That's cool. Make sure like I'm following your lead on

there's not an expectation of what it has to say. Perfect. And do we need a motion? No. Had a chance to touch base and if you were available for that and invite any other commissioners item as well. Yeah. Okay. And I think we're on to item seven which it which is the adjournment which is 7:41. Okay. Will we have any other meeting this year? No. Yeah. Actually, we wanted to ask you about that. Um, we were planning to cancel your next meeting because it's it's close to Christmas, December 17th.

Are you looking for that? Are you looking for approval of that? As long as you're okay, we don't need a motion on that. And then December 10th, so that is going to be our commissioner appreciation night. And next Wednesday, yeah, that'll be at the North Bend Downtown golf. The golf center. Yeah. And we'll have um appetizers and I actually I think it's a dinner. So I don't think that were we supposed to. Yeah, you can RSVP help us. Yeah. The golf center is the the old single track. Yeah,

it just says food and non-alcoholic beverages be provided. Feel free to bring a spouse or a plus one. Well, I am curious. So, my emails, I'm getting the emails for the meetings and I used to like RSVP on the calendar, but now that's not showing up for me anymore. It should though, right? It's showing up for everybody else. I know what you're talking about. Jamie always says, "I also included the the packet in your calendar invite, but I don't get any notification about that." So instead, I

open up Outlook, which I don't I only use Outlook for this thing. So I open up my Outlook app, find that there's a calendar section, and I go to the meeting date, and I RSVP for the meetings there. We used to get something in the inbox that you just Yes. [clears throat] It's integrated into the on. You're not getting a separate email. Yeah. Okay. I'll have to look. But I don't get notifications from the account. Yeah. Me, too. See, it's different. And I used to get on my phone. I don't get it on my phone anymore. So, it's like the service got cut somehow. Still getting half of it. But

it may be a setting thing. So it must be they probably updated something and I didn't do it. So but same I don't use it a lot. So if they updated it without my knowledge that's probably why [laughter]

we look forward to seeing you guys there. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Do they serve alcohol on their own? Like if we will we be able they have alcohol. need to have alcohol. Makes me sound terrible. I'm going to Hey, I don't know what these people have. Okay. Where is Where which side is the entrance to the golf club on? Is it from North Bend Way or is it from the alley? North Yeah, North Bend Way. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Thanks. Well, you guys have a good night. Bye.