Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

We're live now. Okay. Okay. Good evening. At 7 p.m. this evening, I call to order the January meeting of the Columbia Burough Planning Commission. May I have a roll call, please? Um, I just want to confirm before roll call. Will Barb be included in today's roll call or It can be noted that she was sworn in and present. Okay. Perfect. All right. Chairperson Wikenheiser here. Vice Chair Lynn present. Secretary Lynn here. Member Evans here. Member Crest Hartman here.

MemberLair here.

Okay, if we could stand for a moment of silence. [clears throat] Pledge to the flag algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Okay. Next on the agenda, we have the swearing in of member Barb Fiser, who was appointed by council. Mayor Lutz is present to officiate. Thank you for being here this evening.

Nice to see you. [laughter] Anything to say anything?

Raise my right hand. Raise your right hand. Raise your left hand. [laughter] Have to do this twice. Repeat after me. I do solemnly swear or affirm I do solemnly swear and affirm that I will obey and defend that I will obey and defend the Constitution of the United States the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this common and the Constitution of this common that I will discharge and that I will discharge the duties of my office the duties of my office. Yeah, right. You've done that a time or two. Mayor, welcome back, Barb.

Welcome back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back. I would note that that Barb will be serving for two terms. She will be filling the unexpected. [laughter] We're going to get you. We're We're optimistic. uh she will be completing the term of Nathan Roach who left planning commission. Okay.

Okay. At this time we will have our reorganization of officers and at this time I would state that I will not accept chair of planning commission for another year. I have been a member of planning commission since 2012. I have been chair of planning commission since 2016 and one of the reasons I became chair at that time um Justin Evans was chair in his work position he was not able to continue in that position so I filled in and it's been a what a nine-year fill in here and I think it's time that someone else sits in this chair So at this time I would open the floor to nominations for chair for 2026 to planning commission. Do I have such a nomination?

I would make a motion to nominate Justin Evans as chairperson of the Columbia Burough Planning Commission. I'll second that. Okay. Do I have At this point that name is in nomination. I will ask for a vote. All in favor signify by saying I. I. I. To abstain. Anyone opposed? Justin, it's all yours. [laughter] We got to switch seats. So, you're going to get up seat. No, next time. Next time.

All right. Um, nominations for vice chair. Correct. Chair is Tiffany or vice chair. I will make a motion to nominate Tiffany Lynn as vice chair of the Columbia Burough Planning Commission. Okay. A motion. Do we have a second? Go ahead. Thank you. Whoever. Okay. All in favor say I. I. Likewise. All right. Welcome back, Tiff. Uh nomination for secretary. I would make a motion to nominate Brad Lynn as secretary of the Columbia Burough Planning Commission.

Okay, we have a motion, a second for the nomination. Second. Okay, all in favor say I. I. I. Opposed? Likewise. All right, great. We have reorganized. Thank you for your nine years. I was thinking it was 10. Is it 10? Nine. And because it was like June, nine and a half. Okay, we'll round up. Mary, you did. You were fantastic. I'd like to make mention before we start that Tiffany is starting on her 21st on planning commission. Yeah, that's awesome. Thank you, Tiffany. That's awesome. Y Thank you. It's been an honor. Awesome.

And Brad, you've been on the planning commission quite a quite a while. Yeah. Prior to co Yeah. Right. So, it's great continuity. And now we have now we have a full full table full board. We need some alternates. Yeah, we need an alternate yet. Yeah. So any if you think of anybody Mary he can't I mean the invitation for you as well if you know of anybody in the community who would be interested in this. We have an alternate position open in case of absences. We can actually fill two positions. Why is that? We were actually authorized for two alternates.

Okay, two alternates. All right, so I guess we all got some thinking to do on that. All right. Uh, back to the business. We have the minutes for consideration for the December 16th meeting. I would motion to approve the minutes as submitted with the correction of members present that Roach was not in attendance. Um, I would just like to say that I made that correction today in the office. So, in that yellow folder is the corrected minutes. Okay. Thank you very much. I'll second that. Okay. We have a motion um including the correction which was already made in a second. All in favor say I.

I. All right. The minutes are approved. Uh no zoning hearings upcoming. We'll have a little conversation about that at the end. zoning hearing board. Um, no engineer reviews of subdivision land development applications. So, the main event tonight is the demo application for 240 Riverfront. And we've been provided with the application, your photographs, and the plans for the uh new new home there.

Yeah, you can go. Yeah, the podium. Yeah. Speak into the microphone up in there as well. Is it on? It's on. Yes.

My name's Eric Draggy. Uh my residence is out on 4439 Fairview Road. And uh the problem's getting too big for me to handle anymore. So me and my wife want to move down here to the river. So for us to live there, we got to build and move up and build. But we're going to build in the same spot a little bit angled towards the river down. They want to angle it down a little little bit so the scenery is a little better. The building will be from Superior Homes excavating the ECman's excavating. It' be on all four concrete flow through flood uh flood uh flood flow through about nine opening uh nine foot openings in it to six foot openings in it going north to south and east to west be the same openings. The will be around building will be 52 long 26 and a half foot wide a double wide single uh open bottom peers uh footers 4 foot to three foot blow frost uh rebar and concrete everything on And that's the building. The building there is about 33 wide by 40 something long. And the new one square footage wise, I think it's around 100 bigger. It's around 100 square feet bigger. It'll have a six foot

porch on the left side from the parking lot down be six foot's my walkway so I got to be up and it' be a 10-ft porch on the front towards Riverside. How long have you owned that? Uh roughly 88 89. Okay. Bought it from uh Tommy Swingler. Have you had any flooding in? Flooding was 96 where it came up in about two hours. Come up to our windows. Right. That was today actually when the dam broke and everything happened.

I Well, I had back then I was supposed to get my stuff out but Greg Beer was down there and he was supposed to call me but within two hours, three hours it was done. And in 99 2000 something it came up to the floor didn't win the house on the floor other than that. But now we're going to build elevator the house you wait top left corner Dave did that house right right in that corner there. That's Nancy and he had DC going do the elevation on that and they built it six inches above flood elevation. That's where I want to shoot off of that flood elevation.

Right. The finished floor will be above. Yes. Okay. So that would roughly be in on peers up about towards this parking area roughly. It's about seven and a half feet up and the river side. And I'm gonna move back somewhat. You can see I'm there's a it it rolls down. So I'm gonna roll back up on the next level, the front of my porch. So that' be roughly about maybe 9 10 foot from the ground up. So Eric, is your 10 foot deck there on the new property? Is that more oriented to the river? Yes, that's boarding the river up front. Yeah, because right now you kind of sit on the

Yeah, I want to it down so I can see down river scenery a little better [laughter] and into my tree. I have trees out front there and that'll be I'll be removing that that shed's coming down. Take that out of there. There's a tree here and a tree here. That's the I'm having Dittle Brian Doodle come in and take them down for me. All the rooms get around there. Is it is there only one set of stairs coming off the Yes. wraparound porch? Yes.

Going out the front be if I go towards a river. I mean it's in the future if I want to do that. It's it's this is great. Yeah. There's my Well, next one down. Okay. Down. Bring this down. Oh, wait. Where am I going? [laughter] It's like the opposite. Okay, there we go.

You want to go up here? They're going to come up onto there and they're going to be four foot wide steps with three four stringers and I'm pretty sure four string. Uh they're going to be 6x6 post, three foot in the ground for frost with wrap around railing all the way around. Uh, all the electric be upstairs. Nothing's downstairs. Uh, the heat will be in the attic. AC's in the attic. Uh, things upstairs. Ain't nothing's downstairs. You have a set of stairs coming from

I have steps coming down into the basement and I got steps going to the attic. Okay. Uh, be a B. Uh towards the river, it'll be an open open living room and kitchen. The slide glass door and a door towards the be facing towards the river. That' be a slide glass door, a door onto the deck, side door, steps going down and up to the attic is here. Bend right up and around here go down. bedroom, bedroom, bed, office, bathroom, and a bathroom. And that would be my kitchen over here.

Okay. Very nice. Eric, what's your time frame on this? [snorts] Uh, my wife says now. [laughter] Well, there's a reason why she's saying now. She ain't doing too good. I'm sorry. She had a brain aneurism last year and she's still we got to go down to Philly to one more operation and she would like to see it. So, River is a good place to recover. Yes. So, we had a call from Right.

Yes. Uh [snorts] to be shut off shut off March 3rd. They uh called me and says, "Is this for real?" I said, "Yeah. So yeah, he said they just want to make sure you know. So I said that's what uh Harley Zemer is the contractor engine whatever Ecman's does the foundation on down and all they do everything. Ecman's they have a construction as in doing the cement work. They do everything the porch. So I got one contractor that does it all. Good. and Superior Homes is going to bring it in two sections

instead of with a crank. That's awesome. That's a good idea. That's great. Awesome. So, uh, any questions? No, I I don't have any. You know, all the debris is going to be hauled off site. Yes. Yeah, there's there is uh he's bringing in big metal dumpsters. Dumpsters. Yes, he's bringing dumpsters in and he's going to haul all the way to his location wherever he takes. Okay. So, what you're looking for this evening is the uh demolition only. Okay.

And I have no questions. I think Eric's covered it very well. I'm excited. Excellent application. This was just awesome. Yeah, she's excited. This is a couple of projects. I bet she is. Couple projects that we've had down there with Myers and Lman and they've all turned out really well. Sort of did the same thing and they've turned out very well. So I would make a recommendation I would at this time make a motion to make a recommendation to Burough Council to approve the demolition of the property at 240 Riverfront for Eric Draggy. I'll second that. Okay, we have a motion and a second by Tiff. Any further discussion? Okay, all in favor say I. I.

I. I thank you very much for your time. So do you do you follow what's happening now that this will go to Bur Council? Yes. Okay. And that's next next 27th. Yes. The next week. Okay. Thank you. Good luck. Good luck. Thank you. Good care. Okay.

All right. So, um we have no other action item on the agenda. So, we'll just dive into the discussion items. A little bit of followup from ZB. Why I had this put on this evening is to let you know over the years what we have done with our recommendations to the zoning hearing board is toy them with the draft minutes showing a recommendation. We have been told by the solicitor that we cannot do that. There can be no written recommendation to the board. If we want to make a written recommendation to zoning, it must go to the solicitor for her to present at the hearing.

Okay. We may make our recommendation in person also or instead of that a representative from planning commission can attend the zoning hearing board meeting to present the recommendation from planning commission. Those are the only two ways that any action we take with regard to the board can be made. I don't know if you have I just felt that this was something that's why I put it had it put on here for this evening. Okay. because I felt that the members of the planning commission needed to know this is what happened. and it had something to do with a um a hearing either Mount Joy Burough or Mount Joy Township where the uh the judgment of the zoning hearing board was actually reversed on appeal because they had received recommendation prior to the hearing.

Wow. I mean, I can see where depending on the um extensiveness of the presentation made here and the detail in the minutes could not sway could um affect the purity of what the zoning hearing board's going to hear that night. Uh, so when you and I when we were emailing about that, you know, I I was sitting at my desk and I'm thinking,

well, I kind of thought that a couple of times. Now, granted, there were presentations that weren't either the people didn't show, I didn't show up, or the applicant really wasn't prepared, the applicant didn't have an attorney or an engineer with them. So granted, the minutes weren't as extensive as they could have been, but then there were some here who did their whole presentation as if they were at the zoning hearing board. So I can kind of understand why that's, you know, moving in that direction. So

So you said other than a representative showing up and when you would do that, when would you speak on it? At the end. No, it would be when the parties would be heard. Okay. When the parties to the hearing because if being there as a representative of a planning commission, you are automatically a party to the hearing and represent the burrow. Okay. And and Leo shaking his Leo was on the zoning hearing board. The burrow is always a party to the always a party and as a member as of the planning commission planning commission you are representing got it.

Okay. There's an official planning commission action official and I would say in the future if we have such actions to take I would not be averse to being a representative of planning commission you know but I feel that unless Justin were to go as chair which I always went as chair of planning commission you know for planning commission to also say we are making this re recommendation and we are appointing so and so as our representative to the zoning hearing board. Gotcha. So that's all part of the the action that

would have to be part of the action to take to just not have any member of the planning commission show up and say hey I'm repres you know you're right we we just need some consistency in something in writing. I would agree with that. So we either do that or we or you write a our recommendation submit it to the ZB through you write a letter to the zone board that will be presented to them during the hearing. It just can't be presented to them like in the packet beforehand. Just the application materials. Yeah. So we would do that write something up and get it to you to forward to the solicitor then yes I would.

Yeah. So we have a couple options. Yeah. Okay. But that that's why I wanted this on tonight because this all came out as a result of the latest zoning hearing board meeting. Gotcha. The two there was two cases that and they turned down both of them. They denied. Okay. That was what I had to present with that discussion. Well, thanks. Yeah, that'd be good. We can then from from here then we know the proper procedure. We're either appointing someone or we're gonna put what we vote on in writing and then forward it through. Okay. Thank you, Mary. Thank you very much.

And I'm sure we will take you up on your offer [laughter] to represent the planning commission unless somebody else is willing to do it. I mean, I'm not saying I wouldn't, but that is a very generous offer because the zoning hearing board meetings can be long sometimes. I know I still work those. Yes. So, yes, you do. [laughter] Um, yep. So, thank you again, Mary. Um, old business, new business, nothing on the agenda. Anything that came up in the meantime, Elise? Nope. All right. Well, our next meeting will be February the 17th, 2026. Oh, wait. No, wait. Justin, I'm sorry. I do have new business.

All right. Um we [snorts] Brad and I have a conflict with something else that um we should be present at on February 17th and um one of us can come here and one of us can go there as with a proxy if need be. But if everyone's planning to be here and it's a light agenda, we would both like to attend on their commitment. Okay. So

if if you know ahead of time like and if someone gets sick in the meantime, let us know and I'll come here and Brad will go there. But I'm not sure 100% what the agenda is going to look like next month. Right now we from my understanding we don't have any applications in for planning commission. Um granted I wasn't here yesterday for the holiday and then I was also off Friday. So, unless something came in and I haven't seen it yet, um I I don't know of any applications that will be on for next month so far, but they have till tomorrow. So, if we get Yeah. tomorrow, I'll let you guys know.

Okay. And we could also if something, you know, we are going to have a meeting, you know, we usually usually use the sending out the agenda as the way to say, hey, let me know if nobody's going to be there. So, in that case, it's even more important. Yeah. um if somebody gets sick, then I'll I'll come and he'll go there. But we can get by with four to have a quorum in case there is something that we need to meet for. Okay. Um so that leaves one, you know, other absence. So I think we should be fine unless, you know, the flu comes back or something. So

we'll take our vit'll take extra vitamins in the meantime for you. If we have these light agendas, do we want to get back to look at the uh resoning, the combined, the simplified zoning, get into that? Because we're not doing workshops, but I think part of the reason we decided not to do the workshops is because we thought we would have, you know, some agendas here. Oh, okay. or even help with Jess or something like that or with uh Gwen at Lancaster County Planning. Okay. You know, if we want to look into doing some of that if we have some light agendas over the next couple months.

Okay. You know, we were looking at at the uh the comp plan and the combining the zoning districts. The zoning districts. Yes. Yeah. Okay. And that kind of meshed with the simplified planning. So I can reach out to Gwen from Lancaster County and see if she'd either be available for the February meeting or for the March meeting. Uh depending on what those agendas will look like, see if she's willing to come down and kind of maybe similar thing to what she did in over this last time she was here. Get into a little more detail about um helping us with that zoning. I think even you sent her like where we were at like what we had done with the land use map like the idea of combining them

to see we I had sent her an email was the last time we talked about it. I forget which meeting that was but we said to kind of hold off until the the new year um perfect because of the heavier agendas at the end of the year 2025. Um, so I can reach back out to her and and let her know we're ready for her. Yeah. But see, even now with with the demolition application, it's not even 7:30 yet, right? And I fielded an hour. No problem. Yeah.

Okay. So yeah, if you don't mind doing that to see what when's schedule like is for February and March and if we have a light agenda for one of those then we'll get back into you know the proposal for the map. Okay. Well said, Mary. Thank you very much. All right. You want to move one again? Shall we move on to adjournment? [laughter] I make a motion that we adjourn at what 7:28. [clears throat] I'll second. All right. motion in a second. We're done. Thank you again, Mary. Thank you. Congratulations. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Thank you,