Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

We will call today the August 18th Planning Commission meeting to order. Can I get a roll call vote, please?

Commissioner Niles.

Here.

Commissioner Walsh.

Here.

Commissioner Hines.

Here. Commissioner Taylor. Here.

Commissioners Hull, Anderson, and Buena.

All right. This is our Opportunity to begin with for the public to make any comments concerning any of the items on the agenda tonight, including items for final action. Is there anybody who would like to take this time to speak here? I look.

Oh, Tyler Sanders canvas. Um, planning commission. Um, probably notice these, at least those of you that are present, um, these invitations I've left today. I. And everyone else at strong towns campus would like to extend a special invitation for all of you to as well as. Interest members of the community come participate in our, the good, the bad and the ugly bike ride. This will be next month, September 10th or September 19th. At 10 a.m. I'll email invitations to anyone who's participating online. There's there's been a lot of valuable discussion. In the last year about the future of canvas, what the future of transportation and canvas looks like. Um, and obviously this, this planning commission is very instrumental in defining what the future of of our city looks like, um, you know, exploring questions like, what what is adequate by. infrastructure why what's the value of separated and protected lanes um similar topics of course um it's to this point just um mostly been abstract or policy oriented and the whole point of this ride is to make it more concrete um there's there's a huge difference between talking about it talking about different kinds of bike infrastructure and experiencing them uh for yourself that's why we've organized this event um at this ride we'll be experiencing lots of different kinds of bike infrastructure lots of different levels of safety um and and comfort we'll ride on everything from world-class protected lanes to you know the narrow painted strip on the side of an arterial and everything in between temporary retrofits, long-term solutions, and really see a pretty wide range of infrastructure in a pretty short little two-hour, a couple mile loop. So we we just want you to come for come experience this for yourself. So you can be informed on not just a theoretical but an experiential level about just really what it's like to bike on on different kinds of infrastructure as a rider. I want to be very clear that this will be a casual ride open to people of any level. I don't know if you guys are speed demons on your road bikes or just haven't busted your bike out in a couple years. Whichever it is, we want you there. Even if you don't have a bike, please reach out and we'll try to track one down for you. yeah please please come ride with us at our the good the bad and the ugly viking infrastructure tour next month thank you very much all right that will close the pendant portion of this part

We'll move on to our minutes for July 21st. First, if you want to take a look at those, then I'll take a motion to accept or reject.

I will move to accept the minutes.

We'll second that motion. Wonderful. It was moved by Commissioner Keller and seconded by Commissioner High. Can I get a roll call vote, please?

Commissioner Niles.

Yes.

Commissioner Walsh.

Yes, sure.

Hi.

Yes.

Yes.

All right, it's past that. We'll move on to our meeting items. 1st, on the agenda is the year Iraq annexation. The presenter is.

Good evening commissioners and the public. Start with a powerful here shortly. Okay, you may recall this 1. About a month ago or so and Madeline. Calls her almost called her by her maiden name. Took me a minute there. She was standing in for me, because I was out of town, moving my son to Utah and. You know, we have had a few annexations come through the planning commission over the last several years. I know we have a couple of new planning commissioners. So I think it's important to kind of go over. What is annex? What is an annexation? What's the planning commission's role? Um, and then, uh, you know, so what we're going to be doing here to this evening. Um. Annexations for cities and counties within Washington state are under 35 a 14. there's 10 different methods that are allowed. Most cities end up using the direct petition method, which is basically a percentage of property evaluation. It's not a numbers game in terms of population, but it's, it's property value and. Um. When we go through our comprehensive planning efforts, you know, there are urban growth areas that accompany incorporated areas and those are areas that we have already planned for as Alan's been going over with you over the last year and a half. Um. You know, we, we just zoning and conference plan designations and so forth, but in order for them to develop, they need to incorporate into the city limits to move forward with what we had planned for the infrastructure and so forth. And there's an urban holding that's typically placed on these areas by the county. So it sort of nudges the property owners to make that annexation request. You know, in this case, this is just 1 parcel. It's a relatively easy 1 in the sense of, you know, some of these annexations can get quite complicated. This is located by Woodburn Elementary. The hills around Lake area, and it originally when we did the North road annexation a couple of years ago, those 5 parcels that are. In that little notch, if you will. They made it clear to the city that they didn't want to be in. Uh. The ink was just drawing on the ordinance and then we got somebody asking, hey, I'd like to annex in because the woman who lived there sold the property and, you know, so. We started going forward with this effort. We want to make it clear that we're not annexing the other 4 parcels. We're respecting their wishes. You know, so the exercise for the planning commission, when we do, this is your role is to provide a recommendation for setting a zoning designation. In this case, the urban, um. Or the, uh, here's an area photograph just for reference. Um, largely undeveloped, there's a house towards back a little critical areas off to the East side of the site. Um, but the proponent, uh. does want to look to incorporate this into a larger development north of the area for utility purposes.

And moving forward to the next slide here.

There's the North Shore Road annexation just by reference in red. And then here's the comprehensive plan designation of single family high density. These are all going to change in October when We adopt the new comprehensive plan and so forth, but there's going to be very similar uses in terms of densities and things like that. We're just going to call them something different. So, a single family high density, it's actually really only 1 zoning designation that can implement that, which is our 6. Um, so, um, not a lot to choose from, but that's essentially where the, but it is similar to what's happened, uh, with Norris or not North, but at least certainly the existing subdivision you see up there. And then, um. Uh, actually was Norris road as well and then, um. Surrounding area, so it's, it's pretty consistent with what's in the region there. Um. that's kind of the quick and dirty of it. Essentially what you do is you're going to hold a public hearing, take any testimony, and then if you do want to formalize a recommendation, you know, staff is recommending it would be R6, and then we will hold a final hearing with the City Council where they actually do an adoptive ordinance to incorporate the property with the zoning designation that's going to be in place and the fact that they're going to have to assume indebtedness for statutory requirements. Uh, so that's it. It's pretty pretty straightforward where you will be seeing some come in the coming months that are a little bit more complicated and for for other reasons. But, um, we'll get to that at another time. Uh, so I happen to answer any questions. Otherwise recommend that you open a public.

Any questions or commission. I just I'm warning in the process in general, like, what's what's it. Finish it through something for a Dan is a single piece.

That's a good question in total. It's around 4000 dollars. Sometimes you need to get like a perimeter legal description. If you've got a bunch of properties involved in this case, we were able to use the legal description for the single parcel itself. It's something that the county requests. The soft costs could be more if there, if the proponent is hiring a professional, either attorney or surveyor. engineer, but that's basically what it is. The development costs are something completely different.

This came into my mind with the single one.

Yeah, you know, certainly with a larger area, you get to share the cost a little bit, spread it around. But in this case, it's just the one. Thank you.

Commissioner Walsh, have anything? Is he raising his hand at all? Since I can't see him.

There we go. There it is. Oh, Yuri.

Uh, we don't want to wait until public.

Yeah. So, Yuri, what we're going to when we open the public comment, then you as a proponent will be able to certainly speak to this. So, just maybe go ahead and just open it then.

Yeah, I think Madison did the front work for you because we had a lot of questions for. Yeah, I had it that way. Right? So it's from commission, then we'll open up the public hearing part of this and open it up for questions. So, thanks for your patience. Uh, we'll go ahead and go to Yuri 1st and see how Sandra is already. See if I can get it connected. Did it pop off? Is there Erie?

Still up.

There's another. Is there? Yeah. I don't know if it's that other. Yeah. Do you want me to stop sharing? Oh, there he's back. He's muted though. There we go. Oh, back on again. You both are doing the same time. All right. How about Yuri? Can you hear us now?

I can hear you now. I can see you too.

Great. It's all for you. Go right ahead.

Well, all we want to do on a property is do utilities and bike pathway and pedestrian crossings.

Perfect. All right. Thank you, Yuri.

You're welcome.

Stay clean.

We'll stop at Camas. I'm a proponent of this project. As Yuri talked about, there is a future development that's planned to the north of there as part of the Norris Road annexation. And this is a key piece of property for that for two reasons. One is staff has said that we can't move utilities through county property. It needs to be within the city of Camas. Therefore, this needs to be annexed in order to utilize that for various utilities as well as we envision a walkway that'll go through there for the kids so they're not having to walk on the the umatilla and those more major highways so those are the reasons that we'd like to see this go through wonderful anyone else in chamber okay and how about online

John Potter, All right, that will close the public hearing portion will open it up for discussion. John Potter, For our Commissioners. John Potter, There is no discussion, we can move on to recommendation, but go right ahead.

John Potter, Do we do it as a motion or.

John Potter, yeah you'd want to make a motion motion to forward it on to.

city council with a recommendation of an r6 if that's what you're thinking yeah i would move that we recommend to council to approve this annexation with a zoning designation of r6 okay i'll second that wonderful i've got a motion from commissioner keller and a second from commissioner high can i get a roll call vote please commissioner niles yes or walsh yes

Commissioner Keller yes that has passed wonderful all right thank you very much for your time thank you it's motion yes it didn't work that well you did much better than life uh all right then we'll go on to our next uh item on the agenda which is our zoning code amendments update for uh presenter Alan Peterson all right good evening planning Commission

So tonight we have actually the final batch of code amendments that we're proposing to include with the comprehensive plan update. Following this meeting, our next step is to hold a public hearing at the September planning commission meeting. As we're planning for that and thinking a little bit about Um, what that might look like, uh, we might reach out to see if there's an opportunity for maybe a special meeting if there's. A need to extend that into a 2nd meeting, because there's gonna be a lot of material in addition to all these code amendments we've gone through. We are going to be looking for a recommendation on adopting the comprehensive plan and the downtown sub area plan. And while you have seen those, it's been quite a while since that a lot of time. So we've spent a lot of time focusing on present minutes, but we do want to remind you that that overall plan is sort of the bigger, most important piece of this process. Tonight's items, I think, are, in wrapping this up, a little bit more straightforward, and so we might not take the entirety of the time. So I'll just jump into here. There's five different sections we're looking at. The first one is a proposed amendment to the short subdivision chapter 1709. So this new section 1709 would be called administrative lot split. And what this does is it implements a bill that was passed in the Washington legislature last year, HP 1096, which requires cities to establish an administrative lot split process, which would allow an existing residential lot to be divided into two. Lots through an administrative decision. And so when I first heard about this, I was a little confused as to what this map because. Seems a lot like a short plat, which is a way to divide land through administrative decision administrative process that doesn't require public hearing. And I was more straightforward. But this diagram here, I think, explains very well what the intent is and where I think we would see this applied most often in Washington and in Camas. So a good example would be here a lot with an existing home. It's large enough to be divided. If under today's code, and processes you wanted to develop that lot, you would have to, as the landowner, hire an engineer, draw up a subdivision or short utilities go through that process is quite complex. If you want to make any money off of your land and stay in your home, that itself can be an obstacle. A lot of folks are facing the choice of selling the whole property or entering into some agreement with the developers or not realizing that potential. What this would allow you to do is split that lot into two. Then in the future, a subdivision could occur on that new lot that was split off. So I think the key distinction here really is that you can split the property without having to install any sort of improvements up front. So I'll walk through What the code states, um, and, uh, and, and again, you know. What do we achieve here in canvas? Um, so. Just going to kind of actually just walk you through the side that the code here is drafted. Um, so applicability, it's only permitted within residential zones. Um, and so it's not something that can be used in commercial zones. It's intended for residential development. um would follow the short plant process generally uh with exceptions provided herein um a lot of splits could only create one additional lot and that parent lot that is used for a lot split could not have been created through a lot split in the past so you cannot lot split a lot but it's a one-time deal um and then both the parent law and the proposed new law would have to meet the minimum a lot size of the zone in which the administrative J Lenz, D.B.A. : lot split is located. However, there is no maximum lot size requirement that would apply to this. And so the idea is, you would likely be creating a lot that was bigger than more normally be a lot in that zone, because that new lot would likely be created for the purpose of further subdivision. It could be that you're creating 2 lots of exactly the same size and maybe that that 2nd lot is just going to have a house built on it. Right? That's a possibility too. But you're trying to achieve a new developable parcel here. Um, well. New improvements are not required. You would have to ensure that that lot that's created has access and utility agreements in place. So, easements recorded for any future potential development that could occur on that. So, well, again, you wouldn't have to build an access road. You wouldn't have to install water and sewer. You'd have to ensure that. And the maximum number of units that could be built on that lot would be served through easements that are put in place. And then this C5 here I think is key. If a lot split results in a newly created lot of a size that would allow for future land division, and this is the scenario I think we contemplate, subsequent lot splits are not allowed, but the newly created lot may be divided under other applicable land subdivision processes. So the way we read this is That's that new lot or either new lock because really you're creating 2 in a way. Could be divided through a short plan process. Or a subject process, you just can't use a lot split and so. Again, just provided that the lots big enough to be divided, it can be divided through another process and that's important because that process is what is going to trigger those improvements that are normally required with development. And then there's an interesting section 6 here, which is a state requirement and this is exactly from the RCW. If a lot split would require demolition or alteration of any existing housing that would displace a renter, the applicant must recommend a displacement mitigation strategy that may include, but it's not limited to relocation assistance. So, again, that's just straight out of the RCW. If that's something we encounter, we probably need some legal guidance on how to administer that. But the idea here is that the intent is not to displace renters who might be impacted by this process. So, again, a key difference here with an administrative law split versus a short platter subdivision is that new development is what will trigger the improvements, not the lot split itself. When you're splitting off the property, we could condition that lot split to say that right-of-way on the parent lot be dedicated, but not necessarily improved. We'd want to make sure that if we were normally through a subdivision process would require additional right-of-way, we can require that right-of-way with the lot split. What we couldn't require is frontage improvements. But development on either lot could be conditioned then on constructing those improvements. So I'll go back to this image here where let's say you get to that third phase there where a developer splits the new lot into four lots. They could be, and we would require, Improvements to be made to serve those 4 lots, but also would require frontage improvements along the parent parcel as well. So, uh, the key is at the end of this process, the city's being made whole well. There were steps here that were made easier. We're not circumventing the subdivision process entirely. And the full property would get those friends improvements. And so I think the risk that we, I think the city would see here is, if that couldn't happen where you can condition that subdivision on front end improvements, you'd end up splitting off a piece of property. Those friends improvements would never happen on that old house. you just get improvements within that new subdivision. Again, the idea is we're made whole as if we required that subdivision upfront. But this allows, again, that landowner, the homeowner to sell the property, that developer develops their piece, and then with that development, they likely are installing the frontage improvements in front of that house. That might happen later, but it will happen at some point.

So if they split it off and then a developer does the improvements, John Pimentel, Is it going to be on the second owner, then to do the initial improvements on the first lot is that going to fall into them, or is that going to fall under the homeowner that sold or that split the lots originally or do you know or would that be up to them.

John Pimentel, I think it's up to them, the condition would fall on that future development so and that future development in this scenario it's a four lot short plow right, and so the the landowner the applicant for the four lot short plow we're saying okay. TAB, Mark McIntyre:" Part of the improvements you're going to do also find improvements in front of that that parent lot right. TAB, Mark McIntyre:" I think, as far as the city is concerned, the developers responsible for that condition to be met or else they're not going to get final acceptance of their subdivision they're not going to be able to plat. TAB, Mark McIntyre:" But we really don't care who's paying for it right, so you know it may be that that homeowner is paying but. More than likely, it's going to be the developer. More than likely. They're not going to get to develop unless they do. Exactly right. So I think, you know, there is a lot of responsibility and risk, I think, placed on that homeowner in the process because, again, they're in a way taking a shortcut, which allows them to I can sell property, make money up front without having to go through development costs and timeline. But there is some risk because, unlike with a short platter subdivision, we're not doing a deep review. This is a quick, easy process. We're not really looking at whether or not the lot is buildable. So there's information that we're not going to have that we might have in a short platter subdivision process. And there's easements that might be recorded upfront but if those uh you know if if the utility or access is not engineered those easements might not be in the right place right or they might not be adequate so there there is going to be their homework yeah substantial risk and one of the things that we would then require um to protect the city's interests is once that final uh Survey is created and it's called administrative lot survey rather than a plat. Uh, there are notes on here that say the cities, I mean, from any liability loss or damages suffered by another that's related to our of that lot split, including if the lot split creates a lot. That is later determined unbillable. And then on that, if applicable, whether future development will require frontage improvements. I think in most cases again, we would determine that yes, frontage improvements would be required. And then whether right-of-way dedication would be required. Again, the right-of-way dedication could happen upfront. And then would have to know the location of all those access and utility easements. So. That is the proposed amendment. This is again a bill that's just over a year old. It's been a challenge to find examples of cities that have implemented this, but many have been doing this over the past few months. And so I think this is. modeled most closely after the City of Puyallup. Vancouver also adopted a version of this earlier this year. And so it'll be interesting to see how it's utilized and how successful it is. It's taken some effort to try to make sense of it again, and what was the intent of the legislature in adopting this? And that's why, again, I share that example, because it's a little confusing, but that's what makes sense to me as far as where it's useful and where it might benefit a property owner. So you know we'll see where this goes but I think you know we've looked at the guidance we've learned from some of those examples. And I think one of the one of the questions that cities have had to address is, you know, How do you divide those blocks that are created through the lot split and it's clear they can be divided. Uh, but there's a process that's, you know. That's where again, the city is sort of made whole in this is if there's development that happens, right? If there's not development, then. There really is any difference to the city 1 way or another. So, um, any, any comments questions on that 1 question is, if you go back to your.

image there what happens if you so you know i own property and i divide it off to sell you know half of it to uh to someone and then x number of years go by and then they decide to Christopher McConkey, divided as well, or they prohibited permanent hiding it. Christopher McConkey, So. Christopher McConkey, i'm just kind of think of what what do we kind of end up with if you have. Christopher McConkey, areas where we have like Okay, we have an acre lot now they divided half somebody built a house that they did that five years later that can be divided in half.

Yeah, I think that's what he was saying is that it was doable, but they'd have to go through the already processes that are already in place, which come with all of the improvements.

And your example could happen, though, where you split off half of your property salt to someone, and all they do is build a house. Yeah, they can build a single home on it, or they can build a home and ADUs on it. That'd be permissible under the zoning code. However, that that would be the development that would trigger the improvements required, right? So at that point, fringe improvements would likely be required for both lots, right? And the utilities and the driveways would have to be built to access that lot or those units, even if it's just one home, right? So again, at that point, you know, I think the city's made whole. Now they could then, five years later, decide to subdivide it. And then at that point, they they can't do a lot split anymore right it's already been lost but one so they have to do a short plat or a subdivision uh and the same would apply to the parent lot so um you know i think that the language uh is a you know perhaps a little bit confusing because it references the newly created lot but really both lots as long as as long as they're large enough to be divided could be divided again they just can't not use the lot split process to be divided again perpetuity yeah and perpetuity short flats are different you can short plat i think every five years but um i'm just more using it because like yeah you know the first times it's kind of fun but you could end up with a real ugly patchwork yeah it's continued you know and that's why it's a one-time it's a one-time it's a one-time thing and it it I think it's critical that the planner is always looking at the notes on the product plan to make sure that this isn't a sequence of law splits. Again, I think the risk of that is pretty low of that happening, but definitely something for us to make sure we're looking out for over the next few decades. I think of all the things tonight, this is the most interesting one. Again, totally now I have a better sense of what the intent was legislatively. It may create some challenges for us. Certainly it's different, but this is a state requirement. And we have until next July technically to implement this, but it seemed like it would be appropriate. It's consistent with the general goals of the comp plan to streamline some processes and encourage housing. Thanks for the explanation. I would have done the same thing that you did. Look at and go, huh?

Yeah, I believe it took a little while to make sense of it. You say administrative on this. That's building department. You guys, not a hearing.

Yeah, it doesn't go to a hearing. And also, I didn't go into this, but it could be... Approved concurrently with a building permit. Um, not exactly sure how that will look. I don't know that it would make sense for someone. They're going to have to do all the stuff anyway, but yeah, theoretically, that's what the legislative. Have we got a cost associated with the administrative so we haven't we haven't yet set a fee for that. If adopted, we would set that with the fee schedule, but it'd be similar to, I think a short plan. So Chapter 1803, this is a definitions chapter. Right now, that chapter is separated into three different sections. There's definitions for land uses, definitions for development terms, and then definitions for environmental terms. If I'm looking up a term, I might correctly guess that it's in 030. It might actually be in 040, right? As far as what's a development term versus the land use term, I think sometimes that's confusing and I think there's terms that might be better under one heading of the other. What this does is it basically get rid of those three distinctions and it just puts all the definitions in one place that's alphabetical, I think. Uh, that's simple enough, but there also are some new terms that have been incorporated and these are terms that are used in the various code amendments that hadn't proposed. I think the absolute most affordable most important 1 here is the affordable housing definition because that's something that appears in several different sections and there's new requirements applicable to affordable housing. For example. portable housing, you cannot require a minimum parking standard anymore, right? And so what does that mean? You would go to this definition. The packet, the updated section, I think, was only uploaded into the packet today. But it does include, again, these new definitions here, also includes definitions for approval authority, data center, fulfillment centers, mass timber construction, modular construction, non-residential use, and these other four here. And I'll have those in the presentation and go over, but again, those have been implemented in there. Section 1809, this is the section that regulates the density and dimensional standards for zones. So this is where you see that Units per acre that are allowable within each zone, what the height and setback requirements are basically, there's been a lot of clean up here to update that those tables to include the zoning districts that are being proposed to remove those that are being removed. Um. The density standards are going from a unit measurement of dwelling units per acre to lots per acre, which is distant with. We're now developing middle housing in campus. We're adding section section on the new multi family 24 zone. And then there's a new section that addresses the 4 downtown zoning districts. 1 of the. And more interesting changes in this chapter are some exceptions from House Bill 1183, which was also a bill last year out of the Washington legislature. And this provides new height and setback exemptions or exceptions in certain cases. So those cases basically are where someone is adding exterior insulation to a building envelope. That exterior insulation can now project 8 inches into a setback. So that's for new construction, but also for a retrofit. So you can see an example where a house maybe was built right at the five foot setback through a remodel. They add to be anywhere from an inch to eight inches of new exterior insulation, which technically is a setback encroachment. I don't know if we would ever have seen it that way, but it's clear now that you can encroach eight inches into that setback. You could also Increase your building height by 8 inches if you're adding exterior insulation to the roof. And you can exceed building height now by 48 inches for roof mounted solar panels. So. These are all, I think, compatible with our climate planning goals as well. And is a new state law that is being addressed with these code amendments. Chapter 1813, straightforward, but I think big change here. This is where we have our tree density requirements. So we adopted 2017-18ish, maybe Robert, the tree requirements. in our landscaping section yeah see what year that was oh that was uh 2016. yeah so 2016 10 years ago um that was set at uh 20 tree units per acre uh and so that could be met by existing trees or replacement trees on a site but basically ensures that any development has a minimum tree density uh in 2023 when robert took forward the north shore zoning changes that was increased 50% to 30 tree units per acre in the North Shore subarea. And then there was some language added that at least half of that tree density, so 15 tree units, would have to be met through existing trees on the site where that could be achieved. And in situations where it cannot be achieved based on an arborist report, Those replacement trees cannot just be any tree. They would have to be either native or coniferous trees. So the idea there is you get trees that are more consistent with the natural landscape and expectation in Kansas and in the Northwest. That seems to have worked just fine, and we've only had three years of experience with it, but those projects that have gone through in North Shore haven't really taken any issue with that. And that came up, I think, pretty early on in this process. It is hard to increase that. And so what's proposed is to remove that North Shore specific standard and just make it a citywide standard 33 units per acre. And so this is what that change looks like. Great forward, you're going from 20 to 30, but that is a 50% increase. And the other increase again is that. You have to, you cannot just automatically say, I'm going to cut those trees down and replant them. yeah where you can 50 percent um and then this this is there's no changes proposed here but this does explain you know what a tree unit is a tree unit is not one tree it could be less or more depending on you know the the size of the tree so you know a mature uh you know typical duck fur you might see on a property in canvas is probably somewhere in the neighborhood of five to eight tree units maybe right but a newly planted tree would be one tree unit um I think this is pretty reasonable uh for for new development I was kind of comparing my you know what my lot which is like 4 000 square feet which is quite small you know, has five tree units on it. So I think it's, it wouldn't be that difficult to meet it. But I think it is still an important thing to include here. And then Chapter 1815, we have some amendments proposed to the sign code. And these come from a a variety of different places and experiences. First one applies to awning signs, and then there's a change on temporary sign placement and on master sign permits. The first one, awning signs, we currently have a requirement that state signs must provide a minimum clearance of 14 feet over any vehicular use area or 10 feet over any pedestrian area. That's a minimum clearance based on the sign code. um building permit uh building code requires clearance of seven and a half feet which uh going to be, you know, it's like the 99 percentile of height, right? So, but that's where that code requirement comes from. And that's what applies to awnings. So our downtown awnings, when those are approved, we're looking for that minimum seven and a half foot clearance. And so now we have a situation where you have an awning that's two and a half feet lower than the the sign minimum. And what that does preclude is placement of signs on those awnings, such as the left image here, which I think does violate that standard as written, or the right image where you have a sign that is affixed to and hanging from that awning. So this is something the DCA actually pointed out to us, and this, I think, just kind of harmonizes the awning dimensional standard with the sign standards. So in this unique situation most likely downtown as long as that vertical clearance is maintained when a sign is affixed to or on an awning, you can go lower than that. The second proposal is related to temporary signs and medians. I think this is pretty self-explanatory. During election season, but also other times of the year, we get a lot of signs out there. And I think in the interest of public safety, vehicular safety, there was a code amendment a few years ago where at roundabouts temporary signs were prohibited from the center island and the splitter islands approaching around about and this would extend that to median. So basically anything sort of within the curb lines or outside travel lanes would preclude any placement of temporary signs. So you can still have them within the public right-of-way along sidewalks and planter areas, but not within the manions. So I think there's some safety benefits and clearly aesthetic benefits. We cannot go so far as to clearly prohibit signs from our public rights-of-way. But this is, I think, a reasonable approach that a lot of commercials for a while. Yeah. Yeah.

They're not forever. Yeah. Although we seem to be three more months.

So that that is 1 proposal. And then the other 1, which is related to temporary signs generally, but, you know, largely political science here. I don't know if it was a loophole or not, but an interesting feature of our code is there are smaller temporary signs that are allowed in residential zones. We typically don't want to see large billboards or things like that. Temporary signs can be larger in commercial zones. But there is an exception when master sign permits, and then you see these when there's new residential development. So subdivision might say, Hey, you know, we've got a 100 lots here. We don't want to put a 100 little signs up. Can we consolidate those signs together and put up a couple of big signs that advertise? In this case, we're selling 101 townhomes, right? So rather than 101 signs, they could have one bigger one, right? This exceeds the limit in that zone. So that was really the intent of the master sign permit code. And then over the past couple election seasons, we have gotten requests which we've had to approve for master sign permits to allow for larger political signs, larger temporary signs in these residential zones. So to sort of get at that issue, what we're saying here is that you can still do that, but you can't do that within the public right of way. So if you are in a situation where maybe you can get 10 neighbors together that all live next door to each other, and they want to sign on to the master sign permit. and put a bigger sign up for an issue or a candidate or whatever on one of their properties, that's fine. In the rare circumstance where that might be the case. That might be preferable to having 10 signs, but that's what you'd have to do. You can't say, oh, I'm going to get this permit and just put it on the corner of 6th and Norwood, which is what we've seen happen. This is intended to preclude that in the future. Um, and I believe that is, uh, yeah, that's all the material I have for. Yeah, so you've now seen all the code amendments, uh, that are, are being proposed. Um, and, you know, there's, again, a whole range. Some are more, uh, complex. More comprehensive, there's been a lot of smaller things. Um, I do think it's clear as as you see the comprehensive plan and sub area plan, uh, over the next month or so that, uh. There's still going to be a lot more work to do in the coming months and years to implement that plan. It is a 20 year plan. But we are getting at the bigger items. I think have prioritize those changes that are required by the state. And I think that advance the sort of most important changes in the draft plan.

So, you need questions from commission. What's our rough timeline for that?

For adoption for like, so the, uh, the next step for the planning commission, and really the final step is a hearing on September 15th. So, uh, you would hold a public hearing on that on that day, and the intent would be to forward a recommendation to counsel. Like I did say earlier, I do want to. J. Sam Hurley, Make sure that you know we are at least planning on the possibility of you know, two meetings to do that. J. Sam Hurley, And so i'll have carry reach out we'll figure out our availability to do that and see if there's you know, a second date that we could roll over to if we needed to.

So you're thinking that possibly 2 in September, or are you talking 2 months consecutively?

Uh, my, my hope would be that we didn't have to wait until the October meeting. Right? Yeah. I'm going to make sense. I think that.

The other questions about. Good job explaining this stuff like a master sniper. I had no idea what that was. Good job. We didn't either.

Yeah, I kind of ran into a little bit of hard knocks on the class selection. What is it?

No, but there's a lot of people that read our codes very, very closely. And I'll then have you sometimes learn questions. Anything from Commissioner Walsh online?

No questions for me. Thanks for checking.

No problem.

John Pimentel, All right, so we'll close that part about miscellaneous disputes. John Pimentel, And i'll just reiterate you know staff will be coming to the planning Commission with a couple of annexation zoning designation. John Pimentel, Think about for a while yeah yeah one one will be. Well, these are probably more forthcoming the other may take a little bit longer just because it's a, an established neighborhood with 171 lots and. Um, there's some added homework we need to do on that 1. so, um.

Yeah, if for anyone that was watching the council meeting last night, there was some good discussion and so Winchester Hills neighborhood. So. Established neighborhood that's just been in the county part of our growth area for a long time. And those residents are. Looking and come into the city and so that process was kicked off basically yesterday that council's blessing, but there's a lot of work yet to happen. Yeah.

Mark Warren, All right, else. Mark Warren, All right, then. Mark Warren, Our next meeting will be September 15 as we talked about earlier. Mark Warren, Beyond that i'll close the meeting.