Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Hello, this meeting is now called to order. Welcome to the July 20th, 2026 Planning Commission meeting. We'll begin with the roll call. Casey, will you please call the roll?

Yes. Chair, Queaton? Here. Vice Chair, Daniel Garcia?

Here.

Commissioner Burger?

Here.

Commissioner Rafael Garcia?

Here.

Commissioner Grubb?

Here.

David Ensign, Commissioner Ibrahimovic may not be in attendance tonight. David Ensign, Commissioner and Johnny don't see. David Ensign, Commissioner sour off.

David Ensign, Here.

David Ensign, And Commissioner talia's David Ensign, Present. David Ensign, And we have quorum chair.

David Ensign, Great, thank you. David Ensign, Our first order of business is approval of tonight's agenda. Do I have emotion and can the motion maker, please state their name. This is Aaron. So moved. Second.

Seconded by Daniel.

It's been moved by Aaron and seconded by Daniel to approve the agenda for the July 20th Planning Commission meeting. All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed say nay. Any abstentions? Okay. The agenda has been approved as submitted. Uh, moving on to approve of the minutes from the June 15th, 20 or June 15th, 2026 planning commission meeting. Is there a motion?

So moved Jessica.

Do I have a second?

I'm going to take Jessica.

It's been moved by Jason and seconded by Jessica to approve the minutes from the June 15th, 2026 planning commission meeting. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed say nay. Any abstentions?

I'll abstain since I wasn't here.

Great. Thanks, Elle. The minutes are approved. We'll move on to public comment. This portion of the meeting is an opportunity for members of the audience to speak on any items related to city business, including items on the agenda, except those items for which the commission held a public hearing, but has not yet completed its deliberations and issued a recommendation to city council or where the speaker promotes or opposes a candidate for public office or a ballot measure. Comments on all topics will be allowed during this portion of the meeting tonight. I will identify two to three speakers. And when your name is called, the host will unmute the microphone. You'll then need to unmute your microphone before you start speaking. Comments will be limited to three minutes, and staff or one of the commissioners will share a countdown clock. We will interrupt you and ask you to quickly finish your comments. If you extend beyond three minutes, I believe we have some interest in providing public comment. If you would like to give public comment, please raise your hand digitally. OK, I see one hand raised. You can let them in, Casey. You're muted, Casey, too.

Yeah. Was it Brianna Murray that was first?

Brianna Murray and then followed by Julia Gordon. All right.

Brianna, you should see an alert to promote to panelists. So I will share a clock here in a second. When you would like to begin, I will start a timer. So give me one second while I grab that. And Brianna, can you hear us? And are you able to check in with us? Let us know that your microphone is working. I think you've still muted yourself. Quick check with us.

Hello?

Sounds good. All right. So you'll see a three minute timer in my camera box. So I'll start that clock once you state your name for the record, please.

Good evening, Commissioners. For the record, my name is Brianna Murray. I reside at 1604 Water Street in Olympia. Thank you for the opportunity to provide public comment on the home-based business code that you're considering this evening. I have been a lobbyist in Olympia for just over 20 years. I work for a government relations firm that's headquartered in Tacoma, where I'm an employee, not a business owner. In 2020, my son was born. Like so many working parents, my husband and I have spent the last several years trying to balance successful careers with spending as much time as possible with our son during his childhood. When the legislature returned to in-person activity after COVID, we purchased a home in the South Capitol neighborhood. My family lives there seasonally during the legislative session, much like many other families who split their time between warmer or colder climates. To make that possible financially, I rent the unused bedrooms to several of my colleagues or other employees at the firm I work with. Some stay there seasonally, like me, while working in Olympia. Others simply use their room as a quiet place to work between meetings. Their rent makes it possible for my husband and son to be with me during the busiest months of the year. It has allowed me to put my son to bed on nights that I otherwise would have missed. As I've read these proposed amendments, I honestly don't know where I fit because I don't own my own business. And because I work for a company headquartered elsewhere, I don't know whether I'm considered a home-based business, remote work, or something else. And that uncertainty alone concerns me. But my greater concern is that this proposal doesn't feel like it's about regulating businesses. It feels like it's about regulating professions. Several neighbors have made it clear that my family is not welcome They've made rude comments to my husband, to my colleagues who rent rooms, or even to my cat sitter. I can't help but think that if I were a CPA or retired and using my home exactly as I do today, that I would be considered compliant. But because I'm a lobbyist, somehow my home has become a problem. government should not write land use regulations that in practice single out particular profession professions i respectfully ask that you reject these draft amendments and instead pursue clear objective impact-based standards that apply equally to every resident regardless of their profession, that focused on regulating noise, traffic, parking, and signage, objective standards that protect neighborhoods regardless of what someone is doing for a living, and they're consistent with the recommendations submitted by others that you've received in writing. Thank you for your time, and I appreciate the opportunity to share my perspective.

Thank you. Up next will be Julia Gordon.

All right, Julia, you should get an invite. Just do a quick sound check with us. And then when you're ready to start, state your name and I'll start the timer.

Okay, great. Thank you. I'm Julia Gorton. I'm a lifelong resident of Olympia. I wanted to share similar concerns about the home-based work amendments that the commission's considering. About two years ago, my family had the opportunity to purchase a home in a South Capitol neighborhood. It was very exciting for me to be able to buy a home in a neighborhood that I grew up in. Now my daughter gets to experience Halloween in the neighborhood. We get to walk just a few houses to watch the lake fair parade, and she'll get to experience the very unique experience that is possession of the species. One of the best parts about the home is its proximity to the Capitol campus and state agency headquarters where I do work. And like many other working moms, it allows me to balance my responsibilities as a parent with work. I can cook, I can stay warm, I can rest, and occasionally I take Zoom meetings and respond to emails. When friends, families, or colleagues have business before the legislature, they can park in my driveway and walk a few blocks. This past legislative session, my colleague was able to use the home between meetings so she could continue to breastfeeding her baby and spend time with her little ones. That flexibility is life-changing as a working mom. I have deep concerns about these proposed amendments, not just for me, but for working parents all across Olympia. As written, they appear to prohibit my ability and the ability of many other remote workers to work from home if a coworker, client, or other work-related person ever visits. That means ordinary parts of working life suddenly become questionable. Can coworkers meet in a driveway to carpool? Can we plan tomorrow's presentation around the kitchen table? Can we celebrate a retirement or a promotion with coworkers? And why are these activities permissible only if you go to an office every day and never work from home? Flexibility is something many women rely on. And according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 36% of employed women work from home on any given workday, a much higher rate than their male counterparts. Women are about 24% more likely to work from home than men. If these amendments make working from home more difficult, they are more likely to have a disproportionate impact on women, particularly working mothers. I respectfully urge the Planning Commission to table these amendments and, at a minimum, conduct an equity analysis before moving forward. The South Capitol neighborhood is a historic neighborhood, a history that has impacted people differently. I hope the history we can continue to celebrate is that ordinary people, including working moms like me, can continue to fully participate in it. Thank you.

Thank you. If anyone else would like to give public comment, go ahead and raise your hand digitally. OK, not seeing any new hands, that will Close public comment there and move on to staff announcements.

Let me get the timer turned off here real quick. All right. Thank you, Chair. I'll be very brief tonight. Just want to let commissioners and the community know that our next scheduled meeting will be on August 17th. We will not be having a meeting on August 3rd. So sorry for the kind of continued disruption to our regular rhythm here. So we'll be next meeting on August 17th. I'll include an announcement for that and update our schedule online and on Legistar as well. So that's all I have for everyone tonight. We'll check back in on August 17.

Thank you, Casey. And moving on to business items, tonight's business item 6A is a briefing regarding home-based business code amendments. David Ginther, Senior Planner in Community Planning and Economic Development, will be introducing this topic tonight. David, would you like to begin?

Certainly. Give me a second here to share and start the presentation.

Okay.

I hope you're seeing the presentation. Okay. Yep. All right. I'm here tonight to talk about home-based businesses and our code. It currently is called Home Occupations, which most people might be a little bit more familiar with. Give you a little bit of background on where this is coming from. During the 2025 update to the comprehensive plan, which actually lasted about four years of work there, we got a lot more comments the last year there from people who reside in the South Capitol neighborhood. Many of the comments were their concerns about the use of homes by lobbyists. And it was also pointed out that our code is significantly out of date. It hasn't been updated in quite some time. As a result of a lot of the comments that we received, there were a couple of adjustments to the policies within the comprehensive plan and the land use chapter. The one dealing with home occupations, we modified that a little bit. And the small scale commercial in residential areas is a new thing that the council wanted us to work on this year. And you'll be seeing that in the next couple of months as well. That's different than home occupations. So there's a couple of policies in the comprehensive plan that deal specifically with those and the direction we got from the city council. Well, I'm skipping ahead there. Last fall, the city council had had a number of comments directed to them, as well as our planning director. And so this is our former planning director. She wrote an interpretation memo and brought it to the city council for a discussion item on home occupations. And based on that, the city council placed on our work program for this year to update the regulations for home occupations, home-based businesses. Here's one of the policies that deals with both issues. This is how it's written in the updated plan. And the first sentence there, prohibit conversion of housing and residential areas to commercial use is not designed to serve the residents. And at the bottom there, allow home occupations that do not degrade neighborhood appearance or livability nor create significant environmental impacts. That's the main one that we're dealing with. And then the other policy here really deals with streamlining the code when possible because there are several sections and subsections in this update that are being removed because they're in the code elsewhere. So I wanted you to have that policy as well. And what these amendments do is they remove references to permits. We have not had permits for almost 20 years for home occupations. Around 2008, significant staffing and budget cuts. That was one of the changes that was made was to remove the permit requirement for that. They still do have to get a business license and sign a home-based business addendum, which is an affidavit saying that they do meet all the requirements that are in the city code for home occupations, home-based businesses. These amendments also allow for onsite sales provided you can't see it from outside. We didn't think that it was an issue if nobody can see it going on. No one can see the product. We didn't want it to be stored outside or advertised for sale outside. Structural renovations were prohibited, but these changes would allow them, provided they are consistent with the residential character of the lot and the neighborhood and the structure. Here's one of the redundant sections was adult daycare homes. It had out-of-date building and fire code citations in there. or sections and it's also addressed in state law already so even if we updated it to what those those codes and the state laws say it could be out of date again at some point in the future so removing them would be best taking care of elsewhere one of the new things is mechanics and detailers only if they're mobile would be allowed to have a home occupation as this. No work allowed at the site, at the home. There is a new definition for remote work that was based in part on the federal government's definitions for that. However, it had to be tailored for the city, city of Olympia. And we really tried to make situations so that someone who actually is not running a business from their home is simply working for someone else. We did not want those to get tangled up in the requirements for home occupations. There are just some other general changes. The name home occupations, it was suggested we change that to home-based businesses. Department name, which our department name may change again very soon. That's in discussion right now. And then there were a number of grammar changes that were suggested. And then short term rentals. There was a very short subsection on that. That is actually identical to another section that's in a separate chapter of the municipal code. Okay. There is some special exceptions that were put into the code specifically for the 300 to 400 block of West Bay Drive. There is a home-based business located there. They have an original permit from 1988, and it's the same business. There are four special exceptions around 2000 to 2003. I don't have the exact date, but those exceptions were put into the city code by the city council. Basically, they're allowed a slightly larger sign. They can do group counseling where it's not allowed for other home occupations. They can use more square footage of the home for the home occupation and the employees do not have to be residents of the home. The proposal or the amendments do propose to remove these. I've been in contact with the owner of that home-based business. they will be able to continue utilizing these exceptions under the non-conforming use chapter. In fact, we offered to provide a letter and they said they did want that, an official letter explaining that those uses were legally established. They can continue to use those consistent with chapter 1837 on non-conforming uses. This is the section that seems to be getting the most attention is probably the one that spurred on most of these amendments is the South Capitol neighborhood. There are a number of people that had concerns about the impacts of use of homes by lobbyists. And I'm not going to try to explain the reasoning behind the comment, the mentions in the comments. This is just what I gleaned from several of the comment letters that we got over the past year or so. We did get a list provided to us of about roughly 20 homes that the neighbors feel are being used for this purpose. They mentioned that they believe these homes are empty for a good portion of the year. They believe there's an impact on their neighborhood, the social fabric of their neighborhood. There have been some reports. We did get an official complaint recently about a home that was converted to a commercial office space. The city code enforcement officer and our department director are looking into that currently. There have been mentions of parties or gatherings. And then some of the homes that they have mentioned do not appear to be used for residential purposes and are primarily used for a non-residential purpose. There were concerns about impacts to the housing stock. when a home is not used for residential purposes. And the research from the people who submitted the comments indicated that most of these, if not the vast majority, do not have a home-based business license. I do want to clarify some things about what the city can and cannot do. The concern about the homes being empty for a good portion of the year, we can only require that it be kept up and maintained. We can't regulate that it needs to be occupied. We have no regulatory authority regarding who owns a home. We can address large gatherings, but that is in a different section of the code. That would be a police action if there is a disturbance, disturbing the peace kind of thing. We don't necessarily address that in these particular regulations in the zoning code. The area is already located within a residential parking permit zone, and they do patrol that regularly. The homes that have been alleged to be converted to commercial type office space, if the code enforcement can determine that has occurred, then they can address that. In the past, some of them have been very difficult to tell because there was no obvious, at least when the code enforcement officer was out there, there was nothing obvious that it had been converted. Now some of the neighbors may get to view the home on a much more regular basis and they may be able to see more than the code enforcement officer can. We can require people who are running a home-based business to provide proof that the site is their primary residence. That is already in the amendment. It's already in the code that these amendments reinforce that. And there is an affidavit or addendum that must be signed when you obtain a business license. And that's if you're going to do a home-based business. And that one also, we would revise that so that it is consistent with the reinforcing of that requirement in the amendments. And that can be accessed on the city's business licensing webpage.

Okay.

This is the approximate timeline for this. Obviously, the first draft was released a few weeks ago, and we got it out on the website, and quite a few notices sent out. tonight is your briefing on this public hearing is scheduled for August 17th. That will be your next meeting because August 3rd is canceled. Um, and then the following month, uh, land use and environment committee is scheduled to take a look at it. We do not have a date yet for the city council review of it. So thank you. And I'll turn it back over to the chair for discussion and questions.

Hey, David. Do planning commissioners have questions?

Yeah, I actually do have some questions. Um, I was reading. It's okay.

Yeah.

So I remember when I was reading, there was something like we could only have one client at a time and only two off-street parking spaces. I was wondering where those numbers specifically came from or why those are the recommended, I guess, impacts.

Look at that section of the code. Is that in regards to counseling?

I was looking, sorry, on the draft. I was trying to find the place where it mentioned how many clients you could have visit at one time and I wasn't finding it, but I believe in, oh, it says you can have two parking spaces. specifically to off-street parking spaces. And so when we're talking about people visiting the home, which is one of the concerns brought up with the public comments, were those numbers chosen for a reason?

I'm looking for those to see if they were existing in the code previously or if they're new. Do you happen to know which section that is in?

was for parking and I was looking for the client one.

But let me try to share screen. I think I might have it here. It looks like it's on page 13 of your packets under section. Oh, I can try to share a screen here real quick. Commissioner burger. Is this what you were referring to hear the section?

Yes, Section 0 for parking, because I noticed that we had numbers there. So I was just wondering where some of these numbers came from or what examples we've used or have been used.

The two off-street parking stalls was pre-existing in the code. I don't know where or how that was come up, that they came up, the council came up with that as what they wanted to have as a requirement.

Okay. Christopher McConkey- And that's off street parking as well, so typically we don't require any sort of off street parking for a residential use. Christopher McConkey- However, it's a home based business, it might generate additional trips. Christopher McConkey- So I think if they were trying to provide additional parking we could allow up to two off street or on street parking spots or. off street now. Yeah, I'm with David. I'm not sure why we included that as no more than two off street may be provided. I think that really has to do with if they're using some of the parcel to try to create additional space. If anything, we would address that more through impervious surface or hard surface coverages through other site development requirements. So I'm not sure why it's saying no more than two off street. It really just doesn't even make sense under our current code.

And there was a change there from shall to may.

So that further shows that it would be optional.

It's not required that they they have two off-street parking stalls. And provided they can meet those requirements that are already in the code regarding, like Casey mentioned, about impervious surface.

Right. I think the other one that I found, it was in counseling, is that there might not be group sessions. And again, I was wondering what the purpose of that was. But I will have more questions. I don't know if Jason has something on this topic.

I think, David, if I may respond to the group sessions, I think that really just had to do with parking, essentially having groups of people show up. If you had a group session of, I don't know, six patients or participants, and they all showed up and creating an on-street parking space, In a neighborhood, it might be problematic. My guess is, again, when council passed that over 20 years ago, they likely were trying to lessen the impacts of home-based businesses.

Jason, do you have a comment on this or something different?

Well, yeah, on the parking, I guess I'd love to just kind of strike that. As quickly as possible. It seems like using the impervious surface or hard surface limits, if there is going to be some sort of limitation there. I have some vague recollection, and this might just be from reading too many codes, but that there being a fairly new limitation on garage stalls. But I might just be bleeding codes at this point. Otherwise, you know, minus that it seems, uh, it seems like a highly problematic thing to try to limit any of the residents from putting in more parking on their house through that portion of the code. Um, the other, so I have another question if that's okay.

Yeah, go for it.

Um, I was really trying to track down, uh, primary residence definition. Um, And it does seem like if so much is going to hinge on that, that we should have one. And maybe I'm just, I may have just totally missed it somewhere. I didn't see it in the zoning code. So I started looking in building code and all of that, but I think there's just a lot of variance between jurisdictions on what constitutes a primary residence. Um, not that I'm necessarily for or against, I'm just saying if we're going to have it, I think we should have a definition. Um, and then wait, just quick question on that.

Jason, would that be something that the city would define or is that something the state would define?

Would that be like define it? Yeah. Sorry to step in, but yeah. Um, I typically like in our municipal code, we have a whole, yeah. Our catalog of definitions. Um, And at least from what I'm used to seeing, if we don't have something defined, then you have to go to the next higher level up and see if they have a definition that we're abiding by, essentially.

The other- On that topic, I was also curious about how you manage that if the home's owned by an LLC. Is it- the manager of that LLC that then is there, or how does that complicate all of that? I know it showed up in one of the comment letters, but that's also... Sometimes it's a big corporation, and sometimes it's just someone that owns their house in a different way. I don't know, David or Casey, if you have any input on that.

Well, the... You sort of jumped over to... Well, that's sort of an extension of the principal residence, primary residence discussion there. Let's see. There is a section I believe I put in here. I also did quite a bit of research on trying to find primary residence definition.

The

It's not specifically defined as Jason mentioned. Principal residence is only used in this subsection 2A. That is the only place it is used. Primary residence is used throughout the Olympia Municipal Code. Now, when we need a definition, we actually, in our definition section of Title 18, It does say that when we do not have a term that is specified and defined, they shall have their ordinary accepted meaning within the context in which they are used. And then it references Webster's dictionary and says it should be considered in determining the ordinarily accepted meaning. We certainly could put a definition for primary residence. I got comments late last week from our planning director regarding primary versus principal. And she had a few concerns about using primary versus principal. because it could conflict or confuse some of the other uses of primary that they use in land use. For example, what is the primary use on the property? What is the primary building? So if she would suggest we move back to principle. Now, eventually I will get to your question there.

Real quickly, I just wanted to highlight that we do have the definitions for... I zoomed in on it. I apologize. I lost it already. We do have definitions for principal use and principal unit. And my guess is that's where the planning director was wanting to take a look at those words and that usage as well. So when you look at principal unit, it's the single family housing unit located on the lot. So a little bit of splitting hairs there, but that's probably where I would say the planning director was pointing back to. So I just wanted to share that and highlight that real quick.

Now you mentioned, what if an LLC owns a home? Whoever is living, first of all, they'd have to determine if that person is doing remote work or they're running a home-based business. And we tried to add a definition to sort out the people who are simply working from home. And there is an option, or not an option, there is a section in that definition that says, If something is hard to determine for staff, then a determination will need to be made. I would assume that our director making an interpretation would also consult with our finance staff because one of the comment letters did mention the definition of business use in the city. I did have our finance staff review the code amendments. They had a couple of suggestions, but that was very late last week. So I'll be able to explain what those are at the next meeting into the staff report. With LLC, Is my internet a little choppy? Okay, I got a message on my screen saying my internet's a little bit unstable. In a situation with an LSC, theoretical situation, if someone wants to work there and lives there, that is their primary or principal residence, they can do remote work there. If they're conducting business, then that could be considered a home-based business. But if that is their primary or principal residence, they can do either.

Right. So it doesn't matter. The ownership doesn't matter. It's just however. Jason, then we'll go to Raphael.

so just as a hypothetical and throwing this out there if for example we have an artist who enjoys traveling around and has created a personal business that's allowed them to live in different parts of the world for say two to three months of the year but that's their primary business under this current proposal What we're saying is that they could not move into a house in the city of Olympia and use that as their business as well. Is that correct? If they're there for two months of the year, let's say.

I don't believe so. If that is where their driver's license and voting records indicate they live, then that is their principal or primary residence. We do not have a month limit or requirement for that. That varies significantly as to what that would be. Everything from 183 days I've seen down to three to four months. So it really varies. We don't have that requirement in our code though, and it's not limited in months.

Raphael.

I see the draft says a residence can't be used as like a place of meeting for work that occurs off the premises. So I guess question being, how would you say apply that to like a neighborhood association meeting with their consultant or I guess volunteers organizing around maybe like an issue or so? Not sure if that overrides it or I'm just curious.

I don't think that would apply. It's probably more looking at if someone has a roofing estimate, just hypothetical, if someone has a roofing estimate company, we wouldn't necessarily want the roofers to show up to the site where the home-based businesses and then everybody take off. It'd be a little bit disruptive for the neighborhood to have things like that going on. I think that's the reason for that being in there. That is pre-existing language, though. Gotcha. Thank you.

Daniel? Yeah. There's a lot of like discussion of just like what a home-based business cannot be. David and Casey, do you just have examples of like what a successful like home-based business is? Because I just feel like I'm getting a lot of like, you can't be this, you can't be this. Like, what's an example in the city of Olympia of like, I don't know, a dog sitter? Like, is there some like, is there some example that is like, very common?

It's difficult to research home-based businesses in the city because we don't have them in our permit system for the last 18 years. So finding what they are is difficult. We can get some of that from the business or from the finance department. But they redact a tremendous amount of the information about it, which is required by Department of Revenue. There's very little info that they can actually pass on as public information. A lot of that's because their social security numbers, home addresses, all sorts of things. in those applications. What we usually end up with is a name, if we can get it, is a name of the business and possibly a code for what broad category it may fit into. The one home-based business that I mentioned earlier that is on West Bay Drive, the Media Relations Company, They said they do lobbyist work as well. That one's been there for, we're closing in on 40 years. So as for the most common, I do not know, but I have a feeling it might be people reselling things online.

I can imagine like music lessons too, something like that.

Yeah. If you look at the formal definition for home occupation, it's basically any commercial use within a residential dwelling or which is incidental and accessory to living there. So it's very broad and I think that's intentional to allow for a lot of different types of uses or allowing those residents to pursue opportunities where possible. When you look at what is explicitly prohibited, You're looking at the vet, medical, dental, basically anything that's going to create any sort of high traffic, high noise, and high waste, and potentially hazardous waste. Then you're looking at vehicles, sales or repair. Vehicle sales in Olympia are generally allowed in a very narrow set of zoning districts within the city. Then contractor yards, restaurants, exterminating services, kind of the same deal. Something that would either generate a lot of traffic, a lot of waste, or have potentially hazardous materials. So I think when they made that list, they were looking at things that would outright be prohibited based on how much of an impact would this have on a residential neighborhood. Jason Connelly, So I think that's why that's so specific versus the very broad home occupations that are allowed so Jason Connelly, Again, when they pass this. They were really just looking for what would be super impactful and saying this won't this won't fly here. So that's kind of the best I can offer. Jason Connelly, Vice Chair Garcia.

Got it. Thank you.

Jason

You're muted.

I just said everything amazing. On the topic of the broad-based allowances, the 500 square foot limit, I guess I was wondering if we could have some rationale behind that aside from the incidental use of the residential property. I'm not sure why, say for example, if a house had a basement that was

thousand square feet uh why that basement wouldn't also be an incidental use if that were all the business for example i did check several other jurisdictions oh looks like my internet might be a little unstable there if i need to repeat myself let me know So far, so good. I did check several other jurisdictions. That is a very common. It almost looks like many jurisdictions use the same amount. It would be difficult to come up with a number that we could defend as making a lot of sense. The one thing that is a common theme here is that it needs to be secondary to the use of the home as a residence. I suppose there could be more discussion about whether you would go up to 49%. Is that still secondary? That's where my head went. Yeah. Yeah. So there is a size limit on it, whether that's really something the city can investigate very well. There was language in the code here saying you had to sign something when you got your permit, an affidavit saying you'd let city staff inspect the space. Our code enforcement officer was not too fond of that. saying that going into demanding access inside of people's houses and then trying to measure would, that would be very difficult to do and probably very unpopular. They did ask for that to be removed. I suppose in a situation where something has become obviously much greater than being a secondary use at the site, that's when code enforcement get involved. But with many of these businesses, many of them, you don't even know they're there except for a tiny sign. Some of them don't even have a sign. I think it's two square feet is what you're allowed. Yeah. One other thing I should mention is that many HOAs do not allow home-based businesses. Even though some of those businesses do exist, they keep such a low profile that they slip under the radar of not all HOAs, but some.

David, what... Would there be anything limiting like a cafe or something that has that kind of public access space or customer access space? I didn't really see anything in there that would preclude that. And I was just curious how we deal with that.

Yes.

That is something that would run up against the regulations, if I can find the section here. It sort of wound throughout this section that something such as a cafe would not be allowed. Let's see if I can find some highlights for you real quick.

It's under H. If you're in the packet on page 12, restaurants are one of the explicitly prohibited. So basically when you look at most of our code, cafe essentially falls under our restaurant for most city code. Yeah.

Right, I guess it's like specifically limited. But you could do something like, I'm thinking of things where you have, maybe a better way to put it is, is there any limitation to having customers on site? Like we had the limit on number of counseling, but just customers on site in general.

Yeah.

No, there is not a set limit on the number of customers. However, there is some there's enough language in here that if someone started having a tremendous amount of people coming and going, it would definitely raise the demand. It would definitely raise some suspicions, I bet, of nearby neighbors, and probably the resulting traffic would be a complaint.

Yeah, these are... Part of my angle on that is just trying to think if there are any... Say, like, some commercial spaces are treated differently for, like, public safety or even, like, building requirements if it's a commercial building versus a residential... If there'd be some number that would trigger some concern from the fire department or something like that, though obviously you can have a big party in your house, so maybe not. And then this idea of whether... whether some activity is really any different than any residential activity. I could see getting friends together for a bike ride and all parking on the street with six cars, and that's just a purely residential family friend sort of activity. Is there anything worse than that happening for some business thing?

That's an interesting point.

I think it is.

Someone is running a home-based business. That's a very interesting point about the bikes. I hadn't thought of that. If someone is running a business where they organize bike rides and they have everybody come to their residential home there, that would be an impact. It would not be consistent with the regulations, having everybody come to your place. Yeah. there's that prohibition on congregating for off-site, congregating on-site for off-site work.

I think if someone was doing that. I'm trying to make the opposite point maybe that that could occur easily in a residential, for purely residential uses and it seems overly restrictive to constrain some home, like this home-based occupation idea is that it's not, that if the kind of activity is in line with what you might expect out of a residential house, then go for it. In my reading of like the kind of overarching idea. Raphael?

I noticed the language on no structural alterations not consistent with the residential character and exterior appearance of the lot and dwelling. I guess, who judges said residential character? Is that something that gets handled when someone's applying for a permit? Or is it a matter of, I guess, when like a neighbor makes complaint?

It would be both. If someone comes in, they're going to have to come in for a permit and apply for the permit to do the structural alterations. So not only will planning and building be involved, there's also, if anything on the outside is going to be modified, We do have design guidelines that they would likely have to adhere to. And I say likely because some areas, there are a few areas of the city that they don't necessarily apply to, but very few. Thank you. I think I might have, go ahead.

Oh, no, go ahead.

Oh. I don't think I had much more to say on that one. If you have a further question to prod me along where you want me to go, go for it.

I guess only a other additional question right now. I noticed there's an area where it talks about now allowing mobile auto repair with no more than one vehicle used for the mobile business at the home. So I guess hypothetical does a van that's both say a work vehicle and I guess also a family vehicle count and how does that kind of I guess interact with the whole two commercial vehicles a week limit?

This is a while back, but I actually knew a mobile mechanic and he worked out of his house. He didn't do repairs there, but his mobile vehicle was very obvious what it was. It had his business name on the sides, phone number and all sorts of things. And it was so full of supplies that really only two people could go in it. So it was his dedicated vehicle. And I'm going to guess those two types of uses, repair and detailing, are going to be difficult to... In some instances, they probably could be used as a secondary vehicle for people. But for the most part, from what I've seen is... it would be unlikely, not impossible, but unlikely. And the second part of what you said, can you remind me?

I think if I can, David, I'll jump in here real quick. Commissioner Garcia, you were asking about the commercial trips, commercial vehicles, and the limit on two per week. So I think, is that right? So I think we're looking at the vehicle sales or repair and the mobile auto repair. So it's a home-based business in the sense that to get licensed, you have to provide an address. But if they're doing... basically a mobile auto repair or mobile detailing, they're not necessarily doing that on-site from their driveway. They're driving out to do that, but the business license still might be listed at the home address. So the detailing vehicle is still allowed to be on-site. And I think that's coming from some of the discussion we had about, we've had some businesses where they've actually been basically using residential lots or areas or essentially their vehicle yards. So they had crews and vehicles that were just parking in a residential area. That is still prohibited in the sense that if you've got a large company with 10 fleet vehicles, you still can't yard them in a residential district. So I think that's where this language is coming from and part of that discussion. Is that ringing true for you as well, David?

Yeah, I was trying to read that section. That is language for the most part in the second half of that paragraph.

Zainab?

Can you guys hear me? I've been having computer issues.

Okay.

David, I have a question. So some of this work um that you've been doing with code language is in response to you know feedback from south capital and they have that list of 20 houses and so as part of this um proposed um link or proposed code language um people have to attest in their business when they apply for their business license but then i thought i heard did you say that like that you were given a list of those addresses and like none of them had business licenses for those addresses?

This is a list that was given in one of the comments that we've received. So, I'm breaking up a little bit there, David. A lot, a little bit. Is my internet cutting out a little bit there?

Yeah, I caught none of that.

Yeah, David, maybe try going off camera and see if that can help.

Okay, we'll give this a try. I took a look at that list that we got with one of the comments received last year. I did check to see if there were business licenses and if any of those had what's called the home-based business addendum signed. And it looked like three of them signed. um three of them had done so whether or not that's the lobbyist use that people were talking that the complainants were talking about or if it's another home-based business there i did not get the information i requested it from finance department they said they were having some problems with our mapping system which should have told me that that use code So I don't have that information yet, but it looked like about three of the 20, roughly, 18 or 20, about three of them had a license. Go ahead. I think someone wants to ask a question.

Sorry, had a license in general or had a license with the home-based business affidavit attached?

Yeah. Open up that document where I requested that info. Please hang on just one second.

I guess let me rephrase. I'm trying to figure out how would enforcement then work? People would just have to complain because it seems like maybe a lot of people who are doing this home occupation, home-based business work, aren't

necessarily licensed at the address that they're doing the work so i guess i'm having trouble like figuring out like how is it all going to be complaint based enforcement casey is nodding that is what the that is what the city does right now it's complaint based code enforcement um to answer your question there are approximately 18 addresses that we were given um Three have business licenses. One, two, two of the three, there is a home-based business addendum signed for them. I do not know what that home-based business is at this point because I wasn't able to get that information from finance department.

Okay. So the three that have business licenses, they have the home-based business agenda. So all three. Okay.

Yes. Can I ask a question? Sure. Those are 18 homes that were provided to you. So is that for all of South Capitol or those are the only, like the three of the 18 of those you're given, they're just three of that 18 list or is that all of South Capitol neighborhood?

just a list that was given to us by one of the people who submitted comments last year it is mainly focused in a two roughly a two block area basically water street and columbia street um there's a couple on sylvester street as well but it's it's basically confined to a two block area directly south of the capital uh capital campus

I guess that would just be my question is like how many businesses just in the entire South cap neighborhood have the addendum, the home-based addendum thing that you're talking about versus like the one. Cause I feel like that's like, I feel like it's kind of like giving up maybe a warped sense. If you're only looking at businesses or only looking at homes that got complaints versus like the whole neighborhood as like a whole, like I would love to know like what that number actually is just for the whole neighborhood.

Our former director actually had our GIS staff do research on that. So I think we do have that info from last fall. I'll see if I can find it while we're continuing here. If not, I'll be able to provide that additional info at the next meeting. Thank you.

Aaron? Yeah, thanks. Just want to to get clarity on something is did, and somebody please refresh my memory because a lot happened in the comprehensive plan updates. Did, are we, is this work coming from an actual update we made in the comprehensive plan or is it just coming from a comment that was made during the process?

The comments were made during the process and brought a lot and a number of the number of comments that were directed to city council got their attention and so when we modified the the the policy that's in the comprehensive plan that mentions occupations We also had to take into account the small-scale commercial uses in residential neighborhoods, which the council wanted to see. And you'll be seeing that subject in the next couple of months here. They are different. One is an actual commercial use, trying to get customers to come there, located in a residential neighborhood. Whereas home occupations... Breaking up, David. It's more of a, we need it hidden so it doesn't impact the neighbors. Is it still breaking up? It kind of cuts out just for like a few seconds.

Okay. But just to follow up on that. So did council in that process specifically ask staff to check into this or do this work?

Yes, they did. I did find a map of the South Capitol and the neighborhood and all the business licenses. It looks like there are 49 businesses and 76 home-based businesses in the South Capitol Recognized Neighborhood Association.

76 out of how, like, 500, 1,000, like...

That info isn't on the map. I don't know how many homes are there. Great question, Daniel.

I'm sorry. I didn't catch the numbers. David, could you repeat them, please?

Yeah. Let me see if I can share the map to give you a view of what the former director of our department had created. Just give me one more second, please. Okay. We got it? Yeah. Okay. So a little bit of tiny print there. I'm not sure if everybody can read it, but... But those are our businesses. The red is a regular business. The green is a home-based business.

And also, just on Zoom, at least on my Zoom, I'm on a Mac. You can Zoom in. I can Zoom in on David. David is sharing screen. And then I can Zoom in on native. Currently, my Zoom is set to 250%. So just share that as a feature. scroll on Windows.

I forgot about that. Thanks. We have a rough number of how many units are in the South Capitol neighborhood. So we can create a ratio.

I think we can. That's something we can do. I just don't think we have it on hand right now.

Could we please have that for the hearing on the 17th?

Yeah, we can get that number.

Jessica?

Yeah, I guess my question kind of piggybacks off of Aaron's as well. You know, the work was asked to be done because of the number of public comments. I don't know if it would be helpful for some of those public comments that happened at the time to be reviewed because there are some new commissioners on the panel. Because from what I recall, it was like during the legislative session, the houses were being used for parking and causing congestion issues there. and then also being used as meeting spaces off basically what we have in the new language is that you cannot have meetings for off site work. So I think some context, I guess on that for some of the new commissioners would be helpful and for us to revisit because the comprehensive plan was a fire hose of so much data to go back onto this. It might be helpful to see some of that stuff again, what those comments were. Because I also kind of agree with you, Greg, that if it is a lobbyist that invites four other lobbyists over for pizza one night to discuss a topic how is that any different than me inviting five of my friends over for pizza to talk about a movie we want to go see i mean it that's a normal something that would happen in a normal residence so you know if if it's going to happen would it be you know beneficial to put a limit on it the number of cars or just not allow it at all, not allowing it all. I feel like it's still going to happen anyways. You're still going to get those complaints because, you know, they can just say, well, we just had a few people over for dinner.

So. Okay. Can I jump in just real quick? All right, David. I think something, David, we might want to go back and take a look at is the language around the meeting for off-site work. I think there is a misconception on what the intent there is. I think, David, you kind of explained that as like, if you had a crew, let's say you had a contracting business, and again, you're doing all your work off-site, you're not going to, that language that I think we're referring to is that As the contractor, you're not going to have your crew meet at your house and then motor pool over to your work site and leave behind six other trucks or vehicles to get to that site. That is the intent. I don't think the intent is to say that you can't meet at the home-based business for other things, but... you're not going to use it as like a carpool a lot. I think that is the main intent of the language. And I think there's some misconception around that. So we may want to take a look at some language to clarify that, David.

Yeah, Casey, I would suggest that we could You could control for that external cost with parking management. So that might be better done that way than specifically in the home occupation or home-based business piece.

especially in the South Cap neighborhood, you wouldn't be able to park off street if the vehicles didn't already have a permit. So they're limited to the two-hour parking. So we have language around that, but there is, to your point, Chair Wheaton, there is actually a language around the parking districts and the limitations to park there already. So

Yeah, and I've gone and walked South Cap with some of the folks out there and not to put words in their mouth, but my impression was that the parking management had improved to the point that that was like an externality that was being pretty well managed. So that does seem to be like in the realm of possibility at the very least.

Daniel? I just want to second what Jessica said about updating. This issue has come up before, and I think that it'd be good to maybe update some of the newer commissioners on it. Something that I have brought up before, of course, is that lobbyists can also include state employees. I am a state employee. I file a state lobbying. Lobbying, I think, has this connotation, but it's like I'm meeting on behalf of my state agency, which is like a governor's cabinet-level agency. at the legislature with, like, legislators. And so, like, that is considered, like, public agency lobbying. I have to file with the Public Disclosure Commission, the PDC, like, every year about that, me and my boss. So, like, I also just think that, like, there is, like, that question for me of, like, I live in Olympia. If I wanted to buy a home and wanted to go buy a home in the South Capitol neighborhood, and then me and my friends wanted to, like, meet up, and we're all technically lobbyists because we all work in state agency legislative affairs departments, Are we now suddenly going to be like breaking the rules because I had five of my friends over and we're all lobbyists? Like, I don't know. I just feel like I feel like this issue has come up before and I feel like lobbyist sounds like this really dirty word. And it can also, I feel like, have like ripple effects on like people who just like are a state employee. And I don't think I'm like some big bad lobbyist. I'm just a state agency employee. But I just feel like maybe like level setting with some of the new planning commissioners of like that distinction and how this whole conversation has gone. in the past. If the Georgia will.

Zainab?

David, I have more of a mechanics question because it sounds like you got some comments from internally the finance department and a plan director that need to be incorporated into the draft language. It sounds like you maybe have some ideas that you're going to take away from this meeting and are going to incorporate. So can you just Talk with us about the process of like the changes you're planning on making, like the timeline and when we would see that. Because for me personally, like I don't, if you're going to make changes, like I don't want to look at a more like intermediate. I don't want to look at the product now if there's going to be like a fair number of changes. It's just hard to keep track, especially with something as like nuanced as this.

What I plan to do is have a secondary document that will explain what has been changed since the one that you received for tonight's meeting. I think that would be much better than trying to weed through the document and see what may not be there anymore or what has been changed because it's very difficult with the strike through and underline. If it's changed again, it's difficult to show what the new changes are. I mean, when you see underline and strike through on the same word, things start to get really messy. So my plan is to provide a secondary document telling exactly what was changed.

And that would be in the packet for the August 17th? Yes.

Okay.

um and just remind me when will that packet get sent out to us so i don't want to check my email because now that i know there's not an august fourth meeting definitely not checking it for a week or two uh it's usually uh all that cases please you go

So if we're convening on the 17th, packets would, I typically try to get those out the Monday prior. David, I don't know, are you publishing a revised draft prior to that? Or... I guess that's my question. When would you want to publish the next draft? Actually, because it's a public hearing, it has to go out 10 days prior to that. So I think you would have to publish the public hearing draft by the 13th, I believe, or excuse me, the 6th. I think it would have to be published by August 6th. Is that correct? Is that 10 days? yes yeah so you would probably see the the public hearing draft by august 6th or 7th when that is uh noticed um i would i would go ahead and just send that on to the planning commission as well and then you'll get the actual packet um no later than the 10th most likely for that date thank you casey thank you david oh

Yeah, I mean, clearly a lot has changed since the first time this code was written. You know, Airbnbs are much more of a thing now. And, you know, I guess I can see that there's an intent to have some minimum protections in there for people who are running home-based businesses. But there's a lot of questions, or I've at least heard a lot of questions about what constitutes participation in a home-based business. So we're looking at C again, because That's the one that defines that you can't have anybody participate. I read it as employment, but I can hear other people reading it as something different as actually being a client or being a colleague. So I think there's still some more tightening to go and I'm definitely looking forward to the next revision.

I mean, yeah, for work that occurs off the premise. It's pretty broad.

And then when you looked at the requirements for counseling, you're not allowed to have a group, but if you were teaching music, you could have a group. And so I think staying closer to the intent would make that a lot more equitable for both purposes. And letting the neighborhood associations manage their own details, because as long as it's not a family daycare center or an adult daycare center, I think neighborhoods can still have their own rules. And so this would be about establishing those minimum protections for home-based businesses. Yes, OK. That was a question. There's a recap.

Raphael. Apologies. Another one came to mind. So I guess because we've in the past talked a good bit about ADUs and whatnot. So saying Like a home-based business must be a license holder's primary residence or set accessory structure on the same property. So I guess, is it detached, ADU, an accessory structure someone can run their business from? And what if, say like a tenant lives in the ADU, can that main house owner still use it? And can, I guess, the ADU tenant run their own home-based business from a unit that is their primary residence, but then it sits on, I guess, someone else's lot. How does that like kind of fit in there? Because I know there's been a lot of discussion on ADUs, especially with the housing situation.

Yeah, is that like whether it's It's whether it's linked to the property or the residential unit kind of, right?

Yeah. If I heard you right, the question or the example was if there's a home and an ADU on the same property and the resident of the home runs their home occupation out of the ADU, Is that the question?

Yeah, that's, I guess, part of it in a hypothetical scenario.

I would think that because the ADU is not their primary residence, they would not be able to run a business out of the ADU because that's a separate address. So if they lived in the ADU, they could run it. Really, the regulations are saying you can run a business where you live. And when it says accessory structure, they're really talking about garage or shed, not another living unit.

Gotcha.

Now, it does get more complicated if you talk about what used to be called the mother-in-law apartment if it's detached. Is that an ADU? Very likely. Not all of them in the city came online when we had regulations. So some of those, there could be situations where the mother-in-law apartment in the back doesn't have an address. I think that would be rare, but it's, you know, things are complicated often in planning.

And an ADU is something that's really specific. And one of the reasons you would want to categorize it as specifically an accessory dwelling unit is that if you do intend to rent it and have a tenant, it has to be an ADU, which has the living space, bathroom space, and cooking space. And then in order to register on the rental registry within the city of Olympia, it has to be an ADU. So if it's an accessory structure that is, you might have family members that might stay in there. Um, in an accessory structure um kind of using that old nomenclature of uh an in-law suite but you you can't rent an in-law suite that's kind of that's kind of the distinction there so in that sense and kind of the nuance there that david referred to is that those those accessory structures are aren't um they don't have an address so the the language that we have does allow for the business to be operated out of the accessory structure I think that that does get a little wonky. And I think that there might be some rental agreements that might prohibit that as well. That might be something, David, you and I would want to take a closer look at.

Yeah, it sounds like that opens up the conversation about ACUs, but on the property use question, looking at D, occupying no more than 25% or 500 square feet, whichever is less. I guess I would just ask what the intent is of that because I have an embarrassingly large house and I'm sorry about that, but I have a whole gym that is over 600 square feet. So if I wanted to be a personal trainer, it sounds like I could not do that. And why? Yeah, I...

That could be something you could discuss about changing to a percentage. I realize it has 25% there. You could get rid of the 500 square foot per dwelling unit maximum. That would be your recommendation, City Council, if that's something you felt was more appropriate. I don't have the background for that language other than it reoccurs throughout many jurisdictions in the state, almost as if people used one another for guidance on what to put there. I don't have the background on how or why that was put into the code.

David, I don't know if you've looked into it with building or fire, but I think occupancy limits might come into play there. Larger space includes larger occupancy, which includes additional fire hazards, so that might be something we need to check and verify.

Yeah, I would be interested in that casey what because i was thinking there there are are plenty of converted homes particularly on uh like near where i live on fourth and state there you know they're a converted residential house but they're a full you know it's the the zoning district is allows full commercial space And I'd be curious, like, do those buildings then have to go through something if they're going to be larger but can take on customers and whether there's a safety issue there?

I think the only other reasoning behind the 500 feet that I can come up with is, again, it's still supposed to be primarily a residential use. So once you start... occupying a large amount of the space or the home business, it's really calling into question the primacy of the use. So if suddenly, you know, 49% is business, but you're also occupying the entire garage, say, with stock or something like is it a commercial use at that point or is it residential? So I think that's the other, I would say, best way to limit what the use is. Maybe not the best way, but it was the way that they could think of at the time when they adopted the 500 square foot limitation.

Seems like 25% would maybe cover that too. Yeah, fair. Jason? Jason?

Just swinging back to Commissioner Garcia's point on the dual-use DADU, I guess David and Casey, as you're talking this over this week, I'll throw a hypothetical one out there where you have a two-story DADU, two-story in part because of the site's topography. The top story happens to be 450 square foot dwelling unit, and the bottom story with an external Access door is a 400 square foot office. So you have your 850 square foot maximum accessory structure, only 450 square feet of which is dwelling. But with this home occupation code, all of a sudden there is the potential that that whole bottom use is not allowed as a home-based business for either the renter I mean, certainly unless we make it out of 49%, um, or, or for the owner of the home, if it's a separate addressed building to make it a full DADU.

Okay, good point. Much to think about and actually somewhat limited time to get all of these issues addressed and back into a version for the community to look at as well as you.

Rafael?

Apologies, I'm adding another point to it. Another thing that I guess came to mind I noticed like there's a straight just flat ban on home-based counseling for substance abuse, I guess, thought being just to think into it, I guess, with there being such a big opioid crisis. Yeah. just a reconsideration of maybe just looking into that in a sense. Maybe if staff can explain the current justification for singing out substance abuse counseling specifically, especially given just environmental standards of what's happening in the area now too, I guess. Which section is this?

um page 14 of your packets um so it would be subset c of specific home occupation business standards so three c and i can share a screen if you'd like to take a look oh the counseling part right yeah the counseling where it says c1 under three three c1 You folks should be seeing it on my screen at least, or should have a share screen here. So I think that's what you're referring to here.

Because I see the pros and cons of the whole safety aspect of it, but I guess more so the thought on substance abuse since there is an opioid crisis.

It opens up the question of where and where not. I think it's a valid question. where is appropriate for that, where is not appropriate for that.

The nomenclature, I believe, has changed anyway. It's substance use disorder per the state.

David, What consequences are there for both defining or not defining work from home or remote work? Because that's certainly a very common activity that people would be probably hard pressed to find who's doing that in the neighborhood. And it kind of dovetails with like, if this idea of the home-based occupancy is to essentially kind of be indistinguishable from other common residential activities, behave like activity. Um, yeah.

What, why, I guess, why isn't that a home-based occupancy or, or, uh, The, the intent was for I'll use myself as an example. Uh, I work from home the vast majority of the time. I'm not running a business. Um, I, I work for the government. Um, I would not need a business license. Um, what I'm doing working from home is not prohibited by my HOA. One of them ensure that people who were doing that, not necessarily all have to work for the government, but, uh, doing their work from home. Um, I actually have an associate, uh, she does online counseling, um, for mental health issues. She's one of the people that responds on the emergency line that people call for a mental health crisis. She does that from home. It's not her business. It's her job. No one ever comes to the house. We wanted to try to make sure that people doing those types of jobs where they're not conducting a business didn't get sucked into saying you have to get a home-based business license. now i might have some additional information on the business license comp the the finance department comments about when business license are are required and i think someone in one of the comments either tonight or one of the letters touched on that as well so i will have some additional information on that for you at the next meeting because potentially

if it's an activity that doesn't need a business license, then you're outside of the home-based business anyway.

For the most part, um, the comment that I got from finance muddied the water for me a little bit. So I'm going to have to take a closer look at that and probably talk to them once again.

Cause that would seem to map onto some of the, um, like if the lobbying business is incorporated in Seattle and I guess with the home-based business or with the work from home, maybe you'd have to live there. But yeah, I guess the water's a little muddy for me too with like what problems you're solving for the comments that we got with the comp plan and if we're just making a lot of hassle for other home-based businesses in response to that, so. Other questions? I had one more with the, I know the neighborhood sort of small commercial ordinances are coming up in the future. And I'm wondering like philosophically how the home-based businesses and that interact. since I think some of the same concerns will be there of the impacts on the neighborhood and how things fit with residential areas.

Yeah, with home-based businesses, basically, we want it so that the neighbors aren't impacted, and it's almost invisible. With a small-scale commercial use scenario, in a residential neighborhood. I need to find a better name for that. Those are going to look and function like a commercial business, but with some controls on them. And the range of uses will be narrow. You'll be seeing that in the next... Let me check. I think I have it on for... Sorry. You've got a lot of stuff coming up, subdivision codes coming up.

I think we don't see that until November, David. Small-scale commercial public hearing is November 2nd. October 5th. October 5th is the briefing.

Yeah.

And I think the other big distinction there is the small-scale commercial uses. A lot of that really is coming from the neighborhood center discussion that some of you may be familiar with from, gosh, two years ago at this point. And I think the other big distinction is that the small-scale commercial use is not primarily residential use. It is a business within a residential area. area, but it's not necessarily where somebody lives. Think of like a corner store, small cafe. There might be some other uses considered, but again, it's a small type of commercial destination that's located within a residential district. So again, think your neighborhood centers type uses, and that's what we're trying to address through the small scale commercial use. Is that tracking for you, David? Yeah.

El?

Yeah, actually, that probably answered my thought. I've seen it before as home office, home business, and home industry, but it sounds like the home industry doesn't quite equal the small-scale commercial that you're talking about, so never mind.

I did see one of the emails that came through. And we saw this on the ad use to that if the property is subject to some sort of condition covenant or restriction. or homeowners association that doesn't allow home based businesses that these. These rules that the city are putting in place, they still need to abide by the CC and ours, a lot of times people when they buy a house in a neighborhood. they maybe glance at that title report once for 25 seconds and don't remember anything that's on it ever. And then they go and they look at the city rules and think they're fine. So I did see that in one of the emails that there was some concern that there should be some sort of language, I guess, reminding people that they have other restrictions that they need to consider besides just what the city is putting into play as well.

As a response to one of the public comments that came in on that issue, I did ask our finance department if they could add something to their business license page about that. Mentioning HOA rules in the city code is typically not done. We have been able to occasionally add it to handouts, brochures, and things such as that. I do not know if it's on a permit application, but I do know that it has been used on brochures and informational pamphlets.

I did add it to the permit portal, I believe, for ADUs because there are some CC&Rs or HOAs that prohibit accessory dwelling units. So I'll double check, but I believe when we had some of the middle housing things go through, based on that concern on CC&Rs, one of the permit questions that you have to acknowledge is that you have checked your ccnrs or homeowners association rules and verified that this is permissible other than that if they choose to check that box and go forward and that is not necessarily correct where the city of olympia does not enforce that it's it's basically saying you acknowledge that you've checked the rules and that's that So we have done that, I believe, on our permit portal, at least for that. I don't believe we would necessarily be able to do the same for home-based businesses because I don't think, and correct me if I'm wrong, David, I don't believe that they have a permit portal. I think they're still paper-based for their business licensing through the city. Go ahead, David.

If I could, um, the department of revenue does the business licensing for the city. Now, um, the home-based business addendum, which is the affidavit people have to sign, say that they're in compliance with our city code. That might be because that's not city. That's not a part of the city code. Um, there might be an opportunity to add it to that, um, But I would have to check with our legal department to see if it's appropriate to put on an affidavit from the city. And without a permit, we really don't have many ways to put it on an application. Department of Revenue is interesting to work with to get changes on the business license applications. So we putting it on the website might be the first step, possibly getting it on the affidavit might be the other step.

But to reiterate, this city does not enforce CCNRs or HOAs at all.

Okay.

Yeah, so on 3A, family child care homes, it says are allowed in all districts, but everything else would not be subject to your covenants in CCNR. So it does seem like a reference is warranted because we are highlighting that, or it is highlighted that the family child care homes are allowed everywhere. And I know it's just one line, but it is stated, right? The positive is stated, but the negative never is. Yeah. Yeah, so to Jessica's point, I think there's some value in that language.

Zainab?

Aren't, I guess, one statement too, isn't there like state laws around child care, like home-based child care centers where they're like allowed everywhere?

I think state law did change to make that allowable. I was going to have to do some research, David, or I would have to check the state law that changed it. Like some of the middle housing requirements, they may actually have language that says... um you can't create new uh bylaws or ccnrs that restrict it but they still allow those that were in existence prior to adoption of so i uh commissioner najati i was having the same thought but without reading that bill i i'm not 100 sure okay thanks casey and then i guess my thing is i i don't think it's appropriate in city code for many reasons to add a language about uh

need to check or comply with your CCR is like that. That is a relationship between you and your homeowners association, not you and your city. And I don't think that the city needs to be involved in that at all.

And our language does say allowed in in districts permitting residences. So it's it's referring to the zoning district. It's not necessarily saying it's allowed outright, it's it's allowed per the zoning code. which is leaving out the fact that if you've got an HOA or a neighborhood association that prohibits it, our language isn't addressing that.

Great. Any last questions? Otherwise, we'll look forward to talking about it more at the next meeting. Great. Thank you, David. So we'll move on to reports. Does anyone have anything such as a meeting, relevant book or article to share or discuss? Okay. And then other topics, we do have one. We need to select our finance subcommittee for the 2027 to 2032 capital facilities plan.

Anyone interested? Greg, what if I'm a new planning commissioner and I maybe don't know what the capital facilities plan is? Could you tell me what this amazing opportunity is?

Thank you, Daniel. Uh, yeah. So for folks that aren't, uh, familiar with our beautiful CFP, it's the spending plan for capital facilities. The first year becomes, see if I can get this right, Casey. The first year becomes the budget. Um, And then there's a six-year planning time horizon and a 20-year planning time horizon. Subcommittee is usually three folks, three planning commissioners, review the plan. Oh, sorry, Casey, I didn't give you time for your spiel.

No, no worries. What's a capital facility? So yeah, I'll try to answer that. So capital facilities plan is basically a five-year plan for basically infrastructure. So that includes parks, buildings. Other examples might be fleet vehicles, fire engines, police vehicles, things of that nature. Basically, a facility, a park trail, any of our water or sewer infrastructure that is managed by the city, those are all capital facilities. It is not personnel and it is not programmatic. Programs being like some of our arts and cultural programs, those are not within the capital facilities plan. Capital facilities, think of like hard goods and property. That's what this is looking at. And to Check Wheaton's point, the first year of that five-year outlay is kind of what we're spending this year and what are we funding this year going forward. So it does include kind of long-term projects. So another example might be like the Yelm Highway Park project. That's a multi-year project. So when you look at our five-year plan within Capital Facilities, that's showing what are we funding this year and what are we projected to pay for it next year and kind of looking at the different phases of that. You might see like some of our previous CFPs included purchasing of fire trucks and say like 2029 based on obsolescence of what we currently have, or maybe not obsolescence, but based on when we think we can reasonably afford to make those types of purchases. So the capital facilities plan is really as a five-year outlook on what we intend to spend a large portion of the city's budget on outside of personnel and workers. So when we're looking at the CFP, these are the program sections. The CFP is like a 200, 300 page document, and I can share that with you. The way we've done this previously and what we've tried to do with the review of this is the planning commission has opted to appoint about three of the planning commissioners to what we call a finance subcommittee. And then the finance subcommittee will actually meet, let's see here. Sorry to scroll on you folks. We'll have the finance subcommittee meet approximately three to four times, generally three times. The first meeting is really fairly straightforward. You'll review the timeline and then you'll, between the three members, you'll actually assign those members three to four chapters to review. That way you're not reading the entire document and trying to review. So try to assign those chapters kind of based on a general interest. Some of the chapters have been assigned to multiple members just because they are so interested in what some of those things include. That being said, when you're reviewing this, you're not necessarily reviewing kind of for the finer details and it's not a document that it's not kind of like an ordinance where you're getting into the really minute details and making suggestions on what should and should not be changed. It's much more about when you're looking at this five-year outlay, these are the policy considerations that I would advise you consider when you're looking at the CFP. Does it make the investments needed to implement the vision of the comprehensive plan? Are there gaps to actually implement those policies and goals within the comprehensive plan and the mission of the City of Olympia? And really where I think a lot of where the comments that have been useful coming from the Planning Commission on this are, How can the city better implement the comprehensive plan in the future? So, I would use the example of sidewalks being a major topic for the last, I don't know, five to eight years. I think roads are likely going to be a topic of discussion going forward, especially as we've looked at how are we funding sidewalks and how are we going to fund street maintenance going forward in light of what is a difficult economic situation in the state and in the nation so when we're looking at the projects that are prioritized in year one and then looking at the near-term projects kind of in years two and three Are those the priorities that we should be looking at? Is there something that's kind of. Maybe on the periphery that city council or city management hasn't looked at yet. And should should there be additional attention on that going forward in the future? So, like I said, sidewalks was a big thing that I would say. The Planning Commission and some of our other advisory committees have said we need to focus on this. And I think that that has resulted in some of the work that you've seen around the sidewalk policy repair. updates that we're working on right now. So those are the policy considerations when we evaluate the CFP. It's, I would say, when we get into reviewing the chapters, that can be challenging to get through all of that. That being said, the finance subcommittee also prepares questions for the chapter contributors for each of the departments. So you review the chapter if something doesn't make sense or there's a program, excuse me, not a program, but maybe a project that's upcoming that you have questions or concerns about. We ask that you actually write out those questions and we send those back to the staff that have prepared the CFP document for you and ask them to kind of address whatever those concerns or provide additional information on what that project is. And then based on that, we'll actually have those chapter contributors come generally to the second or third meeting of the finance subcommittee. And that's probably your biggest commitment outside of reading the chapters on your own time. But the second meeting, I would say, could last anywhere from two to three hours, depending on the depth of questions and the additional detail you're looking for. And then from there, we'll actually present the CFP to the planning commission at large for a public hearing where ideas for the comment letter will be listed. And then the finance subcommittee will generally meet one last time to kind of start drafting that comment letter that will go on to the finance, the council finance committee, as well as city council. at large so it's three maybe four meetings it's a commitment in terms of reading the three to four chapters that you're assigned to it's it's a great way to learn about um really specific um details of a given department and a kind of sub organization with the city of olympia but it's dry reading. I won't sugarcoat it in that sense. So with that being said, I'm looking to Chair Cweeton. If you want to pursue that same finance subcommittee going forward, I would ask for three. We've done three previously as long as I've been here. We're not limited to that. We could certainly have additional folks on that. These are already publicly listed meetings, so I'm not worried about quorum. You can have up to five. I wouldn't suggest going much more than three to five just because of time commitment and getting these scheduled. It doesn't have to be Monday night. When we select the finance subcommittee, I will send out kind of like a poll as I've done in the past for some of our other meetings. We'll find an evening or afternoon that works best for the finance subcommittee to meet. and then we'll go from there. So with that, I'm open to any questions. I'm trying to think. Last year we had one of our former commissioners who's no longer on the commission. I think Vice Chair Garcia, you chaired the subcommittee and Commissioner Talius, I think you were the other commissioner last year. So if you would like to add anything or other commissioners, if you've been on the finance subcommittee in the past, would like to add anything? please do so but yeah i'd like to if we do go the finance subcommittee route i just want to identify those members so i can start scheduling and then the preliminary capital facilities plan should be released by the end of july so you'll see the the preliminary cfp i believe on july 31st and then we'll be hitting the ground running from there so that's what i've got um sorry that was a lot of words

I have done capital facilities planning the last couple years. It is fun, I think. Casey says it's dry. I think it's very fun. I think it's a good chance to learn about some of the stuff that the city does that are just not as well publicized. It's a really great way to learn just about the nitty-gritty of what the city spends its money on and that long-term vision. I think it's a fun time, and I would encourage everyone to participate if you want.

For the rest of the commissioners, you will see the document and you will have opportunity to comment on it. Finance subcommittee is really just an opportunity for kind of a select group to really get into the minutia of the document. That isn't to say that the commission at large won't be able to read the entire document. If you would like, comment where you see fit. Finance subcommittee is great. it helps us um uh create kind of a questions document that we pose to the um the chapter contributors and that that q a document we've included with the recommendation letter going to city council and city council has actually expressed a lot of appreciation for that q a document because that's kind of where a lot of the the recommendation or the comment letter comes from but having the q a so the questions that you provide staff will actually prepare written response to that. And some of those written responses are really detailed. And I think that's been really useful for the comment letter. And then also for consideration by council at large, city council at large, they see where that conversation has come from, helps them kind of take some of these things into consideration as well. So that Q&A document has been pretty useful along with the comment letter.

Is anyone interested in chairing the finance subcommittee this year?

Don't raise your hands all at once.

Anyone interested in being on this finance committee? Also, don't raise your hands all at once.

Don't get your hopes up. I'm volunteering for neither. I actually was going to say, because I can't commit to nighttime meetings with my one-year-old. But I was going to say, if I still, I always enjoy the opportunity to like provide questions, like as part of like the CFP, that document that goes to the different departments as part of the CFP subcommittee process. So I just, I would love to continue to have that opportunity. And then also I am fully willing to like read a couple of chapters to like lighten the load for other people. I just can't like officially be part of the subcommittee because I just can't guarantee I can make those meetings.

Christopher McConkey- And I can certainly work with that I I I don't want it to sound like other folks couldn't do the same So yes, I think, last year, you did have some questions that we did include in the Q amp a Commissioner and a Jody so no issues there. Christopher McConkey- Questions can always be directed to me and i'll route those to staff and I will try to include those within the Q amp a document more possible so. no issues there and then however the finance subcommittee wants to kind of divvy out chapters we can work with that too so again this isn't necessarily the way it has to be it's just the way we've done it it's it's been pretty functional and i think it's been useful for staff to have the opportunity to to do the at least the one meeting with the finance subcommittee so

there's a number of different ways we could do this if subcommittee doesn't work I think I definitely would welcome anybody who wants to read like I think that we all should be very you know attentive and so yeah Zainab I definitely like welcome your comments you always do a really good read of everything I do think we do still need a couple people who are gonna like sit for those like longer like like specific meetings that are in addition to planning commission. So I would just like, I would offer myself, like, I would love to like partner with anybody. I did see one other hand, not to put anybody on the spot, but yes, I did see L. So I'm happy to at least be one of the people for those additional CFP meetings.

Do you have a third?

Also, Commissioner Ibrahimovic is not here tonight. And I could imagine because of his outside work, he might be interested in this. So I just might also offer that as like, there might also be some more interest. But I think, L, I think if there's at least two of us, I think that seems good. And of course, welcome more input from others. But I also think I could imagine him also maybe being interested.

Yeah, that sounds... Do either of you want to be the chair? Mostly it's saying the words that I say at the beginning of these things and then maybe taking the lead on drafting the letter, but that's a big collaboration as well.

I've done chair roles before. I'm just new here.

That sounds like a volunteer to be chair.

Commissioner Berger, it's not a huge commitment as the I don't want to belittle it in any way, shape, or form. The chairship of the finance subcommittee is, it really is just kind of helping run the meeting, taking comment. Because the finance subcommittee, being an a public meeting there is uh we have had people uh provide public comment before so it's really just kind of working through the agenda um and but you will have full staff support um for that i.e i'll be there to help run the meeting as well so you're not on your own by any means that's more than i had before so that sounds great yeah that's a pretty straightforward process all right and i will uh casey i think l for uh

chair of the finance subcommittee losing my words getting late um and daniel and then then i will reach out see if any and if anyone else uh considers it and wants to jump in uh shoot an email to me and casey okay great thank you both

In the meantime, I'll reach out to both of you and we'll try to get some meetings set up. Other commissioners, like I said, if you have particular interest on a chapter or two or three, by all means, please reach out to me when we do meet with the finance subcommittee in our first meeting. I'll at least share that with those commissioners that you have interest in those chapters and we can possibly assign those that way. So that's another option. So by all means, reach out to myself and we can make it work.

Great. Casey, could you also possibly circulate last year's comment letter with the entire commission? We'll do the big, because I think we do more years in actual CFP subcommittee, but can you just share the just last year's with everyone, just so everyone can just get up to speed on what that looks like? Sure.

just last year or I've got a running document that I think has the last 11 years. I could narrow that down to the last three years if you would prefer or just last year.

I think you can share it all and people can partake as they see fit. Fair enough. I feel like when I think Joyce helped gather up like the eight or something when I was first on planning commission. So we've added a few to that now.

Okay, I've got a note. We'll share that.

Do you have what you need, Casey?

I've got everything I need.

Appreciate it. Great. Then we'll move on from other topics. Next meeting is August 17th, 2026. And otherwise, the meeting is adjourned at 8.32 p.m. Thank you, everybody.

Thank you.

Thank you all for your work. Good night.