Planning & Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

16th, 2025 Pulk City Planning and Zoning Commission meeting to order. Roll call here. Here item number three, approval of agenda. So moved. I'll make a motion that we approve the agenda as written. Second. All in favor? I oppose. same sign. All right. Item four, approval of PNZ commission meeting minutes for May 19th, 2025. I move that we um approve the minutes from May 19th. Second. All in favor? I I oppose. Same. All right. Item five, architectural design standards discussion, city engineer report. All right, we're going to be leaning pretty heavily into the stuff that was in the packet for you guys. Um, but uh just kind of wanted to talk through what we had talked about a little bit pretty briefly last month, but then getting into a little more detail. So, included in the packet, we had um the architectural standards section from Pulk City Code. Um, and then I went through or staff went through and made a bunch of markups to that code section. Um, called out specific locations, specific questions. And then just because I'm more of a

lists kind of person, um our memo included um some specific questions that are kind of highlighted in those code markup sections, but I think it's probably just going to be easiest for us to go through items one through I think it's eight and kind of talk through each one individually. Um so throughout the code markup section, you'll see the the red rectangles. Um those are places where we flagged as words like encouraged, desirable, very very interpretable language. Um so I guess the first question we had for this commission is what are your feelings on those? Do you like having the flexibility of that interpretation? Would you rather up up the strength of that language to be required? Shall things of that nature? or are there specific places where you like the flexibility and specific places you want to change it of the ones that we marked out? So, um I suppose the best way would be canopies, awnings, and similar porticoings for windows and walkways are encouraged to add architectural character. Um, so that would be something like a wind an overhang over a window should be architectural in nature. It just shouldn't be some metal pipe frame thing that doesn't do anything for the building. Um, how do we feel about strengthening that? It it it gets tough uh because when you know I I would like I would like the ability to have teeth to be tough when we want to be tough but yet some buildings that would look ridiculous. And so you can't say that it's required

when uh you know would you want to put a canvas canopy on the uh uh you know on a church or or something like that? you know, it's just it would just look way out of place. And so, I'm not sure what kind what I I would like to see it be stronger than encouraged, I guess. We kind of got a good lesson about flexible language last week, I guess. And want to have something that gives us more teeth to say no is my opinion. We've always used strongly encourage when we're doing contracts. It's a simple modifier, but and I think we've had pretty good luck in the past to be able to have some discussion with the developers on what they present and they've taken our input pretty well. I'm not a big proponent of being real prescriptive either. I think it gives us some flexibility to to leave it as loose as we can and yet it is tough because you want it to look nice. Mhm. You can't just say that, you know. So, um, strongly encouraged would I like that. I think that would in fact maybe even shall strongly encourage might even be a step up. Is there value in adding um architecture character of the neighborhood or of the area? Because what you might have down on the square might be different than what you have out on Bridge Road. True. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. One one uh conversation Travis and I had was we wanted tonight to focus on commercial and industrial and come back to you on the town square stuff probably in a few months since that is such a specialized

zoning district. So, if that's okay with you all, we think that'd be a great winter project for us to tackle and bring it back to you in a few months. Um, and then tonight we focus on commercial industrial. Yeah, that sounds good. Okay. Yep. So, then are we okay with saying something to the effect of and we'll word Smith to match the character of the surrounding area? Something like that. Mhm. Okay. Yes. Um, pitched roofs with gables, hips, dormers, or similar offsetting and intersectioning roof lines are desirable for increased architectural interest. Strengthen that one. Leave it as it is. I'd say to strengthen that one if we're looking for just different intersecting lines. Okay. Desirable maybe. I think when you you when you were going to put to match the character of the surrounding area, I think if we put it either on B or C, it should definitely be on C. And we'll word smmith this and you guys will actually review and approve the formal. Yeah. So a shall be strongly encouraged might work there again on B. Yeah on C on C as well as okay we may want to remove shall for that one just because that leaves some ambiguity. You're given like a may shall if process. I don't know what everyone's thoughts are on that. Yeah. Shall is normally a requirement but when you're we shall we shall encourage Yeah. you know, but we're still we're still encouraging. We aren't requiring, right? Yeah.

But yeah, normally shall means, you know, darn it, it's going to get done, but darn it, we are going to encourage it, I guess, is is the teeth we have. Um, so then this one's got a couple in it. Buildings proposed in commercial districts that are adjacent to residential developments are recommended to include an articulated roof line giving emphasis to architectural elements that will help divide the mass of the large building into smaller identifiable pieces. Flat roof building shall not be encouraged. So this is this is kind of defining the whole nature of the neighborhood where if you're directly adjacent to residential, your building should look residential. Um but then again, we're not disallowing flat roof buildings. If you can make it look residential in nature um and then we're recommending that you include articulated roof lines. Um, I think this one maybe we don't touch right now and we look at what are some of the other architectural requirements we want to have because this may be one where we fold some of the other things like if you want, you know, depth of your frontages or whatever it may be. This may be one where we can kind of wrap that stuff together where you've got the articulation both on the frontage and on the roof itself. So, I think we'll leave that one for now and then we can kind of shape that based on the conversation later. And some commercial buildings, the hardware store is a good example. We can't see if it's a flat roof or not. It's Yeah, it's it's hidden. Yep. Yep. Exactly. Um and then this one I flag just because adequate treatment is very very

subjective. Um, and I think this one kind of goes back with the markup above as well. Um, and this will be something we kind of talk about a little bit later, but clearly defining what it is that we want for screening. Right now, staff is administering it and kind of interpreting it as at maturity that landscape buffer is going to cut it so that you can't see the loading dock from the public rideway. If that's how this commission wants it to be interpreted, I think it probably makes sense to kind of beef that language up, tweak the language to make it clear what we're trying to accomplish. You know, maybe it's a reference to our type C buffer requirements. Maybe it's a reference to shall completely screen at maturity. Maybe it's as simple as including language like that. So, um, do we have thoughts about what you're wanting to see as far as adequate screening of loading docks, loading areas, storage areas, um, trash enclosures, and HVAC systems. I kind of like your idea of adequate screen screening at maturity. I think that makes sense. Yeah, I think eventually we do want them screened. And are we thinking we want it to be opaque, semiopaque? I guess what are we looking for there? Cuz as it is now, basically the way we interpret it that interpret this, a good example is um Lakeside Fellowship Church. They've got the HVAC systems on the back side of the building. There's a solid um privacy fence that screens those from view from the adjacent ride ofway of

Edgewater Drive. Um I mean that's how we interpret it. If you guys are fine with that interpretation, we can kind of beef it up to where it's kind of clear and it's less interpretive in terms of what we're trying to accomplish with that. But I don't I also don't want to put words in your mouth. So, if you're okay with that and that and you want us to do that, that's totally fine. But if you have a different opinion, yeah, I I I'm not thinking we want it to be opaque at all. Yeah, certainly. So, I would say beef it up. You don't want it opaque. Uh, you don't you don't want uh or you don't want it transparent at all. Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, don't want it transparent at all. Okay. So, you're thinking opa opaque and then maybe we put something to the effect of at we can define a standard height from the right of way. You know, if you're standing on the sidewalk and you're 5 and 1/2t tall, that is our standard height, something like that. And do you when you when we make that determination, do we take into consideration the the elevation as an like if your sidewalk is lower, does it make sense? You know what I'm saying? So So that that would be that would be why I think we define what height we're talking about from the adjacent sidewalk cuz Edgewater is a good example where I'm pretty sure they had to put a taller fence in there because it sat up above. Yeah. And we can do some research and determine and then determine what a standard height is. But so that's kind of the vague language that we wanted to talk about. Um item two, define the terms permanency and strength as used in code. This could include provision of specification sheets for materials that demonstrate a particular lifespan or warranty

duration. Um, I talked to Corey Sharp, who is the architect of record at or on this building, and basically what he told me is pretty much every desirable material that's being used today, you could probably say it's going to have some sort of warranty, some sort of justification, some sort of design lifespan in the 15 to 20 year range. So, he thought that that would be a good starting point and then, you know, we can always make an adjustment if there's something out there that you guys find desirable that maybe is new on the market. So, they're only warrantying it for 10 years, but you think it's a good product or something like that. Um, so I guess that's kind of where we were thinking going with the the permanency and strength definition is a lifespan or a warranty length. Um, the one thing he did say is, you know, it doesn't matter how long your warranty is if the tenant doesn't take care of it. If the property owner doesn't maintain it, you're still going to end up in a situation where it's going to run down faster than it should. But does the commission have an idea of what kind of lifespan they want um or anything like that? I think if you get in that 15 20 year, you're getting into a better product. Obviously, if you use 10 year, you're going to have probably more of a sighting house sighting type of material. So, I I would say that's a pretty good I would agree with his philosophy there. And I also was wondering if there would be any additional information from somebody like the gentleman you're talking about for uh definition of new products out there because I, you know, I know there's new stuff coming out every year. And I don't know generically what they call all these different products, but I've seen things around that I really like, but I don't know if you just call it metal sighting, but it's metal siding that looks like wood or it looks like terracotta or it can look like But I've seen a variety of things like that around on newer buildings that I really

like. So, I think after reviewing several codes around the metro, I think what a lot of communities are referring to that stuff that you're referencing is textured metal sighting. Yeah. So, it's it's things like that where they are not straight, you know, vinyl looking steel siding. It's not the vertical ribbed stuff that you guys have explicitly prohibited, but it's got some texture to it. Um, and I think that would be a situation where you could, if you're specifically talking about, you know, maybe it's a textured metal sighting that simulates the appearance of Yeah, wood. That's what I have. Stone stucco, right? Okay. [Music] A and when we're talking about a material like that, are we wanting that to be replacing a 100% of the brick requirement or a portion of the brick requirement? So, that is that is one that we're going to get to because I think I think that's a bigger discussion, okay? Is how this commission feels about architectural steel panels replacing all that kind of stuff. So, so I'll get that cleaned up and I think that kind of answers the permanency. So, um, the next big one I think is going to be a really big deal here is addition of brick or stone proportions for the M districts, specifically M1. Um, we don't have anywhere in the future land use plan as of right now that is heavy industrial. Um, part of that is

just the lack of interstate access that Pulk City has. Um, so the M1 for sure we want to talk about, make sure that we have a comfort level. Um, but what I would tell you is I think I think just if you applied it to both it would be pretty reasonable. Um Jenny went through and averaged out the requirements across the metro and of the communities that we pulled so Ankeny Urbandale Grimes Indianola Norwok Adel I think there's one or two others but a lot of communities what we found is that the average was 50% brick or stone um with the context being that almost always that percentage is less than what they require for commercial and some of it was as little as 10% less some of it was half. So just kind of giving you that added context of it's 50% but it's almost always lower than um the commercial. I think the one exception to that would be Bond Durant and it's because they specifically wrote I think they specifically wrote their ordinance for those data centers and so they had a very specific idea what they wanted in those data centers and so theirs is actually higher than their commercial because of what they're trying to do with their downtown district versus what they wanted to do out there. That kind of stuff. So that would be the one exception. But does the commission have an idea of what they feel they want to require?

Can you remind me what's our commercial? commercial is 60% if it faces a shared parking lot or public ride of way, 50% for everything else. I don't know. Personally, I just um for manufacturing that seems like 50% is heavy to me. Seems like a lot. Most of our manufacturing M zones are out farther out, not right on the main drags, you know, coming into town. But, you know, I just look at it from a construction perspective, too. Cost may deter some con some companies from coming in if we put too much weight on that person. I mean, that's my personal feeling. I I would probably vote to lower it to 35% or something less, something that still looks nice, but it doesn't have to be quite so heavy. And this does not include glass on the if we write it the same way as your commercial. It is exclusive of glass. So it is non-glass non door material and uh I I'm I guess in the boat that it should be likely less than our commercial but uh if you take a number too small and only half of your I mean half of the wall is glass and door uh and generally you hit some larger or can have larger doors on on on an M1 building, you might end up with so little brick and stone that you can't see it or it's unnoticeable. I mean, that's true. I mean, if you look

at the well, as an example, Titan Storage, they pro I think if I remember right, their proportions I'm not I'm not going to pull that number. um out of nowhere. I'll pull that up, but I want to say their proportions were in the 30s. My gut number as at least as a starting point was 30 on right-of-way, 20 on non-rightway. Um I I'm there's no science, there's no specific reason for that. I just think that that's kind of a decent number and then we can always, you know, read and react. That's the thing is if we get to the point where we're too far off. Oh, so actually Titan storage by the time you got these black or these dark columns in there, they were um 50 or 40 or 48% stone, 52% steel on the sides that face the street. to give you some context of what that is now. And that happens to have no windows or doors. Correct. Yeah. And so if that had windows and doors, you know, that would end up minimizing the appearance of the stone because there I mean there'd be a lot less of it. Guess just to throw a number out, I do would go for the 40 and 30 maybe. And you know, some of it would be dictated by the architectural design, too. I mean, that would be a minimum. What I threw out was a minimum. If they want to put 40% on or I'm Yeah. Yeah. I'm fine with that. 4030. Yeah. 4030. Seems to be a little lower than what

we're seeing in other communities. Yes. Yeah. I will say some of the average that's probably just short of average um if you take some of the outliers out because there are some that are like 60% brick because their commercial is 75% brick. Hanken would be an example of that. Um, but I think I think that 4030 probably puts you really in a competitive spot and then you know if there's a situation where we get something that's really really good and you know they're coming in and saying hey at this price point because we're paying for land because of this that and the other we'd be more comfortable at 35. Well then if we do 3525 I think that's a that's something that we can kind of adjust to particularly because we don't have anything to compare to right now. we don't have anything to talk about right now and so it's something that we can kind of have a little bit of flexibility on and I guess uh from my own perspective on a on a M zoning district I would be more open to alternative materials other than brick and stone than I would be in a commercial district. I'm not sure how you put that into words, but that's my own perspective. So, something that a lot of communities do is they will do classes of materials, which is kind of what you guys do. Basically, from, for lack of a better term, class A is your standard brick and all the acceptable alternatives. Class B is everything else. Class C are your prohibited materials. I The way that we could do it is we could do brick and stone or class A materials. Class B materials would be architectural steel panels with texture and something else. And then in the commercial districts, A is the only thing that meets the the stone and brick requirement. B

and C then meet everything else and D are prohibited. And then in the M districts, maybe you write it so that A and B meet that stone and brick requirement. And then C is everything else. That would be kind of the way that we could kind of puzzle piece it together is if we commercial to do a B you really need to get approval of council with a recommendation from like that. Yeah. Yeah. Well, are we are we saying brick and stone for class A? What about things like exposed sand blasted concrete or pre-cast? Would that fall into I think that would fall because really the only question that we've had up to this point about an acceptable alternative is um what is an architectural steel panel and do we still feel that is an acceptable alternative to the stone and brick requirement. I think basically the way we've got it written is it's for lack of a better term the earthiness of those bricks, those stones, um architectural concrete, um stucco, that kind of stuff. That's all acceptable. Stone and brick alternatives. I think we would continue to do that. I think the brick and stone Yeah. I think the only question would be is where do those architectural steel panels sit and where or what is an architectural steel panel? Yeah. Um and and we'll talk about that. Um next one actually let me make a note to myself here. Modification of the brick and stone proportions for residential and commercial districts. Um, what I will tell you is residential, you're fairly low. I forgot to pull that number before I while I was putting this together. And then your commercial districts for facing the right of way

are basically spot on with the average. I don't think from our perspective based on what we're seeing, we would recommend a change to that, but I wanted the c the commission to have the opportunity to voice an opinion if they wanted to. I would agree. I would agree to agree. Okay. Item five, architectural steel panels. So, as code is currently written today, architectural steel panels are an acceptable alternative to brick and stone. Um, that that's 60% on commercial, the 15% on residential and it's 30% on multif family. Um the biggest question we had is does this commission steel still still feel that those architectural steel panels meet the intent of the brick and stone requirement? So when we're talking architectural steel panels, what we're thinking is the blue and silver panels on this building. That's kind of what we think when we think architectural steel panels. They're large. They're manufactured. And what they're intended to do is they're intended to simulate those large stone slabs or the large concrete slabs that you would see typically in that stone and brick requirement. Out of curiosity on this building, uh did did the that material uh get into the uh brick and stone requirement or was it actually being used as a nonbrick and stone portion? I don't know that we your question. I don't I don't know that we ever answered that question because it's brick or stone or or that and they had enough brick and stone to meet the the requirement. So I don't know if we ever really contemplated that to be honest with you. Um because they had enough

brick as it was. Well, that's what I meant. So that so really the uh the steel on this building the steel panels are uh essentially the yeah the accent that was not part of the stone uh requirement. So and and so I'm not really aware of any building where we've used steel panels as a replacement for the brick brickstone requirement. Uh, do you like the possibility of it though? Oh, well that's what I mean. Uh, and and I and I don't like the requirement of uh of it being a total replacement for brick and stone. Uh, that that's something I can easily say. Uh, could it bump down the amount of brick or stone if indeed it was textured? But I I think that's almost something we need to look at uh and can't easily put into to words in writing I guess and I what I will tell you is there are so because communities use these different classification materials um in the packet we kind of included that table but um if you read through those code sections it's a little more complicated than what we were able to distill into that that Excel file but they There are communities that will say all or x% has to be from class A and class B, but class B cannot occupy more than half of the requirement for class. Okay. So, I guess is there a magic number for you guys? If you've got 60% frontage and 40% of its stone, is that enough? Is 45% a better number? Is it 50? I guess. Well, and also we need to

better define what a steel panel is. I believe kind of a key that we got a lesson on last week. And I think that's that five and six are kind of married together here because in terms of what is ar what is an architectural steel panel and what is vertical steel sighting and then where does that line cross? So, I think that's that's ultimately I think in reading through the code section, looking through Kathleen's notes who wrote the code section, what it seems to me is the intent of those architectural steel panels, they were meant to simulate a large stone installment. That that's really what I'm interpreting that requirement to be or what that option to be. So, I think smooth steel panels probably don't meet that in a lot of ways because almost every other material you're going to use is going to have some sort of texture to it. Um, and I think it it just it opens you up to a lot of interpretation that I don't think is beneficial. So, I think I think we can kind of go back to the same thing where we were talking about Doug was talking about those that that steel siding that has the texture to it. I think we could probably beef that up saying it's has to have texture or it's a textured architectural steel panel that simulates an approved material. That's kind of the language I look at. And then the question becomes is what proportion are you comfortable with it replacing of the stone. So if you got a 60% brick requirement on the front of a building, are you okay with 15% of the building being these architectural steel panels with 45 of it being actual brick and stone or is it less than that, more than

that? I think that's the question we're after. That's tough, too, because every building's so different. Um, right. My first reaction was I'd be comfortable with half of it being if it was the correct textured panel, but how do you define that? Um, not sure. And I'm not sure I'm comfortable with half of the brick component being the textured but half of the whole side of the building being the textured steel. Yeah. That's uh design part, you know, so it's difficult. Yeah. Yeah. And and I think if we I mean I don't know the dates of of that update, but it seemed like this was around the the time of the Lake Lakeside Fellowship when we didn't really have uh architectural concrete panels in our code. And so we were trying to update our code for uh kind of for that building. and we were trying to get out in front of other materials that we might be missing. I think is kind of how this all came into play. And so we've never really been tested on somebody dragging in something and saying, "Do you like this or don't you like this?" Is there a number low enough where it gets people to come in and ask us the questions and bring examples? So five or 10% which is still feasible but you get the people to ask. I don't know that I have an answer for that. I I think that's kind of why I landed on 15. I think 15's reasonable and you know we're talking the building or of the or of the facade or of the brick and stone

requirement of the 60% of stone or brick. You're saying right percent of the 60. So it would be okay 12 12ish no 8ish% 8ish% of the building down that math check out Justin probably okay so maybe we start with that you guys can think on that while we're drafting up a revised ordinance and then we can kind of talk about it and maybe make a change if you continue to think about it and you feel differently. I was just wondering if there's any verbiage like we were earlier talking that you didn't have to put a percent on it. Something about strongly recommend maintaining the highest percentage possible of the re 60%. I don't know if that does anything to help us or not because like I said, every building's so different and somebody may come in with 20% and it really looks great and we say 15% and they got to do something different. I don't know. That's the tough part of it. I mean, we could start out at 15% and then if we run into issues, I guess we could always go back and visit that again. Yeah, because I I just I have concerns about putting new language in that's interpretive because that's part of the reason that we're going through this exercise is to kind of clean up some of that stuff, make it a little less ambiguous. So, I think starting there probably makes a lot of sense and then we can kind of see what kind of reactions we get. We could also as we're putting this together because you're right, Ron. I don't know outside of this building. I can't think of anything unless I would have to look at like P&M has it up top, but it was not as a brick

replacement. It was part of their non. Yeah. The only one other one scooters may have it, but I don't know if it was used as a brick replacement or not. I'd have to go look at that one. I don't think so cuz I think that has more brick than any scooters you'll see on it. Yeah. And Quickstar would be brick with siding. Ace is brick with like that simulated stucco. Homestate Bank is brick and I don't remember what the top of it is, but I don't think it's an architectural steel panel. So yeah, we'll just I'll have to go look and see if there's anything that I can pull when we're look looking through this. But I think that's a probably a good place to start. But I think currently we're kind of looking at it as an accent, not uh to, you know, not as a total replacement, right? Could you So are you good with the 15%. Oh, yeah. I'm good with 15. I'd be good with 20. I mean, that will still be 48% brick uh or whatever if I'm doing the math right. And uh yeah, so somewhere in that range I'm I'm comfortable with. I'm just uh you know, wondering if those act accents could have gone in as just a portion of the non-brick and stone part of the facade and why we're cutting back at all. But yet, uh, I'm kind of interested in seeing new ideas and and and new materials as well. Yeah. I mean, but we have to make sure our language is such that we're we're critical about what those are. I think that would be the other possibility is maybe maybe that's the path we go down instead. Is are architectural steel panels even an acceptable replacement or are they just an acceptable material for the other

40%? that that makes it really easy to interpret. Yeah. That's what I was kind of wondering. Then they'd have to bring anything outside of it for approval. Then you'd see renderings and see if you like it. And I mean there's there's all sorts of sentences like that in your code where unless specifically waved. So maybe that's Yeah, I hate doing that too much, but this might be a spot where where it would be nice to use that. Yeah. So we move architectural steel panels out of except the replacement for brick and steel or brick and stone and then but we put a blur in there about PNZ and council having the ability to specifically allow certain materials. Do we run into any risks with that where someone may come in and say we're not approving for X reason? Well, I mean the I think that the way that we would write it language wise, if they don't meet the 60%, you have every grounds to deny their waiver. Okay. I think that gives you the flexibility to adjust to a unique situation, but it doesn't open you up to interpretation because right now it's just there's too much interpretation. I think I think that's the problem mostly. Well, I guess I'm wondering if we can just add a little bit extra to it. So, we're not coming in with someone with just pure steel panels. They're coming in with a stone. Yeah, I see what you're saying. Where under no circumstances was would an architectural steel panel be allowed to fully replace. Correct.

So then I guess does that go back to is 20% the absolute maximum you would allow or Well, I thought we were going back to it just being a non we're sticking with the 60 brick and stone or concrete and uh well so may maybe then instead of doing a percentage because what Alex is saying is you're never going to want them to fully replace it. Correct. So then maybe it's just a maybe we just say that under no circumstances will a waiver be approved completely replacing the brick and stone with an architectural steel panel. Okay. Could you put something where it's like so if we know that it's a minimum of I don't know 40% of the 60% it's this is a bare minimum period and then the other is if it's allowed. So it's so then it's more clear that under no circumstances should that come in front of the the commission where it would even be an option. So are you saying so because the hard part about percentages is which what are you percenting out? Are you saying when you say the 40% are you talking 40 of the of the 60 2/3 of it would be stone and brick period or whatever that number is. It is a bare minimum that that is not replace replaceable by anything else. And then anything from that point from the whatever that number is to the the maximum or not necessarily the maximum the that portion would have to be approved. Is 2/3 enough? Good starting point. And you

can kind of think about this too. We just want to have something to be able to put together so you guys can review and comment on it. Is 2/3 too much? Not enough. So that'd be 23 of the 60%. So you would be at 40 total percent of the side and then would still be having a good chunk of architectural steel panels that are textured to simulate approved materials. But if that would have to then be specifically requested and approved, then then there would be some flexibility. Exactly. Yeah. No, I I'm good with that. And I'm assuming that this all works out when you make your category A of only this, right? Okay. I'm sorry. Yeah, that's kind of where I think this is all going is I think we just will probably end up with categories. And I mean, effectively that's kind of the way the code's written now. Maybe it's just a little more prescriptive in how we refine refer to those things. Uh before we go on to six, I guess it is uh just above in the code just above where we were on B4 is B3 which is uh it says architectural concrete or stone panels. I wonder if that definition could be expanded. Uh I really liked the Windsor No, it was The Ankeny C1 halfway down they talk about architectural textured not smooth face

concrete masonary units including split face weathered face sand blasted face or ground face pre-cast concrete. So something a little more descriptive than architectural concrete. I I that's just an idea. When I was reading through some of the other cities, it seemed like we were pretty brief there. And if the commission's okay with that, I I would agree. I I liked the way that they define that. Um Windsor Heights, I like the way that they do that. Yeah, that was that was the other one, the depth and the cutouts and that kind of stuff. So, that could be something that we simulate with some of the other requirements. Um item six, what's the difference between architectural steel panel and vertical steel siding? Well, I think we have step uh with our new description of architectural steel panel. So it needs to appear as though it is, you know, a piece of granite, uh, you know, and or, you know, has the texturing to simulate that. And if your vertical steel siding, uh, you know, was big enough, uh, and wide enough, you know, it it could it could pass. But uh but if it's, you know, 10 in wide with ribs, you know, it's not going to pass. So I guess the bigger question is is something like what Dollar Tree showed. So there there's an ambiguity there in the code of they had concealed fastener smooth face sighting that was somewhere between 10 and 16 in wide. I'm not remembering right off hand, but it was vertical.

So then the question became right, you allow steel horizontal lap sighting. If they had flipped that horizontally, is that an acceptable building material? But does that simulate the approved materials? I I think the I think we've answered the question of is it is it a stone and brick replacement, which is no, but I think it's more so is it a prohibited material or not. Well, I think the horizontal sighting was more getting back to the residential look. Uh whereas vertical sighting does not give us a residential look is kind of my how I think we got there. Well, I think and and so I was not happy at all with uh well what portion are you are you talking about on the sides and back or you talking about the flat part on the front? I they had some vertical sighting on the front also that was flat. Uh so I I think more so those are the ones I'm talking about. It would have been the red and it was like a dark gray on the fronts and sides up on the where the Dollar Tree sign was. Would you consider that vertical steel siding and would or would you consider that an acceptable material where stone and brick are not required? Well, when I look at the P&M building up high, granted, it's not it's more squares as I recall, but it's uh it is uh if that had been narrower, I would not had, you know, more rectangular and in a vert vertical fashion, I guess I would not have considered it an issue. uh

you know and it had it had everything hidden. It it looked like a flat it looks like a flat piece of black metal up there. You can barely see the seams, which what I would say is if you're interpreting it that way, I would say that is consistent with the way you just interpreted and approved Titan storage. And I would just add that the interpretation that you have as clearly as you can just define it makes it easier to have some of these conversations when people are calling the city firstand which is how we ended up where we ended up with this last person because they're asking very specific questions that aren't fine where I'm having to then try to articulate first on the phone that my interpretation and understanding of what the commission wants is this. But the but yet the code doesn't say that. So that's kind of where we're going with it depth, a width, a something on it so that I can say no, this doesn't meet code or what some communities are doing because they're trying to accomplish the same thing. What they use is the terms corrugated and ribbed are not allowed. I think the ribbed is what gives you a lot of the look that that we don't like. We don't like but but if this P&M panels there was a what maybe two and a half three feet wide something like that if those had been one foot wide and No, I I No, I think I would have still Yeah, I think I would have still liked it because you can't really even see the seams. It kind of looks continuous the way it is. Uh, so there there was just something about the example from last week where it was so glossy white, it just came

across looking very machine shedding, I guess. And whereas this is a lot flatter and textured. So maybe we start there. Maybe it's vertical steel panels are okay even if they're not simulating the stone and brick as an acceptable material. But then ribbed and corrugated metal siding are not are still not allowed. Maybe that's the change we make. We good with that? I think that probably catches most of it. I mean, I I don't disagree with you. And it's hard to name a width when maybe there's a product out there you like and you're you're kicking it out, but conceal the fasteners. I think that's definitely important. I'm not 100% sure, but I think the better panels are wider. I think they're going to be 24 in or more. Those are in particular are the same panels that we have on the church. and they're 30 in wide. And you're right, Ron, because they're short, they look square, but if you had those if you had 12inch panels on our church that are 30 foot tall, you wouldn't like it at all. That's what I was wonder, you know. So, I was almost thinking maybe 24 in is a minimum, but um again, and I'd be I'd be happy. Yeah, 24 probably gets you out of that. Yeah. And the other thing is when you texture it, you eliminate that oil can look that I think we were getting yes the other time and Dollar Tree. I just it was oil can all over and it just looked horrible. I thought whatever product they had. Now there's other smooth panels that probably look better, but um the texture takes that away. It diffuses a light. You don't still be a little oil can, but you don't see it as much. Okay.

Okay. I think that gives us enough to run with where we can kind of take a shot at that. But still, if I look at the panels on this building, if we go back to the simulating improved materials, do you think they simulate an improved material? I I don't I mean, I don't They don't have to in this situation. Yeah. Effectively, I don't think so because they're smooth, right? That's kind of where I'm at, too. It's not a I think I really to simulate it, you'd almost have to have them stamped or you'd have to do some sort of I don't even know how you would do it to be honest with you. Whether it's a a molded product that kind of gives that simulated look. I wonder if maybe like an a steel ephus product where it's got the insulation right behind it and it goes up as a singular unit that may be functional enough to do that. But I'm not sure if I've ever seen a product that really would do that. But I think having the language to be able to do that I think is perfectly okay. Okay. So seven and eight again are kind of paired together. this kind of we're going to kind of pivot a little bit in terms of kind of what started this whole conversation, right? Is how do we want garages, accessory structures, and then more broadly multifamily structures to look? Um, so I guess the questions we'd like to ask, are there specific residential elements that you would like to require on non-s single family buildings and residential districts? Um, and then at what frequency would you want visual interest structures? So, recesses, projection, columns, openings, ornamentations, things like that. Um, Windsor Heights had a good one where what was it? It's every 20 no wall

greater than 20 ft without some sort of visual interruption. Um, we kind of make so a lot of the stuff that I listed in item 7, the pitched roofs, the dormers, the coupulas, and other residential roof elements. We encourage those. That's one of the things we looked at earlier. It's encouraged, but it's one of those things where do we have a specific number we're looking for? Is that one that we're we're going to know what we don't like and we can kind of just interpret as we go where we just kind of say the building's going to be residential in nature. It needs to have a pitched roof and then we move on from there. I think that may be a question that has never really been contemplated but figured we would ask since we're having this conversation. And I think eight is probably more in line with the questions that we've been asking. You suggested the Windsor height verbage. That's That's pretty good. 20 ft. Yeah. And I I think that that that's not super restrictive in terms of if somebody wanted to basically frame around an apartment, I think that gives them enough space to be able to do that in most situations. Um I think that's a good starting point. And again, this one's going to be field tested in the probably not too distant future. So that's always something that if there's something that they want to do that then they're like, "Hey, we can't do it because of this, this, and this." Well, then the commission can then make a modification. But if you don't have

anything to start with, I I would like to see, I guess, something more uh specific and maybe a large a longer distance than 20 ft, but something that would incorporate recesses or something protruding. Uh so that you don't end up with a long flat building with some visually interesting things, you know, like a, you know, some, you know, little fake ornamentation along there. Would like to have some protruding, you know, things or recessed items, whether it be, you know, an apartment or a strip mall or a uh, you know, a threelex. uh or something like the uh the town homes on Parker, you know, have something where the front has to have some variability in it. Uh and certainly probably more than 20 ft, but I I'm not sure what that number should be. So maybe we pivot then and we spec we don't include openings, columns or ornamentation in those requirements. And it's well no I I think I like the idea of having something from this list every 20 ft. Okay. But then in addition to that, you know, maybe every 60 feet needs to be a recessed area or a protruding area, something to break up the monotony of the straight line of the front of the building. Okay. I just threw 60 ft out there as being something larger than 20. So then you could do a minimum of or a minimum of 20 spacing wise

and then you could write it. And in no and in no circumstance shall 60 ft of a facility be what would the correct terminology be? Like the same have the same setback. That's not the right terminology, but I think I understand what you're saying where it's like we want something every 20 feet or more, but then we want that vertical element. If you've chosen, you know, if you've chosen every 20 ft to have a recess or protrusion, then you're good. We'll move on. But if you haven't given us that depth variability, then every 60 ft you need to do that. And and some of that is scale, too. I mean, if you have a long apartment building, you know, maybe every 60 feet is great or uh or maybe even every 80 feet if you have a long apartment building. But if you know, you have a forplex of town homes, if you have 60 feet, that's probably only one break. Mhm. And uh you know to where the shorter the building is kind of the shorter that number of frequency needs to as I would look at it for from a scale perspective. So then maybe we percentage we could do a percentage or we could do a rate. Those would be the two ways that you could handle that where no structure or every structure shall have no less than two protrusions or recesses. three what whatever that is whatever that number is or you could do no more than 25% of the building shall be at a continuous depth from the street or something like that I mean is there is there a preference there there's a sentence in under C1 under Windsor height says buildings constructed shall be designed to sustain interest throughout the entirety of the building's exterior and reduce the appearance of a box or cube

something like that um individual buildings within a plan, retail center, office park, similar environments, and it goes on. I can't read the rest of it there, but is that where we're trying to get at is really we don't want it, we want some interest on that wall, not just a box. Yeah. Look, which is kind of think what you're saying, Ron, is like correct. At some point, 60 ft or whatever it is, it starts to just look like a box again. Does it have to have a protrusion or could it be a change in materials or it could be something to break up the visual? Well, uh, uh, as you look at the town homes on Parker, which were built to our code, I mean, want to make that perfectly clear. They didn't do anything wrong. Uh, you know, they have they have changes in material. Uh, each building has slightly different gables up top, but really the Can you hold that? But the front but the front of the roof never varies. I know that. Yeah. And uh and so the depth of that, you know, just never never changes. I've seen more when they do the whole material change every so often. Looks like a separate building. But yeah, and and I've uh boy I Right here. Right here. I brought from last week there was a a example of that on uh one of the one of the backs of the garages. It didn't really come off that well um because it was just flat all the way across and they switched it from gray to white and put a gable on top but it it looked flat. It looked flat. Mhm. And uh and as you go up and down the string each building is slightly different. So there is you know shutters are different and the gables are different. uh you know so there they did

do some but still you see the ro the the whole front of the building is flat uh and the roof line is really flat all the way across there and it didn't really provide much interest particularly with a row of them and and I I guess the question is is do we want more like this build or do we want something that offers offers a bit more interest and variability because in theory if they had a recessed door like two of those doors that would meet what you're talking about right sometimes you know how town homes like if it sat back even just you know so then you have an overhang too for your Yeah right I mean that might so there is that they break it up some break it up M. Yeah. Or the other thing is you could take this center section and you could pull it forward too. And that that would have been really easy with these. Yeah, that would really help. So is there I think I think the way that I would do it or the way I'm leaning right now would be a proportion of that building. So is it I I guess let's look at these as an example. How many how many changes in depth would you want to see on these? I would say at least two%. Maybe back up and back again. Well, yeah. Two. Yeah. So, three sections. So, two changes, I guess. So then I think what we could do is no no portion of the building or no more than 33% of the building shall be at a continuous depth from the property line or something like that. We'll figure out how to write it. But does that you think that's a good

starting point? Well, and again uh that's on a building this size, right? If you had an apartment building, you know, 10 times longer than this, you would want to have more than two changes, right? Yeah. This is a PUD, isn't it? This is a PUD, isn't it? I don't believe so. It's not. Is this R3 then? This? No. These that we're looking at? Yeah. I have no idea. I'd have to look into that because that would be the way that you could do it. Or you could do it on a threshold. If it's a row home, it has it no more than a third of it can be on a single depth. If it's an apartment building, do you go up to four? You go up to five. Five probably makes sense. Yeah. Yep. Does that sound like a good starting point? Row home, town homes, we do three at least three different or depths and then apartments we do at least five. That seem like a good starting point. Yeah. Okay. And then would you want the ornamentation? This is in addition to the uh yeah the the rest of it being every 20 ft. You 20 ft or would you do a proportion as well because you could double it. Although you were doing if you use 20 and 60 you would triple it. You can triple it. I would prefer to see a proportion just

because when you start doing proportions or fractions and you incorporate the feet, you might get some overlap somewhere that doesn't make sense or a skip or an off a bush right next to a door and then three spaces. Yeah. So would you would you say a proport so at least three sections that have different depth and then would we do six or nine ornamentations I guess would be your your idea. So one one/3 would have visual difference and then is it one ninth of the visual interest boy. uh might be good particularly since we're we're now talking about row houses which could be you know they could be 40t wide or they could be you know 15t wide and so or do we do a third and six on the row homes and town homes and then a fifth and a tenth on apartment buildings. So we have two So So a 200 two items of interest per and the recesses count as one. Yep, that sounds good. Okay, we'll go down that path then. Okay, I think that gives us what we need to get started. We'll uh we'll get this put together and then we'll have an

actual ordinance modification to review. Is there anything else? I guess so we would write this so that access so like apartment building accessory structures and garages would have the same requirements. Is there something different we want to do with that? We already know too that we want to have them give articulated roofs that are in the same nature and character of the primary structures themselves. Is there anything else that you want us to take a shot at when we put the ordinance together for the uh for the garages? For the garages. Uh I I I think we need some sort of recessed or protruding area for something, you know, anything over, let's say, 60 ft. You know, if the building gets longer than 60 ft, it needs to have uh some changes in variability. Would so if you if we go over 60 feet would you want a similar rate to what the primary structures are or would it be less uh or come up with a distance that each time you exceed that distance in the uh in its length then you need to have another change in the uh the setback uh of the building. So, you know, and I threw 60 out there. I guess that would only be that would probably be about four parking stalls. Yeah. Four parking stalls. And uh or and so for every time you have four parking stalls, then you need to do a

kick out or set back. Or you could just have one kicked out and the rest, you know, staying back. but some sort of variability, you know, every 60 feet or 80 feet, I don't know what the right number is. Uh, and then also have items of interest from that list. Okay. Okay, I think that gives us what we need. We should be able to take it. Just a quick item. The way this was organized in our packet was very helpful to have us step through it. It kind of made it real easy to review. So, appreciate that. Mhm. Good. Okay. Okay. No other commission feedback on that. All right. Item six, reports and particulars. Council liaison. Good afternoon, commission. I mean, evening. Sorry. It's been a long day for you guys laugh, so hopefully you caught it. Um, it's been a couple months since I was here. Just in matter of time, I'll provide a few updates. I know last time I was here that you were talking working through our 2026 budget, which our

fiscal year starts at the end of this month, 1 of July. Um, good news is we got to add half any changes to our assessed levy. So, that's pretty good being able to add some additional head count and move forward with some additional operational purchases. Um, one thing I do want to call out that I think is uh should be um people should be aware of is the city has signed a agreement with um Iowa DOT Ankeny and Allure to do a traffic study out on 415 and 44th Street. So that's going to be starting sometime here. We are still waiting for the agreement from Hope County and then we can get started. Okay. So, that's going to be good to kind of understand traffic flows and impacts um coming in and out of our community. Um the other couple items just to call out is um we updated our fireworks ordinance recently and then updated it again. We updated it to reflect some of the changes from the state that passed recently and then uh we had to do another update to that to uh make sure we weren't excluding certain residents based on being close to combustible like gas stations. Um more importantly, this is a I think this is a good update. No one watched our working session last Monday. Unfortunately, I was out of town and business. But um when our b on referendum failed last winter, the mayor um established a municipal park committee of I think 10 individuals somewhere around there. Um and tasked that committee with um coming up with a different uh approach, a different strategy on how we can move forward and utilize the ground as you guys all know that we own out there. um something that

we can move forward without such a big uh fiscal um expense right now. So the the committee came to um the council in the working session last week and made a recommendation to um move forward and hopefully Chelsea will correct me if I get any of this wrong. Um but to start out with a couple soccer fields and areas a couple areas for uh practice for softball and baseball as well as parking and I believe restrooms. So, the next step is we're going to work on seeing how we could leverage some of our uh tiff money to be able to help fund that as well as some other opportunities for um uh to get funds from either a loan or something like that so we could at least um move forward and get something out there that's desperately needed. Um did I miss anything? No. Um as well as um doing a couple updates potentially out at the sports complex. Um, last thing I wanted to mention too is we're about two weeks away, a week and a half from our festival. Um, they're still looking for volunteers, so spread the word if you can. I just signed up myself, so um, I'll be out there helping tear stuff down and set stuff up. Um, and I think that's it. Any questions for me? Thank you. Thanks, Jeff. City manager, I don't have anything. Thank you. Thank you, staff. Good. All right. Thank you, Commission. Just a quick question, I guess, for

staff. Did we hear anything back from the uh dollar tree? So, no no additional communications. Okay. I thank the commission for their time involved with that so far. Any other commission? I do. Um, I would like to take a minute of the commissioner's time to address some comments I made at the last meeting la or last last month. After a recent meeting with the mayor, he requested that I apologize to the current management at TCI. I agree with that and apologize publicly to him for any offense that he may have taken from my comments. I'd also like to apologize to the members of the commission for um if I made you feel uncomfortable or took you um back on my comments, I apologize. Um clearly our street has some strong feelings and we need to work with um TCI to get through that and uh we are looking forward to having a better relationship. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. No other comments. All right. We need a motion to adjourn. So move. Second. All in favor if we have to do that part. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.