Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

We have um taken attendance and we do have a quorum so we can move on. Um, first off, um, I wanted to have, uh, we have a new commissioner, um, Ruth Burke from, uh, actually she works at ISU, but, uh, Ruth, uh, I'm a associate professor of art at ISU and a farmer in unincorporated county, Old Mtownship, and I'm really excited to be here and be in service to Can we go around the table real quickly just to make North who we are executive director for MCPC Roser. I'm the unit representative um but I also work at you. I'm also and represent county.

Hi I'm Katie Rder represent city of Bloomington. I've been a commissioner since August of 2023. Mark Wy represent district 87

reader I represent the county [snorts] chair and I represent the town of okay um do we have any public comment seeing none um like to move on to the consent agenda um we have um we have a couple of things to consider on the consent agenda today. Um, and before we go into that, I wanted to preference um, and give people some background in terms of the minutes. Uh, you remember at our last meeting, I asked uh that we table the minutes from the September 24th, November 5th, and December 3rd meeting, and that was pending a review by the Attorney General's office uh on a session uh that we had uh related to our August 6 meeting. Um, and there was a question raised as to whether or not we properly um, as chair, I properly got us into a uh, um, executive session for uh, for the um, commission meeting. Um, and questions were raised as to whether or not that was actually done correctly. Um, the AG decided that it was not correct. Um, and that uh, in essence there were a couple of things that we could have done. I could have done differently as chair and such. And so those are reflected in the um us bringing the August 6th uh both the August 6th minutes and then also for the close session for August 6th as well. We'll get to those in our regular agenda. But in the consent agenda, we have the minutes from the 24th uh of uh September, November 5th, and December 3rd. Um that we would be regularly um that were not uh under any consideration or any problems whatsoever. So those are essentially clean and ready to go. So um

that's part of the consent agenda. Uh we also have our financial reports um and also the staff reports. Um, is there anything that any commissioner would like to remove from the consent agenda for further discussion? If not, I'd entertain a motion to approve. Thank you, Mark. Second. Thank you, Mark. All those in favor of this indicate by saying I. All those opposed, same sign.

Okay. Yes. Yeah. Um, and um, now into our regular agenda. Um, Ray, I understand you have something you'd like to mention. Yeah, just really uh quick uh to point out that one of our staff members uh recently uh passed the what we call AICP exam for professional planners is ICP stands for American Institute of Certified Planners and uh with Thomas sitting down that way who's now being certified as AICP. again ICP. So congrats. We said that many times and uh but yeah it's a big accomplishment and that would uh he will be for years the third person carries that title Jen and myself now Thomas who uh who uh is certain accreditation you have to meet certain experience and academic uh requirements in order in pass exam uh in order to qualify for that u that title. So [snorts] just yeah I want to recognize that and that the commission

thank you congratulations Thomas um we're now on to the regular agenda. First is the amended minutes of August 6th um is up for um a vote and approval. um the AG what we did was we went to our legal representative through the count uh through the county to um revise those minutes so that it met the spirit of the um of what the agent wanted us to do and so the minutes you have have gone through her. The other issue that I'd like to bring up at the same time is as part of and for those of you who have been through OMA, um we periodically have to go through uh our close sessions and review uh whether or not those minutes needed to be re remained confidential and such. Um, and in discussion um, uh, with others here at um, or with Rey and Katie, uh, I think we've determined that those minutes do not need to still need to remain confidential. That essentially what was needed to be covered was covered and can now be released. So, we have two items to to operate today or to vote on. one is the amended minutes of August 6th um to close the loop on that and then finally um the August 5th close session to release those um and um unfortunately if we want to talk about the contents of the close session we would actually have to go back into close session to get that done. Um I'm not sure one of the reasons why we had we shared that with everyone beforehand was to make sure that you had a chance to review those and um and so I would open it up to uh a motion to approve the

uh amended minutes of August 6th and also release the closed session minutes of August 6. So thank you. Second second. All those in favor, any further discussion? All right. All those in favor signify by saying I.

All those opposed saying sign. Okay. And that item is taken care of. Okay. We're now on to the election of officers. Um typically if I were standing for chair, I would have to excuse myself and have someone else take over as chair. I'm not standing for chair again. Um and so I can go ahead and proceed uh with the election of all of the officers. Um first up is our chairperson. Um typically what we do is we leave this open for nomination. Um and you can self-nominate if you'd like. So that's always open. Um but first up is the chairperson. And is there any nominations for chair? like to nominate Katie for Chip. Are there others? If not, I'll declare the nominations closed uh and proceed to vote. Um and unfortunately, this is one of those uncomfortable things that we do, you know, it's not by secret ballot and such. So,

yeah. All those in favor of having uh uh Katie as the new chair of regional planning signify by saying I. I. All those opposed, same sign. Katie, the job. Cheers. Congratulations. Okay. Um next, uh position up is vice chair. Um and I would open the floor for nominations.

I have a nomination. um not discussed previously with this individual, but um I'd like to nominate Amy Roser. Uh the reason stated in uh this for like sort of where we are in this busy year is and tightening things up procedurally as things we've discussed recently. Amy brings a wealth of experience from the school district or the school board, excuse me, and I think is the right person for this. Of course, you don't need except what are the respon can we go over the responsibilities [laughter]

essentially um the vice chair fills in in the absence of the chair. Um but there are really minimal activities that you're required to do uh per se. Um the only big worry is that Katie stays healthy uh and we don't have any u lips and such. So that's primarily what it is. Uh you do serve on the executive committee um and that meets once a year. Okay. So it's not an ownorous task in any way, shape or form. Um and such. So I mean I've served in both roles and vice chair is is I wouldn't say a walk in the park, but it's It's not ownorous in any way, shape, or form.

I I feel I could meet those expectations. [laughter] Glad to hear. [snorts]

Okay. So, uh are there any other nominations? I will then call for nominations that are determined the nominations have been closed uh and proceed to vote. Um all those in favor of uh Amy for vice chairperson for the commission signify by saying I. All those opposed, same sign. Congratulations, Amy. You're now our vice chair. And then finally, we have a uh as part of it, we have uh for the executive committee, we have the um uh chairman, the vi or the chairperson, a vice chairperson uh and then we have one other member of the commission uh as that designated person. Um and so that would um we would need a designated person to serve on the executive committee from the commission. Um are there any nominations for that?

I nominate Clark. Okay. Thank you. Any other nominations? I'll declare the nominations closed and proceed to vote. Um, all those in favor of Bart being our designated member to the executive committee signify saying I. Uh, all those opposed same time. Okay, Mark, congratulations. You're done.

Katie, I need to hand the uh gavl over to you and we change positions. You're now chair. Oh, okay.

It's all yours. Yeah.

[clears throat]

Would anyone like to motion to close the election of officers for 2026? Second. I. Um, all in favor signify by saying I. All oppose, same sign. Motion passes. Uh so next on our formal agenda is the items for information or discussion. Um so we will start with uh Ray with our housing coordinator position update. Thank you. U my stuffy.

Yes. Um yeah good news. uh just shortly before the uh new year uh we received a fully executed uh grant agreement from the CEO and uh that basically confirm and and and also put in writing uh the the agreement that will allow us to uh hire a hosting coordinator and then it's a two-year uh agreement and with possibility of extension if needed. We'll see it when it gets closer. And so we working on uh getting an RFP together and they are to advertise the position and uh get it going. Um so that's that's the good news. That's a major milestone.

Any questions for Ray? What was the roughly the job description that?

Yeah. Uh in 2024 uh there was uh a regional pre-covy housing plan uh that was adopted actually by the planning commission and in there there's like uh action items and strategies and recommendations and so that person uh in working with an implement a plan implementation housing plan implementation committee uh will help to uh coordinate to carry out uh the those action items but under the guidance of the implementation committee uh which yet to be formed but there will be a smaller committee uh uh with representatives from the county, city, town to begin with and so and also a couple people from from the industry so to speak because when we talk about housing it's not just for profit but also nonprofit and there's so many different players and also uh they'll be working with others in the communities who are in the housing city. Thank you.

What are job minimum requirements? Do you know yet what minimum requirements they look like?

Yeah. Uh since this is a kind of somewhat high profile position. uh we perfectly you know somebody a master degree but then at least a minimum a bachelor degree with few years of experience especially working in the housing sector you know different partners is I think the collaboration and the cooperation is really important as you all know uh you've been hearing updates every month when the housing sector is so diversified by there's so many needs you know from house to unhouse uh from affordable housing to to forprofit housing. Uh developers even some are nonprofit developers. There's some forprofit developers. Uh the uh the public housing authority you know is another player. So state regulations, federal regulations and the local scene. So um you know that person really should have really good experience and also work well with with different different uh parties and entities. Yeah.

Any other questions? Housing coordinator position. And Ray, as discussions have progressed and the grant was finalized, has the reporting structure changed at all or is the thought that this person will still report to you when hired?

Yeah, it that person uh will report to me and and also will be working uh along with me with this implementation housing plan implementation committee. So in terms of day-to-day uh that person will be uh reporting to me there's some uh state uh grant reporting requirements that we would be working with that person uh and and so it's it's trying to control but I think from the from the uh the administrators from city town county they they thought it's better for the uh for that coordinator you'll be you'll directly be talking to some accountability

and you have adequate office space at regional planning to accommodate that person. Uh we actually don't we will find space we had to make space uh to certain degrees uh because we see that person also doing a lot of like meetings outside of the office and so we'll be somewhat mobile so we had to work it out for for that. Yeah. Okay. And this will be a a regional surge, national surge. We hope to to go Yeah. regional and not national. I mean, of course, local definitely. Uh uh if if somebody end up high locally, that's great, too. But then they don't need to find housing.

Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. And then they they know what's going on uh the needs, but then also uh is somewhat high profile position. uh and so somebody you never know maybe used to live here move away into the into the housing uh sector work for a number of years and decide to move back things like that. So we'll see keep our fingers crossed and if you know anybody uh uh might be qualified interested you know let us know so when we post there definitely that person. Thanks so much, Ray. Definitely expect um continuous updates as that progresses. Um so next we have Luke with our regional housing initiatives update.

Hi, good afternoon everyone. Congratulations. Um updates for the regional housing initiative. Um, first we chaired the joint affordable and supportive housing and housing staff meeting last month and we had home CEO Matt Burgess [clears throat] as our invited speaker to talk about the bridge. Speaking of the bridge, yesterday we attended um the ribbon cutting for the bridge. Um so just a brief overview, the bridge is a non- congregate shelter project by Home Sweet Home Industries. They have 48 units um composed of 40 single bed units and eight two bed units. Uh so this will s serve um 56 individuals and so Matt said that they are one to two weeks away from having the un unsheltered people move in and they were targeting January the week of January 12th but really depends on how fast they clear things with the city. Um moving on we will be having the housing staff meeting on January 22nd. That's Thursday. Um and for other updates, we've submitted the city of Bloomington CDBG program year 1026 application late uh end of last month. And this month we will be submitting the third quarter report to the town CDBG program. Also this month we will be started we will start working on the AMI um or rather updating the AMI white paper and updating the housing dashboard once the new 5-year ACS data comes out um sometime later this month, January 29th. Um, also we attended the housing coalition meeting which they talked about the spring and fall care dates which is May 21st and October 8th and then the preparations for the 2026 point in time or the pit count which will happen on January 29th. We also attended on house task force meeting where they talked about street outreach and more of the bridge. Um, it's all that I have. Do you have questions? I was just curious with the bridge

facility, is there a do they build a a restroom or bathroom facility that's central or do they go over to the home sweet home facility? I noticed. Yeah. So, there's a a central uh bathroom for them. They don't have individual bathrooms, right? So, because that's the common misconception. Do they have individual bathrooms? So, it's not really a tiny house. It's a cabin, but they have like a communal. So there's they built a I didn't know I didn't notice. Okay. Yeah. I didn't see that. It's right behind the main building. I guess I haven't been closely enough to see.

It's basically it's a building. Uh and then they have like individual rooms for the shower and the toilet, but it's all connected. Have any more questions? One unique thing about the bridge is in their in their common building they named the main room after a person who' been on the home sweet home mission but who also had experienced homelessness in his life. Russ March and uh so I thought that was kind of neat that they did that. Cool. All right. Thanks Luke.

All right. So next we have Jennifer with the human services transportation plan update. Jennifer in the same place. Thank you. Congratulations. I'm finally having so as some of you will recall from our last meeting. It happened you know beginning of December. Um on December 15th the region six joy committees that is the technical and policy committees um in charge of this process met in Pontiac. Um in-person participation was somewhat limited because it was really really cold that day and a lot of people were not up for charging out but we had good uh participation mostly from Livingston County and a couple people from K County and eight people participated virtually including ID staff. So they were there they just were in the room. Um, since no month goes by without some sort of surprise, I will announce that as of last Friday, uh, January 2nd, the Chris Rural Mass Transit District announced its dissolution. Uh, it was the provider for Ford and counties in region six, two of our more rural counties. Um, in a special Chris board meeting on Friday, it was decided that the withdrawal of IDOT funding meant the service could no longer operate. This also applies to Vermilion County which is in a different region. Um we've reached out uh regarding possible replacement providers. We've not yet had a conversation with ID about this. We hope to do that soon simply so we can respond to questions as they come in and kind of get a sense of what the timeline might be for that. In the meantime, Chris's website is now down to one page which has what they call referrals to other possible providers. The last time I looked, there was one agency listed and it was somebody I'd never heard of. So, that's not encouraging, but we're hoping that things will improve quickly.

Jennifer, why did they decide to cease operation? Because they had no money. They got decided to withdraw certain categories of funding. Okay. And frankly, I don't know the details on that and they were not discussed. The fact of that withdrawal of funding was discussed in or on the agenda for the board meeting held last Friday morning and by midday they had put up an announcement. They were closing down again. They started out in Vermillion County and affects Vermillion as well. The agency has essentially ceased to exist. So in essence uh residents in those areas do not have any transportation

as they stand right now. And there are again these are areas that can be difficult to serve. County is quite large scattered population and I'm I'm not sure you know Chris had been operating in Vermillion County which is slightly smaller than but they may not have understood what a challenge this was going to be. Ford County of course is small and kind of hard to reach some of the same problems obtained from distance. Also, residents in for county are more likely to want to travel, especially for medical trips to Champagne rather than Lumington because it's closer. Sure.

And so that is another consideration that may come up as I do, you know, advances a search for a replacement provider and we have heard nothing about where they are on that. And again, I hope that they will get to us or we can persuade them to talk to us soon so that we have a sense of what that looks like and if they have any competitors essentially to take over in those two counties and that may include, you know, providers, existing providers in the other three counties. We don't know yet. So we'll wait and see uh and hope that you know things move along quickly and they can find someone who can manage the task of providing service but also manage process to their satisfaction. Uh so we'll see moving on to what we're doing um because we're more reactive in this thing than we would like to be. That's the way it goes. Um we are currently developing a public survey for all of region six to compile information especially with regard to um service needs and gaps that people identify. they know and obviously in Purquay and for counties that's going to be a giant gap of no service at all but we're trying to gauge what is coming and what is available and all of that data we receive will assist in the update of the region six plan for review and discussion and then presentation for uh approval over the next almost six months. Um and that would be April would be from the original policy committee which consists of members of the county boards of the relevant counties. Uh by the end of the year for ID do which is the end of June. Um in the meantime a number of other activities are going forward and we are updating and Thomas was mentioned and again this is Thomas's baby uh updating our HSTP information hub on our website. We do now have an announcement regarding the Chris withdrawal from service in the two

counties, but there's lots of other information there, too. And Thomas has been great about keeping it up to date so that people can find the resources they need. Any questions? Okay. Thank you, Jennifer. [clears throat] Next, we have the Veterans Parkway corridor plan update.

Okay. Thank you. Um the next project ste committee is this Friday in two days. Uh but most recently uh they also have completed what they call the pinary alternatives analysis report and also an executive uh summary. Uh there's uh a lot of work on the different alternatives they have considered and we have post uh those documents on our website. Uh so if you go to our website um which you're familiar with then click you know the button for that project and scroll scroll down to the toward the the bottom and you see those two documents on there. Uh basically they are at a point where there alter alternatives being considered and the and so the next step is for them to kind of narrow it down. uh given that if you recall they had uh public open houses and the business community uh back in the fall and so those were also taken into consideration input from the project steering committee and the technical uh knowledge and research. So uh so they uh compiling all those in that report and the exact summary and so uh the project is on target for completion September of 2026. Uh but this also is a major uh uh phase almost the final phase there four phases we kind of in the beginning of the fourth phase where they start narrowing down to the to the preferred alternatives and go further. uh so there will be uh more uh public engagement opportunities down the road as well. So for any questions and finally uh we have the regional comprehensive plan update Ray and Anthony.

Good afternoon everyone. Uh short update this time. Not a whole lot going on. Uh the strategic venues plan, as you know, the last meeting uh was received and filed. And so at this point, um it is now in the hands of city, town, and county uh to go through their official adoption process. We're still waiting to see what they're going to do. Um but when we know, we will update you. Um, and then as for the comprehensive plan, uh, since last month, we've been working on a lot of the pre-planning kind of background work, putting together what we think is a good timeline, uh, some preliminary information, scope of work, what to expect, when people can have public input, when we're going to build those into the timeline, and such. Uh, at this point, we're still kind of buttoning that all up. So, we're hoping that next meeting in February, we'll be able to kind of do a big kickoff announcement and let everybody know what the plan is. That's all I got. Is there any timeline on how long they have to act each of the city, town, and county? I mean, is there or is it just kind of sit there and they can always just reach to it if and when they want utilizes it? So, they have to adopt it in order to be able to utilize it as official policy documentation. Um, as to when they are required to adopt it, it's it's up to them. Obviously, they want to adopt it. They want to use the new information. Um, but figuring out how that process will work for each municipality is going to be different. Um, city town has to bring it, I think, to their planning commissions and then potentially another uh advisory board org and then their council for final approval. And how long that takes when they decide to initiate that is kind of up to them and don't really know.

Got there's no shelf life on it or any any deadline that they have to meet. It's just kind of follow their own each their own process. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Um, is the fall of 2026 date is that to have a timeline and a plan for the comprehensive plan or what is that date?

I can answer that because I I was the one put that dates down. Uh, that was prior along for the comprehensive plan. We had a timeline and actually we started some work and behind the scene uh staff done some work behind the scene. So the before the work that happened you with the strategic language plan we were planning to have that done around the summer of this year or fall of of of this year and so that's why we kind of put keeping the the September uh date uh for that uh and as what Anthony just said you know we we'll kind of revisit the timeline you because we don't want to rush through and the things that we have learned you know through the strategic venues process and so we will be uh revisiting that and hopefully by by actually next meeting uh then uh we have you know something definite uh in the September there from when all this was being worked on so we will have uh conversations with administrations uh and just see what fit and work typically a comp plan process uh from beginning uh to finish uh it's about you know 18 to 24 months uh that it's pretty uh not untypical I mean you talk with other you know cities uh you know different sizes and counties that it's not uh unusual uh so since we have done some work uh we with the input through the strategic venues plan process and things we have learned we still want to have a solid product. So we uh uh we hopefully you know by by next meeting the planning commission we have someone know something about that.

Okay. So yeah. So I guess I'll hold my other options for next meeting. We talk about that more in depth. Um but I I know that in 2009 that and that was an update from 2000, right? So it was building on work that had been done nine years previous. Um that that took I think two two years right when you were here

I think it was two years probably close to that it's a little we were and really more starting a fresh at that point because it had been nine years and I was not I wasn't here yet so I wasn't involved in that 2000 document um it felt like a good start and this time around of course we have a larger gap in time and although we had done some prelim preliminary work uh last year mostly on existing conditions issues and some other organizational stuff. There's still a lot to be done and time to be used for really a brand new document.

Yeah, if I may add too um uh 2009 seems like a long time ago. uh for those us those of us who went to planning schools the planning professor said there's really no set uh time that it has to be re like update so often really depending on the on the localities and the changes and some places more high growth area then they see more changes some as not as much that it doesn't mean that it has to be 10 years or 55 years 10 years it depends on on the area. And if you recall 2009, that's when the global economic recession. And if you all you know um uh know this area, a lot of things stay flat. Well, a whole lot of things happening, you know, development wise and everything. And so it took a while to recover. Uh we're not there yet. Uh but now we start seeing more housing or subdivisions you know start uh uh being built and that's great. Uh but I remember used to see before 2009 2008 every time when I drive by when I drove by on 55 is always new subdivisions always see some construction. Uh so while things kind of stay flat in a way uh for a number of years until Vivian got into you know we want to uh do more work uh and and and took up the the close Mr. VC plans and few other employers and then also changes with the state crown. Uh some people move away. Uh so that took some of the population uh uh away and but then also we recognized the 2020 20 census information now is available with

more you know more uh more accurate uh information on the correlation uh census. We have uh sustainability and resilency more you know is an issue uh that need to be considered. Uh there other things employers is you know the chocolate factory that we expansion all those. So those have to be taken into consideration. So a lot of factors come into play and that's one of the reasons why uh in working with our partners that we work on as an offshoot of the comprehensive plan that strategic land really causes development pressure in the last few years housing needs and other you know development and so it deserve need to be uh look at no just taking the land use and trying to address the development pressure for the time being now that's done so we back to the comp plan in China. There's still context. Now,

Ray, can I just add one thing? Um, the 2009 plan, which I hope some of you had had a chance to look at, was one of those demonstrations of the adage that timing is everything. Yes. Because, of course, we included it right before the 2010 census, which meant we were using relatively old data, even though both normal did cycle uh account updates. But the other thing is that you know it there's a forward to the plan from the the chair of the steering committee saying uh a whole bunch of stuff has happened in the last six months that we couldn't foresee

and so she didn't exactly say take this with a grain of salt but it was kind of implied that because of that timing there were things that hadn't looked at and hadn't considered so this time around I think we have more more luxury over time and we are sort of midcycle on the census but we have data to work with and it's a whole different process and thus you know it's not just an update it's a new set of scenarios well like wind farms and solar farms is another you know phenomena in our area that wasn't here 20 years ago as yeah thanks

any other questions for Ray and Anthony so for other matters of discussion I have one before I open it to the floor. Uh so last meeting we of course recognized Jim and John and Ron for their service and I think we would u be neglectful if we didn't recognize Carl for having served for chairperson. So obviously we get to keep on the commission appreciate your leadership and professionalism and patience and just always like being willing to listen to different perspectives. So thank you so much. Um are there any other matters to come before the commission?

I would just like to share that in the spirit of you know land use and housing developments, unit 5 is doing an enrollment study um looking at where uh our amenment is and what our future needs are. So in the spring uh you may start to see um actually in February we should have some recommendations for out for discussion and then by March some final um proposals to the board to decide that could include um potentially some closure of a school or so um boundary movement um new schools if uh depending upon what the enrollment and the pattern and include for the future. So that's a big deal for a lot of people and so you'll hear a lot of um chatter about that. Some of the families have already referenced the strategic land use plan uh in their comments. So so that kudos to those who put work. I have some questions for you then about that. So

well and hopefully the information from any other five can be fed into the play. Yeah. As well. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We are using a a private outside consultant proper GI that does this work across the country um for and they're I'm on the internal committee for the um planning and it's pretty impressive and the work that they're doing. So we're we just got the um their projections of where they think housing question come back with on that areas. It's good stuff

Amy. Well, thank you for that update on the unit 5 enrollment study. Any other any questions or be back on? Any other matters to come before the commission before we adjourn? I would move to ajourn. Second. All in favor say I. I. All oppose same side. All right. [laughter] January 7th meeting adjourned at 4:41 p.m.