Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay. I'm gonna open the meeting at 06:00, and we'll do the pledge of allegiance, please. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God in Israel. Okay. So I'll take the role. So, Carly? Here. Joanne Overfield here. Tom Green?

Not present.

Okay. Jan is off the

Also not present.

Yes. And Layla? Here. Harley? Here. Okay. Role is complete. And is Jan has she left already?

My understanding is that she's still effective through the end of this month.

Okay. And Tom not online. Okay. Alright. So the next thing is the consent agenda, which I assume everybody has bruised. So may I have a may I have a motion to pass the consent agenda, please? Motion to pass,

Carly Lynn Waugh.

Okay. May I have a second?

Second? Second. Carly Guillory.

K. Thank you. All those in favor? Aye. Say aye. Aye. Aye. Okay. We're good. Citizen's comment, period. Is there anyone in CyberLand that if there is, raise your hand. Okay. So

No hands at this time.

We'll move on. So the special events code, who's going to enlighten us?

Thank you, chair. Had some good conversations over the last few months over the special events code. Appreciate the discussions. What you have in your packet is final proposed version gone through legal vetting already. So feeling very good about what's presented this evening. Staff report touches on our formal analysis. No surprises. We're recommending recommendation of the council, but happy to take any last questions or comments you might have this evening.

Okay. I think that all of us have had a chance to have input into this, and I'm assuming that everybody has read what we need to pass on to the city council. So is there anyone I'm looking for cyber people, but we're all here. Is there anyone that has anything to add or interact?

I'm just very happy with it, and I'm happy that we're at this place to make this progress for the city. I think it's really, really beneficial for us. Oh, thank you.

Okay. So it looks like everyone's happy with the work you've done. So we will pass a motion sent to pass it on. Okay. So we have a motion then to send this on to the city council, the special events code. So may I have a motion to do that, please? I motion to pass it on to the board. Okay. That's Leila.

Commissioner Church.

Church. Yes. And may I have a second?

I'll I'll second that, commissioner Linhua.

Okay. So all those in favor of passing this on to the city council, say aye. Aye. Aye. Alright. We're all good, and I will sign that before I leave.

Thank you very much.

Uh-huh. Okay. On to Josh's favorite topic, electric fences.

Yes. Thank you very much for that one.

There we go. Alright.

We've been discussing this topic for the past two months with some direction from planning commission. Regarding fence definition, the proposed fence definition excludes hedges from being defined as fence as directed by planning commission from last month's meeting on residential and mixed use maximum fence height. The Planning Commission voiced concern that the fence along arterial and collector roads would create a less pedestrian friendly environment along the street. As such, the proposed amendments include a a requirement that residential fence is above four feet along R 2 and collectors right away. They'll be located behind five feet of pedestrian or in landscaping, which would be a mixture of shrubs and trees.

Maybe not trees. It could be just shrubs depending on the public work standards and be maintained by the property owner. So the last question on this item is does Planning Commission have any comments or additional suggestions regarding the proposed change, or had you had additional time to think about this potential issue? This part. Right? This specific item. Yeah.

Okay.

And we talked about nonresidential maximum height, the Planning Commission voice general support for the proposed changes. No additional questions. Same with the barbed wire penson. Because item of discussion came from the retaining walls. The municipal code currently, as a reminder, allows retaining walls up to four feet within front yard setbacks and up to eight feet eight feet in interior and rear yard setbacks.

However, in a zoning district with no setbacks, retaining wall can theoretically reach the maximum, height allowed for a building. In our last month's meeting, the Planning Commission generally supported limiting retaining wall height, but wanted to see some examples and images. So staff has went ahead and provided that, and I'll provide some context as I'm going through these images. So this is a multifamily project with a large retaining wall that based residential properties, but it was separated be by a stormwater pond. And as you can see, it's almost two stories tall.

But from a from a distance, it doesn't look so burdensome to a neighbor. However, obviously, if you're closer, it could definitely be overwhelming. Here are some residential retaining walls along a public street without terracing. This was by the time you get to the bottom of the the road from the left image, it is more of 10 to 12 feet tall. Mhmm.

But there isn't really a sidewalk in that section of the older area for this meeting sidewalk standards. But it's an example of retaining walls that are based on public streets without any. Interesting enough in the same neighborhood, though, there's a lot of terracing. So Yeah. A good example.

So here are some examples of terracing facing public right of way with landscaping. You can see the image on your left are two retaining walls of approximately three feet tall, each one of them. The one on the right, terracing tall would be probably close to 10 to 12 feet and then a fence on top of it. But while we're walking the street, staff didn't feel any concerns about being overwhelmed by the height or anything. That was pretty much felt comfortable with the pedestrian walking through there.

Residential retaining walls facing other property examples. The image here on your left is a about three foot wall that we is right against the property line with a six foot vent. Mhmm. So this would sorry. Actually, it was a four foot retaining wall, six foot fence. So this would be at the maximum of what we're kind of proposing for the combination of retaining wall and fence. This would be right against the property line. So this is Mhmm. Exactly what the neighbor would be seeing as they left their door. A great example of it, the other side is the one on the right.

A little bit more. While this is a public road retaining wall that has would be slightly different if there's a safety concerns that has to be built a certain way, this prevent an example of a large retaining wall over again, this would be about 10 feet directly adjacent to a property owner, and so this is impacting how they view and and utilize their property. Your next one's an example of a backyard with. We had a request for regarding stormwater. So stormwater retaining walls.

This is an example of basically, it's in the ground, so it's not above, but you can see the walls. So there was a question about that. I wanted to show an image of that. This area hasn't been well, landscape hasn't grown yet. Yeah. So it's not providing as much screening at the moment that fully expected to do in a few years. Off of this is an example of a multifamily retaining wall terracing off of Meridian. These walls are about four foot ish, three to four foot for the first one and then a little bit smaller on the second one.

Is that did they put plastic flowers in there?

I cannot confirm if I've looked at those plants.

Are they allowed to have old flowers as opposed to real plants?

There is probably a landscaping plan that's not being followed, but I have not been able to confirm that.

Okay. Not not a good look, I have to say. The retaining wall looks fine.

And then to rent out the photographs, here's we wanna also look at commercial. So the commercial walls facing Meridian and or adjacent properties. The one on the left is about a two foot retaining wall kind of sloping a little bit with some fencing and landscaping on it. This is off the Walgreens property.

Mhmm.

And then the behind the Riley's Auto Parts, there's another retaining wall there. This image doesn't do its great justice because it's the bushes have grown up. And when they've cleared it off, it's about a three to four foot wall facing that property At five feet of the highest with then a fencing and railing behind it.

So Yeah. So is

there any questions regarding the images here?

No. There it's great. I mean, that you that's that is what we needed to see, you know, because I think that sort of solidifies our you know, any thoughts we might have had. It's certainly the high wall in the neighborhood was on the street there was not not very pleasing aesthetically.

So

if we if the house was built today, it would not it would still be able to to have a wall that high facing the street?

No. I would say that we would that would be considered a front yard.

Right.

That would be subject to the maximum of four feet tall, and then it'd probably have to have some piercing on that. Mhmm.

Yeah. Yeah. Because that's a great example of something that really walls off the nay sort of walls off the neighborhood to the street. So

So this staff as a reminder on the staff question on that, does the planning commission have any input regarding reducing the maximum retaining wall height from eight feet to six feet within setbacks for right of way? So the interior and rear ones for a single family. And should the town center mixed use of the zoning districts be limited to four foot retaining walls along right of way? I I I would also like to point out though, there is a protection oriented requirements. So all the ones that are on Meridian will still have to meet those requirements, but they can't immediately put a retaining wall unless it's like a seating feature or something else.

It can't be just a flat retaining wall. It need to be a a pedestrian oriented feature of some type. We have one proposed, for example, in the, actually, on this property here, they have some the property slopes, they're proposing retaining walls, but it's gonna be seating height.

Oh, okay. Yeah. I mean, limiting the height is definitely an issue. I mean, you know, more than four feet, I on commercial areas. I'm assuming that everyone kind of has a thought about that. Or I

don't know. I'm I I wasn't here last month, so I didn't really I don't know if we I I apologize. I didn't read through this stuff as much last time, but I just I guess I had a property once that was on a corner in a neighborhood that my it was my last house that I lived in. It was a issue with the ivy growing, and we ended up putting a retaining wall. And that eliminated the crazy, like, overgrowth into our property, and it made the neighborhood look nicer.

And then but it was one of those situations where it was a very tall retaining wall with our fence at the top because it was the backside of our it was, like, the side of our property. That's probably not a very good description, but it was very similar to one of the pictures I saw in there. And I don't know. I guess my question that I always think of is I always try to take it from the perspective of the property owner and utilizing the property that you're paying so much taxes for. Right?

And so when you're in your backyard and in our situation, I wanted every square foot in my backyard, and then there was this annoying slope just beyond my fence that it would have been great to be able to extend to the edge. But I don't know. I guess I always just wanna make sure that we're considering the property owners' rights and and, like, utilization of their their stuff as long as it looks nice and is built well and not, like, scrap materials that look just kind of randomly put together, I guess. I don't know. That's just something I always wanna voice and and make sure that we are considering is the property owner's entitlement to their land and not being forced to lose a couple feet and then a couple more feet because of the terracing process.

So, again, I'm probably late in adding that comment, but I do that's just something I I always think about.

Well, I don't. Does anyone have any issues with what's on the properties in the backyard and the side yards? That's one of the that's a different different than having what's on the right away. So does anyone have any I I don't have any thoughts myself about somebody building a fence to the height that we allow or in their backyard or their side yard.

So okay. So with a comment on that is a friend of mine that lives in the neighborhood next to mine. There was brand new homes built behind her. She's lived there for twenty plus years. Brand new homes built behind, and they are literally looking down in her yard, and she's lost all privacy based on how high up their property is.

It's a very strange thing, but she was like, when we knew they were building, we weren't worried until we saw this huge retaining wall and then a fence above it, which it made sense to level their property. However, for her sake, I can see why that would be a concern and, you know, losing your privacy, not even so much as a visual, but, like, the way they now look down in her yard from their property. So I guess I just always feel like there's gotta be, like, case by case, obviously Right. Situations where it's different because, you know, it it's not that it looks bad. It's that it changed their whole function of their backyard.

And, you know, now it's almost like I would say if they're building something like that, they should also, like, have a, like, a fee for planting trees to create some sort of privacy barrier of some sort. Because, like, you know, when my brother-in-law moved into his home, we bought, like, those full size trees and put them in it. It was, like, instant privacy. It was such a nice thing Yeah. To have. So, I mean, it would be maybe something we could consider as, like, an option Well if there's a complaint or something, you know, that they would be required to, like, plant trees or something to create that privacy that's no longer there in that situation. Well, on

the other hand, the person whose property is in can plant their own trees.

Right. But now they're financially on they're not cheap. So it's it's just one of those things.

I I understand that.

Yeah.

With the you know, there's always issues when you're used to not having a house next to you. I mean, I I sold a piece of property behind my house. And so until things grew up, I was looking into the house. I knew I would be Mhmm. For a while. And so, you know, you always lose you lose something when you're used to something. Yeah. So, you know

Well and so, yeah, I'm I'm all for, like, the front yard I get. I guess it depends on, like, if there was, like, a percentage of, like, if the person's backyard was bigger than their front yard or maybe their front yard is their main outdoor space. I think in those situations, it kinda would detent determine for me, like, oh, how much of their front yard are they losing as a result of having to do this terracing process where they can actually build their fence up, have that privacy. I don't know. I I didn't really get a chance to look into this enough, so I I apologize.

Well, not everybody had to terrace their front yard. Yeah. You know, that's Yeah.

Of

course. I just always wanna think about, okay. If it were me, would I wanna give up those four or five feet where I could potentially have this little kid pool or a playground or something? You know? It's like using your your

Yes. I understand. Yeah. Leila, you had a question?

Yeah. It it's it's more so for staff too. As far as when these plans come to your table, are there different classifications for retaining walls as far as their purpose, as far as, like, aesthetic safety or something else. Because I would I would still advocate for walls that are necessary for safety considering has existing hazards or new hazards. And I would think that there would be a vetting process that happens before any opinion is weighed in as far as the the safety issues and and necessary consideration.

Yeah. So any wall over four feet, and that is the even the part of the wall includes part of the wall that's under the ground that's yeah. A little bit under the ground requires a building permit. They have their own requirements based on loads, but depending on how close it is to house and steepness, that they'll require geotech or deep folks, for example, where that's required. But, yes, that that happens.

That's on the building department side. From the planning side, we look at it just as a retaining wall. What is the max height? Where is it located in the setback? So and except for a commercial project, they're exempt from all the blank walls item requirement.

So they can put up a huge wall and not have to do anything to break up that look. So yes. The and but the building department doesn't also care much about the height outside of does it have the geotech? That's where we have conflict not conflicting, but different priority. One of the main hopes of this is that this would force developers to grade better and grade better with the land so they're not having to flat out the whole site and build larger tanning wall, that they they would be forced to tear stuff more. Mhmm.

Yeah. Because I can see an incidence where you would have a slope that faces a public right of way. With a new construction, you would get sloughing off of that onto the street. So if there wasn't some requirement to do something, it's just gonna continue to run The, you know, the mud will or this the dirt will just run into the street.

And it and c's would be height and setback standards, basically. They could also ask for administrative variance or a variance. Administrative variance allows for a 20%, up to 20 reduction of or addition in height in this case or place and setback. Or they can request a variance if it's a situation where their site is encumbered because of steep slopes and they have to do that would be the extra that that could be done, to ensure that development of that property.

I guess I have a a connecting question. So, like, I see a lot of these new developments and I see a lot of retention basins. So, like, even in my neighborhood, we have two right around that, these two mechanic shops and the new builds in the back. So I guess what I'm wondering too is, like, when they're building up their property and putting these retention walls so that they can build these homes in those areas, are they then also causing us to or themselves to put in a retention basin, which then the city has to manage? Or, like, what is that responsibility, and how are the walls maybe connected to some of these other city elements that are being put in place and then we have to manage as a city?

So our standard practice is that all those are considered private and have to be managed by private parties. And they the city engineer and yeah. Senior engineer reviews them to make sure they're not impacting city property or right of way or neighboring property. However, there are a couple of them, if Jeremy wanna speak to that, those.

So, yeah, what Josh is alluding to, there are some instances in in my almost ten years here, we've kinda swung the pendulum from one side to the other and back again where everything had to be private to well, we'll take it as public as it's big enough or has some importance to the city for potential future use or expansion. So now back to mostly private. I'm just trying to balance that. So, yeah, there there are a few instances where if if it makes sense and there's opportunities down the line for us to take something on public, you know, but generally speaking, private is the first choice when it comes to the storm water facility.

And the requirements around these holding areas, are there certain vegetation? Obviously, this one, the vegetation hasn't grown up, but you do require certain types of vegetation in some of them. I know my neighbor has to had to plant certain around their holding area.

Yeah. We have landscape standards that go around

Yeah. Know, pertaining. Yep.

The fencing is a requirement of engineering

Right.

Based on the size of it. So they always will have a fence. However, there will always be a landscaping as

Right. So yeah. Go ahead. Thank you.

So I think just in general, we're gifted in Edgewood with a lot of topography. And in trying to wrap my brain around the regulations with regards to retaining walls and fences, it's difficult to do because there's a lot of different the context is gonna be different every time. And so it reminded me to look back to the intent statement at the beginning of this section, and it talks about promoting safety, providing screening, and protecting neighborhood character. And I think what I've heard from the commission today generally and in my opinion is a concern around neighborhood character. And so I might recommend that after adoption of these regulations or the regulations that we continue to be mindful of feedback we receive from our from our citizens as it relates to fences, and and maybe we need to take a renewed look at it.

Maybe we we are always considering I mean, we can adopt these regulations, but that doesn't mean that we don't monitor and then maybe refine in the future.

Yeah. As things change and Yeah. As things change and then in our city. I mean, there's always room to revisit. Okay. So the street height for the retaining walls is four is four feet?

In the proposed amendments, it would be four feet.

In the and and in the commercial areas too. Right?

Correct.

Okay. So does anyone else have any input as to anything? So I think that everyone is comfortable what you've drafted. And Okay. So we'll

Alright. We'll go on to the electrical security alarm system portion. Planning commission of voice general support for a five foot setback to adjacent sensitive uses and limit these systems to eight feet if located within a building setback and that the minimum perimeter barrier height would be a six feet barrier fencing. So I don't have anything to add on this. Would that if you had chance to revisit those sections, do you have any comments or questions on those?

Does anyone have anything that they wanna add or any concerns? Okay. Go ahead.

Thank you. Clarifying question. I think I heard last month that with our new middle housing legislation, there are instances in which there are no side setbacks. Is that correct? And so would that then is that that right?

That's correct. Yeah.

So would that then mean that this fence could be the maximum height for the zone?

So those would be in the residential zone. Mhmm. And as currently proposed, those would not be allowed.

Okay.

But you will Penn State.

Oh, okay.

For farm Okay.

Thank you for clarifying.

Okay. That's a good that's a good question because yeah. Think about that. Okay.

So the next steps on this is, know, obviously, these are some big changes, and we're not trying to rush these through.

Right.

So our our next step is actually going to take these through the building department to have them give a deep dive, same with the engineering department, to make sure they're not nothing from their side that they're seeing is a red flag. So I don't know if I'll be bringing them back next month or for if we do, we might be ready for hearing in the following month. So Okay. Don't be surprised if we don't actually talk about it next month. Okay. Be a placeholder.

Okay. Great.

But if there's any comments, questions in between time, you can still email us any of those. We're just not gonna be rushing this through to hearing right away.

Okay. Great. Thanks. Okay. So the introduction of the home business and licensing.

Yes. So we have two codes for or basically end up being three codes, but two home business code sections and then our business licensing section. In December 2024, the city adopted a new comprehensive plan that had the goals e d three a and three b that are shown on your screen that basically are provide support for existing small business, home based business businesses, and encourage new home based businesses. Our current code is very convoluted in how it's broken. It's basically two repeating codes except for very minor changes between the two, and it causes a lot of confusion.

So right now, everyone that does a home home business has to either apply for a limited home business or get a home business occupation permit. That is a little redundant, not needed, more unique for Edgewood. So we are looking at ways to update the code to ensure that it it works better for the community and home based businesses and encourages it like the comprehensive plan wants to. This has also been an area that EDAB, the Economic Development Advisory Board, wanted to be updated as well as part of their their own mission. But we're gonna be starting reviewing that.

Our goal is basically to remove the limited home business and basically be permitted outright with your just business license that you have to have anyways, and then look at the requirements for the home occupational permit and see what thresholds we should be actually having there. Because that gets noticed to neighbors and often cause delays and timing. So we wanna make sure that we're just not artificially saying everyone just needs to have it, but really looking at how they impact the neighborhood and at what levels do, okay, neighbors should have more of a say at this level than others. Or yeah, there's nothing in the packet for the any draft amendments yet. However, you can start looking at the code sections now to see what we're we're talking about and if we prepare for next month's meeting.

Jeremy, do you wanna talk anything about the business licensing code, though? Yeah.

I'll just tag on that while we're in the business licensing code, there is a change at the state level regarding the minimum threshold or how much activity a business has that warrants a license. We're compliant now, and we expect to stay compliant with our current language till 2029, but there's now statewide indexing language, and might as well hop in there and take care of that at the same time. That's that's what that's about.

So general question for the planning commission is does the planning commission have any specific regulations or guidance for staff to consider as we start reviewing this process?

Well, I was looking at things that were prohibited in in Edgewood, and it may be that we just don't have the staff to police some of what happens because, you know, I have seen houses that are redoing vehicles in their front yard, more than one vehicle. And, obviously, what they're doing is something that's prohibited because it it is it changes the neighborhood, first of all, and it's quite clear that something that's going on is commercial. And, you know, and you everyone has seen the fellow who has all the lawn mowers on a hundred and twenty second. To me, that person has violated the code in many different ways. And so I just wonder what we do with a situation like that because that person has been had heavy equipment in there and light equipment and obviously not probably disposing of materials.

So correctly. Working on vehicles on private property has been, like, one of the probably the highest more code enforcement issues that we have in the city. We regularly get those, and we address them when we get complaints. There's been a couple that we've been able to address this past couple of year. So if we're not getting a complaint about it, which we're we're not going out and looking for them. Right. However, we we do get complaints, and we address them quickly as we can, somewhat faster to assess than others. Regarding the lawn mower site, that's been an ongoing code enforcement that we have been trying to deal with over time. I don't know if Jeremy has anything else. Don't know.

I can just report that there has been some cleanup out.

Yes. There has. I I

It's a slow process, but it is one of our older residents, and our surface water compliance staff has been in contact with them.

Right.

They have been making some progress.

That's I do notice that some of it has been cleared, but I think about it for the future when that property goes up for sale, there has to be a lot of dirt that's gonna have to be removed in terms of

Part of it is in our ex exceptions, it does talk about people being able to work on their cars and family direct family members of their cars.

Yes.

So that becomes a little bit of an issue trying to verify.

Yes. I understand that.

Well, it's that's their first step is that these are our personal vehicles.

Yes.

And they have no plates or anything else on them, and they're gone next day type of situation. So it's a regular thing that we're we're dealing with.

Yes. I I and I realize that because people do collect cars, sometimes they think they're gonna work on them, and then they just sit in their yard for years. We have many examples of that. But, anyway, okay. I I'm not gonna, you know, go on about that. But so anyone else have any go ahead. Thanks.

So the question asking us if there are any specific regulations or guidance that we might recommend, and I what comes to top of mind for me is signage. Neighborhood character is often a concern when it comes to home businesses, and then signage can sometimes teeter the line between a residential character and a commercial one. So if we're gonna include signage regulations, I think that that could be helpful.

Yeah. Yeah. I I agree. That's that's a good good point.

I had a couple of

things. Okay.

As a home based business owner,

mostly,

the signage thing is something that I think is gonna be case by case basis. Obviously, I have a unique situation. I'm on a private road. I have no street front visibility to clients. So, like, technically, this private road we're on, there's an easement. I could potentially put, like, a little sign, and it wouldn't really bother anybody because there's not really too many people right there. I imagine don't know if it would be allowed. I'm just saying. I could imagine it being an offensive to people. I would ask permission first.

But I don't do that because I like keeping my business private and having it be more, like, tucked away. So but my point is if I'm trying to drive some business to myself and try and get someone's attention, I can see it being beneficial, but having some regulations to keeping it small and modest and appropriate for a neighborhood. That's one thing. Another thing that I've been working on is for my own business is the expansion and making it a larger situation for the downstairs area of my dog lodge. You know, I think one of the things I was talking to Jeremy and Josh about today was just others.

Would this be appropriate about the square footage? Okay. The so there's, like, a limit of up to 2,000 square feet based on this or 40%, I think it was, of your, like, main dwelling unit, I guess, of the main house. So so it's, like, up to 40% or up to 2,000 square feet, which is not appropriate for my situation. When you have over certain amount of acreage, I think there needs to be a different set of criteria.

So that would be one thing I'd like to talk about or have addressed. As far as the home based permit or, like, limited home based permit, that was probably my biggest headache for when I was applying for my business license in the original process. It didn't obviously, we've cleared up a lot of the confusion in that process of, like, the comprehensive plans and all the different things we've done recently related to home based businesses. But I will say that they were so similar that it literally came down to, like, such minute differences that it didn't make sense that there was two. So I'm glad that we're talking about that and, like, essentially merging them to simplify.

Because, again well okay. So I'm kinda jumping around. But when you're talking about having to notify the neighbors, it makes sense to notify neighbors of a business potentially occup like, happening on a property if it's going to increase traffic in any way. I will say that I don't think it's necessary if you're getting a business license for something that has nothing to do with your neighbors, and you're just operating from your home. You're just running your business from your home, and it's, like, on the phone, on the computer.

I don't know why we have to notify neighbors. I think you wouldn't have to do that in a lot of cities. You're not notifying neighbors. I think it only pertains to if clients are coming to the location. I think that would make sense.

Otherwise, I hate to say, but, like, it's not anyone's business what business license I wanna get unless it's going to create, like, a noise element or some sort of environmental impact. I don't know why we would have to notify. So, like, in my case, it's dog business. Obviously, I'm gonna have clients coming to my property and then noise concerns and all the things that would potentially come with you know, if I was outside, I'd be going, oh, this is what I'm worried about. That makes sense to have community, like, notification.

Again, I do think that there needs to be certain, like, categories of what is deemed necessary for notifying the community. And then I also think that there's gonna need to be conversation about I believe it's 14 trips. Is that what it is? 14 round trip. And that includes 14.

So this is something that's always really irritated me because it didn't make sense that it had I get that they had to count the arrival and the departure. So, like, if a client comes and drops their dog off and then they leave, that's two trips right there. And then let's say I did day care and they came back later, that's four. That means one dog is four trips. That means I essentially have to reduce the amount of business I can do based on that.

Now I will say that when I express deliver Amazon or something like that, they break it up into about three or four different trips. And I always use that as my example because I can genuinely say I get more deliveries from Amazon packages that decide when they wanna come than I do my own clients coming to my house. So being that we're on a private road, again, it's another situation where that maintenance on that road is up to us anyway. I don't know why it would affect my neighbors or why I have to, you know, work within a certain amount of trips per day. So, again, another situation where the general rule isn't going to necessarily apply to my situation.

It doesn't make sense. So it's not like I have this huge stream of people coming in and out. I will say, and no disrespect to them, but there is a business that's been around for a long time. I'm gonna keep it general because I like them, and I don't want any kind of bad flag. But there's a business that's been around for a long time.

They have way more activity at their property on a daily basis, and they handle it really well because it's like I know you know what I'm talking about. But I I think they run it really well, and I think it's done very well. But it's one of those grandfathered in companies. And so I would say that would be more concerning to me because there's so many neighborhood neighbors right around it. And yet I know that they're getting they're doing way more than that in a day than I am for a boarding facility.

So I think it seems like the rules are applied in different situations. And so I just want I I know it's an enforcement issue. Like, it's hard to, like, track everything, but there's a lot of little, like, gray areas that just are confusing. And I don't know. I just think that there's kind of, like, an overhaul that definitely needs to happen there, and I'm happy to be a voice of of concern or Well rational.

You have to you have to remember that they have to go on a different street before they go to your private driveway.

It's off the main off off 8th Street. Yeah. I mean, it's

So, I mean, if you're gonna look at the broad picture, then you have to figure out that there's more traffic on 8th going into your place. You've created more traffic on a on a street. I I'm just looking

at the broader picture. I understand that. I mean, it's a it's a main street. I I understand completely the concern of increasing activity. Totally. And and that's why I operate within a very certain, you know, hours of operation, which I'm very respectful of. And as long as that is honored by other people, that's, I think, an important thing to

And I take consider. And, you know, in your point, you know, I I think you have a point. That's for sure. But, anyway, that's something that maybe should be explored.

But, again, you know, back just touching on the the percentage of, like, how much of your property or how much how large your facility or whatever your building has to be in comparison to your main property. I definitely think needs to be a separate category based on the the property size, you know, up to an acre, up to two acres, and then a different percentage. Percentage. Yeah. Okay.

That's all. Okay.

Yeah. We'll Good. Take the guidance, and then we'll also take look at some neighboring jurisdictions as well and come back with some draft comment or draft provisions. So start looking over and commenting on.

Sure. Okay. So onto climate phase two. Big bucks.

Yes. So we we may mention this last month at the staff reporting section, but we did apply for the last the full amount of our remaining climate grant money. It was $395,000. And oh, we did. We bid it. We bid out Milton. Sorry. I I was I submitted it within seconds of it going to work. So the so we're picking that back up. So as you remember, last year, we did a phase one, which is a draft climate assessment, vulnerability assessment.

We had the measurement come in and do a presentation. They are our consultant, again, like, you know, that work. So we have just did our kickoff meeting last week. Part of this is gonna be the development of a climate advisory team, which should be a different sec well, the aim is to fill out different sectors, agriculture, economic development, zoning develop planning, emergency services, a whole range under under under served populations and have representation throughout the city and that part of that climate action team or climate advisory team. So Citi has right now put together a initial list for measurement to kind of send out to.

Planning commissioners and the board members can also be a part of it if you wish. You can go on the Citi's website and do a we have a little mail notification, email notification. You can sign up for that so we can email that. When we get ready to send out the official request, we'll send it out to people that are interested and have that then notify me on our website.

How many people do you anticipate putting on this committee?

I'd say just from the list measurement provided us, it could be 15 to 20 total.

Okay.

However, we don't expect them all to show up at one time or Okay. Ever.

They'll have different sections to be in

And they can so we're gonna be doing ninety minute meetings a month, once a month, I mean, and for probably the rest of the this year into next year. And, however, if you can't meet the times that we're gonna be scheduling for anyone in public also listening to this, that measurement will meet with you on one on one to get some feedback with you Okay. Separately. So it's not necessarily you always have to you be part of the team, but maybe you might miss the meeting and make comments differently. Right.

So we're working on that. If you're interested, email Jeremy or I or I that you're interested. Expect about ninety minutes of meeting with a few documents to review each month as we're working on building our climate resiliency chapter. There'll be a lot more in the coming months as we're measurement starts working through the other documents and some additional public input. But getting that climate advisory team together is gonna be the is the priority.

We we have to get that set up so we can do the rest of the work. But it's gonna be climate heavy until June year because that's our timeline of the grant. Right. Which includes comprehensive plan update as part of that. And the comprehensive plan update final part where city council adopts it won't be part of the official grant because of their June's the deadline of the grant. So then city council's deadline of comprehensive plan amendments in December, so we have a little bit of a gap there. But measurement has agreed that they'll they'll work with us to make sure it gets adopted. So that's the update for the planning commission on that. And if you have any questions, so on it, let us know.

Well, I just something that jumped out at me was this greenhouse gas analysis, and I was wondering, you probably don't even probably can't answer my question, but it just seems like a huge undertaking. And so I was thinking, is there there must be an algorithm for a city of a certain size for traffic, what's, you know, being put into the air for traffic or houses that are using gas as opposed to electricity.

Yeah. There's a variety of formulas you you that can be utilized. And it's based off based on whatever the what you're looking at. I've done a little bit of this work before.

Okay.

And if you have so many vehicle trips that your city has, that equals x number of greenhouse gases.

Right.

If you have residential, you can actually pull sometimes from the the electrical company the actual voltage, and then there's different calculations of what that means for greenhouse gases wise. Even depending on how it's broken up by the electrical company, how much is natural gas for them, wind power. However, they break it up too. So it is a big undertaking, and that's Yeah. Why the grant is not a small grant.

Right. Right. And I suppose it depending on how much trucking goes through your community too. So that would be a big deal, which we don't, of course, have a lot of well, we do on Meridian. Yep. Anyway okay. I just just something that, you know, I was thinking about. Anyway okay. So I guess that wraps up what we needed to talk about. Does anyone have anything else to add, or does the staff have anything else to tell us?

Yes. So Dunfurry was her last month was this month for being a planning commissioner. She was moving out. She gave us notice at our last meeting. We, I believe, have a new commissioner member or will have a new commissioner at the next meeting for the one that was previously open, and we're still working on advertising Ben's very position.

Okay. Great. I'm glad we have at least one one person. And the and the city council's already approved that person, I assume.

Pending formal approval tomorrow night.

Okay. Okay. So I'm going to during the meeting, it's 06:53. Thank you all.