Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Thank you for your patience, everyone. We are ready to begin.

Okay. Good evening, everyone. Welcome to the Westland Planning Commission. Today's date is Wednesday, 02/18/2026, and it is 06:02PM. So first on the agenda this evening, we're going to call to order and do roll call. Thank you. Alright.

Commissioner Dietz. Present. Commissioner Kaczorowski. Present. Commissioner Wolbotti. Here. Commissioner Jones.

Ahoy. Ahoy.

Ahoy. Commissioner Evans.

I am here.

Commissioner Watten. Here. Chair Schulte Hillen?

Present.

Alright. We have all in attendance.

Next on the agenda is public comment related to land use items not on the agenda.

We do not have any testimony, public comment that is not for the CUP tonight.

Okay. Next is the public hearing quasi judicial continued from 02/04/2026. This is CUP dash twenty five dash o two slash d r dash twenty five dash o two slash WAP dash twenty five dash zero one proposal for new City of Westland operation support facility at the vacant parcel east of the Salama RoadGreen Street intersection. So good evening. Tonight, we are holding a public hearing regarding application number CUPDash25DashO2SlashDRDash25DashO2SlashWAPDash25Dash01 for a conditional use permit, Class II design review, and water resource area permit at 23823 Thousand 834 Salomo Road that was continued from the previous public hearing on 02/04/2026.

The proposal is for construction of an operations complex servicing the city of Westlands public works, environmental services, parks and recreation, and water and streets departments on two vacant lots. This is a quasi judicial decision. Unlike in legislative hearings where personal opinion may come into play, quasi judicial rulings must be grounded in the relevant code. And if the application meets the code, the commission must approve it. The hearing will proceed as follows.

After the preliminary legal matters, staff will make a presentation, followed by the applicant, then anyone who wishes to testify will be given the opportunity. Finally, there will be time for rebuttal by the applicant. The applicant will have twenty minutes initially, plus fifteen minutes for rebuttal. All requests to speak during public testimony have been received. Commission members may ask questions of the applicant, staff, or anyone else who testifies. If participating remotely, please remember to use the hand icon if you wish to ask questions. Please keep yourself on mute until you are ready to speak so everyone is heard clearly. I now call to order the public hearing. I will now ask the city attorney to cover the preliminary legal matters.

Thank you, Chair. The applicant has the burden of proving that the application is consistent with the City of West Linn's Community Development Code, Comprehensive Plan, and any applicable Municipal Code provision. The criteria that must be addressed in the hearing are Chapter 11, Residential R10 Chapter 32, Water Resource Area Protection Chapter 41, building height, structures on steep lots, exceptions. Chapter 42, clear vision areas. Chapter 46, off street parking, loading, and reservoir areas.

Chapter 48, access, egress, and circulation. Chapter 55, design review, chapter 60, conditional uses, chapter 96, straight improvement construction, chapter 99, procedures for decision making, quasi judicial. As the planning commission is sitting quasi judicially, any testimony, argument, or evidence that speakers give us must be directed at these criteria or at some other criteria in the code or comprehensive plan which you believe should apply to this decision. Only those who have proved, provided testimony to the planning commission in person or in writing will have standing to appeal this item to the city council. If you have provided written testimony or previous oral testimony to the commission, you do not need to read your written testimony or repeat previous oral testimony.

Failure to raise an issue accompanied by statements or evidence sufficient to allow the commission and the parties an opportunity to respond to the issue precludes an appeal to the Landy's Board of Appeals based on that issue. Failure of the applicant to raise constitutional or other issues related to proposals or proposed conditions of approval with sufficient specificity to allow the city or its designee to respond to the issue precludes an action for damages in circuit court. So I'll now ask the Planning Commission, do any members of the Planning Commission wish to declare a potential or actual conflict of interest or bias? Okay. Seeing none, do any members of the Planning Commission wish to report any site visits or ex parte contacts?

As a resident of Westland, I traveled on road all the time, so I feel like that's the only relevant site visit I did.

Just a drive by?

Yeah, just drove by. And

you feel like you can still make an impartial visit?

Of course, yes.

Okay, great. And does any member of the audience wish to challenge the jurisdiction of the Planning Commission to hear this matter or the impartiality or ex parte disclosures of any members of the Planning Commission? See none. And please unmute members of the audience so we can hear from them on this matter if there are any. I don't think there are there are there any attendants? No, there are not. Okay. Perfect. Thank you. So that concludes the legal matters.

Before I move on though, I just did wanna provide the Planning Commission with some additional with some additional information, that will be helpful for you all when you are reviewing this application. These are just, additional items, legal legal matters for you to consider, about the standards of review and other important, requirements while you are reviewing this application. So first, it's a bit confusing because I know we have the city as the reviewer, and we also have the city as the applicant. But this is a fairly common thing to happen when you know you have a city who is needing to develop projects. It's important for you to keep in mind that these are two different parties.

The city as the reviewer are you all and this team. Right? Erin, Steve, and I. We are assisting in the review process. The city as the applicant involves the public works department and this team. And we are two separate teams where they are working on the actual application, the applicant, and we are the city as the reviewer. So that's just an important thing for you to keep in mind as you're going through this process. If you have questions for us as the reviewer, the reviewing team, we're happy to answer them. They will answer the city as the applicant questions. And then just a comment about purpose statements in your code.

So a lot of chapters will have purpose statements at the beginning of the code. The purpose statements tell you what essentially the purpose of that chapter is, but it isn't actually an approval criteria. It's just a goal essentially for that chapter. It lays out the purpose that that chapter is intended to fulfill. And then application requirements versus approval criteria.

So in a quasi judicial decision like the one that is before you here, there are two important procedural aspects to that process. The first is the completeness review of the application and then a decision by you all on whether this decision should be approval or denial. The completeness review is a staff decision. That is just looking at the application criteria in your code and deciding is the application complete or incomplete. That has usually nothing to do with the Planning Commission or the decision making authority.

Your review criteria are completely separate from the application criteria. So they are not dispositive on your you cannot use the application criteria when you're making a final decision. Those are two entirely separate things. Then also approval standards in the code. Approval standards, as I mentioned in the script, you must make your decision based on the criteria that are in the code, as nice as it would be to be able to make decisions based on other evidence or facts or arguments that you hear.

You must be able to tie the evidence, arguments, and facts that you hear to a standard that's actually within the code to be able to rely on those facts in making your decision. And then finally, I also wanted to clarify the standard for evidence that is submitted. The decision you make must be based on substantial evidence in the record, and that means the evidence that a reasonable person would rely on in reaching a decision that is also consistent with the substantive requirements in state statute and the planning goals. So that's a lot of information, but if you I just wanted to pause for a minute, and if you have any questions about anything I just said, I'm happy to answer them.

Okay,

great. Thank you so much. Thank you for bearing with me on that.

Thank you. Moving on, let's proceed to the staff presentation. You, Aaron.

Thank you, Chair. Pull up the presentation tonight. My name is Aaron I'm a staff planner here in the community development department. So we're here tonight to continue a hearing from February 4 as you all are aware for the City Operations Facility CUP twenty Five-two, WAP 20 Five-one and Doctor 25 dash o two. Just a brief refresher before I go into some of the approval standards and some of the testimony that was heard at the first hearing, recaps of that and then be able to take some questions and provide clarification if there is any sort of needed after the presentation.

Here is just an idea of where the site is located. It's off of Salama Road adjacent to I-two 05 Freeway. There these are vacant lots as they exist right now And so, the proposal is to construct a new city operations complex that will, house public works, environmental services, parks and rec, and the water and streets division. And, so here's a site plan, and without going, you know reiterating what was heard at the previous hearing, it would be accessed along Salama Road. There, are essentially three main buildings and then a separate higher area with storage of materials there, on the upper level.

There are, there's an existing wetland as you see in the center of the page there and then in the bottom left hand corner there is a stream as well, identified in one of the water resources reports as Stream 1. Alright, as we remember on February 4, the hearing was opened and the testimony was heard. The public record, was kept open since February 4 so it has been open from the fourth to today which is February 18. We did receive some comments immediately after the February 4 hearing. Those are included as attachments in the revised application package which I'll get into in a second.

And there are also comments from the public just previously earlier today as well as some that were submitted by hand almost immediately before this meeting that you should all have in front of you as well. So, just to kind of, go over the revised packet, that was, done by staff, so we we heard from the planning commission that the packet was maybe cumbersome and large and difficult to decipher a lot of the materials that were in there. So, we extracted, staff extracted the attachments and made them as separate attachments. These are a lot of the reports that were done, the geotechnical report, the water resources report, the tree preservation plan, the storm water report, etc. So, those are identified as separate attachments in the table of contents for the staff report.

And then additionally, there were conditions of approval that were revised that are outlined here that would require a project arborist on-site during the tree removal. There's a condition for maintaining compliance with DEQ standards. There's a condition of approval for a final geotechnical report prior to the building permit issuance. Also, condition of approval for submittal of a Department of State Lands approval for the planting mitigations based on the impacts that are proposed from the development of the wetland and the stream buffer areas. There's also two voluntary condition of approvals from the applicant that were provided after the February 4 hearing and the testimony that was received to conduct a traffic impact analysis and to prepare a noise study for the site.

A little more recap, so again continued from the February 4 hearing and then the exhibits that were revised and then additional exhibits that were created as a result of the testimony. So, exhibits include titled PCN. These are the additional public comments that we received earlier today from public members. Then PCM is a staff memo that addresses previous and the most recent additional public comments. Also, exhibit PCO is submitted by the applicant team and this is a clarification memo with information on the details of the project, Everything that is being reviewed here tonight is provided clarification on the applicant and then the applicant provides clarification in that exhibit.

So, that's included as an attachment. Then, exhibits P and Q are the city's comprehensive plan map and zoning map, that we heard testimony, regarding the zoning at the previous hearing. So, we wanted to clarify that testimony and those concerns with these maps. And then Exhibit S is summarizing some of the findings of fact in the staff report and then their location within the PC packet really for ease of reference for you as the commissioners to feel that you can you know gather all the information correctly and understand you know what it is that is being asked tonight. And so I'll go into a few where I'll be recapping a bit of the testimony that we heard last night or I'm sorry on February 4 and then up until the hearing tonight on the eighteenth.

So, initially we heard some concerns on transportation. So, comments were made about the adequacy of the transportation system and its ability to accommodate the proposed use and the comments that were shared discussed the lack of a traffic impact analysis. So, staff would like to clarify that submittal of the TIA, a traffic impact analysis, is a discretionary part of the application submittal, not an approval standard, and the staff findings for transportation system are found in pages 39 through 44 of the staff report and then additionally supplemental findings are in the staff memo dated from 02/04/2026. And if I may just a second I'll get you the title of that attachment. PCM, that attachment.

And then additionally the applicant as I mentioned previously has volunteered to submit a traffic impact analysis per the condition of approval number 15 in the staff report. We also heard some concerns about noise and the compliance with comprehensive plan goal six, section four and concerns about a noise study not being submitted as part of the application. So, again a noise study is a discretionary part of the application submittal and not considered an approval standard. These findings for noise are on pages sixty two and sixty three of the staff report and findings addressing the comprehensive goal six are found in the staff memo from February 2026. Again, exhibit PCM and as well as in the beginning of the staff report.

And then again, per the testimony that was received the applicant has volunteered to submit a noise study per condition of approval number 17 that was included in the staff report. Additional, so some more recap. So we heard some concerns about the geotechnical engineering about a previous man made landslide that was created at the site during the construction of I-two 05 in the late 1960s. A map was submitted from the state of Oregon by the public and we would like to just emphasize that these maps are informational in nature and not a regulatory map. And then also just to sort of reiterate the applicant submittal, there is a complete geotechnical engineering report that was submitted previously.

No revisions to that were made, but that was included as part of the submittal with methodology of their findings and exactly what was studied there on the site and there is acknowledgement of the previous landside in that report. So findings for the geotechnical engineering are found page 52 of the report and points one hundred thirty four and five of the staff memo from February 4, that's again attachment PCM. And, additional geotechnical engineering findings are on, page sixty nine and seventy of the applicant's narrative which is attachment PCA and the clarification memo that I had mentioned earlier that the applicant had prepared after the hearing on February 4 entitled PCO. And then also would like to mention that there's a condition of approval number 12 that would require a final geotechnical engineering report prior to building issuance. This is a standard process here at the city for development projects that require this this level of engineering.

We just wanted to point that out. And to touch and then we also heard testimony on zoning on property and so the city has included zoning maps, the existing zoning map and the existing comprehensive plan map showing that the property is zoned r 10 residential on the zoning map and, identified as low density residential in the comprehensive plan map as well. We're also testimony on tree removal and preservation. So comments were brought up regarding heritage trees designations. So we just wanted to clarify some things.

A heritage tree is defined in our local code, our local municipal code with certain parameters. No heritage trees have been found on this site or were found on this site. So, in its entirety the tree related findings are pages 44 through 48 of the staff report and then additionally you can find findings from the applicant on pages 57 through 59 of the narrative and tree preservation plan, that is part of the exhibits as well. Condition of approval number eight would require protective fencing around specific trees that have been identified to be retained and condition of approval nine would require on-site monitoring of the development by an arborist during construction. Okay?

And then additionally there were comments regarding the natural resources, the wetland, and the stream identified on-site and the findings for these are on pages 12 through 23 of the staff report and then supported by findings on page 14 of the applicant's narrative and the water resources area report that was included as part of the applicant's submittal that identifies these water resources on the property and provides analysis for them, as well as the wetland delineation report that was part of the applicant submittal. Condition of approval number 15 would require the applicant to submit for final approval from the Department of State Lands, excuse me, it would require an approval from the Department of State Lands to be submitted to the city for installation of the required mitigation plantings. This is a standard issue approval that happens when there are impacts to a resource area as part of a development. More testimony was heard regarding the stormwater management on the facility. There were concerns about the capturing of the stormwater and maintenance of the stormwater system.

So, to recap and reiterate, there was a storm water and grading plan that was included. This is exhibit PCD. These were included as part of the applicant's package, the applicant's submittal. The findings for these, the staff findings for these were on pages fifteen, fifty two, and 64 of the staff report and additional findings are on pages fifty nine and seventy three of the applicant's narrative. Condition of approval 10 would require submittal of a final stormwater report prior to issuance of building permit.

Again, this is a standard building permit process here done at the city. And then also there was testimony regarding the previous purchase of the property. I believe it was in twenty twenty, twenty twenty one. So, I believe it was brought into the record at the February 4 hearing, but there was an attachment for the agenda bill from the City Council at that meeting in it looks like 2021 indicating the purpose of the property being purchased and then there was also background information provided by the applicant team as part of their memo that was submitted after the February 4 hearing providing more context as to the reasons for the purchase and so on and so forth. And so now I'd like to go into some of the approval standards for the conditional use permit that you'd be hearing tonight.

So, are laid out in chapter 60 of our development code. So, these are the seven criteria that would be that are analyzed or required during a conditional use permit review. So, these can be found on finding 60 through 65 of the staff report and the first one is deeming that the site and dimensions are adequate. So, in this case, staff believes the site is suitable and adequate size for the proposed facility. And number two, the characteristics of the site are suitable.

So, the site and facilities are located away from other uses. The nearest building is 300 feet away and substantially lower elevation 20 to 30 feet lower than the existing, than the uses above it. So, topography below, site topography is below the grade of Salamo and provides a visual and auditory buffer from the nearest uses and the building design took out into the site's natural features while they were designing this. And then the geotechnical report and all of the technical reporting that was included as part of the applicant submittal outlined here, the water resource report, the storm water report, the tree preservation plan, the geotechnical report have all deemed that this proposed project can be constructed safely and efficiently. And to get into more of the standards here, so number three, the development would provide overall benefit to the city.

So, moving the existing functions from the current operation site off of Norfolk Street, This would allow for consolidation of the existing dispersed material and equipment storage. It happens at multiple locations right now throughout the city and this would all be consolidated onto this one site allowing for more effective and efficient public services. And this would reduce the need to travel around the city for various materials when some sort of project is needed or emergency occurs. Additionally, number four, so adequate public facilities would be available or can be made available so the site is within an urbanized area, all necessary utilities and facilities are easily accessible and could be tied into with relative ease for construction. And then number five, the applicable requirements of the zone are met.

So, as mentioned previously, this is an R10 zoning and the proposed use of public support facility is a conditional use within the R10 zone. And then number six, Chapters 52 through 55 of the CDC and CDC 92.01 E are met. So, findings for facilities adequacy are addressed under Chapter 55. These are findings fifty four and fifty five of the staff report and the supplemental memo that was provided, exhibit PCM. Also, findings for the zone are addressed in Chapter 11 in the staff supplemental memo, Exhibit PCM.

And then chapters fifty four and fifty five are applicable and findings for those sections are in findings 31 through 59 of the staff report and again the staff supplemental memo exhibit PCM. And last, for the conditional use. So, the use would comply with the applicable policies of the comprehensive plan. So, findings addressing the comprehensive plan compliance are found at the beginning of the staff report. I believe it's page four.

So, many of the comprehensive plans are not approval criteria and many are implemented through the compliance with the Community Development Code, just as a reference or a refresher here. And then comprehensive plan goal six, section four was addressed separately. This is on page sixty two and sixty three of the staff report and in the staff memo dated on February 4. Again, attachment PCM. And then we'll go into some of the water resource area permit and this deals with the wetlands and the streams that are located on-site.

So, these can be found on findings number four through 17 in the staff report. There is a 65 foot buffer that applies to existing wetlands and that is required. So, the existing wetland A that was shown earlier on the site plan essentially near the center of the site at the lower portion. There are permanent impacts proposed to that, to the buffer area of that Wetland A and this is where Building E would be proposed. This is where the dewatering, deicing and sandbagging area would be.

Also, there's an existing stream on the site identified as Stream 1. It's two twenty five linear feet long and at the southwest corner of the site. There are permanent impacts to Stream 1 buffer proposed from this project due to the road construction to the lower fleet area for the maintenance portion of the operations facility. And then just to mention that Stream 1 was identified through the water resources report that was done as part of the applicant submittal, but previously it was not identified on any of the city's adopted environmental or water resources maps. So, on the site, the total permanent impacts to these buffer areas would equal 15,120 square feet per the Chapter 32.09 which is the water resource area, vegetation to be created, enhanced, or restored as a result of these impacts would need to equal five square feet for every one square foot that is permanently disturbed.

So, as proposed the applicant is showing 7,560 square feet of mitigation plantings within Wetland A as a result of those permanent impacts. So, Chapter 55 is the design review section of this application. Those findings are on number 32 through 59 of the staff report and a tree preservation plan, an arborist report was submitted and as shown here the applicant is showing to retain 40% of non significant, 44% of significant trees totaling 46% of the existing trees on the site. And just to note that this project site is heavily wooded and is about 50 to 60 feet lower elevation from Salama Road and the neighboring homes to the north. Additionally, parking that is provided is shown in the applicant's submittal and they'll be providing a total of 96 spaces.

So, 45 of those would be for visitors and employees and then 51 would be for operations of the facility or fleet parking of maintenance related vehicles. And then finally, the geotechnical engineering report that was submitted as part of the applicant submittal. So, provided site specific boring analysis, test pits, site drainage, soil conditions, etc. Seismic hazards were analyzed in section five of the geotech report and the report concluded that the site is suitable for development of the proposed facility. I would like to mention that tonight you may be hearing from or you may have questions for the engineer that prepared this as well as other members of the applicant team that are here to answer any questions you may have regarding some of the reports that were included as part of the applicant submittal.

And that would conclude what I have started here tonight. I'm happy to take any initial questions that you may have about the additional memos and supplemental findings, maybe public comments that were received. So, I'm happy to take any questions right now and possibly maybe even provide clarification on some of the most recent comments and responses from staff that were done. So, thank you for listening.

Are there any brief clarifying questions of staff before we move on to applicants presentation? Thank you very much.

And if I could share just I've been asked by Aaron to just summarize briefly our memorandum that we submitted earlier this evening, Exhibit T, which responds to some of the comments that were received after close of business last night. And you have that exhibit in your packet. The first argument is that the city is required to submit a TIA, a traffic impact analysis, with its application, not as a later condition of approval. Drawing on Ashley's summary at the beginning of the presentation tonight, application criteria are distinct from approval criteria, and so that is a function of city staff review, whereas the decision maker of the Planning Commission reviews the approval criteria to either deny or approve the land use application. And in this case, the code states a traffic impact, and I'm emphasizing, may be required to be submitted with a land use application, emphasis added on the land use application.

So therefore, a traffic impact analysis would be required as a component of the land use application, not as an approval criterion. In this particular case, SAP did not require a TIA and so therefore the Planning Commission may not make the decision on the application based on whether or not the TIA was submitted. However, just for the Planning Commission's benefit, even if the particular code provision allowing for submittal of a TIA when certain standards are present was an approval criteria and the City would still not be required to perform a TIA. And the reason for that is that the purpose of that section, so again purpose statement, is to implement the statewide planning goals, specifically the transportation planning rule, Oregon Administrative Rule six sixty Division 12. And the purpose of that rule is in order to apply conditions to development proposals order to minimize adverse impacts to and protect transportation facilities.

And so in the case of 85.17 at SEC, it provides a potential trigger for optionally requiring a TIA as two fifty average daily trips. However, the purpose of a TIA is to determine whether or not the land use in question generates sufficient impact on the transportation system to require public improvements in order to mitigate for that impact. In this case, there's evidence in the record in Exhibit PCM that the adjacent transportation facility, Salamor Road, is fully improved for the transportation system plan and both operates at a level of service A out of D in both the current and future years of the TSP, meaning that no improvements are identified or warranted on Salamor Road. As such, a TA is not needed to reach the same result. Further, as noted in the applicant's transportation assessment, exhibit PCE, the trips associated with the existing facility were below the two fifty trip recommended threshold on two of the three count days.

The three day average was only six trips in excess of that two fifty number. I think importantly also the weekday PM peak hour trip, which is generally the time of transportation that has the most impact on the system, averaged only seven outgoing trips from the site, which would result in a negligible effect on the transportation system. Meaning that even if there were potential transportation impacts that needed to be mitigated, it would be unlikely that this particular development would have enough trip generation to meet Nolan Dole and Kuhn's requirements to actually implement further improvements. And then lastly, as noted in the applicant's oral testimony, the trip count did not account for trip reduction that would occur from the consolidation of the material and equipment storage that currently is spread out across the city into this one site. And so that trip generation estimate of two fifty would be actually reduced by fewer trips going here and there to get materials like the applicant said in the testimony a snow plow for example.

And so therefore, staff recommends that the Planning Commission recognize that the DTA is not an approval criterion for this application and approve the application overall on its own merits. Second point that was raised was CDC 50 five-seven-zero-two H regarding the sound study, and so the contention is that the land use proposal is expected to generate noise that may exceed DEQ standards and therefore a noise study is required. However, that statement is not supported with any evidence in the record and to the contrary, the existing operation site does not exceed DEQ noise standards and is currently located closer to noise sensitive uses that is other residential properties than the current facility would be. In addition to the distance as noted by the applicant, the proposed facility would be buffered from noise sensitive uses other surrounding residences by buildings, vegetation, topography as identified in Exhibit PCM. Lastly, there is no evidence in the record of any specific noise generating use or activity that is suggested to exceed DEQ standards.

However, the applicant is still offering to voluntarily conduct a noise study in good faith. The next contention that was raised is CDC Chapter 5.03 C regarding the zoning map and so the claim there is the zoning was done incorrectly. The support for this claim is no evidence other than a remark from mister Goodell. And so his comments were intended to generalize about the rezoning process and not specific to the subject site. And so in the record, you have the city zoning map which identifies the subject property as being zoned residential r 10.

The other thing that I wanted to address is the kind of dovetailing off of that is the additional testimony submitted by mister Mike Capigan this evening, which provides the same zoning and comprehensive plan maps in the record, as well as a copy of the land use decision for a minor partition from 2021, 2022 that created a single lot partition that basically effectively vacated part of the I-two 05 right of way and created property which then became part of the subject lot that is the subject of this application. And so that particular land use decision in the staff report it indicated which I think is an incorrect conclusion that the property as formerly right of way was unzoned and talks about

their

conclusion, which is again not it's not a finding, it's just a summary, it's not based on code, is that the because of the fact that the property was right of way that it was unzoned and that their conclusion is that they would need to go through some sort of amendment process like a comp plan zoning map amendment to apply land use designations and applicable zoning to the entirety of the parcel. However, I believe that they did not take into account Community Development Code Chapter 5.04 which is titled Determination of Zoning Boundaries and includes due to any reason if there's uncertainty, contradiction, or conflict as the intended location of district boundaries, determination of boundaries are determined by the planning director in accordance with several guiding principles, which include that boundaries indicated as approximately following the center lines of streets, highways, and alleys should be construed to follow center lines. Boundaries indicated, and this would apply in this situation I think as well, indicated as approximately following platted lot or parcel lines will be construed as following lot or parcel lines. And then also whenever any street is fully vacated, the lands in those boundaries therefore attach to and become part of lands adjoining such street, the lands formerly within the vacated street shall automatically be subject to the same zoning designation that is applicable to the lands which it attaches, which is exactly the case here.

The property was taken out of right of way and turned into property. And, the other thing that I'll add to that is that, as you can see from the remainder of the zoning map that's in the record, the city zoning boundaries are normally and customarily understood to extend to the centerline of rights of way. They're not shown as as ending at the property lines. And so, for whatever reason in the drawing of this particular zoning map, the entirety of 205 is shown as being unzoned, but that's that's not accurate. The zoning boundaries follow to the centerline of 205 for the entirety of it, not just specific to this property.

But I think that because of the need for negative space on the map and otherwise shows 205 as looking kind of small, if you will, they chose to use use a negative white space in this particular map. So for those foregoing reasons, staff believes that the property is properly zoned r 10. And so that is the supplemental finding to the zoning map in that particular CDC chapter. And then the last one? So then turning to the last couple of points approval standards.

So the argument in that case is the proposed facility will not provide an overall benefit to the city as required by Chapter 60 conditional use criteria. And so in support of this claim, there's Slido, Dagami and Westland natural hazard mitigation maps showing a landslide susceptibility threat for the property and an argument that no other public entity wanted to buy the property because of the risk. However, as previously addressed in exhibit PCM, the previous staff findings, those maps are not regulatory and by and large contain notes in the legend that the determinations on the map are not site specific, and so it shouldn't be taken as dispositive. The applicant in this case has provided site specific geotechnical analysis, which is exhibit PCJ, demonstrating that the site is safe to build on and is not subject to the risk of future landslide. In addition, as provided in oral testimony by the applicant at the previous hearing, the previous landslide on the property was man made.

And then further, there's a July 2020 ODOT document which says that the city plan to use the property to build a city shop. I'll just note there that ODOT's assessment does not serve as definitive evidence contrary to the applicant's own stated intent for the site. So the applicant intends to use the site for vehicle service and maintenance along with other maintenance operations. Obviously, Citi is not bound by what ODOT's conclusion of the Citi's purpose for it. So in other words, the intent may change and evolve from their original purpose statement, which is clearly the case here.

And then lastly, to that end, as noted in the City's own agenda bill in deciding whether or not to move forward with the purchase of the property, which is Exhibit PCR, and you're provided at the last hearing, the Council voted to approve funds for acquisition with the specific statement that it was for the purpose of a City operations facility on the site, end quote.

And just a quick point to further drive that point home. I think there's ample evidence in the record of the city's intent to use this property for an operations facility. I mean, even just in this Exhibit four that we received today, there's a comment saying that the intention for this property is an operations facility in the future, and that was in 2021.

Thank you. And then moving to the last point under this particular criterion, there's citation to a geotechnical memorandum from ODOT from August 2020. However, as noted in the staff supplemental findings from February 4, Exhibit PCN, this memorandum does not provide evidence that relates to the specific approval criterion for the application, which is CDC fifty five one hundred B four, that the structure shall not be located in areas subject to slumping and sliding. ODOT's document was for their own internal use and clearly did not include any site specific geotechnical investigation and cursely concluded simply that this area has a history of slope instability without any evidence in support of that. And no mention of the man made landslide as well.

And then, as provided in the applicant's previous oral testimony, that the historical landslide was manmade. And then in their own site specific geotechnical investigation, which I've already mentioned, the site is not subject to something inciting and can be safely developed. In addition, the memo regarding whether to sell the property or not, which concludes, Before any sale of the requested property, ODOT would need to be assured the landside will remain stable. Ellipsis, Without those assurances ODOT should retain control of the property. And so, in conclusion there, if ODOT had not felt assured regarding the landslide list, they stated that they would not have sold the property to the city.

So it seems that they must have felt some assurance. Last point, going back to this distinction between purpose statements and approval criteria, the testimony that you received from last night cited to CDC thirty two zero one zero e, which is a purpose section of the WRA chapter of the development code, which talks about improving and protecting the function and values of the WRA. So, again, this is a purpose statement for the chapter and is not an approval criteria or criterion for the application. Each section of the chapter is generally understood to satisfy one or more of the specific purposes for the chapter. And so, while the City has demonstrated compliance with the applicable approval criteria of Chapter 32, thus, by extension, has satisfied the purpose statement of Chapter 32, it does not specifically need to demonstrate compliance with that section.

And that concludes my remarks on the supplemental testimony that we've received into the record. Are there any questions from the Chair or the Commission?

Commissioner Robbins. Thank you, Chair.

Just real quick, Mr. Gudai, thank you for your testimony. Your recommendations, there are six of them. I just want make sure that's what they are. There's only six staff recommendations, correct?

Are you

I'm not seeing the documents, Planning Commission hearing two eighteen continued, the city operations and then, like, your presentation you went through, I just want to make sure that these

The conditions of approval? Yeah. Yeah, so those were additional conditions of approval, the voluntary ones from the applicant and then I'm sorry, go ahead.

Yes, right. I just want make sure there was only the six is what you guys That's correct.

So in the, if I may, I didn't do this in the presentation, but on the staff report, the revised staff report, the revisions to the staff report were in reference to those revised attachments that were referenced throughout the staff report. And those revisions were gray color scaled, bolded and underlined in the staff report to show that these were the revisions done to the staff report just to indicate that there was no additional material or findings or evidence added to the record as part of that.

Thank you.

Thank you. Just to clarify your comment, Commissioner, there are overall more than those six conditions that are

Okay. So where do you guys have that all in one document? Because it's gonna

the the staff report as mister Goodall referred to.

So it would the the conditions of approval would start on page six of the staff report, and there are a total of 17 that are recommended. So they go from page six, seven, and eight of the staff report.

So the ones that are in your report from today are additional to the ones in your other one?

Additional and just revised based on the testimony that we received and the applicants' willingness or volunteering of the two technical reports.

So what what page would these that be on on your original?

There's on the

On your on your staff report.

On the staff report. So the revised ones, they start so

It's like 75 pages and

So at page seven of the staff report, so if you start on condition of approval number nine, you'll see some gray text.

Thank you.

I underlined it.

I I found it.

And then nine through 17 are the ones not through 17, but those are, the ones that were, revised or added after the February 4 hearing.

Thank you, Mr. Goodall. Thank you, Chair.

And just to make a quick clarifying point, I think in your presentation, the additional condition related to the traffic impact analysis was stated as being number fifteen sixteen. Number 15 is related to the mitigation plantings. Yes.

That's correct. Yes. Yes.

So just a real quick clarification. So it's the 17 and then the additional six?

There's 17 total for the entire the entire project, and then those six additional ones that were either revised or a portion of them were new conditions based on the applicants volunteering.

Thank you again. Thank you, Mr. Udall. Thank you, Chair.

Are there any further questions? Yes. Oh, Commissioner Wabotany, sorry.

Thank you, Chair. So I have a question on the traffic impact analysis. In other applications that we've had, TIAs have been required in neighborhoods with less traffic than this location. And also, we've we have had conditions where basically a fee could be required to the applicant to contribute toward better functionality of an intersection and I'm just trying to understand how we can make that sort of requirement if a TIA not a condition of approval.

So, couple of thoughts. I mean, one answer to your question as far as why would there ever be a TIA for fewer trips. I think the answer is that if there are potential improvements that could be identified through, you know, that there's potential improvements that need to be made that are specifically directly impacted by that development, like frontage improvements or something else. In this case, the frontage is fully improved and so there's not further there's not any further analysis that needs to happen. As far as the, like, other project bases, I mean, we provided notice of application to ODOT, which would have potentially a project in a proportionate share, but, I mean, they generally use a rule of thumb of 10% of the overall intersection volume, at which if it doesn't exceed it, they don't look at it.

And so I don't they didn't they don't provide comments when they don't have anything to ask for, so I don't I can't say for sure, but I mean and then as I mentioned in my oral comments, think that there's probably some question just given the low volume of traffic and the potential existing operational deficiencies whether or not you can actually correctly, legally, constitutionally hang a proportionate share on this application if that's the case. And so, I just think given the overall de minimis impact on the transportation system, I don't think that that would It wasn't identified through the process. The city doesn't have any projects. Like, I was thinking about like a by analogy, I think that there is like proportionate share for like the Willamette Falls Drive improvements on the roundabout, for example. I don't know if that's one of the ones you're thinking of, but there aren't any such projects here.

Adjacent transportation facilities fully built out.

I'm actually thinking about a specific project on Highway 43, well actually a subdivision off of Highway 43 and the, that is actually we just looked at that one again for an extension because of new ownership and I think there are 34 homes to be built and the access to 43 is through the neighborhood. That intersection has a proportional fee that was assessed against the original applicant. So, and that's at distance from the property, it's not fronting the property at all.

So the other thing I would note is that there's a different standard for TIAs to do with dwellings versus no dwellings. So you were just referencing a subdivision and you know this application does not include any sort of dwellings. So it's a different approval criteria in the city's code.

But there will be large vehicles, slow vehicles that will be turning into traffic on Salamo and going uphill, which would make them even take them even longer to merge into the speed.

Have applicants testify a little bit about that, but part of the improvements that exist include an acceleration lane for the site.

Okay. Thank you.

And I'll also note that fees are typically a fee in lieu for physical improvements on a site. I'm not sure if there was a fee that you were referencing or fee in lieu.

It would have been fee for costs on Highway 43. The one that I'm thinking of.

Commissioner Evans.

Thank you again, Chair. Mr. Goodell, thank you for clarifying the recommendations of approval. I apologize because it was taking forever to find them. I would have asked this earlier and familiarized myself with it in my prior question.

The planning department is recommending some pretty restrictive I would call them restrictive requirements for plantings. And I'm just wondering out loud how the Planning Department plans to enforce that, specifically related to testimony we heard previously where the Public Works Department was unwilling to meet the condition of use permit that was previously given to them regarding their trees. This is pretty specific about one inch of water per week. I mean, who's going to hold them accountable?

So that would be, the arborist that, the the city arborist that would be on-site to monitor these things. These are these were conditions that were proposed as part of the water resources review and the tree preservation plan. And frankly, these are fairly standard when there are these types of impacts on these water resources in the city. It typically would be a a staff member of the city or in this case, don't I don't know if we specify if it would be an applicant. So it says that the applicant would be responsible for the monitoring and maintaining all the plantings with the following practices, and then it would be up to us as city staff to enforce all of

these. Yeah. But I guess I guess if you if you I realize I'm putting you on the spot, and it's not your fault, I apologize for that. But if you the previous testimony that, you know, this public works was not willing to deal with the tree issue. And it seems like the city is responsible for policing the city and, you know, who's to hold them accountable?

Sure. So the the standard practice is for something like this is at during the construction of the site and then at the end of construction is sort of verification of these mitigation plantings to be up to the standard that has been outlined in the conditions of approval. So, those would be monitored during the construction and then at the end of the construction to verify the specific plantings, the square footage in this case, and if they're dying or you know appropriate plantings. So that would happen at essentially the end of construction and during the construction process. If

I can also just add to address that point. Mean, I guess what I'm asking is

who from your team is gonna tell them to do what we told them to do?

So I mean, partly what what Aaron's referring to is that it's it's Aaron that would implement it and that we would withhold building like the final certificate of occupancy sign off until we verified it. Also just point out in the case of the existing public works facility, granted not a criteria for approval of this application, The plantings were established quite well. I mean, it was it was built in 2015 and the plantings were put in. They failed in the ice storm of twenty twenty one.

Well, if you look

at the

pictures, if you look at the pictures, they they were dying. Every other picture showed a different one dying, a different one dying, and a different one dying. And it seems like nobody was willing to take care of it. And that's irrelevant because the question I was making, as I just pointed out a moment ago, who's going to tell the city that the city said to do this and the city governs itself? I

I think I think let's have the applicant testify a little bit more about the work that they're doing with the property owner to try to mitigate the situation. I think that, you know, again, I think the fact that shrubs grew to 15 feet tall tells you that it was it was successful for quite some time. I would say I I take your point about them dying and observe observe the same thing, but I mean, the ice storm took them out and then it's a very hard it's a sloped location. It's hard to put plantings back in, especially plantings of that size. And so I'll let the applicant speak to the good faith effort that they're making. But I mean, the answer is that they don't get the certificate of occupancy until they've met the conditions.

Okay, fair enough. As far

as ongoing maintenance, would just say, you know, if you feel like there's something insufficient in the code that isn't addressing this properly, you as a Planning Commission can always propose amendments to the code to address this further. So if you feel like there's something further that can be done to impose requirements on staff to enforce these requirements, please suggest it in a code amendment.

Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Was just going to counsel, could you lean a little closer or speak a little slower? I've been having a lot of difficulty hearing you most of the

time. Apologies.

Yes. No apologies. I'm just having a it would be helpful.

Is this better?

Better. Okay. Thank Perfect. Thank you so much. I think if there are no further questions, we will continue on to the applicant's presentation. Thank you. And you will have twenty minutes.

Yes. So we offered to the planning commission a hard copy of our submittal with our clarifications. And we also offered that to the the public as well. So good evening, planning commission, commissioners, chair, city staff, interested citizens, and neighbors. It's good to see you all again. We appreciate the opportunity to continue the discussion about our application. We heard questions and concerns from the commission and the public last time. We heard you. We're here. We understand the concerns.

The Public Works Operation Complex wants to be a good neighbor. So tonight, we would like to provide clarification information regarding our application and testimony from the last hearing. And so just by way of introduction, I'm Sid Scott, principal with Scott Edwards Architecture. We have, our team here tonight and, a number of them will be addressing, clarification items. And again, this is really clarifications.

It's not new information, but it's simply, clarifying the information that we had submitted. Okay. Here we go. So the items in terms of clarifications that we would like to address tonight, first is purpose and need for new public works operation complex. Second is the land acquisition history, intended purpose, and site selection. Third, the geotechnical engineering and site stability. Fourth is the storm water and water resource management. Five is construction parking plan. Six is existing operations complex versus new operations complex. Seven, facility generated noise study, and lastly, the traffic study.

So we will get all that here in the next twenty minutes. So here we go. Turn it over to the public works director.

Alright. Good evening. Eric Lias, public works director, City Engineer. Just wanted to go over a few quick bullet points on basically why we're here tonight presenting on a new operations complex. The current public works operations facility dates back to 1937. It's on a small two acre parcel located within a mix residential use of R 4.5 all the way up to R 10 and it served the city of approximately 2,000 people to its current population today of over 27,000.

Lynn, do

you have the I guess it's in the packet but the PowerPoint that had the pictures? Is that Okay. Okay. Okay. That's fine.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. We submitted with our additional application some photos of the current facility so. There's a couple of examples, our break room lunch room is not equipped for twenty four hour operations. You like to think of it as a fire station for certain events where folks are working around the clock, where you have places to cook and so on.

There's no quiet sleep rooms again for those long round the clock operations. Most of our crew comes from south of here, South Clackamas County, Moala Colton area, so in a snow ice event it's quite a commute, so having them gear up and be able to sleep and stay and have accommodations is what we're lacking. Our division team rooms as we call them are really just the supervisor, they meet in the supervisors offices with limited space. Locker room is well undersized, two showers you know there's certain duties in public works that require, could require showers after potentially getting into some sanitary sewer and so on. Undersized conference room, so you'll see the theme undersized.

Our fleet maintenance, again undersized, three undersized workbays not large enough to get a commercial vehicle up on a lift. Limited indoor vehicle and equipment storage, unheated bays, limit emergency response times and wear on equipment. This is a perfect example, when it's hovering around freezing, we have to dewater certain equipment so the pipes don't freeze up and break the equipment. It's also when we have water main breaks and so if we can't have access to that equipment right away it prolongs our emergency response. Not enough, actually I skipped one, unfinished restrooms, etcetera.

You'll see in some of those pictures there's unfinished rooms, not enough parking for staff, parks has quite a influx of seasonal employees in the summer time to help with all their events. That spills out into the neighborhood. After hours calls, again with all the fleet vehicles parked inside, some are with limited space, they're double parked and so if somebody needs a piece of equipment sometimes they have to move another one to get another one out. HVAC is old, needs replaced, the admin buildings, which is the newest one nineteen eighty nine, it's overcrowded. We have bird holes nesting in our wood siding, there's no dedicated office space for the crews to maybe do some online training to maintain their certifications, etcetera.

So it's kind of a little bit of examples of why we're looking to build a new facility.

That's great. Thanks, Eric, for the recap. It's important to remember why you're doing this. The next item I wanted to cover is the, site acquisition and site selection. As has been reported, the agenda bill twenty twenty one zero seven twelve o five went to the city council 07/12/2021 and with the intended purpose of acquiring the surplus property owned by Oregon Department of Transportation to be used for future construction of a new operations facility.

And that passed five to zero in terms of votes, so the property was purchased. The items in terms of consideration of that site, one is the site is located outside of a primary residential neighborhood and there is a significant natural buffer that's available between operation site and the neighboring residential area, so there's a nice buffer. The site is directly adjacent to primary bless you. The site is directly adjacent to primary snow and emergency service routes, which is a very important feature. The site is a is a developable parcel which is greatly exceeds the existing undersized operation site of two acres basically.

Just as a side note, we have done a dozen of these kind of operation facilities and they're typically five to six acres. So the city of Westland has been doing a lot with not much for a long time. The site has a close proximity to existing fire and police services located within the Willamette area, and the site has an assumed natural noise buffer for operations activity due to its proximity to I 205, and that'll be part of our noise study is to verify that. So that's some of the rationale on the selection process. I will turn it over to our geotech engineer to talk about the site.

Good evening. My name is Najib Kalas. I'm geotechnical engineer with Columbia Waste. Just gonna provide a quick geotechnical summary for the project. The project site is located in a large man man made landslide area that was triggered more than sixty years ago during the construction of I 205.

Please see the red de clouded area on the site plan. During the construction and excavation of the freeway, a weak thin layer of silt located between rock layers was exposed. This silt layer caused the hillside to slide. The State performed a major corrective work by removing the landslide debris, materials and constructing large embankments to stabilize the hillside as we see the brown hatch on the site plan. The ground surface was lowered significantly and the hillside visible today is not the same slope that fell in the 1960s.

The civilized hill has remained stable for decades. We have conducted extensive geotechnical work, site specific investigation including deep soil and rock borings, despots, seismic testing, groundwater monitoring and laboratory testing. Our investigation confirmed that the proposed building will sit on a flat bench of strong and stable basalt bedrock. Please see the blue hatched area on the site plan. The groundwater is a depth that will not impact the building foundation.

The weak set layer that triggered the original landslide remains below the hillside north of the site. However, that layer will not be disturbed exposed during our site grading which propose only filling in that area. The weak site layer, I'm sorry, our project intentionally avoids deep excavation in that area, that's the north portion of the site, so stability of the hill is not impacted. The site access road will be constructed as engineered fill. Please see the green hatch area on the site plan.

This fill acts as support at the base of the existing hill. It will increase the overall stability of the hillside north of the property. Building foundation will be designed to bear on structural fill and basalt. The Bisserian bridge will be anchored into the basalt using micropiles. The access road fill will be internally reinforced to remain stable during static and seismic condition.

That fill area is in green hatch on the site plan. In summary, the project doesn't rely on unstable soil for foundation support. The major structures will be founded on structural fill and basalt. The historic landslide materials were previously removed. The access road provides stabilization at the toe of the neighboring hillside north of the site, and the hillside will not be disturbed. Based on our investigation and engineering analysis which is site specific, the site is considered suitable for the proposed development. Thank you for your time.

Mr. Thanks

Sanjeev. Next up, we'll have our civil engineer talk about the stormwater and water resources.

Yes, thank you commissioners. My name is Alex Simpson. I'm a registered professional civil engineer with HHPR in Portland, Oregon. Site storm water, the existing conditions flow from the North towards the South to the Southwest area where there's an existing stream. Water then acrosses beneath a large culvert underneath the Interstate 205 Freeway and eventually like most areas in this area ends up in the Willamette River.

The proposed project will collect all impervious areas such as building roofs and pavement. All of those are piped underground with the blue lines you see on the exhibit towards the southern lower portion of the site where the water is filtered through a series of filter cartridges. The water is treated for things like sediment, heavy metals, oil. The clean water then goes into the larger rectangle at the bottom that has a large volume space to store and slowly release the water down into the stream in the southwest portion of the site at a rate that is equal to or less than what has been occurring on the site for decades and decades. So again, the post construction development of the site, stormwater meets the approval criteria by filtering it and then detaining it and releasing it at a rate that is less than or equal to the current conditions on the site.

As for water resources, the water resource area, our team of natural resource scientists did delineate the existing wetland in the Southeast portion and the existing stream in the Southwest portion. This project does not propose any impact, will not touch those resources. So the actual resource themselves, the wetland and the stream, completely untouched. However, the city does apply a 65 foot typically in some cases larger buffer to those which we are impacting and providing some mitigation for our impacts at the very perimeter of the buffer area. The existing wetland buffer is going to be replanted with new there's a lot of invasives there today, blackberry, English ivy that's going to be removed.

New native plants will be planted to enhance the wetland. In the southwest portion of the stream, the buffer area that is being impacted just so happens to be the bark chip area today. So again, because there's a 65 foot buffer, the very edge of the buffer happens to fall within the wood chip area and that is what we are disturbing some of the existing wood chips that are there today. Thank you.

Thanks, Alex. So next we'll have our contractor give you a recap of construction parking.

Thank you, Sid. Thank you, commissioners. Thank you for the opportunity to be here this evening. My name is Kimberly Larson. I am a project executive with Skanska USA Building, your general contractor.

I wanna briefly clarify the temporary use of the Salama Road acceleration lane during the first four weeks of project mobilization. This short period is needed only to install the erosion control, build and stabilize that access road, and establish safe internal circulation for construction equipment and for craft parking. Fewer than ton vehicles will be staged at any time, all fully contained within the 225 foot acceleration lane that is shown in yellow on the plan that you're seeing. It will not be on neighborhood streets, so there'll be no construction parking or staging on Green Street or on Barrington Drive. All construction access will come exclusively from I 205 via Salama Road.

During work hours, certified flaggers will be on-site, Monitored vehicle counts will be done. Scheduled deliveries will also ensure safe and controlled traffic flow, which will be important. We've also built in a contingency plan. If staging ever approaches that capacity, vehicles will be redirected to Kaufman Excavations office. It is three miles of the chlorophylls in Oregon City.

So if we have a that would prevent any possibility for spillover onto residential areas. And I wanna add as a twenty nine year resident of Westland myself, I am personally very sensitive to these concerns and how important it is to protect the character, the safety, and the calm of our neighborhoods. In summary, this plan is tightly managed. It is time limited in its operation, and it minimizes the off-site impact, protects the public, and the transition to the full on-site parking, which will happen as soon as that construction space is open. Skanska is committed to that responsibility for construction and to be a good neighbor throughout the process. Thank you.

Thanks, Kim. Next item is there was a question regarding the existing operations complex versus the new operations complex, so we just wanted to clarify that. The new operations complex is going to house the same number of staff from the water division, streets division, environmental division, which is sanitary and storm water, parks maintenance, and fleet maintenance. So those are all currently on that on the existing site. All groups currently report to and work out of that existing facility.

Any new trucks, vehicles, equipment that will be purchased will be replacement for existing equipment, which is per the capital replacement plan for the city. The additional acreage of the facility will allow for consolidation of approximately four satellite storage yards that the public works and parks maintenance utilizes overflow storage currently located in residential neighborhoods. So they will be consolidated on this site. And that will these consolidating the remote locations to the new facility will improve the efficiency by cutting down the back and forth trips and reduce impacts to the neighbors around them. So that's a little on the existing operations complex.

If you imagine, basically, we're gonna pick up the existing one and we're moving it to the new one, but just with a much bigger site and a modern facility.

Okay.

Next item we wanna talk about is the facility generated noise study. That is, again, something that we offered to provide. We heard the concern from the neighbors, and we wanna make sure we're really addressing that. So the study is gonna basically consist of measuring the sound levels at the current public works facility so that we're able to understand the decibel levels that are currently generated at the site. They then will test the decibel levels at the new, the proposed site as a baseline.

Then they will build a sound model where they will be able to interpolate the sounds from the existing site to the new site, and then be able to interpolate the decibel levels to the property line. So we'll get a good reading on what actually will be there in terms of decibel levels along the property lines, noise levels. Just a side note, that existing site's been in a residential neighborhood right in the smack of a residential neighborhood for many years and talking to staff for at least the last thirteen years. They know that there has been no violations from DEQ or anybody in terms of sound. So I think a good neighbor they have been.

Okay. Last item is traffic study, and we've got, mister Bell online, our traffic engineer, to give you a brief overview of what he's, going to be doing.

Good evening, everybody. Matt Bell with Kittleson and Associates. And we touched on this subject a couple of things, but I'll just quickly state that we understand there continue to be some concerns about traffic and a willing to accept as a condition of approval traffic impact analysis. So that traffic impact analysis will evaluate existing and future traffic conditions with and without the operations complex. It'll take a look at the location, the safety, and the site distance of the side access driveway. And identify any transportation related impacts, potential mitigation measures. We should be able to do the study relatively quickly, and I'd be happy to answer any additional questions folks have related to traffic. Thanks.

Thanks, Matt. So that concludes our portion with our clarifications and we're happy to answer questions, provide more information, whatever we can do.

Commissioner Dietz. Hi. Yeah. So I just had a question about the technical report, the geotechnical report. I don't know a lot about engineering standards, but I was trying to get a grasp on the it's the minimum seismic margin, the FS, the factor of safety is a 1.1, which I understand is the minimum industry threshold. But considering the potential for, like, Cascadia earthquake and stuff like that, do you think that maybe that should have been more conservative? And just for the safety factor, it looks like FS, the 1.1 means a collapse is unlikely and movement is expected and allowed. Can you talk about that?

Yeah sure, that's a great question actually. So there are standards for factor of safety. You will follow typically ODAT standard procedures. So it will be like under static condition and seismic condition. And what is a slope doing? Is it supporting a melding? Typically if it's supporting sectional you increase the factor of safety, the standard would be 1.5. You could reduce it sometimes to 1.3 under static condition, depends on the location of the slope and what's the impact of the slope on the development. For the seismic, it is standard to go with 1.1 factor of safety. So that is like industry standard.

You could, like you said, you could be conservative if you want and you could increase the factor of safety, then you have to do further slope mitigation. So you could there are engineering method to increase it to see 1.3, 1.4, whatever you want, but at a cost. So just to answer your question, it's a standard industry to follow these values for required factor of safety. But you could increase it, like you said, if you do other means of improvement. And for example, to your point, on the North Slope, that green hatched area, we actually using reinforced slopes, so it's not just soil.

We are going to use GeoGrid, strong geosynthetic material. It's gonna be installed horizontally to reinforce the slope and hold it as one mass to increase both static and seismic. Hopefully that answer the question.

I I I just wanted to add one thing. I mean, as the architect, we don't get to talk all about the geotech and all of that. But we're very excited because the buildings are gonna be founded on basalt, which is incredibly stable and makes for an excellent base for the buildings. And I think we also wanna just reiterate the point that with the work that we're doing and Najeeb has pointed this out, we're actually improving the stability of that site through where we're placing the buildings, building the road that's gonna be a buffer against the slope. So we see it as an improvement.

Thank you. Commissioner Evans was first. You did. We have a number of questions. Thank you.

We are ready. Thank you, Chair. Just to piggyback off of Commissioner Deese's question for the geotechnical engineer. Have you considered a cascading subduction zone event and how that would impact this site?

Yeah. We use so we actually take, you know, horizontal acceleration. We apply it to one stop model. We we consider the seismic. In fact, for this project, we did site specific seismic at the site. So we did test. It's basically essentially calculating shear wave velocity for the top 100 feet profile of the soil to come up with site specific response analysis under seismic event, and that is incorporated by the ASC seven twenty two.

Okay. Thank you. I have one more follow-up if I could. So to the design architect, did you guys design any earthquake resilience to this building?

Yes, so it's built as a resilient building, category four. Okay. And again on basalt. Okay.

Alright.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you. Commissioner Kaczorowski.

Thank you. I have a question for Mr. Callis. You have said previously that the landslide that was referenced in the last meeting was human caused. And I wonder if you have further insight as to what went wrong, and do we do things differently now? What went wrong? I would just love a little more detail about that.

Yeah, that's actually a great question. So think about it historically, is it is like basalt flow, let's say 2,000,000 ago. That layer sat there for, you know, this basalt sat for, I don't know, hundreds of years. The table will be decomposed essentially by natural, you know, ice, rain, storm, heat. It breaks down into so it's, you know, texture. You get another volcanic eruption or another basalt flow on top of it. Now we have two layers with weak zone in between. That weak zone that that silt like material I'm getting close. Okay. Thanks. I speak loud,

so I forgot to stay back.

I used be a teacher assistant. Anyway, so that weak layer, when it's exposed, if you cut into it, essentially it tends to slide because there is no resistance force at the bottom of the slope. So it's really not circular rotational slope of failure, it's a planar failure. So it's actually come down along that horizontal path, if you will. So what happened at the 205, when they cut down, they made deep rock cuts, you can still see one west of the bridge actually.

If you're coming, you know, 205 South, on the right hand side, once you cross the bridge, you're gonna see that similar to that cut. They expose that sit layer and a rock, you know, mass starts sliding. And unfortunately, once the slide initiate at the bottom, there will be more successive failure going uphill. And there was a reservoir, I wasn't there, not this old. But my theory personally, if that reservoir according to the record, it cracked.

It's holding water, water came down from the reservoir differently undermine the slope further and cause more slide. And that slope is that bullshit slide. Actually, our project is as a very end of that slide. That's why we have that basalt shell for this building in a go. That's this is we drill borings, we did test pits, so we know exactly that area we hashed, that's the basalt area. The rest where we have the buttresses, that's where it fell.

So

do we have different technology now that tells us what is under the layers of soil? I guess what I'm wondering is, could that happen again? Or is our technology and our processes such that we're ahead of

that now?

Yeah, that's a good question. I think if you have this sheet, you could look and see. We went up above the site, actually. If you look at this corner, there's a boring. We went down about 140 feet to make sure when we are analyzing the slope stability, we know if there is a weak layer and we don't want to trigger or impact that layer. That's why I just printed one like standard cross section. So we could plot that weak zone and make sure we're not doing any excavation work, we're gonna impact that area. So that's good question, but essentially we can learn the lesson from the bad mistakes. We don't repeat it. If somebody comes and say, hey Najeeb, we're gonna cut this hill down and do something like, no.

So that core sample is something that they didn't do before?

To my knowledge, I'm not sure they did. We know there are a lot of boardings actually on the site, but specifically where we did our work, we did these core samples to make sure we don't have that simply up somewhere in our work or construction or excavation zone.

Okay.

So that's what's taken into consideration.

Thank you for that additional detail.

Yeah. No problem.

And so, for example, from a civil engineering grading standpoint, you know, Najeeb and his team told us, Alex, you cannot make major cuts on the site. When we're grading the site with our grading plans, you are not allowed to make large major cuts, you know, into the slope. And so we have not done that here on the project. We have made, you know, predominantly fills or minor cuts to avoid exactly what happened back then.

Commissioner Rotten, you're up.

Thank you. Looking at the geotechnical report, you've kind of answered some of my questions just with your presentation. But there's undocumented fill in depths one foot to 31 feet in 15 of the 18 borings. And so it sounds like by what you guys were talking about is the structures themselves are going to be on relatively undisturbed soils. And so those those borings that are the test pits or I guess it's beyond test pits, but those are in areas where the structures are not going to be.

Is that correct?

Yeah, that's correct. Yeah, so that site map shows actually the exploration is going to be all on basalt. The other areas which will be, which we have the fill, which is the old, you know, embankment fills. That's where you have pavement and you have, you know, some other improvement. It's not like, we don't call it like, it's not like sensitive, settlement sensitive structure. Yes. Essentially when we build the fill, we're going to consolidate the material. It might take, sorry, might take about two, three months to pave the site. By the time we are ready to pave the site, what we call the fill induced settlement has completed. So we look into that. The building is not consideration because they are built on basalt and structural fill.

Okay.

Okay. Thank you.

Commissioner Jones.

Thank you. I just had a question about the water storm water management report and the contact water cartridges. Tell me about that and why the choice of the cartridges, cartridge system? And this is not an area of expertise of mine, so small words.

Yeah, absolutely. So the most common ways to filter and treat storm water are either through soil media, which would be a vegetated planter type system. Right? So the water goes in and it filters down through the soil, and then it's collected, you know, at the bottom in in the rock in a pipe. In our site, building a vegetated facility is essentially infeasible because you're trying to cut, again, yeah, if you think of, you know, our steep site, and you're trying to cut a bathtub into the side of a hill, it's extremely difficult.

And as Najee pointed out, we want to avoid large cuts into the side of the hill. So we decided to go with the filter cartridge system. They're housed in a concrete vault. And inside of that vault, there's, I think in our case, I don't recall exactly, but I think there's 20, you know, or so cartridges that are approximately 18 inches in diameter, two feet tall. Those cartridges, water goes in, you know, again, kind of like your refrigerator filter cartridge. It goes through the cartridge, it filters out the contaminants, and then goes to the next stage in the system. And those cartridges are removable and replaceable.

And then that brings me up to the two things of like, what is or is it already budgeted what that cost is either annually, biannually?

Yeah, exactly. Yep. So those cartridges typically have a three to five year maintenance interval. It all kind of depends on specific sites. But yes, that is a maintenance cost that the city of Westland, the Public Works Department, every three to five years will need to swap out and replace those cartridges. Throughout the Portland Metro Area, there's a dozen vendors, you know, that come in and replace the cartridges and things like that.

Thank you. Then the word that keeps I see keep coming up in conjunction with them is proprietary. Is there a universal cartridge system like as we are seeing supply chains and issues with insolvency with multiple corporations recently, are there universal systems or universal cartridge systems?

That's a great point. I'm not aware there are multiple manufacturers that make cartridge systems. In this case, we've chosen a specific manufacturer that's been around for decades and is used I personally use them on dozens of projects. The word proprietary is because, yes, it's from a manufacturer that makes these cartridges versus a non proprietary system would be like a rain garden with soil. Did that answer your question?

Thank you. I think

one other point we want to make is that the public works team has the perfect equipment to maintain the system, and that was one of the factors Could as

you tease that statement out?

Yeah. I can thanks. Yep.

I was just

teeing it up for Alex.

Yeah. So, yes, as part of

the maintenance of these, the filter system as well as the detention chamber system that stores the water, you know, to release it at a slower rate. Over time, sediment, you know, can accumulate in the bottom of these systems. For a typical owner, getting the sediment out of the bottoms of these systems can be cumbersome, or they have to hire a third party to come in with a Vactor truck and vacuum and suck out the material out of the bottom of the the vault. In our case, it's a perfect scenario because the group that will be here, City of Westland Public Works, owns their own Vactor trucks. So they just simply tell, hey, staff, open the vault lid, vector, suck it out, and it's clean.

Thank you.

If that makes sense.

Mr. Robbins.

Thank you, Chair. Can you tell me if the project team has met with TVFR? Yes, we have. And then do you is does it just looks like your turning radius are kind of tight. Does it have they said they can indicate they can get down there on from the north of the site to the south of the site?

Yes. Yep. We've had multiple e mails and discussions with TVF and R and do have have had their review on everything from hydrant spacing, where the hydrants are located, where's the FTC, how are they going to turn around through the various areas. And so this site plan is fully vetted and approved by Twalton Valley Fire and Rescue.

Thank you so much. Thank Chair.

Commissioner Rotten.

Think it's been answered. Thank you.

I'm sorry, I didn't hear you.

I'm good. Thank you.

Commissioner Wabotany.

Thank you, Chair. I have a variety of questions, but I'll follow-up with, Commissioner Evans' question about TVF and R. Did TVF and R say anything about one way in, one way out?

No. They did not raise any concerns about the one entrance or exit point.

Okay. Going to back to the storm filter. I mean, that typically requires doing some downstream water quality sampling. Is there going to be a storm water management plan to document when and how often and analytes that will be considered? Those should all be tied into the storm filters that are used as well?

That's a yeah. That is a good question. Typically on projects that we see that require like monitoring are more industrial, what's called a a DEQ 1,200 z permit that require, yeah, ongoing monitoring, you know, every six months or whatnot. This project, because of the nature, because it's not an industrial process facility that that generates when I say industrial, I mean, you know, it's not a waste related use. It's not required to obtain a 1,200 permit.

But that being said, the maintenance interval, you know, for replacement of the cartridges, for example, yes, would be when essentially the flow rate of the cartridges is decreased. And so that's when, you know, maintenance would would come out to replace the cartridges.

So I've done some 1,200 z's on Yeah. For storm water on trucking facilities and and maybe it's a function of what what was being also managed in the truck yard, but but those were all required to have 1,200 Z permits. So I'm not sure how the city is expecting to get get by without having a similar level of regulation by DEQ.

Yeah. It's a good I don't have, unfortunately, the top of my list. DEQ does have a list of the sick codes and the nature of activity that occurs on the site and that those trigger the 1200Z permit. As mister Scott mentioned, our group and our team has done multiple half dozen at least public works facilities specifically for other local jurisdictions, which none of those also triggered a 1,200 z permit. But I'm not sure how to get follow-up clarification back to you on that since I don't have the documentation in front of me.

Right. Okay. And I guess part of my concern is that the discharge is into a stream and not to a city sanitary sewer, where it would go to a treatment plant. So that's my concern. I I understand it's gonna go through the storm filter, but

Yeah. Which is the k you know, predominantly all storm sewer goes to either a municipal storm system, right, which eventually ends up in a water body, whether it be a a stream or a lake, ultimately, you know, the the Lima River. Sending

to

a sanitary sewer, right, would be inappropriate because we don't wanna send tons and tons of storm water to be treated by the sanitary sewer. I guess all all I can say sorry, to to summarize my thoughts is that the storm filter units are a recognized and approved method to treat storm water per the city of West Linn's storm water management manual, and are also, in case it helps, are also approved in all other local jurisdictions such as clean water services, water environment services, like Oswego, Tiger, Beaverton, for example.

Right. Okay. Let's see. You know I guess, I'll go back to the geotechnical report. And so in the report, this is I'm looking for a number.

Well, it's appendix e, and so a few pages in, there's a section on landslide, And I know when I read through the report that there were three cross sections that were looked at. And the one that's closer to the entrance, or what would be the proposed entrance, It's the text says under the landslide section, says the only slope in our analysis that did not have a factor of safety of 1.1 under pseudo static loading was a marginally stable factor of safety equal to one point o fill slope considered in cross section three. The fill slope will support a portion of the proposed access road near Salama Road. Based on the topography in the vicinity of the cross section results of our analysis, slope displacement under seismic loading is unlikely to involve a considerable volume of soil or impact any existing or proposed structures. However, it is possible that under seismic loading the slope could displace enough to adversely impact trafficability of the access road.

And so I guess that comes back to the point that Commissioner Dietz raised on the factor of safety and that it doesn't sound as if slope stability factor of 1.1 is adequate and that the city will have to beef up the roadway in that area to eliminate the possibility of a cascading subduction zone quake causing a slope failure.

Sure. Can I please confirm what's the date on that report, the one you're referencing?

It's from

I just want to make sure you have the revised report, which we issued It I think January

is looks I think it's 01/26/2026.

01/20/2026. Yep. So essentially what we are doing, we are reinforcing the slope to increase that factor of safety. So, there are different methodology to increase it, but one of those will be to add geo grid. We have to re finalize the analysis after we get basically, essentially, I don't want to get too technical, but once we know what's important material build the slope, we could actually finalize that analysis. Because now we make assumptions based on general material type. Once the contractors tell us what material they're using, we could reanalyze that stability and decide the spacing, the type, and the length of the geogrid to get to factor of safety 1.1 under seismic condition.

So is that the purpose for this the follow-up geotechnical study?

Yes. So so that study based on assumed soil parameters, and essentially we need an actual submittal of the material so we could actually redo that analysis. Again, it's not going to be redoing the whole, it's just essentially you would say, okay, we need to get this type of geo grid. This is how long is this spacing. For example, in our initial analysis, we assumed three feet vertical spacing. We could change it to one foot, two feet. Depends on what the math and the analysis tells us. Does that make sense?

Okay. And so you think a geogrid is provides adequate stability for a magnitude nine earthquake?

Yeah. That's correct. Yeah. Essentially, it's gonna intersect the slide plane.

Okay.

So, yeah. So it's like building retaining walls like you see sometimes MSC walls on even state highways or freeways. It's the same idea, except for in this case we're not building a wall, we're just stopping the slope and reinforcing the whole slope with geo grid, you know, material.

Okay. Okay. I just wanted, and this is a question maybe for staff as well, in the community development code CDC 32.05 D, and that that part of the code references the review of soil maps and doigami maps, the Department of Geology and Mineral Industries maps from the state, and that those are that those are sufficient or can be used for conditions of review approval for for slope hazards in West Linn. It's in our code. And then it goes on to say that geotech studies may be required to demonstrate that the proposed development will not cause or contribute to slope failure.

And the geotech studies shall include all necessary measures to avoid or correct the potential hazard. So right now we don't know what that what those measures are to avoid or correct a potential hazard. But the second geotechnical investigation would tell us what that would be. What corrective measures would be.

Yeah, correct. It's not investigation. We just so at this point, the geotech report has a table under slope stability. It shows the listed factor of safety. All of them should be under 1.1 for seismic and under like say, let's say 1.3 or 1.5, depends on the location of slope for static. What we need to do is essentially before when the project essentially goes almost to construction phase, we need to revisit the layout of the GeoGrid. So, the methodology will be the same, but depends on the material. Is it reject rock? Is it crushed rock? So, depends on the material property.

So, once we get submittal from the contractor, we could look at the material property and decide that geo grid layout, how it need to be adjusted to be this factor of safety. So really we made assumptions in the report because the project's not even, we don't even have anything into construction. We had to make some assumptions to see if this option is feasible. And the analysis shows you could work with methodology to have a stable slope. But we have to, just to clarify, we have to revisit the analysis once we know the material type which is to be used for fill.

That's for two areas shown on the site map, Especially the main entrance road, which is a green hatch area. And we have short, you know, step Okay. Down

So are there any other corrective measures, possibilities that if your studies indicate that the GeoGrid wouldn't be adequate?

The GeoGrid so the study we did, it shows the GeoGrid would be adequate based on these factors of safety. Okay. Sometimes if we when we get the actual material, if we believe the material properties are weaker, the proposed fill material, import material properties are weaker than what we assumed in our analysis, then we have to come back, we do the analysis, and likely have to come up with longer geogrid, potentially even stronger because they have a grade change even the vertical spacing. It could be, again, it could be foot and a half, two feet, three feet. It's a limited amount of changes you could make to meet the stability.

As far as for the walking bridge, that bridge is going to be supported on basalt on the south side. On the north side, it's fill. Therefore, we recommended micropiles, which is drilled pile foundation, which is to be anchored down to basalt to support the bridge.

Okay. Thank you. One more question on the GeoGrid. So the numbers that come out of testing for the GeoGrid and based on new product. Do you ever use numbers from studies that show weathering rates of the geogrid?

Because it's basically, it's a polymer. I mean it's usually HDPE. And so over time that's going to weather. There's very little volatiles in it, but that can come out of the plastic. And that's what you're relying on is basically plastic sheeting with holes in it?

Yes. That's a good question, actually. So when we take the material we're going to use, there are actually reduction factors. I don't have copy of it, but like there will be reduction for degradation with time essentially. So you take that strength and you reduce it for multiple factors. So that will reduce the strength and that strength will be used for the design. So it's a standard to reduce the strength of the geogrid by having these reduction factors. That's a great question. It's used all the time like for the tank wall design or reinforced slopes.

Yeah, okay. Thank you. Many years ago I managed a geosynthetics laboratory and we tested those materials. That was like forty years ago, so.

Yeah, no, that's great. Yeah, there is, I think, about three or four reduction factors you actually take into account when you look at the tensile strength of the geogrid, and you reduce it to account for this degradation. So you're not under designing.

Okay. Thank you.

No problem.

Commissioner Watton, I believe you're just

That is okay. I remember where I was going. And this kinda goes back to we're on you, obviously, with the geotechnical stuff. So so just one thing that I was looking at because you were talking about some deep my concern is that there's deep fill. And the deep fill to me sounds like as it shows here that that's mostly going to be where the street road improvements are.

And it's talking about deep foundations. But to me it sounds like what you're saying with basalt that you with your current study that you don't see that there will be any structure on any of the deep fill. Is that is that true?

Yeah. That's correct. The settlement sensitive structure, which are the buildings, the main buildings, they're gonna be on basalt.

And and I know you okay. Just I'm I know you've said it a number of times. Just wanna make sure that I understand that.

That that is correct.

So because obviously, and you even stated in your summary that it's an economical situation for deep foundations and things like that are having to come back. I mean, so with with the roads and the the undocumented fill that we're talking about, is there gonna be requirements to excavate to undisturbed in some of the proposed road improvement areas?

Yeah, that's a good question. So that's actually I could answer your question when we go to construction. They will have contingency costs for repair of soft areas or removal of unstable material. So essentially, when you cut the road, you're going to evaluate on the actual condition, and you might end up excavating some areas locally to stabilize the road. So that's very standard, even with native soil, not even with just this is essentially it's undercommitted fill, but we know it's buttress fill, it's embankment.

Essentially it's a crushed gravel with some fines in it. So maybe 85% the gravel and crushed rock and 15% fines, daxil and clay material. But when we go to construction, there will be some excavation repair. So we're gonna say cut it and Yeah.

And I and I get that. I just what concerns me is when I see, you know, 31 feet below ground surface. And I think there was even somewhere else in your report that it said as much as 49 feet. Yeah. It says four 49 feet of fill.

And that's I understand that that's man made fill that was probably pretty nice, you know, a lot of rock and stuff like that. But the fact that it's it's undocumented and it's not engineered fill, that's that's a big contingency in my mind as far as if if you have to go down. I mean, it's one thing if you're putting a foundation for a structure in there and you decide to do pilings, whatever that looks like for deep foundations. But is there a deep foundation for the roads or the streets?

Yeah, you don't need that. Typically, the influence zone of wheel load, like heavy truckload, would be about three feet. So you're adding You have your pavement say, I don't know, four or five inches, you have base rock and then you stabilize that soil below. So there is a limit, you could maybe fix one or two feet. That's very standard for pavement. You don't have to go down. That's a good question. If you're on building, you're right, then you might say, okay, need piles or I need the ground improvement to support the building. But for pavement is totally different application. So you don't go as conservative with, I guess, with the civilization work. Yeah. No. That makes sense?

That makes that makes a lot of sense. I appreciate it.

Yeah. No problem.

I think we should also clarify that during construction, we will have the geotech on-site to observe the excavation, making recommendations, very normal part of construction.

Commissioner Evans.

Thank you, Chair. For your civil engineer over there, there's a on your sheets C1 and C2, you know, when the road starts at the north and curves down between Building A and that curve, there's this elliptical looking rectangle that is the line type is like a dash and a circle, a dash and a circle, a dash circle. And I was hoping to see if you can clarify what that is. Is that on your legend?

I think if I think that

I'm following you, the dashed line that's shown kind of around the

No. No. No. This right here.

Area is is the limit of grading. So so we're doing work within those dashed or, you know, either inside or outside depending on how you look at it. But that's the the where the dash line is is where the grading stops.

So that's ungraded area? Yeah, ungraded area,

like undisturbed, we're leaving it alone. Most of those areas are filled with trees. We're retaining, you know, a significant amount of trees in there.

I get the impression it might be some sort of fence or that you were trying

to Oh, no, sorry. Yep. No, that's just like no work in there.

Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

Yeah, exactly. Yep.

Commissioner Dietz. So on this next report that's going to come out, is there going to be, like, a displacement analysis or anything like that that's included?

So essentially, we will do, it's not going to be a full geotech report, but we have to look at the actual when we look at the material which is going to be used for that fill, we have to revisit slope stability analysis and respecify type, length and spacing of geogrid. So that's why I envision. And I'm not going to be able to do that analysis until we have an actual submittal from the contractor of what they are proposing to use. So that would be specifically for essentially those reinforced fill construction, which we have the major one would be the site entrance. Other than that there is no major fill at the site, that's the biggest fill area, the green hatched area.

Thank you all very much. I think if we have no further questions of the oh, Commissioner Wavadhi. Okay.

Thank you, chair. I think one last question. And I meant to ask this for, before. So up here on the map, you can see, well, you know where it is, the Decant Dewater location, which is right here. But my question is that it's located and it is the reason that you're in the WRA at that particular end of the wetland. And my curious question is why couldn't you move it further east and then stay out of the water resource area?

Yes. I I suppose that the project could continue to push east, you know, but but to what limit, right? We are trying to be responsible.

Well, we have plenty of land.

Correct. Yes. We are trying to be responsible of keeping the footprint in check of the project, right, to for city funds, right, budget is limited. And if we do continue to expand east, that that does add just more disturbance potential

Swap the disturbance in that location and put it further east. Yeah. Not to increase it.

I think part part of, if I may, I won't go too deep into the water resource analysis, but the areas of buffer that you're describing specifically, if I may read here, the portion of the water resource around Wetland A is predominantly dominated by grass, scotch broom, and Himalayan blackberry. So the area do not act as water quality habitat due to a lack of food and refuge areas. They don't provide water quality benefits because they do not provide shade, erosion control, or water treatment. So essentially, what I'm getting at is that area at the end of the buffer is not high quality habitat. So it's not a pristine area that we were intent on preserving because it's essentially blackberry bushes and invasive species.

Right. And I recognize that the area between the decant dewater shed and the wetland is actually a slope.

It is. It's steep slope. Yes. Yep.

So my other question related to that facility is, will there be a sealed floor basin for as I'm assuming that the decant dewater is for materials coming out of the vac trucks. Yes. And things like that. So you need to have a means of controlling that capturing the water. Is that water going to sanitary or is it okay.

Yeah. Great question. Yeah. So this is an application where, and again, we've done this on numerous other public works facilities Inside of the facility when they do their decan operation, there's a trench drain Okay. That has a basin with a sump. So that's like capture number one to help capture debris and sediment. It then goes outside of the unit. We typically have another device, a vault. In this case, I don't actually believe it's an oil water separator. It's a different type of, sediment separator, vault that helps to remove sediment, And then this is actually the unique case. This does go to the sanitary sewer system. The decant water does.

Okay.

So

is that going to I'll skip that question. So my understanding is that because of the elevation on the property, there's no gravity flow to sanitary and you have to have a significant pump station to push everything uphill to get to a sanitary sewer along Salamo, I assume.

Correct, yes. We did evaluate in the schematic phase over a year ago all the options and and what other options there were for sanitary sewer and determined that, yes, that a lift station, a sanitary lift station has two, you know, a lag lead type configuration for a backup pump. So everything gravity drains down to the lower yard, it's then pumped up into the Salamo Road public sewer system. Yep.

Okay. Thank you.

Turning that on. Adding the location also helps us with just the amount of utility we have to run-in terms of the water and drain system.

It's minimal?

Yes. We're But looking for everything.

Well, if we were looking for it, I'll stop.

Okay, thank you. At this point we will move on to public I Chair? Yes. Sorry.

Would you consider a short recess for people to take a a break?

Sure. Yes.

Five five minutes, I

move that we recess until 08:20 on the clock behind Ashley and Steve. So five minutes. Thank you.

So five minutes? Okay.

Yes. Thanks.

Thank you.

It's a couple minutes past 08:20. So we are now at the public testimony, part of the proceedings tonight. As I mentioned at the beginning of this meeting, if you wish to testify during this hearing, please complete a sign in testimony form and submit it to the staff now. The Commission will first hear from proponents, then opponents, and finally, anyone who has neutral testimony or wishes to ask a clarifying question. When your name is called, please come forward and state your name and city of residence for the record.

Consistent with City Council rules, each commenter, including neighborhood associate representatives, will have five minutes to testify. If you have any written material or other evidence you would like us to see, please hand it to staff. The staff will distribute it to the members of the Commission and the applicant as well as place it in the record. If you have provided written testimony or previous oral testimony to the Commission, you do not need to read your written testimony or repeat previous oral testimony. At the end of your testimony, commissioners may ask questions clarifying any testimony, argument, or evidence that relates to the applicable approval criteria.

Please keep your responses brief and to the point. The application before the Commission must be decided based on the applicable approval criteria. Despite the importance of other issues that may be raised during the public hearing, the authority of the Commission is limited only to those issues that address compliance with those criteria. With that, the first proponent is Jim Edwards. Jim Edwards?

It appears that he has, left the building. Okay.

Okay. Moving on to the first opponent. Would David Dodds like to come speak, please? And I will give you a one minute warning. Thank you.

Thank you. David Dodds, longtime resident of West Linn, And I'm here to address the issue that was raised by mister Kappigan as far as zoning and I would like to thank him for the research that he did that did with this. And I really urge the commission not to dismiss this out of hand. And why is it important, you might ask? Because it is incumbent upon the city in their own projects to meet the highest standards in their proposals.

And it has been, quite frankly, somewhat amazing to listen to the arguments put forward by staff as relates to this issue which have been all over the map. In as much as in the last hearing, it was referenced from the application's submittal that this was a low density residential area, I'm referring of course to the southern portion of the property that on the existing comp plan map and on the existing zoning map shows that it is unzoned. But in any case, that presentation from page seven of the submittal, it was stated that the zoning designation was given by the City Council in 12/14/1983. I noticed that in this proceeding this evening, that reference has essentially been abandoned and instead there is discussion of a planning director's discretionary approval, however if that was the case, then the applicant or the staff could have addressed Chapter five on zoning as part of the staff report and that was clearly not done. We have from Mr.

Kappican's submittal from the minor partition, very clear references where city staff recognizes that the southern portion of this site is not zoned. And in finding 45, it states clearly that they anticipate that when a development proposal comes forward that there will be a zoning map change and there will be a comp plan amendment as well. Also, and in tonight's testimony from staff, if I heard correctly, the presentation is made that the current zoning map is not accurate. Whereas Chapter five of the CDC clearly states that the planning director is to keep an up to date and accurate zoning map. And I have presumed that that is the map that is on the city's website just as the comp plan map are both accurate and up to date.

So I would essentially say that until it is established, what is the actual zoning of the southern portion of the site, that this application should not go forward. I was a planning commissioner and then I was a quasi judicial decision maker and I tell you I would not approve this currently until that was resolved. And it could have been resolved very easily by the applicant or the staff requiring that they do a zoning map designation, at which point you could have actually had the discussion of what is the appropriate zoning. Is it R-ten? Is it something else?

Is it, would light industrial be a better designation? It's an open question. On an unrelated issue, there was some discussion about the storm water and I would just suggest that if the standard is a twenty five year storm event, that the history of these in recent years is that five year storm events have becoming one year storm events and ten year storm events are becoming five year storm events and that twenty five is quite possibly insufficient.

Chair, that's time.

Are there any questions of Mr. Dodds?

All right.

Thank you. Next to testify is Mr. Cap again,

Chair, when you get through the testimony, we do have someone who's attending online that we may wanna check-in with them to see if they wanna testify at the end.

Don't wanna fall. Mike Cap again. Westland. If I may ask the chair, I'll also do the clock. I noticed last time when I testified, you said thirty seconds and it threw me off trying to know when it was over.

I'm sorry. Would you mind repeating that you would not like me to Yeah. Notify. Okay.

I can look at this. Sure. You can tell me to shut.

That's fine.

I'm gonna try to be a little more pleasant this evening. I'm gonna try to say make sure I express my gratitude for everyone up here tonight who's volunteered to do this job and appears to be another late night, which I don't think, any of us want. But again, it's a $45,000,000 plus project, a fifty or a hundred year type of facility, I don't think we need to be on a fast lane or shortsighted. I think it was pointed out that the city polices itself. I like how that was said.

It's a real concern of mine. If I'm looking for the city to police itself especially when I see, well, earlier tonight, I think that we one of the staff threw another staff there and under the bus and said, that was just a staff's, finding or a suggestion on that partition when they did the lot line adjustment. Staff was very clear and adamant. I hope you take the time to read that. I submitted it into the record, that application.

I wish I'd like to also point out on that application there is a conditional use excuse me, condition of approval that requires undergrounding some of the wires. I'd say condition use number two of the submittal I made exhibit four. I I did not make copies of that to the, body. I did make copies of the one page for everyone, but the submittals were fairly lengthy. I'd like to ask that the, I'd like to point out that the staff report has not been made available and seven days in seven days in advance.

And I would say that's relative to the ORS one nine seven seven nine seven four b and that it says, essentially shall be made available seven days prior to the hearing. It says all staff reports. There's now been a modified, I have that exhibit here, a modified staff report. They well they call it revised staff report. And I would say the IRS says that that is not timely, that it should have been presented seven days before the hearing.

So based on that, I'd like to ask that the record be left open so all those things can be addressed. I would also point out that it identifies in our own development code that 99.04 the duties of the director and it says a staff report available at least ten days prior to the scheduled date of the public, and then it says hearings with an s at it. So I don't know that that's for the first initial hearing. So again, I think I've cited the the relevant ORS. I would also point out that of the same one nine seven one seven nine seven six b requires the city to leave the record open for seven days so I can address any written testimony that's been submitted tonight.

I don't know that I'm I'd briefly like to talk about very important to me and I know you're dealing with a lot of serious issues here tonight, right? Serious question about the stability of the slopes and investment the city is ready to make on this so I don't in any way minimize that. But all the rules in the app, in the code should be followed. And so you'll see some things that I've mentioned that are not followed and I don't know if it's just staff's remiss, staff doesn't care, but the rules need to be followed. The city can't sort of like they kind of tried to explain earlier, well there's a difference between planning staff and the applicant and then we know who's going to do the enforcement back to the planning staff.

And if that's the case, then I would hope they would do a diligent job initially in presenting their staff findings and reviewing the application. So I've I've given you extensive amount of written, not extensive, four or five pages that really explain the conditional use criteria, one of which is to comply with the policies in the comp plan. And I've identified a policy in the comp plan that I think requires a submittal, which staff says submittals are not criteria, but I don't want to get into that. But because the burden is on the applicant to prove that they meet all the criteria. Not, and that part, if they don't want to make the submittals to not prove it, let staff say they don't have to make it, that's up to them.

But to the point, it suggests that this applicant needs to have an acoustical engineer send a letter saying prior to the approval that it can meet the standard of the DEQ standard. That's in the comp plan and the comp plan is referenced again back to chapter 60 of the CDC that says Comp Am policies shall be met. Thank you.

Thank you. Does anyone on the Commission have a question of Mr. Kappigan at this time? Yes. Commissioner Mopotney.

So I just want to clarify that this is a continuance or we're leaving the record open for another seven days?

Yes. So, first, we want to clarify we did post the, staff report within the required time period. It was updated, to incorporate additional evidence, and arguments at various times within that seven day period, but it was appropriately posted. And then second, that request for a continuance is required to be, provided after the initial evidentiary hearing, which we did at the initial evidentiary hearing, any future continuances can be granted in your discretion, but they're not required. So if you all choose that you would like to grant another continuance, we can discuss that, but it's not legally required.

Any other questions of Mr. Kappigan at this moment? Thank you very much.

Mr. Chair, may I make a comment, please?

You may,

I'd like to present this as an exhibit the city has, and they call it revised staff report. So I'd like to add this into the record, what they've revised, and I'd like to point out that there's been new evidence put into the staff report and new findings representative by the six conditions of approval that are now added. And I think that would require the opportunity for the public to review those timely. Thank you for the opportunity. I'll try to be brief.

Next to testify is William Relye.

William Relye, City of West Linn. Good evening chair and members of the commission. I'm here this evening to provide clarity on my previous testimony. Clearly, the agenda item placed before the council on 07/12/2021 asked the council to approve the purchase of surplus ODOT property for future construction of a new operation facility. And on its face value, that summary is a far cry from the discussion that ensued and the premise under which the council approved the purchase of that property.

As the council president in that meeting, I made the motion to approve the purchase. However, what preceded that motion was a discussion with my fellow council members and the public works director about the use of the land given its high risk designation by the State of Oregon for deep landslide susceptibility. Maps and meeting minutes have been provided to you as part of my testimony previously as well as tonight minute markers from the transcripts on the audio from that particular agenda item. They clearly delineate that the council directed the public works director to conduct studies, engineering studies and assessments about the use of that property for any purpose other than staging for emergency management purposes and debris from things such as ice storms. However, that that marker has never been met.

I don't see any place in the record where any meetings were were held through the public works department with the City Council or the Planning Commission that talked about how that property was going to be used and how it was suitable for the type of property that is now being proposed. So, the citizens including myself have been robbed of that opportunity to have a fair assessment of that property and they've now placed that burden on your shoulders through this land use application. That is certainly not the process that was envisioned when we approved the purchase of that property. I'll go on to continue my testimony here. The testimony clearly describes my discussion with the director about using the property for an equipment staging area as part of the emergency management plan and a lay down area for debris collected and stored by the city as a result of emergencies.

The director clearly stated that geotechnical work would be done once the city had access to ensure the site is the right fit for the anticipated land use. Several counselors expressed concern about the site being in a landslide zone and entrusted the city with addressing those concerns. However, that institutional knowledge apparently was lost when the city manager changed hands and when the public works director changed hands. And so, without understanding the record and the history of our approval of that property, the current applicant just leapfrogged right into providing a new public works facility without any base value to the previous agreements between the council and the public works director. In the present application, I see a standard building being placed in a site with no studies that mitigate the high risk of destruction in the event of a seismic event and typically I would see caissons and other engineering features that address those risks.

In all cases, the applicant has the burden of proof to show how their application meets the standard of care. I don't see that in the record. In law school, we measured risk as as a toward action through the learned hand formula. In other professors professions such as in my civil engineering background, we address we address it through the calculus of risk, both address the duty of care and provide a framework for evaluating the reasonableness of actions by comparing the probability and magnitude of potential harm against the burden of taking precautions. They provide the means to systematically measure actions and would in order to make informed decisions across legal, financial, and safety concerns.

And within the construction industry, we look at that level of effect needed to provide the work product. In this case, they've clearly missed the mark. In this instance, the work product does not support the construction of a major facility on a high risk site and for that reason I do not believe that the applicant has met the burden of proof. The applicant should withdraw their application and conduct the city should conduct further site assessments and not rely upon the opinion of a single geotechnical engineer. And I thank you for your time.

Are there any questions of mister Rallier? Thank you very much.

Alright. Chair, can I I apologize? Is it time to ask if the virtual attendant would like to speak?

It is.

We have Jeannie Tom Thompson online. If Jeannie Thompson would like to, testify, you can unmute your microphone at this time and speak. Miss Thompson, if you are interested in testifying, you can go ahead and unmute your microphone and speak. Alright, it does not appear that she's interested in she would like to testify so we can move on. You.

Could just being that if somebody's at home on a Zoom call or remote access, can we send them a message or something being if I got up to use the restroom for thirty seconds No.

That we don't have the capability to send

a message.

Okay. It is now time for rebuttal by the applicant. Does the applicant wish to respond? So you have fifteen minutes. At the end of your testimony, commissioners may ask questions clarifying any testimony, argument or evidence that relates to the applicable approval criteria. Thank you.

Thank you. And again, we appreciate the public's interest in the project and the comments that they have made and we'll respond as we can to the things that we that are part of our application. I wanna start with the storm water, there was a concern about the twenty five year event and Alex, our civil engineer will respond to that one.

Yeah. I will. My response to the frequency of storms and and whatnot, what I will say is that the project in front of you in the storm water system as designed meets the City of Westland storm water management manual, it, meets the approval criteria, by using the published standards that we have in front of us.

Thank you.

Any questions on that one?

Okay. Next, I wanted our geotech engineer to respond to the question about analysis of that site. We've heard the term high risk site and Ajeev, if you could explain the standard that you have done your work

based on?

Yeah, Thanks Sid. Yeah, I just want to clarify, you know, I understand the public concern about the site mapping. Site mapping actually resulted from a massive landslide that happened in 1960. If you look at the map, it's showing that red slide area that's actually been documented when the work was done on the freeway. But in our presentation, in our explanation, we divided the development of the site and the aspect of it.

So we address the building landslide concern by stating the building actually been established, will be established on basalt. It's stable material and we have deep soil boring to support that. We didn't make assumptions. Nobody beside us, Columbia Waste, did site specific exploration. So anybody can come in and say, okay, know, it's a landslide or this area cannot support the building.

We had to do our work and due diligence to do these soil borings to support the idea that we can build building on this area. And the same for the slope we discussed. We are supporting the neighboring slope by installing reinforced slope. Again, we're not excavating into it. So I just want to clarify that we did our due diligence and we did our exploration.

We did extensive investigation and we did extensive analysis. We revised the analysis on a couple of occasions to accommodate different scenarios of the development on the site which kept evolving and changing and we adjusted our analysis. Just, we didn't take the original analysis and said it's valid for everything. Every time there is change we adjusted our analysis to address the new condition and like we discussed we will even address it more once we get more details about specific fill materials we have to address it. So I just want to clarify that and our work was done extensively and we actually consulted with a CEG certified engineering geologist licensed in the State of Oregon. Thank you.

Thanks Sanjeev.

One of the other questions that came up was about underground electrical along that site and that work has actually been done along Salamo Road. When they did improvements to Salamo, the electrical was undergrounded. So that's actually been completed. Next item I wanna respond to public works director, although he was not public works director at the time of the purchase, his understanding of the purchase of the property.

Correct. Yeah. We we heard some testimony about the purchase of the property and what the use was was for various things there. What I can tell you is that the previous public works director had a public works facility in mind because he solicited Scott Edwards and Associates as our design architectural design firm. He provided them with preliminary designs on what he thought it should look like.

As part of that solicitation, it included preliminary geotechnical work that Najeeb was involved with at a previous firm, but because of his history with the site, we retained him on a separate contract with his his new firm. So we have the history there with the geotech and again public works director provided that solicitation. One other thing I heard was a fast track, you know, to get to this point. I disagree, I think we're over two years just to get here and well over a million dollars with these kind folks that are here with me tonight. I think we've, you know, every every step of the way, you know, was was bar chips, oh, that could, you know, slow down there's no access to the road and into the site.

So we we held back and you know, we discovered that there's a wetlands. Nobody had really with current staff had been on the site. There's a wetlands, so we stepped back, did our conformance study with state lands and so forth. So I think we've we've taken our time, we've done the right thing at the right time, hired the right experts to testify to their expertise on landslides, storm water, wetlands. So I I I don't agree that we were we're fast tracking anything.

I think that was all I In the back of my mind, was gonna address mister Evans's comment from earlier on the landscaping. If I can throw that in there, I know that was a couple hours ago but parks director is listening and she did mention that as part of any development they would do yearly reports vegetation on what's what's what's healthy, what's what hasn't survived and and that's all part of the mitigation process. Again, as far as the previous meeting with the comments about the I think you brought it up about the vegetation, you know, conditions of approval. Just wanted to make a note of that that, you know, basically new leadership here, nobody from public works, engineering, planning were here at the time of that minor partition or conditional use I guess it was at the site. We're doing things differently, we want to make it right, we're working with Mr.

Cozzi, staff met with him last Friday, we're still trying to come up with a solution that can meet everybody's needs, taxpayers, residents for some adequate screening. That's still ongoing, we're trying to do the right thing, we're gonna do the right thing with the mitigation and that's, Alright.

Thanks, Eric. So I think that is the last of our comments. I think the city will make comment on the zoning. And so we wanna appreciate your consideration of our application. We feel like we have met the criteria. We have agreed to all of the conditions that have been put on the project, and appreciate your consideration and and support on it, and hope you get going.

I believe we have two questions or two commissioners have questions before you return to your seats. So, Commissioner Jones.

Hi. I just wanted to follow-up. Mister William Reilly brought up questions about seismic and caissons. Again, this is outside of my preview of knowledge. So if you can address the questions and issues that he brought up, I would appreciate that. Sure.

So to break it down for the building we conducted site specific seismic hazard analysis because this is an essential facility. So by the ASCE, the Oregon code, just to simplify it, they are different type of structure, type one, two, three, etcetera. So public work facility is a critical facility. So actually you do site specific, specific to this property seismic analysis. And like we did Dremie testing, so we collected shear wave velocity data, 100 feet.

That's where the building code. So we followed the building code requirement and we conducted the seismic study for the building. So to address the building side. For the slope side like we discussed, we took the seismic forces and we induce essentially horizontal acceleration from induced by an earthquake and we calculate the factor of safety for the stability of the slope. So we take that Ah component essentially it's a force, horizontal force acting trying to fill the slope and we do that analysis based on the seismic criteria, which again this is per ODOT criteria for slope stability analysis.

And again for the bridge it's going to be supported on micropiles which essentially going to be on the fill side, on the native side which is the south side, and be supported on the building which is going to transfer the loads down into basalt. So I hope that can explain the those are major components of the development and the seismic consideration for

Commissioner Evans.

Thank you, Chair. Just one real quick question, and I'm going to butcher your last name. Is it Kolas? You're a registered professional engineer. Is that correct?

That's correct.

Okay. Thank you.

Commissioner Wabotny.

Thank you, Chair. I don't think I've said this before, but I want to thank you all for the amount of work you've gone through and for the amount of time you spent on this. I mean, think the site proposal looks great. I think there's potentially some issues, but I just wanted to thank you for the facility would look wonderful. I'm still not quite sure it's the right location, but so my questions, I have two of them.

So I'm looking online at the city's website on the GIS maps web pages and there's a zoning map and the one that's shown on here and you can't blow it up very easily because it's just quirky. So but you can tell that the map is dated November 2023 and the southern portion of the property has no zoning. It's white and that runs down to I-two 05. So, I'll throw that out there and if there's a response to that whether it's staff or the applicant.

Can you just repeat the question? I heard a statement. I'm not sure I heard a question.

So the question is that we're talking about we're talking about a reason to support the zoning going to the center lane, the center line of I 205, yet our own zoning map does not demonstrate that. And the zoning map was produced after that argument is supported by some action by a previous planning manager.

Just just to clarify, the issue of of whether the issue is raised previously. The fact that that the previous staff didn't identify the portion of the code that allows for the discretion to make a determination of where the right of way is. I I don't I can't answer the question. It's not that they actually made a finding under that code section and said this doesn't apply for something like that. They just threw out in an executive summary their conclusion that it was unzoned. And what I'm saying is based on the reading of the code, don't think that was a correct interpretation.

Well, map doesn't show that at all. Correct. And so the

The issue is just raised anew tonight.

Right. But I'm what I'm saying is that if we're expecting the public to go by that zoning map for actions, then zoning of city owned property needs to be properly indicated on the zoning map.

I think that's If that's

what if that's the go by, we're not getting there.

No, I think that's a fair question. Again, the issue is raised tonight, so we didn't fix the zoning map between when it was raised and now.

Yeah. Well, and and we used to have a zoning map right over here on this wall. And a few years ago, it disappeared. We have nice artwork in here instead, which is great. But occasionally, it would be nice to have a zoning map that was here. And I asked numerous times about having that particular zoning map updated, and it never was updated even though we have the capacity to do that in house here. And instead, it was moved. It was taken away out of here, so we couldn't ask that question any further. So that's where I'm coming from on this. So we need an answer on the zoning.

Yeah. So just to add, and hopefully you can hear me okay. Just to add another clarifying point to that, I would say that chapter, I mean, ideally, the zoning map will be perfect and the comprehensive plan, the maps in the comprehensive plan will reflect exactly the exact zone designations of every legal lot within the city, but mistakes happen and staff is only human. So I think that that Chapter five language is intended to address this very type of situation where the reality of the lot doesn't necessarily reflect the exact mapping of a particular legal lot. And so I think, you know, previous planning commissions and city council members have contemplated this very type of scenario and that is why they have provided that code language that Steve referenced earlier.

So I think the intent behind that code language there is for this very type of situation where there's this little sliver at the bottom of the property that's unclear and in a situation where there is conflicting or unclear legal lots or zoning classification for a portion of a legal lot, that particular code section can permit the planning director to reach a termination.

I guess my question is that along the whole length of 205 running through West Linn, we have white non shaded property along either side. That's because it's a right of way owned by ODOT. And I don't think that they would that they would say our our our I 205 right of way is zoned r 10.

So the way right of way works is they're essentially an easement. Right? So ownership actually doesn't ODOT will own the right of way, but the underlying property still belongs to the property owner on each side of that right of way. In the event of a vacation, the property will be divided midway through that right of way line, right? And so essentially regardless of a right of way existing, the lot lines still will continue to the center or you know the zone designation will continue to the center line of that right of way.

I understand that on the city street where you've got residential houses or commercial properties on either side, But in the case of a state, this is a state highway system and if the state doesn't own that property, someone has made a tragic error.

Well, I guess I'll just say right of way works the same if it's the state, federal government, or local communities, you know. So the I I mean, a vacation obviously would be a much more complex process for a state highway than a local road, but the underlying principles of the, zoning designation and the legal lots are remain the same.

Okay.

Let's see.

My other question and thank you Mr. Callis. Mr. Reilly brought up the potential for using things like caissons for support for the roadway area to take that support down to the underlying basalt to get through all of the material, the fill material and I guess what I wanted to point out is that is that the water tank that was built over on the other side of the ridge several years ago. It's a 4,000,000 gallon tank and that is has footings essentially that it's as I understand it's compressed rock footings that go down caissons basically to go down all the way to basalt and that's what supports it.

So I guess the question is at what point would we move beyond the geogrid design to a more serious, in terms of cost, another option for supporting the roadway? So

for the roadway, we don't have a settlement issue from loading condition like water tank or buildings. So really we don't need any ground improvement or deep foundation to transfer the load deeper. On some occasions, let's say you have high potential for liquefaction. So you might have some like, say, south wire front or wire front in Portland. You might say, Okay, I might get foot of settlement and going to destroy my roadway.

You could probably do ground improvement so you actually stabilize the roadway. In this case, our site doesn't have any liquefaction or hazard, which basically is soil lose the shear strength and settle during an earthquake. So this is not a concern for the site. The only thing is, you know, we stabilize the fill once we excavate the site like we discussed. If we see any material, it will be like shallow stabilization.

You know, if I'm going to guess the number, I'm going to say let's say two feet. Just a number. So, with that stabilization and having a road based section and pavement, you'd get an established roadway which is going to perform just fine for roadway. As for the fill, the reason we're reinforcing the fill because that's a slope, we need to mitigate that slope against any potential sliding. That's why we need to reinforce the first slope at the north portion of the site. That helps.

Okay. Thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you very much. So I'm going to seek a bit of clarification because at this point, we would be addressing a possible continuance.

Correct. So at this point you have had a request for a continuance. As I explained previously, you must grant a continuance at the initial evidentiary hearing. You are not required to grant one at any continued future hearing, but you may do so. So essentially what I recommend in deciding whether to grant the continuance or not is just deciding you know it was there sufficient evidence, additional evidence provided today or within the last seven days that you believe would be important for members of the public to be able to consider and potentially provide additional evidence or arguments regarding?

Or do you feel like there was sufficient time for the public to be able to respond to the evidence and arguments that were presented today and within the last seven days? If you were to not grant the continuance, we would move directly into deliberations. If you were to grant the continuance, I would recommend doing so to simply leave the record open basically in accordance with Roman numeral 10 a, the first motion that essentially that period, that suggested motion. And that would essentially allow written evidence for a period of time, usually seven days, and then an additional rebuttal period for the applicant, is typically an additional seven days.

Okay. Thank you. I have one clarifying question. You said that if we do not seek or if we do not grant a continuance, we would go on to deliberations Correct. Thereby skipping questions of staff.

Oh, I apologize. We could we could have questions of staff first and then move

Okay. To So, Commissioners, based on the request and what the attorney has just discussed with us, how does everybody feel about the request for a continuance?

I feel like we've heard all the information that we need, and I personally can deliberate with the information provided.

So apologies, but just to be clear, the question is, has the public heard all of the evidence and arguments tonight within the last seven days? Do they have they had sufficient time to respond to that new evidence and make additional arguments?

So I would put this back to the city attorney and I'm correct, you're the city attorney?

Yes.

Okay. So

one of the

questions about the seven days of having the information beforehand. So it sounds like the city posted it and they made amendments to it after the seven day

period.

Correct. So we received

Peanut butter jelly time.

Nice. So, yeah, so we provided the staff report sufficiently in advance. However, we received additional supplemental testimony between when we initially submitted the staff report and today. And so at those times, we provided supplemental material.

So you're not the city is not required to then post that rebuttal information seven days in advance?

No. But we are required to allow the public sufficient time to respond to those arguments and evidence. Otherwise, we could potentially prejudice someone substantial rights. So it's essentially a due process analysis rather than a specific bright line rule of a time period.

My fellow Commissioners, I feel like the information that was additionally brought forward that was already repeat information that we've already received. That's my general feeling on it.

I disagree. I think the zoning question is something that the public might want to comment and participate in. I think we should allow for that kind of public participation.

Commissioner Wabotany?

I agree with Commissioner Dietz.

I do as well.

So please correct me if there's any error in, how I proceed.

So I apologize, but before you proceed I would suggest if you are leaning in a particular direction that we proactively talk about dates and times if you are planning to leave the record open.

Okay.

Think if that's the will of the majority, I think we can discuss dates and times before we figure out a next step with continuance.

I think March 4 would be the next one? March 4?

Yeah. March 4 I mean, so if you were to do an open record period, so seven days for everyone

Oh, could do seven days from now, couldn't we?

Say again?

Could we do seven days from now?

You you would well

Yeah. So you could leave the record open for an additional seven day period from tonight, which would leave it until February 25, but then you would need to leave the applicant time to submit final written argument or waive that right, which would be until March 4.

Yeah.

So theoretically March 4 would be available and you could come back then and not hold another public hearing, return for deliberations only, which would mean you would essentially skip this script and go straight into Roman numeral 10. You could do that on March 4 or to give yourself some more time, could also come back March 18. I'll also just note, I'm not available on March 4 unfortunately, but staff is also prepared.

I would say given the complexity of the application thus far, we would recommend, waiting until March 18 for that reason.

Okay. I will not be in town then, but if the majority of the commissioners are available and my vice chair is available.

The day after Saint Patrick's Day? I've if I I would lean more towards March 4, but if March 18 is the more just

to clarify, sorry, not to introduce further confusion. We can also coordinate and find a replacement contract city attorney for March 4 just to keep the calendar going because then we have another hearing item on March 18. So it's easier to have this deliberation beyond March 4 separated from that item?

I would definitely prefer to allow all members of the Planning Commission an opportunity to attend.

Yeah. If that's possible, I think that's preferable as well. And just to keep on with the rest of the calendar and business as usual. Okay. So would someone like to make a motion to hold the record open to a date certain at least seven days from today? And if you need script, I can provide it.

I move to leave the record open for written testimony until and the date we agreed upon was

March 4. No. February 25 at 5PM.