Planning and Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

People, parents would sit here in the parking lot for their kids and then they're all concerned about the people drinking. I was trying to figure out how DNR allowed these guys to put what they did along here, along the river.

Yeah, well, I haven't taken a look at all that.

I know that those $200,000 lots was... Well, but, you know, they had legs. They were very careful. They got concrete.

Well, they weren't supposed to cut any of those trees down. Look at all those lots are clear. Yeah.

All right. Good evening, everyone. It's 7 o'clock. I'll call this September 3rd, 2026 meeting of the Planning and Zoning Commission to order. Second thing on our list here is roll call. Paige, could you help us out?

David Larson.

Present.

John Meyer.

Present.

Pete Fuller.

Present.

Stephanie Garner. Present. David Huser.

Here.

Kate Payne. Kathy Olson.

All right. Well, we have quorum, so we'll begin. Item C in our agenda is approval for tonight's meeting. So moved. All right. I have a second. Second. All right. That motion has been moved and seconded. All in favor, answer with aye. Aye. Hearing none opposed, tonight's agenda passes. Item D is approval of our last meeting, which was back on June 4th, 2026, as printed.

No questions?

No? I move to be approved as presented. Second. All right. It's been moved and seconded. All in favor, say aye. Aye.

That motion passes as well.

So item E on our agenda is the start of our public hearing section. So I'll go over a couple things here, and we'll open and close each of these items one, two, and three separately as we go through. I'm not going to reread this every time. So if you have any questions, let me know. But at this time, the commissions will open a public hearing on the agenda item one as listed. This public hearing has been properly noticed in accordance with Iowa law. I invite anyone wishing to speak in favor or in opposition to this item to come forward to the podium, state your name and address for the record. We can limit the comments. I don't see that as a problem, but I'll throw five minutes out for now. So we'll limit everyone to five minutes. So everyone has the opportunity to be heard for and against. And I respectfully ask that comments not be repetitive of testimony already provided. So state your opinion, not necessarily repeat what others had. Please direct all comments to the entire commission, not individual members or staff. And with that, if anyone would like to speak on our first item, which is the rezoning of parcel ID ending in 6007 from R3 multifamily residential to an R2 district, please come to the podium at this time.

It would be nice to have addresses on these.

I know, this one I didn't have an address for what I could find, but it's the friends of the family lot.

Yep. Behind Pizza Ranch. Yes. Yep. Yes.

All right. Seeing no one who wants to speak at this time on this item one in our public hearing session, I will close the public hearing, and now the commission can begin our discussion in action. Paige, could you help us with the agenda memo at this point?

Yeah, to start out with, Iowa Heartland Habitat Free Community is the applicant on behalf of Cedar Valley Friends of the Family to rezone that parcel from R3 down to an R2 to allow for single family homes. The intention is to parcel off that single lot into three single family lots.

Okay.

As you'll see, I'll start with no public comments were received for that public hearing notice. And then as you'll see in the agenda memo, there were some items to consider as this would be a rezoning, amending the zoning map and future land use map.

Yep.

Yeah, I had some questions and kind of notes I took. I don't know specifically and anyone knows, but I noticed on the future land use, it was zoned as future commercial, where other areas in that current zoning weren't. So I don't know if there was some history there or a backstory or if it was just, it's not a perfect science. All of that.

Back when, you know, because of what it was in the middle, all the residential area, that's why we did that back.

Yeah, I didn't think the copperheads, I think it's because the copperheads are planters, didn't figure on it burning down, you know. But when it burned down, I think it changed a lot of people's plans.

So that was a non-compliant use as an R3?

Well, it was vacant when we did the comprehensive plan, whatever, two comprehensive plans ago.

Oh, okay. So a carryover, more or less. I think, yeah. Okay.

I mean, I think it's... I think it's an excellent use for it. It fits. It's, to me, certainly not spot zoning. Everything on two sides of it and across the street is residential. So, you know, I think it's an excellent use, and I hope Habitat for Humanity has success with it.

And we do have a representative with Habitat for Humanity tonight, if there's any questions.

Yeah, I agree with John here tonight as well. I think the infill areas like this are good development opportunities. It's a spot that I think helps. It's cohesive to what's around it.

And prior to Cedar Valley Friends and Family, it was an infill. Okay.

Okay. All right, additional discussion? If not, I would ask for a motion.

Move the Planning and Zoning Commission recommend approval of the rezoning application for parcel ID 8090427600 from R3 multifamily to R2 residential district and amend the zoning and future land use maps to the city council.

That seven should be up at the end of the partial ID number. Yeah.

So we'll add that. I didn't pick that up right away but then I looked up and I saw where it was.

I will second that motion.

All right. That motion's been moved and seconded and noted typo correction there. All in favor say aye. Aye. Hearing none opposed, that motion passes as well. All right. I understand that's a long motion to make because it's like five sentences there, you know, five lines. All right, so now I'll go ahead and open the public hearing for item two, which is the rezoning of 1300 20th Street Northwest and 1302 20th Street Northwest, Waverly, Iowa from A1 to R3, multiple family residential. So if anyone would wish to speak on this item, please approach the podium and state your name and address. All right. One more time. Anyone want to speak on this one? If not, I'll close the public hearing.

I mean, I can add a few comments.

Absolutely.

This one. This particular... Could you identify yourself, please? This is Paula Guise. I'm the CEO at Bartels Lutheran Retirement Community. For this particular property, there were already two homes there. When we purchased the one home, that home has been tore down. There remains a home there that we rent to someone. We would like to rezone this so it's... cohesive with Eisenach Village, which is already there, and then use it for future properties or accessories to go along with that property. I'm not sure how that all happened historically, but it makes sense. Seems like it should have already been an R2, but I don't really know the history of that. So appreciate you taking a look at it.

Alright, anyone else would like to speak on this item? Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing. And now the commission can have our discussion and actions.

I have been asked by several people out there. The application talks about accessory use. With an R3 zone, technically you could put a couple duplexes out there in the same mold as Anna Estates or Eisenach Village. The plan is to use it for storage or garages or something like that?

We don't have a plan for that yet. What we were thinking is yes, we could either do a couple of I don't know if a duplex would fit, but maybe a single-family unit, kind of like at Anna Estates. We would like to consider possibly doing a storage unit for our residents out there. So it would be specifically for our residents, but it would have the same look and feel as the rest of the units out there.

Okay. Thank you.

I realize I didn't have Paige go through the agenda memo, but I feel we've covered that, just for the record's sake, I guess. I'll acknowledge that.

I will also add, though, that no public comments were received on that one.

I was gonna ask, thank you. I will note, and I guess in support of, it does match the future land use plan that this transitions to residential of some sort, so R3 certainly fits that.

Well, I would move the Planning and Zoning Commission recommend approval of 1300 20th Street, 1302 20th Street Northwest from A1 to R3 and amend the zoning map to the city. amend the zoning map and recommend that to the city council. Second.

All right, it's been moved and seconded. All in favor say aye. Aye. Hearing none opposed, that motion passes as well. Okay, moving to item three in our public hearing. I'll go ahead and open the public hearing for item three, which is a rezoning of 220th 9th Avenue Northwest from R2 to our four multiple family residential transitional district. Anyone who'd like to speak on this one, please approach the podium.

I'm Larry Hanson, live at 1010 4th Street NW. I live directly west of the property you're trying to rezone. I am definitely against you rezoning that to R4. That is in the middle of an R2 residential district, and it should not be brought back in as an R4. The school wasn't that bad in an R2. The reason I'm very much against it, I'm not sure what's going in there. In an R4, you can build a building up to 45 feet tall. within 10 feet of my property line. I have a good view of everything now, but if you put a 45-foot building up next to my park lot line 10 feet away, I sit on my deck and look at a building that shouldn't be there. You may need housing in this town, but if you want to put single family in there, fine. But don't be building those 45-foot buildings. And I can't seem to find out just what is going in there. I've heard rumors, but I'm dead set against it. It'll lower the value of my property along with my neighbor's. It's going to create more problems than it is good. That's all I have to say.

Thank you, Larry.

Paula Guise again, CEO of Bartels. So we do not have an exact plan for what we want to do. I would just like to talk through a few of the reasons why we're making this request. So we're requesting a zoning change from R2 to R4 for this property to allow us to develop additional senior housing. We believe this is a thoughtful and appropriate use of the property that will provide a significant benefit to the Waverly community while being respectful to the surrounding neighborhood. Our goal is not simply to develop this property. Our goal is to create quality housing options for seniors in an appropriate location that strengthens the community for years to come. Two independent housing studies have been done, one by the city, one by Bartles, that support the need for additional senior housing in our area. The demographic information also supports continued demand for senior housing well into the future with the need projected to continue through approximately 2055. This isn't a short-term opportunity based on today's market. This is a long-term community need. As our population ages, Waverly and the surrounding area will need appropriate housing options that allow seniors to remain very active in the community. We are proposing a lower profile, lower density development really located on this than the former school site which housed approximately 180 students along with school buses and a lot of traffic for pick up and drop off of students. Our proposed development will be a lower profile, lower density than what previously existed on that site. We believe this will create a much different environment to the surrounding neighborhood. The traffic will be significantly different and we feel like this is an appropriate location for senior housing because it gets them close to the downtown area, other existing community amenities. They will support the Waverly downtown businesses and the WAVP right next door gives them other amenities that would be close by. When seniors move into appropriate senior housing, they frequently make their existing homes available to first-time homeowners, which is also an important feature for Waverly We are a continuous care retirement community, and what that means is we have experience serving seniors and understanding their needs over time. So we have many things that support them along the way and help them to be successful for a long time in the buildings that we build. We take pride in the quality and stewardship. We build quality products. We care about the surrounding neighborhood and would definitely want something to fit in. And we do feel like this would be a long-term benefit to Waverly. It addresses a documented need for senior housing. It'll meet a long-term demographical need. It'll put an underutilized property back into productive use, create a lower profile, lower density residential environment, reduces the traffic from the former school, supports the downtown Waverly businesses, provides convenient access to existing community amenities, and it should complement other residential developments in the area. We understand that rezoning changes deserve careful consideration. We respect the Planning and Zoning Commission's responsibility to look at how this proposal fits into the neighborhood and the Waverly community. More importantly, we believe this project provides a meaningful public benefit and the opportunity for seniors to stay in the Waverly community while helping create opportunities other families to enter the housing market. We are committed to building something that's high quality, well maintained, and a positive addition to the neighborhood.

If you look at this site.

Can you put that on the screen?

Not unless we can put it on a projector. I don't think it'll go on the screen.

This is the site. Like I said, we don't exactly know where we would position things. These two buildings, this is right across the street. This is right down on Fifth Street. We obviously want something that looks better than that. This is just kind of a proposal with decks facing the river, but more of a low profile. We're not exactly sure. about the garages underneath. We know the individuals that live here will want garages, but we definitely want kind of a modern look, low profile, but the ability to have people have decks facing the river and have it be something that looks really nice for the area. Here is the Hanson home. We're really thinking down like this. Put that in.

And your topography.

Right. It kind of goes down. So if you remember where those playground equipment was, that kind of was down the hill.

Okay. What are your plans going to be for the south part of that lot?

Looks like parking in the concept.

Yeah, but I mean, do you need that much parking in here?

We'd probably keep as much green space as we could. We like to do that with all of our developments. This tree line, we'd probably clean out just a little bit so that they actually could see through it.

Yeah, I mean, looking at the beacon, it looks like most of those trees are on

Yeah, when you look at it, quite a bit of this could be .

So you would have no intention of having anything in front of the two residences up there? No.

There's actually, it doesn't show it very well, but I think it's because of the line. There's actually a row of hedges right here. Right. We do like to keep a fair amount of green space just for walkability and outdoor space.

This is just a thought, though. So could it be split that the R4 would be down below and we keep the, and so that would, to appease the present landmarks that they would not, could not build anything in front of their, you know,

What would that do with setbacks?

It makes life very complicated. Yeah, well, I know, but I'm just trying to appease, you know, and I think, you know, that, you know, we can say what we want and right here and then turn around and down the road. It could become an issue.

Let me ask you this. You were on the PNC when the Waverly Veterans Post was built. How did you guys handle the buffer zone there between the dwellings and that?

Well, before we go there, let's finish the hearing.

Yeah, I'm sorry. Before we go there, yeah, thanks. No problem. Do you have anything else right now?

No, not unless someone has questions.

All right.

Have you shared that with the...

The crowd?

The residences? Sure.

Yeah.

and burned, and they never did it until it came up another, a second time.

I know that would make it complicated, but it would sure make everybody Exactly.

That was my concern with what they were planning on doing. There are two. We could build a house, seven foot from the boundary line right there. Maybe two stories, two and a half stories to the end.

Yeah, all right. but you're right What was that?

Well, let's save that for later.

Yeah, but you cannot build a garage and run all the water in it. That's a slope that goes steadily toward the river. that would be our construction company's problem. We can work with them to figure out how to make this little fort the right way.

Yeah, we don't have any specific design yet, but anyone that knows Bartles knows that we're very thoughtful about making things try to blend in to the neighborhood the best we can.

Well, that's where I disagree. That hill is quite steep. It all goes toward the river, If they try to build garages underneath, you're running all the water toward the garage, which no contractor's going to do. They're going to have to funnel it somewhere else. So they're going to have to move it more to the top of the hill to avoid that. And I don't understand why you want to put an R4 in the middle of an R2. All of that is R2.

The school was hard to preferential use, I believe, at the time.

Yeah.

My name's Bob O'Hare. I live at 1008 4th Street, Northwest. I am the other homeowner. I agree with everything that Larry is stating. And at this stage, of giving them the right to come with R4, they can change their mind tomorrow and put what they want there. I mean, we've got to have something. I don't want to wake up in the morning and go out on my deck and look at a wall either. So until we get some assurance of what's going to happen, I'm not for it. And then while we were talking, she was talking about the hedges there. The hedges do belong to the school. Our property line is just on the west edge of that.

The only other comment I would just add is if you look at some of the houses that are already built, if you kept it just an R2, the number of houses and how tall those houses are, there are very large houses there by the river.

Okay. Additional public comments on item three here?

I'm Judy Hanson, and I live at 1010 4th Street, NW. And our backyard is connected to the lot that we're talking about. And the tall houses that she's talking about are the ones that are over by the river. They are nice, tall, big houses. The ones around us aren't. When we moved here in 2014, We moved there because we liked the area. We thought we were real happy with everything, the school, the neighbors, the housing around us. And then we heard that the school was going to close. And then we heard that it was being sold and tore down. And it just broke our hearts because we thought, what's gonna go in there next? And We don't want three and four story homes or condos or apartments or whatever they're going to be right next to us, sitting out on our deck. We entertain with families and having entertainment out there and looking at a side of a three, four story home is just not attractive. I don't care how fancy they make it. I agree with my husband and the neighbors that that's not a place for condos to be put up in the middle of the homes. We're all used to the school level, a single story. That's why we moved there, because we like the area. We like the low housing. And I just hope you don't switch it over.

If it was R2, you could put in a two-story house within... Seven and a half feet. Seven and a half feet of your property. You realize that, too, don't you?

And it can be a max height of 35 feet, is what I was looking at. And maybe we should close the book again.

Yeah.

I want to make sure everybody has a chance to speak. Obviously we have some other items to discuss here. Does any other member of our public audience tonight wish to speak on this topic? Okay. Seeing none, I'll close the public hearing and we'll go ahead and start our discussion as a commission. Sorry to interrupt you, Dave.

No, that's fine. I just wanted to point out, I mean, we need to point out to them what could happen there, too, if it was left in R2. They could run a street down from, what is that, 8th Street? Yep. Down through there and sell off for R2 housing.

Yeah, and I was doing a little reading here as well. So, yeah, 35 feet for an R2, 45 feet for an R4. So it does increase the height with an R4, and it has a provision for... distance on the setback if it's higher than 45, which increases the distance from adjoining parcels.

For Paul, do you have any concept of how many units you're talking about on this lot?

We haven't done anything.

We haven't done any of that.

Typically what we do is we work with a civil engineer and look at the layout and then we'll work with an architect to help us. roughly what we were thinking is two lower profile buildings with about 16 units in each one 14 to 16 we're not exactly sure for the wire situation you can put retaining pods in there so it doesn't run down into the

housing.

Yeah.

I mean that could be done to take care of that watershed.

Well I guess I'll start some discussion make some comments. All of those drainage issues can be addressed. The lot is big enough and when you're talking about buildings of that size and footprint you can solve all of those problems. I truly believe you can. As far as the setback, and I don't know if we can recommend approval with an additional buffer. There is not a, there's a requirement for a site plan, but the site plan goes through administrative review and approval. And I don't know if we can require with the zoning that that we have instead of 10 foot, 25 or 30 foot setback on that westerly side. When I look at our comprehensive plan that we work so hard on and look at the housing goal strategies, it fits virtually, well it does, it fits all of them. We want a mixed housing type, support increases in density, filling in vacant spaces, try to make a cross section of affordable housing for the different age categories of the community it just fits all of those things and I feel that we've had an eye on that kind of a development that we want more than what R2 density would require with basically 65 foot by 150 20 foot lots I think that the I think it's important to do some kind of a buffer on the west side behind those two houses for sure and I would hope that that could be addressed during the site plan review process I would also urge Bartles I can't make it a requirement but when they get more firm site plan that they talk to the people out there and make that happen. So.

I'll chime in real quick. We can put a condition within the rezoning ordinance for this specific parcel. So we can increase that west setback.

Like we did with the Waverly area.

That's different because that was a special provisional use.

But we could do something like that to require some type of a... We did it out in...

I know like Heinz Edition had one.

Across the road from El Sol Restaurant. They put a berm in that when that was developed too. So we could require that as part of that, because that's what we did out there. But I know there was a special provision used with the way the area veterans post, and putting a berm in there with some trees and shrubs. How many parking spots are you going to be looking at there, Colin?

And we depends on the number of units we've got requirements of how many are yeah, no I know I just was trying to figure out you know if we if the space you know in there When you were showing garages in the concept so it would be for a

Let me ask this question, Bob and Larry. If we could come up with some kind of a area there to the west, to the east of your houses that would not allow for anything to come within a certain number of feet, would that be, if you could work with Bartles and that, would that, I don't know how large area you're thinking of, but if that would be able to be

pulled together with Bartles, would you be happy with that? I guess the big thing to me is the height of the buildings. Even if they put them 45 feet from my backyard, I can get a 45-foot building, according to your zoning. I'm not saying they're going to build one that high, but they could. It could be 35-foot, too.

Right, it could be 35. But I think they're talking about parking in that area.

Well, this is what I don't know. And I don't like the idea of granting them R4 when there are limitations that are way beyond my expectations. Because I don't know what they're going to do. And you don't know what they're going to do. If I had a plan and they give me the elevations and the heights that they was going to do it, then I would look at it a little different. But when you just automatically change it from R2 to R4, that opens it wide open to whatever they want to do according to R4 regulations. And I don't like the R4 regulations right next to me. That is my complaint. I understand. And there is other property in town, yes, I know. Things have done over years. I served on the city council for 20 years before I come to this town, and some of the things I see go on here are very disturbing. Thank you for your input.

I didn't mean to open it back up to public hearing, but I'm trying to come up with something, a solution that we can... Yeah, I'll entertain additional discussion here.

Go ahead.

I agree with Larry somewhat that we don't know what the future is going to bring. I mean, once we sign the papers on it to come in, we can't stop it. I could live with that being a parking lot down there and taken care of, like you say, with a buffer strip or something. and the other units further up over the hill. I could live with that. Larry is right up on top of the hill there. He's gonna take the brunt of it, of them. Where mine is just facing east. But I could live with the parking lot out there.

All right, thank you. Within our commission discussion, Kate, I know you had public comment on the screen before. Could you put that back up for us? So we did receive a letter, I guess you did, Paige? Okay.

In support of.

In support of, yeah.

No, we just emailed it out. We didn't attach it to the agenda. Oh, I thought it was a... No, that's just the application.

Oh, okay. It was small. Sorry. Anyway, there was a letter received in support from a homeowner to the south of the road a little bit, right?

Yes.

Okay.

Well, you know, I understand the concerns, but I also know Bartles is in a position where they don't want to start spending money on detailed plans until they know that they've got a target that they can hit or what they're at. To ask them to bring a, to spend a lot of money on a plan and not have an idea that the zoning is going to be approved is a pretty tough thing to ask. So, I don't know. Well, I don't see any mails jumping up, but I'll move that the Planning and Zoning Commission recommend approval of this to an R4 with the condition that special attention be made in site plan review related to a buffer along the west property line.

We have a motion to the commission. Do we have a second?

I'll second that. Okay.

All right. We have a motion that's been moved and seconded. All in favor, say aye.

The only thing I would say is that I think you need to... I don't know where the vote's going to come, but I think, Paula, you guys need to get together with these folks and... and work with them in putting a plan together so they have a good understanding and would feel comfortable with that. And I think with what John added to that makes a big difference there. And I don't know, can you bring it back to us to make sure that it's before the city... Fathers, or not fathers, but the city staff approves anything that you bring it to us first?

That's not in the ordinance.

I know it isn't in the ordinance, but can we do that?

I mean, you guys could see it, but I don't think you could do anything about it.

Well, once you pass it, but I think it, you know, I was trying to think if we could.

Would a modification to the motion make a difference? If you put something in that, that it comes back to the commission?

I don't see how. The ordinance says the site plan is administratively approved by the building official and planning and zoning administrator. We can't change the ordinance on our own motion.

It would come here and... We would try. if they didn't like my, they could appeal my decision to you on the same plane with you.

We obviously would be happy to work with neighbors to make sure that they understand what we're proposing to do.

And I think Paige actually hit upon the solution is that if what they propose is, I mean, it has to be presented to the property owners, and if they don't like it, you can turn it down, and then it can be appealed, and then we would see it.

Yeah, that's right. Because we had that situation out there on the east, on the south side of 3 there, because the first time around, it didn't meet with what the developer Of course, that was a development. Oh, it's right there behind, it's across the street from one of the old Schneider's, and then there's a line of commercial property, and then there's berms there with trees on it. We had to go back and forth on that before. Is that Monahans? No. Monahan addition, yeah, yeah. So we know what can happen, so if they're not, they can appeal, comes back to us, right? Okay. I didn't mean to stop, but I want to have something that, I want to be nice to people having it, and it works well. They've been there longer than what Barnes has been, so.

All right, I want to resume. So we have a motion that's been moved and seconded. Any other further discussion? All right. I would ask all in favor say aye. Aye. Hearing none opposed, that motion passes. Next item on our agenda is item F, which deals with staff updates. Paige, I see what you've listed.

Yeah, I just put that out there as a reminder that our update to City Council is on September 28th, the fourth Monday of this month. Dave, are you planning on putting something together and do you want to send it out to us for feedback?

I do and I am. So I will commit to a week, week and a half from today to have something put together for review and input from the commission here. And you're certainly welcome to join me on the 28th if you'd like. Yes. And we'll go over our update.

It's on my calendar. Okay.

So yeah, that's the plan. Anything else? That's all I have. All right. Commission updates on G and R agenda. Kind of feel like we just covered some of that together. With staff updates, anybody else have anything? Okay. Hearing none, we're moving to item H. Move we adjourn. We are so adjourned. Thank you.