Board of Zoning Appeals - Regular Meeting

I would love for him to do that.

Which building is he in?

Hummingbird Square.

I have spent a lot of time at Tallgrass. I deliver like, you know, 40 with Easter lilies and 40 poinsettias. And thank God for good signage because you cannot get lost in Tallgrass Creek. Well, most every building is connected to another. Just keep following the signs. It's a... It's a maze. It is a maze, but it's a really well-organized place.

It's a great place.

I can introduce you to a lot of nice places.

Every once in a while, somebody will ask me if I live there when I'm visiting. I'm not taking that as a compliment.

You walk too briskly through the halls.

Yes, and I don't have on my badge.

Probably.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to this regular session meeting of the Leawood Governing Body. We're here tonight on August 17, 2026. I call the meeting to order, and with that, I would ask the clerk to call the roll, please.

Council Member Sunkel.

Here.

Council Member Guyette. Here. Council Member Harrison. Here. Council Member Kane. Here. Council Member Rubin. Here. Council Member Larson. Here. Council Member Pappas.

Here.

Council Member Castor.

Here.

And Mayor Mark Elkins is present and presiding.

Thank you, Stacey. I find that all eight of the governing body members are here this evening along with me as mayor, so a quorum is present and we can move on to the business of the evening. And with that, I would ask you all to rise for the Pledge of Allegiance on my leave, please. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Please be seated. Ms. Stromberg, are there any amendments or changes to the agenda as it was last published?

No, sir.

Thank you. If not, is there a motion to approve the agenda as it was published? So moved. Thank you, Mr. Pappas. That was Ms. Guyette, I believe. Any discussion? All those in favor of approving the agenda as it was published, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it and the agenda is approved as it was published. I don't have an indication of anyone having signed in tonight to address the governing body from the public. We have no proclamations this evening, nor do we have any presentations or recognition. which brings us to the special business of the evening uh item a under item seven is to conduct a public hearing and consider an ordinance vacating easements located at lot one of hallbrook east village sixth flat within the city of leawood johnson county kansas the staff wish to be heard yes mr lay

Okay, I can bring up the PowerPoint. Okay, there we go. So this first item for 7A is in lot one of the sixth plat for Holbrook East Village. In 2025, the developer did a replat and converted two lots into one lot. And with that, they knew there was already an existing easement along those two lots. But now that it's just one lot, this easement is cutting that lot in half. And so this is just to vacate that easement through the middle of the lot. we have uh confirmation from all the utilities that there are no issues or objections from them and so we are supportive of vacating this easement and mr lay given the map that's in front of us can you use the cursor to show us the easement that we're talking about so this is pretty hard to see but the old lot line ran right through here east to west if you can see my cursor and then the easements are right along that old lot line can you help us with the thank you cursor for me if you want there we go there we go okay thank you okay so this is where the old lot line was between the two lots and then that's the easement that we are vacating all right very good thank you mr lay questions for mr lay

If not, Mr. Lay, because this is an abandonment of an easement, a public hearing is required. And so with that, I will open a public hearing. We normally allot about three to four minutes for any comments that anyone may have. with respect to the proposed action of the city to abandon this easement. And I think that we still have a clock that works that will start to blink when you get to near the end of the three minutes. And when it switches to red, we would ask that you bring your comments to a close. With that, I do open the public hearing. And is there anyone in the audience who wishes to be heard on the proposed abandonment of this particular easement? If not, I would entertain a motion to close the public hearing.

So moved.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Ms. Guyette. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor of closing the public hearing, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it, and by unanimous vote, the public hearing is closed. That brings us to a consideration of the ordinance to vacate that easement located at Lot 1 of Hallbrook East Village, 6 Platt, within the city. Is there any discussion concerning staff's proposal to abandon that easement? If not, is there a motion to adopt the ordinance which would vacate the easement?

So moved.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Is there a second? Second. Thank you. I'll give that one to Ms. Rubin. Is there any discussion of the motion? If not, this matter does call for a roll call vote. And with that, I would ask the clerk to call the roll, please.

Council Member Pappas. Aye. Council Member Sunkel.

Aye.

Council Member Larson. Aye. Council Member Guyette. Aye. Council Member Rubin. Aye. Council Member Harrison.

Aye.

Council Member Kane. Aye. Council Member Castor.

Aye. I have eight votes in favor and none against, so the motion to adopt an ordinance vacating the easements located at Lot 1 of Walbrook East Village on the 6th flat passes unanimously. The ordinance is adopted. second thing under special business tonight is a as a proposal by staff uh to vacate the easements located at lot two of hall brook east village the fifth flat within the city here in johnson county kansas mr lay yes the developer same developer came to us last year and replanted three lots into two on the hall brook east village it's on the very southern end and if you can see my overhead

We can bring that up. There we go. So there's the current lot line between the two lots, and they are vacating an easement that actually comes from the right-of-way towards that house, and it's within the setback. It's not being utilized by anyone, and so we are supportive, along with the utilities, of vacating that easement.

Thank you, Mr. Lay. Questions for Mr. Lay? Ms. Harrison.

Thank you. David, with regards to all of these, I think this is the fifth and sixth time we've seen lot lines disappearing. this neighborhood in the last two years, is there a process where any approval has to happen from other neighbors or a notification or anything?

They go through the Planning Commission and City Council approval for a final plat. So it goes through the whole process and the notifications of the property owners.

So property owners nearby are notified?

Yes.

Okay. We don't do it that often. I just never thought to ask what the neighbors all think. So thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Harrison. Other questions for Mr. Lay? If not, just as before, there is a requirement that we conduct an open hearing on staff's proposal for the city to vacate or abandon the easement. Same rules as before. I'll formally open the public hearing and ask if there's anyone in the audience who wishes to be heard on the proposal that the city vacate or abandon the utility easements that are located on Lot 2 of Walbrook East Village in the 5th Platte. If not is there a motion to close the public hearing?

So moved.

Second. Thank you, Ms. Harrison. Second. Second. Thank you, Dr. Castor. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor of closing the public hearing, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it, and by unanimous vote, the public hearing is closed. Brings us to a consideration of an ordinance that would effectively vacate the easement located at Lot 2 of Hallbrook East Village in the Fifth Platte. Is there a motion to... Adopt such an ordinance.

So moved.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Is there a second? Thank you, Mr. Sunkel. Is there discussion over the proposal that the city abandon these easements? If not, all those, this again requires a roll call vote, and I would ask the clerk to call the roll, please.

Council Member Larson. Aye. Council Member Guyon. Aye. Council Member Rubin. Aye. Council Member Harrison.

Aye.

Council Member Kane. Aye. Council Member Castor.

Aye.

Council Member Pappas. Aye. Council Member Sunkel.

Aye.

Thank you. I count eight votes in favor and none against. So the ordinance vacating the easements located at Lot 2 of Fallbrook East Village, Fifth Flat, is adopted and the vacate, the easements are vacated. Thank you, Mr. Lay, for your help. Appreciate it. So we come now to the consent agenda of the evening, item number eight. Are there any items on the consent agenda that governing body members would like to withdraw for additional questions or comments? Ms. Kane.

R as in Red Robin.

R as in Red Robin for Ms. Kane. Any others? Yes, Ms. Rubin.

N as in Nancy.

N as in Nancy for Ms. Rubin. Others? If not then, is there a motion for the governing body to approve and adopt the items in the consent agenda with the exceptions of items N as in Nancy and R as in Red Robin?

So moved.

Thank you, Ms. Guyette. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Mr. Pappas. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor of adopting and approving the items on the consent agenda with the exceptions of N and R, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it, and the governing body approves and adopts the items on the consent agenda with the exceptions of N and R. We'll call first item number N, which is plan commission case number 130-2026. which is a resolution approving a final development plan and final plan for the bi-state business park, boundary luxury condominium garages located north of 143rd Street and east of Kenneth Road. Planning Director, do you wish to be heard on this item?

If Ms. Rubin has some specific questions, I am happy to answer those.

Okay, Ms. Rubin.

Okay, so I have a question on the downspouts. In the preliminary plan, they were supposed to be enclosed, and then in this plan, the final plan, they're not enclosed. I just wanted to hear from the applicant as to why that change was made, and if it was a cost issue, what the cost differential was. And then I have one other comment or question.

I can speak to that. And so just to your point, just kind of to bring everybody up yet on the preliminary plan, that was one of the stipulations that the downspouts would be enclosed on the exterior of the building. That is not a requirement in the LDO. It's been a pretty common practice to ask for that on most non-residential buildings, but it is not an LDO requirement. And so when the applicant came back to work through their plans for the final development plan, they discussed not internalizing those. And there's a little bit of context in the bi-state business park. A number of the buildings out there already do not have enclosed downspouts. And with this development in particular, staff felt that it was an appropriate location to not have them enclosed. It's a completely fenced and gated private development. The only people who would be entering and seeing the downspouts would be any individuals who have purchased one of the individual condo units within it. It's not the parking lot that's going to be open to just the public. So staff felt comfortable with it and revising that requirement for the final development plan, but I'll let the applicant speak to their particular reasons for making that change. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Shirley. I'd invite the applicant to step forward if they're here tonight. And if you would not mind introducing yourself again, welcome back to the governing body. And as you heard, Ms. Rubin has some questions relative to the changes in the plan that we're approving tonight, or we're considering tonight.

Okay. Daniel Taylor. I live at 13920 Kenneth Road. I live directly across from our project.

Can you speak up a little bit, please?

Oh, I'm sorry.

Daniel Taylor. Is that better?

No, that's good. Thank you.

13920 Kenneth Road. Thanks. I live right across from the development and it's very important. to me and has been for quite some time. So we spent a lot of time studying these communities here locally as well as nationally, and every piece of aesthetic architectural elements that we've chosen we've really thought long and hard about, and we think we have one of the coolest ones that we've seen thus far, even nationwide. We essentially were following the precedent of what has already been built around us, where there are downspouts everywhere we look. And so we felt that we'll just follow what was already put in practice. I'd like to bring Chad Streeter up here from Bandeers & Associates, who did all our design work. And then if you're interested, we could also have Dan Finn from Phelps talk about the fact that we are going to bury all of these downspouts underground, and he can talk about flow direction and exit points as well. So we thought a lot about these.

Very good. Thank you, sir.

Are you okay with that?

No, absolutely. Please step forward. And if they would introduce themselves and give us their business address for our record, we would be grateful.

Chad Streeter, 11011 King Street, Suite 130. As Dan said, this is a kind of unique project, at least for Leawood. We work with staff quite a bit on developing an ordinance for this type of project and developing that you know we tried to make it upscale but still make it you know like look like a garage where someone want to hang out bring their luxury vehicles and don't have a club feel along with that you know somewhat of an industrial application in the design you know with with the downspouts in the gutters being seen within the in the site itself we thought that was appropriate as staff had said the areas where they're really where you can see them along cambridge lane we did we did put in collector boxes and we did match the downspouts to the buildings so we we were cognizant of the surroundings and what people would see and so you know from from a design standpoint we We liked how it looked and the way it came out and the way the project is coming together. So I'll just take any questions that you might have. Ms. Rubin?

No other questions on that issue. I just have one other quick question for the developer, but that was it for this.

Mr. Taylor, did you have someone else that you wanted to come up to speak to this change? Welcome, sir. If you could give us your name and address, we would be grateful.

Dan Finn, Phelps Engineering, 1270 North Winchester, Olathe, Kansas. Just wanted to echo on what Dan had mentioned. A lot of the concerns with exterior downspouts are both the look of it and then also concerns if it's going to be dumping directly onto grade via splash blocks and surface draining away from buildings, causing erosion issues onsite and also downstream. So with the downspouts being exposed externally, they are all going to be piped underground. There will not be any external downspouts that will discharge directly to grade. They'll be routed to a private detention basin for stormwater treatment and detention on-site, and then we'll connect to the downstream public stormwater system. So we have thought about both aesthetically what it will look like and also to ensure there won't be any erosion issues from the external gutters and downspouts.

Thank you. Ms. Rubin, additional questions? No. Great. Thank you. And Mr. Taylor, I think that Ms. Rubin had one additional question for you.

Just one quick question. So in the last hearing, when you had the preliminary plan, we talked about the neighbors at the villas next to you. And I was just wondering, I think we talked about some of the rules and regulations that might apply. And has there been any update on that with those neighbors?

Yes, we've actually... I've met with... I wish I could remember her name. My apologies. The one that runs the HOA. And we've added some additional landscape. They were concerned maybe about headlights, and so we've replaced some deciduous trees with evergreens. We're going to use green giant arborvitaes and some other spruces. And we... They were asking about the retaining wall, and we explained that the retaining wall would be high enough where the car lights would basically be blocked by the retaining wall itself, and they were completely excited about that.

Okay, thank you very much. I appreciate that. It's a great project. I think it's an interesting idea, and I hope it's very successful.

Okay, we do too.

Thank you.

Thanks very much.

Thank you, Mr. Taylor. Appreciate it.

Dr. Castor. I was just going to say, I know Mr. Taylor socially. His name wasn't on the staff report, so I initially didn't withdraw from the conversation. But if it's okay, I'll abstain from a vote on this. Your decision.

I'm happy to abide by that. Given that, is there a motion relative to item N?

I'd like to move to approve.

Thank you. Rachel, I appreciate that. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Ms. Kane. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor of adopting the resolution approving a final development plan and final plat for Bi-State Business Park Foundry Luxury Condominium Garage is located north of 143rd Street and east of Kenneth Road, which is Planning Commission Case 130-2026. Please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it on a 7-0 vote with Councilmember Castor abstaining from participation and voting on item number N. Call now, which is... A request for approval of the purchase of Cold Spring Black Granite from Carthage Stoneworks in an amount not to exceed $106,050. That's identified as Project 79032 under the Parks and Recreations Group. Ms. Kane, I believe this one was yours.

Yes, it was, Mayor, thank you. In our discussions with this and conversations, all the conversations, whether it was at the dais or not, about the Leawood Veterans Memorial, I remember item 8F was talking about the parking lot improvements and the sidewalk going around. And that the city was going to pay for that. What I don't remember is that the city was going to pay the money for the $106,000, which is about a third of the project, for the granite. So I'm assuming either it's going to be reimbursed by the Leawood Foundation, or perhaps they've already given us the money one way or the other. I don't recall that the city was responsible for that purchase.

Ms. Stoddard.

Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember. The answer to that is that this would be reimbursed from the from the Leawood Foundation, which is holding all the donor money for the Veterans Memorial. We have been working on an agreement on the staff side that we'll be sharing with the Leawood Foundation for their consideration. And basically, it's just an understanding, a. kind of a letter of agreement with the foundation since they're kind of an arm of us to transfer those monies upon invoice by the city. We'll have other expenses related to the Veterans Memorial because it's envisioned that the city actually be the one to issue the contract. And that just allows us to work directly with the contractor to oversee the project and then have those monies reimbursed from the donation money received for the memorial.

And I would note as well that the foundation has raised sufficient funds to cover this amount, and they currently have it on deposit and available to pay when the invoice is sent out. And again, I would echo Ms. Stoddard's view. It's one that I share that it's appropriate for the city to be in the in the command position to manage the construction project.

I couldn't agree more. I was just making sure because that was what the understanding was. So thank you for the clarification. And with that, I move to approve item 8R.

Thank you, Ms. Kane. Is there a second? Second. All right, Mr. Sunkel, thank you. Sorry, I missed somebody on my left, so I apologize for that. Any discussion, Ray, the approval of the purchase for the black granite from Carthage Stoneworks? If not, all those in favor of approving that purchase, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it. And the purchase of that Cold Spring Black Granite from Carthy Stoneworks is unanimously approved. That brings us, I think, to the mayor's report. I have, I guess, just four items to mention this evening. First, and I know it's been a while since we've met, so this goes back a ways, but I think it's important to note on the public record that on July the 29th, Moody's issued a credit opinion for the city of Leawood. that rated our bonds at AAA. This is the highest rating issued for municipal bonds, which identifies Leawood as a particularly credit-worthy municipality, and that results in the city's ability to borrow and fund capital projects at the lowest possible interest rate, which obviously benefits not only the city government, but our city taxpayers as well. And I would note that this is the 18th consecutive year that... Moody's has issued that AAA rating for us. So again, congratulations to Jeremy and to Ms. Stoddard for the work that the finance team did in advance and the way that they presented the city to Moody's. So again, a great accomplishment. And as we noted at our last meeting, we used that AAA rating to successfully sell our facilities Series 2026 short-term notes and bonds at particularly favorable interest rates. Secondly, on August the 3rd through the 7th, the KC Metro area hosted the Maccabi Games, which are an Olympic-style athletic competition among Jewish youth from around the world. Our city, our sister city, the Gezer region of Israel, brought a delegation of 26 athletes that competed in baseball and basketball. They were accompanied by Gezer Mayor Rotem Yadlin and Regional Administrator Carmel Tall, who both spent a considerable amount of time with both the Leawood staff, members of the governing body, and members of the Gezer committee. We also hosted a brunch for the athletes and their sponsor families, as well as a dinner that included the governing body and the Gezer committee. During the course of their visit, the mayor and the regional administrator shared really interesting insights to the challenge of operating municipal government during a community emergency such as the 1,000 days of war that their community has experienced since the October 7th incident. But what was really remarkable to me is in the midst of all this, uh mary adlin had taken the time to to think about how their lessons learned might be of benefit to us in in emergencies that are not quite of the nature that she and carmel have been managing through over the last thousand days in addition uh... we hosted a dinner that included the governing body and the geser committee and on monday august the third councilmember rubin and i participated in the opening ceremonies at bartle hall for the maccabi games and it would be important for me to note that councilmember rubin also hosted three athletes from memphis uh... for that event and so she and her son had the opportunity to to spend some time with those three athletes and i think they very much enjoyed it Third, on August the 5th, Council Members Larson and Guy Ed were kind enough in my absence to welcome the Cornflower Bakery and Mission Farms to Leawood in a ribbon cutting. And that ribbon cutting was particularly a sweet experience, as I noted from some of the social media postings, particularly in Ms. Guy Ed's case.

It was such a hardship.

She seemed to be very much enjoying that.

It was a sacrifice we were willing to make.

so i appreciate the both of you stood there in my stead uh... also notice that uh... What was the date? On August 10, I was pleased to join the Chamber of Commerce in a ribbon-cutting for the new Leawood Family Eye Care and Optical Offices at 114th and Knoll. I think that they were previously members of our community. Their business has grown dramatically. They saw a need to expand their business, and they were able to meet that need by staying in Leawood. And so we're grateful for the fact that they stayed with us. Last, and probably most importantly of the evening, I'm pleased that Council Member Rubin has chosen to celebrate her birthday with us this evening. So best wishes to Ms. Rubin on her birthday, and apologies to what happened on the council meeting night. So congratulations, Ms. Rubin. That concludes my report, and now we move on to Council Member's report. First, I'll recognize Ms. Harrison, I believe.

Thank you. I don't want to drag Chris Claxton back in here, but maybe she's listening in the other room as well as anybody on her team. I wanted to just take a minute to share some kudos. I don't know if all of you have had the chance to look at the new Leawood Loop, but I spent a lot of time kind of dissecting these when they come, probably because I used to be in the business of published magazines and things like that. We had a huge increase in the amount of programming available for adults between the February to August, singing your praises, Chris, between this issue and this view. We had two pages of adult programming in this one and more than four pages of adult programming. And that is something that I remember getting a couple of emails about. People wish we had more programming for adults. Now granted, I would say to them, there's programming in so many places. It doesn't have to just be Leawood that offers you fun programming. Take note, they're offering adult summer camp, you guys.

We could go to camp together, and we could stay in the cabins, and we'd make s'mores, and we could sing.

It would be so much fun. And then you could have Starbucks in the morning. I can tell this is really looking like... I think that's very creative. There we could. They also have senior scientists, if that's more up here. Anyway, I love the variety of programming. It's really deeper and wider than I've ever seen in other issues. So kudos to the creative team that put all of that together. So I hope you'll spread the word about it, maybe sign up for something. Bridge, Mahjong, all of it. I'm really, really thankful and impressed. So thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Harrison, and congratulations, Ms. Claxton. We very much appreciate the work that you and your department do in meeting the needs of our community. It's really one of the many things that sets Leawood apart. So please extend our thanks and congratulations to your staff as well. And then I believe that Ms. Kane had a report as well.

Yes, in the same department. We had the Leawood Parks and Rec Advisory Board meeting on Thursday, last Thursday, August 13th. The two main topics of conversation was the splash pad future operations. As you recall, this group, and so did the Parks and Rec Department, voted to eliminate the splash pad or not spend the money to reinvest into it. So we will continue those conversations. The when and the where and the how of what happens to that space is yet to be determined. The second big discussion, which was the bulk of the meeting, was the future of the tennis pickleball. So I have a picture here, hot off the press. So the courts to the north will remain three tennis courts. The courts to the south will turn into ten permanent pickleball courts.

Ms. Gaines, sorry to interrupt you, but Stacey, would you mind grabbing Beth and we can put it up so everyone can see? Sorry about that.

No, thank you. not great vanna white capabilities up here so thank you for that so there we go so um on the the courts i'm seeing on my right i'm assuming you got oh now i'm seeing them on the top those are the uh north courts and they are our tennis courts they will remain tennis courts and then the three that were on the south will be turning into 10 permanent pickleball courts You can see some dash lines in below that will represent fencing, four foot tall fencing in between the court. So we had a long discussion about that and staff is going back to the contractors to talk about Certain things like how tall should the fence around the pickleball courts be that kind of thing? We are talking about having Extending the sidewalk you'll see it kind of swoop in above the three tennis courts and maybe at some point connecting around the side for ad a compliance and there's also talk about shade structures that's hard to say um to the left of the pickleball courts and in likely to the left of the um tennis court so all this is in development but it's exciting and we had people from you remember we had golly how many were here so I think short term, it's the best use, we all think it's the best use of the money. And kudos to the staff for not only working with the developer to get a great plan, but also they have applied for a grant from the USTA for $175,000, $125,000, $175,000?

Chris Claxton, Director of Parks, Recreation, and Arts. So the USTA will give us $105,000. Oh, $105,000. And then we'll get $7,000 from the section and then another $1,000 from the chapter.

So not only are they doing a great job, I think listening to the residents who have been screaming, please do pickleball courts with permanent nets. So we're not only doing that, but we're capitalizing on some grants available because the tennis people are like, please don't. they don't want to see tennis go away so that they're making some grant money available. In addition, they always provide us with the monthly staff report and uh as a copy of what we all get so that's a good working hard working group and smart group and between the department and the group well we do great things so that's my meeting for august thank you miss kane and i note that last week on three different occasions different days i drove through the city park see what was going on there on each of those three occasions

Pickleball courts were full and there was nobody playing tennis Continues to reiterate the need for for pickleball. I think we found a really good thanks to Parks and Recreation Thanks to the committee and thanks to this governing body for finding a creative solution to what had been a challenging question

So we will, with our 10 courts and our fencing, we will be just as nice and just as lovely as Meadowbrook and other facilities around the metro. So what will be done there will not only be there, but it'll be elevated and well used and well liked, I'm sure. So we do it the Leawood way. Thank you for all the hard work there. So it's still not a final plan. It's close, but not a final. But it's a very well-received thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Kane. Mr. Pappas, I believe you had a matter that you wanted to bring to the governing body's attention and perhaps discussion.

I did. Thank you, Mayor. So the other week staff distributed a memo that I put together regarding council compensation and I typed up a few words here just to kind of briefly explain why I created it and then also some of the research that was behind it. I wanted to better educate myself on how our current compensation compares with where it was when we last adjusted it. So the current council compensation took effect in January of 2018. So it's now been about eight and a half years without a change. So one of the things I was looking at was inflation over that time period. So using the consumer price index for the west-north-central region, which includes Kansas, prices have increased about 34.9% from January of 2018 through June of 26. So put simply, something that cost $100 in January of 18 costs today about 134.90. So that's where the 34.9 figure, that's what that represents, and it is why I use the cumulative inflation as one of the main reference points in thinking about what a reasonable adjustment might look like. So I also looked at the total compensation package, comparable communities, and then the broader question of who is realistically able to serve in these positions over time. So my point with the memo was not that compensation should automatically increase with inflation every year, but after eight and a half years, I think it's reasonable to look at how much purchasing power that has been lost and use that as part of our discussion. So based on that, I felt the proposed increase that we originally discussed didn't really address the amount of ground that's been lost since 2018. So my suggestion was to use the 34.9% cumulative inflation figure as a reasonable reference point for us considering an overall adjustment to the compensation. So really, that's kind of put the memo together as a starting place to have a conversation, kind of provide some of that additional insight into why I created what I did.

Thank you, Mr. Pappas. Thoughts or questions for Mr. Pappas? Ms. Larson.

I just want to thank Councilmember Pappas for putting together the memo. I support his initiative and I look forward to further discussion as we make decisions for our budget. But I appreciate the effort that he's gone to and I agree with the outcome in his calculations.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Other questions or comments? Ms. Guyot.

I, too, appreciated the memo. It was very insightful and data-driven, which I very much appreciate. And I do also look forward to further discussion about it. I think one key takeaway that I had from it was we need to think about encouraging more of our Leawood residents to want to do what we're doing up here. We're all not gonna be here forever. So how do we encourage a diverse and passionate and informed group to continue to serve Leawood? And I think compensation is probably a part of that conversation.

Thank you, Ms. Guyette. Ms. Rubin.

I just wanted to add, in addition to compensation, I think we need to look at benefits and our counterparts in the city of Overland Park do get full time employee benefits, even though service on the council is a part time position. So they qualify for full time health care coverage. They qualify for really all the benefits that a full time employee would at the city of Overland Park. So I think that's something the value of qualifying for health insurance is actually pretty substantial. And I don't think that's been considered. So I just would ask that that be looked at and perhaps something that we can provide, you know, for council members in Leawood.

Thank you, Ms. Rubin.

other comments miss kane um just briefly i i would say i'm also in agreement um i i would like additional conversation about benefits i'm not so sure i'm agreeing with the concept of our receiving benefits but as we read and we're doing the comp plan and we all know that it's been an increase um in our amount of time required and um in all for good causes, and then ultimately the fact that we are the decision makers, and it is a huge responsibility. So again, I keep saying how long I've been sitting here because it's true, but the last eight and a half years to have no increase is kind of a little sad to me. If you balance the amount of time, which is considerable, with the amount of the responsibility we have, and we are the key decision makers, and then if you look at what Even if we pop up to the top number, what that means in the scheme of our overall budget and the total employee number, if you balance the two of what's our responsibility and what percentage of that overall compensation, it's it's so it's so minor that it's almost laughable uh to me anyway so i am thank you for taking the time and i would be very much in um agreement with the uh the the the top number that you proposed and look forward to the more conversation at the budget part of the meetings thank you miss kane other comments or questions

Well, if not, based on the comments that I've heard so far around the table, I would ask Ms. Stoddard that you and the finance team model out what that might look like from a cost and budget standpoint, being both the level of increase that Mr. Pepp has described and the... addition of making the health plan available to governing body members on the same basis as it's available for our employees. And we can then consider that at the time that we take up the budget, I think on September 8th, if I've got the date right there. Perhaps you can share some of that information with us before we get to the 8th.

Happy to put that together.

Thank you. Appreciate that. Are there any other council member reports this evening? If not, Ms. Stoddard, the floor is yours.

I have nothing to report this evening.

Thank you, Ms. Stoddard. Appreciate that. We now have a number of committee recommendations, and I would call first Planning Commission case number 123-2026, which is a resolution approving a revised final development plan for Regent's Park, 135, located south of 135th Street and west of Kenneth Road. Ms. Hurley, do you wish to be heard?

I do. Just a second. Please proceed. Okay. All right. Thank you. So as you said, this is a revised final development plan for Regents Park 135. Planning Commission did hear this at their July 28th Planning Commission meeting and voted six to one to recommend approval. So this is a revised PDP or FDP to allow for 190-unit mixed-use apartment building and separate multi-tenant commercial building. The rezoning and PDP for this were originally approved in 2018, and then there was a recent FDP that was approved in 2021 for this particular part of the Regent's Park development. So as part of this, structured parking is provided on the first floor of the apartment building with the apartments located above the structured parking. And the previously approved FDP included 193 dwelling units and two separate apartment buildings with below ground parking. So that is kind of the main difference here, going from two buildings to one. And then the below grade parking has transitioned to above grade parking. structured parking. So just to orient you, this, the blue highlighted portion is where this is located. As you are probably aware, the Regents Park development is a much larger mixed-use development, and I do have some slides on here showing you the whole thing, but this is just the location directly to the west of High Drive and between 135th and 137th Street. This is the site plan for the project we are looking at. The two purple rectangles are the buildings, and I was trying to highlight the pool deck on there, and I got the location a little bit wrong, but there is a pool deck, an amenity deck provided as part of the apartment building there along 135th Street on, I believe it's the second level of the building. And then what you're kind of seeing there on the site plan with the parking stalls as part of that building, that's that first level structured parking on the first floor of the apartment building. And then the red kind of square over to the east side of that, that is where the office space would be located within that building, providing some of that mixed use in the development. And then this is just showing that the entire MXD portion of the 135 development. So again, those two purple highlighted buildings are what we're looking at with this particular application. And then moving on to the east of High Drive, there are four more buildings. We have not had a final development plan come through for those yet. And then further to the east, that orange highlighted building, that is the co-op building that's currently under construction and getting pretty close to being done, I believe. And then just to go through some renderings of this, this is a rendered view looking at the northeast corner of the building. So this would be looking back at the apartment building from the corner of 135th and High Drive as you come into the development. You can see there on the first floor where that structured parking would be. Again, that entire first level of the building is the structured parking area. And they've designed the facade of it to kind of minimize that to the greatest extent that they can and make that blend with the rest of the design. And then just an additional view of that north side of the building as you would see it from 135th Street. You can see kind of a terrace provided above the parking level and then on up to the apartments above that. And then here is a view of that pool and amenity deck on the south side of the building. So this, again, would not be visible from 135th Street. This would be visible from the south side, kind of that parking lot side or 137th Street, a little bit further to the south. And then I just wanted to kind of run through some of the changes between the previously approved final plan and this approved final plan, just to again kind of highlight some of what has changed. So again, the main item is that the previously approved plan had two separate apartment buildings They were actually connected by an elevated pool deck, so they weren't totally separate. If you'll remember, there was that elevated pool deck, so the two buildings along 135th were kind of connected into one a little bit. And they had 226,000, almost 227,000 square feet total with 193 units. This plan has the one apartment building with 250,000, almost 251,000 square feet. It's a little bit larger, but with only 190 units. And the applicant will talk about this a little bit, but the reason for that little bit larger square footage, but fewer units, the unit sizes have gotten bigger. So we already have the minimum unit sizes that are required by the LDO, but those have gotten even larger with this to kind of account for market demands. Then that other kind of main change that we talked about was the structured parking. Previously that was designed to be completely below grade, and then now we still have structured parking with this. It's just above grade and integrated into that first floor of the building. The amount of retail and restaurant space has stayed the same. The amount of office space has stayed the same. Previously, there were 163 surface parking spaces. This has taken it down to only 107 surface parking spaces. And then we've gone from 198 structured parking spaces before that would have been below ground to 225 structured parking spaces in that first level of the structured parking. So we've got quite a bit fewer surface parking spaces in the parking lot in this current proposal and more of the structured parking spaces that are integrated into the building. And then on the landscaping, there was just a little bit of change in the number of trees and shrubs that were provided. The percentage of interior landscaping has stayed the same, right at 18%. The LDO requires 10%, so they're still well above what's required by the LDO. And then the most significant change in the landscaping was nine fewer parking lot trees. And again, what accounted for that is there's quite a bit less surface parking areas, so fewer landscape islands to even put parking lot trees into. So that's what accounts for that reduction in those parking lot trees. So just to give you a visual of the side-by-side, so on the left is what's proposed and then on the right is what was previously approved with that final development plan in 2021. So again, you can see that the general configuration is largely the same. They've just kind of moved the building, that main building, that apartment building around a little bit. It's become a little bit deeper down towards 137th Street from 135th. And then the pool deck has moved just a little bit, and so it's all integrated into just one building. And then just a view of the renderings on the left is what's proposed, and then on the right is what was previously approved. Again, from that same corner, right at the corner of 135th and High Drive, looking back to the southwest towards the building. So similar aesthetic, some changes there, particularly right on the corner with the amount of glass, but overall pretty similar in appearance. So with that, I can answer any questions that you might have. And the applicant does have a presentation to make as well.

Thank you, Ms. Hurley. Questions for staff? Ms. Rubin.

So just real quick, can you go back in the slides? Yeah, there. So where it says previously approved, what was that like blue, the violet section in the middle?

Oh, sorry. Yep. So that blue kind of in the middle, that was the elevated pool deck that connected the two buildings.

Other questions for Ms. Hurley? Ms. Kane.

Yes, on that same photo. I remember this discussion well, and one of the reasons that we were okay with a five-story building and this whole thing was because this whole development is closer to State Line Road was one. The topography really falls off. There was two. And then... the concept along 135th street was put you know put the tall stuff on the outside which you can see and then it insulates better what's on the inside so i mean those were i think it got unanimous approval if i'm remembering correctly it's been a minute If you'll recall, there's townhomes in there, and there was a bunch of attached duplexes that now they've changed to single family homes, which we can see is the trend. But what's given me a little bit heartburn, and I'm not quite understanding the numbers, I mean, I hear what you're saying, Julie, about The apartment number's the same, but they're bigger, but the volume, the sheer volume of the building, according to the blue rectangle, or the lavender rectangle, rather, on the right versus the left has doubled. It's doubled in size and density. What used to be, I think, unless I'm forgetting, a bunch of surface parking, And then if you go to the next picture, please. So where it says Regent, what we approved was kind of the front half of the building, but now we're getting, they're doubling it in size and volume. So... It's not what we approved at all. It's considerably bigger and like I said, that considerably changes in my mind the footprint of what we approved. I like that it's no taller. I like that the four story building is going to one. I appreciate all that. I appreciate your side by side. But unless I'm missing something, because they're increasing the size of the apartments dramatically, it's literally doubled the size of that footprint.

It hasn't doubled it, so the increase in square footage is only about 25,000 square feet. So it went from the 227,000 square feet up to 251-ish square thousand feet. Yeah, square feet. So there's an increase of, again, about 25,000 square feet.

Do we happen to have a picture of what it was supposed to look like before? I know this is the picture of what it's, well, okay, so that's, yeah, so the previously approved is a whole different angle, so I'm not quite seeing.

No, that's from the same corner looking back, and so if you can tell on here, it might just be kind of the way it's rendered, and then probably what you're seeing, so to this.

It might just be the same.

On the picture that's labeled previously approved, that building towards the left side of the picture is that separate building there along High Drive. That was previously going to be taller. Now it's only going to be one story.

I'm sorry, you've just lost me completely. I don't see how those two pictures are the same corner. Unless, like you said, what we're looking at was the four story going to a one story. I get that, I get that part. What I don't get is the stretch along 135th Street. Sorry. Okay, so the previously approved. that that big that big building to the the the left the cent the center of this slide that's the one that goes down to one story let's go ahead and hold that for a second when we get to the yeah just to yeah i might let them um because i think

I think this is the same corner. They can clarify it might have been the previously approved one might have been rendered from the west end of the building, but I'm going to let them confirm that.

Yeah, because again, I love that they went from two courtyards, now they have two courtyards, not one. I love the parts about the four story going down to one story, and there's more interior amenities and more exterior amenities. So those things all check, check, check, right? What I'm not seeing is I'm not getting how these two things are going together. I'm sorry, I'm missing it. Maybe from what you're going to present, I'll understand what was versus what is. Because you've lost me.

So other questions for staff? Ms. Harrison.

I, too, have concerns because this looks huge compared. If I'm looking at proposed, now I'm looking back at, yes, what you've got up there, proposed versus previously approved. It looks like it's. twice as deep. Same width, same height, just much deeper. And in the slide, well, the picture, it looks like it's three city blocks long. It just looks like just the biggest building, I think, that we would have in Leawood is what I'm seeing here. And if they're gonna be bigger units and fewer of them, what I'm hearing is higher rent prices. And so that causes me pause, but of course we can't control any of that, but that's what I'm hearing here. So I appreciate that. that a raised pool deck is probably very difficult and expensive to build, and maybe that's part of this, that that needed to go away. Put the pool in the ground. Pools do much better in the ground, because water leaks. But I don't like the size of this getting so much bigger in terms of the space it's taking up.

So additional questions before we get to comments? Julie, I've got a couple of questions for you here. What is the total length of the building? I'm sure it's on the plans that we saw, but I don't see it from what you've got up here.

I don't think I have it in here. Do you happen to have that?

I'm sure the owner can provide you with that.

Okay, they're going to pull that up for us and get that answer. Okay.

Second question, if you can go back to the comparison plans there. I take it that all of the commercial restaurant space is in that second building that is to the south of the big long building?

That's correct.

And then one that I've been puzzling over is the parking structure is going to be on the first floor, correct? Mm-hmm. On the visual that we have here under proposed, there are a bunch of lines that traditionally I would have thought were parking spaces, but what are those, all those lines there? Yeah, all those.

That is that first floor parking.

Okay, so that's not the top, we're not looking at the top of the building, we're looking at the top of the first floor.

That's the first floor, the ground level plan.

But the... The office is the square there.

Yeah, this is their office space.

And that will go up to the full height of the building, so it will be multi-floored?

I don't think the office itself is going to be. I believe the office is just the ground floor and then apartments above it. You can kind of see this would be that corner. So here's the office and then with apartment units above it.

So that, back to the comparison of the plans, that truly basically, that's basically a view of the first floor. Correct. Okay. All right. That's helpful. But the pool deck that's in blue, that's still elevated?

Yeah, that's elevated. I was just trying to show kind of where it was in relation to where the pool had been previously.

That's fine. All right. Thank you. I appreciate that.

And what's the red again? The office space. That is the office space.

All right, very good. Well, if there are no further questions for Ms. Hurley, I would invite the applicant to step forward. Mr. Peterson, welcome back. Are you speaking for the applicant this evening? Yes, thank you, Mayor. If you could state your name and address, we would be grateful. And we'll let you make your presentation, and then perhaps you can address some of the questions that Ms. Kane and Ms. Harrison had.

Good evening, Council and Mayor. My name is Kirk Peterson, 900 West, 48th Place, Kansas City, Missouri. You know that it's always a pleasure when I get to come to the home city here. Rick Lashbrook, all of you know, is here, moved up right here. And then we have Patrick Roeder also with Clover that's been designing this building and glad to have him here as backup too on the details. robust staff report and a really good presentation from staff and getting into the details. So I try really hard not to be repetitive and just be here where we're additive and be here for questions. But I did, for the brief remarks, I did organize it into three pieces. One is just a tiny bit more background, then getting into the project itself, which is a revised final plan that's in front of you. And it's nice because staff covered much of what, you know, you never quite know what's gonna be spoken, but most of it was spoken, but then I got a lot of questions. So then I get to answer those in that part. And then lastly, I wanted to touch on the sales tax exemption because the agenda makes note of that. So I think that needs a little bit of treatment too. And then I'll be here as long as you'd like with questions. So first for the background. So I would like to say for the record that I hope everyone would agree as I drive by every day, Rick has nailed it. Rick has done a lot. He has done incredible. You've watched that hillside. I know all of you have just be transformed into what he's done with all of the master site work. Lots of public improvements from, in no particular order, the turn lane on 135th to high drive to 137th, which all of you know because you've been doing this job for a while. That is super expensive. It takes a lot of time and effort. And so he's finished that. We've seen some beautiful homes coming up, which are a mix of the, I'm looking at the home expert, the single-family homes, but also the twin villas that are adjacent. They're south of 137th Street. As for tonight, talking about the mixed-use building along 135th Street, the equity market has been extremely challenging, and while we don't come in here usually talking that much about economics, it's real. Mr. Lashbrook spent a lot of time and money on the design of this building and wants nothing more than to bring this very expensive building very high-end condo finishes building out of the ground, but you also, it has to be financially feasible. And so that's what we've been struggling with the last couple of years. The good news is there's lots of interest. I actually get to keep up to speed and see emails and get reports from the equity market a lot. But they keep saying, you're close, you're close. We just, you know, market conditions, we've got to get you there, and we believe in this project, but it's just not here yet. So we've listened, really, the impetus to what we're doing here is we've listened to some real key equity partner stakeholders that want to work with Mr. Lashbrook to make this happen. And so some of these adjustments that staff described, and then I'll emphasize a few of them, are really coming from that because we don't want to sit around any longer. We want this building to come to life. So, as I said, little context, a little history, most of which you knew, but still important, I think. Transitioning now into the plan that's before you tonight, the proposed revised final development plan. So, again, a lot of these are, looks like we have PDFs, which is fine. So, this just gives you another look. The red box is the mixed use building footprint, and just to the right of that, you're okay. Is it not showing up there? Thanks for telling me. There we go. That did it. Thank you very much. The red box again is the mixed use building footprint. And then just to the east of it, you're seeing high drive just for your context. The senior would be all the way, that's under construction, is all the way to the east. And then that vacant ground is just east of high drive. I'm probably gonna come back to this one, particularly for some of Ms. Cain's questions. So just keep this one in mind. I think this does a really good job of showing the width and length of the building which is the red that you're seeing so we'll we'll come back to that in a minute and then i just wanted to spend a moment on this slide which really takes staff slide which was really good and super detailed and i think goes to the heart of the key changes that again we've been working with our equity partners on so in this final development plan you'll see that the two buildings that we looked at that were up long 135th street have become one but i want to pause on that because that's almost I think for almost anybody other than maybe an architect or someone would say, well, that wasn't two buildings. And it kind of wasn't. And the reason I say that it came up in some of these questions that we were connecting the quote two buildings on 135th Street in the previous plan with parking and above it had the amenity deck. And so when you looked at it, most people from 135th Street would not tell you that was two buildings. It's all I have at the holder. But just that's a little note when we say we're going from two to one building. We also took that building on High Drive, as staff pointed out, and moved the residential units, if you think of it like this, that were above the commercial, and we moved them and we plugged them into that upper story gap that I just mentioned. And what is the one building on 135th Street? So if you're a Lego blocks person, right, lift up from high drive and put on the building on 135th Street. We increased the residential unit sizes. We increased the garage parking. We decreased significantly the surface parking. And we added amenity space, importantly. So quick numbers, not all of staff's numbers, but the ones I'd like you to focus on because I think they're the most relevant and most important. Substantially the same number of units, you know, from 193 to 190. But the average unit size went from 930 units to 1,040. That was really important in the market, according to our equity folks, to get those unit sizes up. And then also garage stalls. This is huge when you all know how expensive it is to do structured and underground parking. Went from 198 to 225. garage stalls and then also important from an aesthetics and i know this city and a lot all the great cities around here are looking at this we took down the surface parking from 163 to 107 which we saw as a huge win more garage less surface parking And then lastly, we took what was a single amenity deck and we made it much larger and then split it apart so you have an active one, think pool and louder, you know, going on, and then a more passive amenity deck. And so we greatly increased our amenity sizes, amenity space sizes. So now I'm going to transition into answering some of the questions that were brought up, again, in no particular order. Let's start with Ms. Kane's questions that I heard that were not addressed. You said, and I'm going to go back like I promised I would, to this drawing. And one of the slides triggered for you the feeling that the building was, and what I'm going to call wide, you know how that is, you know, are we talking, which wide to me is from north to south, from 135th Street. I feel like that's where you're reacting to on the screen. And I reacted the same way when I looked at it. It just happens to not be... It's not actually happening. So if you look at the legs of that building on the screen, and I call it legs, the red that sticks south out from the core of the building, again, red is the building, those did get a little bit longer, but the overall massing of the building did not, that's just not accurate as to what you were seeing on the screen and reacting that it's getting to be a much larger building in fact staff ultimately put numbers up that showed I mean could be off by one or two percent but it's effectively square footage wise it's about a ten percent increase in size which does not translate to the feeling you were seeing on the screen also that first we're talking largely first floor footprint you saw in the design that there's lots of step back and I'm going to show an image in a minute that I think helps show that so When you look at those upper stories, which is what people are seeing, there's really no perceivable difference. Also, something that we added, and I'll go to this image in a minute, Ms. Kane has a lot more undulation, a lot more in this design. Pulling the building back, and I'm going to show you one of my favorite features. In fact, there's probably no better time than now, is when you face north towards 135th Street, something that Patrick and his team added here. So what you're seeing is you're seeing first floor down being cut off at the bottom of the screen, and then you're seeing the first multifamily level which is floor two and so on the 135th street side what you have is enlarged patios so you can start to see the third and the fourth above how it's a normal nice balcony but down below you have this great space that patrick was talking about other projects where people do a really nice job with a lot of times with plants and things like that looks really active and nice And so, again, that doesn't give off – this is subjective. We'll see if you agree. That doesn't give off the same sort of bohemian feel. When you look at a footprint and you see that, it seems really huge. But when you notice that's really just overhang patio space for people on those first multifamily floor units, it gives off a different feel. So I wanted to show you that picture in particular. Ms. Harrison was talking about – really what the mayor, I think, was getting to, which was, I think, the length long, length of the building. and um i will say in terms of the length of the building i made sure too we were looking at plant sets back here this is exactly the same length to to the foot as what was approved before again the difference is that whether you consider it two buildings before like i already talked about or one um it's it's just a different design so again we pulled back farther on the second story and above and we created more undulation And we filled in that gap where the pool was before. But it's still exactly the same building length, I mean, down to the foot, 642 feet. We really think it will be sharp. And because of all the architectural, you know, distinctions and undulation that we put in the new design. By the way, I had the same. Can I just say, when you look at these two, these are meant, and that staff showed I'm putting up the same image they did before and after. My brain does the same thing. I struggled looking at this thing. Is this really showing me the same thing? It is. It's just slightly a different angle. That's high drive in the foreground on the previous. And then 135th would be going off screen, sort of up and down. And then you're just getting a slightly different angle on the current that shows you more of 135th Street there. So just if anybody was struggling mentally like I was at first. So it is generally the same, but just a slightly different angle. With that, and I'm hoping that I want to answer more questions, but I'll move to my third piece and then be ready for questions. The third piece, oh, one more quick one. Again, another mental one. We've heard from staff accurately that we had underground parking before, and then generally accurately that you have above ground now. Now, I personally, being somebody that's around cost all the time, knows this is, it's six of one in most cases. I mean, tons of money, really expensive, gets cars off the surface parking, it's great. But in case anybody cares about that, something that's interesting, and this is the slide that I actually, I'm going to go up one, two, three. This shows it the best. So right now. To your kind of right and up, you're looking to the west along 135th Street. And you have about 10 feet or so of climb as you go to the west. And so what you can see is it's not just an illusion. When you see the garage space, which is the tan first, you know, it looks like. It looks like two glazing spots right there, and it's taller in the foreground, and that's because you've come downhill, right? So you've, quote, exposed your foundation like on your house if you have a walkout. And so as you go... West, again, you're exposing less and less and less. Well, when you look at the previous design, while certainly you can say there was underground, it's a little bit of a distinction without as much difference as you might imagine, because now what you would see, if this showed it better, is you would see that there's... foundation exposed in the previous as well. I mean, you can kind of see it because see the hard corner in the bottom right of the image labeled previous. You can see that's, again, gone the same 10 feet, right? We've dropped. And a bunch of that garage was above ground. So in case you care, yes, it was underground, but a lot of it was above ground, too, because we have grade change. That was way harder to explain than I thought it would be. Now transitioning mayor and council to the third category that I wanted to describe, which is the sales tax exemption. So when this project was approved, it was approved with EDRB sales tax exemption to help with the extraordinary cost of underground slash structured parking, which, again, is an incredible cost. And when I had the pleasure of working on the actual EDRB policy that this body, previous group, adopted, which really, really focused on, there's other aspects to it, but focused on, quote, underground and structured parking, because we know it's really great, but it's really expensive. And also I was laughing to myself. I literally wrote this down. I was like, Council Member Kane, Council Member Harrison, Council Member Larson, Ms. Bennett, And Bond Council, who I don't even know if we have Bond Council on right now, probably don't, are the only ones left standing. So I need your testimony that I'm telling the truth, that we really focused a lot on structured and underground parking when we put those policies together. And this was one of the very first instances where we applied the policy because we knew we had structured parking. Please know the reason I spent a second on this is because the continued sales tax exemption for this mixed-use project is essential. And then say it one more time, like essential in the dictionary meaning of the word. This doesn't happen without that. It's really, really important. So within the next few months, you'll see me again briefly, hopefully, come up, and there will be bond counsel for the city here, and we'll be asking for a one-year extension because our equity is quite confident with these changes to the plan that we can be under construction soon. next year, subject to world events and all the normal caveats. And so we would need a one year extension to get our EDRBs in place next year. So I just wanted to give you a preview. So when you see me in a couple of months, you know, say, why didn't you say anything when you're here? Well, I am just giving you a preview. So with that, we formally agree with all staff recommended stipulations one through 14. And would we request your support for what is before each night, which is the revised final plan? But I do look forward to answering any follow up questions. Anybody else? Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council.

Thank you, Mr. Peterson. Questions for Mr. Peterson? I'll start with Ms. Harrison.

Thank you. So I just want to make sure I understand that the sales tax exemption that we agreed to was mostly, I believe, if I can hear Deborah Fila, thank you for giving us underground parking. That's going away. And now it's going to be first level, well, ground level parking instead of underground parking.

Only because the policy uses the terms of art in the industry. I want to use them for the record. We had underground and some above ground parking. That's what I was trying to show with. And now we're doing, sorry, I said above ground. I'm going to use the terms of art. Structured parking. Underground parking, structured parking. We had underground parking that was also technically, you can see when it was on the screen, technically some structured parking. Now we're going to all structured parking. And the reason I did that, and that answer is because that was the policy. It literally said we're focusing on underground and structured parking.

Okay. So I will admit that it is very frustrating for me when I hear people say, but the money, it just doesn't work. We just can't make the numbers work unless you give us this thing. And that's frustrating for us because it's not actually our job to make the numbers work for people who want to come into Leawood and make money. It's our job to protect Leawood from projects that aren't a good fit. And we just spent almost two hours downstairs talking about the next 20 years in Leawood and projects and how we want them to fit. So I'm just gonna throw that frustration right out there because this thing that we, I feel like we were promised something, this was gonna be a tall building and we were okay with that because the parking was gonna be underground, structured but underground, and now it's not. The sales tax exemption was given because the parking was gonna be underground and now that's going away. The building's getting bigger. in one direction, maybe not length, and that is also a concern. So I feel like you came to us with a list of three things you wanted to point out. I'm giving you back a list of three things that frustrate me a little bit because We are hearing over and over again that we've maybe approved too many apartments in Leawood, that the market may just not be able to bear this. And then you're coming to us and saying, we're going to build bigger, more expensive apartments. And I'm just like, no, what if the market can't bear that? But you've got these equity partners, and that's just, I think, a fancy term for the people who make sure you make money. They're the ones that are crunching the numbers professionally. That's what they do. It's their gift. And so they say bigger apartments, that'll make this project work. That'll make the numbers crunch for you. So I have a lot of concerns, unfortunately. But my main one is that this building feels just really, really big and really, really long. And I would have much preferred that it at least looked like it was two buildings with an amenity deck or a pool deck that broke them up so that you didn't drive down 135th. And we should be able to have the exact numbers, by the way, of the exact length and the exact width. In fact, it should be on that screen there. in really little tiny black numbers. I can't get my packet to pull up tonight, so I'm frustrated from that as well. But somebody out there definitely knows exactly how long and exactly how wide the previous one was. Yeah, I said how long it was.

I had that, but we didn't get the width, too. Pardon? 642. 642 feet long.

Yes. But the depth...

It definitely can't be the same because in the picture it's very different. But what is it? What is the city black?

I'll get the exact in a second.

So anyway, thank you. Not a lot of questions, more comments, but thank you.

I just take, Mayor, if I can, take really seriously something that you said and totally agree with it. It is not the city council's problem to make sure a project pencils. I mean that. That never is, never was, never will be. If the city council sees a developer that has been delivering on what they said they would and you're like, and this is the big if. You may not, you may not, you may not, you may not. Somebody will. You have to decide. But if you like what they're doing and you believe that they have a lot of money in the project and haven't moved forward, not because they... are playing games or whatever because they can't. The clock's ticking. There's borrowed money. They can't move forward because they can't make it work. And if you want what they are suggesting, then you may or may not use a tool that your economic development policy said can be used for structured parking. But you don't have to. And I mean that. You either like it or you don't. But it won't happen without it. But I appreciate your comments.

Thank you.

Ms. Larson.

Question about trees. on page 29 of the packet, it looks like there's a lot of trees to kinda soften the look of the structured parking along 135th Street. But then on the picture of the rendering, it looks like the trees are sparser. which doesn't benefit the building. I really like the way it looks on page 29 with the spacing of the, what kind of tree is it? The,

Council Member Larson, could you speak into your mic?

Oh, so sorry. So sorry. I rarely do that. The Skyline Honey Locust, it looks like there's a lot of them along 135th Street and then the entrance that softens the look of that structured parking space. And it looks like more on this architectural drawing than what is in the picture.

We were just talking about that. The renderings, we try so hard, Councilmember, to get the renderings exactly like the actual landscaping plan sheets, but always pay attention to the landscaping plan sheets on the finest details.

Yeah, it looks sparse in the picture. And it doesn't help the picture of the building. So that was something that I'm asking, do you acknowledge that that looks different? It looks like less in the picture, but I like what I see on the architectural drawing. Having that structured parking along 135th Street may not be as attractive, so it'd be really great to have a bunch of trees and shrubs and landscaping kind of as the buffer for the building between the street. I really appreciate the fact that the surface parking number has decreased. from 163 to 107. And so in my mind, that helps. And yeah, I think the pictures, it just makes the building look massive. And so maybe it doesn't, won't really look like that is what I'm hoping, pictures it looks very large but i do appreciate it um how the architecture on the outside has been it's like a 3d dimensional which helps break up the length of that building

That's the undulation, just to be clear. You were describing it. That's the one architect word that I was using for that, yeah.

Yeah, undulation. I like it. And I think that that really helps with the length of the building. This is more of an opinion. I know we're supposed to be asking questions, but since I'm already speaking, Regents Park, has turned out beautifully what has been built thus far it looks like quality it i think the aesthetic is incredibly appealing when i drive through there it looks like someplace i would want to live it looks like quality and so i do think that the developer has earned some street cred i don't know a different word but in the quality of the development that they're going to have for this building because i really like what's been built thus far and i think that wraps up what i have to say thank you ms orson mayor before do you want me to answer this one i have that number now so we don't lose track go ahead okay

Previously, the, and I'm sorry, because I always like what dimension, the north-south, so I'm going to call that what, depth, maybe? Depth of the building was 148 foot, and now it's 152 foot. So like I was saying, it's really hard with these drawings and renderings to capture everything, but again, straight from the architect looking at the depth numbers. Sorry, Mayor, go ahead.

And that was the north-south dimension? North-south, exactly. Yep, thank you.

yes miss rubin um so i have a question about the renderings um i had asked for some different perspectives because we only have the north perspective so i want to make sure i'm thinking about this right like this northeast facade is that if i'm on 135th mrs rubin would you oh sorry thank you so if i'm on 135th and i'm looking south to the development We don't have a rendering of that here, do we?

There's elevations in the packet. I think the point, though, as my team, this is looking along. You're seeing it right there, but you're looking along as opposed to you're asking for a head-on.

Yeah, like I want to see what it's going to look like if I'm driving on 135th, looking south. I want to see what it's going to look like.

So on the right of the screen is labeled current. And that facade that you're seeing facing to the right of the screen is the north-facing facade that you would see if you were driving on 135th Street.

Okay, so it's... The facade is facing north, but I would be looking south. Yes. Yep, exactly. Okay. So I also feel like the rendering doesn't show the entire length of the building. I am concerned about the length of the building. I'm not as concerned about the depth because you don't really see that from the street, from 135th anyway. But like you can see on this northeast facade, you don't even see where the end of the building is. On the rendering. I know you have it on the drawing.

On the northwest. So the northwest corner, which would be down here, you're saying you don't, yeah, right there. Northeast. So that would be the west. Where the cursor is going, like where I'm going with it, is going to the west towards the sky, kind of that way?

I guess look at page 48 of our packet is what I'm looking at.

Is that the one you're looking at now? Page six is what's 48. Okay, I'm getting some clues. And just before we leave it, because I don't want to interrupt when you're mid-speech, but this is exactly the same length as, we did not change the length of the building. So let's go to, Patrick, you're saying it's a PDF. Of course not, and I don't see numbers on here. You want to tell me when to stop? So that is, by the way, just for continuity here in discussion, that is, again, the... north-facing facade. This just is one level up, but Patrick's telling me to go here. And this is what you're looking at in your packet, what I have on the screen, is that right?

Okay, thank you. So I guess I'm not seeing, like it looks like the building keeps going on off the page, so I can't see really what it's going to look like.

It doesn't go off, it stops right here, right there. That's the end of the building.

Okay.

And then...

It's different than the packet, I guess is what I'm saying.

If you look at the packet, page 48, the building keeps going... Yeah, you had asked for new rendering showing 135th, and so this is what they produced in response to your request.

Okay. I guess... It would be nice to see it not at the angle. I'd like to see it sort of head on to get a feel for that length.

I see. I think the whole idea was drivers since you're going 135th. You're not like that. Right, right. I think that was the idea.

Okay. That was all I had. Yes, ma'am. Thank you.

Mr. Peterson, just to make sure I'm tracking on this rendering that's on the screen right now that has the labels for High Drive and 135th Street. The cars that are coming towards us are traveling east. Is that right? And we're looking to the west. And that's the north facade of the building that we're seeing.

Do I have that right?

Okay. You got it. Thank you. Other questions? Ms. Gaines.

This is not so much questions, but just comments. And Mr. Lashbrook, I'm a fan. I'm a fan. You know that. I've said it many, many times. I'm a fan of Regents Park. I'm a fan of yours. I'm still a fan, even after this. What's given me heartburn, however, in this presentation is, you made the point, Mr. Peterson, five of the eight were not here at the time. So even I didn't approve this. And what was portrayed to us when we approved it was, you said it yourself, two buildings with the inside. It looked more like two buildings because the inside was the big pool deck kind of area. and now you've reconfigured it and so instead we will have literally one solid city block of a five-story building along, as opposed to what visually and what we approved in my mind, was it visually looked like two separate buildings with the big separation in the middle, or it wasn't so big, but there was a big separation in the middle. And then even in the packet, which is right here, for the purposes of the newbies, they can't see that. And even to Ms. Rubin's comment is, You're not showing it from 135th before or after. We're not seeing it. We're seeing it from the corner of High Drive. So I just, I don't know. The word razzle dazzle is in my head right now. I just feel like we're getting partial information. You're not being completely transparent with your presentation here. Again, if it's four feet difference north to south, that's peanuts, of course. If it's the same stretch along 135th, so basically what you're saying is the footprint is the same, which is good because that's not what it appears from your very own photos. substantially the same it was a little different just so people yeah right but the visual impact i'm afraid of 135th street i don't know what we do about it if anything but the visual impact along 135th street i think will be uh with or without that deck will will be greatly different than what was in my mind but again i i believe you do quality work i believe or um you know apparently there's a lot of equity partners that are involved which makes perfect sense of course i do think a comment was made earlier today when we were in our work session about We have our, and this has nothing to do with this development, but we have our experts saying we're maxed out with apartments, and yet we have the developers saying, oh no, we need more apartments, but it's because right now they're getting financing for apartments. That's the one piece that developers, they probably get financing for. So we're kind of stuck in this, as a city, we're kind of stuck. um anyway those were not questions those were just comments and i don't know uh what we can do about it other than i'm frustrated by the presentation and by the photos it feels like for the for the new people that they they weren't seeing the true before and after that was approved mayor oh go ahead thank you

Ms. Cain, we are trying to be transparent. We're trying to do the drawings that make the most sense for people to really capture what it would be like. Like I said, going along the roadway we thought was the intent to people passing by what it would look like. And the other problem, if you do do something that is not what people will see when they pass by, and you try to go across the street where there are buildings and you try to do a rendering there, is it's really hard with pictures like this to capture the undulation. So on the screen, even now, it's really, really hard, but at least you have a better shot at being able to show it, which is look how far in the building goes here and the building goes here. It's supposed to look like different. building sections you get a little better sense here although they're closer together these undulations are more spread apart so it really gives you a sense of breaking up the massing and I'll tell you it is really hard and I'm not one that draws it obviously it is really hard to capture that in an image like this and that's what we're trying to do so your opinion is valid because it's your opinion but we by no means we're trying to provide information we're not trying to hide the ball on anything

well and then and this is therein lies the rub right this is a hard part for us is is we either we it happens over and over it's certainly not just you but we we end up getting um you know on a flat piece of paper we get squares and you can't read the numbers And we're supposed to translate a flat piece of paper, your version of what we should see or not, into what it's actually going to look like when it comes out of the ground. Because that's what the neighbors will complain to us about, you know what I mean? And so if indeed this is an entire city block long, I don't know that we have another building this big, certainly not an apartment building this big that is an entire city block long. So that's why it's given me a little bit of heartburn as you can hear tonight. because it was in in my mind visually at least broken up the first time and now it's not well it's got the undulations i love that word but it's anyway but i don't know what we do about it and i am a mr lashbrook fan and a this development fan so for the record again thank you mr

We're just, again, I try not to talk too much. I mentioned you heard me say the word elevation, Mayor and Council, a minute ago when we were having one of these, I said, well, it's on the elevations. It's exactly what you're asking, where you can look at each side and a flat from end to end and has all the dimensions.

This is what we see. This is what we see. So, again, are they here? Yes. But this is, again, this is what I'm saying. This is translating this into out of the ground and we have to... We have to answer to our neighbors, that's the part. Did you give all of us the elevations? Yes, but it's on an eight and a half by 11 piece of paper. And what it actually looks like, even the building coming out, the 55 and older building coming out, because I live out there, people are going, I had no idea that thing was going to be so big. so that's the thing once it starts coming out of the ground it's very hard to mental i'm not an architect it's very hard to go from two dimension to three dimension especially when you're talking about a city block long but again i don't know what we do about it at this point but anyway mr peterson a question that may or may not help and it may or may not be answerable tonight but i'm curious what is the length of the co-op building east west

And how would it compare?

You may be able to get that.

How would it compare with this 642 feet? And is 642 feet basically a full block, a full city block? Anybody? Okay. I'll let your architect.

The city block is between 500 and 700 feet long.

It's 214 yards, so it's a couple of football fields.

Okay. That'd be 600 feet. Fair enough.

642.

Yeah, it would be 600 feet. Yeah. Ms. Ray.

I have a question. Are you able maybe to plant some more evergreen trees along 135th? You have these locusts. They're deciduous. They're going to lose their leaves, you know, for five months out of the year. I don't know if more evergreens might help soften the structured parking. It's just a thought.

Yeah, I was going to say, as you can imagine, I can guarantee you that all the time and money and everything Mr. Lashberg has in this, if council or professional staff wants to make adjustments to the landscape plan, that's not a hill that he's going to die on. He wants the best possible project. So that's, yeah. I don't know that that's the design aesthetic right now, but I don't even have to look back. I know the answer is we really want to build this project, so whatever we need to do in that regard.

just i might hide some of the structured parking view um because then you'd have you know year-round more year-round coverage it's just a thought other questions for mr pearson yes ms guyette um just a quick question about you said that you were increasing the square footage of the units did that impact your and it might have been in our packet and i don't recall The unit mix or just kind of what are you seeing as far as trends to cause you to make that adjustment?

Good question. Yeah, there is something behind that. So we ended up I can flip a few pages and give exact numbers, but I'll start by just doing the high level. We did not have any three bedrooms, and we had some efficiencies, and we had a lot of ones and twos, which is very common, as you know. And we got rid of all the efficiencies and went to adding some threes. So the ones and twos still make up the bulk of it, but I guess on the ends, you could say we— That was my guess.

Yeah. And are the three bedrooms the ones that have those large patios that you pointed out?

Ooh, that's really detailed off the top of your head. Yeah, some of them is the answer, yeah.

That's very similar to some of the concepts that Meadowbrook did with their larger three-bedroom units, which were really, really popular. They did those larger patios.

Which, interestingly enough, only because this was brought up, usually it's not. But yes, this project has to pencil or it won't happen. But we also are trying to listen to the market, which is, again, our potential equity partners here and everybody in this market right now. you make more, and some of you are in nitrate because you know this already, but you actually make more per square foot on the smaller units. You make least on the three-bedroom units. But the reason we made these changes, and our equity partners wanted to, because we want to make sure this is always full. We want to make sure this is highly desirable, and we're building the size units and type of units, number of bedrooms, enough structured parking, adding all that structured parking as compared to the previous plan, because we want it to always thrive and And so that's why we made those changes, even though that's not helpful financially. But it's helpful making sure that people actually show up and rent. And really fast, it was a little detail, but I know y'all were spending important time downstairs earlier. And just to remind that any numbers that the consultant is providing certainly has this baked in, because this is key real estate that's had this approved here for a while. So this is not additive to whatever numbers you're looking at. And I think everybody, that's clear, but wanted to just make clear, maybe even for people that are listening, this is not a quote, new project in the least.

Mr. Peterson, I can't remember, I'm losing track of the presentations here, but in your presentation, did you have the comparison of the plan similar to what Ms. Hurley had?

The image I showed, I showed one slide there.

If you could pull that up. I mean, I think that this is a frustration.

This is the one, and this is when you'll know when I say it that I made the note that it really is. I argued, this isn't right. These aren't apples and apples. It's slightly off in terms of the angle, but it is looking at the same corner.

Yeah, and what I was really in for was the plan, the before and after plan. Let's see if this is what you're thinking. I think it was maybe. Plan sheet side by side. Yes, well, your first slide.

I don't have a slide that's plan sheet side by side. Okay. I don't have staff for those.

Julie, could you pull that up? Sorry to ask you to switch. And Kurt, I'm going to ask you a question about that, which is unfair to ask you a question about something that's not even your presentation. So it's the comparison, Julie, that I'm looking for. There you go. You went right by it. There you go. so mr peterson i think this is one of the things that's causing a pause for for concern is just when you eyeball it and even if you put a scale on it it certainly appears that the purple portion

on the left is wider north to south than the purple portion on the on the right this is the trip up slide that i was saying why i asked for dimensions which you know i'm relying but also patrick knows his buildings and i gave the exact dimensions and i don't again

It is what it is, and when you give us the numbers, there's four-foot differences, but you can see the reason for the concern when you look at these two side-by-sides. It would appear that the one on the left is twice as wide, maybe not quite twice, but as what is on the right, and I think that that's part of what's generating the concern. Patrick, I don't know if you have an explanation. Okay. It was that bear diving in the arch. Well, I think they're both their diagrams.

Patrick, you're the architect.

Patrick Reuter, Clover Architects, address 8813 Penrose Lane, Suite 400, Lenexa, Kansas. Okay, I'm going to try and explain the building footprint. So the original, previously approved design on the right-hand side of the screen, there's that piece that goes along the north that is approximately, I'll say, between 70 and 80 feet in depth width from north to south. Then when you get over to what was Building B on the far right-hand side, it's that kind of L shape, right, where it goes east-west, and there's an L that goes down to the south. Thank you. So this depth here was 148 feet. The new building, which the ground floor only is that entire depth of 148 feet. But there's a, this, and the staff's presentation does not show floors two, three, four, and five. That every floor above that then steps significantly further north. So as Kurt showed, we have kind of that upside down E-shaped building. So we previously only had one leg of the building that turned south, and then we just added two more legs of the building that turned south.

So the challenge here is what we're looking at is we're looking at essentially the parking lot. Just the ground level. Structured parking, but the parking lot is what we're looking at. And you're telling us that the building above the parking lot would look more like what we're seeing on the right hand side.

And if you'd like, I'd like to go to, I think it was page three in our presentation, and maybe zoom in there because I can kind of outline that a little bit better probably.

Real quick before you do that. Yes. So... Maybe, I don't know, I need a cup of coffee or something. So this on the previously approved, where the lavender part Why is it white there? That's outside parking. Was there stories above that? And if there wasn't and there is now, that's exactly what I'm saying. So you're still losing me. What is the white part? Why does the picture look like that? Was anything above it before?

Okay, so the white part in the previous is surface parking. Now, on the proposed, there is one story of that that is now the, when we brought the garage up, it's just one level that is garage. Now, there's not always apartments above it, which is why I like to go to this other plan view, which I think will make it more clear.

So, on the previously proved, it was surface parking with nothing above it.

Correct. Only on part of the south side.

Okay, so that's exactly what I've been saying for an hour. There was the volume of the building, you've replaced surface parking with nothing above it with interior or interior parking with three stories above it.

No, that's why I'd like to, can I please go to this plan and then I think it'll help, I hope. So bear with me here. Okay, I'm going to see if I can zoom in maybe, and hopefully, oh, I don't know the magic buttons.

Is that right? That's what I understand. Got it, got it, got it, got it.

All right, I've understood the system now.

All right, okay. Patrick? So... The red is the building above the parking in our current scheme. So the previous one, which was all purple, right? You can like. It was to the entire south side of this line. So the building is not a full four stories above the parking, the entire south facade, because I'll just use the word of the night of undulation. You have the, you know, western end here that pokes down to the south. That is, you know, this... The piece here would be a full five stories, but then the building steps back another 60 or so, 60 to 70 feet, I think, and then it maintains its density like it was previously on that north half for about, you know, I'll say 250 or so feet. Then there's another small leg that I think is about 75 feet in width that comes down in the middle and then, again, pops back up, and we have the courtyards there on the south. So the... So what you're seeing here with the pool, the turf areas, that is the level just above the parking garage. So it's technically on the second story of the building, but the ground level for, I'll say, probably 70-something percent of that south facade is only a one-story building, whereas the three legs that are about 75 feet in width are still the full five stories. The one on the east remains unchanged from what Building B was, and we just added those two additional southern legs.

That's very helpful.

I want to tie everything we've said to show everybody's saying accurate things. The additional four feet that we talked about would be probably one of the legs.

Yeah, it's the difference between the depth of the legs when we redid the units and moved all the parking up because parking has very specific dimensions that it wants to be. And so I think maybe the only other visual that we have in this presentation that would help with that would be this concept render of the pool deck you can see one of those legs in the background here extending out but you can see that the rest of the building mass is off to your left which would be to the north on the site plan so that's again that 60 to 70 foot setback that railing to the right would be you know the the edge of the south of that purple box in staff's presentation thank you i appreciate that explanation Yes, Ms. King.

So if the residents in the previous plan were looking, they lived in Regents Park and they were looking to the north, they would have seen a whole row of surface parking. And instead they see, they're going to not be able to see over the, but it is going to look greatly improved probably To the residents looking from the south or the south to the north.

Correct. Because if you're looking south to north, what you previously would have seen is a full five-story building mass, which would have been broken up, like you said, by the gap that was between buildings A and B. Again, the gap was also a two-story volume because the gap between A and B in the previous was there was parking on the ground level and the pool was above that with a breezeway. So I'm going to go.

But the distance from the homes to the structure is in three parts is much closer than it was.

Two parts only because one of the legs was always existing. So I get your point.

So from the south, or from looking south to north, for the residents, it's going to look better, in my opinion.

Yes, it's going to be more broken up because you have that big step back in those parts.

However, from 135th Street, because you took out the pool, was breaking up that 642 feet. So that's why they said it was two buildings, not one building. Or now it's one building, it was two buildings. So what was looking better, if you will, very technical term from 135th street is now one continuous undulating because you because you move that all to the back

yeah so it is like you said the ground level is has remained technically unchanged because in the first version there was always an entire one story across the entire north side of the building because we did have a covered parking that was above ground in that gap between the buildings previously which unfortunately when we did that rendering back in 2018 we did not have it further from the north But yes, all we did was fill in that about 120 feet of gap with units. But then when we did that, we pushed and pulled undulation back and forth across that entire facade to further break it up. So that way we could end up getting patios that, you know, have that further depth along 135th. So we're trying to kind of get the best of both worlds. The building actually, you know, four stories above parking actually steps back further from 135th because it changes. Right. And we also try to make sure we didn't encroach too far to the south by making it that upside-down E shape. So we're trying to kind of balance, like you said, both those different components to make this as efficient as we can, but also still provide the design aesthetic that will help break up a 600-foot-long building. Ms. Harrison.

Note to future selves, let the architects talk first, because they are really good at drawing us pictures in their heads. Just a thought. Thank you. You've really helped clarify some things that were giving me heartburn. This is what people will see when they first enter Leawood along 135th. It's kind of like, welcome to Leawood. And a couple of us live two blocks from here, and we'll see it just every single day. I love the view. I've come around. I just want you to know I love the view from the south. Too bad I'm never going to see it because I'm going to always be driving along 135th. Is there anything we can do along 135th? I'm not going to use that word that's been used 47 times that none of us really even know what it means we're just pretending we are it's like on my bingo card now but is there anything we can do along 135th to give the illusion that this thing isn't 700 feet long the longest building in leawood not a prize we were going for tonight um glass You know, sections of glass, stairwells of something, something to break them up.

Yeah, so a couple things on that. I want to get back to a point I think Ms. Larson had said. So in the renderings, we did not fully match the landscape plan. There's about two to three times more trees that will be there. Sometimes when I get up here, I get criticized for hiding the buildings of landscape. So we chose to make sure you guys could see what it would look like. But we were happy to add in all those trees that will help buffer that ground level in an iteration of the render. Um, and overall across the facade, we intentionally also tried to choose materials to make it kind of look like two different portions of the building that's still blended together. Um, so in this render here, um, we internally, it was called having like concept like a and B. Um, but you can see there's kind of one style of the building that goes, you know, from, I'll just say this far east corner. to here, and then we step it back, and we change materials there, and then we step it back out, and then change materials back to scheme A, and then we step it back again to B, and then back to A. So we try to do both the movement of the building, and then also kind of update materials and colors to get that difference. We didn't want to stray too far, that just looks like you have a bunch of random stuff, because we wanted a cohesive aesthetic there, but that was an additional thing that we did, and I think that Once we go back and start looking at the construction document version of the landscape plan, starting to maybe also change some of those tree types maybe that maybe correlates with elevations or something would be a good next step as well.

I've seen that material game. Overland Park has got three different colors. I think we're supposed to think they're little townhomes all stacked next to each other, but it's just one big, long apartment building with... burgundy green and gold and then burgundy green and gold so it's a this is way better but i still just feel like it's going to look like the sprint campus or something when it's just apartments but maybe we'll get there thank you

So what would we have to do to get some more evergreens? Because I think that really would help the view from 135th. So like you're saying these drawings aren't really accurate for the landscaping plan?

The landscape plan is 100% accurate as to what we're proposing. Not on the rendering because we chose to hide some of the trees so you guys could see the building.

Okay. But if we're trying to picture the landscaping, do you have evergreens planted on 135th Street?

we were just all talking real fast yeah insert my comment from before about oh my gosh very open-minded to council and staff's views so we would if this is a prevailing view we would ask for a stipulation with the final plan that says that ms bennett would help with the words but that we would work with staff and listen to whatever mix of additional evidence it's just not something that we're very open-minded like completely

so that could be a stipulation that if staff and miss bennett say okay that i'm not sure how others feel but that to me that would make sense to break things up additional questions well mr peterson we appreciate your standing for us many questions and the way you've responded to them uh but you can step back and we'll move on to the discussion uh portion of our of our consideration uh adding in the discussion we've had so far additional discussion Dr. Castro, I have not heard from you.

I was just kind of thinking through. So I was just trying to put this into perspective of a famous structure, and I was just looking up. So the Eiffel Tower is 400 feet tall. So this building would be 50% longer than the Eiffel Tower. And to me, that just is too long for an entrance to Leawood. I just don't think it's... right scale i don't think it's i think it's gonna be overpowering for that street and um just the way it's described in one of our other renderings it just looked like this just massive building and to me it's too long thank you additional discussion ms guyette um i actually appreciate a lot of the things that were um

shown to us i do appreciate the decrease in the surface parking lot i think having the one level of parking of structured parking is significantly better than that and i i will use the word undulation and i do know what it means so i very much appreciate the intentional use of that. And I appreciate what you tried to show us with the difference in the materials to show kind of the breaking up of the building. And I also appreciate the intentionality behind making the units bigger to respond to the market and changing your unit mix to also respond to the market. So I do, I appreciate a lot of that. I don't have as much of a concern about the length of the building. don't think visually it will appear that much different than what was previously approved. I think they took intentional care with the architecture to make sure that the stepping back and the undulation does make a difference in breaking up the feel of one long building. As far as, we're going to talk about all the things, as far as the sales tax. that was approved for the underground parking versus what is now just structured parking and not underground parking. I know structured parking right now is like mid 40,000, if not more per stall. And so I can't imagine what the cost would have been for undergrounding. So I appreciate that the cost for structured parking continues to go up. I am still in favor of maintaining the sales tax for structured parking garage, even though it's changed from underground.

Thank you, Ms. Guyette. Other comments? Well, I would join with Ms. Guyette in almost everything she said. I was glad that Mr. Peterson reminded me because, quite frankly, I'd forgotten that when we put together the policy on the sales tax incentive, that it was for both underground parking and for structured parking. This certainly still fits within the policy of this governing body for making that incentive available. So I'm completely comfortable with leaving that in place. I do have a little bit of a pause on the length of the building. I think it is important that that length largely I mean I I don't know that as we approved or as as we on the Planning Commission approved it so many years ago and as you all on the governing body approved it subsequently um that maybe there wasn't as much appreciation for that length but it certainly has not changed dramatically I I don't know and I think that Mr Peterson and the folks from Clover make a fair point that As it was previously approved, there wasn't much of a break there. So, yeah, it was two buildings, but I think that was an important point that was made. That having been said, I still have some concern on the total length of the building that... But again, I appreciate the effort that was put into trying to break that up. And so it doesn't seem as massive. I think that the landscaping, certainly not in the first year, the first two years or whatnot, it takes a while for those trees to grow. I think that will have a significant impact as well. So I'm predisposed, although I most likely do not have a vote in this, but I'm predisposed to support this. Ms. Kane, I think I saw your hand in my peripheral vision there.

In your peripheral vision. Yes. I think the presentation in my mind was botched, to be honest. But listening carefully to to the the whatever the the explanation and the overall improvements um i won't run through them and for the sake of time but i i do believe i do believe the developer and the architect um are are trying to make positive it feels to me anyway make positive improvements overall as opposed to i don't know dumbing it down you you dumbed it up or or you know you know what i'm saying you didn't dumb it down you elevated it i do think just like everything else out in regents park it does look elevated i do think it looks expensive um i do think your undulations and i do know what that word means and and use it on not a routine basis but definitely use it part of my vocabulary but um so i i am going to vote in the affirmative but i do wish um if when you come before us again because there are five new ones that the the before and the afters are equally represented So that, again, you even confused me, and I was here. So your purple drawing really flunked tonight. But I do, again, I believe in the developer, I believe in the development, I believe in the sentiment, or whatever the word is that I'm looking for. i will be voting in the affirmative because i did it at the beginning and it didn't appreciably change it was just the way it was presented tonight definitely appreciable appreciably changed thanks thank you miss kane mr pepas

Thank you, Mayor. So, you know, a lot of what I was thinking, Ms. Guy had already kind of touched on, you know, I think this is a really good example of listening to market conditions, you know, the changes that have been made. You know, you all want this to succeed as much as we do, you know, and you're all in it to make that happen. And so without kind of repeating a lot of that, I just kind of wanted to point that out, that I think that this is a very pleasing project, and I'm excited to hopefully get started on it.

Thank you, Mr. Pippas. Ms. Larson.

I, too, know what undulations mean. We use it a lot in golf. I'm the only one who didn't know that. You cannot play golf without knowing about undulations. But I've never used it in this circumstance. I will be voting for the affirmative. And just briefly, I like the reduced surface level spots. That's important to me. I'm fine with continuing with the IRB, ERB, whatever we call that, the tax break for the structured parking. The length of the building does give me pause, but the gap that we had, 120 feet, which is, my mind thinks in yards. I don't think in feet. So in 40 yards is, you know, like to the, second to the back row, it's not that long of a gap. That was there before. I appreciate more amenities have been added for the residents. I also appreciate the bigger units because in our previous discussions with the Hallbrook North development, Van Trust indicated that They wish they had put more three bedrooms at Meadowbrook. And so they're doing that at Hallbrook North for the locked in facilities. So I appreciate that. That's evidently a market driven thing. And then I support. any kind of stipulation that we might have to add the landscaping in along 135th Street to soften the look of the structured parking and then also that would help decrease the visual for the length of the building. So I think that that would be an important aesthetic for the building.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt.

Oh, no, that's it.

Other comments? Yes, Ms. Harrison.

Two measurement questions, please. The berm that I'm looking at, not berm, what is that called? Tree lawn, the green grass, between 135th, how wide is that before the sidewalks?

Sorry, which dimension between building and curb? Between the sidewalk and the curb, the tree lawn.

Give me one second. I'll pull this as long as it doesn't die, and I'll be right back.

And then my second question for the other people to be working on, how big is the pool, length and width? It looked a little bit small in the picture, but that could have just been an angle.

Sometimes when somebody's trying to do something, you entertain. So I have one entertaining relevant thing, Mr. Mayor, which is the Eiffel Tower. This is for fun. This is for fun. The Eiffel Tower is 330 meters. It's 1,083 feet tall. Well, let me see what ChatGPT says. It's mostly for fun, just because I'm stalling. No, that's good.

ChatGPT says it's 410 feet tall. Not long.

ChatGPT, there you go. AI at work again. That's the reason we missed Mars with one of the rockets that we sent up, measured in feet instead of meters.

Two football fields, I'll take it back, instead of comparing to the Eiffel Tower.

Two football fields plus. It's time for trivia, right?

The rocket missed Mars, and the reason was because it had been programmed in feet instead of meters. About a $700 million miss.

Okay, sorry, the undulation of 135th turn lane threw me off. uh so the the sidewalk is at the property line so the building setback is 40 feet so we're approximately 40 to 41 feet from building to back of sidewalk and then it varies a little bit sidewalk then to curb is uh i think about 15 to 20 feet depending on where you're at um so then overall that'd be about i think 50 to 60 feet away from like face of curb to building

50 to 60 feet from curb to building. Yeah, then 40-ish. Okay, that would be grass, a sidewalk, and then a bushes row.

Yep, and then the pool is approximately 24 by 58, I'll say. 24 by 58? No, just 28 by 58, sorry.

All right, is there any more discussion?

If not, do I hear a motion relative to Planning Commission case number 123-2026? Yes.

I'll try this. We'll see if I get it right. I move to approve this plan with the added stipulation that the developer will work with staff to add evergreens on 135th Street. I'm not quite sure how to word that, but.

That will do nicely. Second.

Okay.

Thank you, Ms. Rubin. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Ms. Guyette. Any discussion on the motion? If not, all those in favor of approving Planning Commission Case Number 123-2026, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. Nay. I hear the nays as Ms. Harrison and Dr. Castor. And I believe that Mr. Sunkel has departed. So that gives me five votes in favor and two votes against. The motion is approved. And Planning Commission Case 123-2026 is approved as well. Thank you. Appreciate the work that you all did tonight. I now call Planning Commission Case 126-2026, an ordinance approving a special use permit and preliminary development plan for the, and I'll apologize in advance for my mispronunciation, the Shul Shabad of Leawood, located north of 133rd Street and west of Mission Road. Ms. Hurley.

Okay, thank you. As you said, this is a special use permit and preliminary development plan for the Shul Chabad of Leawood, I think is a little more correct. I tried to get some direction. So Planning Commission did review this at their July 28th meeting and voted seven to zero to recommend approval. It's a PDP and a special use permit for a place of worship inside an existing office building. There are no exterior modifications proposed as part of this. The SEP would be limited to a total term of 20 years. The shul does have currently three locations, one of which is in Parkway Plaza, and this would be consolidating all of these locations into one spot. They would intend to do this in several different phases. As they take over the building, there are some current tenants in there, and so as those leases expire, they'd be able to take over more of the building and move more of their operations in. So just to give you an orientation, this is located along 133rd Street, just to the west of Mission Road, to the west of, I think that's Mission Trail Elementary School there, in that existing office building. Just on the other side of that is the Pest World Dreamer sculpture that we're all familiar with. And then again, this is just kind of their final phase of their occupation of the building. You can see they've got space for their synagogue space as well as their other spaces that they have as part of their operations that would all be contained in this building as they take over um the entire space so if you have any questions i can answer those for you and i believe the applicant is or at least was i saw him on the zoom and so if he is still here he can answer any questions that you might have as well thank you is there other questions miss harrison thank you um how many i'm trying to count the seats but i don't want to assume that this drawing is the actual chairs how many

people can worship in the synagogue at the same time?

And then we had the square footage in the policy report. Oh, I believe the rabbi is on.

I'm here if I can, I can have an answer. It's either sorry. It's currently set up for 120.

And Rabbi, I'm sorry to interrupt. Rabbi, if you don't mind giving us your name and your address so the record's clear, I would be grateful.

Right. Rabbi Mandy Weinberg. We're currently at 5051 West 134th Street in Parker Plaza, 6209.

Thank you very much. Ms. Harrison.

That's perfect. That was your question. Nope, that gives me a sense of traffic volume.

Additional questions. Ms. Hurley, one question that was triggered in my mind by Ms. Harrison's question is, what are the parking provisions for this space? I mean, just thinking about its current configuration in my mind, I'm struggling to see 120 parking spots or even a...

Yeah, let me see. Did we have the parking listed out in the Stafford?

Yeah, it's in here.

Yeah, so parking spaces are required. So it's one per three seats for a worship area. So that would be 40 total for this, and there are existing 112 on site.

Okay, thank you. And again, just a technical point, do I correctly recall that the special use permit is personal, quote unquote, personal to the owner, so that if the property would change hands, that would terminate the special use permit, correct?

Right, so this would be granted to the shul, and so if it was a different place of worship that came in, it would need a different, a new special use permit.

Okay, thank you. Other questions for Ms. Hurley? If not, thank you, Ms. Hurley. Rabbi, did you have anything you wanted to add to the presentation this evening?

I'm happy to answer any questions if anyone has. I will say that we do not have any undulation. We do sway when we pray. But that's very different from undulation, so yeah.

Rabbi, we're glad to hear that. Any questions for the rabbi? Well, thank you very much. Oh, Ms. Guyette or Ms. Harrison? I do. Ms. Harrison.

Thank you. Sir, do I understand correctly that the worship would be on Saturday evenings and that the general use of the space in terms of 150 people coming in at one time would mostly be on Saturdays?

Yes, that is correct. So our worship is generally on Saturdays. That's the day we don't have daily worship or anything like that. It would be Saturday. And generally, you're not looking at 150, that would be or 120. I mean, you're looking at that, you know, for first things like the high holidays and the like, usually would be less than that. So you've got Friday night, you've got Saturday by day, and that's basically the worship part of it. There is a daycare. We have a preschool and a daycare. That would be daily. And that's staggered throughout the day because we have children that come for early drop-off and children that come at preschool time. are picked up after preschool and some are picked up later on. So that's staggered. We did do a traffic study and actually they concluded that it would be a net less traffic than what the building is currently planned for.

Love it. Thank you. Thank you, Rabbi Weinberg. You bet. Any other questions for Rabbi Weinberg? Well, thank you very much. We appreciate your comments there. If there are no further questions, Ms. Hurley, thank you. We will move on to a discussion of the proposed special use program. Yes, Ms. Larson.

I think this is an excellent repurpose of office space and I commend the applicant on the materials and they're very detailed, very clear, and I appreciate the planning that has gone into the build out, the various stages of the build out of the building. That was very helpful and I support approval.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Other comments? If not, is there a motion to adopt the ordinance approving a special use permit and a preliminary development plan for the Shul Shabbat of Leawood? Motion to approve. Second. Thank you, Ms. Larson. Second. Thank you, Dr. Kester. Any additional discussion? Because this is a special use permit, a roll call vote is required. And with that, I would ask the clerk to call the roll, please.

Council Member Castor.

Aye.

Council Member Pappas.

Aye.

Council Member Kane. Aye. Council Member Harrison. Aye. Council Member Rubin. Aye. Council Member Larson. Aye. Council Member Guyed. Aye. Council Member Sunkel is absent.

Thank you. I have seven votes in favor and none against. So on a seven to zero vote, the ordinance approving a special use permit and preliminary development plan is approved. Rabbi Weinberg, welcome to Leawood. We are glad that you will be worshiping here.

Thank you so much.

I now call Planning Commission Case 127-2026, which is an ordinance approving the renewal of a special use permit for the Church of the Nativity temporary modular classrooms located north of 119th Street and east of Tomahawk Creek Parkway. Ms. Hurley, please proceed.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. As you said, this is a special use permit request to renew the temporary use of modular classrooms at the Church of the Nativity. The original special use permit was approved in 2024 for a period of two years. The LDO does limit special use permits for temporary buildings such as this to two years, hence the two year instead of a standard longer period that we might see. The church is currently moving forward with plans for their permanent school expansion, so they just need the continued use of these temporary classrooms while that is underway. So just overall view of church and nativity site over here just to the east of where we are at. And then site plan, and I do promise that the purple rectangle showing the modular classrooms are in the correct spot, and they are no larger or smaller than what they are shown on here. If you have any questions, I can answer those for you, and the applicant is here as well.

Thank you, Ms. Hurley. Questions for Ms. Hurley? Yes.

I have a question regarding the expansion of the building. Like, how long will that take? They're already on their second application, so I'm curious how close they are to submitting a preliminary and final plan.

I will let the applicant address that. Okay. Thank you.

With that, we would invite the applicant to step forward. We appreciate your patience this evening. I know it's been a long wait, and we appreciate the time you spent with us. If you could introduce yourself and your address, we would be grateful.

My name is Harriet Grindle. I'm with Multistudio. We're at 4200 Pennsylvania in Kansas City, Missouri. My name is listed as the applicant, and there are also representatives from the school here as well. Currently, the school is in the process of fundraising, so when this was applied for in 2024, we identified it was probably four years before the permanent facility would be there, so there was going to be at least one renewal and potentially two so they're still within uh kind of headed towards that time frame uh so that there's there's a second renewal there but the goal is is that would be the end of the need for the renewals so there would be one more renewal in 2028.

So you think there'll be another renewal? So it'd be six years?

Yeah, the construction, just timeframes for construction and where they are with design at this time will not be complete and ready for open within that two-year timeframe.

But do you think you would start, that you'd have a plan submitted?

That is the goal for them to start. The PDP and FDP for the building expansion has not been submitted and I can let them, if you guys know, want to speak to the timeframe for the submittal on when you think that would be happening.

Welcome, sir, and thanks again for your patience. If you could introduce yourself, that would be great.

Luke Jennison, 3800 West 119th Street, I believe. I think so. So as far as time frame goes, we are in the middle of fundraising right now, hoping to have all of our 50% of our portions by next summer and then begin putting in plans with our architecture construction firm.

I guess the reason I'm asking, I really, I don't like the modular buildings. I understand it's a temporary fix. You know, I just want to make sure it doesn't keep getting renewed and renewed.

Yeah, no, that's not our plan either on our initial with it. It was just, we knew we were going to have to renew it one time for a four-year total. But with our timeline with the construction company working backwards on that time line with fundraising Puts us at opening hopefully opening the new building for the 20 29 30 school year It that August.

Thank you.

Yeah other questions for the applicant I not thank you you can step back thank you um that takes us to a discussion of the proposed ordinance on the special use permit any additional discussion if not is there a motion to approve an ordinance for the renewal of special use permit for the church of the nativity's temporary modular classrooms move to approve thank you miss kane is there a second second thank you mr pepas any discussion If not, again, as in the prior case where a special use permit is considered, a roll call vote is required. So I would ask the clerk to call the roll, please.

Council Member Kane. Aye. Council Member Pappas.

Aye.

Council Member Larson. Aye. Council Member Castor.

Aye.

Council Member Rubin. Aye. Council Member Guyon. Aye. Council Member Harrison. Aye. And Council Member Sunkel is absent.

I have seven votes in favor and none against, and as a result, the ordinance is adopted for the renewal of the special use permit for Church of the Nativity's temporary modular classrooms. Again, thank you very much for your patience this evening. We have no old business, but we now come to new business. Staff and Ms. Stoddard and I have been busy over the course of the last week or ten days, and I believe that Ms. Stoddard has a recommendation for the governing body this evening.

I do, Mayor. Thank you. After conducting an extensive search and a rigorously undulating selection process, I'm recommending Andrew Grove be appointed as the Leawood Fire Chief, effective September 8th of 2026. Mr. Grove has over 25 years of experience and is currently serving as the Deputy Chief of Operations for the Overland Firefighters. Park Fire Department. Mr. Grove also holds a master's degree in management and leadership, a bachelor's in public safety management and an associate's degree in fire administration. And with that, I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Thank you, Ms. Stoddard. Questions for Ms. Stoddard. If not, I would entertain a motion to approve the city administrator's recommendation to appoint Andrew Grove as the new fire chief for the city of Leawood effective September 8th, 2026.

So moved.

Thank you, Ms. Larson. Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you, Ms. Harrison. Discussion? If not, all those in favor of approving the city's administrator's recommendation for the appointment of Mr. Grove as fire chief, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it. And on a 7-0 vote, we approve the employment of Mr. Grove as our fire chief. And with that, I had forgotten. I have another sheet of paper here. Matters have arisen for which their request for an executive session has been made. And so I am recommending that we recess into executive session for a period of 20 minutes for consultation with the city attorney, which would be deemed privileged in the attorney-client relationship pursuant to the attorney-client exception, KSA section 75-4319 . and we will convene that executive session immediately following a motion and approval and return at approximately 10 20 p.m can i can i request an additional five be added to that so i know it's late but 25 minutes You need 25 minutes, okay? So what I just said for 25 minutes instead of 20 minutes. So moved. Ask the record to reflect that. That's Dr. Castor moving. Ms. Harrison seconded. All those in favor of recessing into executive session, please indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it, and we will adjourn into executive session. To return in 25 minutes at approximately 10.25 PM. Stacey, I don't need to call the roll.

Yeah, it's just, yeah, because you're just a recess.

They're voting on your raise, Stacey.

Karaoke.

Is that what you're wanting?

That's okay.

we'd ask we'd ask the record to reflect the governing body is reconvened at 10 25 p.m um

And I would then introduce or entertain, man, I'm getting tired, entertain a motion to adjourn the regular meeting at this point. Is there such a motion? So moved. Thank you, Ms. Larson. Thank you, Dr. Castor. Any discussion? If not, all those in favor of adjourning, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Those opposed, same sign. The ayes have it. We stand adjourned. With my thanks to the governing body for a very good set of meetings this evening. Thank you. recording stopped is this matt's first this is mitch's first