Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone. It's July 16, and we're starting our planning board meeting. Excuse me. We're starting with item number one. It is the preliminary matters, item 1A, adoption resolutions. We have three this morning. that all the board members can vote on. It's 14-522 Jones Lane Administrative Subdivision, 14-522 Jones Lane Forest Conservation Plan, and Etcheson Solar Forest Conservation Plan. Do I have a motion for approval of these three resolutions? I'll move to adopt the resolutions.

All in favor? Aye. Aye. The second this morning is is the adoption of minutes. We have two. It's the minutes of June 18, 2026, and the closed session minutes for June 18, 2026. So I have a motion for approval of these minutes. But Commissioner Bartley, you cannot vote on this one.

I'll move to approve both minutes from June 18. Second.

All in favor? Aye. Aye. 301. Vice Chair Linden, I believe you voted yes on the resolutions. Correct. Okay, great, great. Great, thank you. And so next we have the minutes for July 2nd, 2026, which all commissioners can vote on to have a motion for approval of minutes of July 2nd, 2026.

Move to approve the minutes from July 2nd?

Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. The ayes have it for zero. And then last, we have two record plats this morning, subdivision plat number 220-26-0190 and 220-26-0230, Cabin Branch. And the second is subdivision plat number 220-26-0720, Chevy Chase, Section 3. Do I have a motion for approval of these two record plots? I'll move to approve the two record plots. Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. The ayes have it 4-0. We will just take a one-minute break and come back with item 12, closed section. But in order to go, we have to vote to go in the closed section. According to Maryland Annotated Code Ge

Second. All in favor? Aye. The ayes have it. So we'll go into closed session and we'll come back with item number four, Planning Director's Roundtable Report. Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and welcome back. We're on item number four, roundtable discussion. with our planning director, Jason Sartori. Welcome forward to your presentation.

Jason, can you give us streets or locations exactly where this is?

Did they talk at all about... Hunter, this is an amazing site. I remember I visited there before they started this process years ago. And it was kind of interesting or difficult to visualize what would come, given what it was originally there and intended to do. And part of that was also the connectivity piece. And I was wondering if they talked about, because the original campus wasn't built to be highly connected. It's obviously surrounded by a couple of highways. Did they talk about how they, or did they, enhance connectivity not just kind of walking through the site, but like from the site

So they're sectioning off the whole thing and having different pieces of it being designed and built at one time.

Complete. Well, thank you, as always, for your detailed reports. I really appreciate that you guys are going to the development tracker, monitor that on an annual basis. It would be always good to know what would get some of those key projects across the finish line. Is there just a little bit, or there's something big? Because we need to jumpstart housing. We're in a housing crisis, and it'd be great to know if there's some support in whatever way that can get those projects across the finish line. And I appreciate your team always continuously learning and doing the tours, going out and seei

Yep. also comparing it to our neighboring jurisdictions. So thank you.

Yeah, I wanted to add my thanks to everyone involved with organizing the tours, both the ones that have happened to date and hopefully more in the future. So it's really cool to see how, in this case, MCPS may start to change some of their thinking around some school design choices. I think that could be pretty transformative, and not just with clean energy, but kind of the entire orientation of the site, as we've talked about in some instances, to kind of further a lot of the goals that we have from a transportation perspective, from an urbanist perspective, and on and on. These are, you know

No other questions or comments. Thank you again. And we'll just take a one-minute break, get back on schedule here, and start with item number five, the LFBET Montessori School Adequate Public Facilities APF Review. Thank you. We're on item 5, Alefbet Montessori School Adequate Public Facilities Review Request, where staff is recommending approval with conditions. And this morning, we have Mr. Gatling with the Planning Department presenting this item. Thank you.

Mr. Gatling, we have two people wanting to provide public testimony. They're on teams this morning. The first is Cynthia Darnell, who is an adjacent property owner, and the second is Daniel Darnell, also adjacent property owner. Ms. Darnell, please, you have three minutes.

Thank you, Ms. Darnell, for your testimony. And next is Daniel Darnell.

Thank you, Mr. Darnielle. We really appreciate you and your wife providing testimony. So next, is there someone from the school here to, yeah, please come up and provide any feedback you may have and also addressed going on the street and irregularly, regularly, and please.

Would the director like to make a presentation, or you'll just respond to questions?

Do you have any... Video or photographs of what occurs when parents drop off and pick up the students?

No, on the date you applied. If you showed a video on the date you applied, was the student population the same as it is?

So here's where I am on this. There was a requirement that The applicant provide annual monitoring. And it said in the resolution, if they did it for five years and met the requirements, that they can petition for the requirement to go away. It appears from the information given to us that they did this monitoring. It was within the limits of the no more than 50 during a certain period of time. It's even less than that. They met those requirements. If the board voted to transportation management plan, they still have the requirement that they can't have more than 90 students. That does not go

But given this, just say this report goes away, so people would call the school, and you would address it that way? So I'm in favor of removing the Transportation Management Plan for the reasons I gave, but I'd like to hear for the other board members.

So how would they know they should reach out to MCDOT?

I think I understand the reason to apply for the removal of the TMP, or at least maybe a couple of the reasons. But from your perspective, could you describe kind of your interest in removing it?

So I think my knowing that there is a little bit of... at least with the testimony we've received today from the Darnells, I don't know if their sentiment is kind of more broadly shared in the immediate neighborhood. My concern with removing the reporting entirely is it could lead to a lot of disagreement over what the actual conditions are at the school. So say, you know, neighbors continue to be, or some neighbors continue to be unhappy with her kind of exit onto Tuckerman. And they perceive a certain level of traffic coming and going during the peak hour. And they make assumptions about how

Mm-hmm. Well, that seems relevant then. I assume the community association probably distributes some information to the neighbors.

Yeah, I understand that. I mean, I don't want to – I don't think we can litigate exactly, like, is there carriers or not. No, no, just one more thing. The subject of the TMP is just the two things that – You brought up, not the queuing.

No, I understand. It sounds like there's a shoulder that some cars theoretically could take advantage of. I understand there's no actual parking allowed.

No, I understand that's what's allowed. I'm talking about the space, the space in the roadway for vehicles.

For cars to prevent the queuing on so I guess but my final question then is you mentioned You know other schools or in other situations so focusing on the TMP the reporting and meeting Other examples might be annual reporting you mentioned that Or biannual is that something that you're open to kind of I understand the administrative burden of doing this monthly for sure and It's obviously, it still requires kind of counts, probably on a daily basis. But is that something you'd be open to monthly or not monthly, annual reporting?

I think what I understand is your question is, You're saying is the only time you have a community meeting is for this?

That's the community touch point, regardless of what.

Could I comment on this? Could I please comment on this annual meeting? Sir, excuse me, sir. Please.

We are not represented by the LCA. Excuse me, ma'am. Could the Garnells go to the community meeting if they wanted to?

So my final question, then, is I'm just trying to kind of understand that the 50 vehicle limit will remain, correct? On a daily peak hour, that's not going away? I'm just trying to anticipate. Like, it would be nice if we could.

Ideally, there is a situation which not everyone's always going to be happy. I understand that. But ideally, there's a situation where this won't have to continue being kind of relitigated within the community, limit the amount of potential conflict between community and the school. So I'm wondering if the 50 vehicle limit remains, but the counting goes away, what is there to sort of understand if more than 50 trips are coming?

I understand operationally you're doing what you can. I 100% understand that. I guess this is more a question for staff. Is this a concern for staff, that there is a vehicle limit requirement, but the counting is going away? And what does that mean for compliance? I'm just curious. Because this does seem like a unique situation. I don't think anyone has an interest in overburdening this particular school. I just want to make sure that there's not some inconsistencies, or we're not actually adding to potential conflict down the road.

OK. And are there other, this is not the only, I thought we had another school where they have limits on how many people can be there and how many people can, I don't know, wasn't there another school that had issue with parking and this other thing and they had a similar plan or am I wrong?

OK. OK. So any other comments or questions from the other board members? You're good? We had one board member that I mean, I'm supportive of approving staff's recommendation. I understand, Commissioner, Vice Chair Linden, that if something comes up, how does someone say, yes, they're complying, they're not complying. But Mr. Brockmire gave his thought on that, that the community or someone would have to do the counts. I'm also... Given that there's also an opportunity, there are community meetings through the association. If the residents had issues, they could go to the community association,

Yeah, I'll move to approve staff's recommendation with conditions. I'll just briefly add that I hope that if comments do come into the school about queuing that folks do see, that you'll be kind of willing to look into that. It's outside the scope of this TMP discussion, but if there is potentially dangerous situations exiting a particular street, I think we can all kind of understand kind of that concern. I think we all live in neighborhoods that have dangerous streets, and we don't want to exacerbate that. So I just hope the school will be willing to listen when those come in.

All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. The ayes have it 4-0. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you to the Darnells for providing your testimony. Thank you. We're going to take a two minute break and go with our next item, which is item number six, the 8001 Wisconsin Avenue Sketch Plan Amendment, where staff is recommending approval with conditions and also We're also recommending staff to adopt the resolution at this meeting. Thank you. We're on item number 6, 8001, Wisconsin Avenue Plan Amendment and Preliminary Plan Amendment, where staff is recommending approval with conditions, and we will

Thank you. Would the applicant like to make a presentation?

Thank you so much. Any questions or comments from the board members?

I just had a question from my own understanding. This extension is, you know, effectively for time to get to the site plan, correct? And so what maybe the applicant, the question partly for the applicant too, what is the downside of, given the reasons you gave for the extension request, which include, you know, the marketing conditions, you know, local policy and things, which makes some sense. But what is the downside from your perspective of just moving to site plan? even given those conditions and not needing this extension request.

Sorry, did you have anything to add to that?

Requests are also considered for site plan. Sorry. If you do a site plan and it is approved, there is a period of time to go to do everything you mentioned, right? You know, record your plaid and on and on. Are there extension requests associated with that part of the process post site plan? I guess that's, is that something that we matter for DPS or how does that work kind of post site plan?

Okay. Got it. Got it. Thanks. Yeah, I was just curious how these kind of from an extension standpoint and kind of where you would make decisions to either proceed or pause. I'm just kind of curious the decision making around that. So thanks.

I'm supportive of the request. Just a quick question, just from a timing point of view. When you're ready to say a year from now, you say we're ready to move forward, right, and you start spending money to finalize your preliminary plan and site plan, like, Just out of curiosity, how long would it take once you decide you're ready from the time you took filing your site plan? Will that be, out of curiosity, a year, two years, half a year? What do you think?

OK, great. Thank you. So I have no further questions or comments. Any of the board members? And so is there... A legal department. Is it two? Well, two votes. So we'll do the sketch and preliminary plan together, and then we'll do the resolutions separately. OK. So is there a motion to approve the 8001 Wisconsin sketch plan amendment and preliminary plan where staff is recommending approval with conditions?

I'll move to approve the amendments to the sketch and preliminary plan.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. The ayes have it, 4-0. And is there a motion to approve the adoption of the resolution?

Move to approve adoption of the resolutions.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. The ayes have it, 4-0. Thank you so much. Hopefully the conditions change where you can move forward with the project. Thank you. We're just going to take a two-minute break to get back on schedule here. Come back with item number seven, friendship, high-h sector plan, working draft. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. We're all looking forward to, as will all of the presentations today, the item number seven, Friendship Heights Sector Plan Working Draft, where staff is recommending that the board approves the Friendship Heights Sector Plan Working Draft as

Well, great. Thank you so much. On the date set, are we still – I think we're still – Have we set, is it still September 10th?

Okay, great, great. Thank you so much. So this is my first comment. This is really wonderful. It's very apparent about the... engagement that went into this and and the and using that to with you and the community developing a vision and goals for for Friendship Heights you know the overarching goals and then as you went through each section the goals for each each section like transportation it's historic preservation schools and things like that and so this is I really appreciate the hard work you know it takes years to make this happen and I'm really excited about this plan and The key is,

I have a few comments. Thank you for your presentation. I really enjoyed how well planned you all were and how coordinated you were in your presentation. So you guys did an outstanding job. So my questions are really simple. And they go back to slide 20 and to also slide 115. And it basically deals with the height, especially along Wisconsin Avenue. My initial question after seeing slide 20 was, why are there height limitations of only 200 feet? And then in or around slide 115, you talked about incentivizing height density. When I look at the development along Wisconsin Avenue, I know further

Commissioner Hedrick? Oh, just a couple, just a real couple of comments. I thought the housing section was really good, so I don't have too many comments there other than I appreciate the truing up of the C and the R on the FAR for that. I appreciate that to allow the flexibility. I also, similar concerns a little bit about the about the restrictions, but not a ton given the difference in the pre-existing era. Could you jump to slide 25 real quick? And so with the priority public benefit area for this plan, do we have an idea of what we're getting out of that? that we're not getting otherwise

God knows. Linking it to the implementation and to the priority public benefits. Is there any reason for 65 versus 60 or that link? Because most of the programs are linked to 60, but I'm just curious about that. I'm sorry. I'm dragging you up from the thing.

Just making sure. All right. No, and anything, no, otherwise I just have a few comments on the transportation section. There was, with the right-of-way, I think it was on slide 54. There were several of these in a row, between 54 and 58. Will there be suggestions or recommendations in the draft plan for possibilities of creating the streetscapes here without accessing the additional right-of-way? Because the additional right-of-way comes sort of with the development piece. The development piece comes in, and that might be piecemeal, and we might have one on this block and not to the next and n

OK, and for the other streets, as well as there are options for interim conditions on River or Friendship Boulevard, I think there was less expansion on the right-of-way, but I was just curious.

Okay, great. No, I just was curious. And then the other question is with cross-section for Friendship Boulevard, I think it was 58. I can read my own handwriting. How does that connect to the D.C. side? What does the cross-section look like as you go down into the D.C.?

Okay, so it connects well over the jurisdictional line to make sure that we're coordinating and everything like that. Great, thank you. No, other than that, that was just a few questions to clarify, but thank you very much. I appreciate it. I'm good. Yeah.

Vice Chair Lunden, do you want to go over your questions or comments?

Yeah, so I have a few. So I'm going to try to organize my questions into a few, I guess, categories. And I don't want to take up kind of, if others have questions, like as I'm going through this, I don't want to just roll through many minutes of me talking only, but Just to get things started, I had a couple of questions on the open space, Civic Green, two of them in particular. Civic Green on Wisconsin and the Shoemaker block. So I guess because, yeah, thanks. So starting on Wisconsin. We've talked about this a little bit in the context of actual development applications, whether we should pl

Okay. That makes sense. Sorry, go ahead.

I totally get that putting the puzzle together in a way that tries to check all those boxes is tricky. It sounds like visibility has been a big priority. I would just offer a few counterexamples to prioritizing that, maybe the expense of other things. If you look at downtown Silver Spring right now, on the corner of Colesville and Wayne going north from the metro, there's that large open space that was likely done a few years ago, maybe in connection with development. I can't remember exactly the history there. Highly visible, right? It has a lot of nice design, and it is very underutilized. A

Is this the one that goes down a lot? It goes straight down.

Yeah, thanks for reminding me about that context. That makes a lot of sense. And yeah, difficult to overcome the natural features of a place sometimes. So 100%, that makes sense.

Can I just say one thing as you're talking about these parks? I know in some areas you designate a minimum size in some areas. So I think is there a way in some places you may need a minimum size, but there's some ways that also talk about the function you want there that may help signal to the owner or developers or whatever. You're not talking about X, but you're talking about Y. So whether it's 0.2 acres, one acre, whatever. But it's the goal of the function of what you want there. And then also about some of these public spaces in the past, I agree that some of them were very hard to get t

I'm going to save, I think, what may be the somewhat thornier comments for the end. So I'll just quickly get to a couple of environmental comments. The first is I would really, when we get to the work sessions, I would love us to include as an additional goal not just climate resiliency but climate mitigation. or greenhouse gas mitigation. It's inherent to these types of plans and these planning principles. I just don't want it to get lost in the wash. I want us to kind of reinforce the idea that this type of development is inherently more climate friendly because it's on a per capita level. P

So to that point, though, we're introducing the idea of a green buffer. we're introducing a double planted row of trees, not a single, but a double. We have the lower height and the suggestion or maybe the requirement that it's facing Belmont with a residential kind of look. That's a lot of things. That feels like a lot of things relative to other plans that we've done. And I'm just like, why are we choosing to go so over and above with this particular site, considering what you said, that it's not a huge height difference, another floor and a half maybe. I mean, I guess you can sort of, depen

Well, that's fine. That's fine. We can do it in the work session. I'm just sort of airing kind of the concern at this point. There is language about the intent, but we talk about compatibility, the intent of compatibility in other plans, too. And I guess what I'm getting at is we're going further. My impression is we're going further with this overlay recommendation.

OK. Yeah, that sounds great. Can I just say a similar comment in that when you come back, could you show us, if you didn't have that, is there some sort of, we talked about, Rendering, what does that feel like if you did it in accordance with our current zoning? And what do you lose in terms of FAR by doing what's currently in the code? And then also a question, I know that a similar situation, and just you can help us understand what we did then. Remember back here, HOC's property? They had a high, I think it's just right down the street, we approved. The HOC property was a high rise. And acr

Okay. I just have one more, and I promise I'm done after that. So I think after preliminary recommendations, which is when we first heard about the parking recommendation for public parking as part of a future mixed-use or some sort of development, I think I raised at the time, like had we done a parking, was there data, not just kind of what we're hearing from community, but have we done a parking study? You know, did we understand current utilization? I understand there's like, there's private lots, but there's also the SAC site, which is, as you mentioned, a de facto like parking site for f

Yeah, that would be great. And I understand it may not be possible to do something super robust. But we need something, especially if it's going to make it to the priority public benefit stage of things. And I think related to that, I think we need a little bit of clarity that if it does remain in the public benefit package of things for the FAR boost, is it sufficient to get one of those, right? One $150 spot within one development or does it continue after the first go? And I think that harkens back to like, what is our initial analysis of the need? So we really need to ground it in that. Ot

Just a couple of comments, additional comments. So now when we talk about schools, it's obvious here you don't need a new school. But would it be helpful as we move forward to talk about what are the maybe because this is talking about capital improvements for the long term. So it'd be good to talk, when we're talking to MCPS, about if that school is an aging school there. Is this the point to talk to say, well, maybe that school needs, it doesn't need a new school, but it may be to the point where it needs a lot of upgrades so that MCPS could It's part of the master plan for that. It's not a

Okay. Great. Thank you. Thank you for acknowledging that. Also, we talk about the real estate market. I'm a little... And in these master plans, we set expectations. And I know a lot of places, we know we have 200 feet, 250 feet, whatever. And what is the likelihood that over the next 10 to 15 years that economics would be right to even go to 150 feet, to 200 feet? And we always talk about incentives for maybe for affordable housing, but are there any incentives even needed to even make the market rate build out on these properties? And so I'm just saying, how do we talk about expectation? I d

And what I didn't see here, which I just question, sometimes in the master plans, we say how much capacity there will be if it was all built out. And sometimes that sets the wrong expectations, too, because it's sort of hard. And so if there is somewhere hidden somewhere, I just want to make sure the likelihood that only 25% of this will happen over there, or 50%. because sometimes it comes back to bite us when the community sees, oh, there's 10,000 or 15,000 more units capacity, but generally that likely will never happen, especially in a plant like that. So all good. Thank you. We look forwa

Oh, yeah. Well, no, we were not going to let this hard work go on. Yeah, so is there a motion to approve the Friendship Heights Sector Plan Working Draft as a public hearing draft and set a public hearing date? I think it's around September 10th or whatever it The 10th and the 14th. 10th and the 14th. So two-parter.

Two-parter. I'll move to approve this plan as the working draft with the public hearings date of September 10th and 14th. Second.

All in favor? Aye. Aye. The ayes have it. Thank you. Wonderful presentation. Thank you to all the team that was here today and all that helped put it together. Thank you. And we're going to go for lunch now, take a lunch break and come back at, what did we say? What should we do? About... Yeah, I want to do 215. Give us a little bit more time. All right, 215. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. We're starting our afternoon session. We're on item number nine, zoning text amendment 2609, rule village overlay zone, vehicle repair, limited use, where staff is recommending that the planning board

Thank you, Mr. Burbitt. We have one person to provide public testimony. It's Casey Cerner representing Monica and Francisco Costa. And you have six minutes, please.

Well, thank you so much. Just a couple questions for you and staff. You can chime in. So the vehicle storage and the setback, I'm not quite getting why that wants to be. She has...

Okay, and so that means that when you're looking at setbacks, if they're storing vehicles on the site, even that... whatever the vehicles are, that also has to be within that setback, can be no closer to, has to be set back that far too, right?

And then Ms. Cerner said that where are alternative shade structures used? And are we allowed those in the code?

Yeah, because I was wondering, I don't know if the applicant, is there some uniqueness to the site where this you can't plant the trees where some pattern to create this shade, and to think about falling sap or trees? I mean, is it a place where all their old trees, and are you afraid they're going to fall? I mean, I generally have never heard that.

Can I piggyback on that question? Because I have a similar question. this is talking about expansion as well as sort of introducing new things. And I mean, plenty of auto dealerships I've seen are pretty much pavement edge to edge. I mean, a planting at that, in that case would require sort of a where are you going to plant if there's no way to get to the ground. So I'm interested in having some at least flexibility with the shade option, I think, because I think it's better to have, you know, be it on or off site with the planting in addition to the sort of the shade option. So I just wanted

And I agree with Mr. Berber, too, that in general, it was not to create these heat islands, I guess, and and provide shading maybe for even customers who are going. If there's some flex, I'm all over flexibility as long as it meets the, and if there's some hardships that when the but it would be a limited use, they just go to DPS, right?

So, I'm open to, like, if there's a... a requirement that 30% of the X has to be this, and if they did it some kind of way or whatever, then I don't care how they do it.

If we had, can I, sorry, I'm in an area in which I was concerned. If we allow for flexibility in the placement of the trees, and I think that's an important distinction between just the shade and then the human comfort aspect of it. But if we allow for some flexibility in the placement of the trees, I mean, the storage and parking of the vehicles is not where people are going to be for the most part, if I'm not mistaken, right? I mean, if you're allowing, you know, if you're encouraging the planting of the trees and say you're walking up to the front, you know, the front door of the location i

And I understand, you know, I get for the most parking structures, but this is a situation which you wouldn't be interacting with that parking structure all that much, at least from a customer perspective, potentially, whereas you might on the other parts of the property. I think it's a reasonable compromise in that case.

Any comments or questions from the other board members? Mr. Rivers has done an outstanding job, and he's put in a lot of effort with his edits and suggestions, and it's always good to hear from you. Thanks.

May I ask one more question on the setback piece? Josh, did you have something else? No. Are we talking – and I wanted to make sure I was clear on the setback. Are we saying to retain the 100-foot rather than the 50-foot setback for those existing ones, assuming it meets the – if it triggers new construction? Is that what it is?

Yeah. I mean, I... I like the ability of being able to modify the setbacks, but I'm also considering if you're looking at it and you look to see and it's 100 foot and you look at your site and 100 feet doesn't work, do you ever make that decision in the first place to get to the point where we can modify setbacks? I think the flexibility of 50 feet is worth considering, but 50 feet and also modify its site plan.

I'm just thinking that with things like the, you know, barriers, landscaping, whatever that might be, might, would be covered in other aspects of the zoning code, or is it the only place in which we would be able to adjust that setback or review that?

I mean, I like the addition of the flexibility. flexibility with the board, but also with the potential setbacks of 50 feet. I'm just trying to think what 50 feet looks like in most auto dealership, you know, auto repair shops that I've ever, you know, been to, and I'm not totally sure there's 50-foot setbacks on those, but it... Well, it's a 50-foot setback if it's, or a 100-foot setback if it's adjacent to residential. So it's just, that's the other thing. So it's just if it's adjacent to the residential piece. In my case, no. Fine.

Yeah, not so much. Vice Chair. Okay, so thank you. Just a quick question. Is this, Mr. Noonan, is your client currently operating an auto repair place, and is it just non-conform? And she has to go get a permit? Okay, great. All right, great. So this is with these proposed changes. This looks great. It's a compromise. And so is the... Or a motion that staff transmit the comments to district council supporting ZTA 2609 with the amendments recommended and, well, as recommended today.

And we include the vehicle storage and the shade flexibility? Yes. Okay. Yeah, then a move to approve the, transmit the comments on the ZTA with the comments of staff, or the recommendations of staff and then the additional comments made today.

Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye. The ayes have it. 4-0. Thank you. Thank you, staff. Thank you, client, for bringing this to our attention. All right. We're going to take just a two-minute break and then start with our next item, which is the item number 10, Clarksburg Library Mandatory Referral Water Quality Plan and Final Forest Conservation Plan, where staff is recommending approval with conditions. Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. We're on item number 10, Clarksburg Library Mandatory Referral, Water Quality Plan, and Final Forest Conservation Plan, where staff is recommending approval o

Yes. First, we have Ms. Kate Kubit to provide some public testimony from Elm Street. And then we'll have the applicant provide their testimony. testimony or their presentation if they'd like. Thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Kubit. Would the applicant come up and make a presentation? And if you're able to, can you speak to why the library isn't going where it was supposed to go?

Would you like to talk any more about the proposed library?

Thank you for the explanation. I missed the point of the presentation.

The, so it's clear that the site was chosen, the location was moved to facilitate the co-location of the library and housing, right? Whereas you assess that the previous location was infeasible. I guess I have two questions. So my first question is, we see the library presented here, And as you just described, there's no current design for the housing component. There's no partner chosen. We have nothing to look at to see how the two will interact. The housing looks like the only location for it is on the east part of the site, which will then be adjacent to or closest to the Clarksburg town c

Well, so I'm still wondering, though, why wasn't the plan... Why wasn't a holistic plan designed to include the housing together and then brought forward to us, obviously, but then kind of through the process? Why are we waiting for the housing? Is something going on where you can't do the housing and the library at the same time?

Okay. I appreciate kind of the context there. I like we're doing this a little bit backwards to me. I understand that CIP projects are distinct. I don't really understand the reason why This couldn't have been a cohesive design together that could have been moved forward. I'm not saying this was your group's charge. I think this comment is maybe more directed at the choice made from others about how to proceed in this situation. But I don't think this is the right way to develop this concept or this site, considering the whole reason it was moved was to have these done together. And we have no

I tend to agree and have the same comments. It rings a little hollow that we moved it because of housing, but we didn't plan for housing. We don't have the feasibility study for the original site. There is no connectivity between this site and the town center. It's two miles away. That's not reasonable to say in this position. It's not near any other housing. And we're not even clear in the forest. We're counting it as cleared. It's counted as cleared acreage, but it's not cleared. I lend toward sending this back for more thought and not approving the mandatory referral at this point because t

I'd like to commend Kate Kubit and the Elm Street developers. When developers set out to deliver, there's three promises they have to deal with. The promise to the county that they're going to comply with the law and the plan, and the promise to the community that they're going to deliver. and then the ongoing promise to the community that once they deliver, that the plan will come together and will serve the community's interest. And when I saw Kate Cubitt's name here, I was surprised that she was showing up today. But it's commendable because Elm Street promised, and Elm Street lived up to t

One of them. Are you going to answer it? Or are you? OK. So why don't we just step back a second, OK?

I don't know. Can you answer it? Kate Kubit might be able to answer it. I'm really interested in it because when we look at, you know, a developer taking a risk and the developer's reputation amongst the community, right, and they have a selling point, hey, we're going to develop houses and we're going to put a library here, bye, and then the developer does their part and then the county doesn't do their part, I think that's a concern that we have an opportunity to address here. Right. And I think that Ms. Kubit might have an answer.

Well, yeah, if we have more history, I mean, this is sort of into us at the, you know, so it's hard to comment on. But if you'd like to give us your version of the story, but here's what I think, and we can comment on this in our transmittal letter, but there's a couple things here, and this is my recommendation. I'd like staff to put up where the library was supposed to go. So you have on the site plan, but a couple of things I want to say. A couple of things we can comment on based on the information is that the mandatory referral for the library, which is the B, we are supposed to, staff is

And that's why you, and that was, that's the B piece, correct? The MRR2026030, correct? Correct. Okay, then there's the water quality plan. We are, they had a water quality plan and we are recommending that that be approved. It went through its right process and And that was your recommendation.

And we concur. Whatever tech things, we went through it, and DPS said yes, and we said no. Whatever. Yes, that is correct. And then the last, the forest conservation plan, that's our plan to review and approve, and we went through it and approved it. I mean, yes, but you are recommending that we approve the forest conservation plan.

Yeah. May I ask a clarifying? So there is, from the staff report, there is a portion of about one and a half acres on the site that's being counted as cleared, but not actually being cleared because there's no housing being proposed. But it's being counted as cleared for the purposes of the forest conservation plan?

It's either an easement or cleared, exactly, in that case.

OK. So now let's go to the A, which is the Stringtown Road. I mean, it's unfortunate, but this is sort of like just learning about the story, right? You know, really. And I understand that the property is already purchased, isn't it? So you're asking us to approve. Is this the A is purchased? For us to approve the purchased acquisition?

Yes, I mean, I think that's a good enough reason for us to disapprove, to recommend disapproval of the acquisition if the process wasn't followed, saying nothing about why that happened. But if the process, you know, wasn't followed and it didn't give us and staff and other property owners in the area to weigh in at the time, I mean, that feels like a big, you know, and so now we are where we are, where we're trying to kind of retroactively figure out what to do. To me, that feels like a pretty clear case of not approving the mandatory referral for that particular piece of this.

Yes, and I was going the same way. What we can approve is what we can't approve. It's already built up, purchased, so we don't need our approval to purchase something that's already purchased, right? And so I don't think we can comment on the acquisition. I mean, I'm looking at our...

I mean, I'm just, I mean, unless you guys know, do you know the story? It's hard to approve or disapprove. I mean, we can't approve. And all I could say is that we can approve these others. It's for library and met the requirements other than the design for the water quality, met whatever. And the forest conservation, if this is what they're going to do, then this meets our forest conservation. But in terms of the... To put in our letter that we don't feel that we can say approved on this acquisition because we don't know the whole story here.

No, I understand that. But I don't think they were here. I mean, are you here today to defend your reason? I mean, I'm just saying, is these, I don't think, if they knew what they were here today, I mean, I think they're here to defend the architecture. I don't know if they're here to defend the acquisition. I'm not sure what they're... You're absolutely correct.

Was there anything in the council bill approving this project that said it needed to happen first, the library needed to happen first before housing?

Those time frames are imposed by the council, correct? So the CIP is updated every two years and the money is allocated to projects within that time frame, correct? And so it's not as though the money goes away, right? It's just that projects are specified to begin within a certain time frame, right? But that can be extended, or that can be modified. Those are all choices that we can make.

100%. I understand that. I think most of these comments, if not all of them, are directed at a different kind of audience, I guess. Can I just say one thing, Vice Chair?

There are plenty of county projects that are supposed to be code. located or co-whatever, and they don't necessarily go at the same time. I remember their fire station on Neville Street. They built the fire station first, and something's supposed to, you know. But at the time, they were saying, I think there's other. So this is not unique that they don't go together.

But I think what we have sometimes seen But sometimes we don't see is at least plans that describe both components at the same time. And, you know, two and a half years ago or two years ago, we saw a mandatory referral for the parking garage in downtown Silver Spring. That was part of the United Therapeutics deal that the county had worked on. Right. they said at the time that affordable housing was going to be kind of in the rear of that parking garage. And we, we asked, you know, that was, we asked, you know, we asked a lot of things about that project. Could you put housing on top? Could yo

So I appreciate what you said. My feeling is that we should deny the acquisition and say why we deny the acquisition and say that it's because it's not, one, it's already purchased. And then two is because you said there's no, even though they're not building it now, that there is no plan to show how the housing and the project and the library go together. But I would move forward with the B, C, and D, but we're a board, its majority goes, and I'd like to hear how some of the others do.

Very few of the situations that we've described before where there's the potential co-location of housing have used housing as a justification for the purchase and the acquisition. And so that's another thing that concerns me is also the Silver Spring parking garage issue is that it wasn't even built to the standards that housing could be put on top of it, something we asked for during the mandatory referral. And so without an actual plan for the co-location of housing, plus having not brought it before us before the acquisition, yeah, I'm inclined not to approve either A or D. I was just sayi

They built one without the other, and it's moved forward. But Commissioner Bartley, we need to bring this home.

It's unfortunate that my question to the county couldn't be answered with regards to the deed that was provided by Elm Street in the development.

Well, she can still come up. If you want her, let's give her a minute.

Thanks, Kate Kubit. During your presentation, you pointed out that a parcel was specifically deeded over to the county for the construction of the library. And my question is, is that land still deeded over to the county, and are there any future plans for that deeded parcel, and if there are no future plans by the county for that parcel, will they be surrendering it back to Elm Street for further development?

Did the county purchase the land from Elm Street, or was that part of a requirement for the development to go forward?

If the property was deeded back over to Elm Street, would Elm Street consider building houses on that parcel?

So, sorry, just to clarify, so if the property that you're describing, it would not revert back to Elm Street ownership? The county retains it?

Okay, the county retains it. Yes, that's correct. Yeah. So, I mean, that's another of a series of questions that we don't know if there is a plan for that parcel, given that the location of the library has moved. There's a lot of unanswered questions as part of this. And I think it is, to be completely frank, I think it's sort of the responsible action at this stage to deny the FCP and try to get answers to some of these questions and try to understand what the plan actually is for housing, what the plan is for that site, where it goes, what happens on it. I understand the community has been w

I hear you. I asked staff, can you just show us where the town center is located and the commercial and residential pieces?

The original 1.1 acre site of the town center.

Here is to be developed. Okay. And someone was asking about a link from the current library site to, no, the current library site is further to the West, isn't it?

So my recommendation is is to not approve the acquisition. And in the letter, we would say why it's already purchased. And there's no sort of formal how the housing and the library would work. And approve the B, C, and D, because I just think that it's The county is going to move forward with the library at the proposed location anyway. And the commissioner, Vice Chair Linden, would like to just not approve A or, I guess, A, none of it.

recommending that we do not approve the acquisition because it's already purchased. And there's no plan for how the library and the residential would work together. I mean, there's just no. And then, but approve the design of the library. I mean, because you said it meets the requirements. water quality plan, because DPS has approved the water quality plan, and we have no issues with that. And D is the forest conservation plan, because we reviewed the forest conservation plan, and it meets our requirements. Is that what I hear staff saying?

And this was a question I was coming to ask on the, because we're approving, with the Forest Conservation Plan, we're approving a variance. And one of the findings of the variance is that this is not due to the actions of the applicant. And I would argue that the actions of the applicant in purchasing a different property from where they had already had planned a thing is possibly a reason not to approve the variance for the Forest Conservation Plan. I'm rereading the portions of the Forest Conservation Plan under the variance, and it's not a special privilege, and it's not, you know, it meets

And I think just to build on that just quickly, if we approve the Forest Conservation Plan, which is clearing based on hypothetical housing in the future, but then the housing doesn't come, let's just say, let's just use that scenario. We have massive amounts of forest clearing, no housing. I mean, we understand that the plan is to bring housing, but the Forest Conservation Plan is anticipating housing. We have nothing to sort of... base that calculation on other than we think that it's going to take this area. But we don't have any designs to base it on, correct?

But they're not removing that. Its design is based on removing the forest. But in the temporary, if they only build the housing, they're not going to remove that forest. But the calculation was assuming that they were going to remove the forest, right? They're not going to remove that forest if they're not going to build the house. So I can make a motion for what I said. If you don't approve, we can do another motion.

May I ask a question along those lines? I'm happy to support giving them a week's deference to come with more information and a reasonable plan, potentially a draft RFP or something I think would be... It would be reasonable to approve that. Is it possible to address the first three motions, the motion for property acquisition, the referral for the library and the referral for the water quality ban and defer the forest conservation a week? Would that make life easier or would that be more of a pain?

I would not do that. I appreciate your... I would either... Director Sartori, great. Because we had not planned to talk really about this, meaning about this is more information that we had not... understood before today, at least for me, that I would prefer to defer it, one, or two, what I had proposed. Because I think the county, these wonderful people from the county were here to talk about They're not, they weren't here when, in the room when it happened, okay? And so, so I think- And reasonable, I completely agree. So I would prefer that we have, we defer it for a week to get some of our

I'm okay with that too. And I think the two kind of big questions on my mind, of course, are, you know, to Commissioner Hedrick's point, you know, can we get assurances about a timeframe to see some movement on the housing component, whether it's a draft RFP, whether it's other parts of the process and when that will start, assurances there. And the other big question is the site that, may or may not get deeded back, or may or may not go back to Elm Street? Does the county have any plans for that site? And if so, can they share?

I may make one more request on that. For the forest conservation plan for the determinations for the variants, I would like a little more investigation of conditions or circumstances as a result of actions by the applicant. I would like to make sure that we're clarifying that because I think there's a case to be made that the movement of the site is a condition or circumstance created by the applicant to, you know, I can see the one site and it doesn't have any trees on it and I can see this site has got a whole bunch of trees on it. So there's an option there. I would just like to see if ther

That was my same question. Would we be tabling this or continue?

Yeah, I would not do it next week. I think they need some time, the 30th, and to see if that's a reasonable time with the county.

So is there a motion to continue this item on the 30th to get more clarity on why this site was chosen, the timing of when the residential is also coming, more fleshed out plan for that, the question about what happens to the previous property that was deeded

And may I ask for a copy of the feasibility study that was conducted as well? Because it was indicated that there was a feasibility study conducted on the original site, and I'd like to see a copy of that.

I agree with that. And I do know that there's been a lot of discussion with the community, the county, and the community about finding a library site. The library site was really important for the community. So I know that there was a lot of discussion with the county and a lot of thought through this. So we need to have someone from the county come and talk to us about it. Thank you.

All right. I would move for a continuance to July 30th or our July 30th meeting, provided we receive the information just discussed. Second. All in favor?

Aye. Aye. The ayes have it. Thank you all for coming. Thank you. All right. So we'll take just a two-minute break. and come up with our last item of the day that will be just as exciting. We're on our last item of the day. It's 5011 Olney-Laytonsville Road Animal Boarding and Care Facility Conditional Use, where staff is recommending approval with conditions of the conditional use and transmit those to the hearing examiner. We have Mark Beal today presenting this item. Welcome, Mr. Beal.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Beal. Would the applicant like to make a presentation?

Thank you, Ryan. Mr. Barr, just quickly, can we just, what is the main issue? What are we, it seems like the, the dedication is the issue, right? So maybe we can go over again with staff. This dedication, it solves this issue of you put up there where the road sort of does this jig. Can we just go over what? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I just want to get to the gist of it.

I'd like to get all the conditions, all at once, please.

Thank you. CHRIS JERRAM, JR.: Yeah, thank you, Mr. Farr. With the planning staff and DOT, are there any ones that he just went through that we can just cross off or you have so that we don't have to get? Like, for example, though, the last 17 and 18, are there no requirements? I mean, what? As he went through, are there any ones that are like no need, trust, or should we just start ticking them all off, OK? Start at the top of the list. Or would you like to respond to the, have you seen this list before?

And did you guys talk through this list at all, that letter?

So before we get to that, I think that's the biggest thing. These other things, like this, I'm just trying to just, just so we can, this tree buffer requirement, you know, is that a big deal or, I don't know, is the, I'm just saying, are the, Are all of these other things just, I mean, are there, in terms of importance, Andrew, you think?

I'm just trying to think what... I know, you're trying to get to the tougher ones.

And one of this tree buffer requirement, what is the, you said you didn't understand what that was. So can staff, what was?

No. So I thought it was something on site. So this is on a, so you can't have a tree, what?

So if a tree falls within 35 feet of a center, I'm trying to understand.

Yeah. OK. So all of these are about the do you have public dedication or not. So my piece here, one in this, so a DOT. So any time you touch a property, someone is asking for a public improvement easement. The applicant is saying, I'm not doing much to this property. Why am I creating a public? Why do I have to dedicate? Like even if I, I don't know, and we're saying.

I'm trying to make sure that I'm following along. And that puts them within the 200 foot setback requirement. That's no longer 200 foot.

Yeah, it doesn't seem as if that's an issue with only .

Or vice versa. But isn't, though, the play area, I'm just trying to figure it. The play area wants to be around the building, correct? I mean, isn't the play area around that you open the door? Let me see that. Didn't you have the screen thing that the play area is

And where is this related to the whole where the road is?

I don't kind of see it. Okay, so if you had to do the dedication, how would that site, I mean, is it encroached five feet into that fence area, 10 feet into this fence area?

OK. So on this side, so you will have an easement on this side of the property. On this side of the road, it would be one side you're creating, they're dedicating on their side, correct?

Chair? So from the center line of the road

No, no, I know this creates the problem. In the future, if you...

So you only get dedications when that property wants to do something. Suppose you wanted to put drainage on both sides of the road, just because you thought it was the right thing to do. How would that happen? You would just go to the adjacent property owner and say, you must dedicate 15 feet, 35 feet?

Okay. So this has nothing to do with their property going into being the road inside their property. Is that part of it too?

But the reason why we're asking for it is because of they're doing something on-site, their property, and you're thinking it triggers this, right? You're saying?

OK. And this does not necessarily mean that the applicant can petition for a variance in order to keep their poles fencing wherever they want? Yes, the outdoor play area, it's fenced in, yes. And what is the likelihood of that happening, you think?

That's what I wanted to ask. I mean, I think it comes down to the setback of being 200 feet, which is a long, it's a large setback. But it is what it is, and the AR is not one that we can do. But is there a way that we can encourage or support with either the hearing examiner, or I think I mentioned the Board of Appeals, to do the variance, to support the variance for the thing? Because I think it's a reasonable thing to ask. 200 feet is a large setback, and it can accommodate both the... exterior play area, the dedication for the right of way for the road, which I understand, and still be fai

I would agree with you. We're all about getting new businesses to... I want this owner to have his dog daycare business and Because we want small businesses to succeed. And I would like the board to do everything it can to make sure. And we also want to follow our rules for dedication to roadways. And I want to do everything we could to support both. So if there is a way that we can show that the board really, really wants some leeway here for them to have an efficient layout around for this dog play area. That's what I would want. And we want to minimize red tape. But I also want to support t

But I didn't think he said, I mean, he said to pull a building permit. He didn't say, you can't have, you can't run this, you can't have an outdoor play area, you can't have a dog thing, right?

I was going to ask on the condition. The condition 13 has alteration building permit or building permit for the exercise area fence. I think what you're potentially offering is to make conditions 12 and 13 conditional upon the building permit for the exercise area for the fence. Is that right? Am I getting that correct? So they could go ahead and continue to do the interior alteration? That's correct. Yes.

That's why I was saying, yes, 13 has alteration building permit or building permit of the exercise area. And what I was suggesting was a building permit of the exercise area be the conditional thing for both conditions 12 and 13. So instead of building permit, we limit it to the fence permit. Is that something that's reasonable for those with the dedication in the... and the variance for that to allow for the interior work to start?

For the building permit for the exercise fence, and that would condition upon the exterior work can be done. Okay, I think that's fine.

Yeah, I think that we're trying to work with you. And so we may not have it all figured out. But the point is that you have submitted

So I think, and I'm asking for our attorney to help us here with it. But I think if you're making best efforts going through, I mean, you're going through a process. Yeah, Mark.

Mr. Beale, great. You have been a articulated an enforcement mechanism where DPS can, or whomever it does, can revoke the permit. I mean, I'm fine with that. Because, yeah, we just wanted to, and we wanted, I think this is a win-win. You get to move forward like you wanted to, and then you're getting the dedication of the road like you want to, but there's some enforcement if you don't do it by a certain time.

I'm saying, so just to clarify, we're striking 18, we're making 13 conditional for the issuance of the building permit, and we're using a post-90 days of occupancy for the dedication under condition 12. Is that, did I get all that, or did I miss?

Fair enough. And splitting A and B under condition 12 for two triggers on enforcement .

So talk through it one more time so our legal team could get it. OK. So why don't you say it again, Mr. Beal.

Well, it is. Generally, is it, I mean, do we see it along these pages? Okay.

Well, I think it's best to, you know, the more you can remove before you go to have another. If you're saying you can remove it.

So you're saying it's OK to remove it? Yes, you can remove it.

Are you able to strike the site distance evaluation?

So what if they had said this is not an entrance and the entrance on this other street, you would still have required it?

I'm not sure why this is a big deal, because you have to- Do the site distance, please. But it just seems as if that is not the entrance to the property, right? But you said people don't know it.

But can you sort of say exit only if no one's using it?

I know, but just so that you don't have to do it. If they had a sign that says exit, It doesn't matter if it's exit or entrance. What is the issue?

I understand. Because, yeah, you don't want to go there. But what if you just said it's just close or something. You don't want to go there. So you don't have to do the test. You don't have to do this. But what if it can just, what can they do, Rebecca, so that?

Well, can we just have a condition that staff do this and work with staff to figure out, I don't know, what would you say, Richard?

Then you would have, yeah, that way you take it to the next step. Nothing may need to happen, right?

OK, great. OK. We need to either, the condition has to stay evaluated, OK? What else do we have? Do we finish it all?

OK. So I think we've gone over all the pieces, OK? So we went over the conditions written down. OK. All right. So does there have a motion? There's just only one motion, to approval of conditions of the conditional use as amended today and transmitted to the hearing examiner.

Yeah, I'll move to approve the conditions of the conditional use as discussed here today and to be transmitted to the hearing examiner.

All in favor? Aye. Aye. The ayes have it. Thank you so much. Thank you for all the time. Yeah, look forward to you moving forward with your project. Thank you. Very much. Appreciate it. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you.

All right. I love you all. I have to run. Yeah.