Planning & Zoning - Regular Meeting

to order. Roll call.

Ms. Salo? Here. Mr. Brady?

Here.

Mr. O'Hara? Here. Mr. Spirk?

Here.

Mr. Bolton?

Here.

We have quorum.

Thank you. Order of business, any additions, deletions, or deferrals? Any comments? I know we got a lot of people here. I guess most of these folks are for the ordinance issue. I was just trying to figure out is there a better way to kind of accommodate those folks and the applications that we have in front of us today. Any comments on that? Should we listen to maybe comments from the body here and then do our applications, and then come back to our ordinance discussion? Or just do the ordinance and let the folks wait?

Follow the agenda.

Please sit down.

No, I didn't ask you.

Please sit down, and I'll give you a chance for comments. Thank you. You'll have your chance. All right. No, we'll follow the agenda. I'd like to open it to public comments. And you may start us off. Please go to the podium and state your name and address. And you have a three-minute limit. No, we don't. Yep, state your Social Security if you want, for the record. I don't care. All right.

My name is . He has 485 North East 103 Street. And you are asking us for comment before the meeting. How can we make any comment before we don't know how the meeting is going down? How can we make a comment? You want to know what's going on. That's why we are here. And then we make our comment. That's all.

Thank you.

I have comments before the discussion. I'm Cindy Herps. I'm from 1000 Northeast 96th Street. And I'm here again to reiterate the fact that I'm very much not in support of the current proposed ordinance. For the sheer fact that the information provided on the 2025 residential parcel analysis shows that a much different picture than what we were led to believe by the Corradino consultants, information which guided us in the workshops. Over 97% of the existing single-family residential parcels have significantly lower averages than the 2024 zoning amendment and the proposed ordinance. For instance, lot coverage ranged from 22% to 30%. It's now proposed at 42% for one-story and 32% for two-story. Building height averages from 13.5 to 19 feet. It's now proposed at 28 feet. Livable average square footage was at 1,600 to 3,100 square feet. There is no limit in the proposed ordinance, and hence the creation of the six and seven bedroom, seven and a half bath homes. If our goal and the purpose of this initiative is to be more effective regulating home size, bulk, and overall scale to maintain the neighborhood compatibility, then we owe it to ourselves not to turn a blind eye to the fact that the information we were given by Corradino to work with was flawed. And as a result, our results are flawed and will not align with or deliver what we want or expect. it will leave us with much larger build outs of homes which fly in the face of neighborhood compatibility and decrease green spaces and tree canopies on residential parcels i think it's important that the board and corradino go back and review the changes outlined in the 2025 parcel analysis with intention review edit and revise down as needed to make sure the ordinance gets us to where we hoped to land. I just don't think we're there. The numbers don't correlate. They're too large. When I look around the community, we still have very large homes sitting on too small of lots and the sad realization that younger generations of families who in the past would look to stay and buy in Miami Shores may no longer be able to afford to since we are decimating smaller homes. This board has the opportunity to guide and preserve our history. We don't want to look like Miami Beach, Belle Meade, or any other nearby communities. We want to preserve and enhance our beauty and our character and protect our tree canopies. Let's not be so quick to throw away our history and our legacy, but instead embrace and preserve that which has made us distinct. Because once it's gone, it's gone.

Thank you. Thank you.

Linda Schwartz, 1304 Northeast 104th Street. I agree with Cindy just said. Also, the whole community is changing, and not for the best. Not only are we losing our beautiful trees to reckless, and I don't give a, and have the money to pay the fines, but we're losing trees. I mean, even though they have the little orange things preserving the trees, we turn around and those trees are gone. And there's no explanation. My concern is that I see here, somebody brought it to my attention, that it seems that the people, the owners, to be LLC. So that rings a little bell in my head, that these are people. who are here to invest and make profits and disappear and to sell to people that have the money for the means. We still have on our block, 104th Street, a house that was, I think, $7 million. Now it's $6 million. And it's still not a saleable house. I mean, I did a tour, and originally they had fake foliage in the back. There's no thinking about some of these houses, and I don't know, you know, you all reading the plans of the houses, but I mean, this is a house where all the bedrooms are upstairs, steep stairs. No steps are you could see through. Things can fall through. The laundry room is beautiful. It's downstairs. It's gorgeous. But there's no lift or no dumbwaiter. And you'll really be dumb carrying the stuff upstairs after doing the laundry. That's all. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, everybody. Carol Ennis Respondek, 1162 Northeast 105th Street. First, having been here many times over the past quite a few years, I just want to thank you all for all the hard work that you put in before the meeting and during the meeting. I understand that it's a lot more than anybody even imagines, and thank you for that. And I thank you also for wanting to always find the middle, for working together to compromise so that you can find the middle. I get how hard that is, but I think if we don't do it, we don't succeed. So thank you for that. Having said that, I still hope that you'll find a way. I know that you've already done this, but I hope that you'll find a way to decrease the maximum lot coverages, especially for large lots. I hope you'll find a way to decrease maximum impervious spaces because we can see we're flooding like crazy whenever it rains everywhere. And for the garage conversions that you guys have thought about and talked about, I hope that you will, when the bedrooms are more than four, I hope that you will require more parking of those places and that you will make sure that that new parking area is also pervious. That's it. Thank you for all your efforts. Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Good evening. Maria McGinnis, 1250 Northeast 101st Street. I echo the comments that you've heard. I also echo the comments of every single resident that's appeared before this board in the past two years since the 2024 amendments were adopted. When those were adopted, we were shooting in the dark. We were looking at other municipalities. We were trying to see what would apply. Let's see if we could get to where we need to be. They've been in place for two years. Those of you who've been on this board know that week in and week out, month in and month out, you have applications coming here trying to build to the max, get away with the minimum, and it's individual houses. Individual houses, one by one, that are getting demolished and replaced. And it's not to say you can't demolish a house that needs to be demolished. I'm not opposed to development. I'm not. Surprisingly, I'm not. But I am opposed to what that development does and the outcome of that development on this entire community. And I'm also concerned about the future with the infrastructure as we're going through septic to sewer conversion in the Shores Estates. If we're tripling the size of homes, which these numbers allow, they allow. And I don't think anybody's really crunched these numbers. I appreciate the effort. You all have done a deep dive on a lot of areas in this code that I agree with. But the most problematic weren't really touched at all and really weren't meaningfully discussed, especially in light of the study that was done by the Corradino Group about the built-out community here. And when 97% of the homes that are here are well below these numbers that were put in place in 2024, How can we not expect this continual trend of things being out of size, out of scale, running off into the neighbor's yards? I mean, I see that you're trying to address all of these issues, but fundamentally, if these numbers are well out of range, which they are, I mean, they're well out of range. I mean, you heard them earlier by one of the commenters, but our far range, based on the data in that chart, is under .26. 0.26. Our far range for multifamily is 0.5, but we have ours at 0.45. We're allowing multifamily buildings basically to be built in a residential neighborhood. It's tripling the size of homes that are existing. How can we not know that that's going to have an adverse effect? I also think these numbers, the increase in those four groups is ridiculous. I also think the groupings are ridiculous. You have over 23,000 square foot differential in the fourth group in the largest lots. How does that even get a pass? In the smallest lots, we don't even acknowledge them, and yet we're letting them be built out. There's two examples of shotgun homes on 95th Street, east of 2nd Ave. They're new builds, 2020. Go see what they look like. Do the math on them. Guess what? They're well below the numbers that you're proposing. This is just ridiculous. I don't know where these numbers came. I wasn't present for the meeting that you had with respect to where these numbers came from. And I understand the objective. And the objective is good. I get it. But the numbers don't work. And they need to be reevaluated. So I really appreciate the efforts that have been made. I think there's been tremendous progress in a lot of areas that are trying to address the issues. But these fundamental numbers are too much, and this data cannot be ignored because we didn't have it available two years ago. We have it available, but it wasn't even addressed. So I would ask you to go and revisit. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good evening. Manny Del Monte. I'm at 480 Northeast 91st Street. I've lived in this neighborhood for now 15 years. I'm also a architect and a planner with over 20 years experience. So I'm looking at this from a slightly different perspective. I'm seeing what the code was previously that we've changed, that the new code is obviously trying to fix wrongs, right? It was a much more dense code where everyone's saying that the community is smaller. Yes, it is smaller. It has evolved over time, which is honestly what drove me to this neighborhood. It's a beautiful neighborhood. The range of architectural styles is amazing. You can see the natural evolution of the architecture throughout the years. And that's not something you see common in Miami. Most neighborhoods try to kind of contain a style and they kind of go with that as years go on. Miami Shores has evolved. And much like that, the zoning code needs to evolve. So it's natural to want to go back and see, OK, there's things we don't like. Some of the buildings are oversized. The houses are out of scale. So we need to see what can be done to improve them. But what I feel is that my concern as a resident and as a planner is that I'm looking at the changes And we're reacting to a fear of oversized scale. And instead of going through and truly evaluating what the characteristics of the neighborhood are, what have made the neighborhood what it is, what have made these houses that we proudly show on our newsletters every month. This is the historic house of the month, and we show a beautiful two-story home. None of those homes, none of those homes would fit under the current code. For whatever reason, either upper level setbacks, front setbacks, continuous facades, you've taken what has made the neighborhood what it is, and you are completely ignoring it. As a planner, the first thing I do when I come into a neighborhood, I try to see what's unique about it, what's made it what it is. And the diversity in style, the diversity in size, the way that the neighborhood has naturally evolved and continued to grow, the needs for people 100 years ago for a house are nowhere near the needs for families now. We need more space. So yes, naturally, the homes are going to be larger. But that has to be done responsibly. So what you're doing in looking at the code and trying to figure out how do we improve that, that's great. but we can't throw the book at it. And what we're doing right now is throwing the book at it. FAR, lot coverage, different lot coverages for one story versus two story, different lot coverages for lot size, different lot sizes. You're adding all these percentages on top of percentages, and all you're doing is making it harder for the planners to evaluate. And I have some diagrams that I can show you guys later on if you want, that illustrate how you're going to make the planners lives even harder because essentially they have three styles of building that they need to look at a one-story home with one lot percentage a two-story home with a pitched roof with one percentage and a two-story home with a flat roof with different setbacks so what you're doing in this case is now you're starting to affect the style you're affecting the form and you're dictating style by doing this The best thing you can do for an architect is give them the ability to come up and have flexibility to massage their buildings. If you give them an FAR and you tell them they can be two stories, they know they can only go so much on the ground and they can only go so much on the second floor. It's a piece of clay. You're molding it. But if you're giving them one percentage for the ground, if you're happy with one percentage on the ground for a one story, Why would you need to do a second percentage if you're doing a two-story? It doesn't change your FAR. If you were fine with a larger lot coverage, then you should be fine with it on a two-story. Side setbacks, front setbacks on the upper levels, it's not doing anything for you. Go look at most of the houses that are in your catalog of historic homes. none of them do that and they're amazing and why because it's the characters the style of the home and that's what we need to focus on is not the well it's a solid it's a flat roof and that's an issue because now we've had more flat roof designs come into the neighborhood that's not the issue it's the design its materiality is detail its texture that is what's gonna give change not all these additional requirements that's not what's gonna do it so I really think you need to take a step back and look at what's truly important and with the neighborhood and how do you implement that into a building because it's not all these additional regulations it's not throwing the book at it that's not gonna solve the answer

Good evening, board members. Leslie Del Monte, 480 Northeast 91st Street. I actually had a set of things that I wanted to say. And hearing the comments, I'm realizing that we're addressing an issue that we can't legally address. And that's where the flaw in this ordinance is. The ordinance and the staff report don't actually say what everybody is saying. And it's because it can't legally do so. So by definition, this ordinance is flawed. And it is not going to deal with what the issue that the public is identifying out there, it's not gonna deal with that. Good zoning requires for the minimum thresholds and the minimum regulation to be evaluated and to be applied. That's good zoning. You do the minimum to address the problem and it requires a rational nexus. I'm an architect. I'm a planner. I have over 20 years of planning experience, over 10 of those years in municipal experience. I have worked in cities all over the southeast. I have never come across a city that tries, as my husband said, to throw the book at it. You are looking for absolutely every regulatory tool to throw at this. This is not belts and suspenders. This is a 12 buckle straight jacket. You are tying architects' creativity. You are hindering exactly what made this neighborhood beautiful, that you're doing the exact opposite. And the worst part is, and what I have learned in over 20 years of doing this, is that you cannot legislate good design. You cannot legislate good design. So you're gonna do this, it's not gonna work. You're gonna come and come up with another 20 regulations to throw at it and it's still not gonna work. We're still gonna have the ugly white boxes. They're just gonna taper back and forth. it's not gonna solve anything. And we're still not going to address the character of the neighborhood. And yet, we're putting together an ordinance that is not enforceable. It's not statutorily enforceable. The state of Florida will not legally allow us to enforce this ordinance. And to hear you say that you're willing to take the risk is quite callous, because you're doing it with my money. Because you're setting up the city for liability. Nowhere in the backup did I see, I heard a lot of percentages here today. I haven't seen a single report that speaks to the amount of houses that are going to be rendered non-conforming as a result of this. Where is that percentage? What happens when a hurricane comes? And if there's some devastating catastrophe and we have to deal with that? Sure, there's waivers, there's things, but why are we drawing a box that we gotta get out of? Why, why is that necessary? Why, when we could actually have good zoning regulations? Why, when you could actually look at something and have the wherewithal to comment on the design or the lot size or whatever it is before you and comment on it. You don't have to resort to the book. you don't have to resort to the book. So I encourage you to go back to the drawing board because what you're doing is the exact opposite. You're actually hurting lots like mine that are smaller lots and you're not going to solve the problem. Thank you very much.

Debbie Madsen, 335 Northeast 93rd Street.

I also want to thank you guys for all the hard work that you've put in.

I know it hasn't been easy. It hasn't been fun. It hasn't been fun for us either. So I think the one thing that I want to remind everybody is that we've been talking about this for five years, at least minimum, of all the giant sugar cubes that are going up in our neighborhoods. And I think that the part of it that disturbs me the most is that we're not taking into consideration the shores as a community. You have people that are building these monstrous homes next to these regular-sized, normal-sized homes, and you're taking away their privacy. You're taking away their sunshine. You're pouring water onto their grounds. So there's a lot more at stake than just simply somebody wanting to put a house there. And so many of them are LLCs and spec homes. So the people that are putting them up, they don't have plans on staying. But you know what? Whoever lives there is going to have to face those neighbors every day. So I think we need to be respectful at the same time when we're trying to consider this and take into account that many of us have lived in this community for years. I've been here for 62 years. I've seen plenty of changes. And change is good and it's gonna happen. There's nothing we can do about that. But at the same time, we can try to approach it with grace and with respect and listening to other people and taking the time to listen to them and honor what they have and all the years that they've put in in this community. So I just ask you, don't rush into this. Take your time. Let's do it the right way. There's a lot of people who are still on vacation or who aren't even here who would like to be here this evening. So I think, in my opinion, I would like for you to table this so that everybody can think it through better and perhaps come up with some better options. Thank you.

Any other comment?

Public comment? Public comment?

State your name and address.

Bernard Maton. I live at 53 Northeast 105th Street. I've been living there since 1988. And a concern that I have when I drive around Miami and I see, for example, I have friends that live in Aventura, the amount of construction, the problem with traffic. We have a place here in Miami Shores that's unique. We need to keep it that way. And going the route of having these high rise housing, I'm not exactly sure on how many floors. I think you want to go up to three floors. It's a concern in terms of what happens to the environment overall. I don't know if you are going to make a decision now. I'm not aware. I just got the information on that new zoning regulation. I think it has to be questioned. I think staying with the original plan of the village is what we need to do. That would be my two cents based on what I've learned and what I've seen around in Miami. This is a beautiful village. We need to keep it that way. Thank you.

Thank you.

All right. Any more public comment? No more public comment. Minutes, approval of minutes? Just a small comment.

Diana Pecchio 400 Northwest a hundred and twelve terrorists all I need when I say is It hurts my eyes when I go by those big Square houses that look like boxes and I don't feel like Miami Shores anymore and I imagine if we allow this They're not going to stop. And it kills the beauty of the style of the shorts. That's all I have to say. Really, they're awful. that's all a man of all the other environmental that damages that can bring I'm just talking about the visual impact on the shores that's all thank you

Good evening, everybody. Corey Pecchio, 400 north of 112 Terrace. Just one question. Have you ever seen what those big square white houses look like in a nice neighborhood? Get down to Northwest 2nd Avenue and look at the white horse to the left. When you drive halfway down, you'll see all the rest of the houses looking really good, and you've got this thing sitting there. Have a good day.

Any other public comment? Hearing none, approval of minutes.

Move to approve minutes of the April 23 meeting.

Second. All in favor? Aye. I have comments on the May 28 meeting.

OK.

the first commenter who also commented this evening the sentiments of the commenter I think are not captured accurately although the commenter did I think invert the FA our conversation the person was very clear that they do not want larger homes and I think that that should be reflected in the comment this is public comment number four for Cynthia Herbst then beyond that page 7 I think when we were talking about the language of the additional step back on the second stories I don't recall for sure who presented that I thought that was you yeah I support it but but I think that the record might want to be corrected so that's page 7 10 11 mr. Spirk proposed adding language requiring an additional step back that was actually mr. O'Hara that's all I have on the main minutes

So Brandon has two comments. Do I have a motion to approve them as corrected?

So moved.

Second. All in favor?

Aye.

Minutes approved. Item 6A, legislative item, an ordinance of the Village Council of Miami Shores, Appendix A, zoning to comprehensively update regulations relating to the residential district, providing for input implementation, effective date. Discussion?

Do you mind if I start us? I think it's important to at least give a summary to where we are. Thank you, sir. In recent years, redevelopment trends have underscored the need to more effectively regulate home size, bulk, overall scale to maintain neighborhood compatibility. As part of the village's broader effort to update its land development code, The Village initiated this review and revision of the residential R zoning code provisions. The purpose of the initiative is to address outdated standards and ensure that future residential growth aligns with the community's planning objectives. At the direction of the Village Council and the Planning and Zoning Board, staff conducted a detailed analysis of the existing residential R code regulations and identified provisions requiring clarification and amendments. Staff also implemented a structured public engagement process to inform residents about how zoning standards function and to solicit meaningful input on potential revisions. Two community workshops were held on April 22, 2025, and July 17, 2025. These sessions included visual presentations followed by moderated discussion. Public input was collected through live question and answer periods, written surveys, comment cards, and follow-up email submissions. To ensure transparency and broaden participation, staff created a dedicated R code web page on the planning and zoning department's website. The web page includes an online survey, video recordings and downloadable presentation materials. This web page has also been up to date and serves as a timeline of all of the events from the beginning and up to where we are today. So at any point in time, any member of the general public can visit the web page and view staff's past presentations, our executive summary report, and a link to all of the meetings. In September 2025, staff prepared the executive summary report, which compiled the public feedback and provided professional analysis of the primary issues identified. The report evaluated recurring themes and outlined potential regulatory approaches. This summary served as the basis for drafting proposed amendments to the residential R code provisions. On December 8, 2025, staff presented the draft text amendments at a Duly Noticed Planning and Zoning Board special call meeting. Staff summarized the public engagement process, outlined the proposed changes, and presented illustrative graphics to demonstrate the practical effects of the revisions. The board conducted a section by section review of the draft ordinance and provided direction regarding provisions to retain and sections requiring modification prior to scheduling a future public hearing. Now, I think what's important here is that within staff's report that has been mentioned throughout the course of the public comments, There's data that essentially is pulled directly from GIS. This is factual data, and it essentially calls out what are the lot sizes, where are they located, when was the site built, what's the existing lot coverage, the building for print, so on and so forth. What's important to note is that in 2024, the village adopted the zoning in progress. So in essence, up until 2024, there were no regulations in place. There was no lot coverage. There was no FAR. There was no impervious data. Essentially, a developer could build up to their setbacks. And there was no other type of regulations that would limit what someone could build. unfortunately what it does for us is that it serves as a line in the sand because once the 2024 zoning and progress was put in place there was an far there was a lot coverage there was impervious data that we now have to regulate subsequent to that in 20 in Later in 2024, the state adopted regulations that made it difficult for any local municipality to draft rules that are more restrictive. So therefore, in staff's draft ordinance, we had to measure the community input, the board's desire, but also we could not exceed the numerical values that were adopted in 2024, because otherwise we would be encouraging an ordinance that would be more strict than what the state of Florida allows a municipality to conduct so that is why the numbers are where they are and more specifically where staff kind of presented it because we we had a baseline that we could not surpass So prior to the March 26 planning zoning board meeting at which the revised ordinance was scheduled for consideration, village staff conducted a comprehensive legal and policy review of the draft ordinance for consistency with the recently enacted state of Florida legislation governing local zoning authority. Recent legislation adopted by the Florida legislator had introduced additional parameters affecting municipal zoning authority, including provisions that may limit the extent to which local governments modify residential development standards or regulate certain aspects of design for single-family dwellings. Pursuant to this review, staff evaluated the board-directed amendments to assess potential areas of inconsistency with applicable law. As a result of that analysis, specific provisions previously discussed by the board were not included in the March Ordinance, where their implementation could present legal concerns and create potential inconsistencies with state law. At the March meeting, the board reviewed the proposed ordinance section by section and made additional changes to the ordinance, including directing staff to reintroduce certain provisions that had previously been omitted following staff's legal and policy review. And therefore, the revised ordinance was presented once more at the Planning and Zoning Board's May 28th meeting, where further additional revisions were requested. And therefore, that brings us to where we are tonight, where this ordinance essentially has all of the indicated amendments that the board has discussed and requested of us. And that's what we have.

Thank you, sir. Thank you. Before we get started here, any comments from the board? I mean, I guess my thoughts are we have this draft, and we're in the process of polishing it. Maybe we should go through and you know, there's a few Discrepancies here. I'd like to discuss to just try to get get us to a finished draft of what we started and then at the meeting discuss if we want to go forward and make the recommendation to pursue it or maybe Table it for another meeting for further discussion but I think that most a public and general needs to understand that also that what Eddie just mentioned and that's a good point that the Florida statutes do kind of limit us to what we have right there with our far and our lock coverage so if we go any tighter than that then as one of our speakers said to we're opening ourselves up to I wanted I wanted to make a general general comment if I could

Just to kind of zoom out and look at this big picture-wise, we're stuck between a rock and a hard place. We have an overwhelming majority of the participating public that show up at these meetings that have asked us, pleaded with us, to try to enact regulations that prevent these larger structures from being built on these properties. And they don't understand why this is happening. I think they think that we've changed the codes and that that has then therefore allowed that to happen. although I know that our planning and zoning director has said that that's not the case I want to try to do this in more plain language the fact of the matter is a lot of those historic homes were built and they were not built they did not maximize what was allowable at the time when they were built life was different then but then homes became and properties became much more speculative in nature and as a result we saw a mostly businesses coming in looking to commoditize the properties and it created structures that maximized the code that was in effect at that time one of the reasons why I ran for this position on this board because I too was one of those people that had some concerns about what had been what was being built I was attracted to this village because of its quaint character and I also saw it being eroded and that is why we passed that initial measure before the state preempted home rule essentially and the states continued to do that time and time again it seems as though there is no limits to the amount of ability to control our own destinies that they want to take away from us but that does prevent us from further restricting these numbers and there are little loopholes and little avenues that the state has left open mainly in regulating volumetrics which is the reason why we are as one of the commenters put it throwing the book at it because that's what we're allowed to do legally speaking if we had a design review board that wouldn't be the case that's an ongoing debate as to whether or not we actually were designed or design review board in the past or not but that's a subject for another conversation the point is I think we're trying to find that balance between what is legally permissible and to address the overwhelming desires of the community to prevent very very large structures from being built on relatively small sized lots and that's the code that we have in front of us this evening that we're trying to articulate the further articulate and further clean up I think that the choices we have are to table it or to move forward moving forward in my view is an improvement what we had back in 2024 it's not a step backwards so provided that we are able to clean this up a bit I think that I would advocate for that and my hope is that as the government changes at the state level and we begin to see a restoration of home rule we can in the future revisit the zoning code to potentially unrestrict some of these restrictions and maybe institute a design review board which then we instills the ability for architects to be creative because as it currently stands now we're going to get more recreation centers built on properties that are going to infringe the rights of the adjacent property owners that really shouldn't have those rights infringed so we're working within the context of what's available to us at the state level pushing the boundaries where we can but I think that's the code we have in front of us so I just wanted to put that out there thank you thank you any of any other comments from the board before we get started on this

so I agree I think we should go ahead and finish reviewing and at least get to where what we started to an acceptable level of completeness and then we'll discuss how we want to go forward at that point the understanding to that we have limitations that Brandon just mentioned about Florida statutes as far as changing some of these other metrics that we put in place on this thing so with that said I guess let me just do a page Turner's any any major things I just have a few comments I'd like to discuss as we walk through this I don't have a lot based on our

This is, as Eddie indicated, probably the fourth time we've gone through this exercise. The last P&Z board meeting, we had a discussion item to kind of clean up some things. Prior to that, where you all left off on was that this meeting was going to be a cleanup meeting, not a page-by-page meeting. And so I just wanted to kind of bring that to your attention, if your intent is to do page by page, so be it.

It's clean up, things I think should be addressed, yeah. Okay.

Yeah. No problem.

It's not a lot. I mean, we're whittling it down.

No, it's, I mean, by all means. All right, good. No problem. Just reminding. That's all.

So my first comment's on page 3, line 72. Anybody got anything before that? I have a comment on building height and established grade they go together but why don't you go first it's it's building heights from oh we're on the same yeah building heights from 69 to 73 established grades from 81 through 87 here was my comment or my question you know for discussion with the board we've kind of changed the way to measure the building height for flat roofs the overall and then for pitched roofs to the tie beam supporting a roof structure on the top floor for any type of roof. My question is this. If our further regulation says 28 feet in height, that would be from the finished floor to the top of tie beams. Is that correct? Is that your understanding?

Well, actually, last time when we talked about trying to establish an additional step back for a flat roof, I believe we agreed to revert back to the previous definition of building height because a separate definition for the revised definition was no longer required because there was an attempt to address the community.

So I see you put a memo forward here, I guess, addressing this? it does it also cleans up what the term established grade means I think the way that that was written is and that's further that's further yeah but they go hand in hand so so so so then this is that we need to because my I was where I was leading was if that's 28 feet to the top of the tie beam and then let's say you have a very steep pitched roof then you could essentially have a very tall structure you've revert back to the previous way of measuring it which was the mean between the even the ridge And is that stated later on?

That's the revised building height definition that I sent via email shortly before this meeting.

All right. So this is the first time we've looked at this? The first time we've looked at it. Has everybody had a chance to look at this? Do you want to take a few minutes and read it? Do we want to? Do you want me to read it out loud? Do you want to read it out loud?

Not really, but I'll do it. Thank you. If it's okay, I'd like to start with the established grade because I think that makes a lot of sense. All right. the way that we had previously written established grade it looks like we were trying to regulate a finished floor by the use of the term established grade but that's not the intent of that word so I proposing the revision as follows established grade the minimum average grade of a plot compatible with adjacent properties backs of sidewalks and adjacent roadways but in no case lower than the average crown of road fronting a property a finished floor shall be set a minimum of six inches above the established grade goes on for building height changing that definition to be the vertical distance shall not exceed 28 feet from the minimum finish floor to a the top of the roof for flat roofs or be the mean level between the eaves and the highest point of the roof in the case of roofs of any other type for those properties located in areas identified as flood zones subsection 1 In all flood zones except coastal high hazard areas, the minimum finished floor shall be the elevation established by FEMA plus free board requirements. And Subjection 2, for buildings located in coastal high hazard areas such as VE and V zones, the maximum building height shall be 28 feet measured from the lowest horizontal structural member supporting the lowest habitable level to the roof point described above. And I'm happy to answer any questions.

Let's start with finished grade. So what we had here prior was the finished grade of a plot shall be not less than four inches above street grade. And then further, the established finished floor of a plot shall be at or above the minimum. Oh, that's for the flood portion. So that's going to stay the same there.

item number it's only slightly different because the way it was written before doesn't take into account the fact that FEMA does not specify finished floor elevations for for coastal high hazard areas the finished floor shall be the FEMA base flood plus freeboard where do we have freeboard it's two feet

And where is that?

We, unfortunately, outside of our zoning code, but in the building code section of our code of ordinances, have something arbitrary that talks about two feet above flood. We don't have liberty to change that, unfortunately, because it's not within our purview.

At least that's what we've been told. I would love to change it. So as far as you know, it's not in our zoning section.

It's not.

And then the county, I guess, has a one-foot requirement, right? Free water.

so that's a confusion factor it is but we don't really have purview over that so this works around that because it's saying free board as established by FEMA not free board is established by the village of Miami Shores any comments on this I just just wish it was clear

well I think as staff definitely I think we have a little bit of reservations referencing the the 28 feet just because the building height definition refers to all zoning districts so there may be other districts that have different height numerical values so that may be an issue so we definitely wouldn't want to put in a numerical value in the definition so I think that

that in the tables other buildings not within the our district 40 feet correct but the building height definition as being proposed and by mr. Spirk includes that 28 feet and so these definitions are not exclusive to the our district

only it includes all our version to specify that height I think is causing an inordinate amount of confusion so maybe a workaround that would be to specifically state that this is

so in drafting codes we don't do it for the immediate moment we do it for the future and I just think that best practice and for for this to be a definition it just needs to be a definition not a regulation and I think that's the issue with these two provisions even as drafted in the proposed ordinance is that we are going beyond just defining the term and now we're regulating within a definition and that's not a useful thing to do in code you want to have your regulations set out and your definitions separate in part I would even go as far as saying it sounds like we might need to make a separate definition for finished floor because it kind of is a bit conflated with a finished we define established grade and then the last sentence we go into a finished floor shall be set a minimum of six inches above the established grade now we're complaining conflating two different terms for one and for two now we're regulating something within a definition most users of codes yes you use the definitions to inform you but you're gonna first look at the regulations to tell you what you can and cannot do so I think anything that is more so a regulation needs to be relocated in another part of the code and the definition be so should be in section 508

correct so that was great establish greater plot and finish floor and we'll add a subsection B to put that finish floor minimum at that point all right so what are we concluding here then on the established grade I've got I've got a Brandon suggestion I've got what we Eddie provided in the the ordinance

so if there's no issue with the language that mr. Spirk has recommended then we'd add that language strike out what's included now well not technically strike out it's we're still at the stage where we can just swap things out this is not new link this is not current language in the code so we'll just what if we just leave what

opinion and I'm not sure Brandon exactly what you're trying to change from what what is in right now on the the ordinance proposed which just says not less than four inches above street grade this this this edit started because when we when we agreed as a board to implement an additional step back for a flat roof we also said that we would revert to the previous building height definition

So if that's what we're doing in the definition I think that's all we need to do is simply revert back to the previous definition prior to our edits or and I'm sorry Yeah, I'm on a step.

I'm just I guess I'm folk. I'm just trying to get the established grade portion of straightened up first. Right? And then the height, I mean. Okay, so you're changing what we have in the ordinance completely.

So the established grade, the way it was written, in the current edits, regulating, it's defining a finished grade of a structure.

Four inches above street grade.

Yeah, but saying the finished grade of a plot should be not less than four inches above street grade. I don't know if that was the intent. Was the intent to take the entire grade of the plot

make it four inches higher than not less than four inches above right so maybe even more than that i don't know if that was the intent i don't think that was the intent it's just saying you gotta add at least four inches for you know but that flood that your yard doesn't flood so it's above the street you know not below the street And then so it sounds like you want to change that to six inches.

But then it goes on to talk about the finished floor, like subsection one in that definition is talking about the finished floor established by FEMA.

Yeah, and then the finished floor shall be above the minimum FEMA-based flood plus freeboard. That doesn't have anything to do with established grade. And then that's for the flood area too.

So if we're looking to simply define what established grade is, because that is ultimately the basis of measuring height later on in the code, think what I'll go with what you said well got that last sentence yeah the finished floor she'll be set a minimum yeah and then that could that could that could follow in the code in the section that's specific to residential so that'll then go where under line 81 established grade is yes Yes. None of what we have written there with respect to FEMA has anything to do with established grade of a lot.

I think that simplifies it.

That's my perspective. Eddie, I don't know, am I stating that correctly? I think I am.

So that's for the established grade. What Brandon submitted minus the last sentence starting at line 81. Right.

So essentially that would replace 81 and 82.

like oh that whole things what about one and in parentheses one parentheses oh so that would also be that's coming out all right building height now perhaps we come back to that when we get to section 508 because now we're jumping let's go on the definition here yeah if we leave this as is

The previous definition, as it was previously written, I think we can just simply state it like that if everybody's in agreement.

And not the one that's in this ordinance in front of us. Correct.

So removing all strikethrough, all underlined, and just the verbatim building height definition as is.

I believe that would be the case. Except building level. It's saying the established grade elevation of a plot. I don't think we're referencing building level anymore. I think we're talking about established grade elevation. okay so we'll leave that first line and then would the vertical distance from the established grade elevation of a plot to to a the top of the roof in the case of flat roofs or be the mean level between the eaves and the highest point of the roof in the case of roofs of any other type I think this was wordsmith were better except we don't use building level anymore that's what I'm saying building level was a different definition altogether that didn't make any sense we got rid of that and we were saying let's go by established grade so which is why I'm saying it doesn't seem like we're gonna revert back to with the exception of instead of saying it it's defined by the building level it's the established grade so it's as I wrote it's it's basically it's as I read it it would be

yes that's what yes that's my understanding we're ready to be but not the others yes any other comments on these issues my next comment is on line 188 before that

my question to I guess Eddie or whoever you have district this is just a type of thing district you have our dash one district shouldn't shouldn't that just be our district we don't have our one it's just our that's it I'm just trying to be I didn't call it off yeah and then I think it's a little confusing the title you have on the far right column you have permitted and unauthorized uses It doesn't doesn't read read. Well, I should it be permitted uses period I think we just permitted uses and then you yes, but it specifies that the following is a partial list of Not of uses not to be included

to me it was a confusing confusing you brought this up before and that's the reason why it was included is because of that additional language that includes the unauthorized uses typically we just would have a permitted uses session but because this not only has but when you say permitted and unauthorized uses then you have to specify at the beginning of each number permitted use permitted use

non-permitted use because you can't say it's permitted and unauthorized and then just start with permitted and unauthorized use one family dwellings you understand what i'm saying the following is a partial list used not to be included in the foregoing authorized uses that specifies that that's why i think the column should say permitted uses and then that's obviously clearly not permitted uses one family dwellings but not more And then we have item three, family occupation and professional offices. Is professional offices a permitted use in the R district?

Home-based businesses.

Home-based offices are.

Whether we want to or not.

Yes.

Okay. That's just my comment. I think it would read better under permitted uses. I'm not going to dwell on it too much here.

Yes.

My next comment on line 205, anything before that? FAR, where do we have FAR defined in our code?

It's there. In the definitions in 201.

It is defined in there? When you did the streamline. With what's included and what's not included? It says that. All right. I look for it.

When you did the streamlined, our district changes in 2020.

So it is defined with what is and what's not included. Okay, good. My next one is section 412 to 228 Our coverage issues What my comment and I was just looking at it, I think it's I think we could simplify it Like the first the first 7,500 square feet and above take that out and then the second line I You know, I'm thinking just less than 15,000 square feet, 40%, one story, 30%. And then 15,000 and over, 21,000 and over. The only issue that I have with that is that having the smaller lot. Well, I don't know. Too much house on the smaller lot.

And that's the thing. That was actually going to be my comment. I don't really recall why we did that. But in 2024, we had said 30% and 40%.

And that's what's in our code right now.

And then a number of residents came forward and said, yes, but that's going to allow for a very, very large structure on some of these larger lots, which is why when we talked about the other definitions, when we were talking about 12,000 square feet, 15,000 square feet, and 21,000 square feet, these were already areas that were defined, I believe, in our code, which is why we took them. And we reduced the percentages to not allow for it. for an unreasonably sized structure next to another lot that it would ultimately be allowed to only build something compared to, you know, much less volumetric, voluminous, I should say. But when we went to the 7,500 square foot lot, we, I think, arbitrarily just increased that. And what I've heard from the public, for the most part, there has been some dissenting view that we've heard this evening, although I think that was really about the mechanics of how we're writing the code and not so much about the results. but the remainder of the people that have spoken publicly in this meeting and other meetings have objected to that increase. So if we're listening to them, I think we would go back down to the minimum that we're permitted to go back down to, which in my understanding would be 40% and 30%. So to your point...

just change to less than 15,000 square feet 40% 30% no I would say yeah less than 15,000 square 15,000 and above 38 28 yeah so yes on that table you have four rows strike the first row completely The second row under lot size right, less than 15,000 square feet. And then the rest remains the same. Because then the next row says 15,000 square feet and above.

Correct. So we'll only have less than 15,000 square feet?

Yes. Yes.

And less than 21,000 square feet.

Less than 15,000 square feet, 15,000 square and above, and then 21,000 square and above with the numbers that are in there. You with me?

All right.

My next question is on line 248. Somebody's got something to put on there. Anything before 248? So maybe somebody can help me understand that paragraph there from 245 to 250. I don't know who kind of proposed that. But I guess what I'm struggling with is...

you may recall that I came in with an inventory study of flat roofs to pitch roofs and proposed a mechanism of regulating that but I think it was unanimously deemed to be overly complicated and mr. O'Hara came up with an alternative suggestion because the premise of my initial proposal was the community wasn't necessarily objecting to flat roofs, although some objections were heard about flat roofs, more they were objecting to the volume metrics that were being presented to a street. We heard big white cubes, massive oversized homes. the provisions that we had proposed up until that point really didn't address that and it seemed as though what we were trying to do or what I was trying to do was really getting stuck on whether or not it was a flat roof versus it was a sloped roof ignoring the reality that the people were really talking about volumetrics and that's why I came forward with that inventory study as a basis of trying to demonstrate that we had a character in the shores that was depending on which area of the neighborhood you looked at, somewhere between 2% and 9% flat roofs to the majority pitched roofs. So instead of trying to implement a complex way of regulating that that would put undue burden on staff, the solution was if you're going to propose a flat roof because by nature of a flat roof the volume is larger than is presented to the street, simply set that back further.

so this says 10 feet for the second floor yes and then what I did what I maybe you can kind of walk me through the front shall be increased by one additional foot for each one foot by which the height of the upper wall plane measured vertically from the finished floor

explain don't remember exactly who presented that but as I read it my understanding of that is that you're allowed by so it's 10 foot in theory until you get to 10 feet so that second story is 10 feet and then if that second story has more than 10 feet associated with it and you need an additional force we've had a number of proposals that have sought to maximize height but that's the first

You're at a minimum of 10. This has to be at least 10. Yes. But if this is 12 feet high, then this step back.

This is the height of the first floor. Right. That's the height of the first floor. Second.

Second floor. Well, no, this is the height of the first floor. Right. If it's at 12, then your step back is 12.

A one foot by which the height of the upper wall plane.

Yeah, this is in relationship to the second story.

What's the upper wall plane?

Second story. The upper wall plane, the second story, measured vertically from the finished floor elevation. From the bottom of the second floor.

The finished floor elevation of the second story to the top of the parapet or higher. exceeding 10 feet. Oh, so if this is more than 10, if this is 11 feet, then I got 11 foot step back. Right.

Second floor. Okay. All right.

But also the first floor. That's fine.

I just talked about it.

I don't know if I read it that way. So if you have a very high second floor, you're stepping it back even more. And these are the regulations and the metrics that we've

over detailing like our speaker said earlier and I think the some control we know we are there's no question about it what we're proposing is architectural architects do their thing it's a reaction it's a reaction for yes but it's an unfortunate reaction because absent of those regulations we already saw what's happened we have the rec centers that are being built and the community hates that and they were here with pitchforks and torches

so so I mean we're trying to put some control in there and I think these I was a creative way I can't remember who came up with this I guess I would much rather argue that we have a design review board and get rid of all this but I don't we can do that

It came out of a discussion on how to break up mass, and there's very limited tools that we have to break up mass, and the step back is one of the only things that we can use to break up mass on the second floor. So that's why we came up with that idea, because we're already stepping back six feet, but six feet is not...

the eye can't really distinguish six feet and also this was this was intended to create a little bit more of an incentive for somebody to design a pitch group structure because that matches the character majority of the character of the village and if our charter tasks we don't think templates too much maybe we get rid of that part i don't know but if our charter tasked us with maintaining the character of the village as it does it's written into the beginning of our planning and zoning board code and i believe it's also in the charter then we have to implement whatever tools that are at our disposal to be able to do that. So that was the intent behind this, and I think it's a justified intent. It's not the cleanest way to get there, but unfortunately the redemption of home rule is the only thing. Unless you want to do the version that I came up with.

No, that was too complicated. yeah all right the next one I got a section five oh sorry I'm okay I just needed to I just wanted to the next one I got section 505 line 278 so on lines 280 to 289 isn't that contradictory or confusing with lines 291 to 296 looks like we're saying one thing and then saying again a different way on item B

Well, I think there's a differentiation, right, because the proposed language that begins at 291 is to deal specifically in residential areas where the other language pertains to the commercial and non-residential areas.

Oh, okay. So that's for the commercial. But don't we need to specify? Oh, because it says in residential districts. So that's the difference there. Okay. But now look. Why do we?

It's not. It's confusing the way this is written because it lumps all of it together. It's dark and the others.

And others.

I see. So the residential is that. So that's where I thought it was. Now let me just read something that I'm not sure I read right. I'm going to read it. Water tanks, air conditioning equipment, mechanical in residential district shall be located at grade where feasible in no event on rooftops. Should I say and in no event on rooftops?

That needs to be revised for feasible, but in no event.

And in no event on rooftops. So we're saying you can't put it on rooftops. And it designated to minimize visual. So it needs a little word smithing, doesn't it? no noise impacts on adjacent properties putting it great so you're gonna have more noise impacts right except the solar water heaters and associated may be located on a rooftop that is not visible from public rights away and then to make it clear should we start the line a water tanks and necessary air conditioning equipment and other mechanical purposes located outside of the our district you know so we don't have that confusion where that's outside the our district and in in the our district we have that other requirement I don't it is a confusion factor I don't disagree with you I'm we're limited in our title and that we are talking about changes to the our district that's our advertising this

and I've I know I know it is trust me but we've been very hesitant we'll get there when we get there it's kind of how we've approached it at this point let me give it some more thought I'm just moving pushing forward here on residential districts because I had it we had it crossed out or edited but it

And this is non-residential. These are non-residential districts.

Well, here we had exceeding overall height of six feet above.

Can you refer us to the line number?

Well, this is 286. 286. 286. Exceed a height equal to...

We can't, I can't, you'd have to speak into the mic for sunshine purposes.

So previous markup I had for non-residential districts exceed an overall height of six feet above the roof slab for flat roof or above the top of the typing pitched roof.

Here, exceed the height equal to the distance from each structure.

It's like it wasn't, it was unstruck.

so the you're based on your previous instructions were to keep this section as is because it affected districts outside of the our district and so to revert to the actual cult language now and then create a separate section all right section 508 Brandon did you have any issues on that I do not no I don't address those just for the record 508 is we're gonna add that additional information that was once included in your definitions we're gonna relocate it down to 508 and retitle from established grade and put finish grade as well I think that works okay all right

The next one I had, and I guess it's just a reading thing. I'm at line 321. Does it make sense? You're starting that section. Canopies, awnings, balconies, eaves, architecture features may project, colon, and then you go to 3. Second story balconies and terraces located within residence shall not be permitted. So it doesn't go with the line 314. It says these items may project, and then you're listing. And then you go to three, which isn't anything about a projection into a setback. I mean, is that the right place for it, kind of what I'm asking?

I don't. I disagree, but I want to say this probably was in more of another direction, but we'll revisit this and change it.

Just look at it if it doesn't read right. My next comment, and I'm trying to get to our applications here. I don't have any more comments after that.

Does anybody have any more comments? Yes. Line item 568. This is about the level of service standard. This is if you get there, it basically says for new single family construction or for additions that increase the existing square footage by 50% or more and involve significant land disturbance assigned in sealed drainage engineering plan that demonstrates that no water runoff onto, not onto, adjacent properties and then and the public right-of-way during a 10-year, one-hour storm event. I think we're missing runoff to the public way, public right-of-way. I would add those words, in between properties and during.

What line is that again?

This is actually existing on 568, and it's in between the words properties and during. Add the words, and the public right-of-way.

And the public right-of-way. And the public right-of-way.

Any other comments? My next comment is on line item 622. I would strike the words, or enclosed.

622, strike, or enclosed. And open on the story.

All right. I wanted to go back to... the section right before didn't we have let's say line 596 at the end of that so a 7 vi drainage plans to demonstrate?

It's already in subsection A.

Is that the first one?

Yeah. So under number one, subsection A, it says sign to seal a drainage and engineering plan. Any other? I'm done.

You're done?

Nothing else.

Am I right? So we've kind of gone through

I mean I'm just trying to honor your your wishes of making it to the last meeting but I will say that we've had several changes several changes to this ordinance and various forms because of that I will do a final review before this is some if you decide to recommend this item to the village council we just want some room to make none substantive changes if we catch them ie typos or items that you just mentioned just a final cleanup because I know we've had several reiterations yeah and so because we have that next month off we would like the ability to take a closer look from that standpoint you want a motion for that no when you When you need to open up for public comment, but when you do vote, I would like a motion to recommend this with any non-substantive changes by staff or the attorney.

I have a general question. In the course of reviewing applications, we find things that are nonconforming. And on a whole, we tend to, I guess, give forgiveness. Is that the right word to use? And setbacks, because the house was built 30 years ago, are 9 and 1 half feet, not 10 feet. When these things are done, we tend to simply say it's a allowable non-conforming do we need a phrase in here that talks about pre-existing non-conforming conditions there's a section in the code that essentially talks about non-conforming uses non-conforming characteristics like

it's already it's already in there under item section 412 where we have the lot coverage in that for existing single-family residents built prior to 65 or prior to the adoption of this regulation may be permitted up to a 2% increase in maximum lot coverage beyond the applicable standards provided the principal structure is not demolished and retains a minimum 50% of its exterior walls and 60% of its existing floor area. Does that help address what your concerns were? No. I don't believe so. No.

What his concerns is, I think, deals with any property that now would be deemed Legally non-conforming based off of these new based on the bar and the coverage Yeah, anything in this code that now it's changing We have standard non-conforming language that defaults in the code As to how many properties whatever studies How many properties will be non-conforming because of these regulations? No, I don't know necessarily have that information but if there were to be one

like for example the big box that has no step back on the second floor right now we have step back requirements so that that's not almost every split level in the shores has no setback on the second story they just don't let alone to have it on the front plane and on the whatever side that is I think there are probably more of those things than people realize and I think all the changes we made

very good and very appropriate and long time coming but I do get concerned that every now and then we do something that we're not sure we're doing we have some of those kind of consequences you know the thing is the way I see it is non-conforming properties there's a section in there it happens all the time the zoning codes evolve and change and that's the point zoning codes do evolve and they do change and this series of evolutions has really been because of the Because of the preemption of home rule, for the most part, we used to be able to regulate building design language. We would be able to, without having all these codes that were restricting volume metrics, to be able to respond to the neighbors' comments about any particular application. We are without tools to do that. And so we've made changes. Of course, as time marches on, the code will continue to evolve. There will be other edits in the future, maybe even relaxations on certain restrictions that we put into place now. if the community feels differently in moving forward in the future. I mean, I think we get the government that we participate in. By and large, people have showed up to workshops and showed up to give their commentary here, actually want us to go much further than we have been able to go. So, for one, I feel comfortable with where we're at. It's not everything that I think everybody wants, but I think it's a good compromise, and it does seem to meet people halfway between those that are property rights absolutists and those that are

character absolutist yeah so I mean on that further discussion on that item though on properties that are now deemed non-conformist I own the big box that doesn't conform to the step box or whatever and I want to do an addition to the house or whatever

is that gonna be a problem I'm gonna have to get variances or something like that you just have to follow the non-conformity non-conforming regulation so it's certain it depends on the percentage or the amount that you might be changing and we have different non-conformity regulations based on the district I think the first one is popping up right now is downtown district but I know we have one that's specific to the our And so it'll just have to conform within that range. And if it doesn't, then you'll have to get a new approval by not a variance. You just have to bring your property up to code. The point is that eventually.

How do I bring my property? How do I build a step back into my house?

If you're beyond what the code provides, you're going to have to.

bring it up like that's the point of nonconformity it's not that it's going to be we've had applications come before us already that were nonconforming and what we said was you can't further extend the nonconforming condition and we've been very liberal in that interpretation there have been instances for example where a property that was required to have a 10 foot side yard setback came into the 9 foot 6 side yard setback existing condition and in the constrictive conservative reading of that code, we wouldn't have allowed an addition to further extend that, but we have allowed that here. So I think there's some subjectivity as to how we interpret it and precedents that we set.

So let me ask, so I got the square box with no step backs in it, and I want to add on to my second floor. So I could add on, the only way I could add on to my second floor is to build a step back

10 foot for that section of the add-on remember there's an exception for a certain percentage of the structure that you're that you're if you're adding more than 50 percent then yeah you need to comply but let's say you're adding less than 50 percent of room yes then i could continue that wall i could continue that wall in the front without a step back what i'm trying to do is give you the exact language in the code it's just not populating at the moment um eddie's trying to look as well maybe while

you take any what I started eight o'clock on our applications what you can't do unless you you're gonna open this application yes but I would like to open it to public comment here I think we're close right any other comments on this let me open this to public comment then like to open this item to public comment the legislative item the ordinance that we've been reviewing I understand. Any public comment on it before we continue? Okay. All right. There's no further public comment on it. Any further discussion on it? Maybe we can get a motion right here then.

Just for the record, I want to be clear. I know you all have discussed your limitations in terms. Yeah. I'm not sure we have them. Okay.

I got a taker. All right, go ahead.

In Miami Shores, we don't have sewer system. We have septic tanks. Any extension of properties, is that going to affect the septic tank systems?

You'll hear one man.

Because you can have only such a size of septic tank and cannot cover all area of it and so forth exposed. Is this considered in this conversation? It is. And the final analysis, because we are a neighbor, we are a home section and so forth. What is the final height of any building you all want to allow to be built? One floor, two floor, how many feet?

In our code, it's 28 feet. It's 28 feet, what we're proposing. Two stories, yes.

That's about three floors.

It's two stories. Two stories or 28 feet.

It's a little bit too high, isn't it? No, it includes the roof. You've got a pitched roof or whatever. Or the homes that are three, four high.

It's not really a discussion item. It's more public comment for you.

Pardon me?

It's public comment for you. It's not really a discussion. Well, I don't think so.

What I want to say is if the septic system does not allow any larger... construction then that will control that will control the height of the structure absolutely the height is the average size in Miami shows none of them are three four three four high I can't I can't think of it they're all these increases 1972 is there any homes are three feel high right now no no okay thank you so I think it's a little bit excessive

through the chair as I was stating earlier with the non-conforming regulations it appears it falls underneath the Miami Shores downtown district I would recommend you add something in the art code that just cross-referenced to that non-conforming regulations for so we're you know specific that it applies is that okay yes okay so I think we should yes okay so we'll add that amendment as well and then the only thing is when we counsel council will inform them of the original recommendations and our recommendations as it related to the SB 180 items that we initially removed and those items that you guys included in this version so they're clear in terms of what we are recommending is legally sound versus what we believe should be removed from this job

but what we believe will be included in just advising them.

Right. I'm going to forward them over your ordinance, and then we're going to separately indicate every item that will be violated.

There's a question. Yes. All right. So what's our next thing? I guess we think we have it where we want to be, subject to your ability to make any sort of non-substantive...

changes so I'd make a motion to make a recommendation to council to approve the code as we've edited this evening with the addition of the non-conforming cross-reference and authorizing staff to make non-consequential back in

I got that we beat you to the second Michael's got the second all right all in favor say aye all right thank you no chair could we take a five-minute break before we go into these yeah family homes I've had a request to take a five-minute break and then we'll start our applications So long.

All right, Eddie, you ready?

All right, let me call the meeting back to order. We'll continue on with our applications. Starting, did we need to swear in? Yes. Yes, yes. Start in with the quasi-judicial items. Sure.

So please be advised that the following items on the board's agenda are quasi-judicial in nature. If you wish to comment upon these items, please indicate the item number you would like to address when the announcement regarding the quasi-judicial item is made. An opportunity for persons to speak on each item will be made available after the applicant and staff have made their presentations on each item. swearing in all testimony including public testimony and evidence will be made under oath or affirmation in accordance with section 2-100 of the village code any lobbyists must register before addressing the board on any of the following items board members must disclose any ex parte communications concerning any items on the agenda pursuant to section 2-86 of the village code at this time if are there any board disclosures no

The recording secretary will swear in any persons who wish to testify Good evening Will all the applicants please raise their right hand Do you swear to tell the truth the whole truth and I think what the truth in your statements today, thank you

Thank you, sir. The lot is approximately 12,875 square feet in size. It contains a one-story single-family home originally built in 1948. The existing structure has an actual area of 1,672 square feet configured with two bedrooms, one bathroom, and a one-car garage. The applicant seeks to demolish the single-family structure and proposes the construction of a new one-story single-family dwelling comprised of 4,368 square feet in size. The proposed site plan indicates a total of four bedrooms, four and a half bathrooms, exercise room, two car garage, and swimming pool with outdoor terrace area. Staff has confirmed that the R15 zoning district is compatible with the single family future land use and measured the site plan amongst the 23 different zoning criteria as found in the village's zoning code. And therefore, we're recommending approval along with all of the stipulated conditions as found in your condition, in your staff report. Sorry. Thank you.

Just be sure to speak into the mic, please. Thank you.

Good evening, team members. My name is Federico Zapata, 156 Northwest 89th Street, El Portal, Florida, and I'm proud to present Casa Lume. We sincerely appreciate the staff's unwavering support throughout this process, working with Mr. Nunez and Ms. Tzin. It's been a pleasure. Our application has been vetted and confirmed as 100% compliant with the village and zoning code, The staff has recommended approval, and we are here before you tonight seeking a unanimous vote to move forward. If you can please turn to page 32. 32. It's further down. While we scroll and we look at the renderings. Casa Lume is a contextually sensitive single-story residence meticulously designed to complement the character of Northeast 95th Street, establishing a presence that is perfectly harmonious in both volume and mass. We deliberately chose a low-profile, single-story configuration that sits significantly below the 30-foot, two-story height allowance, peaking at just 15 feet 8 inches. Our proposed design incorporates deeply recessed central volumes structure masonry openings, and layered solid and void transitions that introduce visual rhythm, shadow depth, and pedestrian skeleton work. Together with my wife and my two daughters, we live in El Portal, and I'm certain that we would love to live in this house. The material palette that will show selected leverages, durable elements, smooth white stucco, natural travertine accents, and stained oak. Furthermore, the two-car enclosed garage is fully integrated into the building's massing, minimizing the visual prominence from streetscape. Our landscape is 100% native or Florida-adapted species, The front perimeter hedging is restricted at 36-inch Bahama coffee, while the side yards utilize a 48-inch Spanish topper for neighbor privacy. Stormwater management, septic tank structural engineering, and public works protocols all have been thoroughly coordinated. conclusion Casa Lume replaces an aging structure with a resilient code compliant and beautifully articulated home that protects long-term property values and respect the village character I respectfully request your approval tonight thank you yeah I have a question

In the front, as you go in the front door, if you go in the front door to the right, it has something called a mood room.

Yes.

What's a mood room?

It's a flexible space. It could be an office. It could be meditation. It could be another bedroom. It doesn't have a full bathroom, but it's just a small room. It's not a big room.

And then the exercise room in the back has a separate entrance?

Correct.

well yeah so that could be another bedroom when you put the the car the garage on the side you're sure you can make that that turn into the space correct we better it and

Yes, you can see we put decorative stone surface as permitted by the code, so that way you can back up and then progress and lift towards the driver.

So you're going to use that area to drive over, but it's permeable?

It's permeable, yes. Stones that are decorative, you can drive over, basically back up and lift if you need to.

Any other questions from the board to the applicant? Just wondering, the articulation of your facade that fronts the street, I've noticed that it's substantially devoid of any kind of fenestrations or patterns. It's presenting essentially blank masses to the street front. What drove your design decision on G201?

Repeat the question again, please.

The facade that you're presenting to the street front is substantially devoid of any fenestrations. There are blank walls that you're presenting to the street.

No, there's a fenestration on the right side.

Can we show the updated rendering or the floor plan?

That's why I said go to rendering page 32. I have the updated rendering in front of me. And as you can see,

Because the question is on the garage, specifically on the garage, you have no fenestration or windows or anything on the side of the garage there. Doesn't that look kind of blank?

Referencing your north elevation that you're seeing on page A200, this would be page 14? Yes. If you look at this.

You have one window. Correct. Well, you have two windows and the door.

I do see you have a recessed facade that's further back. But I'm talking about the facade that presents to the street. That's the first plane that we see on the street. I'm just wondering how you find that to be harmonious when you look at the rest of the homes that are on that street.

Well,

We wanted to also create a house that is modern, and it fits within the modern context. If you look at most of the windows that you drive around, most of the windows or houses that have a lot of fenestration looking into the front property, for the most part, they just have the shades down. So we just wanted to create that privacy. That's why all the bedrooms are located on the rear of the house on the side. That way people can open the window and have that privacy that you want.

I mean, Miami Shores has a lot to do with the street front and what gets presented to the street front. For example, you have a walled-in front yard, and no other house on that street has a walled-in front yard. What I do appreciate with your design is that you did choose to do a single-story structure on this property. I think that's great. But I am having a hard time seeing how, other than that particular part of the volumetrics, that the way that you've articulated the design is actually in harmony with the rest of the homes on the street. I'm just wondering.

If you look at the materiality, you look at the rooms, you look at the volume metrics, that's what we wanted to.

I've looked at the volume metrics, I've looked at the materiality. If we're talking about other metrics, you mentioned that you thought that the home was small, but the problem that I'm having with it is it feels like you've maximized every single metric. If you look at your septic system, for example, you haven't submitted a design septic system, but you are suggesting that you're going to do an engineered septic system, which is an alternate to the standard drain field. But the Miami-Dade County OSTS manual doesn't allow that unless there's a specific demonstrated hardship on the site. But this is new construction, so you're creating a self-imposed hardship where the house is so big that you don't have room for a drain field, a standard-sized drain field.

So I have done it in the past where we have the drip system and established those reductions.

The problem is Miami-Dade County specifically in accordance with the OSTS manual doesn't allow it. So I don't know if you had a reviewer that just didn't catch it, but they don't allow it. There's only certain exceptions where they do, and new construction isn't one of them. It's from their own interpretation of that particular code. So, I mean, you'll... you'll have that issue when you get to them and maybe it'll go through but I'm using that as a point to suggest that there's a lot of footprint on this site there's not a lot of area that's left there's a specimen tree for example that you're calling to be removed because it's in the way of your garage You're using decorative stone for section 536, but that violates the intent of that particular section. You're not supposed to use that as an extension to a driveway. Decorative stone in that section says that the intent of it is to be used to enhance the growth of landscaping. But you're using that to create your turning radius to get into a two-car garage with an 11-foot, 6-inch driveway, which otherwise doesn't allow you to turn into that garage. That's why the decorative stone's there. So I think that there's some issues that you've got to contend with here from my point of view. I don't know how my colleagues feel about that. But my concerns would be I think it's just a little bit too much on this site. I do have a problem with the removal of that tree. It's a very large tree, a mature tree that you're taking out. Not great to be doing that.

It's a nuisance to the neighbor. I spoke to her when we visited, when we've been at the property.

Look, I would tell you this much. It's a Florida native specimen. So it's a strangler fig, which is not an invasive. It's not.

It's sitting into the current home.

Yeah, I don't know what to tell you about that. I'm just telling you that that's a mature tree. Miami Shores is characterized by its tree canopy as well. And that will be a major subtraction to the character of that street. you're really not proposing a lot because you don't have a lot of area left over to plant much so I'm that's pretty much what I have here I think that the design it's a good start any other questions to the applicant I have some similar comments or regarding the fenestration on the front just seems like you're there's some elements that are

fantastic but then it seems like the house turns its back on the on the pedestrian and then opens up in the back so I think if you added some windows or broke up that mass somehow that that might definitely help so you have a big window

so yeah this is the sheet the front of the house which is correct which is also hidden behind what we're struggling with right here yeah so but if you look at it look at this rendering it's a big window here that it's pictures you know you have the demonstration yeah so this one here there's no it's not like i'm closing it completely you do have windows on the front because that's what we want to create. We want to create that privacy from the frontage. But the windows are there. The articulation of the volumes are there. We're not creating just a blank facade or two-story blank facade. We're creating this harmonious and pushing it, creating shadow also with the setbacks of the volumes. You can clearly see it here.

no we understand that we just struggling with that big wall on the side of your garage on the right side you got that one little vertical window and then on the left side I would agree with you there but

You just have two huge expanses that are flat. Forget that there's no windows. I know you have one little tiny window there, I get it. But if you're looking at the rendering on the left-hand side, it's just totally flat. It's not even broken up, you know.

You want me to add the windows? I can add windows to the garage. That is okay. I can bring light into the garage. We just mimic that into mimic this, create some verticality, create some fenestration. I'm not opposed to that. That would accomplish the goal.

So this is a different one than we got in here, but basically because the picture we got at 201 does show the vertical window on the right mass, but nothing on the left mass, but something symmetrical to the right side on the left side.

And also, I mean, the version that they're looking at is a hard copy version. The version I'm looking at is what the public sees when they go to the application. I download everything that the public would otherwise have access to, and the version that we have doesn't have the window on it.

There is no page...

presenting a garage door to this to the street front isn't appealing either I believe this property has an alley, right? Is that? This property is on an alley? Yes, correct. So you're also missing the indentation at the alley. Our code requires an indentation for refuge pickup when you're on an alley. You should look at that.

Yeah, we can add it. That doesn't add a single line.

Also, in your pervious and impervious calculations, you're missing the wall foundations for the wall. You're missing the pavers that wrap around the building. You're missing equipment pads. And you have no hardscape around your pool, but you have a roof that's draining right into the pool. So likely somebody's going to add some hardscape around the pool. And all of this together, you're going to be past your impervious calculations. I think it feels a little bit too much on the site. Yeah, I think it needs to be brought down a little bit.

We added the pads. We added the pads. That's part of the calculation. We coordinated the XI requirements with the mechanical engineer. We have a civil engineer that will take on all the water collection. We're going to do infiltration traces on the property. That's how we do it.

PDF page 6, the previous calculations only show the one equipment pad to the right, but you have another pad that looks graphically you're having some sort of an outdoor tub in your floor plan. That's not shown. The wall foundations aren't shown. and the pavers that wrap around the edges aren't showing. I'm raising all this and then obviously nothing around the pool or the connection to the house. I'm sorry, G101. It should be the next page. So this is the third diagram from the left. So you're missing the connection to your paver connection to the house, the walkway connection to the house from the driveway. We don't count that right now in our current code. in the new cope there is some provisions for that but that's not in place yet you're missing all your papers that wrap around the outside edge of your property you're missing the connection from the pool to the to the house as well and you also have no allocations for any hardscape around the pool you've got this narrow strap strip of grass but you have roof drainage running right into that you there's not gonna be any grass that grows there so people are gonna wind up putting papers there the point is you're going right up to the line of what's feasible but you're not showing certain things so I believe that you're gonna wind up being over that goes to the idea that you have too much on the site coordinator it's it's I understand your point it's a hundred percent compliant we went back and forward on all the items and like I said

We can, we have a program. The program is not big. We're not proposing a massive house. I rather, I think this is a better proposition than a two-story home. It fits within the context. It's one-story home.

All the homes on the street are one-story. So I don't think that you're necessarily can say I'm going to build a two-story home here and maximize the height because we'll push back on that as well. If you had a bunch of two-story homes on the street, that would be a different story. But there is something in our code that's called Harmony, Section 554. And that is what we're tasked here as the gatekeepers to maintain. And you've made a good effort. But in my estimation, at least, I don't think you're there. But I'd be willing to listen to where the rest of my colleagues are. Does anybody else have any comments?

I would agree with you. I would agree it's really very very tight and there are items that are missing from the purviews and impervious that I have concern about Like what he just said connection from the pool deck or the pool to the house?

The edge? It's all, we propose artificial soil so we're not connecting the pool to the house. It just wraps around. If you go to the rendering, you can clearly see.

Actually, if you go to L004, this is PDF page 23. Let's get a list of things. You're showing graphically. pavers, not artificial turf. So I think there's inconsistencies in the plan. That's all right. That's just a natural stone. But again, we don't count that as being pervious. That's currently counted as being pervious. So if you're putting that as a paver, you've got to count that as being impervious.

It's just a decorative stone. It's natural. All right.

I want to give you some guidance here. Bottom left corner. all those papers that are wrapping around the edge but those are all they need to be counted in your impervious calculation the wall that you're including in the front yard if you want to get rid of the wall great you don't need to count it probably the neighbors would prefer that nobody else has walls but right now you've got a wall foundation there that's impervious you've got a connection that connects to from from the sidewalk to the driveway and then from the driveway to the house that's not being counted in your in your in your calculations When you add all that up, you're going to be over. And that's not even having the conversation about whether or not you're going to be able to do any kind of thing around the pool. Right now you have no way of even getting to the pool other than those two steps. It's likely that a future owner is going to wind up putting hardscape around that pool and it'll push it over your max. But I'm not even calculating that right now. Just thinking about all the other things you're not showing, you're going to be over. But you're not showing it, so we don't know for sure.

any other questions from the board to the applicant like to open it to public comment any public comment on this application and cabal 37 north there's a hunter Street and listen to all the comments and the one thing that I still don't understand most of it is builders slash architects slash whatever, they're forgetting the word harmonious. And I don't see too much of that building, that structure there, that's harmonious to the existing structures. Those homes there, the ones that I'm familiar with, are what we call common Miami Shores homes for all the people, the working class people that basically lived here for decades, and that's all they could afford. So I don't also understand what this fascination is with building a wall in the front of the house. I mean, if you're an architect, I would think that you would like to promote the front of your house instead of putting a wall up front. I think that's ridiculous myself. I can go on and on. Most of you already answered the questions to this gentleman here. And I'm sure that, is it a 4,000 plus square foot home that he owns? I wasn't sure of the square. Isn't that kind of big for that area? I don't think anybody has more than 2,500 square foot homes in that area. I mean, that's 4,500 is a big house, huge. I'd love to live there if you could pay my mortgage. That's it for me. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other public comment on this item? Discussion? Can I get a motion?

I assume there's no easy way to create more green space short of shrinking the overall size of the home. And I do understand and appreciate the issues with squeezing as much into the lot as possible in some regards the crux of the chronic complainers about the planning board. I don't know that it needs to be much smaller

I really don't.

I mean, I think where I see it busting at the seams is that you're proposing an engineered septic system, which we know is going to require maintenance. People aren't going to maintain it properly. It's going to cause a public nuisance. Dade County doesn't allow it. Usually, if they're following their own letter of their code, I could show you the OSTS manual where it says it's not allowed. But you're doing that because you have so much on that site that you can't do it otherwise. I think if you came back to us with a standard size septic system, I would encourage you highly to engineer it. Do the right sizing. Don't come to us with some performance-based system that we don't think that the county is going to accept. And then articulate your design a little bit better in the front. Maybe consider getting rid of that wall. I'm not saying, or if you keep it, open it up a little bit so it's not so solid. if you were to proffer those kinds of things come back with something I think you got something it's workable I don't dislike your design I just think if we're talking about trying to evaluate the merits of it as it relates to section 524 I think it's really because you're trying to squeeze too much on the site I do think you have a tectonics issue with regards to how you get vehicles into that garage I think you need those decorative stones to do that but that's that's not really violating the right that's that's not really keeping into some respecting the rights of your neighbor we have a setback for driveways for a reason but that will become a driveway somebody's gonna park there I imagine that you're doing this as a spec home and you don't need to answer the question whether you are or not so I do I do understand there's a certain value calculation that goes into that I'm not trying to screw you up there But at the same time, we're tasked as gatekeepers to this harmony, and that's what makes the shores what it is. I don't think you're far off. But I think you're too far away for us to tell you what to do and make conditions here. I think you're going to need to come back with something.

If I might. Please. The septic engineer has been coordinated. We not only have the back. But you don't have it in your package. That's for Miami-Dade County to approve. If you're uncomfortable, we can put a condition and add those fenestrations that you want.

If that was the only thing, I wouldn't have a problem with that, but I've narrated to you about seven or eight different items that I think that need attention, and I think that's just simply too much for us to add conditions here. I think we need to see it. would support a table all in favor say aye

All right. Moving right along. 8B, RSP 2625. Owner, Clara Hubla. Beckerstein. Beckerstein. Thank you. 113 Northwest 107th Street. Planning Director.

Thank you, sir. The lot is approximately 9,150 square feet in size. It contains a one-story single-family home originally built in 1950. The existing structure is a living area of 1,602 square feet configured with two bedrooms, one bathroom, and one car garage. The applicant seeks an approximately 275 square foot garage conversion to the existing residence to accommodate a new master bedroom suite and kitchen area. The proposed overall improvements include an interior reconfiguration of the residence with installation of hurricane impact windows and doors. The total area indicates 1,602 square feet with three bedrooms, two bathrooms being provided. Staff has measured that the R15 zoning district is compatible with the single-family land use, and we've measured the proposed site plan along with the 22 different zoning criteria. And we found that it generally complies, and therefore we're recommending approval along with all of the stipulated conditions as found in your staff memo. Thank you.

Thank you. Any questions to the planning director? Put on sheet SP3 for the rendering. Please.

applicant would you like to make a presentation yes hi everyone my name is Clara Huber beggar sign thank you for the opportunity to be here and present our project today as you can see this house we bought it back in January my husband and I it's our first home it was well loved by the previous owner and we seek to convert the garage into a bedroom And actually, I wanted to just point out that on our letter of intent under request, we did state that this would continue being a two-bedroom home because one of the bedrooms will be converted to an office. We will be getting rid of one of the closets and utilize it to a laundry kind of closet. but essentially we're planning and hoping to get approved the conversion of the garage into a master suite our kitchen will become the master bedroom and we do have a Florida room in the front of the house which will be the new kitchen thank you questions from the board to the applicant open to the public public comment on this application

Discussion yes So you're replacing the garage door with Concrete block and not having any type of window SP2

There is currently kind of, I don't know how to describe it, like a block, like breeze blocks, I guess, that into the current garage. We're opening that up and putting a hurricane impact window there. You can see it on the side of the house.

Because I know any time we're replacing the garage door, we like to see a window go into that.

Is that the rear elevation? That's the rear.

Yeah, I've seen it in the rear, too.

So the reason we do a window to the rear of the house is because the garage is below the level of the house. We will be elevating it. And we just figured that putting a window and not an entrance to the backyard, which has the back driveway, would be more suitable for that.

Thank you.

You have to go to the podium, just for the record. She's the architect. Fantastic. And then you've got to state your name and address, please.

the reason is your name Daniela Pagano the reason is because the we need to hide the flooring to the same level of the house in this case the window will be lower for the typing so the window will be in this high if we keep the the the the typing and install the window on the garage door today so for that reason we change it so if you can put the window on the other side isn't your tie beam at the same height No, yes, actually, but the tiding is higher in the side because for the roof, because the roof is like this, and there is a, I don't remember exactly. I don't remember exactly more, but we discussed that about it. There is a section here.

An SP6?

Yeah. Yeah, the SP6, section BD. Yes, actually it's because the garage door, now I remember, the garage door is lower than the typing on the other areas of the house because the garage door usually has 70 foot high. So in this case, we need to remove the tie beam, to cut the tie beam or whatever for that. We decided to leave the garage door closed and the windows for the other side because we already have one opening the other side. And also because we need the wall to put the beds.

So where the window is on the side is where the breeze block is now? Correct. Yeah. So same height?

Correct. There is one existing window in this place, and we just increased the size.

Yeah.

It's on the elevations. I think it's SP5. If you see the proposed west elevation, number 4. five SP five yes the number four that was one square window and now we created a larger one in the same in the same place yeah any other questions for the applicant just a helpful comment you might not that might not pass it looks like it's to the sills too high for me egress requirements

Not for us here, but just for you to look at.

For that window.

Yeah. And I already opened this to public comment? Public comment on this item?

But you've got to go to the podium, please. Maybe I missed the flat drawing. They require setbacks on both sides. Do they have the 10 feet requires setbacks?

This is just a garage conversion, so we're not adding and changing the footprint.

Can you show me a picture? It's an existing house.

No, keep going, keep going. No, I can't tell the setback from this one, but there we go. Yeah, all right. On both sides, do they have the same feedback setback requirement?

You want to go to PDF page 213, SP0. Yes.

Oh, okay, looks like it.

All right, thank you. Any other questions? Can I have a discussion? Motion?

Motion to approve with staff conditions.

Do you have a second? I'll second. If you want it, we'll get you one. No, no, no. You got it. You got it. You got it. You got it. Catherine seconded. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Motion passes. Thank you. Application passes. 8C, RSP 2640, 574 Northeast 96th Street, Edward Fortyke, Fortish.

RSP 26-40. The lot is approximately 10,687 square feet in size. It contains a one-story single-family home originally built in 1950. The existing structure is a living area of 2,784 square feet, configured with three bedrooms, three and a half bathrooms, and a two-car garage. The applicant is seeking a 413 square foot garage conversion to existing residence to accommodate a new bedroom suite. The total habitable area will indicate 2,784 square feet, complete with four bedrooms, four and a half bathrooms. Staff has confirmed that the R25 zoning district is compatible with the single family land use. And we've measured the site plan along with the 22 different zoning districts as found in the village zoning code. And therefore, we're recommending approval along with all of these stipulated conditions as found in the staff memo. Thank you, sir.

Put on sheet A402, please. Any questions to the planning director from the board? Hearing none, would the applicant...

good evening my name is Ed Fortage I'm the owner of Simja construction where the design builders on this project thanks for having me again hello to all this is a very simple garage conversion we're not touching the roof we're not changing the footprint it's we're it's actually the We're not proposing any changes to the facade. This is the back alley, and it's actually a dead end It's a very last house on the alley, and the two houses immediately behind it do not have access from the alley. So literally nobody can see this is the whole point of that. Because it's a dead end, it's the last house, and the two houses immediately behind it don't have access. So there's no real visible significant change. We are proposing a window. We're proposing a planter. So there's a little bit of landscape buffer. it's pretty straightforward just garage conversion and there are also proposed windows on the lateral sides of it as well there's one from like the proposed bathroom and another one from this room towards the pool I have a question so on the edge of the garage you have a planter there

but you have a metal canopy over that. That's an existing canopy that's remaining. So those plants are not going to do well. They get no sun, they get no water. And, Eddie, I do have a question. They're 18 foot, 18.7 to the alley, and then they have their planter, so they can't, I don't know how that works, they can't put a car there. Into the alley right or did I not do the math right we could propose removing the planter No, that's that's required. The planter needs to be there with any garage condition What you may not have probably is that canopy I Don't understand how you put a canopy over that okay let me put it a different way I don't know how you enclose a garage put a planner beneath a covered canopy well the point of putting the planner there with a garage conversion is to give that I mean I'm sure we can do the irrigation system there and things that require them

There's also an existing driveway that's within the private property at the front. So, I mean, if you're concerned about parking, they definitely meet those requirements with that.

Yeah, there's a circular driveway at the front. Correct. On a busy street, though, it's 94. Okay.

So I don't know if the intent is to continue using this rear driveway or there's just – This would be just for the homeowners to park.

They can't park there. That's what I'm saying. They can't park there. Mean this elevation of the car being there you you don't have that kind of space You're into your alley There's there's 18 minus minus So yeah, you've got 13

I mean the car could park parallel that's really an issue whether however they end up using this is I think we're all considering we have a front driveway if they decide to not park there I hear it's existing but this is it a change change abuse change

renovation to a garage and the intent is to not make it look like a garage anymore and I would beg to differ I think that having that canopy makes it still look like it's a garage should I remove the pavers or whatever the parking is that's gonna be I know I hear you you don't want to move

I don't think the planters I don't think the planter works with the canopy over it any other questions from the board to the applicant hearing none I'll open it for public comment any public comment on this application seeing no public comment further discussion

and get a motion no that's required I know the distance is required.

No, no, no, the planter is required for a garage enclosure. Is that right?

No, I think there's a five-foot gap between the edge of the driveway.

A five-foot space.

A planting.

Five foot of no pavement.

You have to provide a five-foot green space. There's no planter required.

Okay, well, green space.

Green space, but it has to be green space anyway. I mean, it...

I mean if it's green space I'll get rid of the planner just leave side That's I mean whatever I well this is what you have on your application right now, so that's what's in front Can I get a motion Second

to get a second maybe a little bit more discussion I think the concern is that now the garage isn't there we're gonna part wind up parking there it's gonna invade the alley right yeah and the plants are gonna die so basically what we're saying is that by removing the the canopy that's there We give the plants a chance to survive. It greens up the area a little bit. It discourages parking there, even though it won't prohibit it.

I mean, I really don't have an issue with somebody parking there. I mean, they want to pull in sideways or whatever. And, yes, it's great to have a canopy. But to say that it's existing and that's why you're keeping it there, that's not kosher.

What if he removes the planter and puts a strip of artificial turf?

probably the best no no that's a capital and a buffer there you know I I don't believe that that's I hate to hold up his application if it were in the front yard I would I would entirely get you back on I mean it's part but is it not part of the requirement to have a green space right next to the garage I mean that's the whole idea okay I'm out. You guys decide.

Do I have a motion to approve?

Questions to the applicant? If you proffer removing the canopy, are you okay with that? Or are you going to be like...

I'm sure the homeowner would prefer the canopy. Unfortunately, they're not here on vacation. I'm sure they would prefer the canopy I mean if it means that I can't close the garage so sacrifice the canopy it definitely wouldn't want that especially over the question of some landscaping which isn't even a true code issue because we could just put sod or artificial grass it's kind of a hard thing to tell someone hey we're forcing you to remove a canopy Eddie could you put our artificial grass there

sure for that your green space yes it would comply as long as it's five feet in width but it but isn't the purpose I guess I'm following your argument so it isn't there any that the purpose of getting rid of that putting putting that strip in there is to prevent parking there

to provide a separation between the parked vehicle and so you can't the heart that's the idea you don't look like you have an old driveway going into a house that's no longer in service you know just to kind of to eliminate the driveway that's that's the thing most times we see the elimination of the driveway there which is the five foot

right but with the canopy the driveway remains garage so it would be nice if they could still have a carport that's the reality if I get rid of the roof now they have a garage and no carport and you're forcing them to always use a very busy street

I don't have a carport either so I got a motion do I have a second does it be cold or is it anesthetic so I mean you know I'll pass the gavel and second it but I guess if this thing doesn't pass then I don't think the rules are you can't come back in front of this board for a year right If it gets denied it's the night if it gets denied otherwise we can table it I mean, I'll pass it Is on the table was the motion to approve is I don't have a second, right?

So if there is a second you will cut the vote will be called on the motion to approve if the motion fails There's nothing

And it's a motion fails the second the motion failed if motion dies, right? And then we've got to come up with another motion Since I got to do something with this application I either got a table it pass it or fail it so Since there's no second.

I'll make another motion them Okay, that motion that motion died dies for lack of a second. I'll make a motion that

that it's approved without the carport with the proffer that the carport is removed that's if it's proffered i kind of heard that that was presented yeah is it proffered by the presenter so you're asking me to make a decision for the homeowner if they're willing to sacrifice the carport correct would you prefer for it to be tabled and you can go ask i would prefer to either Michael or Brandon to just step up and say, yeah, it's okay to prove it because it's not un-aesthetic and there's not really an issue and there's no code issues. So I was really hoping that somebody was going to come through because I think you guys know me, but I mean, whatever you guys want to do.

Look, they're preserving the house. It's not a violation of any code. I'm going to second it.

All right, I got a motion and a second. So that motion revived. I got a motion and a second. let me take it to the all in favor say aye aye aye all opposed motion passes thank you guys have a good night item 8d rsp 2643 91 Northwest 92 Street Owner Nina Pitkin, Planning Director.

Thank you, sir. The law is approximately 7,678 square feet in size. It contains a one-story single-family home originally built in 1942. The existing structure is a living area of 1,075 square feet. It's configured with two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a one-car garage. The applicant seeks an approximately $202,000 212 square foot garage conversion and an overall 192 square foot addition to the existing one-story residence In doing so they would accommodate a new bedroom suite area the total habitable area would indicate 1479 square feet complete with two bedrooms two bathrooms a mudroom and den area being provided The R17.5 zoning district is compatible with the single-family future land use, and staff has measured the proposed site plan along with the 22 different zoning criteria, and therefore we're recommending approval along with all of the stipulated conditions as found in your report. Thank you.

Put it on sheet A-3.2, please.

any questions from the board to the planning director the applicant like to discuss the project with sure so one single car garage conversion pretty simple and our addition is less than 400 square feet on either side we're replacing the roof structure because it simplifies the addition but honestly if we didn't have garage conversions coming to I think

Audiovisual.

Yo.

I'm sorry. The remote is not responding.

Thank you, sir. 8-3.2.

I didn't say my name Victor Bruce 3 7 0 Northeast 101st Street

so single car garage conversion and then adding to the north and south of the house putting a new roof just simplifies the addition but this is one of those projects once you guys take garage conversions out we're not exceeding 400 square feet we wouldn't be here to talk about this project it's very simple very simple addition for a single person that lives in the house questions from the board to the applicant

I got a question speaking of landscape buffer tell us about your your native landscape buffer in front of the existing taking the garage door out in this case you have Nate on your a3 your plan view you have a native landscape buffer there

I don't I don't agree with that with an artificial turf. That's It's not it's not pervious unless it's special right now it's in there like a carpet I I'm putting native landscaping. The client also likes it. She likes landscaping a lot. We're having to do the same thing in the front.

That's not a planter box or anything. That's just dirt with native landscaping.

We're removing the hardscape and we're allowing for growth of nature in that gap. It seems closer because this house was built way back and the setbacks were different back then. So we're doing as much as we can on that side. We're not building beyond the setback, but we're cutting the five feet out. There's no issue there.

How much space do you have between the green space and the sidewalk?

Six, seven. Because that house was built, like I was saying, that house had a garage built closer than it should have.

So where are they going to park?

They're going to park in the front. We have enough space. We have 16 feet with 18 in depth. Two cars fit there.

Any questions from the board to the applicant? We're good. Open to public comment. Public comment on this item? No public comment. Discussion? Move to approve subject to staff conditions. I'll second. I got a second here. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion passes. Thank you. Application passes. Thank you.

All right. I guess you're still up, huh?

Item 8E, RSP 2644, Agents Victor Bruce, 418 Northeast 105th Street. Planning Director? Thank you, sir.

The lot's approximately 16,500 square feet in size. It contains a two-story single-family home originally built in 1956. The existing two-story structure has an actual area of 8,714 square feet. It's configured with seven bedrooms, seven bathrooms, and a three-car garage. The applicant seeks to demolish the single-family structure while proposing the construction of a new two-story single-family dwelling comprised of approximately 7,280 square feet in size. The proposed site plan indicates a total of six bedrooms, five and a half bathrooms, sitting areas, great room, three-car carport, and an outdoor terrace area. Staff has reviewed the existing future land use and zoning criteria and determined that the land use is government and institutions with states This land use designation is intended to accommodate a full range of community support facilities, including governmental buildings and facilities, public utility installations, parking, public and private, educational, medical, religious, civic, cultural, and similar institutions. As such, we conducted a little bit of research to understand how this came to be. Based on our research, we found that All of the properties in that subdivision actually have a single-family future land use, and this is the only property that has this institutional. So what we believe is that it was done intentionally, and I'll read some of that research. So official Miami-Dade County plat records, plat book 56, page 15, identify the subject property as comprising of lots 6 and 7 as part of the Mirror Lake subdivision. The property's government and institution's future land use designation is not generally intended to accommodate conventional residential development. However, the designation is intended to support a broad range of public and community serving facilities, which include religious and institutional uses. The subject property is owned by a local religious organization and is located in close proximity to an established place of worship. The proposed single family residence is intended to provide housing for priests and other clergy affiliated with the adjacent religious institution. As such, the proposed residential use is accessory and directly supportive of the principal religious use and is consistent with the community-serving purpose of the government and institution's future land use designation. As such, staff reviewed the proposed site plan along with the different zoning criteria found within the zoning code, and we found that it generally complies, and we're recommending approval along with the stipulated conditions as found in your report. Thank you.

Can you put A-105 on the board?

this is an idea this is a building in front of the church yes on the lake the priest lists and will continue it's currently a single

So, I mean, like I said, so it's a single family, but the zoning had some conditions, institution, because it's affiliated with the church, but it's in the our district, even though essentially its use is not really our district use. It's not our single family use. I mean, you know, right? I mean, multiple priests live there, you know. It's more like a dormitory use.

The zoning is single family.

I've got a general question Why are we demolishing the existing structure to build a substantially Basically the similarly sized structure to serve the same purpose the existing structure and we we visited that first the existing structure is

Peculiarly built in relationship to the grade and the slope that happens there If you notice on the when they show the survey these properties are unlike these any property that I've ever seen where they own a Piece of pie of the lake which is a yeah, there's square footage in essence is bigger But there's a slope from street down to the lake What you see when you see the house you've seen the uppermost level. It's got levels below and which complicates things because it's almost like underground spaces. It also has a situation, being underground, it needs to go uphill with the septic system drainage. They have problems with water intrusion. The building itself is in horrible shape. Some of the things that have been happening to the building because of space demands that they have end up having spaces that are not interconnected. So there's a variety of reasons. And beyond that, there's stairs and We want to introduce vertical circulation. There's four reasons. In the letter of intent, they're listed, but it's mostly because the building cannot be rehabbed. It's too, as I said, it's like a basement type of a building, and we're doing basically the opposite. We're bringing it up and trying to get it out of there so septic works, they have vertical circulation, and they have a better connected and better quality of life for the residents.

I have a question. The wall that's on the sidewalk there, how tall is that?

That should be three-sixths.

Yeah, it looks a lot higher in that.

In the elevation, you'll see it when we have a dimension.

Okay, and is that the reason for that is because of your septic?

the reason for that is for racing grade so that when you reach the level that we put the first main level it doesn't look so detached from the sidewalk the septic doesn't need it but it will benefit from it because I don't need to do a mount system here at all but we're gonna have the septic system race and the wall will contain that grade it's just quite a barrier from that sidewalk

you know, walking down that sidewalk, you've got one entrance.

We should have two entrances because there's going to be one main one and there's going to be a secondary entrance. You look at the site plan.

Yeah, which maybe is a service entry.

Well, not so much the priest's entry.

How much does the grade drop going west east?

About six to seven feet.

From east to west?

From north to south.

What about from east to west?

Not so much. East to west is the street. North south would be towards the lake. So there's about six foot.

Looking at some of the drawings, it looks like it declines quite a bit that way too.

No. No, in the survey you might see it, but the street doesn't have that much of a slope. If there is, maybe a foot between west and east, but the change in elevation will be from the front to the back. The wall might seem like that. miss out miss us out but there's gonna be landscaping and that's part of a landscaping plan there's gonna be vegetation on the edge of it so it's not just gonna be the wall it's gonna be vegetation all right but that wall is right on the sidewalk yeah they have every right to do but we'd like to race the grade and to race the grade I have to put a wall That way, the difference between the house.

I guess I should have asked that. Why raising the grade? And you're saying that it doesn't have to do with the septic so much. It has to do with how you've designed your flow or your levels going back.

At this location, septic systems don't need to be up higher from the water table. which is literally, if you see the change in elevation, the water's back down by the lake. So up by the street where the church is, there should be no issues with septic.

What would be the implications of reducing the grade such that that wall wasn't required?

Well, it's the effect. Right now, the house that's there is slightly elevated anyway, so they have some steps, but they just have a mound. If I present that mound to the building official, he's going to want to put something to hold the water from going to the sidewalk. So if I were to correct the situation that they have right now, the building official will ask for a wall. So I'm putting a wall so I prevent that situation because I'm trying to keep the idea of that grade being a little bit higher. If I just have a mound like that, Ismael Araujo is not going to allow the project.

No, I understand that. I just think three feet is kind of high for that. I mean, it's a heavily traveled sidewalk and also coming back and forth from the church.

It could be lowered, but I still need a retaining wall to hold the grate. So at 3-6, which is our max, we could bring it down to 2-8.

You're at 3 foot now, according to your elevation. The reason why I started asking that question is because the adjacent properties don't have that. And I'm worried that by bringing the elevation up, I know you say there's a mound there already, and, you know, I don't have enough factual data to contest that because it's been a little while since I've been past this particular site.

You can see the survey. The survey will show elevations. Okay, but the adjacent properties don't have it.

And my worry is, you know, we've had a lot of issues with drainage that permeates to the adjacent properties, and I'm just worried that maybe that's going to happen here. Maybe I'm not understanding how you're raising the grade either.

well it's only raised in front there and you're and you're dropping it down before you get to the property line if the wall is right along the property line which is the sidewalk you have no that's not the concern I have it's not it's not about you said drainage on the adjacent properties but if you let's see she didn't want to want the wall only contains itself the footprint of the house the wall ends up the house there's grass to the right and there's grass to the left the wall doesn't meet the neighbors they all stops short of how far so it looks like the driveway stops at the driveway on the on on the west side and it stops at the

But is it essentially an existing tree on the right side?

Maybe the elevation. If you look at 401, you'll see where the wall is. Once you see the wall where it ends in elevation, then you can look at the site plan and see. Because the wall doesn't extend past the house on the east side or the west side, and that's the area that's raised.

I think I see that.

So it's contained. It doesn't extend to the west property line or the east property line. Yes, in fact, it is three feet. The rendering is showing it higher than it is. In 401, you can see it, and it's really not that tall, once it's landscaped.

So on this property, does everything kind of drain toward the back, toward the lake, I guess? No, it can't. The grade seems to go there.

It can't.

How does the driveway drain?

Well, the driveway is going to have catch bases, and we're going to collect the water and have storm drains in the property because water cannot go from the property into the lake.

You can't dump it into the lake.

But the houses that are around it do that now. That was the old system. We're retaining the water inside the property because we have to.

So you have catch basins in the driveway. Catch basins, storm drains.

We have a- A French drain or some sort of percolation or something for the- There will be gutters of the roof. We'll direct water to right places without having it. Because the last thing we want to have is a flooded driveway so when they come in, get out of the car, the shoes get wet, right? So we have catch basins. There's a retention area on the east side.

Oh, so the cash patients will take it to the east side in that retention area?

It'll be a combination. We could do storm drains underground. We'll do retention pond because at 30% of 18,000 square feet, we have a lot of green. So we have a large area, sheet 101, if I may, please. Retention area on the east side is a large area that we're going to have there, and we're going to have another retention area on the south side preventing it as like a swale. But we will have storm drains as well. for the driveway.

You see on the right, we're going down The right, that's probably mostly for the roof, whatever drains off the roof, right? Battery tension area.

Yeah, that's going to be from the roof, and then you see another one at the bottom.

I guess, and then across the back is probably for the driveway there, yeah.

And we'll have a storm drain underneath the driveway for sure. Civil engineering is going to be involved, but we have a surplus of green area to be able to retain the water. You can see it on the right side and on the south side. we're gonna create a nice well that's all gonna be sawed so the water is gonna be able to collect itself and then just permeate or perfectly any other questions for the applicant yes and so Victor can

It's more of a question on how the property is used, so maybe I can put Father George on the spot to come up and kind of walk us through the use of the building, how many of the clergy would reside there, things of that nature, if you can just kind of walk us through this, Father George. I didn't know you were going to put me in this spot.

Here you are, Father George. I reside at the same property for Northeast 418, and I serve St. Josoli, my Catholic parish and the school. And, you know, I can start with Brendan's initial question about why are we tearing that house down. It's because every time Mirror Lake floods, I'm almost like, inside my house is almost like Mirror Lake. I have water, two, three feet of water inside.

Inside the garage or inside the house? The entire house.

As you said, it almost looks like a basement. So everything underneath floods. And it starts with the garage and the chapel. We have a chapel there for a private prayer and so on. So it starts there and gets into the entire house. And then, you know... We have to, every time there is a flood, we have to invest so much money, and we realize that in one year, it flooded three times in one year. And then in addition to that, there is a septic tank inside the house. I don't know who designed it, how it was put in. And then we need to pump that to the exterior septic tank, everything that is inside. As soon as you walk into the front of the house, it almost smells like a septic right in front of the house. So those are the reasons why we have that problem there. I know. And then with mold and muskiness and everything else, it's making us all sick. And that is the reason we need that house. And then to come back to your question, Michael, there used to be about five priests at one time residing there. That is, we have about three priests in the parish. There also were resident priests who used to serve at the pastoral center on 9401 Biscayne Boulevard, which is the archdiocesan office. Currently, we are two. I mean, once I go there, I'm there 10 years now. So we were, at one point, we were four priests there. So there are two priests assigned to the parish. There may be a resident priest or a student priest or someone who works in the pastoral center or whatever else. So there could be, you know, it depends on the archbishop how he assigns the priest. So it could be two, three, four priests. That would be the usage of the house. Okay.

So the use of the house is strictly for... The parish and the clergy? Absolutely. Okay. So there would never be a plan where this property would be sold and be used for something else?

The parish was started in 1948. This house was built in 1956. It is still under the ownership of the Archbishop. I don't think the parish is going anywhere, and the priests do need a residence, so it is not going to be a flip-over. It is not going to be sold anywhere, you know. God forbid, unless we have to close down the church and everything else that we know. I hope that is not the case.

Any other questions? You actually did the design? Did you?

I didn't hope so. Architecturally, it's... That's the first question.

That's the first time anybody has ever... Whose name's on the plan?

Do you? No, it's... Now, one thing we wanted to make... You may be an artist.

You may be a tactician. I mean, just as a design... I thought we were going to the Alps for a tour.

I mean, it just... We chose the watercolor because we thought you were going to like it.

But I mean, it's not offensive. There's nothing wrong with you doing that. But it is relatively atypical.

of houses okay no I mean I just I I assume you did but you know then hurt to ask

And we wanted to keep in mind the architecture of the village and neighborhood and so on, and that's why we kept it in a smaller footprint than the current existing house, and also that it matches with everything else in the neighborhood.

Why did you go with a metal roof?

It's steeper than any other material.

Oh, for the slope? Yeah. Why did you go with such a steep slope? I'm just following up on my colleague here.

I'm listening to all these boards, and I'm learning as I go along, and this street is a one-story street, and this house is a two-story house. So we are trying to impact as least as we can a volume that will read as wall, two-story. So there's a drawing there that you see the context, but we're trying to keep it as a single story with a roof, and the steepness of the roof allows us to do an attic space, that's our second floor. So we're hiding, you see there, we're hiding the second floor in the attic.

So A105.

It's a very common way, and I only know this, my daughter went to the northeast, we've been traveling for four years up there, and there's a lot of houses that use that. It's a single story, but the second floor is hidden in the attic, and it's a full bedroom, and it's

So that's like you can see it on that middle right one there. It's how much room you got in the attic there.

You can see it. There's a couple sections that show you where it is.

So you're trying to keep the one-story look with some attic.

Yeah, the second floor is basically in the attic, and then we're also introducing what we're very, very excited about, these dormers that will allow for these rooms to have windows and to be able to look out with a full height of clearance, as you can see the figures that we put there. That way you can walk out and go up to the window.

That answers my question. Any other questions?

Just a statement. Design-wise, if it weren't more of an institutional use, which I think makes sense that it stands out a little bit, as the existing building does on the street, I think I would have an issue with the steepness of the roof. But I think in this particular case, because of the use and because of its relationship to the church, it kind of makes sense.

How wide is the driveway?

And then but it's definitely their review doesn't let me go forward with anything so they've Their review is very very thorough The driveway is going to be 16 feet in width entering all the way down and then turning And then there's a swale retention ponds that are then further east of the driveway and Well, on the opposite side of the house, there's a huge, about 20 feet worth of width by almost the entirety of the depth for that. But the driveway will have a catch basin because water is going to be flowing, and we're going to have to slope it in such a way to collect it and then go through the stone drain.

Yeah, it's landscaping, but you can see that that is the width of the driveway as it comes in from the street This is your retention pond and that's a retention And and the the property is owned by the Archdiocese or by Your child's Winsky.

I'm sorry Any other questions for the applicant

None, then I'll open it to public comment on this application. State your name and address at the podium.

We have the seawall.

Please state your name and address.

Name and address. The foundation of the new building.

Name and address, please.

Excuse me?

State your name and address.

Oh, well, I thought, okay. It's 485 Northeast 103 Street. Thank you. All right, now we have a seawall. And your foundation will be above the seawall? Or you're going to be level with the seawall?

Actually, sir, this is comment only, not question and answer. So make whatever comments you'd like to make.

Because I want to know if the foundation is in level with the seawall. When we have floods, there's going to be some overwash. Because that's why we build the seawalls if nothing washes back into the lake. or the soil and whatever, because it's a landlocked lake, and there's no way out. So anything goes in, it stays there. So if they raise the foundation of the building above the sea wall, we're going to have some wash back in the lake.

I think that isn't that why you have the retainage, the stock?

Right through here. Which one is the seawall here?

The seawall's below that. There's the seawall, okay.

And the... This is going to get dug in? Right now, right now, the building's foundation is the level with the bottom of the seawall, right? So you're going to raise that, no?

The foundation of the building has nothing to do with the seawall? What you're talking about is that anything watches down into the lake, it won't, because we have right here... We're going to dig it down, create a swell. So if water comes this way, it's going to get collected right there and stay there. Nothing's going to flow south of that, into the lake.

Nothing's going to go into the lake.

Nothing can go into the lake.

Yeah, well, I understand. Well, I hope it works out.

No, it's going to work out. We don't get a building. We're doing everything we have to do.

Any other comments on this application? Is that gavel still in one piece? I think I got a splinter from it. Any other comments?

Motion to approve the application with staff conditions.

All right. Hang on. Let me have some silence, please. All right. Do I get any further discussion? Motion? Motion to approve. I got a motion to approve. Second?

I'll second it.

We got a second here. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Application passes. Thank you very much. Good luck. Thank you. Thank you.

All right. Discussion and possible action items on item 9A.

So I see here, all right. I guess I'll open it to you. Yes. And then I guess we're looking for a motion just to let this project continue to go forward with the revised sheet.

The idea is to give you the ability, should you allow the applicant to explain their current situation and give you the ability as a board, should you find it to be agreeable to allow them to amend the application. That is correct.

All right. Go ahead, please.

So pursuant to development order RSP 2493, the property was granted a facade modification and site plan approvals by the board for an approximately 1,191 square foot single family addition to an existing two-story residence. The approved site plan indicated four bedrooms, five and a half bathrooms, outdoor terrace, and swimming pool area. The development order was executed on April 17, 2025, requiring the applicant to submit for a building permit within one year of its execution. On August 13, 2025, the applicant filed for a building permit review pursuant to RC08-25-1848 and commenced the pursuit of required Miami-Dade County outside agencies for the square footage addition scope of work. Furthermore, on January 26, 2026, the applicant filed for a demolition permit review pursuant for the proposed areas of demolition within the property, and upon staff's subsequent review of the provided demolition sheets, it was determined that the proposed exterior walls to be demolished far exceeded the walls to be demolished as approved by the Planning and Zoning Board Development Order. The Board had previously indicated to staff that for additions to existing single-family residences built in or before 1965, any modification to the approved site plan, which included deviations from the demo plans, incorporated into the site plan that exceed 10% shall require a public hearing before the board. The applicant has indicated following the approval that a comprehensive structural evaluation of the existing residence was performed, including a review of original microfilm records, engineering analysis, and structural load calculations. And based on these findings, it was determined that the existing wall reinforcement and foundation systems insufficient to support the structural loads generated by the approved architectural design the applicant is now seeking that the Planning and Zoning Board grant the approval of the revised demolition sheets as tied to the original site plan approval in order to support the approved architectural design all other aspects of the approved plans will remain unchanged as such site plan approval RSP 2493 remains valid the applicant shall construct and complete the new single-family structure within 18 months of the date of the issuance of the first building permit and with that the applicants agent is here to answer any questions you may have any questions to the planning director looking back to my files of having a hard time understanding when this came before us the app the

The actual cover sheet says it came before us, I think, in October of 24, but I looked through my files and couldn't find it. Maybe it was just I looked at the agendas, too, and didn't find it there.

March 27, 2025. March 27, 2025. Okay. The development order is part of their letter of intent.

So go to sheet DA 3.01 on the existing. that's 302 that's fine that's the new go back to oh one so I mean when I reviewed this basically the existing plan showed a couple of walls here to be left in place and due to the your structural analysis investigation apparently those walls are not adequate for what you want to do so you need to demo those walls and build new walls there right now those and those in fact our interior walls to correct so it doesn't affect the look of the house at all so when I looked at it so these these walls are gonna be demoed and new walls put there and similarly similarly on the second floor second floor plan these walls here get everything on the second floor let everything gets demoed yeah yes so you're demoing the their CMU walls that are there and you're demoing them and putting reinforced CMU back or cast on place okay custom place concrete solid walls

these were before stick walls concrete block it was completely different

No, it would look like that. In the plans package, this was from that date. That's why I just asked. They haven't changed the presentation to the original.

My name is Rafael. I am the social inter-engineer working on this project. First, I'd like to apologize because sometimes my English is not very fluent, so I need sometimes to find the right words to explain, but I do the best. In this project, the existing residence was originally designed as a conventional wood frame structure. However, the proposed renovation replaces the original wood floor and roof framing with reinforced concrete floor and roof slabs. This represents a significant change in the structure of the system and substantially increases the gravity laws that must be transferred safely to the foundation. Because of this change, many of the existing walls cannot be effectively integrated into the new structural system while maintaining proper load path and structural continuity. For those reasons, the demolition is not intended to maximize the scope of work. Rather, it is necessary to provide adequate structural support and establish a safe and continuous load transfer throughout the building. In addition, our field investigation also identified existing unreinforced CMO walls and foundation elements that do not meet the requirements of the new structural design. Consequently, the structural plans include new reinforced structural elements and a large foundation design to safely resist the revised loading conditions. For this reason, we respectfully believe that the proposed demolition is structurally justified and represents the safest and appropriate solution for this project.

Thank you. Any questions from the Board to the applicant?

So in addition to the couple of walls that are taken out on the first floor in addition the whole second floor is taken off but if we're looking at this elevation this is the approved elevation from before the front page so the only thing changing are these three sheets that they included these demo sheets

It's on the condition of approval. If you'd like, I can read it. Well,

We didn't have them update all they're providing is the demolition sheets because that's all they're asking to swap out So we're fully intending that they will meet that condition Within the building permit Well, hold on you said they submitted for building permit already.

Yes. So did they add the windows or not? They have a comment that they need to add but they haven't done it yet They have a comment for them to add it. They have not done it yet. Now they're coming back to us and asking us for something, but they haven't done what we asked them to do in the first place. And I say we. I wasn't at that meeting, but that's what the meeting minutes say. I think that's an issue. Otherwise, I mean, personally, I don't have a problem with the demo plan change. If it were retention of an historic structure and they were looking to change – Demolish more that historic structure as it happened on the sixth Street That would be an issue I think from my perspective But my concern is that there's a there's a comment here where we put a condition in place Provided by they clearly submitted a plan that didn't have that Didn't abide by that motion.

So I think Well, well, we should as let me clarify. There's so an applicant submits and staff issues a series of comments and Typically, we'll say, hey, where's your outside agency approvals? Because it's one of our conditions. We'll go through the conditions list, and we'll cite all those things that are not in the initial submittal. So I think what they did was they did a dry run review, which the building department allows folks to do a dry run review. which then would provide them the feasibility to go to the outside agencies. And I think they underwent that course and in that process came back and filed the demo permit. So they kind of left the original permit kind of, let's say, idle.

and I don't believe they've resubmitted addressing those comments because of the what they found with the demo you guys can speak to it and we also have it I mean it hasn't been presented but it it was done and we are working on the windows and all of that so I mean it's being worked on it's just that we were getting Miami-Dade County approval all the outside agencies and we know that we had to go ahead and revise our hearing so that's why we're here And instead of going back and forth more on reviews, why is it met so many times until the approval was done here?

So let's make sure we're all on the same page. What was the comment? Additional fenestration?

On the second floor of the west elevation.

So that would be this wall here? Yeah. And you guys understand what our comment is?

Correct. We are adding two windows.

And if you'd like, I can read the condition that was in the development order. Sure. So the condition reads, the applicant at the time of building permit shall revise west elevation sheet A401 and indicate windows along the second story of the west wall similar to the proposed window openings as located at the second story of the north elevation. Staff shall review for compatibility. So they have to adhere to that.

So that condition survives with whatever we do?

Absolutely. Absolutely. Because I guess today the only thing, the only question in front of us is those three demo sheets, you know, as revised sheets to the other one, which I don't have a problem with, you know, and good memory, you know, about. comment from the other one so I guess this is a discussion of possible action items like I guess I'm looking for a motion to approve the sheets da 101 da 301 and da 302 to be incorporated into the project motion to approve those revised demo sheets to be incorporated into the project do I have a second All in favor? Aye.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Sorry to make you wait so long, but we got to be here, you know. All right. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Good. Board member comments. Any board member comments? I got this be your guys last meeting what's that is this it you guys that's what my question is has has the council has the council reviewed any any applicants to replace Brady and I mr. Brady's position has been replaced for a while now