Planning Board - Regular Meeting

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the August 18th Nags Head Planning Board meeting. Good to see you all here today, and after a couple of months, we'll be a little rusty, but we'll get there. Anyhow, so we're called to order, and I would like to have a approval of the agenda.

Can I make a motion to approve the agenda?

I'll second.

You have a motion, second. Thank you. And public comment. This is where anybody in the audience can get up and talk about anything other than what's on the agenda.

We don't have any. Okay, we're moving right along to the approval of the minutes.

Can I make a motion to approve the minutes as submitted?

We can.

We have a second? Second. We have a second. All in favor? Aye. Thank you. Now, first action item of the day. Consideration of a zoning text amendment submitted by George Goodrich to amend section 7.2.2, size of the arrangement of supplemental regulations for cottage courts. And to address that, we have Kelly Wyatt. Thank you, Kelly.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. Let me go ahead and get the ordinance pulled up first. so we can have that in front of us as we go through the staff report. As mentioned, this is a zoning text amendment submitted by George, I think everybody calls him Eddie Goodrich, related to the town's cottage court standards. The request would create an alternative to the graduated size and height requirements that currently apply to cottage courts. And I have included that graduated scale um on the screen and as part of the packet just so everybody is familiar with it under this alternative every cottage court within the development would be limited to a maximum of 1 000 square feet and generally limited to one story with the ability to include a limited loft or mezzanine um this would be an optional alternative it would not eliminate or modify the graduated standards adopted in 2022. so these graduated standards where we talk about one-third shall not exceed one story one-third shall not exceed one and a half and two story those that language was originally adopted in 2022.

Um, there's an issue. Um, I, um, I can, I can pull up the agenda front page, but not no other information is coming up.

Yeah.

So everything, but I just went to a separate, we'll take a short break here while we fix some technical issues. Yeah.

We all had to see the problem quietly.

I'm okay because I went to it. Just check this. I just went to it.

Okay, thank you. We are back in order now. And Kelly, please continue with the action item.

Okay, we'll do. Thank you so much. As I was saying, what's on the screen, what's in your packet is a graduated schedule for our cottage courts that was adopted in 2022. And there's some history on that in your staff report, and we'll touch on that briefly coming up. But what we're looking at today would be an optional alternative to this. It would not eliminate or modify the graduated standards adopted in 2022. An applicant could either use the existing standards, which allow some larger and taller cottages. As you can see, you can go up to two stories and 1,750 square feet of habitable area. or you could elect to use the new alternative, which would keep cottages substantially smaller. So just a little history and background on cottage courts. In 1985, Cottage courts were eliminated from the zoning ordinance at the time. So they were essentially discontinued as a use that was permissible within the town. So all of the existing cottage courts that were here at the time became non-conforming. The town reconsidered that position through its focus next head planning process. In part because we had experienced a loss of hotels and other traditional short stay accommodations, cottage courts were viewed as another form of visitor accommodation that was consistent with the history and character of Nags Head. So in 2016, the town reinstated cottage courts as a conforming use, subject to the standards addressing their location, density, design, parking access management, and the continued operation as a unified development. The original standards allowed cottage courts between 500 square feet and 2,000 square feet. When the UDO was adopted in 2019, the maximum was reduced to 1,500 square feet because of concerns that buildings approaching 2,000 square feet would look and function more like a single family dwelling that you would see on the west side as opposed to what we're familiar with in terms of a cottage and a cottage court. So in 2022, Mr. Goodrich requested another amendment that would allow some larger cottages. During those discussions, both staff and planning board expressed concern about allowing an entire cottage court development to consist of buildings approaching 2,000 square feet and two stories. Ultimately, the Board of Commissioners allowed some additional size and height, but required a graduated distribution, which is... what we currently have in the ordinance today. One third of the cottages shall remain one story, one third shall be up to one and one half stories, and the remaining one third may be up to two stories. and the corresponding maximum habitable area is 1,500 associated with the one story, also 1,500 associated with the one and a half story, and then 1,750 square feet of habitable area associated with the two story. That approach was intended to prevent an entire cottage court from being developed at the maximum size and the maximum height. The practical issue raised by the application is that this same graduated distribution applies even if an applicant wanted to build an entire cottage court consisting of much smaller cottages. So in other words, the current ordinance prescribes a mixture of building types and heights and would not allow an entire cottage court development to be developed at the lower end at the 1,000 square feet. So what this amendment would do, it would give any applicant seeking to do a cottage court two paths. The first would be the existing standard. That's going to remain as is. And the second would be an alternative small cottage design. And in this scenario, you can look at our proposed conditions, Every cottage in the development would have to comply with the one story with loft or mezzanine and habitable area not to exceed 1,000 square feet. You could not be selective. You could not apply a little bit of the graduated scale and a little bit of the new. You're either going to pick one and go with it so you don't get to mix and match there. Each cottage would remain subject to the minimum 500 square foot habitable area. No cottage could exceed 1,000 square feet of habitable area. Each cottage would be limited to one story with a limited loft or mezzanine permitted. The cottage court would incorporate, we're proposing at least two coordinated exterior design schemes. That way it just doesn't look like a cookie cutter development where everything looks the same. And all the other criteria that we have in place for cottage courts would apply. Lot coverage, distance between structures, stormwater management, all of that would still stay in place. The amendment would not increase the number of units permitted on a property. Right now the maximum is 10 cottages on any property. It would not reduce setbacks or building separation. It would not increase lot coverage or change parking and access. It would not change the landscaping requirements, the architectural design point system, or any type of emergency access requirements that are in place. Staff believes that the 1000 square foot maximum is consistent with the traditional cottage scale that these provisions were originally intended to emulate. Back in 2015, 2016, when we were looking at reintroducing cottage courts from when they became nonconforming, we ran some numbers on existing habitable sizes and footprints of cottage courts currently here. So Two Fish Cay, Cahoons, Oceanside Court, Sand Spur, and sea spray were the ones that we focused on this was included in your packet as well but when the town reviewed five of its historic cottage courts we identified 36 structures 24 of those or approximately two-thirds of those contain no more than 1 000 square feet of heated area Some of the overall averages are misleading because the cottage courts occasionally included one substantially larger structure, which was maybe an office, the manager's residence, or another principal structure. In the case of Cahoon's Cottages, you have your cottages and then you have the store. Same with Sand Spur, you have an office and management area. So for example, we focused on Oceanside Court. Seven of the eight structures range from approximately 486 square feet to 877 square feet, but you have one structure that contains more than 3,000 square feet. So that raises the average above the 1,000. But the individual figures alone support the idea that a 1,000 square foot maximum is generally consistent with the actual cottages that are traditionally found in the town of Nags Head, older cottage courts that we have. Bump back to the ordinance. The application refers to one story cottages with a loft or mezzanine, but it does not establish how large that upper level area could be. So I did have a conversation with the chief building inspector coming into this meeting. The North Carolina Residential Code recognizes both loft and mezzanine, but it doesn't have a definition for one and one half story structure. So a conventional one and one half stories building can include a substantially complete upper floor with enclosed bedrooms, bathrooms, hallways, closets. That is gonna be different from a true loft or mezzanine, which is gonna retain its open relationship to the space below. And we do have some floor plans and some pictures that I can show you that kind of speak to what the applicant is wanting to do and more reflective of a loft or mezzanine, but again, as we all know, text amendments aren't site-specific, but this would just be to give you an idea. I can actually maybe pop over to those quickly now while we're talking about it, just for reference. We can always pull these back up if needed. But this is just pulled from online. But this is your first story with fixed stairs to a loft area up here. As you can see, it's open to below. Don't hold me to this, but I believe a loft per North Carolina building code is no greater than 70 square feet. A mezzanine can be larger. A mezzanine can be one third of the total ground floor area. So I'm not sure what this would fall under. There are no dimensions, but just something to think about. And then kind of another view, the same concept, your ground floor and then sort of your bedroom or master bedroom on the second floor. So that's just visually to help give some context of what we're talking about. To preserve the intended one story cottage form, staff recommends allowing one code compliant loft or mezzanine per cottage unit provided that its floor area is less than 50% of the floor area immediately below. It remains open to the story below as required by the residential code and that it does not meet the residential code definition of an attic story. So I will say this was something new to me. Our chief building inspector showed me this definition and it really hinges on that 50%. So that's why we included that. And any habitable area within it counts towards the overall 1,000 square foot maximum. So that first story as well as your mezzanine or loft, the area of that goes towards your 1,000 square feet. The intent is to allow some usable space beneath the roof without allowing what is essentially a full second story to be labeled a loft or mezzanine for zoning purposes. Exterior variation or architecture is something that I wanted to focus on. And that is proposed in section 7.2.2.1.4 of the ordinance. Existing cottage court standards require each cottage to earn at least 75 points under the residential design guidelines. and to comply with the applicable roof pitch and orientation requirements. Those standards promote design quality, but they do not prevent an applicant from using the same plan, the same exterior colors and elevations for every single cottage. Staff has therefore included a limited and objective, admittedly, design variation provision for cottage courts if you choose to adopt this alternative. The draft would require at least two exterior design schemes. Each scheme would differ in at least two listed exterior elements. And at least one of those elements would have to be something other than color. So you're gonna have to pick between color and shutters and gable brackets or color and siding trim, something like that. So you just can't focus on color. Examples would include your siding material or pattern, trim details, shutters, porch railings, decorative gable brackets, gable treatments, things of that nature. So the same scheme could not be used on cottages immediately beside or directly opposite one another. So you do have some variation as you're looking at the different cottages. The intent is not to force dramatically different architecture or compromise the quality of the cottage. It's to prevent a development of identical small buildings from becoming overly repetitive while still allowing a consistent cottage court style appearance. This is an area where staff would welcome any planning board thoughts regarding whether you feel like this balance is appropriate, that there's another path. Right now we're saying two elements. maybe you wanna consider three elements, that's up for discussion among this board. The proposal does not change any provisions that distinguish a cottage court from just a collection of individual houses. Cottages must continue to operate as transient rental accommodations under unified management. If you wanted to look at this as something other than transient, and I know Mead had asked about this previously, But we did find some terminology that does state that a cottage court should be used for transient purposes. So keep that in mind. And it would have to be operated under a unified management scheme. So this is going to mean essentially one property owner, one management. Maybe a POA or an HOA is managing that. And we go on to say that you can only have one utility. And this is to prevent essentially each of these cottages being condoed out where they begin to function as a single family dwelling. and not under one unified management. So those safeguards will stay in place and are important because the town's support for cottage courts has consistently been tied to their function as a unified form of a short stay accommodation. and not a condominium style rental. In terms of the comprehensive plan, staff finds that the amendment is consistent with the comprehensive land use plan. And I think that was provided in your staff report as well under policy considerations. The comprehensive plan supports a diversity of visitor accommodations and specifically recognizes cottage courts as an alternative to large single family vacation rentals and conventional hotels. It also calls for buildings with a residential scale and appearance including lower heights and smaller footprints that reflect the Nags Head heritage. Staff believes an optional alternative that limits cottages to 1,000 square feet continues to advance those objectives. Staff, therefore, would recommend approval with the revisions that are included in the draft ordinance. Pop back over to that. which include limiting each cottage to one story with a code compliant loft or mezzanine remaining less than 50% of the floor area below, retains the required openness to the story below, and does not constitute an attic story, requiring at least two coordinated but meaningfully different exterior design schemes, and confirming that all other applicable cottage court provisions remain in effect. Again, the graduated scale would stay in place. So at this point, I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have. And as you know, Eddie Goodrich, the applicant, is here if you have any questions of him as well.

Kelly, you might have already said, is there a limit on the number of cottages per cottage court?

There is. It's limited to 10.

Okay.

yes and for some reason six seems to be the sweet spot with every cottage court that we've had since then six has has been the number that we have um so if we had 10 the max at least two of them are going to have to look different or how does that work again Um, so you would apply two different design schemes. Um, so in a group, if you had 10 cottages, five would have one design scheme and five would have the other, and they would have to be side by side of the same across the street.

Correct. Right. Okay. That makes sense.

Absolutely. This is, this is one story being that there'd be likely parking parking underneath. of this.

It would likely be elevated, yes.

So they'll be elevated. And this is kind of a constant. you know one story is every one story is the first habitable story everything after that um the other issue that i see a little bit of is exterior non-conditioned space you know where we are seeing much more so especially in larger houses and i can see it scaling to smaller houses as well you know fenced in yards with um a barbecue an exterior kitchen kind of set up you know maybe enhanced barbecue outdoor recreation of all sorts bar wet bar other things like that all of that is you could start to get quite a bit of congestion exterior to this thousand foot so i don't believe

In single family dwellings, absolutely. And I think that is something that we've recognized and we're trying to work on. And I apologize, I should have included all the supplemental standards for cottage courts in here, but the way a cottage court would operate is you would have your cottages and then there's like a community amenity. So there's only going to be one pool, maybe one cookout area, something like that. They wouldn't each individual unit would not have its own fenced-in backyard, per se.

And the reason I'm saying this as much as anything else is once you add a situation where we're in a limbo with parking presently, where you have... infill of vacationers, people taking advantage of this and an emergency happens. Planning access egress issues could be problematic and parking versus accessibility does not have an emergent quality to it and there is no fire it would it be a fire lean yes there there would be let me try to pull this up for you quickly and again it this is and with each fire lean applied to an area around each each structure so that accessibility to in into areas that are fenced off would be not problematic.

So this has to be under a unified development scheme. So again, I don't believe you would have cottage court units being fenced off individually. Again, I apologize for not having this in there in advance.

We would see this on the sketch plan, would we not?

You would. So a cottage court is going to be a conditional use permit. So when somebody was ready to develop it, they would have to come before the planning board and the board of commissioners. But the supplemental standards for cottage courts are under 7.2. We talk about location. Cottage courts can only be located on NC 12 or 1243, properties east of NC 12 or 1243. Cottage courts shall be designed and attended for transient guests on a rental basis. The property manager can have a larger unit. Here we have the graduated scale we talked about. Architectural design. In addition to the 75 points, they have to meet the minimum roof pitch requirements. Dwelling units shall not contain enclosed, attached, or detached garages, but may have parking beneath. Cottages shall be oriented towards open space or shared drive. Cottage courts shall contain at least three, but not more than 10 dwelling units. Each cottage should have a separation of 10 feet, including projections, 15 foot front yard, eight foot side yard, 25 foot rear yard. Your minimum lot size for development is 20,000 square feet. Your lot coverage is 55%. You're going to have to have one shared driveway must be designed to a width of 22 feet to allow firefighting apparatus to locate within 150 feet of all sides of the structure. Any time this comes before you as a site plan, it's going through technical review where we're going to have every department looking at it, including the fire department.

This is kind of one of those things where, you know, not looking at Eddie doing anything nefarious in any way, shape, or form, but it's one of those things where you're asking me to okay something, and I don't see what he sees. I don't see a plan. And this is one of those kind of situations where if I saw an iteration of something I could understand with more context of why, one, what he's going to do, and two, why it's at his advantage, and if there is an advantage that is not optically clear to me, but might become something that would become the nose of the camel.

So again, we're not talking site specific, but what we're talking about is not necessarily new. One of the more recent cottage courts so i mean you're you're looking at at this but instead of 1500 and 1750 and two-story you're looking at one story with a loft and a thousand square feet so i i understand eddie doesn't have something before you today um and nor should he but you know the the idea of a cottage court we have several of new ones, there's also this one down at Whalebone that has a more linear... Sorry, you have to bear with me while I... Okay, so this was a cottage court constructed under our new 2016 regulations. So this is a central access way, 22 feet, shared amenity, your cottages. So I mean, I would imagine this would be Similar.

And a covered deck would not be part of square footage, but it would be locked coverage. Correct. As would any walkway.

Right now, a covered open deck is not considered habitable space, so it would not count towards that thousand, but it would be considered.

But if you had an uncovered deck that's wood, would that be locked coverage?

It is lot coverage, it is not built upon area. So recent legislation speaks to built upon area being what you're trying to manage for stormwater. It would be lot coverage, it would not be built upon area. As long as it were open.

There's nothing in there that says anything about the common space building? Is there usually a common building that people can use that has amenities?

So there doesn't have to be, no. Let's see if I can get back.

Would it, it would fall under these same requirements just as the house or the cottage would be. So it would have to be within that thousand square feet.

No. So, um, hang on one sec. Let me get back to our ordinance. Um, Going back to individual cottages shall contain 500. Cottages shall be limited to the following. In addition to the above restrictions, one structure may be up to 5,000 square feet if it is combined with onsite management or another complimentary business use. Each cottage unit shall contain separate sleeping, bathing, or living. So you can have one larger structure if it's for on-site management maybe your office something like that and does it have the same sort of architectural standards it does yes i have a question about septic each each house in the scottish court would use a common

on-site septic system?

That's what we've seen with the newer ones. One large advanced system as opposed to each individual unit having its own.

And there is no requirement for repairing area with that, is that correct?

As of now, I don't believe there is a requirement for repair area.

Thank you. Does anybody else have any questions for Kelly? Mr. Goodrich. Would you like to share some comments with us this morning? And please come to the microphone. Thank you. That way I can hear you.

My name is Eddie Goodrich. It's George Edward, but everybody calls me Eddie. She calls me George. So I'm not really trying to. Well, basically, no matter what, hopefully y'all will accept this today, but anything that anybody does anywhere will come back to this board for review and recommendation to the planning. So I think any fears that you may have, you can address it at that point in time. And I think the commission has listened to y'all rather well. You know, being afraid of what may happen in the future. And that's not really, you deal with it when it happens. Because I think you have enough safeguards built in that you can cover about anything that you see not being good for the town. Really, what I'm trying to accomplish here is something more suitable for today's market. By being smaller houses, this 1,000 square foot limit is a good number. That's a two-bedroom size. And when you think about a two-bedroom house, you automatically assume, well, maybe I don't have enough kitchen space. Maybe I don't have enough living area. Well, and it seems smaller. And it is small. But when you add, and you saw those pictures, when you add the mezzanine with the bedrooms up top, it just opens the whole place up like it's a much larger unit. What people are looking for today are, they love the traditional architecture of old Axhead, if you want to call it that. But inside, they want contemporary and when you blend the two it looks really good and basically that's what you're looking at right there the contemporary interior and then you will see of course the outside architecture will be the mutual standards for the town of max head let me see any uh issues regarding fire protection the fire marshal and chief of fire chief They'll make sure that happens, and that'll be done before it ever comes to you. They'll make sure that they have adequate, the amount of pressure from the hydrants as well as the placement of the hydrants, and a way to get in and turn around and come back out anywhere it may be.

The issue, just down that road with you, the issue that is often the problem with fire suppression is orientation of buildings and the exposure to the elements, i.e. the wind. So you'll have an elevated fuel load over top a venturi effect. Anybody that's ever been to Chicago understands how wind shear does affect constructed space. Throw an accelerant in there, which is fuel of any sort. what I'm hearing now as I work in emergency services more and more often is it doesn't necessarily matter how well you build the residents, the structure. It's how the people who were invited to stay there use the structure and what they do in that space. And then through accelerant, population, access egress issues, secondary exposed structures around that area start to become part of the problem. Getting people out of a front door that is blocked by an active problem. with the barbecue in the way. That was done because of something. In this situation, it's going to be a managed space with a POA or some kind of HOA. There's going to be some understandings. That's all great, but it's foreseeable that people will behave badly or be outside of this. What I'm trying to do is I'm trying to No one wants to work with a hero because no one ever wants a coworker to have to be heroic. And I'm trying to understand how this could go and make it so that nobody has to be a hero and rush through a fire to get to somebody who's inside a door that is blocked by something.

If I may, I'd like to remind everybody we're considering a zoning text amendment here. All we're doing is saying you don't have to do it graduated. You can have 1,000 square foot cottage courts. I think that's what we need to bring ourselves back to right now.

It's difficult to disagree with myself after I've gone through and agreed with something.

Well, I will say that a smaller house is easier to get out of than a big house. And their first job is to save the people. regardless of the structure. And then it gets to the surrounding structures, because by the time, I'm sure this is true, I've been told by one of the fire chiefs and fire marshals, that one of the biggest problems, and again, I agree with you when I'm talking about, well, that's a separate subject, but it's the furniture. The furniture that's in houses now is what will burn quicker than anything else. It's what it's made of, the kind of wood and the fabric and everything. But anyway, I think the fire marshal and the fire department will make sure that it's as safe as it can be. And again, you can get out of a small house, but then you can't a big one, I promise you. And frankly, with this open concept, It's easier, I mean, I can't imagine a fire alarm that's driving everybody, and that's when it goes off. So, but again, I agree with you, it's a separate subject. Something to be addressed. Down the road. When plans are submitted, then they will look at the ingress and egress to and from the structure.

And we'll have plenty of time to revisit this down the road. Does anybody else have any questions with regard to the ordinance itself as it applies here?

No, I would just like to say I'm pleased that we're here discussing an amendment meaning a smaller cottage design rather than, I'd rather go small than go big. So keeping things on the smaller side is, I think, a preference rather than trying to amend something to go larger than the existing standards. Thank you.

Everybody loves their family, but they don't particularly want to spend a week with them. Absolutely. So you can be Uncle Solace who can be over here, and you can be next door, and your grandmother can be there.

I agree with you, Valerie. I had to look at it a couple times saying, wait a minute, we're going to say you're

lowering the requirement i know i kept rereading it and thinking okay so we're going smaller instead of anybody else have any questions for mr goodrich thank you so much sir thank you very much for your comments and answers thank you okay so we have an action item here and um me i'd like to hear some discussion amongst the planning board members

I mean, I agree with Basil and Valerie. I love, I've always liked the cottage court concept, number one. It is a segment of lodging that is very much in demand and that demand is going to continue to grow where one family can come and stay for five days at an affordable rate enjoy what we have to offer in dare county with all the different regulations that the town already has in place on the structure and design and everything else, I think it will enhance the town of Nags Head. I think it brings in what the town is looking for. We are a family, we like to look at Nags Head, the town, as a family resort. This is a family-friendly design. This is a family-friendly text amendment. And while I certainly don't have a crystal ball and I can't see the future, I think affordability down the road is key. And if you're going to top it out at 1,000 square feet, I think that's great. I would also add that back in the 70s, when they were building salt boxes, not salt boxes, but beach boxes as fast as they could. A lot of those were only 1,000 square feet. And there's a lot of happy family memories that have been made in the beach boxes in Nags Head. And there are some now that are right at 1,000 square feet that are selling for half a million dollars. So yeah, I'm fully in favor of this.

I agree.

I like that. I really like the idea, too, of shared spaces. So one pool versus six pools that, you know, that it's going to be utilized better. You know, instead of just one family using it for one hour, it would be six families using it for the six hours or so. And then probably also with a barbecue. So that may decrease the chances of fire if they have a community area that has a barbecue area or a bar or whatever. yeah and all that stuff so i i love the idea and a thousand square feet is exactly how big my mountain house is that i built designed with a loft area just like that and it's perfect for four four people rents really well thank you any other comments i just the this is all going to be done under residential building code non-commercial is that correct correct

Yes.

So any sprinklers, et cetera, are going to be outside of that, outside what is required?

It's my understanding of when we first adopted this in 2016, sprinklers were required. you have some cottage courts that are sprinkler protected. I think the last time we looked at a cottage court, it was questionable whether the sprinkler protection was required, but they applied it anyway. There's a residential sprinkler design, and I don't know the acronym for it, and they did use that. But if it is required, it will be. if that's required. And I know in the past a conversation has come up about ADA. They are required to meet ADA. At least one of the units has to have some accommodations to meet that as well.

Okay. I would like somebody to make a motion here. I'll make a motion to approve this.

I'll second.

We have a motion. We have a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposition? Motion passes unanimously.

All right. You're all very welcome.

Good luck. Thank you. Okay.

Duke? Maybe we know it was you. Okay.

All right. Report on Commissioner's actions. Kelly?

All right. Let's see. So because we didn't meet in July, we have both July and August to look through. So this is the Board of Commissioners July 1st meeting. We didn't have a whole lot there. We had our consent agenda request for, if you remember, Suzanne Baer was here on behalf of BIPA to allow water-dependent recreational uses as a permissible use within shopping centers. So that was consent agenda in July. And then it did go forward to the board in August for public hearing, provided our staff report, and our deputy planning director, Joe Costello, provided an update on the estuarine shoreline management plan. I believe that is it for our July 1st VOC meeting. On our August 5th meeting, we did have some recognitions that I wanted to highlight. I'll skip down to the last one. Our chief building inspector that probably everyone here is familiar with, Steve Szymanski, retired. So in his place, we welcomed Rick Gotsi. He was the chief building inspector in Currituck. For a while, we were able to lure him down here. He is our new chief building inspector, so you'll get to see him and know him, I am sure. consent agenda um we it's hard to believe i feel like i just gave a report on our final numbers for sand relocation and without skipping a beat we're preparing for our next season of sand relocation and doing management but um that was on the consent agenda and the board did authorize the 400 000 just like they have in years past for allocation for sand manage for sand relocation and stabilization so that will be in place when we pick that up again the public hearing that we talked about for water dependent uses in shopping centers or commercial mixed-use developments the board voted unanimously to recommend approval of that and that's it

Is there going to be an effort to do like a dune fencing addition, I guess, in league with the new beach? With the nourishment? Yeah, with the re-nourishment. Just to slow the stand down before it gets to the dunes, hopefully.

yes i do not know the parameters so david ryan would have to speak to that but yes as a follow-up to this latest nourishment project some areas are receiving fencing and some areas are receiving sprigging i don't know it's not the entire length i think they have identified more vulnerable areas but i can't i don't know what those areas are I can reach out to David Ryan.

No, it's one of those things where it seems like once it starts to blow around, that's when the inundation of sand and sand moving is more and more of a problem. Right. I'm not sure. What I've seen is the dune height is increasing quite nicely for a storm. And so it would be maybe thicker and not higher would be great.

I'll pass that along and try to get some more information for the board.

Thank you, Kelly.

Thank you.

Count updates?

I don't have anything unless y'all do.

Other than what you've shared here?

Correct.

We're still here. Thank goodness. Thank goodness, yes. All right, let's move into discussion items. informational presentation regarding accessory dwelling units. This might, if you need to take a restroom break or whatever, this might be the time to do it. Otherwise, let's get into it, Kelly. This is near and dear to my heart, so.

I'm good, I'm good.

Okay.

So I did provide a summary sheet in advance of this presentation. And there's been two efforts, recent efforts with regard to ADUs, one in 2019, one in 2024. The 2019 version came to a vote. The 2024 discussion did not. But in 2024, 2023 actually, ADUs were, the discussion of ADUs was on our strategic plan for the town. And specifically it was one of the planning department's items as part of their work plan. It is still on there. At our last retreat, we asked the current board, is this something that you want to keep on the strategic plan and continue to move forward? And the board said yes. We do want to keep the conversation open. We do want to keep it moving forward. So it is a large discussion. It's a complex discussion. We have some board members here that are familiar with it, several that are newer and are not. So all I wanted to do today is to just give a little bit of history and background on where we've been. not really talk about the future. After today, I'm gonna leave you with some questions. I'm gonna email you way more information than you probably ever wanna see from the 2019 and the 2024 efforts. I'm gonna provide you with the ordinances, the minutes, things like that. By our September, meeting maybe, maybe even October. maybe then we're at a place where we've digested the past and we're ready to start talking about the future. This is just a little glance into that. So that being said, a quick outline, just reiterating, there's no action items associated with today, just background information. So we want to discuss the characteristics and definition of accessory dwelling units, and you'll hear us call those ADUs. Review the town's ADU efforts. Like I said, there was significant ones in 2019 and in 2024. Explain the overlap that we have here in Nags Head with accessory dwelling units, partial home short-term rentals, and duplexes. Some of you probably remember these conversations, but it gets really, complex and hard to wrap your mind around what we currently have out there and how how to navigate that identify legal and policy considerations and conditions that shaped why the 2024 work was put on pause and then again like i said would like to leave the board with a couple of questions to think about in the months ahead So an accessory dwelling unit is a second, smaller dwelling on the same lot. It's an independent living unit located on the same lot as the principal single family home. It contains living, sleeping, cooking, and restroom facilities. and it should be subordinate to the principle dwelling in size and in function. And so this is essentially the town's definition of an ADU broken up into little digestible segments. You'll hear them called accessory apartments, in-law suites, granny flats, garage apartments, backyard cottages. And noting that we do not allow them in the ordinance now, I'm sure there are some other interesting terminology that we've heard at the permitting counter. But those are the common names. So as we've put down here, the terminology varies, but the core idea is that we have one property, a principal home, with an accessory and subordinate living unit on the same site. Attached and detached ADUs are the two things that we look at, and they raise different different pros and different cons, honestly. An attached ADU or an accessory apartment, it's within or connected to the principal home. Probably everyone here is familiar with something similar to this, but we do not call it an ADU. We call it a short-term rental or possibly a duplex if it's permitted properly, but not an ADU at this point in time. Examples are gonna be your lower level apartments, spaces that have been converted to allow that addition. It usually shares the same building envelope and may have internal or external access and is often perceived as less visible to the neighborhood. So what you're commonly going to see here is that beach box where perhaps many years ago they did a storage enclosure and then at some point decided to take advantage of the partial home short-term rental And if they could, if they were above the flood elevation, if they met all the requirements, convert that area into habitable. So that's what we see a lot of in Nags Head today. The other type of ADU is going to be a detached ADU, and a lot of people like the name backyard cottage. That's a separate standalone structure on the same lot. Examples are a small cottage or apartment over a detached garage, or it can stand alone on the same property. This adds another building footprint, and it may affect your setbacks, your lot coverage, your height, vegetation, I didn't write it here, but any conversation we have, septic is going to be a conversation as well. I will say Nags Head has historically allowed one principal structure, thus one septic system. I think in other areas that do allow ADUs, People might look at doing a smaller, secondary, conventional system. That's historically not been something that the town has wanted to entertain. Thus far in all of our conversations, we have maintained that this should still be accommodated by your principal, your primary singular septic system with no allowance for some ancillary or secondary system. But that will be a point of conversation as well. The detached ADU or the backyard cottage can create stronger concerns about density and neighborhood character. You're gonna hear a lot about density and neighborhood character over the next couple of months as we start to dig into this more. ADUs can serve several needs, but the outcome is going to depend on how we regulate them. So potential function of a detached or an attached ADU, it can provide housing for an aging parent or adult child, It's a smaller unit, so it might be more attainable for local or seasonal workers. It kind of speaks to that workforce housing that we've spoken about in the past. It can provide long-term rental income for a resident homeowner. In 2024, we did some public engagement. We had two opportunities for the town to come in, hear a little presentation, and then express whether they liked ADUs or didn't like ADUs, thought they were beneficial or not. And what we found out is we do have quite a few permanent residents here in Nags Head who really rely on this additional rental income to make it possible for them to stay here. So that's something to think about. ADUs are beneficial in that it allows that aging in place. multi-generational living, so kind of in that first bullet point, housing for an aging parent or adult, you can sort of potentially age in place. You can also have a caretaker, although that's really under a different category, but it's all generally the same concept. And another positive is that It provides for more housing choices without having to go through some type of subdivision process. It can provide additional housing without encumbering additional land like you would in a typical subdivision. So some of the concerns, additional density on single family lots, parking, traffic, trash, noise, septic capacity and the environmental constraints that you would have dealing with that, detached unit scale, placement, and neighborhood character, Again, that's really predominantly with the detached unit, more so than your attached unit. And this was an important bullet point, create more opportunities for short-term rental use. So when you talk about looking at ADUs as one mechanism to help address workforce housing or affordable housing, you're really looking at some mechanism to make that a long-term rental. If we open up an ADU to be a short-term rental, then it just becomes another weekly vacation rental. It's not really helping our workforce and affordable housing issue. It's a deeper conversation, but as some of you may remember, talking about deed restrictions and enforcement, how do you make these ADUs remain long-term rental and not short-term rental? That's going to be a big conversation as well. And administration and enforcement along those same lines, how do you enforce that? will be a large conversation. Nags Head has considered ADUs from both a housing and a land use policy. The 2017 comprehensive plan supported exploring ADUs while preserving low density single family character and I actually put the section of the comp plan that's in here. Land use policy 27, promote and expand types of housing and accommodations for varying income levels, aging populations, and the seasonal workforce within the town. LU 27 actually speaks to cottage courts, which we just had a conversation on. LU 27B, Talks about examining the barriers that may inhibit hotel development. Again, that kind of goes back to where we talked about cottage courts, reintroducing them in 2016. Land use policy 27c, research and explore other options to diversify the types of housing and accommodations available within the town. This could include creating allowances for accessory dwelling units and housing appropriate for seasonal populations within the town. The town should ensure that any regulation for accessory dwelling units are consistent with the town size and limitation for large residential dwellings. And then LU 2017 review existing policies and ordinances to remove regulatory barriers preventing accessible housing for the aging population. So this again, this was in our 2017 comprehensive plan. I think it's why the conversation has stayed relevant through 2019 all the way through 2024 and continuing into the future. So keep that in mind. Another item, historical context does matter. Accessory quarters have existed alongside some of our cottages and historic cottage row. So the idea of having a detached that had habitable space is not unknown. It's part of historic Cottage Row. Granted, different context today, but we've had it in the past. Also, the 2018 Local Business Committee recommended evaluating ADUs as an alternative to broadly expanding the duplex allowances. Again, we'll get into how ADUs, short-term rentals, and duplexes that interplay and how there's some similarities and not some similarities. But the local business committee was put together to help sort of create a line of communication between the town and our local businesses and the commercial community. We talked about a lot of things. We talked about signage. We talked about landscaping. But one thing that came up was even in 2018, was housing for employees. So even that was a relevant conversation in 2018 with the business committee then. The recurring concern, it's the same. Diversify housing without changing development intensity and without changing the character of Nags Head. And I think that is what came out in 2019. It's what came out in iterations of this even before 2019 and it's what came out in 2024 as well so that's that's going to be something that we're going to have to keep in mind as we move through these conversations In 2019, kind of already touched on this, March, April, the Board of Commissioners directed staff to prepare an ordinance related to ADUs. The Planning Board wanted to have some more studies take place. Planning Board looked at ownership, occupancy, short-term rentals, looked at parking, location, created a draft ordinance that received unanimous support from the planning board. We set the public hearing for this and in September, the board of commissioners heard the proposed draft and it failed with a vote two to three to not move it forward at that time. The 2019 draft was pretty restrictive, and again, I'll give you a copy of this, but the proposal was to only allow ADUs for single family dwellings in specific zoning designations, only one ADU per single family dwelling, It could be no more than 50% of the principal dwelling or 600 square feet, whichever is less. It was proposing an allowance of attached or detached, but you could not use an RV, a camper, or some other type of accommodation to function as an ADU. The ADU would have to meet principal structure setbacks. And any detached unit would have a height restriction of no higher than 25 feet or more. So right now our maximum height is 35 feet. So that 2019 ordinance was even more restrictive. The bedrooms within the ADU shall be counted along with the home. And in terms of parking, you had to have one additional space for your ADU beyond the minimum parking required. um same as we talked about with cottage courts but utilities they had to have shared electric and water meters and approval from derrick county environmental health which again at that time we were proposing one septic only if you were going to add a bedroom beneath your home even if you're going to add a bedroom in a detached structure that bedroom had to be accommodated in your existing septic capacity And then it would be required to go through the conditional use permit process. As I mentioned, the motion failed. The board and community discussions reflected unresolved questions about density, neighborhood acceptance, ownership, and rental use. So going back to that short-term rental conversation versus long-term rental, there's conversation that the ordinance would not work without community support. and expressed concern about continuing to expand it without garnering community support. The vote ended that ordinance effort, and we didn't really settle anything moving forward from that. But again, it's been an ongoing conversation, and I think part of the community engagement that we did in 2024 was very eye opening, very helpful. You will receive that information moving forward, as well as a survey that Joe put together. But we have started that process of engaging the community, educating the community, and hearing their thoughts, what they would like to see, and what their concerns are. In 2024, we restarted the conversation. As I mentioned, in 2023, at the retreat, the board directed staff to continue to explore ADUs. It became a strategic plan item. Staff began with an overview rather than a finished ordinance. where should they go, how large should they be, attached or detached, short term, long term, owner occupancy, parking standards and other safeguards were explored. The July 2024 presentations reframed ADUs as part of a larger issue involving existing partial home short term rentals and those homes out there with duplex like configurations. So this is one slide for a very complex issue. And I think in 2024, Joe and I did a PowerPoint presentation that was specifically dedicated to the interplay of these three things. But an attached ADU, a separate dwelling within or attached to a single family dwelling So we kind of get that, but it very much mimics what we already have in a partial home short-term rental, which is a resident occupied home where part of the dwelling is rented for stays less than 30 days. And then a duplex is one structure containing two dwelling units designed or occupied by two separate households. And so your duplex can be top and bottom, it can be side by side but sometimes your partial home str you might think that that resembles a duplex but in most cases your short-term rental may not have a full kitchen may not have all the amenities of the principal dwelling and it's should be, I think in all the cases that I'm aware of, subordinate to the primary structure. So an attached ADU might look very similar to what a partial home short-term rental looks like today, but it's how do we deal with those two things? Because we already have one of them out there. So how do we create this new use that embraces what's already out there? Does it enhance what's already out there? Is it more restrictive? Do we create nonconformities? It's a really large question. Yes.

So ADUs currently are not allowed by definition of an ADU.

Yes.

Partial home short-term rentals, are they currently allowed? They are. Okay, and as are duplexes? Yes. Okay, thanks.

Yep, absolutely.

So a partial home STR would be considered a duplex if the owner lived in the house and then rented out part of the house that had a kitchen, a bath, sleeping area, all self-contained.

It could potentially.

So if it had all of that under a partial home SDR, it could also be a duplex. The difference is that perhaps a duplex to stay might be longer than 30 days.

A duplex might be longer than 30 days. The other thing to mention is if you are building a duplex, you have fire separation between the units like this or like this that you do not have with a partial home short term rental. The duplex use takes into account things with fire safety, things with, you know, in terms of how your electrical, all your utilities, it's typically two independent units, whereas a partial home short-term rental is not. So those are all conversations. And also typically I will say a duplex. The second unit, is equal in size or the same size? They're both similar in size. You don't have one that's smaller or subordinate to the other.

And then separate entrances from outside and all that? Yes. Okay.

Yep. So as we dig into this, this is going to be a huge part of our conversation. Partial home short-term rentals and duplexes are allowed. They exist. Some compliant, some non-compliant, some permitted, some unpermitted. Some we know about, some we don't. And so how do you then incorporate this new attached ADU with its own set of regulations, and how does it impact these other things?

Seems like it's the same thing that you could never police them.

Enforcement is going to be an issue as well. The toughest issue.

Will these be slides that will be sent to all of us? Yes. You're showing us now? Sure. Okay, good. Thank you.

The advanced wet bar versus the stove roll is also part of it. And do you get to areas, would this be throughout the town, or that was another significant point?

Yes, so 2019, the conversation was only to allow these in certain zoning districts.

Is that going to be fleshed out in this? Okay, great. It will be.

No, no, no. This is like, we're just barely... We're just getting paint on the paintbrush.

I'm sorry to get too inside baseball, but it got very specific.

Yes. This is just a very broad brush. We're going to dig in. Like I said, it's going to take several months to just dig in to where we've been to better understand how we can move it forward. Um... another zoning districts were contemplated in 2024. What was also contemplated was probably everyone on this board knows next head has a cap on habitable square footage, which is 5000 square feet. 3500 square feet is also a cap for lots that are less than 16,000 square feet in area. So one thought was if you're going to allow an attached ABU or a detached ADU, you've gotta have that 16,000 square feet or greater. But as we know, we already have partial home short-term rentals all over the west side that are not on lots that are 16,000 square feet or greater. So that's just something we have to navigate as part of this.

Yes.

I'm sorry. Yes. So to have a duplex, you have to have 22,500 square feet of lot area to have a duplex. Yep. Thank you.

And as well, we're the only town in their County without an ADU possibility.

I believe that's correct. Yes.

And I will say... And there's been a threat from the state to kind of do a big tent ADU move.

Absolutely, yes. So that's coming up. We've really talked about a lot of this already. Our public engagement that we had... Some of the more positive comments that we received, a majority felt like ADUs should be allowed. There was a preference for a long-term rental over short-term rental. There was a greater comfort with attached units than detached units. I think because we can already see what that looks like a little bit. Housing for family, workforce, and aging residents, that was something that people very much felt was needed. and the ability to earn income and remain in your home. What people were worried about was that this could potentially change Naxahat's character, allow additional density in single family areas, create septic issues, especially when it comes to enforcement and how can we enforce everything at all times. Parking, traffic, noise. absentee operation, so that's if we don't have an owner occupancy requirement, what happens there? If we put deed restrictions on there to require that it be a long-term rental, how does that affect property value moving forward? And how do we keep any ordinance moving forward fair? to the existing partial home short term rentals that we have. Things to think about. Is this town wide? Do we allow them east of 158? Do we only allow them in certain districts? Do we only allow them on lots with a minimum lot size? Attached or detached? Long term, short term, or both? In terms of the area, do we allow a percentage of the principal building, a fixed cap? A combination, a bedroom limit. As you saw that 2019 ordinance had a height limitation. Do we keep something like that in there? Do we require that it be owner or resident occupancy? Do we require shared utilities? Do we get into that conversation about deed restrictions? And then if we adopt anything that transition, what does it look like in terms of nonconformities? So in 2024, Senate Bill 382, the downzoning bill, played a big impact on where that 2024 ordinance went. There was some risk involved with that. So this Senate bill, or this law, states that downzoning includes decreasing any allowed density or reducing the permitted uses that somebody was afforded on their land. an ADU ordinance would expand development rights. So essentially, we wouldn't be taking anything away from anybody, we would be adding a potential use to it. So in that upzoning, there was a concern that as long as this downzoning bill is intact, if we were to approve an ADU ordinance, and after a year, We didn't get the parking right. We didn't require enough parking. We we saw something where we're like, oh, we need to reel that in. We need to scale it back. We need to make an adjustment. We would not be able to do that under this down zoning rule. So even though it said you can't down zone, there was a little bit of fear to up zone because if you don't get it right the first time, you can't go back. You can't reel it back in.

But at the same time, if the ADU policy that comes in from the state after this point, if something comes in, we don't have anything more restrictive in place, therefore we have to stick to their larger standards and it gives us less, possibly a less agreeable version.

It could. Yes.

Wait, I thought we would have to adopt the state's... Not unless there's something already in place locally.

Oh, okay. Is that correct?

I would have to look into that. I think if there were a statewide bill and we had something in place, we would probably have to, our attorney would have to look at that. We may have to succumb to the state bill.

But it would give us, it'd be a discussion.

Correct.

Instead of just having to go with, okay, as an example, the 65 foot or 57 foot rule throughout the state of North Carolina that we fell outside of, we're outside of it now, it seems like, right? But if we had something more restrictive in place for adus at least we have a version and we can say why we disagreeable with the state version correct it would give us something to say we already have an ordinance in place and and and we are aggrieved because we would be aggrieved if we had to yield to the larger state version we can say that i don't know that anyone is going to care but yeah how would that be in reverse with down zoning

So if what we already had in place was more liberal than what the state comes up with for ADUs, and we've already approved it, is the state forcing us into down zone?

So let me run through this very quickly, because I think this may help. There's pending state legislation that's out there, that's been out there for over a year, SB495 and SB291. They've essentially plateaued because there was this larger Senate bill, 445, I think it was called the Omnibus Bill. It had a lot of stuff in there. That bill would require at least one attached and one detached ADU by right. for every single family detached dwelling in a qualifying area. However, Governor Josh Stein signed this into effect August 2026, but as we know from our lobbyists that were there in Raleigh, they kind of gave us a heads up. There was a key provision that was included that applied to cities and towns with a population greater than 50,000 square feet. 50,000 residents, which we do not have. And then additionally, it exempted municipalities that are in the coastal CAMA area. So that has already been signed into law. That Senate bill that basically said if you are a single family dwelling in a single family district, are allowed by right. An ADU, both attached and detached. That is currently in place. It's set to go into effect January 2027, but we had this little caveat written in. So we are not We are outside of this due to the number of our population number as well as being a coastal county. So important to note, there has been a lot of activity at the state with people wanting ADUs to just be allowed carte blanche, no regulations, no nothing. You can't require that it be owner occupied. that one of the dwellings be owner occupied. You can't require one singular septic. You can't require shared utility. So that's already out there. So we gotta pass for this most recent one. But it doesn't mean that something else may not come up. And I do feel like if we had an ordinance in place, and some other legislation were to supersede ours, we would have a talking point. We would be able to say we have something in place. These were the restrictions. Here's where yours is different. At the end of the day, would that matter? I don't know that it would.

Has the town had any success in the past with broadly parallel issues where the town has been in court? and defended a position with any level of success against something like that.

I can't answer that. I apologize.

Because I feel like there, even, not just the town, but in other areas, that's a legal consideration, and that's where the specifics of the two versions of law, local, state, go into court, and it's hammered out, and sometimes it

really interesting things do come out of it and they are quite advantageous to one or the other perhaps it's administrative judges etc etc etc yeah most recently i will say and i guess this is what gives me pause our parking standard required parking stalls widths to be 10 feet so that was in place we've had that we've had that for 20 plus years the parking space had to be 10 feet wide. State legislation got introduced that said parking stalls, no municipality shall require a parking stall to be wider than nine feet. It didn't matter, we didn't get to keep our 10. We had to go to nine. Same thing when they're arguing you can't regulate based upon the number of bedrooms. Can't regulate architecture based upon the number of bedrooms. That's when we had to punt to the 3,500 and 5,000 square feet. I won't say that having something in place, if the state proposes or adopt something less restrictive. I don't know that we can argue that, but it can't hurt to have it, I would say.

So it's a raincoat on a rainy day, perhaps. You're still gonna get wet, maybe.

You might. I think this is one of my, the last slide. Central question. is bigger than should we simply allow ADUs, we need to think about what problem are we trying to solve? Family flexibility, multi-generational living quarters, aging in place, things like that, workforce housing, and inequity in the existing rental rules, short-term versus long-term, or all three. Should attached and detached units be treated differently? How would ADUs relate to partial home short-term rentals and duplexes? What are our essential safeguards and which may be vulnerable to state preemption? So we've already seen how that could happen. We got a little pass this time, but it doesn't mean that we will again. And how much uncertainty is acceptable when future local correction may be difficult under 382? So what are we comfortable moving forward with knowing that we can't rein it back in? So those are really important questions, things that we should all be thinking about and over the course of the next couple of months, we'll dive in deeper and talk about those. And I think that's just my last slide, just history, 2019, 2014, why it was paused. And then today coming to you to start the process of getting the ball rolling again, trying to get some momentum on a new proposed draft.

So. So SB 382, that's the down zone.

It is OK. And so, like I said, this was just more informational when we leave here today. By the end of the week, I will send everybody this presentation and I will send you the efforts from 2019 and 2024 We do have a chart that we compiled in 2024 that talks about what all the other townships, Kill Devil Hills, Kitty Hawk, Southern Shores, Doc Manio, what they allow.

Deer County too.

Deer County as well, yep. It has not been updated to 2026. That will be something we'll have to undertake.

2024 also, 17th and the 18th of September, we had the public hearings.

that information will be in there as well yes thank you for saying that yes all the public engagement will be included that those public hearings were maybe my favorite public hearings or the favorite in community response we've ever had because it was it wasn't It wasn't fractious at all. It was very clear how much misunderstanding there was on what we have in place and how the law meets what is or isn't being done. There's just a ton of misunderstanding.

It was an opportunity to separate fact from rumor.

With an idea of we were, at the time, we were trying to create something that would allow allow things to become compliant that are ongoing and non-compliant correct right we also learned that an evening public hearing is exponentially better attended than a morning it was it was interesting to see people change sides yeah people came in on one side of the discussion completely change sides and leave the room converted and that, and it wasn't that anybody was trying to convert everybody. It was just the free share of information. The information shared changed their minds. Absolutely.

And the comments after the meeting was over and we're all mixing and mingling and people stay, the comments and the interchange between board members and, and the public citizens coming in was phenomenal. I learned so much just from that informal, give and take. So it's, um, it's a lot to take in that you're going to read at that public hearing.

Did it end up most of the people who were in favor of ADUs?

Yes.

Okay. But we didn't go forward because of three 82. Correct. All right. So now we're back here because the board commissioner said, keep it on the plan.

And also, also we have a different makeup of the BOC.

it was a three to two vote and a three and that's, that's as close as it gets. Yeah. Yeah.

I'm curious, how many houses do you think could actually hold an, uh, that with the, an ADU with also including the septic, like even if it was a separate septic system on the lot, cause that takes up, I mean, I feel like all the houses that I know about, The lot is pretty much maxed out.

Some are. Joe did run some GIS analysis with some of that information, which will be included in your packet. But what you could see is a home, a five bedroom home with septic capacity four or five bedroom maybe they choose to remove reallocate one of those bedrooms from their home to a detached adu or even an attached below or there's always the option if somebody's already maxed out with where they are today they It's expensive, but if they want to do it, they can explore going to an advanced system to provide more septic capacity to offset some type of ADU.

There was a really cool application that we had. A gentleman who was buying an existing house, he was moving into the area and he was looking at creating space so that it would be able to long-term rent to someone and he wanted something that was very parallel to an ADU. And it hit a sweet spot in this already existing, all I have to redo is move a wall or reconfigure utilities so that I could have a secondary stove. And it was no, no, no down the line because you can't have two stoves. You can have as many sinks as you want. Bathrooms are up in the air. Bedrooms are prescribed. We have one stove policy. Why is that? that's that is adus when it really if i were to come up with any one issue in this whole mountain of information single stove roll is it yes and i think that served us well in the past it does not serve us well now at all and that's kind of there's so much more on the field with right yes do you have a really wet bar or is a wet bar with you know a hot plate. A hot plate's okay, but a stove is. So it's really gray. At this point, if you have an air fryer and a hot plate...

You can see everything has advanced so much since the days when we said, well, we're not going to approve a 220 electrical connection downstairs because you can't have your stove. We're we're so far past that now. Yeah.

Yeah. An air fryer. is a convection oven. A hot plate is a little stove. So when you have the two, guess what you have?

You've got a stove. And really, the interest on a lot of our point was let's try to have what we, let's get fire code in front of this and make everything safer so we don't have issues for residents and everyone else.

To Brad's point, I'm certainly not noted for my powers of clairvoyance, but as far as detached ADUs go, when you take out all the properties that wouldn't have room to even build a detached structure, much less additional septic, and you just focus in on the ones that do have the room. Okay, that's great. Where's the return on investment for the cost of building a detached ADU? Because you're going to have to maintain, obviously, all the, it's going to have to meet all the same building specifications that the primary home does. And if you build something that is 800 square feet, I mean, it could cost upwards of $300,000. And where's your return on investment on that if, in fact, you are providing affordable housing?

Right. And that comes into play significantly, the long term and the short term. Because a lot of what we heard was an interest for perhaps someone with a really nice single family dwelling, principal dwelling. They wanted to build this detached ADU for them to go live in and rent out the main house.

And the other thing that has really since the first iteration of this to now workforce housing that was very much in the room with them, with the hearing that we had in and It never goes away and it's never really discussed, but that may be the best version of this brought forward as a partial resolution of some of the issues because we would make it okay to do things that realistically people are doing presently.

So back to the 2019 2-3 vote, I know that was a long time ago, was the opposition all about SB 382 primarily, or?

No, in 2019, i think the primary concerns were just that wasn't even there correct okay so in 2019 it was um just concern about community character concern about density and concern that we had not had enough public engagement to really involve enough of the community there was also only involving the beach road nothing west of the beach road so it would only the only place where any cottage courts would have been

included in that iteration would have been east of the bypass nothing on the bypass or west also speaking to the density portion of this if you build an accessory dwelling unit whether it be attached or detached

and you continue to live there and one person or two people rent that, okay, your density has increased. But on my street alone, there have been two houses sold in the last two years, and in those two houses, the seller was a couple and four people moved into the house. So the density doubled overnight just by the sale of the home and where there was one car at one house, there's now three cars at that house.

This is, this is kind of that application that I was speaking of. This gentleman was looking at buying a vacation home that he wasn't going to be in all the time. And if he could have a longterm rental in there, they'd keep an eye on things for him. He'd get some income from him to defray some of his costs, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, and he would still have the vacation home that they could come in and be in now and then. And that was his, as I remember, his version of the application. As a family, also as the kids move out, reprogram the space into something so that they are living in an expensive area, and now they can get some payback into the property.

Is density generally capped based on how many people can be tied to one septic system on one property? So if my septic system will allow for eight people to be in my house full time, but only two are living there, me and my wife. And 12 months out of the year, it's just, I mean, 10 months out of the year, it's just the two of us. And the other two months we have the place loaded with family and friends. Point being is the density is still allowed for eight people.

Correct. Yes.

And so if only two are basically living there full time, And then we rent out a room, partial, whatever, for a long term. We haven't increased the density that's allowed for that area. So if we have two people, a husband and wife, renting space from us legally, full time, in our house, we're still at 50% of the capacity. We haven't increased the density. We only increase the density when we permanently are having more than eight people on that septic system.

Is that correct? Yes, I agree with what you said. But density is very tricky, and I think people have differing ideas of what density is. is versus the perception of it, how it presents in a neighborhood character. So you're going to hear density in a lot of different ways.

What Dave talked about was there were four people living in that house.

But they're full-time.

Three cars.

Right, full-time.

Full-time as opposed to the two full-time people that sold that house. So that's more people using it than before.

And it's more cars.

More cars.

And it's more trash generation. So...

but is that increasing density?

For some people, in their opinion of what density looks like, perhaps.

My point is just to try to clarify, what is density? Subjective.

It really is. And that was really the difference between the 2019 version and the 2024 version, is SDRs really fleshed it out and took another chunk right out of the middle of it, and it became...

very gradient oriented everything you just discussed with the short-term rental has always been fine so in 2024 we stopped because of sp 382 but had had the planning board gotten to the same level of detail as 2019 yes okay we had very different ordinance um no they were similar in a lot of ways um

We had created new definitions. We had, I mean, it wasn't ready to go to public hearing, but we had a good, we had a good draft.

Because I was going to say, what little we just saw of the 2019 version looked pretty palatable to me. And if it's now about changing public perception and desires,

i think we've already got a good framework we're not ready to go there yet but between 2019 and 2024 it sounds like this board had some pretty good product out there to work from i think both were great efforts i will go so far as to say that the planning board was surprised that we got turned down two three that was that was it and the amount of effort that was those were long hearings we in fact we changed the way we work because of those hearings like we were every day every time we came in we were meeting on adus and i might add now that we're looking at this maybe with some fresh eyes at 2026 a lot has changed since 2019 we have gone through covid where everybody wanted to have an adu

everybody wanted to have an Airbnb of some sort in their home or somewhere. And now what I've been hearing and what I see on the Airbnb Facebook site is that they're not being rented because it's oversaturated market. The problems in having weekly rentals in and out of your living space have been monumental to the point where people are just they're over it they just don't want to deal with it anymore and now that we're looking at 2026 and we're still struggling with workforce housing i feel like it might be a very different conversation. And I can guess that almost everybody on this board might be facing with an aging parent that they're having to. I'm just aging. I'm just aging. I don't need a parent. I'm aging. I'm the parent. I'm the parent. I mean, I just feel like there is a lot of need for multigenerational families taking care of each other. It's very, very helpful to have something in your home.

I'm just remembering so much about that big meeting. Yeah.

I will say just to make things even more confusing.

Thank you.

Yes. Talking about inequity and fairness. So right now you can have a partial home short term rental that you can rent out for less than 30 days, and that's fine. But if you choose to rent it out long term and it's two independent households, more than 30 days, by definition, you're a duplex. And if you're not on a lot that's 22,500 square feet in area, it's a violation. So that is a huge inequity, that is a problem that we have recognized and has to be part of the conversation.

And I just consulted Google on exactly that same question, that's what I was tapping out, and Google says it's legal in Nags Head. And I agree with you, because that's what we talked about, but we're shaving ice here.

I will say that of that three to two vote, Of those three that voted no, density was a major concern for two of those votes. So it is important, and that was my point in bringing this up, it is important to really define what is density. All of us have to be in agreement that we understand what density is. Because a lot of the people in the public hearing were very concerned about density. But to each one of them, the density definition would have been different. And that's what I read on that vote. Density was a major concern for two of those no votes. So I just want to point that out to you. As you do the research and we move forward on this, it's time that we prepare for a good presentation to the Board of Commissioners, hopefully by October, that we're ready to give you something that you can really understand and agree to.

Two things on final. Density in neighborhoods, character. Absolutely, those things. But also, three of the members of the planning board are now on the board of commissioners. And those three members went through all of this with us. And so they're going to be very, very much on their front foot. And I think they voted in the majority with the planning board on that. Amazing. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

So it's, I feel like there, we have sentimental years, but the biggest thing we got to figure out where the holes are.

Well, and that gives us this opportunity. We are at a wonderful point now where we have more receptive ears at the board level and I'm speaking openly. that i think um we have a shot at this finally after all these years because we're the only ones that don't have adus only ones understand okay all right are you done i'm sorry

I am done with that, but I do have my director's report.

Well, thank you very much for this, Kelly. It's been very helpful and informative. I didn't know an AD from a hole in the ground. Now I've at least had a small one.

Oh, you're going to learn so much.

No, it really was helpful.

Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Thank you, basically. I agree with that.

Okay. That was wonderful. Thank you. Planning and Development Director's Reports.

Yes. So again, we have July and August. I am just going to try to hit the high spots of these. Obviously, there's no need to go over the things that occurred in this board. So for Board of Adjustment, this was the July director's report. We did not have any Board of Adjustment hearings in June. But we did have two appeals, one in July, one in August. The one in July was related to a property down on Pelican Street, the private street, and the application of the front yard reduction requirements. In that scenario, the Board of Adjustment agreed to uphold or affirms staff's determination on how that front yard reduction should be applied. And in the August, meeting, you'll see some information that our August appeal with the Board of Adjustment was also from Pelican Street, and it was related to a permit denial that I had issued for demolition of a shared walkway. A lot of history behind it. Pelican Street is a private street. There is an active HOA. In 2011, a boardwalk was constructed going within the access easement of the roadway over the beach for the use of the people as part of Pelham Park subdivision. But we had received an application, someone who was one of the 13 owners, wanted to demo the walkway. And so I had denied that permit. It was appealed. It went before the BOA, and the BOA did uphold staff's determination to deny the permit. So a lot of BOA has been going on, a lot of appeals. So I did want to mention that to you because we don't often have BOA, but I guess when it rains, it pours. So back to that. The Septic Health Advisory Committee, so they did meet at the end of July. At that time, we had a lot of discussion on the Division of Water Infrastructure 0% loan. Since then, everything has been tied up, taken care of, we're good to go. Joe got the letter out to all of the vulnerable properties that we talked about, those at high risk. So those letters have gone out. That wasn't captured in this, but today it has gone out. We've updated some of our outreach. We had the flyer. We also had some giveaways that Connor's been handing out at the farmer's market. And we've had an updated magnet dedicated to essentially what should go down your drain and what should not go down your drain. We're trying to get that out to the rental properties now. So as I said, Joe provided a update on the estuarine shoreline management plan. If you're interested in that, maybe he can step up once I'm done and give you more information on that. Dowdy Park is just in full swing. It's actually winding up, to be honest. We still have our fitness days on Tuesday and Friday. wagging wednesday the dog park that came to a close last week but we do still have our concerts ongoing and this coming thursday is their final summer farmers market so things are starting to wrap up but we also have things planned for fall so um just keep an eye out for all of that um I'm gonna just pop open our August report just to see if there's anything in here that I need to mention. environmental planner to give some updates on closing out the fiscal year for the septic health initiative let's see here town completed 190 septic inspections issued 158 water bill credits and facilitated 10 septic repair loans so increased activity along the way which was which was wonderful and I think that's it I will note we do have our so we previously we had a part-time seasonal events assistant and now we have a part-time year-round events assistant her name is Erica Rohrabacher and She's been with us several weeks now, and she has been just a huge help to both staff and to Paige as far as these events go. So if you haven't seen her yet, I'm sure you will.

Thank you, Kelly. Absolutely. Appreciate that. Okay. Planning board members agenda. I would like to start with Brad. and see if there are anything that you would like to share with the board, ideas or whatever.

Well, I know when I first came on, we were talking about the cord, the sound side area in Nags Head, and a lot has come up since then, and it's kind of been pushed back or not really been discussed much. So I don't know, I just was thinking how the boardwalks out there still kind of just go to nothing. They're not, they go and they just kind of end. And I still feel like it would be nice if they connected down to Tanger Outlets and whatnot. But I totally understand that it's not a priority at this moment.

Isn't that the isn't that the plan, though, eventually for it to connected to the Nags Head Outlet Center?

It is and it is it's not not a priority. It's still on our strategic plan. The boardwalk element. Now staff is at a place in terms of the text amendments that we were talking about with regard to enhancing that area. Those just have to be drafted and brought back to you. So we're kind of taking it in two pieces. One is the text amendments and then the boardwalk. So they're both ongoing and they both have momentum.

Awesome. Thanks for that.

You'll see the court again, if not September, maybe September, October.

Anything else, Brad? No.

I think I have two items. I was glad to see in the Board of Commissioners meeting that the connection from Carolista Drive to Soundside Road is ongoing. And I saw that they wanted to see a plan in place. I think precisely around Jockey's Ridge. I think that's the trickiest part of the connection. So I'm glad to see that moving forward. But I ride my bike a lot. So I've noticed I go past Blue Moon often, and I've noticed that their building next door to them that they were going to use as the waiting area, that they've repainted that now to match the existing Blue Moon building. And now I've noticed that the other building south of, I didn't know that they had acquired both of those buildings south of the barn. Now the barn has been painted blue. So I was just curious because it wasn't accepted, their idea of having it as a waiting area for the main restaurant. And I've seen several trucks in and out of there dropping off equipment. And so something's happening. I was just curious. I haven't heard any. I was almost expecting when I got the agenda for this meeting that there would be something on there about the Blue Moon. Because I was just curious as to what was happening with that project.

So as you know, like you had stated, the request for the waiting area was denied. And we hadn't heard from them for quite some time, but we received a, we had something called a change of tenant, change of use application that you can file online. And so we received one of those, and it was for that address. 101, the dove. It's Haven on the Banks. Right, the one right next to it. Just south of there. Stating that they wanted to change the use of that building to a restaurant. And so I reached out to the property owner to ask for some additional information as far as septic. and the floor plan for the proposed restaurant, because my recollection was that the septic was not adequate for a restaurant, which is what had precipitated a lot of our conversation. And the health department had issued them a permit for a 26-seat restaurant, but those seats were bar seats. which are assigned a septic capacity that's only half of what would be assigned to a, like your traditional sit-down restaurant seat. And so my response back to them was to explain how the bar seat design met the definition of a restaurant for zoning purposes, given that 75% of the seating had to be full service sit down dining and I have not received that yet. So I, I'm aware that work is going on and they do have permits for some interior remodel. Um, but the use at this point, I think they are leaning towards trying to have it function as a restaurant. Um, but today we've not been given information that shows that it would be a restaurant that is compliant with zoning standards.

That was just curious. There's such a successful business and I hope that something can happen to help them since they've acquired these buildings. That was just curious.

It's ongoing. I don't have an answer. I feel like there's movement on their end. I feel like they're trying to coordinate maybe some redesign with the septic or some things like that.

I have one more thing. Yeah, Nags Head Pier is supposed to open this week.

Yes.

And we're really looking forward to it. It's right by our house. Oh, yeah.

They have worked so hard. Yeah, well, he opened up the fishing pier today.

Yeah.

Well, I saw him on Friday. He said he was... I was hoping Thursday. I was hoping maybe Thursday.

For them to try to acquire staffing for their restaurant, it's such a hard time when every business is losing employees.

I have a feeling Rob and Susie are going to be doing a lot of the meetings.

Can I insert one more thing? I apologize, Joe reminded me. And it's because we didn't go through the director's report. So another, like the top priority on your strategic plan, I didn't go through it line by line. Had I gone through it line by line, I would have caught this. But the number one priority on our strategic plan was the update of our parks and recreation plan. And so Joe most recently put together an RFQ that's been out there for about two, three weeks now. He is getting a lot of questions, a lot of inquiries. He's updated the addendum to the RFQ. He's anticipating getting the final packets in on the 28th, August 28th. So based upon talking with Joe and what's happened, we should have a lot of packets coming in from design firms hoping to work on our parks and recreation plans.

What is RFQ again?

Request for Qualifications. Yep. So that's exciting. I'm sorry. I should have mentioned that.

I didn't mean to miss that. Sorry. I was really excited.

I missed it. Yes, sir.

A couple of things. One Saturday landing was better all the time they're doing. It's it's really been interesting how the relationship between their county as the leaser of the recreation there of town property have kind of improved it incrementally over time. Sprinklers are still kind of an issue. It's really weird to watch sprinklers turn on while it's raining. More water in the drainage is always an issue in every neighborhood, especially if we have a lot of rain. That's something that I'm always a little bit I thought it was understood. It is great now that the lights shut out at night, more dark skies in neighborhoods is kind of something that I do really like, especially with as much celestial activity that's been going on recently with different meteor showers and such. Is there a possibility, this is a DOT question, At the end of the summer season, are there, you know, a question to emergency services through NAGCED hotspots? You know, are there access, are there areas that we can look at for, where there are accessibility problems, accidents, areas where we have more traffic accidents that we might be want to be more aware of where we're reviewing some of these issues with development. I know that's something that does kind of come up, but we are always kind of on the back foot. And I'm wondering whether a activity report might be kind of cool just to get from the fire department. And I never thought of it in the past.

Sure, so a minute note, it sounds like perhaps something like a joint effort, police, fire, EMS, like if we can pull something together from everyone. It's something that I will at least put in writing, mention to our town manager, because it's probably good information for everybody.

Thank you.

Okay.

Basil?

Kelly, the lot at across from Jockey's Bridge, the 4.7 acre lot at Hallowell on 58 has sold recently.

Yes.

And I know it's very near and dear to my heart with everything that happened there. But anything that's going to happen there has to be in the C5.

compliance right yes and we'll see anything that's going to go in there is that correct yes you will any type of commercial development new commercial construction would come before this board okay so you yeah you will see it i'm sorry i didn't hear the location it's a it's a big lot of

across from Jockey's Ridge State Park at the corner of Hollowell. That's Carol Lista as well. And 158. Okay. It's a almost five acre lot that several years ago, that's where Dare County and Woda Cooper Company were proposing to build some affordable housing.

I remember that.

Did they get preliminary like drawings or anything or any kind of request for permitting for any? I heard they're doing a museum and a restaurant type of thing.

So we haven't seen any drawings thus far. We've had multiple meetings with John Harris and his team on potentially a a museum sort of the regalo museum first in flight as well as some type of restaurant we know that's what they were looking at but they've not submitted anything formally i think one piece of that one part of the conversation was their vision for the museum was going to be to mimic a glider or something like that, and it was going to be very difficult for them to meet our architectural design standards. So they had gone back to think about that a little bit more.

Anything else, Beth? Yes, sir.

Beth? I'm not sure this really comes under our jurisdiction right off the bat, About end of June, I think, everybody got a email from Catherine Overstreet. Valerie and I both responded to her about the possibility of maybe the arts and the culture looking into the troll sculptures that are done. And I didn't know if that would come before us or would it be better for her to approach the Committee of Arts and Culture. I mean, they're gorgeous. I've seen them in Raleigh and I saw them in Maine. And one thing that really impressed me is that it brings out a lot of community support. They get lots of volunteers and it really pulls a lot of the towns together. I know the one in Raleigh is actually five. It's like a family. And the one in Maine that I saw was seven. And it's phenomenal. And I did question about the elements, but her daughter did some research and talked about that they generally last was it seven to ten seven to ten years but she said um the overwhelming part was just the community involvement people just want to be part of it so and i there again i don't know if that would come before us or whether she should maybe contact paige

So Paige was included on the emails.

Yeah, okay.

And Paige has had some conversations. I think Paige did reach out to her.

Oh, good.

And the Art and Culture Committee is involved. So I don't, that's not to say that there's any... Oh, yeah, but I'm glad she's in the right avenue. And there are things like that. I will say that was one request, one that actually came directly to the Art and Culture Committee. um was a someone had requested that we consider putting a wind foam somewhere within the town of knagshed and we are pursuing that currently oh cool so we'll update on that okay anything else yeah okay okay you're on uh you know i'll just reiterate what

Most everybody has heard me say many times, there is no better place to live than Nags Head, North Carolina. And anything that I can do to continue to improve Nags Head is my pleasure and is my passion. I would add to that that government in general, and I'm not considering the planning board as governmental, because we're not elected, we're appointed, but elected government, their primary function is reactionary. Laws are passed based on something that has happened, not something that is going to happen. Our job as a board, while there is some reactionary, when someone comes before us with a plan, we have to react to that plan But our job here is more visionary than reactionary. And the Board of Commissioners and to a greater extent the town relies on us to be the visionaries and things like ADUs and CORD and parks and rec and all these different things. That responsibility to look, be forward thinking and look down the road that falls to us and i think that is a pretty awesome responsibility that this board has while we only do this once a month there's a lot to think about and it can have a lot of long-term repercussions and hopefully the decisions that we make make it continue to make a better place to live and that's my only agenda Very well said. Thank you.

And we do appreciate your efforts.

Thank you.

But speaking of efforts, I want to just conclude by saying, first of all, to Kelly and Joe, this presentation, particularly on ADUs, I know, I know. But you're all part of a team. And it was wonderful. It was excellent. Thank you for going back and getting this and putting this together in such a format that even I can understand. I do thank you for that. And two questions. Pickleball. It looks like there's some activity down there where the pickleball courts are going to be next to this outside.

They have likely gotten some land disturbance permits in place. I will double check that. Okay.

Yeah, they are. They are moving forward.

Yeah, it looks like that. It's going to be exciting. And then the building that was just knocked down, the BB&T building, that went down very quickly. It's just amazing how fast that was gone. What's the story as far as that EM station going to go in?

So they are moving ahead quickly. Obviously, the demo we've got the building plans under review currently. So I imagine they're going to be ready to roll with construction as soon as possible. In the meantime, our the gym that was in that building for the town has been relocated to one of the bays and fire station 16. while we await for it to be relocated into the new fitness center being constructed right now, right across the way.

And the completion date for that?

Maybe end of September, first of October. Dave Ryan might kill me for saying that. Wonderful.

Thank you very much.

You brought something into my head. There is the property, the potential next fire station. What's the timeline look like on that?

i know what you're talking about sort of that campus the town hall campus plan and i do not i have fallen off that conversation it's not even in potential plans but we the town did buy the property a while ago five to seven years well not so this is south of the post office on the on the west side of the bypass

It's a big chunk of property.

Ten acres. It was owned by, I think, the Methodist Church, United Methodist Church. And there was some conceptual plans, sort of envisioning, sort of town hall campus re-envisioning, you know, what town hall, police, fire, what everything would look like. And I know that it was, you know, like a ten-year-plus plan. um funding was going to be a big part of that but i don't know i don't know where we're at with that okay well i think we're wrapping this up dave i'm going to make a motion i know i know i know

Well, you guys gotta remember that