Planning and Zoning - Regular Meeting

City of Nagish Planning and Zoning Commission meeting. Uh we have a technically this is a reszone we have tonight. So it would be introduced if it uh it'll be introduced at the next meeting uh of the city council November the 10th. Final passage will be on November the 24th. Um technically on November the 10th it's for introduction only. There'll be no discussions. I would suggest the applicant or the design show up on the 10th in case somebody shows up then who says they can't be here on the 24th because well that that will be Thanksgiving week madam director. Is that what that is? So it's very easily somebody could show up on the 10th and say I can't be here on the 24th because I'm visiting my kids. Sometimes they let them talk, sometimes they don't. We don't have anything that would be appealed. Uh Richmond's if y'all sign at least on the way out. uh if you didn't sign on the way in just so we have a record. Whoever's going to come forward, please identify yourself uh speak directly into the mic. Our next meeting is Tuesday, December the 2nd right here. Any other comments? That's Roman numeral one. Anything else, Madame Director?

No, sir. Roll call is Roman numeral 2. Roman numeral two. Roll call. Miss Brenda, Miss Oaks, whichever y'all's going to do it. Anita Deo here. Bobby Clayborn here. Isaac Lewis here. Michael Lewis here. Charles Whitehead III here. Alexa Bernard Condandy here. Ricky Mallister here. Walter Johnson here. All right, we've got a quorum. Is that a full count for the first time in a while? It has been a while. How about that?

Roman numeral three. Three. We're going to defer the uh approval of the meetings till next time. Uh I would let everybody know that the uh videos from uh all city meetings are available on the Nagash website, Nagash city website. Uh we're going to go straight into uh number four, old business subsection A. The city council denied the application by Julie Hule and Chantel Hule to reszone the following location. Uh I guess that's lot three of the Harvey Landram subdivision on the north side of St. Maurice Lane from R1 to R1 special exception to operate a short-term rental at 720 St. Maurice. Uh we'll swing back to that at at the end

u for comments from the director. Roman number four subsection B to city council approved by application by Glenn and Sheree Moffett to reszone the following location lot 2B of the Nolly Street town homes as shown on a map slide 403B of the records of Nage Parish Louisiana from R1 to R1 special exception the reason operation of a short-term rental 20114 Nollie Street uh that is all of the old business madam director it is

Roman numer dispense with the description uh of how we go by this process since it doesn't appear we have anybody to speak anybody anybody but the applicant uh or their designate Roman numeral 5 new business subsection A the application by Mr. Walter LDAR to reszone the following location a lot containing 0.438 acres as shown as track 2A on a plat by Mr. Robert Lynn Davis, professional land surveyor, dated September the 8th, 2021. Recorded in map slide 834B of the records of Nagish Parish, Louisiana from R1 to R1 special exception. The reason is to operate a short-term rental Washington street council person district number four, exhibit number one in commissioner's packet. Uh uh comments by the director.

No, this is a a usual standard short-term rental application. They've provided all the documentation that we've required stating who they are, who's going to be responsible for the maintenance of the property. We have a diagram that shows the layout of the property. It shows adequate parking. It meets all of our requirements for a short-term rental. All right. Any comments from the 300 foot letters? I haven't received any comments, no opposition or any one question in the application. And and if I'm not mistaken, this is in the city uh historic district. Is that correct? It is. It's just outside the landmark district, but in the city historic district. Correct. M. Richmond, if you'll identify yourself and tell us who you represent.

Kathy Richmond for Walter Dar. You heard the comments by uh the director about Mr. Dar's application and the lack of opposition to it. Uh can you just tell us very briefly what Mr. Dar plans to do, although it see appears to be self-evident? Uh yes, he is. they have it as a second home and it it's it is for sale right now. Um but he would like to go ahead and have it approved for um short-term rental because he you know they live in Texas and um want to put it on Airbnb. Did you hear have you heard any feedback at all uh from any of the neighbors? No, none and we're we're a block away um so I have not.

Any questions for Ms. Richmond from commission members? Which one of these properties is this? It's actually right here and it's down here. This is a hill. Well, that's that place that goes down the hill down here. That that little office building, the buddy lighthouse is right about here. And then that restaurant t

You can get your phone back at the end of the meeting. Yes. [laughter] Have to hold it for a week. Any questions for Miss Ms. Richmond by commission members. I move we approve. Well, second. Motion's been made to approve. Second. All in favor say I. All oppose like sign. All right. You heard my comments about November 10th. Really not supposed to do anything. Passed on the 24th. Uh you know, Mr. Richmond, you get silenced once again. I was going to give you an opportunity to speak, but a but a strong but a strong but a strong woman got out ahead of you. I'm good. Thank you, Richard.

But can I still give you my phone? No, I'll just give you We'll swap. Thank you. That's all for new business. That is Roman numeral six report of office activities. Uh you have any real report? No real report. Can you tell us what what happened? Why one of these got approved and one didn't? Uh, you know, my thoughts were I haven't looked at it. Mr. Harrington sent me uh something. I haven't had a chance to look at it, which sounds to me like they want these things to be closer to the historic district.

Well, that was his idea. And I guess my idea about the whole thing, we did months and months of deliberation over how to do the short-term rental. So, if they wanted it specifically to the historic district, then they should have said that. But to me, Nollie Street's a hell of a lot further away from the district. That's the point I was about to make. It is certainly from the from the national district. And I guess where is the state? Where's the city district in over there by Bayu Jacko? Yes. Right around there. But that's still three times the distance that St. Maurice was. Correct. Cuz it's right there. Right around Bayou Jacko. the triangle right there is where the local district ends.

And even though there was no opposition to the application, um, from my understanding, the reasoning behind it, he did not want to open doors to allow short-term rentals in that area, even though the whole strip of St. Mary's Lane is all rentals. All rentals. And you know, as as far as a single mile strip goes, they've been the most vocal I've seen of any single mile in the 15 years I've been on this thing. Right. Anytime we come out and say if they got something to say, they come out and say,

right? So, no one came out. No one opposed it. So, for us, we did what we were supposed [snorts] to do. Even though we were it was said that we didn't have any guidance on this particular application, which I vocalized that we did. We did. And I just I just think the market's going to take care of the bad operators and the marginal ones. I mean, we'll note that that one they want to do on Parkway. I think if it hadn't sold, it's under contract to sell as a single family residence. So, I mean, you know, some people are going to use it as a stop gap. And I think, you know, unlike the DAR, I think they're using it as a stop gap until they can sell it. Correct. But I mean, you know, most people are not going to get in that business,

right? But my thing is most, and I think someone made the comment before that if you look at all of the places that are short-term rentals or Airbnbs or bed and breakfast, they are maintained and kept up better than just a single residential piece of property. I mean, you have a ton of single family residential properties, but they're not being maintained. They're not being kept up to to code. You know, the beauty of that is social, which I hate social media, but those Airbnb and all that kind of stuff. You know, you get four or five bad reviews and you might as well they're going to shut you down. You better spend some money on it and be able to put renovated in 2025 so that if there any old comments,

uh, you can always point to that was is it Eddie? That's Eddie district. What's that? That's that's Harington district. I guess it would be Heritage because well is it I think he said it was his district because Councilman Washington because because Neielson ends about St. Clair, doesn't it? Mhm. Right. Roughly. Roughly because Councilman Washington made the comment that

that was his district and he didn't want to allow it in his his district then he had the right to oppose it. But I still don't agree with that comment. I don't either because he's basically saying, "Okay, it's okay if if I don't want it, but if you don't want it, it's not okay." And that's just Well, you know, it goes back to the old deal about our people in the Congress. You represent the United States and you represent your district. It's a fine line. And then you go up there and represent yourself. Well, that's that's what's happening there. Yeah, that's what's happening right now. But the court I [laughter] don't care. I don't agree with it either. I don't

So anyway, that's that's what make it not fair to us as commissioners, too. But we did what we did. When we doing our part, then you need to do your part as a council person. They not. Well, it's sort of like Chantel and I were having this discussion about these tiny home deals. I don't think that's the way to go. But I think we need to do it and get couple of dozen of them out there and see how it impacts. And if it doesn't work out, we just repeal it and let the 14 or so 20 or so that we approve just live through that. But I bet you can't uh you can't just automatically get in the party and know you got to try something.

He's got them substandard launch. Does he have any more he could develop over there for them tiny homes rand? No. I mean the thing about it though with our tiny homes, our minimum lot size is 7200 ft. Who wants to put a 400 square foot building on a piece of land that's 7200 square ft and and that's it. What's going to end up happening? you have these substandard lots that you can divide that that's not 7200 ft² but it'll be big enough to put a tiny home on I wonder so then we need to have done a good job over there since we don't know if y'all been over there but ran building all those and that whole area in there he's done a good job of Oh yeah

remember we did those let's [clears throat] put one of them tiny homes on St. CL. Let's see how it go. Never have. That should be I guess some of the things that we need to be on that far end. Do we allow them be the place they used to duck hunt when I was in high school and they all shocked and they all shocked that the marsh is uh flooded. Come on. One of the restrictions though for the placement because in our ordinance it states that the approval of a tiny home is left to our discretion in the planning and zoning office. And one of the things that we don't want to see happen, someone bringing an application for an already established neighborhood like St. Clair.

Right. We are off record right now. No, we we got to be on record. We're live. Okay. We're live. We can't we got a quorum and we're talking so we got to be on record. Yeah. But that that that's my biggest concern too, you know, that we don't put these tiny homes in established neighborhood, you know, unless it's uh well, unless it's Elizabeth and that over there that are already substandard. Correct. You got Elizabeth and then Bailey Height, part of Bailey Heights, actual Bailey Heights that were uh done right after World War II that were all about 5200 5,500 square feet.

And so this would be I'd be perfectly happy to try some of that. try something in there in an established subdivision because we got to do something. We got to do something in those things. They they they don't meet the minimum square footage. But, you know, unfortunately, I'm not sure. Maybe Elizabeth and Harvey. Elizabeth and what's the other one over there? U that runs parallel to East Fit. It's Elizabeth and one other one, but you know, try it over there. Um, but anyway, that's the one going to Trinity Church, right? Can't think of the name of it.

But two of Elizabeth [clears throat] and there's one other and then Smith, but it was all done under a VA type post World War II, you know, back before they had lawnmowers. You know, before you go to Otesco or Western Auto and buy a lawnmower, nobody wanted more than about 5,000 square feet. So I think what we should do as a commission though is to come up with what we want to say will be restrictions, [clears throat] not allowing them in established neighborhoods, coming up with where we would say or suggest they may be and then stating the obvious that every application will be subject to an individual review approved. Yes, that's right. Yes, I agree with that.

So our next meeting is here. Yeah. Are there any smaller grocery chains that are looking to come in? I got one thing that I've been doing lately. I go to Walmart. I get the prep package. I take it to the scale up front and the weight is always off sometime as much as 2 and 12bs because everything is getting sent preacked. Mhm. And pre-marked. So I put it on I put it in my grocery cart. I go up front and I put it on the scale. Mhm. And the weights don't match.

Tyler Towns might want to talk to you. You might sound like you might have a check coming your way. [laughter] But uh there's, you know, with the other grocery stores, you know, consolidating and Super One's the only big boy in town. Yep. You know, there there's nobody with a actual meat uh meat processing portion in the store. And unfortunately, had someone stepped in to buy Piggly Wiggly, then they would have had at least some type of competition. But the company that bought Piggly Wiggly was actually bought by Super One. That's what I was about to tell you. That's what happened.

We're seeing it uh you know, I'm seeing it in New Orleans and Baton Rouge. The little small one or two mom and pop deals are getting bought out by the big one. Rouse has just bought one of them out and another one bought some other ones out that's near where my kid lived. One where my sister-in-law lives. Uh, you know, it's just it's not just here, Bobby. They just all getting sucked up. When you look at at how much money is being ripped off to the consumer just because we don't check. How many of us, you know, we buy stuff that's already prepackaged, pre uh weighed, pre uh priced and uh if it don't add up when it hits the the scale for the price that's on it, you know, we just getting ripped off and not knowing it,

right? Yeah. Well, you know, we going to buy beef from Argent. We got cattle farmers all over the United States. What the heck? What are we buying beef? It's not making a lot of sense for me. But the red you we probably not going to have to worry about that if uh if uh they don't lose some snap because might be going out there. I think they I think they're a little they they supposed to got that straight. Yeah. Reverend Claybert. One more one more comment. You know we have to adjoin a motion. I'll second. All in favor say I. I. All oppose like sign. See y'all do a second. Everybody.