Planning Board - Regular Meeting

speech to order uh for Thursday, May 14th, 2026. Um do I have a motion to adopt the agenda? Second. Okay. All in favor? I I Okay. Um, now we need a motion to approve the minutes from the March 12th, 2026 board meeting. So moved. I'll second it. Okay. All in favor?

All opposed? I think it's unanimous. Okay. Motion carries. Um, public comment. I think we have someone signed up for public or no. Do we have someone signed up for public comment or you sign you signed up for public comment? Mr. Mr. Ralph, would you like to speak to the board? Oh, okay. We'll move we'll move that. There is no old business. No old business. Now we're on new business. Request for right-of-way encroachment to construct private beach access. Miss Hill

address them. All right. Okay. Is it Ralph? It's Rayo. Rayo like the sauce you see.

All right. Okay. Mr. Rayo, owner of 611 o Ocean Drive, request to encroach into the town's Ocean Drive rightway to construct a private beach access at 614 Ocean Drive. It's lot six in block seven of Ocean City. The lot exists entirely oceanward of the dune system and is between Chestnut Street, public access number 10 and Thompson Street, access number 11. Um the specific action requested is to review the tax letter of request and provide a recommendation to the board of alderman for their decision. So we are uh you're being requested just simply to make a recommendation. We're not uh doing anything else. So Mr. O owner of and indicated in figure one to the right is Mr.'s those properties. Uh they're outlined in pink to the right ofway width is 60 ft and the landward toe of the dune is approximately 22 feet from 614 Ocean Drive. Uh property zone CDR5. Uh the ex existing land use is public trust area. It is surrounded by the right ofway public trust area in the Atlantic Ocean. There are no site improvements on the property. property is approximately 0.1 acres uh or 4572 square feet. Mr. purchased the lot on March 27th, 2026 with a tax value of $100. Uh the recorded deed reference is book 6556, page 349. North Topsel Beach accepts state and federal law regarding land uses and development in areas of environmental concern, including all North Carolina admin code 7H standards. By reference, all applicable state and federal

regulations are incorporated into the comprehensive plan. The design which is included uh as attachment two and three provided by the applicant submitted does not meet CAML letter of exemption 42-26 condition 4 and 5 nor 15A NCAC 7K 207A 2 uh which is included as attachment five and uh 15 NCAC 78 308 C and D uh which is included as attachment six. There's also a Google Street View of Ocean Drive uh dated February of 2024 as exhibit 7. The lot exists predominantly with the public within the public trust area in located oceanward of the Duncrest, 273 ft to the Chestnut public beach access and 240 ft to the Thompson Street public beach access. The uh Mr. Ryo's letter is included uh on page it says page seven of the package uh and they and I'm sorry that the attachment got covered up by MUN codes section six item A but that should be I think that should be attachment one uh attachment one page one and two and then the dune crossover is um attachment two and aerial of the property provided by mro is on page is on attachment Three,

the camel letter of exemption is number 4226 is uh attachment four pages 1 and two and then uh 15A and CAC uh 7K 207 is attachment 5 with 7H308 C and D as attachment six. And then the aerial photo, it's kind of tiny, might not have trouble seeing it, is attachment seven. So, um, with that, I'll let uh turn it over to Mr. Reo so he can address the planning board members. Thank you.

Yeah, I thought we were all going to be wasting our time today since this morning I was approved, but uh thanks for hearing me anyway. Um I think it was more just trying to be collaborative. I understand what the concerns are and the migration of the beach dunes and looking for an exception to be able to have the steps start in the rightway and it's in the encroachment and uh similar to both my neighbors on both sides of my house uh have very similar I don't think you can't really see it well here but here and here and I'm proposing doing just the exact same thing that both of these neighbors have there for their beach access. I um I stated in my letter that, you know, not not concerned. Obviously, if the city needs to do something on Ocean Drive, that's going to be a pretty big project on how small that street is and and private that street is. So, um certainly willing to wave anything or do what I need would need to do to any steps that were built. We're not building a big deck or anything else. It's a simple set of four feet wide steps to go over the dunes for for private access. We live at the house, you know, this is our primary residence and um we have to go down to the public and our neighbors would would allow us if we needed to, but we go down to the public access. And so I purchased a lot hoping I could to do this project to have access to the beach.

Deb, you in In your um explanation here, you're saying that the conditions four and five are not met in the in the plan. What's what what are those issues? If you go to Yeah, I've got I know. legit what what's not in compliance with those

condition four of the uh exemption letter the access way shall remain within the property boundaries and must terminate at the first line of stable ma natural vegetation which was flagged on March 4th 2026 due to an existing BM that is not fully stabilized at this point you can you can continue to post and row so one that that would be a modification because he's asking for 22 ft past his boundary line. And the other the diagram that he's presented is not post rope and there's no plat there's no plat with like the elevations or um uh distance for an encroachment. Uh condition five. In no case shall a beach access structure or stairs be constructed in or over the starter dune or burm. Posting rope may be used on and over the burm not to exceed six feet beyond the seawward toe of the burm. I did not get those pictures in there where you shot the lines. Did I?

No. Where uh camo flagged it? Yeah. Do you have it in your phone? Can can I ask a question about what you just read because I'm not sure if I when I spoke with Heather at KMA what she said was wherever our steps stop where they flagged it from that point forward towards the Atlantic Ocean that I could put posts in and rope if I wanted to or that I didn't have to do that at all. The exception I believe is on the other side on the street side because the dunes have migrated so much that the stairs are going to have to land in the right away.

How are you going to get off of the landing down to the beach if you and we don't have a description there. We've got a photograph. That's why and I'm sorry that I didn't include that in there. I sent Brady down to take a photograph. Uh, so you'd have something other than the street view. But if you are if you come up off of the street end and you're on that landing, that landing has to stop where that first line of stable stable natural vegetation is and then continue on with post and rope.

Right. How are you? We don't see a diagram that fits that description um either of the property or um the camel letter of exemption and where you're coming in like you've got a 16 foot rise. I'm not sure like how far that's coming across but you're now this document is not to scale. This was for an example and I think it says not to scale somewhere on it.

Right. In order in the event that in the event that this was approved, you would have to provide a better diagram or sketch of where you were starting that post and rope and what the boundaries were that would meet uh those came of conditions. Can we switch to the aerial? Well, I want to make sure I understand what you're saying because of So, do you want to explain it to them?

I just if this is I thought I was here because of the concern of how much this is migrated over and coming into this right away, but what you're talking about is here when this when this ends here that I've got to go use post and rope to get from here towards the beach. Is that is that correct? Right. Yeah. it was not appropriately shown on the the site plan provided um where the post and rope would be along with the encroachment into the ride ofway. So those those two problems are of major concern here.

This this is my attempt to try to illustrate somewhat of what this encroachment would be similar to these other ones not to scale. I mean here I was looking for tonight I thought I was looking for approval to at least be able to do this. I can't do any of this without this piece. What what do you think that that distance is from your property boundary to where you want to where you're asking for an encroachment? Uh that that has to be at least 15 ft. It's more than that. It's it's more I had a number of 22, but I don't know that that's right.

Yeah. Well, that's that's what we that's an approximation based on what we did off of GIS. But when you're asking for an easement uh or an encroachment, we need to kind of You're not presenting the information to say I'm asking for a 22 foot encroachment. We're the ones that provided that information to the to the board. Right. I I have and I have to lean on you guys because Okay. I'm not I'm not I'm a homeowner. I'm not a professional contractor. I would be hiring a third party to do it, build it. You're a pretty good draftsman. That was a nice drawing.

I'm good with technology. Actually, that's that's uh chat GBT. Okay. Okay. Madam Chair, just a couple questions to follow up on. All right, Miss Hills. Um um I I went out there and I apologize because of uh can't walk very far right now because I had an affected foot, so I couldn't get on the public access. I had a question on both sides. So on the seawward side, I couldn't figure out where the where the dune was in either relation to that diagram that I saw that was not the scale right

um where it would stop. So, I think what would be helpful if there was a survey beyond the property to the rightway to and maybe have the surveyor drawn where this thing was going to be because that was my concern on the seawward side on the landward side because it's a dirt road and the other the other crossovers of the adjoining properties are back into the dune. So, I was thinking you were coming forward and you were going to be like right up to the edge of the road and my concern is somebody driving at night or something hits that there's a liability to not only the the homeowner but to the town. So, it's hard for me to at least um analyze this not knowing where this thing is in relation to the edge of the rideway, the edge of the dune um and on both the on the land side and the seawward side. So, if you understand what I'm

I I do totally and I apologize. I could have put more work into this before tonight. I sent this in a few weeks ago and this is kind of the first I'm hearing like, hey, we need I thought because because marked it, they said you can either do post and rope or you don't have to from this point on. It may not be necessary. I thought my Can we go to the other photo, please? The one. Yeah. I thought this was the point. Now again, might not be that many steps. Might be here, might be at this point, might be at this point, could be. But wherever that is, I assume this is where the flags were on the beach that they put a little closer up. Yeah.

Is there a way that I can get a picture off off my phone from screen? If you can email it to Ricky. Okay, Ricky, I'm gonna send you meetings at. Okay. So again, from that diagram, it's hard to see where where's the edge of the rideway in relation to where the dune is to where the end of the uh

was there another document where it had a a line through it where it was like approximation of the rightway that had something kind of similar to that. Miss Hill, uh, wouldn't the applicant also to get a building per permit, aren't they going to have to have a survey that shows the location of this thing within

to He's going to have to do all that for if the lease agreement before they can actually drop a lease, they need to know. I mean, that's got to be well defined. Typically, we do not re if somebody's putting in a beach access and it's on their property. Uh, typically we're not required if it's just simply a beach access, there's not any concern to have to do a to pay to go through the expense of paying for a survey. Now, if they want to do a deck or something like that, then yes, they do because they need to be five feet off that toe of the dune. Beach access. Beach accesses are an exception to that dune protection ordinance that the town adopted. So why why have the property owner incur an additional cost for a survey under normal circumstances?

So I would say this isn't normal because there going to encroach onto the public right away. Right? If it was in within their property I like it's like me putting the fence up getting a fence permit. I did a diagram on the survey and said I'm gonna be this many feet off the house and this many feet off the property line. So you could evaluate it and say he's building it in his property. Well, you know,

and I would think for a lease agreement, you're going to have a legal or something of that where this is and how much space you're taking up of the public rightway. So from from staff's from from staff's analysis and with cons, you know, consistency with the comprehensive plan and whatnot, the there's no public benefit to granting this easement town. The town doesn't normally uh grant easements into public rideways. and he the one thing that he said that I completely agree with is that that dune has has shifted and it's going to continue to shift and public works is expected to go out scrape out sand off the road all this other stuff and by allowing and granting requests for easements into the town's rideway you are only exacerbating the conditions when it comes to scraping the roads emergency vehicle access all the other things that you could that you may consider public,

right? Of what benefit is it to the public in granting his request? Even if he had the diagram, even if he knew that he was requesting 20.5T or 5T, whatever it is, you you're looking at the aerial he's that dune goes 22 feet. the property line, the landward tow of that dune is 22 feet from his property line approximately, right? So are the other two adjacent crossovers within the their properties?

They now the one to the north the dune is cut out there with her like there's like a five or six foot cut out there where they're right and that's what we were expecting to do. Okay. I guess that would be to me it's like why why would we allow an encroachment on the public property just to to maintain the public property? But why couldn't he build it within this property and just have be allowed to cut the dune back? Can you go back to the aerial please?

Do we know that that is a cutout or did it pre-exist when the dune came forward? That was my presumption cuz they we just looked when we went to look at it, we looked at the neighbors crossovers and my husband was in construction for 30 years. So he's sitting there, well that's at least so and so old. That's at least so and so old or was replaced at 10, 15, 20 years, right? That was my other concern in in the letter where he talks about excavate, you know, possible ex excavating the dune. We would never allow a dune to be excavated for you to put in a crossover.

Right. Additionally, there's a condition through CAMO which has probably been in place for quite a while. I'm not sure why how long it's been in place. Um, but it says that the access way must be constructed on raised post or pilings of 5T or less in depth. Um, right. So that whenever possible only the post or piling touching the frontal dune without any alterations to the dune. So there is not an option for alterations to the dune. I'm

I'm uncomfortable with the concept first of all of reviewing something that we don't entirely understand, but also the concept of approving something where we're not clear um exactly how much how detrimental this is to the beach and the town. It's not in accordance with KMA's requirements at this point, which is different than anything the town would allow you to do.

Uh, I guess that's where I'm confused because of the exception letter that we got from Heather and the discussions that on the non ocean side that it was fine for what we were proposing. I mean, she came out and looked at it, flagged it. We discussed it on multiple occasions and she sent the exception letter. But the letter says it still has to comply with all state and local authorizations. And so that's where we are now.

Yeah. No, I I understand. I just I'm not trying to go around camera, guys, and I'm not trying to fight you guys. I'm trying to do the right thing. And that's that's why I'm here to figure out h how's how's a way to do this. I have people 30 and 40 feet in both directions. Actually, this one is this one is actually in front of my house completely. That's that's the neighbors is in front of my driveway. And so, um, I'd be striking a deal with the neighbor. Yeah. I'd be looking agreement or something. You share the maintenance.

Sure. I'd be I'd be talking to us, not us per se, but staff and the appropriate people about what can be done to maintain this and then pulling resources to maintaining your neighbors. Oh, maintaining the the neighbors. But that's what we do. We have a shared access with people that actually have the authorized access and we all pull resources to keep that in proper maintenance. No, I understand. It's It's certainly on the list. It's further discussion.

Uh just a just a statement and this is just from my own personal view. I I understand the the reasoning for wanting, you know, wanting wanting wanting what you're after. But my I guess one of my concerns or not necessarily concern but but opinion. You're you've got a neighbor right there you could probably strike a deal with. Um you've got a public access 240 ft one way, 270 ft another way. I've got to I live on the marsh and perpendicular going perpendicular to the shore. I have to go approximately two two ten of a mile in either direction just to see an access to the beach.

Sure. So 240 ft I wish I had it

and you know so that's you know and that that's that's kind of kind of where I am. Um, and I understand understand where you're coming from and if I was in your shoes, I'd probably be be trying to approach it myself. But um the expense and of what's happened over the years trying to get these dunes reconstructed and what we're trying to do now to get the beach reconstructed. Um it's not something that I've see us really getting in, you know, you know, approving and authorizing at this point. There's, you know, you you've got you've got you've got options that are a whole lot better than a lot of other folks have. And we can certainly explore that again with the neighbors. The last time I did that, that was not something they were interested in.

Anything further from the board? I I just had one more question and it had to do with the the ocean drive there, which is basically a dirt road. And uh do we know have we talked to public works to do they they have to I assume use a road grader to keep get the sand off of there or they use a brush. Yeah. You see them come by with Oh, they use that same the same comes by. They they come by they they sweep the they sweep the they sweep the street for us. Okay. Okay. Um at this point, do we have a motion

to make sure we word this thing right now from our some of our previous meetings? Would this need to this would need to be in the form of a positive I guess what I'm saying is if we when we have our motion on the table that we're voting or does it need to be worded in an affirmative that are we that we're approving? Are we voting to approve it? No. So that the issue is whether we are going to recommend to the board of alderman or not recommend.

Okay. Then should it be worded? You're you're going you would re make a recommendation to the board of alderman to either that they either approve the request or they deny the request. So, can I ask a quick question then because that feel I feel like we're stepping over an entire me doing more due diligence to get you the information that you asked for about distances, other photos, more information. I don't think that that's what we're hung up on at this point. I think we're hung up on

the issues of the crossover itself um and the with everything that's happened with the town, everything we're trying to do to keep to protect the dunes.

I I am in 100% in favor of protecting the dunes. So, I mean, it's it's the number one priority. So, I'm not in any argument there. One last one last question for me at least is even if you went through all the processes of doing a site plan showing how the crossover as you envision it would come across the rideway onto the dune down the dune would you still be starting the steps in the ride of way next to the road?

Yes. They're they they have no chance but to land and that's that's what I thought we were discussing was this whole road issue versus the other side. There's no if you can see if you could draw a line from here to there we'll say it's about there from that point the top of that property line to there is that 15 to 22 feet that we think and that's um that's that's how I addressed it and I I've never done this before so all I could say is I would take responsibility and I'd never heard the word lease and so that till tonight so that's that makes more sense to me to be leasing it so then it can be taken back and my perspective is even if you brought all of that work and paid that money,

if you're starting steps in the right of way, it would be a no. That would that would be my recommendation to the board because you'd be starting steps in a public road right away and that shouldn't have a structure in it. Okay? and no precedent from the neighboring ones that are when those were built, right? Those those may have been fully compliant at the time that those No, I I understand. I understand. I just thought there was something that I would be agreeing to to say, you guys tell me to move it, take it down, or do that, then I'm going to agree to that in that lease or whatever that is. That's that's where I saw the flexibility.

This is not a permanent structure. It's not even attached into the dunes. They're handdriven posts in the dunes. The post would still be there though to hold the railings. Oh, yeah. Yes. I don't think we're making any constructive progress with the board that's here now. I think we can make our recommendation yes or no to go to the board of aldermen. Yeah. I was just trying to explain to him why more work with them. Yeah. Right. So, is I appreciate that. Thank you. So, is there a motion? I would make a motion that we um recommend to the board of alderman that they not approve the request.

Do I hear a second? Second. All in favor? I I unanimous. Okay. No, that's okay. I'm I'm not upset about it. I mean, this was a this was a chance. I'm No, I appreciate it and I appreciate what you guys are doing to protect the dunes and that's right in front of our house. Uh, I mean, this is still going to go to the board of alderman. I would recommend that you have some more information. Maybe if you talk to the public works and fire department in terms of how they maintain that road, what the other people have done, how they get around. I know the other ones that the dune's been cut out because I saw at least the two. Yeah. Or or it was there before where it's grandfathered in and I understand that. So, thank you.

Okay. Thank you. All right. Okay. Um, next item on the agenda is any other discussion. Yeah. So, I just have uh one little thing. Uh, the board of alderman I presented your recommendation in April to the board of alderman to adopt the geodatic the electronic GIS

GIS. Sorry, I'm getting all tongue time, but I think I've got Sunday hours. Anyway, to adopt the electronic version of the zoning map and there's kind of a chicken and the egg thing. You have to have both the uh ordinance before you adopt the electronic version. And so, not really sure where they were going to go. Plus, there's a lot more that needs to be done to that. So, I asked them to um continue the meeting the public hearing until July. And so in June, I'll be coming back to you with all the pieces for you to review and for you to make a recommendation on that uh on the adoption of electronic version of the zoning map for a public hearing in on July 1st for the board of alderman. Yeah. So, I'm thrilled about that. Just a little background if I I don't know if you got it for uh if you listened to the board of alderman yesterday or not, but the planning board worked on that zoning map from 2006 until 2010. That took four years going through and verifying all the zoning, the lots, and everything else. And um for us to go from that adopted paper map 16 years ago to potentially having the electronic version available to the public. Uh I just really congratulate the town. I'm really excited about this. Of course, the mayor, you know, I he didn't call me a geek, but you know, I'll take it. But it is something to really be excited about. Young Mr. Brady starting out his time with North Tops Beach with an electronic zoning map. There is no telling what the maps are going to look like when he is my age doing this. So anyway, who knows?

Yeah, that's that's all I have. Madam Madam Chair, and and I don't know what the process of this is since there isn't a chair of this committee. Is it is the chair appointed by the board of aldermen or is it are we appointed among ourselves? No, the planning board members elect every every May, which is this is May, so we're we're kind of in a hiccup right now. So, we'll do it in June. Okay. That's why I was like, can we put it on the agenda for a meeting to get a chair and a vice chair?

No, it's it's an annual annually like like if you lose both. We just haven't met and we haven't you know, there's no sense bringing you in if there's not something for you to do. Um so at the next meeting we'll put on the election of officers and you nominate among yourself who the chair is and you nominate among yourself who the vice chair is. Okay. Okay. Right. All right. At this time, do we have a motion to adjurnn? some.