Planning Commission - Special Meeting

5:00 sir 55. All right, call the meeting to order and we can start our just have two items on the agenda to amend old line zoning regulations and uh so mention the FOI training. So start out with the zoning regulations. Okay, go ahead. Uh, excuse me. Could I could I just talk a little bit about process again for a second about this?

Okay. Uh, as you know, I I said last time, it just seems to me that a sense this is all kind of backward that, you know, before they do the zoning regs, we should be looking at the plan of conservation development. and you have and so I went to the zoning meeting and at the public comment I mentioned that you know you guys have your schedule you're on it but we should be finding ways where we could be coordinating our efforts here because if because of the new housing law and if we review the POC you know you may be making additional changes later and you know it's kind of uh you'd be better off doing it all at once. Um, and then if you look at the, you know, we do have this new housing law and there's decisions that planning is going to have to make. There's going to be, do you want a transit u orientated community? Um, and we're also going to be involved in the housing plan. So you you take all of those things together and then you if you look at the law, you know, it requires the POC be produced every 10 years. But the law also says you are required, not optional, to periodically review the POC. So, I know like at the planning commission at Rivercog this week, they announced uh Westbrook just reviewed theirs. They're they were on a 10-year schedule and they were five years and they thought given, you know, the changes in town and everything else, they should do it. So my feeling is that we should be I'm not saying a degree. Maybe we don't have to go through the

whole rigomearroll of uh reviewing the POCD, but I think we should be doing that given the zoning changes, given the new housing law. Yeah, I think we discussed that last night. We discussed and decided what we were going to do. and said, "Yeah, decided that we'll look at, you know, if there are specific sections that we think need a review and to be looked at as part of this whole process that will do that." And so, I guess I need to maybe take a step back, but I mean, there's also the housing. So, I guess I need to say though, this current discussion, and we actually can't vary from it too much because this is a special meeting. Yeah.

Is to talk about the petition to amend the OM zoning regulations. And this first step is the phase one of those regulations. And it really isn't an overarching change of regulation and all that. And so we I think we need to stay focused on what this is for today. And that is the phase one. And again, as I may have mentioned last time, the hope is that once these are adopted in some way, shape or form that starting in March, we will have a gathering of commissions come in and talk to the zoning commission about issues that are related to the phase two.

So, I understand your concerns. I would encourage you to bring them to the phase 2 opening session that we're going to have next month. And hope again we can we can bring it up at that time. But I think Rob is correct. The only thing I need you to do tonight is tell me consistent or inconsistent and why. Um because my commission is meeting on the second Monday in February and I'm hoping to get the regs adopted at that time. Um, I spent a few hours going through the regs and my initial reaction is there really aren't any significant changes and you can kind of get a good feel for it if you

have Julie send you the the red line markup. Yeah, it shows the it shows the reorganization as in new readings, but then it also has an appendix that says line or section by section what they did. This was moved. This was modified slightly, but if you look at the the amount of red new things, it's relatively limited. Um, and even the crossouts are relatively limited. There was something about adult um we consolidated operations

consolidated the adult entertainment section. Um we took out about three pages worth of stuff there um just because we didn't feel we needed that verbose amount of stuff for all entertainment. It doesn't seem to be a big issue in town at the moment. Correct. Um so yeah in places where we didn't think it was important we started to take out some of the language. Um the biggest additions that honestly we added were in definitions. Um mostly because there were a lot of terms in the regs that were simply not defined and the hope was by adding in a definition it would make it clear for people who want to use the regs what what that was actually getting at.

Now were these definitions from the state statute? Usually not always. the the the consultant we had basically went not just to the state statute but also to what other towns were using for definitions um and basic tried to come back the best practices for what these definitions were and we honestly had a whole session across the street center school where we just went through these definitions one by one and what we liked what we didn't like and you know again we we tried to make sure that we were coming up with things that we thought were helpful here but it's only words that are already in the rags that don't have a definition.

But that's that that was the goal. The goal was for words that were using but not defining to give clear definitions of those of those terms and most of the changes were section numbers. Yeah. Yeah. It just seems like keeping kind of this party. But again, if you I gave you a memo on it and again if you went to the link that I gave for what FHI did explaining the difference and again Julie gave you a copy of their memo. You have it in front of you.

Um you know you can pretty much see that the goal here was not to make major substantive changes to the regulations. Um again there are some changes that were required by state statute. That was the other changes. But then the state statute number is cited. Yeah, absolutely. But again, we used to have a minimum house size. The state says we can no longer have a minimum house size. So the regs regarding outdoor uh um outdoor restaurants have changed since CO. They will put a whole bunch of new stuff in after CO for outdoor restaurants. We had to update the regs to incorporate that.

Um those were just things that our regs hadn't kept up with changes in the law. So that's what that's what we're doing and all we're doing is seeing if this complies with the PCD, right? I mean, we're not And again, I gave you some thoughts getting into the zoning.

No, but again, Todd mentioned a couple things he wanted to clarify or at least figuring out where they came from. We can certainly look at that if you have questions. Um, but again, the goal for tonight for this commission is to say they believe these changes are consistent or inconsistent. um or again the sort of first line I said in my memo there was you could at least at the very least say not inconsistent with your eggs because you're not really doing anything that um that makes major changes to them. So let me just make make sure I understand. So, you're saying that tonight's purpose is to say that the changes that were made, if they're consistent with the current EOCCD and or is there something in the changes that were made that we have a problem with?

Well, if we don't, then everything is fine. But it's not to say that to Todd's point before, if there is something in the current zoning, even as modified that we that I we don't like or object to, should we bring that up tonight or not?

Well, if it hasn't changed from old to new, you can I would say please bring that up in phase two because phase two is going to be substantive changes that need to be made to address things people are unhappy about. That's really the entire purpose of phase two is to figure out what doesn't work about the regulations, what people want in them that's not there now, what what's there they don't like, and then make those sorts of changes in phase two. So, if it hasn't changed, then I'm going to ask that you sort of put it aside for tonight. [clears throat]

This is to your point uh the last time we had a discussion and we had that problem with the with the property that was on 250 Shore Road and you said well you know we should have excluded it from use in that particular zone district. So that's that's C10 that's sound view along. So I'm looking at permitted uses and there's permitted uses of adult entertainment. Okay. There used to be one down here. There were a couple down here. Yeah, thrown out all of them. By law, it definitely should. But I will say this,

by law, by constitutional law, we have to allow at some location in town, adult entertainment. Okay. We're not allowed to ban it outright everywhere in town. I think it's C30 is fine. How about alcohol? Yeah, I know the town of Bridgewater. Um, when I You can be a dry town, but that's by ordinance. It's not by zoning, right? By ordinance. So, it can't be by zoning. That's interesting. Okay. Actually, so we can't ban gas stations, though. Huh? We can ban gas station. You can ban gas stations. You can't ban adult entertainment. That's sort of bizarre. Adult entertainment is considered protected speech under the First Amendment. Okay. Okay. I I'm I'm not making this up. or something.

Um, I mean, the reality is with the advent of the internet, the adult entertainment business, the live adult entertainment business is not what it used to be. I'm not sure we'd really have to worry about that coming into the town of Old Line. Okay. Um, people are going elsewhere for their adult entertainment, but again, by first amendment constitutional law, we're not allowed to ban it completely from town. So, there you go. You can you can have it not within x number of feet of churches or schools or all the things you do with alcohol, but theoretically there has to be some spot in town where it theoretically could go if it wanted to. Again, the likelihood of it ever happening is pretty much zero. So, I wouldn't spend a lot of time worrying about that delay. So just kind of back to this other discussion a little bit that I at times in the past we've where we've had to approve things or or say it's in you know consistent with the plan conservation and development if we have other little comments or things that we've caught that are typos we can absolutely so we can provide other feedback but ultimately we're just to vote on the consistent or inconsistent. Yeah, I mean, as everyone has pointed out, it's a very thick document. And if there's just typos in here, I don't pretend that it's a perfect document. So, if you find something that's a typo, by all means, we need to go go back and fix it.

I think Denise has found a couple typos already. So, it gets tricky with AI because if you spell a word that's the wrong word, it doesn't pick it up. like doing technical stuff, aviation stuff, anything. They they always want to change it to something that is not the right one. If there isn't any more discussion, I I would propose a motion to approve to to indicate that the amendments phase one amendments as as we've reviewed them are consistent with the POC. that being second it other discussion

being none then all those in favor okay I want to thank you know for the opportunity to look at all this stuff yes I want to thank you guys no helped me focus on having a special meeting because obviously this saves me an extra month so I do appreciate you guys coming in in extra time this month to get all the information you gave us, the comments, the red line copy was just very valued.

Well, again, the goal here, Michael, is to be as transparent and helpful as we possibly can. The website will be updated in real time as things change. We want to make sure that people have the information. Everything is on the website. You can get everything we got. Well, not the red line. No, not the red line. Not the red line. Why did you wind up um cancing the public?

Honestly, we ended up cancing it because it's not part of the public hearing process and the commission members wanted to attend and the fear was that they would hear something at this meeting that would alter their vote but be outside of the public hearing process. So, procedurally it was creating a gap that was dangerous for the for the regulations. So we decided the safest course was just cancel it and have everything being done through the public hearing process. So there was no opportunity from for misinterpretation or or things coming outside the record. Has have has the public been coming to the hearing to comment on the administrative stuff? No. Um

I think you're going to have your hands full later phase two.

And and rightly so. and and we're we're we I mean, Michael, the goal is honestly for the rest of this year to have sharetses and meetings and gatherings of every possible group in town to get their thoughts on what should be in phase two and then go back to them with whatever we come up with. So, we we are looking to spend six months, eight months doing nothing but trying to get the public's thoughts on this thing. Um, you know, the goal is not to to give them a rag and say, "This is what we've done. Take it or leave it." Um, the goal is what do you think the regs need

and the consultant's going to help us do that? Absolutely. Yes. Because honestly, my skills at things of that sort is not so great. So, there might be some special working groups like on the housing bill, right? Yes. Robin. Well, in fact, we talked last time about having two members of planning, two members of zoning, and the first select been working on that piece of it as well. Yeah, those would be

I think very very valuable because then we could focus on changes to the POC that we might have to do to update it as as we get. And I I know ZBA is incredibly concerned about flood zone issues because right now the R10 zone has a maximum height of 24 feet. And so if they're elevating for a flood zone, you you will have to get a variance. And ZBA is saying there's something wrong with the regulations if everyone has to get a variance because then they're not unique, right? You're supposed to have some unique hardship. Well, if everyone in the R10 zone has a unique hardship, then it's not very unique anymore. Sure, we'll find more of those.

Well, absolutely. Um, I mean, there's a lot of people who are talking about accessory apartment issues. Um, so yeah, at the end of the day, I am sure there will be no shortage of issues that people are want to talk about. Now, I'm not sure we're going to make everybody happy at the end of the day, different, but we're going to at least try and let everybody be heard and see what we can do to address the concern. Everybody's equally unhappy maybe. Okay. So that that's that back to foyer I guess is the next issue. And they and then they'll be required to do some zoning changes for the new housing law too, right? Absolutely. Yes. But the the the Howard the problem was that law came out after we were 99% finished and we couldn't go back. I got

so but it will absolutely be in the next phase.

Okay. And I suspect honestly the next legislative session is going to make even more changes. Um, so it's going to be a moving target throughout the year. Fortunately, it's an election year and so they have to finish in May. So when they finish in May, we've got the whole rest of the year to figure out what the hell they did and try and put it in the regulations. Okay. So with all of that said, I've talked too much and Kim would be kicking me under the table if she were still here. But anyway, back to FOYA. Um there is a FOYA gathering here that and um I would certainly encourage you all to attend. Um we are tracking for you know whether you've taken FOYA within X number of years and we're supposed to be reporting that back to the uh for select woman. So if for whatever reason this meeting does not work for you, please let us know. There are other FOYA gatherings that happen in other nearby towns. Westbrook, Gold Sabbrook, Clinton. I can send you to some of those if you need to.

Um, but the goal is to I've been through it like three times already. Well, how recently What was the last time? Uh, yeah, probably four or five years. No, you need to go again. Changes. Gotcha. Okay. Theoretically, they want you doing it every two to three years. Okay. And that's about all I've got to say on it. Fine. I make a motion that uh we're complete. You're adjourning here. Is it? Yes, sir. Second. All favors. I Okay. Another short meeting. left.