Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

I got my computer on. I can't see them. Can't see them. Oh, I already I I just mean that. So, um yes, it looks like Cool. Madam Chair, Madam Chair, Good evening. Um I will call the February 5th, 2026

regular meeting of the planning commission into session. Um the first um matter of business is the pledge of allegiance and um Commissioner McGee, can you lead us? United States of Americ

present. Commissioner Morando present. Commissioner Reland present. Commissioner Embry, Commissioner Capen, Commissioner Mcrenolds present. Commissioner Barber here. We have qu. Thank you. Um the next matter is the approval of the agenda. Um, do we have any changes to the agenda?

Yes, Madam Chair. I think what we want to do is move uh the um matters from the staff up before we hear any cases so that we can get a presentation done and then um you may wish to pull the audience.

Yes. Um, so we're we're looking at possibly um moving the cases so that we would hear the um Commamino deos Marcus case um second and the Serios Road case first um because Commissioner McGee and I will be recusing ourselves. Um so but I don't we don't want I don't want to do that if it's going to inconvenience um people in the audience. So, um, are there people here in the audience that, um, want to participate and comment in the commun one person? And what about online? Do we have um Zoom?

If there is anybody who wish to participate in the Camino Delos Marcos apartment complex, please raise your hand. Madam Chair, I see no hands raised. So there's one person. So is it all right if we move them around?

Okay. So we'll um I recommend that we do that if someone will make a motion. So, just to make sure, uh, we're we're moving the communication from staff up before new business and we're swapping, um, the arrangement. We're going to hear the Marriott Hotel first. Yes,

that's Madame Chair. We uh I'd like to make a motion to move uh matters from staff first on the agenda and then uh flip cases uh 11386 and 11380. So having um 11380 come first the um uh 100 1101 and 1103 Srios development plan. Okay. A roll call please.

Commissioner Smith. Yes. Commissioner Morando. Yes. Commissioner McGee. Yes, Commissioner Reland. Yes, Commissioner Barber. Yes, Commissioner Mcrenolds. Yes, Madam Chair, the motion's passed. Thank you. And next, we'll move on to the approval of the consent decree. comment on that or is there a motion to approve?

Madame Chair, um in uh case 2026 111 807 at 7261 Airport Road Development Plan, um a time extension. I'd like to make a motion to approve. Is there a second? Commissioner McGee. Second roll call, please. Vice Chair Smith. Commissioner Morando, yes. Commissioner McGee, yes. Commissioner Veland, yes. Commissioner Barber, yes. Commissioner Mcrenolds,

yes. Madam Chair, the motion is passed. Thank you. And then next we will u move to the approval of the December 18th um 2025 um minutes. Um I have three changes. Um there's three matters that were voted on and um it shows that I voted on those matters and I did not. So that needs to be taken out. Any other changes? Not move it. I move the minutes. Second. Roll call, please. Vice Chair Smith. Commissioner Morando.

Yes. Commissioner McGee. Stain. Commissioner Rean. Yes. Commissioner Barber. Yes. Commissioner McRanolds. Yes. Madam Chair, the motion is passed. Thank you. And um next we'll have the assistant um city clerk um Xavier um swear in city staff.

Daniel Esel 200 Ling Avenue. these items. Yes, thank you. Heather Lamboy, 200 Lincoln Avenue.

Thank you very much. Okay. Now, um we will move uh to staff communications um presentation by the affordable housing department, Fabola Chavez. Thank you uh Madame Chair Clow, members of the commission. My name is Fabiola Chavis. I am the director of affordable housing. Today I will be sharing with you our fee and loop program and how it works um with the affordable housing trust fund. So, the Santa Fe Homes program. Can you It's not showing.

any Something. I'm going to email it to you again.

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you're good. It's safe. Get one more.

While we get set up, I just want to say happy new year to everybody. This is our first meeting for the year 2026. I have a question. Are we having a second meeting this month?

I don't think so. Okay. Okay, thank you for your patience. I'm so sorry um commissioners um and chair cloud. I apologize for that. So again, my name is Fabiola Chavis. I'm the director of affordable housing and we're going to be discussing the fee and loo program and how that those funds go circulating into our affordable housing trust fund and how we redeploy those into the community. So, um, the first slide, slide number two, is our Santa Fe Homes program. And the Santa Fe Homes program requires developers to include affordable housing units in their development. So if a developer comes into the city of Santa Fe and they want to incorporate track homes into the city, we require that at least 20% of those homes be set aside for affordable housing. Our rental multifamily housing developers are also required to fulfill the requirement of set aside for affordable housing and we require 15% of those units be set aside for affordable housing. Next slide. Slide number three. So, the Santa Fe um homes program home ownership projects um projects that are 10 units or less um have the option to pay a fee in LO or 20% of those units are set aside for affordable housing developments. And then projects that are

11 units or more. So if you're developing track homes 11 units or more, um we require that you commit 20% of your development to affordable housing and you are not eligible as a developer for the fee and loo program. Slide number four. So there there are many ways for rental housing development projects to incorporate the fee in lie and then the 15% set aside. Um, and so we we ultimately do require that you come in and fill out an agreement and then that agreement goes to the planning division and then they will see that your project is set aside for affordable and then that leads you to other pathways to include some fee waiverss for the water department. So home ownership sales, we do also require that if you're a single family developer, you don't excessively charge for home ownership. So in this example on slide five, we do require that let's say for instance, you are purchasing a five bed or a fourbedroom home. These prices do not go over 350,000 depending on the area median income level. So what ultimately mean what that means is that developers eat the remainder of that cost. So they're not allowed to sell homes that are higher than 350,000. The next slide. Um so what is the Santa Fe Homes fee and ll program? So the Santa Fe fee and loop uh the Santa Fe Homes program requires developers to include affordable units within their development. A fee and loo

option is offered for the following eligible projects. Home ownership projects again 10 units or less. Rental housing projects. The fee is calculated through a fee and loop process and used to fund the city's affordable housing um development. I will add that last year in 2025 we received approximately 900,000 from the fee and loo program that went back into the affordable housing trust fund. So it is helping to deploy additional resources. So the next slide um slide number seven there are many benefits for the fee and loo program. It streamlines the approval process. There's a simplified source of financing and it leverages funding for affordable housing projects which is very important for our community. It funds a variety of activities. So how is the fee? Next slide. Slide number eight. How is the fee in L calculated? It's not as complicated as it seems. Again, it's the 15% set aside for multifamily housing developments. And we base this on HUD's fair market rents that are published in an annual basis. And so our developments are required to incorporate 15% of their development as affordable. The established base fee by unit, it starts again with the fair market rate. Um and then we subtract the average rents across the affordable housing tier to identify the rental gap. We we multiply that by two for the base fee. And then to calculate the monthly cost,

we will take the we'll multiply the number of affordable units by the base fee and the unit type. And then we determine the total fee by multiplying that by 24 um months. And on the next slide you'll see that calculation and how it how it affects the project. So in this particular case there's a 90 unit development and they have onebedrooms and all the way up until three bedrooms. You'll see that the 15% comes out to a total of 13.5. the fee, the monthly fee is calculated and then we have to multiply that by 24 which gives us the 425,000. Ultimately, what this means is that we are collecting about 1 year's worth of cash flow upfront from the development to inject into our affordable housing trust fund. So the next slide represents how the funds are deployed. So the Santa Fe fee and loo program will come in and then we'll appropriate that to the affordable housing trust fund and then we'll award projects. The next slide will demonstrate our impact that we had in 2025. So the affordable housing trust fund funded approximately 3,675,000 in projects. our CDBG program, which is the community development block grant, which is an award from HUD, we um deployed approximately 480,000 to support affordable housing initiatives. Next slide demonstrates the developer

benefit. Developers get a density bonus. Developers may permit to may be permitted to build a higher density of units on the site than typically allowed. Enables this enables more affordable units per acre. The exchange for creating afford and is an exchange for creating affordable housing. The fee the fee waiver allows for eligible Santa Fe homes programs and affordable housing units being developed in our community. The reduction, the reduced water fees reduces the utility rates for our Santa Fe Homes affordable housing units. And with that, I'll end and answer any questions that you may have.

Any questions? Commissioner McGee. Hi, thank you. Um, I'm curious, do you know how long homes are required to be affordable in Santa Fe? So the affordable housing set aside restriction is five years if it is a single family dwelling. Um and then the other set aside for multifamily is 20 20 years. 20 years. Okay. And then do you know if a family has to be a certain size for each level of AMI? No. It's all based on the area median income requirements and if the units can support their family size.

Gotcha. And then last question. Do you know how often the HUD fair market rent is updated? Yes, it's updated on an annual basis. Okay, thank you. Oh, and actually Sure. So, I would assume that that fair market rent is based on the city of Santa Fe. Yes. Okay. So, that's a HUD issued determination and they do it throughout the United States. They they do the calculation on what they determine is the fair market rent. Thank you. No further questions. Thank you. Uh, Commissioner Smith.

Yes. Um, you may I mean not know the history of this, but I'm interested in why rental housing was excluded um and is not under a a fee and loo mandate the way constructed housing is. So multifamily housing development projects are definitely subject to the fee and loo. So it's a 15% set aside that they're required to have. I Okay, good. I didn't I don't think your slide said that. At least I didn't get it. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner Mc Reynolds.

Thank you for your presentation. Um, I had a question on how once the funds are in the affordable trust fund, how are they allocated to different organizations for down payment assistance? Um, because I saw a number of organizations mentioned in that one slide. How how is that determined? Uh yeah, just like some insight on that.

That's a great question. Thank you, Commissioner. So, we are required to do a formal solicitation every year for our allocation of funding. This is um either the CDBG program and also the affordable housing trust fund. So, it is a competitive process and each um either nonprofit or for for-profit developer is eligible to apply for the RFP and those come out usually in March or April of every year.

Okay, got it. And is there So, obviously there's a number of organizations in Santa Fe that do affordable housing and that specialize in down payment assistance. Um, is the amount that they qualify for based on like their capacity or is it based on like what they request? Is it just a full transparent request or Yeah. Yeah. So, what happens um we have funding that we allocate to organizations like Homewise and Housing Trust. Some of those fundings come through the general fund and what they do is they with those dollars they um income eligible um they do income eligibility for for homeowners and people seeking rental assistance. So what happens is that once they do once they do the determination then they have an allocation of homes that are readily available from these devel developers. It could be PY. It could be whoever in our community that's developing. These developers have to work with these two organizations to get their income qualified folks into housing.

Got it. So there's um and you may not be a part I don't think you are a part of this conversation, but um you know ver like for instance the housing trust is a smaller organization uh staff-wise versus homewise. So it's not like a set amount that's like given to Homewise. It's it's really more like what their capacity is and what they're what they're requesting throughout a given year basically,

right? In terms of development. So whatever their capacity can handle for development concepts and development infrastructure, that's what they um that's how they apply. And then on an annual basis through the um general fund we fund their um entities to income al you know to qualify people for income eligibility requirements. And then I have one more followup if that's all right. Sure. Um what and this may not be like obviously it's a shifting number but typically what is the percentage of developers that is choosing to pay the fee in Lou versus just building affordable housing?

Yeah. So um you know for the majority of our developers they do like that fe option um so many of them do choose to do that and it is also beneficial for us. We are a very small but mighty department. We only receive two sources of revenue into our into our department right now and that's through affordable housing trust fund and also CDBG. So, those are we do have the mansion tax, but because of um the circumstances, we're not able to use those dollars yet. However, um these money that that come in from our developers are really impacting our community at the end of the day because we put those funds into the affordable housing trust fund and redeploy it for affordable housing projects.

Sorry, one last question. Go ahead. Could you give me the full of that acronym, the C community development block grant? No further questions. Thank you, Commissioner Morando.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, yeah, just a couple of qu I I think following up on maybe where uh Commissioner Smith was going. Um so what I have always wondered um was you know definitely it seems like fee in lie of is let's say lighter on rental units right um or more available I should say I should say affordable housing because of fee and lu of is much lighter on rental right yes

so is there a a thought process of why in lie of is always made available to rental units versus uh affordable housing ownership.

Madam Chair, Madame Chair and Commissioners, yes indeed, there are mechanisms for track housing developers to incorporate 20% of their development to affordable housing. So single family developers, whether you're KB Homes or PY or somebody like that, you are required to do the 20%. Paying the fee in Lou is not an option for for you as a large track home developer. One of the things that we've considered in the housing department, um, just know that I've only been here since September, so it's very, very new, but we are thinking about increasing our affordable housing percentage from 15 to maybe 18 and getting a little bit more impact. But that would have to be an ordinance change and we would have to have have that changed at the ordinance level. Yes, Heather.

Thank you, Chuck. I I'd like to point out to um Commissioner Mirando that um we went through a lot of things when it came to the phase one update of the land development code. Part of phase one is the a change small change into the theloo program which mean which is that developers can opt to pay a foo but they will not get the density. So that hopefully will inspire more developers to develop affordable units on site and the the percentage just with a broad brush of numbers in the past year in terms of approvals is probably about 10% actually do provide partial or affordable units. you know partial number because not before with the development on a Korea or um affordable units on site. So trying to inspire them because multifamily housing is a need for affordability in addition to single family housing. So um but but that change in the code I think will be telling to us um and inspiring developers to provide it on or multi

just one followup question is is the time difference the reason that for rent there's so much access to the fee in L instead of single family or I I I've just always been curious why it for for rental there's almost full access to it whereas for um or you know ownership it's it's capped any madam chair um commissioner I'm sorry I don't have my glasses so I can't see everyone's name so I apologize but in terms of the cap are you talking about the 15% or are you talking about the 20.

Yeah.

I believe Commissioner Morando is is asking why um single family home developments that are over 10 units require 20% affordable housing. Whereas uh we allow uh rental units like multif family uh developments regardless of the number to access that fee in lie of and I have been told and maybe correct me if I'm wrong that historically uh many years prior when this um when we came up with the percentage of affordable housing requirement we saw a a major decline in um in multif family home developments. And so the city made the decision to implement fee in lie of in order to um still provide some funds for affordable housing and give developers an opportunity to to pay into it. Either way, Madame Chair, Commissioner McGee, thank you for that clarification. Um, as a multifamily housing developer, you would never want to put a burden on a multifamily housing development because then they won't cash flow and the project won't succeed. So, it's a little the cash flow is a little tighter with multifamily housing development, especially when you incorporate low-income housing tax credits. So, the low-income housing tax credit requirements require that a development have a it's called a debt service coverage ratio. And that debt service coverage ratio cannot exceed usually like 1.24. And so, when you require more of the units to be affordable, it begins to really impact the project's ability to

cash flow. because lower AMIs and lower um rents will inhibit the ability for a project to cash flow. And so when you're doing track home development, you have a little bit more leeway on the development percentages and what you're able to do for the set aside. But again, this is based on the ordinance. The ordinance was created before my tenure. So I, you know, I I just have to follow what it currently states and unfortunately that's what we have in front of us today. Thank you,

Commissioner Smith.

Yeah, as I remembered, I think um there was no multifamily housing being built from probably about 2008 until last three years. I mean, it was the economy for a while and then it just became it was not I mean people couldn't make it work financially and so that's why the city passed on multif family because nothing was being built and that's why all of a sudden there's a lot being built shockingly. Yes, Commissioner Barber. Just want to check my understanding. So, um, for single family housing, the developer has to allocate 20% of those houses being built for lowincome housing or affordable income housing. Right.

Yes. Afford. Okay. But, but they're not eligible at all for the fee and loo. That's correct. Uh, um, my other question is, does this apply only to brand new housing? Yes. Okay. Yes. So, let's say for example, we have a single family. They move into a brand new development. They're there for two years and then they move out. Can someone else come in and you know apply and and still be able to buy that house at at an affordable price?

It's a great question. Thank you for asking it, Madam Chair, members of the commission. you are required to have your home for five years. And then if you want to sell that home, you are required to at least try to sell it to an income eligible um resident, you have to try for at least 60 days. And then if you are not able to, then we will allow you to sell it in the open market. And we do get paid back for the down payment assistance if that's if if we injected down payment assistance to it.

Any other questions? Commissioner Wheeland. Madam Chair, uh so you mentioned the excise tax. Uh at this point, what is the city holding and is there any future on that of when you'll be able to allocate those funds?

Well, we're keeping our Thank you for asking that question, Commissioner. U Madame Chair, we are really hoping that we can utilize those funds. My department is very understaffed and so we are really hoping that we can use those funding sources. The reason why we're not allowed to use them right now is that we are um on there's some ongoing litigation. We don't want to have we don't want to use it and then have to pay it back. So, we're holding it as a set aside in one of the accounts. And what is that that you're holding exactly the amount?

The last I heard it was um pretty substantial. So, I I believe it's somewhere in the range of u 2 million, but don't please don't quote me on that. Um I'm not really keeping track of the balance because I haven't been awarded or it hasn't been allocated to my department as of yet, but it is very impactful. Thank you,

Heather. you. I just want to to draw the attention of to of the commission to the fact that we have some tools for tracking affordable housing and um on our digital platform. It's called the residential pipeline. I'm going to share my screen really quickly. Um you can access via the Santa Feforward.org website and it's you know um it's our digital platform in the residential pipeline map. It's called the city smart. Um it illustrates on GIS what the developments are that have been approved and then what portion is affordable and what portion is not affordable. So for instance for Ross's Peak which um there was a photograph of one of the units that's over in Laseris um there are 182 units that were approved. 36 of them are affordable and those are ones that actually are built on site. So inclusion is what that means. So I just wanted to let you all the public know about this tool. So if they would like to take a look at that they could.

Thank you. Anything else? Not. Thank you very much. That's helpful. Um we'll now move uh to case number 2025. Um 11 380 um case number U 11380 um 1,001 1,11 and1 11 and3 Srios Road Development Apologies for the delay. Duke

This is D. turned up. It's glowing. What's this? Second screen. It's okay.

charact. You're all about

I understand it's going to take about 7 minutes for this to kick in. So, we go ahead and have a 7 minute break.

probably unless you have something different. It's my explanation. I I took the one that was the latest time stamp on it. Still dead in the air. Madam Chair, I think we're ready to go. Good evening commissioner uh madame chair commissioners this is case we have to start the meeting come back

11380 about lunch 11:01 break you have to come back out of the break so that yes so we are now back in session And um do you want to swear in um Claudia? Um I'm I'm still rebooting, but um let's see. Do you solemn please raise your right hand? Do you solemnly swear and affirm that the testimony you're about to receive is the truth and nothing but truth under the penalty of perjury? I do. Thank you.

Okay. This is uh case 2025 11380 which is 1,101 and 1103 Serios Road. The applicant is Titan Development. The agent is Jacens Gavin and I am Claudia Cath the case planner. So, the applicant requests approval of a development plan for a 79,000 square ft fourstory 150 room AC Marriott hotel. The properties comprise 3.40 40 acres and are located within the suburban archaeological review district, the Serrios Highway corridor, zone one and is our zone C2 general commercial. So this the location and vicinity map on there you can see the site in the white triangle and which fronts primarily on Serios and the major cross street is St. Francis. And you can see the school for the deaf is directly across from the site and um surrounding our government uh buildings and to the northish is the Santa Fe Railro Railway Park. Next slide. the um the the two lower properties 11:01 and 11:03 have a legal lot of record by plat that was pre 1962. the upper lot. We were able to provide a

certificate of compliance for legal lot by exclusion because a seros road to the north east, the railway to the south east and the ex uh legal lot of the other two lots uh to the south west I guess. And these are some site photos looking north and south uh at the property. And then the next slide is some photos from the railway side. So the back side of the property and next slide. So this is the site plan. The as mentioned before the building will be four stories with a maximum height of 45 feet no below grade construction. Uh some of the features include um meeting room, lounge, coffee bar, market, fitness room and a rooftop terrace. There will be a total of 150 parking spaces. So, one per room uh that's required and the plan provides for 151. There are eight accessible spaces including two van accessible spaces. Both are they are that's what is required and provided. The parking spaces will meet the standards parking style dimensions of the city with uh 9 ft wide and 18 ft long. So as mentioned previously uh all three lots combined uh create an 3.4 acre parcel at the intersection of Serios Road and St. Francis and um Suros

borders to the northwest, the railway to the souththeast and the two commercial businesses to the south. The proposed development plan complies with C2 zoning standards and the Serios road overlay district. So next slide. So that's the existing C2 zoning and you can see the red there's the C2 around it and these are standards. So the height uh required is 45 proposed 45 setbacks required is from the street is 15 67 is proposed from the um sideyard. 0 feet is required but uh 51 and 1/2 ft are proposed from the rear. 10 ft is required but 10.6 is proposed. The open space requirement is 20% but 27% is proposed. And the required um maximum lot coverage is 60% but 13.4 is proposed. And if you go to the next slide uh sorry next slide this is the future zoning map. So you can see basically what is red in the current zoning it will become community commercial in the future land use map and then the blue uh will become public institutional. So next slide. Uh for the traffic impact analysis, the

site currently has nine curb cuts along CIOS. Uh and the proposal is to reduce those to two. So the one furthest to the upper left hand part of the screen that would be a right in right out or left in um herb cut. The one that's mid block would be uh all axis. Next slide. Uh, also, um, I wanted to mention that there's no sidewalk currently abuing the site. And right right now there's just a volunteer path, the a very narrow that goes through the dirt. And so, as part of the new plan, a 6 foot wide pedestrian sidewalk would be constructed. Um, and this is the train management plan. Oh sorry this the landscape plan. So you can see there will be proposed um trees along Serio and in the site and if you go back one slide to the train management plan you can see there there are no trees and the subject is the subject parcel is gently slopes from east to west with no drainage ways or axi areas exceeding 3% slope. And if there are um steeper slopes, they're man-made, not naturally occurring. Okay, slide. And um so as mentioned previously, the landscape calls for new trees and shrubs um including parking lot medians

bordering the building and uh adjacent to the drainage pond. And then the next slide is the lighting plan which in the diagram this complies with city standards and includes overhead downcast polemounted fixtures. And staff is adding a condition um that the applicant revise the lighting plan to show all exterior fixtures and address nuisance glare with down lighting or shields on the fixtures. So next slide this the architecture and according to these renderings from the uh applicant the architectural design follows the Santa Fe style featuring exterior stucco walls in a two-tone earth color. The as mentioned previously the building is four stories tall and includes more than 20,000 square ft of gross floor area. The public uh the publicly visible facades incorporate stepbacks or wall projections. And uh while these um do not meet the architectural standards, there um the building still meets all the points required for the C2 district. And um so the exterior SK color scheme reflects the Santa Fe earth tones uh achieved through colored masonry. The structure includes a flat roof with concealed roof surfaces and screened mechanical equipment. So next slide. Next slide.

So this is the fire one plan and um two 26 foot aerial apparatus access drives are provided along the west and north sides of the building each with the required 28T turning radius as required by the IFC. The building will have an automatic fire suppression system. The two existing fire hydrants are like located on the west side of Serrios directly across from the site and a 6 inch fire line will connect to the water main and to the building through a backflow pretor and hot box. Next slide. So, for water resources, I'd like to invite uh Alan Hook from the water resources department to um go over this portion of the report.

Good evening everyone. Um Madam Chair, Mr. Hook. Oh, you uh raise your right hand. You can stay at the podium. State your name. Raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Uh my name is Alan Hook. My address is 3188 Live Anita, San Marcos. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so in the penalties of perjury? I do. Please proceed.

Uh again, Madam Chair, good evening. Um, I just wanted to sort of clarify a few things uh related to this project uh and how they are utilizing uh the city code for what's called an alternative water budget if you're not familiar with it and some of our uh technical comments related to this project. Um so first this is kind of our uh offset fee chart. It's basically a calculation for every development, every type of development, how much u their water usage or water demand would be based on the category. Um so this is a hotel and you'll see in there in the middle we have a standardized rate. This table is built out way back 2010. Um so based on the code uh chapter 14 8.13 B2B section B2B a development can choose not to use this calculation for a hotel. So it's water usage per room the hotel and instead uh choose their own rate basically compared to reliable data to other um comparable hotels in this instance. Um so they chose that for their development water budget. So, if you want go to the next slide, it's on there. Um, as you can see, they're using 08 acre feet per per hotel unit. Um, and we're fine with alternative development water budgets, but one of the comments, technical comments, we said um they were using the Elray Hotel that was traditionally a motor lodge hotel in um there was Spring Hill Suites, which we don't have a Spring Hill Suites in Santa Fe. Um, I did mention they could use there's uh a Marriott uh in that's in Santa Fe for comparable comparison. Um, and then there's also a residence in that could be used. Um the other factor

in this development water budget that wasn't finalized is um any development especially if it's prior usage you'll see in the yellow line there um they can go back 10 years for the previous uh land owner and look at their water usage. So the highest 24 months, so two years of water usage than 10 years back of the previous property owner and they deduct that their total water budget. So they haven't finished that yet. It says to bed to be determined. Um so as of right now we don't have a finalized water budget for this project. Um, and right now, uh, given it's commercial project, anything over 5 acre feet requires the transfer of water rights into the city. Um, so that is a process that has to be completed before they can get a construction permit. And you'll see that on page, it's page 10. It addresses the transfer process for this uh, development project. And with that, I stand for any questions that you might have. Oh, okay. Sorry. Specific to the water bill.

You Thanks, Alan. So, next slide. We're almost done. I promise. This is the um utility map. And you can see the in the dashed pink is gas and the proposed um the solid is proposed gas. The sol um existing sewers the dashed green and the proposed sewers the solid green and then the solid blue and solid red are um a new 4-in uh domestic water line. And for fire, it's a new 6- in fire line. Next slide. And um the for signage, we are working with the applicant. They're proposing three um signs, a monument sign, a wall sign, and a port share sign, which um uh appear to be uh compliant with city code, but we will need a a more detailed sign. um permit or you know submission from them and next slide. So the applicant properly noticed for the early neighborhood notification meeting and um that was held on September 30th of 2025. Approximately 31 community members attended. Discussion centered around concerns regarding traffic, building design, building height, environmental impacts, use, safety, and the need for a new hotel. Next slide. The land use department recommends approval of case 2025 11380 uh subject to the conditions of approval and technical corrections outlined in attachment A. And next slide.

One motion is required in this case to approve or deny case 2025 111380 for 1:01 and 11:03 Serio Road subject to the conditions of approval and technical corrections in attachment A. Next slide. Next slide. And that is it. I stand for questions. Any clarifying questions from the commissioners? Commissioner Wland.

So in reading the traffic study that was provided to us in the documents, uh the DOT made it very clear that they did not want a left in right out on the side of the project. But I saw in your presentation you still had it as a left in right out. So, we have um Leo P um Leroy Pacheo here from um public works who may be able to address that better, but the idea is that it would be right in right out at the entrance closest to Burrito stop, but then you could also make a left into that driveway as well.

Okay. No, and I saw that it said left in or left. Yeah, left in, right out. Um the DOT clearly state in their documents that they did not agree with that in the analysis of the traffic study and also mentioned that the upcoming uh work that's to be completed on Srios Road that it would actually complicate the left-hand turn onto Cordova Road. So yeah, if Leroy could talk to us and see give us some clarity on this Please state your name and address for the record.

Leroy Pacheco 313 Lumita. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth to do so under the penalties of pery? I do.

Please proceed. Madam Chair, Commissioner Freeman, I think it should start with the DOT is currently the owner of Sirius Road in this section and we're included in the traffic scoping for the TIA that was done and had reviewed all traffic documents as well as the city's uh traffic engineering agents. Um, you are correct. Kathleen Garcia did make a note and the developer agreed to all conditions set by the DOT. So, this hotel will um incorporate the road reconstruction plans as part of its development plan and there will be no changes to the DO's plans as as this makes its way. So we don't know where the where the the road will be rebuilt first or the hotel will come first but that communication will be you know carried through so that it's current and the DO's um designs will determine that hotel's access this at the moment is the most current that we know and uh the guess it's the western most or southernmost driveway will be right in right out only right in right out only. Oh, no. Well, you can take a you can't take a ride in. Okay. So, it's a right in only. It's a little late and we've had so many breaks, but it we're going to conform to what the DOT needs. So, if and maybe we'll save this for the applicant, but so then you're telling us there is truly one only one ingress to this property. Then at that point for 150 hotel units that's a right out

the traffic has been analyzed the operation and I believe there's also a del lane into the hotel so that traffic turning into the hotel will have its own access lane to slow down stop and turn into the traffic moving through Sri Road continue on with that um One access point would have a deceleration. Any other questions? If not, we'll move on to the applicant. Let's go ahead and get sworn in. Good evening, Madam Chair, commissioners. I'm Jennifer Jenkins with Jenkins Gavin and I'm joined by Josh Rogers and Ian Robertson with Titan Development Group and we're prepared to be sworn in.

Please raise your right hands and speak clearly into the mic your addresses. Address Jennifer Jenkins 130 Grant Avenue. Josh Rogers 6300 Riverside, Albuquerque, New Mexico. Robertson, 6300 Riverside. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth, nothing but the truth, and do so under the penalties of perjury? Do you do?

I do. Um, please proceed. Oh, that was pretty painless. Thank you for your patience. Nice to see you all. So, I have a fairly brief presentation and I'll try to touch on some some of the questions from Commissioner Reeland as as as we as we go through it and then I'll be happy to be happy to stand for. So, I'm going to move through because Claudia's presentation was obviously very thorough. So, I'm not going to waste a lot of time on some of the particulars, but I think we all know where the the site is located. And we are in an area of um of mixed zoning but surrounded by C2 zoning. And looking at um the um standard requirements which you talked about of course a hotel is a permissible use in the C2 district. We are compliant with the maximum height. We're compliant with setbacks. And um while the lot coverage is permissible at

16% a 60% lot coverage and lot coverage refers to the amount of roofed area you can have on a property. So in C2 you can go up to 60% of the parcel with roofed area. We're at like 13.4% of roofed area. Second I just have to some things. Excellent. So, this is the um there we go. This is the proposed site plan. And so, we do have two access points proposed that um this is the our central main access, which is um a full access that is aligned with the access the one of the access points to the New Mexico School for the Deaf across the street. And then our southern or southwestern access is limited to an exit only, a right out only. And that was in accordance with the requirements of the um New Mexico Department of Transportation. So with respect to open space, um the code does require 20% of the site be um dedicated as open space and landscaped areas. We are providing over 25% open space. One thing I think is is worth pointing out um with respect to our Serrios frontage, we are in the Crios Highway corridor overlay which has some unique requirements. So um between the kind of what we call the back of curb on Serios, um we're going to have a 5-ft planter strip which is going to have street trees. We're going to have a six-foot brand new sidewalk because the pedestrian connectivity in this area is we call it absent. So, we're really excited about providing that and improving that connectivity. And then

behind the sidewalk, we have another 10-foot landscape buffer that is that is required um per the Crios Road overlay. So we have a total of 15 feet of landscaping that um within that area is a six-foot sidewalk. So the experience of this stretch of Srios Road visually and for pedestrians is going to improve tfold. So these are just some of the specifics um on the hotel hotel program. Um we it's a four-story building. There's approximately 20,000 square feet per floor and um and there also is an exterior roof terrace at the so we did conduct a traffic impact analysis and as Mr. Pacheco pointed out um we met with the city public works department as well as the department of transportation to determine the scope of the analysis and this is the this is the first thing that has to happen. We just don't get to decide which intersections we study. We are told it is mandated to us by the applicable jurisdictions which intersections we are going to study. So we studied a series of five intersections. So we analyzed Serrios Road at St. Francis. We analyzed this access to the school for the deaf. It's number three. Fortunately, these aren't in order as you go down the street. And then number four is the um the other access point into the school for the deaf. And that is the that is the access that we our access will align with. Number five is a southernmost access into the school for the deaf and number two is sur and court of a road.

So I know a lot of you have heard my little spiel about traffic studies but do indulge me a little bit. So when we do traffic studies the first thing we do is we go out and we we literally count cars. We need to understand the existing conditions and we count cars at intersections. Traffic studies are based on how do intersections perform because those are the choke points of any roadway network. Right? If you're just on a road and there's no stop signs, no signals, and you're just free flowing, you're going to cruise right along. That's why freeways have great levels of service, right? So um so intersections are where we can experience delay um vehicular delay in a roadway network. So we analyze the the traffic moving through the intersections. We do it at the what we call the AM peak hour or the morning rush hour and we do it in the PM peak hour or the afternoon evening rush hour. So we're counting cars at the busiest times of the day. So then we have a baseline. We know how many cars are on the road right now. And then the Institute of Transportation Engineers, which is a national organization, they have data for every type of land use you could possibly imagine, and they look at how much traffic those various land uses nationwide, how much traffic do they generate? We don't get to decide and cherrypick how many cars are going to be generated by this project. It's not up to us. We have to follow the regulations as established by the IT. So then we take that what we call trip generation. We add it on top of the existing traffic. So we assume in two years when the hotel is operational,

this is the that what the traffic on the road is going to look like at these intersections. Then we establish what is called a level of service. So it's like a grading system like when you were in school. Level of service A means minimal delay. You come to a stop sign, you look both ways, you're off, off you go. Not a lot of traffic at the intersection. And there are different standards for signalized intersections and unsignalized intersections. So as the delay increases slightly, then your your grade level goes down. And so acceptable levels of service are typically anything A through E. Um, and then you get to F, that means you have a you either have a failing intersection or you can have a failing turning movement. You can have an intersection that works great 99% of the time and then in 15 minutes at 5:00 your left turn fails because there's excessive delay. So, we don't just analyze what's happening at the intersection. We analyze every single turning movement, the through traffic, the left turns, the right turns. So, it's very, very granular. So, these are the results of the traffic study and starting with the Srio St. Francis intersection. Today, that intersection operates at a level of service of C. For the busiest intersection in the city of Santa Fe in an urban area, that is fantastic. Utterly spectacular level of service in the build condition. We have a slight degrade in the PM to a level of service D. Still acceptable.

But here's what's interesting. When we project forward to when this hotel is potentially built, not only do we add the hotel traffic, we also add a background growth rate. We don't assume that the background existing traffic stays static. We assume population increases even though Santa Fe does not experience significant population increase and hasn't for you know a lot of years. We we're conservative. So we assume a 1% annual growth rate. So in 2027 towards the end of 27 is when we would anticipate that um the hotel could potentially be complete. that intersection is going to degrade to a level of service D even if this project doesn't happen. It's just the nature of how that the the traffic impacts in that intersection are going to evolve. So then Serrios and Cordova I mean really great operate level service B in the build and the no build and then we look at the um the NMSD driveways and again B's and C's across the board still really great levels of service and then um and then of course our um southernmost driveway which is that ride out operates at a level of service fee in the build condition. So, our traffic study was reviewed by the city of Santa Fe public works department, was reviewed by the Department of Transportation. We um made some adjustments to the geometry in order to accommodate some of the comments that we received. So, this is the Serio frontage here. So we are, as I

mentioned, we are limited to a right out only southern end. As you head north on Crios, we have a 120 foot right turn lane, so cars turning right into the project can get out of the travel lane. So that is for safety purposes. We have a um left a dedicated left turn lane that Mr. PCO reference for southbound traffic heading into the project. And also one of the things we were able to do really nice is that this left turn lane, there's an existing left turn lane here serving school for the deaf. And this is this is how you get into the James A. Little Theater. And so this sometimes could back up especially if there was an event. So what we were able to do is we were able to lengthen their turn lane. Doesn't do anything for us, but we're out here in Seros Road. We're doing these improvements and so we were able to lengthen their turn lanes. So that is going to function much better um for the school for the best. We're really happy we were able were able to do that. And the length of these turn lanes, again, we don't get to decide. These are established by the traffic engineer who looks at the quantity of cars that are moving into the project and establishes what those minimum turn lane lengths are. And our engineering team from Terara West is online. And so if you if there's any particular questions for them, they would be happy to to answer. And um and with that, I'm going to have Mr. Robertson come up and um just walk you through the design of the building.

Uh Madame Chair, commissioners and planning staff. Uh, first, thank you for your time. Thanks for letting us talk about the project and for all the work that's been done. We really appreciate it. Uh, my name is Ian Robertson. I'm a director of development for Titan Development. Um, prior to my work in the development field, I was an architect and Josh was too. Um, partner in charge of this project. We're both really committed to creating beautiful spaces, walkable spaces, and and respecting the urban environment. We're excited about this project because it's an opportunity to to address a site that's basically infill. And although the site isn't currently vacant, as we'll talk about a little bit more, we do think we've made some improvements to the site. Um, looking at the elevations, I think uh the the previous uh planning staff presentation was very thorough and I appreciated that. Um, what I will say about this is that we did have a previous design that was shown to neighbors and planning staff. We heard comments about that contemporary design. and it was very modern in the AC hotel style which some of you may be familiar from other cities and um in the spirit of the city different we decided to address those concerns by completely redesigning the project in a way that we felt was honoring the Santa Fe history and heritage. Um this final design is the result of those uh choices that we made and we did appreciate the neighbor comments about that. Um we always think that that uh makes a better project not a worse one. Some of the comments we received were also regarding views, specifically views to the north of the mountains or northeast to some of the mountains that exist out that direction. Uh we created this overland rendering to show uh first off that the existing building is to some degree blocking views from street and pedestrian view. Um also to show just a little bit of where the capital flats project is. That's another uh project of similar height. And in fact, just due to finished floor elevations, it does sit higher in elevation, although not in height from ground. Um,

and then we also just showed that the predominant views are to the north, especially of the mountains. We also wanted to show a little bit about the before and after, what we have planned versus what's there now. The current uh use of the site uh has a lot of you know RVs, abandoned cars, there's no sidewalk, there's chain lane fence, um there's weeds. Essentially, we feel that the urban design components of this, as Jennifer mentioned, are just a vast improvement in terms of walkability, also providing shade, and then just creating just a generally better experience for any pedestrians or people driving by the site. And in this conceptual rendering, um, some of our previous renderings sent to staff and was shown in the staff presentation wasn't, uh, fully realized with regards to landscape. So, we just sort of updated our conceptual rendering to show the level of landscaping. Although, um, some of these trees and are not are not the right species, but it does show the density of the plantings that we plan on doing on the site and how we'll uh hopefully improve the streetscape significantly from where we started. Um I believe that's the last um thing that we wanted to touch base on you back up. Thank you.

Thank you very much. That completes our presentation and be happy to stand for any questions. Thank you. Any questions?

Commissioner Barber in the traffic study. Did you account for the railroad stop?

Chair Clow and Commissioner Barber. So, it gets accounted for automatically in terms of when they're out there counting cars and looking at how long it takes cars to move through the intersection. Definitely the through we count cars for two to three hours. So, the train definitely comes through there during that time period. And so it is it's it's it's definitely in the mix. So all we have to do is say it took this you know so it is accounted for in the delay with respect to that intersection. Absolutely.

Any other questions? Commissioner Morando. Thank you Madam Chair. Um a couple in terms of the median. Um so is is the median work entirely within your development plan or is it just it's coordinated later with

so it it the thank you um chair cloud commissioners commissioner Morando um that's a great question so yes the the the improvements the median work we're showing in Srios road is incorporated into our development plan and we are coordinating also very closely with the DOT around the timing of their project. So what we're proposing here aligns with what the DOT is already proposing and um and so we're just going to be again communicating very closely in terms of timing. So there's certain improvements if if we're out of the gate first, we're going to we're going to do the improvements that we need to do to serve our project. If they're out of the gate first, then there'll be certain things that they will they will implement. So I that's really um that's kind of where we are right now in terms of um the schedule.

I guess I thought of it specifically. You know in the rendering we're showing a very nice median with landscaping on either side of it and I wasn't sure if there is our frontage. We're responsible for that sidewalk and the landscaping along our frontage. That is definitely part of our of our construction plans. I didn't see a streetscape that is there a streetscape that you might uh be able to just in terms of the section had this that kind of shows you head northbound on Srios gives you a sense of um so I I made notes and I'd like to make sure that they're right. So you have

you have a planting strip in the front. Correct. On the back of curb adjacent to Serios. We have a 5ft planting strip. We have a sixft sidewalk and 10 feet. Is that what you said? Then sixoot sidewalk and then another 10-ft landscape strip. So as in the rendering I see it's a particularly at the back of the site close to um St. Francis. Um we have a really intense planting right um but I couldn't is that in where is that's in the median or that's in

that's that's along our frontage. This is Yeah, this is right here. This is a driveway here that runs along the front of the building. This is Serrios Road out here. I'm sorry, my my little hand. Yeah, maybe. See?

Yeah. So what that rendering you were seeing is as if someone was standing about here and looking down towards the project. So it is not this median area that I'm trying to show with my mouse. I hope you can see that. It's this area here that showed those additional plantings and trees. So So the plantings are in the 10 ft and there's plantings in the five feet sixoot sidewalk and then another 10t of plantings. I do really like because it's Serios that you have the five and then the 10. Um because there's just a a huge safety component over the top of that.

Yeah, absolutely. I do. It really does seem like that planting is really key for this project to not be uh Yeah. Yeah. Not a big deal. Okay. I appreciate it. Great. Thank you, Commissioner McGee.

I just have a question about uh your proximity to the New Mexico School for the Deaf on the other side. Were there any considerations like accessibility wise uh to accommodate? I I don't even know if that's like required as part of code, but I'm wondering if it was like part of the traffic study if you had to make any considerations for um students entering and exiting. I think I saw a mention that no schools like there there weren't I'm just curious if if there was any consideration for that. Did I miss it?

Um we definitely um counted the vehicles um all three driveways into the school for the deaf were part of our traffic study. So we absolutely are accounting for all of the traffic moving in and out of the campus. Absolutely. And one of the things we were able to work really closely with the school for the deaf on on our program and um one of the things that we are implementing with them because they have students who love to walk in the area. They want to go over to a and they want to go get a burrito and you know all that kind of stuff. And so we're going to be doing training with our security staff in terms of how to engage with the deaf community and um because they're gonna and they want our security staff to you know be kind of eyes and ears on the ground because these kids want to have some freedom and the teenagers want to be able to go out and walk around and do their thing. So a there's going to be a lot better pedestrian amenities there, you know, to serve that. And um we also and have our staff know that you know what, there's kids kids in the neighborhood that are walking around, so let's be aware. And with that sensitivity training, if a kid is out walking and there's some something sketchy going on and they they need some support, they know they can come into the hotel and and they can they can get what they need.

Got it. So I think what you're saying is there is there is some thought to the fact that you're placed across the street from students that are deaf. Absolutely. Absolutely. The primary um mitigation is to train staff. That is one of them. Yes. Absolutely.

Mr. Rando. Yeah, Madam Chair. Just one more. Um uh so you had mentioned that there was a more contemporary design that well you I believe but yes development group there sorry I forgot your names. Um okay uh do you have a representation of that at all? I know it's not relevant but I'm interested. I do. I could um I could pull it up maybe and then maybe after um any public testimony I'd be happy to share that. I just don't know if we It would take me a minute to just dig it up, but I can absolutely share that. Thank you.

Any other questions? If not, we'll open it up to public comment. Okay, Commissioner Wland. Thank you, Madam Chair. So, so and I was trying to find this, but as I was reviewing all the documents, and it's extensive on this one. Uh there was a mention of the water line for the city that had to be either repaired or replaced. Is that due to the construction of this hotel or is that just necessary maintenance? That's actually just part of the the the Crios Road reconstruction. They whenever they do this, they look at opportunities to do utility upgrades because you're out in the street anyway. So, it's just part of that project. Thank you.

Okay, we'll now open um this matter up for public comment. So, if anyone is here from the public who would like to make a comment um on this project, please come forward. State your name and address for the record. Edward Archeletta, PO Box 2952, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this case shall be the truth and nothing but the truth? and do so under the penalties of perjury. I do. Please proceed.

Thank you, Madam Chair, planning commissioners. Good evening again. My name is Edward Archeletta and I'm a co-director with the old Santa Fe Association, which was founded 100 years ago this year to help preserve and protect the architectural cultural heritage of Santa Fe. We all know that the architecture in Santa Fe is unique in all the world and is one of the reasons people visit and move here. It's something like natives like myself are very proud of. We are slowly losing that uniqueness to frankly poor design and planning like this project tonight. We really need another multi-story hotel in Santa Fe. The oldest Santa Fe Association is united in opposing this development based mainly on its location and the traffic issues. The intersection of Serrios Road and St. Francis Drive is already already overly congested. Traffic especially at the rush hour backs up were blocks. I know this fact because I worked a block this intersection for 15 years and I worked on right across from Los Chosa restaurant on Ellery Street and I'd lived down on the southside and I used this intersection constantly and I would sit there forever just trying to cross that intersection especially when the rail runner was coming through. Um I'd like to read to you something verbatim from the traffic impact analysis submitted by the applicant for this project. It can be found in the report traffic impact analysis report on the ninth page and it's marked as Roman numeral bore and I quote during turning movement counts at Serio Road St. Francis. It was observed that eastbound traffic on Serrios Road backed up to the proposed proposed main driveway of the Marriott also serving the school for the dead coinciding with the passage of the railroad through the signalized intersection. As traffic volumes continue to grow over time, this issue is expected to worsen. That's from their own traffic study. During these periods, westbound traffic on Sirius Road may be unable to turn left into the main driveway, potentially

resulting in complaints to the city andor the New Mexico Department of Transportation. Um, I'd also like to read an excerpt from a letter to the editor of Today's New Mexican by former county commissioner Anna Hansen, who couldn't be here tonight and asked me to read it. She states, "Building a hotel at this location is such a bad idea. St. Francis surreal already is a compelled intersection that needs to be widened so traffic does not back up to Cordoba. Instead, the Department of Transportation of the City of Santa Fe needs to buy or lease the land and widen the road. A hotel casting shadows also would create ice on the road in the early morning when residents are trying to get to work. We we do not need a four-story building on other or any other building in this area. So, please I hope that you seriously consider this application tonight. Thank you. Please state your name and address for the record. Unit 725 is here.

Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under penalties of perjury?

I do. Please proceed. Uh here's a good good question for all of you guys. Where's that the closest fourstory building that bless Sus Road on on the whole stretch all the way from Zephrano all the way down in the Elorado? There's not one there's not one single four-story building at all. What we're doing to this to this corridor is we're changing this whole landscape to the whole way down. I could see if there were fourstory building somewhere. The the state transportation is only a twotory. You have the the lofts the cap lofts are on the other side of Early Street. They're set way back there. The capital flats are set way in the back. So, we don't really notice them. This is going to be an eyesore as as we go downh road. It's something that we haven't seen before and changing this landscape that we come into our city is really a bad design. I mean I I when I spoke at the at the ENN I had suggested a two-story but most of your hotels inside of it are all twotory build. So it's nothing wrong with going down lower. You don't have to have that four-story building. You know if that's all you are is looking for money then you're in the wrong game. Um, I had spoke too about the the the about the icing on Sus Ro and the casting of the shadows. I was hoping to see uh storyboard story pose. I don't know if you guys know what story poll are, but pose that go up and they they they show the cast the shadow. You know, the courtesy of the you guys this the the developer and staff could have showed us story poll ahead of time and we wouldn't have to have this conversation. But I really really believe that's going to set a a cast on serus for the for the longest time especially if come December, January, even February because the sun is further down south. So those are the time the ice sits up the longest. So we're we're putting a lot of people in danger those that road just stays icy because we don't see those truck and then if the

traffic's backed up so long that ice is going to sit there for a long long time and I think that traffic with the rail runner which was mentioned a lot more it really backs up and even when those gates don't even work it backs up further. So I really just think that this is really a a bad idea to have a four-story building on this corridor at this point. I think if there was more that we could do that, but you look at the only four story there is is Alderorado and I think there's maybe one way up on Sisso by Zephor. Other than that, there's not one at all. That's really a shame that that the people want to come in and destroy the city that is the way they want to do it now. This is not doing us any good for all the hotels we have in in town. Go to a two-story building. Let's make us happy. They can still make their money. Don't need the four the fourstory building. I thank you. Please state your name and address for the record.

Hello, my name is Marsha Emerton, 2826 Vera Oriente. Um, do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do this under the penalties of perjury? Yes.

Please proceed. First of all, I guess I could just say ditto to the last two people. I'm very much against this. Um, we don't need it. Doesn't fit in any way, shape, or form into anything around there. To me, it just seems like a money maker marriage. Um, these presentations are always so good. They think of every detail, you know, helping the kids across the street, doing things. The only thing I like about this are the trees and the sidewalk. It'd be nice to have a sidewalk. The rest of it seems like a debacle. And we keep building these things that don't that aren't good for traffic. I don't know how long surreals will be closed to do this, but that's going to be fun. But the new thing out on Zia and St. Francis trying to get in and out of there is going to be a mess. Everything always looks good until they start to build it and then you go, "Well, how do you get out of here? There's no way to do it." So, just say no. Thank you.

Please state your name and address for the record. Mary Shubin, 2119 Rancho Seringo Road. You solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury. Yes. Please proceed.

I have a lot of questions uh for the developer and the proposal to answer that I'd like the commission to be sure get addressed. Uh what are exactly the plans that DOT has for the expansion of Srios Road, especially the long promised right turn lane going north onto St. Francis. Um there are 150 parking spaces for 150 rooms. There are no parking spaces for the staff, guests, or anybody else. And there's no description uh in the pictures that we were shown of where the service entrance is nor where the laundry room and the hot air vent is located. And u I think that those things need to be considered. I've been staying at Marriott hotels all my life and I've seen places for those and I've seen plenty of hotels that have none and it's not fun. Um, I'd like to know more details about the train traffic, the amount of time that uh either any of the streets, Cordova, St. Francis, or um, Srios Road are blocked and no traffic is moving. I think that's an important factor uh, number for you to know. They're not on I could not see them on the chart. Um, I'm very concerned about the left turn lane off of the southbound Serios Road onto the middle or center opening. Uh, because that is that from my experience, I'm I'm also always sitting there waiting for the second or third light to to get up and get out of that space. So, I don't see that a left turn it lane is

going to be possible there, especially if it's not signaled. Uh, the next one between the Capitol flats, I believe I have that right, hotel, I mean apartment buildings and the hotel, the uh train tracks will be completely frozen during three or four months of the year. And uh that to me presents an extreme rail problem. Um and I don't believe that there is now any defrosting equipment there and I don't know whether it will need to be provided by the railrunner outfit. I don't know what's going to happen but that is for that length of line between St. Francis and Cordova. That is a very dangerous position for both the hotel and the railard flats. Um, in none of the photographs drawings that we were shown are any of the rail stop and go bars down, bars up, none of that equipment is shown. And I think that to be honest that needs to be drawn in on all of the drawings and where it is and what it looks like from any perspective. As to the school for the deaf, the promise of um some kind of safety training for guards that will be inside the hotel is absolutely insufficient and um not acceptable. And um I'd like to see some pictures of the school buses entering and entering

entering and exiting on their side of the street of Sirius Road. And what's um what new equipment will be required by the fire department if there is a serious rail accident and traffic accident? when the one call truck ladder truck that we have is already occupied at another building and how many how much is that going to cost and which uh which firehouse will be responsible for that and one two more um the closing of Cordova road uh by the train uh will be compounded by the ice on the track and The delays of that will the delays on that traffic absolutely prevent Cordova from being used as an alternate road for traffic to avoid the entire intersection when it's going to be destroyed or incapacitated for any more time than five minutes. And um those are my questions. Thanks very much. I'd like you to include the answers to those in your deliberations. Thanks.

Please state your name and address for the record. Marsh. Uh,

do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? Please proceed. Thank you, commissioners. I was not planning on speaking today, so pardon me if I ramble a bit, but I'll try to be short. I just want to be one more person in person to say no to this project. Um, I moved here from Colorado six years ago. I've been coming here for 40 years because I have a lot of family who live here. I love this place. The reason I why I left Colorado is if you've driven up to Denver lately, I don't know where I am anymore. I was in Fountain, Colorado, and I was lost. My grandparents used to live there as a tiny little place. We are the city different. Let's keep it that way. Not the city same. Um, and I really believe in supporting community. I don't go to meetings like this often, but I go to a lot of community meetings and I if the Marriott wants to come here, I would like them to be a good community partner and right now they're not. I live very close to La Pasada and their POS system was down for eight months. Eight months. you I liter people literally either had to pay for cash or go to the front desk in order to pay for their dinner. What why did Mary not Marriott not care? I know that's a small thing, but if you're if you want to come to this town, fix what you already have and do that really well before you build another hotel that we don't need. Thank you. Is there anyone else in chambers that wants to come forward and comment on this project?

If not, is there anyone on Zoom? If there's anybody in the Zoom room that would like to speak, please raise your hand. Madam Chair, I don't see any hands raised. Thank you. So, we'll close the public um comment portion. And madam chair, I'd just like to advise you that we do have the fire department here if you have any questions. Okay. Thank you. Um questions, comments by um commissioners.

Commissioner Smith. Uh yes. I would like to ask uh I think Ken or Heather or Dan just what is the latitude? How is the code working and what are the options in terms of heights of building and numbers of stores? Where is the what are the rules? I'm I'm sorry. Um um Commissioner, Madam Chair, could you please repeat that question?

Um I understand that there's a fourtory limit and I read through everything. What I don't understand is kind of flexibility we have determined second, third and fourth stories. Heather, go ahead.

Um, Commissioner Smith, that it is always under the purview of the planning commission to consider the context as well as compatibility with the surroundings. And so uh even though the maximum height is 45 ft I believe it that it certainly is within the power of the commission to consider a condition of approval that it be lower um whatever is decided and I guess my the purpose of that question is that we treating traffic as one thing uh another hotel as another thing and the number of stories as yet another issue but they all involve numbers of people and cars and congestion and as well as each having its own characteristic and I'm trying to understand uh that we do have latitude around compatibility of that if if each of us or however it works deem that to be appropriately Chair um Commissioner Smith. Yes, that is all part of the approval criteria and that compatibility piece is certainly a criterion that the commission

Commissioner Mirando. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um suppose I have a couple questions for the applicant. Did did you hi did did you uh show all the renderings that you have today? Yes. Um, so there isn't a rendering so much that's let's say further back to the intersection of Srios or at the end of the development.

No, I don't I don't think so. No. Um, do you have your presentation at your share situation?

I guess I wanted to look at two things again. I I looked at it in the packet here, but I thought it might be good to see it on the big screen. Um, you know, I I I take um the public's comments seriously. One, the um the shadow lines I thought was interesting. Um it's not something I thought of looking through the packet. Uh and then shadow lines in the train tracks is a whole another thing, right? So, okay. So, this is further up. I'll say from somebody who's occasionally applicant, I would not have shown this. Um, I mean, this is this is what you see for about you see this in a car or if you're on the sidewalk, the primary view of the back of this or most people for a leng any length of time is much further back and that's actually where you have a lot of trees planted. So,

okay, I I think that might be helpful. Um uh but if you if you go to the um not the uh landscape plan, but the traffic plan because I believe that's the one that has the north arrow. I'm I'm trying to get a sense this issue that I didn't so much consider. Can you you zoom out so we can see the north arrow? I believe this is the one that has the north. It's not this one. It is.

Oh, you know what? I'm looking at the one in in the right packet. So, we have oriented this, you know, just for the ease of display. Yeah. landscape orientation, but you know, Serrios moves in essentially a northeasterly direction. So, north due north is kind of off this direction, like right here. So, you have a plan that shows the whole building then because this one's not useful. May I put you in the wrong direction? There we go. I mean, that one works. Yeah. Okay. So now we're north pretty much straight up, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So to me, I mean, I I looked on my phone after I heard it, but to me, the shadow line issue is in very good shape, and that is because of the length of the parking lot. Um, on a four-story building, you're going to run. Um, I mean it's a little bit embarrassing, but I know about what that's going to be. I mean, this building is about 55 ft at least away from Srios Road.

Yeah. So, that's that's about 15 feet out. So, we're we're good there. And but the other one that was even more interesting was the tracks. Now, we are predominantly north. I'm sorry, predominantly south. So, our solar orientation is actually quite good. Yeah, there's great southern exposure there

and we don't have any trees there. So, from my perspective, um I from at least this plan commissioner, I take the comment seriously, but I I do not I think we're in good shape. Um uh the believe wasn't a quest. Yes. Um, you know, I did have something else, but it's it's lost somewhere. So, someone else.

Commissioner Wland. Thank you, Madam Chair. And per in your presentation you mentioned the necessity for the city of uh do you have in your docket the hotel occupancy rates at peak season for the city of Santa Fe?

I am going to defer to I I think I know but I don't want to I don't want to guess. My clients of course have done a thorough market analysis um and so I'm going to let speak to speak to that. Madam Chair, Commissioner Rean. Um, obviously we did a financial analysis to determine whether or not this hotel is going to be financially viable. With that is occupancy rates, etc., etc. Santa Fe's been doing very well since coming out of COVID with occupancies in the high 70s to low 80s depending on the subm market. What's interesting about Santa Fe's hotel market is the South Serio where a lot of hotels have been built in the last 20 years. I even call it a lot some that those hotels are the ones that are struggling. Downtown area is doing really well. The residence in that's over off of St. Mike's and St. Francis uh sold last year. It had 82% occupancy for the year 2024. Um so the the hotel market in Santa Fe is very strong right now. Obviously there was the travel and leisure article about tourism which has been a huge boom for Santa Fe. So it's you know tourism in Santa Fe is strong and there is demand for more hotels and more hotel nights.

So in your analysis though you never saw that we were at 100% occupancy at any time during our peak season. Oh, for sure. On certain days, I mean, you know, whether it's the Zobra or, you know, whatever event is going on in Santa Fe, you'll have 100% occupancy in hotel nights, but that's infrequent, but that's not how you measure hotel occupancies. A demand study will say anything above 75% is a healthy market, and Santa Fe is way above that. Thank you. Any other questions? Commissioner Smith.

Yes. Do you have Can you point out on this picture, one of the uh folks testifying for the public talked about a right-hand turn off Serios onto St. Francis that was going to be a new a new turning lane that had not been discussed before.

Is there some way to show us how how that is proposed to work? I I believe um Sher Clow and Commissioner Smith, they're referring to a um northbound Cerrios that um there could be and I I I can't speak with authority about this, but there um that with part of the Serrios Road reconstruction that as you head north and you approach St. Francis, they would they would create a dedicated right turn lane. So, you could basically kind of do that 180 and and head south on St. Francis Drive. But I can't speak you know authoritatively at the moment of whether or not that is incorporated in the DO's plans because that is um you know just the g as you can see the geometry there is is challenging like I said you're essentially doing essentially a U-turn um but I I can't I can't speak to that but I believe that's what was referenced. Commissioner Mc Reynolds.

You um I had a qu I guess going back to the discussion of the right in, right out, left in, right out. Uh so I saw in the notes that do said we'd be fine with a right in and right out, but it sounds like in your response that you've the develop or the applicant is choosing to do just a right in. No right or right out only. Excuse me. No, right.

And then you discussed uh or mentioned that you know you're working in coordination with DOT. So is that like a commitment like for coordination with them throughout the project like if something comes up you know in this development that chair cloud commissioner renewals absolutely we will be coordinating with them very closely because you know there can be construction there's going to be likely some construction happening in parallel. So we have a very good working relationship with the team at the DOT and that that coordination will continue throughout the life of the construction of the project. And speaking to our south entrance here, part of the issues with the right in is this is our property line right here. We can't get a right turn del lane. There's no space within the ride ofway. And due to the proximity to Cordova, because you see we have a really nice generous right turn lane here going into the main entrance, we could not accomplish that there. So we felt and so basically DOT is like we're good with a right in but you got to figure out a delane like well that's not possible. So that's why we abandoned the right in. So we feel like this is the the safest the safest geometry site.

Thank you for that clarification. Any other questions, Commissioner Wland? So, two questions for you. Uh, one, nowhere in the packet did I see you mentioned a rooftop terrace. Do you have an idea of where that's going to be located within this project? It's right there. Okay. So it'll be basically it's on the board on top taking advantage of the views of our congregate. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Good choice. Um second question being is next at the north end of your development proposal here. There has been a longstanding Gunnison prairie dog population that's been there. Um just going to ask it because you're going to get asked it by the public. So what's the plan with that?

Yeah. So, um, so let me just go back to zoom in. So, so as everybody knows in this kind of area here around the tracks, there is a beloved fairy dog colony. Currently on our site, there is a chainlink fence about right there that's existing today. So the amount of real estate from our property that sort of abuts that DOT rightway where the where the colony is is is is very small and the rest of our site is essentially paved in the existing condition. So, I had a chance to visit with our local prairie dog wrangler and biologist, Trent Bodkin, and he's very familiar with this property and um and he's like, I've never seen any prairie dogs on this site. Of course, we will do a prairie dog survey prior to any earthmoving activities as required by code. And if there are any dogs present, they will be removed. And the other thing that we're going to do because we know that prairie dogs are mobile, right? They they move around. And so we are um so one of the requirements for storm water pollution prevention is what we call a silt fence. So if you drive by a construction site, there's like this black almost looks like tarp or mesh. It's like a little fence. It's like two feet tall and it kind of runs around the perimeter of site. So that um silt fence um they have a version of that that's embedded with wire so it makes it much more structurally stable and then you can get that and what we're going to do at the north end of the site is we're going to bury that into a trench

and so um what Trent expressed to me is that that is a great preventative measure from keeping the dogs from coming back onto the site while we're under construction. First, the visual barrier alone is enough for them because they can't see if there's predators on the other side of that. So, the visual barrier is very effective, but then we bury that that material into the ground, which also prevents the burrowing into the site. So, we are very aware and we we are taking extra precautions that are not required by code in order to ensure that um that colony is protected. Any other questions?

Madam Chair, I believe that Mr. PCO would like to Oh, sorry. Some information. Sorry, Leroy. Go ahead.

You madam chair. Uh, I think it's important to really understand the context of this uh DO's design project. I believe it's 100% complete design pending funding and so they're moving looking for funding to build what they've designed. This project came in after that and so that coordination is critical. They've been involved in understanding what they're doing. Um one of the comments or questions raised was about um ADA accessibility with the roadway itself. And I know we know as going through Serio St. Francis intersection, we see deaf signs, signage by the highway and I believe the um buttons or vibration or whatnot to deal with blind or deaf or whatever. So, a lot of those accommodations with respect to the street uh infrastructure is built into the roadways, the federal standards. I would like to read um the DO's statements and review comments that came from this design because I for the record I think it there was a lot of miscommunication even in my notes and I finally woke up. So this came from Kathleen Garcia. She's the DOT district 5 traffic engineer and her statement is after review NMD dot does not approve the proposed secondary west driveway as a right out leftin only access. We can only support the driveway as a right in right out only configuration. But she's saying right in right out at that western driveway. Allowing left in movements at that location raises safety and operational concerns, especially given how close it is to the westbound left turn lane at Cordova Road. Introducing additional left turn movements in that area could negatively impact traffic flow and safety on Seras Road. In terms

of the reconstruction project on Sirius Road, the plan to extend the westbound left turn lane at quart of a road to 175 ft plus transition is necessary. This design accommodates both deceleration and queuing needs and will move forward as planned. I hope that helps. I think there was a little bit of been saying different things. So, it's right in right out for the DOT. whatever it is, it will be reflected in their design. And you the I believe at the end of the whole TIA, we're requiring them to get a DOT access permit in addition to a city of Santa Fe access to make.

Thank you for that clarification. It's helpful. Any other questions, comments? Commissioner Mirando. Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, Jennifer, if you would. Um, did you happen to find the Yeah, might not be relevant, per se, but I'd like to see it.

You're clearly curious about it. So let's oh um I I think that's um I think that's a a significantly better design this one.

Um I I think the new project is really nice, but that's a that's a really that's a really well done facade. I'm not saying it works or doesn't work. I'm just complimenting it.

Um okay, cool. Um could we go back to your rendering from about the same place? I guess I'll say while you're teeing it up, you know, for me the the traffic is interesting and it kind of was something when I reviewed it, I felt like I needed to spend a lot of time with it. It carries a lot of weight for me that without this it's at the same grade in the future. Um that's um okay. Right. So what I'm interested in is your rooftop um patio. So we have this pilaster sort of facade element that goes out to Serios and yeah and I think you know that motif is is cool and and it looks nice but I I think it's an opportunity to soften the corner of the building and cake terrace more

that I think might be uh better re reception to to the the we're getting here. You can actually see three windows there that are aligned with different solstice dates. So, they will create a perfect line in line with the sun at those dates. So, we could soften the corner, but the decision to do something there was supposed to be something interesting and architectural, but also have some significance to the passage of time. You don't know how much it pains me to say this because it sounds like something I do, too. I I I would I I think uh take it as a suggestion.

We'll definitely look at it. Um I I do think it really affects the view of the stories to this corner and I I can't say more how I really think this does not do the application justice. Yeah. um to pull it back further, show the actual end. I I think it actually has less of an impact on the overall facade than it looks like. Well, happy to revisit that that corner. Absolutely. Thank you.

Any other comments or questions? If not, is there a motion? Madame Chair, I would like to make a motion in case 2025 11380 for um uh 10,000 111 and 113 Srios Road development plan. I'd like to make a motion for approval provided uh with um with accepting um uh technical corrections and um staff's uh comments. Um it's close enough. Um

thank you. Um, I would like to add as a provision of the approval that the applicant um work with staff to soften the corner and um uh also that the applicant make an effort to um if it's possible to uh help the landlocked uh prairie dog community in the application. I I understand that that would take actual coordination with the property owner. It's my motion.

Yes. Dan, can you repeat that last section about the prairie dog again? That the owner um make a good good faith effort to re uh relocate the prairie dog safely if the property owner agrees. Dan, are we okay to second?

Yes. Okay, I'll second. Roll call. Vice Chair Smith. No. And I just would like to explain that that I think this is 10 pounds of sausage in a five pound bag. I think they've done a great job. I think the staff has done a great job. It's just u 10 pounds of sausage in a 5B bag. All Vermont say. Commissioner Morando. Yes. Commissioner McGee. Yes. Commissioner Relent.

No. And I'd like to actually explain my answer as Commissioner Smith did. I do not have a problem with your project. I get the occupancy. I understand what you guys are trying to do here. My issue is is that I don't think we've fully addressed your ingress and egress in and out of this structure with 150 units and you have one access point and you're going to expect people to go lefthand turn onto Srios Road. It's a tough pill to swallow here and I get going over the railroad tracks. You're going to deal with federal, state, and local. So, it's not really a viable option. Um, so just with the fact of how that traffic is and in your traffic analysis, not seeing it incorporated with the DOT and the timelines in the grading scale of what their improvements are supposed to do just makes it to where kind of want to pump. Thank you for the presentation,

Commissioner Barber. No. And um I don't want to repeat what my colleagues have already said, but for the same reasons. And Commissioner Mcrenolds. Yes. Madame Chair, we have a tie. I vote yes.

Madam Chair, the motion is passed. Um so Commissioner uh Smith will be taking over chairing the meeting and um Commissioner McGee and I will um be leaving. Thank you. We have five minute break.

Yes, we're going to take a five minute break for the turning this over.

I didn't I did I have enjoyed it. The fun like Oh, wow. Yeah, man. I don't know. We'll still be

Yeah. Oh, really? No, I think

uh if we could if we could begin to call the meeting back to order. There you go. Uh if we could be confused as to who I was call the meeting back to order and we now have before us under new business case 2025 111386 uh 214 Camino Dillos Marquez. Um, staff would like to proceed.

Oh. All right. Have you been sworn in?

Nathan Legwis, 703 Alto Street, Santa Fe. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? I do. Please proceed. Thank you, Dan.

Good evening, chair and and uh planning commission members. I'm Nathan Luwist, senior planner, and I'm here to present staff's findings on case 2025 11386 214 Camino Dos Marquez development plan. Uh, the agent on this project is Jenkins Gavin. The applicant is Santa Fe Opera and I'm the case planner, Nathan Linquist. Next slide. Just for a project overview, um, the applicant is requesting approval of a development plan to construct 83 multif family units in two buildings. The property is zoned R29. It's about a 2 and a half acre lot and the proposal is to provide units for seasonal technical apprentices for the opera as well as other renters in the offse. Um and as you look at this site plan you can see that um the buildings are generally tried to be pulled closer to the Camino deos Marquez uh street. There are two driveway accesses. The driveway wraps around the property and the parking spaces are oriented off the driveway. There's a courtyard in the in between the two buildings that provides open space and uh usage for the tenants. Next slide. So you can compare that to the existing conditions of the property where there's a uh 50 units of multif family for Santa Fe Opera uh technical apprentices and there there are five different buildings are pulled a little bit further back from commun Marquez towards the rear of the property closer to the neighboring properties. There's three access points be reduced to two. If you look at the surroundings

in the neighborhood, there are several other um condominium complexes, uh there are some single family homes around uh the property. And then looking at that image on the picture, you can see that there it's a twostory buildings. Um the sidewalk is narrower than city standards and that'll be improved uh to get up to 5t wide of a sidewalk. there are street trees that uh will be preserved and um so overall there's some differences to the project but uh it's kind of an extension of what is already on the site. Next slide. The zoning of the project is um R29 as we stated that was uh reszoning approved by the city in May 2025. The surrounding zoning of the property of the property includes R5 zoning, R21 zoning, uh both residential zones there and then C1 and C2 zoning which are commercial zones. If you go to the west of the project, there's that Cordova Road commercial area, uh, including Trader Joe's and other shopping centers. Future land use map shows it as being highdensity residential, 12 to 29 dwellings per acre. Uh, the surrounding properties are the same, either the same designation or some of them are low residential, 3 to seven dwellings per acre. Next slide. Looking at the the summary of the zoning, you can see that um the the project meets the zoning standard of the R29 zoning as far as height, which will be 36 ft, lot coverage, uh which is less

than the required 40%. open space, square footage, building setbacks, which we'll talk about a little bit more on in a couple slides, and then the density of the project, which with a 15% density bonus, uh, meets Santa Fe Home Program requirement and gets them to the 83 units allowed on the on the property. Next slide. Looking at the architecture, uh the new structures be three stories, 36 feet with stepbacks to two stories at the corners of the building. So you can see the northwest corner, the northeast corner, and the souththeast corner all have step backs down to two stories and the corners closest to um surrounding properties. And if you look at those elevations, the third one down, the north elevation is what it would look like from the street. And you can see the grade slopes quite a bit. And so that uh east side of the property will would be a good bit shorter than the the west side from how it would appear from the street. Next slide. So the setback issue um the standard street street setback in an R29 zoning district is 7 ft. Uh however the code does allow lesser setbacks to be approved via a development plan and planning commission may approve that if the shorter setback um helps benefit the relationship of the building uh with the neighborhood and with the project itself. So uh looking at this there's an average setback of 8t 10 in across the

whole uh frontage but in in a few places the the request is go down to 3 ft and that is really to accommodate some of the building massing and breaking up of the project as well as some porches and balconies. Um so overall staff's finding is that this meets the allowance and code for a shorter setback given that it improves the streetscape by you know pulling the buildings forward um away from the other properties and breaking up with the massing. So uh we would recommend in support of the the three-foot setback. Next slide. the landscaping plan. Um the applicants are seeking to preserve as many of the existing trees as possible and I'm sure they can talk more about that. Um but you can see there's quite a bit of landscaping included in the courtyard around the perimeter of the building and uh staff has added one condition of approval to require that the subject provide substantial landscaping to screen neighboring properties on the west, east, and south sides of the project. Next slide. As far as utilities, parking, traffic, and archaeology utilities, uh the major aspect here is just that there's a new wastewater main required to be installed by the project and that was a condition of approval at the resoning last year. Uh the the project meets the parking requirements of the code and has been received approval from the architectural review committee. As far as traffic and access, there were no additional traffic requirements coming out of the TI TIA other than items that were already required by code such as five foot sight, 5 foot sidewalks, and making sure the driveway accesses where it hits the street meet all the city's driveway standards.

Next slide. There was a early neighborhood notification meeting September 29th, 2025. There was discussion from um attendees at that meeting about the height and the balconies and uh porches of the building. Applicant has also complied with 14-3.1 notice requirements for public hearing. Next slide. Uh I'll just show the development the different criteria involved with this project. On the whole um staff has found that the applicant has met this criteria but these are the criteria for development plan approval criteria which you see on just about every project. On the next slide then is the criteria for density approval given that there's a requirement for that to be approved and consider these factors to reach the the the full density allowed in an R29 zoning district. And then same thing for the height on the next slide. So you have any questions on any of these, we're happy to answer them um as they're discussed further in the staff report. And next slide. So the staff's recommendation is that planning commission approve this case and subject to the conditions of approval technical corrections outlined in the staff report. Um and then we provided the motion language should planning commission choose to approve or deny the project. So with that um I'll stand for questions. Thank you.

Commissioners have any questions? Mr. Lqua. So on the density bonus and maybe I'm overthinking this because they're paying the fee in L. So presentation that we heard earlier today is that if they pay the fee in L they do not get the density bonus or is that the future land the update of the code? I you want to go ahead? No, I believe um so they're this project came in under the old code. Yeah. Okay. So they're subject to the old code. Am I getting that right? Okay, here I see head knots. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you very much.

Thank you very much. You'll have the next presentation, please. Everybody raise their right hand and when you get to the podium, uh, go ahead and state your name and address for the record. Um, Jennifer Jenkins, 130 Grant Avenue. Colleen Gavin, 130 Grant Avenue.

Robert Mayo, 301 Opera Drive, Santa Fe. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? Please proceed. Hello again. I'm Jennifer Jenkins with Jenkins Gavin. Also joined by Colleen Gavin with Jenkins Gavin and um Robert Maya, executive director of the Santa Fe. And um before we have a fairly brief presentation, but before we jump in, I'm gonna um have Mr. Maya come up and share a few words.

Thank you. Good evening. I'm Robert Mayer, general director, the Santa Fe Opera, and I'm here to speak a little bit about the importance of this project uh to the Santa Fe Opera. Uh the Santa Fe Opera is much more than an opera company. It's also an educational organization and it has been since our founding in 1957. We created the very first apprentice program for singers in that year. And a few years later, we created the the program for technical apprentices. These are the single most important programs in the opera industry, training young people, not only as performers on stage, but also in all of the theater arts. So each year we have about 125 apprentices and they receive career advancing instruction in their fields. They're also paid and they're provided housing which is critical for several reasons. They simply would not be able to afford living in Santa Fe and working at the Santa Fe Opera were not for the the housing that we provide. They also work very late hours and sometimes six or seven days a week. 27 years ago, I myself was an intern at the Santa Fe Opera and was a beneficiary of the housing program. In fact, it was because of the housing that I accepted the opportunity to work here. In 2001, the Santa Fe Opera had the foresight to acquire the property which represents an asset that is critical to the opera's current operations and more importantly critical to its future and to its ability to attract the best talent in the industry. Currently, the 50-unit complex, which was constructed in 1983, is nearing the end of its lifespan. Buildings are poorly constructed and poorly insulated.

roofs and stucco are in constant need of repair and the electrical capacity does not support the added load to provide air conditioning which makes it difficult for our apprentices to get a good night's sleep during the increasingly hot summer nights. We also believe that this project aligns very nicely with the city's objectives for enhanced density in central locations with access to public transportation and easy access by foot commercial centers this evening. We respectfully request your support the development plan which allow us to redevelop the site with newly constructed environmentally responsible apartments while doubling our capacity and providing housing for all of our apprentices. both the singing apprentices and the technical apprentices. Thank you very much. So just um we've already made a few introductions. Um you met Mr. Mayo with the Santa Fe offer who's the applicant on the project and um Colleen and I with Jenkins Gavin are the planning consultants and owners representatives. Um architecture services provided by SNPC architects, civil and traffic engineering by Tiara West and landscape architecture by planned collab. So um you already heard a lot of background from Mr. Maya that um they you know they acquired the what is called the Axton Apartments was acquired back in um 2001 was built in the early 80s and um they were able to house their technical apprentices at the facility but they did not have enough space for

the singing and um housing the singers has become increasingly challenging in this rental market and the cost and the availability of rental space. So, this is a really critical opportunity for them to um be self-sufficient in housing their apprentices and house all of them in this one location. And as um as Nathan mentioned, back in May of 25, just um bit earlier last year, the city of Santa Fe approved a reszone of the property, which also came before this body from R21 to R29. So, um, the property is located on Commamino de los Marquez. You can see here we're just off of Cordova Road, a little to the north. And what is really great about this location in terms of, you know, a moderate increase in density is this is an incredibly a diverse and walkable neighborhood. We have access to all kinds of commercial services, shopping, restaurants, and um access to parks, access to public transit. So, this is um the the definition really of a of a of a great walkable neighborhood. So, this is the um the future land use map which reflects the property as high density residential. Then the zoning map, we are R29. We have R21 directly across the street. There's a condominium project there. There is a condominium project direct directly to our west. That's actually zone C1, but that um but you can develop housing in C1, but it's kind of based on R21 standards. And then you see as you move further west, you get into all the commercial C2 office and shopping center zoning. And then um

to the north and south you have um residential um zoning R5. So these are the existing conditions. Um as mentioned there are a series of five buildings around a central courtyard. On the east there is a carport structure here. Then there's a small maintenance building in the southeast corner. So, um the site is 2 and a half acres. Um we're proposing 83 units. The um required open space is um 20,750 ft. We're actually providing um 20 over 26,000 ft of open space or 24% of the site and we are compliant um with um providing 106 parking spaces on site. So this is the site plan kind of zoomed out a little bit so you can see our surrounding context. You can see the condos across the street and the and the condos to our west and then you see the um single family development to the south and the east. So just zooming in on the site plan a little bit here. We are proposing two access points. Then we have a driveway that wraps around the building which of course provides great connectivity and it's also great for emergency access so we don't have any deadends that need to be navigated. Um there are currently three curb cuts on um on community Los Marquez. So we'll be closing one of them which consolidating those access points is always a benefit in terms of how the roadway networks and um so we have two L-shaped buildings around a um a densely landscaped um interior courtyard. So this is providing seating and landscaping and just kind of outdoor chill space and gathering space for for the residents. And then um we've concentrated the parking around the perimeter and we also have another kind of small office maintenance building in the southwest corner.

So this is um just a rendering of our landscaping. So we have a very robust landscape plan in term we have some um we're like I said preserving as many trees as we can. We actually did a health assessment. We hired an arborist to assess all the existing trees and determine their health and um and so we have existing trees along Camino de los Marquez. Existing street trees will be retained and we'll be we'll be augmenting that a little bit as well. And then along the south there's there's kind of a a drainage area and we have a lot of existing mature trees that will be retaining beds. So um as mentioned um when we went through the reszone process as you might recall it was determined that there was um a segment of sewer line that was basically has was built in like the 30s. Believe it or not we still have sewer lines in city of Santa Fe built in the 1930s. It was determined that that segment of sewer line and an associated manhole needed to be replaced in order for the city of Santa Fe to provide service to to the project. So, a financial guarantee was put in place. So, that money is sitting at the city in order to implement this work. We actually the plans are done and we're going to be submitting for permit and we're going to be doing that work this spring. So, that'll be a separate permit. So, we'll kind of be doing it in advance of the rest of the construction. So, this is an interesting little overlay that we did. This is the aerial underneath. that is the existing apartment project and the blue outlines are the new proposed buildings. So, a couple of things to note here is that um we intentionally pushed the building closer to Camino de los Marquez um and and Nathan touched on that in terms of our setbacks and we did that for a couple of reasons. One is

it's really about having that kind of building having a relationship to the street. We think it's much better to have a building on the street than to have parking on the street or have a driveway adjacent to the street. It creates a much more dynamic kind of urban walkable environment. And so that was a that was a very intentional design choice and it also moves the buildings further away from our neighbors to the south. So um again that was very intentional. And so just looking at the setbacks we on the west right up here we have we are 77 and a half feet away from our neighbors to the west and um just looking at my cheat sheet here. Um oh no actually up here we're a little closer. This one is we're 64 feet here. Down here we're 92 feet away. And then as you look at the south elevation, we range around 50 52 feet away at this end of the building. And then when you go to the east end of the building, we are um approximately yeah 50 ft 50 ft away as well. And you can see here currently the existing building goes all the way to this point and we have pulled this back. So, we're creating much greater separation and distance for our neighbors right here with this location of so this is kind of a streetscape view. This is not really a view anybody could really see, but so it's just a graphic representation that if you were across the street really far, you were looking straight on to the building looking at the north elevation. What you see here on the left is we have a single family residence on the corner of Camino de los

Marquez and Galasto Street. That is directly east of us. And then um to the west of us is the um cond the two-story condominiums. And we have a 12 foot blade change across our site to west. And so what this reflects so the the the residents um to our east is perched up quite a bit higher than we are. So what you can see is what this dashed line is reflecting is comparing where our roof line is to our neighbors. And then the same thing on the west side. our roof line compared to our neighbors roof line. So, this provides a sense of context in terms of how this building um takes advantage of that grade change across the site in order to settle the building into the site and um and provide a proper context with our neighbors. So, this is the northwest view. So if you are traveling east on Camino de los Marquez. So you're coming from Maria's and you're heading towards Galasto, this is um that elevation. So this is Camino de los Marquez right here. And you can see that we have a twostory element here at the corner. So we intentionally um created some some strategic twotory elements just to minimize minimize the mass. And then this is the northeast view. So if you're leaving Galasto and you're heading to Maria's, this is the view. And you can also see that twostory mass there. And then on the southeast corner down um where you know kind of across from where that maintenance building is. That's our southeast corner. This is the view there. And you can see again we have

another twostory mass most adjacent to our single family. So, we did conduct a traffic study. I won't bore you with my my little narrative regarding that. But one thing that is really important to um to speak to, we currently have 50 units in the in the associated traffic associated with those units on the site. We're proposing 83. So the delta is 33 units. One could argue that the traffic study should have studied the impact of those additional 33 units because when we count the cars on the street, we're counting the 50 units that are the cars that those 50 units are generating. But we didn't do that. We did a traffic study based upon assuming we had a brand new 83 unit project. So we took an incredibly conservative approach to the traffic study. But what is important here this is the trip generation. So as I mentioned the IT or the in institute of transportation engineers establishes trip generation for multifamily projects. And you can see the top line is how many cars are generated by an 83 unit project. Next line is how many cars are generated by a 50unit project. And then what you see below is the delta. So we are creating with this project three additional a total of 13 additional cars in the morning and a total of 18 additional cars in the afternoon evening.

So we studied seven intersections for this project and starting with community de los Marquez and Galasto Street direct to our east. Levels of service B in the existing condition as well as in the build condition. Same is true of Cordova and Galasto which is a signalized intersection. level of service B is maintained. Cordova at Don Diego, which is a four-way stop. Um, same level of service. It's it's an A and a B now and it's remains an A and a B in the build condition. Um, Marquez, I'm sorry, Civan Diego was signalized. My apologies. Camino de los Marquez and Diego is a four-way stop. It is an A and a C and it remains an A and a C. Marquez and Don Cubo A and then both of our access drives function as a level of service A.

So that concludes my presentation and we'd be happy to stand for any questions. Thank you. Are there any questions the commission? Yes.

Question. The existing building there is a twotory. Is that correct? Yes, that's correct. Thank you for the presentation. Um, so we touched on this last time with the resoning that you guys had five long-term tenants that were in the residences. Understandably, Opera is in for a season. I know you guys can't predict outcomes of construction, demolition, and so forth, but is the concept for your project to minimize your impact to the rest of the housing of Santa Fe because in the time of your construction, you will affect our housing situation because you're displacing many of your apprentices.

So that Thank you, um, Chair Smith and, um, Commissioner Relan. So our we have a very aggressive construction schedule because we can manage housing our apprentices elsewhere for one summer. We get one summer to do that. And um and so our plan is is in September of this year when the season is over and the apprentices go home, we immediately proceed with demo and construction. So the summer of 27 we will be um working on that there's an they have a entire staff at the Santa Fe Opera dedicated to housing apprentices as well as you know visiting staff or other you know um people who are here for the season. And so they will house the apprentices for the summer of 27. And then the plan is is for this building to be complete in April of 28 and then the apprentices move in for the 28th season.

Thank you for taking that into consideration. Of course, the rest of the community. And I do actually appreciate you guys pushing your project towards Camino Dillos Marcus and giving the neighbors that extra space, a little breathing room. Yeah, absolutely.

It was mentioned in the packet that um during the off season they typically provide like workforce h like temporary workforce housing for like Absolutely. like traveling nurses like that. Absolutely. Is that correct?

Yes. So in the offseason we can provide um six month leases and six-month leases really serve a really important need in the housing market. is they're hard to come by because landlords, they want a year at a minimum, right? But you have a traveling nurse or some other traveling professional or somebody doing a gig at St. John's, they just need six months or somebody's moving to Santa Fe and they're on they're hunting for their home, they need a place to land. So, a six-month lease really really serves, I think, a really important need in the housing market.

And have have you all been providing that? Has that been what's been happening since development? It has been available, but just because of the age of the facility and the lack of air conditioning, it's not like they're beating down the door. Got it. Thank you. That's excit. I have one flipping the coin. You're done. Just But assure me that it won't be short-term rentals.

Oh, absolutely. I 100% assured. Um, thank you, Vice Chair. Um, hi. Um, so I I guess I had two. Um, guess I could we go back to your renderings? Yeah, here you go. Yeah. And the the um right the average step back is like 8 feet something or other and there's a couple of them that need to be three and so the three feet ones that's really where are the three feet backs? I'm

not I'm not sure I understand the question. Commissioner Miranda

there. Well, I thought there was a three-foot um step back somewhere. Oh, yeah. Um, Vice Chair Smith, um, Commissioner, um, Mirando, um, um, fellow board members. Um, so where the three-foot stepback occurs is actually on Commamino Deos Marquez on the north elevation. So, as you can see from here, sorry, I take my glasses so I can see here. Um, you can see in this rendered site plan right here, that patio balcony element projects out. And so at that sit at that condition is where we we get pinched for that three-foot setback. But other than that, we actually have more generous setbacks. Um but that is our worst case scenario with our average of 8 foot 10. And so by code we are required seven. So by average we're complying but we do have that pinch because we are providing um outdoor space for all of the units. We feel it's really important that these um the apprentices in particular because they work so hard that they have a space to themselves to be outside and enjoy our our beautiful scenery, our beautiful air. Um and then of course when these are leased at, you know, to the open market that obviously we want them to be um attractive, accommodating.

Thank you. Yeah, I it's um it's a cool site plan how it basically hides the parking I think in a an elegant way. Um I I So if you could go back to the rendering I guess what I want I I wasn't clear where that happened but it looks doesn't look like a big deal at all. I just couldn't tell. So, do those parapits consistently step along the elevation? Do we have an elevation where that

this it's this area here where the 3-foot setback occurs? Well, no. Well, I what I more mean if you go back the the you had a streetcape like an overall streetscape, but I I wasn't quite sure uh how the parapits were stepping all in a line. Oh, okay.

Yeah, it I mean it comes across in the three-dimensional views like I thought they might be um the same at points there. Is that on the Yeah, those higher those higher paraputs are the same. So we have Can we zoom in? I guess I feel like the like I I I mean I like the images uh in in general, but I not getting a good sense of the elevations as a whole. Um right. You want me to walk you through the the elevation, the stepping?

Yeah. Yeah, for sure.

Certainly. Um, okay. So, um, if you go from basically from east to west, you can see here. So, this is this is what we call the the east building. We'll get better names as we move forward, but the east building here. Um, you can see that this is actually a two-story element here. So that parapit height is at um 28 plus or minus. It's definitely a minus, not not a plus. So we've got 28 top of parapit there obviously. And then you can see here that is our threetory element that's beyond it. Right. So we've we've carved off that section of the building there. Um oh I apologize. And then as we move um to the west, you can see that um this is a three-story element here. So you can see here that this is a three-story element here that continues here. We have a little bump up here that's I believe 18 in in the center to break up the longevity of that plane. And then it continues west here. We have another little bump up here. And then again in that northwest corner we have a twostory element again. So we have, you know, a 20 probably 27 foot top of parapit height there. And then as you go along the facade of what we call the west building, you can see we've provided these um patio balcony elements that actually project out. And so it's a massing element that provides not only the horizontal um staggering but also a vertical stag staggering of our mass. So you can see here that the top of the parapit of that balcony element is below our threetory parapit height. So um and in the analysis that that Nathan did and

in the staff report he I thought he very clearly and succinctly kind of summarized that. Um, but we really were trying to break this up and again, not just on the north facade, which is the most publicly visible, but all the way around the building because we want to enjoy our building too. And in fact, we did it on the interior. So, the um the elevations of the courtyard incorporate these um architectural elements as well. had a I guess I had a little bit of a concern of how much the the dominant mass is basically two heights in parapit. Well, three it because of the orchards, but um I mean it it's so nicely cut into the ground it just I I guess I guess I had hoped that the parapits would enjoy not be so regular. Um

yeah, I mean we we did have to as you can see in this northeast corner here actually our finished floor is 48 in below grade right there. Okay. So, we did try to depress that again to have a relative height that is that is complimentary to our residential neighbors to the east. Right. And then to your question about, you know, maybe varying those parapit heights even further. So, we're restricted by the height um restrictions of 36 feet at our roof line, basically top of roof, right? And um as you know from doing multifamily housing, the the efficiencies of systems, mechanical systems in particular, as they run through the building horizontally, it's always best to keep our our ceil ceiling plenum consistent at each floor. And so um the only floor where we actually have a variation is the first floor where we've utilized um ramps to basically um help with the grading so that again we can step down our site east to west um as much as possible and depress this building as much as possible.

Okay that answer your question. Thank you. Thank you very much for your presentation. Do we have any members of the public want to

state your name and address for the record? My name is Sarah Birmingham. My address is 300 Camino de los Marquez. Do you slely declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under penalties of perjury? Yes. Please proceed.

Thank you. First of all, I want to really recognize that our my neighbors and we are directly west of the Axton Apartments right now totally recognize the influence and impact that the Santa Fe Opera has on our economy. We are not at all anti Santa Fe Opera. In fact, many of us are ticket holders to the opera. And for any of you, you're not my neighbors, but you should know that living next door to the Santa Fe apprentices during the summer is an absolutely delightful way to spend the summer. Watching the young people or older people come in with all those different license plates. My window looks right out onto that parking lot. So, it's really wonderful there. We do have some concerns with this larger building in our neighborhood. And I have to admit that Jennifer has been so reactive to the large amount of people that came out during the zoning uh meetings and we really appreciate that she listened to us, responded to us and reacted to many of the things that people were worried about. We continue to worry about Camino de los Marquez. It's a wide street. It has no center divide. There's lots of cars that come down that street. So, there must be some plan for modifying that or even turning left into the opera housing on that street. There's no center divide. There's not even a line down the street. And we have had many cars come down right down the middle of the street and run into the signs there. So, that's something I'm sure that they're going to consider. I don't think there's any plans for street parking. I don't think there could be. So, I don't know if they plan on it, but I don't think there can be street parking on that. Um, we do have concerns of the waste

management that's going to go on there. We have a lot more residents there. There are large unmanaged open uh bins that are not managed very well. The tops are always out. Often people come in and dump off their garbage in those areas because there's no nobody modifying it or watching it very well. So that would be a big concern. The waste management now is collected often twice a week sometimes and often at 3:30 in the morning, 4:00 in the morning. So you have a lot more people with balconies. They're going to hear that. And I would assume they'll have to go around the entire property to pick up the bins on the other side because I don't think two big bins is going to cover those extra people in there. I don't know anything about recycling. I'm not sure they do. Um, we're a little bit concerned about the lights and the noise level with new balconies facing it. It's a pretty quiet little community there. There's condos on the other side. We've never been used to balconies or lots of light. The apprentices are wonderful. They're sometimes practicing their music in the parking lot as they come and go. We're hoping that that's not the case at 1 or two in the morning now that they have balconies that face our area. think that's part of the plans, but and most importantly, will the opera manage the the population there? So, if there are issues with extra lights or noise or laundry being hung out on the balconies that we would be able to contact. And finally, we have a we do have, as Jennifer said, this drainage situation that it's much higher up there near Galasto than it is down by us. and we have had a number of times that the water has come through and taken out a lot of our landscaping. We're just assuming that that's also going to be handled. Um, we're just nine little condos. We're

right on the edge. We love living there. We know we don't have much influence or importance to the opera, but we want to be good neighbors for them, and we think that they'll be good neighbors for us. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next, please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Konquas 7:30 Camino Pñana Santa Fe 750. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? I do. Please proceed.

Vice Chair Smith, commissioners, um I live in Santa Fe uh City Council District 2, not too far from the Axen Apartments at 214 Commamino Deos Marquez. First attended the Santa Fe Opera in 1988. I've done so regularly since then, and I have been a director since 2021. The Axton apartments are very tired. They need to be redeveloped to enable the Santa Fe Opera to house both the technical and the singing apprentices. As Robert may have stated, these people are crucial to the mission of the Santa Fe Opera. But the Axen apartments also need to be replaced to enhance the ambiance of the neighborhood. As you have heard from the individual who spoke ahead of me, um we have tried to be very uh receptive, listen to the concerns of the neighbors. And it does seem to me on the plan that we saw this evening, especially with the overlay, the new building, that the single family dwellings to the south of the uh apartments will benefit from this. But the neighborhood as a whole will since it is such a very tired building will allow us to provide six-month rentals during the off season that will help in a very modest way alleviate pressure on the rental market. So the plans for which staff has recommended approval I believe have been

sensitive to and are in keeping with the area. The proposed building will be an enormous improvement for the community. Urge you to accept the recommendation of staff whom we thank for their work and recommend this for approval to the governing body. Thank you. Thank you sir. Next witness please. Please raise your right hand. State your name and just for the record. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? Please proceed.

Good evening, vice chair, uh, commissioners. My name is Michael Robbins. I live in Santa Fe, a short distance in the house where my great-grandparents lived. I've attended Santa Fe Opera regularly since I was in elementary school and have served on the board of directors since 2023. Santa Fe Opera was recognized as a festival of the year at the 2022 International Opera Awards. It's worldrenowned for its quality of production and treasure and a treasure of our state. The Santa Fe Opera tracks visitors from across New Mexico, the United States, and countries around the world. All told, opera visitors inject what is estimated to be $250 million into the state's economy, supporting indirect jobs and tourism and hospitality, generates significant gross receipts tax for the city of Santa Fe. In short, the opera is a vital part of the infra uh infrastructure of Santa Fe today. For it to continue it to produce celebrated summer festivals, the opera must address its seasonal housing needs. The Santa Fe Opera was the first American company to start an apprentice program and this is the backbone of our organization. These individuals come to Santa Fe to learn key skills and to build their careers. Many go on to be leading lights in opera and also return to Santa Fe stars because their love for our company. Ensuring they have quality housing is essential for them and for the Santa Fe Opera's continued success. Santa Fe Opera and those who have developed these plans are deeply integrated into our community. The design is intended to fit into the neighborhood and the design to reflect Santa Fe's unique architectural style. It's also designed in a manner that will make it attractive as a rental option out of season for those seeking housing during times of the year that the apprentices are not in residence, including those who may have recently moved to Santa Fe, healthc care professionals who might have be here for a temporary position, and those working during the legislative session. I urge you to approve this request. Doing so will benefit the opera by allowing it to house technical and singing apprentices during the season, thus reducing competition for housing during that period. You'll benefit the city itself by increasing diversifying available

housing units overall, protecting jobs and GRT revenues that flow directly and indirectly from the San Fe Opera. Thank you very much for your consideration. Thank you, sir. Do we have anybody on the Zoom that would like to make a comment?

Yes, Commissioner Smith do. There are several hands raised. The first one is Karen's iPhone. Sorry for the It's just what I see here. Um Karen, if you can please state your name and address for the records and be sworn first and then you may speak. And you may unmute. Speaking. You're not unmuted. Hi. Can you hear me now?

Yes. Please raise your right hand. State your name and address for the record. Hi. Um, do you and your address, please? Uh, Los Alamos County. to 2000 Torion. Do you so only declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? May I speak? Yes or no? I'm not sure if you can still see me. I I'll read it again.

Yes. Do you So,

my name is Karen Henderson. I'm a resident of Los Angeles County, as I've been mentioned, and I have been a member of the Santa Fe Opera board for three years and prior to being a board member for the opera. I've been active with the opera company for 15 years as a volunteer and in engagement in the organization. And Santa Fe Opera is one of my favorite places on earth. I'm a licensed professional engineer in the state of New Mexico and currently my position in Los Alamos County is senior engineer for the public works department. One of my roles is to review future developments for Los Alamos planning department. My tasks are specific to traffic grading and drainage impacts ensuring that the proposed development shall not adversely impact structures on the lot or adjacent lot so not to create a nuisance. I also expect that construction activities of developments, ensuring construction and infrastructure installed conforms to the approved engineer stamp drawings and is within design standards that will lo county the state and federal codes. Additionally, my role is to verify infrastructure that has been designed and built correctly prior to Los County acceptance of projects. I've had the pleasure to review these plans at the accident department at 90%. And um I I reviewed them just like I would any other plans that would come into Lama County which includes apartment complexes and fire stations and housing development. And the action apartment project is aligned with the city of Santa Fe's general plan with increased housing while considering the historic Santa Fe style and character. Santa Fe Opera has thoroughly considered it availability in the proposed site plan especially environmental factors such as tree placement and building height creating a condition where the existing community and the opera can thrive together. It was found by the city of

Santa Fe that the application meets all requirements for a approval of the site plan and land use. I would recommend this approval of this site plan and land use. Thank you. Thank you. Next.

Thank you. The next speaker is Cheryl Peterman. Miss Peterman, if you put can please unmute, state your name and address for the record and um be prepared to be sworn. If you're speaking, please unmute. Hi. Uh, my name is Cheryl Peterman. I live at 318 Delgado Street in Santa Fe.

Uh, do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of pery? Please proceed.

Um, like I said, my name is Cheryl Peterson. I'm a member of the Santa Fe Opera board and I'm an architect and a former planning director. I'm here to support approval of the development plan for the Axton Apartments project. First of all, I would like to express my appreciation for the time that's been spent by the commission as well as the city staff in support of this application. Uh the Santa Fe Opera is known around the world for its outstanding performances and for the architecture of its performance hall. What is not as well known outside the opera world is Santa Fe's apprentice program. The mission of the opera includes not just the worldclass performances, but it also includes the education and training for the future of opera around the world. Hundreds of young people with dreams of having professional careers in the performing arts apply for the chance to participate in the opera's apprentice programs and the lucky ones who win a spot need a place to live. The Axent Apartments has been a partial answer to this need, but with the approval of the application today, the opera will be able to provide housing for all the young apprentices in the future. The new accent apartment project has been thoughtfully designed to not only answer the needs of the opera, but is planned to be a positive addition to the neighborhood and echo the historic Santa Fe style. There have been ongoing communications with stakeholders in the neighborhood and the proposed project has met all technical criteria for development. Thank you for your time and I ask for your you to vote approval on this application.

Thank you very much. All right, Chair Smith, the next um speaker is Jesse Gree. Jesse, if you can please unmute, state your name and address for the record and be sworn. Jesse Greece, 205A West Cordova. You raise your right hand. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under the penalties of perjury? I do. Please proceed.

Thank you. Um I was going to just gush about the opera because we all love the opera, but I think everybody beat me to that. So I think maybe I'll talk about the development plan instead. I'm going to focus on um trees and tree preservation. Um the tree preservation plan looks to be in discrepancy with some of what they're showing on the other plans. Um if we just focus on the southeast corner, there are two absolutely massive elm trees. And it's true that they're elm trees, but they provide this beautiful canopy. Um one of them is a 12ft circumference and the other is 11. and they're both being uh slated to take out. Um if you look on the agenda packet, it's uh page 12, which shows in the southeast corner in basin A, both of those trees being removed. And then if you look at um the pictures provided tonight, they'll be replaced with, you know, a 4-in caliper tree or something like that. It just doesn't seem right. So there's lots of talk of keeping these existing giant beautiful trees that you know are one of the best things about our neighborhood, but when you look at the tree removal plan, it seems as though most of them are actually being cut down except in the center of the property all the way to the south, specifically the ones that border the neighbors property extremely closely. And that doesn't seem right. It feels as though if they're going to take down these trees, they shouldn't just replace them with, you know, a skinny little sapling. Um, that they should have to replace them with something significant.

Thank you very much. Thank you.

Are there additional Chair Smith, there are no other hand space. Just in reference to one of the first public comments, the she did mention management and I was wondering if you could speak to like how that works. like is there staff at the opera that like if there is an issue like that is available and then could you just speak to like the waste management plan like you can have dumpsters or individual absolutely thank you vice chair Smith and commissioner Mcrenolds and commissioners so yes as I mentioned we have staff at the opera that is dedicated to managing this property and as I mentioned there's a small office maintenance building there. So there's a presence on site. So one thing we can ensure is that all the surrounding neighbors have somebody to call, have contact information, but if they run into an issue or something, we want to be continue to be good neighbors. And we think that, you know, having open lines of communication is key to that. And so we will ensure that, you know, that contact information is communicated to our surrounding neighbors so so they have that information. And yes, we are proposing dumpsters at the basically the southwest and the um southeast corners which is and not accurate. I don't have the side just get to it. So, as as Jennifer mentioned, um there will be a dumpster enclosure as required by code with with solid gates um at the southwest corner. So, um currently, yes, there are there

are um trash receptacles at various locations. We are consolidating that so that it can be managed better, right? And so, yes, that's in that southeast corner. You can see where she Okay. Oh, you beat me to it. Yeah. So, um yes. So, you can see Jennifer will point that out. There you go. Right there. So, and and of course, we have to, you know, conform with the um solid waste management best practices and access requirements. So, thank you. Other questions? Mr. around.

Uh, can you touch on the most recent public comment on the large elm trees that will be removed in the southeast corner? Sure. Let me pull up that drawing real quick. We I think um you know I think the the we have I think that might be a better choice. Yeah, it shows it on page 12 that you guys are removing those large elm trees in the southeast corner as he referenced his statement. Just share this real quick.

The reason why I'm asking this is because you you all did make such a great effort to give that barrier between yourselves and that neighbor. What's the purpose of removing consel?

Um, so, Commissioner Ryland, um, Vice Chair Smith and and fellow commissioners. Um, so as you can see from the tree preservation program, as Jennifer mentioned, we did hire, um, arborist who went out and assessed the health of the trees. Um, the ma the maintenance um team of this facility currently has been aware that some of the trees are of concern. are some of them are very mature and as we know trees as they mature their stability is compromised. So the trees in the area here that some of these are in in very poor health. Um so um per the public comment that we heard you can see here that on this plan any of the trees with the X on them those are the trees to be removed. The trees I believe that the gentleman spoke of are these trees here which are in poor health and they are elm. So um those are to be removed and but you can see this is the drain the existing drainage swell here to the south which abuts all of our southern residential neighbors. Um all of these trees that you see here are to remain. None of those trees are being removed. So that incredibly dense and lush kind of green belt is remaining. So and and and any and the gentleman was correct. Yes, these these are being removed but due to health and as you can see it it it is kind of right in our fire access lane as well.

Would you be able to provide your documentation from the arborist that shows what the cause and the health conditions are? Yeah, I believe I believe actually that was I thought that was submitted as part of our application, but yes, we do have the report from arborist. Okay, great. That can be provided to the public. Yes, of course. Thank you.

Yes, sir.

Can someone speak to the potential for noise at night? So, um, um, thank you, Commissioner Barber. So, yes, so the apprentices, they do get home late. You know, if you've ever been to the opera, you you know what time you get home, and they're getting home after you are. And so, that is really part of the management and education of the residents as they all get here. they have kind of this onboarding in terms of what are the rules and regulations living with the free housing, right? And so the opera takes that very seriously and really educating them about you, you know, you need to keep it down, you need to go to sleep because you know and so so yes, there is activity on site later than what you would normally see, but um the opera takes it very care seriously to manage that closely. And again, that kind of speaks to the idea of making sure that our surrounding neighbors have somebody to call. They do have concerns.

Sure.

Vice Chair Smith. Um my uh I guess my questions would be for um uh Colleen and potentially uh the architect. Is there building design questions? So whoever um yeah, both of you maybe. Um so I guess I I might have if if we could maybe bring up the applicant materials. uh uh at the the elevations. So I I either miss I I either saw something that I is is different here or I I missed something in the elevations in the packet. I thought that the um the tops of the foremost um uh porches were at the at the the third floor of them was a lighter thing did not have a stuckco was more like a a uh an exposed roof line. That's not No, I thought it was a shed roof at the time. said roof. Um um

um vice chair vice chair Smith, pardon me. Um Commissioner Morando, fellow commissioners. Um you're speaking about the top basically the roof of the balcony element, right? Not obviously here. I just that's how

Yeah. No, there. So, um, in some earlier renderings, we actually were exploring, um, articulating the the balconies, um, a little bit differently, kind of more similar to, um, Lasoya de El Castillo, um, which is a project that we were very involved in, but, um, we we moved to more of a simplistic PBLO massing because it really, um, it just felt quieter and, um, just tried to create more of a quieter space. Um, I'm a true believer, as a licensed architect myself, when you design a space with an intention with quieter elements and vernacular, sometimes the occupants actually, you can kind of affect their behavior. Um, and and and to that point, I'm kind of going off subject, but yet related. Um, we took a lot of care in how we laid out that courtyard and making sure that yes, we have balconies on the on the perimeter of our building facing our our neighbors to the north, southeast, and west, but we also have balconies on the interior of our courtyard. But the intent is that these these spaces are quiet and they're a relief from the the long hours and the you know non-stop pressure that these individuals endure during their their work at the opera. So um you know we're trying to create a quiet kind of place of relief and reprieve really from their normal. So um yeah and again we we kind of they're kind of like a its own little kind of cave in a way. Um but also allowing it's really important that we have a lot of um openness to allow the light into the units themselves.

Okay. I don't know. Um I know that um Kihei, our architect from SNPC, hasn't been sworn in, but I don't know. Kia, you want to he'll be he'll need to be sworn in. Uh 4108 court,

please raise your right hand. Do you solemnly declare and affirm that the testimony you have in reference to this item shall be the truth and nothing but the truth and do so under penalty of perjury? Please proceed. But some of the earlier study dead some of the earlier designs also had action for the And so the feeling there was actually that it was adding too height. So we prop down. I think uh we also decided on Some other things to mention is that we're using the street level. Very nice street safety. stream.

Sorry. I I think what it is is when I reviewed it, which was more based on the elevations, I really felt like it was very repetitive and I had a lot of but I I I do see that it presents much better here and and I I get that um you know this is actually what you more experience, right? Flattened elevations aren't necessarily reality. Um, so I I I I did carry that concern into this meeting which you've maybe heard, but I I think I I I think I'm good. Thanks.

There other questions. And could I hear a motion on case 2025 111386? Motion to approve case number 2025-11386 214 Camino de los Marquez development plan subject to the conditions of approval and technical corrections outlined in attachment A. Is there a second? Second and all in please call the role. Vice Chair Smith, I believe I'm acting as chair and there

Oh, you're correct. That's my apologies. Commissioner Morando, yes. Commissioner Relent, yes. Commissioner Barber, yes. Commissioner Mcrenolds, yes. Vice Chair, the motion is passed. Excellent. Um, are there any staff communications? We did that. Uh, any others or any other matters from the commission? Everybody's ready to go home. Greetings.