Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

It's 5 o'clock and we are at the Canyon Community Center for the May 6 meeting of the Springdale Planning Commission. From the town we have Nile Connelly, Tom Dancy, Kendall Sagers, and April Radits. On the dis we have Matt Frink, Zion National Park representative, Rich Swanson, Terry Krushki, myself, Jennifer McCulla, Paul Zimmerman, Kosh Bati, and Melissa Labour, and Melissa will be voting in tonight's proceedings. Is there a motion to approve tonight's agenda?

Second. Motion by Melissa, second by Terry. All in favor? Rich I. Terry I. Jennifer I. Paul I. Hash I. Melissa I. Motion passes. Does the town have any general announcements?

We do. Uh we have a we have several announcements. I will start and then I think there are some other folks that want to make some announcements. Uh my announcement is an exciting one. Um and that is that after a long recruitment process and um with many qualified applicants to select from, we have filled the vacant town clerk position. And I'm happy to report that Kendall Sagers has u has has been selected um to be the new town clerk. So congratulations to Kendall.

Congratulations. Um, so, uh, Kendall and April are going to make a fantastic team in the clerk's department. Um, what that does mean, however, is that the community development department has pretty much been depleted. Um, and, uh, so, so Nile is kind of a um, lone ranger, a lone ranger. Um, so, so that's that's my exciting news. And I think Nile has some follow-up news. based on that.

Sure. So, just just following on from that, just to give you an update on some of the projects that have been um the planning commission have been working on. Um so, in particular, the uh Virgin River Management Plan implementation project and the storm water management permit project. Um I think those are the two we wanted to talk about. Um there's still high priorities because of staffing levels. We may need to pause those for a little bit um and and get back to those when we're uh a little bit better staffed. So I just wanted to let you know that um we haven't forgot about those projects, but we will need to pause them and pick them up a little bit later. Um and in addition to that um we were uh yeah we wanted to suggest to the planning commission to consider whether um whether it would be possible or if whether you'd be open to uh cancelling the June work meeting uh just with the same view of um kind of helping our limited staff to um kind of keep up with the workload. Um cancelling that meeting may be helpful step. Um so that's maybe something for you to discuss and consider whether that would be something you'd like to do. June work. So the yeah the June work meeting would be on June the 3. So, we propose that we'd still have the regular meeting on June 17. Um,

so that's just something for you to ponder on. Thank you. Are there any other announcements? Does anyone have any conflicts of interest that they would like to disclose? For tonight's agenda, we have one action item which includes a public hearing and two non-action items. The first item in action item is a public hearing design development review. Mr. Hans Denzinger requests approval to create an additional parking lot on his property, the Driftwood Lodge, 1515 Zion Park Boulevard. The staff contact is Nyall Connelly. We will be following public meeting rules of order and procedure. Please be sure to have signed in if you have an intent to speak. And please keep in mind that each public comment is limited to three minutes. Um Nile will introduce.

Thank you.

So this is a design development review application. The applicant is Mr. Hans Dunzinger. Um on the property is the Driftwood Lodge which is 1515 Zion Park Boulevard. The application is for 10 parking spaces. Um those spaces are proposed to be next to Mr. Dunzinger's new building which is nearing completion. Um and the parking spaces will serve his uh hotel customers. Um, so the submitted plans give some details on the design of the new parking spaces and the staff report sets out how they comply with the relevant code requirements. Um, we also have uh Mr. Tony Brooksby who's the contractor on behalf of uh on behalf of the property owner here who um is here and able to answer any questions and and I'd be happy to answer questions too.

Does the applicant have a presentation? Okay. Um questions to the staff andor applicant from the planning commission. I have one. I just I think I just want to confirm um in March of 2025, we approved a uh a hazard permit request for this project. Um with the addition of the parking lot, I'm assuming there's no needed need to update the um erosion hazard assessment. Is that true?

Yeah, that's a that's a good question. And you're correct. the the erosion hazard mitigation that's been put in is on the river side of of this parking lot. So, uh it it doesn't affect that. So, it the parking lot doesn't contact the Yeah. Okay. Correct. Sounds good. Any other questions from the planning commission and questions from the public at this time? Is there a motion to open public hearing? Move to open a public hearing. Second.

Motion by Terry. Second by Paul. All in favor? I. Terry I. Jennifer I. Paul I. Hash I. I. Motion passes. Um, this would be public comment period which it looks like there's no public to comment. Is there a motion to close public hearing? Move we close public hearing. I second. Motion by Paul, second by Melissa. All in favor? Rich I. Terry I. Jennifer I. Paul I. Hash I. Melissa I.

Motion passes. Uh at this time um is there any response from the applicant and we can move into planning commission deliberation. Overall, this seems pretty simple, straightforward. Um, and I did, like I said, I checked on the erosion hazard and it didn't look like we're good with that. Um, and, uh, it looks to be outside the 100red-year flood plane, so I think we're good with that. Other than that, I I don't think any problems myself.

Yeah, I looked like everything complied. Um, I thought maybe add in um the concrete color must be the town's approved color or a pre-approved equal alternative. And then also mentioning the recommendation to select other plants in place of the pompus grass and the great leaf cotton Easter I guess it's called. Um, I thought those might be worth putting in. Yeah.

Yeah. Um, I might also um consider adding um a condition. The uh the lighting fixtures appear to be compliant, but there was not any technical specification that came with them. So, maybe just uh a condition that the compliance must be verified um prior to completion.

Yeah. My only question was Terry, did you do the math? Did you check the math on page 45? No, I didn't get to that part. Oh, darn. Sorry about that one. Yeah. Yeah, it looks good to me. Any other comments? Is there a motion for the planning commission to approve the design development review application for the 10 new parking spaces at the Driftwood Lodge?

Yeah, I'll go ahead. I'll let you do it because you threw in an extra condition. Yeah, that's right. I did. Okay. Um, so the planning commission approves the design development review application for 10 new parking spaces at the Driftwood Lodge, 1515 Zion Park Boulevard. This motion is based on the following findings. The parking lot expansion complies with section 1023 of the town code regarding ARF off streetet parking requirements and standards. And the uh parking lot expansion also complies with sections 10184 and 10186 of the town code um regarding landscaping requirements. Um with the conditions of this approval uh include that the concrete color must be the town approved color Davis color number 5084 2% to pounds per 100 pounds of concrete or a pre-approved equal alternative. Um in addition the uh proposed parking light fixtures as stated by the applicant appear to be compliant with section 1015 C of the town code. Although detailed specifications were not provided, compliance must be verified prior to completion of the project. And uh then the last one is um the uh the landscape plan called for pampas grass and gray leaf um continer I think it is. Um and they are both considered non-native. um they're not specifically um prohibited, but we would encourage the applicant to find other native plants to replace these.

I'll second. All in favor? Rich I. Terry I. Jennifer I. All I. Motion passes. The next item is a non-action item. a discussion the um about potential revision to the town's parking standards. Staff contact is Tam Tom Tom Dansancy and Tom will present.

Thank you. In the uh previous work meeting, the commission started started a discussion about um revisions to the town's parking standards. Um there's there's not not to kind of rehash what we talked about in the last meeting other than uh the fact that um this is a a trend across the country of looking at parking standards to see if if um towns and and local governments can use parking standards more efficiently um to better accomplish their land use and transportation goals. In the previous meeting, you expressed some interest in investigating potential revisions to the town's parking standards. However, you wanted additional information and data upon which to begin that that discussion. You directed staff to develop a an action plan for how we would provide you with the parking data and and uh other information that you would need to begin that discussion. And so the staff report outlines a proposed action plan. Um, and as as indicated in the staff report, we've actually done this a couple of times previously. And the the basic idea is that we first of all inventory all of the parking available in the town. That includes both off streetet parking areas as well as on street parking areas. So we have a know we have an idea of what our approximate parking capacity is. Um then we go and actually perform counts of how that parking is being used and we perform those counts at various times during the day, various days of the week and various um seasons. So um we in in the past what we've done is we've counted four different times 10 a.m. 1 p.m. 4 pm and 7 p.m. That gives us an

idea of how parking is utilized at various different land uses throughout the day. We've also counted um on different days. So, weekdays, weekends, holidays, non-h holidays. That gives us a better idea of um to identify trends of how parking is used on different days, weekends, holidays. Um based on all of that then in the past what we've done is we've come up with an analysis of how of kind of the util utilization rate of the different parking areas. So we we can say this parking area, parking area A at property A is used at 50% utilization on average at this time, 60% at this time. Just to kind of give you a better idea of what those utilization rates are. Um like I said, we've done that in the past. We we did an extensive analysis in 2007 and then we followed that up with a couple of more limited analyses in 2015 and 2016. Um, and so we propose to do the same kind of thing this year that allows us to go back and um to compare results year-over-year to see how we've changed. Um, this will be also be interesting because this will be the first time we've done this analysis since the town started our parking manage our on street parking management program. Um, and so it would be interesting to see how that has impacted parking. So that's that's kind of the basic outline of what we propose to do. We also proposed some dates. Um and um we're I I'm going to at this point retract those proposed dates. Um the reason being for for reasons similar to what Nile um alluded to earlier. Um, at at this point with with kind of the limited staffing resources in the planning department, it would be pretty much impossible to get th those parking counts done according to the dates that

I had originally proposed, which is throughout this month, taking advantage of taking advantage of the Memorial Day holiday. Um, and then doing an analysis. um where whereas I think this this issue is important and I think that the commission um should be interested in analyzing this um given current staffing in the community development department, it's probably not something that we can put devote a lot of resources to now. However, I do think it's important that these parking counts capture a holiday period. So, what I'd recommend at this point is that we postpone these parking counts um till later in the summer and anticipate using um late summer counts, capturing the Labor Day holiday, and then doing some some counts maybe early fall. So, what I'd appreciate your feedback on at this point is just a general overview of the system of of the plan as we've outlined it. Is this something is does this respond to what you wanted? Will this give you the data that you that you were were seeking? Um get any feedback that you have on the plan. Um and then also your feedback on those dates from this May to later this summer. So that's the feedback that um I would appreciate. Now

and also are there any questions for Tom? I'm assuming that the like the holiday period includes like peak months because it sounds like Labor Day and that early fallish period would capture some of the peak times as opposed to doing some of the more like quieter months.

Correct. Yeah, that that's the intent is that we capture a variety of of periods with different demands. So holidays, Labor Day certainly that would be one. Um, uh, October is, you know, September, October are kind of super busy periods. That would be a good point. And maybe late August, mid to late August traditionally has not been as as busy. And so comparing those times would be would be important to know as well.

Yeah. So, second bullet point number one, um, how many parking spaces are available to visitors of Zion? Do you mean within the park? Um, sorry, good, great, great point. No, that that means um like street parking. Yeah.

Or we we we since the last time we did this, we now have a number of paid public parking lots. So the idea is there's like we talked about in the last meeting there's there's two different kinds of parking demand that we have in the town. One are patrons of local businesses and it's important to to know what the demand is there. The other are visitors to Zion National Park which may or may not be patrons to local businesses but their primary um parking need is to visit the park. So kind of trying to get a handle on the parking needs of those two groups is what what that number one is all about. Okay, thanks. And um I guess another thing you may want to consider is um inventorying during the shuttle offseason because that is a different we have more parking available in the park. It it is quite different than when the shuttles are running, but um I don't know if that's exactly what you're looking for or not. So

absolutely. Yeah. So be after December 1st, the shuttles would not be running obviously besides Christmas and New Year's and all that. So in reading through this, the one question I couldn't figure out is how do you distinguish between parking used by businesses and parking used by Zion or getting on the shuttles to go to the park?

Yeah, great question. and and you can't really other than where the vehicle is is located. So the the assumption is that if a vehicle is parked in a business parking lot that is a patron of the business versus if a vehicle is parked on the street that is most likely someone who's going into the park. Obviously those are assumptions and they don't hold true 100% of the time but but that's the underlying assumption. And then I don't know how easy this will be when you get there, but as far as when you're inventory the vehicles, is there a way to track if that vehicle's been there all day or if maybe there's different times a different vehicle? There is a way to do that. We do not have the the technical capacity or resources to be able to do that. So what we've done in the past is just done a total car count. it does not capture the dwell time or the turnover, which would be another really important aspect to capture. Um, we we I haven't figured out a a way that we can do that within our resources, but that's certainly something we can discuss if there's a possibility to do that.

I don't have a solution for either, but I I throw it on. We just throw out the problems. Yeah. Um I I I I would consider adding one other piece of information to the collection. Um and that would be um on the business related parking, the commercial property parking that we identify if we can what the minimum number of parking spaces required is. Therefore, we can identify if um owners have done the minimum or if they have done more than the minimum number of parking spaces.

Great suggestion. Yeah, and in fact, we we I I should have clarified that that is something that we captured in the past and absolutely that's an important metric to to include. So, yes, that's a fantastic suggestion. Otherwise, looks pretty good to me.

Yeah, I this is a question, maybe a little bit of a conversation. Um, so the goal here is to try to figure out what makes sense if changing the parking requirements for new development. And I'm just wondering trying to separate like the off streetet parking spaces and how that impacts the number of spaces at businesses and how we would factor that into the requirements for parking for the businesses. Does that make sense? Like Yeah. I I you follow what I'm saying? Yes.

I would actually even extend on that. My question is there's a priority between parking going to the Zion and people going to the businesses. Are we diving those up? Correct. I mean, should we be taking some of these off- streetet parking and make them more hourly so they, you know, cater more to businesses and not just to the park. But then that hurts scion. So, it's that trade-off. I don't understand how to,

but I think if you capture the type of information that Terry was talking about, then so that you know how many the business is supposed to have, how many they actually have, and how fully utilized they are, you'll capture that information because you'll know that people are I mean, if I have a chance to park in a business parking space, I'm going to do that rather than park on the street. In fact, most people probably will park in the business parking space and then try and wander off, so to speak, get on a shuttle bus and disappear and come back hours later and take advantage of the fact that they don't have to pay for parking that way. So the question the only question I would have then is the information that we might want be interested in is um how actively the businesses pursue sort of towing those people away or citing them if they're parked illegally in private private spaces. Very difficult to do or that we try and capture businesses to at least capture that information for us during these times so we can make an evaluation on that. What's that?

Yeah, that would be valuable to know. You know, how much effort goes into enforcing the parking is for my business only. I mean, my observation that some of them some of the businesses that are more frequently or more uh actively frequented, they don't do a lot in that regard. they just kind of accept the fact that people are going to do that and they, you know, on the other hand, um, the transient lodging facilities, we really would prefer that the that those customers park near their hotel room and leave the car there. Sure. Absolutely. We'd want really in a sense, you'd want a difference like a restaurant, you'd want a different kind of behavior than parking lot. Agreed.

Transient lodging. Yeah. Um, I I I would agree to delay. I I think I would rather get good data than try to hurry. Yeah. The dates that are proposed are good. I would recommend that we um recommend that the staff u perform the actions that they recommended that we direct them to rec to to do but at this time at a new time SC frame. and come back and propose a new time schedule to us. Yeah.

If Yeah. If we want that or do we just trust them figure something out? I don't know. Thank you. This is that clear for you? Yeah, absolutely. Great feedback, really great suggestions and yeah, we will propose a new time schedule focusing on late summer, early fall, uh potentially extending into the shuttle off season and keep you updated.

The third item, second non-action item is a discussion about potential changes to the land use code that will be necessary following adoption of the wildland urban interface zone. Staff contact is Nile Connelly and Nile will be presenting.

Thank you. Um so you as a commissioner previously discussed the Wildland urban interface code. Um and that's also been discussed by the town council and there's been some public meetings on that topic. Um so the town will be adopting uh the WOOI code as it's known for short in the near future. Um in anticipation of that uh the commission has already recognized that there are some some standards in our code in our land use ordinance that are potentially at odds with the WOOI code and that may make it difficult as we're implementing this. So there may be some some adjustments that need to be made to our existing land use uh standards. Um the conflicts primarily occur in the areas of uh building materials uh which are part of the standards of the WOOI code and also this idea of defensible space and fuel management. Um so as far as building materials uh WOOI requires fire rated materials and uh most of the materials in our code are are are good with that. Uh but there are some materials particularly wood products such as wood siding, wood roof shingles and then wood for fascia sopeta detailing that um that are generally not fire rated and may uh may not really pass the the WOOI standards. So it might be worth removing those from the approved list. It may also be worth adding some fire rated substitutes into the approved list such as a fiberboard sighting or also known as Hardy board

that is is uh used across town. Um it's not it's not listed as prohibited. So it is used across town but it might be might be worth adding that as an approved material. Um the next issue is around this uh defensible space concept where um for compliance with the WOI code buildings need to have an area around them which is um free from flammable materials essentially. So it doesn't mean that it needs to be totally bare earth. there can be some vegetation um but uh there needs to be minimum distance between trees. Uh we're also aware that certain species of trees such as junipers are highly flammable. Um and um and so this kind of potentially is an issue with some of our landscaping standards where we do require two replacement trees for every one native tree that's removed. Um and then just our general uh landscaping requirements for tree planting. Um, as some of you know who've uh built homes in the town, um, you know, many of the vacant lots have a lot of these trees on them. And so, um, so extensive planting of trees is is often required when when you're building a new home. And a lot of those trees tend to have to be close to the house just for space reasons. Um so th those are some things for you to consider uh because they may be at odds with the defensible space requirements. Um

and uh and then while considering it um it's worth bearing in mind the reasons why we have these landscape ordinances in in the beginning. So, you know, there is a real benefit to having native vegetation, to having these trees around town. There's landscape and ecological value to these. So, um so yeah, it is kind of a balance, but it it's just something um that would be worth discussing. Um, so the staff report includes a few options that you might want to consider um on how we could address these and and you might also have other ideas too that that I haven't considered.

A question on the the planning. I get it. If you're packed and you got to have them by the house, that could be a problem. But on bigger lots, especially in the foothill residential, do are you allowed to plant those two trees outside of the defensible space of 30 ft? Yeah. So, where where it comes up if you have a foothill residential lot um that is on a 2 acre or larger parcel, uh you may have the space to to plant those replacement trees. A lot of our foothill residential zones are in a planned development overlay. So for instance, Anastasia Plateau or the Clar Cup subdivision or Canyon Point. So the the way those subdivisions have been designed is that you have a smaller building pad where you put your home and then it's surrounded by a conservation easement. So like a natural area. And so on those parcels or on those lots, um there's really not very much space that you can build on when once you built your house. Uh if you have a bunch of replacement trees to plant, they're inevitably going to be pretty close to your house. So, um that's yeah, that that's kind of how it occurs. Are there any other questions for Nile?

On the other building permit, was there any thought or looking at flat roofs as far as being fire resistant material? A lot of the flat roofs are probably not that fire resistant right now. Yeah, flat roofs can be an an an issue. Um, for those of you that came to some of our um meetings that we've had recently with representatives from the fire district, they've talked about about those flat roofs and and how they can be an issue um if an ember comes and the problem with a flat roof is an ember comes and just sits on on the roof and and can burn through it. So there are um roof membrane materials that are fire rated and would be an approved material under the the WOOI code. There are there are others that are are not. Um and so it just really kind of depends on the type of roof material that that's proposed. So that could be again something for the commission to consider. um uh if someone does want to do a flat roof requiring that the roof membrane be and I I apologize I don't remember off the top of my head the technical terms that the the fire professionals have used um but but whatever that um fire ignition resistant material is for flat roofs you could you could make that a requirement in your code.

Yeah. The the WOOI code refers to some international code that calls class A, B and C. And so class A is the most resistant and C is the least resistance. It might be if we go down that path it might be simpler to pick okay it has to be class A or B or something like that. Then we don't have to keep put specific materials in our ordinances that then might become outdated if we stick to the class ratings. And I think along with that, my understanding is is that the highest rated membrane, there are no colors that currently fit within the acceptable colors. Like I think that the it's they're very bright.

Yeah. TPO tends to come in kind of white colors and and and um it uh it comes in different gradings. The trade-off is that the more the more ref fire retardant material they add, the more brittle the material becomes and so there's a trade-off and um so yeah, if we go down that path, I think there's a lot of pieces of information for us to get to know before we we try to make a rule on that. Um I think that's a little bit side to particular issue. Um but I think we it's something we should be thinking about. Yeah.

To me, it would fall under the building materials like when we're talking. Well, yeah. If we wanted to remove or or change the building materials for the roof. Now, that wasn't recommended by the staff at this point, but it's something, right? Yeah. Um, and and there are I I know some at least a couple of homes that have a, you know, aluminum roof, but that's um anodized or something, so it's not bright. So that would be a fireproof roof in a sense. Is it something that makes sense to put in the at this point? And the building construction materials.

Yeah. So I I think so what you're saying is that some of the most the the higher rated materials don't match the color code. They're they're not uh it's currently available in that. So yeah, if you wanted to accommodate people being able to use those materials uh more freely, then that probably would be something to put into the code as far as because because the the color palette and the color material all part of that process. So yeah, that could be something to consider.

We go far and I'm not sure if it's class ABC. I always remember is um IR ignition resistive class one two three. Do we add that into our codes that we want homes to have certain ignition resistant classification? The if I remember the way the WOOI code was written that we would be required to incorporate into ordinances. It didn't say. It said if your house has a certain rating, then you have to have a greater or lesser distance of cleared space. That is correct. Yes. Um but I don't think it said that you I don't think it disallowed building a house of a lower rating.

And so I don't think if we adopt the ordinance as it is, which I think we're supposed to do, we would not be disallowing a particular. So the question there is, isn't wood siding considered to be below IR standard. So why are we saying you can't have wood siding? Essentially saying you can't have wood siding is saying you need certain type of Well, I think what was proposed was removing wood siding from the per recommended. We don't necessarily have to add it to the um excluded or the not not out. Okay.

Right. Um because there is a list of not allowed and a list of recommended and some things that are not on either list. Yeah, that's correct. Yeah, there there's specifically approved and specifically prohibited and then there's some that are on neither list. So what being recommended is that the wood would not be approved. Correct. Would not be recommended. It would not It could be approved but it's not desirable. Okay. So, so and we we could make this choice, but it's right now on the list of preferred or we thinks we'd approve, we could move it to the list of not approved or we could remove it alto together, right? So, taking it off of the approved list,

right? Yeah. But it doesn't mean that it's prohibited doesn't unless we choose to put it on the prohibited list. Yeah, I follow you now. Yeah. I I think it makes sense to put on the prohibited list. Well, having had a house that survived a fire like this in the midst of all my neighbors whose houses burned down and mine was fully woodsided um and survived. I'm not necessarily sure that's a appropriate thing to do. Yeah, I I would want to get a little more expert input because because if your house is, you know, gets a lower rating, you're supposed to clear further, which is supposed to mitigate the risk,

right? somebody chooses that they really want wood siding and they're willing to go 100 feet instead of 30 feet or whatever. I think I'd want to have some more knowledge before we say they can't take that path because the WOOI code as as I read it last year last summer allowed for that path but you're supposed to then trim much further back. And what about what shingles? Same. wood shingles I think are probably

um a little different thing and that they're probably I mean there are fire retardant or fire resistant wood shingles but that doesn't necessarily mean that they're super good. I I would take those off the list and yeah, be more apt to prohibit them, but and and and maybe maybe with some expertise input, we might come to the conclusion that we'd want to put some of these things on the not allowed list. Yeah. But I wouldn't want to do it without getting some expert input because you're restricting people on something that may or may not that they may or may not be able to mitigate a different way,

right? So, is it possible for us to get expert input on the wood sighting and

Yeah, we can certainly do more research and work with our building inspector to get more guidance on that. I don't really have much experience with wood siding, but um I have had many experiences that involved wood roof shingles and lived in areas where they were prohibited um being in the midst of neighborhoods um where homes were burning down because those fireballs land on the roof and those wood shingles just Yeah. But like you said, maybe there's some kind of wood shingle that's different that doesn't catch on fire like that. I don't know.

So, in a couple of the points in in the um in the in the staff notes um talked about the the tree requirement, the 2:1 tree requirement. Um start with that one. Something I was thinking about is we could we could go to a one one tree requirement instead of a two to one. Actually was thinking about it. We're actually kind of going against our our general plan idea in not impacting or reducing the impact on the land. And if we double the number of trees on the land, aren't we impacting the land? You know, so I thought about it two to one is actually kind of an impact upon the land. whereas one would say, "Oh, the land still has the same." So, I kind of thought, well, you know, we could go to one one with the ability to um reduce that as necessary to comply with the WOOI code, which isn't yet in our code, but will be.

I agree with that. Yeah, the the thought I have on that is that the 2:1 probably came out of I I don't know for sure, but I would assume it came out of the thought process that, you know, you've got big tree, you're cutting it down, and now you're going to put little trees and two little trees still don't make up one big tree and likelihood is one of those is going to die. And I don't know that we do any compliance to make sure that the trees that were planted survive beyond some short period of time. So, um, yeah, I don't know. You know, I understand what you're saying and I kind of agree with it, but on the other hand, from, you know, the bigger picture, maybe it maybe

Yeah, I kind of thought through that, too. I thought, well, we live in a human time frame. So, yes, two little trees are smaller than one big tree, but they grow up to be twice as big to one big tree if they survive 50 years later. If they survive,

they survive. My experience has been I've planted double trees and I've only had one of my double trees actually fail. And so I've got lots of double trees. So, you know, assuming they're going to die is is just as much of a subject, right? Um and so, you know, so I was kind of thinking about that in the long term, we're actually creating more trees than naturally would be there. Um and more tree volume than would naturally be there over 50 years or whatever. Um,

well, the other thing is we're changing we're changing the location of the trees, too. And the the natural trees that you find around here are the ones that are close to water, not out in the hillside somewhere. And so, if you've got somebody planting a couple of a couple of new trees out on the hillside, they're they're probably not planting Well, and then and then we pump water over there. Exactly. So now we've got different vegetation, which is kind of what you're saying is we're impacting the environment because we're bringing in different kinds of trees than would naturally occur. But whatever. I don't know.

Anyway, I I don't think we're making decisions today. So I was just on the consideration might be do we go to one to one? Um might be a useful consideration. So you're saying go to one to one within the uh defensible space or right. So you you you you produce a development plan. Let's say it requires taking out four trees. Um you would be required to re to plant four trees somewhere else on your property versus having to plant eight trees somewhere else on your property. So you're just saying blanket, you know, within your property. Yeah. I I think the way it's now, as long as it's somewhere else on your property, it it counts, right? Doesn't have to be any

Yeah, that's correct. Yeah, it should be a similar species. Similar species. on the plant list and other things. Yeah. Um in my understanding it still gives the property owner a choice because you there are trees on the list that aren't as flammable and then there are the one like the junipers I think are on the list and they are flammable. So a property owner could choose. Yeah, you could choose. In fact, if I remember correctly, the the thing I read said like desert willows were actually at the other end of the scale. Yeah. Almost not flammable sort of. Yeah.

So certainly we could even include in the code encouragement for certain kinds of trees. Um and then the other statement in in in the staff notes was about um the requirements we have in landscaped areas for I think it was one tree per thousand square feet. Um, I'm think I sort of thought, well, we might potentially just remove that for the commercial and public use zones. Well, and then it actually also covers the res. There's two Oh, I see. Yes.

residential. Um, potentially we do it for one and not the other. That's a possibility. Um, then we're not again requiring tree more trees than would normally grow there. Um, and I'm I'm I'm almost of a mindset of like, well, maybe when you're all done developing, there should be the same number of trees there were before you started. And rather than say there has to be, you know,

what is the size of a tree? You say you have to have two to one. What is the size of the tree? Can I put a twig or is there like there is a requirement? Five gallon I think minimum, right? There's a call out. Yeah, five gallon certain height and a certain trunk. Yeah, one one to one and a half inch trunk. Yeah. What what I'm questioning is, okay, if we go to one one, do we change that? Do we change that? Um, I guess it depends a lot on what's readily available, you know. I mean, it gets quite expensive if you want to plant a much bigger tree. Um,

and and they're hard they're really hard to find. So, I would be in the camp of leaving that requirement the same. I would think so because five gallallon trees are easy to find. As you start getting bigger, they get harder and harder to find, harder to plant and transport and

transport and everything else. Yeah. Um just on the point of the thousand square feet, um it does include shrubs and ground cover. So if we were to take that out completely, we would be taking out that requirement. True. We could just take out the tree requirement, but in the

because I think it refers to shrubs six feet or taller I think is what the code talks about. If you take out anything six feet or taller you have to replace it. Um and so we should look at those details before we Yes. Yeah. And maybe there's a way to uh put that language in so that it's you can understand that there still is a landscape requirement with a specific tree requirement. Yeah.

Any other comments? Nile, do we need to clarify any of the discussion? Um, so I've been taking notes and maybe if I just run through what I what I think I'm hearing and you correct me.

Um, so there is a question around flat roofs and uh some of those membranes that are more or less desirable um and then the various classes. So we need to have a think about um whether whether the yeah those specific membranes be mentioned in the code or whether we refer to the different classes uh that are mentioned in the WOOI code. Um there was also a discussion about color. Does that become an issue? Um, are we by applying the color palette to roofs, are we limiting some really good products that would be fire compliant? Uh, so we need to look at that a little bit more. um you wanted some more expert input on wood siding um to learn really um you know how how big of a disadvantage is it and obviously taking into account that there's um you know property owners in complying with the movie code you have various options you can select and so you wanted more information before we just outright prohibited wood siding Um the wood shingle roofs, it seems like you were leaning more towards scrapping those because they tend to be a little bit more dangerous. Um probably needs a little bit more research. Then on the tree replacement requirement, um you're looking at potentially doing a one:one replacement instead of the 2:1. Um but also with the ability that that could potentially be reduced on a sightto-sight basis if woo

compliance is a problem. Um and then to find a way to encourage nonflammable or less flammable trees where possible. Uh then on the minimum tree standards uh in the landscape chapter um potentially looking at removing that minimum tree requirement uh but not the minimum for shrubs and other plants. So I I can take that away and uh work on that a little bit more and come back with kind of proposals that are a little bit more meaty the next time. That sounds good. Thanks.

I really struggle with the keeping the 2:1 tree replacement requirement but allowing a relaxation when you're in the uh WI conflict area. When you're I It's still very confusing to me when you're planting trees. It's not the center of the tree that has to be 10 feet apart. It's the branches of the trees. If I plant little trees, they're good and someday they're going to grow. And I don't I don't have a thought right now, but it seems that whole that could get confusing very fast because when they're small, they're great. Yeah. Yeah. When they're small, 10 ft apart, but grow up,

they grow together. Um, we we might consider adding something to the code that the landscape plan has to um plant trees perspective to their full growth size, right? Not the size they are when you plant them. Yeah, it's a good point. Have a question for the staff as well. What's the status of the local map with respect to the WOOI?

Great question and that's um one of the main reasons why we have not updated the WOOI yet and I'm um shagrined to admit that it was a gross misunderstanding on my part of what the uh state law actually requires for the map. Um, I was reading the updated state law to mean that um to mean something opposite of what it actually meant. So the the the takeaway is that we we we can use our own local map for the WOOI zone. Um, which I I was a misunderstanding on my part. So that that's what we're preparing to do now is to adopt the WOOI code and adopt our own local map for the WOOI zone. Again, for those of you that have been following this this issue along, keep in mind that there is a distinct difference between our local WOOI zone where the WOOI code will be administered and what the state refers to as high risk WOOI properties where they will where the state will be assessing a fee on those properties and and they'll be subject to to to to different um state requirements. We have no control over those where the state maps the high the high-risk WOOI properties, but we do have control over where our local map shows where the WOOI zone is. Does that answer your question?

Sort of. I guess the um I I was under the impression that pretty much everything around here is in the high-risisk zone according to the state maps, but if we define a local map that to be different than that, then the state will kind of back out of the local area. Is that correct? So again, this is it's hard to say, right?

Well, no. I I it's it's there's been a lot of confusion and and I think everyone has been somewhat confused, including me. Um and and as I'm learning more, I'm getting more clarity. So there's there's a lot of mapping going on. Um and and all this mapping has different impact or or or the end result of this all this mapping is different. the the state has something called the um Utah uh wildfire risk assessment portal, the URAP, where you can go on and you can see all the different mapping that the state has done by different metrics. They'll they'll you can map your property by something called structure exposure score or fire severity or all these different metrics. And according to all that mapping, yeah, Springdale is is in in quite inconsiderable everywhere in Springdale is at considerable risk of wildfire. That mapping isformational only. That mapping has no regulatory impact either at the state level or at the local level. Additionally to that, the state has used that mapping and other sources to produce a map where they have identified high risk WOOI properties. Those are the properties that will be subject to the to the assessment and and they'll be those will be the ones that will be subject to having an inspector come out and do do an inspection. Only generally speaking, only properties in the Anastasia plateau area of Springdale have been mapped in the high risk WOOI property area by the state. That means that as a town we can establish our own WOOI boundary and the impact of that town determined WOOI boundary is where the wildland urban

interface code will be administered. We have complete discretion on where that boundary is located except for Anastasia. Well, there's completely separate issues. Oh, so so they will do their thing and we could also manage that area as well. Correct. They're managing it for one purpose.

We're managing Okay. They're and the purpose for which they are managing it is are these are properties that the state has identified are at such high risk that they are going to be assessed a fee um and there'll be inspections of those properties and the intent of that fee and that inspection is to um encourage those property owners to do wildfire mitigation around their properties to reduce the wildfire risk. That's the whole impact of the state identified high-risisk WOOI zone or high-risisk WOOI properties. Completely separate and distinct from that is the local administration of the WOOI code. The things that we've been talking about tonight. Where is defensible space going to be required? What kind of building materials are going to be required? It is up to us as a as a local government to determine in what areas we want that WOOI code to be applied. The state has made some recommendations to us on where they think we should apply the WOOI code, but it ultimately is a local decision on where we where we um determine that boundary to be. That was my misunderstanding. I I thought I I thought that the state was going to override our ability to determine that boundary, but no, that is not the case. We get to choose where it is.

So, have we made progress on the town map? Yes. So, we have a we have a draft map. We we've presented that map to the to the community at a couple of meetings and we're in the process of of getting that to approval of the council. So that means that the council is actually enforcing more of a wooui area which then changes the building requirements.

Rephrase that question. So, it seems to me that it's up to the city to decide. As long as the state hasn't come in and said you have to be an extreme area. If you're not an extreme area, it's up to the city to decide if it's an extreme area. Th this whole this whole discussion the terminology that the state has used is very unfortunate because they use terms like high-risk wooi property which similar terminology is also found in the wildland urban interface code and and that's led people to conflate those two issues but they're completely separate and distinct. What the state has said is town of Springdale as with all other municipalities in Springdale, you must adopt the wildland urban interface code. You have to. We don't have a choice in that. We do have discretion on ad establishing the WOOI zone. The WOOI zone is where the wildland urban interface code standards will be applied. That's completely our decision. has nothing to do with the properties that the state has identified as high-risk wooi properties. We get to make that decision.

The decision we get to make is is the is the area. Correct. Not the wording of the ordinance. Right. That is correct. The ordinance is is predetermined for us, but we get to determine where that ordinance applies within the town the boundaries of Springdale. Precisely. that mean like the defendable area where that applies and where that doesn't apply.

So the defensible space is one of the requirements of the WOOI zone and to answer your question yes that defensible space requirement will only be required for development of properties that are within the WOOI zone as we determine where that is located. properties that are not included in the WOOI zone, however we determine that to be, will not be subject to the defensible space requirement or the the building materials requirements or anything in the WO zone. So, as as as the we've worked pretty extensively with the Hurricane Valley Fire Protection District to come up with a draft map. Um, and that map generally includes most of everything in the foothills, not the when I say foothills, I don't mean the foothill residential zone. I mean actually in the foothills which can include some valley residential zone and does not include certain um parts of the foothill residential zone but it essentially is is property in the foothills um will as recommended by the hurricane valley fire protection protection protection district will be included in the wooi zone which means those wooi requirements defensible space and others would be required on those properties. So on that map, not every property on Anastasia is in the high risk, which is really interesting because if you look at the map, there could be one house across the street with the same kind of black brush and cedars and one is high risk and one is not. And when we met with the um the fire chief from Hurricane, he didn't even have an answer for us as to why. Um

but it's concerning and frustrating because um some are in it or some are not. But I guess the question I have is will the WOOI zone is that go that would go up onto Anna's Sazi? I would think in the on the map that the town is doing

it does correct. Yeah. Again, pretty much the only let let me take a at the risk of adding further confusion, but hopefully with the intent of adding further clarity, let me give you a little bit more background. This I I referenced the state mapping called the URAP earlier and and that's justformational mapping that the state has done to help municipalities analyze fire risk. the the the state has said, "Hey, local governments, we recommend that you include in your WOOI zone all properties with what they have a metric that they have come up with called smooth structure exposure score of five or greater. This this smooth structure exposure score has a scale of 1 to 10. and they say, "We we recommend that all properties within with a smooth structure exposure score greater of five or greater be included in your WOOI zone." That was their recommendation. Everywhere in Springdale is five or greater on this map of the smooth structure exposure score. So that's part of the reason why initially we we thought, "Oh my goodness, we don't have any choice in the matter. everything in the Springdale has to be in the in the WOOI zone. Turns out that's not true, right? So, what we've done is use that data and other data and and boots on the ground data with with the fire marshall and and representatives of the fire uh Hurricane Valley Fire District to refine where the WOOI boundary is for Springdale. So yes, it includes everything in the foothills, all of Anosazi Plateau, most of Canyon Springs, most of Kinosava. The things that are not included would be things right along

SR9 between SR9 and the river. Um, a little bit on the on whatever side of SR9 we're on currently. East, west, west, thank you. A little bit on the west side of SR9. Those are those are areas that the fire marshall said, "Yeah, the state is encouraging us to put these in the WOOI zone, but looking at this boots on the ground really there's not really a significant as I mean everything is at risk of fire of wildfire, right? But but not not a significant enough risk to warrant putting this in the WOOI zone, but everything else in the Foothills. Yes. Is that draft map available for viewing?

Yeah. Yeah, we've we've put it I think it's on the website maybe. I um uh let me double check the website really quick. Will you go on the website now to the town's website and go to the community development department and there's a there's a tab for wildfire or wooi or something like that. Uh I thought that for sure we had put that on the map. I I apologize we have not. Um we will get that up on this website so that that will be available to the community. But but yes it is it is we have presented it a couple of times at these different meetings. It is available. We'll get it up on the website. Thanks.

So, um the presentation is the one that was done at the public meeting a month or two ago. Yeah. So, we've had two presentations. The first one um was done um actually it might be in that one. Kindle if you'll bring now bring up the wild that first one. Yeah, I think it's No, this was this was a presentation that we partnered with the Hurricane Valley Fire Protection District on um just kind of introducing the concept of the WOOI zone and um I think that's I think one of these slides has our map in there. There's the high-risisk

that's the high-risisk WOI zone from the state. Keep going. Keep going. That there you go. that this is a really bad version. I apologize, but that's the map. We'll get a better version on the on the website. So, it hasn't changed substantially from that. No. No. So, any anything um on either the east or west of those two red lines would be in the WOOI zone. Um and yeah, so so between the two lines would not be in the WOOI zone. So probably most of our commercial properties are not in the WOOI zone. Is that a true statement? Correct. Yep.

So maybe we don't need to concern ourselves too much about changing the code for commercial zones if they're not in not going to be in the WOI zone anyway. Okay. Interesting idea. Um just gets really ugly if you're on the border all that. Yeah. What if you're on the red line? Red line or your neighbor is okay, but I you're not because that's where the red line goes. Yeah. Yeah.

The same thing happens with Foothill and Valley. I mean, Canyon Springs has several foothill properties that are on the river and valley properties that are up from the river. So yeah, we run into that kind of thing and um trying to figure out how that influences our codes. How does it influence our codes? Yeah. Yeah. And and there will be neighbors who are going to be different because they'll be on two sides of the line. Yeah. And it's the same with the high risk like and Anastasia. Some people will be paying a fee and your neighbor next door across the street don't because they're not yet.

Yeah. Are there any other comments or questions? Um, so, so what what would be the plan for this? I'm assuming that we would not want to make changes to that we're talking about here until we know when the WOOI code is adopted because we're going to refer to that WOOI code which is not yet in our town code.

Yes. So the plan is that the WOOI code will be adopted in June by the town council. So I think by the time this is run through a few work meetings then it'll already Okay. Okay.

Is is this map uh fixed in stone when that adoption occurs or is this going to be a um you know I don't know something that can change over time conditions change or do you have to go through and change the code to do it? Um yes and yes it can change just just like any other zone boundary. It it can change um and and yes we would need to change the code to do so because the the WOOI zone is going to be um housed in title nine of the code. That's our building standards and not title 10 which is our land use ordinance. the process to change the code is much easier than it is for than it would be to like change a property from value residential to village commercial or something like that. Um so so yes it can be changed. Yes, it will require changing the code and that code change process is much easier than a typical zone change that the commission would be familiar with. Can the can the code be drafted in a way that this this becomes a you know something that is referred to in the code but it's but it can but it's changeable without having to go through that process.

I think we have to adopt it by ordinance for it to be for it to become effective um to to binding. Um ordinances carry the force of law behind them and because this WOOI code is something that we'll want to have the force of law behind we'll have to adopt it by ordinance. Um, but again, changing changing an ordinance associated with title nine is is much easier than changing an ordinance associated with title 10, for example. There's no public hearing requirement. It is something that the town council can do on their own initiative without uh going through the planning commission process. So, it's it's a pretty streamlined um process to get that changed. Okay.

One other question. So, if the state came in and said you're in the Will you zone? But if the city said you are, do we are they as restrictive on the defendable area? The only time the state is going to get involved is with the properties that they have mapped as the highrisk WOOI zone properties. Go back to that red blob over onazi plot. There you go. those properties um have been mapped as the high-risk wooi zone properties. Those are the only properties that the state is going to become involved in. And they're not going to um from a regulation standpoint tell you what you can and can't do with your property. What they are going to say is we're going to assess you a fee and the amount of the fee that you're going to pay is uh directly related to how well you have mitigated the fire risk around your property. So you're welcome to keep your property in a state of high fire risk. You will just be paying more money in your assessment. If you want to reduce that assessment and you live in this high-risisk wooi area, then you would say, "Oh, I'm going to do the things that the state has asked me to do to reduce the amount of money that I have to pay every year in my assessment."

The city of Springdale is going to assign what they think is a high risk independent of the state. And then do they get fines? the city of Springdale start saying

that so we are the the again the whole terminology is unfortunate. We're not going there is a we're not going to be saying a property is high risk the same way the state is saying a property is high risk. We're going to say saying a property is either in the WOOI zone or it's not in the WOOI zone. If it's in the WOOI zone, the WOOI zone requirements are applicable to that property. That means when you develop the property, you will need to comply with the building requirements and building materials and those kinds of things. The only part of the WOOI zone that is retroactive is the defensible space requirement. Um, and so the town could say at some future date, you are in the WOOI zone. You are out of compliance with the defensible space requirement on your property. Therefore, we're going to bring we are going to be bringing a code enforcement action against you and we would enforce it through a a code enforcement process.

Should be up to the city council and the planning commission to review. No, that's a that's an administrative process that that is is done through our community development department. Whether or not we're actually going to get to that point, it I I I think is is questionable. I I think the the whole um idea behind this WOOI zone adoption and the defensible space requirement is to educate property owners about the wildfire risk on their properties and to say here are things that you can do to better protect your property. We've already started this process. The other link that was on that website, the town's website that that we saw, um, was a a presentation that the Damarind Valley Fire Chief came and presented to the community about here's what you can do as a property owner to make your property more fire safe. That's what we're trying to do. We're we're not trying to be punitive as a as a town. We're not trying to come down with a heavy hand. So I don't envision a time where we would ever get to the point where we are finding people for being out of compliance with the defensible space requirement. I think it's primarily about education and helping them become more firewise. And the reason one of the things I bring this up is like for burns and screening between properties. Well, if you have trees up to be screening and all of a sudden you're in a defensible area, you got to start cutting your screening out. So that becomes, hey, we got an ordinance that says you got to put up a screen. And then you have another ordinance that says, oh, that's too much trees. You got to start taking them out. That's why I'm trying to figure out

it brings up a good point. Maybe relative to what we're this issue, we should look at what are the screening um requirements, our ordinances, whether we need to modify those. I think that's a a good point. Mainly applies in the commercial. That's the only tends to which is not is um not it's outside of the WOI boundary, right? Look like most of them were. Maybe all of them are. We don't know for sure at this point, but

um yeah, you're right. The screening requirement is generally to screen between commercial zone and a residential zone. And so if you're required to put trees and or plants in that screening area and it happens to be on the other side of that red line, then I think it's something to look at. Yeah.

Yeah. I' I've seen, you know, residents with screening up just even just a block to nine technically in the um the workhouse, you know, zone. They uh you could put screening. Part of that code says they expect some screening up in different houses that they're building a certain number of houses for the workhouse overlay zone. Oh, workforce overlay zone. Yeah. Okay. Technically, according to our code, you have to put in some kind of screening, but if you're in a red area now, again, we got a conflict that that's where I keep

Yeah. Yeah. And and I think it's important to to recognize and and Terry, you made this point earlier that there um one is not all trees are created equal when it comes to fire risk. Um there are actually many trees that the town would allow and encourage that don't present a significant fire risk. Um there are those that obviously do like junipers or opinions are a significant fire risk. So so I think it's important to to recognize that. And the other is that the WOOI defensible space requirement does not mean you cannot have a tree. It means that you need to be careful about where that tree is located and how it's maintained. If the tree is within a certain distance of the home, 10 feet, it has you you have to make sure that the branches are 10 feet away. If it's into the defensible space, you need to make sure that it's limbmed up off the ground, at least six feet off the ground. But it does not mean that you cannot have trees. So I I I think I think presenting this as a choice between trees and screening or WOOI zone compliance is is not completely accurate because the WOI zone actually does allow trees. It just says here's how they have to be maintained and and here's how they have to be located

in the state high-risk areas on Anastasia. Where are things at with um the defensible space to your house that's actually outside of your property? The code said 100 ft or to the property line. So

property line's closer then the the code says you only have to go to your property line. Now does that make you safe? I don't know. So when we did the walk through with the fire chief, he was showing us stuff out in the open space of how to um make the like the brush like at least three or four feet away from each other when not on our property.

Yeah. So so a couple things. Um Terry is right that the strict wooi zone requirements talk about to the property line or a certain distance. That's a wooi zone again. There's two different things going on here. There's the WOOI zone, which is what we'll be enforcing. Then there's what the state requires for high-risisk WOOI properties and and more broadly what maybe an insurance provider is going to require for um protection of a of a structure. They don't care what the WOOI zone requires.

They're worried about actual protection of the structure. And they may in fact have told property owners, I don't care if that tree is not on your property. it's presenting a wildfire risk and it needs to be mitigated. Um so in in a recent town council meeting, the town council has given blanket approval to maintain vegetation in the Anastasia Plateau conservation easement for the purpose of fire mitigation as required by uh either WOOI or a um insurance or or some some other

requirement. requirement. There is there is a requirement that you that a property would need to kind of vet that with the community development department. So, it's not just a cart blanch go down and cut every tree you you want, but the council has recognized that issue and has taken steps to address it.

Anything else? We turn. I just have one question um about Sorry, not about this topic though. um about the the the June work meeting. Um is it appropriate now to take action or would that be something for the on the agenda next meeting? Like do we need to vote on that? Um so it is on your um on the meeting schedule that you publish. Yeah. And and so it it probably would be a good idea to take action. I mean we we've canceled meetings in the past without a formal action. So, I don't think it requires one, but it's probably a good idea just for transparency so so that the community is aware that we're going to be doing that.

So, the answer is I would I don't think it's required, but I would encourage you to do that. Okay. Does somebody want to make a motion? I move that we um take the June 3rd meeting, I guess it is, off the schedule. Well, actually, you can't do it tonight because on the agenda, you have to do it in a public Yeah, it needs to be on the agenda. Okay. You have to do it. I I apologize if my way you'd have to have it on the agenda in your next meeting and then action on it when it's on the agenda. Perfect. Thank you. Okay. If we forget to do it next time, we'll just cancel it afterwards. We'll just have nobody show up. Now, is there a motion to adjurnn? I gave up. You gave up.

I will second Paul's motion now. Okay. Motion by Paul, second by Terry. All in favor? Rich? I. Terry? I. Jennifer I. Paul. I Kashai. Motion passes. Meeting is adjourned.