Planning Board - Regular Meeting

I would like to call to order the Monday, May 19th, 2025 meeting of the planning board. Please join me for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Roll call, please. Member Ray, present. Member Perry, present. Vice Chair Angelus, present. Member Grocott, present. Chair Hubard, present. We have a quorum. Thank you. Okay, first item is approval of the agenda. I would like to add a discussion item 5B which is to just mention an upcoming webinar related to a cup. Uh does anyone else have anything to add? I'd like to add a comment about the last commission meeting. Okay. [Applause] Okay. Any any other changes? Okay. Can I get a motion to approve the revised agenda? Motion to approve as revised. Second. Roll call, please. Member Perry. Yes. Vice Chair Angelitus. Yes. Member Grocott. Yes. Member Ray. Yes. Chair Huard. Yes. Motion carries. Thank you. Are there any audience comments? Does not appear so. Okay. The next item on the agenda is the approval of minutes from the April 21st, 2025 meeting. Does anyone have

revisions? Okay. Uh, can I have a motion to approve the minutes as in the agenda? I'll make a motion to approve the minutes as written to 21st 2025 meeting. Second. Second. Roll call, please. Vice Chair Angelos, yes. Member Grocott, yes. Member Ray, yes. Member Perry, yes. Chair Hubard, yes. Motion carries. Thank you. So, there are no action items today. We will start with discussion item 5A. Thank you, chair. We didn't have any major items this month, but we did want to have a meeting to talk about Senate Bill 180. Um, if we could pull the PowerPoint up, please. So, this is a major bill. It is certainly going to affect the planning board and and some of the other activities that the city is undertaking, assuming that it is signed by the governor. Uh, it was enrolled in early May of this year. uh it is awaiting the governor's signature. It didn't face much resistance at all in the legislature and it's basically the hurricane Helen and Milton version of a Senate bill that we talked about a few years ago back in 2023, Senate Bill uh 250 that applied directly to areas affected by Hurricane Ian at the time. It is the significant preeemption in local planning. um and it would be in effect for the for the major planning related items through September of 2027. So there are some requirements that affect the city in this bill um directly some of the responsibilities of the community development department uh but not necessarily planning directly. Um one of those is that there is a prohibition on building fee increases until 180 days following a state of emergency declaration that has passed it. It was uh April 3rd for Hurricane Milton. So, we're outside of that. But that is something moving forward. Uh municipalities that are affected by a

hurricane cannot increase building fees until 180 days after that initial state of emergency declaration. Um one thing that changes more the review side of of zoning and and planning is the prohibition on impact fees for replacement structures that are not changing in use or intensity. specifically regardless of age. So the way that impact fees are currently assessed is that when a building is replaced and there's no change in density or intensity, so if you're taking a multif family development away, you're replacing it with a multif family and the number of units is staying the same. Number of bedrooms is staying the same. Typically impact fees are not assessed. The exception to that is it used to be for structures of a certain age. They were built prior to a certain year. um no impact fees were assessed when they were originally developed. Um they would be collected when they came back in for that redevelopment. Now regardless of age um impact fees cannot be collected unless there is some demonstration that the impact of the development through density or intensity is increasing. So that will affect um certainly some of the older developments in St. Pete Beach if they come back in for redevelopment that would affect us in in that regard. Uh it does require municipalities to reopen permitting departments at 40 hours a week as soon as is practicable after a hurricane. That's not defined. Um practiceable is not defined. But I assume that to mean that once city city city hall is back up and running um the city moving forward would need to reopen its permitting department after the storm. And it prohibits any kind of cumulative substantial improvement rule being adopted by cities. Uh we had one in place. We had a fiveyear and then a one-year going back to 2021. We did repeal that back in December 2024. It is now permit to permit with the exception of storm events. It is inclusive of all the storm event permits, but that would

be um the minimum FEMA requirement to remain in the NFIP. So, we do currently um align with this requirement, but this would prohibit us from going back and adopting a a multi-year cumulative improvement rule um at any point in the future. What would happen if FEMA chose to require that and now the state has prohibited it? That's a good question. Um, I mean it would be a if it were a minimum requirement of NFIP, um, there would have to probably be some kind of state application for exemption from that. Okay. So, as far as the planning items go, and we did print out a a short summary of this um that we just passed out a short time ago. This um if if passed as written, this would be retroactive to August 2024. I don't believe there's anything that we've adopted in this time frame that we would have to repeal. Um it would be in effect until October of 2027 and moving forward for one year following a state of emergency. Cities that are in the declaration zone cannot prohibit any kind of moratorum on construction, reconstruction or redevelopment of anything that was impacted by the hurricane. So any storm damaged or storm destroyed uh structure would need to be able to be redeveloped. Um that would not mean that we would have to um go above our zoning code. So if something were a prohibited use, it wouldn't necessarily need need to be uh reestablished. However, if a structure is eligible to be reconstructed, the city cannot prohibit any kind of moratorium on reconstruction of that development. We cannot pass any more burdensome amendment to the comprehensive plan or land development code which I'll get into in a minute. We also cannot make it any more restrictive or burdensome to review, approve or issue a development permit. So item two

is anything that would pre prevent any kind of use prohibition or make it more restrictive on in terms of zoning standards, comprehensive plan um permissions for future land use. City could not prohibit anything related to that. We also cannot put up any more barriers to actually applying or approving for a development permit. So, we can't make it more arduous to apply for a site plan, for example. Uh we can't require more information than the code currently requires to make application for an item. Uh the above does not apply if a developer sponsors the change or application and the change applies solely to them. So a developer can't come in and ask for a change to a zoning district unless they own all of the property within that zoning district. But if and you don't see that as frequently in St. Pete Beach because we are largely built out. But if you looked in cities or municipalities that have a large amount of vacant land where you have a future land use that allows for a certain type of density or intensity and the developer comes in and they're looking for some kind of a zoning change to allow for that density or intensity to be activated. And if they made a voluntary restriction on their development, um that is something that cities can allow to move forward. the developers specifically applying a um restriction to themselves under this item, they would they would not be restricted from doing that moving forward. But for any kind of city initiated restriction, that would apply through October 2027. So, one of the one of the concerns with this is that development permit is very expansive. Um I think a lot of the work that the city's been doing with the comprehensive plan is looking at density intensity some of the the big picture um development restrictions but development permit is is something that includes basically any kind of building permit.

It would include things as you know specific as permit uh sorry paver layout fence location sign height sign setbacks things like that. any kind of zoning permit. So any kind of use permit through our business tax receipt or any other kind of review that we perform for zoning, anything related to the larger items like subdivision plats, variances, site plans, conditional use permits and so on. It makes it so that cities cannot do anything more to make it more burdensome or arduous to obtain any of those those uh approvals. So, one of the items that was brought up and um there has been a little bit of push back from organizations like thousands of friends of Florida, other planning organizations in the state is that it's effectively prohibiting placement of any kind of greater burden on any project that is submitted for planning review until October 2027. It's unclear if the regulation was intended to be so encompassing in terms of scope. This does affect all of Florida, every single county. uh the hurricane Helen or Milton uh disaster declaration did apply to every county in the state and then of course you have cities like Miami um Broward County places in Jacksonville that weren't substantially affected by this but it would affect them moving forward. It would also require after a declaration of a state of emergency related to a hurricane a one-year um effective date for all of these prohibitions as well. So even post 2027, this would apply to cities moving forward. Penelis County has obviously been under multiple states of emergency um not related to these storms looking back a decade. So it would extend it out and wouldn't make it rolling forward. Any city within a 100 miles of an impact of a hurricane would automatically be included in this um moratorum and and prohibition moving

forward. And like I mentioned before, the regulations appear to proit minor items like fence height reduction, uh stricter standards on sign placement and so on. In addition to the more essential elements of development like density, intensity and use, the law requires challengers to provide the municipality 14 days to revoke or void a more more burdensome amendment. So this isn't an automatic effective overturn. The law does require that anyone who's challenging any ordinance that is applied as a more burdensome standard, they do need to present the city with 14 days notice prior to fi filing suit. If the action does move to court, plaintiffs are entitled to attorney's fees and cost. Any amendment or administrative decision found contrary um by the courts is void back to adoption. It cannot apply to any other development. So if the city has applied it to another development, it's automatically voided as it applies to them as well, even if they are not the challengers. Staff is exploring adopting a procedure for declaring and demonstrating a burden to be able to be reasonably evaluate any claims made. So this is something that would be adopted in the code. It would basically set a procedure for any kind of declaration of a burden. the steps that the applicant would go through at the city level um to show that a burden has been um applied to a property based on an ordinance that we adopt. And that's something we'll bring to the planning board if it if it moves forward. Brandon, on on bullet two, it doesn't mention whether or not plaintiffs have to prevail. Is I'm I'm sorry. It is for if they prevail in court, they are entitled. Okay. So, we have spoken with the city attorney's office as well as our consultants for a few of the ordinances that the um planning board reviewed last month. For the overlay, um there are no changes that are identified as needing

to be made at this time. For 8th Avenue, we have identified one potential change. Currently, the 8th Avenue district does not require design review for any project that is proposed. Um we if this bill passes, if it's signed by the governor, u we will change language that it goes from required to be strongly recommended. Um typically the board just wants to be made aware of these projects, the historic preservation board. Um so we would still be sharing these projects with them. It would just not need to go through a formal design review um based on this language change. for the sign ordinance. Um with the help of the planning board, a lot of the amendments that are being proposed are more permissive in scope. Um we have not identified any changes that are necessary at this time for this ordinance. So in terms of next steps, um there has been a concerted effort among some planning organizations like I mentioned Thousand Friends of Florida to reduce the scope of this request. I will say that most of the efforts that I've heard of so far have been focused on reducing the statewide scope. Um there have been some issues that have recently as in the last week been brought up with the scope of restrictions. I don't know why the focus is on this now because these restrictions have been in the bill since the beginning but there has been a focus toward turn toward this bill uh possibly due to it sailing through the legislature. Um the Senate Bill 250 as I mentioned before has been in effect since Hurricane Ian. I believe it's still in effect for some of the the counties are under this scope and for Manatee County in particular. they'll be rolling from Senate Bill 250 into the uh Senate Bill 180 if if this is signed by the governor. There was recently an issue I believe it ma made it to the courts or it might have been something that they saw an administrative interpretation from the state on and the manatee county had uh been proposing some wetlands protections that aren't really directly related to zoning but it does have some additional burdens on development and there was an

interpretation that that would be a higher restriction under Senate Bill 250. not something that directly relates to the hurricanes, but they were looking at wetlands protections that um they were told could not move forward under this bill. Um we bring this up um in part because the city commission is seeking in the next few months, not not this month, but it'll be something that we add on to the agenda in the next month or two to get your ideas for strategic efforts moving forward for the next year. And based on that, um, some of the items that certainly staff are contemplating, some of the items that might be brought forward to this board, um, we might need to recontextualize in the in the scope of this bill. So, as you're considering ideas for your next year of strategic efforts, um, just be, you know, keep this keep this bill in the forefront of your mind because it will definitely affect the city's efforts should it be signed by the governor. And I believe city attorney that would be by the end of June. Is that correct? Um what happens is they take a long time before the bill gets sent to the governors and gets sent in batches and then he'll review them. If he doesn't veto it, then he has a choice to either sign it or not sign it but let it go into law anyway. Um but we anticipate he's probably going to sign it. They signed two Senate Bill 250 before for Hurricane Ian and this is very similar and it has a lot of other provisions in it. The bill itself is pretty thick and has a lot of emergency election provisions and things like that. So, not just this section. Does this one have language similar to 250 where a future name storm prior to October 2027 extends it? This um has two sections. one about Debbie, Helen, and Milton. And that has a set period of time and then actually creates a new Florida statute so that every time there's a hurricane, there'll be a one-year uh limitation on more burdensome, more

restrictive uh LDRs, comp plans, site plans, and then also the um moratorum. Is that a landfall or just in general? Um it's 100 miles of landfall. Okay. That's for future storms. Okay. So, this for the the last couple storms, it's the it's the whole state. Anyone that was in the declaration area, this could be in continued in perpetuity given frequency of storms. Yeah. We've seen in the past few years. If you want to be more restrictive or burdensome, you got to wait till there hasn't been a hurricane for a year at least. You might have a small window. Yeah. One of the impacts is that if we wanted to introduce some lessons learned to make better resiliency, it's like we're being locked in to an older understanding of storm damage. Correct. It doesn't make sense. Yeah. I I sent emails to a lot of Florida representatives and including those from Miami Dade who led the nation in some of the hurricane development codes that and this kind of bill would have prevented those from ever coming to exist. So it it is what it is, but it doesn't make any sense. There's a lot of interesting information in the bill if you if you actually read the entire bill and it passed the House and the Senate with one nay vote. Every other every other vote was yes. in including the disaster subcommittee. I know our local representative, Linda Cheney, was trying to get changes made and trying to um get rid of this language, but to no avail the the leadership in both the House and the Senate really wanted this to go through. They weren't willing to make any changes in committees. Now, we did see with Senate Bill 250 originally, it had applied to us here in Penllis County, at least the south part

of Penllis County. Um, they did pass a bill in late 2023, I believe, that rolled that back and they they applied it to named counties. So, it was a little surprising they went back to the 100 100 mile radius language, but there's always a possibility they take it back up the next legislative session as well. And that first one in 250, there was a hurricane and it went in one side of the state and came out and then made a second landfall. So there was actually two landfalls that was within 100 miles of landfall. This is for the future now with within 100 miles of the track. So it's not just where it makes landfall, but how it moves through the state like through Orlando or through Daytona. Okay. It'll follow the storm. 100 miles on each side. So, it's another hurdle we'll have to deal with as we go forward and think about every time we want to amend the land development code or the comp plan or even review conditional use permits and development orders. Yeah, one of the items that we were thinking about bringing forward and we might still contemplate doing this. Um, and I think one of the organizations has reached out to the state was the marine turtle lighting ordinance that FD had prepared. And I think reading through there could be an argument made that a state prepared ordinance would be more restrictive if we adopted it. So I I think there there are currently a few exemptions. Uh there's one for ordinances that are approved by the state related to a particular area of of protective interest in the state. So it it could expand, but I think we're just seeking some some guidance on things like that because um it was a state prepared ordinance. It's model ordinance for the municipalities, but we might not be able to adopt it for the next four three years. So it doesn't address things like building code. So, I think you're still allowed, they'll still work through the

Florida building code revisions as they go along. Um, this is more of land use of planning. Um, and then also some things like, uh, changing a light bulb isn't actually development. So if a light bulb is replaced with a turtle friendly infra whatever the ultraviolet wave length is that may not implicate this um because it's more about the light bulb than the actual development. M and then there's another option too for some things instead of uh saying strongly proh or is prohibited we could say strongly recommended as we talked about or we could also create incentives for opt-in programs. If you opt into this then you get extra something. Okay to make them voluntary. Has has the commission given any indication on things they would like us to focus on at this point or would they look to us to brainstorm on things we might find of interest to work towards? So I I believe they're going to be undertaking their own strategic planning session and from that they'll be setting the the overarching goals and for you that'll be our basis for All right. Any anyone have further questions? No. Okay. The discussion item 5B I wanted to bring up was uh I know there is a cup for Corey Landings that will be working its way through the system. Uh it has been assigned number 255069. I've been made aware there's a webinar coming up on May 29th, 5:30m, but I I don't know who all is aware of that or how you register. Um I know it was sent in an email, so I don't know if there's a link the the city is aware of that could be shared. Well, we

we just received that today and we'll be putting it on the website. Okay. All right. Great. And 5C, member Perry, what time was it on May 29th? That was 5:30 p.m. It's a virtual webinar on May 29th. Okay. Okay. Um, I asked for this to be on the agenda because I'm trying to make sure that I do everything properly and, you know, uh, keep things public that are supposed to be public, the sunshine laws, things like that. So, I don't know if you've all had a chance to watch the commission meeting um from last week, but in that meeting, and I realized that the applicant was trying to persuade a certain view, but um his direct words were that the planning board completely failed in their duties. And so, I never take failing nicely. So I thought, well, you know, maybe this is a learning opportunity and I need to go figure out what we should have done wrong or did done better. Um, so a couple things that happened. Um, I went back through the comp plan and some other things and, uh, just to give you the context, you already know this planning board is tasked to advise the city commission on matters relating to the city's comp plan and other planning and zoning matters. So like um he he stated that we did not um look at his hardship. Um but I looked at the things that we said um like for example on the the water shallow and it says element six goal one conserve protect and manage um enhance natural resources aquatic wetland etc. Um when we talked about traffic, of course there's a lot in there about safety of pedestrians, um the things that we brought up in terms of the density, um it I mean basically we were textbook I could I

could say policy 1.1.4 is what we were talking about. Um, and I even saw under the goals and objectives for the Gulf Boulevard Redevelopment District, which this property is in, it even goes so far as to say with particular emphasis on redeveloping temporary lodging uses on the west side of Gulf Boulevard along the Gulf beaches and redeveloping appropriate commercial and residential uses on the east side. So basically my conclusion was that he truly did not meet the requirements and that we were right on target. Um so I went back and I looked at um I even put a timeline. I sent an email to um Lisa cuz she's the one who appointed me and I copied the other commissioners and the city manager because I felt like it's not good for us if the planning board is called out in a public meeting that we have totally failed our duties. I I don't think that's what we want to leave in people's heads. So, um I wrote a I wrote an email about this and I said we here's the findings. I took it out of the minutes. Exactly. um the minute the concern about the traffic density um the freebus docks being shallow beach access jaywalking all those because he was almost mocking us with jaywalking jaywalking is a reason well as a matter of fact it is um and at at um meeting timeline 209 all of us kind of summarized where we were and um I think um you said it best when you said they were trying to place a resort in a non resort district. And I went back and I watched it and I think that is a summary of why we felt the way we did. Um unfortunately the slide that was presented on the planning board recommendations um really did not talk about the fact

that we were concerned that it didn't meet the comp plan or the land development code. And to me that was the that was the whole meat of what we were doing. Um, and so the the architect quoted verbatim the points which were still valid points. They're all valid points, but the bottom line was it didn't seem to meet code. So I sent this to the commissioners and I asked for guidance of, you know, what could we do better? I mean, should I be citing the code that I'm saying, you know, this doesn't meet or uh because I don't again, I don't think it's right for us to be publicly um cited as failures. And again, I I didn't take it personally because I realized the person was very much trying to persuade. I mean, he he also thought that our thing was not advisory but binding and he was trying to file an appeal. So, he he not only didn't understand the codes, but he really didn't understand the whole process. Um, but I just wanted to um say publicly because again, I don't want to violate any sunshine laws, but I have tried to bring this forward as an issue that I think needs to get cleaned up a little bit so it doesn't happen to us again. So, on the slide that's shown saying this is what the planning board's advisement or what their thoughts were, was that a stat slide? Yes, it was. Okay. So, is there a mechanism where after we make our advisement that there is a period where the staff formulates that slide and then brings it back to ensure that it represents what our thoughts were? I know like would delay the applicant for a month and going in front of a commission. But that way then we're reviewing what it is the staff is representing as being the planning board's objections or input in input. It could be in favor of or against. Would that be possible? It it is um if if nothing else, I could

send it out prior to the meeting if we have to move it forward within a certain period of time and I could just make you aware of what's going to be stated. I the the individual items were correct. I I believe you just wanted a more definitive statement. Yeah, the individual items were correct, but what it what it didn't say was that um like I it's I took it directly out of the minutes. Um, member Perry Opine, the project did not meet the comp plan or land development code requirements and there are other things um where like I said um you said placing resort in a non- resort. I mean the bottom line was that that was not the right project that didn't meet code in that space and that was not communicated. It was like he he picked up on the freebie and the jaywalking and made it look really and again those are all valid points and they also tie back to the code. Um but I just thought we should not be um in a situation where we're not all together. So would that resolve the issue of Yes. I think if we could see the slide of what we're going to do and and the minutes the minutes were fine. I mean the minutes were very accurate. It just wasn't a bullet point. was the statement at the end of the bullet points and so I I didn't have any problem with that. But yes, got it. Well done. Um I appreciate your efforts. Uh I I watched the meeting. I listened to the arguments. I also didn't take it personally. I I've heard, you know, being up here for two and a half years now. heard several cups and applicants have not always agreed with my opinion and that's going to happen and it is what it is. But yeah, I I got the I got the impression that the commissioners had watched our meeting and and understood. Yeah, I mean he did not sway them but he did go at length about what failures we were. I mean he said it many many times and I just the general public is hearing that other people are hearing that and I don't I believe the

commissioners know the code. I mean, they were right on top of it and and didn't they weren't persuaded, but um I think we could have a better process. Okay. Anyone else have anything? No. Okay. I will move to ajourn. Thank you.