Planning Board - Regular Meeting

Okay. Good morning everyone. Uh seeing that we have a quorum, I'd like to call to order the regular meeting of the Sunset Beach Planning Board for April 16, 2026. Stand for the pledge of allegiance. Oops. 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.

Okay. As always, our first order of business is conflict of interest. Does any member have a conflict of interest or the appearance of a conflict of interest with regard to any item on the agenda? And if so, please state so at this time. Richard, I do not. I do not. Uh I do not I do not. Mr. Chairman, uh due to a family matter, I'm going to have to leave at 11 o'clock today. Okay. So, I wanted to get that on record. Okay. Thanks very much. So, if you try to remind me just before 11 you leave, uh we can reserve a few minutes for you to speak to anything that comes further down in the menu. Okay. Thank you.

Uh item three to amend or approve the agenda. As we can see, we have a rather large agenda today. Uh so, I'm going to try to keep the moving along. So, first of all, I'd like to make a motion to amend the agenda, which is really just uh moving things along. First of all, I'd like to move what is currently item 8.2, which is the update on the land use plan up to uh old business 6.2 since I believe that's where where it should be and should be able to handle pretty quickly. Then I'd also like to add in as item 9.2 to just an update from staff on the open ETJ seat on planning board if there's any update a quick update too and maybe for and third part of the motion so it's a three-part motion is move item 7.3 the 904 study up to the 7.1 position and shift 71 down to 72 and 72 to 73. So the engineers here can make a uh quick presentation and allow them to go back to work. Do I have a second on any of that?

I I I'd like to just add one concern given the U time frame for Michael. I'm concerned that the 7.4 before I think it's important that Michael be part of that discussion and it's fairly low down in the agenda. Um well we have I I agree but I'm not adding that to my motion at this time because what I'm trying to do is get people who have other jobs first. Uh okay because I think we have two two applicants here correct

and the engineers. Okay. So that's so one so seven what becomes 71 72 and 73 are people who are here I believe on their work time. Okay. And like I said I will try to give Michael the uh at least chance to chime in if he can before he leaves. We have a second on that motion. I second. All in favor? I Any nays? Hearing no nays. The eyes have it. The agenda is modified. uh as moved. So I guess technically do we approve the agenda as modified? Um I move to approve it as modified. Second second.

All in favor?

I. Any nays? No nays. The agenda is approved as modified. The first item is approval of planning board minutes from the February 19th, 2026 uh meeting. And again, I'm going to try to keep moving along. So, I don't have any objections to the minutes other than one thing, and that is on item seven, new business 7.1, the adoption of the SOG's rule rules, which we're taking up again later. on the attachment and I bring this up because it is going to be brought up again later. Rule 13, which is the notice before a meeting. My notes say we agreed to 4 days before which is our normal practice Friday. And I believe the attachment says two. And I have, like I said, I have notes that say we what we talked about was four. And the reason I bring it up is because it's going to be brought up again later. So, I don't know if we want to put that as a comment in hold now. Do we come up to the We're going to come up to this again.

Yeah. And corrected later. But I think it's worthwhile mentioning that this I don't know. I didn't have a chance to look at the tape to see what we actually said. I'm looking at my notes that we the final agreement on that was to stay at the normal practice of a Friday release for a Thursday meeting which is four days. So I don't know what everybody else notes and recollection says. So that is my recollection. I know it was discussed but I'm not sure what we wound up on.

Yeah, not either. So at this point I'm willing to accept the minutes with that point on the attachment being I don't know question you could say questioned by the chair or something just for a matter of the record being correct without into a long discussion here because it'll come up again later because I'm going to ask that rule be relooked at. So is that good enough Ron too

Kimberly? So you can note that for the record the chair made an except exception that that that is up for debate. Uh and then we'll resolve it later when the item comes up. So at least it's noted that way. Anybody else need any changes to the minutes for February 19th? The only thing I had was um on the first page down under 4.1 minutes is misspelled, but other than that I'm good. It's a menu. Minuettes. Yeah. In the in the paragraph the were approved. Yep.

See it further down. Is that must spell checker must have that as a word. Yeah. That is a minuette. Yeah. Richard, anything else, Michael? Um,

yeah. No, I think I'm fine. Okay. Does anybody have a a motion to approve the minutes with the one item of stipulation? I second. We got to make a motion. I makes I I make the motion. I'll second. All in favor approving the minutes with the one item being questioned or stipulated to. All in favor? I. Any nays?

No nazs. The minutes are approved with the one question mark. Okay, the next item is public comment period. This period is public comments on anything on today's agenda. Uh the p each comment will be limited to three minutes. I do have a timer here, I believe. Uh step up to the podium, state your name and address and uh tell us what you think. Anyone? Okay. No public comments at this time. Moving on to old business. Uh again, so right where we ended on those notes was 6.1. It's the adoption of the North Carolina school governance suggested rules and procedures for the appointed boards and hopefully we can get through this pretty quickly. One question I have for Ron Sederfield, assuming we get through this today and we adopt or whatever, does this need to be added as an appendix to the UDO at all? I would say no. It's not part of the UDO. It would be just the document that's housed in the clerk's office um that is utilized by the planning board after it's approved by council and

um once it's approved all the planning board members would get a copy of it and that's how we would conduct business moving forward and that would be part and that would be part of the onboarding process officially. Yes sir. But we can also post them on the website. Okay. But it's not it's not amending the UDO at all. Right. I thought so, but I just wanted for record to have make sure everybody has one and it's

sure. What we will need to do though is, and we've done a little bit of this, but whatever is ultimately adopted by this board and then council, is we may need to go through our UDO to see if anything in the UDO needs to be modified as a result of the actions of this rules of procedure because there are things in our current code that are somewhat found in typical rules of procedures, right? So, we'll just make sure that those documents are consistent once we get once we get a final approval.

So, at this point, what I would like to do is to keep things moving along is I guess express well my concerns. Then we'll go down the row in one order. Maybe we'll go this way. Uh, and hopefully whittle it down to not many changes. So, my first comment occurs on rule 10 special meetings. Uh, and it comes to notice which I'm have sort of a theme here. Uh in section C notice to members it says if the chair or a majority of members I thought we were were going to strike a or a majority of members can call a special meeting and for notice of a special meeting. I believe 72 hours or three business days is appropriate for a notice to members because the notice to the public is 72 hours and three business days which the way it's written now the members know about it a day after the public does which makes no sense. So I believe B and C should be the same. So the special meeting can only be called by the chair and the note the public and the members should both receive the 72 hours or three business days. The sense of the board here. Do you we concur?

Makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Do you guys see what we're talking about there? Yeah. Okay. Yep. So C would have to be changed to if the if if the chair strike and then called and then three sentences down at least 48 hours is replaced by hours or three business days to match the one that's above in B. The next item emergency meetings. I I have I have one concern on rule 10. Yeah,

there are situations where we are mandated to provide public hearing timelines based on a special meeting specifically the text amendment changes. Does not including that in here somehow dilute that requirement? Your ordinance, my in my opinion, your ordinance that would specify when items have to be advertised for public hearings, as an example, would supersede this. Okay. All right. So, this would be something that would not require public hearings or anything like that.

Good. Would it be appropriate just to include that in here just as a note? I would feel more comfortable with it in here. It's not wrong to include it, but it was I don't know if it's necessary, but it's not wrong to include it. Does that make sense? Well, there's other things that public hearings is mentioned further down in this thing. So, I believe it's actually covered in the motions further down where public hearings are required. Okay. Okay. Rule 11, I believe we are not adopting. If you look at the very end, my preference is we either remove this text completely.

Yeah. or strike the whole thing so it doesn't confuse a future reader and the public that that rule is not there. My preference is as opposed to putting it at the end where it says rule 11 is not adopted which I we agreed upon at our first meeting that we either line out this entire text or delete the entire text and put rule not adopted or something. And if I may add to that, Mr. Chairman, rule 11 is titled emergency meetings. First and foremost, likely there's nothing that's really going to be an emergency the planning board would need to do. If so, then we can call it a special meeting, which we just talked about, right?

Second of all, emergency meetings are already covered by general statutes that all appointed elected and appointed boards would need to follow. So, it's covered. It's not that it's not it's not that it's not covered. It's already covered by statute. Okay. Yeah. So all I was saying instead of elite confusion here is to either strike the text, remove the text. I just remove it. Yeah, I think our preference is remove the text. If you want to leave the rule number there, you can leave the rule number, no text, and say not adopted or something. So you don't have to go and reumber all the rules. What I'm saying? Take all the text out and just say not adopted. Okay. Comfortable with that.

Small change to rule. Yeah. Small change to rule 12A is it still mentions emergency meeting in the first sentence should be struck out. That mean that word should be deleted because we just deleted the rule above it. So it's just getting rid of where it say emergency. It's called regular special or special meeting or emergency has to be strucken. Struck if that's a word. I'm sorry. So that's just a technical change. Now we I missed what you said. Rule 12. Rule 12, paragraph A. The first sentence, it lists emergency meetings in that sentence. Okay, I said. Thank you.

Yeah, just delete reference to that. And here we come to the item uh brought about concerning the agenda. Rule 13, paragraph A, drafted. I'm trying to I'm moving faster here just to keep time as uh saved as quickly as possible. Item paragraph four there. Delivery to board members. Each member shall receive a copy of the draft agenda and agenda packet at least two business days before the meeting. My notes indicate that we said four, which is our normal practice. I don't believe two is enough because it just happened and it's not enough. It's not enough. Yeah.

Uh I guess I could be sold on maybe 72 hours or three. My preference is four business days which is normally a Friday release before a Thursday meeting and I thought that's where we ended landed the last time but let's open that up. What's everyone's thoughts on that? Uh

well it does give us the opportunity to review packets over the weekend which I think is particularly on some of the larger packages like we have today. I mean, the 904 study is probably a day's worth of work to review really. So, um I know this we're putting this on Kimberly, but she's done a great job in the past. So, we agree then. I agree. 72 hours, I think. Well, I thought you want you want four days or three days? Four days. Yeah. 40. Four days. Okay. Kimberly.

Okay. Kimberly's okay with it. Yeah. Staff Ron, I guess officially you two guys at the end are the official calls on that. Making sure that the agenda and this stuff is released typically would be the Friday before the Thursday. Yeah. And that's what we typically try to do is usually this codifies that. Yes. Well, this it doesn't really codify. Well, it's a rule. It establishes a rules of procedure. Okay. But it's not a it's not part. So, we will change subar make it. It's not the end of the world. Yeah. Right. Yes. I guess if you can't make it, maybe an announcement that it'd be delayed for one day would be sufficient. Yes.

There we're going to hit this 95% of the time. There may be something comes up that we're still massaging a case summary or staff report or a matter that needs to be further discussed before it gets quoted released. Okay. So, for clarity, so rule 13, do you want to change should to sh? Do you want to change should or shall to should? So this way if you say they shall receive it within 4 days and then something happens and you said that we could kind of eb and flow. If it says shall there's no eb and flow. You change it to should that gives you a little bit of you know leeway in case.

So let me reread what I think it should say. I agree with that. So rule 13 a draft agenda sub paragraph 4 delivery to board members. Each member should receive a copy of the draft agenda and agenda packet at least four business days before the meeting. Greet everyone. Yes, I think that's fine.

Okay, everybody's going to get a chance to pipe in on anything that I don't mention. So, uh, rule 19 is the same as that other one. We did not adopt that rule or we had planned not to adopt that rule. So, my preference is delete the text and say rule not adopted. Okay. And what else do I have? I don't think I have much else. Rule 26. I'm a little confused on it. Tries to set this debate thing and there's a last fourth dot there. Don't recall what we did, but my thought is the presiding officer at the conclusion of debate shall close the debate and initiate the next appropriate act. The loop doesn't seem to be closed in that rule. Again, this is sort of nitpicking, but we're doing rules here. And it becomes an issue if you look at it. Adding of that fourth dot allowing the presiding officer to conclude the debate to close the debate and initiate the next appropriate needs to close that loop. It's unclosed in my mind now.

Yeah, I agree. Agree. I'm sorry. What are we looking at again? on page 31, which is rule 26, debate. Not that we really follow this anyway. Well, I tried to get a motion, get everybody to speak, give everyone a chance to speak as much as they want. Again, this says to extend practical. I try to alternate between one side or another if there is two sides. But at some point I think the loop has to be closed and some presiding offer at the conclusion bait shall we can change the shell the may I guess close the debate and initiate the next appropriate action. That seem reasonable to everyone. Yeah.

Yeah. The staff hear me on that?

Okay. Uh the next one again is a little confusing on my part. Rule 29 we adopted right on this duty to vote and we all have a duty to vote but I'm confused on the unexcused failure to vote what what some people might call an abstension and it looked like we haven't chosen the two choices there. The last set says shall be recorded as brackets an affirmative vote. Affirmative vote or brackets a negative vote.

I believe it's a negative vote. Correct. I I believe that's right. But we talked about this and we didn't make a decision. I think Kimberly, I've thought about all the scenarios how this might come up. But let's say we are members of five. We have voting two to two and an abstension occurs. So does that motion does that motion carry or not carry because it was tied and an abstension? Uh and it looks like from this we didn't choose. So and I went through all the possible you know do we want it to always be in descent but a tie is not a descent. I

Ron what's what is the typical rule on that for planning boards if there's a abstension is it recorded as a negative vote my inclination is I was told that earlier by a previous attorney during a meeting where I tried to abstain and he said that's going to be recorded as I think he said negative vote but I've always learned or boards that I've worked with when we've had attorneys present if someone doesn't vote vote when they've not been excused. It goes with the motion. That's what I whether or not that's a rule Robert rules of procedure or not, we can So then it's records as an affirmative vote.

Affirmative vote of the motion is how I've always heard it, but I might be wrong with that. So if there's a two two tie the planning board and one person abstains without an excuse, the motion carries. That's what I've heard, but or other boards that I've worked that doesn't make it right, but that's what I've always gentlemen. Well, I mean, obviously, you know, we're dealing with, you know, the legal aspects of this. I mean, an abstension to me is not now this is not an excuse. In other words, yeah,

if someone says there's a conflict of interest and they can't vote, say talking about your house or across from your house and you say, "I'm sorry, I got a conflict. I can't vote." If it's two to two, it don't carry, right? Uh, in that case, Ron, say we have a legitimate excuse. Say Richard excuses excusing won't vote because it's he has a conflict conflict and it's two to two, it doesn't carry. The motion will not carry. Correct. So why should it then carry? But why then the opposite occurs for an unexcused?

Let us confirm with the Robert rules and and our attorney's office if needed. But my understanding if he's a body sitting here just fails to make a motion or fails to vote. Yeah, I would think it didn't. If it's two two doesn't carry. The question is if like say there's no conflict like this and I'm going to dump this on Richard and he just says I'm not voting refuses to vote. We all vote two to two. What happens? Ron thinks it carries it's a but if it's a conflict of interest he shouldn't get a vote right at all. If not he just refuses to vote.

Okay. So I guess we can't resolve this. We need to unfortunately get a I think regardless we have to follow what Robert rules say. So what we will our attorney what we will agree here it's this would be chosen as stated but I know no one really follows the whole Robert's rules because they're very long is that we're going to agree on that we will adopt what is legally acceptable in Robert's rule of conduct. Right. so that we can put this to bed. And it is what it is. And again, every member is encouraged to vote unless they have a conflict. So I will probably push someone to vote. But

well, the problem with but I can't make somebody vote. The problem with the conflict of interest is the abstension if it counts as a vote kind of negates the idea of I mean if I abstain and know that it's going to be a positive vote. All right. So I'm reading from Robert rules of order and but I still would like for us to confirm because regard we have to be consistent with Robert what our what our attorney would

advise but if I'm reading this correct it says in the us the in the usual situation where the rules require either a majority v requires a majority vote extensions have absolutely no effect on the outcome of the vote since what is required is either is a majority. On the other hand, if the rule explicitly requires a majority, an abstension will have the same effect as a no vote. Even in such a case, an abstension is not a vote and is not counted as a vote. So, I think we need to get clarification from our attorney's office and we'll just make sure that it's they're good and ultimately what council adopts is consistent with Robert's rule and because this impacts council as well, correct?

Well, no, this is just for us. But I mean, but in general that would apply as what's good for the goose is good for the game. Okay. My final comment and I think I know the answer Ron's going to give me is do we need a rule 37 that re that codifies the hierarchy? You know for instance in the instances where the above rule is in conflict with the UDO the requirements of the UDO take precedence. And when in the instances where at above rule a requirement of UDO are in conflict with the NC state statute, the prevailing NC state statutes apply. We need to formally state as rule 37A hierarchy or do you feel

don't need to but it probably would wouldn't hurt to have it in there. Okay. So essentially what we're saying is the last item on this thing I already sent you. We're essentially saying this is redundant. Well, no. It sets the hierarchy. State statue on top. Yeah. UDO next. These rules third. Got it.

If there's a conflict between these rules and the UDO, the UDO takes precedent. If there's a conflict between these rules, the UDO and state statute, state statutes pre Okay. Okay. Anyone else have any comments or suggested or required? Let's call them required changes at this point. No. No. Stuart,

I have one comment, question, whatever. in the order of business and rule 16. Um the council meetings have a um at the beginning of the meeting have a council discussion period where they can bring up new items. We we've never done that, but I'm wondering if that wouldn't be a good thing to add. And I don't know that it needs to be at the beginning, but maybe it's at the end of the meeting where we have a few minutes to bring up something kind of like when we last last time we talked about the green wave festival and you know, could we bring up stuff like that? That's planning board issues that

What does the council call it? You have a name for it? I think they just call it council discussion. It's just a um I have no objection to putting that someplace. I guess I'm more inclined to put it towards the end. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Probably just be just before just after administrative comments because sometimes they kind of roll together. Maybe just before and we add a I don't what you want to call it a uh open discussion period, planning board, something like that. Whatever. I have no objection to putting in if there's none. There's none, right? If occurs, right? It's just something I get to ask agenda. Does anybody have any items to discuss? I

mean, it it helps in a way that, you know, if we want to bring up something during the meeting, there's no time for us to bring up something new. So, this would be a So, like a planning board initiated discussion, right? Something like that. Yeah. I have no objection to adding it, Ron. So, council calls it a general council discussion. So we would have a general planning board discussion and we'll push it to the to the back somewhere around administration around administrative probably just before administrative comments because sometimes it will probably lead to an administrative comment because either administration will have a groan or a yay attached to it afterwards. And so I'm good with that. Yeah, I'm fine with it.

Well, okay. So that's adding another dot I guess between and there's there's a couple of open dots and yeah you can move the dots around accordingly. That's good. Yeah, that's a good idea. That's the only thing I had

before you guys vote just just what we're going to do is we start out with the initial the original document of course and that's what was moved forward to us by council. So we will identify your changes. So council will see the kind of like a strike through underline if nothing else. So they'll see what you've included, added, what you've deleted or you know in your recommendation. Ultimately they have to adopt this but just to make sure that they're understanding what we've captured all the discussion if you will so they understand what we've what what the motion is of what what you're recommending. So similar way we do a text amendment. Okay. We going to do what? similar to what okay similar to how we

So I'll make a motion that we recommend adoption of the suggested rules and procedures for the planning board as modified in two discussions with the planning board and settled today to the town council for their adoption and return to planning board to be used for onboarding. and etc. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? I I Any nays? No. The motion is adopted. The rules.

Yes. Can we please get a copy of what's the final look like? Administration. Good with that. I'll take the Oh, yeah. Let me go on the microphone instead of the head instead of the head nod. Yes. Thank you.

Okay. Moving my piles around here. Next, uh just item 6.2, which was the modified agenda, is an update on the land use plan. And for disclosure, it was sort of disclosed by uh well was disclosed in the last uh council meeting by administration, but uh on March 23rd, the planning board was uh advised uh to put a temporary hold on the land use plan planning process. Uh so no further action uh will be taken on that. In the last council meeting, a request from a citizen was made to uh get a final report on the survey that our good citizens participated in for information purposes and the council agreed that they at some point in the near future would provide that. So, I just want to make sure everyone in the planning board knows that if after why no further action on the land use plan occurred is because the council has decided to put this on hold uh for review and a further update later. Uh a final report on the survey will be provided forformational purposes to the council and the planning board. Uh since our citizens took the time to do it. Uh, any other administration or staff comments on that? That's the way I read the thing. That's correct. Everybody is now up to date and the public's up to date.

Yeah, I just have two comments. First of which is I am concerned that North Carolina ordinance is very clear. Municipalities that reserve the right to control their own zoning must have a quote unquote current land use plan. Our land use plan is 9 years old. Of the communities that surround us, it is the oldest land use plan currently in force. the state has the right to come in and say absent a land use plan, we will take over zoning consideration in your municipality. That's something we want to avoid. Number one, just want to make that clear. Hopefully the council will take this and move it along expeditiously. Second, there were some comments made in the last meeting about issues within the survey and one of them was that basically on the way that survey monkey, which is how we did the survey in 2016, which I felt gave us really good data, there were some concerns that because of the way the survey is set up, people can vote twice, more than twice, and so that might have some impact on the data. Yeah, Ron, do you know if we can look at the survey and isolate IP addresses so that anyone that votes multiple times, let's say, and in her testimony, uh, Christy mentioned that someone had voted nine times. Now, I don't know if that's true or not. Um, that was

I don't know. Can we get some clarification on my my experience with Survey Monkey? Unless you collect email address, no. they don't capture IPs or something. So in our in this discussion, we talked about requiring email address from a respondent and we decided not to. So we actually technically by decision accepted that possibility and went on the honorable nature of our citizens, right? Well, I think there's citizens that want to have a greater impact on

I mean it kind of works both ways. Does a household do one? Does that mean if there's two people and they say that the court of agreement? So it kind of cuts both ways to a little extent but well it would be interesting to know how compromise the data is if we can based on redundant votes. Statistically speaking if you have enough respondents and the N minus one is high enough. I agree you you kind of washed that out to a certain extent but anyway and I agree but it was it was an issue raised by the council and I want to make sure that it is addressed if it can be addressed if not agree with if it happens to come back to us again

okay I will kind of make a note we make a note that when it comes to deciding on that same point again do we require a name and an email address of a respondent to ver I mean this is not like an election vote. So I think we'll make a note that if it happens to come back to us again which I don't know if it will or not that I will that we will have that as a discussion item to rethink again. All right when we did it originally we decided not to. That's still as good as the data that's input. So unless you require like a two-factor authentication right? You know, I could say that my name's Bill Clinton and put a comment in the LUP, right?

And there's no way to verify that without authentication. That's what we we talked about. We just agree most of our citizens would take it seriously and That's correct. Do one for a household. How many respondents should we ultimately get? Do we know? I'm assuming it was a lot. What? It was It was a lot. I don't remember the exact 12 or 1500. So, last time we heard it was only it was 900. No, it's above 12. It was 12 something what I heard. It's higher than that. Okay, that's good. So, okay. All right.

If I can comment statutes, Mr. D make a comment about having being required to maintain and keep in our fact that the code our current land use plan is 9 years old. Statutes basically say is that local government shall adopt and reasonably maintain a comprehensive plan or land use plan. It doesn't give any guidance on it has to be done every 5 years, every 10 years, every 15 years. What they're looking at is how is your jurisdiction changing?

Well, my concern is in the land use plan, we set a standard of reviewed every two years, replaced every seven. We have not adhered to that standard. Okay. I I I get what you're saying. The North Carolina law is a little murky, but it is. I think we need to be aware of the fact that we are in fact vulnerable and need to you know this is important. Duly noted. I just wanted to put out there that I believe we're still consistent with what the law what state I see Richard's point of view states in our plan itself we should do something.

So which we're now beyond because it was a 2017 plan which if you follow that was like 2024 throw in some COVID excuses because it seems to cover everything. You get to 2026 we started it and now stopped it. So yes, someone could make an argument someplace that we haven't adhered to our own rules. So I hear your argument. I think the planning board agreed that we needed to do it and we started doing it. We've been instructed to stop and we will hold until further notice. Okay.

Okay. So that's publicly done. Oops, I lost my agenda. Okay. Okay. The next item that we moved up is to have the folks who worked on the 904 corridor study update by the company of Bolton and Mech will have to come to the podium. Anything from staff on that before we give apparently the young lady a chance to speak.

Uh the only thing is we were re reached out what a week and a half ago or two weeks ago requesting an opportunity to present the plan. um good planning board for endorsement before it goes to town council. Um I know that this this group has been more I've not personally been involved. I know they've worked with other members of staff um an executive steering committee I believe and I believe you'll go in a little bit of detail there. So we'll certainly hear from the this is with with Bolton and Inc. I I want staff to know since I received this on Tuesday. I will hardly admit to skimming it. Understood.

So I will listen. I believe this is a very important report with great information that should flow into the land use plan, but I am not in any position to endorse or reject anything. I yeah my my review I mean I was able to go through the whole thing but in terms of an in-depth understanding of the implications it's going to be a little short. I mean there's some things that jumped out at me but you know would be worth highlighting. So

not incriminating anything you guys have done. So come up and tell. But I just want everyone to know that we have not really digested any of this yet. So unless you can just tell us it's great, which I'm hopefully you will. Uh I don't know what else we can do, but please tell us what you can. Uh you have an obligation probably to do that. We probably have no way to request you to come back later when we're in a better position to dig in and talk about it. That's probably optional on your guys point and I'm forced to probably live with that. But uh just realize we weren't involved with this before. We're not even on the list of the people the acknowledgements. None of our names are on there because we haven't been involved. So tell us the best you can. Name and position and go ahead. Sorry. Don't want to ruin your presentation. That's okay. Um, so we do have slides. Yes, thank you. Uh, so my name is Zoe Heapner and I'm joined by my colleague Tim Tresevy. Um, and we are transportation planners at Bolton Mink. Um, our project manager, Andrew Bab, had um, a scheduling conflict today, so he could not be here. Uh, but Tim and I can walk you through the NC904 corridor study and answer any questions that you may have. Um, and so this corridor study is obviously about NC94 from Highway 17 in the north uh to the intersection with uh Sunset Boulevard Beach Drive in the south. Um, so pretty simple agenda. We'll go through our process uh then talk quite a bit about the plan recommendations and then just a few next steps. Um so at the beginning of this process

um we talked with our project management team um about the plan goals and so those are highlighted here. Um from this plan we wanted to address recent and anticipated growth and the stress that it places on NC94. We want to improve access to local beaches, create safer transportation opportunities uh for all modes of transportation. um also want to work to guide policy and strategy for access management and then do all of this while holding the needs of the natural environment in mind. Obviously that's important any anywhere you do a plan um but especially near the coast. Um and then we just have a few plan outcomes uh that kind of went along with our goals. Um so we wanted to create recommendations for specific transportation improvements. Some of these include walkways, bike facilities, um access modifications, etc. We wanted to come up with policy recommendations uh to guide future development. Uh so this could be updates uh to the town or county UDO um or other um development guidance. Um and then obviously wanted to create and adopt a plan document. Um so our plan uh our plan started in August of last year. Um and it was really divided into uh three different pieces. Uh we spent the fall looking at um existing conditions and collecting data uh that would be used for our recommendations. Um we also had our first stakeholder meeting um that included folks from the town um from GATS and then the county as well and we also had our first public open house where we invited the public um to kind of tell us more about their problems that they experience on the corridor. Uh following that we moved into um our

initial identification of improvements. So the whole universe of things uh that we could do on the corridor. Um and so we brought those to our second um stakeholder meeting and our second public openhouse. Um and with that feedback we worked to refine those recommendations. And then also in this time period we started looking at policy um and a few other recommendations uh that may get us closer to achieving our goals of the plan. And then this year uh we really focused on the creation of the draft reports. Um we also had our third stakeholder meeting um where we went over the plan. Um we had our project management team and our stakeholders to review this and then hopefully in May it will go to council for adoption. So to give an overview of the report um mainly broken down into four different pieces. We have our intro which I kind of just went over with y'all. our existing conditions. We have a whole chapter on the engagement that we did and the results um that we got from those meetings. Um and then the bulk of the report is the recommendations. And so we'll just go through a few of the existing conditions. This is not inclusive of everything that we did, but just a few of the highlights. Um so here we have our corridor. Just wanted to show that visually. Um the corridor is uh split between two jurisdictions. Um so the north part is in Brunswick County, the s the south part is uh Sunset Beach. We have our future land use uh that we looked at between those two jurisdictions uh mainly staying with residential um with areas of commercial. We looked at previous transportation planning efforts um and currently nothing is funded. Brunswick County had some plans um to address all of the

traffic and also the need to accommodate other modes. Um and then NC DOT um had a planned intersection improvement uh with Highway 17 um that is also not funded. We looked at traffic volumes and we have all of our specific numbers. Um but but the short of it is that this corridor is over capacity for um similar two-lane roadways in the state on the southern portion and then it is approaching capacity um on the northern portion. So definitely want to look at this roadway, see what we can do um to help mitigate some of these um uh traffic volumes. And then speaking to the environmental portion, we looked at wetlands and flood planes. Um, no surprise, the land surrounding um, NC94 is mainly wetlands. And then we also looked at the natural areas and critical habitat. Um, so nothing right on the corridor or adjacent to it. Um, but then critical habitats um, farther south towards the coast. And then if any of our proposed improvements were to move forward, these items would obviously be looked at in much closer detail just to make sure there are no critical habitats in the area. So now we can move on to the real meat of the report. It's our recommendations. So the recommendation section is split into five pieces. So we start with our guiding framework. Kind of just goes through the plan goals again um and then the anticipated outcomes. And then we move into our project locations. So we have two maps in this report um that breaks up the corridor into a northern and southern section. So this is the overview of the physical improvements and their locations. And then we also have a concept drawing um for the portion of the corridor that is south of

Old Georgetown Road. Uh so this kind of just expands upon some of the recommendations um and gives a really good visual for it. Uh following that uh those project types are detailed more in these project one pagers. Um so we give the name of the project type an example of it being done in other communities. Um a planning level cost estimate and then the agencies that would be supporting a project like this. And we also include a phasing plan in this section that has all of the different projects, those agencies listed again, and then breaks it down into a project horizon. Um, short, medium, and long-term. We also include a few roadway sections after that. Um, so if the corridor were to redevelop, what could we do with the right-of-way space that we have? Um and so these have really been tailored um for the existing right of wayed and so we tried to accommodate that as best as possible because obviously we don't want to be um having to buy right away and all of the things that could come from that. So staying within the right of way. Um and then we do get into other recommendations. Um, so this includes things like code amendments, um, complete streets ordinance, design standards, um, those types of things. And to speak a little bit more to that, all of our recommendations are on the left. Um, and so essentially these new or updated policies would create predictable expectations for developers with respect to walking and biking facilities, roadway connectivity, and landscaping responsibilities. Uh so some of these uh policies would be appropriate for the town and county while others would just be for the town.

And so I know that was a really quick overview, but we have already made it to our next steps. Um so we would so we would request that the planning board recommends the NC94 corridor study to city council for adoption. Um and then we would anticipate to present to city council um on May 4th. So that is all I have. Thank you. Yes. And if you have any questions,

I I do have a couple having reviewed it. Um it seems as if the round the schedule for the roundabouts on the southern section of 904 are positioned as 15 years out. I can tell you the biggest complaint within Sunset Beach is people that are trying to make a lefthand turn out of the post office, left-hand turn out of any of these places because in the haste to get these places up, many of these intersections are staggered, which makes it even more dangerous.

Okay, I was shocked. I just read the Gstat study. Sunset Beach is the fifth largest community in Brunswick County. We are second in terms of accidents. Okay. And I think that reflects the fact that number one, the 904 Old Georgetown is just an a recipe for disaster.

So the roundabout, and I'm a big fan of roundabouts, okay? I would say seven out of 10 times they work beautifully. They've had issues with the Ocean Isisle roundabout, which I know they're in the process of fixing, but if we could get the roundabouts moved up, that would relieve a lot of the stress that our community is feeling. This is an elderly community. Sunset Beach demographically is the oldest community in Brunswick County. And I see people out there driving and oh boy, it makes me very nervous. Okay. The beauty of the roundabouts is it doesn't require a lot of thinking. I slow down, I yield, I go around the circle, I get into traffic flow. It's not a big deal. So, I really would encourage in the presentation that we frontload roundabouts because I think they provide an immediate relief to what is, I think, one of the most serious concerns of the residents here. Second, I'm on record as being a big fan of getting Angel Trace Road back in operation. Now, I looked at this and I was shocked that it was an $18.5 million project. Um, I drove Angel Trace yesterday and I think I see some of the issues. First off, they've now used Angel Trace Road as a way to get power lines into the community. So, in terms of being able to expand it in one direction, there's you can't do it. So, you know, those are the two things that I'd like to see because I mean, I've been lived here long enough I can remember when you could take Angel Trace Road. You wouldn't have to be in traffic

on 904. And I think that'd be a great alternative. I realize $18.5 million is a lot of money. I didn't think it would be that expensive, but maybe this is something that we can review in terms of, you know, what are these costs? Um, I would say half of the road is actually in pretty good shape. Half of it's basically a dirt path. So, those are the two things that I would comment in terms of my initial review of this document.

Mhm. Um, I think the biggest thing would be funding like you mentioned um especially for the roundabouts. Um, an NC94 um is an NC DOT roadway. Um, so a lot of that would require coordination uh with them and I think that's where some of the timelines come into play just for that coordination. Um, doing a lot of the environmental finding the funding. Um, so that might so that's why that one is so far out. Um, for Angel Trace, I know there are quite a few environmental factors that go into that and I think that's where some of the cost kind of goes up because if there are any bridges

I agree and it may be just a a a fervent wish that will be denied. But the roundabouts to me, I think that should go to the top of the to-do list in terms of bang per buck in terms of what you proposed. And I and I and I I think it's a great overview and you know we spend a lot of time talking about the gateway district into Sunset Beach and how we can make the approach to our community an attractive experience and I think this accomplished a lot of that. But so thank you.

Yeah. Thank you. Nope. No. No. Well, the only comment I'd say is that I really loved the appendix and it was very detailed and very specific about the sidewalks and multi-use pass and I love that specificity because now we can try and implement some of that stuff as we move forward. So, thank you.

Thank you. My I guess only other comments or thoughts on this are I I think it's a when I looked at it and I can't say I did a deep dive. Thank you Richard for doing that is there's a lot of highly valuable excellent material in here that I would love to spend a lot of time on with you folks going over and I just don't know how to do it. Where's your offices at? So we're both from Raleigh. Raleigh. So, barring that you don't want to come here, uh I don't know if we could create a subcommittee to go there. Oh, could we create a subcommittee to do a Zoom meeting

or something to if at some point I guess what the next step your next next step is after today is going be front of the council with something probably similar to doing today. What's the next step after that? What happens to this? I mean, if we pass it to the council, council says, "Great." Does it just become the big crate where the ark of the covenant went in a warehouse or does uh is there like what is the next real steps? How in my mind, I'd like to take this information somehow adopt it into the land use plan

if we ever get a chance to do something with it. And then from that what UDO ordinance might change and then my participation kind of ends at that point because I got no jurisdiction over and then whether any other ordinance need to change and money is way out of my pay grade. So I don't know. I mean it's I hate to see this thing filed only. I I don't know. So yeah.

So obviously you're focusing on concluding your end of it. I'm sure there's a checkbox for on the contract uh and then getting to the council, but how is there a possible path to some next steps where we can better digest and discuss this information? Uh that's all where my mind ends on this. I guess how can we use this better than a file cabinet? Yeah. Well, any thoughts from you guys? You don't have to. I'm not holding you to a commitment.

Yeah, I think we would definitely need to have some discussion on that. Um, but ultimate next steps is that this document becomes the town of Sunset Beaches um becomes GATS becomes Brunswick's Brunswick county's document um to continue to look at and take recommendations from um and as you go through other planning efforts, projects to refer to this document um and to use those recommendations that way. My concern is in the history of dealing with things like this, studies like this seem very fluid and manageable and then one day you look back and you go, when did this become concrete? When did it become unchangeable? We have an opportunity now to kind of and I' I'd be in favor of a subcommittee that, you know, had some time. You and I could be a subcommittee look at this and really make substantiative requests for changes that would be included in this. All right. So now we have a document that before it becomes cement now reflects in greater detail the sentiment of planning board and then you know hopefully the council. So it's is there a way to do that or am I whistling in the wind?

Uh staff and ad I guess barring further comments. Thank you very much and thank you for an excellent report. Uh, I apologize for not doing a deeper dive in it in the first place, but I will. Uh, what are we supposed to do with this? I'm unclear from this cover sheet that I got. The staff report just says to present. Are we supposed to vote? Are we supposed I believe they're hoping to get an endorsement from this board today so it can be moved forward to town council at their May 4th meeting is what I believe your first slide indicated. Okay. In its current form, I can't endorse it. Well, I endorse the framework of it. I endorse, but you know, there are things in here that

it's going to council council either way. They can go to council. There's still opportunity for the public to provide comments on Can we Can we just vote to not object to it? You can vote for council. I I guess yeah I I guess it's it's a document that's going to be used by the town, by the county, by GSATS and u jurisdictions.

I sort of I mean I I agree with Richard. I mean I it requires more input and work is last kind of was agree if this is it and it just goes in a file I mean sort of a but to work to massage it to get it to a document that we can actually use that flows into our other work product. I don't know what we paid for this. I none of my business. So, but whatever he did to to make it worth the bang for the buck, I I just don't know what really we're doing here. I have no They can go to the council. I can't stop them. I But it just doesn't seem like it it's a wise we're doing the wisest thing we should be doing. Tell me I'm wrong.

Don't think it is the wisest thing you should be doing. So, what is that what you just said? Right. Well, it would be nice if if we could I mean, I I want to endorse the spirit of this because it's obviously a huge improvement over what's out there now, but I I I think we should be able to use this as an opportunity to recommend adoption with the following suggestions. I mean, I can go before the town council on May 4th as a private citizen and say, "Hey, I think these are things that we ought to include." And, you know, hopefully they'd listen to me. But, um,

well, I don't I don't know that we've had enough time to, you know, take in all this information and make a substantive recommendation on other things to be included. I mean that that takes a lot of time and effort and we need to talk with the planning board about that kind of stuff.

Can Zoe can I ask you a question? What is what is your timeline? I mean if if they if they delay this today so they can have more time to review it. They did not get it as the chair said until Monday Tuesday time frame by the time we got the packet out. We didn't get it until last week I don't think. Um what is your timeline if you don't if you're not in front of council on May 4th? What does that do to your project? Um, I believe that would just delay the meeting. I would GADS is the client, so we would have to confirm with their time. And then you also would need to present to the Brunswick County Planning Board, I believe. Is that correct?

Um, so we are only scheduled to present here and then to town council. Um, GAT staff, I believe, will be presenting. So you're you're Back me by the way I said you're representing the town of Sunset Beach in essence with your presentation the Gats is your client right but you're but you're only presenting to the town not to the county correct GAT will be presenting and do you know what have they already presented to the county they have not do you know what their schedule is do not know off the

So I'm just trying to see if it's if if we delay it a month if they could so they have time to review it and we and they hopefully would then endorse it next month with how what does that do to your schedule and to the to the Gat schedule? Yeah, I think that would just probably delay further meetings. Um because beyond this uh the plan is essentially complete. Uh so we don't have any further work. You've gotten public comment and you've gotten feedback and you've made modifications as necessary based on the feedback. Mhm. Um which I know members were had an opportunity to to go as a citizen and participate and I believe I believe the chair did.

Um and just planning boards know just so planning know this did not have to come to the planning board for endorsement. It could have gone straight to council. It's not a requirement that it comes to you. Yeah. Um so

we certainly we we endorse the effort. I just don't know what it means to endorse the report other than not get in the way. I mean ultimately the plan would be used by the town move forward with a with a comprehensive plan or not whether it's some you know near future near term or long-term plan will be this plan will be used once it's adopted by council as part of that land use plan process. So we will make sure that the land use plan and this plan are consistent. It may just be by reference in the land use plan. Um, and then if there's any necessary code changes that would come as a result of this, then we would can consider those at that time. But I don't know that there's code changes. Majority of the stuff is going to be

I can see where it's going. Okay. So, things need to be done. I'm going to make a motion that we that the planning board sends this plan to the Sunset Beach Town Council. I can second that. Well, I'm sorry. What is the motion? The motion is to send this plan as presented to the Sunset Beach Town Council. So, we would have no further opportunity for review or comments. Well, it doesn't sound like we're going to anyway if they We're not going to approve it, then. It's It's already done. It's done. Okay. All in favor? I. Any nays?

I abstain. I heard an I. uh the eyes have it. So, thank you very much and have a good presentation on May 4th. Yeah. Thank you.

Next is what was 71 is now 72. Uh amend. I'm going to make sure I get my right packet here. Hold on. Uh 71 amends section 3.15A major subdivision perimeter fences and walls apply to allow thanks guys to allow single family residential subdivisions in MR3 mainland residential zoning district to be gated subject to certain provisions. Ronu staff report please.

Sure. And I'm just going to give a summary. We do have applicant here. So applicant is uh Katherine Hall. Um goes by Kathy. She is a resident of Paddington Place and she's here with at least two other residents of the area. Um they've submitted an application to amend the town's UDO to allow basically think of a gated street. Um be able to put a privacy fence or gate across a street that is a private street. Um yeah. So this is off the main entrance into the Hannington Place. Yes. Off of 904 Georgetown, Old Georgetown Road. Well, you go into the community first, Ocean Ridge, right? Yeah.

And then make a right into Hington Place or left. I'm seeing heads nodded. So yes, no. No. Yes. So when so Georgetown Road. Now this is a text. They're they're the applicants. is a tax amendment that if it is approved would apply to as um any any MR3 property that meets the same criteria if you will. So, but only if they're in the ETJ.

And let me clarify. Yeah, we'll go through the points. So, the points the the as proposed they would this opportunity to gate a street um in the MR3. The gate serves a single family residential subdivision located in the ETJ. So, not in the town limits. Um the subdivision streets are have to be privately owned and maintained. The height of the gate cannot exceed four feet. Um it's a decorative fence or private basically think of a decorative type fence element. Um emergency responders would have unlimited access. Typically you'll see a knockbox or something of that effect. and the gate does not obstruct or preclude a future street connectivity identified on an adopted plan and required subdivision approval. So that's the proposal that was and just for a little bit of history um there was an amendment in 2020 that allowed it in the BR2 district and that's where some of the language came from. In 2023 before I started, there was a request um to for this particular property to or community to be gated. Uh the termination by staff was that the gate was not allowed per the way this the code was structured. Um they were given an official termination by not not this group but the the person requesting at the time was given an interpretation by staff and official termination that was not appealed to the board of adjustment for an interpretation. So, the next step was a text amendment and I met with uh Kathy and the two gentlemen sitting with her um six weeks ago roughly and we talked about the amendment process and so forth and that's why we're here. So, they have the you know the right to

I I have my first question is is this gate on Mayfair? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Well, we'll let them come up and present then you can ask questions. Do we have an applicant then? Yes. Kathy is the Kathy Hall is the applicant on a view or can you come to the podium at least because my understanding is the houses on the left side of Mayfair Road are within the town limits not the ETJ. There are 13 13 lots that are in the town limits but the road itself is in the ETJ.

So in essence we tried and and I'm for you okay? Don't don't get the wrong impression. Um, we're we're we're trying to limit this by kind of putting in the ETJ consideration, but in fact, the execution will impact 13 homes that are in the town limits. So, at at its beginning, do we really need that a paragraph located in ETJ? Yeah, I think so. Otherwise, anybody in M3 can point up a gate. And that was one of the things we talked about when we

No, not everybody. You have to you have to have to meet B, C, D, E, and F. Yeah. But that I mean that and and we can have no longer in town do you have a private road, a new one. It's going to be town roads. And I understand I understand where Mr. Dyinger is going. If we need to add if if you're interested in recommending approval, we could add some clarifying language if necessary. But the intent of it was the road itself is in the ETJ. The placement of the gate is going to be in the ETJ even though it impacts houses the that are in now have these homes been consulted as to the wisdom of this and therefore

the the not that matters to us. If I may clarify from an emergency responder perspective, maybe may may be part of your concern. Yeah, those 13 lots and I've got the police chief beside me. If it is a private fence and they uh the say a knockbox is there, they can still get in there if necessary. If they need to get to one of those 13 lots, the sheriff's department can get there. The fire department can get there. So, probably the wording is a is wrong because the gate serves a single family residential subdivision located in ET DTJ. That's not correct. It serves a subdivision in both ETJ and town. It's both, but we can clarify that. We need to say that the road. Yeah. Need to say the road is in ETJ. Yes.

Yeah. It's a private road in ET. It has to be a private road which is further down, right? Yes. It is a number two or B. But the road has to be the gated. could just change B to privately owned, maintained, and located in the ETJ. Right now, move that located in ETJ down to after maintained, right? Yeah. Just take an in ETJ and move it down one line to B. We'll move it to B. And leave you can leave a the gate serve single family residential subdivision only. Right.

Yes. and then move located in the ETJ down to where B would read. All subdivision streets are probably owned and maintained and located in ETJ. Okay. So, the private road, all that stuff is okay. The second issue, Stuart and I discussed this yesterday. I think there's a general consensus that at some point North Carolina is going to get rid of ETJs. Okay. This has been a concern for the planning board and the council since forever. How would that impact? Wouldn't

in my knowledge unless I would not anticipate it impacting anything because it would under Brunswick County if that if that is the case. The main thing is going to be can emergency responders get there. So in essence, they would revert to Brunswick County. And now if Brunswick County has a problem with it, they they could say it's off of our agenda. They would be vested under Okay. All right. Okay. And then just for just so understand, if town council ultimately approves this amendment, it allows it. They still got to got to figure out how it gets installed, who pays for it, does the where the the gates located, is does the property owners agree to it, those kind of things. This just allows it to happen.

There will be some structures there that when the community was first started many years ago, they were planning for that. I need to get up to the micro. I'm sorry. Yeah, it was anticipated when uh this section of Ocean Ridge was first opened that there would be a gate there. So, the structures are there to accommodate a gate. And the structures they're they're pillars. Oh, the pillars. Okay. Okay. Okay. So, emergency access is there. So, they have to m they have to maintain this gate, right? Correct. Is that Ocean Ridge would maintain it? Well, now are you part of the Ocean Ridge HOA? Yes.

And that's an independent HOA, correct? Or are you still under the the clearance? Um, we're part of the HOA that uh Saunders uh owns um the roads, right? Okay. Okay. The developer And if it our main concern is safety. I mean, we've had some vandalism. We've had um trucks coming in at 10:00 at night. Big trucks. Um Well, I know there's a lot of construction going on back there, and it's, you know, a community in under construction. Well, so

I hear what you're saying, but that doesn't that doesn't then really agree with D. With what? D because there's a I'm sensing it is a security checkpoint. Well, it's just like any other gate that prevents people from coming in at night. I mean, it's open all day. This is ocean rich. They don't close. Security checkpoint means like a guard house, right? So, it' only be in operation past 6 p.m. or something. Uh or it's probably 8:00 p.m. with daylight savings time. Okay. All right. Any any other thoughts on this

as the police chief okay with all this and your side gig? Your part-time job. In your other part-time job. I don't know that I have a dog in that, but um I have my own opinions about the sense of security that a gate gives um homeowners. And I agree with his well, if I'm reading his mind correctly, I agree with his thoughts, but which is which is there's typically a sense of security. Um, I'll use example, there's gated communities in Wilmington that they believe that they're safe and there's been crime and violent crimes that have occur behind the gates.

Well, it probably doesn't prevent crime, but it can it may deter, but just it does not fully guarantee, right? It's not a It's not a And that's true of most gates. Yeah. But it sounds like it's really more to stop nuisance. A lot of times people will take the path of least resistance and if there's a gate, they're not going to go through it. My biggest concern would be access and as long as it's set up as they propose that it has emergency access features. Otherwise, if we have to get in, we're going through it. Right. And I think that's true of the Ocean Ridge part of um Ocean Beach, right? They have access.

And and my concern was maintenance. When you get into these HOAs and who owns the gate, who owns the road, who owns the maintenance? If the thing breaks and is not working, then how do you get in? I mean, obviously you're going to break through. Well, Mr. Dyinger brought up a good point. Is it still is that subdivision as it's still being built out under the control of the declar? So if it is my understanding is Ocean Ridge has an independent HOA. Mr. Saunders still owns a vast part of the property but it is an independent HOA. They are not under the eegis of the declarant. Right. That's correct. Okay. As opposed to sea trail, right? So if the gate is inoperable, someone's going to fix it. Yeah.

Well, if it's inoperable, it would be the responsibility of the HOA. Correct. which is true now in Ocean Ridge proper, the main campus. Right. So, as part of the permitting process, they would declare the owner of the gate and who's going to maintain it, right? To get the permit. Yes. Okay. And they would have to get a permit to construct this. Sorry, Alan. the zoning permit from planning and if there's any electrical and structural they would need to get a building permit and part of that process we're looking to make sure they have permission from the property owner to do that

and I think there is an agreement with Saunders right now so just but just understand that and that's why I made the comment that just allowing it it doesn't make it happen but I think there's an agreement that he's acceptable you know accepted the the possibility of having a gate Fantastic. All right. So, we made one or two minor changes to the text, correct? So, can I make a motion to adopt I'm okay. The amendment as as as altered. Do I need to read that for the record? Sure. So, the change was A will now read the gate serves a single family residential subdivision

only. only and B would say all subdivision streets are privately owned and maintained and located in the ETJ. Correct. And and that's the roads are in the ETJ. The subdivision streets are privately owned and maintained and located in the ETJ. I'll second that motion. Good. All in any further discussion. All in favor? I. Any nays? Hearing no naysay. The eyes have it. uh the text amendment as Oh, wait. I got to read the property of consistency. Consistency statement. Hold on. Bear with us.

Uh so we're adopting plan planning board action A. The planning board hereby recommends approval of the proposed amendment with modifications to the uniform devel unified development ordinance and find that it is one consistent with the town's comprehensive plan 2017 town of Sunset Beach land use plan and two that is in the public interest because the amendment allows gated residential streets in a limited fashion preserve emergency vehicle access and use in a manner that is not detrimental. to the residents. So to make sure we'll vote on that again. Uh Richard,

I propose the motion. So yes, Michael, a yes. I'm a yes. A yes. So four yeses for action A. So that action is approved. Thank you. Thank you very much. It has to go. It'll go before council in May. So, we will take the because of some advertising constraints, we will take it to council for them to establish a public on May 4th. We will have it in front of council for them to then hold vote to hold a public hearing at their June meeting. Okay.

We'll get you there.

It's just part of the process. Okay, next on the agenda now move down to 73 is the major site plan review of Las Palas, a 5800 square foot restaurant located at 1670 Seaside Road. The subject property comprises of 0.91 acres that is further identified by Brunswick County partial 24200926. The property is zoned mud mixeduse district. The applicant is Norris and Bland Consulting Engineers. So we can have the applicant up and staff report on that.

Sure. And I'll just Mr. Norris, if you don't mind, I'll just going to briefly go give an overview and then you can take the podium if you want. So, we do have an application uh to construct this lost pomeis u eating I call it an eating establishment in case because that's what our zoning ord just for consistency. Um 5,800 square feet. They have had previous approval by the planning board um on January of 2023 because they did not pull any permits within two years that expired. And so they had to come back through the process but also comply with the current land development UDO instead of the previous UDO and there wasn't a whole lot of changes that really impacted them. U primarily probably some plantings species. Um so my went to TRC and on in April 2nd um it was three of us there Mr. Norris and I thought we had good conversation. Um he and his office turned our comments around pretty quickly. They were pretty basic comments. Um so it's the use is permitted. The it complies with the dimensional height requirements. You may remember your text amendment um that we no longer have minimum maximum parking standards in the um urban mix or excuse me the mixed use district.

They um previous approval was 50 parking spaces. Now, this one is 48 because two landscape peninsulas were added to comply with the code. Um, landscaping in my review appears to be in compliant. Um, they've added all the notes and things that we need on it. Storm water, they they've given us a copy of the state stormwater permit. They do not need to get Brunswick County approval because they already have a the mixeduse district development already has a Brunswick County stormwater permit. um utilities or the watered sewer and those plans they they'll get their water sewer approvals from Brunswick County and I don't know if you want to go into that or not. Access and driveway will be from Dempsey Way. It's a private um access easement if you will that comes to the

not off. It is not off 904. Okay. And based on our review, um I'm recommending approval because I believe it is 100% compliant with the town's code. Now, is is this the restaurant that's already in existence. No, it's not the chef. No, no, no. Not the building, but the the Mexican restaurant that's in shopping center. I believe the same owner. Los Palmis. So, there's a lost pal. Yeah, same. So, is this an additional or are they moving? I can't answer that question. Okay. I did not attend a TRC. Stuart did in place. So I kind of want to have Stuart lead the discussion on this particularly when it goes to TRC comments whether

okay uh you agree with everything that's been any issues open from TRC you feel or um no did the applicant did you want to say anything before

I I just my name is Phil Norris with Norris and Bland we did the original plans that were approved a couple of years ago as Ron mentioned uh the approval expired for some reason the owner was not able to begin construction within that time frame. So basically he asked us to reapply uh for approval which we did. Uh it was determined there were a few code changes that had taken place since that that initial approval. So we met with Ron uh at in a pre-TRC meeting I guess and got uh his comments and we had the TRC we've addressed all those comments. So, as Ron said, we we meet or exceed all of the town's requirements. Uh we have all our other regulatory permits in hand to begin construction. So, with your approval, assuming we get it, uh they'll be in a position to proceed with getting their building permits and it's now my understanding that the owner is very anxious to get started. So, I'll be happy to answer any questions you might have. Um, the only thing I'll say at TRC a lot of the comments had to do with some missing plan sheets and so those have been provided and they have all the grading and landscaping and everything seems to match up with the UDO guidelines. I just noticed on the Sunset Beach Fire Department one uh the recommended install one fire hydrant need near the FDC location to be determined. The response was we do not feel this is necessary based on the FDC location. Has that been resolved?

Uh yes. Uh yes. He did not have the the current plan in hand when he made those comments. So the FTC is located well within the jurisdiction of the the distance to a hydrant. And of course as this goes through building permits, fire will review it again because they're going to review the sprinkler plans and all that. So this is this is a site plan. So to answer your question, yes, his comments that's been res that open issue. Well, I Well, the only open issue is that he'll have further review when he gets sprinkler plans.

Right. Turn it off. Right. Right. Alan, I turned it off. So, if I call for something, you don't hear it, but um a lot of times the FTC is determined at the building code at the building permit level. Okay. So you agree that TRC stuff has been their answers have resolved everything.

Looks like everything's been resolved according to the TRC and you know I don't really have any other question. I do have one kind of sidebar question. Did the fact that you had to come to the planning board for approval, did that cause a problem in your scheduling or was that just trying to get background on? Well, I guess I mean as a general statement, not necessarily on this project, but all projects, I don't understand why a buy right use with no no possibility of conditional approval has to come before the planning board. It's a it's a waste of time, your time and everybody else's.

Okay, I just have a couple of questions. Some are in the request category. Looking at your drawing C1, which is your site plan. Uh, I know we got the Richard famous sidewalk to nowhere in front here on Highway 904. You got that little stub that goes into the building. What is that piece of sidewalk for? There's a there's there side door there. So, there is a side door there, like an employee door or something. I can't answer that question. It's on the architectural plans. we had to provide access to it.

Okay. And then now the way I read the access, you come in and then you make a right-hand turn down this Darcy Lane. Uh on the opposite of that, the stubout that goes to the adjacent property, the same issue came up for the Dollar General when I was here. Uh, and they agreed to provide a restriction, a fence there, a blockout if you notice on at that property so that folks don't who missed the turn, don't go all the way around through this property and try to come in this way. Uh, I guess I'm asking the applicant, would they consider doing the same thing for safety reasons? Block the until temporary. You talking about access to where the candy?

No. No, the um where the shell building is. Yes, sir. So people wouldn't drive through that empty lot and access this or drive off of your pavement onto the dirt. I really don't know. That is a that's a access easement and I don't know that my client has the right to block anything. I I I see your point, but I don't uh I don't even know if that's legal. They'll say that the approved plans for the shell building property does Dempsey Dempsey Drive, Dempsey Lane, whatever the name of it is, does extend up to

Yes. as and it and it is listed as an access ement. Yes. It's not there yet. Has not been constructed yet, but it's probably Are you asking for a temporary just Yeah. If you look at Dollar General, they have like a wood fence. I can certainly make that request the owner. That makes sense. It's to like discourage. Well, yes. Miss because Well, it's sort of because you have to come in here if you miss this turn. Yes.

Okay. The other thing I was thinking of which would be smart because you're not you don't have any minimum requires a parking space to give access from the parking behind this property towards the I guess what's the bank the bank building to walk into this property even if you end up losing a parking spot. I I just see people coming in missing that right turn

if they could park here. I'm sorry I'm holding this up. if they can park here and walk in as opposed to going around coming through here and try to getting in. It's just if there's ways to encourage, let's just say safer ingress and egress to this property for consideration for you guys. Uh and the third thing, you do meet ADA. ADA is requires two handicap spots. Yes. For the 50 spaces up to 50. I see one's vans. Yeah.

Again, we've had this comment earlier. We're sort of a senior community. Uh any consideration that could be given to be adding another handicap reserve spot someplace? I'll be happy to ask the client that question, but I don't know how many they have now. We uh you know parking spaces for a restaurant are very valuable. But uh you I mean permitting wise you would have to permit them but it just seems there could be a little uh safer layout and I think that's all the qu the trees have been resolved right we got the right bushes or whatever the holl or whatever

tree. Yeah as far as landscaping. Yes sir. and the existing trees that were shown at one time they may you may be looking at TRC comment those trees actually are not there right they were there in the 2022 plan set up okay those were sort of in the requests and but other than that I don't see any problem with the plan looks good Michael looks fine to me Richard yeah I have no comments um sooner the better no Other comments? I'll make a motion to approve the site plan for Los Palmer Maris. Second. All in favor? I I Any A's are approved.

Thank you very much. Thank you.

The police department can get can get the car out of mud when they're back there. Let me get a little organized here. That was approved. Okay. The next item is where are we at here?

74. Uh, excuse me. Get myself together. 74 is amend various sections of the town UDO regarding planning board and the board of adjustment powers and duties roles. This is probably composition term limit as directed by the town council staff. What do you got for us on that?

All right. I'm going to start out with attachment one. Um at the April 7th council meeting, council um voted to move the proposed the attachment one item. The attachment one in your packet is exactly what council had on their agenda.

They voted to move that item to the planning board. Um, in essence, I tried to summarize what it says, at least how I interpret it. Those changes, what they move forward would establish the planning board's involvement with a new with a new comprehensive plan with any new comprehensive plan or land use plan um at town's request. town council's request if town council wants you to be the steering committee or have a role they would advise as as such and Mr. Claymore if you don't mind if I'm saying anything that you want to add on to jump in as well because you've had you've been more you were more um in touch with some of those conversations that I have been on that um it would clarify that the planning board is not involved with quasi quasi judicial hearings such as a variance of special use permit or an appeal that is by the board of adjustment. Um it would move the authority um approval authority for major site plans and major preliminary subdivision plans from the planning board to staff. And uh the fourth, my summary, fourth bullet was to specify the UDO language that members of the planning board and members of the board of adjustment serve at the pleasure of council. Certainly was more packaged into there, but those that was as I read it how I felt like was best way to summarize the changes. So when we got that um I did a search code search for planning board because I wanted to see it wasn't just amending sections 2.3 and 2.4 for if as an example I knew if move this forward as what that was saying if planning board was not going to be the approval authority for a subdivision or a subdivision subdivision or site plan then I needed to go find other places in the code where that might be impacted so I did a search I think planning board come up 96 times in the

UDO so you know and so that's why then I broke it down to article 2 amending 2.3.4.5 12 14 15 and 22 to address all of those what I felt like council was asking the planning board to consider. Um, article three was section 3.7 dwelling townhouse. And in my opinion, that was probably a a leftover from previous code because it was I think some bad code reference as well in there. Make that for sure. So it said townhouse projects and then it says final flat approved by the planning board in accordance with section 13.02. Section 13.02 was a reference from the previous code. Um so but because planning by this direction the planning board would not be involved in approving final plats or preliminary plats that's why that one was included. And then also article seven when I did that search for planning board there was this definition of a basic term called special sign district which is not in the code anywhere else. It may have been in the previous code

and it talked about the town requiring a special sign approval through the planning board to due to unique circumstances. Again I'm proposing I propose to remove that one because special sign district is not listed in your code. Two if The code is to make clear that you guys are not involved with quasi judicial proceedings and approving site plans then under unique circumstances or due to unique circumstances makes that a quad judicial subjective. So that's why I proposed to change that. So okay

it was more than just a mending 2.3 and 2.4 which is what the attachment one says but after I had you know reading what 2.3 and 2.4 for says and then searching to see where to at to codify those changes. Where else do we need to change? That's what um I've proposed. I can go a little bit more detail if needed, Mr. Chair. Not at the moment. We'll get to the detail question.

So, that was overview. So, in the meantime, well, I'm going to go through the full bullets. did look up the school of government's checklist uh on 160D and I guess I would say in general we're in compliance with 160D. Yeah, that was one of my questions is and I I also noticed that we currently in compliance and I assume you're referencing 160D301 which is the role of duties of planning board. Yeah, is let me pull it up just to make sure. Well,

in my inspection of it, um you're cons that it's not in it's not inconsistent with Right. Okay. I mean, I have one 60D301 and I would say we're in compliance. That item does come up about this quasi judicial review possibilities. And I guess was this did we do the $2,000 160D scan that the school of government offers to come up with this? Uh, hold on. I don't know. I don't know what you're referencing.

Well, the school of government for $2,000 flat rate does a scan of your code to do to uh Mr. Ben Hitchings here, whoever he is, uh to scan that to do it. But anyway, so you don't know. I'm not aware that the town. So going through the four bullet points, I guess basically to start out before we get into detail and you come up with a summary.

Yeah. Okay. on your you know establish the planning board involvement with new comprehensive plan or land use plan or review such plan is at the town council's request I guess I have no objection to that I guess uh in whatever code or whatever language gets us there we can look in detail but I believe that's consistent with what we've done if we need to clean up that language we can and it seems to be consistent with 160D301 one and the school of government's checklist for 160D. The second poll vortis clarify the planning board is not involved in quasi judicial hearings such as ver special use projects and appeals. Uh though it does seem that 160D allows us to do some forums on that. I was under the impression we were already not

you're not doing that correct. So, if this if this is just some language clean up there, um I guess I have no objections, but it but we'll see when we get to the details. I don't believe we had of an intention in our code to put us I mean, they do seem that it does say we may have planning birds planning board serve as a preliminary form for review and quasi judicial decisions. So, we do not do that now. Correct. If we have to clean up that language to get there, that's fine.

Well, I don't just what that some jurisdictions say some say for a special use permit as an example. Um, and I'll use Wilmington as an example from New Hover County example because I know their process. Um, New Hover County special use permit that is is actually approved by their board of commissioners, not their board of adjustment. Mhm.

And they but they require a preliminary or a cursory review to go to the planning board. For the planning board, I wouldn't necessarily say to make a recommendation, but they may point out to the applicant and to anyone who maybe they're opposed to the applicant to help your case, you might want to consider doing one, two, three. Yeah. They describe this they describe as some sort of forum, public forum.

Public forum. So, um, so it's not they don't necessarily make a recommendation to the decision-making body, but they would advise to help the applicant and the citizens who may be opposed to get through the process. Wilmington used to have planning board make a recommendation to the before the special use permit was issu was considered by the or by the town council or city council. We took that out. I can say we because I was part of the process because it really did matter what the planning board thought and I say that with sincerity because the decision has to be based on the evidence presented to the decision-making body during their hearing. And so as a result of that um we felt like it was best to not include the planning board. So this that general statute Mr. chair basically just says that it is okay for

right a planning board to in our current process current process you do not special use permits go to staff the staff and then they're issued by the board of adjustment and all we might be doing here is cleaning up language if there is something here that's vague or unclear or whatever. Yeah, I think the the intent here was to make it clear that the town's position is they do not want the planning. Yeah. I mean, I see you put that into one sentence there, but whatever. We can we'll look into detail. And by the way, I use that attachment um one as the guide right

that you have and I believe and chief is okay. I believe that that was prepared by the town's attorney that language. So I took their language and tried to put it in our current code format and I did remove some what I felt like were some unnecessary redundancies. Okay. So the next bullet point is move approval authority of major site plans and major preliminary subdivisions plans from the planning board to the UDO administrator or designate. So it it' be no surprise I guess that I do not support that.

Yeah, we had we had a long discussion on this during the UDO before your time Ron and Chief wasn't involved in this kind of stuff at the time when we updated the UDO for public consumption and history sake. During the UDO update, we removed from the planning board review minor subdivision plans. Well, that's 20 or less, I believe. Right. It is currently. Yes. Yeah. 20 lots or less.

Right. And we removed final plant approval because we felt that was redundant and sort of useless. As for example, today we looked at a preliminary plant for a eating establishment under the ODO. that applicant would have to come back a second time for the final plan. Maybe not this particular plan. Yes. And we decided that after lengthy discussion that that and we weren't 100% convinced I would say uh that that was unnecessary that the staff could just basically confirm compliance that the preliminary plat excuse me the final plat did comply with the preliminary plat and

that would expedite timelines based on the planning board and just as the applicant said here not waste time and expenses. So, and that can I can I just No, I'm not done yet. interject here. Mike has to leave at 11:00. We have I know. I'm going to give it to him next. Okay.

Uh, so I So, we went there in the UDO plan. I do not believe it is a wise move and will support any move to remove preliminary plats and major subdivisions for the planning board. Uh, because whether a public participates or not, it's an opportunity for the public to see it. for us to discuss it, for them to hear it, and then move on. To have staff do that, uh that provides complete opacity to the public on what could be major developments around their property. So equally on the next um bullet point is changing all the members of the planning board, their terms and all that stuff I find completely unnecessary and hurts the operation of the planning board. But I'll take a pause there because Michael has to leave shortly. So, I want to give you at least five or so minutes to uh express some any comments on this or anything remaining on the agenda before you leave. Then I may call a short recess after that. But

and Mike, I know you need to leave, but let me touch on that real quickly. The document approve that move forward with council did say one-year appointments for planning board. Based on conversation that I heard, I believe um the members were agreement. They talked about having staggered terms. So in my conversation with the chief, we went with a three-year, which is what you are now anyway. Right. So So it's not removal process. I have a most objection to because that's so so that political info inside a planning board.

I just want to make that make sure you don't I should have made that change or or noted that. So Mike, I'm sorry. Uh it's hard enough to get people to come and stay on the planning board as it is now. So I just want to just want to put that out there.

Well, let let me first say that u uh this the term things that you just talked about the staggered. I'm glad to see they maybe changed their mind on that because uh you got a lot of experience. It'd be a shame to lose some of this experience uh if you changed too much of that. Overall, what I would like to say is that I'm extremely disappointed in what the council has done uh with taking some of the power away from this group. Uh talked to Stuart yesterday and I know when he has a chance to talk, I think there's going to be many issues that need to be discussed. I hope they listen. I think some of what uh has been done needs to be challenged. at several levels. But besides just being disappointed in and what they've done, one of my biggest disappointments is I think what they done, I want to go on the record as saying, is very disrespectful to Stuart, Ron, and Richard who have put tons of time, years, months of service uh and then to do this to these gentlemen. I'm new. Uh, so uh they can disrespect me all they want to, but I just think it's disrespectful to these three and I need to go on record saying that before I leave.

So that's it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Michael. Uh, what I'd like to do, you have a motion. I'll make a motion to call a fivem minute recess. Second. All in favor? Mike, you want to vote? Hi. Hi. Okay, thank you. We'll be back at uh 11:00 sharp.

recess and call the planning board back to order. Test one, two, test, test, test, testing.

Okay, so I seem louder. Uh, we heard from Michael there. appreciate his comments, but uh I'm more concerned about public transparency than how we're viewed personally. But anyway, so again, I don't I the the three year I'm on the last bullet again where I left off is fine because in my mind, an end of a term is usually a decision point for people whether they're going to reup. So, if we have shorter ends of terms, I think we're more likely to lose people. We have a hard enough time keeping people as it is.

Yeah. Uh, but anyway, we can we'll address that when we get there. Uh, so that's just my kind of opening comment before we get into the text itself and go through the red lining, etc. Uh Richard, any just general comments before we get into each article or you want us to move just to the redlinining part or

you know I mean in essence you know this is essentially a neutering of the planning board. Um this you know in an ideal situation the planning board and the council should be partnership. we serve at the pleasure of the council. I I think it would be beneficial for us because I I I think in in in listening to their comments on this at the council meeting, I think it's pretty clear they're getting some shaky advice from council because my understanding is a lot of this came from council. Um I don't think they've understood. By council, do you mean legal?

I'm sorry. Legal counsel. Thank you for clarifying that.

Um, you know, you know, staff does a great job here. We're very lucky to have had the people that have been on staff and have the people that are on staff. But in terms of the preliminary discussion about potential major developments in this community, many of those staff don't live in this community. Many of them are not going to have the sense of history that those of us that have lived in this community and do live in this community have. And that's an important component to the decisions that we make. Um, I don't know if we're going to go into the latest um, action by the council to um, provide relief to the applicant for the Luminina Fairways. But that's an example of how things shouldn't be done. Um, and the irony of all this is there were plentiful means of addressing their concerns, the applicant's concerns uh, in the existing procedures that we have in place. that particular developer has a long history of attempting to bypass the legal qualifications that the community has a right to place on them. And absent that long experience, people may not be aware of that. Um, and that's the value that a planning board based on community members brings. And absent that expertise, um I mean the decision they made is about a 4ft ceiling variance. I don't think it's

going to have a huge impact, but it sets a precedent as I and as I put in in my response to social media, you know, we spend a lot of time in our discussions of text amendments to avoid the potential of opening a quote unquote Pandora's box of unforeseen. And what the council did in in this case really really opens a Pandora's highway. If an applicant can bypass the planning board, which they'd now be able to do and go directly to the council absent review, uh it just opens up um there needs to be a balance. I am a proponent for what I call communitydriven development. And that's a negotiation between the legitimate entrepreneurial aspirations of developer who wants to build homes, build commercial entities and the desire of the community to be shaped in the way that he wishes to be shaped. And the planning board is the crux of where that happens. Remove it and that all goes away. And that is essentially what is being done in the majority of these. We're being reduced to at the whim of the council, we're allowed to exert our influence. And I think that's a big step backwards. This planning board has a long history and Sunset Beach's prominence as an eminent community is a byproduct partially of the planning board's historic initiatives and their ability to work with the council and I think we're off to a bad start here. I would be open to any suggestions on how we can

improve those relations whether it's um meetings between a portion of the council and a portion of the planning board. Um I think their institution of uh preliminary meetings where the public can come in and make comments and there can be a discussion. I think a planning board member should be present at that. I think it would give an opportunity for us to have discussions with the council. I have a feeling that we're probably in terms of what we want to accomplish in pretty close proximity. I may be wrong. Um, but it would be an opportunity to kind of share views and get an understanding of where they're coming from in terms of their aspirations of what they want the community to be like. um and ours. I think the removal of the land use plan was a disappointment, but hopefully uh that can be resolved and we can move forward on it uh shortly. Uh probably more than you wanted to know, but there it is. short.

Um, so my overall comments on this are that I'm really concerned about the lack of citizen input. I mean, if this goes through, you know, there's no citizen input in site plans, subdivision plans, and you know, where are we going? They actually put a statement in here that they wanted us to find ways for more citizen input and action and and then they turned it right around and basically trying to take that away. Um, so I'm concerned about the citizens, you know, not having as much input, not having as much knowledge about what's going on. And, you know, is that the right thing? I don't I don't think that's the right thing. I you know, they, you know, this document said out of one side of the mouth, you know, we want more citizen input and out of the other side, we don't want any. So, I just I I'm not sure where we're going with this. Um, I know that when Ron and I spoke at the council meeting that the council then turned around and said, "Well, this was just a document that the town attorney drew up. But, you know, is the town attorney out there drawing up UDO amendments on his own? I I I don't

No, I believe I can't imagine that Ron will ver I won't speak to, but he took that document and then put it into the text amendment form, right? And I believe the council was aware that how that was going to work. I'm not sure they know what the impact is uh or what what is the subsequent impact I should say. Maybe maybe they do. I guess I can't say but that

my understanding Ron can feel can correct me is they took the attorney's document and I'm not sure what that was for. I I heard at the count council there was some sort of it was said 16D at the meeting but I believe they meant a 160D review it what was stated was 16D-301 which I believe is 160d1 but anyway that was just a

and I make enough oral mistakes here too that I that's so they took that and now he's written up this text amendment for us to look at and provide a lights on, which is where we're at today. And uh so back to the what I was talking about the so in reality what the town attorney wrote up did was it set up to be in inserted directly into the code like that? I mean was that how it was written? It looks like some kind of code document, but was that the intent

of 2.3 and 2? Unless I misinterpreted the direction. Council said move this forward to the planning board and we move they were hoping or anticipating and expecting to get action from the planning board at this meeting. So on those on these changes. So what so those were supposed to be code. So to do that I took their language right um I just used the powers and dut the very first thing where on planning boards you'll have the following duties and I took those and put it in the current format instead of the format that was given right

um and I like to think I like to have each one two three four to kind of have the same verb tense if you will so instead of starting out where it says at the town council's request to prepare review I said to prepare, review, and recommend to the town council at the town council's request. So, I made some I took some liberties on doing those kind of things just to make sure that things were consistent. You know, I say verb tense, but things were consistent. And there were some redundancies in there like several times it talked about at the pleasure of the council at the pleasure of the council like three or four or five times, right? I felt like maybe one or two times was was enough. Does that make sense?

Yeah. And I would share the liberties that I took on. My other concern is know in the interest of transparency why don't I get to finish we

it would be helpful if the c legal council was present at the meeting or available to the public um it's a new council legal counsel um my understanding in reviewing their website municipal law isn't listed as one of their areas of expertise Now, you know, I have no exposure to them, but it would be helpful uh if they were part of this discussion. Um anyway, I'm sorry, Stuart. Go ahead. Go ahead. So, I was trying to establish that, you know, did the town attorney believe that this, as Ron pointed out, they provided two sections of code, but there are eight more sections of code that are impacted by implementing these two sections. So, I don't know. I kind of went down a rabbit hole and I was trying to figure out why would the town attorney have something like this trying to get us to approve it when it's incomplete. It's really incomplete. So then I went down this rabbit hole of who's the town attorney and pulled up their website and they listed out 14 practice areas on their website. None of them have anything to do with real estate or municipal law or zoning law. So now I'm really concerned about Sunset Beach. I mean, what have we done? Are we opening ourselves to potential liability? I mean, I don't know. I I just I'm very concerned about the town's exposure. Um, well, if we've learned anything from trying to amend UDOS's, it's be careful

what you wish for because a simple change in one area, as Ron points out, can mean substantial impacts on areas that don't necessarily come to mind. Uh and I will say that our prior council was very helpful in advising us well if you do this you have to consider that and I don't see that in this document.

Um I you know I think it would in some respects it might have been more helpful. Here's a general memo in terms of what we want the relationship between the town council and the planning board to be. And they could have sent that to Ron to draw up. I mean, they could have said, you know, this is generally what we think. Why don't Why didn't they send it to Ron? Because he's going to have to write it up anyway, right? Why did the town attorney spend money writing up something that then Ron had to rewrite? Right.

Well, we are where we are. We have this before us. So it gives us some we have an option tree in front of us decision tree right we have the in attachment to the document that Ron Sederfield provided as a true text amendment following on from the town attorney document that he had. So we can go section by section and decide what stays, what goes, what gets modified like we would normally do for a text amendment that we uh initiate ourselves or the public initiates, etc. Mr. Chair, before you do that, can I make a statement just real quickly? I failed to do this in my summary.

Go ahead. I was asked earlier does the current powers and duties of section 2.3 regarded planning board is it consistent with state law. The answer was this not inconsistent with yes it is consistent but also the proposal that's before you is also consistent with 3 160d 301. So I just wanted to make sure that was clear.

Correct. So obviously one choice we go through the whole thing which is the way I did it. I went through well I went through most of it with the exception of the board of adjustment stuff because I'm not sure have they been consulted on any of this but anyway or we can certainly which is what we don't normally do is outright decline to endorse it. I don't know what the my my or we could table it which I don't believe I don't know. I mean we have we have two actions on here now which is recommend approval or recommend denial.

My

we can also table but I mean my original thought was we go through it completely uh take what we think is okay is in the best interest of the town. That's where my priority is, not in the best interest of the planning board or myself or whatever. It's the best interest of the citizens of the town. Uh, and then if we can come to an agreement on, we may not three of us come to an agreement on if we can come to agreement on what the the modifications to this modification would be and then pass that back to the council to have a second look at it. Uh, I don't know if we can get there. We can probably spend two hours on this. I'm not sure we'll get there but that's our path or other path is just an outright denial which doesn't seem thoughtful or a table because we need to spend more time on it or what. So my initial plan here was to go slug through this thing for a number of hours that it takes

my my and then if if we can come to a we got three people to vote now so it can't be a tie. uh uh come to a a denial, an approval with modifications or whatever. Abstain.

We're not gonna let you abstain. We had that we we we don't have that option yet. So that that's my original thought is to slug through the whole thing and put back what we think is I mean I I sort of agree with with both of you coming. I don't think anything was broken that required fixing. That's my first thought is nothing was really broken that required fixing. We have I have had discussion with Ron Sederfield that there are a few things in our code that are probably not exactly word for word in compliance with state law like on the timing of resubmitts etc that we should fix. Okay. And we can do that

right? It's probably in here somewhere. Well, those are on my to-do list. It is not in this document but it on my to-do list. Restructuring the powers, restructuring the terms, moving site plans from the public to the backroom. Was it on my agenda to do or I don't think it was broken? Well, that doesn't it didn't require fixing in the first place?

Yes. And I and I think in in almost an acceptance of this document in any form we are in some sense implying to the view that it is broken. So my instinct is to deny it in its totality with the suggestion that there be some community initiated discussion of this some discussion of between the planning board and the council. Um I'm intrigued to know what their motives are. Why? And

my problem with doing that is is now it becomes a loggerhead thing which I don't really want to have happen because then their choice would be just approve exactly what Ron has put here and that becomes law. Yeah, that's I'm thinking through that too and that could be they're going to say who do those people think they are?

That could be problematic. But if we change some of this back to the way it was, and maybe we change article three and article 7 because they were incorrect to begin with and we go back on article two and put most of it back the way it was and send it back to them for for review and approval. You know, maybe maybe that would work. I mean, I don't want this to be this really.

Yeah. I I I agree with you, but I don't see they've unfortunately put us in a position now either purposely or in uh inadvertently that that where we're heading and in the end, of course, they're elected officials. They get to decide. I don't have a problem with that. But I don't think we're in the best interest of the would you prefer to be shot or hung. So, well, or just I opt for being shot. So I I I I I agree that I think

the most constructive thing that we can do is to express our general concerns, which I think we've done, um, and go through this and return it to where it is, uh, and what the history of our relationship has been with the few changes that are appropriate and an invitation that this be, you know, I mean, I at the end of the day, I want to open a dialogue. I, you know, I I walked in here the other day when Katie and Christy were present, and there was just really a feeling of, you know, we're walking past each other in the hallway. Uh, it's a new council. In many ways, they're very inexperienced. Um, I think their instincts are to improve political allegiance. Unfortunately, that comes at the expense of professional competence. Been doing this for a long time in a lot of different venues and my experience tells me that usually does not end well. So I will um forego making a motion to send this back.

Yeah. So next our improvements start slugging through the whole thing. Oh god. All right. So let me lead it. Uh I don't know how to do this the right way. It's just I'm going to just go with mine and we'll see where it ends up. Uh so thank you for attachment two starts with article two administration procedures planning board paragraph A there or sub paragraph A I don't have I guess any problem it just tells us we're comp7

167 is where I'm starting okay that's just a general establishment that we're in compliance with 160D301 uh Ron then basically threw in the sentence from the doc colony abortion not exercise quas just it just seems kind of hung out there I'm not sure when to me it's sort of also it's sort of redundant because it occurs uh probably in item C1 right that's basically the same thing occurs on the next page in item C1 so I'm not sure we need that sentence there at They've taken it out

if well if you look at their the document that was provided 2.3 planning board one establishment authority that first planning board a is exactly like it was given to council that's why it's there okay but why is that second planning board should not exercise when it's also in C1 the planning board shall not conduct that seems redundant and useless to to be disagree that it's not I don't disagree with that but it's limitations of authority I think that was but it's not in that it's in establishment of authority establishment authority and then their document

I don't believe that sentence needs to be there because it really should be worked on in C1 now powers and duties overall I don't have a problem with this list. My problem with the whole thing is the wording where it goes at the town council's request, etc.

I agree. I agree that should I believe I think we need a qualifier on all those because I don't know what the town council request is because I believe it should be comma as confirmed by majority vote of the town council in open session after everyone because what's a request that two people meet in the council and then a request comes to the planning board or do they have a vote? I think we should all this should require a vote in open session. I don't have any problem with them requesting us doing any of this. It's just how it happens.

But part of this at their request is taking out the ability for us to initiate anything. Does it? Yeah. So like the old the last paragraph on 167 just for um if I can make a suggestion I I like you know Yes. This has to be a formal procedure and then insert or at the planning board's discretion.

Yeah. Um but like this last paragraph, you know, we we could have started to prepare or conduct studies and prepare advisory reports related to land use. Uh we could have initiated some of that stuff on our own. Yeah. Just like we've initiated lots of text change and other things, you know, that's part of our function, right? But the way this is worded now is everything has to be a request from the town council, right?

And so we just sit here twiddling our thumbs until they send us something to work on. And we're not allowed to go out into the community and hear input. Oh, and speaking of that, this is a sidebar, but have y'all noticed that all of our information is down off the website. Our addresses, phone numbers, and emails are all off the website. All the boards. So now the count now that citizens have no way of contacting us. Kimberly, is that true? Was that done at the request of the council?

The name the names are on there, by the way. Our names are there, but that's it. I mean, our address and phone number and email has always been up there. Well, there was talk before. This is we're on a tangent here. I know. Sorry. Of getting us a Sunset Beach email address so we don't get spoofed and spammed. Okay. But that maybe this may be an unrelated issue, but I agree. I guess

well, one I want clarific I guess I want qualification of what a town council request is. In my mind, it's a vote, majority vote in open session needs to be added. And I agree with Stuart somewhere the planning board shall have in absence of that that we can selfinitiate these things by a vote. Yeah, we can't spend money, but we can initiate and I agree that we should vote on it, too. We should not put the requirement on them and not put it on us, right? that by a majority vote of with a quorum of the planning board we can do some of these same requests right

so if we get balance of that I'm fine with the request of what they want us to do well I think if we can get that language that includes your ideas of a planning board vote we can plug that into about eight places in here where yeah place at the council's request with based upon a vote by the council in public session or a vote in public session by the planning board. Bingo, right? Could I just do it? Yeah, I believe so. They're typing over there. I'm not sure. Could we do that and then list these items that were listed before? I mean, I would repeating that over and over.

I would I would restructure it saying this is how it's done and here's the things that can be right. Right. And bullet point behind it. I don't know. Ron's typing. I don't know if he's getting any of that, but instead of doing this item by item and repeating the same language, I'm probably a comment or two behind, but what I was typing in just now was where I thought, Mr. Chair, that you were talking about trying to figure out what does that town council's request mean

and should something be included about it um been done in open meeting by majority vote of council or whatever. That's what I was typing out. What I'm hearing I thought what I as I was typing I thought I was hearing is maybe it's redundant because it says that town's council's request two or three times four or five times whatever it is could it be could it be somewhere else the following request could be made by the town council by or the planning board self-directed by vote etc and and and here's all the things you know you can say list all these items then pull all these items out so you basically have a a how it's done

and here's they can vote in request of us or we can self selfinitiate with a vote and then these are the things that you know the land use plan the updates the UDO in other words just bullet point the what can requested down as opposed to repeat that over and over and over yeah so I just in my mind I just took powers and duties and now with some the planning board shall have the following duties at town council's request And then I would remove that town council's request and two or three other places where it is. Well, we we

is that what I heard? Did I hear that correctly? Close based upon a public majority vote by the town council. I understood that. Okay. That that was a Yeah, that was another that was a note that I made. Yeah. Okay. So, that will replace the phrase at the town council's request. Yeah. So basically there'll be an opening section B1 or whatever the town council with their vote can request or the planning bag can also selfinitiate by a vote and here's the following items that can be done that way which is like comprehensive plan or land

should we include also the at the staff's request staff often brings issues to us but that's really us they bring it to us then we vote on it and and right okay so code already allows the planning. No, I Ron's Ron makes the point staff brings it, we vote on it, we discuss it, we vote on it, then it becomes an adopted action, right? Got it. I'm just thinking about the code already puts out there that planning board can initiate a text amendment, right? So, it's that's in your text amendment and map amendment section,

you know, so it's already there. So, you already have the ability to do that. I did not that that was not part of this change, if you will. Um, so that's why I'm like quick on I'm making notes to respond in my mind and not to just arbitrarily put it in without fully thinking.

Okay. Well, let me just summarize to make sure for this power the first section the powers and duties the the list of items that can be worked on seems to be generally fine all the way through seven. It's just the C council can request it when they do it in public by vote or the planning board can selfinitiate in public by a vote and then there's going to be seven items unless you can consolidate the seven into a lower number of things that can be done that way that can be done that way. Correct. Agreed. Yeah, folks. Yep. Thank you. Sounds good.

Okay. Thank god it's being recorded so Ron can keep up later. It is being recorded, right, Ellen? Okay. Okay. Yeah, it's Kimberly. So, just so just to be sure, can we have that read back to us? Well, wait. We're going to the hard part's going to come later. Okay. Oh, poor Kimberly.

And how how we're going to react to these changes later is going to be a final item. Okay. C. Limitations of authority. Again, I I I think one is fine because I think that's the way we do it. I do don't think we need that earlier sentence, but but item two C2 final decisions requiring site plan approval, subdivision approval, zoning permits, and other misate approval shall be made by the UDOM administer or designate unless otherwise required by statutes. I that my mind that number two should be removed from this in its entirety. Yep, I agree. I agree. Or should we should we rewrite it to say shall be made by the planning board?

Nope. It needs to be just removed in its entirety. Okay. That that does subsequently mean that the table doesn't get changed later. But we'll So that was C2, right? So now back to B. So that should be D, right? Membership, vacancies, and meetings. That should be D, not B, right? Oh, I don't know. I didn't I didn't concern myself with the intent. Uh B is power. C is limitation. B D should be membership vacancy. I guess it must be D. Yeah. Sorry, I messed up. I was I was getting confused because I jumped

I jumped back. Yes, that's correct. It's D. So, now we're on what will become D, membership, vacancies, and meeting, I guess. Uh well number one let's talk about number one appointment like so you cleaned this up some based on

well the terms further down in three uh some of this is related to ETJ which I understand we've all had let me try to find a word frustration over getting an ETJ member we have that opening now and we're going to discuss what have we made any progress this later. So I guess um sort of okay with I think what they're trying to Brunswick Brunswick County has generally been cooperative is they always take the one we supply and I by putting in here if they fail to make a recommendation it becomes the appointment I guess is okay

unless Brunswick County has an statuto it's it's statuto so that's okay. So I don't have a problem with number one then I'm going to believe and without going back and checking the statute because I did look at it the statute may say the may the town may and if if Bars County I don't think this is allowing it to do

the way it's worked before when we finally get an uh someone that applies they get interviewed they get recommended and I think you guys been sending it to Brunswick County and they do respond but I guess in the case that they don't respond the appointment goes in it's fine with me because we have a hard time keeping that person anyway. So, I'm okay with paragraph one. Appointment number two, service at the pleasure. All members shall serve at the pleasure account may removed at any time with or without cause by a majority vote at town council. That is not acceptable to me

or me. And I don't think that necessarily agrees with statute on a removal of a a ordinance created board that there's some uh whether or not but without having some evidence of failure or inability to adequately perform the dut duties of the office and must be given notice and an opportunity to be heard is the general with cause removal requirement. That's with cause.

With a removal with cause I guess I'm fine. I mean removal with cause. Yeah. But without cause. Without cause is So do we just get rid of or without or do we get rid of the whole thing? Well, I don't know. I I mean removal with cause I guess is fine as long as cause there becomes qualified and defined as the way the state views it and court cases precedent view it as sub evidence of failure or inability to adequately perform the duties of the office and must be given notice and an opportunity to be heard.

Can we install that? Just take that language and plug it in there. I I don't say why not. where term or tenure is for a fixed or definite period of time, the power to remove will cannot be implied or such a pointy may removed for cause without notice without opportunity to be heard. So I I my my initial impression is just get rid of the whole thing because there seems to be precedent in state law. And again, this is sort of what Michael maybe was going to here. Again, another what was broken before that this needs to fix,

right? I don't So, I don't see why it should be in there at all, right? I mean, we all know we sort of we work for the council and I'm sure if someone obviously like when someone moves out of town, that's cause for removal. if they don't remove themselves because they no longer are in the jurisdiction, etc. But I'm not sure. This this one concerns me. Maybe shouldn't, but it does because I feel that it's hanging an axe over a board member. It's polit political intimid intimidation in a way.

Yes. Either intended or not intended. I'm not sure. Right. But it could be used that way, right? Even Even if we limit it to to the sentence with cause. Well, they have with cause no matter what. I think based on what I read the state statutes give them that right. So I I this my the service to me the service at the pleasure needs to go. But if staff or someone tells me it's okay, it should be left there because it complies with law, I might be had on that. And in my mind, if if it's going to stay in there and say with cause, then cause should be

spelled out in agreement to what state law and judicial precedent says. And that's kind of my instinct is to okay, yeah, we're we're not arguing that you don't have the right remove us, but here is the requirements for that. I think if we eliminate this in total, I'm not sure they're I mean, they already have this power. I'm not sure they're aware of it. I don't know if it hurts us to reiterate it in this document. Well, it was someone softened. I agree because they took the one year out, right? To put it back to three years one. Yeah. I think it works. It just

works better for us to hold our experiences.

Exactly. and then and then your term is up and you're not I mean I'm assuming we're not going to be reuped but uh uh you know that those when your term is up it's a decision point to remember do I reup or not reup so it's I think that so moving that back to three is wise because most people who take one of these positions

do so because they want to be involved themselves and do the right thing that they would at least stay their term Not I mean obviously an illness can come up or some or they move but it but anyway I I think that whole paragraph should go but if it has to stay for some reason then that cause better be more spelled out. I'm open to suggestions. I think just I'd say delete it. Okay.

Again we're trying to you don't want to scare people from basically volunteering to be on the planning board. So it they have that right by general statute. Why I put it in here is, you know, people think, "Oh, no." Can we can we uh

can can we omit that language and just point out that uh terms of removal are defined by statute and the removal again occurs in number three here the last sentence or removed by town council and I would add remove for cause by town council or the Brunswick County Board of Commissioners. between the removed and the buy should be for cause again added in there. Yeah,

you can just add for cause at the end. So, we're just going to get rid of that last phrase or we need to put removed for cause by town council or Brunswick County Board of Commissioners or get rid of the or stop at the qualified period and and remove the unless earlier from the whole thing, which I guess maybe is a default division. this perioded at qualified and remove everything the word unless all the way to the end out if we're going to strike number D2 above strike the last sentence in three.

Okay. And just put it at put the period at qualify and strike the rest. I'm okay with that. All right. So, we're going to get rid of service it. All members shall serve. That whole thing is gone. No. I think it's fine up to the word qualified. Right. Can we take out subject to the pleasure of town council? Where is that at? Put it in parentheses. Serve terms of service. Members of the planning board shall serve subject to the pleasure of town. Oh yes, I asked that out. Yes. So we're striking that all together. Just the

subject to the pleasure of the town because we struck two. That has to go too. The part in the parenthesis part in parenthesis goes. The rest of it's fine. Do the period of qualified. Yikes. Okay. Got through a page. Moving to number four, sub paragraph four. Not a problem with that. But I believe because you fixed the term the the first line should say vacancies occurring during the term not year. Yes.

And then the next one it says each year again it needs to be removed because the term isn't a year anymore. Annual organization it can start with the town council. each year part needs to go. The third paragraph, the attendance one is not I was wanting to add at the end of that without excuse of the chair. Basically, the town council may remove and replace any member who is absent for two consecutive regular meetings without the excuse of the chair.

Yes. Because it happens illness. I mean, we've had it before where someone says they're going for surgery, probably going to miss a meeting or two. Yeah. I guess we have to be more careful and I have to probably do that in public and grant that as an excuse. Yeah. What if the chair is the one? Oh, well then the vice chair does all the duties of the chair, right? That's for elsewhere in the rules, I guess. So, yes, because we've had had cases uh where someone for illness reasons or family illness reasons. I think Pete had that for a while while he was on the board. uh

had to miss a couple meetings and I don't think I don't think the intent here is to remove some from the board for unexcused type absences like that. It's someone who just don't show up. Right. So my mind is that if we tag on the end there without the excuse of the chair we could chair or vice chair I guess as appropriate or whatever. In my my mind it's it's illness, family issues, stuff like that. we would probably excuse. Yes. So, what I've seen some boards do, um, let's say you knew, let's say Mike's not here right now, but let's say he called, you knew he wasn't going to be here,

it would be mentioned at the beginning of the meeting, Mike was on a business trip or whatever, sick, family emergency or whatever, and the chair would announce they are excused from the meeting today. Yeah. So, I've seen that happen. have to be more careful doing that to make sure it's an excuse absence so it doesn't fall into just the no-show absence. Right. Just point out I've seen other boards do something similar to that. That sounds good.

We okay with that tacking that on that cubes absolutely don't fall into this removal category. Number seven here. I'm struggling reading my own notes. I put one further down. The planning board shall adopt rules because I think we just did right in in the third or fourth sentence there. You Oh, no. You struck out. I'm saying that has to be left in where it starts the planning board and you struck out adopt rules. Planning board shall elect a chairman. Oh, I get it. vice chairman and

yeah I believe Ann and's missing the ands and shall adopt rules or may we just adopted rules earlier. So should we change the may shell because we just just did all that earlier. I guess we can leave it a shell. I see the and is I get it now. The and is missing right? The and should be in there. Oh, if we read it, the planning board shall elect a chairperson and a vice chair annually and adop

either may or shall adopt rules. And it goes all the way down of procedure consistent with state law, keep minutes, records of meeting and all that stuff is set on open meeting law. And then the rest is struck to the end because our quorum is three, not a majority of the members. That one's hard to sort out because the the remaining sentence is so fragmented

between strikeouts and not. But let me read that read this paragraph and Ron too you can tell me if that number seven meetings and procedures. The planning board shall elect a chairperson and a vice chair annually annually and shall adopt rules of procedure consistent with state law. Keep minutes and records of public as public records. Keep meeting minutes and records as public records, including a record of each member's attendance. Conduct meetings in accordance with the North Carolina open meetings law. Period.

Works for me. Yeah, works. You got a round two or no? Okay. Yes, I have it. I didn't make any notes about the next subcategory. See, gathering background is instrument. It seems like that's covered earlier. So, anyone see anything objectionable in that section? I didn't make any notes saying we're basically striking out that whole section. Yeah,

it seems like that's covered by the first section. If we have a vote to do something or we get a voted request from the council to do something, we can't. All right. So, in I don't

the only thing I'll say is in number three where it got struck out um it said gave us the planning board or its agents may in the performance of official duties enter upon lands open to the public and make examination or surveys and maintain necessary monuments thereon. So, like if we when we had Angel's Trace, I went out and walked parts of Angel's Trace because I had this statement giving me the right to go on the property. Yeah. I think it would be better to get that. I just I drove Angel's Trace yesterday. Yeah. You're on private property.

Yeah. And realize, you know, somebody challenged me. What am I gonna say? So, why did that get struck, Ron? Yeah. I'm trying to read it again. Believe I read it when I prop proposed when I stricken it when I took when I struck it through here. Believe I got my mind was C was not needed in its entirety since since it was a may or at the pleasure of council or whatever it was. But as I re as I'm rereading the entire C in its entirety or the gathering background information in its entirety see why we could

I don't know like I believe it can be I can it's not it would still be consistent if they allow you if they say we want you to be involved with land use plan or comprehensive plan. So I think I think you can keep that section in its entirety not just number three but all of it. Okay. But it would be it would be when I first read it though I was thinking okay it was like saying that more of like a shall so we're gonna unstrike the strikeout so that now it would be E. Yeah I think all of the gathering can remain it becomes section E only but stays as is basically right. Yeah.

Okay. now becomes F the comprehensive plan I didn't make any comments here only because like I got tired out of time comprehensive plan when a company maps charts and shall show the planning board recommendations to the company for development of any proposed area compre they refer to as a camel land use again why are we changing in this why we struck out that line. I proposed again it seems consistent with

it's it's probably again it was the shall show the planning board's recommendation and if you guys weren't involved in a in a plan the reason was my thought process. Ah because we might not be involved unless requested. That was my thought process. How about we just change the shell to may. That's fine. Right. And then leave it. just only changed that one word to may, which means if we weren't request, in other words, if we weren't requested to work on it, we can't do a shell because we weren't requested. Right. Right. Right. So, we just changed it to a may and then everything should be okay other than a few looks like a just from a code perspective andor to me always means or. Yeah, I

that's why I prop that's why I suggested changing that. Yeah. Now 2.4 the board of adjustment. I did not look at. We can come back to that later because my question is have they been consulted on any of this? Do they care? They have not been consulted. Well, we did the UDO revision. We did pause at that too and had that set to them. So, and then the next meeting we picked it up. I don't remember if they made comment or not. So, they have not been consulted yet. council, when is their next meeting?

We would, if we're going to have something between now and the May, if this is moving forward to the council's May meeting, we're gonna have to have a special meeting. They meet the third, the second Wednesday of every month. They have not been consulted yet. Um, do we have a full board of adjustments yet? So, board of adjustment does not is not required by state law to provide input on a UDO. I do believe council in conversation thought it might be a good idea for board of adjustment to get involved at least on their section. It seems like their main thing is the item seven, the vacancies, right? Everything else seemed pretty well. No,

they have the same thing of being able to be terminated with or without cause in there. Should we just change this? That was by the I mean that was for the attorney suggestion there. So, um, well, the these are pretty much we can convert this to match what we're doing on the planning board. Yeah, I hate we had the same kind of dilemma when we did the UDO revision. We're making rules for another group without them inputting it. I'm just not comfortable with doing it that way other than at this point saying we should have their rules mirror our rules that we just went through.

Yeah, I agree. But but that does that doesn't allow them to say well we'll accept those other rules. We're happy being so long story short we're still trying to determine whether or not we're going to have the board of adjustment involved. So we're if we do we're going to have to get a special meeting called well I would guess if this is moving forward to council for their May 5th May 4th meeting. Otherwise, if y'all don't make take action today, otherwise we can just hold it at their May meeting. May I was 12. So, the council could just impose this absent the board of adjustments review. Correct.

So, my understand just hearing we are we're going to hold a special meeting with the BOA to get their input on 2.4. Okay. We won't hear any of it because it'll be after our meeting. So, I mean, we're the ones making the recommendation to council, but we won't hear. Yeah. Technically, they review make a recommendation to us, right? Under this directive was by council or or voted on by council on April 7th. the board of adjustment would have met on April 8th. We had already cancelled that meeting because we didn't have any items.

Okay. And so I would feel better if we had their input because I don't know whether there's something in here that I'm not seeing that they're going to be upset about. I I don't know. Yeah. No, I agree. I mean the termination issue I think is something that ought to be consistent between the two boards but other than that my first suggestion is that 2.4 should be consistent with the adjustments we made for and they're um I don't know what section it was that counted the planning board so that it's basically the same. They're attendance is totally different than ours.

Yeah, that came up that came up in the review. They can miss three or six in a year. Yeah. Where where can I get a job? It came up in the when we did the UDO we had same of the same discussion UDO review because none of us were on the board of adjustment understood how it worked really. Yeah. And the council made a point of at the last meeting of saying that they wanted all these um attendance things to be consistent. So we're not where is theirs at? We're not being consistent. Um it's

yeah number six. any member of the board of general misses more than three consecutive regular meetings or more than half the regular meetings in the calendar year May that's where we settled on that May and I'm I'm picturing Wes in front of me here we argue settled on the May that gives like the discretion to the chair basically whether they do anything.

Which one are you talking about? Six. If you look at C6, six, board of adjustment who misses more than three consecutive regular meetings or more than half the regular meetings in a calendar year may be replaced or reappointed. And there's and see we had it as lose his status as a member of And board of adjustment meetings are they're actually more they're quasi judicial. They're quasi judicial, right? They by state law they well I'm hoping I'm not going to butcher this. They serve it through for three-year terms. Yeah.

Um if I remember correctly. So we we get in trouble when we define when they can be thrown off. Is that that? I don't know. That's That's something I allow in our attorney's office. Hold on. What's the checklist say here? Yep. Anything concerning? Seems like

Nope. I didn't I didn't copy. It's in the checklist, but I did pull it out. Seems like their attendance should be the same as ours and the the excuses excused absences we should have the same language in there just like ours. If council wants us to be consistent then I agree. I agree. But I feel better if the board of adjustment meets regular schedule is once a month, right? But if there if nothing comes up, they don't meet. How often does nothing come up? Most most of the time quite a lot. I've had three. They could have two They could have two meetings in a year and I miss one and I'm out.

Yeah. I mean with this language because you about h missed half my two years here Mr. Diser I believe I've attended five right four five I did miss all coming back to me is vaguely familiar from the UDO the same problems we occurred. Obviously the point is you don't want someone appointed to the board of adjustment and not show up when there's an important meeting right because it's an important function I have for giving relief to the applicant and provide a factf finding evidence

gathering evidence presenting quas judicial thing so their attendance is important and then it was how to enforce it right right I have flagged what we've talked about and whether then to look can we do consistency be consistent there. All right. So well I'm glad we stepped into that bucket. Yeah. So I don't know what and I would assume they'd be somewhat on the removal being the same but I can't say.

So I I moved on after that and I don't know if that's what we need to do is the 2.5 technical review committee. Yeah. And of course the one I object to is the last sentence and they're taking the planning board liaison out of those meetings. I want that left in. I think it's been quite helpful. Yes, I agree. Now, my rules for doing this and I guess we don't have a rule. Maybe we should have made a rule. When the planning board goes there, you're there as an observer and a listener, right? Not a complainer and commenter and changer. I try to do that. Sometimes people ask me questions and I try to answer. I made comments.

Yeah. Our point was just trying to be helpful. Yeah. So this is for the technical review committee, right? Yeah, it is the purpose. The reason why I took it out is if you guys aren't having the role of approval, right? That's why I took it out. I understand your position is you want to remain in the approval process and that's what your recommendation is. So I have flagged it on this is a second copy that I'm working on. Yeah. Okay. Basically trying to capture this conversation. So I have flagged it as planning board wants us to remain. Right. Okay. on page 174 through 12 common review. My exing out the planning board there I guess has to be unxed out, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Based on your recommendation to keep yourselves in the process. Yes. and 2.14B major site plan I guess is do none of these changes I guess because yep

we still want to be the FD on major site plans. Now you got a few little changes in here that are grammical sorry grammatical review of the major site plan and I don't know. And you got an all or an of all in there. Any of those little granical changes, I guess, is fine. But basically, your point is your your point is you want to remain where you want to remain in in the process. Just like further down, you're crossing out the his her design. Just make it a design obviously is fine for cleanup. Yeah. That's just unnecessary words.

And I also try to keep pronouns out of it if I can. Yeah. on page 176. Likewise, and all this red lining in B, C, D, E is undue to strikeouts. I left in the conditionally approved with corrections line that you have in C. I think main thing is you want to remain in the process.

Yes. But I believe that if you look at C, that last paragraph, that would be correct. Within 90 days, received a major subdivision preliminary plan. The planning board shall approve, comment, conditionally, approve a correction or deny the preliminary plan. Yes, I believe that is correct. That is a correct correction. Yes. Yeah. You want to keep that, right? Yeah. And that's why Sorry, Kimberly. I took the opportunity. Correct. Correction to make that clear what that meant. Right. Yeah. And further down leaving the planning board in and not UDO administrator. Right.

Correct. Unchange that change. And I'm just making it as a note on this document I'm working in. Just FYI. So that gets us to 177 which is the table which is obviously don't leave the FDS in the planning board column. major site plan, a major subdivision preliminary, not move it to UDO. Well, we passed by number six. Did I? Sorry. Same thing. Yes. Same thing is just leave planning board in, take UDO administrator out, which would be what the table is essentially. Right.

Right. I think what concerns me is reading this in greater depth is this seems to be an attempt to streamline the process for developers. Yep. Yep. And nobody will, as they as someone stated at the council meeting, basically you could have a development as large as the sanctuary go in next to you and never have heard about it until the trees drop. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. And then is what happened?

What happened at that point? There's no stopping it because it's already been approved permitted and everything there. Well, I should say no stopping it. You only have the court system to stop it then. Well, yeah. Good luck in North Carolina. Yeah. Um, but I I think it's appropriate to question the motivation here. Um, Ron, I don't think there's a huge consensus in the community that we want to increase residential density. Yeah. Ron, this this little box goes to this table, right? Yes. Okay. Yeah. It just got pushed down. Yeah. All right.

All right. Article three zoning on page 179 is again undo those changes. Other than the 2.15F is correcting the section. Right. Right. Yeah. Other than that it stays final plat approval is Yeah. Well, we don't have Oh, that's the town. The final plat we already took away from ourselves. So that probably should be xed out. Yes. And the planning board shall operate in accordance with section 215f. Right. Correct. And the strike should stay there. The final plan approval shall be filed or for the town houses or whatever.

And the reason why I did that, Mr. Chair, is when I went back to I've actually looked back at article 13 and section 13.02 2 and to it would have been using the same 2.15F twice and so I'm just going to merge the sentences together. Okay. The next thing this definition was this little special sign district. It does exist. It doesn't. You got something else? Yep. Section 13.

There's a 1301 up there. fix that one. So, I don't know is this I don't this might be before my time. So, it can go I don't think referred to the mud. The mud has their own rules now, right? So, yeah. Yes. And there's several it could have been the mud and there's several definitions that or it could have been before the gateway district perhaps, but there's the there's a term was it greenwar and the definitions think it had something to do with the mud district at one time. So, there's been definitions that carried over. Obviously that definition can be removed. I don't have any problem with it because we have Bud has their own we just did their sign. So

uh page 180 it's just undoing the changes to put it back where it was. Right.

Yeah. The is that the certificates? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So those changes there was just changing the planning board to the UD administrator. it changes it in the chart but al and also in the um certific certificates as well. So just just undoing these changes entirely on this page, right? Yes. Yeah. Look at it. It wasn't so bad. No. Now comes the problem part. I'd like to see the final version of it. I would too. We made substantial changes. Yes. So, we have a choice here. And I'd like to hear from

we can go ahead and take another recess to get it fixed. So, we can read the whole thing. And I got the rest of my day open. We can we can move on to the next item and get that disposed of and then recess and come back after lunch and look at the final thing. So, we know what we're voting on and sending back up is what we really want. Yeah. I I think that's that we haven't made any mistakes, overstepped, underststepped, but we won't have heard anything from the board of adjustments. Okay, I understand that. But let's get the rest of it to where I know what you're saying. I hear that now. Can't we just

Well, I'm not I'm I'm Our other set is to say these are changes, but we want to see the final version at the next meeting with with the board of adjustment with some board of adjustment. I'm much more inclined to get this absent the board of adjustment. I mean, to be honest, we're back to the same dilemma. Does it just go get the original version get approved because we haven't sent the new version back? I don't know. I would think somebody in good uh mind wouldn't do that, but

I would much rather be in a position to present the version that we can complete ready for consideration by the community and the council at their next meeting. I realize it's going to mean that we can address some of the board of adjustment issues, but you know, we're really trying to preserve something very important. And I don't I don't want to leave ourselves vulnerable. I want to be able to say, having received your thoughts on the future of the planning board, this is our adamant response.

Well, we're always vulnerable. So they can just go back to the original one and pass it, which is their prerogative as the town council. But I at least have wanted to give the town and the council an alternative, right? That we have thought about and reason through without any malice. This would be the version though that we voted on. Can they approve another version? No. Yes. Thank you. They can absolutely reject what you're proposing and say we want what staff has initially proposed. Well, they can absolutely do that. I

I I would prefer to put them in a position to do that because I can tell you on social media people are starting to get a whiff. Well, I would think and I think I would hope that they would look at this with a critical eye. I would hope so, too. and say why are these planning board people which they have appointed even though it wasn't the same people it was the they the office of the town council right

uh have looked at this and made changes and sent it back again I'm not trying to get into a loggerheads thing I'm trying to make good policy but so but I not comfortable voting on something that I haven't seen, haven't read yet. I don't want to pass it. I don't want to read it after we pass it. So, I think or unpass it. So, at some point there's going to be either a push to the next month or a recess to later. I'm far more in favor of that option. Special meeting. Yeah,

I guess we could call a special meeting, but it won't be in time, will it? It could be could be. Yeah. Have to be next week. Or could we get squeeze it in do a special meeting after the board of adjustment looks at it and before the time? Is there a squeeze point in between or is that too late then the Senate to the council that we mess? Sure.

Yes. Yes. We need we need 48 hour notice for a special meeting with the BOA because this is not like a quasi additional item where we have to advertise 72 hours 48 hours right now we have has been signed by we're I'm talking about a plan with Board of adjustment. We can do special meeting 48 hour notice. What's our timeline to publish the agenda for council?

Yeah, it's our deadline there. Two weeks ago. So that's what we're up against.

Yeah, Kimberly's going to need a mic. So whatever we do would happen have to happen next week, right? In order for you to get it on the town council agenda,

right? So right now their deadline for their agenda to be ready for viewing poss prior to publishing would be the 22nd of next week. My proposal this point is to recess this meeting until the 27th and allow us to pull the board of adjustment members to try to get them to meet the week of the 20th possibly Wednesday, Thursday or Friday to review this document and then bring it back to you on the 27th. Yeah. I will not be able to attend on the 27th.

How about the 24th? Yeah. Me either. Yeah. So, we don't have a quorum. I could do the 24th. Can you do the 24th? Puts more pressure on the board of adjustment, but it's okay. Bear with me. I cannot do the 22nd. But if the council deadline for the agenda is the 22nd, whatever we do can't be published as part of the agenda. Correct. That's usually the date that it would go out to the public. We could ask for

a little leeway if we want to add this to the May 4th agenda. So, I'm worried that if this doesn't get published up to you with the agenda, then the community won't know our thoughts. Well, that's what I'm saying. Well, but when do they do they have to publish on the 22nd? Is that just norm? Can they publish on the 24th and then maybe we can meet a week from today on the 23rd? So, the actual publishing to the public would go out on the 27th. Oh, 27th. Okay. So that means we could meet a week from today, the 23rd.

It just puts a lot of pressure on a board of adjustment to take a look at this between now and next Thursday. But we also have to advertise two weeks. We got to do the for the paper to be on the May 4th public process. Yeah, but you could have it on the agenda. You don't you advertise. You don't put the detail in. Right.

Right. But we have to make sure we can we put it in the paper for advertisement. What if um we invited the board of adjustment members to come to our meeting and had a public comment period where they could make comments? Well, let's just stick with this. Let's just stick to Ron. Are you here next Thursday, 23rd? I'm scheduled to be here. Okay. I cannot wait the 22nd. I can 23rd. I'm available. That's a week available today. I'm available. So if we have if we recess this meeting for one week until the 23rd

and then today solicit board of adjustment comment on that section and tell them they have to have it back the morning of the 23rd or show up. We can try to incorporate anything they want on the 23rd and then wrap it up. Could they make comments without a meeting? Couldn't they just submit written comments or something like that? It's well I think we

they can make comments and come here and we'll be making the decision, right? They could send their written comments. They can publicly speak as a citizen or I guess and then we're going to make the changes, not them to that section because it is in our purview, I guess, technically because it's in our right. But at least we've heard from them and we'll do our best job to get it right for them. But I don't see any alternative. And if we do it on the 23rd, that means the final document goes ready for town council on the 24th and they have time to release it and review it and do all their thing on the fourth, right? I think that's the only alternative.

It's been advertised. So, we still have one more. So, we've resolved to convene on the 23rd to review the final draft. Well, we haven't yet. I'll have to do that at the end. It's okay. Not ajourn. I'll res we'll have to have a motion to recess the meeting. We'll take this up again on the 23rd. Okay. But we also have a couple things to do in the meantime. Yeah. So, any other comments? Planning board required for this? Mr. Chair. Um, yes, sir.

Can we just run by your suggestion for the board of adjustment review one more time? Kimberly stepped out. I just want to be sure she hears that to make sure that we're we we need to send this material to the board of adjustment for review and comment

to the planning board for basically we're soliciting their comment to be sent to us because we're deciding on the text amendment if they want to hold them. I can't I don't know what their meeting proceed you know they're free to come to that next Thursday's we recess today they're free to come to next Thursday's meeting if they want to speak as the public all we can at this point is try to vacuum up their comments somehow they may not be able to have an official meeting and we'll just make a good faith effort then to incorporate their comments in our deliberation of that session and try you Is that a good policy?

Because I don't think doesn't sound like there's no way to get them to do an official meeting, right, and meet any of these other time fences. They respond to a email inquiry.

Well, at that point, if we hear nothing from them, then we just get decide next week and we'll do the best we can. They'll get a second. I guess they can further object to it before the town council meeting. Right. Then yeah. Right.

So I just want to give them all I can do is give them an opportunity to look at it to comment to the planning board in in writing through staff whatever is the legal way of doing it through administration. and they're free to come to the when the meeting is reconvened next week and we'll try to incorporate their comments and our deliberation on that section so that we can then next Thursday move for a vote on it then which would then fit the timelines for the council I believe was what I'm trying to do. I'm going yes I would agree with that but we're going to strongly suggest and we're going to I'm going to try to make sure that we can poll them at least have an official meeting just to make sure it's

great that's better if they can have official meeting and then tell us exact just like we do they can send us revised text to include in our and we would just probably take it okay I'm just saying short of an official meeting and an official just review of that section whatever section They were here 2.4 or something. 2.4. Yeah.

You know, yes. The the best solution would be them have an official meeting, take section 2.4, review the whole thing up to 2.5 and send us send through you guys the right text. And when we come back next week, it's incorporated in our text and staff tells us this is what the board of adjustment wants. We'll read it over and we'll probably just adopt it as is then. But short of that, I'm open to taking written comments, oral comments, and and try to do the uh good faith effort to get what they would want in there. I'm not trying to step on anybody's toes. Okay. So at this point board is done with this at the moment and we'll handle the recess as the final item here coming up shortly. I before we do a journal because we got one other item on the agenda so I can't recess now. I need

Mr. Chair if you'll excuse me though I have a another meeting soon. Thank you for coming. We all you're free. We'd love to have you anytime you'd like to come for as little or as all. Thank you.

Okay, we'll take this up at the end again, but we need to move on now to discussion item 8.1. This was amending section 3.1C, overlay zoning areas in relationship to the zoning district. Section 3.3 gateway overlay district in section 3.21 21 urban design standard to eliminate a code conflict. Clarify the tree schedule found in table 353637 in article 3D. Apply the gateway overdate dress district and expand the acceptable color palette and inserting 3.12 design standards into the table of content. Staff prepared a tech uh report here. Ron, if you're still with us,

tell us what we got. Even though I know what we got, but you can publicly tell us what we got here. Let me pull it up. Sorry, I was going through the document to make some of the changes you were talking about. If you want me to jump in, I can summarize your report. Basically, we sent basically at the planning at the council meeting. Too many colors. Basically, they they felt like it was too many colors. Um, based on the print out, I think there were 79 colors that were listed and they felt like it was too many. Um, I put it I believe I set this up as a discussion item only this time, not necessary for you guys to take action,

but okay. I for me just update the way I understand it and I got it through our wonderful new newsletter. I think it said if I got it here somewhere. The newsletter said I had it. It I'm trying to remember the exact wording, but I think it said they agreed with everything else except too many colors. Right. They seem to be fine with Stewart was actually there. They seem to be good with the other.

Yep. Town council re referred a proposed unified development ordinance from the planning board to amend section 31 to expand the color pallet back to the planning board. Council believes 79 colors did not achieve the consistent look the planning board is seeking request to amend the UDO. Okay. So what I did was in the interim and this is a discussion item but we may change we may uh it was take action to me that's fine or we can put it in next week. We have this color chart that's in there printed and I went on screen pulled it up on a UDO and the colors don't match because everything you look at it it's different.

Yeah. There are no color numbers in here. Right. So I said, "Ah, I I bet you there's color numbers someplace." So I went through all the paint companies and some of them do have like Benjamin Moore has a stormy sky and number 1616. I looked that up sort of close to this, not exactly right. And in the in there, that comes from their what they call their classic collection. And there's 1680 colors there. That might be too many colors.

My point to this, I probably maybe didn't do a good I didn't didn't go to that meeting, is I believe we have no color standard. Now, I believe this what's in here is uninforceable for two reasons. One, anybody can say anything is a match to this. You can call fern fern, nonfern, soft fern, easy firm, light firm. Unfortunately, I've been to the paint store. my wife. Okay. So, I believe this whole thing what we got in there is un So, really it's any color is allowed. Now, also for the second reason is there are buildings out there with colors that are not on this list. I had some pictures probably on my phone. I could pull it up. Those would like to see the coastal store there. Those yellows. Find me a yellow in this list.

Yeah. So, we've already approved colors not in or I should say we the town has always approved colors that are not on this list. So, to me this I understand what the town was saying. We want to have some consistency in our look and I agree. But what we have now is no consistency because I believe if anyone came to you with anything sort of close to this,

you'd have a hard time. You could not disapprove a color on the permitting side because depending on what printer you use, you can print these colors up. A matter of fact, you can adjust your your graphics card to change the hue and everything to make it match the color you want actually. And there's no So, I understand. So, well, we agreed with you, but the town council didn't get it, I don't think. Well, I think I'm not sure what they got and what they didn't get, but we took that out and we basically just went to the urban design standards.

No, we basically by adding this to the appendix, the 72 colors or whatever they are, which was pulled from a Sherman Williams Charleston historical Charleston. So, they weren't in the appendix. That wasn't We're going to create an appendix and make the overlay district and the urban design standard point to the same appendix. Council got the colors. It was 79 colors, right? They felt like that was too many colors. So, they did receive the 79. The planning board moved forward the colors of Charleston or whatever it was entitled.

Now, does Sherwin Williams have numbers for those colors? So I I chose a Sherbo Williams happened to have color numbers for the colors of Charleston. So obviously we wouldn't hold someone to you have to use Sher William colors. No, but you can but I figured Sher Williams has the numbers. Benjamin Moore has a number. You can match the color. And so that was the logic behind so that we we and and Kimberly and I printed them. I think they were they were one color on the on the computer. When they were saved in a word document, the colors slightly changed. When they were then converted to a PDF, the colors change a little bit more. And then if you start printing them out, they change even slightly more.

So my point what I'm saying here, we have no color chart now. We think we do. Oh, we don't.

I say we do not have one. So because I don't believe now and I believe that's how it work with the general store which came to us. They proposed their color and it was like close enough. It got approved. It got permitted and that will be continue. I don't believe the staff can re would be able to technically reject one on a color because it's uninforceable in my mind. And what popped in my mind, I'm I believe we have two additional zone properties across the road from the overlay district that will be under the overlay district from And

this is on 179. No. Yeah. Here. This is the overlay district. We're sitting in it. But there's two properties in the conditional zoning of seat trail that also have to apply to this. I I would submit if whatever color they propose on their buildings, which are none of their buildings use any of these colors in their development over there in Seat Trail now that it's going to get permitted. So, well, the other issue too is that in terms of this is just the gateway district. Well, it becomes all our urban design standard. Yeah. The way we did this is

this color chart exists here and in the other one and they look a little different because the way they were printed, but what we tried to do was put create an appendix with 79 colors, right? Okay. And said the overlay district and the urban design standards go to that appendix and pick a color from there. So it would apply to the mud district as well. Everywhere, right? No, mud mud is exempt. Mud's exempt from everywhere, but not your homes. Right. Right. Right. Residential is not included. Then mud is exempt from non-residential all non-residential properties be covered by the same 79 colors.

And I did again further research. I looked up these colors. These colors were supposedly okay between Sherman Williams and the Historical Society of Charleston agreed these were the historically correct colors for Charleston. And I thought, well, if it was good enough for Charleston, it probably should be good enough for some. But anyway, my bigger concern is we got no we the council saying no 79 was too many. I really believe it's whatever the applicant wants to put on it right now. So should should our recommendation back that we should be out of the coloring business? Well, we can so we have a couple choices.

We don't have this for action. This is a discussion. We can push it for action in a recess meeting if we want. Well, I'm not going to be able No, I'm not going to be able to get till next week. Well, it could be easy. We could just send it back the same way it was and say and try to talk to go to the council and explain why better why we're doing it. We could drop the whole thing completely or we can just undo the color part, take the appendix away, just leave it as is and hope for the best. And because doesn't does does doesn't the mud district have its own POA with color standards in it? Yeah. We're not going to supersede those. No. No, no,

I mean Hampton isn't going to come is going to come to us and ask for color. The gateway overlay would and andor the urban design standards would apply to like your MB1, MB2. So you have areas that are outside the gateway, excuse me, outside the mud that would the these standards would apply or do or any any non-residential Yeah. in MR3 too. Yeah. Georgia the CZ stuff. Yes. Right. The Right. Yes. But so I mean if I'm understanding correctly really the only thing where this would apply would be the the two plots on the C anything here. There's nothing developed in the overlay district. If somebody wants to put up a building between the general store and the coastal store,

right, and they want to just duplicate the coastal store, it's not in here. It's it's not a color that's here, but they can because the one next to it already got permitted, right? there. No way to stop that because we've already permitted it. Right now, you could say we only permitted the specific yellow, but try to sort that out. So, I think I understand what the impetus is trying to create. I don't understand what the council wanted was, but it we may be chasing the tail of the horse after it's out of the barn. We could drop the whole thing, leave it as is. I mean, we narrowed it down from thousands of colors down to 79, right? But more than the 12 that were here,

right? But the pictures I took, the dark blue building, forget what it's called. That's right over here somewhere. The dark blue building. That's not on here. So we have to trust the good taste and judgment of the people. Yeah. So we could get rid of So this is a discussion to decide what to go forward for the next meeting, not necessarily a recess meeting. Drop the whole thing completely. That would be my instinct. And when Riptide comes and proposes colors that are not in here, it'll get approved anyway. Yeah.

Not worry about it. We can send this back without the color thing changed at all. Just leave it as is and know that there is no color standard. Or we could say take it up again and say, "Do we want to leave one in? Do we want to shorten the list? Take one of the reds out or something. Make I don't know what the right number is. 79 was too many. Is 60. Okay. 35. I don't know. We have what's the magic number?" I don't know. A lot of these are hues, right? If you look at these, they're the same colors just hued, you know? I mean, we've all been to the paint store, right?

Uh I don't know. I was trying to improve. I My point on this and I started this and I feel bad now was to improve and consist the overlay district with the urban design standard to promote nonresidential development in what we consider our central business area. Right.

As far as I know, nothing none of these things are getting in the way really. There was other things we technically corrected here. So, which I'm assuming if we send it back to them without the color changes, they would just adopt those couple of technical changes you made that we agreed on in the language. From a current code application perspective, if we had a new building coming in that these rules would apply to, I would ask for a paint sample that said limestone or sand or deep sea or whatever fawn or whatever other, you know, whatever the other colors are,

but it wouldn't match that because But I would, but if they could show me like this is my screen, Richard, I know you can't see it. Um, yeah, there's already Yeah, I mean it it's like one color in this screen might look gray, but on the real color is kind of a green. It's a green color of beige color, whatever. So, if they can produce me a color sample that would say mushroom, dark earth, stormy sky, deep sea, limestone, sand, fern, olive, or fawn. But the next or so you egg shel then I would approve if the next person could come in with the same color that's not the same color

right but if they have like a sample that has that word on it out they would have some that even fern there isn't a fern anymore there's a soft firm and easy firm or quiet I looked it up I understand but that was still

my sense is and and I have two examples that dealt with this issue one of which was in Nyak where I lived and one of which was in Carmel by the Sea where my uncle lived and the color standards evolved out of an existing pallet. In other words, the community had kind of been built and these colors were the colors that had been chosen in the organic growth of these towns. We don't have that. Right. So, basically, I tried to adopt Charleston's. Yeah. And I'm not sure we South Carolina, not the other one. I'm not sure we can impose Charleston on Sunset B. I mean,

but if you look at the colors, it is it's just a little country Carol. It's what every paint bear has. They're kind of all in the same group of what? Yeah. You know, can we find another grouping that I tried to the Benjamin William that other one Benjamin Moore one was bigger that I found closest was is that easy Carolina colors. They call their easy something. They call it they're low country. was like 360 colors or something. Again, cuz all the but to most of them are hues, right? Right. Well, maybe maybe perhaps the path is to advise the council that Yes. 79 seems like it's not really a lot. Hey, I that's what I thought. I said it's really not a lot.

When I stand in front of the Benjamin Moore thing, there's thousands of colors. Exactly. Right. 79 is not a big number. It's not really a big what we sent them really was not a big number. And so the simplest thing may be able to politely instruct the town council that while we understand that 79 may seem like a big number, in fact, it's not that big. And the difficulties in trying to hone it down far outweigh the benefits. Right? Is that fair? And I hate to burden the permitting people to try to decide, well, that's close enough. This isn't. Yeah.

And then somebody gets mad. I want this soft fern. I don't care. It's not your fern. Why? I don't you know. Okay. I don't know what to do it. So, it's only a discussion item. So, where would you like to go everybody? We just need a consensus for the next regular meeting. Yeah. We'll not be able to have anything before you on this at your if you Yeah. I mean, do we want this meeting? I will not have anything on this. Yeah. Next. And it's just the next regular meeting. Do we want to consider regurgitating as it was? Do we want to what do we want to do? Stuart, help me.

I think we ought to whack some of these colors out of here. Just I mean what's printed in here? Some of these look the same to me. Plum brown Turkish copy. Chop one. You go to the next sheet. muddled, you know, butter up and sunbeam yellow look very similar. Chop one. I mean, if they want fewer numbers, just give them fewer. All right. Well, I will. So, our plan is the next meeting is to come up with all the planning board members between the next meeting. Whack out it. You all must whack out five colors. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to get my wife to do it.

Yeah. So what we'll do so the plan is see the the text part is fine they agreed on that it's just so the the plan is to try to taking the existing color chart that we proposed which was in the text amendment here we we got it hope you guys didn't throw it out uh I'll try to pull it up here it was uh where we voted Please, Ron, here. It was this appendix appendix C that staff created. Right. Right.

And if you don't have one, go see Kimberly on your own and have her print you another one. We're going here and we're going to try to trim this down to resend it to the And we all should try at least five reduction. And should we set a goal as to where we I would say 50. Yeah. We'll try to get down uh 52 one for a week. We'll try to get down to 52 colors. Okay, sounds good. Okay, that's the goal for the next regular meeting. And then whoever's going to paint can pick that color and then, you know, change it a little bit.

Well, if they have a color number, they can match it to I mean, it may be fern for one company and it's olive green for another. It's the same color number. Yeah. Right. The number determines the color, not and then the following year it'll be a different color because the sun will have faded it. Yeah. Well, that's the whole Okay. Okay. So, we agree on this discussion item. We'll be moved hopefully to an action item at the next regular meeting with the same text amendment but a color palette in appendix C reduced from whatever the number we got now 79 down to 52. Sounds good.

Thank you people. Okay, we went through that. Okay, administrative comments is what we're on now. I I I would Yes. And I'm It's unfortunate that Ken's not in here. I would like to facilitate some sort of dialogue between the planning board and the council. Uh, at one point I contemplated reaching out to Christy and Katie on my own. That might not be the appropriate path.

I don't know if we have a a through so much stuff this week. My mind counts, but I don't think there's a a path for us to really do that somehow anywhere. We could have just created a rule on how else to do it. But yeah, there's not a path to go other than sending text amendments up there. I don't there's not a path for us. I mean, we obviously can speak at a public meeting, but we're in an offic unofficial capacity at that point.

Well, if this is a desired planning board, if you want to have a meeting with council, obviously be a public meeting. We can share that with Ken and Ken then could look to see if that's something council wants to do. You obviously can't call a C meeting and say we want council there, right? Council could do that. Call a meeting and we want planning board there. But I don't do we want a public meeting. We don't want a public meeting. I don't think yet. But it's a Do we want a subcommittee meeting of two members of the planning board meeting? Two members of the council or is that not legal? I don't know. I mean, that's going to I'd have to Right. I mean, been here since 9:00. So, I don't know that we're not When they interview us, it's usually two at a time. two council members interview one planning board at a time member. Yeah.

Uh I I don't know. But if you're having like a I try to send a message official subcommittees a lot of times could be considered public bodies. Okay. So I I don't know. So is there a here is is there Well, I guess I'm just stumped. Okay. can best thing you could do is show up at that Wednesday council meeting and discuss things with them at that time. We're not in official capacity. Can't speak outside of this meeting. That's true.

I'm sorry. Say it again. Right. We cannot speak in official capacity outside of this meeting. We're only planning board members when we're here. Really? True. Everything else we do as a citizen, my understanding I could someone correct me if I'm wrong, but we're in official capacity after I gave you in and then done when you gave it out, right? Other than that, we're just citizens,

right? I mean, look, if the planning board had a position on an item and you and let's say we're and you guys wanted to appoint or have Ron go represent the planning board at a council meeting, I believe you could do that. Otherwise, you're when you go to speak at the podium, you're speaking as a citizen of the town, right? Because the way we technically work is you speak for the planning board at the council meeting. That's right. Yeah. I'm presenting I'm presenting recommendation and if they ask what did the coun, you know, what the planning board do, whatever, you know, certainly I would provide that information. I try to do a brief sonary, right? I don't know if we should be speaking for ourselves,

but well, I'd like to explore and see if we can create some options. I mean, I I think we Well, I'm I'm taking notes here. I'll speak with I think we we've created a well it has been created a some points of contention that were not necessary to be created cuz I mean in in in the previous council there was enough kind of informal bump into each other conversations that I just don't feel happening with this one. Okay. Other administrative comments? I don't have any administrative.

I Well, we have two items on here. We got elected officers and I apologize. I wasn't at the January meeting, so we put it off. Oh, we did? Huh. And then when we came back in February, we didn't do it. So, we do need to elect a chair and a vice chair. And assuming our rules get adopted, it will only be effective until January 2027. So, does anyone like to be the chairman? I move that we continue the service of Ron Lebruno as chair. I second. All in favor? I I You're stuck, Ron. Uh likewise, vice chair.

I move that we continue the service of Stuart Jones with vice chair. I second. All in favor? I Oh, thank God I escaped. So Ron Luna will continue as a chair and we need next January to have another election uh and Steuart as the vice chair. The other thing I asked for uh amended agenda was any progress on the open ETJ everybody's kind of like out of energy but any any progress on the open ETJ seat on the planning board. I don't have any information on that. Kimberly, do

you have any information? Okay. So, yes, we have sent out letters about 225 letters to the ETJ members and received no response or ETJ residents. those letters been sent to cuz now there are a fair number of residents in um God I'm blanking on the name now the sanctuary have we've been sending letters out to those folks

those sanctuary addresses were included so they were included in the mailings yes okay that's disappointing I guess was how much period of time has passed week, two weeks that were letters went out or I believe they were sent out um I had it pulled up a while ago around the 10th of March. I have received applications for planning board interest, just no one in the ETJ.

Maybe we could get them to move. Yeah. Anybody willing to move? Okay. Well, nothing we can do. We sent the letters out, been advertised in the paper, right? It has been advertised on Facebook multiple times. Yeah. Okay. We just need to keep it up and try to get some I'd like to have ETJ some representation here, but uh it's always been a problem. And are technically are we still supposed to have an alternate member? Did we strike that someplace? It's not in the code.

We took it out because we're having so much trouble. I think originally we were supposed to have five members, four from the town, one ETJ, and one town alternate. I think when we did the UDO, we got rid of the alternate because it couldn't keep the hardly keep the four. Yeah, I'm just reading through the code real quickly. It does not indicate an alternate for the planning board. It does for BOA, but not the planning board. Yeah, I guess we could consider adding the alternate back if we have a few have them elected as an alternate so we have a backup to one of us when we go. But uh

we may have to if we can't get an ET. It took us a year lifetime. But the alternate can't serve that ETJ spot. No, it's just right. If one of the town four leaves or is absent, it's absent. The alternative can step in, but it doesn't it doesn't solve the ETJ problem at all. No, but it solves our quorum issue if Yeah, it starts to get problematic. Okay. Starts to get an issue. Okay.

Can I ask Ron a question before we move on? I know you're you're doing mind meld over there, but um so last month we didn't have a meeting. It was cancelled, I guess, by council, but in the code it specifically says that we're required to have a meeting every month. Uh we can believe we had items. So staff canceled it. Okay. At the time I didn't have items other than we could have brought the UDO gateway gateway thing over to you and I didn't feel like that was a priority at that time and

yeah I guess just thinking back on it you know not that we had a lot of citizen stuff here today but you know if we don't have a meeting in a month then we nobody can come speak at the planning board meeting if we don't have a meeting right so I don't The code says we're supposed to have one every month, right? So, now we're saying if there's no item, should we still have a meeting? We say we have no items. Anybody want to speak? So, we just come in for end up coming in for a 10-minute thing. I don't care. I'm willing to do it. I'm willing to do it. I'm willing to do it.

So, I guess in the future, should that come up, I'm obviously, if there's a hurricane or something, it's a different story, right? But uh barring any natural or disaster or CO 26 or whatever uh I'm okay with coming in just basically to have a public comment only meeting and administrative comment administrative comments because now we're going to add the discussion item the um planning board discussion. Okay. Unless there's some substantive reason is hold the meeting. Yeah. It was we chose not to have it. We pitched it because we didn't have any items that we felt like were ready to move forward. Right. Right.

So we so we we can't it was staff's council. We we canceled it. Okay. Well, just thinking about it logistically, had there been one or two items on that agenda, even though it might have been short, it might have taken stuff off of right example, the rules of procedures, which could have been last, we weren't ready to have them in front of the Okay. So then basically is well we will we will have our monthly meeting no matter what even if there's no action items on there other than the com public comment and discussion uh anyway unless there's a outside reason you can't hurricane or something.

Right. Okay. Or if we can't get a quorum or we can't get a quorum. Right. Okay. Speaking of public comment, item 10. Public comment. Seeing a no public. Item 11. Uh I will make a motion that we recess this meeting until 9:00 a.m. next Thursday. And I've lost the date. 23rd.

23rd. uh to take up the unresolved items in this meeting which would be the amending the various sections of a UDO for the planning board and the board of address right which I believe was item 7.4 four on this agenda, right? Yep. Anyone second a motion to recess? Second. Uh, anyone I in favor of a recess? I All right. Any nays? So, meeting is recessed until 9:00 a.m. next Thursday.