Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

This conference will now be recorded.

I call to order the July 21st, 2026 workshop meeting of the Planning Commission. And the results stand for the invocation, which Jan is going to offer.

We thank you for the opportunity to serve the residents of Surfside Beach. Grant us wisdom, integrity, and discernment as we consider the matters before us today. Help us to listen respectfully, speak thoughtfully, and seek solutions that promote the common good. Give us the humility to value different perspectives and the courage to make decisions that are fair, responsible, and in the best interests of our community, both for today and the future. Bless the residents, business owners, visitors, first responders, and town staff who contribute to the well-being of our town guide. Our efforts to protect the beauty, safety, and character of Surfside Beach while encouraging thoughtful growth and responsible stewardship. May all that we do be marked by cooperation and a spirit of service. We ask for your blessing upon this meeting and upon all who are present. In your holy name we pray, amen. Amen. Thank you, ma'am. Congratulations.

Congratulations. Give me the flag.

First workshop item this evening is just one where

I had intended that Mark would just inform us as to the status of Section 17-201. So we have a record of where that stands.

At this time, the director is not planning on bringing any modification to that section of the code forward at all. after doing several iterations of this with the commission where I was seeking a clarification on the word that I simply after hearing up from all of you understand what to see and not see and there was a there was a at one time there was a modified version of this that basically took down all of the director's relaxations from 20% down to 10%. And while I still think that that's a valuable modification to move forward, unless anybody on the commission disagrees, I'm simply not going to move any, I'm not going to move anything forward at this point. I'm just going to leave it the way it is. Is that the director has up to no more than 20% variation on only required yards and setbacks, not on coverages, not on height, all of that sort of thing. It's simply leaving it required yards and setbacks. no we did not we never we never really came back to that um i was trying to get a clarification the difficulty that we had with this was that i was trying to get the clarification on the definition of the word yards to include the word coverages and i believe i met with a substantial amount of pushback from the commission at that point and i just said you know what I've been here a year. I've only had one request, and it was for a modification to parcel coverage, and I simply said no to that application and just said I'm just going to only use this on substandard lots where the applicant is seeking a relaxation on yards or setbacks. In my opinion, yards and setbacks are essentially the same thing, so basically on setbacks. If the commission would like to move an amendment forward, my suggestion is that the amendment moves forward the existing language with the only change being reducing the director's percentage from 20% down to 10%. And I don't think that's unreasonable either. I just came here basically saying, I don't want to move it forward. If you want to move it forward, then I would seek direction from the commission on moving forward and what we're moving forward with.

Anyone want to comment, have questions?

I just brought up yard because I knew that was one of the terms of the terms letter. I personally am fine with

leaving this all alone and saying that for the time being, the issue is withdrawn, resolved, whatever. If it needs to come back, then at a later time, bring it back to us.

I believe I have, and the only trepidation I have is that tomorrow morning I don't wake up and I'm not here with the rest. And you get a new director. The new director has this section and it says 20%, and that person may not know what the definition of required yards is or possibly tries to interpret those yards to include coverages, which would create, I think, sort of the same issue that we were trying to resolve initially So I really don't feel like I have a dog in this fight at all. It's really up to the commission. If you believe, and I believe I heard some of you say that you'd like to reduce it down to 10%, I'm fine with moving it forward with a 10% reduction.

Madam Chair. Did we also get a finalization of like having it not include commercial properties and not including the height part of it?

No, we didn't. Yeah, nothing about that particular ordinance has been changed because we did not pursue it for Newton. If we need to, then we need, I guess, new language and

I can't remember at this point whether it's been through a public hearing. No, it has not. No, it hasn't been through a public hearing.

No, Chair.

Yes.

I think you did it down the road. It does need some tweaking, but we've got a whole lot more priorities to deal with in this room. It's not broken. It's not fixed.

Anyone else?

Comments to pursue?

At least that won't change or?

I'm kind of agreeing with Mary Ellen that we do have a lot of other things and we did talk about this a lot. I hate to just throw it away because I think we got down to like the last three things that we needed. you know, not being commercial, not including high, getting it from the 20 to 10%. And then it was just a matter of, of wording, you know, to get the definition, you know, finalized. So, I mean, it was just a few small things, but if it's going to take three more meetings to do it, I would say there's other things too.

I'm open to others. I say let's move on. And if for the next agenda tonight you want to put it on the agenda, let me know in advance, and we'll put it on the agenda.

Okay. Moving on to the storage facility. Facilities.

In terms of the commission, this is a, what I call a multi-headed set of modifications. And I'm just going to refresh your memory on what the history of this is. Approximately three months ago, an owner of a piece of property that sits directly behind the proposed hotel was seeking a permit moving forward to build a self-storage facility behind the hotel. Self-storage facilities are permitted in the C1 zoning district. The catch was upon review of the parking requirement for the self-storage facility, the applicant and myself were surprised, I guess, surprised by the number of parking spaces that were going to be required by a self-storage facility. Subsequent to that, I presented the commission with an analysis of communities around us, and at that point, I believe the direction was to change not only, well, to change the funding requirements so that somebody could actually, in fact, do a self-storage facility. Following that, there was a direction from commission on making sure that while self-storage facilities permitted in the C1 zoning district, that we wanted to have a locational requirement for any self-storage facility to be located in the minimum of 150 feet, 17 right of way. That was to ensure that we would never have what I would call a window or eyes on a self-storage facility from Highway 17. The requirements moving forward to modify would be to modify the parking regulation for said self-storage facilities. And I believe at the time I was recommending changing the parking ... Okay, let me back up for a second. I want to bring it all along so that we're all on the same page. The parking requirement for all uses are identified in the land use table for all users in the community. And in the last, very last column of that matrix was something called parking code. The parking code relates to a letter, which is then found later on in the code, identifying what the parking code requirement is for that. But I believe, and it's been a while, so I'm treading water here a bit. But I believe that I recommended at the time that the modified to mirror the Horry County parking requirement. And at that time, I do not recall what I would call pushback of the commission. It was only getting this moving forward that where we could come forward with a suggested modification for modifying the letter. for self-storage from, and I'm gonna probably try to give you the letter that it is today. And this is day 137, usually that we're looking for things.

Yeah, what's the storage under? I'm sitting here trying to find it.

I'm looking under right now. It's not under retail, it's not under auto. Like I said, it's been a minute since we've done this. Instead of being one space for every 250 square, it was one space for 50 square.

It was something. These storage units. It was, yeah. It was egregious. Let me just put it that way. But it used to be one space for each 150 square feet of space.

Correct. Yep.

Warehouse and storage facility. Government uses public, right?

That's not it. There's two places. There's under government.

but the mini storage is under manufacturing slash industrial.

Yeah. So about halfway down the paragraph under manufacturing and industrial, which is on page 10 of 11, in the middle of the page, it says mini storage. And the parking code was R. And I was going to be recommending a new letter to be placed in that location. And I will be returning to you at the next meeting with what that letter is because- Isn't that you? Yeah, I believe that's what I recommended at the time. Yeah, it's on the handout. It's you.

Yeah, it's in the- It's in the documentation of 17-4-20. You're adding a letter U there that it's one space for 50 storage units and four spaces for the manager's office. I don't believe that that was carried through to the use table, that it was still stuck at R and it should be used. And the other question I had is I don't think that this cross-reference on the applicable standards should have dropped out 17396.8.

Yeah, it shouldn't drop that out. 6.42.

Conditional use. The conditions that it has to meet is 1736.42. And the parking regulation, we're changing from R to U, which is one space per 50 storage units. And I apologize, some of the parts of this moving thing here have gotten sort of lost in past iterations. And the other one that, and the last metric that we're trying to change, so we're gonna change the use table, that was one. We're gonna change the parking code table, to include a new U. And lastly, we're going to include a distance requirement, basically would be under applicable standards. One of the conditions would be that it could be placed no closer than 150 feet from the right of way of Highway 17. Those were the three pieces of the puzzle that we were trying to put together to, move a self-storage facility forward that was being proposed, contentedly proposed, by the owner of the property behind.

So, Mark, I do have a question.

When you're talking about 150 feet from the 17 right-of-way, how does that get measured? If you're on the western side of 17 that has a frontage road, where are you measuring from?

Measuring from the property line of subject property, 150 feet toward the Highway 17, this Highway 17 right of way.

But what's the barrier?

What's the barrier?

Yeah, in other words, The 150 feet, it needs to be more than. All right. So let's say it's not. So let's say. How do you know that? What are you measuring? I'm measuring from that parcel. No, no. Okay. 150 feet from the parcel towards 17.

Correct. If it's more than 150 feet, they're fine.

No, but what she's asking, and I'm curious about the same thing, is what is the barrier along 17? We've got the highway. Right. And then on the east side, west side, you've got the frontage road. So is it from the right-of-way on the west side of the frontage road or the right-of-way on the west side of Highway 17?

The frontage road is part of Highway 17.

Okay, so it is.

So it would be from, I'll call it the front edge of the front.

Yeah, and the right-of-way is what, 15 feet?

Oh, no, the right-of-way?

Yeah.

The frontage road? Yeah. Probably 80 feet.

Oh, 80 feet.

Oh, it's a big right-of-way. Good God. And the right-of-way for Highway 17 is somewhere in excess of 170 feet. I mean, that right-of-way on one side of the road to Highway 17 on the other side, it's a large amount. I don't pretend to know the measurement. I don't pretend to know what the width is. But you've got four lanes of active traffic. You've got a median. And you've got two lanes. Yeah. two lanes in each direction, a median, and on the west side, a frontage lane. So my guess would be that if you measured that all up, it's probably going to be well in excess of 150 to 250.

Yeah, plus the 150.

Yeah, because everybody thinks the edge of right-of-way is the edge of pavement. No, no, no. It's way, way up on these pipelines. I didn't realize it was 80 feet. That's pretty simple.

I hate to say this, but My mind is not wrapping around how this would work. I thought the goal was to make it so that these storage units were not visible along Highway 17.

Correct.

That's the goal.

And I'm thinking that 150 feet doesn't really make them not visible. I'm trying to understand that. So let's use a landmark. I'm going to use Crabby Mike's. Is that?

I was actually going to use another landmark that none of you are familiar with yet, the hotel site. The hotel site is exactly 150 feet deep outside. Now there's also right of way in front of the hotel site that, you know, where that hotel's front side is. That is also the line of the highways, US Highway 17. So they're the same thing. The property line and the Highway 17 right of way are at that front of that parcel.

Yeah, but the hotel's not built yet.

No, that's why visually I can't give you a... I can't give you a landmark that you'd all relate to and understand. And there's no frontage area. Yeah.

I don't think so. From the hotel there is. Yeah, absolutely. There is?

Yeah, the frontage road, it runs right by it. I didn't hear your question.

I think it goes to Johnny D's den.

Is there a frontage road in front of where the- Is the frontage road in front of the proposed hotel property?

I believe there is, although I- Yeah, the road that goes back to the hotel is right next to the chicken place, right?

Yeah. I brought my bell card on it to go get our air cut. Oh, yeah, there's produce there.

Well, that was you. That was me.

Yeah.

No, I mean, there definitely is a road there. Guaranteed. Go back to it.

Okay, so the way you describe that, That means if the property were deep enough, you could still see the storage unit from 17, but for the hotel.

If there were no hotels.

Yeah.

Okay. If there were no hotels and that site were to be bought by the Baptist Church of wherever, and they decided they just wanted to leave an open field, oh, yeah, you'd see the self-storage behind it for sure. For sure.

Just add to the statement under the 17-396.8 that we just say must not be visible from Highway 17. That puts me in a very, very difficult position.

I need a measurement. I need something that I can put my hands on. And The recommendation for 150 feet came from my measurement of the hotel site in front of it, which is 150 feet, which means that they'd be able to build from their property line on back. I'm not saying that's the right number. I'm not saying it's the wrong number. I'm saying that's how I determined it. And we're talking about a property, one of the last large pieces of property on Highway 17 that is located behind the parcels that are all in front. Most of the parcels in that area are front-loaded. Shopping center across the street, that back property line is approximately 150 feet back. So if there's no shopping center there and many storages there, you can't see it, but it's a distance. 150 feet is three-quarters of the football field. 300 feet would be the length of a football field. So I'm trying to give you some ideas and measurement because there's nothing suggested in my number that says that we have to have the self-storage right up on their front property line. If we increase it to 200 feet, let's say on that, let's talk about that parcel, they'd have to set back another 50 feet from the 150 in front of them on that parcel. So I tried to do something real, something tangible that I could see. So I looked at that parcel, I looked at the parcel, and I said, How big is the parcel in front? The parcel in front is 150 feet deep. That seems like a reasonable number to expect.

So I'm now understanding your concept when it relates to a property close to the proposed Hampton Inn location. How about on the east side of 17? Would those be allowed or not allowed because that would get you, there isn't that 150 feet. I don't know.

One of the things that I, it's interesting we're having this conversation because I've asked that there be a zoning map posted in this building so that we can do this kind of stuff over. The only thing I could suggest is if one of you has a laptop and you have access to the zoning code, zoning map, We can put it on the projector and we can look at it on the screen.

I have my laptop. Let's talk about the east side, the ocean side of Iowa 17. 150 feet deep.

I see one parcel, I see two parcels on the east side that if somebody pushed it back 150 feet, they would have maybe like 30 or 40 feet left to put in self-storage. The depth on Highway 17 on Tennessee 1 is on the west side. That's where all the depth is. That distance to that lot is 150 feet from the front of that lot to that lot, right there. Then there's the self-storage proposal right there. So you can see 150 feet. If you took that square and you started moving it along this side, you probably, that site, that site, and that site. But it doesn't leave, once you push the 150 feet, there's no room except possibly for that

to build your facility and have the parking lot.

Yeah, yeah.

And that's good.

Yeah, you can see that this, the deepest parcels are here and on the waterway side. Waterway side, yeah, there could conceivably be, you can use that 150 feet there. It would cut that parcel right about where that line is right there. This could be self-storage and active resale. If we're looking out further, yeah.

As well as these locations back here. Yes. Right. Yes, for sure. And what I'm pointing to are the lots along Glens Bay.

Right.

That are further afield from 17. And I believe that use right there is a, It's not a residential site. Those are both suitable sites. No, not suitable for residential.

There are residential properties there.

Just not the first site. I'm not going to mark it.

But this square rectangle that I'm pointing to, which I don't even know. Can everybody see where we are? That's the hotel. And then all of this is vacant back here? No. There is a big storage area back there.

This is the South Carolina Department of Energy. That site is like a site owned by one of our big utilities. I don't know who that is.

That's what it looks like. If you drive down this road right here, this is the hotel over here, the lot that you're looking at there.

Right, but this is the side road. This is not the frontage road.

No, the frontage road is back here.

Okay, this is the frontage, right? Yeah, I wish we'd have this. The only site, I see what you're saying, that site, I don't recall the owner of that site or the current use of that site, but this use is a utility. And the reason I know it's a utility is that we went round and round with them on the access point across the property to access their property. The access for this is going to be through, I believe this owner owns this parcel as well. It's going to be through this right over here. So it's not azalea.

Correct.

So the distance thing is simply the math on that's 150, that's 150. If we said 200, it would be there. You'd probably get all your parking in front, and you'd probably get the structures themselves in the background. So that would be the only way. caveat that I could add to that. So if you added 50 feet to it, you'd probably get the first 50 feet that that came there. Pardon me.

I just gave it a number of minutes. Wow. Okay. It's okay. Now.

Currently. Okay. Just for your, for the record. Just trees. Currently, storage facilities are allowed anywhere on Highway 17. Right, right, right. Okay. Just want you to know that. So what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to get out on Highway 17, push it back, but allow them to occur.

Yeah.

There's something that tells somebody like me who's not educated about this, that the frontage road is part of Highway 17 in terms of this measurement?

That's correct. We do not maintain that road. That is a state highway frontage road. I wish we could get the trees all up.

So, Madam Chair, are you asking if that should be clarified in the wording?

I am, yes. Not very artfully, I admit.

Just because I was thinking the same. It just, like for us, like you deal with that every day. We don't. Right. It might be helpful.

Well, this is a workshop. So let me come back. We have to set this as public hearing at our August 4th meeting. We'll set this, if you agree, for public hearing. When I bring it back, I will have double, triple checked to make sure that the frontage road is actually State Highway. I believe John Adair can verify that for me. And if it's not, I will simply add the distance of frontage road to the 150 feet so that the measurement is taken up to the back of what is Highway 17, right?

Well, whatever that measurement is, it's going to be the same measurement for the east side and the west side. Or are you going to delineate?

I'm going to have to dig deeper on that, John, just to be honest.

It just seems like if you're going to use Highway 17 as the demarcation point, it's going to be good east side or west side.

Correct. Even if, I mean, I guess if I really just wanted to dumb the whole thing down, I could just say 150 feet to the closest. Right. It doesn't matter if it's town or state. I just say right-of-way. Yeah.

Then there's no – Yeah, and then that way it's pushed back on the west side because of the right-of-way of the frontage. Right. And it's closer on the east side because there's no frontage.

Right. Yeah.

I'll say go for that.

That makes sense to me except for the fact that you're going to have right-of-ways along side streets. And does that?

We don't have C1 zoning on this.

No, you're correct. There are some side streets that if there were one, they'd have to be 150 feet down from that.

Call that two if you didn't specify that it was the 17 right away. Mike, do you see where she's going? Use the Fifth Avenue extension

over across so that means that you would have to be 150 feet off from the north south as well as the east west yeah so i don't i don't think that would work all right now unless you said something like north south right of way i mean you could say i mean i don't want to do that why don't you just say highway 17 right away well i could say highway 17 right away but if there are members the chair is uncomfortable with that because

Because of the ambiguity.

Because of the ambiguity in front of us, right?

So what we did was add to say on the west side of Highway 17, that shall include the frontage road and its right-of-way.

Got some more language, but yeah.

Then we've got more words, but it should be clear. On the west side of Highway 17, right-of-way.

Certainly get 500 feet, but that's.

Well, then you're not having anything.

And you're outlawing some storage altogether. Thank you. Yes. Thank you. But that's what we tried doing with the parking regulation. And I'm telling you that. Not we. I don't know. I'm sure it wasn't all of you. It was somebody else.

Well, Mary Ellen was in on it.

Mary Ellen said you should probably. Mary Ellen, remember you said that you didn't think that that parking regulation was an error? You thought it was, that you thought it might have been. I believe Alex was saying that. Correct. Yeah, yeah. Alex said that it was deliberate. Yeah, which is interesting. It makes sense to me. It's not the way you prohibit uses. Which brings up what I was saying, my turn.

Yeah, sure. What's wrong with just while we're at it, forgiving self-storage on the east side of 17th?

I think you've got it on there. Or you mean new.

Yeah, I mean new. We don't want it there. Yeah, we don't want it in.

We're just dealing with the west side of the park. Mary Ellen, I would agree with you. We do not want it on the east side because of all the residential neighborhoods directly behind here. That's not quite what it was. Let's work this somehow so that it can't happen on the east side. All right.

That would be my opinion.

I like that. You start. Okay. Okay, kind of with that language.

Well, let me ask a, I don't know if this is a legal question or what. So we do have currently self-storage on the east side. All right.

We have a small one, sure.

Right. Well, I mean, the one that big one back behind, yeah, right over here. Water tank. Yeah.

You know more than I do.

Well, I mean, behind the surf dog and the golden egg and all that, right behind there, there's a big old long chain of it. But my point is, if we have a use of the mini storage that's on the east side now, and we say we prohibit it for new construction or whatever, if somebody who owns that lot decides to sell it, so there's an exchange of title, I mean, somebody knew he was buying it. Is there a way to say, okay, well, you know, if you're going to sell it, because they've got a vested interest in the value of that property.

It's called a non-compliant clause. And what happens is if we did that, that property instantly becomes a non-compliant use. It's a non-compliant use. Right. And it can be sold. It can continue as a non-compliant use into perpetuity. Right. And the owner could change it to a conforming use or simply continue it as a non-compliant use with one notable exception. And most codes are written this way, that if the non-compliant use sits vacant for six months or more, it has to revert to a conforming use. But I don't want to use that stick to hurt a property owner. Usually that's done. No, that's what I'm saying.

They have a vested interest in the value of the property and the current application.

And I wouldn't, I wouldn't dream of changing that either.

And I don't think we have that.

We don't have that clause in our code.

No, we don't have that provision anywhere in our code.

If it's a non-complying use, it can continue. You all understand the word grandfather. Right, yeah. It's grandfather. Okay, that's all I'm

even though I wish they would change. But it's not my money.

But I like Mary Ellen's suggestion about just not allowing on the east side, because I never thought about that. And there is two properties that I can see on that map that could be, could be. And they back up right to our R1 and R2 zones, which I don't like that at all.

So you would change this language to say they should not be located on the east side of Highway 17?

Correct. Or? Or within 150 feet of the right of way.

We'll just see.

And I'll find out right of way, question mark. John will know instantly how much of that is or is not. All right. once you do all that you'll bring it put it on i'm going to bring it back on an agenda to ask you to put it to set a public hearing for it when we got it right we've got the language right we'll then set the public hearing i'll notice it and we'll probably end up talking about it in september with the current applicant given the changes that we're talking about now with the current applicant still be about the property he's looking at the property behind the hotel yeah yes okay i just wouldn't want

and I'm a herd, look at it and go, oh, come on, man, y'all did all this to keep me from.

Yeah, one of the things, I'm going to bring something up that I think about, and it makes me worry a little. When we talk mini storage, self-storage, we're all talking about an enclosed building, right? The units that roll up doors and you put your stuff inside. What I don't want self-storage or mini storage construed as outdoor storage.

Yeah, like boats and RVs.

Boats and RVs and all that kind of stuff. On my mind, I don't like that. I don't want. I don't think we want. Let me put it that way. I don't think we want that anywhere visible from Highway 17. So I would say that the self-storage possibly come back with it, and I'm spitballing now, or workshopping, I spitball and I come back with the definition of self-storage. Not to include exterior, visible storage of boats and RVs and trailers and junk. You know, junk.

I'll put you on for one minute, because I think everything we've sort of been talking about is taken care of in paragraph one of 17396.8. It's saying we have to be on Sandy Lane, which is, I guess, a problem with regard to the proposal to put the storage unit behind the proposed Hampton Inn. And that no portion, it also says no portion of the use shall be located on properties contiguous to the town's frontage road or highway 17. I'm not sure I understand what that verbiage means. Contiguous to? Properties contiguous, too. Does that mean you have to be on the western side of Sandy Lane? I don't know. Anyway, I think we have more of a language issue than perhaps we thought we did. I think it means broken.

Where are you bringing up Sandy Lane? Well, it's in the verbiage.

It's in the verbiage.

Yeah. We need to modify that.

It's in the current... Condition?

Condition.

Is it listed as one of the conditions? 17396.8 is the first condition.

It's the first sentence. Yeah, that was John 50, but the Sandy Lane thing is just current. It's in them.

Yeah. I'm wondering what they would. Use is located on property strutting on Sandy Lane.

Well, it says it's allowed. I mean, you gotta read the intro language.

Use is allowed in the C1 NPO district provided. It's low-tended. Fronting on Sandy Lake. Well, that doesn't, we need to do more surgical removal then, if that's the case. Because that property behind the hotel clearly isn't on Sandy Lake. I think that was deliberate language in the first place.

Right.

Well, I'm going to tell you that I believe that a mini-store self-storage behind the hotel It's the best land use that that hotel could possibly offer. It's a dead use. Hampton Inn. Hampton Inn. If you were the Hampton Inn owner, what use would you want to have behind you besides open space? That's what I'm getting at here.

Well, they don't get to control that, but they would say that was okay.

No, I had a conversation with the Hampton Inn, and I told them that there was a proposal, and they went, As long as there's no outdoor storage, we couldn't ask for a better neighbor because right now, and I'm probably telling you more than you need to know, right now the Hampton Inn is worried about the site behind it because there's a lot of illegal camping going on back there. There's a lot of vagrants. Stuff is happening behind there causing police action. Hampton Inn doesn't want that to continue once they open. They don't want to see campfires in the woods. I don't know. So I said to him, I said, well, there's a proposal from the owner of that property to put self-storage on. And they said, oh, that would be great, because self-storage doesn't create traffic, doesn't create glare, noise, all of the things that a hotel would like to have as a neighbor. And the other site is the South Carolina Energy, I'm sorry, I don't have the correct letters, but it's a public utility. And that's quiet. 99.9% of the time, too.

I'm OK with that. I just think this language is more of a renewal.

Yeah, I think the removal of Sandy.

Or the modification of the language to identify what they were talking about. It's just restricted uses. That's what the heading is on that. What I think we could do is we could add just a conditional condition to self-storage in the land . Some place in the code, that condition that I placed in the, probably in the incorrect place.

No, I think it probably, instead of being G, it's a rewrite of one. One, yeah. Okay, all right. Thinking about. Much thought at the moment.

I'll talk about what you're talking about right now first. That is that it wasn't that long ago, I don't know if you know, there was a huge kerfuffle about whether we were going to have, where we were going to have storage. And that Sandy Lane thing was a Big deal, deliberate choice. So I don't think we can just casually strike it and move on. I think it's a bigger decision than we realize. I'm not saying it isn't that I like, you know, the idea of storage behind the hotel makes sense to me. But to me, the ordinance as it stands is perfectly clear. They can't do that unless we change it. And I'm saying if we change it, it may turn into another great fuss about no storage on 17 and they've got to be on Sandy Lane. that's what we work for yeah yeah i understand well the council ultimately has final decision on that right so if they didn't like the proposal they would simply strike it and just say no we're not moving forward and find a way to well the mood changes but it was a great outcry about no storage buildings on 70. yeah what i was originally going to say was that i don't have the whole zoning word in front of me i'd like to have a copy a hard copy I could just carry around, but we're talking about outdoor storage, open storage, and I believe somewhere in chapter 17 that is dealt with. I don't remember all the ins and outs of it, but there are rules about outdoor storage and where it may be seen from.

Can somebody bring up the zoning code and search the word outdoor storage for me?

I've got the use table up. Let's see.

and just bracket it in quotes. That way it'll come up.

Outdoor dining. See if the word open. Open?

Might be open storage room. Or just search for storage and then go through all that.

Well, there is storage in a number of locations. So we've got warehouse storage facility under government uses, public owned, which is a different critter than what we're talking about. And we have fuel and chemical storage. We have the mini storage that we've been talking about. And we have wholesale storage and distribution, which is also subject to this 396.8.

Outdoor storage appears in that very section you showed me, John, which is 17-396.8. Number two, if use, other than the warehouse, mini storage, or other facilities, includes outdoor storage of any kind, a fence with a minimum height of six feet shall be provided to effectively block the public view.

I don't know how this is getting applied to... any facility because we have lots of what I would call vehicle storage along 17 on the eastern side that there is no blocking from view. But my guess is those are grandfathered facilities, although How do we keep track of grandfathered facilities?

That is- We can pull the permits on the property, find out when the last zoning permit was actually issued. I actually did that yesterday. I actually pulled up zoning permit from 2008 because the applicant was arguing with me about whether a shed was there or a shed wasn't there. And in 2008, they took out an application for a shed. And I said, you've got an application for your shed. So I sent Nick out there to see if the shed was there. The shed had been removed. So sometimes you find out there's a permit for it, but the applicant or the subsequent owner decided to remove it. So they didn't have the coverage that I was concerned about. So we can. Now, it's not impossible.

we allowed to if i if a the location of a use is grandfathered are we able to say that even though you're grandfathered you still have to comply with this like putting up a fence and a curtain or whatever that blocks the view here's the like here's the way the language

If it doesn't read this way, it should read this way. A non-complying use may not be expanded beyond its current what I call non-conformity. Any amendment to the site that doesn't, and this is the important sentence, increase the degree of non-compliance may move forward. So if somebody wanted to put in a, I don't know, an ice machine on their property, and it was allowed. But the building was a non-conforming use. But the ice machine was. That wouldn't be increasing the degree of non-compliance. And I use that phrase all the time with my staff. Does it increase the degree of non-compliance of that grandfathered use? You have to counsel me.

I've been to some of them. Yeah.

That doesn't address a non-conforming use along 17 and it's outdoor storage, but it doesn't have the fence or other blocking materials. Are we in a position to require the installation of the fence and the blocking material?

No, because the permit has been granted for the outdoor storage in its current condition. You can't like reach, it's called the reach back clause. We don't have a reach back clause where we can go back in and say, now if they wanted to expand or they wanted to change it significantly, then we can require But you can't have a reach-back clause that says, you know, we've decided that now everybody's got to be screened, so your 1963 permitting you to do that is null and void. You can't reach back and say, we're going to add a condition of approval or condition of the use at that point.

Do permits ever have to be renewed?

Only upon change of use, change of setback. change of coverage, reduction of parking. Those are triggers.

So is the language in paragraph two sufficient for the regulation of the outdoor storage that you were thinking about?

Yeah, the number two makes me very nervous. This is professional, but it's also a personal opinion. I don't think that the construction of self-storage in today's world is the self-storage that we had back in 1950 and 1960 that you see on Iowa 17. It's different. It's cleaner. It's much better looking, all that kind of stuff, right? However, outdoor storage? Outdoor storage to me is old RVs that haven't been around 10 years, boats that have got sails ripped on them. I mean, it's just an accumulation of people's junk that they can't put on their own property. So it fills this site up. And you can argue with me all day, but I just think they're a lot more unsightly than a self-storage building. And some of those self-storage buildings actually do have large enough bays to put in RVs, to put in boats, to put in antique cars. So, yeah, I think we need to move away from allowing this outdoor storage stuff, particularly on Highway 17, if not everywhere. And an amendment for another day, but I want to come back to that. paragraph two and I want to delete it. I don't want us, put a six foot wall and it's still outdoor storage. Why don't you just do it while we're doing it? It could just be a cleanup item, probably not associated with this one item that we're talking about this evening. I could come back as a cleanup item, certainly. I don't understand that. It's not directly related to the allowance of a mini storage building. That's all I'm saying. It's not directly related to it.

Well, we don't have an applicant here who is asking us to change all that, right? I don't think we have an applicant here. This is coming from you.

No, there's an applicant for the property behind the hotel.

No, no, no, no, no, no. We don't have an applicant who's asking us to make a change to the zoning order.

We have an applicant asked who has come to me to further the modification of the zoning ordinance to allow self-storage behind the hotel. We do. And that person's in the audience. But not on outdoor storage. I'm not talking about that book.

Okay, I'm just trying to understand whether or not the timing requirements related to an application have come into play

with regard to our consideration of this we have an application on file i have an application on file to modify this and smile back in march and we have been pushing this item down the road ever since

I've been appreciating the pushing it down the road where we had a pending application for this.

We were not aware that there was a pending application. We're just talking in general terms.

Yeah, I was coming to you with the modification on behalf of the owner, right? I'm acting as your director. If I get a request for a zone change, I come to you with what? I want the zone change to be what I feel the language should be. The applicant isn't directing me to, I want this, I want that. It's like I've got to, the request was storage is allowed on Highway 17 in the C1. Mark, we can't meet the parking requirement. The parking requirement is out of scale. So that's why I came back to you with modifying the parking requirement.

I thought we just went over the fact that many storages do not allow it anywhere but Sandy Lane. Certainly. This is the existing ordinance, is it not?

Don't have a mismatch in the ordinance because I believe you.

17-396.8 is strictly location. I'm assuming that what she's been handed out is the current . The use is allowed in the C1 district provided the use is located on properties in front of the Sandy Lane.

So can somebody help me here? Because I haven't got the code in front of me. Right now in the land use table, many storage facilities are conditional use in the C1 district. subject to 17-396.42.

No. That plus 17-396.8. It somehow got removed, right?

Where is that in my land use table?

It's removed from the draft that is circulated, but it is in the current use table.

was accidentally deleted from the draft.

I didn't remove that from the land use table draft.

I don't know how it got removed. I did earlier point this out, that it was not there when it should have been.

I see the 396.8 up above this one, but under mini storage, What are you looking at, my land use table? The draft.

You're not looking at me.

The only thing I'm recommending changing in the land use table is the parking designation. That's all I'm looking to change is the parking designation from R to D. Yeah, you can sell.

It says 17-396.42, but there's a space under it where my assumption is it should have said 17. but it's not there.

We shouldn't even be talking about a change in parking. I think we probably could talk about a parking change

but are you also in the meeting to talk about any locations? Yeah.

Hang with me for a second, folks. I'm going to the use table online. I just want to know what happened to that designation.

As far as I know, it's there. I'll find it. I have a downloaded version.

It's not in the table. It's not in the table. It is not in the table. There's one down below it in the next use, which is research facility.

Yeah, 396.8 is everywhere above it and everywhere below it, but not there.

I just want to scream. I hate to say it, but it was 396.8.

Yeah, that's the other thing. No open storage or junk. No salvage materials.

Right.

Shall be located a manor of 150 feet from any residential site.

Do we need to research back into the stuff that didn't make it in the Minicoad?

i i think we've got a lot of problems in that regard yeah well i i know all of our stuff from everything everything well does its presence or non-presence impact the ability to resolve the question of the current applicant it ain't Because I know what you're saying, Mary Ellen, as far as number one.

We can fix the parking, but is it allowed otherwise? Right. That's my point. Well, is fixing the parking moved because the use says it can't be there? I don't know because we've seen the innovation. So here's the zoning mentality that I have.

In the table, any storage has a C under C1. Right, conditional. Conditional use. in my world is a permitted use. It's permitted if it meets that condition. There's no other thing can supersede this. So if there's something in a section that says only on Sandy Lane, that's a mismatch of regulatory components. And one of them has to be modified.

Okay, so at one point, Mark, you thought that I presume you thought that 17396.8 applied the mini storage because you gave us a modification to that language. So I'm wondering whether or not in the official version of the code, there is an applicable standard for mini storage that refers to to this.

So if I asked my, if I asked the town attorney what the official version of the zoning code is, that's the official zoning. The one that's online and accessible to the public.

It's also... That seems to be a matter of debate anyway.

I'm not going to debate you on it. I'm just telling you what I think. No, she's not referring to you. She's just talking about... Yeah, yeah.

Some of the powers that

Okay.

Not in this room.

Not in this room.

Yeah.

I would let my attorney answer that question. It's the one that's readily accepted. Okay. So let's regroup here for a second.

Yeah.

Let's regroup. I've got a modification where I believed, maybe correctly or incorrectly, that according to my land use table, any storage is a permitted use with a condition, C, condition. The condition I have is only one condition. There's no .8. So if I refer to a .8, I made a mistake because I'm looking at the printed version. I'm also looking at the online version, and there's nothing there except 396.42. The bigger question is for all of you, okay? Let's just hammer this out right now. Do we feel that allowing self-storage on the west side of Highway 17, separated by Highway 17 by 150 feet, is something that we can support.

I can support it if it's not fronting on Highway 17. For instance, the current application we have, I don't see anything wrong with that. I do not want to see Highway 17 lined with mini-storage. I do know the general public

You get no argument from, I don't think you get any argument from anybody on that count. The only, so I'm trying to parse how that could happen, and I'm thinking of the wild water site, which right now is, well, it's been parcelized. No, you wouldn't have it on Highway 17. It would be in the back. I don't think anybody, Mary Ellen, disagrees with that comment at all. No one, No one wants to see storage on Highway 17.

All I'm saying is I could go along with changing it from designated Sandy Lane to not running Highway 17. I don't know if that's going to apply to the general park.

Well, wasn't that what the kerfuffle was about when we said Sandy Lane was because whatever the application was? was going to be front 17 yes i mean my thought is that's why they said no no no it's got to be sandy lane yeah it seems like no matter how far back up the hill they pushed it and how many pretty places but yeah yeah still hell no we're not on 17. yeah so i think in other words i think if the language is changed to still actively say not know that hell no on highway 17 you know, the Phoenix reemergence of the kerfuffle that created the...

I would have no problem saying the location we're talking about here.

Yeah. But whatever we put in place, it's not just this location, it's the whole dadgum 17. Go ahead.

Okay, so what we need is a practical solution. We have an applicant who I guess we have been putting off and putting off and I'm sorry, sir, I was not aware that we had a formal application. Okay, so is there a way to get his application as a exception to the use table?

No, we can't do it.

Because we have a lot to fix with regard to the storage. We need to fix the use table to make 17396.8 apply there, assuming it's not already there in some more official version of the code. We need to change the parking code. to accommodate what I think we're all thinking can happen. But we need to retool the language in 17396.8. I think that probably could happen pretty quickly. But it seems to me that it's got to be all of the package. I frankly would include the outdoor storage component because why do this piecemeal? How close are you being to wanting to build? Yeah, we'll let you talk. This is a workshop.

Based on this one text, we're ready to move forward with civil design engineering. I'm not necessarily retained by it. I am the applicant. I work for G3 Engineering and Surveying. we will be the civil engineer designer for the project. So as we were planning through this, looking at the parking, the landscaping, the drive aisles, the stormwater, based on that parking regulation, it really renders all sites just not valid. It's just not economically or practically feasible to do that use. So in working with Mark, we said, you know, obviously we don't want the commission or the ordinance to curtail to us, What is the most reasonable solution for that? We've worked with Mark. Mark's been great. You know, one of the concerns was the visibility from the 17 corridor. Fortunately for that, on our side, it's not necessarily an issue, but I agree wholeheartedly. And just a little bit of background. I have some experience in planning zoning as well. I was a former planning director for Horry County before I went to work. So very familiar with this. Mark, I apologize. I've been through this code. um no fault to anybody's own zoning code it's extremely technical it's it can be extremely difficult to read and i wholeheartedly appreciate the uh the willingness to go through it clean it up it's just you know unfortunately my client is wanting to press forward and this is kind of one of the things called crossfire but i appreciate the opportunity to address the board and if there's any concerns any comments that we can take under consideration we'd be more than glad to oblige okay

thank you very much yes ma'am i i apologize no apology um it's just awful delayed you so do we need to talk further about this i've got a lot of notes i think i've i've got i think i've got it nailed down yeah we're gonna do the outdoor storage my son you know miriam sure

helped me remember this, but I think that when we had the previous person who wanted, previous people who wanted to put storage on property that was facing 17, a lot of this was written for that purpose because everybody was in uproar and like, no, no, no. So at that time, That storage facility, if I remember correctly, had an outside storage component to it, which is why that piece of it is there. And so, if this never made it to .

But it's just not. It's not on this use table. It should be. So you know what happened?

You know what happened? Okay. I'm going to tell you what I think happened. So right above miniscurrent, it's called medical or dental lab. And its applicable standard is 17396.8. I don't think. any of what is in 17396.8 applies to a medical or dental lab. I think we've just got a misalignment. It's also research.

Science labs, green printing.

I think we've got some sort of goof It's almost like everything. Oh, wait a minute. Everything is. It's being applied to so many different things.

It was on an Excel spreadsheet.

It was somebody.

Somebody copied it and ran it down.

Yeah, yeah.

I've done that.

Yeah, it's a move. It's a point just right down the line. Yeah.

Well, I don't think we've had a whole lot of applications for science labs.

Okay. How do we fix it?

Okay.

So I think we fix it by amendment to 17396.8, which accomplishes the things that we've been talking about.

He's got that. I've got that one.

We've already got the language change for 17420, which changes the, adds the parking code. And then the use table needs to be amended to have the applicable standard be the 17396.8 as well as 0.42, because that does have application. And then also in the use table, the parking code needs to change to U from R. Yep.

Yeah. Maybe someplace in the resolution that goes through with this, we can use the term correcting an administrative error for the chart thing. Because that's basically, I think, what it is.

Absolutely. I think so, too. I think somebody clicked that on an Excel, because I've done it, and they didn't realize they were dragging it down and populated all the cells below.

One of the things on the laundry list that changes is to correct an administrative error on the chart.

And then get it published online, dadgummit. Whoever's in charge of that.

This horse is now blue. No, no, no, no.

Okay, so just so this gentleman knows where we're going.

So we need to bring this back with new language and then

What's the soonest we can have our public hearing so that this doesn't sit too much longer? First meeting in September.

On the meeting in August, you're going to approve the modifications as I bring them back to you, and you're going to request setting a public hearing. We don't have enough time to get in that public hearing for the August meeting because of the noticing requirements that we have.

Okay, so that the business item in August was to set the public ear.

Please, please, please, when you're writing this, make sure that there are not going to be unintended consequences or other properties so that we don't have to say, no, Mark, this isn't right. We've got to do it again. I will do that.

I mean, that's reasonable to ask. That's reasonable to ask. As far down the road as you can see with any of these changes, you've got to do that. And what we're really doing is we're really painting the C1 district allowances for many stores in very, very, very few locations. And that's fine. as long as you're not spot zoning it for only one parcel. Yes. Parking, we're going to have west side only. We're going to have no outdoor storage. We're going to have 150 feet from whatever the right-of-way is. I'll find the Sandy Lane portion, which is the 17396.8. So I'm going to bring all of those back to you as one inclusive package.

And we're saying that it will not impact the current storage facilities that are east of San Francisco. No, it won't say that. No, I'm not saying you're going to write that down. I'm just saying that the reality will not have an impact on it. That's right.

They will become legal now before they're used.

And if they sell their property, they can sell it and continue to use it into perpetuity. And that verbiage is in our ordinance now?

Yep.

Okay.

I just want to make sure so that we're not at the next meeting going, oh, we got to do it.

Because I'm used to so many ordinances that I work with that tend to have a common rhythm. The common rhythm is that as long as the use is continuous. And in some codes, continuous means that if the site sits vacant, unused for six months, it reverts back to the permitted use.

I think that sounds like there's something to that effect.

Yeah, along with change of use, change of ownership. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Sean. Appreciate you. Yes, sir. Thank you.

Okay. Moving on to our next topic, which also involves the youth table, which John was the one that raised this, but when I was looking at what he raised with me, I found that we have, surprise, surprising, inconsistency. in our use table so in our use table we have um both gas stations and auto auto auto uh service service yeah and the gas station was a permitted use and the auto service station is a um Conditional use. Conditional use. Right. And when you go to read the conditions on the conditional use, it is the description of the facility is very clearly a gas station. And so what I am suggesting is that for gas and service station, we just tell the reader to look at auto and then they accept the permitting. I don't know whether that's the correct way to do it or we just eliminate gas station altogether. I would make it so that it was easiest for the user and perhaps the user is looking for gas station first. I don't know.

Not sure. I did a little research on this prior to coming to the meeting, and here's what I came away with. The gas stations and the auto one are not the same. The auto one is a throwback to what we used to see all the time, and that was a gas station that had roll-up doors and lifts that they were actually working on the cars. That was the gas station back in my day. That is the one that's included under auto. to work auto, if you look at that one. That reads to me as it's the one with the roll-up doors. I haven't seen an application for one of those in 30 years. The gas stations now are simply refueling, and now instead of the bays, it's a convenience store. So it's usually gas, convenience store, combo, thing going on. You strike out the auto one from the... And make gas station conditions. Make gas stations conditioned, and I have some really draconian conditions that we could place on gas stations that would make them really pretty if they ended up getting through the process. Do any of you know what a reverse gas station is? A what? A reverse gas station. I haven't seen one in this part of the state. A reverse gas station is the convenience store is up front, and the pumps are behind. You don't see the pumps going down Highway 17. The pumps are hidden behind the building. And I can show you pictures of them, and they are built across the United States, and they are, for a gas station, they are gorgeous. because the building, the architecture, is what predominates the site, not the fuel pumps and the canopies, which is what we're all sorely used to, even if it's a refuel, even if it's a, what's the other one that I like? There's refuels that are kind of nice, and there's the other one.

I mean, Racetrack has nice ones. Racetrack, yeah. Fleet, is it Fleet that, Sheets. Sheets in the northeast is another. Yeah, but the bottom line, they all have the big old canopy, the gas station, and they're over lit for safety, which would be the same in the reverse, but they would just be behind the building.

I'm not proposing that unless I could go that far, because I will tell you that every gas station heretofore who would come to town, who would find that they'd have to do a reverse gas station, would reverse himself right out of town and go someplace else. Yeah.

So I understand your point, Mark, but I'm not sure I buy the idea that the auto service station that's in our code was so old that it was written for something that maybe was in the last century. Because it's a code change that occurred in 2021. And it describes things that match what you've described as your typical gas station these days, even though It doesn't mention anything about a convenience store connection to it. But I'm afraid if we took out auto service station that we are having maybe some of those unintended consequences where we are impacting something in town that technically fits parts of the auto service station, but may not be just the provision of gas.

I understand what you're saying, and I don't disagree with what you're saying. What I'm suggesting is that if you look up the auto service station use in the code, which is under 17-396.3, one of the conditions is, and it's the last condition, which is what made me think of, they're thinking about fixing cars, all wrecked. or disabled vehicles awaiting body or fender repair or legal disposition following an accident are currently licensed except those waiting for legal disposition and are stored in an area separate from the adjoining properties and public streets by a planting screen, a fence, blah, blah, blah. It just goes on and on. That to me suggests to me the old type of gas station where we had junk cars, right? Am I missing something?

Yes, but I don't read those. conditions or provisions as saying every facility covered by this has to have all of those different aspects to them. So I think that this regulation or this ordinance is currently written would cover a gas station like the Circle K, but might also cover DeFalco's or Beach Boys Auto and things like that. And so why not leave it alone?

Only because I don't know the uses that you're talking about, so I have some loss here. But are there gas pumps in front with repair bays? Alcoves have gas pumps. I don't think they do.

I think they just have the repair.

auto repair business, not an auto airport of gasoline.

If I can make a suggestion based on this dialogue.

Yes, an auto service station.

Leave them both and just make the gas station one a conditional use and reference the conditions that we're talking about, okay? And just because there is a distinct difference and each addresses the idiosyncrasies of its respective its respective use, then leave them both in there. But the whole point that I was making about gas stations was to make them conditional. And right now, the gas station, the gas and service station under retail service is permitted. It's not conditional. So given that they seem to both have unique value applicable to their unique uses, then leave them both in there. but make the gas and service station. We put a big old C over here in C1 and C2, if those are the two that it's, no.

It shouldn't be in C1.

C1, yeah, just C1.

Not C2.

My bad. Everything else had permitted in both. But we make it a C in C1, and then over here in the applicable standards, that's where we develop, you know,

the this better look no that's the better looking gas station yeah okay let's get it proposed okay i can support that yeah all right we'll leave them both we'll leave the auto going alone because it's already conditional and we'll modify yeah the gas station station and fuel gas service station to see and come up with some conditions uh that makes sense for us controlling the look and the appearance of fuel stations.

And maybe the title of it, instead of it being gas and service station, maybe it's gas and convenience station. Because that's what they all are now. And then you put in the appropriate language. This better look good.

I'll get that one ready for you.

So that says to me, if you change the name like that, are we creating a problem with a use that is a convenience store somewhere in the U.S. table? And so I think we probably are.

I agree. Because there's also like fast food restaurant ones.

We don't need a Domino's at that time.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, I'm looking at it now. It would be under retail and service, right? And there's nothing in here that says convenience store.

I don't know. I do a word search. Well, I'm doing a word search right now. I'm doing it right now. Convenience store and general store is under food and convenience store.

Is what?

Convenience slash general store is under food and convenience store.

Oh, okay. I didn't see what the food and convenience store said.

Hospitality fee is applied to convenience stores.

Food and convenience stores, it's a whole section.

Well, okay.

Do we have to, Madam Chair, do we have to research this during the meeting?

Because we have two additional items to review and one is pretty big.

Yeah.

Can we move on, please? Can we move on? John can do his homework offline and come back.

I appreciate you collaring my enthusiasm.

We'll keep it gastric. Wouldn't want you to seem that motivated. Keep gastric.

Keep it gastric.

Okay, move us along to open the displays. 17, 12, 312. Yep.

I guess I'll start the discussion.

I did the best I can to modify what I had quoted before based on my notes of that meeting. Unfortunately, I cannot access the recordings.

So that's another problem. I was not able to take advantage of what might have been more specifically said that I didn't have in my notes.

Anyway, I did this redrafting. Primarily, I separated C3 and 4 out from C2. And I took the requirements that apply to all districts and made it more of a laundry list. And added encroachment permits for the sidewalk area along Switchside Drive. And then I floated this language to Director John Adair to see what his thoughts were, since we knew from our meeting in May, we had marked that John Adair was not particularly fond of the, well, maybe that's being, who, that he was actually, I think Mark's work was he was opposed to this idea. And so anyway, I sent it to him to see what his thoughts were on my redirected version. And we all have his email response. And then he was, referring to the encroachment permit for a sidewalk cafe and pointed to things about retrieving objects. My thinking was, this is not a sidewalk cafe that's being proposed. So most of the stuff having to do with the sidewalk cafe has no application. There's no reason to, fence it off because alcohol might be served and things like that. I know that encroachment permits are issued for certain things along the sidewalk and the C2, but not along Surfside Drive. So I know that For example, the Salty Mermaid has some decorative stuff outside, not merchandise, it's like floral stuff, and they had an encroachment permit. That is her understanding because she got an encroachment permit for it. Anyway, I think they should be able to display their merchandise. The owner of the Shore Decor told me she had lost a lot of money compared to her money making the year before where this hadn't been an issue. She was, you know, displaying her limited merchandise outside, then signaled to the potential consumers or whatever, that she was open for business and what have you. She had also said that she thought that our C2 district was not sort of meeting the intent of having more retail in the area, and instead, because the retail establishments are not able to display merchandise, that for the most part, that area of Surfside Drive is populated by non-retail things like lawyer's offices going in, real estate things, and what have you. I think we need to make this change. I do think, oddly maybe, that as you make your way towards 17 in the CT2 district, that the merchants on the law firm side, they are putting their merchandise outside. to display. Now they don't have the, as I understand it, they don't have the town sidewalk issue that the folks who are along the bricked area of the sidewalk have. So I think we should make this change. I think The merchants, or at least this one merchant, and hopefully we would attract other merchants to come in, should be able to display their wares within limitations. And I don't think the limitations or the area we're talking about causes any problems. And it's a got the encroachment permit, whatever the permit requires comes into play too.

Then I'll stop talking.

Anybody have any other thoughts?

I just wanted to say that after I read that, I was very happy and that you met all my expectations of what we discussed at the last meeting. And I really appreciate all the work that you put in that because it was very clear that You were trying to show those businesses that we really cared about them and wanted to keep that as part of our culture in this city, which I really feel like that's a huge benefit when I go around that area. I really love it. And having stuff outside really makes it more of a drive and a feel for what that business is. So I, I agree wholeheartedly with all in Britain.

I'm going to be a little less sympathetic. It seems to me when you rent it, you know where your property line is. You don't rent it and then start asking for changes. And it also sounds just a little bit like a one person, one problem. I don't really like that either. I'm kind of concerned about what might be on Surfside Drive three years from now that we might not want there to spray up. I think it's a risk and I think it's the tenant's problem. They rented the building that has town sidewalk in front of it. I don't like the idea that the rules aren't the same on 3rd Avenue. I'm not gonna die on this hill, but if we go forward with this, I do think at the very minimum we must demand liability insurance.

whether that is part of the encroachment from it.

I don't know.

I would guess that it probably is. And yes, it should be. I don't have an answer for that, but that is something that I will investigate. So one question.

So right now, if someone wants to put something outside, they can apply for an encouragement permit and potentially be approved?

No. As I understand it, because the ordinance prohibits, it doesn't specifically prohibit, it only says the things that we are allowing for display.

And the allowance for display does not include the merchandise of the businesses in C2. So I also have some problems with it. I, number one, think that we've asked our public works director, and he clearly says he does not think that it would be wise.

He clearly does not think it's a good idea. I think we need to listen to that. I also agree with Mary Ellen's point that it does kind of feel like they're doing it for one business. And as much as I love that business, and I do, I do think that unintended consequences work. Businesses change in and out of those buildings frequently, some of them. I think we've got to be careful what we approve what we, you know, recommend. And I'm not in favor of it. As much as I want to support that particular business and all of the businesses up there, and I do, I'm not in favor of it.

Anyone else?

Yes, Scott.

um i agree with uh i'm actually glad you had a conversation with the business owner i think it gives a little bit of an insight on uh what it's like um that downtown area is a nice area i've ridden my one wheel over there it's pretty pretty interesting i do understand some of the concerns that melody and Mary Ellen have. However, I agree with Jeanette, and I'm actually pleasantly surprised at the ideas that he came up with here. And I support it within limitations. You know, I did read the letter from a public works director, and I understand where he's coming from, but also He's the public works director. I mean, they help create it and have to maintain it. That's the limitations of his viewpoints. So, saying all that, I support it more than I reject it. Thank you.

I'm going to place myself on the fence on this. One additional comment I want to make about Director Adair's comment. In full disclosure of his statement, he says, I believe allowing general merchandise to be displayed outside in this area would not be wise, as it takes away from the appearance of the streetscape. So he does say he doesn't think it would be wise, but he further states his logic behind that statement is it takes away from the appearance of the streetscape. I don't know how other people would read and interpret that, but to me, that's kind of a subjective opinion more than it is a matter of public opinion. works expertise, professional expertise, if you get my drift. Now, where he does lend specific opinions about things that are more in line with public, he mentions that he I believe that the three-foot limit from the facade is a good idea, which is in your recommendation. So he's saying, if you are going to do it, I like that. He also says, you know, we need to make sure that we maintain compliance with ADA regs, okay, and the clear path of pedestrian travel, he lists that as a minimum of six feet. which I assume the sidewalk is at least nine feet. So you'd have three feet of, you know, three feet from the facade and then six feet for the minimum pedestrian travel. And to maintain the setback requirements for uniformity across the whole area. And then in this part, I do strongly agree with Mary Ellen's statement that, you know, if it goes forward, absolutely it would require the liability insurance. He says to match up with the cafe sidewalk or sidewalk cafe requirements, but I don't know if, as you said earlier, if that is also part of the encroachment permit. But my point in the view of Director Adair's position is that I think The way I read what he's writing is his reason that he thinks it wouldn't be wise is more one of subjective observation than it is anything of professional regulatory type. And when he does talk about the professional and regulatory type things to consider, I believe that your recommendation it at least addresses them because you talk about, you know, no further than three feet from the facade. It's no closer than one foot to any doorway addressing part of the, you know, pedestrian traffic and a three foot and three, an encroachment permit is issued. So, you know, I'm on the fence with it as it is, but if you sought to add some additional language saying that it doesn't provide non-compliance with ADA and then inclusion of the insurance. At that point, I would tell you I'm fully in support of it.

One thing is I didn't say anything about ADA even though I know we, in our prior meeting, and I had notes of it, because I think it's a non-issue with the width of that sidewalk. There was, even if you measured out three feet from the building, there was still, more than four feet from there to even get to the tree planters that are there. So there's – and that's in the – not even, you know, half of the sidewalk or whatever.

Yeah, I don't know what the ADA credits are.

Yeah, so I was just trying to simplify because I didn't think it was a matter that – came to play because there was so much space there. But we could take the three feet down to two feet, and that would still allow for merchandise to be displayed. And I think this applies to more than one shop. uh because i think i think kb's farms um displays merchandise other than their farm related or agriculture related products and currently under the red they can display agricultural stuff and things like that but they can't put out their um jams and jerrys and you know things like although the honey might be considered but it doesn't come with yes it so so anyway i i think it does apply to more than one business at least on this side and it would i think allow the merchants on third to put some uh

material out. I don't know, that would be up to them to see how that would work. But if they're allowed to display floral stuff, it's not for sale in their shop.

It's just to signal, I guess, to the passersby, this business is open. So we've got this stuff out here that attracts your attention.

They do that today, those management companies have their planters with flowers and things.

Yeah, and I don't know why they haven't been, at least I haven't heard whether they've been sighted.

I only heard that short and cord got sighted. I don't know how that changed.

One of the lines in Jonathan's memos caught my attention, and that was that, this year we expanded the permit to allow a sidewalk investment of a decorative nature, planters, et cetera. Decorative nature covers the waterfront. All right, everything in Robin's shop is of a decorative nature. I'm not sure that's true with K-Bar Farms. Yeah, I don't know what some shop, as I said, a year or two from now is going to have as their merchandise. It may be totally. I just, you know, right here in River City, I can see lines of T-shirts, you know, and junk.

Or a lingerie store.

Thank you.

I mean, that's most certainly a retail. It's a very legitimate business.

Heaven forbid.

But do we want a mannequin out there with a teddy on?

Thank you. That's what I'm afraid of. It's very nice for Robin's shop, and it's very nice for . We're opening the door. That's all I have.

I do have one more. And I agree with, again, to the support that we're concerned about when this opens up for other businesses in the future.

And as far as Director Adair, I do think that we need to give him a little bit more credit than just saying that all he comes from is his public works hat. I think that Director Adair has been around this town longer than most everyone, if not everyone, on staff at least. He has been around for the conception of a lot of things and ideas. He even said for background, when we created the Surfside Drive Street State with the wider sidewalks, it was with the intention of council to create an attractive, walkable environment, which was attractive and safe. started putting in benches and, you know, doing more things like that. But I hope that they'll continue to do more of. I just think he's got more vision than anything. I think he does. So I don't want to discount his opinion because of that. I think he comes at it from an overarching higher picture than what we're giving him credit for. And I think he's coming at it with good intent, not just, you know, hey, I don't want room to clean up the sidewalks. I think he understands why things are the way they are and is trying to help us understand why it is the way it is. Now, can things change sometimes? Absolutely. I'm not in favor of this change but i do think we i think three feet is a lot the you know yes the sidewalk is bigger there but uh evidently they can already put out some decorative um pots or whatever i don't know what is con you know what is construed to be decorative but um i'm not in favor of it I'm still not in favor of it, but if we do it, then I think we need to have all of the restrictions that we're talking about and maybe smaller, but I'm not in favor.

I was just trying to look up what the requirements are for ADA. And as far as I can tell on sidewalks, accessibility on walking surface you know route must be at least 36 inches wide so i think we're well within that range you know like you said there's four feet even just to the planters so i don't think we're by any means encroaching upon the required ada i agree yeah yes something

Just kind of came to my attention here in the last minute or two since I made my last comment. So under Section 17.4.12, in Open Display, and then if you scroll down from Open Display down to, it's 4C, I believe. No, I'm sorry, 5C. You have a category that's temporary displays that's currently in there. And I think that this says it's in C1, C2, C3, so it doesn't specifically say the C2 downtown district. But there is the availability for Religious meetings or church properties or non-residential districts, that's C1, C2, C3, and this is for temporary displays. Fundraising events for local nonprofit organizations only in the non-residential districts, C1, C2, C3, and C4. And the last one, which is C1C, special sales promotional events for local businesses licensed in the BAM. So out In other words, outside of the C2 Surfside Drive downtown business overlay area, there's already a provision for special sales promotional events. Now, there are some limits to it. The displays provided for special sales and promotion shall require the issuance of the temporary certificate of zoning compliance, which I assume is

you know, similar to the encroachment. It's referenced in Section 17-208.

The more appropriate part that I want to mention is they can have these special promotional things for no more than 10 consecutive days, and they could get up to six of them per year So in other words, peak season in the summertime, they could do them consecutively and just use them all up during peak season. I guess what I'm trying to say is there may be a way already in existence for these businesses to display their wares

with the regulations we currently have for special sales promotion and events for businesses in the town you may be right i truly don't know and that would be a way to go but i think the fly in the ointment is none of this says it may be done on public property c1 c2 c3 but I think the implication is private property and C2 in that area. We're talking about doing things on public sidewalks. That might be a showstopper. I don't know.

And that's good. Mary Ellen, that's a great point because I'm reading this thinking about the applicability, not considering the fact that this doesn't stay either way. least what i'm reading doesn't doesn't specifically mention whether it must be on public or private property so maybe that maybe that's not a solution i was just i was just thinking well hey if there's already a way for them to do it and no it wouldn't be year-round but i mean let's face it if you're if you're running a retail business the biggest impact going to be guaranteed season and you know if this were applicable they could have up to six of them a year for up to um 10 days so that would be 60 days so two months out of the five months you know or four months i don't know what we consider peak season here

It's the uniqueness of C2, and it's the only place I'm aware of where the minute they step over their front threshold, they are on public property. Yeah.

I understand all the reservations, and I acknowledge that I have some of them myself, but if somebody can get an encroachment permit, to put a planter or a decorative item out.

How are we drawing a distinction there just because the decorative item might also be offered for sale in the store?

you know, business.

It's unfair that because, well, this wouldn't apply to KB Farms because, you know, they may have some vegetables. Well, the vegetables are okay because they are,

agricultural products different set of rules yeah that we that we are for some reason allowing that even though i don't think when that is adopted do you have any agricultural anything i think it's probably a different state law thing somehow just like the actor just like the forestation with the tree ordinance there are states

It's going to stick with the fact that it's not their property.

It's not theirs.

So we tell her about these encroachment permits. There's no open display for decorative stuff allowed at C2. So I don't know where those encroachment permits are allowed.

They get their encroachment permit from Public Works.

Okay. But I thought this ordinance and the encroachment had to work together.

Am I correct on that? If they get an encroachment permit, they're off to the races, pretty much. So, wait a minute.

So, um, sure to core would not have been cited, had an encroachment permit being issued. So she could display like attached to her building, uh, or at the, uh, right at the edge of her building, she could have displayed, I don't know, one of her fish things and KB, farms could display one of their craft items. And all they had to do was get an encroachment permit. So I've gone down this road for no reason whatsoever.

And what about the bar that Griffith, Griffin's that has their, or one of those places along there have a big sign out in the middle of the sidewalk to draw people in?

The sidewalk signs,

Like a sandwich board sign, yeah.

I think they're allowing sign limits.

Because that's not super good either. It is on public property. So I think whatever we decide, we have to make sure it's consistent because it kind of goes back to like the, you know, the golf carts where we allow this and we don't allow this over here. And then it makes us look like we're just, Favoritisms, you know, so bars can do whatever they want and management companies can have big pots of flowers and hanging pots all over. But somebody has a two inch decorative item propped up against the brick and we're all over them. You know, I just John, we're here. Well, sure, he's done his thing. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, he's probably like, oh my God. to explain some of this.

Okay. I'll try to convince him to come to a meeting. If not, I will meet with him and get some answers to.

Is Third Avenue different?

Yeah. Yes. And how does Open Display dovetail with separate but the encroachment doesn't really have any great details to it unless it's a sidewalk so the other aspect of this was dealing with um golf carts so we just left All of that go by the wayside.

No, I was waiting on that one.

As a secondary.

You're going to ask me to enforce that? Oh, my God.

As a secondary.

You don't have 12 golf carts out front.

Okay. So the message I'm getting is table this and talk to John Adair, but that doesn't deal with golf carts.

No, the one that you put in there for the C1 district is that they can only have 12 motorized vehicles. And I'm thinking to myself, oh my God, I've got seven of these establishments and they're all fighting with each other over who's putting out more carts than the other person. It's driving us insane. We're trying to enforce it equally, which is very, very hard.

There's no limit.

There is currently no limit. Isn't that why we're saying 12? She's suggesting that we limit it to 12. I'm going to enlist everybody on the Climate Commission to become a code enforcement officer. Help me count carts every morning on my way into work. And not just golf carts. We have used cart places on Highway 17 as well.

have to count used cars i think we got a place to rinse those sling things yes so that's so it's the new rule that we only do code that we're going to enforce because i still see cards go by every day with babies under their arms not secured at all the number one rule of writing code is don't write a code you cannot enforce it's trying to waste it so can i take pictures of that and send them to you

Of the babies in the carts? I see babies in carts all the time. Vaccines. Don't get me started on golf carts.

Yeah, that's crazy. To get back to what you said a minute ago, I think the golf cart display and the open display in C2 are two different animals entirely.

Yeah, I agree.

Because the C2 thing involves public property. The golf cart has nothing to do with public property. Right. Unless they approach on the right of way. That's something that can be enforced.

Yeah. No, I agree with you about that. I think in general, it's just two topics that are related because we're looking at. Just because of the terminology of it.

Yeah. Right. And technically, you could put the golf cart in C2. Even though.

I'll help you with that code enforcement.

I'm not kidding you. I'll go with Nick or Rick or whatever the guy's name is. I'll go down there and talk to that dude because I know the guy we're talking about. And he's also a very active member of the business community. And I about had a word with him at one of those meetings with no authority whatsoever. So I'd be glad to go down there and talk to that dude. Yeah, after his coffee wears off. Yes, please. But yeah.

I don't think you need to have your coffee. I'll have mine.

Thinking that we just need to thank

Either I need to give up on this or we need to explore more with John and David and see whether or not there's a way to make all of this work. And maybe it's just encroachment permits for the people on the Surfside Drive side of

Because the sidewalk cafes would be on the same public property, right?

The best of my knowledge, every bit of sidewalk along that strip is public property. So some things we say it's fine.

We don't try to dare that. So Mark, is anybody enforcing the C

two businesses that are at the curve with 17 over by the floyd law firm and 180 because those businesses are displaying merchandise that does not meet the current code what we what we don't know or what i don't know i have trouble answering questions

So I believe most of that display is actually on the property. It's actually not in public right of way. If it's in public right of way, then we have every right to enforce it. And if somebody wants to file a complaint, we'll be glad to go out and enforce it.

This ordinance, forget what I have put out there, but as it's currently written, it is not about private versus public property. It is just about whether or not you can display things outside of your brick and mortar store. And so that it covers the things like the golf carts that are outdoors and not within the brick and mortar. So those businesses are displaying merchandise that does not fall within the description that is currently in 17.4.12. So we'll call that a complaint.

Go again.

No, I mean.

I think it's not in conformance with this section. You're right. Exactly. The way it's currently written.

You're right. Either we blow everything up and we say, we're not going to enforce all this stuff, so we shouldn't have it and we should just ax it. Or we enforce it. Or we fix it so it's sensible and it takes into account what businesses want, and then we have something that probably has an enforcement threshold that's lower, because we have more folks in compliance because we've written a better regulation. I don't know.

Well, it sounds to me like you're volunteering to rewrite that part. I mean, that's what I'm hearing.

I heard that too.

Did you hear that? Yeah. That's what I heard.

I'm fine with redrafting things and what have you. I don't want to waste my time, but I do think it is a broader problem than just the public side. And so, yes.

It was brought to my attention under Section 17.4.12, and it's B.4.C. And let me read this here.

Okay, Scott, can I stop you one minute? Sure. Are you reading Current ordinance or what I said?

No, this is the current.

You don't have the current in your packet. It's got it right there. Okay.

This isn't found in the packet. This is not your. Yeah, yours is the reverse. This is the current.

Okay. Oh, I'm sorry.

Yours is red, right?

In the packet, you had the markup and the clean version of what I did. It did not have. It doesn't have the current.

Is yours in red?

But if you look at the .

It is in black. It's a red line.

It is a red line, which I circulated, but I also circulated a clean version of that red line. I did not circulate the current version of the ordinance other than as it's shown in the red line.

Okay, so this is your addition.

The rest is what I was proposing.

All right, thank you. So this version isn't highlighted like the other version I have, so we're good. Yeah, but I like your versions. Again, I mean, in old school, when I was a little kid, downtowns were in vogue. It was the place to be, and it was a festive, lighthearted, place to go. And, you know, I think lightening it up a little bit might not be a bad idea. And I love your additions. And I want to say that I was not discounting John Baer's credentials or his opinion. What I was saying is that take it into context of why he would to do that kind of work um and so he's one of many counselors i think as valid as any of our opinions for you know the director here and um his uh the former uh pnz director uh he's related to the former so she i'm sure has an opinion as well which is you know i had great respect So, you know, I think it would be wonderful if you had a conversation and from a perspective of the business, also from the perspective of residents who walk down that street and having a light, festive feel is wonderful, a downtown feel. And we're all uptight because we do, you know, we're working on all in these details, but if we could put our feet in the shoes

somebody's walking down the street i think there's something to going with the feel instead of just well this is public ground so you can't do this um you know so that's my opinion thank you okay i i will i intend to see what um john dare will do maybe he'll come and talk to all of us you know whatever but i'm definitely going to find out about encroachment permits and how it dovetails with this open display ordinance, because right at the moment, none of it is making sense to me. I do appreciate that we do want some way to attract customers to these locations. At the same time, no, we don't want the lingerie shop with the .

I think that's something you don't want to encourage.

But in terms of public works having to clean up and things like that, I don't think that that's an issue. because what we're talking about is these businesses displaying their merchandise. Well, they don't want their merchandise trashed. They're going to pull it inside every night and lock it up and who knows, maybe have one of their store folks in the vicinity of the doorway so that they're making sure that nobody pilfers anything, you know, because those are the kinds of things that I'm sure would concern them. So anyway, let's put this to bed unless you look like we have something more to say, Jeff. I have one last comment.

At the end of you investigating, perhaps editing things as you see fit. I would also suggest that we're a board of seven members. Each of us has our respective opinions. And my humble, and I mean that humble, suggestion is bring it forward. Let's vote on it. And some of us will vote for it. Some of us will vote against it. And that's what we're here to do. So the goal isn't necessarily to get everything to the point where we know before we bring it up, okay, everybody's going to vote for it, because there may be those of us that don't, and there will be those of us that do. Sure, sure. I mean, I know that's an obvious statement, but I just feel like sometimes when we get into the dialogue, we have different perspectives, and it seems like the objective is, well, let me try to put this together so everybody can agree, and you're never going to do that.

No, no, no.

At least if I had suggested that,

It's more of an impression.

I didn't mean to. I just know that there's lots of things that, as we go along, some of us won't have thought of. Like, I never thought of the lingerie stores in C2. Well, a friend of mine told me. Never even crossed my mind. Did you have something in mind about 18-year-olds? Yes, because during our last discussion, We talked about, for example, could the vape stores have their wares out in display? I think it was Larry who suggested that we mix that with regard to products that there was an age limit to buy. Obviously, I had to. limit the alcohol, at least I think I did that, because in certain areas you can consume and display the alcohol outside because they have like the sidewalk cafe permission. And so you can't regulate out of that the idea that they can't have So I hope I was honoring what was suggested and yet not creating an unintended consequence that related to the bars.

Anyone?

Chair?

Yes.

I haven't said a word today, so I have to say just a couple. Number one, this whole idea of encroachment onto the public way, I can't see that we can limit it just to cafes that are drinking on the public sidewalk and all that kind of thing. I'd rather see it expanded so that we will keep restaurants and retail over offices. I'd hate to see that gift shop turn into another real estate or law office because frankly, yeah, I'd walk by those and I wouldn't even look in the windows there. I'd rather be walking down that street and looking at pretty cool stuff to put in my house. But anyway, that's all I have to say. I can go either way on that. We'll see how it develops.

Moving right on to our next presentation.

Okay, I can walk through what I did with most of them, so I'll give you all an explanation. I am the source for whatever what's being proposed here.

So the change in section one, article one, section one is just to deal with the The issue of getting these posted on the downed red site, which we seem to have had in the Kashiba. And I'm hoping that this will hopefully resolve this. In section five, it seemed like removal of a commissioner was more appropriately placed in organization than in records, which is where I put them, and that's the language we currently have. I just pulled it out of Article 4 records, Section 3, and put it into this organizational area.

Madam Chair? Yes. Shouldn't that be Section 7?

Oh yes, it should. OK, I thought I was like yes, yes, OK.

I will never say that I am a good. Fruit breeder. I have been blessed on my professional life of having fruit breeders to come along with me. Same here. OK, in Article 2, Section 1, this is to return us to where we were. I'm not sure our prior amendments ever got posted on the town website.

Doesn't that happen every six months? That's what I was told.

No, it's not a code. It's not the MENA code. I do know, and just a full disclosure here, that the section three and section four have the language about new elections that we previously voted on and adopted earlier this year, but have never made it to the town website. Okay, so then in section three and four, of Article 2. I broke them out so that regular meetings without a public hearing are different than regular meetings with a public hearing. We talked a bit about this, I can't even remember when it was, but not long ago. about the idea of, I think it was related to that we thought maybe having votes on things following the public hearing and the comments would be a better practice than having those things follow things like gender approval, minutes approval, et cetera. So all I did was, create an additional business item following the public hearing. I like it. For those. And included some introductory language about the noticing the public hearing. Don't be confused by the fact that this is 5 p.m. because this is not the meeting time. It's the time for submission of the proposed agenda.

Okay?

The section numbering needs to be updated. Okay, where did that below go? 2-8, Section 8. So it'd be, we'd have to change the second Section 8 on public comments to number 9. But then it doesn't match. Does it? Okay, wait a minute. Down below. Are you in Section 4? Section, page 2, where it says Section 8. The seven was crossed off to eight, and then we have the next one, so section eight. Oh, okay. And then section nine, 5010 from the next page. Okay, you're right, I just didn't know.

There's a proofreader.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think Jeanette just volunteered.

I think that would be excellent. And then it should be section nine was just to add that the public comments during hearings are covered by a different thing than public comments during non-hearing.

First on the sections don't apply to the numbers up above them.

No, no.

But what the numbers that are in

These little bitty numbers under Section 3 and Section 4, what they apply to is the agenda. So when you see the, I mean, this agenda is not a good example, but the agenda order would follow those. That's very useful. I like that.

Madam Chair, since we're commenting on it, may I make one comment? Sure. And this is, I think we had a meeting where this was important. Should under section four agenda items for public hearing and regular meeting, should number six go before four so that we prove the agenda before anything else transpires?

and i don't know if this this is supposed to be an order or this is just what could come under a regular meeting like this one order right because that would follow the one above it then too like in section three we do the call to order the invocation the pledge the agenda and then the minutes approval wouldn't that be the same or should be yeah so six and seven would move seven is as important

Well, no, no, I mean, just to be consistent. We did it up here.

So let me offer this. I don't know whether this matters to anybody, but I went back and looked at the framing materials that at least I got when I had my training and In that was a section about planning commission meetings and the order of business that is in section three, save for the removal of a public hearing is exactly what appears in those training materials. And so I don't know its origin,

I can see where that would come into play. Here's where it would come into play. Public hearing item is something that's been publicly noticed and it's on the agenda and no agenda approval is pulling that thing off the agenda because it has been publicly noticed. So having the agenda approval after the public hearing item makes sense because once something's publicly noticed and on the agenda, the agenda is I don't want to say wrong, but it certainly seems inconsistent with everything I've ever learned about agenda approvals.

And should it be before business items?

Possibly before business items.

Related to the hearing, the whole idea was that you would pass the continuity of the discussion about whatever the topic was in the public hearing before you went a field to address other things.

Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I just noticed that.

Yeah. It's radical.

Closing the public hearing.

The change. Yes. Close the public hearing and move on. So here's the more, I guess, radical thing. And that is with regard to public care. So this is a sort of a debate that Mark and I were having about how something got noticed for public care. And so I think that what I have put in here is language that follows, adopts whatever marks thinking as to how it should proceed. In other words, if I understood it correctly, Mark has to be directed by us through a vote under a business item in an agenda before he goes out and publishes the notice in the newspaper. That's my understanding. That was not necessarily how we had been doing things. So anyway, I put this out here for us to discuss. Is this the way we want to do things? And the concept is not only is it a direction vote as a business item, but you don't even put that business item on an agenda until the topic has at least gone through one, none, has gone through a meeting where it was just a discussion item.

And let me add to that, and this is probably taking it, no, let me just add to that. What that does is it keeps the director and basically just decided on my own that I'm going to run a public hearing on an item that I haven't even discussed with y'all. Okay? So it keeps me, it keeps the director in check. In other words, I need to get a direction from the planning commission, and I bring an item to you, like this whole item with the self-storage. I could have simply just helped. I could have simply just taken that to public hearing. I could have just, I mean, if this wasn't here, I could do. I don't think that's the way we want to run business here. I think the way we want to run business is the item is discussed. We come to a kind of a general agreement of what it is and what it's going to look like. I bring you a draft. I bring you a new draft at the August meeting. And at the August meeting, you said, Looks good, Mark, set it for public hearing. That way I have about eight or nine days to publish it so that it's placed in the paper far enough in advance to hold the public hearing in September. That's the way I think we should do it. Have I done it other ways? Yes, I've been in other communities that don't do it that way. We've done it other ways than here. Yeah, I'm sure of that. It's a suggestion. It's a suggestion only. I just want you to understand what my thinking is. I might not have the right answer, but I want you to know what I'm thinking.

So I put this language in here. My main concern about it was where you have an application such as like, let's use the seven group as an example, where you're under the gun for a time clock, you can't, I don't think you can abide by this.

It's very difficult.

I think it's impossible.

Yeah, it's very difficult. It's not impossible.