Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

I think we're good to go. All right.

I'd like to call to order the June 17th, 2026 Planning Commission meeting. Lindsay, if you'd proceed with the roll call.

Yes. Commissioner McNevin. Commissioner Lindley.

Here.

Commissioner Wettick.

Here.

Vice Chair Wimmer.

Here.

Commissioner Kuhn. Present. And Commissioner Parachini.

Here.

All right. We do have a quorum present this evening, so we'll proceed with our agenda items. First on our agenda is announcements and Planning Commission communications. Commissioners, do you have any announcements or communications you'd like to share?

Nope.

Okay. Next on the agenda would be approval of minutes, but we don't currently have any minutes to approve. So we'll move on to communication from the public. If there's anyone here that wishes to testify on a non-agenda item, present or online, now is the time to do so. You'll have three minutes to provide your testimony. Do we have any? Okay. And we'll move on to our first action item then. First action item on the agenda is a staff presentation to provide information on the development of a five-year work plan for Tualatin's Community Climate Action Plan. Staff will incorporate feedback from the Planning Commission into draft prioritization criteria for the five-year work plan. Staff, if you'll please present your report.

Thank you. Do I need to do something to get the presentation up or? Sorry. Okay, thank you. I think I'm not in the Zoom here. Well, thank you for having me tonight. My name is Amanda Watson. I'm the city's Climate Action Program Manager, and I'm in the city manager's office. My position is pretty new. I've been with the city for about six months now, actually just about six months, started in mid-December. And like Vice Chair Lemur said, I'm here to present. an update on our climate action plan. I'll do a little bit of background in case this is new for some of you. Apologies to one of the commissioners was here for the previous meeting. So we'll get the same presentation again. And then I'll give a status update on kind of where we are with the plan and would love to get your input for that work planning that we are doing now. Thanks for getting the presentation up. All right. So just to kind of set the scene.

Do you want to give her the mouse?

Sorry. Thank you. That works to get extra challenging on you. All good. I can walk into dot com at the same time, I think. All right. So this is working. Spacebar. Spacebar. There we go. Okay, thanks. So why do we have a climate action plan? The short answer is that we are already experiencing the impacts of climate change here in Tualatin, as you probably are experiencing already. We're seeing hotter, drier summers, more heat waves like we've had in even just the past couple of days, and warmer, wetter winters with more intense precipitation, more atmospheric rivers. more winter storms. And these are having impacts on the health and well-being of our community members, on businesses, on our ability to provide city services. And so the city needs to respond to these impacts. And so the Climate Action Plan is our roadmap to help our community adapt to and lessen those impacts of climate change on our community and really to meet the needs of Tualatin today and into the future under changing climate conditions. Let's see if this works. It works now. Thank you. All right. So the climate action plan was adopted in 2024 by the city council, and it was developed over about two years. And we had a plan that was informed by climate science, by local data on our sources of climate pollution, you know, electricity use, population, all of this, and on a lot of community input. So there were a lot of different ways that the project team asked the community for their input to develop the plan. And there's kind of two main goals in the Climate Action Plan. One is about reducing our contributions to the problem of climate change. And so we have this goal of net zero emissions by 2050. And just, again, for a little bit of kind of the climate science behind it, when we say emissions, we're talking about greenhouse gas emissions, which is air pollution-like emissions. um carbon dioxide and methane these are the gases that when they're in the atmosphere and they're released into the atmosphere through the burning of fossil fuels and it creates this sort of heat trapping blanket right it's preventing heat from escaping the atmosphere that's causing global temperatures to rise that's driving extreme weather and so we really need to reduce our emissions of this climate pollution to make the problem not continue to grow larger. The other goals that we have are about preparing our community for those impacts we're already experiencing and that we know we'll continue to experience even as we try to reduce climate pollution. And so what this actually looks like in the plan, the plan is structured in terms of a number of strategies and then action. So we have 28 different strategies and 119 actions. It's a big plan. And this is why we need to develop work plans and why we need to prioritize, right? But we have the first three focus areas you'll see up here on the screen are about that preparing our community and making sure that our infrastructure, that our natural systems can adapt to the changing climate conditions. And then the next four areas focus areas are about reducing climate pollution, right? So reducing emissions from buildings, from transportation, from our urban form and land use, and from consumption, so food, goods, services. A little bit more of kind of what does this actually look like in practice, these are some examples of actions in the plan, just to give you a little better sense of what's in it. So these are examples of the sort of climate adaptation or the preparation strategies how we're adapting to climate impacts and we're their strategies in the plan, including. things like designing our parks so that there's adequate shade or access to water so people can continue to enjoy these spaces and these community resources even when it's hot outside. We have actions around emergency preparedness, working with groups like CERT to make sure that our residents have information about what climate hazards exist and how they can be safe and prepared for them. And we have strategies about increasing access to cooling for folks in their homes, right, making sure that people can stay safe and comfortable in their own homes, and how they can weatherize their homes again to, again, be more safe despite things like extreme heat or wildfire smoke or colder weather. These are some examples of the actions in our plan to reduce climate pollution, and they focus on making buildings more sustainable. So increasing energy efficiency in buildings, electrifying space and water heating, right? So moving away from the use of fossil fuels to heat our homes and buildings. supporting increased use of clean energy by residents, businesses, and the city. This is kind of where land use comes in, so building more walkable neighborhoods so that folks have options to conveniently and safely get around town without using cars. We know that we'll continue to need cars, but that we want to also provide people options to get around safely and conveniently in more low-emissions ways. And then there's a number of actions and strategies in the plan that relate to the urban forest. So increasing tree canopy, making sure our street tree species will continue to thrive even though it's hot and dry, right? Things like that. We actually just updated our street tree list this year. The Parks Department worked on that to make sure that they removed ash trees, for example, right? Because of the ash borer and they looked at trees that are going to thrive even with less water. All right. So for just a snapshot of where we are today. So the plan was adopted in 2024. And in 2024, city staff developed an initial two-year work plan looking at what was already in progress and what they could take on with the existing staff capacity and resources. And that was a list of 33 actions. And we presented an update to the City Council this spring and found that a majority of the actions were either completed and ongoing or in progress, well underway. So we're making pretty good progress already. Um, seven of the actions hadn't been started and the majority of those were, um, going to be funded by a federal grant that would have helped us, um, install more electric vehicle charging infrastructure and a number of related actions, um, looking at electrifying transportation. Um, that's on hold because that federal grant has been held up by the Trump administration. So, um, we hopefully will see that money someday, but unfortunately, um, it's, uh, being held up right now. Um, So two of the actions that were completed were developing new funding sources for the climate action work. And so that kind of helps us enable, enables us to implement other actions in the plan. And the city council approved two sources. One was called the Pennies for Climate Action Program. This is a 99 cent fee on city utility bills that's designed as an opt-out program. So all accounts are enrolled, but people can choose to opt out if they don't want to participate. So that is one source of funding that's dedicated to the climate action work. The other was a 0.3% increase on PGE's franchise fee in the city. And so that, again, dedicated to climate action work. And the idea is that these, you know, relatively small but still substantial pots of money will help us to add new areas of work that we aren't already doing that are related to the climate work or could serve as matching funds to get grants from the state or if we do see federal grant opportunities in the future. We also do have general fund money going towards climate action related projects. But these other new sources of funding will help us accelerate the work. They also added a staff position, which was my position. And so again, kind of this first couple years was building the foundation for climate work. and adding actions that we had the staff capacity for at the time. So turn to today, we're coming to the end of that 2026 plan, which was through the end of this current fiscal year, which is June 2026. And the city council has asked that we develop a five-year prioritized work plan. So what are the actions we want to take on in the next five years? out of those 100 plus actions in our plan. And that's what I would love to get the planning commission's input on. So the process that we've put together to develop this work plan starts with developing criteria. So how do we actually want to prioritize those actions? This is a way we approach a lot of things in the city, like our capital improvement plan, right? Or when we're looking at transportation system projects or prioritizing use of the park utility fee, we want to start with like criteria, what How do we want to prioritize these actions? We'll then apply those criteria to the actions in the climate action plan. We'll get that short list of prioritized actions and then develop metrics for them to put together a work plan. The idea is to have this done by the end or the goal is to have this done by the end of this fiscal year, or excuse me, this calendar year, not fiscal year. Yes, this calendar year, thanks. So that it can inform budgeting for next year and the city council goal setting process and that sort of thing. So we're trying to trying to get it done within the calendar year. And so we have a staff group. We have representatives from all our different city departments. And then I'm also talking to a few of our advisory commissions and city council. We have developed a draft list of prioritization criteria, which is in the packet i think that you all got ahead of this meeting um that came out of the staff group and i'd love to get input from you all we've also talked to the idea commission um and the the tea park twelton parks committee um for their input as well um so the draft that we came up at up with looks at um prioritizing actions based on their climate impact. So really how well they advance us towards those two big goals of the climate action plan, either reducing climate pollution, reducing emissions, or reducing the risk from climate impact. So preparing our community. Um, another criteria is about co-benefits. So in addition to those benefits towards our high level climate action goals, are there other benefits of a particular action, right? Does it create jobs or economic opportunity? Does it contribute to health and wellbeing? A big one in that category would be an action might help reduce air quality or air pollution, right? Other types of pollutants besides carbon dioxide. Um, does it improve ecosystem health, you know, create wildlife habitat, Or does it reduce disparities, right? We have actions that are focused on helping low-income folks access resources to weatherize their homes, for example, and that helps reduce disparities within our community. The next criteria is alignment with city council goals or adopted master plans, right? So things like our transportation system plan or a stormwater management plan. This is sort of about efficiency, but also alignment with the city council's overall goals. And there's a criteria about feasibility and this look we're trying to get at sort of how difficult, is it how much effort, would it be to implement this action in the next five years so looking at something. Looking at Community support is there existing Community support for an action, do we have existing staff capacity, do we have funding available. And again, this is just a way to rate an action. So we wouldn't necessarily not do something because there wasn't funding or staff capacity available, but it gives us a sense of what we would need to do to get it done in the next five years. Implementation cost and then opportuneness or timeliness. It's a little bit awkward wording, but what we were trying to get at here is understanding whether or not there was an opportunity to partner with another organization on a project that relates to an action in our climate action plan, if there's a funding opportunity that's available in the next five years that we know that might not be available beyond that, or if an action needs to happen first, right? So do we need to do a study before we act on that study, right? We want to do the study in the five years so we could later do the next related action. So that last criteria has to do with whether or not doing it in the next five years makes it more efficient or effective than waiting to do it later. So that's our draft list criteria. I'd love to get any input feedback you have on that. Does that feel like the right list? Are we missing something? Is there something you might remove? But also, I've just talked at you for quite a long time. So if you have any clarification questions or questions about the climate work in general, I would love to hear them. Thank you.

Maybe the microphone, make sure you. Yep.

Out of curiosity, do you have any information available since we started it in 2024, if we were going for that zero emissions, if we had made any progress toward it yet in 2025? That's a great question. Where that kind of thing would be available if I wasn't me? Oh, that's a great question.

Yeah, great question. Unfortunately, we don't have the data. So we did a greenhouse gas emissions inventory. So that's sort of how much, how big are our emissions now? Yeah. I think it was 2022 or 2023. So to develop that plan, but our schedule is to do that every five years. So we don't have it yet, but you know, we have the high level. Exactly. We have our baseline. Yeah. Which I don't know off the top of my head, but I'm happy to email it to you if you're interested. Yeah.

Go back to that slide with the prioritization.

Yes. Remember your mic. Oh, right.

I think it just happened.

It's because I have Cheetos on. You're asking for questions on how it should be prioritized with that, I guess, looking?

Yeah, yeah. Does this feel like, yeah, this was our initial draft, but does this feel like the right list? Would you change things? Do you have questions, concerns? Yeah, just looking for feedback.

Um, my personal opinion is that we, I'm imagining we're going to have very limited resources and funds for a certain time being. Um, so that possibly with climate hazard risk reduction would be something that I would put higher on the prioritization. Um, but then also still looking at projects that are low hanging fruit things or options to, um, piggyback with other agencies on things, whether it's incentives or just getting that out so that we're not duplicating efforts, but still as far as the larger financial projects or bigger projects on there to kind of focus on the climate hazard risk. We can do this as best as we can at Or reducing how much greenhouse emissions that we do in Tualatin in general. But the biggest harm is probably going to come from massive flooding if the Tualatin River decides to do its deal again. Or when, really. So what big projects can we do looking at like a 500-year floodplain to... address that especially we're about to pump a bunch of money or the idea of revitalizing downtown with that project going on and that we should with that will probably be some major capital improvement projects uh so how do we take all capital improvement projects and like ensure that

Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. And I will say I'm going to be on the technical advisory committee for downtown revitalization, but I know the community advisory committee also had sustainability as one of their criteria. So we're working on integrating the climate goals into that project and into Riverfront Park. So we're definitely going to be talking about flooding, but that's a good, you know, it's a good point. Definitely have our eyes on that.

Yeah. Maybe making sure that The goals that we have within this project are being done in all the other projects going on, whether it's the road that we're talking about, changing up with the railroad to downtown to the riverfront park, making sure we're doing all we can with the funds we have so we're not wasting opportunities.

Yeah, that's a great point. Yep. And that's kind of what my role is at the city is to work across our departments too, right? Everyone's already doing a lot of work, some of which is implementing our climate action plan, but I'm helping to coordinate and making sure that we can integrate those goals into the city's work, just like for the transportation system plan, right? We'd also be integrating those goals into other projects and other departments.

Yeah. I had a question for Amanda. Are there any outliers among pollution sources in Tualatin? Obviously, motor vehicles and fossil fuels are the prime ones, but are there any surprises? Are there any industries, areas, sources that might not seem completely obvious could be addressed in a different way?

That's a good question. In terms of the big sectors, buildings is actually our biggest sources. Transportation is a close second. But it's buildings and among buildings, commercial buildings are bigger than residential. So we do have a number of strategies in our plan that look at reducing emissions from residential buildings. And that's particularly want to lean into the co-benefits, right? How do we make people's homes safer and healthier at the same time that we're making them more efficient. But I think there's a lot of opportunity for us to work with businesses to understand, you know, what they can do to reduce emissions and, you know, maybe to reduce energy, right? So they can also, you cut their energy bills at the same time, right? So I'm trying to find those strategies to kind of help businesses in a difficult economic time, but in a way that can help them reduce their emissions. The other potentially surprising one is consumption. So our emissions inventory looks at not just local sources, but sources that Tualatin as a community is responsible for that happen elsewhere. So when we, you know, the food that we eat, the goods that we buy, those emissions aren't necessarily, the pollution is not being generated here in Tualatin always, right? There's farms outside or we might be buying things that are made in China, but we're responsible for those emissions. And that's a big piece of the pie as well. That is difficult for us to get at. But there's certainly educational campaigns, you know, we can do things like the library has a library of things, right? Or people can borrow tools instead of buying them. So there's strategies that we can take to get at the consumption piece. But that can be a surprising one for people. I think when we look at kind of overall sources of pollution. Yeah.

We have a tool library.

Oh, yeah. We have the library of things. It's got some tools, but I don't know that we have a separate standalone tool library like you see in other communities. Yeah.

And there's neither the seat library, but they park. Yeah. Do you have things here at the Wellington Library?

Yes, we do. Yeah. And they can borrow from other libraries, too. There's certain items that are, like, only local, but I think a lot of them can be borrowed. So, like, board games and tools and kitchen equipment and that kind of thing.

Musical instruments.

The musical instruments, yeah. It's pretty cool.

I don't know if everyone got one, but I just got a new garbage guide or whatever it was, and it had a listing of things for repair fairs and other ways to connect to that too. Yeah, exactly. Now that I can put my pizza boxes somewhere not in the yard bin. Separate from that, I just was going to note in the packet that we received, the climate action plan was pointing to a public works page that doesn't work, but it is on an administration page that does work.

Yes.

So I don't know who's in charge of that, but somewhere, somebody link those two.

That's a good reminder that we have a new website. So sorry about that. I wrote the staff report before the website came live on Monday. So yeah, we'll have to switch some of our links, but the administration page is the new one.

Apparently it's having some growing pains.

We just went live Monday. The poor library people, I felt bad. We're updating some pages, but it will soon be...

Awesome. Administration is not the first place I would look for climate action.

Yeah. That's just because that's where my position is. But yeah, it's a, well, I think the search optimization will also improve as people use the website. So we'll get there. Cool. Awesome.

Andy, you had something?

Yeah. I'd like to piggyback on both Justin's and Alan's comments about the climate hazard risk reduction. I'm more fearful of fires, wildfires happening than the 100-year flood, even though it's an issue. But given what's happened both locally and nationally, wildfire concerns, I don't know if there's a wildfire plan for Tualatin or the district. Something, though, that should probably be near the top of the list. And on Alan's comment about greenhouse gas emissions, as you pointed out, and as I recall, the largest contributors, the buildings, and you said they're commercial. Realistically, though, Amanda, what in terms of incentivizing weatherization or conservation or sustainability, if PGE is not on board or Northwest Natural is not on board, the state, I don't know if they're issuing weatherization grants anymore. Realistically, what kinds of programs might be out there to implement the GHG part of this?

Yeah, that's a good question. There are still a lot of incentive programs. So a lot of our strategies are about making sure people are aware of them. And Energy Trust of Oregon is the big one we have here. They're funded both by Northwest Natural and PGE. So like all of the utilities, there's funds from those utility fees that go to Energy Trust. They have all sorts of incentives for residential, commercial, industrial energy efficiency. So the city can help get that information out there. We can help Energy Trust understand what our community's needs are. And there are some state programs, the funding has been sort of come and go over the years, but I'm tracking that too, just to make sure that-

the community I came from, they were well received. And a lot of people weatherized, replaced their windows, did all kinds of things. But it seems like the peak effort of that or the interest in that has kind of passed as well. And that kind of refer to that as low hanging fruit. So what's the experience here and what might we be looking at in terms of the next generation of kinds of incentives? Do you have an idea?

I mean, last I talked to Energy Trust, they had pretty good participation from Tualatin, but I think part of it is just framing those programs differently, right? So we had all these federal incentives that were getting people to install solar and install heat pumps and those are gone, right? And buying electric vehicles. But I think right now, I mean, people are concerned about energy bills, right? And I think telling people, here are some resources that can help you reduce your energy bills, right? And kind of helping people understand those benefits. They have climate benefits too, but that may not be the primary motivator. And so I think the same program, just helping people understand what the benefit is.

Are home batteries an option that could become viable in the near future?

They are. They're just expensive. And unfortunately we're seeing fewer, I don't know of any incentive programs right now. I know PGE is trying to see them happen and they might have some small sort of. Oh, they do. They do have.

Okay. Yeah. We've got an energy charger too. And they pay us to pull from the charger and they do these like peak things that you guys get or whatnot. So they steal it from our battery. It's hilarious. They give us a tenth of the sentence. That's true.

So you can, you can enroll in that. Yeah. But in terms of the installation. Yeah.

Are there any movement towards smart meters?

That too. Yep. Yep. Um, smart PG has a smart thermostat program, so they'll pay you, I think it's $25 a month to participate.

So, you know, I mean the meter itself on the house, they have those two weight meters.

We have one that goes forward and backward. Hmm.

Is that everywhere, or is that an option if you want it? That's what I'm asking.

That's because we put in the battery, and we told them they could take the battery from us instead of just to us.

Okay, but that's what I mean. PGE is not pushing that, or the city might not be pushing that sort of conversion, the smart rendering.

Yeah, I think we can share information about it. One of the challenges we have, you know, it's... I know this group talks about this a lot probably, is the building codes are set at the state level. So we can't often require these changes, but we can potentially incentivize them or share information about them. So those solutions are kind of out there and options are out there, but we can't require people to do that.

And so one last question. Five years from now, when you go out to try to measure greenhouse gas emissions, How do you do that? How do you know if any of this is going to have whatever kind of impact it might have? How do we measure what kind of metric, for example, for commercial buildings?

That's a good question. So things that we had a consultant do it the first time. And they look at things like what's our building stock like, right? We'll look at what the energy use intensity of, you know, the buildings in Tualatin. They'll look at vehicles miles traveled, right? We have data from the utilities about natural gas usage and electric usage, so we can do the calculations there. And, you know, ideally we would see energy use go down and that would help us, you know, we would, as things get more efficient, we'd see a decrease in the emissions intensity of our energy use.

But we should voluntary incentivize rather than regulate and

We do have some strategies and actions in the plan that are about regulation, about exploring opportunities to update our development codes, right? To incentivize or require more resilient type developments. It's kind of an all of the above. We also have some strategies in there that are about the city advocating that the state take action, right? Because there's some things in there that are out of our control.

Yeah, yeah.

So, yeah, it's kind of an all of the above.

So is the idea to take the 100 and some action plans and actually prioritize?

Yep. Yeah. The idea is to like apply these criteria to help us get get a sense of what are we what are the highest priority based on the criteria to take on in the next five years? Yeah, because it's, you know, we want to do some combination of those lower hanging fruit and laying the groundwork for some of the bigger actions going forward. So, yeah. Good luck.

Thanks for the questions. For 33 actions, she's already done six.

Reading through, it seems like some of the stuff like regulations of changing business practices, you guys seem to be holding on that just because the community outreach you got was people and businesses are still recovering from COVID and struggling. So is that part of the reason why? on incentives and support instead of just changing regulations and potentially putting people on a struggle.

Yeah, I think that's a big part of it. We will also see what does come out of this prioritization exercise, and we may see some of the regulations score really highly on the things that we care about and we want to prioritize. But for any of the actions in the plan, we'll have to approach them like we do any project, right? So community outreach, do the landscape analysis, and then kind of figure out where are we at um how do we approach this in a way that makes sense for where we are today but that's definitely that's the like the overall context of this work right now so yeah all right thank you amanda yeah thank you great questions appreciate it and thank you for the feedback i'm supportive of direction Okay, thanks. And you can always reach out with any other questions, comments, feedback. I'm always happy to hear from folks.

Amanda, who did the tree guide?

Tree revisions at Parks? Dustin Schall, so Parks director, was our project manager. And then we worked with Parametrics on the... It was Parametrics on the... updating the guide and doing some of the recommendations for that.

Oh, that's great. Really? So like leaps and bounds over the last tree list.

Yeah, I think they did a great job. I'll pass that along. I think you'd be happy to hear it, but yeah.

I mean, it's like a lot of stuff, like what Portland's or Peabody's tree list is, which is broken down on size.

Yeah. Has the maintenance considerations and all that. Yeah. Yeah. I'll pass that along.

long as we're not promoting bradford pears it was the number one thing on there bradford pears everywhere berry trees how many yards make a bradford pear forest no lived in the south please no more please anyway smell so great they just pop up everywhere they're great for allergies they're great for birds love them can we have any other questions for the staff

All right, we'll move on to the second action item, which is a staff presentation to provide an update on the project to amend the Tualatin Development Code for compliance with the Oregon Revised Statutes 197A.400, Clear and Objective Housing Standards, which is one of a series of state laws intended to address barriers to housing in Oregon. Staff, if you'll please present your report.

Great, thank you. And thank you for your time this evening. So staff are returning tonight with our project consultant, MIG, or M-I-G. And they've been assisting with this project to update the 12th Development Code with clear and objective standards for residential housing. Just a note before we get started that there's going to still be some additional opportunities to review the draft code. We're anticipating two more touch points with the Planning Commission prior to a formal adoption of the code. So tonight's just going to be an update on the project's progress, and then we're seeking the Commission's feedback on a few policy questions. Tonight we have Kate and Keegan from MIG who are joining us virtually. And if they're online, I will go ahead and turn it over to their team.

Relax.

All right, yeah, we're here. Thanks so much, Madeline, and good evening, Planning Commission. Nice to be here with you tonight. I'm going to bring the presentation up on the screen. All right, great. And just so you know, I'm working on a single screen, so I may have a hard time seeing the presentation and you all at the same time. So if you need to stop me, please just say something, because otherwise I might not see you raising your hand.

And just a reminder, sorry, Kate, for folks in the room. Since Kate's online, she can only hear you through the mic. So if you're interrupting, just make sure to turn on your mic, flag her down. Thanks, Kate.

That helps, too. All right. Great. Thank you. All right. So Madeline gave a great intro to the purpose of tonight's session, but I'll give you just a quick overview of the agenda and a little bit more background. So again, we'll review the project purpose and kind of where we are in the process. We will provide just a high level overview of the draft code amendments that we've been working on over the last several months. We'll report back on the discussion that we had with you all back in January and with the city council. and the direction that we got from you and from city council on some of the policy questions we had for you at that time. And then we'll have a couple of additional or follow-up policy questions for this evening as well. So this is something that you've just heard and I think you already know, but the purpose of this project is to update the development code to create an adoptable code that meets statutory requirements around clear and objective standards and approval pathways for housing development. And this work was funded by a state planning grant through the Department of Land Conservation and Development or DLCD. So this is where we are in the process right now. We're meeting with you and we'll be meeting with the city council next month in July. Over the last couple of months, staff has also been meeting with a couple of or had a couple of focus group meetings with folks involved in local development in Tualatin to kind of review some of the questions and drafts of the code amendments that we've been working on and to kind of get some initial feedback from those folks as well. So I believe there was a summary of those meetings and kind of the key takeaways in your packet for tonight. And so we've been working on the draft code updates. We'll get some feedback from planning commission and city council, and then we'll work on revisions that might be necessary to address any comments or any additional feedback from staff over the next several months and then be headed towards the adoption process and public hearings later in the fall. So just kind of a brief overview of all of the draft code updates. You received a packet that had a lot of amendments, a lot of pages. This project kind of touches many of the chapters of the development code. But here are some kind of categories of the types of changes that we made. One is to review procedures. So in particular, we revised the procedures for multifamily housing. and created a new design departure process. We'll talk more about that later in tonight's presentation. And we also needed to reflect some recent, some very recent changes to state law that were passed in this year's legislative session. So again, we'll talk more about that shortly. We related to land use categories and allowed uses. We clarified some of the distinctions between retirement housing, that's really just kind of age restricted standard, you know, maybe it's multifamily housing, Maybe it's a different form of housing, but it's meant for retirees versus congregate care type housing. So kind of separating those two use types. And then we made some targeted changes to where multifamily housing and retirement housing is allowed. And again, we'll follow up with a little bit more detail about that shortly. Also related to multifamily, we updated the design standards. There were some changes that were needed to make the design standards fully clear and objective. And we also added new purpose statements and applicability statements to facilitate the design departure process. And we made many changes to other development and design standards, again, to make sure those were all fully clear and objective, or at least there was a set of clear and objective standards with opportunities for some discretion through the alternative path. So we revise things like setback requirements, some parking kind of design standards and access sort of public facility related provisions to make sure those are measurable and enforceable as is required by state law. And then there were some updates to some definitions and some other kind of more technical cleanups, updates to partition and subdivision criteria and some other technical corrections. So today's focus is on a couple of key policy questions that we have flagged for your input as well as City Council's input and direction. So following up on that January work session where we received some policy direction from you all, if you recall, we had some discussion about the two-track system of review criteria and standards. So we had some questions for you all about that system. And this two-track approach is where you have clear and objective standards and criteria and kind of a parallel set of discretionary guidelines and discretionary approval criteria. So in the current code, single-family housing and middle housing both have those two kind of distinct review tracks, but multifamily housing currently only has one set of approval criteria and design standards. So what we heard from you and from the city council generally is that you want to have applicants need to have options for flexibility and some discretion where they are seeking that out. It's preferable to avoid kind of an all or nothing approach where applicants have to choose either all cleared objective standards or all discretionary standards. So if we're thinking about kind of a new process for multifamily housing, not having to choose kind of one or the other track is the preference that we heard. um in general applicants so we hear from staff um tend to want to limit the uncertainty in the application and review process and so they're typically more likely to choose the clear and objective path and standards that's the more kind of straightforward approach um there's you know fewer opportunities for issues that might come up during a public hearing. So that's kind of the more straightforward and preferable approach. However, multifamily development needs some options for flexibility if we're making the standards clear and objective. So the way the draft responds to that kind of direction and those findings from the earlier code audit work, we have, again, updated the multifamily design standards to be fully clear and objective. We have added purpose statements for each design standard. And then we've created this new design departure framework. And that... Design departure process is really laid out in the procedures chapter under architectural review. So this is kind of, these are opportunities for flexibility as part of that architectural review or design review process. And we're calling these design departures to kind of differentiate them from modifications or adjustments, which, you know, other codes have those options. And this is specifically for design standards. That's why we use the term design departures. The current code also has variance, an option for variances. But variances require you to demonstrate some sort of hardship. Like there are some physical characteristics of your property that make it really unfeasible to meet all of the clear objective or the standards in place. And so in those cases, you can seek out a variance. But unlike that, the variance option, there's no need to demonstrate variance. a hardship, you just need to demonstrate that your proposed development still meets kind of the purpose of the standards. And in accordance with the direction that we received, design departures, at least for now, are limited just to multifamily development applications. And that was kind of the approach we had as a recommendation was to kind of keep keep it limited just to multifamily for now to kind of test it out and see how it works. And also to kind of limit the scope of the changes as part of this project, which is kind of a limited project. But if it's working out well, maybe those design departures could become available for other housing types or other development types in the future. But for now, just sticking with multifamily. So this is just an example of how the design departure option will work. So currently there are some standards in the multifamily requirements related to children's play areas. So we've added a new purpose statement related to providing safe usable and appropriately scaled outdoor play areas for children that support active recreation and contribute to overall site livability. So that's kind of what we concluded was sort of the purpose of those standards. And then there are some specific requirements around the minimum size. So a minimum of 150 square feet per dwelling unit. And there's also a standard, a new standard proposed that would require at least two different children's play amenities or equipment. that are approved for use in a public playground. So making sure that there is at least some kind of play features that would be suitable for a public park. At least two of those features need to be included to meet the clear and objective standards. So if an applicant wanted to maybe do something a little bit different, they might request a departure on that standard and maybe propose a smaller play area that wouldn't meet the 150 square foot per unit requirement. And maybe it wouldn't include two types of, you know, publicly approved playground equipment, but maybe they're proposing a smaller area that maybe has more kind of innovative nature play type features that's more integrated into the landscape. That sounds like a great proposal, but it doesn't meet the specific clear and objective standards. So to have their departure request approved, then they would need to demonstrate that the request equally or better meets the purpose of the standards, so that this purpose statement here, and also that any negative impacts I think in this case, probably there wouldn't really be negative impacts, but you could imagine some other types of standards that might lead to potential impacts, say, on abutting properties, things like that. So that's just an example to let you know kind of how that's intended to work. Okay, another topic that we wanted to report back on that we heard from, we discussed with you all back in January was this issue of multifamily housing and retirement housing in the low density residential or RL zones. So currently those housing types require conditional use approval, but that is a discretionary approval process that is not allowed as the only pathway for those housing types in that zone. So the code needs to either be updated to either allow those housing types by right with some potentially new clear and objective standards, or you need to prohibit them. So you kind of have to choose one or the other. So there was a robust discussion about this topic at that earlier work session. We heard a lot of support for senior housing options. That was kind of one of the key things that we heard from that discussion. We also heard that it's recommended to regulate retirement housing the same as any other type of comparable housing. If it's the same housing form, it's just meant for a certain age group, then they really should be regulated the same way. So if it's multifamily housing, that's for 55 and up. That should just be regulated as multifamily housing. As opposed to congregate care facilities, which are things like assisted living facilities that have maybe more staff on site, they might have more different kind of parking or access, drop off, pick up, kind of loading needs, and might have other different kinds of impacts than just typical housing. And that those types of users should be regulated differently. um and so the conclusion the direction that we heard was to prohibit multi-family housing including multi-family retirement housing in the rl zone there's a lot of discussion about this but that was kind of the conclusion that um that a bigger change to allow these uses outright again not through the conditional use process where you would be evaluating impacts and, you know, compatibility with surrounding properties and development, that it would be better just to prohibit those uses, at least for now, and maybe consider bigger changes as part of a future effort. So, How the draft responds to that direction, we again have separated retirement housing from congregate care facilities in the code and the way they're defined. We're allowing retirement housing wherever comparable housing is allowed. And we're retaining that conditional use requirement for congregate care. But then for multifamily housing in the RL zone, multifamily structures changed from conditional use to not permitted. And same thing for retirement housing facility. So you'll see those changes in your packet of amendments. Okay, so that's the kind of recap of where we are. And now we have some additional policy questions for discussion, so. We are talking about multifamily review procedures. So this topic is a little bit technical, and it's a little in the weeds of the planning process. So if you do have questions, again, please speak up and let me know. Feel free to stop me if you need me to slow down or explain things a little bit further. A little bit of kind of table setting before we get into the specific questions here. Just a reminder that you generally have these four or five types of review procedures for different types of land use decisions. So your type one or ministerial procedure, and this is in the Tualatin Development Code, but these align with state law and many other jurisdictions have similar procedures. a similar breakdown of review types. So type one ministerial decisions, these decisions are made by staff. There's no discretion or judgment involved in these types of decisions. So they must be made based on fully clear and objective standards. And as a result of that, the decisions are very straightforward. So there's no public notice to neighboring properties or other agencies involved in a type one decision. And there's no opportunity for local appeals. So if you are, I'm frustrated about that decision. There's no there's no way for someone who's observing the process to appeal that decision, at least at a local level. There are options kind of it's I think it's a circuit court and that's all kind of laid out in statute, but no local appeals say to city council. Your type two administrative review is also a staff decision, but in a type two decision, you are allowed to have some limited discretion and there is public notice provided for those decisions. So currently notice is provided within a thousand feet of the property and to properties within a thousand feet and also to citizen involvement organizations or your neighborhood organizations. And there are local appeal opportunities to either the architectural review board or to the planning commission or city council, depending on the specific review type. So that's type two. And then type three, we're kind of working up in terms of review level so uh these decisions instead of being made by staff are made by either the architectural review board or by the planning commission at a public hearing so there's opportunities for public members of the public to participate Um, these are discretionary reviews. Um, and again, public notice is provided within a thousand feet into neighborhood organizations and appeals go to a city council. Um, then there are also type four reviews, which deal with legislative decisions. Um, we won't, don't really need to get into those, but that's just a little bit of background. You probably are all familiar with these, but, um, just to make sure we're all on the same page with that. So the issue is, in the current development code, multifamily projects are reviewed through either type 2 or type 3. So smaller projects, small. Relatively speaking, under 100 units go through type two staff review, again, with public notice. Larger projects with 100 or more units go through type three review. So that's an architectural review board decision at a public hearing. Okay. But because we're making these amendments to make the multifamily design standards fully clear and objective, there are new state requirements, House Bill 4037, which again, passed this year's 2026 legislative session. And those change how cities are required to address applications made under fully clear and objective standards. or decisions made under a fully clear and objective standards. So the new requirement is for housing, again, subject to clear and objective standards, you are allowed to provide limited public notice, but it's specific about what you can provide. what notice you can provide. Public hearings cannot be required, and only the applicant is allowed to appeal the decision. So there's no opportunity for someone, you know, an abutting property owner to appeal the decision if they're unhappy with it. So as a result, the city is no longer allowed to require type two or type three reviews for clear and objective applications. So if an applicant is following all the clear and objective standards and not requesting any design departures, it needs to either be reviewed as a type one ministerial review, or you're allowed to adopt this kind of modified administrative procedure. So we have been referring to this modified administrative procedure that's kind of outlined in statute, this new statute, as type 2X, because it's kind of like a modification of an administrator review. So it's a staff decision. Again, there's no discretion in the review process. You can provide public notice within 100 feet, again, instead of 1,000 feet, or up to 500 feet for projects with 20 or more units. So if it's a really small project under 20 units, then you can require notice just within 100 feet of the property. And again, only the applicant can appeal the decision. No, we've referred to the other option as third party appeals. So no third party appeals in this type 2x decision. So finally getting to the question, that's all the groundwork. So what review types do you think should apply to multifamily projects that are reviewed under these new clear and objective standards? So the first option, which is the option that is reflected in the draft code that you received, It makes a kind of sized based noticing distinction or review type distinction. So under 20 units, those would be subject to type one review. So it's a ministerial decision. And that would be similar to the current requirements for single family and middle housing. So townhouses, cottage clusters. Again, if the applicant is following all the clear and objective standards, that's a type one review. And then for 20 or more units, those would be subject to this new type 2x modified administrative procedure that is outlined in statute. So that's the recommendation. So if it's smaller, I'll clear an objective. Type 1, slightly larger, would be this type 2x recommendation. The other main option, I mean, there's a lot of kind of variations on this, but the other kind of main option that staff wanted you all to consider is a uniform notice for all multifamily projects. So regardless of how large the development is, if they're following clear and objective standards, they would be subject to this type 2X review procedure. So the This process would provide notice to all neighbors or excuse me, to all neighbors that are allowed within either 100 feet or 500 feet. So it's providing that notice for every project while still complying with those state limits on hearings and third party appeals. And then under both options, the recommendation is where applicants request, or actually this is really more of a requirement, where applicants request these design departures, which introduces discretion into the decision making, those then would be elevated to either type two review, staff level review, or type three public hearing review requirements. So the recommended kind of breakdown is that if you're requesting a limited number of design departures, so up to four design departures, that would be a type two staff level decision. And then if you're requesting five or more departures, that's introducing quite a bit more, potentially quite a bit more discretion into the decision. So then that would be elevated to a type three, and that would be a public hearing with the review board. um i believe that's it okay so that's that's the question for you so we have these kind of two main options um but i want to hear i want to hear what you all think about that before we move on so i'm going to try to switch my screen so i can see you all there you go

Thanks, Kate. I think you and Madeline are moving along very well on this. I have several questions. First, to start with the discussionary design departures, if I read the staff report correctly, there are 12 possible points of departure. And Kate, I think it was based on your recommendation that one third should be the type two and the other two thirds should be type three. Is that just an arbitrary number or do you have some basis for making that distinction?

Can you restate that, the one-third, two-thirds? I'm not quite sure what you're asking.

If I read the staff report correctly, I think your recommendation was of the 12 discretionary design features, one-third should be the type two type of review and the other two-thirds should be the type three type review. And I'm wondering why you settled on four as the magic number here.

Gotcha. Okay, so yeah, and just to clarify, the recommendation is that if you're requesting up to four design departures, and they could be, you could pick any four of the standards of the multifamily standards to request that flexibility. I think we... Four, I think this is based on experience with some other cities that have a similar kind of way of splitting up kind of staff level review versus things that get elevated to a public hearing. And then we were thinking that somewhere around like three to four, that's adding some discretion to the decision making, but not a ton of discretion.

Okay. Yeah, that's fine. The other part of it is, and again, I'm very pleased to see that there were focus groups held with the architects and developers, and I hope that was useful in that whole process. A question that was asked, are there, does this apply to each facade or in total, these discretionary points? Was that resolved?

So that is a topic that we still need to discuss as a project team. Okay. To kind of frame the lineup of how we've staged our feedback groups is they pretty much reviewed the exact same information that you have. So right now you're in tandem with the information that we've obtained from them. So we're going to take your direction. direction from our feedback groups and then go back to revise the draft.

Okay.

So since those meetings, we haven't been able to actually update the code in accordance with what we've.

So that question is still out there. Okay. Four total or four per facade. And then I'm wondering how does a playground, what, what facade does that get counted against? So anyway, that was still some discussion on that.

Yeah. I mean, I think the way that, that to think about it, is it, is it per standard? Right and however many times that standards applied to a project is that considered one or are we looking at the incremental like okay we've looked at just not a standard in the code but blazing is it the amount of windows on all front edges or is it glazing as a total.

Yeah, it's the same. It's similar to when we had that sign issue, counting the square footage on each side of the building and adding them up and applying them across the board. Okay, well, good luck with that one. And a question on the current type two administrative review where there's no public hearing, but there is notice provided to the neighbors and there's no appeal. Well, I guess there is appeal, but there's no public hearing. When you all get a comment from a neighbor on a project like that, where there's no public hearing, this is their chance to send you a letter either with a concern or a comment. How is that treated? Specifically, does that enter at all into your decision-making processes as you're moving forward with that project?

So generally, when we receive public comments, they're included as an exhibit to the final land use decision. And then we include within the staff findings how those comments either do or do not address the actual approval criteria. Okay. As you can imagine, we get a lot of comments that sometimes might be less relevant to the project and the actual standards that we have to use.

But the ones that are relevant, Madeline, that might... might be pertinent and might be something that hasn't been presented either by the applicant or found in your own staff work is that taken into account can that affect your decision on the approval or disapproval or the conditions applied to the to the application yes if the comment is addressing something that staff might have missed in the original report um we will address each of the relevant code criteria within the report and

In some cases, reach out to other divisions within our community development department. For instance, if it's someone asking something about traffic specifically, we'll revisit with our transportation engineer and have them provide an updated memo.

Okay. So it's not just put into the staff report. Okay. Very good. Okay.

The only thing, other thing that was good, the only thing I would add is that, you know, there's sometimes more than one way to meet an approval criteria, right? So our test is to say, does the project meet it, right? That's staff's role. But if we get something that comes in that says, oh, the neighborhood's looking at maybe you, applicant, you addressing in a different way, we pass those comments on to the applicant and get them their offer.

Okay, okay. And then one last one on the limitations that this new law has imposed on the 100 and 500 foot notice. The city currently also advises the CIOs. Does this eliminate that opportunity or can you still send applications to CIOs?

That's a really good question. Yeah, I might ask Kate.

Sorry to jump in.

Yeah, it's not something that I've heard anyone at the state clarify specifically. Because the statute is pretty specific about the distance that you're allowed to provide notice within, I would think that that would preclude providing additional notice, say, to neighborhood organizations. But that's a good question to maybe ask someone at the state and see if they can provide any further guidance on that.

We're also looking into provisions for signposting, which is part of our requirements, and how that may or may not be affected by this, and then as well as neighborhood developer meetings, which we currently require for type 2 land use applications across the board. So we're looking into how that might also be affected by this.

We can continue to post all the applications on our website when it's working the way we want it to work. So that's still allowed.

Interesting. Okay. Those are my questions for now. Great. Thanks.

Can I get clarification on that? So does the state code say that you cannot notify them or you cannot require the developer to notify?

Not required to.

Or that you're not required to. So it makes it optional then if a city chooses to or...

And Kate can correct me. You're only allowed to notify within that specified distance. You can't go beyond.

Yeah, that's right.

But the city couldn't. Correct. You are limited to notifying only within the set parameters within that bill. You're not allowed to over notice. That was the first question everybody asked. I do more.

You can't. And I imagine you mean on paper, not like you put it on the website.

I can't mail individual notices out.

Given the answers to my questions, I tend to lean towards option two. And for this reason, currently, multifamily units, which, as we all know, can be more units than the middle housing. But anyway... Currently they require, I think it's a type two review and even for proposals, yeah, proposals with fewer than 100 units, it's a type two review, which requires notice. Given these limitations, I think it would be a disservice to the public to not continue providing notice even at 100 feet it's just experiences that we've had we know that people get really upset and emotional about any kind of a multi-family unit going up in a neighborhood and if the city doesn't let them know that this is happening even though now all they can do is send a comment to you I think we'd be trading in an area where we would not want to go with public involvement and being the citizen involvement organization, the planning commission, I think in this case, we need to do option two rather than go with the option one under 20. That's my point on it.

I have a related question. Can I have the mic for a second? Option one, I was struck by a notice requirement for fewer than 20 units, fewer than 20 multifamily units. As I read the definition elsewhere in the development code of multifamily units, you could have four or five quadruplexes adding up to 20 units in one project. And if you're that's certainly big enough to create some interest and concern in the neighborhood. So why not have no notice requirement for, say, five or fewer units, but something as large as a project of 20 units retain the notice requirement? That just seems unfair to the neighborhood.

If I could respond, I think... One issue is that the administrative rules are pretty specific about how cities are required to treat middle housing in terms of review procedures. So if it falls under the umbrella of middle housing, so if it's truly a quadplex on a lot. So I think the scenario you're thinking of, if all of those... four-unit structures are all on the same property, then that would actually still be considered multifamily housing. But if those are on separate properties, so it's four units on a lot, that's a quadplex, or say it's a cottage cluster with eight units maybe. that needs to be reviewed through the same review procedure that applies to a single family home. So in the code, I'm assuming in the code that preceded the middle housing allowances that the city treated a single development of one single family home as a type one review procedure. So then the city had to apply the same review type to a middle housing development. So that's kind of the situation that the city is kind of in is that there's these requirements for middle housing and there are now these new requirements for housing reviewed under clear and objective standards. So there's not really an option, unless you wanted to require a type two review for single family as well, then you're kind of limited with what you can do with middle housing.

Well, and Kate, there's already... Restrictions on how many or what kind of size of lots and placements multifamilies could even go on. I can't fathom a place in town where there's a spot where you could do what we're talking about for it to be a concern. I'm trying to think of one. Because we already restricted it to not low density. We already restricted it to not medium low density. We already have it restricted already to, what is it? High density something or other. HDL.

Wait, clarify that, Ursula.

The places where the multifamily units for individual units, because multifamilies are treated like regular houses that are standalone, already have lot and placement requirements. We went through this last summer on how many houses you could put without dividing the lot, but still have multifamily houses. And when they asked us, we said not in low density, not in... medium low density. Yes. In whatever it was, because that was where. Well, there's, there's another in between like HDL or HDLD. There's a lot of letters. There's a kind of residential where it is allowed. And it had to do with the apartments on Norwood behind the church by the soccer field. Because they could get away with it. I'm trying to remember now. I guess I'm not as concerned that the possibility is even an option. in town for us to have to consider whether or not we would need a type 2 review for something with 20 units.

Let us not forget, though, what was the name of that one park that went for a higher density? I mean, it was already a high-density multifamily unit development. It's right by Tualatin Elementary School.

Even in Bull Mountains?

Yes, I know what you're talking about.

Oh, the one in Baltimore. Oh, on the other side of 99.

It's right down the street from me. The apartments. The apartments, yeah. We upzone now. And so, Ursula, there's always a chance for rezoning.

Well, sure, when we rezone something. But the standard that is clear and objective, that is the baseline, that is approved without having to make an exception or change, I thought was what we were talking about here. Okay.

Can I ask a clarifying question? And this has to do with basically the purpose of public notification given the restriction in options that are given. If there's no discretion permitted under either review, it's all under the established clear and objective standards. Okay. and only the applicant can make an appeal of the decision, then, you know, in essence, what is the purpose of the public notice if they cannot argue, you know, we don't want this because of something that's not, you know, no discretion, that's either a yes or no, it meets the criteria or it doesn't. Public comment doesn't really come into that. And if they can't appeal either.

Well, it goes back to my first question to Madeline. if you receive public notice no public hearing you're only and you and there's an issue that you want to raise right a valid issue not emotion not we don't want this i think the public needs to have the right to present that letter that comment to the planning department or their consideration if there was if we don't give that notice They lose that opportunity.

I'm just not certain what action is available to the planning department.

If you get a letter, even in this scenario, now with the limited review to 100 feet, you're still going to get the same kind of comment, whether it would have been 1,000 feet. Somebody is going to comment, and if there's a valid point, That would affect your decision on this or the developer's decision. I think that needs to that opportunity needs to be presented.

It would only be relevant if it is a case where it is a violation of one of the clear and objective standards because we've removed staff discretion. They can't make a decision that says because the local community doesn't like this, there is no discussion.

Can I chime in a little bit here? So going back into the world of planning very far and in the 50s and 60s, public participation was nothing. And so there was a huge outcry of things going in and the public not having any information or anything about it or any control over it. So we evolved over those decades to try to give the public more participation and more

Awareness.

Options for the process and that, at least with notifications. And so with notifications in Portland, really, Oregon in general had led that charge on increasing that. With notifications, people were just surprised about this construction starts and it's going up and just had no idea. So the blindsiding. So with notification on this, and I'm very shocked to see the state go this way as a way of removing red tape. The tape was removed when you say... that, like what you're saying, people have the option to participate, but yet you really can't do anything about it. So that red tape has been removed. The boring of notification to people is, I mean, it's...

I'm not a fan of removing the notification. In principle, I'm with Randy. I think that we could include notification to the extent that we are permitted. My general question is, What action can the city take in response to any comments that the public may give after being notified?

In practicality, it will probably be very few and far between where we can do anything about. We can pass that information on to the applicant. If they just feel generous, they can maybe modify. Let's just take height. If the neighborhood's all upset about the height of this multifamily structure, but it meets a clear and objective, staff's going to say thumbs up, right? If we get friends tell, neighbors tell others and everybody's submitting letters that even are beyond 100 feet, we get an outpouring of concern about height. That's up to the developer if they want to bring that down. They don't have to. But there is, you guys are wrestling with something that I think everyone in planning has seen coming is like, is there now value to just sending a notice with minimal amount that they could, impact the outcome? Is there still just value of not seeing construction happening next door and not knowing it was there? Or is it just maybe we don't send out that notification because they're going to feel maybe potentially helpless?

Yeah, what's more frustrating to you? Not being invited to comment or be invited to comment, but not having your comments be able to do anything. I'm telling you, it's not being invited to comment.

Teresa, to your point, I fully expect that there's probably very few cases from a practical standpoint where it's going to make any difference. But here we're talking about the state removing a right, an expectation, We have in our current code right now, we extend notice out to a thousand feet for projects under a hundred. I don't want to be a planning commission member as part of a group that says, I'm taking that right away from folks. Reducing it, we're forced to do that by a state mandate, but I'm certainly not prepared to say disregard notice to even a hundred feet. I'm not ready to do that.

I don't think that's what Zach was saying.

I'm just, I'm trying to see just what. What options the city actually has to to respond to any comments of public money. It's really the same. It's a policy.

It's the same that they have every no, it's the same every before prior or the existing when letters come in the majority of letters that come in. Or I don't want this. They're not valid. They're not anything that. A planner is going to take action. I don't want this here. I don't agree with it. I don't like it. It's stupid. It's dumb. Unless they can come up with something on how it does not meet the code, a justifiable argument, then city staff cannot legally even take any action on it. It's giving that feedback. But when you've given somebody the process to, like you got those three minutes to come into city council all the time, when they have the process, even though it's not going to do anything or change anything, but having that that have a newer approach gives people some level of comfort and involvement and hopefully, and there are developers that do make changes. The project in Eibach, the developer chose to make changes based off of feedback from surrounding neighbors.

Autumn Sunrise, they pulled their application.

What's up, Ray?

Thank you. I agree with you guys. I think One of the things, because if the open forum, like you're talking about those three minutes, a lot of that is made so that the community can feel as well as getting letters. I feel if we take away the notices that is dissolving further trust that the community is going to have in the government. Yes. The state is making a mandate of less notification, but if we take away the rest of it, that is potentially showing that our city government is not doing the best to still notify and give those opportunities to the people in our community. given that something still has to be a valid point, because even if somebody comes to one of our meetings, another meeting and has three minutes, if it does not have valid, that goes against the code that the city has to weigh these on, it's still not gonna change anything. So it's leaving that avenue open for them to still have that output. and to be able to put that into their community, working within the state law that our system still has to follow. So I think keeping the notifications is the best thing we can do, work within the grounds that we have and still supporting our people to be able to get their word in.

Okay. Yeah. Then, like I said, I'm still in favor of notifying as many people as we can. I'm just trying to understand how much the city can respond to that, given that we are taking off the discretionary. You know, staff discretion has been removed. It's all energy.

What they can do depends on what falls in the code and what people bring up of whether it shows a problem within the code or not. They have to follow the code.

Here's a crazy thing about like, if you're the next door neighbor to the property, why you get the best input on something or the best thing is like somebody pushes a development that's coming through here and they've submitted an application and they got surveys or whatever that comes in there. Well, that property owner next door, they're like, I've lived here for like 50 years. One thing I've noticed that's not in this application is an existing easement that I have over this property. And this hasn't been brought up. And so if this project goes through, gets approved, starts construction, and then this uh neighboring neighbors finding out about it like this thing so it's already been improved by the same like what about the easement that goes through it now i'm stuck taking this to a through a civil process to sue the guy next door with the easement issue so notification is is definitely a helpful thing um and again like the transparency like we're trying to improve transparency in the government we're supposed to be leading that here in oregon and i feel this is Another one that's slightly pulling the rug out, unfortunately. I do get reducing red tape in a lot of ways for projects or these unnecessary appeals that have just hit because of nimbyism. And I totally support that. But taking away the notification or trying to hide projects like we did decades ago from people. So I won't get the approach to get more of these things.

I also think that the people that are building these types of communities are going to be the people living there are going to be joining and be a part of our community. They don't want to have a bad relationship with their neighbors. They want to, they're coming here, they want to be part of this community. Of all the meetings and all the things that I've been a part of, even though it has been a short time so far on this mission, they want feedback. They take feedback. They listen to our town and our government pushes for that. That's why we're all here. So I think they're going to, for the most part, take that example and take that feedback well.

Kate, I guess I'm just going to ask one more time because I feel like I've gone on a tangent. You're asking us to decide about a sized base notice that still has the type one review that's ministerial. Or all units will no longer have ministerial. They'll only have the administrative X. Is that right? Is that the two choices right now? We've only got two choices right now?

Well, those are the two main choices. If there's some variation that you prefer, I think that there are other options out there, but I think these are the two kind of most straightforward and most kind of logical approaches. Okay.

And if we were addressing our concerns that we have with the ministerial ones, is there any modifications to one of these two options that would... put that in a way that was purposeful for us that we can do. That's even an option that we can do because I guess we have so many new rules now. Do you have anything in mind, Randy, while you're over there percolating about the type ones that would maybe go away if we chose option two, which I think is what I hear you asking for because the type ones don't have any notification. Is that right? Is that what I hear you asking? That's correct. Okay.

That's correct. And to Alan's point about whittling it down to five. Right.

Instead of 20.

Then I think we're starting to get arbitrary. Right. More complicated. So I just put it across the board. We're reducing it from a thousand feet to a hundred.

Yeah.

That's significant. That's a 90% reduction. Yeah.

So, in this instance is option to the 1.

That's right. Okay. That preserves the most community involvement. Really? My question was not about whether or not we should have the notification. It was about whether the removal of discussions leaves us any options to respond to that in a functional role. I don't want us not to notify people. The real question was moving from type two administrative with limited discretion where we remove that and basically treat it as though it were a type one for the purposes of the approval, how that's going to impact our ability to respond to any things that were raised by the public. That was kind of my concern.

Which one?

My concern was when you move from type two administrative to type two X, it's not that you lose, obviously we're going to lose the notification radius, but I'm not arguing that we not notify people. I'm wondering with the removal of discretion, because we shift from limited discretion to no discretion, CNO review standards, just like in a type one ministerial. I'm wondering where that leaves the city and their ability to actually respond to those complaints.

That's a great question. If the evidence presented is not relevant to the criteria, then it doesn't count. And 99% of the...

So then what I'm asking the city is what's the difference between limited discretion and the no discretion? Like what discretion were you guys able to take previously?

That we could appeal to the ARB or the PC or the council and this one.

Except this also nixes that because only the applicant can appeal. It looks like the difference. Is that true?

Yeah, I mean, like if a project came in for multifamily today, yeah, as a type 2, there's very little. Can you think of any particular discretionary standards?

Not at this time.

Wasn't there something about the distance, the entryway relationship?

Great well, in the last multi family project we had was the plan back garden project and there was also a few variances that the applicant requested to that. And so that was an additional level of discretion that was applied to that project.

Um, a way to approach that might be Kate, the, the, the things we identified in our code audit. That weren't clear and objective fixed.

We fix that.

Well, for multi family, those, those would have needed a small amount of staff discretion. So those are coming out. And so those little areas that were kind of squishy language, that's the type of discretion that we were probably... Oh, so it's already been removed.

It will be removed. Okay.

We're fixing it.

Okay. So the discretion that they did have, they don't have because now we... An appropriate stoop or appropriate size of a porch.

Right. That's not word for word. So we haven't...

So the city has not functionally lost any ability that it didn't already have to respond to...

major thing but the type 2 to the type 2x and the only reason the type 2x is popping in is it wasn't because of the clear and objective language it was because of these two house bills or most specifically house bill 4037 that's then requiring this different type of procedure that we don't currently have and now you got to implement it so we're thrown in the type 2x and so then the question is like do we apply to all multi-family housing option one or not option one option no that's the same do we do with option one And so what really we're boiling down to is like option two is the best option to still include that.

Because we've already done the work and they've already done the work to make the clearing objectives that we've only just really gotten into the last 18 months when you guys brought us that after the revisions with the updates. So had we not done the CNOs, I might be a little more mouthy, but we've already done them.

And you are required to do that, of course.

Yeah. Thanks, Kate. We did what we were told to in the timely fashion. Actually, Madeline did. The department did.

It seems like we're all on a grants with option two.

Yeah. Can we think of anything that would be detrimental? I can't think of anything that would be detrimental here.

Staff will follow up with if we can get any more guidance on notification with the CIOs. Yeah. and or posting of the property.

Yes, for sure.

Because within 100 feet is on the property, eh? Eh? Okay. All right. Sorry.

The House bill already went through, got approved, and stamped.

Did the governor sign it?

In action. She did sign it. Okay.

You mentioned something else, Teresa. The notice, the CI, the posting, the CIO, I thought there was a third thing.

The neighborhood developer meeting.

Yeah, that's what it was. Yeah.

Okay, we got one question, Kate. Sorry. What was the other question? You had two questions.

There's one more question. I think this one will be shorter.

We paid her to keep us on track. We're good. You guys are doing great.

I appreciate the discussion. You're a very thoughtful group. It's great. I mean that. Okay. So the next question is about just one specific zone. It only applies in this one area. It's the commercial or recreational commercial or CR zone. And the basic question is, should multifamily housing and manufactured dwelling parks currently require conditional use approval? So this is similar to that multifamily in the low density residential zone. Okay. Should those be permitted by right with clear and objective standards or should they be prohibited in this zone? So this recreational commercial zone applies to this existing RV park. It's right on the river, Roemer's Rust. It's between the river and Highway 99. Yeah. So again, this is an issue because requiring conditional use is not allowed as the only approval path. It is important to point out the purpose of the zone as stated in the code. So this highlighted portion says it's intended to preserve that area by allowing and encouraging commercial and related uses that are oriented to the traveler and the highway or towards the river. And one thing to point out, staff shared this, thought it was important to point out the fact that this, most of that CR zone is within the floodplain. So, you know, development opportunities are somewhat limited in that area. And it is already developed with an RV park. So this, I imagine this zone is to, if that RV park were to, you know, shut down and somebody wanted to redevelop that site for a different use. or maybe add on to the site possibly, then that enables some kind of either river or highway-oriented uses. So here we have two options again, permit by right. This option is shown in the draft just for discussion's sake. There's no particular recommendation from staff, I believe, on this one. So that would create a cleared objective path. You need to determine what the standards are that apply, but you could probably kind of refer to another zoning district standards for standards in the CR zone. And then the other option is just to prohibit those housing types from the zone, given the fact that the purpose seems to be more related to commercial uses and not so much for housing standards. But, you know, if you wanted to preserve sort of maximum flexibility for future development on the site, then you might want to consider allowing those specific housing types by right. So I think that's the last slide on this one. So, yeah, I'll open it up to discussion here.

Randy? To me, this one's pretty clear. I definitely lean towards prohibit for the two reasons Kate shared. The multifamily and manufactured parks are not consistent with the purpose of the zone. And as Justin brought up in the climate action plan discussion, If floods and floodplains are going to be more of a concern in the future with climate change, then development certainly is not consistent for residential development in the floodplain here. So I'm with prohibiting this.

I'm with Randy on that one. I think that opening that up to densification is just going to put more people at risk.

It will also make it easier to flood because there will not be, it will lessen the ability for rainwater to be able to fall into the ground.

I might be the only person in the room who's actually lived there for more than 12 months. When I couldn't afford a house, we did live in that park on the other side. Right alongside there, all those new apartments that look like tiny choo-choo trains are not any further up the hill, by the way.

Just outside the blue area. On the southwestern edge there.

Just build all these things. There's a whole apartment complex right here. A hundred and some apartments that all come right through here and they come up this road. Right now, there's only one way to get into this park here. You don't do it from this westbound side. You can't cross up here. This is where you come to the other way from Hayes Road. So the gas station on the other side over there and the groceries over there are a whole thing. I 100% can tell you they will fill that in and build houses on it if you want to. Because the guys who own that RV park are so excited to try to get rid of it because they can't charge us enough and it's transient housing. And they would really like us to be permanent housing because they have to kick us out every eight months for at least 30 days before we can come back again. If you know all the rules. And then you have to go find somewhere else to live for 30 days and come back. You can't get mail there. You can't do things there. I don't know that I'm necessarily opposed because that's already got protections along the riverfront there. They don't let the trailers come any, I think it's like 100 and some feet. They don't let them come down. They've already leveled it out. And all those apartments all right back there, too. have that same requirement and the new code standards for building i'm pretty sure included like percolated parking or the impervious surface stuff and to put all the landscaping things in so this would end up getting more tree cover than just the waterfront side currently it's like a big giant parking lot that you just park on there's not even really any trees except on that east side um So I know it's easy to think that it would flood, but it will be as likely to flood as it is now, and they will just dump some more dirt over there and pack it down. But I'd be more worried about the access of it, but the requirements for putting multifamily anyway already have rules about how many sides and access in or out you have onto that main drag. Now, if somebody wants to buy a house over there that ends up being a mobile home park instead of an RV park, More power to them. But this recreational commercial, if we have it nowhere else in the city, including Browns Park, like where they do the kayaks, where they do the summer camp, where they do Willowbrook, how in the world did we end up with one tiny parcel in town that had this one classification? And do we need to do what Randy said and just reclass it? This one parcel in town. Yeah. rather than figuring out about manufactured in a CR, just change the CR. I guess that that's a different question. So instead of asking about manufactured in CR, we're asking, what are we doing about CR with this one person?

Madeline, can you share with us what uses are permitted in that zone?

Yes, let me pull that up. I'm trying to like a... The businesses and restaurants on the bottom, houses on top.

Thank you for sharing all of your knowledge and personal.

Oh, man.

Yes.

Little did I know when I moved to town, I couldn't afford to live in a trailer park. That was eight years ago.

So some of our permitted uses are limited to like a boat dock, marina, boat rental, public or private camping, a private meeting club or lodge hall or a dance hall. a nursery or greenhouse with retail sales under durable goods.

Oh, so not even like a multi-use, like if you had boat rentals on the lower floor with a restaurant and housing above it. I'm trying to think.

So is currently the, is Roemer's Rest then considered camping?

Transient housing.

Let me tell you, I'm not sure how it's currently defined. I'm not even sure if we have an active land use case on that site due to the nature.

They've been there. It was there.

The limitations and the things that are allowed by that, you'd really have to go back to when that zone was applied to it and where those discussions were with wanting to keep it that way and keep it locked in forever on it. And they're like, we're going to give you your own zone for this lot. So I think everybody's kind of, like, agreeing, like, that's not a great spot for multi-dwelling. Even if, like, in theory, if you said multi-dwelling is okay on it. Right. And you could, it would be terrible for them to.

I don't know who would even try to build it there.

Put a mobile home park on it. The river floods and, like, who the hell put a mobile home park there? Like, oh, we did not.

So if we are unable to change that zone, then I guess we could at least.

tell them that we can't do it in that zone multi-dwine on there then just apply for rezoning right right is that that's an option yeah if they want to yeah you could always okay yeah we'll leave this one sub tax block realistically once you apply all the different standards onto the properties to be such a small amount yeah of um you know areas that are real potentially be developed on put them back

And we've got other river frontage access because we've got the big train bridge, the TCP, the Browns and further downstream already. So it wasn't like it was preserving river access. It wasn't like it was preserving. I'm trying to think why it would have. Okay. Yeah. I can't think of it. And that's a big, huge road where they're going 45 if they're doing the speed limit. So they're not, by the way.

As I understand it right now, everybody's leaning towards option two. Yeah.

I mean, I'm not saying I'm not opposed to two because I'm like, who in the world would do it?

You're saying that they try, not that it would be a good idea, but that if we permitted it, that they would try.

I think someone could find a way to pencil the math out and sell it to someone.

I think option two meets our climate action plan goals better.

Yeah.

Do we need an official recommendation there or just to say that we like option two?

I think your consensus has been noted.

Was there anything you wanted to add, Alan? No, I agree. Okay, cool.

All right, we'll throw it back to you, Kate.

Great. Thank you for that. Yeah, that was our last question for you all. So just are there any other last thoughts or questions from you before we conclude?

Thank you. Thank you. I know we don't sound like it, but thank you.

Cool. Yeah, so next up, as I mentioned, there's a city council work session on July 13th. So we'll be hearing their perspective on these same issues. We'll incorporate this feedback and direction that we received tonight into the revised draft code amendments. And those will be also distributed for public review at the end of the summer, early fall, and then heading into adoption hearings later in the fall. So stay tuned. There are more opportunities for input

and uh yeah thanks again for your attention and um discussion tonight and uh i'm gonna stop sharing cool thanks thank you all right thank you so much have a good evening beautiful bye lindsay will we have meeting minutes to review for the next month okay sorry i was like because i'll forget if you give me two at once or whatever oh yeah i don't know what i said back in february

All right. That was, that was our second action item. We don't have any public hearings. I don't see any further communication with the staff, unless you guys have thought of something since the meeting started. Okay.

So if I would just take a minute, we did, we did touch on the, some of the little like works in the website. There was some problems with the packet. Just reach out to me if you're having difficulty accessing anything you need to access as we work out the kinks.

Lindsay was immediately responsive.

He's on it. Yes. That's good.

All right. Note, kudos to Lindsay.

For the record.

For the record.

Yeah.

All right. If there's no further business, planning commission meeting is adjourned at 8.15.

So moved. Come on. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you, guys.