Planning and Zoning Commission - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the July 20th, 2026 meeting of the City of Tuscaloosa Planning and Zoning Commission. Any written comments sent to staff are forwarded to the commission directly. At this time, I'd like to introduce our staff. We have Jimbo Woodson, Deputy City Attorney, Michael Garner, City Engineer, Zach Pons, Director of Planning, Leota Coyne, Principal Planner. There are nine members of the Planning Commission, all of whom were appointed by the Mayor for staggered terms with the exception of the City Council representative who was appointed by the City Council. I ask that the Commission members introduce themselves and state their occupation, starting with Mr. Rumsey.

Stephen Rumsey, business owner.

Dena Prince, attorney.

Portia Clark, 311 manager.

Tim Harrison, general contractor.

Councilwoman Raven Howard, District 2.

Bill Wright, business owner. There were sign-up sheets located outside for public comment. Four speakers are allowed to speak in favor of a petition, and four speakers are allowed to speak in opposition of the petition. All speakers will have a maximum of five minutes unless the commission votes to allow a longer time. Tonight's procedures, the Commission will take up items in the order of our final agenda. The Commission will initially receive a presentation from the staff as to the details of the agenda item. Additionally, we will hear certain matters involving the same property, such as an annexation and a zoning matter concurrently, although we will take separate votes on each matter involving the same property. After the staff presentation, we will then call upon the petitioner to present their case Petition will have a maximum of 10 minutes unless the Commission votes to allow a longer time. At the conclusion of the petitioner's remarks, we'll then call on any party in order to sign up who desires to support the petition. Thereafter, call on any party in order to sign up who opposes the petition. When it's your turn for comment, please introduce yourself, say your name and address to the Commission to provide your remarks. Any written comments, again, have been included into the record. After receiving the remarks of those who oppose the petition, the petitioner will have the opportunity to respond to those objections. Any rebuttal will be limited to two minutes unless the Commission votes to allow a longer time. If the petitioner presents any new information in response to the objections, the Commission will allow those who oppose the petition the opportunity to respond to the new information only. Any response will be limited to two minutes unless the Commission votes to allow a longer time. During the course of this presentation, you may be interrupted by a member of the Commission for clarification or additional information. Such interruptions will not reduce your time. Once the Commission members are satisfied they received all relevant information, we'll then close further discussion by the public, at which time the Commission members will discuss the matter and then vote. After the vote, you are free to leave. Tonight's proceedings are video recorded and broadcast live. All in-person public comments should be made at the podium into the microphone. Jurisdiction. In all matters pertaining to the following items, this commission serves as the final authority. One, subdivisions located within the city limits. Two, subdivisions located outside city limits but within the city's planning jurisdictions. three, developments with special district, and four, approval letters for developments in historic district buffer zones. As to all remaining agenda matters, including annexations, rezonings, planned developments, and street vacations, this commission serves as a recommending body to the city council. In that regard, our decisions are on the form of a recommendation to present to the city council. Again, the city council will make the final decision on those matters. Subdivision approval requires the affirmative vote of six members of the Planning Commission. All matters which are recommendations to the Council require a majority vote for an affirmative recommendation. At this time, I ask that any members of the Commission have any conflicts of interest as to any agenda matters before us tonight. If so, please state for the record. Having heard none, I would ask staff to confirm on the record that proper notice has been given to all parties and interests as required by law as to all matters before the commission tonight.

Yes, it has. Thank you.

With that, we'll begin with the approval of the minutes. As the Planning and Zoning Commission has received the synopsis of the June 2026 meeting, I move that we dispense with a reading of the minutes of the same unless there are any deletions, additions, or corrections. All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those opposed, ayes have it. Approval of the minutes.

Good evening, Commission. Starting off tonight with the consent agenda, we have two items. We did not have anyone sign up out front.

All right, Commission. For us, we have two items on the consent agenda, S-56, S-26, S-54-26. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed, ayes have it.

All right, we have one case requesting to withdraw. That is S-4126. This was withdrawn prior to notice, so no vote is needed. We have one case requesting to continue tonight. That is S-5926, and the applicant is here.

Good evening, Commission. Eric Hamner, TTL, representing Lake Island Properties. We're working through a couple of things with the county on the easement, and we ask this be continued till we get that solved.

Any questions for petition? Commissioner Forrest, I have a continuous request for S-5926, Lake Island Subdivision. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Ayes have it.

All right, Commission, starting off with unfinished business tonight. Starting with a companion case. This is Hargrove Heights Townhomes. Two parts, rezoning and a subdivision case. We're at 3311 and 3327 Hargrove Road East and 3728 34th Avenue East for the rezoning. It's about 4.6 acres requesting the rezone from SFR1. to SFR4, then looking at a townhome subdivision, 24 townhome lots, now four open space lots on that first half, 2.3 acres. So getting into it here, we're just south of I-20. You all have seen this property recently. It was before you for an annexation in October. You can see those existing structures on site. You can see that existing zoning of SFR1. The applicant is requesting to rezone from SFR 1 to SFR 4 for a townhome development. These are just some photos showing you the conditions today taken from Hargrove Road East and from 34th Avenue East showing those properties be rezoned and ultimately with the goal of two phases of townhomes, so rezoning that whole area to SFR 4, but tonight looking at that first phase on the north end for the preliminary plot. Here are some supplemental tax information that the applicant submitted, as well as some renderings they submitted. These were submitted to us after packets were posted, so they may be new to you all. Just clicking through those here. In framework, this property is identified as suburban residential. This request does conform to the plan as well as the use. In this future land use character, attached residential is a secondary use. You can see that future land use character identified here. Here are those permitted uses in this zone. Now moving into the subdivision, so again rezoning 4.6 acres for the subdivision, looking at 2.3 of those acres for 24 townhome lots and now four open spaces. So you can see we're looking at that north half of the property. There's two existing homes here. You can see that townhome layout here with those four open space lots. You see that without contours. We have one variance request. We do have some public comments submitted. They did submit some slides, but before we get into that, and the applicant, do you have any questions for staff?

Engineering on the variance request.

So we're in favor of granting this variance. They're creating what's called a hammerhead, which meets the fire apparatus turnaround. The future phase, when constructed, will give us a complete street to the south. That suffices for an alternative to a cul-de-sac.

Can you bring back up the zoning map again for the area? Okay.

And before I sit down, just want to make sure we're getting the record. We received 13 comments and 48 signatures in opposition to this request. Thank you.

Petitioner.

Hey, before, well, he can answer my question. I just wondered on the plat, what is this green area that's got a chain link fence around it? What's that supposed to be used for?

Future detention pond.

Okay. Okay.

Sorry, I'm Tom Sams, Longleaf Engineering. Clay Smith and Mr. Cam Parsons. You guys may remember this is a property that was initially brought last year that was proposed to be a office warehouse space that didn't go over very well. Mr. Smith has worked with city staff and personnel and tried to come up with something that We feel that would better suit the area, and this does seem to be in the framework classification, and the townhomes, I think, is a much better option residential-wise than the commercial UCF proposed before. He has performed a traffic study or gotten one performed for this site. And it seems to have the results of that study, which also I believe engineering has a copy of. And there's no reduction in classification of the existing Hargrove Road traffic as far as the classification goes is it's currently a B, it stays a B after not only development of this one, but also the possibility of the future second phase to the south. Otherwise, I believe we meet all the parking requirements, we meet fire code, and I think they showed the renderings previously. So if you guys have any questions, I'd be happy to answer.

You know, one of the things that we talked about in the pre-meeting last week was, you know, we worry about when we start seeing all this parking away from the apartments, and you talk about how you've got one car and it's lower to the south here. You know, we run into some times where you'll have cars parking on the street there, and we talked about why not bring like you did on the upper lots where you have the parking in the, I guess it's really the back because your front's facing Hargrove. Why not do the same thing, just kind of flip it here and put the parking?

That was mainly a conformance to the city regulations. There's a requirement about the percentage of parking that can be shown in the front yard, so to speak. And so on the northern lots, we can use Hargrove Road as the front yard. And so we have double parking in the back. And for these, the front yard would actually be facing the new street. And so we don't have that option. I don't think we would be opposed to it. It's just a conformance to the regulations.

Mike, we talked about in that meeting, we talked about potentially an alley feeding those back. Obviously, it goes with the aesthetics of the redesign. And I guess for Sims, if there's a mechanism by which during the LDP process, something different than this parking inside the street made sense to y'all that you could get two parks per unit, would that be amenable to?

Yes, sir. This is certainly not anything that we're driving, so we're open.

I think there was some ideas kicked around when we talked about that, Chair, Vice Chair. In fact, in my opinion, it might enhance these. I could see that.

You said you couldn't put them two in the front of them?

conventional parking space is what, eight and a half to nine feet wide by 22 feet long. So you really can't park a car in front of one of these units or behind one of these units because their width is 20, right? So even if you had, we've talked about this before, when you have guests, I mean, how does the parking count work on this development? Do we have any, Do we have any extra parks?

We do. We discussed exactly your point, too. The spaces between the parking driveways on those units doesn't leave a lot of room, and it would probably deter people from parking there for fear of blocking those spots. But we do have additional guest parking spots accounted for in the parking there in the middle there in the green.

Again, there may be an opportunity to enhance this with a few changes if you all work with Mike on it. Sure.

Are the other green spaces, are they going to be maintained by an HOA? Yes, ma'am.

There will be a common area HOA to maintain all the common space including the pond and all the greenery.

Staff, did we get any input from environmental services on servicing this? Are you going to service with carts or are you going to do a dumpster?

We kicked around both options. Currently, we're showing servicing with individual carts. You know, if, you know, something else we may need to look at, if that's not something you guys would prefer, but it seemed to be the best option here.

And I guess if you're one of these interior units, you know, where are you going to park it? I guess you're going to put your card in the garage or in front of the house and you're going to roll it out?

Well, we had talked about that as well. You either can put it in the garage, or we were planning to maybe designate some areas on the side of the units. You know, the worst case scenario, if you're in a middle unit, you'd be two units away from the side. But I think either option could help.

So we said garage. These don't have garages. They're going to have just driveways. That's what's drawn here. That's correct. Oh, yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah.

So there is no garage to park up. So no garage for the cart. That's correct.

Can we go back to the picture of what the area that is going to be, like the site, what it looks like right now?

Yeah.

Where is Bradley Road on this map that I'm looking at? I mean, I know exactly where Hargrove Road is. I know exactly where Bradley Road is, but I just can't figure out where it is in relation, and you're doing something to Bradley Road, correct, so that there's no cut-through? That's a different project. Is that a different one? Okay, well, good. I'm glad I was like that.

Ms. Press, these are next to the large Palisades Apartments.

That's right. Yes, indeed.

As you're facing it to the right.

Can you go back to the drawing, the flat drawing, please? I like the... The fact that you have, I guess this is guest parking on the end of this green down here?

Yes, sir.

That's certainly going to help. That's been a problem with a lot of townhome developments. We just, they're not, they're going by the code and they're using two parking spaces. And if anybody has anybody over for a football game, it creates chaos.

Yes.

That being said though, we put some code in, I think, I think Reynolds. you know, as it relates to, this is going to be a sea of concrete through this parking back here. And I know it sounds funny coming from me, but you know, he had, he had some stuff written into the code that you can only have so many parking spaces before you have some sort of tree or something planted for landscaping design. So when you turn into this development, it's just going to be solid concrete. So, I mean, I don't know if you could, If you can work on this green spot down here and carve out an area and get something to break that up. You know what I'm talking about in the parking from, say, this lot all the way to the end. I'm trying to envision it when I pull in there, and it's just going to be white concrete, not shade tree, not anything.

I think there's an opportunity to maybe shift that parking down south a little bit and create a buffer between there and the roadway that could be landscaped.

I'm kind of surprised that there's not some landscaping code in it. Don't we have some requirements?

We do. Yeah, we'd look at that at the LDP phase.

Okay. We've caught ourselves leaving enough buffer around the perimeter to meet those requirements.

So what's the bedroom? Is it like a two-bedroom, three-bedroom? I believe we plan for two bedrooms per unit, right?

The front, closest to Hargrove, those would most likely be three-bedroom. The back side there, there will be a mixture of two and three. And that was one of the reasons we asked for the cul-de-sac variances, because the cul-de-sac would have been all the way to the left side of the drawing, or where the lots 13 through 16 are, and that would have created a pretty far distance for guest parking if you were in the first row of town homes there.

So units 13 through 24 are going to be, I'm assuming, two bedrooms? Yes. Back to the park, you've got room for a one-car parking pad there. So if it's a married couple or two roommates, You've got one car that's going to park in the front, and one's going to park over here on this side over here. That's where we get concerned about is like, you know, if it's raining one day, if you're in 24, you're going to park all the way down here, and you're probably going to park in front of 24 on the road. And that's where back, you know, going as to the initial conversation, why not alley the back and bring all your parking behind the units, push the units forward, and then you're not, I think it's more, if I'm a renter, are you gonna rent these or sell these? Do you have that? They'll be for sale, Mr. Feld's, he'd like to see them for sale.

So, Bill, you're saying move the lot back and give us a parking in front?

No, I'm saying like on lots 13 through 24, push them forward, do an alley behind the units on the property line and rear park them. You can get two there.

Okay.

As opposed to, again, would I buy number 24 if I got my wife and I?

I don't think so. One's got to park all the way down here by the hammerhead.

I think we've kind of tried to avoid the alley just talking about the sea of concrete. If you have the sea of concrete on the front and you get an alley in the back, then there is zero grass. At least now they have a backyard.

You know, if you push the lots back, you could do like Fox Run, you could park in the front. The bay parking?

I'm a fan of bay parking. I think it helps the situation and it eliminates parking in areas that you're not supposed to.

Which I guess you're doing on 13th.

It also gives a little bit of green space between the parking area and the house for aesthetic purposes.

I want to go back to the garbage carts and just make sure I've got this in my head right. So if I live in 13 through 24, okay, I'm going to have my garbage cart in the back, and I will pull it to the green part, the common area, and then up back in front of my house. And then if I live in one through 12, it'll be, I don't know what north and south is, but anyway, where the little sidewalk is. And then I either go to the little area between lot 12 and the detention pond or the area in the middle to get it out to the front Is that what, I mean, is that?

Yes, ma'am, that's our current thought on it. I think she's asking, are you going to pull the carts out basically on Hargrove? No. No, you're going to put them all in this hole.

No, no, no, no, I didn't.

She's asking where you're going to store them.

Well, you know, I wish there was, and I don't know anything about, you know, dumpster, but gosh, I wish there was a way to consolidate that. I mean, it would take up lot 13 probably.

So ESD, environmental services, they will need to request a variance from providing a dumpster in this development. So it might be that they are required to provide a dumpster and then they'd have to work that out and configure that in their land development permit.

Our thoughts were just from a convenience standpoint to the homeowners. And Zach's right. We'll obviously conform to whatever we need to. But if we had a centralized dumpster location, they would likely be walking further than they would to the end of the building.

And my honest thought was we would do a car containment facility. in the front of the house for each unit and try to match the aesthetics of the unit. So if you're in 22, it would be off on your lot still that kind of in a convenient location. And there's not really a,

I don't like the idea of a cart containment in front of the units or in the, you know, from the house. And it seems like we can't come up with a aesthetically pleasing look for these garbage carts, whether they're on the front or the back. So I feel like that the dumpster would probably be the better option. Is that what you thought about before the dump? If you had the dumpsters and there would be a garbage cart service?

Yes, that's certainly on the table for us. We were kicking around what would be the best aesthetic and the most convenient for everyone. We have not discounted the dumpster option.

I feel like when you mentioned putting the garbage carts in the front, that just goes against just the slightest integrity that we try to upheap in our other surrounding neighborhoods.

Yes, and it would be the same materials of the exterior of the house to try to match it as best we can. But there's not really, that's something that we'd have to work out when we ask for a plan approval.

More questions? I'm sure we've got quite a few people that want to speak on this.

The good news about the dumpster is at least if you put it at the very end down here, It's not that far to walk. The truck dumps it and it backs up and backs here and goes out forward so you don't have the safety issues that we've discussed backing back into a major thoroughfare. At least you can come out forward. That's the most positive thing about that. You better get your dirt packed good down here on the end. We're just going to run it up fastball if you don't. Why don't we let them?

I'm sure you'll have some questions to answer from those who are here. So let's open it up to the public.

Mr. Chairman, we had four people sign up. First person is Mr. Chris Allen.

Hello. I'm Chris Allen. My wife Taffy and my son Cooper all live at number three Broadview, which in this picture, we would be just to the east and a little bit south of that road. Our house is the one directly south of Miss Booth's house with the pool there. That's it. I've heard a lot of talk tonight about parking and dumpsters and things like that. Our problem, or my problem, I'm really just here to speak for myself. I'm not speaking for anybody else. But the problem I have with this is density, if that's something that y'all can consider. We don't have 50 cars in the neighborhood now, but this development would add, my estimation, 50 cars, dumping them out on our one-way road there. We've got one way in, one way out, and we'd be competing with those 50 cars to get out on Hargrove Road every morning. And it's already hard, I know that's anecdotal. But it's already hard to pull out in the mornings. There's kids that wait for the school bus right at that corner, that north corner. Now, it seems like maybe a small thing to everybody else, but to us that development would fundamentally change the character of our neighborhood this is the only entrance to our neighborhood and that's going to be the first thing that everybody sees when they turn in it's going to be the first thing everybody sees in the morning will be a long line of cars waiting to get out on hargrove and like i said it's already hard And this is just phase one. Phase two is gonna double that. So the problem that I have, I think a lot of people are gonna share it, is the density. 24 new homes with 50 cars competing every morning to get out on Hargrove Road. Not to mention the 50 people taxing our sewer system, our water system, the electrical grid, all those things. You can't see it on any of these pictures, but just to the east of us is a apartment complex that came in I don't know, 20, 25, 30 years ago. My family's been there since the 70s. But just to the east of our house is an apartment complex. And they were told when they built that apartment complex that they had to put up a privacy fence between the properties. They never did that. They built some columns that reportedly were gonna be a privacy fence, but those columns still stand there with nothing attached in the middle of the woods. Now, I'm not here just to be adversarial. I don't want this guy to lose money on his development. I would love to sit down and come up with something less dense that he could make his money back on. but we've not been given that opportunity. Thank y'all for your time.

Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, the next person is Brian Croom.

Good evening. My name is Brian Croom. My address is 3815 34th Avenue East. Let's echo the sentiments of Mr. Allen. My issues are very similar to his as far as the traffic issue. It's very congested, like I said, already coming out there in the mornings and getting back into the neighborhood. I work night shift, and when I come home in the mornings, especially certainly during school time, but it's very congested coming in. Another concern is as far as the upkeep concerns me. I have pictures, videos if you need it, what he was speaking of about the Crown Point development. I've called down to the city quite a few times a year I have to call because it's a forest, it's a jungle behind my house that adjustment property that they Allegedly allegedly was going to put up a privacy fence that has not happened. It's a complete eyesore If everyone's property is kept up, but then you have to look out to see To see that so that's a concern of mine as to if if that development is placed there Would we have to be looking at another potential eyesore? so So I stand in opposition of having this development in our neighborhood. Thank you.

Thank you. General, next person is Carolyn Booth.

My name is Carolyn Booth. I live at number one Broadview. I like to use that address even though our address has changed to 3709 34th Avenue East. When my husband and I married, we started hunting a subdivision that looked like it would probably be a good subdivision for us. We wanted one that had family about our age and children and all because we wanted a good neighborhood to live in. And we found one. It was just being developed. So we bought two lights, light number one and light number two, because we planned to have children and we wanted to make sure they had plenty of place to play, you know, because kids nowadays, back in my day, we played in the neighborhood. Then later on, you know, cell phones, iPads, everything kind of took the place of that. But we wanted it so our kids could play. So we bought two lights. And we love it. And we have a wonderful neighborhood. And through the years, people have moved out and new people have moved in. And now there's a lot of young families still, but I'm not one of them. But I think I'm the one that's lived there the longest. My husband and I moved in on Labor Day weekend in 1967, the home we built. So I've been living here for 59 years coming this Labor Day weekend. I've seen things change over that time. We were in the county. Everybody said, oh, you live way out in the county. Well, then it was way out in the county. It was the Hargrove Road and then us. Every now and then, you'd see one or two houses, and then there'd be space, and then there'd be another house or so. And my high school home ec teacher owned a house on Hargrove Road, and she owned all where Palisades Road is. and where those apartments are. And then she sold them, and we were taken into the city, and next thing I knew, there would be apartments built down there, palisades. And then we survived that. And then later on, like they were saying, they built the Crown Point Apartments, and we were told that there would be a privacy fence there, and it never happened. And for a while there, I was having problems about kids, teenagers from that neighborhood walking across my yard and Ms. Hagler's yard, going over to visit at the Palisades. And it got to be a regular stream of teenagers. Even my storage building where we had lawn equipment, everything was broken into. And I'm just saying those teenagers did it. But whoever broke into it didn't want any lawn equipment. They didn't want any wheelbarrows or anything like that because nothing was taken. All they did was just mess up my door to the storage room. But anyway, that was a problem. And like I said, nobody ever made sure a fence was built. One wasn't ever built. And the next thing I knew, we were having to have an address change. I mean, I love being number one and number two Broadview. And suddenly, our subdivision now has three different addresses, 34th Avenue East, 38th Street East, and 33 Court East. And it's really messed up the bail system, because we're getting mail all the time that's not ours, that kind of thing. But my main concern, again, like everybody else, is the traffic's going to be involved. When you put 24 townhomes there, most likely that's going to be like 48 cars. And then when you go to phase two and you add more, that's going to be 96 cars. And we have a real problem getting on Hargrove Road. I don't know what their traffic status showed, but I know from experience, we have a problem getting on the Hargrove Road. Thursday I was involved in some things, and all of a sudden I realized, it's 4 o'clock, and I haven't eaten lunch. So I thought, well, I'll go get me some lunch. Hopped in my car, got down there, string of cars. And then I thought, well, count them, Carolyn. So I started counting them. Some had already gone by, but there were 21 cars that I had to sit there and wait until they went by. And in the mornings, because of the red light down at the Palisades Road and there's not a turn signal, cars back way up. In the morning, you can't get out because cars are all backed up. And then when the light changes and the car that was blocking everybody because it was going to turn left turns, well, he can't turn because all the cars are coming from the other direction. It's just really a problem. I don't know what his... traffic study shows because we never were given that information. But I know firsthand from experience, it is hard to get out on that road. That Hargrove Road wasn't built to handle all the cars that's going up down. And one of the reasons there's so many is that it's a cut-through road. You know, people don't like to go down McFarland and then come up Skyline. So they cut through, come on Hargrove Road. And I've been behind a lot of them. Some of them are going to the market up there. I'm going to leave it on down, you know, because down on past Scott Road is really built up.

They're down that way.

And that means more on the Harcourt Road.

We do need a vote to go over time.

That's wrapping up.

Okay, like they mentioned about the children getting off the bus right at the beginning. I'm even thinking that, you know, I almost try to consider this. They're going to come out of that road in my driveway, in my driveway, and if I take back up in, I mean, Broadview Road, There's so many cars in those townhomes in the mornings because people line up there. And so they're going to have a hard time where those townhomes are. And I'm concerned, too, about who might end up living in those townhomes. I know a lot of times people buy those townhomes, but then they rent them out. And I know I heard that university students aren't supposed to be living in there. But I know a lot of times your parents buy town homes and put their kids in them. Because I had a relative that did the same thing. But my concern there is that we don't know who's going to live there. And we don't know who's going to enforce the decisions that are made today. Because the same thing that happened on the subdivision the Crownport subdivision, where we were told there'd be a fence, and there's never been a fence. It's still not a fence. But I'll be honest. I'm almost feeling like they're trying to do away with our subdivision, because they're just crowding us more and more and more, putting more and more cars, making it more and more hard for us to live there. And we have a wonderful subdivision. We're all real close. We even got together and prayed about this meeting. That's how close we all are. One time, one of the guys was in the hospital for a few weeks. So some of us got together and cooked meals for their children so the wife wouldn't have that load to take care of the kids because she was trying to see her husband in the hospital, trying to take care of the kids. We've done a lot of things as a subdivision. And I hate to see our subdivision be destroyed. I mean, I won't be there much longer. I'm 92 years old. But I don't like for our neighborhood to be destroyed because we have a wonderful neighborhood. We're not a white neighborhood. We're not a black neighborhood. We're both. We live side by side. One of my neighbors, even when I go on vacation, he volunteers to bring a car down into my garage.

Sorry, I don't mean to interrupt, but just to follow protocol, we do need a vote to extend this time. Because we need to be fair to all people who are coming forward to speak.

I think we understand your concern.

Oh, another concern real quick.

Well, first, let's vote. We do actually need a vote per the bylaws that you have to vote to recommend more time and specify what that time is.

Let's give her 30 more seconds. Motion.

30 seconds, Ms. Booth.

My concern also is that Mar would. We need to vote. That Mar would. Motion.

Motion.

All those in favor say aye. Give her 30 more seconds. Aye. Opposed?

You know, down at Hargrove Road now, they're talking about, down below the school, William Forrest School, they're talking about building those Marwood Preserves. It's coming up, I think, on the agenda. 137 more homes and 72 more townhomes. They're going to be cutting through our subdivision, through Hargrove, not our subdivision, but through Hargrove Road to get back there if they want to avoid the McFarland and Skyland. You know, when we plan all these extensions and more and more things coming in on Hargrove Road, we need to be thinking about the road because the road is not built to handle the traffic that we now have. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, last person is Isaiah Harper.

All right, good morning, Commission. My name is Isaiah Harper. My wife, Pamela, and I, we live at 3743 34th Avenue East, which is about On that map where you saw Ms. Booth lives, where the pool is, we live four homes up the street from her, okay? Actually three. And ours is five, Broadview, but really it's 3743, 34th Avenue East.

Can you show that on the map?

I can. Let's see. If you come up past the 3 and 34th Avenue East, you'll see that driveway right there come up to where it's going to curve to your left at the bottom of the screen there, a curve to your left, my left, or to your right. I don't know how you're seeing it. But when you curve, before you take that curve, that house on the opposite side over here. I don't know how you guys are seeing it. That's why. Can staff mark it? No, I am. No, go one more up. One more. There you go, right there. Okay. That's where I live, okay? And Ms. Booth lives down there where you come into the subdivision. Do you have my PowerPoint? Okay. So here's my position is that nothing has really changed since this developer came last time. He came last time asking for commercial building. When he was here before, he said, you ask him, you know, what kind of green space are you going to put up? What is it going to look like? And guess what he said?

I don't know.

And you guys told him to go back to the drawing board, and that's how we ended up with the second meeting. And I'm just summarizing. And then he came back, and then there were still questions about how it's going to look and what's the traffic is going to be about. And so then what happened? So then on January 22nd, you unanimously rejected the rezoning for that commercial building and also on August 18th, okay? And then here we go on July 20th, and we're asking you to deny it again, okay? Here's what both are going to do. Significantly increased traffic. The new one is going to even slow it down much more than the commercial building would have because you're going to put families in there. You're going to put multiple cars. You guys were just asking about that. It's going to change the long-time climate of the neighborhood that Ms. Booth was just talking about. And it's not really in sync with this zoning particular that he's asking for, SFR4. And I'll talk about that in a minute, okay? There's the proposed townhome area right there. I sat down there like Ms. Booth was saying. There's Ms. Booth's house on the left of the screen. This is entering. And I sat down there the other day. I took this video, and it was 30 seconds, but I sped it up to about 15 seconds. You can see the amount of cars that come by there in a 30-second span of time, okay?

So that's what that's about.

These cars come down there speeding. The other night, about two weeks ago, One car came down speeding. It hit, knocked the pole up in the air, power pole in the air, cracked it, and took our power out for about seven or eight hours. So we have a lot of traffic that comes through there, and occasionally we have accidents through there as well. What you're going to end up having if these proposed homes are here, just like Ms. Booth was talking about and Mr. Allen, is you're going to have congestion. Look at that road up there. It is an incline. It is not a flat road. It's an incline. So we come leaving our neighborhood going down riding the brakes. already to that stop sign. So you're going to have cars turning in every which kind of way. And if you look behind that neighborhood sign right there, neighborhood watch sign, that's where the driveway is. And that's where the people who are in these town homes will be exiting. So you're going to have a mass congestion right there with cars going every which way. And that area is going to eventually just wear out that road. And you're going to need frequent repairs. That's how the cars are going to be turning in and out. Then, so right here, I made this to show you that you're going to have congestion. Lots of very quick, tight, and cross turns. The neighborhood is going to be congested right in that area as they're leaving, frequent accidents and frequent road repair right in that area. Again, it is an inclined roadway, okay? And also, right there where they're talking, right there where that bus is, that's a bus stop. Children are standing right there, literally almost in the road in the morning time, catching buses on Hargrove Road. And you're going to put all that traffic within that little area from Hargrove Road going into the neighborhood that's about 15 to 20 feet off the road before the turn is into the proposed development. This is the area we're talking about. I took a ride. That's the church across the street right there. And I want to show you, that's one of the houses right there you saw earlier that is on this particular property, where the first phase of the townhome could be. I'm across the street. How many cars I had to wait on in just a 30-second span in order to turn out from the church across the street. These are all cars flashing before your eyes. And here I want to take you up into our neighborhood for a second. If you will be patient, I'm turning into that area. There's Ms. Booth's house right there. Sorry, I shot this on my cell phone. You can see, this is that area of area of yellow that I'm speeding through. This is our neighborhood. This is where we live. This is how we go in and out of our community where these townhomes are being very interesting. People live all around here. We have older people, younger people, people that work. And here at the end of the curve, you will see there's my turn here. There's my house right there. And I stop right here for a purpose. Because right where that house is, that's where the second phase of the development will come up to. And Ms. Ingram that lives right there where you see the swing set, That's where her child plays, but the development would come right up to that. That's just unheard of for a neighborhood that's just trying to go to work, raise a family, and make a living. So that's that. There it is again. I just put that in there.

We have reached five minutes, so if we could have a vote.

I've got a question.

If I can finish my PowerPoint real quick.

How much time is on that PowerPoint? How much time is left?

About a minute, two.

Anybody want to grant additional time for this? Yes. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Please finish the slideshow.

And so inside that SFR zoning that he's asking for, if you look at when you guys considered the SFR flow that was back in 2024-25, I think when it was passed, and it was mainly created not for it to squeeze in these type townhomes into a SFR just like this. It was mainly created for the purpose of doing this type of development in an already open space on lots in West Tuscaloosa. And if you look at it right here, this is the document that is in your documents online. If you look right here, it says FRO, well, let's read it. The FRO for district carries forward and consolidates, modifies RD1 and RD2, which is where you had on the west side, you had some of these residential detached districts where you were trying to build developments like this, and the FR4 districts intended to reduce the number of existing non-conformities, some of those things you had questions about in the beginning, in the West Tuscaloosa residential neighborhoods as well as provide land for new small lot residential development. This is not meant to be squeezed into where you have SFR1 all around you. That's in your own documents. Okay? And I blew it up just so you could see it. Okay? And that's why you have RD1 that was turned into SFR1. SFR 4, RD 2, that was turned into SFR 4 consolidated. That was why you did it. And those SFR 1, 2, and 3 were approved separately from FFR 4 because you're trying to find a way to make these things happen, this type of development happen in West Tuscaloosa. That's your own documents, okay? So anyway, I don't think it works here. I understand it's a bus stop, it's an incline roadway, it doesn't work for this community, and do not change the integrity of our community, please. And before I sit down, I want to ask, how many people are here from Broadview? Opponents, stand up. Everybody that's from Broadview. Not even speaking, but they came out tonight to show support that we do not want this. Thank you.

Can I ask a question? You seem obviously very dialed into the community, and that makes a neighborhood, which is great. You know, what would a neighborhood accept in this area? I mean, the property owner, it's zoned SFR1. Tell me, or maybe the developer needs to hear this as well, what does the neighborhood want there?

What would you accept? How about some garden homes? Some what? Some garden homes. Put homes there. Keep our neighborhood looking the way it is. Look on the side of us. Look on the left side of us. You have, what is that? West Oak, right? Waterhook, I mean. And then over here, you have Crown Point Apartments. We're already crowded by multiple family type development. Keep that area what it is. It's one way in, one way out. And you're talking about dumping, creating a townhomes there and dumping it out onto our one way in, one way out street. That's not even feasible.

Staff, I got a question. What would be the density of a townhome development in that area?

An SFR4?

Well, a garden home.

An SFR1.

An SFR1, the minimum lot size is 12,000 square feet with 85 feet of width at the front building.

Based on our best knowledge and guess, how many garden homes could be on that property?

For SFR 1, you would not be able to fit very many homes. You would not be able to parcel this out to fit very many homes in a 12,000 square foot minimum lot size.

And that's why he's asking for the SFR 4. Well, sure. Yeah, obviously.

You could do something kind of like profit justice academy, sir.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, thank you, sir. Well, that's all we have, speaking of opposition. Petitioner. Love to have you come back up. You heard several concerns and issues. Need to address those.

While they're coming up, Mr. Chairman, can we go back to what Mr. Harper was talking about as far as when we combined RD1 or whatever we combined to make the SFR4? Because I thought I saw that the two that we combined into that were detached housing.

right so this again as we spoke through all of the framework process this isn't just a one for one you know sfr1 goes to this type of specific you know uh district that's new um so i just want to caution you on using this as your frame of reference related to you know the one for one change i need to be cautioned about using this as my frame of reference and talk a little bit louder for me because okay so so this um in our previous ordinance we had sfr1 it doesn't just strictly translate or sorry we had r1 it doesn't just strictly translate to sfr1 It's similar, but it's not just a one-for-one. And so we kind of harped on that throughout that whole process of don't just think R4 goes to SFR4. R1 goes to SFR1. So that's why I want to caution you related to that.

Because I know there's other wording that does allow townhouses and duplexes.

Right, and so that's where the future land use character map that we use for rezonings, that's why we reference that and the different types of uses. And so as Leota mentioned through her PowerPoint, the framework, the future land use character map is suburban residential, a secondary use of that. So primary is single family residential detached homes. Secondary is single family attached homes. And so that's kind of the character of that area does allow for this type of product being a townhome or a duplex or something similar in scale to a single family home.

Thank you. Hi. Yes, sir.

Is that it, Mr. Pons?

Yeah. Cam Parsons. I'm going to address a few of the comments that were made by the neighborhood folks and First of all, I was going to reiterate basically what Mr. Pons just said. The staff has submitted a report. You've seen it. And the staff has said that the proposal does fit within the SFR for classification. But I do want... I'm a little bit upset about the comments that the last speaker made comparing this project to the project that was shot down a year ago. That was a commercial project. And I call those workspace type development where you've got the mini warehouse type thing and the business is operating. Employees are coming and going all the time. And I would agree that that particular project that was not residential based was what's properly denied. This is totally different. This project, you've got architectural drawings of what it's going to look like. You've got the green space and all that. There were a lot of misstatements made by the last speaker about what's been presented now and what was presented before. This is a totally different project. Trust me, we have met on many occasions with not only staff, but the city council member in this area, trying to find something that would make the project economically feasible and be harmonious with the rest of the neighborhood. Now, to be perfectly harmonious, you would tear down those houses and build two new houses. That's not going to happen. That's what's there now. But I do want to let Mr. Sims address, it seems like a lot of the opposition is based on traffic complaints. And the city staff asked for a traffic study. And the owner, developer, spent a lot of money on a traffic study. And the traffic study says that this isn't going to create any adverse effect there. I know these people live there. And I respect, I respect, I really respect their concerns. But this is not going to be a high-density apartment complex. These are going to be owner-operated. You never know. People can buy a townhouse, and they can rent it. But this is going to be designed for people. The prices are going to be below the Tuscaloosa County median price. It's going to be what I consider to be affordable housing. It's going to make housing available for people in that area that they might not be able to afford somewhere else. I'd like for Mr. Sims to talk a little bit more about the traffic study because the city asked for it, spent good money on it, and I'd like for you to hear about that.

Just quickly, a couple of points. One, we did hire professional traffic study specialists to perform the study. They provided some feedback such as distance from hard road for the driveway location that sort of thing so we we conform to the recommendations of that study uh but but frankly like uh mr parsons was saying there the the level of service that's currently there and what is proposed to be there after the development is completely built out even for the two phases uh according to the study is uh you know it doesn't change service classes so it's still the same before and after. And they did include, you know, a projected growth over many years as part of that study as well. So it wasn't just solely based on the traffic they, you know, monitored currently. And they did also, just one more point, they did also make sure that they conducted that study before school let out as well. So to try to get the the most difficult traffic conditions they could in the area. So that's when the study was actually conducted.

Sam, one of the things that was discussed outside the traffic and the taxing of our utilities was the upkeep HOA, I'm assuming it's HOA, will be required for this?

Yes, sir, there will be an HOA. And again, these are intended to be owner-occupied residences. And so, you know, different than the apartments, I think you'll have a standard of care that's a little elevated than you would see in those situations.

Any more questions?

Any further questions of the petitioner? Thank you, gentlemen.

What is the density per acre?

What is the density per acre? So in SFR 4, the loud would be 15 dwelling units per acre. They're coming in under that. I don't recall the exact number off the top of my head. Ten and a half, I believe.

You're ten and a half? Yes, sir. That's 15?

Yes, sir.

And also I just want to clarify something with my comments. I'm not saying that SFR four is appropriate. I mean, you've got to take all of that into consideration, you know, the traffic and everything that's been brought up today. That's why you have to go through this process. And another thing is if you look at, so this is about 15,000 square feet. So you can roughly see, you know, if this was an SFR one, If this was built out as SFR 1, you'd get lots of typical to this type size.

You know, Zach, we talked about when we had the deal with Beverly Heights.

And he had, the whole thing had been rezoned. And so the guy who was redoing the house tore down a house, I think, and built the other one. But we talked about, I wonder why we didn't consider SFR 3 or SFR 2. Because you could put smaller lots in there. I mean, bigger lots than SFR 4, but not as big as SFR 1 would require. I mean, I'm just trying to figure out how to balance all of this. Because I know you're within your density. But you can be within your density, but in my opinion, not necessarily congruous with the density around you. And I know we need housing like this. I really do. But it's given me heartburn. I'm just going to be perfectly honest with you.

I would like to say that I went So whenever we purchased the property, it was county land. And the reason why we're doing this in two phases is because Ms. Haler lives in the south property right there. She wishes to stay in her home until she has to move out on her free will. So she kind of got lumped into this whole situation because of me. So I've been speaking with her and her family, and that's the reason why we're kind of, I'm taking the responsibility of trying to steward her.

He's talking about phase two.

Yes, why there's two phases. I think part of the SFR4 was for those phasing requirements because her land was also in the county before the annexation. And if it got left out, then it would always remain SFR1 with the road requirements. I mean, the frontage requirements, you would have her house on two and a half acres where you could maybe subdivide and make one lot. So they wanted to go ahead and, they didn't want to, but they were kind of forced into go ahead and getting it, because they were planning on remaining in the county until after she passed and they got ready to sell. Also, I would like to say that I did look back at the last, as far back as I could find, if you look at any zoning cases along this corridor, you have had zero cases of going from county into SFR1. it's in this area of the city, it's just not a popular or desired density. So the SFR four, it makes it where we can try to provide the entry level housing attainable housing for the next generation of neighborhoods. Whenever this is the modern day neighborhood, this 20 years ago in the early two thousands, it was the garden homes. And now There's a reason why the townhome developments have become so popular. It's just people need housing. It's the only way that, as a developer, you can provide it.

Okay. Thank you, gentlemen.

Thank you.

All right. I think we've heard from the petitioner and those opposed. We'll obviously close and have a conversation amongst this body, and then we'll start addressing each case. Any comment from any commissioner?

Yeah, so I would like to say, for me, I believe that this is a dense project considering this area. And right now, I'm still not confident in the amount of traffic that this project will bring to this neighborhood and Hargrove Road. And I'm not confident in the parking situation or the overflow of parking when that need arises. And Not only is it a dense project, but I believe that it's, right now, from what I've heard, considering the parking and the garbage carts, is going to appear to be a very dense project. So those are my concerns with this development.

Any other comments from commissioners?

Mr. Chairman, when this project, I remember when this project came before us six months ago or so, originally, I forget. I don't remember this much opposition coming out when it was going to retail, I felt like, in my opinion, in looking at the project and in talking to staff, we do have an approved traffic study. We have staff somewhat letting us know that this does somewhat conform to the future use plan. Given the fact that, I mean, this is a case of a developer taking what we said to him and going out and rethinking this whole thing from retail a high traffic area with these work sites that he had into a residential thing that could potentially help our community with our housing issue. So, you know, the density is lower than what's required in the SFR4. It's adjacent to higher density uses. I think this is a case where the developer heard what we said and tried to come back and reconvene something that would work for us. Just my opinion. Any other comments?

I understand that it fits within SFR 4, but it isn't SFR 4 yet, right? I mean, we have the option to... to not approve a zoning that would allow this much density. I'm sorry about the traffic study that we haven't had sort of more time to look at and think about that. I am concerned about the street level, the rise that, I'm sorry, Mr. Ha was speaking about. I think it adds to the problem, not insignificantly. It gives me heartburn along with Ms. Price.

I like some things about it. You know, go back in time. Len was in the county. I mean, he could have trained wrecks in people's lives, and he hasn't, and I appreciate that in a way. I do think, to your point, Mr. Chairman, about the alley, you know, if you really want density, you know, provide some ways to make it happen, you know, I think if you're not willing to rear end, park them, it may mean you need to cut down on some of your density. In my mind, I can see maybe a cul-de-sac, like the vineyards. The vineyards, garden homes, I may disagree. Just in my mind, I can see maybe 20 or something like that. I understand roads take up space, I don't think I should have to sit here and do the math and try to figure out how many parks this is and how many, you know. I don't like the idea that the lot's 20 feet wide and I know parking spaces are nine. I mean, I think that means it's gonna be car, car, car, car, car, car, car, car. So I don't know if you can take some of this green space and move it around, break it up and make it look good and get the numbers you want. I don't have a problem with town homes. I think they're good. But at the same time, I know what this looks like on the ground. I think I can envision this. And I do think we have some landscaping. And Zach says they have their code, but I can't see it in this drawing. So that means there's got to be some breakup in here. And I love the rear-loaded parking, say, at Reston and some other places. In other words, if you want to pack them in, give the cars a way to get to them without— See, I worry, and y'all know this because you've heard me do it three or four times. When you start getting to be 20 feet wide and people start parking in front, it doesn't take many people to have somebody over for the football game to create total chaos for emergency vehicles or anybody else. And our job is to prevent that, okay? Because once it's built and cars are everywhere, I mean, we've won awards. Bill, you've been a part of. We won an award for changing the way the cars were handled around town. People were parking in the front yards. Now they're parking to the rear. They're reestablishing front yards. And I think that's still a model in my brain that I try to think about every time we go to a development. How can we keep the cars from being ugly and everywhere? And that's what's going to happen if you don't have parking places for them. They're going to be ugly and everywhere as soon as somebody has somebody over. So, now, he's making me work out a little bit, because I don't think it's my job to have to count parking spaces. I think it's his job. But I don't have a problem with townhomes, Ms. Clay. I mean, I really don't. And I think, to Tim's point, he's done a lot of what we asked. Somewhere in the middle, maybe, I think there is a, maybe a better design than this. I don't have a problem with the product. I do feel bad that this is a, look, I hadn't seen or one subdivision since I've sat on this board. I don't think. Have I? I mean, I think it's a dream. I mean, I just don't think people do it. So we might as well just throw one out and start picking up on two, three, and four. I mean, hey, that's reality. That's how I feel.

One of the things that I was worried about when we first heard this development when it was a commercial warehouse space, it was in the county, and then through some pressures, the city annexed this property, not to request the developer, but the city. And so we kind of forced the man's hand on coming in and building residential, which I think is appropriate. And to Mr. Harris's point is this gentleman is trying to build something that one he is required to now but maybe he has some rights to build some housing that's what he's required to build now is this exactly what everybody wants obviously not Can they get there? That's the reason I asked Mr. Harper. I said, what would the neighborhood want there? Because he's not going to build a single family house. He's not going to keep it R1. Now, I think that'd be a tough house to sell. I don't know if there's been much collaboration between the neighborhood and the developer. Maybe there's a chance to do that because we are at the point now where this is now a residential request development. So I don't know if the developer wants to rethink this. I would hope the neighbors would realize that something needs to happen here, is gonna happen here. Can y'all agree on it? I don't know. I mean, most of the times when we have any development, any residential development near any other current development, nobody wants it, I get it. Nobody wants something in my backyard. But if we kept that mental philosophy, we'd have no neighborhoods and no growth.

We've never had anybody show up and say, I'd like that.

Zero. And usually the product that's built is an asset. Because I always talk about traffic. I always talk about my property values. I always talk about Bambi and Thumper. And it never has been to the detriment of those neighborhoods that were here in opposition. So... I don't know if y'all can get there. I don't know what this body's gonna do. I don't know what the city council's gonna do. I don't know if the city council representative of this area is hearing. I'm sure he's hearing quite a bit. If this gets there, that'll be those paid and elected officials to make that decision. I think we kind of created a little bit of a mess here, but here we are. I need a review of that.

What was the reason for annexing this? The city petitioned to annex since the property owner didn't petition? What was the?

Yeah, so the city went forward with an annexation for this property for neighborhood protection, essentially.

Okay. To make sure it went residential.

Not necessarily residential, but to make sure that there were regulations in place for the property itself.

So that we could go.

Right.

And so is Ms. Hagler's already in the city?

Yes.

So this whole square and everything around it was in the city, correct? Right.

It was surrounded by the city limits. Also, one more thing to clarify. One more thing to clarify is this has been continued twice before, so it does require a vote tonight.

Did we vote on it? No.

Any other? I mean, obviously, you heard Mr. Pons there. We have to vote on this issue tonight, so we're going to. Any other comments from this commission before we take these votes?

Ours is just a recommendation.

It is just a recommendation. Yeah. Yeah. So I would just like to say, I don't know what my colleagues are going to do, but regardless of what happens, I think it's important that the petitioner and the residents continue to try to work on communication through this process. I would like to see that happen.

Excellent point. All right. All right, commission. I'm texting votes. All right, first case is Z1426, petitioner, request to rezone 4.6 acres from SFR1 to SFR4.

Motion to approve.

Second. Second. Mr. Rumsey. Yes.

No. No.

Yes.

No. No.

No. Yes. Where are we laying?

It'll go without.

It'll go without a record. All right. S-3226 Hargrove Heights, 24 townhome lots on those 2.3 acres. Do I have a motion and a second? With one variance request, engineering has no issues with it based on the hammerhead turnaround where fire department needs.

Motion to approve.

Second.

Ms. Hornsby.

No. No.

No.

Yes.

No. No.

Yes. Yes.

Same thing.

I'm assuming those who are here in this case are free to leave, and we'll give you a minute or two to depart if you wish to. If you want to stick around, you're more than welcome to.

We need a reason, don't we?

Okay, did y'all hear that? Everybody that voted no would have their rationale and reasoning for no.

My reasoning is that I'm not confident in the parking situation and the traffic study. I would like more information on the traffic study. Also, I feel like they did not give us a clear plan on their garbage carts versus the dumpster situation. I also have concerns on... if this really fits the nature of the neighborhood. And this is a recommendation to the city council, so I would like to see them be able to work more with the residents in the neighborhood that have stated their concerns as they move forward.

The second vision is a final vote. Ms. Hornsby, do you want to give your rationale?

Can I share? It's ours, sir. And we're well put.

Thank you. I agree. I've been listening to this on my phone, believe it or not. I guess I'm a nerd.

Is this adequate for responses for you, Mr. Woodson?

Yes.

Can we answer others? Okay.

I agree with everything that Howard said. Concur. I agree.

All right.

You good? This is democracy at work. All right, thank you. Next case.

All right, next. Exactly. Our next piece of unfinished business, it's a companion case, Parkside Flats, two parts, rezoning in the subdivision. We're on .8 acres at and around 916 22nd Avenue East, requesting to rezone from GC, General Commercial, to MR2, Mixed Residential 2, and then consolidating that lot. You can see we're just south of University Boulevard East, below the tennis center. See that lot today is vacant, has some existing concrete on site. You can see that existing zoning is General Commercial, GC. The applicant is requesting to rezone from GC to MR2 to allow for a multifamily development. Here's some photos taken from 22nd East on the left looking towards University Boulevard, on the right looking south. And then from 21st Avenue East on the left looking kind of into the lot and then on the right looking towards University Boulevard East. Here's the site plan you saw last month. The applicant actually submitted some new slides this morning that you can take a look at here when they get up here. A sample elevation for the front and floor plans as well. In framework, this has two future land use characters, so the first being corridor commercial. The rezoning request does not conform, nor does the use. But another piece of this is also identified as multifamily residential. The zoning request and use do conform to the plan on that piece. And you can see those two different classifications here. Here are our permitted uses and MR2. Moving into the subdivision now, consolidating the lot on 0.8 acres. You can see it's vacant today. It's made up of multiple parcels here. You can see that with contours, without, just cleaning up those interior lot lines. We have one variance request. We did not receive any public comment. Do you have any questions for staff?

Engineering on the right-of-way dedication?

We're in agreement.

Okay, thank you, sir. Petitioner? Commissioners.

Mr. Chairman, members of the Commission, Bobby Herndon, 2728 Lurley and Wallace Boulevard in Northport. This is the case that was presented last month. There were some concerns, some comments, some questions, and I think we answered those. We've got a new layout as far as the layout of the buildings. Do we have that? Can we put it on the screen? Okay.

Yeah, if I may, Brandon Clark, 2201 Maxie Thomas Way. Just to recap, last month we had- I missed the address. 2201 Maxie Thomas Way, 11th Street.

Thomas Way, change the name.

Yeah. Yeah, we had, just to recap from last- Last month we developed the three bedroom townhomes on Kicker Road at the Viaduct there on the corner. We wanted to diversify our investment in that area by adding some one bedroom and two bedroom units. It's not really feasible to do that as townhomes, although townhomes we feel like is kind of our thing. But so we came up with a concept that looks like townhomes but still allows us to incorporate some ones and twos to balance out the three bedrooms units. It's a use by right in the MR2 zone that we're proposing. So our request tonight is for a rezoning of some of the parcels from GC to MR2 and also just a plat because our property is made up of several small 45-foot lots that really aren't developable otherwise. We had also provided last month a conceptual site plan, and I've don't believe I'm speaking out of turn when I say you're not actually approving our site plan tonight. The site plan provided last month and the revised one this month is just for your consideration to see that we've got a plan of what we're doing and what we plan to do, but there'll be plenty more review of that through the LDP and the building permit process. Last time we came with more of an alley loaded design, like our three bedroom units on Kicker Road, but And we had not been able to meet with Councilman Tyner. We'd had to reschedule with him. Y'all gave us a lot of input and suggestions that, frankly, were good ideas. And we changed up that plan for the property. And another question that y'all had and Councilman Tyner had as well was about the potential. You know, Councilman Tyner is in favor of more residents moving into his district. And he understands that that's needed to generate the commercial development, but he also wants to make sure that the commercial development can still be done when the residents get there. So we provided, did some engineering to provide a plan to show what that would look like and how that could still happen with what we're proposing. Can you, I've got it right here. So this is our revised plan. In the prior conceptual plan, all of the units, so University Boulevard is at the top. So there's a commercial row in front of us there.

Can you mark University Boulevard?

Do I have a pointer? Okay, yeah. And the area outlined in green is actually part of our property as well, but we're not requesting for that to be rezoned MR. We're requesting to keep that GC for future commercial development on University Boulevard. But what we did is instead of having the units closer to University with more of an alley design behind as we had last month, one of the concerns was the proximity of the units to the commercial property and to University Boulevard. We pulled the units back further from University Boulevard and put our parking lot between the units in University Boulevard to kind of give some more of a transition and more of a buffer. Another question was about the buffer that would be required of the GC properties. And there was some confusion about if it would eat up 35 feet. of the commercial properties. We met with and spoke with planning staff immediately after the meeting. What most people do is they do a 20 foot alternative compliance with a fence along the back. So there's already a 15 foot rear setback on that commercial property anyways. So it's just five more feet of space. But to show you what this would look like with our revised plan, again, the units are designed to look like townhomes from the outside, even though they're one and two bedrooms to try to fit into the neighborhood as best we can. You can see the St. John's flats, three bedroom development behind us, which is more of a traditional apartment style development with a center breezeway. We've got the parking lot in front now, in front of University. You can see the area outlined in green, which we own, which we're asking to remain commercial for future development of that frontage. And then you can see the 20 foot strip there with a fence at the rear, which would be the buffer. And then we also had our engineer lay out a commercial plan for this frontage property because Councilman Tyner really has a goal to increase the retail presence in the area. He wants to see a restaurant there with everything going on at the tennis center across the street. So we worked with our engineers to come up with a concept on that, which is this. This is 7,800 feet of retail on the frontage parcels there, and it all fits on there. Um, there's spaces at five spaces per thousand. Your code only requires three and a half spaces per thousand for restaurants. So there's plenty of parking there for those types of uses. Um, this is 7,800 square feet to give you an idea and scale like the building that, uh, is Southern Alehouse, uh, on McFarland. That's 6,400 square feet with those three tenants in there. So this would be slightly larger than that. And it would have parking that exceeds the code. Now we don't control all of these properties. We just own the green parcel there, but you know, I think what y'all wanted to hear was that you wanted to make sure that we had checked that what we're doing is not gonna, you know, jettison the idea of the commercial development. So I'll leave it at that. And if y'all have any questions, we'll be glad to answer.

Any questions for the petitioner? I applaud you and your team for hearing our concerns. And I feel like addressing them in a smart manner, in a smart way. And I think Councilman's correct. Chicken or egg, which comes first, the beds or the heads or the retail and the commercial? And I think being in the old retail world, you need people living out here. And I think this product has got potential because it's a straight shot at the new campus. You got, what, one traffic light, two? I think that area would probably be really conducive for your grad student, your law student, who does not want to be on campus. So again, I applaud your efforts. Not really a question, but more of a comment. Thank you.

I'm going to echo Bill. I was pretty out front in my opposition to it being pulled up against that retail. I think what you've done is a great job. I think it will be, in my opinion, will be more successful. I wish you all the success. Thank you.

Anyone here speak for or against this petition request? Thank you, gentlemen. All right, commission, I'm going to close it and we can, I think Mr. Harris and I kind of set our two cents. Anyone have any comments?

What's the bed, what's the count, what's the parking count and bedroom count?

So last month we had, we call them modules because each one's designed to look like a townhome, but it's actually a one-bedroom and a two-bedroom stacked. So last month we came to you with 24 units, 12 modules total.

I mean, how many beds and how many parks?

So a module is a one-bedroom with a two-bedroom above.

How many beds and how many parks? How many beds and how many parks?

So, yeah, last month we had 24. This month we're down to 22 units, which is 33 beds and 33 parking spaces. 33 bedrooms, 33 parking spaces. How many parks? 33, I think.

Say 33 or 38?

33 beds and 33 parking spaces, one-to-one, which is the code requirement.

So can someone have a guest come and watch the football game with them? Anybody? Can anybody have anybody?

We do have room to add a couple parking spaces on the east side.

I mean, multi-family does have 1.07, right? So how many parking spaces do you need to add?

We changed that in this code update, the 0.07 piece.

So we have no guest parking, zero.

Right, but he was addressing that comment, I believe.

So if you have, so is this a rental product? Yes. You need a part. You got to have it. You're going to rent all the beds, right? You want to. That's the idea. You got to have AX. You got to have. One or two. I mean, if you don't, where are they going to go? Somebody's got a boyfriend or girlfriend, I think. Somebody?

We do have room to add two spaces on the east side. We had taken them back off when we removed a unit, but we do have room to add a couple more spaces.

So you are adding two more?

Yes.

All right, again, anyone cares before or against? Any comments from this commission?

I know they admit the required parking spaces, so I'll just leave that at that. But this is definitely an improvement from how it was presented the first time, even with the retail space. It's a big improvement.

All right, commission. Before us, we have Z1626. Z1626. Petition to rezone from GC to MR2 on 916 22nd Avenue. Do I have a motion and a second? Motion to approve.

Second.

Mr. Rumsey. Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes. Motion approved. Commission S4726 Parkside Flats. One bearing request right of my dedication. Engineering has no issues with it. Do I have a motion and a second? So moved. Second. Ms. Hornsby?

Yes. Yes.

Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Motion approved.

All right, moving into our next case tonight. This is another companion case, Markwood Preserve. Three parts, annexation, rezoning, and a subdivision for phase one. So overall, looking at 221 acres requesting to annex, we are near 6800 Hargrove Road East. Once annexed, requesting to rezone from SFR1 to GPD. And then lastly, on around 64 acres, completing the phase one subdivision. So get into all the details here. We can see we are south of Woodland Forest Elementary. You can see that land today is vacant. And last time we saw this was May of 2026, so this was that master plan presented then. It was a total of 855 lots. You can see that master plan updated for today. It's dropped to 843 lots. They've also added a 65-foot wide lot width. So I just wanted to kind of show those to you side by side here. I've kind of boxed the major changes between the two master plans here between the two months you've seen this. So now getting into the annexation, we're looking at that full 221 acres. Requesting to bring that into city limits. You can see city limits in yellow on this map. They're requesting to enter city limits for a general plan development. In framework, this is in three of our expansion areas we identified. And here are the staff comments on the annexation petition. Give you a second on this one. Now moving into the rezoning, if annexed, your default zoning is SFR1. They're requesting to rezone to GPD as a general plan development. So again, we're looking at that full 221 acres. You can see the surrounding zonings here. Again, making this request for a general plan development. You can see that master plan here. Overall, you can see kind of the variety of lot types, totaling 843 lots. Just zooming in so you can see some details starting on the east side near the entrance off of Hargrove Road East, moving south and west here, north and west, and finally to that last section off of Gardner Road. So overall density 3.9 acres, 51 acres of proposed open space that makes up 23% of the site. Again, you can see kind of the mix of lot sizes, single family homes and town homes. Last time you saw this, there's a lot of discussion about the parking piece. So you can see they're providing additional parking in phase one, phase two, where those town homes are located. Now looking at the phasing, so overall they're looking at three phases broken into two sub-phases each. Tonight they're looking at the preliminary plot for phase one, that's why they have those details on phase 1A and phase 1B, but you can see 209 lots phase one, phase 1A 88 lots, phase 1B 121 lots, so on, so forth, and you can see the densities associated with each phase. Getting into the narrative now, so this is just a sample. Of course, more details in the packet. This is for sale, looking at single-family homes between 1,400 and 2,700 square feet, townhomes between 1,700 and 1,800 square feet. Looking at two commercial lots, you can see several different common areas, clubhouses, pool, walking trails, playgrounds, open space, and other areas. accessory uses listed here. For parking, they're proposing a minimum of two parking spaces per dwelling unit, as well as additional parking for guests for the townhomes. You can see those numbers at the top. Their primary residential uses will be single-family detached and townhome units with a max of 35 feet in height. The setbacks they're proposing, 20 in the front, 15 in the rear, and five on the sides. You can see the typical lot configurations here based on the different lot widths, whether it's a corner lot and whether it's a townhome dwelling. Getting into the materials, permitted materials of brick, stone, cement board for the residential products, looking at the commercial permitted materials, brick tile, natural stone, wood clapboard, and so on here. So overall, 51 acres of open space, it's about 23% of the site, looking to be sold in the mid-200s to mid-500s. Here are the commercial uses they're proposing, so office, coffee house, quick service, and sit-down restaurants, convenience stores, and small retail sales. So as I kind of mentioned earlier, they're looking at three major phases, each phase divided into two sections. So you'd see that phase one, A and B, then phase two, A and B, phase three, A and B. You can kind of see the summary here for the amenities provided in each phase, as well as the variety of lots they're proposing. Now getting into some renderings here, you all saw this last month, and again, more details in the packet. So just a sample here of a one-story home and a two-story home, entrance signage for the development, proposed amenities for the development, commercial spaces, and additional amenities provided here. I can see, again, two commercial lots. So first one proposed off of Hargrove Road. You can see that here. And the second off of Garner Road at the northwest end of the development. They're proposing some road improvements. You can see existing conditions on Hargrove Road on the top and proposed improvements on the bottom. And again, for road improvements to Bradley Road as well. Last month, or excuse me, in May, there was a lot of discussion from the schools. The city schools did turn in this letter to us. I'll give you a second here to read it. All right, now lastly, moving into the subdivision. So again, we were looking at the full 221 acres for the annexation rezoning. Now we are looking at a portion of that around 63 acres for that phase one subdivision. You can see kind of the difference in the full project area and phase one here. This is what you saw again in May of 2026, overall 225 lots. When you first saw this, you can see the phase boundary change slightly and they're down to 209 lots in phase one with 88 lots in phase 1A and 121 lots in phase 1B. And just to clarify that phase line, was about there, this area was included in May. That's where you kind of see that shift. Here's the breakdown in both of them overall for this phase, 3.34 dwelling units per acre with just under three in phase 1A and just nearly four, 3.85 dwelling units per acre in phase 1B.

Leota, stop right there.

Yeah.

Go back to that. We can kind of see the line there. Would you use your pen and really show us the phasing line? Yes. So it's clear for all.

This red dash line you can see here.

Okay. That's 1A and 1B? Correct.

1A to the right and 1B to the left, right?

Yeah, the right is going to be built.

1A. That's the 1A. That's why we're going to get more clarification from the petitioner on

I guess you said that it's three phases, two sections. Correct. Are the two sections going to be built in common at the same time?

From their narrative, they intend to plot the sub-phases and then move forward with the next sub-phase.

So you don't know?

That's how it read to me. I'll let you ask them.

So where is it? So there's 220 acres and they're saying 50 acres of green space?

That's for the overall site. So now in phase one, you can see they have roughly 18 acres of open space.

Where is that?

All the green you can see here.

So the contingent bondage?

You know, it just dawned on me. You gave me an answer that my kids give me. I don't understand either one of them.

So you said they're going to do it in phases. So phase one, though, is broken down into two sub-phases, 1A and 1B. And so what are they going to start on? Are they going to start on the left side or the right side?

I think that's a question we need to ask. Oh, okay.

Because of access, I assume it would be 1A.

That's what I was trying to pin her down on.

Got it. This is just that plat without contours. And then, of course, they have very large tax parcel. There's platting that remnant piece as well. Just zooming in for some detail, this is phase 1A you can see here and phase 1B. one variance request. We did receive four comments in opposition when this was first presented in May. Before the June hearing, we received one neutral comment and one in support. And before tonight's meeting, we received one in opposition and one in support of this request. The applicant did submit some slides. Do you have any questions for staff?

Let me ask Mr. Garner, what level of engineering understanding do you have on this project from the developer to date? I mean, there were some issues with regards to the sewer that passed down the sewers. There were some issues with regards to the current situation with the land. I mean, it's a pretty massive project, 221 acres. And, you know, permitting, jurisdictional permitting, is any of that, have they embarked on any of that yet?

So they did do a sewer study and submitted that where they did some flow monitoring and some manholes along the sewer line that, you know, runs through the development. They identified a segment of sewer that with the build out of this development would exceed the capacity. It is a segment of pipe that is very flat.

Without... Say that again. The total build out of this would exceed the current capacity?

That's right. So there's a segment of pipe that's relatively flat. And in their analysis, they identified where they could... And they did this using as-built rock construction plans, but that they could... change the grade of several segments of pipe from manhole to manhole, and satisfy the capacity requirement. So there will be some sewer work that they have to do before they're allowed to tie on to the sewer system.

Sewer work they have to do on?

Our system.

Our system.

Yeah, to improve our system.

Do we know what?

To what extent, volume-wise? No. I'm going to guess it's probably 500 to 600 feet of pipe that's going to have to be relayed and reconnected.

Has there been any cost projections done for that?

That didn't have any cost projections, no.

OK. And what's the tipping point? Do you know? I think approximately. Are we talking 50% or are we talking 50% bailed out? Are we talking 70% bailed out? I mean, I know you haven't done final engineering.

And I'll, we'll work together with the water and the sewer department on this, but I'm thinking that this would have to be triggered before anything past 1A and 1B could be constructed.

Okay. Okay. Is this not something that needs to be addressed up front because they're asking for a conditional approval on all phases. We might not get beyond first phase until it's an oh crap moment. Look what this is going to cost us. Yes. Thank you.

Any other questions for staff before we call the petitioner up? Petitioner.

Hi, everybody. Scott Holmes, 313 Antigua Way, Niceville, Florida, 32578. Yes, we'll talk about the sewer. We'll talk about the sewer study. We'll be happy to get into all that. Leota did a great job of just sort of doing a review of the project, so I can probably get slides pretty quickly. As you can see, we're asking for a rezone to match the GPD zoning to the north, and annexation of that is the full build out, roughly a 13, 14 year build out. And phase one, as we talked about, divided up into 1A and 1B sections. And we looked at the The renderings, all of this is reflected in the plan development in the master plan. To include the commercial pods, A and B, one off of Hargrove and one off of Garner Road. And so in the last meeting it was requested that we show where we're comparing the lot sizes to, so the neighboring communities or the neighboring subdivisions are up there and as you can see our home size a lot sizes are in general all larger than those in the nearby community for the single-family detached and then the density is comparable so The advantage here is that, you know, we have a lot of different lot sizes to offer, a lot of different home sizes to offer, so we can have a price point somewhere in the mid-200s and then up to all the way up to estate lots in the mid-500s, but everybody in this community obviously has access to all the same amenities and will be in the same neighbourhood, so you can serve a larger group of economic backgrounds. OK, so parking was an issue that we talked about in the last meeting. And as Leota mentioned, there was a need for more townhome guest spaces in case there's a football game, a lot of people come over. There are 98 additional spaces equaling seven spaces per five dwelling units. And we also added two dumpsters for refuse collection. And so that ended up subtracting seven single-family lots, as Leota mentioned, seven single-family lots from Phase 1 and 39 townhome lots, reducing the density from 3.83 to 3.43 units per acre, and the overall density went from 3.96 to 3.9. We didn't really mention this in the last meeting, but we just wanted to make a point. There is this Future Parkway Corridor, that's a longer-range transportation initiative by the city. We added a right-of-way and a stub-out should the city wish to connect in the future Columbia Parkway over there. Obviously, completely up to the city's decision. Currently, this is a picture of Hargrove, and then what we're adding is a right-turn lane onto Hargrove. and proposing a left turn lane onto Hargrove along with the widening, half street widening along the Hargrove frontage. And so offsite, you've got a right turn from Hargrove onto Bradley that we'd be adding. And the traffic study made note that currently the current road conditions of 82 and Bradley Road is insufficient for the current needs of the community. So offsite, we would be adding a left turn lane from 82 onto Bradley, and then a right and a left turn lane from Bradley onto 82. Leota kind of went over this, obviously, you know, high quality finishes, cement board siding, hardy plank, brick, everything has to go through a design review committee to be approved. So school capacity was an item that was brought up in the last meeting. On May 26th, we had the school capacity meeting with Dr. Daria, Dr. Cameron, and executive leadership. That resulted in a school support letter that was issued by Dr. Daria on June 2nd and submitted to Scott Holmes, the city attorney, different Scott Holmes, and... City, excuse me, yeah. And in terms of sewer, so in the last meeting, Planning Commission requested that a sewer capacity study be conducted. The sewer flow calculations were completed by the Water and Sewer Department. Brian Gurney, Director of Capital Projects, wrote a letter on June 4th confirming that the sewer treatment facility possesses sufficient capacity to accommodate the full build-out. We also commissioned a study by CSL Services to evaluate the flow on the sewer lines that would serve this project. EDG provided a report based on those results, and we have accepted their recommendations. So capacity would, so there would be more than enough capacity in advance of any need for that capacity. All right, that concludes my presentation. We're ready to get into any questions you guys have.

So you're the developer of the project, right? Yes, sir.

bring them up as well.

Who's going to build the houses? Who's going to build the commercial?

Right. We've had conversations with lots of builders in the area, smaller and national builders. Ultimately, to bring a builder on, we would have to get the annexation and the rezone complete. But we've talked to a number of builders in the area, everybody from Roush Coleman, Lennar, the builders group, yeah, a lot of different builders.

Who's the one on the plat? I noticed there was one from Minnesota.

Oh, he's the funding arm of this group. He's another land investor, but he's based out of Minnesota.

Mr. Holmes, is Ready Land, that is the developer of this project? Yes, sir. What's the, has Ready Land in its current form ever developed a project this large?

Not this large, no, but that's why I've combined with a partner. Actually, David, you can come up here and we can give your background as well. So it's a partnership with David and then obviously working with EDG as the engineer on the project. So while I... We do not coordinate outfits.

Pardon me? Good evening. My name is David Hanson. I'd be happy to answer any questions. Address the record, please.

Oh, your address. Name and address for the record.

Name and address. My name is David Matthew Hanson. I live at 205 Tammer Court, St. Augustine, Florida. Hanson? Hanson. Hanson. H-A-N-S-E-N.

So, both of y'all from my standpoint. Look, I commend you on your presentation as far as your amenities. Those are great. The waterfall, the mountain, the stone, and the. in the signage, the level of detail. It looks like you went in the pavilions, the common area, the look, the aesthetics of the retail. Man, that looks great. I promise you. Thank you. And part of what this body has to do is if you show it to us, we're going to expect it. Yes, of course. By dinging, I'm going to expect you to build it at that minimum capacity or better. My concern here is you said you have commitment from the city sewer system that we can handle the bulk. We can handle your sewage from this full development. You just can't get it there. Currently, you can't get it from point A to point B at full capacity when you build this thing out.

So, well, prior to... Prior to... May I finish? Yes, sir. I thought you were asking a question. Thank you.

Appreciate it. Very much. Appreciate it. So, if you can't get sewer from point A to point B, and it's somewhere around the second phase you're doing this, there's got to be an expense, okay? You don't know what that expense is, okay? Right now, I don't think you do. If you do, you hadn't told us. So I'm concerned you get into 1A, 1B, we go to 2, and it's like, oh, no, I've got to spend a bunch of money on the sewer. I can't afford to do these phases. I can't afford to do these build-outs. It looks like we're getting the cart before the horse. Just my opinion.

Can you address that? Yes, sir, I can. So before the first toilet flushes, the sewer line that is subcapacity right now will be replaced. Okay. Before the first. That'll be before phase one, before final platting. That is the first thing that will be addressed is... removing the 24-inch line, replacing it with a 30-inch line at a greater slope.

Have you identified what that impact is on this project? I'm sorry? Have you identified what that impact is on this project?

exact cost at this point? No, sir, but we will address it. The line exists. We will pump around and the manholes will be inspected and replaced if necessary. The line will be replaced. Okay.

Scott, let me ask you a question because My phone just died, and I'm a Googler. Yes, sir. I like to Google. And when I Google Scott Holmes Ready Land, I get lot liquidation, lot liquidation, lot liquidation in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Are you liquidating any lots in Tuscaloosa, Alabama? Is there anything on your Facebook page that indicates that you're liquidating lots in Tuscaloosa, Alabama?

I also, if... I'm trying to think of the area to describe. Around Second Street, around the Housing Authority, I bought some lots that have had nothing going on for years, and I'm gonna build on some of the lots and sell some of the lots. Okay, but that's not. Yeah, that has nothing to do with this, but it's. Okay. Yeah, some single family homes.

I thought that would be getting the cart before the horse.

Any other questions to the petition? We've got, I should be back up here very shortly, I'm sure, as we got several that signed up to speak. So is there any questions before we hear those in opposition? Okay, gentlemen have a seat.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I have three people sign up to speak. The first one is Mr. John Barth.

Joan Barth, 5541 Woodbury Lane in Tuscaloosa. I'm here tonight on behalf of the Woodland Forest Association of Homeowners. And so we do not object to the annexation of this property into the city. However, we have several concerns about rezoning the property to GPD and consequently also don't support the phase one build out. We're apprehensive about how the proposed density would impact the quality of life for our residents in our neighborhood. As you've already pointed out, the total number of dwellings would be 843, and that's one and a half times the size of Woodland Forest. I wanted to point out, before I forget, when he did his lot size comparison, he did Barrett's Trays, he did the Woodlands, he did not compare it to Woodland Forest, which has considerably larger lot sizes in it. We're concerned about an increase in traffic on Hargrove, especially during the morning commute. I feel like I'm repeating your first case here, but I'll go through the points quickly, because I think you're familiar with these sorts of concerns. The sizable number of residents from Markwood Preserve will turn north on Hargrove, and that'll take them past the entrance to our neighborhood. It'll take them past the Dollar General. That's an amenity here. It'll take them past the school, Woodland Forest, where the kids are likely to go to school, and then continue on to Skyland, where the closest grocery store and gas station are. So we expect an increase in traffic along there. It's already challenging to turn north onto Hargrove from our neighborhood during the school rush hour commute. Traffic already on Woodland Forest Elementary, they have to have an officer there, a traffic officer, to direct the traffic. It backs up in both directions because people can't get into the school. Simply adding turning lanes isn't gonna solve this problem. It just backs up on the turning lanes. Additionally, some of the residents will no doubt come through our neighborhood on their way to Bryant High School and Eastwood Middle School. This also provides another access to the interstate, and if you were heading east to go to Mercedes or Birmingham, this is the way that you would go. We note that within the woodlands, you've already had it on here, there's already two large undeveloped tracks that are zoned MR1 and MFR. And those have yet to be developed. And so there's already zoning that exists that's gonna increase traffic in this area. I don't think I've ever heard a traffic study come before this group that hasn't said it's okay. I mean, seriously, maybe we'll just add a turn lane. So we do have concerns about the traffic. In addition to traffic, we're concerned about the impact on water and sewer system. And Mr. Harrison, you just made us more concerned about that, especially with the, if you don't have it now and now you're building it out, then you're left with a bunch of undeveloped things. We also have trouble with pumping stations in our neighborhood, and that's taken years to resolve. We don't oppose building new homes in this area. We would prefer, however, that it sticks with SFR 1 into larger lot sizes. Keeping an SFR 1 would reduce the number of dwellings and alleviate many of our concerns. It would also be more aligned with the suburban residential and rural edge character designation that's in the framework plan. That's all I have to say. If you have any questions, you can just replay the first rezoning in your head. We have the same concerns. Thank you. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, the next person is Anita Hallman.

All right, this is the second time I've addressed you on this issue. My name is Anita Hallman. I am a lifelong resident of Tuscaloosa, and I live at 7925 Bradley Road. This property backs up, and I'm speaking for our family. Our family, Bradley Road is my family road. We have a great concern for what it's going to do to our properties that back up to this particular subdivision. It's going to have a tremendous impact I think on this community. We love this area. We want to see it, whatever we do, be something that will, in the future, and I'm saying in 20 and 30 years, still be viable, still be a good residential area that young people will want to move into. But we are definitely concerned about things like the sewer. The sewer runs through some other property that my family has owned on Garner Road for years. They have just recently replaced all the lines down through there, and you still can smell the sewer. All the manholes have been replaced. All the sewer has been replaced. We're downstream from where this is coming from. Just saying, you got to do something with the crap. It's got to go somewhere. And we could not build a subdivision on our property because of the smell. I wouldn't even begin to ask people to live with the smell that we have on that property. We don't live there. but we are there every day. Some of the things that I'm concerned about is Ready Land Company. Don't know them from Adam's house cat, can't find them online, can't find any information about them. I mean, I have searched and searched and searched, so I'm concerned about their, who's backing them, where they're coming from, they're not local people. Do they really care about Tuscaloosa like we care about Tuscaloosa? Let's see, financial backers, transparency. Like I said, who are these people? Where are they coming from? Where's the money coming from? Also, things like proposed things, water. Right now, that water is not Tuscaloosa water. That is Mitchell water. I'm concerned about the cost for them for that, the cost for sewers, whatever that's going to be to repair all of that. where are they getting the money from? Can they actually viably do what they say they want to do on this piece of property? I'm also concerned about the changes. This is the third set of different drawings that I have seen since the beginning of this project. The last project, the road was not just straight through their subdivision. It actually came in and you had to like make lots of turns to go to different parts of the subdivision. It was kind of like it was sectioned into smaller areas so people would know their neighbors. This is more like Almost, to me, like a commercial-type building, of building out. I'm also concerned about traffic on Hargrove. It's horrific. They've already said that. Bradley Road, we're not designed for commercial big trucks or anything. It even says on our road, you know, you have to have small vehicles, regular vehicles. Personal vehicles is what our road is set up for. That's some of the things that we're concerned about. Let's see, there's a couple of other things I think I had written down. as everybody else was talking. Retaining ponds, concerned about some of the retaining ponds. I think some of them seem to have been moved around. Adjacent properties, the runoff, that was one of the main things that some of the others spoke about last time, was the runoff from the water. What is that gonna be doing to our properties that are right around that? I have seen lots of other subdivisions where it has not necessarily been taken care of properly. I think that's pretty much most of the talking facts. The other thing was possibly some Indian connection to this property. lived there all my life, my grandmother, my great-grandparents, find all kind of artifacts on this property in this area. So I don't know if that's a concern to anybody, but it's definitely something that needs to be looked at, and we were told it would be looked at, but I have not heard anything back on that either. Is there anything that y'all would like to ask?

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, the last person signed up is Renee Allen.

Thank you guys for being here. I know you're tired, but we appreciate you. We really do. I'm Renee Allen. I've lived on Bradley Road most all of my life. I live actually in my grandparents' house that we remodeled, and my family has lived there And I have many memories, of course, with the land. I have land that is adjacent to the project. And many of my concerns have been mentioned, but a couple that I really wanted to mention was Bradley Road. I know we've been kind of brushed off that they're going to make the one turn lane off Hargrove onto Bradley. And on the other end, they're going to do these turn lanes But sometimes, because I'm retired, retired teacher, I can go out and sit on my front porch. And I could tell you, I know the big trucks are not supposed to come through on our road, but our road is a cutoff road between Hargrove and 82. Dump trucks, 18 wheelers, the big coke trucks, delivery trucks, all come through our road. And I'm just very concerned that one little turn lane off of Hargrove onto Bradley Road is just not going to cut it. I think as time goes, our road is just going to be torn up or broken up or lumps and potholes. I just don't think our road is going to carry the traffic that's going to turn off of Hargrove to go to and we also just went through they came down our one side of the road the Alabama State and put their fiber optics and then AT&T came on the other side of the road so now we've got fiber optics on each side of the road and I know if you do road work, you have to take that into consideration because of the cost if you cut one of the lines. And as a retired school teacher, I didn't get a chance to really read the letter. I'm not sure. I just take their word for it that Dr. Darrier and the team said that they would support it. But I just don't see, when I think of $800,000 40-something units, there's got to be a bunch of kids in there that's got to go to school. And I know Woodland Forest is really overrun. They really are. And so it would be nice to know, how are you going to solve this? I mean, where are these kids going to go? And I'll tell you, one of my ideas was that they take I don't know how many acres they have to have for a school, but maybe they could do a pre-K through to a primary school on there and it would be close to Woodland Forest and Woodland Forest could become, that's just my idea. I just thought I'd throw that in for good measure. Anyway, but I guess one of my main concerns is how this is going to change our community. You know, if it was a couple of hundred houses or something, I could understand. But when you're putting over 800... new homes packed the way they've got them in there, it's gonna change the face of our whole community. We have Cottondale on one side, Duncanville on the other, Tuscaloosa City, but it's really gonna change the face of our community. Change is hard, and I understand that, and things are gonna change. But to me, this is more than just a reasonable change. This is taking a small city or a town, compacting it, and putting it in the middle of us good old country people out there that enjoy our freedom and the wildlife. Because I know that when you take 220 acres of wildlife land, there's going to be some issues. I know, you know, your regular raccoons, possums, fox, wild turkey, deer, we have that, but we also have a lot of coyotes, and we have to be very vigilant with our animals And even with our grandchildren outside playing, when the coyotes go into their mating season, it's really bad. And I don't know what else. I know, you know, I worry about guns. I worry about the violence in such a with so many people. I don't know. I take it that the city police would be the ones that would provide the protection and all that that way. But I don't care if you're rich, poor. It doesn't matter to me. We all put our pants on the same way. And a lot of money doesn't come . But my dad always told me, They make a lot of things. And once it's done, it's done. Thank you.

Thank you. Speaking up. The petitioner has the right to address points of

Just a couple quick points. Yes, the sewer smell over there is bad. It's going to be a result of that temporary sewer line that's sitting on top of the ground. So that temporary line will be replaced and buried so you don't have sewer running on top of the ground. Regarding the Indian artifacts, I have been in contact with the University of Alabama Archaeology Department, and we've had some emails back and forth. trying to get them to see if faculty or students would come out and could actually walk the site. The initial reaction was that there's not anything there to see, but we are communicating back and forth. We've had two community meetings, and at one of the meetings, one of the neighbors offered to help. I guess she has a connection with the archaeology department, so she was going to help continue to get me in contact with them, but we have been talking back and forth about that. I did want to make the point that the project, you know, it will utilize local contractors and subcontractors and material suppliers. So we're using local talent for this. And in terms of gun violence and, you know, more people coming into the area, I mean, last time I walked it, honestly, there are hypodermic needles and there are homeless people using drugs off of Hargrove Road in there. So I think the way the land is currently being open to some negative things, I think this is gonna remove that from the area.

Can you answer some of the questions about Ready Land? Is it a Ready Land company? Yep.

Can you tell us some things about it? Are you the sole owner? So I am me and some land experts are Ready Land. And then David is Open Land Communities. So we are a partnership on this project. So I'm doing and have done.

How long have you been in business?

Six years.

And what projects have you done?

So I've done one in Dauphiniac Springs, Florida, and then another in two more in Pensacola, Florida. And then obviously for a larger project like this, I've enlisted the help of somebody who has a lot more experience with bigger projects. And where are you incorporated? I believe I have a North Dakota incorporated, just because that's for tax purposes, that's

You were prepared in North Dakota? Yes.

Never heard of that one. That's a new one.

It was always Delaware.

Yeah, it was Delaware. I want to know the why and the how your Phase 1A and Phase 1B. I guess that was a new one at this meeting. So why the 1A, 1B, and how do you develop 1A, 1B?

I'd be happy to respond. The reasoning for phase, well, it's one single phase. It's broken into two sections. Just for ease of construction and to allow a builder developer to come in They can get started in Phase 1A, if you will, Section 1A, build the initial infrastructure, manage the widening on Hargrove Road, build the lift station that will serve this whole section and the force main, do the necessary repairs to the existing sanitary sewer gravity downstream. and start selling, build their model court and start building and selling those initial homes while they phase the next section. The other reason is for bonding because I'm assuming that the city is gonna make them bond the improvements as they move forward. It's easier to bond a smaller number of units, take those to plat, and then while you work on the second portion of the first phase.

Staff, would you pull back up the, Phase 1, Phase 2. All right, so my question, follow-up on that is, how long would you project Phase 1A to take?

I mean, it's 200 some odd units. My guess would be, very educated guess, phase 1A will take about nine months and they'll start selling homes. And then they'll go in, then they'll bond phase 1B and start construction on that. My guess, the build out on 222 lots will probably be two and a half years.

What about the commercial? One of my concerns originally was it does, Mr. Harris has said, it looks great. I mean, it's awesome looking. You know, one of the, I think we mentioned last time, so who's going to build like the clubhouse? Who's going to build the commercial? You know, we always see developments and the amenities are, They're not going to make you any money. They might help you sell it, but they're not generating your revenue for you. They're an expense like the sewer line.

They're a driver.

So, well, it should be a driver. My question is, when would that happen at what phase? I'm assuming at least by 1B. But the commercial, is the commercial part, it says A, so I'm assuming it's going to be the very first phase.

The commercial will definitely lag behind the rooftops. You need the rooftops to support the commercial. There's no doubt about that. It will definitely be driven by the internals on this subdivision. If the builder gets a toehold early and is working through it and moves through Phase 1A and 1B or Section 1A and 1B and into the next phase of this project, then the commercial will probably drive itself at that point. The idea at this point is that the Amenity Center will go in with Phase 1B.

Mr. Hanson, I'm going to understand something you said. You said the developer and the builder. Are you not the developer of this? Are you going to sell this to a developer? You mentioned a builder and a developer in this conversation. Yes, those are just generalized terms.

If necessary, we could.

I guess is your intention to get this project approved and sell it to a developer to develop after you get it approved, or are you going to be the developer and hire the builder or builders? Because this is a large project for a single builder, and that's a local builder in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, or this geographic area.

Yes, sir, great question. This is a large project, probably will be a national builder because they have the ability to work through this over the time. As far as developing, we... My preference would be to sell it to a developer who will build it out for the home builder. But if necessary, I've developed land. I would be not my first choice.

Yes. And therein, too, lies the issue that I have.

OK.

If we're relying on you to depend on the level of quality, the standards that we put in place, the commitments that you make on the sewer. Yes, sir. And you sell this thing, and the Joe Blow developer down the road then we no longer have you here to rely on. We've got to rely on this guy that he's going to fix this sewer that you tell me is going to be fixed prior to starting any of this. Okay? So, I mean, it's real loose where I'm sitting here, just to be honest with you, the way I feel.

And I would guess that there will be some very binding legal documents prepared that hold either our feet to the fire or a developer that may follow us in or a large builder developer that would take over this project. So, you know, I like...

people that come up here and commit to us, and I appreciate, again, I appreciate all the documentation we've got. I appreciate everything, this marketing material. Like I said, it looks great. I'd like to live in a community like that. The amenities look great. Wonderful. But in the long run, we may not be talking to you. The guy that came up here and cut this deal with us. And so, I need to be looking at the guy that's committing to me on a 841 complex development. There's a lot can go wrong with this on three phases with all the issues that are out there. Understood.

I just heard a conflict between you two gentlemen. You just mentioned that probably go to a national builder. Mr. Holmes just said five minutes ago that We're going to be dealing with local builders and local developers and local materials.

Local contractors. Which one is it? I can't. No, sir. I mean, if you're talking about who's going to push the dirt on this, it's going to have to be a local contractor.

Well, sure, but I'm more worried about the other, from the dirt up. Mr. Holmes just said we're going to build local builders and buy local suppliers, which would be great for this community because that would be a heck of a lot of sales tax dollars hitting the coffers. Now I'm just hearing the possible going with a national firm. Well, they're going to bring everything from out of town, all the supplies. We're going to benefit zero from that. And that's always one of the concerns we hear about these national builders is like, what are they going to build? Talk about how this could impact the property values of my neighbors that are in the area. Woodland Forest Neighborhood, great example. I mean, it's great estate lots, super nice house. It's probably 25 to 3,000 square feet, and we're gonna plop something in here that's gonna be built by a national builder. That just gives me a lot of heartburn, a lot of concern.

Well, I hear what you're saying, Bill, and I'm not sure that you can discriminate against those national builders like that, but... What I heard him say was that before anybody flushed the toilet, he was going to fix the sewer system.

And there's 800 units on this thing.

Yes, sir. So he says it won't happen. They say it will. How do we get to the bottom of that? Because if you don't know what the price is, how do you know? And then how do you define fixed? You say we're going to fix it before we flush the first toilet, okay? Does that mean you get it to capacity? In other words, you get it where it will go downstream? No, sir, it's currently at capacity. It's at capacity? Yes, sir. So you're saying it's at capacity now?

Yes, sir.

What do you say? All right. If we're at capacity now, you're going to upgrade.

The line segment that I mentioned earlier is at capacity for gravity flow. Okay. You could have head or additional flow that would help push the water through the pipe. They're going to have to make the improvements to the sanitary sewer, just like he said, before they can plat the first lot for sale.

Why is there a line above ground right now?

That is a component of a project that wastewater has had underway. It is a temporary bypass, and that's all it is. So it will be removed with the City of Tuscaloosa's construction project. It's not got anything to do with their development.

Mr. Garner, you or Zach, I know in the past there was a discussion about having to purchase Mitchell Water or something before this could be done. The city or someone would have to buy Mitchell Water. Do we have a cost on that? Do we have a cost on the sewer? I mean, are these guys going to spend $10 million for their store?

We've not been presented with a cost for either of those two, and you are correct. They will have to purchase this service area for Mitchell Water.

We don't have a cost on that either.

Not been furnished to us.

No, you do have a contract. Can you go back to the bigger picture on this plat?

With Mitchell Water, they've issued a letter agreeing that the the servicing rights would be transferred over to the city of Tuscaloosa. And then in talking to Zach, you know, before we would go to city council, there would be another payment to Mitchell Water for that transfer.

Mr. Woodson, is that all doable?

It's doable.

Do you have the cost on that?

We have some ideas of how much it might be. It's within the parameters of what we could handle.

Back to some of the concerns we said earlier. I mean, we don't know the cost yet on the water. I don't know the cost on the sewer. You guys are looking at a lot of potential money before you even proceed.

And Bill, I know it's been a while since I saw this. Was it May? Was it May?

Yeah.

And I see up in the top left-hand corner.

So we hook on to Danner Road or is that it?

Garner Road. The one up in the top left hand corner. Okay, all right. So you say it's 843 lots and I don't know how many. So I'm assuming that this is one A and this is one B and I guess we get up here and this is like Z or something, I don't know. But my question is, so I guess you're gonna run 600 of them, at least six or 700, 600 out this one gate, right? Or is there a connection down here on Bradley Road? I keep hearing about Bradley Road, but I don't see where it connects to Bradley. There's no connection to Bradley. Okay, so.

There's a emergency only access that comes in off Bradley.

So this, let's call it 700 lots you're going to build, and you're going to send them all out the front gate, right? No, sir. And then at the end, you're going to send them out the back gate?

No, sir. The second phase goes out the back. The third phase is the connecting point. Third phase? Is the center portion of the property. Second phase is northwest. Okay. Yes, thank you. That's phase three.

Okay.

So you're going to hook to the Garner Road? Yes, sir. Before you do that? Yes, sir. Okay, that's good.

Good.

And real quick to address the local contractors. Conversations with any of the builders, no matter who the builder is, the actual contractors that are working here in Tuscaloosa would be local. That was the agreement. And like I said, I've talked to tons of different builders. There is one particular builder that during the community meetings people had a strong reaction to. and that builder is not one of the ones that we plan on using for the project.

Not a local developer, right? What, a national developer?

A national that has had problems in the past.

Any more questions for the petitioner? Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you. All right, we'll close for public input and questions. have a discussion amongst this body before we take some votes. Anyone? Comments from commission?

I appreciate the way that they made progress from the last meeting. I mean, the presentation, it addressed, if my memory serves me, it addressed everything that we talked about. all the concerns that we had previously when we looked at this project. I just cannot get over how massive it is. I just feel like it is just a lot. And I don't understand why it has to be so huge and cumbersome because of everything that's around it. I agree with Mr. Harrison, it's beautiful. It looks great. But when you really pay attention to this, This rendering plat, whatever the technical term is, it's just a lot. And I also agree with the fact that we don't know who's going to come in and do what we've seen, and y'all more so than me. We've seen people come up here and make promises and not deliver. And this is just such a massive project to possibly have that happen on. I know that Tuscaloosa needs to grow, it needs to develop. This just seems like, it just seems like a lot. 800 lots is a lot. So that's kind of where I stand on it. I think that it looks good and it sounds good when we're talking about it and we're looking at the renderings and the beautiful presentation. the scale of the project is just really, really large. And that's something that I can't quite let go of.

Or to what? just to protect the community, the local community. Ms. Allen brought up a good point that she's not opposed to this property being developed. And at some point in time, it's going to be developed. If it's on the market at this point in time, somebody's going to come along and figure out a way to make it work. But our job is to make sure that the surrounding communities are safe or have a neighbor next to them that are good neighbors, that are common neighbors, that are in keeping with the current area. My opinion, this one's not because of some things going on with the size of it. I don't have a comfort level that the current applicant is going to follow through with all the things. If we're not sure we're going to build, if we're not sure who the developer is, if we're not sure who the builders are, we're not sure of the cost, then again, once again, this body becomes a litmus test just to see if this can fit and this can be sold to somebody else. And that's not what this body does. So that's my opinion.

I agree. It feels more like a concept that has been developed as a commodity rather than a real commitment to developing something that is this massive and complex and has this many questions still out there about how it would happen.

There's a lot of uncertainties for this to be a 640 single-family lots, 203 townhome lots, two commercial lots, and 39 green spaces, which one of them is the detention pond. But there's a lot of uncertainties, and there's no definite about the sewer system upgrades that would need to be had. So I know we need development. I'm not against development. But most of the times, someone purchasing a home is their biggest investment of their life. So what goes around those surrounding neighborhoods is very important that we get it right. So I'm sure this might be developed. I would feel better if we could rezone this in phases. I don't know if we could, but this is just so much. Even phase A1 and 1B and 1A or however it goes, even that is a lot for something that just seems conceptual. I don't know if I've ever... you know, approved for favorable recommendation or anything, a project of this magnitude. So it's hard to grasp the reality. And then especially when you have so many issues that could arise before you even get to the next phases. I think we need some definite concrete solutions and answers to move forward. And then once again, I wish we could possibly rezone it in phases if they plan to build it in phases so that we can see this along the way.

You know, I agree with Ms. Howard. I've always, always had a problem with rezoning something, especially something this big, because once we rezone it, you can't unrezone it. And once we change it from SFR1 to GPD or whatever, it's there. They can do what they want. Like Ms. Howard said, you know, Do part, do part, do part, do part. And that way we know who we're dealing with, like Mr. Harrison's talking about each time. If they're here to do phase one and they're not here to do phase two, then, you know, it changes the whole ballgame. Plus, we don't know what the sewer's going to cost. We don't know what Mitchell Water's going to cost. And I'm sure that Mr. Garner's looked at it, and I guess the fire and police and everything, but One way in, one way out. I see you got an emergency exit and all that kind of stuff, but if something happens to the front of this project and you can't get to the back, that needs to be looked at and addressed somewhere along the line also. Ben used to work for the fire department. I know that if you can't get to somebody, you can't help them. And if something happens on this project with just this one entrance, not counting the one off Garner Road, because if it happens up there, it could close the whole front end of this project off. So I've got some safety concerns. I've got questions about the cost of Mitchell Water and the sewer. And rezoning this thing all at one time, 200-something acres or whatever, I can't see that.

One thing that I think Mr. Hanson said, he said, I think he said in 20 months or something we're going to go into phase two. I don't think things move that fast here. I mean, I'm kind of used to 40-inch time per year. And I might be wrong. We almost need to do some studies on that. I just don't know if you can knock down 200 or 300 houses a year, I mean, 100 houses a year. I think this is a 20-year development. I mean, I do. Now, with all due respect to Mike Darrier, first of all, he's not the county superintendent. He's a city. And we're a city hall. And so the devil's in the details. And that's just a small detail. But they did meet with the county superintendent. They met with the city superintendent. And that worries me a little bit. I know it's going to be in the city, but they said they met with the county superintendent.

He's the city superintendent.

No, no.

Didn't they? No.

I know who he is. I'm wondering if they know who he is. Okay. We got a letter from him. I mean, I'm just saying, didn't they say, didn't the thing say we met with the county superintendent?

It was a typo on their slide. It was a typo on their slide.

On whose part? Yours or theirs?

On their slide that they presented to you.

I'm just saying it's a little detail, but it is a big project. And there's a lot of little details. Honestly, we need this type product. I want them to hear me. We need it. We need affordable housing, quality affordable housing. We need this type site developed. I know the neighbors don't necessarily want to hear that, but we do need it. I think there's some angst up and down this board because, like Tim said, I mean, first of all, Mr. Hanson, I don't think you're gonna do this in a short period of time. And I do think you're gonna flip it. And that's the American way. Look, I don't anymore care about how you make your money. I'm happy for you to make a bunch. But to Tim's point, we don't know who we're gonna be dealing with and whoever we're dealing with, we're gonna be dealing with for a long time on something like this. And that is a concern. 800 houses don't get built in Tuscaloosa in five years.

Anyone else? All right, I think we've heard a pretty good broad spectrum of input from the Commission. Let's take some votes. All right, Commission, before us we have an annexation request of 221 acres. That's annexation 0626. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? I just have it. Let's move on to GPD0326. Petition to rezone the 221 acres from SFR1 to GPD. Do I have a motion and a second? Motion to approve.

Second.

Mr. Rumsey? No. No.

No. No.

No.

No. No. Nope.

Does that kill the whole thing? Or do we need to take a vote on PS03?

Yeah, you got to vote on the next one as well.

All right, making sure. All right. PS0326, the mark would preserve the phase one.

Motion to approve.

Second.

Ms. Hornsby?

No. No.

No. No.

No. No.

No. Nope. Motion denied. You can state for the reasons being the same as in the plan development and also that since the plan development was not approved, then they can't meet the subdivision requirements.

Health, safety, and welfare.

Health, safety, and welfare. No more.

I'll tell you mine. Mine was I was not convinced of the viability of this by the developer of the viability of this unit because of the unknown costs associated with developing it to date.

I agree with that. And then just the general scale of the project, I feel, is a huge undertaking, and they haven't properly addressed ways to make sure the infrastructure can support it. Yeah.

To me, that's .

We all need to state it.

Yeah, I think that speaks for everybody. Unknown. Let's carry on.

All right, moving into our cases to be heard tonight, we have a preliminary plat, S-5126, factory addition number four, re-survey factory addition number three and unplanned land. This is one lot on approximately 0.8 acres, located at and around 2851 Southside Drive. This is Council District 2. See, we are just west of 359 here. You recently saw this to vacate a portion of the right-of-way on Southside Drive. Now they're asking to consolidate that piece of vacated right-of-way into that one larger lot. You see that with contours without two variance requests. We did not receive any public comment. Do you have any questions for staff?

We're okay with those requests. Petitioner.

Mr. Chairman, member of the commission, this is Marty Montgomery, Montgomery-Hickle Land Survey, 203 Hargrove Road East, Tuscaloosa, Alabama. I'd just like to Again, add the vacated right-of-way to an existing lot.

Any questions for petitioner? Thank you. Anyone care to speak for or against this petition request? Having heard none, Commission, for which we have S-5126, the factory edition number four, two variance requests, engineering has no issues with. Do I have a motion and a second? Motion.

Second.

Mr. Rumsey.

Yes. Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Motion approved.

All right, next up is S5226, Piney Grove Estates, consisting of two lots on approximately 5.4 acres, located north of 12133 Sellers Lane. This is not in city limits. You can see we are way north of city here. See that lot today is vacant. They'd like to split it two ways. You can see here with contours. And without three variance requests, we did receive one public comment with concern about erosion. Do you have any questions for staff?

Engineering on the variance request? We're okay with those.

Thank you.

Petitioner?

Mr. Chairman, members of the commission, Marty Montgomery, Montgomery-Nequiland, surveying 203 Hargrove Road East, Tuscaloosa, Alabama. This is a two-lot subdivision. Lot two will be going to the owner in front. Jeff and Ginger Love will be buying that for their family, and the other is being retained by Piney Grove Baptist Church.

Any questions for petitioner?

Anyone sign up for any of this? Okay.

Anyone care to speak for or against this petition request? Having heard none, Of course, we have SB 226, three variance requests. Engineering has no issues with it. We have a motion and a second. Motion to approve.

Second.

Ms. Hornsby.

Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Yes. Motion approved.

All right, next up is S5326, Lake Tuscaloosa Spillway Subdivision. This is four lots on approximately 106 acres, located southwest of the Lake Crest Subdivision on New Watermelon Road. This is Council District 3. You can see we are just east of the spillway here. You can see that land today is vacant. Requesting to split it four ways. You can see here with contours, without several variance requests. We did receive four comments in opposition. One of them included 17 signatures, and one other included a link to a change.org petition. Do you have any questions for staff?

Yeah, back up to the map. I think everybody's good.

They need to see it. So one and three and two and four, okay.

Now is this light and zoned? Zoned open space currently. And who owns it, the city? The city of Tuscaloosa. And Ms. Kreitz is here as the applicant if you all have additional questions.

We're back at the Farrington West, please. Engineering on these.

We're okay with those at this time.

Because you're the applicant and the petitioner?

Both tonight.

You don't want to get upside down with the boss? I've been waiting for this for a long time. All right, petitioner.

Good evening, Commission. Ashley Kreitz, Executive Director of Urban Development, 2201 University Boulevard. Yes, this evening, I think there's been a lot of discussion about this piece of property that I'd like to clear up before we get into any level of public comment. Number one, the property is not for sale. The city is not selling it. What this preliminary plot is doing is protecting our public infrastructure. And as y'all are familiar with the subdivision process, you can't have remainder lots. And so what happens is when we created lot number three and lot number four, where our critical infrastructure is, that creates remainder lots, which is the proposed lot one and lot two that you see on that screen in front of you. And so the property is not for sale. The City Council has not directed that that action take place. And if it is to go down that pathway, the Properties Committee, the City Council will have to vote to do an RFP. The property will have to be declared surplus. An applicant will have to submit something that the City Council is interested and entertaining. And then of course, the property is zoned open space today. And so it will have to come back in front of this body for a rezoning petition, in which case they're gonna have to make a very strong argument to you about what they'd propose to do with any potential sale of what, if there is to be any. And so I wanna make that really clear this evening that discussions about traffic about sewer capacity, about anything like that are just not quite ripe for this evening's discussion because this really is just taking one massive lot deeded parcel and splitting it into these four lots only because we need to make sure from a security perspective that we could get lots three and four that we could we could do some legalese with it so do you all have any questions for me yeah it's a great question for the city council mr rumsey

What is our critical infrastructure on three and four? I'm sorry, I'm just lost.

This is the spillway in the dam area, Ms. Prince.

Okay, just that, okay.

Yes, ma'am.

All right.

Got to make sure we protect that.

Okay. Just out of curiosity, it'll remain open space.

Yes, there's no rezoning being proposed. This is going to remain open space. The only way for that to change is through that very, very open public process.

So obviously the concern here is it was going to be sale and it was going to be developed.

Oh, sure. I saw all kinds of stuff.

So having said that, Ashley, from your standpoint, if it ever, down the road, if it ever works, the steps would be it would have to be, would the RFP have to come out from the?

Properties committee and then they would send that to the full council.

The council would have to vote on it. It would have to go out for an RFP. People would come in and present this, that, and the other. Based on what they present, it would have to go through the normal process, come back through us for rezoning, any additional subdivision. Absolutely. Then go back through the city council. Yes, sir.

And, of course, there'd be, you know, if, if, and that's a big if at this point in the game. I need to stress that. If anything is to ever happen, of course, the same way that notification went out for the subdivision, this would actually, any rezoning would require a 500 foot buffer from the edge of that property. And so it would hit a large swath of neighbors for consideration as well.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think when people hear subdivision, they don't understand we're just talking about lot lines.

Understandable. It's one of those things that for 13 years has been such a problem because we talk about subdivision with this group of nine, and we know that it just means the division of land, but when you hear subdivision, you think, oh my gosh, there's going to be 200 homes that are built right next to me, and that's just not the case in this situation. Thank y'all. Thank you. Thank you.

So, Mr. Chairman, we had three people sign up. I think the first one was Pam Marbu. Marbu?

Good evening.

Let me make sure you can hear me. Can y'all hear me okay? Mm-hmm. Yes, ma'am. Okay. I'm Pam Marbut, and I live in Lake Crest Subdivision. My address is 2609 Lake Crest Lane. As she mentioned, this property is not for sale right now. but we are concerned about the future. So the concerns that we have for the future are the adequacy of our sewer infrastructure and the status of the studies that have, recent studies that have any studies been done on this, as well as details regarding how the land was acquired initially when the city acquired this land. How did they acquire this land and for what purpose did they acquire this land? There's several points that I wanted to discuss. Number one, the sewer system capacity and the available capacity for new development. Before additional development is approved, I urge the city to confirm that the existing sewer system has sufficient capacity to accommodate increased demand In particular, I would like to understand when was the most recent engineering study completed to determine the capacity of the sewer lines serving the area? The sewer lines associated with this route run approximately 13 miles, and that takes significant time, about three days, and it involves multiple lift stations that our sewage has to go through. These lines also run under the dam on the lake. Given the level of growth north of the lake, I believe it is critical that the city confirm, based off documented analysis, there is adequate capacity and that the system will operate safely under increased load. Number two, infiltration and inflow and integrity of the sewer lines beneath the lake and dam. I request that the city ensure or provide documentation showing that a study has been performed to evaluate, number one, the infiltration and inflow levels, including during the wet weather. whether there are cracks, breaks, or structural failures in the sewer lines that could allow leakage and the risk that any leakage could contaminate Lake Tuscaloosa, which supplies our city water. Because the sewer lines run under the dam and into the areas that connect to our drinking water source, the risk assessment and condition assessment of these lines is especially important. The third thing is the land acquisition details and whether the land use is limited. I would appreciate clarification on how the city acquired the land that is now being possibly proposed for sale. In particular, did the city acquire this property specifically for the construction and operation of the lake and the dam? If so, was the land acquired through eminent domain or through a deed or purchase, and are there any legal restrictions or limitations tied to the original purpose? Bob Allman was the original engineer involved with the building of the spillway and the dam. He always said that this land was sacred land that could not be touched because of the spillway and the integrity of the spillway and the lake. When I purchased my home in Lake Crest in 2003, I was told at that time, as well as my neighbors, that that land would never be sold, that the city had to keep that land as a buffer for the spillway and the lake. If the land was acquired for a specific public purpose, I understand it may be limited to that purpose. And I would like the city to confirm the legal constraints, if any, before moving forward with any type of sale. The next number four is the traffic hazard at the spillway. Placing a new residential or commercial development near the narrow two-lane spillway creates an immediate traffic hazard. New Watermelon Road is a critical commuter artery. It experiences extreme time-sensitive congestion as families travel to all the nearby Tuscaloosa schools. The bridge acts as a dangerous funnel with no shoulders or no turn lanes, adding a new entrance with turning vehicles and increased trip volumes right at the throat of this bridge. Safety in our commuters. Thank you for your time. Any documentation that y'all can provide. Thank you very much. Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, next person, John Elmore.

Thank you for taking us here tonight. I moved to Lake Crest about 15 years ago, and that was one of the things that was told to me that that property would never be sold or subdivided. And in reading some of these things where y'all had put in one of your appears in development of land goes against the city, that it said that this property is on your list to be sold. And I don't know if y'all have that copy in front of y'all now, but it's on y'all's plat of items to sell because the city needs money. That's what this thing started out. And so... I got a copy. I didn't know it. And it was on the list to sell this property, and now we're being told it's not for sale. So one hand's feeding the other, or we're not getting any food at all. So we're being told one thing, and then later down the road, we're afraid that the city is going to subdivide this property and sell it. And that's why we want to petition this, the city council, to not take something that's been precious not only to the lake but right there at the spillway. You know, you can't subdivide that very much and get something there. You have 106 acres and most of it is across the road on the other side. Whatever y'all want to do with that, that's fine. But right there at the spillway, there's not a lot that you can really do on that side of the road. And so we're petitioning that y'all would not take this in consideration, too. And it says you're going to subdivide lots, four lots. And then it also says you're going to subdivide it to clean it up.

What are you going to clean up?

You going to cut the trees down so you can subdivide it? I mean, you know, there's a lot of good views on that property. I'm sorry? I bet there's some good views on that property. Oh, there's wonderful views. No, it's wonderful. I didn't even know the city owned that property. But, well, y'all dumping on it right now. So y'all, you sweep the streets and then you take it over and you dump it and then you come back and pick it up.

Mr. Elmore, y'all is we.

Y'all is we. We just like you, okay?

Y'all is we.