Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

e good evening and welcome to the Planning Commission meeting for December 19th 2024 I'll call a meeting to order Miss Meri may you please call the RO Dr Derek hunt present Victor Mendoza present David Brown present Dan mlinka present Cynthia Staley Rebecca Spears present Brian oen Monica Rodriguez Ralph Gonzalez present we have thank you um as a reminder tonight's meeting is being Samuel cast via TV 15 um at this time we want to go ahead and uh open up for Citizens communication if we have any citizens that it's wishing to speak only in items that's not uh listed for the public hearing this is the time that you may do so um you may come up and we ask that you limit it to three

minutes hello I'm Michael vandro uh I live at 22 for East North Street uh lot 20a it's uh Victor Oaks uh the trailer park looks like a war zone and I have been complaining about it and the reason I don't complain to the a community manager because she has a sign that says uh no trespass and it locks her gate so instead of going through her I used to go to public works or code enforcement and um the city of Victoria really don't understand why the trailer park owner can't uh fix the trailer park he is a personal injury lawyer he's very successful and makes a lot of money and he could easily fix it but instead he chooses to turn a blind eye and not fix it and when he's supposed to go to court he needs to show up to go to court you know and I wish he could come in person to go to court you know and he has no interest in fixing it and he did give me along with the general manager unlaw for eviction and I'm uh officially evicted on December the 23rd and they refus to tell me when I did wrong I always pay my rent on time I've been paying it on time for 30 years and I do want the city of Victoria to hold the trailer park owner accountable it's uh very unprofessional the way he's treating us and the way he's treating uh the city of Victoria and code enforcement can no longer do anything because he don't listen to them so it's really up to the legal department to do anything uh maybe under civil forfeiture laws the city of Victoria just needs to take over the trailer park thanks and have a good uh evening thanks ladies and gentlemen thank you Mr Michael um at

this time again I'll ask if we have anyone that is willing to speak on doing citizen Comm uh citizens communication uh that's dealing with any items that is not listed on the public hearing at this time we will go ahead and close the uh citizens uh communication and we'll go to our first uh item on public hearing uh my first item is the Vance request for the off street parking for a residential townhouse located at 209 uh Chantilly Street uh may we have the staff report please yes good evening Commissioners so the property at 209 Chantelly street is ploted and developed as a residential townhouse with two off street parking spaces covered by an open carport meeting the minimum parking requirements the owner began the conversion of the open carport into an enclosed garage without obtaining any permits with the conversion of the carport into the enclosed garage the property is no longer meeting the minimum requirements the enclosed garage does not meet the standards for off street parking all off street parking must be located on the owner's own private property enclosing the carport does not allow enough space for the minimum off Street rep Park parking requirement for the owner's property staff is recommending denial the variant request to eliminate the minimum off street parking for the residential Town H home additionally separate variances were presented to the board of adjustment and appeals for the fire separation distance emergency escape and rescue openings of a bedroom the board on Monday did deny those variants requests I'm open to any questions do we have any questions for Les no thank you I'm at this time we will go ahead

and uh we're open for public hearing anyone wishing to speak on this item um we're asking that you please come forward at this time and limit it to three minutes okay well now sorry okay yes ma'am I'm the owner of 209 Chantell and there's three other enclosed carports there that are garages and it does not open up onto a street in the back it opens onto a driveway which is about 2 and 1/2 car wets the property has been there for 45 years people have put buildings boats everything else under those cardboards still managed to have adequate parking like I said there's also three other garages there that still have adequate parking um I understand that this is not good to the code the board on Monday told me that they started cracking down on people so I guess I just came too late but I would really like a garage for safety security and privacy so any consideration I could get for that I would appreciate thank you thank you is there anyone else that is willing or wanting to speak at this time publicly dealing with this item hi Commissioners I'm Debbie sperin Garner I own the uh town home at 211

right next door um I don't mind if she has a garage my problem is that the side of my garage is not a common wall I've had three incidents with the new owner and um where jackhammering took place under my dining room wall which cracked my dining room wall and uh separated a bookcase um she put up a new Roofing that went under my roof of my garage on one of the garages um I've been living there since 2011 and the last incident was where she poured concrete I don't mind I have a problem with her encroaching on my property there are property lines there for reason and I've spoken with M uh Debbie about that that side of my garage is not a common wall and um when the concrete went down for the garage she's trying to put up she put concrete on my side and I I've had Hardy plank or Hardy pennel so if you you can break it bust into it and stuff I like I said I don't have a problem with it I'm a kind of laidback keep to myself kind of person and it's been very stressful with uh the property damage that's taking place to my my town home and my uh my garage thank you Commissioners for listening to me thank you if there's no one else at this time we will go ahead and enclose the uh public hearing and uh Commissioners do we have any further discussion that we would may want to discuss or I have a question about I have a question about the property lines can you clarify

Celeste are you asking me on property line or the I'm asking you oh okay so the yellow is the highlighted is her property completely so with town homes they do share common walls in the buildings as they go but right there's the highlighted yellow would be her property lines Sam didn't we just hear that this garage when it was built went over the property line on no no the garage is on her property they she enclosed the carport so the cport is on her property which is over the two off Street parkings that she has assigned to that town home she's enclosing that carport so we do not have a survey of the existing um enclosure of the garage that was uh built without any permits so we really don't know if statement made is correct right we don't know if it encroaches or not it it very May it's easy to do things like to have small encroachments of a of a few inches even or centimeters because of the nature of it being Town Home Development um in common walls um I can say that uh unfortunately we closed the public hearing um but I can say that I research because once I got the look that we I was researching and just looking at that area being familiar in that that area um where go through where you had those and it's unfortunate that you had those that built um garages there prior to um but even my researching um it wasn't done the right way uh and so now we have a situation to where even when that place is there it's kind of hard for traffic or if somebody was to stay uh a park a

park there it would en hinge um the area um and so that's my comment on the on the situation it's unfortunate um but when you look at it I I understand uh the reasoning through especially through the Udo I went through and read and try to see if I could find a loophole but there was no so do we have a case of some properties being grandfathered where the the the garages are allowed or would you like to address uh that at all um I wouldn't say their grandfather as we can't find evidence that they were legal um the appraisal district shows two were built in the early 80s and then one was constructed in 2010 so that is something that we will seek direction from City Council on as how to pursue um the garages that appear to be have been illegally constructed sometime in the past but our practice has been since I've been director in 2017 that we absolutely do pursue enforcement of Il legally constructed structures I'm sorry you said we do pursue since 2017 when I was appointed as director that is my direction to to staff and we've pursued a lot of illegally constru structures ready for a motion yes um so right now we're asking a motion um on the development item uh regarding the off street parking for the residential townhouse located at 209 uh shil Street uh going with the recommendation of the staff do we have any motions or any actions move for denial we have one motion for denial or do we have a second I'll go ahead second to den we have a second uh motion motions pass motion passes all all I'm sorry excuse me apologize all those in favor say hi Oh H

oppos all right all in favor let us move to our second item Vance request for the minimum separation for the commercial animal use from single family residential land use for a property located at 5902 Dairy Road uh where may we have the staff report please good evening commissioner our next variance request is to is to the required minimum separation distance for commercial animal uses to the single family residential homes the proposed animal use will be located at 5902 Dairy Road the property owner wishes to open a doggy dayare and indoor boarding facility the property currently abuts the residential neighborhood to the rear of the property thereby not complying with the minimum separation distance in order to open the an animal use facility at this location it would require the owner to obtain a waiver from every single single family residential property within 300 ft of this location the applicant was unsuccessful in obtaining the required waivers and has now come before the commission to ask for a variance for the separation requirement staff recommends denial of the variance requests to the recommended minimal separation distance for the commercial animal use to single family residential homes staff believes the approval of the variance could have a detrimental impact on the surrounding single family residential neighborhood based on the proposed animal use the proposed animal use has the potential for added noise and odors being produced which could impact the adjacent single family neighborhood the recently adopted unified development ordinance established the separation standards to prevent the location of incompatible uses and provide for more neighborhood protection finally a variance would not be necessary if all waivers were obtained the lack of waivers indicates

affected neighbors are not supported in this use so in the slide um it says the yellow highlighted properties are single family residences within 300 ft the pink highlighted property is single family residents opposed to the use and the green highlighted property is a single family residents who returned the waiver thank you do you have uh any questions as so far for him right now so I want to make sure he said that the the pink denied it the other three didn't get any answers is that the is that what you said the green is um people who return the waiver um pink is denied and then the yellow is just everybody within that 300 fet okay okay very all right thank you sir uh at this time will now open up uh for a public hearing uh before I ask any citizen to come up I do want us to put on notice that we did all commissions have a letter um from Miss Amanda Reyes um the owner of uh 124 Lancaster and so we do have that letter um and we reviewed this this letter um and so we take that in account um but now we want to open up if there's any citizen that is here that would like to come forward and speak on this agenda item you may do so at this time when you come up we ask you to please State uh your name um and and address and we may come at this time you're limited to three minutes any citizen isable inome all right my name is Nathan hanselka um my property butts right up to that property uh my backyard does I'm concerned about the dogs barking I'm concerned about about what

it does to the value of the homes being able to sell my home with it there um what it does to the natural water flow of my backyard what they're going to build how high because there's a creek that runs right beside throughout the property that is a natural flow for our neighborhood at least my side of the street and if they build it up and block the water's going to back up to B um right now those are my biggest concerns um the definitely the dog barking and the water flow and what it's going to do to to being able to sell my house if you know people come into to my backyard and they have dogs barking potential sus you know people that might buy it they may back out because of that and it wasn't like that when I bought the house so um on top of that you know this is low on on the pole but the the dog the female dogs that they have in there if they're in heat they're going to make all the dogs in the neighborhood go crazy those are my my biggest concerns so I understand this is a variance it's already been shot down by the city because of code and those are my biggest concerns how how I'd like to have answers on those before I give a yes when she came to the door I was kind of shocked at what she said and uh I was one of them that didn't give an answer and asked her to come back I would think

about it after thinking about it I don't want it thank you thank you Mr Nathan appreciate is there any more citizen at the time that' like to speak please make sure you state your name and address hi my name is Priscilla Davis I'm the owner to 592 Dairy Road uh when I purchased this property uh I guess in June was the new ordinance of the 300 ft from the property line uh I was unaware of it um I bought it for the Doggy Daycare uh um you know I you know my it's 2.2 Acres so I'm not going to go all the way back to the neighbors now on Mr hula he is not directly behind my property he has a house behind his property um from what he told me he had Neighbors in the back and on the side of him barking um the people that are directly behind me have said yes uh yes they did not turn in their waivers but it's very difficult to get them I I did get them to sign petitions and I think you all have a list of the petitions of what them signing their name because it's just difficult to get a waiver to get notorized from someone I I had paid stamped envelopes I gave it to them so that it could be easy um but all the ones that are directly behind me of my property line said yes I I do see other people that are here that I did go to the door I asked I explained to them that the to Doggy Daycare would not um it would be certain hours uh we would have a perimeter it would be an indoor there will not be any kennel runs um you know this is property that I bought I understand that their concern is um you

know the noise uh but there are there's barking dogs in the neighborhood he I mean they've had complaints of other people they neighbors now the ones the neighbors that are here today uh to be against it these neighbors are the furthest from my property line uh but everyone else that was here that was closest to said yes um I'm I understand if this I I see his concern about the water but regardless of whatever it is this property has been bought I'm going to have to do something with it regardless whether it is a Doggy Daycare or whether it is going to be a home or whether it's going to be another hotel something is going to have to be done with it I purchased it I purchased it for the Doggy Daycare because it's a love and a desire that I want to do uh but not because you know it was just a a place to take them to but I mean I see what the neighbors are saying but and I all do respect dogs do not bark unless someone's right by behind their yard dogs bark when someone's at the door dogs bark when they see other dogs um if he's talking about dogs and heat that there are going to be guidelines for um shots and everything else so you know please take that all in consideration thank you Miss Davis you is there any other citizens willing to speak please limit to 3 minutes state your name and address yes good evening my name is Justin Miller I live at the property of 212 lamac that would be at the the South tip of the uh the zoned area there we're within the 300 ft um so we we stand in opposition to the the variance request we we did our diligence when we purchased the property we

certainly wouldn't have purchased a property if there was a canel uh just across the street on the on the other side of the the building we're concerned about noise and uh smell we also have small children who are concerned about how these animals will be contained inside of the area um and we would uh hope that the the board here would make the decision to not move forward with granting the the variance request um I wasn't sure how to uh submit in writing that that we were opposed I see that one person did we did prare a written statement if there's somebody that I I give it to and uh to show that we do stand in opposition we can take that thank you thank you Mr Justin again at this time is there any other citizen willing to speak again sir please give your name and address good evening my name is Bill Pass I'm at 213 lamorak uh that's across the street from the gentleman who just spoke I share some of the other concerns but uh my main concern is health issues when you have animals they attract flies you get other kinds of flying insects because of the smells even if we can't smell them uh you may have a problem with the treat that low the the spillway that runs through May attract ticks and other things like that things that can't be controlled fleas that could get into the neighborhood that we live in that we don't have a problem with now um these are things that no matter how diligent you are they happen uh animal kennels and other places have these problems from time to

time and uh I think something in this close of a location to a neighborhood just isn't an appropriate place for uh a type of kennel housing dogs animals what other things and again I would add that uh I don't think anybody starts a business is thinking they're going to keep it small who knows what expansions are going to be asked for in two three or four years down the road and there's really no place to expand thank you thank you Mr Bill is there any more citizens willing to speak at this time at this time we will go ahead and close the public hearing on this matter and ask any Commissioners if we have any further discussion or things we like to discuss about this property I just uh I think that uh if if we would have had full you know we have the new Udo in place and uh working together and you know to have that if we would if we we wouldn't be having this discussion if we would had 100% right so uh uh I uh I think it's important that we we uh you know we we've got a Udo for a reason okay so I just uh there was there's a opportunity there to to work together as a as a community you

know sometimes it doesn't work out that way so I just wanted to say that you well uh I would like to say Miss Davis I understand it's unfortunate situation especially in buying an investment property and then you have the Udo that you have to follow by but as my fellow commissioner said There are rules that are in place um but I also want you to know that you also have an opportunity that you can go to the city council um about it if you disagree with what we recommend um and so uh we think at that time if there's no further discussion I'm uh asking for a motion or action uh regarding uh this item for denial I have one motion for denial do I have a second I have a second for denial all in favor say I I I any opposed motion passes thank you for this time at this time we'll move on to our third item which is the Vance request to the minimum lot width for the AC uh Han subdivision resubdivision uh the number two uh final plat may we have the staff report please good evening Commissioners our last variance for the evening is the approval of a variance to the minimum lot width for a proposed single family lot located at 7 East Constitution Street uh the property was previously platted and developed uh with three single family homes um the owners wish to replant and reconfigure the property into three single family residential lots with one lot being below the minimum lot width requirement one of the Lots being proposed has a lot width of 42 ft but will not be able to meet uh sorry but will be able to meet all other

development requirements um staff recommends approval of the variant request to allow the replat of three single family residential lots staff has determined the approval of the variant would not significantly change the existing character of the neighborhood it would not be detrimental to surrounding Lots condition upon final approval of the variant staff would ask Commissioners to also approve the final plat for AC Han subdivision re subdivision number two as well as the final plat meet all requirements for detached single family residential lots do we have any questions uh for the gentleman thank you sir at this time we will go ahead and open up a public hearing uh for Citizens communication for if there's any citizen and The Artisans that would like to speak at this time you may do so we ask that you limited to three minutes since there is no citizens that's willing to speak at this time we will go ahead and close the citizens communication um and go any further discussion motion to approve uh so since there's no further discussion second we'll go ahead and we have a motion uh to to approve and we have a second all in favor say I any oppose motion passes all right now we are to up to consent agenda um there are two items on the consent agenda which are the adaption of the minutes from the November 21st 2024 meeting and the final plat for the AC uh Han subdivision rub uh reub division number two um I'm asking for a motion um on accepting motion to accept I have one motion to

accept I have a second motion uh to accept all in favor say I I any opposed motion carries now we at the action uh items for Planning Commission may we have the step repres uh staff presentation on the submitt schedule please I'm back Commissioners so typically we don't have to bring y'all the submittal schedule as typically our regular schedule meetings happen on the third Thurs day of every month however for June of 2025 the regular commissioner meeting meeting will F fall on the federal holiday of June 19th so staff is bringing to you to approve us on moving the meeting to June 26th the following week and changing the submitt schedule to accommodate that new date in time so we are asking for your approval of the new submitt schedule with that special meeting uh any discussion I mean I don't have a vote but I you know I say yes cu sweet potato pie day but um uh so do we have a motion to okay U so we have one motion do we have a second second all in favor say I I any oppos motion carries all right uh Now we move on to other business uh may we have the mo the monthly development report uh please okay so for the monthly activity report the total is at 252 um this would be slightly more than last month uh for MP permits issue this would be at 132 which would be a slight decrease and permit fees total at $ 43,9 28 um this would also be uh slightly

less there is uh one minor plat one major plat one site plan and one site modification as as well as a city council action okay um we we thank you uh for the uh monthly reports uh we're now um at items for the Planning Commission um as of all right um from last month's meeting was asked that we kind of bring back the Udo requirement for multi- dwellings multif family dwellings minimum off street parking so with the this month staff report I kind of went back over the memo I sent to y'all previously so what I'm going to do is just kind of do a quick overview from our 1992 which kind of lays out how we had all the different bedroom units and the according parking spaces required at that time as you can see with the 202 for udio we did minimize those parking requir requirements drastically so instead of having so many dwelling units broken out we kind of went to the one bedroom would would be at the one and a half space and two or more we were going with two spaces and if there's more then you add an extra half space on that um in the difference between them we let me go back real quick so some of the major differences between the 9 2 and the 2024 is that you can see we eliminated the senior living benefit before senior living apartments we only would require one space per dwelling unit versus actually counting their bedroom units also a difference is we now do not have the efficiency bedrooms

they are considered the one bedroom and that once again the three or more bedrooms receive a parking reduction benefit as we would see those type of variants come more often with those three and four bedrooms having that higher requirement some of the similarities that we do have between the '92 and the 2024 is that with neither of these ordinances did we ever take into account requiring a mandatory guest parking in there guest parking has always been included within the unit parking requirement another similarity that we do have between both ordinances is if there's additional uses with those apartment complexes we do make them a account for those off street parking requirements such as if they had an leasing office or a clubhouse we would be looking at how many bedroom units they have plus the office space the clubhouse space and add those additional parking spaces in there I kind of provided some test cases for you to kind of show the differences in those parking requirements as you can see when we were doing the three and four bedroom units we were you would see a significant kind of increase in parking at 158 for an 80 unit where now with the 2024 we're at 145 units you can see with the second test case there is the kind of the senior living so with the senior living apartment complexes under the old ordinance they would be required 75 versus under our new one they're kind of not given that same benefit so you're seeing that increased parking with their units at 135 our third test case is one of those smaller complex units where you would see we have the efficiency one bedroom 2 which was 16 where you were at 25 versus under our new you're get you're gaining two additional spaces at 27 very similar especially when you look at that one and

two-bedroom number they don't even change on those parking requirements that last case kind of shows that breakdown of the leasing office being added with the square footage and kind of showing that difference um with the larger complex you're kind of seeing the 121 versus the new Udo at 114 but I am open at this time kind of based on our memo and kind of going over these case scenarios staff isn't recommending any amendments to multif family parking but we are open to questions and feedback does we have any further discussion anything that we would like to talk about this situation I I do have one question question is what constitutes multifam dwelling and and the reason I'm asking that is if I remember clearly there was a distinction made about there were only three units possibly four units of budding so it didn't qualify under a multif family yes so it goes back to building code so building code describes multif family as four or um four or more units living units dwelling units where single family is you're intending to only it's a lot that only has one mint for one house so typically we do classify single family homes duplexes and Triplex triplexes as a a single family lot where anything over four where you're housing multiple families on one lot as multif family okay thank you do we have any questions or concerns of anything that we might want to talk about discuss I appreciate the staff work I think they did an excellent job um the test cases were particularly interesting glad to see those uh

especially with the uh fish pond development that's that has yet to reveal itself I think uh in the the reason that this came up was because of a congestion problem we think we faced but had nothing we could do about it I was hoping that we might have a solution seeing none I withdraw my objections um I'd also like to point out um on for example fish pond um so they are they were um their site was developed under our old code um because they had started the development process before we had adopted our new code or far enough along um there is extensive state law investing rights that developers um are privileged to have whereas if they um take some steps and file some applications then they are um only held to the ordinance that is in place at the time that they start their applications so uh for example like said fish Pon hasn't broken ground yet but they have received all of their approvals and their um applications are active and they were started at such a time that it was under our old 1992 ordinance and not uh the current ordinance so there can be sometimes frustrations especially when in our eyes we fixed the parking issue because we didn't feel like there was enough on the efficiencies or senior living but we felt there was too much on the three and four bedroom because generally people living in three or four bedroom unit Apartments have um more children than roommates and therefore not as many drivers um so that's where we are seeing the variances from if I heard you correctly you said that fish pond is going to only going to be required provide 75 spaces yes I believe have 74 units and then um the extra space for their office area because that was so you're counting on everybody who moves in there to have

only one car and no parking for staff that was a a flaw with the 1992 ordinance which is why the new ordinance um changed that and so the understanding of it is because that's passed they were already approved but moving forward to do they were vested under the 1992 ordinance and we obviously saw a big flaw in that which is why the udm made those changes and it kind of goes with the situation we heard previously of something that was done prior to and so now that we did try to come together and have something in place future for future purposes then things like that would not happen if fish pond is being given the old development plans uh the 92 is that what you call them 92 yeah uh the the that ordinance also required or prohibited more congestion than 27 units per acre that they I believe fish pond complies because even it wasn't the acreage is not limited to just the buildable area it's the overall site which gave you the opportunity to go across the drainage ditch they count the drainage ditches St that's part of their l i see as I said it'll be interesting to see how this reveals itself okay at this time um do we have any other discussion great um so now it moves us to um if there's any additional items that uh any of the Commissioners may have or would like to share I will go first I would just like to say that uh I hope that everybody have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New

Year we won't see each other to to the new year I get to use the joke I hadn't seen you since last year um but I want us to remember that uh it's not about presence but it's about being present and it's about living and that's what I want to say to you um will we have anything else awesome at this time we'll go ahead and adjourn um the meeting at 556 p.m. ajour thank you