Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Did we have a packet for today? You're live. All right. Call this uh meeting special workshop workshop uh to order at 6 pm on November the 6th here in the town of Weddington. Do I need to we can jump kind of right into it or need a motion to adopt the I may I move to adopt the agenda as presented. Do we have an agenda? Yeah. Yeah. 917. It's basically worked out. That's what I was I didn't see one of those. So, awesome.

We did have uh some info from the meeting on the 27th that you had in that packet that we wanted to discuss. Right. Those you had some uh we did have some other stuff. I have uh I have information from the past two planning board meetings. uh a packet specifically available for reference. Okay. Besides shift 97 and basically All right. So we got a motion for adoption of agenda. We get a second. Second. I'll second.

Second. All in favor? I unanimous. All right. Determination of a quorum. I say we do now as we're on a short board.

So I say we got a determination move into the workshop regarding UDO section D917E additional specific requirements for conventional residential developments. Uh Greg, if you want to just give us a brief rundown real quick. Yes, thank you Mr. Chairman. So this discussion of D917E which layman's terms is the requirements for new conventional subdivision applications A being applying to everyone B being applying to conservation subdivisions C being commercial D being etc etc. Uh we discussed this in the past couple meetings. Uh Bill's provided some good feedback on text amendments he would like to put into this requirement. Uh and our last uh scheduled meeting. Uh this was on the agenda. Uh it was actually a special called meeting and this was on the agenda and it was determined that this should be uh more fleshed out into a workshop which is our purpose here tonight. So no business will be conducted tonight. No votes will be taken tonight. This is simply a workshop to discuss this particular topic. This whole UDO section 917 is basically talking about the requirements for u new applications or new subdivisions that come to town. So this is an appendix 2B. This is in the checklist, but these are things that people should do uh when they're aiming to develop uh new residential communities within Weddington. Uh, for example, our previous standard was 10% for developments. Now it's 20%. And so this new section is to kind of balance out, okay, now that they got to do 20%. What are the other things we're asking

for and what are the concessions we can make? Um, the subcommittee has met on this before and we adopted this new section 97E. Um it's roughly borrowed from conservation side and again the the mayor objective of this section is to not infringe on property rights of longtime property owners, small lots, other things. These are things that should just apply to new applications. And this is six lots or more. Correct. That's that's correct. And so well it's actually greater than six. Six lots seven lots. seven lots

which yeah that comes up often that's good clarification and so you know we hold the strict standard to conservation type subdivisions uh it kind of made it and conventional subdivisions for example because a lot of the trees are going to be up kind of these areas buildable and unbuildable bless you

in advance uh segments this area. Uh just the last thing I'd note, this is a great example of a code section in the UDO that could use visual aid that could show an example of this is what we want shown. This area is buildable. This area is unbuildable. This area is your yield. We've had confusion over that in applications. we've had manipulation of that in applications before looking forward. Um, so I think that's one of the things we'd like to shore up is, you know, what are we looking for as an exhibit that's included in your packet that they can show that complies with this section. All that said, this is a workshop. This is a discussion. Please be loose about conversating back and forth. You don't have to, you know, make a motion or anything like that. This is a workshop. We're not making any decisions today.

Awesome. Thank you, Greg. One thing before I start. Can I borrow one of those pins? Yes. I came ill prepared.

Thank you. You need a pen, Scott? Thanks, sir. Thank you. You need some paper? Speaking of a visual, okay, look great. I'm a super visual guy. I know when the subcommittee got together and we talked this, you know, we were drawing pictures this and that. I got with Greg because I just I didn't feel the way it was written up. It was real clear. So Greg I kind of drew this and that and I said, "Am I looking at this right?" We were kind of got a head nod. So I created a visual to see if the the visual matches the intent of what the words are saying

or if so everyone understands the intent is right. If this is the intent and I think that would help us. So what I've done and I apologize for the people out there. I'll pass it out once we're done but this is an example and correct me if I'm wrong. This is a 20 acre parcel. Okay. It's got um steep cliffs. That's what that is. Greater than 25% steep slopes.

Uh this is a flood plane. Here's a creek that comes into a pond. So basically we're saying is this is not buildable land. So what we say is all right of our 20 acre parcel we've got four acres I'm making up these numbers here that are not buildable or what we were calling in the ordinance primary conservation subdivision or primary conservation land basically unbuildable land. So, if we looked at this and then we're saying, okay, I got my 20 acre parcel. Here's my primary basically unbuildable land. So, I've got 16 acres of buildable land. If it's if it's a conditional subdivision, actually, if it's either subdivision, my yield plan would come out of these 16 acres. So, keeping it simple, 16 acres, 16 homes. All right? It's going to be less than that by the time you get roads and stuff. So if it's um my conservation subdivision again getting simple I'm going to basically say and this is an oversimplification here's 8 acres here's 8 acres and I can put 16 homes over here 20,000 foot average square uh lot 18 but it has to average up And then this becomes conservation. And conversely, if this was a uh R40 subdivision, they get to use all that.

They they put 16 houses on everything.

They put 16 houses on all of this. So, that was the concept, right? Correct me. That's the concept we were coming with. But I just didn't feel um you guys want to look at that pass around. I'm happy to leave it with you. Um I just didn't feel the as I was trying to to read the ordinance it I just didn't feel it was coming through clearly. So, that's what I talked to Greg about and um I tried to take a shot at some changes on the 917s, but when I did it only where it referred to open space and conservation land.

So, the difference too was that open space whereas RCD the primary conservation they still had to give open space outside of that which is where you dedicate. This one does not. That open space, that primary conservation can count as their percentage and they can build in the good land. They didn't have to come back in that good land and get give an additional 20% because they gave whatever primary was out of the in convention. To me, that was another question when we when the actually the council up that 10% to 20%, you know, I'm thinking, okay,

that's got to affect the yield. Does that really have a real impact on the conservation lands? Especially if you you've got primary, you're saying, "Hey, we're taking this off the table to begin with." Correct. Whereas in conventional, that could have been part of their property that could have been in someone's backyard, the property line. Yes. Correct. So, we were trying to align the goals of RCD to say, "Let's just get pull that land out." But in our in conventional, they would be allowed to use that towards their common open space calc since they're pulling it out. we're not invest not taking their property rights away. We're just going to go ahead and pull it out, build on good land, make lots on good land, and then if it doesn't meet that 20%, they have to find the additional right

somewhere else. But they're automatically are going to put that into So if you start if you start from a blank slate of all good land, all buildable land, no steep slopes or anything, nothing, right? Then you have to pull the 20% out and then do the yield. Correct? If you have land that you can't build on and if it's 20% or more, that should count as the open space in conventional inconvention. I feel like that should because the goal was not to make those lots where it could be lots traditionally uh to just make lots to get an extra lot back there and then Yeah, because on the example there the 20 acres and four of it is primary conservation. That's 20%.

Yeah. You've met the So that's their that covers their their open space. Then they got the 16 acres of buildable good land to put quality lots on, right? And uh whatever road network, whatever they needed to threw instead of giving up that additional other half, whereas RCD would have half of that to putt their lots at 20,000. The conventional still has to stick to the right the big lots, but they just get the bigger land.

Yeah. Conventional is pretty conventional I think is pretty straightforward. It's the R it's the RCD. Now when you have to look at what is considered primary conservation and secondary conservation and the taring system that you know you're going to use to determine that because you used to be able to if you could carve out depending on where you were in the UDO 9,000 square foot or 10,000 square foot spot for it to build on build on. You could have a flood plane on yards in there steep slopes on your property and now we're saying no, right? You can't. So is that generally the concept I think?

Yes. and and so and you'll and you'll probably see more unbuildable land now in the conventional subdivisions because of that because they were go but they were bringing those lots into you know potential wetland just a little bit of it right so now you can't do it anymore so you you're going to get more of that uh land that's unbuildable in the conventional zone which could account for the 5%. Yeah. The uh so so again in conventional I felt like we were reading something that was confusing everybody

and when you try in the conventional and when we tried to articulate at that one meeting we had a hard time uh articulating I'm reading the common open space. It's 20% no more to 50%. Is that on the 917A? It's go to B. Yeah. 917E. Oh, additional. Okay. For conventional and go to B and read open space.

You said D. Yeah, I think it might be this. Not more than 50% of that minimum required area of open space shall be comprised of wetland, submerged land, steep slopes. So, in that case, in Bill's thing, we only get to use half of that. Yeah. And because it and what was the reasoning for that? I don't know. I really think that we should be able I really think the goal was meant to align with pulling it out and putting it into conservation and not be a not conservation, putting it in a common open space. So it wasn't going to be part of the lot, right?

Then all lots that would be delivered to a new resident were going to be quality lots. Uh so maybe that's where our hiccup was was not more than that 50% because then then I feel close that we might be stepping on Yeah. You're cutting into homeowners. Yeah. I mean you just good land

because you're going to have to give 10% of good land now and you gave up more. Let's let's give an example of a site that has uh 20% of the land is flood plane. Under this rule, you're saying, okay, you got to set aside 10% of that flood plane, but that other 10% of the flood plane has to be on somebody's private lot because you're restricted on how much common open space can be by these factors. Correct. Yeah. But I mean, we we're not allowing any foot on. So, read B.

Right. And the second sentence, not more than 50% of the minimum required area of open space shall be comprised of wetland, submerged lands, steep slope, flood planes. So to his point, the uh is that D917B E? Oh, E. Yeah. Which is why I think we were Or is that primary conservation land? No, it's D917E is additional specific requirements for conventional residential subdivisions or major subdivisions. A is everybody, B's conservation, etc. E is conventional. Yeah. Which is our new section.

And we were saying, you know, we're not going to punish any citizen here. Joe Weddington gets to do what he wants on A. Yeah. But if if anyone comes in and takes Joe Weddington's land and goes seven lots or greater develop it. Yeah, we wanted this to align with some of the goals that RCD had had with pulling out the bad land so that it just wasn't being able to create lots on it.

Yeah, I think there was an important statement, but a couple weeks ago, we got several of our uh councilman elects in the audience. We kind of described that as forprofit land or you know for profits that were going to be developed versus private homestead that owns the land. He wants you to the gross gross acreage and gross acreage. It's the total track. Okay. So the total tracks 20 acres. Yeah. of the track will be required to retained as common open space. Not more than 50% wetlands

of the minimum required area of open space shall be comprised of wetlands. And I think in conventional we want to go ahead and put that as common open space. Yeah. In the conventional section we

Oh, this is in the conservation section, excuse me. We we changed this from basically 50% to zero. We said if it's um if it's challenging lands, it's got to go into public lands. And then with this, we want same thing challenging lands to be kind of common open space HOA maintained lands and not have that on private property. That idea of this 50% which was the original another one is saying like we're we shouldn't reward you for building something you weren't going to build on anyway. You should have some of that common open space be uh a neighborhood green or you know common open space or a buffer around the property areas that you um could have built on but by not building on let's say there was a row of evergreens on the side of property that you would normally just wipe out to make somebody's private backyard. You're saying let's set aside some of that as common open space. Let's make that as a buffer between the neighborhoods etc etc. And now behind

that will be the case in in in a lot that has no you know no deep slopes no no you know it's got all buildable land correct if it's 20 acres of pure come up with 20% of something to put aside correct but they would have to at that point and even if it's the farmland they would have to plant to get to some type of common open space right so I mean it all depends on the land really and what's out there

and since the conservation section was written which we know was based on Randle Arts, you know, consultation and advice to the town several years ago. Um, we've made a significant advance in our tree ordinance and we have literally doubled the amount of open space that's required for these developments. So there are some you know shifts in in language that that impact the original language um that may say okay these these things settled out but um per the discussion we've had already you know there's some maybe confusion about how much we want to apply this to new development. If you know if they already have to set aside 20% of open space what are we actually asking them for? are we asking them to demonstrate to us that they're planning for it? So, I think is what we want to get to. What deliverable do we want from these for-profit developers?

So, in Bill's illustration, he would he would only be able to use half of what's not buildable as his common open space. So, he had four acres. He can only use two of that which means two acres within the buildable area has to go into common open space. Correct. Correct. Per written out way.

And I don't think that is what the real intent of doing a normal big lot uh subdivision was meant to be. See what what I was trying to do I finally found he was saying is at a minimum 20% and I said the adjusted tracked acreage. So I'm saying that that you got to give another 20% on the eight acres on eight acres. I would not ever be in part of that for a regular conventional subdivision. % of the 16 20 not 20% on the 20 acres, right? Because this

So you're going to pull that out of a homeowner's land. Then you're going to tell them they got to do 20% additional on the 16 for a conventional subdivision. Yeah. But aren't we saying that this could count towards that? Right now it counts 50%. Yeah, but you're saying with the adjusted track yield that would not because the adjusted track definition says pull all that out, give us the area you have left and in RCD and now you've got to start meeting our 20%. So that definition of adjusted track yield is really just for conservation. That was my understanding.

Yeah. But we wanted to align the conventional to pull out the bad land instead of it just being but not necessarily penalize them on the common open space part. Like I was saying the yield plan whether conventional or RCD would be the would be the same. Correct. Yeah. Correct. Because RCDs in in theory is doing a yield plan per our conventional right layout. So, so yes, whereas before you've seen where their yield plan can go into the bad lands and they just show how many lots they're getting.

Um, so I would be in favor of removing that second sentence and then a good trade-off would be asking them to just take the bad lands and and to Steve's point, I don't think we're always going to get our whole complete 20% in wasted land. But when we do have bad land, just go ahead and give him credit. Pull it aside. Don't put it in someone's lot. Uh and then let him start putting on those 16 acres he can put his 16 homes. So you're saying take out basically that second sentence.

Yeah. for the for the E 917E. Take out the second sentence where we're not gonna make him give pull out all that land and then go get more good land. Okay. Well, I think our goal is to just make sure they're using good land. This from the previous That's from the previous meeting. Yeah, that's in the meeting. I know there's a problem because I printed something on the back of the page and Karen when she ran copy, she didn't realize that. But then you sent out here. Look, look at that. See, I think that's what you're saying on B where I I lined out the whole second sentence. I'm not sure that this is the D917E, right? B1.

Yeah. Well, you've just instead of gross acreage, you're wanting to use the adjusted track acreage yield. Yeah. I don't think you can use that for uh uh conventional. So at a minimum 20% of the adjusted track acreage yield of the track will be required to be retained as common open space and adjusted track yield definition was pull out all the bad land all the primary conservation

then that's what you had for your yield. So you're going to say pull out his four acres now give another 16 acres 20% in that needs to be common space. So, you're going to give four acres plus an additional 20% of good land in the common open space. Oh, okay. Well, what I was thinking is you actually 20 acre track and maybe it's just I'll say coincidence that four of that is bad land. And so 20% if we take 20% of the gross parcel that's four acres. I was saying 20% of the adjusted of the adjusted which would be 3.2 2 acres of open space.

And I would be good if you wanted to to word that, but still giving credit for the bland you're pulling out because we don't know how much of the land when you do the gross, you'll know how much we're pulling out. Yeah. Uh and it needs to be in common open space, not in someone's lot. So, a question for you, Bill. Are you saying that instead of having the four acres be the required It would only be the 3 point something in this in this example,

right? But it's it's the 20. It's you don't you add you take it out, but you add it back in. So you're you're figuring out the common open space on the buildable area. But if but if it's but if the bad land is greater than that, then that's what it is. And your percentage instead of 20 might be 30. No. No, no, no. Yeah, cuz his 20 If he's saying that adjusted track is 3.2 acres, but you're giving four, you gave more than 20% of 3.2 acres, you 35% of your adjusted track. You're counting all the bad land, right? Yes.

Right. But but if it were if it ended up being something shy of it, it actually if it was shy, you just have to add add it somewhere else. Correct. But the adjusted yield would be favorable to the developer

if you get to count the primary as common open space and he's only going to do his calcs off of pulling it out of the adjusted versus the gross. Because if gross was four acres, right? Then his adjusted is 3.2, but he's still given four acres of common open space. We're well over 20% in our calcs for development data. So, it would be giving the developer a hand up to use the adjusted track yield to quantify his 20% he needs to give. Because if he was given 3.2 acres on this total track due to the adjusted track, but he gave four, he's well over, he would come in saying, "Hey, I'm giving 32% open space on this."

I was looking, what would that do for? No, just look like he's given more than the ordinance says. You know, if you were minimum is 20% and I come in and say, "Look, I'm giving 50%." I'm giving 40% on a conventional. Sure. It would look good for a developer, but it doesn't I mean it doesn't affect the build. Correct. Correct. Doesn't affect the build. So, nor does the gross. you're still getting some type of of yield uh coming out 20% whether it comes out of the adjusted yield which is the his in his case 16 acres or it comes out of the gross it's just a calculation number what's 20% being taken from

right so if you had let's say 10% primary or unbuildable that'd be two acres then you got 18 acres my thinking was your 20% applies to that acres, which is 3 additional to the primary. Yes. See, I I would not I would not be in favor. You're I think you're misspeaking. It's not additional. You're talking about just having that be what he has to come out. Yes. Yeah. I think what you guys are saying, my latest example, 3.8 8 acres, but he's already we've already taken Well, in that example, you gave four acres out of 20.

We took two acres off the table. If I'm using a 10% example, yes. So, so if instead of that being instead of the colored area that Bill's grandchild drew, um, buildable land, it's two, it's two acres instead of four. So that gives you 18, right? So now he's got to come out with 3.6. So it's the two acres of unbuildable land plus 1.6. Okay. Yeah. Is that I'm fine with that. I just that's what I'm trying to get clarity around.

If there's if there's 20% of unbuildable land, he's good, right? In conservation. If it's less than 20% of unbuildable, he's got to come up with he's got to make it up to 20%. Right. With with buildable land. But we're not going to penalize him in conventional bad in a conventional. Yeah. For having the bad land RCD, we don't want them to use that land to get their credits to get yield plan because then that yield plan comes in and they get eight more lots because they put lots in it and we're putting eight and 20,000. Yeah. Everybody in Weddington would love you to say we're going to have a neighborhood that's got one acre lots. That's not I can't imagine we're going to

have but when it's 20,000 and they got an additional six or seven lots because of how you can math it I think that becomes a little little hairy but this is conventional big lots. Yeah, we want that's what we want. So yeah. So if he couldn't if the bad land becomes their common open space that's great. I guess it would just be coming back. Do you want to use adjusted track or gross gross track? And in that situation, I think I would just make it as simple as possible. If you've got gross land, 100 acres, 10 acres, five acres, whatever it is, you got to set aside 20%. If you've got 20% of bad land, well, great. You're good.

If you don't, you got to still come up with whatever it is. But now, you still have to you still going to have to determine if it's conservation land, right? And well, it's not conservation. It just be primary, right? But it'll be going into land. Yeah. Steep slopes, rock outcrops, stuff we flood plane, creeks. But this is for a convent. We're talking conventional only. An R4.

Yep. An R40. But if we're if we're trying to align things with pulling out the primary in RCD so that a developer can read it the same, shouldn't we shouldn't we then be pulling out in this too and doing it off of the adjusted as opposed to the the full lock? Or do you mean give in a conservation subdivision give them credit for this towards the 50? No, he's saying do the adjusted and conventional and give them the credit of lesser land to pull 20% off of in pulling the bad land out.

Right. I mean, we're it it's apples to it's apples to apples. I agree with you. It's just it's a matter of whether we want it to look like it aligns with RCDs. You have to pull out the unbuildable area first and then we figure everything off of that. I think that would make it simple simpler or clear because it's kind of the similar type process. It just applies to I actually think it would be simpler just looking at 100 acres and saying okay 20%. But if we doesn't align but if we want it to align with RCD then I think we need to figure out how to make it how to pull out that but make it not impact the

they still get to use it back towards their calculations. So, so I think and and again I'm I'm I think you're I I think I understand what you're what you're saying is that you don't you you take the unbuildable land out as far as calculating what as far as calculating the the percentage that you have that you have to set aside. But that can be a part of that percentage once you figure that out.

Yep. It can't be built on it. it's going to not be part of a lot be kind of just pushed out but in conventional they retroactively get to bring it back to their calculation whereas RCD that's where they would split it doesn't and again to Greg's point I think this is going to be a couple pages of pictures and kind of a step by step use it for calculation of your plan in RCD in RCD correct yeah there's no yield plan in conventional well I know but I mean Your yield plan is basically 48 40,000 square foot lots all over the whole property. Now it's not, but it used to be.

Show me 40,000 foot lots all over. Now what we're saying is 40,000 square foot lots, but you got to you can't count that buildable land when you're when you're calculating that yield in a conventional subdivision. But we're going to give them credit for that towards the 20% of common open space. Common open space. Yes. Not to confuse the matter further, but

conservation development, 50% of that land is conserved. It's placement deed restricted. You can't build on it. Kind of set aside. And this 20% we're talking about for conventional development, that doesn't necessarily have to be a conservation land. That doesn't have to be something that's restricted on development. be a ball field. You can mow all that down and open space as long as you have your tree somewhere else. So just point of clarification for our future listeners that open space does not equal conservation land, right? Good, good call. I think the goal though is to we want to build acre lots, you know, on quality acre land.

Quality land. That's what we want to build. So, we don't want to I don't want to uh penalize a builder who wants to build acre lots. I agree. Agree. I want to push them to to build a lot because RCD is exploited. For what reason it is exploited? Exactly. You give us something, we give you something.

Yes. Um so I I whether we do adjusted track to to stay in alignment with the RCD, I I'm valid argument. I'm I'm good to support that. or if we did gross. Uh just as long as we're all on the same page that that primary pulled out is getting to go back towards that 20% common open space and they can put picnic tables and do whatever they want back there. And uh again, this is just strictly common open space.

Yeah. And yeah, and like I said, I think just doing it off of the gross acreage is a whole lot cleaner, but you know, if we're trying to align things so that they look the same within our ordinance, then you maybe we do we pull it out and then add it back in, which you know, it's kind of clunky, but I don't know these. I don't know if I want them to look the same. I mean, that's different. That's different. I was going to ask the same. Get Gregs. have visuals I think will go along way towards you.

I I think the goal we're meeting today is to have alignment of what we're expecting and to not unexpectedly create some kind of loophole. We're like, "Oh man, they just tweaked this amendment and now I can,

you know, only set aside 10% but it counts as 40, you know, which is I think we've discussed very fairly in conversation." So uh do they need to align equally? I think there is a strong in my experience with these developers there's a strong consideration even before they come to the town on which one they want to do. So there I have conversations every day about somebody who's like hey I want to do conservation versus conventional which one's better. Those don't usually go anywhere. The conversations that go somewhere is, you know, I've hired a land use attorney to review your conservation subdivision code ordinance. I think we could yield this much out of it. Here's a site plan we have. Can we do a sitewalk now? I think they're doing their homework into these these code sections in advance. So, they're not really weighing, well, should I do one versus the other? They've usually made up their mind as soon as they come to town. So, I don't think they necessarily have to be apples to apples in terms of how they read it. It just has to be very clear what our expectations are on the the option they choose.

Good point. So then let's keep it simple. Yeah. Gross acreage. Yeah. And then are you also now I I'm going try to word this correct. You would you say that we should give if we went adjusted that we should also make them give additional 20 outside the primary because if they're tens to 40 or are you kind of hinting that maybe we should be getting more? I I think the the mandate if you would is that the council wants that 20% open space that's been debated in the past and that decision's been made. Um, are they going to get it in this they're going to get it in this lineup.

So that's that that's a tough ask for somebody to say we want acre lots but you set have to set aside 20% still. I feel like that dissuades people from going conventional especially when when that's what we really want. We really want acre lots, you know, we'll and we and on, you know, people that have bad land, they can use conservation, right? And still make and still get somebody to buy their land, right? I I wouldn't say conservation's all bad. I'm just saying, no, but the way it's been used in the past, we know what it's used for with tinier lots. Yeah.

The lower still get a yield impact on a smaller amount of land. development cost the value of your land is it it maintains the value of your land. Yeah. Because if you have a if you have 30% of your land is bad in an R40 yield, you're going to have less homes. Now, if you go if you go conservation, you can build the acreage, you can build the amount of homes you have that the yield plan, you're getting two per every lot. Yeah. That the yield plan gives you. Sometimes three if you can make the averages work, right? Okay. See, I was thinking you're going to build the same amount, but that's why you've got to take out that primary conservation. I said, "Guys,

this would be harder. It'd be harder to put 40,000 square foot lots on on 16 of them on 16 acres. You got road infrastructure easements, but I can guarantee you in RCD that I can get 16 20,000 square foot lots. You know, you got a 100 foot buff or two to deal with if you're on a road. Um, you know, that's a that could that that's a lot of land depending on the size of the road, you know. Well, yeah. It also depends on whether you've got a 100 foot frontage on the road or a 50 foot. That's right. What's the shape of the lot, right? But I know right now the UDO, it requires 100 foot buffer, but it

it cannot exceed 15% of I think the gross parcel. So, if you've got a lot that's long and not that deep on the road versus one that's shorter and deep. Yeah. And that just comes down to what you got, right? Again, I'm going to always argue quality. And that's what I I don't want us to pigeon hole something to where you get crap out of what you're trying to do. I agree with trying to manage how we get a UDO in that can cover so many Yeah.

odd situations. Well, I don't know how many conventionals can I don't even know if we've seen many conventional come through. It's not It's a It's usually the smaller little ones that RCD doesn't even hard for them to apply to. So, if you've got a 100 acre track, the rarity of seeing a conventional not coming. Yeah. Well, we've had before I think the majority of what came through was conservation. Yeah. You can do a 12,000 foot line. You can you know well you know without sewer though without sewer it makes it a little difficult to do the conservation you can't do conservation really

so so that's why you're you're you know in the last I guess in the last year or so we did have some more uh conventional subdivisions because of the septics you know yeah and you can on a on a conservation subdivision you can put individual septic in the conservation land. Yeah, you can use it, right? Yeah. Yeah. We really haven't seen that yet having that. I think um the last proposal I think DA had some of that, didn't it? They were doing that, right? And then they were having problems. Where's land? Trying to find good land, right?

And that's the situation that was happening with Morris Farms. Greg and I talked about that. I actually again make sure I got my concept right. I'm drawing pictures and um you know well the 500 foot culde-sac plane they were going to go like 1500 ft to go across the flood plane to pick up three homes and then they did that one stub road to the side that went to nowhere that counteracted our culde-sac. Yeah. Then they put hammerheads in. That's not a So they're always going to find a weakness, but at least right now what they're showing is

they maxed that out at 600 ft. So they stopped just before the flood plane and then there's another lot. They were trying to save some trees and it was like I want say it was 120,000 square foot lot in that corner. In that corner they gave it up too and they just said we'll take that one out. Yeah, that's an excellent point. Let me just note that Morris Farm is a Toll Brothers prospective project. It has not gone through the public participation process fully yet. It's not gone planning board, but because we're in a workshop, I think it's fair to talk about now. We're in regular discussion meeting. Let's probably not talk about Good point.

Another just another thing I just want to clarify on the conventional. In the past, you could draw your lots for yield a certain percentage into the flood plane, right? In this is the whole the whole property can be used. Now, that cannot be done anymore. That's not that's so so you know, that's another additional uh shrinkage of what what can be what you can yield out of out of that. Anyway, so yeah, if you had 9 thou you could have 9,000 square feet to build a home and you could have 31,000 square feet of flood plane, lakes, steep slopes. Now you can't do that.

Yeah. But what again when we say you can't to your point of you can't you're already shrinking it. If I was going to the land and it's in a flood plane before I submitted, I can submit to FEMA a lowar by field and I can go bring some dirt in here. As long as I have a no rise certificate that says what all this that I'm doing doesn't make that creek rise 100th of a foot, I feel I put my thing into uh FEMA, they sign back and they're like you're out of the flood plane. We would like to dissuade that. I agree. I agree. But from a developer side, they're going to say, "Hey, homeowner Joe Weddington, we need to do this first."

And used to say, "As long as you had your livable area was 2 feet higher than the base flood elevation." Yeah. Now we're saying you can't have any of that on your Yeah. Which is good. This is where this whole concept started with Mayor Pro Smith like a year and a half ago is saying, "Yep, we don't want anybody to be able to build in a flood plane." And we can't do that. We have to say we can make it really hard to build in a flood plane or we can make it so if you build a new subdivision you can't build a flood plane but we can't tell a property owner that if you own a flood plane your lot is unbuildable. But our intent of doing this was to protect a current owner. Yep.

But any for profofit development you can't be there. Yeah. And I there's if if if your minimum open space is between 20 and 50% which is really restrictive anyway, of course you should put that in HOA property rather than private property. Yes. Yeah. So can someone summarize here on uh

I think we're going to take that second the sentence out, right? I think that's all we need to do now is just take the second sentence out of uh minimum open space B and just leave it at minimum 20% of gross acreage of the track were required to re to be retained as common open space. Okay. So gross acreage this is for conventional. Yeah. Yep. 917E additional specific requirements for conventional residential.

Yeah. But now here comes the trick. Here comes the the cartoons we're going to have to create. How do we put into this that they have got to pull out all this primary conservation at the beginning? We need somewhere in there that they know that's why we were using adjusted tracked acreage. The intent was being it's pulled out.

Well, u my just put something in there that says they could use that as their open space. So is it here to say at a minimum 20% of the adjusted track acreage of the track will be required to retain its common open space for the calculation. But then we're saying you can then No, I think we need to be more deliberate and almost mandate in here a line that says you're going to pull out.

So this is what this is the one I got. It says adjusted track acreage yield means the total gross track acreage after excluding the conservation areas as described in section D917B which shall be no less than 50% of total track for a residential conservation development and no less than 20% for other developments. Primary and secondary conservation area shall be defined. And we got to find a place to put the definitions because right now they're

Yeah, I it's not there. I maybe we can talk about that, but I had submitted something to Greg again. It was on the back side of the page where we have definitions of conservation land and I've added words in there for primary conservation land. What's that mean? And secondary here, you can see that. So, Steve, what you just read made sense to both conservation and Yeah, because that's a definition of adjusted track acreage yield. You're going to add both things in there. But we're not but we're not using adjusted track acorage if we

Well, we don't want to, but then we've gotten back to are we going to use it, right? Because a primary conservation. Yeah. But Chris said Chris said uh Bill said yes. I don't think that gets us back. That's decision between the two. Adjusted track acreage yield is the gross. It's the 20 acres less the four. That's the adjusted track. That's the definition. So then you're going to make him do 20% on the adjusted track. I'm just trying to clarify. Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. If we use that word in that sentence, then we use that definition. I thought we I thought we were using the

gross. And if we use gross, we now have to explain. We have to explain not with adjusted track acorage. That's we're leaving that completely out. We just have to define pulling that out. Pulling that out. We have to define primary. We have to define what that is and why it's not buildable. And yeah, and then we have to say that it can't be used uh in in a conventional subdivision, but it can be credited towards the 20%. So, do we have outside of minimum open space, do we have somewhere in here where it says that they cannot build on unbuildable land? That's I think that's what we're trying to

Yeah, that's what we're trying to figure out. That's what this adjusting track acreage yield kind of came into. So, this one definition might solve three chapters worth of headaches. Uh yeah, Scott's point, I think that's where we're at. Use the growth, but we need to figure out a definition that or mandate how we pull out primary. You tell them how to get to what's primary and how much potentially do they have on their lot. And is uh primary and secondary definitions in our definitions already? Uh kind of. Well, that'd be another good illustration along with the definition.

This is what I was proposing adding on. And actually, I'll tell you what page it is. It's under definitions. I think it's on page 85. Well, it's 85 in in the hard copy. I'm not sure what it is. I had it say right now it says it has primary and secondary. And what I did, I I added where it says primary conservation land means that portion of the track that consists of view sheds, flood plains, wetlands, lakes, ponds, hydric soils, and steep slopes greater than 25%. You might be able to build on a viewshed in that, huh?

You might be able to build on a viewshed if it's buildable land. If it's not, you know, bad land. Well, the view shed is just for for the nice for the view, right? That just when you say view shed, you view shed is looking into the land from the road has a 100 foot area that we've got to stay clear on. Secondary conservation plan shall include that portion of the track that consists and this is definition now that consists of forest land, farmland, historic sites. It said steep slopes. I'm saying though that should be moderate slopes because because we have steep slopes in the primary.

Yeah. Steep slopes that are and it defines it moderate slopes which defines it as less than 25% rock formations and land adjacent to parks. That's the that would be the pass this over. So like can't you just say in in no instance are they allowed to build in primary open space of primary primary conservation conservation lands. Well that's that's what we're saying. Well I think that's the intent of what we're trying to say what it is though. Well that's the definition.

He wrote it off. But some of that land could be not bad land. Then it wouldn't be primary. Doesn't matter. Right. If we if we label it as primary, then it's primary regardless of whether or not it's bad land or good land. Right. So now you cut Now you're taking more land out. No, no, no. It's the same same intent. So to Scott's point, just sum up a lot simpler as you just can't use it, can't build in it, can't be part of a lot kind of thing. How do we get to that sentence? Yeah. But if you're saying that it's land adjacent to parks, I mean, that could be flat buildable land. That's

so then take So then take it out of your primary. If you if you if you have a problem with that, then pull that out of the primary. Don't leave it in the primary. We have to come up with whatever we want to put in the primary needs to be what it should be unbuildable land or land that we don't want somebody to build on. Not necessarily unbuildable, but land that we don't want somebody to build on. We we have to define it. Right. Right. That's right. And Right. So maybe we pull parks out, you know, of that definition part,

right? But that's that's a that's a different conversation. We have to if we want to go with the gross acreage, then we have to define what they cannot build on. Outside of that, we're we're good. Numbers the numbers work out. We just define what we what they can absolutely not build on. unconventional unconventional and and then things start becoming simpler. So we just have to we have to put in verbiage that says you know under no circumstances shall you know shall these this shall the primary conserime primary conservation lands but we don't want to use conservation lands right

because conservation again we're in common open space we don't want to yeah elude or imply that it's conservation yeah that's that's confusing it's area we want them to conserve set aside But the true definition of conservation lands is something that you deed over and it's in this conservation type subdivision. So So then all you do is you ditto you ditto this and make a new definition for primary open space. That's it. That's great. Primary open space actually use the exact same verbiage for this. It's just it applies differently. Primary open space sounds great.

Yeah. I'm just concerned. I don't want to take more than, you know, I'm worried about taking buildable land uh away from a conservation subdivision more than, you know, we could get into a big percentage. Well, in the we can primary open space can maybe not paste all of that definition. Uh we we can come to terms on what we want out of that for conventional, but you want it to stay when it's primary conservation, you want it to be in there. And then in con in a conventional, we maybe remove parks or some language in there to just know that our intent is to pull out the unbable stuff. Yep. John, we have a definition for open space right now.

Do you have a definition? Primary open space. I was going to say we're going to have to have a a primary open space or something else and then that's a one sentence thing back to Scott's point that we've just put in. They look, they see it to figure out what it is, right? And they take it out and if it's less than 20, they got to come up with more. If it's more than 20, they're good. They can say they've got 30%. It's a deliverable brought to them basically to the public up front. It says like here's the area we shaded out as the primary open space. There's no moving this around later. We've clearly defined where this area is per town's definition. This is area we're not going to build on,

right? Yep. Yep. I think that's our kind of path forward in my opinion. I mean, if if we're trying to if we're trying to keep things simple, I mean, you know, we can lawyer ease this to death. But if you want to keep it simple, we're trying to keep it simple so that

so that when so that subsequent planning boards aren't confused when things come before them, I think keeping it very simple is is the is the better option. And then you know if we have to make six new definitions to to make it work then we make six new definitions that that make it work or one or two turns out to be. Yeah. Greg, as long as all those definitions are in the same ordinances voted up on in the same manner, we can do as much as we need to.

Yeah, I mean we got that. I think we're on the right path. We need to word smith get a something that we can present as a recommendation I guess right that that we could all feel comfortable with and then and then pass it on for this someone that has their arms around I'm I'm a little shaky on it but as long as people are grasping it well I'm I'm fine. Yeah, I think I I think I got the intent. I think it's good. And if we get a separate definition for primary open space affecting conser uh uh conventional conventional really change the names and we're so damn close. I mean conventional conservation. You try saying three times. So I think that's good for for conventional, right? We kind of squared that.

I think that kind of hammers home what our intent was in conventional. The other one, the last thing I would say, and I want to say this very clearly for future reference, if we could change what RCD is in terms of its name, so it's more clear of something, the conservation versus a conventional subdivision, that would be great in terms of a zoning map. So, we know what types of development is allowed there. That said, there have been things stated kind of online and there's campaign promises and other things that we want to get rid of RCD zoning in the state of North Carolina. Down zoning is legal. You cannot do that.

You cannot get rid of RCD subdivisions. Well, we can we can we have to have the people who own the land say yes, you can do it. Yeah. But who's going to do that, right? Nobody's gonna do it. Yeah. So, just just be cautious about, you know, we're we're going to change all these things to make everything an acre lot. It's it's not that simple. Not until you get rid of conditional zoning. Not right zoning. Done deal. We got the uh the good one fixed up pretty good. Then the next one has got a lot of stuff that needs to be addressed, I guess. What was the next one? The

Are we going to talk about con uh conservation? We're going to talk about the RCD subdivisions because all that primary conservation needs it needs that all needs um definitions and yes I've got kind of Bill's tweets on that on the screen that was part of that you know requirements for development cut sheet that he had provided. So he had talked about that adjusted track acreage yield in 97B. I think we talked about what we want for 97D. This is do we want to tweak this section at all?

I think it's on the back of the document I gave you. I think it's on the front and it does have a a primary conservation land definition in there. And again, it doesn't have to be exactly workshop in it. We're coming up with ideas. But if if yeah the direction of hey do we want to roll with what's on the screen or do we want to keep more of a theme with 917E and then come back at our regularly scheduled meeting with those changes directing staff to do so that's what we need to discuss.

So yes one part is I do want to come back that 917E I think we can clean that up next meeting. I think that's that's a wrap. This one I think I've already seen this from Bill and I don't think I was having issues with his changing the thing. I think it was back to again we just need to have defined well- definfined definitions and probably again some of these little illustrations that can follow some of this stuff. Illustrations help a lot. Yeah,

I think when I when I put this I sent it out to the subcommittee. Yeah, I think I I've definitely I don't I think when I read this I read I just again if we had you know when you look at his book you see those illustrations it helps put two and two together. So I I don't think it would hurt for us to have have some illustrations back and uh you know not only adjusted track acres definition yield but then have a little brief snippet of an example example of your grandson's artwork there kind of thing to pull out primary show secondary I mean in his essence almost do like the book does. Mhm.

Yeah, we could go as as far as to say primary conservation or primary open space has to be denoted as a dash line or has to be denoted in red, you know, and then shows an example of that visual. So that that's the deliverable that they have to provide when the application comes in. Yeah. Define primary, secondary, we're giving you the definitions. We're telling you what we interpret that as you have to show us that. Show it on the on the plan basically. Yep. Yeah.

Um Greg, did you have any recommendations on these on this wording from a planner standpoint? Did did it look like we were

No, I mean if we change, you know, gross to adjusted, those are all math things. That's that's up for the applicant to determine if they they meet those standards. And then we double check that and then the planning board we triple check that. I agree with um Bill's section here on identifying what's the priority and you know moving the slopes around. We we want to set aside those those super steep slopes. So we want to identify kind of these secondary areas as as other things. Uh no strong recommendations. I'm I'm looking for something that we all agree upon. So if it's if I wanted it to be if I wanted the slopes to be 12 instead of 10 like I I'm not that's not a hell I'm dying.

No, I'm just more like do do we got enough language in here? Uh does once we add some illustrations to this? Does this kind of bring this home? Um I've said the word a couple times. I want the deliverable. I want the definition and I want the deliverable for staff interpret. You know, when a guy says, "I'm submitting an application. What does this definition mean?" I can say, "It's right here. This is what I interpret that as what our planning board interprets that as here's a visual example of how I want you to show that." And then when I get a bad application, which happens all the time, I can say, "You did not draw it the way that our visual exhibit shows. Please do that."

So, quick question. Do we have secondary conservation? because it it's not in our Yeah, that's that's kind of that's a that's a good point. That's kind of what we said is like that's the other stuff, but we haven't talked about what that other stuff exactly is speak. So honestly because it what I what I have a little hard time flowing is we talk about the priority of the conservation lands and C and then E we define the primary conservation lands but we don't necessarily they're not does that mean the tier A tier B and tier C and C are secondary conservation lands right

I mean so to me it's it's a little disjointed no that tier A B and should be primary. Correct. Um with all the rocks and all the unusual and then no like tier A you see forest lands. Um oh no I was reading that different. I was thinking that was I might need I might need glasses. We have we have a definition of secondary conservation land. Where where is it? It's on page 85 under definitions is con conservation land means a portion of a track that is set aside for permanent

perpetual protection as required by this UDO and it talks about primary conservation primary conservation land means that portion of a track that consists of flood plains, wetlands, lakes, ponds, hydric soils and then I added in there. Steep slopes and then it talks about secondary conservation land shall include that portion of a track that consists of forest land, farmland, historic sites and then I took out steep slopes and put in moderate slopes, rock formations and land adjacent to parks. So we have definitions in there. Now, all I was proposing we adjust the um slopes and I just went with the 25% because I'm assuming sometime in the past planning boards have wrestled with what percent of slopes. I didn't want to redep that one. So if if I were setting it up, I would put the primary conservation land on top, make that C, and then it would be the pri priority of secondary conservation lands would be really what I what would C would be.

Yeah, we're we're almost replacing this section. So this priority conservation lands section is like, okay, if you're Joe engineer and you're laying this out. We want you to start here and then go over here and make an interpretation here. It's fairly subjective for them to decide what they want to prioritize. This is a guide to them when we're now that we're more strongly defining primary versus secondary lands. It's not a guide, it's a requirement. And so we have these stronger definitions. We're saying, you know, I don't care how you interpret the section C of what you're prioritizing. We're telling you what the primary and secondary lands are. You have to show them

because that there is all what the way we've been discussing it as secondary observation. Right. So So we're not going to we're not we don't need to tar it or we're not going to tar it anymore. We're just going to call all of that secondary conservation. That's what I would think. That's why I took out the 25% because that plops it into the primary.

Correct. But you I mean if it's tiered there's obviously things that are more important to the town even within instead of going primary secondary tertiary yeah what quarterary whatever you know you're you're tearing your your secondary which we may still want to do or do we just in in any respect I think you put primary on top of it right because that's the most important and then you say and then I would say it's the priority of secondary conservation lands or just take it out as tears and just say secondary. Yeah, I'm following.

Yeah, I'm following. Just don't know if it makes that big of a on the tears because again, if you took out the steep slope, you still got a priority for secondary. Uh we prefer forest lands. We also would prefer even though you're required a buffer you can put more conservation land up there so you your viewshed from the thoroughare that's what uh at the corner of Weddington Matthews road in Providence I mean that's so set back that's all conservation land front

I I'm I'm fine with it being tiered I I actually do think that you probably have you know not just primary and secondary, but you know, you've got this within secondary. I'm just saying to to cl to kind of clean it up, I would think that you would put the primary conservation lands on top because it is primary. And then just because again, similar words, you're using priority and primary are kind of back to back. So, priority of secondary secondary conservation land. I'm following you. I see what you're saying on on primary conservation land if I'm understand there is there is no priority. It's all right.

It's all these because it's all inclusive. It's not this one versus this one versus right. You're pulling it out anyway. It's coming out regardless if it's primary. But you know in secondary if they had you know if we had the choice between them using the moderate slope one as part of their conservation or you know the forest land we would prefer that they use the forest land which I think with our tree ordinance would kind of dictate that anyway. But should that just say priority of secondary secondary conservation land? Yeah. I I would kind of say that at the very least to to Scott's point because priority primary I mean we're right at the

when I'm reading it and it doesn't in this paragraph say secondary uh right I think you did that that clear it up and then like you say primary is an absolute there is no yeah we prefer you do this then this than this it's all

yeah because I mean obviously they're going to have the discussion with us eventually but Somebody could, you know, read through this and say, "Oh, well, their priority is is, you know, viewsheds. So, I'm just going to put all of my regardless of primary, I'm just going to put all of my, you know, conservation in the viewshed." And then we're go back and say, "No, we really need the primary out first." So, it just kind of it makes it again, I think it it makes it clearer and and easier to follow.

Yeah. And then if you do the secondary sounds great, but then where do we fall in line at the end of this to put some illustrations, some like exhibits or do we put exhibits after like a like for instance C when we get to the bottom of it, do we want to show exhibits and see of what this would look like as far as an illustration? We have that flexibility, but kind of the limited visual aid we have now are kind of put at the end of a theme or section. So that's what I was hoping I actually would I would feel better. So our visual a would kind of be at the end of the or I think that's what I'm patternwise that's what I'm used to seeing.

Cool. Just as long as they're labeled. Yes. Appropriately. Yeah. And once they're in there, you might find that you want to add an exhibit A to the paragraph or something that once we've had a little bit of you could hyperlink it too, right? So that if as you're reading it, if you're like, huh, I wonder what that looks like, you'd be able to you could click it and then that would take you to the to the picture. Correct. Yeah. And I have gotten to where man, if you print it out, Bill, you're not going to be on the right page. But if you get in here and you just click the table of contents, you're it's rockstar. We had that discussion at the planning board meeting. You weren't here. Miss Dewy's not here to defend.

No, my printed out version. And then I go to this, but I've gotten to where now I just hit that hyperlink stuff. Working on the macros, right? Yeah. If you go and click on it, it takes you to the right page. I agree. But if you do the page, I'm doing it this way because I would do a search on PDF. Yeah, that's what I did. And then I thought, well, wait a minute. But it's not it doesn't quite get the same, but Gotcha.

But yeah, so I guess on this one, uh, we just want to add a little bit of language on C to secondary to put the word in there. Secondary, take out Bill's steep slopes, add your adjusted track acorage. Um down at the bottom where you've got E, you've uh you kind of just struck through and came up with a new one, didn't you? I miss tried to get the same information, but yeah. Can you put that up there? Will it show? This is from your packet, so I think we still might be missing that.

It's It should be on the whole thing's on the back of there, Scott. I think, isn't it? you know, it has a lot of I mean, to me, they're flowery words. Um,

human life and property protection, yada yada yada. So you basically are wanting to say primary conservation lands and then you're wanting to go into because of their extreme limitation streams, valley swells, submerged lands, flood planes, steep slopes greater than 25% and other lowland areas warrant designation as primary conservation lands. They may also require adjoining buffer lands to be included as primary conservation lands. This is to be determined by an analysis of the protection requirements as determined. Yeah, that's where it gets a little

by the planning board on a casebyase upon finding that designation of such as primary conservation land would have significant and long-term environmental impact. I would might have to read that one a few times to know if I'm understanding. Well, I think thematically what we're I get where he's at. want to say that anywhere in these sections, let's say it's either

B or E, we'll use E as an example. We move the definition and concept of primary conservation lane to the top of the page and say this is what we're looking for first. Here's how it's defined. Here's how you define all the other stuff for how we prioritize other things. End of section. Here's a visual exhibit of how you should demarcate primary lands on your yield plan before you submit your application. That's what we're looking for. That you I I couldn't have put it that eloquent. Yes. Comes in. We want Yeah,

this red section is primary conservation land. This green section is secondary conservation land. And the other section is built.

Yeah. Because I mean we we've got yield plans before and I do think that they were adequate for our UDO standards, but they would say, you know, we could yield 15 lots out of this thing and then you see the backyard of that one yielded house and it's got five change of 100 feet. It's like, okay, technically you could yield a house out of that front, but I want you to show that a lot more clearly so that we could contest that or say, you know, is that really appropriate for a private lot? Should that become common open space?

Because if it falls off quickly, greater than 25%, it's going to be primary anyway, right? So let me as an example when Keystone came through um last week a couple weeks ago if someone like that came through in the future everything was labeled I think as open space now wouldn't it have here's primary conservation land the flood plane in the back that kind of stuff here's secondary conservation land and And here's where I'm building. And oh, by the way, that primary is X acres. The second area is X acres. Is that what that's what we want to get to when it comes before the planning board? Correct.

Yeah. Our chairman's the surveyor. He's used to delineating those areas. You know, and I would say this, too. I know I missed that special meeting, but I saw that packet. That is what they should have led with in the very beginning. That it would have been a totally different ballgame versus what they gave us at the very beginning. The second time, that's what I was expecting to see the first time. Yeah. Uh and I don't know if y'all know I caught the differences, which is just my thing, but

definitely uh the six pages on the first was a was a weak showing versus that that second packet. So, that was more of what I'm in line with seeing with what we had intent for seeing with 2B. Um, and then, you know, hashing out a couple of the little things through it. That's what I felt like would be a productive to productive submitt and meeting. Um, but yeah, so I guess we've kind of got some marching orders on those to to make a stab. I think we could have probably both of these cleaned up minus how do we want to handle illustrations? Can we leave that for staff to Yes. Yeah.

So we can make these things that we want to make recommendations, leave it to staff to handle the illustrations and then I can give you a doodle and then by the time it goes to the town council for the ordinance, that's actually what's going to be the circuit of the text.

So do so do you want us to take a shot at writing the text or do you have enough information for you to write the text? I think it can go either way. Phil, I trust you in terms of your text amendments so far. If you want to take a stab at it, that is my job to do it. That said, I am out of town for the next week and a half. So, it may not be ready for the next planning board meeting, which is a month or is a week earlier. And Bill is always reading and eating the UDO. Well, I was I'll be honest with you, I was looking to have Greg do it because I'm a little unsure this. Well, let us we can we can get together or why don't you try when are you going out of town

tonight? Morning. Okay. So, I would say let's let's bill if you want to just send what you've had to make a stab and then what we can do is if I'm not mistaken we can email it individually, right? And then let us make sure individual we just pass it along. Uh if you send what you've got, I can I can go from there or three can get together and we're legit. We just can't do four. I just say we do give us that first stab these next few days. And when Greg gets back before meeting, Greg, if you read it and you like, "Look guys, this this and this," that's that's when he kind of is our final edit to Okay, I'm on really shaky ground here, but I'll put together what I think and then

See, but that's that's the thing. Even if you are on shaky ground, then we're gonna when you send it out, we're going to say, "No, you're on sh this is what this is what we meant." Well, I think I I think we all agree on the concept. They're just now getting it into words and and I'll take a shot at it. Yeah. So, some of the things I noted uh in the records as I'm acting secretary for this workshop is uh you know, we don't necessarily have to align with the conservation developments. It's a different type of project,

right? We're looking for some kind of deliverable like a yield plan for these acre lots. We don't want to penalize people for building acre lots because that's the that's kind of the preference of our citizenry is we want more of these types of developments because there have been certain loopholes in RCD developments. As I stated, RCD cannot go away because they're not down,

right? Um, we talked about the definition of um, gross acreage versus adjusted track acorage. And using that gross acreage versus having alignment of the two definitions, we were going to stick with the gross. Uh, we were going to remove that second sentence in D97E, which talk about the no more than 50%. Yeah.

Um, rule. We're going to add a bunch more definitions to define them. Primarily we're going to define primary and we're going to emphasize that at the beginning of each section as the deliverable we are searching for. Um the other things these priority of conservation lands these etc. These are priorities for what you're setting aside but these are more guidelines whereas our primary and secondaries are are strict definitions that we will be s searching for them to meet that definition. Um we effectively are saying in no instance primary land shall be built upon. There's an expectation if you define something as primary you're not building any stuff on it. No structures

not really any development. We don't want you to really degrade there. Yeah. We want serve there.

Correct. Um so we're showing we're asking them to show buildable and unbuildable land effectively which is what council's goals were for this um conservation lands when done in this type of development will be defined as primary open space. They're effectively the same thing in terms of being set aside. They have different legal ramifications and how they're plotted and how they're filed with the registration lands cannot be disturbed. primary open space and plan. We're asking you to say that you're not going to be served. Um primary is identified as a priority and then the other sections of code and then we will provide exhibits at the end of each of these sections that show the deliverable we are looking for. Whether it's a definition of saying you have to hash it out or put it in red. You have a clear exhibit of what item they are to provide to the planning board for you guys to review compliance with.

That was money. Can I get a copy of that? You won't be able to read my handwrit you watch back and hit pause and hit pause and hit pause. No, that that was that was it. That's summed it all up. Uh, I think for us guys on making his language is going to just kind of copy and paste to a degree the primary open space definition to Steve's point, take out some of the stuff that uh may not and may not have wanted in a normal against park stuff like that. But we can get him back some after we

I'm not sure what primary open space is. I know we've talked about it. It's the primary conservation area, but in a conventional subdivision, it's not conservation. So, it'll be primary open space. We're going to set it aside. We're going really that's the base of it. We don't use the term conservation. Correct. We're going to use primary open space. That way we hitting on the same similar bill. Uh prim Yeah. primary being the the key, whatever you want to call it after that. Yep. Yeah. Yep. Primary open space in R40 is similar to primary conservation in correct. We just may take a little bit of the words out of the definition of primary conservation. Yeah.

Uh to get it and then we'll let Greg give a final edit. But different town expectations for each. Correct. We don't want to quite treat them apples to apples. Yeah. We have the same ecological goals for both for two separate approaches. We're just going to define how they are with some clarity because I had expressed some concern as I I was looking at some subdivisions we've done. I actually went into the deeds office in Monroe and we have some of our newer ones out there. The older ones say conservation land. The newer ones say open space.

Well, but yeah, but I think Karen said that that might be a function of the deed office not having them labeled correctly. Well, that's why I went into the deed office and pulled it all up. Yeah, but didn't she say she said we need she said you really need to check someplace else. If the plaque can say one thing, but if you're going into conservation, there's a totally separate CCR private restrict instruments that that do it. My only concern I couldn't find that in Y uh but ideally we would want that wording on a plat ideally.

Yeah. um just makes it easier for everybody because again open space has a different condentation to what I can do in it versus conservation. Uh real quick, I'm not going to try to keep y'all much longer, but we toll had brought up on our septic that uh in 2B, if you'll pull up 2B real quick. They made a great point and uh we when we were doing 2B the subcommittee we met with the state and the county about this septic stuff and although she told us about all the third party uses she didn't go in as detail as the actual third party engineers did. Here's appendix 2B and we say in there about the improvement permit but there that comes the improvement permit in there comes from the county and can only be issued by the county. There is a third party engineering company that that can do it that issues the same exact permit that's it's actually they were going to tell you it's equivalent. It's a A2 or A5, but it's a higher standard of uh permit than what? So, the improvement permit is is, hey, my daughter is 18 years old. She just got a job, Union County. She goes out and assesses your property for septic. She looks at a couple things on the checklist. Jaboom, you got septic. Here's your thing. You move on. That's the truth. These are soil scientists and have their license behind it. So they can't just do that. So they have to go three more degrees to say what it is bedrooms. And so they were wanting to say if we could either change that or recommend they're going to they're going to meet with the mayor and them too as well and add in their third party

equivalent to some type of thing to that A2 permit that they do. And what they do is with their A2 permit is send it to the county. County signs it and issues. It's not the improvement permit per se. It's going to be their A2. Uh, and a lot of the developers use engineering, outside engineering because of their time. Sure.

The county is like if the county sees an A2 permit coming through, they pretty much rubber stamp it. Yes, it's there. That's and the the engineer if we wanted to talk, I think he was kind of open to talking to us, but I wanted him them to get with the mayor and let the council members hear from him because some of this just comes down to education. I didn't know it went this deep. We talked to that state and county lady and and she kept saying from her end that improvement permit, which is can only be issued from the county. State lady kept saying about the third party engineers, but they didn't bring up this other permit. and this guy uh that was with the engineering firm did. And again, it's it's one of those things if somebody's got a seal behind it, there's a little bit more education behind what they're doing and know versus my daughter coming out to tell y'all we can do septic through the county. And

so you're saying we need to add Well, they're going to meet with the mayor. We'll see what they all say. But I just wanted to bring that up that there is an equivalent or even a higher standard than that improvement permit. My my only question would be is there ever an instance where the county doesn't issue their improvement permit if somebody has an A2 permit? It's a good question for them, right? Because that that I mean that would be that that would be a a catch.

Yep. That that'd be a good question for them. Uh but we'll let them see if if the mayor and council says they want to this is something for them and they ask us to to review that again, then we'll review it. Otherwise, they can go get the improvement permit and and just know it's of I don't know they all of it's going to be a an expense to a developer, but they can Well, they would have to wouldn't they have to have that anyway? Even if it's rubber stamp by the by the county there's

Yeah, you're either going to come the equivalent of A2 permit or you're going to have an improvement permit. But we don't say anything but the improvement permit. So, we don't even lend to the option of having a hire a third party company do it. Well, I think most of it's done that way. I mean, because the county gets backed up. I know when my Yeah. Well, that's when we were talking to the county. I mean, she was absolutely like we're so slow that most people have their own engineers. They do it, send it, we go. But they kept using the word improvement permit from the county. County can't issue the A2 permit, but they're equivalent technically. One's just a

So, is it just county approval? Is it as long as they have county approval? Well, a county or an engineered approval that the county accepts as a Right. So, the bottom line would be the county would accept that. As long as they have county approval, it should be

back to Scott's point. We want to make sure that is something that is accepted. That'd be a good question for council to ask them when they when they meet because My thought process would be that they're just trying to get it quicker. They're gonna they need the they need the improvement permit from the county eventually. And 99.9% of the A2 permits get that. But once they have that, they want to be able to come to us and say, "We don't have to wait three months for the improvement permit from the county." I think is probably where we're going. That's where they're headed. So that was their whole thing,

right? So are all A2s accepted by the county, right? And if and if the answer to that is no, then I think you would want to stick with improvement with the improvement permit. If the answer to that from the county would be the answering party to that would be yes, we've never seen one that hasn't been, then maybe we could go with the AT. Yeah. But that definitely would, you know, again, you know, I don't I'm I'm perfectly fine as long as as long as the developers know what we are asking of them. I'm fine with having them jump through as many hoops as long as they know what the hoops are. So,

and that's what I think they were just trying to clear up with us, uh, was that we don't we only allude to the county permit. So there is verbatim no word of of of going to the to the engineer.

I think most developers, at least I know my subdivision, again, they're trying to get it done and get it through. So they hired their own engineers to do the work, then they submit it to the county, and then the county would say, "Yeah, this is this is good." Well, in our experience in surveying rural areas that use a county to do septic, get their septic area delineated, right? They go out there, they build their house, they get a septic, and it's not even eight months after everything's active, and the septic failed because it was just they looked at topography, they looked at a little bit of soil type, whereas

these 18y old these engineering firms, you know, if that happens, his insurance is about to step in and pay for whatever he's sealed and and messed up. So to some degree I get the developer wanting someone on the like you botch this. We're putting a claim into your insurance because counties like their own sovereign nation. The A2 permit seems to be what we want to get to.

Well, I don't know if we want to force them to use it because the county is still but I would say improvement permit or equivalent A2 permit or something. That's a good word. But again, let's let I just wanted to bring that up that and I got a little bit of education the other day from them and then I know they're going to talk to council and we'll see where it goes. But uh it's definitely was definitely kind of eye opening because all we did was talk to the state and county. We didn't I you know now in hindsight I was like man we should have probably talked to a soil scientist. We were getting all this information. So the board at this point

yeah well anything else I would like to raise one topic and I'll make it real quick if you missed the meeting is Keystone the planning board got into a real discussion over community green you know we're saying for an RCD subdivision conservation sub you need a 10,000 square foot community And this one doesn't have one. And correct me if I'm wrong, Greg, but when they first came through, they didn't have community green, but they didn't have a walking trail either. Right. Correct. There was no walking trail previous.

So then they came through and said, "Oh, all right. We we screwed that one up." So they put in a walking trail in Louis of Community Green. And I read the UDO as a walking trail. And actually we list it on there as an amenity. You want to do it great. It's not required. And um anyway, planning board didn't we all didn't agree on that. And so my concern and this was the example went back and looked at it. When we when we tighten up the UDO, we're expecting part of the reason we do that is to get the developer to be more creative as they lay out their their lots versus here's a road, here's a grid, here's I don't think they even thought about that. Their their lots and again there's only 12 lots, but their lots exceeded the 20,000 square foot required in my mind. If they planned that correctly, they actually could have gotten the lots a little bit smaller, still meet the 12,000, and they would have picked up um 6,000 square ft of land. So, they'd need another 4,000 to get the the green. And that's basically a 60 by 60 by 65. And in my mind we say is required to the greatest extent possible. That's the out because we try to help these guys and they jump all over those outs. So at a future meeting I'd like to bring up we revisit that thing because if our intent is it doesn't do us any good to tighten up these ordinances and then we have the outs. I mean, we need them because there there's gonna be those.

I'm assuming the house was is they wanted the walking trail in lie of the sure. Well, well, the the I think the the the biggest issue was that the common the open space was going to take a lot away. It's going to take one of the down to 11 lots. So,

but I think if they planned ahead of time, that might not be the case. You know, they were they were saying, well, we have to put it here. the land falls off 15 feet, we're going to have to take a bunch of trees out. So, this goes back to what I was saying where I think we need to have a meeting where they come in with their preliminary plat so that we can look at and not the sharet where we're out on site and all that, but a a real planning board meeting where they're come in with a preliminary plat where we can go through that and say, "Well, you know, we really we know it doesn't say you have to, but in this instance, you know, you really need to plan for it because and that gives that gives us time to look at the fact that they had larger lots. Although I think council wants larger lots. So bear that in mind as you're

Yeah. as you're taking, you know, and not only that, the size. Well, that's a good I mean, if you're can giving us good tit for tat, we're getting something out of it. I don't want to be so hellbent that we got to we can't get out of our box.

My concern is that you know, you're going from seven is the minimum. So if you have a seven, eight or nine lot subdivision, now you want to require an open space that's going to drop that down even more. So I mean at the small end, I think it's worded properly. It's as required, right? But maybe when you get into the bigger RCD developments, 25s, the 35s, maybe it should be required. So, you know, so we so we leave ourselves a little bit of out on those small subdivisions who are going to have a tough time paying that HOA bill, you know, when you got 12 houses.

And and that's why we leave the outs because when you write a UDO, it's got to cover every situation. And I'm fine with it. Maybe I'm Well, again, it's us to negotiate our terms on when it is going to be required and steadfast or when we're getting some kind of concession that Okay. Right. And I'll give you Weddingington Glenn as an example. I don't believe they have a a common area over there or an open what do you call it? An open community. They don't have 35 something homes. There's there's one at they don't have one. There's one at Enclave at Baxley. They have one. Yeah. It's one and 1.3 acres. Yeah, it's a pretty good size one. So, and they're having a lot of issues with it.

And that's not that but that's nothing to do with OD O UDO. I just maybe I feel like I'm trying to hold our developers to a higher standard in some ways the situation but the fact that this is one we've worked with in the past that I remember when they made their show and tell at the council they said well do you want us to meet the tree ordinance or the the buffer ordinance which to me that sends up a red flag it's not either or right and we struggled with them on a on a buffer on another subdivision so it was kind I don't want to say old school where it used to be they would tell the town what they were going to do.

Oh, no. He definitely came in with six pages when I was the first one here and said this is all the planning board needs to see. Yeah. So, I mean I just I just feel we know that that subdivision has a 100 foot buffer. I'm not taking up for the guy. I'm just saying there's a 100 foot buffer that we want landscaped in the front of that thing. Yeah. And you want a you want a an open space which takes a lot away. uh common green which is g have to be maintained. They're gonna have to maintain street lights. They're gonna have to maintain the the storm water. Right. Maintain the HOA 12 homes. Yeah. So, you know, you're talking about 2,000 a year as an HOA bill. Yeah.

I'm going to summarize that in a very politically correct way. I'm gonna say that rather than revisit a topic that y'all have already voted on and is a pending town council issue that that uh that code issue is a should could maybe we should revise as text amendment is a future that that be a trigger with a certain number of lots. So it may not be very fair for somebody with seven lots to build the neighborhood doing somebody with 40 lots. a lot more reasonable ask and there's a lot more resource available to take care of all that stuff. So,

well that said, I got one more question for I guess Greg council. How does it work now down to planning board? Is it just we keep operating the way we operate until we get a seat filled? Yes. Okay. So, that person basically has to be nominated by a councilman. So, until they do that, we have a but there's nothing stops us from doing what we do. So, how does it affect? Okay. Now you got the other two boards that that affects too, right? You got the adjustment board and the historical board. I mean that adjustment would be the important one. Yeah, but I they got we got people that Well, they had alternates alternates. Yeah, two. You and I are the alternates, I think, on that anyway. So, one of us would just rotate on her place. Okay.

As long as the the number required for a majority doesn't change, then you should still be able to conduct business as usual. But with one down, everybody attending is of the essence to make sure we No, we're missing I know. Yeah, that's what but I wouldn't want it to be I'd like to see if we could again I get it. We're all traveling doing things but as full as possible as much as we can. So, Mr. Chairman, are you looking for a motion? I would love a motion. I make a motion to adjourn. So, or second. In favor. In favor. Ajourn. Thank you guys. All right,

that wasn't bad. That was an hour and 40 minutes.