Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

pean Hey, feel you.

Heat. Heat. All right. I don't know how long is this good this

I like your priorities. Good evening and welcome to the March 10th, 2026 meeting of the Westminster City Planning Commission. Uh, will the secretary please call the role? Commissioner Conir, here. Commissioner Tomichek, here. Commissioner Dunn, excused. Chair Boscher, excused. Vice Chair Carpenter here. Commissioner Je Young here. Commissioner Peg here. Commissioner Calling excused. Commissioner Morris here.

So tonight's workshop is a little different than a typical planning commission meeting. Instead of considering land use cases and holding public hearings, tonight's meeting will be an informal workshop to receive a presentation and share ideas on the proposed unified development code or UDC. Uh and and I I guess we are ready for your presentation, Mr. Spurgeon.

Thank you, Chair Carpenter. Uh and uh Ronnie, maybe I should have reviewed the script tonight. Um but that's okay. Uh we actually uh are bringing to you um four different um presentations that we've kind of merged together. So, um the first part we're going to talk about our growth management system and how we manage our resources. Um some of this is content that we've done with uh council uh recently and we thought the planning commission may may appreciate uh receiving some of that same material. Uh then Jacob is going to talk about our planning and development process just as sort of a refresher and for Commissioner Morris, you know, sort of an introduction. Uh then John uh then we're going to take a break cuz um based on the number of slides we think people are going to need a break. Uh but we'll plan on a break uh then and then John is going to talk about um sort of bridging the academic sense into actually putting it into a specific project on the ground. And then the last part will be the unified development code as as you introduced. Um and uh with that, nothing nothing really new tonight that you all haven't seen before, but again, sort of a refresher and talk about where we go um from here. So, those are our four parts uh tonight. Uh and again, just for the the benefit of the commission, we wanted to share a few slides that we've we've been uh working with city council on um recently. Um so, uh why manage growth? Um, this may seem obvious to some of us, but you know, just as a reminder, uh, water is limited. Um, Westminster, we've planned for the water needed to build out our comprehensive plan. Um, we, uh, have taken into account, um, conservation measures, uh, weather and land use patterns. Uh, in that planning, um, about 88% of the water needed to

build out the comprehensive plan is already allocated. Um, and I would distinguish that from that is not 88% of our water portfolio. That's 88% of the water needed to build out our comprehensive plan. Um, so there's that. Uh, land is limited. We only have about 4% of our land area remaining for development, but if you look at the sites that already have development applications working or we've already approved development, um, it really only leaves about 2.3% um, after that. And about 40% of our land area in the comprehensive plan is is for parks, open space, golf courses, and those sort of uh green spaces. And then finally, I'd say that we uh try to balance growth. Um we try to balance the uh service demands of from growing too quickly and avoiding oversaturation with too many of of any one development type and and having more of a variety um there. Um so looking back on um the urbanization um of Westminster um up until 1950, Westminster was uh you know sort of a small town um out on the high plains. Um and and though it was near Denver, it was really not um experiencing a lot of growth until um after World War II. similar to suburban communities um all over the country really. Um after World War II, there were housing programs, there were highway programs and other things um that uh brought people to the suburbs. Um the city uh was was growing and and then with the 1952 opening of the Boulder Turnpike, it really opened up, you know, that whole northwest quadrant uh for growth. Um unfortunately Westminster actually started running out of water even back in those days. Uh they had to institute the first water restrictions.

Um and that was mainly because uh while there was water there wasn't enough water for good fire flow. And so uh to be assured that there would be adequate um uh water um fire pressure in those lines. They actually was a series of sirens that would go off citywide that basically you turn off your faucets to make sure water was in the system for fire response. Uh 1955 the city did a study for the first time stating that um growth should be based on available water. Oh, what a concept. Um those two actions really sort of introduced um into the city government the idea of correlating um growth and water supply and you know we've sort of continued that over the last 70 years. uh to give the city greater control over its destiny. The the voters did approve um the move to home rule authority in 1957 uh which gives the city more um latitude uh in the things it does um in a in a whole range of things whether it's land use, economic development, um criminal justice or or other matters. Uh so the city continued to grow after um becoming home rule. Um there was a drought in 1962 that was particularly um impactful to the city. Uh they call that the long hot summer. Um basically what happened was this the city needed to augment um its water sources with uh uh water from ditches uh in order to ensure there was enough quantity. um and the the poor quality water uh and apparently it was very stinky. Uh this led to what we call the mother's march on city hall. And this is an actual photo at the old Westminster city hall um of of the mothers and you know this nice little sign that says congratulations city planners you goofed the water yada yada yada. So um we've been unpopular with

the public for many many decades. Um but out of that um out of that you know came uh people came together to find a solution to this problem. Uh there was a citizens water committee. Um there were actually two votes uh of city residents on whether to join Denver water or not and the both of those failed. Um, and so with that, it it basically um forced Westminster to um sort of grow up and build up its utility uh into a modern enterprise. And just like going to home rule, controlling um our water resources gave us control over our destiny. Um the city's really biggest period of growth was in the 1970s. um 1970 to71 specifically um the town increased from 4 and a half square miles to 28 square miles um which is uh really um extending out close to our our current um boundaries. We're 34 square miles uh today. Um with that growth though again there were uh challenges uh to water um and our infrastructure. Um, and the city, like most places, had this sort of first come, first serve um, basis for water taps. Um, until it was realized that, um, there were plans in for about 28,000 dwelling units. Uh, but we had capacity to only serve 2,900. Uh, so that was that was a problem. that created the uh what became the 19 uh78 uh growth management program which was in place uh for many many years um in Westminster. It also created better coordination between um planning uh water resources and then working with city council to identify uh priority

types of projects uh for the city. The sort of pacing system that it used um again was around for many years. Um that is no longer in place. that was repealed uh several years ago. Um it it really out outlived its purpose. Um at that point um the cities had sort of four uh comprehensive plans in its uh modern era. Uh 1997 was was really the first modern comprehensive plan. Um it had a real focus on housing. There's a lot of dialogue in there about uh getting the right types of housing to go with the uh jobs that were being pursued with the city's economic development initiatives at that time. And then having um really highly amenitized neighborhoods uh the kind of neighborhoods that many people in the room probably live in with with trails and parks and and that kind of thing. uh the 2004 comprehensive plan. Um this one was you know sort of being worked on during the dotcom bust of of the first part of that decade. Um but it it really supported a maximum flexibility paradigm. It was u a lot of latitude um in the land uses and where things could be. Uh the 2013 plan sort of refocused growth and it introduced the concept uh that you all probably hear in these meetings. You talk about focus areas and these are the areas um where that are the focus of of housing and economic development initiatives and where the infrastructure is going to support those higher densities. And then with our current comprehensive plan um you know the added focus on neighborhoods uh that came with our current comprehensive plan. Uh the current comprehensive plan you know it sets policy direction um for the city's physical development. It it's a communication tool uh to uh residents, developers, uh city council, other partners. Um it adds on to the uh city's

vision statement, a strategic plan with with more of a long-term um outlook on things. Uh it focuses on enhancing vitality and it's uh linked with a lot of other uh city plans like our transportation plan, our water supply plan, uh sustainability plan, the parks plan and so forth. Uh it is a living document. It is meant to be revisited and um amended uh based on the city's changing needs um in the future. Uh the plan's organized around four main uh cornerstones. Uh I won't read these off but but these these sort of overarching ideas um permeate um the whole document. Uh the comprehensive plan was directly correlated with our water supply plan. Um in the past um comprehensive plans and water supply plan the city had used a system sort of of um averaging where example projects were used as a proxy to understand uh future water needs. Um in this last case we did a different methodology though. Um we actually um audited all 33,000 utility accounts um and those were linked in GIS so we could understand um different patterns of water use associated with land use um and there were thousands and thousands of model runs that literally ran for days um with the consultant's computer. Uh we there were four sort of scenarios that were examined through that sort of a a lower growth kind of scenario. One was a super high growth or actually two were super sort of super high growth and then one that was sort of a uh business as usual that just continued the trends that we've had in in Westminster into the future. But uh the

three main variables uh were weather um land use and conservation habits. Uh and as you can see uh the delta on these charts. Uh weather and conservation really are the the biggest drivers of future water demand. Having said that the big butt is land use is the one we can control as a city. Um we can't control the weather. We can influence conservation through things our utility does. Uh but ultimately land use is is is one that's actually in the city's authority which is tricky since that's the least impactful. Um keep going here. Um so this is just an example that again shows uh how the comprehensive plan is is directly related with the water supply plan. So there's an assumption um of the water demand for those different land uses in acre feet per acre and then you can see where they go um on the land use map with the associated color. I will now turn it over to Jacob to talk about our development process. Thank you Andrew. Um just a quick introduction. I'm Jacob Kaza, the principal planner for current development for the city. Um so I supervise um four planners who do development review as their main focus and then I also supervise our ODP inspector um who does construction inspection on for new projects and and a couple of other things as well. Um next slide. So the the city has kind of a a multi-layered um land use control. So the first one Andrew kind of briefed you guys on on is the comprehensive plan. And Westminster is pretty unique in that our comprehensive plan requires mandatory compliance through city code. Um so what the color you see on the map there is what the development should be built to. Um so when we receive a development application um we require them to follow

whatever the plan says or they have to come and seek a comprehensive plan amendment um which an a property owner does have the uh ability to ask the city council to change the comprehensive plan for their parcel. Um the the comp plan being mandatory is actually great for the way our system is set up. Um on the right there you'll see the zoning map. Um zoning maps, you'll usually see them as this, which is kind of a mix of color like how the comprehensive plan is. The one big difference for us is about 60% of our city is PUD planned unit development. Um that's kind of a form of negotiated zoning where you craft a special district that applies just for yourself. Use a doc here. We'll cover the documents, but and you create rules that just apply for your community or your development itself. Um, and the great thing about having the mandatory compliance comprehensive plan is it gives us as the negotiators for the city, the planners, um, we know what the expectation of the city and what the expectation of the community is. Um, most most of our community is actually pretty pretty good about this. They're familiar with the comprehensive plan. They know that that's the regulating document. Um, and so they are often very um, confused if they see something that they think doesn't meet that category. Um, unfortunately though, a lot of people are still very um, familiar with zoning being the controlling thing. And zoning for us controls what the existing land uses are, not what the future land uses should be. And that's really the key for the comprehensive plan. That regulates your future land uses. If you have an existing building on your site, you can still continue to use it for what it was built as. Um, um, so that's kind of the one ch change there. Next slide, please. So uh in our system for uh planned unit development um this is PDPs are specific for planned unit development. They don't apply to our straight zoned or uklidian zone districts. Um we use two different entitlement documents. The first entitlement document is the preliminary development plan. Um this is a very broad document. It's kind of like

creating your zoning category is the way I like to explain it to people. So you're going to have a list of permitted uses. You'll have just a general site plan. any perimeter or cons constraints that you might have and then it'll typically show some like natural features joining roadways and then access points. So in this example um it's very much just a simple bubble diagram shows the parcel shows how they can access it and then in other sheets on this one it'll say here's the 20 uses you're allowed to do on the site here's the setbacks you need to consider. Um so that's usually what we like to keep PDPs to or plum development plans to. Um next slide please. So, the second um entitlement document, and we use this across the city for straight districts or for um uh PUD districts, is the official development plan or ODP. Um we amend these quite frequently. If you'll notice, this one says 28th amended. Um it's not uncommon to see that. Um the intent here is that this is a living fluid document and and it's very much administrative approval. So um say they just need to rearrange a parking stall or or they want to make a small change. Almost all those changes come to us administratively. Um we kind of um kind of call these a sight specific plan. But one thing to keep in mind is that has a different connotation um when it comes to uh bested rights. So I tend to not use that all the time. But it's really the ODP is designed to look granular at the site at essentially like a six inch scale. Every six inches I need to know what surface cover you're going to use. is there um where's where are the shrubs going? What's the mulch? Um what is the building going to look like? Um the planting, the parking, everything goes into that document. Um these can be uh usually for a small pad site, they're 12 pages. Um for large development like Uplands, you guys have seen them over a 100 pages. Um I imagine when we get the Ericson in one, that one would probably be pretty large as well. Um next slide, please.

So overall for entitlement and construction milestones, so we al we start the uh development review process at the comprehensive plan. So if they're already compliant with the comprehensive plan, they can go ahead and move on to the next steps. And if they're not, they need to um come ask the planning commission, city council for an amendment to their application. Um next step is the PDP. Um and kind of just what that basic document is that typically is only approvable by city council. There is some ability to administratively amend it. And then the ODP um the ODP by design is actually in the purview of the planning commission to review and consider um specifically how the how the process was drafted so that way city council wouldn't see so many of them. Um and typically the reason why we're seeing them not go to city council is because they're asking for um they don't want to meet some sort of requirement and it's above your authority to approve that. Um but ODPs generally for amendments are typically all administrative approvals for amendments. And then after the development review process, there's three other steps that they follow. Um they need to get a land disturbance permit. That's kind of the civil construction drawings, a building permit for their buildings. And then finally, they'll get a certificate of occupancy at the end. Next slide, please. So generally in our our development review process, the first step is the pre-application review. This is uh in a meeting. We meet with the consultants. Um we bring all of our internal development review partners. So fire department, uh public works, wastewater, storm, sewer, um the traffic team, uh parks department. We bring everybody to that meeting and then we like to meet with their entire project team if they're available. So architects, engineers, property owner, everybody's welcome to attend and we discuss the project at a very high level. um kind of giving them the basic uh steps they need to take, what the approval process is, ensuring they know their zoning, the comp plan category, that they can access all the documents, and that we'll give them any feedback we

know on on things that we know of issues. And then it's also a time period where we'll also give them historical documents they might need like other studies, um subdivision plats, and such. Um then the applicant will go into drafting their their uh site plan documents, whatever they have, and then they'll submit that in step two. In step three, we do our technical reviews. Um, and that usually is uh I'd say a minimum of three rounds and sometimes it could be four or five. Um, and in worst case scenarios it goes way above that. Um, step four is public hearings if applicable. So, this could be just the planning commission or it could be city council and planning commission. It's going to depend specifically on what they're asking for as far as um to to change on the plans or what they're what they're seeking approval of. Um, typically just for just as an FYI, the staff have the administrative approval authority of 10% from what is approved. So, we can't approve anything more than a 10% deviation of a standard. And I think we're keeping that the same for the UDC, right?

Yeah. And we're really not changing that at all. Say it again. I'm sorry. Um, as far as the standards we can vary from for the UDC, we're keeping it at 10%, right? The threshold 20. Are we going to 20? Oh, we're being bold. Okay, there we go. Uh, and I'm actually gonna talk about that later, but uh, one reason we're going 20 is that the so many of the numerical amounts are smaller. Yes. So, something that maybe used to have a 100 foot setback, if staff could do 10%, that's 10 ft. But if a standard is now 5T, yeah. And we're left with six inches. Well, I was I was thinking like 30, but Okay. Okay. But yeah, so then the five foot thing has come up multiple times recently.

So um and then finally if if they have approval of their document, they'll go to a checkpoint review. And this is really just to make sure that the document is ready to be required at the county and it meets the formatting standards. Um and then we'll record the document. Um it's actually not required to record our uh zoning documents. Uh that's not a requirement of of law. It is just we do that because these are essentially a contract that runs with the land. PUB system is essentially a contract where the applicant is agreeing to make something or do something with the city and we agree to permit them to do that and so when they don't build that they're they're breaking our contract with us. Um which is not not great. Um next slide please. Um so really quick on administrative approvals um we predominantly process all of our applications as administrative approvals. Um so on the PDP um again the standard I think we are limited to might it's it's stricter on the PDP than it is on the ODP. Uh this is really limited to like um entrance locations um if we had some language about architecture design in there but we're not allowed to really change standards in the PDP in the ODP um since these are very much more specific to a site design. So often times it could be they want to change the the facade of a building or all of a sudden they want to change a a brick type that they can't buy that brick anymore so they need a new one. That can be a lot of our amendments. Um we have three different tiers of amendments and the vast majority of them are two smaller tiers um where there we don't require very very much documentation for that. Um then within our specific plans, we have two areas of the city that have specific plans uh downtown and the station area. Um we do also require official development plans there. Um they are entirely administratively approvable. That was by design because we wanted to make it really fast and easy to develop

in those locations. And the specific plans have very um clear regulation on what's expected and it gives us a limited authority on what we can vary from the plan which is good and bad in both circumstances because we don't get that same flexibility we get in PUB where we can make um better contextual tradeoffs. um landscape plan. Um we uh under the current landscape regulations, the 2004 landscape regulations, the city uh the planning manager has the full authority to vary from the landscape plan uh landscape regulations. Um he doesn't have to seek or the applicants don't have to seek approval of the plan commissioner, city council to do so. Um, we're pretty strict on that requirement though because that is still kind of an expectation of the city and the community and we've heard that loud and clear that people still expect high quality landscaping. Um, even if we're going to go to zero escaping. Um, and I say that very clearly, zero escaping, not zero scaping because we're in full support of going to zero escaping. And it's actually what the 2004 landscape regulations were drafted to do. Um, but people are misunderstanding that with this concept of zerocaping where they just rock everything. and that's um not not achieving any goals at all. Um subdivision plats, those are also entirely administratively approvable. Um conditional uses for some things like thrift stores under 5,000. You guys recently saw that thrift store that was over 5,000. Um administrative variances, uh we have a 10% deviation. Um sign plans and building permits are also administrative. Next slide, please. So, uh, the planning commission, um, right now you guys are a recommendation for original PDPs and PDP amendments, comprehensive plan amendments and specific plans. Um, the comprehensive plan itself, I should say. Um, as well as the amendments to the comp plan and specific plans and then, uh, resonings. Your approval authority is for original ODPs not requiring city council review. Um, there's a threshold category. So,

for residential projects, it's 10 acres. Anything over 10 acres has to come to the planning commission for an original ODP and anything over 20 acres that's commercial has to come to the planning commission. Um, as you may have heard Andrew say, we are at what 2% of the city not built out. So, we don't really do very many original ODPS anymore. They're pretty rare. Like I think you guys have seen probably two in the last six years um that you weren't that you were just approving authority on. So, it's kind of that's kind of where we'd start to look at this and see how can we um change things or make make things um work better. So, that's kind of where that's some of the lens we're taking to it. Um special use permits um you are the proving authority and then as well variances um which you are familiar with. So, next slide please. City council approves original PDPs um and then here's the criteria for the PDP amendment. So, new land uses, changing land area by more than 10%, density or intensity setbacks, or a significant change by the city manager. Um, the city manager also has some pretty broad authorities to decline to approve some things, and they c he can refer um a lot of applications to the planning commission and city council for um review. We tend not to do that very often, mostly because it's very clear there's a lot of reasons why they have to come seek approval. Anyway, um ask we're and you guys are pretty familiar with this as well. Most of our applicants are asking to deviate from a standard at least one or two um and some 30. So um they city council also approves the original comp plan, the specific plans as well as amendments. Um they're the sole approver of resonings, annexations, um appeals. We did see an appeal uh recently um when that first came to you and then went back to them. Um and then they will approve ODPS. Um this one may be changing soon, but so they're they're

for multifamily land uses. Um they are they're required to see those per a resolution they approved. Um the Uplands projects, there's a condition of approval that city council added that they have the city council must be the approving authority for for the ODPs for uplands, which is why they don't stop at your your review. Um and then projects that are requesting exceptions. Um so so that's um another one that we've spoken about quite at length tonight. Next slide please. So for uh review of staff application review for staff timelines um this really depends by the project and it can entirely depend upon um how how the discussions and negotiations go. Um the one thing we I try to tell every landowner is consultants are busy. There's only so many consultants out here and if you think your consultant is going to turn over an your application in a week, it's not happening. They're they're not going to get the comments back on Monday and turn it back by Friday, that just doesn't happen unless you paid them specifically to do that and they have nothing else going on. Um, which is not what we're experiencing here. What I what I'd say is every consultant is pretty is pretty busy right now across the front range. Um they're not um so just for like an administrative ODP um this would be for a pretty large one. Typically our our smaller projects, tier twos and tier 3es, we're getting those accomplished in a couple of weeks. U typically um for a larger one, it'll it could be a couple of months. Um small pad sites, uh four to five months is a pretty good timeline. Um, for something that comes to a public hearing, we tell our applicants to add four to six weeks for every public hearing because that's the that's the timeline that it takes us. Um, our agenda memos for city council are actually due um 30 days in advance of the meeting. So, we have uh kind of just an automatic. We have to factor that in for us. Um, and then council currently has a process called the concept plan review, and that also the

same thing where you take it to council, you notice it, and that can add a considerable amount of time on there. Um, the one we've been experiencing has been, uh, some of our concept plan reviews have been getting bumped off of the meeting agendas, and so they'll get pushed out many months. Um, this one where they're going to hear later this month, I think, um, it's been pushed out since before the election. um they were ready to go back in November and they wanted to wait till the new city council was seated. So that's four months now that they've been delayed. So that's that's um can be an added time frame as well. Um and then as far as technical review, it's really going to depend on the project and who's involved in the level of dis discussions and negotiations and the complexity as well. Um um it it it can it can depend on on on that a lot. Um uh next slide please. Um just kind of mapping out what we typically see as an as a response period. It's not common, but uh it it is it does occur that applicants will use up a full month in between resubmitts. So we kind of just mapped it out to explain what that can look like if you add the applicant response time in. Um we have a couple of projects where they would routinely go four or five months in between. um getting their comments back and then doing a resubmitt. Um it happens uh the pillar of fire barn that came up with theirs. Um you guys recently heard the valley view estates one that came up with theirs a lot. Uh so we have a 180day expiration period. So if you don't resubmit within 180 days, your application expires and you have to restart. Um so that's kind of the the goal there is is is if you're going to occupy our time, please be serious about it and and get something going. Um because I mean this a month is is I'd say around average or typical maybe it's a little faster than that but going

beyond a month is unfortunately pretty common. Next slide please. Um just as an example of a project uh just to explain here was the orchard estates project. So under 10 acres so it's a residential project. It could have been eligible for the PC approval. um infill location. They generally met the majority of the um uh single family detached design standards, but they did have seven different exceptions they were requesting. The way the design standards were written is that city staff cannot amend them or or vary from them at all. We any change requested to them has to go to the city council for consideration. So it it goes above even the planning commission for review. Um before we had the design standards, we had uh design guidelines and we were afforded the ability to vary from them um uh quite considerably and so that kept a lot of applications out of going to um the plant city council and switching to the design standards has has referred a lot of applications to them. Next slide please. And that's it for me. If you guys if you want to take a break, does anyone need a break? right now or you guys or do you want to keep going? Commissioner Peg,

is now a good time for questions? Yeah, this probably be a good time. Yeah, you can definitely ask a question. I just have one. Uh, you said that staff could approve a 20% deviation from uh uh the requirements, but on slide 18, it showed 10%. It's 10%. Your mic's not on. It's It's 10% currently with the UDC. We're proposing to go to 20. Gotcha. Okay, thank you. Uh, we do have uh we we put the break at the halfway point, but we could do John's uh piece and then revisit if if a break's desired at that time or just finish it.

Yep. Everyone seems like we're we can keep going. So, let's uh go to Mr. McConnell and let let him do the next piece.

Yeah. So, full of energy tonight. We underestimated you. Uh, I'm going to talk a little bit about how we incorporate the city's vision into new development. Um, Andrew will cover this uh shortly in in the next segment, but as you've probably recognized already, we are almost completely built out. Our future is infill and redevelopment. And those scenarios become pretty hard and difficult. A lot of the sites that are still vacant at this point in our history are vacant for a reason. They're difficult. They lack access to utilities, proper access. Uh the size, shape of the lot may be difficult to to develop on. And we'll touch on that a little bit more, but uh you know incorporating being very decisive about the city's vision through the comprehensive plan is really critical and updating that comprehensive plan periodically is also very critical to adjust to changing uh u development patterns in the city. So

yeah, I'll just

Oh, will you next slide please? So as noted earlier and Jacob said it very eloquently the the comprehensive plan is for future growth and development. It does recognize the existing development typologies as you can see from the comprehensive plan map on the left. Um much of the city is residential and that's in the yellow, orange and brown colors. And a large portion of the city is parks, golf courses, open spaces that help uh bring a a really high quality of life to the city and its residents and uh fewer areas are devoted to non-residential land uses and those are very important too and it's important that the comprehensive plan maintain the an appropriate balance and mixture of those things. uh we rely on retail sales tax uh for uh to pay for everything that the that the city um provides all the services and so maintaining uh proper employee or appropriate levels of employment land uses commercial activity and putting those things in the right places and in the right quantities to support our the residents is is really critical. but also getting a balanced mixture of residential land uses in the proper place. So the while the comprehensive plan is the road map or the vision um the zoning map and the zoning regulations are the vehicle that takes you there. And so um a zoning ordinance by nature is is an implementation tool for that vision. And as I mentioned earlier to you in our premeating um the the the zoning

uh sorry lost my place here let me come back to that let's go to the next slide. Right. So, one of the main tenants in our current comprehensive plan, and this is a carryover from the 2013 comprehensive plan um is is the concept of focus areas. And in the current comp plan, we've added uh a new term and that is transition areas. And so, the focus areas, just like in 2013, they're areas where we have the greatest potential for growth. And that may be for several reasons. is because we have some vacant land that's available to develop. We might have infill opportunities in existing developed areas and we also have these areas um uh positioned around transportation networks. And specifically when you look at the downtown uh which is in the um um uh dark red color there, the burgundy color or the church ranch focus area which is in the mustard color. Uh those have access to some of the best transit that RTD offers which is the flat iron flyer stations. And I know that's a relative term uh but um there it's it's a really really uh active corridor. And so uh focusing residential density around transit, focusing commercial activity um allows people to uh take advantage of the transit thereby lowering their cost of living. uh they potentially could choose to ride a bike like like uh Tim does here or um you know at least park their car and take transit for many of

their trips. So it's really important to focus on those focus areas and make sure we have the right mixture of of land uses there to to really help people thrive. Um, so among the focus areas I mentioned the downtown and the church ranch focus area, there's also the Westminster station which is down around 72nd and federal and that's another transitoriented development just like the downtown. Uh, but we also have focus areas up on the northern end end of town up near the orchard. And so, uh, that's the north I25 focus area that has a a different, um, a different concept in play there. A somewhat different concept. We're trying to focus a lot of our employment land uses there. Um, it's very, it has direct interstate access with exits to 136 and 144th on either end of that focus area. And so the city envisions a mixture of commercial uses that support the employment land uses as well as the residents around there. There is some um decent residential density in the Orchard Town Center which is north of 144th. Uh a really uh uh prominent tax generator there too with with that shopping center and that mixeduse center. um m much of the residents the residential land uses around there are pretty low density because that was the outer limits of suburbia when when a lot of that was developed. So again really the the vision there is is to concentrate a lot of employment land uses and it's somewhat different from the visions that we have in the other focus areas that are really focused around transit. One of those focus areas that I'll

highlight tonight is the Brook Hill focus area. And this focus area is located near the intersection of Wadssworth Parkway and north of 88th Avenue and south of West 92nd Avenue. It's shown here uh and this is a page taken from the comprehensive plan. Uh it's it's shown here with a brief description of what that focus area uh envisions uh with graphics showing um some key elements of what that that vision uh sees for the area. And again, this is the comprehensive plan. This is for future development. We recognize that much of Brook Hill, if not all of it's fully developed right now and but we do see it in we do see infill potential over time and redevelopment over time as the community changes. So if you notice on this graphic uh you see the major streets 88th 90th West 92nd Avenue Wsworth Parkway. you see um images that uh or icons that show where we see a primary gateway. And what that is is it recognizes that you're transitioning in this case from Arvvada on the south side of 88, the southeast side of 88th, and you're entering into Westminster. So, a lot of traffic moves through this area and a lot of pass through traffic comes in. We want to make sure that as things develop and redevelop that we have elements there that that say welcome to Westminster and you're you're you're moving from Arvvada to Westminster and there's some distinction there. You also have secondary gateways which is a smaller little sunshine emblem. And so that's envisioned on 88th Avenue uh near what would be possibly in the

future an extension of old Wads. And that's what that blue line is showing there that runs north and south. And so you'll notice that blue line extends northward north of 90th Avenue and twists and turns and connects to Old Wads above 92nd Avenue. And that's shown as another gateway. And so I'm going to show you a couple of other slides that illustrate uh how that plan is started to implement. Andrew.

Yeah, it's there we go. there. So, um, those of you that have been around Westminster for a long time probably remember the aerial on the left. Uh, that was taken in 2014. And you'll notice that there is uh there's a nice park there on the right hand side of the screen along Vance Street. And then there's a rather large big box footprint that's in the Brook Hill Shopping Center. and that and the Brookell shopping center, you know, just for references, the one with Hoffbrow in it. Hoffbrow's been there for a long time. You have Murdoch's Epic Mountain Gear. So, if you're familiar with those businesses, that's the shopping center. But that larger footprint uh used to be a u a business called Builder Square, and it was very similar to Home Depot or Lowe's. It was a it was a large uh um home improvement type store. Uh for various reasons that business left the building and that building sat vacant for I think over a decade. So it was vacant over 10 years ago when I moved to Westminster and started working with Westminster and it and it's got close to a century good. It felt like that to the community and so um it it caused a level of perceived blight there, you know, having a b a vacant building, a vacant parking lot for that long. Um people often complained about it. Uh when's the city going to do something about it? Of course, the private market really wasn't um you know pushing anything there at the time. So with the 2013 comprehensive plan and that Brook Hill focus area vision um we redesated this to a

mixeduse category that would allow with city council approval integration of residential land uses with the commercial land uses. And And Andrew, if you go back one slide, if you remember the blue line shown on this plan between West 90th and West 92nd, that's really envisioned to be an extension of old wads to connect West 92nd down to West 90th. And so right now it's just a shopping center parking lot, but the focus area vision says that should be a connector street, you know, provide more walkability and connectivity uh on that block as the shopping center might decline in the future and and redevelopment scenarios are more feasible. So you go back to the aerial to the aerial. Yeah. Thanks. Um so as if you can as you can see u that's really the main drive aisle right now going in front of the uh inline buildings but um if you look to the right and you see the current aerial photograph and the more recent development of the MAA apartments you'll see that that street is beginning to shape up. And so with the development of the MAA apartments, we were able to work with that developer to dedicate that street ride ofway. So that's not just a drive that's extending into the apartments from 90th Avenue. That's a public street. It's Wadssworth Boulevard. And so the public street ends at Hoffbrow right now, but in the future, if that owner decides to redevelop or infill develop, we'll work with them to extend that street. uh if it makes sense to you know the the owner and the city at the time and so but that this first development set the stage for

that that future development hit the so this is a closeup of uh of that same aerial and I wanted to point to some key elements uh Jacob did a good job of uh talking about how we negotiate land use regulations and there are a lot of regulations that apply from um engineering, storm water, transportation, uh traffic, you know, um all the way to planning stuff like design and architecture. So, in this case, the focus area envisioned a more urban form um and a higher density of residential land uses and a mixture of uses there. So again, this being the first step to the overall redevelopment of Brook Hill, uh this sets the stage for the future pattern going north when it's appropriate. Uh but as you can see, the buildings are are a little more uh structured in a in an urban form. There are there's the street that runs it way it winds its way through the middle of the development. There are connecting a lot of pedestrian connectivity, sidewalks like you would typically find along a street and so there's a high degree of walkability and connectivity. You'll notice that there is a dash line that runs from an existing uh RTD bus stop up on Wadssworth Boulevard down the existing sidewalk. And then there was a new connector that connect that connected the u the multi-use trail along Wadsworth Boulevard and it's kind of twisty like a snake there and it winds its way down uh to the east into the apartment complex. And so that connect, all the sidewalk connections within what kind of looks like just like an apartment complex on the outside really create this this kind

of robust pedestrian grid. Um, if you look to the right side or the east side of the development, you'll see a pair of shoes there. Uh, that's just an indication of where we worked with the developer to make a connection to West Glenn Park. If you remember the old uh Builder Square when it was there, um that was just a big box that backed up and isolated that piece of property from that park. And so it was important to help this developer realize that they have a really really nice neighborhood asset there. And there was some grade and some burming there, but we were able to help them realize a connection to that. Now all those residents have access to that park just by walking out of their their doors and down the sidewalk. Um some other unique features here, you see the raindrops. So with any more dense urban type development, uh you still have storm water regulations and the engineers in the room uh and others understand that there those regulations um they're really not bendable. You can't ignore them. you have to accommodate all the storm water that you create create from new impervious surfaces. So in this case, we help the developer explore rain gardens and and that's just a creative way to to f to to handle your storm water quality and some of your storm water quantity in a more compact way, in a more eco-friendly way. And so this is one of the first scenarios, may have been the first scenario we had in the city where we allowed something like that. And if you go out there today, you should see some signs that that talk about that that uniqueness there. And so that people when they walk by, they don't think it's just a hole in the ground with some plants growing into it or or or a trash pit that they can throw their their trash in. They see a sign there says,

"Hey, this is a rain garden. This is what a rain garden is and this is how it works. So it's it's uh educational in a way. So if you go to the next slide, um this is kind of what it looks like on the ground. Um uh I I'm guessing you all have been through here before, so you're probably really familiar with it. Again, that's that's Wadssworth Boulevard. Uh not just an apartment drive aisle. So uh Andrew, go to the next one. Can you go back two slides? One more. Yeah. So, as I've mentioned before, infill development and redevelopment scenarios are are really tricky. We worked with uh Mr. Bedrin, the property owner. Uh he he doesn't live in the state. He he lives in New Jersey, but he's very active and proactive um with the city, and he's very interested in developing and redeveloping. uh he was really excited about the comp plan in 2013 and we worked with him for several years not only with this MAA project but reimagining what those big parking lots could be and how we could extend the Wadssworth Boulevard there and and h and those businesses would all of a sudden have street frontage and parking right in front of their their doors. Um the challenge to this site is there's a lot of underground infrastructure. There is a storm sewer line and a sanitary sewer line that that run north south through the property and it's a public main and so it's deep underground. It's not easily moved. There's underground storm water detention on the north end of the site. So he had a really difficult time finding a developer that could deal with those challenges financially. And so as as hard as he tried, he could not make

that work. So for the time being, this is going to be a shopping center. Until such time those variables change, you know, when the economics are are more favorable to it, we may see some further redevelopment here. So all right, Andrew, take it away. All right, I'm going to turn it back over to Andrew and he's going to bring us on to the finish line unless you guys want to take a break. U looks like we can keep going, but I do want to uh give you appreciation for uh your graphics on there. The beer for the Hoffbrow, the burger for the good times, and the apple for the Applebees.

Symbols everybody can recognize, right? I did have one question about that. I know um it's really hard to zoom across that parking lot since it doesn't exist anymore. Um there's apartments in your way now, but has there been any push back from Applebees or others about the reduction in parking um or any of the other businesses there on that side of that development?

I'm not I'm not aware of anything on the Applebee's side. I know Hoffbrow uh they they have a high patronage there, so they they tend to fill up the parking lot, but that parking lot is so big. Um I'm not aware of any issues where they've lacked parking for all their patrons. I imagine I imagine uh there may have been a day when you could park a little closer to the entrance, but people were probably having to park further out in the parking lot, but I don't know that there's a capacity issue.

As a as a patron, I definitely was they definitely took out a role of the closer parking that was to the south and so now you got to park a little bit farther north or farther closer to Wadssworth. But yeah, there's plenty of parking in that lot. I've never seen it even close to full. Well, you just walk off that big meal that you had at Hawk Brow. Sure. But I don't think it's the meal that need to be walked off from.

I I'd say that that particular place is lucky in as much that the other tenants are not like big draws except at certain times of the year. I mean, Murdoch has got a pretty big draw to it every once in a while. ski hut the other way, but the hobby shop, the liquor store, the other things that are in there probably balance all that out. Yeah. Yeah. It's a it's a relatively healthy shopping center comparatively speaking. There's some uh good tenants that have been there for a long time. It's just that none of them none of the other ones seem to have a lot of draw at any particular time. It balances out.

Yeah. All right. Thank you, John. Um, so, uh, kind of continuing some of the things we already talked about, but, um, as as John introduced with his section, our our future, um, growth in the city really is, um, our focus areas and, uh, infill and redevelopment areas. Uh, only about 4% of our land is remaining, as we talked about. That's 2.3% when you net out um places that already have applications either under review or in some cases already approved. Um and that 2.3% it's it's about 493 acres about 190ish properties is is really all we're talking about uh now. So we we anticipate it most of the future growth will will be in infill and and redevelopment. infill meaning uh perhaps a a vacant piece of land but it's it's surrounded by otherwise developed properties uh and in many cases it may be encumbered for one reason or another uh based on the existing development around it and then redevelopment um if you think of like downtown Westminster where the mall used to be this is where um existing uses are are removed or altered and and a new use type of development takes takes place on something that was previously developed. This is important because our our codes and our standards were really from an era when Westminster was more of a green field community. It was it was a new suburb. There was a lot of land um some someplace like Castle Rock or Parker uh today where where there's just a lot of land and they're just growing outwards. Um our standards really have not made this same shift yet and so

that's what we're trying to do. uh with the unified development code. Um really we got a lot of policy direction from the new comprehensive plan but also strategies in the sustainability plan, the transportation mobility plan, the housing needs assessment, the redevelopment adaptive reuse toolkit. All those things made a lot of recommendations on our codes and our development standards uh that we need to update. Um so the UDC is going to include zoning and use regulations, site and building standards, um provisions to administer the code and its procedures or simply put it's the rule book for entitling land uh for development. Uh the scope of the UDC is is citywide um with generally applicable standards and procedures. It's it's not geographic specific. Uh we do have our downtown Westminster and Westminster station specific plans. Uh and these are sort of parallel codes uh with zoning and design standards specific to those places. Uh and those would remain in place and and be independent from the UDC. Um the UDC is not intended to be retroactive. It's it's something that uh staff would use proactively on future applications uh for development or redevelopment. Um staff is not proposing to reszone any existing property uh something other than what it is today. Uh but the comprehensive plan would remain controlling of course. Um, and finally, we do remind some audiences that the proposed unified development code or UDC, it will be a part of the missile code, but there's a lot of other parts of missile code that do other things for other purposes such as alcohol sales and animal management, short-term rentals, um, restrictions on cannabis sales, you know, all those kind of things are are addressed in other parts of municipal code.

Uh so we did come to the planning commission actually four times last year and we appreciate you indulging us uh in these uh workshops. Um they were very helpful uh to us. Hopefully they were helpful uh to you. Um we talked about zoning u the proposed zoning and districts and uses. Uh getting those to better align with the comprehensive plan. Um having more options for mixeduse development. um more ways to achieve housing diversity and then some use specific regulations. Uh we talked about our development standards uh the idea of having both standards and guidelines. Um the concept of differentiating urban and suburban uh development patterns so it's not oneizefits-all. Um and having the right provisions in place for infill redevelopment and adaptive reuse. Uh we talked about procedures at at the July uh workshop. uh with uh opportunities uh for greater uh flexibility built into the zoning as well as a range of site layout options and locationational adjustments. Um all that to say is trying to get out of the business of exceptions. We heard that uh from the commissioners that night who made comments. Uh that's that's something we're want to get away from. And then uh it was a few months, but then we came back to you with the uh first public draft. um and walked through what that looked like. Um and this is just an excerpt on that. Um we will be preparing a new draft um that's still under development at this time, but we will uh once it is ready uh we will put that back out. Um and and obviously we'll understand that this is not something you get on a Wednesday or Thursday and vote on the next week. You're going to need a little time. We we get that. Um we'll cross that road, that bridge when we get to it. Um these are slides that that we have shown the commission before but just you know to understand um the unified

development code it's sort of the instructions for development the comprehensive plan sustainability plan transportation plan these things are setting policy and then the unified development code is really that technical provisions on how do you actually uh achieve these things uh and I'll just show an example the sustainability plan has uh actually two strategies uh pertaining to solid waste management, making sure um that um solid waste collection is designed in a way that's efficient and that people actually use it and it's integrated uh with larger site plan concerns. Um so that's just a concept and then the unified development code would actually provide more numerical standards on where that gets placed, how big it needs to be, how you access it, how you screen it so it's not an isore, those kind of things. Um so just separating out this concept of of policies uh with technical provisions. The unified development code is uh unified in the sense that uh it's taking uh Westminster Municipal Code or updating Westminster Municipal Code and what are currently uh the seven separate um design standards or design guideline documents that all live independently and bringing them all uh into a one-stop shop. Uh and so that's why we say it's it's it's unified. Um the documents we work with now were mostly uh put in place in 1997. They have been updated a few times along the way um but not comprehensively uh since uh 1997. So uh it's it's time to do that update. Uh I'm going to stop and talk about zoning uh for a minute. Um, Jacob and and John also talked about um our zoning pattern in Westminster, but just to tie it back into what we're looking at with the unified development code. Um, most

of our zoning is planned unit development or PUD. Um, that's about 67% of the city, 2/3 of the pie chart. Uh, really it's it's write your own zoning. The regulations get tailored to a specific property or neighborhood. within each PUB there's provisions for allowed uses, a lot dimensions, building placement, um amenities, that kind of thing. Um staff has recommended to city council that we would leave the existing plan unit developments in place and we would use the unified development code again in the future for new development and and redevelopment. Um we have uh spoken with staff in uh other communities of the Front Range that tried to unwind their PUDS and reszone them to something else. It did not sound like the juice was worth the squeeze. It sounded like it caused a lot of frustration with residents and uh in the end, what are you really accomplishing? These areas, these neighborhoods are not going to, you know, not they're not going to be torn down or bulldozed. Um, so, uh, we didn't we didn't think that was worth it. Uh, and that's that's something we've presented to council, but we we would work, uh, you know, proactively with new development, um, or redevelopment. Uh, downtown and Westminster Station, as I mentioned earlier, have specific plan zoning. Um, and those are that's sort of a parallel code. And then we have our 01 open and agricultural district that covers about 20% of the city. So if you think about the planned unit development, the specific plan districts and the 01, uh that's 88% of the city's land area. Um so it really just leaves uh a very small uh 12% of the city's land area with with more conventional zoning uh that you might see in other cities such as residential or commercial or industrial. Uh and that's primarily in the southern uh most part of the

city. Uh I'm going to introduce just a few topics of interest. Uh and this is based on uh things we heard from city council when we presented uh this presentation to them uh last week actually. So one thing um besides our extensive use of QD uh one thing that makes uh Westminster unique is that we really try to think about the public realm uh when we're planning development. Um, and most communities, uh, zoning really looks at the private lot and then not beyond that. Um, what we've been doing and what we're going to do even more of with the unified development code is really taking some of the built form concepts and looking at the entire public realm and looking at the entire block and the composition of buildings within the block. uh the uh setback area, how that's used, if there is a setback, uh the sidewalk, the rideway, um that whole the whole experience of the public realm, and how people move around and experience a place. Um that will be done through menus in the unified development code of different building types, different street types, different civic space types, all those things uh put together. And I just want to show an example of what this looks like. Um, on the left is a a very large uh multif family building being built in Denver. It's 18 stories market rate. It has 4ft sidewalks. I actually called Denver and asked how was that possible? And Denver told me, you know, zoning, they just look at the private lot. They do not look once you leave the private lot. and then Department of Transportation Infrastructure Doy uh does what's in the rightway. So, contrast that to what we've been doing in downtown Westminster where we're trying to get um 8 10 even

12T sidewalks because we want people out. We do think about the experience. Um and so it's just a different way of of looking at things and that's one of the ways um Westminster is different. uh we've been challenged on how does it support housing and we were specifically given uh two uh books or manuals to review. One of them was the housing supply accelerator playbook uh and this was introduced uh actually last year at National League of Cities and then the Colorado Starter Home uh initiative. Having gone through both documents and looking at all their recommendations, the Unified Development Code is incorporating all of the recommendations in one way or another. And I won't go through all of them because it's a very long list. But um the procedures, the provisions for missing middle housing and accessory dwelling units, the administrative flexibility, um anticipating buildout and planning for it. Um the regional housing needs assessment that Dr. Cog conducted last year said Westminster is short 7,300 units. Our comprehensive plan accommodates almost 11,000 units, so we're above that. um relaxing standards on things such as parking setbacks, um non-conforming use procedures. Um one of the recommendations is not having a minimum unit size, which is not something that we have now or proposed to have. Um that was all from the housing supply accelerator playbook from the starter home initiative. Um things like incorporating anti- monotony standards, removing occupancy limits uh which has already been done by ordinance um conducting um pre-applications and completeness reviews to help applicants move forward administrative alternatives. Uh I feel good that we're

we're incorporating the the recommendations out of both of those um academic documents. Uh and again thinking about um our future development patterns and really there's going to be three important uh types of patterns. Adaptive reuse where an existing building is is uh reused and po potentially expanded uh even maybe popped the top with an additional story uh and reconsidered into something else. uh redevelopment um using literally the example John just presented where there was an existing use that was obsolete and the land was um repurposed into something else. And then infill where we have these small pieces of land um all over town um that are surrounded by builtout areas and then getting the right projects uh into those um for adaptive reuse, redevelopment and infill uh which in the UDC each have a very specific definition. There is uh greater uh flexibility in terms of how we apply the standards. it' be sort of a sliding scale um way of of treating them that would provide potential reductions and setbacks, lot dimensions, um outdoor space, landscaping and and parking. Uh and then very specific pro provisions. If you have uh small lots, there's additional relief understanding that when you have a very small lot, there's only so much you can really do uh within the confines um of that property. Uh this is just a example showing some of the standards that are being revisited uh with the unified development code. Um the one on the upper left is looking at um the setbacks from an arterial street something like 92nd or Sheridan um outside. And then again this concept of of having different uh standards for urban and

suburban uh contexts. And then on the right side looking at updating our parking requirements um bringing those down um to a degree um but with some specific exceptions. Um on top of changing the ratios providing more opportunities for alternatives um whether that's through shared parking uh transation transportation demand uh management uh proximity to transit facilities would qualify for reductions um adding additional bicycle parking um and then um lower parking requirements for senior and special needs housing um as well. Um, how does the UDC impact me? We get asked that question a lot. Um, for most households and businesses, the UDC probably will not change their life all that much. Um, the ex if we uh stay with staff recommendation not to undo the existing plan unit developments and specific plans. Again, that's about 68% of our city's land area. Um when a property is proposed for a major redevelopment with new buildings or changes in uses, that's that's when the unified development code would come into play. Um be mindful that the comprehensive plan remains controlling um the land uses, densities, the development formats in the comprehensive plan that that remains controlling. Um but implementing the comprehensive plan through the UDC will allow greater um introduction of of the concepts from the comprehensive plan and sustainability plan and the other plans that I talked about. Um things like housing diversity and sustainability concepts um mixeduse development patterns um all those things that we've talked about in this presentation tonight. Our next steps would be to continue to develop an updated draft and then put that out um for review by the public, review by the

planning commission, further review by staff. Um and then uh we want to do some staffing analysis to make sure we have uh the right people and the right skills to implement the EDC. Uh legal review, super important. Um and then um when it's ready, come back to the planning commission where you would make a recommendation to the city council and then to city council um for action hopefully um in the coming months. And that concludes the presentation. 50 slides. Thank you. That that was very comprehensive. Uh uh Commissioner Beck,

uh I have two questions. Is now a good time? Great. Um my first one is uh you said we were short uh 7,300 units. Um is there any estimate from Dr. Cog about how that is changing in time?

I don't believe they addressed it that way. Um what I do know is that they had done an earlier study that showed us at over 8,000 and it actually decreased to 7300. So I kind of felt oh we're kind of tracking in the right direction. That's how okay that that's that's a change across studies. But like is there an estimated it's a housing needs assessment. So I guess my question is how is the estimated housing need changing in time? Have they is there is that part of the housing needs assessment? I don't know that they looked at it that way, but I'm probably not the best person to speak to that.

Okay. And I guess my next question is uh you said we have we have uh uh room in the comp plan for 11,000 more homes. Uh 10,900 and something. Yeah. Um let's round. Um um so I guess my question is how quickly do you estimate that those additional 7,300 homes will develop? Uh it'll be as the market brings them forward. But do you have a rough idea of that? I I do not because I have been extremely disappointed. We've had a TOD zoned for our highest density in the city for almost 10 years and not had a single multif family development come forward there.

And then my next question is I saw that staff could approve I think it was 20 to 50% reductions on parking. Mhm.

Um is that are is that the range that we are contemplating putting in the UDC or is that is that is that range inspired by other rules or uh uh where some development what I'm trying to ask really is uh where some de development falls in that uh 10 to 50% administrative reduction. Um is that is that set up by other rules? What's going on there? Uh, good question. Um, so the way the the way it's drafted right now is that there's sort of your standard parking requirements, the stuff that's in the upper rows of the table. Um, and then there's a series of different options to reduce parking. And it's it's going to be based on the the use, the location, and and frankly the applicant's choice. uh if they choose to incorporate the transportation demand management provisions, it's 25% reduction. Um if it's the transit proximity reduction, that's uh 10% or 20% based on the um level of transit service if it's rail versus bus and so forth. um 10% uh if you're doing 10% parking reduction for cars if you're doing the additional bike um bike parking um 50% reduction for uh senior and special needs test housing. So there's different percentage decreases depending on which option.

Okay. So okay the options are as little as 10% or as much as 50. And I guess my question is we have this whole complicated set of rules, but if we had no requirement here, what do you anticipate would actually happen? We'd probably have a lot of parking. We'd probably have a lot of parking. So why have the rule? We we can discuss that further with city council. Okay. Thank you. That's all. Great. Uh anyone else have any comments or questions? like one or two. Give us your toman check. Yep. Um the 2.3% of buildable land that isn't built out yet,

how do we does that include um land parcels that we know are just not buildable? No. No. This is uh we always say it's vacant, developable land. Okay. So, it doesn't include flood planes, steep slopes, um stuff that's encumbered by a giant city easement or things like that. Yeah.

Okay. Um there's still a a I say a fair amount. I don't know the exact square miles or acreage. Um that's unincorporated Adams and unincorporated Jeffco. Do our water use assessments include those homes and the um zoning and development plans for those individual counties as opposed to using the rules we have in house?

Yes and no. Um yes, because uh for the most part we are the water provider uh for the enclaves uh in Adams and Jefferson County. Um Shaw Heights, Cherylwood. Mhm. those whole areas. So, so we're already the water provider if we're the water provider for um Water World even. Um so, we have a pretty good handle on on the accounts and and they were included in that audit.

Okay. That was really my question. And it secondarily to that, are their development rules similar enough to ours that they won't suddenly knock down a bunch of businesses and put up a crap ton of apartment complexes and outrun what we're estimating for them? Do do we have enough influence over that to make sure they don't dent our capabilities here? Sure. Uh so ultimately uh they do fall under our utility service regulations even when they're outside the city that their missiles our utility service regulations would apply.

Um our tap fees apply um and th those are not insignificant. Um and there's actually a higher rate for out of city. Um, but I I do believe uh that we looked or I say we the staff, not Andrew personally, but the staff did look at uh the development patterns. Um, knowing that uh federal height we're also provide the water in Federal Heights. Uh, knowing that Federal Heights and a lot of these areas are more or less also built out. Um, I I I think we feel pretty confident at this point.

Okay. And how much they they and they are they do have contracted amounts so they can't go over their contracted amount unless you know we revisit the contract. Do we have agreements with those two counties or any of the other jurisdictions that might have uh land within the boundaries of of Westminster um to try to abide by the UDC or do they basically develop on their own using the the county standards or fed heights or wherever that might be? uh in the unincorporated counties. So not federal heights or other but in the unor our typical process is when when a completely undeveloped piece of land chooses to develop and it needs access to the utility system, we actually force annexation.

Okay. So you're attempting to influence the counties as much as you can. Yeah, it's it I the it would actually my understanding and particularly with the Jefferson County staff, it is it's actually their preference that the city would annex these properties. It's it's it's assumed that as urbanization occurs from, you know, these remnants of agricultural properties, it's assumed that once something goes from agricultural to more of a urban level of of development that it becomes part of the city. Okay. Thanks,

Commissioner Conir. I just want to make sure we understand that Westminster does have control over water use in those areas simply by the fact that we've contracted for a fixed amount of water. You do whatever you want in your land area, Federal Heights or whatever. This is all the water you're going to get from us. Is that is that fair? That that sounds I'm a little bit outside of my lane. That that sounds like my understanding. Yeah. All right. Um, oh, Jacob's gonna add something.

Good. So, the one difference is like Federal Heist, they are a wholesale purchaser of water from unless they buy an allocation. If you're in unincorporated Adams County or Jefferson County, you're you have a single tap for your own triides and we they buy that tap from us and then they buy water like just like you do one gallon at a time through the meter. And so when we institute drought restrictions this summer, which I guarantee is happening, um they get the same drop restrictions as well. And then because they only have purchased a single tap for a single home, they can't take that same tap and turn it into an apartment building. Um they'd have to come purchase a new tap from us at the city, in which case we may choose not to do that. We have we have in many instances chosen not to provide tap to properties in the county. Um in some instances, we've not required um annexation. project.

Thank you, Jacob. Thanks. Um going to pile on this uh subject just a second now. Isn't some of the land at the southern end of the city like along lol still in Crest View Water District. So it's not really in control of the city. It it's a mun code requirement that new water comes from the city. So as those properties sell and change use, we bring them into the city's Okay. So, unincorporated Adams County, if they're currently in Crestview and Crestfield will sell them a tap, they can do whatever they want basically uh on our on our transitional boundary. Yeah. Outside the city limits, that's certainly possible.

Yeah. Okay. Just wanted to be clear there. Um yeah, I let me get back to my notes here. I had a couple of items that I wanted to discuss. Uh the the one thing with the with the built form in the public realm and the uh reduction of setbacks, one thing we need to consider is uh potential future rightaway considerations. uh which that's one thing good a setback can be good for is to make sure that that if Sheridan or 92nd needs to be expanded that we're not building right up to the edge of the sidewalk and choking uh putting a a permanent chokeold on a road. Um also the taller buildings that close to the road, you're going to end up with shadows. And even though this year is not indicative of normal, we do get snow here and it and we don't and and we don't use a ton of salt to melt it. So we're going to have that runoff that'll freeze overnight and cause black ice. So that those th and and maybe stay in the shade all day. So that's those are those I think should be considerations at least,

you know, and maybe we're stepping back the upper stories to allow more sunlight or something like that. Those are, I think, considerations we should be looking at there. Um, yeah, as as far as parking reductions, I think there's I think we should look into opportunities for parking sharing, parking reductions. However, uh, every time we have any plan come before us, number one, one of the number one complaints of the public is parking. Um and and we just if you drive through our residential neighborhoods already, you already see that the there were six cars in the driveway and five cars on the street in front of the of some of these houses. So, it's we we need to make sure that that we're that we're taking that into account. And well, and I'm all for, you know, I the creative ideas like using on street parking as some of the required parking, but I think we need to be we need to be aware and you know, at the same time, you know, maybe maybe we can talk to the developers during the process uh and say, you know, maybe we don't need 700 spaces here for your for the Walmart or for Brook Hill, I think, was a good example. That's a very underused parking lot right now. Um uh and then yeah, I guess my only other comment was uh kind of back to Mr. Kaza's presentation about the development timelines and stuff and and I I love your your 10-month development timeline that it does not live in it does not seem like it lives in in any reality in which I've spent my professional life. Uh and you know I think your 15-month timeline is a

lot better. But the one one there's the one bad side of our PUD zoning is that we are negotiating a lot. We're negotiating currently. We're negotiating the exceptions. Hopefully with the UDC we're going to have fewer exceptions to have to deal with, but we're but that negotiation of of standards and how it looks. There's a lot of back and forth and it could it's not just the consultants. could be the developer and I've personally seen as an engineer, you know, one sentence comment that looks minor that redesigns an entire site. So that which adds at least four to six weeks of time to get get everything back to there. So there. So that's we just have I know I know it's a difficult thing to do, but I think I think we just need to make sure that we're working with the consultants and the owners and making sure that we're we're all working there because I've been on this planning commission for 15 years. I have seen I think the most I ever saw for revisions was about four years, but you know two to three calendar years is not out of the question for some of these bigger projects. And I think we, you know, I the royal we, not pointing fingers at anyone at this room, but uh I think we all could do better at uh moving these projects forward and hopefully this UDC is going to be a pathway to that. And that's all I have. Uh does anyone else have a comment? Uh M Commissioner Peg,

I do now have more parking questions. as uh car uh uh chair carpenter mentioned um some people do own a lot of cars and I'm curious if uh uh has anybody looked at um how does the availability of free parking affect household car ownership? That's not something I have a budget to do. No.

Okay, good question though. Any other questions? All right. So, I'm I'm not sure if I heard, but uh I I know you you've got some internal review and some rewriting and then you're going to be bringing it back for public comment. Do you kind of an estimated timeline for for when we're going to see the next draft and uh potentially and then from there when we you think we might be actually voting on this?

Uh we we're hoping to have the next draft this month. Uh, in fact, I had hoped to have it in hand by now, but it's not ready yet. Um, still going through some unresolved issues there. But probably later this month and then, you know, it's we'd leave that open for a month or so and then do like a final draft after that. So, I would guess uh at this point probably May or June at the soonest. Okay, perfect. All right, one more bite at the apple. All right, right. Thank you very much everybody for your presentation. I really appreciate the update and it's very interesting information.

Right. Yeah, we'll be back and we'll have more to talk about. Sounds good. Uh, anyone have anything else for the good of the order? If not, our next meeting is April 14th and we will we will see you then. And this meeting is adjourned at 8:00 p.m. Have a good night. Heat. Heat. N.

down. Heat.