Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Welcome to the June 9th, 2026 meeting of the City of Westminster Planning Commission. Anyone who wants to speak on the item before us this evening who has not already signed up, please do so on the table in the back of the room. Will the Secretary please call out the roll?

Commissioner Kinnear?

Here.

Commissioner Tomachek?

Here.

Commissioner Dunn?

Here.

Vice Chair Carpenter?

Here.

Commissioner Young?

Here.

Commissioner Pegg.

Excused.

Chair Bosher.

Excused.

Commissioner calling. Here. Commissioner Morris. Here.

Great, thank you. And both alternates will be voting tonight. All right, the next item on the agenda is consideration of the minutes of the preceding meeting. Would I have a motion and a second for that, please? Commissioner Dunn? Great. Thank you. Second. Thank you, Commissioner Zhang. Sorry, I forgot your name for a second there, even though your name tag is on. Anyhow, we'll have a roll call vote. Madam Secretary, please call the roll.

Commissioner Kinnear?

Yes.

Commissioner Tomachek?

Abstain.

Commissioner Dunn?

Yes.

Commissioner Carpenter?

Yes.

Commissioner Young?

Yes.

Commissioner Colling? Abstain. And Commissioner Morris? Yes.

Great. The motion passes on a 5-0 vote. Okay, we have one item on the agenda tonight, item 3A, public hearing and a recommendation of a proposed comprehensive plan amendment and preliminary development plan amendment for Northridge at Park Center, lot 13B-1, the Northridge Senior Living. I hereby open the public hearing for Item 3A, Public Hearing and Recommendation of a Proposed Comprehensive Plan Amendment and Preliminary Development Plan Amendment for Northridge at Park Center, Lot 13B-1, Northridge Senior Living. Mr. Harlow, will you please begin your presentation?

Yes. Good evening, Commissioners. My name is Trevor Harlow, the City's Planning Division, here tonight to give the presentation for the Northridge at Park Center Senior Living Project. As part of bringing this project before you all, a staff agenda memo has been created and tonight's public hearing has been properly noticed. The agenda memo, its attachments, tonight's PowerPoint presentation, and the public notices has sent with the mailed notices and the posted signed notices are hereby entered into the public record. The notices of the public hearing were mailed to over 400 property owners, tenants, and HOAs within 1,000 feet of the parcel under consideration tonight, and two public notification signs were posted on the subject property in both English and Spanish. The city has also posted the hearing date and time on its website. Right. The subject property is approximately 6.84 acres and is located at 1259 Park Center, specifically on the southwest corner of West 122nd Avenue and Park Center Drive has identified on the vicinity map on the screen. On the left side of this slide, you will see the current comprehensive plan land use designation, which is employment flex. The adjacent image on the right shows the proposed comprehensive plan land use designation, which is being requested for amendment tonight to go to suburban multifamily. I also wanted to point out, as you can see on that right image, there is an existing suburban multifamily designation development located to the southwest of this property, so right, down here. Just wanted to point out the existence of this land use present in the area. All right, section 11.521 of the Westminster Municipal Code contains 10 criteria that are to be considered when reviewing land use plan amendments. These cover compliance with city regulations and policies, analysis of planning and impacts on surrounding communities, site constraints and impacts on existing infrastructure as well as other criteria. Staff has found that there is need for senior housing and a corresponding lack of need for additional office space throughout the city and region. And given that, this proposed amendment is expected to have a generally minor impact on surrounding uses and is considered harmonious with the area. So staff finds that all 10 of those standards of approval for land use plan amendments have been met. And further noting with what was just said, the proposal does support goal H and four of the comprehensive plan, which you can see on the screen before you. And this, you know, by ensuring housing options for seniors are supported and developed. So not only does it meet the criteria and meets the comprehensive plan goals and furthers a need within the community. Moving on to the PDP criteria, Section 11514 of the Westminster Municipal Code contains 10 criteria that are to be considered when reviewing preliminary development plan or PDP amendments. These include compliance with the comprehensive plan, sound planning, compatibility with the surrounding context, circulation and access, and performance standards related to site design and architecture. Staff received this PDP amendment from the applicant to allow for the development of a 122-unit senior living community. The proposed amendment would also change the allowed uses from employment flex uses to suburban multifamily uses, as covered in the comprehensive plan analysis that would allow for this proposed development. Staff finds that the proposed amendment generally meets the criteria considerations for amendments to PDPs, as noted in the staff agenda memo. I also wanted to mention as part of our typical process, a neighborhood meeting was held for this project that was held at the Bradburn Village Clubhouse on February 11th, 2026. At that meeting, we did have two residents in attendance. They were generally supportive of the project and did not really voice any concerns or feedback that would require or request changes to this proposal that I could bring before you tonight. And with that, no other feedback was received before, during, or after the neighborhood meeting as part of the outreach for the neighborhood meeting. And with that, staff recommends that the Planning Commission hold a public hearing and recommend that City Council approve the Comprehensive Plan Amendment and the Preliminary Development Plan Amendment. And lastly, staff finds that a recommendation of approval of the application would support the city's strategic plan priority of opportunity to thrive through creating a new housing development that specifically caters to a demographic in need of stable housing while fostering a connected and prosperous development. Thank you all for your attention tonight. I'm happy to answer any questions and additionally the applicant is with us tonight and has a presentation to share with you all so I will pass it to them unless there's any questions first.

Seeing none, let's begin the applicant presentation please.

Well, good evening, distinguished members of this Planning Commission. We want to start by expressing our appreciation to staff, in particular to Trevor, but also his counterpart, Jacob. We've really enjoyed working with Andrew Spurgeon and certainly Mr. McConnell. Thank you. It's been a journey. We started about 20 months ago with you all, and we are very excited to present a much needed senior housing project. We recognize we're at the PDP level and we also are very excited about moving forward into the next stage, the ODP process. I'd like to introduce myself and if you don't mind maybe advancing the slide, Trevor. My name is Doug Spuehler and I'm an architect with Beck. Also pleased to mention that I'm a 14 year former resident of Westminster. I'm really pleased to be representing two long time Westminster residents who not only live here in Westminster but also own businesses and work here in Westminster. I'd also like to introduce a couple of my counterparts, Bill Maher with NARS and also Savannah Benedict Welch with NARS will be presenting with me.

Great, thank you, Doug. Good evening, commissioners. My name is Savannah, as Doug mentioned, and we can talk a little bit about the timeline. Doug's already mentioned that we've been working with staff for a couple of years now, but we just wanted to provide a quick kind of snapshot of the process with this timeline. There's been a number of meetings with staff throughout this process and we're excited to be here this evening. As you know, following these hearings, we will pursue the site-specific ODP following the council approval, and that ODP process will also require hearings as well. So we will certainly be back to see you guys when we get to that stage as well. Next slide. And Trevor did a great job of outlining the location of this site at 122nd and Park Center. But we did wanna highlight the kind of surrounding uses. As mentioned, there are kind of a mix of commercial and residential uses to the south, as well as open space to the west and north and single family development to the north as well. So we wanted to talk a little bit about the project background. As you know, the site is just under seven acres in size, and we are proposing a senior housing development with some wonderful landscaping and amenities for the development and for the residents to enjoy. And so that will create a very energetic environment. So that's really the goal of this community. And we also wanted to highlight here that As Trevor mentioned, there is a need for senior housing in this area. So as a strategic plan talks about and as a comprehensive plan talks about, this will create more opportunities for the senior community and really will create a great vibrant community for residents. So we wanted to talk a little bit about the comprehensive plan designation and what the suburban multifamily designation allows. I won't go point by point here, but we did wanna just highlight the fact that the suburban multifamily designation really is intended for kind of transitional uses and this is, really a transitional site. So there's higher intensity commercial and multifamily to the south and then lower intensity uses to the north and the senior housing will really provide that great transition between those two densities. So it really creates kind of the right environment for it. This site is really lends itself well for residential with the open space surrounding and is really more on the fringe of the park center development and really just lends itself better for residential. And then as it relates to the PUD zoning, as we discussed, and as Trevor discussed in his presentation, this is approved for the preliminary development plan. And really the intent of that is to provide for an innovative design framework that includes standards for setbacks and site design, landscaping and architecture. So as you can see in the packet, there's some information in there about those site design and architectural standards as well as landscaping. And those standards will need to be followed throughout the official development plan. So we will certainly utilize this plan throughout the official development plan process to ensure that we meet those standards. So we will continue talking about the site plan next and I'll let Doug discuss that, thank you.

Thank you, Savannah. Excited to present an extremely conceptual version of our site plan. One of the big ideas that we were striving for was to design the project with the open space in mind, to open the project up to the west and really embrace the open space. What you'll see here is that we've thoughtfully and carefully located three three story massings, stepping down the hillside, intentionally trying to preserve view shed, notably also making key trail connections, particularly to the west. And then lastly, as Savannah and Trevor had mentioned in his portion of the proposal, the intent here is an amenity rich, highly landscaped and again, well balanced site We believe that, again, this is a terrific transitional density to the adjacent context and to the open space, both to the north and to the west. Emphasize that it is extremely conceptual in nature. This next image begins to provide what we believe are an array of precedent imagery. The precedent imagery we think helps craft a vision for the project, notably things like in the upper left, covered entry. Down in the middle, a varied array of outdoor spaces, some more contemplative, some more active. We're anticipating shade structures. We're also I was really excited to hear in the study session that we did with City Council back in January of 25, there was some discussion about a community garden. And we've really embraced that as a concept. You'll see that we're running towards that with some of the imagery there on the lower left. And then lastly, emphasizing again, an amenity rich, high quality environment. Trevor, if we go to our last slide, we want to, again, be succinct this evening. We're excited to take any of your questions, but want to reinforce staff support. We also want to reinforce that we are requesting no exemptions. And that lastly, we believe that this application meets all of the city of Westminster's criteria and will deliver not only a successful project that meets the city goals, but also the much needed senior housing in our community. Thank you again to this commission. Thank you again to staff. And we are eager to take any questions you may have. Thank you again.

Great, thank you. Any questions for the applicant and or staff? Well, I have a couple of questions. And it's mostly related to the approval criteria. About a month ago at our Planning Commission meeting, we had a comprehensive land use plan amendment recommended by the city to deny. And one of the items was item four of the proposed amendment is necessary in order to address substantially changed conditions in the immediate area of the subject track since adoption of the land use plan or an error contained in that document. Yes, both and both that one which we recommended denial and this one have not had any changes in the immediate area and the designation is not the result of an error in the document. So, can you kind of walk us through that thought process, please?

Yeah, absolutely. And thank you very much for that question, because that is something we did have pretty substantial conversation around. I think that's a very fair point to make on it. Really, the way we were approaching it is while there may not be an immediate change in conditions in the surrounding area. the kind of change and how employment flex land use is being needed and being utilized throughout our community is a changing condition. And given that that's kind of that area has quite a bit of that employment flex office land, we're seeing that as a change, an overall change in condition for both that area and for our community. And this kind of offers that opportunity to address it.

Okay, thank you for that. I appreciate that explanation. The other question I have is based on an email comment received in our original packet discussing traffic. There were some concerns about the traffic at Zuni and 122nd and at Park Center there where they all come together. And so during the ODP process, is there public improvements going to be planned for this area or is there something the city is looking at as far as some of these traffic concerns the resident had?

Yeah, absolutely. So both at this stage and at the ODP stage, we'll look at traffic considerations and things of that nature. I can say for any of these changes, engineering does review it and we had our traffic engineer review it and their analysis for it was that this change in land use would not offer a negative impact, specifically stating will not negatively affect the transportation system changing from these land uses. So that was the determination at this stage at least.

Okay, great. Thank you. Seeing no other questions from commissioners, I would like to hereby open the public testimony for item 3A. Madam Secretary, have we received any emails or voicemails?

We did not receive any emails or voicemails.

Great. Thank you. All right. Has anyone signed up to speak?

I don't have anyone signed up to speak, but I don't know if anybody in the audience.

Yeah. If anyone in the audience wants to speak? Yeah. All right. Then I hereby close the public testimony portion of the meeting. And then if there's any Commission discussion or I will also entertain motion. Commissioner Colling.

Before I make a motion, I wanted to just comment that I support this land use change. It's a perfect piece of property for a senior housing because of the mountain views. So I'm hoping that your architecture will maximize westerly views. I mean, it's perfect for that. I mean, I'd hate to waste that on office flex. So it's great. And plus, it's on open space. It's ideal. So hopefully, that one building looked like it was kind of oriented more north-south than east-west. Hopefully, you can turn that a little bit and get more mountain views.

So I think it's a great piece of property for that and I wish you the best of luck with that.

Oh, and then Mr. Doug Spieler, you said you were a former Westminster resident, what happened?

We ran out of room when we had our second daughter and unfortunately moved to Broomfield But my mom and brother and there are three cousins still reside in Westminster. We miss our legacy address We lived in legacy Ridge.

It's a great community. Yeah. Thanks.

Just I don't mean to give you a hard time Great any Anyone else or would you like somebody like to make a motion? I

a motion. I move that the Planning Commission recommend that the City Council approve the Comprehensive Plan Amendment for Northridge at Park Center, Lot 13B-1, to change the land use designation from employment flex to suburban multifamily. This recommendation is based on the findings that the Comprehensive Plan Amendment complies with the criteria in Section 11-5-21 of the Westminster Municipal Code. Are these separate motions, separate things we vote on?

They're both recommendations, but they are written as separate motions.

I'm sorry, that was a question for Mr. Graham. Separate?

Yes, separate motions, one for each question. Thank you.

Great. Thank you, Mr. Colling. Commissioner Dunn? I would like to second Commissioner Calling's motion. Great. Thank you. Any discussion? Seeing there's no further discussion, I'll ask the Secretary for a roll call vote, please.

Commissioner Kinnear?

Yes.

Commissioner Tomachek?

Yes.

Commissioner Dunn?

Yes.

Vice Chair Carpenter?

Yes.

Commissioner Young?

Yes.

Commissioner Cawley? Yes. And Commissioner Morris? Yes.

Thank you. The motion passes on a 7-0 vote. All right. And now for the second item. Do we have a motion?

Commissioner Kinnear. Sure, I move that the Planning Commission recommend the City Council approve the Preliminary Development Plan Amendment for Northridge Park Center, Lot 13B-1. This recommendation is based on the finding that the Preliminary Development Plan Amendment complies with the criteria in Section 11-5-14 of the Westminster Municipal Code.

Commissioner Tomachek? I'll second that motion. Great, thank you. Any discussion?

I would just like to say I agree. I think this is a really good idea for that property and to move away from the office flex that I think everybody thought was gonna be needed for so long into something that there is a demonstrable need for is a great idea.

Thank you, yeah, I just want to say that while I don't share Commissioner Kinnear's idea of office flex, I think that's important as well. I think that your project is very good and I think you've taken a lot of good things into consideration, so I wish you luck with your project. Seeing no other comments, Madam Secretary, may we have a roll call vote, please?

Commissioner Kinnear?

Yes.

Commissioner Tomachek?

Yes.

Commissioner Dunn?

Yes.

Vice Chair Carpenter?

Yes.

Commissioner Jeung?

Yes.

Commissioner Cawley? Yes. Commissioner Morris? Yes.

Well, the vote passes on a 7-0 vote. Great. Thank you very much to everybody. Do we have any old business to discuss? Do we have any miscellaneous business? Well, the only miscellaneous business I have is that the new Aerostat Park opened about a week and a half ago and there's the grand opening. So many of the long time serving members on this commission worked so hard when we passed that specific area plan for downtown and have watched it grow. Just seeing that what was formerly Central Park now Eurostat open is just a great thing. So I hope you all can go visit and revel in a great asset for our community. All right. And seeing nothing else, I will close the meeting at 725. We are adjourned.