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HomeMy WebLinkAboutAugust 8, 2005 P&Z Minutes Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 13 of 98 supporting staff that they may have of engineers or architects or whatever, will have a total of 15 minutes to clarify anything that was unclear from the staff, respond to things, tell us a little bit more about the project. Following that we open it to the public testimony and did I mention that the applicant has 15 minutes to do that. We, then, open it to public testimony and whether you're for or against, we ask that you come forward and, please, come to the microphone and begin by stating your name and address and, then, make any remarks that you think we need to know about for the record. We do ask that you limit your testimony to three minutes, so that we get through these meetings without going to 1 :00 o'clock, hopefully. And if you find that some previous speaker has said what you had to say, we always appreciate if you would just say I agree with Joe who spoke a few minutes ago, we know what you mean. We do have a provision that if there is somebody who is a spokesman -- and the example of that would be the president of a homeowners association that's neighboring a project that we are talking about. If that person identifies them self as speaking on behalf of a group of people, we do allow them ten minutes to speak and, then, we ask that the other people that they are speaking for do not make further comment, unless they have something that we totally left out. Then, at the conclusion of that portion of the evening, the applicant gets a final opportunity to come back up and respond to any issues that have been raised and we ask that that be ten minutes, including any supporting staff that they have. We have a handy light system here. When the green light is on you have time to speak. It will go to yellow and you should begin to conclude and when the red light is on we ask that you do conclude or turn your remarks over to somebody else. Then, the Commission will deliberate and we may ask further questions, either of the applicant or public or staff, and the end result is intended to be a recommendation that we will make to the City Council where there will be another very similar hearing. And the City Council does not always come out with the same results that we do, so if you came to this hearing, I recommend that you go to that one as well. Item 8: Continued Public Hearing from August 4, 2005: AZ 05-033 Request for Annexation and Zoning of 3.02 acres to R-8 zone for Banff Subdivision by Landworks, LLC - 675 South Linder Road Item 9: Continued Public Hearing from August 4, 2005: PP 05-032 Request for Preliminary Plat approval of 21 single-family residential building lots and 7 common area lots on 2.91 acres in a proposed R-8 zone for Banff Subdivision by Landworks, LLC - 675 South Linder Road: Item 10: Continued Public Hearing from August 4, 2005: CUP 05-036 Request for a Conditional Use Permit / Planned Development to allow reduced lot sizes, setbacks, frontage and minimum ground floor square footage for Banff Subdivision by Landworks, LLC - 675 South Linder Road: Zaremba: And that being said, we are ready to open the public -- continued Public Hearing for AZ 05-003, PP 05-032, and CUP 05-036. All of these relating to Banff Subdivision at 675 South Linder Road and we will begin with the staff report. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 14 of 98 Guenther: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Banff Subdivision is a 3.02-acre annexation, with a 2.91-acre subdivision for an amended 17 single-family residential lots. The original request was for 21 building lots and seven common lots and it was amended to 17. As stated, the subdivision is on South Linder Road, just north of Waltman Court Lane and there is several other R-4 subdivisions in the near vicinity, as well there is the -- I believe it's a middle school or an elementary that's to the -- it's an elementary immediately to the west of the site. The site is currently a single-family residential lot for one existing home with several out buildings. The back portion is vacant. It is fairly flat ground. The proposal that is in front of you is for a planned development with this application. There is several issues that needed to be raised that are detailed in the staff report. The first being that planned develops do not allow for perimeter setbacks to be amended. The applicant has requested ten-foot rear setbacks. However, 15 foot is what the ordinance says and that is what -- they are not eligible in order to ask for the -- I'm losing my words here. Zaremba: Setback. Guenther: They can't ask the setback to be amended on the perimeter of their lots, essentially, is what it amounts to. The second standard is that the flag lots that are in, essentially, the northwest corner of the property have been designed with a five-foot common drive style lot design. The standards that are listed in the Meridian city ordinance are designed so that homes that are two homes, which is what is in the northwest corner, need to have 15 foot of flag lots on road frontage and with that they have added two other five foot common lots to provide for future access to the property north of the site, as well as an easement in this location across their common lot for future development of the one acre site. This one-acre site is a county property and it is not located in the City of Meridian's annexed area at this time. As well as the property to the south, which even though this is a small parcel and is bordered by the City of Meridian, is not considered by our ordinance to be an in-fill parcel. This is a -- this does not meet that classification and the allowances that go along with an in-fill parcel do not apply to this site. The second, I guess, key issue to look at is the roadway is proposed to be 29 feet back of curb to back of curb. The Meridian city fire has a policy that they measure roadway that need to be 29 feet front of curb to front of curb. So, even if this subdivision was approved, it would have to have an amended street section that that would be wider in order to accommodate the Meridian city fire concerns. Currently, with the 28-foot roadway, the Meridian city fire has said that there will be no parking on this street. So, the entire roadway would be designated no parking. The other major concern is that most of the subdivisions in the area have developed at between three and 3.2 dwelling units to the acre, where this subdivision is proposed at a little bit over six dwelling units to the acre, even with the larger sized lot for the existing single family residence. With that I will try and keep this short. I'm sure you have questions, which I will answer. The issues that I have just detailed for you are the reasons that staff is recommending denial on this subdivision. It just does not qualify for several of the issues that are key for this type of a neighborhood. The neighborhood is predominantly very large lots and county lots. The properties to the -- about 200 yards to the south of this site are all low density residential, as well as across Linder. The avenue lot size is Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18,2005 Page 15 of98 greater than 10,000 square feet. With the lot sizes that were originally proposed, they were over half of what the R-8 standards are, which is 6,500 square foot lots and they originally brought in roughly at 3,100 square feet per lot. With that staff felt that this is just asking too much of the planned development standards, which are usually brought in for a type of a mixed use and not just an alleviation of the box standards as set forth in the Meridian city ordinance. And I'll stand for questions at this time. Zaremba: Commissioners, any questions? Moe: Not at the present. Zaremba: All right. Thank you very much. In that case, we are ready to have the applicant, please. McKinnon: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission, Dave McKinnon, 735 South Crosstimber. You guys have before you a 22-page staff report and you just heard Joe's staff report as well. Not exactly a ringing endorsement for this product tonight and so I think we need to talk a little bit about the design and there is a few other slides I think Joe probably has. Do you have the elevations as well, Joe, and the slides for a couple others. The product type you're looking at is more of a cottage product type, more the smaller house on a smaller lot. And there is another one. You can scroll through those real quick. Guenther: That's the last one. McKinnon: Is that the last one? Okay. You're looking at a product type that's small. Right now, as many of you know, the housing market in Meridian is going through the roof and not everybody can enter the market right now with a 200 to 300 thousand- dollar house. Your Comprehensive Plan says to encourage the type of housing that will allow people to have home ownership and one way to do that is to provide smaller lots. One of the reasons for the rising house prices in the City of Meridian is not necessarily the cost of construction, but also the value of land. In the last six to seven months the value of land in Meridian has almost doubled, if you're trying to purchase land for development. So, that automatically equates into higher prices for selling homes and so one of the things we are trying to do with this site is provide a nice product that would be viable in this area and be affordable to people that complies with the Comprehensive Plan-and-joe, if you can go back to the overall site plan. It was the first slide. Keep on going. There we are. That's great. When we first dealt with this piece of property, we looked at this piece of property and the property to the north. Both of these properties were on the market and they were being marketed together by a real estate agent. We went and looked at the properties, made an offer on both properties and the property owner to the north decided they did not want to sell. They decided we would try to work with the property owner to the south, the Banff property you see in front of you. It's a long narrow piece of property and they'd like to do something with this piece of property, we'd like to develop this piece of property, but as you can see, there are some constraints with this. It's 197 feet wide and 600 -- I mean almost, that's just over 90 feet Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18,2005 Page 16 of 98 in length. Long and narrow. The property to the north is 66 feet wide. Almost one acre in size and it also runs the full length and we are trying to decide whether to make those work with this piece of property and how do we develop this piece of property, as well as provide for some sort of access to this piece of property to the north. We met with your staff, had a pre-application meeting and we discussed a number of different issues that Joe brought up tonight. In fact, after we had the pre-application meeting we modified our design a little bit. Joe, can you go to the first design we submitted? There we go. The first design we submitted did not provide any access to the north in this location. It provided access through an easement to the property owners to the north, because staff and ACHD said in the future the homeowners to the north will not have access to Linder. They have asked us to provide access to this property owner on the north and so we provided a cross-access easement at this location, which puts it behind the garage so they can come in on this property and, then, access back to get off of Linder. They won't have access to Linder, it's a narrow piece of property, and they don't want them to have access right next to our access. After meeting with ACHD and the City of Meridian, they said we are to provide access to the north. City staff also requests we have this stub street to the south. A couple weeks ago this was supposed to be heard in front of you and staff called us up, as Joe pointed out, and you pointed out, Commissioner Zaremba or Chairman Zaremba. We worked closely with staff. Staff called us in and said we have some changes we want you to make and let's talk about those before it goes to the Commission and, then, if we can make those changes, we can probably go to the Commission with some sort of agreement in hand. Joe, can you go to the application we have got now? The meeting with Joe, Joe said it's too dense, let's take some of those out. One of the reasons for taking those out is to make these lots bigger. All the lots. If you remember from the first slide that we were just looking at, these houses will all turn north-south, just like this area. We have turned them east- west. They have gained in length. And we have also got a little more width. These lots are a little bit bigger in size. We also provided two common lots that would be deeded to the property to the north in the future, so that they would have public street frontage, because as of right now the house that's located on this site, there is no way to gain access to this rear part of the property, because they can't take access off of Linder. But if they do take access off of Linder to get to this house, they would have to pour a driveway all the way to this point in order to develop back here. So, city staff said, please, make a connection here. We have provided a key connection there. We felt the reason -- the best way to do that is to provide them public street frontage with a five foot wide common lot, which is what you can do for a flag lot where there is four or more -- three or four coming off of a flag lot. So, that's the reason for that. Work at the school district and their staff, they supported us having a pathway through here. In working with this site we wanted to keep this house in the location that it's at, so in order to keep that house together, they would bring the road in and jog it around and put an open space area right here. Joe, do you have the landscape plan? If you can flip back down. Putting in a landscape target, they would pull into this subdivision, the first thing you see is not houses, but you, actually, see a landscaped area. There was also provided a picnic area, a covered area in this area. It's now shown on this plan. But a covered picnic area so when you pull into the subdivision this is what you see, you don't automatically see houses. We thought that would be a nice design feature for Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 17 of98 something a little bit smaller. As far as the design of the road goes, Joe talked about that a little bit. We have worked with ACHD and they have worked with Joe Silva at the fire department. Joe Guenther is absolutely correct when he points out that the fire department wants a 29-foot street section that's flat, doesn't include curb, we can accommodate that. I have met with Joe and I have also met with ACHD. The 29-foot street section and the 42-foot right of way, you end up with a foot and a half of right of way behind the sidewalk. If you widen that roadway of 29 feet flat, before face of curb and face of curb, you end up with one foot behind sidewalk right of way. ACHD is happy with that. We are happy to make that accommodation as well. With that, we had -- and after working with Joe Silva on this, we asked that we could have parking on one side of the street, which meets the fire department's guidelines and it meets the requirements for the city. The reason why we went with the 29-foot street section is because this is a very small subdivision, we felt that bringing a 36 or 33 foot road system for something that's very small and services a very few number of lots would be overkill. We had a smaller subdivision, it creates more of a small neighborhood feel, which is what this is, it's more of a cottage product than a standard housing product. Joe, if you can go back to the current. Another thing we discussed with your staff, with Joe, before we resubmitted this was -- we talked about the standards for attached housing. Under the R-8 zone in the new zoning ordinance, 4,000 square feet is all you need for attached housing. In talking with staff we felt that detached housing was more appropriate than attached housing and that the lot sizes would be similar. We have provided elevations that can work on these smaller lots -- on these smaller lots and still be detached, rather than providing duplexes on this lot. Individual homeownership without having an attached wall was thought to be preferable by both us and staff, so that's the reason why we still got the smaller lots, but they would come very close to meeting the standard for that. This is, obviously, a planned development, so we are asking for some reduction in the lot sizes and lot frontage. Joe pointed out correctly that on the Comprehensive Plan -- on the plat we have asked for a ten percent -- a ten-foot rear lot line. However, if you see this little note right here, it says a 15-foot rear setback is typical. We are more than happy to accommodate a 15-foot rear on the perimeter of the subdivision. That was our intent in the first place and we had discussions with our engineer about having a ten-foot setback on the rear at one point, he didn't take it off, but we are not requesting a ten-foot setback. A 15-foot setback still works with our elevations and that's what we have actually shown on this submitted preliminary plat. We are going to need some help from you tonight. We have tried to work with staff. Staff asked us to make the changes. We have made those changes. We were hoping to come to you guys tonight with a recommendation from staff for approval after they asked us to make those changes. We made those changes and we are still at loggerheads with them. We think we have got a product that works with the city. The Comprehensive Plan calls for this property to be R-8. In order to get eight units per acre on -- or even six units to the acre you have to go to a smaller lot size. On the Comp Plan it says three to eight units per acre. We fall within that. The property to the north -- Brad, can you turn the overhead on? I gave Brad an overhead -- just a real quick layout. That's not it. That's Justin's house. Thanks, Brad. We decided to see what it would look like if we went ahead in the future and the rest of the redevelopment for the property to the north. In the staff report there was some discussion that we are Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 18 of 98 not providing access to the north. In the future the existing residence would be able to take access off of this location, the easement we provided back to this house. We have been able to show that this could redevelop into four lots. Remember that these lots are only 66 feet deep. There is no more width to them. So, we had them coming off of what is an existing drive. We can't provide for that. That existing drive is not part of our project. We can't provide access off of that, but in the future they could redevelop that way. And Lots 1 and 2 could redevelop, coming off of the flag lots from our subdivision. They have no other way to access that in back, unless they were to bring the driveway through here or driveway down and, then, reduce those lots from 66 feet wide to even a narrower section, almost making it impossible to build. So, we feel that it actually allows for the north area to redevelop, provides a stub street to the south that ACHD wanted us to have. In meeting with city staff, one of their comments from a couple weeks ago was to remove that. ACHD would have nothing of that. They wanted to have the stub street for interconnectivity. So, we ask for some help from you tonight as to what you think is appropriate here. It is a narrow piece of property. It's long and narrow. The property owner to the north does not want to sell the property and the owner to the south does not want to sell. We don't want to be left hostage to requiring them to come in with us and we don't want them to feel hostage to us that they have to come in and develop with us at the same time. We think this is a product a little bit different and different is sometimes scary, but we think that this product is, actually, something that would sell very well in Meridian. It's directed towards not all the -- the smaller families, but towards professional couples and to people downsizing. We don't see a large number of people with children in this area and for the professionals that don't want to have to come home and take care of a large yard. A high amenity product without having to have a huge yard to take care of and a lot of house to take care of. With that I'd ask for any questions that you have and I'd also ask for any suggestions that you might have to help us to get through this tonight and see what we can do to make this piece of property work for the development that would be a benefit for the City of Meridian. Zaremba: Commissioners, any questions? Rohm: I think that was a good presentation. I don't have any questions at this time. Moe: I just want to verify a couple things. You said that as far as a 15-foot setback, you will comply to that? McKinnon: Absolutely. Moe: As well as the 25 foot road section? McKinnon: The 29 foot flat road section face-to-face. Moe: Face-to-face. You can do that. I'm a little bit -- the five foot common drive with the flag lots, with the road through there, can you kind of go through that one more time. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 19 of 98 Guenther: Sure. Commissioner Moe. We had one recently that only had four homes accessing the common drive. The minimum paved surface of the common drive is 24 feet. They are proposing 20 feet, each flag lot being five feet. So, even so, it would not meet the standards of the ordinance and there is specific roadway standards for common drives that are called out in our ordinance, which must be met. Moe: Okay. McKinnon: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission, we have the depth on those two lots. Those are the longest lots -- the lots up on the west end, those are the longest lots, and we can abide by that 24 foot driveway surface for that. We just need to drag it out into this area a little bit further west and we have the width to accommodate that. We are more than happy to agree to that. Moe: That would be a 24-foot? Guenther: They would have to meet the standards of the ordinance for the minimum road frontage on a common lot with a minimum of a 24-foot paved surface. And that would also have to be approved by the fire department and it's such a long common lot that the police department would also need to review that. Zaremba: Help me understand. There were two elements, though, weren't there? The paving needs to be 24 feet wide, but does a flag have to be ten feet wide, which means if there is four flags in here, it needs to be 40 feet wide? Guenther: Correct. But this is only two flags. There is only two lots actually using those access points, which -- Zaremba: And those two lots are the ones that would develop on the next property, not this property. Guenther: That's correct. And for a two lot flag lot it needs 15 feet of road frontage. Zaremba: Okay. McKinnon: Chairman Zaremba, Members of the Commission, we can't design for that and, then, not provide them access. If the city is asking us to help give them access, we have to provide a way to do that and we will try to do that within the ordinance. We can accommodate the 24-foot wide asphalt. You're asking us to provide it, but, then, at the same time saying you can't provide it, because, then, you won't meet the ordinance and so we are in a Catch 22 there. Zaremba: Okay. Any further questions at this time? All right. Thank you. I believe we will move on to the public testimony. McKinnon: Thank you. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 20 of 98 Zaremba: Thank you. Signed up we have Jerry Hiatt or Hinath. Please come forward. Hiatt: Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the Commission. I'm Jerry Hiatt. I represent my mother at 755 South Linder, the five just south of this three acres. In the audience I have my wife and my brother, who I am also speaking for at this. I don't know whether this is Banff or Baniff. I think it should be Banitt. You talked about EI Gato a little earlier. I think it ought to be called EI Ghetto. We are putting an R-4 in the midst of R-1 and R-4. It's an R-8 request. We have R-4 and R-1 all the way around. It's -- I don't think we should be building no Garden City slum in the middle of Meridian. Mrs. Brown talked earlier about being number 74 on her sheet from Money Magazine, I believe it was. This will put you down about three million in 74 for developments like this. So, I'm definitely opposed to it in every aspect of it. And I have got some other reasons in here and I would just like to read it to you. I have got copies here if you want to read along. Or we can give it to the planner and you can get it later. It's your choice. Zaremba: If you have enough to -- Hiatt: I have amended that. Zaremba: If you could give one to the clerk, please. Hiatt: I will get my spectacles on so I can read. I oppose the development on the grounds that as an adjacent neighbor the survey markers have never been identified to us. Are they developing their property or are they encroaching upon and developing what is our property? Surveyors have been all over Mrs. Hiatt's property, on the five acres. Another developer had given her or her representative, which is myself, the courtesy of identifying where the property lines are at. Several stakes have been placed from the recent survey about 12 feet north of the existing fence line and 3.02 acres that are there should be developed on what is theirs and that fence should be put in there prior to any development. He talks about the size of the lot and setbacks, so is that -- the size of the lots based on where the fence line is or is it based on the plat? Because the -- out front on the property line, the drive into the back has been platted and staked. The actual property line between 755 South Linder and 675 South Linder has not -- the pins have not been put in the ground. Out through the pasture out back there was three stakes out there and those three stakes have been removed. So, when we went to the Public Hearing meeting -- the local community meeting that they had, my brother was there, he asked them what the deal was on the property lines, and the comment was that, well, we do have some concern in area and the other comment was we don't know what's going on. So, we would like that clarified before anything is planned and approved. Zaremba: Can I interrupt you for just a second, sir? Sorry. Hiatt: Sure. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 21 of 98 Zaremba: You mentioned that you were speaking for the other -- are you acting as a spokesman and they are not going to speak? Hiatt: The next two people on the -- yes. Zaremba: Okay. In that case we will give you a total of ten minutes, only three of which have elapsed. Hiatt: Thank you. The issue of who replaces the fence. The fence ought to be put in prior to any development. There is also the problem with irrigation rights. This is the fourth time we have had to deal with a developer in this area and this is the last side that's open for development. Each time we have lost irrigation and had to fight for the irrigation on this five acres. It needs to be retained as provided by the Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District. The next comment, of course, I have already made concerning R-8 versus R-4 and R-1. And my last comment on this is concerning the number of houses. The allowance of reduced lot sizes, reduced setbacks, frontages and minimum floor space should be kept out of this neighborhood. Although affordable housing should be made available, this is not the way -- or the subdivision to do it in. The gentleman used the word cottage. That's a nice term. You know, it's a good marketing term, but I just don't think it dwells in this area. I agree that there should be affordable housing, but I just don't think this is the place to put it. There are much larger lots and homes surrounding this development. The integrity of the neighborhood should be maintained by maintaining similar lot sizes and square footage of lots and dwellings that are in existence in the surrounding neighborhood. The main -- we need to maintain the property values of the existing houses. We need to attract buyers in that area of the same economic level. The tax base for the future of Meridian would be jeopardized. The property values would not accelerate in that area and the existing neighborhoods at the same rate as they would if it was a similar housing put in in this three acres as what is around it. So, I have no qualms with them developing the three acres, but it should be reduced to an R-4 at least. There is also the problem with the fire department on means of egress in this area. They are already -- South Linder is the main arterial in that area. There is already 700 houses down in there. There is no other exit out of there or entrance into that. And those issues need to be resolved before more housing is put down in there. So, I understand talking to the planner today that in the future there is going to be an egress out to Ten Mile Road down Waltman and until that's done, though, I think everything should be tabled because of safety issues. Any questions? Zaremba: Thank you. Commissioners, questions? Borup: Mr. Chairman. I do have one question on the fence. You said that the survey markers are 12 feet north of your fence -- your mother's fence? Hiatt: When we seen -- when they were first put out in the pasture we seen three markers out there with flags on them. They have been taken down and it was approximately 12 feet north of that -- of the fence. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 22 of 98 Borup: So, you're not sure if that was their property line or not, then? Hiatt: Not sure, but that was where the flags were. Borup: Okay. Thank you. Zaremba: Thank you, sir. Hiatt: Thank you. Zaremba: That covers everybody who was signed up and anybody who was not signed up care to add anything that has not been discussed? Commissioners, do we wish to have some discussion or are we ready for the applicant to respond? Moe: Probably the applicant. I will have a couple questions for him as well, so -- Zaremba: Okay. If you care to return. McKinnon: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission. It looks like there are a few things to talk about. It's a nice opportunity, I'm glad the neighbors were here tonight to bring up some of those issues. Let's start directly with the survey. When we had our neighborhood meeting the survey was not complete. We had a site design that we worked through at our office and we presented that at the neighborhood meeting. The surveys weren't complete at that time and so at the neighborhood meeting we didn't have an answer for where the surveys were. As you well know, I'm not a professional land surveyor, but we have had a professional land surveyor go out there and survey this property. The plat that you have in front of you tonight is representative of the property lines as determined by a professional licensed surveyor. So, as far as the property line, I have to rely on the professional that we have hired to do that. They are licensed by the state and that's the best we can do to answer that question is, yes, this does comply with the boundary lines. As far as where locations of fences are, as many of you are well aware, fence lines do not necessarily depict property lines and if there is any discrepancy there, I do have to rely on the professional opinion of a professional land surveyor. What you see in front of you tonight is representative of that. Borup: Question on the fence line, then. The survey line that's -- you believe is correct is north of the fence line that is there? McKinnon: What you have in front of you tonight -- I can't speak to -- Borup: I'm talking about where the fence is in relation to this. McKinnon: I'm not sure where the fence is in relation to that. I wasn't out there when they did the survey, as far as where pins were placed and where the flag is done for the property, I'm not sure. What I do know for sure is that the plat that you see is Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 23 of 98 representative of this and that the boundary and -- when the topography map was created for this, the house and all of the buildings were within the property line and that's what you see represented on this map in front of you tonight. And so that's what the plat is based on as well. One of the other comments that he had was the fence. We are more than happy to have the fence put up prior to development. That's typically a standard of the City of Meridian to require a fencing program prior to, so that construction debris and construction workers lunch material doesn't fly across the fences. That's usually a problem and the city has addressed that by the fence code by requiring that. We are more than happy to abide by that as well by having the fence up prior to construction. The idea that we would block the irrigation on this property -- there is irrigation rights in the state of Idaho. We are required to provide irrigation to pass to and -- to and through our property. I understand that very well. We will endeavor to make sure that nothing happens. We have been working with Nampa-Meridian irrigation about this situation already. We have had a meeting with John Anderson and we have also discussed the pressurized irrigation system working off a loop system with the elementary school, so -- rather than require a new pressurized irrigation pump station for this area. We could improve the lift -- the pump station that the school is using and, then, hook off of that to come around. Their pressurized irrigation system -- I see Commissioner Moe looking at me a little bit. Their system loops around the outside. They'd provide a stub to us if we upgrade where they are dragging their water from. So, we have had some discussions with Nampa-Meridian. We understand the irrigation issues in this area. The R-8 versus R-4 -- could you show a -- go back one more -- there we go. Perfect. There is an R-4 subdivision right here. The average lot size in this subdivision is just under 6,000 square feet. It's an R-4 subdivision. I have got a map -- I didn't -- don't actually have it with me, but it's not a well detailed map. These lots right here are 5,000 square feet. Actually, 5,009 square feet. Some are 5,008 square feet. Those are substandard for the R-8 zone. The discussion is that this entire area is predominately larger lots. Kiddy-corner from this property the majority of these lots in the subdivision are substandard R-8 lots in an R-4 zone. It was handled as a planned development. It was Blue Marlin. Several of you were on the commission when that came through. It's a W.H. Moore project. These are very small lots. On these very small lots they also had reductions in the amount of home sizes. A lot of lots within here were designated as having 1,100 square feet, some 1,200 square foot, some 1,300 square foot minimums. They were all different colors, if you remember that. These are small lots in this area. Another thing to point out -- Linder in the future -- and you can see in the design of this subdivision it's widened out at this location. Linder is going to be a thoroughfare, there will be an overpass at this location. Just, like the overpass that's going to be under construction soon at Locust Grove. In the future Linder will be widened and it will be expanded to include this overpass. The large lots are not easily as marketable next to a large thoroughfare. The smaller lots, people recognize that you will have some of that. We have provided a buffer. The existing house, plus a long drive in with landscaping to buffer those people in the future in having to listen to the traffic as this widens. ACHD does not include this small portion of land from here to here in their 20 year work program. However, this portion of Linder is in the 20 year work program and this portion of Linder is in the 20 year work program. ACHD typically will only purchase right of way if it's in their 20 year CIP. They stepped Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 24 of 98 forward and said we recognize that that may have been a problem. We will pay you for the right of way there. We do want to include that as part of our 20 year CIP. So, they have stepped forward in the staff report you have in front of you tonight saying, yes, we would like to purchase the full 48 feet from centerline. Right now it's a two-lane road. In the future this will be a 96 foot right of way and they want to purchase this right of way now, even though it's not part of their CIP, they haven't exactly detailed what the funding will come from, but I do realize that they'd like to purchase that at this time, rather than wait into the future and take care of this. This is going to be a wider road. It's going to be a bigger project. It's not different from here. The lot sizes within the subdivision towards the rear are larger than the lots within the subdivision that's already been approved by the City of Meridian. Now, as you know, I worked for the city of Garden City for four and a half years. This is not Garden City. The project and the product type here is something very different. We are not talking about a lower amenity product type. People are getting more and more discriminatory in their purchasing of homes. You recognize that the people that are purchasing newer homes are not purchasing lower quality homes in Meridian and Boise area, they have moved out to the Nampa area or Caldwell areas and the Kuna areas where the price of land is lower and the price of land, just for these lots, will push up the value of these homes. They are going to be nice smaller homes. I can't guarantee you they are going to be large homes, because they are on small lots, but they will be nice homes and they will be representative of those drawings and elevations that we submitted to you tonight. We know that there may be some issues that you have and we want your help on this. If you have some suggestions for us, some things that might make it more tenable for you and for the city, we are open to those. We tried working with staff, we have worked with ACHD and we have worked with the fire department. We have had discussions about the one way in, one way out with your staff at Linder Road -- has only one way in and one way out right now and we understand that and in the future it may not be the best idea to put a public school on a one way in, one way out. We don't believe that a three lot -- I mean a three acre subdivision will add the extra pressure. I believe we are on the brink right now that no extra development can happen in this area until Waltman is extended in the future. With that I'd ask if you have any questions. We ask for your support tonight and your suggestions that we can move forward to City Council with this project. Moe: Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Thank you. Commissioner Moe. Moe: Well, you pretty much answered all the questions that I was going to ask you, but, then, that just brings up a couple more in your comment of suggestions and I really do have a real problem with the amount of lots that you have got in here and the size of these lots. I mean you have made the point that the R-4 caddy-corner there was small lots, even for an R-8, but we are down into 35 and 36 hundred square foot in this development here, when minimums, you know, for an R-8 are 6,500. Now, you have got a couple, you know, over there on the west side that are getting close, but I think when staff discussed trying to reduce some lots to make this a little bit more appealing Meridian Plannin9 & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 25 of 98 to an R-8 zone, I think it was more than four lots that they were looking for reductions on and that's a big concern of mine in this thing as far as what you have already discussed making the changes and whatnot, I'm glad to see that, but for an R-8 in these such small lots, I think we are -- I think we are going to crowd everything in here and I realize that it's zoned for the R-8 right now, but have you guys looked at all to reduce any of these lot sizes again? McKinnon: Joe, can you go ahead and flip back to the site plan that we have got right now? We have talked about that and taken a look at it and I don't know if I did a great job of explaining myself in the discussion we had with staff. Under the new development code, the Unified Development Code, that has recently been discussed by you and approved by you and recommended to City Council to approve, under the development code -- Moe: Keep in mind it has not been approved. McKinnon: It has not been approved. But this is the discussion that we had with staff. Was that under that code -- and the old code was very similarly written. This part didn't change a great deal. For attached housing you could have 4,000 square feet and 4,000 square feet and that would meet code for the R-8 zone without a planned development. We both felt that it would be more appropriate and a better product if it was detached from each other and we felt that if we were to push those lots closer to that 4,000 square foot in size, that it would be better to have detached, which is a better product typically, it's a better ownership product, people would rather purchase a detached home than an attached home. So, we said let's move these closer to that 4,000 square foot number. If we removed this lot, we could widen each one of these lots out, it would exceed 4,000 square feet in size. We could reduce the open space here. Drag these lots over. We would lose one net lot -- one lot, essentially, in the net. These could be moved over. These could be expanded to, essentially, 4,000 square feet. I haven't done the math on the north side. On the south side we definitely have done the math. It's a lot easier down there to make it work. By losing one lot these would all be pushed to be 4,000 square foot lots, which would match for attached housing. We were asking detached housing on the same lots and having reduced setback between the two on the non-habitable side. Moe: But as far as a PD, are you anticipating the open lot as part of the amenities in the PD? McKinnon: Under the PD ordinance there is a number of different amenities that can be required. One's a pathway to public open space, which is a park, which is right here. This area is included as an amenity with the picnic area. It can be -- it will have to be squished a little bit. The requirement for a PD is if you want to count your open space as an amenity, it's a ten percent open space requirement. This piece of property is not asking for the ten percent open space requirement amenity. In fact, on a three lot subdivision there is no -- a three acre subdivision there is no requirement for open space. Only subdivisions in the City of Meridian that require open space are those Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 26 of 98 subdivisions that are five acres in size or larger. This is smaller than that and so providing open space, it's not the ten percent area, that's why we have got the picnic shelter in this area. So, it would be squished a little bit further. We don't want to squish it too much, but you could take 20 feet here, incorporate that between each one -- see if I can do some quick math here. These are about 76 feet deep. Is that right, Scott? Seventy-eight feet deep. If we take an additional ten -- 20 feet here, that's 78, 1,400 feet, one, two, three -- it would probably be in the neighborhood 15 feet we would have to squeeze that in order to get those lots all to 4,000 square feet. So, It would reduce that, but we can draw that up and see how that works. Moe: Or take another lot off to the north side. McKinnon: We could possibly do that as well. We can redraw that and come back to you with those drawings. We just feel that a detached product is a better product than an attached product for ownership and marketing as well. Moe: I have no more questions. Zaremba: I will have to say there are elements of it that I like, but I will give you the couple of things that I struggle with and some of them are brought up by staff and also by the neighbor. Can you go to a larger area view? Like that. Yeah. Thank you. The logic to me, if it were possible to develop -- it's difficult to deal with these small parcels and I realize it gives you a tough challenge and it gives us an awful lot to chew on. One of the struggles is isolating this little property just north of you and you have made some accommodations for that. Logic would be that in the far future when Linder actually is being used as an arterial and crosses the freeway and stuff like that, that it would make more sense for all of these three properties -- my light is not working very strongly, but the three properties that are neighboring each other -- actually, to access off of this street, as opposed to off of Linder -- it seems a little premature to try and shoehorn this subdivision into a spot that could develop much more favorably not only for the future residents, but also for the current residents, if the whole picture were looked at. And that also brings me to the subject -- and I'll ask Commissioner Borup to comment on this as well. My recollection is that when we were discussing this subdivision, which is Blue something. Blue Haven or -- McKinnon: Blue Marlin. Zaremba: Blue Marlin. I thought Blue Marlin was the commercial on Eagle and Ustick. McKinnon: Yeah. That's the marketing name. Borup: Blue Horizon. Zaremba: This is Blue Horizon. Borup: Yeah. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 27 of 98 Zaremba: We had the discussion about there only being one way in and one way out until now and, as I recall, we went ahead and recommended approval of Blue Horizon, based on that it was imminent to have a second connection somewhere, either to the east off of -- I think there is a stub street under this compass mark, but also one here. Or to the west connecting -- I forget what the name of that street is, but -- or that within a couple of years, since they were setting aside space -- and I think they even contributed to it, to get this intersection going. And I will ask Commissioner Borup whether he agrees with me on that. I think the instinct of the Commission at the time was to say -- we were kind of holding our breath to approve Blue Horizon, with the thought that we would not really discuss any further growth in this area until there was a second way out. Was it that firm or did we go that far? Borup: I don't remember going that far, but I think we anticipated there would be -- Zaremba: By now. Borup: Well, I thought to the east was what we thought was most likely in the shorter term. Zaremba: Yeah. Well -- and where I'm going is my discomfort with even adding one or two houses more, when I feel we are way beyond -- typically -- I mean this is a cul-de- sac and the rules usually are 50 dwelling units on a cul-de-sac and we are -- I'll take the word for it that we are up to 700 at the moment. It may sound minuscule to say we are not adding that many more, it's a small percentage, but it's getting a little scary to isolate that many people with only one two lane entrance and until those improvements are made, I, for one, am very uncomfortable discussing further development in this area. I don't know if I'm the only one that feels that way, but -- you know, if we do take the responsibility to make sure that public safety is available to anybody who is likely to move in here and the end result to me is that I kind of think it's premature to even annex this at the moment. McKinnon: Mr. Chairman, help me through this process in my head, if you would. I understand a little bit about emergency services and, obviously, you have a better grip on it than I would. I'm trying to think of what type of catastrophe that could happen that would block Linder that would be -- that would -- you say that you're uneasy right now as to adding more to that. What type of catastrophe is it that would concern you in the future? For instance, is it a traffic accident that would block people from getting in and out of their homes or is it a life safety issue of people having to exit if there was a massive fire in the south end of this heading north. I'm trying to understand the reason for that. I have looked at the fire department's comments. I don't believe there were any comments from the police department to this. I notice it was more Planning and Zoning. But help me out with it. I'm trying to understand the -- Zaremba: A fire in the area where the word Linder is would be a very difficult proposition. I'm also well aware that even though they don't happen very often, this is Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 28 of 98 an earthquake area and I have seen the surprise devastation that they can cause. And, hopefully, that will not happen. They are very scary when they do. But I think it's kind of our responsibility to be prepared for them. McKinnon: Joe, can you go to the aerial really quick? The thought just occurred to me. Oh, it doesn't quite show it. The school site in the back of that -- just over. There we go. I'm a little bit familiar with Whitestone Estates Subdivision up here, with the access further to the north in this location. There is this -- it looks like a stub. It's actually not a stub, it's a sewer connection to the school. This was a sewer easement that runs through here. It's bollarded off. And when it extends with the sewer easement -- if you remember, sewer easements -- and, Mike, you may want to jump in on this and help me out -- the sewer easements are built so that you can drive a vehicle over those. There is a secondary access back around the school site. The school area is paved around. Vehicles can drive and park on that pavement in that area. There would be a secondary access to this location for emergency vehicles. And so if something were to happen at this location, there is a secondary road -- or secondary means of emergency access to get to this location and to this location, if something were to happen south of this access point. And so I remember we were dropping my kid off -- I have one child that went to Peregrine and we used to drop off here, rather than rotate all the way around. I have a friend that lives in Whitestone Subdivision and we'd stop by, but there is secondary emergency -- and, Mike, help me out with that. Your sewer easements are typically built with gravel over the top or asphalt so they can support a vehicle? Cole: Are you asking, Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Yes. Cole: Typically, yes. If a sewer main is run through an easement, we will have a gravel access road for maintenance of the sewer main. This particular easement here, I'm not aware of what the status is. I'm not familiar with each and every easement in the city. But, general, yes, there are access roads over that for maintenance of the sewer line. Zaremba: Okay. Thank you. Let me ask staff a question, if I may. It's been mentioned that -- is this road that's along here, is that Waltman, as well as -- Guenther: Yes. That's Waltman Court. Zaremba: Portions of it. Guenther: But this over here is where the mixed-use development for the Ten Mile interchange occurs. It's immediately west of the large lots, Connie Subdivision, in the southwest area of this site. Zaremba: So, where I was going with that, if there is discussion of punching that road through to Ten Mile, is there any thought of a time frame? Would it wait until the interchange is done, which is several years off to -- Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 29 of 98 Guenther: That would come in a part of that mixed-use development for all of that undeveloped agricultural ground at that time and a connection through to Waltman Court would be a long-term solution. The most immediate would be Commercial in the location at the stub here, which would be the one coming across north of the Waltman Court -- I think it's Waltman Court Subdivision, which was approved last fall. Zaremba: Okay. McKinnon: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission, it sounds like there is a few things that we still probably ought to work out with staff. I have got your comments, Commissioner Moe, about reducing the density. I think that I saw some nods of some heads as you were making those comments from the Commission. Borup: Maybe you could remove two lots, one on the north, one on the south. McKinnon: We can absolutely draw something up to see if that works and we will do that and we'd like to come back to you and have a little more discussion about -- and have some timing discussions with Mike and with Joe and with ACHD concerning when the -- a secondary access to this area comes in and have a better answer for you. So, I guess we would ask at this time for a continuance to be able to draw some different designs up, come back to you, and make a few changes. We will make the change to the property to the north, make that 24 feet wide, and make the road section 24 -- and the 29-foot face-to-face, other than back-to-back. And we currently show that the -- we will make sure that the plat's corrected to show a 15 foot rear setback instead of the request for a ten. We will make those changes and have a chance to meet with your staff. If we could have a couple weeks to do that. As far as the changes to the plat, those are pretty quick drawings to make. It's moving some lines. And we can try to make that work and that's, actually, going to help us with our elevations, if it was a wider lot to work with, and we will probably have some additional elevations that will fit on some wider lots, to ask for a continuance at this time, so we can continue to work with staff and make some changes that you suggested at this time. Zaremba: I certainly think that's reasonable. Let me throw one question into the mix, then. If you are able to consider and perhaps accomplish the suggestions that Commissioner Moe made -- let's see, can we actually go to a site plan? That's fine. Would it not, then, make more sense -- and, again, I'm thinking way off into the future and property that's not actually your property, but not only this narrow one right to your north, but the two that are north of that, I'm sure ACHD would like them to lose their access to Linder at sometime, too, and where I'm going with that is what if instead of -- my light's dying. Here it goes. Instead of this being a 24 foot driveway, could it be a 29 T intersection, so that it -- you actually have a stub south and a stub north and a T intersection there, instead of a driveway. You're losing another five feet off of what you have already agreed to shuffle, but -- Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 30 of 98 McKinnon: If we are losing a property to the north, it would give us some more to play with on the north side. So, there may be some possibility of widening it there. The bigger concern I have with that -- if you can flip back to the aerial. Okay. Great. This property owner at the neighborhood meeting had to put in an emergency vehicle turnaround on his property. He wasn't really happy about it when he was annexed into the city and he was very adamant about, you know, this is -- I'm trying to see how this is going to develop in the future. ACHD granted this access point here. It accesses this property and this property. ACHD's major concern with this driveway was the location of the driveway that we are proposing. They have to have an offset. This piece of -- this driveway meets the offset requirements when compared to this driveway. So, the little piece in the middle -- Zaremba: It is far enough away? McKinnon: It is. Zaremba: Okay. Okay. McKinnon: In addition to that, Commissioner Zaremba, I -- Joe, flip back real quick. I think it would actually go right to that house, if it was stubbed right there at that location it would go right through that house. But I guess we could move the stub in a little bit different location connected with the cul-de-sac. But we can play with the design of that. I think there is an area that we can design off of to see how that would go. Zaremba: Okay. Let's see. If we continue this for applicant and staff to work together a little bit more, is there anything that staff would want to add right now? Guenther: Well, clear direction of what we are looking -- Zaremba: Say again. Geunther: Staff would like the Commission to give us some clear direction as to what you guys would like to see at this site and what you would feel comfortable approving prior to going with that direction. Zaremba: Yeah. Moe: So, I guess my -- Zaremba: Commissioner Moe put a number of things in order. Moe: I would anticipate pretty much your concerns about the road width. The flag lot road section through there be taken care of. The perimeter or the setback to the 15 feet. I'm looking for possibly at least -- at least a minimum of one lot per side of that road to go away. I want to get some larger lots in there. I would really rather not lose " . Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18.2005 Page 31 of 98 any of the open space, if at all possible, in that north side. That's where I want to take the one lot out. Is there anything else? Guenther: Commissioner Moe, when staff did have discussions with the applicant there was several other things that were brought up that Mr. McKinnon did say. We did look at the option -- and staff had recommended that they make all of their lots a minimum of 4,000 square feet, as that is the minimum lot size that is called out in the city code. As well as we had made a recommendation that they either stub to the north or provide also a connection of a minimum 20 feet in this area for future roadway connections. We understand that there is an existing garage there where the potential connection for the roadway would happen, but staff would still feel more comfortable with having a public road service to this site, rather than having the flag lots in the first place. What staff's recommendation to the applicant was that the -- at the last time we met after the original recommendation, was to provide either a large hammerhead type of a structure there with a very narrow common lot that would be for future access to that site or something along that method, which we never had the discussion about this type of a design. This is not something staff had commented on with this -- with this applicant. Moe: Before you go farther, in regard to the Chairman Zaremba's point in regards to ring the road there at the end, would that be accepted to staff as well? Guenther: That was staff's recommendation to the applicant almost to a T. Moe: All right. Well, if it was to a T, then, I would anticipate that that's what I would like to see. McKinnon: Commissioner Zaremba, Members of the Commission, ACHD had a problem with the T, where is it going to, it's going to a 66 foot wide lot. They want the access to the south. The city didn't want the access to the south. We were stuck between a rock and a hard place. The city staff report says we don't recommend the stub street to the south. ACHD required that. What we did on the north side with the -- this -- I guess the quasi-stub there, the common lots, was try to provide frontage for those lots without having to provide a full street to that property. It's 66 feet wide. It's not a huge property to develop and if you have a full 29-foot street section running back into it, there is not a great benefit to ACHD or to the city, for that matter, to provide a larger street section back there. We have discussed that option with ACHD and they felt this was a good compromise for that. Borup: Yeah. It's not a real practical property to develop. It's not something you're going to run a roadway down, obviously, from Linder and -- and I -- it looked to me like, you know, the proposed development sketch is probably the only practical way to even try to do anything with that. But, you know, it's going to depend on the property owner if that's something they even want to do. McKinnon: Well-- -," - .. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 32 of 98 Borup: Has there been any discussion with the property owner to the north? Is that something they would be looking at long term? McKinnon: You know, I don't believe they came to our neighborhood meeting. We have asked the real estate agent that was representing both the sellers at that time to, again, approach them to say we would like to purchase that and we have asked her to approach them and the answer was, no, they did not want to sell at this time. In some of the discussions we have had, the property owner to the north that had that cul-de- sac, the turnaround, there was some discussion that maybe he was wanting to purchase the back half of that property. Borup: That looks more practical. McKinnon: That would be something that, you know, we would be fine with as well, but, like I said, it's a 66 foot wide piece of property to drive the driveway the full length this way, even if it's a ten foot wide driveway, then, you have a 55-foot deep lot. Take a 20 foot front setback and, then, you take a 15 foot rear setback, which you can't reduce, as we discussed tonight. All of a sudden we have got a 20 wide building lot and that's not much to build on. And so we think that that one alternative we put up there probably provides the best alternative. There is, obviously, other alternatives, but we think that that's probably one of the best alternatives to redeveloping the property to the north. Guenther: Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Yes. Guenther: As staff we don't make recommendations on how off-site parcels are brought into this city or what their width is or anything along that line. Our main concern is leaving that out, because there is no way that ACHD is going to give that property access to Linder and this is our one shot at redeveloping that property. If it doesn't redevelop it will probably stay a once acre tiny parcel, with a driveway access to Linder for who knows how long. And that is -- that was the purpose that staff was looking for either some sort of stub connection to Linder -- regardless of how wide it was, that's -- I mean, obviously, that's the purchase that we are looking for. Borup: But that's also why you're purposing two access points. Guenther: No. They are proposing to put an easement here. Staff's recommendation was to either provide a jog in the road and bring it up here and redesign some of the portion back here, so that they can provide lots in the rear of that, or something along that line. Borup: That's what I was saying, you're proposing two access points. Guenther: No. This could go away as far as we are concerned, because this driveway cut actually cuts into their open space. So, in the future this lot -- this home here is Meridian Planning & Zonin9 August 18, 2005 Page 33 of 98 going to have a driveway across what is the amenity for the rest of homes in this subdivision. Borup: So, you're saying if there is access at the rear, then, the easement in the front can go away? Guenther: If that's what the applicant chooses. Like I said, we are not -- Borup: As far as staff is concerned it could. Guenther: It could. As long as they come together with some sort understanding of how that parcel is going to have public street frontage for redevelopment that's not on Linder Zaremba: But that's part of my struggle. Should we even accept this problem without some coordination or an area plan, really, for these three properties? Is it in the best interest to annex -- best interest of the City of Meridian to annex this problem at this time without seeing a plan for those whole three properties? Borup: Well, every time we annex something we do. We don't look at the adjoining properties. And there is also -- you know, this is always an issue. Really, this is a little more difficult because of the size and the location of the existing buildings, but there is always the adjoining properties and always the stub streets that's -- that's included in. It's the same issue, only this is just a lot different. Rohm: Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Commissioner Rohm. Rohm: From my perspective it seems that if the applicant were to make the changes that Commissioner Moe brought up, that really addresses the primary issues of this development as a whole, if they get the 4,000 square foot lot minimum, reduce the lots on both north and south of the roadway by one, the back lot line setback be 15 feet, and 29 foot roadway and a 24 foot roadway to the back portion of the one acre lot, that seems to me to address all of the issues that are -- Borup: In the staff report. Rohm: -- are within the staff report and the parcel that is one to the north -- north of this 66 foot wide, they just developed that and I don't personally think that that parcel will redevelop yet again in the near future. So, it seems logical that to provide access to the back half without having a fully developed roadway is the most appropriate. That's-- Zaremba: Okay. Rohm: -- my position on this. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 34 of 9S Zaremba: It sounds like consensus is -- Borup: I agree with that. I agree with Commissioner Rohm. Zaremba: -- to continue this to a future meeting for the purpose of applicant and staff working out those details and staff providing a report with conditions for approval. Is that what we are -- Rohm: That's what I would support. Zaremba: Okay. Do you want to pick a day? Guenther: Mr. Chairman, it would have to be a minimum of a month, because we do need to take this to comments meeting for at least -- and I'm not sure when the next one is. We only had one last week and they are only once a month. Zaremba: And it needs the ten days to go out to staff again, there would be -- I'd call these changes -- Guenther: Yeah. And we would need to send this -- we would need to transmit this to ACHD, obviously. Nary: Mr. Chairman, this is just more of a cautionary I guess comment. It is within the purview of this Commission to make some suggestions based upon the staff's report. On this particular project, although it's a fairly small project, I mean one of the requirements is -- because there is a conditional use requirement, is that there is compatibility with the neighbors. As long as in your next hearing you're going to hear all public testimony all over again and all from the neighbors -- because in redesigning this project up here you have changed it significantly from the neighbors' comments, but yet you haven't made any findings that it's compatible and I think this is the danger and that's why I'm saying a cautionary statement. It's the danger of this Commission designing the projects for the applicant as how to get them approved when you have to make a finding that it's compatible with the neighbors who have already -- the only neighbor that testified says it's not compatible with the neighborhood. So, I would just caution you on this project, as well as others, in, essentially, putting yourself in the place of the applicant. You can certainly say we agree with the staff report. We would suggest that we are not in favor of this based on it. If you want more time, as Mr. McKinnon asked in his early comments, to go back and redesign and come back to you, that's fine. I just would be cautious on this one and others to redesign the project to this degree again and make sure that you're going to take the neighbors' comments again and that we are going to have a full hearing a second time. But in other ones -- I didn't find a spot to interject, but the level of redesign is probably not in your best interest as Commissioners to make objective decisions later as to whether this is an appropriate project in the best interest of the city, because at this juncture, from Mr. McKinnon's standpoint, if he meets all of our criteria, potentially indicated your pre-approval without Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 35 of 98 seeing it. So, I would not recommend that you -- to design them to this degree, merely give recommendations, allow them the opportunity to redesign if they wish, or make a decision based on what you have in front of you. But if you want to set this over, I'd just make sure it's clear for the neighbors you're going to have a full-blown hearing, you're still going to have to make findings on whether they are compatible and you're going to hear whatever they want to say in regards to this project. Zaremba: Yes. I appreciate that and I was even considering whether we would insist that there be another neighborhood meeting. There is enough redesigning going on and we have asked that in the past. And I certainly -- certainly at the Public Hearing would expect to hear from everybody again and I'll leave it up to the other Commissioners whether we would want to ask for another neighborhood meeting once they have gotten together with staff and come up with a different agreement. Moe: Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Commissioner Moe. Moe: Like I say, I do appreciate Mr. Nary's comments. They are very much appreciated. I, for one, am not a designer, so, therefore, I wasn't designing, but what -- I did want to make sure what everybody understands is -- is that this area is zoned R-8 and the whole point is to try and get within the R-8 zone requirements and as far as I'm concerned, he's not near that at the present time, in my opinion. So, therefore, number one, I would like to have you guys have another meeting, neighborhood meeting, if, in fact, you're going to redesign and, yes, I would hope that the public that did speak tonight and others would come back forward and speak again on this once they see the redesign and, hopefully, in the neighborhood meeting they will be happy with what is presented and, hopefully, this project can go forward. So, therefore -- Zaremba: Let's discuss timing. The choices would be September 15th, which is -- Moe: I would anticipate the 6th of October. Zaremba: Or the 6th of October. Moe: Yeah. I think that would probably be the way to go. What do you think? Borup: Well, either the 15th or the 6th. Does the 15th meet the time criteria? Zaremba: It's less than a month from now. Borup: Right. Guenther: I would request a little bit more time than a month. Borup: That leaves the 6th, then. Meridian Planning & Zoning August 18, 2005 Page 36 of 98 Moe: Okay. Borup: I mean -- yeah. The 6th. Zaremba: So, if we continue -- the question was if we continue it we don't need to renotice; right? Even if the changes are significant, it's still the same application, the same Public Hearing? Borup: The street's not going to move, is it? McKinnon: We are reducing lots, it shouldn't have to be renoticed. Zaremba: Okay. Nary: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Commission, since the recommendation is to reduce lots, not increase them, and because this was the open hearing an opportunity to come here, you can continue it without having to renotice. If, certainly, the Commission believes there is a need to, you can certainly recommend that or direct that as well to renotice it, too, so that's within your discretion. Moe: Okay. Mr. Chairman? Zaremba: Commissioner Moe. Moe: I move we -- what do I move to do here? I'm figuring that out here. I'm just trying to figure out where I was here. Move the Public Hearing on AZ 05-033, PP 05-032, and CUP 05-036 be continued to the regularly scheduled Planning and Zoning meeting of October 6th, 2005, and I would also request a renotice of all three hearings. Borup: Even though that's not necessary? Moe: Yes, I do. Zaremba: And did you want to include in your motion suggesting another neighborhood meeting? Moe: Yes. And I would also like to have another neighborhood meeting required prior to our hearing date. Rohm: Second. Zaremba: We have a motion and a second. All in favor say aye. Anyopposed? That motion carries. MOTION CARRIED: FOUR AYES. ONE ABSENT.