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2002 06-20Meridian Planning and Zoning Meeting __ June 20, 2002 The regularly scheduled meeting of the Meridian Planning and Zoning Commission was called to order at 7:00 P.M. by Chairman Keith Borup. Members Present: Chairman Keith Borup, Commissioner Keven Shreeve, Commissioner David Zaremba, Commissioner Leslie Mathes. Members Absent: Commissioner Jerry Centers. Others Present: Bruce Freckleton, Dave McKinnon, Nicholas Wollen, Sharon Smith, and Dean Willis. Item 1: Roll-Call Attendance Roll-Call: ___X___ David Zaremba ___O___ Jerry Centers ___X___ Leslie Mathes ___X___ Keven Shreeve ___X___Chairman Keith Borup Borup: Okay. We would like to begin our meeting for Meridian Planning and Zoning Commission for June 20th. Begin with roll call attendance of the Commissioners. Item 2: Adoption of the Agenda: Item 3: Consent Agenda: A. Approve minutes from June 6, 2002, Planning and Zoning Commission Regular Meeting: Borup: The first item is that of minutes from the June 6 meeting. Do we have any comments on those minutes? Zaremba: Mr. Chairman, I move that we accept the minutes of the meeting of June 6th. Mathes: I'll second that. Zaremba: Motion and second. All in favor? No opposed. MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Item 4: Continued Public Hearing from May 16, 2002: AZ 02-004 Request for annexation and zoning of 127.74 acres from RUT to C-G, L-O and R-4 zones for proposed Sutherland Farm by Sutherland Farms, Inc. – east of South Eagle Road and north of East Victory Road. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 2 of 43 Item 5: Continued Public Hearing from May 16, 2002: PP 02-004 Request for approval of 308 building lots and 30 other lots on 127.64 acres in proposed L-O, C-G and r-4 zones for proposed Sutherland Farm by Sutherland Farm, Inc. – east of South Eagle Road and East victory Road. Item 6: Continued Public Hearing from May 16, 2002: CUP 02-005 Request for a Conditional Use Permit for a Planned Unit Development for residential, commercial and office park development for Sutherland Farm by Sutherland Farm, Inc. – east of South Eagle Road and north of East Victory Road. Borup: The first regular scheduled item is -- well, actually, Items 4, 5 and 6 is a continued Public Hearing on -- from May 16th on AZ 02-004, request for annexation and zoning of 127 acres for Sutherland Farms and related to that project is PP 02-004, request for preliminary plat approval of 308 building lots on the same project and also CUP 02-005, request for Conditional Use Permit for a Planned Unit Development for a residential, commercial, and office park development on Sutherland Farms. I'd like to open these continued hearings and start with the staff report. Anything additional? Hawkins-Clark: Thank you, Chairman Borup. The only additional items I guess I will touch on, unless any of the Commissioners would need to hear any other summary on the background of this application, is, as you recall, on May 16th, the Commission continued the hearing, but restricted the continuance to new testimony pertaining strictly to the Sasser -- Gail Sasser property, so you did restrict the continued hearing to just that, which, to remind you, was this piece of property here at the southwest -- I'm sorry, southeast corner of the Sutherland Farms Subdivision. You should have received in your packets a memorandum of understanding that was dated the 17th, signed by the developer and Gail Sasser and it did address four different compatibility issues. Staff's understanding of this memorandum of understanding -- obviously, it's an agreement between two private parties, it does appear that they have come to an understanding. The only item to point out from the staff's perspective is the second bullet on that memo does talk about an eight foot high fence, which is, of course, prohibited in all residential districts of the city. It is a planned development application, so there was some question between staff and legal as to whether or not a fence could be just addressed as an exception, because it is a planned development application. If it was already in the city and somebody came in with an eight foot, it would be a no brainer, it would be prohibited, but as a planned development I think if -- staff's opinion is if the Commission includes in your motion that an eight foot fence adjacent to the Sasser property be allowed as an exception under the planned development, that City Council would see that as a part of your motion and they could address it, you know, at that point in time, but it should be addressed specifically and -- if this memorandum of understanding is to be allowed in terms of that eight foot cedar fence. Other than that, I think you -- one of the main issues at the last hearing was the extension of Hollandale Street through the Muir Woods Subdivision. You did recommend that there be temporary bollards at the east terminus there until the Overland connection is made, so that -- and the same with Napp drive. So I just wanted to remind you that that was a part of what you decided at the last meeting before you continued it. So other than that, I think there were two memos on this project, so we'd just ask that you refer to the memo dated May 15th, Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 3 of 43 which is the revised one and has the conditions there that are updated. I think that's all I have. Borup: Any questions from any of the Commissioners? Zaremba: Yes. On the fence subject, actually. Two separate questions. One that directly relates to the memorandum of understanding. If the fence were on the property line, half of it is in the county and not subject to our rules. Is that enough or do we need to do a variance for our side of it or ask them to move the fence back six inches or -- Hawkins-Clark: That's a good question. I do know that Ada County's code also requires six foot on residential. Zaremba: I didn't know that. Thank you. Hawkins-Clark: Yeah. They do provide the outlet for a fence variance, as does the City of Meridian's code. But it is a maximum of six foot on either the Ada county property side or the city limits property side. Zaremba: Okay. The other fence question was pretty much entirely the south and west boundaries. There was going to be some discussion about deciding on the same kind of fence to run that whole boundary. Has anything been resolved there that you know of? Borup: Not to my understanding. Zaremba: All right. Hawkins-Clark: Are you referring to the south and west boundaries of the Sasser property or -- Zaremba: No. Starting where the Sasser property is, continuing west and then up and west -- or, I'm sorry, east from the Sassers, then that jog north and then east the rest of the way to Muir Woods. There was some discussion about what kind or kinds of fences would be along there and that it be a common type. This agreement would seem to decide that it's all going to be cedar fence. Hawkins-Clark: Right. Since the agreement is signed just by Sasser, we would think that that would just apply to their boundaries only. Zaremba: Okay. Hawkins-Clark: We do have anything in our files so far that -- Zaremba: We haven't resolved the issue of what the rest of the fencing is. Hawkins-Clark: I don't believe so. Zaremba: Okay. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 4 of 43 Borup: Maybe the applicant could address that. Would the representative like to come forward? Fluke: Mr. Chairman and Members of the Commission, thank you. My name is Daren Fluke with JUB Engineers, 250 South Beachwood in Boise. We left the last meeting with instructions to show the Sassers our alternative layout. We met with them not even a week, I think, after the hearing. We showed them the layout and we showed them why we didn't like the layout. Our client was there as well to speak to them directly and after some good give and take we came up with what you see in front of you there to address the compatibility issues. So I think everything is okay as far as that's concerned. We did not speak with any of the other neighbors about fencing materials. We would propose to do is six foot cedar fencing around the balance of the property, as would be required by the code. Zaremba: Nobody came forward to object to it being cedar. Somebody had mentioned vinyl and I just -- Fluke: No. We had no -- Zaremba: If nobody's raised the issue, then you have resolved it as cedar. Fluke: That's what our preference would be, which would be consistent with the code. Shreeve: Just one more question. Excuse me. Of course, you have got the lot restriction. I guess if you have worked that with the Sassers. What about the remaining part of the property, the boundary? Were those all going to be also limited to single story? Fluke: Brad, do you have another drawing of the plat? Do we have one that shows lot numbers? Hawkins-Clark: We do not. Fluke: Okay. Well, specifically with regard to that question, the last paragraph of my memo to the Commission states that we would suggest that we put that restriction on Lots 8 and 9 of Block 16, which I believe are these two lots right here and then also on Lot 19, Block 15, which is this lot right here and the way we determine that was based on the topographic map that we have in the difference in grades, as well as the location of the homes and where we believe we would be restricting their views to the north. The other -- for the balance of those, the homes are far enough back or they are high enough up that it wouldn't make an appreciable difference to those properties. Borup: Any other questions, Commissioner Shreeve? Shreeve: Not right now. Borup: Anything else that you -- Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 5 of 43 Fluke: No, sir. Borup: Any other questions from any other Commissioners? Fluke: Thank you. Borup: Thank you. Do we have any testimony from anyone for the Public Hearing? Seeing none -- Wollen: Mr. Chairman, I believe I brought this up at the last meeting and I don't mean to be repetitive, but it's legal's opinion that instead of story limitations, we believe that it would be better if you go by height limitations regarding these lots and any lots where the same concern arises with neighbors, loss of view, situations such as that. I see that on the -- on the memorandum of agreement between the developer and Mr. and Mrs. Sasser there has been a restriction agreed to regarding single story homes on Lots 12, 13, and 14 on Block 9. Legal would recommend to the Commission that there be height restrictions, instead of story restrictions. Zaremba: I think the sense of the Commission last time you mentioned that was that it was a good idea. Would somebody refresh my memory of what a typical one story height limit is? Borup: I think that's part of the confusion. It depends on the pitch of the roof and generally a more expensive home has a higher pitch, so that's going to raise the height. Shreeve: That doesn't mean that a lower expensive home has a lower pitch. Borup: Daren, did you have any comment on that? Has that been discussed at all? Fluke: Mr. Chairman, Daren Fluke again. I was not able to reach my client on that question today. I spoke with Brad earlier in the day and so I couldn't -- couldn't speak with him directly. I suppose we -- you know, just from what he stated, they were going to be single story homes, so, you know, typically you would be 12 feet at the top of the wall, so, you know, I don't know, depending on the design of the house. If you want to measure that to the peek, I suppose that we would be asking for something in the neighborhood of 25 feet. I think your restriction in that zone is 35 feet; is that right? So I guess that's the neighborhood that we would be looking at. Hawkins-Clark: Chairman Borup, I did ask the building official, Daunt Whitman, and he stated to the peek a standard single family house that he inspects, 20 to 24. So the 25 is in that ballpark, but that was his statement to me. Borup: Okay. All right. I think that -- again, you get a home with ten foot ceilings and a 12-12 pitch, those heights increase. Zaremba: Beyond 25 feet? Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 6 of 43 Borup: No. It shouldn't go beyond 25 feet. It depends on the size of the house. The bigger the house, the -- Zaremba: Some will probably be less than 25, just generally, so -- Borup: I would think so. Freckleton: Mr. Chairman, our City Council took this up at great length Tuesday night. There was another subdivision south of town that there was a lot of discussion about this and it comes down to what are we trying to protect. Are we trying to protect view corridors or are we trying to protect privacy? And the privacy issue -- my belief what Council kind of resolved themselves to is that there is a maximum building height of 35 feet, but they could restrict no windows on that side of the house, in case you have bonus rooms and that sort of thing above the first story. But I think as far as -- or, excuse me, a view corridor, they kind of had the opinion that they are not protecting views, they are protecting privacy. So I believe what they landed on was 35 feet maximum height, no windows above the first story on that side. Borup: On a different subdivision? Freckleton: Correct. But there was -- they discussed it at length and that's kind of what they landed on. Borup: Well, the view corridor statement is in line with other legal opinions that I have read and heard expressed at seminars, is that it's not for the city to preserve view corridors. That's not a right that we really should be getting into. We are looking at public safety, you know, and everything else that we look at. Proper zoning and meeting city codes and ordinances and preserve the view is not one of those things. I think we are on shaky ground when we get into that area. Shreeve: However, privacy, I think that's a different story. Borup: Yeah. Zaremba: Well, I think in this case the one that we are dealing with now, some of the new subdivision properties are at a grade elevation higher than the homes they are being built next to, in which case the privacy is an issue. If you have a higher grade for your ground to begin with and then you build a higher structure on it, you would be looking right into the backyards of the lower properties and I can see this is a privacy issue in this case. I can see limiting the height of the buildings, because the grade level is already higher. Borup: Well -- and distance is the other thing that factors in on privacy. I guess presentation and everything else. The 25 feet sounds like it's -- Zaremba: Reasonable and supportable. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 7 of 43 Borup: Yeah. And it depends on the house, of course, but you would be hard pressed to get a single story house above that. It's feasible, but it would be pretty difficult. Shreeve: Then looking at, you know, the privacy issue, especially in light of ground being higher, on the -- on these lots here, of course, you talked about Lots 8 and 9, which are about these right here and, of course, we talked about whether they are still there or not, I never quite gathered who was right and who wasn't. Not that that's important, but in either case it appears that there is some higher ground there. I guess I would lean towards some additional lots being considered for privacy limitations. Borup: How about those people's neighbors within the subdivision? Every time you have a two story home -- I mean here instead of being 150 or 250 feet away, you're talking about a neighbor that's ten feet away. So are we starting to look at their privacy rights, too? Shreeve: Good point. However, this subdivision is new. People come and get what is there, as opposed to somebody already being there and somebody showing up now that's looking in their backyard. So I think there is a -- somewhat of a difference there. Zaremba: Well, my memory of the boundary that was just referred to was that it was going to be single story all the way across. Shreeve: That's what I recall. Zaremba: That that had already been an established subject. Shreeve: Yeah. That's what I recall. And on the grounds of privacy, because that land is -- we heard that it is higher, whether it was filled or not, it appears to be higher, anyway, naturally. Borup: Is that the direction the Commission is leaning? Zaremba: I know I am. Mathes: I am. Borup: Okay. That was -- I think that statement was made without looking at the actual location of the neighboring homes and where -- you know, where those would be affecting. Shreeve: Well -- but I don't know if -- I mean you're looking at two different things. Again, yes, the homes, people looking right into the homes, but, equally, looking right to the backyard. Now, granted, a single story, that's still possible in many cases, but there is still privacy of the yard, in my opinion, and not necessarily just the home. Zaremba: I also had the feeling that we were not going to be revisiting that subject at this point of the meeting. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 8 of 43 Shreeve: That's a good point. Zaremba: I felt that was settled. Shreeve: Yeah. Borup: Did we have a -- did we pretty much have a motion composed last time? Zaremba: I think we are close to doing it. I would like to ask, Mr. Chairman, for one more thing before we do. We do have a letter, a memorandum of understanding between Sutherland Farms and Gail Sasser. We have had the representative of Sutherland Farms say that it is a true representation of their feeling. I would be pleased if Mr. Sasser would come forward and say that he agrees with this also, even though we do have it in writing. Sasser: My name is Gail Sasser. I live at 3516 East Victory Road. Commissioners, I did meet with JUB and the owner of the property, I did look at that particular proposed plan and it really wasn't good for him or me, the lights would have been just shining right in our house, all the in-bound, and so we went through our negotiations and felt this was probably the best thing I could come up with, so I'm in agreement and I certainly appreciate your support and your help. Zaremba: Thank you very much. Mathes: I have a question. What do you feel about the height? Sasser: The height of the -- Mathes: Single story height. Sasser: Twenty-five feet I think is reasonable. I think it could be somewhat restrictive on a -- as Mr. Borup says, new houses are very tall, even one level, so -- Mathes: Thank you. Zaremba: Mr. Chairman, I would be willing to -- well, first make a motion that we close the Public Hearing. Borup: I wondered if the Commission wanted anymore -- we talked about some things different than what the applicant had testified to previously, as far as those other lots. Would we like anymore information from him before we proceed? Shreeve: My recollection is that it was resolved. I think his letter is contrary to what I recall the resolution having been. So, in my opinion, I think it was resolved before and his letter is contrary to that. Unless I can -- I'm wrong. That's what I recall, anyway. Zaremba: And I recall it the same way. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 9 of 43 Borup: Resolved between the applicant and the Commission? Shreeve: Uh-huh. Zaremba: Yeah. I thought there was agreement. Borup: Okay. You were going to make a motion? Zaremba: My motion was to close the Public Hearing at this point. Mathes: I will second that. Borup: Motion and second to close the Public Hearing. On all three? Zaremba: I'm sorry. Borup: That was all three public hearings? Zaremba: This is -- the motion is to close the Public Hearing on our Agenda Items 4, 5 and 6. AZ 02-004, PP 02-004, and CUP 02-005, relating to Sutherland Farms. Mathes: Second. Borup: Motion and second. All in favor? Any opposed? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: Okay. Zaremba: Mr. Chairman? Borup: Commissioner Zaremba. Zaremba: I move that we forward to the City Council recommending approval of Item 4 on our Agenda, AZ 02-004, request for annexation and zoning of 127.74 acres from RUT to C-G, L-O, and R-4 zones for proposed Sutherland Farms by Sutherland Farms, Inc., east of South Eagle Road and north of East Victory Road, to include all staff comments in the staff's memo of May 15. Borup: We have a motion. We don't have a second. Mathes: Oh. I'll second that. Borup: Motion and second. Any other discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: Okay. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 10 of 43 Zaremba: Mr. Chairman? Borup: Commissioner Zaremba. Zaremba: I move that we forward to the City Council recommending approval Item 5 on our Agenda, PP 02-004, request for preliminary plat approval of 308 building lots and 30 other lots on 127.64 acres in a proposed L-O, C-G, and R-4 zones for proposed Sutherland Farms by Sutherland Farms, Inc., east of South Eagle Road and East Victory Road -- that should be north of East Victory Road, to include all staff comments in the staff's May 15th memo, with the following modifications: That the bollards in the stub road to Muir Wood Subdivision do get put in and remain until Sutherland Farms has access to Overland Road and the same for -- I believe it's Napp Road; that the building height be restricted along the southern border on the east end to what's intended to be one story buildings with a maximum peek height of 25 feet. Shreeve: Do you want to get specific on those lots? Lots and numbers? Zaremba: Yes. I believe I'm talking about Block 16, Houses 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11. Block 15, House 19. Block 15, Houses 12 and 13. In addition to that -- Borup: In your motion did you say one story or did you say 25 feet? I thought -- Zaremba: I said both. One story, limited to 25 feet peek height. Borup: So you're disagreeing with our counsel's recommendation? Our legal counsel's recommendation? Zaremba: No. I put in the height. Twenty-five feet. Shreeve: The proper language would be just 25 feet -- Zaremba: You don't need to stay both? Wollen: I don't believe it would be problematic. I think for the protection -- in my discussions with Bill Nichols, he had recommended the height restrictions. I don't believe that there is going to be a problem if there are both height restrictions and story restrictions. I think they will together accomplish what we want or what the Commission is, in my understanding, wanting to do. Zaremba: Then in that case I would like to leave my suggesting that they be one story, with a maximum 25 peek height. The additional exception to staff comments is a memorandum of understanding, dated 13 June 2002, between Sutherland Farms and Gail Sasser, a neighboring property owner, to incorporate the memorandum of understanding in its entirety, again, assuming that single story homes means a peek -- maximum peek of 25 feet and recommending that this carry an automatic variance, the cedar fence be eight feet and not six, and that it be recorded specifically that the Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 11 of 43 setbacks on the lots mentioned will forever be 30 feet. I believe that concludes my motion. Mathes: I second that. Borup: Motion and second. Any discussion? Shreeve: Yes. Just -- well, get back with some comments. I just want to make in the record that Herb and Kathleen Papenfuss -- and this was talked about on several occasions -- simply that they have access to the New Easy Jet Road, as they have agreed to in the past. Zaremba: The maker incorporates that in the motion. Mathes: I re-second that. Borup: Any other discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Zaremba: Mr. Chairman? Borup: Commissioner Zaremba. Zaremba: I recommend that we forward to City Council -- I'm sorry. I move that we recommend to the City Council approval of Item 6 on our Agenda, CUP 02-005, request for a Conditional Use Permit for a Planned Unit Development for residential, commercial, and office park development for Sutherland farms by Sutherland Farms, Inc., east of South Eagle Road and north of East Victory Road, to include all staff comments in the staff's memo of May 15. Mathes: I will second that. Borup: Motion and second. All in favor? Any opposed? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Item 7: Continued Public Hearing from May 16, 2002: AZ 01-015 Request for annexation and zoning of 34, 60 acres from RUT to I-L zones for proposed Utility Subdivision by Falcon Creek, LLC – 3365 North Ten Mile Road. Item 8: Continued Public Hearing from May 16, 2002: PP 01-017 Request for Preliminary Plat approval of 7 building lots and 1 other lot on 34.60 acres in a proposed I-L zone for proposed Utility Subdivision by Falcon Creek, LLC – 3365 North Ten Mile Road. Borup: Thank you. Thank you, everyone, for coming on the Sutherland Farms. The next item is Items No. 7 and 8, continued Public Hearing from May 16th on item AZ 02-015, Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 12 of 43 request for annexation and zoning of 34.6 acres from RUT to I-L zones for proposed Utility Subdivision by Falcon Creek. Item No. 8 is a continued Public Hearing, PP 01-017, request for preliminary plat approval of 7 building lots and one other lot on 34.6 acres in a proposed I-L zone. I'd like to open this continued Public Hearing and start with the staff report. Hawkins-Clark: Thank you, Chairman Borup, Members of the Commission. As with the previous item, I will primarily touch on the outstanding items since the previous hearings, unless you would like some more background or otherwise. The first hearing on Utility Subdivision was October 4th, 2001. It has been continued, as you know, a number of times. Most recently was -- it was continued because the applicant was making modifications to the preliminary plat layout. On the screen is an aerial photo. Here at the northwest corner of Ustick and Meridian Road you can see the city's wastewater treatment plant there on the north side. The Nine Mile Creek runs in the generally north-south direction. The Five Mile Creek runs generally here in the east-west, both bordering the property. There are two applications. One of them is annexation and zoning of the 34.6 acres and as was discussed by the applicant and the Commission in previous meetings, there are two different zone requests on the 34.6 acres. Two of the proposed lots -- and I will just generally point out here. Two of the proposed lots, which are on the north end of the acreage generally up here, are a proposed I-L, light industrial zone, with the balance of the property being a proposed L-O and that would be for Lots 3 through 11. In Dave McKinnon's and Bruce Freckleton's June 10 memo, there are -- there is a summary there of the changes that have been made to the plat and generally the one acre park -- and maybe we should throw that one up there. There we go. Okay. Here we go. As you may recall, there was at one point a one acre park that was designated up here in this northwest corner of the project. That has been removed from the plat, so that leaves eleven lots in the subdivision. Another modification was that this cul-de-sac coming off of Ten Mile Road has been shortened to meet city ordinance, which is a maximum of 450 feet. They do have -- flag lots have been reconfigured, so we have -- we have a flag lot here in the center of the project, which has the minimum required frontage of 30 feet on Ustick Road and there is another lot adjacent to that that has the minimum 30 feet on Ten Mile Road here. So it does have the two flag lots that have been reconfigured as well. And then a six foot sidewalk has been added to the full length of the cul-de-sac coming off of Ten Mile. Borup: Did you say a six foot sidewalk? Hawkins-Clark: That is what's proposed, yes. I believe. Yeah. City code just requires a five, but -- so in addition to that -- let's see. I guess we will go on to the specifics of the Sanitary Service Company lot. As you can see on this, they are proposing a buffer generally around here. This is where it lies in the plat and then here is a blowup of the site itself of that particular lot. So, again, here is the terminus of the cul-de-sac here and the entrance to the Sanitary Service Company lot is the ingress-egress point here. The parking area is immediately here to the north and then their proposed administrative office uses are here in the northeast area. There is a landscape buffer and berm along the south of their lot and the waste transfer station building is located here towards the western end. This is a boundary here within their lot. They do own clear to the creek or Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 13 of 43 would own if this were approved. This northern lot would be -- would be over here to the edge. So we got a couple of others that you should have in your packet that reflect some of the building elevations. And, again, the reason why we are getting into this area is the Conditional Use Permits, the applicant is proposing that this lot not require a Conditional Use Permit. All of the L-O lots as recommended by staff would require them, but essentially the applicant is looking to have more detail presented. At this point in time with the annexation and the plat on the building, they would like to have most of this approved at this point in concept, so that they can come in with a building permit when they are prepared at that time. So this is a decision that the Commission needs to make tonight as to whether or not there is enough information here that you're comfortable recommending approval of the design without a Conditional Use Permit. So there is -- that's a little bit difficult to read. This is the east elevation here on the top. This is the north elevation here on the top right. I believe it's an approximately 75 foot wide open door. As it's proposed I do not believe there is a door. Staff has raised that as a concern in our report, that there be some form of door here in this open. The south elevation here in the bottom left and west elevation on the bottom right. Here is a cross-section. Yeah. And then this is the proposed office building there, which would be closer to the east boundary of the lot. As far as the items in the staff report, dated June 10, I just wanted to touch on a couple of those. The -- I'll go back to give you a couple other photographs here that were submitted by the applicant. These are existing site photos, which I believe have been presented before. Inglewood and Hartford Subdivisions. The applicant did submit a couple of photos from various waste transfer facilities throughout the area. These would be of the -- again, of the waste transfer area that was there at the south end of the lot and certainly the applicant can go into more detail, but we wanted to at least show those. Here is generally a representation of what a -- a berm to the approximate height that is being proposed here would look like with the fence area and then the berm with the trees on the top of the berm. Here are a couple of site building elevations that might be similar to what's proposed. They are metal sided. However, the compaction unit is proposed to be completely surrounded with concrete block. And then these are the adjacent Candlelight Subdivision and Inglewood Creek Subdivision. So the two items I wanted to touch on in the staff report, the June 10 staff report, there were several issues that were addressed there of some concern that staff had. One was that essentially the transfer station is a three-sided 100-by-100 building that has that 76 foot wide opening. Staff does agree with the orientation of the opening, but, again, that inability to close a door and secure the building from winds and weather and whatnot is a concern. The staff would prefer also to see the entire perimeter of the site landscaped at this time and one of the reasons for that is the proposed pathway, as well as the increased buffering for noise and sound that would be facilitated by an increased buffer. So we are asking for that as both the landscaping and the fencing around that Lot 2. We do have concerns about the -- about the large commercial vehicle repair and storage uses that are not necessarily limited to light industrial when considering the current Meridian code of light industrial, but certainly there are some mitigation efforts that are proposed here for you to consider. You should have received in your packets of June 19th a reply from Hubble. Did you receive that? Okay. It was in four page response from Hubble Engineering and in staff's read of it, it looks like there are a couple of disagreements that you will have to consider tonight and one of those is, as I just mentioned, the request to landscape and fence the full perimeter of the lot, which, you know, was a fairly standard city Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 14 of 43 requirement. We would ask on page two of Hubble's response at the top there is some discussion on the fact that the Department of Environmental Quality and Central District Health would require a litter control plan before any permits for use would be issued and we'd just ask that if this moves on to approval, you know, that a copy of that litter control plan be submitted with the certificate of zoning compliance or with the Conditional Use Permit. The issue of hours was another item that staff had. Hours of operation we had recommended be limited from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday and the applicant is in agreement with that condition, but they are requesting, with the exception of departing commercial trucks be added into the condition language and I guess primarily that -- the question there is do hours need to be added to that as well in terms of any departing trucks out at the site, if they are not within the 6:00 to 10:00 time frame does the Commission want hours limiting those as well. My understanding -- we haven't received much information, but Mr. Sedlacek could address that. I think the last item is this issue which got some discussion at your last hearing about the public pathways adjacent to the subdivision. This does not address just the SSC Lot No. 2, it does address the entire subdivision, but Tom Kuntz, parks director, did submit an April 7th letter to the Planning and Zoning Commission. He had asked for two items. A, he supported the need for the one acre park, so, of course, that has gone away, so if you do make a motion tonight, you include staff conditions, that particular one would need to be omitted from Tom Kuntz's April 17th memo, since the park is no longer there. And then the second one is Parks Department is asking for the -- for a ten foot wide hard surface pathway within the 30 feet easement along both the drains and I will just go back to that first. Actually, maybe we should go through this one on there. Okay. The Parks Department is asking here along the Five Mile -- on the south side of the Five Mile there is an existing right of way there, unlike many subdivisions, as you know, this is not an easement in favor of the irrigation district, this is actually owned by Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District here along the Five Mile and the Nine Mile. So the Parks Department is asking for a ten foot wide hard surface and 30 foot easements and then to provide surety in the form of a letter of credit for half of the construction cost of a future ped bridge over the Nine Mile that would be up in this northwest corner. In Hubble's response, though, they are opposed to providing that improvement. There is an agreement that is in place between Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District and the City of Meridian regarding pathways and we should probably get a copy of that to the Commission, so you can see. But generally it does the say that the irrigation district will consider pathways -- they do ask for a six month notice prior to construction, I believe. Six month I believe notice to them and, if need be, a city representative and/or an applicant representative would go to the irrigation district board, you know, and discuss the specifics of where the pathway would be within their easement or within their right of way. So there is certainly some precedent. The main difference here is the fact that there is a right of way and not an easement. So the city's condition on this, if it was made, it would technically be an off-site improvement, because they do not own the ground on which a pathway would be located, should the pathway be located adjacent to the drains. The requirement could be to certainly put it onto their property, but probably a more appropriate place for esthetics and general recreational use would be to try to get it a little bit closer to the drains, so it's some question for legal as to whether or not at this point the city can make that a condition, since it is an off-site improvement, but the File Mile pathway is shown on the Comprehensive Plan, the Nine Mile is not. And it is an annexation, so certainly there is -- there is some ability within an annexation Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 15 of 43 to say as a condition of that that we want this constructed and it needs to be worked out. But I don't come to you tonight with a specific answer as to the legalities of requiring those off site, but we do support them and certainly the Parks Department is asking for it. Borup: Any questions from any Commissioners for staff? Zaremba: I have one -- maybe it's a multiple question, but one subject. On the preliminary plat drawing that I was given, which has a date stamp of June 7th, 2002, under note that says this subdivision is a commercial industrial subdivision within the City of Meridian, I-L zone. Somewhere else it says there will be I-L building setbacks and L-O building setbacks, but nowhere in the notes does it identify to me what is I-L and what is L-O. Should that actually be discoverable from the plat? Hawkins-Clark: Yes. And that could be a -- certainly a condition that we have them add that. Zaremba: Okay. Hawkins-Clark: You're referring to which -- what specific setbacks are in each zone? Zaremba: No. I really wasn't pointing to the setbacks, I'm saying the only place it mentions that there may ever be L-O is where it's designing the setback. There is no mention that there will be L-O on this property at all. Borup: There is no boundary or lot and block -- Zaremba: No. There will be an L-O or -- Hawkins-Clark: Yeah. It should be handled at the first discussing which lots and blocks and show a line. Zaremba: Okay. Because we have had others where they split the zones and we could tell by looking at them which one was which zone. Freckleton: Commissioner Zaremba, I agree with you. I think a line defining that boundary would be a good thing to have. From the comments you will also note that they will need to resubmit legal descriptions for the annexation and zoning, one description for each zone, so that we can define the boundaries by metes and bounds. So that is a requirement as well. Zaremba: Okay. Borup: Yeah. Good point. I think some documents we received show where those boundaries were, but it did not get on the plat. Is the applicant representative prepared to come forward? Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 16 of 43 Unger: Good evening, Mr. Chairman and Commission Members, my name is Bob Unger, I'm with Hubble Engineering. Our address is 701 South Allen St. Suite 201, Meridian, Idaho. And we represent the Falcon Creek, LLC, the applicant on the subdivision, and also SSC on their portion of the project. We appreciate the work the staff has done as far as bringing up to speed as where we are in the process at this point in time in the changes we have made to the preliminary plat. You all have a copy of the June 19 response letter from Ashley Ford. She was supposed to be here this morning, but she took very very ill. Either that or she's scared to death of doing this, I don't know, but I'm here in her place. So I will try to go through this as best I can. Bruce, can we get a little better focus here? Either that or it's my eyes. That's good. Staff has reviewed this and we are asking for the annexation and zoning for an L -- or the limited -- or light industrial zone on Lot 2 and Lot 1 and then the limited to office on the balance of the project and I do apologize, I think originally we had those zones delineated, but we have made so many changes to this preliminary plat over the past two months that I think it just kind of fell off the plans and so we will show that zoning boundary and we will put it as a note on the preliminary plat to clarify that. And this is the area where SSC would like to put their facility. The rest of the lots on the project have not been committed to by anyone at this point in time. We have provided frontage for all the lots. They are via the flags for this lot or flags of this lot. We will have cross-access agreements for all of these lots throughout the project right in through there, so that they can access from across one lot to the next lot if need be. We anticipate this pretty much to fill up in all office space and office use, so there will be parking, etc., that will be used by all throughout the project itself. We put in the -- we showed the cul-de-sac and it complies with city code. We went with a little bit wider sidewalk, the six foot sidewalk, because it is -- you know, this is light industrial proposed uses right in through here and we felt that the additional foot of sidewalk would give pedestrians some extra room, because of the trucks that would be coming in and out from this facility here particularly. Sewer and water services are all available and I think staff doesn't have any issues with that. What I would like to do is to move forward into our comment letter in response to the staff report. I think, you know, we have kind of gone through as far as the annexation and zoning, we feel that it's very appropriate, we have the Meridian wastewater treatment facility directly on the other side of Five Mile Creek, which lends itself very well to this light industrial use that we are looking for here and then the office use becomes a buffer between these industrial uses here and, of course, the treatment facility and residential uses, which are on the south side of Ustick Road and also we have residential use on the east side of Ten Mile. In fact, it works very very well with the office area zoning here, it makes a great buffer. Recently the City Council has approved an amendment to the Comprehensive Plan to allow light industry in the area of the sewage treatment facility and I'm trying to think -- I think we were involved in requesting that amendment. When we looked at -- when I looked at the staff report, staff has really seemed to be concerned about this waste transfer station and the lack of the door and kind of wanted to review that with you very quickly. The reason that we are not proposing a door on the -- on the transfer station building is that, you know, we have oriented it to the north, so that the folks down in this area won't have to see it. In fact, the only ones that will see it will be over here in the wastewater treatment facility and possibly folks who might be using this future path. During the day, even if there were a door, it would be open during the day. I know Brad commented that it would help in keeping the noise and things like that down, but it has to be opened during the day, you Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 17 of 43 know, to be -- you know, to be of any use whatsoever. The only reason there would be any kind of a door on that 75 foot opening would be for security purposes when the facility is closed. But, of course, they are proposing a security fence all the way round their facility. So we are asking not to be required to put that door in. The noise concern that has been brought up -- and I just kind of want to touch on this as we go through the process. There is proposed extensive landscaping on the south side of the facility for the purpose of -- Bruce, can you throw that up there for me? Freckleton: Which one? Unger: I'll give you the transfer station -- and I don't see it on -- Freckleton: Site plan? Unger: Yeah. That's great. Thank you. This is the landscaping and berming to help cut down on any noise transmission that may come from the facility. The facility itself, the compactor, is enclosed in a concrete encasement to help keep the noise down, but also is part of the requirements for keeping any kind of debris, etc., from getting out of that area and things are compacted in there. It's very very quiet. It's an electric motor, so any -- the noise coming from that facility is going to be very very minimum. I would say not any more so than the noise you get from the sewage treatment facility right across the creek. Very very minimal. I know people tend to -- when they think about compacting trash, et cetera, et cetera, you think about the garbage trucks you see out here collecting commercial garbage and stuff and the trucks are just making all this loud noise and crank, crank, crank. That's all from the diesel engines that are cranking those -- the hydraulics of those trucks. That's most of the noise you hear. This is an electric motor. You're not going to hear this big huge motor roaring. And so that's -- you know, the noise is very very minimal. In addition, the distance from this facility to the nearest residential home -- residential home, other than the one that's on the property today, the nearest one is over 800 feet from where this structure would be and the subdivision which is on the south side of Ustick Road, Inglewood Estates, is over 900 feet. That's three football field lengths from this facility right here. So as far as any noise disturbance, et cetera, from this facility to the residential area, I think it's going to be almost inaudible. And I have covered the full landscaping. You also have to understand that they are talking about this structure right here not going in before five years would be the soonest they would be looking at putting one of these facilities in here and it could be longer than that. So this landscaping is going to mature very very nicely over the next five years and also the -- hopefully, the office section of the development, hopefully, will also develop, will have structures between Lot No. 2 and the residents to the south of Ustick Road. So, you know, we do have plenty of time for a lot of things to happen out there to really keep any impact -- adverse impact, if any, from affecting the residents in the area. We have been asked by staff to discuss our fencing plan. We plan on fencing the entire area with a security fence. We will be holding that back from the property line, so that -- but we have our landscaping and everything to really -- to really be used as more of a visual barrier and I understand you can't put slats in the fence, but we need to have a secure chain link fence. So my thoughts are we put a fence and landscaping on the outside of the fence and you get both, because the landscaping will be maintained and irrigated and I think you can end up with both Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 18 of 43 without having to go with some sort of a cedar fence or vinyl fence or something like that, because that does not provide security for these people and they really need the security. So we are trying to integrate the fencing with some extensive landscaping that will provide what the city is looking for. Staff has asked that the landscaping still continue all the way around the property, which takes it clear out over to here and back over. The area -- the west half of this lot they don't plan on doing any development on whatsoever, any expansion on whatsoever for a minimum of five years and we are probably looking more like ten to 15 years before they do any expansion and, of course, any expansion on that lot they have agreed to go to the conditional use process, if needed, and a review by staff. So they are not opposed to it, but at this point in time trying to landscape -- it would almost double the amount of landscaping that we are proposing right here right now. So we are asking for a little bit of a break on that, knowing well that when the time comes they will have to do the balance of the landscaping out there. Borup: Bob, how will that property be maintained, the unused portion of the -- Unger: The unused portion they will have to keep it mowed down, you know, cut down, et cetera. Somebody made a comment to put horses on that. I don't think that works, but I think they will keep it mowed down and you can probably talk to Steve a little bit more on that when he gets up here in a few minutes. Okay. Item seven where staff was asking for an environmental impact assessment on this property and as staff commented, they are required -- this facility will be required to get permits and approval from DEQ and locally CDH, Central District Health, and DEQ's requirements and guidelines for a facility such as this transfer station will meet or exceed any environmental impact study or assessment that is done as a standard report nowadays. We are not discharging anything into the creek. There is no discharging into the creek. Any and all drainage from this entire facility has to go into a sand and grease trap and filters out all the sand, all the pollutants, et cetera, and then those, when that clean water goes into a seepage and filtration bed within the -- within the facility itself. So there really -- we don't see a necessity here for any kind of environmental impact assessment in that we don't feel that the operation of this facility is going to adversely affect the environment in this area. In fact, I think it's going to be probably an improvement over some of the things that are going on currently. And certainly, you know, the sewage treatment facility on the other side of the creek to the north, you know, they are regulated by DEQ just like we are and, you know, I think that DEQ does a fabulous job. In fact, more recently they have become more stringent on their guidelines for storm drainage and et cetera, where they used to not review that at all and now they do review all plans for storm drains and they have some pretty steep requirements. In the recommendation on the annexation and zoning, the hours of operation were to be limited from 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday. That's -- you know, that's very good. But we do have some commercial trucks that -- trucks that do commercial pick ups, they do them very early in the morning and they leave the facility at 5:00 a.m. If we could put some sort of an exception in there with, you know, an exception for departing commercial trucks, then we would be fine with that. There is just -- you know, they have to get out early to do the commercial pick ups, because, you know, if you get out there during the day you get an awful lot of traffic, a lot of people parking in front of the dumpsters and they can't get to them. So they need Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 19 of 43 to get out early in the morning to get those. So we would ask for that change, which pretty well leaves me to the discussion on the pathways that parks is asking for. Bruce, could I have the plat back up, please. And I did -- I talked to Brad this afternoon and indicated to him that I was hoping that maybe we could get some sort of a legal opinion as to the requirement for us to provide paths on the property we don't own. Okay. Nine Mile drain is right here. We have got Five Mile Creek that runs right along through here. This line right here, it has the two dashes in it, the broken up line right here, it goes all the way around, the center is Ustick, the center line is Ten Mile, goes around this piece, because that's Idaho Power. That is our boundary, that is our property, and it's been that way for a few years. The land from the center of Five Mile Creek and the land from the center of Nine Mile Drain were deeded to the federal government, Bureau of Reclamation, who ultimately quitclaimed or fee simple title to Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District. Anyway you look at it, we don't own the land and our question is does the city have a legal basis to require us to build paths on property that we do not own and that was a question I had asked Brad and he was going to try to get together with legal and get us an answer on that. This is not a residential subdivision. In a residential subdivision paths like this are an amenity and a lot of developers will -- you know, will say, you know, that's to my advantage to do that, because, you know, I have got all these people that are going to live there and use the path. That's just another amenity. This is not a residential development. We are proposing light industrial here and limited office in here. The developer is -- he is opposed to building something on somebody else's property and he's opposed to the additional expense, particularly, of ten foot wide and your parks department is requesting a ten foot wide paved path, plus ten feet of landscaping on both sides of the path. That's extension. I mean we are already looking at doing extensive landscaping along here as it is as these properties develop, you know, your conditional use is going to require that they do extensive landscaping along here also. That's an awfully large burden to put on this developer. I mean I understand the city would like to see that, but the path along here, that's in the Comp Plan, that's anticipated, and it's supposed to go down through here and I believe it was a requirement of this development. I was out there today. There is no path over here yet. Hopefully they are going to build it one of these days, you know, and I think it's a great amenity for the city. The path along here wasn't identified by any document that was in parks and recs. It doesn't extend here. There is no path along the Nine Mile Drainage on the south side of Ustick through that development. Now I have -- the developer and I have discussed this and here is king of the way we look at it and we will leave it with you folks this way: If the city has a legal stand where they feel they can legally require the developer to do it, he will do it. But, if not, then we hope to be released from that requirement. And that's only fair. So I think that fairly well concludes what we wanted to go over with you folks. You know, as far as the path on those ditches or creeks, I do realize and know that the city has some sort of an agreement with the Nampa-Meridian Irrigation Board to put paths along the canals and the ditches, et cetera. I understand that. But this was -- you know, I spoke with John Hansen today on that and John explained it to me, plans would have to be submitted to their board six months ahead of time, they have to be approved, et cetera, et cetera, and certain agreements for liability and whatever the case. So we do understand that and, you know, certainly we will abide by whatever the law requires. I stand for any questions you might have. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 20 of 43 Borup: Any questions from any of the Commissioners? I think one of the things that maybe happened in the past on some of those amenities is -- and maybe -- did we have any other input on the pathways? I know sometime in the past some of those things -- there may not be a strong legal basis, but sometimes that's part of what helps the project to be approved or annexed and I think maybe that's something we look at in annexation to have -- Wollen: Mr. Chairman, I have not adequately reviewed this to give an answer tonight. I did have a couple of concerns with the pathway just when it was brought up right now and that is lighting and police access, just to bring that before the Commission, but I will certainly get an answer to the Commission on this subject as soon as possible. Unger: If I could? Borup: Yes. Unger: Just a quick comment on that, you know. We will kind of close out here a little bit. We would like a decision from this Commission this evening, be it good, be it bad, be it whatever conditions you want to put on it, we need to move forward. I don't know if you're aware or not, SSC's facility burned the other night, their maintenance shop, et cetera, so time is of the essence, so we would like to move forward as quickly as possible and certainly we have drug this thing out long enough and we will work with you as much as we possibly can, within, you know, certain limitations, but we would like some sort of action from this Commission this evening. Borup: Mr. Unger, has there been any discussion perhaps just doing the pathway on Nine Mile, just with a turn around and maybe not doing Five Mile, at least at this time? Unger: There hasn't. Vice-versa, you know, the one on Five Mile is one that is shown. Borup: That's why I brought that up. That's the one that's in the Comp Plan. Unger: That certainly is a compromise. Borup: Any discussion from staff on that at all? I mean it's just going down there and looping around. It's not like both pathways go to different locations. Hawkins-Clark: Right. Chairman Borup, I think our main issue has been that the Five Mile is -- was a requirement of Bridge Tower Subdivision to the -- on the east side of Ten Mile Road. Borup: That's why I mentioned just doing Five Mile. Hawkins-Clark: You did say Nine Mile. That was the confusion. Borup: Did I say that backwards? I apologize. I meant Five Mile. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 21 of 43 Hawkins-Clark: Okay. Yes. That's what is in the Comprehensive Plan. In terms of the planning department, that's certainly a priority of the two. Borup: Okay. Hawkins-Clark: I do not believe there has been discussion about just one -- the Parks Department memo does ask for both. But, you're right, that on the south side of Ustick Road I -- it would need to be investigated. I'm not sure that there is adequate easement width to continue the pathway through the existing Inglewood Subdivision. Borup: And that's what I was wondering if, you know, doing a pathway to nowhere, it doesn't accomplish what we are trying to do. I would really like to convey to my grandchildren to be able to walk clear across this city on pathways, I think would be fantastic. But that also doesn't accomplish anything to have little stretches that don't go anywhere either. Shreeve: Of course that's the process is ultimately over time connecting them, but it might be a stretch before -- Borup: Right. We are going to have a lot of that, but if there is not enough right of way for the one where these two both go to the same place, I don't know that it accomplishes -- Shreeve: My question is the ten foot. That seems awfully excessive. I would agree with that. Is that the normal park standard? Ten feet? Borup: Yeah. I think we talked about that before. It's a lot, but it definitely would be used by -- Hawkins-Clark: Commissioner Shreeve, I believe the other issue is vehicular access for the Parks Department for maintenance purposes and for the landscaping adjacent to the path. But the parks comprehensive plan does have a ten foot standard for the multi-use pathways. There are others that are certainly narrower. Borup: Okay. Anything else? Did you say that Mr. Sedlacek has some -- Unger: Thank you. Borup: Come up, then. Sedlacek: Mr. Chairman, Members of the Council, my name is Steve Sedlacek, I'm the business manager for Sanitary Services, 722 West Franklin is our location. Our current location. I wanted to just hit on a couple three of the issues in Ashley Ford's reply to the staff report. Bob's talked about -- has gone through that already. I just wanted to hit three topics and then I will sit down or take your questions. The first one is regarding the doors. If I could get you -- could you show those transfer station photos that were on the Power Point? There are transfer stations with doors and there is transfer stations without doors. They are typically installed for security reasons, as Bob said. We can Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 22 of 43 look at a couple of them here. This one -- okay. This facility -- well, both of the facilities are -- these pictures were taken in Canby, Oregon. This is a transfer facility. Just to the right here -- the picture is chopped off. This portion of this building is a recycling center and then over here is a maintenance facility for their collection vehicles. So they have a maintenance shop and a recycling center and a transfer station all in one large building and to protect their tools and other materials in there that have value, they put doors on this building. The trucks would back into this door and dump on the floor here, it's pushed into a compactor hopper right about at this level and then a trailer backs down this chute and when the brick of garbage is ready to be extruded, it extrudes into the trailer here. If you enlarge this picture you can see some litter here in the trough on both side. We took this photo because this is an example, obviously, of the type of landscaping that we are suggesting, also with the fences on the inside where you can't see it and we want a visual barrier between us and homeowners and anybody else. We don't want to be seen by people. We are not a business that attracts -- you know, people don't flock to see us. Okay. The unfortunate thing about this picture is you do see an accumulation of material here. They are accumulating waste for recycling purposes at this facility and we are not going to be allowed to do that, so just for clarification purposes. The next one. This facility is in Latah County in Moscow. It is 100 by 100, approximately. It might be -- I don't know. It might by 80 this way by 120 this way. There is no doors on it. I guess I'd ask you to look at all the litter out here. There isn't any. And Bob said when -- if we put doors in the building, that's -- we can do that. It's physically possible. But when there is material on the floor and there is a large pile of waste here that's just been dumped -- I don't know if you can enlarge that photo -- and there is a truck right here that's dumping waste, it's a homeowner that's come in and dumped stuff from his yard. The wind was probably blowing 20 miles an hour across the front of this building. Typically you will get some swirling wind in this area. You know, obviously, you will. But with only one side open you're not getting wind that's swirling through and causing all sorts of problems. Right here is the -- this is the brooming attachment for the front end loader that operates in the building. The back side of this building is right here. You can see there is an exhaust fan missing. There is no litter in this area. Typically when the -- well, when the waste comes in on our trucks, it's already been compacted into a 25 feet cubic yard square and when you dump it, it pretty much stays in a square. It's not loose stuff that's going all over the place. Okay. What they do in this facility is -- the tipping floor is at this elevation and this is the tipping floor here from the other side. They push the waste into an open semi truck trailer behind this sliding fence. Here is the trailer. There is no tractor attached to it and you have scales on the axles in here and so when they load that -- when it gets full they pull it out and put an empty one in there. There is no compactor at this facility. One thing you will notice about these facilities is there is typically a lot of topographic change. That would be great. I would love to buy a piece of property that had some elevation to it. The one -- this one we are proposing has -- is flat as a pancake. So what that -- that's going to change our building elevation a little bit and that's why a compactor is excellent for us. We can't -- it's very difficult for us to have to lift the garbage up into the trailer and dump it in, creating litter and other problems. That's why we are proposing to use the compactor. I will go to the next one. This is Boise county. Just one other point on that Latah county one. That building is about ten or eleven years old. This building is probably a year old. The transfer trailer is down here. Again, you can see the topography top to bottom. People come in here and they dump. This one has doors. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 23 of 43 There is no fencing around the site. The Payette River runs right through here. I think if you had a pretty good arm on you, you could probably throw a rock from this building into the Payette River. It's on the old Payette Highway between Horseshoe Bend and Payette. One interesting point here, it's a very small building, there is not much waste generated in Boise county. A garbage truck was just dumped. The truck was leaving when we came and you can see the waste has come out pretty close to the door here. This facility is too small. As a matter of fact, when the roll-up doors are up, the truck, when it comes in, backs in, it can't open the tailgate. So it's poorly designed. The tipping floor is not large enough and that's why -- you know, the width of this building is probably 25 feet by -- now this right here is -- well, two doors, plus a little bit more. That's probably 25 feet, probably, too, would be my guess and we are proposing 100 feet by 100 feet. The trucks that dump in our facility will be inside the building. We have some cross-sections to show where the catch drains would be, but we'll get to that in a minute. I want to go to the next slide. Wasn't there another -- no? I had some photos of Gem county, which is up at Jackass Gulch between -- just outside of Emmett. They use just a little bit different system there on the compactor. They have a door on theirs. Again, it's an unfenced, uncontrolled site. You could walk right up to it and do whatever you wanted there. I guess those didn't -- oh, there it is. Okay. That's Jackass Gulch. As you notice here, there isn't as much topographic change. It's a very shallow -- the tipping floor is here and then the container is just a little bit lower, so they are actually lifting those waste containers with a front-end loader. You actually enter the building on this side here. This is a little office. And Gem County -- the people in Gem county, somebody might -- you know, there isn't very much waste generated there, so it's a much smaller building, much like Boise county. Anyway, we did a tour of the area and these were some of the buildings. They are always tan. I don't know why. I just wanted the people to understand what this is. I'm not going to -- you know, I just wanted people to see what we were planning to do and get some better real life picture of what we are trying to do here. So, anyway, the building -- the doors for us are a maintenance problem. If we put bollards in doors and in front, people are going to have to back through them, they are going to get hit, the door rails are going to get sheered off, it's doable, but I don't -- if you're thinking that you want doors on this to prevent noise and prevent litter, they will be up at all times when there is material in the building and when the material is -- at the end of the day when the material is all pushed into the compactor and the floor is swept, then when there is no noise and no litter we will shut the door and go home. So to me it doesn't make any sense. But that's my -- that's my view point. The other point I wanted to talk about was noise. I contacted Fred Cahoun who runs the Canby disposal site, that was the first slide that we looked at. He has a compactor at the building. His is contained within a concrete trough. The building exterior goes outside of the compactor, so any noise comes up into the building. You can hear the compactor in the building. There is no doubt about it. The hydraulic pump is going to whine a little bit. Again we are 800 feet from the nearest home and, frankly, the road noise from Ustick and Ten Mile to the homeowners is going to be much higher than anything we can generate from the compactor. But that's my research, if you will, from talking to other people that have done this. Understand, you know, we would build this thing in the future. We don't know -- technology will change. We don't have a model number picked out or, you know, the type of compactor picked out. There is many different varieties of them. So, like I said, that's my comment on noise. The last thing I wanted to talk about real quickly was in the staff report there was a requirement for an Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 24 of 43 environmental impact assessment. I'm not sure what that means to staff. To me an environmental assessment and an environmental impact statement are typically required on federal projects or state projects where the state has an environmental policy act. The purpose of the act is to prevent public money from being used from -- like if you want to build a dam or a roadway through a canyon, you have to do these statements and impact analyses to determined that you're not doing it through an indian burial ground, you're not disturbing wetlands, those sorts of things. This project has no public money involved. This is our company's money building it, so I'm not sure what -- if we hired an archeologist to determine if there was an indian burial ground here, we could do that. Is that what the city wants to do? Is that what they did with the wastewater treatment plant, I guess, when they expanded? I don't know. I don't know if the city has an ordinance that requires this or -- I guess I'm a little bit stumped as to where the -- I just saw the staff report, you know, in the last two days. The requirements that we have to meet if we were to build a facility, we have to comply all federal standards, which includes RECLA, CRCLA, COSCA, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, we have to comply with OSHA, obviously, and all of our trucks and men have to comply with all DOT standards. So we are an exceptionally, heavily regulated business. You know, we could do an environmental impact statement. It won't increase the number of laws that apply to us, because they all apply to us right now. Also last time, two months ago when we had a hearing, Commission Zaremba you weren't here, but we went through the state requirements and I have a summary of that I could hand out. They are very extensive, you know, talking about flood planes and design requirements and it goes on and on. There is a Conditional Use Permit required from DEQ that the Health District administered that they did an inspection on that. So I guess I'm searching a little bit for the necessity for this environmental impact study when I don't even know what it is at this point. I guess that's all I really have. Commissioner Borup, you had a comment or a question about maintenance of the lot. Our intention of not landscaping the entire lot was, frankly, to save money. We are a city contractor and we will expand into that area with time. The timing of it depends on how quickly you approve subdivisions, probably. We are seeing a lot of larger subdivisions come on board. That area will be used for container storage where we will put 30 yard containers or three yard containers for commercial customers or totter carts for residential customers. We are just going to need a lot of -- we need a big parking lot to park all of our stuff. To service the city we have a lot of equipment. And the trigger for, again, the transfer station is will the county keep the landfill open or will they close it? Now in the newspaper recently we have read that they are going to keep it open. That's great. If that's true, I don't need to building this facility. Unfortunately, two of the county commissioners didn't win reelection, so what will the next commission think? I don't know. I know my contract is longer than the landfill -- life of the landfill. I have got about a 16 year contract. There is probably eight years left at the landfill. How big will the city get and those kinds of questions are ones I have to answer to meet my obligation to the city and I just want to have the tools to do my job. Now as far as landscaping, if the city is concerned about landscaping this other area, you know, we have talked about we can post a bond to do that if it is a financial issue. A letter of credit, that's fine. I don't have a problem with that. Frankly, the city controls all of our funds, so if you tell us to do something, we better do it. So we are in kind of a unique situation in that regard. Are there any -- I guess that's all I have got. If there are any questions. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 25 of 43 Borup: Any questions from the Commissioners? Zaremba: I do have one. The typical truck fills out -- fills up in how much time? How many times would they return to this in one day? Sedlacek: A residential truck would return twice a day. Typically now they are going twice to the landfill now. The waste collection business is seasonal. In the winter there is no grass clippings, those kinds of things, maybe you do one load. In the summer and the spring right now, which are the heaviest times, two or three loads a day. So we have got four residential trucks. A roll-off truck typically hauls six boxes a day. We are hauling 15 to 20 boxes a day. Each lot is a load, is a trip, and you take it from St. Luke's or Winco, whatever, and take it to the landfill and bring it back and refill it. Now the commercial trucks that were mentioned, now they do leave earlier, because they start their routes, you know, at 6:00. We are talking two trucks. This isn't a mass exodus of school buses as was the concern prior early in the morning. Borup: So just to clarify that, it's two trucks -- Sedlacek: Two commercial trucks right now. Borup: And 5:00 a.m. is what you're requesting for those? Sedlacek: Right. Borup: Or a little after? Sedlacek: Or a little after? Borup: Well, you said they would need to be there by 6:00. Sedlacek: Well, yeah, typically they come in and hit the road about 5:00 and they start dumping bins about 6:00. They leave the site at 5:00. They have to drive a ways to get to where ever their first stop is and they are not always on time. Sometimes they sleep in a little bit, but, anyway -- and, of course, as the city doubles in five years -- if the city doubles in five years, I think it's a reasonable assumption our fleet will double and we won't have two commercial trucks, we will have four, but I guess I would wonder how many cars are going to be at Ustick and Ten Mile every day. Are our four trucks going to adversely impact the neighborhood, I guess. Maybe yes, maybe no. I can tell you that the vehicle estimation was done as if we had built the transfer station on the site and we used the truck counts from the Latah county site per year and it was submitted to ACHD and a traffic study, which I believe shows that the road will need to be improved. Everybody knows that, but ACHD, I believe, approved the project; is that right? Borup: Back to maybe just a clarification on Commissioner Zaremba's question on -- the trucks leave and all their trips are to the landfill and then at the end of the day they are back? Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 26 of 43 Sedlacek: Yes. Yes. If there are no transfer facilities, the trucks leave in the morning and there is no one there, basically, other than three or four us -- well, we have our mechanics that are working on maybe something and then at 3:00 -- or from noon to say 4:00 the trucks start rolling back in. They are out and when they are full they go to the landfill. Now the transfer station -- Zaremba: Do the numbers for me again. Sedlacek: Okay. Zaremba: I think I added up four residential trucks, two commercial trucks, and how many roll-offs? Sedlacek: It depends on the load. Two or three trucks recycling -- I'm sorry. Two to three roll-off trucks and two recycling trucks. That's about 14, 17 -- have to do the math. Zaremba: Roughly about 17 and we are talking a potential in five years from now that could double? Sedlacek: Yes. Zaremba: And that each making two to three trips. Sedlacek: Yes. Zaremba: If you have the transfer station. Sedlacek: Yes. Zaremba: That was my question. Sedlacek: Okay. Borup: Anyone else? Thank you, Steve. Okay. I'd like to open up the Public Hearing at this time. We have had five people sign up, but we really -- what, of course, we are interested in is information on the new plat and new information that we received, something in addition to what we have heard testimony on before, especially I'd like to start at this time -- I guess we don't have anybody -- okay. You need to come up here to the microphone. Brown: I am Jeff Brown, I live in Candlelight Subdivision, 3057 West Pebble Stone. My problem is that we keep hearing from these guys that we can trust them and then we keep hearing from what they won't do and so when you tell them that they can have light industrial zoning, that takes away our right to a Conditional Use Permit. So they are saying to us that we are not -- we are not going to have trash. We are not going to be noisy. That hydraulic pump isn't going to be noisy. We don't need doors. We are taking away the one acre park, because you really wanted five. You can trust us, though, because we are great. So we don't need CUP's on this thing. We are saying that we do. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 27 of 43 We are saying that these people aren't necessarily our friends and we are saying that these people can't necessary be trusted. So we are saying if we give them light industrial, then you're taking away our right and your right to CUPs. I think it's a bad idea. Borup: Thank you. Anyone else? Come forward. Hochhalter: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to address the Commission. My name is John Hochhalter. I live at 2717 West Whitestone Court in Meridian. That's in Stone Meadows Subdivision. I have been a resident there for eight years. I'm assuming that the gentleman behind me and also you folks would have a copy of a memorandum from David McKinnon and Bruce Freckleton, dated June 10th, concerning this project. I don't know if you got -- I don't know how it works, so I don't know if you have time to review it or what, but I would like to cover just a little bit of this, it would be instructive to my neighbors and to all those concerned. Borup: Sir, you want to read to us all the paperwork that we have already read? Is that what you're saying? Hochhalter: No. No. Borup: Okay. Hochhalter: No. Just little sections here and there that I wanted to comment on. Borup: Okay. You can do that all you want in the three minutes. Hochhalter: Okay. First, aside from this, I'd like to make note that the gentleman behind us showed us pictures of existing waste transfer stations and they all look to me to be in outlying areas away from any residential city area, so I do appreciate them providing those photographs for us. On page one of said document the applicant hopes that the current Commission and Council will not require a Conditional Use Permit for the SSC uses, because the use is a permitted use in an industrial light zone. So I'm here to speak totally against an industrial light zone in this area, because it states that those uses are permitted. So if you give them an industrial light, we just may as well sign it off to having that transfer station there. To page four of said document, the land use chapter of the Comprehensive Plan, page 24, offers the following policies that will support the requested I-O zoning. Going down to the bottom of the page. The following policies raise questions concerning the requested I-L zoning. 3.4. Industrial uses adjacent to residential areas should not create noise, odor, air pollution and visual pollution greater than levels normally associated with surrounding residential structures and the gentlemen behind me I think are mistaken when they tried to think that we believe there would be no additional noise or air pollution or visual pollution above that of a residential area. They are incorrect on that point. Page five, number E. Will the proposed use be designed, constructed, operated, maintained to be harmonious and appropriate in appearance with existing or intended character of the general vicinity and as such will not change the central character of the same area. The uses -- the answer is -- from the Commission -- or whoever these folks are, the use proposed by the Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 28 of 43 applicant will change the existing rural residential character of the general vicinity. Okay. Go on to page six. Designation -- staff recognizes the agriculture rural designation of the subject property is inadequate in light of the growth of Meridian in this area, but that does not, you know, give us the right to have some people walk in here and destroy our property values and cause increased noise and traffic and so forth. Staff is uneasy with a waste transfer station that is essentially a three-sided 100-by-100 building and agrees with the opening, but the ability to close the door and secure the building from winds and animals is a major concern. Okay. I have neighbors -- I don't know if we have them in the audience with us tonight, a Janet Wilder. Is Janet here? I called you on the phone today. Can I use your name? Is that all right? Okay. Janet has gone to the expense and effort of going down to Twin Falls, as well as some other areas, visiting some transfer stations down there located in industrial -- Borup: Janet has signed up to testify, too. Hochhalter: What's that? Borup: Janet has already signed up to testify. Hochhalter: Wonderful. Okay. Borup: Unless you want him to give your testimony for you. Hochhalter: No. Borup: Okay. Hochhalter: She would do a better job than I will, so -- will not -- let's see. Will the area be served adequately -- no. I'm sorry. Point H on page seven. Will not excess conditional requirements of public cost for public facilities and services and will not be detrimental to the economic welfare of the community. I question that, in that certainly economic welfare in the community I believe would be tied into taxes collected -- as property values drop, taxes collected will also drop. Will proposed uses not involve uses, activities, processes, materials, equipment and conditions and operations that will be detrimental to any persons, property, or the general welfare by reason of excessive production, traffic, noise, smoke, fumes, or odors and the answer from the Council -- or the Commission here, Planning and Zoning people was the proposed uses will bring in more noise, traffic, and smoke into the area from increases in employee and work related vehicles, odors from garbage trucks, odor and possible debris from the waste transfer station and noise from motor vehicle service bays. Point J. Will the area be such as to not create interference with traffic on surrounding public streets? Staff finds that the proposed uses will affect traffic on the surrounding streets. The increased flow of vehicles and large commercial vehicles entering and exiting the property will increase additional -- will create additional traffic that does not currently exist at this time. Borup: You're kind of over your time, but what we are interested in would be your comments, not the staff comments. We have read them. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 29 of 43 Hochhalter: Yeah. I just -- and, again, I was here to educate my friends here. What I propose is that they not be granted an industrial light zoning in this area because of the aforementioned concerns of your own planner and senior engineering tech. I did have one question for -- is it Mr. Wollen? Wollen: Yes. Hochhalter: Yes. I'm sure there is -- my friends behind me and myself were concerned about what procedures or recourses legally do we have as homeowners to go about finding legal actions to block the proposed I-L classification and so forth? Can you give us any help on that? Wollen: Well, I wouldn't feel comfortable giving you legal advise on that. Hochhalter: Okay. I will make note here in talking with my friend Janet Wilder that she can tell you again that she has been in contact with a lawyer from the Sierra Club that does pro bono work and we are quite interested to see what that might bring in the future for us, but appreciate your time. Thank you. Shreeve: I have one comment as far as the process. We have spent many many days last summer going through the Comprehensive Plan looking at all aspects of the city zoning. Nothing was ever discussed about this area. I think that's been mentioned in the past that nobody here showed up. So the Public Hearings were advertised and the whole shooting match. Hochhalter: Right. Shreeve: The City Council has been now reviewing that for, what, several months, I believe. And, of course, I don't know what's gone on in that realm, but I know it's been mentioned in the past, you know, certainly contacting City Council. But those have been what have been and I guess the City Council has now approved it, is that correct, though? Hawkins-Clark: What's that? Shreeve: The City Council -- Hawkins-Clark: The Comprehensive Plan of the City of Meridian was approved on June 4th by the City Council. Hochhalter: And that -- Hawkins-Clark: That lays out the basic land use designations throughout the entire 49 square mile area. Hochhalter: Right. So are we still under question as to whether or not this property is going to be industrial light or not? Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 30 of 43 Hawkins-Clark: Yes. Hochhalter: And that's under question -- Hawkins-Clark: This is a separate process. The actual zoning is what we are doing now. Hochhalter: Okay. Great. Right. That's what I thought. Hawkins-Clark: Okay. Shreeve: Okay. Hochhalter: Well, in comment that you like -- there was a few comments rumbling from the background as you were talking, but, you know, we are all very busy in our lives and sometimes we just don't catch onto things until they are further along in the process, but that does not negate the fact that we are taxpayers here, we are paying salaries for people present in this room and -- Borup: We are volunteers. Hochhalter: How about over here? Hawkins-Clark: Yes. Hochhalter: I got you. What you need to ask yourselves, okay, would you gentlemen or any of you like this -- do any of you live in this area out here that we are talking about that's going to be impacted? Or can you make comment about that? You probably can't. Okay. The fact is put this in your back yard and then let's hear from you. But just to let you know, it doesn't matter who came in when, the Public Hearing about it, this isn't going away and we will take -- I will personally be involved in any effort legally or otherwise to stop this project, so I appreciate your time. Thank you. Zaremba: Just a comment. I think most of us try and treat every project that comes before us as if it were in our own back yards. I know I think with every project that happens. Borup: Do we have anyone else? Crane: My name is Charles Crane. I live at 3610 West Ustick Road. I'm the neighbor on Ustick Road -- on the north side of Ustick Road and my property is right across Nine Mile Creek from the development. I have got a lot say. I'll try to keep it to three minutes. I recently discovered this flood insurance map that shows flood zones. I'm not sure exactly what the AE, X means, but it shows this property being in the flood zone -- Zaremba: Excuse me, sir. Did you have an extra one that you would hand to our staff to project? Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 31 of 43 Crane: Yeah. So this is an insurance map and I'm not sure exactly how the legal rules are on flood zones go, but it was my understanding that a waste treatment -- waste transfer station is not recommended or maybe even forbidden in a flood zone and this shows that property being in the flood zone of the Five Mile Creek and the Nine Mile Creek. So the containment of oil, waste, possible hazardous chemicals on this site and if it floods I don't think the little berms and trees are going to contain that matter at the site and that's one of the issues that I was concerned with. Another issue is the argument of not in my backyard. Normally that doesn't apply, but I wanted you to consider that we already have in our backyard the entire city sewer and we feel that we contribute to the city by putting up with that, by having that in our backyard, but we don't believe that it would be fair to increase that burden on us. It would be a better spot for this to be out maybe south of the interstate, get some different sloping lands that would accommodate their building better, away from houses and residences. I feel like I'm dealing with two entities. I have gone out of my way to meet with the Falcon Creek developers and sanitation people. I get a different feeling for both groups. I met with Steve and the other owner of Sanitation Services and we walked over the property and we talked about landscaping and berms and on the north side of the property is a stand of older large trees and we talked about a possibility of those providing a little park area for their employees to meet and people walking along the Five Mile path that could stop and rest in the shade and I thought things were going pretty well, that we might have some compromises, but this latest map, again, I see no indication of that. The one acre park is gone, but there is nothing to replace it and now Falcon Creek is saying they want to have no part of the community by participating in a pathway system. So the Comprehensive Plan was amended to say that the city may consider industrial next to the waste treatment -- or the sewage sanitation sewer. I believe the city has done that. I think this has been going on since last year in October, November, and the city Commissioners and the Planning and Zoning Department have all listened very carefully to this. I think at this time we should put an end to this and say, no, that this is the wrong place for this project and developers have gone about this the wrong way. This is a residential area and they have not worked with the residents in that area well enough to build any trust with us, that I think this should be put an end to and if they want to come back under the new Comprehensive Plan, they should apply again with more community interaction. I'm not very organized on those four pages, just things that -- those are a number of issues that I would like to be addressed. If this is going to be put in without the Conditional Use Permit where these issues would be addressed, then these issues should be properly addressed during an annexation. These things should all be detailed in the development agreement, the same as they would be in a conditional use. So if we can continue that I think you're looking at a very long process. Thank you. Borup: Thank you. Any questions? Did we have anyone else? Janet Wilder, do you still want to come up? Wilder: My name is Janet Wilder and I live at 3340 North Ten Mile Road and I have some questions and then some comments. The comments I have are that I, too, was interested in what a waste transfer station looks like, so I looked for a city that might be comparable to Meridian. Twin Falls was the only one I could find close enough that I could go to. So I did take a trip down to Twin Falls and looked at their waste transfer Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 32 of 43 station. I found it clear out on the south end of Twin Falls in a very industrial area. I mean there is nothing else there but industrial. It was -- in back of it was total open ground. There was nothing there. But in front of it and on the street beside it were -- was industrial. So that was -- and it was a pretty big building. It was 4:00 o'clock in the afternoon when I was down there and it still was noisy. I don't know what was going on inside of it, but you could hear all of this clanking and noise coming from the building. Then we went -- we didn't stop in Jerome, because it said it was eight miles out of town, so I figured it wasn't right downtown Jerome. We did go to the Wendell one, because it was not that far off the interstate and it was out kind of between Gooding and Wendell out -- but the only thing around it was across the street was a dump for old cars and it was quite unorganized, I guess. It had dumps of old -- it looked like some shrubbery and pallets and such dumped up in a big berm out front. There was a big pile of appliances on one side. It looked like just rubbish pushed up on another berm and there was no fence around it. Anyway, that's what we saw down there. And I went to see their Twin Falls one mainly. But my observation from that trip and the pictures that we just saw here was that they are out away from houses, even these pictures didn't show houses around. So I think it needs to be in a different area than right in the middle of the subdivisions. Now I had some questions about the hours. I think 6:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. in subdivisions -- or in a residential neighborhood is excessive. All of these transfer stations down in the east end of the state, the latest they are open is 7:00 or 8:00, I believe, and they -- most of them open like 7:00 or 8:00 in the morning. I have those, but just in my recollection that was it. Let's see. How many trips a day would the semis be taking out of there? That hasn't been addressed. And then on the issue of the immediately adjacent definition, I was at the City Council meeting when that was discussed and it was really discussed -- they finally ended up approving it simply as a means to -- of discussion, opening the door to discussion on that and it wasn't -- it was stated very clearly that this was not giving that property industrial designation, it was just a means to discuss what might go there and then the other thing, they have just said it tonight, but the strip in between them and the wastewater treatment plant doesn't belong to them, so wouldn't that be immediately adjacent? The part that they say belongs to Nampa-Meridian Irrigation would be immediately adjacent, wouldn't it, rather than this other property? What is immediately adjacent is what I'm asking, I guess. Let's see. Another issue that -- Borup: Did you want that answered or are you just kind of -- Wilder: I would like to have an answer, yes. Borup: I don't know if I can answer any better than anyone else, but from past applications we have had and past discussions, the waterways basically have the same definition as a street as far as being -- Wilder: But they just said this was unique. This was not the same as every other piece of property. Borup: Right. Well, no, we have -- most of the properties have canals through them or drain ditches or whatever. Those weren't figured in in the boundaries, anymore than the road was, so a road would have the same -- Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 33 of 43 Wilder: Does Nampa-Meridian own that, though, on all of it? Borup: No. And at one of the last meetings we were at it was the same situation. Wilder: I think it's an issue, myself. Borup: Okay. Wilder: I could be wrong. Borup: So you're saying you think the City Council intended for the light industrial area just to be over the drain ditch? Wilder: No. I think it's just something that has come up, you know, that's kind of a gray area, maybe. What their intention was, I took it to be, was that it gave a way to discuss the possibility. Borup: Right. It didn't say it was automatic zoning, but those in that definition could apply. Wilder: And it's not that I'm getting feedback, you know, it's that there is so many that's already zoned industrial or it's designated industrial or they have the right to have industrial there and that wasn't the intention, I don't think. Let's see. How tall is the building? That's another question I had. Do you have that? I don't think that was ever mentioned. Borup: It was at the last meeting. I don't know if anyone here remembers, but that was discussed. Wilder: I have never heard how tall it was. Sedlacek: You mean the height of the office or the -- Wilder: No. The waste transfer station. Sedlacek: We have reduced it down so far it's hard to -- Wilder: They are pretty tall, from what I saw. They are taller than two story houses or something. So another question I have is is there a city ordinance that covers waste transfer stations? Hawkins-Clark: No. Wilder: I think that's something that should be in place before we automatically authorize one to be here, in my own opinion. And -- oh, another issue is at one of the previous meetings they said you could put a fence up around anything and the noise is going to go up over it and further out. So we'd see the same thing here, wouldn't we? If Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 34 of 43 they are going to put a berm around it, the noise is going to go up and further out. So it's not going to get rid of it. The noise will still be there. That all I have. Oh, I do have a letter from a neighbor -- potential neighbor. Borup: You can give that to the clerk. Wilder: He had to leave, so he wanted me to give you that. Borup: Okay. Hennings: Good evening. My name is Cheryl Hennings and I live at 2696 North Morello and I represent the Parkwood Meadows Subdivision, which is just south of Candlelight. I come this evening -- oh. Commissioners and Chairman, I come this evening to appeal to each of you to consider the following: Your zone decision for the corner property at Ten Mile and Ustick will affect the entire City of Meridian for a very very long long time. Perfectly drawn plans on paper with penciled in landscaping give us the lovely ideal of a proposed project. Newly constructed buildings freshly painted, grass, shrubs, and trees do look beautiful. We all know, however, that years pass -- that years do pass by and the newest of anything, if not properly maintained and taken care of, becomes a community's worst nightmare. I do trust the people who are currently in charge of our sanitation, but, unfortunately, our future can't insure that the same amount of care that would be given today would be the same in the future. We fully understand the needs of Meridian and her growth crisis. The waste transfer station is a recognizable necessity. However, we are asking you, please, because of location, to make a decision that everyone now and in the future can live with. There simply has to be a continued search for land to house the station, sanitation, and recycling. We have, from the very beginning, felt that industrial was not appropriate for this land and we still do. Personal experience of individuals living near or next to and visitation to similar facilities is the truth that overshadows developer promises. We truly need a way to control the development of this parcel and the only way that can happen is with a mixed use or less designation of this property and we would like to have the choice of knowing that large truck traffic will not become a constant in our neighborhoods. We want the piece of mind knowing that each and every request for this area will have to meet the conditions of use. More than anything, we desire for you to have truly heard what we have been saying. We have respect for many concerns surrounding this difficult and painful intrusion into our lives. This is not a part of Meridian that should be sacrificed to industrial developers. The one thing that remains a constant in all of this is that this corner property is completely surrounded by residential neighbors. My understanding is that these neighborhoods have the protection of Meridian's own ordinance prohibiting pollution of any kind, debris, noise, odor, sight and traffic. I will state again, that buffering for the wastewater treatment plant needs to be from the inside out, not the other way around. It has been so convenient for us to attach the waste transfer station to something that is already in existence. It only adds insult to injury. Provide more protection around the wastewater treatment plant and those developments that occur outside of that have a fighting chance. This is a very valuable and vulnerable piece of property in the middle of Meridian neighborhoods. Please protect it and us from improper development. Thank you. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 35 of 43 Borup: Thank you. Any questions? Whited: My name is Dan Whited, I live at 2864 West Joust Street in Candlelight Subdivision and I'm not on the list, but I would like to bring up some things that I have heard tonight that cause me concern. They stated earlier that all the L-O or light occupancy lots will require Conditional Use Permit. If something that is light occupancy is going to require a Conditional Use Permit, why doesn't something that is going to, obviously, have so much impact on our area not require it? That doesn't make common sense. The noise that was addressed, they addressed a couple issues that are actually the same issue and that was the noise inside the building. The noise that we are concerned about is the traffic and according to the calculations and the numbers that have been brought up, that's 60 to 100 trips a day on a one-lane road -- or two-lane road and very little in and out of that area and so that concerns me very much, not only for the safety of all the people that want to use the pathway that we are talking about, if you have trucks going in and out of there every day coming all directions, how safe is it going to be to access that pathway and those parks that we would like to see developed there. Since we don't have specifics on this building, we are talking about future things. Well, we can't regulate future things, but if they want an unconditional use permitted. If you have an unconditional use permit, we have lost any kind of control that you might have over that area. That doesn't make sense, since we don't even know what's going to happen five years down the road. Since we don't know how big the city will get and we don't know what kind of impact we are talking about to think about selling it, so we really don't know. So how can we issue an unconditional use permit for something that we have no idea about? The last thing I'd like to say is that as citizens, if you grant an unconditional use permit to that area, we have no recourse in the future to do anything about it. So they could put up whatever they want. We all know what drives business, profit drives business, and to grant them open license to put whatever they want, no matter what they say here tonight or in the past, is irresponsible, I think, and I don't think that you guys want the city to develop that way in that area. It's very nice right now and we'd like to keep it that way. Thank you very much. Borup: Thank you. I might just mention one thing -- and at least from past testimony -- come on up, sir, while -- the discussion was that was a place for a development agreement; is that correct, Brad? Hawkins-Clark: I'm sorry. Could you repeat that? Borup: I think there was previous testimony or discussion that there would be a development agreement in place. Hawkins-Clark: One would be required. Yes. Borup: Right. And that would specify the controls on what would go in. So it isn't completely open to anything that wants to go in. It would just be limited to those things that were specified at the public hearings. Yes, sir. Go ahead. Beckwith: I'm Ken Beckwith, I live at 2866 West Parkstone Street in Candlelight Subdivision. I just really have a couple questions. Can people dump off their trash or Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 36 of 43 their building materials at the transfer station now or later? And I'd really like to know what happens to the recyclables that they pick up now and what will happen when the transfer station is built and like most of the people here tonight, I am opposed to them granting permission without a Conditional Use Permit. Thank you. Borup: Thank you. Anyone else? Cody: My name is Charles Cody. I live at 3691 West Niemann Drive and I am here this evening to talk about this collection station. I have witnessed several of these collection stations, one of them which was located in Martinez, California. BFI trucks was coming to that waste station -- these were ten wheel trucks and the majority of them was caught by the highway patrol, they were overloaded. Some of these trucks had to change their routes and some had to be equipped with extra axles to carry the extra weight and the Martinez Collection was approximately three miles from the road and no residents around. This road was littered with garbage and in the evening when the gates was closed people showed up with their garbage and they'd just toss it off to the side of the road. None of these people who work for these collection stations go out in the evening pick this garbage up, it just lays there. There was refrigerators, old couches, and such and such. Building offices, as far as being built in this location, as they claim they want to, I don't know of any office collection station is going to attract office people. It just doesn't make sense. The other thing I'd like to say that these -- during these hours if this is opened up to the public to bring in local garbage in the back of a pickup or trailer, this particular station backed up for almost a quarter of a mile for traffic, because they weighing trucks and collecting going in to dump. If they are going to do that, the entrance for this traffic is only a two lane road. I find that that would be necessary for the city to consider. As far as a parkway, a pathway, I certainly sure wouldn't want to be walking on a pathway, it would be like walking between a commode and a urinal. It just doesn't make sense. And as far as your mote and fence, I don't think that the scavenger birds and the rodents, the snails and all of these is going to be blocked by any mote or a fence and this collection station is going to be so quiet -- everybody one I have seen, all the workers are running around with ear muffs. Are we going to have to wear ear muffs in our back yards when we have a barbecue? I don't know. Any questions? Borup: Thank you. Do we have anyone else? George: John George. I live at 3070 North Turnberry Way. That's in the Dakota Ridge Subdivision. I'm also a member of the homeowners association board. Commissioners, thank you for letting me speak. One of the factors -- safety factors that was brought up in the past, I want to bring it to a point that Ponderosa Elementary School, which will open up this September, which is west adjacent from Ten Mile and Ustick area, loaded busses full of school children, your proposed walkways, children walking home from school, with the amount of trucks coming in and out of the facility that's being proposed, definitely a safety factor. I'd ask you to consider that. Studies being done, especially noise studies on the compactor that's going to be installed, have we taken a look at those? Do we have evidence of those on the decibel levels. One other point I need to bring up is the smell. Nobody's really addressed that, have we? Yes, we do live by the sewer plant, but it's very controlled, also to the fact that we do have very high north winds blowing in that area, so the smell is a great concern of 89 homes of the Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 37 of 43 subdivision that I live in, as well as the surrounding areas. Safety, noise, smell, those are our biggest concerns. We do not want this facility in our area. We are asking you to reconsider the rezoning. Thank you. Borup: Do we have anyone else? Bob, do you have some final comments? Unger: Again, for the record, Bob Unger. In response -- I tried to take notes here and I'll try to address everybody's questions and issues as best we can. I believe the first gentleman who spoke, just in response here, granted, this particular zone that we are looking at for the transfer station, that would not -- does not require a CUP, but all the information that we have submitted in conjunction with the transfer station is the same information that would be required to be submitted to the CUP. Staff even acknowledges that in our discussions with them. So even though it's not formally a Conditional Use Permit that we were requesting, certainly, we are providing all the same Information and you are going to do the same review that you normally do under a CUP, which includes conditions of approval, which are going to be incorporated into our subdivision conditions of approval and a development agreement, which, in my experience, development agreements are more binding than conditions of approval for a subdivision, because those -- the conditions of approval and conditions that are in the development agreement, those are signed and acknowledged by the developer and the city and they are recorded, they are a very very legal document. So I think we are going through the CUP process right now. I want to address the gentleman's questions on the flood plane. He had a map that showed the flood zone there as being zone AE and a zone X. This piece of property does lie within a flood plane. It is within the 500 year flood plane. This particular facility is permitted within a 500 year flood plane. Certainly you can't put it in a flood zone, things like that. We checked with the county engineer who enforces the FEMA regulations for flood planes and flood zones throughout the county and he's clarified that with us, so that we do know that this zone is a 500 year zone. So, as such, we -- this type of facility is permitted. Mrs. Wilder -- and I really applaud her effort to go out there and try to look at some facilities. I really do. I had seen some facilities, as it turns out, before I even knew about this project, but there isn't going to be any rubbish allowed -- permitted outside of this building. It's just not going to happen. They are going to be so well -- so tightly regulated by DEQ -- and it's also the owner's pride in his facility, he's not going to allow rubbish outside of any building whatsoever. And this is not solely a transfer station either. I mean, you know, it's also their maintenance facility and things like that, so as far as the regulations -- trying to shorten up the time of -- their time of being open and things, that is very very tough. Semi trips -- there was a question on semi trips. At their current load there is three semi trips per day. When we talk about land uses and zoning designations -- she was asking a question about, you know, that the property is owned by Nampa-Meridian Irrigation District. So is this zone particularly adjacent to the wastewater treatment facility? When you talk about zoning designations, you know, those zones can be adjacent, it doesn't have to be the actual land itself, zoning designation and the boundaries of the zoning designations. I think they went through the building height. And the city doesn't have any regulations for wastewater treatment -- transfer stations. On the noise, she asked about fences and how noise will bounce up and over the top of fences, et cetera. That's why you come in with the landscape and the berms and trees, because the trees truly do break up the noise -- any kind of noise that may come out of this facility. Trees are Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 38 of 43 excellent for breaking up noise. Solid walls is where you have problems where the noise just hits the wall, bounces up, goes a mile down the road. They have experienced that in California on the freeways down there and they are now experiencing it over here in Boise on the freeway now. So -- but trees and those kind of things really break up any kind of noise transference. As far as maintenance of the -- continued future maintenance of the whole project, there are specific conditions of approval that we have to continue to maintain the landscaping, et cetera, for the life of the project and if we don't, the city can come down on us and enforce those regulations. So, you know, there will be continued maintenance of the entire project. The traffic. Ustick Road and Ten Mile Roads are arterial roads. They are designated and designed to have a whole lot more traffic than they have right now. Ultimately, Ten Mile Road is going to be, you know, at least a three lane road and then 23 years down the road it may be five lanes. I mean that's just the way traffic is throughout -- everywhere. Okay. It's designated as arterial. It's designated to have an extensive number of -- amount of traffic. There are arterials that get traffic out of town into town, whatever the case. We have gone through the Ada County Highway District, we have gotten their approval for this project and the facilities and they had no problems whatsoever with that. To Mr. Hennings comments that -- or Mrs. Hennings, that the property is surrounded by residential use, well, it's not. We have got the wastewater treatment facility to the north and to the west is not residential -- I mean it's an agricultural use more so at this point in time, you know. So I just want to clarify that we are not -- it's not surrounded by residential use. And, once again, the limited office between the residential and the light industrial is the standard type things that -- it's good land use planning. It's done throughout the entire country, you know, for this type of buffers, so that residential doesn't butt right up against the commercial or industrial uses. Let's see. You know, once again, we go through the conditions of approval, we are totally going to be regulated by the city regulations and by DEQ. As far as drop-offs, yes, they have acknowledged that there will be drop-offs. When this transfer station actually goes, when and if it does, there will be drop-offs and there will be recycling that -- they do recycling now that goes to Western Recycling. Mr. Cody. I -- one question. Where in California is this place? Cody: Martinez, California. Contra Costa County. Unger: That's all I wanted to know. Okay. It's three miles out of town, you know, you get way of town, people are going to dump garbage out at the front of the gate. They just -- I've seen it myself. Okay. But we are going to looking at right here in the city limits -- we are going to be located within the city limits. There is going to be city police, county sheriff, and they are going to have access -- Mr. Chairman, could you help me out here. Borup: We need -- Unger: I didn't laugh when they talked and I would appreciate -- Borup: Sir, you're out of order here. (Simultaneous comments from the audience.) Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 39 of 43 Borup: He's answering to each of you. He gets three minutes per person that was up here if we want to do it that way. Read the regulations. Read the instructions. We will close this meeting right now and vote on it if we don't have some order here. Go ahead. Unger: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The bottom line, you know, we understand that this type of development is typically opposed by residential development, by folks who live in the area. We feel we have a good buffer, we have a Comprehensive Plan that designates this area for this type of -- this type of zoning. We feel that the facility can be a very good facility, it can be very neighbor friendly, I think the landscaping and things like that certainly show that. The buffering is good land use planning. We feel that it's a good project and would ask for your approval this evening. We are certainly open to any and all appropriate conditions of approval that you feel you need to put on the project to ease any concerns that you might have to possibly ease some of the concerns that the neighbors brought up this evening. Certainly we want to be a good neighbor and we want to be a good business with the city, we have in the past, we want to continue that. And my client with the subdivision itself certainly -- the subdivision by itself is a good subdivision, the zoning that we are asking for is something that seems very appropriate, so we do ask for your approval this evening. Borup: One just -- one thing I don't know if you did address and that was the aspect of closing hours. Do you have any comment on that. That 10:00 o'clock may be a little late. Bob, we need you to state that or -- we need to get you on the -- Unger: 8:00 o'clock would probably work. The land fill closes at 7:00, if we could get the trucks back, 8:00 would probably work. Borup: Okay. Any other questions for Mr. Unger? Thank you. Okay. Commissioners, are we ready for some discussion or -- we have been doing this since October. Zaremba: Does staff have any further comment? Borup: Right. Any comments from staff? Nothing? Hawkins-Clark: I don't know if the question of the building height was addressed. The proposed height is 30 feet to the pitch and 24 to the eaves. Borup: Twenty-four to the eaves? Hawkins-Clark: Right. Shreeve: Mr. Chairman, as I understand waste facilities, which I'm no expert in, but -- let me reword that. As I understand EPA and those regulatory agencies, there certainly will be some criteria placed on this facility by EPA and DEQ -- I don't know fully and conclusively what those conditions are, but I do know that they will be certainly watched very closely relating to the garbage and everything like that. However, if, in fact, there are odors and other nuisances, you know, I guess worst case they would have to put in air scrubbers or who knows what. You know, then put in a door, you know, whatever the case may be to certainly rectify those problems as they may or may not arise. But on Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 40 of 43 the same token, I think the public equally has spoke as well. There is some concerns out there, legitimate or not, I guess would only be whether the facility is built and if we could erase it or not, but certainly I think the public has spoken, so, admittedly, I'm torn, I don't know quite which way to go. I think the presentation of the developer and Steve have been very impressive, particularly in days past, as they handed out EPA booklets and certainly have done their homework on that side, but then there have been others that have looked at this facility and have done their homework. So I will just make that as a passing comment for now and see what the other Commissioners have to say. Mathes: Well, I'm torn also. I just don't know which way I would go. Zaremba: All right. I'll jump in. I am not the least bit torn. I don't think our ordinance supports this being in that location. There is a very clear definition of what a light industrial use is and whether or not the building would meet that, the trucks certainly don't. They create all the problems that light industrial zone is supposed to prevent. The applicant is trying to claim that this is a permitted use in an I-L zone when, in fact, the ordinance is unclear. There is a very clear definition of what limited industrial is. The only place where you can find out whether there are -- something is permitted or conditional is in a different chapter where there is a chart. There is no light industrial zone on that chart. The only thing on that chart is industrial and all of those uses are heavy industrial and, in fact, in heavy industrial this would be a permitted use. In the other chapter where light industrial is defined, there is no definition of either normal industrial or heavy industrial. I am not comfortable shoehorning this application into a light industrial zone when the City Council has said, for the stake of discussion or otherwise, they want this to be limited light industrial. This is by no way meets my definition -- we have a definition of light industrial, we don't have a clarification on what they mean by limited, but it certainly doesn't mean to expand it into a hundred heavy trucks coming and going from this facility. Now I realize that this facility needs to be somewhere and they provide a service to our city. I, for the sake of suggestion, if Meridian School District is going to find a larger facility, their current facility might be -- it's in an industrial zone, it's in a regular industrial area, I agree with some of the people as a suggestion that this is a thing that should be surrounded by heavy industrial. As for the application for annexation and zoning, the definition that we have for light industrial I can see would be appropriate in that location, as a Commission that we have limited office I can see being appropriate in that location. I do not see in any way that this is light industrial. I don't think it belongs there and that's my choice -- my choice on this is either to continue it until we clarify our own ordinance or to deny it today. Frankly, I would be very happy with the light industrial zone and the limited office zone in that location, but this application is not light industrial. Borup: Probably the only comment I have got is it's probably time to let City Council take a look at this. Zaremba: And clarify the ordinance. You know, I use Sanitary Service as well, they come and pick up my garbage and I'm glad they do and they do need to be helped somewhere, but I don't think this is the location. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 41 of 43 Borup: The City Council are the ones that put that definition on there, maybe they need to decide what they meant by it. Zaremba: Define what limited means. And, in the meantime, I believe sometime next month we are going to be clarifying our ordinance, are we not? We will be making corrections. Mathes: What does the MUWTP mean again? Hawkins-Clark: Mixed use wastewater treatment plant. Mathes: It's its own -- Hawkins-Clark: It's its own designation. Right. It is just a Comprehensive Plan designation, which is not a zoning designation. That's needs to be made clear. But it is its own separate mix used classification, which is addressing just the land immediately around the wastewater treatment plant. Mathes: So that was put on that one chart also or not? Hawkins-Clark: No. Mathes: Okay. Hawkins-Clark: No. It's not a zone. It will just be -- it will be defined in the new Comprehensive Plan. Mathes: Okay. Shreeve: Mr. Chairman, I move that we close the Public Hearing. I don't think we have done that. Zaremba: I second that. Borup: Motion and second to close the Public Hearing. All in favor? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: I might just mention just for the record, we did receive written testimony from Dana Berquist. All the Commissioners have had an opportunity to read his comments. Shreeve: Mr. Chairman, I would agree with Mr. Zaremba and, therefore, based on that I'm prepared to make a motion. Borup: Okay. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 42 of 43 Shreeve: Mr. Chairman, I would recommend denial of AZ 01-025, request for annexation and zoning of 34.60 acres from RUT to I-L zones proposed Utility Subdivision by Falcon Creek, LLC. Zaremba: Second. Borup: Motion and second. Any discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? The ayes have it. MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: That was on -- Shreeve: The annexation. Borup: -- the annexation. Shreeve: And that was intentional, Mr. Chairman. I know the -- it's possible to have approved that, but I think we need to keep our leverage with annexation open in the future for any other future development. Mr. Chairman, I would recommend denial of PP 02-017, request for preliminary plat approval of seven building lots and one other lot 34.6 acres in a propose I-L zone for proposed Utility Subdivision by Falcon Creek, LLC. Zaremba: Second. Borup: Motion and second. Any discussion? All in favor? Any opposed? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: Thank you. Thank you, everyone for being here today. I guess we are ready for one more motion. Is there anything that needs to be brought up by any Commissioners? Next week we have two Commissioners that will be at the next meeting. Shreeve: I did not realize that we would be postponing that to the second week. Borup: We did that because of the holiday, because of the Fourth, and felt that the 5th would be a conflict with -- why was that changed? On why the Fourth -- why the date was changed? Because everybody on the staff was out -- Zaremba: The first Thursday is the Fourth. Borup: Oh, I'm sorry. I was one day off. Zaremba: The first Thursday is the Fourth and it was moved to the second -- Borup: Anything else we need to bring up? Okay. Let's have a motion. Meridian Planning & Zoning Meeting June 20, 2002 Page 43 of 43 Zaremba: I move we adjourn the meeting. Mathes: I'll second. Borup: Motion and second to adjourn the meeting. All in favor? MOTION CARRIED: THREE AYES, ONE ABSENT. Borup: Adjourned at 9:46. MEETING ADJOURNED AT 9:46 P.M. (TAPE ON FILE OF THESE PROCEEDINGS.) APPROVED ____________________________ _____|_____|_____ KEITH BORUP - CHAIRMAN DATE APPROVED _________________________________ SHARON SMITH, DEPUTY CITY CLERK