PLANNING COMMISSION SPECIAL MEETING
MINUTES OF
MEETING
CALL TO ORDER:
The Chairman called the meeting to order
at 6:30 p.m.
PLANNING COMMISSION MEMBERS
PRESENT:
Don Bergwall, Pete Griffin, Ken Kraus,
John Cunningham, Alan Seymour.
Roger Yoder – absent. 1
vacancy.
OTHERS PRESENT:
Jim
Watkins, Doug Tailford, Phil Roush
ADMINISTRATION COMMENTS:
Mr. Cunningham stated Mr.
Roush was just filling the commission in on the possibility of a planner for the
city being hired. Mr. Roush stated
at the Public Service Committee last night the Mayor did request that City
Council consider hiring a City Planner to be in the City Engineering
Department.
CITIZEN COMMENTS:
None
NEW
BUSINESS:
Approval
of Final Plat
– Adena Point Section 1 Part 1 filed by – located on
Mr.
Roush stated we have received the parkland money and the performance bond. All the engineering plans have been
approved and we would recommend approval of the final plat. One thing you will see is the final plat
in front of you tonight is slightly different. We had asked them to change the location
of the permanent monuments and to spell out one of the street
names.
Mr.
Jim Watkins stated he would just like to thank the commission for allowing this
to be heard at this special meeting.
Mr.
Seymour asked Mr. Roush if there was any new news on the
Mr.
Seymour asked if there have been any conclusions as to whether it will be moving
water or still water in the end.
Mr. Roush stated we are still investigating this issue. Mr. Seymour stated then there is still
the possibility of it being a rural wildlife setting. Mr. Roush stated he can’t rule that
out.
Mr.
Kraus made a motion to approve the final plat for Adena Pointe Section 1 Part
1.
Mr.
Seymour asked if Mr. Roush could confirm that
Mr.
Cunningham Yes Mr. Seymour No-
because of 1107.03 it interferes with the safety of new residences that will go
into Adena Point. It would affect
their quality of life with mosquitoes, snakes and varmints in their
backyard. Mr. Kraus Yes
Mr.
Bergwall he stated
before he votes he would state he is in agreement with Mr. Seymour’s comments as
a whole. I will vote Yes for this phase, but if this gets
pushed into phase 2, it will be time for more detail. Mr. Griffin
Yes
Motion
Passed
Discussion
Items
Mr.
Cunningham stated what we want to do tonight is take a look at our To Do
List. We need to go through the
list and make sure we are clear in defining what we are looking at with each one
of these issues. We should identify
the next few months’ effort that we need to look.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the first item on the list is visioning. We were looking in multiple directions
around the city. First and foremost
was looking south. It seems we are
continuing to develop in that direction.
I am looking from commissioners now as to how you feel where we are at on
this.
Mr.
Kraus stated he does not think as a commission we can do any visioning without
public meetings and citizen input.
He stated if in fact we have a planner coming on board for the second
half of the year that is someone that would be able to with this topic.
Mr.
Cunningham stated he thinks it will take that person a little bit of time to get
up to speed and get familiar with the city.
Mr.
Griffin stated he somewhat disagrees with Mr. Kraus. I don’t think you can finalize anything
without input from the public but I think as a planning commission we can give
it our best shot. We need to take a
proactive prospective and say this is what we think makes sense.
Mr.
Bergwall stated I think both of the comments are right on target. It gets me thinking that there is a
multi step process. I think in
visioning, as a planning commission we need to state what we want to include and
what are the objectives we want to achieve in this visioning
process. Define the areas of
concern in an outline and then have a public forum meeting and get their
input.
Mr.
Cunningham stated he thinks we have a good opportunity in front of us, if we do
get a planner. I think one of the
first things we are going to want to do is to sit down with the planner and talk
about our visioning.
Mr.
Kraus one of the keys is to develop our expectations and we need to break it
down by region.
Mr.
Cunningham stated another item on the list is big box post use management. I know there is some disagreement as to
whether or not it is a role for planning commission or not. It is basically is to say once a
building is vacated what can we put in place to issue some assurances that it
will be maintained or marketed appropriately.
Mr.
Kraus stated this is not a planning issue it is for city council. Mr. Seymour stated city council should
handle the buildings that are already in place, but as new buildings are coming
in something should be addressed.
Mr. Kraus asked if it is a planning issue then or design review. Commission agreed it is design
review.
Mr.
Cunningham stated he believes it is something that can be moved onto the design
review docket.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next item is the
Mr.
Kraus stated there are at least three rezonings on the
list. He stated on the
Mr.
Griffin stated as he recalls there were not any significant issues with the
zoning on this property. Mr.
Seymour stated we also discussed having a unique zoning for government
offices. Mr. Kraus stated he is not
sure he agrees with that.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next issue is managing home owner associations. Mr. Bergwall stated he has a draft on
this topic. He stated that in order
to do this it requires someone in the city to be able to keep track who has a
homeowners association and who are the contacts.
Mr.
Cunningham stated Mrs. Penhorwood is going to get information for us on the
POD’s.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next topic is commercial/industrial subdivision signage
regulations. He stated he thinks
this should also be directed to design review.
Mr.
Griffin stated he is disappointed that Best Buy has gone to BZA to get relief on
the size of their sign. I think it
should be harder for them to get the variances.
Mr.
Cunningham stated he agrees. He
stated he doesn’t know of a commercial or industrial building that has gone up
that hasn’t gone to BZA.
Mr.
Griffin stated he is not sure BZA is in sync with what we are doing.
Mr.
Kraus stated it states in the code that they must prove a hardship and that part
of the code gets ignored. BZA does
not follow the code. On paper they
should deny 90% of the applications.
Mr.
Seymour stated maybe there should be a memo to BZA.
Mr.
Kraus stated Bear Creek stood here and told us that there were going to be all
ground signs for these businesses and they were going to enforce it. Mr. Griffin stated it is Bear Creek that
is going to BZA for the variances.
Mr.
Kraus stated he thinks someone needs to be attending the BZA meetings.
Mr.
Kraus stated back to the subdivision sign issue, Mrs. McCoy came across a
section, 1143.20 (c), and industrial parks. It talks about signage for the
park. The only thing missing is
commercial signage. We just need to
adjust that verbiage a little to apply it to commercial.
Mr.
Seymour stated as a side note, the Movie Gallery did not put on the exterior
that was approved in the plans. Mr.
Griffin asked what we do about that.
Mr. Cunningham asked what recourse we have.
Mr.
Cunningham stated back to the signage, I think I will draft a letter and run it
by the commission, to BZA.
Mr.
Kraus stated the clerks need to do a word search in the code for all references
to Shade Tree Commission and Design Review Board in sections of the code that we
have not sent to city council.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next item is Historic district zoning. Mr. Kraus this is when we received the
letter from Meg Michel. Basically
what she is looking for is in the uptown area to allow a greater percentage of
the lot to be covered to allow for the addition of porches and garages. He stated he believes it would be a new
zoning district that needs to be created.
Mr. Cunningham stated it could be an overlay to the underlying
district. The one thing I am
concerned about is if someone does a minor subdivision.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next item is Mark Reams memo. Mr. Kraus stated it is about the B-R and
O-R districts and what is permitted in these areas and the lot size
requirements. Mr. Cunningham asked
if there has ever been code written to say at the time of zoning of O-R or B-R,
planning commission would make a recommendation as to what type of single family
residential guidelines they must follow.
Mr. Kraus stated to have a flexible district would be difficult. If you are looking at undeveloped
property, I would suggest PUD would be the way to go.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next topic is 1111, mobile homes. He stated we have not really done our
due diligence on this chapter. Mr.
Bergwall stated he did a proposal for change to this chapter. The fire chief wants this change for
safety reasons. Mr. Cunningham
stated he did make contacts and did not get very far. He stated he will get with them again
and try to get more information.
Mr.
Bergwall stated there will be some mobile home owners that will not like what we
will do because we are going to turn the screws on them. However for their
own safety, it will be best.
Mr. Kraus stated we have to be careful that we are dealing with zoning
issues not construction issues.
Mr.
Bergwall stated the issue is building.
Mr. Kraus stated it is not in our jurisdiction.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next item on the list is rezoning of Northwoods. Mr.
Kraus stated he brought this one up because it is zoned O-R but it is all
residential. The people that live
there are clueless that someone can buy a property put in a business and have
signage and all and there is nothing that can be done about it. Commission decided it should be taken
care of right away. Commission
asked that it be put on the June agenda.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the next item is the rezoning of the Bunsold property.
Commission decided they need to rezone it to AR. Commission asked that it be placed on
the June agenda.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the last two items are 1107.09 and .10. They are the 1000 ft. between
intersections and 600 ft. long cul-de-sacs. He asked if Mr. Kraus could get some
recommendations from other cities through the planning
association.
Mr.
Kraus stated a lot of cities are doing away with limitations on cul-de-sacs
completely.
Commission
discussed pros and cons. Decided it
may be something that when the city planner comes on board they can give some
advice.
Mr.
Bergwall asked what Adena Pointe on the R-4 property ended up with as far as
having the garages coming out into an alley. Mr. Kraus stated it is still the same
plan.
Mr.
Seymour stated they last plan we saw showed that the drives would be backing out
right on to
Mr.
Bergwall stated in the code it also talks about the maximum length of
blocks. I think the commission has
been negligent on that. Mr.
Cunningham stated it needs to be added to the to do
list.
Mr.
Cunningham stated this is what he would suggest for the
to do list. Visioning we
will hold off until we get a planner on board then build a strategy from that
point. Big Box post use management
we will ask the new design review board to take a look at and make
recommendations to us. The
Mr.
Kraus asked why they want to send the signage issue to design review when we are
looking at basic requirements. What
they look like is in design review.
Mr.
Cunningham stated we are going to send a letter to BZA. Signage is referenced in the design
review section.
Mr.
Kraus stated as far as putting something in the code that allows commercial park
signs is something that we need to deal with. Right now there is nothing that allows
commercial subdivision signs. We
just need to put something in the code under the sign section. When you get into what it looks like
that is design review.
Mr.
Cunningham stated the commission would keep the signage issue and Mr. Kraus will
bring back a recommendation for language.
Mr.
Cunningham stated as far a prioritizing what is left, Bunsold property is one, Northwood is two, County Home Rd.
rezoning three, Mr. Reams memo (OR, BR zoning)(changes to 1135) four and then
Historic District zoning.
INDIVIDUAL
COMMISSIONER COMMENTS:
Mr.
Cunningham – None
Mr.
Seymour – None
Mr.
Kraus - He stated a couple of weeks ago, he had lunch with Rob Meyers. Sometime in the near future we will
probably be seeing a revised final plat for a couple of sections near the
woods. The lot sizes will be
increased with the possibility of 70’frontages.
Mr.
Bergwall- None
Mr.
Griffin – None
Architectural
Review Board – We did approve two signs.
Mr.
Kraus stated he thinks the commission should look at the zoning as it applies to
Mr.
Kraus stated
Mr.
Griffin stated he would encourage the city to better maintain their
property. Especially the property near the hospital.
Discussion
held on properties that need cleaned up.
Mr.
Cunningham stated 3rd Fridays are coming back this year. Lots of donations have been collected
and we have some big bands coming.
ADJOURNMENT
Chairman
adjourned the meeting.