Committee of the Whole Meeting

Committee of the Whole Cedar Falls Council Chambers August 2, 2021 The Committee of the Whole met at City Hall at 6:05 p.m. on August 2, 2021, with the following Committee persons in attendance: Mayor Robert Green and Councilmembers Frank Darrah, Susan deBuhr, Kelly Dunn, Simon Harding, Daryl Kruse, Mark Miller and Dave Sires. Staff members from all City Departments and members of the community attended in person and teleconferenced in. Mayor Green called the meeting to order and introduced the only item on the agenda, Downtown Zoning Code – Parking Requirements for Private Property. Mayor Green introduced Planning and Community Services Manager Karen Howard. Ms. Howard explained the focus of tonight’s discussion: Parking requirements proposed in the Downtown Zoning Code (parking requirements when new development is proposed and parking located on private property) and not discussing City-owned or public parking lots. Ms. Howard introduced Ms. Mary Madden and Mr. Geoff Ferrell from Ferrell Madden to present by teleconference. Mr. Ferrell provided an overview, including supporting slides, of the intent of the proposed parking requirements and the goal to encourage more development similar to the Main Street parkade area as expressed in the adopted Downtown Vision Plan.. Ms. Madden provided a more detailed overview of the proposed parking requirements; an explanation of the benefits of shared parking with supporting slides; and noted how the recent parking study revealed significant available parking during peak times in private lots. She noted the goal for new development moving forward is to require a small percentage of their parking to be shared when it is not being used by on-site businesses or residential tenants. She noted how requiring parking beyond what is needed drives up residential rents and commercial lease rates, so in a downtown setting a shared parking system reduces costs for everyone and allows land to be used more efficiently for revenue producing uses that also increase the tax base. She also noted how they arrived at the proposed requirements through community input; stakeholder interviews; review of the parking study, on-site observation; and review of shared parking and parking requirements in other communities. Mayor Green opened Council discussion. Mayor Green asked Attorney Rogers if shared parking is added in as a requirement in the City code through the zoning ordinance; if council decides they want to change that would the buildings that applied and developed be grandfathered in? Attorney Rogers stated this would be grandfathered in. Councilmember Kruse asked for clarification of the Viking Pump agreement. Attorney Rogers will provide Councilmembers with documentation of the Viking Pump agreement and include the City’s liability coverage. Councilmember deBuhr expressed parking concerns on the negative impact and more traffic in adjacent neighborhoods. Ms. Howard stated that is not the intention to cause spillover parking, but rather to right size the parking requirements based on the observed parking in the downtown area for residential development so there is enough, but not too much that is then sitting there empty much of the time; there is evidence from the parking study that the current parking requirement of one parking space per bedroom downtown is more than is needed. The observed parking indicate that the current parking requirements may be set too high for Downtown Cedar Falls. Councilmember deBuhr asked for clarification on a ½ parking stall. Ms. Howard explained that the requirement is calculated for the entire project and then any fraction is rounded to the nearest whole number. Ms. deBuhr asked about a project with only Ms. Madden reiterated this is a minimum requirement and a developer can always add more parking stalls to ensure their project is successful. Councilmember Kruse expressed concerns regarding residents parking on State Street and disagrees with the ¾ per bedroom requirement. Kruse would prefer to have one stall per bedroom. Councilmember Harding stated that parking downtown is complex and he would not rent from a location that didn’t have adequate parking stalls, but he has not heard any complaints from residents downtown that they do not have adequate parking, but only from commercial businesses and with the new shared parking requirement this will create more parking for commercial customers, so is supportive of the change. Councilmember Sires expressed concerns about the shared parking and requiring existing businesses to share their parking lots. Ms. Howard explained that the new shared parking requirements will only apply to new development or re-development. There being no further discussion, Mayor Green adjourned the meeting at 6:57 p.m. Minutes by Kim Kerr, Administrative Supervisor