Planning Commission

SUMMARY MINUTES Regular Public Meeting Eugene Planning Commission Sloat Room–The Atrium Building–99 West 10th Avenue April 26, 2004 11:30 a.m. PRESENT: Charles Rusch, President; John Lawless, Vice President; Mitzi Colbath, Rick Duncan, Adell McMillan, Jon Belcher, members; Susan Muir, Allen Lowe, Steve Nystrom, Plan- ning and Development Department; Chris Henry, Gary McNeel, Public Works Engineer- ing; Terry Connolly, Eugene Chamber of Commerce; Roxie Cuellar, Home Builders As- sociation; Josh Bruce, Satre Associates; Lauri Segal, 1,000 Friends of Oregon; Paul Conte, Kip Amend, Robert Hitson, guests. ABSENT: Ann Marie Levis, member; Tom Coyle, ex officio member. I. PUBLIC COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS II. APPROVAL OF MINUTES Mr. Duncan, seconded by Mr. Belcher, moved approval of the minutes from the meeting held on November 4, 2003, as written and the minutes of the meetings held on February 23 and March 22, 2004, as amended. The motion passed unanimously, 6:0. III. NODAL PROGRAM IV. OTHER ITEMS FROM COMMISSION AND STAFF A. Subcommittee Reports B. Other Items from Commission and Staff SUMMARY MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 1  MINUTES Regular Public Meeting Eugene Planning Commission Sloat Room–The Atrium Building–99 West 10th Avenue April 26, 2004 11:30 a.m. PRESENT: Charles Rusch, President; John Lawless, Vice President; Mitzi Colbath, Rick Duncan, Adell McMillan, Jon Belcher, members; Kurt Yeiter, Allen Lowe, Steve Nystrom, Plan- ning and Development Department; Chris Henry, Gary McNeel, Public Works Engineer- ing; Terry Connolly, Eugene Chamber of Commerce; Roxie Cuellar, Home Builders As- sociation; Josh Bruce, Satre Associates; Lauri Segal, 1,000 Friends of Oregon; Paul Conte, Kip Amend, Robert Hitson, guests. ABSENT: Ann Marie Levis, member; Tom Coyle, ex officio member. Mr. Rusch called the meeting to order. Mr. Yeiter noted that Ms. Muir and Mr. Coyle were at a national conference. I. PUBLIC COMMENT ON NON-AGENDA ITEMS Roxie Cuellar, 2053 Laura Street, Springfield, spoke on behalf of the Home Builders Association (HBA). She stated that two items up for discussion had caused concern. The first was consideration on whether the urban growth boundary (UGB) expansion should be “master planned” and the second was whether the City should require certain large undeveloped parcels within the UGB to create a master plan before development. She asserted that the land supply was constrained and the builders of the HBA were “desperate” for lots to build on. She added that due to the shortage of buildable lots, the cost of such lots was formidable. She said the HBA was obtaining almost as many building permits in the City of Veneta as it was in the City of Springfield and as third as many as the City of Eugene. She pointed out how much smaller Veneta was than either Springfield or Eugene. She commented that sprawl could happen in two ways: it could come from the City or it could come to the City. She noted that the City of Portland had recognized it needed to add to the UGB in 1996 and was still in the planning phase. She felt complete master planning could add 15 years to the process and would delay the development of more lots by that long. She asserted that land developed in outlying communities such as Creswell and Veneta there would cause a dramatic increase in commuters to Eugene. Mr. Rusch shared his perception, from a walking tour conducted for the Planning Commission, that there was a lot of vacant land in Eugene, some of it close to the center of town. He asked if the HBA had any sort of program to gear itself to more infill. Ms. Cuellar responded that it was more expensive to “do infill.” She alleged that many lots were not for sale or had other encumbrances. She said many land developers come to the HBA office for maps of available land. As time transpired, lots were increasing in expense. She opined that home builders did not have another 15 years to wait for new lots. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 1 Paul Conte, 1461 W. 10th Avenue, read from a statement he submitted in writing. He favored the draft work plan for the nodal program, but felt it did not adequately address vehicle miles traveled (VMT). He suggested the plan include a two to five page explanation of how nodal development would reduce VMT. Robert Hitson, 2105 Washington Street, expressed his frustration at the bureaucracy in the Planning and Development Department (PDD). He described the experience he had with a property he had developed which now, due to code requirements, could not be used. Mr. Belcher asked Mr. Hitson to elaborate. Mr. Hitson replied that the City now wanted a four-hour fire wall in his structure. He had already installed a complete sprinkler system and did not feel this to be necessary. Mr. Belcher explained that land use code was the purview of the Planning Commission. He noted that the City had engaged a consultant and the permit process had been recommended to be streamlined. Mr. Yeiter recommended that Mr. Hitson fill out the public comment form and he would ask the chief building code enforcement staff person to call him. II. APPROVAL OF MINUTES • Minutes of November 4, 2003, February 23 and March 22, 2004. Mr. Rusch offered the following correction to the minutes of February 23: • Page 3, last paragraph: “Mr. Rusch said he the Planning Commission…” Mr. Lawless offered the following correction to the minutes of February 23: • Page 5, paragraph 2: “He noted at the November 17 4, 2003 public hearing, the …” • Page 12, paragraph 3: “Mr. Lawless offered a friendly amendment adding the language ‘as their designing guiding principle’.” Ms. Colbath offered the following correction to the minutes of February 23: • Page 8, paragraph 6: “Ms. Colbath Levis noted designation of all streets as local could be more expensive in the end for the neighbors.” Mr. Belcher offered the following corrections to the minutes of February 23: • Page 9, last paragraph: “Mr. Belcher said the Planning Commission had a responsibility through the classification system to encourage people to drive the streets as they were in- tended designated.” • Page 10, paragraph 5: “Mr. Belcher said he was saddened to only see so few sidewalks imme- diately adjacent by to the school which created a hazard for children.” Mr. Belcher offered the following corrections to the minutes of March 22: • Page 2, paragraph 5: “Mr. Belcher said the a primary issue was that the State-mandated pur- pose of nodal development set unrealistic targets.” • Page 6, paragraph 4: “He emphasized the need to change the community’s perception that the City citizens had antipathy toward public/private partnerships and to help the public realize MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 2  that change was coming and they should take the opportunity to guide it in the right direc- tion.” • Page 8, paragraph 7: “Mr. Belcher encouraged flexibility in working with residents and de- velopers…” • Page 10, paragraph 2: “He pointed to use of land from urban reserves and the requirement that the development be platted to allow eventual denser redevelopment.” Mr. Rusch offered the following correction to the minutes of March 22: • Page 5, last paragraph: “Mr. Lowe replied that the code language could be written with that flexibly flexibility…” Mr. Duncan moved to approve the minutes of the Planning Commission meeting held on November 4, 2003, as written and the minutes of the meetings held on February 23 and March 22, 2004, as amended. Mr. Belcher provided the second. The motion passed unanimously, 6:0. III. NODAL PROGRAM Mr. Lowe stated that the discussion on “fixing” the nodal program had been going on for some time. He highlighted the Agenda Item Summary entitled Nodal Development Implementation: Draft Two Year Work Program. He said the same discussions were coming up and listed them, as follows: • A need to rename the program; • A need to distinguish between types of nodes; • A transition to a smart-growth discussion with the community; • A need for new tools and a different, more flexible process to address variable conditions; • A need to understand how the smart-growth agenda was embedded in Eugene’s growth man- agement study policies and how smart growth could be marketed positively; • The need for the community to understand the incremental nature of development improve- ments; • The need to reveal the City policies and practices that were at odds with achieving smart growth and nodal development implementation goals. Ms. Colbath asked if staff could take a moment to address the question of VMT. Mr. Lowe replied that it would be dealt with in the process, but he did not have any real information on it at this time. The State was looking at the validity of the VMT target. He noted that the Chase Gardens node had proven to increase VMT. He said no Oregon cities had been able to meet the VMT target, but the Transportation Planning Rule VMT targets are still in effect. Mr. Henry said the Transportation Planning rule had established a target for VMT reduction. He stated that the Eugene/Springfield metropolitan area had adopted alternative performance measures, however there was a different assumption based on nodal development. This assumption was that nodal develop- ment would reduce the number of automobile trips by 10 percent. Mr. Yeiter related that the Land Conservation and Development Commission had been asked to form a subcommittee to revisit the rules and the subcommittee would be charged with reviewing and reevaluat- ing what the rules were, how they played out, and whether or not they were realistic at State and local MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 3 levels. Mr. Lowe explained that this was a way to look at a long-term effort to implement nodal development, but first there needed to be adjustments made and tools put into place so that it could be effectively implemented over a long period of time. He said that this represented a beginning of an eivnrornmental transformation process that could take many years to play out. Mr. Rusch called it an “amazing piece of work,” broad and far-reaching. He thought the City Council had asked for a narrow program. He asked how staff and the commission were going to address this with the council. Mr. Lowe responded that the council had not forbidden the commission from working on a multi-year work program. He felt the commission was identifying what the community and the commission had discussed as a need. Mr. Belcher asked what the process would be to put it into place. Mr. Lowe explained that staff was seeking the commission’s comments on and acknowledgement of the direction laid out in the work program. He also said that the Council had recently reviewed the Planning Division work program and had determined that nodal development implementation would be the highest priority activity. He suggested that the commission would not need to return to the council for approval of this work program. Mr. Yeiter explained that the intention was to keep the dialogue open with the Planning Commission. He noted that the next joint meeting between the City Council and the Planning Commission was scheduled for the end of the summer. He thought that this discussion should be part of that meeting. Mr. Rusch supported a shift in the language toward smart growth and away from nodal development. Mr. Lowe commented that Eugene was the only City in the State that used nodal development in its planning program, but that many cities around the country used the node concept in their planning programs. Mr. Rusch felt the terminology needed work. Mr. Lowe suggested staff return to the Planning Commission with some options. He said using phrases such as nodal development and smart growth still helped to communicate to the community, until other language was brought into play. He stressed that all that was being created was a tool. Mr. Rusch remarked that there was a discussion in the staff notes that nodal development was too broad a brush. He thought the terms ‘residentially-oriented mixed-use district,’ ‘commercially-oriented mixed- use district,’ and ‘industrial-oriented mixed-use district’ were coming into play to aid in differentiating between different kinds of nodes and not as a tool in the toolkit. Ms. McMillan recalled that the group had a discussion as the Planning Commission and had decided to recommend that all of the districts be nodes. She advocated for having the discussion again, noting that the TransPlan referred to such areas as employment-oriented districts. Mr. Yeiter commented that ‘district’ had both a geographic meaning and a tax connotation for the citizens of the area. He felt, for marketing purposes, care should be taken with the nomenclature. Mr. Lowe discussed the “high priority nodes” initiative. He said the City had not made much headway as only three of the eight nodal overlays were acted upon. He related that the staff believes that the right tools were not in place to initiate the rezoning process, particularly those related to public relations, information and marketing. The overlay zone process also lacked the necessary flexibility to allow it to MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 4 be adapted to unique conditions in the various areas. Mr. Belcher noted that the Chambers Street area had presented some challenges. He asked if staff had considered the neighborhood’s feelings about the proposed grant-funded project. Mr. Lowe said the City was attempting to get money from the State and then work with what the neighborhood had said it wanted. He noted the neighborhood had liked some elements of the 1998 draft specific plan but had objected to the overlay zone, because they could not count on density and infill projects being compatible with the neighborhood. He thought the end result would be a general set of commercial and residential standards that, with some tweaking, could be applied to other neighborhoods. Mr. Yeiter commented that during the process the neighborhood had held walking tours and showed staff areas in which high-density residential development worked. Mr. Lawless felt it led to context sensitive design, a methodology by which common ground is identified and adopted into an improvement plan for an area. Mr. Lowe commented that every word said at the commission seemed to open up another discussion. He thought discussing standards versus guidelines and where flexibility could be would lead to a discussion of what would be proposed; would it be a design review process? How much would it cost? He thought painting a picture of something that seemed easier because it was more inclusive was ignoring the layers of complexity. He remained unsure whether the end result would be standards or guidelines. Mr. Lawless felt getting people to buy in and self-select the design process would be a good beginning. Mr. Lowe asked the commission to go over the proposed program elements and provide specific input. In response to a question from Mr. Rusch, Mr. Lowe explained that when the council had not acted on five of the eight nodes, the priority nodes program had effectively died. He said a revised overlay zone should be brought forward and the question applied on whether areas should be picked to apply this idea. Mr. Duncan suggested the commission consider this on a City-wide basis, rather than in regard to a specific area. Mr. Rusch noted that the Friendly Street area had asked to be considered a node, but because it was not on the priority list it had been rejected. He thought that neighborhoods that wanted the nodal designation should be able to have it. Mr. Lowe called attention to Smart Growth Education and Marketing element and underscored the need to put program materials in place and use the money allocated by the City Council to create the docu- ments. He noted that presently it was up to staff to provide presentations to neighborhoods, civic and special interest groups. With materials, citizens could better educate themselves on concepts and general issues. He commented that currently staff was spread thin and was having to make multiple presentations on nodal development in a month. Mr. Belcher said the commission had indicated it wished to look at other communities and how they have managed to succeed. He expressed concern that the draft did not include this idea. Mr. Lowe assured him that much research had been conducted and work in other communities would be considered. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 5 Mr. Lowe stated that he would be speaking with Ms. Levis on structuring the program. Ms. Colbath asked who the marketing would be geared to. She noted that much had been presented already to neighborhood groups, etc. Mr. Lowe said one activity in the work program was to identify key stakeholders. Ms. McMillan asked, regarding Overlay Zone Amendments, if it was a possibility that it would be decided that overlay zones were unnecessary. Mr. Lowe responded that, yes, anything was possible, including abandoning the overlay. He said that, over the next two years, the commission was projected to have a major discussion item related to a nodal development project to consider every three months. Mr. Yeiter said, regarding the overlay zone, that a primary concern was that the zone tried to do too much. He recommended that, at the very least, this needed to be fixed. He thought it possible that other tools could be brought into play rather than an overlay zone. Mr. Belcher left the meeting at 12:50 p.m. due to another commitment. In response to a question from Ms. Colbath, Mr. Lowe said it was difficult to obtain data on programs that did not work because cities were less willing to discuss their failures. Mr. Yeiter commented that, because of the State’s willingness to reevaluate the Transportation Planning Rule, they had pulled together a meeting of all of the metropolitan planning organizations in the State. He related that each had chosen a different path to meet the rule and, from this meeting, it had been ascertained that the City of Eugene had the most tools already adopted to further the process toward meeting the transportation goals. Regarding Potential Nodes Status Report, Mr. Lowe said that it was proposed that affected neighbors be brought to weigh in at a work session on nodal development. He felt they should be asked for their ideas and for what they felt was “doable” in order to get agreement and discussion on the mutual ambitions for a given area. He thought it had been a mistake in the overlay zoning process in treating each area as if they all had MetroPlan designation implications. Mr. Lowe pointed out Attachment B: Excerpts from Summary Description of Potential Nodal Development Areas. He underscored that the information on potential nodes was now outdated. Ms. Colbath asked if the commission would see more analysis on how infra-structure, such as pedestrian and bicycle transit facilities, would affect the way things were being developed. Mr. Lowe replied that a growth management policy addressed this. He stated that, at a policy level, influencing how the capital improvements program was structured was a focus so that the Budget Committee made decisions about how to spend the money based on higher-density mixed-use transit pedestrian oriented development. Mr. Yeiter said, aside from transit, it was development that influenced infrastructure. Mr. Lawless commented that a good portion of it had been planned in Planned Unit Developments (PUD) and were all falling within a rough range of the development goals. He felt the current code was helping achieve development goals incrementally. Mr. Lowe concurred. He noted that through the Crescent Village PUD and overlay zone priority node process, that particular node had been shifted northward. He said a decision had been made de facto, at MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 6 that point, that the City was writing off the two “big box” stores that were in the area, as well as the commercial area surrounding those stores. He explained that such stores were not built to last 100 years and, when redeveloped in some future year, a nodal designation would have required a more specific approach to development. Without the designation, such requirements would not be applied to the development. Regarding Mixed Use Zoning, Mr. Lowe said the City did not have a tool that allowed mixed-use zoning for new development, though many jurisdictions did have such a tool. He thought it would be an incentive to have a zoning district that would allow a developer who wanted to do a mixed-use project to quickly come into a community, make use of that tool, and build. Mr. Yeiter remarked that the lending and market community were not yet comfortable with mixed-use development. Mr. Lowe noted that Mixed Use Zoning and New Tools would be discussions planned for at least one year out, when it was better understood how nodal development would proceed. Mr. Lowe called the New Tools discussion a “grab bag” of things that had come up and questions that had been raised regarding the overall citywide implications of the development. He thought this was aligned with the concerns expressed by Ms. Cuellar at the beginning of the meeting. He said a discussion on the Master Plan and the expansion of the UGB would have to be held and there would be both positive and negative reactions to it. Mr. Rusch asked what the status of the urban reserve was. Mr. Yeiter replied that removal of the urban reserve definition from the MetroPlan and the reserves off the diagram had been part of the periodic review. He said the City Council adopted the changes in the previous week and it was now up to Lane County and the City of Springfield to follow suit. In response to a question from Ms. McMillan, Mr. Yeiter said some land lent itself to UGB expansion better than other land, most notably areas in Santa Clara that already had services. Mr. Lowe hoped that some factors would be identified that would have a widespread application for a general generic kind of strip development. He said there were design issues in such development that did not work for pedestrians. Mr. Duncan thanked staff for sending him the link to the smart growth website. Mr. Rusch thanked staff for a good job. He called the work plan ambitious. IV. OTHER ITEMS FROM COMMISSION AND STAFF A. Subcommittee Reports Ms. McMillan reported that the Historic Review Board (HRB) had held a workshop with a number of proponents of affordable housing, including Richie Weinman of the Neighborhood Development Division. They exchanged ideas on the relationship of historic preservation and affordable housing. She noted that Mr. Duncan had been in attendance. MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 7 Mr. Duncan commented that the changes in government philosophy supported building multi-unit complexes as the paperwork was the same whether one unit or 90 was being developed. Ms. McMillan agreed, adding that the funders for these projects were not used to working with a small number of units. Ms. McMillan noted that the University of Oregon would be moving a lot of houses over the next few years. Mr. Duncan said this raised the question of how to increase density when more footprints for single-family residences were being developed. B. Other Items from the Commission and Staff Mr. Yeiter provided copies of the Public Facility Service Plan for the commission. Mr. Yeiter said he and Ms. Muir had missed the HRB workshop because they were in Salem presenting before the Land Conservation and Development Commission (LCDC) because 1,000 Friends of Oregon had filed a petition against the Eugene/Springfield/Lane County area. He stated that the petition attempted to keep all of the periodic review tasks as mandatory and to try to impose deadlines. He commented that they were in general agreement with the petition. He related that LCDC was complimen- tary of all that had been done and appreciated the complications that the Cities and the County had to do to get things approved and the amount of public outreach the area had to do. He concluded by saying that the area was still expected to complete everything except the Willamette Greenway Report, which was being conducted by Lane Council of Governments (LCOG), and there would be no talk of sanctions before July, 2005. He projected that many of the tasks would be completed by the end of June. Mr. Rusch adjourned the meeting at 1:32 p.m. (Recorded by Ruth Atcherson) m:\2004\planning and development department\planning division\planning commission\pc040426.doc MINUTES – Eugene Planning Commission April 26, 2004 Page 8